A/N - Thanks for the reviews so far! Hope you're enjoying reading and it's not too hard to follow. This chapter expands upon the scene where Henry and Alison are playing chess in the episode 'So It Goes' from season one. For anyone who needs some little reminders as to what happened - Elizabeth, Henry and Isabelle are investigating the plane crash and manage to find the guy who sabotaged the plane and get a confession out of him - it seems as though the President was responsible so Henry and Elizabeth are paranoid and wondering how to go about the whole situation.

In response to TeamAlison - Henry and Alison play chess a few times throughout the show, in season one they play in the episodes 'So It Goes' and 'Tamerlane' which this fic is based on, and they also play a game sometime after Henry is recovering from radiation poisoning from the dirty bomb. I'm not sure if they play any more chess games, I really am due a rewatch of the entire series!

So while doing some research for this story, I found out something really cool - I googled the meaning of "Tamerlane"and apparently it is a medieval variant of chess that included a way bigger board and more pieces, even completely different pieces such as giraffes! I've always thought that the chess metaphors and symbolisms in this show were awesome, but for some reason this new discovery just blew me away.

FYI the Queen's Gambit is a popular opening in a chess game played by white to try and gain control over the center of the board. Opponents can choose to either accept or decline the Queen's Gambit, as you'll see in this chapter.

Chapter Two

Queen's Gambit

Things had been so strained lately due to their little covert investigation into Vincent Marsh's death, The whole thing seemed like a giant puzzle to which they already knew the conclusion, but didn't yet know how certain factors played their parts up to that ending. Henry knew that what they were doing was not condoned, late night meetings with Isabelle, so many secrets from everybody they knew - yet he couldn't shift the feeling that Elizabeth was definitely onto something.

Her words the previous night played on a loop in his head.

"Maybe we shouldn't be doing this, whoever's behind it had no problem killing the Secretary of State, we have to consider the kids. Maybe it's too dangerous to go poking around."

He had to admit, she had a good point - the entire thing reeked of foul play and he was determined to help her get to the bottom of it for her sake and the kids and was just thankful that his marine background was able to help Elizabeth and Isabelle out in their investigation as to how the plane crash happened.

"Hello? Earth to dad." A nearby voice pulled him out of his thought train and he looked up to see Alison standing by his seat at the living room table, the wooden chess set under her left arm.

"Huh? Sorry Noodle, Hey." Henry said, pulling his glasses off and rubbing his temples in a circular motion.

All five of the McCords were once again resting in the living room of their Georgetown home, and although they were now seven years older, Henry couldn't help but be reminded of the day when he taught his little girl how to play chess. Many things were different now, but Stevie was still, as usual glued to her phone - and Elizabeth and Jason had traded the Disney movies for Halo and a trashy magazine.

"Can we play?" Alison asked hopefully.

"Sure." Henry said and watched her as she opened the folding wooden chess set and removed all the pieces and laid it flat out on the table. She placed all of the pieces into their starting positions and looked at her father.

"Which pieces do you want?" She asked.

"Hm, I don't know. How mean are you planning to be during this game?" He joked. Alison laughed and flipped the board around so that the white pieces were now in front of Henry.

"Oh, now you're just pitying me." Henry moaned, laughing as he put his glasses back on and made his first move. Alison mirrored his move with her own pawn, to which Henry responded with another pawn push on the left.

Alison chuckled to herself as she pushed another of her pawns up.

"Oh I'm not falling for that." She said. "Queen's gambit declined."

"Of course, I trained you too well to fall for such basic tactics." Henry said, chuckling as he developed his knight into the game. He was struggling to see which moves would be best for him as thoughts about the investigation swirled around his head.

"Wow, rookie mistake." Alison chimed as she moved her bishop out, threatening his knight.

"Crap." Henry said, looking down at the game, astounded that she'd pinned his knight and he was unable to move it to safety, she was right, it was a rookie mistake.

"Geez, focus dad!" She said, capturing his knight and putting his king into check.

"Sorry, sorry." Henry said, resting his head in his left hand while he thought about his next move carefully.

"Apparently -" Elizabeth chimed in from her spot on the sofa. "Every pair of my shoes is out of fashion." She absentmindedly flipped onto the next page of her magazine and continued to read.

"You really need a magazine to tell you that, mom?" Alison joked as Henry eliminated the check that Alison had forced him into.

"Guess I'll just embarrass you at your soccer game." Elizabeth said.

"She's already embarrassing me at this game." Henry added as he watched Alison capture one of his pawns.

"Come on dad, stop going easy on me!" Alison jeered.

"I'm not!" Henry said, moving up his bishop and accidentally blundering it.

Alison looked down at the board and then at her father, confusion plastered all over her face from the absolutely idiotic move her father just played, she was about to ask him if he was feeling okay when Stevie screamed loudly from the kitchen. Everyone was startled but Alison saw both of her parents noticeably jump up at the sound.

"Stevie!" Elizabeth shouted, frustrated. "What? What?" She asked, barely sitting on the edge of the sofa.

"I have a date with the cutest guy on Earth!" Stevie said, smiling widely as she walked back into the living room. Elizabeth and Henry visibly exhaled, relief washing over them. Alison looked from Henry, over to Elizabeth and then back at Henry.

"Are you guys okay?" She asked.

Henry and Elizabeth sat cross legged on their bedroom floor, a laptop in between them listening again to the audio from the plane's black box, which Henry thought they must have listened to for almost a thousand times by now, but he'd received a text from Elizabeth on her way home saying that she had come across some new information so he decided not to protest.

"The stabiliser has failed completely, I cannot keep us in the air. Trying to push -" The pilot's panicked voice stated on the recording.

"So it goes." Vincent Marsh's calm and collected voice said, plain as day.

"So when his plane was going down Vincent Marsh was thinking that Jackson and Dalton were behind it. This doesn't mean he was right." Henry said, trying to reassure his wife.

"Ambassador Dori didn't deny that the CIA was involved in the Dubai crash." Elizabeth said. "If they were, then Dalton knew how to sabotage a C-600 and get away with it. Maybe he tapped me because he didn't think I'd ever suspect him." She thought aloud.

"Your loyalty is your soft spot?" Henry asked.

"Maybe I'm the Secretary of State because he wanted to keep me close - which would explain Russel making overtures to Matt about spying on me." Elizabeth suggested. Henry didn't reply - he was at a loss for words.

"I'm calling the President of the United States a murderer." Elizabeth stated, a look of fear flew across her face. "Now is really the time for you to start talking me off the ledge." She looked at him hopefully - expecting yet another of his helpful quotes, a reassurance that she was being paranoid, something - anything.

"I'm sorry babe." Henry said, shaking his head. "I got nothing."

Elizabeth sighed, starting to twirl her wedding ring around on her finger, she looked directly into Henry's eyes.

"What's my next move?" She asked, feeling overwhelmed.

"For as long as I've known you, you've always been five steps ahead of everybody." Henry began.

"You navigate the playing field like a pro, just keep your head down and an eye out for an opportunity to get any more proof or information - it'd only improve your position - you need to make sure that all avenues are covered before you go in for the kill. You got this, babe." He said, he smiled at her and swept away a strand of hair that had fallen across her face as she'd tilted her head at him.

"Thanks." Elizabeth said. "So, speaking of moves - just how badly did Noodle obliterate you in that chess game you two played?" She asked.

"I don't want to talk about it." Henry said sarcastically, Elizabeth burst out with laughter. "Seriously though, we should have enrolled her in tournaments or something, she's seriously good." Henry admitted.

"I guess she takes after me." Elizabeth said, feeling ever so slightly smug.

"I'd say that's a fair assumption. You know one day, I will beat you at that game." Henry joked.

"You wish, Mr. McCord." She laughed and kissed him.