The Phalanx Covenant: The Return of Hotshot
                                #1
			by Ben Church bchurch@su.edu

     The Phalanx, The StarJammers, Vincente and the X-Mansion belong 
to Marvel.

     "Give my regards to my son." Corsair's parting words echoed in his 
ears.  Soon, he found himself back on the planet of his birth.  Will 
Davidson, had returned.
     He stood on the front lawn of the Mansion, taking it all in.  He 
jumped as text appeared on the lenses of the shades that Cybo had let 
him keep.  He'd forgotten for a moment what they really were.  Will took 
them off and put them in his pocket.  He wanted no reminders of what 
had happened to him just yet.  The mansion looked strange for some 
reason that he could not quite place.  He blinked and realized what it 
was.  He was seeing it for the first time with both eyes.
     After he had climbed from the lower levels of Coruscant (X-Men: 
Trek Wars) he'd been reunited with the Imperial Guard, and an elated 
Anhala Starbore.  He'd been too late to be reunited with the X-Men 
however.  He'd stayed through the conference, waiting for the Shar to 
arrive.  Once they had, the extensive process of cloning him a new body 
began.  When the new body was ready, Oracle, with the help of Luke 
Skywalker and Lawaxana Troi had transferred his mind into it, leaving 
Cybo's memories behind.  Now Cybo, and Anhala were back in space, the 
Imperial Guard's newest members.
     "I'll never get used to this." he thought.  "I'd just gotten used 
to the patch."  He began to walk towards the house, wondering what kind 
of greeting he'd receive.  "I hope they haven't given someone else my 
room yet."
     He opened the door slowly and walked inside.  "Hello?" he called. 
 The house seemed eerily quiet.  "Jubilee?  Beast?  Professor?"  There 
was no answer but his own echo.  "Must be on a mission." he thought.  
"Well, I'll be a nice surprise when they get home."
     Unbeknownst to him, he was being watched from the balcony above 
him.
     "ERROR." the unseen observer said.  "DESIGNATE: DAVIDSON, WILLIAM 
A.  STATUS: DECEASED."
     "There must be someone home," Will reasoned.  "Otherwise, who'd 
guard Creed?"  Behind him, he heard something plop to the ground.  He 
whirled around, expecting to see an escaped Sabertooth.  Instead he saw 
what looked like a mechanical version of the Blob (the old horror 
movie, not the X-Villain).
     "What the hell are you?" he asked cautiously.
     "WE ARE THE PHALANX.  YOUR KIND WILL BE ASSIMILATED."
     "Are you sure you're not the Borg?"  Will had heard the tale of 
how Anhala's world had been destroyed.  "God help us if they ever come here. 
Or if you two form an alliance."  Will slipped on his shades.  
*Complete scan.* he thought.  *Search for Weakness.*
     The Phalanx leapt, it's body undulating towards him.
     "Yikes!" Will cried, dodging to the side.  The Phalanx reached out 
an arm and snagged his ankle.  "Uh oh."
     SCAN COMPLETE.  PHALANX: BIO-MECHANICAL MATRIX, POSSESSING A HIVE 
MIND LIKE THAT OF THE BORG.  THEORETICAL WEAKNESS: DISRUPTION OF 
ELECTRICAL IMPULSES MAY TERMINATE THE ENTITY.  WARNING: SUCH A TACTIC 
WILL ONLY WORK ONCE.
     "Well, all right."  Will shot a blast of heat at the ceiling, 
collapsing it on the Phalanx.  The momentary distraction was all Will 
needed to escape.  "Fusebox, gotta find the fusebox."  Will ran to the 
garage.
     The Phalanx soon emerged from the collapsed ceiling and started 
after him.
     "RESISTANCE IS FUTILE.  SOON MUTANT KIND WILL BE WIPED FROM THE 
EARTH."  It's speed increased, and began to catch up.
     "Must go faster," Will muttered.  "Must go faster."  The Phalanx 
elongated it's arm and formed it into a blade.  Will ducked 
instinctively.  "I wonder if there's any truth to Luke's claim that 
Mutants have the Force?"  While still at the conference, he'd had long 
conversations with Luke about the nature of his power.  "Nah.  I just 
felt the rush of wind."
     Finally, he reached the huge, four door garage which held among 
other things, the fusebox.  The Phalanx close at his heels, he ran 
towards it.
     "YOU HAVE NOWHERE LEFT TO RUN MUTANT.  SURRENDER, AND ACCEPT YOUR 
FATE."
     "No," Will said.  "You accept your fate."  He whirled, ripping a 
high voltage cable from the wall, and thrusting the un-insulated end 
into the Phalanx.  "This better work."
     "ERROR, ERROR, ELECTRICAL DISRUPTION, UNABLE TO REROUTE 
-------------@----------*"  Slowly, the Phalanx began to disintegrate, 
and fall apart.  Soon, it was nothing more than a puddle of 
bio-mechanical mesh on the floor.
     "I don't know what I'll do when I meet another one of these 
things.  Now let's see what happened here."

     "My god." Will thought when he saw the state of the Professor's 
ready room.  "What the hell happened here?."  He walked to the ruined 
computer.  He let the shades scan it, and then an interface tendril 
shot into it.
     *Download all surviving files.*
     DOWNLOAD COMPLETE
     "Geez, that didn't take long at all.  I hope there's something 
useful in here."  Indeed there was.  When the files came up, he viewed 
each one in turn.  The first was a video surveillance tape showing him 
everything that had occurred in the mansion up till the explosion of 
the computer.  The second was a record of all the files accessed within 
the last twenty four hours.  The last, was the most important.  It 
contained the Cerebro files of two mutants, these files, he
saw from the record, were accessed by the phalanx, but not by Banshee.
     "Oh god," Will thought.  "I've got to get to them before the 
Phalanx does!"

               Next Issue:  The origin of Vincente!