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Provide a full summary of the comic book.

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X-Men 2 Prequel: Nightcrawler
The Szardos Traveling Circus, currently in Canada. Patrons fill the seats inside the big top tent as another act gets underway for their entertainment. In the arena, circus artists dressed in white cloaks are in some sort of church scenario, ‘Oh, heavenly father, I offer myself to you - your humble servant to do your bidding’ exclaims one of the stars of the show, Amanda, while up above, on the trapeze platform, a blue-skinned young man that looks rather like a demon, keeps telling himself that it is only a show - entertainment, a bit of fun, that he is now demeaning himself by doing this, but adding to the experience with his uniqueness.
‘Show me the way, Oh Lord. Send me a sign!’ exclaims Amanda, when suddenly, the blue-skinned acrobat leaps downwards, carrying a staff that resembles the Devil’s, he lands on a large wooden cross, ‘God has abandoned you, woman! God has abandoned you all!’ he shouts. ‘Noo! It cannot be true!’ a “shocked” Amanda replies with dramatic flair. ‘But it is true!’ the “demon” exclaims as he grabs Amanda. ‘Now, really. Do I look like someone who would lie to you?’ he asks. ‘But he - heeey, that’s now how the script goes!’ Amanda scolds her co-star, Kurt, quietly.
‘It is today, Amanda!’ Kurt exclaims as he yanks the trapeze, sending the two of them bouncing upwards, much to the delight of the audience. Amanda’s shoes fall off as she tells Kurt that he takes her breath away every time that he does that. Landing on a platform, Kurt looks into Amanda’s eyes and tells her that he lives to take her breath away. ‘You…you do?’ Amanda replies, confused, before turning away from Kurt, who has moved in closer, and asks him what has gotten into him tonight. Returning to the performance, Kurt shouts ‘God shall not have you, oh beauteous one! Not this night, nor any other! Tonight, you belong to the Devil!’ Kurt shouts, before laughing wildly as he and Amanda swing on the trapeze.
At the other trapeze platform on the other side of the rink, a handsome acrobat turns to his colleague, both dressed like angels, he mutters that Kurt is ad-lobbing again. ‘How am I supposed to know when my cue is up if he’s ad-lobbing? I’m gonna get all mixed up!’ exclaims Werner. His friend tells him to relax, and reminds him that his cue should be the swing-out anyway. ‘Yes it’s true, ladies and gentlemen! The Devil is a real swinger!’ exclaims Kurt as he and Amanda swing above the audience, who all groan. ‘Help me, oh Lord!’ Amanda exclaims. ‘Send me an angel!’.
‘Hey, where do you think you’re going, lady? I’m not finished with you yet!’ Kurt exclaims while Werner begins to swing out to rescue Amanda. ‘Come on, baby - don’t you know sinners have more fun?’ Kurt asks, to which the audience laugh. Suddenly, Amanda falls from the trapeze, ‘You haven’t lived until you’ve loved a guy with a tail!’ Kurt exclaims, while Amanda screams. ‘Ooooohhhh!’ gasp the audience, as Werner swings into place, but he cannot reach Amanda as she plummets to the ground.
‘Oh no! He missed her!’ a shocked Kurt whispers, before suddenly vanishing with the noise bamf. The other actors look up at Amanda, flailing towards them, while someone in the audience exclaims that the demon has just vanished. ‘It reappeared!’ someone else shouts as indeed, Kurt reappears at Amanda’s side, in another bamf he clutches her, ‘I’ve got you’ he assures her, then he hit’s the ground, cushioning Amanda’s fall. ‘I don’t think this was part of the show…’ one women in the audience remarks, while a man suggests that somebody call an ambulance, and the other circus performers gather around the motionless bodies of Amanda and Kurt.
Later, ‘That was a stupid thing you did, Kurt. Stupid!’ exclaims Margali Szardos inside a tent, where Kurt has just been bandaged up. Margali asks Kurt what he was thinking, and tells him that he cannot change the cues in the middle of the performance - especially when the net has not been rolled out yet. Margali reminds Kurt that he has been with her circus since she found him as a baby and should know better. ‘I said I was sorry’ Kurt mumbles, to which Margali replies that sorry is not good enough.
Margali tells Kurt that he is like a son to her and a brother to Amanda. Margali adds that she does not mean to be harsh, but now that Kurt has broken some ribs, it might be a whole month before he can perform again - and the circus needs him. ‘Why would you do such a thing?’ Margali asks, while outside the tent, Amanda and Werner are locked in an embrace, as Werner asks Amada if she is all right. ‘I am now…’ Amanda replies as she puts her head against Werner’s chest. Kurt watches this through the opening in the tent, and in reply to Margali’s question says ‘I don’t know Margali - I guess I thought - the devil made me do it!’. Margali puts a hand on Kurt’s shoulder and assures him that whatever is bothering him, will work itself out.
Later, inside a church, where Kurt is kneeling, looking up at the altar. ‘I love God. I have to’ he thinks to himself. ‘Without a belief in His divine plan for all of us - a mutant like me, a person born with strange and very inhuman-like-powers - would have no reason to go on’ Kurt thinks. ‘Without God’s love - without a belief that God loves me - what else could there be in life for me?’ he wonders, when a voice calls down to him from the entrance to the church - it’s Amanda. ‘Are you all right?’ she asks, stepping into the light.
Kurt looks at the ground as he replies that he is fine, but embarrassed, before asking her how she knew he would be here. ‘Old theaters, old movies, or the nearest church. You’re sort of predictable that way’ Amanda replies. ‘I suppose I am…’ Kurt remarks, grinning that he will have to be more impulsive in the future. ‘No! Please!’ exclaims Amanda, assuring Kurt that she has had enough of his spontaneity for one day. Kurt apologizes, telling Amanda that he doesn’t know what got into him. ‘I do. You made it very clear’ Amanda replies, before suddenly, kissing Kurt on the lips.
‘If God wasn’t there to love me…who else would?’ Kurt thinks, before kissing Amanda back. After breaking the kiss, Kurt tells Amanda that this is too good to be true, to which Amanda replies that before today, he never let her know how he really felt about her. ‘And besides, ever since mother found you alone and abandoned as a baby, you always seemed to think of me as a sister’ Amanda points out. Kurt however replies that he never thought of Amanda as a sister. ‘I just always assumed you thought of me as a monster!’ he explains, putting his hands on Amanda’s face.
Amanda touches Kurt’s hands and assures him that she never thought of him that way, before suggesting that they leave together - now. ‘Leave? Why?’ asks Kurt. ‘Can’t we just stay with Margali and the circus and just be together?’. Amanda replies that her mother would never approve. ‘She loves you as an adopted child, loves you as a son - but never as a son-in-law’ Amanda replies, reminding Kurt that it was Margali’s idea to put him in the devil costume. ‘How do you think she truly feels about you?’ Amanda asks.
Kurt replies that he knows it was Margali’s idea, but that he never thought of it as a “racist” thing or an anti-mutant thing, that Margali somehow thought less of him. ‘You should hear the things she says about you when you’re not around!’ Amanda exclaims. ‘No…no, I can’t believe -’ Kurt exclaims, to which Amanda assures him that it is true, that Margali tells her things she would never tell Kurt himself. Amanda places her head on Kurt’s shoulder, telling him that they should go away now together. ‘Don’t you want to be with me?’ she asks. A solemn Kurt replies that he does - more than anything.
Meanwhile, at the Szardos Circus, Margali enters a caravan and exclaims ‘Oh, for crying out loud. Have you no shame, Amanda?’ as she sees her daughter sitting on Werner’s lap, arms around his neck as they have been making out, Werner‘s shirt is unbuttoned and Amanda‘s is hanging off her shoulders. ‘Mother, really. Does the word “knock” mean nothing to you?’ Amanda asks.
‘Do the words “This is my trailer” mean nothing to you?’ Margali replies, before asking Amanda if she has seen Kurt anywhere, explaining that she cannot find him around the camp. Amanda replies that she hasn’t since after he was bandaged up following the performance, and asks her mother if she has checked the local church, to which Margali replies that she hasn’t, but supposes that she should.
Nearby in some woods, Kurt and Amanda rush down a path, and Kurt asks Amanda if there is nothing she wants from the caravans, or to say goodbye to her mother. ‘I’ll say goodbye when it’s too late for them to change our plans’ Amanda replies, when suddenly, Kurt asks her to wait. ‘No, Kurt. Keep running!’ Amanda exclaims, but Kurt drops to his knees and tells Amanda that he needs to know something. ‘You said earlier…you said…”son-in-law”. Did you mean that?’ he asks. Amanda replies that she has never meant anything more in her life, to which Kurt exclaims that he never imagined he would ever hear those words from her. ‘I love you, Amanda’ he whispers, before Amanda replies ‘And I, you’ before asking Kurt to kiss her, and promising to show him just how much she loves him.
However - in reality - Kurt is making out with nothing. A group of soldiers suddenly surround him, ‘Disgusting’ remarks the leader, reminding his officers to keep in mind that they are not seeing what the mutant is seeing. ‘What the hell is he seeing?’ one of the soldiers asks, addressing his commander as Mister Stryker. ‘Something that almost makes me wish I were being mind-controlled, apparently’ Stryker remarks, motioning to where Kurt has begun writhing around on the ground, before Stryker orders his soldiers to load Kurt into the truck before it gets too graphic. Stryker explains that Kurt will not feel anything, that he won’t even know they are there.
One of the soldiers asks if there is anything they should be careful of, anything that would disrupt whatever it is that Mutant Twelve is doing to this one. Stryker replies that, apart from distance, nothing can interrupt Mutant Twelve’s unique mind control abilities once they have began. At least, as far as he has been able to ascertain. ‘Ewww. He’s sticking his tongue out, sir. He’s tongueing the air!’ one of the other soldiers exclaims in disgust, while another soldier asks Stryker if there is a time limit, when will the control over the mutant’s mind wear off. ‘When I tell it to, and not before’ Stryker replies.
The next day, at Alkali Lake, Canada, inside a large facility, Kurt lies on a cold bench in a cell, alone, but he believes himself to be in a bed, in a comfortable room with Amanda at his side, telling her that he has never been so happy. ‘Me either. I love you so much, Kurt’ “Amanda” replies, when suddenly, Kurt moans and clutches his head. “Amanda” asks him what is wrong, but as he sits up, Kurt replies that he doesn’t know. Suddenly, “Amanda” begins to fade away. Kurt starts screaming for her, even when the illusion of the luxurious bedroom wears off and he can see his cold cell, he still calls out to her.
‘Shut up you animal!’ a voice calls out via a comm-link. ‘Who is that? What have you done with Amanda!?’ Kurt replies urgently. Suddenly, the doors to the cell open, and Stryker enters, telling Kurt that Amanda is gone and never coming back. ‘Unless…of course…you do as you’re told’ Stryker smirks. ‘Who are you? And what have you done with Amanda?’ Kurt asks. ‘If you’ve hurt her in anyway…’ he begins, to which Stryker assures Kurt that when he sees Amanda again she will be exactly as he remembers her.
‘Now, then…instead of getting into who I am, I’d like to know more about you’ Stryker declares, explaining that the intelligence they have gathered is rather incomplete. Kurt continues to crouch on the floor as Stryker remarks that they know he is highly agile, and speaks five languages, including Swedish. ’We also know that you can move yourself through some kind of dimensional portal - some form of teleportation - and can cover large distances in blink of an eye’. Stryker smirks as he asks Kurt ’What else do I need to know about you?’.
Kurt frowns, when suddenly, he screams in pain and is overwhelmed by a powerful blast. ’Let me guess…you were trying to do that teleportation trick I just mentioned’ Stryker remarks, supposing that something along the lines of “to hell with this” went through Kurt’s little monster mind, and figuring that he could locate Amanda - somehow - find an exit, and make his way to safety. ’Until you discovered that we had considered that option also, motioning to the collar around Kurt’s neck.
‘Hurt’s, doesn’t it?’ Stryker sniggers, before asking Kurt what other interesting mutant talents he possesses. Kurt remains silent, before grinning as he exclaims ‘Well, if you rub my belly…my leg wiggles uncontrollably’. Stryker is not amused and takes his leave. ‘What? Are you leaving - don’t you want to give it a try?’ Kurt asks. When he gets no response, he jokes ‘All right. Maybe later. I’m here all week. Wherever here is’, before the cell door slams closed on him.
Back at the Szardos Circus, Amanda approaches her mother, who is leaning up against a tree, a few meters away from the caravans, and asks her if there is any sign of Kurt. Margali replies that there hasn’t been, and that she is really worried. Margali informs Amanda that Kurt was not at the church and that no one has seen him since just after the last performance. ‘We‘ve waited as long as we can. The circus has to leave for Calgary’ Margali announces.
Amanda puts a hand on her mother’s shoulder and remarks that she is sure Kurt will be okay, before telling her mother that she knows she is probably imagining Kurt dead in a ditch someplace, but that she shouldn’t, as Kurt is probably just upset with himself over what he did and is hiding out for a while. Pensive, Margali replies that Amanda is probably right, that Kurt has done it before. ‘There are just so many bad people out there who hate mutants…and Kurt is as mutant as they come!’.
Back in his cell, Kurt is praying. ‘Please let Amanda be safe. And Margali, Woodhead, Chester and all the others’ he asks God. As two soldiers enter the cell, dragging a weak mutant, Kurt adds ‘And while you’re at it, please bless these soldiers, for they know not what they do’. One of the soldiers tells his colleague to put this mutant on the other cot, before turning to Kurt and asking him what it is he is doing. ‘Are you praying?’ he exclaims. ‘No you don’t! you don’t pray - God doesn’t listen to prayers from animals!’ the soldier shouts cruelly.
‘And please bless Tiny Tim here most of all -’ Kurt exclaims, to which the soldier exclaims ‘That’s it, demon, that was a mistake!’ and brings out his baton. ‘You’re a mistake - one of God’s mistakes!’ the soldier exclaims, despite his colleague, who calls him Norris, telling him to stop. ‘You don’t PRAY!’ Norris shouts as he smacks Kurt hard across the face with his baton. The other soldier begins shoving Norris out of the cell, while Norris warns Kurt that he better not catch him on his knees again. ‘Not praying to my God!’ he exclaims, while the other soldier asks him what is wrong with him. ‘Not my God!’ shouts Norris as the cell door slams shut, leaving Kurt lying in a pool of his own blood.
Meanwhile, the Szardos Circus is all packed up and everyone is on their way to Calgary. In their trailer, Margali gazes out her window, clearly saddened by Kurt’s disappearance. Amanda takes her mothers hand, and gazes out the window with her.
Back in the Alkali Lake facility, Kurt sits beside the mutant that was brought into his cell and tells her to hang in, as she has survived the worst of it. The mutant lets out some cries, while Kurt assures her that he is here, before wondering who these heartless monsters are. ‘You need to be in a hospital, in antiseptic conditions. Not rotting in a cell like this!’ Kurt remarks, when suddenly the woman screams. Kurt shouts at the door, asking for someone to help him, while the woman screams again, then, suddenly, giant claws, like long fingernails begin extending out from her fingers.
‘God in heaven…’ Kurt whispers, before a baton is shoved in front of his neck and he is pulled backwards by Norris, who has entered the cell with several other guards. One of the guards tells the others to watch out for the claws in her fingers, as they are sharp, while Norris remarks that he thought they were going to remove those things. ‘No they - I think they put them in’ another soldier remarks. ‘You’re kidding me!’ another exclaims, while Norris takes pleasure in smacking Kurt to the ground.
‘Done any praying lately, Creepy Kurt?’ Norris asks. Blood dripping down his face, Kurt grins and replies ‘Yeah, well…once. I couldn’t help myself. But it obviously didn’t get through…because you’re still ugly!’. Norris obviously doesn’t appreciate that comment, and raises his baton, while Kurt frowns and mutters that he has got to learn to keep his mouth shut.
Meanwhile, the Szardos Circus has begun setting up in Calgary. Inside the big top, Amanda explains to Werner that it is just an expression. ‘I don’t mean “hot” like temperature…it means I think you’re “good looking”.’ ‘Oh. Right. I’ve heard that before!’ Werner replies, ‘But what does it mean?’ he asks. Amanda looks oddly at Werner, before noticing Margali approach her. ‘Oh. Hello, mother. We were just -’ Amanda begins, to which Margali exclaims ‘I know what you were “just”’ and walks past them, asking them to find someplace private where she doesn’t have to look at them.
Amanda follows her mother, asking her what the matter is and why she is being like this. ‘Why am I being like this?’ Margali asks, before snapping ‘because I’m watching you throw precious love away - just like I did - on a stupid, stupid man with a pretty face, when you could have…’ her voice trails off, and Margali goes silent. ‘Could have what?’ Amanda asks. ‘Could have had Kurt’ Margali replies.
‘KURT?’ asks a stunned Amanda. ‘You think I should be with Kurt? But he’s blue! He has a tail! He’s a mutant!’, to which Margali replies ‘And he’s funny, and intelligent, and sweet, and kind…and he’s like a son to me!’. ‘A son you dressed in a devil’s costume to sell tickets to your precious circus. A son you called the “Nightcrawler”!’ Amanda declares. Innocently, Margali replies that was because Kurt was always up at night, that he only slept a few hours, so she called him her little Nightcrawler. ‘And you think he liked that?’ Amanda asks. ‘You think he liked being called the nickname of a worm?’.
‘There’s no way I’m letting you blame me for Kurt’s leaving!’ Amanda exclaims as she begins to walk away from her mother, adding ‘I know you’re worried about him, Mom. But I’m worried too, believe it or not. Terrified for him! But however I treated Kurt, however I may have wronged him - I learned it from you!’. At her daughter’s words, Margali covers her face with her hands and weeps.
Back in Alkali Lake, Norris and another soldier drag Kurt across the ground to where Stryker is waiting on a platform. Norris calls out that Wagner refuses to walk, to which Stryker tells him to drop him anywhere. Kurt lands head-first on the ground, and Stryker orders his men to take the bag off Wagner’s head. ‘Well, we should mention…’ begins the other soldier, ‘He tried to escape, sir’ Norris reveals, explaining that they had to get a little rough with him to settle him down. Stryker frowns, ‘”A little rough with him”?’ he asks, wanting to know what they mean by that.
Norris and the other soldier remain silent, ‘Take that bag off his head!’ demands Stryker furiously. One of them does so, revealing a blood-covered Kurt, who grins, ‘Surprise!’ he exclaims sarcastically. Stryker looks at Kurt, then at his men, who both stand their solemnly, before being told that they are excused. As they walk away, Norris smiles at his actions, while Stryker asks Kurt if he is capable of killing.
‘Am I - am I what? What are you talking about?’ Kurt asks, confused. ‘With your mutant abilities. The teleportation, the agility and whatever else you can do…are you capable of killing, say, from a long distance away?’ Stryker asks. Kurt replies that he doesn’t understand what Stryker is asking him. ‘Are you asking if I can or -’ Stryker interrupts, ‘It’s a simple question, Wagner’ he remarks, motioning to Norris and the other soldier, he informs Kurt that he is offering him the opportunity to kill his oppressors over there.
Stryker holds out a remote and informs Kurt that it will turn off his inhibitor collar, explaining that he will disable the collar and allow him to teleport over to Norris and the other soldier - and kill them - for the beating they have inflicted upon him. ‘All you have to do is ask’ Stryker. Kurt watches the retreating soldiers for some time, then looks at the remote control and replies ‘No. That would be against God’. Stryker is amused at this, ‘Against whose God?’ he asks. ‘More people kill in the name of God than for any other reason on this godforsaken planet’ Stryker points out.
Kurt smirks and replies that the only thing forsaken by God will be those who kill in His name. My God is capable of nothing but love. My God even loves people like you’ Kurt declares.
In Calgary, Margali approaches Amanda who is sitting under a tree beside a small river. ‘Like Kurt to churches, so you to nature, Amanda’ Margali remarks as she sits down besides her daughter. Amanda apologizes to her mother for what she said before. ‘I know you’ve loved Kurt ever since you found him, that’s never been a question’ Amanda states. Margali tells her daughter that there is no need to apologize, and admits that Amanda was right, in some ways. ‘I loved Kurt, yes, but that didn’t stop me from being insensitive to him. Sometimes you can still be a racist, even with those you love’ Margali explains.
‘Is that what you think I was? A racist?’ Amanda asks. ‘No. I think you’re just a young girl who wanted the best-looking man she could find. But someday, I hope…I pray…that we can both see past those things to someone with a good heart and who deserves to be loved, unconditionally’. Amanda begins to cry, and replies that Kurt does deserve that, and admits that she misses him more than she thought she ever would. ‘That’s because you do love him, Amanda…even if you haven’t realized yet how much’ Margali remarks, before exclaiming that she hopes, someday, they both get the chance to tell him so.
Back in Alkali Lake, Kurt sits besides the mysterious woman in his cell, promising her that they will get out of this. ‘I know someone misses you the way Amanda and I miss each other’ he exclaims. ‘That kind of love is the only thing that can keep you alive right now, I know. Even God has his limits in a place like this -’ Kurt remarks, when suddenly, Norris enters the cell, assuring his colleague that he will not hit Wagner again, ‘I just want to say goodbye to him, that’s all’ he claims, while his colleague tells him not to push it.
Norris replies that he has something better than a baton this time, and informs Kurt that he is here to give him some good news: ‘You’re shipping out. Doubt you’ll ever be back’ he remarks. ‘But - but what about Amanda?’ Kurt asks. Norris grins as he remarks ‘Now that’s the good part. They told me I could tell you, and it made my whole day’. He then tells Kurt that Amanda was never real, that she was all in his mind. Kurt frowns and asks Norris what he is on about. ‘You think I’m going to buy this?’ he asks.
‘Yeah, I do. Because inside, you know it’s true. She could never love a freak like you’ Norris remarks, informing Kurt that Amanda is still with her handsome human boyfriend back at the traveling freak show. ‘You’re lying to me!’ Kurt exclaims, declaring that he will never believe anything Norris tells him. ‘You’re just taunting me again’ he states, before Norris reveals that there are men watching Amanda, and that she is with the other acrobat every night. ‘The normal one. The angel. The moved into your old wagon and do it like husband and wife. In the biblical sense’ Norris reveals, adding that they laugh all the time about what a freak Kurt is.
Kurt looks clearly upset at this point, while Norris informs him that the tiny hotel, the flat champagne, the tiny wedding in Alberta, and especially the intimate stuff - the “I love you Amanda - kiss me, and let me show you how much” stuff, Norris points out that Kurt never told them about, so how else could he know it was true. ‘That was us. Mind control. Never happened!’ he reveals, crushing Kurt. As he leaves the cell, he tells Kurt that if he feels like getting in a prayer or two then he should go for it. ‘I won’t interfere. My little going away present to you’ Norris grins, leaving Kurt sobbing in the cell.
Later, Kurt is strapped to a table in some sort of laboratory. Stryker stands over him, remarking ‘You wouldn’t kill on your own, Wagner. And we couldn’t risk long-distance mind-control, unfortunately. Too many variables’. Stryker then reveals that they discovered that by removing this genetic material from the body of their mind control - Mutant Twelve - ‘The same mutant weapon, by the way, who so skilfully built up your fantasy with Amanda and now will build -’ Stryker interrupts himself, remarking that there is no time to explain.
Holding up a syringe filled with the aforementioned genetic material, Stryker exclaims that it will all make sense in a moment. Holding the needle above the back of Kurt’s neck, Stryker comments on how quiet Kurt is this evening. ‘No witty remarks? No genial asides?’ Stryker asks, unaware that the face-down Kurt is crying softly, tears rolling down his face. ‘No. I suppose not’ Stryker remarks. ‘Discovering the most perfect moment in your life was all a mental fabrication would understandably be a little upsetting, I imagine’, before sticking Kurt with the needle and remarking that soon, it will all be forgotten.
Later, Norris and the other soldiers are in their barracks playing cards. ‘Gentlemen, you picked a bad day to invite me into your game…four aces!’ Norris boasts, remarking as he gathers up his winnings that it is hard to imagine this day getting any better. Suddenly though, Kurt bamfs into the room. ‘What is that stink?’ Norris asks, when suddenly, he looks up and sees Kurt looming over him with a deadly blade. Kurt grins with what appears to be pleasure as he slices Norris, then bamfs away again. The other soldiers look around, and one of them remarks that even though Stryker warned them that was coming, it still scared the hell out of him.
Shortly, in Stryker’s office, Kurt bamfs in, Stryker is laughing, ‘Perfect’ he exclaims, before declaring that poor, hideous God-loving Kurt Wagner will pay a visit to the President of the United States!
In Calgary, Amanda strides into a church, ‘Hello, God. I know you know I’ve never had much faith in you…or even believed you existed at times. But when people are at their most desperate, they still manage to turn to you, don’t they?’ Amanda remarks. Kneeling at the altar, Amanda declares that she is at her most desperate. ‘So, I beg of you, Lord…if you are up there, and if you have any compassion for those who are truly deserving…please take care of Kurt Wagner…’.


[User]
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Provide a full summary of the comic book.

[Assistant]
untitled
Special Ops Military Installation – Location Unknown
A man runs down a darkened corridor and bursts through a door. He begins to say they have found someone but a voice cuts him off. Another man, cloaked by the shadows, addressing him as “Mr. Norris” and says if he ever barges into his office again he will cut off his right hand and use it as a door knocker. Norris apologizes and says that he thought he should know that there has been a sighting. Their field agent thinks they have spotted one of the failed experiments. He’s tracking it now and he’s pretty sure it’s 1033… one of the superhumans. The other man tells Norris to calm down and says they will celebrate if and when the mutant is returned to them. He tells Norris to assemble a recovery team and to do whatever it takes to get the filthy animal back.
Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters, Westchester, New York
Wolverine walks into the office of Charles Xavier. Wolverine asks Xavier what he wants with him and then guesses it might be about his “excessive behavior.” Xavier tells Logan that, when Wolverine agreed to assist the X-Men, Xavier promised him to help piece together what he lost from his past. That’s a promise he intends to keep. Logan asks if he’s found a way to give him his memory back but Xavier tells him he hasn’t. He says he does believe his amnesia and skeletal enhancements are connected. He says he doesn’t know how or why but he believes someone experimented on him. They laced his skeleton with adamantium, taking advantage of his healing factor. Xavier says he searched for remnants of the rare alloy and he believes one particular deposit may shed light on his past. Xavier shows his a holographic display of a military compound at Alkali Lake, in the Canadian Rockies. There isn’t much there but he might find some answers.
Logan stares at the display for a few seconds and then thanks Xavier. Xavier asks if he’s going to say goodbye to them. Logan asks if he means the X-Men and then says it isn’t what he does best. Xavier says he understands, the world in which mutants live in is a lonely one. He wishes Logan luck and Logan turns to wish his the same. As the door closes behind him, Xavier mutters to himself that he hopes he’s done the right thing.
As Logan walks through the halls of the school, a voice calls out to him. Rogue comes up to him and asks if he’s running away again. He says he isn’t really; he’s just got some things up north to take care of. Rogue stares at him devastated. She quietly says that she doesn’t want him to go, as he has been like a big brother to her. He takes off his dog tag and says it’s the only thing he has left from whatever he used to be. He’s always had it but he can’t remember how he got it. He places it in her hand and tells her he’ll be back for it. She asks him if he crosses his heart. As he walks out the door, he says he hopes to die.
Alberta, Canada. Four days later
Logan rides his motorbike through the snowy mountain forest. He passes a sign that reads “Last chance for gas, we mean it.” As night time arrives, he comes to a service station. He fills his bike up and then goes in to pay. He walks up to the counter with his money and the woman behind it looks at him and asks if he’s having a bad hair day. Logan leans forward and says he bets that smart mouth… He suddenly stops and sniffs the air. He looks out the window and says there’s trouble; he can smell it a mile away. She asks how he can smell that and he replies that he has unusually keen senses. He tells her to stay down out of sight as he leaves the building.
He shouts out that he knows someone’s out there and calls them out. A voice comes from behind him and asks if he’s only just catching a whiff of him now because he has been tracking him for days. Wolverine turns to see Sabretooth walking towards him through the snow. Wolverine says that he thought he took care of him last time they fought when the X-Men knocked him off the Statue of Liberty. Sabretooth asks if he wants a medal and Wolverine unsheathes his claws and says he has enough metal already.
Sabretooth says he’ll let Wolverine draw first blood. But he doesn’t finish the sentence before Wolverine slashes him across the face. He tells Wolverine that it wasn’t bad but he isn’t the only fast healer in town. Wolverine watches as the slash marks on Sabretooth’s face heal up until there is no trace of them left. Wolverine says they both heal fast; big deal. If he wants to go, then go already. With that, Sabretooth picks him up and throws him into a nearby tree with such force it snaps in half.
Sabretooth yells at Wolverine that he and his X-pals with the stupid costumes ruined his only chance to find out who he is. Wolverine says he doesn’t know what he’s going on about but he hasn’t got the right to make fun of anyone’s fashion sense. He says the fur coat Sabretooth is wearing is the lamest thing he’s ever seen. He’ll be doing him a favor when he rips it to shreds. Sabretooth picks up a log and jumps at Wolverine, who dives towards Sabretooth at the same time. Sabretooth hits Wolverine with the log, sending him catapulting through the air and into the windshield of a nearby truck.
Sabretooth runs towards him and says it’s déjà vu all over again but this time he hasn’t got his little friends to save him. He’s nothing but raw meat for him to tenderize. Sabretooth says that when he is done eating Wolverine’s heart he will go to their not-so-secret hideout and finish off his X-buddies. He’s going to scalp them all starting with that tasty little girl who looks up to him. When Sabretooth says Rogue name, Wolverine leaps off the truck and shouts at Sabretooth that he’s dead. Wolverine lunges at him and misses, stabbing the fuel pump instead.
Sabretooth mocks him for missing but Wolverine says he wasn’t aiming for him. He pulls out his claws and fuel sprays all over Sabretooth. As Sabretooth drips with fuel, he says he’s going to tear Wolverine apart. Wolverine pulls out his lighter and says if he makes another move he’ll light him up like a cheap cigar. Sabretooth says he wouldn’t and Wolverine asks why not. Sabretooth pulls out a fuel pump and sprays Wolverine with fuel too. Sabretooth says that now he’d light them both up. Wolverine grins and says if he can’t take the heat… With that, he clicks his lighter. Sabretooth screams at him but it’s too late and both of them catch fire.
As both men burn, Wolverine says the typical human body will give up after the first layer of skin has been removed. But his will keep going till there’s nothing but bones left. Even if it does hurt like hell. As Sabretooth writhes in pain, Wolverine attacks him and says he may be bigger and stronger but he isn’t the best. They both collapse into a snow drift, which extinguishes the flames. Wolverine hauls an unconscious Sabretooth out of it and prepares to kill him. However, before he does, he spots a dog collar around his neck. He angrily asks the weary Sabretooth where he got it from. Sabretooth says he doesn’t know and Wolverine yells at him to tell him as he had one just like it. He says he doesn’t know; he’s had it as far back as he can remember. Wolverine holds his claws to Sabretooth’s head for a few seconds and then retracts them. He holds out his hand to him and says he’s buying him a beer. Still sitting on the floor, Sabretooth seems confused.
Unknown to them, they are being watched by a soldier perched in a tree. He has Wolverine in the crosshairs of his sniper rifle. He radios to someone else and says it’s field agent Lyman. He tells them he’s acquired the target but he’s been joined by another mutant. He says to converge on his coordinates and come loaded for a bear.
Wolverine and Sabretooth make their way to a bar. As they walk across the car park, Sabretooth says that Wolverine should have killed him when he had the chance. Wolverine says he will still pop his claws in him if he wants. But right now all’s he wants are answers. He says he’s lucky that the bike he “borrowed” off Cyclops is still in one piece. If it was so much as scratched he would have flown here in the X-jet to finish him himself. Sabretooth sneers at Wolverine and says that Cyclops is a dork. Wolverine says that the first drink is on him for that comment.
Many beers later, the two men sit in a booth in the bar. Sabretooth seems intrigued that Wolverine’s name is just Logan. Wolverine asks his name and he says that it’s Victor Creed or at least he thinks it is. Wolverine asks how far his memory goes back and Sabretooth says that everything after five years ago is gone. And there are a few things he does remember doing that he really hopes he didn’t. Wolverine asks what that means and Sabretooth tells him he has nightmares about stuff he did.
Wolverine pushes further and asks what kind of stuff. Sabretooth says he remembers being on missions where men made him do bad things to people. Wolverine says that if he is trying to convince him that he is some kind of gentle giant then he can save his breath. A minute ago, he was threatening to skin his friends alive. Sabretooth snarls at him and says the X-Men are mutant soldiers. They’re on the wrong side but they still know the score. The things he remembers doing he did to old people and even babies. He wants to believe that his dreams are just that but now he will never know thanks to Wolverine.
Wolverine asks what he has to do with figuring out his past. Sabretooth tells him Magneto was going to help him uncover the truth in exchange for helping out with his Brotherhood. He would have done it if the X-Men hadn’t defeated and imprisoned him. Wolverine asks how dumb he can be. Magneto was just stringing him along so that he would do all his dirty work for him. He doesn’t know anything about Sabretooth’s past. Sabretooth says that Magneto told him that he and Wolverine share a history and Wolverine would remember even less than he does. Wolverine mutters under his breath that it was a lucky guess. Sabretooth asks what Xavier promised him to get him to work with him. Wolverine says Xavier didn’t lie to him… or at least he doesn’t think he did.
A voice bellows out and yells for everyone to get out of the bar. A group of armed soldier stands in the doorway and Mr. Norris calls Sabretooth and Wolverine “muties” and says for them to raise their hands. He says that “subject 1033” is officially government property and he is coming with them. Instead of talking to Wolverine, though, he is talking to Sabretooth. Wolverine unsheathes his claws and asks if they called him mutie. Norris whispers in amazement to Agent Lyman that the other mutant is Wolverine. Lyman asks who he means and the soldier says that Wolverine was one of the first experiments that escaped years ago. Lyman doesn’t seem too concerned and tells his soldiers to take them both.
One of them fires a laser beam at Sabretooth but Wolverine pushes him out of the way. Sabretooth is surprised Wolverine saved him but Wolverine tells him that he only did it as he figured he could use a hand with the soldiers. Sabretooth asks what the plan is and Wolverine suggests “maneuver 355.” With that, Sabretooth picks him up and throws him at the soldiers. Wolverine lands in the middle of them and after a brief fight they are all laying on the floor. Wolverine suddenly asks what maneuvre 355 is. As Sabretooth is dealing with two other soldiers, he has says it feels familiar. Like the two of them have been fighting together before. Some more soldiers hit Sabretooth with tranquilizer darts and he collapses on the floor. Norris says that Sabretooth is tranqued and, when Lyman asks about Wolverine, he says he’s unstoppable. He tells Lyman to try hitting the metal skull of his with a sonic disrupter. Lyman fires the disrupter at Wolverine and the pain causes Wolverine to pass out.
Norris smiles and says to load them both in the cargo hold. Lyman asks if they are dead but Norris says they are merely unconscious but they should get them back to HQ quickly before one of them wakes up. Sabretooth and Wolverine are chained up in the cargo hold. Their hands are locked in place and they have numerous chains holding them in place. Sabretooth wakes up and starts to struggle. He says that chains can’t hold him and smashes out of them. He walks over to Wolverine and asks if he’s still alive. Wolverine starts to come around slowly, so Sabretooth slaps him. Now awakened, Wolverine pops his claws and breaks out of his confinements.
Wolverine asks where they are but Sabretooth says he has no idea. He can smell guards coming though. Wolverine slashes at a door in a bid to find a way out. When he looks outside, though, he sees he is miles up in the air. He says they are in transit, flying off the radar in some kind of… Sabretooth suddenly grabs him around the neck and thrusts him out the plane. He holds him in midair and Wolverine asks what he’s doing. Sabretooth tells him he’s throwing him out. He’s going to ride the plane back to the people that experimented on him and he’s going to get answers. Answers that Wolverine doesn’t deserve.
Wolverine turns to Sabretooth and says he’s helping him escape; he can smell it on him. Sabretooth stares at him for a few seconds and then says not to flatter himself. Wolverine says not to do him any favors. He says to Sabretooth that he thinks he can keep the soldiers busy long enough for Wolverine to get away but he will be dead without his help. Sabretooth says that this isn’t a favor. They are twice as high up as the Statue of Liberty. So consider this payback. One of the soldiers comes up behind them and orders Sabretooth to put Wolverine down. Sabretooth says he was hoping he would say that. With that, he lets Wolverine go. As Wolverine falls to the ground below, Sabretooth turns to the soldiers and asks who’s up for round two.
Wolverine crashes down in the middle of a snowy forest. He hits the ground but thankfully it’s actually a layer of ice over a pond. He emerges from the water a few seconds later gasping for breath. As he walks out of the pond, he watches the plane fly off and he mutters to himself that there are more questions than answers.
Special Ops Military Installation – A few days later
Mr. Norris walks along a corridor and knocks on the door at the end. The man inside commends Norris for knocking. Norris enters and says that he has some bad news… the experiment was a failure. After restraining Sabretooth, his body rejected the adamantium they grafted to his bones. The man is annoyed but he says they will have to go on without him. They already have one new adamantium success story and that will have to be enough. He holds a set of files marked “Project: Deathstrike.” He orders Norris to put Creed down like the dog he is. Norris asks if they should continue searching for Wolverine, but the man says not to bother as he’s sure they will be seeing more of him soon enough.
In the snowy mountains of Canada, Wolverine continues his trek to Alkali Lake.


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Provide a full summary of the comic book.

[Assistant]
Altar/Piece Alter/Peace
Krakoa:Many of the mutants, without even knowing it, have been manipulated by Onslaught, none more so than Charles Xavier, who is about to destroy the Cerebro back-ups that allow mutants to be resurrected.
Many others are on the way to the Cruci-Ball, among them Pixie, who is suddenly teleported away by Nightcrawler. He teleports them several times, until he drags her through a Krakoan gate. On the other side, she is surrounded by darkness and sees Lost and Fabian Cortez huddling there as well. Legion orders her to be calm and listen. She’s been compromised. Kurt adds it’s the dying. If Cerebro records your mind on Monday and you die on Wednesday, what becomes of Tuesday? She stammers, what are they prattling about. Why can’t she teleport out?
Kurt adds that they think he eats them and grows strong, and in the gaps he leaves his strings like a puppeteer. Who? she screams. She knows who, Legion replies. Pixie stammers then Onslaught rises from her mind and sneers, Legion urged him from the priest’s mind. He will not find it so easy now. He has sunk his hook into a thousand minds and fantasies.
Legion retorts he might want a wee think about whose skull he is in. And whose fantasies are currently in residence. “Repel boarders!” Kurt shouts dressed as a pirate, as he attacks.
Legion announces, “Welcome to the Altar where all minds are one.”
In Xavier’s mind, in the no-place, Onslaught senses Pixie go dark. No matter. He was slipped into a mutant mind by Orchis, meant to destabilize Krakoa. He means to do more. He plans a massacre the trauma of which will raise him to godhood.
At the Cruci-Ball, Loa asks Mercury to dance.
Onslaught steers Xavier to begin deleting the back-ups of mutant minds.
Standing alone in a cell, Fabian Cortez shouts for Nightcrawler. He wants answers (and a bathroom)! He did what Nightcrawler wanted. He told him what happened before he died. He passed on his stupid message.
Kurt appears behind him, startling Cortez. “The Spark,” ja, he agrees. He asks if Cortez knew they were going to leave him in a coma. Onslaught is in all of them now. He had to release Cortez in secret…
Cortez mumbles, at least he doesn’t need that bathroom now. Kurt continues that it worked. Fabian reminded him and triggered his epiphany. The idea he has been seeking. Cortez snarks that he hopes Kurt and his little cult are very happy together. But there are better ways to thank him than dump him in this place with the woman who tried to kill him three times. He points at Lost, who is huddling in the corner and muttering that she is lost. Kurt agrees. She hates Cortez, even if she hasn’t found her voice yet, but he deserves it. His priestly lack of judgment is inspirational, Cortez mutters. Another voice announces that Cortez killed her parents. They were visiting her in the hospital. Her powers had only just come in. His thugs ran amok for no reason except to make a fuss!
A shocked Cortez looks at the speaker, David Haller, his hair replaced by cables and tendrils leading somewhere. They’ll not take lessons on civility off a sebaceous gland with shoes, David snaps.
Cortez stammers that that was a righteous war with justifiable collateral. He doesn’t know where they brought him, but he demands to return to Krakoa. He wants to go on with his very important life and forget… Kurt gently interrupts him and points out he had to release him from his coma. What makes him so sure he is still alive?
Stacy X gives both Lost and Fabian a nudge and they fall. Kurt and Legion have asked the help of Dust, the Xorn brothers and Gorgon. During the fall, Cortez first gets attacked by Dust, then by energy then he gets cut by Gorgon. Cortez blames Lost for this and shouts that he hates her. She screams back that he doesn’t know the meaning of hate!
Suddenly, the surroundings change to hellfire and a giant Legion as the devil appears, ordering them to burn. Both scream in horror.
Nightcrawler then points out that Lost took Cortez’s hand when he was afraid, despite what he did to her. Doesn’t he see what a gift that is? A normal-sized Legion joins them and tell them they are not dead. They kidnapped them both while the Onslaught-infected numpties were planning their big shindig, but they are in his house now, so Cortez will stop bloody whining and start bloody listening. And if he ever wets his knickers in Legion’s brain again, David will choke him with them!
Kurt suddenly stands at an altar and announces the first sermon. Consider a shoal of fish… They swim through the endless depths – and they are hunted. Should a predator attack, the shoal reacts all together, ja? Well, not today. Today one of these little fish goes left when the others go right. Well, what happens? It gets eaten by a shark? Lost ventures, it is alone and lost. Not a very clever survival strategy, Kurt muses, if it is a shark.
At the Cruciball, Pixie teleports Loa away to a gallery above the party, then stabs her with her souldagger to exorcise Onslaught, as she has already done with DJ, Blink and Dazzler. They all reel, recalling the horrible feelings they had moments before. They look down to the party, sensing all that adrenaline and aggression. Dazzler shudders. She was going to sign a song about kissing with knives. DJ adds it will be built up. There will be fights. He had all the songs picked out already. Pixie spells out that, at midnight, everyone will murder everyone else. Just for the thrill. Because none of them know it’s a one-way-ticket.
At the Cradle, an Onslaught-possessed Xavier is busy getting rid of the back-ups.
At the Altar:Kurt continues. Imagine if that crazy little fish could come back from the dead. What does it do the next time the shoal is in danger? It learns the lesson, Cortez replies impatiently. Leads the rest of the idiots to turn right all together. Nein, is the reply. It turns left again. Or maybe it does a little dance. Perhaps it tries to jump out of the water. Perhaps it attacks the predator head on.
The Cruci-ball:Pixie heads down to the dancefloor again, telling the others she knows how to stop this. But she needs their help.
The Altar:The little fish understands that playing it safe is only important in a world where death is the end!
Cortez protests that is the worst parable he has ever heard. He thought Nightcrawler was against this cheap death crap.
But it is not cheap, Kurt replies. Being eaten is quite traumatic, but this little fish keeps doing it. Why? Because the predator is just a shark and nobody understands why the lunatic little fish goes his own way. But sometimes the predator is a whale and it swallows the rest of the shoal instead. Mutants need not fear sharks, but there are more whales around them and monsters and whirlpools than they can count.
Take Cortez: pomposity… ambition… defiance. Always he has turned toward the front of the shoal. Kurt is asking him today to trust him. To believe that what is happening now in his heart isn’t cheap - it matters. He has done terrible things. But today, whether they like it or not, the Spark is with him. Kurt touches his shoulder and tells him it is time he swam into the dark and tried something new. It is time to put away his pride.
Fabian glares then his face crumples and he admits he has hated himself for as long as he can remember.
Cortez’ narration:He was never blind to his privilege. Wealth, power, connections, he was too cowardly to throw it away, but it nagged him. He never earned anything.
Most kids are terrified when the X-gene kicks in. Whole new world of otherness and exclusion. Btu he was delighted. Finally, something to fight for. Does that make him a persecution tourist? Poor little rich boy, thirsty for some struggle. Maybe. Fact is he spent five minutes testing his powers and realized the joke was on him. All he does is boost other mutants. No starring role for Fabian Cortez. No heart-stirring arc: “spoiled brat answers the call to revolution, learns humility and heroism.” It’s because nobody wants to throw a parade for Captain McGuffin. In the end, he figured if he’s gotta be the bridesmaid, if he’s always got to be in someone else’s shadow, then he better pick the biggest damn shadow he could find – hence his fascination with Magneto.
Present:A possessed Magneto struggles against Onslaught as he begs Pixie to leave. She stammers she knows he is guarding the professor and asks him to let her through.
Cortez’ narration:Cortez admits that all those years he did appalling things in Magneto’s name. He set him up as a god, and he kept the blood sacrifices pouring in. He failed, obviously. It takes a rare power to control an ego as big as Erik’s.
Present:Magneto warns Pixie that it takes every ounce of his will to resist the idea of annihilating her.
Pixie throws her soul dagger at him. Not made of metal, it passes through his defenses and hits his face freeing him from Onslaught’s influence.
Magneto shouts Xavier’s name and orders him to get out. Still possessed, Xavier flees and Pixie curses.
Cortez’ narration:Cortez continues. Damn the leaders, that’s what he’d tell them if he had the guts. Damn these great men and their too-big-to-judge bull/&%$. He spent his life propping them up. Outdoing their excesses like some blood-spattered understudy. Fabian Cortez, rabid hench weasel! He’d burn the whole +#&% world for a pat on the head!
Angrily, he wipes away a tear as he continues ranting. The worst thing? He could bear all that… the loneliness… the nightmares. He could live with being this… this poisonous little trickle of mediocrity – if he’d ever believed in a single one of the causes along the way. But he never did.
Cortez swears and cries openly. He doesn’t think he ever believed in anything. Lost takes his hand. She cannot forgive him. He is a pitiful thing and that is how he will stay until he can forgive himself. But today at the very least she does not hate him.
Suddenly, she begins to glow and light pours from her orifices. Well done, Kurt tells Fabian. The Spark is within her now. Let them see how it burns.
At Cruciball, the revelers partake of Dr. Nemesis self-grown mushrooms while he rants and seemingly eggs on their violence. Dazzler grins that he is enjoying this way too much. Piffle, he scoffs as he dons his hat. If the Welsh one hadn’t used that ghastly knife to free him, his exquisite psychedelics would have incited an extremely entertaining spiral of violence. Much could have been learned. For science. Instead, he had to re-gene his beautiful mushrooms into feel-good bilge, just to make those idiots more compliant than they already were. What’s to enjoy? And yet he did his duty uncomplaining. Truly a martyr to mutantkind, she agrees with a grin as he passes out mushrooms that he promises will make one see unicorns made of pasta.
Dazzler tuns to DJ and orders him to drop it. She sings and, with all attention on her, she orders the guests towards a gate leading them to Arakko.
Xavier runs through the crowd, chased by Magneto, who realizes he erased the back-ups.
On Mars, they are led to the Temple Gate leading to the Altar. Inside the Altar, the celebration continues.
Cortez asks why all these children are here. Legion tells him he made this possible. All minds are one in the Altar if they want to be. Kurt continues. When they raised Cortez from his coma, he showed them what Marinette said as they fell from the sky. Lost reveals that, when her parents died, she was taken in by an organization. They did things to her. Kurt and David explain that Orchis used Lost to sneak Onslaught inside. They hid Onslaught deep, anchored it in her hatred for Cortez. The hatred he just cured, Kurt stresses. Does he understand? Red tendrils emit from Lost. Nightcrawler tells Cortez that he just smoked out the devil himself.
Onslaught also leaves the kids, and Magneto has reached Xavier. Onslaught decides that he will then use its first and finest hosts, focusing on Xavier and Magneto and turning into a giant shape.
Legion asks the Xorn brothers to run intervention, while Cortez rants his beautiful heroic moment was yet again about fulfilling someone else’s damn journey. Kurt suggests he should not feel bad. He makes a #*&% hero. Cortez rolls his eyes and grudgingly agrees. Kurt continues, their sacred land has plenty of those. What they need right now is strong links in the chain. He nudges him toward Dust, who takes his hand while asking Legion if he is sure about this. Legion tells her she can connect a billion particles without effort. Turning to sand is literally the least amazing thing about her. Whoever called her “Dust,” did her a disservice. What would be better is “Congregation.”
Legion has created a special part of the astral plane as a kind of astral altar, a place of communion. Where every mutant is valued, where every mind could be as open or closed as they choose.
While Onslaught prepares to strike, Nightcrawler preaches to the crowd. He tells them of carnage averted by ice cream. He tells them, imperfect replication is the engine of individuality and love is the product of risk. He tells them evil can be overcome by humility and a new perspective can link a thousand hearts, and all of it is the same thing. It is the power and the privilege of always daring something new. He calls it the Spark.
The mutants connected by Dust attack Onslaught as one, as Kurt tells them they have fought this old devil before. He knows them. He knows their fear. He knows the darkness inside them, and Kurt thinks it is time to be honest. They cannot be a people without first being people – imperfect and impure. They must accept their share of this shadow. So just once let them not fight this predator but embrace him, crush it with all that makes them them. The flaws and passions and hopes and pains and stories and their unity.
Onslaught shouts in protest as Kurt continues: let this be their holy sacrament: let them grind him to gristle, so that he knows – so that they know – so that all the world knows “We rule us.”
Onslaught has shrunk to a tiny creature that gets squished in his hand. “We rule us,” Legion echoes his mantra.
Two months later, a much healthier and happier-looking Lost and Fabian Cortez tell a group of children, of how they almost lost this sacred land, because it was growing bigger but emptier… meaningless. And terrible things grew in that vacuum. The people who saved it will not allow that emptiness to return. In its place they have built a house of infinite welcome. A heart for their homeland. What they offer is no cult… it’s a culture.
Kurt waves at them before he enters the gate that leads to the Altar. Quite a change, he tells Legion. Luckily, the Astral Plane is enormous; there are all kinds of places and rooms being used. Some people are just connecting, Amahl Farouk is meditating, Gorgon is teaching martial arts in a dojo, another group is dancing. Loa is in a talk with Stacy X. Training… trauma healing, Legions muses. Anything but a bloody basketball court. What’s next?
Kurt chuckles it is David’s head. He knows what Kurt is planning. He was hoping to use this as a HQ. Mutant cops, David agrees, with his brain as the precinct. The council won’t like it. He’s okay with that, Kurt mumbles then states it is not a police. They must defend what unites them, not punish the growing pains. What then? David asks. Peacekeepers, sheriffs, mutant jedi? Kurt was thinking… Legionaries.


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Provide a full summary of the comic book.

[Assistant]
Part One: Born to Die
Alice Springs Region, Australia. 50 years from now…
Kadee, an Aboriginal woman, rests on her bed. Her husband Burnum rushes into the room and tells her they need to leave immediately. Kadee doesn’t understand; why isn’t Burnum at work? Where are they supposed to go? By the time he explains, Burnum says, it will be too late.
He escorts Kadee out of their house by her shoulders. They find their fellow villagers running around in a panic. Burnum curses; the news must have already spread. Again, Kadee asks what is going on, but Burnum still refuses to explain. Kadee stops and turns to him. Since she’s not his child, but his wife, she demands he explain the situation. With a grave expression on his face Burnum, informs her that he picked up chatter on a high-level security band. In less than ninety minutes, there will be a tactical nuclear strike right where they stand. Fortunately, he has found a way out for Kadee and himself. As she limps along with her husband, away from their panicked neighbors and toward a nearby jet, Kadee asks him to slow down. She doesn’t want to rush because she is afraid she might lose the baby. “The whaaaat?” Burnum asks. Apparently, this is the first he has heard of it.
Burnum and Kadee make it out on the last flight before the first missile. They were my parents, Bishop later recounts. My life, from the very beginning, has been ruled by luck and horror. Yeah, I’m lucky to be alive. But I was born into a world of horror. Probably would have gone crazy, except for one thing—one core belief. That I am a child of the atom. And I was born for a reason.
Immigrant Processing Center, Sheepshead Bay, New York. Thirty-seven hours later…
Burnum and Kadee wade through the over-crowded, hectic immigrant processing center, a room watched over by several ominous Sentinels. Kadee worries the Sentinels will detect they are mutants; Burnum asks her to keep quiet. He knows a man in North Jersey who can provide them safe housing.
Although they try to keep a low profile—specifically because of America’s strict “No Mutants Welcome” policy—Kadee and Burnum do not evade detection for long. One of the Sentinels points at them and sounds the mutant alert. It then fires a shock-blast, knocking Burnum to the ground. Another Sentinel fires on Kadee. She blocks it by generating a spherical energy shield. Her efforts prove worthless, as the Sentinel follows up its initial attack by binding her in a mercurial substance.
The authorities put Kadee and Burnum on trial for being mutants. The trial lasts three seconds. The judge reads the charges—Burnum can regenerate low-grade tissue and has enhanced stamina, while Kadee can absorb and dispel energy—then sentences them to a mutant internment camp in Sheepshead Bay. This unsanitary, overcrowded camp—where scientists perform illegal experiments on mutants—becomes the place Lucas Bishop calls home.
Sheepshead Bay, seven months later…
Kadee goes into labor. The camp doctor is nowhere to be found, leaving the difficult delivery to Burnum and two friends. After much struggle, they deliver the child, but to Burnum’s horror, it is not breathing.
Most people don’t remember anything before the age of two or three, Bishop later recalls. Maybe I’m imagining it, but I swear I have memories from seconds after I was born.
Burnum removes the umbilical cord wrapped around his child’s neck and breathes life into his mouth. It finally gasps for air, and once it begins breathing, begins crying as well.
I remember fighting.
Kadee and Burnum fight too—mainly with each other. Although they were supposedly happy once, none of their behavior during this time at the camp displays any evidence of this. Kadee spends much of her time with other mutants, away from her family. She essentially creates a mental force-field between herself and her husband. With her gone, Burnum takes the most care of their son. He doesn’t talk much. He just plays with the young boy and comforts him when he needs it.
Later in his life, Lucas Bishop will remember the tight muscles of his father’s chest, the way he smelled, and how safe it felt in his arms.
By the time Lucas turns three, two more people join his family. The first is his little sister Shard. The second is his grandmother, whom Lucas had never before met. She had been in another camp and heard about Burnum and Kadee’s presence, and somehow worked out a transfer to get into their camp. Lucas never thinks to ask how she got the transfer, but knows enough to feel thankful anyway.
His grandmother, an elderly woman with striking white hair, tells Lucas one day that she had dreamed about meeting him. They spend as much time together in the camp as the guards allow. In her soft, whispered voice, she regales Lucas with stories of mutant heroes from the past: mutants who did the right thing, no matter what, even in a world that wanted them dead.
Lucas often drifts to sleep dreaming about these stories and the heroes within them. He dreams of a man with long brown hair who fires a red beam out of his eyes, a metallic boy with super-strength, a little blue demon with horns and a tail, a feral-looking man with Aboriginal features and claws coming from his hands, and finally, a graceful woman with white hair soaring on the winds she creates herself. The stories of these heroes play in Lucas’s head all night long.
Around the time Lucas turns five, the camp begins grumbling with rumors of some new initiative; something their captors intend to do to all of them. Sheepshead Bay is a camp for experimentation, after all. They want to see how much pain mutants can withstand so they can work out their cataloguing glitches. The guards begin pinning down individual mutants and branding a large “M” over their right eyes. Lucas is horrified to come home one day to see his mother wearing a large, white bandage over her right eye. When she sees her son, Kadee slowly removes her bandage, revealing a burned, bubbling scar, and gives Lucas some simple instructions. “When they do this to you, and you scream,” she says, “…you scream at the monster. That red-haired monster! She did this to you, not us!”
Soon, it is Lucas’s turn. They strap the five-year-old boy to an operating table. The tattoo artists sharp red needle in a cup of red ink and holds it menacingly over Lucas’s face. He then gets to work. The horrors of this experience will never escape Bishop. In his future, every time he squints, rubs his eye, or even blinks, he will remember this moment.
Once they finish with Lucas, they bring in his baby sister Shard for her turn. Lucas is infuriated. If he could tear out his own heart and throw it at them, he would. Instead, he’s left with nothing but his weak little five-year-old fists to fight the grown men in the room. They quickly beat him senseless. As Lucas lies on the floor, he cannot help but ponder why mutants deserve such treatment. In his opinion, none of them deserve it. Where are the mutant heroes to stop it?
It takes a few weeks for the headaches to subside. Lucas spends this painful time wandering the camp, listening to people talk. By this point, he notices everyone has a brand—and that it isn’t just their faces that are scarred. “Think they branded the monster?” he hears one inmate asking another. The other inmate doesn’t seem interested in discussing it, so the first one continues. “Huh. Hope. Should’ve called her Despair.” Lucas interrupts the two men and asks who the monster is. Genuinely surprised his parents have not told him yet, they tell Lucas to ask his folks about the monster that killed a million humans—and to ask them why they’re here, in the camp. The other man mutters something about not being in the camps for long, but his friend silences him.
When Lucas gets home, he asks his grandmother about the monster. Don’t listen to what those men were saying, she says, adding that those men were not there—and stories have a way of getting twisted. Lucas insists; he wants to know about the monster. Gently, his grandmother explains that the girl was not a monster. She was around at the time of her birth, and everyone was overjoyed. Besides, with all the talk about the monsters and the mutants, people seem to have forgotten the witch.
Lucas asks what she means. His grandmother explains how the Scarlet Witch cast an evil spell on mutants everywhere. All over the world, mutants lost their special gifts, and there were no more mutant babies. “If the little girl you call a monster hadn’t come along, there would have been no you. No Shard. No daddy or mommy, either,” his grandmother says. That’s why they were so excited about the little girl, the first new mutant baby in years. She gave hope to them all.
Even with his grandma’s loving description, Lucas imagines a scowling little red-haired infant with evil, glowing green eyes.
In the camps, Lucas has no television, no books, no comics, no movies, and no music. He has only his grandmother’s stories to entertain himself, and these stories fill his head. He listens eagerly to the story of the coming of the baby, followed by the massacre of all the infant children in a town in Alaska. He listens to the tale of the X-Men and their desperate battle with the crazy zealots who wanted to kill all mutants. These stories swirl around in his head, like the stories about the crazy days before the birth of Jesus, like Herod ordering the massacre of the innocents in Bethlehem to prevent the ascension of the King of the Jews. Somehow, even though these stories are scary, Lucas considers the time in which he heard them the happiest time of his life.
Then, hell comes home. The mutant prisoners rebel, inciting the backlash of both the guards and their Sentinel overlords. This rebellion will later be known as the “Summers Rebellion”. Although it should be a happy time for Lucas Bishop, the rebellion takes everything from him. He watches a Sentinel blast his father, whose body vanishes in a wall of fire. With tears in his eyes, Lucas kneels in his ashes and screams. He will never press his face in his father’s chest again.
While the battle rages, Lucas searches for his mother. He finds her using her rechanneled energy to create a force-field around herself. She lets her shield down for a moment amidst an explosion, and in this crucial timeframe, a Sentinel smashes her into the ground. Lucas will never see his mother’s face again either: her angry, scarred face that he wished, just once would have looked at him with something other than resentment.
With both his parents dead, Lucas hears the words his grandmother uttered echoing in his skull: if the girl had not come, there would have been no daddy of mommy. But the girl had come, Lucas thinks. And it was like daddy or mommy had been born just to die.
The fighting and the chaos and the bleeding continue. In the middle of it, Lucas searches for his sister Shard and his grandmother. He keeps praying he will find them alive—or not at all. While in a graveyard of mutant corpses, some guards spot Lucas and open fire with explosive rounds. He runs, barely escaping. Somehow, he makes it out of the camp and heads for the nearby city of Manhattan. Lucas hopes it big enough for him to hide in.
Thankfully, he learns the city is huge and crowded. Lucas is seven years old, alone, hungry, sporting a giant “M” tattoo on his face, and has never seen the world outside of the camps. Any of the people he sees in the city could turn him in for a reward—especially after the carnage of the rebellion. Worse, he has no skills, no abilities and no frame of reference for the insanity of the city. Fortunately, he can understand a tiny bit of the words on the signs, thanks to the bit of reading his grandma taught him. However, after a while, Lucas stops worrying even about that. He only worries about his growing hunger.
One day, he steals a bag of groceries from a man in a market. His victim shouts, alerting the police sirens. At this point in his life, Lucas knows nothing about the police; his experiences have been only with camp guards. Nevertheless, he knows he has done something wrong, and that the screaming in the skies is about him.
With the groceries still in hand, Lucas turns the corner of a dark alley and passes by a tall, silhouetted man. The man grabs him by the collar. “Huh. What ‘ave we here,” he says. “You wanna be a mastah thief, you gonna need some sliver moves’n ‘at,” the man says, wishing the boy had at least swiped something decent. Lucas looks up at the man in terror; who is he? “Me?” the white-haired, red-eyed man asks. “I’m an X-Man. An’ right now, I’m about de only one in de whole wide world who’ll give a damn about your mutie ass.”


[User]
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Provide a full summary of the comic book.

[Assistant]
Part Two: Police State
Detroit. Sixty years in the future...
They say some criminals are born. Lucas Bishop doesn't see it that way. A child of ten years, he wanders suspiciously through the crowded streets of Detroit, wearing a bomber jacket and a green baseball cap that, for the most part, conceals the "M" branded over his right eye. He thinks people only steal for one of two reasons—for food, or for fun. As a boy, he steals for food. On the other hand, for the guy who taught Lucas how to steal—the mutant who called himself the Witness—Lucas swears it is about the fun.
On this particular day, Lucas wanders into the path of an oncoming speeder, initiating the first step of his mentor's con. The speeder swerves to avoid him. Lucas dives out of the way, feigning terror. From the shadows of a nearby alleyway, the Witness watches. A nearby law enforcement officer rushes over to little Lucas's aid. Is he trying to get himself killed? Meanwhile, behind him, the Witness takes advantage of security's distraction and slips into the door of their van. Lucas's eyes follow the Witness as he slips into the vehicle.
He was a stone cold pro, Bishop will later recall. You had to be, in a world where no sane man would employ a mutant. The only way to get something—out of the camps, anyway—was to take it.
The guards suddenly see the mutant mark branded on the young kid's face. As they angrily hoist him off the ground to arrest him, the Witness turns on his new vehicle. Lucas's face remains expressionless, but he notes the flawlessness of this heist. With any heist, the timing has to be perfect—timed to the second. As the van starts up, the guards lose their grip on Lucas. He rips free from their arms and runs away into the crowd.
He and the Witness have pulled this job twice before: once in Pittsburgh, and another time in Toledo. At this particular moment, Lucas realizes he's at the crucial stage in which he has to nail the escape route he practiced hundreds of times in his head. A guard fires at him with a plasma rifle. Lucas dodges the attack, while the Witness brings the van around to the rendezvous point. Another plasma charge cuts Lucas across the shoulder, eliciting a gasp. Lucas, however, rebounds and rushes to latch onto the van’s bumper.
Lucas was not born a criminal. He quickly became one, however, thanks to his birth. After all, Lucas Bishop was unfortunate enough to be born a child of the atom. He and the Witness only target food trucks. They carry the only things they need: food and power cells. Anything else they obtain is worthless, as no fence would dare work with mutants.
In their hideout, Lucas and the Witness examine the spoils of their latest heist. Lucas solemnly reports that they lifted protein butter, again, and synthetic apples, again—two food items that Lucas Bishop will never be able to stomach as an adult because the abundance in which he consumed them as a child. The Witness notices his disappointment and asks if he was expecting Dom Pérignon and Beluga caviar. "Dom Perry what?" a confused Lucas asks. The Witness tells him to just load up the power cells so they can get moving.
They head west. According to rumors, mutants have an easier time slipping through the cracks out west. All they need along the way is power and food, even if it is the same food over and over again. The Witness doesn't seem to mind, however. By this leg of their time together, Lucas starts to wonder who needs whom more. After all, the Witness is an old man who needs a cane to walk, while Lucas is young, smart, and fast. Additionally, he has already learned everything the Witness has to teach. He thinks the Witness may have reached the same conclusion. He supposes that is why the Witness keeps enticing him with stories about the old days—specifically stories about the X-Men.
"The X-Men? Ah, dey was a buncha babies," the Witness tells him in the car one day. "Always fighting each other, plottin' this, plottin that. I swear there could be two damn mutants left on the face o' de Earth... and still dey'd be throwin' punches at each other." Lucas asks if he ever saw her. The Witness asks whom he means. Lucas says he already knows. Inferring he means the red-haired girl, the Witness reveals that he not only saw her, but even came close to snuffing her himself. Lucas glares at the Witness and asks why he didn't, then. She was just one mutant. Why didn't anyone kill her?
His mentor asks if he thinks he has what it takes to kill somebody. To save the world, Lucas thinks he could do it. "S'true," the Witness says. "But the only time you would've stood a chance was the moment that monster got born. And believe me, some brave souls tried." The Witness recalls how the Son of Askani Clan got to the baby first, and hid her away—until it was too late. Lucas will not realize to whom the “Son of Askani Clan” refers until many, many years later.
Casting his gaze aside, Lucas asks if that means the red-haired girl, Hope, had her powers from birth. No, the Witness tells him, but the trouble really started the moment Hope could access her powers. He pauses for a second and asks if Lucas truly wants to hear this story, but casts these doubts aside. Kids go through monster phases, during which they're fascinated by people like Hitler and the Marquis de Sade. “Marky the who?” Lucas asks. "Look, just tell me." The Witness tells him. By the time the girl came back, he says, it was all over. She was far too powerful to stop. He recalls the wailing and gnashing of the teeth that occurred when she returned; like he said before, the X-Men were a bunch of babies, right up until their bitter end.
Lucas listened to stories about Hope all the way across the country. He came to think of her as the mutant who damned them all. Funny that years later I'd be criss-crossing the same country trying to find her, Bishop later recalls. And I don't mean ha-ha funny. Sometimes, he thinks life twists people back around on the same road they traversed as children simply to teach them a lesson—that lesson being, "you didn't know #$%& then, and you don't know #$%& now."
Las Vegas, Nevada...
Midway through their trip, the Witness just vanishes. Lucas will later come to learn that this is what the Witness does; he pops in and out of time. With his mentor gone, Lucas sets out for what he had heard was the last mutant camp on Earth. Apparently, this camp had a loose agreement with the U.S. government. If they didn't bother the mutants, the mutants wouldn't bother them. After the Summers Rebellion, there had been a lot of public pressure, to which the government responded by throwing mutants some funding for lasting programs like schools and farms. This helped everyone rest easy thinking the government had handled the "mutant problem" once and for all.
At first, Lucas doesn't recognize anybody in the camp. That changes when he stumbles upon his grandmother and his sister. Like Bishop, they had escaped Sheepshead Bay. Lucas runs over to Shard and throws his arms around her neck.
For a while, their lives from the old days resume—days Lucas acknowledges were not great, but during which they at least had each other. Lucas now has so much to ask his grandma. He reminds her she once told him that if Hope had not come along, his parents would never have existed. "That's right," his grandma says. Even if that's the case, Lucas asks if the world wouldn't have been better off without her—even if it meant no mom or dad. Holding Lucas close to her chest, the elderly, white-haired woman tells her grandson there is no changing the past, and that it makes no sense to fill one's heart with hate for someone who is long gone. She implores him to think about what he has in the here and now. "Besides, I'd be awfully sorry if you didn't come along," his grandma says. "Because who else would I tickle?" She reaches down and wiggles her fingers over Lucas's ribs. Laughing hysterically, he pleads for her to stop.
Like everything else in his life, the good times do not last for long. A new government regime decides it doesn't want to spend any more money on mutant affairs. It calls this decision "emancipation, but it really means the mutants now have to fend for themselves and try to find jobs in a world that hates them.
You see homeless people in your time, and you think: they must have done something to deserve it, Lucas will later say. My grandma did nothing to deserve it. Her elderly body proves incapable of handing life on the streets; she is just too frail. In her final days, she implores Lucas to take care of his sister. This is his most important task. Lucas tries to tell his grandmother that they will get her medicine, but she snaps at him, once again urging him to take care of Shard. Lucas promises.
His grandmother dies later that night. Since she was a mutant, nobody takes her body for burial.
Several years later...
Lucas and Shard find a place to squat. It has no gas, power or water. It does have an abundance of bugs, though, that don't seem to mind the lack of utilities. Meanwhile, on the streets right outside their dingy walls, a war rages between humans and mutants. Worse, the mutants seem to do a good job taking swipes at each other as well, as gangs of radical mutants begin preying on other mutants.
To counter this, a mutant police squad called the X.S.E. starts beating down on the radicals. Lucas observes this happening, but takes no part in it. This is their war, not his. His only task is to take care of Shard, and he intends to do whatever is necessary to do so.
It turns out, Lucas and Shard's grandmother did not leave them completely alone. A mutant named Hancock, one of her friends from the Vegas camp, looks after them. As luck would have it, of course, Hancock is blind. Naturally, he becomes their lookout during robberies—the only way Lucas knows how to provide for his sister. They pull must of their jobs amidst the gang war between the radical mutants and the X.S.E.
As the years pass, it becomes much more difficult to stay under the radar. The gangs, it seems, don't just want some of the action; they want all of the action. They take offense to freelancers like Lucas. One night, during a routine robbery, a gang of mutants approaches Hancock outside the house and stab him through the side of his head with a butcher knife. They then come for Lucas and Shard. Without question, Lucas would sacrifice his life to these craven murderers to spare his Shard’s. However, Lucas doesn’t give them the chance. One of the mutants tackles Lucas while the other lunges at Shard. This triggers a surge of anger within Lucas Bishop, which in turn triggers the onset of his mutant power. His hands glowing with radiant energy, Lucas devastates the two mutant thugs. He stands in awe of himself afterward; he has mutant powers, just like an X-Man.
Within minutes, an X.S.E. squad arrives and picks them up. They lock Lucas in a room by himself for several hours. Finally, an X.S.E. officer enters. Lucas starts at him; he wants to see his sister! The officer casually pulls out a gun and fires a round into Lucas's shoulder. Lucas groans in pain; what is this man doing? The officer kneels down and stares at Lucas, who writhes in pain across the room. Interesting, he says. Lucas assumes the officer is crazy and tells him to stay away, but the man fires several more energy rounds into his body. Lucas doesn't initially realize what the man is doing to him. Regardless, he absorbs the kinetic energy from the rounds and rechannels it back at the officer, pummeling him senseless. The officer, Bishop later realizes, was testing him.
The X.S.E. officer picks himself up off the ground and approaches Lucas, who stands relatively unharmed. It isn't bullets, but other kinds of kinetic energy that he absorbs, the officer says aloud. Although Bishop still struggles to understand why this officer seemingly assaulted him with a deadly weapon, the X.S.E. obviously sees his potential and makes him an offer. Lucas Bishop accepts, but with one condition: his sister gets to join too.
A week later, Shard and Lucas Bishop begin training under a captain named Hecat'e, whom Lucas likens to a living nightmare—much like some of his fellow trainees. One recruit in particular stands out in this regard. His name is Trevor Fitzroy. “So… what’s your excuse for living?” Fitzroy asks Lucas upon their first meeting. Lucas stutters out a response, but before he can finish, Fitzroy interrupts and shakes his hand. The next moment, Fitzroy seemingly vanishes, while Lucas feels exhausted. As he soon learns, Trevor Fitzroy can drain mutant energy and use it to teleport.
I should have broken his neck then and there and saved myself a lot of grief later, Bishop later recounts.
Lucas and Shard work hard over the years to fit in with the team. Their adventures with the X.S.E. remind Lucas of the stories his grandmother told him about the X-Men. The X.S.E. feels more like a family to Lucas than anything he has felt in a long, long time.
One fateful day, a tip from Fitzroy about a mutant gang hideout leads Lucas and his X.S.E. squad into a system of caves. The cave appears to be a dead-end at first. One of Bishop's female teammate presumes Fitzroy just took them for a ride, and Bishop doesn't doubt it; Fitzroy got into some trouble recently, and this tip was his way of redeeming himself. He certainly had incentive to lie. "That son of a bitch," Bishop says. Shard disagrees with the assessment of her teammates; the Fitzroy she knows would not send them there for nothing. "Oh yeah? So why did your boyfriend send us here?" Lucas asks his sister.
While Shard turns to Bishop to remind him that X.S.E. officers are not allowed to have romantic relationships, a creature emerges from the shadows and reaches out to her. In the palm of its hand, it has a full mouth with monstrous teeth. Oh what I would give to be back in that moment now, Bishop later laments. I'd give anything to have turned around two seconds sooner. The hideout, they discover, is filled with Emplates—vampires who like to feed on mutant bone marrow through the mouths they have on their hands. The Emplates are everywhere—and Fitzroy knew it.
Bishop gasps as an Emplate tackles his sister. While the X.S.E. squad fights for its life, Bishop watches in horror as his sister transform into an Emplate. X.S.E. policy requires officers to destroy all Emplates on first contact; they are considered too dangerous to live. Bishop would sooner cut off his own arm than do this to his little sister. His grandma had told him to take care of her, after all.
Once they eliminate all the targets, they scoop up Shard's quickly transforming body and rush back to base. Bishop takes Shard with him and desperately searches for help. Because the X.S.E. keeps on all known mutants in the area, Lucas Bishop has no trouble finding the one on whom he keeps tabs: an old Cajun named LeBeau, whom Lucas knows as the Witness. He speeds to LeBeau's door with his ailing sister and asks for help. When LeBeau opens the door, he asks Bishop if he has come to arrest him. Right away, Lucas explains he comes not as an officer of the X.S.E., but as a man trying to help his sister. He claimed to have been around during the good old days. The bad old days. He claimed to have seen it all, Lucas later recalls. I prayed he'd seen this before.
Shard's eyes are already turning black. Lucas has fitted her with a respirator to keep her alive. He helps her through the door and into LeBeau's lab, where he lays her down on a chair to rest. He asks LeBeau if he can help her, if it isn't too late. LeBeau explains that Shard is in there somewhere, underneath all the toxic garbage flooding her blood. They simply need to pull her out of this infected body. He turns to Lucas. If he performs this operation, he expects something from Lucas in return. When Lucas asks what he wants, LeBeau demands he leave the X.S.E. for a year and work for him. Lucas Bishop hangs his head. He hesitates. What other option does he have, though? He can keep her attached to life support like a piece of rump roast with a battery attached, but even then, the moment he brings her back to X.S.E., they will put her down immediately. Lucas has no choice but to agree to the deal.
The Witness gets to work. Sometime later, he produces a piece of machinery in his hand and tells Bishop to say hello to his sister. The hand-held machine flickers to life and emits a band of green light. Slowly, the figure of Shard forms from the light. "... Lucas," she calls out. Bishop tells his sister he is right there with her. "... Lucas... I can hear you but I can't find you," the gasping, ephemeral hologram of Shard says. "... Oh Lucas, where are you, I'm so so afraid... please Lucas..."
Lucas can barely look at his sister. Grief-stricken, he turns away, walks out the door, and unleashes a devastating charge of kinetic energy into the ground. They say some criminals are born; Lucas Bishop swears to make Trevor Fitzroy wish he never had been.