MADISON JEFFRIES: Page 4 of 4

BIOGRAPHY - Page 4

Though Alpha Flight were apparently unable to track down their abducted teammate, another organization had no such troubles. Several agents of the re-launched Weapon X program invaded the Zodiac’s headquarters and left as swiftly as they came, but not before capturing Gemini. Malcom Colcord, the program’s mutant hating director, had no quarrels to use mutants for his goal of terminating all mutants and Madison Jeffries played a key role in his plans. His brain already malleable due to the Zodiac’s brainwashing, Colcord had Madison conditioned to be loyal to him. Repeatedly lied to that he was actually doing good deeds, Jeffries designed a mutant concentration camp dubbed Neverland for Colcord, fully run robotic guards resembling his Box armor. [Weapon X (2nd series) #1, 4] Madsion had no idea that his wife, Diamond Lil, was among the camp’s detainees.

Over the next few months, Weapon X’s second in command, Brent Jackson, collaborated with a rebel underground movement, trying to wrest control from Colcord. With Jeffries providing Colcord with a near infinite number of robot guards, it seemed that Colcord could stay in power when Jackson made his move. However, among Jackson’s followers was someone who could absorb all surrounding technology, including Jeffries’ robots, into himself. Now defenseless, Colcord fled from the compound with the still loyal Madison in tow. [Weapon X (2nd series) #12-13]

They set up camp in the original, long abandoned Weapon X compound and, unable to accept his failure, Colcord started drinking a lot. Madison tried to help the man who he believed to be his friend as much as possible, and created some of his robots – now resembling Sentinels rather than the Box armor – to clean up the base. However, Colcord angrily lashed out at Jeffries when he went shopping for supplies but wouldn’t bring any more alcohol. Over time, Colcord became delusional but sobered up enough to come up with a plan to win back his position at the Weapon X program. Over the course of a month, he had Madison create an entire army of Sentinels. [Weapon X (2nd series) #22] However, right when they attacked the Weapon X base, M-Day struck and over 90% of Earth’s mutants lost their powers, making the entire point of a secret agency hunting and killing mutants a moot point.

Madison was one of the few to keep his powers and, after being abandoned by Colcord, he began to realize that his mind had been tampered with. Fearing that someone else would take advantage of him, Jeffries retreated to an abandoned factory outside of Old Crow in Yukon, Canada with only his mechanical creations to keep him company. Apparently, the robots learned how to self-replicate and adapt, ultimately deciding that they didn’t need Madison anymore. At least that’s what a paranoid Madison believed and he was scared for his very life. When the X-Men made their way to the factory, wanting to recruit Madison for their science division, the X-Club, Jeffries had just activated a self-destruct mechanism to destroy the entire building and everything inside. [Uncanny X-Men (1st series) #505]

In the X-Men’s base in San Francisco, the members of the X-Club were introduced to each other. Other than Madison, the group included the Beast, Dr. Nemesis, Dr. Kavita Rao and Dr. Yuriko Takiguchi. Their initial purpose was to come up with a way to reverse the effects of M-Day, first of which they needed to determine the cause of mutation. For that goal, they time-traveled into the past to acquire blood samples of Dr. Nemesis’ parents, with a time machine that Madison assembled for them. [Uncanny X-Men (1st series) #508-509, 512]

Shortly thereafter, the X-Club’s mission drastically changed when Norman Osborn, director of National Security, used several riots over a proposed ballot initiative limiting reproduction rights of mutants to outlaw the X-Men and hunt them and other mutants down. While the X-Men fought Osborn’s troops all over the city, Cyclops had sent the X-Club to the Pacific Ocean, where they raised the remains of Magneto’s Asteroid M, turning it into a floating island, Utopia. The island was then declared a sovereign nation and safe haven for mutants outside of Osborn’s jurisdiction. [Utopia X crossover]

Given the dire circumstances under which it had been raised, Utopia was a work in progress. Over the first weeks, the island was in constant danger of sinking again. With more and more mutants arriving, all of Utopia’s systems – flotation, air, water, communications, defenses, structural integrity, etc. - needed to be checked, upgraded and improved… and Madison was the right man for the job. Actually, Jeffries didn’t mind the non-stop work, as he was good at it and it kept him away from people. [Nation X #3, Uncanny X-Men (1st series) #518-519, 521-522]

One of the many mutants seeking refuge on Utopia was Madison’s wife, Diamond Lil. He deliberately avoided her, thinking he had caused Lil  enough harm but that angered her even more. A few days after her arrival, Lil told Madison that she would kill him if she ever saw him again. However, anger gave away to disappointment and sadness and, over the next weeks, they found themselves seeking each other’s company again. Madison struggled to find the right words to apologize for his past mistakes, and he and Lillian reconciled. They slept together in Madison’s workshop, hoping for a bright future. Unfortunately, a couple of hours later, Lil was killed when a group of villains invaded Utopia. After the attack was over, Madison created a glass coffin for his wife and she was put to rest off Utopia’s shore. [X-Force (3rd series) #23, Nation X #3]

There was another among Utopia’s residents that Madison has shown an interested in – Danger, the artificial life-form that started out as the computer system running the X-Men’s training exercises and eventually created a physical body for itself after gaining sentience. While initially it may have been scientific curiosity on Madison’s part, he eventually seemed to develop feelings for Danger. Madison creeped out some of the other residents when he called the prosthetic leg of Karma “sexy,” not even realizing how weird that comment must sound to the recently maimed young woman. Shortly thereafter, Madison asked Danger to join him for a picnic, a clearly romantic activity. [X-Men: Legacy Annual #1, New Mutants (3rd series) #9, X-Men: Second Coming #2, Uncanny X-Men (1st series) #529]

When the vampire community launched an attack on San Francisco, releasing a manufactured virus which turned innocent people into vampires, Jeffries demonstrated his increasing prowess over technology once again. This time, he used his skills to recalibrate Cerebro so that the mutant-detecting machine could now also detect vampires, assisting the X-Men with managing and putting a stop to the vampire problem. [X-Men (3rd series) #2] When reality was restored following Legion's warp, Jeffries had no hesitation when it came to electing to have the memories of this reality removed from his mind, citing the memories as “horror and misery.” [X-Men Legacy (1st series) #248]

Long ago, the X-Men encountered and defeated beings known as the Evolutionaries, who offered to assist mutantkind by wiping out all humans. When the Evolutionaries returned and discovered that mutantkind had been reduced to less than two hundred in number, they sought to replace Cyclops, whom they saw as mutantkind's leader. Jeffries was tasked with re-creating the device  the X-Men originally used to defeat the Evolutionaries and, despite doubting that he had the necessary skills to re-create something designed by Hank McCoy, Jeffries overcame his anxiety to complete the device and once again proved a worthy ally to the X-Men as the Evolutionaries were defeated. [X-Men (3rd series) #12-15]

Following the X-Men's “schism,” Jeffries, along with Danger and the X-Club, elected to remain with Cyclops on Utopia. [Uncanny X-Men (2nd series) #1] When the X-Club assisted with the creation of the Stratocorp station, which would link Earth to a space station in orbit via an elevator called the Stringstar, Jeffries and Danger worked closely aboard the space station, ensuring the mechanics were operating correctly. However, when Danger connected to the station, something strange happened and she leapt from the station, needing to return to Utopia, where she launched into an attack on several mutants. Jeffries was taking the long elevator ride back to Earth when Cyclops alerted him to the problems Danger was causing. Jeffries was telepathically connected to Danger, who expelled him from her mind, causing Jeffries great concern. When he arrived back on Earth, Jeffries, struggling with how he felt about people in general, kissed Dr. Kavita Rao but decided there was no connection, and elected to return to the space station. During the long elevator ride, he encountered a super artificial-intelligence who confirmed what Jeffries was beginning to suspect – that he was attracted to life not of flesh.

When the super artificial-intelligence attacked Jeffries aboard the space station, Jeffries made himself a make-shift armor before he was expelled into space. Floating in the vacuum, he was rescued by Danger, who found him thanks to a microchip she planted in his brain, having deciding he was of importance to her. It was soon discovered that Danger had been made pregnant by the super artificial-intelligence when she connected to the space station, which had led to disorientation and attack on the X-Men. Jeffries assisted Danger in giving birth to a new entity. It was in fact the super artificial-intelligence itself, which, once it gained its freedom, transported itself between realities. That seemed not to bother Jeffries and Danger, however, who were more concerned with each other, their feelings finally confirmed and acted upon with a very public kiss. [X-Club #1-5]

During a bitter war between the X-Men and Avengers following the return of the Phoenix Force, the X-Men were briefly reunited from their schism as they viewed the return of the Phoenix as the possible means by which mutantkind could be reborn. The Avengers, meanwhile, were concerned that the Phoenix would end life on Earth. Most of the X-Men's students were sent to the Avengers Academy for protection, and Jeffries was sent with them. There, he and Kavita Rao worked with the Avengers Academy staff to protect the students from Sebastian Shaw, who had escaped custody at the Academy where he was being held following having his mind wiped. Jeffries created an armor that closely resembled his old Box armor for protection as he tracked down Sebastian Shaw, only to be knocked out after Shaw absorbed the electricity from the Academy and used it against Jeffries. [Avengers Academy #29-31]

Following the war between the X-Men and the Avengers, Utopia was abandoned and many of its residents and allies of the X-Men seemingly went their separate ways. Around this time, Danger fled Utopia, apparently without even saying goodbye to Madison.

It's not known what Madison was doing in the intervening time period, but at some point he joined up with several other mutants who were fed up with the constant struggles their kind were faced with. They banded together as “the Utopians” and started living in the ruins of the old island of Utopia. When S.H.I.E.L.D. detected a mutant presence on the island, officers were sent to investigate and, when the officers did not return, the time-displaced X-Men were asked to discover what happened. Eventually, the Utopians were teleported to the old Weapon X facility that the time-displaced X-Men were using as their based, dubbed the New Xavier School for Gifted Mutants. S.H.I.E.L.D., meanwhile, were confronted with the fact that the Avengers were allowed to set up home wherever they wanted, but mutants were always investigated and forced out. [All-New X-Men (1st series) #40-41] Madison and members of the Utopians later stood at Cyclops' side at Washington D.C. when Cyclops announced that a mutation revolution was coming. [Uncanny X-Men (1st series) #600]

Madison never took part in the forewarned mutant revolution, however, and once again kept a low-profile for some time. Apparently bored, he found himself working alongside Toni Ho and Arno Stark when Tony Stark – Iron Man – went missing. The group worked with Ironheart to find Tony Stark. Madison even constructed new armor for the group, including a green armor for himself somewhat resembling the Box armor. Their quest led them to battle android versions of several criminals, and eventually they discovered that they had been gathered by Leonardo Da Vinci, who was alive and well in this time period. With the group, Jeffries assisted in a battle against Doombots. [Invincible Iron Man (1st series) #597-600]

Madison returned to aid the X-Men when he answered a distress call at Quadra Island in his native Canada, where dozens of X-Men were battling an out-of-control X-Man, who was attempting to remake reality. Along with most of the others present, Madison was seemingly killed when the X-Men were unable to defeat X-Man. [Uncanny X-Men (5th series) #10] In fact, none of the x-Men truly died, instead they were transported to a pocket reality in which X-Man had created a utopia, one where mutants were celebrated. In this reality, Jeffries taught history at the Summers Institute for Higher Learning. When one of his students, Rockslide, began to research what happened to the mysterious Life Seed after Hope Summers used it to give everyone their powers during the Resolution, Jeffries suggested to Rockslide that he not question the official texts and look for answers which are not true. [Age of X-Man: Nextgen #1, 3]

When the pocket dimension was destroyed, Jeffries and the other missing X-Men were returned to their true reality. When the mutant nation of Krakoa was established, Jeffries accepted the invitation to live at the wondrous new home for all mutants. However, Krakoans must abide by three unique laws. The third law was to respect the sacred land of Krakoa. Whether he knew it or not at the time, Jeffries violated that law when he attempted to build an environment for Danger to be sustained on Krakoa. Artificial lifeforms were not welcome on Krakoa and as such, Danger was rejected by Krakoa, and Jeffries' relationship with Danger once again stalled. Jeffries was eventually tried by the Quiet Council of Krakoa for breaking the third law, and sentenced to The Pit, along with several other mutants recently caught breaking Krakoan law.

Jeffries and the other sentenced mutants were effectively held in suspended animation, but their minds were connected and they “existed” in a literal version of Hell created by someone who had been sentenced to the Pit much earlier – Sabretooth. Jeffries and the other prisoners were tormented by Sabretooth but, after they fought back against him, their version of the Pit changed to a more traditional prison setting.

The imprisoned mutants were able to work together to get the word out to other mutants on Krakoa that they were being perhaps unjustly kept prisoner by having their psychic forms projected onto Krakoa. Jeffries was sent to find one of Sabretooth's allies, but he and the other mutants agreed that they couldn't trust Sabretooth and his allies to help them, so they sought out mutants who were somewhat outcast on Krakoa, like they were themselves. Jeffries manifested as a cloud of microplastics before the mutant Skin and told him that he was being held captive. While word spread about the imprisonment of Jeffries and the others, Cypher, representing Krakoa, struck a deal with the prisoners. He freed them from the Pit in exchange for hunting down Sabretooth, who, in the meantime, had already escaped the Pit. Deciding to take the offer, Jeffries transmuted the microplastics in the ocean around Krakoa into a vessel to transport himself and the others to start tracking Sabretooth. [Sabretooth (3rd series) #1-5]

Now dubbed the “Exiles,” the group's quest took them to a strange island which was secretly a waste disposal for one of the Orchis prison stations, and led to an encounter with The Creation, the mysterious bodyguard of Dr. Barrington. The Exiles didn't have to search hard for Sabretooth, having himself escaped custody of Dr. Barrington, who had been experimenting on him. Madison and the others accompanied Sabretooth back to an Orchis station as Sabretooth wanted to free the hundreds of other mutant prisoners. Jeffries was able to connect to the station's machinery to locate the mutant prisoners. However, when the Exile Orphan Maker's armor was damaged, exposing his catastrophic powers, the Exiles were forced to flee into the Astral Plane. There, Jeffries' abilities to transmute inorganic materials were put to use in assisting with the creation of a new armor. When the Exiles returned to reality, they rescued the captive mutants by Jeffries transmuting the station into a ship large enough to transport all of the mutant prisoners. The Exiles learned of another Orchis station where mutant babies were being held prisoner but, en route to rescue the babies, Jeffries was torn in half when one of the frightened babies lashed out from a distance, seemingly killing Madison Jeffries. [Sabretooth & the Exiles #1-4]

Presumably, Jeffries’ death will not be the end of him and he will be placed in the queue for Krakoan resurrection. However, given his status as lawbreaker and escapee of the Pit, it remains to be seen what kind of priority, if any, he will receive.