The Hero To The Masks

The first time it happened was probably the worst. One completely mundane night, Janice Solome had been blissfully curled up in bed, completely unaware that her simple and uncomplicated life was about to meet a swift end. Like many such endings, it came about with a single and simple action.

A knock echoed through her bedroom.

This was unusual because, last she checked, her parents weren’t home so Janice should have been alone in the apartment. It was especially unusual because the knock came from the window instead. Janice looked out the window. The alleyway outside was almost completely pitch black, but she could just about see the outline of someone crouched on the fire escape. Atop their silhouette sat two chilling blue lights, piercing through the darkness and staring into Janice’s bedroom. Naturally, Janice did the only reasonable thing. She tumbled off her bed and rolled away from the window.

Janice scrambled to her feet and kept backing away from the window. One hand reached out to grab something, anything, to use as a weapon. She held up the old spelling bee trophy while her other hand managed to flick the lights on.

The light flooded out of the window, illuminating the figure. Now Janice could see that the blue lights were the glowing lenses of the figure’s sunglasses. His hair was matted and filthy. He had one arm wrapped around his stomach, his hand squeezing his black leather jacket to his body. And, attached to his belt, sat a sword.

At the sight of that Janice went from panicked to full on terrified. The trophy in her hand started shaking wildly. She started slowly making her way along the wall to get to the door. Never once did she take her eyes off the figure crouched outside. She didn’t even dare to blink.

The person pressed his hand against the window. It squeaked and groaned as it began sliding upward. Janice’s hand tightened around her still-shaking trophy.

He stumbled through the window and landed in a crouch on her desk. He let out a hiss of pain and wobbled in place. Janice herself was so caught off guard that she actually stopped for a moment. The figure looked young. Younger than her. If she didn’t know better she’d have thought he was a child.

He tilted his head back to look at her through the piercing blue lenses of his glasses.

“Can you keep a secret?”

With a wobbly hand, he pulled his glasses off. At the same time he groaned and slipped off the desk, crashing to the floor. The arm that had been around his waist fell to the side.

Looking down at him, Janice realized three things.

One: she vaguely recognized him. He was the younger brother of a vague acquaintance of hers.

Two: he was covered in blood. The red liquid came absolutely gushing out of his stomach, spilling past a knife embedded into his flesh.

Three: she had no idea what to do.

———————————————————————

Janice walked into school the next morning in a daze. She didn’t remember actually falling asleep the night before, but evidently she had. When she’d woken up, she was alone. The blood that had spilled onto her bed and carpet had been cleaned up. Frankly, Janice would almost be able to convince herself it had all been a dream. Almost. It definitely would have been easier.

Falling asleep slumped against the wall she probably could’ve found a way to rationalize. But there was no getting around the note left on top of the first aid kit. It only contained a simple thank you, but that was enough that Janice couldn’t overlook it. It was only because Janice was in a daze that she didn’t start freaking out at any given moment.

Because of that, she hung out near the front doors of the school, keeping her gaze locked on the entrance. Most of the students who walked through were completely unremarkable to her. And then, through a lull in the entrants, she caught a flash of bright blue. Janice zeroed in on the hoodie that Peter always wore. Once she was certain it was him, she looked around him. Where Peter was, his friends almost always were. Sure enough, Calem, Amber, and Devlin were walking with him. And, trailing behind them in silence, walked her target. Daniel Koggal.

Janice stomped over toward the group. Calem was the first to notice her approach. “Oh, hey Janice,” he said easily. “What’s going-” Janice marched past him, completely ignoring his words or raised hand. “On…” Calem finished lamely.

Janice’s gaze locked onto Daniel. In that moment, his face was perfectly blank. Unnaturally so. If Janice had had any doubts before, that face alone would’ve wiped them out. Not that she’d had any doubts left.

She grabbed Daniel’s arm and, without a word, began dragging him away. For his part, Daniel offered no objections. The same couldn’t be said for the others. “Hey,” Devlin began. Janice whipped her gaze toward him. She didn’t mean to glare at him, not really, but he still took a step back anyway.

“It’s fine,” Daniel said. His brother visibly relaxed. “I’ll see you later?”

“Yeah,” Devlin said slowly. “See you later.”

Janice brought Daniel into a nearby custodial closet. She barely took the time to make sure it was empty before practically dragging him into it. She shoved the door shut and finally released his arm. Janice felt her body pitching and leaning against the door. She told herself it was to make sure Daniel didn’t run and not because her legs felt like jelly.

“What,” Janice began.

“Yeah,” Daniel agreed.

“What the.”

“Yep.”

“What is.”

“Yes.”

“What was that?!” Janice finally burst out. Her words echoed around the closet. She barely stopped to take a breath before opening her mouth again, fully intent to follow up on that thought. Instead she found a hand slapped over her mouth, cutting off any further sounds. All Janice could do was blink and stare at Daniel. She hadn’t even seen him approach. One second he was across the closet, and the next… there.

“If I let you go, will you not shout?” Daniel asked.

Janice blinked again. She slowly nodded.

Daniel lowered his hand and backed away from Janice again. “Sorry about that,” he said. “But you were screaming and I don’t think these walls are soundproof.”

“What was that?” Janice said again. At least this time she managed to keep her voice level. More or less. “You came stumbling into my room with a sword and a knife sticking out of your stomach! What was that?!” Janice’s voice started picking up again near the end. Daniel had tensed, clearly prepared to silence her again. She cut herself off and groaned. “What was that?” she asked one final time.

Daniel lifted his right arm in an awkward shrug. “I’m a vigilante?”

“You’re a vigilante,” Janice repeated.

“I call myself Iarumas,” Daniel admitted.

“You call yourself Iarumas.”

”Yeah,” Daniel agreed. “I’ve been trying to keep a low profile, but… yeah. I call myself Iarumas.”

“And part of that low profile involves falling through my window?” Janice demanded. “With a knife sticking out of you?”

Daniel cringed and looked down. “Sorry. I wasn’t really sure what else to do.”

Janice scoffed and finally pushed herself off the door. She flopped down to sit on an overturned bucket. “You could’ve gone to a hospital.” Daniel didn’t actually respond. He just arched an eyebrow and shot Janice the driest look he could. “It’s not a stupid suggestion.”

“It really is,” Daniel countered. He sighed and dropped down as well. Instead of a bucket or anything like that, he just chose to sit on the floor. He winced slightly, his face twisting for a moment.

Janice stared down at him. “How are you doing?” she finally asked.

“Great,” Daniel said immediately. He rubbed his stomach, right where Janice intimately knew that he’d been stabbed. She’d sewn up the wound herself, after all.

“Why come to me?” Daniel blinked and looked up at Janice, once again looking like the question itself was absolutely idiotic. “Ignoring the part where you really should have gone to a hospital, and it’s not easy ignoring the monumentally stupid and completely idiotic thinking that was going on behind the scenes of that ‘decision’ let me tell you, why me? We don’t know each other. This is possibly the longest conversation we’ve ever had. It might well be the first. Why did you decide that of all the people to go to for help, it had to be me?!”

Daniel blinked and stared up at Janice for a moment longer, still with that baffled look on his face. “You’re a nurse,” he finally said.

Janice’s mind went blank. “What?”

“Well, okay, you don’t have the qualifications,” Daniel amended. “Obviously. But you work in the nurse’s office here. You have experience.”

Janice felt her mouth fall open. She closed it with a soft click, but it just fell open again. Daniel shrugged again. Janice took a deep breath and ran her hands over her face.

“Liaison.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Liaison,” Janice said again. She dropped her hands. “I am a student liaison in the nurse’s office.” She stood up and started pacing around. Occasionally she’d look to Daniel, but each time she did she had to tear her eyes away from him.

“People come to me if they would feel more comfortable talking about their problems with someone their own age. Problems that I then pass on to the actual professionals who take care of it all. Usually when I’m not in the room. I have no actual experience, no qualifications, nothing. I mostly do paperwork.” Janice finally stopped pacing and spun around to face Daniel. “I am a glorified secretary!”

It was Daniel’s turn to have his mouth fall open. “Oh.”

“Oh?” Janice repeated. “Oh?! OH?!?! That’s all you have to say?!”

Again, Daniel’s hand traced the spot on his stomach where he’d been injured. “You did a good job,” he protested.

Janice’s eye twitched. “Do you know how I did that good job?” she asked, her voice falling flat and cold. “After you passed out from blood loss, I had to treat your stupid injury while I frantically looked up how to treat a knife wound. I had no idea what I was doing! Frankly, it’s a miracle you’re alive!”

Daniel flushed and looked away. “You should give yourself more credit than that. You really did do a good job.”

“That is so not the point right now,” Janice hissed through gritted teeth.

“I suppose not,” Daniel allowed. He pushed against the floor and hopped back to his feet. “By the way,” he began slowly. “You didn’t tell anyone, did you?”

“Not yet,” Janice muttered.

“Yet?” Daniel repeated. “Does that mean you’re going to?”

“Obviously!”

“Ah,” Daniel said flatly.

Janice shot a critical gaze down at him, her hands on her hips. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well, I’d just really rather you didn’t, that’s all.”

“You’d really rather I didn’t.”

“Yep.”

“Does anyone else know?” Janice asked. “Outside of this room?”

“Well, no,” Daniel admitted. “I don’t want anyone to know.”

“And why not?”

“Because they’d try to stop me.”

Janice crossed her arms and stared at Daniel for a long time. Daniel stared back for almost as long. Eventually he broke the impromptu staring contest and looked away. “Okay, I can see why you think you’d need to tell someone,” he began.

“You think?”

“But still, could you not? Could you just keep it a secret?”

“I could!” Janice allowed, her voice cracking and borderline hysterical. “I shouldn’t!”

“But you do have the ability,” Daniel pressed.

Janice rolled her eyes. “You know what? I’m not doing this. Nothing you say can convince me not to tell anyone. You know it’s for your own good, right? Like, in the most literal possible sense?” Janice didn’t wait for a response. She just turned around and grabbed the door, intent on leaving. She already had vague plans to track down Devlin. Surely he could knock some sense into his brother.

Janice cracked the door open.

“No one will believe you.”

Janice froze, her hand still on the doorknob.

“No one will believe you,” Daniel said again. “I mean, think about it. Who would possibly believe that a kid is a vigilante? I’m just a poor, innocent fourteen-year-old kid. No one would believe you. You’d just look foolish and alienate yourself from anyone and everyone.”

Janice slowly turned to look at Daniel. “You think that’s enough to stop me?”

“You’re still here, aren’t you?”

This time, it was Janice’s turn to break their staring contest. She pushed the door closed and turned properly to face Daniel again. “I have so many questions,” she pointed out.

Daniel nodded. He hummed thoughtfully. “While you’re asking them, think you could take a look at my shoulder? I got thrown against a wall after leaving your place and haven’t really been able to look at it.”

Janice sighed. “Yeah, take your shirt off.”

———————————————————————

She should’ve said no. She should’ve shoved him right back out that window the first time he dropped onto her desk. She should’ve just called the police and been done with it. Because after that first day, Daniel would not stop coming to Janice with new injuries.

After just a few days Iarumas knocked on her window then dropped onto her desk, knocking a half-written essay to the floor. “Can you keep a secret?” he asked, whipping his glasses off. His eyes were unfocused and pupils dilated to different sizes. Daniel leaned over and lifted his hand as if to whisper the secret to Janice. “Someone slammed my head against a wall,” he said in a normal tone.

Janice sighed and grabbed her computer. “Right. You stay awake, give me a minute to find out how to check for concussions.”

———————————————————————

“Can you keep a secret?”

Janice looked up from her phone to see Iarumas sitting on her windowsill, his legs dangling in the empty space beneath the window. He didn’t bother to take off his glasses. He had one arm gently holding the other, which was dangling limply at his side.

“Don’t suppose you know how to relocate a shoulder?”

Janice groaned and grabbed her phone from her desk. “Give me your sword and I’ll chop your arm off,” she muttered. “Throw it out into the alley. That’ll relocate it.”

———————————————————————

“Can you keep a secret?”

Janice sighed and put her book to the side. “What is it this time?”

Iarumas hopped into her room and whipped the glasses from his face. He held up his right hand, showing an arrow sticking through his palm. A trickle of blood dripped down his glove. “I may or may not have gotten the attention of an assassin. Think you can pull this out?”

Janice approached Daniel and grabbed his wrist, pulling his hand closer. She was going to have to cut the glove off. “You know how sometimes you’re watching a cartoon and the characters turn to you and tell you not to try something at home?” she asked. “This is one of those things.”

“Good thing I’m not home, then.”

“You are an idiot.”

“Ouch. You have terrible bedside manner.”

“I’m not a doctor! I don’t need a bedside manner!”

“Be nicer to your patient.”

“The most patient person in this room is me.”

———————————————————————

Janice knew something was wrong right away. She didn’t hear a knock on her window before it started sliding open. As soon as the sound registered she hefted her trophy and spun around. Someone new hopped into her bedroom. Instead of the black leather and sword, he wore a light blue hoodie with a bow and quiver of arrows slung over his shoulder.

“Hey, the name’s Compound,” the new guy said easily. He pulled back his hood, showing brown hair and his dark sunglasses. “Iarumas said this was the place to go if you were hurt,” he added.

Looking down at him, Janice realized three things.

One: he wore that same stupid hoodie that Daniel’s friend Peter always wore.

Two: a bit of blood dripped from a gash on said hoodie, splashing down to the plastic sheet she’d laid out below the window.

Three: she should have just hit Daniel over the head with the trophy when she had the chance.

“Can you keep a secret?”