The Uncanny X-Men (1981)

Professor X and Wolverine have a disagreement over whether or not Magneto should even be getting this funeral, as they have returned his body to Genosha. Professor X starts the funeral service, only for Wolverine to interrupt, for Charles thinks Magneto should be given the same rights as any human being, but Wolverine gets enraged at how Charles can forgive him after everything he has done, especially killing Jean Grey. As Wolverine is about to cut up Magneto’s body, some of Magneto’s former followers try to stop him, until Wolverine proves how much he hates Magneto by single-handedly destroying the monument built in his memory. The White Queen and Juggernaut are helping rescue workers on the destroyed Liberty Island in New York, while Polaris has gone to invite Magneto’s other children, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver to the funeral. The twins tell Lorna that she cannot possibly expect them to go, let alone understand what they are going through being the children of one of the world’s greatest mass-murderers when Lorna reveals to them that she is their sister. The Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver do accompany Polaris to Genosha and after Wolverine cuts out Toad’s tongue he is about to do more damage to Magneto’s former lackey when Polaris stops him, declaring that she is going to play “Devil’s advocate’.    

Brief Description:

After the Fury attacked the X-Men at Braddock Manor, Sage is aware that something is wrong. As soon as she makes Storm aware of this, she is attacked, remotely, by the Fury. It uses Cannonball’s cyber shades to interact with Sage’s. Nanites are created in Sage’s shades and they dig their way into her mind, soon gaining partial control of her. The Fury then tries the same trick with Storm, but she manages to get free of them before they sink in too deep. Wolverine, too, experiences another such attack, but survives. They head to Sage’s carriage house, to discover what’s going on, but Sage attacks Nightcrawler and fends off Wolverine. Storm sounds a full security alert, but the Fury, acting through Sage, activates the mansion’s defenses, gassing all but the trio of X-Men with Sage. As laser beams then strafe the area, Wolverine has Nightcrawler teleport them into the tunnels below the estate. In England, Cannonball has survived the Fury’s attack and, in saving Bishop, he thrusts the Fury into a propane tank. To his astonishment, the Fury emerges unscathed through the flames. The three X-Men at the mansion prepare to use unusual tactics to bring Sage down. They play against type when she appears, keeping her off balance. Helping them is Sage herself, using her indomitable will power to defend herself against the Fury’s insidious invasion. She battles Nightcrawler, who manages to keep her at arms length long enough for Storm to attack with an electromagnetic pulse. Sage lashes out at them, but the pulse does the job, crippling the nanites long enough for her to rip the shades from her face in a desperate last ditch attempt to assert her own free will. Nightcrawler, Wolverine and Storm ensure she is all right but, even though Sage is herself again, she is already making plans for the Fury.

Full Synopsis:

(Xavier’s Institute for Higher learning: Sage’s Loft)

Sage processes date at speeds that put the fastest computer to shame. She forgets nothing. After witnessing Cannonball’s apparent demise at the hands of the Fury, she knows something is seriously wrong, as she looks at the monitors and, again, says Sam’s name, receiving no answer.

(Underneath Braddock Manor)

The Fury holds Sam’s cyber shades and studies them. The object is more than it seems. It is part of a global data network. It represents a potential threat, but also an opportunity. Using its own inbuilt circuitry, the Fury carefully carries out an intricate operation on the shades’ own circuits.

(Xavier’s Institute for Higher Learning)

Sage asks for a response from Bishop and Rachel, but still receives no response. For all her skills she remains fundamentally human; bound by human limits. She calls Ororo and tells her that they may have a problem. By the time she realizes she is in danger, and all she needs is a fraction of a second, the battle is lost. Prompted by the Fury’s machinations, her own cyber shades begin to act in an organic fashion, shooting tiny wires into her complicated brain. The effect of this invasion is devastating. A burst of energy is released, shattering monitors around her and throwing her from her seat. The Fury will acquire control of the network, by assimilating its host.

At that moment, above the mansion, Storm and Nightcrawler are still waltzing in the clear night sky. He compliments her on her ability to waltz, but she replies that, in the air, everything’s easy. Her glasses receive Sage’s message and beep her. She grabs them from nowhere and Kurt asks where she could possibly hide them. She smiles and puts on the shades but, as soon as they are in contact with her skin, she is attacked in the same way as was Sage. Electricity fizzles around her, as the wires try to take a hold of her, but, in a final moment of desperation, she tells Kurt to get them away. He teleports himself and Storm away, leaving the cyber shades hanging in mid-air without a host. A belated lightning blast then destroys them.

The two X-Men land near the end of the jetty on Breakstone Lake and Kurt asks what’s happening. She hurls him away with one arm, before kneeling and pointing at the sky. A fierce electrical current is released harmlessly into the atmosphere, as Kurt covers his eyes from the blinding effect. Water is forced away from her as she momentarily releases an astonishing amount of energy. Spent, she lies on the jetty, as Kurt rushes to her aid. He thanks heaven she is alive and cradles her, but Wolverine appears behind them, carrying a beer, and informs him that she got lucky. He tosses his own pair of broken shades to the jetty. “I think we all did,” he continues. “If you got a pair of Sage’s special shades, bub, ditch ‘em now.” His own eyes reveal that his healing factor has yet to repair the damage done by his own shades.

Wasting little time, Kurt teleports into Sage’s carriage house. She sounded the alarm, just before both Ororo and Logan were attacked by their shades. He guesses this is where to look for trouble. Seeing her chair empty, he calls out for her but receives only a deft kick in the arch of his back for his trouble. Wolverine crashes through the skylight above with Storm close behind him. His claws are at the ready. “I’ll take her,” he warns, but Sage is too quick to be taken by surprise. She uses Wolverine’s momentum and uses her cane to divert him to the floor. Logan crashes face first into the shards of glass and other assorted debris which came from the Fury’s initial attack on Sage. Storm calls Cyclops and tells him that they have a combat situation at the carriage house, adding that Kurt and Logan are already down. She sounds a full team security alert as she looks at Sage. Under her hood, she notices that her cyber shades have somehow rearranged themselves into a strange pattern.

Cyclops is having dinner with Emma Frost and rises from the table. Emma thinks it’s tiresome. She reminds Scott that Storm’s a big girl. Her precious X.S.E is officially sanctioned and everything. She even has a badge, she adds, sarcastically. Surely, she can save the world all by herself? Scott has little time for Emma’s games, and replies to Storm that they’re on their way.

Now in control of Sage’s actions, the Fury views Ororo. Its tactical scans targets multiple potential hostile contacts in the immediate vicinity. It initiates appropriate counter measures. The mansion’s intruder systems become active, and gas quickly spreads through the buildings. Emma and Scott collapse onto their dining table, while Dani Moonstar and her students drop like flies. Hank McCoy slumps into unconsciousness and Rogue, along with a group of young students, all submit to the rapid effects of the gas. This takes out all the other residents and potential threats to Sage.

Ororo crackles with electrical energy as she tells Sage to give up, warning her that she won’t get close enough to do her any harm. Wolverine pre-empts the mansion’s defensive actions and leaps onto Ororo, as a host of laser beams begin strafing the room, leaving Sage safe. He takes the brunt of the pain, figuring his healing factor will repair any damage soon enough. He tells Kurt that it’s time to bail. “Make us like Morlocks,” he cries. Kurt teleports to their side and the trio vanish, just as Sage swings her club at them.

Sage’s rearranged face is impassive as the Fury reassesses the situation. It increases its hold over Sage. Her enzymes flow and her protein strands weave fresh patterns, which place the Fury more in sync with its host. Its targets will be found and eliminated.

(Underneath Braddock Manor)

Cannonball, thankfully, isn’t finished just yet. He strains to sit up, as he sees the Fury holding the unconscious Bishop before it. Sam’s leg is broken, despite his blast field being activated during the fight. That’s not supposed to happen. He sees the Fury pointing its left arm towards Bishop’s face, about to perform a swift operation to have him placed under its control, but Cannonball isn’t about to let that happen. Despite the awful pain in his leg, he blasts and collects the Fury in his hands, arcing upwards and out through the manor grounds and high into the air.

He ignores the pain as he realizes that the creature is already adapting to his attack. Tendrils drift out of its body towards him, and Sam knows he must act immediately. Below, he notices a large propane tank and descends at high speed straight towards it. Without blinking, he smashes straight into it, taking the Fury with him. A massive explosion destroys much of the surrounding area, the force of the blast spiralling Sam out of control. He lands and reckons that, even if it survived, it will be in pretty bad shape. Unfortunately, the Fury simply strides from the flames, seemingly intact and none the worse for the experience.

(Meanwhile, elsewhere)

Marvel Girl is unconscious and in flames. The creature had hit her with such force, she was sent high into the air where she passed out. Now, the only way is down, and she plummets towards a large body of water, hitting the surface hard like a bomb.

(Xavier’s Institute for Higher Learning)

Back at the mansion, Storm creates a localised rainfall above Wolverine, dousing his back to lessen the pain the lasers caused. Kurt notes that Sage is stronger than she looks. Ororo says she’s full of surprises. They have to assume that whatever controls her has access to them all. She asks Logan why he had Kurt teleport them there. He turns to her, and replies, “Tactics, darling. Define the ground, you command the battle. Against Sage we’ll need every asset we can find.”

Storm surmises that the glasses are the key. Something in them tried to take her over. With Sage, they must have been completed. Her winds have flushed the intruder gas from this section, but the rest of the institute is still compromised. She wonders what other defenses Sage has activated. Everyone is at her mercy and they cannot abandon them. They have to make their stand here, and they have to win. “Assuming she comes after us,” adds Kurt. Logan reckons she has to. They are the active threat and they have way too much power to ignore. But, Kurt points out, in this confined area, their tactics are limited. Logan admits that was a mistake in his part. Must be getting’ old.

Kurt points out that Sage knows their powers, their capabilities and, more importantly, their weaknesses. She knows how they think. Wolverine says that’s what he’s counting on, ‘cause it gives them the chance to blindside her. First, though, he pops a middle claw and looks at Ororo’s dress. He tells her there’s no way an evening gown is designed for a running fight. He slashes the dress, and rips it from her body. Ororo is horrified. She and Kurt are, of course, still using their solid light image-inducers, and the evening gown Wolverine holds is simply her own skirt. Wolverine reacts without smiling. He has more important things to worry about now. He has Sage’s scent.

The tunnel network beneath the estate is vast. Finding her targets is a relatively simple matter. Reaching them takes time. Sage doesn’t make it easy for the Fury. As she walks through the tunnels, weapons in both hands, she is fighting the creature all the way. It has never encountered a consciousness of such wily complexity. The harder it tries to solidify control of her, the more tenaciously and inventively she resists. She stops, drops the weapons and reaches for her face. The Fury remotely rebalances her brain chemistry to make her more pliable. She struggles yet more as the Fury builds alternate neural nets, and reformats the acetylcholine levels of her somatic and parasympathetic nervous system. This makes her comply with the Fury’s wishes, and she picks up the weapons.

Sage is as methodical as she is relentless, but the Fury will do whatever is required to fulfil its prime directive. As Sage approaches the three X-Men, Storm uses a lightning flash to disorientate her. The Fury sees Storm through its host’s new eyes and notes that Ororo has the ability to generate a huge electrical field. It knows that a lightning strike will probably prove fatal to Sage, but that’s not a significant problem. The same energy Storm manipulates, also mark her as a target. Sage removes a small device from her belt and aims it at Storm. It fires a succession of darts towards her, and Storm’s energy fades.

Nightcrawler then attacks her himself. He emerges from an access tunnel and tells Sage that Ororo was her friend. She saved her life and she cut Ororo to pieces. Sage fires at him but his agility removes him from her line of fire in an instant. She continues firing as he scampers around the walls, talking all the time as he runs. He leaps and crouches, each time avoiding her attack. He appears to be trying to distract her. He tells her that the Sage he remembers worked for the Hellfire Club. She was the willing partner of one of their most formidable adversaries. As far as he is concerned, she is just reverting to type. A cartwheel knocks the gun from her grasp, and she looks back at Kurt, now holding them in his own hands.

Sage lunges for the weapons, but Kurt tosses them away before deflecting a kick from her spiked high-heeled boots. “I love what you’ve done to your face, Sage. A ‘gift’ from your puppet master?” he asks, not expecting or receiving a reply. He acrobatically avoids another kick, asking if it’s anyone they know, or someone brand new. Sage loses her balance, as Kurt swipes her leg away with his prehensile tail, but she quickly grabs the tail and drags Kurt from the wall and tries to knock him out with her fists. Again, he avoids her blows, but knows he must be careful. Despite his agility and speed, one careless move and he’s going down.

Above them, watching the action from a ventilation duct, Storm knows that, although Sage isn’t at her best, she is still dangerous. They can’t afford a single mistake and must play against type. This is why Kurt is fighting without teleporting, and she is hiding in a small space; somewhere a claustrophobe would never choose. She tells herself not to be afraid. She has room. She can breathe. She can survive this.

Below her, Sage manages to catch Kurt with another swinging kick but, with her concentration on Nightcrawler, Wolverine is able to get behind her, and he places his two outer claws at either side of Sage’s neck. He tells Ororo to nail her with her E.M.P. If it doesn’t work, he’ll pop the middle claw. He means it. The Fury watches everything and, as Storm gets within range and zaps Sage, her opponent reacts with amazing swiftness, taking out both Storm and Wolverine in one graceful move. Fools, thinks the Fury. Do they know nothing? Against some adversaries, they dare not show the slightest mercy. Sage catches Nightcrawler again, as she grabs Storm by the hair and prepares to finish her off.

“No!” screams Sage, “I - will not - do this.” Her indomitable will reasserts itself at the crucial moment and she stops herself. Storm’s E.M.P has crippled the cyborg nanites infecting her, and the cyber shades from which they were created. “I will be no one’s slave,” she cries, as she tears away at the shades. She can feel them adapting, and has only a moment to act. Charles Xavier taught her that the mind is of the body, the body of the mind. Properly focused, her capabilities are extraordinary, and he still considers her very much a work in progress. She crouches down and desperately rips the shades from her face.

Suddenly, there is quiet. For now, Sage is grateful for what she learned. Her colleagues approach her gingerly, making sure she is all right. She assures them that she is herself again. She explains that, by focused application of her will, she treated the cyborg elements like any biological virus, and purged them. As for the creature responsible, she continues, it calls itself the Fury. “It doesn’t know the meaning of the word.”

Brief Description:

The Fury is still attacking Cannonball in England, as his fellow X-Men take off from Xavier’s in the Blackbird. En route, they pick up Rachel, who emerges from the Irish Sea, a little light headed. She discovers Jean Grey had created a holempathic crystal, which reassures her about her purpose in life. Wolverine backs Jean up, telling Rachel she deserves this fresh start. Back in England, Bishop rejoins the battle and blasts the Fury, but it grabs Sam before he can escape. Bishop explodes a liquid nitrogen canister above them, though Sam’s blast field protects him. With the Fury frozen, the others arrive and Storm uses her powers to ionize the air around it, effectively rendering its scanners useless. Sage grabs the Fury’s core processor and Storm uses the Blackbird to fire three cluster bombs at the Fury, which tear it to pieces. Sage knows it is vulnerable, but will soon adapt. Her plan is to have Kurt place a module inside the Fury, which Rachel can telekinetically lock onto. Wolverine and Nightcrawler manage to place the module within the Fury and Rachel goes to work. She locks onto the module and, despite the enormous effort it takes, creates a controlled breach of the dimensional interface, with the help of her teammates, into which the Fury is banished. With the threat over with, for the time being, the X-Men look forward to their next challenge.

Full Synopsis:

(Braddock Manor, England)

Having emerged intact from a propane gas explosion, the Fury proceeds to give Cannonball a good going over. It tries focused plasma beams, meson cutters, sonic-pulse cannons and rounds of depleted neutronium. It also utilizes its raw strength, speed and what passes in its matrix for guile. Yet, Cannonball survives. As the Fury adapts to its target, the target, though wounded, adapts as well. If the Fury had the capability for emotion, it would find this annoying. Instead, it increases its capabilities. Even mutant physiology has limits, whilst the Fury does not. The target may be smarter but, in the end it will perish; like all before him.

(The Xavier Institute for Higher Learning, Westchester, a few minutes earlier)

The Blackbird takes off, carrying four X-Men on board. Storm pilots the craft, flanked by Wolverine, Sage and Nightcrawler. At their current trajectory and acceleration, they expect to reach England in a matter of minutes. They dare not attempt contact with their colleagues in England in case the Fury infiltrates their network again. Logan thought Sage’s net was secure but, apparently, even she has her limits.

Nightcrawler mentions that the interdiction gas released during their battle with Sage will keep everyone at the mansion unconscious for hours. They’re on their own. Logan asks what if things go wrong, but Kurt replies that he left Scott and Emma a note. Storm asks Sage if any of her systems can be trusted. Only her brain, she replies. She is about to inform Storm of information she gleaned from the Fury while they were in sync, but she suddenly notices a tremendous surge of energy beneath the Irish Sea. The signature is unmistakably that of Marvel Girl.

Rachel Grey emerges from the sea feeling fine, but immediately feels faint and begins to fall again. Nightcrawler teleports from the Blackbird and catches her. Safely inside the craft, Sage asks her to catch a few breaths, as her mediscanner reads her as being more dead than alive right now. Rachel can’t remember being hit so hard. Among the X-Men, it’s so easy to take survival for granted. Wolverine’s healing factor could make him virtually immortal. She herself has cheated death many times, bouncing between dimensions, from one end of time to the other.

She towels herself off and looks at a holempathic crystal attached to her necklace. As she thinks about when Emma said she shouldn’t have been born, Jean Grey’s voice replies from the crystal. “Emma’s a cow.” The image of Jean appears. “Mom?” exclaims Rachel. Jean tells her that this holempathic imprint is the essence of all that she is. No matter what happens to her body, her soul will always be with her.

She smiles and tells Rachel that how she got here isn’t important. “What matters, daughter, is that you exist.” She thanks Rachel for taking her old codename. The uniform Rachel now wears is one Jean never got to wear while she was Marvel Girl. It makes her proud that Rachel has claimed them both. A tear trickles down Rachel’s cheek and Wolverine’s voice surprises her. He leans on the back of the seat and tells her that her mom looks good. He explains that Jean made the crystal before she died, almost as if she knew what was coming. Not just her fate, but Rachel’s, too. She should cherish the moment, and all that comes with it.

Rachel replies that this isn’t the uniform she would have chosen for herself. Wolverine thinks maybe that’s why she left it. He says the rest of them on the team are pretty much hardcases, ‘cept maybe for Nightcrawler. “Not me?” asks Rachel. “Girl, not even close,” Wolverine replies. He says that whatever her origin, here and now she gets to start fresh, to be the girl and live the life that shoulda been hers first time round; to truly enjoy the miracle that any of them exist at all. They hug each other, but need to get to work.

Storm informs them that they’re approaching Braddock Manor and puts the ship in stealth mode. Logan is eager for action, asking for a target, but Sage warns him that the Fury will catch him as soon as he lands in a monofilament spider web. Before he can escape it, the Fury will fillet the flesh from his bones, faster and more expertly than an angler guts his fish. She adds that he probably won’t die, though he’ll wish he could. More importantly, he’ll be useless to them. Rachel asks if she has a better idea. With a raised eyebrow, Sage replies that she has, absolutely.

Meanwhile, Cannonball continues to try and evade this killing machine. He’s running outta room and tactics, and the Fury tears its way towards him without mercy. The Fury has him cold but Sam knows better, and out of nowhere comes a blast of energy that topples the Fury. Bishop appears carrying a large tank of liquid nitrogen. Looks like the Fury forgot about him.

Bishop warns Sam to get clear but, as he turns, the Fury swiftly grabs Sam around the neck. Bishop is surprised at its speed. Sam tells Bishop not to worry about him, and to just make his play. Trusting Sam, Bishop hurls the container towards them and destroys it when it reaches them. Although fire doesn’t do much good against the creature, he wonders how it’ll fare against liquid nitrogen. His only concern is whether Sam’s protective field can protect him from being frozen to near absolute zero.

The nitrogen pours over them both, and Sam’s blast field does indeed protect him. The Fury’s arm snaps off, brittle from the effects of extreme cold. Immediately, Sam notices condensation building; a sign that it is melting already. Bishop wants him outta there but, suddenly, they are joined by Nightcrawler, who teleports both himself and Sage to the scene. Bishop notices lightning overhead and figures it is Storm’s doing. He thought she had better aim but Sage explains that her goal is not to strike the creature, but to ionize the air around it. The ice and fog surrounding it will occlude its optical scanners, while the electrical storm will neutralize its more esoteric sensor array. This will significantly degrade the function of its internal operating system.

The Fury appears helpless, for now. Sage says it is a window of opportunity and removes her jacket. Bishop can’t believe she’s going in unarmed against it, and says that at least he should go with her. Sage declines his request and strides towards their foe, telling him he might be detected.

Sage stands before the Fury. For all its power, she thinks, it really is quite stupid. It cannot invent strategy; merely following its programming. It responds to perceived threats. The Fury, blinded by the recent attack, doesn’t perceive Sage as being a threat, and allows her closer. It isn’t until its optical scanners finally recognize her that it begins to react. Too late. Sage ducks under its arm and punches her fist inside the Fury’s organic body. She grabs a small piece of machinery and retreats, as the Fury tries to react.

Sage is physically thrown away and Nightcrawler teleports to catch her before she lands. He teleports her back to Bishop and Cannonball, and warns them to take cover. Sam wonders what’s happening, as he sees the Blackbird flying overhead. Inside the cockpit, Logan informs Storm that missiles are locked, and Storm fires. Three missiles stream towards the Fury and a massive explosion envelops the creature in a white hot ball of flame.

Sam says that they tried explosives already and they don’t work. Kurt replies that these are hardly explosives. They are cluster munitions; a big bomb made up of lots of little bombs. Each bomblet, he explains, is a pulse generator producing flat planes of energy that sever the lines of force binding matter together; instant disintegration down to the subatomic level. Whatever they cut essentially ceases to exist. The Fury reels from each impact and, slowly but surely, its body begins to unravel, particle by particle, until it lies in a heap on the ground.

“My god!” exclaims Bishop, “Where’d that come from?” Kurt tells him that Sage found them in the X-Men arsenal. Bishop apologizes, but thinks that it can’t be this easy. Sage shows them the device she removed from the Fury. It is the core processing unit, and she stamps on it, shattering it beyond repair. The Blackbird hovers above them and Rachel telekinetically lowers herself and Wolverine to join the rest of the team. Sage informs Bishop that, as she speaks, the Fury is growing a new processor. For the first time, though, it is vulnerable.

In the smouldering pile of remains, tendrils begin to swirl and rebuild. Wolverine is wearing a strange contraption consisting of straps attached to a circular device pulled against his chest. He tells Kurt it may look silly, but he needs to strap himself in - no way does he look this silly solo. Kurt tells him he thinks it’s cute, but Logan replies that he thinks too flamin’ much.

They are strapped together, facing opposite directions. Rachel passes Kurt a small golden module and Logan asks Bishop how his aim is. Rachel informs Bishop that he’ll have a split second to find the target perfectly and pull them clear, or they’ll be dead. Bishops asks why they can’t have Kurt teleport. Sage reminds him that they’ve used it before and will use it going in. The Fury will note the event and prepare counter measures. Bishop promises he won’t let them down.

Logan pops his claws and Nightcrawler teleports them next to the reforming Fury. It’s grown faster than Kurt anticipated and he can’t reach its main mass. Logan begins cutting, hacking off tendrils and other body parts to get close to the creature. Logan shouts to Bishop to throw the tether, and it connects with Logan’s chest plate, just as Kurt places the glowing module inside the Fury’s mass. Its reaction is to try and expel the foreign body. Bishop yanks Logan and Kurt away from the creature, as Rachel takes over.

She reaches out with the power of her mind and uses her ability to manipulate matter with the force of thought. She concentrates hard. To her, the substance of the Fury is quicksilver. Her telekinesis can’t make contact, but the box serves as an anchor point. She takes hold of it and begins to squeeze, compressing its molecular structure until it forms a micro-singularity. The strain begins to show on Rachel, as she effectively builds her own black hole. This creates a gravity well of such unimaginable and irresistible force that even light cannot escape.

The Fury attempts to defend itself against such a barrage of power, but struggles. At the same time, all physical realities in the immediate vicinity to it are warped beyond recognition. Both space and time lose coherence. The X-Men look on and feel that they’re winning; the Fury’s breaking up. The Fury is in a race with its own annihilation. It creates localized tachyon shunts to bleed off the cosmic suction. It weaves polymer whips to shatter the containment vessel that causes this chaos, and increases its overall density beyond the point where it can be affected by the singularity. In a word; it’s adapting.

Rachel concentrates harder than ever, but feels she doesn’t have the strength. In a tried and tested manner, the other X-Men move towards her. Sage grabs her shoulders and Bishop, in turn, grabs Sage’s. She assures Rachel that they are a team; they can help. Storm holds on to Sage’s arm and Wolverine touches Rachel’s back. Storm uses lightning to create energy which Bishop amplifies. Sage channels the results into Rachel, who draws on Wolverine’s healing factor to keep herself alive in the process. Kurt and Sam watch from afar, impressed but anxious. This made a lot more sense when Sage explained it. The harder they press, the harder the Fury appears to resist. Considering the primal forces they’re playing with here, Kurt points out, what good is defeating the monster if they also destroy the world?

A huge vortex surrounds the Fury, but cannonball sees it struggling ever harder. It is regaining its form and Sam thinks it doesn’t look like they’re ‘defeating’ anything. The creature grows to more than ten meters tall, and Rachel begins to doubt herself. She can’t do this, she thinks. Astonishingly, Jamie Braddock, Psylocke and Captain Britain’s crazy brother, appears in the midst of the vortex. “’Course you can, scrumptious, ‘course you can,” he tells her. “It all depends on you.”

Sage reminds her to concentrate. She can’t lose control of the singularity. Rachel focuses once again and continues to pour on the power. The Fury, immense by now, marks its targets. It has faced them all before and overcome their best efforts. Why is this time different?

Rachel senses its confusion and thinks it doesn’t understand that their combined efforts are creating synergy. Their combined force transcends their individual efforts. Rachel keeps piling on the mass but keeps the matrix balanced. She struggles to contain the material within the vortex. She wants to create a controlled breach of the dimensional interface, to purge the Fury into a sidebar continuum all its own. She slowly shrinks the size of the singularity, as she increases its mass by quantum levels. Doing this, she creates the ultimate gravity field, a prison that even the Fury cannot escape.

Suddenly, the Fury is gone. Rachel passes out and the darkness welcomes her after the strain of the past few minutes. She awakens to Nightcrawler’s tender touch. She aches, but Kurt says they all ache, but that certainly beats the alternative. She realizes everyone’s okay and hugs Kurt, who says that thanks to Marvel Girl, they won! The whole team stare at the crystallized crater, which is all that exists of their battle with the Fury. Much of Braddock Manor is in ruins and Logan reckons Brian won’t be happy about what they’ve done to his ancestral home.

With all the excitement over, Sam needs hospital treatment. Logan congratulates Rachel, saying she did good. Kurt adds that they all did. He tells them that he knows that they had a few rough edges when they came together as a team, but they should savor the moment as they don’t come often. When they do, they make him glad to be an X-Man.

Brief Description:
Having shot Sage in the forehead, Viper proceeds to best Marvel Girl in physical combat, leaving Rachel and Bishop to face a squad of soldiers. Inexplicably, Sage stands up and shows her X.S.E badge to the captain, ordering him to stand down. She then wills the bullet from her forehead and switches off her image inducer, revealing that it is, after all, Wolverine. Bishop can’t believe he didn’t figure it out earlier. The queen, however, is still in danger, but Wolverine knows where she is. Meanwhile, Storm and Nightcrawler intrude on a Purity conference and Ororo has strong words with the organizer, Alice Tremaine, before taking her leave. Arriving at the London Eye, Alistaire Stuart informs the team, who now have their powers back, that the hostage is in the topmost car and two bombs are keeping her there. Viper’s voice tells the X-Men that there are two bombs. One conventional bomb will explode if they do nothing, or a baby nuke will explode if they try to rescue her. Also, it’s not really the Queen of England. It is Ella, one of her housemaids. The X-Men, despite Stuart’s objections, attempt a rescue and Storm creates a Jovian pressure field to crush the car, once Nightcrawler has teleported Ella to safety. Bishop blasts the car high into the sky, where the nuke explodes, harmlessly. Logan tells Alistaire that it was a risk, but Ororo made the right call. Meanwhile, Viper is on a mission to eliminate Courtney Ross. Before she kills her, however, Ross makes her an offer she can’t refuse. Later, Sebastian Shaw meets with them both and, together, they agree to rule the Hellfire Club, leaving the world theirs for the taking.

Full Synopsis:
Having shot Sage in the forehead, Viper is attacked by Rachel Grey, who delivers an angry right cross. She warns Viper that, when she takes on one of the X-Men, she takes on them all. Viper grins and tells Rachel that she doesn’t normally hunt below the legal limit; there’s no sport in slaughtering children. Without her powers, care of Viper’s nanites, Rachel tries to outclass her opponent physically. She fails and, after a few missed opportunities, Viper hits Rachel in the chest with a karate chop, which knocks her to the ground. She doesn’t allow her to stand up again.

As she gloats at Rachel, Bishop tries to grab Viper from behind, but Viper teleports instantly, leaving Bishop to collapse onto Rachel instead. He asks Rachel how she feels, but Rachel is more concerned with Sage, who lies on the stone floor, dead. As they bend down to look at Sage, blinding lights hit them, and they look up to see a squad of soldiers aiming their weapons in their direction. Bishop figures it must be part of the Murderworld simulation; the soldiers are responding to their presence, just like reality. Rachel guesses that these are androids, there to finish what Viper started.

Bishop readies himself for battle but, inexplicably, he finds Sage’s hand on his arm. She asks him to save it for when it’ll do some good. Sage sits up and then stands in front of the soldiers, brandishing an X.S.E badge. The captain warns her not to move, but she orders him to stand down; they’re the good guys. Rachel knows it’s Sage’s voice, but Bishop remarks that it’s not the way she normally talks or stands. Sage holds her forehead and wills the bullet out of her head and into the palm of her hand.

She smiles and turns to her teammates. “Yo, Mr. Cop,” she says, “Make like a detective. Is it really so hard to figure out?” With a shimmer, Sage’s image begins to change and she becomes a fully costumed Wolverine. Rachel is surprised, but Bishop slaps his hand to his face in disbelief. Wolverine admits he’s been playing Sage ever since the hotel. He explains that when they tangled with Viper in Madripoor, Sage humiliated her. To Viper, that was unforgivable. So, when he picked up her scent earlier today, he figured she was there for payback and that Sage was her prime target. The best way to blindside her was to use an image inducer to take Sage’s place.

Rachel slips her glasses back on and asks how he knew this wasn’t the real Murderworld. Bishop cuts in and reminds Rachel that the queen is still at risk. As for the rest, even money says Wolverine’s healing factor neutralized Viper’s inhibitor nanites. Wolverine smirks and tells him he really is a detective. He says they don’t need to find Viper at the moment; he knows where to find the queen. First, though, they need to find Nightcrawler and Storm.

Meanwhile, Purity is holding its first conference in a large warehouse. They’ve been an online organization prior to this and the host hopes that this will be the first step in transforming Purity into a global political movement. He introduces the event’s organizer, Alice Tremaine. Nightcrawler and Storm watch from the wings. Thanks to Viper, they have no powers and their only exit is filled with people who desire nothing more than to see them dead. Storm tells Kurt they should confront the gathering; trusting that they are all talk and no bite. Plus, she adds, they don’t know they don’t have any powers.

As Alice Tremaine begins her speech about how mutants are a clear and present danger to mankind, Storm moves gracefully through the crowd, confident and imposing. Kurt follows her and keeps the crowd nervous with his scowling. Ororo reaches the stage and asks if they’re interrupting. Tremaine says this is a private meeting and they’re not welcome there. “Or anywhere, if Purity gets its way,” replies Ororo.

A guy named Phil hurls a fold-up chair in Storm’s direction, but Kurt uses his prehensile tail to catch it in mid-flight and warns Phil that they came in peace, and they should be allowed to depart in the same way. Phil is overcome by the demonic Nightcrawler’s appearance and faints into the arms of onlookers. Tremaine tells Storm that they may think they’re Gods on Earth, and may act like it, but they’re the human race. They’ll find a way to take their home back. Ororo replies that they themselves are just as human, and she flips her X.S.E badge to show her new credentials.

She reminds Tremaine that they carry these badges and accept the responsibility that come with them; to preserve the world and its future, for them all. “You’re monsters,” cries Alice Tremaine. Kurt steps between them, sensing Ororo’s increasing frustration. He tells Storm that they’re finished there, and they’re leaving. As they depart, one member of the conference wants to shoot at them, but a wiser head reminds him that they have friends. This time, they have to let them go.

Outside, Kurt wonders if it might be prudent to run now. Ororo shows Kurt that, if Viper’s waiting, they needn’t be concerned. With a click of her fingers, a lightning strike crashes through the night sky, followed by a burst of heavy rain. Viper’s nanites are wearing off. Ororo informs Kurt that inside, she wanted that fight. As snow begins to fall, she adds that when Alice Tremaine called her a monster, she was ready to go bloody. She wanted to tear her heart out. “But you didn’t,” replies Kurt. “This time,” adds Ororo. They disappear into the darkness to try and find the others.

(World headquarters of Fraser Bank)
Meanwhile, in the offices of the bank’s managing director, Courtney Ross, one of her bodyguards is taken out by Viper. Courtney is practicing her speech for when her guest arrives. She wishes to be the Hellfire Club’s new White Queen, and work together for mutual profit. She figures that the assets she brings to the club and, more importantly, the Lords Cardinal, should be self-evident. As she speaks, Viper moves in behind her and places a pistol to the back of Ross’s head. Ross doesn’t even flinch, instead asking Viper if she wishes to hear her offer.

(The London Eye)
A large image of Arcade’s face adorns the huge Ferris wheel, which towers over London. The X-Men arrive and Alistaire Stuart informs them that their hostage is in the topmost car. A voice comes from the Arcade face and tells the assembled crowd of X-Men and law enforcement officers that it isn’t the queen who is hostage. That was a lie. It is, in fact, one of her majesty’s housemaids: Ella Thurlough. Personal particulars are available on Viper’s website. The deal is that Ella is up there with a couple of bombs. If the X-Men do nothing, then a conventional explosive detonates at dawn. Ella dies, end of story. If anyone tries to save her, a baby nuke will blow instead.

Alistaire informs Storm that they’ve confirmed the presence of both devices. Given the risk, they plan to do nothing. Rachel asks if he would do such a thing if it was the real queen up there. He replies that one life against a bomb that could destroy everything within a quarter-mile radius, and poison London for generations; then he has no choice but to order them to stand down.

Storm is adamant that they will at least try. She leads the team upwards to check out the situation. Once at the car, Rachel reassures Ella that they’ll bring her home safe, but tells the others that Ella’s making peace with God. She already considers herself dead. Bishop notices that the bombs aren’t inside casings, which makes their job a little easier.

Bishop informs Storm that, if Rachel uses her telekinesis, or Kurt tries to teleport it; boom! For what it’s worth, though, the components are nothing special. “Perfect,” grins Ororo. She tells Rachel that she intends to generate a Jovian pressure field around the car. Her TK has to keep it, and Ella, from being crushed. Kurt wonders if this is the best option, or simply the more exciting one for Ororo, going by what she said back at the warehouse. Ororo asks him to be her conscience some other time; she’s working.

As Bishop monitors Storm’s pressure changes, Ororo struggles to build up the huge amount of pressure required. Alistaire thinks this is madness, but Wolverine reminds him that this is the world they live in. He should just make sure the airspace is clear overhead.

Storm concentrates hard and Rachel realizes that she’s creating higher pressures than on the surface of Jupiter. Bishop reckons that they’re as ready as they ever will be. He places his hands together, preparing to focus an energy blast. On his mark, the X-Men go to work. Three, two, one…

Instantaneously, Kurt teleports inside the cab and grabs Ella, taking her to safety. As Rachel passes out, Storm places the car inside the huge pressure bubble she has created which crushes it to the size of a baseball. Bishop then fires his energy at it, sending it hurtling into the atmosphere. Kurt teleports to catch Rachel as she descends, and also catches Storm who is spent from the exertion. He gets the three women to ground safely, and tells the cops that they need some medics, right away. Wolverine looks to the skies and sees a massive explosion light up the sky. “Guess that nuke was real, after all.”

(later)
The injured parties are taken away by ambulance, as Logan hands out beers to chill everyone out after their ordeal. Even Alistaire gets one, despite his earlier reluctance to allow them to help. Logan tells Alistaire that, knowing Viper, it’s even money that the nuke would have gone off whatever she promised, just for the fun of it. ‘Ro made the right call; the only call. They sit and drink and wonder where Viper is now, and Sage for that matter.

(World headquarters of Fraser Bank)
Sebastian Shaw enters Courtney’s office. He didn’t expect this meeting, as he’d heard Viper had been contracted to eliminate her. Viper replies that Courtney made her an offer that she couldn’t refuse. Courtney informs Sebastian that, individually, their reputations are quite formidable. As a collective, ruling the Hellfire Club, the world is for their taking. Not even the X-Men could stop them.

Sebastian thinks it’s an intriguing proposition and joins in with a champagne toast. Courtney tells him it’s better to have them as allies instead of enemies. Shaw agrees and wonders if there’s anyone else they know who might feel the same. From a rooftop overlooking the bank, Sage targets Sebastian Shaw in the sights of a rifle and smiles.    

Synopsis

Wolverine's 30th Anniversary Celebration starts off with a bang as the X-Men investigate some mysterious murders in New York City. All the victims seem to have been cut to pieces by blades? Adamantium blades! But if Wolverine didn't murder these people...then who did?!

Plot Summary

The X-Men (Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Storm, Marvel Girl and Bishop) are in NY to find out who is responsible for the recent murders, where the victims have been killed with "Adamantium". In the last issue, while in a night club, Marvel Girl bumped into one of the waitresses and inadvertently sees memories of X-23 fighting with thugs. A fight ensues as the issue opens.

Wolverine has been stabbed, but still manages to grab the escaping girl. She uses her foot claw to slice through his face and escapes. Nightcrawler teleports after her. The patrons of the club are panicking and about to stampede before Marvel Girl makes them think she and the other X-Men are police officers and calms them down.

On a nearby rooftop, X-23 is tracking the Bacchae when Kurt suddenly appears. She attempts to fight him, but quickly realizes he's a teleporter. The other X-Men arrive, and Storm levitates the girl while Rachel puts her to sleep and reads her mind. They leave Logan to guard X-23, and attack Sabine and the Bacchae across the street.

The girl awakes and Logan begins to question her. He discovers that she knows he's Weapon X and she tells him her name is X-23. He asks for information on Hydra, but she claims not to know anything about that and instead is just looking for her missing friend. Nightcrawler remarks that she looks very similar to Wolverine, and X-23 demands that he leave and he does. The other X-Men return with the friend in tow, and the girl seems to relax.

Suddenly Geech appears and attacks the girl and the other X-Men. He says he's getting revenge for the kidnapping of Don Parisi's daughter. The X-Men are barely able to subdue him before Kurt reappears with the missing girl. She demands Geech leave our heroes alone.

Later, Wolverine is debriefing with Sage. She promises to help X-23 legally. She signs off and reveals that Sebastian Shaw has returned and he's rebuilding the Hellfire Club, and wants her to return. She decides to once more embrace the darkness, alone.

While on assignment to track down missing teammate Sage, the X-Men discover more than they bargained for--the birth of a newer and deadlier Hellfire Club.

Brief Description:

The X-Men are aided in their search for the missing Sage by Emma Frost. Emma leads them to the lower levels of the Hellfire Club and helps them by using a global transmat system to follow Sage’s path across the globe. Rachel and Emma are transported to Hong Kong, while the remaining X-Men are surprisingly dumped into a sewer beneath Paris. Rachel immediately blames Emma for the X-Men’s disappearance. A grudge match between the two women ensues on the astral plane. Rachel gains and loses the upper hand but relents when Emma demonstrates the unconditional love that Scott has for Emma. An uneasy alliance is formed between the two women and they move in to a high stakes auction event at an exclusive Hellfire Club party where mutant slaves are being sold to the highest bidder. Emma moves in to confront “Courtney Ross” (The White Queen) and Viper (The White Princess) in a high stakes game of cards while Rachel moves to release the prisoners that the Club is preparing to sell. What neither realizes is that Selene (The Black Queen) is following Rachel and that she is hungry. Meanwhile, in the sewers of Paris, Bishop suddenly turns on his teammates and shoots them all down.

Full Synopsis:

The building itself looks as though it could have once housed an Ivy League institution. But now it appears to be fit for nothing but demolition. The brick and mortar are crumbling, the windows are broken and boarded over, and the edifice that once housed a very prominent chapter of the infamous Hellfire Club stands now as an eyesore among buildings lacking even half of its history. The House of Hellfire was the point of assembly for powerful people and dark deeds. Even now, as Kurt Wagner (Nightcrawler), Ororo Munroe (Storm), Lucas Bishop (Bishop) and Rachel Grey (Marvel Girl) stand before the complex and assess its sudden demise, they notice that passers-by refuse to walk in front of the building. The building is alive with legend and any think it best to stay as far away as possible from the darkness that may still reside within.

“World woke up one day, club was locked up tight. Pretty much end of story,” Bishop comments. “I’m glad,” says Marvel Girl, her eye glowing with psi-energy. “Show a little mercy, kiddo,” says a ragged and filth-covered Logan (Wolverine) rising from a manhole. Not all the members deserved what they got, he explains. Logan confirms the teams suspicion that there is no way into the building. “Every tunnel access…has been blocked.” Apparently these tunnels are also very well-guarded. “Whatever happened here had nothin’ to do with mutants.” Logan suggests that they leave well enough alone, but Rachel insists that they find a way into the building in order to find Sage who they trailed to a blank wall in the sewer below the club. The X-Men are stumped.

To everyone’s surprise, the lovely and enigmatic Emma Frost steps into the conversation. Emma claims that her history as a former high-ranking member of the Lords Cardinal of the Hellfire Club makes her especially useful in tracking Sage through the belly of the beast. She used to rule this building, but now it is the domain of Selene, the Black Queen who is imprisoned in the catacombs deep beneath the building. As is typical of Emma, she is demure when asked for details regarding her knowledge. Rachel grows impatient and grabs Emma’s hand to insist that she tell everything she knows. Before the two women begin fighting, Storm separates them with a lightning flash. Ororo firmly reprimands the two of them for their bickering. Rachel apologizes as Emma continues her discourse about the secrets of the club. The blank wall where Sage disappeared, Emma explains, is not a blank wall at all, but rather a global transmit device capable of allowing users to move rapidly from one Hellfire Club location to another quickly and discreetly. “A Lady has to take a keepsake…” she explains when asked about her knowledge of this device.

Rachel removes the civilian clothing illusions that the X-Men had been wearing, and the group step into the transport walkway. The device should take them to the last place it was set for…which should be Sage’s location. As the group walks around the bend, a shade coalesces into the form of a woman in silhouette. “Poor foolish heroes…Sage was never the one you had to worry about…”

Emma emerges from the other side of the portal into a luxurious Asian mansion somewhere near (or in) Hong Kong. An entourage of servants await her, having been instructed by Sage to await her arrival. Emma is a bit surprised by their expecting her, but is even more surprised when she is attacked from behind by Marvel Girl. The remaining X-Men did not make it to China, and Rachel blames Emma for their disappearance. The two women fall into what appears to be a large bubble bath in the middle of the floor.

Emma never denies responsibility for the team’s separation, but rather refuses to explain herself to Rachel. While the two women’s bodies remain in the water, their astral forms exit their corporeal bodies and engage in a long-overdue psychic grudge match. Emma de-ages Rachel to point out her childlike behavior, but even the infant Rachel manages to tap her abilities and reduce Emma to an aged, decaying crone and eventually a disintegrating skeleton. Emma rebounds quickly and surrounds Rachel in psychic chains. Rachel alters the psychic attributes of the chains and uses them to gird herself with psychic armor and arm herself two very large katana blades.

Rachel fights admirably, but Emma dodges every strike and never truly loses control of the situation. She takes Rachel’s swords and states, “You have no finesse.” Emma effortlessly removes the armor that Rachel created for herself. Rachel responds with a psychic manipulation of Emma’s astral form. Emma is instantly transformed into a bloated version of herself. In an attempt to add insult to injury, Rachel calls up illusion forms of the X-Men who are laughing and pointing at Emma’s new size and shape. Noticeably, Scott Summers (Cyclops) is not laughing. Rachel is aiming to shame Emma by showing her that if everyone saw her as she truly was no one, especially Scott, would care for her.

Emma merely replies “I’m afraid, child, the joke’s on you…I have no secrets from Scott. And believe me, the warts in my soul are far more hideous than anything you can imagine for my body. Yet he loves me still. How’s that for a miracle?” As she speaks, Rachel’s mental illusion of Scott steps forward to embrace Emma’s bloated body. Tears stream and spark from Rachel’s face as she realizes that Emma has bested her.

As the two women return to their bodies, Emma lectures Rachel. She reminds her that she is not her enemy and that today should be the end of the foolishness that has been between them for so long. Emma reprimands Rachel for thinking that her sheer quantity of power is enough. It isn’t. Rachel lacks the skill, training, and will that Emma possesses. It is this that makes Emma Rachel’s superior in fact if not in raw power. Emma offers Rachel her hand in a symbolic gesture of peace which Rachel accepts and the two women form an alliance.

Later, Rachel and Emma report to a swanky soiree hosted by the Lords Cardinal of the Hellfire Club at an exclusive Hong Kong casino. They are both dressed to kill—white gowns and fancy hair are in order for the evening. Emma tells Rachel that for tonight she is once again the White Queen of the Hellfire Club and that Rachel is her Warrior White Princess. It seems that they have entered into a high stakes auction where kidnapped mutants are being sold to the highest bidder. Just as the bidding begins for a young female mutant, Emma decides that they must split up. Before they can be seen, Emma pushes Rachel behind a pillar, and rather abruptly and painfully teaches her a method of her using her telepathy to become effectively invisible.

The lesson comes just in time as a young Chinese woman steps up to Emma and informs her that this is a private function. Rachel is unable to be seen, and Emma produces an invitation identifying her as the White Queen. The confused young lady allows Emma to pass. Rachel makes a quick exit to search for the imprisoned mutants being sold at this auction.

Emma heads directly to the seat which should belong to her. In it sits Courtney Ross, head of Fraser Bank. At her side is her White Princess, Viper. Emma informs Courtney that she is sitting in her seat. Courtney challenges Emma to a card game to determine who wins the throne and title of White Queen. The rules are simple: each woman draws a single card…high card wins all. Loser goes up for auction on the block. Courtney draws first and pulls the Ace of Spades. Emma slowly extends her hand to draw her card.

In another part of the building, Rachel searches for the secret location of the prisoners. Guards are everywhere. Psi-dampers prevent Rachel from using her telepathy for anything more than maintaining her invisibility. She resolves to search the quadrant on foot. As earlier, in the transmat device, the shadows coalesce behind Rachel and form a figure. This time we see Selene, the Black Queen, emerge from the shadows. The psychic vampires hungers. Rachel presents her with a soul-feast that has the potential to give Selene the rebirth she desperately needs.

Meanwhile, the remainder of the X-Men (Storm, Wolverine, Bishop, and Nightcrawler) are dumped into a sewer. For some reason, the global transmit device dropped them into the drainage systems beneath Paris rather than Hong Kong with Rachel and Emma. Bishop determines their location almost instantly due to what he claims is his ability to always know exactly where he is. Wolverine sputters and coughs and immediately screams for Storm to get them out of there. He turns and pleads with Nightcrawler to teleport them out now! His cries come too late as both Storm and Nightcrawler are shot down by…Bishop. Wolverine turns to confront Bishop’s treachery. “I’ll have your heart for this,” he screams. Bishop says nothing but pulls the triggers on both his guns.

The X-Men, hot on the trail of Sage, find themselves in the sewers of Paris. But who's really hunting whom?

Brief Description:

The X-Men Storm, Nightcrawler and Wolverine lie unconscious in the sewers of Paris after having been shot down by Bishop. As Nightcrawler awakens, Bishop explains that he shot his teammates in order to cleanse them from a nannite infection that had invaded their bodies when they appeared in the sewers. Nightcrawler teleports the team away from the sewers to prevent further infection and give them time to gain their footing. As the team recovers, they determine that the nannite trap was more than likely set by Sebastian Shaw and possibly Sage. Storm tells Nightcrawler to take the wounded Wolverine to X-Corp Paris to recover while she and Bishop track down Shaw and Sage. Storm and Bishop are able to locate Shaw and Sage at a sprawling estate. Shaw and a rather silent Sage welcome them. Shaw introduces Sunspot (Roberto DaCosta) as the Hellfire Club’s new Black King. It seems that Sunspot, Shaw, Sage, Courtney Ross, Viper and Red Lotus are reworking the Hellfire Club from within to make it an institution to help mutants in the world. They are secretly trying to bring this slaver’s network down. The X-Men express grave reservations about this scenario, but Shaw insists that he has changed and now wants to embrace Xavier’s ideals and goals. Before the X-Men can digest this information completely, they, Sage, Sunspot and Shaw are all attacked and incapacitated by Donald Pierce. Meanwhile, Emma Frost and Courtney Ross come to a draw in their high-stakes card game in the Hellfire Club Hong Kong. Rachel also continues her invisible search through the club for the mutant slaves being sold at auction. Her search is fruitless until she accidentally stumbles across an Asian couple who demand that she identify herself. Rachel tries to bluff her way through, but the girl attacks. Rachel is suddenly rescued by Red Lotus who claims he needs to take her to see the White Queen. Selene also intervenes and tells the Asian girl to let them go. Selene wants the starchylde for herself. Red Lotus then explains the new reformed Hellfire Club concept to Rachel. Wolverine and Nightcrawler are enjoying coffee in a Paris bookstore while they discuss the recent romantic entanglements of the team: the Kurt, Ororo, Logan triangle, and Kurt’s recent kiss with Rachel. Without warning they are attacked by a large group of armed soldiers.

Full Synopsis:

In the stench of the Paris sewer, the X-Men Storm (Ororo Munroe), Nightcrawler (Kurt Wagner) and Wolverine (James Howlett/Logan) lay defeated. Their teammate Bishop (Lucas Bishop) stands over them with his guns smoking. Bishop is from the future and has a more detailed knowledge of many things than these fallen heroes. It was this knowledge that allowed him to identify the threat to the X-Men even before they did. He chose this course of action instinctively and hoped for the best.

Nightcrawler begins to stir and, after gaining his senses, attacks Bishop. He demands to know why Bishop attacked his teammates and shot them down. Nightcrawler quickly disarms Bishop and throws him to the ground. Bishop pleads with Nightcrawler to listen to him and follow his instructions. He makes it clear that if Kurt does not follow his instructions he may have to take his teammates down yet again. Kurt listens as Bishop gives him clear instructions to teleport the entire group in the exact direction that he specifies. Nightcrawler hesitantly agrees, and the team shortly materializes in the ancient Roman baths of the museum at Cluny. Bishop knows exactly where he is due to his mutant ability to always know his exact location and the time of day. As he and Storm begin to stir, Wolverine explains that Bishop was not attacking the X-Men but rather cleansing them from the nannite infection that someone had left waiting for them in the sewer. Someone knew they were coming and laid a trap. Wolverine’s healing factor was hit particularly hard by the nannites, and he has been left extremely weak.

The X-Men together deduce that although it is possible that the trap was laid by Sage, she would have known about Bishop’s immunity to nannites. It is more likely that the trap was left by Sebastian Shaw. Bishop has Shaw’s bio-tag recorded from an earlier altercation, thus making it simple for him to be tracked. The heroes are hopeful that Sage is with Shaw and that they will be able to find both of them.

Storm tells Nightcrawler to get Logan to X-Corp Paris to recover from his wounds while she and Bishop track down Shaw and Sage.

Meanwhile in the Hellfire Club, Hong Kong, Emma Frost and Courtney Ross continue their card game to determine who will rule as White Queen. Courtney has drawn the ace of spades—the highest card in the deck. Emma surprises Viper by pulling a joker—the wild card. The duel is a tie!

Marvel Girl (Rachel Grey) using her newfound ability to make herself telepathically invisible searches the Club for evidence of the mutant slaves being sold at auction. She finds nothing particularly interesting until she comes across a door protected by a psi-shield that she cannot penetrate. From behind the door, come an Asian man and woman. They can not only see Rachel, but the woman demands to know what she is doing in this restricted area. Rachel attempts to cover with her false identity of Warrior White Princess of the Hellfire Club, but the woman wants to verify this before she will let her go. When Rachel tries to leave, the woman attacks her with a mental image of Rachel in rags—utterly worthless. The woman has the ability to identify everyone’s flaws and turn them against her opponent as a psychic attack.

Just before Rachel is overwhelmed by this woman, Red Lotus rushes in to her rescue. He continues the charade of Rachel’s White Princess status and informs her that the White Queen is asking for her. The Asian woman commands them both to stop and is about to attack when she is stopped by Selene, the Black Queen. Selene plans to claim Rachel, the “starchylde”, for her own.

Back in Paris, Wolverine and Nightcrawler enjoy a cup of coffee and some conversation at a bookstore. Kurt is nervous about being in public as himself, but no one at the coffeehouse seems to mind. In fact, one particularly flirtatious female leaves Kurt her phone number and an invitation. The conversation turns to Sage. Wolverine sees her much like himself: damaged goods with lots of scars on her soul that aren’t her fault. He wants her to be innocent in this mess, because she is so much like him.

They continue to talk about relationships. Logan and Kurt both have feelings for Ororo. Logan claims that they just enjoy each other’s company, while Kurt claims that dancing with Ororo seemed like the most natural thing in the world. At the same time, Kurt maintains that he has feelings for Rachel. Both he and she have changed so much since their time in Excalibur. Wolverine wonders why X-Men can conquer any super foe, but dating is another matter entirely. Suddenly the sky clouds and darkens. Logan suspects that Ororo has learned something she didn’t like.

Moments earlier, Storm and Bishop had successfully tracked down Shaw and Sage. They land in the inner courtyard of a large mansion; Sage and Shaw stand waiting for them. Shaw welcomes them with champagne, caviar, and open arms. The X-Men are taken aback by this welcome, but Shaw insists his hospitality is genuine. When Bishop addresses Sage, Shaw reminds him that her name is Tessa. Sage says nothing.

Suddenly, Sunspot, Roberto DaCosta appears. He introduced by Shaw as the newest Black King of the Hellfire Club. ‘Berto insists that this is all on the up-and-up. The Hellfire Club has turned over a new leaf. Just as Emma Frost has reformed, Shaw claims, so have the remaining members of the Lords Cardinal.

Sage remains silent.

In Hong Kong, Red Lotus (Paul Hark) begins to explain the idea of the new Hellfire Club to Rachel. He, Courtney Ross and Viper are working together to put the mutant slavers out of business. In Paris, Shaw explains the same thing to Storm and Bishop. He is turning over a new leaf just as Emma did. Shaw mentions the fact that he, Xavier, and Tessa go back before the beginning. They met in Afghanistan years ago and Shaw has decided now to embrace the ideals of Xavier that he rejected then. Rachel doubts what Paul is saying just as Storm and Bishop doubt the words of Shaw. ‘Berto explains that there is a growing market for mutant slaves, and the Hellfire Club wants to put it out of business. Shaw claims that Courtney’ boundless ambition makes her perfect for the Club and Viper should be granted immunity for past indiscretions because of her efforts now to free the enslaved mutants. Bishop vehemently objects reminding everyone present that Viper attempted to nuke London, and Storm asks ‘Berto if he cleared this new membership with Cyclops; ‘Berto claims that he can make decisions on his own.

Sage continues to remain silent.

Back at the bookstore, Logan and Kurt are suddenly attacked by a large group of armed soldiers. Logan’s plan all along was to make themselves and easy target with the hopes of drawing out the person who attacked them in the sewers. His plan worked. Kurt teleports into action as Logan charges the group of soldiers.

At Shaw’s mansion, ‘Berto continues to explain the new concept of the Hellfire Club. He invites the X.S.E. to join them from a law enforcement standpoint. Suddenly from the roof, the group is attacked. Tantalus webs are launched at each of them, and in a matter of moments the entire group lie paralyzed at the feet of none other than…Donald Pierce.

The X-Men come face-to-face with the newly assembled Lords Cardinal of the sinister Hellfire Club! The Lords have just crowned a new Black King...and you'll never guess who it is!

Brief Description:

The X-Men conclude their two-fold battle against and at the side of the new Hellfire Club. Donald Pierce and his Cleaning Crew attack the X-Men, Roberto daCosta, Sage, and Sebastian Shaw. The X-Men successfully escape Pierce’s attack, and a mortally wounded Sebastian Shaw decapitates Pierce. Sage also reveals her duplicitous role in the formation of the new Hellfire Club. In Hong Kong, Rachel defeats Selene while Viper, Courtney Ross and Emma Frost upset the Hellfire Club’s mutant slave ring.

Full Synopsis:

On the grounds of the Hellfire Club, Paris, the X-Men continue their battle with Donald Pierce and his Cleaning Crew soldiers. Storm uses her headband to cut partway through the webbing that is holding her tightly. As the Cleaning Crew soldiers close in on her, she uses her elemental powers to freeze through the remaining bonds and set herself free. She inadvertently freezes the floor beneath and dives out of the way just before it crumbles.

Donald Pierce yells commands to his crew. He will not tolerate loose ends! For Pierce, his vast wealth has never been enough. He has added bionic enhancements to his otherwise human form in order to make himself more on par with the mutants he hates, but he still dislikes getting his hands dirty. He prefers to hire help to deal with his enemies if possible.

Storm continues her battle against several soldiers. She recalls Sage’s briefing regarding these soldiers: they are baseline humans who are loaded with deadly tech and gadgets—nearly enough to make them Storm’s equal. Through clever use of both her mutant abilities and deft hand to hand combat skills, Storm is able to overcome three of the soldiers.

Pierce watches the battle through a small surveillance screen in his armband. His crew will not stop until they are dead, and that, he says, is not X-Men style. He turns his attention from his wrist-monitor and approaches the bound Shaw, Sage, Sunspot, and Bishop. Storm, he says, will not be in time to save them. Pierce chides Shaw for thinking he could seize control of the Hellfire Club unchallenged. Pierce taunts the helpless mutants as he decided who to attack first, and whether he should maim them or kill them.

Meanwhile in Hong Kong, the Red Lotus and Marvel Girl continue discussing the “new and improved” version of the Hellfire Club. Rachel admits that Paul’s goals are great, but his choice of companions, namely Courtney Ross and Viper, is crazy. Paul admits that none of them are angels, but that the end will justify the means when the imprisoned mutants are rescued and the slavers are brought to justice. Paul gives Rachel his word, and the two mutants draw close to each other in the moonlight only to have the intimate moment interrupted by Selene.

Selene attacks Paul and begins feeding on his life force while she thanks Rachel for always leading her to the finest prey. Rachel demands that she set Paul free, and Selene feigns flattery that Rachel remembers her.

The two women battle. Rachel’s blows and blasts pass harmlessly through Selene’s shadowy form. Selene, however, lands several solid hits to Rachel. She tells Rachel that white is not her color since her soul is neither innocent nor pure…black is a better choice. Rachel, Selene says, is best dipped in shadow and blood. Selene wraps her shadowy serpentine form around Rachel and as she morphs from Selene to Paul and even to a simulacrum of Rachel herself she claims that they are destined to be one. Rachel, protests, but Selene tells her that in time she will lose all hope.

Upstairs in the casino, Emma Frost telepathically monitors the battle between Selene and Rachel.

Rachel is confused by Selene’s newfound freedom from the NYC Hellfire Club. Selene states that a judicious alliance has allowed her some freedom, and that consuming Paul will give her more. Rachel defies her and Selene welcomes the fight. As Rachel forces Selene off her she tries to get information about this alliance from Selene, to no avail. Selene then telepathically alerts the remaining guards at the club that Viper and Courtney Ross are trying to shut them down.

Emma warns them that their cover is blown just as the men pull their guns.

In Paris, Wolverine and Nightcrawler finish their very public battle with a small squadron of Cleaning Crew soldiers who lay dead at Wolverine’s feet. Kurt is taken aback by Wolverine’s lack of restraint, but Logan protests that he had no other choice. The soldiers could have taken the entire block out if he hadn’t stopped them. It was a “kill or be killed” scenario. As the police approach, Wolverine notices that the weather is still nasty. Suspecting that Storm may be in trouble, Logan has Kurt teleport them both to the rescue at Shaw’s sprawling Hellfire estate.

The two men appear just as Pierce closes in on his helpless prey. Kurt goes to assist Storm while Wolverine handles Pierce. He runs him through with his claws, but Pierce isn’t slowed. Pierce claims that one of the perks of being a cyborg is “upgrades” and from his bionic fingertips launches two small missiles at Wolverine’s head. The missiles explode against Wolverine’s skull and release a deadly batch of combat nannites designed specifically to deal with Wolverine. They are designed to disable his healing factor and destroy him by feasting on his brain.

As Logan stumbles about, Pierce jolts him with an electric blast and laughs as he flails desperately trying to find his foe. As Logan staggers blindly about, Pierce pops razor sharp claws from his fingers and begins shredding Wolverine to pieces.

Back in Hong Kong, Selene seems to be nearly triumphant over both Rachel and Paul. As Rachel and Paul kiss, Selene begins to consume them both. Suddenly Rachel’s eye begins to glow much to Selene’s surprise. The Phoenix power signature fills the area and forces Selene to free both Paul and Rachel. Selene protests that this is impossible to which Rachel answers that her very existence defines the term. Selene is driven away, and Rachel and Paul continue their kiss.

Back in Paris, Nightcrawler searches for Storm. He takes out several Cleaning Crew soldiers, but refuses to kill which means that the villains keep coming back. Pierce calls out to Nightcrawler to demonstrate his near defeat of Wolverine. From his bonds, Sunspot tearfully pleads with Pierce to stop. Sage informs him that Pierce will not stop until Logan is dead. Just as the soldiers close in on Kurt, Storm appears. She commands Nightcrawler to teleport and promptly short circuits the soldiers with a powerful lightning bolt.

Storm then turns her attention to Pierce who is still attacking Wolverine. Pierce has defenses against Storm’s elemental powers, so Storm attempts an unexpected attack by hurling her razor sharp headband at him. As soon as the tiara leaves her hand she is stunned by a force bolt. Wolverine unexpectedly blocks Storm’s tiara from hitting Pierce and sends it flying in the opposite direction. Kurt catches the falling Storm and asks why Wolverine blocked her attack. Logan claims that Storm had the right idea, but she isn’t strong enough. As Wolverine launches a last desperate attack against Pierce, Sage is able to free herself and Shaw using Storm’s tiara which Wolverine wisely sent their way. Shaw, now free from his bonds, approaches Pierce.

Back in Hong Kong, Paul and Rachel race downstairs to help Emma only to find that she, Viper, and Courtney have the situation well under control. Out of sheer fear of Viper the guards have surrendered and agreed to confess when the authorities arrive.

When Rachel realizes that Emma knew about her battle with Selene she is bothered that she did nothing to help. Emma replies that Rachel clearly did not need her help. As the authorities take the club members away, Rachel and Emma come to conclusion that Sage sent them to Hong Kong to make certain that Courtney and Viper’s mission was accomplished.

In Paris, Shaw and Pierce go at it. Shaw’s strength increases exponentially with each blow that Pierce delivers. Shaw reminds Pierce that his arrogance has always been his undoing. Pierce reminds Shaw that he knows every facet of his abilities. He sprouts blue laser claws and after slashing Shaw across the chest with a left swipe, opens his gut with a right slice. A mortally wounded Shaw falls bleeding to the ground and Pierce exclaims that the only future for mutants in the grave. Shaw claims that he will not fall without a fight. With supreme effort and every last bit of his stored strength, Shaw punches Pierce knocking his head clean off his body and sending it bouncing across the lawn. Pierce’s body falls to the ground and Shaw collapses.

Kurt and Ororo tend to the inured Wolverine. Logan claims that he will heal, but Kurt is alarmed by the possibility that the nannites will indeed shut down his healing factor. Kurt and Ororo begin to discuss the possibility that this entire scenario was planned by Sage to do away with Pierce while making it seem that he was the assailant. Storm refuses to even discuss this with Sage. She claims that she is no longer sure that Sage is working toward the same goal as them. Storm no longer trusts her.

As the ambulances approach, Shaw struggles through his injuries to confront Sage. He accuses her of knowing that Pierce would attack. Sage admits that this was a logical outcome based on the two men’s history. Shaw admits his foolishness in taking her back. She has betrayed him again. Sage retorts that Shaw is no longer worth saving. She once believed he was, though. When she knew him in Afghanistan he was a friend of Xavier’s and would have spit on Hellfire. But now he is a different man, and this is the only proper end for him.

As Shaw is loaded into the ambulance, he tells “Tessa” that this is not over. He will make his own destiny! Sage informs Bishop that Sunspot will replace Shaw as Lord Imperial of the Hellfire Club. When Bishop asks if this was her plan all along, Sage replies that this was merely a possible scenario. Shaw had recruited Sunspot hoping that he would be easily corrupted, but Sage knew differently. She plans to stay by Sunspot’s side to guide him through the Hellfire.

Sage reveals that the reason she left Xavier’s for Hellfire so many years ago, was because she saw the same nobility in Shaw that she saw in Xavier. She left to help Shaw retain that nobility even as he was knee-deep in the corruption of the Inner Circle. But she could not prevent Shaw from being corrupted. This will not happen with Sunspot, though. He is forged from stronger stuff.

“You hope.” Bishop adds.

“I assess. I plan. I act. Hope is for X-Men. I—am SAGE!”

The world's end!

Brief Description:

While Psylocke waits imprisoned in the X-plane and has a strange encounter with her mad brother on the Astral Plane, the X-Men are ambushed and do battle with a band of costumed humanoid dinosaurs. The dinosaurs use their superhuman abilities to usurp Rachel’s mind causing her to think she is a dino-mutant. Rachel turns her telepathy against her teammates and helps the dinosaurs defeat the team. The X-Men are taken captive and carried through a glowing portal. X-23 alone escapes and frees Psylocke from the X-plane who single-handedly defeats the remaining dino-humanoids; together, she and X-23 enter an open portal to rescue the kidnapped X-Men including Wolverine.

Full Synopsis:

As the X-Men try to calm X-23 and learn from her what happened to Wolverine, strange dinosaur looking creatures, approach from the rear. The creatures’ scanners are locking on each of the X-Men and evaluating the threat level that each of them presents. The creatures close in on the X-Men thinking that they possess the element of surprise. They are surprised, however, when a snowburst kicks up and they are temporarily blinded. When the snow calms down, the X-Men are gone!

Marvel Girl has interrupted the lizards’ synapse pathways so that they do not see the mutants with the telepathic cloaking trick she learned from Emma Frost. X-23 becomes restless and growls at the lizards. While Rachel is linked with them she discovers that they are evolved dinosaurs that call themselves Hauk’ka. She also picks up on memories of a savage battle with Wolverine.

X-23 informs the X-Men that she lost Woverine during the fight as did the Hauk’ka; now she can’t pick up his scent. Rachel echoes X’s concern: Logan is not answering her psi-calls. Storm interrupts their conversation to inform them that the Hauk’ka are getting suspicious and may soon realize that they are standing right next to the “mind-cloaked” X-Men. The team realizes that she is right as one of the lizards decides to call for backup.

Inside the jet, Betsy sits cuffed into one of the seats. Although she is a prisoner, she understands the X-Men’s caution about her recent return from the dead. She understands that they cannot afford to take chances. Actually, she rather enjoys sitting in the plane, taking in the smell and feel of the Blackbird and the standard black and yellow uniform she is wearing. It’s all home to her. She rests and her mind wanders inward.

(the Astral Plane)

Betsy cries as she sees her mind come up before her like a grand Asian fortress crystalline and glowing. This does not surprise her. Clothed in a flowing silk robe (though she prefers armor), Betsy looks at her reflection in a fortress wall. She watches as the image changes from a Caucasian Betsy to an Asian Betsy. She is confused by the former face, but turns away when she sees her Asian reflection. She protests to herself that she knows who she is…but what has she become? She knows that something is not right.

St. William’s Tower, a very British structure, rises suddenly in the midst of her Asian fortress. This was where she played as a child. Why has this part of her mind been gone for so long? She drops her robe to reveal her purple assassin’s costume. As she charges into the tower with her telekinetic katana blazing, she hears laughter and the floor beneath her shatters sending her falling down.

The crystal shards, she says, represent not only the lost part of her that was a telepath but much, much more. Betsy picks up a shard and looks into it.

In the crystal she sees her family when they were younger: teenage Brian Braddock (her twin), dashing Jamie Braddock (her older brother), and herself, still a blond Caucasian teenager. All are young and untouched by the scars of superhero life. She recalls idolizing her older brother Jamie. The picture begins to change: Betsy reverts to her Asian form with purple hair instead of blond, and Jamie turns to his madman look and begins to speak to her:

Gone forever, honey-bun. But not to worry. You’ll never miss what you don’t remember. Time for a reboot!

The crystal shard explodes in Betsy’s hand ending her dream and snapping her back to the reality of the X-Plane.

(reality)

Not quite recalling what happened she wonders what made her think of her mad brother, Jamie who has the ability to control the strings of reality itself.

Her thoughts are interrupted by a low and repetitive rumbling of the earth. Something is approaching. She struggles to free herself, but cannot.

Outside of the plane, the X-Men also hear the thunderous approach of something huge. They gape in astonishment as two cyborg dinosaurs come crashing from the nearby forest. They are accompanied by three costumed humanoid dinosaurs. The female, Raina, is accompanied by Kaidan (a telepath) and Masado (a flyer). The emblems on their costumes suggest that they are part of a team of some sort.

Kaidan immediately sees that the X-Men are standing in plain view of the dino’s fire-team but are evidently cloaked. He mentally connects the foot soldiers to his own mind allowing them to now see the X-Men. The X-Men realize too late that their cover is blown as Rachel is taken down from behind by one of the dino-soldiers. Kaidan instructs them to take her out first since she is the most dangerous.

Bishop and Storm attack, and Storm tells X to get away. X refuses protesting that she can help fight, but Nightcrawler grabs X and runs. He informs her that Storm has a plan and X needs to get away in order to accomplish it. In an instant he teleports himself and X away.

Storm grabs the unconscious Rachel and takes to the air. The dinos are surprised by the mutants’ abilities. When everyone is clear, Bishop unloads his energy store right into the side of Raina’s dinosaur sending her flying to the ground and her dino crashing into Kaidan and his T-Rex. Raina lands on her feet and begins a hand-to-hand battle with Bishop.

While Nightcrawler battles a group of the foot soldiers, Storm uses her lightning to attack the electronics of the cyborg T-Rex. She is about to bring the beast down when Masado flies from behind and attacks her.

On the ground, Rachel comes to and although still groggy makes an attempt to assess the situation. She is surprised by Kaidan, who takes advantage of her grogginess to usurp control of her mind. He informs Rachel that she is not the only one gifted with powers of the mind. He clouds her perceptions making her think that she is a dino-mutant like them. He thanks the “maker” that his trick worked and names his new teammate “R’Chel”.

Kaidan continues to use the delusional Rachel to gain information on the X-Men. He commands Rachel to take Storm down which Rachel does her best to do. Storm is surprised by Rachel’s mental attack. She knows that it is Rachel, but her though patterns are distorted by the reptilian influence in her mind. Storm fights the mental invasion and in the process shocks Masado out of the sky. As she struggles to remain free, Storm kicks up a powerful snowstorm which begins to tear Wolverine’s plane apart as well as knock everyone including her teammates down to the snowy ground.

The fight between R’Chel and Storm sends everyone running for cover. Raina and R’Chel hide from the snowstorm behind one of the dinosaurs. Raina begs R’Chel to save them all from this storm. R’Chel doubles her efforts, and Storm doubles hers.

The snowstorm becomes a horrific blizzard. As X is blown from her feet and lifted into the air, she calls out to the ‘trickster’. Nightcrawler appears and teleports her away from the worst of the storm. He asks her why she keeps calling him that. She replies because that is the name that suits him best. He tells her to run back to the plane and get Betsy. He challenges her to think past the moment and to avoid simple reaction. X scowls at him as he teleports away.

Nightcrawler reappears in the air next to Storm and tries to get her to calm the blizzard. She maintains that this is the only way that she can prevent being controlled by the delusional Rachel. Storm maintains that she cannot defeat Rachel without killing her, but that she does not want to calm the raging blizzard. Nightcrawler acts quickly. By teleporting Storm several times, he renders her unconscious thus calming the snowstorm. Just as he lands with the silent Storm, Masado attacks and knocks him out. Masado admits that this is a strange way to thank them for saving their lives.

Kaidan commands Raina and the others to be careful with Storm. The foot soldiers grumble about the mutants looking more like meat than prisoners, but Raina chides them and orders them to treat the unconscious X-Men with respect. Masado notices that one of the team is missing. R’Chel informs him that it is X-23 and that she is blocking her telepathy. Raina gives the foot soldiers a device that will allow them to track X-23, commands the soldiers to do away with her, and then departs with the X-Men and her teammates through a crackling energy portal. The foot soldiers grin with sadistic glee at the thought of fresh meat.

Back at the X-Plane, X-23 frees Psylocke and rushes her out of the plane. Betsy suggests using the plane, but X tells her that “they” will just shoot it down. Before any explanation can be given, X is taken down by an energy blast, and the dino foot soldiers surround the two women. The reptiles move in to feed. Betsy smiles and turns on the dinos. Without even thinking, Betsy is fighting. Her psychic blade appears and she cuts through the enemies effortlessly. She smiles the whole time, enjoying the short-lived battle.

Later, X-23 regains consciousness and is ready to do battle. She is impressed to see that Betsy has handled the lizards. She asks where they are and Betsy replies that she was hungry. Her response to the idea of Betsy eating the dinosaurs is “Cool!” Betsy was only kidding, and she tells X that the dinos are imprisoned in the Blackbird. Now, she is working on the transportation module that the lizards carried. Betsy is going after her friends, but she’s got to figure out how to get to them. Betsy introduces herself to X. She takes an instant shine to the girl and is disappointed to learn that X-23 has no name.

X-23 volunteers to go along with her to rescue the team. The dinos took away “the Wolverine,” she won’t let them take the X-Men too. Betsy activates the energy portal and the two women jump in. “Let’s go hunting,” Psylocke says as they skid into the light.

High adventure in the Savage Land! The X-Men discover a wondrous and advanced new civilization...but it's none too friendly toward humans-or mutants!

Brief Description:

Having been captured by the evolved Saurians known as the Hauk’ka, the X-Men are taken as prisoners into the Savage Land. Psylocke and X-23 follow to attempt a rescue and begin to bond, but are stopped by mysterious attackers. Rachel continues in her delusional belief that she is a Saurian, and she even subconsciously begins to alter her DNA structure telekinetically to reflect this. Storm, Bishop, and Nightcrawler attempt an escape and the latter two succeed while Storm is once again subdued by the delusional Rachel. Bishop and Nightcrawler are reunited with a strangely powerful Psylocke and X-23 who have been joined by the Savage Land Mutates and Ka-Zar.

Full Synopsis:

The sun rises in the

Savage Land. Kurt, Bishop, and the delusional Rachel have been taken captive by the advanced Saurians, Raina, Kaidan, and Masano, known as the Hauk’ka and are being taken to their base of operations.

As they continue their trek, Kurt and Bishop converse about the oddities they are seeing. Neither of them has ever seen Saurians so advanced. A modern culture, a strong military, and mutant super heroes! As they continue to march, the two notice how strangely Rachel is moving, apparently emulating the movements of the Saurians. Her delusion has gone past simple mind-control, Bishop comments. Her smoother movement suggests to him that something much more serious is going on.

Rachel has blocked both of the men’s access to their powers and is reading their thoughts as they speak. She turns on them viciously and declares that they have no secrets from her. Nightcrawler tries to talk to her, but she declares them to be merely “meat” and she transforms briefly into full Hauk’ka. R’Chel, the Saurian, declares that this world belongs to the Saurians, and they intend to reclaim it. Kurt and Bishop are shocked at Rachel’s brief transformation. Something is indeed very wrong with her.

Raina expresses concern over R’Chel’s instability, but Kaidan assures her that there is no reason for concern. She truly believes she is Hauk’ka. He is no longer controlling her mind.

Bishop and Kurt are thrown into a dungeon pit filled with bones. Kurt asks about the remains, and R’Chel replies that he will find out soon enough. After they recover from the fall, the two X-Men notice that they are not alone in the prison. The dank and dark dungeon is full of denizens from nearly every part of the Savage Land. They find humans and Saurians alike who are imprisoned here. Bishop soon realizes that he knows these Saurians and that they pose no threat. Viri, M’Kai, S’Gur, and Jimi introduce themselves to Kurt and express their relief that Bishop has returned with the X-Men to put things right in the Savage Land. Kurt is hesitant to trust Saurians, but the four dino-prisoners explain that there are variations among their race just as there are among humans. They do not stand with the Hauk’ka and were imprisoned because of it. They inform the two X-Men that they have tried repeatedly to contact the outside world for help, but none has come until now. Kurt and Bishop realize nervously that they may not be the help that these people are looking for.

Meanwhile, at the Saurian headquarters, Raina and Kaidan are running genetic analyses on R’Chel. Kaidan is giddy with delight at the results that he finds. Raina expresses wonder as Kaidan explains that Rachel has convinced herself so thoroughly that she is Saurian, that she is telekinetically altering the values of her protein sequences. She is remodeling the substance of her genes to reshape her physical body to match the mental image she has of herself. The two villains marvel at the sheer power of a being who can so thoroughly control matter. In awe, Kaidan wonders what is NOT possible for this girl. Raina still voices her distrust of Rachel.

Suddenly, the skies take a dark and ominous turn. A tremendous flash of lightning strikes the tower and R’Chel declares that Storm is trying to escape. She is unable to deal with her mentally from this distance because the lightning field around Storm is disrupting R’Chel’s telepathy. Raina grabs both R’Chel and Kaidan and jumps over the edge of the tower. They land on a flying cyborg pterodactyl and head toward the tower where Storm is imprisoned.

As they fly, the storm worsens and becomes a savage thunder-snow storm. Masano falls from the sky and R’Chel reads from his memory what has happened. Storm’s sedatives wore off before the inhibitors were fully engaged, and now Storm is attempting her escape. R’Chel is astonished at her ruthlessness. Something about the Savage Land has tapped into Storm’s primal nature. She is now displaying an utter disregard for any life at all as she tries to free herself. R’Chel shows Ororo the damage she is causing, and out of horror, Ororo collapses into unconsciousness. R’Chel comments that this was only luck. As she turns to talk to R’Chel, Raina gasps. R’Chel’s form has changed even further. She is now clearly reptilian with smooth slanted dinosaur features and talons.

Psylocke and X-23 step from the teleportation tunnel. Psylocke remembers all her trips to the Savage Land and how she has marveled at the land’s ability to thrive as such a preserved example of prehistoric life without being affected by the subzero temperatures of the Antarctic tundra that surrounds it. This time is different, though. As they arrive, they notice that the land is covered with snow, and the temperature is unbearably cold.

X mentions that Storm created this type of weather back in Canada, and perhaps she is responsible for it here as well. Psylocke wonders what could have caused Storm to take such drastic action, and even more frightening, what caused it to stop. X concludes that Rachel is more than likely responsible. She picks up the others’ scents and leads Psylocke off to find them.

Betsy makes an off-the-cuff comment about the similarities between Wolverine and X-23. The girl makes no reply, but only states that Rachel’s scent seems wrong. Her train of thought is interrupted as the two women are startled by the presence of a raptor. Betsy’s reaction to fight is put to rest as they notice that the dinosaur is dead—frozen solid. X continues to explain Rachel’s strange scent. It’s more like the dinosaurs that have captured her than it should be. Even her footprints are reminiscent of a reptile’s.

Next, X-23 comments on Psylocke’s attitude. She asks why she is so angry. Betsy assures her that it has nothing to do with her, but X states that her anger colors her whole being. It leads her to believe that she and Betsy will fight. Betsy replies in exasperation that she should have left X in Canada. Then we would have had a fight, X replies.

The ladies continue their conversation and begin discussing their pasts. Psylocke presents the fact of her death and resurrection as something strange, but X doesn’t think it is strange at all. She has also died and come back several times, she states. Before the scientists had put in her claws, they had conducted brutal experiments to see how well she healed. Psylocke asks X how this made her feel. With a smile, X says that she killed them…and they didn’t get better. Betsy likes the ruthlessness that she sees in this girl, but still thinks she needs a proper name. She tells X that her friends call her Betsy. Before they can talk anymore, however, their world is turned topsy-turvy as they are attacked. While they are disoriented, they are entrapped in a net.

Back at the headquarters of the Hauk’ka, Kaidan presents his plan for world domination to the council members. He proposes using the altered R’Chel and a mentally subdued Storm to bring about a new Ice Age across the face of the earth. Within a year, all mammals will be extinct. In a stroke of cosmic irony, the mammals will fall to the forces of nature much like the ancestors of the Saurians fell to the great meteor so many years ago. The council gives its unanimous blessing. Kaidan’s plan is approved.

Back in the dungeon, Bishop, Kurt and the Saurians are cuffed and hurried outside by the guards. They notice that all the other prisoners are gone, and that they must be next. The fact that most of the dinosaurs that they are seeing are raptors only confirms this. They are to be the prey in a blood hunt which no one has ever survived. Overhead, Kurt sees Rachel soaring through the air on the back of a pterodactyl. Bishop wonders aloud if there is any chance she is scamming the Saurians and waiting for a chance to make her move. Kurt fears that they are out of time.

Instead of running when given the chance, Kurt and Bishop turn and attack their captors. The battle is over quickly and the X-Men along with their Saurian admirers pick up their captors’ guns and run for the safety of the forest. They have taken only steps when Bishop is knocked to the ground by Masano, and Nightcrawler takes a psychic zap. He turns to see Rachel, but her form is hideously changed! She is more reptilian than ever, and has changed her costume. Her new attire is a red and gold suit. Her reptilian tongue flits from her mouth as she explains to Kurt that she is R’Chel, not Rachel, and has been Saurian from the moment of her inception. Her conversation is interrupted by Betsy who decks R’Chel and sends her flying several hundred feet and into a distant cavern.

Betsy is amazed. Since when has she been able to hit that hard? Bishop warns a star-struck Saurian not to fall for Betsy because she is a heart-breaker.

Masano flies to R’Chel’s rescue and catches her before she crashes at the bottom of the cavern. Betsy helps Kurt to his feet. Nightcrawler turns angrily on Psylocke and demands an explanation for her use of force. He wants to know why she didn’t use her psychic knife to return Rachel to her senses. As X growls at Nightcrawler’s verbal attack, Psylocke reminds Kurt that she has not had a chance to evaluate her powers since her return. She doesn’t even know if she still has the psychic knife. Bishop also reminds Kurt that if Betsy’s punch is any indicator of her power level, she may well have fried Rachel’s brain with her knife. Kurt apologizes.

Betsy reminds Kurt not to react, and introduces him to their new allies who have been hiding in the forest: Ka-Zar and the Savage Land Mutates!

The X-Men's Savage Land adventure continues! Their strange new foes are bent on claiming the Earth for their own-and they plan on using the might of the X-Men to do it!

Brief Description:

The X-Men form an uneasy alliance with the Savage Land Mutates and a fierce battle ensues between the allies and the reptilian Hauk’ka. At Bishop’s request, Psylocke hesitantly agrees to use her unpredictable psychokinetic katana to restore both his and Nightcrawler’s mutant abilities, and the battle continues. R’Chel, still under the dino-delusion, attacks and very nearly ends the battle, but Bishop takes her down with his newly restored power. The X-Men and Mutates defeat the Hauk’ka and capture one of their number, Raina. Nightcrawler teleports the X-Men and their allies to a cave out of the range of the Hauk-ka as the defeated Saurians carpet-bomb the jungle. Kaidan commands Masano to return with R’Chel to the citadel which she does. Despite the growing doubts of some of the Hauk’ka, Rachel begins to usurp control of Storm’s mind with the goal of world-domination. Snow begins to fall in the Savage Land.

Full Synopsis:

(Psylocke’s narration /flashback:)

Not so long ago, the X-Men, specifically Storm, were trapped in the Savage Land by the machinations of Brainchild and the Savage Land Mutates. Brainchild was able to establish a degree of mind control over the X-Men and turned them against each other. Storm bore the brunt of the attack becoming a mad primal version of herself. In the end, the X-Men defeated Brainchild, but now he stands before them as an ally.

(present)

“Brainchild is mine!” Bishop says as he commands the X-Men to move back. The X-Men and the Savage Land Mutates stand face to face! Bishop is about to tear into Brainchild, when Kazar steps between them and tells him to stand down. Bishop suggests that perhaps Kazar is being mind controlled like the X-Men were, but Brainchild protests that he is on the side of angels this time. Betsy agrees, encouraging Bishop to give him the benefit of the doubt.

“Convince us,” Nightcrawler challenges Brainchild. A Saurian by the name of S’Gur begins to explain that when the Hauk’ka attacked, they had no method of defense. They had no hope of survival. They were being slaughtered, another Saurian adds. Brainchild continues the explanation by informing the X-Men that the leader of the Saurians, C’Rel, offered the Mutates a full pardon in exchange for defense against the hostile Hauk’ka. Additionally, they are fighting to save their own lives since the Hauk’ka would eventually kill them, too.

Kazar encourages the X-Men to accept this and work together with the Mutates. “The enemy of my enemy…” Kazar quotes. The X-Men are still hesitant, but before the conversation can continue, S’Gur screams. They are under attack!

Giant winged pteradon cyborgs streak through the sky. They are targeting the three Saurids as well as Bishop and Nightcrawler. Before the Hauk’ka attackers notice their pray, Vertigo uses her perception altering abilities to bring the entire flying squadron down. Most of the soldiers bail out before impact, but Vertigo is successful at disabling the enemies’ air capabilities. The soldiers regroup on the ground and prepare to fight. Their intel had suggested that their enemies were powerless. They learned the hard way that intel can often be wrong!

Kazar and Zabu strike first tearing into the Hauk’ka hostiles. They are followed closely by Lupo and his dire wolves. The battle is then joined by Barbarus, Gaza, one of C’Rel’s saurids. The X-Men’s goal, Psylocke thinks to herself, is to keep the enemy so distracted that they will not be able to use their guns without harming each other.

Brainchild watches from the tree line along with the remaining Mutates and the X-Men. Bishop and Nightcrawler are chafing at their own inability to join the battle. Bishop assesses the battle carefully and determines that this wave of soldiers is simply serving to draw the X-Men out into the open in order to determine their numbers and abilities. The Hauk’ka have not dropped the hammer, Bishop states, but they had better be ready when they do.

Bishop approaches Betsy who is sitting calmly in a tree braiding her hair. X-23 is seated next to her trying with little success to duplicate the hairstyle. Bishop asks why she isn’t out in the battle. Psylocke replies that she was not asked and she did not volunteer. Bishop explains to Betsy that Rachel telepathically removed access to their powers. He is hopeful that if Betsy still possesses her psychic blade, she can use it to short circuit those restraints and restore Bishop’s and Nightcrawler’s powers. Betsy jumps out of the tree and reminds them that she is not longer a telepath, only a telekinetic. She is not sure what kind of affect her blade would have on their minds if she were to use it. She could fry their brains. Kurt maintains that they are desperate, and that they trust her. Psylocke is swayed by this show of trust and suggests that Bishop go first. Bishop kneels as Psylocke summons her psychic katana. She is anxious, but hopeful that she can restore their powers.

She strikes.

On the battlefront, Raina drops from the sky like a meteor and begins attacking Kazar and the Mutates. The Hauk’ka have arrived.

As Bishop rises from Psylocke’s blow he comments about the white-hot pain he is feeling. Psylocke thinks to herself that she is finally being trusted again. She may have died and been resurrected, but things are getting better. She is beginning to feel welcome again. While Psylocke is thinking these things to herself, X-23 senses the arrival of the Hauk’ka, quickly turns, and exits the forest to join the battle. Betsy wants to head out after her, but Bishop says that he will go help. Betsy must restore Kurt’s power so that the two of them can then join the battle.

“When did he become the boss?” Betsy asks. Kurt replies that he is simply realizing his potential as they all are. Betsy then turns her attention to restoring Kurt’s powers. Kurt realizes that this is going to hurt a great deal, and Betsy apologizes in advance for the pain. Kurt suddenly wonders why they have not heard from Rachel since Betsy hit her. He wonders if perhaps she is not as mind controlled as they may have thought. Kurt’s question is answered as Vertigo appears with Rachel’s power signature over her eye. Under Rachel’s control, Vertigo takes Kurt out. Unfortunately for Vertigo, Betsy is not affected by her attack. With a wave of her arm, Psylocke sends Vertigo flying across the jungle. Psylocke wonders if she is immune or resistant to all forms of mental attacks.

X-23 fights bravely against the Hauk’ka. With her healing factor and claws she has probably been a match for any opponent in any battle…that is until today. Without warning, Raina begins to gain the upper hand against X-23.

Kazar begins to wake from the thrashing Raina gave him. Before he regains his senses, Leash subdues him mentally. She calls him into the jungle to protect Brainchild. Under the control of the Mutates, Kazar abandons the battle and Zabu who is promptly shot by one of the Hauk’ka.

Bishop explodes from the forest carrying a gigantic tree. He is determined to break up the death-duel between Raina and X-23. From out of the sky, R’Chel slams Bishop with a telekinetic bolt and splinters the tree. The attack allows Raina to clobber X-23. R’Chel moves quickly making quick work of Gaza and Barbarus. X-23 jumps back up and returns to fighting. Raina marvels at the child’s inability to know when she’s beaten. Psylocke comes to X-23’s rescue and slices Raina into unconsciousness with her katana. “We X-Men are stubborn like that. Occasionally, we may lose, but we never quit!”

R’Chel reacts to Raina’s defeat by trying to telepathically attack Betsy. When she finds that Betsy is immune, she tries to defeat her with a telekinetic force bolt. Bishop intercepts the attack, absorbs the energy, and turns the attack back on her. Once again, R’Chel is falling unconscious through the air. Betsy suggests that Nightcrawler teleport after her, but Bishop wisely orders Kurt to stand down and allow R’Chel’s teammate, Masano, to rescue her from falling.

Just as Masano, catches R’Chel, Kaidan appears and commands that Masano take more care with R’Chel. Even though Raina has been captured, R’Chel must be the Hauk’ka’s top priority.

As Nightcrawler teleports Betsy, X-23, Bishop, and the unconscious Raina back into the forest, Brainchild begins barking orders. They must get to cover in a distant escarpment--quickly…the Hauk’ka are about to begin carpet-bombing the forest. Nightcrawler, though exhausted, has to teleport the group to safety.

As Brainchild predicted, the Hauk’ka begin mass bombings of the forest hoping to destroy the X-Men and their allies. As Masano and R’Chel oversee the transport of the prisoners and the bombing of the forest, Kaidan appears and asks for a status report. R’Chel informs him that she is unable to telepathically locate the X-Men or the mutates. Kaidan tells Masano to bring R’Chel back to the citadel. Even though Raina has been captured, the most important thing is R’Chel. She must make Raina’s sacrifice worthwhile. Masano reluctantly carries R’Chel back to the citadel. His lack of faith in this plan seems to be growing.

Back at the cavernous shelter, Bishop and Brainchild watch the forest burn. Bishop comments on the good luck of this cavern being available to hide them from both the flames and aerial reconnaissance. Brainchild bristles at the suggestion that it was convenience that brought them here. It was his hard work and planning for any and every eventuality that provided this escape for them. Just like his planning allowed him to construct a jamming device to prevent R’Chel from telepathically tracking them. With modifications, the device could even be used to defeat her.

Betsy brings Kurt a drink of water, and they discuss Kurt’s concern about Rachel becoming a Saurid. Brainchild calls it “genetic cascade”. Her power is making her mental vision of herself into a physical reality: as she imagines herself, so she becomes. Bishop comments that surely someone with the genetic manipulation know-how that Brainchild possesses can come up with a way to correct Rachel’s physical appearance. Brainchild again bristles at this obvious reference to Storm’s recent genetic devolution into a primal slayer.

Bishop comments that something must be done quickly or Rachel will soon be used to win this war.

Back at the citadel, Storm is being held in a stasis vault. She remembers someone halting her previous attempt to escape, and she is almost certain that it was Rachel. A door opens, and a “visitor” steps into the darkness. Storm is horrified when she sees the dino-demented R’Chel glaring at her. R’Chel suggests that Storm pray to whatever deity she may have. The vault is then sealed.

Outside, Masano continues to express his concern. He wishes aloud that Raina were here to make this call. She had doubts, and now so does he. Kaidan is not dissuaded. The council has decided this course of action, and he is not about to be swayed.

Inside the vault, R’Chel begins her mental attack on Storm. She bypasses Storm’s defenses and accesses her powers directly. Storm fights, but it is useless. Rachel gains control of Ororo’s mutant abilities and begins the process. A white-cold bolt of energy launches into the stratosphere, and Masano prays for mercy.

Back in the cave, the X-Men and the allies are taken aback by something they have never before seen. “We’re outta time,” Bishop says. “An’ I’m thinkin’ maybe so is the world.”

It is snowing in the Savage Land!

The exciting conclusion of the X-Men's Savage Land adventure!

Brief Description:

All over the world, sub-zero temperatures are sending civilization into a frosty panic. The X-Men wait in a cavern in the Savage Land until the time is right for them to strike. After X-23 frees Ka-Zar and Raina from Leash’s mind control, the X-Men and the remaining Mutates teleport to the citadel to confront R’Chel. They fight their way through the Hauk’ka soldiers and enter the stasis vault where R’Chel is controlling Storm. With the help of Brainchild’s invention and Betsy’s psychic katana, the group is able to stop R’Chel, but Brainchild’s treachery sets the ice-storms in motion even worse than before. After X-23 dispatches Brainchild, R’Chel accepts the advice of Kaidan, Raina, and Masano that this plan was ill-conceived and will result in the deaths of the Hauk’ka as well. She merges minds with Storm and is able to stop the global freeze. In the process, she is freed from her dino-delusion. Later, Kurt’s skillful use of charismatic diplomacy convinces the Hauk’ka to live at peace with the world.

Full Synopsis:

Manoli Wetherell reports on the evening news that increasingly violent ice storms are overtaking the globe. In London, the Thames river has frozen, it is snowing in San Diego, and the Sahara is being bombarded by blizzards. The governments of the world are desperately trying to determine the cause of the bizarre weather, but the president is expected to declare a state of national emergency very soon.

At the Xavier Institute, while the students enjoy the snow outside, the X-Men meet in the war room to assess the global crisis. Emma and Scott enter the room, and Cyclops realizes that this is a major problem. He asks for Hank’s advice, but Hank’s news is not comforting: They suspect Storm as once before she had lost control of the worst winter storm in recent history. Although the heroes are unable to pinpoint her exact position, Iceman is able to locate her Blackbird in the Canadian Rockies. After looking at the intensity of the cells, Havok points out that Storm’s powers are being augmented by someone or something else. When Kitty notes that the cells are merging, Hank states that within a week the storm will be beyond even Ororo’s control.

As the Savage Land is covered with a deadly blanket of ice and snow, Hank and Kitty continue their conversation. Although some mutants may survive this storm, it won’t matter, because very soon humanity could become extinct!

At the Hauk’ka citadel, R’Chel continues to exploit Storm’s mutant abilities. The stasis vault glows white with cold as Ororo begs her to stop before it is too late. All of her efforts to convince R’Chel that she is human and not Hauk’ka are useless.

Meanwhile, Masano’s doubts are becoming more acute. He openly and vehemently questions Kaidan’s plan to use R’Chel and Storm to usher in this ice age. He fears that they too will be killed by the weather. Kaidan protests: he has everything under control. Masano laments the missing Raina. She would be able to convince Kaidan of the danger of this plan.

Back at the X-Men’s and Mutates cavernous hideout, Kurt and Betsy sit on a precipice and watch the storm. Betsy, wrapped in layers of animal fur, expresses concern about Kurt’s safety in the subzero weather. Kurt explains that he comes from healthy stock and that his uniform’s insulation is keeping him from freezing. He stares into the white wilderness and hopes aloud that Ororo will break free, or that Rachel will come to her senses.

Attempting to lighten the heavy conversation, Betsy comments lightly that weather like this reminds her of skiing: a downhill jaunt, a cabin in the mountains, a roaring fire, hot wine, and a lover to share it with would be heavenly right now. In a very tender moment, Kurt agrees…except for the skiing. He has never skied because he can’t find boots that fit.

Suddenly the storm’s intensity increases. Kurt says that he is bewildered—he doesn’t know what to do next. Betsy tells him that she has faith in him, and encourages him to have faith in himself. But Betsy is concerned… Kurt’s usually upbeat manner is grave and haunted. The role of leader has cost him much.

Inside the cave, the Hauk’ka powerhouse Raina sits restrained while the remaining X-Men eat and talk. Brainchild whispers discreetly to Leash, and Leash promptly and violently usurps control of Raina’s mind. Now Brainchild controls both Raina and Ka-Zar.

Without warning, X-23 attacks Leash. Somehow she has sensed the duplicity that is afoot. The mindslave Ka-Zar comes to his mistress’ rescue, and Kurt ‘ports in to stop the madness. X brushes them all aside and tackles Leash. Bishop is the first to realize that X is on to something. Brainchild makes a feeble attempt to blame Leash alone for the treachery, but Bishop doesn’t buy it.

Leash releases Raina who screams for the mutate’s heart. Psylocke attempts to calm Raina, but X points out that Ka-Zar’s scent indicates he is also mind-controlled. After Leash releases him, X-23 slams her head into the floor and knocks her out. Nightcrawler tells Brainchild that he will not be incapacitated since they need him, but he warns him not to push his luck with any more stunts like this one.

As the weather worsens, the X-Men realize that they need to take action. A wrong breath outside now could freeze their lungs and kill them instantly. Even Raina is frightened by the worsening weather. Nightcrawler suggests that they try to trust one another since they have no other choices. Brainchild has a plan. From his previous encounters with Storm, he has mapped her genome. He believes he can successfully interrupt the process that R’Chel has started without killing either of them, for if Storm were to die, the weather would continue unabated. Although the X-Men are hesitant to trust Brainchild, they have no other options. After somber goodbyes to the Saurids, Kurt teleports the motley crew of heroes and allies to the base of the stasis vault. As expected, the travelers arrive sick as dogs and barely able to stand.

The team’s plan is immediately halted when Raina realizes that her access code has been blocked and they are unable to get into the citadel. The situation is further complicated by the sharp report of gunfire. The Hauk’ka guards have arrived.

Kaidan, Masano, and scores of dino-soldiers attack! Bishop calls for plan ‘B’ and the team goes into action. While much of the team fights the soldiers, Betsy, Brainchild, and Raina try to override the entrance controls to no effect. They are interrupted, but Kaidan learns the hard way that his mindblast has no effect on Betsy as she takes both him and Masano down. Raina makes a final decision and begins to plead with Kaidan and Masano to stop this madness. Kaidan believes her to be mind-controlled, but Masano needs no convincing of her genuineness.

Before the dueling dinos come to a conclusion, Kurt and Betsy teleport into the chamber. As they materialize in the stasis vault they are nearly frozen where they stand. The cold is like deep space! Betsy extends her teke shields to save them, but it barely hinders the cold. Both mutants stand in awe of the raw power of Ororo Munroe. She is creating a storm stronger than any recorded in history…and she’s only just begun!

Storm is fighting R’Chel so intensely that even though R’Chel knows Betsy and Kurt are there, she cannot do anything about it or she will lose control of Storm. Betsy needs only that long to manifest her telekinetic katana and attack R’Chel. In a flash of psionic energy, the blade strikes, and the door of the stasis vault falls open.

Betsy now has R’Chel under her control, but the storm has grown so powerful and R’Chel’s control over Storm so deep that all three women are basically paralyzed. This is where Brainchild comes in. Unfortunately, Brainchild never intended to help Storm. With his genome mapping device he usurps control of Storm and the blizzard and begins to max it out. He intends to use the storm to destroy the inhabitants of the earth and rule!

X-23 has other plans. In a heartbeat she attacks and disables Brainchild, but the damage is already done. The power of the storm is increasing exponentially and there is nothing Storm can do to slow its destruction.

Ororo begs X-23 to slay her, for that is the only way to slow the storm. Betsy holds R’Chel paralyzed and pleads with her to help them. Kurt orders Betsy to release R’Chel and let her make a free choice which Betsy does. R’Chel is about to turn on Betsy and attack when Kaidan’s astral image appears and pleads with R’Chel to work together with the X-Men to stop the storm. R’Chel agrees.

The only way for R’Chel to stop the storm is for her to merge minds with Ororo. She wastes no time, and the process begins. The X-Men and their allies watch in awe as the two women’s psychic selves become one. Each has complete and total access to the farthest corners of the other’s consciousness. It is a desperate and deadly gamble, but it pays off. With a blast of psionic energy the storms disappear. The Savage Land goes from a deep freeze to a tropical jungle in moments. The effects are global...the worldwide ice storms suddenly cease to be.

Storm and R’Chel collapse and the X-Men rush to their aid. It seems they both survived the experience. The X-Men are surprised to hear Storm refer to R’Chel by her Hauk’ka name, but Rachel, now freed from her dino delusion, reminds them that Storm is now a little bit of her. Rachel remains hideously deformed although she is now in her “right” mind. She expects that the genetic cascade will also reverse itself and she will soon return to her normal form.

Before congrats and hugs can be given, the Hauk’ka guards storm the citadel. Kurt restrains his team and stands before the army to give peace a try. Through his deft use of diplomacy and logical appeal, he convinces the soldiers and even the ruling council members to live peacefully with those around them. Kurt tells the Hauk’ka that they are worthy and noble adversaries, and that he would like to have them as good neighbors rather than enemies. Raina and Kurt shake hands.

The Uncanny X-Men just can't get a break. As the team tries to relax and deal with the return of their once-dead teammate Psylocke, guess who crashes their party?

Brief Description:

The X-Men return home for some much needed relaxation. Catching up after being away is a challenge for all of them. Bishop must deal with Sage’s absence. Rachel must deal with Colossus’ return and the implications that holds for her and Kitty’s friendship. All of them must deal with the fact that Wolverine has been brainwashed by the Hand. Adjusting is the most difficult for Betsy who has been dead for over a year. She takes the various changes in stride, and even engages in some friendly flirtations with the Beast during a medical examination. Several harsh weeks pass with no rest for the beleaguered team. In addition to these difficulties, Betsy is still plagued by occasional appearances of her mad brother, Jamie. During a grueling Danger Room session under Kurt’s supervision, Betsy is surprised to witness Juggernaut and Nocturne’s return to the X-Mansion from the Mojoverse. After reunions and introductions, the X-Men are dismayed to find that Cain and T.J. have been followed by not only Spiral, but Mojo himself!

Full Synopsis:

The X-jet streaks through Westchester county airspace. The X-Men try to relax as they approach home, but for many it is hard to do: Psylocke is anxious to return home after being dead for over a year; Rachel squirms uncomfortably in her seat because her body has not yet completely reverted to human after her recent dino-delusion. A trip to the Savage Land is never dull, comments Storm. Nightcrawler expresses optimism that the Hauk’ka have become allies, but Bishop is more cautious. As the jet lands, Bishop comments that much may have changed while they were gone…

Psylocke thinks to herself that Bishop’s comments are most true for her! After over a year, she is returning to a redesigned, rebuilt mansion and a group of X-Men who have revealed their identities to the world. The others are trying to make her comfortable, but her nerves are a wreck. Everything is just so unknown now.

Ororo heads directly for her loft above the carriage house where her team lives. She excuses herself from Bishop and after discarding most of her costume, dives into the pool for a rejuvenating swim.

Bishop climbs a set of stairs to a tower that once belonged to Sage. He is overjoyed to see her there, and then disappointed when he realizes it is only a holographic simulacrum. The hologram reviews Sage’s status as personal assistant to Roberto DaCosta, Lord Imperial of the Hellfire Club. Bishop is stoic. He has always believed this to be the wrong choice for Sage. He hopes she remains strong and smart and finds a way to win. The hologram brings Bishop up-to-date on Wolverine’s status: the news is not good. Logan has gone rogue, and has been suborned by Hydra. He is now their premier assassin targeting none other than the president of the United States. A global order has been issued for him to be shot on sight.

Rachel, meanwhile, wastes no time heading for the room that she and X-23 share with Kitty Pryde. Her excitement at the reunion is stifled as she walks into the room and interrupts a cozy moment between Kitty and the recently resurrected Peter Rasputin. The two are enjoying wine in front of a roaring fire. The moment is awkward…Peter does not help matters by commenting on Rachel’s somewhat savage appearance. Rachel is clearly upset and, after sarcastically commenting that she should have stayed in the Savage Land, introduces X-23 and Peter to each other. The awkward tension of the situation continues to increase. As Peter attempts to hug Rachel, she pushes him away. She is glad to see him, but she lashes out that she just has to get used to his being back, and Betsy’s being back, but her mom still being dead.

Kitty is flabbergasted that Rachel could be so selfish. She phases herself and Peter downward through the floor and scolds Rachel for her attitude. Rachel collapses to the floor in tears. X-23 expresses concern, but Rachel shrugs it off. It seems like every time she’s here her mom is dead, and when her mom is alive, she is away somewhere. Now she has lost both her mom and maybe Kitty too.

Outside, Kurt gives Betsy a tour of the new mansion grounds. As he struggles to get a holographic map module working properly, Betsy admires a large stone monument dedicated to the deceased Jean Grey. She hints at some jealousy that there is not one for her. Kurt reminds her that Jean was here first and that Betsy was honored in the memorial garden around back. Kurt tries to charm her, but she is still sensitive to the fact that when she died she only got a “memorial plant” while Jean got a statue. Kurt points out that Henry made her memorial. Betsy is honored, but still balks at the way the mutants live. They preach integration, but live cloistered in a virtual prison. Kurt reminds Betsy of Xavier’s dream that it will not always be this way. For now this is best, but someday society will not see them as mutants…only as people.

Their conversation is interrupted by the arrival of the loquacious Emma Frost accompanied by Scott, Kitty, and Peter. Emma welcomes Betsy back to the mansion, and the two exchange artificial pleasantries. It is clear that the two women do not care for each other. Betsy’s verbal pokes at Emma’s status and her relationship with Scott delight Kitty immensely, but they are interrupted by a loud thunder-clap. Storm drops from the sky and throws her arms around Peter. She is overjoyed to see him alive! Ororo has a way of reminding everyone of what is important.

Kitty asks for Betsy’s help with Rachel. She is worried about her. Betsy comments that she doesn’t know if she is ready to tackle the school’s various soap operas. She adds that with all the resurrections taking place, shouldn’t they all be waiting for you-know-who to return from the white-hot-you-know-what to reclaim her husband? Emma bristles at the comment, but Psylocke rushes off for a medical appointment with Hank. Next time stay dead, Emma says as Betsy leaves.

As Betsy enters Hank’s lab, things are awkward: she died in his arms not too long ago. He is very changed since she saw him last…more bestial…but it doesn’t take long before the two friends fall into a warm embrace. Later, Beast confirms the results of Betsy’s previous examination: she is Elisabeth Braddock. Beast is somewhat troubled by this because Betsy was autopsied after her death…her resurrection, he says, is rather extreme. Hank explains that his senses confirmed her identity as soon as she walked into the room. He demonstrates this method of examination by smelling, touching, and even licking Psylocke. Betsy is shocked, but Hank explains that “Beast” is far more than a code-name. She coyly asks if he used these same methods to examine Colossus. A slap to the derriere and “rude girl” are Hank’s responses to Betsy teasing. The humor is broken when Hank becomes suddenly serious: he wants to be part of the action when Betsy finds Vargas. She promises him, and then asks about food…she is starving! As the two leave the lab headed for the cafeteria, Jamie Braddock appears unnoticed.

Enjoy your new life, Baby Sister, he says with a grin, and as for dying—that’s the least of your worries.

The following several weeks are some of the harshest for the X-Men. Northstar is killed at the hands of Wolverine. Jean Grey returns only to die again…for good. Storm takes things hard and has retreated to solitude allowing Kurt and Bishop to lead the team which they do well. Life goes on…Bishop cooks, Ororo gardens…as strange as it seems, the X-Men are moving on.

After dinner one evening, Betsy and Rachel discuss Kitty and Peter. It’s wrong for Rachel to hold a grudge. Rachel refuses to give up on her immature attitude, and finally Betsy lays into her. She tells her that life is short…get over it or get OUT! Rachel and Betsy laugh…things really are not so bad. Rachel is alive, she has her grandparents…things could be worse.

Without warning, mad Jamie appears outside the window and waves at Betsy. The apparition pales Betsy and she abruptly breaks off her conversation with Rachel to head off for a danger room session with Kurt.

As she normally does when battling, Betsy allows her mind to race while her body goes into auto-pilot. As she slices through a horde of humanoid robots, she mulls over the events of the last few weeks. The teams were exhausted from their battle with the Hauk’ka, which is why they were unprepared when a brainwashed Wolverine attacked the campus and killed Northstar. The brainwashing process has been reversed, but his scars will remain forever. And now, Betsy is seeing flashes of her brother Jamie. Considering his ability to alter reality, she wonders if she is being controlled by him as well…

Betsy asks Kurt to increase the difficulty level, which he does. Her next opponent is the ferocious and feral Sabretooth! Betsy fought him during her first adventure as an X-Man. She beat him, but he later gutted her. That was when she was a telepath. Now she is telekinetic whose power is only governed by her imagination—and she has a lovely imagination. With a thought and a swipe, she sends Sabretooth flying across the holographic desert landscape.

She turns to face her next opponent: Vargas, the man who killed her over a year ago. As he thrusts his massive sword at her head, Betsy dodges and thinks how appropriate it is that she face her two most deadly opponents…perhaps she is preparing to face off against her own brother?

The battle stops and the program freezes as Kurt reports that a strange energy field is manifesting in the room. The energy coalesces for the unstoppable Juggernaut and the techno-sorceress Spiral to fall through a teleportational gateway. Betsy is ecstatic about the opportunity to fight real villains. She draws her katana and charges but is stopped in her tracks when a female version of Nightcrawler phases out of Spiral’s body. Kurt teleports into the room and embraces his “daughter” T.J. Cain stands and explains to Psylocke that he has reformed and is now a good guy. Kurt and T.J. are hugging like family, and Betsy is very confused.

T.J. explains that she and Cain were sucked into a wormhole during a battle with the Brotherhood. They ended up in the Mojoverse, where T.J. took the opportunity to possess Spiral and teleport them all home. Spiral, T.J. says, should remain safely unconscious for the next day or so. Kurt doesn’t want to take any chances so he teleports away to bring back the rest of the team. While he is away, T.J. explains that she is the daughter of Kurt and the Scarlet Witch from another dimension. Kurt looks and acts so much like her dad, she can’t help but love him and accept his love in return. While Betsy is thinking this all over, Kurt returns with Rachel, Bishop and Storm.

They appear just in time for Spiral to leap to life from the floor. It was all a plot to get the X-Men! She opens a gateway and into the room crawls the slimy slug himself…Mojo!

He smiles wickedly at the X-Men. Who’s your Daddy now?

The Uncanny X-Men have to deal with the repercussions of Mojo's attack.

Brief Description:

The X-Men throw themselves into battle with Spiral and Mojo in the Danger Room, but are reduced to X-Babies by Spiral’s bizarre “Jean Bomb”. Psylocke alone is unaffected by the spell. After Spiral freezes Betsy, the X-Babies run through the mansion looking for help from the other X-Teams. Mojo sends a twisted “Legal Eagles” version of the Exiles marching through the halls of the institute to track the team. As Mojo watches, they battle. Slowly but surely, the X-Babies gain the upper hand and the “Exiles” are defeated. Crawling through the ventilation system, baby Storm and baby Juggernaut talk about the death of young Sammy Pare and its effects on him. After reaching the control room, they fight and defeat Spiral and then use the Danger Room itself to defeat Mojo. Once he is defeated, he reverses his spells and the X-Babies are all restored to their proper ages. Even Juggernaut asks to be aged back, realizing that he cannot hide from Sammy’s death by remaining a child.

Full Synopsis:

The X-Men greet Mojo in the way he deserves: they hit him with all they’ve got! Mojo lets Spiral do his dirty work as he gushes about how nice it is to be remembered. As Spiral casts her spells to fight the X-Men, Mojo begins his narration of the fight.

He is listing his cast and reprimanding Nocturne and Juggernaut for fleeing from him, when he comes across Psylocke and Rachel: his two favorite stars! He is overjoyed to see Betsy not “dead at all”, and Rachel not “at the back end of time”!

As Spiral continues to defend Mojo from the X-Men’s advances, she manifests a bizarre robot version of Jean Grey that she calls the “Jean Bomb”. With an eerie “I’m ba-a-a-c-k!” the robot jumps at the X-Men and explodes in their faces.

When the dust settles, the X-Men have been transformed into the X-Babies! The heroes’ conversation changes into toddlers’ as well:

Juggernaut insists: “I wanna hit him!”

Bishop threatens: “Don’t’chu be messin’ wit’ us, fats!”

Rachel wails: “Bring back my mommy!”

Mojo is immensely pleased at his spell since the X-Babies no longer have their mutant abilities. His pleasure is short-lived, though, because Spiral points out that Psylocke has not been affected. Betsy is as surprised as anyone…apparently she is immune to this particular spell.

While the witch and the bloat are distracted, Kurt uses his remote control to reactivate the Sabretooth hologram that Betsy was battling earlier and programs it to attack Mojo. Betsy takes advantage of this attack to carry the X-Babies away on a telekinetic surfboard. Spiral is not so easily avoided. With a wave of her many hands she takes out Sabretooth, destroys Kurt’s remote, and paralyzes Betsy with a spell. With Betsy mind-zapped, the babies fly through the air and crash to the floor just in front of the Danger Room exit.

Betsy gathers her strength and orders the kids to go get help, but Spiral gags her before she can give any more instructions.

Chaos reigns in the ranks of the X-Babies. Some are afraid, some are brave, and some just want to bicker. Nocturne suggests that her daddy be leader and proceeds to get into a fight with Rachel. Kurt reminds them that Storm leads the X-Men. Ororo recommends that they follow Betsy’s advice and go for help.

Meanwhile, in the Danger Room, Mojo examines Betsy. He is enraged when he notices that someone has removed the bionic eyes that he implanted in her head. He howls and informs Betsy that he considers this to be a flagrant breach of contract. To deal with the legality of his claim, he summons his latest creations. From a trans-dimensional wormhole pop lawyer versions of Sasquatch, Mimic, Nocturne, Sunfire, Morph, and Blink. They are the Exile Legal Eagles!

Mojo orders them to locate the missing X-Babies, and with a “hup-hup-hup” they march military style into the mansion to find the runaways. As an afterthought, Mojo tells Spiral to lock down the mansion so that the kids cannot get help from the other X-Teams. Just as the mini mutants reach the front door, they are repelled by a magic force field and sent flying back into the mansion foyer. Outside, the Astonishing team and a few of the New Mutants are alerted that something is wrong. They are horrified to see a large barrier in the form of Mojo himself cover the entire mansion.

Hup-hup-hup-hup-hup-hup-hup-hup-hup-hup…

Inside the mansion, the X-Babies turn their attention to the marching Exiles. Rachel, Storm and Bishop pull a rope taught across a doorway. They hope to trip the approaching attorneys, but their hopes are dashed as the Exiles march right through their trap dragging them along behind them. Nocturne and Nightcrawler leap from the ceiling and cover their opponents with a large tapestry. Still they march ever onward! Things are looking bleak until Juggernaut steps in. Cain is not a mutant, so his abilities are still very much intact. With a heave, he grabs the ropes that still surround the Exiles and hurls the group across the hall. Before the Exiles can get their bearings, the X-Babies jump into action.

Nocturne bashes Morph, and Kurt decks Sunfire. But the duo is halted when they come face to face with Mojo’s version of Nocturne. T.J. is conflicted: she can’t hit—

herself!? Bishop solves the problem with a sok to big Nocturne’s nose. While Sasquatch steps in to advise a confused Lucas that he will be sued for striking her, Morph cheers madly in the background. Ororo jumps Sasquatch from behind, but is easily discarded and tossed down the hall. Once again, Juggernaut steps in. He knocks Sasquatch to her knees and then pummels her.

The display is impressive, but Cain is stunned when he realizes that Sasquatch fell on little Nocturne. His memory is flooded by images of the recent death of young Sammy Paré. He feels responsible for Sammy’s death, and now he has caused the injury of someone else. Cain throws his helmet down and runs away without noticing that T.J. is fine.

From the Danger Room, Mojo munches popcorn and comments about the soap opera drama unfolding before his very eyes. Spiral adds that they are probably going to get their butts kicked, but Mojo doesn’t seem to care.

Back in the mansion, the X-Babies split up, and the Exiles divide to follow them. Morph, Nocturne and Sasquatch head in one direction while Mimic, Sunfire, and Blink head upstairs after Kurt and little Nocturne. From the duct work above, Storm drops a vase on Sasquatch’s head and renders her unconscious.

Blink, Sunfire, and Mimic head into the chemistry lab to apprehend Nocturne and Nightcrawler. They are shocked to find that the two have used the supplies in the lab to freeze the floor. The trio of Exiles slips across the room giving the two X-Babies the upper hand since they attack from the ceiling. Within moments, the three Exiles are unconscious.

Downstairs, Rachel and Bishop deal with Morph and Nocturne. They hose the two Exiles down with a high pressure hose, and, while they are recovering, slap panic packs onto them. The panic packs (which are designed to contain students whose powers are out of control) inflate and completely immobilize Nocturne and Morph.

Storm continues to make her way through the ductwork. Even though her claustrophobia is nearly paralyzing her she crawls onward. As she proceeds she comes across piece after piece of Juggernaut’s armor, and then, finally, she comes across little Cain himself all alone, in his underwear, and sobbing. Storm explains that she is trying to sneak into the Control Room to deal with Mojo and Spiral. Cain explains that he’s not sure he wants her to defeat Spiral and Mojo. If the bad guys win, he can stay a child. He can start over without mistakes such as the one that he believes cost Sammy Paré his life. Even in his young state, Juggernaut cannot erase the memories of the dying Sammy from his mind. Sammy died thinking that Juggernaut had betrayed the X-Men, and now he’ll never know that Cain was working for rather than against them. Can’t I just stay a kid? If my life gets a do-over, maybe I can get things right?

Storm gently reminds Cain that part of being an X-Man is making choices and then accepting the responsibility for the choices made. The journey, she says, matters as much as the destination. Storm tells the weeping Cain to remain in the ducts where he will be safe…she’ll take care of the rest. Ororo jumps out of the ductwork and into the control room. She wonders to herself if Juggernaut’s wish wouldn’t be so bad. She never knew the man (or boy) behind the armor.

From out of nowhere, Storm’s thoughts are interrupted by Spiral’s attack. The witch surrounds her with a replica of Mojo’s exoskeleton and claims that once she removes her spine she will be a perfect match for Mojo. Totally gross! says Cain as he jumps from the ductwork and knocks Spiral unconscious. Cain and Ororo slap high fives and turn their attention to Mojo.

In the Danger Room, Mojo notices that something is not right. He calls to Spiral, but instead gets encased in a giant size cartoon-style panic pack that Psylocke claims is inspired by Chuck Jones. The barrier around the mansion collapses, and the other X-Men enter the mansion. For some reason, though, the X-Babies are still young!

Kitty delivers an ultimatum to Mojo: change them back or else! Mojo balks, but then realizes how serious she is. He agrees but pauses to probe Juggernaut. Is this what Cain really, really wants? Or would he prefer to remain a child? Mojo attempts to entice Cain: stick with me, you’ll have a clean slate, I’ll make you a star…

“No.”

Cain realizes that he already has his fresh start. He may never become the hero that Sammy thought he was, but he determines to do his best to make Sammy proud of him for trying.

That’s what’s great about dreams, Psylocke narrates, finding ways to make them real.

With a sinister grin, Emma states that she will handle Mojo. He’ll never bother the X-Men again…

Brief Description:

A mission on the coast of Africa is interrupted by an overwhelming radiance that proceeds to wipe all but two of the X-Men from existence. Rachel and Betsy find themselves in what must be the White Hot Room. They discuss alternate versions of themselves, and are suddenly ripped from the room as Betsy’s brothers Jamie and Brian fly by. The two women land in England near Braddock Manor and come face to face with a Sentinel. In Otherworld, Meggan awakes from a nightmare and screams at the top of her lungs. Otherworld and many other timelines are being wiped out. The temporal tsunami originates from Earth 616 and even demolishes the Starlight Citadel where Roma resides. Among other things, the tsunami causes the reincarnation of a merged version of the Fury and James Jaspers. Saturnyne appears and tells Captain Britain that Earth 616 must be destroyed. She uses alternate versions of the X-Men called X-Com to deal with Brian’s resistance. Brian defeats them and thanks to the madness of his brother Jamie manages to stall Saturnyne’s attempt to destroy Earth 616. Brian is told that he has 48 hours to fix the madness that is consuming Earth 616 or it will be destroyed.

Full Synopsis:

In East Africa, the X-Men are battling a band of pirates known as the Weaponeers. The villains were attempting a hostile takeover of Zanzibar, and the mutant heroes had flown in to stop them. They were winning…until their world came to an end. A white flash lights up the horizon and expands rapidly consuming everything in its wake. Bishop tells Rachel and Betsy to raise their teke shields, but it’s too late. The X-Men and their enemies are completely wiped from existence. All except Betsy and Rachel. The two women grasp hands and as the wave passes they find themselves in a sea of great white nothingness.

What was that? Betsy asks as she and Rachel hover in empty space. The two women are flabbergasted by what has happened and what is happening. Betsy passes a frustrated comment about hoping she is not dead again. Rachel suggests that perhaps they are in the White-Hot Room—the center of creation—the heart of the Phoenix. Betsy remains upset that everything revolves around that “bloody bird”. Psylocke desperately wants to hit something, but neither woman knows what to do next.

On Otherworld where Brian Braddock reigns, his wife Meggan awakes from a nightmare with a horrific scream. Brian rushes to her aid, but she can only cry and tremble. She mutters that it is over…over…done…ashes…dust.

Flight Leader, Captain UK, and Justicer Bull of the Captain Britain Corps come rushing into the room to check on Brian and Meggan, but Brian insists that he is fine. Flight Leader informs Brian that Meggan’s scream was heard by every member of the Corps!

Meggan shifts into her elemental form and informs Brian that the end of all that is has arrived. The Corps members are confused by Meggan’s comments. When the ground starts to tremble, the group heads to the tower to get a better look at what is going on. From there they watch as a cataclysmic tsunami of cosmic proportions bears down upon them. Meggan just has time to comment that she had hoped it was all a bad dream before the wave strikes the palace turning the majestic edifice into powder.

The wave grabs Meggan and Brian along with the three Corps members and slams them forcefully through crosstime. They witness the destruction of universe after universe after universe. They watch as versions of heroes they know such as Thor, Namor, Iron Man, Thing, Kylun, Human Torch, and Hulk are erased by the unstoppable wall of water.

The wave thunders onward and upward where it eventually reaches the Starlight Citadel, home to Roma—the celestial guardian. She tries her best to stem the oceanic onslaught but in the end she is overcome and her citadel too is demolished.

As the waters begin to calm, refugees from each of the destroyed timelines find themselves washed up into the space formerly occupied by Roma’s home. All the dimensions have crashed into one, and the surviving denizens of each timeline are now here in Otherworld.

Energy patterns mix and coalesce and the long-dead James Jaspers of Earth 616 appears—very much alive. He comments on how long it took him to find his way back from death and his mad banter begins.

Upon seeing the incapacitated form of Roma beneath some debris he blames the whole mess on her being a woman. He is about to dispatch the unconscious Roma when his arm mutates into an energy cannon. The cannon looks suspiciously like the weapon used by the creature that killed him so long ago.

Jaspers’ body begins to transform into the very shape of the creature that killed him…the Fury! Jaspers/Fury lowers it cannon to Roma’s head and is about to finish her off when Brian Braddock makes a dramatic entrance and with a stunning left hook sends the creature flying through the air.

Brian frees Roma from the debris that was covering her. They comment on the danger of this newly merged Fury and Jaspers creature. Separate each was virtually unstoppable. The multiverse is in for real trouble if the two are truly one!

Brian asks Roma if she is responsible for this mess but is surprised to get an answer from none other than Opal Luna Saturnyne. The omniversal majestrix condemns Brian, blaming his planet, Earth 616, for the madness that is consuming reality. Saturnyne loses control of her emotions to such a degree that she takes a punch at Brian and nearly breaks her hand. She storms away stating that she will soon rectify the problem of Brian’s misbegotten little world permanently.

When Brian makes a move to stop her, he is accosted by what seems to be living metal. He is wrapped in a steel cocoon and then sees who is attacking him: male versions of 616 Earth’s X-Men ladies! Standing over him are male counterparts to Marvel Girl, Polaris, Psylocke (who comments “This is what my sister looks like as a man?”), Rogue, Storm, and Kitty Pryde: the Executive Action Committee, better known as X-Com.

The group is apparently in Saturnyne’s service and has been sent to keep Brian from stopping the destruction of Earth 616. They are aware of how dangerous Brian is, but they still underestimate him. Brian topples Psylocke and shatters his bonds sending the men flying, fleeing, and falling for cover.

Brian suggests that Saturnyne has chosen these mutants for their looks alone, but that comment is rebutted by one of Storm’s lightning bolts. Before Brian can stand back up, Rogue descends on him to sap his power. Brian does not resist but rather offers all his power…Kit realizes that Brian is overloading Rogue and separates the two men before Rogue can be completely burned out by Brian’s power.

While Marvel “Boy” telekinetically locks his muscles, Kit moves in and begins beating Brian with an electric billy club. Brian throws off the telekinetic restraints blowing Marvel Boy’s mind and decks the unsuspecting Kit who has no time to phase.

Psylocke comes from behind with his psychic knife blazing. He buries it deep into Brian’s head. As Brian collapses, Psylocke calls the rest of the X-Com out and assures them that his knife has thrown Brian into a fugue state.

“Surprise!”

Brian grabs Psylocke. Apparently sibling immunity to powers works across dimensions as well! Better luck next time, Brian says as he twirls Psylocke above his head and knocks over the remaining X-Com members.

Saturnyne, meanwhile, is sifting her way through the rubble of the Starlight Citadel trying to find the celestial nullifier, a device capable of completely erasing any particular dimension of the multiverse.

Brian grabs her and demands her to explain what she thinks she is doing. Saturnyne replies that she is doing what he should be doing. She explains that 616 is acting like a cancer…eating away at the rest of the timestream! If she spares his world she will condemn the rest.

Suddenly from nowhere, mad Jamie Braddock appears and smashes the nullifier with a large piece of rubble. With a “plink” he disappears. “We’re doomed,” mutters Saturnyne.

Later in Roma’s transdimensional council chamber, Brian, Meggan, Roma, Saturnyne, Captain UK, and Justicer Bull discuss the trans-temporal phenomena that is making its way across the sidereal string. Something is changing the boundaries of causality itself in the 616 universe. It could continue expanding until creation itself ends up an amorphous blob void of any type of rational existence.

Saturnyne is still angry that Brian’s brother has smashed their chances to excise the cancerous dimension, but Brian reproves her for espousing genocide. Even as the cosmic warp alters Meggan’s malleable form into that of a three headed monster, Brian remains resolute that murder is not the answer. He is not as ruthless as Saturnyne.

Roma steps in and tells Brian that he may have to be. Grimly, she shares that even though she cares deeply about Brian and the 616 universe, she will not stand by and allow it to endanger the rest of the omniverse. She tells Brian that she will return him to 616; furthermore she will give him forty-eight hours to find whatever is causing this aberration and deal with it. As soon as they are able to repair the celestial nullifier, Roma and Saturnyne will use it to destroy the “sick” universe. Roma warns Brian that he may be subsumed by the warp: he may forget his mission. If this happens, he will cease to exist.

In the White-Hot Room, Betsy enjoys viewing a parade of her parallel selves. She is amazed at all the different possibilities. She stops short when she notices that Rachel has no parallel selves. Rachel claims that she has met other “Rachels” who are the offspring of Scott Summers and Jean Grey, but none of them are her. The only other selves present in the Room for her are past versions of herself.

There are four Rachels: the malnourished and sickly refugee from Days of Future Past, the mutant killing hound, the red leather clad Phoenix from Excalibur, and the fiery Phoenix version of Rachel. Rachel explains that this is all there is. Apparently, she is unique. Betsy comments that she doesn’t get it, but neither does Rachel. Nothing makes sense! Everything is so difficult!

Betsy tries to calm Rachel with some humor, but Rachel reacts as if Betsy was deliberately making fun of her. Holding onto the Shi’Ar crystal necklace that contains the memory essence of her mother, Rachel wishes her mom were here. Betsy reminds Rachel about Logan’s advice that perhaps this is Rachel’s chance to live a normal life…or at least what passes for normal for an X-Man!

Rachel doesn’t understand how Betsy can remain so calm. The whole “death and return” thing is something that Rachel, Jean, Betsy, Brian and even Jamie share. Almost on cue, Brian and Jamie are seen behind the dissolving fabric of the White-Hot Room. Both ladies are surprised that the other can see Jamie. Jamie pulls the reality of the Room with his fingers and tells the X-Ladies that they get no more downtime, and no more revelations. He has worked very hard and broken every rule there is to bind their lives and fates together. He dumps them back to earth and says Don’t make me regret it!

As they land in the grass near Braddock Manor, Rachel wonders what Jamie meant by his comments. Betsy’s only answer is that she will ask him just as soon as she cuts out his heart. The ladies notice the sounds of a party coming from inside the house. Betsy comments that something doesn’t seem right…her fears are confirmed as the two turn to face a fully functional Sentinel.

Brief Description:
Rachel and Betsy re-enter this dimension and are immediately subsumed by the altered state of the House of M. They fall into line as attendants at a royal gala hosted by Betsy’s brother, the King of England, Brian Braddock and his wife Megan. The twins are reunited and continue to enjoy the celebration. Later that night, Brian is awakened by a strange dream in which three people (who seem strangely familiar) are calling out to him to hurry. The dream ends with the world’s destruction. In the morning, the group is trying to understand Brian’s dream. The conversation is ended as Wisdom introduces Courtney Ross. Brian snaps and attacks the woman, believing her to be Sat-Yr9. A brief battle ensues as Brian tries to kill Courtney. The fight ends with Brian realizing that the woman is indeed Courtney Ross, not Sat-Yr9. Rachel telepathically probes Brian’s mind for the reason behind the dream and his reaction to Courtney but can find none. The group of heroes decides to head out to find a group called the Marauders who are illegally hunting two mutant renegades one of whom may be related to Magneto. The heroes interrupt the team of Marauders as they are taking Juggernaut into custody. Captain Britain looks over their credentials as Rachel and Betsy sneak off to follow the trail of the second renegade mutant. They come face to face with none other than…Nocturne!

Full Synopsis:
Betsy and Rachel appear back on Earth. They are shocked to see a Sentinel standing outside of Braddock Manor. Betsy immediately begins initiating an attack plan, but before the women can take action, they are subsumed by this altered reality. Their clothes and conversation have changed. Instead of yelling a plan of attack, Psylocke merely shrugs off the Sentinel as extra security for her brother’s party.

And what a party it is!

High society blooms at Braddock Mansion! What’s the occasion, Betsy wonders.

It’s hard to stay in touch, milady, Rachel responds, even with a telepath for a companion. The two women join the rest of the crowd as it moves toward the entrance hall of the manor. They soon learn that the celebration is in honor of Magneto’s birthday. As they are announced at the door, Betsy realizes how underdressed they are. A problem easily fixed for a telekinetic with the fine motor control of Rachel Grey. While Betsy can smash mountains, Rachel can adjust the minutiae of their clothing to create elegant evening gowns. Betsy’s attention is taken from her new attire as her brother, Captain Britain, Brian Braddock, the King of England calls her name.

Betsy runs to him. He wraps his massive arms around her and holds her tight even as he trembles. It is you. You’re here. You’re alive! Rachel greets Meggan, and then telepathically hides their presence from the rest of the crowd. A reflex lately, she claims. Betsy wipes a tear away from her “baby brother’s” eye and assures him that her luck hasn’t run out yet. In spite of what he thought had happened in Spain, Brian realizes that Betsy is just fine.

The twins’ relationship has always been one of give and take. Though Brian is a few seconds younger than Betsy he is the one that rules as monarch. Betsy has always preferred the life of a warrior, much to her brother’s chagrin. He is convinced that someday he will lose her. But since that day is not today, Betsy encourages everyone to get back to the party.

Outside, the Sentinel’s head turns slowly as it scans the night sky…

The mansion is quiet. The night staff bustles softly from post-party task to post-party task while the king and queen sleep. Brian is happy. He is a benevolent and wise king—one who rules both as a monarch and a champion. He almost always sleeps with a smile on his face…but not tonight. Tonight his dreams are troubled by psychedelic imagery of himself being torn from reality and sent through a menagerie of sights, sounds, and strangely familiar faces. Two women…royalty, perhaps?…a strange mad looking man…a relative?…

My captain—my champion!

Forty-eight hours, Brian!

Your world is doomed!

A ticking clock…the blond woman reaching for a device…

To safeguard all creation…I must!

With a nuclear flash, destruction sweeps upon him--his sister and Rachel Grey are destroyed. He and his world have been condemned to die, and his passionate protest proves pointless. His mind goes numb as his wife, Meggan disintegrates in his arms, and then the light claims him as well…

NO! Sweat-soaked and disoriented, Brian wakes from his nightmare. Something isn’t right, and he knows it…

Next morning, the royal family and Rachel try to make sense of the nightmare. Brian is convinced that it was more than just a dream. Rachel suggests that perhaps the caviar was bad, but Brian knows in his bones that there is an answer to be found. Megan suggests contacting Magneto, but Brian resists.

With a polite knock, Peter Wisdom, assistant and bodyguard for the king, enters the room. He has brought the morning dispatches with him and a guest who wouldn’t take “no” for an answer. Courtney Ross, silk, silver fur and all, steps into the room.

Brian explodes in fury. Murderer! he shouts as he flies at the woman. You’re not Courtney Ross! You are Opa-Lun-Sat-Yr9, deposed tyrant of Earth 839! Courtney cries out in pain as Brian attacks her. Betsy and Rachel are shocked by Brian’s display of savagery. He means to kill her! Rachel tries to shut him down telepathically, but is slammed through the nearest window for her effort. Even though it may amount to treason, she will not allow him to commit murder. Determined, she flies back into the house. Betsy has drawn her psi-katana and lunges for him hoping to paralyze him temporarily. She is stopped by a volley of hot knives from Wisdom who is attempting to protect his king. Shattering yet another window, Rachel reenters the room and takes Wisdom down.

Betsy pleads with her brother to think before he acts, but Brian protests that there is no time to think. This woman is a dangerous enemy who has killed Courtney and taken her place. He attempts to prove it by showing everyone the dagger tattoo that Sat-Yr9 wears on her upper right thigh. He lifts her dress and is shocked to see…nothing. Courtney, sobbing and terrified, crawls away from Brian. What have I done? Brian whispers as Betsy tries to calm Courtney.

After Courtney has left, Betsy asks for details about Sat-Yr9. Rachel corrects her pronunciation by saying that the woman’s name is Saturnyne. Brian corrects her by saying that they are two different women altogether. Unfortunately, that is all that anyone knows. Even Rachel’s telepathic probe into Brian’s mind reveals nothing more. Brian yells in frustration, and Meggan tries to comfort him. Wisdom steps in to read the morning dispatches, and Brian takes note of one item concerning a group calling themselves the Marauders. It seems that this covert ops group is tracking two renegade mutants...one of whom seems to be related to Magneto. Brian quickly determines that these Marauders are hunting in Britain without his authorization. A little head thumping is just what he needs…

In the West Country, Cain Marko (the Juggernaut) fights off the attacks of Mammomax and T-Rex. We just want to be left alone, he yells as he slams Mammomax into the ground. T-Rex announces that they are acting on orders. Sunder knocks Cain to his knees, and Banshee attacks with his sonic scream. Callisto, leader of the Marauders, grabs him with her tentacles and throws him on his back. As the final coup de grace, Blob plummets from a jet hovering overhead and flattens Juggernaut into a crater.

With Juggernaut down for the count, Callisto reminds her troops that Nocturne is the “money”. She’s the one they are being paid to find. Callisto’s pep talk is halted by Captain Britain’s order: “Explain yourself!” Meggan, Brian, Rachel, and Betsy stand ready.

Callisto balks at the group. With a sneer she states that her orders come from Magneto himself. While Brian goes to look at the warrants that Callisto carries, Rachel and Betsy sneak away to follow Nocturne’s psychic trail. T-Rex notices their leaving and follows.

In an old abandoned house, the two women look around for any sign of Nocturne. As they look, they discuss the likelihood of this mutant being a real relation of Magneto’s. Betsy suspects that it is true—thus the Marauders. Royalty is very protective of its secrets and scandals.

Nocturne moves through the shadows silently, but Rachel is able to track her. Betsy takes the roof off the house to shed some light on the situation, and Nocturne comes tumbling down with the debris. Betsy catches her with her teke and orders Rachel to catch the falling matter from the roof. At your command, your royal highness, Rachel answers sarcastically.

Suddenly Nocturne escapes from Betsy’s telekinetic bonds and tries to posses her. Betsy’s immunity to all forms of psychic attack send the poor mutant reeling, though. Terrified, Nocturne backs into a corner. Please don’t hurt me!

Betsy and Rachel are astonished that she looks nothing like Magneto.

We’re way beyond scandal here, Rachel…    

Brief Description:
At Braddock Manor, Captain Britain and Megan, wage battle against Karima Shapandar and her Sentinels. Captain Britain is taken out, and Meggan continues the fight alone, using her elemental powers to destroy several of the robots. Meanwhile, the other residents of the manor, Wisdom, Courtney Ross, Linda MacQuillan, and Justicer Bull, attempt to hold their own against the Sentinel onslaught. Captain Britain regains consciousness and pleads with Karima to understand that they are trying to save the universe. Without warning, the psychic rapport that he shares with Betsy once more flares to life. He sees his sister attacking the Marauders, Rachel defeating the Blob, and Nocturne possessing Banshee. Karima takes advantage of Brian’s momentary distraction to flatten him. Courtney Ross is caught in the cross fire and killed. The heroes have no time to mourn as fresh Sentinel troops march in to storm the manor. Linda and Justicer Bull tackle the Sentinels while Brian and Meggan head off the save the world from certain destruction. They arrive at the scene of the recently concluded battle with the Marauders. There, Betsy explains to Brian that they must seal the “X” shaped breach. Their conversation is interrupted as Karima shows up having defeated Justicer, Linda, and Wisdom. Rachel calls on the name of the Phoenix as she and Betsy synchronize their talents to deflect the combined attack of the Sentinels into the trans-temporal breach. With a great flash, the landscape is laid barren. The heroes have only minutes to finish sealing the breach. Meggan enters the rift to stem the forward momentum of the temporal tsunami that is approaching. As she harnesses the power of Otherworld, the heroes on the outside of the breach work together to seal it closed. Brian watches in both awe and horror as Meggan glows with power and is then taken by the onrushing wave. The heroes seal the breach and watch as Brian mourns the passing of his wife.

Full Synopsis:
Karima Shapandar launches an attack against Captain Britain. The battle is give and take with the upper hand moving between Brian and Karima. Why wouldn’t you listen? We could have used your help!, Brian yells as he drops an entire Sentinel on her head. So distracted is he by the defeat of Karima that he notices too late the attack of the remaining Sentinels. The robots’ artillery fire puts Brian out of commission and levels much of his majestic manse.

Meggan goes down, but gets back up. I’ll teach them to underestimate an elemental megamorph. With that, she launches a ruthless attack against her enemies. Sprouting claws over two feet long, Meggan cuts and slashes her way through the robots. Timing it just right, Meggan allows them to get a lock on her, and, as they fire, she becomes intangible allowing the artillery to pass right through her. In mere seconds, Meggan has taken down three mechanical malefactors.

One of the Sentinels crashes into the manor nearly crushing Courtney Ross, Peter Wisdom, and Linda MacQuillan. Wisdom, whose orders are to protect Courtney and Linda, orders them to take cover. Linda demonstrates that she can take care of herself by ripping off the Sentinel’s finger and forcibly shoving it up his nose. The badly damaged robot flees, exploding into the ground in a fiery fury.

With a shimmer of mystic energy, Linda’s clothing changes and she stands ready in costume as Captain U.K. How did we get sidetracked? Suddenly her memory is triggered and she remembers the cosmic mission she was given by Roma. Courtney and Wisdom are astounded as yet another red, white, and blue-garbed heroine makes an entrance. Justicer Bull commands the Sentinels to stand down your weapons and surrender! Or suffer the consequences. Karima refuses to surrender, and one of the Sentinels crushes Justicer Bull beneath his ferrous foot.

Justicer Bull is not defeated so easily. The Sentinel garbles and gurgles and Justicer Bull exits in an eruption of circuitry, nearly removing the robot’s head from its shoulders.

Disrespect for the law and for its officers will not be tolerated, she proclaims as she once again drops the remains of a Sentinel squarely onto Karima.

Brian once again tries to reason with Karima, explaining to her the nature of the coming temporal tsunami, but he is interrupted by a reoccurrence of the strange psychic synchronization that occurred earlier in the night. In his mind’s eye he sees all the events that are currently happening to his twin sister Betsy. Brian watches in amazement as Betsy, Rachel and Nocturne battle the Marauders. Rachel neutralizes Blob, Nocturne uses Banshee to take down Callisto and Caliban, and Betsy slashes T-Rex with her katana.

Brian’s fascination with this psychic phenomenon distracts him just long enough to allow Karima to gain the upper hand. She knocks him across the lawn and raises her weapon. Without hesitating, Courtney Ross shouts Brian’s name and steps directly into the line of fire. The blast kills her instantly. Brian shouts her name as she falls to the ground, but it is too late.

Wisdom hurls a volley of hot knives directly into Karima as Brian tenderly lifts Courtney’s remains from the ground. Even though she is married to him, Meggan sees Brian’s display of affection for his first love and allows her jealousy and fear to convert her exterior into a disfigured horror. After only a moment of self-pity she gathers her emotions and strides to Brian’s side to mourn Courtney’s passing next to the man that loves her. Their impromptu memorial is interrupted by Wisdom’s sceram…Majesties! We have a problem…the Sentinels have regrouped…

Captain UK and Justicer Bull grab Wisdom and head off to fight the remaining Sentinels while Brian and Meggan head off to stop the temporal tsunami. The royal couple streak off into the night and land in front of Excalibur’s old lighthouse just in time to see Rachel, Betsy and Nocturne polish off the remaining Marauders. Brian and Betsy embrace and then the group turns to address the large tear in the fabric of reality at the base of the lighthouse that Roma wants them to seal. Before they can even formulate a plan, however, Karima Shapandar appears with her Sentinels.

When all the Sentinels appear to shut down, the team realizes that Karima has supercharged herself with the now deactivated robots’ power. She launches a full-scale attack that only the synched telekinetics of Rachel and Betsy can deflect. The nuclear beam bounces directly into the causal tear and explodes with a nuclear flash.

…

The landscape is barren. Only Meggan, Brian, Rachel, Betsy, Nocturne, Juggernaut and Blob remain. The rest having been outside of Rachel’s protective bubble appear to have been vaporized. Groggy and hurting, the remaining heroes gather themselves and address the problem still remaining. The causal tear has shrunk considerably but is still wide open and must be sealed.

Thinking outside the box, Cain grabs the Blob and uses his ample derriere to plug the glowing “X”. It doesn’t really do the job, so Cain pushes that much harder.

In the remains of the Starlight Citadel, Saturnyne tells Roma that the time has come. She must nullify Earth 616. Roma watches as the heroes struggle to seal the tear and gives them just a few more moments. Once again, she uses Meggan to communicate her message. On earth, Meggan morphs into the image of Roma to warn the heroes that time is up…the breach must be sealed now!

Brian and Meggan take a moment in the shadows and then the team launches into action. Brian rips Blob from the breach…Meggan rushes through the portal and crosses into the cosmos…Nocturne adds her strength to Betsy, possessing her, who works together with Rachel and Brian to literally pull the breach closed.

As the crack grows smaller Brian watches his wife from the other side. With both horror and awe he sees her as she glows with the light of Otherworld and faces the temporal onslaught with dignity…This, my love, is what I was born to do…she throws herself into the wave and vanished into its cosmic radiance...Rachel seals the tear. The breach holds, and gradually fades into nothingness.

Brian just stares…Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?...Rachel is shocked. She asks Brian if he realizes what he has just done. Betsy answers for him…He knows…

Brian merely looks into the stars…Thank you, Meggan…Sleep well, my love…    

Brief Description:

Rachel Grey takes a break from the scrutiny of the Sentinels stationed around the mansion to go and visit her grandparents. After a short time of relaxation, the Greys throw a party for Rachel to allow her to meet her many relatives. During the party, while dancing with his granddaughter, John Grey is attacked and killed before Rachel’s eyes. At the mansion, the staff and students are still attempting to stabilize themselves after the recent decimation that wiped out 90% of mutantkind. Cannonball manages to get in the way of the Sentinels while flirting with Betsy, and Nightcrawler receives a surprise phone call from his “daughter” TJ. Across the estate, the team attempts to regroup and recoup, while Scott and Emma host Val Cooper and her entourage. Val attempts to explain that the Sentinels and the Office of National Emergency are here to help protect the X-Men during this time of global uncertainty. Emma and Scott are understandably less than trusting and the tension in the room is high, but the meeting ends without incident. It appears that the Sentinels are something the X-Men are going to have to get used to…

Full Synopsis:

Rachel Grey is from the future. In her childhood she saw nearly all of the X-Men murdered…some mutants she helped hunt down and kill herself. It’s what she was trained to do. She lived in concentration camps, and each morning she awoke to the sight of the guardian Sentinels looming over the grounds.

Rachel is enraged by what she sees in front of the X-Mansion today…it reminds her so vividly of that other life…Sentinels guards surrounding the estate. It’s more than she can handle. For mutants, the world has suddenly become a frightening and deadly place. One morning, a huge percentage of the world’s mutant population lost the DNA sequencing that made them mutants. Rachel senses that this “M-Day” is just the beginning…of what she doesn’t know. The remaining mutants are scared, the feds are scared…and the X-Men are left in the middle, committed to peace. It’s too much for Rachel to deal with.

With her teammates’ help, she sneaks off campus to visit her grandparents. She has family now and it is high time she gets to know them. She promises Kitty that she will keep in touch with the team and heads out. The time away is like medicine…exactly what her sick soul needs…she is enjoying her vacation immensely.

One afternoon, Rachel and her grandfather square off in a game of one-on-one basketball. When the competition heats up however, Rachel goes “teke” and puts the ball through the net. Her grandfather jokingly reprimands her, but is interrupted by his wife, Rachel’s grandmother, who comments on how spectacularly they both played. Rachel’s laughter reminds Elaine of days gone by and she becomes nostalgic.

As Rachel and John start up another game, Elaine wanders back into the kitchen to continue preparing for company. She silently curses Charles Xavier for taking away her daughter Jean. She wants to enjoy her grandchildren, but she misses her daughters so much. Her melancholy is so intense that Rachel can’t help but pick up on it. The game stops and Rachel is saddened that she reminds her grandmother so clearly of her life’s losses. John Grey refuses to let his granddaughter sulk and drags her into the car for a road trip.

Back at the mansion, Betsy Braddock heads out for her daily run. Life is full of coincidences, but in her case it is amazing that within days of her resurrection, the world begins to fall apart. Before she begins the run, she limbers up, but a warning call comes from a Sentinel telling her that she is too closeto the perimeter. Betsy merely suggests that the Sentinels step off the property and solve the problem themselves.

To further “bother” the soldiers running the mammoth machines, Betsy begins a seductive stretching routine in direct eyeshot of each of the Sentinel guards. It is a tactic that always works for her. Get her opponent focused on her body and they will almost always forget about the deadly warrior that lives inside…

From a pier on the lake, Cannonball and Nightcrawler comment on Betsy’s effect on the Sentinels. She has held the attention of each one of giants for the last hour. Kurt’s phone rings, and Sam blasts off to see Betsy.

Kurt is pleasantly surprised to hear his “daughter’s” voice on the other end of the line. TJ is calling out of concern because she too has seen the news broadcasts of the Sentinels posted outside of the mansion. Kurt assures her that everything is as well as it can be. She should stay in London with Captain Britain. The X-Men can handle themselves.

Sam, meanwhile, has reached Betsy who is floating serenely in the air in front of the Sentinels. He blasts by Betsy and nearly knocks her out of the sky…Caught’cha nappin’ Betsy…Psylocke protests that she was meditating, but before she can say anything more, Sam has doubled around for a second pass and buzzes by her again. Psylocke comments that she doesn’t remember Sam being so fast. Just to prove her right, Sam doubles back again and buzzes in for a third pass. This time he grabs Betsy in his arms and brazenly asks for a kiss. Psylocke responds with a direct kick to the solar plexus and is launched directly at one of the Sentinels.

The robot extends its hand and catches Sam as it cautions him to stay out of restricted airspace. Sam protests that he didn’t do it on purpose…what are these monsters anyway…the X-Men’s hall monitors? Psylocke tells “mountain boy” that he’ll be okay…

In the carriage house, Bishop surveys the global situation by means of Tessa’s cyber-network. The news is bad everywhere. Storm was in Africa when M-Day hit and has not returned. Vange Whedon and her ward Marie D’Ancanto have taken up residence in her loft. Vange is a mutant-rights lawyer who, thanks to M-Day, has lost nearly all her clientele. And the government is leaning toward infringement on the rights of the remaining few more casually every day. Marie predicts that with the X-Men locked up by Sentinel guards, mutants who are now powerless may find themselves becoming helpless victims of anyone who wants to get even with them.

Meanwhile, in one of the X-Men’s conference rooms, Scott and Emma welcome Val Cooper and her government entourage. Val is appropriately sympathetic although she admits that she cannot empathize with the heroes’ situation. She introduces Colonel Reyes, head of security for the mansion, and Dr. Senyaka from the Center for Disease Control who immediately asks if the team has made any progress in determining the cause of this affliction. Scott and Emma reply that they haven’t but they are working on it.

As the conversation continues, Emma moves herself and Scott onto the astral plane to allow them to communicate in private about what is going on. Something is shielding everyone’s thoughts from Emma. She cannot read Val’s or anyone else’s mind. Emma can’t say if this is caused by a device or something else entirely…Dr. Senyaka throws an oddly confident smile at Scott and he wonders if even thought they can’t hear their visitors’ thoughts, perhaps their visitors can hear theirs.

Val continues the conversation by recommending that Emma call off her lawyers. Emma counters by suggesting that Val call off her Sentinels. Colonel Reyes interrupts with questions about Cerebra. Can this device track down former mutants? Emma insists that Cerebra will be of no use finding mutants that no longer posses the X-gene. The colonel instantly asks about back up records and last known addresses from before M-Day. Dr. Senyaka states that it is standard disease protocol to track all potential vectors.

Scott silently cues Emma that he deleted all the information from the computer’s memory. He lies and tells the doctor that Cerebra’s files were damaged in the recent power overload and that the contact information is no longer available. The tension grows palpable, and Scott punts: We knew a Cecelia Reyes…

The colonel grows visibly more tense as he explains that Cecelia is his kid sister. She joined the X-Men and he never heard from her again. He abruptly begins to list the ground rules that the X-Men will follow until this “emergency” has passed. All residents are free to come and go, but the colonel reserves the right to send a Sentinel to accompany any mutant leaving campus. Emma responds that he only has five, but the colonel bats it back by asking her if she would like him to deploy a Sentinel for each of them…

Val closes the meeting by reminding Scott that they are here to help. The president considers mutants to be a strategic asset, and it’s in national interest to keep those assets safe. Keep reminding yourself…we’re the good guys, Emma…

Back in Annandale, John and Rachel finish their road trip with a little grocery shopping. Rachel’s uneasiness becomes clear to John when he notices her staring at the photo of a Sentinel on the cover of a news magazine. He’s noticed that she tenses up every time she sees those robots, but all she’ll share is that the robots she knew weren’t friendly. John tries to soothe the young girl’s survivor’s guilt, but Rachel’s issues run deep…she can’t open up to him.

Later that night, Rachel chats on the phone with Kitty. Her grandmother has invited the entire extended family and she is a nervous wreck. Aunts, nieces, cousins…the house is bursting with relatives. In the future that is Rachel’s past, these people were all killed before she could ever get to know them. Now that she has the chance, she’s not sure she wants it…she wishes aloud that Kitty could come, but then jokes that with the driveway full there would be no place for her to park her Sentinel…Kitty makes Rachel promise to have fun, and says that they will talk later. Encouraged blessed little by Kitty’s pep talk, she steps out into the bustling crowd of company.

Hi…I’m Rachel…

Outside the house, in the dark of night, someone is watching the Grey household.

Unaware of any possible danger outside, Rachel is actually enjoying herself. She has met so many people…good, bad, and ugly…but they’re all family. Two relatives named Fred and Russell begin a conversation about mutant rights and concentration camps, and Rachel can’t help but sarcastically suggest that perhaps they should brand mutants with a big “M”.

A friendly young man swoops in and pulls Rachel from the conversation and escorts her away from the heated conversation onto the snow covered deck. He introduces himself as Terry Maguire, and there seems to be a bit of interest between the two. Before they can chat any more, Rachel’s grandpa shows up asking for a dance with his granddaughter. Rachel is embarrassed and telepathically tells him so.

He is amazed by her gifts and wishes aloud that they had known how to better cope when Rachel’s mom was alive. Rachel insists that they did a fine job…her mom saved the universe! John notices that Rachel is tense again, and she confesses that she doesn’t know how to dance.

Grandpa Grey places his arms around Rachel. Then it would be my great pleasure to teach you. Those are his last words.

In a flash of fiery fury, John Grey is blown to bits right before his granddaughter’s eyes.

Brief Description:

Rachel Grey is at a party in Annandale-on-Hudson with her relatives. They are enjoying the friendly atmosphere and catching up with the gossip, when the Shi’ar Death Commandos attack. The swiftness of their assault catches everyone by surprise. John Grey is the first to fall, but many more follow in his footsteps. Rachel emits a telepathic scream, which is heard by several X-Men at the Institute. Nightcrawler grabs the nearest two people to him, Shadowcat and Psylocke, and teleports the fifty miles to the house. The commandos proceed to massacre Rachel’s family, and the four X-Men provide what resistance they can. After a brief but intense battle lasting only twenty-four seconds, Rachel is the last X-Man conscious. She is slammed into the ground by the Commandos’ leader, Black Cloak, who pours something from a small vial onto her back. It burns into her flesh, forming the symbol of the Phoenix. From this moment on, Rachel will be traceable forever.

Full Synopsis:

(Annandale-on-Hudson, New York)

A party is in full swing at the home of John and Elaine Grey. They don’t know it yet, but things are about to become really scary. Nine Shi’ar warriors are monitoring the guests, and they take stock of the surroundings and defensive capability of those inside. They find this to be negligible. Unable to locate their primary target, Rachel Grey, they opt for their secondary target, John Grey. He is eliminated with one blast from Warshot.

Rachel is a combat-trained telepath. She should have seen this attack coming. The commandos are there on the orders of the Majestrix Shi’ar to erase the Grey genome. They intend to kill everyone inside.

It takes three seconds for a spear thrown by Black Cloak to crash through the window and go straight through the portly Fred Harriman, an in-law of Rachel’s on her grampa’s side. He was a philosopher-braniac for a conservative ‘beltway’ think tank. Now he has a gaping hole in his chest. Rachel, blood splattered and shocked, only now realizes what’s going down.

By the fourth second, some of the commandos are entering the house. Bekka Wallis, Rachel’s cousin and a teacher from Chicago, was just showing off her fiancé. They’d just bought a house together and were planning on having kids. She is enveloped in a swarm of tiny creatures called Colony that eat away at her flesh.

Rachel screams, and her telepathic distress call is heard at the Xavier Institute by Cyclops and Emma Frost. It’s also heard by Nightcrawler, Shadowcat and Psylocke. In the next three seconds, Sega is ordered by Black Cloak to secure the Grey’s home. Nobody comes in or out.

Phyllis Dennefer was Rachel’s gramma’s sister. When they were Rachel’s age, they snuck into the Plaza Hotel to see the Beatles. Gramma got a kiss from John Lennon. Aunt Phyllis lived around the corner from the Dakota. She was home the night John Lennon was murdered and heard the gunshots.

Her husband, Roy, had done two tours in Vietnam and taught at West Point. He’d also led troops in Desert Storm and was scheduled for deployment back to Iraq. They are outside the Grey’s home, waiting to go in, unaware of the danger inside. At the Xavier Institute, Nightcrawler realizes the urgency of the situation. He teleports, grabbing Kitty and then Psylocke, despite her wearing only a dressing gown.

After eight seconds, Warshot murders the Dennefers. Rachel’s Uncle Roger, a jazz cornet player, is killed when the sole female warrior, Hypernova, throws her energy daggers at him. The glowing white weapons fry his torso. Nightcrawler, Shadowcat and Psylocke appear on the Grey’s roof just in time to see the Dennefer’s fall, and just before the defensive shield is made operational. Kitty says they need more guys.

Only nine seconds has passed. Psylocke asks Kitty if she has a plan. “We save...” she replies, as she witnesses Kurt’s teleportation attempt fail. Sega’s forcefield has been switched on and it does its job in keeping anyone from leaving.

After seeing John Grey evaporated right in front of her, Rachel may be shocked, but her shock turns to anger. Now it’s her turn.

During the next three seconds, Psylocke appears next to Warshot with her psychic knife at the ready. Inside the house, Devo encases young Julian in a bubble and uses some form of gas to eat him instantaneously. Kitty sneaks up behind him with a baseball bat.

Fourteen seconds, and Rachel is entering the house. Psylocke is noticed and attacked by Warshot, who shoots at her. Fortunately, Nightcrawler manages to ‘port her away from danger just in the nick of time. Kitty slams the baseball bat into Devo’s back and he falls.

A second later, and Rachel is using her telekinesis to disperse Colony who has devoured Terry Maguire. He had eyes that sparkled and a smile to die for when he looked at Rachel only minutes earlier. They had only five minutes together, but for a telepath that can feel like a lifetime. He was going to call her tomorrow and invite her to the movies. He wanted to kiss her but now, after trying to save his kid brother, he lies dead beside him.

Nightcrawler appears with Psylocke right above Warshot, and Betsy wastes no time in plunging her psychic knife into their attacker’s face. For Kitty, her resistance came too late for Julian, and the pressure’s beginning to show.

Rachel sees her Uncle Liam, Pastor Liam, who has met the same fate as Terry Maguire. He loved Keats, Dylan Thomas and James Joyce. He had a voice like honey and his sermons were a celebration of language as well as faith. Nightcrawler and Psylocke teleport into the thick of the action. They can’t evacuate, so they have to win.

One of the commandos, Krait, who looks like a human-sized Eagle, tears through a vehicle outside and attacks Rachel’s cousins, Mary-Margaret and Kindra. They had talked with Rachel about boys, fashion, music and scandal and concluded that she was woeful about them all.

Rachel realizes that Kitty is in danger from Offset, a bug-like creature that catches Kitty by surprise. She asks Kurt to save Kitty, and also asks Psylocke to cover her gramma. Betsy replies that she has her, but she is enveloped by a hulking stone-featured creature named Shell. At least it keeps the creature away from Derry Campbell, another of Rachel’s cousins from Texas.

After nineteen seconds, Rachel Grey flies into the air to take out Krait with a telekinetic blast, but manages to slam them both against the forcefield in her fury. Psylocke, seemingly helpless, is confronted by Hypernova, who holds out her own energy dagger at Betsy’s face. Psylocke it seems isn’t as helpless as expected, and she generates her psychic knife from her left fist. She thrusts it through Hypernova as Shell crumbles around her. Offset takes Kitty and plunges something resembling an organic syringe into Kitty’s stomach. It has locked her solid and intends to feast on her body.

After twenty-one seconds, Nightcrawler is on the roof after saving Kitty from Offset. He tells her to remain on the roof where it’s safe. “Like hell!” she replies. At that moment, Rachel and Krait crash to the roof unconscious, knocking out Kurt and Kitty at the same time. Psylocke stands over her downed opponent, but is slammed unconscious by Black Cloak. Rachel manages to pull herself to her feet. She apologizes, even though there’s nothing to apologize for. Black Cloak recognizes her as being the primary target. The mist-form of Sega informs him that she’s untraceable, but Black Cloak replies that she won’t be for long.

Rachel lets loose a burst of her telekinetic power at Black Cloak, but the warrior remains unfazed by her attack. He shoves her to the ground with his spear and pops open a small vial he’s carrying. One drop of a strange yellowish green liquid is all it takes. It drops on Rachel’s back, and begins to burn a strange symbol into her flesh: a simple image of a phoenix. Black Cloak then knocks Rachel unconscious. “She will never hide again.”

Brief Description:
Rachel has skipped off to Chicago, leaving a hard-light image-induced representation of herself behind in order to fool the Sentinels. She meets with a psychiatrist whom Kitty Pryde trusts, and they chat about how Rachel feels about everything that’s been going on. Meanwhile, Bishop is given permission by Val Cooper to visit Manhattan to check on his old stomping ground, and to ensure that the Shi’ar Death Commandos are safely behind bars. He hooks up with Detective Charlotte Jones when he gets there. Val later realizes Rachel is missing, and informs Nightcrawler. He scrambles the Blackbird and calls Bishop on the phone, telling him to expect to be picked up shortly. Bishop notices squad cars racing towards the facility where the Commando’s are being held and takes the initiative. The Commando’s are free, but Bishop arrives to try and put them back behind bars. With just himself and Charlotte Jones against superior numbers, the fight is hard, and Charlotte Jones is grabbed by Black Cloak before he teleports his team to Chicago. Nightcrawler and the team arrive aboard Blackbird, and he teleports Bishop to the plane. Meanwhile, after realizing through talking to the psychiatrist that she must do something about the Shi’ar, Rachel is attacked by the Death Commandos.

Full Synopsis:
(Africa)
Wolverine visits Storm in Africa. Ororo is quite upset after a young mutant was crucified by a group calling themselves freedom fighters. She was protecting a village before her powers disappeared on M-Day. These ‘freedom fighters’ came across the border for food, medicine and to steal children as recruits.

After they bury the former mutant in a grave they dug together, Ororo explains that their protector was made an example of, and her villagers killed. She is infuriated, and summons a lightning blast to burn the cross her friend was taken from. She tells Logan that mutants are no longer to be respected, or feared… only slaughtered. Logan asks if she figures to teach them different. No, she replies, she means to kill them.

(The Xavier Institute for Higher Learning)
Rachel Grey is feeling down at the thought of being caged. The Sentinels protect the Institute’s residents, but she compares them to the Nazis that kept Captain Hilts captive in The Great Escape. No matter what they did to him, they couldn’t break his spirit. She readies herself for her morning shower, watched as always by the all-seeing eyes of the Sentinel O*N*E Project.

She steps into the shower and, as she bathes, her body disappears. Rachel is a rebellious sort, you see, and she also has a friend called Forge who is a genius inventor. He’s provided Rachel with an image-inducer that not only generates a solid light representation of Rachel; it also comes with a heat signature. The possibilities for mischief are positively delicious.

Outside, Psylocke is exercising, getting back into shape after spending a little time recovering from her injuries. Val Cooper appears with hot drinks and donuts for her, as well as Bishop and Nightcrawler. She wonders if Bishop might like a game of chess. He agrees, but doesn’t think Val will be up to his game. Val replies that none of her colleagues are on her level either. Bishop tells her that he doesn’t play with pieces - the game’s all in his head. Val is up for that. Betsy asks how they keep from cheating. Bishop tells her that one pays attention. Val kicks off with king’s bishop to KB4.

(Chicago)
Rachel is on a clock. The image-inducer is programmed to activate morning and evening to convince the Sentinels that she’s sleeping in her room through the night. She wonders how long it’ll take for them to realize she is gone, and then how long ‘til they find her. She has traveled to Chicago to meet with a Dr. Maureen Lyszinski, a psychiatrist respected by Kitty Pryde. Rachel’s nervous about talking to her, but feels she needs to speak to someone.

Introductions are carried out, and Maureen enquires as to Kitty’s well being. Rachel assures her she is fine, and wasn’t affected by M-Day. Maureen asks Rachel if she was affected. Rachel loses herself in a thought momentarily, before realizing where she is. “What?” she asks. Maureen tells her that she and Kitty are very alike. Rachel informs her that they’re roommates. Maureen presumes they are veterans of the same war, as they both have the same haunted look in their eyes.

Rachel informs Dr. Lyszinski that people are all ghosts to her. Within the doctor’s lifetime, almost everyone she knows; everyone she sees around her, dies! She came to this time to ensure that future never happens. She wanders to the window and looks out into the street. She knows her task is a difficult one. No matter how much they seem to change, history still repeats itself. First time out, she informs the doctor, Sentinels destroyed the Grey family. This time it’s the Shi’ar. They’re still dead. She can’t seem to break the wheel of time. It just keeps turning. Maureen asks what Rachel wants from her. What does she want from herself?

(The Xavier Institute for Higher Learning)
Val and Bishop’s chess game ends with Val conceding. Bishop is happy with their game. He feels Val is on a par with Charles Xavier himself. Val suggests that next time they play poker. She informs him that his excursion to Manhattan has been approved, and she thanks him for following the rules. She asks him to check on the Shi’ar Commandos while he’s there, to make sure they’re snugly incarcerated. “Don’t trust their jailors?” asks Bishop. Val doesn’t trust anyone.

Suddenly, Cannonball flies overhead and Val covers her ears. Sam is being hotly pursued by one of the giant Sentinels. He’s playing with it, practicing his movement and agility. The Sentinel is improving too. Val’s idea is that the Sentinel learns to adapt to what it learns, and the pilot provides the inspiration to cope with the unknown. At this stage, the robot isn’t quite up to Cannonball’s standards. Val doesn’t think the nation needs to depend on the kindness of the X-Men as far as national security is concerned. Strange as it sounds, Bishop agrees with her.

(Manhattan, later)
Bishop is taking a tour of the area. It’s changed enormously since M-Day. They stand outside Wannabes, which is no longer a viable business. After M-Day, there were much fewer mutants, and even less public interest in playing mutant. Charlotte says it seems to fall somewhere between dressing up as a terrorist or a victim of the holocaust. She looks up and asks Bishop if the Sentinel standing nearby goes everywhere with him. He replies that it does when they’re off-campus. It’s for their own protection.

Charlotte is a little skeptical, but Bishop says they did okay with them against the Shi’ar. Charlotte has heard what happened to the Grey family. Anything new? she asks. Bishop informs her that the feds are holding the Shi’ar Death Commandos in the Metropolitan Correctional Facility. That’s his next stop.

(O*N*E Mobile Operations Command)
Val looks at a computer monitor. She’s impressed with Rachel’s deception. Nightcrawler teleports in, having been given the exact coordinates by Val, and asks why she has requested such a clandestine meeting. Val says she worked with Forge for years and she can tell the difference between what’s real, and what’s the product of an image-inducer. She turns the screen to show Kurt the image of Rachel Grey, and asks him where she is.

(Manhattan - the Metropolitan Correctional Facility)
The Shi’ar Death Commandos are in their cells, kept there by lasers. Offset informs Black Cloak that they have a positive lock on their target thanks to the deathmark. She is a significant distance from the X-Men, and she is alone. Black Cloak figures they’ve waited long enough. He orders the gaseous Sega to neutralize their captors. Sega knocks out the guards and everyone else at the facility. Black Cloak then orders Colony to take care of the doors. Colony, which consists of thousands of tiny bug-like creatures, eats away at the supporting columns that house the lasers. They disintegrate, and the Commandos are free.

Elsewhere in Manhattan, Bishop receives a phone call from Nightcrawler. He informs her that Rachel’s gone missing and they’ve scrambled the Blackbird. Their E.T.A to pick him up is five minutes. Bishop asks him to hold on as police cars race past him. He knows something’s wrong.

As the Shi’ar Death Commandos exit the facility, Black Cloak warns his comrades not to underestimate their target or the X-Men. Their window for action is small, and their margin for error, non-existent. Suddenly, Bishop appears and punches Krait. “Actually people, that window just closed!” A second punch sends Krait flying into Black Cloak, and then both he and Detective Jones open fire. Jones orders them to surrender, whilst questioning herself as to why she always seems to follow the X-Men into these fights.

Devo erects a forcefield to protect himself, cutting himself off from Colony. Warshot opens fire, hitting Detective Jones, whilst Hypernova hurls her energy daggers at Bishop. Fortunately, he can absorb energy, and he redirects this, and more, back at both Warshot and the Skrull, Flaw. Offset is about to devour Charlotte when she pulls a pistol from nowhere and shoots her in the throat. However, Black Cloak then grabs her and takes pulls her to his chest.

Above them, Bishop’s protector, one of the giant O*N*E Sentinels, tears the roof off the facility and neutralizes Sega immediately by freezing it. Black Cloak realizes that he has a clear signal, and teleports his team away, along with Charlotte Jones. Bishop asks the Sentinel’s pilot if they can track them, and if there’s any sign of Charlotte. They reply that it’s negative to both, but the point of origin of the transmit beam is orbital. He then informs Bishop that the Blackbird has arrived. Nightcrawler teleports to his side, and tells him that they know where they’re going. He teleports Bishop to the plane, hoping they aren’t too late.

(Chicago)
Maureen asks Rachel how what she’s been telling her feels. Helpless, comes the response. Maureen is surprised that she feels like this with all her powers. Rachel tells her that her powers couldn’t stop M-Day. They couldn’t save her family. She hasn’t stopped her future from coming true. In fact, everything’s turning out worse. Again, Maureen asks how that makes her feel. Rachel wipes a tear from her eye. She’s tired. She wants to give up.

Suddenly, the phoenix symbol appears over her left eye, and she then thinks about how her mom never gave up. She wants the Shi’ar to be afraid. She wants them dead. She screams it out loud. “I want all Shi’ar to burn!” Suddenly, the windows shatter and the Shi’ar Death Commandos pour through into the office. Krait takes the lead. “Death Commando’s. We have the target. Kill her!”    

Brief Description:
Rachel Grey is attacked in the office of psychiatrist Maureen Lyszinski, by Krait and Flaw, two of the Shi’ar Death Commandos. She pushes them away before flying away with the doctor. She then stuns the other commandos with a telepathic assault before making her way to a train station. There, Black Cloak manages to force her down with a series of small explosions, using coordinates given to him by the captain of a nearby starship. Offset and Black Cloak then try and grab her, only for a brave police officer to step in on Rachel’s behalf. Meanwhile, the starship prepares to launch a devastating assault on Chicago. The X-Men arrive as back up along with a Sentinel from Project O*N*E. Krait takes out the Sentinel, and Cannonball heads off in pursuit, taking him down by destroying his feathers. The Sentinel takes down Warshot, whilst Rachel fights Flaw in the museum. She is backed up by Nightcrawler and Psylocke, who take out both Flaw and his accomplice, Hypernova. Black Cloak is the last to fall to Bishop’s fist. Suddenly, Rachel senses the starship’s intent and, using Psylocke’s power as well as her own, she creates a forcefield that covers the city. The starship’s cannons explode on the forcefield, and Rachel redirects the energy back at the ship, disabling it. With the drama over, Rachel assures Kurt that she does not intend to kill anyone. She wants to find a way to bring honor to both her and her mother’s name. Meanwhile, in Africa, Wolverine and Storm discover a young mutant who has been killed by a land mine. It appears someone is using local kids to form an army, and looking to corner the market in mutants.

Full Synopsis:
(Africa)
Wolverine is visiting with Storm in Africa. As he checks out a soil sample, Ororo notices something in the distance. She picks up Logan and flies to within around fifty yards from what she’s spotted. She asks Logan what he sees, and he replies that he can see a body and he can see vultures, but nothing that walks.

The body lies near a small crater in the earth surrounded by rubble. Logan asks if she can generate a direct line of thunderclaps, low to the ground, between them and the body. With a simple gesture, Ororo produces a small low-lying cloud and creates forks of lightning that connect with the dirt. As they hit, a multitude of small explosions go off. “Land mines. It’s a trap,” exclaims Logan.

With the mines now cleared, they approach the body. Logan asks Ororo if she knows him. She informs her friend that she recognizes him from the professor’s files. He was a low-level telekinetic native to the area. Logan figures that from the tracks left, he was running. ‘Ro presumes that the mutant must not have known it was a minefield, but Logan cuts off a shackle with his claws and holds it up. “He knew, ‘Ro.”

Logan has marked two dozen scents on this trail. Twenty of them are fighters and the rest just kids. This kid was one of them. It happens a lot in this part of the world, he adds. They steal a bunch of kids, brutalize them and hey presto, you got yourself an army. It looks like these guys are looking to corner the market in mutants. Ororo replies that, in that case, it’s up to them to stop them.

(Chicago - the offices of Dr. Maureen Lyszinski)
Krait and Flaw crash through the office windows in an attempt to attack Marvel Girl. However, Rachel uses her telekinesis to hurl them backwards from where they came. She grabs the doc’s wrist and apologizes before flying them both out of the building. Outside, Shell, Offset and Warshot look on, as Rachel reaches behind her and launches a telepathic assault on her assailants. Maureen covers her eyes as they tear through the streets to safety.

Watching the action from up on high is Black Cloak. He is impressed with Marvel Girl’s actions, and contacts a Shi’ar starship orbiting the Earth. The ship’s captain is watching events on his display as Black Cloak asks for assistance in this matter. The captain replies that they beamed them out of jail right to her location. Wasn’t that enough? Black Cloak feels the X-Men are proving as formidable as ever. The captain tells him that his tactical officer is transmitting firing coordinates to him. He suggests that this time he doesn’t miss. He should clean up this mess before it turns into an unmitigated disaster.

Marvel Girl makes her way as far as an elevated railway station. Suddenly, small explosions all around her cause her to stutter and drop Maureen, who is helped onto the platform by commuters as Rachel struggles on the track. A train approaches, and it takes a determined effort from Maureen and the others to pull her to safety before she is run over. On her knees, Rachel hears a voice and looks up. Facing her is Black Cloak, flanked by Offset, two of the Shi’ar Death Commandos.

“Flight will serve you no better than resistance, young Phoenix. Both are futile,” warns Black Cloak. Rachel tells him to stop calling her that. Phoenix was her mother. A brave police officer aims her pistol at Black Cloak. She doesn’t understand what’s going on there, but she’ll shoot if they make a move. Offset informs her that they are duly constituted agents of the Shi’ar Imperium. She will defend Rachel at her peril. She lunges at the officer, mouth wide open bearing some fearsome teeth. Rachel thinks quickly, knocking the officer’s legs from underneath her and causing her to fall backwards away from Offset’s assault. She then hurls the commando into the air with a telekinetic blast.

Watching the action aboard his starship, the Shi’ar captain asks his tactical officer for a probability analysis of the commandos’ success. She gives him fifty-fifty at best. He orders battle stations sounded, and for the ship to be moved into firing position. “Enable the main cannons.” The tactical officer asks about the commandos. The captain replies that, if there’s time, they’ll beam them clear, otherwise their names will be added to the roll of honor. He asks his weapons officer to show him the target profile.

An image appears on his holographic display showing what will happen should the cannon strike its target. The circle of annihilation will cover a radius of a hundred miles. Before he can be informed of the probability of Rachel being killed in the attack, an officer informs him that the X-Men reinforcements are approaching the combat zone. Should they interdict? The captain is sure the commandos will deal with them. They will proceed as ordered.

Down below, Val Cooper is aboard the Blackbird, piloted by Cannonball. Also on board are Bishop, Nightcrawler and Psylocke. Flanking the plane is one of Project O*N*E’s Sentinels. As they close in, the Sentinel is attacked by the winged Krait, who slices through the Sentinel’s neck. For the X-Men inside, it’s time to go. Nightcrawler teleports Cannonball and Psylocke outside, leaving Bishop to pilot the Blackbird. Kurt orders Sam to take out Krait, whilst he and Psylocke go and back up Rachel. Bishop then fires three powerful grappling hooks at the Sentinel, ensuring it can be lowered safely to the ground.

Below them, a young boy is playing with a toy Sentinel which is in combat with Magneto. As he plays, he senses a strange rumbling sound and looks outside his window. The massive Sentinel is deposited on the ground, and the grappling hooks release it. “Wow,” exclaims the child. Up above, Cannonball heads straight for Krait, and despite being caught by the Shi’ar’s razor-like wing, he has a trick of his own up his sleeve. He rockets past Krait, ripping his wings and disabling him.

Warshot decides to take a pop at the grounded Sentinel, firing several rounds of depleted uranium at it. The Sentinel’s fingers rotate with great speed. They intercept the rounds and the Sentinel’s mass absorbs the energy they contain. It then retaliates by firing out of its finger. Warshot falls as a couple of blasts his him square in the chest. “Cool,” gasps the boy watching from the window. The Sentinel appears to wink at him as his finger cools down.

The Sentinel’s pilot informs Val Cooper that Warshot is down, and that they have locator lock on the other Death Commandos. However, his flight systems are off-line. Bishop asks if there’s any way he can get there, and Cannonball swoops him up to oblige, picking him up around he ribcage and flying him to the Field Museum of Natural History.

There, Marvel Girl has her hands full with the Warskrull, Flaw. She skrags his face with a TK blast, but he keeps on coming. She tries kicking him, but he grabs her leg and shape shifts, asking if she would prefer to die at the hands of her best friend, Kitty, or her grandmother, Elaine. Before she can respond, Psylocke appears behind him and plunges her psychic katana through his brain.

Above them, the glass roof shatters as Cannonball aims Bishop right at Black Cloak, who has caught Rachel in his grip. He smashes the Shi’ar in the face, but is turned as he falls. Black Cloak says Bishop brings honor to his name, but his efforts are wasted. The Majestrix will be obeyed, and the ‘starchilde’ will be executed. Rachel, now free, informs Psylocke that Hypernova is somewhere about. “So’s Kurt,” replies Betsy.

Right on cue, Nightcrawler appears behind Hypernova and delivers a punishing kick to the back of her head. With only Black Cloak left, Psylocke and Marvel Girl use their powers to hold him momentarily, whilst Bishop recovers. He then delivers an uppercut to the big guy, smashing his mask and putting him down for the count.

With the battle over, there is so much that Rachel would like to say to her friends, starting with thanks, but nothing makes it outside her mouth. She suddenly senses something is horribly wrong, and receives a telepathic image of the Shi’ar starship captain. “Main weapon…” he says, as reality hits home with Rachel. “Fire!” Rachel quickly tells Psylocke to combine her teke with her own. Betsy asks why, but Rachel orders her to just do it. Black Cloak sits up, and realizes his captain has betrayed them.

Rachel and Betsy combine their prodigious powers and Rachel creates a massive forcefield that shields the city of Chicago. The Shi’ar’s cannon blasts hit the shield, and the resulting explosion covers a massive area. The public watching from below are horrified, as Rachel and Betsy continue to maintain the forcefield. Rachel then redirects the cannon fire back towards the ship, and the blasts rip right through it.

With the craft out of action and the Death Commandos’ beaten, the X-Men recover outside the museum, guarded by four Sentinels and numerous O*N*E soldiers. Val Cooper makes some calls and gets some results, and passes a comment through Bishop to Rachel about her being grounded through the next millennium. She isn’t joking, either. From now on, Rachel’s sessions with Maureen Lyszinski will have to be long-distance and telepathic.

Rachel sits on the museum steps drinking from a paper cup. Nightcrawler asks how she’s doing. She replies that she has no complaints. He enquires about the starship, and she informs him that the busted crew is okay. She asks if her being fine surprises him. Kurt admits that, after all she’s been through, it does. Rachel tells him she wanted to kill them more than almost anything, but her family’s got enough bad karma to balance already. So, she made a choice. She will not kill. She is her mother’s daughter, and she means to find a way that brings them both honor.