UNCANNY X-MEN #211: Massacre

The X-Men confront the Marauders!

Originally Published  November 1986

Previously, on X-Men...

And now...

The mysterious, murderous mercenaries known as the Marauders have arrived in the Morlock Tunnels with one very specific purpose in mind: to kill mutants. Straight away, they demonstrate their power and ruthlessness by mercilessly attacking the first several Morlocks they see.

The Marauders present are the deadly serious leader Scalphunter, the power-negating Scrambler, heavy-hitter Arclight, the whirlwind-creating Riptide, the dizzying Vertigo (who takes her namesake's tribute to Hitchcock very seriously with her aesthetic), and... Harpoon. He has harpoons.

The Morlocks make for easy prey, for as formidable as some of them are, they are largely just people trying to live their lives in private refuge.

The fight quickly spills over to where Callisto and the rest of the Morlocks are, and the hired guns are quickly able to overpower the sewer-dwellers.

Up at Westchester, the X-Men are still recovering from their all-out-brawl-out with Nimrod (and possibly Mojo?) Wolverine refuses to sit back and relax to heal, and Nightcrawler is already trying to tax his regained teleportation abilities, and clearly paying the price.

When one of the Morlocks makes their way to the X-Mansion, the X-Men resolve to help their comrades-in-arms (being that Storm is still technically their leader.) Leaving Magneto behind to help the New Mutants in case the fight makes its way to the mansion, the X-Men are brought via Illyana's teleportation circle to the heart of the battle.

They only have a moment to survey the carnage before being drawn into the fray against Vertigo and Riptide.

Kurt steps up to use his rapid-teleportation offense to disorient Vertigo, putting himself at great risk since he's far from 100%.

It works, but the exhaustion leaves him vulnerable to a sneak attack from Riptide, putting the fuzzy elf out of commission. 

The two Marauders beat a retreat. Illyana teleports the wounded to the mansion's infirmary for immediate care while the remaining X-Men press onward, with Wolverine and Rogue particularly out for blood.

Elsewhere, Scalphunter finishes a job he started months ago by attacking Annalee and her children. As you might recall, this woman had suffered the tragic loss of some of her children months ago, and we now know who was responsible.

 

A moment later - sadly too late to intervene - Colossus and Kitty come upon Scalphunter and Arclight, the latter of whom is tickled to be up against the X-Men, some "real competition."

Scalp fires his gun directly into Shadowcat's temple, but fortunately she is more than capable of contending with that attack.

The girl puts on a brave front, taunting Scalphunter that he can't hurt her but she has myriad ways to harm him, only that saving her teammate comes first. Inside though, she is a torrent of emotions and not nearly so bold. She struggles, knowing that she is in a life or death situation but may not have what it takes to execute her foe.

In another part of the tunnels, Wolverine senses a familiar presence, and has the presence of mind to help his team evade an errant optic blast!

That's right, the Original X-Men are in this same location. But before the two groups can rendezvous (and figure out what they hey is going on with X-Factor) Colossus crashes through, creating a barrier of rubble between them.

Annalee dies in Callisto's arms but they have precious little time to mourn as the Marauders return. Wolverine matches up against Harpoon while Scrambler attempts to rob Storm of her powers.

That's why you do the research, Scram.

While his power does prove effective on Rogue, and Harpoon manages to do an end-run around Colossus to throw one of his energy-spears at her. Kitty tries to phase her teammate to safety, but the outcome is... complicated. 

Riptide, meanwhile, taunts that he can probably chip away at Colossus' organic steel hide with his throwing stars, but Colossus is... really not in the mood.

Oh... SHIT. 

There's something we've almost never seen. Beware the nice ones.

Unfortunately, Harpoon and Scrambler have slipped away, avoiding Piotr's wrath. Rogue is still standing and Kitty is alive, but at a grave cost.

Storm makes a tactical decision to retreat, much to Rogue's chagrin as she was very much looking forward to relieving some tension at the expense of the Marauders. Ororo, however, does leave Wolverine behind with a simple directive.

Further Thoughts:

You would think, in the wake of the intense Nimrod battle, which saw the deaths of two villains, the mysterious loss of Rachel (who was near death at Wolverine's hands) and Nightcrawler severely injured, the book might throttle back for a moment, giving us something low stakes and irrelevant like the return of Kulan Gath or something, but no, the heat is only being ratcheted up by pitting the X-Men all too abruptly against a team of scarily effective hired killers.

Yes, it's supposed to be "life and death" pretty much every time out for these heroes, but you know and I know and everybody knows that not all threats are created equal. You don't go into just any of these stories seriously thinking that the villain has a shot at killing an X-Man, but there's a lot to give credibility to these Marauders. For one, they really do seem like frightening killers. Yes, some of them have cartoony powers that are seemingly designed not to be fatal, but they are led by Scalphunter, whose deal is shooting his targets directly in their faces with a gun, and he is able to do that multiple times in the issue, invoking real world violence in a way that has usually been effective in this comic. As such, they have a very high kill rate against the Morlocks.

Setting the Marauders on the Morlocks is a cruel but effective way to establish their threat, since we know the Morlocks are numerous and (to us as readers) largely anonymous -- there's no limit to how many can be pulled out of the woodwork only to be killed in the next panel. Many of them are physically tough but just as many are vulnerable and not prepared for this. The Morlock's "Strong protect the weak" ethos is truly tested by the merciless outsiders.

Still more reminiscent of the Holocaust than being canned by a giant corporation for being a nightmare person!

Duly, the direness of the situation pushes the X-Men to the brink, and beyond. The fight is so intense and so pitched that we see Piotr, of all people, resorting to lethal means, and while none of his teammates seems to have been killed, they've been maimed in ways that may truly affect their lives -- Nightcrawler is grievously injured and Kitty's power has disrupted so that she may never live a "normal" life again. The cost of this battle is on a scale that we have rarely seen in these comics. All the moreso because although there is a motive to these killings, they still echo more senseless real-world death and violence than more soap operatic tragedies like the deaths of Phoenix or Thunderbird.

Also Piper is here? I thought he lived in the Savage Land. And he wasn't a mutant. And Ka-Zar killed him.