X-Men: Before the Fall – The Sinister Four

London, 1852:
A handsome couple promenades along the Thames near St. Paul’s Cathedral. The young woman, Rebecca, talks about water gods, specifically “Father Thames” here in London. Think of the river Styx demarcating the now with the hereafter. Her companion indulgently teases her that, for a good Christian girl, she is surprisingly knowledgeable on all things pagan.

A girl is allowed passions, she replies demurely. She would think a man courting one would know that. Well struck, Nathaniel Essex agrees. With a smile, Rebecca looks at the river and explains it is not the same thing at all. Those gods are just stories. She loves a good story. Then he will give her one, he announces, as he takes off his hat. Picture this: The greatest scientist of the age and his dazzling wife beside him. They’ll have a life beyond imagining!

Nervously, Rebecca replies she is a simple Essex girl. And he is the self-styled greatest scientist of the age. It is like something out of a novel! Why would one so grand come to her? Essex admits to not having the words. He isn’t a poet. But… he sees her and sees all that life can be! He is a man with hard edges, but she makes him believe he can be otherwise. And he says he isn’t a poet, Rebecca sighs.

Essex fumbles pocket then offers her a ring and proposes marriage. Will she stay by him always? Will they be happy forever? He asks for the moon, she replies breathlessly. He does, he agrees as he puts the ring on her finger. They deserve nothing less. Rebecca promises her heart is his for always, and they kiss.

London, the present:
Dr. Stasis, the Essex clone who fancies himself to be the closest to the original nervously presides over a group of hybrid animals creating a romantic atmosphere and setting the mood. He barks orders while thinking that she is coming. He spent a century trying to carve her from flesh, and now she is alive! He scurries back and forth like a nervous schoolboy while looking at the elevator doors.

Finally, the doors open and Mother Righteous steps out. Immediately, she mocks the fancy place and asks if Orchis membership come with an expenses account. It does, he replies as he bows politely. Ownership of the world comes with a lot of fringe benefits. He calls her Rebecca and she immediately corrects him: it’s Mother Righteous. She is thinking he has to earn the right to use the “R”… while she has to earn the trust of his Orchis fellas, yes? What did they tell him?

They say many things at length, he hints. Nimrod is doubly suspicious of her recent actions, especially with their contacts saying she is so popular on Krakoa that she’s an outside bet for this year’s X-Men vote.

Mother Righteous interjects that shows just how useful she can be. Impatiently, she informs him she doesn’t want to join the gang. She just wants to get a working relationship going. As does he. It’s been decided she has to prove herself. There are two things they need as a show of good faith. The first… He hands her a note. Interesting, she smirks, then burns it. He hasn’t changed, still asking for the moon. And the second demand? He points at the set table. A date. She knows how he hates to eat alone.

Annoyed, she sighs. She is not her, and he is not him. Not really. When they met, she kicked him in the unmentionables. That wasn’t flirting. She warns him not to go down that road. The story doesn’t end well. For him. For her either. Still, he insists. When they were merely human, she’d say she’d married him for duty but grew to love him. He believes she can love him again…

She sighs, snaps her fingers and changes her outfit to a white evening gown.

They sit down and find the conversation stilted and halting. He asks what she has been reading. Really? she mocks. This is a date, he reminds her. Small talk. Fripperies. He knows she liked to read. Austen and that. Weightless feminine stuff.

She glares and he silently chides himself for his habitual sexism. Stasis apologizes. It is no longer the nineteenth century. He should respect her career goals. So how is taking over the world going? So-so, she replies, not as well as with him. Orchis is on the rise, but she observes that seem more like a side game. He is not the kind to be in a crowd scene.

While several animal servants walk in with covered trays, Stasis is inwardly delighted that she still knows him so well.

On their plates are tiny steaks. Stasis takes the gamma ray gun from the gorilla waiter, shoots the steaks and suddenly there are smashing green Hulk steaks on their plates. He suggests she ignore the color. The meat tastes divine. She agrees and asks how the last century has been for him.

Dr. Stasis thinks of events:
Being part of the group of scientists watching Steve Rogers beat a Nazi spy after being injected with the super soldier serum.

Standing next to General ‘Thunderbolt’ Ross as military personnel lead Dr. Bruce Banner and Rick Jones from the site where the first gamma bomb detonated.

Watching from the distance as a young Peter Parker is about to have his fateful encounter with an irradiated spider.

And secretly working with the Children of the Vault.

Busy, is all he says. And her?

She recalls things she did: Finding Apocalypse, during one of his sleeping cycles in his tomb. Babysitting the Maximoff twins. Studying the Darkhold. Working with the demon sorcerer Belasco.

Busy, she echoes, tight-lipped.

If they’ve both been so bloody busy, there is a question, she muses and points to the heart symbol on her forehead. When did he realize there were others who share this little thing? She saw Sinister when he started playing in public with the X-Men. Gave her a right fright. He did, the showy ham, Stasis agrees. He was aware of Sinister much earlier. They moved in similar circles in the 1940ies, when he worked with America for the war effort. Stasis investigated and thought him Apocalypse’s creature, a possible leftover from the process that birthed Dr. Stasis. He stayed clear of Sinister and tried not to think of him. He is bad memories personified.

So, it’s only been a decade since she discovered Sinister? he presses. She is a smart girl, he is surprised it took her so long. Ignoring the taunt, she retorts that she was on Orbis Stellaris’ case much earlier. Who? Stasis asks, only to choke out a moment later: oh god, there’s a fourth? A spade on his head, he’s sure, he sighs resigned. Bang on, she grins. It’s like one of his schemes, he groans. It almost makes him believe in karma. This seems like some sort of payback for a lifetime of manipulation, mystery and mutilation.

That’s not how Karma works, she corrects him, and it doesn’t matter if he believes in Karma. Karma believes in him.

They share a silent smile before he smoothly announces that while he doesn’t know if he believes in karma, he certainly believes in her. She chimes with him so much, but he knows there is something they are missing. They should probably compare notes. How did they meet? Studying her glass, Righteous gives her short version: They met, he was noble, her not. He courted her, convinced her of his seriousness. They had a child. Adam. He was unwell.

He grew obsessed, Stasis continues. He worked so hard to save Adam.

He lost himself, Righteous continues. Adam died and he wouldn’t let go. She was pregnant again and he still wouldn’t turn back. He wouldn’t, Stasis agrees, looking down. She continues, saying she lost the child and died cursing his name. She said he was the most sinister man she’d ever met.

Clearly overcome, he continues, the pain was too much. He turned to Apocalypse who transformed him into something that couldn’t feel grief. He became that monster. And then? she challenges. He could not feel it anymore, but he could see what he had lost, Stasis narrates.

Dr. Stasis’s narration:
He knew what a danger mutants like Apocalypse were. He’d done nothing that Essex couldn’t undo. He would become the man he once was, emerging from the pit with treasure claimed from mutant Hades. He was Prometheus stealing fire from the mutant gods and he would burn them down!

Reborn he stepped from the chamber, knowing what he had to do, and the awful mistakes he had to make amends for. Most of all, a father protects his family. They would be recreated and he would protect it from any who would harm them, be it mutant or machine minds… he would not change!

Present:
Stasis - that is what is required. Stasis. No matter how much the world demands otherwise. Mother Righteous mildly corrects him, while this is his memory, it is not true at all, but a constructed story, something she knows a bit about. So whatever she believes is correct? he shoots back. Why does her story have primacy? She admits that her story is a story too. She knows what is happening. She refers to the crushed flowers he had strewn before the date, remembering what she likes. In return she brought a present, a book with a heart symbol on the cover.

Stasi begins to read. Though much is redacted it describes the current situation of all four Essex clones up to the current date. It also gives the backstory, that they were all created with false memories, their own specialty and the desire to become a Dominion. As the Sinister timeline revealed one of them would (or has) already reach that goal and it is not Mr. Sinister.

A little later, she asks for his thoughts. He supposes he should be having an existential crisis, Stasis replies unhappily, but he is not a weakling. What does he owe her for this? With a smile, she suggests a thank you.

Instead of thanking her directly, he dramatically states she has not been listening or paying attention. Everything he does is in thanks to her. He does everything for her. She is everything! Lost for words, she mumbles thank you.

Still rifling through the book, he muses about his nature being to protect her and the children. A man’s home is his castle. His dominion one could say. She presses if he isn’t bothered by not being the original Essex. Stasis mansplains they should consider the four of them and what the original Essex wanted. He is clearly the one Essex wanted to be, and the one who is supposed to win, and it is his duty not to disappoint.

What does that make her? Mother Righteous demands. There is clearly too much grief and regret for one body, he suggests smoothly.

He observes how her eyes go cold and distant. When next she speaks, her cadence has changed. Gone is the pre-transformation Eliza Doolittle. Now she turns precise and bookish. She is even more her, the woman who went to her grave cursing his name.

He talks of regrets and grief, she states. Has he ever returned to Milbury House? As it turns out, neither of them has, so they do it together.

He looks at the grave, recalling how he - Essex - had smashed the gravestones. Their daughter was buried without a headstone. So was she. It was too much for the man he was. He looks up and asks what she would have called their daughter. Morgan, she replies tersely.

He uses a laser to inscribe the headstone for Adam, Rebecca and Morgan Essex. He points out Sinister would not mourn her or the children. Stasis is the very part of him that he had Apocalypse cut away. Stasis is sorry for his family and would make things well. She points out he also isn’t mourning. This is the opposite of mourning! He cannot undo the past and keep things safe in neat little packages! Stories where someone tries to do so, always go wrong. He is mistaken! She stresses his name: Stasis. Everything changes. The story goes on and…

What does she remember? he changes the subject. Mother Righteous muses that Nathaniel Essex wasn’t a poetical man but, in his regret, his thoughts turned to something he had been reading.

Mother Righteous’s narration:
Old long-dead Ava Lovelace had an idea: poetical science. As he died, he tried to make the woman he lost. A creature of poetical science, a scarlet woman in every way. She is a love song in her own way.

Present:
She continues that Essex told a story, so the woman he loved and then drove to the grave could go on. Alive, guided by her wants and interests, not his. A story that could fight for a happy ending.

Surprisingly perceptive, Dr. Stasis points out the veracity of the memory doesn’t matter. Essex must have regretted everything to have made her. Maybe, she wonders, but could a creature with his head all cut up by Apocalypse make anything other than monstrosities? He must have, Stasis insists. These passions are not monstrous. They are all that matters. He cares for her, and he cares for their children, and he cares for nothing else at all.

He gently touches her shoulder and promises he loves her. That will not change. That is who he is. For a moment, she says nothing, then she announces, enough with the soppy stuff. It is time he asked for the moon.

Inwardly, he notes the cheerful tone of a girl married far above her station is back. She is playing with him, and he loves it!

Will he help his old lady go get her? she asks and he thinks he would do anything for her.

Soon, she takes him to the riverside, where in another lifetime Nathaniel Essex proposed to Rebecca. He asks if this is extra cruelty. She replies he made a proposal earlier too. Here is where she answers it.

She takes one of her glowing floating balloons and talks to something in it, promising it a snack for its work. When Stasis shows curiosity, she explains that in old times the Beaker People lived in Britian. They know nothing about them safe for some funny pots. This is one of their gods of sunrise and sunset. Life and death. She doesn’t like burning up her stores like this, but needs must. Come on, little death god, she orders, bring her the Moon! She lets the ballon fly upward into a rift. Within the rift, there is a dark strange city in the background and the moon is shining. She’ll keep the way open!

This is some damnable Golden Bough stuff, isn’t it? Stasis swears. He sees a black barge nearing on the water and asks if that is her death god coming back. It’s Mother Righteous’s turn to swear, because in the barge is the Grim Reaper, who angrily declares she will not steal from him! He points his scythe at them and energy crackles, though she can put up a shield to deflect it.

She wasn’t expecting Charon? Stasis asks. She admits she forgot this was once Londinium, so on Greco-Roman turf. She’s got all her magic tied in the ritual. Is he going to let her be done in, Nathaniel? she asks and looks at him.

Without thinking, he draws a gun, his Sinister Six Shooter, called so not because of his alter ego, but because each of its six rounds is inspired by and derived from the Spider-Man villains. He starts with an electric blast, but before he can fire another round, Charon hits him with his scythe, shattering Stasis’ helmet and causing him to drop the gun. Instead, he uses something else, something irreplaceable. From one of his pouches, he draws a small globe made of metal that almost - though not quite - is as indestructible as Captain America’s shield. He throws the small globe at Charon, into him and then activates the Pym Particles he carries. The Pym Particles cause the globe to grow, exploding Charon. It was irreplaceable, Stasis figures. But not as irreplaceable as her. Taking her hand, he announces, he would kill death itself if he tried to take her from him.

For a moment, they draw closer, until somebody orders them to kiss! Kiss for the entertainment of eternal Selene! orders the External mutant sorceress, who now stands in Charon’s ferry. Instead of thanking them, she informs them she would have made her way back to life herself eventually. She adds a highhanded ‘thank you’.

Mother Righteous unnecessarily points out that Selene is named after the goddess of the Moon and with a flourish offers her to Dr. Stasis. Yes, he got the joke, he mutters, his education did include the classics. Well played; expect a glowing report card from Orchis.

Later, in Feilong’s base on Phobos, Stasis is sitting with a cup of tea and addressing another person. The date went well, with some surprises, he relates. She actually told him about the other party… namely the fourth Essex clone Orbis Stellaris.

Stellaris opens his life support shell to show an old man. He is not surprised, since she considers Stasis a fool in love. She thinks she can play him. She does not understand that men of the sky and men of the Earth are not as far apart as fact and fiction. Stasis agrees. He does everything for her, but she needs to realize that does not mean he does everything she wants. She swore an oath to him long ago. He intends to remind her. She promised to love, honor and most of all… obey.