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.
His life had changed. It was getting increasingly hard to avoid the realization, or thinking about it. It was getting less consuming to think about too, fortunately. Maybe because he could think while running, and he found it so much easier to focus after the training stuff he did with Cafas?
At any rate, Adder dodged and darted between the trees of the forested part of the mansion's grounds, running full-tilt simply because he could, even though it was only a few hours after a round of exercise that liked to leave his body sweaty and tingly in places. Was this what being well fed did? It was a good thing Cafas had given him something to do, because otherwise he probably would vibrate through a wall or something. He couldn't just exist any more. He had to do as well as be.
Right now, what he was doing was challenging himself, simply because he could, and because if he did clip a tree and hurt himself he could just go inside and it would be fixed and he wouldn't even have to explain why. It was...
He didn't have words for it, just like he didn't have words specifically for the way his ankles shifted to keep him balanced on the uneven ground, or the feel of the ground under his toughened bare feet, or why he had decided to run on only two feet and keep himself from shifting. Just because? Maybe. There were places it would have been easier on four feet, like that path of jagged rock pieces he'd passed a while back, but he could also just jump it at the speed he was going, and so he did. He could have jumped farther with his tail to balance him, and the ability to curve his body and land on forepaws instead of the feet he'd pushed off with, but it was also kind of a challenge to do it the hard way, and he felt lighter when he landed the jump and kept on running.
Adder ran even faster for a while after that, starting to exhale through his mouth though he could still get enough air through his nose, and a side thought occurred to him: he could run faster as a wolf, but he could feel cooler through his entire body as a human. When he made himself warm, his fur could trap that too much in the summer. It was wonderfully warm in winter, and one of many reasons he'd survived, reasons without which he almost certainly would have died and probably in his first year alone, but in summer he could barely be glad his fur wasn't black.
He was thinking too much about wolf and he had decided he wasn't going to shift. Needed more human. What to think, what to think. There was an open area ahead of him. Change of scenery, change of thought? It would probably work, and it didn't mean he had to stop running.
Adder sprinted out of the trees, sweat streaking his still-super-new-to-him dark blue shirt under the flecks of tree and leaf and dirt he always picked up while running in the forest.
Adder's ears leaned back at not-cop-face-shifter's shrug. It wasn't followed with anything aggressive, though, so when he moved backwards it at least wasn't an outright bolt. He made note of the office location just so he could avoid it later, and decided to avoid the kitchen for a while as well just in case not-cop-face-shifter decided to try to catch him there.
Then, without another word, he turned to the side and trotted towards the rest of the trees, ears bent back towards not-cop-face-shifter and pace a practiced-awkward split between a human jog and a wolf lope.
Salt softy had made it! Adder let her lean against him, tail shifting a bit before he noticed and it fell still again. It didn't need to be moving. He just had to hang out and be still and not be racing from one thing to another.
And eat stuff, because it was there and salt softy had said outright that she wanted to share. So he should take her up on that. Sharing was... not something he was used to. It was kind of special. There seemed to be a range of people here who were willing to share with him, though he would still guard his food against them without a second thought.
This was shared-food, though, not his food, so he wouldn't steal it from salt softy. He would... he would share the shared food. Or at least try?
He was curious about the movie too, so he nudged her hand towards the screen with his nose. That was where the movie would be, yes? It had been a very long time.
Adder stiffened a little bit when the other guy started to move, but held off bolting until he saw it was just to pass the paper. It was... a frog? A picture of a frog, kind of, with lines everywhere. He wasn't used to people drawing frog guts, or really anything guts. He was much more used to pictures of healthy, perfect-seeming things.
"You're... behind in school?" And why worry about frog guts? They were all equally slimy but edible. And there wasn't really anything dangerous about them. Maybe that they could swim underwater and were slimy enough to be hard to catch. Learning about rats seemed more useful. They at least had nasty teeth. Or birds. How they flew, maybe.
"Why frogs?" Maybe there was actually some reason to it.
Stairs, stairs were awkward with four feet. But Adder was getting lots of practice, and he had to keep salt softy upright and stable. It wasn't a perfect job, and she still wobbled a little bit in place, but he was good and supportive and they got through it.
And then they were back to her room, or close enough, and she was telling him to go on ahead. Was she sure? She would be okay on her own? Okay, then he would go get settled, and also make sure no one had snuck in while they were gone!
He sprang away and into the room, and inhaled deeply while he did a quick investigation. No intruders. All was well. He pushed himself into the blanket fort and stretched out on his belly with a bit of a wiggle, settling himself down on the fluffiness. This was vaguely familiar, but he certainly hadn't done anything like this recently. Hm.
Had he stopped just because his parents had died and all?
Angry bear, angry Tyson, very regretful Adder. Tyson had bars for a shield, plus his claws were way tougher than Adder's own. He'd be totally fine. Adder, on the other hand, didn't heal unusually fast or anything, and as such wanted out while he was still fully intact.
Except the bear had turned towards him regardless of any threat display on his part, and he'd never fought a bear before. Sides were usually dangerous with animals, going over could be safer except he was vulnerable while in the air and he only had this instant to judge the bear's speed.
The green sleeper was in motion as well, although it took Adder a frantic heartbeat longer to notice, but by then he was already diving to that side, stretching out arms into paws and desperately dragging himself back into wolf for the protection of his pelt.
Hopefully he didn't mess with the guy's kick. At least he wasn't in line to catch it.
Laundry... day? The barely-existent sliver of relaxation that probably definitely didn't come from Cafas' approval fell over and broke, leaving a whole lot more confusion than should have fit into it. Maybe he could think this one through. It had to involve clothing, since it would leave him cold.
If he took his clothes off for something, though, couldn't he just put them back on? No, he was going to need more information on this. At some point. It probably wasn't really all that important.
"You said the one that felt best," Adder mutter-protested, but separated a second shirt from the bundle. It was dark blue and reminded him of shadows, so that was kind of reassuring, and it was only a little smaller than the one he had on now, so he felt the seams more but it didn't go as far as to dig into his skin. "This one's okay too." But he still didn't get why he needed more than one. He couldn't wear them at the same time, so he'd have to stash the other one.
Replacing his vest altogether was actually met with minimal resistance; it reminded him of fire now, a little bit, and it left his arms cold, and the zipper was broken and it was hard to open and close. But why did he have to go put his old shirt back on? Why not just wear this one? Was there some weird rich person rule for stores, that you had to carry things with hands and not wear them? What was the difference, really? If anything it would be easier to see it.
Was Cafas planning on sneaking it out? That would make wearing the old shirts make more sense. Then he could say that they hadn't found anything, and he would be believed, and then they could go and they would have the clothes.
It made enough sense, so he (still reluctantly) nodded and headed back to the change room. Where the zipper on his vest broke even more, and definitely wouldn't open or close now, so he had to haul it over his head (which he could do because his ribs didn't hurt!). He may have thrown it against the wall a little bit. He also left the changing room carrying it, and rather openly annoyed with it.
"It broke more," he explained, and tilted his head to look for what Cafas had found to replace it.
Size? That was a question he could answer! Adder's ears crept up a little bit, no longer quite completely stress-plastered to his head outside of their nervous flicking. "I can get any normal adult size on," he said. Some of them bit into his shoulders or his neck or his hips, though, and those ones didn't last very long. Plus he didn't like them. They were uncomfortable and sometimes outright hurt. There was kind of a problem when his clothes left more bruises than fists and sticks.
He did his best to keep pace as Cafas moved around, uncertain of the difference between the different shirts he was grabbing. Some of them looked like exactly the same shirt. Why would they bother to make everything same? Why not let them vary? Things weren't usually identical. There was probably a rich person reason, built on stuff he didn't know. They seemed to do that a lot.
The salesperson was moving. Adder paused midstep, vision almost completely blocked by the nearest rack, but he could hear her walking across the store. Her shoes made so much noise, at least to him. She didn't come towards them, just sort of across, paused and shuffled fabric-sound and a little bit of metal-sound, and then walked back to the counter to shuffle more fabric. Was she testing to see what they'd do? He wasn't going to move just yet. Had she seen him, really? Was she waiting to make a move? Waiting for other people to come? Cafas was rather intimidating, visually. And also he could reek when he had been on his bike, but other people never seemed to even notice smells even when they were so strong it felt like his whole face was going to fall off or crumple in on itself or catch on fire.
Speaking of Cafas. Cafas was talking. Adder had been paying more attention to the salesperson because Cafas was safe and not a threat, therefore he didn't have to spend all of his energy paying attention to exactly what Cafas was doing. Something about not testing to see if something ripped? The shirts? Why would he try to rip them? He just wanted them to not rip. Ripping them would defeat the purpose. And feel best to wear? That was. What even was that? Just not-digging-in and stuff? But they could just grab bigger sizes and go and then that wouldn't be a problem. Bigger was always easier and then he could wrap it around himself more when it got cold. Bigger had more. So why not get bigger?
The little doors Cafas pointed at looked like they would at least stop the salesperson from watching him, though, so he could play along with the whatever Cafas had in mind. After he got over there, now carrying a bunch of odd-smelling clothing. With intent and a destination, Adder's nervous energy slipped (more or less) into harness, and he moved fluidly through the racks as appropriate to avoiding the salesperson's attention. It was so much easier to go to a place than it was to just exist without notice. He had a specific reason, that helped. A purpose to it. A more defined one than just 'stay alive,' although that was an excellent reason that was always a good reason to do things.
He pushed into one of the change rooms with his shoulder, and then hastily put the clothes on the little bench and spun around to shove the lock closed. A quick, light test of the door to ensure it was actually locked, and then he could step back and breathe and calm down a tiny bit. He could hear and smell outside of the tiny room without issue, but he couldn't see, and if he couldn't see then he probably couldn't be seen. So then the salesperson couldn't be watching him even if she'd seen him get in here, which was possible but not guaranteed. He would work under the assumption she had and the hope she had not.
He just quietly, trying-not-to-think-it-at-all, worried that Cafas might leave while he was in there, for some reason, and did his best to follow Cafas' directions quickly.
The wolf shifter eventually emerged from the change room, some of his nervousness traded for a less familiar flavour of awkwardness. He kept his weight even more on the balls of his feet than before, just shy of rocking as he edged out. One arm gripped a bundle of cloth - most of the shirts Cafas had grabbed and not one but two clearly older t-shirts he had actually taken off - while the other hand tugged at the cuffs of one of the new shirts, a pull-over shirt that was maybe just a little bit big by other people's standards. For Adder, it was loose enough in the shoulders and throat that it didn't bother him, and he could hide his hands in the sleeves, and it didn't seem bothered by having his kind of slightly melted vest on top, and it felt like heavy material so it should last, even if the seams were all stiff and made his skin jump and crawl and chafe underneath. His old shirts weren't like that, but all of the new ones were, so maybe it was just how they were. Stiff. He was used to old things being stiffer than new things.
"This one fit the best," he told Cafas quietly, glancing over at the salesperson to see if she was bothered by him wearing and holding stuff he hadn't paid for.
"Hitting bruised kids is even worse than actually fighting them," Adder retorted flatly. Definitely too drunk to function. 'Allowed to' or not, either his job or he was messed up. Or both. Whatever it was, it wasn't only his job. Drunk Chihuahua was definitely messed up.
But not completely unaware of what was going on, so he clearly had some danger level. Probably mostly when he wasn't so drunk, but enough for a little of it to stick around. He seemed to be satisfied or something, though, and Adder held off making for the window as drunk Chihuahua made to leave.
"Clearly you've never tried to eat with a burnt mouth," he growled, but very quietly and after drunk Chihuahua had turned the corner. He wouldn't still be here if he hadn't worked out how to get food out of the place. The food access was what balanced out the sheer amount of people. Annoying people. Loud people. And now drunk people too.
Adder waited until he couldn't hear drunk Chihuahua anymore, and his smell had mostly faded, and then slipped into the hallway and away. Time to find somewhere more private to exist for a while.
Not-cop-face-shifter's mood seemed to shift a little bit, and while it did make the guy a bit less threatening it didn't put Adder at ease at all. Plus he seemed to think that Adder had only just arrived. Should he let him keep thinking that? It was another layer between them, deflecting all the nasty dangerous stuff that went with attachment and familiarity.
He didn't want to spend too much time with not-cop-face-shifter either, though, so another tour was definitely out. Plus wandering around like that would probably draw nosy noisy kids who didn't know how to keep their fingers to themselves, and rich adults didn't take well to him even snapping at kids. Human or wolf snapping. He wouldn't have to if they taught their brats properly.
"I know where the food is," he said by way of tour-dismissal, but almost immediately figured that that wouldn't be enough to actually dismiss not-cop-face-shifter. "And there are too many people inside. So no."
Adder would work out just when he'd seen a bear before later. It was probably a vague childhood thing. Bears didn't exactly wander around New York City that much; those that did were mutants.
That this was almost certainly a mutant didn't stop him from sidling at maximum speed to the side, shedding his fur in an off white haze as he went and dropping into a human crouch. Coming here was a bad idea. One stranger was one thing, but now there was a very large bear reeking (and roaring) almost entirely of bitey predator, gtfo now taking up most of the space, and another person behind the bear.
Basically, this had escalated way too quickly into DANGEROUS CROWD and now he wanted out, but the only way out was through the person behind the bear.
Adder eyed her. He could probably shove past her, especially as a wolf. Better balance and all. But if he were that close to the bear for another roar... or if shifting drew the bear's attention...
Rich people in general, and especially rich adults, were already weird. But the drunk Chihuahua definitely yapped his weirdness from every street corner and rooftop.
"Why the hell would I make a deal with you?" Adder growled, more bothered by the expectation of trust than the canid insults. "If you're dishonest enough to pick a fight with a burnt and bruised kid, you'd hardly be inclined to keep that deal." Seriously, how stupid did the drunk Chihuahua think he was? Habit of distrust aside, this guy was actively showing himself unworthy of trust.
He'd have to be some spoiled rich pet, never let outside and only ever seeing the world through a pane of glass or mail-slot, to miss something that obvious. There was also the part about trusting mutants to not have work-arounds for old injuries. Because that was so bright.
Whatever. Time to leave, if movement didn't trigger some response from the drunk Chihuahua. Adder let his weight shift towards one of his chosen windows slightly.
Not talking as a wolf was really starting to be limiting. Salt softy had seen him as not-wolf now, sure, but he still remembered her first reaction. She didn't feel comfortable seeing wolf-as-not-wolf. So it was better for his to stay like this, even if he had to fight against smell-headaches and noise-headaches to do it.
He rose to his paws when she turned away from the counter, arms full of food-smelling stuff. Sugary stuff. Should be good stuff. Not filling but he didn't need filling right now. If she was concerned about falling while carrying so much stuff, he really could help. If he had hands right now. He huffed but fought back the shimmer trying to twist at the back of his neck. No shifting.
Without hands, the best he could do was lean against her, very gently, to keep her upright and balanced. It was honestly very awkward to walk like that, and it kept him to her pace, which wasn't exactly a pace he normally moved at in any form, and he couldn't just go ahead and wait for her or fall back and catch up.
He would be glad when they reached her room and stopped moving.
Smiling did not help. How did Cafas think that smiling made this any better? The store person hadn't noticed Adder yet, but it was only a matter of time before she did, or someone else did, and made a fuss, and then he'd be better off gone and not looking back. It didn't take stealing something to get arrested, especially with teeth.
Teeth that very nearly came out when Cafas' hand appeared against his back. This wasn't going well. The longer they stayed in here, the longer he stayed in here, the closer everything got to going very badly, and Cafas was steering him away from the door. To a rack of clothes that smelled as if the only things they had ever touched were each other and. Er. Something chemical-y and gross. Smelled like rich people clothes is what they did.
At least they wouldn't smell like that for long.
Regardless of how long they'd stink, they were still clogging up his nose now, plus the ventilation in the store was making it harder to figure out where everyone was by smell alone. Or even how many people were currently around, for that matter. He didn't see anyone other than that one girl, who had gone over to a counter to pick up pieces of clothing that weren't hanging up like the rest and fold them without making them any more compact, just more square.
He looked back at the rack in front of him, then at Cafas. They were all shirts. They all smelled the same. They all looked pretty much the same. "It's good if clothing doesn't tear," he sort of agreed. Long sleeves caught on things all the time. That was why his vest had lasted so long. No sleeves to catch on things. No sleeves to keep his arms warm, but it was hot right now so that didn't matter.
Adder also kept the rack between himself and the store person, but stayed upright so he could see her. "Are there shirts with sleeves that don't tear or get hot?" She'd better not come back.
Rich people did weird stuff. This had to be part of it, one of those specific super-weird things.
What even was-
No, he was really better off just not thinking about it. Besides, Cafas was moving and Adder did not want to lose him. Even if it was fairly hard for him to lose track of someone, even in a crowd. Especially someone he knew by sight and scent. He slipped into Cafas' wake, since he was actually leaving a substantial gap in the crowd behind him (magic? size intimidation? X-Men awe? something clothing related like he'd kind of said? no, that was magic too).
Adder stayed in the metal manipulator's shadow like he was just an extension of the much larger man, always keeping the same not-quite-touching distance but moving so as to keep as little attention on him as possible. Let everyone notice Cafas, and no one notice Adder. He was used to doing this with people who didn't know he was doing it, and having to keep them from noticing him as well. It wasn't exactly a problem if Cafas knew Adder was there. Of course Cafas would know he was there. Where else would he be?
Other than maybe considering fusing with the wall roughly half a second after they walked into a building. Unfortunately, that wasn't his mutation, and attempting it otherwise would draw a lot of attention. So he stayed right behind Cafas, where anyone talking to Cafas wouldn't be able to see him, and attempted to look like he was supposed to be there and this was completely normal and there was nothing unusual and therefore no one should bother looking at him, much less seeing him.
He may have still looked more than a little stressed and fidgety by the time Cafas turned to look for him.
