He'd been in the common room when he'd overheard one of the younger years saying something about a Nerdy Bird down in the kitchens studying. Walton could figure out from what she was saying that they meant Sasha Schlagenweit. He was a good kid, for the most part. Walt had always gotten along with him anyway. He seemed to be a magnet for bad luck, though.

But studying in the kitchens couldn't be any fun. It seemed that Schlagenweit was constantly with nose in a book... And not in the typical Ravenclaw way. It seemed to consume Sasha. So Walt decided it was time to distract Sasha from studying. Unfortunately, he had a feeling that exploding snap or gobstones wouldn't be Sasha's game of choice. A quick trip to his dorm found an old wizard chess set folded up in the bottom of his trunk. Grabbing it, Walton immediately made his way to the kitchen.

He waved casually at the house elves, and spotted Sasha easy enough. Walton walked over to him, and began to fold up the books Sasha had open- careful to mark the pages first. "Study time is over," he stated. "Time for some fun. You need to learn a balance, Schlagenweit." Walton even took the book that Sasha was holding, placing it on the neat stack he'd made of the others.

Then he opened up the chess set on the wooden table. "Play a game of chess with me. Give your brain a rest." Without waiting for an answer, Walton began to set up the pieces. "Which color do you like to play?"

A last minute revision of his Divination assignment had necessitated skipping dinner, once again.  What food he had filled his backpacking mess kit with at breakfast had been long gone by lunch so, by the time class let out for the evening, the Ravenclaw had gone directly to the kitchens. 

By now, the house elves had gotten used to crossing Sasha's path at random intervals.  Seeking food after a missed meal or two was a common enough occurrence and, more often than not, the house elves would find Sasha studying, or passed out, in the common room when they came through to clean in the early morning hours.  Even before Sasha had unpacked his textbooks, a salad, left over dinner rolls and cheese had found their way to an empty table in the corner. 

Sasha had made his way halfway through a list of Arithmancy problems and his dinner when Walton appeared out of nowhere and started closing his books.  "I - wait...what are you..." Sasha asked, looking up and then around at the various books.  The next moment, he yawned wide and quickly covered his mouth with his hand.  Lowering his hand, Sasha sat back and slid his half-eaten dinner out of the way.  "Exams are in a month," he pointed out. 

But, Walt wasn't leaving a whole lot of room for discussion.  Sasha sighed and sat back as his Arithmancy text was placed on the top of the pile to make room for the chess board.  "Alright," he agreed.  "I usually play black."  Though there was an advantage to playing first and taking the lead, Sasha usually preferred taking a defensive stance.  He took the tray of black, battle-ready figurines and started setting out the black pieces. 

"How'd you know I was down here?" he asked while nudging an over-zealous black knight back to his square. 

"Exactly," Walton commented. "Exams are in a month. Not in a week, not tomorrow. But in a month." He couldn't imagine cramming so hard when you had a whole month to study. "There's no reason to spend so long face first in a book when you've got a month left to get prepared. Especially if you're already smart enough to pass exams without the extra studying."

The white pieces began to grumble as Sasha opted to play black. They were muttering about Walt being a horrible player. The pawns were quickly deciding not to listen to where he directed them to go. He ignored their grumbling. This happened every time he played with his chess set.

"One of the second years was grumbling about a nerdy bird down in the kitchens," Walton told Sasha with a shrug. "I took a gamble that it was probably you, and that you probably needed to be distracted."

"I know you've got more exams to study for than the rest of us, but if you don't take a break now and again you're going to burn out. Besides, studying won't decrease your chances of going blank soon as you see a test. Trust me on that one." Walton hadn't even cracked open a book to study the entire year, and he was doing pretty well in most of his classes. That was the perk of being a NEWT student. You didn't have to take all the classes.

It seemed that Schlagenweit had missed out on that memo about NEWTs.

"Besides, it's not like your NEWTs are around the corner. Mid terms don't have any bearing on your career or life after Hogwarts, Schlagenweit." He placed his last few chess pieces, rolling his eyes as the knights started calling out insults at Sasha.

Sasha lifted a hand, on the verge of speaking before deciding better of it and letting his hand fall to the table once more.  He doubted Walton would listen if he tried to point out that that meant they had only a month left to prepare.  They had very different perspectives on how to approach lessons and studying.  Walton was much more like Figaro on that front.  Sasha was more like ... well, he wasn't quite sure.  Whoever he was like, "I can't just pass." 

In the end, debating the issue was unlikely to get Sasha out of the study break.  It would only delay getting back to studying and breaks could help clear the mind. 

In shining contrast to their white-hued counterparts, the black pieces hustled across the board and found their places.  They'd played on more than a few occasions before and the pieces had since learned that, even though he took his time making decisions, Sasha was a careful and exacting commanding officer.  He'd never gotten his own chess set.  Perhaps it was his muggle upbringing but he had a harder time watching the talking, moving pieces get bashed on the floor than he cared to admit.  There were a few sets, like Walton's, that he played frequently enough to become familiar with the pieces.  He had a tendency to approach playing Wizards Chess with a combination of Chess and Stratego tactics. 

"That feral Gryffindor,"  Sasha verified after greeting his king and queen.  He didn't need Walton to verify it was her.  That pint-sized Gryffindor was ill-mannered and short-tempered.  "She was in here snatching left over dessert.  She terrorizes the second year Ravenclaws." 

Sasha sighed and shook his head when Walton spoke of midterms.  "I know," Sasha admitted, blushing slightly as he caught one of the white knight's more colorful taunts.  "I ... to be honest, I'm not sure even my NEWT scores will matter much after Hogwarts."  If his life continued on his current trajectory, his GCSE scores and, later, A-Levels were going to be the ones that really mattered. 

"I can't afford to fall behind, though," Sasha pointed out as he coaxed one of his own knights back to its square.  In their usual testosterone-driven, chivalrous manner (assuming chess pieces had something like testosterone), the black knights were growing weary of the white knights' insults.  If they weren't careful, they'd have a free-for-all melee on their hands before the game started.  "If I slip behind, there'll be no way I can catch up before the end of term.  I'm just barely balancing it all as it is, without having to do any additional catch up work."