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Blood Reigns Over Westeros: A Song of Ice & Fire Story (Accepting Player Proposals)

gowi smells like feet

Blood Reigns Over Westeros: A Song of Ice & Fire Story (Accepting Player Proposals)

THE BOYS.

Superboy's Shitty Characters

House Information

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My Hider

Synopsis

Founded in the Age of Heroes by Brandon the Builder, the Starks have ruled in the North for thousands of years- first as the Kings of Winter and now the Wardens of the North. Having narrowly survived the War of the Five Kings and the Long Night, the Starks have spent the last eighty years in relative isolation from the rest of the Seven Kingdoms, attempting to deal with their own internal squabbles. They've invested a great deal of resources into shoring up the Neck and rebuilding their fleet at White Harbor, and have begun securing alliances with other Great Houses to ensure the North never falls again.

Head of House

Lord Theon Stark

Seat

Winterfell

Demesne

House Manderly of White Harbor
House Glover of Deepwood Motte
House Umber of Last Hearth
House Dustin of Barrow Hall
House Karstark of Karhold
House Reed of Greywater Watch
House Ryswell of The Rills
House Flint of Flint’s Fingers
House Mormont of Bear Isle
House Thenn of Dreadfort
House Redbeard of Sea Dragon Point

Recent History

Rickon Stark 306 - 340 AC

After the ascension of Queen Daenerys Targaryen to the Iron Throne and the death of Jon Snow, House Stark was left to lick its wounds and pick up the pieces of what remained. Many of its surviving members left Winterfell to pursue their own ends: Sansa to the Vale to live out her life as an Arryn, Brann traveled Beyond the Wall to continue his mysterious duties as the Three-Eyed Raven, and Arya vanished in the night, never to be heard from again. Only Rickon Stark, barely more than a boy, was left to rebuild.

And there was much rebuilding to be done. The Long Night had ravaged the North, all the way from the Last Hearth down to the tip of the Neck. Even Winterfell had fallen to the armies of the dead, forcing the Northmen to ride south of the Trident until the Night King was eventually defeated. Returning home brought no shortage of monumental challenges, and without the support of the other kingdoms and the Iron Throne, the North might never have returned to its former glory.

Men helped for as long as the memory of winter remained. Compassion and unity rebuilt many of the fortresses, towns, and villages that the dead had torn apart, but it couldn't last forever. As time ran on and the years passed away, the apocalypse became a distant recollection, and aid came in smaller and smaller supply until it eventually ran wholly dry. Rickon, now an old man with graying hair and a litter of children to call his own, begged Daenerys for further gold dragons to complete reconstruction- his requests were denied, and he was sent home with a hardened heart.

Jon Stark 340 - 378 AC

Rickon took ill not long after returning home from King's Landing, and though he fought the disease for weeks, eventually succumbed. Jon, thirty-one at the time of his father's passing, took poorly to the news that the Iron Throne had abandoned them. He set to work finding the necessary resources elsewhere: new, harsh taxation on his vassals brought in the dragons he needed, but also a sleuth of consequences. The newly christened houses of Thenn and Redbeard, unused to such burdens, pushed back hard against their new lord's legislation. Jon attempted to persuade them with diplomacy but found such methods inadequate with the former Wildings. Rather than concede to them, however, he chose force. He personally rode to Sea Dragon Point and the Dreadfort with a small company of veteran warriors to see the collection done at the tip of lance and sword. Both Houses complied, but they wouldn't soon forget how their Lord responded to disagreement.

Reconstruction continued briskly with the newly acquired coinage. Every fief and holdfast was returned to its former glory over the decade's long project, and a number of new villages were built up with some of the excess to make room for the new Freefolk immigrants. The worst of the afflicted noble Houses, the Umbers, were ecstatic to see their land refurbished and their halls ring with the joy of feasting once again, and their relationship with House Stark quickly flourished. A betrothal between the young heir Dorren Umber and Jon's sister, Jocelyn, was set up, and they were wed in the spring of 354 AC.

That wedding was not without incident, unfortunately. Lords from all across the North had ridden to Last Hearth to attend, including the hot-blooded Lord of the Redbeards, Bael, son of Gerrick Kingsblood. Bael got considerably drunk during the feast that followed the wedding and went on a long and angry tirade about the Battle at Long Lake that had claimed the life of his ancestor, Raymund Redbeard, and many other members of his family. His words were met by the ill-placed goading of one similarly young and drunk Lord Osric Umber. The two came to blows in short order, and soon enough their retinues joined into the brawl.

No one knows who drew the first blade, but blood was drawn between the Redbeards and the Umbers. The melee was quick, chaotic and brutal; Osric was heavily wounded and succumbed to his injuries later that night, while Bael was able to escape back to Sea Dragon Point with what few of his surviving men remained. Jon took his brother, Willam, and a collection of bannermen and warriors to drag Osric from his keep to see justice for the murder of Lord Umber. They were ambushed before they'd even arrived at the holdfast, and a series of violent skirmishes ensued as Jon and his men pressed toward the keep. There they found Bael and his men held up with the gates barred and ready for a fight.

Rather than risk more bloodshed in either storming the keep or besieging it, however, Jon attempts to negotiate with Bael. It took several days of back-and-forth, but the Lord Paramount and his vassal eventually reached an accord. In exchange for relaxed taxation and forgiveness for his murderous and treasonous acts, Bael must swear that neither he nor any of his descendants would ever again take up arms against House Stark, on pain of death. The decision was...controversial, to say the least, and Jon continued to receive criticisms for the way he handled the situation until the day he died.

Theon Stark 378 - 379 AC

And die he did in 378 when the front axle of his carriage came loose and he was sent careening off the side of the road. Theon was among the riders that pulled Jon's body from the wreckage. He returned his father's body to the crypt under Winterfell, and was crowned Warden of the North shortly after. His untimely death has left the North in equal parts mourning and chaos as unruly vassals look to challenge Theon's authority now that his father has passed. Whispers of Theon's ill temperament travel across the North, and more than a few wonder if he'll be able to hold the region together.

Realm Relations

House Tyrell

The Reach is a distant land full of strange, southron men, and House Tyrell is no different. The Starks hold no ill-will toward the flower lords, but find little reason to care for their troubles. Jon Stark put what effort he could in delivering relief supplies to the starving Reachmen, for what it's worth, though such a policy has yet to be put in place by his successor.

House Martell

TBD

House Tully

TBD

House Baratheon

There is only one Great House in all of Westeros that boasts the trust of the Starks, and that's House Baratheon. Ever since Lyonel warded under Jon the two families have grown inseparably close, with the Baratheons often going to painful lengths to visit Winterfell as often as they can. Theon looks to Lyonel as something of an older brother and a pseudo mentor, and someone he can trust to have his back no matter the circumstance. Though the two don't always see eye to eye, Theon's loyalty to his family remains steadfast and unshakable, and he considers Lyonel as much a part of that family as anyone with Stark for a surname.

House Targaryen

Though Jon and Daenerys's love was strong, for a time, the loss of the last King in the North during the Long Night brought a swift end to their alliance. Rickon served the queen as best he could yet found himself scorned all the same, and no Stark since him has bothered to ask anything of the Iron Throne. Isolationist tendencies continue to go on strong under Theon with no end in sight.

House Lannister

The hate between the Lannisters and the Starks runs deep. Even with the deaths of Twyin and the whole of his line, the Red Wedding is not easily forgotten, and never forgiven. Their relationship is tense in the best of circumstances, and near-violent at it's worst. Attempts were made to stem previous hatreds under Jon Stark, but his son, Theon, doesn't plan to continue down that path.

House Arryn

TBD

House Greyjoy

The Ironborn and the Northmen are traditional enemies and rivals with a long and storied history of conflict between them. Though the sacking of Winterfell has effectively been scrubbed from the history books thanks to Rickon, there's little left good will between the two Houses, even if the bloodshed came to an end when Daenerys rose to power.

House Velaryon

TBD

Storyline Premise

Duty, honor, loyalty and family have all been central themes of House Stark's story. I intend to continue each of these threads in my own way, testing them all against one another. The conflict created by these themes contradicting one another will be critical to Theon's progression and development as a character, and in the end he'll be forced to abandon some of them so that he may pursue others to their logical end.

Stark Family Tree

http://familyecho.com/?p=N9QZC&c=ls97iihqe4&f=117377167389635944

Character Information

---

My Hider

Identity

Lord Theon Stark

Age

32

Role

Lord of Winterfell
Warden of the North

Characterization

Theon Stark has only recently taken his father's place as Warden of the North and Lord of Winterfell. As such, he remains untested, though he's eager to prove himself. He had plenty of time to study the ways of lordship under Jon- he's well-read, particularly in matters of statecraft, warfare and history. He's taken an interest in his family history in particular, ranging all the way back to Brandon the Builder, the Kings of Winter and everything before and after them. Even at a young age he seemed taken by the legends of the mighty heroes and conquerors that built his House. He looks at the sorry state of his family now and yearns to see it brought back into glory- to see that it's name is as feared and respected as it was in the days of old.

His ambition and zealousness are not tempered by patience as they should be. Theon never quite lost the fire of youth, and it's carried with him in the form of both great passion as well as ill-temperament. Quick to anger and reveling in loathing, he's known to bear grudges for great lengths of time, and his forgiveness is a rare and precious thing. The only thing that's ever proven to keep him in line is the wisdom and advice of those few people he truly respects.

The things he chooses to respect in others are informed, primarily, by what his family's best known for: honor, duty, and loyalty.

True men of loyalty, who stick by their brothers no matter the personal cost, are seen as a precious commodity by Theon. He feels quite strongly that many of his bannermen are only loyal when it suits them, and that they would turn on the Starks the moment things became difficult: as proven by the betrayal of the Boltons and those that bent the knee to them so long ago.

Duty is loyalty of a different form. It is loyalty to an ideal rather than any individual, and for that reason Theon holds it quite highly too. Holding to one's cause even in the face of death is the truest test of a man's character, and more often than not men fail that test. Those that don't, however, must be men of great character and quality.

Honor is the one value of Theon's family he is unsure of. To hold to a personal code of conduct is, in a way, a form of loyalty or duty; but it entails with it a number of traits that Theon believes led to the downfall of many of his ancestors, namely Robb and Eddard. Aspects of honor- such as compassion, honesty, and chivalry- created a weakness in his family that was exploited by honorless men and traitors alike. Honor nearly wiped his family off of the map. And yet, at the same time, it could be argued that honor was the reason the Starks rose to prominence in the first place. It's a confusing and often contradictory thing that Theon continues to wrestle with, and likely will do for a long time to come.

Attributes & Talents

Theon Stark is well-trained in every aspect of lordship. From riding to swordfighting and statecraft to diplomacy, he spent the first two and a half decades of his life preparing to eventually become the Warden of the North and Lord of Winterfell. He's became quite proficient in most of those areas, taking well especially to those skills that gave him an outlet for his anger- swordsmanship in particular. Though not a master at much at all, he's a well-rounded man, capable of acting with competency in almost any situation, bar those where delicate diplomacy is required.

Family

Leona Stark

Leona Stark is Theon's mother and a pious follower of the Faith of the Seven, and is almost singlehandedly responsible for the Faith's resurgence in the North. Her position as Lady of Winterfell allowed her a great deal of influence and power, and gave her the opportunity to rebuild the Sept and invite Septons and Septas northward to spread the good word among the Smallfolk. She acts as both a source of wisdom for Theon, offering him what knowledge she has whenever he needs it, and a source of compassion when he's at his most vulnerable.

Lyanna Baratheon

Lyanna Baratheon is Theon's wife

Willam Stark

Willam Stark is Theon's uncle

Cregan Umber

Cregan Umber is Theon's cousin

Harlon Stark

Harlon Stark is Theon's eldest son

Edrick Stark

Edrick Stark is Theon's other son

Sara Stark

Sara Stark is Theon's only daughter

Personal Relations

Lyonel Baratheon

TBD

Axel Baratheon

TBD

Brus Baratheon

TBD

Garth Tyrell

TBD

Randyl Tyrell

TBD

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

@Saint Maxx What a great post. The dialogue, the stakes, the description was all expertly crafted but what I must say I enjoyed the most about this post was how masterfully you tied your ongoing plot with @DocTachyon's. Using the mutant bias to paint a sympathetic light towards Spider-Man and then just the description with Jean reaching out and being the first in the IC to truly discern between Peter and Symbiote, perhaps even more so than Peter himself, it was a great read. Definitely very excited to see where this Crossover is going to go and the impact it's going to have on both the X-Men and Spider-Man himself.

@Lord Wraith

Shucks, dad, you're makin' me blush

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

L O N G I S L A N D

---

^{Night | Queens Borough, New York City}

The wind pounded into Scott's ears with a roar no lion could match as they shot across Brooklyn and into Queens. He jerked the steering wheel to the side to narrowly avoid a car turning into the street he was busy barreling down at dangerous speeds, ignoring every red light along the way. He could already practically hear the professor chiding him about such recklessness, but on this particular night, Scott wasn't all too concerned with following the rules of the road. Anger was cutting through his veins like a virus, seeping into his fingers and forcing them to clamp down on the wheel hard enough to make his knuckles go white.

Jean had been right. Putting the pedal to the metal had gotten them to the 105th precinct in just ten minutes' time. He let his foot loose off the gas at the sound of sirens- they weren't approaching, though; it actually appeared he was coming up on them from behind. The building melded into view as he rounded the corner, revealing a fleet of cop cars as they sped out of the station's garage in pursuit of their mutant attacker. The sight of it made Summers' stomach drop.

Only two nights ago a psychopath who just happened to be a mutant murdered a pair of New York's Finest. It didn't take a mind reader to feel the rage bubbling just beneath the surface of those officers as they raced after the culprit. There were no reports of casualties coming out of the precinct, at least not yet, but...that wouldn't matter. Not when a bunch of angry cops with guns got their hands on whoever did this.

"We'll get to 'em him, Scott." Jean placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder, snapping Summers back into the present.

He had a half a mind to give her the 'no mindreading' spiel again, but it felt like a waste of breath at this point. Instead, he let his hand fall down to the gear shifter and eased the gas back down, pushing past the precinct once the police cruisers had gone on their way. "We don't have a lot of time before they catch his trail. Do you think you can reach out to him? Find out which way he went?"

Jean gave a hesitant nod, falling back into her seat so she could concentrate. Her eyes slipped closed and her mind's eye opened in the same instant, revealing to her a hundred faces in her immediate vicinity. 'Face' wasn't an accurate term- not really. What she saw was more of an...imprint. A brief, surface-level imaging of a mind. It was easy to parse through them when they were like this, though it took a bit of strain to reach out for specific traits that might stand out.

'Mutant' was an easy one, letting all the faces that word didn't resonate with melt away. There was Scott right beside her, his image far more detailed than most. And there were a handful of others. A child hidden under a blanket with her cellphone, pretending to be asleep. An old man knocked out on his favorite chair. The police officers spreading out in front of her, though their connection to the word was...dark, to say the least. But she couldn't find their perpetrator.

She cycled through a few labels the criminal might give him or herself without any luck. Whoever they were, they didn't seem to affiliate themselves with the seedier parts of New York City's underbelly. It was possible they weren't any kind of thief, gangster or mobster- this might've been the first thing like this they'd ever done. Hell of a start to a career.

Jean furrowed her brow, glancing over at the precinct itself as they drove past it. She noticed a window was broken and glass had been shattered across the lawn. It was quite a fall. At that height, most ordinary people wouldn't have been able to stand back up, let alone escape the police. She zeroed in on a new word. 'Pain.'

"I've got him," Grey told Summers, raising her voice to be heard over the wind and the sirens. "Keep going straight, then hang a right." There was something...off about him. The imprint read like it was two different people, completely distinct from one another yet placed right on top of each other. One of the faces was recognizable as a person, but the other...The other felt horribly alien. Its very presence near her mind made her throat tighten and her eyes water. It was like nothing she'd ever felt before.

The convertible's driver was none the wiser to the nature of the thing they chased, however, and eagerly pressed on in the direction Jean had pointed him to. Scott's heart was pounding against his chest as he tore across the pavement light lightning, glancing over at his mirrors every other second to keep an eye out for the police that were so very near to them. Trees, houses and the night sky raced passed them on either side like a blur of green, browns and black. He slammed down hard on the break the moment they reached the intersection, skidding across the pavement to make the turn in record time. They were off to the races again without pause, soaring down the road with abandon.

Sure enough, though, his recklessness had proven fruitful: their prey's back had come into sight.

Whoever he was, he appeared to be wrapped up in some kind of costume. He was dressed head to toe in a skintight suit as black as midnight like you'd expect any thief at this hour to be- but then there was that big, ugly beetle symbol stretched all along his back, painted on in a blinding white. When juxtaposed on the field of black that was the rest of his suit, it sort of looked like a giant target.

"You see him, Jean?!" Cyclops roared, his fingers dancing across the rubber of the steering wheel with an equal measure of anxiety, excitement, and anger. "Let's slow him down!"

Jean blinked a few times to get the block splotches out of her eyes, nodding in agreement. She stuck her arms out the side of the car, keeping her palms held straight out and her digits as widely spread as possible. She focused fully on a bundle of objects sitting on the side of the street that they were rapidly approaching: a couple of garbage bins full to the brim with trash and a mailbox filled with much the same. She took in a deep, ragged breath, willing her mind to grasp each of the containers with an unseen hand. A silent scream fled through her parted lips as she strained to tear the mailbox's post from the dirt and lift the pair of surprisingly heavy bins from the ground, bringing them into the air and dragging them alongside as they approached the mutant from the back.

"Hey, pal, you got mail!" She shouted, heaving her arms forward and willing the objects to fling through the air toward the black-clad man's back.

Superboy's Shitty Characters

L O N G I S L A N D

---

^{Night | Queens Borough, New York City}

The wind pounded into Scott's ears with a roar no lion could match as they shot across Brooklyn and into Queens. He jerked the steering wheel to the side to narrowly avoid a car turning into the street he was busy barreling down at dangerous speeds, ignoring every red light along the way. He could already practically hear the professor chiding him about such recklessness, but on this particular night, Scott wasn't all too concerned with following the rules of the road. Anger was cutting through his veins like a virus, seeping into his fingers and forcing them to clamp down on the wheel hard enough to make his knuckles go white.

Jean had been right. Putting the pedal to the metal had gotten them to the 105th precinct in just ten minutes' time. He let his foot loose off the gas at the sound of sirens- they weren't approaching, though; it actually appeared he was coming up on them from behind. The building melded into view as he rounded the corner, revealing a fleet of cop cars as they sped out of the station's garage in pursuit of their mutant attacker. The sight of it made Summers' stomach drop.

Only two nights ago a psychopath who just happened to be a mutant murdered a pair of New York's Finest. It didn't take a mind reader to feel the rage bubbling just beneath the surface of those officers as they raced after the culprit. There were no reports of casualties coming out of the precinct, at least not yet, but...that wouldn't matter. Not when a bunch of angry cops with guns got their hands on whoever did this.

"We'll get to 'em him, Scott." Jean placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder, snapping Summers back into the present.

He had a half a mind to give her the 'no mindreading' spiel again, but it felt like a waste of breath at this point. Instead, he let his hand fall down to the gear shifter and eased the gas back down, pushing past the precinct once the police cruisers had gone on their way. "We don't have a lot of time before they catch his trail. Do you think you can reach out to him? Find out which way he went?"

Jean gave a hesitant nod, falling back into her seat so she could concentrate. Her eyes slipped closed and her mind's eye opened in the same instant, revealing to her a hundred faces in her immediate vicinity. 'Face' wasn't an accurate term- not really. What she saw was more of an...imprint. A brief, surface-level imaging of a mind. It was easy to parse through them when they were like this, though it took a bit of strain to reach out for specific traits that might stand out.

'Mutant' was an easy one, letting all the faces that word didn't resonate with melt away. There was Scott right beside her, his image far more detailed than most. And there were a handful of others. A child hidden under a blanket with her cellphone, pretending to be asleep. An old man knocked out on his favorite chair. The police officers spreading out in front of her, though their connection to the word was...dark, to say the least. But she couldn't find their perpetrator.

She cycled through a few labels the criminal might give him or herself without any luck. Whoever they were, they didn't seem to affiliate themselves with the seedier parts of New York City's underbelly. It was possible they weren't any kind of thief, gangster or mobster- this might've been the first thing like this they'd ever done. Hell of a start to a career.

Jean furrowed her brow, glancing over at the precinct itself as they drove past it. She noticed a window was broken and glass had been shattered across the lawn. It was quite a fall. At that height, most ordinary people wouldn't have been able to stand back up, let alone escape the police. She zeroed in on a new word. 'Pain.'

"I've got him," Grey told Summers, raising her voice to be heard over the wind and the sirens. "Keep going straight, then hang a right." There was something...off about him. The imprint read like it was two different people, completely distinct from one another yet placed right on top of each other. One of the faces was recognizable as a person, but the other...The other felt horribly alien. Its very presence near her mind made her throat tighten and her eyes water. It was like nothing she'd ever felt before.

The convertible's driver was none the wiser to the nature of the thing they chased, however, and eagerly pressed on in the direction Jean had pointed him to. Scott's heart was pounding against his chest as he tore across the pavement light lightning, glancing over at his mirrors every other second to keep an eye out for the police that were so very near to them. Trees, houses and the night sky raced passed them on either side like a blur of green, browns and black. He slammed down hard on the break the moment they reached the intersection, skidding across the pavement to make the turn in record time. They were off to the races again without pause, soaring down the road with abandon.

Sure enough, though, his recklessness had proven fruitful: their prey's back had come into sight.

Whoever he was, he appeared to be wrapped up in some kind of costume. He was dressed head to toe in a skintight suit as black as midnight like you'd expect any thief at this hour to be- but then there was that big, ugly beetle symbol stretched all along his back, painted on in a blinding white. When juxtaposed on the field of black that was the rest of his suit, it sort of looked like a giant target.

"You see him, Jean?!" Cyclops roared, his fingers dancing across the rubber of the steering wheel with an equal measure of anxiety, excitement, and anger. "Let's slow him down!"

Jean blinked a few times to get the block splotches out of her eyes, nodding in agreement. She stuck her arms out the side of the car, keeping her palms held straight out and her digits as widely spread as possible. She focused fully on a bundle of objects sitting on the side of the street that they were rapidly approaching: a couple of garbage bins full to the brim with trash and a mailbox filled with much the same. She took in a deep, ragged breath, willing her mind to grasp each of the containers with an unseen hand. A silent scream fled through her parted lips as she strained to tear the mailbox's post from the dirt and lift the pair of surprisingly heavy bins from the ground, bringing them into the air and dragging them alongside as they approached the mutant from the back.

"Hey, pal, you got mail!" She shouted, heaving her arms forward and willing the objects to fling through the air toward the black-clad man's back.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

@Lord Wraith@Inkarnate@Saint Maxx

As y'all may have noticed my posts have kind of vanished at this point. Well its sort of because of good news because I've been accepted to do research/serve as a visiting professor in Saint Petersburg this summer at Saint Petersburg State University. Because of that though things have been really hectic around here as I get ready for that. So unfortunately because of this and of uncertainty because of the quality of Russian Internet which can be very spotty, I do not think I will be able to complete the season here. I might return in the future but it would be unfair for me to hold onto characters that others could use if they so desire.

Thanks y'all for the opportunity though and writing in these games is always a pleasure.

@Hexaflexagon

I'll miss you. And good luck. Hope to see you around again, sooner than later.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

X - M A N S I O N

---

^{Two Days Later, Night | Salem Center, New York City}

MUTANTS ATTACK SCHOOL, TWO OFFICERS DEAD

Those six words sat like an anchor at the bottom of the television screen. Above them a bunch of Jumped up, make-up caked pundits and talking heads were screaming at one another about what they were calling the 'Bayville Incident.' Over a dozen men and women in suits had appeared to give their expert opinion on the threat that mutants posed to America's youth. There was all sorts of talk about arming teachers, making watchlists and putting armed security in every one-room schoolhouse in the States.

No matter what channel Scott flipped to it was all the same. Lance Alver's photo was plastered across national television and it had stayed there for the past two days straight. They were calling him all sorts of things: the Bayville Menace, a deranged psychopath, a disturbed youth; one particularly bizarre old man had taken to calling him the 'first stone' in an "avalanche of mass killers to come."

All of it pissed him off. But the one thing that really got to him was every time they mentioned the other mutants. Evidently, the media had gotten to one of those kids Lance had attacked because they'd actually started to discuss the X-Men by name. Opinions on them varied, of course. Some people thought the X-Men and Lance had both come to the school with the same goal in mind but had ended up at each other's throats. Others thought the X-Men were vigilantes that had tried but failed, to put a stop to the attack.

Those people were the ones that really got to Scott. They were the only ones giving him and his team the benefit of the doubt, but even they were quick to agree that the 'X-Men' had done more harm than good. "Let the police handle it," they fervently said. "A bunch of kids in masks are just going to get in the way."

As much as it made his blood boil, Summers couldn't help but feel like they were right.

There were other stories interspersed between breaks in the main event, none of them good. Some guy dressed like a Spider had attacked more NYPD officers in the city proper. A supermarket in Atlantic City that had refused service to mutant customers had been burned to the ground by protesters. A millionaire executive at Roxxon named Clayton Burr and his wife had both been abducted from their home and their son was just found dead in his office, his body torn to shreds by metal shrapnel.

They all shared a common thread that Scott couldn't help but notice. Every single story that ran that day- on every single news channel he could find- was about violence conducted by mutants. The talking points differed, the channel logos changed, and even the stories weren't all the same. But the agenda being pushed by everyone with a voice was paper thin. They all marched lockstep in their demonization of people they didn't so much as try to understand.

The remote in his hand crunched, it's plastic shell cracking and the electronics inside crumbling. Scott dropped the remains of the device onto the carpet before he rose from his chair. The voices coming from the TV grew distant as he left the room and started down the hallway toward the garage, stopping at his room to snag a coat and stuff his uniform into a duffel bag before making his exit.

Just as he stepped out of his door, though, he found a hand pressed up against his chest.

Jean Grey was a good six inches shorter than Scott and nearly fifty pounds lighter, but she didn't have any trouble stopping him in his tracks. All it took was a look.

"Oh, uh, Jean-" Scott started, clearly caught off guard. He would've thought everyone else was either asleep or stuck in their usual nightly routines by now. Summers retreated a step back into his bedroom, trying in vain to conceal the bag he had over his shoulder behind the door frame. "Did you need something?"

She let her hand fall away as he stepped back, crossing it over her other arm. She didn't bother answering, a knowing- and disapproving- look on her face.

Scott cleared his throat and turned his eyes away. "I'll be back soon. No need to worry about me."

"Uh huh." Jean sighed, lowering her chin into her chest. "You gonna talk to me or are you gonna keep pretending like nothing's going on?"

"I don't know what you-"

"Dude." Grey cut him off. "You never sneak out. Mister 'up with the sun' should'a been in bed an hour ago."

Summers locked his jaw and turned to look at her. Her hoodie bore on it the image of a skeleton with its mouth duck-tapped closed and two, boney middle fingers held high, and the name of some punk band he'd never heard of right underneath it. That was only what Scott noticed first, though- what he cared about more was the blue material of her uniform that peaked up around her neck.

"No." He shook his head, attempting to squeeze past her. "No, no, no. You're not coming with me."

"Oh, come on!" She snarled, punching the door frame to put her arm directly in his path. "You can't go out there by yourself, especially with everything that's going on."

Scott hesitated for a moment before grabbing Jean's arm and pushing it down, forcing his way out of the room so he could start toward the stairs. "How'd you even know what I was doing?" He asked incredulously, fully aware of the fact that she was just a step behind him.

Grey took him by the arm and spun him around to face her. "How do you think, you idiot?" She poked his forehead repeatedly with enough force that it began to sting. "Your brain's been practically screaming it since dinner."

Summers grabbed her finger and pulled it up over his shoulder, dragging her face closer to his. "How many times do we have to tell you 'no mind reading' until it gets through that thick skull of yours?" He asked in an annoyed whisper.

"You know I can't help it. Dick." She pulled her hand away, though she refused to step back.

"Maybe if you took those meds the Professor gave you-"

"-So I can be a drooling moron? Bobby's already got that covered, thanks." She scoffed.

Scott just threw up his hands. "Whatever. Fine. Let's just get out of here." He conceded. When Jean made up her mind he knew there was nothing he could do to change it, and he wasn't in the mood to argue with her for another forty minutes. The pair made their way down to the mansion's garage, completely unaware of the pair of glowing yellow eyes that had borne witness to the whole ordeal.

H A N ' S P I Z Z A P A R K I N G L O T

---

^{Two hours later, Night | Brooklyn, New York City}

The classic sound of CCR'S Fortunate Sons rolled out of the convertible's expensive stereo, smooth as silk but as powerful as a typhoon. Jean's black-booted foot tapped against the dashboard in time with the music, her hands currently occupied helping guide a hot slice of pizza into her open maw.

Scott's mood wasn't nearly as good as hers. His expression was twisted in dour concentration as he stared down at his phone, scrolling through endless incident reports and news coverage. Occasionally he'd flip from those over to another page scattered with digital notes, reminders and things to improve or follow up on.

The fight with Lance had been disastrous by most accounts. Bobby had managed to go toe to toe with Alvers, but he'd gotten so cocky that he nearly cost the rest of the team, those students and even himself their lives. And Hank had lost control of his anger again. Scott blamed himself for all of it. The onus was on him to keep everyone in line. He was the leader. He should've pulled them together when it mattered most. If he even had a little bit of real control over his powers, Cyclops knew he could've ended that fight in a second. All it would've taken was one, solid blast to the chest.

As it was, though, Scott couldn't have done that without killing Lance and probably someone else on the other side of the street. He felt frustratingly useless in that encounter. He couldn't control his team, his powers, or-

"Can you, like, stop feeling bad for yourself for two seconds and actually eat?" Jean interrupted, her mouth half-full of pizza. "You're really getting my mood down, dude."

Scott just grunted. "You're the one that wanted to come. And I am eating."

"Uh huh. Sure you are."Grey said, glancing at the slice of pizza Scott had set back in the box after taking exactly two bites. Taking in a breath she focused on it, compelling her psychic energy to surround the unfinished food and lift it into the air. She guided it over toward Scott's face and, in the same movement, reached over and plucked the phone from his hands.

"Hey!-" Summers started, only to find his open mouth stuffed with cheese, pepperoni, sausage and a whole load of tomato sauce. He looked like he wanted to complain, at first, but it didn't take long for him to take the slice himself and start scarfing it down until it was nothing but a few crumbs on his chin. "Alright, there. I ate. Now give me my phone back."

"Noo way, buddy." Grey shook her head. "No work allowed during graveyard-shift pizza time. It's the law. Look it up."

Scott didn't reply, except to lean across the front of the car to try and swipe his phone back. Grey was quicker, however, and managed to swap it into her other hand so she could press it up against her window. "Ahh. Too slow as per usual, Summers."

"Alright, that's it. You asked for it." Summers clicked his seat belt off and lunged across Grey's seat in an attempt to pin her arm down long enough for him to get his phone back, prompting Jean to squeal and squirm to get it as far away from Scott as possible.

The two's struggle only lasted a minute and a half before it was rather rudely interrupted by that same phone pinging in Jean's grip. She only glanced at it, one arm pressing into Scott's face to force him out of her personal space as the other held the phone toward the windshield. Summers took her by the wrist and forced it down, his smile faltering. He recognized that particular tone. "Hold on, that's important."

Jean furrowed her brow, handing it back to Scott. She knew when he was kidding and when he wasn't. "What is it?" She inquired, letting her feet drop off of the dashboard and back down onto the floor, intent on leaning over to get a view of the screen for herself.

"Sentinel app," Scott replied. "It pings me every time the NYPD mention a mutant on their scanners. Looks like...shit, that's not far from here." He quickly fumbled to stick the smartphone onto its mount on the dashboard. "A precint in Queens just got hit. That's twenty minutes from here."

"Ten if you floor it." Jean agreed with a nod.

"Call the team."

"And let them know we were out this late? Alone?" She scoffed. "Bobby and Kurt don't need more ammunition as is. Nah, we can handle it."

Scott just sighed, pulling them out of the parking lot and starting down the road much faster than he should have. "Here's hoping."

Superboy's Shitty Characters

X - M A N S I O N

---

^{Two Days Later, Night | Salem Center, New York City}

MUTANTS ATTACK SCHOOL, TWO OFFICERS DEAD

Those six words sat like an anchor at the bottom of the television screen. Above them a bunch of Jumped up, make-up caked pundits and talking heads were screaming at one another about what they were calling the 'Bayville Incident.' Over a dozen men and women in suits had appeared to give their expert opinion on the threat that mutants posed to America's youth. There was all sorts of talk about arming teachers, making watchlists and putting armed security in every one-room schoolhouse in the States.

No matter what channel Scott flipped to it was all the same. Lance Alver's photo was plastered across national television and it had stayed there for the past two days straight. They were calling him all sorts of things: the Bayville Menace, a deranged psychopath, a disturbed youth; one particularly bizarre old man had taken to calling him the 'first stone' in an "avalanche of mass killers to come."

All of it pissed him off. But the one thing that really got to him was every time they mentioned the other mutants. Evidently, the media had gotten to one of those kids Lance had attacked because they'd actually started to discuss the X-Men by name. Opinions on them varied, of course. Some people thought the X-Men and Lance had both come to the school with the same goal in mind but had ended up at each other's throats. Others thought the X-Men were vigilantes that had tried but failed, to put a stop to the attack.

Those people were the ones that really got to Scott. They were the only ones giving him and his team the benefit of the doubt, but even they were quick to agree that the 'X-Men' had done more harm than good. "Let the police handle it," they fervently said. "A bunch of kids in masks are just going to get in the way."

As much as it made his blood boil, Summers couldn't help but feel like they were right.

There were other stories interspersed between breaks in the main event, none of them good. Some guy dressed like a Spider had attacked more NYPD officers in the city proper. A supermarket in Atlantic City that had refused service to mutant customers had been burned to the ground by protesters. A millionaire executive at Roxxon named Clayton Burr and his wife had both been abducted from their home and their son was just found dead in his office, his body torn to shreds by metal shrapnel.

They all shared a common thread that Scott couldn't help but notice. Every single story that ran that day- on every single news channel he could find- was about violence conducted by mutants. The talking points differed, the channel logos changed, and even the stories weren't all the same. But the agenda being pushed by everyone with a voice was paper thin. They all marched lockstep in their demonization of people they didn't so much as try to understand.

The remote in his hand crunched, it's plastic shell cracking and the electronics inside crumbling. Scott dropped the remains of the device onto the carpet before he rose from his chair. The voices coming from the TV grew distant as he left the room and started down the hallway toward the garage, stopping at his room to snag a coat and stuff his uniform into a duffel bag before making his exit.

Just as he stepped out of his door, though, he found a hand pressed up against his chest.

Jean Grey was a good six inches shorter than Scott and nearly fifty pounds lighter, but she didn't have any trouble stopping him in his tracks. All it took was a look.

"Oh, uh, Jean-" Scott started, clearly caught off guard. He would've thought everyone else was either asleep or stuck in their usual nightly routines by now. Summers retreated a step back into his bedroom, trying in vain to conceal the bag he had over his shoulder behind the door frame. "Did you need something?"

She let her hand fall away as he stepped back, crossing it over her other arm. She didn't bother answering, a knowing- and disapproving- look on her face.

Scott cleared his throat and turned his eyes away. "I'll be back soon. No need to worry about me."

"Uh huh." Jean sighed, lowering her chin into her chest. "You gonna talk to me or are you gonna keep pretending like nothing's going on?"

"I don't know what you-"

"Dude." Grey cut him off. "You never sneak out. Mister 'up with the sun' should'a been in bed an hour ago."

Summers locked his jaw and turned to look at her. Her hoodie bore on it the image of a skeleton with its mouth duck-tapped closed and two, boney middle fingers held high, and the name of some punk band he'd never heard of right underneath it. That was only what Scott noticed first, though- what he cared about more was the blue material of her uniform that peaked up around her neck.

"No." He shook his head, attempting to squeeze past her. "No, no, no. You're not coming with me."

"Oh, come on!" She snarled, punching the door frame to put her arm directly in his path. "You can't go out there by yourself, especially with everything that's going on."

Scott hesitated for a moment before grabbing Jean's arm and pushing it down, forcing his way out of the room so he could start toward the stairs. "How'd you even know what I was doing?" He asked incredulously, fully aware of the fact that she was just a step behind him.

Grey took him by the arm and spun him around to face her. "How do you think, you idiot?" She poked his forehead repeatedly with enough force that it began to sting. "Your brain's been practically screaming it since dinner."

Summers grabbed her finger and pulled it up over his shoulder, dragging her face closer to his. "How many times do we have to tell you 'no mind reading' until it gets through that thick skull of yours?" He asked in an annoyed whisper.

"You know I can't help it. Dick." She pulled her hand away, though she refused to step back.

"Maybe if you took those meds the Professor gave you-"

"-So I can be a drooling moron? Bobby's already got that covered, thanks." She scoffed.

Scott just threw up his hands. "Whatever. Fine. Let's just get out of here." He conceded. When Jean made up her mind he knew there was nothing he could do to change it, and he wasn't in the mood to argue with her for another forty minutes. The pair made their way down to the mansion's garage, completely unaware of the pair of glowing yellow eyes that had borne witness to the whole ordeal.

H A N ' S P I Z Z A P A R K I N G L O T

---

^{Two hours later, Night | Brooklyn, New York City}

The classic sound of CCR'S Fortunate Sons rolled out of the convertible's expensive stereo, smooth as silk but as powerful as a typhoon. Jean's black-booted foot tapped against the dashboard in time with the music, her hands currently occupied helping guide a hot slice of pizza into her open maw.

Scott's mood wasn't nearly as good as hers. His expression was twisted in dour concentration as he stared down at his phone, scrolling through endless incident reports and news coverage. Occasionally he'd flip from those over to another page scattered with digital notes, reminders and things to improve or follow up on.

The fight with Lance had been disastrous by most accounts. Bobby had managed to go toe to toe with Alvers, but he'd gotten so cocky that he nearly cost the rest of the team, those students and even himself their lives. And Hank had lost control of his anger again. Scott blamed himself for all of it. The onus was on him to keep everyone in line. He was the leader. He should've pulled them together when it mattered most. If he even had a little bit of real control over his powers, Cyclops knew he could've ended that fight in a second. All it would've taken was one, solid blast to the chest.

As it was, though, Scott couldn't have done that without killing Lance and probably someone else on the other side of the street. He felt frustratingly useless in that encounter. He couldn't control his team, his powers, or-

"Can you, like, stop feeling bad for yourself for two seconds and actually eat?" Jean interrupted, her mouth half-full of pizza. "You're really getting my mood down, dude."

Scott just grunted. "You're the one that wanted to come. And I am eating."

"Uh huh. Sure you are."Grey said, glancing at the slice of pizza Scott had set back in the box after taking exactly two bites. Taking in a breath she focused on it, compelling her psychic energy to surround the unfinished food and lift it into the air. She guided it over toward Scott's face and, in the same movement, reached over and plucked the phone from his hands.

"Hey!-" Summers started, only to find his open mouth stuffed with cheese, pepperoni, sausage and a whole load of tomato sauce. He looked like he wanted to complain, at first, but it didn't take long for him to take the slice himself and start scarfing it down until it was nothing but a few crumbs on his chin. "Alright, there. I ate. Now give me my phone back."

"Noo way, buddy." Grey shook her head. "No work allowed during graveyard-shift pizza time. It's the law. Look it up."

Scott didn't reply, except to lean across the front of the car to try and swipe his phone back. Grey was quicker, however, and managed to swap it into her other hand so she could press it up against her window. "Ahh. Too slow as per usual, Summers."

"Alright, that's it. You asked for it." Summers clicked his seat belt off and lunged across Grey's seat in an attempt to pin her arm down long enough for him to get his phone back, prompting Jean to squeal and squirm to get it as far away from Scott as possible.

The two's struggle only lasted a minute and a half before it was rather rudely interrupted by that same phone pinging in Jean's grip. She only glanced at it, one arm pressing into Scott's face to force him out of her personal space as the other held the phone toward the windshield. Summers took her by the wrist and forced it down, his smile faltering. He recognized that particular tone. "Hold on, that's important."

Jean furrowed her brow, handing it back to Scott. She knew when he was kidding and when he wasn't. "What is it?" She inquired, letting her feet drop off of the dashboard and back down onto the floor, intent on leaning over to get a view of the screen for herself.

"Sentinel app," Scott replied. "It pings me every time the NYPD mention a mutant on their scanners. Looks like...shit, that's not far from here." He quickly fumbled to stick the smartphone onto its mount on the dashboard. "A precint in Queens just got hit. That's twenty minutes from here."

"Ten if you floor it." Jean agreed with a nod.

"Call the team."

"And let them know we were out this late? Alone?" She scoffed. "Bobby and Kurt don't need more ammunition as is. Nah, we can handle it."

Scott just sighed, pulling them out of the parking lot and starting down the road much faster than he should have. "Here's hoping."

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

If we're talking a theme for the game as a whole, you can never go wrong with the classics.

As for the X-Men? I have nooo idea. Been bouncing between a couple of different ones like this, this or maybe this one. Maybe even this one, though that's a little out there. Basically anything overtly political'll work for the team, though, since that's sorta their shtick- the X-Men without the politics are just a bunch of dorks in spandex.