Pawn Promotion - A Chess Tale

Have you ever wondered why pawns promote to queens when they reach the end of the board? Probably not. But I was bored, so I created a story about it:

Once upon a time, in the lovely world of Chessland, a long, long, LONG time ago,

“We have a problem!” announced King. There wasn’t a single piece in the room who didn’t already know that there was a problem and what it was, but the pieces listened with fake interest as King described the problem. In their heads, they were all trying to figure out a solution. “As you can see, my crown is gone!” King went on. There were some fake gasps from the crowd. “How are we going to get it back?” King asked Queen. Whenever there was a problem, Queen was expected to come up with the solution. As if that wasn’t enough, she also was expected to do it on the spot, with no thinking time. Luckily, she had already known what the problem was before King had started speaking, and had come up with a hopefully decent solution. “We will lead our army into Black’s Fortress and reclaim the crown!” shouted Queen. The pieces cheered.

It was eleven at night, and the pieces were preparing to launch a midnight raid. But PawnC knew it wouldn’t work. Black’s Fortress was always defended well, and now that they had stolen the crown, they were undoubtedly on high guard. They would hear White’s army long before they saw it, and have plenty of time to prepare. PawnC knew what he needed to do. He was going to have to break into Black’s Fortress alone, get the crown, and bring it back to King. All before White started their attack. And he had to make sure he wasn’t found missing, or he’d be banished.

PawnC only had one thing on his side: a map. He had pickpocketed it from Queen. It wouldn’t be long before she realized, and everyone would be searched. PawnC silently snuck away from the Army Grounds. He had brought his black bedcover in his pocket, and now he put it on like a cloak. He had already cut eyeholes out of it a few hours ago.

He was halfway between his fortress and Black’s Fortress. He stopped and studied his map. He would go around the side of the fortress, then look for the secret escape route indicated on the map and use it as an entrance. He glanced at his map one last time, then slipped it in his pocket and crept over The Little Hill, the halfway point between the fortresses. He would have to run; he could see the fortress now, which meant they could see him if they looked carefully. But he had only taken a few steps when something caught his foot and he crashed down to the grass.

Black’s RookA had seen something move. He had called over the other tower guard, RookH, to help him figure out what it was. Neither had seen PawnC fall; at that exact moment, RookA had taken his binoculars off to clean them, and RookH was just then focusing his.

PawnC desperately started to crawl forward on his hands and knees. He wasn’t sure if someone had seen him when he fell, and he didn’t want to stand up again.

RookA and RookH were watching him crawl. “I think you need to calm down a bit, RookA. It looks like a stray dog, not any form of enemy,” RookH said skeptically.

“I swear I saw something white on its head,” RookA responded. “I thought it had the shape of a pawn.”

“It’s a dog. How many times have I told you that you have an overactive imagination?” RookH went back to his tower, amused.

A few seconds later, PawnC finally stood up. He had to. The bedcover was about to rip at his knees, and any decent guard would clearly see the white underneath. He ran toward the left side of the castle.

RookA still had his binoculars trained on PawnC. He was becoming more and more convinced that it wasn't a dog. It was getting closer, and fast. It was now only about 20 feet from the base of his tower. That wasn't a dog. It was a piece covered in a blanket.

RookA dropped his binoculars. He sprinted down the spiral stairs in his tower that lead to the ground floor. As he neared the bottom, he drew his square sword, that look more like a club than a sword. He smashed through the door at the bottom of his tower, which could only be opened from inside. He saw the intruder immediately as they sprinted by him. He pressed the intruder alarm button on his wristwatch. Alarms started blaring in the castle. But the alarms had just sent reinforcements to the front gate. He had forgotten to press the button indicating his location.

PawnC saw RookA out of the corner of his eye. He knew that he was going to have to kill the Black rook. Rooks were twice as fast as pawns and would easily catch up. He stopped in his tracks, and turned around to see RookA already charging him. He just managed to dive out of the way, but the sword caught his bedsheet. The bedsheet was ripped off and thrown aside.

PawnC noticed that it took RookA a few yards and a few seconds to stop. He tried to use this to his advantage. He stood against a tree, and RookA charged again. He dove right, correctly predicting that the rook would assume he would go left, as he had gone right last time too. RookA lunged to the left as PawnC dove to the right. But before he even realized he had missed his target, RookA slammed into the tree and slumped to the ground.

PawnC ran forward. There! The secret entrance! To his surprise, it wasn't guarded. The assigned guard, BishopC, had gone to the front gate when the alarm sounded. PawnC ran through the narrow passageway. He crashed through the door at the end, only to find himself looking at Black's king and queen chatting around a table. The table held what he was after: the crown.

"Get him!" screeched Black's king. The queen threw a knife. It missed PawnC's cheek by an inch.

PawnC yanked the now-broken knife out of the door behind him, ducking just in time as Queen tried to cut his head off with her 2-yard, steel, fine-cut sword. Well, at least he had something to defend himself with, even if he was outmatched in every possible way.

Queen raised the sword above her head and whipped it down with incredible speed. If PawnC had reacted a split-second later, he would've been sliced in half.

But Queen was slow to bring the sword back up, and she wasn't expecting PawnC to attack her. She hadn't seen him pull the knife out of the door; his body had been in the way of her vision. So she was caught completely off-guard when PawnC buried the half of a knife into her side. She screamed in pain before collapsing, still clutching her side.

King couldn't react fast enough after being shocked at what had just happened. He merely watched as PawnC not only reclaimed White's crown, but also stole his own crown right off his head, and retreated out the secret passage. Then he barked orders into the loudspeaker:

"GET THAT PAWN!"

PawnC raced back toward White's castle, pursued by every last one of Black's pieces (except King). They were catching up quick. He was at the crest of The Little Hill when a knife whipped past his face. He heard a scream behind him. He looked back just in time to see RookH collapse, and one of Black's pawns trip over him.

What was going on? Who on White's side of the area had thrown a knife at him?

When he looked up, he was shocked to see White's army, which had steered off course and was charging the Black army. A big clash was inevitable.

White soon won the clash; this was their territory and they knew all the ins and outs. PawnC was promoted to Queen, the other Queen having died in the clash. He now wore one crown, and King (obviously) wore the other.

And that is the story of how pawns become queens