Not Your Sidekick

by C. B. Lee

  M laughs. “I don’t think I’m anything of the sort, not here at least.”

  Jess grins. She doesn’t try to be funny often; it’s better to leave that to Bells and sometimes Emma. “You’re not exactly a villain, are you? I mean, you work for Master Mischief, and you’re… sorry, my friend Bells would probably get me for not asking sooner, but um, what are your pronouns?”

  “Oh! Sorry, I—I forget that I look like a robot.”

  “No, not really. I mean, the suit’s really cool—and it is Master Mischief’s suit, right, but I want to make sure I don’t misgender you or anything.”

  “She and hers are fine, thanks for asking,” M says. “We should probably keep that between us, though, because some of the other employees here—um, well, I’m trying to take care of some stuff for Master Mischief in the interim, and so he… asked me to work some things out in his place. So it’s important that some people think I’m him.”

  The secret sends a thrill through Jess at being trusted with this information. “Ah, so you’re pretending to be your boss—”

  “At his request!” M sounds indignant, and the electronic voice skips and suddenly it sounds much younger.

  “Wait, are you my age? Oh my God, I thought you were a senior employee, wearing the mecha-suit and everything! Please tell me you’re not an intern.”

  “I’m a senior intern. And I wear the suit because I need to make sure it stays functional. I have a job to do. You just… Yeah, I’m gonna get more boxes.”

  M flies off in a hurry, leaving Jess standing there puzzled. She’s just getting back to work on the file system she’s created when M starts bringing in box after box. The room smells strongly of dust and rocket fuel.

  Jess recalls that Master Mischief used his powers to operate the mecha-suit—was this one modified so a person without abilities could use it? It does seem a bit unwieldy to walk in. But really, is it necessary to fly inside the building?

  The mechanical suit clanks stiffly as she sets down another box.

  “Why are you wearing that thing anyway?” Jess asks. “It’s not like you’re gonna be doing battle with anyone in here.”

  “Upkeep. And it’s helpful. For protection, you know, in case—”

  “Right, because I’m super-powerful and dangerous.” Jess waves her hands in a mock imitation of her father manipulating magnetic fields. It’s his standard pose for all his press stuff.

  M must not get the reference because she just stands there with one green light blinking, watching Jess flail about, until Jess realizes how absurd she must look and stops.

  M’s visor panel is all green now. The lights keep blinking.

  “Are you laughing at me?” Jess asks.

  M shakes her head, and the panel lights are still green.

  Jess snorts. “Fine, you can just say it; I know I look ridiculous. You’re the one who didn’t stop me.”

  “Maybe I found it entertaining,” M says.

  “Well, we’re both interns and on the same level. I think it’s perfectly reasonable to tell me why you have to wear the suit. It can’t just be a pretending-to-be-the-boss thing because this whole experimental lab is just you, me, and Abby.” Jess is talking to herself more than to the robot, but she follows the idea until she finds the next most logical reason. “It’s a secret identity thing, isn’t it?”

  “You could say that.”

  “But you already told me you’re pretending to be Master Mischief. And for Abby too, I’m guessing, since she’s not freaking out that you’re not the actual Master Mischief. Where is Abby, anyway? She could be helping me with this.”

  A few lights on M’s panel blink blue, and then yellow. “She’s busy. In her own office. Doing some important letter-writing.”

  Jess laughs. Abby, who she knows is in all AP classes, who writes essays on the wrong topic in English class and still gets an A because of her “impeccable style” and being “irreverent,” that Abby is doing secretarial work? While Jess is being trusted to handle all these old files and secrets?

  She sets down an old box, sending dust through the air, and laughs until the laugh turns into a cough.

  “What’s so funny about that?” M demands.

  “I dunno. It’s Abby Jones!”

  M’s suit is silent, and Jess realizes unless she also goes to AHHS, she has no idea what this means.

  Trying to find the words describe Abby, Jess waves her hands. “We go to school together. That girl, I swear, would never be satisfied with just letter-writing. Unless it’s like, epic scale change-the-world letter-writing. I dunno. She’s like…” Jess sighs, unable to explain the amazing combination of idealism and determination that is Abby. “Why don’t you have me do the letter-writing and Abby do all this important stuff? I mean, you hired her, you know what she’s good at, right?”

  Green, pink, and white lights flicker across the entire visor panel. Jess isn’t sure what that means. Every time she’s seen M, the panel has been blank, just a sleek black metal casing, mirroring the surroundings. It’s blinked a few colored lights before, but today’s the first time she’s seen the whole panel light up. What does it mean?

  “That’s an interestingly take on Miss Jones,” M says finally.

  Jess shrugs. “I don’t know her that well; we just have the one class together.” She looks at the box, grateful that Emma and Bells aren’t here to tease her about her crush. It had been a thing freshman year when Emma first got onto the JV volleyball team and she and Bells would go watch all of the games.

  Jess didn’t understand the sport, and she would clap and cheer whenever Bells did, but her attention had always wandered to the other side of the gym, where the varsity team was playing. Abby was captivating. She was demanding, angry, so vibrant and full of life. The one freshman on a team full of juniors and seniors, she somehow bypassed all of them in energy. She took toss after toss, spiking and standing tall at the net, yelling at the other team. Abby was formidable and beautiful and Jess could not look away.

  It was a thing. And it kind of still is. Jess never planned on acting on it; she’s not the kind of person who would just go right up to someone and ask them out. Plus, she doesn’t know if Abby is into girls, and asking just seems rude.

  Jess deftly changes the subject. “Anyway, where’s Master Mischief? Or Mistress Mischief? I’d love to meet them. I like how both their outfits don’t really match but they’re complimentary, you know? But my—I mean, you know Shocker and Shockwave, they have the whole coordinated colors and everything. Everyone knows they’re a couple so it’s not really necessary and it’s super-cheesy. But yeah, the Mischiefs are really cool. Are they around?”

  “It’s not of import,” M snaps. She walks to the other side of the room, opens a box, and starts sorting.

  Jess guesses even though she’s working in the secret lab, she’s still probably not important enough to meet the Mischiefs themselves. Mistress Mischief is telekinetic and, with Master Mischief’s technology manipulation, they could be quite a formidable team if their power class wasn’t so low.

  It takes ages for Jess to sort through the files, but her diligent perseverance and tendency to obsession pays off; she creates a cohesive file of robbery successes, and even starts an electronic log of all the valuable items Mischief wants to steal.

  In the background, M clinks and clanks, bringing more and more boxes, and sometimes taking things away.

  “I don’t know what’s the point of stealing this trophy,” Jess says, holding a fat file filled with details on all the times Mischief has stolen the large silver cup and her parents have retrieved it and put it back in the museum. She stares at the picture; what is it for? The photograph of it doesn’t say what it is. It took an entire group of those men—a sports team—to lift it into the air. Jess has no idea why it looks as if knives are strapped to the men’s feet. She flips through the curr
ent plan to steal it and the protection details once it is stolen. “Whenever the Mischiefs steal this thing, either Shockwave or Smasher is just gonna steal it back.”

  “I know, right? It’s the stupidest thing to fight over,” M says, giggling.

  The visor on M’s mechanical suit is dark, but green and blue lights flash and then the electronic voice is back, noticeably deeper. “I mean, yeah, I tell Master Mischief that all the time.”

  “Okay, I made a search system where you can just look up the plan by date or location or object focus. And I’m gonna update everything that’s in this room.”

  “Perfect,” M says.

  Jess yawns. “Hey, can I take a quick break?”

  “Sure.”

  “Just gonna ask Abby if she remembers how many chapters of The Awakening we’re supposed to read for English.” Jess gets to her feet.

  “Oh, okay,” M says, “You do that. I’m just… off to the bathroom.”

  Jess snorts. “Must be difficult with the suit.”

  “You have no idea.”

  Jess takes her time as she walks down the hallway, checking the rest of the offices. They’re empty aside from one office with two strange-looking robots cheeping at each other. When Jess opened the door, they both made high-pitched noises, so she just closed it. She couldn’t tell what they were doing, hovering over a metal frame—possibly building another mecha-suit?

  There aren’t many employees, but because this is Master Mischief’s secret lab within Monroe Industries, that does makes sense. The criminal mastermind could have a whole crew working away to help plan his elaborate pranks.

  But using just robots makes sense, too. The two robots down the hall didn’t look like any MonRobots Jess has ever seen.

  Experimental division, Jess reminds herself.

  She walks through the main lab to the elevator, but the receptionist’s desk is empty. “Abby?” Jess calls out.

  Abby’s desktop projector scrolls a line of text, which reads: “Running an errand on the seventh floor, be right back!”

  “Hm.”

  She plops down in Abby’s swivel chair, spins about playfully and hums. She sits upright, curling a loose strand of hair behind her ear. What it’s like to be Abby Jones, beautiful and put together all the time?

  Footfalls echo down the hallway, and Jess jumps. Abby appears, sprinting.

  Did she take the stairs?

  She’s not dressed in the stylish skirt-suit combo Jess has come to associate with her at work, but in what looks like a black fitted shirt and yoga pants with a funny-looking dot pattern running down the sides; her stockinged feet make soft noises against the tiled floor. Her hair isn’t in a French braid or any other complicated style, but is pulled into a messy ponytail with strands of red curls escaping in a frizzy red cloud. Abby blushes and grabs a sweatshirt from her desk drawer.

  “Hey,” Abby says, her face flushed with exertion.

  “Hi,” Jess says. “Um.” She’s never seen Abby look anything other than picture-perfect; even at volleyball games her hair has always been done and her makeup simple but elegant.

  It’s strangely intimate that Abby is okay like this in front of Jess.

  “I uh, I was working on a mechanical project for M, and my clothes got singed,” Abby explains as she struggles to put her arm through her sweatshirt.

  “Oh okay, neat. Mechanical project?”

  Tendrils of smoke waft from Abby’s hair in delicate spirals.

  “Yeah, I’m, er, working on an experimental robotics project for the company,” Abby says. “I used to work on the seventh floor in the main research department, but I’ve got my own projects I can focus on down here. I like it; it’s quiet and being around the Mischiefs’ business is great. I was just up there helping the team with a quick thing.”

  “Cool, I didn’t know you were into robotics. I was kinda telling M you were wasted as the receptionist. Not that you couldn’t be a receptionist if you wanted to, I mean, you’re really talented and… ahhh…”

  The bodysuit is skintight. Jess blushes, looking away from how fitted the workout clothes are on Abby and…

  She’s just gonna stop speaking now.

  Abby pats her hair until all of the sparks are out. “Did you need me for something?”

  Jess tries to get up and Abby’s chair continues to spin until Jess grabs an armrest to stop it.

  “Yeah, I, uh, I was super-daydreaming during English today and totally spaced out. Didn’t pay attention at all. Did you take notes on Rhinehart’s assignment for next week? And how many chapters we’re reading tonight?”

  “Sure. Ah, it’s just chapter five. And I don’t have the notes for next week with me, but I can message them to you later, if you want.”

  Jess grins. “Awesome.”

  She trudges back to her office, continues with the never-ending process of filing, and congratulates herself for a successful interaction with her crush. She whistles to herself.

  M comes back twenty minutes later, suit clanging, with another box.

  “Hey, M, are you like super-strict on the dress code here? Obviously, you’re wearing a hunk of metal, and Abby’s running around getting her suit caught on fire and now is wearing yoga gear,” Jess says. “I mean, it would be super-simple if I just came to work in the clothes I was already wearing for school.”

  “Sure, you can wear whatever you want.” M waves to the empty lab around them. “No one will care.”

  They work in silence for until Jess’ curiosity gets the better of her. How old is M, anyway? Is she another high school student, like her and Abby? Has she worked for the Mischiefs for a long time? Does she know them personally?

  “You know, I won’t tell anyone who you are,” Jess says slowly, smiling. She looks up at M, at her face panel, hoping she looks sincere. “I mean, you already had me sign a nondisclosure agreement about the company and all the supervillain stuff. And I’m sure Mischief would find a way of keeping me quiet anyway.”

  M stands up. “That’s not really the issue. I’ll leave you to your work.” She scoots backward, exits abruptly, and clanks down the hallway.

  “Okay then,” Jess says, eyebrows raised. She thought that she and M were getting along pretty well. She guesses the question is too personal.

  Ch.6...

  At lunch the next day, Jess takes a bite of her peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich and promptly spits the thing back out. “Ugh, it’s still frozen inside!”

  Bells nudges his container of carrots and celery sticks toward Jess. “You can have half my sandwich if you want.” Today his hair is bright pink and looks soft despite the product in it to get it to stand so high. Jess loves seeing Bell’s looks. He enjoys bright colors in both his hair and outfits, and changes his hair about every week.

  Jess has only tried to dye her hair once, with Bells’ help, but her thick black hair refused to hold the color longer than a week.

  Jess smiles, accepting the egg salad sandwich as Emma sits down next to them. She holds a lunch tray with a dismal offering—sad-looking protein nuggets and cold tater tots.

  “So how has work been? Monroe Industries treating you well? Have you destroyed any robots yet?” Emma asks. She picks at her lunch until Bells pulls out another sandwich from his backpack and hands it to her.

  “Oh yeah, no, it was great. It’s just, boring office work. Like I said, I don’t do any of the robotics stuff, I’m mostly in a file room, and their files are a mess because they moved, but yeah, it’s cool. Abby Jones works there too.”

  Emma’s eyebrows nearly reach her hair. “Abby? Wow. I wondered what happened. I mean, out of nowhere last week she just drops out of the volleyball team and Coach is like Hey Robledo! Here’s a new uniform! I mean, I’m happy to be on varsity but I can’t really replace her, you know. They just picked me because I was the best JV player, but the vol
leyball team still sucks without her.”

  “Aw, you’re great, though, you have that awesome spike,” Bells says.

  Emma shakes her head. “Spiking is useless unless you have someone to set up the shot. And Abby was the best setter.”

  “Yeah.” Jess takes a thoughtful bite out of Bells’ sandwich.

  Emma nudges Jess, then catches Bells’ eye and both of them giggle.

  “So…” Bells starts.

  “So… what?”

  “You still like her, right?” Emma teases.

  “You guys are never letting that go, are you?” Jess tries to fight the hot blush rising on her cheeks, but she can’t. It only gets worse when Bells and Emma start laughing. “Oh, come on, I never made fun of you for liking—what’s-his-face all last year!”

  Emma looks at Bells, and they both burst into giggles.

  “Okay, maybe I lovingly joked about it with you, but that’s different! The two of you crush on people all the time! I don’t know how you do it. You just… like someone? Or you ask them out? Or then it goes away? Or you like someone else? But like…” Jess sets down the sandwich. “You both have dated people. I’ve never… I don’t even…”

  “It’s okay; it’s all out of love,” Emma says, drawing Jess into a hug. “So, what’s it like? Do you have intense sessions of eye contact? Do you work together?”

  “No, not at all, like I barely even see her. We’re on the same floor, but she does this complicated robotic stuff for the company, and I’m in the back sorting files for this side project.” Jess stares at the sandwich and nudges a stray piece of egg back in.

  “Aw. Well, you get to hang out with her, at least?” Bells says.

  Jess shrugs. “Maybe. There’s another girl, M, that works there too, she wears a mecha-suit. I’ve been hanging out with her mostly; she’s pretty cool.” The words are already out of her mouth before Jess remembers the NDA she signed, and then she runs through the clauses. It was mostly about Master Mischief, and secret patents, and stuff like that. Mecha-suits aren’t extremely common, but Jess knows lots of hi-tech factories use them, so it’s probably okay to talk about them.