Writing: Larry Hama
Art: Randy Green
What Went Down: After being arrested by Val Cooper, Xavier is secretly taken to the location of Operation Zero Tolerance and held personally under Bastion. He is labeled Prisoner M-13, and Bastion constantly interrogates him for information and mistreats him as well. Henry Peter Gyrich is around, chastising Bastion for mistreating Xavier, who is apparently responsible for Xavier being there. We also learn that the location is an abandoned Hulkbuster Base. Bastion knows that Xavier is, or was, a mutant, but Gyrich doesn’t understand why Bastion thinks this is true.
We see a replay of the interrogation with Bastion losing his patience as Xavier refuses to admit that mutants are less then human. He then strikes the Professor. We also learn about prisoner M-9, also known as Nina the Mannite. She is a non-human little girl who is potentially the next stage of evolution beyond mutants. Bastion brings in a psychologist, Dr. Ingrid Thysson to try to prove that Xavier is a mutant. After introducing herself, Dr. Thysson sees a body bag being disposed of, but she is told not to question it. Thysson comments on how Xavier has obviously been mistreated, as does her associate Daryll Smith, a character from Hama’s Wolverine that is immune to psychics. While watching the monitors, the feed is interrupted by a cartoon called the Rainbow Bears.
In Xavier’s cell Nina teleports in and uses telekinesis to get Charles back in his chair. Bastion and his men barge into his cell, but Nina is already gone. As Bastion freaks out, Daryl tells him to calm down, and Bastion orders him to the brig. The next day Thysson sets out to create a full psych profile on Charles. She straps him in a weird gyroscope and asks him loads of questions. Xavier asks her if she knows the true purpose of this facility, and claims that after he volunteered to help, he was taken away without Cooper’s knowledge. Ingrid discovers Nina’s stuffed rabbit, and Xavier grabs it from her.
Later Gyrich and Bastion are discussing Nina. After learning that Daryl is a psi-anomoly, Bastion tells Gyrich to give him the DX order for Nina. Since the body bag from early had the letters DX on it, that can’t be a good thing. Nina visits Charles again and explains how she can read people, except Bastion. Charles tells her about his own powers, and Nina offers to turn them back on, but he tells her he’s not ready. Xavier wishes for a phone and she makes one appear, which he uses to call Renee Majcomb. Thysson sees the Rainbow Bears back on the monitor and goes to investigate. She barges into the cell, and Nina reveals herself because she senses Thysson is good.
Nina tells her that she read that she was scheduled for DX. To save the girl, Ingrid gives Xavier access to a hover vehicle to distract the guards. Thysson tries to get Nina out, but they are stopped by Darryl Smith. Xavier is recaptured and Thysson is knocked out. Smith delivers the girl in the body bag to Bastion; Bastion claims he takes no pleasure in this. On board the helicopter meant to dispose of the body, the soldier notes that the body bag is empty.
The next day, Thysson tells Xavier that she’s been transferred. She assumes that the little girl mentally controlled them, but a phone appears out of thin air. It seems that Renee has picked up Nina, and that Nina also has the power to appear dead and lifeless. Charles is happy and tells Nina to find more people like herself. Nina ends the issue by telling Renee that one day she is going to turn Charlie back on.
How It Was: Well, let’s get to the huge, gaping problem. This issue is called Onslaught: Epilogue, yet it has absolutely nothing to do with Onslaught whatsoever. In reality, it should’ve been called Operation Zero Tolerance: Prologue, but I guess Marvel was eager to keep cashing in on their super-mega crossover. Really, this is the type of issue that belonged in X-Men Unlimited, and it was most likely editorially mandated. As it is, it offers up an interesting twist on Xavier’s fate, and it offers some cool sequences where the Professor gets to calmly stand up to the bully Bastion. As a Xavier character piece, it’s actually quite good at exploring his feelings of hopelessness and his desires at redemption, all while constantly frustrating Bastion.
But then there’s Nina the Mannite, who is an overly cutesy overpowered plot device. She seems to have about a million powers, from phasing to telepathy to dropping her heartbeat, but for some reason she hasn’t escaped Bastion up to this point. Yeah, she’s a little girl, but she can materialize phones and block security systems, so what the heck is her hold up? Believe it or not Nina actually appears quite a bit later down the line, so you have that to look forward to, don’t you?
As for the rest, I like Xavier as Bastion’s prisoner, but the circumstances under his imprisonment are a little iffy. Henry Gyrich, who isn’t supposed to be a bad guy, just one who doesn’t question rules often enough, seems pretty oblivious to the fact that Bastion is mistreating a voluntary prisoner for no particular good reason. Shouldn’t he and Thysson be reporting Bastion, I mean he’s planning on annihilating an entire race? And shouldn’t Renee contact the X-Men to tell them what’s going on? Oh well. While the plot isn’t spectacular and the new characters are less than compelling, Hama does an admirable job with the internal and external struggles of Professor X, even if it is in a story that’s hard to really care about. This story definitely didn’t warrant its own one-shot, but what are you going to do?
D+
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