The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)

Capture the Captain

Previously: "Like a Boss" 

There's no real rush to decide on who your next "convert" to Baphomet should be, and picking one of your five candidates now won't preclude picking another of the five later.

But when you wake the next morning—Sunday—you find that you have picked a name: Ellie Kemp. You like the idea that the team captain should also be the head of the three-girl coven secreted within the team.

And besides, you go to church with her.

* * * * *

"Is she really that popular?" Ellie asks you on the drive out to Sydney's. "I mean, don't get me wrong," she quickly adds when you gasp at her question. "Everyone likes Sydney, and she could be really popular. Don't look at me like that!" she cries as you take your eyes off the road long enough to give her a boggle-eyed stare.

It's the middle of Sunday afternoon, and you've just picked Ellie up. The pretext is that Sydney has generously offered to host a fundraiser for the volleyball team at her house. She wants to throw a party, you told Ellie after church, where she and Reagan both sing in the choir, and there'll be great food and a band and everything. She'll pay for it all herself, but people'll have to pay, like ten dollars or twenty dollars in order to get in, and all the money will go to the volleyball team!

The idea took Ellie aback, and what enthusiasm she did show felt as limp as runny toothpaste, but she agreed to go with you to Sydney's to talk about it. Besides, she had never been out there, and you gushed over how great Sydney's house was, and how if Ellie saw it she'd understand why it would be the perfect venue for a classy fundraising party.

But now, on the ride out, Ellie is explaining that she isn't sure Sydney is popular enough at school to draw a paying crowd. "I mean," she says, "if it was Chelsea who was throwing the party—"

"Nobody likes Chelsea," you retort.

"No, but everyone has to. When Chelsea gives a party, everyone is required to show up. So if she was throwing it—"

"Chelsea's not going to throw a fundraiser for the volleyball team!" You roll your eyes.

"I didn't say she was! But this would be like ... like Kelsey Blankenship throwing a fundraiser. Sure, it'll be fancy and stuff, but no one'll want to—"

"What have you got against Sydney?"

"Nothing!" Ellie crosses her arms and turns to stare out the passenger-side window. "But she's new, and I don't know if she's got enough ... pull ... at the school to draw a crowd."

"Catherine's new, and you need a crowbar to pry your way through the crowds she gets at her house!"

"Everyone already knew Catherine. Sydney's from ... California, right?"

"Kansas."

Ellie's head swings around. "You're kidding. She looks like she went to a Beverly Hills high school."

"You knew she came from Kansas!"

Ellie turns back around. "You'll probably have to remind me again."

You texted Sydney just before you left, and you text her again after pulling into her driveway. Ellie says nothing as she gets out, but her expression suggests she's impressed by the size of the pile. "Just let me do the talking," you tell her after ringing the bell.

Sydney is all smiles and gushing gratitude when she opens the door, and Ellie chirps and gushes back. (You have to fight to keep from rolling your eyes.) Sydney also makes a great play of telling Ellie how good she looks. And she does look good, for after changing out of the loose-fitting, calf-length dress she wore to church, she is now in a neon-green t-shirt and tight black shorts that show off her butt, her legs, and her rust-red hair to great effect. You flatter yourself that Sydney's praise is a backhanded compliment to you for your choice of a new body for her.

She leads you into the living room, but a bearded man with haggard, wolf-like eyes is sitting on the sofa with a newspaper, so Sydney smoothly turns your trio around and suggests going upstairs. "My stepdad," she tells Ellie. "I'd have to clear my idea with him, but that's no problem if I can get my mom on board." She shoots you a hooded glance as you put your hand to your mouth to stifle a titter.

Upstairs, Ellie coos enviously over Sydney's bedroom, and asks to see the backyard. "Patience, Blossom," you tell her, using the nickname that Reagan and Kayla like to give her behind her back, for Ellie has both the coloration and the bright but slightly bossy personality of the chief Powerpuff Girl. "We've got something else to show you first."

You close one arm around her from behind, and with your other hand draw the memory band from your pocket. Ellie has only had time to stiffen before you raise the strip and press it to her forehead. She relaxes in your hold, and you release her she topples face first onto Sydney's bed, where she bounces twice, and slides off to the floor. Her head, twisted at an ugly angle, stares up sightlessly past your shoulder into a high corner of the room.

"Jesus, Will, that was fast," Sydney mutters as she hops over to close the bedroom door.

"I don't fool around," you reply as you bend over to grab Ellie by her ankles. You pull her out away from the bed, straightening her head and neck but disordering her long, flat hair. "Besides, I was sick of talking to her about this 'fundraiser' idea, and I didn't want to go all over it again. You get the masks from the school?"

"Yes. Your brother's awfully cute, by the way."

"My brother?" You straighten up. Your first thought is, I don't have a brother. Then you realize she must be thinking about Robert, the pestilential thirteen-year-old who shares your house and last name. "When did you see him?"

"This morning. When I stopped by your place to pick up the key to the basement." She gives you a look, like she can't believe you had to ask. "He answered the door and was staring at me in the foyer the whole time after he called your pedisequos down." Her mouth spreads into an indulgent smile. "Has he got a girlfriend yet?"

"Not that I know of, and I don't like thinking about it," you mutter.

"He's going to get one soon, I bet. He's going to be real popular with the girls, I can tell." She pinches at your belly, and you jump. "I can't believe you weren't more popular with the girls. I should have had to pry them off you with a—"

"Just get the mask ready, please."

Sydney's smile widens, but she sweeps over to one of her dressers and pulls open a drawer. "Oh, and I had nothing else to do while waiting for you this morning," she says as she takes out a plastic sack that clinks and clanks, "so I made up and polished three more masks. If Ellie has no more plans for today, I thought we could finish up the rest of the bits to go with them."

"You'll have to tell me if she's got any plans. You know, after—" You wave a hand before your face.

Sydney drops the bag on the bed and slips her arm around your waist. You slip yours around hers—a much more natural feeling than it has been, maybe because Reagan likes putting her arm around her girlfriends. Embracing this way, you look down at the body that Sydney will soon be putting on.

Ellie isn't a small thing, except next to a big, bluff girl like Reagan. She is very Irish-looking, with coarse, rusty-red hair that hangs down to the top of her boobs. Her arms are thin, but they have some definition; her legs are well-shaped, but the flesh wobbles loosely on them. Her breasts are on the small side. But she's well-shaped, and she's got a cute face.

"You could afford to go a little lighter on the mascara," you tell Sydney, "after you put her face on."

"What mascara? And why are you mentioning it?"

"Just following a train of thought. And she's not wearing as much right now, because her mom doesn't let her wear makeup to church. But she likes to lay the mascara on thick at school. Haven't you noticed?"

"Not really."

"God, Sydney." You roll your eyes. "You must be, like, the least judgmental girl at school. I mean, if you're not going to go around noticing how the other girls are doing their makeup, and what they're wearing—"

Sydney grabs a fistful of your flesh and pinches you hard.

"Well, whatever," you say. "It's going to be so cool having extra classes with you, and volleyball—"

You prattle on while Sydney listens with a fixed smile on her face.

* * * * *

The memory strip comes out, and Sydney remembers (just in time) that she also has to make a mask of herself, to put onto Ellie. She glues the memory strip she made last night into one of the masks she polished this morning, then stretches out on the bed and places it on her face. You prep a new container of the pedisequos-paste as you wait. The mask comes out of Ellie while you're waiting for Sydney to be copied into her mask, but you're not too scared of Ellie waking up—you figure you can just pop the mask back onto her to knock her out again. You coat the inner surface of Sydney's mask with the paste, snip off a little of her hair, and burn it inside the mask. Ellie is still unconscious when you carefully lift the mask from off her face.

Before you drop Sydney's mask onto Ellie, though, you have a thought. You've not coated Reagan's mask with the pedisequos-paste, which means that if you wanted to, you could pass Reagan to Sydney, and take Ellie's face for your own.

Next: "She Who Runs the Show" 

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"Table of Contents (Vol. 3)" 
"The Book of Masks (Vol. 3)"