I've been doing research (never a guarantee of safety) and think I have found a good reference for Vic's facial appearance. It's the Circassian in the bottom row, second from the left: https://tinyurl.com/pjpp6wu5

Vic is a bit darker and a bit more Asian looking, but that's pretty close.

"You okay?" asked Gadgetive.

"Rat," gasped Energia. "Giant rat. Giant, fire-breathing rat! Giant, fire-breathing, exploding rat!"

Well, I had an adventurous night. Went to bed early, then was woken out of a sound sleep by the sirens a bit after Midnight. Very windy. Stayed up about an hour and a half, mostly watching Weather Underground on TV, and trying to get the weather radar on my phone to show current conditions. Things got quiet again and I went back to bed. Thunder finally started sounding in the distance. Still sleepy.

Hope other members had things as easy as I did.

Are you now or have you ever been empowered? Can you open jars no-one else can open? Can you fit into jars no-one else can fit into? Can you kill with a dirty look? Did you wake up this morning and find yourself in another country without knowing how you got there? Did you wake up this morning and find yourself in another body without knowing how you got there? Do people run screaming when you leave the house? Do you have more than two eyes/ears/arms/legs/heads? Have you ever had wheat rust?

There is plenty of precedent for hidden facilities - some of them quite large - even in famous pieces of architecture:

https://www.oddee.com/item_99554.aspx

So far, no-one has given me grief over superhero bases in my Masks stories. This should head off anyone doing so. :-)

The Vatican is famous not only for concealed nooks and crannies, but walkways high above ground.

Anyway, Happy Holidays to all!

I now have nearly 21.5k words on _The Angel of Peace_. It's going slowly.

The Masks Timeline has been updated. It can be found at: https://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/blog-entry/77382/masks-timeline

Note that many of the items in this come from old SF movies, novels and short stories.

I've had several medical professionals tell me this is the worst allergy season they've seen. The actually didn't have to tell me; I can feel it.

Also, for the first day or so after getting allergy shots (every two weeks) I feel very sluggish. I got my shots yesterday. Oog.

I'm looking for questions people in the Angel universe would ask Aaron/Malak. (I already have "What do you wear under those robes?" :-)

I can't guarantee to use any suggested questions, or even to give answers to the questions I use. Don't worry if the questions are inane or serious; I can use both.

Heh. I love puns. In the next "Angel of..." story Aaron/Malak encounters someone who can make cutting remarks.

I don't read a lot of fiction these days. Neither do I always think things through. The Masks series was originally written in response to the first Incredibles movie. They were intended for the entertainment of myself and other members of the Transformation Stories Archives. If I had realized it would become a commercial product I'd have called it something besides Masks, which is too generic.

Likewise, I didn't realize there was already a series titled "Angel" on BCTS or I would have lumped together my "Angel of..." stories under another title.

An excerpt from The Modern Age, an unfinished novel set in the Thirties of the Masks universe:

"Wow," whispered Dutch, looking over the edge of the roof at the street far below. He glanced back at the Night Master, who was preparing to throw a grapple wrapped in rags across the gap between the buildings. "You've done this before?"

"Many times," the Night Master replied, as he sent the padded hook whistling through the air. It caught on a vent pipe projecting from the roof of the penthouse of the lower, neighboring building.

I am still only about a third of the way through writing the next Masks story, so I am posting an unconnected short story. This is set in the same world as "The Master of Cuts" and "In the Hollow of the Devil's Hand."

Masks 23 has dropped on Amazon. Yay!

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CW1KFVXQ

Another reason I like characters with bird wings is one of my favorite childhood books: The juvenile novel Black and Blue Magic by Zilpha Keatley Snyder. Wikipedia says it came out in 1967 and I must have first read it within a couple of years at most. I now have an ex-school library hardback book of the 1972 edition.