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 like the idea of having a couple of super-tough bad guys around for people rally against.
I think playing a character with an out-of-control mutation would actually be interesting. I'm sure if there are some people made uncomfortable by the idea of facing a foe that makes their power go awry, there are an equal number of people who would love the opportunity to try it. I assume that the player would get to determine what their out-of-control power does, so it wouldn't be god-modding.
I'd recommend letting the players writing in the thread control the NPCs, either by taking turns or deciding ahead of time who controls them.
I'd avoid assigning the players that will defeat the Zodiacs ahead of time. By the time the plot is run, people that were active might not be and new people that join might feel left out that they didn't have a chance to play a big role in the plot.
I recommend allowing anyone who wants to have an encounter with the zodiacs permission to do so. Of course, if they intend to defeat a zodiac they should probably make that plan known in this planning so they don't take an NPC out of the picture that other people wanted to go up against, or can set it later in time so others could face him/her earlier. If you too tightly control who is allowed to play against them, people will feel they don't have enough freedom to be creative and may lose interest in the plot.
I could actually see this working well with the idea of getting the Order more active. Clearly these guys are encroaching on the Order's turf and need to be made examples of. The X-men better get out of the way, because the Order is totally taking them down (or thinks they are). All sorts of great possibilities here: like Isabel almost getting defeated by a Zodiac, but getting rescued by CS. <- Just one example of the awesome interactions that could ensue.
A couple questions: 1. The general is acting on his own, without government support, correct? If so, what is the government's response to a private army descending upon it's largest city? How are police likely to respond? 2. Who is the ally that implants loyalty? How do they fit in? 3. Can anyone who wants to have an encounter with the zodiacs?
Real life has been super busy the last two weeks. We've had weddings and other family type gatherings as well as looming prop deadlines for the LARP Calley and I both go to. I'm also switching jobs, so have to pack up a classroom. I should be back to more posting in a week or so. Sorry to those for whom I have not posted, I'm plotting what to write, just need the time to write it! I have not forgotten about you!
Katrina hit the dirt. A log, some tall grass. It was all the time her mind had to process before she dove for the ground.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
She should have realized, should have been more careful. Just because a college boy couldn't see her didn't mean that mutants or even normal humans equipped with the right technology couldn't see past her illusions of invisibility.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
What had she been expecting? CS having a nice picnic with the kidnapped students on a mountainside with some psychic pal that had simply sent him a friendly invitation?
More bullets exploded dirt in her vicinity, though not so near as the first. She crawled on her hands and knees through the tall grasses, trying to get away from where most of the shots seemed to be clustered. She reached the log and cowered beneath it.
After a moment the bullets stopped. There was the sound of a scuffle, then a crunch of knuckles on nose, followed by something hitting the ground.
“Go! Get back to safety! I'll cover for you,” she heard her tour guide from the direction of the disturbance.
She was in the very middle of the field. She could go back, certainly, but what would she accomplish? She could tell the X-men that the place was guarded by people with guns and that was about it. Where was CS? How could they get to him? Where were the children? Were they safe? She didn't know the answers to any of those questions.
She closed her eyes and concentrated. She could be invisible in more ways than one. She imagined herself making no noise, leaving no smell, having no heat signature, not existing in any way. Her body was not there, it was just another part of the background. She even tried to make her mind a blank slate as best she could.
When she was ready she rose to a crouch and looked over the top of the log. Nothing happened. She made her way to the side of the field where cover was the closest, hunched over all the way. She ducked behind the first tree and was startled to find that the spot was already occupied. A man holding a gun was still pointing it at where she had been a few minutes before.
Katrina hardly dared to breath. She skirted around him, toward the next available tree, as silent as possible. Before she had quite disappeared behind the trunk, the man lowered his weapon and raised his hand to his ear. The little illusionist was almost certain he was getting ready to blast her with laser beam eyes or something. Fortunately he was simply reaching to touch the communicator attached to his ear.
“She vanished. Not even infrared.” He was silent for a moment, then nodded and added, “Roger.” Then he stared stalking away in the direction of the mountain.
He was giving up? Or getting reinforcements?
There was movement around the field, all in the direction of the mountain base. She was too far to see where they were going. If she could just follow one of them, she could find the door, find the way into their base.
Or she could just leave. It wasn't too late to get out.
Except that the X-men would be here for hours and who knew what could be happening to those kids. Taken not just by a mind controlled teacher, but by a mind controlled teacher to some kind of militant base inside a mountain.
It may have been stupid, but she was going to do it anyway.
Katrina slipped out from behind the tree and made her way silently, invisibly toward the base of the mountain. Alongside the edge of the field, a little way behind the man with the gun, as invisible as she possibly could be.
The rustling of the wind in the leaves overhead sounded like, “Stupid, stupid, stupid.”
A closer look took a lot longer than Katrina expected. There wasn't a road out to the other peak, at least not really. There was kind of a path that was almost wide enough for the car, except when it wasn't. Then they had to start walking, and by walking, of course, she actually meant hard-core hiking. It wasn't easy going on foot and she really wished she had the X-jet to just hop on over all this wilderness and land right on top of where she wanted to be.
“Sorry to drag you into all this,” Katrina panted.
“Well, it isn't normally on the tour, but if there are kids in danger we don't have much of a choice, do we?”
She shook her head, “Still, I...”
Katrina stopped talking. They had just reached a clearing and the scene across the field matched her mental image exactly. She waved her hand for her guide to be silent.
“You should stay here. I'm going to go take a look,” her voice was a whisper. She started forward, but felt a hand on her arm.
“Wait, I can't let you go in alone and helpless,” he protested quietly. “Let me come.”
“I'm hardly helpless. Mutant, remember?” With that she disappeared, making his fingers around her arm feel as though they held nothing but air. He relaxed his grip in response and she slipped away from him.
“If I'm not back in an hour, go home without me,” she whispered before slipping away across the field.
She thought she heard a faint “fat chance” and had to smile just a little to her invisible self. He was being very chivalrous for a guy who knew she had a boyfriend. Maybe he was just one of those types that couldn't say “no” to helping a girl in need.
I found the place, she informed Slate. I'm just going to look and see what I...
The thought was cutoff by the sound of gunshots and an explosion of dirt next to her feet.
Three cans of Foothill Frost, a bag of Cheesey Cornpuffs, and an hour and a half of winding back and forth later, Katrina and her handsome tour guide pulled of at the side of the winding road in a little dirt parking lot. There was maybe room for three cars.
“That's Ormes. This is as close as the road goes to the peak. There are trails that go farther up. It's a fairly easy walk up, as mountains go.”
“Let's take a look.”
Another exercise filled twenty minutes brought them to the top of the mountain. Katrina was pleased to see that when it came to slightly longer distances she was at least no more out of breath than her guide. She silently thanked CS for the torture he had put her through in conditioning classes. From the peak Katrina had an unimpeded view of the area all around them. She slowly turned, comparing the landscape to her mental image of where CS was supposed to be.
South of them was another peak, the only one in sight that had snow on it at this time of year.
Wait, Colorado? Really? Katrina could hardly believe it. CS was here the whole time. She'd been worried about how to get home for nothing. Now she had to worry about how to get the rest of the team here.
She turned to stare over the shoulder of her tour guide, his mouth still agape. Mountains lurked at the edge of the campus.
“Uhh,” her tour guide finally managed to articulate, “Sure. Where?”
The illusionist pointed over his shoulder, “That mountain. What is it called?”
In the image Slate had sent her had a mountain that looked like that, in the background and from a different angle, but the twin peaks on the top were a definite match. Slate had said she was close, and he was right. She was very close.
“Never mind. The name isn't important. I need to go here.” She drew her finger across the air in front of her, tracing the outline of the mountain she needed to get to. As she did, an image of the mountain was left hovering in the air for a moment, an illusion that would look like nothing more than a shimmer of heat to anyone that was not standing right next to her.
“That's right near Ormes peak.” He seemed to be getting used to the idea that she was a little bit different from the average co-ed. was pointing at the shimmering outline in front of them, one of the mountains in the background of the peak where CS was supposedly hiding. “We did training exercises up there. You can't drive straight up a mountain, though. The road up there loops around a lot. It takes about an hour and a half to get there.”
Katrina bit her lip. An hour and a half of driving on top of commercial air travel time for the rest of the team meant that Slate, Mirror, and the rest of the X-men wouldn't be here for several hours. She shouldn't go alone, but she didn't want anything bad to happen to those kids, either.
“Let's go then. I'll owe you one,” she informed her tour guide. “Gas, road snacks, all the Foothill Frost soda you can drink, it's on me.”
His eyes brightened slightly, “Alright. You have a deal. Just... can you erase the uh...” He waved his hand at the shimmering illusion floating in the air.
“Of course.” She smiled at him, glad that he wasn't running away to his ward his dorm room with garlic and heavy firearms.
The mountain is near Ormes Peak. I'm going to go scope it out, she informed Slate. I'll be careful. Don't worry.
Katrina wrote a big “O+” on the bag of blood and set it with the other bags that had not been burst open. Once again, it was ready to save someone's life.
She wasn't entirely certain Serena was being sincere about her question about the X-men, but she decided to answer it anyway.
“It's... exciting, to say the least. There's always some crisis to avert somewhere. I pilot the jet most of the time, which is a lot of fun. I don't have a very combat oriented mutation, so most of the time I stay out of any real trouble.”
The little illusionist thoughtfully bit her lip. What else was useful for the new girl to know about the X-men? “They focus a lot on teamwork and training. They have a hologram machine that let's you practice using your mutation in tandem with other members of the X-men to learn to work together.”
She tilted her head at the other blonde girl, “You know, if you're a student at the mansion, you'd probably make a pretty good X-man someday.” Katrina didn't know how blood-bending would work as an offensive tactic in a morally-good team, since it wasn't as readily available as water or air, at least not without hurting someone first, but Serena seemed to be the type that would enjoy helping people. That was a quality that could go a long way.
“Maybe you could learn to heal or something, you know, if people are injured.” She was envisioning blood bandages covering people's wounds or something of the like.
I have arrived in Ohio! There shall be several wedding-related events I shall be attending over the weekend, but also the potential for some down time in between. I shall see about posting, if there is time. <3
Katrina did some quick mental math (thanks to Slate's years of tutoring she wasn't quite as bad at it as she used to be). If she absconded with one of the school's planes she could be back in New York in two hours. That would be a terrible idea if she wanted any sort of future at this school.
Plan B involved catching the first cab to the airport and getting on the next flight back. Even if they didn't have a ticket available, she knew her way around airport security. A local flight would be a cinch to sneak onto compared to an international one. It would just take a bit longer. It was at least half an hour back to the airport and who knew how long until the next flight back to the city.
Stowing away sounded so much better for her potential criminal record than grand larceny, though.
Katrina answered Maya back, “I--I think it's going to be a couple of hours. I don't know how soon the next plane back will be. In the meantime, we should make sure that someone is ready to defend the mansion while everyone is gone in case this is some kind of two pronged attack.”
The little illusionist had already started walking, taking only a slight detour to avoid her tour guide. As she walked she tried to think what she would have done when she helped run Pax Academy, once upon a dream. She would have hidden it, but it was a little late for that now. Then she would have had tunnels to get everyone out.
“Perhaps we should also prepare for an evacuation, just in case.” It would be Maya's call in he end, since she was a team leader.
She hated being stuck down here when important things were happening. Was this going to be how it felt every time there was an emergency with the X-men while she was away at college? Was this were her loyalties truly lay?
On the curb of the main street leading out of the Katrina looked around for a cab. She looked both ways. There wasn't one. What kind of godforsaken town was this with no cabs anywhere?
She heard footsteps behind her. Her tour guide was running up behind her. He stopped, still breathing easily and had not a bead of sweat on his forehead for his efforts.
“Is everything alright? Are you leaving? I'm supposed to take you back to the campus center for the financial aid presentation about the FAFSA and...”
Katrina turned to stare at him, “Don't take this the wrong way, but there are more important things to do right now.” She bit her lip, trying to decide how much to tell him. How much of a don't-ask-don't-tell policy did this place have about mutations? She decided in an instant that if she couldn't be herself, she wanted nothing to do with this place any way.
“I need a ride. Some kids were kidnapped by one of the teachers at my school. We think he's being mind controlled. I need to get back so I can help rescue the students. Because I'm a mutant.”
He stared at her, slack jawed. It was the least attractive look he'd had on his face all day so far.
“You're...wait...mind controlled?”
Katrina held up a finger for him to be quiet and tilted her head to the side. Slate was back.
>>Katrina? Are you there?
Yeah, you had me worried for awhile there. Did you find CS?
She smiled back at her tour guide, “Sorry, telepathic boyfriend calling. So, that ride? Yes or no.”
She could barely believe what she heard at first. Maya's voice answered her, and explained quite rationally what Slate was up to. Using Cerebra. That made sense. He probably should practice it anyway.
The why he was using Cerebra was what didn't quite register in her brain as something that was even remotely possible. CS, kidnapping students? Impossible. Except. Mind control. Anyone with malicious intent could probably pretty easily figure out that young impressionable mutants would be easy to mold into super soldiers or whatnot. It was one of the reasons Katrina tended to downplay what her powers were.
The X-men had figured out a long time ago that they could train soldiers or vigilantes or heroes or whatever, when they first opened their school. So why would someone not want to take a shortcut and take students that were already halfway trained? Especially if they had someone who could control people's minds.
Mind control. Katrina shuddered.
Once upon a time, in a far away reality, Slate had taught classes on how to protect one's mind from outside influence. Perhaps it was time to start doing that again, or rather, way past time. It was already too late now.
It took a moment for her mind to catch up to what Maya had told her. Meanwhile her mouth answered, “Oh my god.”
Then her brain caught up again and she responded more quickly.
“Are there any other clues as to where he would have gone? I'm in Colorado on a college visit. It would take me a couple hours to get back. How long do you think it will take Slate to find him? What can I do to help?”
She glanced across campus at the planes that were taking off from the nearby airstrip. Her mind was already running through possibilities of how she could get home to help with this. There was also a little voice telling her she had better be careful not to ruin her chances by doing something dumb. Missing kids and a mind controlled CS were very important, but so too was getting into college. Would she be forced to pick between those? If so, which would she pick?
You will be greatly missed, Jorge. You're one of the best writers and all around nicest people we've had on this site. Take care of yourself and your family. <3
Katrina nearly pounced on the bishop when Slate first moved it, but something made her stop before she completed the capture. Something wasn't right here. Slate didn't usually make such mistakes. She studied the board again, what was she missing?
"You okay?"
Her handsome tour guide gave her a questioning smile and Katrina realized she had been staring off into space rather than staring at the things he had been pointing at with his ever-so-strong arms.
"Yeah, so... the library, huh?"
That got him started about all the different aspects that made their library better than all the other college libraries, and distracted him for another ten minutes while the little illusionist thought about her next chess move. She couldn't see the logic behind what Slate had done. Finally, frustrated, she decided to just ask him.
Is this supposed to be some kind of trap?
...
Katrina frowned. Her tour guide looked alarmed and hurried her along to something she might like looking at better than a bronze fountain by some famous artist that had once gone to the academy. The little illusionist was distracted, not caring in the least what he showed her next.
Slate?
Still no answer. Something was wrong. It was possible she was being a paranoid over protective girlfriend and Slate was just busy doing something, except if he was busy he wouldn't have contacted her first. ...No, something had to be wrong. She was sure of it.
"Sorry, but I need to use the ladies' room," she blurted out, surprising her guide. She didn't even wait for him to point in the right direction before hurrying off. As soon as he was out of sight she pulled out her phone and dialed Slate's blackberry number.
No answer.
Apartment phone.
No answer.
She was out of numbers to call and starting to panic.
Finally, out of desperation, she grabbed her X-communicator and looked at it carefully. She did not know how to use it to call just one other comm; she only knew that the main button on the side called everyone. Hopefully everyone would not be upset.
"Slate? What happened? What's going on?"
As she waited, she clung to the communicator as if for dear life. Someone had to answer. They had to, or these communicator things were completely worthless and what use was it being an X-man anyway?
Katrina held the bag steady, smiling further encouragement in Serena's direction. There was nothing like a little fighting spirit to boost energy levels for using one's mutation.
One bag down, Katrina sealed it up and held a marker poised thoughtfully over it, ready to label it.
"I've been enrolled since middle school and I graduate this year. I've come a long way since then. I used to have nightmares that the X-men were villains who beat people up in the basement, and now I'm a comm-carrying member."
It was funny how things came full circle like that.
She tapped the marker end against her chin, glancing down at the unlabeled blood bag.
"How should I label this? Does it have a blood type or anything?"
Some inner-faction conflict would also help drum up more excitement for the factions themselves. We've kind of been stuck in a rut of everyone being neutral for awhile. It would be nice to see another reason for people to want to be recruited.
