Posted in: Comics, Marvel Comics | Tagged: Beast, chronicler, marvel, x-force, x-men

Who is the Chronicler? X-Force #7 [SPOILERS]

Published Wed, 12 Feb 2020 09:00:32 -0600

X-Force #7 is in stores from Marvel Comics today, a mostly Domino-centric issue as Domino attempts to track down the person who has stolen her luck. But the issue's prose pages are another story, focused on The Beast as he saunters around Krakoa doing Beast things, like asking Forge to develop technology so he can spy on the Avengers or collecting insect samples from Krakoa to do… whatever it is Beast does with that sort of stuff. Maybe he eats them?

But seemingly the most important revelation comes when Beast returns from one of his jaunts to find a scorched piece of paper with a single word written on it, left by his desk somehow without Sage noticing.

Perhaps it is a reach to say that it was waiting for me, but the way it was lying on the floor near my desk… just so… I couldn't help but feel that someone wanted me to find it. Now, this was not merely paper but the highest quality ivory cardstock. A thick quality weave that is almost the texture of cloth. Dockle-edged where it had not been burned. A writer's stationery.

What was once written upon it, I cannot know, since only a single word remained…

ЛЕТОПИСЕЦ

That's not Krakoan. It's Russian. And Google Translate tells us its meaning:

There's several translations. Story-writer? Could be anyone. Annalist? Emma Frost pegging Scott Summers. But the most common translation: Chronicler. And that could be a description of a person. Or it could be a codename. One Marvel character who went by the name of Chronicler is Irene Merryweather, an associate of Cable's created by James Robinson and Jose Ladronn and first appearing in 1997's Cable #48. During the early 2000s Cable and Deadpool series, Irene went by Chronicler while administering Cable's pre-Krakoan utopia of Providence. Of course, Irene is also dead, killed by Deadpool in Despicable Deadpool #292 at the behest of Stryfe.

Unless, of course, she isn't. X-Men characters have a way of coming back from the dead. Irene isn't a mutant… unless she is, of course. That has a tendency of changing. She is, however, immune to telepathy, which would be a nice asset if trying to hide from a militant mutant nation with some of the most powerful telepaths in the world.

What motivations could Merryweather have to become an adversary of mutantkind? Well, she was friends with a version of Cable who was murdered by the current one living on Krakoa. And her association with mutants did lead to her death. And of course, there's also the fact that Irene was friends with a man from the future, which means she might know stuff… and we know that knowing stuff is forbidden on Krakoa.

Of course, we could be totally off-base. The note could refer to someone else, or someone new. Can you afford not to pick up a copy of Cable #48 just in case, speculators?

X-Force #7 is in stores now.

X-FORCE #7 DX
DEC190790
(W) Ben Percy (A) Oscar Bazaldua (CA) Dustin Weaver
MISS FORTUNE STRIKES!
Domino's luck seems to be changing… Can she find the source of her misfortune before it costs lives all over the world? And has Colossus healed enough to help her… or even himself?
Parental Advisory
In Shops: Feb 12, 2020
SRP: $3.99

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