| Uncanny X-Men 316 X-Men 36 Uncanny X-Men 317 X-Men 37 | "Encounter" "Drop the Leash" "Enter Freely & of your Own Will" "The Currents Shift" |
Monet St. Croix Clarice Ferguson Angelo Espinosa Everett Thomas Paige Guthrie |
Harvest Gregor Fake Ororo Fake Iceman |
Sean Cassidy: Banshee Jubilation Lee: Jubilee Emma Frost: The White Queen Victor Creed: Sabretooth |
| Phalanx Covenant: Generation NeXt began in Uncanny X-Men 316 with a scene of terror. A young woman named Monet and her governess, retired Colonel Gayle Cord-Becker (formerly of the MI-5), are travelling through Monaco in a limosine. "Missus Gayle" is worrying out loud about the near comatose Monet; she reveals that Monet has not spoken in three months - not since something happened to her siblings. ("the twins and your [Monet's] brother.") |
| Suddenly the entire limosine, from the tires to the state-of-the-art electrical tracking and guidance system, goes haywire and crashes. A member of the Phalanx, the techno-organic alien race dedicated to conquering Earth, attacks them. Colonel Cord-Becker pushes Monet from the car and tells her to run, while she attempts to hold off the Phalanx entity. However the Phalanx kills her (easily) and retrieves Monet, who sat next to the car in her comatose state instead of running. The Phalanx is unable to execute a "biocentric scan" on Monet due to an "intense level of psionic interference." Stating that she is scheduled for termination, the Phalanx returns to its base, taking Monet with it. |
| Meanwhile, at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, Sean Cassidy, AKA Banshee, has returned from vacation to find that "things have changed." Emma Frost, the former White Queen of the Hellfire Club, is an "unwilling" guest at the Mansion while recovering from the trauma of losing her students (the Hellions) in battle. Yet it is unusual for even Emma to claim that the X-Men are trying to kill her. Sean decides that the loss of her Hellions has caused Emma's mind to snap and doesn't believe her accusations, although he does try to convince Ororo that perhaps someone else should run the tests on Emma. |
| Ororo tells him not to worry about it, and Sean feels a little put-out, though he tells himself that he is making a big deal about nothing. That is until he finds that several other X-Men are also not acting like themselves. In fact, Sean finds them doing things that they would normally never do, like dissassemble the communications room and make adjustments to Cerebro. Sean finally realizes that the mansion has been invaded by the Phalanx, who assumed the forms of the X-Men. Sean (as Banshee) frees Victor Creed (SabreTooth) and together they save the White Queen and Jubilation Lee (Jubilee) from the Phalanx. But while fighting, Banshee learns that the "Next Generation" of Mutants has been targeted for assimilation or termination by the Phalanx. These young mutants are: |
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Monet St. Croix Everett Thomas Angelo Espinosa Clarice Ferguson (spelled Fergeson) |
| As well he should, Banshee sets out, along with Jubilee, Emma and 'Tooth, for St. Louis - the hometown of Everett Thomas - to save the Next Generation of mutants from the Phalanx. |
| In X-Men 36, we find the Phalanx examining Monet. Yet she, in turn, is studying them as well, learning that the Phalanx intend to assimilate mutants like herself into their collective. The scene changes to St. Louis, where we find Everett Thomas and the entire St. Louis Police Department in a stand-off. Everett claims to have been attacked by several wierd techno-organic aliens, and the police have trouble believing that. But the thing they have the most trouble with is the fact that when Everett shouted, he broke several hundred windows in the St. Louis area. |
| Before the conversation could go any further, however, the aliens attack again. The officers are nearly overwhelmed before Banshee and Sabretooth come to the rescue. Everett realizes that he must have been "in synch" with Banshee when he broke the windows earlier. During this fight, Emma and Jubilee wait for Banshee and 'Tooth to return with Everett, but then are attacked by more Phalanx. |
| The scene changes again, to a quiet evening at the Guthrie farm in Kentucky. However the evening stillness is shattered when the Phalanx attack Paige Guthrie and her family. Paige is captured and taken away by the Phalanx, and her family is left to wonder if the X-Men will be able to save her. |
| Back in St. Louis. Jubilee and Emma are saved from the Phalanx by Sabretooth, Banshee and Everett, but even as a group they are severely outnumbered. Emma links Everett's mind with Jubilee's and shows him how to "synch" to Jubilee and use her powers to blow up the Phalanx. The Phalanx are not destroyed however, and they reform only to reveal that during this fight they captured Paige Guthrie. It is also shown that Sara Grey, Jean Grey's long lost sister was long ago assimilated into their collective. |
| After declaring that they will not be defeated, (Can we think of a more TYPICAL evil-bad-guy statement?) the Phalanx leave, but not before Emma is able to make telepathic contact with Paige's psionic imprint. Emma, Sean, Jubilee and Everett are preparing to follow the Phalanx to their base when they realize that Sabretooth has vanished. (Needless to say, Banshee is ticked.) |
| At the beginning of Uncanny X-Men 317, Paige Guthrie has just been placed in a techno-organic prison along with Angelo Espinosa, Monet St.Croix, Clarice Ferguson and a young man named Gregor. When she awakes, she finds Angelo and Gregor attempting to console a frightened young girl named Clarice. Monet sits, comatose, in a corner. Realizing that Clarice is convinced that they will all die at the hands of the Phalanx, Paige tells her that she is sure they will soon be rescued by the X-Men. Overcoming her near-pathological shyness, Clarice asks Paige if they will arrive in time to save Paige from the infection that is starting to ravage her body. |
| Gregor tells them that because the Phalanx cannot assimilate mutants into their collective intelligence, they are experimenting with the young mutants to learn how they might be able to do it. Apparently they have succeeded with Paige, he tells them. Paige realizes that she might be the first mutant to die at the hands of the Phalanx, and the first of the Next Generation of mutants to die. But the pessimistic Angelo urges her to have hope. Their Phalanx captor, who is only called "Harvest" opens a portal to tell them that "hope" is futile, and that the Phalanx will not rest until all organic life, Human and Mutant, is culled from the face of the Earth. Enraged, Clarice attacks Harvest. A caption reads, |
| "As with most mutants, Clarice Ferguson remembers the first time she used her mutant ability. Unlike many, she recalls waking up several hours later... in a pool of blood. In that moment, she vowed never to use her power against another living being. But all that changes ... in the blink of an eye. For a fraction of an instant, everything that is Harvest... is somewhere else!" | |
| Clarice uses her mutant ability of spatial displacement to somehow injure Harvest. Gregor tries to stop her, supposedly fearing that she will be hurt by Harvest during the fight. In the instant that Clarice is distracted, Harvest manages to close the portal. But they know it is only a matter of time before Harvest returns to kill them. |
| Banshee, Emma, Jubilee and Everett arrive in San Fransisco, following the psionic imprint of Paige Guthrie. Although Paige and the rest of the young mutants are closer than anyone realizes, her psionic imprint mysteriously dissappeared as soon as they reached California. Jubilee and Everett have a conversation about how inadequate Jubilee feels when she cannot help her friends. Everett tries to cheer her up. We find out that, after some especially witty banter, Emma and Sean are busy infiltrating a Sheild Safe-House. However they are forced to reveal themselves and then knock-out the personnel there in order to use the Sheild equipment to track down the Phalanx. |
| Meanwhile, the captives are discussing their options. Clarice, Paige and Angelo want to try to escape. Gregor thinks they would be safer if they didn't. Monet recovers from her comatose state and tells the group that they must escape "from this, the FIRST of many prisons." She revelas that Gregor is a Phalanx spy, while putting him out of commission at the same time. Although shocked, the others recover quickly and listen to her explanation of how it was done. |  |
| As X-Men 37 begins, we find Clarice being pulled apart by the Phalanx, with her friends unable to do anything to help her. Captions tell us that the other children have nicknamed Clarice "Blink" because that is how she utilizes her mutant powers. Paige tells Clarice that her only hope is to use her mutant power to free herself, to "BLINK" the Phalanx to pieces. Clarice is terrified though and doesnt think she can do it. But then she panics, and manages to "Blink" the Phalanx to pieces. Monet follows up with a killer punch and Clarice is freed. But then they are faced with Harvest, who tells them that he is going to kill them, and then he will kill every other mutant and human who resists being assimilated into the Phalanx collective. . |
| The scene changes. Banshee, Emma, Jubilee and Everett, have finally realized that Paige, Monet, Clarice and Angelo are imprisoned in the hold of a large, abandoned ship in San Diego Bay (?? did Marvel Screw up??) and infiltrate the ship in order to save them. Emma and Jubilee find that the Phalanx have been using rats as material for their collective life form; Jubilee blows the rats up, revealing that she has been afraid to use her powers because she fears that she will hurt someone. Emma concedes that it is probably time for the older mutants to teach the next generation of mutants how to use their powers. |
| Meanwhile Monet, Paige, Angelo and Clarice are trapped by the Phalanx, with no way out. Just in time to save them, Sabretooth arrives and slashes several of Harvest's arms off. However Harvest grows them back, bigger and stronger and it seems that there will be no way to stop him. Then Banshee and Everett show up to help. Seemingly destroying Harvest, they regroup and Banshee asks Paige what is wrong with her. Sabretooth, with his enhanced olfactory senses, realizes that Paige has been infected by the Phalanx. He slashes through her skin, and she tears the top layer off, revealing another body beneath it. Her mutant ability to "husk" into a new form by removing the top layer of skin from her bosy, has saved her, because only the epidermal layer of her flesh was infected by the techno-organic virus. |
| Then Harvest reforms, and seems to be indefeatable. When Sabretooth is injured in the fight, Clarice realizes that they cannot defeat or escape (forever) from the threat of the Phalanx. |
| Blink: Frost: Blink: Husk: Blink: |
Ma'am--Harvest--can't be stopped, can it? I mean, even if we do get away today, it'll keep coming after us, won't it?
It will. We are simply delaying the inevitable. Then...it has to be stopped, right? I mean, right NOW, doesn't it? Clarice--Stop!! You can't beat him! You know I can, Paige. Goodbye...my friends...I hope what I'm going to do makes a difference...somewhere down the road...I can stop this monster--here and now--and forever." |
 | Clarice displaces a section of the hull of the ship, dropping her friends into the bay. Then she blinks Harvest and a large part of the ship into pieces. Because of her inexperience, Clarice becomes trapped in the displacement field and is unable to escape. The rest of the team survives, including Banshee and Sabretooth, although only at the cost of their young friend's life. |
| Brokenhearted at the cost of their victory, the young mutants and their mentors decide that Blink's sacrifice will not be in vain. With the blessings of Charles Xavier, the other young mutants found "Generation X" - the newest incarnation of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. |  Paige, Angelo, Everett, Jubilee and Monet; mourning the loss of Clarice. |