The Book of Masks (Vol. 2)

Jobs Begun Badly, Then Bungled

Previously: "Hit from All Sides" 

You're pretty sure that Gary Chen can't hurt or frighten Gordon Black—

Well, you're pretty sure he couldn't hurt or frighten the real Gordon Black, and knows that he can't hurt or frighten the real Gordon Black, so he wouldn't even try to hurt or frighten the person who's currently walking around acting like a stoned-out-of-his-head Gordon Black.

So even when Chen rounds on you with some vicious blows—

"You fucking moron! You goddamned, cock-sucking ass-for-brains, you let Gordon find where we've been putting the—! You are so fucking dead when I've calmed down!"

—you don't confess you've got the stuff at another location. Let "Gordon" take the blame!

Chen has a satchel—the twin of Dane's—hanging off his shoulder, and he ends the conversation (with a curse) by throwing it at your head and stalking away. You and Semple are left to stare wide-eyed at each other.

"Gordon found your secret stash?" Semple asks.

"Yeah? Didn't you say he did?"

"I just saw him poking around here." Semple takes the satchel from you and looks through it. He pulls out two joints from its depths, then notices another one on the grass. He scrambles around, collecting the ones that Chen had slapped from your hand. "I didn't know Gary knew about it," he says.

"I guess I'm gonna have to move it," you say.

"You know, Gordon was acting real funny yesterday," Semple says after a moment's thought. "He hung out with us yesterday, last period and after, instead of going to practice."

Of course you heard this from Carson, but you feign ignorance. "No way! Did he, you know—?"

Semple nods. "He got really mellow, started going on and on about Chelsea and all the—" He swallows around a sudden grin. "All these fantasies about stuff he wanted to do with her, how he was gonna try doing it with her. It really freaked me and Tim out. We didn't know what to say."

"Holy crap!" The thought of the Dane-run Gordon trying to talk—let alone get it on—with Chelsea Cooper leaves you dazed. Then you get to wondering what Gordon—watching things play out from Will Prescott's point-of-view—would think of Dane's antics in his body. Oh, but Gordon's trapped at your place because he's been both suspended and grounded.

Semple's voice pulls you from this reverie. "Aren't you supposed to be in Walberg's class this hour?"

Walberg? Oh yeah.

Oh, shit! You hurry off.

He makes you suffer, both that period and in detention after school. But at least you manage to avoid "Gordon."

* * * * *

"I guess that makes sense," Caleb says in a distracted tone.

"You're not even listening! I told you that Gary Chen—"

"I heard you!" Caleb says without lifting his eyes from the book. "Chen beat the crap out of you 'cos you lost Dane's stuff."

"And then I managed to pin the blame on 'Gordon'." You giggle as you make air quotes around the name.

"Clever. Meanwhile, we're stuck here with—Psh!"

"What's wrong?" You crane your neck to look around his head.

Naturally, you're in the elementary school basement, and it's a little after five. Caleb has the grimoire open, and a metal strip is laying across the open page. "What's wrong is that I can't figure out what I'm doing wrong," he says. "I can't get the damn page to turn."

"Did you finish the next spell?"

"Yes I finished the next spell," he retorts peevishly. "I stayed up till two in the morning tracing the sigil and carving those fucking runes in that piece of metal. Nothing happened when I put the strip in the sigil, but I figured maybe it was just not going to be dramatic about it. But if I did it right, the page should turn, shouldn't it?"

"Did you try using it? Maybe you have to activate it by using it first."

"I tried that, I followed all the instructions here. You're supposed to put it on someone's forehead, and I put it on mine before you got here."

"Let me try," you say, and snatch up the metal strip.

"You're wearing a mask," he objects, but it's too late. You've already slapped it against your forehead.

It falls off, clattering to the floor. You and Caleb look at each other. "That's not the sound of magic," you say.

He picks it up gingerly. "You know, I had kind of a creepy feeling when I was handing the masks. They felt, I dunno, alive-like. This just feels like a hunk of metal."

"Maybe you copied the sigil wrong?"

Caleb glares murder at you. "Check it yourself," he snaps, and stalks to the other side of the room.

So you do. He's left out the paper he traced the sigil onto, and you lay it atop the one in the book. Carefully you check the one against the other. They seem to be a perfect match. You study the rest of the spell while asking Caleb what he did. He seems to have followed the instructions perfectly.

You take a strip of metal—about the size of a bookmark—that's got some runes like those in the book carved onto it. You set it in the sigil, run your fingers around it three times, and touch the strip. You try all that again with the band that Caleb made. Nothing seems to happen; nothing happens when you put it to your forehead afterward; the page doesn't turn when you lay it on the book.

Finally, you suggest starting over again. So Caleb goes back to his house to collect some more blank strips while you start tracing out a new copy of the sigil. The plan is to separate and for each of you try independently completing the spell.

But after Caleb leaves, and your eye keeps returning to the desk where Caleb stashed that metal briefcase that Dwayne Macaulay gave you yesterday. Finally you can't stand it anymore, and take it out and try fiddling with the locks. But it won't open. You lay it aside and return to work on the sigil. You only last another five minutes before you're playing with the briefcase again, with mounting frustration. You hear a noise outside, and quickly return to the sigil. But when Caleb doesn't come in, you pick up the briefcase again. You end up searching the basement for any kind of instrument you can use to break it open. You find a crowbar.

You bash the case about hard before it finally bends enough that you can jimmy it open.

It's in this attitude—you levering the briefcase open—that Caleb finds you when the basement door slams open. "The fuck are you doing," he cries.

You laugh nervously. "Just, uh, snooping, I guess, into the—" You indicate the briefcase.

"So I see. But that's not our business. You're supposed to be finishing up that—" He grabs the case away from you. And as he does so, it flies open. His words die.

The case is packed tight—so that there's hardly any room for air—with stuff like Dwayne gave you yesterday. You feel your eyes bulging. You and Caleb are both silent for a very long time.

"Jeezum Crow," you murmur. "What do you think the street value of that crap is?"

"Less than you think," Caleb says, but he doesn't sound as confident as he words would suggest. He's pale when he looks up at you. "That's what you were supposed to give Chen? Fuck us, no wonder he was so pissed at you."

You sink back onto one of the desks. "Wanna go in as Dane for me tomorrow?"

That jerks him back to the present, and he quickly sweeps the briefcase shut and shoves it back in the desk. "No, you fucked up, you take the consequences. Anyway, tomorrow's Saturday, lucky for you. How far did you get on— Oh, Christ, Will!" He snatches up the half-completed sigil. "I even gave you plenty of time to work on it! I went by your house to check up on you-know-who."

"What's going on there?"

"Nothing. He's still barely talking to me. He did say that his dad—your dad—did some calling around, found out what a shit Lynch is, so he's not as mad as he was yesterday. I bet that makes Black feel good, learning that his friends are totally despised. But Jesus." He sighs over your sigil, then shoves it into the book and sweeps the book into his bag. "I'll finish it at my place. You take the one I finished."

"I can finish my own work."

He glares at you. "Apparently you can't finish it. And look how you fucked up Chen when he gave you an assignment." He peers at you. "You're even beginning to look like Matthias."

That last remark makes no sense, since you are wearing a defect-free disguise of him, and you challenge Caleb on his insult. "I mean, you're getting that whole space-cadet look in your eyes. Look, just take these things—" From his pocket he takes three metal strips, and from the work table he picks up the band he had made yesterday. "Use the sigil I copied and try to get these to work. I'll finish up the sigil you started and work on some of my own. We'll meet tomorrow. Here, ten o'clock?" You nod. "Good. And lay off the weed."

* * * * *

But you don't take Caleb's advice. You've only had two or three joints ever, and you've never been interested in acquiring the habit. But playing the part of Dane Matthias gives you a once-in-a-lifetime chance, you figure, to experiment and have some fun with it. You enjoyed it last night, when Dane's mom got you high; tonight you don't find her at home, so you take it a little more lightly, and only give yourself a really pleasant buzz while copying the runes from the band Caleb made into the new bands. It goes slowly, because you keep pausing to groove on the—

Fuck, man, you're playin' with runes! How cool is that?

So distracted, you only dimly become aware of a hammering at the door, and when you raise your head it ceases. Then—

BAM BAM BAM! It's at the window. You twitch aside the curtains, and shriek.

Dwayne Macaulay is glaring in at you.

* To continue: "Pulp Friction" 

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