kaolin fire presents :: writing :: fiction

"Chess"

words

Picture a chessboard, pristine and unmoving. Two sides locked in eternal struggle. Deep forest jade squared against blackest onyx. The two sides stare at each another with neither enmity nor comraderie. They seem to bear no emotions. The jade King sits unseeing, staring across the board.

"Will this never end?" he asks, to the world, the board which is the only world he has ever known. The board which is the only existance he can know. And it will never end. All know this, but none answer. He knows this himself, but cries out rhetorically in despair.

The onyx King wearily looks up. "It's your move."

"Yes, yes, I know. Don't rush me, old chap." He looked once again across the board. "Mate in thirty-nine."

"What?"

"Mate in thirty-nine." The jade King tapped the Pawn in front of him. "James, go forwards two squares." The jade Queen turned to the King, distinctly agitated.

"John, you know he hasn't got his brother's proficiency. Why don't you send out Phillip instead? He's much better at holding the center."

The onyx king called out, "Please, let's have no kibbitzing this game. We wouldn't want another case of the sqabbling of the last game, would we?"

John, looking sadly at his Queen, nodded assent. "Please, dear. A fair and friendly game is so much more pleasant. And after all, how would James get better if we didn't send him out now and again. It's not as if he's completely untrained." The Pawn dutifully stepped forwards two squares, and planted his pike upon the ground. Turning around, he called out, "Father, the center square is ours." The jade King smiled his pleasure, and answered. "Good, my son. Mate in thirty-eight." To the onyx King he called, "Your move, I believe."

"Would you quit calling moves? It's disturbing my concentration."

"Very well."

"Thank you. Infantry regiment five forwards two."

"Infantry regiment five?" asked the jade King.

"Well, it is somewhat fun to pretend, isn't it? That this is all a larger battle somewhere? That these mere Pawns are greater things, regiments and battalions?"

The jade King shrugged, saying nothing.

The onyx Pawn guarding the Queen stepped forwards two. James stared crosswise at it.

"James, go ahead and kill him. It will do you good to practice your spear." The jade Queen looked to the King in fear, for she saw that James would die only one move later. John looked at her without apology. "Everyone dies, my love. They all come back ready to fight again." She began to say something, but stilled herself when she saw the pain in his eyes as well. If only they did not have to live this awful game!

James stepped forwards, and waited honorably for the opposing Pawn to lift his sword. Saluting each other, they circled warily, but it was over before it began. When the opening presented itself, James thrust his pike straight through his opponents helmet. There was a wet tearing of flesh, and the pike stopped itself in the back of the onyx Pawn's skull. Slowly, the body sagged to the ground, and James removed his pike, brushing it off against the fallen one's uniform.

"Mate in thirty-seven," the jade King muttered under his breath. The onyx King looked up at him disapprovingly. "Okay, okay. I'll be silent."

The onyx Queen merely lifted her hand, and James began to writhe in agony. His face contorted, blood pouring from his eyes. He fell lifelessly upon the other body. The onyx Queen slowly stepped forwards until she loomed above the two, and then stood upright, stately and unwavering.

John sent out his queen's sworn Knight to threaten the other, feeling a pang of regret for his son, but knowing that it was all for the best. After all, he was going to win, and that was what was important. Or if it were not important, that was the only thing that really existed. Whether existance were important was another monologue altogether.

The onyx Queen merely sidled over and smiled at the King. She had him dead to rights. "Check," she stated, looking pleased with herself. The jade Queen stepped in front of her husband. "Do you wish to die so soon," she asked of her rival.

The onyx Queen's Knight jumped out to avenge her, should the jade Queen choose to attack her. Phillip, seeing his mother threatened, stepped forwards angrily to cover the onyx Queen, regardless of his danger from both the Queen he threatened and the Knight at her back. That Knight did not so disregard him, however. Instead, it charged and lanced him, unawares. The jade Queen shreiked, seeing her favored son defeated so.

"Dear, fear not. We shall win, and he shall come back to fight again. It was a quick death, that can be thanked, and it will be a short one." The jade King tried to comfort his wife.

The onyx King called out derisively, "How many more moves is it, Lord?" There was a definite sneer on the `Lord.'

John turned to his wife. "Will you dispatch her, please?"

"With pleasure." Her features hardened as she stepped forwards. As she moved, she raised a finger towards the onyx Queen, who grasped her own throat choking. A look of wild fear passed her eyes just before she snapped her own neck, and they glazed over. The jade Queen stood atop the three bodies upon that square, shaking.

"In thirty-three moves, a Pawn will have you in Check-mate, my lord," called the jade King.

A snort was followed by the onyx King calling out orders. "I have your Queen's Rook, my lord." And it was true. The enemy Knight had forked him and the Rook, and he was forced to move back, while the Knight lanced yet another and then another of his men.

The jade Queen moved over, attempting to flank the enemy King. The onyx Knight jumped out to defend his King, and the Queen stepped back, looking for another angle of attack. The onyx Queen's Bishop strode forward, tightening the onyx line. It was a solid black wall, seemingly impenetrable, but the Queen trusted to her husband and kept heart.

The jade King sent the Queen's Knight before her both to protect her, and to search for an opening. The onyx King took this time to Castle with his former Queen's Rook, forming an even tighter defense. Attempting to create a diversion and a hole for his Queen, the jade Knight gallantly speared the probing onyx Knight, even as a Pawn took him down from behind. The Castle stood strong, but the jade Queen saw her chance.

She darted to the edge of it, and gently helped the Pawn that stood there to the ground, as his life pleasantly faded away. She was inside the castle, and one wrong move on the onyx King's part would mean the end. But she remembered her husband's words, and counted out herself. She stared the onyx King in the eyes as his smirk fought to stay on his face. "Twenty-six moves you have left. My lord."

Seeing his danger, and not trusting to prophecy, he called for desperate measure. Twice his bishops were sent out, and twice the jade King was Checked, and the onyx King fought for a solid footing once more. John moved so as to attack the Bishops that threatened him, but in doing so finally allowed his enemy Queen's Knight to escape the pit that he had been holed in for so long.

This, however, was part of his plan. His enemy thought he had the upper hand; now was the time to show him that he did not. He spoke briefly, quietly with his Queen, and outlined what he saw to her. She nodded her assent, and proceeded, though with caution. The jade Queen slowly entered the onyx Castle, and stood facing the onyx King. "Check once more, my lord. You have but one hole. Scurry into it, and you will live. For a bit."

The onyx King muttered a curse and did as she said, for truly he did have but one place to go. The Queen patiently disassembled another Pawn of his Castle, as he slumped out of it, no longer protected, his pieces scattered about the board. The fight was not out of him yet though. "Rooks! I command you to take that wench!" And one rushed to attack her while the other supported his friend. Mockingly, the jade Queen danced away, and yet again placed the onyx King in Check.

The onyx King slunk sideways, hoping to give room for his Rooks to attack again. The jade Queen simply curtsied to him, and then about-faced towards his Queen's Bishop. The Queen raised her arms in the air to dispatch him, but he quickly uttered a prayer of protection, and her magic could not work on him. He smiled as she came to him, and raised his staff, thinking to crush her skull. Closer yet she came, and embraced him with a tight hug, which so confused him that he could not attack. And then he noticed the pain in his heart. The Queen stepped back, removing the pen knife from his back, and allowed him to collapse unto the ground, gasping for breath, his life's blood draining from him.

The onyx Queen's Knight slunk out of its hole a bit further, while a Pawn threated the remaining onyx Bishop. The Bishop stepped back a square, and made a sign to avert the Evil Eye. Heedless, another jade Pawn stepped forward to continue the attack, using the other as protection. Annoyed at his position, the onyx King paced back and forth, vying for a better one.

While the onyx King was lost in thought, the Pawn stepped forwards and stabbed his pike through the Bishop, even as the Bishop attempted a ward. The onyx King, hoping that the jade Queen was putting her attentions elsewhere, ordered a timorous little Pawn forwards to attack her. Instead, she drew beside her husband, and threatened the onyx King as well.

The onyx King looked about him, seeing his forces decimated and scattered. Two Rooks and a Knight were all that was left him, but for five Pawns, and he never counted his Pawns. "By your count I have seventeen moves left. Do you seek to toy with me? It seems you could best me now, most likely. But I think I can make you mate go stale. Perhaps that is what will take its toll on you. A stalemate I yet will win."

The jade King shook his head sadly at him. "I'm afraid not. Make your move." The onyx King slunk out of Check, with a desperate and hunted visage. Once again, he called for his Rooks, and once again, they set forth for the Queen. Meanwhile, she had called for her Bishop to begin the trap. The jade Queen stepped back and once again Checked the onyx King, keeping him off balance. The King ducked behind a wall of his pawns, wistfully thinking of the safety of his Castle, now in ruins.

The jade Queen swept back and finally ended the life of the wretched Knight that had been sneaking about in her home ground. "Silly little Knight. Sleep well." Still the onyx Rook followed her. She stepped back a bit to observe the situation, and to confer with her husband. "What do you see, my love?"

The jade King chuckled. "I see thirteen more moves. I see the onyx King trapped in another Castle, one built of Pawns. Ordered, ours and his. It will be his new cell, and his executioner will be among them. After that? A pause. And then the game will begin again. And end and begin and end and begin. What use is this life when nothing ever changes? Thirteen moves and we simply come full circle. There is no heaven nor hell, nor advancement of any kind. A Pawn can know few pleasures, and it seems a King fewer still, to see those he cares about suffer. Eternity it has been, and eternity it will be, and still the onyx King is a craven fool. Occasionally he blunders into a win, and sometimes I think he wins simply because I can not stand the sameness of victory every time. After all, there is no difference whether we win or lose. There is no difference at all."

The jade Queen, silent, rubbed his back. She knew nothing she could do that could fill his emptiness. She knew nothing she could do that would fill her own. "What if... James has a way with words, what if he could write a story? Perhaps a story about all of us? We would have accomplished something, perhaps. Maybe our moebious of stagnation would help someone realise that to change is the only way to fully live."

"A story? A divine comedy of fools, perhaps. Perhaps not so divine, perhaps not such a comedy. Fools surely though. Where would he write it, who would read it?"

"If he wrote it in his heart, remembered it beyond death, maybe there some other presence would catch the words, and transcribe it. That would be a change, would it not? We would have done something."

"Stop your apocolyptic dilly-dallying, and let's get on with this," harumphed the onyx King. "The point is to win or lose, and I plan to not let you win in the least. Save your posturing for someone who cares. Like you've said, it doesn't matter. Nothing matters. Let's get on with this, for I am bored."

The jade royalty exchanged pained looks. "If we dispatch him," started the King.

"We shall have peace," finished the Queen.

"But if we dispatch him," continued the King.

"Then we shall simply begin again," replied the Queen.

"And when that happens," prompted the King.

"We shall not have peace," finished the Queen.

"So the only way to gain peace is to kill him, and to kill him is to simply destroy the peace once again. That simple little riddle is itself the sum of our existance."

"Oh, will you two shut up already??? Enough already! The game, remember? The game? It's what we are? Let's get back to it, eh?" The onyx King was only mildly annoyed. It amused him to be able to jibe the couple in such a way.

Somberly, they complied.

The jade Queen stepped out of harm's way, only to see the selfsame Rook that had been doggedly following her Check her husband. The King simply smiled and took a step to the side. The Rook then slid over to jump between two jade Pawns, ludely threatening each. The Queen's Bishop lithely slid down and buried yet another onyx Pawn. The onyx King had but one corner left to hide in, but for his Rook which was even now being trapped. The other onyx Rook jumped out to trap the Bishop, but the Bishop was too quick and instead took his turn at Checking the onyx King.

The onyx King took a further step into his surrounding Pawns, while the jade King took a step towards the first Rook. He looked at it in mild distaste. He held its eyes with his own, and slowly mouthed the word, "Die." And so it did. Meanwhile, the remaining onyx Rook stepped back, and with one solid punch, dispatched the jade Bishop. The Queen, anger drained from all the killing, simply snapped her fingers at the Rook, which then dropped.

The onyx King advanced a Pawn, relentlessly, and then another and another, and slowly he led them up the board. The jade King sent one of his pawns down the board for a transformation, and he grew to be a fine Queen. Slowly, one jade Pawn stepped forwards to Check the onyx King. He sidestepped simply enough, but then another jade Pawn stepped forwards, and he was indeed in Checkmate on the thirty-ninth move. And so he died. And so the game ended.

And so it began again.