The X-men run missions and work together with the NYPD, striving to maintain a peaceful balance between humans and mutants. When it comes to a fight, they won't back down from protecting those who need their help.
Haven presents itself as a humanitarian organization for activists, leaders, and high society, yet mutants are the secret leaders working to protect and serve their kind. Behind the scenes they bring their goals into reality.
From the time when mutants became known to the world, SUPER was founded as a black-ops division of the CIA in an attempt to classify, observe, and learn more about this new and rising threat.
The Syndicate works to help bring mutantkind to the forefront of the world. They work from the shadows, a beacon of hope for mutants, but a bane to mankind. With their guiding hand, humanity will finally find extinction.
Since the existence of mutants was first revealed in the nineties, the world has become a changed place. Whether they're genetic misfits or the next stage in humanity's evolution, there's no denying their growing numbers, especially in hubs like New York City. The NYPD has a division devoted to mutant related crimes. Super-powered vigilantes help to maintain the peace. Those who style themselves as Homo Superior work to tear society apart for rebuilding in their own image.
MRO is an intermediate to advanced writing level original character, original plot X-Men RPG. We've been open and active since October of 2005. You can play as a mutant, human, or Adapted— one of the rare humans who nullify mutant powers by their very existence. Goodies, baddies, and neutrals are all welcome.
Short Term Plots:Are They Coming for You?
There have been whispers on the streets lately of a boogeyman... mutant and humans, young and old, all have been targets of trafficking.
The Fountain of Youth
A chemical serum has been released that's shaving a few years off of the population. In some cases, found to be temporary, and in others...?
MRO MOVES WITH CURRENT TIME: What month and year it is now in real life, it's the same for MRO, too.
Fuegogrande: "Fuegogrande" player of The Ranger, Ion, Rhia, and Null
Neopolitan: "Aly" player of Rebecca Grey, Stephanie Graves, Marisol Cervantes, Vanessa Bookman, Chrysanthemum Van Hart, Sabine Sang, Eupraxia
Ongoing Plots
Magic and Mystics
After the events of the 2020 Harvest Moon and the following Winter Solstice, magic has started manifesting in the MROvere! With the efforts of the Welldrinker Cult, people are being converted into Mystics, a species of people genetically disposed to be great conduits for magical energy.
The Welldrinker Cult
A shadowy group is gaining power, drawing in people who are curious, vulnerable, or malicious, and turning them into Mystics. They are recruiting people into their ranks to spread the influence of magic in the world, but for what end goal?
Are They Coming for You?
There have been whispers on the streets lately of a boogeyman... mutant and humans, young and old, all have been targets of trafficking.
Adapteds
What if the human race began to adapt to the mutant threat? What if the human race changed ever so subtly... without the x-gene.
Atlanteans
The lost city of Atlantis has been found! Refugees from this undersea mutant dystopia have started to filter in to New York as citizens and businessfolk. You may make one as a player character of run into one on the street.
Got a plot in mind?
MRO plots are player-created the Mods facilitate and organize the big ones, but we get the ideas from you. Do you have a plot in mind, and want to know whether it needs Mod approval? Check out our plot guidelines.
And then they were running! But, like, everything was weird. It could’ve been a side effect of swallowing up the van but he felt so light on his feet, ever since Juniper took his hand. He suspected the two were related, but honestly Zek wasn’t paying much attention to divining the correlation. He was focusing more on running and not throwing up.
And oh there was so much running! He ran quite a bit, but usually not so pell-mell or dealing with power hangover! Or being dragged about by a building-jumper gang target.
Zek was actually having a pretty good time.
Even if his lungs were burning and his stomach was heaving.
Finally, oh finally, they stopped running. Juniper let go and the weight-loss returned. Zek immediately bent over and tossed his cookies. He dry heaved a few times before finally trusted himself to stand upright. Which was a bit of a mistake as things started going topsy-turvy again.
Zek staggered away from his mess and abruptly sat down by Juniper. In response, Zek just groaned. Suddenly, he wished he’d’ve snagged that cart of drinks in the restaurant they’d blurred through. He could really go for a smoothie, tea, water, whatever they had, as long as it was liquid.
After like a minute of just catching his breath and sitting with his eyes shut, he moaned, “You know, if you wanted a workout partner, there were far easier ways to ask for one.” He looked at her through a barely open eyelid and smirked just a bit.
“By the way, who were those friendly folks?” Zek said. “You know, just so I don’t get disappointed if I don’t get a Christmas card from them.” He closed his eyes again and basked in not falling and being a hot, sweaty mess. Oh yes, he was gonna feel the burn in the morning.
She was leaning one arm and trying to fan cool air down into her hoodie by jerking the collar around by the time he sat down beside her.
"Hah!" Juniper cracked a wide grin and laughed a bit more, "Aw, but just asking people is so boring. It's much more fun dragging someone willfully into my chaos out of the blue!"
She sopped up the sweat on her face with one sleeve and tried to comb her hair back. Of all the days to decide not to do anything with it! She could only fathom what she looked like. Maybe a greasy Yorkie? A messily blow-dried cat? Eh, best not think of it too much. At least her makeup was firmly affixed to her face with whatever modern-day witchcraft makeup companies used.
"I was told they might be part of the Russian mafia? Or like, stereotypical New York mobsters, I guess. I dunno for sure though." She chuckled and angled another grin at him as she leaned back on her arms a little more and splayed her legs and bare feet out in front of her.
"Ehhh... they probably won't come after you... I, uh, think? They seem really fixed on me right now. Probably don't have enough time to be flirting with other potential homicide victims." Really, she was going to need to talk to L at some point about getting this fixed somehow. That was possible, right? Sure. Yeah.
Either that or keep unintentionally causing criminals to get caught and shipped off to prison until there just weren't anymore in the city, which was her current mood apparently.
"Thanks for helping me back there, and uh... sorry for ruining your ice cream break. I'll buy you a new one if you want?"
Zek sprawled his legs out in front of him. He knew he’d have to get up soon to prevent his legs from locking up, but he just didn’t feel like it right now. He mopped his face with the bottom of his shirt and only then realized he’d wiped his mouth with it. Ah well. It’d come out in the wash.
Also, Juniper was kinda wanted by some gang or other, and apparently there were other people involved who were telling her this. Sounded like someone involved in consistent less-than-legal activity, if you asked Zek. But nobody was asking Zek.
I’ve definitely gotta go back to that rooftop more often! At this rate, next week would feature an aerial battle between gryphons and dragons with laser and force fields. He was so gonna bring a folding chair with him.
“I am definitely going to hold you to that,” Zek said. “Oh yes.” She was responsible for him losing out on almost three quarters of his ice cream! Actually pretty worth it, in his opinion, but it seemed like Juniper was providing a chance for him to get free ice cream so he was going to milk it as much as he could. He even put on a mildly miffed expression! Complete with a slight pout!
“No problem, though,” he said just a hint more sincerely. “It was a welcome diversion. Honestly, it was better than I’d hoped. Last week, the only action was some lady bawling out her kid for hanging out with ‘people of ill influence’.”
He turned back to his fritzy-looking friend. “Before we get the ice cream though, you wanna take a look at what was in the van?” He flashed her his best conspiratorial smile.
Her grin turned just a tad bit sheepish as he vowed to have her uphold her offer. "Ah, every day normal drama then. It's like pigeon watching, but... with accents."
Her eyes popped open a little wider when he asked about the van because it was gone. Duh? But, then again, she was a little slow a lot of the time, so maybe it wasn't gone-gone. Only slightly gone? Halfies?
"Whaaat? You can do that?" She sat up a little straighter because that idea was actually pretty exciting! A chance to see what the people regularly trying to murder her had in their creeper van!
"Ooh, yes. Please? That sounds like all sorts of fun, or... maybe horrifying, but fun at first!"
She tucked her legs under her and clapped her hands excitedly like he was about to perform a magic trick. Which.. he kind might? She still wasn't sure how exactly the whole 'X gene' thing worked. Like magnets. How did those even work, right?
She did glance around though, maybe a bit apprehensively.
She was in. “I can totally do that, luv,” Zek said in a fake British accent.
“Yeah, this’ll work,” Zek said, looking around the alley. It was a pretty spacious one, thankfully. Otherwise his sprawling legs would be in danger of contact with his liberated stomach contents. “We’re going to need to back up some, though.”
Zek pulled himself to his feet and began shooing Juniper toward the entrance of the alley, following right behind her. “It’s been a while since I’ve done this, and no matter what we oughta keep an ear out for trouble,” he said. “You saw what happened to Baldy McIce cream Head?” He pointed down the alley. “That’s going to happen here, too.”
Zek stopped moving several feet away from Juniper, out of arm’s reach. “Alright, time for the wind-up,” he said. Again he angled himself, lining his left side up with the end of the alley. He extended his right arm back towards Juniper and scarlet light blossomed there. He toss the orb a few inches and then casually tossed the ball toward the back of the alley.
It honestly only went about ten feet, but that was enough.
The van burst into existence again, continuing the same moment it had been captured, still going at about 30 to 40 mph. Except about three feet above the ground and without a driver.
The van shot forward and bounced as it struck the ground before wildly charging down the alley, scraping the walls, peeling paint, chipping bricks, and leaving black rubber streaks on the ground before impacting the far wall. Fortunately the alley was wide enough for the van to roll through, but not wide enough for it to completely turn or flip.
Between the fall and the walls, the van hit the back of the alley with far less force than expected, but leaving it messed up, but hopefully not explodeable.
Conveniently, the force of impact triggered a lock, so one of the back doors started creaking open with a long, wailing squeak.
She was shooed and scrambled to follow his directive. Keep an ear out of trouble. Gotcha. She flexed her fingers like she was in that one old western she had watched half of and prepared herself.
She waited in tense silence as he did his thing, listening to the sounds of traffic and people not too far off. A light ball (still neat) a throw, and then SUDDENLY VAN. Juniper couldn't help but jump back a little more on reflex and got ready to dive at him if things went back.
Oof! The sounds! Squealing metal on brick was not pleasant and thankfully it didn't last long. She turned to peek out of the ally down both sides of the street, just in case anyone heard and headed to investigate.
Nope, no one. All clear!
"That was..." She turned back and took a few steps back into the ally. " SO COOOOL!" Like, fer real. He'd just magicked a van into existence exactly as he'd magicked it out.
She started for the van as the door finished with it's keening protest, but paused when an honest to goodness Morning star plopped out from the open door and landed with a thunk on the ground.
"Wow... they, uh... musta really taken their job seriously, huh?" When she was close enough to, she poked at it with a bare toe, and then tried to open the other side of the double back doors. It popped open without much protest and stayed open where she left it.
"@#$% this thing is packed!" The whole inside of the big van was filled with things. Stuff hung on the walls, some of which had fallen off in the crash. There were a few seats, but it looked like most of the goons who had been packed inside had been in standing room only.
Whelp, no time like the present! Tucking her hands into the sleeves of her sweatshirt she hopped up inside and headed deeper in. She didn't want to leave any finger prints if she could help it.
A few things caught her eyes, like the garden shears still hanging in the inside of one wall, and a bucket full of hammers beside one of the seats, which, upon closer inspection, showed that each hammer appeared to be labeled with a different name. She carefully picked up a big rusty one named 'Besty' and cringed at it.
"... Very creative." That hammer was dropped quickly back in with the others and she poked at a big zipped up black duffel bag with her toe.
Oh! Was that a manila folder on the floor with a little picture of her face on it? Creepy! Time to investigate!
She clambered into a messy front passengers seat, that was only slightly smokey, and reached to gently pick up the folder.
Was that a cheese shaped air freshener hanging from the rear-view mirror? Huh.
Zek’s eyes immediately fell on the mace that had also fallen. His brown eyes went round. “I’m keeping this,” he said, walking up to the van behind Juniper and dropping an orb on the morningstar. It was his now. He was probably going to have to soak it in bleach, and then maybe acid and holy water, but he wasn’t passing up that beauty.
He stuck his head into the van after the blonde climbed in. “Yeesh!” he exclaimed. “You’re not exaggerating! It looks like a flea market threw up in here!”
A bag of peanuts had spilled across the floor in the back. A pile of coiled ropes, cables, and chains were covering a folding chair that had fallen against a kerosene container. The walls had a lot of hooks for stuff and bars and straps, probably serving dual purposes for holding other things and as handholds for standing folks.
As Juniper moved further into the van, Zek climbed in himself. “You really attract the most interesting people,” he commented, nudging what looked to be the battered head of a rat costume. There didn’t appear to be a costume itself, though. And oh look, there was some bleach! He might not even have to go back to his apartment to clean his new favorite toy.
“Like, you need some mouse traps? Duct tape? Paintbrushes? Socks?” he said, listing off a highlight reel of what he could immediately see. Then his eyes widened as inspiration struck. “Oh hey! Check the glove compartment! Maybe there’s some money in there!”
"You know, for looking like a bunch of typical mob goons one of them kept really tidy notes. Like... wow, how'd they know I like tacos that much??" There were various other startling notes, some a bit more private than others, and some she felt like she should be totally offended by. 'Flaky and aloof' was listed on one page and ouch! She wasn't flaky... was she?
Juniper glanced up at the interesting people comment, snorted attractively, and bobbed her head in agreement. "Too true." Literally all of her current shortlist of friends, enemies, and acquaintances were easily placed on that same list. Xavier was probably the most normal person she knew, well... actually Zek probably topped the list currently seeing as Xavier still had a habit of exploding his own clothes off occasionally.
She turned back to her file on herself, still vastly interested in getting into the brain of someone who had supposedly been tailing her for a while. Even though the notes seemed pretty good for a murderer, she was noticing things that made her wonder if they were actually a part of the mod still. Whoever had written them referred to their group a few times, but neglected to use any, like... mod talk? Was that a thing?
"Hmm." Shutting the folder and er, folding it, she shoved it into the large front pocket of her hoodie and forced herself to pay attention to Zek and what he was saying. "Checking glove compartment, stat." She leaned forward a little and popped the button and it fell open with ease. Out fell a toy squirt gun and a ball gag.
"Negative on hidden stash of money in glove compartment, Captain. Creeped out level steadily rising though."
She turned and fished around in the middle compartment, which was filled with an assortment of chewy and hard candies because of course it was. "Oh god, the creepy van has candy in it."
She abandoned the front seats to head back into the middle where he was and glanced around with her hands on her hips. If she were money, where would she be hiding?
Unzipping the big black duffle bag produced a small avalanche of metal clips, thumbtacks, nails, and other small sharp pointy bits. A little bit of green peeked through though, so she grabbed a corner of the bag and phased it off of whatever was containing.
Money. Glorious bricks of very neat bills hidden amongst things that could make fingertips and feet cry.
"Found the stash, Captain!" She tossed the empty carcass of the bag to the side and mock saluted Zek, grinning from ear to ear.
Zek felt like he’d been poking around in the van for over a month. It just seemed to absorb you, like those gross ViewTube videos on people popping pimples that you couldn’t look away from. Different parts of the van exuded creepiness, chilling fear, and downright absurdity in varying measures that they all seemed to congeal into a soggy mess of “wut”.
He was just crouching to take a look at what appeared to be a speargun nestled underneath one of the lone chairs when Juniper nixed the idea of money in the glove compartment. “Well, darn,” he said offhandedly. It was a tad disappointing, but, like, he’d had no expectations at all so it really wasn’t ruffling any of his feathers. “We can’t sell creepy on the black market and I don’t have any contacts in Hollywood.”
And then a candy cache was found. “Ewwwww!” he said in a slightly higher register than normal. His skin crawled. He suddenly felt like capturing a bucket of soapy water to scrub out the pocket dimension the van had been stored in. No, scratch that. He suddenly felt like capturing some napalm to burn away the pocket dimension.
And if he looked enough in the van, he’d probably find some napalm, too.
Zek was facing the back of the van and doing his best not to touch anything, including the air, when June-June made a discovery. His neck snapped around quick, his eyes widened, and only then did the rest of his body pivot. “Arrgh!” he exclaimed, slipping into a terrible pirate accent. “It looks like ye found the booty!”
Heheh, booty.
He grinned. And not just because of his immature thoughts. Stacks and stacks and stacks of money were just sitting there, amid a pile of...sharp garbage. “And it appears the booty be booby-trapped,” he continued.
Heheh, trapped.
Zek crouched down by the money and held a glowing orb up to it. It wasn’t the best light source in the world, but it did okay at illuminating the print and designs on the greenbacks, even if in a very golden light. “Recken ye this money be funny?” he said, eying it. “Or like, laced with something?” Help! Me accent be slipping!
The snicking continued, because the accent and Booty Booby. There was no escaping the pit of gutter she immediately landed in. "I dunno, sounds like the best booty ever to me."
She crouched next to him, arms around her knees as she wondered what he was looking at. Oh. Laced? Fake or poisoned? Or did he mean drugged? "I dunno." She blinked, and then reached out suddenly and snagged one of the neatly wrapped stacks.
"Looks pretty legit. Straight from the bank, from what I can tell." She'd seen plenty of these stacks before, although she wasn't an expert or anything. They tended to have clean bricks like that in the back, which was where she found her easy pickings. She thumbed through the crisp bills for a moment, before setting it back down carefully on the pile.
"It's a toss up as to whether it's, uh... laced? Guess if I keel over in a few minutes you'll know, but they probably wouldn't mess up this amount of money."
She shifted around a few of the stacks in the little pile. There was a LOT of money sitting there. Stacks of almost every type of american paper currency. The more she looked at it, the more nervous it made her, really. Were they willing to pay that much for someone to kill her? Kidnap her? Accost her with a bucket of hammers? Shiiiiii-
"Oh, hey more files."
Past the wads of cash at the very bottom of the pile were a handful of manila files, many of which had red check marks on the front. She assumed that meant that they were already taken care of, since her own file has lacked a red check of its own. "Yeesh, these weirdos have been busy." 12 folders in all. She thumbed through them absently as she rocked on the balls of her feet gently.
"Makes more sense thought, I seriously doubted anyone would pay that much to have someone run me over with a van." ... Speaking of. "Anyway, wanna split it? Halfsies?" It was a nice chunck of change, that, and even half of it would cover her rent for a few glorious months. And, oooooh~ Splurge money!
She turned her chin to Zek as she set the filed back down close to the piles of money.
“Well, if ye say so,” Zek said, falling entirely out of the pirate accent. He glanced at the woman. Interesting how she was so familiar with bank money. And that she was being chased and, like, possibly brutally murdered by a bunch of guys who had weird access to weapons and so much bank money.
Zek liked her. And her snickers. The booty wasn’t bad either.
“You’re probably right,” he said. “Why drug or poison money. Why send a dozen doofuses after one woman. Why be bald.” Zek looked Juniper over a few times in a slow, meandering gaze. “Well, you’re not dead yet. Guess I’ll take my chances.”
Zek started looking around the van again, but this time with a purpose. “Halfsies is awesomesies,” he gushed. “This will definitely make up for the ice cream!” Actually, dumping it on a guy’s head had already been worth it, but he wasn’t gonna turn down lots of free money! Even if it was drug money or drug-covered money. These bills were just so crisp! He could already imagine rolling around in them on his apartment floor.
“You take the bag for your half,” Zek said, looking around still. “And I’ll take….the murder bucket, I guess,” he finished lamely, his eyes rettling on the hammer bucket. Well, it didn’t have to be pretty. His shoulders sagged before shrugging. A couple of orbs later, the bucket was on the floor beside him and he was ready to start swiping some serious scratch.
And to revisit the whole mysterious envelope thing. “So by the way,” he drawled. “I notice you noticed some files and stuff. Care to clue me in on what they’re about?” He put a stack of money in the bucket. “Some kind of dating portfolio, perhaps? Been there, done that, got a red check for it?”
Zek definitely didn’t hear the sound of some footsteps entering the alley.
"Yeah, they all sound like terrible life choices, if you ask me." She grinned toothily and started shifting through the pile to begin splitting it evenly. Jeez, were those caltrops mixed in with all of the other sharp pointy things? She pocketed a few to show her friends later, otherwise, they might not believe a word of her story. "Woohoo! I'm out of ice cream debt!" Though, she hadn't minded the idea of having to buy him another one. Heck, now she could afford one of those fancy ones where they put unnecessary gold leaf on top to make people feel like they had escaped poverty temporarily!
She fished for the bag she had discarded with her foot, dragging it back over inch by inch in a marvelous display of laziness. "Oof, murder bucket. Rough. Are you at least going to take Betsy with? She looks lonely." Indeed, the innocently-named blue hammer with chipping paint looked pretty wholesome compared to her brethren, what with their rust and mystery stains. She giggled as she began stuffing her half back into the old duffle bag.
She half shifted her attention back to him when he asked about the folders, and blinked a few times before chortling loudly. "Oh, god, I hope this wasn't the world's most cringy attempt at a date!" She paused stuffing her bag to grab a folder and scoot a litter closer to him with it open, hunching over like she was sharing a secret.
"Looks like they probably aren't a part of the mob, like I thought. Hired goons I guess? Someone took really good notes though, see!" She pushed it at him so he could see the intricate, delicate cursive handwriting in pink ink, and with little hearts dotting every i and in place of all the periods.
She definitely wasn't showing him her file, seeing as she was 100% sure he didn't need to know her bedroom habits, or that she danced around with her cats in the wee hours of the morning when she couldn't sleep. How'd they even know that?!
"I'm assuming other targets?" She paused as she peeked at the papers. "David here apparently really likes ostriches. I didn't know you could have one as a pet in the city!"
Juniper, engrossed as she was in sharing what felt like weird gossip, didn't notice the footsteps either. She didn't notice the shadow creeping up to the back of the van.
"Wait, you've got a dating profile?" Ah, like a hamster who just found something to nibble on she was suddenly distracted from the distraction keeping her from filling her bag more.
"Don't you two know its rude to rifle through someone else's things?" A voice suddenly piped up from the back of the van. Juniper jumped like she'd been electrocuted and immediately dove for the nearest weapon... which happened to end up being a sledgehammer that had been propped up in one corner. It was easy to heft up with the use of her power to phase the weight away.
Zek continued to diligently dump the designated dollars into his dingy diminutive dumpster. He snorted. “Nope! Ice cream debt isn’t annulled until there is actual ice cream!” he decreed. “And Betty is lame. Nobody likes Betty.” And that was really all there was to it. No matter the giggles that came from Juniper. He Hath Spoken.
And the guys maybe weren’t the mob. Wait, were they ever the mob? Zek hid his puzzlement behind a look of confusion. “Hired goons? So who’s after you, then? Wait, is it an ex-lover! Aw, you’re really good at playing hard to get,” Zek said. His pearly whites flashed at her and he momentarily stuck his bright blue tongue out.
She handed him a file and his day just got even better. “Oh look, your admirer has such pretty handwriting!” he said. He pointed at the margins. “And it looks like they had some other plans, too. Let’s see, C.G. + J. J.” He stared at his cohort. “So much passion! You’re a lucky woman!” By now his voice was just dripping with sap.
“I don’t think ostriches are legal,” Zek said as they looked into other folders, the money apparently forgotten. There would be time to finish later. “Oh look, this Gabrielle likes singing in the shower and dancing in--on second though, we’ll come back to that one,” he said hastily. OF all days not to have his trenchcoat and its big, conveniently hidden pockets.
THe she asked if he had a dating profile. Whoops. “Maybe,” he said quickly. “Do you have one of these files?” Haha, ball’s in your cou--
"Don't you two know it’s rude to rifle through someone else's things?"
“Yipes!” he squeaked in a low voice, so only Juniper should hear. She kinda exploded into motion but Zek instinctively did the opposite. Smoothly standing, Zek pivoted and faced the voice.
It was an ugly guy. Like, real ugly. The kind of ugly you modelled cheap Halloween masks after. Seriously. Warthogs would run from this guy. Zek didn’t have that option. He forced himself to not vomit and instead plastered a hopefully convincing smile on his face. “We are all friends here” it was supposed to say. He slid his hands into the air.
Oh, the guy had a gun too. Zek’s smile stretched just a little bit more and he thought fast. “Oh hey,” he said in completely moderate levels of surprise yes sir. “Are you the owner of this van? We heard a terrible noise and saw it crash. We were wanting to make sure nobody was hurt.”
Drat! She wasn't off the hook yet! She puffed her cheeks out at him.
"Last I heard I'd ticked off the Russian Mafia, and lordy help me if the dude thinks we were a thing seeing as I tricked him into kissing me for a picture." She was immediately and thoroughly distracted by the blue, seeing as she had never seen a blue tongue before. Or, if she had, she hadn't been paying attention at that particular moment.
"Huh, wonder if Blue tastes any different." Had... has she said that out loud? Oops!
She didn't get a chance to respond to anything else, because, you know, gun toting maniac. Zek didn't seem too bothered by him, though, so she tried to calm herself a bit. Right, they had this in the bag! Totally! She didn't need to worry about the gun, and Zek could just light-pop the guy away, right?
Her gaze flitted back and forth between Zek and the guy, while she stood there like an idiot holding the hammer aloft like she was planning to do something with it. Oh, were they playing dumb? She sucked at that! "Ah...oh... er. Hey look, I found your hammer good sir, don't wanna lose something that big and hammer-y, right? Haha." @#$%, she wasn't cut out for this kinda stuff.
The guy, who she was going to dub 'Mr. Roadkill', looked at her but didn't move his gun from where he had it pointed at Zek. He didn't look amused, or maybe that was just his face, she didn't know!
"You, uh, want it back?" Preferably hefted into his stomach hard enough to give them time to grab the rest of the cash. She took a step toward the guy, holding the hammer out in front of her like it weighed nothing, and then suddenly it did and the whole ass metal head of it went crashing down into the metal floor and narrowly missed her feet.
Juniper squawked like an angry bird. It didn't register what had happened as she tried to phase and lift the thing again only to find that she couldn't. Then it clicked into place.
"Aw shi-"
"This is my van, and you can bet somebody's about to get hurt."
Her first instinct was to panic. Panic and run; preferably in the opposite order. She turned and tried to fling herself out of whatever radius he had because that always seemed to be how those types worked, as the guy hefted himself up into the van and blocked that escape route.
A few things happened right then, and Juniper wasn't about to pretend to know what was happening. The space inside the van was suddenly very cramped as Mr. Muscular seemingly randomly popped back to existence. Juniper was ungracefully smooshed to the side by a tree trunk like arm, but it didn't last very long seeing as he was also still caught up in a powerful rush forward. Whatever mutation that made him super big and beefy canceled out as soon as he barreled into Mr. Roadkill, but that didn't stop the momentum and both of them ended up bursting back out of the back of the van and into a thrashing pile on the ground outside.
She didn't even notice that the morning star Zek had nabbed had popped out with Mr. Muscles until she stumbled forward and tripped over it on the floor and tried to windmill her arms to stay upright.
"Got a plan, Captain!?" She hurried back to stuffing all of the money into the duffle bag. It was important after all, and they could split it later after they were out of imminent danger.
Zek was sure Juniper was trying to help, he just really wished she wouldn’t! His smile stretched to a painful degree and his eyes lit up with mania. Dead gods! We’re going to die! All because we wouldn’t want to lose something big and hammer-y! If his face hadn’t frozen in a rictus, Zek was confident he’d be going into hysterics.
His voice was squeakier than it had been since puberty when there was a loud metal clang of Juniper dropping something and then the guy started coming in. Zek backed up a half step. “Oh, this is your van!” he tittered. “Well on the bright side, nobody seemed to get hurt or --CATCH!”
He whipped his hand forward and a glowing ball
Did not appear. “Double you, tea, eff?!” Zek swore. He blinked at his hand. And the guy was coming in.
Zek felt a kind of wrenching inside of him, but also off somewhere else, and then Muscle-Man was coming out of his storage closet. “What the FLITTERJIBBLETS!” he roared in disbelief. But now they had an exit. The Facial Horror was out of the van and out of the picture, at least for now, and Juniper was still going fast.
“Yeah I got a plan!” Zek said, dropping down by the money. “Get the loot and get out!” He pushed the money together in a pile and willed an orb into being. Huh, it worked now. He smashed it into the money and then materizled the now full orb and shoved it into Juniper’s bag. “Zip it up, let’s go!” he said and grabbed his own bucket.
And the morningstar. He wasn’t leaving that just lying around.
“Can you take us through the wall?” he said quickly, once fully loaded. Otherwise, it was going to be a close run to base.