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 Micheal stared at me for a while in silence. My feet desperately wished to move, but his look held me there. I was about to plea for my freedom before he started laughing. It was eerie and hollow. I would have traded anything in the world for the silence to return. Finally, he stopped. “Well, Kid, looking for a job?”

  “I um, yes?...”

  “Look no further! You’ll be working here from now on. With all your snooping, you know too much.” He glared at me as if daring me to say otherwise. My shoulders slumped and I could feel the words’ venom sliding down my spine. “Your first shift starts tomorrow. Eight to close on Thursday afternoon; the graveyard shift. Where noone is here except my fat Prisons and Pythons friends. I’m the Prison Master. The campaign is going great, by the way, thanks for asking.” He picked up a uniform he apparently dropped and thrust it into my arms. “Go home. I don’t want to have you rummaging through any more of my stuff. Any questions?”

  I fumbled for a moment and tried not to picture what this man would do to me if I declined. Then a thought struck me. I bowed my head with as much respect as I could. I’ve been looking for a hero.

  “Just one. I want to be your apprentice. You can even see it as extra insurance that I won’t rat you out. We can both benefit. After all, no hero has a record even close to yours, be it under legal means or not. Maybe under you… Maybe I can actually become a hero. Please. Will you train me?”

  Laughter. He was laughing. He was laughing at me. At my request. My heart sank as the venom returned stronger than before. It poisoned my mind and killed any notion I had of turning this venture in my favor. His laughter faded. “Kid,” he said, “I’m no hero. Eight o’clock. Tomorrow.” He spun on his heel and began to march out the door.

  I took a step towards him, but the venom had drained me. I staggered and fell to my knees. He turned to see my pathetic attempt. “Please!” I reached out to him, but pulled away when I felt my eyes start to sting. I stared down at the floor. “Be a hero to me.”

  He watched me for a moment, and it was the first time I saw a genuine smile reach his eyes. A previous thought crossed its way back through my mind: he really was gorgeous. “I’ll think about it.” He looked back up at the open wall safe. “Close that, would you?” With that, he left, closing the door so no one else could see.

  With a strange flutter in my chest, I stood and approached the glimmering suit. As I closed the safe, I was faced with the bizarre poster once more. My eyes immediately locked onto the four words, but only one registered.

  ‘Hero.’

  The next night was easily the most depressing night I had ever experienced. It started with an awkward interview and a dreadfully long application. The outfit was uncomfortable. The customers were rude. The pay was almost non-existent. And Michael had nothing to do with me. The only positive note was the bartender training me. Andre King was a kind and quiet man. He had an incredible ability to look at a person and know every detail about them. An ability honed because of his many years behind the bar, but naturally given to him behind dark eyes. The man was larger than The Armsman and had an innate ability to disappear in the shadows. However, his low, calming voice and soft eyes stopped him from appearing threatening. “AK” as he insisted I call him, had a rare and powerful gift. However, it wasn’t what one would call ‘heroic’. He had incredible hearing. He could easily hear a fly land within the same room as him, and with some effort, he could make out a conversation a mile away. Unfortunately, a power such as that would have to rely on partners finishing the work for him and a field in either covert ops or rescue. He informed that he used to actually work as a spy, but couldn’t spare me any details. Otherwise, he’d “have to kill me.” With the soft smile and twinkle in his eyes, he made that hard to believe.

  AK trained me under Michael’s pre-issued instructions. I was supposed to always be smiling. Whether taking orders, carrying trays, handing orders off to the cook, my number one priority was to smile. Secondly, I was advised to use the femininity I was so graciously born with. I was pretty sure that was a direct quote from the Almighty Pervert Michael. If I sway my hips, I get more tips. Third, as the joint’s gimmick I was supposed to pretend that I didn’t know what most forms of machinery were. My words also had to be chosen wisely to fit the theme. If flirted with, I’m to inform the customer that they could find some lovely strumpets two blocks down.

  The job was slow and emotionally draining. However, I made it through the night. Oddly, it was satisfying. I watched as other barmaids left the bar, chatting with one another as they went. Shouldering my backpack, I went to follow them. Andre clapped a hand on my shoulder and shook his head. “Boss wanted you to stay for a minute.” I went through a mental checklist of what I could have done wrong. Drinks were poured, food was delivered, I swung my hips, I smiled, tips were handed out, I kept the secret. What else could I possibly be missing?

  AK poured himself a drink and raised a toast to me. “To surviving your first night as The Drunken Pixie.” He swallowed the drink in one massive gulp without so much as a wince.

  “The Drunken Pixie?” I asked.

  Michael walked out of his office in the back and joined us at the bar. “Yeah, Kid. You spent the whole night working here- did just fine by the way- and you’re just now figuring out her name? Where’ve you been?”

  I thought back at the night and bit back the urge to tell him that I’ve been regretting ever coming into this building in the first place. However, my irritation was quelled as Andre gave a hearty laugh. He made a second toast to Michael and stepped out from behind the bar. “Boss! So are you finally going to explain how the naive kid found out you are a wanted criminal?”

  I gaped momentarily at AK’s nonchalance. At no point had he given me any clue that he knew of Michael’s secret identity. However, it only felt natural that he did.

  “Well, King,” Michael began, “just ruin the surprise why don’t you?” His eyes shone like mist by a lighthouse as he laughed. His charm was turned to max, and I hated that my heart was falling for such lame tricks. “Luckily, I have more up my sleeve, but that’s for later.” He regaled AK with the previous night’s turn of events, including some rather embarrassing details about me almost crying in his office. “And now,” he waved a hand at me, nonchalantly, “we have one more to add to our club.”

  “Club?” I felt that the longer this meeting went on, the more clueless I would become. “What do you mean?”

  Michael rolled his eyes and tried to look stoic, but a smile broke through. He seemed to be in a pretty happy mood. “I told you I’d think about it, and I did. I figured, what the hell. I sure could use an apprentice. Surprise.” I sat perfectly still for a moment, turning the words in my head. Michael coughed. “I said congratulations, Kid, you now have a master at your dispos-” I leapt up and squeezed the man in a tight hug.

  “Thank you, Michael,” I whispered. I buried my face in his shoulder to try to push back the tears.

  Michael coughed after a moment when I still hadn’t let go. I blushed and gently removed myself. AK stared at us with a look of amusement. “That’s another thing,” Michael pushed on, “the name is not actually Michael.” Correction: Not-Michael pushed on. “That’s just my name while I’m here at the bar.”

  I stammered. “At the bar- W-why?”

  “It’s a complicated matter, but in short, Unnamed Hero is a high-level criminal. And I so happen to have plenty of enemies with plenty of names to go off of. With that being said, I have a multitude of aliases. Makes it easier to blend in and not turn any heads.”

  “That seems to be counter-intuitive. And paranoid.”

  “Maybe I am paranoid, Kid. But let’s look at it this way. If you come to my bar regularly, you know me by Michael Smith. If you hear the name Michael now on the street, you may turn just to see if it is the same Michael that you know. However, if you hear Jacob Johnson, it’s not as likely. And if you do turn, you attempt to convince yourself that that is not in fact the bar owner, it just looks like him. Now you’ll walk on without a second thought and will even forget about it. It not only makes me invisible, but it also makes it easier for me to break all ties. I can start over and leave Malfakor if it really comes down to it. Besides, now I know what people want from me if I’m called out on the street.”

  My eyes went wide and I looked between him and Andre to see if this were some kind of a joke. Andre gave a small, concerned smile as if he wished it were. I looked back at Michael. “You’re crazy.”

  Michael just shrugged me off like I would never understand, and he was completely right. “It doesn’t matter. I only go by Michael in the bar.”

  Seeing there was no point in arguing with a wall, I nodded. “Ok then, Not-Michael, what do I call you?”

  “That depends on where we are and who is around. I promise, you’ll catch on quick.”

  “No, I mean, what is your real name?”

  Michael’s eyes widened in fear, but Andre’s soft voice cut through, relieving the tension. “Not even I know Boss’s name, and I’ve been in this gig since the beginning.”

  “That name is dangerous and dead.” Michael’s voice shook slightly as he glanced around as if he expected danger in every shadow. The man was completely paranoid, and I wondered again what it was that I had gotten into.

  “Okay… So, um, Boss, what exactly is your gift?”

  The fear slid away as quickly as it came. “I thought you would never ask. But before I spill my juicy secrets, I want to know how you make things disappear.”

  “Actually, Boss,” I was starting to like the nickname, “I freeze things in time.”