Zeitgeist

Origin

Axel Cluney discovered his mutant-powers at the age of 14 when he got sick off of alcohol and vomited his super acid in a girl's face, melting it off and scarring her. The incident was as much traumatic for Axel as it was for the girl. He would spend years having nightmares of the incident, and feeling the guild of not even remembering the name of the girl.

Creation

Zeitgeist was created by Peter Milligan and Mike Allred in 2001 and first appeared in X-Force # 116.

Mayor Story Arcs

X-Force

Axel would later team up with Hollywood tycoon Spike Freeman and a former mutant named the Coach to create a team of celebrity mutant superheroes that would be accepted and even looked up to by society; X-Force was born (not to be mistaken for the X-force from the early '90's lead by Cable). This was Axel's enterance into superhero business and he took a codename; Zeitgeist.

When Edie Sawyer aka U-Go Girl, joined the team Axel and Edie developed a romantic relationship. After various roster changes X-force began to become less popular with the public and the Coach and Zeitgeist decided to kill off the team and replace it with a fresher group of heroes. To do this they orchaestrated a kidnapping of the popular boy band "Boyz R' Us" and set up a squad of heavily armed soldiers that would kill all members of X-force, except Zeitgeist and the Anarchist (the newest member of the team). During the fight a fiasco took place. Not only the X-force team, but also Zeitgeist was accidentally killed, while Anarchist and U-Go-Girl survived instead. U-Go-Girl held Zeitgeist in her arms while he passed away. Zeitgeist's last thoughts went back to the girl he hurt when his mutant powers first manifested. He finally remembered her name, then he apparently died.

Return

Years later, it was revealed that he survived the massacre. Axel also formed a new team called the X-Cellent, to fight the newly reformed X-Statix.

Powers

Axel has the power to secrete corrosive acid from his mouth/throat. It is said to be able to eat through anything.