Uncanny X-Men #186 (Oct 84): LifedeathCreative Team: Chris Claremont, script & story; Barry Windsor-Smith, story & pencils; Terry Austin, inker; Wein & Scheele, colorists; Tom Orzechowski, letterer; Ann Nocenti, editor; Jim Shooter, editor-in-chief
Starting Line Up: Storm, Nightcrawler, Wolverine (DNA), Colossus (DNA), Sprite (DNA), Rogue, Rachel (DNA)
In New Mutants #20:
The New Mutants battle the Demon Bear; officer Tom Corsi and nurse Sharon Friedlander are transformed into Indians; Magik defeats the Demon Bear with her Soulsword; Psyche's parents return from the dead, having been freed from the Demon Bear's power.Synopsis: Forge has been taking care of Storm since she lost her powers, but she seems to have lost her will to live. She won't respond to anything her tries. Forge watches a history of Storm with his holographic imaging room, including Storm losing her powers and Forge rescuing her. She enters the room and finally speaks to him. Back at the mansion, Xavier is using Cerebro to search for Storm, but cannot find her. Xavier searches for Rogue instead. Back in Dallas, Storm and Forge begin bonding and an attraction is developped. Storm sees a storm on the way and is frustrated by the fact she couldn't sense is earlier. Forge goes swimming and Storm joins him. That's when she realises he is missing a leg and a hand, and has a scared torso. He explains he understands what she's going though, losing her powers and how she will have to learn to go on as he did. In Mississippi, Valerie Cooper meets with one of her field agents. He tells her Rogue's trail has disappeared. He drives off and is attacked by a Dire Wraith. The wraith takes over his body as well as his memories. He leads two more to Cooper's hotel room. Before she can be posessed, Rogue shows up to save her. Not that she wants Cooper to live, but Rogue needs her alive. Rogue fights off the two wraiths while Cooper kills her posessed agent then flees. In the course of the battle, Rogue touches a wraith and absorbes its memories and hatred for humanity. Xavier senses Rogue's sudden change and tries to pinpoint her location. Val Cooper is still trying to get away in a car, but Rogue was in the back seat and touches her. She finds what she was looking for - Storm's location. And she discoveres Forge's connection to everything. She leaves the unconscious Cooper and goes to get the X-Men's help. In Dallas, Storm puts on a dress that blows Forge away. She's embarassed to puts on more casual clothes. The attraction between the two is growing. They talk about their pasts and heritages and flirt a lot. When she's the raging storm outside, she becomes afraid, feeling helpless in its might for the first time. Storm tells Forge about living her life being in control of her emotions out of fear of how it might affect the emotions and how she cast off that lifestyle to finally be free. Now she has nothing to be free from. Forge consols her, kisses her, and begins to tell her the effects might not be permanent, but the phone rings. He takes it in the other room. Storm picks up the phone to tell Xavier where she is (forgetting Forge is on the phone in the other room already?) and overhears his conversation with Gyrich. Gyrich wants to take Storm to a federal pen, but Forge believes he is best suited to keep her. She also finds out he created the gun that stole her powers. She is shocked and hurt. She tries to run, but Forge creates a hologram to confuse her. She finds the remote and tries to shut it off. Instead, she activates a hologram of the bomb raid that crippled Forge. Forge gets to her and tries to explain his side of the story. She doesn't listen and completely tears him down and strips him of all dignity. She leaves him a broken man.
Yeah, but is it good? Claremont pumps out another classic. To be fair, it's only partly Claremont. The artist, the legendary Barry Windsor Smith, played a big role in the creation of this story. The result is something great. There's enough action with Rogue and the wraiths to keep this from being a total talk issue, but the talk is great. The conversations between Storm and Forge are so natural and well done that, unlike X-Men Annual #5, Storm falling in love with someone is the span of one issue makes sense. And wow... Storm spends four pages verbally ripping apart Forge. It's almost cruel, since Forge hasn't been shown to be that bad of a guy, but he did create a weapon to basically allow his people to suffer a fate similar to his crippling. When you get close to loving someone, you're in an emotional state. It's easy for those emotions to take a 180 under the right stress. This government anti-mutant era makes for some great stories. It's too bad there some shit mixed in with it, as we will see soon enough.
Significata: Storm falls in love with Forge, discovers he made the weapon that stole her powers, and turns to hate. Double sized issue sold for $1.00.
