Current Timeline
"So...either the had a huge sale on milk or people are really that paranoid." Jean-Paul gowered at the empty shelves. "They must be stocking their fallout shelters or something, I swear."
"Well there's always the dehydrated stuff....?" Greer suggested, "Unless they got there too..."
"I think I'd rather find a cow to buy. Are there any dairy farms to be had?"
"Fortunately for us, however, most people seem to not yet have uncovered the wholesome and fantastic attributes of lemony fruits," Selene said, carrying an entire armful of lemons to their shopping cart. "Their ignorance it truly surprising."
* Luminator stands quietly in a corner of the unusually design-y grocery store, tall, thin, and 3-legged. (Link: http://www.scossa.co.uk/images/detailed/luminator-2.jpg)http://www.scossa.co.uk/images/detailed/luminator-2.jpg
"Dairy farms? In New York?" Greer raised any eyebrow at JP.
"The whole state isn't a city." Jean-Paul returned the look, then saw what Selene was carrying and was carrying and just stared. "Yes....their ignorance is absolutely appalling and cannot be understood."
"Obviously it's a yet untapped market - city cattle." Selene found the idea quite promising.
"Maybe the Professor will let you teach an agriculture class so you can buy your own cattle."
".... don't tell her that, she'll want an abottoir next...."
Selene wore a thoughtful expression. "We could combine it with further classes on meat procession and even cooking..."
"I like to encourage her shenanigans, I want to see which ones stick. Plus this might result in free steak dinners."
"And from the looks of the meat section we might wish we had given her cattle before. I think this might be a bust."
"I can catch food easy enough if it comes to that..."
"Don't worry, we can take the van later to pick up a cow from outside town," Selene explained. "I'm confident it will fit in there. We once used it to transport a donkey we... liberated from a farm."
Jean-Paul turned again to stare at Selene, then looked to Greer. "Were you there for the donkey escapade because I think I need that one filled in."
"... No... I'm kinda glad I wasn't..." she frowned a little.
"Sadly, we had to return it when it started eating the seats," Selene remembered.
"Pity, we could have used it I'm sure." He zipped forward a few asiles, peering down for ice cream. "Oh come on! How is that an essential to stock up on?"
"Maybe we should send some of the fliers or speedy types to forage in other states...." Greer sighed, eyeing one lonely bag of frozen vegetables in the back of a freezer cabinate.
"Looks like we'll have to make do with products of... questionable quality," Selene said, eyeing a plain large packet bearing only the letters "Cheese".
"Well, maybe I will later but for now...I guess it'll be cheesy vegetable mix." He pushed the cart towards both of them, shrugging.
She cautiously poked the package, and was quite sure that the consistency didn't match any kind of cheese she had ever tried before. "Or maybe let's not."
"Yeah... that looks.... disgusting..."
"...maybe it's trying to be tentacles. It could be contaminated cheese."
"I think it's still moving inside there," Selene muttered, watching the cheese.
"Well.... now we know why that's still there... makes me wonder what's wrong with the veggies...."
"I never believed the day would come where enduring on ramen alone would be the healthier alternative to supposedly fresh food," Selene said, trying to find anything else of value on the shelves.
"I never thought I'd be glad that I'm happy to kill things for food...."
"I think it's time we just back out of this store and trawl the streets for takeout places that are still going." Jean-Paul had picked up the veggies but thought better of it. He wasn't sure but he couldn't help but think there was movement there as well.
"Maybe we'll get lucky and run over dinner on the way home." Selene held on to her lemons and hauled them over to the checkout.
"Yeah... maybe..." she sighed a little. She'd been doing so well with suppressing the feral and now she was going to have to let it out just to feed herself. Stupid blacklung flu....
The clerk gave her a curious look when Selene paid for several nets of lemons. "I'm going to make... lemonade?" Selene shrugged, and tried to balance all the fruit in her arms.
"Not to worry, there'll be an out-of-town run made later on. I was just hoping to avoid it. Running or flying without fuel isn't my favourite thing int he world anyway...plus I guess we can make lemonade now." He shrugged, trying not to look too amused at the cashier's face as she dealt with all the lemons.
"Well you could always delegate to Illyana or Pietro - fast and teleporty... and they're too nice to say no..." she grinned, "Then you can just sit around and wait."
"First of all, we might have to get through what look like a perpetual traffic jam to even make it back home," Selene said, glancing out through the store windows.
Greer frowned, "Ugh... what is wrong with people...?"
"Oh, we've got enough runners and the like we'll be kept in food for...huh, so that's why the place is picked dry, park the evac bus right in front of the store?" He looked at the bus outside, watching as the line formed of people trying to get a seat and head out of the city. "There's plenty things wrong, probably."
"Now I wish I hadn't allowed Darren to weasel his way out of coming along for shopping," Selene muttered. "He could have turned into a scooter to drive us back home."
"First the streets are deserted, now they're packed full. You'd think people would at least try to organize their evacuation." Grabbing one of the bags of lemons, Jean-Paul started for the door, muttering at the absurdity of it all.
"Since when do people organize anything," Selene asked in response, following them outside. "Then again, I do believe it actually takes some planning to screw things up so badly."
"On the plus side... no queues in stores...."
"Soon there won't be people and we can just loot what we want." He shrugged, trying to avoid the line for the bus as best as he could as they tried to get to the van.
"No to forget conduct death races in the deserted downtown streets," Selene added, nodding knowingly. The line leading to the bus, if the disorderly throng of shoving and pushing people could be called a line, became increasingly restless as the number of available seats dwindled.
Greer nearly fell over as one of the people in the queue stumbled into her as a result of shoving. "Hey! Be careful! Some people are trying to walk here!"
"Death races? Now I'm intrigued. I think I want to hear mo-" Jean-Paul was cut off by shouting in the bus as some were trying to get on only to be shoved down the steps and out of the bus with an angered shout of 'No Muties!' easily heard over the din.
Selene turned around, holding on to her lemons, ready to defend them against anyone in the line. The cause for the commotion seemed to just have been thrown out of the bus, however.
Greer frowned, helping one woman up again after more shoving.
The one mutant getting shoved out of the bus didn't seem to be entirely on his own, either, as one of the persons responsible for the shoving got socked in the head next. "Now this bus ride looks like it's going to get uncomfortable before even the first kid pukes on the seats."
"That one's one too! Don't let them on!" More cries for and against broke out and now fists were being thrown, wanna-be evacuating mutants picked out through the crowd and surrounded.
"Oooh crap.... this is gonna get ugly...."
"...oh this is ridiculous." Jean-Paul sucked in a breath as he watched this going down.
"Perhaps we should intervene," Selene suggested, giving the others a look. "I know it might sound like a drastic measure, but I'd be willing to part with a whole net of my lemons if such generosity would appease the crowd."
"If by generosity you mean pelting them in the face with acidic fruit I'm for it." He dropped his bag, running for the first mutant who had been put to the ground.
"I like your idea even better." Selene rushed along, still holding on to her fruit haul.
"... Ugh... and I liked these pants...." she kicked her shoes off and shapeshifted, using her claws to cut the majority of her clothing off.
Tigra leapt over a group of people that had surrounded a mutant and crouched in front of them defensively, "Okay people, I really don't feel like washing blood out of my fur today so if you would all just back the hell away I'd be very much obliged..."
Mobs weren't generally known for their reasonableness and this case was absolutely no different. People were using their suitcases as maces at this point.
The sudden appearance of a fur-covered tiger-girl with bared claws and fangs certainly helped to give them some room as people retreated, even tough it didn't help to quell the unrest. "Okay, everybody, stay calm," Selene called out, stepping up beside them. "I have plenty of lemons and I know how to use them."
Jean-Paul ducked between and around people, swearing when he'd get the bad end of a suitcase as he grabbed onto people, running them out of the fray.
"Stay behind me..." Tigra instructed the other mutants, backing up a little, checking the area behind to make sure they were backing into safety and not more trouble.
"You can't say I didn't warn you!" Selene was left with no choice but to defend herself, swinging a net of lemons at a large guy who tried to pummel her with his suitcase.
"Throw away, just don't hit me!" Jean-Paul wasn't a fan of being hit with anything. His face was priceless and lemons wouldn't do him any favours.
Someone had the audacity to pull Selene's hair, earning a quick kick between the legs. Then her net of lemons got torn, the yellow fruits tumbling to the ground. "Things are getting out of hand..."
"You're telling me!" That man hit his jaw! That was a key component to the face! Jean-Paul had ho problems with testing out a (restricted) speed punch to the gut for that as he latched onto a little mutant girl, running her back to her family. "Is there anyone else?" He turned to Selene, figuring she could tell if there were more in the crowd.
The crowd was too enraged to be reasoned with at this point, every person swept up in the groups anger. "We'll have to get the mutants to our van," she told the others. "Or hijack the bus." She dodged a flying suitcase. "In any case, we can't leave them together with the rest."
Jean-Paul glanced back at all of the mutants that had been trying to evacuate, trying to figure out if they were going to all fit in the van. "...yeah, I think someone might come to the school after the bus if we stole it. Fit who we can in the van and I'll juggle people to fly back to the school."
Tigra hissed and swiped at a couple of suitcase waving idiots that got too close. "You guys heard - I'll carry on growling at people..."
"Fine by me," Selene replied, tearing open another net of lemons. "I'll work on some distraction." She imbued the fruits with her powers, using telekinesis to let them float in the air. This caused some shouting among the assembled mob, until the floating lemons began to zip about, hitting people in the head here and there.
Jean-Paul kept himself low, coming back to the others and motioning for the mutant evacuees to follow behind as he hurried them towards the parking garage.
A suitcase was aimed at Tigra's head, she caught it and threw it right back without thinking. She made sure to keep herself between the crowd and the fleeing mutants, actually considering that she must be insane to be doing this.
The smart members of the mob saw this as a chance to skip ahead in the line as the duller ones gave chase to the escaping mutants.
Selene: Selene tried to manipulate the minds of the people nearest to her, which proved rather difficult in their current emotional state. Things would have been so much easier with Jason there to give them an imagined mutant hobo to chase after. Instead, she decided that kicks to the shin and simply tripping people was much more effective and straightforward.
Tigra: Tigra lashed out at another group of braver idiots... or stupider idiots - depending on how you looked at it. She sliced into the clothing of the one nearest her and growled threateningly, baring her fangs.
"Right then, on in the van, don't be shy. I suggest sitting on laps and getting to know one another because this is probably going to be a very swift ride and you might need to cling to one another." Jean-Paul ushered people towards and inside the van, speaking and motioning just barely out of speed.
Selene noticed another mutant girl kicking and flailing at the people surrounding her, trying to whack her with their luggage. Rushing over, Selene toppled the first by kicking him in the leg, immobilized another with an arm-lock, and stopped the third from swinging at her by having one of her lemons fly into his face.
"We shouldn't get too comfortable and hang out with these people for much longer," she called, grabbing the mutant girl by the hem of her shirt to drag her to the van.
"It's getting really dicey out here!" Tigra called back, swiping at a couple more who had now armed themselves with bricks. "They're getting more creative!"
"Get on in, you two!" Jean-Paul shoved the absolute last that was going to be able to get in that van with it remaining driveable, holding his arm out for the girl with Selene. "When bricks get involved it's time to retreat."
"I agree!" Tigra ducked one of the bricks as it was thrown at her, she turned to head for the van and someone grabbed her tail. "Ow! Fuck!" She turned, managing to remember to retract her claws and shoved back violently - sending the poor unfortunate flying backwards into the crowd and probably breaking a couple of his ribs in the process. "... Whoops a little excessive..." she ran for the van.
Selene stopped a flying brick with her powers before it could hit her in the head, handing the girl over to JP. "I just wish our van came with a plough," she said, looking back at the crowd closing in around their vehicle.
"I'm just glad it comes with walls right now!" she grabbed her shoes as she ran past the remains of her clothing and jumped into the van, apologising to the people she was stepping on.
"Don't worry, won't tell." Jean-Paul called back to Greer, taking the other that wouldn't fit in the van. "I'll drop these two off and double back in case you get into any troubles." With that he was off, flying towards the mansion, playing dodge the bricks until he was high enough.
"Sel... you drive..." Tigra couldn't believe she'd said that but... desperate times and all that...
"What did he mean by 'in case we get in trouble'," Selene asked, giving Tigra a look before watching the crowd closing in on them. She quickly hopped into the driver's seat. "Good thing I'm not insured, because I doubt they'd buy my explanations for these damages." Hitting the gas, the van surged forward and knocked over a metallic barrier.
"I think maybe he meant just that?" Tigra hit the locks on the doors to keep out the scary crowds, climbing over more people to wrench the sliding door closed when the mob tried to open it to get in.
Selene worked the steering wheel as she tried to find a way through the frenzied mob. A lot of people actually needed a few gentle nudges with the bumpers to encourage them to step out of the way. "Aren't you a mechanic," Selene asked, while bricks cracked the windows. "I think I can already guess your next project."
"Yeah I am... but I think we'd be hard pressed to find new windshields right now...." She climbed back over their passengers and dropped into the seat beside Selene, "I can't believe these people... they'd rather try and kill eachother than get the hell to safety..."
"Maybe they'll panic and scatter when they hit our oil tank," Selene muttered, slowly pushing her way towards the street. With other cars already trying to make their way out of the city, there was barely any room, so she had to drive halfway on the sidewalk to keep moving at all.
"If there wasn't so many I'd offer to move the cars out of the way..."
"I think most have people in them," Selene replied, leaning up to look over the traffic jam. "They might complain when you topple them in their cars."
"I'm not gonna topple them... just move them sideways a bit... or pick them up and put them somewhere that's not in our way..."
Selene glanced over to Tigra, arching an eyebrow. "That might even be better than my plow idea," she said.
