The Book of Masks (Vol. 1)

Intruders at the Old State Theater

Previously: "Location, Location, Location" 

by rugal

"Hey so you know, I mean all of that is good and all but," you start. Caleb looks at you, waiting for you to say something. "I'm still thinking the theater's the best place to set up."

Caleb is aghast. "Why!?" he asks in astonishment. "You said it was dumpy and filled with mildew and rats."

"That's what makes it perfect!" you exclaim. "It's an old piece of shit in a bad part of town so who's going to want to hang around there?"

"Right, and you know what else is perfect?" Caleb asks and then answers before you can even say anything. "A modern fucking building. Air conditioning, no rats, no mildew!"

"But that's the problem," you retort. "Those places are desirable right? They're going to get a lot of traffic too and if they're connected to people we know from school then there's a good chance we could get discovered and then what?"

"We deal with it when the time comes?"

"Look, okay, I almost got busted twice," you state, "and while getting caught may be whatever for you it's not for me. So I'd rather do what will probably minimize the risk of ever getting found out and especially of getting found out by people we know. Look we just go out there, put a latch and padlock on the door and we're good."

"A metal latch and... shit! So now we have to play handymen too if we want to use it!?" Caleb explodes. But you can see his resolve start to falter less because he agrees with you and more because he knows your mind is made up. Caleb is stubborn but he knows that you can be just as, or some times even more, stubborn yourself. "Fine, we'll get out there, get it done with and get the stuff in. Shouldn't take more than, what, an hour? Two?"

"Hopefully," you say as you pull out your phone. "Hey Mom. Yeah. Yeah, I was just calling to tell you that I'm going to have to skip dinner tonight. Yeah, I'm going to be eating with Caleb tonight. Oh, well, he's kinda nervous considering he starts at Dad's place tomorrow so, you know, I figured I'd hang out with him for a while and help calm his nerves."

You look at Caleb with a big grin while he flips you off.

"Uh huh, right. Yeah, I'm gonna be a little late in getting home but I'll be back before curfew. Oh, really? Okay, sure, I'll tell him. Love you too, Mom." You end the call and continue grinning at Caleb. "Dad apparently can't wait to see you tomorrow," you tell him with a laugh.

"You're a real dickhead, Will. You know that?" he says with a scowl.

* * * * *

Back at Caleb's he changes out of the mask of yourself before the two of you exit your truck. In the garage you gather up the material that you salvaged from the basement, which admittedly isn't much, as well as the book. Next are the masks of yourself, the girl you copied in the basement as well as... "What's this?" you ask as you hold up a metal band. "Is that doohickey you made with my brain on it?"

"It's a spare I made last night with some of the left over material from the first one."

"Huh," you say as you absentmindedly shove it into your pocket. "So that about it?"

"One more thing I want to grab," he answers. He digs around through the garage and finally pulls out what looks like an old car buffer.

"The hell do you want that for?" you ask.

"Just something I thought of while working on the extra band and the spells," he replies. "I mean if we're going to make masks once I've got some money we can't be taking a few days to polish each one right? Plus that shit's tiring on your arm."

"So you want to try... a car buffer? And you think it'll work?"

"Dunno," he shrugs, "couldn't hurt to try though. It's not like old wizards had access to twenty first century technology."

It's sound enough reasoning so you have him toss it into your truck with the rest of the stuff and the tools you'll need to padlock the door of the theater.

"Hey so what are we going to do once we're able to make more masks?" you ask as you drive over towards the theater.

"What do you mean? Put 'em on, what the hell else would we do?"

"No but I mean," you start. "Okay so look, we put on masks of each other and we can go to school, fool our families, whatever right? But say one of us puts on that mask of Sarah. What do we do?"

"I'd finger myself and play with my tits," answers Caleb as if you've asked history's dumbest question.

"Alright and then what?" you continue. "We can't switch places with her because we don't have one of those mind thingamajigs. Even if we had one we don't know her so we still couldn't switch."

"If we had a complete disguise of her we could still pretend I guess. Like roleplay as her in public," he says. "We'll cross that bridge when we get there."

You grunt at that as it's an answer that leaves you unsatisfied. Sure these things are neat but there has to be a way to do something more with all of this you think. Because eventually when Caleb gets bored of playing with Sarah's body he'll probably ask you to put the mask on so he can play with it from the outside and that is a thought that makes you want to puke.

* * * * *

"Goddamn!" Caleb exclaims as he drops the cordless power drill. "This was a bigger pain in the ass than I thought it would be. You got the lock?"

"In the truck," you tell him as you lower your phone. Dusk is deepening, and you're using the flashlight on it to work by. "But yeah I want to take a break first."

Caleb doesn't say anything and instead walks through the open door into the theater to check it out. Now both of you turn on the flashlights on your phones as you look around at the remains of the likely office. It was spooky enough in the daytime but at night it's even worse.

Back outside, you've just packed up all your tools and are about to return out front to get the padlock from your truck when you hear a voice. Someone's talking, and it sounds like they're coming down the alley toward you. You and Caleb look at each other, then duck back inside the theater and stand just inside the door, in the dark, trying not to breathe.

The voice comes closer, until it is just on the other side of the door. Though muffled, you can just make out words:

"Look, just come out here alright? Nadine 'n them already bailed 'cause she's got a date or some shit and the others said they weren't coming out here if she wasn't. What was I--? Goddamn it, what I was working on last night that I didn't get to finish! The fuck do you think?"

There's a long pause and you wonder if the person's left but it starts up again.

"Yeah, okay, whatever. Thanks for leaving me high and dry. Huh? No I can't just finish it now! I need an audience, you know that! The performative part of it's half the fun! Fine, whatever, I'll see ya tomorrow." You hear a beep but it doesn't seem like the person's gone away because you start to hear them muttering. "The fuck's goin' on here? Someone break into this old place?"

The door opens, and footsteps shuffle inside. Your hand brushes your pocket, and you remember the spare mind band that Caleb made. You pull it out, and when a voice right in front of you says, "Hey, who the fuck--?" you smash it into where you think the person's forehead must be.

Something heavy and lumpy falls against you. You catch it in your chest and carry it to the floor with you.

Caleb turns his cell phone light on. He freezes it, in a dim spotlight, on you and--

You groan and Caleb nearly doubles over with laughter. It's another girl.

* * * * *

As soon as the band reappeared you'd grabbed and pocketed it. You and Caleb then hauled the girl outside and propped her against the wall, then closed and padlocked the door. Caleb drove while you studied the band. There's a name on it now, that seems to float in blue letters over the surface of the band: ALEX ELISABETH JOSEPHINE DAY.

You put it on.

It takes a while but with Caleb's coaching you're able to sift through things (and he's taking all of this in stride) and find out some interesting things. The girl is a senior at Eastman. She's a local graffiti artist and all around troublemaker and is really well known among the underground crowd both at Eastman and Westside where it seems people from both schools will come out to watch her "performances". She'd been engaged in one such performance last night that was cut short -- probably explains the graffiti you saw on the building -- and is hoping to get it finished this week.

You ask Caleb what you should do with this information and he's surprisingly cavalier with suggestions. One is to just take Alex's band and combine it with Sarah's mask that way you'd have a complete disguise of a girl. Even if they're obviously not the same person you could still roleplay a little. But if you want to wait until he's paid maybe you can grab a mask of Alex and, since she goes to Eastman, maybe use the disguise to try and get one for Sarah too.

But is that all there is to really do? What's the fun in roleplaying with just the two of you? Hell, if you wanted to roleplay you know some guys who would be experts at it.

But there's something that intrigues you even more. A stray thought that seems crazy but might pay out huge. Alex will probably try again tomorrow and the rest of the week. What if the two of you met her up there and showed her the book? Someone like her would undoubtedly have a lot of wild ideas about what to do with it and, well, you saw her. She's a cute girl. Her brain tells you that she knows more cute girls. What better way to impress some cute girls than with a little magic?

Next: "Payday!" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 1)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 1)"