CYCLOPS: Page 4 of 4

ALTERNATE VERSIONS – BATTLEWORLD ALTERNATES

Near the death of Earth-616, a series of catastrophic multiversal events known as Incursions systematically obliterated individual realities within the multiverse, two planetary collisions at a time. Often times, these Incursions were preceded by inhabitants of one of the colliding realities invading the other in order to destroy its Earth in order to save both universes. Other times, they were invaded by Sidera Madris, or Black Priests, both of which had their motives for destroying one of the planets. Many Cyclopses fell to these invasions and Incursions and, by the end, only a handful of realities remained. These surviving realities were compiled into one final reality, consisting of a hodgepodge planet called Battleworld, ruled by Doctor Doom of Earth-616. The following entries list the only Cyclopses outside of the ones living on Earth-616 that remained in the multiverse before it was reborn as the Prime universe.

In an alternate timeline where the X-Men failed to contain the Inferno outbreak, Illyana Rasputin fully succumbed to the Darkchylde and took over the demonic Manhattan as its permanent overlord. The entire city was quarantined with all of the X-Men, X-Factor and New Mutants inside of it. When it was incorporated into Battleworld. God-Doom appointed Cyclops Baron of the region. Once a year, Cyclops, as the leader of the X-Men, allowed Colossus to venture into the Inferno to try to save his sister but, every year, it grew more dangerous. On the final year Cyclops approved of it, he himself was crippled. The wheelchair-bound Cyclops commanded the X-Men from his headquarters, but refused to Colossus any further forays into the Inferno. Colossus defied him, however, and went on one last mission into Limbo with his teammates. They failed once again and remained trapped in Limbo after Nightcrawler was kidnapped. Cyclops was at their headquarters when Darkchylde and her horde of demons attacked. Later, Doom stripped Cyclops of his Baron title and bestowed it upon Darkchylde. Although the combined forces of the X-Men managed to stave them off for a while, the Darkchylde eventually overpowered them and the entirety of the X-Men (except for Colossus, Domino and Boom-Boom) died in battle. Colossus ended up defeating Darkchylde in the end, though, and the three surviving mutants fled their domain.

In the Battleworld domain known as Westchester, which was trapped in the spirit of the early 90’s, Cyclops was still the leader of the X-Men, though a lasting peace between mutants and humans led him to believe that the X-Men might no longer be necessary. He decided to retire as leader of the X-Men after one final mission to check out Baron Robert Kelly’s Clear Mountain Project, a rehabilitation institution for wayward mutants. During their investigation, however, its director, a Shadow King-possessed Cassandra Nova, captured the X-Men and tried to reform them into clean, upstanding, obedient citizens. She succeeded in “rehabilitating” several of them, but Cyclops and Jean were among those who resisted and, with some outside help, they managed to defeat Nova and the Shadow King. Cyclops followed through with his retirement after this mission ended.

In a Battleworld domain built from a reality where Xavier committed suicide to destroy Cassandra Nova, Magneto led the X-Men at the Institute of the Atom, while Cyclops, Emma and Wolverine faded into obscurity as their powers dissipated. Despite his powers faltering, however, Cyclops developed a secondary mutation of persuasion as he aged. Much later, Cyclops, Emma and Wolverine discovered that Magneto had used a Phoenix Egg to amplify the powers of himself and his students and dampen the powers of the former X-Men. In doing so, however, Magneto inadvertently unleashed Sublime. After rescuing and recruiting Xorn, Cyclops, Emma and Wolverine attacked Magneto, freeing the Phoenix Egg and Jean Grey. However, it turned out that Cassandra Nova also resided inside the Phoenix Egg and now had control. When it hatched, Cyclops tried to approach his possessed wife, but she obliterated him in a blast of heat and light.

At the massive wall at the south of Battleworld that separated the relatively civilized regions of the planet from the most savage one, an army of Baron Sinister’s discarded Cyclops clones known as the Endless Summers served as footsoldiers in the fight to keep the legions of invading monsters at bay. Although largely interchangeable, one of the Endless Summers served the leader of the Shield, Abigail Brand, and the two of them grew close. Most of the Endless Summers were killed trying to repel the (Nick) Fury, and the hundred or so that remained met their end when the Shield finally fell. Abigail and her prime Endless Summer stood hand-in-hand and awaited certain death by the approaching army of zombies and Ultrons.

In Battleworld’s Age of Apocalypse, Cyclops betrayed Apocalypse and helped the mutant-human resistance overthrow his successor, Doctor Nemesis. Apocalypse, however, unleashed a fast-acting Legacy Virus that he hoped would expedite the survival of the fittest process — and ironically, was among the first to fall. The virus threatened to destroy all of mutantkind, but the X-Men reactivated the Phoenix Force within Jean, who then saved everyone by eliminating their susceptible X-genes. Although Cyclops lost his optic blasts, he had Jean in the end.