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 Welldrinker Cult
A shadowy group is gaining power, drawing in people who are curious, vulnerable, or malicious, and turning them into Mystics. They are recruiting people into their ranks to spread the influence of magic in the world, but for what end goal?
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’m serious, Elliott. It’s haunted. Been on Afterlife: AMHP and everything! Something is going on. You should look into it!”
The green man stared at his red headed girlfriend, unsure what to do. He was at a loss.
“Kenzi, that’s not really... what I do. I handle muggers and stuff? Patrol work. Friendly neighborhood stuff, right?” Elliott said.
“Hmph,” Kenzi crossed her arms.
The conversation seemingly ended.
~Two days ago...~
“It’s getting worse, Ell.” Kenzi said. From out of nowhere. Continuing a days-old conversation, even.
Elliott blinked at her. “What is?” He said carefully.
“I read a blog.”
“Yeah?” Where was this going...?
“People living in the building are having vivid dreams or horrid nightmares. Many are afraid to sleep.” She said adamantly. “There’s this story about a little boy. Billie Porter.”
“Billie Porter.” Elliott repeated.
Kenzi told him.
Elliott halted full stop.
~And now-
Sick. He felt sick. The blogs all reported about the hero worship thing, the good dreams kids got. The artist who devoted an entire collection to the Daydream. The purple man. Whatever. But only one blog had talked about the kid who went off the deep end because the waking world was inferior to his dream life. Elliott didn’t even want to detail all the crap that went wrong. Whoever this thing was, whatever this thing was, it was some sort of monster.
Maybe it had wanted the kids to have happy dreams, to make up for the twisted crap it gave the general populace. But it had gone too far. The boy was in an asylum now and Elliott hadn’t even realized those things still existed!!
Kid had sent an open message, a truly demented thing, promising $1 to the person who could bring him the Purple man. So he could thank the horror. And beg it to take him back. Into his dreams.
Elliott didn’t want that $1. But he did want to talk to the purple man. He didn’t want to thank him. He wanted to kick his ass.
The kid slept most of the day. Listless. The rest of the time, he spent drawing pictures of the things he’d dreamed. Jagged lines, dark motion. Bright colors. Twisted. The kind of abstract expressionism that spoke to you. The kind only children could create.
Elliott was not sure if he could fix him. It was probably a one in a million case about the kid. Because yeah, sure, he had read about dozens of cases. Dozens. That seemed positive! At least, for the kiddos. Adults got it worse. But they were better equipped to differentiate. To tell the living world from the dream. They had a barrier. Tools. This guy had played with fire, manipulating people. Messing with them. Messing with kids. Elliott was no saint. He had done things he regretted. But one thing he had vowed, since after he’d turned over his new leaf, was this: you don’t mess with kids. And yes, that was about as cliche as cliche could get. Maybe he just needed justification to investigate this. Because it was out of his comfort zone. And he’d had to deal with something messed up the last time he’d gone outside his wheelhouse.
He found himself humming Santa Claus is coming to town, and he shuddered. Then, he strolled into the building.
He was dressed in steel-toed boots that felt uncomfortable for his two-toed feet, black three-fingered biker gloves, blue jeans and a black leather jacket with Kevlar inserts. Oh, and his green motorcycle helmet with the wide Cheshire grin and the jagged teeth. The one he had painted himself. With the lolling tongue and the tinted visor to obscure his features. Shoes and gloves were an oddity for him, but hey. He wasn’t planning to climb any walls here.
A bell dinged. The door swung back shut.
A fairly normal apartment building lobby. He’d been in enough to know the basic layout. What was not usual was the little bulletin board full of fan art. He didn’t immediately pay attention to the person near the board. Just felt his feet get drawn toward it, out of what could have been morbid curiosity.
Would the board have it? And what was his plan here to confront the nightmare?
Cheshire scanned the board.
“There.” He placed a finger about an inch away from touching the page. A psychedelic scribble, with a yellow and pastel pink swirl that reminded him of a fingerprint. In its center, harsh dark lines. Darkest purple. A silhouette. A man. Above the swirl, a blood orange sun so harshly scrawled onto the page in crayon it almost tore the paper. In the bottom right hand corner, a name. “Billie Porter.”
He felt sick. Had felt sick. But oh, it came back all over again.
“Can you believe this guy...” He muttered, not really paying attention to who he was talking to, If anyone. Mainly, he was just being disgusted, and talking to himself. “All the worship... but this kid is in the mental Health hospital because his real life was dim in comparison to the dream... spends all his time sleeping. Hoping for good dreams.”
The kid was a stammering wreck. Crying. And mom was out of sight and out of mind. “Should be illegal...” he muttered. And oh, it kind of was.
>> “Something happened to Santa!” He cried.
And now the boy was gonna make him responsible for ruining Christmas. Gods dammit. He was already green, IRL. He got all the Grinch jokes every winter. This would just exacerbate that. And he really didn’t want— god.
He should have just let the cops handle this. But then, his old friend Benji would have interfered. Told him to “be better.”
He glanced around, sighed, and held up his hands to try and talk the kid down from starting a riot. “Look. Kid. This is just Santa’s helper and he’s, sure, having a bad day.”
That was an understatement. But— what could you do?
“Keep your voice down. You don’t want to make people more upset, or else Santa can’t get the help he needs from his, his elves. And,” he glanced over his shoulder at the not-so-distant sound of a radio. Mall cop, probably. Rubbernecking to see what was going around. “And his pigs.” He finished lamely.
“Maybe we can get them to help you find mommy.” So I can leave, he thought to himself.
All he had to go on, all Cheshire had to go on, was the evidence he could see when he landed. His very special costume bathroom time had cost him the precious moments after the hit, when things like the attacker fleeing may have been visible. What he had was a scared kid, and anything amateur detective skills could handle.
Usually, he left detecting to the detectives. Police hate a vigilante. They hate them even more when they directly interfere in matters related to an investigation. Pocketing shell casings, or rummaging Santa for loot tended to make their brows crinkle and their heartburn flare.
Elliott eyed the kid from behind a tinted helmet visor. His eyes, in fact, his entire face, was hidden. The mask just made him seem a smiling fool. He still wore shoes, too. Steel toed boots. Hopefully, he wouldn’t be called upon to climb on any walls. Such was the price of anonymity in a mall and changing on short notice.
Was the kid scared? Scarred? Did he know what had happened? Santa was looking pretty rough.
The crowd moved around him, shifting, but Cheshire just stood a moment. Watching. From a distance of about 15-20 feet. Then, he stepped forward. Approached. And, the kid started to wail. He flopped,
Aaaaand Santa. Plopped.
Oy vey. Elliott paled the forehead of his helmet, and let the hand sliiide down the glass of the visor. This day, it was just going to be a disgusting pain wasn’t it? What? What else did 2020 have to offer, if not this? He was not sure what he had expected.
Here was hoping Kenzi got her niece out and off the scene. Because this, this had so not been what she had signed on for when she had agreed to show her sisters daughter Santa.
Here. A dead Santa. “And where is Tim Allen when you need him...” Cheshire grumbled. Louder, he shouted “Security!” Some elves cautiously, carefully, stepped forward. To— “Help with Santa. And call someone?”
To the kid, Cheshire said “I am so out of my depths here. If only you were a mugger, or an ax murderer. Look kid. Where are your parents?” Hopefully he hadn’t wet himself out of fear.
And how had Santa bit the bullet any way? He was no firearms expert but if it had been long range, the sound would have been... louder, would it not? He was just spitballing but it seemed to him a wound like that would likely have been a close range small caliber or— whatever. But— eh.
It just had not sunk in yet. For the moment, he focused on the kid while security elves did their work.
“On Dasher, on Dancer, on Prancer and Vixen! On Maya and Rudolph and Dinner and Nixon!” The little boy sang.
“Now, Donnie.” She patted his head, in the way parents do. Tenderly, lovingly. Reproachfully indulgent. “That isn’t how it goes. If you sing it that way, Santa is liable to explode.”
“Heh.” The little boy smirked to himself as he played with his stuffed bear. “Such a sight.”
Elliott stood behind his red headed girlfriend and her niece in the Frozen blue tutu and full-on product placement line. He hadn’t wanted to go out for the holidays. Especially not to visit Santa, something he really hadn’t ever done. But when Kenzi made that face, he just had to humor her and go with her to help out her busy sister with the niece unit. And the kid was okay. So, whatever. Unfortunately for him, it wasn’t just the two girls he stood behind.
The line was long. There were a good ten to twenty “people” ahead of him. Oh well. At least the music wasn’t Mariah Carey’s all I want for Christmas is— what the hell was that kid ahead of him singing? Those weren’t the lyrics. Those weren’t the reindeer. And—
What, to his non-existent alien ears arose with such a clatter. He glanced towards the chair to see what was the matter. He saw.
Morbidly, he grimaced and said “Like a bowlful of jelly...”
Kenzi shot him an aghast look. Elliott glanced away pointedly, towards the bathrooms, and squeezed the backpack dangling at his side. She nodded. Without another word, he ran off. They had done this dance before. A couple seconds later, a tall man in a green motorcycle helmet with a macabre grin waltzed out of the men’s room in a black leather jacket. He raced towards the scene, tightening the green 3-fingered grip gloves he’d just pulled onto his hands. A backpack bobbed on his back. The whole transformation had taken but seconds, so he was still quick to literally leap thirty feet into the scene.
“What the hell happened,” he looked around trying to figure out cause or causer.
>>"Miss! Hey yoohoo! Can we try to sit down like reasonable semi-adults and talk this through? I realise your upset. I would be too, but this is not helping the situation and will only land you and not the derving party in jail."
Ooh boy. The guy. He was trying... sensible talk. Diplomacy. The language of adults. Just how exactly would this thing go, Elliott wondered. The jaded part of him, the Cheshire part, the part that was always smiling... it thought it would go over like the Hindenberg. Badly. But hell, he had five minutes. If they could break up the action to give the local constabulary time to arrive, it would be worth the wasted effort.
"Yeah," he chimed in. Lamely.
Just as he had thought, the attempt failed. She was undeterred from violence and destruction. Joy.
The guy tried to get his attention. Calling him Motorhead, of all things. He'd have to clue him in, he was Cheshire. Vigilante. This was sort of his area. Doing stupid, dangerous things he wasn't equipped for, or paid to do. To help people. Because he had a responsibility. Ha. Ha. Ha.
Yeah. He still thought it was hilarious that he actually thought the age old refrain about responibility and power meant a damned thing. Heroism doesn't make one a better person. it just helps one sleep at nights, knowing they've done something to prevent someone else from getting off worse than the vigilante, themself. Case and point, the guy got attacked. For trying to speak sense.
Boom, into the table. With a solid knock to the noggin. Looked nasty. Until the guy stood back up. Like a boss. And did something weird, with popping.
Cheshire said "Ew."
The guy said please don't do that again, and the girl just sort of... well. The fight went out of her.
"But they... bad people. They took my pet. And... I hit you SO HARD. How did you even just--"
"Heeeeey. Yeah. So anyways." Elliott picked up a chair. The same chair the guy had been sitting in a moment before. He stole it. He sat down in it. "Let's try this again. Before someone kills someone. Can't undo that. Can't we all just talk this out?"
"I should hit you. You're standing up for-"
"Heck no." Elliott cut in. He glanced back at the weird popping guy. "I think it's safe to assume we're both too stupid to be working for this restaurant as bouncers. We just sort of wandered in and wanted to be heroic, yeah? So, owners. SIT DOWN PLEASE." There was darkness in his voice. Elliott was not a squeaky clean, sweet vigilante boy child. He'd dealt with some stuff. And this was the sort of situation that could get really stuffy, really fast. If they could talk this girl down from throwing her life away in the American Justice system, and cleaning up her act... well. He honestly sometimes wished he'd been given a good little pep talk to get out of crime before he'd even started. Would have changed a lot of things.
The restaurant owners... the one who was still conscious, at least, sat down. Backwards. In a chair they had pulled up.
"Okay." The girl said. Then, she looked at Erik. "I'm sorry I hit you... I just... my cat..."
"Mrow."
A gray cat hopped up onto one of the few undisturbed tables in the restaurant. The girl's eyes lit up. "Snowball! But I thought-- with all the animals who vanished lately... and this place. Smelled like you, all the way up here. For my senses. And--"
"My wife... mutant." The restaurant owner said, blandly. "Animals come. She feeds them. They do not like to go. Some stay. Does not mean we serve them. Not THAT WAY, least."
The sprinklers, they sprinkled. The bears, they bawled. Soggy as they were, their mobility was severely impaired. Weakness bared, as water beared down on them. What a grizzly fate.
Elliott... just could not take this entire day seriously any more. He momentarily took leave of his senses to let his mind wander off and create dumb puns as he charged with Mal and the others, and engaged in some ruthlessly stuffy violence on inanimate objects. White fluff rained. Bears got gutted gud. It was all just too violent and messy to describe here, for the G-rated crowd who like stuffed bears. Suffice it to say, the bears masses were parted as they pushed their way forwards, towards the back room.
Mal shouted out a suggestion about fallback and tactics.
Elliott sighed. "Whew. Yeah. Let's just. Like. Keep a few back to guard our rears. We don't want to bare our asses to these bear asses now do we? Okay. Lets push on dude. Who is the ringleader here?"
Without waiting for confirmation, or anything of the sort, he pushed past people through the doors, into the back room. He was met by a miniature army of bears guarding a sniveling, laughing, maniacal bipolar villain of odd sorts. The puppetmaster of the whole thing.
Elliott took one good look at the army of bears. Some of them had tools and crossbows from the sporting goods store nearby. He just really did not want to mess with any of this. So... he cheated.
He stepped back out the door. Looked at everyone. "Even more bears. With crossbows and chainsaws."
He bent and stripped off his socks and shoes. Revealing green feet. Then, he pushed back into the back room with a "Wish me luck!" called over his shoulder.
He hunkered down, sprang up to the ceiling, and started running across it, upside-down. He stopped above the main bad guy, and did a flip to land in front of him. The blood had rushed to his head, making it feel a little light. So he wanted to finish this quick. He dropped down and swept the guy's legs out from under him. And then, he dove on him and started pummeling him with his fists.
"Call. Them. Off!" He shouted. Each word emphasized a blow.
As he worked, the bears... they all turned... starting a Carebear Stare. In his direction. Their eyes, they glowed. Like something from a Horrorfilm. Teddy Bears of the Corn.
'Weird ears', Andrea repeated. She didn't ask further.
"Weird ears, because super human hearing." He hastily explained. Wiggled his hands by his head, to demonstrate too.
"She could hear everything, except the sound of my heart breaking when I learned the truth," he added earnestly. To be melodramatic and wax poetic about the whole thing. He never had been poetic, up until recently. His current girlfriend must have some sort of power, to bring that sort of bullsense off from him. Bullsense... bullsh*& nonsense.
>>"Well... I'm certainly happy that you have Kenzie now. You two seem to work so well together." Andrea smiled.
"Er, yeah. I was actually thinking the same thing." He agreed. Well, sort of the same thing. General ballpark.
Andrea suggested a dinner and a movie sort of thing. Elliott's eyes lit up.
"Hey, yeah? Like a double date! But, then. You'd need a someone. Don't you have... a someone?" He couldn't remember. She was in and out, and he was in and out, and they were so busy. But he felt like she had to have someone. Some person, guy, girl. Platypus. She was definitely good enough for someone special.
Oh man, this was messy. People had fled, the front window was totaled, the crazy cat B was throwing chairs and tables, and the owners were cowering in fear. And worst of all, he wasn’t sure who the villain was here.
What had the lady been shouting? Something about an animal? Snowball? Had these people done something to her animal? Stolen it, or— oh THAT was nasty! Who would even think that? That was totally uncalled for, and unfair too. Just because it was a Chinese joint. Except
“This is for Snowball!” She shouted, and hurled a chair. Elliott threw himself to the floor, and let it sail over his head. It crashed into a wall and dented the wall a split second later. That had nearly been his neck.
A moment later, some guy got his attention. Of all things to ask, he wanted to know if Elliott were with her?
“No. No,” he said. He shoved himself off the ground with one arm and got to his feet. “I am definitely not... though I’m not sure if she’s the real bad guy here or not.” He glanced around the other guy. “Needs to stop wrecking the joint, sure. But did you catch what she was shouting about? Sounds like someone stole her pet.”
As if on cue, she shouted again. “You took Snowball! Where is he?! He better not be—“ She raised an entire table in her arms, and hauled it over her head.
Hrm.
Elliott shouted “Think fast!” And kicked a plastic vase her way. It crashed into her shin and she staggered back, dropping the table.
The call went out on all police and X-men radio wavelengths. Another big angry mutant causing trouble in New York. Oh joy.
He’d been doing this for a while now, hadn’t he? Elliott remembered when he was in his 20s, making mistakes. Being an ass clown. How long since he’d begun the hero thing? A year or two? More? How long had he been with his girl? And now, he was 27. The time flew when you were busy fighting for your life.
Elliott stashed the police scanner in a drawer in his room, put away his paint brushes, and got dressed for work. He’d have to finish the abstract painting later.
What had the police scanner said the monster was? He couldn’t remember. Something about Taylor Swift and that damned movie with way too much — ... eh. He didn’t care. He’d see it when he saw it. Whatever It was.
He pulled on his wrist guards, elbow and knee pads, and his fancy feetwork shin guards with the toe plate that covered the front of his feet, but left the bottoms bare. Pulled on fingerless gloves. The leather jacket went on last, over the black tee with a UFO on the chest and the words ‘I want to believe!’ A gift. Kenzie liked Z Archives. He inserted a few Kevlar strike plates into special pockets in the vest. Then, he pulled on his motorcycle helmet. The one with the green paint job and the scary smile. Now dressed for duty, he went off to save the day.
—
It was weird, doing hero work in the light of the sun. Usually, Elliott operated at night. Because the darkness helped hide his features, and added that extra element of fear he could use against thugs. But today, the painting had... not been going great and he’d wanted to take his mind off of it. And one thing had led to another.
The place where the trouble had originated was... a Chinese restaurant down by the college. He parked his motorcycle several blocks away, and ran the rest of his he way to the scene over the rooftops. When he got there, the police had yet to arrive. It seemed calm... from the outside. Did he have the address right?
Usually, when police got calls about big mean mutants, they were big, mean, and highly visible. You rolled up and, bam! There it was. But here... well... Elliott walked up to the front entrance and strolled in in.
Weird. People were just... eating lunch. Acting normal. Yeah, he decided. He’d gotten one Chinese restaurant confused with another. That’s what he got for only half listening to the dispatch and going by memory.
He smiled at the hostess through his motorcycle helmet, and was about to pull it off and just act casual. Eat lunch. But then— someone rushed through the front doors, and forced their way past him. They looked like a gray cat fused with a woman. In rag-like clothes.
Elliott eyed them as they entered the restaurant. And then, things got messy. And the screaming began.
~A few moments before~
“Freaking place,” the girl muttered under her breath. “Gonna wreck em. I knew it. Effing knew it. Did all the digging, and now I’ve got em. Gonna get em. Gonna— sorry.”
She turned to apologize to some guy she had bumped into. Looked like he’d just gotten food. Hopefully not from the same place she was going.
As she spun and turned her focus back to the matter at hand, fur began to crawl up her cheeks and down her arms. And the muttering grew louder.
“GONNA KNOCK EM OVER. Snowball. Gonna teach em a lesson! Gonna—“ The bell rang as she shoved her way through the restaurant’s double doors.
A moment later, the front window exploded outwards and shouting spilled out onto the street.
That... was a flamethrower, wasn’t it? He had a flamethrower. Or she. It. On top of the stuffing machine. And they had created a freaking castle, made of crap. The dissonance of the situation brought Elliott’s mind to a momentary halt.
“Wow.” He said.
It was almost like they had prepared for just such an occasion, we’re gearing up... and planning to create more of them. Like a vampire party where they turned innocent people... His girlfriend had made him watch Buffy. Don’t judge.
The store workers were fighting for sovereignty over their own domain. Blocked in, scared. Or rather, disturbingly calm for the situation they were in. If it had been him, he’d have been scared. If he hadn’t had these dumb powers he had.
One of the workers even had a safari hat. How weird.
He followed after Malcolm, hacking down bears and guarding the man’s back. Reinforcements, yeah. He had to be a bit kookoo in the head head.
Heh.
Mal took charge, asking good questions. The man shook his head.
“No injuries yet. But that flamethrower. We need to take that one out before he sets something on fire.”
“Although then, we’d trigger the sprinklers and be rewarded with an army of soggy bears...” Elliott muttered, as his eyes strayed to the ceiling. Several sprinkler heads were visible at spaced intervals of about 6-10 feet. One head happened to be directly overhead for the flamethrower bear.
Was he... suggesting they set something on fire to make the bears soggy and heavy?
“Are you... are you suggesting we set off the sprinklers to make the bears soggy and heavy?” The safari hat man asked. Without waiting for confirmation, he grinned at them both. “Boy, I like your style! Pedro! You smoke right? Why don’t you light one up! Smoke em if you got em boys. When the sprinklers go off we’ll charge the castle, using the rain as a distraction!”
“Did I just... accidentally a plan?” Elliott blinked at Mal.
“When we get the castle, we’ll handle the monsters in the store... and work our way to the back room where He is holed up. With about 20 heavy infant tree bears.”
Awkward. Well. God forbid. He'd already stripped in front of her that night. And bled all over her stuff. What was a little awkwardness between friends, after all of that?
He nodded, and listened as she composed her thoughts. Ex-husbands were a sticky subject. But she didn't sound like she hated him...
He had been one of the X-men. Those goofy goody two-shoes who had chased him away from the mansion because he'd been doing the same thing as them. Just... not as part of a team. With a name like The Masochist, the guy sounded just as goofy as the triangle-eyed Asian man. Elliott kept him mouth shut. This was her ex-husband, not the butt of jokes. Not that second, anyways.
He had been one of the first people she had met in America. Grumpy grump, but he'd warmed up. Then she'd gone back to Greece and... he'd tagged along? Married her to get her back into the country legally. And-- Well, because.
Her parents had hated Masochist Man.
Then bad things had happened. And she'd been so caught up in her own stuff, that she felt she could not bring him along. He felt bad for her. That was no good. She had been overwhelmed. The marriage had fallen apart.
But at least, he sounded happier now. Married, with children. Well. Child. Singular. And she was happy for him. She did not hate him. In fact, she cared about him a lot.
She felt like it was cowardice not to try and talk to him... because it was awkward.
Elliott frowned. "You aren't a coward. I don't know enough about your personal life... or his... to say anything about all of that. But it sounds like he's happy. And you want him to be happy... so you're just letting him be happy on his own. Nothing cowardly about that." He shrugged. "People who save my life don't get to call themselves cowards. Not within earshot of me. Er, You know. Even with the lack of ears."
He coughed into his fist. Had that been coherent, like, at all?
"You know what's awkward? My last ex had weird giant ears, and cheated on me with a rock guy. Then dumped me for a rock." At least, he had a good girlfriend now.
>>"... much as I love being a big damn hero, I would also rather not be a big dead hero." Mal said.
"No," Elliott agreed dryly. "Dead is bad." Very bad.
He wished the sporting goods store had been a hardware store. If it had been a hardware store, they'd have been able to get a chainsaw. Maybe a torch. Nail gun? But the sporting goods store had camping supplies and stuff, and that was good too.
Mal got a hammer, a hatchet, and a machete. For him... what would be best? He usually fought with his feet. With his sticks. He'd trained with his friend Kineta in other weapons. Staff. Knives.
He nabbed the gear belt, and strapped a long-bladed knife to it. Then, he grabbed two machetes and a hatchet for the opposite side of the belt. To sort of balance himself out.
Really, he should have just taken a tent and stripped the package of its tent spikes, or purchased tent spikes on their own. Wandered around the store, staking the bears. Left a trail of skewered bears in his wake. It would have been impressive... if impractical.
Could have used a walking stick, too. Given him some range. Maybe strapped a machete blade to one end. But he was not too confident in his skills with the staff. Knives, though... he'd played with those all throughout his teens and adult life. A couple machetes was good enough for stuffed animals. It'd be good enough for him.
He scraped them together briefly, then sheathed them and hung them from his belt.
When he stepped up next to Mal, the guy grinned like a happy fool and cracked a joke about hammers to the cashier. Why the hammer? Why the hammer, indeed.
He was last out the door. As soon as Mal was safely out of earshot, he told the cashier. He jabbed a thumb in Mal's direction, and announced "The hammer is his--"
--
Outside the store, he matched the same manic grin. "Okay. Let's fight some fuzzy bears. Wokka wokka."
Elliott lead their way to the Build a Bear Workshop. It was time to rain stuffing. Despite gearing up and being fully aware of the sort of craziness he was likely to see... when they reached the store finally, Elliott... was. Not. Prepared. For what he saw.
Gully was Gully’s name. Good. He had not lied. Elliott had seen the tattoo on the side of the guys face. Matched the name given well enough. If he’d lied, he’d have been caught in it.
Gully pressed on his chest to nab his attention, and he slowed to a stop. His eyes fell on the two men.
The skinny guy caught them staring, and asked if they were alright. Elliott wasn’t sure why Gully was wary. Maybe being nervous about late night loiterers was fine. Especially after having been mugged. Or maybe they were just nervous about the weirdo in the happy helmet?
Silent guy never said anything, just knocked on the window in the glass door. His compatriot interpreted for him. The shop was closed, huh? Then why wasn’t the metal grill rolled down?
A memory of a movie he had watched once with his girlfriend popped into his head. Something in black and white, but not a golden oldie. Something about a couple of convenience store clerks and a broken door. A cardboard sign painted in shoe polish or something. ‘I assure you, we are open.’
They were blocking the way. In this day and age, most convenience stores were open 24 hours, for your convenience. Something screwy was going on here.
“Something screwy is going on here.” Elliott said to Gully. Quietly, so only the two of them would hear. “I’m going to lean you against the wall. One sec,” he said. Then, moved them over to a brick wall and matched his action to his words.
He stripped off his fingerless gloves, and flexed green fingers. The helmet smiled innocently at the blonde guy.
“Say. One of you wouldn’t happen to have a cell phone would you?” He asked cheerfully.
The silent guy said nothing. Typical. The blonde guy shrugged.
“My friend over there is injured. I just want to call him a cab so he can get home safe and sound. Help me out?”
Blonde sneered. “We don’t got any cellpho—“
The quiet guy held up a flip phone. Elliott glanced to Gully. “Want a cab?”
Real blades. Yeah. Mal man was right. Right about a lot of things.
“I’m Elliott,” he said.
He glanced towards the man. The guys tray was looking rough. They’d need to find him a better weapon, or else finish this before it got out of hand.
An elderly woman in the distance screamed, and sent a bear into the ceiling with a rising uppercut. Two stories up. It had almost flown, as if propelled by unseen force rather than strength alone. They could use her in their team... but no, she was just protecting a clutch of kids.
>>”From personal experience...” Mal said. Elliott returned his focus to the man.
Demonic creatures. Perpetrator. Got it. Guy asked if he was planning to stop it, and Elliott grinned a manic grin at him.
“‘Course I am. I’d have to be an idiot to try.”
Mal the human listed off bullet points on his supposed resume. “Glad to have you.” Elliott said quickly.
The dragon bear caught his attention. Caught Mal’s attention, too. So incredibly odd. And that was coming from a green space man with prehensile hand tongues and the ability to jump large distances in a single bound.
Mal seemed to think they were either cyborg bears, or else cartons come to life. “Best way to find out would be a vivisection. But I doubt they’d stand still long enough to let us do that.” He ran up and kicked a potted plant across the mall into the dragon. Stuffing flew and the flame cut off.
“They’re stuffed.” Elliott said. “Want to raid the sporting goods store for hammers and machetes, or do you just want to barge into the toy store with your tray and do what a man’s gotta to do?”
The guy reached for his hand, and then pulled away as if shocked by seeing his fingers.
Stupid of him. He should have kept up the distance. It wasn’t likely there were many green-skinned, three-fingered men in New York. The fingerless gloves helped mask some of his hand from view, but they weren’t perfect. He’d had to shop around online to find fingerless three-fingered gloves, too. A hacker type might be able to somehow reverse engineer his internet search history or something...
For a time, he had been worried he would have to buy five-fingered gloves, then cut off a few digits. That would leave the sockets glaringly open, and it just might inconvenience him at some point when such things mattered. Like in a fight. A loss of dexterity, any loss, directly affected his ability to snap sticks around like a mad mofo. He would have to fall back to his kicks... which he tried to hold off on. His kicks tended to be stronger than your average bear. Shame it covered his hand mouths. Prevented him from using his tongues. But then, you had to make some sacrifices to have warm hands.
The hesitation the guy showed annoyed Elliott a little, made him feel impatient. He’d stuffed his paranoia away. Couldn’t people do the same? Even if they were being helped by some strange “masked” man.
“It won’t bite,” he commented blandly.
Finally, the guy smiled at his awkwardly and moved to take the hand. Rested some weight on him, Elliott bore it graciously.
The guy asked him about the store, and Elliott grunted. “Mm. Yeah. About a block or two.”
Together, they stumbled couple of minutes without talking.
They could see a small convenience store ahead now, across the intersection, and about 100 feet down the street from that. It was a little hole in the wall with gas pumps out front and a red roof. The glass front windows looked like they were advertising brand beers, cheap. And cigarettes, cheaper. The ones that used to have a cartoon mascot.
There was a husky guy in a grungy black trench coat smoking out front with his friend. The first man was stout with dark facial hair and a backwards-facing black ball cap. The second one had long blonde hair pushed under a ratty stocking cap. He was clean-shaven, with a thin face. Smoke trailed from the cig held affectedly in his hand. He said something emphatically, and gestured for his friend. The other guy said nothing. He was silent.
Elliott and the man crossed to intersection. Traffic was nonexistent.
On a whim, Elliott said “So what’s your name? I’m Cheshire. Usually like to know who I’m buying cigs for. Been referring to you as Guy in my head, and gee but that seems impersonal.”