T his obliges me to drink my third drink. I haven’t felt anything from the last two, but the third is definitely dizzying. That’s not good; I need my mind alert to think of something else.
Surprisingly, the Chessmaster struggles with topping his own move. A few members of the unseen crowd hiss with wonder. The Chessmaster tenses.
A few minutes later, I see him sweat. Is he really that stupid, or hasn’t he played against his ego before?
But finally he manages and responds to his own move.
“Brilliant!” a few members of the audience hail.
“Now I should play your fourth move,” he tells me.
And just right there, when his hand reaches for my fourth move, I get hit with a lightning bolt in my head. I immediately stop his hand.
“What now?”
“I think I can make my next move,” I declare.
“Is that so?”
“I think I can beat you,” I say.
“Really? Again? Do you really think you have the slightest idea what you are talking about?”
“I think I do.”
The audience members in the dark gasp.
“Come on,” the Chessmaster says. “You don’t really believe she can—”
I interrupt him with my next move. The winner’s move.
The Chessmaster squints at it. His face dims. His forehead knots.
Then the Chessmaster bursts into uncontrollable laughter. “Do you have any idea what you just did?” He points at the chessboard. “You’re so easy, you have no idea.”
“Why?” I act surprised, afraid, worried, and shocked.
“You just handed me an early win with your move,” he says.
“You can’t be serious.”
“I am. You totally lost it. This is the worst move possible. I can checkmate you right now.”
I stop a small, sneaky smile from shaping on the corners of my lips. Unfortunately, he catches it.
“Wait.” He leans back. “You have a bigger plan, don’t you?”
I dim my face and tense my shoulders on purpose. “I wish I had. I really thought this was the best move.”
“Really?” He thinks it over. “You know, none of the world leaders I played with, no matter how bad at chess they were, made such a bad move.”
“Oh.” I cup my mouth with my hands. “Did I do that badly?”
“You could have shot yourself in Russian roulette and never done this badly.”
“Can you please give me a chance to correct it?” I plead, reaching for his hands.
The Chessmaster pushes them away. “Of course not. You know why? Because your move is so bad, I have no other move but to checkmate you. I mean, literally, I have no other option but to end the game now.”
As I’m still pleading with him, he, still enraged, unthinkingly reaches for his favorite knight and checkmates me.
The crowd behind me claps and hails and chirps with enthusiasm, cameras flashing from all around.
“This is the moment I’ve been waiting for,” he tells me, mirth wrapping his soul. “I’ve killed you, Alice.”
That’s when I sit back, cross one leg over another, place my elbow on the rim of the chair, and glance with disgust at him.
The Chessmaster doesn’t sense at first what has really happened here, but some in the audience do. They let out a series of uncontrollable shrieks, saying, “She tricked him!”
The Chessmaster’s face knots so tightly I think he’s going to bleed. He stares at the chess pieces, the checkmated king, and doesn’t get it. What’s the fuss about? Why is the audience saying that the little girl from Wonderland tricked him?
Then his eyes shift toward the poison cups.
I seize the moment and reach for my fourth cup and gulp it with all the ease in the world. It does drive me crazy and makes me dizzy, but I don’t show it, because I’m in for the grand prize: saving the world.
“You tricked me.” The Chessmaster slumps back in his chair. “You little b—”
“Save the swearing for when you burn in hell,” I tell him, remembering what the Pillar taught me. “I made you play with my rules, not yours.”
“Who taught you such a trick? Why hasn’t anyone thought of it before?”
“Because they’re afraid of you. You’re the terrorist who bombs a building with innocent people because he’s been hurt in the past. You force people to play your game by scaring them.” I am so excited I can’t even catch my breath. “And all I had to do was play my game, not yours.”
“By making me think you made your best move when in fact it was deliberately your intention to make your worst.” The Chessmaster moans, knowing his time has come.
“Exactly,” I say. “You forced me in a game where I have to try winning in a losing war; where, when I lose in the end, I have no choice but to drink the seventh poisoned cup that will kill me.”
“And you fooled me by losing earlier and not buying into my game.” The Chessmaster is amazed but saddened and disappointed with this whole outcome. “Now that you made the most stupid move in history, I had no choice but to checkmate you in the fourth round.”
“Stupidity is so underrated.”
“And by recklessly checkmating you in the fourth round, you will never reach the seventh cup, and you will simply not die,” he says. “You bought yourself out of hell by being a moron.”
“I prefer being called mad.”
“And that’s not all.” The Chessmaster nails his own coffin with his last words: “Having been unable to kill you, I’m obliged to drink all seven cups, even though I checkmated you. It’s the rules of the game.”
“Let me just correct that part. In reality, I checkmated you. Kinda kicked you in the balls, wrapped you up in choking coils made out of your anger, and rolled you down the rabbit hole of hell.”
The Reds in the place crash onto the stage and force the Chessmaster to drink the seven cups of poison.
I watch him give in, the audience behind me applauding, reminding myself of the man who taught me this trick.
The Pillar.
With my Red guardian reminding me of the technique written on the napkin, I was the one who laughed last. I didn’t buy into the Chessmaster’s game, made him think he was winning, and struck when it was hot.
Now that I’ve practiced what I’ve learned and saved the world, I have to finish my masterpiece with a few last words. Words I was taught by the Pillar, whom everyone says is a devil.
A broad smile, a euphoric feeling of transcendence, and a breeze of hope caress me as I stand above the Chessmaster, Death himself, and tell him,
“I will die when I say so!”