She had found the figure several days ago on her desk, the white horse shining in the lights of her home office. Her home office. How they'd gotten in and out without security alerting her was distressing enough. Who they were was worse. They were supposed to be dead.

Of course, by rights, so was Tess.

On one hand she was curious to see what they wanted from her this time. On the other she was certain Lord was now in charge and the last thing she wanted was to see him again, let him take advantage of her one more time. She'd kill him before she let that happen and that, well, that just wouldn't make for a cooperative partnership.

She can't stop thinking about it. It makes her nervous, anxious and distracted. She tells the team, since they were the target last time, and everyone's on alert. Tess feels it more. Checkmate always comes for her first, the loyal white knight who betrayed them to their deaths.

It feels final this time, more so than last, and she doesn't know how she feels about that. She's never really had closure on anything about her past, despite her break from Lex, despite her going back home, despite everything, there's still a sense of underlying openness, as if she could still do more to make herself feel at peace with it all.

She hides it in the vault after having it tested. It's nothing more than a simple chess piece carved out of wood. Such a small thing to instill such fear, but fear of the unknown can be triggered by almost anything. She hopes she can laugh about it later, but for the time being, she tries to keep her emotions in check. Just like they taught her.

Soon, it will happen. She doesn't know when or how, but she knows it won't be much longer. And it's the waiting game that just might be the final straw.