Part Six: “Longshot - To See Him Is to Love Him”
Although Spiral had a plethora of reasons for making humans suffer, she found the love they shared for each other most repulsive of all. Nothing made these feelings of revulsion more apparent to her than when she accessed the memory banks of the young assassin Kwannon and observed an amorous interaction between her and her lover, Matsuo:
”Ah, young love… how it sickens me so! It reminds me, perhaps a bit too much, of everything I once had - and lost. Is that why I was so willing to become involved in this pathetic little game? Because I was jealous? Angry? Resentful? Why else - when the opportunity was presented to me, to stitch a love back together that had been shredded by fate - did I choose, instead, to further tear it to pieces?” [Spiral to herself in X-Men (2nd series) #31]
Spiral revealed here the love between Matsuo and Kwannon angered her because it reminded her of something she once had, but lost. To whom could she have been referring, though? Where, in Spiral’s fractured, tormented, miserable soul, could there have ever been room for something like love? The answer lies in her life as Ricochet Rita.
When Ricochet Rita first met Longshot, she was “a human who ate life with an appetite for adventure.” Despite the dangers she faced from Mojo and Spiral, the adventurous Rita willingly accompanied Longshot when he went back to the Mojoverse to free it from tyranny. Only when she went there did she learn that Longshot was known by his people as the Fallen Messiah - a man destined to fail over and over again. Worse, when Mojo captured and tortured Rita and transformed her into Spiral, Longshot never came to save her. Her entire life was utterly ruined because she fell in love with a man. It is no wonder her feelings for him crossed the thin line separating love from hate. As Spiral, she was as obsessed with Longshot as she had been enamored with him as Rita. [X-Factor Annual #7]
Even though Spiral tried to disguise her feelings as hatred, Mojo sensed his slave’s feelings for Longshot and often mocked her taste in men. He once even offered to make her a new version of Longshot to play with if she helped pull him free from a dimensional void. Spiral’s
reactions to these comments indicated that she resented both her feelings for Longshot and Mojo’s detection of them. Worse, even Longshot seemed to sense Spiral had feelings for him, despite that he didn’t know she was his former love interest. Spiral once practically went mad during a battle when Longshot asked her about these conflicting feelings. [Longshot #6]
Sometime after Longshot returned to the Mojoverse to lead the failed rebellion, Spiral helped Mojo recapture him, wipe his mind and use him as bait to capture the X-Men. During the climactic fight that followed with the New Mutants, who came to rescue the X-Men, Spiral grew jealous of the attention Mojo was getting from the crowd and began reflecting on her own life. She recalled that it was once her in the spotlight - a reference to her former life as stuntwoman Ricochet Rita. This longing reminded her once again of what she lost, which of course she blamed on Longshot. She leapt off the stage to kick him in the butt, actively suppressing her affectionate memories the whole time. [Uncanny X-Men Annual #10]
Spiral’s attempts to repress her true feelings failed to fool Longshot. When the X-Men and Freedom Force converged to thwart the threat of the Adversary in Dallas and Spiral once again came face-to-face with the amnesiac Longshot, she hoped he would not recognize her. Some part of Longshot found Spiral familiar, however, which angered her. As soon as a fight broke out between the two teams, Spiral - in her mad desire for revenge - ignored the rest of the X-Men and went straight for Longshot. He recognized the attack as driven not by her diligence as a government agent to arrest a fugitive, but out of some deranged desire for revenge - yet he had no idea why. [Uncanny X-Men #225]
After the events in Dallas, Spiral and Mojo believed the X-Men - including Longshot and their living camcorder Psylocke - to be dead. As soon as they learned Longshot was still alive, however, Spiral attempted to apprehend him. She chased him across dimensions and eventually pinned him in Lila Cheney’s home in Malibu, where he eluded her grasp with Lila’s help. Spiral vowed to capture them for Mojo in good time. [X-Men (2nd series) #5] Her pledge to her master proved futile, as her master was killed by none other than Longshot and the X-Men. [X-Men (2nd series) #11] Spiral was absent when this happened. It would be a while before she encountered Longshot again.
Meanwhile, with Mojo seemingly gone, Spiral dealt with her newfound freedom by once again interfering in the lives of Psylocke, Revanche and Matsuo. She provided both Psylocke and Matsuo with a sense of closure after Revanche died. [X-Men (2nd series) #31-32] Perhaps Spiral’s guilt over 
rending their love apart, and the actions she took to achieve some form of atonement, proved therapeutic for her, because the next time she saw Longshot, she behaved differently toward him than she ever had in the past. This reunion with Longshot occurred when he and his fellow rebels tried to overthrow Mojo II: The Sequel. Even though they crossed swords, Spiral’s feelings for Longshot were less passionate than his were for her. Adding to that was the fact that she opposed him in this instance for purely political and financial reasons, not because of some twisted desire for revenge. The two of them even joined forces to dethrone Mojo II. Judging by her behavior during this encounter, Spiral, for reasons undetermined, appeared to be overcoming her obsession with Longshot. [Marvel Fanfare (2nd series) #4-5]
Her increasing indifference toward Longshot continued. She next saw him when they teamed up with X-Force to save the life of Shatterstar. During this interaction, Spiral actually treated Longshot with civility. In fact, outside of asking for assistance in saving Shatterstar, she barely acknowledged his presence. [X-Force (1st series) #59-61] Perhaps Spiral has finally come to terms with what happened to her and forgiven Longshot. Perhaps she has stopped blaming him for the circumstances of her life and instead channeled that negative energy into other outlets - although who knows how she may react to Longshot the next time their paths cross.
Part Seven: “His name will be… Shatterstar!”
When Spiral helped X-Force save the life of their dying ally Shatterstar, her actions piqued their curiosity - and rightfully so. After all, this woman brought nothing but torment to them and their allies in the past. When Cable pressed her on the matter, Spiral only said to him the following: “Is it not enough that Shatterstar will live again to fulfill his destiny? It is not enough to say that both young men mean more than all the world to me..?”
Shatterstar’s destiny as the one who would free the Mojoverse had already been revealed. It’s the second part of that statement that raises questions. Although Spiral has tossed out a few cryptic hints like this, her connection to Shatterstar has never been adequately explained. Shatterstar, a soldier from 100 years in the Mojoverse’s future, should have no connection to Spiral. For some reason, however, Spiral feels a deep connection to him.
The first time Spiral teased a connection to Shatterstar, he had just established himself as a member of Cable’s X-Force and had never crossed her path. However, after telling the tragic story of how she became the monster she is, and after revealing that no matter how hard Longshot tried he would never overthrow Mojo, Spiral revealed the name of different man destined to free the Mojoverse from tyranny. His name, she said, would be Shatterstar. Spiral's words here could be trusted; she genuinely wanted to overthrow her master and her abilities allowed her to travel to any moment in time, allowing her to see for certain that Shatterstar would one day bring freedom to the Mojoverse. [X-Factor Annual #7]
Seemingly contrary to what Spiral foretold, however, the X-Men and Longshot killed Mojo before she and Arize had the chance. Shortly afterward, 
thanks to Professor X’s telepathy, Longshot and his lover Dazzler learned they were pregnant. Longshot suggested they name their child “Shatterstar.” He and Dazzler remained in the Mojoverse to help its inhabitants rebuild. [X-Men (2nd series) #10-11]
Mojo’s death did not instantly bring peace to the Mojoverse. With the tyrant gone, the people of the Mojoverse tried to eliminate everything that reminded them of his regime… including his TV stars, the X-Babies. Fortunately for them, Dazzler - having seemingly lost the child she was carrying - decided to take the X-Babies into her and Longshot’s home. [X-Men (2nd series) #47] What exactly happened to Dazzler’s baby remains a mystery. Jean Grey simply sensed it was not there, yet not enough time had passed for Dazzler’s pregnancy to come to term. Something happened to the fetus, and Dazzler clearly did not want to speak about it, as she has never since broached the subject.
Around this time, X-Force and Shatterstar learned of a runaway from Boston named Benjamin Russell, whose face and fingerprints exactly matched Shatterstar’s. Russell had been a patient at the Weismann Institute for the Criminally Insane. As Spiral would later tell them, Russell had laid comatose for years, ever since his mutant powers manifested.
Sometime after Mojo miraculously returned from the dead, he solicited Spiral’s help in capturing and restraining Shatterstar and Cable. Mojo knew of the prophecy foretelling that Shatterstar would someday kill him and set out to get rid of him before he had the chance. He digitized Cable and Shatterstar and put them inside a video recreation of the prophesized battle. Contrary to expectations, when Shatterstar attacked Mojo, Mojo actually slew him, and not the other way around. Mojo televised this event for all to see, X-Force and Spiral included. Spiral saw the prophecy crumble before her eyes. If Shatterstar didn’t survive to overthrow Mojo, who would?
To prevent this, she transported X-Force to the Mojoverse, retrieved Shatterstar’s dying body from its digital prison and took him to the Weismann Institute, where the comatose Benjamin Russell rested. There, she had Longshot transfer Shatterstar’s “uemeur” into Russell’s body. Shatterstar woke up in this new Benjamin Russell body and, for the first time in his life, felt complete. When Cable asked Spiral why she chose to help them save Shatterstar, she shed a tear and posed the questions mentioned earlier. Was it not enough that Shatterstar would live again to fulfill his destiny? Was it not enough to say that both young men meant more than all the world to her? [X-Force (1st series) #59-61]