Charles Francis Xavier is a mysterious man, even to his peers in academia. Beyond brilliant, the geneticist is secretly a mutant, a subspecies of humans born with great powers. Gifted with a powerful telepathic mind, Charles has a vision for Mutantkind, one forged after a life traveling the globe and meeting great allies and terrible foes. Aiming to build a future for both humans and mutants, he founds the Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, and recruits eight young mutants to be the first X-Men.

The first X-Man is Cyclops, a shy orphan from Omaha, and he is followed by Marvel Girl, an until-recently comatose girl from New York City; Beast, a disgraced star athlete from Dunfee; Angel, a masked superhero from New York City; Havok, a juvenile offender from Honolulu; Iceman, a young runaway from New York City; and Polaris, a secretive student from San Jose. Lastly, Professor X enlists Sage, a former slave from the sinister underworld of Cairo, but he keeps her a secret. The eight youngsters are trained arduously to master their powers.

To the world, mutants are still theoretical, a rumor spoken of in hushed tones, a conspiracy theory most academics believe is too wild to be true, or too frightening to face. "They walk among us," say the believers, and the thought that a normal-looking human could in fact be "one of them" is terrifying. Beautiful actors, high-performing athletes and pariahs are looked at with skepticism, but things are still peaceful. Tense, but peaceful.

In a year's time, the youthful X-Men are born, uniforms and all, having trained in the rudimentary Danger Room and bonded into a family united by shared experience, instead of the pariahs they once were. Aware the world would fear a group of teens gifted with such fabulous powers, Professor X avoids fielding them, for now.

A distress signal erupts from the Cape Citadel military base, reporting that the facility is under attack by a superpowered mutant calling himself Magneto. When the X-Men arrive, they find themselves facing the Brotherhood of Mutants for the first time. The Brotherhood initially holds the advantage, but the X-Men’s constant training allows them to overcome Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, Toad and Mastermind. As mutant powers collide, the battle tears through Cape Citadel. Buildings buckle, weapons systems are destroyed, and terrified military personnel scramble for safety amid the chaos.

Magneto, however, proves far beyond the X-Men's ability to defeat. Even as they engage him, their true objective becomes buying the soldiers enough time to escape. Magneto turns the base's own weapons against its personnel, making it clear that he has no qualms about executing every human in the facility. That changes when Professor X telepathically pleads with Magneto to consider the consequences of allowing so many young mutants to remain caught in the crossfire. Magneto calls off the attack, ordering both the Brotherhood and the X-Men to withdraw.

In the brief reprieve, Magneto warns Professor X's students that the day will come when humans hunt and kill mutants. For thousands of years, he argues, humans have demonstrated a willingness to wage war far beyond reason or restraint. Sparing the X-Men, he offers them a place within the Brotherhood should they ever choose to join him, but warns that his mercy may not extend to them the next time they meet. The battle at Cape Citadel nevertheless announces to the world that mutants are real, and that some of them are not friendly.

Riots erupt in the streets, while politicians and civilians alike demand testing to determine whether children carry the X-Gene. Intelligence agencies and clandestine contractors accelerate research into technologies and weapons capable of combating mutants, while the experimental Sentinel Project is given the green light.

And at the heart of the country, as fear begins to take root, as William Stryker is visited by something he calls an angel, and from it he receives the holy task of purging the world from mutants.

Professor X detects a strange reading in the middle of the Pacific Ocean belonging to an incredibly powerful mutant. The X-Men are dispatched to investigate, only to discover something ancient: Krakoa. Awakened after ages of dormancy, the massive creature is driven only by hunger, seeking to feed upon the life force of other mutants. It captures every member of the team except Cyclops, with only Cyclops managing to flee.

Desperate to save his students, Professor X turns to Cerebro to find mutants who might be able to help him. The first to answer is Banshee, Xavier's old friend from Ireland; followed by Storm, a shaman who commands the winds in Kenya; Sunfire, a Japanese criminal from Tokyo; Wolverine, a feral vagrant with no memories; Thunderbird, a Native American Marine; Nightcrawler, a demonic-looking acrobat; and Colossus, a gentle Russian powerhouse. Together, they have one mission: bringing Xavier's students home.

Every inch of the mutant island teems with unnatural growth, and the land itself lashing out at the rescue team. They eventually locate the original team, but the captives remain bound to the island's alien consciousness, forcing the X-Men to continue their assault until their bond is severed. The battle reaches its climax when Storm and Polaris combine their powers, tearing a massive wound through ancient Krakoa and leaving the Living Island gravely injured.

The ordeal leaves deep scars. Traumatized by their captivity, most of the original X-Men choose to leave the team and attempt to live civilian lives, while Cyclops remains behind to lead the new mutants on the team.

All the while, Professor X is troubled by increasingly strange dreams and fears that he may be losing control of his mind, prompting him to take a leave of absence and stay with his old friend, Dr. Peter Corbeau. Before withdrawing completely, Xavier gives Sage a new assignment: investigate a powerful mutant industrialist named Sebastian Shaw and his lover, Lourdes Chantel. Her mission is not merely to observe them, but to earn their trust and discover what are their goals.

Leaving the X-Men behind, most of the original team disbands to try integrating with society. Lorna leaves for Nevada to pursue a degree in geophysics, Jean opts to study at Empire State University while pursuing a modeling career, Hank goes into research at Oscorp Industries to study the X-Gene, Alex rides on his own for a while across the United States, and Warren and Bobby return to their families.

This leaves Cyclops, left to lead a team of older mutants who, at points, are harder to manage than Alex, Bobby and Lorna put together. Arguing with the likes of Wolverine and Thunderbird is a constant, and without the Professor to guide him, Scott holds on the best he can. At this moment the X-Men are a cult hit with young mutants and seen as dangerous by humans and mutants afraid of upsetting the way of things. While Cyclops and the X-Men deal with threats such as Sauron and the Friends of Humanity, it is rumors of a mutant registry built by the secretive Project Armageddon that puts the team on notice. Having kept tabs on almost every active mutant in the US, the man responsible for the project, Dr. Stephen Lang, intends to launch a massive attack on every mutant in the country, and that is something Cyclops knows the X-Men have to act on.

Assembling the team, Scott leads the X-Men against the Project Armageddon facility, only to discover it is also responsible for the Mk. I Sentinels, the same models that had tried to capture Alex when the X-Men first found him. While the X-Men succeed in destroying the archive, and the team holds up under Cyclops' leadership, facing the man responsible, Dr. Lang, invites tragedy. As the military contractor jumps into his ship to flee, Thunderbird follows, climbing onto the vessel as it takes flight. Urged by Banshee to let it go, the warrior refuses, screaming he will not let Lang go. He smashes the ship until Stephen Lang is forced to eject, and the resulting crash kills the Apache warrior.

The mission is a success in that the mutant population is safe, but it marks the first death in the X. Although none of his teammates blame Cyclops, the young man blames himself, and the X-Men go through a moment of reflection. For a while, things are peaceful for the X-Men, with the Mk. I Sentinels and the registry gone.

A year passes, and on Christmas Eve the former X-Men meet up with the new team in Manhattan for a night of relaxation organized by Jean. While young mutants make new memories and new friends, they are ambushed by the massive Mk. II Sentinels. After a hard-fought battle in the city, in which the X-Men try their best to avoid civilian casualties, Marvel Girl, Wolverine and Banshee are apprehended by the Sentinels. Unbeknownst to the X-Men, two additional groups of Sentinels are sent to capture mutant targets: Professor X and Sebastian Shaw. Professor X is taken, while in the attempt to capture Shaw the Sentinels end up killing Lourdes.

Days later, with the help of Dr. Corbeau, the X-Men learn that their friends have been taken to a space station controlled by Dr. Stephen Lang. Taking a shuttle piloted by Corbeau, the group sets off to rescue them. After a drawn-out battle, Stephen Lang ends up causing his own death and compromises the whole station. As the X-Men race to their own shuttle to escape, they realize it has been severely damaged.

The X-Men weigh their options, but Jean Grey knows it must be her. She absorbs the piloting skills from Dr. Corbeau and plans to use her telekinesis to shield herself from the radiation on the way home. She is afraid, but she is the only one with even a small chance to succeed. The X-Men wish her luck, and go into the life support module.

While Jean manages the impossible at first, it doesn't last. The radiation is brutal and her telekinesis falters. Her dress is bleached green. Hair falls out, she is bleeding inside out. With skin clinging to her bones, Jean knows she is going to die, and prays for help. The answer comes in the form of the Phoenix Force, a vast psionic entity who offers her the means to save her family, if she will only bond with it. Jean is warned of the dangers of such a thing, but withering away, she takes the deal. The X-Men make it home, crashing into the waters of Jamaica Bay. Marvel Girl rises above the waves wrapped in psionic flames - Jean Grey and Phoenix Force both - before passing out.

Months after Jean's recuperation, she receives her family and friends in her Greenwich Village apartment when they are visited by the otherworldly creature that had been in Charles Xavier's mind for more than a year now, making him think he had lost his mind. The woman reveals herself as an empress of a faraway empire, the Shi'ar. The bird-like alien asks Charles for help. According to her, Lilandra Neranami, her brother, the Shi'ar Emperor D'Ken, has found the most powerful weapon in the universe, and plans to use it to reshape reality itself.

In pursuit of Lilandra is The Firelord, in service to D'Ken. Upon arrival, the warrior believes no Earthlings can match his power, but Jean Grey quickly disabuses him of the notion. Displaying incredible new powers, she not only defeats the Firelord, but is about to kill him when Lilandra is captured by another Shi'ar agent, Eric the Red. Professor X fears they have failed as the Shi'ar vanish through a stargate, but the Phoenix Force opens a portal of its own. The X-Men, having just arrived after being ambushed by a mind-controlled Lorna, are teleported to a nameless planet, home of the M'Kraan Crystal, where Emperor D'Ken and his Imperial Guard wait for them.

The groups attempt to parlay briefly, but there is no accord. The Imperial Guard has an edge in the fight until the arrival of the Starjammers. Once slaves of the Shi'ar Empire and now rebels, they ally with the X-Men as nine stars align in the sky, the event that will allow the Emperor to weaponize the M'Kraan Crystal. As the fight rages and the stars align, a face of the Crystal becomes a door into the nexus of all realities. The Emperor goes inside, eager to seize the ability to rewrite existence as it is.

Realizing the damage already done to the artifact, the X-Men battle the last of the Shi'ar as the Phoenix Force guides Jean to heal the Crystal and push D'Ken out. In the end, Lilandra is crowned Empress, and the X-Men return to Earth. Elsewhere, in response to Stephen Lang's attack on his beloved, Sebastian Shaw, along with Harry Leland, Emanuel da Costa, and Emma Frost kills the Inner Circle of the Hellfire Club, financial backers of the defunct Project Armageddon.

Though there is peace for a while, something is wrong in the life of the X-Men. Jean is still trying to have it both ways, heroine and Manhattan model, but more and more she is losing time, growing increasingly emotional. Without her awareness, she has been singled out as prey by Mastermind, now defected from the Brotherhood and vying for a role in the Hellfire Club. To prove his worth, the man has decided to give Sebastian Shaw a Black Queen worthy of him, and for it he has settled on Jean Grey, whose fight with the Firelord made the news. For months Jean is stalked by the man, who assumes any identity and performs any act needed to shape Phoenix's mind into believing the servile but sinister persona of Lady Grey. Jean suspects nothing, but the abuse slowly begins to manifest in both her and the Phoenix Force.

During this time, Cerebro also detects two powerful readings, one in New York and another in Chicago, and the team splits to recruit them. In Deerfield, Katherine Pryde is also courted by Emma Frost, and the Hellfire woman attacks and captures Storm, Colossus and Wolverine. Meanwhile, Phoenix, Nightcrawler and Cyclops go to New York, where they find The Dazzler. Mastermind furthers his control over Jean Grey, and amid her growing mental instability, Phoenix brutally dispatches the Hellfire mercenaries who come after them. Thanks to Katherine, the White Queen is also found in Deerfield not long after, and once more Jean shows a lack of control, leaving Emma in a coma. Seeing this, the X-Men finally realize something is off about their friend.

Weeks later, the X-Men infiltrate the Hellfire Club itself. There, Mastermind unleashes the persona he has spent years crafting inside Jean's head, effectively controlling Phoenix and turning her into Lady Grey, the Black Queen. With her help almost all the X-Men are captured, and Jason Wyngarde is about to be inducted into the Inner Circle when Wolverine tears through the door, having left most of the Club's staff crippled or dead. Jean snaps out of Mastermind's control, and aware of the years of abuse suffered at his hands, leaves Jason Wyngarde a vegetable without hesitation. The fight spills into the party, festivities are interrupted, authorities are alerted, but the mutants involved do not give ground, winning the day and escaping in the Blackbird. As most of them celebrate, Phoenix warns them it is too late.

The Phoenix Force, corrupted by the abuse suffered at the hands of the Hellfire Club, having never before experienced such vileness in the flesh, overwhelms Jean, who cannot hold it back. As she roars to life, Dark Phoenix attacks the X-Men, wanting Jean Grey for itself. It quickly defeats the X-Men and blasts off the planet, indulging its sensual state and wasting energy until reaching the D'Bari system, hungry. There, it devours its sun, instantly ending five billion lives in Shi'ar space to sate its desires. The same fire that gave Jean Grey life now threatens to consume everything around her.

Empowered, the Dark Phoenix returns to Earth, but to destroy it. It returns to the Grey household, conversing with Jean Grey's family, trying to convince the young X-Woman she does not need them. Unable to sever the bonds between Jean and her family, the Dark Phoenix leaves, urged on by Jean, but is ambushed by the X-Men, as Scott knew she would be coming, thanks to the mind link shared with Jean.

Promptly the woman engages her former friends in battle, but Nightcrawler locks a power dampener onto Jean, and while she is subdued by Colossus and Storm, it is Wolverine who finds himself in position to deal the killing blow, but he cannot kill his friend. Hesitation costs them the fight, as Dark Phoenix knocks the X-Men down.

The window is missed, and Dark Phoenix overwhelms her former friends, but still won't kill them. Even with all its urges, the Dark Phoenix is unable to do it, finally realizing it is not in control of Jean Grey. It is Jean Grey. The moment of pause is used by Professor X, who musters all his knowledge of Jean, his first and most beloved student, along with Jean's own help, to build constraints so the Phoenix Force can be brought under control. After a vicious psychic battle, Jean returns to normal, worn out.

As the X-Men gather, they are teleported to a Shi'ar cruiser for the trial of Jean, who stands accused of taking five billion lives. Professor X, aware of Shi'ar law thanks to his psychic bond with Lilandra, calls for trial by combat, and the X-Men have one night to prepare before the battle in the Blue Area of the Moon. The fight is one-sided, and the X-Men fall one by one. Phoenix is sentenced, and aboard Lilandra's vessel, Jean Grey undergoes massive surgery to excise her powers and shut the Phoenix Force down forever. She and Scott leave the X-Men after the fact, having given all they could to the cause. As the dust settles, Colossus brings his younger sister, Illyana Rasputina, to live with him, and Moira MacTaggert brings her adopted daughter, Rahne Sinclair, to the school as well. The two girls represent a change of paradigm in Professor X's mind, and he realizes more mutants are coming; to prepare for that, he begins planning a new class of New Mutants.

Anxiety about mutants is rising, and soon the United States will be gripped by the Mutant Hysteria, the awareness that homo sapiens shares living space with another, new and more powerful species. In big cities, gatherings of Friends of Humanity back the surging candidate Senator Robert Kelly, while in the heartland Purifier sermons draw thousands, promising a post-mutant Land of God devoid of the satanspawn. Support for the Sentinel Program is high, the Registration Act trends across social media, and amid the chaos a fire is lit in the dark of night as a streak of flames crosses the sky above the Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. As its originator crashes into Breakstone Lake and the X-Men investigate, they find a young, frail girl who bears a striking resemblance to one of their own. Her name is Rachel Summers, and she comes from a future where everything, and everyone, is dead, and only the X-Men can stop that from coming to pass.

Taken in by the group, Rachel explains that in a week's time Senator Robert Kelly will be the victim of a political assassination performed by Mystique, leader of a Brotherhood-aligned group who follows the edicts of the Destiny Diaries, a presumably prophetic account of the future of the mutant race. According to the girl, after the Senator is killed, the Sentinel Project is greenlit and the Registration Act enacted, provoking the activation of the first Master Mold in history. Unchecked, the Sentinel creator builds Sentinels designed to protect humans from mutants, and then to protect humans from themselves. In less than ten years, the country is completely overrun, its heroes dead, its children in death camps. Storm, now leading the X-Men, enlists Rachel and the X-Men to save the life of the man who most ardently champions the Registration Act, and with little preparation they set off to fight Mystique and her dangerous band of mutants.

The X-Men fly to Washington D.C. with Storm leading them for the first time, arriving just in time to save the Senator from a bullet meant for him. For the first time the X-Men face off against the likes of Avalanche, Blob, Destiny, Pyro and Rogue, fighting on even as the National Guard gets involved. With the Senator safely protected and the future safeguarded, it is Nightcrawler who asks Storm to leave, allowing Mystique to escape. As the X-Men return home, they can only hope to have changed Rachel's future, but there is no way to tell. The girl, stranded in this reality, leaves the school to find Scott and Jean, the couple who birthed her in her own timeline.

Realizing America is rapidly changing, the Professor increases his Cerebro sweeps, which lead him to Xi'an Coy Manh, a Vietnamese mind-controller fleeing her past. The young girl is found protecting her younger brother and sister on the streets of New York, and she joins the school as Xavier's first New Mutant. She joins Wolfsbane and Shadowcat when the Professor goes to meet Black Eagle, who wishes his old friend to care for his granddaughter, a mutant girl named Danielle Moonstar. Arriving on site, Xavier is met by the Purifiers, also looking for the girl, having already claimed Black Eagle's life. Though the human extremists are defeated by the Professor and his two students, the fact the Purifiers found Dani so quickly is not lost on the Professor.

Returning, he instructs Storm to prepare the X-Men for things to become more hectic from here on. Xavier focuses on finding young mutants in need of help, while Storm keeps the X-Men ready for when they are needed. Ironically, one of the great boosts to the X-Men at this time is Rogue, who joins as her mind begins to wither under the weight of the voices of everyone she has ever touched. Unbeknownst to them, things are about to worsen, as following Senator Kelly's failed assassination the US government greenlights Project Wideawake.

Chaos and violence rise across the United States, from scattered lynchings promulgated by the Friends of Humanity to the emergence of the Morlocks, whose member Caliban kidnaps Kitty Pryde and unwittingly forces Storm to battle his leader, Calisto, for Shadowcat's freedom. The X-Men are scattered, dealing with too many calls and crises to prepare for what is coming, despite their best efforts. More dangerous than the threats that make themselves targets openly, however, are the ones of a subtler nature, and the first to strike are the Purifiers.

Taking advantage of a debate between Professor Charles Xavier, known to them as a mutant, and Reverend William Stryker, the group of religious zealots kidnaps Professor X with the help of a young mutant in their ranks. The boy, Samuel Guthrie, is kept by the Purifiers as a living weapon to use against the X-Men, but spending time by Charles' cell during the man's captivity, he slowly learns the error of his ways. When the team of Karma, Mirage, Shadowcat and Wolfsbane comes to the Professor's aid before Stryker can use his telepathy as a mass-destruction device, Samuel sides with the young mutants, and together they defeat the Purifiers and send the Reverend to jail.

Shortly after, the Professor detects the mutant presence of Roberto da Costa, a Brazilian boy whose power causes a whole stadium to erupt in riot upon manifesting. Flying there, the leader of the X-Men finds the boy endangered by the Reavers, a group of the mangled guards of the Hellfire Club crippled by Wolverine years prior. Now enhanced cybernetically and led by former White Bishop Donald Pierce, the group attacks Roberto, who only escapes with his life thanks to the X-Men. Upon his return, Xavier finds yet another reading, this time in the Amazon rainforest, and investigating it he stumbles upon the lost civilization of Nova Roma, where Amara Aquilla welcomes them with fire in the name of her domina, Selene Gallio. While Charles does what he can to protect young mutants worldwide, his own children, the X-Men, are about to go to war.

With the awakening of the first Master Mold, Project Wideawake goes into production, and swift action is decided upon. Bands of Sentinels are sent to attack, capture and kill specific targets, and whole squadrons of the deadly Mk. III Sentinels are dispatched to collect or kill powerful mutants deemed too dangerous to remain free.

While there are deaths related to the Night of the Sentinels, and many more captures of overwhelmed mutants unable to fight off the new models, the unity of Mutantkind proves its greatest strength. The Brotherhood fights off the Sentinels sent against it, though Blob falls in battle, while Magneto manages to seize many of the death-dealing robots. Cyclops and Prestige in Alaska protect a young Nathan Summers and a depowered Jean Grey, until Phoenix's powers reactivate to protect her family. The X-Men themselves are not a target, not yet, their numbers too great and headquarters unknown, but to them falls the quest to find the Sentinel base and destroy it, to safeguard the rest of Mutantkind and rescue the detained mutants, whose numbers include Polaris.

Tipped off by Sage, still undercover in the Hellfire Club, the X-Men find the Master Mold factory and arrive at the location, joined by the Brotherhood of Mutants. Quickly the groups strike a truce, courtesy of Storm and the Scarlet Witch, and do battle with the enormous Sentinel-factory. Warned by Moira that they must not allow the Master Mold to finish uplinking into any datastream, lest it become effectively immortal, the X-Men and the Brotherhood unleash everything they have, fighting off the experimental Sentinels and waves of Mk. III models to end the nightmare of Project Wideawake then and there.

While the day is won, many X-Men and Brothers lie wounded or unconscious, most of them young, having spent most of their strength to stop Master Mold. Magneto, however, observes the destroyed factory and sees it for what it is. Unable to let humans go unchallenged after such an act, especially after the death of Blob and the kidnapping of Polaris, he summons the Sentinels seized by his Brotherhood, and flies off.

Magneto and the Brotherhood of Mutants finally come face to face with the war they had predicted for so long, guiding his followers straight to Washington D.C. There is very little human authorities can do to stop the Master of Magnetism now that the Sentinels have been defeated, Project Wideawake now a widescale disaster that has radicalized a great portion of the mutant populace and pushed Magneto into action. As the leader of the Brotherhood lands upon the lawn of the White House, crowds of mutants already gather to support him, his Sentinels hovering overhead.

With the words "America dies tonight at the age of two hundred and thirty-seven. Your intolerance and all-consuming greed will not be missed," Magneto is kept from killing the president only by the arrival of the X-Men, who take the fight to him, the Brotherhood and their Sentinels. As mutant fights mutant, both sides feel the anguish of being forced against each other, but the X-Men do not back away. The groups of homo superior battle until humans can muster a response to Magneto and his allies. As the X-Men, tired from all the fighting, start to lose ground, they are joined by S.H.I.E.L.D.'s last-ditch effort, the product of the Avengers Initiative.

Assembling the greatest heroes of humanity in response to the rising mutant groups, the team consists of Iron Man, Tony Stark's own guardian, who dons an armor of incredible technology; Giant-Man and Wasp, a couple of S.H.I.E.L.D. R&D scientists who can alter their body sizes; Hawkeye, a wild marksman who joins the fray with only a bow; Black Widow, a deadly warrior born in the Cold War; and The Hulk, a behemoth and a one-man army born of science. Led by the first superhero, Captain America, they take the fight to the Brotherhood, and unlike the X-Men they see Magneto's followers as criminals at best and genocidal zealots at worst. Still inexperienced as a team, the Avengers have the advantage of being fresh, and as the Scarlet Witch and Polaris fall, it becomes clear the Brotherhood is about to be overwhelmed.

Incapable of accepting defeat, even as his loyalists lose heart, Magneto musters his power and reconfigures the Sentinels under his control to hunt humans instead of mutants, unleashing them upon his enemies and the capital. As X-Men and Avengers do their best to protect the population, an arriving Professor X and Quicksilver decide to put an end to things. Magneto's own son removes the man's helmet, and Charles subdues his old friend, ending the madness before it reaches a point of no return. As the Brotherhood is arrested, Charles Xavier meets with Nicholas Fury for the first time to discuss mutant-human relations in the days ahead.

The emergence of the Avengers and X-Men as heroes of their respective kinds, and the imprisonment of Magneto, the Brotherhood, and human groups like the Purifiers and Friends of Humanity, does much to give both homo superior and homo sapiens some respite, but it is not to last. Soon rumors of kidnappings and killings of powerful mutants reach the X-Men, all perpetrated by smiling men in suits of armor. While the disciples of Xavier investigate, something else looms in a realm that overlays and exists apart from their reality, where dreams and thoughts coalesce into being: the realm of consciousness known as the Astral Plane.

There, the growing fear and distrust between species spawns actual nightmares, spectres that eat away at the fabric of the Astral like a toxin running through the bloodstream. They clog reason, kill intuition, and breed resentment and paranoia, all food for things that prey where people are most vulnerable. Crawling out of the darkness for the first time in a decade, the mutant entity of the Shadow King feasts, growing stronger and more aware, its tendrils reaching far and wide, following the thought-trail of its ancient rival and the world's most powerful mind, until it finds the Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, and all the ripe prey contained within. For a while, the psychic parasite observes and learns about the X-Men, their fears and tics, but it is the young minds it lusts for most, too full of potential for the sinful glutton to ignore.

As the X-Men remain busy pursuing these dangerous new foes who call themselves The Right, unable to find them and seemingly always one step behind, the Shadow King strikes not at the older mutants, but their children. He batters their minds and dreams by planting seeds of self-doubt, dejection and mistrust, splitting the young ones and creating deep divides. With the young mutants in disarray, the monster targets young Karma, whose psychic talent allows the Shadow King to infuse her with an urge to leave the nest in Westchester in search of her family. As she falls prey to the Astral parasite, Karma vanishes and hides from Cerebro, causing the New Mutants, the Snow Valley Academy Hellions, and Storm to leave in pursuit.

The rare absence of the X-Men and New Mutants provides a cowardly opportunity for a dangerous foe, and Cameron Hodge strikes. Angel's best friend has remained a close ally to the mutants for years, and is secretly one of their most bitter enemies, though it wasn't until the Night of the Sentinels that the right technology became available to him. Using Mk. III Sentinel scraps from various battlegrounds, he develops The Right's powersuits, capable of fighting powerful mutants as the Friends of Humanity and Purifiers never could, and his proximity to the X-Men means he always knows where they will go next. Aware of the X-Men's efforts, he approaches a young Illyana Rasputina, marking her for a demonic ritual that would grant him eternal life. In the dead of night, Illyana is taken into Limbo, and Shadowcat tries to pursue her. Hours later the Russian girl returns, Illyana now transformed into the older Magik, to find Kitty in the company of a demonic creature called Lockheed.

Meanwhile, Storm and the younger mutants find Karma in Cairo, ruling the wide-spanning web once belonging to Amahl Farouk. With its psychic strength restored by possessing Karma and using her latent psionic prowess, the Shadow King once again rules the underworld of dark vices few are in a position to provide, controlling the slave trade and narcotics distribution across Northern Africa and the Middle East. Though the New Mutants are not aware of how dangerous the creature can be, Storm is, and after the New Mutants conquer its gladiatorial games, she uses their boon to switch places with Karma, aware the vice-addicted creature would want little more than to reclaim someone he once thought belonged to him. Sure the X-Men will come for her, Storm willingly sacrifices herself for the innocent Karma.

One too many mistakes from The Right allows the X-Men to foil their plans and learn about their enemies, including how the Sentinel tech of their armors works. Slowly, their operations cease and many are brought to justice, but that does not mean the children of the X get much time to relax. Not many weeks after The Right goes to ground, the X-Men are tracked down by a mutant in need of help. The wounded Caliban, known to Storm and Shadowcat, interrupts a baseball game among the X-Men to beg them to stop an ongoing massacre in The Alley, the lair of the Manhattan Morlocks, before falling unconscious.

The X-Men rush to the location via the powers of Magik, recently awakened in Limbo, as the girl teleports them via her stepping discs. Their arrival is heart-wrenching, the team from Westchester finding itself surrounded by the blood and corpses of Mutantkind's most vulnerable. Some of the X-Men, chiefly Colossus, are deeply affected, and when they meet face to face with those responsible for the massacre, the fight that breaks out is unlike any the X-Men have ever been part of: unlike the Brotherhood, these Marauders fight for the joy of killing, and for the first time some of the X-Men go all out as well. In the aftermath, Phoenix crashes Prism against a wall, shattering him into a thousand pieces; Shadowcat saves Rogue from being mortally wounded by Harpoon and is struck herself, despite her intangibility. Hearing Kitty's screams, Colossus rushes the man but is interrupted by Riptide, who grievously wounds Piotr before being taken by the throat and killed by the Russian man. Most brutal of all, Angel is assaulted by Blockbuster and Harpoon, his wings mangled and speared into a wall, left for dead. Though many of the Marauders flee, the X-Men cannot give pursuit, instead tending to their wounded and the remaining Morlocks.

While the bulk of the X-Men stay in The Alley a little longer, the newly arrived Elizabeth Braddock and Tabitha Smith are still acclimating to the Xavier's School when the alarms go off and they find themselves face to face with the deadly Sabretooth, a Marauder with a bone to pick with Wolverine. The two women do as well as they can against the savage monster, but to the surprise of Logan's nemesis, the British telepath proves quite the handful, eventually unleashing all her telepathic power into a blade she jams into Victor Creed's head. By the time the X-Men arrive, Sabretooth is completely subdued, and against Wolverine's wishes, he is taken in by Professor X and held in a cell in the lower levels. After this, Elizabeth joins the X-Men as Psylocke, and Tabitha joins the New Mutants as Boom-Boom.

While the X-Men tend to their wounded and assist the surviving Morlocks, they remain unaware of a strange consequence of the mass murder caused by the Marauders. Drawn by the amount of liberated mutant souls, Selene Gallio goes to New York and is quickly courted by Sebastian Shaw. Though the relationship is strained at first, the sorceress lacking the social finesse the Hellfire Lord has grown used to, her power cannot be denied, and she rapidly works her way up the ladder.

A hospitalized Angel has his wings amputated, deemed too infected to keep, a diagnosis falsified through extortion and bribery by the scheming Cameron Hodge just to see Warren finally, and truly, undone. With the recent assassination of Dazzler, something Warren comes to blame himself for, Hodge's crowning moment is upon him. At the same time, an ancient order awakens, believing it now to be the time foretold, when their lord, En Sabah Nur, would return to them. Believing Warren to be the one foretold as their master's heir, the Akkaba arrange to crash the young man's plane and kidnap him, bringing the earthbound X-Man before the returned ancient. Promising to empower Angel with flight again, a second chance in the face of such cruel fate, Apocalypse plants the Death Seed on Warren, turning the man into Death. Following Death, Caliban is seeded with War and Praga is seeded with Pestilence to avenge the dead Morlocks from the Alley. Finally, Autumn Rolfson is seeded with Famine, and after the four fight, Death is declared leader of the Horsemen of Apocalypse.

Apocalypse sets his sights on the modern world, and to test it he unleashes his Horsemen and minions upon Manhattan, home of Earth's Mightiest Heroes. To his surprise, the Egyptian finds the first wave of resistance is The Right, deluded humans who think themselves guardians of humanity against the threat of Mutantkind. The group of heavily armored mutant hunters launches dozens of its members against the Horsemen, only to find themselves woefully outmatched, many toyed with and butchered by Pestilence and Famine. In this battle Death finds himself facing the leader of The Right, and discovers him to be Cameron Hodge. Bloodied and insane, the man spitefully confesses his crimes as architect of Dazzler's death, Magik's corruption, the amputation of Warren's wings, and the death of Iceman's father. In this final moment, Hodge is denied even a reaction from Death, beheaded callously and left to rot under the sun as the Avengers take the field and The Right lies broken and ineffective, its leader gone.

The moral heroes prove more of a threat than expected. Though Wasp is embarrassingly taken out by Famine, and Giant-Man's limbs are broken by a vicious War, the Avengers recoup and strike back: Iron Man and Vision take down Pestilence together, while Quicksilver and Hawkeye fight off Famine. As The Hulk stalemates War, Death takes down Scarlet Witch, and slowly the tide of battle turns again as Apocalypse descends from his Celestial Warship into the arena of Central Park. Taking out the technological heroes first, the one lauded as The First One is about to deliver Captain America an effortless killing blow when he is pushed back by a wallop in the form of Cyclops' optic blast. Behind him, the X-Men tag in and take the fight to Apocalypse, but along with Death and Famine he proves too much of a hurdle. Every attempt to bring Warren back fails, until Iceman reaches for him inside Death one more time, mustering all his concentration and desperation to tap the fullest potential of his powers. Unwilling to let go of his longtime friend, or let Apocalypse harm anyone else, Bobby Drake commands all he has and unleashes it against En Sabah Nur. As everyone is forced to clear the area, the result is a tremendously wounded Apocalypse forced to finish Iceman off, his friend's last stand snapping Warren out of Death.

As Apocalypse leaves the battlefield, taken by War, Famine and Pestilence, the X-Men are left behind, having proven their worth through the ultimate sacrifice of their longtime friend, one of the very first X-Men, their youngest brother, Bobby.

Elsewhere, on her way to the Xavier's School with Nathan, Prestige is ambushed by the rest of the Akkaba. Realizing she has no path to victory as she lies bleeding on the floor, the young woman says her farewells to her baby brother, but the killing blow that comes her way doesn't end Rachel then and there, as the Phoenix Shard within her sends the young woman to the future, where she will build a resistance against Apocalypse and the means to save her family in the present.

At the Blue Area of the Moon, the Egyptian demigod heals in his chambers when the Akkaba clan approaches with a sacrifice worthy of Apocalypse's return: not only had the clan been tracking the mutant heir in Warren, but also the one destined to kill him, Nathan Summers-Grey, the child of Cyclops and Phoenix. Aware the X-Men will come for the boy, and unwilling to kill a child, Apocalypse decides instead to inflict upon his supposed nemesis a great curse, infusing him with the Techno-Organic virus minutes before the X-Men arrive and unleash everything they have upon him. Meant to eat his flesh little by little, the Celestial plague will almost certainly be fatal, but the arrival of Mother Askani presents Scott and Jean an opportunity to save their child by sending him to the future. Jean, aware of Mother's true identity as a greatly aged Rachel, accepts the bargain.

Apocalypse's resting chambers on the moon are lost in the battle, and many of the Akkaba are defeated, but the loss to the X-Men is greater: Iceman has fallen, Prestige has been ambushed and killed, Warren has been forever changed, and Nathan has been taken away.

A few months into the new year, a new figure appears at the Xavier's School: the mysterious Cable, a traveler stationed at Muir Island. Accepted by the Professor, the veteran soon bonds with the New Mutants and accepts the offer to mentor them. Though a rough instructor, the soldier teaches the younger mutants how to be warriors, a lesson even Amara, Illyana, Roberto and Tabitha take to heart. Meanwhile, Cyclops, along with Archangel, Beast and Wolverine, assembles the X-Force, a strike team to take the fight to the Akkaba and unearth their conspiracy of silence. The first clues come in the form of the clan's ties to the Hellfire Club in London, which Banshee, Multiple Man and Siryn are sent to take down. There they find and rescue Jonothon Starsmore, while X-Force moves forward.

Months pass, and Cyclops' team is all but unreachable save for a few sporadic calls shared between him and Phoenix, the two now estranged as the loss of Nathan has split the couple apart. In Westchester, the X-Men residents prepare for a joint graduation with the Snow Valley Academy, Emma Frost now an ally of Professor X, if something of a tense presence among the older X-Men. It is during the graduation dance that the Xavier's School is stormed by none other than Havok, leading a new group of foes, the mysterious mutant hunters known as Magistrates who consider the X-Men a threat to their nation of Genosha. In the fight that follows, the Professor, Karma and Cannonball manage to neutralize Havok and his brainwashing, but at great personal cost, all three ending up severely injured by Magistrates. Though the White Queen is also taken out by Wipeout, the true loss comes when Cypher intercepts a bullet meant for Wolfsbane. The young man dies instantly, and Jetstream succumbs to his wounds days later. In the fight's wake, Rictor, Rogue, Roulette, Storm, Warlock, Warpath and Wolfsbane are taken by the fleeing Magistrates.

The kidnapped mutants are teleported to the Citadel, the capitol building of Genosha and seat of its power, to face the orchestrator of the attacks on the New Mutants and Hellions. The group realizes the man is none other than Cameron Hodge, or what is left of him after being beheaded by Death. Still alive thanks to a bargain struck in exchange for Illyana's soul, the man now exists in the cursed state of a head attached to a cybernetic monstrosity. As Wipeout strips the mutants of their powers, Hodge slowly and systematically overpowers his prey, the sole resistance coming from Warlock, who is imprisoned and taken by Hodge while the rest are thrown into cells to be subjected to the mutate process later. Wounded, tired and powerless, they are helpless to resist whatever the sadistic, increasingly unhinged Hodge has in store for them.

In Westchester, the remaining X-Men piece together who their enemies are and where their brethren have been taken, prying information from the mind of a fallen Havok. Their hunt leads to the island of Genosha, the paradise-state in Africa secretly built on the backs of a slave-caste of mutant drones, genetically engineered to be servile, their gifts twisted to better serve their masters and country. While the X-Men are heroes, fighting a whole nation requires a new approach, and for this mission Cable takes leadership of the X, choosing to trust the recently inducted Gambit to lead independent incursions on Genoshan soil. The veteran does not intend to fight Hodge the way he would expect, and after folding the Hellions and New Mutants into the X-Men, he departs for Genosha to cripple the country and take down Hodge, once and for all.

Elsewhere, X-Force ends up at the orphanage where Professor X met Scott, finding laboratories underneath it. Logan leads the way through a workshop of horrors and butchered corpses discarded like trash, scenting something familiar. In the heart of the facility, among deactivated specimen tubes and drowned experiments, a young woman remains in stasis. The mutants free the still-living girl; all she can offer is a name: Madelyne Pryor.

As X-Force tries to understand the meaning behind Madelyne's existence, the girl slowly develops her pyrokinetic powers, her raw talent not going unnoticed by the older mutants. Not long after her gift awakens, the girl taps into Death, within Warren, so the X-Man can feel the call inside him to return home, to his clan. X-Force is on the move.

At the same time, with the help of saboteurs like Forge, Psylocke and Gambit, backed by nearly all of Westchester's mutants, Cable carves a path of destruction through Genosha to rescue the kidnapped X-Men, turning the pristine city of the future into a warzone filled with mutate rebels and crumbling infrastructure. The Genengineer's lab lies in shambles after the rescue of Rictor, Roulette, Warpath and Wolfsbane, and the Genoshan war council realizes they are not dealing with a mere team of heroes. Behind closed doors, as the country's political institutions devolve into quivering, scared men and women praying for a way out, Hodge assumes control of the capitol building and awaits the final showdown, his cybernetic body further bolstered by the small amount of Warlock's power he managed to siphon before the alien succumbed. As the last of the military and many of the Press Gang of Magistrates are taken down by Storm's furious elemental barrages, Hodge welcomes the X-Men into his lair.

The battle begins in Hodge's laboratory, where he still keeps Warlock's remains and where the X-Men were first teleported when the Magistrates attacked. The monstrous cyborg can overcome any one mutant alone, but the X-Men attack their enemy with everything they have, forcing the arachnid-legged thing to crawl to the rooftops of the Citadel, where it can no longer run. Hodge makes his last stand, but Havok separates the human head from the monstrous body with an overcharged blast of plasma, and Wolfsbane finishes off the thrashing body. As their foe is reduced to nothing but a yelling head, Karma asks Cable for permission to bury the immortal man. Granted, Rictor splits the earth beneath them to sink Hodge within, and Magma brings the Citadel down on top of Cameron's burial ground. Hodge is done, Hammer Bay is freed, but the country remains in disarray and most Magistrates have fled to Carrion Cove to marshal their forces. There is peace for a moment, but it won't last without more fighting.

While many of the X-Men leave the island altogether as Hodge falls, chief among them Cable and the New Mutants, many stay behind for their own reasons. Nightcrawler wants to help the mutates with spiritual woes, Phoenix helps the children of their revolution and offers psychic therapy to former slaves, Rogue and Gambit help the mutates build new homes from their ruined lives, and Forge studies the curious Genoshan technology. Many remain, and are there when Magneto appears, recently broken out of the Raft by his Brotherhood, Colossus among them. This time, however, Magneto shows a wholly different side of himself: having had the chance, even if forced, to converse with his old friend Charles often while in custody has done much to heal the old mutant's mind. He refutes the idea of a skirmish with the X-Men outright, and instead convinces those willing to join him in liberating Carrion Cove and bringing the last of the Magistrates to justice. Havok accepts the offer, and many of the X-Men follow him into the Genoshan Brotherhood.

Things are not as promising in the United States, however, as during the X-Men's absence, Sabretooth breaks free and runs rampant through the School. When the fighters from Genosha arrive, they find that Psylocke, Mirage and Boom-Boom fought the hulking psychopath, who, though defeated, claimed Elizabeth's life before the end. Meanwhile, Snow Valley Academy lies in shambles as Selene Gallio employs allies such as Emplate and Blackheart to attack her rival, Emma. To defend their school, Chamber, Husk, Jubilee, M, Skin, Synch and the Stepford Cuckoos band together as what they call Generation X and fight back. Though they force the Black Queen back, Synch does not survive the clash, and in the aftermath, Emma, Banshee and the kids are taken to the Xavier's School.

The war at Carrion Cove is swift as Magneto unleashes his fury upon the higher caste of the country and their traitorous mutant servants. To the X-Men who have joined him, a distinct change in his behavior is apparent. Magneto is often seen sparing humans when before he would have dispatched them without a thought, and where his old self would have chastised and punished failure among his followers, now Magneto seems to carry a greater sense of responsibility for those around him. He is not kind, but he is tempered. With their final defeat, the Genoshan ruling class is no more, many of them judged and banished for crimes against Mutantkind. Magneto declares it to be a mutant land.

Miles above ground, the life support module of the Akkaba space station blows up in a spectacle of blinding light as X-Force arrives at what is believed to be the seat of the Black Womb Project, an old initiative aimed at breeding superior mutants, initiated centuries past by one Dr. Nathaniel Essex. In the sinister halls of the organization responsible for Madelyne's creation, and which gave rise to the Weapon X program, exists something far more dangerous: a new body for En Sabah Nur, one to replace the one damaged by Iceman in their earlier fight, a superior vessel for the warlord to truly ascend in the modern age. As the Akkaba flee the station in escape modules, the X-Men split, Beast stealing the local data while Archangel, Cyclops and Wolverine destroy Apocalypse's new host.

X-Force finds the base littered with the bodies of Akkaba loyalists, all withered and drained of life and flesh. As Wolverine slices the doors down, they are met not with the dangerous threat they might have expected, given Exodus' warnings, but with a child bearing a striking resemblance to Apocalypse himself. Archangel warns them this is the Celestial warlord's clone, and that given time he will become their enemy, one way or another, but Wolverine is the one to suggest that the right company can temper one's nature, being proof of that himself. In the end, though Cyclops vividly remembers his son being injected with the Techno-Organic virus, and the man responsible for it, he sides with Wolverine. The boy leaves with them, and as Beast requests assistance after being drugged by a mysterious facsimile of himself, the young En Sabah Nur helps them free the Akkaba's captives.

As X-Force returns home, it does so with Domino, as well as the one who will come to be called Genesis.

In time, with the power of free mutants and mutates by his side, Magneto rebuilds the nation of Genosha as a mutant state, a place free of strife and persecution. To the X-Men's surprise, and to signal his desire to move forward, Magneto disbands the Brotherhood, its purpose now achieved. Immigration to Genosha is massive, and the new country grows at exponential rates, establishing academies after the mold of Xavier's School and allowing mutants to dream of a better future. Though the world expects Magneto to announce plans for global domination and an offensive against the human race, those never materialize, the Master of Magnetism finally finding some grounding as the leader of his people. For all intents and purposes, it seems mutants will finally know some semblance of peace, brought by Magneto and Charles' children.

It happens on a Tuesday, late in the morning, like a bad feeling that does not coalesce into concrete thought. A sense of unease blankets the home of the X-Men in Westchester as telepaths like Phoenix and White Queen suddenly lose control of their powers, and those attuned to the mystic arts, like Magik and Morrigan, feel sickened and disturbed. Beast's computers capture impossible energy readings, and Charles Xavier wakes up screaming in despair. Fear seizes the hearts of those present, but it is only when the news hits the airwaves that the X-Men learn Genosha, the country of mutants, home to sixteen million homo superior, has been razed to the ground, most of its denizens turned into anguished statues of ash or shadows printed upon walls. The full scope of the horror resists entry into any one mind at the Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters.

As the X-Men can barely turn to each other for support, one man holds back his grief as words from an old friend echo in his mind: "Look, Charles. Look at what they've done."

Professor X sends his X-Men to Genosha to look for survivors, but their numbers are sparse. Among them are Polaris, Wiccan, Speed, Rogue, Gambit and very few others, most of them powerful mutants with training who reacted fast enough. Survivors speak of a Wild Sentinel. As the mutants of Westchester take in a genocide, they are surprised by the appearance of the Avengers, who assist the wounded and help care for the victims. To some X-Men it is a sign of hope for relations between humans and mutants; to others it is too little, too late, a sentiment that finds a home in the hearts of most mutants in the X.

A month passes and human-mutant relations have never been better. Humanity, for all its flaws, is not without compassion, and the brutality visited upon Genoshans finally tips the scales toward pity rather than hatred. In the shadows, groups like Orchis, A.I.M., S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra understand that whoever snuffed out the lights of Genosha bought humanity time it did not know it needed. As a direct counterpart, the loyalists of Magneto found the zealous Acolytes, with his son at the forefront, as after his death the Master of Magnetism becomes a martyr to young mutants everywhere. All of it culminates in Professor X sending notice through Cerebro, to all living humans, metahumans and mutants, that things will change. He reveals his human identity, admits to leading the X-Men, and bestows upon the world three miraculous drugs, I, L and M, in exchange for absolute sovereignty over mutants, among other things. He establishes in his school the first embassy of his budding mutant nation, the first Xavier Habitat for Higher Learning, and openly seeks young mutants to join it, the faces of the future.

Humans at large eagerly accept a mutant country, and peace with Mutantkind, in exchange for a cure for all ails of the mind, drugs that extend lifespans, and the world's most powerful antibiotic. Their leaders are far less enthused, the overtones of Professor X's speech making clear, in no uncertain terms, that this is a unilateral edict. Something has changed within Charles Francis Xavier, and because of it, he has changed the world as well. As the X-Men prepare for their home to become a proper school for the first time, and to guide the future of Mutantkind, something strange takes hold of the hearts in the Habitat: a sense of empowerment that comes from agency. No more waiting for humans to see the error of their ways; the X-Men now realize that, left to their own designs, humans will make the wrong decision, every time. Mutants cannot afford to wait anymore, and they must become the keepers of the peace, if peace is to be had at all. If humans won't be better people, then mutants will, for the sake of both species.

Unshackled by the mores of homo sapiens, Professor X forgets his dreams of integration as he opens the way for his people to develop as a species of their own, and intelligence agencies everywhere learn, to their shock, that within the boundaries of the Xavier Habitat, fallen mutants are being resurrected, brought back from the dead through the power of the X-Gene. Everywhere mutants are known to live, strange and abnormal vegetation grows, nowhere more obvious than in the Habitat itself, a flourishing alien environment of colorful flowers and enormous plant life.

A post-human world requires post-human solutions, and as mutants celebrate, a new era begins.