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.
Something was up with her power and she had yet to figure out what it was.
Sometimes she was walking around on a ceiling just like she used to. No big deal. Sometimes she was left slipping on the brick wall outside someone's apartment window and hanging on for dear life like that cat in a poster. Why? Her power had been so nice and consistent before the universe split and then when the time issues started, that was when she had her first malfunction.
Grumbling at her lack of transport, Raine turned her shoulder against the wind and marched on through the pedestrian walkway of the bridge. Alas, her leopard print heels were gone, lost outside that window she'd dangled from. Now she had these nice high top sneakers "borrowed" from one Booker B. Bookman's sister. As if his real name really was Booker B. Bookman. She was glad to have given him a fake name and gotten out of there before things got weird.
The wind tried its best to fling her off balance. It was brutal out here over the water, now that she was almost halfway.
"Oh screw this!" There had to be better shelter on the bottom side of the bridge, right? Raine touched the ground with the flat of her palm and started the first part of a gravity tether. It wouldn't kick in until she placed the second half and since she wanted to be walking on the bottom of the bridge eventually... well, she expected a moment or two of freefall.
Raine climbed up on the handrail. The dang thing was slippery with its shiny paint coating.
Someone honked. She turned to give them the bird right as a strong gust tossed her back toward the open air.
Well, it wasn't how she'd planned to go, but she managed to raise a second middle finger as she fell.
> “Aye, Impact woods gie ye a stern word if she knew ..."
"But can't you see that's exactly why she deserves a break from the responsibility?" Maybe not since they were kind of the same person... "I'm probably overthinking it. I get all tangled up in my own head sometimes and I feel paralyzed for making choices. I need to just... do it. Or do something." She might be waiting forever for her friend, that's why they'd decided that after two weeks, Raine should go on with her life.
Except she hadn't.
> ”We’ll bring ye o’er as discreet as possible.”
That would minimize the risk to everyone, assuming that the reason why Rianne hadn't returned was personal to her and not related to why Raine had been getting arrested when the universe decided to get split open like an egg.
"D'you have a domino mask in black? Black's totally in my wheelhouse." She didn't expect to miss the X-men routine, but... she kinda did. Maybe it would be worth looking into the team here if she stayed.
Worst of all, her cookie was gone. Raine was left wholly unsatisfied because she didn't even remember the last bite. That was supposed to be savored not sucked straight past the taste buds. That's why she was surprised at her hands. Not because Becca was asking a potentially embarrassing question.
"When my friend was here to help out, we had a fleabag motel room in a good location to watch the rift. Once she was gone, I wasn't making nearly enough money to sustain that so I went to the homeless mutant shelter. The one with the golden doors." Which, they'd called for all displaced citizens to report in and get transferred back to their origin universe. Raine felt she was justified in going against that directive.
"It's not my favorite, but at least it's free...? I'm trying to save up, but--" Oh. Right. Today wages had gone to the pile of a human she'd left behind earlier today. Raine mustered a smile anyway. "It's really freaking expensive to live here, y'know?"
Raine chuckled through her cookie at the thought of at least taking Rebecca to dinner first. (Yes. The cookie was already half gone.) She wasn't opposed, but Raine couldn't even afford the good canned soup right now. The thought of a date was absolutely cringe-worthy. Not because it was Becca, an almost stranger. It felt like they'd moved right on past the awkward phase and straight into actual friendship. Nah. A date would have been awkward for almost every other reason in the world.
> "Raine. Ah'm an X-Man, sae Ah'm gonna be crossing the rift..."
Oh. So she could sound like Impact when she wanted to...
"I know." The blonde picked a chocolate morsel out of the cookie. Maybe she was being a baby about this. Or overly cautious. "Do you think... it might be safe to go across if I went with the X-men? Wear a domino mask? Cloak and dagger and all that? I don't want to endanger people or put them in the spot where they know things they shouldn't, but people like Impact... she's already got all the secrets we don't want them to have."
And her dad would be so worried. Could she at least say goodbye?
But she'd seen Trace's powers and the guy who'd tracked him. Sure, there was some mutual stabbing involved but Trace was ambulatory now. So that meant the tracker probably was too. Trace was free now because he was here. Raine just didn't have enough information to make an informed decision on whether she needed to stay or not.
Ah so the tables had turned! He didn't especially love being a Booker the Hooker. Apparently Booker the Bookman was bad (or good?) enough.
And yeah. Apparently, it was actually, legitimately, 100% verifiably Booker B. Bookman.
"How freaking awesome were your parents?" Honest question with not a shred of sarcasm in sight. Since he was a telepath, he would know that. "They must have had absolute stardom planned for you. Nobody average is named like a superhero." She nearly dropped her coffee when she realized it. HE COULD TOTALLY BE A SUPER HERO. Instead, she just sloshed a little on herself in her excitement. Selene had to set the cup aside for the time being. She was just too excited.
"Or Super Hero aspirations." She may have been excited, but she did know how to play it cool... kind of. "How about that? Are you a vigilante on the side, Mr. Bookman?" He looked strong and if she imagined just right, he could pull off spandex and karate chopping action. Mild-mannered librarian by day... take off the glasses and BAM!
Damn. It was harder to keep her brain from wandering around and she was just so conscious of her thoughts now that she was around a telepath. Selene tried to reign in her Raine, but she's already gotten her hopes up.
The roaring silence of disbelief was drowning out just about all attempts for her brain to restart.
He explained and she took a breath to cut in with an interjection that he must have changed his name. But, no. He had an answer for that too. He had all the answers so neatly lined up that Raine realized her mouth was agape.
PSYCHIC?!?
Her brain practically screamed the word and then she found herself mentally apologizing just in case he actually was. But he didn't cringe? So maybe he wasn't? Was there such a thing as mental volume?
Selene shut her mouth and cradled her coffee cup between her hands so that she could leech all its warmth.
> ”That about cover it?”
'Not by half.' She admitted to his brain, just in case he was psychic.
He was in the middle of another sip when her most burning unanswered question came tumbling out on its own.
"So you're not a sex worker, then?" He had the abs for it...
Selene was perfectly ready to be embarrassed no matter what the answer was.
If it was yes... she had no shoes and she was in the home of a psychic sex worker.
HOLY SH8T PSYCHIC SEX!!! THAT HAD IMPLICATIONS! (Sorry, sorry. Mental sorry for mental shouting.)
If it was a no... she'd just called him a hooker. Which was what she'd been all irritated about being mistaken as.
But. Seriously... "I-I just mean that I've never met a librarian at all let alone one that looked like you and you said that yeah they exist and then I was thinking maybe that was a euphemism and I let you give me a name and you could totally legit be selling me this story that you're a "librarian" because I just sort of insulted all sex workers which I was not intending to to by the way and--" And she had just spit out more words in the last minute than was good for any human or mutant. Yep. Taking a sip of coffee now and shutting up.
"So much better when they grow." She agreed between sips and page flips.
> "Ever watch Shambling Deceased?"
"I didn't think I wanted to, but once I realized it was a personal drama with super magnified circumstances and a smidge of gore, I liked it a ton better. Could allllllmost practically leave off the zombies except that I loved inspecting those actors during scenes. They never break." And that was two or three mentions of actors in the span of a few minutes? Selene resolved not to so obviously tip her hand as Raine the aspiring actress. Selene was much cooler than that.
> "the last big thing they came out with was that new superhero show, the Discipliner”
The combination of raised eyebrows and the slow draw of her eyes up from the page held everything that Selene had to say about that. WHY DID EVERYTHING SOUND SO KINKY TODAY!?!? Selene snortled into her coffee cup. Okay, okay. She couldn't read this book for beans while Booker was around, apparently. She'd been looking at the Selene page for how long and the most she'd gotten out of it was something, something moon. Selene was just a blanket badass goddess worthy of non-euclidean planetary space and the casual inspiration of madness. She'd stick with that.
So. Maybe she'd gleaned a bit more than just "the moon."
Booker made his oh-so-casual escape to the living room, but he didn't sit. Raine moved around to the other side of the kitchen and leaned back against the counter. She would have hiked herself up to sit there, but even short as she was, Selene didn't want to hit her head on the upper cabinets.
> ”Don’t laugh, but…”
Fireman. Private eye. Pro pole vaulter... sounded too kinky. Oh. Oh no. Oh gods in R'yleh. She'd offended a sex worker.
> ”...I’m a librarian.”
That was such a jump from where she'd been mentally chasing her tail that it took Selene a blink or two for her to put the pieces together.
Booker.
The librarian.
"You're sh*tting me." She raked him up and down with her eyes. Booker. He was such a looker. Booker? A librarian? C'mon. How gullible did she look?
He jumped right in to Raine's enthusiasm. Even better, he kept drinking his coffee. That meant he wasn't just being nice.
"Too many eyes, arms, and mouths...?" That's all it too to be a Lovecraftian creature, eh? "Maybe Lovecraft had a needy boyfriend and then just exaggerated from there." Looking sideways at a Miigo and skimming the paragraph about how it ate brains and then left its victim as a husk of a person... yeah. Definitely something Raine would have said about an ex of hers.
"I think Weirder Stuff was just perfection, except the way they shot the second seasons kind of gave it away too quick. Like, I knew they couldn't kill off the popular sorta ex-boyfriend because the showrunners loved his baseball bat so much. Seriously. Did you notice how much they started or ended a scene looking at that thing?" It was easy to talk about Binge shows. Raine had binged while doing homework. In easier times. In safer conditions. It was an easy mutual experience to share with a sort-of stranger.
Selene sounded like someone who got to binge whenever she wanted. "Has Binge released anything new in the last few months?" TV was yet another passion, but mostly because she someday aimed to be on it.
She flipped to the front in order to find the entry on her namesake and grabbed her coffee. With the warm mug in her hands and a warm floor under her feet, she was almost back up to feeling her toes.
"What do you do for a living, Booker?" He was obviously a nerd from the encyclopedia on pretend stuff, but being nerdy was cool now, as the mass adoption of shows like Weirder Things proved.
Selene and Nyarl (which now, in Raine's mind, rhymed with Carl) were not Egyptian deities at all.
> ”Better… Lovecraftian!”
Lovecraftian. She mouthed the word, but it sounded like a video game or something. Selene turned her head to see the book better as Booker beamed so proudly at her. Lovecraftian? Those were tentacles. Was this some kind of kink worship? As Booker claimed his coffee and took a proper moment to enjoy his first sip, Selene snuck the book toward herself and flipped a page or two around. Yes. She absolutely wanted to know about how badass Selene was, but she needed to know that she wasn't being made fun of on the sly for her almost-sorta-hooking.
Cxaxukluth. Hziulquoigmnzhah?
She paused to see that Booker was satisfied with his sugar. It was important enough to derail her worry over the weird-ass book in her hands. That was pretty much the only thing she was consistently good at. She wasn't good at being a mutant (she slipped, ffs). She wasn't good at not being a hooker (apparently). She wasn't going to go down the 'I'm not good enough' path right now. She didn't have to wallow in self-pity at all.
He liked it.
"Thanks! But seriously. What is up with these names?"
Selene set her coffee at a safe distance and flipped back a bunch of pages until she saw one a picture she actually recognized.
Cthulhu.
"Ohhhhh! Oh this guy was in that movie Cloverplain." Huh. Now that she was looking closer there were a few that seemed familiar. "And this guy looks like the bad guy from the Binge show Weirder Stuff! Those child actors are so lucky to start their careers so early! And that mom really killed her performance."
Raine caught that Booker was moving around behind her, but he wasn't moving close so Raine went on pouring the hot water in a circular motion and ignored whatever he was up to. It wasn't important because she could, and would, defend herself. She even had spiffy powers to help so she wasn't too worried.
She waited a bit, smelling the oils releasing from the grounds and taking just a moment to appreciate that she was warm and safe and that coffee was happening.
Not even an hour ago she'd jumped out of a window and then slipped and lost her gravity for a bit. She'd nearly fallen to her death great harm. But that was, like, totally not even a big deal. Usually gravity was her biotch.
Why hadn't gravity been her biotch?
There had been a lot on her mind at the time of the slip. The only other time gravity stopped working for her was when she'd stuck her coworker's phone to the ceiling. It fell by itself. So... maybe she had a time limit she wasn't totally aware of. Inexperience struck again.
Thankfully there was cream and sugar to find. Booker was still fiddling around with his book, but he did take a moment to help her find the mugs. She fished those down and set them aside in order to stir the crust of slurry.
The book was an encyclopedia, as it turned out. An encyclopedia that he used to find a name.
"Selene?" It sounded sleek and more than a little cat burglar-y. A little mischief curled her lips up at the ends. "I could get used to that."
He surprised a laugh out of her with his second suggestion. Being faceless was cool, but..."Nyarl-a-hotep" was not how he'd said that one, but she was going with it, "has a nice ring to it. Is that Egyptian or something?"
She fit the lid on the french press and pushed down the mesh filter. One cup for the encyclopedian, one cup for her. Hers was easier to fix with just the barest smidge of milk. She went ahead and eyeballed what a "sweet tooth" kind of guy might like. Shame, really. Raine (who was seriously considering the merits of being Selene) delivered Booker's latte.
"I did not steam your milk, but feel free to worship me anyway." And of course she craned her neck to see what kind of badass Selene might be.
She counted the beans. Some said coffee making was an art. Some, a science. For Raine, it was a bit of both. Maybe she could find a coffee place willing to pay her under the table, but Raine doubted it. The people up front who they trusted with the grinders and the scalding hot water and the customers? Those all had W2's.
"There's not a ton of money in coffee. It's more of a passion than anything else, I guess." That was a nice deflection. She just didn't want to admit all the things that made it impossible for her to go back on the other side of the rip... it was too heavy for having just come in through the window.
"Why don't you give me a name? Pretty much anything's better than what I got right now anyway."
Dark beans weighed less than light roast. This being somewhere in the medium, she choose to count out a medium amount and got to grinding by hand. She could probably do it in the dark by smell and feel as much as by sight.
There was something very zen and grounding about the routine of making coffee. Booker might be a stranger, but he'd accidentally hit on maybe the one thing that let Raine work through what had almost just happened and not freak out. She did take a break from grinding, just for a second, to wipe a tear that had leaked out and was tickling its way down between her nose and cheek. It wasn't a big deal.
Raine dumped the grounds into the press and that was when the kettle started its barest whistle. "Do you get silt in your coffee?" It was full on barista mode, now. "You can combat that by stirring the slurry after it sits for a minute or two. That makes the grounds fall and settle."
Mugs. Right. Raine went hunting for mugs. "Do you take cream or sugar?" What a lovely host she was being to a stranger in his own home.
Raine? On ViewTube? Well, it wasn't Broadway, but it was a stage. Rebecca may not have noticed the stars in her eyes, but Raine hadn't ever considered ViewTube as a steppingstone to stardom. Hadn't Justin Beaver done that? It might even be a classier way to get discovered as opposed to reality shows.
"I know she's okay. And I trust she has her reasons." Raine affirmed with all the belief of her heart. Rianne was a cop. If she hadn't come back, it was the best choice for the both of them.
Becca on the other hand... Raine didn't want to endanger her. "I'd love to tell Impact somehow, but my stuff and, even my ID. It just isn't worth the risk. The day the rip happened... there's some bad people on the other side. And I don't want them to know I made it." Was she willing to start fresh, though? Not just a new world, but as a new person? A new college career? New everything?
Her mind was chasing down new avenues of thought rather than really taking in her surroundings so Becca wasn't the only one surprised to find baked goods in arm's reach.
How did she feel about chocolate?
"Chocolate is the culmination of all that is good and kind and wonderful in this world." She did not miss a beat. That answer was automatic as if it'd been already barreled and waiting in the chamber, ready to go.
"Dark chocolate, though... dark chocolate is the key to my heart. Becca, is this dark chocolate? Will you marry me?" There was not a doubt in her mind that by asking this woman for a hug, she had made the BEST decision of her life. Raine still had that shivery, tight ball of stress in her chest, but little by little she felt that tension relaxing.
She was done being a soggy, kicked puppy. Bad things almost happened. They didn't. It was time to be something else. Confident, for starters.
Raine kicked off the one shoe before she got to the kitchen and set the blanket on the counter as she mosied close enough to snoop out whatever Mr. Neighbor was doing.
He hadn't even really gotten started and so it was a simple thing to back off. He seemed to know enough to let a woman do her thing when she was of a mind to get it done. "Looks like your sister already taught you some things about how to treat a lady." Emphasis on lady. Raine teased as she took stock of the beans. The expiration date was passed, but only just. She gave them a sniff: a medium-dark roast. She'd worked with worse.
"If you don't weep at my feet for the joy of flavor, I will have failed here." Exaggeration? Sure. But this was one thing Raine knew she could do, and do it well. She also got to poke around and see what kind of kitchen this guy kept. He was strong enough to actually help lift her in through the window. And he had a burr grinder? That was half way to marriage material right there.
"Booker? What kind of a name is Booker?" She went on tippy-toe and dug around, making herself at home in this stranger's kitchen as she looked for a digital, or even an analog, scale. Grr. She would just have to count the beans.
"I'm not telling you my name." She wrinkled her nose at him. "For your own safety. Wouldn't want you getting lumped in with the rabble." Not to mention the fact that she was actually a person of interest to the people who were running the other side of the rip...
Raine dug out a candy thermometer --That was better than no thermometer-- and set about putting a kettle on the stove to boil. The french press was already out. Clean-ish. She unscrewed the mesh filter and made sure nothing was sandwiched in there. A cloth went inside and then outside the press.
On a more serious note. "Thank you, Booker." She addressed the french press that she was cleaning rather than his face. It was easier. "I'm glad people like you are a part of this world."
"Why does everyone--!?" No. Actually, Raine didn't want to know WHY people thought she was a hooker. She had some idea already and did want it confirmed. "No!" She breathed to calm herself and the man took the opportunity to offer her tea. TEA. Like... like she was a welcome GUEST.
Had she ever been a welcome guest, and offered tea? Raine stood very still in her little designated safe-to-stand spot.
"I'm on the wrong side of the rip so I was trying to make some cash under the table. I'm damn lucky I haven't been picked up by human traffickers." That made her cold in a whole new way. She wavered in her safe spot.
"Coffee. I'll only steal your stuff if you made a bad pot." She put her bare foot back down. She was joking about the stealing, but her tone made it fall flat. She had to shake off her funk. If she wanted to be an actress, she would have to put on a face, no matter how she felt.
Raine took heart from that. She could pretend.
"I'm a coffee snob, you see." And a coffee snob would not need to use the blanket like a shield. Coffee snobs weren't wounded animals. She smiled, falling into an easy tease as she pulled off the blanket and walked toward the kitchen with a fresh eye. What was there that was even worth stealing? If he had a espresso machine maybe. "Let me learn you a thing or two."
> ”Let’s save the anecdotes for after you’re not dangle out of the window like a flightless pigeon, shall we?”
"Flightless!" She was somehow sure that was an insult, but Raine couldn't quite fit it together how it was an insult, specifically. To be fair, she was having a rather spectacular mess of a day. It hit her all at once when her bare foot touched his apartment floor, which felt warm to the touch. Maybe even hot by comparison of her frigid toes.
"Flightless pigeons are just rats!" She complained.
Rats with wings - wings = rats. The math checked out.
He moved past and Raine more than made way for him. She kept a suspicious eye on him all the way to the couch and back, in fact. It didn't occur to her that the blanket was for her until it was already in place.
What must she look like to be pitied so by a stranger?
She considered protesting. Her mouth even fell open a bit, but any argument she attempted died before it had fully formed. She blamed her shoulders, which were starting to thaw. The fact that she could feel them was a distraction.
"I— You didn't—" Words were hard. Raine tucked her shoeless foot behind her shoed one in an attempt to hide it. She sighed, knowing that hiding the fact that she was a ship without a rudder (or a hoe without a heel) was a ship that had already sailed. Instead, she tugged the blanket closer around herself and cocooned as best she could without moving from her designated standing spot.
"No. I'm not here to steal your stuff." She didn't make a move to return the blanket, though. "But I totally could be. You can't trust anybody in this town. That fool thought I was a hooker!"
Or maybe, she realized, she was the fool for accidentally hooking.
It was the girl code to repay compliment for compliment and Raine got her turn to bask in the sunlight of their fast blossoming friendship. If Raine's experience held true, then they would continue to fling compliments until they either became best friends or hated each other. Chemistry between people was a whole art unto itself.
Becca's ViewTube sounded pretty standard for an influencer. With her good personality, looks, and accent, Raine had no doubt that it was going just fine so long as Becca didn't spout anything too crazy or too boring and so long as she kept uploading things regularly.
Wow. She hadn't been to class in months, but her incomplete New Media Marketing degree still had some value after all.
"I would totally watch a freckle video. Mine aren't as prominent as yours, but I like what little freckles I have." Also, makeup in general, which she could not currently afford. Raine did her best not to feel self-conscious next to someone who seemed so... so... together.
> ”Hoo abit ye? Ur ye warking oan this side? Or… skale, mebbe?”
"I would really like to finish school. I'm waiting for my friend to come back over. She was supposed to be able to recover my ID so I can apply for real to be here. Officially, I'm not yet. I got tossed when the rip, uh, ripped." Raine tugged at the cropped nature of her sweater as the elevator bell dinged. It was probably safe to talk about that here, with Becca. Becca was one of the good guys.
"She hasn't come back yet. She's a big girl and she can handle herself, but... I guess it's mostly inconvenient for me to not officially exist anywhere." She trailed out from their little box of safety and Raine was reminded of her wet clothes by the drafty hall which, compared to the closed environment of the elevator, was still better than being outside in the autumn rain. "I've been working cash jobs here and there. Uh! I'm not a hooker, though! I mean, like, washing dishes and stuff."
