2987/Broken Veins

Broken Veins
Date of Scene:	19 August 2020
Location:	Bushwick <Mutant Town>
Synopsis:	A protest in Bushwick becomes something much stranger ...
Cast of Characters:	Alanis Bezanero, Angelica Jones, Rogue, Erik Lensherr

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Alanis Bezanero has posed:
Bushwick, part of the 7th congressional district of New York City. Embattled even before Brainiac took a big bite. The Titans and Avengers did their best to put it back where it was, but the edges of the crater were exposed to weather while the town was bottled up. Services have been slow to return. The most recent being water and some sewage. Only parts of Bushwick have power back. People are sick of it.

"Mutants are treated as second class citizens. Our tax dollars are going in to someone else's pockets, why do we still not have power!," Alanis says revving up the crowd, holding up a sign that says "Mutant Rights are Human Rights". The police have set up a barricade between the police station and the people that live here. It's unfair, as the police of Bushwick are on their side, but the police of New York have moved in and taken up residence. They seem less interested in solving problems as with maintaining dominance.

The protest crowd is starting to chant loudly, "Tax Dollars At Work!." It's not the catchiest of slogans that have been thrown around in the last several days, but the numbers in the protests have been growing. Stop work orders by civil engineers via political manipulation have meant large sections of the seam between Bushwick and the rest of New York have been left in a state of disrepair. People are being forced from their homes - some for legitimate reasons, some being strong armed by vested interests wanting to redevelop the area.

Police on horse back behind a row of police in riot gear are attempting to slowly move the protest line back from the police station but the citizens of Bushwick are not having any of it. They know these aren't //their// police. From Myrtle Avenue, the big road that cuts through Bushwick, all around Bleecker street and Knickerbocker avenue, people have gathered and are chanting, waving signs. News crews have begun to gather, sensing blood in the water.

At the front of these lines, Alanis is chanting and points angrily at Senator Antonio Reynoso who is meant to be on their side, but seemingly his vested economic interests have meant he's not pushing hard enough to get all utilities back in place.

People are sick of the checkpoints going in and out of Bushwick, showing identification to prove they live here.. some people sneak in and out via the sewers instead. Then there's the cars that seemingly have their own special level of privilege when they enter and exit the district without showing any identification at all. There's a double standard going on.

Angelica Jones has posed:
She went looking for mutant town. Angelica Jones, the nobody from nowhere, new to the area, new to the ...well, that's for later. She is here. She doesn't know what's going on, but she's listening. And to be honest, it's making her angry.
It's an odd thing, but Angelica would happily have protested with this crowd even before. She hasn't had to sneak her way into anything in a long time, and isn't very good at it to begin with, but she managed it. She isn't even sure how! She walked up to a wall, and she must've passed some kind of checkpoint, and she's in this area and wow it's really loud. o.o

She looks on at the chaos, wondering how she got involved in all of this, and smoldering. Nobody should live like this. So she's standing just outside the mob, arms crossed, and just glowering. Because she can't make it all better. I saw kids in here.

Rogue has posed:
Rogue was in the business of being her own independent hero lately, or trying to be. And because of this, she's found herself in the Mutant Town area of the greater NYC regions. Currently, she's up on top of a building's roof, abuilding with a giant colorful sign that reads 'Mootant Town Milkshakes' with the cartoo picture of a cow drinking a milkshake.

Seated on the edge of the building, Rogue's yellow booted feet are dangling off, her yellow gloveds hands are on either sides of her hips, gripping the concrete seat she's taken. Her brown leather jacket is on over her shoulders, and her two-toned hair is flowing over her shoulders in the winds sweeping in from the northwest.

Her eyes... are down upon the crowds, protesting, gathered-up... She's watching them, not here to stop them, here to make sure it all stays peaceful and calm, she's here to lend the services of her abilities, as a strong Mutant, but also one wel trained by the X-Men now...

Alanis Bezanero has posed:
The imported police are spoiling for a fight. These mutants are unruly after all. They're pushing at the front line. One of the protesters falls down and a cop tries to grab her, but other protesters pull her back and help her back on to her feet before that can happen.

Alanis has been to plenty of protests, some she's started herself.. that was unusual. She slips back from the front line and is handed some bottled water. She drinks, gotta hydrate. But her eyes are scanning the crowd. She's heard of agitators before. If anyone is going to start a fight, she'd hope it's her.

A hooded person circulating through the crowd suddenly throws a bit of brick at the police line, blocked by a shield. Then another hooded individual throws another one at the other end. "Sunnova.. false flag fuckers!." She walks over to the latest one to throw something and shoves him. His hood falls back and he has a buzz cut and looks alarmed he's been exposed. The crowd surrounds him and starts pushing him to the edges of the protest, ejecting him.

On the outer edges of the protest are people organising bottle water in bags. They are offering anyone who is interested to go distribute them for free.

The senator taps on a microphone, trying to get enough volume to talk to the district but the chanting is beating him out in terms of volume. The police push harder taking the 'attacks' as an excuse to being more aggressive themselves.

"It's a powder keg in Bushwick today," can be heard from one of the reporters off to the side as they film the protests.

Erik Lensherr has posed:
On the rooftop where Rogue sits, there is the sudden rush of wind as someone lands alongside her. Should she turn her head, she'll see a familiar face. Though he's not dressed in his usual accoutrements - the helmet is gone, and he's opted for a dark turtleneck and slacks over his usual costume - it is clearly Magneto. His silver hair has grown long in captivity, unruly and hanging down to his shoulders.

"The more things change," he says, lifting a hand to gesture towards the line of police. Quite suddenly they are all thrust backwards bodily by the same invisible force, toppling to the ground or clattering back noisily against the doors of their cars. The horses whinny and roll their eyes in protest.

"The more they stay the same. A pleasure, Rogue."

He doesn't stay for a reply, instead the Master of Magnetism steps off the air and seems to walk into the air. He steps out over the crowd, hands held at either side of him.

"Hear me!" he shouts with the voice of an ancient orator, microphones unnecessary even in the din.

Angelica Jones has posed:
Watching isn't enough. "I gotta do something," Angelica says out loud. She doubts anyone would hear, but that barely matters. She's used to being ignored. Time to act!

She steps into the mess and approaches the people with the water. Her clean look has won more trust than this in the past, no reason not to use it now. Seconds later she's elbowing her way into the crowd. She gets shoved back once but she counters it with a bottle of water and a bright smile! Whatever she says is drowned out by the ongoing noise, until suddenly things die down and she can be heard.

"...GOING TO BE OKAY!" She absolutely rolls with it, glad to use Magneto's arrival to give someone hope. Then and only then does she turn her head upward to look. The "Holy Crapnuggets!" that she says in her own voice next is a little less audible at least.

She clamps her hands over her mouth, realizing she's speaking over frigging Magneto. Then bends to pick up the water she just dropped, needing her hands for those things. Damn physics.

"Here, have a water. Don't stare it's rude, he's here to help. I mean, probably." Please be here to help. I can't fight evil yet, I'm new!

Rogue has posed:
Rogue is raising up the cup with what's left of her milkshake to sip from its straw when that feeling touches on the back of her neck... you know that feeling... it's the feeling of someone else being suddenly close to you and taking up your 'air space'. And then his voice comes...

Rogue knew his voice. IT'd been a long time since they saw each other. She was... fourteen? It'd been on Genosha, no less, Mystique had taken her there to meet him. Mystique had been proud of Rogue, and wanted to put on a little show of the southern belle's powers for Magneto.

He had seemingly been impressed, as much as his stoic-ass ever can be!

But that was four years ago, and a lot had changed since then, Rogue was a lot more powerful now.

When he flies off down to the protest, she suddenly lunges up into the air and hovers there on the edge of the building's roof. She watches him go down ot the bodies filling the streets and she raises her left hand up to speak into an X-Men comm on her wrist. "Magneto's in-play, in Mutant Town." She speaks quietly, in her husky-hued voice. "Watchin' over him. This might get bad, ya'll."

Alanis Bezanero has posed:
The police line goes tumbling back. Too much metal. Always too much metal. They start helping each other up. One of the officers with a gas shield down and a grenade launcher up takes a shot with a gas grenade at Magneto. Two other police bearing the 83rd precinct of Bushwick on their arm surround him immediately. One takes the grenade launcher off of him before he can take another shot and the other places his hands on his shoulders and lifts up his face mask and begins shouting at him, "You do NOT have permission to fire that weapon!"

The sergeant in charge points at two of his officers and they rush inside the building, presumably to call for backup. Magneto is a serious threat to the underlying currents of anti-mutant sentiment running through some parts of the police force.

The crowd, however, quiets and parts, looking up as Magneto drifts over them. Alanis looks up and says, "Holy fucking shit it's Magneto," only to take a blow from behind by the fake protester who then starts sprinting off down the street. Alanis stumbles and grabs at the back of her head. "Aahhh fuuuck me," she says as several other protesters help her out, pouring water on the wound and helping keep her on her feet.

The media, the police, even the senator are unsure what one does in these situations. They look to the floating man with a mixture of fear and confusion. Didn't he just leave to live on an asteroid somewhere?

Erik Lensherr has posed:
The gas grenade arcs through the air, coming within feet of Magneto before some invisible hand catches it. It takes off so swiftly that it's barely visible, singing through the air towards the stratosphere like a bullet. Along the way it explodes, a distant cloud of gas visible in the sky that's likely to disperse long before it reaches the ground. It doesn't so much as cause the mutant to turn his head.

The fleeing man stops suddenly, his legs still working as he spins clumsily through the air. Held aloft by his belt buckle, he remains suspended there. It's then that Magneto moves a hand through the air, and the very ground beneath the protestors and police begins to tremble of its own accord.

"Bushwick is scarred," the former Lord of Genosha declares, "Wounded. And those humans who claim to care about it offer nothing but empty platitudes and brutality. Magneto offers you solutions - immediate and whole."

The severed wires that still dangle overhead lift on their own, snaking forward to meet their counterparts on the other side of the neighborhood divide and merging together. Reassembled at the atomic level. Beneath their feet, the broken sewer pipes similarly reconnect - sealed together by Magneto's power.

Angelica Jones has posed:
The one flaming red puff of hair in the mass below, the people that Magneto and Rogue look down on, looks upward. She is still being pushed about, a part of the mass of what could be humanity's future. She drops another bottle of water but this time doesn't notice the loss, as she sees what could be. If her own abilities didn't suck so much.

She actually begins to cheer, not caring who sees or hears her. Then she turns and her heart breaks. Moving as well as she can, she finds herself near to Alanis and offers a place to lean. "Lean on me, I'm just here to help." Putting words to actions, she tries to check on the woman; she saw the injury and has basic first aid. And bandages. You know. Useful stuff that people carry.

Rogue has posed:
Rogue lowers her hand down to her side and watches the activities down on the street, she's not sure what to do here...

What she does do, is starts to remove her belt. She unclips the silver and red X bucklet, then drops the belt on the roof where she'd been before. She then proceeds to take off her jacket and toss it over the belt so it drapes over the roof's edge. Her communicator is removed, and lobbed at the jacket where it lands softly on one of the sleeves, then the Belle turns and looks at the situation down below.

She exhales... now, devoid of any metal, she's ready to do /something/ if needs be. "What's your play here, Mags..." Rogue quietly whispers, whilst floating out over the crowds and hovering a good fifty feet off of the street in her green and gold bodysuit.

Alanis Bezanero has posed:
The police of Bushwick are no stranger to violence and difficulty with Mutant Town. They, unlike the larger force, tend to be very pro-mutant. When some of the non-Bushwick police move to draw their weapons, the police find themselves in an odd stand off amongst each other, staring the fellow police down. The sergeant has no idea what to do with this situation, but police fighting police is a definitely must not happen on his watch. "Stand down! Everybody stand down!," whether he's pro or anti-mutant is irrelevant, but this will go right up the chain of command for sure.

The rumbling under ground does make the crowd as a whole unsteady on their feet and concerned. But there are a number of mutants in the crowd who are pro-Magnetic and some shout out, "Yeah Magneto!" Alanis is a little star struck herself, having only seen him on video clips before. She braces herself against her fellow protesters as the ground shakes and the wires work their magic.

Two police officers from the 83rd walk over to the dangling attacker and draw out handcuffs, moving to actually arrest the right person for a change. Alanis is pleased to have the help of Angelica and smiles to her, "Right on, fuck the haters." Alanis steadied and seeing an opportunity she doesn't want to miss, pulls open her backpack and takes out her camera to shoot footage of Magneto in action, well, hopefully.

"See the might of mutant power, rebuilding Mutant Town," she narrates as she would one of her weekly vlogs, "What city hall fails to do Magneto does with a flick of the wrist. All their politicing and money grabbing, watch them fight to keep the power off claiming his work is unsafe, as if!" She notices the red light on her camera is flickering and she hits it on the side, "Oh come on you piece of shit, don't fail me now this is gold content!"

Erik Lensherr has posed:
"Your suspicion is unbecoming," Magneto says to Rogue, his voice grave, "Would that you reserved some of that suspicion for the brutal, thick-headed throwbacks who are putting your people in a ghetto. Is this part of Charles' dream? The freedom to live in squalor on the scraps you are thrown? But then, I suppose the view is different from atop his ivory tower. Surrounded by forest, and lakes. It is easy to forget how your people are made to live. I do not forget."

There's another wave of his hand, and the barricades that surround Bushwick along its cracked perimeter lift into the sky. Hundreds of them, along with the machinery of the checkpoints. At once the metal panels begin to creak and fold in upon themselves, forming what look like statues. Famous and infamous mutants who met their end in one way or another fighting for human rights. They land upon the ground, filling the neighborhood - set at various street corners and plazas throughout Bushwick.

"I am doing for my people what the governments of the world cannot - will not - do. You would be wise to stand aside. Even without all that metal, you're no match for me."

Angelica Jones has posed:
Merely keeping her feet underneath her is a challenge, with the current state of things down in that exact squalor. With the people she's almost certain are her own, though she's not spoken the word aloud often. Mutant. She stops getting distracted with those thoughts though, shaking her head, which causes celphones nearby go to on the fritz and ..yes, cameras to fail.

Looking up, she squeezes Alanis' wrist. "It's probably me! I make stuff go futzy if I'm nearby." She doesn't sound proud of her super-awesome ability, to make things screw up, but she's honest. "I'll go, here, take some water and ..look, don't get hit again. You're worth more than a good camera angle."

Then she kisses Alanis on the cheek and backs away, giving her some space. And lo and behold, the camera would start to work, if a bit slowly. The red hair stands out, it does. Too bad she's not more.

Rogue has posed:
Rogue's eyes glance down to the streets, at the chaos down there, wrought by those there-in and added on to by the dramatic arrival of Magneto. She looks back to him though, when he addresses her, as she flies just out of arms reach of the man. She narrows her greened eyed gaze at him. "Don't act like I'm some silver spoon kid." She tells him. "You know where I come from. You know what I've been through. The Professah has helped me, in ways you couldn't have, maybe even ways you /wouldn't/ have." She motions down at the street. "Those people down there, them Cops and others. They're just here doin' their jobs, doin' what other people told'em t'do, tryin' hard to keep people from gettin' hurt."

She then motions up to him. "All your doin', is provin' t'their bosses that they're justified in all'a this..." She shakes her head left, to right, once. "This ain't the way, Magnus. This only stokes the embers, that sparks the fire."

At his crack about being no match for him, Rogue just smirks and puts one hand on her hip. "You better not taunt me, neither. Cause I'm full'a surprises..." She threatens him back.

Alanis Bezanero has posed:
Senator Antonio Reynoso sees the opportunity for some easy political wins. Now that the chanting has stopped and Magneto has captivated the audience, he taps on his mic and says, "Everyone give a hand for Magneto and the X-Men - turning the lights back on in Bushwick." He lifts his hands and starts to clap them, hoping this might dissuade the situation from getting worse. Politicians know all about stroking egos and how public optics work.

Alanis keeps trying to film what's going on anyway, some of it might survive. If not.. well, she'll just have to try again post-event with a wander through the streets. The crowd at large begin chanting /MAG-NEAT-OH MAG-NEAT-OH/, spurred on by their elected senator who only moments before was the target of their anger for failing to do his job.

Alanis can feel the throbbing on the back of her head where she was hit and stares daggers at the man in handcuffs as he is escorted by police in to the station for processing. "Fuck it," she says and tries to turn off her camera, but even that function is going a bit haywire. She nods in surprise by the explanation from Angelica, "Shit happens, don't beat yourself up about. You're a mutant just like the rest of us, be proud. I'll just do over. Don't sweat it." She looks at her with a confused expression as she's handed water and given a kiss and then left. Her camera comes back to life and she lifts it up to get some footage of Magneto and Rogue in action. "Cray cray day," she mutters to herself, that's a first, getting a kiss on the cheek mid-protest.

Erik Lensherr has posed:
"I have not harmed them," Magneto answers, arms still held at his side as he attends to every severed utility in the neighborhood of Bushwick with only the power of his mind, "And I will not harm them. I am simply doing what they will not do. When I am done here, there will be no cause for protest. No need for unrest or chaos."

As the Senator speaks, the Master of Magnetism regards him with an imperious look. It would be easy right now, to blow up the relationship with the X-Men. To cause chaos and have them be blamed. Once upon a time, that would be something he might have done. No longer.

He turns his attention to Rogue now, hands falling to his side.

"Take me to the School," he asks of her suddenly, looking down at the crowd chanting his name before turning his attention back to the Southern Belle, "I will go peaceably."

Angelica Jones has posed:
Angelica, the less-than-heroic one downstairs, is not seen again for a while. Unless you count the child she pulls up, lost in the crush, and makes sure that he finds his family. Unless you see her try to stop a fight between two men, twice her size apiece, and the black eye she's sporting an hour later as her trophy for the effort. Unless you see her red hair in the water lines, tired face beneath.

Unless you see how proud she looks, for trying. I will help you, her face says. And Alanis is not the last one warmed by a kiss from her, and her strange aura of warmth that she seems to carry. A little lady who seems to own the sun. And is sharing it, even if it hurts.

Rogue has posed:
Rogue's eyes also glance down to the politician below, his voice over the crowd is booming... she doesn't like politicians, they seem like career-based liars to her, but she's a small town girl, living in a lonely world!

It's Magneto's follow-up words that draw her eyes off of the crowd, off of where Angelica and Alanis are below. She looks back to the Nagnetic Man.

It takes her a second before she defiantly tips her chin up and stares down her nose ever-so-slightly at him, while she decides. Then, finally, she just says. "Lemme get my jacket."

The Belle will turn then, to sweep back to the building, her gold and green suited body silently gliding through the sky as she gathers up the leather garment, with belt and phone, then back to the Genoshan King, to lead him northward, over Manhattan.

Alanis Bezanero has posed:
The Senator seems pleased with himself. Some of the local police start mingling with the crowd, offering hands to people. Slowly the chants die down as Magneto and Rogue leave the area. It is painfully obvious which police are not from this part of the city, as they start to pack up their gear. The police politely ask people to disperse in their own time and so the crowd does, filtering in to nearby bars and restaurants or heading back to their homes as lights and microwaves spring back to life across the town.

Alanis starts to monologue as she walks down the street and finds herself confronted with one of the new statues made by Magneto. She films it and says, "And there you have it. Magneto, repairs the wound of Mutant Town and decorates it with heroes of the movement. The battle still continues folks, they won't take this sitting down. You can bet they will up their harassment, to remind us we're second class citizens in their world, not ours. Keep up the good fight everyone. This is @MRHR signing off for the day."