6335/Does this smell funny to you

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Does this smell funny to you
Date of Scene: 01 February 2019
Location: Xavier's School, Westchester, New York
Synopsis: Logan LEADS the X-Men into doing the right thing! For once!
Cast of Characters: Wolverine, Cyclops, Black Widow (Romanoff), Rogue, Pixie




Wolverine has posed:
    A flurry of snow had cast everything in white. Not enough to stick, not enough to make driving difficult, but enough to make the outside picturesque like a post card from the Rockies. Inside it's warm, one of the staff had taken the idea of getting a fire started and others had even made some mulled cider to be handed out amongst the worthies. All told it was a lovely scene, with frost on the windows, good cheer as they mingled.
    So of course Logan was outside. Right on the front stoop, sitting there in a light jacket and with a cigar in the corner of his mouth. A tendril of smoke wending its way upwards as he takes a drag now and again. With his grim features and weathered look he presents the profile of some sort of growly scarecrow.
    An image which was ruined when two students walked up and waves, "Hey Mr. Logan!" Waving cheerily as they climb those steps and slip inside. Utterly unphased by his grim visage.
    At least, to his credit, he half-smirks and gives a nod. For a moment trying to remember their names. Failing.

Cyclops has posed:
    "Brian and Felicia." Scott says from over Logan's shoulder. Slim stands against the doorframe and is holding a silver metallic cup in his gloved hand and he frowns down towards Logan. He shouldn't say it, but he does, "You'd know if you'd have been around." The teacher says with a smug air before he takes a sip of his coffee and remains standing behind Logan. Seems it is Scott's turn to get some things off his chest.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    A black SUV begins up the driveway, setting off any security measures to announce the arrival of a guest. Anyone who sees it would scream 'government issued' so the question is what agency it might be from. Coming to a halt, the snow crushed under tires, it is but a moment before a slight figure hops out of the driver's seat.
    Natasha Romanoff is a known Avenger. She's also a lesser known member of SHIELD, which would explain the vehicle she is using. (She thought it would be less obvious than a quinjet.) Spotting the figure on the steps, she can't help but smile as she walks his direction.
    She's dressed for the weather in a heavy jacket with a faux fur collar. Jeans, boots, no guess what the shirt might be underneath since it is hidden by the jacket. She has black gloves on her hands. She is carrying a box in her left hand. Her hair has been cut short, almost a boyish style, very different from the long locks she usually sports.
    A nod is given in the direction of Scott but then she focuses on Logan again. "I decided to deliver it personally. Since it's been a while since we've seen each other." She passes over the box.

Rogue has posed:
Rogue is also outside. She has to be. Even in the worst weather. Because Remy bought her a dog... and now she's grown to care for the darn thing, so going outside is a requirement. She also doesn't like to get told to 'clean up the yard after your dog' so she takes him out beyond property to do his thing out in the forested area in front of school alongside Greymalkin Lane.

This is where she's returning from now, with Aces on a leash and her hands in her black navy peacoat's pockets. She's on her way down the driveway back to the house, her boots crunching on the pebbles paving the finely cared for drive. Aces is happily panting and looking around in every direction as he walks ahead of her.

Rogue looks over to the SUV as it passes her by and by the time Natasha is out of it, she's reaching where they're all gathering. She, of course knows Natasha, she'd worked with her in Manhattan at the Avengers place. She doesn't speak up though, since things have an 'official' feeling to them.

Wolverine has posed:
    A snort slips from Logan as he just sort of minimally shakes his head, blue eyed gaze distanced on the driveway as he lets the silence after Scott's jab to linger for a time until finally dispelling it with a reply. "Mebbe." He offers, then he looks to the side slightly just so that Cyclops can see his profile, "Then again sometimes I struggle rememberin' yers. So there's always a bright side."
    He looks away, but the smirk on his lips shows he's pretty pleased with what he just said. Of course that's the moment when the SUV rumbles up the driveway, engine going quiet just before the slight figure of the Black Widow slips out of it. Another glance to Scott is given then he pushes himself to his feet as he starts forward.
    "Well as I live and breathe." He ashes his cigar to the side in the small snow bank and meets her halfway, hand extended and enough to draw her into a hug though it's a more comradely one with a light thump on the back.
    Logan turns away from Nat and motions toward Scott, "Agent Romanoff, let me introduce you to..." His brow furrows and he opens his hand as he gestures toward Cyclops, waving that hand absently. "M'sorry, what was yer name again?"
    That jerk.
    But then as if to drive the insult home all the more he half-smiles towards Rogue, "I believe you've met, Rogue." Even as she wanders up with that pup.

Cyclops has posed:
    "Good to have you back." Scott snorts and would kick at Logan if he were closer, but eh, not worth the effort to move a few feet. Scott lifts the YETI cup to his lips and takes another sip as he watches Rogue meander up with her dog on a leash and the black SUV troll up the drive with no words as he simply watches.

    "Summers." Scott says, terse towards Logan, but he doesn't name call, as he would if an Avenger wasn't on the frozen lawn. "I'd say it's nice to meet you Agent, but I worry the circumstances aren't the best." Scott says, his way of asking what does the spy want with Xavier's?

    He squints behind those rose glasses at Logan and then back to Rogue, "Did you clean up or leave it out in the woods again? I stepped in some yesterday by that dead tree." Scott complains towards Rogue.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    The hug is returned to Logan openly then Natasha steps back as she hands over the box to Logan. "Don't tell. I got them from Fury's secret stash." She winks playfully then turns to the others as introductions are made.
    "A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Summers." Then she looks to Rogue with another smile. "Rogue, you're missed." She turns back to the man with the crimson sunglasses. Interesting that. "This isn't a business trip. I just came to visit Logan and deliver a present. It's been a long time since we got to socialize so when I heard he was back, I thought I better show up before he wanders off again."

Rogue has posed:
When Rogue stops walking, Aces sits down at her side on her right and just stares at the people in front of him and his person, with a judgmental doggy stare.

Firstly, Rogue looks to Logan and she offers him a light smile. "Nice t'see ya, Strange'ah." She says to him in a flirtatious tone of voice. "Been far too long." And that almost sound teasing, because it is.

Scott is given a sidelong glance at his questioning investigation on her and her dog's activities out front and after a second of thought, the southern girl speaks up again. "Its the damndest thing, Scott." She starts, her accent in full southern belle mode. "There's a pack'a wild dogs out there, terrorizing the woodland critters. Why, Aces and I barely even escaped with our lives... One'a them even had a gun! A GUN Scott." She shakes her head and releases a dramatic sigh. "Someone's gonna have t'look inta this."

To Natasha she then looks, and smiles. "Miss Red. You're as beautiful as I eve'ah remembered. And ya'll don't need me, ya got Rhodey. He's three times the Avenger that I ever was!" And now she's just grinning lightly and rocking on her heels.

To everyone now. "Whats goin' on here?" She asks while sweeping her gaze across them all.

Wolverine has posed:
    He'd smirked a bit in Cyclops' direction, but doesn't give him anymore guff. At least for now. Instead the box is accepted from Natasha as he takes it up, cracks it open briefly to peek inside and take a sniff. His eyebrows rise as he murmurs, "You spoil me, Romanoff." He steps back and then tucks the box under his arm, hands slipping into his jean pockets as he turns to include Scott and Rogue in their circle of conversation.
    The Wolverine looks between the others, "Actually, wanted to talk to you two." He looks back at Rogue and Scott. A glance is spared towards Nat. "Widow can be trusted, I'll vouch for her if'n there's a need." He rounds towards Scott. "You were sayin' about the duplicates. Got one downstairs in cold storage. I'm thinking I should take a gander."
    His cigar is ashed to the side again then he replaces his hands in his pockets. "See if I can smell a difference between it and the real thing."

Pixie has posed:
Pixie is late. She jogs in and tucks her phone away. "Sorry, had sweats on not the most professio-" Her dark eyes hit Rogue and she stops quickly. "Uh, hi, Rogue?" She looks to Scott as if to confirm it is Rogue for real. The Welsh girl's face screams guilt looking at the southern belle so she looks away and walks over to their fearless leader. "Sorry I'm late."

Cyclops has posed:
    Scott smirks and gives everyone a soft nod and motions towards the door, "Come on, best to talk down stairs." The man says, opening door for the group to go in, and for anyone but Widow to take the lead and get them to the basement. On the walk, Scott turns to the group. "We don't know a whole lot, just that it showed up one day and was just like the real one in many ways." He says, keeping it vague until they get to the elevator.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    Duplicates. Cold storage. That's an interesting conversation starting there. Natasha just gives a nod and a brief, "Thank you." when she is invited to tag along with the group. She does notice that look on Pixie's face, her read on body language and micro expressions not even necessary to discern it.

Wolverine has posed:
    "Hey kid," Logan addresses Pixie's arrival. "Heard you held yer own in the ruckus." He takes the cigar from his mouth, pinches the ember until it fizzles out, then pockets the stogey inside his inner jacket pocket. Hands back into his jeans he nods in turn towards Cyclops.
    "Let's mosey. Figure Nat and her people might give us another angle on things if needs be. See if whatever is whatever is further abroad than we know or if it's just some folks targeting us."

Cyclops has posed:
    Scott kept walking, not realizing Rogue has pulled out her phone and like any modern teen, stopped paying attention to real life and focus on her device. Scott shrugs and just lets her go as the elevator door opens up and he slips inside, leaving room for the three others. "She was the real one by the way Pixie." Scott says with a soft reasuring sentence.

    "Not a bad thought Logan. No reason we shouldn't use every resource we have access to."

Pixie has posed:
"Old man." Pixie counters to Logan with an awkward quirk that could almost be a smile. "We're gonna go look at...it?" She asks and looks to Scott deeply unsure that it's a good idea. "It's not gonna move again, is it?" She asks hesitantly. Pixie falls in next to Scott though as they walk.

Wolverine has posed:
    Into the interior of the house, Logan's footsteps cause the stairs to creak slightly and then he shoulders open one of the two large doors leading into the foyer. Holding it open for the others, Scott included, the Canadian mutant gives a nod. "I'm hopin' I can tell the difference or there's somethin' there. If not then things are gonna be messy."
    With that said and once the others are on through, he'll close the door and fall into step bringing the rear. Towards the elevator that's hidden behind a sliding wooden panel that opens for them. It takes a quick biometric scan, and then there's a security alert for Widow which Logan dispatches with his override.
    A small smirk touches his features as he says sidelong towards Scott, "Good ta see my codes still work."

Cyclops has posed:
    "Yeah, we have to learn as much as we can about it. Jean seemed to think it was a puppet being controlled by some, demonic force." Scott says as the elevator doors close behind everyone. He lifts his hand to press the button, and the machine quickly begins to decend, "Plus Hank probably wants to study it as well. But as far as we're aware, it's not moving again Pixie, you're safe. Plus I feel safer having you around." Scott says with a smirk to the young woman.

    Looking back to Logan and Natasha, "Man's got the nose that counts and Jean wanted him to give her a look over as well, so we're following the doctor's orders."

Pixie has posed:
"Safer with me around. You really out to check my latest training scores." Pixie snorts but relaxes with the news it's stopped moving. "It has to be some form of supernatural for the dagger to have worked-not to give you any sort of bias going in-Logan." She looks over her shoulder to him and shifts her dark eyes to Natasha curiously.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    The whole time, Natasha has been quiet as she was allowed to enter the elevator and now is descending into the belly of the mansion. Her expression is neutral but she is taking in ever bit of the conversation and filing it away. Thus far, she still isn't sure exactly what is going on but a few pieces of the puzzle are starting to fall into place.

Wolverine has posed:
    A hand holds up towards Pixie as Logan slips into the elevator, "Hold off for the moment, mebbe feed me what you know while we're eyeballing it. Sometimes helps fill in the blanks for me." Since, to be fair, there are often a lot of them for the man.
    The ride down is short, just a few moments locked in the enclosed area together. Wolverine hands the box back towards Widow for the moment as he asks, "Mind holdin' that for me for a bit, darlin'?" His lip twists as the doors open and they step out into the metallic hallway, the futuristic decor not at all matching with the manor home above. "I like ta have my hands free. Just in case." Then again, he's sure Natasha probably feels the same.
    A few more moments of travel carry them to the storage facility where he'll step back and let Cyclops take the lead. "Alright, let's see it."

Cyclops has posed:
    The elevator dings and Scott allows Logan to be the first one off, and with some foresight, Scott offers to take the box from Natasha and would tuck the cigars under one arm as if he was actually going to carry them, but he sets the box down on the ground inside the hallway next to the elevator doors.

    Scott catches up and takes the lead and while he's against the doorway to the storage room, he turns to the trio and smirks, "The boys like to call it, the Freak show." With an out of place smirk on his face before it's wiped away by the room.

Pixie has posed:
Following along, Pixie looks to the older adults and shakes her head a little. The welsh mutant looking more uncomfortable the closer they get to the body. Just to be safe she slowly draws the souldagger out and side glances to Natasha. "You know, just in case."

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    Natasha does relinquish the cigars but only so she can pull off her jacket. As she does so, what she is wearing beneath is revealed. It's a short sleeved green blouse. Which makes those wristbands on her forearms painfully obvious.
    "Of course," she says to Pixie as she drops her jacket on the floor over the box of cigars. She isn't sure why the precautions but she isn't one to ignore all the warning signs.
    Upon entering, she frowns as she sees what they have brought them down for.

Wolverine has posed:
    With things set, Logan gives the other people a nod then steps towards the entryway and on through into where they're keeping the body. Once inside he flares his nostrils, taking a deep breath and frowning to himself as he gets lost for a moment in the examination of sensations that provides.
    He reaches over towards the control panel on the wall, keying the lights brighter before he steps towards the bed where the corpse reclines in a powered preservation body bag. He frowns marginally as he walks and as he moves Logan looks over his shoulder towards Pixie and Scott, "Tell me how things went down. A'right?"

Cyclops has posed:
    The room is poorly lit and there's a dense fog rolling out across the floor as the doors open and there in one of the hospital beds, is the prone form of Rogue, kind of laying there and not embalmed or anything, she's just laying there clinically, like in a morgue. A few things would be noticeable quickly, she doesn't look hurt, Pixie certainly stabbed the girl but there's no blood, and the wound isn't visible even though Pixie had stabbed the puppet in the chest. "Anything to report Logan?" Scott asks as he steps to the side to look down at the fake Rogue and then back up to Logan.

Pixie has posed:
Everything about this puts Pixie's spine up. Her wings flutter with agitation and she walks closer almost reluctantly. "Where's the stab wound?" She asks softly. "Jean lifted it off my knife-I I /felt/ killing it." She looks at not-Rogue and leans over the body cautiously.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    They have a morgue in the basement. Perhaps that should be something that leaps out to Natasha. Along with the state of the art facilities down here compared to the mild mannered building above. They also have a corpse.
    Really, that should get some soft of a negative response her being an agent of SHIELD. However, she is also an old ally of Logan's. Very old ally. For that very reason, she doesn't bat an eye at the situation.
    "You stabbed her?" she asks, walking closer to look at the body as well.

Wolverine has posed:
    Scowling to himself, Logan continues to advance and then pulls open the bodybag a bit, revealing the Rogue simulacrum. For a moment he touches the cheek of the creature, not able to detect life in it, but also something more as he takes another deep breath.
    "Well," Logan steps away to let Nat have a closer look, his arms folding across his broad chest as he takes up a place at the head of the gurney. "Good news is that it doesn't smell anythin' like Rogue." He lifts his chin and gestures with a nod, even as he shifts his weight to the other foot. "Bad news is we can't know for sure until we run into another live one."

Cyclops has posed:
    Scott gives Pixie a subtle motion of his hand for her to calm. "It's okay. She's not going to move again." We think. But he doesn't say that last bit. He looks over to Natasha and Logan behind his ruby glasses and asks, "Got any ideas? There's a Bobby on the loose reportedly, but no one's seen him since Lorna's report. And even then only she has seen him. Could have been Mystique or any number of things." Scott says with a sigh.

Pixie has posed:
"There's more?" Pixie asks and looks to Natasha with a nod. "She-it tried to fly past me and Jean said it was controlled by a demon so-you know, good old soul dagger." She looks to Scott and backs off a few steps. "I went up and under into the chest cavity. I'm very sure of the blow."

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "I don't know what a soul dagger is," Natasha admits as she examines the corpse from the other side. "But it seems to be very effective since there isn't a mark on her. I'll have to ask you to fill me in about that someday." She isn't going to right now as they are focused on something more important. "There's another of these out there, impersonating someone else?"

Wolverine has posed:
    Arms still crossed, his expression still distanced, Logan gives a nod towards both Pixie and Natasha. "A version of Iceman." He offers, to perhaps help Widow identify who they're talking about, since Bobby probably doesn't bring much to her memory.
    He holds up a hand though, fingers flaring as if for them to hold on for a moment, "Thing is, the way this thing smells, it smells like... not even human. Beast might be able to kluge somethin' together that'd let folks identify them outta the crowd." He takes up a place against the wall, still looking at the inert Rogue and frowning the whole while.
    "How many ferals we got on the roster these days? Me. Laura. Wolfsbane? That Catspaw kid still around? Might be a good idea ta allocate them teamwise."

Cyclops has posed:
    "That sounds about right." Scott says in reference to the ferals, "Forge could make something up as well." Scott says, a hand moving to his chin and he frowns. "I have no idea where to start looking. However this Rogue was just attacking the city and several people, maybe the same thing will happen with this Iceman." Scott says with a frown, knowing that will hurt Mutant images around the world if they see more of that on the news and internets. He looks to the pink and red heads, "Any ideas you two?"

Pixie has posed:
"I could chat up some magic people. If it's infernal, there's got to be some whispers about someone being up to something." Pixie says and rubs the back of her head idly. "I don't think it's Faerie." She shakes her head a little and looks to Scott. "They're crafty, but it's not their style."

Wolverine has posed:
    Shaking his head, Logan pushes away from the wall. "Let's put our tech guys onto makin' something if that'll help. Get our ferals briefed and split up." He rolls his shoulders and there's a faint metallic scrape for a bare instant at which he scowls.
    To Scott he says, "In case yer wonderin', everyone I've met so far smells like themselves." He crosses the room towards the door, but then shoots a smirk towards Natasha before he pushes the entryway open, letting the subtle fog to billow out into the hallway once again.
    "A'course, all this is for nothin' if I'm a duplicate. So let's all keep our heads about us just in case." That having been said it's out into the hallway and then back towards the stairwell. Over his shoulder he asks, "You got all that, slim?"

Cyclops has posed:
    "I already had it, Geezer." Scott says with a roll of his eyes, hidden behind his custom glasses. Scott motions for Pixie to come with them and he frowns back into the room before shutting the door and sealing it, after everyone is out of course. "Ask your mystic connections Pixie, what should we do with the puppet's remains." Scott says, giving Pixie her own job to do as they follow behind Logan.

Pixie has posed:
"Magic liason at your service." Pixie nods to Scott before calling ahead to Logan. "Scott said he's too pretty to listen, old man!" because she might as well before giving her dagger a twirl and putting it away as they head to the elevator. Leaving the creepy corpse behind seems to do a world of good for Pixie.

Wolverine has posed:
    "Ain't that the thing." Logan says over his shoulder towards Pixie, shaking his head sadly as if they both had Scott's number down, the two of them. But with that said he heads on down the hallway and towards the elevator, making his way out of the lower secure areas.