The new story, and MASKS Volume 2 begins …?

Awesome art by Derrick Fleece. More on this later.

So in case you missed it (for some reason Facebook only let about 40 of you see the link), I posted a brand-spanking-new story over on Pocket Coyote yesterday. I was originally going to call it “Ghost Dance,” but it went in a different direction and ended up with the title “Brothers in Arms.” Same story, different title. Sorry for the confusion. Anyway, it’s over 5,000 words long and introduces three(!) new heroes in the Masks-verse.

No, they’re not taking over the series in Volume 2. But each of those three guys will be important in Rae’s and Trevor’s next adventure.

The first new guy we meet is Clayton Ross, a.k.a. the Black Mask. He’s the guy we get the word mask from, sort of like how modern English speakers got superhero from Superman. And for someone who basically defined what it means to be a mask, he’s rather … well … human. And grumpy. And sarcastic, but by now you guys know to expect that. He’s a trenchcoat-and-fedora hero, not a cape-and-tights hero, and he apparently spends most of his time punching mobsters in the face and taking their stuff. (In this story, he’s somehow acquired a rather luxurious private plane—and in 1947, having a private plane of any description was pretty impressive.) He’s spent the last few years creeping around Europe, punching Nazis in the face, and he’s fresh off using his skullduggery skills to gather evidence for the Doctors’ Trial in Nuremberg. Now he’s back in the United States, and he’s uncovered something that gives even him the creeps. Someone has been keeping a mask—or “mysteryman,” as they’re called in Ross’s time—prisoner, trying to figure out how his powers work. Ross wants to break the guy out, and to that end, he’s recruited the kid.

“The kid” is actually almost 30 years old now—Ben Wise, a.k.a. Eagle Eye. He got into the masked-hero game when an eccentric inventor paid him a hundred bucks to strap on an experimental flying harness and jump off a roof. (It was the Depression. Don’t judge.) Ben got hooked on the rush of flying, and the next thing you know, he’s gliding over rooftops looking for muggers to beat up. Sometime in the 1930s, he ran into the Black Mask and teamed up with him several times. Later, Eagle Eye volunteered for service in World War II, and some bad things happened to him overseas. When Ross finds the young man he’ll always think of as “the kid”, he’s trying to drink himself into a stupor. But Ross needs the kid sober if they’re going to pull off a superhero-style heist …

The third side of this triangle is a bit more mysterious, and he’s important to “Brothers in Arms” mostly because of his absence. First identified as the Big Guy, he’s a well-known mysteryman who teamed up with the Black Mask and Eagle Eye and was the major reason they got along before the war. The Big Guy had a great sense of humor, he was bulletproof, and he was the sort of fellow who’s friends with everyone within a few seconds of meeting them. Ross and Ben miss having someone around who can laugh at the bad guys, and they’re not sure how to do this team-up thing now that the Big Guy has gone missing in the bombing of Dresden. But the Big Guy still has a few secrets in sore …

So what does this have to do with Masks volume 2, you ask?

Well, each of these three men—the Black Mask, Eagle Eye, and the Big Guy—has a role to play in the story. That’s not to say any or all of them actually appear; the Black Mask, of course, was famously blown up ten years ago, and Eagle Eye’s a very old man if he’s still alive, and the Big Guy, well, was in Dresden. But they cast long shadows, and those shadows begin to gather in the first chapter of Volume 2, which goes live tonight at midnight Pacific time.

Yes, you read that right. Volume 2 starts tomorrow. Only on Pocket Coyote. The first chapter is called “Transformations,” and it throws Rae and Trevor into a new and dangerous situation. A major supervillain has died, and the executor of his estate is selling off some of his most treasured and esoteric possessions—including one object that Trevor desperately needs. He and Rae must go undercover at an auction full of villains in order to get that precious object. If they’re recognized, they’ll be dead before they can reach the door. And there’s someone there with an agenda of his own, someone who’s nothing but trouble for our young heroes. Oh, and somebody wears leather pants. I’m all about the value for click.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have an illustration to finish …  

Comic-Con, Ghost Dance, and good news / bad news

Please don’t kill me. I’ve been working on it, honest.

Well, no, actually, I haven’t been working on “Ghost Dance.” I’ve been working on Volume 2, which is more important but less urgent for reasons I’ll explain.

Good news first—“Ghost Dance” will hit the web by Saturday, July 14, during Comic-Con. (I’m going on Sunday this year.) You guys will finally get to meet the Black  Mask and Eagle Eye and thrill to one of their stranger adventures just after the end of World War II. Can I get an excited squee, please?

Less-good news—Volume 2 is running behind schedule, and will be delayed until September. Sorry, guys. It’s turning out a bit more complex than I expected, and life is interfering. More bloggage on that later.

Good news again—I have bookmarks! Two kinds! Here is the artwork for both of them—one featuring Rae and one featuring Trevor. And heeeeeeeere is the text that goes on the back of them, to whet your appetite for Volume 2:

On the Rae bookmark:

There are capes—heroes with powers. There are masks—wannabes with a few tricks. Everyone knows who the real heroes are.

Until now.

Rae Masterson, a.k.a. Merlin, doesn’t let her lack of powers stop her from fighting the good fight. At 17, she’s already saved her city, built a superhero team, and fallen in love with her crimefighting partner, Peregrine. But everyone knows masks live fast, die young, and leave anonymous corpses. Rae’s time is running out.

When Peregrine’s bloody past comes back to haunt him and a long-dead hero suddenly returns to life, Rae must choose between love and survival. To save the world, she must confront her own death. To save Peregrine, she must make a deal with the devil. Can she do it?

And if she does, who will save her?

On the Trevor bookmark:

There are capes—heroes with powers. There are masks—wannabes with a few tricks. Everyone knows who the real heroes are.

Until now.

Trevor Gray, a.k.a. Peregrine, was born to be a hero. Raised as a sidekick, he took up the colors of his missing mentor and now fights on in his name. At 17, he’s built a team of young heroes and fallen in love with his masked partner, Merlin. But death is never far from any mask, and now it’s paid Trevor a visit.

When a last message from his teacher upends his life and a long-lost hero returns from the dead, Trevor must choose between duty and love. To save the world, he must confront his demons. To save Merlin, he must break her heart. Can he do it?

And if he does, who will save him?

Are you excited? I am!

Further good news—I have the most adorable Pocket Coyote buttons known to man. Here’s a photo:

And finally, less-good news—I am not totally sure there’s going to be a blog entry next Monday, because my schedule for next week is absolutely psychotic. I will probably be spending a lot of time on the road for work-related stuff—teaching classes in another city, having meetings, etc. If I can blog from God-knows-where, I will. If I can’t, I won’t. It might not be on Monday, either, because I expect to be completely exhausted from Comic-Con. I will try to get con photos up on this blog and on Pocket Coyote sometime next week for everyone to enjoy, but I won’t be seeing much of my house and you may hear zombie-like groans coming from the depths of the internet. Bear with me, guys.

And while you’re at it, be sure to keep submitting names for our contest to name the coyote!

Free Comic Book Day preview!

It’s almost that time again!

Yes, this coming Saturday is Free Comic Book Day, and you know what that means—Masks is back!

On Saturday, I’m posting a new story on Pocket Coyote and on this blog. It’s called “Ghost Dance,” and it will introduce at least two heroes you haven’t seen in Masks before, including the man who gave his name to heroes who might be nonpowered but are never powerless—the Black Mask himself! And that’s not even the best part!

Set in 1947, “Ghost Dance” follows Clayton Ross, a.k.a. the Black Mask, as he tracks down an old ally and recruits him for a daring rescue mission. Clay hasn’t seen Ben Wise, a.k.a. Eagle Eye, since the early days of the Second World War, and while he’s heard a few rumors about what happened to the kid behind enemy lines, nothing can prepare him for what he finds. Once a costumed vigilante who relied on a pair of mechanical wings to fight crime, Ben was captured by the Nazis and subjected to horrific experiments as the scientists tried to discover the source of the powers he didn’t actually have. Ben emerged from the ordeal with a set of Pyrrhic superpowers and a growing distance from the people he once loved.

Can Clay remind him of what it means to be human before it’s too late? And can Ben pull it together enough to help save an old friend from a fate worse than death? The answers lie in the southwestern desert, along with a few surprises that will lay the foundation for Volume 2 of Masks …

Did I mention that’s not even the best part?!

I am so excited about this that I am literally vibrating as I type, so pardon the typos, but here it is—I wrote a comic book!

An actual comic book! With pictures and everything! I’m hoping it will be done in time for FCBD, but if it’s not, it’ll be because I was late finishing the script and not because of the artist because the artist is freaking amazing, you guys. No, you don’t have to put up with my art this time around—I’ve got THIS GUY!

 Yeah, the guy who drew, oh, the best Masks art ever. His name is Derrick Fleece, and if you’re not already a fan of his work, you should be. He was the first guy to give Trevor a face that actually made sense—a face I liked so much that I immediately changed the way I drew Trevor just so he’d look more like Derrick’s interpretation. 

 The 8-page story, titled “Pick Your Poison”, should be available on or shortly after Free Comic Book Day, and it picks up where “Ghost Dance” leaves off, with Clay making a decision that will change his life forever—and turn Rae’s and Trevor’s lives upside-down. Derrick wanted to draw some noir, so I gave him all the shadows and muddled morality I could, and the results are unbelievably awesome. And if all goes well, you’ll get all of it this coming Saturday.

If you’ll excuse me, I need to go find a way to speed up time … 

Right on the edge

So I’m supposed to be working on the Free Comic Book Day story (you’re all showing up for that, right? May 5!), and I’m also working on Volume 2 of Masks, and both projects are going to interesting places.

The FCBD story first got my attention when I got a mental picture of its opening scene, in which a character I know to be one of my most heroic (albeit tragic) is sitting in a dark corner of a bar, trying unsuccessfully to get drunk. It’s his little sister’s wedding day, and he can’t go to the wedding because his family thinks he died in World War II. He’s letting them think that because it’s easier than telling them what actually happened. I’d written a series of stories about this guy when I was a teenager, mapping out his whole life from the day of his birth to his possible death at an advanced age, and the darkness in this scene surprised me. As bad a life as he’s had, I didn’t think he was prone to this kind of despair.

Then the devil sits down next to him and offers him a job.

Not the literal devil. It’s not that kind of story. But it’s someone who plays a big role in the Masks universe, and a man this young hero has come to see as a bit of a personal Mephistopheles, the tempter who leads him into all trouble. And as I sketched out the remainder of the story—the exact nature of the job, and what the young man ends up doing, and the devil’s secret reason for getting him to do it—I realized that I was actually drawing an arc of redemption for my hero, with the devil (of all people) as its agent. And when I sat down to actually write the story, I found I was writing it from the devil’s point of view.

 It’s something that mirrors a few of the events in Volume 2 of Masks, although you’ll probably end up being surprised by who rises and who falls by the story’s end.

It seems I’ve been spending a lot of time lately with characters who stand right on the edge between light and dark—literally, in the case of Masks, and a bit more metaphorically in Street of Bakers. I used to know a classics professor who would talk about liminal figures—people and things that only appear when you’re crossing a border from one place to another, one state to the next. Psychopomps and threshold guardians, sentries and scavengers. And the thing about liminal figures is that they’re shape-shifters. You’re never completely sure of who you’re dealing with or what they’ll do next. You have to trust in your own power, or your wisdom, or your cunning, or your god, to pass their tests. And the crazy part is that a liminal figure might turn out to be any of those things. You just don’t know until it’s too late to change your mind.

Makes you watch the edges of the shadows a little more carefully …