Beyond Evolution

12/10 - Someone's powers begin to spread Bollywood-meets-techno music throughout the school all day. The pool is officially heated for the winter.

12/11 - Upper teams fight in the DR, open for viewing (with warnings of graphic violence), no holds barred. Tag if you'd like a roll to participate! (omg old school)

12/13 - Tiny beings are seen skittering around the lakehouse. Upon closer inspection it's a group of tiny elves who have turned the lakehouse into their toy workshop. Up to players if they let them stay or make them leave!

12/14 - An unexpected (?!) eclipse happens. Worldwide. Every part of the globe receiving sunlight at the time sees something slowly cover the sun, keep it eclipsed for several minutes, before moving back out of the sky.

12/16 - An anti-mutant rally because of Harland's book gathers in DC. At the same time, a pro-mutant protest is happening on the streets of DC. And finally, a pro-human and mutant rally is held on the other side of town.


12/3/22 - 12/9/22

We are trying this week to keep tags at a max of 150-175 words! Obviously do what you want, but that's the dare this week!


10/14 - 10/16: Everyone's worst fears have come to life and are roaming around the school. They can be killed, but do keep coming back to life.

10/18: X-Men locate the thief that got away from Colin.


11/5/22 - 11/11/22
11/1/22 - 11/4/22

10/15 - A package is left for CHARACTER B. It’s another Grandma’s Antique’s delivery, right to their door: Crying Boy painting ((ooc comment below if youd like to have your character receive it!))

10/16 - When everyone wakes up, they discover the mansion has turned into (an expanded version of) the house from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Its characters are roaming inside, and remember: they’re all just as deadly as Leatherface, and much more twisted. Network does work, but only for the journals, and no one can teleport out or use other powers that would allow them to leave. The family doesn’t seem to be able to die. Lasts 24 hours.

10/17 - Colin’s pumpkin body comes back for 3 days. All of the plumbing has snakes coming out of it. Sink faucets, shower pipes once the heads have been taken off have snakes pouring out, they are in all of the toilets, and so on. They don’t respond to animal compulsion. Lasts for 24 hours.

10/18 - The forest comes alive and starts slowly creeping up on the school from the side. Sinister, like the corn field, but in a different way. Dark and tangled and foreboding.

10/19 - A man shows up at the school looking for help, and anyone who offers is immediately transported to an old, run down farmhouse with no weapons or powers, where they have to fend off a number of cryptids (your choice which!). This lasts for a day.

10/20 - Rain starts coming down. Normal rain, but when it touches anyone it begins to melt them like they’re witches in the Wizard of Oz.

10/21 - Powers are gone! A bad time for it, as werewolves, vampires, and green-skinned witches are descending upon the school.

Some happenings!

Monday: Labor Day, typical lawn/lake/pool/bbq celebration

Wednesday: A SC starter project -- a wall in the entryway that is being painted white and supplied with paint pens so that everyone can sign it or write in their mutations or whatever they'd like!

Thursday: Everyone decides not to go to work or school or really have the will to do much but laze around

You know the drill. Get all the reflections back on their side of the mirror so the coven can end the spell!

Dedicated to Jamie.

As the Phoenix drew closer to Xavier's, the creatures coming through the portals could sense it. All that energy, all that power -- it drew them like a bright light draws insects, pure instinct, none of them knowing what they would do with it if they actually reached it. They started to draw away from the other portals, focusing on the ones closest to that beacon of power. The ones closest to Xavier's. The campus was already packed with strange, dangerous creatures, but soon it would be even more so, the Phoenix's power just out of reach driving some of them into a frenzy.

It wasn't just monsters that followed in the Phoenix's wake. Some of the Hellfire Club's members had abandoned this whole business after what happened to Shaw, but some of them were still tracking the thing they had summoned. If they couldn't control it, they could at least make sure nobody else could take control of it, either.

And then there was the Phoenix itself. Brilliant, burning, it sensed what it had come here for -- the host that could contain it without being destroyed. The girl who, in the kind of cosmic coincidence that started to feel more like fate, even shared its name. Phoenix. Jean Grey. It found her in the chaos, and it moved into her like it had moved into Shaw, and this time its scorching psychic fire met a mind that could withstand it.

Inside, the spellcasters would feel the burst of psychic energy as the Phoenix found its match. It filled them, giving them strength, powering their spell as it reached its peak. Giving it that last burst of energy it needed. Outside, and all across the multiverse, those who'd gone through portals to other worlds would feel themselves drawn to the portal that would take them back where they'd come from. They could follow it home, or they could resist it and remain where they were. That was their choice. But they would only have a few minutes to make it, before the portals began to close for the last time.

When the last of the portals closed, the damage that had been done to the very fabric of reality would finally be healed. Powers that had weakened, strengthened, fluctuated wildly, would be restored to normal. But there would still be enemies to fight, both monstrous and human, before this was truly over.

(Fighting continues! Everyone!)

[Watch for headers for Jean and the Phoenix, portal entries and exits, and continued fighting! Some of the monsters will respond to the pull of the spell and go home before the portals close, but more of them will stay to keep causing trouble. There will also be Hellfire Club members arriving to cause even more trouble. Last fight thread!]

((WARNING: Lots of references to suicide.))

Nasir was underwater when he emerged from the portal. That was a good thing, in the end. It meant that he couldn’t scream and so his rescuers didn’t flee at the repulsive sound of his voice. They pulled him onto the shore of the island. Saved. Safe. ( Bereft. )


[ NARRATIVE ]

WHO: Raj and Nas.
WHEN/WHERE: This afternoon, on the grounds near the garage.
WHAT: Just two brothers getting ready for their parents to arrive.

( Something was terribly wrong. )

”You always hurt the one you love
The one you shouldn’t hurt at all.

Nasir paused, something on the afternoon breeze catching his attention, something soft as silk, quiet as a breath. A voice. Singing? Distractedly, he reached out to touch Kate’s sleeve, but his head had turned away from her, peering down the path running up against the outside wall of the mansion. He and Kate were heading into town for an early dinner, quite wisely reckoning that they were at least guaranteed a meal which wouldn’t sprout legs and chase them around the building, and maybe wouldn’t even taste of pumpkin. They’d stepped outside to make their way around to the garage when Nas had been brought up short by the voice on the wind. He took a couple of cautious steps in the direction it was coming from.

”You always take the sweetest rose
And crush it ‘til the petals fall.

It was a girl, sitting cross-legged on the grass, face hidden by the veil of dark hair falling in front of her lowered eyes. Nas didn’t think he recognised her. Maybe she was a new student? She wasn’t dressed for this weather though and it struck a chord of concern in him. In nothing but a short skirt and a tied off top, she must have been freezing out here in the cold of autumn. As he stepped closer, the swelling of pity in his chest shifted into something more uncertain. There was blood on her hands. Spattered on her socks too. After a glance back in Kate’s direction - without actually meeting her gaze, of course - he lifted his device and tapped out a few words. Hey. Are you okay? Do you need help?

As the mysterious girl looked up at him, Nasir’s instincts screamed at him to turn and run because the look in her eyes, the gleeful malice, the dead malevolence, told him he and Kate had stumbled upon something they should have avoided. There wasn’t time to move before the stranger whipped out something sharp, metal flashing in the late afternoon haze before it slashed across his stomach, slicing cleanly through the fabric of his hoodie and the soft flesh concealed beneath. Somehow, miraculously, Nas retained the presence of mind to not cry out, swallowing down the shock and pain, even as he stumbled backward into Kate. The strange singing girl with the blade was already scrambling after them, intent on spilling more blood.

[ KATE ]

This was a much better day. Never had Nasir felt so grateful for the ability to sit on his backside without having to make room for a tail. This week’s silliness had been a trial for him. And for everybody, of course, but most people seemed to be able to see the funny side. Nas himself would have seen the funny side if he’d wound up with a dog’s tail or feathers or even the impractical fish tails a handful of people were unlucky enough to end up with. A devil’s tail though? Pointed, thick and rubbery, black. How was he supposed to find the humour in that? It wasn’t just a wacky oddity to him. It was a manifestation of his deepest fears.

It was gone today, mercifully, but Nasir had yet to fully shake off the dark mood which had overtaken him with the arrival of the tails. Herr Wagner’s words had helped. At first Nas had felt like this was some kind of targeted attack on him, the universe singling him out to laugh at, but Kurt had helped him to see that it was far more likely these tails had drawn on each individual’s subconscious sense of identity. Certainly that explained most people’s appendages being somewhat appropriate for them. Nasir’s anxiety about his potential true nature probably did dominate the way he saw himself so it all made sense. Being able to rationalise it had made the experience easier. But still he felt glum. Still he felt like a freak.

That was why he’d sought out the company of a friend tonight. He wasn’t sure where Raj was, probably hanging out with Theo because they’d become good friends in recent months, which Nasir was very happy to see. It was good for his brother to have a buddy. Nas had his own friends too, after all, like the one he was spending this evening with, Sapna. They’d commandeered the porch with bottles of ice cold lemonade in their hands to watch the sunset. It was nice, calm, peaceful. And so, inevitably, Nasir’s thoughts had drifted down a path he should probably have avoided.

Because what did it say about him that he enjoyed being around a girl with such a deep connection to a demon dimension? And her pet demon? He should have been horrified by Sapna and Boogers. He should have been doing everything possible to put distance between himself and them. But he didn’t want to. Sapna was nice. Funny. Unique. Nasir cared about her and he knew that should be a simple and straightforward thing but it wasn’t, was it? Because maybe there was part of him which was drawn to the darkness. Maybe part of him needed it.

Can you see demons here? The question was out of the blue, breaking the hush, Nasir’s fingers flying over the touchscreen, voice-to-text producing words in his native tongue since Sapna was one of the few who understood them. I mean, if a demon was here, in the real world, posing as a human. Would you be able to see through a disguise like that?

[ SAPNA ]

WHO: Raj Dhanial and Nasir Dhanial
WHERE/WHEN: Cafeteria; Backdated to a few days after this, pre-Ramadan
WHAT: The Dhanial twins need to have a Talk

( He’d never lied to his brother before. But avoiding the truth wasn’t exactly the same thing. ...Right? )

WHO: Kate Silvex and Nasir Dhanial
WHERE/WHEN: Outside, today (so specific)
WHAT: Kate has a confession to make

( Do you hate me? )

Inside Yana's castle was a wild mix of styles and even species. Some people had taken her directions to dress up very seriously, sparkling and bordering on formalwear, while others -- ahem, Holly Black -- hadn't bothered at all. Some weren't even people, although they did a good impression of being people, at least at the beginning of the night. As the party went on, it got a little bit more obvious which of the people you hadn't seen before were new students and which were demons in disguise. And of course there was Boogers, all dressed up in a half-suit and tie, giving everyone a good sniff before letting them inside and looking very pleased with himself.

The drinks had all been brought over from the human realm, but a few of the demon guests had smuggled their own flasks in, so partygoers accepted drinks from strangers at their own risk. And made out with strangers at their own risk, too, since some of the demons were a little... toothier than others. With Yana, Sapna, and Ananym all on hand nobody was actually going to get eaten, but they couldn't make any promises about nibbling.

The party would last until morning, or until everyone had gotten tired and gone back through the portal home, whichever came first. Most likely morning. Even if the Xavierites were ready to crash out, demons knew how to party.

(Rapid-fire, open to everyone!)

By rights, Nasir should have been in a good mood. He’d had an amazing weekend, after all. The trip to Hawaii, complete with a surprise wedding, had turned out to be a great day. He’d had fun, even. Swimming in the ocean, motoring his way through the food on offer, spending time with his brother and his friends, he could hardly complain about any of that. But then they’d returned to the school and the now familiar heavy sensation had returned, settling back onto his shoulders, into his stomach, down to the soles of his feet. It wasn’t like Nasir enjoyed feeling this way, he had actively tried to shake off the depression which sat like a stone in his chest, he’d tried to embrace his new life and the opportunities which came with it. Life was good here, that was the reality of it. He was lucky. He should be happy. And yet. And yet.

Monday morning brought classes along with it and that didn’t help at all. Back in Pakistan, before his mutation had manifested, Nas had finished with school. He’d embarked upon his career and his mindset had shifted from childhood to young adulthood, he’d started to think of himself as a man rather than a boy. Coming here and being enrolled in classes had felt like a step backwards and it always would. He yearned to graduate so he could get on with his life once more, whatever shape that life may take. But he wasn’t there yet. At least it was lunchtime?

Before he could meet up with Raj in the cafeteria though, he had an errand to run. Politely knocking before opening the door to Herr Wagner’s office, Nasir kept his head lowered to ensure he didn’t accidentally drive the Dean utterly insane. Mondays were lame enough without adding a crazed X-Man to the mix. He tapped his device to play the words he’d written on his way here, a tinny and robotic approximation of his true voice crackling into the air. Hello, sir. The Geography teacher asked me to drop these off for you. Nas held up the stack of papers he was holding to indicate what he was referring to, then placed them on Kurt’s desk. With a brisk nod, he headed back to the door, planning to leave the Dean to his work and start making his way to the cafeteria.

Something made him slow down as he held the door open though, hovering with one foot in the hallway outside. He wasn’t even sure for a moment quite why he was lingering, what it was that was holding him here. Nasir turned, his face in profile, his one good eye fixed firmly on the wall rather than the Dean’s face. Deep down, he realised, he knew exactly why he was still in this room. He’d wanted to talk about this, to this particular man, for a long time. Allowing the door to softly click shut, he raised his device and tapped at it. Forgive me, sir, but may I ask you a question? You can say no. It’s a personal question.

[ KURT ]

WHO: Kate Silvex and Nasir Dhanial.
WHEN/WHERE: Backdated to not long after everyone's back home from plot! Kate's room.
WHAT: Nas needs answers.

( I don’t think I could have smiled at the camera though. )

They’d been at this school awhile now -- not long enough for it to feel anything like home, but long enough that they weren’t really that new anymore. Raj didn’t know what he’d been expecting. This place seemed pretty normal, by all counts, and that was hardly what he’d been taught that life with mutancy would be. It made it harder, somehow. Everyone here was so nice and he simply couldn’t reciprocate. He wasn’t being mean or rude to anyone, but he was too busy fighting off the depression he could feel curling itself around him to attempt to really make friends. He felt like he was still in denial about it all, on some level. Like he didn’t need to make friends because he already had friends.

And then he remembered. He didn’t. Not at this place.

He still had a half-written letter to her scribbled down and hidden in a drawer. He wasn’t sure he could handle finishing it.

And he knew that Nas was suffering even more than he was. His brother had lost everything in his life except for Raj, and he knew how hard that must be hitting him. He was having to live with his eye gone, on top of everything else. The culture change, the loss of his one passion in life, the fact that their parents still weren’t speaking to them… That feeling that he’d had in the pit of his stomach twisted. He wasn’t sure if it was homesickness or just pure anger at them doing this to Nas.

He couldn’t sleep. And he had a feeling that it was mutual, some unquestioning part of his mind knowing that his twin was likely the same as he was, laying on their respective beds, the lights off. They should have been asleep. But he was kept awake instead, phantoms both recognizable and not yelling at him, cursing him for who he was and what he had brought down on their family. ...It was getting too loud.

He sat up and sighed, glanced around and then looked to his brother. ”Come on, we’re going somewhere.” He’d been sleeping in a pair of sweat pants and an Xavier’s School shirt, so he was good to go. He grabbed a hoodie off the ground and tossed the other to his twin. ”Gotta go by the art studio first, then I’m gonna show you something.”


(Backdated to around 1 AM Sunday morning. Part of the outside of the school Sunday now has this on it (finished version on the right). He tagged his name too, so it won’t be hard to figure out)

WHO: Raj & Nas Dhanial.
WHEN/WHERE: The day after they arrived, their room.
WHAT: Nas finally comes to, and Raj tries to explain their circumstances.

( As long as we’re together, we’re unbeatable. We’ve always said that, right? We’re unbeatable. )

Raj was terrified. He couldn’t even tell where he was. There was concrete against his back, and a bench that he was sitting on, but that was all he knew. His eyes had been covered tightly by strips of cloth, and his mouth had been likewise bound. It wasn’t necessary. He had no idea what he could do, the extent of his powers. His whole arm ached from his shoulder being dislocated and not re-set, and he was feeling dizzy -- he’d been hit in the head by the butt of a guard’s gun to get him to stop trying to talk. He felt nauseous. It wasn’t only physical, the mental toll this had all taken on him was incredible; he still wasn’t entirely sure what had happened, but he knew that he was in trouble now. Something bad was going to happen. And, worst of all, he didn’t know where Nas was. They’d been separated at the jail, and shouting for him had only resulted in violence from the guards to get him to shut up. Before his eyes had been covered he’d seen them wearing noise-cancelling headphones, and his mind still couldn’t process why.

His fingers flexed, his hands feeling numb from being cuffed behind his back. Shit shit shit… He knew that he shouldn’t have done what he did, that he could get in trouble for his drawings, but he didn’t know why it had gotten so bad. Why he and Nas had been swarmed, why people were grabbing and hurting them. He’d never seen anything like it. His parents were going to be so angry. Whenever he got to see them, at least -- being arrested was a bad sign. His mind kept running around in circles -- maybe this was a mistake, maybe there was some way to explain all of this, maybe they could be let go with only a slap on the wrist.

He really didn’t want to think about what he’d heard all of the guards saying. Mutants. They couldn’t be. There was no history of it in their family, and they’d done nothing wrong to bring it on themselves. Nothing of what he knew pointed to them being najas. It had to be a mistake.

And that scream that had come from Nas...

When he heard something out in the hall his attention was pulled immediately, but he bit down on the gag to stop himself from making a sound. He didn’t want to be hit again. Instead he tried to listen, to hear if it was something to do with Nas. Maybe they would let his brother go. Even if Raj had done something wrong, his twin was innocent. He heard shouting then, and the sound of a gun, and he immediately started pulling at his restraints again. He had to get out of here.


(Open to Nas/X-Men!)