Why Am I In This Handbasket?

Whether you celebrate it as Hikago Day, Children's Day, or Cinco de Mayo! To bad it's on a Wednesday this year so I can't spend the afternoon eating nachos while watching Hikaro  no Go. Maybe this weekend.

I toltally missed Star Wars Day yesterday. /sigh/ I'm a bad geek.

Title: Chosei
Author: Aishuu / Deva-esque
Fandom: Hikaru no Go
Summary: Ichikawa watched a game between Touya and Shindou.
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2294007/1/Chosei

Go is an ancient Japanese board game that is simple to learn and hard to master. Hikaru no Go (Hikaru's Go) tells how 12-year-old Hikaru Shindou finds an old Go board (a goban) possessed by the spirit of Sai, a Heien era master, and goes from thinking Go is a boring game old men play to becoming an internationally ranked professional player within a few years under Sai's teaching. He is motivated by a rivalry with Akira Touya, a boy his own age who is the best player of his generation.

In this story they are 16 and have settled into the habit of a weekly match at the Go salon managed by Ichikawa. I've only read the first four volumes of the manga and the chapters published in the past year in Shonen Jump but from what I've seen Ichikawa is alone in treating Akira as a kid first and a Go prodigy second. During the course of an afternoon's play she watches, and watches over, the boys and thinks about their rivalry, their friendship, and what the future might hold for them. It's pretty faithful to canon so if you haven't read the series before this could be a good sampler to decide if you might like it and if you are already a fan you should enjoy it.

Title Seance de Go
Author: Aishuu / Deva-esque
Fandom: Hikaru no Go
Summary: A stormy night, a game between Hikaru and Akira, as promises are finally fulfilled and made. Not romance.
Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2295997/1/Seance_de_Go

Hikaru shows up one stormy afternoon to let Akira know that he won't be able to make their weekly game the next day.  They decide to go ahead and play while they wait for the storm to pass and during the game Hikaru finally reveals the secret of Sai's identity. The whole Go world had been trying to guess for years who the mysterious online player with the handle "Sai" was but Akira learns an even bigger secret when the game is over. This is a very good character piece examining the friendship and rivalry between these two with an ending that made me cry.