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.
This was Capital I- Important. Maybe even ALL CAPS IMPORTANT.
His boy Matt had shown Leo that there were still people who were out of the loop. There were still people who didn’t know what a mutant looked like in context in the real world. Nothing bred fear or hate like a lack of knowledge so he wanted to fix that. He had to show everyone what it was like to work with a mutant. To be a mutant working with humans. He had to show that it was not only possible, but that people were already doing it. Today. Successfully. Even with obvious physical tells that made them look different.
When he asked What mutant has the coolest “normal” job? on AudubonX, one of the answers lead Leo to a worthless two-line article on a racist blog about the New York Philharmonic Orchestra hiring a bug girl and how everyone should stop listening to classical music as a result.
A bug girl that played violin? Perfect.
He wasn’t sure the best way to go about things, but he figured asking permission was the right thing to do so he emailed, faxed, and called until they were so sick of him that they changed their initial ‘no’ into a ‘if I say yes will you leave me alone?’ which was as good as it got, really.
Leo was suave in his own mind and sometimes even managed to be suave on the outside, dressed in slacks and a button-up with his pinhole camera in place on his navy blue vest. He didn’t have the funds for a camera man. This was about as good as it got.
He tried the door. Locked. Leo tried at least 5 other doors before he found one that was open. It all felt sorta of taboo to be here when it wasn’t all gussied up for a show. Like he got to see the secret underbelly of the orchestra.
And then… there was a girl there, like actually waiting for him, and all his suave left him in a rush.
“Hi!” Too enthusiastic. Leo tried again. “Hi. Ohno. Not cool. Be cool.” Oh God. Did he just say that outloud? “I mean hello. Hey. I’m uh.” He didn’t know what Agnes looked like, but he caught a flash of wing and it all came crashing together in one giant ball of sense. “You’re her. And I’m—” Failing! Horribly! ABORT! ABORT!
Leo took a step back and closed the door between them.
So. Freaking. Suave.
He took a breath and tried it again. From the top.
Leo opened the door, spied the girl who logically must have been Agnes and offered his hand. “I’m Leo DeValdenebro. I have permission from your boss to get some footage of you at work and I was really hoping to grab an interview with you after. I’m sorry that I’m a moron. DId they say anything about the whys of what I’m doing?” His hand might have been a tad shaky, but he gave a good handshake otherwise. Nerves? What nerves?
DID THIS POOR WOUNDED STAG GROW UP UNDER A ROCK!? Survey said yes when a bit of dark confusion showed on Matthew's face after Leo made his comment about them being perverts. Survey then said 'hell yes' when he said the word 'bro' like it fell out of a vending machine. It was absolutely bewildering. Leo had never felt so out of his depth before.
But they were in need of sitting. Sitting was good goal for now. But a bench just would not do.
"O-okay. Yeah. Uhm, actually, my exit strategy was this way. The Coffee Tree, the place where the guy grows the... yeah, you're just going to have to see it, actually." The most important part was that it was a known mutant-friendly establishment since the owner was 'out' as it were and he was way cool with mutant shop talk and the potential need for privacy. It was hard to explain all that, though. Better to show it.
Leo hefted his bag to re-seat his journal inside and then indicated the way with his head. They could walk and talk.
"It was a joke. I- The nose thing- It's... Do you know what anime is? Or... the internet?" What would Leo do if this guy did not know what the internet was!? Okay. Deep breath. He could teach this guy what memes were. No sweat.
"Clearly you have a lot on your plate. I've just never met somebody so—" Leo shrugged apologetically as he cast about for the right words. Out of touch? New? "—sheltered. I hardly know where to start to get you up to speed." Matthew was formal and stiff and, God, what if he'd been one of those kids raised in his parents' basement watching only Golden Girls or something like that?
Leo's eyebrows bunched as he stepped over a fence that was meant to keep walkers on the path. It was a short cut, not a legitimate park entrance or exit.
Well. Leo decided, at last. Then that basement at least had a gym in it. Either way he's here now.
"Okay. I got it. We start with your powers and real world crap can wait. You need to know your strengths and your limits." He wished he had his video camera. This would be fascinating to document. "Sorta like a goal at the gym, right?" He had to be familiar with that given his physique. "You write down how many reps you can comfortably do so that next time you can try to do one more, right? So what do you know about what you can do, exactly?"
There. Yeah. They just had to start with what he knew and go from there.
Leo pointed to their destination as soon as they pushed their way through a mess of undergrowth. They just had to cross a street to get there.
"Thar she blows." The building was three stories high, which was short for the area, and sported a bit of green peeking out each window and a bit at the top. "It's a coffee tree. They guy is a plant manip. or something. The thing gets berries and goes through leaf cycles and stuff. It's awesome and it smells amazing." Also the tree was giant and each branch held enormous, waxy leaves that drooped to serve as great dividers between tables. There wasn't a lot that was quiet or private in New York, but a booth at The Coffee Tree came pretty close.
Whoah. Like serious mutant denial going on in there. His face was a war zone. The best thing Leo could do was distract him with FACTS! That was pretty much all he had to offer since his offer to hug it out was ignored.
This kid— he was definitely older than Leo, but his inexperience made Leo start to think of him as a kid— had it bad. He still used somatic gestures and was still trying to hide those somatic gestures. So that meant he was new and ashamed.
Leo felt a tug on his journal and didn't want to give it up at first, but it wasn't like Matthew hadn't already seen what was inside. He let the book go and it moved across the space between them. The book wasn't big, nor was it heavy, but the strain on Matthew's ace was telling. Everything he did screamed 'NEW!'
"Ahhh. I see." Leo tried to think about how to approach this with a guy who was so, so, so new. He had to be gentle with his words. Careful. "That's called telekinesis. You're moving junk with your brain." Or... he could be himself. That worked sometimes too. "That's not bad, actually. I like the page turn. That means you've got a good handle on it."
And then with the nose bleed.
"Mother Mary, we're going to look like a bunch of perverts." Or perhaps it'd look like they'd been in a fist fight. Either way two bloody-nosed teens lurking about in the park and passing a book back and forth was a bad idea. Leo glanced around again. He didn't exactly have a stack of napkins in his tactical bag. In fact he didn't have anything that was going to staunch any blood flow and he didn't see anything handy either. At least no one seemed to be looking their way.
"Hey. You okay to walk? Let's stop standing around and go find somewhere to sit." Somewhere a little more private so that he could get a grip on himself and Leo could "You probably have questions and I want to be a bro— I mean, I'd like to help you. If you want."
She was charming. So, so charming. How did Invasion-er-Jiri... how did he keep his cool while giving interviews? He was a much better journalist than Leo was.
Raise-UR-Donger said:
Bachelorette? She did say bachelorette, right? Her accent is hard to parse. SOMEONE PLEASE CONFIRM.
Leo typed a quick reply and by the time he was back in the IRL, she was making some marbles dance in a hypnotic to and fro.
needy1 said:
She came prepared, ya'll. Wonder where those have been? ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
"Uh." SERIOUSLY DISTRACTING. Leo looked away from the page more resolutely. "Ferrokinesis or Magnetokinesis? Or is there a difference?" Not that it mattered exactly. Or that he was taking notes. Okay. He totally was. Powers were absolutely fascinating. Maybe more so since he was a non-powered kid.
ALLCAPS_OCTOPUS said:
WHAT DOES ON THE BEAK MEAN
Downvote.
politicalSnowflake said:
Dude, mutant is just a word. I thought you guys owned it like in rap and stuff.
Downvote.
"You're doing great, Miss G. Just the right amount of corny." Leo gave her the thumbs up after she finished out her explanation. He tried not to get too puffed up at the compliment she left out there for him. Exceptional. Was he exceptional? Or just the bull-headed exception. "There's going to be more than we can ever cover here. Keep upvoting, guys."
He upvoted one or two as well.
"You're Scottish. We get that. But are you playing up the accent at all? Is this really how you talk all day, every day?"
"Have you ever hunted the mighty haggis?" Leo shrugged. That wasn't, like, offensive was it?
"What's the airspeed velocity of a- oh we get this one every time, guys." Downvote.
"What do your parents think about the lifestyle, the powers, everything? Do they watch your YouTube channel?"
The guy stopped so Leo stopped. He glanced nervously back toward the woman, but she was no longer on the path watching them. A roil of tension unfurled from his chest. In the end, she seemed to have at least one shred of dignity left.
A glance back at the wannabe hero and Leo had to double take. He was seriously struggling. Anger? Fright? Skepticism? Serenity? Whoah. He was going through emotions too fast for Leo to get a good read on him. Unstable? Nah. Leo had seen this a lot at the Mansion, unfortunately.
"You are fresh out the package aren't you?" Leo sighed. This had all gone wrong today and now, here he was screwing up some fresh, delicate, robustly muscled newbie's perceptions of the world. He pinched the bridge of his nose... which actually felt puffy. Crap. Was his nose swelling?
"Okay. Let's back up and try this again. Hi. I'm Leo." He wiped his hand on his pants just in case and offered it to the guy. His grip was firm and sure. Leo knew who he was and what he was about. That came across even in something as simple as a handshake.
"You want to talk powers or do you need a hug or something? I live at the mutant school and you already saw my notebook." He shrugged. That was about as good as it got as far as qualifications went.
A mental review of the moment Leo had tripped was not giving him a whole lot to go off of. His brain had jumped to invisible person. It took a second to unpack that logic jump. He'd thought that someone grabbed his foot. His new pal had been far away... so... Leo gestured upwards in a sort of a-ha!
"Astral projections? You want to know about that, right?" Another guess. Leo grabbed out his little book and flipped through the pages. "It's a hard one to document because, y'know. Mostly invisible." Leo shrugged.
He was shaky. That's was what adrenaline with no outlet did to him. Leo'd just gotten so riled up he was, even now as he walked away, mentally reviewing what they had each said to one another.
Could he have been calmer? Clearer? Did he say enough? Not enough?
Leo felt as if he could jog for miles before he got tired. Maybe he should just to make sure there was distance between him and them. It was lucky that woman hadn't figured out what Leo had already been doing. She would have assumed the worst, no doubt...
His train of thought was derailed by a voice calling out to him. He turned to look back. It was the man, the hero. The woman was still sputtering at nothing in particular. Hopefully she would clear it all up with the police and no one would get in trouble. Leo didn't want any trouble, not even for her.
Did Leo even want to talk to this guy?
Considering the first thing he blurted out was about mutants? Yeah. He did want to talk.
Leo eyed the young man as they continued to walk instead of answering immediately. He didn't actually seem that much older than Leo. He had assumed the guy was older because of the bulk. By comparison, Leo was at least 50% more puffy jacket. The evidence was piling up— The hero complex. He'd seen Leo's field notes and come to the conclusion that Leo was a mutant. The beefcake build. Plus, there was a little bit of vulnerability that he detected, in the man's voice and face. Like he'd just said a naughty word or something.
"I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that there's no invisible guy, is there?" Or maybe, Leo was just looking right at him.
The Scream was an accurate depiction of what Leo felt inside. Impressionistic, aggressive strokes of feeling formed a picture of horror, sheer horror at these people. One roll of film ruined. One notebook compromised.
"I amb not a terrorist or a thiebf, okay!" That should have been a question, but it'd come out with more exasperated force than he'd intended. It was time to shut this down. Now. Leo stopped dabbing at his bloody nose and stomped toward the pair of wannabe do-gooders with his hands up in a placating gesture despite the irritation twisting his face.
Once he came within grabbing distance, Leo pointed at the woman with a bloodied finger.
"You call the cops and you apologise, lady. I'll bet they'll send someone out to check anyway, but you're going to tell them the truth." He then grabbed his camera out of her hands in order to inspect the damage.
The film roll hadn't popped out. It was possible that the portions of film that were not directly exposed would be okay. Or, the photos might suffer from light leaks. At this point it was about more than photos. It was about her assumptions.
She sputtered, finally at a loss for words. Leo snapped the back of the camera into place and advanced the film 3 times. Then he grimaced in anticipation of what might have happened to his long range lense. He was clearly familiar with the equipment. No obvious cracks. Had he actually managed to not break everything?
"And you." Leo grabbed his notebook out of the nosy Mc-Wannabe-Hero's hands. "You best check yo'self before you wreck yo'self. I swear, everybody and their dog has a hero complex in this town." He stuffed the notebook back into his bag and took his sweet time securing the camera into its properly padded spot.
"B-but why'd you run?"
The question of the day, Leo guessed. He stood and put the bag's strap over his head.
"You didn't give me a chance. You went from 0 to screaming, man. Er- lady. Ma'am." He was trying not to be rude despite all that'd happened. While it might feel good in the moment, Leo knew that kind of vindictive behavior was not going to change someone's worldview. This lady was used to being right and used to being heard. Hopefully today would make her stop and think before she said something next time.
"No, I—"
Nope. Leo put his hands up, turned on his heel, and walked away. Nothing she could say would change that. Sermon delivered. Leo out.
It didn't matter exactly where he was going. He just wanted out so that he could find a quiet place to get the nervous energy out from their confrontation.
Leo took a chance and popped off the path and back into the underbrush. He stopped abruptly behind a tree and slapped his hand over his mouth to quash that burning need to breathe loudly. Trees were brown. His jacket was brown. He was rather tan. He was trusting that was enough camouflage to keep him out of harm's way without making him run much more. His legs were warm with the familiar ache of exertion. He could run more, easy, if only he could manage to catch his breath.
Mr. Sucker punch called out to Leo. No doubt an attempt to lure him back out to the open. Meanwhile Ms. Can I talk to your Manager? had caught up.
"What are you talking about?" was quickly followed by an incredulous, "What is this junk?" She stooped down to pick through the bag, handing a black notebook labeled "field journal" to her savior and picking up the camera. It was then that she noticed her own bag as it slid around her to sit next to the bag on the ground.
"Oh." Clearly embarrassed, the woman bobbled the camera in her hands and the shutter snapped, flustering the woman further. That photo would likely be all black since Leo'd managed to get the lens cap on. "Stalker? Unibomber? Geez. I think we just accidentally stopped a terrorist. I mean why else would he have run, right?"
Leo could hear her mounting her defense now. She was trying to save face and surely had to get her story right before the cops showed up. He tensed. The leaves at his feet meant that if he moved at all, he would be heard. He just had to be still. Wait it out. Right?
"Let's see what's on his camera. You never know what evidence—"
"Noooo!" Leo popped back out of the woods. The film! Most people these days were used to digital. "It's analog—!"
Too late. She'd pushed the back release button which opened the entire back half of the camera. The film, now exposed to the light, turned a milky brown.
Leo’s hands and arms went up in the air. Not in surrender, but in an expression of sheer incredulity. This was a serious misunderstanding all based on the fact that he’d dare to share a bag color with a Can I speak with your manager? type.
“Police?” The word squeaked out as if he hadn’t already experienced his fair share of puberty. Leo got up even though his throbbing face told him he should probably keep down.
His Mama was gonna kill him dead.
And Mr. Sucker Punched was apparently a hero in his own mind. Standing up was so threatening that Leo apparently deserved… well it didn’t matter what that guy thought Leo deserved because Leo was not planning to take it.
“¡Para! She’s freaking crazy, dude!”
He didn’t have time to grab his bag. He left it all. While he’d been just trying to get away from something potentially awkward before, now he was running away to keep from getting arrested for no reason.
He’d done the whole ‘righteous anger for unfair incarceration’ thing before. No. Seriously. He had. And it sucked. It sucked when no one listened to you. It sucked when you were subverted. It sucked to be wrongfully incarcerated, stereotyped, and descriminated against. And it sucked to try to free those who were on the wrong side of the bars.
"Stop running!" The woman complained, still not even caught up to Leo's bag.
They sometimes got these odd spring days in the middle of winter. Not that Leo was complaining. The day was an oasis, something different and welcome. Unlike real spring when people would know they had plenty of mild days to enjoy ahead, people were lured en masse into poking their heads out of hibernation and seeking that sweet siren song of the sun.
It made a perfect excuse to go out and try his hand at finding some original content.
He packed his tactical bag carefully, fully aware of the dangers he faced. Running was just about guaranteed so everything had to be secured. He brought cash and his bus pass, but no ID. And, even though it pained him, he left his phone in his room. Ever since he'd been detained for protesting in Australia without his Mama knowing, the woman had kept a closer eye on him via family location tracking. She was getting scary good at this technology stuff.
Central Park seemed the most logical location to start so he rode the bus there and then hailed a group of men with tree trimming equipment. With a jumble of English, Spanish, and— was that Lebanese?— he was able to ask what parts of the park had any anything interesting going on.
From what he could tell, Leo had options. In the open field area there seemed to be a group of old people practicing Tai Chi or Yoga or whatever old people practiced these days. And a bug mutant in the woods past the Alice statue. A couple odd groups on the footpaths, one of which was doing something with foam swords.
Oh. So tempting to go join the LARPers. But Leo had a duty as an AX-man and a resident of New York. Not everyone was lucky enough to have such a dense population of mutants.
Half an hour later, from the depths of a hedge, Leo's SLR shutter clicked and he pulled the film advance lever automatically. Digital was nice, but mutants affected all kinds of things in odd ways.
A wasp landed on his viewfinder as Leo adjusted the lense to get a better shot of what looked like insect wings on a chick. There was an X-chick who'd had wings once, right? Or was it armor? Or eyes? There were some serious theories about what her actual power was. Leo jotted down a note in his field journal, and casually flicked the wasp off of his viewfinder.
The next time Leo brought the camera up to bear, the girl was looking right at him.
Casually, oh so casually, Leo slipped backwards out of his hiding spot. His brown coat snagged on a branch so Leo slipped his camera into his bag and yanked backwards to free that last little bit. That put him quite suddenly in the path of a querulous woman. They rebounded off of one another and Leo had to dive to catch his bag from hitting the ground.
"Is that my purse?"
"Purse? No. It's a tactical bag." Leo plucked at the canvas of his man-purse and noticed he'd bumped her bag around to sit behind her. They were similar in color and shape, but he was clearly—
"STEALING!" She grabbed for him and Leo scrambled back and up to his feet.
"Wha-?" It did. not. compute.
"HELP! POLICE! THIEF!"
Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap. He panicked and bolted. He shouldn't have, but she was a nice looking lady and Leo was brown and already probably acting suspicious. He was also running away because CRAZY. The lady would realize her mistake soon enough and be embarrassed and they could all laugh about it from a SAFE DISTANCE AWAY FROM EACH OTHER.
And then his foot caught on nothing.
He was quite sure there had been nothing there. It almost felt like something grabbed him, but he didn't have time to process.
Having only a tenuous hold on his bag to begin with, when Leo face planted into the cobblestones the tactical bag went bouncing ahead of him, contents spilling. His nose hit first and Leo shouted out his anguish and he rolled over, ready to defend himself with slaps or words or something.
—But nobody was there. There was a guy not too far away on the ground who looked like he'd been sucker punched and far back toward the way they came the woman was still trotting up to the scene.
"Dib someboby invibible just run througb here!?" Aug! Leo tasted blood and dabbed gently at his nose.
"Did he hurt you, sir?" She shouted ahead, slowly and steadily catching up. "I'm calling 911."
He could get lost in that accent. Actually, sometimes he did, if the freckles didn't first capture him.
Ehm. Books. Baseball. FOCUS, MAN. The internet was counting on him. "Good afternoon, Miss G. I'll try to keep the worst of them off you, no doubt."
He indicated the chair that was ready and waiting. She looked nice. She always looked nice, though.
"Uh. I know Jiri usually does this, but your fans are pretty rabid and Jiri is taking a nap so we're gonna try the best that we can here." When wasn't that kid napping these days? Ever since he'd figured out the couch in front of Gemma's office was in range of her anti-mutant field, Jiri could be found there as often as Gemma was in office. His sleep schedule was pretty messed up as a result.
"They're actually battling in chat right now for who's gonna get the first question so we'd better start." How did Jiri do this all so smoothly? "So. Yeah. You've already seen the other staff AMAs and all. D'you have any questions before we start? Anything you are dying to answer? That kinda stuff."
He adjusted the webcam and made his way behind screen. This was about the mutants, not the behind the scenes guy.
Once she was ready, Leo hit record and the red "live" indicator light flicked to life.
"Hellooooo, Internet. LionOfTruth here subbing for InvasionOfTheBS. Today we have the ever lovely Miss Rebecca Grey AKA PixelBecky. She teaches English at Xavier's Sister School, but is better known for her video blog. Yeah. I'm not saying "vlog" that's- nobody calls 'em that, sorry Miss G." A shrug and Leo bumped into the computer monitor which sent the webcam wobbling. Ack! He reached out to grab and steady it before the thing fell over and he got a dozen complaints about his fingers being in the way. He kept talking to cover up his careful re-balancing of the camera.
"We're here to answer your questions. Don't just spam your questions out in chat, okay? Go upvote like you're supposed to. I don't want to miss anything important. Let's see here..." Now that he had both hands he could scroll around as needed.
"First question: 'Are you single?' There's a lengthy comment with a lot of names in it, but that's the only question mark I see, PM_ME_BUTTS."
"Can you give us a demo of your power?"
"What's it like to teach at mutie school? It's only mutants allowed up there, isn't it?"
Alex breezed right in. No big deal. Yeah. Leo could do this. He could.
Be cool. Be cool. Be cool.
Leo moved with robotic inefficiency that came from him over analyzing every movement. He could feel her eyes on the pair of them, but was entirely too self-conscious to look right at her to see what kind of look she had on her face.
Was he walking too fast? Too slow? Did she think he was here to steal stuff? Leo took his hands out of his pockets. How had his hands gotten in his pockets? No one walked with their hands in their pockets. That was WEIRD. He needed his hands to find chips.
"Hey."
Leo tried to inhale and answer out loud at the same time and he ended up gagging on absolutely nothing. He heard the hinged countertop bang back into place and footsteps. Footsteps did not make his tongue any smaller.
"I know you don't I?"
His excitement prompted several inaudible exclamation points to come out of his mouth. His jaw obliged them by hanging open wide enough for them to escape. She stopped just a couple paces down the chip aisle.
"Yeah. You're that guy... You know the ice X, Cold Steel, don't you? He went to your trial and all of that? Wow. I mean, I guess I knew objectively that you lived around here. I never thought I'd actually meet you."
At first he felt a bit crushed at her enthusiasm, but no... it actually made more sense that way. Leo was careful not to be on camera since he knew his mother would drive the two hours just to come whap him with a flip-flop when she inevitably found out. Alex was somebody who was actually news-worthy.
"Oh. Sorry. I'm probably bothering you guys. Didn't mean to ambush. I'm Libby." She tapped her name tag which said the same, but was mostly covered in stickers of glib sayings or glittery cats.
For the moment, Alex's girl problems were subverted by his own. He had practically stalked his way into finding out where she worked. He knew her username, IP address, and cell phone provider, but not her real name.
"This was a bad idea wasn't it?" But they were already parking now. It was too late to turn back, wasn't it?
He'd already stopped by once. Leo bought a newspaper and his heart nearly beat out of his mouth when she made a quip to him about the cheeto in office that was running their country. He had tried to say something back. He'd wanted to sound smart. The best he'd managed was the word 'yeah' and then he kicked himself the entire ride back to the Mansion.
Oh. But there was one major difference this time... Alex.
"Drinks and snacks, right?" That is what they had originally come for. Leo unbuckled and got out. He had a wingman. Someone to help him not be one big walking butt. They could be cool and relaxed and natural. "What's your poison?"
He opened the door and hesitated at the threshold because angels started singing in his head. There she was. Purple hair. Earbuds in. Phone in hand.
She was perfect.
And she looked right at him because the door chimed.
Anonymous internet anecdotes indicated that Axe was a surefire way for a dumb kid to overdo it in front of their crush. Miss Grey was not a peer that was likely to forgive. She was the unattainable, perfect teacher crush. She was sweet and lovely, her classes fostered a safe environment to talk and explore ideas.
And freckles.
So Leo dressed to impress and did not dare touch the axe.
Logically, he didn't have a snowball's chance, but even if love wasn't on the table, his professionalism was. He had to to represent. This was the first AMA since they'd, uh, visited Australia. The laptop they used to stream before had been the only casualty and he had yet to save up enough to source a replacement so, he had a webcam and he scheduled some time in the library.
He figured that one of the more private computer alcoves worked best so Leo set up shop there. Most kids used those more private spaces for more private affairs, but it'd help cut down on potential distractions. As per previous AMAs, Leo moved the screen to face away from the interviewee. He would be screening the questions. The chair was for the hot teacher. The webcam faced the chair. Everything seemed in place.
Leo opened up the chat and posted a hello that spurned a wave of emojis in response. The public was ready. Leo tugged at the cuffs of his button down shirt and settled in to wait for his English teacher to show up.
"I think I can see the appeal of a gun. Hypothetically." Mother nature had a twisted sense of humor and mutants were people deep down under all that power. "It's just not for me, man. I don't want that kind of responsibility." If he had training that might be a different story. In theory he didn't have a problem with guns. It was just that practice always turned out so different from theory.
And it was just sad that Alex didn't have anybody in his life. He was starting to let people in, like his step dad, but everyone deserved to be loved. Everybody. So Leo wasn't like pity sad. He was on board for fixing Alex's little 'problem.'
"We should fix that, man. I mean, trolling the park at this time of night is not gonna get you the kind of girl you'd want to introduce to you new dad so maybe that's out. There's gotta be somewhere..." Maybe there'd be more than one nice chick at the bodega. Leo sat on his hands to keep from pulling his phone out and checking for posts.
