The Brood Saga Part 2

Welcome back Muties. In our last installment we discussed an overview of the first half of the Brood Saga, by Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum. As a quick review, Lilandra, empress of the Shi'ar empire, was abducted by her sister Deathbird, in collusion with the parasitic alien race known as the Brood. The X-Men, along with their allies, the space pirates known as the Starjammers, rescued Lilandra and saved the Earth from destruction in the process. Unbeknownst to the X-Men, though, their mentor, Professor Charles Xavier, was infected with a Brood embryo. During a farewell celebration for Lilandra, the X-Men are captured by the Brood, to be used as breeding stock for the next generation of mutant Brood warriors.

This takes us into an issue I've already discussed multiple times here on Feral Samurai as well as on my Patreon blog, that being Uncanny X-Men #162. The book opens with Wolverine on the run through a hostile alien jungle, battling the Brood soldiers that pursue him, as well as the highly aggressive plant and animal life of the jungle itself. Through a series of fever dream flashbacks we learn that the Brood queen infected each of the X-Men with a Brood embryo, while using a hallucinatory fugue to keep them docile. Wolverine, due to his enhanced senses, is the only one able to see through the veil, though not in time to save him from the infection. When the Brood discover that Wolverine knows the truth, the chase is on. In the present moment, after defeating the last of his pursuers, Wolverine begins to succumb to the Brood transformation process, though he is saved by his healing factor, his immutable Adamantium skeleton, and his own indomitable will. Afterwards, he vows to either save his friends or avenge them.

When Wolverine returns to infiltrate the Brood base in tbt following issue, he finds them experimenting on the X-Men's Ally, Carol Danvers, the now-depowered and former Ms Marvel, trying to unlock the secrets of her unique genetic structure. It becomes immediately apparent that the experimentation has had an unexpected effect on Carol, as her eyes now look as if they contain entire fields of stars. Wolverine and Carol locate Storm and Cyclops who, through nightmares and meditative impressions, have come to suspect the nature of their situation. The three X-Men rouse the rest of their team and Lilandra into action. They are about to be overwhelmed, when they' are suddenly teleported aboard Lilandra's space yacht.

The Brood give pursuit, attacking the X-Men in individual  living fighter ship's that resemble flying sharks. During the battle, Storm is forced to use her lightning powers to kill for the first time since her childhood. Also, in the heat of the exchange, the experiments conducted on Carol Danvers trigger her transformation into an immensely powerful energy-based form. Carol, now calling herself Binary, uses the powers of her new form to destroy their attackers, save Kitty from certain death, repair Lilandra's ship, and power the ship's warp drive engines. In the aftermath of the battle, Storm somehow senses that she is with child, and is able, to her horror, to determine the nature of it. In her shock and despair she flees on a small personal space craft. When Cyclops confronts Wolverine, the latter at last reveals to the rest what the Brood have done to them. In a rage, Binary bursts through the hull of Lilandra's ship, declaring vengeance on the Brood, though the remaining occupants are now in danger of being sucked out into space.

The X-Men manage to seal the hull breach without any significant injuries, though some distance away, Storm begins to undergo her transformation into a Brood. The process reverses itself for just a moment, leaving Storm in full control of her body, a moment she uses to unless the full power of her elemental abilities, incinerating her ship and committing herself to suicide in the cold and vacuum of space. Moments later, the X-Men begin having visions of Storm in different appearances - a Victorian vampire, a child, a primal warrior/hunter, and finally in her more familiar form, albiet glowing - before their ship is swallowed by one of the giant space whales. Storm assures the X-Men that the whale - an acanti- means them no harm, a fact she knows because she and it have become as one.

On the desolate planet Madrizar, Binary lays waste to a Brood colony, and if forced to render a mercy killing to an adult Acanti that has been enslaved by a Brood virus. She is met there by an astral projection of Storm, who guides her back to the young Acanti to which Storm is bonded and where the X-Men have been given shelter. Storm shows Binary an embriotic pod where the Acanti is growing Storm a new body from where hers was partially transformed into a Brood and then ravaged by exposure to open space. Storm tells the X-Men of how the Acanti prophet and keeper of their racial soul, the Soul Singer, was enslaved by the Brood ages ago, and that when it died it's soul was not permitted to move on to the next Soul Singer, as the Brood had turned it's corpse into their main hive city. Storm convinces the X-Men, as their final act before their own Brood transformations, to free the Soul Singer's spirit so that it can move on to the young Acanti to which she is bonded. During the assault, Cyclops' transformation begins, causing him to turn on the X-Men. At the last moment, however, he is able to resist long enough for Wolverine to knock him out and take the Brood Queen hostage. Kitty becomes separated from the rest of the team during the fight and is in danger of being overwhelmed by the Brood, only to saved by a small purple dragon-like alien. When a lone Brood soldier accidentally blasts a hole in a nearby wall, Kitty, the dragon, and the the Brood step, almost hypnotized, through the hole into a bright white light. When the X-Men find the crystalline chamber containing the Acanti soul, Kitty steps out of it, saying that the Brood who had entered with her had been turned to crystal. The X-Men enter the chamber with the Brood Queen, when their transformations begin in earnest. The Queen gloats that the psychic resonance of their transformations with corrupt the Acanti soul, bonding the Acanti to her forever. Binary flies an injured Wolverine to safety, then uses her powers to generate the power of a star within the chamber, setting the soul free, allowing it to merge with the young Acanti. The soul, in turn, purified the X-Men and Lilandra of the Brood infection and turned to Queen to crystal. As the X-Men and their allies rocket away with help from the Starjammers, Cyclops and Wolverine recall that the Queen had gloated about a young queen gestating in safety, and come to the conclusion that it must be growing with Professor Xavier.

Back on Earth, the X-men assault Xavier's mansion, taking care to remove the Professor's younger students, the New Mutants, from the scene of the battle with as little damage as possible. As they take the fight to Xavier, he transforms fully into the new Brood Queen, with the full range of his telepathic abilities intact. Xavier manages to hold both the X-Men and the New Mutants at bay, until he is incapacitated by Storm. As Wolverine and Cyclops move in for the killing blow, however, Xavier begs them to wait, telling them that he's struggling for control mentally, and asking them to save him before his mind is fully subverting. Over Wolverine's objections, Xavier is taken aboard the Starjammers' ship, where their medic, Sikorski, clones the Professor's original body, transferring his mind from the old one to the new. Much to the X-Men's surprise and Kitty's consternation, his first order upon being united with his students is that Kitty is to leave the X-Men and begin training with the New Mutants.

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Wow, that is a LOT of information to unpack, even over two installments, and there were still plot worthy bits I had to leave out for the sake of a cohesive narrative. I did say, though, that the reason I was having this discussion was to bring to light the elements contained in this arc that will play an important part in the years of storytelling to come, to let's look at them now.

1.  This arc is bookended by family-related events for Cyclops. In issue ___ Scott learns that X-Men ally and awesome space pirate Corsair is his father. In the closing issue, # ___, Corsair reveals to Scott that he has more family, Scott's grandparents who live in Alaska. Cyclops' decision to go meet his grandparents will lead to an event that will have massive and lasting impacts not only on Cyclops but the Marvel Universe as a whole.

2.  Issue 158 features the first appearance of Rogue in an X-Men comic. At the time she was still operating as a villain, though as long time X-Men readers will know, she'll soon become a significant member of the team. Also in 158, while temporarily back on Earth, Wolverine, Storm, and Carl Dancers infiltrate the Pentagon to erase the government's files on the X-Men. Intervention by Rogue and Mystique leads to an open confrontation within the Pentagon, heightening government anti-mutant sentiments.

3. In issue 161, Storm and Cyclops come to a heated disagreement about who should lead the X-Men. This would be the beginning of a subtle plot thread that would come to fruition in a few years.

4. In issue 162, as I've mentioned in previous posts, we get the first use of first person narration for Wolverine, something that would become a staple for the character later in the 80s and on into the 90s, and would feature prominently in one of the issues we'll be covering here in our next installment.

5. Arguably the greatest personal ramifications of the Brood Saga belong to Storm. Being forced to kill, being away from the Earth for so long, having a literal new body built for her, in conjunction with events coming up in the next Uncanny X-Men arch we'll be covering, lead to one of the most dramatic and glorious character redesigns in Marvel history.

Join me here next time when we begin to explore the fallout of some of these elements, when I cover both Uncanny X-Men #___ and Wolverine (miniseries) #1. In the meantime, feel free to leave comment here on the blog, and follow and tweet me @IamGrantRichter. I also encourage you to download the first first episode of Krakathoom, the new podcast starring me and Herman Louw of the Longbox of Darkness podcast.

Until then, see you neXt time, Muties!