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.
"I don't talk about work in polite company," Nigel reminder her.
"I'm hardly polite," Jocelyn insisted.
"Sorry, can't help you."
"Even if you might be working with a murderer?"
"And what have you got to go on? I can hardly accuse one of my coworkers of murder because my little sister says he smells like a rose petal and cat hair, or whatever."
Jocelyn sighed. "I could come to work with you and smell him out myself."
"No. Sorry sis. Who ever he is, you'll have to track him down the human way."
Jocelyn retied the bow on the back of her apron for what felt like the fiftieth time. The ribbon was too slippery to hold itself together.
"Felix, would you please finish setting the table?" Her 10 year old son always seemed to wander away before he got the silverware on. "Your gran and uncle will be here any minute."
"Coming mama!"
Jocelyn gave the pasta sauce one final stir before turning off the burner. The noodles went into the colander. The beans, into a bowl.
"Honey, the fork goes on the left," she reminded him, then sighed as the doorbell rang and Felix abandoned a whole handful of spoons on one plate as he ran off to let in the dinner guests.
"Sweetheart!" Her mother hugged her, then held her by the hips at arms length. "You're not eating enough. You're getting way too skinny, dear."
"Puppy, don't listen to her, you look beautiful," countered Nigel.
Jocelyn rolled her eyes at the nickname and hit her brother in the arm,"So how is work? No buildings fell on you this week?"
"Not this week," Nigel grinned back at her.
Around all three of them Felix bounced like he was riding a pogo stick.
"Mom, can I bleach my hair like uncle Nigel?"
"Not until you are twenty and a half," Nigel answered the question himself, "It's very important that your hair reach a certain level of maturity before you start to change its color."
Nigel put his arm around his sister's shoulder and led the way to the table. "This smells excellent," he informed her, "but then, I don't need to tell you that, do I?"
Jocelyn smiled and rolled her eyes. Then, something caught her attention. There was a familiar scent on her brother's coat. One that she had only ever smelled in the sewers.
"Shall we pray?" Their mother asked.
Jocelyn nodded and vowed to ask her brother about the scent later when she could get him alone. She nodded to her mother and they each took their places around the table holding hands.
The worst part about being off duty? No utility belt meant no flashlight. No flashlight meant that she could smell what she was stepping in, but couldn't see it well enough to avoid it. She really wished she hadn't been wearing four inch heels to go out on her date. They were sandals, too.
As she followed it backwards from whence it came, the woman's scent changed. It was a little like using a time machine, to first follow the scent of decay gradually back to a place that still smelled like her as she had been when she was last living.
The scene of the crime was illuminated only slightly by storm drains, but even in the dim light Jocelyn could see the dark splashes that hadn't been washed from the walls. The scent of blood was strong, laced with fear and adrenaline. The murderer didn't leave behind anything other than the stains on the walls and the scent of his sweaty, bloody palms on the ladder when he had climbed up again.
Halfway up the ladder herself Jocelyn took a good sniff and memorized the scent. Male, mutant, shifter of some kind, owned cats. He also smelled of fear, not the woman's, but his own. The pattern of his scent solidified in her memory. She felt confident that she'd recognize it if she came across it again.
At the top of the ladder the trail went cold. A week of rain and city traffic had taken its toll and completely masked the trail of the murderer.
That meant they would have to track him down through normal human methods.
Jocelyn didn't waste any time staring at the angular creature vehicle thing he conjured. So what if it looked strangely familiar? If it got her to the top of Liberty faster than a boat and a long spiral staircase would, she didn't care what it looked like.
She swung her leg over the back end of... the thing and wrapped her arms firmly around Shin's middle. She hoped to god he knew what he was doing.
It was kind of like a motorcycle in shape, but in every other aspect it was completely different. It was silent, smooth, had a really uncomfortable seat, didn't smell like exhaust, and it flew. It actually flew.
And quickly, at that. Jocelyn barely had time to catch her breath before they were arcing across the sky, already halfway to the statue. By the time she positioned herself to hang on with one hand and drew her gun, they were circling below the torch.
Porco Rosso was dangling his captive dangerously close to the edge.
“Police,” she announced loudly, “Step back from the edge. You don't have to do this. No one has to get hurt.”
She really hoped that if the snout nosed villain up there decided to release his catch that their pastel colored ride was quick and strong enough for them to snatch her out of the air.
Sometimes Jocelyn loved her mutation. Other times she really wished it had manifested itself some other way. Smelling the New York harbor from two miles away didn't help her get there any faster. Time bending or teleportation... those would be useful.
As it was, the flashing lights at least did a pretty good of scattering taxis, buses, and civilians from her path. Car Moses would have been proud.
Another minute and she was wishing to trade in for the ability to fly instead. Boats were swarming the docks, headed for Liberty. More boats swarmed at the base of the statue. None of them were going to get her to where she needed to be: on top of the torch.
Curses.
“Your magical rainbow thingies can't get us up there by any chance, can they?”
Jocelyn had her gun pointed towards the cop killer, had her finger on the target, all she needed was a clear shot and they could cross Rena's name off the most wanted list. Smoke swirled, vines whipped, and before she could take a shot her target turned and fled through a wall of flames that used to be the back wall of the little shop.
Josie stood and waved a hand signal to her comrades across the street to let them know where the pink murderer had gone. They'd radio for backup and hopefully have this block surrounded before their quarry could squeeze through.
The lady cop stepped around the corner to assess what was left of the rest of the shop and to see if she could follow.
Orange and yellow flames licked the walls at the back of the shop, effectively making it as impassable as any concrete wall would be. For sane people, that is. Jocelyn wasn't about to go leaping through a wall of fire to go up one on one with a serial killer whose mutation was a bit more offensive than her own.
Then there was the bark covered guy to deal with. Smoke clogging the air made it difficult to breath and even more difficult to smell anything, but as she got close, something about his woody aroma was very familiar.
“Farm boy?” It certainly smelled like the boy that had once been caught up in a break in investigation simply for trying to help. “Hey, let's get you out of this smoke.”
“Houses aren't going to get up and move, so we can check those any time. If we can prevent more kidnappings, I'm all for that plan.” She was always a bit sensitive about cases involving missing kids. She knew how she'd feel if it was her own ten year old son that went missing.
She checked the little digital map that Fed showed her and made a mental note to suggest that the NYPD invest in a couple of high tech phones for their detectives. They were nice.
“I've got a motorcycle and an extra helmet,” and they were parked just around the corner. That was one of the benefits to bikes; they got all the best parking spaces. It only took about a dozen steps and they were standing aside the machine in question. Jocelyn picked up the extra helmet and held it out for Noel to take if she wanted to ride along.
Psychic smell plus 'barriers' descriptor equaled force fields. Diamond hard, razor sharp, and creating a variety of shapes with a force field sounded like a certain glowing pink girl from the tippy top of the most wanted list.
“Sounds useful,” she conceded with a shrug. 'Useful' could do a lot of damage, either intentionally or otherwise. Since he was supposedly one of the good guys most likely any damage he'd cause would be of the unintentional variety. One would hope. Though, maybe they'd get lucky and he wouldn't have to do anything at all today other than sit in the car.
As for his questions, “Mutant. Heightened sense of smell.” Heightened may have been a bit of an understatement, but it made for a nice, simple explanation.
“And your name? Mine is Jocelyn Banks.” She didn't go for the whole fancy name plaque on the desk kind of thing. It seemed a bit pretentious for a back corner office filled with second hand furniture that still smelled vaguely like the previous owner, a brandy drinking detective that had left his butt imprint in the chair and his dirty coffee mug in the window sill.
She stood as he was about to answer and gestured for him to follow as he was speaking. They had patrols to do today, which hopefully meant nothing more exciting than driving round and round the town making sure people felt like they were being watched. Maybe they'd even set up a speed trap once rush hour ended and it was actually possible to speed.
They had barely even climbed into the car (Cinnamon Gum's usual ride, little silver wrappers littered the ground around her passenger's feet) when Captain Cynthia Myers' voice crackled to life over the radio, “Banks, change of plans. We need you down by Liberty island ASAP. Hostage situation up on the torch apparently.”
Jocelyn didn't voice the few choice words that came to mind, and was glad that her triangle barrier kid partner wasn't the type or psychic that could read what she was thinking. Instead, she opted for something a little less likely to make a sailor blush, “And this is why we have sirens.”
Jocelyn had known it was going to be a bad day right from the moment the phone had rung on her bedside table. Wear blue today, they had told her. Wearing blue was like painting a freakin' target on her back. Wait for it, it got worse. The reason for the uniform? She was getting saddled with babysitting duty.
Sure, on dead trees it looked good: the NYPD was understaffed and underpowered and the X-men were willing and able to lend a hand fighting crime for free in order to promote peace and good will and lawfulness and rainbows and unicorns and all that jazz.
In reality, they were really just a bunch of under-trained and unpredictable vigilantes dressed in... oh my those were tight pants.
The prickly detective had been all set to glare as he entered, but she turned away with a sniff and adjusted her reading glasses to hide a smirk. She wasn't the only one that was wishing for more comfortable clothes. At least hers fit well enough, or as well as it could over the layers of kevlar and flame retardant long underwear. Long underwear. In July. She was going to die of overheating long before any pyromancing delinquents got to her.
Somewhere, someone had a complete file on the Asian X-man sitting in front of her. It would tell her his name, birth date, mutation, details on what training he'd had... or it would if she had access to it. Whoever had his file hadn't seen fit to share it with her. Jocelyn had gotten nothing more than a pat on the back and a, “Have fun!” Right.
“So.” She echoed the Asian's sentiments. “What do you do?” He smelled like a psychic, but she couldn't tell what kind. If they actually ended up in some sort of situation today, that would be really helpful to know.
She was surprised that the clerk had been so forthcoming with the receipts of the two transactions, but then she may have been a little biased against him for not having been so very helpful on her missing person case. Once outside they got a proper introduction. Without handshakes. Smart girl. Someone had dealt with mutants before. Jocelyn gave a nod that said it all, a gesture she had learned from her older brother and his friends years ago.
She then replied with her own name, “Jocelyn Banks.” She left out the detective title. Noel had figured that out on her own. As for the Upper East Side, “and yes. Yes it did.” There was something odd about that, too; the little girl, Daisy, lived in that neighborhood. Even if it related more to Noel's missing granny case, somehow it felt like it was also connected to the missing girl. It was worth a shot, since she didn't have any more promising leads.
“So, Upper East, granny's bank, or the buyer first?”
The medics were still seeing to the pale and bleeding man lying on his bunk, so Deputy Perham escorted the sneering dark haired teen down to the interrogation room and left the medics to finish their bandaging.
Jocelyn greeted the young scowl with a smile that froze as soon as he entered within six feet of where she was standing.
The air all around her, that had moments ago been so alive with scents, was now dead. Not being able to smell was like suddenly being blind. If it hadn't happened so suddenly and if she wasn't still able to breath, she would have thought she had come down with a cold.
For whatever reason, this boy canceled out mutations.
Great. She loved surprises.
“Please take a seat. I have a few questions for you.”
Something in his gaze hardened when she had said “the title explains it all”. Apparently it didn't quite explain everything. His assumptions about what that meant were fairly clear on his sullen expression.
“Mutants as victims, possible suspects, or witnesses,” she clarified. This was not discrimination. This was common sense. It took people who were trained to deal with mutants who got defensive, aggressive, or even needed someone to simply listen and understand. It hadn't always been that way, but with the cooperation between the X-men and the police force and the addition of a few X-gene enhanced agents, they were getting better and better at what they did.
Yet, they were not perfect, as Mr. Stein so aptly pointed out.
“I will see to it that we schedule more training time in that area,” she promised and made a note of it on her yellow pad of paper. That was probably the most helpful thing he had said thus far.
She could tell when it was useless to continue pressing for information, and she wasn't about to start butting her head against his brick wall. He had given her all he was going to give.
“Thank you for your time, Mr. Stein. That's all of the questions I have for now. I'm afraid you'll have to stay with us for a little longer, but rest assured that I'll try to have this process completed as quickly as possible.” Again she gave him that comforting smile and stood up to lead the way to the door. The deputy opened it and led the way back to the cell where he would deposit Mr. Stein and collect the next suspect for interrogation.
(Interrogations of Sebastian and our little adapted friend coming soon. Martin and Kai, feel free to chat if you like.)
Jocelyn nodded, indicating that the woman's guess was correct.
As for her, the brunette wasn't a cop. She didn't have the snotty know-it-all attitude of the CIA coworkers her brother used to complain about. That left only one option, or so she thought.
“Fed?”
Jocelyn looked at the picture the woman offered. She was awful at remembering faces. If only she had one of Mrs. Claus' personal belongings, she'd be much more likely to be able to track her down. She shook her head.
“How about this one?” She flashed her picture of the missing child. Blonde ringlets, blue eyes, china white skin.
The shop keeper chose that moment to insert his helpful bit of information. Ah, so now he was overflowing with knowledge. Great. So very helpful.
The shopkeeper shrank slightly under their combined stare, but managed to answer Fed's questions, “They sell pretty fast. She only makes a couple each year and even at the price we charge there is always a buyer within a couple of days. This one's already been sold. The guy's supposed to come pick it up later this afternoon.”
“Mind if I open it up for a sec?” Jocelyn asked it like it was a question, but already had the back of the doll house swung halfway open before he was able to answer. She managed to knock over a paper tent in the process, one that commanded children 'Do not touch'.
The doll house had real windows, which had left the air inside relatively unstirred since it had last been closed, probably right before it had been shipped here. She took a deep breath of it before it mixed with the rest of the toy shop air as she visually inspected the little abode. Sawdust, wood glue, cotton, wool. The creator had crafted the furnishings of the house with as much care and accuracy as she had the exterior. Coffee, cheap cigarettes, a stale apartment with not enough air circulation. For some reason the layout of the house seemed almost familiar. Old fashioned perfume, mildewed clothes, gum balls like the ones Fed had perchased. Creepily familiar.
With one last sniff she closed up the house again, brushing away a thin strand of spider silk as she did so. She ignored the glare the shopkeeper was attempting to aim at her. Really, he called that a glare?
“Can we get granny's address and the name of the man who purchased the doll house?”
A single blink brought Jocelyn out of her reverie and back to the real world. A breath cleared her thoughts of dolls and informed her about the person to whom she now spoke. Mutant. Psychic. Sea salt. Sharpie marker. A very different smelling person she spent a lot of time with; not a mutant, but not quite human either.
Gun.
This woman belonged in a toy store even less than Jocelyn did.
The detective raised one eyebrow a fraction of an inch, “No more so than you.”
Jocelyn's inquisitive mind was already whirring, trying to figure out the mystery of this woman. She'd been to the candy store next door; she carried with her traces of caramel apples, toffees, dozens of varieties of fudge, and one small bag of gum balls. It wasn't the usual type of purchase for an adult woman in a candy shop. She was armed, but wasn't acting in the slightest like she was about to hold up the clerk at the register. She didn't smell nearly nervous enough for that, nor would she have chosen to strike up a conversation with a random person. Nothing about her clothes really stood out; they blended with a crowd almost as if she had planned it that way, but there was no hiding the scar that turned her serious mouth into a macabre lopsided grin. It wasn't exactly the kind of thing one acquired working a desk job.
Jocelyn's gaze flicked from the woman's face, down to her toes, and back up again making no effort to disguise the gesture. Disguising anything from a psychic seemed like a rather pointless thing to try.
“I was looking for someone, actually,” she admitted. “And what brings you here?”
