chess
Returning to his anarchist cult was less nostalgic and less warm than expected. The warmth was the result of an incoming cold front, driving rain before it that chatters across metal siding and pooled in corners with badly sealed concrete.
The lack there, of nostalgia, came from a constant checking of former friends, what had he been up to? What were his recent contributions to the cause?
Odd. He had helps found this small sect. And things had changed significantly, but he was a helper, an orchestrator of it’s greatests successes if also - a participant in it’s greatest defeat.
Oprah’s Rook Club (not a cult) had started as an intense if fun-loving chess meetup group. Every Wednesday without fail, they dragged out storage bins from the back room of a Denver brewery and pulled out worn yet serviceable thick matted rollup chess boards, the quality silicone kind that could stand up to a few beer spills.
The great success came in mid 2027. When the facists came a calling, pawns, knights, rooks and the queer pieces between - having the trust built over so many meetings - eagerly formed ranks of opposition. The several hundred strong league of chess players (and its correspondingly well trusted and verified email list serve) brought their best freinds, who brought their trusted confidants; to sign up early and complete the requisite training to become election workers - poll workers. The ORC crowd ran nearly every polling location in the city and county of Denver, and lo and behold, the expected turnaways and listed denials were quite low in that locale. A sweeping victory of same day registrations, verifications of documents, quick collection and processing of mail in ballots.
The ignomious defeat followed swiftly. Corporate backers of their home pub suddenly put pressure on the owners. Cease and Desist letters, once posted proudly by the club runners piled high upon doorsteps. An anarchist collectives strength relies comes from its ability to self organize and execute a vision. But it also means they spill out, like water across aluminum roofing, and slide between ill sealed concrete and dissipate into nothing quite efficiently too.
When not channeled towards a goal, all the rain of a storm front is simply a drizzle waiting to disappear into the parched high plains dirt.
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But, the stakes had changed now. Nil (also known as Second Place) had returned with renewed purpose. There was another battle to fight, and this one not so real, but surreal. In his errant travels and questing he had found a portal. And this portal led to a land, a fantasy place, castles - cascading waterfalls, lily green valleys cast gold by picturesque sunsets. Knights and wizards and warlocks. He had found him services sorely in need There, and after stabilizing the situation, found himself sorely in need of the kind of help one doesn’t find in bucolic, mid fantasy realms.
He needed nerds. Programmers. Esoteric artists. But mostly he needed an army - strike that. He needed army COMMANDERS.
Thus the return to his chess club cum anarchist (we swear were not a cult) collective.
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K-Nights. Mechanical armies. Warfare and raids. AI enemies - pitched battles…
The ingnmoius defeat came in mid 2027.