Chaos Magic
Apr. 19th, 2026 02:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xp_artie posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsHaller, Paige and Madin face the night afternoon of the living husks.
Sure, Paige’s room was kind of a mess. She was self aware and could admit that she could do a bit better there. But it’s a bit hard to find time for things like putting your laundry away and cleaning off your desk when you had a PhD to finish. So sue her, she had let her chores fall behind, but she did try to keep her space clean. No food waste, no dirty dishes, nothing that could grow stuff or attract pests or sustain life, and she thought she had done a pretty good job in that regard. So far, anyway.
It was a normal evening, Paige was back from school and, since Jono had to work tonight, she was at her desk, working on her homework. It was easy to lock in and focus on her reading, until a rustling sound from somewhere in the suite started to bug her. Probably just Mel doing whatever Mel was up to tonight. Sighing, Paige dug her headphones out from under a pile of sweatshirts and flannel she had stolen from Sam and pulled up her study playlist. The silence had been nice, but she could adjust.
Everything was going just fine, no more distractions. Until something grabbed her ankle.
Paige jumped out of her chair and kicked the thing off, sending it flying across the room. As it gently floated down, she could see a hand, just a hand, made of translucent skin. Paige knew that hand, it was her hand! She must have shed it months ago and missed it on her usual clean up. How had it grabbed her though?
In answer, the hand got up and crawled towards her, not unlike Thing from the Addams Family, causing Paige to jump again in fear. At the same time, something was making its way out from under the bed. Was that the upper half of her torso?! How many of these things were there?
The closet door began to open and that was when Paige decided she didn’t want any answers, she just wanted to get out of there. She threw open her bedroom door, jumped over the husk of one of her legs, and ran as fast as she could away from…well, herself.
“HELP,” she cried, bolting down the hallway. “MY SKIN IS ALIVE!”
Madin stepped out into the hall, half asleep in boxers and an oversized t shirt. "Huh? What the fuck?"
They weren't at their best but they'd been napping on the couch.
The sound of accelerating footsteps almost instantly gave way to the gaunt figure of Haller turning the corner, looking only slightly less disoriented than Madin.
"Did someone yell-" the telepath started to ask, and then caught sight of Paige.
“MY HUSKS!! THEY’RE ALIVE AND THEY’RE AFTER ME!” Paige zipped past Haller and Madin, trying to put some distance between her and the dry, empty footsteps and dragging sounds behind her.
Sure enough, the empty husks of Paige’s body rounded the corner after her, slowed down by any slight breeze that blew them.
Adrenaline removed the last of the sleep from Madin's system. "Fuck. What the fuck. Why are they moving?"
They didn't really think, just reacted. Training in the Brotherhood and the field and honed by the X-Men kicked into gear and plasma knives grew from Madin's arms.
They lunged forward, stabbing the husks. They caught fire but didn't stop moving. One stumbled into a decorative armchair, flopping over the high fabric back.
"Oh fuck!"
Something about humanoid discards flapping down the hallway bypassed both fight and flight to find a direct route to pure revulsion. Unfortunately for Haller, this particular reaction was wired directly to the least restrained portion of his brain. Particularly when the husk on the armchair flopped forward and made an abortive attempt in her direction.
"Fuck this!" Cyndi shrieked, and the entire skin burst into flame. The edges blackened and curled into themselves like burning paper, complete with unpleasant crackling noises. The smell was hideous.
And it smoked. The fire alarm at the end of the hall gave an abortive screech, then abruptly dropped from the ceiling onto the floor. For an instant it rocked back and forth like an overturned tortoise, then flipped over and shot down the hall like a hockey puck.
In a panic with all the fire flying around her, Paige quickly stripped off an outer layer of skin and revealed a marble form underneath. That however quickly backfired, as the new husk began to rise and also caught fire as one of the flaming forms came closer.
"GET AWAY FROM ME!" She kicked out at the closest one, putting a hole through the center of it but not slowing it down.
The scream interrupted Cyndi's chants of "hateithateithateithateit". The pyrokinetic snapped her attention to Paige and made a split-second decision.
A generous person would have assumed that Jim was familiar enough with Guthries past to have a basic understanding of Paige's powers, and that was true. However, at this second Cyndi was operating on only one assumption: She looks pretty fireproof.
"Blondie, head's up!"
Paige watched in horror as her own hollow face immolated before her. She was going to deep clean her room every weekend from now on. Twice. Maybe three times. She was going to scrub every inch of her living space until she forgot what that scene looked like.
The husk split, flaming pieces of skin drifting onto the carpet, which began to smolder. The chair was actually on fire and now? Now the carpet was burning. "It's all on fucking fire, you fucking dickhead." So what if Madin had started the fire. Haller had supercharged it. When Madin had taken over the maintenance work on the mansion, the fire extinguishers on every hallway had seemed... prudent but the product of deep anxiety, even from the point of view of someone who made plasma knives and set shit on fire all the fucking time. They'd still never gotten rid of them. This meant that there was an extinguisher only a few feet away.
Madin grabbed it, awkwardly hopping along the hall in bare feet and turned to spray it back down the hall.
The alter rolled her eyes as she casually stomped on the glowing remnants of one of the husks. "It worked, didn't it? Hey, are you okay?" This last was called in the direction of Paige.
Skin taken care of, Paige took a deep breath and husked back into her normal skin, making sure to peel the marble off in small non human looking pieces. “I’m fine. I think that’s all of them.” It was going to be a long time before Paige forgot today.
Artie and Jean-Phillipe bail when denied access to coffee.
The screaming echoed across the mansion but it mostly had the timbre of a building of people who were horrified and confused, not those who were in imminent danger.
That tracked, because the coffee maker was shouting abuse at the room in Italian. Bad Italian. He sighed and twitched his fingers toward the jug while it screamed "Mamma mia! Non mi touchi! Bastardo!"
"Criss de calisse de tabernak," Jean-Phillipe growled, hurling a mug at the coffee maker. "I just. Wanted. A damn. Morning. COFFEE." He frowned in confusion as the shards of the mug coalesced into a sort of ceramic plating around it. "Merde. That is just uncalled for."
The coffee maker, now clad in armour made from the broken mug danced away from the two men. Artie hissed at it.
It hopped along the counter, hurling insults in that terrible stereotypical Italian accent. And Jean-Phillipe had insulated it against anything he could do to it. He groaned, then noticed the power cord trailing along behind it. He dove as the machine flung itself toward the floor, making an aggrieved noise as the cord slithered out of his grasp.
Artie grabbed a broom, holding it like a hockey stick, attempting to box it in.
The curses from Jean-Phillipe grew more virulent as the pot skittered across the floor, staying just out of reach of the Frenchman. "Fils de putain," he ground out, doing his best to match the movement of the deceptively nimble appliance. But once Artie managed to block an escape, Jean-Phillipe came up from the other side, snagging the power cord and sending a hefty number of joules through it and finally quieting the terrible Italian accent.
"What. The. -Fuck-," he asked from where he lay panting on the floor.
"I have no idea." Artie projected the text and shrugged. "Literally no idea what is going on. But the coffee maker dead now." Which was unhelpful. "No one sounds injured and even if they are, screw them. It's not like we don't make them do self defense and first aid for a reason. I can't handle this. I'm going into Salem Centre for a latte or double shot of whiskey, whichever I find first. Coming?"
Sure, Paige’s room was kind of a mess. She was self aware and could admit that she could do a bit better there. But it’s a bit hard to find time for things like putting your laundry away and cleaning off your desk when you had a PhD to finish. So sue her, she had let her chores fall behind, but she did try to keep her space clean. No food waste, no dirty dishes, nothing that could grow stuff or attract pests or sustain life, and she thought she had done a pretty good job in that regard. So far, anyway.
It was a normal evening, Paige was back from school and, since Jono had to work tonight, she was at her desk, working on her homework. It was easy to lock in and focus on her reading, until a rustling sound from somewhere in the suite started to bug her. Probably just Mel doing whatever Mel was up to tonight. Sighing, Paige dug her headphones out from under a pile of sweatshirts and flannel she had stolen from Sam and pulled up her study playlist. The silence had been nice, but she could adjust.
Everything was going just fine, no more distractions. Until something grabbed her ankle.
Paige jumped out of her chair and kicked the thing off, sending it flying across the room. As it gently floated down, she could see a hand, just a hand, made of translucent skin. Paige knew that hand, it was her hand! She must have shed it months ago and missed it on her usual clean up. How had it grabbed her though?
In answer, the hand got up and crawled towards her, not unlike Thing from the Addams Family, causing Paige to jump again in fear. At the same time, something was making its way out from under the bed. Was that the upper half of her torso?! How many of these things were there?
The closet door began to open and that was when Paige decided she didn’t want any answers, she just wanted to get out of there. She threw open her bedroom door, jumped over the husk of one of her legs, and ran as fast as she could away from…well, herself.
“HELP,” she cried, bolting down the hallway. “MY SKIN IS ALIVE!”
Madin stepped out into the hall, half asleep in boxers and an oversized t shirt. "Huh? What the fuck?"
They weren't at their best but they'd been napping on the couch.
The sound of accelerating footsteps almost instantly gave way to the gaunt figure of Haller turning the corner, looking only slightly less disoriented than Madin.
"Did someone yell-" the telepath started to ask, and then caught sight of Paige.
“MY HUSKS!! THEY’RE ALIVE AND THEY’RE AFTER ME!” Paige zipped past Haller and Madin, trying to put some distance between her and the dry, empty footsteps and dragging sounds behind her.
Sure enough, the empty husks of Paige’s body rounded the corner after her, slowed down by any slight breeze that blew them.
Adrenaline removed the last of the sleep from Madin's system. "Fuck. What the fuck. Why are they moving?"
They didn't really think, just reacted. Training in the Brotherhood and the field and honed by the X-Men kicked into gear and plasma knives grew from Madin's arms.
They lunged forward, stabbing the husks. They caught fire but didn't stop moving. One stumbled into a decorative armchair, flopping over the high fabric back.
"Oh fuck!"
Something about humanoid discards flapping down the hallway bypassed both fight and flight to find a direct route to pure revulsion. Unfortunately for Haller, this particular reaction was wired directly to the least restrained portion of his brain. Particularly when the husk on the armchair flopped forward and made an abortive attempt in her direction.
"Fuck this!" Cyndi shrieked, and the entire skin burst into flame. The edges blackened and curled into themselves like burning paper, complete with unpleasant crackling noises. The smell was hideous.
And it smoked. The fire alarm at the end of the hall gave an abortive screech, then abruptly dropped from the ceiling onto the floor. For an instant it rocked back and forth like an overturned tortoise, then flipped over and shot down the hall like a hockey puck.
In a panic with all the fire flying around her, Paige quickly stripped off an outer layer of skin and revealed a marble form underneath. That however quickly backfired, as the new husk began to rise and also caught fire as one of the flaming forms came closer.
"GET AWAY FROM ME!" She kicked out at the closest one, putting a hole through the center of it but not slowing it down.
The scream interrupted Cyndi's chants of "hateithateithateithateit". The pyrokinetic snapped her attention to Paige and made a split-second decision.
A generous person would have assumed that Jim was familiar enough with Guthries past to have a basic understanding of Paige's powers, and that was true. However, at this second Cyndi was operating on only one assumption: She looks pretty fireproof.
"Blondie, head's up!"
Paige watched in horror as her own hollow face immolated before her. She was going to deep clean her room every weekend from now on. Twice. Maybe three times. She was going to scrub every inch of her living space until she forgot what that scene looked like.
The husk split, flaming pieces of skin drifting onto the carpet, which began to smolder. The chair was actually on fire and now? Now the carpet was burning. "It's all on fucking fire, you fucking dickhead." So what if Madin had started the fire. Haller had supercharged it. When Madin had taken over the maintenance work on the mansion, the fire extinguishers on every hallway had seemed... prudent but the product of deep anxiety, even from the point of view of someone who made plasma knives and set shit on fire all the fucking time. They'd still never gotten rid of them. This meant that there was an extinguisher only a few feet away.
Madin grabbed it, awkwardly hopping along the hall in bare feet and turned to spray it back down the hall.
The alter rolled her eyes as she casually stomped on the glowing remnants of one of the husks. "It worked, didn't it? Hey, are you okay?" This last was called in the direction of Paige.
Skin taken care of, Paige took a deep breath and husked back into her normal skin, making sure to peel the marble off in small non human looking pieces. “I’m fine. I think that’s all of them.” It was going to be a long time before Paige forgot today.
Artie and Jean-Phillipe bail when denied access to coffee.
The screaming echoed across the mansion but it mostly had the timbre of a building of people who were horrified and confused, not those who were in imminent danger.
That tracked, because the coffee maker was shouting abuse at the room in Italian. Bad Italian. He sighed and twitched his fingers toward the jug while it screamed "Mamma mia! Non mi touchi! Bastardo!"
"Criss de calisse de tabernak," Jean-Phillipe growled, hurling a mug at the coffee maker. "I just. Wanted. A damn. Morning. COFFEE." He frowned in confusion as the shards of the mug coalesced into a sort of ceramic plating around it. "Merde. That is just uncalled for."
The coffee maker, now clad in armour made from the broken mug danced away from the two men. Artie hissed at it.
It hopped along the counter, hurling insults in that terrible stereotypical Italian accent. And Jean-Phillipe had insulated it against anything he could do to it. He groaned, then noticed the power cord trailing along behind it. He dove as the machine flung itself toward the floor, making an aggrieved noise as the cord slithered out of his grasp.
Artie grabbed a broom, holding it like a hockey stick, attempting to box it in.
The curses from Jean-Phillipe grew more virulent as the pot skittered across the floor, staying just out of reach of the Frenchman. "Fils de putain," he ground out, doing his best to match the movement of the deceptively nimble appliance. But once Artie managed to block an escape, Jean-Phillipe came up from the other side, snagging the power cord and sending a hefty number of joules through it and finally quieting the terrible Italian accent.
"What. The. -Fuck-," he asked from where he lay panting on the floor.
"I have no idea." Artie projected the text and shrugged. "Literally no idea what is going on. But the coffee maker dead now." Which was unhelpful. "No one sounds injured and even if they are, screw them. It's not like we don't make them do self defense and first aid for a reason. I can't handle this. I'm going into Salem Centre for a latte or double shot of whiskey, whichever I find first. Coming?"
