Owner	Pose
Emma Frost	Emma Frost has setup a time and place at the Mansion, in the staff lounge where it's a bit more secure, to arrange a meeting with the Mansion's resident specialist in infernal affairs. Emma is currently arranging some things. Pictures, a set of holograms, and various old documents that she's had made copies of. The blonde has a very troubled look on her face, even as she's closing her eyes in consideration.
Illyana Rasputina	Xavier's School presumably has -- and continues -- to host the Rasputins. Piotr maintains a room there, possibly nicer than some. Illyana, on the other hand, shows little indication of residency unless she stowed a building in hammerspace. Knowing her, fully possible. The New Mutants all dwell in different directions and spaces, the curse of growing up. But their best teacher in defense against the dark arts responds quickly enough to a text. An invitation no sooner sent than finds her stepping into the room. She is three and a half minutes fashionably late. Darkly glittering, a shirt woven from twisted straps linked to a sheer, slashed black skirt making a statement. The shorts underneath recall her occasional summer-weight costume. "I am told saying my name backwards three times is more effective." Hello in Russian to the White Queen.
Emma Frost	Emma Frost would fold her fingers, "not all of us can be as fluent in Russian as you are, and I'm told it's quite rude to read someone's mind eo get the enunciation correct. I am sorry to bother you Illyana, but I do find this particular.. Incident to be well within your field of specialties. So do forgive me. Have you kept up to date with the.. Psychic assaults going around the Mansion and Charles' state?" Emma waits to see if Illyana has or requires some briefing on the matter first.
Illyana Rasputina	"Welcome to try." Illyana opens her hands and the jagged knotted sleeves barely holding on to her defined biceps almost threaten to tear in a cobweb serenade. The pulled fabric trails back from her elbows, a living fire hazard that swishes a trailing banner. It is civilised to sit and speak professionally. She barely counts as civilised by any yardstick. Her eyes look right past Emma at empty space, maybe tasting for magic and tears. "No bother. We are all one people, one dream, da? We can skip the nice bits, I know what X-Men need to do. Psychic assaults, da, Tabby had a problem. My husband tells me it is not isolated. His business to wield the big stick so I have let him take lead. But more and more a problem here? That is sensitive. Maybe not appropriate for him. I could stand to know more."
Emma Frost	Emma Frost would nod, "It's a psychic parasite. It's yanking souls out of bodies and rending htem horribly. So far we've found dozens, if not hundreds. We're trying to stabilize them as best we can in a psychic haven to hold them as long as we can, but it's been under attack. I fear Charles is gradually breaking down from the strain of it. I do.. Believe that I have a solid idea as to what's doing it." Emma would sit back, "Have you ever heard of an entity called the Shadow King? An ancient psychic parasite that can possess entities. I believe we've figured out whom it initially possessed and what they're doing with it." Emma goes to hold out some notes on a mutant that purpotedly has the power to manipulate souls adn remove them from bodies. "It's doing this purely out of enjoyment. Because it finds it amusing."
Illyana Rasputina	Charles breaking down probably upsets most students. Illyana doesn't bat an eyelash. Arctic pale eyes that could stare down a statue and win don't waver. "Man operating in Egypt, likes to deal in the black market. I have heard rumors and stories." Her palm itches so she plants it against her hip where pressure alleviates the sensation. "He bothered Karma several times. I was smaller when that happened." More hapless. Before she turned into what she is now. Emma is the center for her unflinching consideration as she comes forward to take the notes. Research on paper is familiar, and she starts to read from the top of the stack. "He has a host. You know where the host is? What stops you from excising him?" She thumbs the corner of the paper. Flick flick. "I can show you some exorcism basics. Or I use the Soulsword if I can get close enough. Problem is usually the host. They get strong and twist perceptions or reality."
Emma Frost	Emma Frost would shake her head, "our inability to find the host. We have a name that we're sure is it. Or was it. For all we know he could have moved on by now. I've not had any luck tracking them. Perhaps Jean could through Cerebro. But actively sweeping could also give the thing an alert. I'm reasonably sure that it is the thing.. But I have nothing to prove it beyond it fitting very much a specific profile and thing of legends." She would nod grimly. "we can try and track down the host, theoretically if they still exist in any form. But It seems to be quite happy to engage in assaults upon the psychic haven that we've setup and playing with things there. Not even an outright assault. It send in a soul to kamikaze the outlet."
Illyana Rasputina	Illyana frowns. Her black-lined lips, painted in a dark cherry gloss, give her pale pallor a striking kick. "You have a name for its host. This parasite needs stealth. You are too much like an immune system. You spot it, you strike it. Is there a residue, a trail to follow? These people it hurts have anything in common other than a location, being mutants here?" She gives the hall a quick scan. Back down into the paper goes her head. "We could set up a ward. Strong, one way. Like that glass in crime shows. It comes in but it can't get out. Trapping it inside would be very dangerous to the students though. Could start rampaging. Or, maybe trap works another way and throws it into an other place. Not here, not the Astral. Psychic bug has the advantage in the Astral. So do you, so does Jean. All this means we need bait, though." She taps the side of her skull with a black-and-silver starred fingernail. "May be helpful. Maybe not. You get someone who hides psychic mind, how will it 'see' them? Betsy. Me." Her teeth show through that smile, a glimpse of white and bloody black valentine red lips. "You cannot find my thoughts still, da?"
Emma Frost	Emma Frost would nod over at Illyana and shake ehr head, "All of them are from the New York City area last I reviewed. Very litlte in common beyond that. I've been somewhat beyond the latest updates. I've mostly been helping to ferry them to the sanctuary and occasionally help wrok on the worst damage. THere's no rhyme or reason tot hem. No common backgrounds, identities, species.. Jus tall from around the city. Likely where the thing is operating from." She would smile over at Illyana, "And I do like the way you think. Consider me in full support. However, ultimately it's something that the School is doing, and I have particularly little ifnluence on that beyond recommendations. I think you could very well speak to Jean on that. I'm sure she would find it quite appreciatively sadistic." SHe would nod at Illyana. "Catching it and attacking it in the astral is probably our best bet. If we can trap it and isolate it there it will stand and fight."
Illyana Rasputina	Illyana blows her bangs off her face, turning over another page and checking something on its front right away. "Nothing special about the prey, just the thrill of the hunt? You think this is sport?" The motionless quality of her body means the hanks of her sheer skirt hang to her knees and hardly stir in the air conditioning. Her lack of movement is just at the edge of unnatural. "Sadistic would be giving Wolverine some way to smell the psychic bug and hunting it. He finds, you both show up. I can ask about the spider web. Always bigger, more dangerous monsters. Sometimes it's us." Illyana runs her tongue over the light bite she left on her cheek. Too deep. It'll heal okay in short time. No oranges for her for lunch or dinner, though. "You want to trap it in the astral then. They need evacuation plans for kids. Fewer targets. Astral is a big place but it can reach minds."
Emma Frost	Emma Frost would nod at Magik, "From what I can tell. I've not seen any patterns. Nor has Charles, at least last I reviewed his notes. Nor has SHIELD, at least last time I spoke with their representative helping us on the matter. Ah.. Johnathan Sims I think." She would nod at Illyana. "Humans and mutants, and others." She would tap at her cheek. "It could have when it learned the location of the sanctuary simply obliterated it or gone in for a direct assault. Some of the minds are wholly obliterated and barely have any form of sentience left to ehm. Some were specifically targeted and are in agony. Others had bodies switched. Some are wholly aware of things and intact. So much power and variation. When it snuck past me I realized after it had been.. Smiling. Setting up a decoy to distract me while it sent in a soul to breach the haven and detonate it. It could have taken the entire place down butit did not. It's just a.. Game." She would nod at Illyana as the woman would go on.
Illyana Rasputina	"I don't come near SHIELD. No one needs that problem, da? Authorities ask questions, questions lead to problems, then you have no school." Russian humor is dark as the sins she commits and she accepts that with bleak fact. "What stops Betsy or you from turning thoughts to daggers and slicing it to pieces, when you find it? Is there any restriction like this? My methods are not kind. But they are direct." This, accompanied by a shrug, makes light of violence.
Emma Frost	Emma Frost would shake her head, "No, not at all. The issue's been that we only figured out what it likely was within the last.. Fourteen hours, perhaps a bit less. You're the first one I've talked to that has more than a vague premonition as to it. So assembling a plan of attack has been what's on my to do list."
Illyana Rasputina	Illyana hands th e-paper back. "We need better traps. Something that is hard to spot. Psychic, magic, physical? It matters some. You could turn the focus onto something the bug wants and snap it shut. Talk to Doctor Strange, da? I am going to tell him what we spoke about but he understands psychic things in a way I do not. It is not hard for me to enter the Astral but there I fight as what I am." Her words, then, are carefully chosen. "I am a sorcerer and the Demon Queen. This stains me when I go into these places. It will want to prey on that or it may flee. I can't exactly advertise I have devil horns here."
Emma Frost	Emma Frost would nod thoughtfully. "I understand. I feel that until we get a better plan of attack you're best used as a.. consultant on how to deal with this abomination due to your familiarity. And ultimately I'm not the one that's going to be making decisions, Illyana. It's a matter for the team to decide. Likely Jean and Scott if Charles is incapacitated. So I want to have a variety of options to present to them as possibilities."