As an amateur player, I had learnt that each piece was worth different points. Pawns were worth a single point, queens were worth nine, each rook was five, and bishops and knights were both worth three points. Yet, I would later hear that the bishop was actually worth three and a half points. Emphasis was placed on preserving the bishop pair for the endgame, where they were hailed as superior for their ability to move diagonally, flying to far ends of the board in a single move. Knights, while unique in their ability to surpass obstruction and cause great harm with forks, were forever restricted to a three-by-two L-shape, and thus much slower in progression.

The same could be said with regards to the Populars.

With Natalie out of the picture, it was obvious to the cohort that Gillian would step up to fill the power vacuum - and that she did. She was vibing, basking in the attention that she now received and all the wannabes after her, obeying her every order. Just a week ago, an unspoken law had been passed: for all wannabes to get the same Kanken that she herself brought to school. Guess what? Now almost everyone had a Kanken-style backpack.

I would've bought the backpack too - only because I thought it looked snazzy, mind you - but of course, Mom began a tirade about how I was constantly looking to waste her hard-earned money and that my backpack was still in good shape. Oh well.

But her words continued to echo in my mind, especially considering what Gillian really thought of me - a foolish little chess geek who believed she was cool enough for the Populars just because Natalie was fake-nice to her.

A pawn, far from the eighth rank, and yet delusional for promotion.

Today, I decided. Today, I was prepared, my mind buzzing with fresh information and newly-learnt facts. I had watched enough Taylor Swift music videos to have a proper conversation with Natalie and Lisa.

"Guys, guys - " I exclaimed, and they all turned to me. "I finally listened to the songs!"

"Oh?" Lisa's fork froze in mid-air. "It's good, isn't it?"

"Yeah, it is," I agreed avidly, then paused, realising that there wasn't much I could actually say. The entire group had already watched all the music videos, and repeatedly gushing about the details would be very redundant. But seeing as the attention I had managed to capture was about to slip away, I decided to continue. Hopefully someone would also add something and the conversation could continue from there. "I was yesterday years old when I realised from a YouTube comment that the other girl in You Belong With Me was also Taylor."

"Dude," Addison remarked. "I knew that since the first time I watched it."

"I knooow," I groaned. "She looked so different though!"

"It's so obvious," Gillian rolled her eyes, turning to . "Anyway, you guys want to hang at Springcourt tomorrow? We could get Starbucks; there's a new promotion."

"Oh, tomorrow?" I turned to confirm.

No one acknowledged my question.

"I'm down," Lisa shrugged.

It had been a long day, and after a pile of homework was finally completed with much difficulty, a phone usage break was in order. I hauled myself off the chair, grabbed my phone and plopped onto the bed,

Of course, however, there was always something on Insta that annoyed me. On a good day it was normally a story post asking for more likes on a certain post, but today it was Gillian's private spam. (Wait, how is it a spam account if she has 300 followers?) The image posted was just a pointless meme; the comments were the real deal.

PLEASE WHY IS WALTERS SO FUCKING ANNOING. PLEASE. you did not!! have to!!! call us out like that IN FRONT OF THE WHOLE CLASS !!!! ughhhhhhhh im in such a bad mood now i cant do anything adfnkfnrjfsl. stupid fucking bitch.

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FRRRRRRRR

I clicked to view more comments. All of them, each and every single one of the comments from various wannabes, all agreeing that Mrs Walters was the most annoying and pathetic teacher they had come across in Rifton.

Sweet, caring and capable Mrs Walters who bought the entire Biology class pizza just a few days ago? The only thing she'd ever done to cause animosity between students was earlier today when she had merely called out on the Populars, particularly Gillian, who was being obnoxiously loud when she continued talking to Lisa when Mrs Walters was already halfway through a single powerpoint slide. After an accumulation of such similar incidents with exponentially increasing insolence, Mrs Walters had finally snapped and given Gillian a piece of her mind. Of course, that enraged the new ringleader, who was now full of 'how dare she' vibes and armed with the power of social media plus rumour spreading cronies.

But calling a teacher the b-word on social media? This was outright disrespect towards a teacher who deserved no amount of petty teenage bullshit. It was ridiculous for a student to behave like that just because she didn't like someone, even worse to a teacher who was just sick and tired of their awful behaviour.

Now Gillian thought everyone would either agree or keep their mouths shut?

Sucks for them, but I was going to be different. I was a mere pawn, the weakest link in the hierarchy ruled by a twisted kingdom, but also the same pawn who overthrew the all-powerful Natalie and pushed her all the way below the rank of a loner. Natalie's expose was a bold risk, now covered up by removing the SIM card from Nokia Buttons and disconnecting my conversation with Gillian Bishop now that it was no longer necessary.

But this was different; it was a disciplinary issue concerning a staff member.

If I could do that stunt and make it work, this would be chicken feet to me.

I switched back to Instagram, scrolling to Gillian's post. I pressed down on the home button and the start button of my phone.

SCREENSHOT TAKEN, the notification flashed.

Gillian was the almighty ruler over the students - but she had forgotten something crucial. She was still a student, and a student in a school that preached about flawless conduct and a perfect reputation, that placed an unholy amount of emphasis on obedience to authority. Rifton held no tolerance for even the slightest of mistakes. Not even from the most promising.

And my, what would they say about a student complaining about a teacher so rudely on social media?

A few minutes later and newly armed with a student-basing email account, most of my plan was clear enough. It only involved an email to our darling principal, whose main concern was the reputation of her brilliant school of intellectual girls with docile, conforming personalities. Since my dear old school was so concerned about their little rules, they were sure to react when it came to one of their star students bashing a teacher on the internet.

You are now a concerned member of the public writing in to inform the school authorities on the misuse of social media, I thought to myself in the form of a typical letter-writing worksheet that the teachers used to assign to us as homework as I began to draft the email.

Ah, letter writing has never been so fun.

From: [email protected]

Dear Sir/Madam,

Attached below are links and screenshots with regards to an Instagram post made by one of your students. As seen in the post, the student involved made derogatory comments about a teacher. When I came across this, I was extremely appalled by such behaviour from a student of your school. I believe that this is extremely disrespectful of the student to use social media for such dishonourable purposes.

I hope that you will look into this issue. Thank you.

Yours sincerely,

Martha

Martha did sound very much like the name of a prim and proper old lady concerned about 'kids these days'. She could even pass off as a rich alumnus living in a fancy mansion after years of hard work and fine breeding, now worried that a student had tarnished the image of her dear school.

I reviewed the contents of the email a final time, my cursor hovering over the send button.

Well, then. Reckless Decision #1000 happening in 3, 2, 1.

I clicked.

Now to wait for the trouble to brew by itself.

However, this time I didn't want to just wait. The urge to drop a hint, to let that - beep - know in subtle foreshadowing was unbearable. If I was going to be the badass taking down a tyrannical ruler, I was going to do it right and have all the fun I could have for myself.

With popularity came the obsession with confession page links that people used to get feedback on themselves. In my opinion, it got even worse whenever some random chick threw in a negative comment and the rest of the clique took it upon themselves to bash whoever did send it in via more anonymous responses. All because it was anonymous - for anonymity meant there was room for chaos.

Loading up Gillian's Telloynm page that was the link on her Instagram bio, my fingers flew over the keyboard, leaving a rather vague and somewhat threatening message.

You did something bad, Gilly. And now they'll all know.

To chaos, I thought with a grin and pressed send.

kid are you ok?? what did I do??

Plenty of bull, I thought as I swiped away the Instagram story with the response to my message. Gillian seemed to have interpreted it as some lunatic sending her a cryptic message - but oh, was she wrong. Not all Tellonym Tells with strange messages were to be ignored - just like how a school outcast should never be overlooked and underestimated.

No matter, she would soon understand what mysterious entity had meant - or at least I hoped she'd be called up. If she received no punishment for Mrs Walters slander, I'd be sorely disappointed in the discipline of the school.

Slipping my Samsung into my skirt pocket, I straightened out my blazer and walked through the milk-white hallway lined with black lockers, backpack hanging from one shoulder as I brushed a stray black hair aside with my free hand. Already, I noticed the K-Pop Kids gathered in front of a MacBook covered to the brim with boy band stickers, as usual, as they did their usual screeching in a pitch that could give Pinkie Pie a run for her money. The Intellectuals sat at their usual wooden bench, studying and reading quietly like they usually did between classes.

I located a spot on a bench next to Angeline and sat down after her approval, the silence almost peaceful, almost non-awkward. But it was. Teenage girls were expected to talk and gossip and fangirl when they were together. Sitting together in silence was weird and wrong.

It was then that I decided to gather Angeline's personal opinion about Mrs Walters. "Hey Angeline, are you following Gillian's spam?" My 'sweet-innocent-little-chess-geek' voice was overly high-pitched, but it fit.

She clicked her pen once and placed it on the table, then responded - thank heavens - in a monotone. "I do. Why?"

"Did you see that post about Mrs Walters?"

To my surprise, Angeline's eyes darkened as she spoke, a rare flash of fury passing her gaze. "I did. It was - it was so rude! Like, if you don't like to be called out - just, like, maybe try keeping your mouth shut when the lesson is going on? Hello?"

"Y-"

"And, honestly," her voice rose an octave, as did her level of triggered-ness, "Those people who slander Mrs Walters are just a bunch of childish brats. Just ignore them."

"Yeah... facts," I agreed, still recovering from the shock at the sudden show of emotion and the piping tea she had spilt. Wasn't Angeline supposed to be the respected, silent loner that suppressed all forms of anger and hid it behind a poker face? But now, with me, she had allowed her mask to slide a little and reveal the deeper anger she had towards society? Did that mean that I was slowly on the way to earning her trust? "They're taking advantage of her being nice. They would never dare do this with Lorenzo."

"Unfortunately," her voice grew monotone and sullen, her expression slipping back into the regular, almost-bored look. Okay, yeah - I was imagining things. The facts she had given me barely qualified as life-changing, reputation-destroying gossip. Angeline was a loner, and any opinions, no matter how offensive in the eyes of our peers, were insignificant.

But just 'ignore them'? How was that even possible? Of course, I could understand the concept of ignoring people irrelevant to me, but was that really how Angeline carried along her life as a loner? By ignoring her surroundings and suppressing her emotions as much as possible, detaching herself from the very same things that ran rampant throughout the entirety of Rifton's hierarchy?

Angeline, my dude, I think you're just built differently.

The silence returned, as did the awkward atmosphere. Angeline started making a big show of untangling her earphones. I decided to retreat. "Uh, guess I'll go get some stuff from my locker. Bye, Angeline."

She waved, then began shoving the earphones in.

I headed to my locker and began going about my morning routine, pulling out the necessary materials for all my lessons while checking against the timetable that I'd saved. Whatever the conversation I just had was, I didn't know what to make of it. Maybe there was no deeper meaning, and I was being a dumbass trying to over analyze to compensate for my lack of social ability.

It was then that I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned to see the familiar yet sickening face of Rianne Clifford, tie around her neck and her booking card in hand. "I'm sorry, but I'll have to give you a demerit point. Your skirt is too short. It's supposed to cover your knee."

"It is covering my knee." A futile attempt at protesting against my fate, but an attempt nevertheless.

"Cover," She elucidated, "As in cover completely. part of your knee is showing."

What? Like, one quarter?

One. Freaking. Quarter.

I was at a loss for words - not that having any would work anyway, for Rianne Clifford was already busy scribbling down my name.