12170/Pieces of Mind: Outbreak (Finale)

Pieces of Mind: Outbreak (Finale)
Date of Scene:	31 July 2022
Location:	Greenwich Village
Synopsis:	The telepathic X-Men and Jane Foster regroup to hunt the Shadow King, to force him out of a horrible new body he's made.
Cast of Characters:	Charles Xavier, Emma Frost, Betsy Braddock, Jane Foster, Tabitha Smith, Jean Grey, Loki

Charles Xavier has posed:
After the explosive confrontation with the Shadow King on Friday, things have been .... quiet. Charles is back to himself (although currently taking a nap while the others investigate in the field).

In the Astral realm, the sanctuary torn asunder, still is present, though empty of souls. It is much like the hollowed out shell of something eerie and otherwordly, now: like a giant blackened lobster's husk.

Some souls probably went into that gaping maw made by the Shadow King. Still others were sheparded in part by Jane Foster, though the X-Men group may not know what happened to them exactly.

Today, connections from the Astral were cleaned away, as if someone were covering their tracks. That suggests those trails were important - trails into Greenwich Village: Three of them - the school, the spa, and the NYU Skirball in Washington Square Park. Why clean up those threads, if there's nothing to hide?

Emma Frost has posed:
The astral realm is ripped apart. Emma is currently sweeping through everything that's been going on. She's looking for survivors. For anything that might have gotten away. For signs of the Shadow King's remaining influene. Emma is currently sweeping through the area. Her mind traveling far even through the planescape. Her consciousness sweeping. Even as Emma's sweeping through, going to scry for anything amiss.

Now she's going onto the trails, tracking them along. Jean has no doubt pushed hereslf to the point of exhaustion and is keeping xavier company.

Emma is pursuing the Maw along with any other backup that's coming along with her. Now is hte time to finish the job.

Betsy Braddock has posed:
Betsy had been off the grounds when the attack happened, working with a curious man she met to forge herself a new set of swords. Long story, read the log. The fact that there's nothing to feel guilty about because of that is irrelevent. When Betsy felt the attack happen, she was unable to make it back in time to fight and so carries the weight of all those lost souls.

The result is the British psi-ninja is in rare, serious form. Psylocke is wearing one of her leotards, one of the ones she uses when she's at her most serious and closest to the 'Kwannon' of her shattered memories. Given her unmatched ability to shield herself to invisibility and her own combat training, she volunteered to investigate any locations as a scout.

At the moment, she is sitting on a rooftop in lotus position, keeping her astral projection tight and confined. << I'm in Greenwich. >> Betsy projects to Emma and any other astral presences. << Can you narrow it down? Or perhaps we ask dear Dr. Strange if he knows anything. Isn't his little clubhouse in the neighborhood? >>

Jane Foster has posed:
Of all places, Jane happens to be seated outside the Big Gay Ice Cream shop after finishing up an interview with an entirely too-happy Czech journalist and crew. Having a few words in Czech to pepper among the conversation clearly sent them off happily with their precious footage from the Nobel laureate to a younger generation of high school and middle school students at some of the more prestigious technical academies in the country. Her reward is sitting on a quiet terrace at a small cafe table, umbrella shading her from the sinking sun, and apparently enjoying an audiobook. The image is tidy: earbuds in, her phone propped to face her, sunglasses on. Nothing that would hint she isn't exactly home. Good thing her order was for ice cream in coffee -- a melange -- and not a cone, or else there'd be a telling mess!

Other psychics can divorce themselves from their bodies to astral walk while conducting all kinds of interesting activities, but Jane can't. She can manage, at best, to look like she's engrossed in an audiobook. Casting her other self as an ephemeral wanderer searching for lost soul shards that Kels and she couldn't net the first time around takes a lot more concentration. She looks identical to how they've spotted her in the past, save paler; the damage from recovering other injured souls is plainly painted over her in the diaphanous pallor of her skin, the bleached shade of her jeans and hiking boots. Superhero? Hardly. Lost astrophysicist? Of course.

Tabitha Smith has posed:
Saturday after was a good day for a recharge. The school got the professor back. There was celebrations for birthdays, the Professor's included and Tabby made damn sure he and Jean who was caring for him last Tabby checked., Had cake.

Tabby might have dodged a hgangover now though. Plenty of electrolytes and left over food. She might have a sugar rush going on. Helping recharge the Professor was her first big psychic thing but they're not done and Tabby still has work to do.

That includes actual clean up of the pool and patio area.

With Emma putting the word for backup Tabby tags along. A little help stepping into the Astral herself but she's there. She's been dressed in some comfy yet very snug skinny jeans in olive green while the upper half is in a pink off the shoulder crop top that may have once been a hoodie but cut by hand. Glasses on her nose letting her see.

Of course once she's Astral, Tabby's look is more akin to her usual X-Suit. Full body one peice in what loks like black leather with yellow padding at her shoulders, chest, back and three quarter sleaves. Yellow boots keep her not actually feet covered.

<> she communicates back as she hunts about like the others.

Charles Xavier has posed:
Magical events happened at three places in a more major way - as in, that there were large summoning circles present! - but Jane's location may be the original spot. The first group that were shoved out of their bodies and into the astral were all present there. They may just have been test subjects, true, but that rough connection for some of them, that disruption, lingers around the ice cream parlor like a topping that has gone very stale.

The other three trails were /modified/ somehow, by someone skilled enough to use other psychic events to litter these trails with 'mind debris', though a closer inspection gives an empty, rotted feeling towards the Skirball. It has to do with the minds around it - something is wiping it all very clean. If passerby saw things, they are forcefully forgetting about it...

Emma Frost has posed:
Emma Frost is going to head in with Betsy, taking Tabitha's mind along in tow. <<Elizabeth, this happens to be your specialty, do you care to take point? I'd rather see if we can fully seal these things off or obliterates them if possible.>> Stalking and murdering along the mindscape was what Betsy was the best there was at. Emma's here to give her support and to take Tabitha along as backup.

<<Excellent work Tabitha. Let's hope now that we ca nget this over and finished with>>

Betsy Braddock has posed:
The path is indeed there for Betsy to find, although her astral presence, a shadowy thing barely perceptible, recoils from the foul miasma left in the astral. << Emma, I need help. >> A single bead of sweat goes down Betsy's fleshy forehead, as she struggles against the false trails and psychic trauma of what she's facing. << We can't leave these resonances. Even if the Enemy doesn't use them, they might twist someone caught in them by mistake. Let's test Tabitha on blowing one up. And I think...>>

There's a bit of psychic static, the British psi disappearing entirely from the perceptions of all before abruptly reappearing: << Dr. Foster. >> Betsy's mind voice is crisp and clear in the astrophysicist's ear as Betsy returns from her astral projecting into her body with a grimace, <> And the British psi allows the Valkyrie into her mind somewhat, showing her the psychic stench. << Around the Skirball theater. Guess he's a fan of the arts. >>

Jane Foster has posed:
Try as she might, Jane's trudging spiral pattern across broken trails finds very little of interest in the peculiarly morphic landscape. Some spots might feel colder than others, remnants of terror or incoherent emotions splashed across the fabric of an ephemeral world that holds the last vestiges of existence for one another. She pauses to check here or there, but tracking the fragments or shattered path that was wiped clean is beyond her. Empty-handed failure gambols after her like a friendly hound as she comes upon the lurking, broken structure that looms in dreadful gothic spires. Whatever terrors await Betsy and Emma in their far more finessed pursuits are largely muted to the brunette traveller standing there with her hiking backpack and not so much as a pair of German titanium hiking poles or a cool wizard staff.

For Betsy's sake: Jane's mental presence in the astral is far too clear for a mortal and even a psychic. Usually they have some kind of white-noise fuzz but her frequency is almost too sharp, delineated by a precision that isn't natural. She looks over her shoulder when Betsy reaches out to her, her brown eyes widening, seeking the source. <<Hello.>> A bit of surprise melts back into something cautious but not unfriendly, for the possibility of projecting any louder isn't wise. Not with that monstrous empty building looming up. Her thumb hooks into the strap of the bag, and she walks a few steps forward. <<Is that the university for you? I'm rather glad to have my nose pinched rather than smell that impression.>> Her rueful smile permeates the camber of her thoughts, suffused by a pirouette of images tumbling one after the other in crisp precision. She's a girl who holds immense data in complex dances with ease.

<<Skirball. The survivors of a harrowing ritual were located to the right of the stage, whereas the victims sat in the audience. You might find similar resonance around the Kimmel Center; approximately 180 feet away, northwest, toward Washington Square. They might overlap, since that marks where another set of strikes was.>> The facts twirl in unison with a succession of faces, people spotted by the astrophysicist and tended to, some unconscious and a rare few not. Superimpose that against a map of Lower Manhattan, points of light peppered a bit akin to reading an earthquake map produced by the USGS, epicenters designated by intensity. <<Suffice to say, someone was up to no good there and in a day spa nearby. You've felt the pain?>>

Tabitha Smith has posed:
Tabitha pokes around as best she can. While her own defensive abilities let her minimise her psionic foot print pretty agressively. She's got nothing on either of the mutant telepaths and especially not Betsy's Psi-Stealth. Tabby's a Thief, but Psylocke is a Ninja Though in the astral plane, Tabby's energy for explosions might translate better to an environbment that's almost entirely metaphysical.

<<Thanks. Yeah, this whole thing would make my skin crawl if I was still in it.>> she states and hmmms while she looks around. <<Ruth and I did a pretty good job blasting stuff once she pointed me in the right direction. More Dakka the boys at the school call it.>> she explains and sends the feeling of a smile. The Vakyrie gets the equivalent of a wave as well when she's included in communitcation. <<Crap, there's no handsy Frost Giants again I hope?>> that was a weird thing but turns out a solid enough BOOM! Is perfectly capable of dealing with Jotunheim tourists.

Which shows how much more dangerous the current situation is.

<<Wasn't Skeeball where like a bunch of the stuff we did to get the sanctuary set up in the first place?>> she says while doing her own casing of the area putting some of that training as a criminal to work.

Charles Xavier has posed:
The Skirball itself, for those trying to look at it in terms of looking at people there inside, are finding it empty of psionic signals. Nobody's home - or they are concealed. There are some in the Spa -- perhaps a dozen people going about their lives. The same is true of the other places. There are people there, normally, at least from any cursory look.

To determine if they are mind-slaves would require a lot more in-depth probing.

Emma Frost has posed:
At Betsy's request, Emma Frost gives a nod <<Of course. Tabitha, on me and Elizabeth. Ah.. Doctor, please do help us nail down exactly where these rifts are. If we can save the poor souls all the better. If not.. Then hopefully we can ease their suffering." Emma's putting it politely rather than 'put them out of their misery' or 'euthanize them'. They deserve to go out with dignity.

<<And lovely. I'll do wahtever I can. Just lead us along>> Emma does something she normally rather loathes to do. PUt her powers at the guidance and discretion of another. Letting Elizabeth draw upon her powers, her talents, her skills. It's a dangerous thing to open oen up to another. Even moreso to lend your abilities to them. No control, no shields. Whehter it's out of trust for Betsy or due to the circumstances making things -need- to go beyond her well intended sense of paranoia.

Betsy Braddock has posed:
<> Betsy compliments in that lilting British accent of hers as she focuses on the information shared and making sure the people running psychic piggy-back are able to experience it all too. <> Slaymaster, ripping her eyes out and leaving her blind and helpless. The alternative version of her brother from another universe, attempting to rape her. The sorcerers of the Hand, with their quasi-mystical brainwashing. Kwannon, hands covered in more blood than can be washed off in a single lifetime.

Betsy is careful to shield, but some impressions might manage to work through, given the invasive aura and the subtle influence on her psyche from the resonances. But all heroes have their nightmares, and surely there are skeletons in Jane's closet... perhaps some even with meat on the bones still. <<Oh!>> Betsy abruptly exclaims, her eyes snapping open in the real world and losing the careful balance of telepathic tricks and shields she had going. She quickly recovers. << Yes. Well. Quite. Pin in the souls, luvs. After this... >> Huh?

The British ninja stretches as she allows her focus to shift to the physical. <> Betsy rubs her forehead, wincing slightly as she feels Emma open up to her, expanding her psychic potential beyond anything she ever experienced. << Whoah, there. Heady stuff, Ms. Frost. I assume you want me to probe closer? >>

Jean Grey has posed:
Maybe Jean was taking a nap too. That Phoenix stuff can be a doozy....

Later on, she makes an attempt to reach out to the others. They said they'd be following up. Until she's sure Charles is better, she can't really bring herself to stray from his side, and one thing she can't do, in all her great borrowed cosmic power, is physically be two places at the same time. But physics is a pretty minor scale of restriction when you have the varied sort of abilities she does. The man looks like he's already, and ultimately, she's with him, ready to pull back in a moment...

...so she can afford to leave that part of herself behind to find the others. Distance is less a factor this way, as is familiarity. And she knows this part of the city pretty well, from when she lived in New York for college after graduating Xaviers. It was her chance to get away and be a bit independent. A time she looks back on fondly. And those reminscences connect her.

Thus, poof. An astral Jean! Her fire-mane seems quite dim today, by comparison, if the costumed appearance is the same. Maybe that's an upside to giving the Phoenix monsters to fight, letting it tucker itself out! <<What'd I miss?>> she wonders, gazing around the familiar park from her spot just above the fountain. Or whatever mind-realm equivalent.

Jane Foster has posed:
Emma is the most familiar of them, though Tabitha holds a signature and appearance that Jane herself clearly knows as well. The reference to frost giants (and trolls) brings a weary smile to her lips, enough to bring the dimples in her cheeks into full appearance. Brushed over by a light hand, the fragmented memories knit her together a little more, repairing some of the superficial damage. Deeper bruises and cuts won't seal so quickly. <<No frost giants, thankfully. That issue resolved itself, though I cannot say the same for this.>> She gestures in a loose circle around her head in the Astral, while an unnamed distance away, her body continues to enjoy the fading sunset and good audiobook. It's in German, everything takes twice as long to grasp.

<> The benefits of being a senior SHIELD agent in the most esoteric department, eh? <<As you,>> Emma, that is, <<know, we have seen to treating the patients and keeping them stable. It won't be everyone affected by that entity, but the majority. My primary concern is for the Professor at this time, since the sanctuary fell. Is he well? May I be bold enough to ask if there's anything that I can do for him?>>

Her lengthy pause comes haloed in a vibration of worry that coalesces out of the organized depths of that mind, painted a vibrant singed orange around her aura. The clarity is probably disarming. That's what you get for being pure spirit-stuff. Probably best Betsy shield; the nightmares in Jane's closets are reaped from 260,000 lives or so. <<The souls in sanctuary for the most part ended up displaced but in a relatively secure location. Moderate, short-term. I couldn't preserve all of them.>> Her gaze flicks away to the distance, teeth ground in mute frustration. Regrets will be the damnation of the good, the tarnish on their hopes.

<<Ten to twelve were absorbed by the entity and it's best assumed they are lost. Don't rule out their existence but the more important fact, after the Professor's wellbeing, is that these disassociated psyches need to be replaced in their bodies. We have the bodies. I think we have the souls. Can it be done?>> A question spilled out as the Phoenix manifests herself -- and that, at least, she knows. A wave for the redhead; there's a distinct fondness for their fiery counterpart to the vanilla-bean queen, the violet British beauregard, and sassy bombadier.

Tabitha Smith has posed:
The Astral equivalent of kicking over rocks and debris. Tabby's searching where she can. Even using her Astral BOOM's to clear some heavier debris to clear smaller stuff underneath. There's a lot. <> she states and chuckles. More clean up at home that she's mostly respoonsible for.

<<Never can save everyone. We know that feeling.No self beating up. We'll probably have someone else to wail on instead and you can like fight harder>> Tabby commiserates and then encourages while keeping her mental peepers about, lenmding what she can to the ensemble.

Charles Xavier has posed:
The Astral is indeed a mess-- a lot of damage there, weird tantrums perhaps inside the sanctuary. It's serious, but it is also mostly just there, not everywhere.... As they hunt, though, other things start to go into motion.

Oddly, something lit up at the Skirball Theater. Someone with strong psionic presence just appeared, as if materializing out of nothing, mentally. Then the dead area expands, fewer people in general seem to be present - either people are disappearing, or they are coming under another sort of astral dead zone. That single person disappears with it. It was like a little flare of activity, then unnatural silence.

It feels very similar to what that maw of siphoning energy left behind in the Astral. Something that grows fat, leeching silently, like an unnoticed tick.

Whether said tick is aware of all the attention that is coming to these locations is unclear. But that it is currently doing something... That much is now clear.

Still, if it is hiding... it may still be weak...

Or waiting for them.

Betsy Braddock has posed:
In reply to Jane's comment about the souls being in a secure location, Betsy shares a quick flicker of a mental vision: A little mouse, white snowflake patterns all over, crawling into her pocket. << Something like this? I had a... vision... of one of the survivors coming to me. >> The British psi-ninja shares with the group, before there's a similar flicker of fondness as Jean manifests herself in all her firebird glory. << Ah, there's our Jeannie! >>

Betsy gives Jane a mental shrug at her question. << It's possible. I've personally done something similar twice, even displacing an existing psyche, although there were extenuating circumstances. There's only a handful of telepaths I'd trust with psychic surgery that delicate, though, and... >>> A rush of humility, << That number does not include myself. >>

And then a flare of energy makes Betsy gasp, instinctively drawing her psychic imprint into the shadows and utterly disappearing. << Well, that's pretty indicative, mmmm? >> She notes dispassionately.

Jane Foster has posed:
The unease that ripples through the Astral isn't something Jane-in-the-flesh notices particularly much of. Look, the experiential discoveries of her German colleagues is -really- fascinating in a thriller novel, especially one written by an actual cosmologist. She cares not a whit for the occasional curious look of someone who recognizes her, and the staff are amenable to people staying engrossed in books or computers for hours.

---

Jane on the other side is another matter, stiffening when Betsy gasps. Trust the sensitives; they know better. <<The souls are being housed in New York by an ally of ours, but it's not an impregnable prison.>> Her thoughts accelerate, splintered into a trifork; simultaneously a rundown of those she knows of (so many souls, in so many squirrels, doves, and yes, even she's been a doe), the body count in the hospitals and under SHIELD care matched up against the possible numbers. Lastly, the most painfully guarded: a location in the Bronx. <<Their guardian might not welcome a visit right now, but I don't think he wants to be consumed by whatever is out there. He protected and still protects them.>>

Sometimes secrets have to be shared at a cost, some of them anyway. <<What do we do now?>>

Tabitha Smith has posed:
Tabby's BOOMs (Yes the all caps are a must!) in the Astral are probably not a good idea but if it clears room for anyone's soul to be collected and sent to the correct body, it's maybe worth the risk.

<<So you guys are the mistress telepaths. Working to reattach souls and psyches is well out of my wheelhouse. So I'm guessing we're on bait and trap mode for the big bad again? Deja vi right?>> she ponders and half jokes trying to seem like she's not well out of her depth right now.

At least she's in good company for learning all this stuff. Important enough to try and focus though with the weird sensations of the area pressing down she seems more than a littlke reactive as her energy flares for another PsiBOOM.

<<Maaaaabe we should keep the where close to our chests? Let the bad guy fight for the locations. Cold dead hands and all that.>>.

Jean Grey has posed:
<<A soul is a somewhat complex thing to even define,>> Jean answers the question posed by Jane as she appears. <<But insfoar as they exist here, what we have observed and dealt with, we have been able to move them before.>> This is maybe a shortcut to a more difficult and complicated question on issues cosmological, philosophical, or even theological. <<With your help, we should be able to cover all the bases, regardless.>>

<<Let us begin to->>

But then, just in time for her arrival, something changes. She hasn't had the opportunity to fully explore like they have, to quite come to terms with everything in the area, but the dead zone is quite obvious enough. The presence that briefly shines behind it? Maybe less so, but there all the same. If there's a debate on how to handle it? Well...

Jean's astral form starts in that direction, toward the theater. A trap? Well, it seems she is perfectly willing enough to forge ahead, and perhaps even walk right into it. <<After our last encounter, there's no reason to stand off- I HURT it before. If there's something here, let's deal with it.>>

Emma Frost has posed:
Emma Frost would muse over for a moment over and then she would give her support to Jean <<Yes, this thing needs to be over. Finished. We can't deal with more crisises at this time. We need to if at all possible seal this away and contain whatever is left of the damage and repair what we can. And I suggest..>> She would go to lend her mental support to Jean <<We simply just knock and announce ourselves>> She would add after a moment's thought over on the matter.
<<I'm willing to take the full brunt of things. I'm sure if the entity has some inkling that I'll be at least the one it remembers for being annoying. I can try and lure it after me then the rest of you can engage it once it's sprung whatever thrilling antics it has on me>> The best kind of traps work sometimes when they're sprung rather than disarm.
<<And I've grown annoyed with having to play nice. This thing deserves some degree of suffering if there's any capacity left fro it>>

Charles Xavier has posed:
Not to worry... Tabitha wanted some attention, and she's getting it. Awareness lightly crawls the Astral near them, though it doesn't feel like Shadow King himself. More like a minion sent to examine things, someone more expendable!

It is a haunting, blunted little half-torso shape, which mirrors how this presence thinks of itself now. The Astral displays certain deep facts - and this one is half of a person, barely that, now. It appears, to examine them. Or mostly to just listen in, maybe. Information, and controlling that, is certainly power. It doesn't /do/ anything. It's just there, observant of Tabitha's big 'noises'.

As Betsy disappears, there's a strong ripple from the dead zone. It expands, directly at and over where Betsy was. ....Was Betsy disappearing because she chose to, or because of something else?

There's silence from her, now.

Jane Foster has posed:
The mutant women have the advantage of actual telepathic or psionic powers that provide a substantial offensive or defensive capability. Then there's Jane. Not even Jane doe, this time. With Jean leading the way into the Kimball Center stage and Emma following, she too goes, keeping only a little ways back. Less risk for them, should things get hungry for unfettered souls to munch on.

Then Betsy's gone in a blink and her turn, now, to imperfectly swallow a gasp. <<Does she do that often? Or is this another snatch and grab?>> Alarm that normally would be building has her pivoting to look for trouble, a snare in the water.

The threat to the souls elsewhere in the city, locked in their palatial Bronx prison, rings through her mind. <<Will they be safe?>> A plucked note that determines whether to advance or veer off, though dividing the party is always a bad idea. Still, some dim preparations have begun for the astrophysicist...

Tabitha Smith has posed:
Emma's desire to kick ass gets a telepathic grin. <> Tabitha beamsback while she rummages and digs about.

<<Doc, Betsy is like a ninja but it still irks the crap outta me stealh side and I'm supposed to be able to sense presences now!>> Tabby states even while she stares at the entity that looks back. <> she worries as she feels things being extra extra wonky with that dead zone in their midsts <<But I might also be kinda creeped on right now.>> she thinks out to everyone.

<<Guys. I hope this thing in front pf me isn't suddenly Betsy. Ugly litle spud!>> she states clearly grossed out and not at all thinking of Slimer. Unlike that encounter. Tabby is poised with two fists of BOOM ready to go.

Jean Grey has posed:
OK, Betsy just vanishing off the psychic radar IS something of a concern, and it causes the astral-Jean to whip back around. <<Betsy?>> Concern, but not panic. These people are some of her most noteworthy peers (well, except for Tabitha!) and she has confidence in their ability to look after themselves. But it doesn't make the situation feel any better. <<No.>> she answers Jane. <<Well, yes, she vanishes sometimes. She isn't just like a ninja, she was a ninja for a while, or lived in one.>> It's complicated. <<But I think it's doing something to isolate or cut us off. Divide and conquer, if it's not strong enough to conquer on its own.>>

She still forges ahead, pausing only as Tabitha seemingly flushes -something- out, her attention whirling back as the younger woman calls out her little friend. <<Well, hello. Yes, we see you up there.>> She isn't sure what to make of the half-torso, precisely, but menacing, it's not. <<Tabitha, can you hit it?>> 'Powers' are pretty weird here, considering it's all mind nonsense of a sense. Yet self-actualization is an important component. Who among them identifies more with exploding things? <<Because frankly this isn't the time to play games. I want to get inside the theater, see if there are any of the psyches there.>>

Which, unless Tabitha's half-torso suddenly grows a half-spine and gets aggressive, she's still very much set on doing.

Emma Frost has posed:
Emma Frost goes over <<Betsy is best at making herself invisible. It's why in these sorts of things she's invaluable>> The rest might be trained in astral combat, made for it. . Betsy was created for it. She's the ultimate psionic weapon and assassin. Once Emma had come to realize that,s he had gotten into giving the purple haired whatever she was this week a great deal of leeway. <<So let's see what we can do here>> Emma gets the sense that the group is being rather spread out. So what she does is rather than attempt to extend her cosnciousness outwards and spread herself thin..
 She purposesfully fragments herself. Where there was one Emma, now there are dozens. Smaller, faded ones. Each has a slightly different look and slightly different outfit. One is wearing regalia more fit from her days of the White QUeen of the Inner Circle, two are wearing unique variations of X-Men costumes.. One looks like she came out of a polo club. And many others.
 But what each of these Emma's does in turn is split apart to start scanning and scrying away throughout the area, passing along information to one another like they were establishing a network.
 And if one of them does 'hit' something or is attacke,dit would promptly pop over along lik ea bubble, sending a warning flare along the telepathic line connecting it to the numerous other tendrils spreading about like a glowing telegraph network.

Charles Xavier has posed:
Emma's copies brush over a lot of little spy-type creatures, she's flushing all sorts of them out. The little torso thing feels just like a spy, the same. It's looking. It's not Betsy. But...

No, there's Betsy sending out a mental communication now! ---- except.... ....

<< It's //Pitiful//. Are all of you so deluded to think that you can defeat me, when I can so easily simply take your minds from you? >> Asks the Shadow King through Betsy. Betsy, forced, flung at them mentally with a mocking robotic puppetry.

<< It is feeble, how little you grasp. Your mage 'allies' are all MY allies. Your good buddy? Please, he has tricked all of you. He merely holds those minds for me, torturing them to be more delectable. Should you need more proof?.... he was /instrumental/ to make my new body.... >>

And the Shadow King, with pride thick now, allows them to see something bizarre: a massive, engorged limbless MASS, with a spine and most of a head, growing within the Skirball Theater. It's about as large as, say, a dozen people crushed in a pile, and about as pleasant. The oblong ribcage spirals with runes. People mindlessly toil about it, as magic floods through this strange monstrosity. It is, in a way, a lot like that little flame elemental: it is a magical case, that allows use of a very broad range of psychic abilities. The ribs show similar runes to that candle's waxy surface.

For someone like the Shadow King, who is restricted to what abilities the person he possesses has ... this should unleash all of those. The ends are now in front of them: to create this powerful form, where he can flex such a grand expertise of psychic power. He is showing it to terrify... to show that he can, and is, going to exert his will onto the city.

<< Your fear will be delicious. Flee, little roaches. But know you will be squashed when /I/ choose. But this one... mmmm, I think I shall keep her. Her pain is a unique vintage, as are yours, I am sure. >>

Jane Foster has posed:
The thought does indeed dawn on Jane to strike out with the forty-eight letter German term and bind it into the theoretical work she's doing on quantum superpositioning using superstring theory, a matter so arduous that Reed probably wants to throw her out of a building and several galactic empires at Type II or III on the Kardashev scale might start feel their eyes -- or compound sensory abilities -- start to bleed. She contemplates hurtling those extremes of interpolation through a gauntlet of intermediate values on a formulaic measure to bombard a being that doesn't have any comprehension for such technological terms. Because the Shadow King is an other, and you beat the other with what you've got.

Betsy's lovely English voice coopted by that thing sends her careening a step behind Emma, another back to get the better viewpoint of what horror-show monster resides in the halls of learning. Sacred space, academically defined, and defiled by that. Somewhere, in some part of her skull, the warning bells are screaming.

"I'm going to use a lifeline and call a friend," she spits out softly under her breath, a callback to one of those TV shows from her youth that you might watch on syndication when sick. She gives a chummy little wave, absent, directed to either the X-Men or past the rune-stricken mass. It's both and neither. "One of my better angels." They'll see her vanish as she awakens. Any one of the greater psychics might halt that. The Shadow King himself might, snagging the astral projection.

Does he care about a minor psychic mortal? He should fear the bird, the queen, the bombardier, the ninja, the liesmith.

Friends, then. Alas, Doctor Strange is busy when the brunette does a flyby (and the gentleman sends his regrets). Supposing someone doesn't snatch her, the mortal woman awakens. She knocks the chair askew when she stands. Twenty bucks for a tip follows resettling the chair and taking the phone. Faster, faster, the tempo of cosmic nebulae rings in the blood and sings at her wrist. SHe makes it to an alley littered in dumpsters and someone's seatless bicycle. <<Fine. Have your moment.>> Golden tendrils awaken from her wrist, submerging dead humanity for the immortal goddess. Better angels, as plumes erupt from her back in golden ferocity and plunge her in a freefall back to the beleaguered stage through passwords only learned by hanging dead from Yggdrasil. /That/ one stood before Michael Demiurgos. The Shadow King is a /mite/ less scary.

Tabitha Smith has posed:
Tabby shrugs and just throws the BOOM in her left hand. The link of her plasmakinesis to her telepathy much easier. And thankfully nothing should be exploding out in the real world where Tabitha is in a less attentive position. Not booming in her sleep was something she learned long before she even ran away from home.

<<So like if this turns out I'm killing like an innocent Jean? Party foul!> Jean herself had been one of the people actually instilling a dislike for hurting innocents in mission. Tabby always took unneeded cruelty to anyone harshly.

Of couse Shadow King standing up and bing all monstrous and gross just gets Tabby shuddering. tabby's been plenty afraid and of course that tends to end up with Tabby doing something probably very, very reckless.

She just starts winding up a very, very large telepathic BOOM, hands over head as she generates a ball of energy about as wide as she is tall. All bright and glowing before she jumps as high as she can and throws it like she's taking a shot from behind the three point arc on the basketball court at school. <<Jean, spike this thing like a football in his metaphysical junk!>> she calls out and puts the weapon out there to be directed at the entity.

<<Gimme my friend back Lamo Dingus!>> she yells out an angry demand.

Jean Grey has posed:
Whether Jean believes any of it... isn't very relevant. Perhaps he can conquer them easily, perhaps not. Perhaps their allies are enemies, or perhaps they've fallen into his grasp against their will, or perhaps he's lying all together. This is ultimately a higher and more abstract realm, where belief is important. Doubt is dangerous. Fear is deadly. These are things she knows, things she repeats to herself, things that keep her focused.

Things that Xavier himself taught her.

<<Do not engage him on his terms,>> she cautions the others. Although she had been strolling across the space toward the theater, through its doors, throwing aside unreal barriers, when she enters the auditorium space itself, she flies, rising higher, arms outheld. She is a conspicuous symbol, for good or ill. Emma may have offered, but Jean doesn't let anyone fight her battles, doesn't put her friends or students into any danger she wouldn't take on herself. Maybe it is only symbolic. Maybe a symbol is everything.

<<Flee? No. I am surprised, after the last time, that you would even dare to threaten me again, threaten those around me. Because of the two of us, _you_ are the cockroach, and I am the giant.>>

As she rises throughout the theater, the familiar SFX return: the firebird aura, with wings overlaying her outstretched arms. As ever, it is a thing of terrible beauty.

... it is also a bit of a gambit. Maybe a bluff, maybe a blind Hail Mary.

The truth is that the collaboration between the two is a complex and difficult thing, antagonistic as often as symbiotic. Letting it out the other day was risky, done in a moment of instinct and violence, and it's done Jean the worse over, weakened her footing in the whole affair. In this instant, she can't _make_ the Phoenix do much of anything. There is a schism, a gap, witnessed in her faded arrival earlier.

And the fancy visuals? Well, it's the Astral Plane. She could appear like Kermit the Frog if she really wanted to.

Rising up, it is in fact the woman who faces him, more than the firebird. But that woman is its host for a reason. That woman was Charles' protege for a reason. In this conflict, it is his training she recalls, not some extraordinary power source. She builds herself a psychic mantle that represents everything she desires - the strength, hope, leadership and inspiration she wishes to present to her teamates... as well as a perfect union with the more benevolent side of the Phoenix that she has only glimpsed, felt in brief moments - as well as everything she suspects the Shadow King may fear. Around her, as she rises, the feathers glow and brighten, and turn bright white.

Tabitha's alley-oop? Well, obviously the young woman doesn't know any of this. She thinks she's feeding a monster. That's not a good idea, but it isn't the point. There's no plasma here, not really. What there is, is a young woman she has helped train, acting in the moment where she is needed. It really is the _thought_ that counts.

Thus, as the glowing ball reaches her, a glowing-white talon reaches out to do exactly as she asks, catching it and then throwing it at the strange rib-cage flesh monstrosity. As she does, the wings come forward, blasting a massive light of her own psychic will.

Emma Frost has posed:
Emma goes to support Jean Grey. Emma Frost can move to try and deflect and disorient the Shadow King. What she has.. What she has are alien concepts. She remembers the alien mindscape from the Shi'Ar. She bombards him with the spacial geometry of a species and mathematics from things far beyond human ken. She adds to this alien bombardments, consciuosnesses. She fills it with the telepathic diatribes of Oracle, member of the Imperial Guard.
Emma is attempting to keep the Shadow King off balance. The Astral Plane was ruled by a world of skill and willpower. To Elizabeth..
To Elizabeth, Emma can only tyr an dgive the girl a moment to break free. Something of pure, raw rage that hopefully Betsy will forgive her for. That may push things to far. To Elizabeth.. She attempts to as brutally ass he can focus on the british woman an image of her older brother, his arm raised up with intent while horrifically drunk to slap her over across the face with all the power he could muster. And hopefully enough to both distract the Shadow King /and/ enrage Psylocke to throw him off.

Charles Xavier has posed:
<< Beat yourselves against what you think is reality. I control perceptions here >> The Shadow King replies evenly. If he's afraid, he's excellent at masking that. But more than that, he's a coward of sorts. And so forcing Betsy into the front to take a lot of the blow is entirely something he will, and does, do.

While the Shadow King holds this place, it's very difficult to even aim correctly. Energy shunts, explodes, rending huge vents into the area, melting the scenery of the theater.

Emma's distractions and pressure, though, gives Betsy enough space to twist away, to not take ALL of what the Phoenix is using to rend. Betsy goes down, to the side-- down but not dead, protected and aided by Emma!

Tabitha's energy blinds many of the spying eyes, making it more difficult for Shadow King to determine where to place things, and also his backdoor into the Astral starts to burn.

<< Ready to kill another one of your friends? I can simply heal. >> Shadow King informs them, as the magic runes flare on the corpse. Even if Shadow king is concealing how much Jean did burn it, he perhaps just admitted she CAN hurt it. But sometimes show is more important.

Oddly, in the mix of all of this, little flares of ice spike up all over the place. Two dozen ... then three dozen ... more! Tons of strange little animals, appearing all over the place. From one of the portals, a finger-wave towards Jane from the mage, Kels. The critters swarm, aiding Jane! Each tiny critter alone, maybe nothing, but as a group.... they pounce upon the horrid grotesque corpse! Little mice, birds, maybe even real roaches -- they rush like a bizarre magical flock, these souls, and disturb the magic runes.

Reality becomes clear, stops twisting, as Shadow King is forced to open his maw to try to eat these impudent little souls, gaping wide.

Jane Foster has posed:
Realities bloom in effervescent detail as the lone mortal-born Valkyrie among Odin's collective of soul-catchers passes through them. Scintillating wings of gold crackle on rippling plasma edges, fed by no sun but an ancient storm of colossal proportions bound into a dynamic form. Odin's prodigal psychopomp seems content to let Undrjarn shape itself how it will, shifting away from a sword into a flexible, razor-studded bolas weighted at either side by lightning-spackled nebulas.

In the flaming glory of the Phoenix unleashed, humanity a lens to reflect Jean Grey's goodness, silver-shod armour glows white. The helm pulled low gives no sign of the other woman's identity, as anonymous as the angels of yore were always claimed to be. She ducks beneath an oblate limb threatening them, shod sole launching up away from a pattering of doves on the wing and squirrels on the loose. Theatre boards melt as she nimbly tumbles, eyes burning violet to see the very secrets of the cosmos writ by greater entities than even the Shadow King. Than herself.

Bolas twist and fork, splitting further apart into a multitude of lashes to entangle what passes for the construct's legs -- or lower self, beneath the mouth, the back part to toss the Shadow King offguard with all the gods-granted strength that only the Thunderer eclipses.

She doesn't speak, for words here have no weight, sliding with the vicious back-beaten snap of her wings. Attenuated radiance shapes feathers into something viciously sharp, so even they can cut edge out while she pirouettes in a constant dance that seethes behind the psychics unleashing their due.

For Jean is life, her partner is violet-eyed death. This is no stately waltz but the martial rhythms pounded out by bare feet on the beach, a stamp of the heartbeat struck in the Kree clash of arms, an Asgardian threnody whenever she can yank back the physical form. Gouge holes through the runic work. Cut with something that hits the insubstantial as hard as the physical with equal unkindness, the whirlwind of violence and elegance with a history stretching back to the first Hosts that stepped out of the Silver City.

You want to live, you better fight for it. Life is bloody and immediate. Death is patient and eternal. Together they spin the Wheel, the taijitu found in the spell's lash and the silent stabbing reply as bolas become a spear, a spear can just as easily become the exclamation of a pair of short swords, and the conversation turns on a duel of mind and psyche.

Tabitha Smith has posed:
Tabby is the little fish in the pond. But a little fish can really hurt a lot if it bites somewhere sensitive. <<We reject your reality and subsitute our own!>> Tabitha yells out.

The directed BOOM sent and then delivered by Phoenix Express. There's w whoop as her psionic Boom is super effective. Sure it didn't kill the Shadow King but Tabby does take a little pride that she can do something. It also gives her more ideas.

Well it's more bombs. Nowhere as large as the last one. Tabby is all energy while she's astral so maybe not spending all of it is an idea. But she did use a lot of it.

And a lot more yet she uses. Directed up and all over the place. Behind Shadow King to knock down doors that might be escape hatches. Tabby might save those jokes for later but now is serious business.

The little fish is sending her blasts of energy like a swarm of pirahna. Lots of bites aimed at the Shadow King's spectral hiide. <<You're gonna choke on anything you bite now Dingus!>> she lets her fight response drive her. Tabby might be scared but that's sometimes enough to make someone fight harder and be more dangerous.

Jean Grey has posed:
The big light show (emphasis on show!) continues from Jean. As space warps and shifts, this creates some truly strange results, blending beauty and horror through the odd dimensions. That pure light is refracted into its components, bent and twisted, changing through a spectrum of colors familiar and otherwise. In broken reflections of shattered, different images reveal themselves, glimpses of the truth. Not a cosmic bird. Just Jean, many Jeans, young and old, past and even future. The little girl that Xavier found, and rescued from the psychic trauma of a death experienced first-hand. Older versions, training alongside the teammates she would one day lead, then at their fore. Another, different Jean, dressed in a pure white version of her costume.

<<Do. Not. Listen.>> she repeats. The mantra is more important than the display, than any posturing of power. They cannot let him control the story, their experience of the moment. Because that is more real than anything, here.

When things are 'sane' and coherent enough to observe, to resolve one's vision to a single image, there is no longer a Phoenix, false or otherwise (maybe the true Phoenix was in her heart all along? Or is that a little too cheesy?). There is just Jean, although the white costume remains in place of the green, accented with the same gold details. Standing by herself, planted on the stage, the cosmic grandeur is absent, yet her presence is no less significant. The light is still there.

Casting her gaze aside and upward (at least, relative to her own reference frame), she spies Jane's return, her charge, marshalling her own cosmic host. There's a twinge of a feeling, a strange familiarity, though it passes when she tries to grasp it. Something belonging to those distant forces, not their two proxies. Nonetheless, she stands, the same bright beacon, as they come crashing down.

<<You will not shake me with talk of death and loss. I've experienced it. I've lived it. The end of the story isn't a sad one, it's just a new beginning.>> This might seem grand and aloof, until she adds a touch of a personal jab: <<Though I think we could do with less of you in it. We get to make little changes as we go along, you know.>>

With these observations, she only stands and watches as the host descends, launches its own assault on the creature. The reflection of her on their arms and armor is enough. It creates an unrelenting brightness, a light that ever more seems to fill the space. Fill, in such a way, as to deny his control, even his presence. Jane now assaults the body, launches her bloody-handed assault, while she seizes the battlefield itself with the pure unrelenting force of her being. No longer does she try to guide Tabitha, either: she seems to be doing JUST fine, heastrong as she is.

Emma Frost has posed:
Emma can only brace and hold now. In her own way. While the others work at inflicting pain, dismemberment, suffering.. Emma Frost takes inspiration earlier from what Jane had done. Emma goes to take the imagery from Jane, the mathematics.. And from Jane's mind she goes to pull from other things. The nearby observatory, the planetarium.. From them, Emma Frost pulls on the aspects of math. Into the psionic realm she enforces something that ordinarily it does not have beyond a sense of normalicy.
    To it she forces a sense of physics upon it. Or a tleast.. Over on the parts of it that the Shadow King was. Emma goes to focus her mind as the others lash out at it and goes to blast and attack it, and Jean Grey, the Phoenix, goes to rend it asunder..
    Behind it, Emma goes to create the void. The unmaker. From it she makes a neutron star collapsing in and on itself. The unlimited gravitational pull of a quantum singularity. From space, Emma goes to then force it into existence with her consciousness. Attempting to leave the Shaodw King and his essence over with the choice of struggling to stay the line over while the others attacked it, or to be consumed.
    And Emma forces her min dto inflict reality upon the astral plane. To physics. To the myriad forces of existence. And Emma Frost attempts to give i tthat force of being rendered apart at the subatomic level by the overpowering force of gravity.
    The astral realm was the fragmented, disjointed, anarchic realm of the mind. By sheer willpower, Emma Frost goes to try and inflict total order upon it.

Charles Xavier has posed:
It's very unfair, all of how all of these people work together. It's baffling and always disorienting. Why is it that Shadow King's allies all turn, and these other powers seem to know each other's disgustingly heroic hearts? It's so repellent. The outpouring of positivity is shredding his hold. If he can't continue his own version of everything, if he can't make them FEAR, his power wanes.

Worse, there's forces now acting against his perfect BODY, it won't behave as he'd expected. Magic is such a pain in the nonexistant bulbous lower torso zone!

He tries to eat the souls, because ... it's easiest to do what is strongest in his nature: to selfishly consume. But he bites down on NOTHING as the little illusory souls twist away and reveal only a charging Valkyrie, having cloaked HER approach with their stupid illusion selves---

It's really not fair, and it creates this mass of deep, loathesome rage. He can't fight from this body being suppressed, and is forced to launch himself towards the Astral, hard.

Except Emma's weirdness is there, and he's required to move again. It is this lurch into the Astral, then back, that truly shreds his current essence, into a frothing disjointed mass, squatting on both sides.... and looking towards Betsy as an option, then Kels.

Revenge always wins, though, when in a pure emotion state, and he launches at Kels, slamming into those shields, trying to possess, then wheeling towards Betsy -- only to be caught by the Astral attack while lacking a body. He's forced, hard, away from the Astral .... and collapses, into the edge of the Astral, torn and... defeated.

Jane Foster has posed:
Jane Foster -- somewhere -- is enjoying the stultifying view of a brick wall. There will no doubt be some question from a lunar king on why she is studying the bricks so hard, or whether she needs assistance. She might even answer that with a rueful chuckle, if he finds her.

---

A short distance away, her immortal alter-ego battles with the Shadow King in a certain, laser-focused intent.

When the Shadow King throws itself -- himself -- in a rage across the physical to the mental realms, Undrjarn becomes a glittering gold sword slammed across the paper-thin barrier into the Astral. Valkyrie is both physical and astral. There isn't a separation there, not when it comes to making that weapon into a blazing flame. Stabbing someone in the back might normally be a dishonourable act, by some standard, but not under these circumstances. Beside, does the psychic spider have a 'back?' One more reason for it to retreat to safety.

Guard life. Protect the city. Stand guard against its hate and fear. There will be only a small meal of fear from her, being made to fight on the bleeding edge of reality and laugh at impossible odds. She has can take strength from the daring response of Tabitha's reckless attacks, Jean's commitment to hold firm, Emma being fabulously herself. Betsy, a stranger but no less valued by the others, is another candle to hold back the dark. That other flame, the unseen one, commits her to a task without quailing. To wait until the wreckage settles, and the winged, helmed warrior turns her head into the void. <<Kels.>> The all-tongue of the Aesir is a wonderful thing. <<Thank you.>>

Tabitha Smith has posed:
If Jean was a flamethrower. Tabitha would be flicking lit cigarette butts. When they hit they'll still sting. Tabby had enough put out on her while a street kid.

Emma's attempt at creating a void to ensnare the Shadow King. Distraction and a charge from the Valkyrja. Those rushing critters were pretty awesome.

Tabby's psionic booms, if they were plasma, and currently at the size of basketballs. They'd have been lethal to a human. The only people she's listening top are her friends fighting with her.

Though when the Shadow King falls it takes a few moments for Tabitha to eventually stop. Maybe to get a few last kicks in when it's down. Maybe because she couldn't be sure till anyone else fighting eases off their throttles. <<Our world! No souls for you!>> Tabby lets out in a victorious whoop.

Though she is very, very exhausted, visibly so from trying to keep up with the more powerful and experienced telepaths and mystical powerhouses.

Jean Grey has posed:
Jean has no influence or say over the physical goings on here; like Jane, her body is well and truly distant, her and Charles no doubt making a very aw-worthy image as they nap.

But the astral presence is unrelenting. From all sides, the light grows brighter, streaming in through windows the building doesn't have, radiating from her calmly smiling visage. It would be enough to stand and watch him... dissipate? (It is hard to properly categorize such an end.) Except for Betsy. That last instinctive, desperate, fearful lunge provokes precisely what you would expect from the often-called Team Mom of the X-Men. For all she might bluff about some cosmic notion of life and death, the truth is she'd fight clawing and scraping to the damn bloody end for any of her adopted X-family. So in that last moment, she is no longer simply astride the stage, watching his end. In that moment, she brings everything she has left to bear.

Thus, as Tabitha lays down an orchestra of exposions, the whole theater now seems to quake around them (thankfully, not the real one!), breaking into pieces. Through the cracks, there is only more light, and although the space breaks -open-, in seems to get smaller and smaller. Perhaps it is Emma's waiting void that accounts for it. Perhaps it is that there is simply no more room left for the Shadow, against that great psychic light.

Perhaps it that heckin' flaming sword!

Whatever the case, there is simply nowhere left for him, in the end. Nowhere but a darkness beyond. He is gone... and likely unmissed.

<> Jean's thoughts immediately go to the others. The theater is a theater again (that still isn't really there). <<Check on Betsy.>> That might be for Jane (or whatever this version is called - they really haven't been properly introduced), as some of them lack the physical capacity. She reaches out for the woman's mind.

Emma Frost has posed:
Emma Frost moves to get up and over on the ground and slowly goes to massage her temples, running a psychic scan of herself <<LEt's make sure that thing left nothing upon any of ourselves and then..>> Emma's next thoughts are purely emotional and irritable in nature over as the thing goes to collapse on down over.
 <<And that thing is still out there. We don't destroy somethign so old and wretched as that in but a single fight. It's over for now.. But only for now>> Emma goes along with the others while going to give a quick attempted scan of Jean's overloaded psionic aura.
 <<And you, my dear Ms. Grey, do have your own spa now. I -insist- you make use of it's facilities. I bought it for you for a reason after all. You could do to take advnatage of it once in awhile, as horrible as that may seem to abuse your position>>
 Emma is at least back to normal, presuming that Betsy is as well and all of them have mostly survived, sanity intact.
 WEll.. Other than Jane, but that question is not something brought up in polite company.

Loki has posed:
<> the image of the mage, Kels, replies serenely to Jane. His visage flutters, as the role held drops away, revealing the real visual of the shapeshifter. He isn't in impressive city-conquering regalia, so some may not immediately realize who he is, anyway.

<< And though I understand everyone is exhausted, I want to remind that the animal soul-containers filling my palace is /temporary/ only, >> stiffly asserts the prideful, dark-haired mage. Loki, formerly Kels, picks illusory (or, sadly, not illusory...) squirrel fur off of a sleeve with a most put-upon look.

Still, whether or not he heard Jean, he's actually there with Jane, and can look from her to the fallen Betsy. Aquamarine magic flutters under his hand, which might make a LOT of people tense up to see, but the report as the magic disappears is just an indifferent, << She's fine, >> before their 'mage helper' turns towards his blue magical portal.

12170/Pieces of Mind: Outbreak (Finale)

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