He was calm, unnaturally calm.
I sat on the floor bound by my arms and feet, completely helpless except for my vile tongue.
Yet that weapon had been blunted by his last line.
"You actually think the heroes care about a nobody like you?"
I looked again at my classmate, then a famous actor and now a captor.
"Of course they care." I replied immediately.
"They don't give a rat's ass about you Katie." He said again, while crossing his leg and reading a book.
"Yes they do!" I screamed back, not allowing him to win this.
We had fought like this before, him trying to intimidate me and corrupt my ideas.
It's exactly what we've been doing for the past 3 days since I was caught.
"They don't care..." He said again, calmly and smiling. He then came closer to my ear and whispered "...and I have proof."
He clicked a button and a light blinked on the wall.
A projector from which I didn't know where it came from, played a video.
"What's that?" I asked, confused at what I was seeing.
"A live stream footage of Hero Tower." He replied.
"You would think that one would notice if one's sister has gone missing for 3 days." He said again, snickering.
I watched as my blood brother sat relaxedly, picking grapes and putting them in his mouth.
"The Man, Most powerful Superhuman on Earth, Preacher of One Love and Togetherness, is just an overpowered scumbag who doesn't give a rat's ass about his kidnapped sister...."
"I bet he doesn't even remember how you look...."
"You're wrong!!" I shout out again, tearing my eyes away from the screen.
"I have no reason to lie to you Katie."
He clicked a button and the camera's view switched.
In the trashcan I saw a letter. The letter I had banked my hope on, my ransom letter.
"He doesn't care about you, nor anyone but himself."
"What do you even want Michael?"
"What's your point?" I asked as I felt the tears flowing down my face.
"What do I want?" He said slowly as he walked around the bare room.
"I want nothing from you though, just your ear."
"My ear?" I asked him bewildered
"Yes, I want you to lend me your ear. I want to talk." He confirmed
"If you wanted to talk, this is clearly not the way to go." I say gesturing at my bound hands and feet.
"Well this whole get up was needed to prove my point." He said smiling.
"So you wanted to prove to me that I'm insignificant to a hero?" I asked, raising my eyebrow.
"Superheroes have other things on their mind. I've already thought about the fact that I am insignificant to my brother now." I said out loud despite the agony and pain in my heart.
He came closer and squatted down so our faces were at the same level.
"That's quite brave of you, but do you want to know a secret?" He asked, smiling calmly as always.
"You're not the only one that's been kidnapped."
My blood froze over that statement.
"What do you mean I'm not the only one?!" I asked back at him.
"It really changes your perspective, doesn't it?" He asked back, laughing maniacally to himself.
"Throughout last month, I moved across the city and kidnapped 1 person from every street. Homeless, elderly, working class and children. One of every kind." He continued on while I sat mouth opened and was shocked at the scale of his plot.
"Of course they are well taken care of and all their ransom letters have been sent to the Hero Tower, guess what happened next?" He asked me as I sat looking at him.
I said nothing knowing the bitter truth and he just smiled.
"That's right. Nothing happened." He shouted out loud
"As long as there is no press conference or no media to capture their heroic deeds, then they're not moved to work."
"You asked what my motive was, well it's quite simple, my motive is to unmask all these superpowered media hungry jerks."
He brought out a remote and clicked a button while saying "...And this is how I'll do it..."
Suddenly, the whole room became brighter, what I had mistaken for an empty room turned out to be an empty theater.
Michael walked to the front with a camera stand.
"What're you doing?" I asked, now scared of my former classmate.
"I'm going to act a play. Don't worry, you won't get hurt."
He clicked a button and the red light signifying that the camera was on began blinking.
Immediately, Michael came in front of the camera brandishing a gun and began.
"Hey there Mr Man. This is the Unveiler here live streaming this video to everyone in the city at the moment." He begins to rub his gun as he continued
"I have with me your beloved sister and well she isn't going to have a happy ending if you don't get here in the next 30 mins with a bag of 3 million dollars."
Immediately he shot the camera.
I shook at the sudden gunfire.
"You thought it was fake?" He asked, laughing.
My cheeks reddened with embarrassment at my naivety.
"What makes you think he'll come now if he hasn't come since." I asked.
"Oh he'll come. I can imagine he's already on his way." He said smiling then proceeded to sit on the chair centered on the stage.
Not more than 5 minutes later, Mr Man broke through the roof and landed on the stage.
"Glad you could join us." Michael welcomed him.
"I see you didn't bring the ba-" His words weren't completed before Mr Man's fist connected with his face.
Mr Man proceeded to beat him up, hitting and kicking with super strength.
I squirmed as I heard bones crack and saw blood spray on the floor.
The beat down lasted no more than 30 seconds.
Michael's unconscious body lay limp on the floor at my brother's feet.
I shivered at the cruelty of a beating given to a man who didn't even fight back.
"Let's go." My brother said cutting through the ropes with his laser vision.
I noticed something though, he's eyes weren't on me, not on the captive he had just rescued.
Instead his eyes were looking at the window, and after I had strained my eyes I managed to see what he saw.
Right there was a camera, surely a daring paparazzi wanting to get the latest scoop.
"..superpowered media hungry jerks.."
My mind went back to what Michael said as I watched my brother walk away, cape flying and keeping his good side ready for every shot or video.
My rescue of course made the news.
Armed Kidnapper of Mr Man's Sister Subdued and Captive Rescued.
And of course the picture of him walking away was the picture they used for the header page.
2 months later, something new surfaced on the internet.
The entire video of my capture. It seemed that the whole place was rigged with microphones and cameras.
Afterwards, the people who had been kidnapped were released and they wrote and commented on how they had been captives for over 3 months, letters had been sent to hero tower but no reply.
The whole hero community was in turmoil.
At the ending of the video, there was a video of Michael.
He was heavily bandaged and missed a tooth but his smile was genuine and mad as it was when he was telling me his plan.
"Hey Katie. It seemed like your brother gratefully failed to kill me in that flurry of attacks that no normal human being should take."
"Strange how someone whose punch can break a building would be at ease giving a regular someone that same punch, multiple times."
"I've managed to unmask Mr Man for the brute, media hungry fellow he is. I wonder which superhero is next?"
I was overjoyed and kind of shocked that he wasn't dead. I remember the nightmare's I had of the beating he endured and the calm cold demeanor my brother had while smiling at the camera.
With a cold heart...
I reacted to his video and commented on his earlier question.
"I wonder which superhero is next?"
"Me too..."
This post was written using the Inkwell weekly prompt: Mask
- Header Image made using Canva