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.
Rex just had to stare, an ever-present frown on his face as he methodically sipped at the water. Hercules was a lot to deal with. The man had a strong and vibrant personality and bandied it about like a club of motivation. That alone was adding to Rex’s exhaustion. It took so much just parsing what the man said and extracting the important bits.
“Is magic like a muscle then? It can grow from pushing it to its limits?” Rex asked. He’d expected it to be far more academic.
Rex’s frown vanished when Hercules, in passing, agreed to read the Bible. “I will get you one, myself,” he said quickly. A novel thought struck him. Was this why he was here? To introduce the word of God to unbelievers like Hercules, who thought themselves to be or worhsipped other gods?
The frown returned as Hercules poured out some water onto the floor. Rex didn’t move from the chair. “....how do I make a small fire?”
Rex frowned as he tried to follow along with Sam’s simile. “I’ll have to take your word for it,” Rex said with a slight shrug. If you blinked, you’d’ve missed it. “Never been to a club. Good to know about the cop thing, though.”
He turned to stare at the wreckage of the street. So much damage done in such a short amount of time. His teeth started grinding against each other as he watched the fire swiftly overtaking the house, its own smoke detector feebly trying to be heard over the flames. A couple of sparks flew from his teeth but vanished before he could notice them.
Something clicked in him though. He frowned again at Sam. “How’d you stop Razorback?”he said, actually scratching his head. “I thought he was the next best thing to a bulletproof vest when he shapeshifted.”
Rex took a small swig of water and nearly gasped as the coolness hit his tongue. He was soaked in sweat and completely parched, but he kept his shirt on and forced himself to not guzzle the water. That could do just as much harm as the fire.
He instead stared at Hercules with a frown. He was sounding like some kind of coach or a personal trainer. From Hell. Rex had assumed magic would involve more drawing circles in chalk and chanting things in Latin while wearing hooded robes. Not…a workout. He nearly spewed what water he’d drunk when Hercules said he wanted Rex to be able to double or triple the time he could keep the fire blazing.
“You must be joking,” Rex said deadpan. “I’ll kill myself for sure if I try that.” He was already close to heat stroke as it was, not to mention already exhausted. The forming headache didn’t help.
Rex didn’t know what to do with the praise Hercules heaped on at the end. “...thank you,” he finally said then quickly moved on to business. “I can’t control fire at all. These flames just happen. Like in the Bible. I can’t do anything with other fire sources.” He drank more water and rubbed the ice all over his face.
Rex stared at Hercules as he realized the man was in no danger. He could almost slap himself. Of course. He’d fought Brazen, hadn't he? The metal man who flung his fist into fire and then tried to burn Hercules’s hand off? Yet there was no scar tissue on Hercules’s hand. Relief crossed Rex’s face at the memory. Here, at least, was one person he wouldn’t be killing.
The relief changed to a frown. Was Hercules saying he’d killed many people? What? Who was this man? There was no trace of the typical joviality in the man’s manner as he calmly stated there was no option. Quite frankly, Rex did not know what to say. Did it matter? What could Rex do? Did Elizabeth know? Did Sam?
Are there any magic-wielders who do not commit atrocities? Is this my fate as well?
The frown became a defiant glare.
“Fine, you shall have your fire.”
Rex took a deep breath and exhaled. He crossed himself and muttered a quick prayer before closing his eyes, throwing back his head, and speaking from the Bible. “Yet thou in thy manifold mercies forsookest them not in the wilderness: the pillar of the cloud departed not from them by day, to lead them in the way; neither the pillar of fire by night, to shew them light, and the way wherein they should go.”
The whirling curtain of fire erupted around him again, cloaking him in hellish light. He frowned and pushed harder and the fire grew lighter and whiter as the temperature increased.
It stayed like that for a couple of minutes before Rex could feel the fire beginning to waver. “And it came to pass, that in the morning watch the LORD looked unto the host of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and troubled the host of the Egyptians,” he quoted. The fire bucked up and with a rush of new life, flared outward briefly.
Again and again Rex called for fire, new verses uttered each time, all the while pushing to make it burn brighter and hotter. It was stronger than any house or structural fire - all of his protective gear would not have saved him for long from this flame, but Rex stood in the middle of it, untouched. Even so, he could feel a cold sweat breaking out all over him. Lethargy was starting to sap at him even as the world began to spin in the direction of his flames. He knew the signs. Even as the headache began, Rex made his decision.
The fire vanished once more as the spell ended. Heat lingered in the air, the entire warehouse ending up considerably warmer than it had been a mere fifteen minutes before. All in all, Rex had kept the fire burning for just less than ten minutes.
“Need to stop,” Rex mumbled as he staggered to a table with a water cooler. He opened it and snagged a bottle of water, which he started sipping from. He grabbed some ice from the cooler and rubbed it on his forehead. “Starting to get heat exhaustion.” He collapsed on a chair.
What else did Hercules expect? I don’t know any other way to make a flame with magic!”Rex said, raising his voice a bit to be heard clearly over the roaring flames. “Is this not what you wanted?” Embarrassment flushed his cheeks over the misunderstanding.
It didn’t seem to matter to the brawny man. Rex complied. He shut his eyes and focused on pushing himself. He’d done it before, when lives were on the line. He’d faced a mutant who commanded ice and snow and had countered everything the neanderthal had thrown at him. He’d made his fire hotter and hotter until the ice was sublimating. He could do that again. This time, there were no civilians to protect.
Rex took a deep breath and then punched the air with both fists as he pulled on that wellspring of power and channeled even more of it into his burning nimbus. The flames started burning brighter and brighter, the air starting blurring for a dozen feet in all directions as new levels of strength-sapping heat billowed out. “Aaaargh!” he cried as the energy coursed through him, sparking new pathways and conduits in his mind.
The fire dropped to the concrete floor and began scorching it as Rex focused on feeding the flame. The flames never grew larger, merely more intense. “Aaagh!” he said again.
In the midst of it all, he strained to hear Hercules too. “No! I reject that!” Rex said clenching his eyes shut in effort. “Killing is never the answer!
Then he realized Hercules had gotten closer. His voice was nearer. Rex’s eyes flew open and he turned in alarm. At once, rthe magic cut off and seconds later the flames vanished.
“Don’t-don’t come near me when I ‘m doing that!” he said, notes of panic emerging in his tone as he immediately threw his hands up in a likely futile effort to stop Hercules.
Dating? Elizalbeth was dating Hercules? Rex blinked in pure shock. “God, give her strength,”he said in a near-whistle.
Hercules…he had a point. Rex had been able to do some good with the pillar of fire. It just wasn’t enough. He’d been a distraction. Hercules was the one who’d defeated Razorbeak and Brazen. Hercules was the one who’d fought through Dr. Cama’s monster. Rex had broken Hercules’s chains, but then he’d destroyed the building.
Heaviness fell upon Rex’s shoulder and he slumped a bit, a shadow crossing his face. “I know fire,” Rex said hoarsely. “I have fought it for half of my life. I have seen what it can do, I’m still haunted by the people I’ve seen die to it. Help me control fire. I don’t want it to kill anyone else ever again.” His teeth clenched shut with the last syllable and unknown to him, a few sparks shot out from his mouth with the last declaration.
Concern deepened on Rex’s face as Hercules set a foundation. Healing was possible? His eyes lit up momentarily, but fell again. Hercules did not know healing. Very well. He did know control even if…he didn’t do magic myself?
Rex shut down the whirring in his mind. No point in questioning things. He was in this. He had to be all in. He had to trust this man. That was why they were there. “Very well,” Rex said with a sharp nod as he stepped forward to where Hercules pointed. He focused his mind of that source of power that always seemed to be just beyond his skin. He touched it and felt fire responding to his call. “...et per noctem in columna ignis ut dux esset itineris utroque tempore,” he said, switching to a Latin verse he knew would call the flames.
Fire burst into existence around him, swirling in a violent vortex and sheltering him in their blazing heat and blinding light. Flame flicked and lapped at the floor, but for the time being, Rex was holding them back from it.
Rex set aside a book he’d been absently leafing through. It was entirely handwritten, filled with schematics, instructions, diagrams, and so much more. It didn’t make much sense to him. It was the book he’d taken from Dr. Cama’s office, right before he’d burnt the entire clinic down.
He rose to his feet to greet Hercules, who’s arrival could be felt in the bones due to the amount of sheer force that went into slamming over the doors. Rex winced out of habit. “Thank you for agreeing to meet with me,” Rex said by way of greeting. His boots clunked on the concrete floor as he strode over to shake hands. He didn’t get the chance. He was pulled into a hug.
“Oh. Ah. Okay. Okay,” he said in bewilderment as he fought to process what was happening and he realized he’d tensed up mightily. His choice and muscles ached in protest. Beneath his work shirt, he still had healing wounds. In fact, he had bruises and scabs all over his body, although the doctor had granted him a kindness by healing away almost all the ones on his face. “Take it easy - I’ve still got a ways to go before I’m up to snuff.”
When he got the chance, he stumbled before righting himself. He let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. The gusto with which Hercules did everything was already buffeting Rex - he was starting to think he should’ve waited another week or so before trying this, when he’d have more energy.
“I’m still wrapping my head around how Sam and Elizabeth knew you, and that I encountered them both just that day,” he said, rubbing the back of his head. “The ways of the Lord are strange and mysterious indeed.”
His face resumed his typical sternness and he locked eyes with Hercules. “I need to learn how to use magic,” he said bluntly. “I need to know how to control it and how to protect people with it. Right now all I can do is destroy and hurt. Can you help me?” His mask cracked a bit but he fought back a tremor in his lips. If Hercules couldn’t help him, then who else could he turn to? Every other magic user he knew was a Welldrinker. The Church would definitely be of no help.
A wave of humility swept over Rex and his cheeks flushed a bit. “No, no, I’m not the only person taking care of them,” he said with a wave of his hand. “A lot of other people help out in all sorts of ways. I just happen to have more time than most.” He didn’t look Melissa in the eye and just stared at his cup. It was a consequence of not actively working - you had so much time to think about things. Rex didn’t have the option to throw himself into his work so he threw himself into his volunteer work.
It wasn’t comfortable talking about that either. He forced a smile and tried to invoke some interest when Melissa talked about her own liquor brand. Anything to try to redirect a conversation. “That’s great, I guess,” Rex said. “I confess, I’m clueless about what goes into making and distributing alcohol. All I know about it is the effect it has on me.”
The warehouse had been empty for some time, mostly just gathering dust or used as a storage facility. It was near the water’s edge, which made it more suitable for Rex’s intentions. It wasn’t the largest warehouse ever, but you could easily play basketball inside of it. Several storage containers and industrial shelves still remained. Rex had gotten permission from the landlord to use the place - the man had owed Rex a favor and Rex finally had a reason to call it in.
It was late in the evening and darkness had already fallen. That, and the fact it was the weekend, meant very few people would be around. This also suited Rex’s intentions.
There were fewer chances anyone would get hurt.
He’d spent the day clearing out a large space, sweeping it thoroughly to remove anything flammable or, God forbid, explosive or toxic. He’d dragged over a few metal chairs and a table from a disused breakroom. It had taken him all day to set up because he still wasn’t at full strength, not from that horrible event.
Rex had unleashed hellfire on a man and has been suitably burnt himself by it. According to the doctor at that mutant school, Rex had had third-degree burns on nearly every inch of his flesh and had a severe case of heat stroke. The fact that he was even alive was a miracle. A miracle and an irony.
He would’ve died in the street, incinerating just as he incinerated a man, if the mutant Cold Steel hadn’t extinguished the flames. He still would’ve died not long after, if the X-Man hadn’t delivered him to the X-Men’s mutant healer, who’d healed virtually all of his burns over the course of a long, painful night. Rex had slept for four days straight after.
He’d been told he’d still have pain and some physical impairment for a while. There was a limit to even the doctor’s wonders, and seemingly the magic Rex had unleashed had been resistant to healing. The doctor had slept nearly as long as Rex had after. In his convalescence after, Rex finally admitted something to himself he’d been running from.
It was time to learn magic.
It was part of him. That was clear. No amount of praying had removed it, no amount of asking for forgiveness had neutralized it. All he could conclude was he was still meant to have it. “Fight fire with fire,” his priest had said lightly. Rex hadn’t smiled then, and didn’t now. Still, he saw the truth in the words. If he were to be damned for having taken up this power, and it was clear he could not set the power aside, not when there was a chance he could protect people, then he could not afford to be the servant with one talent, burying it in the ground. Whether it was two talents or five, it was up to him to increase that providence, for his master’s sake.
“Father, I hope I’m doing the right thing,” Rex said as he set the final fire extinguisher in place. There were a dozen of them strewn around the warehouse. A dozen buckets of sand and another dozen buckets of water and fire blankets also covered the perimeter. He didn’t want to take any chances.
He finally sat down on a chair and waited for his guest. Miraculously, the mutants had helped there too. After spilling his guts about magic to them, it turned out that one of the teachers at the mansion knew Hercules - in fact, she was dating him. Rex had had no way to contact the false god - Rex had given him his card, but hadn’t received one in return - but Elizabeth just arranged the whole thing.
It was time for Rex to learn magic and control his power. He couldn’t stand being helpless any longer and he couldn’t stand hurting people anymore.
More tears froze to his skin as Rex’s world hollowed out. Again. The familiar chasm opened in his chest and it ached all the way to his magic-stained soul. These people were killed because Rex couldn’t save them. They were killed because a..a…a mutant decided they needed to die.
“Damn you,” Rex whispered, barely audible especially in the storm. “Damn you, you sorceror, you murderer, damn you, thief of lives!”
Rex slowly looked up, at the caveman high in the sky. Cold Steel cut in and drew Rex’s attention. He stared at the other ice mutant in almost blank comprehension. Rex stood up stiffly, his joints already protesting the freezing cold which was starting to affect them as well. “Damn you,” he said softly to the other man. He didn’t know what he was asking. Fighting? That wasn’t what Rex did. Rex tried to save people. Rex killed people.
“Damn you!” he said again, another tear rolling down his cheek. This one did not freeze. “Damn you, man!” He said, anger starting to mix with the pain. He’d heard the man’s report to the authorities. This caveman was going to try to kill everyone in the street. There were already screams as people realized they were being frozen inside their homes.
The tear evaporated. “Damn you!” he said louder, his blood starting to boil. He stepped forward into the storm and tore his gaze from Sam, focusing on the flying figure, barely seen. “Damn you! Be ye damned for what you have done!” he shouted, letting the anger swell inside of him. Steam started streaming from his exposed skin once again. “Damn you, Scion of Satan! Progeny of the Serpent! Damn you for this!”
Tears flowed freely and vanished into steam. Sparks began emerging from his mouth as he spoke. He reached out to that place where he felt the fire, but this time he had no verse. All he had was rage, pain, fear, and an empty void inside of him.
And magic.
“Damn you to Hell!” Rex roared as he crashed to his knees and struck the icy ground with both fists, throwing his head back and howling wordlessly in rage and grief. His heart pounded in his ears and the energy, the power, the fire inside burst out.
A jet of fire blasted from Rex’s mouth and then the rest of his body erupted into flames. His clothes immediately project a cloud of choking, black smoke even as the fire shot forth into the sky. “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhrgh!” he screamed.
THe fire spiraled and grew, what started as a ball the size of a basket expanded until a car sized column struck Ice Age in the center of his storm. Flecks of fire peeled away and formed into tiny flying creatures, imps that began chasing after errant ice and snow. A new scream could be heard, faint over the sudden roaring.
The fire stopped spewing from Rex’s mouth, but it did not go out. It concentrated into a ball, a miniature sun in the middle of the storm, blindingly bright and hellishly beautiful, centered on Ice Age. More imps came flying out of it and as each one did, the fireball grew smaller and smaller and smaller.
Then darkness. Nothing remained. The imps vanished seconds after.
And Rex screamed as the fire devoured his flesh and clothing until he blacked out.
Rex stood in a six foot circle of scorched asphalt, the newly blackened surface sharply contrasting with the white world around him. The melted snowfall was already freezing over though. His flames had flickered out and new snow was landing on him, turning to steam where it touched his skin but merely melting as it reached his jacket.
The firefighter still felt the heat in his face and in his heart.
The caveman had vanished and suddenly, Rex couldn’t care any more. Even when Sam appeared by him, Rex hardly took notice. For the moment, the cold wasn’t bothering him - he felt like he was burning up. He forced himself to resist the urge to peel off his winter gear and leave it strewn about. He’d suffer through it. He’d been in fires, he could handle this.
But he couldn’t handle the people who’d been frozen.
“Merciful Father, help us!” he whispered harshly as he stumbled to the old man and the little girl and fell to his knees by them. He didn’t hear Sam’s jest or question. The ice was gone and the back of Rex’s mind barely registered that the ice was forming into people. He couldn’t concentrate on that. There was no time. He maneuvered his hands toward the old man’s face and an oath escaped his lips. The ice might have been gone, but the damage was done.
The skin had gone black, already killed by the cold. The effects of other cells suddenly expanding and contracting under severe temperatures had….far more gruesome effects.
A gust of wind cut through to Rex’s heart and he turned to the girl. A moment later, a tear froze to his face.
They wouldn’t be moving again.
High above the street, in darkness of a winterstorm sky, the demon of ice and snow kept shrieking and waving his spear. Here and there, ice shards would fly out, some as large as a javelin. One nearly caught a rainbow-trailed flier as they streaked by on some errant errand. By now, the cold front was spreading, striking all the neighboring streets. The central area, the focus of Ice Age’s power, grew even colder. In the negative digits. Negative tens. Negative twenties.
In the stillness of the frozen world, horror crashed through Rex. His jaw dropped and he rushed over to the man and girl, to try to get a better look. There was still time. Hypothermia took time to kill people. It had only been seconds after all. Seconds in which a mutant had focused all of his power on them.
Rex stopped a couple yards away, his flames roaring in his ears, matching the screaming voice in his head. “No, no, no, no,” he whispered, as he was able to see their faces.
Eyes were frozen over and a thick glaze of ice covered their bodies. The ice already looked inches thick, their expressions mercifully obscured beneath impurities in the ice. Rex did not need to see any more rictuses.
“Now stay out of my way!” the loincloth-laden man shouted before leaping off the truck, a gust of ice and wind lifting him into the sky.
The fire around Rex dropped even as the fire inside of him continued to rage.
“Now, where were we? Ah yes!” Ice Age said as he reoriented on Megafauna. “Have you killed the---MEGAFAUNA!”
She was frozen in ice, locked up like her Siberian ancestors.
“Nooo!” he roared in the arctic wasteland. “That’s the last straw! Die! Die! Every last one of you! Die!!!”
A blizzard yanked Ice Age up into the sky, a couple dozen stories into the air, far higher than any of the apartment buildings in the neighborhood. The man let out an unearthly scream and raised his spear high. Winds howled around him, a whirlwind of ice and snow, blocking him from sight, but elsewhere, nothing happened. Not at first.
Then the ice began expanding past the street, into the surrounding streets. Doors and windows began to seal up. Powerlines snapped and fell. Cars stalled. Heat inside homes began to fail and the people, the people, cozily wrapped up in their homes, started to panic. Ice began growing on them, on their walls, freezing their pipes, freezing them. Children started crying, adults started panicking. Within seconds, as the wail of Ice Age just barely hit their ears, the temperature for blocks around were already dropping below zero.
The shower of ice shards ripped and stabbed at Rex’s charges. They began screaming even as they managed to pick up speed. Suddenly they were far less worried about slipping and falling, especially as Rex’s inferno was rapidly melting the ice in the area. Even the ice shards were losing their edges by the time they struck.
“I hate firestarters!” a voice roared out of the ambient blizzard. “They ruin everything!”
From another direction, the wid suddenly blew a horizontal hail of golf ball-sized ice chunks at the people. The old man and the girl immediately fell. “NO!” Rex shouted, lunging forward, only to pull himself up quick. He couldn’t help them, not wreathed in fire as he was. At least, he could help them in that way. Instead he pivoted and he threw himself between the people and the hailstones, blunting them with his blaze. It wasn’t perfect, as he was merely a column of flame and not a wall, but it was the best he could do.
“Stay together!” he shouted, unaware if they could hear him or not. “I’ll protect you!”
Mocking laughter echoed amongst the howling winds. “That’s adorable!” Ice Age crowed from somewhere beyond the flames and ice. “But you can’t even protect yourself!”
For a moment, the winds elsewhere slacked and then began reforming directly above Rex. The blizzard narrowed and focusing directly above his fire and then began touching down. Rex stared up into the swirling snow and bared his teeth. “Prince of lies! Power of the air!” the man shouted in defiance. “You shall not claim these souls tonight! My god is a consuming fire!”
Steam began billowing up from the flames, as the fire slew every single snowflake that struck it. The blizzard twisted and whirled tighter and tighter, growing larger and larger, but even the steam began working against it. For the blizzard only worked with the water that was there - Rex’s fire came from an unearthly plane.
For several seconds, then several more, then even more, Rex fought the howling winds with his own fire whirl, the flames flowing one direction as the blizzard blasted in the opposite direction. As six tons of wooly mammoth tried to smash, crush, bash, or gore Cold Steel, the blizzard kept growing and growing and growing.
The fire didn’t go out.
In the distraction, the two men and the two women managed to flee. Rex only fleetingly saw them, mostly blinded as he was by the contrasting light and darkness, as well as the strain of keeping the fire stirred. His blood was running hot and he was sweltering under his coat and clothes. Sweat poured down his face, threatening to blind him as well, but he didn’t stop. He switched to Latin and recited another verse, rekindling the fire to continue the blaze.
Then the blizzard abruptly halted, as if it froze in place. “Argh! Firestarters are the worst!” said the man in the loincloth and thin sheathe of ice. He was perched on top of a frozen truck, his spear in one hand, aimed at Rex. “I don’t have time for this! Do what you want, I’m finishing this!”
The wind howled and caught him up into the air, where he hovered several stories up. He pointed his spear at the old man and at first nothing happened. Nothing noticeable, at least. Then Rex realized that as they’d made their escape, they’d moved far beyond the protective aegis of his fire.
Then the man and girl stumbled, slowed, and then with final, pained gasps, collapsed as plumes of ice began erupting from their bodies.
Megafauna didn’t bother listening to the one-eyed man. Ice Age was sprawled on the ground, and even though he was quick to his feet and already slaying one of the ice creatures, it did nothing to settle her down. She whacked her trunk against a car, ice person-side facing the car and then twisted her head to repeat it against the iced-over asphalt. Rinse and repeat as needed.
The caveman in question had a manic grin on his face even as the reaching ice person shattered into bits with just an effort of will. “Fool,” he said, a small trickle of blood already freezing into crystals as it poured from his mouth. “There’s always time for an ice age! I’m a force of nature!”
Ice Age planted the butt of his spear on the ground and howled into the darkening sky. A spiraling blizzard whipped up around him, completely hiding him in a white wall of snow. Winds blasted out, accompanied by shards from the shattered clone and they flew in all directions. Power lines snapped under the sudden weight of ice and everything in sight iced over. A transformer blew and the streetlights shut off, along with all the lights in the buildings on either side of the street.
Firelight from a burning column played out early, like a fallen sun in the darkness and the white. The blizzard died down momentarily, just enough to reveal a light coating of ice crystals all over the caveman’s body. “Looks like I’ve got a small fire to put out!” he said and he raised his spear in time to be picked up with a blast of wind and he flew several yards in an arctic gust.
A sudden blast of icy wind made even Rex’s flames falter and whip around even more chaotically than normal. He was flushed with heat and although the increased cold didn’t bother him, he could see its effects on the others. They cried out in shock and pain. Rex could see ice already forming across their skin. “Keep moving!” he yelled over the snapping and crackling of the flames.
“Too-too-too c-c-cold!” the girl whimpered, barely audible over the wind, despite being only scant yards in front of Rex.
“Neither the pillar of cloud by day nor the pillar of fire by night left its place in front of the people,” Rex recited. More power blazed through him and the flames grew in height and intensity, the flames closer to white-hot than yellow. Steam rose from the ground within yards as a wave of intense heat rolled over everything. Gasps of surprise and some relief came from the stragglers. Some of the ice seemed to be melting off them already. He knew the heat could be every bit as dangerous in the long term, but for now, he just needed time off this street or somewhere safe.
Then an angry scream pierced the air and a shower of razor shards of ice began pelting them from above, even as snow began concentrating above Rex and an angry mammoth began a charge toward Cold Steel, fourteen-foot-long ivory tusks aimed straight for his chest.
The cave man didn’t particularly care that the shrapnel didn’t hurt the ice man. It didn’t matter. He didn’t matter. No man of ice could stop an Ice Age.
As the ice man landed on MEgafauna’s back, the mammoth rumbled but otherwise didn’t pay attention. The mammoth smashed the hood of another car.
The pseudo-caveman responded differently. “Joining the party after AAH!” he yelped as a fist came flying at his face. He jerked away but a kick caught him square in the chest and he went flying off the mammoth and got lost behind a thick sheet of snow and fog.
It was only then, when the ice clone sank its claws into the mammoth’s trunk, that the mammoth truly responded. The mammoth partially reared and let out a n angry trumpeting as it whipped its trunk quickly back and forth, its massive shaggy head flailing from side to side. Then it whipped its head back and like a bullwhip, tried to strike the man on her back with the clone-ladden end of her trunk.
By that point, Rex had managed to reach the crowd of fast-freezing people. “Move it, people! You can’t stay here!” he roared, his heart pounding in his ears even as he felt his hands growing cold again.
“Can’t…make it!” an older man wheezed as he collapsed to the ground. Frost covered his eyebrows and beard and patches of ice were growing on his coat. The ground was thoroughly slicked over and as Rex watched. Two women who’d been huddled together went down as one as they slipped on the ice.
“Yes. You. CAN!” Rex cried. He appeared at the man’s side and nearly yanked him to his feet. “You two!” he yelled at two other guys who were trying to walk out of the storm, just yards ahead of the women. “Help those two stand up! We’re all getting out of here together!”
The two guys turned back and stared blankly so Rex repeated himself. There was one person left, a teenaged girl and her dog, a little schnauzer she held in her arms. “You! I need to help this man stand!” he said,
“But, buh buh but what are y-y-you gonna do?” she stammered in the chill as she unthinkingly complied, moving to support the old man.
They weren’t dressed for the weather. None of them were. It felt like it had already dropped below zero. These people were dressed for the forties.
“I’m going to sell my soul,” Rex said. “And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night!”
Energy began building around him from the moment Rex began reciting the oh-so-familiar verses. He reached out to that wellspring of power, the one that called to him, and he opened his mind to it. Heat began to rush hrough him and a vibrant energy flushed away the cold. As the last words left his lips, there was a crackling, a shattering, and then violent flames spiraled up around him in a column of fire, six feet wide, that danced twelve feet into the sky. The light blasted into the darkness and orange and yellow shone against the whiteness of the air and the ground, punching through the whiteout and restoring some measure of warmth and comfort to the people nearby. What once would’ve made them all sweat now gave them a chance to survive.
The people stared in shock and awe so Rex yelled again. “Go go go go!”
The people started to walk, picking up speed as they went.
