The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

Dane's Doom

Previously: "Unscrambling the Omelet" 

"Wha'dju say?" Caleb asks.

His voice brings you back to the present: to the grimy school basement you've been hiding out in, on account of the way you've fucked up so many lives. I fucked them up and I've fucked myself up. It's a thought as bitter as the coffee Caleb brought you. I need to put things back.

And that, you decide with a resolution that frightens the fuck out of you—

That includes fixing things for Dane before returning him to normal.

"We're going to put everyone back to the way they were," you tell Caleb. "But first I'm going fix things between Dane and Chen."

Caleb's eyes bulge. "How the fuck're you gonna do that?"

"Well, I figure Dane can fix things, 'cos, you know, he's Dane, and he— Um—"

"Yeah, he what?" Caleb challenges you.

"Well, he'd know how to smooth things over," you lamely conclude. "'Cos he's so, like, relaxed about—"

"Okay, so where do you come into this equation? I thought you said that you were going to—"

"I am! I'm gonna use one of those thingies you made!" You look around for the metal strip Caleb used to copy his brain, but he must have taken it home with him yesterday. "Sure," you continue. "We'll use it to copy Dane's brain, and then I'll put it on, and with his brain and his face—"

Caleb closes his eyes and groans. "And how are you going to copy Dane's brain?" he asks.

"We'll just get together with him. With, uh 'Gordon'." You crook your fingers around the name. "Sure, we'll get him baked and we'll take the mask off him and copy him. Then I'll put on it and Dane's mask and then— Oh!" You snap your fingers. "I read up on the next spell, and it makes this glue that—"

"No, wait." Caleb waves you to shut up. "You're going to turn yourself into a copy of Dane on the inside and out? And that'll solve things because?"

"Because I'll know what he'd tell Chen, how he'd smooth things over with him."

"Why don't you let Dane solve his own shit?"

"Because he doesn't know what's going on."

"Dane never knows what's going on!"

"Which is why I should fix it for him! It's the least I can do, man, since—"

"Alright, alright!" Caleb raises his hands in surrender. "Since you're trying to be so goddamned noble, the least I can do is not try to talk you out of it. But you know you're going to fuck things up even worse."

"What makes you say that?" you snarl.

"Look at your track record."

* * * * *

Since you've got a number of those metal strips ready to go, there's nothing to stop you from moving right away. Caleb has to text Jenny Ashton, who has to text some of her other friends, before you can get some contact info for Gordon Black. Caleb grumbles that now Jenny is hot to know how come he wants to talk to Gordon, but you've no ideas for shutting Jenny up, and besides, you don't care. Caleb sends a text to Gordon Black's number, asking to hang out with him. Luv too! Gordon texts back, and follows it with a string of random emojis. You have to wonder if he's already baked.

Caleb expects you to go along, but you decline at the last minute, saying that it would be too weird and dangerous if you met "Gordon" under Dane's face, and that you don't want any of this mess traced back to anyone with your own face. Caleb sarcastically retorts that you seem to be fine with having it traced back to him, but you stubbornly refuse to let yourself be moved. So he goes off alone for his playdate.

He's grumpy when he returns some hours later, and flings the metal band at you. Your eyes almost pop from your head when you see the name on it.

"Thor?" you exclaim. "Dane's first name is 'Thor'?"

"That's what it says," Caleb replies.

"How'd it go? You have any trouble?"

"The fuck do you care? I got it, so shut up and put it on and let's get this farce over with."

Now that it's come to the point, though, you hesitate. What if it doesn't work? you wonder. What if there's no way out for Dane? And what if I find out too late that there's no way out for him? While I'm trying to be him?

But when Caleb frowns hard at you, you climb onto the conference table and lay on your back. You close your eyes with a sigh and slap the metal band to your forehead.

* * * * *

Monday morning. Your eyes dart nervously about the parking lot as you wait for Chen to show up.

You passed a very bad Sunday afternoon and evening. I'm so fucked, I'm so fucked, I'm so fucked, you bleated to yourself.

And it was with Dane's brain you were thinking it.

So much for my brilliant plan, you decided shortly after Caleb dropped you off in front of Dane's trailer. There's no way Dane could face either Chen or his cousin Dwayne.

You were okay at first, though a little confused on waking. The last thing you remember, with Dane's memories, is hanging out in the parking lot of King Kong Komics with ... uh ... whatever his name was that texted you. You had Gordon Black's body, which was the wildest trip you've ever taken.

But after you got your head cleared, and figured out which memories went with which personality, you told Caleb to take you home. But the closer you got to Dane's place, the more freaked out you got. Because Dane is terrified of his cousin, and he avoids Chen as much as possible too. You thought you were scared of them? Well, Dane has seen them in action.

So you spent the night in a state of nervous exhaustion. It didn't help that you got to watch Mrs. Matthias getting stoned while you so desperately wanted to get stoned alongside her, but you wanted more to be sober if either Dwayne or Chen showed up. This morning, your heart was pounding in your chest on the long drive out to school. Now you're regretting showing up so early—it's barely seven-thirty—but you wanted to catch Chen and get things over with as quickly as possible. You're hoping that the story you mean to give him, along with the busted metal suitcase, will dissuade him from murdering you.

I remembered where I put it, man, so here it is, is everything cool with us now? you'll tell him. And after he's punched you in the guts so hard that you cough out your back molars, he'll ask how come the lock on the case is broken. Because I was worried someone got into it, so I wanted to look inside to make sure everything was still there, but I didn't have the key, so I had to bust it open. Then after Chen gets through kicking the rest of your teeth out ...

Yeah, it's a stupid story, but maybe it's stupid enough that Chen will buy it while leaving you only mostly dead.

"Dane!"

You leap a foot in the air and whirl. But it's only Caleb, sauntering up to you with a grin. "You're up here early," he says.

"Yeah, I'm waiting for Chen still." You squint down the street, both hoping and dreading the sight of the canvas-sided Jeep that Chen drives. "Wait, what're you doing here so early?"

"Gonna try to catch up with Anthony Kirk."

You flinch. "The fuck you wanna catch up with that smug asshole for?" Kirk is one of the rich AP fucks who hangs out with Kelsey Blankenship, Geoff Mansfield, and them.

"I wanna pick his brain."

"About what?"

Caleb cocks an eyebrow at you. The penny drops.

"Holy shit! You're gonna use one of those—!"

"Shh! Shut up," he growls.

"Why Kirk?"

"Cocksucker's going to Harvard. Or Princeton. If I had a copy of his brain, I might could maybe get into one of them places too." Caleb looks you up down. "I'd offer to score a second copy off him for you, but I think Matthias is about your speed."

You flip him off, but the unfeeling bastard saunters off with a chuckle.

It's like fireworks are going off in your brain after he's gone. The asshole is grabbing advantages with the stuff you made, while you're stuck trying to dig yourself out of the shit pile you've got yourself up to your neck in. Your gut roils with the resentment and unfairness of it all.

But that resentment acquires a new focus when you see Chelsea Cooper prancing across the lot toward the school, head and chin high. She's the one that started all this! you rage to yourself. She sicced her boyfriend on me, and—

It flashes back to you. That idea you had a couple of days ago, to trap her in Dane's life while you put on a copy of her face. That wouldn't have worked, back before you and Caleb figured out how to make those memory strips. But now, if you had her face, body, and her memories and personality to hide behind ...

And she'd deserve to get stuck in Dane's life, too. She's the one who sent Gordon after you.

You hop from foot to foot after she's vanished into the school. There are other people who would deserve equally to be trapped in Dane's body with a death sentence hanging over them. The Molester. Seth Javits. Some of the football players who made your life hell during P. E. back in your freshman year. Steve Patterson.

The temptation is almost unbearable. You could skip school and race back to the club house, make a new mask, grab one of the memory strips, and use it to get a new identity.

And when a car drives slowly past, and you glimpse the driver, you add another name to the list of possible victims: David Kirkham, another bully, and one of Chen's best friends.

Next: "Looking for a Promotion" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 2)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)"