X-Men Legacy (2nd Series) #4

Issue Date: 
February 2013
Story Title: 
Prodigal (Part 4)
Staff: 

Simon Spurrier (Writer), Jorge Molina (Pencils), Rachel Rosenberg (Colos), VC’s Cory Petit (Letters), Mike Del Mundo (Cover), Pasqual Ferry and Jay David Ramos (Variant Cover), Jennifer M. Smith (Assistant Editor), Daniel Ketchum (Editor), Nick Lowe (X-Men Group Editor), Axel Alonso (Editor in Chief), Joe Quesada (Chief Creative Officer), Dan Buckley (Publisher), Alan Fine (Executive Producer)

Brief Description: 

The X-Men square off against David and try to get him to calm down and hand the kids over. He tries to make them see that he won’t hurt the kids but he ends up getting into an argument with Wolverine. He eventually uses his powers to psychically knock Wolverine out and leave with the kids. The X-Men follow but the twins enter David’s mind and help him call on powers to defeat them. David takes down Storm and Frenzy next but is eventually knocked down by Chamber. David gets up and uses his powers to create skin to cover Chamber’s head and chest. As Beast saves Chamber, Blindfold steps forward and enters David’s mind. She kicks the twins out and puts all his personalities to sleep. She kisses him and says that she is supposed to be his nemesis. Before she can explain what she is doing in his mind, she is attacked by the creature that was created when David felt his dad die. As the X-Men help Blindfold, David’s escapes into a nearby warehouse that is full of guns and ammo. Chamber loses his temper and blasts the warehouse with fire. The kids, scared that they are going to die, plead with David to save them. This gives him the ego boost he needs and the David personality grows big enough to take down one of his most powerful personalities. He takes control of a reality changer and manages to remove himself, the warehouse and the fire from reality before anyone is killed by the explosion. The twins are left behind with the X-Men. As the X-Men fly away, David reappears and begins to wonder how the eyeball creature is mixed up in the whole situation, given that it was his mind that sent him to find the twins. On the plane, Karasu is uncomfortable with going with the X-Men but her brother says they are where they are meant to be. Unbeknown to her, a sinister looks comes across his face and his eyes glow electric blue.

Full Summary: 

In Iris House in Tokyo, Wolverine and his squad of X-Men confront David. Misunderstanding the situation, Storm tells him not to hurt the kids and Beast asks him to be reasonable. Wolverine is blunter and just tells him to step the hell off. David muses that they love their drama. They think he’s dangerous and he can’t really blame them for that. But somehow they’ve gotten it into their heads that he is there to hurt the kids he came here to save and for that he should be angry. But at the moment he can only really think one thing. With the twins behind him, David states out loud that he forgot how ridiculous the X-Men look.

Frenzy makes a sarcastic retort and Beast quietly tells her to heel. Wolverine addresses him as Legion and says he just wants to help. David says that, for a start, they can stop calling him Legion. Pointing to Chamber, who was sneaking up behind him, David says that, if the human tracheotomy doesn’t stop them, he might lose his *%&* and fracture the universe or something.

David is only bluffing, mostly. He can’t access most of his inner powers yet, he isn’t strong enough. But the X-men don’t know that. Storm pleads with him and says he isn’t well; they can help him and his friends. He asks how they would help them exactly. Beast says he knows how, they will give them a future; teach them how to control their powers to fight for a better… David interrupts at hearing the word “fight.” He squares up to Wolverine and says the two kids have known nothing but violence their whole lives and they want to fix that by sending them to a paramilitary spandex school. Wolverine asks what he is suggesting. The kids should be kids? Mutants shouldn’t be taught to defend themselves? David replies and says that they shouldn’t have to. And they wouldn’t if the X-Men ever made a jolt of difference in the world.

A little stunned at what David is saying, Storm says that that’s his father’s dream he is talking about. He says that it isn’t the dream, the dream itself is fine. He starts to stutter as he says that maybe the way he went about it was… wrong. At hearing that, Wolverine unsheathes his claws and says the kid has no respect. David moves himself in between Wolverine and the kids and asks him to wait. Wolverine gets up close to David and says he has rampaged halfway across Asia, abducted a pair of minors and now he is sassing his dead father. He asks if he wants to play rough but David says that it’s not that… he just doesn’t want to hurt him.

David mentally recalls how they have all had psychic training, so he needs to find a way to get the hairy hobbit off guard. As the two men start squaring off against each other again, David speaks up and says that Wolverine must be thinking how he could possibly hurt him. David then asks him what good’s an adamantium skeleton if he shoots singularities up his nostrils? (Bluff) What good is reduced aging if he irradiates him so bad that he cannot go near anyone for centuries? (Bluff) What good is a healing factor if it’s turned up so high that he is nothing but a mass of tumors, unable to die? (Bluff)

Wolverine starts to speak and says he doesn’t have to do this. But David immediately realizes that he is off guard and says he could simply put his brain on standby. With that, he smiles and clicks his fingers as Wolverine suddenly lurches backwards and collapses unconscious on the floor. David turns to leave with the kids and says to the X-Men the moral of the story is not to *%&* with him.

As the rest of the X-Men look down at Wolverine, Blindfold comes over the radio and asks if Beast is there. She is sitting in the Blackbird jet, observing the whole scene on a TV screen, even though she has no eyes. She apologizes and says that she could be of some use out there. Beast immediately denies her request and says she’s played her part in tracking David. He won’t prove him right by deploying a youngster.

As Beast picks Wolverine up, he tells the rest of the X-Men to bear in mind that David is ill. As such he should be accorded the care and sympathy that comes with it. But with that caveat in mind. he tells them to get the precocious little swot. As David and the kids run out of the building and past the Blackbird Karasu asks if they will come after them. David sarcastically asks if the Pope *%&*’s in the wood. He apologizes and says he won’t let them fight but there is a way they could help. He stops and crouches down to their level. He says they have seen what it’s like in his head. He can’t access the powers he needs whilst the others are so strong. Before he finishes, the twins say they understand and they want to help.

Inside David’s mindscape, the David Haller personality is crouched in an air duct up high. Below him, the hoards of other personalities search him out. As he looks on, Karasu and Sojobo uses their powers and enter his mind. Their psychic ravens start attacking the other personalities.

Outside, David is suddenly confronted by Storm, who lights up the sky with lightning as she flies down to him. She says the sky dislikes him. It cherishes it’s monopoly on unrestrained overkill. Under his breath, David groans at the dramatics and then yells for the kids to get to cover. He asks them if they can track down a scrawny tinpot called K-zek the conduit.

Inside his mind, the psychic ravens bring the robot K-zek to David. K-zek yells for them to release him but his pleas are ignored and David uses the injection needles on his glove to extract his power.

Outside, Storm hits David with a huge lightning strike. but it doesn’t faze him. He tells her it was a good shot, but he was already getting wet when she took it. As she wonders what he meant, she is suddenly hit with a huge energy bolt and she collapses on the floor. As he escorts the kids away, he says that wet means W.E.T… Wireless Energy Transfer. Before he can get too far, something slams down onto the ground in front of him. After the dust has cleared, he sees Frenzy, who tells him to make some more funnies. As she cracks her knuckles, he asks if she’s going to hit him. She confirms she is and David asks if she will hit him a lot. Once again, she confirms it. David politely asks the kids to find Non-Newtonian Annie.

Inside his mind, the ravens bring David a purple corpse-like woman. As Annie protests, the ravens say that she is slippery.

In the real world, David informs Frenzy that he is cloaked in zero-tau nullskin. It’s only fair that he reminds her of the law of conservation of energy. Unfortunately, she doesn’t listen and punches him full on in the face, only to be blasted away before she makes contact. Just as he relishes in Frenzy’s defeat, he is suddenly hit with a blast of fire. As he collapses on the floor, Chamber stands over him and says that he has officially kicked his ass. He tells him to stay down as nobody likes seeing bootprints on both cheeks.

Beast approaches the scene as the twins run to David’s aid. He tells them to calm down and there’s nothing to worry about. David disagrees and says, with the sweet talk from the Cookie Monster’s toothier twin and the cockney pillock with incendiary halitosis, there’s a lot to worry about. As Chamber stands menacingly by him, the twins say that they could take him together. But David tells them no, instead he asks for them to bring him the Skinsmith.

Inside his mind, the ravens bring him a naked and contorted man who only growls when he injects him.

Outside, David picks himself up off the floor and tells Chamber that it isn’t personal but he needs to shut his English gob. With that, David reaches out his hand towards Chamber and the X-Man suddenly has skin wrapping around his mouth, closing off his powers. As Beast concerns himself with Chamber’s situation, David and the kids run. David turns back to Beast and tells him to remember that the pen is mightier than the sword. Beast angrily tells him to spare it; they didn’t want any violence just as much as he did. Chamber starts to writhe as he cannot vent his powers. He realizes that he is going to blow due to the pressure in his head and bowels. Beast can only watch and wonder why David would do something like this.

Chamber yells for him to go get the disrespectful little *%&%*. Beast then realizes that David has been dropping clues about this moment all the way through their conversation. Back in the house, he insulted Chamber by calling him tracheotomy kid and then telling Beast that the pen is mightier than the sword. Beast takes a pen out of his pocket and empties the contents. He then jams it through the new skin over Chamber’s face, releasing the pressure and creating a flume of fire. Beast marvels at David’s plan.

Chamber starts recovering and Beast tells him that David didn’t mean to leave any lasting effects. His attention is caught by Blindfold, who strides past him and towards David. Chamber comments that Beast told her to stay on the plane but she tells him that David won’t hurt her, not ever.

Inside David’s mindscape, he tells the kids that he is sorry he muddled them in all of this. They note that the monsters in his head are all falling asleep. Suddenly, Blindfold walks up to him, inside his mind. She introduces herself as Ruth and says she didn’t mean to intrude. She tells everyone to calm down and then asks the kids to give them a moment as they have grown up things to discuss. The psychic ravens disappear as David asks who she is. She tells him to be quiet and that she is supposed to be his nemesis. She says she is pleased to meet him and then kisses him on the lips. David looks down and realizes that his hands are now cuffed.

In the real world, the twins are annoyed that they have been kicked out of David’s mind. David realizes that he has no powers either. The twins use their powers to see that the X-Men are on the move to intercept them. For some reason, David’s mind casts him back to the moment he met up with the weird eyeball creature in China. It was when David entered his mind that he saw the twins in the first place. He recalls how the eyeball creature said he was supposed to be dangerous but instead he’s just a stammering punk with a haggis-humper accent. David thinks that maybe he was right. When Karasu asks what they should do David suggests hiding.

Inside his mind, David pleads for Blindfold to let him go, as the children are frightened. With an arm on his shoulder, she tells him that the only scared kid that he needs to save is looking at her. She tells him that everything will be alright and to trust him but before she can finish she is attacked by the yellow rat-like creature that was created in David’s mind when his dad died. The creature yells for her to get out as it slashes at her throat. Light pours out of the open wound and Blindfold collapses on the floor and dissolves away. David is too stunned to notice all the other personalities in his head have regained their senses and are surrounding him.

In the real world, David escorts the kids to a warehouse. He tells them to be as quiet as mice, as he needs to clear his head. As they walk in, they see it is an ammunition store with guns, bullets and other weapons strewn around.

Elsewhere, the X-Men rush to Blindfold, who has collapsed. Beast notes she’s barely breathing as Chamber goes after David and the twins. Beast yells for him not to do anything but Chamber ignores him and starts to charge up his power. Inside the ammo store, David hears rustling coming from somewhere and the twins use their powers to see that fire is coming.

Inside his mind, David’s personalities leap on him in an attempt to claim his body. Outside, Chamber unleashes a huge fireball at the warehouse, much to Beast’s horror. Inside the warehouse, the twins clings to David and say they don’t want to die. Inside his mind, the David Haller personality suddenly grows bigger and more muscled. In the end, it’s simple; somebody needs him and that’s one hell of an ego boost. He fends of the other personalities and spots the sumo-like Origamist. This personality is one of the top dogs; he is a reality changer, a space folder. As flames erupt through the warehouse door, David claims the powers for himself.

Outside, the X-Men can only watch as fire engulfs the warehouse. Then as they look on, the building starts to fold up like a piece of origami. As the building completely folds up and disappears, the twins are unfolded from nothing and appear standing right next to the X-Men. The children say that he folded the fire away and he’s gone now; he saved them. Chamber starts to apologize but Beast recalls David’s words earlier and tells him to “shut his gob.” Beast goes to the kids and says that they can come with them if they like, he promises to keep them safe. Karasu says they don’t want to go as David said they would make them fight. Sojobo, however, interjects and says he thinks they should go. As he walks off holding Beast’s hand, Karasu is confused. Storm walks up to her and says it’s for the best and asks for her to trust them.

David unfolds himself using the Origamist’s powers and watches the X-Men take the children away. He muses that the X-Men are his father’s technicolor mutant militia. He recalls that the eyeball creature called them idealistic morons prattling on about equality and tolerance whilst doing nothing to achieve it. There’s a fire-scorched bullet-ridden dimension somewhere to the left of Limbo to mark his words. David wonders why the eyeball creature hates the X-Men as much as he is beginning to. Looking down at the debris of where the warehouse stood, he sees two glowing red eyeballs staring up at him.

On the Blackbird, a now conscious Wolverine is telling Kitty over the radio that there had better be beer in the staff room. Frenzy mumbles to herself what she will do to David if she ever sees him again. Beast has strapped Blindfold into a seat and is examining her with some equipment but he is not getting any response. On another radio, Storm instructs Dr. Rao to prep a bed as they have a psychic trauma patient arriving. Chamber just sits in his seat and repeats that he is sorry. Karasu whispers to her brother that they shouldn’t have come as these people seem strange. Sojobo tells her, though, that they are exactly where they are meant to be. With that, a sinister expression crosses his face and his eyes glow electric blue.

Characters Involved: 

David Haller/Legion

Beast, Chamber, Frenzy, Storm, Wolverine (all X-Men)

Blindfold (X-student)

Karasu Tengo

Sojobo Tengo

(inside David’s mindscape)

David Haller

K-zek the Conduit, Non-Newtonian Annie, The Origamist, Skinsmith, Tyrannix the Abominoid,

Numerous other personalities

Yellow rat-like creature

(in David’s memory)

David Haller/Legion

Eyeball creature

Story Notes: 

Although not explicitly stated, this is presumably part four of the Prodigal arc.

The Cookie Monster is a character from the kids TV show Sesame Street. Like Beast, he is also blue and furry.

Blindfold seems to be able to speak coherently whilst in David’s mind, as opposed to her normal way of speaking where she places words like Please, Thank You, Yes and No randomly within sentences.

Issue Information: 
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