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.
Leyla bid him a pleasant farewell. "Maybe I stop by. I get bored from this place soon anyway." She gave him an almost pleasant smile and waved him off.
As soon as he was gone, she sidled away from the bar to wrangle her new money moron. "I talk to agent of artist. It take some time to fix purchase. I take care of it, yes? Now, I need leave. Call your driver, yes?"
Leyla had another drink in the limo on the way to where he thought her apartment was. She caught a cab to her real apartment, and stopped inside to change. She had to pick something that looked sexy, but not like she had intended it to be so. She went with a tight black pencil skirt and a dressy red blouse with short sleeves, to bare the tattoos he seemed so fond of. Her hair she wore down, bouncing around her shoulders.
She looked him up to survey the buzz about him. Good enough. After a couple of hours, she hailed a cab, and headed to his apartment.
It wasn't a terrible apartment, she supposed. Nothing she would live in these days, but she'd been in worse. She stopped in front of his door and double-checked her appearance. She looked good. Leyla rapped twice on the door.
Sure enough, Nate heard the sound of knuckles against his door after a few chapters. He placed a bookmark on his page and folded the book closed, resting it on a nearby coffee table.
He checked through the peephole to reaffirm that his visitor was indeed Leyla. He opened the door and immediately noticed that she had taken the opportunity to change into something a bit more... well, yeah. He wondered what her motivation was; the dress was appealing enough, and this change was not for comfort. If he was not with Quin (and reminding himself of that,) this could have been a successful attempt at distracting his mind with thoughts relating to anything but art.
Another quick look also reaffirmed what he noticed in the gallery: with her hands bare, there was no doubt that she was missing a pinkie. He placed his hand on his pocket, wishing to feel the vibration of a text from his informant.
He kept his composure, holding the door open and inviting her in. "Step right in. The paintings are in the room to the left." He went toward the kitchen and asked, "could I get you something to drink?"
He prepared himself a rum and coke, waiting for her next move.
The apartment was cozy, tasteful for a man's apartment. Leyla sidled in, completely at ease, wandering toward the artwork, but openly surveying the rest of the apartment.
"Vodka is good," she told him absently. "Much ice."
She wiped a finger along a windowsill. Clean, too. There was certainly an artistic arrangement to the apartment, but something about it struck her as odd. There was an elegance to it that did not fit the man she had met at the gallery, so out-of-place among the wealthy. And something about the arrangement of the furniture struck her as familiar...
Her eyes narrowed in contemplation. Leyla could practically taste what it was, but it stayed out of reach. "The apartment, I like it."
From what he saw at the gallery to what she was ordering now, it was clear that vodka was Leyla's drink of choice. How very typical of a Russian. The beverage was not his favorite, as he felt it was the drink of choice for teenage party drinkers who just wanted to get to their blackout that much faster. He did keep a nice bottle around in the apartment, because as life had taught him, he should always be ready to entertain company, regardless of their tastes.
He returned to the living room with her glass in his right and his drink in his left. He handed the vodka to her just as she complimented the apartment. He debated keeping one of his key cards to himself, but he felt dirty keeping it a secret. "Yeah, I try and keep it nice. Wouldn't want my girlfriend scolding me for keeping things dirty."
He looked at one of his paintings, but made sure to keep her in his peripheral vision. He wanted to keep her in sight.
So there was a woman in the picture. That might close off one of her courses of action, but then again, perhaps not. "She is a lucky woman, I think." She took her drink, allowing her fingers to linger on his briefly.
Sipping at her drink, she studied the paintings with a careful eye. Truly, she did not have much education in the area of art, but she had acquired enough jargon in the course of her cons that she could fake her way through.
Leyla pointed toward one of them. "This here, it is very different than the others. Is it earlier?"
It was the chairs, she thought, still fixated on this nagging uncertainty. They all had a view of the door. In her peripheral vision, she noticed a book sitting on one chair, probably his favored sitting place, nestled in a corner directly opposite the door. It was a defensive arrangement.
An interesting comment, especially when followed by a just barely noticeable amount of contact between her hand and his. Now that he played that card, was she going to change how she was going about... well, whatever she was going about?
She made a comment about one of his paintings. Despite the art being the reason she was there, he could not help but feel like her comments regarding his paintings were just small talk. He balanced his concerns out by remembering that he had been trained for a lifetime of suspicion toward everyone and he could not always assume everyone was playing an angle.
But he would remain cautious. The painting she was looking at was slightly older than the others, but by no means from his "early" career. "Yes, that'd be one of my earlier pieces. Back when I was still determining my influences." It felt good to lie sometimes.
He got slightly closer to her, both to keep her in sight and to see how she would react. "So is there anything in particular that catches your interest?"
>>"So is there anything in particular that catches your interest?"
His question distracted her from thoughts of the room. So, he was going to play after all? Not resisting the proximity in the slightest, she leaned back toward him with a playful grin. She wasn't adverse to a bit of flirtation. "Oh, I think yes. Much beauty here. What deal are you offer?"
It was harder to hit the play on words when her conjugations were hopelessly mixed up, but her tone and body language managed to convey the intent: she was happy to flirt and make a business arrangement, but she was open to anything else he had in mind as well.
He struck Leyla as a tiger, brought into captivity and taught to dance on its hind legs. He was trying so very hard to be good, but there was something wilder below the surface that she could practically taste.
>> "Oh, I think yes. Much beauty here. What deal are you offer?"
Her tone spoke volumes, and those volumes were filled with suggestive words and plots of their own. Oh, if she had found him earlier, the fun they could have. He loved being in a relationship, but he was certainly being reminded why he could never have been in one as a conman. The commitment took away some of a conman's best weapons... weapons he could have used for a moment like the one Leyla was putting him in.
She was close enough that if he just held an arm out, she would be wrapped up by it... but that was not going to be his move. He was curious, but not enough to do something stupid. Instead, he took another risk; he stepped in front of her, to faux-examine one of his own paintings.
Now she was behind him, still fairly close. She was no longer within sight; she could do anything. And that was the new challenge: to see what she would do when presented with no restrictions. "Oh, I'm willing to deal whatever your heart desires. Just tell me what it is you want." Maybe he was being too inviting...
His move surprised her enough that she had to stop for a moment. Her assessment of the defensive arrangement of the furniture came under question.
But, no, she wouldn't be thrown off by that. Maybe he wasn't as cautious as she thought. Or maybe he was asking for trouble. In either case, she was happy to supply some excitement. Once she had recovered, she slipped up behind him, her chest nearly touching his back, close enough that her breath ghosted on the side of his face as she spoke.
"Shading in this piece...very dark," she murmured, the four-fingered hand reaching around him to point out the areas she was talking about. "Speaks to something more from a man with clean apartment, girlfriend, tidy life. You are not so good as you say."
>> "Shading in this piece...very dark. Speaks to something more from a man with clean apartment, girlfriend, tidy life. You are not so good as you say."
He was not "surprised" by her move, but it did not change the surge of adrenaline he felt as the intimacy of her chest brushed against his back, and her arm weaved around him. He tried to conceal his natural reaction, but her method of seduction was effective.
She realized a morsel of the truth about him... she was to observant. And far too close... but how did he handle his next move. "Well, who stays the same person forever?" Even more true for a co-- former conman. Even if a mysterious woman had her body all but pressed against him...
Bzzzzt! Bzzzzt![/i]
He felt a phone buzzing in his pocket, and for a moment, Quin flashed through his mind, followed by guilt. It took another brief moment before he realized what the text truly was.
He turned to face her, (their bodies now considerably closer,) and he placed a hand on her waist. "That's probably my girlfriend." He leaned in and whispered into her ear, "Just let me make sure she's not on her way, chère." He pressed on her waist lightly to slide her aside so he could check the phone screen privately in the nearby kitchen.
He almost chuckled at the screen, considering the code word used. [DIRTY GIRL.] He wanted to laugh, but that basically meant that his contact found some dark dealings in Leyla's past.
Thankfully, this meant Nate was more prepared. He snagged a small knife from a counter and slipped it in his back pocket, just in case everything hit the fan. He tapped the phone on the counter four times, mimicking the sound of a spider's clicks. Parker would know; he would find his way toward the area, ready to spring out if he felt someone was trying to escape the apartment.
Nate returned to Leyla with a grin on his face. He approached her from behind, placing an arm around here waist. "She's stuck at work until the morning..." Now it was his turn to have fun. "So, what sort of deal are you interested in... because you aren't really striking me as the 'art enthusiast' type... What does leave you... enthused?"
She stifled a touch of disappointment when they were interrupted, but was placated by his excuse. While he was in the kitchen, she started to peruse the paintings more carefully, hoping for some sort of clue into him. She had nearly put her finger on it yet again when he came up beside her.
>>"So, what sort of deal are you interested in... because you aren't really striking me as the 'art enthusiast' type... What does leave you... enthused?"
Leyla practically purred. Well, that left that question answered. The girlfriend would be no issue. Draping an arm over his shoulder loosely, she leaned in against his chest. "Oh, many things. Maybe I find more to enthuse me, though, yes?" To the untrained eye, her expression might be seen as sly and seductive. In reality, it was the grin of the hawk at the field mouse. She brushed her fingers along his stubbled jaw, getting enough positive signs from him that she no longer felt the need to hold back.
The game she could put on hold for a bit of fun. It had been too long since a man had satisfied her, and he was more than acceptable as a means to the end.
>> "Oh, many things. Maybe I find more to enthuse me, though, yes?"
Nate should count himself blessed that he still had one or two contacts left in the underworld of New York. If he was single and unwarned, he could easily find himself in the claws of this devious minx, purring in his arms, fingers tracing his jawline. She would surely have given him a night to remember before robbing him blind in one way or another.
"I'm sure you would... but you should be careful." He leaned in close, his lips millimeters from her earlobe, he whispered. "You already decided I'm a man with a dark past... would you be as enthusiastic if you end up losing another pinkie in a deal gone bad?"
It was a shame... in another life, they could have had such wild fun together...
Leyla froze, eyes going wide. This she had not expected in the slightest. Suddenly, everything clicked: the furniture, the paintings, the attitude. The reason the apartment felt familiar was because it was the same as she had arranged her own. She swore in foully Turkish and shoved him away violently, backing away and wishing she hadn't worn heels.
"You are con man," she spat in disbelief, eyes darting between him and the door. It was possible he would try to stop her, or maybe he just wanted her out. She couldn't be sure if he had known before the phone message or not. If he had, that meant he lured her here for other purposes, and that was unacceptable.
Her hand darted to her purse for a knife as she started sidling toward the door, never taking her eyes off of him.
She shoved him away, approaching the door. He had assumed this would be her next move, because the most unpredictable people become predictable when caught off guard.
She was rushing to sift through her pocket book, no doubt looking for a knife, (or a gun, he thought with a shudder.) Still, he was prepared as well. He reached for the knife in his back pocket and waited for his cue--
A cue given to him by his partner in crime. Parker had shuffled his way stealthily to the front door, and with Leyla trying to make her escape, the spider unleashed a screeching warble. The sound was bizarre and unfamiliar, and it was just enough to get Leyla to turn her head and spot a three-foot long spider, which was enough to drop her guard, if not just for a moment.
Nate took three long strides, wasting no time. Before she could turn to face him, he wrapped one arm around her arms and waist. His free hand placed the blade of his knife against her neck.
Calmly, repressing the surging adrenaline in him, he spoke. "Well, it takes a con to know a con, right?"
He was in control of the situation, but she was trapped, and a trapped mind became far less rational or predictable, so he had to keep the situation calm. As calm as a situation could be when it involved a knife. "I'm not sure what your angle is, but I have no reason to hurt you." Correction: he probably would not if he needed to. Nate was never a killer; merely a con, but she did not need to know that. "You're not going to give me a reason, right?"
With his arm around her and a knife pressed against her throat, there was a time in Nate's life when this would have constituted foreplay.
For Leyla, under different circumstances, this still might have turned her on. As it was, she was face-to-face with a gigantic spider, and just after having the traumatic memory of losing her finger during imprisonment, she found herself trapped, her life threatened. She could not be any more furious, more panicked if the floor fell out from underneath them.
She wanted to torture him. She wanted to make him suffer. She wanted to watch him writhe in agony, and if she had reached her knife just a moment sooner, she might have. As it was, the only weapon she had to use against him was to make him happy. Trying to think of a way around it, she swallowed heavily against the knife. Her options were quite limited.
>>"You're not going to give me a reason, right?"
"Of course no," she breathed, still managing to sound somewhat haughty despite her situation. "No trouble is meant." Her eyes slid closed and she let her powers leak out, just a little. Maybe she could throw him off just enough to get away, get the upper hand.