Eventually, of course, everyone turns to Jamie for the definitive word. Where does he stand? Where does X-Factor stand? What should they do about Quicksilver?

Jamie just leaves.

Outside on the stoop he confronts Layla Miller. He's pissed, but she's as flippant as usual. She never asked him to trust her, everyone just did it. Nobody asked her about the Decimation. She tells Jamie that a cab is coming down the road and, if he wants, he can stop it and send her back to the orphanage. They stand by in silence as the cab passes them and Layla explains that Jamie needs her to help make the decisions, to understand what they need to do and where they need to go. Jamie asks, though somewhat sarcastically, where should go now. Layla is pretty specific in her instructions, and even tells Jamie to buy a hat, scarf and gloves. He goes along with her and tells her that this isn't over. Layla agrees, they'll be arguing for quite some time. Why? Because Jamie and Layla will eventually get married. Jamie just grimaces and keeps walking.

Jamie does buy the stuff, and takes a moment to try and figure out this Tryp thing. Both Junior and Senior are the same person, what does that mean? Are they dupes? Clones? Aren't clones common place these days? Spider-Man always seems to be in so many places at once, Jamie always figured he'd been cloned at some point... But his thoughts are soon interrupted by whatever Layla has sent him to. It's Aegis from the New Warriors, being chased by SHIELD for not registering with the Superhero Registration Act. Jamie runs with and Aegis tels him that first they get their names, and the next thing will be shipping the super heroes off to fight in a war. He tells Jamie to get out of there, but Jamie pulls Aegis into an alley. He's going to help out, like heroes are supposed to do. As they move into the dark, Jamie says that bad guys are supposed to be afraid of the good guys, good guys shouldn't be afraid of the people they're trying to help.

The SHIELD troops come out calling for Aegis, but they're soon met by an army of dupes! Aegis has slipped on one of the dupes' coat, hat, and scarf and slips out through the crowd. SHIELD corners the coatless dupe, who's very depressed. Jamie helps Aegis escape to the subway, and Aegis turns down and offer to go back to X-Factor and get them in deeper. He figures maybe he can find Captain America. They part friendly and Jamie reabsorbs all of his dupes, including the one being interrogated. SHIELD have identified him as Jamie Madrox, but he soon disappears. The shock of absorbing so many at once make Jamie fall down the subway entrance.

In another part of Mutant Town, Quicksilver is looking to buy a new home. But the Astonishing X-Men arrive outside and call him out to fight. Layla shows up and explains that X-Factor now know the truth about the Decimation, and then she explains away the scene in House of M #8 when she woke up to her mother calling her. That was just a lie, she really is from the orphanage. She's had parents in the past, but not anymore. But now the lies are all falling apart, and X-Factor has arrived. They're the ones who called the X-men about Quicksilver as a way to confront the X-Men. They're pretty pissed about not being told about the Decimation, how Cyclops and the like just decided that X-Factor didn't deserve to be in the know. The X-Men lied to them, pretended to be their friends.

Colossus says that the X-Men don't have to defend themselves, they did what they thought was right. Siryn greets that with a sonic scream, and Cyclops regretfully strikes back with a concussive optic blast! But that's when Madrox arrives and jumps in front of it! The force of Cyclops blast creates a whole street full of dupes and Madrox is none too happy. He taunts Cyclops to blast him again, to make 50 more, 100 more! Make enough dupes so that he alone can kick the X-Men's butts. Wolverine is ready for action, but Cyclops holds him back. Madrox shouts at Cyclops that they trusted him. Wolverine says that everybody lies and Madrox should just get over it.

Cyclops explains that they wouldn't let people know that a mutant had created the House of M and then simply put things back in order. If everyone knew a single mutant could simply reshape the world, humanity would want to destroy all the mutants. A wolfified Rahne points out that humanity has always wanted to kill mutants, what's new is that Cyclops didn't trust them with the truth. Now there's this government registration, where do the X-Men stand on that? Cyclops says that Emma has already declared neutrality for the X-Men. He says that Rahne of all people, after all her schooling with the X-Men, would understand the need for superheroes to be trained.

Pietro arrives and quotes a famous man, explaining that doing nothing encourages monsters like Hitler to act. Where is the vigilance one should expect from the X-Men? Cyclops says they don't need to be lectured by Pietro, and says the government and the representatives aren't Hitler and his power-grabbing Nazis. Guido points out that Hitler didn't grab power. He was elected. Quicksilver leaves and Madrox, backed by X-Factor, declares that he's going to call a press conference. X-Factor is going to oppose the superhuman registration act, and anyone who wants help avoiding the government just has to ask for it. Madrox asks if the X-Men will support them. Cyclops tries to once again explain their neutrality, but Madrox interrupts and tells the X-Men to get the hell out of Mutant Town, threatening their own little mutant Civil War. Wolverine is ready to attack, but Cyclops holds him back.

Cyclops then tells X-Factor that the X-Men will be monitoring Quicksilver, and if he sets foot outside of Mutant Town, the X-Men will be all over him. He tells Madrox to enjoy his little kingdom, and God help them when it all comes crashing down...because the X-Men won't.

When they leave, Rahne asks Jamie if they just won. Jamie hasn't the faintest idea...

Review: And we hit one out of the park! This was a great issue, really showcasing the strengths of the Madrox character. Make no mistake, Jamie is the star of this book and it's his story that's so compelling. Totally embracing Civil War, though with a touch of Quicksilver and Decimation, Madrox finally makes a decision and stands by it. It's a nice little adventure he has to help him make the decision, but it's the showdown with the X-Men that really stands out as one of the highlights of the series so far! Sure, this comes off as a scene that will set the precedent of X-Factor never appearing in any main X-book for a long time, but still, it's fun. Jamie faces down Cyclops, Wolverine and a couple other members of the Astonishing X-Men in his bid for truth, mutant justice and X-family trust. The argument seems a bit one sided, as I completely disagree with how Marvel has handled the Decimation. It's really come off as just an editorially mandate, since all the main X-Men kept their powers and none of them seem to care about helping anyone. The Decimation and 198 are only being handled in periphery titles. It sucks, but there's nothing I can do about it. So I just accept it.

Let the Astonishing X-Men have their fun, Jamie Madrox totally put his foot down! Of course, we never get to see this press conference. It's shown in the Daily Bugle/Civil War leaflet and really tells us nothing new...other than a little hint about future Monet developments that I won't get into because I don't want to spoil it. Also, Layla does a fine job of still being Layla, though I'm a bit disappointed that she explains away everything we learned about her from House of M. It's just a bit sad that the character was completely changed from her intro to this second appearance. She was turned into a completely knew character...unless she really has some weird connection to Scarlet Witch. We'll find out.

The rest of X-Factor doesn't really do much this issue, but that's okay, this was Jamie's issue. He's hilarious in a wonderfully subtle way. From his inside joke about the Spider-Man Clone Saga to the fall down the subway stairs, it's just a nice touch of humor. It really helps bring out the character. What's also important is that we get several precedent setting moments about Jamie's powers, whether intentional or not. For example, the multiplying of the hats and gloves means that he can duplicate clothing. In the past, this suits had been unstable molecules. Now perhaps he can duplicate more. One super blast from Cyclops creates a lot of dupes, I never knew that before. Also, he leaps into the blast, says it's going to hurt, and a panel later he's standing up just fine and wiping the spot away. Can he literally absorb the impact? I don't know, maybe we'll find out. But the hat and the big blast issues are brand new as far as I know. And he's my favorite super hero, so I'd like to think I know him well.

Art is still great! Calero nails Madrox throughout and especially in the group scenes, even if some of the dupes look wonky. His X-Men don't look as bad as his Spider-Man though.