X-Corps

NOTE: This story takes place before X-Men #41.

One Month Ago

Leyu Yoshida’s consciousness slowly returned to her. As an agent of the unsanctioned black ops organization known as X-Corps, she was ordered by Wisdom and Psylocke to infiltrate a mutant terrorist group known as the Dictators. Once she approached them, however, she was instantly blindsided and knocked unconscious.

Now, as her eyes opened and her vision came into focus, she found herself staring up at one man she had never expected to see in here of all places. She couldn’t hold the gasp that slipped from her mouth.

“Hello Leyu,” he said.

“Honto desu ka…” she muttered. “…Cameron?”

Cameron Dalin, former CIA operative and, for a brief period, the X-Men’s only human member, smiled down at the Japanese woman he had a brief relationship with when he first came to the Xavier Institute.

“It’s me,” he said.

“But your accident…are you…?”

“I’m fine, bionic implants took care of me.” He rubbed the back of her head. “Sorry I had to blindside you like that.”

Leyu reached her hand to where he rubbed, gently touching his skin. Both of them instantly pulled away and she looked down. “That was you?”

“The Dictators aren’t what you think,” said Cameron. “But I’m not the one who should explain it to you. Come on, the others have been waiting for you to wake up.”

He offered his hand to help her up. Leyu ignored it and got to her feet from the gurney under her own power. “What others?”

“Follow me.” Cameron led her out of the small examination room and down a corridor. At the end was a door leading to a small meeting room, where three other individuals sat. One of them Leyu recognized immediately.

“Banshee?” she asked.

Sean Cassidy offered a warm smile. “Good t’ see yeh again. Time to meet the rest of the crew. This beautiful woman over here is Monica Rambeau and th’ boyo with the fancy face is Jack Hart.”

“Monica used to be Photon, from the Avengers,” said Cameron with a smile. Leyu gave him a strange look and Monica answered her questioning glance.

“I was his favorite Avenger, or so he keeps telling me.”

“And no one remembers the Jack of Hearts, I guess,” said Jack.

“All the better for our purposes,” said Sean.

“What purposes? What is this place?” asked Leyu. “Some sort of X-Men and Avengers team-up?”

“We’re not working with either of those organizations,” said Sean. “We’re Interpol.”

“Interpol?” asked Leyu. “And the Dictators…?”

“A front organization, set up by us to try and learn more about mutant underground terrorist organizations,” said Cameron. “When we heard you were making inquiries, we knew X-Corps was involved.”

“I don’t know what you’re—”

“Lass, I’ve been doin’ this since before you were born, so please don’t insult me intelligence,” said Sean. “We know all about X-Corps an’ we know that Wisdom is only makin’ things worse.”

“Black Womb’s revelation has caused no end of problems,” said Monica. “We’ve been trying to hold back the floodgates, which has distracted us from our primary focus.”

“And that would be?” asked Leyu.

“Weapon Plus,” said Sean. “They’ve fallen under our radar an’ we’ve got one of our agents in deep cover there with no way of pullin’ her out.” He stepped closer to Leyu. “Now, we could’ve just kept yeh in the dark about the truth of the Dictators, but Cameron said we could trust you.”

“I have my orders and I won’t betray X-Corps,” said Leyu.

“No one’s asking you to,” said Cameron. “Look, we’re all on the same side. But Black Womb is just the tip of the iceberg. There’s something big going on behind the scenes and we have a strong suspicion that Weapon Plus and Black Womb are connected.”

“So what do you want from me?”

“We want yeh to join us,” said Sean.

WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION

By Dino Pollard

X-Corps HQ
Now

Fingers dug in the almost-empty pack with the Silk Cut label stamped on the front. They found the one remaining cigarette and brought them to the lips of Peter Winston Wisdom. The Zippo lighter ignited the end of it and he slowly dragged on the end, allowing the smoke to fill his lungs.

“This is just fucking perfect,” he said after he blew the remaining smoke through his nostrils. His feet were propped up on his desk as he stared at the young, slender man who stood before him with closely-cropped blond hair and a goatee to match. “Mr. Big-Time Avenger thinks he can just swoop in, steal away one of my operatives, and has the gall to ask for a spot in my organization?”

Samuel Guthrie didn’t flinch under Wisdom’s scrutiny. The man was tough, but he’d been trained by the likes of Professor X, Magneto, Cable and, most-recently, Captain America. He’d faced down the Master Man and lived to tell about it. Compared to them, Wisdom was nothing but a lot of talk in a suit.

“Fact o’ the matter is Kurt had lots of issues with what you guys were doin’ over here,” said Sam. “He doesn’t work well in this grouping, you shoulda realized that before you recruited him.”

“And you think you’ve got what it takes?” Wisdom began to chuckle. “What’s wrong, farmboy? Find the spotlight too bright? Or did Stark shag your mum?”

“Ah know the people you work with, Wisdom. Ah’ve worked with some of them since I was a teenager. We operate well together an’ if you give me a chance, I can prove that to you.”

“So I’m told,” said Wisdom. “Okay, you’ve got your shot. But this isn’t Avengers Mansion and I’m sure as hell not Captain fuckin’ America. You come here, you’ve gotta be prepared to get your hands dirty.”

“Been doin’ it while wearin’ an X a lot longer than you,” said Sam.

“Fine,” said Wisdom. “Now if you don’t mind, kindly piss off. I’ve got work to do.”

Cannonball nodded and left Wisdom’s office. Pete sighed as he finished off the cigarette and reached for the pack, finding none left. “Bugger…”

“You made the right choice.”

Wisdom nearly jumped when he heard the baritone voice of Nathan Summers. “Bleeding Christ, I’ve told you not to do that!”

Cable emerged from the shadows. “Sorry, I just wanted to talk to you personally about Sam. He’s—”

Wisdom waved his hand dismissively. “Right, right, the future of mutantkind, he will usher in a great new age, I’ve heard all that shit before. Get a few drinks in Bishop and he’ll go on for hours. Had to drink myself into a bloody coma just to get him to shut up.”

“He’s right, though, it was a mistake to involve Nightcrawler in X-Corps in the first place. He’s a better fit with the Avengers.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t Guthrie have a falling out with those X-Force chaps we’ve got working here?”

“Yes,” said Cable. “But they’ve all been friends for a long time. I’m sure they can sort it all out.”

“I’m just tired of operatives deciding left, right and center that they’ve got better things to do. First Summers takes half our crew for this terrorist initiative, then Maverick decides he’s got something to attend to. Not to mention Bishop giving Archer and Fixx the boot without my consent. Everyone seems to think this was just some side gig they could walk away from.” Wisdom flicked open and shut his lighter as he spoke, finding he needed to do something to occupy his mind without a cigarette. “This group’s falling apart, Nate old son.”

Ethiopia

Psylocke transmitted her thoughts across the psi-web she established with the other operatives in her team. {All points respond.}

{Ready to rock and roll,} said Rictor.

{I am prepared to do battle,} came Shatterstar’s response.

{Let’s just get this over with,} said Skin.

{Bishop here, in position.}

{Remember the plan. The Nubian appears to have the ability to control concentrated air, which means no real energy discharge. So Bishop, you focus on the others of the Future Path. Skin, you help him. Rictor, I want you to keep everyone off their feet. Shatterstar, you and I will take on the Nubian directly. Wait for me to move first.}

Psylocke fell back into the shadows and the darkness swirled around her as the mark of the Crimson Dawn began to glow on her face. She vanished into the shadows completely and rose up from the shadow cast by the Nubian as he spoke to the crowd of mutants. She lunged up, the psychic knife emitted by her hand tearing into the Nubian’s head.

Rictor knelt down from his position in the crowd, palms on the ground and directing vibrations into the earth to create centralized earthquakes in the immediate vicinity. Skin leapt in next, his fingers flying out and wrapping around the different members of the Mutant Path, trying to keep them immobilized as quickly as possible.

Bishop moved next, holding an energy rifle in his hands and began unloading charge after charge. One of the Mutant Path appeared behind him, electricity flying from his fingertips into the former X-Man’s body. Bishop simply turned, his eyes now crackling with that same energy.

“Not smart.” He hefted the rifle with one hand while his free hand unleashed a powerful energy burst that sent the electric-powered mutant flying across the area.

The Nubian recovered quickly from Psylocke’s strike and a concentrated burst of air knocked her back. He drew the massive sword from his back and swung it towards her. Betsy fell into the shadow and the blade struck solid ground. Before the Nubian could register that she had gone, the nerves on his back exploded as his flesh was torn into at two spots. He turned and saw Shatterstar facing him, the man’s double-bladed sword coated with the Nubian’s blood.

The Nubian glared at Shatterstar and the swordsman was hit with what felt like an invisible battering ram. The Nubian leapt in the air, bringing his sword down and Shatterstar used both his swords to defend himself, crossing them over his head to block the Nubian’s strike. Shatterstar kicked the Nubian in the abdomen as he rocked back, throwing the Nubian over him.

Psylocke jumped back into the fray, both her hands surrounded by psychic knives. She plunged them both into the Nubian’s head, attempting to overload his psyche. But instead, she saw something else in the recesses of his mind. Something far more disturbing and the feedback from the Nubian caused her to cry out in pain and fall to the ground.

“Psylocke!” called Bishop. He fired a shot into one of the Mutant Path he had been sparring against and moved to his teammate’s side. Bishop checked her, but she seemed vacant at the moment. He pointed the gun at the Nubian, who also had Shatterstar’s blades against his throat.

“What did you do to her?” asked Bishop.

The Nubian smiled. “She just saw the truth.”

“And what truth is that?”

The Nubian spat into Bishop’s face and laughed. “You played right into our hands.”

“What madness does he speak?” asked Shatterstar.

“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out,” said Bishop. He dropped the gun and gripped the Nubian’s head. “Do you know what it feels like to have energy slowly fed into your skull at point-blank range? Because that’s what’s about to happen to you.”

“Your threats mean nothing to me, X-Man,” said the Nubian. “The Mutant Path was created, that boy’s death executed, all to get you to come into our clutches. To divide your forces.”

“For what?” asked Bishop.

The Nubian continued to chuckle. “So we could eliminate you for being a thorn in our side.”

Bishop released the Nubian and called out to his teammates. “Rictor, Skin, get here now!”

Rictor slapped his hands together, sending out a shockwave that knocked the charging mutants back. “My hands are kinda full right now, boss!”

“This was a distraction, they’re going after our base!” shouted Bishop. He lifted Psylocke from the ground. “She’s still out.”

“What about this one?” asked Shatterstar.

“The Nubian’s a dead end, probably an operative who only knew enough to taunt us,” said Bishop.

“Very well.” Shatterstar sliced quickly and Bishop looked down to see the Nubian lying motionless, blood pouring from the gaping wound in his neck. Bishop glared at his teammate.

“I didn’t say kill him.”

“Fekt, he was scum,” said Shatterstar.

X-Corps HQ

The alarms blared throughout the X-Corps facility. Wisdom and Cable snapped to attention, running from his office where they found Cannonball, Bedlam and Warp Savant waiting.

“The hell’s going on?” asked Wisdom.

“It’s an attack,” said Bedlam. “We’re not sure from who or where, but the facility has gone into full lock-down mode.”

A massive explosion rocked the area and when the dust cleared, a giant hole appeared in the ceiling. From it descended a robotic construct of some sort, massive in size, with what looked to be a glowing energy center emitting in the center of its head.

“The fuck is that thing?” asked Warp Savant.

“I am Ultimaton,” it spoke in a voice that sounded like a deep echo. “You’ve been scheduled for termination.”

“Must be Friday,” muttered Bedlam.

Wisdom’s fingers began to elongate and glow with white hot energy as Cable drew his Psimitar and Cannonball’s blast field began to engage. The X-Corps’ director spoke quickly without even looking at the man he addressed.

“Savant, we’ve got Tabby, Omega, Mimic and Northstar in the infirmary,” he said. “Get them to the nearest hospital and get in touch with the X-Corporation.”

“You must be stoned if you think I’m skipping out on this—”

“Goddammit, I said go!” shouted Wisdom.

Warp Savant nodded and ran down the corridor as Wisdom and the remainder of X-Corps faced off against their intruder.

“Blast it all, I could really use a fucking drink…” he muttered.

Weapon Plus

“YOU ARE DEAD, DO YOU HEAR ME? DEADEADEAD!”

Wade Wilson, the mercenary called Deadpool, shouted with rage at his opponent. He executed his maneuvers with practiced precision, but the resounding explosion and the splatter of blood indicated the inevitable had happened—he was dead.

Deadpool fell back, lying motionless on the ground. A few moments later, a shadow fell over him. The light in the room glinted off the robot-like woman’s silvery skin and, surprisingly, the Merc With A Mouth spoke once again.

“Hey Eva, wanna do something useful like throw on a skirt?”

Eva, the artificially-intelligent lifeform who had been placed in charge of this Weapon Plus facility, just stared at Deadpool with those vacant, glowing green eyes. “What are you doing, Wilson?”

“Dying, that’s what,” said Deadpool sitting up. He looked down at the video game controller in his hand and threw it against the wall. “You believe that? I got killed by a fucking elf!”

“Come, I have need of you,” she said.

“Oooooh!” said Deadpool, jumping to his feet. “See, I knew I’d wear you down eventually! So where we gonna do it? The pool? The hangar? The sauna? The torture chamber? Pleasesaythetorturechamberpleasesaythetorturechamberpleasesaythetorturechamber…”

“Wilson, for the last time, I have no interest or need to engage in sexual intercourse,” said Eva. “And even if I did, I most-certainly would not choose you as my subject.”

“I love it when you talk dirty,” said Deadpool.

“When I said I have need of you, I was referring—obviously—to your skills as an assassin,” said Eva.

“Oh…” muttered Deadpool. “Well, can I at least grab your ass then? Y’know, since you’ve got no sexual needs or desires, you probably don’t have any modesty, right?”

“I do not, but the answer, as always, is no.”

“Y’know Eva, you’re not really any fun.”

“It is not my job to be fun, Wilson. I was created to be a highly-efficient killing machine and that is exactly what I will do,” said Eva. “The rest of the team has already been assembled in the hangar bay.”

Eva led Deadpool through the corridors of the Weapon Plus facility and they eventually came to the large hangar where a supersonic jet awaited with several individuals standing outside, each of them looking impatient.

Yelena Belova, the Black Widow, stood with her arms crossed, glaring at Deadpool. Next to her was David Cannon, the mutant called Whirlwind. Also there was Frank Schlichting, the Constrictor and finally, Herman Schultz, the Shocker.

“Do we have to bring this loser with?” asked the Constrictor, frowning at Deadpool’s appearance.

“C’mon Frank old buddy, have a heart,” said Deadpool. “Remember when we were roomies together?”

“We tried to kill each other,” said the Constrictor.

“Ahh memories!” said Deadpool. He looked to Eva. “So what’s the deal, where we goin’, who we offing?”

“Our intelligence shows that one of the X-Corps’ operatives is currently stationed in Sri Lanka.” Eva held out her hand with her palm facing up. A holographic image of a man dressed in white complete with a trench coat appeared.

“We’re going to kill Storm Shadow?” asked Deadpool. “Wait…does Storm Shadow even exist in this universe? And if he does, I didn’t know he was a mutant!”

“As always Wilson, I haven’t the faintest idea what you speak of,” said Eva. “This is Fantomex. He has past associations with the Weapon Plus Program. And now that we have discovered his location, Weapon Plus wants him back. He is a valuable piece of technology.”

“So…we’re not killing anyone?” asked Deadpool.

“He is just as valuable dead as alive,” said Eva. “Provided the remains are intact.”

“So what are we waiting for, hands in!” shouted Deadpool, holding out his hand. The rest of the group just walked past him and boarded the plane. Deadpool looked around and saw he was now the only one in the hangar. “Yay team…”

X-Corporation

Warren Worthington III stood addressing a shareholders meeting at his X-Corporation offices. With Melissa Bennett off, he was forced to conduct this meeting on his own, something he was not as used to these days.

“As you can see, we’ve been making great strides so far, even despite the setbacks from recent events. Because of that, I think we should look at moving into other areas of investment, such as—”

Warren found his words cut off as several individuals suddenly appeared in his office. He recognized each of them as operatives of the secretive X-Corps he had set up with X-Corporation funding and without the knowledge of the shareholders.

“Damn, that was tough…” muttered Warp Savant, the only of the group who seemed conscious. The others lay at his feet—Meltdown, Omega, Mimic, and Northstar. He looked up and saw Warren. “But we made it! Look, we’re in trouble, X-Corps just got hit by something big!”

“This meeting’s adjourned, ladies and gentlemen,” said Warren.

“What do you mean?”

“Who are these people?”

“What’s going on here, Worthington?”

“People please, I’ll answer your questions at another time,” said Warren. “But for now, I need you all to leave so I can address this matter personally.”

One by one, the major shareholders left and Warren turned to face Warp Savant. “Just what the hell did you think you were doing? X-Corps is supposed to be a secret initiative and you just revealed its existence to the company.”

“Yeah well, there ain’t no time for discretion, flyboy. ‘Cause like I said, we got hit by something. Something big. While half our strike force was off on a mission in Africa and while these guys were out in the infirmary. Wisdom told me to get them out and the rest were left there with that thing!”

“Okay…” said Warren, rubbing his forehead. “Let’s go over this again. Nice and easy. Who hit X-Corps?”

“That’s the thing, I dunno,” said Warp Savant. “But it was a big thing, almost like a robot, right? Just burst right through the ceiling. And the only ones standing against it were Wisdom, Cable, Bedlam and that new guy, Cannonfire.”

“Cannonball you mean,” said Warren.

“Right, Fireballs, whatever,” said Warp Savant. “Look, the point is we need some major-league cavalry action, like stat!”

“And who would I call in?” asked Warren.

“Aren’t you like, running the Avengers now? I watch the news.”

“Then you don’t watch it a lot, X-Corporation has a stake in the Avengers and we’ve got Storm serving with them,” said Warren. “But they’re not at full strength yet. Similarly, the X-Men are recovering after an attack on the mansion and I doubt X-Factor will get clearance to leave.”

“What about those other X-Men? Havok’s team.”

Warren gave him a disgusted look. “Even if I had the means to contact Alex, I wouldn’t. Far as I’m concerned, he’s the enemy now. He’s making my job extremely difficult.”

“Yeah well, you gotta call someone!” said Warp Savant.

“There might be someone…” said Warren, moving to the phone.

Sri Lanka

Gloria Mueller tossed and turned in her bed, but sleep wouldn’t come to her. Finally, her eyes opened and she found herself staring down the barrel of a handgun. A handgun wielded by a man dressed from head to toe in white.

“Rise and shine, Ms. Mueller,” he said. “Recognize your handiwork, don’t you? Or would that be your mother’s?”

“You…” she muttered. “But…why me? What do you want?”

“I was sent here to kill you,” said Fantomex. “But I’m not going to do that.”

“And why not?”

Fantomex pressed the barrel to her forehead. “Because I want information. I want you to tell me where my son is.”

“Your…son?”

“I know he exists and I know Black Womb has him.”

“You don’t have a son, Charlie Cluster,” said Gloria. “You have a family.”

“Excuse me?” he asked.

“Project: NEO was based on your genetic information,” said Gloria.

“I was part of Project: NEO,” said Fantomex.

“No, that’s just what you thought you were,” said Gloria. “Black Womb didn’t create you, but we did try to create a new race based on you. You were the product of something else.”

“What?” asked Fantomex.

“You’re Weapon XIII,” said Gloria. “A success story of Weapon Plus, the springboard into the next stage of human evolution. And Black Womb was contracted to launch Project: NEO to help accelerate that process.”

“Why tell me all of this?” asked Fantomex.

“Because there’s one more piece of the puzzle,” said Gloria. “Your son is actually your daughter—Weapon XVII, nicknamed Eva. And for all intents and purposes, she seems to be running things at Weapon Plus now.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” said Fantomex. “Why tell me?”

“Weapon Plus has lorded over Black Womb for too long and now, we’re ready to move out on our own,” said Gloria. “You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.”

“My back is quite fine, thank you,” said Fantomex as he pulled the trigger.

Interpol HQ

Sean Cassidy stood before the assembled members of his team. “Alright, it’s time for us t’ go into action. We just got a call from the X-Corporation. Apparently, Leyu’s old friends have been attacked. An’ we’ve also heard from our mole in Weapon Plus—they’re goin’ after Fantomex in Sri Lanka.”

“Someone’s hitting X-Corps on all sides,” said Monica.

“Weapon Plus is probably behind all of it,” said Cameron. “But there are only five of us.”

“Six if yeh count Natasha,” said Sean. “Maybe if we can get some of the other operatives to turn on Eva, we’d have some more firepower.”

“What are you saying?” asked Leyu. “We go after Fantomex but leave the rest of X-Corps to be slaughtered?”

“They’ve got heavy hitters at the base, like Cable an’ Cannonball,” said Sean. “An’ Warren said there are other members on a mission from Africa. If they get called back soon, they could help turn the tide. Fantomex has no back-up coming.”

“So we go help him first then get to X-Corps,” said Jack.

Sean nodded. “Suit up.”

X-Corps HQ

Wisdom leapt to the side to avoid an energy burst from Ultimaton. When he looked up again, he saw Cannonball rocketing into the Sentinel-like being. But even with the former Avenger’s blast field surrounding him and enhancing the strength of his blows, Ultimaton seemed immune to the strikes.

“Sam, get clear!” shouted Cable.

Cannonball complied with the order, maneuvering himself away from Ultimaton and Cable took aim with his Psimitar, psionic energy flowing through it violently directly into the creature.

Ultimaton advanced on Cable, however, using his hand to block the psionic energy. Cable jumped just as Ultimaton came closer and flew over his opponent’s head. Cable latched onto Ultimaton’s back and the Psimitar retracted from the size of a spear to something that resembled a dagger, jamming it into Ultimaton’s neck.

Cable jumped off as Ultimaton staggered, screeching in pain, energy pouring from his body. He reached around and gripped the Psimitar, removing it and tossing it away.

“Congratulations, I think you just pissed him off,” said Bedlam. He jumped in next, trying to use his powers to disrupt the robot’s circuitry, but it seemed to have no effect. “Something’s wrong!”

Ultimaton fired a powerful energy blast that knocked Bedlam back. Cannonball went to his former teammate’s side and helped him up. “What was that, Jess?”

“There’s something different about him,” said Bedlam. “It’s not just a robot, there’s a consciousness in there.”

Wisdom found himself cornered by Ultimaton and his hot knives seemed to have no effect on him. He backed further, his foot hitting the wall behind him. “Well isn’t this just ducky…”

He closed his eyes as Ultimaton was about to strike and felt someone pull him away. When he opened his eyes again, he stood on the other side of the room and felt a hand on his shoulder. He smiled at the Japanese woman who stood at his side.

“I’ve never been so happy to lay eyes on an ex.”

“Keep talking like that, I’ll feed you to the damn thing,” said Psylocke. “Looks like we got back just in time.”

Rictor and Bishop unleashed their attacks on Ultimaton from a distance as Shatterstar moved in for a closer strike. Skin handled crowd control, checking the rest of his teammates to see how they were holding up.

“The Nubian was a distraction, intended to get us to divide our forces. Presumably so this thing could be sent in.” Psylocke looked at Wisdom. “What do you know?”

“Calls himself Ultimaton, not much else we’re privy to,” he said. “Although Jesse did say it’s not just a robot, said there’s more to it than wires and metal. A consciousness.”

“That means a mind. Something we can strike,” said Psylocke. A psionic butterfly appeared around her face. {Cable, listen to me.}

Sri Lanka

Fantomex ran across rooftops, jumping into the air and soaring across the final building before descending into an alley. His feet struck a fire escape and he bounced to the next level before ricocheting his body off the wall and landing on the ground.

He looked up just long enough to see the Constrictor’s coils reaching for him. Fantomex jumped past them, careful to avoid making physical contact. He knew enough about the Constrictor to know how dangerous those coils really were.

From a building across the way, the Black Widow had the target in her sights, and she found she was able to keep a bead on him. A voice echoed in her earpiece. “Do you have a lock, Widow?”

“Confirm that, Eva.”

“Take it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Shoot the target now.”

“Very well.” The Widow pulled the trigger and the bullet, an explosive shell, fired and blew up the target’s head. At the sound of the explosion, Fantomex looked up to see a robotic figure falling to the ground without a head.

“What the hell was that?” asked the Shocker, who stood at the Widow’s side. He aimed his gauntlets at her, but something struck him from behind, knocking him out cold. The Widow looked up and smiled at her savior.

“Can I kill him?” asked Deadpool.

“No.”

“But he’s lame. C’mon, Quilt-Man?” asked Deadpool. “But we’re square on this, right? You’ll live up to your deal?”

“Yes,” said the Black Widow. “Siryn will have the Weapon Plus implants removed and you’ll be permitted to go free.”

“Just watch yer back, boyo.”

The voice came from above and Wade Wilson watched as the Banshee descended from a jet. He pointed down to the battle between Fantomex and the Constrictor, which was now joined by Whirlwind. Jack of Hearts, Photon and Sunpyre flew towards it to lend Fantomex a hand.

“Don’t make me regret this, Wilson.” He turned to the Black Widow. “Nice work, Natasha. Yeh played your part perfectly.”

The Black Widow smiled. “Good. Now I can get rid of this bitch’s face.”

“Once we wrap things up here, we’ll move on to X-Corps. Help the rest of our friends and then everything will be right as rain.” Banshee motioned to the rest of his team. “Let’s check on our new friend.”

The three of them made their way down to the ground level, where Fantomex, Sunpyre, Photon, and the Jack of Hearts had taken out Whirlwind and the Constrictor. Fantomex eyed the members of Interpol suspiciously, but focused most of his attention on Banshee and Sunpyre. “Someone care to explain what’s going on?”

“Weapon Plus targeted you for termination, to be carried out by Eva’s team,” said the Black Widow.

“We used experimental cloning technology to disguise Natasha as Yelena Belova, to be our mole inside Weapon Plus,” said Photon. “Once she discovered they were after you, we scrambled to get out here.”

“You said Eva…” muttered Fantomex.

Natasha motioned to the now-headless robotic woman. “A very sophisticated piece of artificial intelligence, so sophisticated that Weapon Plus chose her to head up this branch of their operation.”

Fantomex knelt down and looked over the motionless body. All this time, he had been led to believe he had a son out there. Now he found out it was just a product of his genetic structure. Black Womb, Weapon Plus, they had played him and now it was over.

“Something wrong?” asked Sunpyre.

“No,” said Fantomex. He stood. “Now what?”

“Now we get moving,” said Banshee. “X-Corps is under attack.”

X-Corps HQ

Ultimaton grabbed Shatterstar by his head and hurled him across the room. He turned to Rictor, unleashing a burst of energy from his head, knocking the mutant to the ground. Cannonball rocketed at Ultimaton from behind, barreling into him. Once Cannonball disengaged, Bishop cut loose on the opponent with both hands unleashing all his stored energy reserves.

{Now, Betsy!}

The telepathic summons from Cable to Psylocke was the signal and both psionics cut loose on Ultimaton, combining their abilities to overload the creature’s brain. Inside his mind, they felt the pain and suffering he was exposed to by Weapon Plus. They saw his birth, his imprisonment that lasted for years, and eventually his application for military use. They heard him referred to as Weapon XV and saw that where the poor man’s memories should have been, there was nothing, nothing before he became a weapon.

Most would pity such a creature and indeed, Psylocke and Cable both felt his pain. But more importantly, Ultimaton had to be stopped. And they did just that, shutting down his mind and one by one, his other systems ceased operation and he collapsed to the ground.

Almost instantaneously, in a burst of light, Ultimaton vanished.

Two Days Later

By the time Interpol arrived, Ultimaton had already vanished, leaving the X-Corps headquarters in a state of disarray. Now, Warren Worthington himself arrived at the facility in secret and, alongside Sean Cassidy, met with the three leaders of X-Corps—Pete Wisdom, Psylocke and Bishop.

“We’re in trouble,” said Warren. “Weapon Plus did a number on us—the Nubian, Ultimaton, and the team sent after Fantomex. All of them designed to divide and conquer but we missed their true purpose.”

“What would that be?” asked Wisdom.

Warren dropped a newspaper on the table. The headline read X-CORP. FUNDED MUTANT MILITIA. “Ultimaton did more than just cause some property damage, he was also recording and transmitting the entire battle. Similarly, your fight with the Nubian was recorded.”

“You mean they caught us defending ourselves and stopping a terrorist,” said Bishop. “How is this damaging?”

“It’s damaging because I used X-Corporation money in secret to fund this operation,” said Warren. “Now I’m not stupid, I made it very hard to follow the trail. Set up a bunch of dummy corporations to funnel the money through. But these allegations mean the shareholders are not happy and it doesn’t help that Warp Savant idiotically teleported several operatives into the middle of a board meeting.”

“More’n that, people don’t take kindly to militias, mutant or otherwise,” said Sean.

“And once they find out that several of our former operatives defected to Havok’s team, that’s going to make things look even worse for us,” said Warren.

“So we lay low, stay beneath the radar,” said Betsy.

Warren shook his head. “Not worth the risk. The operation has been crippled, half your team is injured, and Weapon Plus has us marked.”

“An’ now that we helped Fantomex, they’ll know Interpol’s involved with you,” said Sean.

“In other words, you’re shutting us down, isn’t that right, Worthington?” asked Wisdom.

“It’s only a matter of time before Weapon Plus convinces Campbell to go public with what he knows about the operation,” said Warren. “It’s in the X-Corporation’s best interests to distance ourselves as much as possible from this. That means effective immediately, the X-Corps experiment is over.”

Shaw Industries

Sebastian Shaw stood in his office, overlooking the city with a smile on his face. He went to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a glass of champagne. “I don’t suppose you would like one as well?” he asked his companion.

“You already know the answer to that, Sebastian.”

“Yes, I suppose so,” he said. Shaw sipped the champagne as he approached the woman, sitting across from her. “This has worked out quite nicely for us. Thanks to our enemies, the world is fearful of mutant militias, and defense departments all over the globe are contracting Shaw Industries to begin construction on Sentinels.”

“Just don’t forget who provided you with the means to execute this operation.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, my dear Eva. And I am happy to see that you have recovered nicely.”

The android smiled at him, not a scratch on her even after the Black Widow seemingly destroyed her. “Weapon Plus built me to be indestructible. And now, we can begin moving into the next phase of our plans.”

“Indeed we can,” said Shaw, raising his glass. “To Control.”

AFTERWORD

Way back before the SuperNova crossover, Ryan had told me about his plans to cancel X-Men and replace it with X-Corporation, which he wanted me to write. But I didn’t feel confident enough in my abilities to execute X-Corporation the way he wanted it and instead, Ryan came up with the idea for X-Corps, a black ops mutant militia answerable to no governments and funded in secret by the X-Corporation with their main focus on the mutant right abuses committed by Black Womb.

I was excited about it but I got careless. I envisioned the X-Corps as being a global team of mutants with different cells in different countries. So I set up four different teams—America, Europe, Asia, Australia. I had originally planned on X-Corps being a finite series, around twenty-five issues or so and I had planned accordingly. It didn’t end up working out quite like that.

I won’t go into the details behind the decision to end this title. Suffice to say, Brent is moving on and now serves as one of the architects of Marvel Anthology’s X-Men titles and we wish him well in that endeavor. As for his titles X-Corps will be canceled, however we are open to proposals for X-Factor or for some of the characters that were featured in this series (i.e. Bishop, Cable, Maverick, etc). Some of the characters who you’ve gotten to know in X-Corps will be moving on to other books, some will remain unused for the time being. I won’t reveal who’s going where because that would spoil some of the surprise. I also chose to use this issue as a larger, anthology issue to close up the book as well as to close off the dangling subplots established in Amazing Fantasy for the proposed Interpol and Deadpool: Agent of Weapon Plus titles which, unfortunately, never materialized. I also wanted to take this chance to tie the X-Men into the larger Conspiracy event which, if you’ve been reading the other books, you know is being led up to in a very big way.

But I promise you this. In the coming months, you will see a rejuvenated and much more connected X-verse here at Marvel Omega. We’ve got great writers taking on titles both new and old. When Marvel-X first launched many years ago, it had a record for producing some of the top-notch X-titles. Since the formation of Marvel Omega, we’ve drifted from that.

That changes now.

Get ready for the evolution.

 

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