New Mutants: Scribblenauts - Aquarelle

[x-wildchild.livejournal.com]

As the crowd starts to realize that something very wrong is happening here, Angel, Kyle, Namor try to gather up the New Mutants to get them out. It doesn't go well.



The panic grew upon the crowd in loud frantic ripples, first curiosity, then concern, then fear. The crews manning the food stands began to shutter them, slamming down windows and closing open awnings as people rushed in all directions, to flee or to help.

Kyle didn't know what was going on - his hearing was superb but not so much that he could pick words out of the mass of voices. At this volume, it was all shouts and fear to him, but he knew 'bad shit is happening' by instinct, and he was fast. He tucked his phone's hands-free earpiece behind his ear and hit the panic button on his phone while he was moving - and grabbing Ty by the back of the shirt to get him pulled out of the way of a large woman running away from the fair.

The third of the pair, however, could not be bothered. He sat there with an implacable frown as concerned parents ushered their children away with shouted words and dodged casually as an elderly gentleman with horns pushed past. He raised an eyebrow as he noticed Kyle and Ty's retreat to safety, but immediately had to turn a shoulder to avoid colliding with a pair of brunette teenagers. He frowned. This was unacceptable. Namor ducked out of sight of Kyle and Tyrone, reaching down to roll up the hem of his slacks.

Thirty seconds later, Kyle's cell phone began to ring.

"Busy!" Kyle had his hands full trying to keep even a small group of people from trampling each other trying to get away - he still couldn't see what was going on, and the crowd noises prevented him from hearing anything clearly. "Tell me you have some kind of situation report." This wasn't the voice of irritated hungry where is the food Kyle, or stop crowding the weight bench Kyle, or stop distracting my girlfriend with your speedo-wearing-ass Kyle. This wasn't even how can these kids not know basic essay structure Kyle. This was most certainly I am a goddamn superhero Wildchild.

The voice on the other end was precise and crisp, underscored by the faint whistling of wind. "The riot is retreating from the murals on the south side of the festival, with crowds movings east and north away from the art vendors. There are a few crowds overturning booths on the west end." A pause. "I can see several teens that may be our's in the vicinity, but there is an dust cloud obscuring the particulars from this height. Plans?"

"I've got Ty, and I can smell Molly and Hope. " Kyle explained. Those two he knew best by smell, they were both prone to scented .. whatever girl stuff girls did that smelled like flowers or fruit or sugar. " "No offense, Ty, but I'm stashing you somewhere safe so I can go back in and get the rest. Namor, do you see anywhere clear? We need a staging point. Do you see Fire... Angel or Matt?" This wasn't an X-Men situation exactly, the codename just.. slipped out.

More faint whistling. "There is a bubble of inactivity to your southeast where the food meets the art vendors, but the entire vendor area is emptying quickly. Best shot. And..." High above the crowd, Namor gained more altitude to get a better look at the skies. "Yes. Angel is in the air. Let me add her to the conference."

"Yo." Despite the flippant word, Angel's voice was clipped, all business. "I had an eye on Sue and Johnny for a minute but they got lost before I could go in and grab them. Last I saw though they were about thirty feet east of you. Whoa!" There was a bustle of activity for a moment. "Jesus Christ, a giant bird just tried to dive-bomb me! On the bright side, fire works on these things."

"B-but I can help," Ty protested halfheartedly, but obeyed Kyle's direction.

Static rustled over the speaker and there was s dull clang. "Not just birds. Miss Jones, we have zero background on where these came from. Please elaborate." Nearby a crudely drawn DaVinci helicopter spiraled down onto a booth; a mouth on its front blowing an impolite raspberry, a hole in its unlikely propeller. Namor frowned at the gunk coating one fist. "They are not real."

"Well actually it was a pterodactyl - not a real one obviously, but ya know." Angel shot off another fireball, shooting down another flying thing. "Right. If they're not real something or someone has to be creating them. Namor do you see anything from where you are?"

Namor squinted, surveying. "The majority of the creatures are terrorizing patrons near the art tents. Those left in the area are mainly congregating around a mural. I would have to get closer to see more." He paused, recognizing a melting clock down below that seemed oddly familiar. It was slithering in pursuit of a group of teens. "Pardon my vagueness, but I recall a homage to Inness on the mural wall with a giant pink pterodactyl..."

He let the thought hang questioningly.

Angel blinked. "Are you sure it was pink?" The pterodactyl that had attacked her was pink too... "You've gotta be kidding me, you think the paintings are coming to life?"

"W-wouldn't be the w-weirdest thing to happen," Ty said. Street rumor still talked about dinosaurs. "B-but what can we do?"

"You can sit tight and keep reporting about crowd situations and grab anyone you know." Kyle said, giving Ty an uncommonly stern look. "And keep them here too. No bullshit hero stuff. We're going to go collect your classmates." Who knowing at least some of them were doing bullshit hero stuff.

Kyle hadn't had a chance to do more than turn and take a step before he had to change course. A booth collapsed into it's neighbor, which threatened the entire row. He ran to grab one of the support poles to hold it up long enough for people to get away, and the reason for the collapse became all too clear - a wall sized painting was slowly tugging the canvas booth tent into it's depths.

Ty complied unhappily. He even did as he was told when it got really weird. "G-guys!" He struggled with his words, even as he stared in horror as the painting drew Mr. Gibney into it, along with almost everything around him. "G-guys! T-the p-p-painting!" He made a noise of frustration and pointed.

There was a strange hiss and crackling noise over the telephone connection as Kyle's connection cut out due to not enough bars in two dimensions. Namor's voice cut across the connection: "Please describe what you are seeing more clearly. Why did Mr. Gibney leave the call?"

Angel pulled a sharp u-turn, flying back to where she had seen Kyle and Ty. Well there was Ty, at least. "Damn it," she swore, diving in. "Come on Ty, time to move, now."

"B-but the p-p-painting," he protested desperately. "It ate Mr. Gibney!"

A pause, then Namor's voice. Calm. Authoritative. "Repeat that, but with more details."

Ty reached for Angel's hand and pointed at the new tiny figure now gracing the painting. The resemblance to Mr. Gibney was unmistakeable.

Angel landed, grabbing Ty and looking at where he was pointing. "Oh he is never gonna here the end of this," she muttered when she saw painting-Kyle. She raised her voice as she pulled Ty away, reporting up to Namor. "It would appear that Kyle is currently out of commission due to being consumed by a work of art. More details to come when I get Ty to a safe place."

"We can't leave him!" Ty protested.

"We're not leaving him," Angel assured him. "We're gonna get him out of there, but the only way we can do that is if we figure out what's causing all of this and put a stop to it. Namor, you see anything up there that might help with figuring that out?"

"No... wait." Namor's tone was thoughtful as the pieces fit together. "There seems to be a commotion around the mural section. Those still in the vendor section are grouped around paintings. They likely have the same problem."

"Right..." Angel snapped her around, eying a darker alley that didn't seem to have been touched. "Alright kid, here's what's what," she said gently but quickly as she tugged Ty over to the alley. "I need you to stay here, alright? And don't draw attention to yourself. I'll be back soon, I promise."

And with that she took off.


Johnny's fascination with a fire-breathing artist does not stop him from trying to play hero once the panic sets in. Sue is so not happy with her brother, and is stuck following him so he doesn't get himself in more trouble.



The booth the Storm siblings were walking past was jam packed with paintings depicting endless alien planets, spacescapes and rocky moonlets - it's artist was one of innumerable who made the street art, but unlike most, he 'set' his with flame breath, not ignited hairspray.

"Hey that looks cool, don't you think it'd be perfect at..." Sue's voice trailed off as she realized that her brother wasn't listening to her, or in fact anywhere near her, Johnny was still 5 or 6 paces behind her, his gaze transfixed by a stall fit to burst with art. "See something interesting?" she asked, an amused smile playing across her lips.

"Nah," said Johnny his eyes glued to the artist breathing fire. "Art's lame." He cocked his head as another searing blast covered the canvas. "Art's lame," he repeated as he saw the artist continue, layering colour upon colour, slowly revealing his vision.

"Mmhmm, yeah totally lame and boring," Sue agreed a laugh in her eyes as she watched her younger brother with a shake of her head, "But fire's cool right?" she regarded Johnny for a second, "You know, you could take an art class at school right?"

Johnny turned to Sue suddenly. "Fire is cool, ok?" He shook his head and walked up to her nonchalantly. "This whole 'art' thing is so incredibly last decade," he said pompously. "Everything's art now." He grinned, "You should have seen the art I made this morning, before I flushed."

Sue just had to stare at her brother in shock, "Ewwww Johnny. You did not just say that." she complained shoving him lightly in the shoulder. "Some of us have to eat later and that image is so not helping, besides," Sue turned up her nose at Johnny, "Unlike some of us you wouldn't know art if it came and bit you on the derriere." she said in her most snooty accent a broad smile pasted across her face.

"Now that's some art I could get into. Art that bites." Johnny chuckled at his own joke as he moved on. His stomach gave a large growl, and he patted it affectionately. "Shh, little one." He looked around at the stalls and displays, searching. He closed his eyes and began to sniff the air. "Speaking of eating later," he said turning to Sue, "I know these art fairs are good for something. There's definitely a food section somewhere. Lend me a couple of dollars, will ya?"

Sue sighed in exasperation, "You're hopeless, utterly utterly hopeless," she told Johnny as she fished a twenty dollar note out of her pocket, ""Seriously,what would you do without me?" she asked rhetorically as she handed her younger brother the money, "Just don't spend it all at once, and not too much candy." Sue didn't know what it was, but she somehow seemed to default to a mothering mode every time her brother came around.

Sue was so focused on her brother she didn't even hear the screams starting or the crowd stampeding until one of the panicking crowd clipped her in the back sending her stumbling forward scrabbling for stability, "What the?" the twenty dollar bill dropped forgotten from Sue's hands as she finally took in the scrambling crowd, "Oh come on, not again," the older Storm sibling muttered.

Johnny turned around. It felt like someone had suddenly turned up the volume, the soft buzz of the Arts Fair had now taken a more sinister turn. He heard the yelps and screams, and just barely jumped to the side as a middle-aged man almost careened into both the siblings.

He stood on his tiptoes to try and see the source of the commotion, but the frantic crowd made it impossible to see what was actually going on. He shrugged and ushered Sue with his head, as he put his hands into his pockets and began to weave through the crowd towards the noise.

Sue sighed but followed Johnny's lead working through the crowd towards the centre of the commotion, whenever they went out as a group there was always something that went wrong, idly the blonde wondered what had happened this time. "You know, I hate to be a cliché, but 'I have a bad feeling about this," she told her brother before wincing as a scream sounded just a few metres away from them.

Johnny smiled as he heard Sue speak, but he suddenly snapped to attention when he heard the scream. He scanned the crowd; seeing a group cowering and screaming he began to approach, ushering Sue to follow him behind.

As he got nearer, he saw their eyes weren't directed at any person. They were all looking and cowering at the mural on the wall. Johnny let out a laugh, "See Sue, art really is lame."

"It...appears to be less than well received at the moment," Sue replied dryly as her eyes flicked over the cowering group, "We came by here earlier, I didn't think it was that bad." she noted as the group moved backwards away from the mural which had terrified them and right into another painting. One minute they were there, and then with a lingering scream they were gone almost as if they're been sucked into the painting. "Okaaay," magic, Sue was sure that magic was somehow involved.

Johnny didn't stop to think. He heard the screams and ran after them. In hindsight, running headlong towards a wall was hardly a good plan. Then again, it wasn't the worst plan he'd ever thought of. He saw the painting seem to reach out to group as if offering to swallow them. He ran harder. He didn't know what he'd do when he reached them, all he knew was that he must. He reached out his hand to the group before, just like that, they vanished before his eyes. Johnny hardly had time to process the information before he was there, still running. He braced for the inevitable smack as he hit the painting. But there was nothing. He just felt himself tumbling. Tumbling down. This is odd, he thought. I'm pretty sure there was a wall here.

"Johnny stop!" Sue 's voice echoed after her brother's vanishing back as he took off running headlong after the festival goers, the teenager could only look on in horror as her brother ran straight at the mural on the wall She was just as astonished as he was when the crowd vanished into the mural, the silence in which the mural stretched out and absorbed the fleeing civilians was ominous, though not as ominous as the silent gloop which absorbed her brother.

Sue didn't even have to think, she just reacted, the mural growing larger in her vision as her legs started pumping carrying her towards the mural. "I knew this was a bad idea," the words echoed around the emptying stalls as the young woman reached the mural, vanishing into it as the painting stretched out and enveloped her.