One of Marvel’s New Ultimate X-Men Just Crossed a Line She Might Never Come Back From

One of the Children of the Atom's strongest members has just lost control of her powers in the most heartbreaking way possible.

Ultimate X-Men #10 finds the young Natsu Tsukishima wasting away in bed as her bother rattles her bedroom door with exciting news about the enigmatic Maester's latest revelation. While Natsu's mother is fiercely dedicated to the Children of the Atom, the young mutant herself has no interest in what the cult has to say about her or her life as a mutant. When Natsu's mother lashes out by calling her a failure, her hurtful words elicit one of the girl's optic blasts, and while the first merely strikes the door, the next brings a brutal end to her entire life in an instant.

Ultimate X-Men #10

• Written by PEACH MOMOKO
• Script adaptation by ZACK DAVISSON
• Letters by VC's TRAVIS LANHAM
• Design by JAY BOWEN & KAT WALKINGTON
• Main cover art by PEACH MOMOKO
• Variant covers by NAO FUJI, MATEUS MANHANINI, and PEACH MOMOKO

Natsu Tsukishima made her comic book debut in Ultimate X-Men #3, which introduced her as one of the classmates of Nico Minoru, Hisako Ichiki, and Mei Igarashi. Natsu is also a member of the Children of the Atom, the cult of mutants who believe they are destined to inherit the Earth as the superior branch of humankind. While Natsu has been a partiuclarly reserved figure, the fact that her powers have already taken the life of at least one person explains why she is so reticent to embrace her existence as a mutant, let alone one of the Children of the Atom.

Marvel's latest Ultimate X-Men run is just one of the many moving pieces that make up the current iteration of the Ultimate Universe, also known as the reality of Earth-6160. This reality was uncovered by the villainous variant of Reed Richards known as the Maker, who used his powers and foreknowledge of major historical events to reshape it in his own image as best he could. As a result, the world of this reality is almost entirely devoid of any heroes of its own, whereas its villains lord over the global population in the name of the Maker himself.

While Natsu is a clear replacement for Scott Summers' Cyclops in the reality of Earth-6160, she is hardly the only new take on a classic X-Men character that has been introduced throughout the course of the new Ultimate Universe's history so far. Apart from Natsu, there is the young Mei Igarashi, better known as Maystorm, who commands many of the same powers as the primary Marvel Universe's Ororo Munroe, aka Storm. That being said, the current Ultimate Universe still has an Ororo of its own, opening the door for this reality to be defended by two very different iterations of the iconic Weather Witch.

Ultimate X-Men #10

Source: Marvel Comics