Magneto

Magneto hovered high above the nation of Krakoa. He had lived through more than his share of wars, but as he gazed down at the Mutant homeland below, he could barely begin to comprehend the full scope of the horrors unfolding on his own sovereign soil. Still, it was not as if he hadn’t seen this coming…

When Emma Frost had first approached the Quiet Council with the idea of reviving her Hellfire Gala in the futuristic era that Mutantkind now called home, Magneto immediately voiced his reservations. He feared that some unknown force might try to take advantage of his people’s hospitality to further their anti-Mutant agenda. With all eyes on their emerging nation, he knew they would have to tread extremely carefully. Still, he gave Emma his vote and let plans move forward, holding onto faith that he and his fellow X-Men would be able to take on any threat this new world could throw at them. What he failed to realize was that the biggest threat to Krakoa wouldn’t come from Earth… at least not directly…

After the Gala began, the Krakoan gateways — which offered Mutants instant access to the island from various strategic points across the universe — were somehow hijacked by an invading army of artificial life forms led by the antagonistic android Ultron. As far as Magneto could tell from the mechanical madman’s rantings, this version of Ultron had been built on Earth decades ago, but had subsequently been banished to the stars by the Avengers. Now, something had summoned Ultron back home, and he was determined to assimilate Earth into his growing cosmic empire during his visit. Krakoa was just another stop on his world domination tour. But if Magneto and his allies banded together and stopped Ultron now, it could very well be his last.

Chaos and carnage quickly erupted across the island as seemingly endless waves of Ultron’s armed automatons arrived on the scene. As most of the Mutant and human heroes who had assembled on Krakoa worked to fend off the streams of synthetic soldiers, Magneto turned his focus on finding the one true Ultron and ending his existence. And now, he had finally found his foe, who was currently distracted by the brutal attacks of a very angry Hulk dressed in the tatters of a suit. Magneto saw the opportunity to strike and seized it.

“No more, Ultron!” Magneto shouted as he rose into the air on a wave of magnetic force. “Krakoa is a free nation… and you shall not take it from us!”

Ultron didn’t even bother to turn and look at Magneto. Instead, he dispatched dozens of his drones to attack the Mutant leader. But with just a wave of his hand, Magneto crumpled the legion of robotic soldiers into tiny spheres of scrap that rained down upon Krakoa’s lush surface.

Magneto would not be insulted further by entertaining Ultron’s puppet soldiers. He wished to face the true threat head on. He generated a massive sphere of magnetic energy between his hands, ready to unleash it at Ultron.

“Consider this battle —”

Before the Mutant Master of Magnetism could release his energy wave and complete his declaration of victory, he was unexpectedly hit with a powerful blast that seared a hole straight through his reinforced armor. It seemed that Ultron knew the threat Magneto posed after all, swiftly and silently removing his foe from the game board. As his body plummeted to the ground below, Magneto knew his battle was nearly over.

“Magneto!” Captain America yelled, racing over to aid his fallen Mutant ally. “Hang on, soldier. We didn’t both survive World War II only to be taken down by some rusty pile of —”

The Captain stopped himself suddenly. He had seen countless allies fall on the field of battle over his years in service, so he knew a fatal wound when he saw one. Magneto wouldn’t last much longer.

“Do not fret, Captain,” Magneto said, a strangely reassuring tone in his voice. “I have died… many times before… and this… won’t be the last…”

As Captain America held Magneto in his arms, the Mutant leader’s vision began to fade from red, white and blue to a deep black.

Many humans believe that a person’s entire life flashes before their eyes in the seconds before their death. But the Mutants of Krakoa know otherwise. For them, their entire lives — every memory and every moment — flashes before their eyes in the seconds before their rebirth. This is a side effect of the Resurrection Protocols, a process in which a full scan of their minds is downloaded from Cerebro into a brand new body grown in the Krakoan Hatchery. It is a delicate process, but one that has given countless Mutants another chance at life. And today, that chance belonged to Magneto.

After what somehow seemed like both a split second and an eternity, the black of the void gave way to a blinding display of memories. Magneto saw his life as a young boy in Europe. His days as a prisoner in a concentration camp. The unexpected discovery of his Mutant powers. His first meeting with Charles Xavier. The countless battles he fought for Mutant supremacy and, eventually, equality. And when his memories finally raced to the point where Ultron struck him down, Magneto emerged from his pod in the Hatchery, gasping for air, alive and whole once more.

Without a word or a moment of hesitation, Magneto used his powers to call forth the metallic elements buried in the Krakoan soil, fashioning himself a new suit of armor far more durable than his last. He then exited the Hatchery and headed to find Ultron. It would be easier to locate the villain this time, as Magneto had sensed a strange, otherworldly element in the alloy that covered the exterior of Ultron’s frame. He honed in on that unique metallic signature and followed it to the heart of Krakoa, where he found Ultron swiftly approaching.

“Curious,” Ultron said upon seeing Magneto alive and well. “I thought your life signs had been extinguished. When I detected your bio-signature suddenly return at another location, I had to investigate the anomaly.”

“I am no anomaly,” Magneto replied, hurling long spears of reshaped scrap metal toward Ultron at a furious speed. “Like so many of my Mutant brethren, I have simply been reborn.”

“And you will be reborn once more,” Ultron said, his devilish grin glowing in the darkness of the Krakoan jungle. “This time in my image.”

Expecting a physical attack, Magneto erected an enormous metal shield in front of his body to protect himself from harm. But this time, Ultron released a cloud of techno-organic nano-bots that swiftly navigated past Magneto’s shield and surrounded the Mutant’s helmeted head. Magneto had already inhaled thousands of the microscopic machines before he could even think to create an electromagnetic aura around his body to repel them. Mere moments later, Magneto could already hear Ultron’s voice buzzing inside of his head.

“Could this be…?” Ultron said, as his mind linked with Magneto’s via the nano-bots’ neural network. “Do you Mutants truly have a machine capable of resurrection? A way of growing powerful new bodies and downloading your consciousness into them? I simply must give it a test run!”

Magneto fought past the pain of his body’s techno-organic invaders and reached out toward Ultron with all of his magnetic might. That much force should have instantly ripped Ultron asunder, but the sinister synthezoid’s body barely bent.

“The techno-organic virus I infected you with is programmed to prevent you from doing any harm to me,” Ultron gloated. “But even if it weren’t, your powers would have little effect. My current form is forged of Mysterium. I’ve found it to be nearly immune to this planet’s basic laws of nature and physics. Still, as impressive as that is, I can’t help but wonder what my next body will be capable of. I have a feeling we’ll find out soon enough…”

With that, Ultron departed, heading toward the Cradle where Cerebro was stored. Magneto tried to give chase, but found himself locked in a new war — one with his very own body. The machines in his bloodstream were swiftly replicating and seizing control. Because of their unique alien techno-organic composition, they contained almost no traces of magnetic metals, which meant that Magneto could not expel them from his body… a body they were claiming more and more of with each passing second.

For a moment, Magneto considered using his powers to impale himself on a metal pike, strategically triggering the Resurrection Protocols again so that he could be reborn in a body free of the virus. But if Ultron managed to get his hands on Cerebro, it could disrupt the entire process, making Magneto’s next death — and the death of every other Mutant — far more permanent.

Instead, Magneto decided to forge ahead, struggling to make his way out of the dense jungle. Eventually, he found himself at the foot of a statue built in honor of Charles Xavier — the founder of the X-Men and one of the driving forces behind the great nation of Krakoa. Magneto caught a glimpse of his reflection in the plaque at the statue’s base. Nearly half of his body had already been converted into techno-organic matter by the virus, and it was spreading fast. Magneto gazed up at the larger-than-life figure of his old friend and thought back to the many years they had spent together, both as enemies and as allies.

“Charles…” Magneto struggled to say “…is this… how the dream dies…?”

No. A familiar voice responded inside of Magneto’s brain. Not like this. Not today.

Magneto didn’t know if he was hallucinating, reliving a distant memory, or actually communicating with his long lost friend. But it didn’t matter. Hearing Charles’ voice in his head once more gave him the strength he needed to turn the tide of the battle within himself.

Magneto knew he couldn’t take control of the nano-bots that had flooded his bloodstream, but he could take control of the bloodstream itself, thanks to the iron in the hemoglobin of his red blood cells. If he could consciously slow his blood flow, he could halt the techno-organic virus's advance. Magneto focused all his power inward and, within moments, he could feel the pain beginning to cease and the control over his body returning.

“Not like this, Ultron,” Magneto said, echoing the words of his oldest ally as he returned to his feet and prepared to head back into the fray. “Not today.”