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 Pharoah Dynasty
An ancient sorceress is on a quest to bring her long-lost warrior-king to the modern era in a bid for global domination. Can the heroes of the modern world stop her before all is lost?
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.
Safe in her office, Ghost shook her head and dabbed away the few spilled tears. She had counting to do and the steady humdrum rhythm of work was soothing. She counted the drawer and the missing money hadn't magically reappeared while she was away, but that was to be expected. She shoved the drawer back where it belonged and set about righting the ledgers and checking the numbers. Ghost checked the security feed. Jake was just sitting there, quite shocked, despite the fact that she had left some time ago. No doubt he had some things to chew over.
Like how did Ghost know what would happen in the future? (She really, really hoped the dream was just a nightmare. There was no way she could end up like that, right?) And the gun thing... guns scared her. (But if she thought hard enough, she knew where the safety was and how to properly holster one without looking as well as how to disassemble them and clean them.)
She sighed, something she'd been doing far too often today, and shook her head. She had inventory and orders and she could really do with some research on more authors aligned with her store's purpose. She could set up a nice display some day. Wouldn't that be nice?
There was a strange niggling feeling at the back of her neck. Some trick of the air flow or something bothersome. She ignored it since there were so many other more important things to do and keeping busy would keep her brain from melting down. Menial tasks that took just enough brain effort to keep her brain from wandering off on its own.
As the day wound down, the employees started checking in with Ghost as to whether or not they could leave. She glanced at her security camera feed again and realized that she hadn't seen Jake leave, but surely he had since it was closing time already. She went through her typical checklist, did you take out the trash, did you sweep, did you re-shelf? This time, Ghost made the employees, including Aurum, wait until she counted each register's bank. With only the acceptable deviations of a dollar or so on each, she dismissed them and set about preparing the night's deposit.
After she was sure she was alone, Ghost flopped the deposit on the table and drew out the perplexing drawer for one last count. Nope. No money had given birth while she wasn't looking. She left the deposit on the table, unwilling to turn the cash in without finding that missing money. She would resolve this day before she started another.
Ghost pushed up her 3/4 length sleeves and walked toward her office door. Again... something was wrong. Just a little... bother. In the air currents. It was almost like something was... Ghost stared straight at the spot where Jake was hiding, but she didn't see anything. She no longer felt ... weird... but... she was just feeling strange today. She turned her head this way and that and still... nothing.
She brushed through the doors and went to lock the revolving door out front as well as the handicapped exit. Yeah. Someone was definitely there. She felt it, a vibration or an eddy. Whatever it was, she knew there was someone still present in the store... and hiding. "What do you want?" She breathed the words, more for her own benefit than the intruder's before she sent a gust of air at where she guessed the person to be. Whether she knocked them back or not didn't matter. She would be able to gauge where they were by how the air reacted.
Jake leaned heavily against the wall, watching the procession of employees flood into and out of Ghost's office with mild disinterest. His throat was sore, but the endless speaking had ground the immediate pain of his depression into a dull ache. It was a good thing, he guessed, to shake out the snakes and cob-webs every once in a while. Why haven't I done this before? he wondered half-heartedly.
It didn't take Jake long to realize that something was very wrong with Ghost's normal routine. When something becomes practiced, it grows static, and although the connection is strong it also becomes dull. Jake watched as she flirted around the confined office, flipping through a ledger here and signing a few papers before wading through another sheaf of paper, but there was a break in that ordered routine, and one laden with concern and suspicion.
Pushing off from the wall, he wandered over to her desk and considered the break in the pattern as she counted yet another....No, wait. That was the same drawer, wasn't it? Jake leaned closer and studied the thin and wiry connections that wove over the surface of the plastic tray. The connections were weak. People didn't value the drawers except as things tied to the familiarity of work, and this made discerning individual ones difficult at best. Then Jake caught something, a hint of guilt about the cracked corner where it had been dropped embarrassingly at some point. He remembered that crack. Only one reason to recount a drawer and show signs of concern and suspicion. Theft, he figured.
Stepping back, he moved out of the way as Ghost completed that final count and re-slotted the drawer into its holder. Frustration and determination weighed heavily between her and that drawer. Someone, he imagined, was going to end up on the wrong end of a witch-hunt. After slotting the drawer, Ghost turned and looked almost towards him, tendrils of curiosity and recognition edging vaguely in his direction. Jake smiled almost painfully.
“I'm sorry babe. You can't find me here.”
Ghost turned and walked briskly out the door of the office and across Full Circle's open floor, but the tendrils seemed to languish in her passing. Jake raised an eyebrow. This was something he hadn't seen before. People's perceptive abilities were limited – their connections didn't hang around waiting for something to connect with. Scowling, he walked through the door, following the petite woman. He watched as she moved across to the revolving door and set a lock at its base, the lacy fragments spilling out behind her. What was....?
Jake blinked for the second time that day and refocused his attention behind him. The web of recognition flooded the space around him, enfolding him like a wide reaching net. The realization flowed over him: she wasn't human.
“Oh, shit!” he exclaimed under his breath as he twisted his senses back towards her. Her form bristled with power and connections to that unknowable source that Jake had first experienced on the roof.
“What do you want?” she growled coldly just as a torrent of wind surged through the shadow-cloaked coffee house. Jake shielded his face with his left arm instinctively, but no wind could blind him. All around him, he felt the strands of recognition she had spun snap against him. Jake felt an inhuman surge of energy flow through his mind as the blocks he had placed on his own pattern shattered like an overwhelmed dam. Power flooded back into the connections as everything snapped back into place. The Shroud was gone, and he was once more visible, meaningful, and very much vulnerable. Jake let his arm fall in the moment between understanding and recognition with a sigh. Standing firm, he stood tall and ready as napkins and other small pieces of debris kicked up by the wind floated down around him.
“I wanted the chance to explain myself, but...I couldn't bring myself to face you again. Not after what I did. I'm sorry,” he said simply and waited. With the Shroud gone, he couldn't defend himself if there was a fight. There was no easy way out of here. All he could be was honest and hope that she could understand.
((OOC: gmoding leg sweep. if you're not okay with it, i'll be more than happy to edit))
The air swirled. There was a person! Right there! As soon as she made the mental connection, he was just there. One second there was nothing, the next? Poof. Just as Jake as before, but slightly more ominous for his lurking. She was... angry, embarrassed, suspicious. So many different emotions bubbled around that she couldn't decide on just one as she launched herself forward.
“I wanted the chance to explain myself, but..." Ghost dropped her weight and one leg shot out, the wind riding behind it to ensure it's target would meet it's match. "I couldn't bring myself to face you again. Not after what I did. I'm sorry,” Wait... what? But it was too late to wait. Her momentum was too great. She'd swept his feet, her leg connecting with the back of his feet, demanding that he loose his balance or simply fall with the sudden lack of support from his lower appendages.
He hit the ground and rather than proceed with her intended method of subduing an enemy she relented and plopped back onto the seat of her pants. Ghost was suddenly right back to feeling wound up and stretched thin. What was he sorry for? Was he the burglar? Or was he sorry for spying on her? "Are you really Jake Townsend? Why are you here? Have you been stealing from this establishment?" She was trusting by nature, but there was a limit to her naivety.
Now that the store was closed, they had all the time in the world to sort this out. "Tell me." She could listen. She could give him a chance before she started throwing punches. As much as she wanted to pin his shoulders to the ground or throw book cases at him, there was a limit to the practicality of such maneuvers.
A sudden chilling thought ran cold fingers up her ramrod straight spine. Was he an assassin? It wouldn't be the first time she'd been hurt defending this place.
(OOC: I'm gmoding you giving me a chance to explain myself. Figured you wouldn't mind, but if you do, let me know)
Jake grunted hard as the woman moved whip fast towards him. Emotions spilled out from her, potent and jagged, and her image gleamed in momentary brilliance as her leg swept across the back of his ankles, kicking the legs out from under him. She was a slight woman, and he doubted she could have shaken his stance normally save for the fierce torrent of wind that followed in her leg's passage.
Years of reflex snapped into place at this point, and Jake hurled his arms downward to collide savagely with the floor just as his back met the surface, breaking the bulk of the fall with a crash far harsher then one would expect from such a fall but keeping him from harm. Sharp pain arched up his arms and his muscled spasmed with the ferocity of the impact, but despite this they responded to Jake's immediate commands, arms continuing to push downward on the floor, causing him to roll backward onto his hands and knees.
“Are you really Jake Townsend? Why are you here? Have you been stealing from this establishment? Tell me.” Her words were controlled but bristling with potential violence.
Jake gritted his teeth against the instinctive rush anger and held his position, making no other movements towards Vega as she sat on the Full Circle's litter-strewn floor. Jake's mouth open for a second to speak something bitter and momentary, then closed as he recollected himself.
“My name really is Jake Townsend. I came here tonight because you invited me in for a cup of coffee and now I'm trying to apologize to you because you were accidentally ensnared in one of my empathic abilities and seemed really, really upset. I didn't steal any of your cash, just a few peanuts from the bar, but I could probably help you find that cash if you'll let me. I've got a knack for things like that,” he intoned evenly, his senses tracking the flow of emotions coursing around her. “I'm also not an assassin,” he added, guessing her thoughts from the particular arrangement of bitterness, danger, importance, and personal well-being for herself and the shop as a whole. It was a minor gamble, but it might win him some points.
Jake stood slowly, extended his hands before him in a sign of peace, and kept his stance relaxed. He was completely unprepared this time, so if she decided to take another swing at him, it was really going to hurt. Acting as casual as he could manage, he brushed some small detritus from his clothing.
“Now, can we please dispense with this useless display of violence? I'm only going to end up running. I'm pretty sure I'll make it, and I'll probably do a lot of damage to your shop in the process.”
Jake sighed, pushing back the anger and allowing it to melt away. His inner senses traced over her form and those impossible linkages he couldn't follow, and his mind reflected back upon their connection in the midst of the Awe. That moment of sublime... Jake shook his head slightly. Focus, damn it!
It took a moment, but Vega seemed to relax slightly. He could tell that she wasn't fully unprepared if it came to violence, but it was a clear indication that she would give him a chance.
“Alright. My ending up on your roof. That was pure chance. I just wanted to look at the city. This is my first time here, and it was something I wanted to do. The whole coffee thing, your idea, not mine in case you were wondering. I'm an empath, or something, I don't know where exactly I fall into this whole mutant race thing. I accidentally made you react far more strongly then you normally would. It still gets away from me sometimes, and that's why you spouted off everything you did. It was all just one big accident. That okay for starters? Can we maybe have a proper seat, or something?”
As soon as she'd plopped back on her butt, most of the fight was out of her. It wasn't exactly a position conducive to movement or reflexive evasions. Her best bet if he attacked her would be to move into her less than substantial state, but even that wasn't fool proof.
Suspicion and hurt radiated off of Ghost in waves and she didn't like it, but she couldn't help how she felt. She wanted to give him a chance because... she hadn't detected any ill will from him while they spoke. In fact, quite the opposite. He hadn't done anything to purposefully alert her while spying... or whatever he had been doing. She shook her head and folded her legs in close wrapping her arms around them and herself so that she was as compact as she could be.
He started off simple enough. Yes, that was his name. Not that a person's name label meant all that much. She'd been lying about it officially for a year and had gotten over the guilt associated with such an act. In Ghost's case, it was to maintain a modicum of safety. She nodded again about the coffee. Ghost had though he would be Luke, but after meeting the man she hadn't wanted him to catch cold. How could she leave someone out in the rain while she had a perfectly safe alternative? Or what had felt to be safe before his invisible invasion.
And then he said something curious. He was trying to apologize. Hadn't he said something like that while she was sweeping his feet? She'd gotten ahead of herself. Ghost tightened her arm's grip on herself, hugging her legs closer. "Empathetic abilities" he'd said. She tried to wrap her brain around what that meant. Did he feel for her? Or did he feel what she'd felt? She wasn't very good at any of those mental games. Jude, the only psychic she'd ever truly gotten to know, had told her that she practically shouted her thoughts at him and had a brain as moldable as playdough.
She was starting to feel guilty now and more than a touch sullen. She believed him about the cash. If he wanted it, it was laying on her desk. He'd have grabbed it and run out the back, not followed to watch her lock up. A twinge of embarrassment crept in now. He offered to rectify the cash drawer problem, but that wasn't the embarrassing part. If he'd followed her out to watch her lock up... she couldn't think of a single good and non-creepy reason for him to do so.
She really must have been shouting her thoughts because he flat out denied being an assassin. And she believed that too. She'd leg swept him and found his hiding place. If he was an assassin, he was new to the game. Ghost set her chin in the valley created between her knees.
“Now, can we please dispense with this useless display of violence?" The idea was laughable. She did have to quell that curiously panicked laugh that had nothing to do with happiness before it escaped her lips. This was so not her day, if she'd exuded that much violence toward another being. She didn't want to contest that he'd escape or the potential damage he could wreak on the store. "I ask people to leave violence at the door and I broke my own rule." Her voice was small, timid even. "I am sorry. I thought... a lot of not nice things about you." Though she still couldn't quite figure out why he'd stuck around. Had he wanted to apologize in private? That could have been achieved by simply visiting Ghost's office and closing the door. There was no need for this cloak and dagger stuff.
He continued to explain. Him being on her roof was pure chance. He had no hidden agenda and he was sorry for scaring her. He had already offered to hep with the drawer. If he was really a psychic of some kind then she didn't need to even wonder how he knew about things. Her mind was an open book. She'd even read some of the darker parts to him earlier, but he helped her feel better about that. Part of her loose lips was owed to his power. She couldn't blame it all on him, unfortunately, but it was a small comfort.
After a moment of thick silence pending the end of Jake's full explanation, Ghost only had one tentative question. "Will you really help me sort out the drawer?" It was really the only constructive thing she could think of just in that moment. "After that you can sit anywhere you like."
Jake sighed in relief and straighted his sunglasses, which had been knocked slightly askew by the physics of the encounter. Things were calming down now, the woven chaos that bound them was settling into a more stable pattern. There was weariness there, but it was muted and controlled. He could only hope this temporary truce would hold until he could prove himself. Keeping his hands raised and his palms towards her in relaxed surrender, he moved slowly towards her, offering his hand to help her up off of the floor.
“Yeah, I can get it sorted out for you. Wherever that cash has gone, I'll find it. I can also help clean up, if you want.” Now came the hard part: explaining how this whole thing worked. Making connections is easy enough when it's between people who know each other. Each person, whether they like the other person or not, establishes connections that bridge the distance between them. They can be woven of love, hate, or any number of other things; but it wasn't always that easy to find a link.
Connections between objects were somewhat more transitory in nature. The links are thin, and serve to tie them together via their perceived purpose. One card from a deck, for example, maintains a connection to the rest of the deck. Money, however, was a tricky thing. It was a transitory symbol in its own right, and people didn't think about it in the same way as their favorite watch. Trying to read and follow such a link was like trying to read the photocopy of a photocopy of a map. It simply didn't work very well.
Further complicating matters, nearly everyone had a connection to the money changing hands around them, even if it wasn't theirs. It was a tool to them, a means to something else, and thus coveted, which meant that Jake was going to be staring into a nearly solid field of light where one connection looked much like another.
“Now this is going to seem a little strange, but I need to see everything you have in regards to that drawer. I mean every scrap of paper you can find. Deposit slips, tip division, the little summation sheets you like to make. Everything. The more you give me, the easier this is going to be. It's a power thing.”
His strategy was simple. Just like a rope was composed of many smaller threads, he would weave together a stronger connection from the meager tendrils of everything she could find. Then it was just a matter of following that connection to whomever or wherever it lead. It was that simple. Well, almost that simple...
“If it's okay, I'd like to use your office.” he asked, looking slightly embarrassed.
" It's my mess, I'll clean it." She accepted his helpful hands and had to untangle herself before getting to her feet. His odd requests were odd, suspicious even, but she couldn't think a thing to suspect him of now. Her books were in order. It wasn't like she was hiding anything.
Ghost led the way back to her office and pulled out the envelope of credit card receipts before bringing out the actual drawer and the rolls of quarters and bills contained therein. She tugged out her ledger where she had underlined a blank place for the mid-day shift's total, but there wasn't a whole lot else.
"This drawer goes to the main register in the circular enclosure at the middle of the store." She looked over the small pile and felt it was incomplete as she felt incomplete. She felt somewhat drained. Too much alternate pouring out and holding in. Something had to have been lost in transition. One last thing Ghost added to the mix was a punch card. It was all that was theirs and kept at the store. "This is the employee's time card." She did not mention the name or gender or the fact that she had doubts about that employee's ability to steal even a penny from the store. If he was a mind reader, he knew all that.
Ghost started out of the office, but hesitated at the door. "Can I watch? Or should I start picking up?" She understood that sometimes there was nothing to see, but it would make her feel easier. It was her office. And she still hadn't bothered to clean out the grass clippings and picture of her ex-boyfriend posing over her mother's grave. Augh. She seriously needed a vacation.
“Please stay. To be honest, I might need some help.” Jake said, smiling nervously as he stepped around the expansive desk and settling into her seat. Quietly, he focused his mind and took stock of his surroundings. The office had a calm, well-used feel to it. This was a place of comfortable stasis, where the ebb and flow of the world was filtered down into a clear and predictable pattern. It would serve as a starting point.
Turning his attention to the pile of papers and notes before him, Jake had to admit he didn't have a lot to go on here. What he needed were items that were directly related to the cash itself rather then an individual person, and so he set aside the time card and gathered himself. Jake relaxed into the well-worn structure of Vega's chair, drinking in the sensations that lingered there. He could almost feel her stretching out the kinks of her day and the subtle joy of a job completed. Pushing forward, he focused on the cash drawer, taking hold of the barely perceivable thread that whispered of failure and dissonance, a connection that spoke of something missing, and slowly, he began following it upward.
The strand was woefully thin and frayed, its power spinning off in several directions. These were covetous connections. Someone, or perhaps several people, had seen the money, and they wanted it for some reason in particular. These sideline connections were sapping the strength of the main connection, just as Jake had feared. Turning to the rest of the pile, he tapped into Ghost's ledgers and brought forth the frustrated connections that disrupted her books. These were clear and sharp in nature, but also lacked range. Without something to connect to, the played outward fruitlessly, but they gave strength of that initial missing link in its demand for answers. Jake continued on, plucking strand from strand in the pile and studying how they interacted as a whole. Even after all of his efforts, the connection was barely alive.
“Alright. I'm going to need your help after all.” He said, standing very slowly and stepping around behind the chair. “I've got a sense of it, but it's a very thin trail. I need just a little more to steady it in my mind. Money is a difficult thing to work with, its....It's actually really hard to explain, but I need you to come over here and take a seat. Your drive to find this money will hopefully be enough to give me a sense of the connection. Once I have it, it's only a matter of time till I track it down.”
As he spoke, Jake turned the seat vaguely towards her. He had hoped to do this without entangling her into it, but he didn't have a choice. He needed that personal and active drive to discover the money to complete the weave.
He said she could stay and so she stayed and lingered shyly in the doorway. He took her seat and didn't even check the drawer for it's hidden contents. Maybe her brain didn't scream all that loud anymore or maybe he was just being a courteous stalker... uhh invisible man.
She kept waiting for something to happen. But he just sat there. He sat there for so long, hardly moving, that she had resolved to open her mouth and say something. What that something was flew right out of her mind the moment he spoke. He needed her to do something and she was more than willing to try just about anything.
Ghost took the offered seat, her seat, and settled into it's grooves. She'd fallen asleep in this chair more times than was pretty. This room, this office was as much her home as her room back at the mansion. Quite possibly, she realized with a start, it had become more a home to her.
"What would you have of me?" She turned the spinny chair around one full rotation in a familiar movement of her legs. "Close my eyes, click my heels and think of home?" She could picture the money. It was green and stacked neatly in a crevasse somewhere just waiting for her to find it. She refused to think of it in any alternate positioning, especially if that positioning were at the interior of her employee's pocket.
Jake smiled calmly as the woman settled into the seat before him. He could feel the completeness of the room fall into place as she sat there. This was where she belonged, in the center of her own personal web.
“What would you have of me?” She asked, pushing the chair around in a childish but terribly endearing way. For a moment, Jake thought to sound out those Awe-infused connections that the pair of them had felt earlier in the evening, but then berated himself internally for his own weakness. He had to focus if he was going to pull this off.
“Close my eyes, click me heels and think of home?” It was obvious she was going to make this unwittingly very difficult for him.
“Essentially, yes. What I'm looking for is the emotions you are carrying that relate to the missing cash. Once I find those, I'll be able to follow them to wherever it may be just like following a string. Just relax and focus on the money.” He explained calmly, settling his hands on her shoulders.
Jake let his alien senses wash over the pattern woven all around her, picking through the many thousands of connections that each person maintained. Instinctively, he learned a lot about her in those first few moments. He knew which of the many tables in Full Circle was her favorite. The artwork she appreciated, and that she despised. In a simple and intuitive sense of what she valued and enjoyed as a person. Finally he found it, a singular drive demanding the correction of a wrong, the lost money. Carefully, he brought it into focus with the other strands of meaning he had pulled from the pile and gathered them together. Following each strand individually, he gained a sense of the direction of the missing cash and was surprised to find it close by. This sense of distance was impossible to describe directly, it was simply an innate sense of range.
Jake grinned boyishly as the image focused, and without thinking, he kneaded Ghost's shoulders in a gentle message for a moment and smiled down at her.
“I think I've got it. It isn't far.” he explained, and walked slowly around the desk, following the glowing strand towards wherever the cash was concealed.
At first her mind flittered back and forth like a nervous bird. With Jake's hands solidly on her shoulders there was no doubt he could really tune in to what she was thinking. What if she thought about something bad? But he'd said to try to think about the money. So she of course thought of the stain by the front door where someone had thrown up on the relatively new carpet. Glue allergy, apparently. After that it was the art on the walls above the coffee bar. She wasn't sold on the second one of the set, but it was a set after all. Oh but she needed to think about the money!
Ghost tried to employ some of the focusing techniques she'd learned in the future. The money. The person handling it. The times that Ghost had glanced at the security feed and seen that person diligently at work. The exchange of goods for that silly green paper everyone was always fretting about while Ghost, herself, was graced with investors who bought into her purpose. Money. It made the world go around, supposedly. Ghost liked to suppose that it more often went around the world.
Jake did something with his hands against her shoulders that had her rolling them slightly forward reflexively. He was gentle, it was just an unfamiliar movement. But it was sort enough because he walked right around the desk and said something that suddenly made her whole day brighter.
Ghost hopped up immediately. "Then let's go!" She hovered right on Jake's heels. To think! She was right and it was here all along!
Jake grinned at her and turned, focusing on the loose weave of connections he had created. He moved slowly so as not to lose track of the bundle, which guided him out onto the floor of the shop. Here, Jake stopped and let his senses slide along the strand as it coursed its was busily through the store. This was obviously the waitress' or waiter's path between the tables. Eventually, it made it's way back to the bar.
Jake didn't ask for permission when he slipped dexterously over the bars surface and dropped over by where the cash drawer would normally have been stowed during the working hours. Jake watched as the connections coiled around the surface of the locked drawer. The money had made it to the cash box at least. As he continued to study the knot, he noticed a faint trail leading down to one of the nearby cupboards. A strip of plastic screwed to its surface listed the contents as reserve bottles of flavor syrup.
Gently, Jake propped open the door to the cupboard and watched as a tendrils slipped inside and knotted around the left side of the bottles, where several plain white envelopes had been stuffed. He could tell instantly that this was not the missing cash, but perhaps a clue to it. As he reached to draw out one of the envelopes, he felt a curious combination of frustrated exasperation and satisfaction. It told him that something had been handled improperly, but it seemed like whatever was wrong with the envelopes had been corrected.
Drawing out one the envelopes, he peered inside with his alien senses. They were small cards of paper with heavy connotations of travel and expense. Parking validations, he guessed, and he set the on top of the bar. Strange. What does this have to do with the money? Jake frowned, searching intently through the mess of connections in the cupboard and picked up another faint trail, one of rectification hopping from the cupboard to the recycling bin beneath it.
Kneeling down behind the bar, he pulled out the bin and ignored the faint odor of stale coffee. Reaching in, he felt his was way down into the depths, allowing his sight to guide him where no other sense could easily see. About half way through the bin, he felt a brush of paper, an envelope thick with something. Instantly, a grin flashed across his features and he pulled it out of the assorted junk and tossed it onto the bar top.
The envelope was well worn. It had been used for storage and had been opened and closed many times. On its surface, the words 'Parking Passes Feb/09' had been scribbled with a difficult to read blue pen which had been partially smeared with dribbles of spilled coffee.
“I hope it's all there...” He muttered coyly as he turned and began to wash his hands in the sink set into the bar itself. His guess was that someone had stuffed the envelope with money to get it out of the way and someone else had figured they were old passes and just tossed the whole wad into the recycling bin unwittingly. Why whoever had stuffed the envelope hadn't told Vega what they had done was beyond him. Maybe they were afraid of being fired for the loss of the money. She was a pretty good boss though. He could see that.
Ghost breathed down Jake's neck as he stretched his hands behind the coffee bar. The coffee bar? But why would it be there? It was from the main register. If it'd fallen downs somewhere, it would be there. Of course, she'd run her fingers along the wood there and poked and prodded it properly, but she had just missed it, she was sure. Because it was here still. Jake said so.
He pulled out the parking validation passes they passed out. They had to pay a nominal fee for those, but people came into the store knowing that they could get a validation for parking this close to Central Park. And the Full Circle gave them out to people who bought something, anything. From a bookmark to a one of a kind tome, it was an alternate inspiration to generate income and get people in the door. February had been slow in the validation front. These expired tags were proof of that.
But Jake wasn't done yet. He fished out a second envelope. When Ghost opened it it suddenly made sense. The employee had needed change. These were all small bills: ones, fives, tens. And that was why there were so many in there. The mix up must have happened when she had brought the change. She'd gotten the envelope of large bills, but the employee must have made due without the small ones.
The burden of the missing money was lifted so suddenly that even though Jake was busy washing his hands, Ghost jumped and wrapped her long, pale arms around him. She was practically giddy. It was her fault, not theirs. She must have set it down somewhere on accident and someone had cleaned up her mess. There was no more doubt about her family of employees! Ghost gave him a quick squeeze and just as quickly disappeared back into her office for a quick count. The loose napkins and slight debris she'd kicked up followed lazily in her wake.
It was all there. She filled out the deposit, filled in the blank in her book, and punched in the remaining numbers in her calculator. It all got zipped up in a locked deposit bag and very suddenly she was ready to leave the shop. She hadn't expected to be free so soon.
Ghost tucked the deposit awkwardly into her pocket (girl pockets are painfully small) and went to pick up the things she'd kicked up. It wasn't too much. "Do you need a ride somewhere? Do you still have a place to stay? Is there anything I can do?" She felt very much in his debt. It would have been a shame to recycle all that money.
Jake half-stumbled against the sink as the woman's slender arms wrapped suddenly around him. He hadn't even noticed her slip around the bar. He smiled softly to himself as she released herself from the momentary embrace and scooped up the money, leaving Jake along at the bar-side. Despite the speed she had fled back to her office, he could feel the trailing connections of meaning that stretched between them, stronger and more complex then any other connection he had made in this city. He had accomplished something where he had expected only ruin, and a subtle feeling of pride encompassed him.
Lazily, he looked around the Full Circle. He could feel Ghost working busily away in her office anchoring the feeling of routine she felt so strongly about. The place still needed straightening. Walking around the edge of the bar, he picked up a broom that one of the staff had propped in a corner and began slowly gathering up the litter the pair of them had created. He didn't want anyone, especially Aurum, to think that anything had happened here overnight. The way he had been wielding the Awe earlier might raise uncomfortable questions.
Jake made good time cleaning. This place had been cared for on a regular basis and restoring it to that state felt almost instinctual to him. By the time that Vega had emerged from her office, he had taken care of the mess and even restocked the piled napkins that had helped cause it in the first place. Leaning on the broom, he regarded her warmly.
“Do you need a ride somewhere? Do you have a place to stay? Is there anything I can do?”
He considered his options for a moment. Normally, he prided himself on his independence, but she seemed like such a good person, and to be honest, he wanted to spend more time with her in the future.
“To be honest....I could use a place to stay for the night. I just got off the bus and I'm not sure I have the cash for a hotel,” Jake explained, somewhat forlorn.
A smile bloomed across Ghost's face transforming her from something ordinary into something practically radiant. "You're in luck. The Mansion puts people up all the time. So does the Sanctuary. I would take you to either one, though I am partial to my own home." Well her home away from home since the Full Circle was fast becoming where she spent the majority of her time. Well, that and the Sanctuary medical room. The unicorn man that resided there was very kind.
"I don't... typically take cabs. Sometimes the bus, but it doesn't run this late." Oh man. It was kind of awkward extending this offer to a new acquaintance, but if he was tight on money it really was best. "If you'll trust me. I can take you by air." She could share her incorporeality and fly they as the crow to the Mansion cutting off about 10 minutes from travel time.
Normally it freaked people out because of the lack of normal vision, but somehow she didn't think that would be an issue for Jake. "Seeing is different and feeling is just about nullified. The first I ferried another this way, he almost threw up." That was true. Zephyr had not taken kindly to his sudden molecular disassociation. He was used to being in control of his body as well as his element, not being transformed into his element.
"So, if you'd rather take a cab, I understand. I just thought you might want to save a bit of cash. Either way, I have to drop this off first." She waved the deposit around. The bank was a short walk down the street. She'd lock up the back and set the alarm before they left on foot and they could call a cab or travel from there.