Chapter 8: Armin Justice vs George Johnson - Round 2
The moment my knight took g2, I could hear my grandfather chuckle to himself. In his head, he was still the puppet master, but the one in control of the strings was me.
"Takes c7."
A pawn of mine was slain by his, leaving my queen to be attacked from two angles. Across the battlefield, his queen stood with her weapon drawn, her eyes gleaming with intent to kill mine in one single attack.
The pawn that just took c7 was trembling before my queen, knowing he was within her grasp and was quite possibly making a sacrifice for his comrades.
This was part of my grandfather's puppet master strategy. He wanted to force my queen to move and he gave me no other option. At this point, I would scan the board despite my eyes being sightless, and in my head, I would play out countless battles to ensure I go down the right path.
Instead, my eyes remained closed as I searched for a way out. I could feel my grandfather's intense stare and his silence was telling. He was trying to get a read on me once again; he was trying to regain control of the strings but I made it impossible.
I mentioned that I had to move my queen and that the old man left me with no other option...
But I found the hidden path to my own victory.
I reached across the board, deep within my grandfather's army's backline, and moved my knight from g2 to e1.
"Knight to e1."
In my head, I could see the battle playing out in full if my grandfather were to slay my queen where she stood. I would simply command my pawn at g3 to g2, pinning his king in the corner and checking him.
However, it would become a checkmate once the king took my pawn and found itself within the sights of my knight.
If the old man took my queen, the match would be over.
I could hear my grandfather's feint heartbeat stutter for a moment for the first time in the hundreds of matches we've played. He didn't expect such a move and it was a complete oversight on his end.
"Queen takes e1."
His queen erased my knight, but at the same time, my queen was no longer in her sights. However, that pesky little pawn was still within striking distance of my queen.
But I didn't care.
"g2. Check."
I moved my pawn to g2 in the same way that I did in the scenario in my head. This timeline was shattered and replaced since the knight was taken out, but it still placed his king in check, forcing him to make a move.
"King takes g2." My grandfather had no other choice but to make this command and I bet this was the moment when he realized that I was the puppet master now.
"Rook to g7. Check."
Again, my queen could have been slain by his pawn at any time, but if the old man were to make that command, his King would be dead. It was the absolute perfect setup, my queen was constantly being sacrificed, laying her life on the line so that his king would then be in the hot seat.
"King to h1." My grandfather's king retreated into the corner, giving him just half a second to breathe before I made my move. As I grabbed my bishop on the board, I made sure to do some of my grandfather's famous shit-talking for myself.
"You played that exactly how I wanted you to, old man. Bishop to c3."
The uninitiated may see this as me giving away my queen to the opponent once again. The king was seemingly safe and my queen was still within the killing range of his pawn. Any novice player would have jumped at the opportunity to slay her right then and there, but my grandfather was a chess grandmaster. He saw threw the smoke and mirrors.
"Bishop to f1."
My grandfather shattered yet another one of my timelines, blocking off the checkmate from happening if I were to move my bishop to g3, the position adjacent to his king.
"Fine." I quipped. "Queen to d3."
And now, my queen was in the line of sight of his bishop. Inside my own head, that shattered timeline was being restored piece by piece now that if he were to take my queen, the aforementioned checkmate would still occur.
Not only was a previous timeline restored in my mind, but a new one was forged right beside it. If my grandfather were to leave my queen and slay my bishop instead, it would lead to another checkmate with my queen and rook.
Anyone else beneath grandmaster level would have cracked, but not my old man. "Knight takes e5."
And just like that, the timeline where my queen takes his pawn and sets up a checkmate in the corner was destroyed, shattered into a million unrecoverable pieces. Not only that, but my queen was now within the killing range of his knight.
And again, I didn't care.
"Bishop to f1."
Though one timeline was destroyed, the previously shattered and restored timeline where my bishop places his king in checkmate would still be at play if he were to kill my queen.
My grandfather did not take the bait.
"Queen takes f1."
But it didn't matter.
"It's over, grandpa."
"Queen takes c3." This move triggered a chain of events where my queen went on a killing spree, slaying yet another rook. My grandfather made a futile attempt at promoting a pawn to a queen, but it was immediately slain by my rook.
His rook then took mine, but once my grandfather made that move he realized it was over.
I could hear the smile in his voice once he spoke. "That was one of the best matches of chess I have ever had the pleasure of playing... Are you really blind?"
"My eyes have been closed this whole time, grandpa."
He laughed as he hovered his hand over the upper left corner of the board. "True. I have been beaten. I resign."
He knocked over his king and the moment I heard the piece crash against the wooden board, I felt my heart send a jolt through my entire body.
I knew the match was over, but it truly set in that I had won. After five years of training for this moment, I finally beat my grandfather.
I could finally box.
"I'll see you in the gym tomorrow then."
My grandfather started to get up, but I stopped him.
"Wait. Aren't you going to tell me what the point of all of this was?"
"You should already know the answer. Why don't you tell me what you think?"
I thought back to that match in the fourth grade against that kid named Zayn. I thought about how boxing was just as much of a mental game as it is a physical game. "To train my mind?"
"That's the simple way of looking at it. Think about your most hard-fought matches. What was different about each one?"
I took a second or two to think about it. My opponents were all different and our matches were unique. It was hard to narrow it all down to just one thing that was different about them all. "I don't know."
My grandfather sat back down and leaned forward on the table. Though we couldn't lock gazes, I could sense that he was looking right into my eyes. "Think about how you won this match. Think about how you won every single other match of your life. What did you do to win?"
"Well, I started seeing you as a puppet master and I cut the strings."
My grandfather broke out in laughter and patted my shoulder from across the table. "You youngsters have a strange way of describing things, I tell you. Do you want to know how I describe it?"
I nodded.
"Every chess master has a gift. For me, my gift is to control both my own actions and my opponent's without them realizing. Your gift is to be able to have steps play out in your head to predict what's coming. That timeline junk you were talking about. Do you get where I'm going with this?"
I didn't realize until then that in every single chess match that I have ever played, the opponent had something that made the way they fought wholly unique. Even low-level players had their own "gifts".
"Boxers have these gifts too. And to win, I have to figure out a way to neutralize those gifts."
"Exactly. The reason I turned you into a chess player was to turn you into a tactician. You can't see, Armin. I'll be honest, I don't think you have what it takes to become a boxer because of that but your drive is what made me want to give you a chance to prove yourself. Physically, you will always be outclassed, but if you can figure out what makes these guys tick and use your gift to beat theirs, you might just have a chance."
"I'll prove I have what it takes."
"We'll see." My grandfather stood up and pressed the garage door opener, letting in the cold night air that sent a shiver up my back. I hadn't realized it was so late until then.
"Let's get you home so you can rest up. You have a long day ahead of you tomorrow."
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