Michael M (Exeter and Shinamo pt. 1)

He was resting. He had already used ice, and now he soaked in a hot bath to recover from the intense fight. Fight days with Challenge-master Shin B were painful, but totally worth it.

While his body recovered, his mind contemplated the way Shin B constantly got the advantage even if he managed to get a few strikes in. It wasn't physical, most of the advantage was mental. Shin B had always fought the top of the heap, the winners of the winners. It was the only fighting he did. Before Michael, there was Julio P.

There was a new initiation to do this afternoon, and then supervising one of the more exciting mid-level fights: 4-4 Sadie Q, the highest ranking woman in the program, against 5-1 Rod R. He hated having any electronics at the Sword Master's Challenge, but being the 2nd ranked member of the program meant he did all the real top-level work of coordinating the challenge.

The SMC allowed only a beeper with a short code display. COMAI was what flashed by his beeper display. If you needed to communicate with the outside world. you could always go to the Compound AI which ran the facility and did a lot of the tracking behind the scenes. It was very stripped down compared to the Arcade and Simulator AIs of his youth, but there was a lot of coordination work with higher authorities, and tracking health and mental health that the AIs did even here.

He dried off, looking at the cut marks and scarring left even after the battle healing machine had processed his injuries. You can wear tough cloth and leather, but fighting at the intensity of a Shin B battle meant using the healing machine was required every time. The pain sharpened things, made it more real. It made the mental battle more activated.

And to be sure, the strategic and tactical dance of a battle between two experts was exciting. Many challengers came from supposedly realistic combat simulators, and wanted to experience the real thing, and learn to enjoy real battles against other good fighters.

The Sword Master's Challenge was based on challenging your betters until you replaced them. There was a "permanent" tier, for everyone who had learned enough to become a teacher in the program. Worlds 1, 2 and 3 were the funnel into the higher worlds where there was no time limit, but expectations and responsibilities instead.

There was plenty of interesting fights from World 4 up, but after battling Shin B for three years, nothing else could compare in interest and intensity. Shin B warned him, that he was getting too cautious and defensive, but the best approach he could find after 150 challenges was a style that mostly dealt with Shin B's attacks and looked for opportunities.

 Michael M had his sleek fighting outfit, which he hung in the World 8 locker-room. Theoretically, they could have multiple people at World 8, but based on the reality of the size of the project, Michael was the only person at World 8, thus the only person using that gym.

The juniors had lockers and mostly fought outside on the spacious lot of the SMC. He passed two World 2 challengers sparring, and nodded to a world 5 challenger.

Michael personally made an effort to get to know everyone at World 5 and up. 4s were changing on monthly basis, as some people got responsibilities, and decided it wasn't for them. They still thought of real work as being the AI's job. Some people couldn't handle the higher level of fights and bailed out, and some had reached their goal and decided to quit.

 It was an accomplishment to get to world 4. There were other groups and challenges for sword fighters. Mostly SMC was known as the toughest. It was contested, but Michael still remembered the brutal difficulty of his transition. He had tried and failed the SMC the first time. Initiates had three chances to try to get in, waiting a year after the first try, and two years after the second.

He waited 2 years after his first try and made it on his second.

The boxy AI building was deceptively small for the massive AI computer systems. The rest of the Compound AI was underground, and much of the 200 acres of the SMC was underlaid with computing, or cooling systems for the AI. The SMCs compound AI had been upgraded three times since it was founded. Originally it had an Uno, a singular AI which ran everything, but then the three-headed Compound idea was put in, and then the Compound AIs were upgraded and expanded.

The holograms of the three AI's visual representations, or precepts, appeared when Michael opened the door to the compound.

In a compound AI, each of the three AIs takes a stance which affects their consensus decisions. For SMC, there was Cloud, the Sword excitement concept character, Dan, the Monastic concept character, and Tina, a replacement for the old third character who represented Sony network efforts to be more inclusive in these kind of competitive groups.

 The rumor was that every time you meant a compound AI, you would relate to one of the three best. While he had originally been fondest of the Sworder Cloud, his years of trials and effort made Dan his most relatable AI. 

 Dan spoke up first, "We have something a little unique to present to you Michael."

Dan was wearing robes similar to Michael's own everyday wear. Cloud wore a sleek outfit and carrying his huge holographic sword as they lead Michael into the center of the compound, where the VisScreen and communication interface was at.

 Michael sat down at the table in the central room. He thought maybe they had a special initiate or group of initiates for the SMC. It had happened before.

Dan motioned to the giant vizscreen which filled the space in front of them.

 A picture of a large room with many people seated in pairs across from each other. The screen changed to the same type of square grid with a woman's voice speaking.

 "This was an aggressive move.  Jin W thinks Donn B won't handle the defense in this type of position very well. He has seen Donn's battle in the League Final."

There were scattered snapshots of something on screen. Some were about these squares, others were food and cooking related. Nothing seemed to relate to him.

"I'm going to bring one of Shinamo's cores into this conversation, but it's truly a Corporate level conversation. The very top, Michael, so we ask for complete discretion," Don said.

The view screen was replaced with a visual of the Shinamo colony headquarters with one of the AI personality cores, represented by a business suited man.

"Sony corporate has made an unusual outreach effort towards Google UK corporate, regarding collaboration between our specialized colonies. They settled on Shinamo as the Sony corporate colony representative, and a colony called Exeter as the Google UK representative. These images you saw were from Exeter.

"While Google UK as a whole choses a more tech-minimalist path than Sony network, their perspective matches Shinamo quite well. However, their main colony New London, is so large and with so many interests and pursuits that we cannot map it well, but one of their smaller, more focused colonies in Exeter.

"Exeter is a retreat and a community involved in a competitive activity called Chess. This is the activity with the squares that you noticed. Exeter also has a community focussed on food, but we are looking at the pairing between colonies because of Exeter's chess.

The cultural differences mean instead of dozens of different micro-communities with very different standards, Exeter has a monolithic chess community, but with local hubs where people meet together. Exeter does have rapid transportation, but they have banned all use of small electronics, and only use computing power by connecting with the colonial AI. This is true even in New London.

Exeter is extremely strict about this, and monitors even for biologically induced cheating. Biomorphs have been detected before."

Michael was bewildered about why they were telling him all of this. "How do I come in?"

"You grew up on a main-world, and then decided you didn't want that life, and within eight years, you've rise to the top of the strictest competition on the most hardcore colony. Corporate proposes to send you to learn chess and rise to the top on Exeter. If you can do that, it would help Sony network establish a middle ground between the Arcade addicted main worlds and the minimalist fringe worlds. It would have a very good and positive impact on our worlds."

"Why would I want to leave what I love behind for that? Sitting down all the time?"

Michaek stood up. He had the right to go where he wanted, and he didn't want to leave Shinamo.

"Michael," said Dan. "You are stuck. You have lost your creative improvement against Shin B, but you can't escape the competitions. You know what I mean. You've started to get bored, but you are hanging on to the memory of the best times. It won't last forever. It's time to move on and face a new challenge."

 "Think about it," the Shinamo AI core said. "Exeter has very smart chess players, but they don't have the intensity of focused constant challengers and duels. We are willing to help you understand how to take sword-fighting understanding and bring it into chess."

 . 

Later that night, in bed, he swore. "Damnit! Why are they right."

He trusted Dan, and Dan deflected his hopes. The AI never got it wrong. He was in a rut. He was mourning the incredible excitement he'd had when actually engaging in the impossible fights like they were possible.

He went back out to the AI compound. It was late, but they ran always.

Dan greeted him at the door. "Whatever you need to do," Michael told him.

 .

Officially, the Sephiroth was just making a few cross-network hops to Exeter and New London. Unofficially, it was beginning a steady route between Shinamo and Exeter which would mark the beginning of the sister colonies program.

A past SMCer was onboard. Aesril L. questioned him. She had boarded at their last stop before leaving Sony space. Several of their pickups at Shinamo had debarked at Aesril L.s homeworld.

"Why Chess?" she continued. "I've never heard of it. No one has ever heard of it. There's a thousand challenges you could try, even the super-hardcore fighting games."

 "I wanted to experience something different. I've heard a bit about Exeter's culture. Maybe I'll stay a year and make it a sabattical," Michael said. Obviously he wasn't going to share Corporate's top secret info.

"Well, I suppose I should wish you the best. But you'll be missed. Who could find a trainer like you. I mean reaching 6-1 to even be eligible for your training was a very grave challenge"

They were in the Sword Fighting arena onboard Sephiroth. Real sword fighting, real medical recovery bots

Aesril L tried her Tier 6 tactics, was rebuffed by his parrying, foot work dodges, push backs and leans, following by unambitious counterstrikes.

"My full repertoire was for the Grandmaster," Michael M said.

"That's why you only counter-attack now?"

"I don't want you to be in med-bay when we land," he said.

After three more sound defeats, Aesril L had enough. She brought up the video screen projector.

"Grandmaster battles playlist 17," she said to the projector. "I kept accumulating your fights with Shin B."

"Really," he said. He didn't know how to think about leaving the fights with Shin behind.

It was shocking to see the blur of activity between him and Shin B from an outside perspective. The video recorder used couldn't pick up all of their movements as they dashed around the indoors Elite Challenge ring. Sword cuts and manuevers on both sides were rapid fire.

"You've slowed down a bit since then," Aesril L said.

"I can't fight like that unless I'm in the zone. Having fought two or three warm up rounds against Shin B. After sparring with him for 17 months. Training with him for 6 months before the spars started.

"You developed a defensive style because attacking style was insane against him," she said. "You become a great spirit of sword fighting when you face Shin B. And he's always been a great spirit. Why did you agree to leave this behind. It's almost religious to watch it, yet alone be part of the art."

"Dan showed me how I was getting into a rut. He's such a tough opponent you can push your art in the wrong direction just to handle Shin. I wasn't going to stay at that level forever."

Aesril said, "If you become as good at Chess as sword fighting, I fear for Exeter's competitors." she said.

After a few hours of Sake and toasts to the old days, they headed separately to sleep. Sephiroth would be arriving in the morning.

.

Between his birthplace, which was filled with lights and music at every hour, and his transplanted home, which was very strict with removing technology and reacting to that arcade ascetic, he saw that Exeter was somewhere in between.

The colony AI building was fancy, and yet muted, with only simple lights and plain walls. He arrived and immediately took the tram-way over to Exeter's AI (called UNO), and her custom's system.

UNO was a non-descript, rather plain looking woman, in her precept form.

"Sephiroth's landing documents declared you as interested in joining the Chess community. Is this correct?" UNO asked.

"Yes. I want to learn the game, and I'm taking a break for a year or perhaps longer from my old pursuits," Michael said.

"In order to join our community, I need to reach a similar level of confidence that you have not violated our competitive agreements, that I have with people who have grown up in the Google UK network. This may take a while, are you willing to go through this examination?"

"Yes," he said. Why would he leave everything and not be willing.

"First, I'll do a detailed scan for prohibited electronics. All personal electronics is prohibited."

Michael wondered what they used when people needed to communicate, if they couldn't have any electronics. With the colony itself not even having a Compound AI, they seemed very primitive here.

The scan felt tingly, and lasted for a few minutes straight.

"Now, I'll set you up to play a few games of chess against calibrated computer opponents to estimate your Letter classification and statistical profile of play. Just go into the next room."

 Michael recognized the table with the squares and pieces from the video he had seen before. There was no chess on Sephiroth since it was something unknown to the Sony network, so this would be his first experience beyond rumors and heresay.

"The pieces are AI controlled, and maneuvered, but you can physically took and move them. The chess table system will walk you through how to do this if you are unfamiliar," UNO said.

The board suddenly moved so that all the pieces had rearranged and the black holograms were in front of him in two rows. He thought he saw how the squares were on that video.

He tried to take one piece in each hand, both hands grabbed nothing.

The table chirped and spoke with a higher voice than UNO. "You may only move one piece at a time. Except in practice mode, after you pick up a piece, you must make a move with that piece, unless all moves with that piece are illegal. Please choose one and only one piece to pick up."

He picked up the piece in the back row with the jagged crown.

"Queens cannot move through any square occupied by another piece. No legal moves are available for the queen in this position, because c8, d7, d7, e8 and e7 are all occupied by your pieces."

When it started spouting letters and numbers at him, he was clueless. So he picked up a smaller piece in the front, and pushed it forward just a bit.

"When you release a piece, it must be release in a manner that makes it's destination square clear. If the computer system is unable to determine what square you meant the piece to be on, it will force you to move it. Consistent ambiguity as a B class or higher rated player is subject to censure."

He nudged the piece so it fit neatly in the square.

Michael noticed how one of the white pieces had already been moved out of the neat two column layout. Now another white piece jumped over the other small white pieces.

The piece looked kinda like a video game horse. The table chimed at him. "Your turn. Be reminded, your clock will continue to run. In evaluation mode, game time is set to 5 minutes plus 5 seconds per move after the 40th move. Your clock has 2 minutes and 12 seconds remaining.

He tried to move that horse-like piece, but the game yelled at him, so he moved those little pieces forward, but then he got stuck and the board wouldn't even let him move them.

"You are in check! You must make a move to remove your King from check."

He didn't even know what piece was his king. How was he going to live up to Shinamo Compound AI's expectations if he had no clue what he was doing.

Finally, the table spoke up: "Black loses on time against C class bot."

UNO spoke up again, "Anyone can lose on time at first. Let's have the table AI show you the super-basics and then try a thirty minute game."

 So the king was the piece with the sort-of plus sign. It had to be protected like your body in sword-fighting. The one piece really was the knight and it could do leaping tricks than no one else could do. And then all of the other pieces.

 He moved, and made mistakes in terms of the rules several times, but more often than not, he had a legal move. He still got smoked, because he was at pre-1-1 levels of understanding what he was trying to do.

 "Use my brain, use my brain", he said.

UNO changed the bot to one that would help him understand the weirder side of the rules. "Mostly we want you to learn chess from human tutors. Exeter is designed to be a community with people spreading the community with other people. I'm just a facilitator."

 Sounded like SMC.

 The whole concept was weird, in terms of what and how, but the competitive idea made it clear this was something you could have a Sword-master's challenge in.

"Your rating will be marked as provisional because neurologically, your ability is widely variable, and you could improve faster than my normal systems update. You are near peak A-class, provisional. I would expect to see you in B class in a few weeks, and C class in a couple of months, if you participate in activities frequently. Currency conversion has completed with our Corporate overseers, so you have 1200 points available. There is an escrow cost for joining Leagues to ensure that people don't join and then leave right away without consequences. You will be expected to participate in Smart Pairings on Tuesday, including tomorrow, unless you officially leave the Chess community, or ask to be on Semi-Regular status."

 "Thank you UNO" he said. He had learned the 6-year old's intro to Chess. Just like a 6-year old with a toy sword, he wasn't ready to do anything, but he had to get out there and participate. The currency rate was AWFUL. Only 1200 points for his 730 million Sony points! Wow!

.

This place was huge for Chess! Between organizations on Shinamo there was miles of wilderness, that was part of the charm. There seemed to be city and suburbia here on Exeter. Chess was everywhere, however. There was residential areas, as he looked out the window of the car that was automatically driving him. Chess Centers, of course. Signs for those were frequent.

Food and Chef centers were also common, and occasionally other clubs and activities, as well as a utilities and official colonial business.

When the auto stopped at his new local chess center, he was able to just talk to the car, and it took him to the League signup. The Leagues had their own Chess centers just for league play, and the closest one was only a few miles from his Local.

There was a hand-written schedule. He was sure UNO gave everyone electronic schedules as well, but the rustic feel was cool. It said:

 Letter Leagues: Schedule by Classification
 A : Monday 8 am - 10 am
 B : Monday 10:30 am - 12:30 pm
 C : Monday 1 pm - 3 pm
 D : Wednesday 8 am - 10 am
 E : Wednesday 10:30 am - 12:30 pm
 F : Wednesday 1 pm - 3 pm
 G : Thursday 8 am - 10 am
 H : Thursday 10:30 am - 12:30 pm
 I : Thursday 1 pm - 3 pm
 J : Thursday 3:30 pm - 5:30 pm

 An actual person was there to sign people up for leagues. He had a chess table at the front desk, and he appeared to be playing against the computer like Michael had been doing. There was some position on the board nothing like he had seen in UNO's building. Only a few pieces were on the board.

"I'm here to sign up for the Leagues," Michael said.

"There is a 1 point fee that will be returned to you if you complete a full league season. We want people to be able to rely on their opponents being here for their matches, so you will forfeit the fee if you miss a league day."

"Ok, how do I pay?" Michael asked. One point was barely anything at all.

"I just talked to UNO, your signed up as long as you approve the point being transferred to the league fund."

"I approve."

"Ok good Michael. You are signed up for Class A league #2 at Letter League Center 0637."

 "Who are you playing here," Michael pointed to the Chess table.

 "Oh it's not a game, it's a position study. A puzzle."

 "I'll see you next Monday then," Michael said.

 The man playing the "puzzle" (why play chess without the competition?) pointed to another sheet next to the Class league schedule.

"League Holiday during Exeter Classic. New Leagues start May 21st, the week after the Classic's completion."

"Where do I sign up for that?" he asked.

"You should have it in your messages. If you just arrived from off-colony, you might get it tonight."

"Thank you!" Michael said.

He had arrived on colony that morning, and now his Local Chess Center was closed for dinner break when he got back from the League center.

If there was anything he'd seen more than Chess centers, it was eating options next to them. He couldn't help but see Exeter as a blend of Shinamo's minimalism and the wild consumerism of his birth colony.

He wanted to compare the restaurant with where he grew up, but when he got several people welcoming him as he walked in, he knew there was no comparison.

He watched as a few people reshuffled seats to make a table available for him. People seemed to be traveling around to their neighbors tables while everyone waited for their food to arrive.

He was fine with waiting until everyone else got their food. He did get here late anyway. He had spent many nights not eating much and breaking his fast in the morning.

"We do a great big burst of meals for Dinner break, family style, so there will be plenty ready for everyone," said one of the servers.

At the SMC, Michael ate meals with the the other senior people, or he had a quick supplement or pill to get him through the day. He did have family meals growing up, but it was almost all virtual.

They weren't kidding either, as soon after a large meal of chicken and sides was placed at the tables.

"How do you avoid passing out from all this?" he asked a neighboring table.

"Little walk around the neighborhood and then back at it for another hour maybe," said the Dad at the next table over.

"I don't want to play Queen's Gambit Declined," said one of the young kids.

"There's other options."

It was all a foreign language to him.

One of the neighbors brought over a plate of chicken and some sides, and Michael transferred small portions onto his plate.

"New here, huh?" the guy said.

"I just got here today from the Sony network."

"You don't look like an Arcade head," said the guy.

"A lot of us disagree with that lifestyle. We have smaller colonies like Exeter. Even here, just this dinner is way more food than I've seen in years."

Michael picked away at the food as he talked with the neighbor.

"We've got a lower-half skewed local, with lots of focus on learning the game and applying what you've learned, but we're not a high-churn local, so most people stick around for at least a year, often longer. Uno keeps us together with our kids, which is nice. Some of the really good parents, they have to go play elsewhere somedays but mostly one or both parents are in the same local."

"It's good that you are able to stick together. I was with my family on the arcade world I grew up on, but Shinamo, which was my adoptive home, it was an adult's world, mostly. Not a lot of family. You'd see regular arrivals and leavers, but no real permanent community beyond a few hundred people at the top of these organizations."

"Everyone has a different situation. Uno is really smart, and she shapes each local to the people there. My brother-in-law has a daughter whose already gone past Letter classification. He's in a local with a lot of parents of bright children, where the children are playing in the nearby Children's regional expert center. Some of the parents there are participating in Expert+ events all across the colony so there's a lot more traveling and it's harder to be part of a community as a parent, but you have the overall Exeter family. The knowledge that you can be accepted nearly anywhere on colony.That's certainly not true in New London, and a lot of people came here because of that."

.

That night, Michael only got to play one game against another person, but he also watched as everyone tried to solve a "puzzle". He supposed it was kinda like a Kata in Sword Fighting. Figuring out how to position your body and sword in a certain situation.

Honestly the only Kata he needed was something basic like, how do you swing the sword. How do you hold it, and how do you stop your opponent's sword.

It was a humorous night in his room as he tried to find some kind of device that he could talk to, to get his messages. When Uno started talking to him out of thin air, he freaked out.

"You have to use devices to talk to your AIs on Shinamo?" Uno asked.

"Of course."

"You can talk to me at any time, or my subprocess more accurately. And I will talk to you on occasion. Just say messages if you want to find your messages."

"Messages."

"You have 7 messages. 6 of them are recommended for trash. 1 is very significant."

"Play them all, starting with the very significant one."

"You have receive a special qualification for the Exeter Classic 2347. Please watch your messages for Tournament Site directions. Each day of the Tournament, until you are eliminated, you will receive your morning site information at 1 am, and your evening site information at 12 pm. Your clock will start running if you are late to the site. If you are late two times during the tournament, your tournament will be over."

The other six were invitations to be trained by particular Chess teachers. He decided to wait on those, especially since Uno classified them as trash.

He had a display screen in his room. Back on Shinamo, even as the 2nd highest rank, he had to go to the AI center to review information about the challengers. Usually he just back to his room late, and spent little time there.

Uno said, "You can watch the professional matches, look up games by people in the same letter class or watch some of the highlights of Exeter's cultural overall."

"I'll watch the Pros. I have no idea how to really play chess of yet, but I'll watch."

"This was the most recent match in the long Show Match series between our top two local pros: Jin W and Sandra K," Uno said.

The pros moved quickly, making a dozen moves between them in a matter of 20 seconds, and then they slowed down.

The clocks started with 30 minutes for each pro, unlike the 10 minute timer he had seen in his first game against a person.

He could skip forward past to the next move, or wait with the Pros. This was like sword fighting at a pace where you can consider each option carefully. Gimmicks were unlikely to work.

He had no idea what the stances looked like, or what the individual strikes and parries were. His Smart Pairing was tomorrow, where he would be matched up in his first rated game. Rated games affected his Letter classification, and if he ever wanted to get out of A class, he would have to win some of these.

There were many white pieces next to black pieces, and the whole thing looked like some intricate inter-locking bonzai trees or something.

Someday he would understand. He had to play a second, and then a third game against humans first. The Exeter classic would be in a few weeks and he would be way out of his depth, but it was a good immersion in the culture.

.

It was a cold yet dewy, humid morning when he went outside. The air was crisp. Kids were riding their bicycles. He could smell baked bread from a nearby bakery.

The apartment complex was apparently for people who hadn't started their own family on the colony yet.

When he left the elevator and walked outside, he didn't go to the curb for a car yet, but waited and watched as kids rode by on bicycles, families walked and waved. He could walk to the Chess center, how far was it?

He picked up speed as he get further from the apartment. Remembering his daily routine, he decided even if chess didn't need body strength, it was part of his daily ritual to get ready for battle. He would do the same for Chess, with some substitution for chess training and drills. He could surely find some drills to do on the little square board every day.

He got to the Chess center but he still had energy to burn, just getting warmed up. He ran back and forth from the Chess Center and apartment twice more before he went inside the Chess Center.

It was obvious despite the lack of formal rules and stuctures at the local chess center, there was an ad hoc organization. Kids were pairing off with each other to play, some of the older kids were studying at chess tables. 

Michael saw several adults standing coordinating and helping.

"If you're A class, feel free to get in some games with the kids," said one of the dads.

When he sat down at a Chess table across from a little girl, she seemed afraid at first, but then when she took his queen, the girl was excited. No one said anything during the games though, but they talked about the games after they were over.

"Smart Pairings start at Noon, so we've got to get our training in now," said one of the guys Michael had seen standing.

In rapid succession, Michael played against five kids, sliding over to different tables. When he won, someone else moved to his table, when he lost, he moved. The kids called it Winner Stays rules. It was just custom and informal practice.

He won twice and lost three times. His opponents were kids from six to eight years old, and mostly they were better than him. It was a dose of reality, another dose, so to speak.

One of the parents analyzed his game with their daughter.

"You moved the same piece too much, and then traded it away. So you wasted all of those moves. You want to make more effective moves than the other person, so you have more pieces when a pileup happens."

Another mom looked at his first move as white. "There's a lot of standard opening ideas, but the center is important. If you move your a pawn forward, you aren't helping, and black can block your Rook from moving forward by moving his e pawn and also opening his pieces up and establishing the center."

But the most helpful comment was from a kid. "Dad says, you've got all the pieces stuffed in the toybox at the start, you've gotta get them out! Once you have the toys out of the box then you can play!"

It was like starting a sword fight with your sword stuck in the sheath and your hands bound.

He learned that rooks were not usually brought out, because the rows and columns were harding to break free from, but sometimes if you traded a pawn you can open up a spot for a rook to take control.

So chess was a game where the first part is getting ready for battle. but you are doing it live, and you can get interrupted, so you have to be fast. Then there's the battle, the big battle, but if no one wins yet then both sides are tired and their weapons are busted up, it's a brawl to the end.

At noon, the friendly Chess Center gathering broke up, as everyone headed to their assigned smart pairings.

There were three pairings scheduled, at the same site, for 1 pm, 2 pm and 3 pm. The site was just far enough that he decided to take the auto.

He had enough time to stop in and eat lunch before going to the Chess Center his matches were at.