When the Brotherhood of Mutants used to be public enemy number one, the heat was always on him or Mystique. Sometimes, the Blob took the heat. No one ever paid much attention to Destiny. Many years later, when they were in the slammer like him or on the run, it was Destiny who was the key to their comeback. She could see into the future and knew a group of mutants outside their reality was coming to fix their broken world. They were called the Exiles, because they traveled around from one parallel world to another, fixing disasters wherever they went. They got their missions through a device on their leader, Blink. No one ever expected the Exiles wherever they went. Not until now, says the Big M.
Outside a motel, Mystique, posing as Blink, whispers into her cell phone to Avalanche that none of the Exiles have suspected her yet but, once the olfactory suppressors wear off, Sasquatch and Mimic will sniff her out. They need to move fast. They already picked up Blob and Pyro and, once Destiny and the Big M are free, the Brotherhood will be back in business.
On the other end, Avalanche sits in his apartment and tells Mystique that he hopes her friends are strong, because it is harder to break into the Vault than it is getting out. Mystique asks about Blink and Avalanche assures her that the Exile is fine. Blink is still tied up and sleeping on the couch and she will stay that way until his sedatives run out. Mystique tells Avalanche to watch the dosages. Too little and Blink will wake up and too much and she will die. If one of the Exiles dies, then another one will be sent as a replacement, which will cause her cover to be blown. Mimic walks out and Blink quickly hangs up.
Mimic asks her if she wants to go out for lunch, because Morph bet Blob that he could eat more cheeseburgers than him, so the others went out to watch. Mimic sees Blink with the cell phone and asks who in the world she could be calling. Blink tells Mimic that Blob had Avalanche on speed-dial. She called him and arranged for him to meet them at the Vault tonight. Surprised, Mimic asks if she really convinced him that easily over the phone. Quickly, Blink grabs Mimic and kisses him on the lips. She then pushes him towards the room and decides that, since everyone is at lunch, they finally have some time to themselves. Mimic is surprised to see how forward Blink is and admits that it has been a while.
At Avalanche’s place, Avalanche fills up a syringe with some more sedative, though he does not notice that Blink, who woke up during his conversation with Mystique, has teleported away. Avalanche decides that if ten milligrams kept Blink under for two hours, then a couple of more milligrams should put her out until Oprah is over. Avalanche goes into the next room and is horrified to find the couch empty and the rope that he tied Blink up with lying around. An angry Blink teleports behind Avalanche and drop kicks him. She grabs the syringe and asks if this is what he used to knock her out. Avalanche threatens to hurt Blink, but stops short when he sees that Blink has teleported the sedative out of the syringe. He then collapses to the floor. Blink tells Avalanche that she has teleported the sedative straight to his brain. “Sweet dreams, dirtbag.”
Blink asks the Tallus to give her an update, as the last thing she remembers was a train derailment. She pauses as she listens to the Tallus. Blink wonders what the Big “M” is supposed to be and tells the Tallus that it is a lousy time for riddles. Can’t it tell her where she is or where the others are. Blink sees a computer and decides to research herself. She logs out of Avalanche’s porn site and looks around the web for a search engine. She finds one and looks up information on the Big M. Blink discovers that the Big “M” is actually Mimic, who was taken down by S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers in Kansas. Blink reads that the Big M’s activities have led to the death of over ten thousand people, including former Brotherhood leader, Magneto, and mutant rights activist, Charles Xavier, as well as every student as Xavier’s school in New York! Blink is in disbelief.
At the motel, Mimic lies in bed, naked, and tells Blink, who has already redressed, that he is worried, because he knows he will not hurt any guards when they attack the Vault, but he is not so sure about Pyro and Blob. Blink tells Mimic that they went over this already. Destiny knows that they are coming, but the Big M does not. The Omega Block nullifies his powers. Once they knock out the generators, the inhibitors will go out and the Big M will come fighting out. He knows Blob and Pyro and not the rest of them, so they must be the first ones to reach him. It’s what the Tallus wants. Mimic rolls over in bed and begrudgingly agrees.
Blink comes over to the bed and turns Mimic’s face towards her. He asks her what she is looking at and Blink tells him that he is different from the Mimic in this reality. She then quickly adds that he must be, since this world’s Mimic is the reason the world fears mutants. However, her Mimic is so soft, clean and pure. Mimic removes Blink’s hand when she calls him pure and reminds her about the lives he took before he swore never again. He has not forgotten even one of them. This world can fear the Big “M” but he should be afraid of him. “Really now?” asks “Blink,” very much interested in Mimic.
That night at the Vault, the Exiles, Blob and Pyro hide out in the woods. Blink is on Blob’s cell phone and impatiently wishes that Avalanche would pick up. She realizes that something is wrong, as the man should have been there by now. What Mystique does not realize, however, is that Avalanche is fast asleep and tied up in his apartment. “Blink” hangs up and tells the others that she hoped Avalanche could crack open the jail with an earthquake, but it seems that they will have to take out the electrics the hard way. Nearby, Morph eyes Blink and asks Sasquatch in a low voice if it is just him or has Blink been acting off lately. Sasquatch adds that she smells off too, though she at first thought it was the fumes she inhaled at the train wreck. Now she is not so sure.
Outside the door to the Omega Block section, the real Blink teleports herself inside. She stands against the wall, as the large door opens and two guards come out, one complaining about a headache. The other guard tells him that the cybernetic interface takes awhile to get used to. He shouldn’t let the inmates catch on, though, as they prey on the weak guards. Blink watches the guards leave and, as the door is about to close, she quickly rushes in. Inside, she tells the Tallus that she hopes it is right.
She walks down the corridor and sees several prisoners, including the Rhino and Mr. Hyde. Rhino demands that Blink tells the guards that he is hungry, while Hyde asks her to come closer so he can see her better. Blink goes down to the last cell, where the Big “M” resides. The man tells Blink that she is no groupie. Is she one of the government’s pet telepaths? Neither one, says Blink. She is Blink and she came to make sure he does not get out.
The Big M gets up, shirtless and covered in tattoos. He laughs and tells Blink that he was planning on staying in tonight. She might want to plan on staying too, as she doesn’t have a staff badge, so he knows she came in here illegally. He points to the panels on the ceiling and informs Blink that those are power inhibitors. Whatever powers she has no longer work. In the Omega Block, they are all Homo inferior.
Blink tells the Big M that she knows the schematics. She read them at Avalanche’s place after she wiped the floor with him. Impressed, the Big M tells Blink that maybe, if she rates as an Omega Cell, they can get to know one another. Blink tells him that she already knows him. Besides, once the mission is over she will move on whether she is locked up or not. The Big M questions what she means, but the whole facility is rocked by a blast. Blink tells the Big M not to get too excited, but she thinks his rescue party just showed up.
Outside, “Blink” and the others take on the guards, as Namora trashes the generator and they begin to work their way inside. Even Beak stands ready with his bat. Blink orders Blob and Pyro to get inside the building, while Mimic reminds all that no one dies tonight. Pyro blasts two guards with flames and asks if Mimic said no one dies or no one fries. Blob knocks two more guards away and asks if Mimic really thinks they came here to play pattycake. Mimic angrily rushes to the two villains, despite Blink’s protests.
As the guards drain the emergency power reserves, the Big M asks Blink what her mutants powers are. Wouldn’t you like to know, responds Blink with much attitude. The Big M feels some familiar feelings, as he realizes the inhibitors just went off-line. He smiles and tells Blink that he will try her powers for himself. The Big M then teleports out of his cell and in front of Blink, who responds with a kick to the side of his head. Mimic tells Blink that she should not have done that, as he wouldn’t have hurt her. His body erupts with energy as he mimics Cannonball’s powers from when he met the boy at Xavier’s school. Blink tries to teleport Mimic away, but finds her arrows cannot get past the field.
Mimic finishes off the rest of the inhibitors with the powers of Magneto and then uses Xavier’s telepathy to read Blink’s mind. He tells the girl not to resist or else she will shred her mind. He then goes in her head to find out who she is and what she wants with him. In seconds, the Big M learns all there is to know about the Exiles, especially about the most prominent member in Blink’s mind: a sugar-coated version of the Big M. The Big M learns that Blink’s Mimic is gentle, generous and nice. Those are thinks that the Big M isn’t thanks to the rotten hand life dealt him. Hell, Mimic even deferred leadership to Blink. Mimic tells Blink go and accuses her of having her Mimic whipped.
As the other Mimic attacks Blob and Pyro to stop them from hurting the guards, the Big M recalls how he used to go over all the “what if” scenarios in his life. What if he was born rich? What if he had a decent education? Now he knows what happened to all his lucky breaks. This other Mimic got them all. Now it is time to collect. A rumbling sound causes the fight between Mimic and Pyro to end. Mimic is confused, as he thought Avalanche could not make it. Suddenly, the Big M flies out of a hole he made in the wall and grabs Mimic by the neck.
The Big M tells Mimic that he makes him sick. Blink thinks that he is better than him just, because Mimic had the dumb luck to be born on a better world than him. However, when the Big M erases every good memory he has then they will see what kind of man Mimic really is. The Big M reaches into Mimic’s mind and finds more than he bargained for. Mimic had no loving parents or a privileged upbringing. He had no silver spoon. He was dirt-poor with an exact background as the Big M. Their lives were exactly the same until one point: right up to when Xavier invited him to his school. The Big M releases Mimic and is astounded. That was the only difference? Mimic said yes and the Big M spit in Xavier’s face?
Not quite, says Mimic. The Exile mimics the Big M’s telepathy and shows him the rest of his life. It turns out that Mimic’s life was harder than the Big M expected. As an Exile, he faced daily impossible odds and choices where billions of lives hanged in the balance. He was forced to deceive and kill and destroy with his bare hands. Then one day, he realized that if he sank lower he would never get back up. He drew the line somewhere, despite the fate of other worlds. He swore never to kill again.
Sometime in the future:
The Big M stands in front of his class in Xavier’s school, high above Earth in orbit on Avalon. With Blob, Avalanche, Mystique, Destiny and Pyro with him, all dressed in the blue and gold X-Men uniforms, the Big M finishes his story of how the Exiles changed his life. That day his whole life turned around. When his mind touched Mimic’s mind, he lived his experiences. His vow to cherish life became the Big M’s vow. He got his second chance to say yes to Xavier. That is why he founded this school and gave that second chance to all these students.
What happened to the Exiles? They accomplished their mission of changing him. After that, they “blinked” away to the next reality that needed saving. After that, he rededicated the Brotherhood to make the Earth a better place like Xavier wanted. It hasn’t been easy and the world is far from perfect, but there are worse possibilities. Believe him, he’s seen them.
