It is an average Thursday morning, an early Thursday morning to be exact. And despite the missing of the usual orange, fiery gleam slowly rising up the horizon announcing the doom of the night and the faint glow of the streetlights, not only the mockingbirds began to chirp but also the first busy residents of sunny Florida started to wake up. A man in his mid-torties curses the alarm clock, gets dressed into a business attire and leaves for his monotonous office work. The man always planned on opening a surf school at the coast.Surfing as been his passion ever since he was little until the accident that changed his life forever.Sometimes he still feels something but every time the now successful businessman looks at the prosthesis where his leg should be the words of his doctor reappear in his head „This is normal, it's a phenomenon called phantom pain." He seems to be quite wealthy but is money worth being stuck in a never ending circle of work, resting to regain energy for work, work. 

What would you prefer: success, wealth, reputation or freedom?

A woman in her fifties starts arranging just arrived delivers in the display window, mopping the floors and watering the flowers of the vintage looking flower shop which has been passed on for generations. The woman loves to admire the versatility of every flower, their range of smell, color, size, shape. Or atlweast she tells herself that. After all, who couldn't love flowers? She even has a favorite plant: the plumeria. So why does every time she looks at the flower shop a tiny bit in her break? It is a honor to take over a heritage wich has been passed for several centuries. It made her parents proud. It is what everyone expected her to do. It is all she was ever supposed to do. She should be glad her parents protected her from following a naive dream of becoming an actress.„Stop wasting your time." „You rarely get to have success in this industry." „I can't believe how selfish you are, wanting to leave everything behind; us, the shop." She made the right choice to stay here. It is the right choice. It is the safe choice. 

What would you prefer: staying in a cage, built on expectations but guaranteed safety or ripping the chains and falling into the unknown white a slim chance of flying before hitting the ground?

 A girl, barely seventeen, sits on top a flat roof of a building that is larger than many small shops here and yet not high enough to be something like a skyscraper. It is something in between, not the one or the other; just like the girl feels. She spent her childhood in various orphanages, always moving.Whenever she started to get used to something the girl was soon ripped out of it again. She doesn't belong anywhere, neither is someone waiting for her. So two days ago she packed all her belongings into a backpack and left for good. Since then the mysterious girl has been roaming the streets, trying to figure out what to do about her future. How long has she been sitting here? Watching the faint glow of the stars slowly being covered by the lightening sky.She watches the light of the small flower shop across turning on and the exhausted proprietor carrying all kinds of plants of which only half will be sold by the end of the day. Maybe the girl could open a small shop like this too. But for now she leans back and continues spectating the colorful sunrise.

What would you prefer: hoping that one day things will get better, staying still and trusting in fate or taking matters in your own hands, going the way yourself even if the direction is yet to be determined, possible unpredictable dangers lurking in the unknown. 

Those are the stories of just three people, completely independent from each other.These are own humans with their unique dreams, tragedies and hopes. Humans you might encounter on the street while taking a walk. Humans you might barely shot a glance at since you are too distracted or on the way to an important appointment. Those are just three people, three out of over eight billion.

And yet they are just pawns. Pawns which are just there, often without any significant role in your own life. But how could we blame ourselves? Life is not a sunny bike ride on a straight and even road, for nobody. We all struggle in our own way, leaving no space for others. And the chess game goes on and on.Everyone playing their own game by themselves, well at least most of the time.

Because there are times where pawns start influencing the queen.