Time to Chessbox | Karl “Ouch” vs Toby “Slowby” White

Five years hence, friends sit down again across a chessboard. Karl Ouch throws out 16 moves in 24 seconds. The brain consumed entirely provides relief from dwelling thought. Toby fails to castle and the Ouch breaks down his kingside defence with apparent ease before the gloves are on.

Fear slips into the brain like jagged splinters of glass. The crocodile now firmly at the helm, snapping, rolling, cognition-less. The crack of broken bones, the idea of enduring smashed teeth and blood-clotted hair. An edict from solipsism; memories, the future, temporal thought of any kind is snuffed out by the weight of fear-fuelled concentration. Only they exist in their shared world for an eternal moment. White lands combination after combination, his punches in multiples of Ouch’s. The round wears on. Body gelatinous with fatigue. Eyes glaze. Time folds in on itself. Like a collapsing star, time is reduced to a singularity.

Referee Reinaldo Dominguez gives Ouch a standing 8 count as he sways gently against the ropes. The punishment continues.

Finally the board broadens time as a mist risen sun over a horizon of future possibilities - like a fungus in the fallen leaves, ever forking, ever expanding. Infinite promise must be paired down to the possible, the probable and the likely. White breaks out of his defensive posture with a daring cross-board bishop sacrifice. On the brink, the chimp brain screams to capture the piece, another step towards emotional satisfaction. No, the trap now naked appears callow. The game builds, with each move the number of possible outcomes narrows and narrows still further.

White ecstasy. Ouch has blundered his queen. Excitement unbound is cut down by the Ouch’s rook barrelling up the e-file to extinguishing the game. The number of permutations brought back behind the possible. In that moment, the cruel satisfaction of an opponent diminutized gives way to empathy beyond measure. The lonely chasm between players forged in chess victory does not manifest, these two souls have shared the intimacy of combat.

This is Chessboxing. Next event, 14th March 2020, London.

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