The Other Shoe

• Writer - Scott Lobdell
• Penciler - Pascual Ferry
• Inker - Tim Townsend
• Inker - Rob Hunter
• Inker - Mark Morales
• Colorist - Team Bucce
• Lettering - Comicraft
• Lettering - Richard Starkings
• Editor in Chief - Bob Harras

Summary

  Anti-mutant demagogue Kelly is in fear of his life. In his home in Arlington he waves a gun at an intruder, but it is Scott, whom he called for help.

  Most of the X-Men are in the Blackbird, hovering cloaked over the Pentagon. Bobby wonders why the government team X-Factor isn't handling this, but they are busy (with the Hound program, X-Factor 122-123).

  Remy and Jean sneak in to Operation: Zero Tolerance. They know how to avoid the mutant detectors, since Forge made them, and Jean is psionically making them look like military officers.

  In Colorado, Warren and Betsy recuperate and work out. Her perceptions are heightened since the Crimson Dawn, and in the shadows she senses a psionic cry for help and is overwhelmed.

  Bastion addresses collected ambassadors, announcing a unified international anti-mutant force. Jean doesn't sense a mind in him. Bastion warns of Onslaught, a mysterious force causing problems worldwide.

  Kelly explains to Scott that the operations he backed, however desperate, never aimed at mutant genocide. He warns him of a new, international group; then Graydon's thugs burst in, the room explodes, and Kelly is silenced.

  Xavier mentally listens to Bastion's speech, although he hadn't been able to before. Bastion pulls a gun; Jean is unable to grab him telepathically, so she and Remy run for it. Remy blasts through a wall, and they find soldiers all over the ground, unconscious. Onslaught appears, but only to Jean, saying it is a gift from him.

  Betsy wakes, but the form in the shadows (Juggernaut) is about to break through.

  Note: Jean's story is continued in X-Men II:53; Scott's in X-Force 55.