Beyond Evolution

The crack in the barrier had reverberated across worlds. It sent aftershocks through the hell dimensions, rattling chains and shaking loose stones. Most of them ignored it, certain their isolation would protect them from harm even if the human world fell. Some placed bets on who would be left standing when it was all over. Some prepared to fight for their own survival if the Elder Gods came for them next. But some had been watching and waiting, and now they moved.

N'kar the Betrayer appeared on the school grounds from a portal of fire, his horned head wreathed in flames. He stood a head and shoulders taller than the tallest man, his body broad and covered in skin that looked more like cracked stone, his hands massive and clawed. Not just a demon, but a hell lord, a wielder of powerful dark magic. Behind him were his priestesses, twelve of them, once human but now twisted by decades of dark magic and service to a hell dimension. They had no real loyalty to the Elder Gods, but N'kar craved destruction, and there would never be worse destruction than the Elder Gods set loose on the world. They needed to be a part of it.

The grounds of the school were already torn apart, turned-up earth slick with blood. Smoke and dust rose from parts of the building that had been reduced to rubble in an instant. The ground was littered with bodies -- most of them Cthon's human followers, which was of no concern to the Elder God himself, they had always been expendable. A means to an end to keep Earth's fighters busy, nothing more. Their numbers had dwindled to a pitiful few, and Yog-Sothoth's monsters were spawning slower and dying faster. But that didn't mean the tide was turning in the school's favor. The Elder Gods had never truly needed any help from lesser creatures.

At least no more of them had come through the opening in the barrier. There were more still waiting, gnashing teeth and snarling in the darkness on the other side, but their massive bodies crushed against the barrier and couldn't fit through. The crack wasn't big enough for them yet.

(Open to fighters!)

3/25 - In a turn of events, day turns to night, only at Xavier's. Despite light pollution many many stars and constellations are visible, including the Milky Way. This lasts until Sunday morning, when the sun comes up as usual.

3/28 - The cafeteria is filled with cakes! Each cake has a little flag with a name on it. Everyone at the school has their own, and it's their favorite kind.

3/30 - Despite it being past St Patrick's day, little (fun!) leprechauns can be seen running around. Everyone gets a real gold coin left in front of their door.



**From this point on, the book will be strongly influencing the members of the coven to try more dangerous and high-risk spells, including dark ones

Murderworld
3/11/23 - 3/17/23
3/4/23 - 3/10/23
February 2023
January 2023
2022

3/5 - An absolutely massive magnitude 9.0 earthquake hits in the middle of the ocean. A huge tsunami hits Fiji and absolutely wrecks it. Deaths and missing are in the hundreds. Teams are immediately dispatched after the earthquake to try and evacuate as many people as possible from the islands, but it doesn't stop the body count from being so high.

3/7 - Anne Holmes releases a statement that this could have been prevented by mutants, but wasn't. Nolan Harland counters that mutants can't save a world that wants them dead.



**From this point on, the coven will all keep feeling very strong urges to use the book as much as they can, even if it's just reading it

February 2023
January 2023
2022

We'll be doing a rapid fire this weekend and next, so everyone can set their chars up properly for anniversary. And just for fun!

Rogue had never planned out a dream wedding when she was a kid. She’d been more rough and tumble, interested in playing in the mud and running around in the woods near her house. Her dolls would get married to one another, sure, but it was always very practical in her head rather than being extravagant in her heart. Going through the motions.

And then, of course, her powers had sufficiently ended any thoughts she’d had about a normal life. Much less one that involved living with and loving someone like that. She had to be careful with everyone that she was around, and there wasn’t much romance to be found when she could suck a person’s essence right out of them with a kiss. She’d come to accept it though, had carved out a place for herself in the world, with the school, with the teams. And while she knew some part of her would always be wistful about it, she’d come to terms with weddings and fairy tales being just that.

But then Liam had come into her life. Or, rather, she’d come (literally) crashing into his. It was the first time she’d had a crush quite like that -- one that was exciting, and new, and returned. Liam liked her back, he loved her just like she loved him, and now he wanted to turn all of those somedays into forevers.

And now here she was, on Waikiki’s tourist trap of a beach, with their friends and friends-as-family gathered around, with her brother Kurt officiating and their friends Colin and Bobby serving as best men. Her dress was, of course, styled by Rogue with help from Irina, who had lifted the hem from her knees to just at the line of decency. Her veil was long enough to drop to the ground, though. And her gloves this time were white. She laughed a little as she took the ring meant for Liam and looked at him, feeling her heart swell with happiness.

“Liam. I know we didn’t start off on the best foot.” Another small laugh. “But I promise to spend the rest of my life stoppin’ my mama from makin’ trouble for you. To make sure there’s hazelnut creamer in the fridge in the mornings. To push you to run ten miles when we want to stop at nine, and to make you look away from work when you’ve been at it too long. I’ll defend mint ice cream when people try to tell you it tastes like toothpaste, and I’ll make sure no pineapple goes near your pizza. Only you could make gettin’ up early sound just as good as sleepin’ in late, and I promise to try and share the covers better. And to only put my cold feet on you in the most dire of situations. I love you, and I’ll love you until there’s no more tomorrows. I’ve got your six for life.”

She reached out to get the ring from Bobby, and slid it on Liam’s finger and grinned. “No backin’ out now.”

(Open to Liam, obviously, and also RAPID FIRE threads if yall want!! There’s music and food and blankets set out instead of chairs for the actual event. ENJOY THE DAY!)

Angelo remembered being awoken from where he’d been sitting and dozing against one of the cell walls, when the sound of the door opening. When several guards came in, pointing their weapons and shouting at them to get against the walls, they did. The men fanned out, studying the mutants and making sure that they wouldn’t move. The one in charge, the one that hadn’t moved from the cell door, said something in another language and nodded towards Ange. He didn’t know what that meant? But he knew it wasn’t good.

A guard grabbed each of his arms, and his trying to fight away from them didn’t work; they were leaving the cell with him, whether he liked it or not. He cast one last look to the others over his shoulder before the door was shut and locked again, and he was taken down the hall, out of sight.

It was hours later when he was finally brought back, dragged between two guards who tossed him back into the prison, unconscious and with a bandage covering his right forearm, but otherwise seeming alright. After about thirty minutes he started to wake, the grey clouds fogging up his brain finally starting to part. His head hurt. His eyes squinted open and a hand went to his forehead, pressing against it to make the dull throbbing stop. Headaches were nothing compared to the migraines he got from over exerting his powers, but it was still annoying.

He sat up slowly, and then a dull throb made him look down to his arm, where the bandage was. Memories came back to him, hazily. Wisps of smoke that disappeared when he tried to grab them. Going down the hall. Being taken into some kind of sterile room, with doctors or scientists or something there. He remembered something going over his mouth. And then darkness. For a moment there had been a kind of white-hot pain, but then the same mask was placed against his nose and mouth and he was unconscious again within moments.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to take the bandage off.

A hand ran over his hair, shaking his head some. “How long was I gone?”

(Open to Kyra!)

The battle was over before it even started. The Worldly Avatar had watched from the safety of the throne room as Mikhail's forces and the rebellion camp were squashed, running like dogs. Tailiv had been successful, as always. And he brought gifts.

His subjects had always been loyal, devout supplicants. They stood before him now in the antechamber of the citadel. Captain Taxxu and her guard. General Tailiv and his lieutenants. A half dozen robed and shrouded nobles in a line behind the throne where the Worldly Avatar sat. All of them extraneous; the Worldly Avatar was more than powerful enough to wipe them all out should he grow weary enough to break things for amusement.

He had felt the arrival long before a single mutant set foot on the planet's ground. Mikhail was an explosion to the Worldly Avatar's senses, like a shark to blood. ( It had been easy to rally forces, to send them to take Mikhail and finish what they started five years ago. )


[ Open to HAVOK, MAGIK, SKIN, SHADOWCAT, AURORA, TWINKLE. Powers are off, they have suppression collars on.]

Mikhal Rasputin was an honest man.

He had only ever been an honest man. When he arrived at Xavier's his desire had always been made clear. He had no interest in the people here, even his own family caused him little want to stay. His goal was to return home, not to Russia, but to Theia Prime, to finish what he started. No one could claim that Mikhail wasn't true about his feelings on all things, or where he stood when the line was drawn in the sand. Every second he stayed trapped on Earth, was another second where that deep resentment began to build.

His family was the only bright spot in the dark recesses of his mind. But they had their own foolish weaknesses. Power was not their first priority. It was these human connections. ( Mikhail did not understand, and so he slowly, inevitably broke away from what should have mattered the most. )


[ OPEN to the DIMENSION TRAVELLERS. Battle will start immediately upon landing and powers are on. A selection of this group will end up taken by Tailiv's forces, via their mutation suppression devices. See subhead below for details. Don't worry, you'll have things to do there, you're not out of the plot! Eventually, rebellion forces will meet for backup and the remaining characters will retreat with them.]

Once the gods were done with the school, they could move onto other, easier targets. Gorge themselves on the souls of the millions of citizens of New York and further until Selene had finished her ascension and called them all back to where they’d been pulled from.

But.

Until then, the school proved to be a fertile hunting ground, most of the gods able to feed off the chaos and fear just as much as the souls being reaped.

Back at Selene’s island, things were going just as well. The teams seemed evenly matched, and she was confident that those fighting for her would prevail. They were, at the very least, very capable of keeping the teams from venturing further and finding her or the dagger. As long as that was accomplished, nothing else mattered.

(Continued fight threads for both the school and Utopia scenes -- please look to thread headers for which one your char belongs in!)

Kyra woke with a start, sitting up in her bed, her heart racing and for a moment, for just a moment, she had no idea where she was. No longer did she hear Kana's deep, huffy snorty snores, there were no sounds out in the hallway and the walls were too well made for her to hear anything from her neighbors. It wasn't a nightmare, for once. Sure, she'd had that weird jerk thing that made her feel like she'd dropped two inches onto the bed as though she'd been floating. Okay, she could fly, so there was every possibility that she had been floating. That was entirely beside the point. Despite the disorientation, the sense of unreality that she had for a moment, the reason she'd awakened in the middle of the night was simple, natural, biological in fact. Her bladder.

A few moments later she was back in bed, her arms tucked around her pillows and her eyes firmly closed against the dim glow of her nightlight. A few moments after that she flopped over onto her other side, took a deep breath and let it out. ( Dear sleep, please? )
[Open]

It wasn't until they had teleported (or flown) back up to the jet that they got the messages about the school. It was always a risk, the X-Men leaving and having to turn off, shut down, or delay comm communication with the mansion until their mission was completed, but it was necessary. If something was bad enough that they were being called in, it needed their full attention. And there were things in place to keep the school safe, with or without them there. The other teams, the medlabs, the security system, the Danger Room. Something happening was regrettable, but possibly, and certainly something that could be handled until they got back.

Except, maybe, in the event of a highly potent drug being unleashed on unsuspecting mutants in New York and a telepathic directive to attack the school at full force, apparently with caveat warnings about things like the Danger Room, the teleporters, the healers, and so on to make for maximum devastation.

The Bird was already in motion, flying fast without waiting for everyone to find their seats or get comfortable. It wasn't fast enough, though. "We have to get back there." Mimic had turned in his seat, looking to the soldiers who didn't have the luxury of a handheld that would let them know what was going on. "They sent a counterattack to our school. There's children there." Switches were being flipped as the X-Men moved from where they were, including Cal and Rahne from the cockpit. "We have to get back. The Blackbird will bring you back to the school. We can protect you there, and help these others. You're welcome to stay there, or go where you think is best. But we have to get there now. You can come with us, or you can stay in the jet. If you're worried about them," their charges who didn't seem much like they would be of any help to anyone in a fight, even themselves, "we have teleporters that can take them to safe spaces until we're done. No one will be able to reach them but us until they're safe." Granted, one spot was galaxies away and the other was in a hell dimension, but. Details. "Or you can stay on the Bird with them. It'll protect itself though; try anything with it and you'll end up flying." Come help the X-Men, have the Kick-addled mutants placed into their teleporters protection, or stay onboard the jet until it landed and decided to let them go. The choice was theirs, but they needed to make it fast. The X-Men were already disappearing one by one, taken back to Xavier's.

(Open to all! Continuation of fighting, set a few hours after the previous threads -- let's say deep night because that's when the best kind of fighting happens! Skills people, you have the option of staying on the jet/Limbo/Dyson Sphere. Soldiers, you can stay with them in whichever place, or help with the fighting at the school. Sorry they don't have time to get you handhelds yet! Things are definitely going from bad to worse on the ground; the Kick seems to be amping up rather than going away, and mutants are blocking various ways into the Danger Room (and starting to target the helpers like teleporters and healers). Keep making life hell, good luck!)

Kiden had always liked going out into the city during holidays. Despite the celebrations everything seemed more relaxed as people weren’t bustling about their lives as much. Instead, they’d take their time a little more, to do things with their families. In the city that meant there was always something going on, and the streets were more packed that normal. It allowed her to slip through the crowds, without the use of her powers, without attracting much notice and that suited her just fine.

It also allowed her to wistfully recall the fleeting, hazy memories associated with her father taking her to a concert in Central Park when she was only a little older than a toddler. It was one of her happiest memories, and that’s pretty much what drew her out into city today. Good times, pleasant memories.

She inhaled deeply, unaware of the aerosol she was bringing into her lungs, and savored the day.

~*~
In less time than it took to blink Kiden Nixon was back at Xavier's with her body full of a dosage of Kick that they wouldn't dare experiment with in their own base. An overdose. Her eyes were wide, pupils not dilating properly, as she took her steps in real time towards the building, joining the other mutants that had been caught up in the same trap as her in their assault on the school. Her pulse was rapid and unstable, her heart threatening to hammer its way out of her chest with it’s heaving, spasmodic beat. The telepathic command shoving her towards violence filled her with a sense of anger she didn’t know she was capable of, but it was palpable, overwhelming in earnest and driving her to lash out at a place she considered home. That was all incited by the fact she felt amazing. Powerful. This was a type of high she’d never experienced before, not in her life, and it was a shame that Xavier’s was intent on ruining that. It was also a shame that Kiden had gotten herself clean only for this to happen, to take on a drug more deadly than she’d ever toyed with for what it could do to one’s power and health.

The danger in this whole scenario that was obvious all over the grounds was playing out similarly within Kiden. The drugs in her system heightened her already powerful abilities several degrees, but the most important part was that Kiden was no longer in complete control of them, there was no block or limitations on them. They were unchained. Without boundary. Time began behaving oddly in her vicinity, both with her intention and without. Pockets and tendrils of time rippled, winking in and out of existence in a fevered pitch. People stopped momentarily so they could be overcome by the others on kick; attackers sped up, rapidly overcoming the lawns to get into the building itself. Grass grew and died, leaves changed colour and dropped from trees, and all the while Kiden was pushed further towards the building, up the stairs and into the school itself on a single-minded goal of taking out her anger on Xavier’s.

Kiden had enough independent thought to single in on one person. Maybe she ought to talk to Helena Tucker specifically.

As Kiden engaged her powers again, wrapping herself in a bubble from a faster-time stream, she stepped inside the main hall quicker than anyone outside of it would have been able to comprehend. Except it was unmanageable, the sheer magnitude of her powers on kick were well beyond her comprehension and control. The bubble around her stretched, growing oblong before popping off into several others and causing pockets of time much like a child blowing them with a soapy mixture on a hot summer’s day. They spread out all around her, breaking into adjacent speeds in the time stream and branching out throughout the school without anything short of sheer random luck, or un-luck as the case may be, capturing other occupants in stasis.

In an attempt to regain some lost control, Kiden furled her brow and concentrated on trying to bring everything back together even as her powers fought against it all. Everything was spiraling for her, and her expression became one of confusion as everything seemed to ripple and overcharge around her. Then, in another blink of an eye, Kiden Nixon was overwhelmed by her raging, wild powers and vanished into the time stream entirely, taking several others from the school along with her. All the temporal anomalies ceased thereafter, but the attack on the school continued.

[ OPEN TO THE 2019 GROUP / EVERYONE FOR MORE FIGHT THREADS ]
((This is your ticket out until 2019 for those of you who are disappearing! The disappearances will happen in the blink of an eye to everyone!))

You're lying awake, the room is different. The walls dissolve, replaced by sky

Kyra opened clouded green eyes and stared into the darkness, seeing nothing. She strained her ears, listening hard, for the soft snoring buzz of the massive dog that usually slept on the foot of her bed. Silence. Was she awake or still dreaming? It had been more than two weeks since her last nightmare, not quite record-breaking, but a reasonable length of time all the same. She didn't feel frightened this time, didn't feel that pulse racing, heart in her throat terror that she usually woke to when she had a nightmare. She just felt disembodied, disconcerted.

( Horizon blackening, twilight beckoning, as the clouds are stretching wide )

[Narrative or Open I guess to any other insomniac]

Kyra was raised in a small southern town, so when the guy she had matched with on the MMatch had suggested that he pick her up for dinner she agreed readily enough. In truth, she was excited about this, it was her very first ever real date! Not a friends date, not hanging out with a group, but a real actual date-date! She’d gotten dressed up with the help (and hindrance) of Kiden and had ended up in a short, fitted black dress with a modestly low v neck, velvet mary jane shoes and the nebula/moon pendant she was never seen without. She’d even smoothed a bit of golden shimmer oil on her skin and through her hair, smelling sweetly of vanilla almond cake and done her makeup, including lipstick this time rather than just her usual eyeliner and mascara. ( In all truth, she felt rather pretty. )

[Open to Drake]

[ OPEN TO THOSE FIGHTING IN THE CITY ]

Kyra hung up the phone with the tap of a button and frowned. Pushing a red handset symbol just didn't have the same sense of finality, of completion that putting it into the cradle did. There was no decisive click, no ability to slam it down in frustration, just that cheerful descending chime sound no matter how disgruntled she was feeling. She put the phone down hard on her nightstand instead, it did make a similar noise, and since she'd done it face up, she hadn't even cracked her screen. Still, it lacked something, it didn't have that feeling of catharsis, wasn't a balm, neither was flumping back on her bed, though the soft grunt from her sleeping dog did make her smile. Arguing with Gramma Lizzie always upset her, perhaps because it happened so rarely.

( You should come home. )
[Closed Narrative]

The carnage, the panic, the fear. All of the negative emotions flooding throughout the school only fueled the ghosts further, making the apparitions more clear and their attempts at gaining corporeal form stronger. They moved throughout the grounds, watching as the undead and the possessed did their work, and themselves took to appearing in sudden and terrifying ways to those trying to run, or those that were already safe in the Danger Room. The few times that a skeletal hand did become real and make contact, tearing at hair or skin, the Danger Room itself became suddenly active, sims appearing to fight the ghosts away from the students and others seeking shelter.

The one that had started it changed his form, shifting down to the ghostly visage of a five year old girl, her throat slashed, still holding onto a teddy bear. This was how he appeared in the Danger Room, moving to a girl with a phone in her hands. Help me. It was spoken out loud and in Priya's head. You have to stop the bad man that did this. If you give Mr. Cody to us then we can finally rest.

He didn't stick around for questions, disappearing and moving back through the mansion, enjoying the fighting going on in the different areas, the destruction they were raining down on themselves. As soon as these people gave up Drake, he could drag him into hell himself. And his cousin, for good measure. And everyone that the man had ever spoken to. And then enjoy the finale that these reanimated creatures were building to.

He'd enjoyed evil in life well enough, but evil in death, as it turned out, was even more fun.

(Open! Please tag below the appropriate header <3!)

Unlike a number of others at the school, Drake didn't actually mind the dark. He didn't wander around looking for blacked-out corners to skulk in, but in his lifetime he'd gotten fairly used to sleeping for a lot of the day and conducting most of his business at night. It just felt more natural to be out and about then, even if right now it meant that he was on his own for a lot of it. Normally that would've been fine too, but there had been….strange things happening, he felt like. Feeling like someone was watching him. The hair on the back of his neck standing up. Something falling over when there wasn't anyone else in the room. All byproducts of living in a mutant school, he knew, but it was still hard to shake that feeling from being a kid and sure that there was actually some kind of nameless monster around.

Which one would think would only serve to make the darkness all the more ominous, but not for Drake. In his mind, the dark provided him as much cover as it did whatever might be out there. It was easier to hide than in the daylight.

Not that he was doing much in the way of hiding at the moment. He was just having another cigarette, the glowing embers lighting up red and casting a small glow from where he stood near whatever tree this was. He wasn't out by the woodlines -- he'd seen things moving around out there and didn't really have any desire to go poking around to see what was living out there at night -- but he was near to some small grouping that was likely there for decoration, to go with the fire pit and everything else in this part of the grounds.

His head turned as he noticed someone coming in his direction; at first sight he thought it was a child, given the height. A kid wouldn't be out here at this time of night though, right? ….Maybe they were evil.

(Open to Kyra!)