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The end of the Krakoa era is here, and with the release of January 10's Rise of the Powers of X #1, the second of Marvel's two interlocking limited series that will close the book on Krakoa alongside Fall of the House of X, the stakes have never been higher.
What's on the line as we hurtle toward the new age of the X-Men? And what could it mean for the X-Men as Krakoa comes to an end, one way or another? We'll break it all down right now.
Spoilers ahead for Rise of the Powers of X #1
Rise of the Powers of X #1 by writer Kieron Gillen, artist RB Silva, color artist David Curiel, and letterer Clayton Cowles spends a good chunk of its page count visiting an alternate timeline, five years after the fall of Krakoa in that world. Like the mainstream Marvel Earth since the launch of the Krakoa era with House of X and Powers of X, this reality is on the verge of being conquered by AI machines that will destroy humanity and mutants alike.
An alternate future X-Men team attempts to stop the machine takeover as they're picked off one-by-one, 'Days of Future Past' style, with Wolverine left as the last man standing to undertake the mission. And succeed he does, as he discovers this reality's version of Mister Sinister, who, like the other Sinisters involved in the story, has stolen Moira MacTaggert's mutant ability to reset the timeline upon her death.
Wolverine kills Sinister, resetting their timeline and ending the machine threat once more. At the same time, Rasputin IV from the core timeline tracks down the alt-reality's Doctor Stasis (himself a clone of Sinister) and kills him as well, collapsing the entire timeline.
Rasputin IV returns to the core timeline, reconvening with Xavier and Cypher, who, along with three other unidentified mutants whose names are classified in the backmatter, are working on a goal that will save mutantkind from extermination, and end the threat of Orchis and the machines once and for all - and it's as dire a plan as the X-Men have ever undertaken.
According to Xavier, the group's secret mission is to travel back in time and kill Moira MacTaggert as a young teen, before her ability to reset the timeline develops, which would not only mean that Krakoa would cease existing, but that reality will be rewritten as though Krakoa never existed, thus also meaning that the downfall of the mutants would have never come to pass.
Will it succeed? We'll have to wait and see as Fall of the House of X continues on February 14, followed by Rise of the Powers of X #2 on February 21.
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