Checkmate - Leona Kingscholar
In which you introduce the prince of Sunset Savanna to your world's version of chess.
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Leona likes to sleep. It's common knowledge that the lion beastman takes great pleasure in snoozing whenever he may get the time. It's also common knowledge that you do not wake him up. Ruggie can, but even in the beginning the hyena was walking on thin ice. You got a taste of that unsaid rule when you stepped on his tail when gathering chestnuts so long ago. Everyone knew you did not wake Leona up from his naps.
Apparently, you did not get the memo.
Someone had told you Leona Kingscholar was the best chess player Twisted Wonderland had seen. You, a previous prodigy as a child, wanted to put your rusty skills to the test. As you wandered your way to the Savannaclaw dorm mirror, you reminisced on those times as a kid, playing the game with your mother on her special chess board. The clashing of colors, the smooth gliding of pieces, the funny trick with magnets. Oh, yeah. Those were the times.
Over the past few days—ever since the whispers of Leona's chess infamy reached your ears—you started to work odd jobs for Crowley with the intent of buying your own chess set from Sam, who had the exact one you were looking for. You spent many sleepless nights toiling away to buy it before someone else got their grubby hands on it. You're exhausted, slightly delirious, haven't entertained Tsunotarō's visits in a week, insanely homesick, and even the trio of Ramshackle dorm's ghosts are concerned for your well-being. But your efforts, blood, sweat, tears, and ritual sacrifices were not in vain. Today, you had finally bought it, the plastic bag swinging limply by your side.
Too distracted by the excitement of finally finding another chess player who could polish your talent, you walked directly into Ruggie who was exiting the mirror.
"CRAP–" the hyena shrieked, tumbling to the floor. You screamed as well, dashing to Ruggie's side. He smiled, reaching a hand out to you, seemingly thinking you were coming to hoist him up as an apology.
He was wrong. Super wrong.
You scooped up the bag with your beloved chess set, cradling it in your arms and glaring at Ruggie like he kicked your baby. "Why aren't you watching where you're going?"
The beastman's jaw dropped. "Y-you were the one to run into me?!"
You blinked. "Oh. Damn. You right," you admitted, tugging him up by his still outstretched hand. You dug around in your bag, pulling out a meat bun and pressing into his hands.
"I'll have to be knocked around by ya more if you'll do this every time, shishishi," he grinned. His blue eyes went from you, to the mirror, to the bag in your hands. "Hey, Prefect, where ya goin' with all that? Where's Grim?"
Your eyes sparkled. "I'm gonna go play chess with Leona. Grim is with ADeuce. They owed me from when I saved them from Azul."
"Uh," Ruggie faltered. "I don't think that's a good idea. Leona is–"
You pressed your index finger to his lips, patting his head reassuringly. 'Hush now, my child. Chess waits for no man." You frolicked away, jumping into the mirror, leaving a gobsmacked Ruggie behind.
The hyena stood there for a solid five minutes before pulling out his cellphone to call someone. "Hey, Ace, could you send Grim over to Savannaclaw? I think the Prefect’s finally lost it…"
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Leona awoke to the sounds of incessant knocking. He knew this pattern. How could he not from that night you and Grim were behaving like literal criminals after he oh-so generously let you sleep in his room for three days? Besides, you always carried with you the slight scent of charcoal and desperation. He turned over, groaning into his pillow. You'd go away eventually.
"LEONA," you hollered, fist pounding into the wood. "I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE THINKING; 'THEY'LL LEAVE IF I IGNORE THEM'. THAT WILL NOT HAPPEN."
Leona huffed, tail thumping on his mattress in annoyance before he threw his legs over the side, feet padding towards the door.
He opened it, standing in all his shirtless glory, chiseled abs on full display. His hair was tousled with sleep, emerald eyes droopy and cold. "The fuck you want, herbivore? I'm busy," Leona growled, judging your messy casual wear and the weird crazed look in your eyes. "You look like shit."
You grinned, holding up the bag. "I come bearing gifts. And chess. Mostly chess," you chortled, pushing him aside and setting yourself up on the floor. "Some say my presence IS a present. Maybe I was the gift all along..."
Leona stared at you, unable to decide whether to beat you up or allow your strange invitation of a chess match. You patted the spot next to you on the floor.
"C'mon, c'mon! I didn't know you guys had chess here! It's good, y'know?" you spoke, voice softening towards the end. "I thought I'd never see anything that was like home again. I know Crowley's trying and all, but sometimes it feels like I'll forget it all. Maybe chess will keep me tethered to my family and stuff. The way life used to be..."
Leona conceded almost instantaneously, lazily plopping down on the opposite side of the board. He couldn't say no after that. He'd just seem like an asshole and if people found out about it they'd have no hesitance in scorning him about it.
"Hmph. I'll bite, herbivore. I won't go easy on you just because you're homesick," the lion smirked, getting comfortable. "Be prepared."
You hummed, finishing setting up. "I wouldn't be so sure about that."
It was now that the Savannaclaw dorm leader really looked at the chessboard and ever so surely, the smugness deeply ingrained into his being faded away. There was no concrete checkered pattern to the board, squares varying in color. From what he could see there was red, pink, orange, green, yellow, purple, and blue. And the pieces? Leona couldn't even begin with them.
There was a skeleton who had 'tumblr #1' inscribed onto its back, a horse piece riding a knight piece into battle, pawns that were shaped like prawns, and two other pieces you explained were people called 'the pope and Queen Elizabeth.' After telling him you burst into tears and wouldn't stop for three minutes, repeatedly muttering 'blessed catholic rager' and 'Chicago deep-dish is a lie' under your breath. There was also one named Panda and it was a panda. No further explanation was given for this piece. The only piece that was normal as the king.
"Herbivore," Leona drawled, ears flicking. "This is not chess."
"Excuse me?"
Leona has never felt more terrified in his life. Not when Cheka was born. Not when he gained the ability to turn anything into sand. Not during his overblot. No, nothing could compare the concentration rage in the room from those few words he immediately tried to rectify.
"Why is it colorful?"
"Oh! That's fine if you don't understand!" you chirped, chipper once more. "Me and my mom played chess a little differently. You do know the basics right? The Queen, king, bishop, checkmate, blah-blah-blah, right?"
"Of course I do." the second-born growled.
Your eyes narrowed, hands pulling another item from your bag. A spray bottle. You placed it next to you, the threat looming over the lion's head. You did not move it. You did not speak of it. But it was there. The air felt heavy.
"Do you want me to explain the colors? You can organize the pieces however you'd like. Do you want yellow or red?"
"...yellow."
"M'kay."
You pushed the yellow colored pieces towards him, silently setting your own up in a bizarre way for a game of chess. Leona followed suit, setting his own up in a way befitting of a chess veteran.
"So," Leona huffed. "Why isn't it a normal black-and-white board?"
You cackled, slapping his arm like he said a funny joke, except there was no joke and you actually hit him really hard for a magicless human. "You're so silly! If I wanted a checkered patterned board I would've bought checkers!"
He bared his canines before immediately zipping his lips at the sight of your finger tracing the trigger to the accursed bottle.
"So," you began, clapping your hands together. "The pink ones you can land on no problem. Red ones you can't go on at all, so like solid walls. Orange ones change your flavor to orange. If either one of us lands on green we have to fight. My mom and I usually just did rock, paper, scissors, but I’m good with fighting if you’d like. Yellow squares electrocute you and force you to go back. Purple tiles force you to go to the next spot in the direction your piece is going. It also changes your flavor to lemon. The blue spots are water, so if it’s next to a yellow tile, since water conducts electricity, you’ll be forced backwards again. There’s also piranhas in the water, so if your flavor is orange they’ll attack you. But they don’t like lemon, so if your flavor is lemon you’re okay.”
Leona blinked, tail going stiff. “...how is this even chess, herbivore?”
You smiled devilishly. “The pieces still move the same, and you still need to capture the king. You want me to explain again or should we start?”
He nodded, feebly trying to keep his pride intact. “Weird or not, I’ll still wipe the floor with ya.”
You slid a prawn onto an orange square. “Let the games begin.”
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Leona was at a loss. He’d been doing okay, all things considered once he got the hang of things. You pointed out his mistakes which he took with begrudging grace. You and him tousled a few times because of the green square, and even though you tended to use the spray bottle to your advantage, the wins had been split evenly. He had even managed to knock a few of your prawns and a panda off the board.
“Your turn,” he yawned, doing a stretch that stole his soul for a minute, only to witness your skeleton checkmating his king from your endzone.
“I win~” you cheered, words slurring slightly from terribly covered up exhaustion. “Better luck next time, Leoooooooooo.”
He was too shooketh to even acknowledge the nickname. Leona was smart. Chess was his game, his intellectual battlefield of choice. He loved the feeling of getting into the opponents head, surprising them by perfectly counteracting their strategy with his own. But, Leona didn’t know if being in your head right now was the best place to be. “What. The. Fuck? How is that even possible?”
“You killed too many of my guys in a row, so the skeleton got your king because of karma,” you responded, flopping onto the floor with a sympathy yawn.
He scowled, nudging the board with his foot. “Rematch. Now.”
You didn’t respond. He nudged you with a foot instead. “Herbivore.”
Still no answer. Too lazy to get up and see why you weren't responding, he just tugged you by your leg until you were next to him. Bad move on his part, as you identified him as a plush and proceeded to hold his arm in your vice-like grip.
Asleep. You had the audacity to fall asleep in the presence of Prince Leona Kingscholar after demolishing him in the strangest game of chess he’s ever seen.
“Honk, shoo, mimimimi~” you snored. You looked at peace, the smell of desperation and fear quelled, if only for a little while. He could tell you were tired, more so than you usually were. Leona saw how much that game meant to you. How for once in all the time he knew you, that spark of life found its home in your eyes. How, finally, you stopped chasing your world, fixing people's problems that had nothing to do with you, and just existed.
Leona…. Leona couldn't bring himself to wake you up. Instead he curled up around you, allowing you to cling to his arm, and promptly fell asleep too.
Everyone knows to never wake Leona up from a nap.
But he wouldn’t mind…
If it was you who did.
OMAKE:
Ruggie Bucchi was nervous, more so than the time autocorrect turned his name into 'rugged zucchini' in a text from Leona. He laughed–which was a bad idea on his part–and the prince turned his secret snack stash into sand. It was a tragic day.
He, joined by a certain fluffy monster, stood in front of Leona's door. Ruggie had explained the prefect's apparent crazed state over the phone, Grim begrudgingly joining him, motivated by one thing, and one thing only.
Tuna.
"Myeh," Grim grumbled from his current perch on his shoulder. "Jus' open the door. I'm hungry, and my henchman didn't remember to get the cans with the tabs so I can't open 'em."
"Yeah, yeah," Ruggie huffed, rolling his shoulder in a way that nudged Grim onto the floor. "Get offa me, will ya?"
"Hmph! I guess you don't need the great Grim-sama's help then..."
The hyena froze. There was no way in hell he was going in alone. With practiced ease from his epic gamer street skills–totally not because he cast his signature spell on Grim, nuh uh--Ruggie forced the feline in front of the entrance, pushing the door open.
"PREFECT, GRIM WAS LOOKIN' FOR YA!"
"MYEH?!!"
"Shishishi," Ruggie cackled, delighting in his expert plan to make Grim bear the brunt of whatever was happening inside Leona's dorm room.
You shot up at the mention of your title, head knocking into Leona's at the speed of sound. "I'M SORRY I DIDN'T MEAN TO BEAT IDIA IN WARIO CART, I'M JUST TOO GOOD AT NUTNUTCO MALL–" you wheezed, eyes darting toward the location of the voice. You visibly relaxed when you realized it was just your son and Ruggie. "Oh, hey, what's up, dog?"
Grim bounded over to you, tucking himself into your arms and blubbering on and on about how he was hungry. You in turn gave him a tight squeeze, fishing around in the bag you'd brought the chess set in for an extra pork bun.
Ruggie, on the other hand, simply raised a trembling hand towards the handle, trying to slip out as easily as he could.
The lion had awoken. And he was not happy about it.
"Oi. Ruggie. Get your ass over here," Leona growled, green eyes shining with malice as a condescending smile spread on his lips. He let his magic pool into his fingertips, activating his signature spell. "I oughta give you a hug too."
"No thanks," Ruggie grinned nervously, booking it. "I choose life."
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A/N: This is probably ass bananas and ooc but I DONT CARE HAHAHHA
I was thinking of doing a period comfort except you don’t need comfort, the boys do
Its a funny little concept that i think is good cuz i personally have pretty tame periods
I might start with ruggie, comment who i should start with lol
Reblogs and comments shall fuel me
