Owner	Pose
John Dee	Dark and unnatural clouds rumble forward in the sky. Energy crackles in them. Shadows roam through the land. Despite these changes the streets are silent. Bodies of people that have turned on each other litter everywhere Psylocke looks. People that have gone insane and turned on their fellow man. People they loved, and cared about, meeting gruesome fates as the world has gone insane. She hears footsteps. Dragging, heavy and clearly, they're labored. It could be an injury or a shamble. Turning she sees Warren. One of his wings lays limply, he's holding his side, blood trickles down from an eye and chunks of his hair have been pulled out. "I thought you said this wasn't coming. You said we were stopping this! What happened?!" Psylocke cannot remember. It was like one moment the world was normal. Everything looked to be going the way it should have.In the a blink of an eye the chaos not only came, but it has settled.
Psylocke	Here again. For nearly two years, Betsy Braddock has been plagued by dreams of this moment. At first they were different, in subtle ways, every time: she would watch different people die in new ways; she would appear in different places in New York, but always the result was the same. Despair, destruction, death. Reminded, over and over again, that she can't stop what's coming. It only makes her /more/ determined -- ruthlessly so -- to find a way to stop it. After so long, the dreams have just been repeats. She's seen it all. She remembers them all, even without trying. A witness to the end of the world. Except that changes, now. Because she /failed/. "Warren?" confusion reigns. This isn't how this was supposed to happen. They had time -- a year or two, by Nathaniel Essex's reckoning. Yet she can't deny what she's seeing: Warren, injured and near death. Betsy is by his side in an instant, her hands coming up to soothe him, reaching out mentally, reflexively, to take away his pain even as she supports his weight. "We- we were. I don't... I don't understand."
John Dee	"Why did you fail us? We followed you...It wasn't enough. I barely got out of the base," Warren speaks as he leans against her. His breathing labored. "You were always the person I wanted to be with on our final days. I didn't picture the day to look like this," he says trying to lookat the world around them. They both know he is dying. That time is fleeting against them. He leans against her more, "Blond children with British accents. Always liked that thought," he says wth a smile pulling at his lips.
Psylocke	Betsy doesn't remember. It's not that strange, at first. There are memories that aren't hers, and memories that aren't wholly hers. But it's unusual, enough of a nagging thought that it lingers in her head even as she's listening to Warren. His words stab her as effectively through the heart as any weapon. They broke up years before, and since returning, Betsy's deliberately kept Warren at arms' length. She tells herself it's because she can't afford to be distracted from the mission. That nothing is more important than stopping what her vision told her would happen. It wouldn't be the first time she's practiced more than a little self-deception. "/Warren/." Always the way Betsy says his name conveys her emotions more fully than any other words. This time: fear and grief and anguish, as he speaks of a future he dreamed of. A future that won't come, she knows. The weight of him is too great, and Betsy sinks to the ground, pulling Warren to her, cradling his head even as she bends over him. "They would have been beautiful. They would have had your eyes." Her own, violet eyes well with tears. She fights to keep them from falling even as her mind reaches out to touch his. She has been in mental contact with people who have died before. It's a terrifying, agonizing experience. But she owes Warren this much. And so much more. "I'm here," she murmurs to him, and into his thoughts at the same time. "I'm here."
John Dee	Warren leans against her more. He always knew Betsy held him at arm's length. However, he figured on brighter days the arm would come down. They would have more time together. Warren's mind is slipping and it's hard to grip at. By the time she has a hold there's nothing t hold onto. Warren's gone. Died in her arms. All the hopes and dreams with him now gone as he lays lifeless in Bety's arms. Betsy's alone now. Whether she s still or wanders, it isn't long before another traveler crosses her path. She cans see the silhouette of someone. However, that's all Betsy sees before energy lances out toward her. Hitting her in the chest and stomach. It burns and the smell of burning flesh goes up her nose. Only after getting hit by, it does her brain recognize it: optic blasts. Standing there in a dark uniform with a grey trench coat on is Cyclops. Somehow, he is surviving this nightmare, but the suit shows wear and tear. "You drove a wedge in the team the moment you arrived and for what?" he gestures around. "You pushed aside your friends and where did it get you!?" Cyclops moves t her with purpose. Blaming her for this world. "We could have saved the world as a team, but -you- didn't want that." The look toward her hard, "This is for what you did to Jean." Pulling up a resolve from nowhere, "I had to put her down because of what did to half of the school with her powers."
Psylocke	For the first time in a long time, Betsy Braddock weeps. It's silent, and it continues as she lays Warren down, folds his arms across his chest, adjusts his clothing and smooths his hair. All little things that won't matter now that she can no longer feel his consciousness. But they matter to /her/. She rises up, soon after, and stalks forward. There's work to be one, her resolve hardened. Warren's death won't be for nothing. She draws her impossibly sharp katana, holding it loosely in one hand as she stalks forward for something, anything -- to vent her fury and grief at. Instead, she encounters another unanticipated figure. She goes tumbling when the blast hits her in the chest, the sword falling from her grasp as she presses her hand to her chest. "Scott?" her tone incredulous and full of pain. "We built this together. This was the Dream. Charles', and ours." This is the moment. The moment awareness comes. Her Scott, the one she knows, would not put the blame on someone else. On himself? Absolutely. But not Betsy. This she knows for certain, even before he says he had to put down Jean. While she knows he would be capable of it, she knows he would do anything to avoid it. Betsy draws herself to her feet, staggering towards him -- only exaggerating a little. When she falls towards him, her hands reach out to grab him, to pull him close. "Scott, please," she pleads, at least until she can make contact. The gleam purple lights her features as it springs into being. The knife is less a physical manifestation, more a focus of her psychic abilities. Without hesitation, she seeks to stab it directly into Scott's head. Alongside the demand: <<Who are you?>>
John Dee	"No. This was your dream. Your goals. Your actions. Where did X-Force fall into Charles's vision? That fell into Magneto's wheelhouse. Especially with the company you were willing to keep," Scott does move toward her. He's readying a blast when an idea slips into her head: This is a shapeshifter. Probably. He's close enough, able to be grabbed. Another blast readies itself. Just ready to do some damage to Betsy. She's not the only one grieving. Jean's death is on his hands and he was forced to do it. They share a similar grief.
Psylocke	"No, we- we talked about this. We agreed." There are some fundamental truths Psylocke knows. She is not a trusting soul by nature, but those she has balanced herself on, her rockbed, these she knows to be true. Just as she knows Warren would never turn his back on her, she knows the same is true of Scott. Whatever, whoever this is, it isn't Scott Summers. Which means he is willing to kill her. Conversely, it means she is willing to kill /him/. She's always been a risk-taker. She's always chosen the fast path, the one that provides the most rush. It wouldn't be unwarranted to accuse her of being so blind to her own danger that she could be accused in some way of seeking death. It's this that drives her, that takes the risk that he's going to hit her at or before she strikes home. But she takes it anyway. Purple flares bright as she seeks to penetrate Scott's mind with her blade. This isn't grief. There's something too cold-blooded in Betsy's manner for it to be so.
John Dee	Psylocke is the risk taker and she's off like a bullet moving toward her attacker. The flash of psychic energy. How it coalesces into the form of a blade. As it comes toward his temple, one of his hands shoots out. It grips at her face, but the blade rings true. Into the temple it goes. At that same time Psylocke can feel someone press against a mental barrier. A flash of a skull with moving eyes dances in her temple. "Scott" starts to laugh. "We are at an impasse, aren't we?" At the same time she feels that pressing, Psylocke realizes the blade's not working. Like there's an equally powered block on the blade. Despite it looking like it's in his skull, it feels like the blade didn't go through at all. "Tsk. Tsk. Tsk. All that anger. That intent. You -really- are a killer, don't need to prod to see that," "Scott" smiles devilishly. "You pieces of yourself with each kill. How many dead eyes do you need to look into before you realize, there's nothing left of you? You're a shell of a woman you were. The you that was -happy-. What would she say to -you-? I really wonder, you bloody impressive thing," that grin almost looks Cheshire like. Scott's face melts away to Warren's. Dashing, and beautiful, those blue eyes staring at you thoughtfully. "You remind me of someone I've recently met. Similarly skilled, but he openly admits he's not human. Makes you think, doesn't it?" Then everything goes black. Psylocke is able to wake up. Any small cuts, bruises, she still hands. However, there is a mental impression. Maybe a round with Cerebro could bring out more?
Psylocke	There are few in the world, even the most talented of psychics, who can resist the sharp point of Psylocke's focused blade. Emma Frost in her diamond form, for sure. But she has encountered few others. The blade presses against the block, presses and presses, unrelenting. Just like Psylocke. Then the figure behind all of this begins to reveal himself. All that talk of her being a killer: it's not like it's news to her. "Tell me something I don't know. If this is intended to shake my confidence, you've chosen entirely the wrong target." Even as well trained as she is, it's hard for Betsy not to react when Scott's face becomes Warren's again. It's not fear, or regret or yearning though -- just pure anger. She strains, the dagger trying to press forward-- --and then she wakes. The sheets fall away from her as she sits up, the psychic dagger manifested in the real world, too. She sighs, and it disappears. She dislikes using Cerebro, precisely because it amplifies her abilities. Maybe for this, though, it's a necessity.