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MV1 GS #1 NOVEMBER Year 4

The Human Rocket. The Weapon X. The Ace. The Seeress. The Explosive Street Kid. The Multiple Man. The Mojoverse Ninja Warrior. Even the Cyborg Lobster.

They have been baptized in crucibles hotter than many of us can even imagine. They have been pushed, tested, hurt, even killed. And they still fight the good fight, in the only way they know how, the only ones who can. They do it their way. They may not know legal from illegal, but they know right from wrong. They are X-FORCE!

Boston, Massachusetts

Jamie Madrox - one of him, at any rate - sat quietly in the kitchen of Tabitha Smith's apartment, trying to relax with a cold beer (a Spaten lager - Jamie's favorite) and ignore the sounds coming from Sam and Tabitha's bedroom.

Another Jamie - one of his "dupes", or duplicates, though even Madrox could rarely differentiate between the dupes and his baseline self anymore - walked through an alleyway with Shatterstar. Bill the lobster was on Shatterstar's shoulder. They were headed to Landsdowne Street, to Axis, the nightclub where it had all happened several months before - where X-Force got back together after the catastrophic Phalanx assault and all it had entailed.* Still another was sitting with Caliban, watching over the massive, childlike mutant as he slept fitfully, trying to let his already fragile psyche deal with the trauma of having been possessed by the otherworldly Bodysnatcher.

[*X-Force broke up after the events of X-MEN #68-72, and the tale of their reformation can be found in Marvel Premiere #73-75. --Self-referencin' Shawn]

Jamie had three more dupes active tonight - combing Boston, looking for clues about the disappearance of Serendipity and Garrison Kane. That was why he was called The Multiple Man - there were lots of him, when he wanted there to be.

He'd given himself watch duty tonight - making sure at least one dupe was with all the members of X-Force still extant. Guarding them.

He wondered when he'd gotten so damn serious.

Sighing, Jamie pulled the cap off of another bottle of Spaten (a nice lager, he thought, crisp and kind of nutty-tasting) and took a long pull... and started to remember.

End Of Days Aftermath: "You Can't Handle the Truth!!"

South Africa - Apocalypse Base

It had mostly gone the way they had told the people at SCN* - right up until the point they barged in on Apocalypse's chamber.

[* The Super Channel Network, a cable network devoted to the exploits, news, and gossip of Earth's "superhuman community". For the story of the assault on Apocalypse's base and the tale that was told to SCN by X-Force, see X-Force #81. --Shawn Connolly, Cub Reporter]

The team had moved slowly through the corridors, expecting at every step to meet resistance and finding none. "This isn't right," Cannonball had muttered. "Ah'd've expected Apocalypse to have traps, guards... somethin'..."

Still, they hadn't complained. They knew, each of them, that they would need all of their energy to fight En Sabah Nur, and the less resistance, the better...

It took only a few minutes, but it felt like days. Endless, featureless corridors of gunmetal gray, no markings, no distinctions. They trusted to Bill's inertial guidance system and Serendipity's powers to reassure themselves that they weren't running in endless circles. When they came up on the doorway, no one moved for a moment - hesitating before what was to come next. They knew how likely it was that some, if not all, of them might not leave this room alive.

Typically, it was Shatterstar who broke the spell, striding forward - with true confidence or false, they all wondered? - and struck the access panel. The door slid open soundlessly, reminding them all of nothing so much as something cribbed from a Star Trek set.

Beyond stood the imposing figure of Apocalypse, the familiar blue-black exoskeleton.

Upon recollection, Jamie wasn't certain how he'd avoided soiling himself.  Words could never describe the sheer majesty of the man, the intimidation and power he radiated. He regarded the ad hoc group with an air of almost casual insolence - as though he'd expected a real superteam. The Avengers or Defenders, maybe. The X-Men, almost certainly. X-Force - who'd long been the "junior varsity" of Xavier's mutants even when they were a coherent group, much less this collection of ragtag lone wolves - just didn't seem enough.

En Sabah Nur, the eons-old mutant who called himself Apocalypse, gestured, saying simply, "So nice to see you all. Please... have a seat."

Cannonball frowned, tense and ready to launch himself forward, but... but this was new. He held up a hand to stop the others from taking precipitous action, but said nothing.

Apocalypse shrugged those massive armored shoulders and murmured, "So be it. I will sit, then." A chair flowed from the metal floor, in a silvery, liquid motion, and Apocalypse sat, slowly. He grimaced, then sighed. "You're here to kill me, I suppose. Well, it's just as well - it's why I brought you here, after all."

"What kinda game're you playin', Apocalypse?"

En Sabah Nur looked right at Cannonball, and there was no fear in his eyes... nor arrogance. Only weariness. "I have lived for several thousands of years, children. It has been said - by myself as well as others - that I am immortal. This is not true. I can die... it just takes me a very, very long time. That time is here."

Involuntarily, Cannonball and the others felt themselves relaxing slightly. Nothing seemed threatening, and although they knew that they should know better... they relaxed slightly, all the same.

Apocalypse gestured to one wall, which suddenly sprang into life with images, pictures, became a massive video screen showing events all over the world - showing the Harbingers, the valiant struggles of the heroes who fought against them, the mushroom cloud dispersing from the enormous image of Apocalypse that stood still in the ocean, laughing. "They hate us, children, though they depend on us. I frighten them so greatly that they would unleash their greatest weaponry, their nuclear arsenal. Though, of course, I have given them cause. All great heroes require great villains, you see.

"Throughout human history, there have been persecutions of the strange, the different, the new. Ever since I realized my difference, my otherness, I have worked to make the world safer for mutants. Oh, you may disagree with some of my methods. The Harbingers, the Dark Riders, the Horsemen. But they have worked. Each challenge I have thrown up, mutants have beaten back down. I had hoped, by this late stage, to have had assistance - it is to this end that I recruited the geneticist Nathaniel Essex. But he became, instead, Mister Sinister - and he has aided me, though not in the ways in which I had hoped. I have ever tested mutantkind, ever hardened them - you - in a crucible the likes of which so many have never dreamed.

"Letters to Congressmen encouraged the Sentinel program. Subtle machinations made Magneto more bitter than he might otherwise have been, made Graydon Creed form the Friends of Humanity. You may hate me, for forcing these hardships on mutantkind. But they have made mutantkind strong. They have forced you to adapt, to grow strong. And they have worked.

"Now mutants are more accepted than ever. Captain America makes speeches about how 'mutants are people too'. SCN polls show that mutants gain more and more acceptance with each passing day, especially among the young. In essence... I have done all I can. The rest is up to you."

Apocalypse swiveled in the chair, turning his back to X-Force. "I have taken the liberty of preparing a videotape, which will be transmitted to SCN upon my death. A rousing battle, if I do say so myself. The sensors that keep track of my life functions will send out a signal upon my death, transmitting the tape and ending the rampage of my Harbingers. Oh... and you will also find several CD-ROMs in the room beyond. They contain all the information I have been able to gather about mutants around the world... my personal journals... and the cure for the Legacy Virus."

He bowed his head. Serendipity caught Cannonball's eye, nodded. "He's telling the truth," she murmured, "about all of it."

Apocalypse sat silently for minutes, while the various members of X-Force debated their options... to save the lives of billions, could they commit cold-blooded murder? Couldn't there be a better way?

None of them had noticed Caliban's silent approach. And none of them could react in time as he shoved Madrox to the side - the impact of his body against the wall set off his mutant power, causing a duplicate Madrox to appear behind Caliban with a soft pop - and charged forward, roaring incoherently...

...and tore off the head of En Sabah Nur, spraying blood throughout the room, drenching his claws in crimson.

It could be argued that no other mutant had suffered so much at the hands of Apocalypse. Caliban had been twisted repeatedly, into one of the Horsemen, into a killing machine. His mind - so innocent, so childlike - had been abused repeatedly by the Egyptian mutant's long predations, even before his possession by the Bodysnatcher.

And now they were even.

Jamie finished the beer, reached into the fridge for another. Sam and Tabitha had quieted down again (cuddling, no doubt - lucky little shits). Maybe that was why we went along with it, Jamie thought for at least the twentieth time. Because we all knew how much he'd suffered, and we couldn't let him suffer even more in the public eye. Indeed, the media had embraced Caliban, telling the shy Morlock's story over and over again, making him an instant media darling - something entirely alien to the childlike mutant who'd once been forced to live in the sewers of New York.

Still... he wasn't sure how he felt about it. Serendipity said that Apocalypse was dead now... but how to tell? How to know? And the CD-ROMs they'd turned over to SHIELD... there'd been hundreds of the damn things, and sure enough the CDC* was reporting that they now believed that they had a cure for Legacy... but...

[*The Centers for Disease Control --Shawn, LOA (Lord of Acronyms)]

...but Jamie wasn't sure if he thought they'd done the right thing.

He wondered if he ever would be.

He opened another bottle, and stopped thinking for the night.

Regrets: Caliban's Story

In another place but not another time, Jamie sat with his back to a wall, cold and slightly damp on this cool Boston night. All around him he could hear the sounds of the city - arguments, cars, sirens, screams. Music from the countless clubs and bars that sprang to life in the twilight reverberated through the entire city, felt more than heard.

He knew Caliban wasn't sleeping, though he was trying to pretend he was. Dim light seeped into the alleyway, letting Jamie see the big mutant's restless shifting. Caliban was huddled in old, filthy blankets, but had refused better shelter. Probably he feels more secure this way, Jamie thought. After being a Morlock his whole life, he probably couldn't feel safe anywhere more comfortable.

Still, he could really use a nice comfortable hotel room right about now.

"You need to talk, big guy?"

The blankets shifted again, but Caliban did not turn.

"Caliban alone."

"What're you talking about, big guy? I'm right here."

A long pause, then, "Caliban... even when Apocalypse hiding, all thought dead, Caliban could feel him. Not feel. Gone, because of Caliban. Caliban know he dead. Alone now. Caliban hated Apocalypse, but... always there. Not now. Everything different." Jamie heard nothing else for a moment, then the soft sobs.

He did all he could, leaning forward to lay a hand on the big mutant's shoulder, wondering how the death of Apocalypse could make him feel... sad.

Loss: Shatterstar's Story

They made an odd trio, to say the least - well, Jamie thought so, at any rate.

"The Multiple Man," they called him. But that was a damn sight better than Shatterstar, who'd been called "a Mojoverse Ninja Warrior," among other things, on SCN over the past few days. It was strange, watching him - he'd supposedly been from Boston, as Ben Russell, but he moved about with an almost nervous air, seeming a stranger in what should have been his hometown.

SCN had done a special on the Mojoverse yesterday. It had gotten great ratings. Jamie found that ironic.

Bill rode on Shatterstar's shoulder. It perhaps said something about Boston that a man walking around with a lobster on his shoulder didn't gather any strange looks. Except for the guy back at the seafood restaurant - there were more of those than brew pubs, which was saying something - but he'd shut up when 'Star had glared at him.

The two of them - well, three of them, but Jamie had a tendency to edit Bill out on the basis that he wasn't bipedal - moved right past the line of clubgoers and were admitted into the club. Axis, the sign proclaimed it. All the members of X-Force had, essentially, unlimited privileges to this club, ever since it had been the site of their reformation... and the death of Shatterstar's lover, Gomi.* The bouncers knew them on sight, and they never waited in line, nor did they pay cover charges. Jamie had been here on Friday night, when WFNX, a local radio station, had their weekly "X Night" party - loud techno on one floor, loud '80s music on the other. It hadn't been fun - the place was so crowded that people kept bumping into him, activating his power.

[* Marvel Premiere #73-75 again. --Footnote-Happy Shawn]

It was a Thursday, though, and most of the action seemed to be over at ManRay, a fetish club a ways away, and so they wove through the crowd with little difficulty. They didn't talk - Shatterstar seemed to simply accept that Jamie felt it necessary to follow him around, and set him in the same mental category as the furniture. He was just there.

'Star ordered a Jack and Coke - which was odd, thought Jamie, as he'd never seen the man drink before - and chose a seat. Jamie followed, flagging down a waitress and asking for a shot of Goldschlager (which he normally avoided, as it usually got him exceedingly drunk, but he felt a strange compulsion to not be outperformed, as it were, by 'Star. He didn't much understand this himself, but put it down to 'a guy thing').

Several minutes passed in relative silence - no one spoke, but the music was ever-present - before Shatterstar began talking. Not to Jamie, not really, nor to Bill. Just... to the world at large.

"I vaguely remember being Ben Russell. Before Longshot transferred the essence of Shatterstar into me. I never even truly understood that process myself, even when Cable explained it to me. It's like... do you know what a palimpsest is?" He didn't give anyone a chance to answer. "It's a scroll that's been written over, reused... but if you look hard enough, some of the old writing is still visible. That's how I feel, most of the time. When I think of me, of who I am, I think Shatterstar... but then I look closer, and bits of Ben Russell peek out.

"The strange thing is, as Shatterstar, I was straight. Heterosexual."

Jamie sipped his drink silently. Bill didn't move, save for a slight twitch of one of his little side legs.

"Ben wasn't, though. It's why he wasn't terribly popular and all - the people he knew, 'hung around with,' weren't exactly understanding about his sexuality. Hell, as Shatterstar - before the transfer, I mean - I wouldn't have been too understanding. Which is why I had so much trouble, I think, understanding how I felt about Rictor.

"I was madly in love with him, I know that now. But then, I just thought I was being a good friend. I think that's why we parted ways, when you get right down to it... I wanted something from him that even I didn't realize I wanted, and the strain that produced on our friendship was just too much to bear."

He stopped, chuckled. "Did you know I met Gomi completely by accident?" When Jamie shook his head in the negative, 'Star continued with his narrative. "I was in a club, the Middle East. There was this loud band playing... the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, I think. I was tracking a drug dealer... and Gomi was at the club. I recognized him from a picture that Meltdown had, way back when... so I went up and started talking to him. It was a useful cover, you know. For shadowing the dealer."

Another long, slow sip. "And we fell in love. And then he died, and... oh, hell. You know that story. Bill here..." he reached up to stroke the cybernetic crustacean's back. "Bill and I are united, in that. A love of a man cut down before his time by an evil, evil beast.* I think..." He sighed. "I think it's made me bitter, but... what can you do about that, right?"

[* In Marvel Premiere #74, Gomi was killed by a drug dealer named "Boots". -- Sacrificin' Shawn]

'Star finished his drink, and stared at the door to the men's room, the place in which Gomi had been killed.

Save for for the music, it was a fairly quiet night after that point.

Rocket: Cannonball's Story

Sam Guthrie held his lady love close, nuzzling her neck. "Ah have to admit, ah miss that curly hair you used t'have."

Tabitha Smith grinned at him in the near-dark of the bedroom. "Well, maybe I'll grow it back out, then, farm boy." She winked at him, giggling. "You're so cute when you frown like that."

Sam laughed, shaking his head. "Man, ah missed you, girl..."

Tabitha winked at him and said, "Oh, I'm sure you had women falling all over you when you were a high-and-mighty Avenger*..."

[* Cannonball was a member of the West Coast Avengers in issues #107 - #114 of that title, written by the incomparable Mark Bousquet! --Always-Good-For-A-Plug-Shawn]

"No, not really. Well, 'cept for Tigra... whoa, girl! Nothing happened, and I know you, and I don't want you tryin' t'blow up the Avengers West Compound, huh? 'Sides, I'm pretty sure she was just teasin'." Sam chuckles and kissed his girl's forehead. "'Sides, you know ah couldn't stay away from you for too long." He always seemed to lapse back into his old Kentucky drawl around Tabitha, especially when they were alone... and then to accentuate it. Even his sister Paige would have been ashamed to hear him ham it up like this, but Tab thought it was sexy.

She grinned up at him and murmured, "You better not... so what was it like, being an Avenger?"

Sam shrugged, leaning back and falling into the bed (his shoulder was sore from propping himself up over her like that, even if the view was terrific). "Bizarre. It'd be all quiet an' sedate one day, an' then two minutes later you're fightin' for your life. Wash, rinse, repeat. It's like, there was no downtime, y'know? Just rushin' from crisis to crisis." He chuckled. "'Least the X-Men got a softball game in every once in a while."

His features softening, becoming more thoughtful, the young mutant and now media icon named Cannonball kept talking. "Ah mean... Ah dunno. Seems like that's what mah life's been ever since I joined th'New Mutants... Man, but ah've seen some things, though. Ah mean, I got trained by Professor Xavier, Cable, an' Magneto... an' Hawkeye, too, when he ran all those drills... ah've done things most people'd kill t'try... ah've seen th'Shi'ar Empire, Asgard, even Hell... an' inside, ah'm still this coal miner's kid from Kentucky, y'know? Ah mean, ah never feel ready f'r this stuff. Ah do it, an' sometimes ah'm even good at it, but... inside, ah still feel like ah've got somethin' t'prove."

Tabitha watched her man silently, eyes soft, lips curved in a smile. He was so damned cute when he got all introspective.

"Ah guess... what ah'm sayin' is... ah've had a damn full life, an' there's still lots of it in front of me... an' ah feel like I can get through it, all of it, long's ah got one thing." He turned, looked into Tabitha's eyes, and smiled warmly. "You."

There was a long silence, then...

"Tab?"

"Yes, Sam?"

Another long silence.

"Marry me?"

Meltdown's reply was not with words, nor is it suitable for younger viewers... but Sam took it as a 'yes'.

The next day

To Tabitha Smith, the world was fresh and bright and new again. She hadn't told anyone - Sam had asked - and wasn't going to until probably a week or so after this interview.

Even the SCN studios looked nicer than they had last time. Jane Rodriguez, freshly assaulted by the SCN makeup artists, looked over at her with a smile. "Ready, Miss Smith?"

"Call me Tab, please. And I'm as ready as I'll ever be."

She'd told all this to Sam, the night before... after he'd proposed. She had to. It hadn't changed his mind.

She loved him for that.

And as Rodriguez rolled off her opening spiel to the camera, Tabitha thought of Sam, and - just as it always did - that made her feel strong enough to do this.

Scars: Meltdown's Story

"Thanks, Jane, for giving me the chance to explain... y'know. All of this."

"Of course, Tabitha. Now, several weeks ago, the... noted? Infamous? ...men's magazine Suave published a photo spread of, well... you. Without any clothes on.* Would you care to comment?"

[See X-FORCE #76 --Skin-Mag-Shawn]

"Very much, Jane. Those photos..." Tabitha sighed. "Well, they were me, all right. Five years ago, when I had just turned 18. They... well, it's kind of a long story. It starts with this." She rolled up a sleeve, pointing to several small dots.

"These are track marks. I'm a recovering heroin abuser."

That, predictably, shut up the studio. Even the cameraman fell silent.

"When I was fifteen, I ran away from home, went to New York City. Dad... Dad wasn't the best parent, let's say. In that, I guess, I'm a lot like a lot of other kids... only I got a few breaks they didn't get. Those came later.

"I was picked up by a chickenhawk - a guy who waits at bus stations for young runaways. He gave me a place to stay, food to eat. At first I thought he was just being nice. When he introduced me to his friend Max, and told me how I was going to pay him back for his... generosity... I freaked out. I mean, predictably, right? Long story short, Jane. They beat the hell out of me -" Meltdown wasn't sure if she could say that or not, but, hell, SCN was on cable - "and put me on the street. I..." She swallowed, hard. "I turned tricks for them. I was a prostitute. And the smack let me do it, let me go through my day without killing myself, because at that point I just didn't give a damn."

She leaned forward, anticipating Rodriguez' question. "My mutant powers hadn't manifested, by that point. I was helpless, Jane - young, alone, scared, and far too easily manipulated." All across the country, though Meltdown didn't know it, viewers were watching her speak, rapt with attention. Some wanted to hear gritty details, some muttered 'slut' and would never again trust or look up to the young Miss Smith, but the majority found themselves sympathizing with the young woman, seeing the pain and hurt and shame and anger in her eyes and marveling that she had found the courage to speak of such things on national television.

"Heroin... they call it 'Horse', on the streets. Among other things. But you don't ride it. It rides you. And I thank God or Goddess or Allah or Buddha or Zeus or whoever you care to name, every day, that I got away from it.

"There was a vice cop, Mark DelGiudice. One night he came up to the holding cell - I'd been picked up for soliciting for the second time - and handed me a card. Didn't say anything, just gave me the card through the bars. It was the address for a shelter, the Fresh Start House. I went there, the next day, because I knew Max'd be hitting me again for getting picked up, and I figured I could stall it for a few hours at least...

"They saved me, Jane. They saved my life. I walked through those doors and a woman named Lola Montez walked over to me and smiled and offered me some soup and some clean clothes and we talked. We talked for hours. I told her everything... and she didn't judge.

"Three days later I was living in the House, and they were giving me methadone treatments to help get me off the smack. Methadone kind of sucks, because all you're doing is transferring your addiction from heroine to methadone, but at least it won't kill you, right? Later I went cold turkey, broke 'em both. And after that I stayed at the House for a year, trying to help other girls the way Lola had helped me."

She shook her head, looked intently at Rodriguez (who was shocked, startled, she hadn't known this, hadn't prepared for this, had completely lost control of the interview but she was still damn sure she'd get a Pulitzer for this) and said, "This happens every day, Jane. To millions of people, all over the world. The pictures? Max took them. He died three years ago, I heard - AIDS - but his estate must've gotten the pictures and sold 'em to Suave. When he took them, he made me sign a contract, giving him control over them. He'd said something about the Internet, I don't know.

"Two days ago I enlisted the services of Mannheim, Thompson, and Thompson - lawyers here in Boston - to sue Suave. Their belief, and mine, is that the contract was signed under duress - Max had told me I wouldn't get to shoot up that day unless I signed - and is null and void. And I am declaring, right here on national television, that should the judgment be in my favor, all damages and proceeds and whatever are going to the Fresh Start House in New York City... so that maybe some other girls won't have to go through the hell that I did."

Meltdown didn't know it, but all across the country there were cheers at her pronouncement.

At least one mutant had become, in the eyes and minds and hearts of America, human.

Epilogue

Outside the studio, there was a giant group hug. Even Shatterstar embraced Tabitha, smiling warmly. "That took courage, Tabitha, and fortitude. I'm amazed at your strength."

Meltdown blushed, smiling. It felt so good to have that off her chest...

It was eerie, the way they all turned as one, to see the lone figure standing in the doorway of the conference room that they had commandeered for their after-interview get-together. Serendipity couldn't help but smile at that.

The precognitive Goth stepped forward and wrapped Tabitha in a tight hug, then stepped back again. "I just came to say goodbye," she said, in her soft voice, like smoke in a crowded nightclub.

"Where've you been?" This from the Multiple Man. "You disappeared once we got back from Apocalypse's base..."

Serendipity nodded. "I had to. It's a long story. Just like I have to go now, too."

Meltdown stepped forward to hug the Goth again, murmuring, "I understand... maybe I'll see you again soon?"

Serendipity's expression was unreadable, to most. Meltdown, who perhaps knew her better than any of the other X-Forcers, might have noticed the sadness in her eyes, but she was hardly in a position to study Serendipity's face. She said, simply, "I doubt it, Tabitha... but one never knows. not even me."

She stepped back and, like a shadow fleeing before sunlight, was gone.

Jane Rodriguez burst in a moment later, carrying a few loose papers, some of which slipped from her hand, cascading to the floor as she gesticulated wildly. "Tabitha! The numbers are huge on this interview! Internet polls are showing an eighty-nine percent favorable rating for you, and over seventy for the rest of X-Force!"

And Tabitha remembered Serendipity's words, so long before, after that first, impromptu press conference* -

[* X-FORCE #75 --Shawn]

"Of course they care," she had said. "We're going to change the world, after all. For mutants... for everyone."

They looked out the window of the city they now called home, where the light of the setting sun played over the rippling water of Boston Harbor.

Don't call it Beantown. The residents hate that.

Holy shit, it's over.

X-FORCE was the first title I ever wrote for MV1, and if you ask me, it shows. I love the story I had to tell in those early Marvel Premiere issues, but the writing... well, I look back and I shudder.

From the beginning I envisioned X-Force as a book that didn't pull punches. Where people swore, just like real life. Where people were prejudiced, just like real life. Where people felt pain and had hope and loved and lost and had great sex and did drugs... just like real life.

Then my own life kind of fell apart on me, and for far too long, there were no new issues of X-Force. Sam Everett, my Branch Editor for most of the latter stages of this run, deserves all the credit in the world for not yanking me out of this title when even I thought I deserved it, and giving me the chance to tell the story I so desperately wanted - so desperately needed - to tell. He was understanding and gracious and unfailingly supportive, and so Sam, thank you.

James Grasselli, who's picking this title up after this issue, also deserves a ton of credit - never once did I get angry hate mail telling me to hurry up and write so he could have his shot. So James, I hope it was worth the wait. I know it'll be worth it for the rest of us - James is a talented and skilled writer.

Mark Bousquet, who I've plugged innumerable times in this series, also gets a special thank-you - for letting me use Siryn in my Premiere arc, and giving me Cannonball, and for serving as impromptu editor/proofreader on the first section of this final issue. Thanks, guy.

But most of all, the biggest thanks have to go to the talented Randy Lander. Even though Randy no longer writes here at MV1 - which is a damn shame but an understandable one - he was the one who took me under his wing when I first got here, whose writing on The Vault urged me to try my own hand, and who was unflaggingly supportive of me throughout his whole time here. Randy, that New Warriors/X-Force crossover never did happen, but if you're reading this, I hope you can understand the depths of my gratitude.

What next for me here at MV1 now that X-Force isn't mine? As much as I have to admit that it'll feel weird having "my baby" written by someone else, that's the way of things in a fanfic project of this magnitude, so I do, indeed, have to move on. So, with Sam's blessing, I now begin to shamelessly promote an upcoming miniseries - Gambit: Turn of a Friendly Card. Mark Bousquet once opined, loudly, on the MV1Talk mailing list that Gambit was a worthless character devoid of any merit - and I've been spoiling ever since for a chance to prove him wrong. So this is it. And, of course, my creator-owned series, Protect and Serve, will finally get off of hiatus and start producing again (even though Bendis's Powers comic does everything I'm trying to do in P&S, only better... grr...).

And one more thank-you - to everyone who's ever read my work here on MV1. Ladies and gentlemen, your letters didn't always see print - rarely did, in fact - but they always gave me a reason to keep writing. I hope you've enjoyed it as much as I did.

See you on the flipside, True Believers!

 -Shawn-