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A Diamond in the Rough	By : DrunkenScotsman Category: X-Men - Animated Series (all) > General Views: 4282 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own X-Men, nor the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 18
- 19
Chapter 19: Queenside Pressure
-CW: various forms of bigotry

On Saturday afternoon, Emma logged onto Scheming Mind, eager to play for the first time in weeks. Midterms proved more challenging than anticipated, she mused. None, besides calculus, were individually taxing, but having all five in such short succession certainly were. I haven’t slept that soundly since…
… since before my ability manifested, perhaps?
A popup window informed Emma that SlimShady03 had invited her to a game. She accepted, and the program assigned her to play White. No draw for you this time, she thought as she opened with her customary d4.
Her opponent responded with d5. A message followed shortly in the chat: < Hey, Queen. Been awhile. Hope you’re doing well. >
Emma played c4, beginning the Queen’s Gambit. < I’ve been busy with midterms, but it’s good to have a break, > she replied. < How about you? >
< Same here. A little jetlagged, > SlimShady replied. He played e5.
Emma sat up even straighter than her usual posture. Albin Counter-gambit? That’s certainly an unusual response. In the chat, she typed, < If I didn’t know better, I’d accuse you of making excuses pre-emptively for your pending defeat. >
< Never dream of it. >
< Where’d you fly? >
< San Diego. Visiting my brother. He’s “crashing” after an early morning surf. “Wiping out always wipes me out, bro.” >
Emma smiled. He sounds just like one of those useless boys at Labor Day, a particularly ridiculous one, she recalled. “If you’re, like, ever in Maui, you should totally call me! We’ll catch some choice waves together!”
Shaking her head at the memory, she returned her focus to the game. I haven’t studied the Albin Counter-gambit in detail, she lamented as her move time ticked seconds away. Taking the d-pawn would allow him to take mine right back, baiting an early queen. Taking the e-pawn would allow him to take my c-pawn, opening a queen trade. Or he could choose to push the untaken pawn forward, limiting my pieces’ development and other pawns’ structure. That’s the usual line.
Devious.
To buy herself time to think, Emma continued the conversation. < My brother’s also on the West Coast, > she typed, < but I haven’t heard from him in a while. >
< He’s probably just busy. The pace of life around here is pretty fast, > replied SlimShady. < Everything is “go go go” all the time. >
I wish I could believe it was something so simple, thought Emma with a glum sigh. As she continued to ponder her possible moves, she wished she’d studied this particular response in more detail. I know enough to avoid the Lasker trap and Spassky variation, but not much beyond that.
Deciding to “take the bait,” she took the unprotected e-pawn; her opponent dutifully pushed his d-pawn onto Emma’s side of the board. Over the next few moves, both of them developed their offensive and defensive positions, and Emma could tell she’d really have to work to break through. It’s not as much fun when it’s easy, she thought as she moved one of her bishops into a more threatening position.
< You mentioned before that you’re in CT, > SlimShady wrote. < Are you from there? >
< Massachusetts, > Emma replied. < West of Boston. >
< I see. My friend Bobby is from there. Big Celtics fan. >
Emma blinked. < I mostly prefer classical music. >
SlimShady blocked Emma’s bishop with a well-supported pawn. < Not music, basketball. >
Chagrin heated Emma’s cheeks, but she took solace in the fact that her opponent couldn’t see it. < I don’t follow sports, > she admitted, adding, < Clearly, > a moment later. She retreated her bishop, keeping pressure on the pawn SlimShady had interposed while also pulling it out of harm’s way.
Over the next few moves, SlimShady began pursuing the general strategy for Black: opening the board via trading pieces and pawns. Emma found herself hard-pressed on the queenside, especially with that annoying pawn on d4 cramping her movement. She seriously considered trading queens just to remove that little thorn in her side. Instead, she took it with her remaining knight, intending to reposition it when SlimShady activated his queen through the obvious kingside avenue.
He took the knight with his queen. Emma’s eyes widened at the unprotected piece. Finally, a blunder, she thought as she claimed her prize.
Nine moves later, it was all over. A series of devastating knight forks left Emma’s position in shambles. A combination of clever bishop and rook moves pinned her few remaining pieces, leaving her vulnerable to one more knight move to mate. Emma resigned instead and immediately logged off, not waiting for any perfunctory congratulations from her opponent.
Emma felt as though she couldn’t breathe. One of the downsides of Emma’s sharp memory was that she could recall, with crystal clarity, the last time she’d lost a game while playing White.

XXXXX

Thirteen-year-old Emma had entered the Eight-Squared Regional Tournament after coming in runner-up in the Girls’ Division the previous weekend to Tessa Karisik, her nemesis over the past several years on the chess circuit. Losing to her rival, again, rankled to no end, not least because of how Father had berated her for “obvious mistakes” and “failing to best that little Paki trollop.” Fueled by that, she’d bested all the field in Eight-Square’s pool play, except for Tessa, against whom she’d forced a draw.
The bracket for the knockout round had placed Emma and Tessa on opposite sides. For Emma to avenge her loss, she’d have to do so in the championship round. As a cherry on top, no girl had ever won this tournament since it began accepting female players in 1987.
Tessa held up her end of the unspoken bargain, winning her semifinal match convincingly.
Emma’s opponent for the semifinals was a bespectacled, acne-ridden dweeb about her own age. She’d overheard him saying to one of the other boys, “I don’t know why they let girls play in this tournament. They’re too emotional to be real chess players.”
He employed an exotic variant of the Semi-Slave Defense, one which Emma couldn’t crack (at that point – she studied hard and utterly destroyed this same twerp a few years later). Pressure built with each move, both on the board and within Emma’s brain, the latter building into intense, searing pain that made her eyes water. The more she tried to stop the tears, the more freely they flowed. Worse, her opponent wore the smuggest grin Emma had ever seen, angering her but intensifying the throbbing pain.
When her timer ran out, so did she, forgoing the customary handshake. “Go home and cry, you dumb cunt! Try not to bleed all over everything while you’re on your period!” her opponent called after her.
(Or so she thought at the time – later, she understood that the little jerk had merely thought the taunt, “loudly” enough to “overhear.”)
Father’s voice echoed in her head with disgust and disappointment: “Weak. Failure will not be tolerated. What a waste of time, teaching you to play.”
Her rival’s voice also echoed in her head, tinged with sadness and pity: “A shame. I wanted us to meet in the final, to guarantee that one of us girls would win. I’ll just have to win for both of us!”
(She didn’t, Emma later learned. The misogynistic little troll winning the tournament further rubbed salt in the wound of Emma’s defeat.)
Emma hid in one of the restroom stalls, clutching her temples, trying not to scream. The layers of her failure piled atop her, one after another, pressing down on her until she could no longer stand. Father’s voice kept repeating, “Weak. Pathetic. Failure. Unworthy,” over and over and over.
One of the female tournament staff found her curled up on the floor beside the toilet. Emma didn’t remember that clearly; most of the next few weeks had vanished in a haze of pain and painkillers. Her next clear memory was the day of her discharge from the hospital.
By the time Emma returned to the tournament circuit a few years later, her rival had moved away. She hadn’t seen Tessa since, never got the chance to finally, finally defeat her. Even her victory earlier this year, before graduating from Snow Valley, couldn’t entirely remove the sting of all those past failures.

XXXXX

The pain of these memories erupted from deep within Emma’s mind, as fresh as the days they’d happened. Not just the pain of defeat – the pain of Father’s rejection of her. The pain of loneliness – neither of her parents had visited her while she recovered from her “severe migraine” in the hospital. Neither had Christian, for that matter, but he at least had the excuse of not yet having his driver’s license, and the family limo driver would never have brought him without Father or Father’s approval.
Tears streaming down her cheeks, Emma barely made it from her desk chair to her bed. Shame filled her as she curled into the fetal position and wept – such a pathetic display of weakness. Sobs wracked her body, but she took the tiniest measure of comfort that no one could see her in this wretched state.

XXXXX

After a good, long cry, Emma further soothed herself with a relaxing bath, one of her favorite methods of cleansing those last annoying dregs of emotion. Unhurried, she luxuriated in the embrace of the warm water. During her bath, she puzzled over her lack of transformation while feeling distressed. The first time, she recalled, had been in response to a sudden, startling noise; the second, a response to Jean’s (poorly-founded) aspersions towards Father.
A defense against an immediate perceived threat, she concluded. Until I can master it, anyway, to manifest the diamond shell at will. I’ll have to convince Jean to resume my training when she gets back. The thought of the beautiful redhead brought a smile to Emma’s lips and filled her with a warm, pleasant, unfamiliar feeling.
She kissed me. I kissed her. We kissed. I can’t believe we kissed.
It felt so wonderful, I didn’t want to stop. Her lips felt so warm and soft. I’ve never felt like this. I never imagined feeling like this.
Emma’s smile faded. Does it matter, though? We can’t even spend time together publicly as friends, lest I get labeled as a mutant sympathizer, followed by rumors that I myself am a mutant. I doubt Father would tolerate the former, much less the truth about this cursed “gift.”
Emma sighed and drained the tub. The plush towel felt delectable against her skin as she began to dry off. I suppose it’s for the best, to nip this in the bud before it blossoms into a nightshade that would poison all my ambitions.
Lesbianism wouldn’t suit me anyway. I’ve no wish to stop shaving or trade my whole wardrobe for denim and flannel. She shuddered at the idea.
A profound sadness gripped the young woman at the prospect of telling Jean they couldn’t be more than friends. I wish things could be different. I wish we could stroll across the quad, hand in hand, before and after class.
But we can’t. The consequences are too great. I can’t risk it, neither for my mutant defect nor my unnatural attraction.
Before, she’d been looking forward to Jean’s call on Monday. Now, she dreaded it.
Fresh tears for a fresh hurt rolled down Emma’s cheeks and dripped off her chin.
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A/N: A shorter chapter this time. Next update might be awhile, since I'm next going to work on an unrelated one-shot as a palate cleanse. As always, please let me know your thoughts in a review!
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A Diamond in the Rough