Warning: Major Spoilers for Immortal X-Men #7 and A.X.E.: Death to the Mutants #3 aheadAs Marvel’s Judgment Day event continues to terrorize the heroes, villains, and regular citizens of the Marvel Universe, Immortal X-Men has revealed that the X-Men and their greatest enemy Orchis are being forced to team up to help take down the Celestial Progenitor and save the planet from total destruction.
Since the dawn of the Krakoan Age the anti-mutant organization Orchis has been gaining strength and allies across the Marvel Universe in a long-term bid to take down the mutant nation. After collecting power and technology from the likes of A.I.M. and HYDRA, Orchis later joined forces with both Nimrod and the mutant betrayer Moira X. For more than two years it has seemed like Orchis is the mutants’ greatest threat…at least until Druig’s Eternals attack in the lead up to A.X.E.: Judgment Day, the first action in an event that leads to the near destruction of planet Earth.
Tony Stark, Mr. Sinister, and a group of religious Eternals revive the Avengers’ Mountain Base, previously the corpse of the long dead Celestial Progenitor, so it can put a stop to the war. The Progenitor instead decides that Earth and its people are failing and need to be judged to see if it deserves to continue its current existence. Sadly, the Progenitor decides that no, the Earth and its inhabitants are not worth saving and need to be culled, leading to a major team-up between the Avengers, X-Men, and Eternals taking place in a bid to take down the rampaging Celestial before it can slaughter everyone and everything on Earth. In A.X.E.: Death to the Mutants #3 – written by event architect Kieron Gillen with art by Guiu Vilanova – the Progenitor attempts to take over the Machine That Is Earth, the Eternal’s AI system that literally operates the planet, first by request and then by force after the Machine refuses to allow the Celestial to simply destroy the planet. Phastos the Eternal tells a group of gathered heroes that the A.X.E. infiltration team won’t be able to solve anything if the entire Earth is destroyed, convincing them that they need to stop the Progenitor from hacking the Machine… which is where Nightcrawler and Orchis come in.
Orchis Must Swallow Their Pride To Save Themselves
Nightcrawler tells Phastos that he knows some “specialists” who would be good at preventing the Celestial’s hack, and in Immortal X-Men #7 – also written by Kieron Gillen with art by Lucas Werneck – it is revealed that the specialists Kurt knows are Moira, Nimrod, and Orchis in general. The exciting Immortal X-Men issue shows the incredible extent that Nightcrawler has been willing to make himself suffer to save his people, and the planet, culminating in Kurt saving Moira X from being killed in an explosion. Death to the Mutants #3 ends with Phastos successfully performing a hard reset on the Machine, sadly erasing its sarcastic personality, but removing the Progenitor from the AI’s system, giving Nightcrawler the go-ahead to provide the Machine the defenses it needs to not be hacked again.
While it has not been revealed exactly how Moira and Orchis will help Kurt in protecting the Machine, it’s clear that Nightcrawler is succesfful in his argument to Moira that they need to put their differences aside for the day because the only two sides at this moment are “life versus death.” However, it is a terrifying prospect that Nightcrawler and Phastos are giving Orchis and Moira X access to the Machine’s system, since it would not be a huge leap to think Orchis could use this knowledge and power for their own anti-mutant agenda.
Moira X and the Orchis organization are an extremely self-righteous and selfish group, so it must be incredibly hard for them to suck up their pride and agree to help the A.X.E. team, but if Orchis and the X-Men don’t team up then the Celestial Progenitor might be successful in hacking the Machine and destroying all of planet Earth.
Immortal X-Men #7 and A.X.E.: Death to the Mutants #3 are on sale now from Marvel Comics.
