Categories > Cartoons > X-Men: Evolution > Aftermath
DISCLAIMER: See the Prologue.
SPECIAL DISCLAIMER: See the Prologue.
CHAPTER 1
Another dawn, another day...
Magnus Lensherr was already up in time to watch the sun rise over the horizon. There was something about the rising sun's soft yet brilliant first rays that made him feel alive again.
Of course, maybe that has something to do with the fact you kept holing yourself up during the day wherever you hid, only going out at night to do what you had to...
The thoughts of the man who called himself Magneto were right, of course. He had done plenty of bad and wrong things in the past. Then again, maybe not as bad as that mutant massacre, but still rather bad.
Somehow, Magneto just simply knew that eventually, there would be a terrible conflict with mutants being exterminated like mere insects. But that didn't mean he had to do what he did and handle things they way he did.
One of the things that truly chilled Magneto down to his old bones was the uncanny parallels between Nazi Germany and the mutant massacres spearheaded by William Stryker. How everyone else got whipped up into a feverish bloodlust against the minority, how brutally the victims were killed... even how the members of the hate-filled organization wore armbands and used eagles.
There was that old saying about how those who failed to learn the lessons of history were doomed to repeat it. This was a lesson which the United States of America had learned, but had forgotten. (Here, Magneto remembered other such events in American history like the Trail of Tears or the interment of Japanese-American citizens during World War II.)
The strange thing was, Magneto began to form his mutant-superiority beliefs with such thoughts in mind, about how to avoid a repeat of the Holocaust.
Okay, so maybe marauding around in his Magneto look didn't help matters...
It wasn't as though Magneto just came out of the concentration camp at the end of the Second World War hating humanity and wishing mutants would replace their evolutionary predecessors. No, even after all he had seen and endured, he was willing to give humanity a second chance.
However, that all changed when he used his mutant powers to help save lives in the village he was in, where the villagers showed their gratitude by killing his wife and trying to kill his twin infant children as well.
Now, he supposed it was perhaps inevitable that things would reach a breaking point... but looking back on it now, he could see that he could have prepared for it better.
Magneto would have never changed if he hadn't been captured by Apocalypse and had been forced to relive his worst memories. He had allowed himself become what he was because he refused to let go of his emotions, thinking they gave him power and made him stronger. (Even his own son caught onto that, although he pointed it out by sarcastically calling him "Darth Vader" once.)
The pre-Apocalypse Magneto would have taken the evidence of Stryker's atrocities and thrown it in the faces of the American government and every other non-mutant around the world, shaming and belittling them and using as justification for attacking them in response.
The post-Apocalypse Magneto, however, used it for the same reasons as Xavier did.
Magneto didn't want revenge anymore; he now knew and understood how vengeance was not what so many people thought it was. He just wanted for himself and his fellow mutants to not be persecuted.
Actually, he always did want that... but before, he would have been willing to resort to doing evil things to ensure it.
Now, another parallel to the Holocaust occurred to him: The horrible event ensured that no one would be willing to do the same thing again. Granted, it was a costly lesson, but debating about whether it was really necessary was moot.
Not only did his friend Charles Xavier show him otherwise, but so had his students, like Scott Summers and Kitty Pryde. Their optimism might have been just what he needed.
However, that wasn't all which Magneto apparently needed. He remembered Magda, and how he promised to take care of their twin children. At first, he shuddered at the thought, wondering, What would Magda think of what I had done?
The question then shifted into something else. What would Magda think, how would she feel, if I couldn't fix what I had done, especially to our own family.
As a father, Magneto didn't have the luxury of simply giving up. He still had much to atone for, to himself, his children, and plenty of others.
Eric Magnus Lensherr still had much to live for, and he was not about to throw any of that away.
A/N: So, how was that?
Note about the Darth Vader thing: Anyone else see any similarities between Magneto and Darth Vader? Helmet and cape, deep voice, marked/disfigured somehow made the way they became because of events earlier in their lives involving deaths of loved ones (especially spouses), sired twin children, tortured/abused daughter, tried to convert son to own philosophy, son represents sun while daughter represents moon (kind of like Apollo and Artemis from Greek mythology)... Let's see, if X-Men first came out in 1963 and Star Wars first came out in 1977, suppose that the former could have somehow inspired the latter?
Next chapter coming up soon... -Quillian
SPECIAL DISCLAIMER: See the Prologue.
CHAPTER 1
Another dawn, another day...
Magnus Lensherr was already up in time to watch the sun rise over the horizon. There was something about the rising sun's soft yet brilliant first rays that made him feel alive again.
Of course, maybe that has something to do with the fact you kept holing yourself up during the day wherever you hid, only going out at night to do what you had to...
The thoughts of the man who called himself Magneto were right, of course. He had done plenty of bad and wrong things in the past. Then again, maybe not as bad as that mutant massacre, but still rather bad.
Somehow, Magneto just simply knew that eventually, there would be a terrible conflict with mutants being exterminated like mere insects. But that didn't mean he had to do what he did and handle things they way he did.
One of the things that truly chilled Magneto down to his old bones was the uncanny parallels between Nazi Germany and the mutant massacres spearheaded by William Stryker. How everyone else got whipped up into a feverish bloodlust against the minority, how brutally the victims were killed... even how the members of the hate-filled organization wore armbands and used eagles.
There was that old saying about how those who failed to learn the lessons of history were doomed to repeat it. This was a lesson which the United States of America had learned, but had forgotten. (Here, Magneto remembered other such events in American history like the Trail of Tears or the interment of Japanese-American citizens during World War II.)
The strange thing was, Magneto began to form his mutant-superiority beliefs with such thoughts in mind, about how to avoid a repeat of the Holocaust.
Okay, so maybe marauding around in his Magneto look didn't help matters...
It wasn't as though Magneto just came out of the concentration camp at the end of the Second World War hating humanity and wishing mutants would replace their evolutionary predecessors. No, even after all he had seen and endured, he was willing to give humanity a second chance.
However, that all changed when he used his mutant powers to help save lives in the village he was in, where the villagers showed their gratitude by killing his wife and trying to kill his twin infant children as well.
Now, he supposed it was perhaps inevitable that things would reach a breaking point... but looking back on it now, he could see that he could have prepared for it better.
Magneto would have never changed if he hadn't been captured by Apocalypse and had been forced to relive his worst memories. He had allowed himself become what he was because he refused to let go of his emotions, thinking they gave him power and made him stronger. (Even his own son caught onto that, although he pointed it out by sarcastically calling him "Darth Vader" once.)
The pre-Apocalypse Magneto would have taken the evidence of Stryker's atrocities and thrown it in the faces of the American government and every other non-mutant around the world, shaming and belittling them and using as justification for attacking them in response.
The post-Apocalypse Magneto, however, used it for the same reasons as Xavier did.
Magneto didn't want revenge anymore; he now knew and understood how vengeance was not what so many people thought it was. He just wanted for himself and his fellow mutants to not be persecuted.
Actually, he always did want that... but before, he would have been willing to resort to doing evil things to ensure it.
Now, another parallel to the Holocaust occurred to him: The horrible event ensured that no one would be willing to do the same thing again. Granted, it was a costly lesson, but debating about whether it was really necessary was moot.
Not only did his friend Charles Xavier show him otherwise, but so had his students, like Scott Summers and Kitty Pryde. Their optimism might have been just what he needed.
However, that wasn't all which Magneto apparently needed. He remembered Magda, and how he promised to take care of their twin children. At first, he shuddered at the thought, wondering, What would Magda think of what I had done?
The question then shifted into something else. What would Magda think, how would she feel, if I couldn't fix what I had done, especially to our own family.
As a father, Magneto didn't have the luxury of simply giving up. He still had much to atone for, to himself, his children, and plenty of others.
Eric Magnus Lensherr still had much to live for, and he was not about to throw any of that away.
A/N: So, how was that?
Note about the Darth Vader thing: Anyone else see any similarities between Magneto and Darth Vader? Helmet and cape, deep voice, marked/disfigured somehow made the way they became because of events earlier in their lives involving deaths of loved ones (especially spouses), sired twin children, tortured/abused daughter, tried to convert son to own philosophy, son represents sun while daughter represents moon (kind of like Apollo and Artemis from Greek mythology)... Let's see, if X-Men first came out in 1963 and Star Wars first came out in 1977, suppose that the former could have somehow inspired the latter?
Next chapter coming up soon... -Quillian
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