15971/Jack-o'-lanterns For Xaviers School

Jack-o'-lanterns For Xaviers School
Date of Scene:	11 October 2023
Location:	Garage and Stables
Synopsis:	Mid-October is pumpkin carving time at Xavier's School.
Cast of Characters:	Kitty Pryde, Kurt Wagner, Warren Worthington, Jean Grey, Rogue, Roberto da Costa

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Kitty Pryde has posed:
The beeping of a service vehicle backing up can be heard outside of the garage at Xavier's school. The sun is just setting, the distant sky in the west a mix of reds, oranges and yellows as if to match the changing colors of the trees in the school's grounds and in the surrounding woods.

A panel truck backs up to the garage, where extra tables have been set up along with containers of knives, spoons, and other utensils that might be helpful for making jack-o'-lanterns. For those who don't want to free carve there are templates that can be used. For lighting there are candles, electric lights and other options in various colors.

The truck comes to a stop and Kitty Pryde hops out, phasing through the door and dropping to the ground rather than opening the door. She stuffs the jingling keys in her pocket as she walks around to the back of the truck. "Pumpkins are here!" she announces loudly to the students and staff who have gathered. Kitty opens up the back of the truck, revealing the load of pumpkins within. They range from a few small ones, to large ones, and even a few very large ones. "Come get them," Kitty says with a grin. "After we're done carving we can get the rest of the decorations up too."

Kurt Wagner has posed:
While Kitty has been out making sure that the pumpkins arrived on time and in good order, Kurt has had an even bigger challenge to manage. He has been running herd on all the students, trying to keep them from wandering off, or making a mess in the garage.

You know, more so then would be created by carving up huge gourds and dumping their entrails all over the place.

All things considered, the fuzzy blue elf would have probably preferred to be on pumpkin duty. But they all have to make sacrifices now and then, right? Still, Kurt flashes a relieved grin when that truck finally pulls up, moving at once to start helping unload all of those pumpkins. "Everyone pitch in and we'll have this taken care of in no time!" he urges.

Warren Worthington has posed:
Warren Worthington helps Kitty to unload, much as he's usually averse to manual labor. He had offered to hire caterers and decorators to take care of teh whole thing, but Kitty had insisted on the 'volunteer' aspect. Warren was a staunch capitalist - he expected to be paid for his labor.

But she pushed him and prodded him and finally he agreed and now he was carrying pumpkins.

"I'm not going to be cutting out any vegetable cuts tonight," he tells Kitty as he walks by her," You can just cut that right out of the agenda."

Jean Grey has posed:
Although this is merely Halloween PREP and not yet the genuine article, Jean is nonetheless wearing a witch's hat. No other costume, really- just the hat! Otherwise it's the usual fall wear, one of her fuzzy green turtleneck sweaters, jeans, etc.

Stood behind one of the tables, she was overseeing some last details of logistics, before the pumpkin mobile arrives with its mighty haul. Some of the students are ready to help grab and unload them, from where they'll be set all along the tables. "OK, just start putting them down along there-" she directs, helping Kurt handle the herd.

On top of that, it wouldn't be Halloween without a little magic, so she does help unload some herself, albeit without moving from behind the table. Instead, she raises a hand, makes a vague 'magic gesture' (Illyana would probably call her out on it!), and causes a trio of pumpkins to lift from the back of the truck, the central larger one bobbing along toward a table while two smaller ones orbit it like satellites.

"WoooOOOoooo."

Rogue has posed:
Rogue is sitting in the yard outside of the garage, dressed in a green tshirt, denim shorts, and sneakers, she's wearing sunglasses, and is currently throwing a tennis ball off in to the distance, while Jeepers chases after it. The Yellow Lab is wearing a pumpkin costume, with the hat of the costume being the top of the pumpkin as though the dog is bursting out of the top of it. He chases after the tennis ball as Rogue launches it a good thirty yards without even trying that hard.

Once the dog runs off, she glances over at everyone, then down at her phone which is laying in the grass between her thighs. She leans down to read it, and swipes a finger across its screen.

Jeepers is a jiggling running pumpkin, headed off after that ball with his tongue lolling out to the side!

Kitty Pryde has posed:
Kitty rubs Warrens' back between his wings, teasing as she says, "Is there some kind of traumatic jack-o'-lantern moment in your past that I haven't heard about yet?" She grins to the angelic mutant and then hops up in the truck. Ferrying pumpkins to the back edge and handing them down to people.

"Kurt," the Jewish girl says, breaking out in a grin already as if pleased with herself. "I got you and Hank two special pumpkins," she says. She goes over and bends over into the mass of orange gourds and picks up a pair of pumpkins. They have both been dyed blue. Kitty grins as she carries them over to hand down to the German.

As a trio of pumpkins float past her, Kitty looks out for signs of who is doing it. She laughs and flashes a grin at Jean and then gets back to work, passing pumpkins down to people until finally she carries the last one herself. She hops down and pulls the truck's gate closed. "I so love this weather. This is the best time of year. I mean, Hanukkah might be better but this way it's still to come to look forward to," she says. Her free hand goes to her necklace with the Star of David pendant, a gift from Warren three years ago at that time of year.

Kitty carries the last pumpkin over to a table for herself. "Rogue, that's an adorable costume," she says of Jeepers.

Kurt Wagner has posed:
Depositing his first batch of pumpkins across the waiting tables, Kurt treks back out to the truck quickly enough -- very quickly sinch one moment he is in the garage and the next he is standing right by that backend to pick up the next load.

Look, few people love hauling things around, but it beats trying to run herd over a bunch of teenagers on an otherwise lovely autumn afternoon.

Pausing at Kitty's words, the fuzzy blue elf waits before taking the next load over to the garage, a grin sliding over his features when she reappears once more with those dyed pumpkins, a wry shake of his head greeting the little surprise. "Why, you shouldn't have. I'm sure both Henry and I will be able to come up with something suitable," he enthuses, carefully gathering them up as well, hands more then a little full.

Roberto da Costa has posed:
Roberto Da Costa wanders over as the last pumpkins emerge from the truck dressed in a imaculate dark gray suit, his shirt is taiored, with cufflinks and is that burnt orange you only see in fall. Tonight he is playing it casual with no tie. He smiles and saunters over, feigning distress, "Aww, did I miss the Unloading this year?" Berto grins and slips his hands into his pockets as he moves through the slight crowd nodding and speaking quietly. He sidles up to Kitty waiting for her to plunge her knife into the pumpkin she has chosen for the annual Halloween tradition.

Jean Grey has posed:
Eventually, the super spooky pumpkins touchdown upon the table, neatly in a line with the big one in the middle and the smaller two flanking it. Meanwhile, Witchy Jean looks back over at Kitty and winks!

"Alright, once they're all unloaded, it's time for the pumpkin massacre!" she declares to the students assembled for this task. "Remember, it'll come out better if you trace a pattern first, before you start cutting! And everyone, safety first." A bunch of powered adolescents with knives... what could possibly go wrong?!

That said, the students do train for things that are arguably more dangerous than pumpkin guts, so maybe they'll be alright. Quickly enough, many get to work. Of course many are just going for simple patterns, mouths with pointy triangle teeth and simple eye-holes, as is tradition. But at a place as wildly diverse as Xaviers, there are some with pretty wild artistic talents. Some pull up reference diagrams on their phones, or use their powers to try and achieve more incredible results!

Once they're settled into it, Jean looks around, probably for Rogue, who she eventually catches by virtue of the pumpkin running around the lawn. Although she's perfectly capable of just -thinking- over at her, she takes a different approach, taking out her phone and tapping out a text. A moment later, Rogue's notification goes off!

Rogue has posed:
In the sunlight of the late afternoon sky, a semi-wet tennis balls lays in the finely cut grass of the yard. It seems to almost smile up at the radiance of the sunshine pouring down upon its green felt body. But then, suddenly, a giant wet mouth with razor sharp fangs descends upon it. If one could speak Tennis Ballsian, they might very well hear the screams that echo across the verdent scape around the poor piece of sports equipment.

"Costume?" rogue says back to Kitty, from her seated space beside one of the hedges. "He tried sleeping in it last night... His giant butt hanging out of it and snores coming from inside it." She notes of her faithful friend that is rapidly running across one of the garden cobblestone pathways back toward her with the green ball tucked between his rows of teeth.

Rogue's phone beeps, and she looks down at it. She reads the text and a smirk crosses over her lips. She fires a text back with a few quick strokes of her thumbs across the smart phone's reflective glass mirror.

Jeepers runs right in to her from the side, jamming the slobber covered ball in to the Belle's face.

There comes a feminine squeal of surprise, and disgust at the gesture from her eager pal!

Quickly though, Rogue leaps to her feet and starts rushing toward the pumpkin carving tables. "Someone carve up the livin' one chasin' me!" She shouts to the kids with the safety knives, as Jeepers runs after her now, still slobbering on that ball as he runs on her heels, the two rushing through the pumpkin carving tables!

Someone is definitely getting hurt today.

Kitty Pryde has posed:
Kitty smiles back to Kurt and then flashes the grin over to Roberto as he wanders in. "Slacker," she tells the Brazilian, wiping her hands before going over to give Roberto a sidehug if he lets her.

Kitty examines her pumpkin thoughtfully. "I was thinking maybe a vampire. Ah, but I don't want to be culturally insensitive," she says, glancing towards the section of the school where Jubilee is housed. "Hrm. Maybe Frankenstein? Get some bolts to put in on the sides at the bottom?" she muses.

Kitty starts sketching on the pumpkin lightly in pencil as she tries to work out what he should look like. "What are you going to make, Jean?" she asks as she draws some eyes and then pulls out her phone to look at some images of Frankenstein to help.

She glances up, watching the pumpkin-shrouded pooch chasing Rogue down. "I'm cheering for Jeepers," she informs Rogue with a grin.

Several of the students start in carving. One of the newest students, Janie, stands unsure as she looks at the other students go to work. She moves over and touches one of the pumpkins hesitantly.

Kurt Wagner has posed:
Once back in the garage near the various carving stations that have been setup, Kurt spends a little of his time helping some of the students gather up their chosen pumpkins, to spread out as they gather up their tracing paper and knives, at least those who aren't willing to let their artistic talents speak for themselves at any rate, and hangs around long enough to make sure no one immediately cuts themselves.

So far so good on that front. Chances are it won't last.

Finally the fuzzy blue elf turns back to his own special pumpkin, eyeing it speculatively for a moment as if considering just what he wants to do with it. He's pretty good with a blade afterall, but in the end he decides to just stick with something appropriately devilish to go along with his own unique appearance, sketching out a pattern on the face of the pumpkin itself before going to work on it with a knife.

Roberto da Costa has posed:
Roberto Da Costa returns the sidehug and gives Kitty a peck on the cheek, "That's me, no initiative. Oh, we finally got the insurance money straightened out. So, your tank arrives Friday." He waggles his eyebrows, "I mean the mileage is crap but you park it anywhere. Is Xavier too done?" He smiles as he looks around at a plethora of bald pumpkins with sneaking likeness to the founder, "It's the great pumpkin Charlie Xavier. Why is that pumpkin chasing Rogue?"

Jean Grey has posed:
"It's a secret! You'll have to wait till I'm done to see!" Jean declares, pressed by Kitty for information on her own pumpkin plans.

She also hasn't really started, although not long after that, and once at least most of the students have gotten settled into their work, she does finally find one of her own and stands behind it, looking at the pumpkin surface thoughtfullly, as if measuring out the space, imagining her orange canvas, ready to be transformed.

... well, maybe. Is she really all that artistic?!

However, any semblance of organization amidst the chaos is upturned as Rogue comes charging through with Pumpkin Jeepers hot on her trail. "No running!" she shouts, like a lifeguard at a pool, voice breaking as the appeal lands somewhere between a laugh and total exasperation.

"Jeepers! C'mere boy. Let's give you a treat." Fortunately they actually have tons of great doggie food on hand... the pumpkin guts itself! That stuff is actually great for dogs. So she grabs one of the plates where one of the students has discarded some, and spends a moment picking out seeds before she puts it down on the ground near the end of one of the tables.

Rogue has posed:
Rogue stops running when Jean commands it. She is right beside Kitty when she stops too, with Jeepers stopping a few feet behind her. The dog with the pumpkin top hat continues to chew on the ball right up to the point where Jean sets something on the ground for him.

Tennis Ball spit out!

The dog descends upon the offered food with an inspective intent...

Rogue, meanwhile puts her hands on her hips, and regards what Kitty is doing, then the others. She, herself, begins to inspect the pumpkins and how they are turning out thus far.

"Good work, Kurt. Keep it up." She says as she passes him by, reaching to snag one of those blue pumpkins that Kitty had made for him. She takes it over to an open station, where she gathers up a couple of tools, and she sets to work. The next five seconds are spent working hard, very hard, until she steps back, having put just one slice... or crack down the middle of the pumpkin's face.

"There. Done." She says to all gathered around. "I call it... Darkholme."

Jeepers is eating that offered food so fast that he has to pause and let out a loud doggy hacking cough.

"Pace yourself, Bumpkin Pumpkin." Rogue tells her faithful furry friend without looking in his direction.

Kitty Pryde has posed:
Kitty Pryde leans over to give Jeepers a few pets as he scarfs down the offerings from Jean. The young woman serving as part time guidance counselor sees Janie standing there looking a bit unsure. Kitty goes over to the new student. "Are you feeling like caring a jack-o'-lantern?" Kitty asks her.

Janie looks at the pumpkin and then up to Kitty. "I don't know. We watched that Sleepy Hollow movie and I kind of didn't like the jack-o'-lantern head in it," she says.

Kitty gently pats her shoulder. "Well, why don't we make a happy one then? A nice big smiley face pumpkin?"

The girl considers and then nods and grabs a pencil, beginning to draw on it.

Meanwhile, speaking of those delicious pumpkin innards, a pleasing smell accompanies the door to the school opening. Hambone comes out, with a tray of steaming warm baked pumpkin seeds. The scents of cinnamon and pumpkin spice fill the air as he brings them around.

Kitty stares for a moment. "Hamb- er... James, you can cook?" she asks.

He grins. "Oh yeah, this is one of my favorites, my mom always makes these," he says. Kitty stands gaping at this knowledge as he takes the baked pumpkin seeds around for people to try them. She might be heard to mumble something about "... can barely make cereal..." to herself.

Roberto da Costa has posed:
Roberto Da Costa whispers to Rogue, "I thought his name was Hamilton?" He picks up a pumpkin seed and munches it, "Tasty. Kitty don't be jealous, it's a not a talent everyone can master." He pats her arm consolingly, and then yawns, "Yeah, that Sleepy Hollow is a lot. Isn't it around here? How have we never had a field trip to Sleepy Hollow... how has their never been shenanigans in Sleepy Hollow? Jeepers, we might have a mystery to solve, I'll bring the bacon."

Jean Grey has posed:
Even Jean is a bit taken aback by the ravenousness of the beast in front of her, but nonetheless looks on with a grin for a moment, before leaving the pooch to eat in peace.

Her attention, thus, returns to the table, where her own pumpkin sits in front of her, awaiting whatever secret rendering. Here, not unlike some of the students, Jean turns to her phone, thumb-tapping it open and then going through a few quick swipes before she finds what she's looking for. She holds it, looking from screen to pumpkin, pumpkin to screen, and scrunches up her nose. A moment later, she turns it sideways. "Aha!" Then it's on to carving, and... anyone who's ever seen Jean around the holidays knows what's coming next!

Like with the floating pumpkins before, the redheaded 'witch' soon instills a handful of knives and tools with what seems like a life of their own, holding her hand in the air and wiggling her fingers in intricate motions, almost like she were working the strings of a marionette. The tools dance to her command, and then begin their work, cutting and scooping and carving and slicing!

It's all a little extra, but she looks like she's having a good time.

"Oh, those smell good!" she calls over, as it's now the humans get their own treats.

Rogue has posed:
Rogue stands proud over her butt-shaped pumpkin, nodding her head slowly at it before she looks over to the tray of food being offered by James. She narrows her eyes at it, then at the Senior with the notorious reputation of being a bit of a troublemaker. When he reaches her, she has Roberto speaking to her, and with a glance toward him, she says back. "That's his last name. His first name is TROUBLE!" She says the last word louder, of course, as she looks back at him and that smile he has on his face.

"I'll wait a few hours, see how everyone else reacts to it." She says with a sardonic smile offered to the once portley teen, now rapidly growing up in to a more athletic, but still totally suspicious 'dude bro' of a teen.

"Well done on the effort though, unless people start spewin stuff. Then it's detention time." She tells him with a small grin as he moves on to offer it to other people.

Jeepers keeps on chowing down though, up to the point of one of the other Seniors approaching him to check on him, the British girl, Rhona.

"Don't get him too excited for mysteries to solve, Robbie." Rogue says to Berto, showing him a soft smile. "You'll get him mostly in it for the Scooby Snacks anyway..."

She saunters over to Witch Jean to peer over her shoulder at what the Headmistress is crafting, or trying to see it anyway.

"Are you making one of Logan? He'll cry a little if you do, I think..." She softly says behind Jean's left shoulder.

Kitty Pryde has posed:
Hambone grins at Rogue and says, "Aw shucks, Miss D'Ancanto, I wouldn't mess up mom's pumpkin seeds!" Though he does get a thoughtful look, as if thinking about what he -could- have done to them that wouldn't affect the flavor!

Kitty smiles as Janie seems to be getting into the spirit of the carving, and heads back to her own table where Franken-Pumpkin awaits. She looks over towards Kurt's table. "It is acceptable to use a rapier," Kitty tells him, and then holds up a hand in a stop gestures towards the students who were already starting to look excited, "If you're a teacher," Kitty finishes, deflating the students who were going to rush for the fencing supplies.

Kitty holds her knife and lets out a ghoulish laugh and then stabs it into her pumpkin and begins sawing away, cutting out eye holes for her monster.

Looking over at Roberto, Kitty says, "I can't even imagine what the insurance paperwork looks like. Description of the accident?" She gives him a grin. "It was such a sweet gift though, I felt bad about having to use it like that."

Jean Grey has posed:
"No peeking!" Jean shouts as Rogue comes over, in a tone not unlike her earlier chastisement. Notably, she clicks her phone off, too. So while she can't totally stop the other woman from getting a glance at the work-in-progress, she can hide the template, at least!

And the work in progress is basically just a... sort of vaguely horizontal blob at this point, with the details not yet fully resolved. What it is could be anyone's guess!

As for Logan? "He should really be here helping, don't you think? Then again, if it's pretty, maybe he's not the best at it and he's a little embarassed?" That very inverted bit of wordplay probably goes over most heads, but she knows the grumpy Canadian well enough to find some humor in the whole thing.

She's also happy to take a brief break to grab a snack, ambling over to Hambone with a spare, not-yet filled with pumpkin guts plate. She's braver than Rogue, and tries some immediately. "Oh, these are great, James! Do you know any other of your mom's recipes? You could show one off for Thanksgiving." She's all about encouraging such wholesome hobbies amidst the student body!

Also, since there's a stray conversation about a famous Horror-oriented town, she's happy to supply: "Sleepy Hollow's about halfway back to the city, yeah, right along the Hudson on the Metro North." Jean and her local-gal info!

Rogue has posed:
When she is denied being able to see the pumpkin that the Dean Jean is creating, the Belle lets out a whine that she might have picked up in-part from her fuzzy friend who is licking his chops while seated over beside the British girl. Rogue lets it go though, and now observes as some of James' treats are sampled, softly shaking her head at it.

"I got some of Hambone's mom's recipes when I went to see her last weekend." One of the other Seniors says, in a small clump of them, all three start to laugh in unison at the joke too.

Rogue ignores it, now focused on the Sleepy Hollow conversation, with her hands on her hips. "Oh no, no way. I'm not goin' there. Look, we have a track record of makin' strange stuff happen wherever we go. I ain't gettin' my noggin' lopped off, an' ridin' around on the spirit of Sergeant--" The horse that Jubilee killed when she was adjusting to her Vampire lifestyle. "No way, no how. We go there, an' all the legends will become reality."

Is she scared? She's fought aliens in space before!

Kitty Pryde has posed:
Kitty carves away, scooping out pumpkin guts and motioning to Hambone. "Want to make some more of those with this?" she asks, gesturing to the innards.

"You bet, Miss Pryde," he says with a grin, happy for the attention it seems. Well, not all of it, he flashes a glare at the other students making mom jokes. "Pumpkin pie, if we get some pumpkin nearer to Thanksgiving, Miss Grey," he tells Jean then.

Kitty turns her attention back to her pumpkin. She's more doing a Frankenstein face than making the whole pumpkin into Frankenstein. "Hrm," she murmurs to herself as she looks at it, then makes some adjustments.

Kitty slides it over to the front of the table. "How's this look?" she asks, putting a light inside and turning it on.

https://www.bhg.com/thmb/UAm2gM88TCA_XyZ6iUcUOJhpUV0=/1244x0/filters:no_upscale():strip_icc()/fall-decor-carved-frankenstein-pumpkin-edae4081-44306e4326304e0490550f70f39913f1.jpg

Jean Grey has posed:
"They do lots of fun stuff for Halloween, though! LIke they do a whole haunted graveyard thing, and Washington Irving is buried there. And they've got a hay ride. Or you can go to Lyndhurst, they do it up as this crazy big gothic haunted mansion..." Jean has DEFINITELY done all of these things, the way she talks about them. "Or if you want to be a grown up about it, they have the Historical Society in Tarrytown. But that's not really very Halloween-y, you could really just go any time..."

She can go on about stuff like this!

Predictably, the insult among the students causes some strife, which earns a quick, decisive interjection from the Headmistress. "Alright that's enough of that! How are your pumpkins coming along? No, ok, then back to work! And we'll definitely hold on to all of this so there'll be plenty for pie-filling, I'm sure," she informs Hambone, in the end.

Then it's up to her to finish off her own pumpkin, with a little more Sorcerer's Apprentice-style 'magic,' dancing knives, and all of that, with frequent but discrete peeks toward her phone to check her reference. And when she's done?

"Tadah!" She too spins hers around. And, well, not so shockingly, it's a female silhouette, lounging sideways, with a pointy witch's hat like her own! Pretty good, especially as she's used her cheaty telekinetic knife-army to carve in some extra detail and shading-like depth. Still, it hardly seems worthy of the secrecy she put into it...

"Oh, nice one, Kitty!" she calls over toward the other reveal, before turning, hands held behind her and leaning forward slightly toward Rogue. "Whaddya think?"

Rogue has posed:
The trio of senior boys continue to snicker at each other even after they are lightly scolded by the faculty. Their mumbling continues as they keep up their own carvings. Rhona takes Jeepers' leash and hooks it to his collar, as she steps past Rogue, telling her that she's going to take him for a walk to walk off the pumpkin bits he'd eaten a bucket of!

Rogue nods after the young woman, then is quick to smile over at Kitty's design. "That's a great Logan. You should show it to him." She states, before she walks down the line of other designers, her dark brows raising up at some of the choices that she sees still in development, along with those that are already finished and super simple. "I've always been partial to the classic look myself... It's just hard t'beat." She idly says to everyone within ear shot before eventually ending up beside Jean.

She starts to tilt her head slowly to the side while taking in the imagery on the woman's pumpkin.

When her phone goes off, Rogue checks it, and just starts grinning. she nods very slowly before looking up toward Jean beside her. "That is definitely not Logan." She tells her with a shoulder bump.