Marvel, Rebirth:

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

Kristen sighed, rubbing the part of her neck where Lynae had bit her. Tell Ms. Pride the truth about the whole thing, or lie?

 

"I have to admit something," Kristen started, looking downcast, "The whole reason I was missing last night was because Dallas, your Dallas not mine, told me to go watch some alcohol that he'd smuggled in. When I got there, I decided to try some... And when I woke up, I was in the middle of nowhere. I actually had gotten a cut there on my neck while walking around drunk or something. I have some bruises on my legs too, probably from tripping while walking."

 

Kristen rolled down one of my socks to show her. While those bruises were technically from Joey, Kristen wasn't about to tell Ms. Pride that a male student had been beating her.

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

She nodded and sighed. "Poor thing was a mess when I foud her... Thank god I did. It isn't safe for young girls to be out alone."

[25K Now!]

IC: Gabriel

 

The door promptly fell forwards. Behind it, Gabriel stared sheepishly at his fist.

 

"Okay, I misjudged my strength again."

[Snelly]

IC: Katherine "Kitty" Pryde - Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters -

 

Ah, everything made sense now. Kitty had been thinking it was something entirely different and crazy, when it turns out it was just kids getting plastered. How typical.

 

She let out a sigh. She knew Kristen had been through enough as it was, considering everything. "While I certainly don't approve those actions, I can understand why you did it. I was a kid once too." She smiled. "Let's just not do that again, okay?"

 

Of course, she was gonna have to deal with Dallas later. But that could wait till...

 

...there was a very loud bang back toward where they had originally come inside the Institute. "Sounds like someone knocked the door down...again." She sighed. "Just sit tight and try to relax, I have to deal with this...."

 

IC: Jeffery Pryde

 

"You know man, you could have just...rang the doorbell!" Jeff was going to give Gabriel another earful when the shrieking of tires burning against asphalt caught his attention from behind. A ridiculous looking bus crashed through the gates and continued on, until it crashed quite abruptly, the wreckage took Jeff's breath away for a moment.

 

"What. The. ######...." Jeff looked shell shocked for a moment, before beelining it toward the wreckage. Out of all the people around, he could see his powers being the most useful for getting out whatever moron had been driving, and anyone else inside.

 

Gabriel if this is somehow your fault I swear...

 

Kitty appeared at the door moments later, seeing the door, Gabriel, the wreckage outside, and her son running towards it. "Jeff what are you doing get away from that!" She ran after him.

Edited December 24, 2013 by Yoko Littner

[25K Now!]

IC: Gabriel

 

"The doorbell was hard to reach," muttered the gender-bender as he ran after his ... compatriot.

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

"Hmm it sure is never quiet here, huh?" Lynae said with a grin.

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

Kristen refrained from breathing a sigh of relief as Ms. Pride took the bait. Kristen hadn't been expecting that she'd actually believe her.

 

She doesn't even have confidence in herself. weak-spined fool.

 

Kristen sat down again, rolled her sock back up, and tried to relax after the possibly-hairy situation they could've been in.

 

Not only are you a murderer, you're a liar too!

 

"Very rarely," Kristen replied when Lynae asked her question. She sighed, looking down at the water bottle that she had been given. The same one that she couldn't open.

 

How pathetic. She can't even open a water bottle.

 

Shutup.

 

"It's not that bad. But once one of us seem to get into trouble, all of us seem to get in trouble too. It gets quite irritating after awhile."

 

Disgusting mutant scum.

 

Didn't I tell you to shut the up?

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

The vampire chuckled, running her fingers through her golden hair. "Typical children." She smiled, almost kindly, with that comment.

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

"Makes me wonder..." Kristen started, "Most of us are almost adults... And none of us really have any aspirations... What the heck are we supposed to do with our lives? I'm pretty sure we can't all just stay here forever."

 

How about die in a hole somewhere.

 

You'd deserve it.

 

Like the rest of your kind.

[25K Now!]

IC: Mikhail

 

The plane landed.

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

"You can always travel the world, seducing people, and feeding off of their life source." Lynae said jokingly.

[Krayzikk]

IC:

 

Tera was out of the plane almost before it hit the ground, sneakers hitting the ground in a plume of dust. The devastation on the ground was arguably even worse. The area was coated in rubble, fragments of concrete and shattered metal. She felt shards of glass stab into the soles of her sneakers within the first five steps, but she kept moving, finally coming to a halt a few dozen paces from the craft.

 

This used to be a few blocks north of Battery Park. That, right there, that used to be a deli. She'd bought a turkey there back in November, taken a route three blocks out of her way to make sure that none of the old gang would be around to harass her. A block to the east was the book shop she used to frequent. All of it gone.

 

Just because some *** from the forties decided he wanted to make a point.

 

Her hands clenched into fists, and for the first time in a long, long time, it took an extreme force of will to keep her power in check. Wouldn't do to have her fists spontaneously become machetes.

 

"Yo, GI Joe." She said quietly, without looking back. "D'you think anyone survived that?"

[25K Now!]

IC: Mikhail

 

"I ... don't know."

[Havelock Vetinari]

IC (Saphine)

 

"Right. We're gonna need cover, if ya can find any. A radio'd be nice too. Doubt the cockpit's made it through the explosion." The hired gun let out a weak laugh. "Oh man, the boss is not gonna be happy. Not gonna be happy at all. HYDRA had better hope whatever hole they're hiding in is mighty deep." The vampire sighed. "I don't know if any of the others are still alive to be honest. Might as well get as many out as we can. Once I can stand up on my own at least."

Edited December 24, 2013 by Basilisk

[Krayzikk]

IC:

 

"That's what I thought." Tera replied, voice even softer. The tears that had threatened to fall on the plane came back in force, welling over her eyelids, slowly leaving a trail down her face.

 

"Why would someone do this?"

[25K Now!]

IC: Mikhail

 

"There are many reasons for why," said the agent quietly, stepping forth to stand at Tera's side, "but none of them can excuse this."

[Krayzikk]

IC:

 

"I..."

 

Her voice cracked for a moment, before her control reasserted itself, forcing herself to maintain that porcelain facade. "I spent hours huddled at the end of an alley, and when the dust settled, I thought it was over. I thought that SHIELD would find them, they'd stop them, and I could keep on living."

 

"The good guys are supposed to be virtuous, never start a fight, never kill. They're supposed to take the high ground. But evil just keeps on coming. Does it ever stop?"

[Snelly]

IC: Aella

 

I walked out of the plane slowly, trying to take in the scene around me. I'd never seen anything like it, though I supposed I'd be getting a lot of that, considering all I could remember was living in a laboratory.

 

Still, the scene felt grim and terrible, I could feel it all around me, the devastation and disarray, it was awful. I walked over towards Tera slowly, my head pounding with each step. I wasn't sure if my head was hurting because of my injury...or something else.

 

I may have been shut away from the world, but I was far from stupid. I could put two and two together, this had once been a place where people had lived, and then HYDRA came and destroyed it, just because they could. I knew it had to be HYDRA, who else would do something like this?

 

I listened to Tera and Mikhail talk, Tera was starting to break down, and the more I listened the more...angry I started to feel. ###### HYDRA, I hated them more than anything, and they kept giving me more reasons to do so!

 

"They won't stop...ever. Not until they're all dead....Every. Single. ######. One...." With every word my breathing became heavier and quicker, my limbs started shaking. I wanted to hit something.

 

 

[25K Now!]

IC: Mikhail

 

"Calm down."

 

Mikhail placed a hand gently on Aella's shoulder.

 

"They will be stopped. I promise you. All of you."

[Constructelf]

IC: Song

Song didn't seem to hear them. Instead, she grabbed one side of the wound and twisted it. A large chunk of skin came off, exposing dark, matted fur.

IC Peter

"Whoa, whoa!" Peter yelled. Running over to Song, he quickly looked her over. "Let's get you to the infirmar-" somebody knocked the door down. Peter groaned, but decided that the violently shape shifting student in front of him was higher priority. "Let's get to the infirmary, okay?"

 

IC Tokiomi

New York coming into view, Tokiomi started the landing procedure. Rather than choosing to land in the city itself, the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent opted to land on an airstrip just north of the city. "Control tower, this is 27404, requesting landing clearance."

[Krayzikk]

IC:

 

"That's what they said before." Tera said, staring at the ground, slowly turning around. "That's what they said after they first hit New York. That's what they said after the Helicarrier fell, that's what they said when the new Avengers went down in a blaze of glory. SHIELD hasn't stopped them, the Avengers haven't been seen in months, the X-Men, as much as I disagreed with them, are gone too."

 

She gestured to the surroundings with a wide sweep of her arms, the facade beginning to crack. "Look around! This is the result. Heroes are only ever reactive, dealing with them when they come. Villains go on the offensive, and even when they fail, they still win. Because they've always inflicted harm by the time we stop them."

 

"What good are powers, what good are heroes, if they can't stop this? Why do I have an ability, if it's no good? Why can they kill the people so many others worked so hard to save?!"

[Snelly]

IC: Aella

 

I smacked the hand away, backing off from Mikhail. "Don't tell me to calm down! I don't want to be CALM! I spend a whole ###### year as a lab rat for the amusement of ###### ######...only just escaped the ###### place yesterday...to find out that the rest of the ###### world is terrorized by the same ###### people!"

 

The wind around us began to pick up violently, swirling around us in a harsh manner. "I don't even know what is ###### happening right now! I don't know where I ###### am, or what the ###### to do, or if ###### HYDRA isn't gonna just come by and ###### kill me, just because I ###### exist!" I was screaming so much my vision blacked out for a second, I stumbled a bit.

 

"And...And if you're so ###### sure you can stop them...why didn't you ###### do it already! Huh!? Can you answer that Mr. SHIELD guy!?"

[25K Now!]

IC: Mikhail

 

Mikhail didn't reply. He didn't know how. Dealing with two agitated girls was not something he was experienced with. So he let them rant.

 

Maybe they would calm down.

 

Maybe not.

[Krayzikk]

IC:

 

Tera, for her part, spotted Aella's near blackout even through the haze of her own distress, and nearly instantly, refocused on that. She couldn't do anything for what had already happened, so she'd have to focus on what she could do. Perhaps it was better that she had something to focus on.

 

"Aella." She said quietly, in a distinctly more soothing tone. "Please calm down. You're going to get yourself hurt, and frankly, that's the last thing I could deal with right now."

 

"Please."

[Blair the Cat]

IC: Song

 

"Okay..?" The bone in her skinned arm snapped loudly, poking through for one grisly second before lengthening into a more lupine shape.

[Constructelf]

IC Peter

"Okay, stay calm." Leading the girl to the infirmary , the teacher cringed as he looked at Song's shapeshiting arm.

[Snelly]

IC: Aella

 

I heard Tera's words, even as I focused my glare on Mikhail, I didn't want to listen to her...listen to anyone...I just wanted to be angry.

 

But the now soothing tone of her voice...it caught my attention, I looked at her, panting heavily and looking ready to just pass out from the stress my body was under...she was asking me to be calm...not demanding, not telling me, just asking.

 

But I wasn't calm, I was angry, I was , I was absolutely livid! I was...

 

...I was on my knees and sobbing? In what seemed be in the matter of seconds I'd gone from raging mad to crying my heart out. I didn't even know why I was crying, I just was.

[Blair the Cat]

IC: Song

 

Song laughed at his expression. "It's about to get a lot worse."

 

As if on cue, a bright red stain started to spread across the front of her shirt.

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

Trinity, to put it in blunt language, had missed the point. If she had known the words to describe the city they were at, it would've been something along the lines of; "Wow this place is a dump."

 

Since she didn't know how to express herself that way, Trinity just didn't say anything. When Aella started having water falling from her eyes (how weird), Trinity rushed over to her side, grabbing her arm and speaking to her, "Aella, let us go to someplace better."

 

 

 

"Funny," Kristen remarked, slightly downcast about the thought, "I've already done something like that. Without the seduction part, that is."

[Havelock Vetinari]

IC (The Legion)

While the organizations that were supposedly in charge of such situations dithered and did nothing, the Legion had heeded the orders of their beloved Emperor with all of the efficiency of their ancient namesake. Processions of military surplus vehicles (all unarmed at first glance) rolled into the devastated area of the city, deploying from Legion safe houses and private garages. It was an odd sight to say the least, the Legionaries wore uniforms based upon the legions of old, but with many concessions made to the rigors of modern combat, but the Roman influence was unmistakable.

Parking wherever they could, or pressing yet deeper into the blast zone, the Legions soldiers displayed an admirable efficiency. Teams of men, sometimes led by hulking figures in powered armor, dug through the rubble of the blasted buildings, searching for survivors or the entrances to the underground shelters most recent buildings sported. Thus far they had found far too few for their liking.

Romulus himself still sat in the meeting room of the Hotel staring down at the city from that vantage point. His aides, and a few other staff that had only recently arrived, were directing the search and rescue operation behind him. Some of them were hunched maps of the city, some were directing the response forces and still others were tapping into the Legions formidable network of agents to pin down any probable HYDRA strongholds. Romulus shook his head, if ever there was a sign of the ineffectiveness and idiocy of democracy, this was it. No other organization had responded to the matter in any effective manner, only he and Mr. Picker seemed to have any inkling of how to react.

Just more evidence of how badly this world needed an Emperor.

Edited December 24, 2013 by Basilisk

[HeavyMetalSunshineSister]

IC(Cynegild Picker, Above the Atlantic):

 

There were certain things to be said for the way New Yorkers had built their city, Cynegild realised as he surveyed the damage to Blackpool, a high-definition camera on a private helicopter sending him all the information he needed. The dense construction of the American city had attenuated the blast wave, and, while debris from damaged structures had caused further damage, it wasn't quite the same as the results of the explosion in Blackpool, which had encountered much less in the way of resisting structures, resulting in, apparently, the complete annihilation of the city, and significant damage to the surrounding countryside - for 80 square kilometers around the blast site, one of the most populous cities in Britain had been reduced to a charred wasteland.

 

Cynegild silently cursed the thoroughness of the enemy as he switched his view to Cardiff, seeing more of the same - the ostensible capital of Wales was more of a crater than a city now, with little truly recognizable as having ever been part of a city.

 

Cardiff was a write-off, Blackpool a rescue mission with slim hope. His efforts would have to be focused on London, where massive damage had been done, true - but there was more than a five percent chance of survivors. Some resources, perhaps, could be allocated to putting up a show in Blackpool, but the true opportunity lay in London.

 

Cynegild Picker was still more than two thousand kilometers from Britain, but the scale of the disaster was quite clear enough, and it had gone a few orders of magnitude beyond the hoped-for opportunity - some public good will, some sway, could still be gained, and the government of Britain would hardly turn away assistance in clearing up the mess, but nothing like what he had optimistically projected before.

Edited December 29, 2013 by Ymper Trymon

[Advent Child]

IC: Siegfried had not missed the explosions rocking across the U.S and likely further by any means. They had only spurred him on, driving him to fly faster, hoping he could arrive in time to make a difference, knowing how densely populated New York was, and terrified for the potential damage.

 

He was ill prepared.

 

While not as massive as the damage could have been, the wreckage that used to be the bottom end of Manhattan was still a horrifying sight, one that brought pain to Siegfried's soul, and burning rage to his heart. A kind of rage that Siegfried had spent years attempting to keep control of. Slowly but surely, it became steadily more apparent that as nice as it was to optimistically hope that things could work out peacefully, the villains being faced were the kind with whom one could not reason until your boot was against their throat, with their empire crumbling around them. And even then, reasoning with them was foolish, only giving them more time to break, hurt and destroy things.

 

The Asgardian's eyes narrowed as he finally touched down in Manhattan, thoughts racing in contrast to his barely moving form standing solemnly near the remains of a bus stop.

 

Such villains were swiftly becoming unacceptable.

 

Thunder rumbled in the distance as the sky seemed to darken to match Siegfried's mood.

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

"It's life. Either you die or they do. I prefer that they do." She grinned wickedly as she stood up.

 

"So... This is the institute..."

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

"Home of the X-Men, School for mutants, etcetera, etcetera," Kristen said, "Congrats. You're standing in possibly one of the most hated places of the world."

 

Understatement of a lifetime.

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

"What's new? I've been chased out of whole towns before with pitchforks.... Just know that puritans are not the most accepting people deary.... But coming back to life after being hanged.. Oh well that's a tale for another day."

 

She gazed out of the window before turning to Kristen. "Everyone is hated at some point. And frankly I don't care that you all are."

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

"Thanks Lynae, that means a lot to me."

 

You suck.

 

Disgusting creature.

 

Monster.

 

I hope you die.

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

"Don't thank me. I just don't care. If mutants are hated then so am I, I'm worse than most of you."

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

Kristen stifled a giggle at Lynae's comment, "Well, at least you're confined to bedtime stories and nightmares. People don't really believe in vampires anymore."

[Eevee]

IC: Lynae

 

"Unless they sparkle and live in Washington state." She said, rolling her eyes. "Honestly, the author of those books is horrible."

[AuRon the champion]

IC:

 

"... I never want to think about that again."