Here We Go (Again)

Chapter 6: Go, Go Club, Go!

...

Hikaru had entered Haze Junior High School. And even more importantly, he had secured his place as the second ever member of the Haze Go Club. (And then he had dragged Akari to be the third, so that, like, they could actually be an official club or whatever.)

"Akari!" Hikaru shouted immediately upon entering the room. "You can quit the Go Club now! I've found a third member to join us!"

Akari looked up offended from where she had been sitting across the room, setting up the plastic go boards they used for the club. "Shut up, Hikaru! You can't make me leave! And I'm staying because I want to!"

Hikaru just rolled his eyes at her and marched into the room, dragging his hostage behind him.

"This is Mitani!" Hikaru shoved him to the front to present his wayward classmate to both Akari and Tsutsui Kimihiro (the founder of the Haze Go Club).

Mitani scowled at the whole room as he shook Hikaru off of him and defiantly crossed his arms.

"Shindo-kun," Kimihiro looked upon the scene worriedly, from the scowling redhead to the happily-grinning Hikaru, "does Mitani-kun actually want to be here?"

Hikaru opened his mouth, likely to spout off nonsense about Mitani, but Mitani beat him to it,

"He just marched into my usual spot after school one day, and bet me ¥10,000 for a go game." Mitani jabbed his thumb over at Hikaru, and then scowled further. "I lost."

Akari whirled around to Hikaru, wide-eyed in disbelief. "Hikaru! Where did you even get ¥10,000? You don't have any money!"

"That's because I didn't have ¥10,000!" Hikaru replied brightly, looking extra-proud of himself.

Akari and Kimihiro dropped their jaws in disbelief. Mitani glared at Hikaru.

"Well, neither did I," Mitani admitted with a huff.

"Then why did you both bet it?" Akari shouted, looking back and forth between the two of them like they were a rare species of the same stupid. "Against each other? At the same time!"

"I thought I could win," at the same time as, "I knew I would win!"

"Is that why you're here?" Kimihiro exclaimed, looking straight at Mitani as he frowned at Hikaru's smiling face.

"Yep!" said Hikaru. "I told Mitani that he didn't have to pay me the money if he joined the Go Club instead. I'm very charitable and generous."

Mitani snorted at him, but also glanced at Hikaru speculatively. He might have lost the bet, but it was unbelievable that he had lost to someone with a face as dumb as that.

Akari and Kimihiro looked at the both of them with obvious concern.

"Shindo-kun," Kimihiro said, taking off his glasses in order to rub at his eyes, "this is…all very amoral."

"Oh, you mean all of the illegal betting and blackmail that we've just heard about in the past five minutes?" Akari pointed out sarcastically.

"And the cheating!" Hikaru added. Mitani immediately jabbed him with his elbow. "Ow!"

"You cheated?" Akari turned back to him in outrage. "Why would you?"

"What? Of course not, Akari! Mitani was the one cheat—OW!"

Mitani grit his teeth and did not at all look remorseful as Hikaru rubbed at his ribs.

Kimihiro stood there and groaned into his hands.

"Look at it this way, I'm saving Mitani from a life of crime! He can't be out there cheating and betting and getting blackmailed if he's here!"

"Because you've already blackmailed me into being here," Mitani pointed out, practically growling at him.

"Exactly!" Hikaru gave him a thumbs-up. "I'm your hero!"

Before Mitani could leap atop Hikaru and pummel him to death, Kimihiro wisely stepped in to diffuse the situation with logic,

"Well, we beggars can't actually be choosers. We need three guys to participate in the team events."

Mitani looked from Kimihiro, to Hikaru, to Akari (who was obviously a girl), to the rest of the empty room. "That'll be us then?"

"Nah, there's another guy who agreed to play in the tournaments but not come to the club meetings," answered Hikaru. "His name is Kaga. Scary-looking, but good guy. He's the president of the Shogi Club. He'll be playing the first board for our team, since he's better than you and Tsutsui-san."

Mitani just stared at Hikaru for a moment, and then asked flatly, "What?"

"Well, it wouldn't be fair for me to play in a school club tournament, would it?"

Mitani stared at Hikaru for another minute again. "What?"

"Akira doesn't enter amateur tournaments either."

Mitani stared at Hikaru for a third time. "What?"

"Hikaru's just too good," Akari mercifully answered, with the kind of tired sigh you developed after having long come to terms with something undeniable but which you still struggled against anyway. "It really wouldn't be fair for him to be on the team. He could destroy another team easily on his own."

Hikaru turned to her and beamed, like some kind of opposite sunflower.

Akari looked at him with suspicion. "I still don't understand how you got so good at go, Hikaru."

"I told you already! I have a go tutor! His name is Sai! He's the greatest go player to have ever lived!"

"That doesn't explain how suddenly you learned this game, Hikaru!"

"I don't tell you everything! I could have been learning in secret, Akari!"

"And I've never even met this Touya Akira. How do I know he's real?"

"You don't know all of my friends, Akari!" Hikaru pointed his finger at her accusingly. "Also, how come you always want to meet Akira but not Sai!"

Akari just rolled her eyes at him. "Because Sai definitely doesn't exist."

"He does so exist!"

Akari snorted, and with sarcasm nearly dripping from her voice, "Oh, the greatest go player of all time just decided to take you—Shindo Hikaru—as his one and only student."

Hikaru crossed his arms and scowled at her. At this, Akari looked victorious.

"Whatever!" Hikaru threw his hands into the air, indicating that the old argument was done (until the next time). "Let's just start playing already!"

Mitani watched as the three regular members of the Haze Go Club set up three cheap plastic gobans. Akari had smiled in a very friendly and welcoming manner as she had shown him which one was his. (However, she also strongly indicated that she was only doing this for him this one time because it was his first meeting. She would not be setting up for him again. After all, it didn't take a genius to figure it out.)

As Mitani hesitantly eased into his seat—he and Akari and Kimihiro all in a row—Hikaru had hopped onto his seat on the other side of them with a beaming smile.

"Alright, first move's all yours," Hikaru announced, graciously waving his hand towards them to begin.

Mitani realized quickly that Hikaru would be playing all three of them at the same time. He would learn later that that was how the club meetings started—with a teaching game from Hikaru for all of them, and then with a game against each other (when it had just been Akari and Kimihiro) before they adjourned for the day.

He also quickly realized that the other two were below his skill level. And since Mitani had always been at his best playing speed go—while Akari and Kimihiro were still deciding their opening moves—Mitani set down his first stone and glared defiantly at Hikaru.

"Oh ho!" Hikaru exclaimed, startling everyone. "A game of speed go, Mitani? Akari, Tsutsui-san, you've never seen this before, but it just means we play go really fast!"

Hikaru was still placing stones as he told them this. Mitani looked murderously at him. And he played even faster when Hikaru effortlessly continued playing the other games with barely a blink despite the high-speed game he was engaged in.

At the end of the game, Mitani was left staring at Hikaru in disbelief. And Hikaru grinned at him while still playing his separate games with Akari and Kimihiro.

"Did you just play a speed go teaching game against me?" Mitani demanded.

"We're all playing teaching games right now!" Hikaru replied brightly, obviously and without ill-intent. "Besides, the only thing holding me back from doing that with Akari and Tsutsui-san is that they're not comfortable with playing speed go just yet."

Mitani glared at him in rage. "We're playing another game."

Hikaru laughed. "Okay. But if I win, you're buying me a Coke from the 7-Eleven on the way home!"

"You'll be buying me a Sprite on the way home!" Mitani snapped at him. "Because I'm going to win the next game."

He didn't. Hikaru won all three of the speed go games against him before Akari and Kimihiro finished their teaching games. And Mitani had to buy both the Coke and the Sprite (though Hikaru made him drink the Sprite).

That day, on their way home, Mitani vowed that he would be coming to every Haze Go Club meeting until he beat Hikaru. And delighted by the news, Hikaru told him that he would be buying a lot of Cokes then.

…

Author's Note: Is this blackmail? It's definitely coercion, but probably not blackmail.

2020.07.11 (For the 7-Eleven joke.)