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Back among the living |
Real
name: Scott Summers Former aliases: Erik the Red I, Slym Identity:
Known to certain government officials Occupation: (current) Adventurer, (former) Student, radio announcer Former
occupation: Subversive, second-in-command of Factor Three Legal status: Citizen of the United States with no
criminal record Place of birth: Anchorage, Alaska Marital status: Married Known relatives:
Christopher (Corsair, father), Katherine Ann (mother, deceased), Alexander (Havok, brother), Philip, Deborah (grandparents),
Madelyne Pryor (first wife, deceased), Jean Grey (Phoenix, second wife), Nathan Christopher (Cable, son), Gailyn (niece),
Joey (nephew) Rachel (Phoenix II, daughter by Phoenix in an alternate timeline), Tyler (Genesis II, grandson, deceased) Group
affiliation: (current) X-Men, (former) X-Factor I Base of operations: (current) Xavier Institute, Salem Center,
Westchester County, New York State, (former) X-Factor I headquarters, New York City; "Ship" First appearance: X-MEN
(first series) #1
History: Scott Summers was the older of the two sons of Major Christopher Summers, a test
pilot in the U. S. Air Force. When Scott was a child, Major Summers flew himself, his wife Katherine, and his sons Scott and
Alex back from a vacation in his vintage private plane. The plane was attacked and set ablaze by a scout ship from the alien
Shi'ar Empire. Katherine pushed Scott and Alex out the plane door with the only available parachute. The parachute was unable
to slow their fall sufficiently to prevent Scott from suffering a head injury on landing. (The injury damaged the part of
Scott's brain that would have enabled him to control his optic blasts.)
The two boys were separated by the authorities: Alex was adopted, but Scott remained comatose in a hospital
for a year. Christopher and Katharine were believed dead. (Actually, they were taken prisoner by the Shi'ar; Katharine soon
died but Christopher later became Corsair, leader of the Starjammers, a band of interstellar adventurers.)
On recovering,
Scott was placed in an orphanage in Omaha, Nebraska that was secretly controlled by his future enemy Mister Sinister. Years
later, as a teenager, Scott began to suffer from severe headaches and eyestrain. He was sent to an eye specialist in Washington,
D. C., who discovered that lenses made of ruby quartz corrected the problem. While Scott was visiting a large city, his developing
mutant power to project optic force beams finally erupted, bursting forth in an uncontrollable blast that demolished a crane,
causing it to drop a huge object towards a terrified crowd. Scott saved the crowd by obliterating the object with another
blast, but they turned into an angry mob, thinking he had tried to kill them. Scott fled, ultimately escaping on a freight
train.
Professor Charles Xavier and F.B.I. agent Fred Duncan joined forces in their mutual attempt to find Scott.
Meanwhile, a mutant known as Jack O' Diamonds, and later as the Living Diamond, forced the frightened boy to aid him in his
crimes. Xavier rescued Scott from the Living Diamond and enlisted him as the first member of the team of young mutants he
would teach in using their powers, the X-Men.
As Cyclops Scott soon became deputy leader of the X-Men. He fell in
love with his teammate Jean Grey, although his reserve and his worries about the dangers of his optic beams prevented him
for years from expressing his feelings to her. When the other original X-Men left the team, Cyclops stayed on as deputy leader
of the "new" X-Men.
Shortly afterwards the cosmic entity called the Phoenix Force secretly placed Jean in suspended
animation and impersonated her, adopting a form identical to hers. When this Phoenix committed suicide, Scott believed that
the real Jean had died and he left the X-Men. Eventually he returned to the team and met and married Madelyne Pryor, a woman
who was Jean's double; he was unaware she was a clone of Jean created by Mister Sinister. Scott and Madelyne had a baby son,
named Nathan Christopher, and Scott again left the X-Men.
Subsequently, the real Jean Grey emerged from suspended
animation. Scott left his wife and joined with Jean and the other original X-Men in founding a new team, the original X-Factor.
Madelyne went insane, developed superhuman powers, and perished in combat with Jean Grey.
Later, Apocalypse
infected Nathan with a techno-organic virus. To save his life, Scott was forced to allow a time traveling member of the Askani
cult to transport Nathan to the 30th century of an alternate future.
After Professor Xavier returned from a long sojourn in space with the Starjammers, Cyclops
and the other X-Factor members rejoined the X-Men. Ever since then Cyclops has remained with the X-Men, sharing deputy leadership
with Storm.
Scott and Jean were finally married. While they were on their honeymoon, Mother Askani, leader of the
Askani cult, drew their spirits two millennia into an alternate future, where they inhabited new bodies. There, as Slym and
Redd, they spent years raising young Nathan into his early adolescence. Then Scott and Jean returned to their own time and
bodies, and Nathan remained to grow up into his time's greatest hero, Cable.
Height: 6 ft. 3 in. Weight:
195 lbs. Eyes: Brown (glow red) Hair: Brown Strength: Athlete Fighting skills:
Extensive training in hand-to-hand combat Special skills and abilities: Experienced battle tactician, strategist
Known superhuman powers: Cyclops possesses the mutant ability to project a beam of concussive, ruby-colored
force from his eyes. Cyclops's eyes are no longer the complex organic jelly that utilizes the visible spectrum of light to
see the world around it. Instead, they are inter-dimensional apertures between this universe and another, non-Einsteinium
universe, where physical laws as we know them do not pertain. This non-Einsteinium universe is filled with particles that
resemble photons, yet they interact with this universe's particles by transferring kinetic energy in the form of gravitons
(the particle of gravitation). These particles generate great, directional concussive force when they interact with the objects
of this universe.
Cyclops's mind has a particular psionic field that is attuned to the forces that maintain the apertures
that have taken the place of his eyes. Because his mind's psionic field envelops his body, it automatically shunts the other-dimensional
particles back into their point of origin when they collide with his body. Thus, his body is protected from the effects of
the particles, and even the thin membrane of his eyelids is sufficient to block the emission of energy. The synthetic ruby
quartz crystal used to fashion the lenses of Cyclops's eyeglasses and visor is resonant to his minds' psionic field and is
similarly protected.
The width of Cyclops's eye-blast seems to be focused by his mind's psionic field with the same
autonomic function that regulated his oriinal eyes' ability to focus. As Cyclops focuses, the size of the aperture changes
and thus act as a valve to control the flow of particles and beam's relative power. The height of Cyclops's eye-blast is controlled
by his visor's adjustable slit. His narrowest beam, about the diameter of a pencil at a distance of 4 feet has a force of
about 2 pounds per square inch. His broadest beam, about 90 feet across at a distance of 50 feet, has a force of about 10
pounds per square inch. His most powerful eye-blast is a beam 4 feet across which, at a distance of 50 feet, has a force of
500 pounds per square inch. The maximum angular measurement of Cyclops's eye-blast is equivalent to a wide-angle 35mm camera
lens field of view (90 degree measured diagonally, or the angle subtended by holding this magazine's pages spread open, upright
at 9.5 inches from your eyes). The minimum angular measurement is equivalent to the angle that the thickness of a pencil would
subtend at 4 feet (3.5 degree, about a quarter of an inch viewed at 4 feet). The beam's effective range is about 2,000 feet,
at which point a 1-inch beam has spread out to 10 feet square, and then has a pressure of .38 pounds per square inch. Cyclops's
maximum force is sufficient to tip over a filled 5,000 gallon tank at a distance of 20 feet, or puncture a 1-inch carbon-steel
plate at a distance of 2 feet.
The extra dimensional supply of energy for Cyclops's eye-blast is practically infinite.
Thus, so long as Cyclops's psionic field is active (which is constantly), there is the potential to emit energy. The only
limit to the eye-blast is the mental fatigue of focusing constantly. After about 15 minute of constant usage, the psionic
field subsides and allows only a slight leakage of energy to pass through the aperture. Cyclops's metabolism will recover
sufficiently for him to continue in about an additional 15 minutes.
Special limitations: Due to a brain injury,
Cyclops is unable to shut off his optic blasts at will and must therefore wear a visor or glasses with ruby quartz lenses
that block the beams.
Equipment: The mask Cyclops wears to prevent random discharge is lined with powdered ruby
quartz crystal. It incorporates two longitudinally mounted flat lenses which can lever inward providing a constantly variable
exit slot of 0 inches to .79 inches in height and a constant width of 5.7 inches. The inverted clamshell mechanism is operated
by a twin system of miniature electrical motors. As a safety factor their is a constant positive closing pressure provided
by springs. The mask itself is made of high-impact cycolac plastic. There is an overriding finger-operated control mechanism
on either side of the mask, and normal operation is through a flat micro-switch installed in the thumb of either glove.
NOTE: James Marsden played him in X-Men the movie.
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