Welcome to Gaia! ::

Mason had, if he was being honest with himself, been running himself a little ragged with the whole 'basically a superhero, if not a very powerful one comparatively' thing. He'd been living fully in the magical world; researching, asking every question that popped into his head (which was A LOT), visiting Blarney, training in both his civilian life and his powered state. He'd been so focused on that, in fact, that even Madeline, who was not exactly the world's biggest fan of his 'extracurricular activities', as she called them, had ordered him to take the night off. She'd gotten him a ticket to the drive-in; normally they went together, but it was playing some dumb buddy comedy that Mason loved which Madeline hated. Or so she said, anyway - he wasn't entirely convinced that it wasn't a poor attempt at jut getting him out of the house and out of her hair for a few hours.

But Madeline had ordered and so he'd obeyed. He'd taken the McMinivan and found a spot, turned the radio to the correct channel for the audio, and settled in. Only for his stomach to growl pointedly as the scent of popcorn, grease and candy wafted in through the open windows.

Well, Mads couldn't get mad at him for indulging when she'd been the one to send him here, right? And if he was getting snacks, he should get them before the movies actually started.

Slightly buoyed by the thought of movie theater popcorn (why was it so much better than the popcorn they had at home?) and not having to share his candy, Mason made his way to the concession stand, just as the sun began to dip below the treeline.

He had to admit - it was kind of...nice, being around normal people. It'd been a while since he had spent any kind of time with anyone who wasn't powered (or wasn't his sister). Hearing the kids laugh and scream, watching them play chase or cops-n-robbers...it made him smile. This was what they were supposed to be fighting for. Normality.

He shook his head to clear it as Mason approached the front of the line. "Hi, can I please have--oh!" Mason interrupted himself as his brain caught up with his mouth. "Nada!" Mason grinned automatically - he knew Nada from school. Everyone at Meadowview knew Nada, or at least of her, on account of her infectious smile and overall fantastic vibes, but he always forgot she worked here until he actually saw her standing in front of him. "Hey!" Mason paused. Had he actually ever--like, introduced himself to her? Or had he and Madeline always just said a friendly hello and scurried back to the McMinivan? He couldn't be sure, but he had a pretty good guess. "I'm Mason. I think we had--like, home ec or something together? I don't remember, but--hi anyway! How're you doing?"

Mason beamed, batting a hand at her in the universal 'oh, stop' gesture. "That's the plan," Mason said, deciding for the moment to simply ignore the growing anxiety that came over him every time he even thought about thinking about college. "We'd never leave this city. What could the rest of the world have to offer that could possibly beat," he gestured all around, then back to her specifically, his smile turning impish, "all this?"

He took his snacks and was just about to turn to go back to his car when he caught - a glimpse. Something dark. Something with tentacles, maybe, disappearing through the shadows of the far treeline.

He froze. His breath caught in his throat, everything in him tensing up. Mason prayed he was wrong, but he knew he wasn't. There were so many civilians - normal people. Laughing kids. Families.

Potential victims.

"Um," Mason said, distractedly. "Can--can I leave my snacks here for a second?" Mason asked Nada, eyes still on the treeline. He had no idea if there were any other powered around; he'd have to power up to tell. And if he wasn't - he wasn't sure if that was worse or better. If he was the only powered person around, he'd have to deal with whatever it was lurking in the forest. If he wasn't, he couldn't very well leave whoever it was out there in the cold.

But god. The civilians. There were so many people.

How was he supposed to power up here? With all these people around? But he had to. All these people...

"Uh. Where's the--the bathroom?" Mason knew where the bathroom was, he'd been coming here all his life, but at that moment, the only things that he knew for sure was that there was a monster in the woods, and there were innocents just waiting to have their nights--maybe their lives--absolutely ruined.

Later, Mason would decide it should've been obvious that they both whipped up a pretty lame excuse at the exact same time that they whipped up a pretty lame excuse for the same reason. In the moment, though, he was more focused on sliding into the bathroom (which was, in fact, surprisingly clean) and transforming into Blarney.

He blasted out of the bathroom, stick in hand, ready to defend against whatever demon was lurking in the woods. And hopefully he would not literally die trying.

Blarney ran toward the noise, grimacing when he finally spotted the horrifying nightmare fuel that was lurking, waiting for dinner.

"C'mere, Ugly," Blarney muttered. He jumped toward the thing, aiming to whack it with his stick. It had worked before, hadn't it? Maybe it could work again, even if he wasn't jumping off a building for extra oomph. He collided with the creature but the blow was glancing, not enough to make it go poof. He rolled away with a grunt, glaring at the thing with increased intensity as it snarled at him, attention completely diverted from the hundreds of tasty morsels that just wanted to watch a movie.

"Yeah, that's right, Ugly. Focus on me."