Reprints the final eleven pages of issue 59, all of 60, and the first fourteen pages of 61.
Picking up where reprint issue 1 left off (beginning with a newly-created page of Cyclops ordering Marvel Girl and Beast to "put our plan into action"), the strike team discovers Toad, Quicksilver, and the Scarlet Witch and exchanges uniforms. Disguised as the Brotherhood, Cyclops, Marvel Girl, and Beast surprise attack the Sentinels while the recently incarcerated Larry Trask urges Judge Chalmers to abet the mutants' escape. Chalmers frees Havok just as Cyclops reaches the containment center. The Sentinels attack begins a chain reaction inside Havok, but Cyclops manages to defeat the Sentinels using logic, setting a course for the heart of the sun. Havok goes into shock, sending the X-Men on a collision course with Dr. Karl Lykos, a.k.a. Sauron, once a colleague of Professor Xavier. Judge Chalmers takes charge of Larry Trask, who has forgotten his mutant identity, and also releases all the other mutants to go their way.
Lorna Dane semi-officially joins the X-Men, perhaps in part to stay close to Alex, whom the X-Men eagerly drop off in Dr. Lykos's care, based on nothing more than his nominal connection to their former (presumed deceased) headmaster. Once Alex is in Lykos's care, the X-Men take off the strain of the last few days with some time on the town and time in the Danger Room. Dr. Lykos, meanwhile, after experimenting on Alex for a time takes a walk and remembers his own origin: his abusive father, his love of Tanya Anderssen, Tanya's father's disapproval of Karl, and his underground encounter with pteranodon-like beings, causing his mutation into an energy siphon. During his recovery, Lykos reads Tolkien and discovers his siphon abilities, turning him into Sauron.
The increasing anti-mutant hysteria starts to take its toll on the X-Men, especially Angel, whose misunderstanding of news reports about a flying mutant sends him back to his former name of "The Avenging Angel" (his nom de plume before Xavier found him years earlier) and out the door. The X-Men decide to go after him, but not before Angel encounters Sauron. The battle rages back and forth until the X-Men arrive to finish off Sauron. Sauron outlasts their assault until Alex Summers revives, turning Sauron back into Lykos. Sauron hypnotizes Angel into saving him and forgetting his identity. Moments later, the X-Men arrive out of costume to pick up Alex and Tanya Anderssen returns to express her love for Lykos but her father once again refuses the union. This sends Lykos into a rage, sending Tanya away in tears. The X-Men take Alex away while Lykos plans his revenge.
Log in to comment