Armageddon
John didn't know how the chessboard arrived at 221B Baker Street—and it was likely Sherlock would never tell him.
It was average, nothing too extraordinary. Black and white, wooden pieces.
A few of the pieces were chipped—just some cheap balsa wood, Sherlock would say.
For the most part, it went unnoticed. John didn't know how to play, and didn't really care to. So it sat, taking up space and collecting dust. Unmoved and untouched.
The pieces were set, prepared for two players to begin their game.
John once tried to move the chessboard to make room for some books, but Sherlock moved it back when John wasn't looking.
Sometimes he would sit before it in his mind palace, staying there for hours. John didn't think anything of it until he saw him move a white pawn, just one space. He spun the board around so the other half was facing him, grabbed his coat, and left.
This was hardly unusual behavior, even for Sherlock. Shrugging it off, he went to his laptop and sat down to update his blog. They had just finished another case. 'The Great Game', he would call it.
As he leaned forward to take a sip of his tea, something caught his eye in his peripheral. He turned to the concave between the wall and the fireplace, where a small, white object lay in the shadow.
John was surprised to find that it was the white king, having been removed from the chessboard. He was shocked that he didn't notice it was missing before.
On top, there was a short stub where something was broken off. He patted around in the corner and found a miniscule cross. The king's crown was pauperized, but corrigible.
He put the king's body back on the chessboard and the crown on the mantelpiece, making a mental note to fix it later.
Forgetting about his blog, he sat at the chessboard, staring at it. The solitary pawn meant nothing to John, but he knew that Sherlock had started to play the game, but with whom, he didn't know.
He was overwhelmed by an odd sense of curiosity. For the first time in a while, he wondered why the chess set was ever here. What possessed Sherlock to purchase a—
That's a stupid question.
It could have been anything—likely an ephemeral interest in chess. With his capricious personality, he will undoubtedly purchase such strange things on a whim.
However, he was still intrigued, thought he wasn't sure why. And he couldn't explain the sudden initiation. Just to satisfy his curiosity, he placed a black pawn forward one space, still unsure if it was a legal maneuver. He may have interfered with whatever he was doing, but he only wanted to know what that was exactly.
The next day, John came home from a milk run and found Sherlock in his mind palace. Once again, he was sitting at the chessboard. John did a double-take when he saw that another white pawn had been moved, this time, it was two spaces away from its original row.
Sherlock's eyes were closed, and he seemed deep in thought. John slowly stepped over to the board, trying not to interrupt Sherlock's concentration. He took another black pawn and moved it two spaces, mimicking Sherlock's strategy.
Just as John's pawn was placed on the board, Sherlock awoke, but didn't pay any attention to John.
"Armageddon, that's what it's called. Oh, there's always something."
John was startled by his sudden interjection. "P-Pardon?"
Sherlock turned his head, "Armageddon chess, a variation of fast chess in which White must win the match for a victory, but Black can draw to win the match. Simple."
Sherlock turned back to the chessboard and moved his knight ahead of the row of pawns. He lay back down on the couch and motioned for John to take his turn.
"No. No, I don't even—forget it. "
"You were the one who continued the game. Finish it."
John laughed. "This is ridiculous. It's a bloody chess game. Doesn't matter," he said as he put the milk in the refrigerator. "Good night."
John found the chessboard undisturbed the next morning—of course. Sherlock was gone, so he was left to work on his blog, which he had quickly forgotten about. However, he couldn't keep his mind off of the chessboard behind him.
Sherlock obviously wanted to play this 'Armageddon' chess game. But he surely knew that John didn't know how to play. A fruitless endeavor, trying to get him to play chess.
It's just a game, John.
As he fixed his breakfast, he remembered what Mycroft had told him at their first meeting.
When you walk with Sherlock Holmes, you see the battlefield.
John stopped, pondering this.
Just a coincidence...
The board remained untouched for several days. No one had moved their piece. John assumed that Sherlock had given up. He took the chessboard and went to—carefully—move it to the other table across the room. Along the way, he tripped over the rug, causing him to jerk forward. He thought he would lose all of the chess pieces, but found that the board was magnetic.
To further test his discovery, he flipped the board upside down. Just as suspected, the pieces stayed in place. But on the flat surface, John found a note written in permanent ink.
N'allez pas à de telles longueurs pour gagner la partie.
C'est dangereux, et sont de plus en plus.
Mais je peux vous le garantir, chess est beaucoup plus sûre.
-MH
Mycroft Holmes, attempting to be a loving brother. How nice.
Unfortunately, John couldn't read French, so he found an online translator and entered it in.
Don't go to such lengths to win the Game.
It's dangerous, and becoming increasingly so.
But I guarantee, chess is much safer.
-MH
And with a lame sense of humor, John thought.
He noticed a corner of the grey velvet was peeling at the top, as if it was held only by Velcro. He pared the fabric from the box, revealing another note, which John translated as well.
Perhaps John would like to play.
After he returned the chessboard to its original state, John retrieved the white king and its broken crown from the mantelpiece. He found a bottle of glue in the drawer and went to repair it. As he sat with the fragments, tediously trying to conjoin the two, he heard the door open.
John tried to hide the pieces behind the stack of books on the table so Sherlock wouldn't see them. After he had done this, he realized it was pointless; Sherlock would notice it immediately after he returned it to the chessboard. He pulled them back out of hiding and continued working.
It didn't take long for Sherlock to notice what John was doing, but he didn't say anything. John saw him look at the chess piece in his hands, which reminded him of his previous question.
"Why was this piece broken?"
Sherlock turned to face him. He made a face, like he had just noticed that John was trying to fix it.
"Isn't it obvious? I threw it."
"Yes, that's what I figured—"
"Then why did you ask?"
John smirked, "Why did you throw it?"
Sherlock turned his coat collar up. "…It was irritating me."
He sighed. "You are the only person I know who could have a row with a piece of wood."
John let the subject slide, as Sherlock began to look uncomfortable. He finally joined the two pieces together and set them on the chessboard to dry.
When Sherlock's back was turned, John took the black knight and moved it in a way that resembled the white knight.
The game then continued between the two, but they never saw each other at the chessboard. There was a tacit agreement between them that they never spoke of the game, but yet, it progressed. John still didn't know how to play, but based off of Sherlock's tactics, he could slowly teach himself.
Every day, two or three moves each would be played, but never together. But sometimes, Sherlock would leave notes for John when he made an illegal move, or just to give him some advice.
The Armageddon style was still in play. Thought John was still confused by the whole concept.
The game went on for months. John suspected that Sherlock was going easy on him, or just trying to prolong the game. But neither seemed to care. They still played, every day. Even when they went out of town for cases, one of them would bring the chessboard along.
John still wondered why Sherlock had thrown the white king. In a fit of anger, yes, but why?
He sat one day in front of the board, contemplating his next move. His gaze wandered to the white pieces as he calculated their positioning relative to his. The white king caught his attention; the magnetic disk underneath had been misplaced, and a small crescent shape stuck out from the bottom.
John picked it up, examining it. The disk was magnetically attached to the piece itself—a metal ring looped the circumference of the base.
He detached the disk from the king and peered inside the hollow cavity.
Inside, he found a small, glass vial, containing a thick, golden substance, almost like honey.
A strip of paper around the bottle read 'Grayanotoxin'.
John had heard of it before, but couldn't recall what it was exactly. He felt disappointed with himself, being a doctor.
Thank God for the Internet, he thought has he grabbed his computer to look it up.
I take it back.
Unfortunately, he couldn't find any conclusive information on the substance. He assumed it was some sort of medication, perhaps for Sherlock's addiction. That's why he would keep it hidden; he didn't want to worry him or Mrs. Hudson.
But then he remembered the chess piece he had found it in. John thought he wanted to stop with the drugs.
He wiped the vial with a piece of cloth to hide his fingerprints (just to be safe—Sherlock was weird like that) and placed it back in the hollow.
The games continued, and John never mentioned the grayanotoxin. But every so often, he would check the white knight, to see if it was still there.
It neither rose nor fell. It stayed exactly the same.
Two days after the Fall
John sat in his chair, lamenting, which was all he seemed to do for the past couple of days. He didn't want to stay at Baker Street, but he felt he needed to be there, to let go.
Most of Sherlock's belongings were given to Mycroft or distributed to various acquaintances of his. Hardly anything of his remained at Baker Street, at John's request.
Except for the chessboard—John insisted that he keep it exactly the way it was: mid-play.
To distract himself, John went over to the board, trying to fight back the tears, the memories. He picked up the white knight, crooked, but fixed.
His thumb toyed with the magnet at the bottom, and he remembered what had been inside. He opened it again, holding his hand beneath it to catch the vial. Nothing came out.
He looked inside for confirmation. The bottle was gone.
John didn't want to ponder this anymore. He wasn't Sherlock, so how could he figure it out?
He replaced the king on the board, just where it was.
But John noticed something—the board…it was different. Something had changed since he last saw it, though he couldn't pinpoint it.
He stared at the pieces, black and white. Perhaps he was going mad, he thought.
Then he saw it. Right in front of his eyes, there it was.
The white rook had been moved.