Rogue's X-Men found themselves drawn into a confrontation at Graymalkin Prison, the former Xavier Institute that had been converted into a prison specifically designed to hold mutants. Dr. Corina Ellis was running the facility, and among the mutants being held there were Jubilee and Beast. Professor Charles Xavier was also imprisoned at Graymalkin following his actions during the fall of Krakoa.
The problem was that Rogue's team wasn't the only group of X-Men coming to Graymalkin.
Cyclops and his Alaska-based X-Men had launched their own mission, and although both groups opposed what Ellis was doing to mutants at the prison, Rogue and Cyclops had very different ideas about how they should handle the situation. Rogue still felt a tremendous amount of loyalty toward Xavier and believed that leaving him imprisoned was fundamentally wrong. Cyclops had become considerably less forgiving of his former mentor and believed Xavier needed to face the consequences of his actions.
Their disagreement became increasingly hostile as both teams entered Graymalkin.
Ellis had also prepared the prison specifically for an attack by mutants. Graymalkin contained powerful anti-mutant defenses as well as mutant prisoners known as Trustees who had effectively been weaponized against other mutants. Among the most dangerous people working with Ellis was a mutant named Phillip, better known as Scurvy.
Scurvy had originally met Ellis when she presented herself publicly as sympathetic toward mutant causes. She gradually exploited his abilities and manipulated him until he became completely devoted to her. Scurvy possessed an extremely dangerous ability to manipulate negative emotions, allowing him to intensify anger and resentment that were already present in other people.
That was particularly effective against Rogue and Cyclops.
The two X-Men leaders already had legitimate reasons to disagree, but Scurvy's influence pushed those emotions beyond anything reasonable. Their argument erupted into an outright fight between the Louisiana and Alaska X-Men teams, leaving mutants battling mutants in the middle of a prison specifically constructed to contain them.
Eventually the manipulation was exposed, allowing the X-Men to turn their attention back toward Graymalkin.
Xavier himself confronted Scurvy telepathically. During their confrontation, Scurvy revealed a strange connection between himself, Xavier and the recently deceased young mutant Harvey X. All three appeared to belong to a mysterious category of mutants called the Avians, and all shared another disturbing characteristic: tumors in their brains.
Although the X-Men survived the raid and rescued their captured teammates, the experience did little to repair the divide between Rogue and Cyclops.
Rogue remained furious over Scott's willingness to leave Xavier behind, while Cyclops believed Rogue's loyalty to Xavier was clouding her judgment. Both considered themselves defenders of mutantkind, but they were developing very different philosophies about what the X-Men should be now that Krakoa was gone.
The confrontation also made it clear that Graymalkin remained a serious threat. Ellis had survived, her anti-mutant operation remained active, and she was already developing new ways of hunting mutants.
Back in Louisiana, Rogue's team returned its attention to the four young mutants they had taken under their protection: Ransom, Calico, Jitter and Deathdream, collectively known as the Outliers.
The younger mutants were still trying to figure out both their powers and their places within this makeshift X-Men family. Ransom had a miniature black hole where his heart should be. Jitter could hyper-focus and temporarily become extraordinarily proficient at virtually any skill. Calico possessed an unusual psychic connection with her horse Ember and could manifest powerful fiery constructs through that connection. Deathdream could move between states of life and death, becoming something resembling a ghost and manipulating the energies of the dead.
The Outliers were powerful, but they were still essentially kids with very little experience.
Graymalkin decided to exploit exactly that vulnerability.
A new anti-mutant weapon was unleashed against them: the Bloodhounds. Rather than traditional humanoid Sentinels, these machines resembled terrifying robotic hunting dogs. They were designed to track mutants through enhanced senses and tear them apart with vicious mechanical teeth. Unlike the enormous Sentinels mutants had fought for years, the Bloodhounds were smaller, faster and specifically designed to hunt their targets relentlessly.
The Outliers encountered the Bloodhounds while away from the protection of the senior X-Men and were forced to defend themselves.
What began as an attempt simply to survive gradually became an opportunity for the young mutants to prove that Rogue's faith in them wasn't misplaced. Ransom, Calico, Jitter and Deathdream began functioning like an actual team rather than four frightened kids who happened to share a house.
Jitter pushed herself to protect Deathdream. Ransom and Calico fought the machines directly, while Calico demonstrated increasingly impressive control over the fiery manifestations connected to Ember. Deathdream's strange relationship with death once again made him both unsettling and unexpectedly useful.
Wolverine and Jubilee eventually became involved in the fight, but the Outliers weren't simply waiting for the experienced X-Men to rescue them. They were learning to protect one another.
The confrontation occurred publicly, which created an unexpected problem for Graymalkin. Instead of producing another incident that could be used as evidence that mutants were dangerous, witnesses saw mutant children defending themselves and protecting ordinary people from murderous machines.
For once, the public reaction wasn't automatically against the mutants.
That infuriated the people behind the Bloodhound program. Graymalkin's attempt to create another anti-mutant incident had instead allowed the Outliers to look heroic.
Nightcrawler was experiencing something similar on a smaller scale. While helping around the community, Kurt continued interacting with ordinary people who were gradually learning that the frightening-looking blue mutant wasn't someone they needed to fear. He also discovered another young mutant, Chelsea, beginning to come to terms with her own abilities. Kurt's experiences reinforced the possibility that Xavier's original dream of mutants and humans living together wasn't necessarily dead, even if the institution Xavier created had collapsed.
By the end of the Bloodhound attack, the Outliers had taken an important step toward becoming genuine X-Men. They were still inexperienced and frightened, but they had survived an attack specifically designed to kill them and had protected innocent people in the process.
Graymalkin, however, remained active.
Ellis and the people working with her had now demonstrated that they weren't content merely to imprison mutants. They were developing weapons capable of actively hunting them.
Rogue's team therefore found itself fighting on several fronts at once. The philosophical split with Cyclops had become more serious, the mystery surrounding Xavier and the strange Avians remained unresolved, Graymalkin continued developing anti-mutant technology, and the four young Outliers had become targets simply because they existed.
And hanging over everything was Charles Xavier.
The raid had raised new questions about whether the X-Men should still trust the man who founded them—and Xavier was about to become a much larger problem for both Rogue and Cyclops.
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