What I'd Do With #21... Runaways, Volume 3, #37 and Beyond!
So, here we are again with yet another bit of "Runaways Alternate Volume 3".
This time around I'm going to be a little less detailed, mainly because I've let the ideas sit a while and I've forgotten some of the more detailed outlines I had in my head, and if I try to discover them all again, I'll probably lose track, forget about it for another few months, and lose even MORE of the ideas. The basics are here but sometimes I skimp out on the specifics. It will also be the LAST of these, I believe, and not a full year, at least not in 'full outline form', I think outlining 43 issues in a fair amount of detail is plenty, especially when virtually no one will read it. Anyway, see the first post (linked above) for the introductions of what I'm doing and how I'm doing it, as well as if you want to start reading from the beginning.
Where last we left, the Runaways had just defeated the Cabal, who were trying to bring back, and then sacrifice, the Gibborum, and ended up accidentally just bringing them back. Klara is now out of the main cast (at least somewhat), and new cast member Noor is still with them (at least physically).
As usual, I'll start with the solicits - three months in advance.
Runaways #37 Solicitation:
(Cover: Group shot. Maybe the team looking up.)
Reckoning, Part One
Karolina and Xavin might have made their peace with Noor, but the rest of the team still has a thing to say. But Noor isn't the only one about to be called to account for past actions. An alien warship shows up in orbit, and they've got a whole planet to avenge.
Runaways #38 Solicitation:
(Cover: Karolina, in her wedding dress)
Reckoning, Part Two
Runaways in Space! Xavin is taken to trial for war crimes, and as Karolina remembers what was supposed to be their wedding day, she's forced to confront the possibility... that he might just be guilty!
(Xavin identified a male then, hence the 'he').
Runaways #39 Solicitation:
(Cover: Xavin, in chains)
Reckoning, Part Three:
Xavin is put on trial, and the rest of the Runaways aren't keen on leaving their friend to the mercies of an alien justice system. But they're not the only ones who want the trial to end prematurely.
Runaways #40 Solicitation:
(Cover: Maybe something simple and symbolic, like a gavel)
Reckoning, Part Four!
The Trial of Xavin concludes! Can a surprise witness sway the verdict? And what is the truth behind the accusation? And will the shocking turn of events reignite war?
Runaways #37 Outline:
We start back at the ghost town. All the Runaways are there, as is Noor (who's tied up with Old Lace watching him), Lotus, and Doctor Conway (The doctor who treated Klara back issue #13). He's examining the tree (Which now has roses growing out of it, despite that it's a tree and not a bush). There's some lines that suggested that Doctor Conway was taken (willingly) to the site blindfolded and is expected to be returned the same way, so he won't be on to their secret hideout's location. He's okay with it.
While he studies her, Nico approaches Karolina, and asks about her staff. Karolina says she can't give it to her. "I was told... by one of them. After feeding on the Gibborum, the Staff's in something of a feeding frenzy." When she cast the escape spell, she had to feed it all of her light energy and it still felt like it was eating her soul.
"That's what it always feels like."
"You're not really inspiring me to want to EVER give it back, then."
At this point Nico's annoyed at people trying to keep the staff away from her and the presumption that she can't be trusted with it. She points out that the Cabal was bad so you can't trust what they say, and that K doesn't really know about the staff. Lotus asks if Nico does. "Why are you still here?" "To keep an eye on the van. It's a rental." Then points out that what Karolina says makes sense. When she was working with Geoffrey Wilder, she looked up the history of the staff. It devoured souls. The Minorus of old tamed it, kept it starving and docile, feeding it small doses of blood and pain instead of souls. If it got enough energy, it would become uncontrollable until it starved again.
Karolina insists she'll know when it's safe to use (Alex told her!), and that she and Xavin will keep it until then... she doesn't trust Nico to have it and not use it. Xavin suggests that, if it is that dangerous, perhaps Victor should be the one to hold it. Victor gets offended a bit at that, assuming the reasoning is "because he's just a machine, he doesn't have a soul to eat." Xavin becomes genuinely chagrined, that wasn't the suggestion, it was just that often machines can't use magic unless they've been designed to. Victor's possibly the safest because it can't tempt him to use it, the temptation Xavin's been feeling since they've been holding it. Xavin hands it over to Victor. Lotus offers to keep teaching Nico real magic in the meantime, but Nico just walks off to get the report from the Doctor.
He doesn't know much, other than "Well... she's a tree." Victor tells everyone about how this tree was there in the future. So maybe Klara will be stuck like this. But, they also know that some of the people they met where said to be "Klara's kids".
Nico speaks of a tale she read, a very obscure one, when she was looking up faeries right after she learned what she was. It was called the Rose Mother. A tree bearing roses that grew where a child died. Crops were good in the presence of a Rose mother, and sometimes faeries were born in the roses, until the parent of the child who died tried to cut the tree down, and after that the land was cursed. She didn't think it had anything to do with Klara because Klara wasn't a tree.
"Then she's dead," Molly reasons.
"She's not dead," Noor insists. Molly tells him to shut up, but he continues to claim that he can hear Klara's voice in his head. She's still in there, happy. Molly gets especially mad, accusing him of making it up because he was the one who killed her. But he relays a message telepathically, about how she's happier than she's ever been, she finally remembers her real mother and how she was chosen to start a colony of faeries in the New World, that she'll love the Runaways forever, yadda yadda yadda.
Finally she adds one more thing. "One of the stars is getting bigger."
They're confused by this, when suddenly an alien ship is hovering on top of them. Karolina or Xavin recognizes it as a Majesdanian ship. Nico demands her staff so they can do something to escape, but a light washes over everybody and suddenly, they're on a ship, surrounded by Karolina's people.
There's a tense moment, but eventually they reveal they're not interesting in harming them, they just wanted to find Karolina. They will return everybody else who wants to leave, they just couldn't target the transporter any more finely. Since the war, all the most advanced ships have been prioritized to protecting the survivors. This one's an old rust bucket, due to be decommissioned soon. They learn that of a planet of billions, only about a million survived. The war, they say, is over (with one person perhaps saying 'for now'). Both the Majesdanians and the Skrull Empire are in a shambles (for different reasons... the Skrulls are reeling from the Secret Invasion fallout), and a peace accord was signed. Nobody was happy with it, but it stopped the fighting they could no longer afford.
Karolina asks what they want - they want to try to convince her to come home. This news is revealed by a new person entering the room, someone Karolina recognizes and greets warmly. It's her cousin Jaya, who she met while she was engaged to Xavin. Jaya's pregnant (under the 'there's so few of us left, we can't waste time' theory), and Karolina squees a little. She even excitedly calls to Xavin, saying, "Xavin! You remember Jaya, my maid of honor..."
Suddenly, every soldier in the room raises their weapons (which I imagine as being something like a bracelet that focuses their own powers) towards Xavin, some shouting "Skrull!" They react instantly, throwing up a force field. Everyone gets in a defensive position. The Majesdanians try to drag Karolina away, while she's screaming, "You said the war was over!"
The military leader waves a hand. "You're right. The war is over. The wounds are still raw, but there will be no revenge killings on my watch. Stand down." The soldiers drop their weapons. He faces Xavin. "You have to forgive my men. You can understand, can't you? After what happened, a Skrull on their ship, in disguise as a human female. Things are tense."
"I can understand. But I'm not in disguise, this is my default form, and I mean you no harm if you mean none to us."
He turns to Karolina and says, "I assure you that you and all of your associates, Xavin included, will be treated with dignity and respect, with full protection of Majesdanian law." He offers them a tour (briefly speaking in alien language to one of his aides), showing off various parts of the ship, quarters, with a light room, something like a shower, where Majesdanians recharge if they're depleted, the bridge, giving a nice shot of Earth. Just a chance for some character development moments (Molly giving Noor the cold shoulder, Lotus trying to stay next to Chase but he ignores her, things like that).
Finally they come to the "conference room" (Molly makes a comment upon the doors saying, "What's a naming? Is that like a Christening? For Jaya's baby?"... which surprises the military leader. Karolina starts trying to remember, but the military leader cuts them off. "We actually have someone here who is eager to meet you."
The door opens, and there is a Skrull. He looks blankly at the group. Xavin recognizes him,
though, calls him by name, Chancellor Kod'x. (I'll probably be misspelling his name several time in this, but he's the only named Skrull in the story, so you know who I'm talking about!)
Kod'x: "I do not know you."
X: "It's me, Xavin (full name given)."
K: "Show me your true face."
X: "I cannot, my shapeshifting abilities were... damaged." He gives a bit of detail that the two of them would know.
K: "Oh, poor Xavin. They've crippled you."
The military leader says, "We did nothing, we found him like this. He's a guest and will not be harmed. Do you have something to say?"
K: "You know it."
Military Leader: "Say the words."
K: "If this is truly you, Xavin.... then I, Kod'x, name you as the one who gave me my orders on (some sort of skrull date). Is that sufficient?"
Military Leader:"Yes. Xavin, you have been named, and much now stand judgement..." He zaps Xavin (in the background, Chase might be raising his fistigons and wondering why they aren't working). "For genocide."
Runaways #41 Solicitation:
(Cover: Xavin in a female Skrull form, perhaps cuffed with power-blocking cuffs, in an actiony-pose)
Reckoning, Conclusion:
The Runaways are on the run again... and this time, there's an alien armada at their backs. With a battle raging overhead, a borrowed starship and some unlikely allies, will they even make it back to Earth? And more importantly, after the revelations of last issue, will all of them want to?
Runaways #38 Outline:
We pick up shortly after Xavin has been stunned. The guards in the room have bound most of the Runaways with their solid-light-waves, although Karolina remains free. She's outraged, reminding the officer of his promise. He insists that Xavin will be given the full protection of Majesdanian law, as he said. There will be a trial, where Xavin's guilt will be determined before passing sentence (Which will be death).
"You said the war's over."
"It is, for the citizens. But war criminals must still be punished, or billions die unavenged."
She insists Xavin's not guilty, and the commander says they she's welcome to speak at the trial, but their witness tells the story (probably seen in flashback-style), of the wedding and Xavin ordering various dirty tricks, Skrulls positioning to attack all along. Xavin's still unconscious. Karolina thinks Kod'x is lying to save himself, but is told that he's been tried and found guilty already. His sentence is also death, and confessing doesn't alleviate it. All he gains out of confessing is better treatment before his death, the chance to contact family, and so on.
The Runaways are deprived of their weapons (perhaps Victor tries, but fails, to use the Staff of One), but they're assured their items will be returned when they go to Earth, which they're welcome to do before the trial. Dr. Conway takes the opportunity to go, he just got swept up in it but really has no place there (they teleport him into the city so he'll have no way of figuring out where the Runaways base was). Molly suggests Noor go, but he says he has nowhere to go. Lotus, surprisingly, decides to stay, though we don't learn why, yet.
The Runaways are taken to quarters, and they discuss rescuing Xavin. Maybe Chase suggests Molly punching through the hull (not being the brightest idea in a space ship). When he's mocked for it, Lotus tries to paper it over, suggesting it's not such a dumb idea so long as you could convince them to go back to Earth or only punch through interior walls, but Chase doesn't want to be 'helped', and snarkily asks why she's here, why she didn't just go back to Earth. She's obviously there to TRY to reconnect with Chase, but can't say that so she says that without Nico's staff, she's the only one who can provide any kind of magical support, and offers once again to try to teach Nico. Nico agrees, deciding it's best to be ready, then asks Karolina the question everybody's been avoiding... is it at all possible Xavin's guilty?
This launches us into the meat of the issue, a flashback to Karolina's time away with Xavin. It's some time after the peace negotiations have started, perhaps Karolina is meeting Jaya and her boyfriend for the first time. She finds that Jaya's parents were caught up in the hysteria after the world realized that it was the Deans who gave up the secret location of their homeworld, executed as accessories, but she doesn't blame Karolina. "Your parents may have started the war, but they didn't keep it going for 15 years". They bond over being slight outcasts to Majesdanian society - the rest of her planet isn't too fond of Karolina, either, due to her parents, and although they're making a peace out of it, they all seem to be disdainful of her, to the point that they demanded the wedding be on Tarnax VII instead of there. Jaya sympathizes, and promises that not everybody is like that, just some of the old guard... she'll introduce Karolina to others, people who can show her Majesdanian culture as it's supposed to be. Jaya also says she wishes the wedding were there on Majesdane, but it would be impossible to follow the traditions like the newlyweds bathing in a solar flare. Maybe a reference how it's going to be a bit of a hybrid wedding, Majesdanian customs, Skrull customs, and a few human customs K's been trying to push through), Karolina is happy, and asks Jaya to be a bridesmaid at the wedding.
Meanwhile, there's a bit of a disturbance in Xavin's conversation. He (still a he back then) is in a discussion about the cease fire and scale-back of operations. The Majesdanians are worried about it, specifically that it'd mean leaving the border open - Xavin assures them that his world's military forces are entirely under his control, and he gives his personal guarantee that nothing will happen.
Someone points out, that, if the army is entirely under his control and nobody could possibly do something without his consent, then killing Xavin now would win the war. Xavin says that would be true, if he hadn't already left instructions to launch an assault if he's believed dead.
Later, Xavin and Karolina have a talk, and Xavin swears he was bluffing, that you have to
negotiate from a position of strength. "What if we fail, and the war goes on?"
Xavin swears he will do everything possible to end the war, but he must protect his people... and he would still like to marry her. She's uncertain, and Xavin stresses only if she wants to. "I don't think I could love someone who was leading one side of a war." Xavin makes a really tasteless joke about launching a pre-emptive strike with doomsday weapons and ending the war right away, and Karolina calls him on it. He apologizes profusely seeing how mad she gets, and swears that he would order his people to surrender rather than launch such a strike. (which hints that if the strike was launched, it was on his order)
Go back briefly to present time, Chase wants to get Old Lace out of lockup under the theory that she's not a weapon, but a person. Molly goes along (if we have room to see the scene, we might get another clue about Molly's understanding alien languages. I don't think the issue would have room for it, but this is as good a place as any to talk about it. At some point, it's revealed that Molly can understand alien languages and, for that matter, all human ones, too. It's not a new power of hers, it's her hat, which was built in the future, and contains a 'universal translator' embedded in it (it's also fireproof, self-regenerating, impact-resistant, self-cleaning, like all of her future-created clothes and so came out not even dirty from the Leapfrog explosion, an early clue. However, this isn't an excuse to give Molly one repeatable costume, like many kids she doesn't WANT to wear the same thing every day, and doesn't even like that particular hat that much. Though maybe sometime, like Superman's cape, she tries to cut it apart to make a superhero costume only to have it keep reassembling. It's just one cool thing she has that may come up from time to time)
Victor's instructed to see about interfacing with the computer systems so they can hack it if they need a quick getaway. Karolina drags Noor off to try to get the truth from Xavin. She demands a private visit with him, unmonitored. The military leader complies, suggesting she's his defacto 'advocate' until he finds another, and says something "Prince Xavin, your bride wishes to see you".
That triggers another flashback, to the wedding day. It's a bit of a lovey-dovey scene between the two of them, maybe discussion how she doesn't understand how they could have the dinner BEFORE the ceremony, she'd be too nervous to eat. But things are good, he gives her one more chance to to back out if she doesn't love her, she says she does. K'dox intrudes, Xavin shifts back to skrull form swiftly, begs a word. The Majesdanians are complying with the terms of the peace agreement, standing down their Light Brigade, just as the Skrulls have pulled back from the heliopause. Ships holding Skrull POWs are preparing to launch and likewise, ships holding Majesdanian prisoners are preparing to launch. But there are a "few more" details to iron out. K'dox and Xavin discuss things privately while Karolina looks out at the guests assembled to eat. After they conclude, K'dox says "To the Skrull empire", and Xavin returns the salute. Karolina asks what it's about and he says, "Just some security details. Nothing to be concerned about."
In the present, Karolina faces Xavin, with Noor nearby. "I wanted to hear it from you," she says.
Xavin looks to Noor, realizing why he's there. "You brought Noor, because you don't trust me to answer you honestly."
"I want to."
"Noor couldn't help you. One of the first things they teach people in Super Skrull training is how to create a false layer of thoughts to deceive telepaths. IF I wanted to lie to him, I could."
Noor tries to explain that he can't even read the thoughts because they're in another language, but Karolina interrupts, "See? When you've been taught so much about deception, right from the day you were born, can you blame me for having a LITTLE doubt?"
"No."
We get a 'telepathic wordbubble' starting. *Can you hear me? Noor, can she hear me?* *Yes, I can hear you.* *We're working on a way to get you out, but we don't want to say anything out loud. That's why he's here.*
"You should return to Earth."
"Don't say that. I have doubts, but... I don't believe it, deep down. I just worry that I shouldn't to trust my belief, if that makes sense. If they're at all honest about being fair, we're going to get you off. We'll all be allowed to testify at the trial, the good you've done since coming to Earth."
"No."
"No?"
Xavin ends the issue by saying "If Kod'x has fingered me, then there's only one possible outcome to the trial. I will be found guilty. I'm responsible for the destruction of Majesdane."
DUN DUN DUN!
Runaways #42 Solicitation:
(Cover: Karolina, blazing in her starform, cradelling the body of one of her friends)
"We're All Made of Stardust"
It's out of the frying pan and into the fire! The Runaways are home... almost. There's one big problem. They're travelling in a crippled Majesdanian ship, but it's too damaged to land on the Earth, so it's decided to go for what it thinks is the best place to await a rescue. From a Majesdanian perspective, that's right into the Sun. Karolina can stand the heat, but this ship wasn't built for alien comfort. If they can't figure out the controls in time, they're dead.
Runaways #39 Outline:
Maybe to begin with a bit of catching up with the other Runaways, Lotus trying to teach Nico magic again, then we go to Karolina reacting to Xavin's "confession". She asks Noor to leave them alone, deciding to rely on their personal relationship.
"You're saying you did it? You launched the missiles?"
"No, of course not. But I might as well have. I knew when we watched those missiles launch, that it was my fault. My foolishness allowed it to happen."
"Oh, Xavin, that's not the same thing..."
"It doesn't matter. My father had a saying. 'Righteous anger is not soothed by truth, only blood.' These people lost a whole planet. They could never acquit me."
"If it's a farce, all the more reason to..."
"No. If you try to rescue me, they'll turn their anger to Earth to find me. I'll not have that. Return. Return to Earth."
"We're a long way away from Earth. And I can't. Who'll be your advocate?"
"Do you really think it'll make a difference?"
"I have to."
"Then perhaps it will. Maybe I'm wrong. I'll tell the truth of what happened and take my chances."
She goes back to the Runaways and insists that she doesn't care what Xavin says, they're continuing to work to break them out. Even though they're on an alien spaceship, between two different galaxies. "I want plans."
Victor comes to visit at once point, because Xavin asked for him. She asks if he can record something, in case things don't go well. Xavin's afraid that, as soon as judgement is rendered, they'll be executed - it would be the way their father would do it. So they wants someone to record their life story, in their own words. Victor agrees. We see a montage of the alien ship arriving at the new, temporary, Majesdanian homeworld, a planet close to the sun but not inside of it. They land on the dark side (and, like on Majesdanian with Xavin, in a shielded area of it), and Xavin is ushered towards trial. As they are, we see something like this in the narration boxes, what they tell Victor.
"On Tarnax VII, there is a local tradition. Each Skrull is said to have a secret theme to their life, and their mission is to find it. The theme repeats in their life, over and over again, in their own fate, and in that of those they become close to, and so, when discovered is shared only with family and the most trusted friends, for fear it would grant power to enemies. My father's theme was Ew'K'in, the Illusion of Change. To outside appearances he went through many changes, from prince, to warlord, from kind ruler to despot. But to those who knew him, they knew that he was the same inside. He was among the most static Skrulls I've met... his values did not change. The changes were just masks. Conversely, my mother's theme was Lyrrn, Adaptability. She rode through genuine changes, and became a different person to deal with them. When war came, she was a fierce warrior, savage and ruthless... when it was time for peace, she became a saint. Both are strong themes for a Skrull, and as a hatchling I wished I would discover mine was one of theirs.
Growing up, I found two themes predominant in my life. The first was an unlucky one. Nrt, Uncertainty. It was no theme for a skrull, particularly one of royal blood. I hoped to quell it with the other theme I saw in my life, K'Zara, The Change that Begins in Deception. When I was uncertain, I acted certain, and in time Uncertainty faded. K'Zara was good to me, it gave me everything I wanted, even if I didn't always know I wanted it. When I was scared, I acted brave, until I became brave. When I wished to be a warrior, I pretended I was one, and in time it was true. I pretended to love Karolina, and one day I found I actually did. That happened faster than I ever would have imagined. She pretended to love me, for the sake of our worlds, and I was gladdened to find K'Zara worked on her heart as well. Later, I pretended to be a female for her sake, and K'zara stuck me in that form. No one ever told me the secret themes had a sense of humor. But slowly I've come to accept it, even love it. Now, though, no amount of pretending in existence will save me. Nrt, Uncertainty has returned.
(Victor, signified by a different word bubble): It'll be okay.."
"No, let me finish, without interupption. For most of my life, I had teachers, I had duty, but no friends. My father wouldn't allow them, calling them weakness. It was one of the many things he was wrong about. They're strength. But my friends can not save me either. The truth certainly won't save me, but nor will lies. My people value truth highly, because we find so easy to deceive, so I'll speak the truth.
I was born Xavin (full name), in a palace on Tarnax VII, and a world celebrated. I may soon die on an alien sun, and another world will celebrate. This is my story of the time in between.
...
There's more to the story of course but it doesn't go here. Maybe Marvel would do a mini, or it could come up again later (like videos of the speech being remixed into a propaganda campaign), but now we have to go to trial so we don't hear any more of it in this issue. The judges are brought in.
There are 5, only two of which are Majesdanian. Because their law requires 'fairness' to the accused, 1 must be inclined positively towards the accused and two more must be 'Outsiders'. So there are two Majesdanians, one Skrull, one Kymellian, and one human, a representative from SWORD. 3 out of 5 is sufficient to convict. The Runaways are perhaps hopeful that it's not an obviously kangaroo court, but they realize - Earth just went through a Skrull invasion (and maybe an outsider might point out that Kymellians lost their own world, albeit to their own action rather than attack).
The trial starts with the court asking Xavin to verify their identity. "You are Xavin, (blah blah blah)?" "No, I am not." (Gasp!) "I am Princess Xava (yadda yadda yadda). I am female both by circumstance and choice. It's only appropriate I choose a more fitting name and method of address." They warn that such sophistry is not a defence, and Xavin (from now on, Xava) says she (from now on, she) doesn't intend it as a defense, she was Xavin and is responsible for everything done no matter what name. "But if I'm to be punished, I'll be punished as she who I have chosen to become."
There may be a break the proceedings where was see some of the Runaways planning. Karolina tries to enlist Jaya's help, but she reveals that she believes Xava's guilty, too. Maybe Noor and Victor obtain Nico's staff (possibly the Fistigons as well) using Noor's mind control on the few crew members on the ship. Maybe a bit of mysterious skulking people in the background doing mysterious things.
K'odx is put up first. He says he gave the order to launch the anti-matter missiles. When asked why, he gives the answer - the wedding, the peace agreement, it was all a deception. The goal was to get the Majesdanians to stand down their defenses and so slip the doomsday weapons in. Karolina cross-examines, trying to suggest that he had something to gain by implicating Xava, but doesn't seem to make any headway. She also brings up the issue of "if she meant to destroy Majesdane, why did she flee before the missiles were launched? Why not stay and be the hero of Tarnax VII?" K'odx suggests that maybe Xavin wanted to destroy his people. The reason the doomsday devices were not used before was because many scientists believed it would provide great damage to Tarnax VII as well. Xavin claimed he did not believe that, but K'odx has doubts.
Then, to have a bit of action at the conclusion, somebody tries to assassinate Xava. Molly might overhear the plan, a few people working in concert, speaking in an alien tongue, and warns everyone just as the attack launches (like one of those TV moments someone shouts "Gun!" and it's unleashed that very moment).
Runaways #43 Solicitation:
(Cover: Molly with her ear against a wall, listening)
"Outside"
Back on Earth, the Runaways enjoy some reflective downtime. They've retaken their home, the Stein-built facility hidden in an extra-dimensional space. But when they begin hearing strange noises, the Runaways have to wonder... what exactly is OUTSIDE the hostel... and what do they do if it wants in?
Runaways #40 Outline:
The assassination is foiled, with the Runaways help, although many of the Majesdanian guards also do their part to help it. It's an action scene so I'd leave the specific up to hypothetical artists. We might learn at this point that the 'signs' that the staff is safe to use again (cool to the touch?), at least for brief periods. Victor remains in control of the staff but lets Nico hold it to cast one spell, etc.
Karolina hopes to get it to cause a delay in the trial, but it doesn't, they want their justice swift. Xava is called next to tell her side of the story - which is that she was persuaded to hand over the weapon codes as a precaution - that it would be a tragedy if something happened, either a physical attack or something as simple as a sleeper agent poisoning Xavin's food at a critical moment. So he gave control codes to officers on duty in a secure bunker. When the fight broke out at the reception, it was chaos. Somebody who had the weapons codes launched them. Xava tries to take on more responsibility than she's really due - that she should have worked harder to ensure they wouldn't be used, that a leader is responsible for their troops even if they don't directly order it. Karolina's upset but does her best to defend Xava nonetheless.
Karolina next calls the Runaways to testify, a short montage with a bit for each of them. (Risking a bit of comedy, I could see Chase having testimony focused solely along the lines of, "When I first met Xavin, he was a dude, and then she was a hot chick, and then when he came back he was a lizard thing, then dude again, then a girl. Then we started calling her a they and I never knew if that was because she was two people." and other irrelevant things, not making fun of it but at least poking fun at the confusion that comes from changing pronouns)
There's a surprise witness, members of the Skrull delegation (the group that made peace after the blast), want to present evidence and a witness... Eastro, the Watcher overseeing Majesdane, or at least a recording of him. Even though the Watchers are bound not to interfere, he owed a favor and felt merely speaking the truth of what he observed and was told by the Tarnax Watcher, was not interfering. Elements of both Skrull and Majesdanian people wanted the war to continue, because they profited from it, and so they sabotaged the wedding, contriving an insult that would spark a resumption of hostilities. That the doomsday weapons were launched was a tragic series of coincidences and miscommunications.
Naturally, with this stunning element, the judges come to only one conclusion. It's a fake.
Xava is pronounced guilty (Though it's 3-2... the Kymellian and the Skrull vote innocent, the Human votes with the Majesdanians). Xava is taken away to await sentencing. No instant death penalty, but it'll be done in the next few days, probably by being sent into the sun.
The Runaways regroup again, and talk to Jaya. She WAS convinced by the Watcher, and so is willing to help now. The military leader of the ship also is on board with helping... he joined the Light Brigade thinking it a noble, honorable system, but believes that they were in part responsible for resuming the war... none of them were too pleased with the peace. He'll help get Xava away, as long as they don't plan to hurt anybody to do it.
The end of the issue has K'odx and Xava together in prison. Xava asks how he could betray her, accuse her of genocide in front of the Majesdanians. K'odx says, "It was the only way I could get them to help find you."
"I thought the testimony of the Watcher would sway them. I suppose they wanted blood, not truth. Your father was right." K'odx shapeshifts into a Skrull female. "But living under the sign of Lyrrn has taught me one thing, my son... always have a backup plan."
"MOTHER?"
(explosion) "Yes, dear. Come, Xavin. That will be the War Skrulls."
(Revealing that the cover wasn't actually skrullform-Xava after all, it was Xava's Mom)
Runaways #44 Solicitation:
I'm going to leave off the solicitations for a the rest of this. They're fun to write but I'm getting a bit tired. It might be part two of Outside, it might be something else. See the end of the issue outlines for my more general "where to go" plans.
Runaways #41:
Xava's mother explains briefly about how she came to be there. Xava's dad did die, but mom was merely taken prisoner... taking the role of another Skrull because she didn't want them to know they had such a high-value hostage. She was due to be released in the Prisoner Exchange after the wedding, but that fell through, she escaped and went on a search for the truth about what happened, by finding the Watcher and convincing him to break his oath and tell her what happened... K'dox was one of those who wanted to reignite the war, and though he didn't plan genocide, he deserved to die. By the time she got to him, they were all captured by the Light Brigade again. She killed K'dox and took his place, then used his position and some of the perks they gave K'odx for fully cooperating with the Majesdanian justice system to contact some of their deep cover agents and plan an escape, if worse came to worst, as well as get them to find Xavin.
Of course, breaking Xava and Mom out isn't the Warskrulls, it's the Runaways. She's annoyed, because it's "too soon". There's a bit of a fight, the Runaways overpowered at first by loads of people all as powerful as Karolina, when suddenly bombs are launched. The bombs depower all the Majesdanians. They're "Darkforce" bombs, which interfere with Majesdanian stellar nature, depowering them for a limited time. With that, the Runaways and a few of her Skrull soldiers who arrive have the advantage in firepower, but are still outnumbered. They fight through depowered Majesdane warriors... Nico wants to use spells, Victor won't let her - the staff's starting to grow warm again.
The Captain of the Majesdanian ship that brought them has given them an old Majesdanian shuttle, programmed the coordinates to take them to Earth. Xava's Mom wants to take them to one of the Warskrulls ships... she doesn't want to go to Earth, and wants Xava to come with her, promising to help restore her shapeshifting abilities, and "If it's your choice, to teach you what it is to be a Skrull woman."
Everyone else thinks that's nonsense, Xava belongs with them, but she surprises them and announces she has to go with her mother... because they have to split up.
If they leave together, the Light Brigade will follow Xava to the ends of the universe, now that she's been convicted. If Earth is harboring her, they'll attack it, and she can't bear to do that to the planet she's come to love, or put the people she loves in any more danger. But if they leave separately, Jaya and the military leader guy can tell them the truth. (Maybe Military guy also won't allow Xava and Mom on board anymore - he was fine with helping before it became a fleet battle)
Karolina doesn't accept this, begs the others to stop her, but Xava puts up a force field between Xava & Mom and everyone else. She says her goodbyes to everybody other than Karolina, ending with Victor, "I think, next to my love, I'll miss you most of all, Tin Man," (Molly reacting with a 'hey, what about me?'), and even gives him a hug, apologizing for treating him poorly at first. "You're a good man."
Then of course, she turns to K. Karolina tells her she wants to go with her. The others can go home. Xava refuses to put her in danger, and Karolina's place is on Earth, but says she loves her and promises that one day, when it is safer, she'll return. Karolina begs her to drop the force field, and she does, and they kiss. The Runaways pile into the shuttle, Xava and Mom board a ship with War Skrulls.
The Runaways ship is fired upon while they try to escape, and damaged, but it still makes it to a warp jump point.
The issue ends with Xava and her mother in the escape pod. Xava stares out a window while her mother talks about how they seem to successfully have drawn away the Light Brigade to follow them, but they should meet up with the rest of her forces before they can catch up. The humans are safe. Then she talks about plans, (perhaps a reference to the time, when Xavin was young, when all Skrulls in the universe temporarily lost their ability to shapeshift. She was briefed on all the methods to help gain them back, and one of them will surely help Xava regain her true form. Xava insists it is her true form, and Mom seems okay with it (though she might need to be corrected a few times on the name), maybe just giving a vague, "Well, then at least you'll have more of a choice". Then, seeing Xava is still sad, tries to cheer her up, telling her that she never had the chance to tell her how proud she was. "I know you care for that Karolina, but you did what was right. The right thing is rarely easy. I am so proud of you, for how strong you are being."
"I'm not strong, Mother. Maybe some day. Right now, I'm still only pretending to be."
Runaways #45 Solicitation:
(Again, nothing I want to write up)
Runaways #42 Outline:
I don't want to give a point by point analysis, but the big thing is that it lets the Runaways face their deaths, and Karolina face losing everybody. Damaged by Majesdanian fire at the end of the last issue, the ship can't land on Earth, and because Majesdanian AIs are simple, it goes for its standard backup plan - park in the corona of the sun until repairs are possible.
At first they're just worried about it taking longer to figure out how to get to Earth, but then it becomes clear it's becoming hotter and more radioactive. Either it's not a ship meant for protecting others, or its heat shielding was also damaged. Karolina might well survive, but it's growing uncomfortable and will eventually be fatal for everyone else. They make do for a while using spells (limited, sparking arguments between everybody and Nico, particularly Victor and Nico, because she wants to use the staff instead of Lotus' mostly ineffectual white magic), and other techniques to keep the ship cool as it approaches the sun, but it's looking pretty grim and hopeless.
Noor asks for forgiveness from the others, believing they're all going to die. Most are fairly willing to give it, in the spirit of "we're all going to die", except Molly who holds out (until, perhaps, towards the end, when she admits that she didn't want to forgive him because she didn't think they were going to die... and previous to that, she makes reference to it being like that Firefly episode where they were running out of air, they'll be rescued at the last minute... in fact, Molly might well have been pretty annoying with Firefly references during this arc, some real, some referring to 'the remake' she watched in the future, due to her excitement being in space). Lotus tries and succeeds at one last fling with Chase, although afterwards he tells her he wouldn't have done it if they weren't going to die. She asks him why, and he says he realized he's in love with somebody else.
Nico briefly considers doing a fling with K, but she's still raw from Xava leaving, and then goes to Victor, who's been thinking of his own - he's giving her back the Staff. He's no more mature than Nico is, and so he has no right to keep it from her or 'ration' her spells. She can make her own decisions. Oddly, instead of jumping him as was her plan to that point, she just hugs him. Unfortunately having the staff doesn't give them much help, she's already used teleportation spells twice, it would be far too dangerous to try again, and she can't think of anything else to try.
Victor also wonders a little about the future he and Chase saw, and Molly, and whether they screwed it up somehow.
Molly lasts, consciously, a little longer than everybody else (except K) because of her future-clothes. I see the title "We're all made of stardust" title coming into play as something Karolina tells Molly (while the others are conscious but so hot that they can't do much more than lie around and wait to die), that her parents told her (and perhaps what spurs her to finally offer to forgive Noor... but I see it as very grudging... like I forgive you but it doesn't mean I want to be your friend"). We're all made of stardust, the remnants of supernovas, every person in the universe is bound by being part of a sun, and maybe, one day, they'll become part of another person.
In the end, with everybody else incapacitated or nearly so, Karolina considers shutting down her powers with her bracelet and dying with everybody else, until they realize that there's a ship already hiding in the sun... one that belongs to Karolina's parents... they traveled off-world but nobody ever mentioned or seemed to think about where their ship went... because it hid in the sun until the Deans required it.
Karolina's able to contact it and arrange it to rescue them, (once she figures out the code word... maybe even her name, or a childhood nickname they gave her, giving her some feeling that maybe her parents cared for her after all (or it's written on her power-dampening bracelet).).
Although it may not all be established in this issue, this is meant as the group's leapfrog replacement. It's barely big enough for all of them, and at first at least Karolina's the only one who can fly it... from within. (Possibly it has an AI on board that will obey simple commands, so she can summon it from afar, but to do anything complicated she has to be onboard). Eventually, the group may try to interface the Leapfrog AI with it. Mostly it's just like a leapfrog substitute, with lasers, shields, cloaking device (albeit perhaps one that's light-based, only works in sunlight or something like that...), except it can actually go off-world, and has limited 'beaming' technology (beam aboard, like in Trek. But like the ship at the beginning of the arc, it can only sweep up everybody in a wide area).
---
Now since I've run out of DETAILED plot for the time being (if I were actually writing this I'm sure I could come up with something, but there's a limit to what I can do for speculative stuff only one or two people might actually read), I'll just jot down some quck thoughts on where to go from there. Heh, which is just as well, because I think I calculated issue #43 would be the point where, if I was really writing it, I would have "passed" BKV in terms of numbers of issues of Runaways written. (And, if we were being continuously published, this would take me up to something like 2012... for all I know, the world would end by then!)
Once they return, that buffer arc or short arcs to get settled. Lotus leaves immediately and doesn't come back for some time, if at all. Maybe one arc would be another encounter with another of the superpowered kid-gangs, maybe the all-girl gang this time (I have an idea for a character in the girl gang called "Meme Mimi" or "Mimi Meme", who's power is to hack your mind and appear everywhere... and it takes weeks to wear off completely. For the first couple hours you see pretty much nothing but her, but after that for a long time you'll think you see her out of the corner of your eye, etc, things like that. I have the idea that Noor mentions to, say, Chase, who got hit with it, that one time one of his friends called her "Screaming Mimi" and she blasted him with it. "She appeared in every nightmare of his for a month. I do not envy you, my friend."... that's not a plot, just local color. And Sniktbabe, a girl with claws (who has no relation to wolverine aside from taking the sound effect snikt)), and get them situated back in their new place and take a little pressure off the major plotty thing.
After that, probably for issue #50, we bring back Gert. Well, not Gert, but an alt. Gert. Here's how I'm thinking of it. She comes from a universe where Alex didn't sneak off and discover the Pride a year early. So, the rest of the Runaways didn't discover it a year later when he triggered the secret passage.
When the Rite of Thunder came around, the Deans and Hayes make their move against the rest of the Pride... but fail. They're killed. Maybe one of alt-Gert's parents dies too. The kids don't know about this, they're told their parents died in a car accident or something. Molly is taken in by the Steins (because Victor knows she's his daughter), Karolina is empancipated, becomes a bit of a Hollywood Wildchild. Time passes, and then Gert discovered what was going on, tried to assemble the other kids against them, but is betrayed... by Chase, who was informed of this all after hitting 18, before Gert found out.
So naturally she has an instinctive hatred for our Chase, which informs part of his arc for the next little while - he knew she was coming, just not when, and it's part of the reason he broke it off with Lotus. But he foolishly expected he could just slip them back into the same roles, without realizing that from her perspective, he's the kind of person who could turn into their parents. So he tries for a while to get her to fall for him (not in a creepy obsessive stalker way, but maybe treading CLOSE to the line), but eventually has to come to realize that you can't force things like that (and, perhaps, that's when she actually DOES start to warm to him).
Anyway, alt-Gert and some of the other alt-Runaways lived through the Second Wave of the Gibborum's plot, ones that are designed to drastically reduce the world population and destabilize the governments. One by one, she lost everybody else. Karolina took the opportunity to escape the Earth's problems by leaving with Xavin. Alex died, and was actually a good guy (because he started a relationship with Nico before learning about the Pride). Molly was brainwashed, maybe. Nico perhaps started to go ultra darkside. I don't know if they ever met Victor, if they did I imagine he died. Finally, with no other option, Gert took a time machine (one designed only for sideways travel between alternate universes) and fled to look for help. So, when the Gibborum here become active again, alt-Gert is the person who knows the signs, what to look for, what to try to stop. That's why she sticks around instead of just running, because she thinks she can make a difference in this world. She possibly also wants help to save what's left of her world, which would be good for an arc down the line... since the Paradise hasn't been completed yet, and there are still loads of pesky humans on the Earth. (And maybe in the process a trip to several different alternate Earths, just for fun)
Alt Gert has no corresponding Old Lace - among the minor changes in her world (since it's not an exact copy up until the year Alex finds out, there are subtle differences before that) is that her parents decided on another means to protect her... maybe a personal force field from the future that renders her virtually invulnerable (but with no corresponding strength or anything), I don't know, but something different. (I kind of picture the forcefield having speedball-like properties, redirecting force).
Anyway, brief character-based plotlines for the next while would include:
Chase: Dealing with alt-Gert and coming to terms with the fact that no matter how much he might want her to be the woman he loved, she's not, she's just very similar.
altGert: Her guilt at having left a world behind, and learning to trust people again after everyone she cared about died or let her down.
Karolina: Moving on with her life after Xavin, rebuilding her friendship with Nico.
Nico: Trying to balance out her need to use magic to control situations and the risks of it, and of course, rebuilding her relationship with K, some tension with Victor since he's still pretending to be her mystery man on the Internet.
Molly: A relationship with Noor, of course! Nah, just kidding. I thought about it, and maybe EVENTUALLY it might go down that road, but I wouldn't rush it. I do at some point think she might need SOME kind of relationship angst, just cause she's getting to that age. Maybe a crush on somebody unattainable for a bit of DAWWWness. Long ago I joked about her developing a crush on Victor, maybe that would come into play, and of course there's always Jack Power. Other than that, nothing immediately comes to mind for her though, she's the fun character of the group, doesn't need to work through issues all the time.
Victor: His usual problem of worrying about the future and his destiny, perhaps exploring more the idea of reprogramming himself, remove his self-perceived flaws, or other aspects of machine culture. He also still wants to get back together with Nico, and maybe part of "reprogramming himself" might be to turn himself into Nico's ideal man (doesn't she always go for bad boys, though? Uh oh). I think he might be due for the next arc centered on him. No, maybe Nico, actually. She had an important role in this arc and the previous, but it's a long time there was an arc devoted to her like this was a K/X arc.
Noor: Trying to find a place within the group that, although they've accepted him, he's not really a part of. Maybe down the line something to do with his grandfather as an eventual threat, the Shadow King, depending on how the X-universe looks at the time (since he's part of their whole dealio and if they say he's absent or doing something else he can't be used). I'd also want to explore his religious side, with him starting to follow the rituals and such of Islam, even though he's not sure of the existence of God at first, sort of questing and in some ways seeking a surrogate parent figure since his own let him down. But since there are few Muslim superheroes, I kind of would have wanted to make him another. (Another possibility is pairing him up thematically with Victor somewhat, with events gradually conspiring to make Victor lose his faith while Noor is seeking his... not 100% sure I'd want to go down that road, since Victor's quiet faith is an interesting part of him, but hey, crisis is always interesting).
Old Lace: overcoming her crippling donut addiction.
Klara: Facing the horror of Dutch Elm Disease! No, more seriously, she'll be a quiet presence and anything in her garden grows super fast, temporarily eliminating the 'how are they feeding themselves' concern. It's a vegetarian diet (which Karolina's all okay with) so some of the characters still find themselves needing money to get more fast foodish fare if it's required for story points, as well as clothes.
Other plot lines, character arcs, include Old Lace laying fertilized eggs from her time in the past, probably another Katie Power/Molly team-up, a new Young Avengers/Runaways teamup (crossover oriented, most likely, so I can't predict the exact plot, but I would like to see one that's NOT crossover oriented, just the two groups teaming up to fight a common foe, like, say, Ultron)
In the future, if I still were writing it, Xava would return, but probably not for a while (and perhaps bringing another threat), as would Alex - his spirit is locked inside the Staff of One. He might well be the next 'Big Bad' after the Gibborum's next plan are dealt with. Perhaps he gets free and can possess people for short terms. Or if you want to get really wacky, he 'jumped' out of the staff of one when Xavin took it briefly, and went into her body, wanting a shapeshifter. It took him time to assert control, but then once he does... How's that for a love triangle? Alex fighting over the body of Xavin, one wants Karolina, one wants Nico, and the girls are torn between their respective first relationships and each other! ;) I don't think I'd go that route, but I did consider it.
Like I said, I did rush this and skimp over some of the details, as my memory fogged over in the last few months, and really, I was getting to the point where I was just really eager to be finished (finishing this was one of three personal goals I wanted to meet before I activate my X-Box live Gold membership and start playing L4D online), so it's a bit sloppy and not as strong as some of the earlier work. Sorry to the one or two of you who actually read this.
A few comments on the Xavin/Xava arc and getting rid of him/her/them. I actually grew to really like Xavin while I was writing these, far more than I expected to - in fact, I kept putting off the exit... when I initially thought of what I'd do taking over Runaways, getting rid of Xavin was one of those things on my list. But by the time I did, I didn't want to, but felt I had to... albeit in a way she could return down the line.
The idea of K'Zara has been with me since the beginning (there was a moment in the Victor/Victorius arc where Xavin is about to tell them about it, but is distracted, and he mentions K'Zara when Klara couldn't change out of Barkform, like she pretended she couldn't). It underlied a lot of my plans - in many ways, one of my rules of thumb was that any time Xavin pretended something, that something would come true. They pretended their true form/gender identity was a woman, and they became one both physically and later in terms of self-image and pronouns. They were told to "if you're not going to stop being robophobic, at least act like you're friends with Victor" and eventually grew to develop a crush on him and respect him as a person. I sort of had the idea that Xavin wasn't fond of having to take care of Klara too, but pretended she was okay with it, then they were stuck in the past together and they grew to really take care of her. Of course, the biggest problem was the pronoun. Just in keeping straight which to type (particularly when referring back to a previous time)! Like I said last time, the name was a big factor in that - Xavin just reads to me like a male name, so my mind automatically goes to the male place when I'm talking about her, even if she's a female. Part of it is that's how we were introduced initially, as a male, and my mind is just very slow to change (it's not from a conscious lack of acceptance of the transgendered, but the vision in my head of people are strongly influenced by how I met them first). I also hope that my choice to portray Xavin as somewhat more "confused" about their gender doesn't somehow provide offense... I'm sure many people are very certain of their gender identity (even when it doesn't match the gender they were assigned at birth) but I believe there are who struggle with it, and Xavin's journey in the official comics felt far too facile, particularly for someone who seemed to choose to present as female just to please someone else so I wanted to build on it as a journey and earn the moment where she finally decides, for real, to embrace being female.
I was almost going to have Xava keep Karolina behind a forcefield for their whole goodbye, thinking it poignant, but then realized I'd inadvertantly be contributing to the trope "Gays and lesbians are cool, but let's do whatever we can so they don't have to kiss and offend somebody" (okay maybe that's not actually a trope, but it seems to happen a lot in comics, where there's always some reason to avoid an on-panel kiss). And so I didn't want to leave them without an on-panel kiss, although of course, if I was actually writing this "for real", it's possible Marvel would object somehow. Anyway, as it turns out, I think it makes their parting a bit more poignant that Karolina doesn't just have the decision forced on her, but participates in it, even passively by not fighting, even though she hates it.
In other 'what might have been' aspects, I thought about having them get home via Alex Power, agent of SWORD, aboard his starship Friday (completing my goal of having them meet all of the Power Pack kids... unless you count Franklin of course).
Speaking of Franklin, it occurs to me that Fantastic Four and the Runaways have an interesting plot potential, since the Runaways have evil super-parents, whereas the main couple of the Fantastic Four are superHERO parents. Not sure what to do with that since I literally just had the idea, but it's something to think on.
I don't think I spent as much time on the culture of Majesdane and Skrull as I would have liked. Couldn't really fit it in. Would have liked to have more with Jaya (who, btw, I imagine was the father of "James Dean", the Majesdanian boy seen in the future by Chase and Victor), but same issue.
Anyway, this is a good enough time to end it. Comments are welcome and appreciated of course, if anyone besides me enjoyed it (or didn't and wants to discuss specific ideas anyway).
This time around I'm going to be a little less detailed, mainly because I've let the ideas sit a while and I've forgotten some of the more detailed outlines I had in my head, and if I try to discover them all again, I'll probably lose track, forget about it for another few months, and lose even MORE of the ideas. The basics are here but sometimes I skimp out on the specifics. It will also be the LAST of these, I believe, and not a full year, at least not in 'full outline form', I think outlining 43 issues in a fair amount of detail is plenty, especially when virtually no one will read it. Anyway, see the first post (linked above) for the introductions of what I'm doing and how I'm doing it, as well as if you want to start reading from the beginning.
Where last we left, the Runaways had just defeated the Cabal, who were trying to bring back, and then sacrifice, the Gibborum, and ended up accidentally just bringing them back. Klara is now out of the main cast (at least somewhat), and new cast member Noor is still with them (at least physically).
As usual, I'll start with the solicits - three months in advance.
Runaways #37 Solicitation:
(Cover: Group shot. Maybe the team looking up.)
Reckoning, Part One
Karolina and Xavin might have made their peace with Noor, but the rest of the team still has a thing to say. But Noor isn't the only one about to be called to account for past actions. An alien warship shows up in orbit, and they've got a whole planet to avenge.
Runaways #38 Solicitation:
(Cover: Karolina, in her wedding dress)
Reckoning, Part Two
Runaways in Space! Xavin is taken to trial for war crimes, and as Karolina remembers what was supposed to be their wedding day, she's forced to confront the possibility... that he might just be guilty!
(Xavin identified a male then, hence the 'he').
Runaways #39 Solicitation:
(Cover: Xavin, in chains)
Reckoning, Part Three:
Xavin is put on trial, and the rest of the Runaways aren't keen on leaving their friend to the mercies of an alien justice system. But they're not the only ones who want the trial to end prematurely.
Runaways #40 Solicitation:
(Cover: Maybe something simple and symbolic, like a gavel)
Reckoning, Part Four!
The Trial of Xavin concludes! Can a surprise witness sway the verdict? And what is the truth behind the accusation? And will the shocking turn of events reignite war?
Runaways #37 Outline:
We start back at the ghost town. All the Runaways are there, as is Noor (who's tied up with Old Lace watching him), Lotus, and Doctor Conway (The doctor who treated Klara back issue #13). He's examining the tree (Which now has roses growing out of it, despite that it's a tree and not a bush). There's some lines that suggested that Doctor Conway was taken (willingly) to the site blindfolded and is expected to be returned the same way, so he won't be on to their secret hideout's location. He's okay with it.
While he studies her, Nico approaches Karolina, and asks about her staff. Karolina says she can't give it to her. "I was told... by one of them. After feeding on the Gibborum, the Staff's in something of a feeding frenzy." When she cast the escape spell, she had to feed it all of her light energy and it still felt like it was eating her soul.
"That's what it always feels like."
"You're not really inspiring me to want to EVER give it back, then."
At this point Nico's annoyed at people trying to keep the staff away from her and the presumption that she can't be trusted with it. She points out that the Cabal was bad so you can't trust what they say, and that K doesn't really know about the staff. Lotus asks if Nico does. "Why are you still here?" "To keep an eye on the van. It's a rental." Then points out that what Karolina says makes sense. When she was working with Geoffrey Wilder, she looked up the history of the staff. It devoured souls. The Minorus of old tamed it, kept it starving and docile, feeding it small doses of blood and pain instead of souls. If it got enough energy, it would become uncontrollable until it starved again.
Karolina insists she'll know when it's safe to use (Alex told her!), and that she and Xavin will keep it until then... she doesn't trust Nico to have it and not use it. Xavin suggests that, if it is that dangerous, perhaps Victor should be the one to hold it. Victor gets offended a bit at that, assuming the reasoning is "because he's just a machine, he doesn't have a soul to eat." Xavin becomes genuinely chagrined, that wasn't the suggestion, it was just that often machines can't use magic unless they've been designed to. Victor's possibly the safest because it can't tempt him to use it, the temptation Xavin's been feeling since they've been holding it. Xavin hands it over to Victor. Lotus offers to keep teaching Nico real magic in the meantime, but Nico just walks off to get the report from the Doctor.
He doesn't know much, other than "Well... she's a tree." Victor tells everyone about how this tree was there in the future. So maybe Klara will be stuck like this. But, they also know that some of the people they met where said to be "Klara's kids".
Nico speaks of a tale she read, a very obscure one, when she was looking up faeries right after she learned what she was. It was called the Rose Mother. A tree bearing roses that grew where a child died. Crops were good in the presence of a Rose mother, and sometimes faeries were born in the roses, until the parent of the child who died tried to cut the tree down, and after that the land was cursed. She didn't think it had anything to do with Klara because Klara wasn't a tree.
"Then she's dead," Molly reasons.
"She's not dead," Noor insists. Molly tells him to shut up, but he continues to claim that he can hear Klara's voice in his head. She's still in there, happy. Molly gets especially mad, accusing him of making it up because he was the one who killed her. But he relays a message telepathically, about how she's happier than she's ever been, she finally remembers her real mother and how she was chosen to start a colony of faeries in the New World, that she'll love the Runaways forever, yadda yadda yadda.
Finally she adds one more thing. "One of the stars is getting bigger."
They're confused by this, when suddenly an alien ship is hovering on top of them. Karolina or Xavin recognizes it as a Majesdanian ship. Nico demands her staff so they can do something to escape, but a light washes over everybody and suddenly, they're on a ship, surrounded by Karolina's people.
There's a tense moment, but eventually they reveal they're not interesting in harming them, they just wanted to find Karolina. They will return everybody else who wants to leave, they just couldn't target the transporter any more finely. Since the war, all the most advanced ships have been prioritized to protecting the survivors. This one's an old rust bucket, due to be decommissioned soon. They learn that of a planet of billions, only about a million survived. The war, they say, is over (with one person perhaps saying 'for now'). Both the Majesdanians and the Skrull Empire are in a shambles (for different reasons... the Skrulls are reeling from the Secret Invasion fallout), and a peace accord was signed. Nobody was happy with it, but it stopped the fighting they could no longer afford.
Karolina asks what they want - they want to try to convince her to come home. This news is revealed by a new person entering the room, someone Karolina recognizes and greets warmly. It's her cousin Jaya, who she met while she was engaged to Xavin. Jaya's pregnant (under the 'there's so few of us left, we can't waste time' theory), and Karolina squees a little. She even excitedly calls to Xavin, saying, "Xavin! You remember Jaya, my maid of honor..."
Suddenly, every soldier in the room raises their weapons (which I imagine as being something like a bracelet that focuses their own powers) towards Xavin, some shouting "Skrull!" They react instantly, throwing up a force field. Everyone gets in a defensive position. The Majesdanians try to drag Karolina away, while she's screaming, "You said the war was over!"
The military leader waves a hand. "You're right. The war is over. The wounds are still raw, but there will be no revenge killings on my watch. Stand down." The soldiers drop their weapons. He faces Xavin. "You have to forgive my men. You can understand, can't you? After what happened, a Skrull on their ship, in disguise as a human female. Things are tense."
"I can understand. But I'm not in disguise, this is my default form, and I mean you no harm if you mean none to us."
He turns to Karolina and says, "I assure you that you and all of your associates, Xavin included, will be treated with dignity and respect, with full protection of Majesdanian law." He offers them a tour (briefly speaking in alien language to one of his aides), showing off various parts of the ship, quarters, with a light room, something like a shower, where Majesdanians recharge if they're depleted, the bridge, giving a nice shot of Earth. Just a chance for some character development moments (Molly giving Noor the cold shoulder, Lotus trying to stay next to Chase but he ignores her, things like that).
Finally they come to the "conference room" (Molly makes a comment upon the doors saying, "What's a naming? Is that like a Christening? For Jaya's baby?"... which surprises the military leader. Karolina starts trying to remember, but the military leader cuts them off. "We actually have someone here who is eager to meet you."
The door opens, and there is a Skrull. He looks blankly at the group. Xavin recognizes him,
though, calls him by name, Chancellor Kod'x. (I'll probably be misspelling his name several time in this, but he's the only named Skrull in the story, so you know who I'm talking about!)
Kod'x: "I do not know you."
X: "It's me, Xavin (full name given)."
K: "Show me your true face."
X: "I cannot, my shapeshifting abilities were... damaged." He gives a bit of detail that the two of them would know.
K: "Oh, poor Xavin. They've crippled you."
The military leader says, "We did nothing, we found him like this. He's a guest and will not be harmed. Do you have something to say?"
K: "You know it."
Military Leader: "Say the words."
K: "If this is truly you, Xavin.... then I, Kod'x, name you as the one who gave me my orders on (some sort of skrull date). Is that sufficient?"
Military Leader:"Yes. Xavin, you have been named, and much now stand judgement..." He zaps Xavin (in the background, Chase might be raising his fistigons and wondering why they aren't working). "For genocide."
Runaways #41 Solicitation:
(Cover: Xavin in a female Skrull form, perhaps cuffed with power-blocking cuffs, in an actiony-pose)
Reckoning, Conclusion:
The Runaways are on the run again... and this time, there's an alien armada at their backs. With a battle raging overhead, a borrowed starship and some unlikely allies, will they even make it back to Earth? And more importantly, after the revelations of last issue, will all of them want to?
Runaways #38 Outline:
We pick up shortly after Xavin has been stunned. The guards in the room have bound most of the Runaways with their solid-light-waves, although Karolina remains free. She's outraged, reminding the officer of his promise. He insists that Xavin will be given the full protection of Majesdanian law, as he said. There will be a trial, where Xavin's guilt will be determined before passing sentence (Which will be death).
"You said the war's over."
"It is, for the citizens. But war criminals must still be punished, or billions die unavenged."
She insists Xavin's not guilty, and the commander says they she's welcome to speak at the trial, but their witness tells the story (probably seen in flashback-style), of the wedding and Xavin ordering various dirty tricks, Skrulls positioning to attack all along. Xavin's still unconscious. Karolina thinks Kod'x is lying to save himself, but is told that he's been tried and found guilty already. His sentence is also death, and confessing doesn't alleviate it. All he gains out of confessing is better treatment before his death, the chance to contact family, and so on.
The Runaways are deprived of their weapons (perhaps Victor tries, but fails, to use the Staff of One), but they're assured their items will be returned when they go to Earth, which they're welcome to do before the trial. Dr. Conway takes the opportunity to go, he just got swept up in it but really has no place there (they teleport him into the city so he'll have no way of figuring out where the Runaways base was). Molly suggests Noor go, but he says he has nowhere to go. Lotus, surprisingly, decides to stay, though we don't learn why, yet.
The Runaways are taken to quarters, and they discuss rescuing Xavin. Maybe Chase suggests Molly punching through the hull (not being the brightest idea in a space ship). When he's mocked for it, Lotus tries to paper it over, suggesting it's not such a dumb idea so long as you could convince them to go back to Earth or only punch through interior walls, but Chase doesn't want to be 'helped', and snarkily asks why she's here, why she didn't just go back to Earth. She's obviously there to TRY to reconnect with Chase, but can't say that so she says that without Nico's staff, she's the only one who can provide any kind of magical support, and offers once again to try to teach Nico. Nico agrees, deciding it's best to be ready, then asks Karolina the question everybody's been avoiding... is it at all possible Xavin's guilty?
This launches us into the meat of the issue, a flashback to Karolina's time away with Xavin. It's some time after the peace negotiations have started, perhaps Karolina is meeting Jaya and her boyfriend for the first time. She finds that Jaya's parents were caught up in the hysteria after the world realized that it was the Deans who gave up the secret location of their homeworld, executed as accessories, but she doesn't blame Karolina. "Your parents may have started the war, but they didn't keep it going for 15 years". They bond over being slight outcasts to Majesdanian society - the rest of her planet isn't too fond of Karolina, either, due to her parents, and although they're making a peace out of it, they all seem to be disdainful of her, to the point that they demanded the wedding be on Tarnax VII instead of there. Jaya sympathizes, and promises that not everybody is like that, just some of the old guard... she'll introduce Karolina to others, people who can show her Majesdanian culture as it's supposed to be. Jaya also says she wishes the wedding were there on Majesdane, but it would be impossible to follow the traditions like the newlyweds bathing in a solar flare. Maybe a reference how it's going to be a bit of a hybrid wedding, Majesdanian customs, Skrull customs, and a few human customs K's been trying to push through), Karolina is happy, and asks Jaya to be a bridesmaid at the wedding.
Meanwhile, there's a bit of a disturbance in Xavin's conversation. He (still a he back then) is in a discussion about the cease fire and scale-back of operations. The Majesdanians are worried about it, specifically that it'd mean leaving the border open - Xavin assures them that his world's military forces are entirely under his control, and he gives his personal guarantee that nothing will happen.
Someone points out, that, if the army is entirely under his control and nobody could possibly do something without his consent, then killing Xavin now would win the war. Xavin says that would be true, if he hadn't already left instructions to launch an assault if he's believed dead.
Later, Xavin and Karolina have a talk, and Xavin swears he was bluffing, that you have to
negotiate from a position of strength. "What if we fail, and the war goes on?"
Xavin swears he will do everything possible to end the war, but he must protect his people... and he would still like to marry her. She's uncertain, and Xavin stresses only if she wants to. "I don't think I could love someone who was leading one side of a war." Xavin makes a really tasteless joke about launching a pre-emptive strike with doomsday weapons and ending the war right away, and Karolina calls him on it. He apologizes profusely seeing how mad she gets, and swears that he would order his people to surrender rather than launch such a strike. (which hints that if the strike was launched, it was on his order)
Go back briefly to present time, Chase wants to get Old Lace out of lockup under the theory that she's not a weapon, but a person. Molly goes along (if we have room to see the scene, we might get another clue about Molly's understanding alien languages. I don't think the issue would have room for it, but this is as good a place as any to talk about it. At some point, it's revealed that Molly can understand alien languages and, for that matter, all human ones, too. It's not a new power of hers, it's her hat, which was built in the future, and contains a 'universal translator' embedded in it (it's also fireproof, self-regenerating, impact-resistant, self-cleaning, like all of her future-created clothes and so came out not even dirty from the Leapfrog explosion, an early clue. However, this isn't an excuse to give Molly one repeatable costume, like many kids she doesn't WANT to wear the same thing every day, and doesn't even like that particular hat that much. Though maybe sometime, like Superman's cape, she tries to cut it apart to make a superhero costume only to have it keep reassembling. It's just one cool thing she has that may come up from time to time)
Victor's instructed to see about interfacing with the computer systems so they can hack it if they need a quick getaway. Karolina drags Noor off to try to get the truth from Xavin. She demands a private visit with him, unmonitored. The military leader complies, suggesting she's his defacto 'advocate' until he finds another, and says something "Prince Xavin, your bride wishes to see you".
That triggers another flashback, to the wedding day. It's a bit of a lovey-dovey scene between the two of them, maybe discussion how she doesn't understand how they could have the dinner BEFORE the ceremony, she'd be too nervous to eat. But things are good, he gives her one more chance to to back out if she doesn't love her, she says she does. K'dox intrudes, Xavin shifts back to skrull form swiftly, begs a word. The Majesdanians are complying with the terms of the peace agreement, standing down their Light Brigade, just as the Skrulls have pulled back from the heliopause. Ships holding Skrull POWs are preparing to launch and likewise, ships holding Majesdanian prisoners are preparing to launch. But there are a "few more" details to iron out. K'dox and Xavin discuss things privately while Karolina looks out at the guests assembled to eat. After they conclude, K'dox says "To the Skrull empire", and Xavin returns the salute. Karolina asks what it's about and he says, "Just some security details. Nothing to be concerned about."
In the present, Karolina faces Xavin, with Noor nearby. "I wanted to hear it from you," she says.
Xavin looks to Noor, realizing why he's there. "You brought Noor, because you don't trust me to answer you honestly."
"I want to."
"Noor couldn't help you. One of the first things they teach people in Super Skrull training is how to create a false layer of thoughts to deceive telepaths. IF I wanted to lie to him, I could."
Noor tries to explain that he can't even read the thoughts because they're in another language, but Karolina interrupts, "See? When you've been taught so much about deception, right from the day you were born, can you blame me for having a LITTLE doubt?"
"No."
We get a 'telepathic wordbubble' starting. *Can you hear me? Noor, can she hear me?* *Yes, I can hear you.* *We're working on a way to get you out, but we don't want to say anything out loud. That's why he's here.*
"You should return to Earth."
"Don't say that. I have doubts, but... I don't believe it, deep down. I just worry that I shouldn't to trust my belief, if that makes sense. If they're at all honest about being fair, we're going to get you off. We'll all be allowed to testify at the trial, the good you've done since coming to Earth."
"No."
"No?"
Xavin ends the issue by saying "If Kod'x has fingered me, then there's only one possible outcome to the trial. I will be found guilty. I'm responsible for the destruction of Majesdane."
DUN DUN DUN!
Runaways #42 Solicitation:
(Cover: Karolina, blazing in her starform, cradelling the body of one of her friends)
"We're All Made of Stardust"
It's out of the frying pan and into the fire! The Runaways are home... almost. There's one big problem. They're travelling in a crippled Majesdanian ship, but it's too damaged to land on the Earth, so it's decided to go for what it thinks is the best place to await a rescue. From a Majesdanian perspective, that's right into the Sun. Karolina can stand the heat, but this ship wasn't built for alien comfort. If they can't figure out the controls in time, they're dead.
Runaways #39 Outline:
Maybe to begin with a bit of catching up with the other Runaways, Lotus trying to teach Nico magic again, then we go to Karolina reacting to Xavin's "confession". She asks Noor to leave them alone, deciding to rely on their personal relationship.
"You're saying you did it? You launched the missiles?"
"No, of course not. But I might as well have. I knew when we watched those missiles launch, that it was my fault. My foolishness allowed it to happen."
"Oh, Xavin, that's not the same thing..."
"It doesn't matter. My father had a saying. 'Righteous anger is not soothed by truth, only blood.' These people lost a whole planet. They could never acquit me."
"If it's a farce, all the more reason to..."
"No. If you try to rescue me, they'll turn their anger to Earth to find me. I'll not have that. Return. Return to Earth."
"We're a long way away from Earth. And I can't. Who'll be your advocate?"
"Do you really think it'll make a difference?"
"I have to."
"Then perhaps it will. Maybe I'm wrong. I'll tell the truth of what happened and take my chances."
She goes back to the Runaways and insists that she doesn't care what Xavin says, they're continuing to work to break them out. Even though they're on an alien spaceship, between two different galaxies. "I want plans."
Victor comes to visit at once point, because Xavin asked for him. She asks if he can record something, in case things don't go well. Xavin's afraid that, as soon as judgement is rendered, they'll be executed - it would be the way their father would do it. So they wants someone to record their life story, in their own words. Victor agrees. We see a montage of the alien ship arriving at the new, temporary, Majesdanian homeworld, a planet close to the sun but not inside of it. They land on the dark side (and, like on Majesdanian with Xavin, in a shielded area of it), and Xavin is ushered towards trial. As they are, we see something like this in the narration boxes, what they tell Victor.
"On Tarnax VII, there is a local tradition. Each Skrull is said to have a secret theme to their life, and their mission is to find it. The theme repeats in their life, over and over again, in their own fate, and in that of those they become close to, and so, when discovered is shared only with family and the most trusted friends, for fear it would grant power to enemies. My father's theme was Ew'K'in, the Illusion of Change. To outside appearances he went through many changes, from prince, to warlord, from kind ruler to despot. But to those who knew him, they knew that he was the same inside. He was among the most static Skrulls I've met... his values did not change. The changes were just masks. Conversely, my mother's theme was Lyrrn, Adaptability. She rode through genuine changes, and became a different person to deal with them. When war came, she was a fierce warrior, savage and ruthless... when it was time for peace, she became a saint. Both are strong themes for a Skrull, and as a hatchling I wished I would discover mine was one of theirs.
Growing up, I found two themes predominant in my life. The first was an unlucky one. Nrt, Uncertainty. It was no theme for a skrull, particularly one of royal blood. I hoped to quell it with the other theme I saw in my life, K'Zara, The Change that Begins in Deception. When I was uncertain, I acted certain, and in time Uncertainty faded. K'Zara was good to me, it gave me everything I wanted, even if I didn't always know I wanted it. When I was scared, I acted brave, until I became brave. When I wished to be a warrior, I pretended I was one, and in time it was true. I pretended to love Karolina, and one day I found I actually did. That happened faster than I ever would have imagined. She pretended to love me, for the sake of our worlds, and I was gladdened to find K'Zara worked on her heart as well. Later, I pretended to be a female for her sake, and K'zara stuck me in that form. No one ever told me the secret themes had a sense of humor. But slowly I've come to accept it, even love it. Now, though, no amount of pretending in existence will save me. Nrt, Uncertainty has returned.
(Victor, signified by a different word bubble): It'll be okay.."
"No, let me finish, without interupption. For most of my life, I had teachers, I had duty, but no friends. My father wouldn't allow them, calling them weakness. It was one of the many things he was wrong about. They're strength. But my friends can not save me either. The truth certainly won't save me, but nor will lies. My people value truth highly, because we find so easy to deceive, so I'll speak the truth.
I was born Xavin (full name), in a palace on Tarnax VII, and a world celebrated. I may soon die on an alien sun, and another world will celebrate. This is my story of the time in between.
...
There's more to the story of course but it doesn't go here. Maybe Marvel would do a mini, or it could come up again later (like videos of the speech being remixed into a propaganda campaign), but now we have to go to trial so we don't hear any more of it in this issue. The judges are brought in.
There are 5, only two of which are Majesdanian. Because their law requires 'fairness' to the accused, 1 must be inclined positively towards the accused and two more must be 'Outsiders'. So there are two Majesdanians, one Skrull, one Kymellian, and one human, a representative from SWORD. 3 out of 5 is sufficient to convict. The Runaways are perhaps hopeful that it's not an obviously kangaroo court, but they realize - Earth just went through a Skrull invasion (and maybe an outsider might point out that Kymellians lost their own world, albeit to their own action rather than attack).
The trial starts with the court asking Xavin to verify their identity. "You are Xavin, (blah blah blah)?" "No, I am not." (Gasp!) "I am Princess Xava (yadda yadda yadda). I am female both by circumstance and choice. It's only appropriate I choose a more fitting name and method of address." They warn that such sophistry is not a defence, and Xavin (from now on, Xava) says she (from now on, she) doesn't intend it as a defense, she was Xavin and is responsible for everything done no matter what name. "But if I'm to be punished, I'll be punished as she who I have chosen to become."
There may be a break the proceedings where was see some of the Runaways planning. Karolina tries to enlist Jaya's help, but she reveals that she believes Xava's guilty, too. Maybe Noor and Victor obtain Nico's staff (possibly the Fistigons as well) using Noor's mind control on the few crew members on the ship. Maybe a bit of mysterious skulking people in the background doing mysterious things.
K'odx is put up first. He says he gave the order to launch the anti-matter missiles. When asked why, he gives the answer - the wedding, the peace agreement, it was all a deception. The goal was to get the Majesdanians to stand down their defenses and so slip the doomsday weapons in. Karolina cross-examines, trying to suggest that he had something to gain by implicating Xava, but doesn't seem to make any headway. She also brings up the issue of "if she meant to destroy Majesdane, why did she flee before the missiles were launched? Why not stay and be the hero of Tarnax VII?" K'odx suggests that maybe Xavin wanted to destroy his people. The reason the doomsday devices were not used before was because many scientists believed it would provide great damage to Tarnax VII as well. Xavin claimed he did not believe that, but K'odx has doubts.
Then, to have a bit of action at the conclusion, somebody tries to assassinate Xava. Molly might overhear the plan, a few people working in concert, speaking in an alien tongue, and warns everyone just as the attack launches (like one of those TV moments someone shouts "Gun!" and it's unleashed that very moment).
Runaways #43 Solicitation:
(Cover: Molly with her ear against a wall, listening)
"Outside"
Back on Earth, the Runaways enjoy some reflective downtime. They've retaken their home, the Stein-built facility hidden in an extra-dimensional space. But when they begin hearing strange noises, the Runaways have to wonder... what exactly is OUTSIDE the hostel... and what do they do if it wants in?
Runaways #40 Outline:
The assassination is foiled, with the Runaways help, although many of the Majesdanian guards also do their part to help it. It's an action scene so I'd leave the specific up to hypothetical artists. We might learn at this point that the 'signs' that the staff is safe to use again (cool to the touch?), at least for brief periods. Victor remains in control of the staff but lets Nico hold it to cast one spell, etc.
Karolina hopes to get it to cause a delay in the trial, but it doesn't, they want their justice swift. Xava is called next to tell her side of the story - which is that she was persuaded to hand over the weapon codes as a precaution - that it would be a tragedy if something happened, either a physical attack or something as simple as a sleeper agent poisoning Xavin's food at a critical moment. So he gave control codes to officers on duty in a secure bunker. When the fight broke out at the reception, it was chaos. Somebody who had the weapons codes launched them. Xava tries to take on more responsibility than she's really due - that she should have worked harder to ensure they wouldn't be used, that a leader is responsible for their troops even if they don't directly order it. Karolina's upset but does her best to defend Xava nonetheless.
Karolina next calls the Runaways to testify, a short montage with a bit for each of them. (Risking a bit of comedy, I could see Chase having testimony focused solely along the lines of, "When I first met Xavin, he was a dude, and then she was a hot chick, and then when he came back he was a lizard thing, then dude again, then a girl. Then we started calling her a they and I never knew if that was because she was two people." and other irrelevant things, not making fun of it but at least poking fun at the confusion that comes from changing pronouns)
There's a surprise witness, members of the Skrull delegation (the group that made peace after the blast), want to present evidence and a witness... Eastro, the Watcher overseeing Majesdane, or at least a recording of him. Even though the Watchers are bound not to interfere, he owed a favor and felt merely speaking the truth of what he observed and was told by the Tarnax Watcher, was not interfering. Elements of both Skrull and Majesdanian people wanted the war to continue, because they profited from it, and so they sabotaged the wedding, contriving an insult that would spark a resumption of hostilities. That the doomsday weapons were launched was a tragic series of coincidences and miscommunications.
Naturally, with this stunning element, the judges come to only one conclusion. It's a fake.
Xava is pronounced guilty (Though it's 3-2... the Kymellian and the Skrull vote innocent, the Human votes with the Majesdanians). Xava is taken away to await sentencing. No instant death penalty, but it'll be done in the next few days, probably by being sent into the sun.
The Runaways regroup again, and talk to Jaya. She WAS convinced by the Watcher, and so is willing to help now. The military leader of the ship also is on board with helping... he joined the Light Brigade thinking it a noble, honorable system, but believes that they were in part responsible for resuming the war... none of them were too pleased with the peace. He'll help get Xava away, as long as they don't plan to hurt anybody to do it.
The end of the issue has K'odx and Xava together in prison. Xava asks how he could betray her, accuse her of genocide in front of the Majesdanians. K'odx says, "It was the only way I could get them to help find you."
"I thought the testimony of the Watcher would sway them. I suppose they wanted blood, not truth. Your father was right." K'odx shapeshifts into a Skrull female. "But living under the sign of Lyrrn has taught me one thing, my son... always have a backup plan."
"MOTHER?"
(explosion) "Yes, dear. Come, Xavin. That will be the War Skrulls."
(Revealing that the cover wasn't actually skrullform-Xava after all, it was Xava's Mom)
Runaways #44 Solicitation:
I'm going to leave off the solicitations for a the rest of this. They're fun to write but I'm getting a bit tired. It might be part two of Outside, it might be something else. See the end of the issue outlines for my more general "where to go" plans.
Runaways #41:
Xava's mother explains briefly about how she came to be there. Xava's dad did die, but mom was merely taken prisoner... taking the role of another Skrull because she didn't want them to know they had such a high-value hostage. She was due to be released in the Prisoner Exchange after the wedding, but that fell through, she escaped and went on a search for the truth about what happened, by finding the Watcher and convincing him to break his oath and tell her what happened... K'dox was one of those who wanted to reignite the war, and though he didn't plan genocide, he deserved to die. By the time she got to him, they were all captured by the Light Brigade again. She killed K'dox and took his place, then used his position and some of the perks they gave K'odx for fully cooperating with the Majesdanian justice system to contact some of their deep cover agents and plan an escape, if worse came to worst, as well as get them to find Xavin.
Of course, breaking Xava and Mom out isn't the Warskrulls, it's the Runaways. She's annoyed, because it's "too soon". There's a bit of a fight, the Runaways overpowered at first by loads of people all as powerful as Karolina, when suddenly bombs are launched. The bombs depower all the Majesdanians. They're "Darkforce" bombs, which interfere with Majesdanian stellar nature, depowering them for a limited time. With that, the Runaways and a few of her Skrull soldiers who arrive have the advantage in firepower, but are still outnumbered. They fight through depowered Majesdane warriors... Nico wants to use spells, Victor won't let her - the staff's starting to grow warm again.
The Captain of the Majesdanian ship that brought them has given them an old Majesdanian shuttle, programmed the coordinates to take them to Earth. Xava's Mom wants to take them to one of the Warskrulls ships... she doesn't want to go to Earth, and wants Xava to come with her, promising to help restore her shapeshifting abilities, and "If it's your choice, to teach you what it is to be a Skrull woman."
Everyone else thinks that's nonsense, Xava belongs with them, but she surprises them and announces she has to go with her mother... because they have to split up.
If they leave together, the Light Brigade will follow Xava to the ends of the universe, now that she's been convicted. If Earth is harboring her, they'll attack it, and she can't bear to do that to the planet she's come to love, or put the people she loves in any more danger. But if they leave separately, Jaya and the military leader guy can tell them the truth. (Maybe Military guy also won't allow Xava and Mom on board anymore - he was fine with helping before it became a fleet battle)
Karolina doesn't accept this, begs the others to stop her, but Xava puts up a force field between Xava & Mom and everyone else. She says her goodbyes to everybody other than Karolina, ending with Victor, "I think, next to my love, I'll miss you most of all, Tin Man," (Molly reacting with a 'hey, what about me?'), and even gives him a hug, apologizing for treating him poorly at first. "You're a good man."
Then of course, she turns to K. Karolina tells her she wants to go with her. The others can go home. Xava refuses to put her in danger, and Karolina's place is on Earth, but says she loves her and promises that one day, when it is safer, she'll return. Karolina begs her to drop the force field, and she does, and they kiss. The Runaways pile into the shuttle, Xava and Mom board a ship with War Skrulls.
The Runaways ship is fired upon while they try to escape, and damaged, but it still makes it to a warp jump point.
The issue ends with Xava and her mother in the escape pod. Xava stares out a window while her mother talks about how they seem to successfully have drawn away the Light Brigade to follow them, but they should meet up with the rest of her forces before they can catch up. The humans are safe. Then she talks about plans, (perhaps a reference to the time, when Xavin was young, when all Skrulls in the universe temporarily lost their ability to shapeshift. She was briefed on all the methods to help gain them back, and one of them will surely help Xava regain her true form. Xava insists it is her true form, and Mom seems okay with it (though she might need to be corrected a few times on the name), maybe just giving a vague, "Well, then at least you'll have more of a choice". Then, seeing Xava is still sad, tries to cheer her up, telling her that she never had the chance to tell her how proud she was. "I know you care for that Karolina, but you did what was right. The right thing is rarely easy. I am so proud of you, for how strong you are being."
"I'm not strong, Mother. Maybe some day. Right now, I'm still only pretending to be."
Runaways #45 Solicitation:
(Again, nothing I want to write up)
Runaways #42 Outline:
I don't want to give a point by point analysis, but the big thing is that it lets the Runaways face their deaths, and Karolina face losing everybody. Damaged by Majesdanian fire at the end of the last issue, the ship can't land on Earth, and because Majesdanian AIs are simple, it goes for its standard backup plan - park in the corona of the sun until repairs are possible.
At first they're just worried about it taking longer to figure out how to get to Earth, but then it becomes clear it's becoming hotter and more radioactive. Either it's not a ship meant for protecting others, or its heat shielding was also damaged. Karolina might well survive, but it's growing uncomfortable and will eventually be fatal for everyone else. They make do for a while using spells (limited, sparking arguments between everybody and Nico, particularly Victor and Nico, because she wants to use the staff instead of Lotus' mostly ineffectual white magic), and other techniques to keep the ship cool as it approaches the sun, but it's looking pretty grim and hopeless.
Noor asks for forgiveness from the others, believing they're all going to die. Most are fairly willing to give it, in the spirit of "we're all going to die", except Molly who holds out (until, perhaps, towards the end, when she admits that she didn't want to forgive him because she didn't think they were going to die... and previous to that, she makes reference to it being like that Firefly episode where they were running out of air, they'll be rescued at the last minute... in fact, Molly might well have been pretty annoying with Firefly references during this arc, some real, some referring to 'the remake' she watched in the future, due to her excitement being in space). Lotus tries and succeeds at one last fling with Chase, although afterwards he tells her he wouldn't have done it if they weren't going to die. She asks him why, and he says he realized he's in love with somebody else.
Nico briefly considers doing a fling with K, but she's still raw from Xava leaving, and then goes to Victor, who's been thinking of his own - he's giving her back the Staff. He's no more mature than Nico is, and so he has no right to keep it from her or 'ration' her spells. She can make her own decisions. Oddly, instead of jumping him as was her plan to that point, she just hugs him. Unfortunately having the staff doesn't give them much help, she's already used teleportation spells twice, it would be far too dangerous to try again, and she can't think of anything else to try.
Victor also wonders a little about the future he and Chase saw, and Molly, and whether they screwed it up somehow.
Molly lasts, consciously, a little longer than everybody else (except K) because of her future-clothes. I see the title "We're all made of stardust" title coming into play as something Karolina tells Molly (while the others are conscious but so hot that they can't do much more than lie around and wait to die), that her parents told her (and perhaps what spurs her to finally offer to forgive Noor... but I see it as very grudging... like I forgive you but it doesn't mean I want to be your friend"). We're all made of stardust, the remnants of supernovas, every person in the universe is bound by being part of a sun, and maybe, one day, they'll become part of another person.
In the end, with everybody else incapacitated or nearly so, Karolina considers shutting down her powers with her bracelet and dying with everybody else, until they realize that there's a ship already hiding in the sun... one that belongs to Karolina's parents... they traveled off-world but nobody ever mentioned or seemed to think about where their ship went... because it hid in the sun until the Deans required it.
Karolina's able to contact it and arrange it to rescue them, (once she figures out the code word... maybe even her name, or a childhood nickname they gave her, giving her some feeling that maybe her parents cared for her after all (or it's written on her power-dampening bracelet).).
Although it may not all be established in this issue, this is meant as the group's leapfrog replacement. It's barely big enough for all of them, and at first at least Karolina's the only one who can fly it... from within. (Possibly it has an AI on board that will obey simple commands, so she can summon it from afar, but to do anything complicated she has to be onboard). Eventually, the group may try to interface the Leapfrog AI with it. Mostly it's just like a leapfrog substitute, with lasers, shields, cloaking device (albeit perhaps one that's light-based, only works in sunlight or something like that...), except it can actually go off-world, and has limited 'beaming' technology (beam aboard, like in Trek. But like the ship at the beginning of the arc, it can only sweep up everybody in a wide area).
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Now since I've run out of DETAILED plot for the time being (if I were actually writing this I'm sure I could come up with something, but there's a limit to what I can do for speculative stuff only one or two people might actually read), I'll just jot down some quck thoughts on where to go from there. Heh, which is just as well, because I think I calculated issue #43 would be the point where, if I was really writing it, I would have "passed" BKV in terms of numbers of issues of Runaways written. (And, if we were being continuously published, this would take me up to something like 2012... for all I know, the world would end by then!)
Once they return, that buffer arc or short arcs to get settled. Lotus leaves immediately and doesn't come back for some time, if at all. Maybe one arc would be another encounter with another of the superpowered kid-gangs, maybe the all-girl gang this time (I have an idea for a character in the girl gang called "Meme Mimi" or "Mimi Meme", who's power is to hack your mind and appear everywhere... and it takes weeks to wear off completely. For the first couple hours you see pretty much nothing but her, but after that for a long time you'll think you see her out of the corner of your eye, etc, things like that. I have the idea that Noor mentions to, say, Chase, who got hit with it, that one time one of his friends called her "Screaming Mimi" and she blasted him with it. "She appeared in every nightmare of his for a month. I do not envy you, my friend."... that's not a plot, just local color. And Sniktbabe, a girl with claws (who has no relation to wolverine aside from taking the sound effect snikt)), and get them situated back in their new place and take a little pressure off the major plotty thing.
After that, probably for issue #50, we bring back Gert. Well, not Gert, but an alt. Gert. Here's how I'm thinking of it. She comes from a universe where Alex didn't sneak off and discover the Pride a year early. So, the rest of the Runaways didn't discover it a year later when he triggered the secret passage.
When the Rite of Thunder came around, the Deans and Hayes make their move against the rest of the Pride... but fail. They're killed. Maybe one of alt-Gert's parents dies too. The kids don't know about this, they're told their parents died in a car accident or something. Molly is taken in by the Steins (because Victor knows she's his daughter), Karolina is empancipated, becomes a bit of a Hollywood Wildchild. Time passes, and then Gert discovered what was going on, tried to assemble the other kids against them, but is betrayed... by Chase, who was informed of this all after hitting 18, before Gert found out.
So naturally she has an instinctive hatred for our Chase, which informs part of his arc for the next little while - he knew she was coming, just not when, and it's part of the reason he broke it off with Lotus. But he foolishly expected he could just slip them back into the same roles, without realizing that from her perspective, he's the kind of person who could turn into their parents. So he tries for a while to get her to fall for him (not in a creepy obsessive stalker way, but maybe treading CLOSE to the line), but eventually has to come to realize that you can't force things like that (and, perhaps, that's when she actually DOES start to warm to him).
Anyway, alt-Gert and some of the other alt-Runaways lived through the Second Wave of the Gibborum's plot, ones that are designed to drastically reduce the world population and destabilize the governments. One by one, she lost everybody else. Karolina took the opportunity to escape the Earth's problems by leaving with Xavin. Alex died, and was actually a good guy (because he started a relationship with Nico before learning about the Pride). Molly was brainwashed, maybe. Nico perhaps started to go ultra darkside. I don't know if they ever met Victor, if they did I imagine he died. Finally, with no other option, Gert took a time machine (one designed only for sideways travel between alternate universes) and fled to look for help. So, when the Gibborum here become active again, alt-Gert is the person who knows the signs, what to look for, what to try to stop. That's why she sticks around instead of just running, because she thinks she can make a difference in this world. She possibly also wants help to save what's left of her world, which would be good for an arc down the line... since the Paradise hasn't been completed yet, and there are still loads of pesky humans on the Earth. (And maybe in the process a trip to several different alternate Earths, just for fun)
Alt Gert has no corresponding Old Lace - among the minor changes in her world (since it's not an exact copy up until the year Alex finds out, there are subtle differences before that) is that her parents decided on another means to protect her... maybe a personal force field from the future that renders her virtually invulnerable (but with no corresponding strength or anything), I don't know, but something different. (I kind of picture the forcefield having speedball-like properties, redirecting force).
Anyway, brief character-based plotlines for the next while would include:
Chase: Dealing with alt-Gert and coming to terms with the fact that no matter how much he might want her to be the woman he loved, she's not, she's just very similar.
altGert: Her guilt at having left a world behind, and learning to trust people again after everyone she cared about died or let her down.
Karolina: Moving on with her life after Xavin, rebuilding her friendship with Nico.
Nico: Trying to balance out her need to use magic to control situations and the risks of it, and of course, rebuilding her relationship with K, some tension with Victor since he's still pretending to be her mystery man on the Internet.
Molly: A relationship with Noor, of course! Nah, just kidding. I thought about it, and maybe EVENTUALLY it might go down that road, but I wouldn't rush it. I do at some point think she might need SOME kind of relationship angst, just cause she's getting to that age. Maybe a crush on somebody unattainable for a bit of DAWWWness. Long ago I joked about her developing a crush on Victor, maybe that would come into play, and of course there's always Jack Power. Other than that, nothing immediately comes to mind for her though, she's the fun character of the group, doesn't need to work through issues all the time.
Victor: His usual problem of worrying about the future and his destiny, perhaps exploring more the idea of reprogramming himself, remove his self-perceived flaws, or other aspects of machine culture. He also still wants to get back together with Nico, and maybe part of "reprogramming himself" might be to turn himself into Nico's ideal man (doesn't she always go for bad boys, though? Uh oh). I think he might be due for the next arc centered on him. No, maybe Nico, actually. She had an important role in this arc and the previous, but it's a long time there was an arc devoted to her like this was a K/X arc.
Noor: Trying to find a place within the group that, although they've accepted him, he's not really a part of. Maybe down the line something to do with his grandfather as an eventual threat, the Shadow King, depending on how the X-universe looks at the time (since he's part of their whole dealio and if they say he's absent or doing something else he can't be used). I'd also want to explore his religious side, with him starting to follow the rituals and such of Islam, even though he's not sure of the existence of God at first, sort of questing and in some ways seeking a surrogate parent figure since his own let him down. But since there are few Muslim superheroes, I kind of would have wanted to make him another. (Another possibility is pairing him up thematically with Victor somewhat, with events gradually conspiring to make Victor lose his faith while Noor is seeking his... not 100% sure I'd want to go down that road, since Victor's quiet faith is an interesting part of him, but hey, crisis is always interesting).
Old Lace: overcoming her crippling donut addiction.
Klara: Facing the horror of Dutch Elm Disease! No, more seriously, she'll be a quiet presence and anything in her garden grows super fast, temporarily eliminating the 'how are they feeding themselves' concern. It's a vegetarian diet (which Karolina's all okay with) so some of the characters still find themselves needing money to get more fast foodish fare if it's required for story points, as well as clothes.
Other plot lines, character arcs, include Old Lace laying fertilized eggs from her time in the past, probably another Katie Power/Molly team-up, a new Young Avengers/Runaways teamup (crossover oriented, most likely, so I can't predict the exact plot, but I would like to see one that's NOT crossover oriented, just the two groups teaming up to fight a common foe, like, say, Ultron)
In the future, if I still were writing it, Xava would return, but probably not for a while (and perhaps bringing another threat), as would Alex - his spirit is locked inside the Staff of One. He might well be the next 'Big Bad' after the Gibborum's next plan are dealt with. Perhaps he gets free and can possess people for short terms. Or if you want to get really wacky, he 'jumped' out of the staff of one when Xavin took it briefly, and went into her body, wanting a shapeshifter. It took him time to assert control, but then once he does... How's that for a love triangle? Alex fighting over the body of Xavin, one wants Karolina, one wants Nico, and the girls are torn between their respective first relationships and each other! ;) I don't think I'd go that route, but I did consider it.
Like I said, I did rush this and skimp over some of the details, as my memory fogged over in the last few months, and really, I was getting to the point where I was just really eager to be finished (finishing this was one of three personal goals I wanted to meet before I activate my X-Box live Gold membership and start playing L4D online), so it's a bit sloppy and not as strong as some of the earlier work. Sorry to the one or two of you who actually read this.
A few comments on the Xavin/Xava arc and getting rid of him/her/them. I actually grew to really like Xavin while I was writing these, far more than I expected to - in fact, I kept putting off the exit... when I initially thought of what I'd do taking over Runaways, getting rid of Xavin was one of those things on my list. But by the time I did, I didn't want to, but felt I had to... albeit in a way she could return down the line.
The idea of K'Zara has been with me since the beginning (there was a moment in the Victor/Victorius arc where Xavin is about to tell them about it, but is distracted, and he mentions K'Zara when Klara couldn't change out of Barkform, like she pretended she couldn't). It underlied a lot of my plans - in many ways, one of my rules of thumb was that any time Xavin pretended something, that something would come true. They pretended their true form/gender identity was a woman, and they became one both physically and later in terms of self-image and pronouns. They were told to "if you're not going to stop being robophobic, at least act like you're friends with Victor" and eventually grew to develop a crush on him and respect him as a person. I sort of had the idea that Xavin wasn't fond of having to take care of Klara too, but pretended she was okay with it, then they were stuck in the past together and they grew to really take care of her. Of course, the biggest problem was the pronoun. Just in keeping straight which to type (particularly when referring back to a previous time)! Like I said last time, the name was a big factor in that - Xavin just reads to me like a male name, so my mind automatically goes to the male place when I'm talking about her, even if she's a female. Part of it is that's how we were introduced initially, as a male, and my mind is just very slow to change (it's not from a conscious lack of acceptance of the transgendered, but the vision in my head of people are strongly influenced by how I met them first). I also hope that my choice to portray Xavin as somewhat more "confused" about their gender doesn't somehow provide offense... I'm sure many people are very certain of their gender identity (even when it doesn't match the gender they were assigned at birth) but I believe there are who struggle with it, and Xavin's journey in the official comics felt far too facile, particularly for someone who seemed to choose to present as female just to please someone else so I wanted to build on it as a journey and earn the moment where she finally decides, for real, to embrace being female.
I was almost going to have Xava keep Karolina behind a forcefield for their whole goodbye, thinking it poignant, but then realized I'd inadvertantly be contributing to the trope "Gays and lesbians are cool, but let's do whatever we can so they don't have to kiss and offend somebody" (okay maybe that's not actually a trope, but it seems to happen a lot in comics, where there's always some reason to avoid an on-panel kiss). And so I didn't want to leave them without an on-panel kiss, although of course, if I was actually writing this "for real", it's possible Marvel would object somehow. Anyway, as it turns out, I think it makes their parting a bit more poignant that Karolina doesn't just have the decision forced on her, but participates in it, even passively by not fighting, even though she hates it.
In other 'what might have been' aspects, I thought about having them get home via Alex Power, agent of SWORD, aboard his starship Friday (completing my goal of having them meet all of the Power Pack kids... unless you count Franklin of course).
Speaking of Franklin, it occurs to me that Fantastic Four and the Runaways have an interesting plot potential, since the Runaways have evil super-parents, whereas the main couple of the Fantastic Four are superHERO parents. Not sure what to do with that since I literally just had the idea, but it's something to think on.
I don't think I spent as much time on the culture of Majesdane and Skrull as I would have liked. Couldn't really fit it in. Would have liked to have more with Jaya (who, btw, I imagine was the father of "James Dean", the Majesdanian boy seen in the future by Chase and Victor), but same issue.
Anyway, this is a good enough time to end it. Comments are welcome and appreciated of course, if anyone besides me enjoyed it (or didn't and wants to discuss specific ideas anyway).