Danger continues to battle Emma Frost's minions, including Sarah (also called Marrow) and Rahne "Wolfsbane" Sinclair while Briar Raleigh waits alone in her suite and Henry "Beast" McCoy, Warren "Angel" Worthington III, and Bobby "Iceman" Drake wait in a dungeon room. At the same time, Frost brainwashes the time-displaced Scott "Cyclops" Summers and Lorna "Polaris" Dane attacks Alex "Havok" Summers. Jean "Marvel Girl" Grey and Jimmy Hudson are surprised by Dane's sudden appearance, and they watch as Dane asks Alex (her former boyfriend) to stop fighting. He refuses, so Dane sends Grey and Hudson to rescue the others, and uses her powers to hurl them down the hallway when they try to help her fight. As they run, Alex insists that New Tian is beneficial for mutants and that Dane is having a mental breakdown, so Dane says she'll stop holding back and attack Alex all-out.
Hudson and Grey defeat several guards, and then Grey uses her telepathy and telekinesis to find Drake, Worthington, and McCoy, and then remove their power inhibitors. The trio stands as Hudson breaks into their cell and they join up with Hudson and Grey. As Dane and Alex continue fighting, the others battle through the complex and eventually break into Raleigh's room to free her as well. Outside, Danger easily defeats Sarah and notes that Sinclair is tougher than before thanks to her new power to split into multiple wolves. Back in the complex, the mutants are approached by Frost, King Kuan-Yin Xorn, and the brainwashed Scott. Frost uses her telepathy to block McCoy from casting an exorcism spell while Scott blasts at Hudson and Worthington and Xorn—whom Drake notes is allegedly a pacifist—blasts at Drake and Raleigh.
Frost them overwhelms Drake with her psychic powers even as Worthington is injured by Scott. Grey then goes into his mind and realizes that Frost is using something to bolster her powers. Scott is confused, since he thinks Grey is dead and isn't sure if he's alive. Grey realizes that Frost is overwriting Scott's personality with that of the older Scott Summers, whom Frost loved and who previously died. Frost appears in Scott's mind and rants that her Scott will live again thanks to her mental powers, but Grey objects on the grounds that erasing Scott's real personality is evil. Frost insists that she's turning Scott into the man he is supposed to be and the man that mutants—and she—needs. Grey calls her insane, though, and is able to get through—even weakening Frost's control over her cosmic cube shard, which she had been using to augment her powers. Frost collapses, swearing hatred of Grey as she does.
Grey swears she won't let Frost take Scott. At the same time, Xorn manages to break free from Frost's control due to Frost's distraction. Grey then leaves Scott's mind and gets him to blast Frost, and though Frost shifts to her diamond form she is still stunned. The mutants then begin to retreat. Frost orders Xorn to give pursuit, but he says that—though he knows she will regain control of him shortly—while he has control of himself, he will not order the others pursued.
Grey and her team meet some more of Frost's mutants on the way out but easily fight past them and—along with Dane—escape in Danger, who shifts back to her Blackbird form. As they leave, Drake notes that Erik "Magneto" Lenshir sent both Dane and Danger to watch them. Grey and Scott note that they now have a permanent psychic link, possibly due to how Frost was amplifying her own psychic powers thanks to the shard. Dane and Raleigh then say that they will be teaching the X-Men from now on, surprising Grey and Scott.
In Vietnam, Steve "Captain America" Rogers confronts Lenshir and accuses him of interfering in New Tian. Lenshir insists that he was not involved, but Rogers does not believe him. He hints that he may find it necessary to kill Lenshir, but Lenshir says that if Rogers thought he could do that he would never have bothered making a deal with him at all. He then tells Rogers not to threaten him unless he wants the X-Men to start focusing on HYDRA's America rather than New Tian.
Back in New Tian, Frost and Alex go into a secret basement area. Frost notes that Xorn is back under control, though her hold on him is still fragile. However, she believes that New Tian will be destroyed soon anyways. She says this is fine because it lasted long enough to fulfill their purpose.
The two reach Claudine "Miss Sinister" Renko and Sebastion "Bastion" Gilberti. Alex says that New Tian gave them sufficient raw material to test their findings, and now they are ready to take Mothervine—a virus which can ensure that mothers give birth to mutant children—global.
Tropes:
- Battle in the Center of the Mind: Grey and Frost fight in Scott's mind.
