Bouncy clowns were everywhere. Seriously, he was surrounded by them. Bouncy clowns to the left. Bouncy clowns to the right, the front, behind. Xavier wiped sweat from his forehead. He hadn't been able to succeed yet, and they'd been at it for the better part of an hour.

The objective? Make all of the clowns fall back at the same time... Without losing all of your clothes.

This was Shin-Sensei's custom 'Don't end up naked' training.


With a look of complete concentration, Xavier crouched slightly, and took a deep breath. Mind clear, and body primed. He started up his full body repulsion field. So far, so good. Hair lifted and waved and clothing billowed slightly as everything was pushed lightly away from him. Easy. Now, the hard part... He pushed it harder. His hair stood straight up as his clothing danced about him violently. The nearest clowns wiggled a little in place. 

Okay... Okay, just... focus. Focus. PUSH!

-BOOM!- 

The shockwave ripped from him, blasting out in all directions. The clowns in all directions were thrown to the ground, before rocking back up as they did. Panting with effort, Xavier looked around to see if he'd knocked over all of them... "Did I... Did I do it?" Was there a breeze in here?

                                                                                           *    *    *
Meanwhile... A Young wizard was up to vile, vile things. The Supremes had rated his skillset lowly. How dare they! Well, he would show them. He was an invocation expert the likes of which this world had never seen! He'd just made one little mistake on his assessment! It wouldn't happen again. Once they saw what he did today, well, they would have to accept his talents!

With the ritual complete, he stood from his building top in down town New York City, and cackled loudly, raising two hands to the sky and calling into the air for the last part of the ritual. Dark clouds began to appear around the building, swirling aggressively in a downward spiral toward the alter he'd set up. "Yes! Yeees! Heed me great forces!  Summon me an army that will murder my foes, and lead me to supreme status!" 

lightening crashed above him, and he cackled loudly, coaxing something within the clouds to join him in this mortal plane! Yelling one more time, he stepped forward , barely keeping his balance as the tripped on his shoe, smudging the carefully chalked magical circle he'd made without noticing. One. More. Push!

Another crash of lightning, this time lashing down to his very roof. "HRRRRG!" He was struck! The energy from the conjured storm rushed through him, and into the magical circle, which flared brightly, brilliantly for just a moment... before the rooftop went dark.

Without explanation, thousands, and thousands of crowd would flood in from all directions, and head toward a certain downtown area of New York.










   

The first trip that Celeste attempted out of the mansion was a rather rousing...failure. Inspired by her fellow gorgon, Praxi, Celeste attempted to go out into the metropolis herself. She had to figure out if living the mansion and forging a life of her own was going to even be possible, so why not just jump in. It took several attempts to find her but eventually the nice Professor Grey and Mrs. Taylor had managed to find her hiding in one of the buildings.

That had clearly been a failure.

But that wouldn’t be her only attempt. As time pressed on and Celeste grew more and more bold, she made other attempts. It was on one of these journeys out into the city that the celestial mutant met Bull and his dance crew.

She remembered finding the park downtown and being entranced by the music that she heard. It had been so enchanting that she had even been able to ignore the looks she received from the other passerbys. When she found the source, she watched in entertainment as Bull, a tall, thin, dark skinned teen around her age was dancing to some melodious music. Around him were several others, each of them dressed similarly and sported a logo that she couldn’t quite read, but they too danced just as well.

Celeste had stayed the whole day, cheering and applauding them as they danced and “practiced” as they called it. Eventually Bull, the seeming leader of the group, pulled her forward to see what she could do. It took some time for him to find the right music selection but, when he did, Celeste knew it was right.

And so she danced. They called it “ballet”. Recently Celeste had stumbled across a television program that was all about the same dancing. Celeste had found the dancing interesting and attempted to copy it, over and over again, to the point that it was all she wanted to dance.

Bull had decided that day that Celeste would be an honorary member of his crew -- so long as she visited often to continue dancing with them. How could she refuse?

Walking through the park, wearing simple yoga pants and tank top, she offered Bull and his crew a hearty smile. The stars and galaxies in her body twinkled excitedly as she ran up to them, even giggling when Bull met her and planted a backwards hat on top of her head.

“Heya, there’s my homegirl!” Bull announced with a big, brotherly grin. “What’s up, Celeste?”

Celeste had been practicing her speaking and English more and more. She gulped and replied, ”No things, my...hom-ie,” she said, with growing eagerness. ”Just...chill...ax-ing?” She questioned that last part. Was it right?

Bull and a couple friends chuckled goodnaturedly and nodded. “Yeah you got it, girl. Come on. We’re starting our warm-ups now, you’re just in time to join.”

Celeste jumped excitedly. Yes. She loved it when she made it on time to do warm-ups. She tossed her bag aside with the others as she walked up to them. They all grinned and greeted her with looks of affection. They didn’t need to be so nice to her but it was much like being adopted by another family. Celeste enjoyed it immensely.

However, just as they were selecting rounds of music, a strange sound and flutter filled the air. A few gasps echoed from around them, to the point that the group eventually had to lift their heads and look up. And like that they watched in surprise, and honor, as feathers as black as night filled the sky, followed by the cacophony of beating wings.

Jokers to the left of him, jokers to the right.

And I’m stuck in the middle with you~ he sung to himself. Standing above it all, watching from the God room.

Cmon X, don’t get naked... He mentally cheered the guy on.

The kid crouched, focused, and boom. Clowns flew in all directions. The one pennywise in the bunch hadn’t stood a chance. But... and there was a but. A rather big but. Had the clothing survived the attack?

Shin’s voice came down from the danger room intercom.

”I can see how happy victory makes you, but... you sort of failed the task I set.” he said.

There was a beeping on the communication device clipped to the front of his white coat. He picked it up and spoke into it, listened. Hung it up and clipped it away.

The voice came down to X again. ”Okay X. Finish your crowing and hit the showers. We’ve got a mission. Grab a spare set of clothes and we’ll hit the road.”

~~~

The road, in this case, was the sky. “Where we’re going, X,” shin had said. Half jokingly. “We won’t need roads.”

Flown. They had flown. He was practicing a new shard construct. This one was probably only going to be a temporary construct for a party on Halloween. He thought he might go as Doc Brown. It had been a while since he’d made a new construct design, though.

They rode to the area in style, in a silver shard Delorean.

As they flew in over the area, Shin banked hard and stopped them in the sky. X’s passenger-side gull wing door swung up.

”What does it look like, X?” He asked.

He had taken the full ten or so minutes it took to generate the car, while X was dressing for the mission. So shin could make additional constructs. Hence, he had no fears of X falling out of the flying car. He’d outfitted the guy with a set of shard wings that looked like a jet pack. The wings were withdrawn into the pack right then, but at a word from X, Shin could release them and control the X man’s descent.

It should also be noted that when extended, the wings would snap out in a very particular X shape. Yes, friends and neighbors. He had hooked X up with an X wing jet pack. Went with the orange visored helmet the Asian had insisted X wear for safety’s sake nicely.

The voice over the intercom caused Xavier to look down, and turn bright red as he covered his shame. "Sorry, Shin Sensei! I keep trying, but gosh, I dunno. It seems like as soon as I put out that much force it just... takes the clothes with it." He frowned a bit as he tried to find a scrap of cloth to cover himself with on the ground.

He perked up, however, when he heard Shin speak up again. A MISSION! He nodded quickly and picked his way around a bunch of bobbing clowns in order to get on a fresh OneInaMillion suit.

Moments later he was sprinting into the garage, and skidding to a stop, sparkles in his eyes as he spotted the Delorean. "OHHH WOW! Like in Future Quest part 2 where they make it fly?! This is the coolest thing ever, Shin Sensei!"

He was wrong.

The Jetpack he gave to him next was. Best. Day. Ever.

As the door opened, and Xavier stepped up, his beady little eyes looked around, and he turned back to Shin. "It's like the news reports said... There's so many of them!"

True to his description, the whole section of the city was crowded with crows, most flying about in a Murder storm abovehead. Even over the rush of wind he could hear the chorus of caws. He spied about quickly. "They don't seem to be bothering anything just yet! Looks like there are a few places they might be gathering!" He yelled back to Shin as he tried to make sense of it all. "That park over there... That rooftop over there... Maybe a few other places!"


-Ten Minutes Earlier-

The flutter of wings would be a low drumming at first, but within the park it would quicky be difficult to make out anything other than yelled speech, fluttering wings, and loud caws... until all went silent.

They had all landed around them. A sea of crows, their eyes on the shiny girl. Staring for a long moment, they all suddenly opened their beaks, and spoke in a cawing tone. "Lord Melchior demands Shiny tribute!" With that, then would all jump into action, cawing out the name, 'Melchior!' as they attempted to grasp her as a group, and lift her off into the sky toward a certain rooftop, where their new dark lord awaited!

Celeste had no idea what was happening. The perfectly bright and sunny day turned cloudy and the air was filled with a near deafening thrumming. She cringed as she pulled herself closer to her new friends, two of which (one of them Bull) tried to put her behind them to protect her. But it did little good. Her starlit eye looked behind her and all around she could see them, black marble eyes, each one zeroing in on her with not hate or malice -- but obsession.

She had been getting better about going outside and being in the world, but this moment suddenly made her want nothing more than to run and hide back in her room; she couldn’t remember when she felt so exposed.

And then they began to speak. Not her comrades, but rather, the crows. In unison Celeste watched in horror as each and every bird began to caw a sound. She wasn’t quite sure what it was, a name maybe, but it was unfamiliar to her. What made matters worse was that in their chorus, they never once looked away from her. Rather they seemed so completely and utterly focused on her that she felt a shiver run down her spine.

”N-No..like…” she whispered.

The rush was hard to prepare for. A wave of black, glistening feathers flew at Celeste and the dance crew. The dancers shouted and tried to swipe the birds away. Bull tried to take Celeste by the arm, to pull her away with him and run for some cover. But the weight and force of the birds as they descended on the nervous, sparkly girl of swirling galaxies was too much to stand against.

Celeste yelped and cried as she felt tiny talons latch onto her clothes and pulled her in all directions. Her eyes closed in fear, she tried to shout but the endless beat of wings and the caw of birds drowned out her voice. Even as they began to lift her, Celeste could scarcely manage a petrified ”Help!!!” before her voice was drowned out again.

The birds had their prize. It was time to return to master.

Crows crows crows. Was Oprah in town? Because you get a crow and you get a crow and you...

It was crazy. What kind of mutant could do this? Aside from Liz. Maybe they should have checked with her first...

No one had been attacked yet, but— what were they doing?

The time to shred crows was not now. Now was the time to investigate. X had pointed out several places to look into. Well, two at least. The park, and the rooftop.

His gut told him, shin, investigate the rooftop. Because you’re flying and it is right there.

He told X to climb back in, then turned the car around so they were pointed towards the rooftop. The DeLorean sailed through the air, practically riding the tail feathers of a few crows (who scattered with annoyed caws). The Asian pulled the DeLorean to a stop several meters above the roof.

True to his word, the rooftop was swarming with crows. Shin popped the full-wing door again.

”Ever rush a group of birds in Central Park to see them scatter?” He asked. Then, he shoved X out the side of the flying car with a shout of ”You’re about to!”

He could almost hear X go weeee as he controlled the man’s descent towards the birds. The X wings were out, folks. The X wings were out!

Shard flew X in a wide scouting path, bringing the car along so X didn’t escape his range. Then, he brought him down quick to buzz the roof, and brought him back up to fly next to the car.

He “rolled down” his window and looked to the X for an update.

So many birds. So, so many birds. The flow of feathers and flaps, and caws and sensation of being pulled at from all directions would come to a stop in a strangely gentle landing. Wings tails and beaks and claws would retreat into a writhing and fluttering dome. The floor was gravel, and vents, and grates. Off to the left there was a roof access hatch, sealed currently. Before her, a throne of crows. And in it. A crow.

"CAW! Kneel before the king of the murder! Kneel before Melchior!"

The chorus would ring out from all directions, aimed at the beautiful, shiny girl. The crow, which looked like any other crow, would stare at her intently from atop its flapping throne and open its mouth to speak...

"Sup."

* * *

"No, that would be needlessly mean!" Xavier was shoved from the flying car, and Shin didn't have to imagine a thing as he yelled out,"WHEEEEEE!" as he shot out into the air, and struck a classic flying hero pose. And then he was shoved through the massive flock on the roof, using his repulsion field to knock any crows out of the way as gently as possible.

"Ohh, sorry! Pardon! Passing through!" He broke through the crowd a bit, looking about for the quick moment he was given before he passed through the eye of the storm. Just like that, he was with Shin again.

"Shin Sensei! There's so many of them up there! I saw something strange... A huge pile of them! I think, at least! Or... A dome?"

Just then, the flock began to speak around them.

"DESTROY THE INTERLOPERS! MELCHIOR DEMANDS IT!"

"U- Uhhh... Sensei!" The birds began to close in to attack from all sides, and Xavier braced for impacts. [/i]

Celeste was terrified. Her stars and galaxies of her body dimmed into shades of crystalline blue as she tried to understand what was going on. She was tugged into so many different directions and for several long, terrifying minutes, she felt something akin to weightlessness. Rather, it wasn’t like floating, it was more like she was before forcefully wrenched from the ground and gravity continuously threatened to pull her back into the warming and painful embrace of the earth.

The celestial mutant shivered, the air around her getting colder and colder. A few of the crows cawed as ice began to cover their talons, for others it was the feathers and wings. But it seemed that no matter how many of them broke away in fear, there was always enough to continue Celeste along her unwanted journey.

Then, softly, the ravens lowered and Celeste felt solid ground beneath her feet again. She shook fearfully, moving onto her knees and hugging herself as the birds began to disperse. Soon it was nothing more than a dome of black feathers, circling all around, threatening to the outside world.

And Celeste gulped, looking around fearfully until a voice called out. Her eyes snapped forward towards a single bird that sat on a throne. Another cawed and demanded that she kneel for Melchoir. Though her English wasn’t the best, Celeste knew these strings of words quite well, having been something heard many times in the Atlantean palace. On her knees, she looked around fearfully for this Melchoir and looked up when a voiced greeted her.

A bird. It was yet another bird. Confusion crossed her face as the large bird nodded a head towards her, a look on his face akin to flirtation. that...was odd.

”W-What…?” she asked.

“You are...so, so shiny…” Melchoir said with utter desire. “...you sparkle...like diamonds…”

Celeste gulped again. Such poetry was familiar to her in Atlantis and even now it made her just as uncomfortable. ”What...want?”/color] she asked. ”With...I?”

The bird puffed up once more, shaking its neck and bristling feathers. “Oooo...just you...for now…”

Oh boy. He’d actually gone weee, hadn’t he? Like, out of joy. Not the other kind.

X flew his route, and came back to report.

A dome? A pile of crows? He ran that through his mind in an attempt to make sense of it. But before he could finish that thought, he was interrupted. By crows. Talking.

”Supposed to say corn...” He muttered.

Then he told X to prepare for trouble. He made it double by adding a layer of shards over the kids clothes. A bit of extra impact protection to go with the cool x wing pack. Then, he moved them both through the crowd of crows.

Ever see a DeLorean drive through a crowd of crows? Just imagine it. Birds scattered, left and right. He did not aim to hurt them. They moved out of self preservation, although some did swoop in after they had dodged, to try and peck the car. Or X. X was probably worse off, being outside the car.

The Asian hurried then down to the roof, where he landed. Shards flew away from the car to reform into an image he had kept in his head the whole time. A white tuxedo with a white shirt and tie. White shoes. The excess shards piled neatly into the shape of a suitcase on the rooftop nearby. He paused as he looked around, then turned to X.

”Too many things. Sorry.”

The strain was too much. He stole Xs shards and let them join the suitcase with the others. He bent to pick it up, and bashed a crow aside.

”Okay! Who the hell is Nelchior?? I’ve come to bargain. With some diplomacy!!” He smacked another crow, to punctuate the point.