"House Divided, Part 4"
by Nunzio DeFilippis, Christina Weir and Aaron Lopresti
Synopsis: Sean Garrison stands over Shan Coy Mahn and Doug Ramsey, going on about how he’s going to kill them for knowing too much about Project Genesis. He’s cut off by Brian Cruz, who tags him, causing him to want to get away from himself. Garrison is so panicked he smashes a window with a chair and jumps out, plummeting to his death. As the three recover, Brian asks whether they should be worried about Laurie. In Japan, Laurie’s pheromones cause the New Mutants, Hellions and Human Resistance to break out in a fight. Dust drops Quill and a human tosses a grenade to finish him, but Synch jumps on it and takes the blast. Mercury, immune to Laurie’s powers, tries to speak reason to her, but Laurie brings some humans towards her to finish her off. Surge and David attack Scion, but Magik teleports them away. Laurie turns towards Jubilee and Dust and has them attack each other. As Laurie watches, pleased, Mercury disarms the humans, and then skewers Laurie through the back. In a volcano, Nori zaps Magik and Scion knocks David into the lava, but saves him at the last moment as the pheromones wear off.
Wind Dancer blows the pheromones away from the group, but as Sophie tries to fix the psychic damage, members of the Human Resistance put four bullets through her. Pierce is attacked by Moonstar as order falls apart. With Sophie gone, Project Genesis’ mutant guards realize their presence. One freezes Quill and another shatters him, unleashing the teams’ fury upon them. Moonstar catches Pierce’s claw and forces him to skewer himself in the face, killing him. The teams begin dismantling the project but are stopped by the appearance of Emperor Sunfire. With no other option, Nori attacks full speed, finally succumbing to the injuries she suffered at the hands of Josh Foley and Kevin Ford. As she dies, the rest of the mutants attack. Then the world goes white.
Review: Well, that’s it for House of M in this book, and I can’t say I’m too crushed about that. This story tried to pull some emotion into the story, but since it was obvious going in that none of these events would matter, the deaths of Synch, Laurie, Quill, Surge, Sophie and Sean Garrison just feel like an obligatory body count. The fight ended predictably, but did have a little interesting scene in which Dust was angered at Jubilee for pushing her away from her roots. Of course, this isn’t much of a surprise for those of us who have become familiar with Dust.
Next issue’s the big one. I can hardly wait!