It was another beautiful day at Acme Looniversity, and the students were gathered in the outdoor track and field stadium for their first class of the morning: physical education. They were currently stretching under the supervision of the Roadrunner, preparing for a race around the stadium. While the students were stretching, they chattered excitedly amongst themselves - most of them bragged about how they would be easily taking second place today. Second place was their target of choice since it was widely agreed that there was no point shooting for first place - after all, that honor had always gone to Little Beeper, and there was little to no chance that would change today!
Changing that was, of course, exactly what Calamity Coyote had in mind today. He had gotten a pair of Acme Super Speed Boots a week ago to try to catch Little Beeper, but they failed catastrophically (and, eventually, explosively). This did not discourage Calamity, however. He thought the idea behind the boots was sound but - like most Acme products he had gotten his paws on - simply needed a more personalized touch. For the last few days, he had started from scratch; he tweaked the configuration and made improvements, rebuilding and redesigning components, until he finally had a pair of speed boots of his own design! He had put the finishing touches on them this morning, so this would be their field test. Calamity looked over at Little Beeper - catching him wasn't his goal. Not today, anyway. No, Calamity's current goal was to take first place in this race! Catching Little Beeper could wait until after he was knocked down a peg or two.
Roadrunner blew his whistle, and the students lined up at the starting line. Calamity lined up along with everybody else, then took the opportunity to flip a switch on his boots, causing them to whirr softly. After making sure everybody was ready to race, Roadrunner blew his whistle one more time to signal the race's start. Both Little Beeper and Calamity took off in a blur, leaving everybody back at the starting time in their dust (quite literally, as their departure kicked up sand and dirt in a huge cloud, leaving everybody coughing). Little Beeper was cruising along, but noticed something out of the corner of his eye. He glanced to his side, shocked to find Calamity keeping up with him quite easily! The shock wore off rather quickly, and instead turned into mischievous playfulness. Calamity wanted to race, did he? Little Beeper stuck out his tongue, and with a loud "beep beep!" he sped up, diverting off of the track and running towards the school. Calamity knew his goal was to win the race, and all he had to do was ignore Little Beeper. By the time Little Beeper realized Calamity wasn't following him, Calamity would have crossed the finish line. But if he did, then he wouldn't get to see the look on Little Beeper's face. Calamity cursed himself, and despite knowing it was a terrible idea, he turned off of the track as well, taking the bait and following Little Beeper.
Little Beeper led Calamity on a wild chase throughout the school building. Their sheer speed resulted in their wake practically being a sonic boom in the closed corridors and rooms of the school. Glass windows shattered; lockers in the halls flew open and their contents scattered everywhere; chairs and tables and food in the lunchroom went flying; even the library wasn't safe from their chase as a hurricane of books got flung into every corner of the library. Little Beeper figured that would be enough, and headed back outside towards the race field. Calamity was in hot pursuit, determined to catch up and beat the roadrunner at his own game. As the pair got outside, they noticed the other students were approaching the finish line. Little Beeper picked up his pace even more, rocketing towards the finish, and Calamity likewise pushed his boots to their limit. The whirring sound got louder and louder and became more and more high-pitched until, just as he reached the track, the boots started to sputter and cough, their limited power source out of energy. At this point, their high-speed effect was quickly lost. With no way to keep his momentum up, Calamity tumbled forward head over heels, rolling forward almost like a bowling ball. Unable to change his trajectory, he slammed into the mass of other students, sending them flying with a loud "crash," very much like bowling pins being knocked over! Little Beeper, however, was far enough ahead to be out of harm's way. With Calamity and the others taken out, Little Beeper was free to cross the finish line unchallenged, winning first place as usual!
The other students got to their feet, glaring at Calamity. He just smiled awkwardly, embarrassed over his failure. Great job taking down everybody but Little Beeper, he thought to himself. The other students took off towards the finish line again, and Calamity sighed, sitting up and dusting himself off. At least it could have been worse, he thought with a sigh. At least his boots didn't...
Calamity's thought was cut off by his boots beginning to whirr once more. The whirr grew into a higher and higher pitch, getting louder and louder. Calamity cringed, and the boots suddenly exploded in a bright flash of light. Calamity lay on the ground flat on his back; the singed, blackened remnants of the boots were still on his feet. Calamity groaned, holding up a white "surrender" flag to nobody in particular.
As Calamity sat up, he noticed several of the teachers were standing nearby, glaring at him. Calamity quickly became nervous; this couldn't have been a good sign. The other teachers, upon hearing the racket inside the school building earlier, looked out. Since they only got a glimpse of the tail end of the chase, all they saw was a grey blur, completely missing the red-and-orange blur he was chasing after. They all went to none other than Wile E. Coyote, figuring he would have the best idea how to handle the situation with his prize apprentice. Wile, standing at the front of the pack, pointed at Calamity and beckoned him to follow. Calamity stood up and hung his head ashamedly, silently following Wile inside. Roadrunner followed close after, and the other teachers brought up the rear. As they entered the school building, Wile led Calamity to his office. Calamity took a seat at Wile's desk, and he closed the door behind them.
"So," Wile said, going over to take a seat in his own chair across the desk from Calamity, "would you care to explain yourself? Perhaps you could enlighten me on why our school looks like a tornado blew through?" Calamity desperately pointed down at the singed boots he was still wearing, a desperate look on his face. Surely Wile would understand! "Yes, yes, I see that. Very nice," Wile commented dryly. "And did those boots also force you to run through the school at whatever ludicrous speed you were going?" Calamity looked outraged over being blamed like that, and he pulled out a sign with Little Beeper's picture on it, pointing accusingly at it. Wile sighed, shaking his head. "Calamity Coyote, I must say that I'm very disappointed in you! There is a time and a place to chase roadrunners. Believe me, I know very well how tempting it is. But I will tell you one thing - during classes when you are supposed to be learning other things is neither that time nor that place!" Calamity could hardly believe what he was hearing. How could Wile E. Coyote of all people do this to him? Wile was his hero, his mentor, his inspiration! Was he seriously telling him that chasing Little Beeper was wrong? Calamity crossed his arms and looked away from Wile angrily, saying nothing but a small "hmph!"
Wile looked Calamity over. He needed the younger coyote to learn a lesson, but it wasn't one he could simply tell him. This was a lesson Calamity had to learn on his own. Wile stood up, and Calamity looked back over at him.
"Calamity, you need to think about your actions." Great, Calamity thought, just give me detention and get it over with. But Wile's punishment came as a complete shock to Calamity. "Effective immediately, you are banned from chasing Little Beeper during school hours." Calamity was taken aback for a moment. He was shocked - he couldn't mean that! Calamity jumped to his feet, about to argue with Wile. "No buts!" Wile said, stopping Calamity before he could get a word out. "You need to learn to take responsibility for the consequences of your actions. If you even so much as think about going after Little Beeper while you're at school, you will be in a heap of trouble. And I don't think you want a parent-teacher conference to come out of this, do you?" Wile said, threateningly. Calamity's eyes widened in horror, and he shook his head no vigorously. The last thing he wanted was for his parents to come down on him on top of his teachers! Wile nodded. "Good, I'm glad you understand. Now, then, you had best get started." Calamity looked confused at this. Started on what? Wile handed him a large push broom and a dust pan. "You didn't think that was your only punishment, did you? This school isn't going to clean itself up, after all. So get started. And think about what you did!" Wile ordered. Calamity hung his head and his ears drooped, defeated. Silently, he turned towards the door, dragging the broom and dust pan dejectedly behind him. "One last thing, Calamity," Wile said. Calamity stopped and looked back, and Wile walked around his desk, moving to stand in front of Calamity. He knelt down in front of him to be at eye level. "Don't just think about what you did. You're brighter than that. Think about why." Calamity looked confused at this last bit, but Wile stood back up and opened the door, ushering him out.
Calamity walked out to find Roadrunner standing next to the door to Wile's office. Roadrunner didn't mean to eavesdrop, but as he waited outside, he had overheard everything. He looked at Calamity, concerned, but Calamity ignored him, using his broom to push along some bits of glass and debris as he gloomily walked away down the hallway. Roadrunner watched him go, then went into Wile's office. Wile looked up at Roadrunner, who was giving him a hesitant, questioning look. Wile had known him for a very long time, and he had a pretty good idea of exactly what was on his mind.
"Don't bother, I know what you're going to say," Wile said. Roadrunner raised an eyebrow at this. "And no, I was not too hard on him. But he really needs to think about what happened. Besides, he's got the whole school to clean up, so he'll have all day long to think about it!" Wile said with a chuckle. He smiled at Roadrunner, cordially putting an arm around his shoulder as he led them back out towards the field, closing his office door behind him. "Don't you worry, Roadie. He's a bright lad. He'll have it all figured out by the end of the day, I'd wager!" Roadrunner nodded. He trusted Wile's judgment, and he just hoped he was right!
Calamity was smart, that much was true. But Wile failed to account for self-pity interrupting Calamity's ability to think rationally. The first hour of cleaning had left Calamity feeling numb, the memory of everything that happened seemingly replaying in his head on loop. He felt like his body was on auto-pilot as he swept up messes throughout the halls of Acme Looniversity. But now his brain was finally starting to kick into gear again, and Calamity wasn't happy about the situation at all. It felt like forever already that he had been cleaning up this mess. No, not just "this" mess. Little Beeper's mess! Calamity growled to himself, wondering why he was the only one who got a talking to and who got punished for this. After all, Little Beeper was just as guilty as he was! Calamity looked up to see how much further he had to go, and his heart sank. The hallway seemed to stretch on forever, and this was still just the first of many. At this rate, Calamity realized, he might really be here for the rest of the day. And all night. And maybe some of the next day, too. Calamity decided there had to be a better way. He looked around, finding nobody in sight. With the coast clear, Calamity ducked into a nearby janitor's closet, locking the door. He flipped on the light, and looked around to see what was in the closet. It wasn't an optimal workplace, but he knew he couldn't risk getting to the science lab for fear that Wile might find him there and think he was trying to evade his punishment. But no one would check in here, and there were enough things in here that he could carry out his plan! Calamity started gathering up the tool kits, and materials, and stray tools, and took inventory.
Once he gathered up everything he needed, Calamity slipped his boots off, and set to work on them. He cleaned them up, then opened them up and started to perform some repairs. He was able to use the materials in the closet to replace and repair some of the blown out (and blown up) parts. He ripped a few parts out, and made some new additions and emergency replacements, tweaking and optimizing the settings based on how the boots performed earlier. It took almost another full hour, but Calamity was eventually satisfied with his repairs, and slipped his boots back on. He peeked out into the hallway, finding the coast was still clear. He stepped out of the janitor's closet and knelt down, adjusting a newly-installed dial on the sides of his boots. He hesitated for a moment - after all, he didn't really have a chance to test these changes, and if anything went wrong there was a very good chance he was going to be in even more trouble than he was already in. He thought about it for a moment, but nodded resolutely, flipping the switch to turn the boots on. He was confident that he had done a satisfactory job adjusting and fixing the boots. With his push broom and dust pan in hand, he sped off down the hall. The boots rocketed Calamity along quickly, but not nearly as fast as during the earlier race. To his great pleasure, Calamity moved like a flash, cleaning up the messes and scattered debris in hardly any time at all! The glass was all swept up, lockers' contents were tossed back inside and closed, the chairs and tables in the lunchroom were fixed, and all the messes from the food cleaned. Even the rather large library took but a few minutes to gather up all the books and get them back onto their proper shelves. With that complete, Calamity breathed a sigh of relief. He was done, and he had done it successfully!
With his task completed, Calamity flipped his boots off just in time to hear the bell ring signaling the start to lunch time. Calamity couldn't decide if he really wasn't hungry, or if he really just didn't want to be around anybody else right now. Either way, he figured he would skip lunch today and stay in the library. Nobody every came to the library during lunch time, so he could get some quality reading time in, at least! He went over to a bookshelf, and pulled out a thick book, bringing it back over to one of the tables in the library and tossing it down with a loud thud. It was a complicated book that discussed electronics, wiring, and how to optimize the efficiency of electrical circuits. Calamity sat down and started reading through the book. He found himself quite interested in the contents, and was so focused on the material that he was paying no attention to his surroundings. That just made the sudden, loud "beep beep!" from behind him startle him all the more, enough to almost fall out of his chair in surprise! He glared back to find Little Beeper standing behind him. As soon as Calamity looked at him, Little Beeper stuck his tongue out and dashed off out of the library. Calamity just growled loudly. He knew if he chased Little Beeper, he would be in a heap of trouble. He was already in enough trouble as it was. And now Little Beeper was trying to make it worse, he thought! It made his blood boil, remembering that he was the only one in trouble after this morning. Little Beeper was clearly not under any restrictions like he was.
Calamity tried to get the thought out of his head and calm himself down. He had to distract himself, he had to stop thinking about it. He turned his attention back to his book, but every time he tried to start reading, Little Beeper came back in and taunted him, almost daring him to chase him! As Little Beeper dashed off for the third time in a row, Calamity finally slammed the book shut. Steam was practically shooting out of his ears. He was furious, and he was sorely tempted to go after Little Beeper. But he knew for a fact that somehow, someway, if he were to disobey Wile's orders, he would find out somehow. Calamity could feel himself growing angrier and angrier. He finally stood up, grabbing the book, and made a hasty decision. If he wasn't allowed chase Little Beeper and he was going to keep pestering him at school all day, then he decided it was time to turn to drastic measures. His name was already mud with the teachers today, and there was no way the day was going to get any better. Calamity was angry enough to go through with something he never thought he would do in a million years, something he was willing to risk getting into even more trouble for doing: he would skip school for the rest of the day!
Little Beeper stood outside of the library, waiting. He and Calamity had known each other for all of their lives, and among the many things Little Beeper excelled at, pushing Calamity's buttons to make him mad was one of his top talents. He knew Calamity especially hated to be bothered while he was reading. "So why isn't he chasing me?" Little Beeper wondered to himself. He quickly got his answer as Calamity stomped out of the library, the large book tucked under his arm. Little Beeper grinned - it was about time! Little Beeper stuck out his tongue and was about to run off, but quickly noticed something was off. Calamity wasn't heading for him. In fact, Calamity didn't even look at Little Beeper! Instead, he stormed by without even acknowledging the roadrunner's presence. Little Beeper froze, and watched him go. What was this, why wasn't Calamity chasing him? After a moment of thought, Little Beeper wondered if he went a little too far today getting Calamity in trouble today. The fact that Calamity was in big trouble was almost immediately known to the entire student body. The specifics of his punishment, however, were not. That was known only to the teachers and to Calamity himself. With Calamity ignoring him, Little Beeper had the rest of his lunch break free. He shrugged, and headed back towards the lunchroom. "Maybe I'll go easy on him for the rest of the day," he thought to himself with a smile. After all, what fun was there in being the best if you didn't have a rival to outsmart?
Lunch was over soon after, and Little Beeper dashed off to his next class. Little Beeper took his seat, and watched as the rest of the students came in. As the final bell rang to start classes, however, he noticed a conspicuously empty desk in the classroom. Little Beeper could hardly focus on the class - where was Calamity, he wondered idly? Had he managed to get himself into more trouble? Did he not feel well? Maybe he went to the nurse's office? Perhaps he had to report to Wile? It was the same for the rest of the classes for the day, and Little Beeper's curiosity turned to worry. He decided that he should probably find Calamity as soon as school was out for the day.
The rest of the school day seemed to take forever, but the final bell rang, and the students were dismissed for the day. Little Beeper dashed off, deciding to check around the campus first. He checked all of the normal places he would usually find Calamity, peeking into the library, the science lab, the clinic, and even the lunchroom. With no sign of the coyote anywhere, Little Beeper decided to expand his search to some of the not-so-normal places, too. He looked in classrooms, peeked into the teachers' offices, and even went outside, looking all around the school grounds. With how fast he was, it didn't take Little Beeper long to check every inch of the campus, and he was pretty sure Calamity was nowhere in the area. There was one last place to check, Little Beeper thought to himself - Calamity's house.
Most of the students of Acme Looniversity and their families lived in a small suburb, located between the school and the main city. Little Beeper and Calamity were no exception, and their houses were actually located quite close to each other. Little Beeper had been to Calamity's house once or twice before, but it was usually when he was working one of his part-time jobs during summer vacation, delivering things. It was a very nice house, Little Beeper thought as he ran up - Calamity's dad got a very good job in the city, so they were able to afford a much larger house than Little Beeper's family was. It was a two-story brick house, and it had a rather large basement as well. Little Beeper headed towards the back of the house, finding a small window near the foundation of the house. This window led to the basement, which Calamity had taken over and turned into his laboratory and workshop. Usually whenever Little Beeper ran through, he could see Calamity at his work table in the middle of the basement, either tinkering with parts and building something or drawing up complicated-looking plans. Little Beeper found Calamity in the basement, but to his surprise, Calamity was not busy working today. Instead, the work table was cleared off, and he had a chess board set up.
Calamity pensively looked over the chess board, deep in thought. Little Beeper was confused by this - was there someone else there with Calamity playing chess? He didn't see anybody, though. Was he playing against himself, then? Little Beeper tapped on the window, causing Calamity to jump in surprise. He looked up, frowning at the sight of the roadrunner. "What is he doing here?" Calamity wondered to himself. Little Beeper pointed towards the front of the house, running off. Calamity sighed and got up, heading up the stairs towards the front door. "Well that's just great," he thought. "I can't even get away from him today outside of school, either." Calamity opened the front door, finding Little Beeper already standing there and waiting. Little Beeper waved hello and smiled, but Calamity just rolled his eyes. He gestured for Little Beeper to come in, and Little Beeper nodded in gratitude, walking past Calamity and heading straight down towards the basement. Calamity closed the door and went to follow Little Beeper when he suddenly realized something: Wile had specifically forbade him from chasing Little Beeper during school hours. It was after school now, so Little Beeper was fair game. Not only that, but Little Beeper was in his house, going right to his very base of operations! And yet, despite it all, Calamity didn't even care enough to try. He was still annoyed over the whole day. He was annoyed at Little Beeper, yes, but he was annoyed with himself, too.
As Calamity came down the stairs, Little Beeper was already looking at the chess board, curious at what Calamity was doing with it. He looked at the chess board, then back over at Calamity, inquisitively. Calamity walked up and started to reset the chess board. Little Beeper watched, but wondered why Calamity was cooped up in the basement playing a game by himself. He would have much rather Calamity come with him to the park, or into the city itself, and chase him! He loved playing those kinds of games with Calamity, not so much the kind where he had to sit down, and sit still, and think. Calamity finished setting up the board, and gestured at the other chair, offering for Little Beeper to sit down. Little Beeper just looked at Calamity blankly, tipping his head in confusion. He knew what chess was, of course, but he had never actually played it before, and he had absolutely no idea how to play! Calamity rolled his eyes once again, and opened a notebook sitting next to the board, ripping out a blank sheet of paper from near the back. He quickly scribbled something down, then set it on the table in front of Little Beeper's seat. It had pictures of all the pieces and how they move, and some quick notes on the rules of chess. Little Beeper shrugged, and sat down. He could humor the coyote for a while, he thought.
Calamity went first, moving one of his pawns out, then scribbling something down in the notebook. Little Beeper looked over curiously, finding the notebook seemed to be full of logs of other chess games. He looked down at the board, overwhelmed by the pieces. What should he do? Calamity had given him the directions, and the rules, but Little Beeper had no idea where to even begin. He moved a pawn at random as well. The game continued like this for a while. Little Beeper had no ideas, no plans of what he was doing. Even worse, he felt like he was taking hours deciding what to do. Calamity, on the other hand, didn't even seem to be thinking about his moves. As soon as Little Beeper had moved his piece, Calamity immediately made his move, scribbling the moves down in his notebook. As the game went on, Little Beeper started to understand it a bit more. He found himself having to check his reference sheet less and less, and Calamity only had to correct him once or twice from trying to move a piece the wrong way. Little Beeper noticed occasionally during the game that when he made a move, he could see Calamity frown out of the corner of his eye. He couldn't help but grin when it happened; he guessed that meant he made a good move, wrecking Calamity's plans. This game was really complicated, Little Beeper thought, but he was surprised to find just how hard he was trying to figure out what the right move to make was. He wanted to win!
The game continued for quite a while. The number of the pieces on the board dwindled as Calamity and Little Beeper captured the pieces of the other. It was Calamity's turn, and he took another of Little Beeper's pawns. Little Beeper didn't even notice, but his body tensed as Calamity did. He had no idea he was getting more and more agitated by the game. Little Beeper looked over the board, idly thinking to himself while he considered his next move. It was too bad pawns couldn't move faster, he thought. Pawns should be able to move as fast as their player, because then the game would be over in a flash and he would have already overrun Calamity's pieces with pawns running circles around them! And then they could go play something more fun. Little Beeper's eyes stopped as he noticed something - Calamity had captured one of Little Beeper's pawns, but that left his queen undefended. And Little Beeper's knight was in a perfect position to take the queen! Little Beeper grinned, and moved his knight to take Calamity's queen. Maybe the game would be over sooner than he thought. Maybe he could win!
As he took the queen, he looked up at Calamity, who didn't even seem the least bit bothered by the loss. Instead, Calamity moved his bishop from across the board to take Little Beeper's knight, then scribbled something down in his notebook again. This time, however, he held the notebook up so Little Beeper could read what he wrote. Most of the lines of the game were simple chess notation, but Calamity had made notes next to a few of them. The notes were in shorthand, so Little Beeper had no idea what most of them meant. The note next to the last move, however, was written clearly so Little Beeper could read it. "Check. Mate in 1. You played really well for your first time, Little Beeper, good game!" Little Beeper looked at Calamity in surprise, and the coyote gave a friendly smile back at him. Calamity meant what he had written - for never having played before, Little Beeper caught on very quickly and made some good moves!
Little Beeper, however, looked back down at the board, refusing to believe it. The queen was a trap, he realized! It was a cunningly laid trap, and he had fallen for it! He looked over the board, almost in a panic, and found Calamity was quite right. There was only one move Little Beeper could make now, and it would allow Calamity to put him into checkmate next turn, winning the game. He looked at every piece, desperate to find another option, trying to find something to get him out of it... but there was nothing. Little Beeper felt like something snapped inside of him, and in a sort of quiet fury, he frowned and used his wing to forcefully sweep the pieces off of the board. The pieces went flying off to the side, and the loud clatter as they hit the wall and floor echoed throughout the otherwise silent basement. Calamity's eyes widened in surprise - he definitely didn't expect that reaction. The two sat in awkward silence. Calamity looked at Little Beeper, who sat with his wings crossed, frowning. He was deliberately avoiding looking at Calamity at the moment.
Calamity almost felt bad at first. He had no idea Little Beeper was such a sore loser. Sore loser? Of course he had no idea, he realized suddenly. He had never seen Little Beeper actually lose at anything! Calamity won - not just won, he thought, but he had actually beaten Little Beeper at something! This was a first! "So why am I not happy about winning?" he wondered. He always thought that the day he beat Little Beeper would be a day for celebration. But Calamity didn't feel like celebrating right now, not even a little bit. After a little more thought, Calamity realized it wasn't just Little Beeper's reaction to losing (though that didn't help the matter), but it was more the realization of what he beat Little Beeper at in the first place. Any fleeting feeling of joy quickly faded. "Congratulations," Calamity thought dejectedly to himself. "You've played chess all your life, and you beat Little Beeper when it was his first time playing. That's a real accomplishment," he thought sarcastically to himself. Calamity was just about to fall even deeper into his self-pity, when another thought suddenly struck him. This was the first time he had ever asked Little Beeper to do something that Calamity enjoyed doing (that didn't involve chasing him). More importantly, it was the first time he asked Little Beeper to do something Calamity was actually good at doing. Usually, Calamity chased after Little Beeper, or tried to beat Little Beeper at his own games. Calamity was dumbfounded by the realization. "Is that why I always seem to fail so miserably?" he wondered. Was it because he tried to beat the roadrunner at things he was naturally good at, but Calamity wasn't? Was that what Wile meant when he told Calamity to think not about what happened, but why?
While Calamity was lost in thought, Little Beeper was irritated. Not just irritated, but he was downright angry over the fact that he lost. He hated losing. "It's fine," he thought, trying to justify it to himself. "After all, I've never played that game before. Of course I lost to Calamity, there's nothing wrong with that! It's fine," he repeated. "Besides, I just lost at some nerd game, that's all." As the thought crossed his mind, it startled Little Beeper. He was surprised to hear the words echo through his mind - he had never thought of anything quite that disparaging towards Calamity or any of his friends, and he certainly didn't believe it at all. He was certainly having a good enough time playing that he got wrapped up in trying his hardest to win for the last hour or so. Was he really so upset that he was lashing out at others? He quickly became ashamed of himself. He had never thought of Calamity as a nerd; in fact, that was the furthest thing from his mind. He thought of Calamity as a playmate, a sort of best friend-slash-rival with whom he always had a good time. He discreetly glanced over at Calamity, finding the coyote staring off into space, lost in his own thoughts. He looked a little sad, and that just made Little Beeper feel all the more ashamed. He realized that every time they did anything together, Little Beeper always made sure to rub it in Calamity's face. In fact, he'd probably still be gloating over his victory even now, maybe even well into tomorrow. He never stopped to think what Calamity would do if he ever came out on top. But that day had come, and what did Calamity do? He complimented Little Beeper on his effort! Little Beeper felt sick to his stomach - he repaid Calamity by blowing up at him and demeaning his achievement.
Little Beeper thought back to everything he put Calamity through that day (and, to be honest, most other days), and Calamity was still kind enough to invite him in and offer to play a game with him. He just wanted to play with Calamity, but he came to the same realization Calamity did - he never gave a single thought to what Calamity might want to do. He assumed that Calamity enjoyed chasing him and wasn't interested in doing anything else. "I really did push him too far," Little Beeper realized. It made him feel guilty, realizing he was the reason Calamity didn't want to chase him today. If that was the case, he certainly didn't help the matter at all by getting angry just now.
He looked over at the chess pieces laying on the floor, and sighed. He hopped up out of the chair, and the sudden movement startled Calamity out of his own thoughts. Calamity wasn't sure what to say or do, but he was surprised to see Little Beeper quietly go over and start picking up the chess pieces. He brought them back over and set them onto the chess board, looking up at Calamity. Little Beeper said nothing, but the look on his face said it all for him, sending a clear message to Calamity that he was extremely embarrassed and felt very bad about what he did. Little Beeper continued staring at Calamity for a moment, hoping that he wouldn't be too angry with him. Calamity just smiled awkwardly, though, much to the roadrunner's relief. With that out of the way, Little Beeper started to place the chess pieces back down on the board. Calamity watched him, confused and slightly surprised. What was Little Beeper doing now, Calamity wondered? Little Beeper finished setting up the pieces, and though the board was set up completely wrong, he smiled sheepishly and held up a sign to the coyote.
"Best two out of three?"