Something you've always had little restraint about is your own curiosity. When you need to know how something works, or something's being kept hidden from you, your dogged persistence wears down yourself and the patience of the people around you. One particular memory from years ago involved your mother angrily confessing that Santa Claus didn't actually exist after you asked twenty five times in a row.
This eventually led to your life being influenced by your desire for knowledge, along with wanting control over your life in any way possible. Since being elected student council president (despite being a year younger than everyone else on the council), you've started to feel for the first time that you're satisfied with where you are in life. Being both the leader in your daily life and being a member of the PJ Masks takes a lot of work, and despite it all you manage to work everything out.
One thing that always got you since joining the student council was how little sleep you got during the night. A couple hours after your bedtime were spent patrolling the town and another hour to check up on the equipment back in the base leaves about five hours for actual sleep. The strange thing was, somehow, you never feel any effects of the exhaustion that should come with constant sleep deprivation. It's something that weighs at the back of your mind, but you figure there's some magic explanation behind it.
Sometimes you can't help but catch a few glances at some of the other students for heavy eyes or an inability to stay awake during class. You've always been a little curious if any of the night time villains attended your school, but not to the extent that Greg not-so-subtly gets.
But while you don't care much to know their identities, if there's one thing you'd like to know, it's how a ray gun that makes birds sad would help someone take over the world.
Romeo seemed almost flabbergasted when you asked him. "Excuse me?" he said, tapping his feet.
"I'm not kidding." you grumbled while trying to squirm yourself free from his huge robot's grip. In its other hand was Catboy and Gekko, who you could hear were as unsuccessful as you.
"Is this really the time, Owlette?" Catboy said.
"Well, it's not like we're in any danger or anything." Gekko said.
"Hey! I can crush you guys like grapes!" Romeo yelled. "And you don't get it!" He pointed at Owlette, like everything he was about to say was from the mouth of somebody worth listening to. "The most important part of having a "happy" morning is the sounds of birds chirping. If the birds are too sad to chirp, then no one will have a happy morning ever again! Then I'll have them hand over the world to me if they ever want to hear the birds chirp again!" He then laughed in a way that sounded more overacted than menacing.
"Who's they?" you said, interrupting his laughter.
"What?"
"You do realize that there's no one person that owns the world, right?"
He tries not to show it, but you can tell that this was news to him. "W-Well, that doesn't mean anything!" he snaps.
"And how would making the birds sad in one town have any effect on the whole world?" you continued to prod. "And can't other birds from out of town come in? You know migration is a thing, right?"
"I know! I'll just zap the ones that come in!" he snapped.
"But doesn't that ray only work on one bird at a time? How can you track down every bird in the city? And that's not even starting on how a bunch of depressed birds will impact the local ecosystem. Might even create a disaster, like bugs everywhere, no one wants to see that."
You glared at Romeo, expecting some sort of response, but he seemed to mentally shut down for a few seconds before stuttering out, "Can't you just play along?"
"So you admit you're wasting our time? That you have no idea what you're doing?" you finished.
"Argh! No!" Romeo clung to his invention like he was going to rip it in half.
"Maybe you should lay off." Gekko said. "Um, Romeo, I thought your plan was pretty evil."
Normally he would take any praise he could get, but tonight he flew off the handle and simply pointed to the sky, causing the robot to swivel its wrist and throw Catboy and Gekko in the air. Romeo then pointed his ray at them, managing to hit them both before they hit the ground.
"Hahaha, now what, Owlette!?" he cackled. "Now you PJ Pests will be too depressed to fight crime, and there'll be no one to stop me from taking over the world!"
"Actually, I'm fine." Catboy said, getting up and offering his hand so Gekko could do the same. "Maybe a little sad, but it's honestly not a big deal."
"C'mon!" he nearly shrieked. His robot shrugged and attempted to grab them again, but you manage to wriggle yourself free in the confusion and use your Owl Wing Wind to cause its fist to sail back into its face. In the confusion, Catboy activated his speed and snatched the ray gun from Romeo, hitting the reverse switch and zapping himself and Gekko.
"Rgggh!" he whined, stomping his feet. "I'll get you, PJ Pests!"
"Right, okay." you mumbled, rolling your eyes at the sheer predictability of it all. "Like the time before that. And the time before that."
You slowly approached Romeo, until you were nearly leaning over him. "And the time before that. And the time before that."
"Owlette!" Gekko said, grabbing your shoulder and yanking you out of Romeo's space. You sighed, something that carried the weight of all your annoyance at his near constant scheming.
"Aren't you tired of this?" you said, holding your arms up and gesturing to the city around you guys. "Your plans always fail, but do you know why? Why we always beat you?"
"...Because you're the heroes?" he responded, his face twisted into a frown.
"No!" you snapped, grabbing Romeo's shoulders and shaking him like a rag doll. "It's! Because! Your! Plans! Are! Stupid!" You let go of him, and he tottered around for a few seconds before reorienting himself. "Even if we weren't around, I bet you couldn't even take over the city with these ridiculous plans!"
"Oh boy." Catboy covered his face with his hands, and Gekko sat on the ground in defeat, waiting for it all to be over.
"Just face it!" you continued, allowing your pent up resentment for him and everything he does to come pouring out. "The one thing holding you back from ever winning against us is yourself! Why do you keep trying? You'd get a lot more out of your life if you tried to, I dunno, build things that made the world better rather than tearing it apart in the most inefficient and useless way possible!" Finished with your rant, you turned away from a flabbergasted Romeo and back to your fellow heroes. "We're done here."
"Ouch." Catboy laughed. He then glanced at Romeo, who gave them a blank stare. Since he didn't seem like he was going to give a response, the heroes decided to return home for the night. You used your flight to help Catboy get into his room, and then lifted up Gekko to do the same when he asked you something that made you stop.
"Are you sure you weren't too harsh on him?" Gekko said, holding onto the windowsill.
"Nah." you said. "It's what he needed. You get what I mean, right?"
Gekko put his hand to his chin. "Surprisingly, I do."
You couldn't help but laugh at the sight of his face all scrunched up in thought. "And that's why you're my friend."
"I guess." he said, crawling into his bedroom. "I still think you were a little too harsh, but it's not like you can take it back….so it's fine. G'night."
"Good night!"
After he closed the window, you returned to your house. Your costume disappeared and left behind your old, unassuming pajamas as you dozed off.
You stumbled through the woods and out to the outskirts of town. Your new robot was out of commission, so you planned to send one of your other robots to pick up the scraps once you got back to your lab.
You wanted to kick your past self for leaving the mobile one at home, but what's done is done.
You climbed through the bushes until you reached an isolated road, then followed it past the smaller houses until you reached a gate. You fumbled in your pockets until you found a key, unlocking the door and stepping through the knee length grass that had overtaken the front yard.
After wrestling your way through the neglected garden, you used your other key to get through the front door. Your house was three stories high, with most of the rooms filled with boxes that were never unpacked. The only rooms in use were the living room, the kitchen, your room, and the nanny's room.
The living room looked old and grand when you first moved in, but now it smelled like smoke. Just as you guessed, you saw your nanny out cold with a bottle in her hand on the couch. You didn't bother trying to keep quiet, immediately deciding to grab a frozen dinner from the fridge (Not that you had a choice-that's all she ever bothered to buy) and run to the basement.
Once down, you stuck it in the microwave you kept down there and activated your smallest, fastest robot. On your command, it sped off towards the city to retrieve the rubble before daybreak. You then sat down in your favorite chair and stared down your work bench.
Nothing she said was true. Nothing she said was true. So stop thinking about it. Stop.
"Just stop!" you snapped, picking up the nearest wrench and throwing it at the wall. The microwave went off, but you suddenly lost your appetite. You stare down your empty work desk and begged yourself to come up with something, anything that could be enough of a threat to make the PJ Masks take you seriously-
You stop. And realize.
You take off your lab coat, and almost think of putting away the goggles before deciding against it.
You try your best to deny the realization that maybe, what Owlette said had some truth to it.
The robot returned, unceremoniously dumping the rubble into the scrap pile and returning to sleep mode. You decide to dig through the pile to find any ideas for what to build next. The first idea that you think of is a device that puts a funny hat on anything it touches.
No. That's juvenile.
You tell yourself that that plan is something the old Romeno would do, but that's not you anymore. You're better than that. Like Owlette said, you need to be more of a threat if you really want to call yourself a villain (Ignoring everything she said about using your skills for more "beneficial" purposes).
You get up and pace back and forth, clasping your hands behind your back. Usually you tend to rush your projects so you have as many opportunities as possible to take them down, but this time you want to take things slow. It's not like you go to school, so there's nothing stopping you from spending nights in your lab.
But what to build? Every plan that you've made now seemed so-so stupid. You need something really evil, something that can prove that you're serious, that you can take over the world!
Perhaps you could trap their block in an impenetrable cage? Or steal their transforming pajamas and destroy them so there'll be no more PJ Masks?
It's not enough. You need something bigger.
How about a weapon that can vaporize the PJ Masks? That way they'll never be a threat to you any longer.
Your eyes snapped open. You stopped walking and glanced around the room. That wasn't your thoughts. There didn't seem to be anyone else there.
Did you really think that?
No. You should just go to sleep. Maybe you'll dream of something better. You try to forget about what you heard and went upstairs, completely forgetting about a late night snack and falling asleep while trying to think about ways to stop-get rid of-trap the PJ Masks.