“Oh fuck,” I muttered, as I saw through the darkness to spot what Tattletale’s power had noticed first.

What? Bitch’s bruises from her run-in with Siberian?

Four of the Slaughterhouse Nine were stepping through the entrance of the parking garage.

…

Alright, yeah, that’s also worthy of “Shit.” “Oh fuck.”

Shit. Oh fuck.

The Siberian was in the lead, her waist-length hair blowing in the wind from outside, her eyes practically glowing in the gloom.

Coming to say hi to your nominee, Sibby?

Behind her, Jack Slash held Bonesaw’s hand as the young girl skipped to make it so she only walked on the yellow lines that divided the lanes.

Relatable.

They were accompanied by a young woman who might’ve been eighteen or so years old, who bore a striking resemblance to Alec.  Cherish.  None of them wore costumes.  The Siberian didn’t wear anything.  She was as nude as the day she’d been born, her skin patterned with stripes of alabaster white and jet black.

Quite a sight, all of them, aren’t they?

Did Bonesaw bring some of her chimeras too?

“Like a dog?” I asked.  In the corner of my eye, I could see Tattletale’s expression change as she looked at the dog, clearly realizing something.  As fast as I could turn her way to try and piece together what that was, something else got her attention.

Oh. Oh shit.

How did I not see that coming?

There’s only one step from “Bitch has a wolf pupy” to Tattle’s power telling her why Bitch has a wolf pupy, and that piece of info is not pleasant.

At least this means the Undersiders can have this realization before they get into an unexpected fight against the Slaughterhouse because of Bitch’s silence.

At least as long as Tattletale doesn’t remain silent for some reason. I could see not wanting to discuss it in front of the Travelers, but it needs to come out.

“Shit,” she breathed.  She clutched at my arm with one hand and at Bitch’s with the other, stepping back to pull us with her.  Bitch pulled her arm from Tattletale’s grip, looking angry at the invasion of personal space.

Oh, personal space is the least of your worries right now, Rachel.

What about Grue, is she going to pull him in too? Or is she already right next to him?

“I’m guessing you named him?” Regent asked, as I reached the top and stepped down onto solid ground.  I missed Bitch’s response.  Had she nodded?

“I was surprised you brought him tonight,” Grue said, being remarkably delicate about the fact that Bitch had undercut any presence our group had by bringing the cute ball of fluff.  It would have been better if he’d brought it up earlier, but he might have felt the same way I did about provoking Bitch before a major event, when she’d been so short tempered lately.

Yeah, I think he too knows to be cautious about that by now.

Also, I think undercutting the presence of the group is excusable when it comes with this sort of cuteness. :p

Of course, none of them know what it really signifies.

Bitch’s response was surprisingly verbose.  “Had to.  For the first year and a half, he’s going to be like a dog.  Need to train him as much as I can, get him used to me.  It’ll be too hard if I wait.”

“He’s going to be like a dog.”

So she’s not going to maintain the pretense that he is a dog. That might lead to some awkward questions. Like “How did you end up with a wolf pupy, anyway?”

“Softie.” Tattletale grinned.

“Are you coming back?” Trickster asked.

“How long will it be before Genesis is able to brief us on the meeting?”

Ah, yeah, that would probably get us some interesting information.

“Fifteen, twenty minutes?”

“Then we’ll be back to finish the strategy session,” Grue responded.

Sounds like it’s a thing for another chapter, unless we’re going for a minor time skip here.

Trickster turned to his teammates, “Mind giving Noelle and me a minute to talk?”  Sundancer and Ballistic stood.

Hm. Alright, I guess?

Joined by the two Travelers, we made our way up the disguised ladder to the second sub-level of the parking garage.  As one of the last to head up, I saw the adorable sight of Bitch managing the sleeping puppy, tucking it against her body with one arm so she could scale the ladder one-handed.

D’aww.

Don’t let her know that you just thought the word “adorable” about something she did, though.

As she reached the top, I could hear Sundancer cooing, “It’s so cute.  Is it a he or a she?”

However, she might be fine with one of her doggos – her wild doggo, in this case – being complimented like that.

Then again, she doesn’t like when people but dogs’ appearances above other things about them…

Let’s just see how it goes.

“He.”

“What’s his name?”

“Bastard.”

Pfft!

She would.

Regent, Bitch and Grue, for their parts, were left looking bewildered.

Maybe they don’t know stuff about shogi.

“Maybe you should clarify?” Grue suggested.

“Shogi is an Eastern variant of chess,” I said, “Some of the pieces move a little differently, though I can’t remember how.  But the big difference is that there’s a rule that says you can take any of the opponent’s pieces you’ve captured and place them on the board as your own.”

“More or less right,” Trickster said.

It’s a pretty huge difference. In regular chess, the resources on both sides dwindle as the game goes on. In shogi, however, the winning side gets more resources as they go along, resources that can be dropped in almost anywhere on the board at any time as the player sees fit.

That fact alone probably makes it a good thing most pieces are weaker

by themselves

than in western chess. Even the promoted rook and promoted bishop, the most mobile pieces, don’t quite match up to a western queen.

“So the question becomes,” Grue thought aloud, “Who can we beat in an indirect confrontation, capture and control?”

I’ve already given my thoughts on that, but maybe Bonesaw is worth considering too, though I’m not sure how useful she’d be as a controlled piece.

Mannequin is right out, not because I don’t think they can beat him, but because there’s no telling if Regent’s power would work on him.

And then there’s Burnscar. I think they could take her, and her power might lend itself well to their needs.

“Jack, Bonesaw-“ I said.

Grue shook his head.  “They know they’re vulnerable.  Either they’ll be watching their backs or the others will watch their backs for them.”

Fair.

Regent said, “Siberian is out, and while we might theoretically be able to catch and contain Crawler or Mannequin, I dunno if we could keep them still long enough for me to use my power on them.  If I can.  Their bodies are different.”

Yeah, I highly doubt Mannequin would work. I didn’t consider it for Crawler, but with the changes to his physiology, who knows.

I counted the enemies off on one hand, “Leaving Cherish-“

Regent shook his head, “She knows me, has measures in place.”

Yeeah. The bomb is an issue. They’d need to find out what the phone number is first.

“Burnscar and Shatterbird,” I finished.

“The bishops,” Trickster said.

Burnscar’s probably the easier of the two to catch, though the teleportation complicates things. Shatterbird would be good for offensive power, but in terms of what Regent would have at his disposal and in terms of what the Slaughterhouse wouldn’t.

A thing I’ve been meaning to say since the board game analogy started:

Being similar in composition to a chess team is actually really good for the Slaughterhouse. One of the reasons chess is such an interesting game is the fact that both players are playing with a really well-balanced set of pieces that work well as a team. The developers of western chess movesets and rules knew what they were doing.

What I think might be the Nine’s weakness is not working all that well as a team, though.

“I always preferred Go,” Trickster said, “But Go is about territory, give and take, less about aggression than an educational sparring match between two master swordsmen, each walking away with a new kernel of knowledge.

Hm. I think to play Go against the Slaughterhouse, you’re going to need more pieces.

Go applies more to taking over the city than it does to this scenario.”

Yeah, it does seem that way.

“Shogi?” Noelle suggested.

Shogi is basically just like international chess but with a couple of the pieces moving slightly differently, more complicated promotion rules, and the ability to take control of captured pieces. It’s too similar to what the Slaughterhouse are expecting and the biggest difference – pieces changing sides when captured – doesn’t apply unless Regent gets some time in private with them. And even then, the Slaughterhouse have two members who can do the same.

Shogi.  I got her meaning almost immediately, and I wasn’t alone. Tattletale, the Travelers and I all looked at Regent.

To do that, you need to capture at least one Slaughterhouse member first. That’s not going to be easy, but if you can pull it off, it might just be the key to success against the rest of them.

Cherish is the greatest threat against this tactic, being able to counter the control. Maybe that means she should be the target. She can’t do anything against Alec with her power, either, making it possible for him to be near her long enough to take full control.

After her, I suppose Jack would be the best target, but even if he is the weakest of them, he’s smart, and if taking him out – checkmate – is the main goal, then I doubt that’s going to be the first step on the way.

If Tattletale was sitting next to me, I would have kicked her under the table.

Better not kick in that direction right now. Not only would she hit the wrong person, but the person she’d hit would be Bitch.

Noelle suddenly perked up, saying, “They want to hunt.  They’re predators.”

“Okay, how can we use that?” Trickster leaned forward to look at the screen.

…is she talking from experience as a “monster”?

“They want to be the predators, we make them prey,” Noelle said.  She was looking more animated again.

Sooo…

That implies hunting them down. Coming to them instead of letting them come to the Undertravelers.

That does give an element of surprise and preparation advantage, but I thought we were trying to avoid direct combat altogether. Hunting traps?

“Not sure that’s possible, but keep going.”

“It’s not possible because, um.  You described them like they’re chess pieces, and we’re thinking in terms of a chess game.  What if we changed the game?”

Okay, so I wasn’t expecting Wildbow to actually spell this out when I made the analogy to playing backgammon instead, but here we are.

I kinda wish I’d gone with my urge to use checkers instead. It’s played on the same board and can be merged with chess without much difficulty (one side has checkers pieces and wins by checkmating the king, the other side has chess pieces and wins by capturing all the checkers pieces), weakening the analogy’s focus on throwing the opponent’s assumptions out the window, but at least it’s a game I actually know how to play. It’d be easier to make further references to it.