Author's Note:

Well, my fandom hopping has completely surprised me yet again.

I've written for "kiddie" shows before, so that's not the real surprise here... the real surprise here is how I got into this show in the first place. It really shouldn't have surprised me, though... after all, it's been going on two decades that I've been on this site (omg I've been writing fanfic for nearly two decades now what am I doing with my life), and the point of my life I'm in right now, it was bound to happen.

That's right... I only started watching this show in the first place because of my daughter.

But, well, I was kind of thrown for a loop with how much I grew to like it. Again, it shouldn't have been surprising—I've always liked silly superhero shows with an enjoyable villain cast, after all, and obviously, PJ Masks fits that description perfectly.

This whole fanfic just kind of happened on its own. My predictable gravitation for hero/villain pairings had me formulating an Owlette/Romeo idea before I really realized it was even happening, and this was written very, very quickly, at least given my usual track record. It's also completely rated G and is probably the fluffiest hero/villain I've ever written, lol. It's seven chapters long, and I'll be posting a new chapter every couple of days as I'm able. I also intend to respond to all signed reviews as I'm able, but it may take a few days, as I'm very busy with a fulltime job, family, and house/yard work. I apologize in advance if I'm slow to respond/update!

This fanfic is, of course, dedicated to my daughter. Thanks for getting me hooked on this silly show, sweetie. :)

I hope you enjoy! It looks like I'm the first one to write this ship (not surprising; I'll be the first to tell you it's a bit out there), so it's fun pushing out into uncharted territory. I hope you'll take this journey with me... it'll be fun, I swear. ;)

Up until the last fifteen minutes of school, it had been a day completely unlike any other day. Perfectly boring, in other words. The sooner school let out, the sooner he could get back to where he really wanted to be—working on his latest evil scheme.

The truth of the matter was that Romeo Mecano, despite being seven years old, shouldn't really have remained in the second grade with his peers. His lessons at school were a complete bore to him, and academically he would have been better stimulated in the third or even the fourth grade—or beyond. But if his intelligence was more in line with his classmates, he'd lose the chance to lord it over them, and, well, basking in his obvious superiority was the only thing that made school even partway bearable. If he lost that in the daytime, sure, he'd still have the PJ Masks to gloat over during the nighttime, but, well… that didn't always end well for him.

For some reason. Because, well, obviously he was better than them in every way. He was just super unlucky, clearly. Yeah. That had to be the reason why he hadn't been able to land a win against them yet.

But their luck had to run out someday!

And that afternoon, fidgeting at his desk while waiting for the last few minutes of the school day to slip away, Romeo couldn't stop the usual pleased, sneaky smirk spread across his face as his mind ran through his plans for the night, each step of his (quite frankly) brilliant plan fully actualized in his brain. All that was left to do was to implement it. And with those pesky PJ Masks finally out of his way, he would finally be able to take over the world!

"Class, before we're dismissed for the day…" his teacher said, cutting off the evil laugh that was about to escape Romeo's lips (which was probably for the best; he always got such weird stares from his classmates whenever he let one of those loose). "The principal's going to be making an announcement over the intercom soon about a special opportunity our school has been given."

Romeo yawned loudly, rolling his eyes. Who cared?

"And it's something everyone needs to be listening to," the teacher stressed, crossing her arms and sending a firm glare in Romeo's direction.

Romeo once again rolled his eyes, but getting the hint and not wanting to be held after school for misbehavior, sat up a little straighter and tried to make it look like he cared. Hopefully the announcement wouldn't take too long.

The intercom crackled to life, and the principal's voice cut through the room. "Good afternoon, students," she said. "Before we leave today, I have an exciting announcement to make. We are one of ten elementary schools in the region chosen to participate in a multi-district, all ages science fair. Each teacher has selected one student from their class to represent our school. The six chosen students will work together on a written report on a science topic of their choosing, but will also be competing against each other with their own individual science projects. Whichever student is judged the winner will represent our school in the regional fair."

Romeo didn't have to fake perking up at this bit of news. "Finally!" he said, under his breath yet still triumphantly. Finally there was a chance to actually do something more fitted to his unique, awesome abilities at this humdrum school. Finally there was a chance to prove to the whole school just what a magnificent genius he was!

That was, of course, assuming his teacher had the common sense to nominate him over his simpleton classmates, but that seemed to Romeo to be practically a given.

"Here are the students from each class who have been selected to participate," the principal was saying. "These six students will meet in the principal's office immediately for more information. Our kindergarten student is… Adrian Quint!"

"Ugh," Romeo said aloud, impatiently. Why was she drawing out the reveal of the name like this was some awards ceremony? Even sitting through the first grade name was going to take far longer than he wanted to wait.

"For first grade… Amaya Devereaux!"

Okay, in comparison, impatience was a much better thing to deal with than shock and anger.

"Are you kidding me?!" Romeo snapped, suddenly and abruptly no longer wanting to be the representative from his class. Because if he was, he was going to have to work with Owlette! He was going to have to team up with one of the PJ Masks! And no amount of science fair recognition was worth that.

Amaya and her friends Greg and Connor probably didn't even realize that Romeo went to the same school as them, let alone that he was aware of who they were. It was pretty obvious, though. They color-coordinated their outfits to match with their superhero identity, for one thing. They also had the really stupid habit of talking openly about their superheroics on the playground. True, they usually did it when they were reasonably by themselves, but they did a horrible job of keeping their voices down. Romeo had been sulking against a far wall on the edge of the building one day a few weeks prior, keeping as far away from his stupid classmates as possible, when he had rather unexpectedly heard his name spoken by the trio of first graders across the way. Stealing a glance at them, seeing their color schemes, inspecting their faces as best as he could from a distance while trying to remain hidden himself, it had been very easy to put two and two together.

Not wanting to have to confront them at school, he had elected to keep his distance from them, which wasn't difficult at all. Kids tended to avoid Romeo anyway, and besides, the PJ Masks were a year behind him, and the first graders usually played on the other end of the playground from the second graders.

But it was going to be really hard to avoid them—one of them, anyway—if they were expected to participate in this science fair together.

Romeo was in a nervous sweat, not at all able to celebrate when, unsurprisingly, his name was announced as the second grade partaker. There was no celebration from his classmates, either, other than a few sighs of relief—whether they were relieved to not be selected or just relieved that this meant Romeo would be leaving the classroom in a bit was a conundrum that normally would have incensed him, but seemed like ridiculously small potatoes now. He had far more pressing matters to worry over now. Like how the heck he was supposed to manage this.

"You're free to leave class now and head to the principal's office, Romeo," his teacher reminded him.

"Ha! You don't have to tell me twice!" Romeo quickly declared. No way was he going to let anyone in his classroom onto the fact that anything about this scenario was bothering him. Jumping out of his desk and making a beeline for the door, he crowed, "All of those other kids just ought to give up now, because I'M going to win! Ha ha!" And he was already halfway down the hallway and thus barely heard his teacher's admonishing, banal statement along the lines of "this is supposed to build inter-class teamwork and comradery and blah blah blah…"

The forced excitement helped bring the real emotion back into the fray, and along with it a heaping dose of confidence to deal with the most unwanted of first grade partners. After all, Romeo reminded himself, his shock had come and gone when hearing her name on the intercom. Amaya didn't even know that he went to this school, and most certainly didn't know that he knew who she was, even if she did recognize him. Of course, she might not… he didn't have his lab or robots at school, and he didn't wear his lab coat, nor his goggles… but it would take far more than that to hide his glorious villainy. Okay, yeah, she'd probably recognize him. But still, even then, he held all the cards for now. She was going to be the one knocked over with shock when she saw him, and he'd be the one laughing!

"This is going to be fun!" he declared gleefully, only barely remembering to stifle his evil laugh again.

Amaya's jubilation at hearing her name called as the first grade participant had spilled out of her in the form of a triumphant holler and a leap out of her chair. She had put a lot of work into her paper on cloud formations the other week, and being selected as her class's representative felt like the highest form of her teacher's recognition of her hard work. Connor and Greg were similarly excited for their friend, giving her high fives, and even the rest of her classmates let out whoops of "way to go, Amaya!" and an excited clamor arose through the class as they all celebrated with her. The din of their enthusiasm only barely ebbed enough after the fifth grade participant was announced for Amaya to catch the principal's concluding statement: "Congratulations again to all of our talented students selected for this honor! Again, please report to the principal's office right away for further information. Thank you!"

"Will you guys wait for me after class?" Amaya asked Connor and Greg as she hastily put her notebooks and pencils away.

"Of course!" said Connor.

"We're gonna want to hear all about it!" Greg added eagerly.

"Thanks! I'll see you then!" Amaya rushed towards the door, only barely remembering to turn around before she left the room to let out a breathless "Thank you for nominating me!" to her teacher before bounding to the principal's office, a spring in her step.

So… we're doing a report as a group, but also individual projects. I wonder what my project should be? Amaya slowed herself down a bit, not wanting to appear out of breath when arriving at the principal's office. I could do something else weather-related. She smirked to herself. After all, I am the only kid out of all of us who can actually fly through the clouds, so I've got a real advantage! In fact, I might have a good shot of WINNING this, even though I'm one of the youngest kids!

She gave herself a quick, passing reminder to not get too full of herself before reaching the door to the principal's office, already hearing some chatter inside. It occurred to her that she had maybe spent a little too much time celebrating in her classroom, and that she was probably the last one to arrive. An apology was already on her lips as she opened the door, bracing herself to face her older competition. "Sorry I—aaAAAHH!"

No way. No way. NO WAY! This HAS to be some kind of joke!

Her reaction, of course, made it even more difficult for Romeo to hide his pleased, knowing grin. Ha! She DOES recognize me! And man, is it making her squirm! Deciding very quickly that he really liked how uncomfortable this was making her, he managed to twist his smirk into what he hoped was an impatient, only slightly annoyed snarl at her, hopefully hiding any reciprocal recognition.

"That's perfectly fine, Amaya, we weren't waiting long!" the principal said. "Now that we're all here, I'd like to go into more detail just what it is you'll be doing." The six kids gathered around her desk to listen more closely—well, five of the six kids, at least. Amaya was still stopped in the doorway, the hairs on her arms sticking out, her face nearly white as a sheet. "As I said on over the intercom, you've each been given the chance to—Amaya, could you come up here in the front so you can hear, please?"

"Uh—yeah, of course," she stammered. The other students had, of course, naturally fallen into place with the older, taller students at the back, and so Amaya had to, very reluctantly, squeeze her way to the front. She situated herself to the right of the kindergartner, Adrian, keeping him between herself and Romeo, although from the corner of her eye she could see that Romeo was still looking incredibly smug and pleased with her discomfort. I can't believe that I have to do this project with ROMEO! How did I not know that he goes to our school? Does… does he know it's me? The fact that she wasn't sure ignited anxious goosebumps once again, and she quickly directed her eyes away from him as the principal continued.

"You'll be spending the next three weeks working on your projects, both individual and group, during the last thirty minutes of the school day. Probably in the library, but we might be moving you around as need be. Your individual projects that you work on can be on any science subject of your choosing, and you will each present your own project, one at a time, at our special science assembly in three weeks. While these should end up, ultimately, as your own work, you're encouraged to bounce ideas off of each other as you please. Remember that even though each of you represents your class, you'll all contribute to the group report, which will be used to represent our school at the regional competition, along with the individual winner and his or her own, individual project. Friendly competition is most assuredly encouraged, but please remember that all of you will be representing the academic strides of our school, regardless of who wins." She smiled warmly at the six students. "Your teachers selected each of you for this honor because of your outstanding academic records. Please remember that and treat this like the privilege that it is." She passed out some papers amongst them. "Here's a rough schedule of the next three weeks. There's also a permission form on the bottom that a parent will need to sign and return by the end of the week."

Amaya took the sheet and read it fiercely, trying to direct all of her focus on something else to curb her anxiety. Romeo, meanwhile, took the sheet with a bit of disdain, not even looking at it before folding it up and putting it in his pocket. He'd have to remember to fake his dad's signature on it later.

"Now, before you go, I've got a few handouts and reading materials to hopefully jump-start some ideas, if you need them." The principal picked up a stack on her desk. "Adrian, Amaya, and Romeo, these are for you."

"Oh please!" Romeo spat out derisively, making Amaya automatically spin her head towards him and clench her fists. "Enough with the patronization! I don't need any of your babyish literature. I have enough brilliant ideas in my head to win a hundred science fairs! Ha!" He abruptly cut the evil laugh short, catching himself just in time. Man, he really needed to work on his self-control.

"Watch your tone, Romeo," the principal said, a gleam of warning in her eyes. "Remember that this is a privilege and you need to treat it as such." She handed the packets to the three younger students as Amaya stifled a strangely pleased giggle of her own. With how awkward and uncomfortable this whole thing was, seeing Romeo get into a bit of trouble was rather satisfying. "Emily, Brody, and Isaac, your packets are by the printer, if you'd like to come with me."

The principal stood up and made her way to the printer, the three older kids following her, and to Amaya's horror, Adrian did as well, trancing after Emily. Oh no, come on, don't leave me all alone with Romeo! she silently begged, but not only was this unspoken request unheeded, but Romeo took this opportunity to slide next to Amaya, still smirking at her. "Soooo… Amaya, is it?" he asked, feigning uncertainty.

"Yeah, that's right," said Amaya uncomfortably, fidgeting and looking away from him.

"I'm Romeo." He abruptly extended a hand, remembering a second too late the social protocol one should follow when first meeting someone—or pretending to first meet someone, in this case. Every second Amaya hesitated made him feel more and more pleased. He was going to keep up this charade as long as he could.

Amaya wavered a bit longer before, reluctantly, taking his hand and shaking it. I have to act like I don't know him, she thought. It was only a few more minutes of being kept in school today, right? She could keep this up for that long. She hoped.

"Just to be fair to you," Romeo said, almost dismissively, "I just wanted to let you know to not bother trying too hard on your project. I'm a super genius and can build anything, so it's pretty much a given that I'm going to win. Don't waste your time trying to beat me. You're just going to be horribly disappointed."

Amaya flared up in anger. "Excuse me! I have just as much a chance to win as you—or anyone else!"

"Ha! Your bubble's gonna get burst so hard!" Romeo folded his arms and shot another derisive smirk her way. "It's almost cute how mistaken you are. But mostly pathetic. If only you knew what you were really up against, you'd be begging me to go easy on you!"

Amaya stuttered a bit at that, knowing that as much as she hated to admit it, he did have a point. He really could seem to build anything, up to and including things that scientifically speaking shouldn't even exist. How was she supposed to compete with him? But she couldn't let him know that she was aware of that.

"Yeah, well, don't underestimate me!" she finally declared. "Because you're the one who has no clue who they're up against! I'll show you!"

Romeo just laughed at that. I know EXACTLY who I'm up against, bird brain! And this time, you can't use your stupid superpowers against me.

Out loud, he simply said flippantly, "Yeah, good luck with that!"

Amaya, clenching her fists again, seethed at him, but any further reaction was halted by the other students and the principal returning.

"Alright, that's all I have for you today!" the principal said. "Remember to get those permission forms signed. Your teachers will let you out of class early tomorrow. At that point, you'll report to the library. See you there. You're dismissed for the day."

The other kids filed out, chattering excitedly, and Romeo bounded past Amaya, sneering at her, "See you tomorrow!" Or maybe tonight. Except now he wasn't sure if he was going to be out tonight after all. Planning for this science fair was definitely going to rearrange his schedule for the next few weeks.

Amaya only gave him an annoyed glare for an answer, slowly bringing up the rear of the group as she desperately tried to process everything that had just happened.

At least one thing was for certain—this was definitely not going to be just an ordinary science fair.