Piotr Rasputin (Colossus) has returned to the village of his birth to pay his respects to his deceased parents. While he visits their graves, at a Russian military research camp dubbed “Province 13”, the director, General Sergei, makes his rounds. As he watches a nurse test a boy and a girl for psychic abilities, he conemplates what he considers his wasted career trying to find gifted mutant youngsters. He is shaken from his thoughts as, for an instant, he feels the mind of the girl, Nanya, touch his. He is then notified of a call for him from Moscow.
Back at the village, Piotr enters a church next to the cemetary and finds within an old woman praying. She turns and rises to meet him, but upon recognizing Piotr, she spits at his feet and expresses contempt for his family. Through tears, she tells him he should have never returned, and he sadly exits.
Not far away, Kurt Wagner (Nightcrawler) and Logan (Wolverine) stroll through the snowy woods. They come to an area where the trees appear twisted and dead, and also find two oddly withered deer carcasses. A gunshot rings out, and Logan decides to investigate.
A squad of Russian soldiers storm the churchyard and approach the elderly woman, indent on taking her into custody. Piotr returns in his armored form of Colossus to defend her and is shot at by the soldiers and their helicopter, but the shells merely bounce of his metallic skin. Shortly, more troops enter the church, but all they find is a collapsed wall through which Colossus escaped with the woman, and a deep tunnel freshly dug into the floor of the church.
Nearby, Wolverine and Nightcrawler confront two soldiers, Gregor and Valerie, who are searching for an escapee from the camp. As the four tensely face-off, the soldiers’ quarry, a huge grotesquely misshapen creature enters the scene and attacks the group. Wolverine slashes at it, but stops, confused, and falls to his knees. As Nightcrawler tends to him, a helicopter sets down. The troops hold the two X-Men at gunpoint, and then drag away the unconscious Wolverine. With little choice, Nightcrawler teleports to a nearby treetop, where he can only watch as the chopper fries off with his friend aboard.
In his office at Province 13, General Sergei is on the phone with his superior in Moscow. He is told that the facility is to be assessed for its value to the government, and so his superior will arrive two days hence for an inspection. Shortly after hanging up, Sergei receives another call, a report from his men indicating they have not yet succeeded in apprehending the escaped creature, which he refers to as “Nikolas”. Sergei continues, saying he authorizes “more drastic measures”.
In time, a Russian helicopter flies over the jungle canopy of the Savage Land, searching. Soon, a metallic tentacle whips up and grasps the landing gear. The soldiers aboard confront their assailant, the exiled Arkady Rossovich, also known as Omega Red. They tell him they are there to take him home.
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