BIOGRAPHY - Page 3
David’s actions continued to have consequences long after his apparent demise. For the next twenty years, time was reshaped into a new, unnatural state. Eric Magnus Lehnsherr 
grew to become Magneto and formed the X-Men in memory of his dead friend, Charles Xavier. The public display of mutant activity in Haifa also brought the conqueror known as Apocalypse out of hibernation a decade earlier than it should have. Instead of the peaceful co-existence Charles Xavier dreamed of, the planet fell into a harsh dystopia as Apocalypse conquered America and Magneto’s X-Men fought a losing guerrilla war against his forces. Meanwhile, the temporal paradox Legion had created rendered the M’Kraan Crystal and the Nexus of All Realities unstable, threatening the end of all that is. [The Age of Apocalypse]
A glimmer of hope existed in the form of Bishop, last surviving member of the original timeline’s X-Men. Already a time traveler from the future before following Legion into the past, Bishop survived the paradox created in Haifa with his memories of the true reality intact. Making contact with Magneto and the X-Men, they arranged to re-enter the past and set right what Legion had done. Bishop returned to that fateful moment and prevented Legion from killing either Xavier or Magnus. He forced David to strike him with the psychic blade and Bishop’s own energy re-channeling abilities created a feedback loop that consumed them both. Legion and Bishop apparently disintegrated, the X-Men returned to the present and the timeline was restored to its proper order. [X-Men Omega]
Missing in action since Legion reawakened in Israel, the splinter personalities of Jack Wayne, Cyndi and Jemail Karami reappeared after David Haller was dispersed in the past. Existing in a spectral state with no body to call their own, the three materialized in Jerusalem months after Legion’s disappearance, causing mass chaos with their powers. Jack and Cyndi refused to give up their existence and die along with David and their rejection of death brought Jemail along
with them. They were confronted by Sabra and Excalibur, who sought to end their tantrum in the holy city. Eventually, the empathic Meggan was able to project a sense of calm that engulfed the disembodied personalities, putting them at peace. Finally willing to accept their fate, the three spirits apparently passed on into the next life. [Excalibur (1st series) #121]
In fact, however, David Haller was not dead at all. As the timestream repaired itself around them, Legion and Bishop fell out of reality and descended into Limbo, the cosmic “no-time.” The elder Bishop died during the passage and Legion absorbed his mind as he had done before with Jemail Karami. The psychic blade devastated David’s mental landscape, undoing all the healing work done on his mind by Karami and Professor Xavier. Instead of four personalities, David now had thousands vying for control in his mind. (Jack Wayne at least found his way back to Legion in Limbo after leaving Jerusalem, although the fates of Karami and Cyndi have not been clarified.) Legion wandered through Limbo for an untold period of time, trying to make his way back home. During his journey, his “bad” personalities would occasionally slay other beings they encountered, then absorb and enslave their minds inside of David’s. [New Mutants (3rd series) #3] Legion was eventually located by the demon sorceress Magik, who agreed to show Legion the way back to Earth in exchange for his later assistance against her nemeses, the Elder Gods. Illyana’s deal was made in secret with The Legion, the God-Mutant and arbiter of the Age of Apocalypse. He allowed himself to be locked away in David’s mind until the time was right to repay what he owed her, leaving the rest of Haller’s personalities unaware of the true circumstances of their return. [New Mutants (3rd series) #21]
The primary David Haller resurfaced on Earth, hoping to find “The Fixers”… his term for Xavier, Dani Moonstar and the other New Mutants who had been present when his mind was first made almost-whole. David’s return to Earth happened near Westcliffe, Colorado and upon his arrival he met a young girl named Marci Sabol. The young-at-heart David liked Marci and they played together for a time until one of David’s other personalities surfaced uncontrollably and killed Marci before David could stop him. Legion absorbed Marci’s consciousness as she died.
Many of David’s other personalities did not want to be “incorporated” again and, led by ringleader Jack Wayne, attempted to rebel against David and prevent him from making contact with the Fixers. David and Marci attempted to elude the horde of rebellious personalities inside his mind. Legion’s mindscape was now an elaborate dream-like world of rooms, buildings and open space all mixed together. Control of David’s body was now represented by a rag doll he named “Moira” – the personality that held the doll was able to animate Legion’s body with their personality and powers. David did his best to keep Marci and “Moira” out of the grasp of Jack Wayne’s entourage, giving Marci a hidden playroom in his mind with Moira while secreting himself away in another part of his mind.
In control of Legion’s body thanks to Moira, Marci stumbled back into town looking for her parents. Uncomprehending, the folks of Westcliffe believed Marci to be some kind of mutant shape-changer and, fearing another Cooperstown massacre, they locked her away in her parents’ basement. Marci’s mother tried to care for her daughter in a young man’s body as best she could, but her father was a bigot and anonymously tipped off the X-Men about a new mutant in town, hoping they’d come and take her away. When Karma and Moonstar arrived in Westcliffe, Xi’an attempted to psychically reach out for Marci, only for her mind to be inadvertently sucked up into Legion’s mindscape in the process. Karma located Marci but the other personalities in Legion’s head found both of them. The other New Mutants arrived in Westcliffe just as Jack Wayne and the rogue personalities acquired Moira. Legion was reborn, assaulting the New Mutants with one power set after another as the personas passed the doll around inside David’s head. Jack Wayne in particular wanted revenge on Moonstar of the “Fixers.” He was prepared to rape and kill her before Cannonball and Sunspot stepped in to save her.
Eventually, Illyana Rasputin managed to enter Legion’s mind in an attempt to rescue Karma and Marci. Illyana wielded her Soulsword with impunity, killing Jack Wayne, Drexel and two other personas in order to make it clear she wasn’t playing around. The petrified personalities led her to where Karma, Marci and David Haller had hidden. They also turned over the doll for fear of what Magik might do to them. Legion’s rampage through Westcliffe was ended and he regained control of his body. Shortly after, the X-Men’s science team arrived to properly contain Legion for the trip back to Utopia. [New Mutants (3rd series) #1-4]
Magik and Karma were restored to their own bodies but, before she left David’s mind, Xi’an learned the circumstances surrounding Marci’s death. Furious over what had been done to the little girl in her care, she located the personality responsible and, with Illyana’s Soulsword, killed the persona for his depravities.
Meanwhile, Doctor Nemesis and the X-Club went to work terraforming Legion’s psyche to create a viable, healthy environment for him to operate in. They manipulated his neural pathways to shape the architecture of David’s mind, constructing individual cells to isolate and catalogue all of his personalities. Though many of the personas resisted, David himself was hopeful that their efforts would "fix" him and lead to the integrated self he desired. As Nemesis’s work continued, Legion was contained in Danger’s virtual reality rehabilitation scenarios at the X-Brig, until it could be confirmed he posed no threat to the other residents of Utopia. [New Mutants (3rd series) #5-6] Danger continued running an ongoing therapy program on Legion and the majority of his personalities were successfully contained in psychic detention cells in his mental brig.
When the X-Men faced an unstoppable force of Nimrod Sentinels transporting back from the future, Professor Xavier went to David for help. A cerebral interface helmet had been designed by Doctor Nemesis and Madison Jeffries to enable Legion to access his powers and personalities under controlled conditions. With the helmet, David entered a psychically-constructed control room to review and “activate” his personalities, letting them operate through his body in the real world, but on his terms. Legion therefore became the perfect weapon to use against the Nimrod Sentinels – his constantly changing mutant powers made it impossible for them to properly adapt to and counter his abilities. David was highly effective in aiding the X-Men, saving San Francisco from Bastion and his Sentinel hordes. [Uncanny X-Men (1st series) #524, New Mutants (3rd series) #14]
Despite his good showing against Bastion, Legion was returned to isolation and containment after the battle on the Golden Gate Bridge. 
He was next seen when the time came to fulfill his promise to Illyana. A cadre of U.S. soldiers had unleashed the Elder Gods in Limbo and on Earth. Magik directed Karma to go back into Legion’s mind and unleash the “God-Mutant” personality with which she had previously bargained. Now at the height of his power and capable of wielding reality-altering energies, Legion was unleashed upon the Elder Gods. With almost no effort at all, Legion confronted those beings of infinite age and unprecedented power and destroyed them utterly, deconstructing the Elder Gods and banishing their essence from reality itself. Having granted Illyana her vengeance, Legion bestowed upon her the bloodstones made from her soul that had summoned the Elder Gods. He then willingly returned to Utopia to continue his psychological treatments. [New Mutants (3rd series) #20-21]
Doctor Nemesis soon upgraded his treatment of Legion’s psychosis, killing personalities under controlled conditions so that their psychic energy was “reabsorbed” into David’s general consciousness. Despite the apparent progress Nemesis and Danger were making with David, however, Charles Xavier was concerned they were hurting his son more than helping him. Xavier believed that, while Legion was voluntarily submitting to Nemesis’s treatments on a conscious level, his subconscious would not accept the continuing trauma of the psychic “deaths” of his personalities without some sort of reaction. [X-Men Legacy (1st series) #244]
Xavier was correct. Soon a new personality developed in David’s mind as a violent response to Dr. Nemesis’s treatments. This entity cannibalized many of Legion’s imprisoned personalities, growing in size and power. It assumed the form of Moira MacTaggert in David’s mindscape and, in the real world, manifesting itself physically thanks to its command of Legion’s mutant ability for reconstructing reality. “Moira” lashed out at the world on David’s behalf, reshaping reality itself into a new format that she believed he could be happy with. She contained Utopia in a several square mile radius that formed the nexus of her new world and completely removed the rest of the universe from reality, incredibly reducing all of existence so that it fit in a tiny box she kept for the sake of nostalgia.
Moira created a new history where the X-Men never formed and mutantkind was hunted to the brink of extinction by humanity. The reality centered around Fortress X, the last stronghold of mutantkind created by General Magneto to preserve his people at any cost. David was reimagined as the powerful telekinetic Legion, leader of the Force Warriors whose sole purpose was to maintain the opaque Force Wall around Fortress X that held back the supposedly endless waves of human soldiers seeking to destroy Earth’s remaining mutants. Moira manifested her personality on the physical plane, operating in the Age of X as a physical being completely separate and autonomous of David himself. She also filled out Fortress X’s mutant population by giving all his separate personalities bodies like her, emptying out David’s mind of all the voices. This act, combined with Moira’s overall influence, meant that David’s mind was completely whole in this reality, and Legion enjoyed fame and hero worship among the mutant population for his role in the Force Wall. “Moira” also maintained a second identity as the enigmatic ‘X’, a communications hub who provided intel and support for Magneto’s army at all times, while also providing Moira with an excuse to keep tabs on all the former X-Men and Utopia residents she had “repurposed” as players in her Fortress X drama.
Moira hoped to maintain her fabrication by isolating the so-called most dangerous mutants in Fortress X’s detention block, particularly Charles Xavier and other mutants with telepathic or prescient abilities that might detect the lie of her world. Still, Moira was ultimately a creature of wrath, not a creative force by nature, and the cracks in her design began to show through. After a lifetime of false memories and 1000 days of siege on Fortress X (in reality only seven days from the start of Moira’s reality warp), Magneto took clandestine steps to investigate the truth of the world around them, soon drawing Gambit and Rogue into the search as well. Meanwhile, Moira used her X identity to direct Moonstar Cadre and the Force Warriors against Magneto and his co-conspirators, and even became personally involved in protecting her secrets. Nevertheless, the information spread beyond her ability to contain it. Once Magneto reawakened Charles Xavier in the detention block from his drug-induced sleep, he was able to show Legion the truth about the world and about Moira. David had trouble accepting what Xavier showed him, which would mean rejecting a world where he was sane and respected by his comrades, but he eventually relented. Legion absorbed Moira back into his mindscape, assuming her powers in the process and used them to restore reality and the universe to their proper places. [Age of X]
