Magneto's way – the Closed Fist
Team Appearances: New Mutants (1st series) #35, Uncanny X-Men #201, Secret Wars II #7, New Mutants (1st series) #36, Secret Wars II #8, New Mutants (1st series) #37, Secret Wars II #9, New Mutants (1st series) #38-44, 81, New Mutants Annual #2, Uncanny X-Men Annual #10, New Mutants (1st series) #45-51, New Mutants Annual #3, New Mutants (1st series) #52, Fallen Angels #1, New Mutants (1st series) #53-66, Uncanny X-Men #230, New Mutants Annual #4, Uncanny X-Men #231, New Mutants (1st series) #67-71, X-Terminators #3-4, New Mutants (1st series) #72-75
Before
- Wishing to redeem himself, Magneto had been working together with the X-Men and Xavier for a few weeks by the time that Xavier was injured. Before being transported to the Starjammers, Xavier’s last request was for Magneto to take over the school and keep his dream alive. [Uncanny X-Men #196, 200]
Chronology
Having just returned from their adventure in Asgard, the New Mutants, were shocked and dismayed to learn that Xavier was gone and had been replaced by the former villain, Magneto. They were split on whether or not to give Magneto, who called himself “Michael Xavier,” a chance with some of them even considering quitting the school. Shortly thereafter, one of their number, Danielle Moonstar, was assaulted by some drunken frat boys who intended to rape her. Though Dani escaped, Magneto confronted the men to teach them a lesson. Witnessing the incident and the fact that Magneto showed constraint convinced the teenagers to accept him as their new headmaster. [New Mutants (1st series) #35] Regardless, Sunspot soon took a leave of absence, not agreeing with the new headmaster’s training methods.
Magneto also worked together with the X-Men, especially when they were trying to track down the near omnipotent Beyonder. Little did Magneto know that in his absence, the Beyonder encountered the New Mutants. He offered the gift of absolute perfection, starting with Magik by purging her soul of her evil sorceress traits. However when she realized that her soulsword, armor, magics and the problems coming along with them were transferred to her friend, Kitty Pryde, Illyana took it all back, not wanting to see Kitty suffer the fate meant for her. Magik’s teammates followed her example, all of them refusing what the Beyonder had to offer. Angered that they refused his gift, the Beyonder not only killed the entire team, but erased them from ever having existed. Neither the X-Men nor their friends and families would remember them. [New Mutants (1st series) #36-37]
Eventually though, the Beyonder recreated the teenagers in a display of power. However, the kids were in a zombie-like state, due to the trauma of dying from which none save Mirage and Warlock could rouse themselves. Magneto was puzzled how to get his young charges out of their lethargy, and eventually asked the White Queen for help, leading to the team being transferred to the Massachusetts Academy and joining the Hellions. The White Queen erased their memories of the painful events. On a surface level, it seemed that the teenagers were themselves again but Emma sensed that there still was something amiss. Meanwhile, Magneto found out that he had been tricked by Empath, who had increased his feelings of self-doubt and despair, thus prompting the decision to transfer the kids. Angrily, he tried to get his charges back but Emma Frost called the local authorities, who, in turn, summoned the Avengers to detain Magneto. Luckily, the New Mutants learned about the fight and helped him. The White Queen decided to try another approach and offered to help the kids together with Magneto. This time, the New Mutants came out fine, her telepathic powers and Magneto’s emotional concern restoring them to their old selves. With the Mutants deciding to return to Xavier’s school, Emma departed peacefully. However, she left her invitation open. [Secret Wars II #9, New Mutants (1st series) #38-40]
After that traumatic experience, some of the kids took dome downtime and visited their families, experiencing some adventures of their own. By the time they returned to the school, Sunspot also came back. The team decided to teach Empath a lesson for messing with the minds of Magneto and other staff members, however Cypher made them eventually realize that if they would torture and terrorize the Hellion, they would actually all sink to his level. [New Mutants (1st series) #41-44]
Some of the New Mutants found themselves enjoying a new show called “Wildways” on TV, unaware that it was really an otherwordly realm connected to the Mojoverse. Together with their unwilling puppet, Psylocke, they were luring in children and teenagers that they could remodel in their own image as loyal servants. Fortunately those that underwent the change could be restored to their regular selves, once Cypher and Warlock freed Psylocke from Mojo’s control. Spiral and Mojo next targeted the X-Men with a spell that turned them into young teenagers and pre-school kids, and as such made them receptive to their brainwashing. Now the senior team, the New Mutants donned their intended graduation costumes and fought Mojo with everything they had. Eventually getting some of the X-Men to remember their true loyalties and taking Spiral hostage, forcing her to undo everything that had happened, the New Mutants saved the day. [New Mutants Annual #2, Uncanny X-Men Annual #10]
Soon thereafter, it seemed to be open season for hunting mutants. A group named the Marauders attacked the Morlock tunnels, slaying nearly all the mutants living there except for those that sought refuge at the Xavier Institute. The mansion bursting with injured and dying mutants, Karma feared that her younger siblings were in danger as well. As the children didn’t pick up the phone, she went to check out her apartment and was nearly killed by a bomb rigged to a light switch. Her teammates wanted to help her search for the twins, but all potential clues to their whereabouts had been destroyed in the blast. Even worse, amidst all this, Warlock’s father, the Magus, had tracked them down to kill his son. [ New Mutants (1st series) #46]
Magik teleported her friends to Limbo, but somehow the Magus found a way to follow them, transforming some of the local demons into techno-organic creatures like himself. When Illyana tried teleporting again, her power malfunctioned, causing the New Mutants to become stranded in two different strings of alternate future timelines. Whereas Cannonball, Mirage, Cypher and Warlock found themselves in a world ruled by a cruel mutant upper class, a corrupt Sunspot and Magma among them, Wolfsbane, Sunspot, Karma and Magma were taken to a reality where they aided an aged Cannonball and an embittered Mirage against the Sentinels that had apprehended or killed nearly every mutant alive. [ New Mutants (1st series) #47-49]
Illyana ended up in Limbo, which was saturated with the Techno-Organic influence of the Magus. Surrounded by hostile parties and the demon S’ym, Magik used the totality of her arcane powers to purge Limbo. The act sealed her Soulsword in the ground and transported her into deep space. Exhausted, she wound up on a world in the Shi’ar Galaxy, where she would have been sold into slavery if not for the timely intervention of Professor Xavier and the Starjammers. Magik informed Xavier of the events that had occurred in his absence. Together, Xavier, Magik and the Starjammers gathered up the rest of the New Mutants from their various realities, only to find it that the Magus had tracked them once again and was attacking the Shi’Ar planet. The heroes rallied and managed to sneak Cypher and Warlock close enough to the Technarchy sire for Cypher to reprogram his body into that of an infant, which they left submerged on the desolate planet’s ocean floor. While Xavier stayed in space with the Starjammers to help Lilandra reclaim her throne, the New Mutants returned home to Westchester. [New Mutants (1st series) #50-51]
Shortly after they returned home, Magneto grounded the New Mutants for defying his orders and for their embarrassing, nationally televised incident with the Impossible Man. [New Mutants Annual #3, New Mutants (1st series) #52] Later, during a soccer match on campus, Sunspot took a super-powered swing at Cannonball, gravely injuring him. The cold reactions he received from his teammates, coupled with an unfortunate glimpse into his academic file, created such guilt in Sunspot that ran away to New York City, where he became involved with a street gang. Warlock soon followed, not wanting his friend to be all by himself. [Fallen Angels #1-2]
Because of Magneto’s recent induction into the Hellfire Club - purportedly for the good of mutantkind - he and his students received an invitation to a party at their New York headquarters. There, the New Mutants interacted with their old nemeses, the Hellions. An incident with a crystal statuette revealed to Magma that the villainous Selene was her ancestor. When the statuette was revealed to be a forgery, the New Mutants and the Hellions started a competition to see which team could find the original first. The Hellions won by siphoning leads the New Mutants gathered and beating them to the culprits, the Silver Samurai and Viper. Meanwhile, Karma took advantage of the Hellfire Club’s computer database to search for potential clues to the whereabouts of her missing siblings. However, the sophisticated computer system came up with nothing. Xi’an felt that she had only one option left, namely the criminal empire of her uncle Nguyen. She quit the team and asked the New Mutants not to follow her. [New Mutants (1st series) #53-54]
Shortly thereafter, during another incident involving Lila Cheney and aliens, Cannonball accidentally ruptured the holding cell for the Bird Boy, a humanoid creature that had been rescued from an ice floe in the North Atlantic. Bird Boy’s subsequent escape from his holding cell generated as much public interest as his discovery and the New Mutants vowed to find and rescue the frightened Bird Boy before he came to harm. The Hellions learned of Bird Boy’s escape too, and both teams tried to rescue him, once again bringing them into conflict. This time, the New Mutants prove victorious by reaching Bird Boy first. Their victory proved to be pyrrhic, however, as immediately thereafter, their teammate Magma announced she was leaving the New Mutants to attend the Massachusetts Academy, partially to pursue her feelings for Empath. The New Mutants sneaked Bird Boy back into the mansion and let him live in the Danger Room. Despite Magneto’s wishes that they turn over Bird Boy to the proper authorities, the New Mutants fought to keep him on the team, even making him an honorary member with the unofficial name “Bird-Brain.” [New Mutants (1st series) #55-58]
One evening, Bird-Brain abruptly fled to an island in the North Atlantic to help his endangered friends. The New Mutants followed Bird-Brain to Paradise, the island where he was created, and confronted his maker, the Ani-Mator. They battled him and his allies, the Right, but were subdued and captured. They eventually escaped just as their estranged teammates Sunspot and Warlock returned and together confronted the Ani-Mator and the Right. During the battle, the Ani-Mator turned his gun on Wolfsbane. Cypher leapt in the way of the bullets. Although he saved her life, he lost his own in the process. The New Mutants returned home after freeing Bird-Brain’s people and subduing the Ani-Mator and the Right, but Bird-Brain chose to remain on Paradise. Back at home, Magneto was livid when he learned of Cypher’s death. To make matters worse, the New Mutants had to watch as the X-Men - Magik’s older brother Colossus among them - sacrificed their lives in Dallas to save the world. With the X-Men apparently dead, the New Mutants donned their graduation costumes and declared themselves the new X-Men. [New Mutants (1st series) #59-61]
Dealing with Cypher’s death proved difficult, especially for Warlock. Magik, meanwhile, grew obsessed with getting revenge for the deaths of her brother and the X-Men and placed the blame squarely on Forge for his role in the events in Dallas. After retrieving her Soulsword from Limbo, essentially ceding the realm to S’ym and his forces in the process, she traveled to Dallas to kill Forge. To get to him, Magik and the New Mutants had to confront Freedom Force - a battle they lost. Destiny foresaw the destruction of the entire planet if Magik continued on her current, bloodthirsty path. Still, even after their defeat, Magik captured Forge and took him with her to Limbo, where she intended to end his life. As she prepared to murder him, however, Mirage coaxed her out of it by showing her a vision of the monster she would surely become if she chose the path of evil. Magik released Forge and the team returned home. [New Mutants (1st series) #64-66]
When the New Mutants learned the High Evolutionary and his Purifiers captured their former teammate Magma from Nova Roma and were attempting to neutralize her immense powers, they once again disobeyed Magneto’s orders and sneaked out of the mansion in order to save their friend. During the ensuing battle with the Purifiers, Magma was freed, but Mirage succumbed to one of the power-altering machines, only to have it enhance her abilities instead of dampening them. Using her supercharged psionic abilities, she helped the New Mutants subdue their enemies in time to return home before Magneto caught them. During this adventure, however, the New Mutants had overheard Magneto and the White Queen discussing the Hellfire Club’s plans for Magma. They trusted him even less as a result. Despite this news, Magma still chose to return to Nova Roma. [New Mutants Annual #4]
One night, while Magik was studying, demons from Limbo adopted the guises of characters from Magik’s Russian folklore book and captured the New Mutants. As the monsters prepared to eat them, Magik escaped and inadvertently recruited her presumed-dead brother Colossus to help save her friends. They succeeded. Afterward, Colossus returned to join the X-Men, but Magik’s continued to lose her grip on Limbo, primarily due to the scheming of her nemesis, S’ym. [Uncanny X-Men #231]
Not long after that, Cannonball received permission to attend another of Lila Cheney’s concerts. During the concert, however, a slave-owning alien crime-lord named Spyder sent his underlings to kidnap Lila, whom he claimed to own. Unbeknownst to the New Mutants, another of Spyder’s minions - the beautiful alien girl Gosamyr - arrived on Earth at this same time, seeking Lila’s help. Although the aliens succeeded in extracting the intergalactic rock-star, Gosamyr remained behind and approached the New Mutants with information on Lila’s whereabouts. After a long quest through the cosmos, the New Mutants and Gosamyr finally found Spyder’s palace, where he held both Lila Cheney and Gosamyr’s monstrous, cocooned family captive. Spyder induced Gosamyr’s family to hatch from their cocoons thousands of years prematurely. In their ravenous hunger, they threatened to destroy not just the New Mutants, but that entire solar system. Lila saved the day by teleporting the lot of them, herself included, into the center of a nearby star, leaving a heart-broken Cannonball behind. Meanwhile, with Magik’s grip on her powers weakening, the team decided they needed to return home immediately or risk getting lost in space forever. [New Mutants (1st series) #67-70]
When Magik took them through Limbo, however, S’ym was waiting for them. The New Mutants managed to stave off S’ym long enough for Magik to transport them to one of her secret hiding places within Limbo. The demon N’astirh then intervened and tricked Magik into fully submitting herself to the arcane powers inside her, completely transforming her into her demonic form, Darkchylde. N’astirh further seduced her into opening a permanent portal between Limbo and New York City that allowed his minions to invade the mortal realm. Once in New York City, the New Mutants joined forces with the X-Terminators (Rusty, Rictor, Boom-Boom, Skids, Artie, Leech and Wiz Kid) in preventing N’astirh from sacrificing thirteen mutant babies to cement the portal between the Earth and Limbo. Magik, meanwhile, confronted S’ym and N’astirh. In the end, she sacrificed herself to close the portal between the Earth and Limbo, reverting to her young, untainted and innocent seven-year-old form in the process. The New Mutants saved the world, but lost the most powerful member of their team. [New Mutants (1st series) #71, X-Terminators #3-4, New Mutants (1st series) #72-73]
With the city restored to normal, the New Mutants convened with the X-Terminator kids and boarded X-Factor’s Ship. Ship recoiled at the presence of the alien Gosamyr, however, and quarantined her. After outlining the danger her species posed, Ship told her of a planet where her kind could thrive in peace. Gosamyr accepted the arrangement and departed for this planet in a small space shuttle after saying her goodbyes to the New Mutants.
The New Mutants, meanwhile, decided they could no longer study under Magneto because of recent revelations about his character and actions. They returned home to Xavier’s Institute to confront him, only to find it destroyed. Magneto and the rest of the Hellfire Club’s Inner Circle arrived at that same time. After the New Mutants attacked them and confronted Magneto, he encased them in a prison of steel girders so he could focus on the imminent threat posed by Sebastian Shaw. During the course of Magneto’s fight with Shaw, he revealed - quite audibly - that his interest in the New Mutants involved training them as soldiers to fight the enemies of mutantkind and that he allowed the X-Men to die in Dallas in order to make a point. Although Magneto eventually won the battle with Shaw and expelled him from the Hellfire Club, the New Mutants, outraged by their headmaster’s admissions during his duel, restated their decision to leave. Magneto let them go but presumed some of them would eventually return to his side by their own volition. The New Mutants departed. For the first time in their history as a team, they had neither a place to call home nor a mentor to guide them. [New Mutants (1st series) #74-75]
Afterwards
- Karma remained in the service of her uncle for months, not gaining any additional information on her siblings’ whereabouts. Eventually, Leong and Nga showed up in the thrall of the Viper, who had them undergo horrific transformations in Spiral’s Body Shoppe. [Beast #1-3]
- Magma continued her relationship with Empath, who genuinely seemed to care for her. Fortunately, she was in Nova Roma when the Hellions ended up being killed by Trevor Fitzroy. [Uncanny X-Men #281-283]
- Bird-Brain remained on Paradise Island, which was later used as a temporary headquarters by the Mutant Liberation Front. [X-Force Annual #3]
- A few years after his death, Cypher’s corpse was taken from his grave by Selene’s minions. They reanimated him with a magically enhanced version of a techno-organic virus, just like numerous other dead mutants. While most of them decomposed after Selene was defeated, Cypher managed to shake off her programming and remained alive. [Necrosha]
- Although it was never revealed how, Lila Cheney managed to survive teleporting into a sun.
- The de-aged Illyana was safely returned to her parents in Russia. [New Mutants (1st series) #77] Later on, she was diagnosed with the Legacy Virus and eventually succumbed to it. [Uncanny X-Men #304]