Deprived Of Heroism
Based on
"PJ Masks"
Written by
Erik Høidahl Lundgaard
TW: Ch!ld møleståt!øn, ch!ld k!dnåpp!ing
CW: Swearing
It is yet another night in the town. An sleazy woman is walking through a street, looking for children inside the windows. She gets, however, disappointed, when she doesn't see many of them, alseep or otherwise. She still, though, has found some prey to do...whatever she chooses to do. But, she walks to the second house she found a child inside and puts her thinly-cut fingernail inside the lock, which she unlocks. She opens the door and silently walks in, just as silently closing it behind her.
While she's inside, however, a car passes through the street and the driver seems to notice her get inside the house. He uses his phone, connected to the car, to call the police. "What is the crime?" "There's a woman, brown, long afro, she's broken inside a house at..." Meanwhile, inside the house again, the woman walks up to the boy's bedroom. It wasn't locked, since his parents saw no need for a lock, the front door was already locked and all. She opens that door, too, and sneaks in to the sleeping boy. She taps him on the shoulder a bunch of times, until he wakes up.
As soon as he wakes up, she puts her hand under and on his cheek. "Don't you want to go to a place that always feels good?" she quickly tells him. That barrier broken, he tells her, "Yes, that would be a great place." "I'll take you quickest of anyone in town." she says before taking him up, over her shoulder, before she runs out, him screaming. His parents don't wake up, thinking it's another nightmare of his. They were too routine for him to need to comfort him for them anymore.
Anyway, the woman, named Lazero, runs out of the house, closing the door behind her again as she escapes to the street. Meanwhile, at the police station, some officers are talking to each other. "Well, no kid has done anything wrong, why would we need PJ Masks for this?" Then, a urgent message comes in on the police radio. "It's the Chief. I've just gotten another witness tonight, of the same woman, he's kidnapped a child from the same house." The officers, knowing what to do now, run to push the buttons and pull the levers to let up the Mask Signal.
While Connor and Amaya were asleep, Greg was doing his very last bit of play for the day, when he notices the shadow and looks up at the moon. Yup, it's the signal. The other kids are soon woken up by the shadow, too, and they all do the transformations as usual. And then, they go down to, their car to use, as usual, yeah... Anyway, seeing it as their best tool, they get on, but Greg sits there. A bit irritated, Connor tells him, "Push the pedal." "Oh, yeah." Greg says and promptly pushes the pedal. They go at a good and quick speed to the part of town the kidnapping happened and stop when they see the woman with the no-longer-screaming kid, who's only mildly wailing now.
Greg jumps out and jumps, well, like a cat, to grab the kid, but the kid pushes him away. "I want to feel good, PJ Masks! Leave us alone!" he tells the heroes. "Why wouldn't someone want to be helped?" Greg asks. Amaya tells him, "One of our first missions included one, remember?" Greg smiled, now remembering. The woman keeps running and the heroes continue chasing her. They soon get to her fairly big house, where all the lights are also off. The heroes are surprised when the lights turn on, with two other kids visible from inside.
She has also locked the door, which the heroes hear from the distance, that being right past the fence of sorts. They look inside the front windows, thinking, "What is she doing to the kids, if anything?" They could faintly hear from inside what she tells the kids in there, "I'm back with another friend for you! Come here, you. Now is the time for you to finally get the feeling you said you wanted." By that time, the Masks had decided to run back and, since the glass was just thin enough, break through them. As they break through, however, they see Lazero stroke her hand down the little girl's back and down on her buttocks.
For obvious reasons, the Masks were horrified, but also had the chance to punch her down. However, the punch got her only partly down, but she still let go of the girl's butt. The Masks began looking confused as the woman was enraged. "WHY DO YOU NOT LET ME GIVE MY KIDS LOVE!?" she yelled at the Masks, who got even more confused. "Is that really love?" Amaya asked her, before being interrupted. "I AM THE MOST LOVING WOMAN IN THE TOWN, IN THE WORLD! THIS IS THE GREATEST THING A CHILD CAN EVER GET! GET OUT OF MY LIFE, YOU SPOILED BRATS, NOW!"
The Masks laughed at the last part. The other kids, including the little girl, ran to them as if they were their parents. "AND GET SOME DAMN SLEEP!" Lazero finished before slowly walking away to her TV, which she turned on her Netflix. By then, the Masks had finally noticed the blue-purple circles around their eyes. Amaya got to thinking something. "You know, we haven't grown much over the past three years, have we?" she asked the rest of the Masks. "Stop it, we have other stuff to do." Connor said, before turning to the victims.
"Let's sneak out of here and keep all your want to make a peep inside your head, OK?" he whispered as sofly as he could while still being understandable. The victims nodded quietly and the Masks organized them into a little soldier-esque play. Lazero hears this and looks at the kids for a bit, thinking, "Soldier play from the kids, whatever." She turns her head back to the superhero show. The kids, two at a time, walk steadily and quietly in an almost soldier style out of the door as the door was unlocked from inside just as quietly and the kids walk still as quitely out of the house. They have gotten past the sorta-fence before the Masks softly take hold of them and fly away from the street.
Lazero had felt the bigger chill from outside and paused the show to walk outside. She quickly sees the kids with the Masks holding them, a great distance away. But she just smiles. "It feels good not to be able to do things to them again." she thinks before turning and walking back inside, closing and locking the door again to continue enjoying the show. The Masks continue flying - forward. The victims quickly notice. "Um, my house is that way." one of them says, pointing south-east, though he doesn't know that word yet. "Don't fly so quickly!" another boy says, almost crying. "I'm airsick!" The Masks decide to slow down slightly, which that boy doesn't mind.
Soon, they see and hear the police under them. "I've been there since Wendseday!" a girl cries, though not literally. "PJ Masks, please come down, we are better fit to bring the kids home." the Chief tells the Masks with his megaphone. The Masks promptly come down and lets the kids go, then the kids hug the officers. An officer comes up to the heroes. "Please, sleep more. You won't have these problems again when you get all your sleep back." The Masks relunctantly nodded yes, but Greg said, "It's our job to fight crime at night!" "Yes", the Chief answers, "but you can wear pyjamas during the day. You are allowed to here." Then he muses, "It's kinda sad that they have these problems during the worst crimes they have ever fought."
Meanwhile, the Masks fly back to their car, drive home and go to their beds. Over the next few months, they get all their sleep back, also with early bedtimes for many days. Then, they were ready to go full force, as the PJ Masks again, sleeping at 6, waking at 6.
THE END