Young Writers Society

When she suddenly heard a voice from beside her, she nearly jumped in surprise.

But she thankfully somehow managed to catch herself before she could do something embarrassing like that - especially since it was Jewel who had abruptly shown up. She hadn't expected he would show up here of all places. And so soon after the start of the attack, too. The thought made something register in the back of her mind, but she was too distracted to really consider the implications.

"...I'm not sure," Wren admitted. She knew her words were sounding rude and distant, but she didn't want them to. She just didn't know how to balance the urgency of the situation with the emotional roller-coaster of running into Jewel again. She wasn't even sure how to really work with another person; she had always done things like this alone. "I was going to use the smoke as a cover and sneak up on him."

Jeff nodded, not sure what to say now that he was at the scene of the crime, or so to speak, and that he was by The Actor, who looked as cool as ever. This was no time for fanboying though, not when there was an actual troublemaker right in front of them.

“That sounds like a smart idea. Since I’ve got the speed, do you want me to try to draw them out? Or, I can stay in front and try to make sure they can’t flee towards the exit?”

It sounded like a good idea, but another idea was starting to form in the very back of Wren's mind. People outside had probably seen Jewel when he arrived, so the element of surprise wasn't entirely there. But if the villain hadn't, they had an upper hand.

She glanced over at Jewel.

"What if I draw them out?" she said. "I can distract them for a few minutes while you make sure everyone has evacuated. Once the villain is too focused on what I'm doing, you can surprise them with your speed and catch them."

“That could definitely work as well.” Jeff tried to curb his immediate reaction to call The Actor “sir,” but after their last meeting, maybe he should go more for the polite way than any other manner. “I’m okay with that. I should only need five minutes, really.”

With that, he nodded, then left as quickly as he entered the theater, stopping in the middle of a large crowd. A few stragglers tripped, stunned in the back aisles, so Jeff grabbed their arms and pulled them back to being upright, waving off any gratitude.

As long as everyone would be safe, that was all he needed in payment for his services. One last look through the theater showed it empty, save for a stroller pushed off its wheels. Hmm. He snatched it up, grunting a bit under its weight, while also placing that outside.

Hopefully someone could make use for that. With his task complete, Jeff ran back into the theater, ready to help The Actor our whichever way he could.

As Jewel ran outside, Wren turned her attention back to the villain. She had been trying to keep track of what they were doing while Jewel and her were planning, but it looked like not much had changed. The villain was still controlling smoke, making weird flashes of light...

...and wearing an outfit that looked strangely reminiscent of techie?

The smoke was still hard to see through, but she could make out the all-black outfit. The woman - the villain was a woman, right? - even had the headphones and microphone she associated with the technical crews. If Wren didn't know any better, she might have guessed that she was just someone who had gotten a little too into the effects.

Even though Jewel was working on rescuing the civilians, some of the actors were still on stage. It looked like the villain was ranting to them right now. When Wren squinted and stepped out of the smoke into a surprisingly smokeless area around the stage, she saw that the main focus of the rant was one of the actors that had starred on Hamilton.

Wren awkwardly cleared her throat.

The woman turned.

And the moment she did, Wren's breath caught in her chest.

Oh no, Wren thought, she's hot.

Well, hot really wasn't the right word. It was more like she was beautiful, in a has-been-sweating-behind-stage-for-hours-on-end kind of way. Her hair was up in a messy ponytail, her blue eyes looked like crystalline seas, and the way she had her t-shirt's sleeves defiantly rolled up reminded Wren of Nora Hart.

Focus! she frantically reminded herself. She had a job to do here! She needed to serve as a distraction for the villain, not the other way around.

"What?" the woman demanded.

"Uhhh," Wren hesitantly replied. "...Your ponytail is becoming undone?"

The woman warily raised a hand up to fix said ponytail, but still kept her eyes narrowed in suspicion at Wren. "Are you here to fight me?"

"Yes?"

The woman crossed her arms.

"You did scare a lot of people," Wren pointed out. "And you are interrupting a show."

The woman groaned.

"That's all people care about!" she exclaimed, throwing her arms up in the air. "'The show must go on' and all that jazz. I didn't want to become Effect, you know. I just wanted to make my voice heard, but the HR department here is terrible and theater union is trash."

"I'm sorry," Wren said, even though she really wasn't sure why she felt like she had to apologize for something she had absolutely nothing to do with. Also, since when did theaters have HR departments? "If...If you don't mind me asking, what were you complaining to HR about?"

Effect pointed a finger at the actor she had been berating.

"Him," she said. "He keeps telling me to get his coffee and yelling at me in rehearsals. And last night he threatened to get me fired because he got a splinter from one of the props. It didn't even bleed when he forced me to take it out!"

Wren mulled it over.

"...You could try going to the director?"

Effect's shoulders slumped.

"He'd never believe me," she said. There was a loud rumbling of notably faked thunder in the distance. Her eyes narrowed a little more. "...I bet you don't believe me, either!"

A moment later, Wren found a cloud of smoke smacking into her face.

Jeff looked at the front of the stage, and can barely hold back from sighing. He might have forgotten about the actual actors still left, but hopefully they wouldn’t be too hurt.

Er, he wasn’t sure if The Actor was really distracting the villain or not, as it seemed like they were talking only for the smoke to grow once more. Jeff hopped from foot to foot, trying to figure out what he should do, until an idea popped in his head.

If he charged right through the smoke, then he could do his best at startling the villain and er, tying them in ropes? Sure, why not. With that, he ran back to the entrance, grabbing up the ropes that had been used to block off the growing crowd until the theater opened.

Finally, he was all set, and decided to run straight towards The Actor and whoever was causing all of this ruckus.

“Let’s just talk, and let these people go,” Jeff said, nodding to the actors still on stage. “Please.”

"Most of them haven't done anything to harm you," Wren added, still trying to fight the blush that was threatening to overtake her. She let out a cough - it was hard breathing with all of the smoke blowing around.

Effect looked unconvinced.

But, after a moment, she let out a sigh.

"Fine," she growled, arms slumping in defeat. "I'll let all of them go - except for him."

She pointed at the actor in question.

"The two of us need to have a little..." She gave a smile that Wren wasn't all that sure she liked. "...talk."

Well, having to worry over a single person was a lot easier than a whole cast and crew.

“Alright, we can agree to that,” Jeff said, “but you’re having that talk in front of us. And, wait until everyone else is out of the theater.”

He watched as the last few occupants sprinted, at least to their best abilities, directly to the exits.

With that, Jeff grinned, under his mask yes, and then turned back to, well, he didn’t know what her name was.

Hopefully The Actor didn’t mind him agreeing to the offer, but he figured they would appreciate minimizing the amount of people left in the theater.

Wren gave a tiny nod in agreement. She didn't have any way of knowing what Jewel was thinking when he spoke, but she had the same exact train of thought. It was easier protecting one person than protecting several.

...She just hoped that all Effect would do with the actor was talk.

(If not that, Wren hoped that Jewel would be quick with tying Effect up.)

The final actor left on stage looked like he wanted to argue the decision, but a quick look from Wren made him fall silent. Wren knew exactly the type of person he was - and she never liked them when they showed up in her parents' cafe. She was usually too nervous to say anything then, but a single look from The Actor was all that it took now.

"...I'm not sure you can talk to him," Wren finally said.

Effect shot her a glare. "Are you going to stop me from having a conversation?"

After freezing for a moment, Wren frantically shook her head.

"I didn't mean it as a threat," she reassured her. "I meant that you probably won't get through to him. I've...worked in the service industry before, and the cafe I work at has had customers like him in the past. My-The owners of the place I work at always say that it's best to let self-absorbed people like him be - they feed off of the conflict."

The actor let out a disgruntled noise at the perceived insult, but was seemingly too afraid to say anything. Wren barely noticed; she was more preoccupied with convincing Effect.

Effect folded her arms again. "So what do you think I should do, then?"

"We could go to the director," Wren said. "Together. I know some of the actors here, too, and they're good people - they can vouch for you and against him."

Jeff blinked a bit at The Actor’s statement.

Oh, they knew some of the actors too? Small world, he supposed. Wait until he found Wren and told her everything that he heard!

Ah, wait, where was Wren? He hadn’t seen her since the first stampede outside, and she even said to meet her out there.

“I’ll, uh, be back in a minute,” Jeff said, not really to anyone in particular.

With that, he ran through the theater doors, gazing over each frantic expression of people standing in the cold.

What had she been wearing? Not a heavy jacket cause she had seemed cold, but, he just couldn’t see anyone that looked like her.

Oh god, oh god. He was feeling like a character in a zombie movie that just realized his friend had disappeared.

Jeff ran back inside the theater for like the fourth time that hour, and decided he needed to get some help.

“I need your help,” he said, this time to both The Actor and, well, the villain. “My friend’s missing, she was just in here, and she actually knows a few of the actors too. Um, she’s got, she’s got, brown hair, and brown eyes. Oh, her name’s Wren!”

He looked at them both. “Does that help? Can you help me find her please?”

Jeff was sure he sounded young, but he needed to make sure she was safe.

Wren was having a panic attack.

Or what felt like the beginnings of a panic attack, at least.

The only thing she could do for the first seconds that followed the request was stare at Jewel - trying to figure out how he knew that she was The Actor. She didn't think Jewel was the kind of person who would say something tricky like that, but maybe she was wrong about him. She hadn't expected him to laugh, either-

No. That didn't make any sense. Jewel was nice, besides the laughing incident. And he sounded honestly worried about her. He was worried enough that he would mention even though it could give away his identity to both a hero he barely knew and someone who had been their enemy last than five minutes ago.

All one of them would have to do would be to put together his appearance with his age, his voice, him having a friend named-

Wren froze.

That couldn't be it, right? That would be crazy. It would be the biggest coincidence in her entire life, and would honestly be something out of a comic book - not real, actual life.

Wren glanced between Effect and Jewel.

"Are you okay with me helping Jewel first?"

Now it was Effect giving the two of them looks.

She let out a sigh, shoulders slumping as the air left her body. "Okay. I can help look for your friend, too. Let me just clear out this smoke."

A moment later, the smoke was gone.

"We should split up," Wren wisely suggested, "to cover more ground. Your friend is probably outside with everyone else right now."

“Thank you so much,” Jeff said, very grateful that The Actor would help him. Should he tell the truth of him being in the crowd or should he try to hide his story?

Ah, it wasn’t like anyone would care that he was at the theater when this all happened, right?

Wait, though, The Actor wanted to split up, which probably was a smart idea.

“Sure, sure, we can meet up in a few minutes.”

Jeff decided to start walking to the left part of the blocks. He wouldn’t be able to say what direction he was going as he never really figured that out, but he was determined to find Wren.

Jewel darted off before Wren could suggest how they would split up, but she was able to decide on how she would split up with Effect. Effect would check out the right side of the crowd and meet her back in front of the building; Wren would go to the left.

She didn't know that Jewel had gone to the left, too. She was still too distracted by Jewel knowing her. The more she thought about it, the more likely it became. She had never seen Jewel and Jeff together. They were the same age. They even sounded the same when Wren tried comparing their voices in her head.

But Wren still didn't know how she felt about that.

She glanced behind her to make sure that Effect wasn't following her before she pulled out her phone from her pocket. Wren didn't have any new messages - she wasn't sure if she should be grateful for that or not. At least she wouldn't have to explain why she hadn't texted Jeff back after a theoretical text message from him.

are you okay?

i wanted to stay to find you
but when my parents heard that there was an attack on the theater, they came to pick me up and make sure we were alright

...and now they're not letting me go back

im really sorry for disappearing without telling you first!!

pls let me know if you're okay

The deed done, Wren slipped her phone back into her pocket. She was glad her parents didn't have a problem with her using them as an excuse.

During what felt like a probably futile attempt at trying to peer through the crowd, Jeff heard his phone alert. Could it be Wren? He walked right up to a storefront, still with his mask on of course, to lean on the brick wall in between places.

He pulled it out quick, out of the one pocket he managed to attach to his suit, scanning over the sender ID. Carter, Wren, oh thank goodness. Jeff sighed, not even reading the messages yet, just breathing in slow breaths.

After a moment, he sighed, swiping open his phone, yes he didn’t get a new phone because he liked his old one, to see a few rapid fire texts. Wren was okay, she was home, and she was safe, all that he could have hoped for.

What should be send back though? Well, what she wouldn’t know wouldn’t hurt her, so he decided to kind of copy her message.

i am so glad you’re okay! i was so worried and was freaking out, but my phone wasn’t charged and so i couldn’t message you! i’m okay too

Jeff wiped at the part of his forehead that was exposed. Dang, that was a relief.

He spun around, ready to tell The Actor that Wren was actually okay now.

In fact, one of the passerby came up to him, who he had actually asked for help from. “Did you hear back from your friend?”

“Ah, yes,” he grinned. “Thank you so much for your help. She’s safe, thankfully.”

Maybe today hadn’t been too bad if they were all safe.

There was a ping as she got a text back from Jeff.

The moment she read it, a feeling settled in her stomach that she couldn't quite describe. Wren had no way of knowing that Jeff had deliberately copied her message, but she could see the similarities. She wasn't entirely sure where Jeff lived. She might have been jumping to conclusions.

But she hadn't seen a charger on Jeff earlier.

...And she wasn't sure he could have gotten home to charge his phone in the time they had been separated.

Wren took a deep, shaky breath.

Jeff was Jewel.