RWBY Fic: Grand(fools)Masters of Chess

It's a quiet day at Beacon Academy. The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, and Ozpin is being reprimanded by Glynda about the importance of completing paperwork on time. In short, all is well.

At least, Jaune thought it's a great day. Jaune stopped by one of the numerous activity rooms at Beacon, specifically the one he and his friends tended to frequent. In the room, Jaune caught sight of Weiss, Blake, and Ren on their hands and knees, the proverbial rain clouds of despair hanging over their heads.

Wait, they were real! Jaune noted empty dust containers next to Weiss. That explains things, he's not as oblivious as everyone seems to think! Huh? Was that Pyrrha screaming in frustration? Jaune wondered what Pyrrha was so upset about.

Upon closer inspection, Jaune noticed their friend Penny happily sitting in front of a chess board. Penny greeted him as she usually does, "Salutations Good-Friend-Jaune! How are you functioning today?"

Jaune smiled at Penny. He thought Penny was great, if a little strange at times. "My day is going great Penny, how's your day going?" Penny raised her arms in joy, "Sen-Sational! I was just playing chess with Friends Weiss, Blake, and Ren. It was very fun."

At that, Weiss, Blake, and Ren let out a collective groan of frustration. Jaune was confused. "Why are you so upset? Chess is really fun!"

"Maybe if Penny wasn't invincible," Blake deadpanned.

"We weren't able to last longer than ten turns at the most with her," Ren said. "There's only so many times even I can take a loss, even after spending years with Nora."

Weiss only continued to groan in frustration. "Jeez, what's with her?" Jaune stated.

"Weiss kept challenging Penny long after Ren and I gave up," Blake replied.

"Friend Weiss is very nice, playing so many games with me," Penny said gleefully. Jaune took a moment, and came to a decision.

"It's been a while since I've played chess, but would you like to play a game with me Penny? I'm sure it'll be tons of fun!" Jaune enquired. "You would play with me, Good-Friend-Jaune? Oh joy!" Penny clapped her hands together.

Penny began to set the chess board up. As Jaune sat down in front of Penny, Weiss shot up indignantly, her pale face stained crimson. "A dunce like you would NEVER be able to beat Penny, especially not if I was unable to!" Weiss spoke heatedly.

Blake leaned over and whispered conspiratorially to Ren, "She's just embarrassed she lost so badly as many times as she did." Ren nodded with understanding.

"I am not! I just know that Penny is too strong for someone like Jaune, even if he is a team leader, he's not up to the standard of strategic thought that playing chess with Penny requires." Weiss retorted.

Then, in a quieter voice she murmured, "I just want to spare him the crushing defeats we went through…."

Jaune turned his head, "What'd you just say Weiss?"

Her face once again reddened from embarrassment, Weiss looked away from Jaune. "I said nothing of importance." "Oh"

Jaune turned his attention back to the chess board, all the pieces in their proper places.

"All pieces are placed according to the proper regulation Good-Friend-Jaune. As white, you go first." Penny emphatically informed Jaune. "All right, guess it's time to get started." Jaune said, making the first move.

Penny immediately made a move in response. Jaune quickly responded with his own. Weiss, Blake, and Ren gathered in the comfy chairs around the chess table.

As the minutes trickled past, and slowly turned into over thirty minutes of near-constant moves on the board, Weiss, Blake, and Ren were stunned into silence. Jaune was not only outlasting any of them against Penny, he was actually playing equally against her in skill!

"How can this be?! How is Jaune possibly doing this well against Penny?!" Weiss near-shouted, eyes wide with shock. Blake's amber eyes tried to keep up with the moves that the two players were making, "I've never even seen some of the tricks that Jaune and Penny are pulling, did you know that Jaune was this skilled at chess Ren?" Ren shook his head, "I knew that Jaune was skilled in strategic thinking, but I didn't realize he was this skilled."

Meanwhile, the two players were taking longer and longer to decide their moves, as the pieces that remained to both slowly dwindled from the clever ploys both were using. Despite the toughness of the match, both Jaune and Penny wore huge smiles on their faces, clearly having a great time.

Finally, after over an hour and a half of playing, Jaune made a move with his last non-pawn piece, his rook. "Checkmate Penny." Jaune said with a grin.

Penny took several moments to assess her situation. Finally Penny ceased her thinking, "Indeed it is Good-Friend-Jaune."

Weiss, Blake, and Ren suddenly felt their mouths open in shock. Jaune, their goofy blonde noodle-armed friend had actually BEATEN Penny at chess. On his first try no less!

"Sen-Sational! That match was so much fun! We should play more often Good-Friend-Jaune!" Penny squealed with exhilaration.

"No kidding, I haven't had that much trouble playing against anyone since the times I played against my grandfather. Your playstyles were actually really similar, though you were sorta easier than he was." Jaune smiled with satisfaction at his close victory.

"EASIER!?" the three audience members shouted with disbelief. Their cries went unnoticed by Jaune and Penny.

"Was your grandfather Grandmaster Aurelias Arc by any chance Good-Friend-Jaune? That's whose example my father and Mr. Ironwood had me learn strategy from. Mr. Ironwood said that Aurelias was the kind of leader he aspired to be." Penny asked curiously.

"Yup, that was grandpa Aurelias, he was one of the toughest old men you'd ever meet. He's part of the reason, along with my dad, why I want to be a hunter. I grew up listening to his stories while we played chess together." Jaune reminisced.

"Wait, Penny, why are Weiss, Blake, and Ren just standing there with their mouths open?" "I don't know Good-Friend-Jaune, according to my calculations that only happens when something shocking happens to people. But what could have been so shocking to them?" "I don't know Penny, I can't think of any reason at all. Oh well, want to go see what Ruby and the others are up to?" "Oh yes! That sounds fun! Let us go and see if we can meet Ruby and paint our nails, try on clothes, and talk about cute boys!" "As long as my nails are left alone, I'll join you and Ruby."

After putting away the chess pieces and board, Jaune and Penny began to walk away together chatting animatedly about nail polish colors. After they left Weiss, Blake, and Ren looked at each other, having reached agreement silently. Those two were either grandmasters, or grandfools.

AN: Welp, that was a thing. I had the idea come to me in the middle of studying for one of my classes. I had a lot of fun thinking of this, so I hope you had a lot of fun reading it! I'm currently working on redoing Twilight ARTS of Beacon, and also on Sket Dance: The Return, but there is no ETA for either yet, as I'm not quite ready for any more of either to be released yet. (Not to mention how busy I am with life. I'm in my final year of undergrad, and I'm trying to keep everything on track for graduation this coming spring, so I don't know when I'll really be able to do more. This was a surprise fic, even for me.)

This is Mikainox, signing off!