Classic X-Men Vol 1 39

The Hellfire Club's inner circle dispatches some of their soldiers down into the basement of their prestigious club to search for Wolverine. While it is assumed that he was killed after being swept away in a sewer flood, they want to be sure.

Wolverine is alive and well, in fact, and hiding in the rafters above them. When his wet body drips water on the soldiers below, they spot and try to shoot him. But Wolverine is too quick for them and he mortally wounds three of them before he appears to take some rifle rounds to the stomach and falls over into some boxes. The soldiers are sure he’s dead but he’s only playing possum, having rolled with the shots. He tags one more of the soldiers, leaving only one left on his feet. Sensing the soldier’s anxiety, Wolverine psyches him out and coaxes him into dropping his rifle. Threatening the man with his claws, Wolverine demands to know everything he knows about his employers.

Upstairs, the other X-Men are the shackled prisoners of the Hellfire Club’s inner circle, who celebrate not only their victory over the X-Men, but the addition of Jean Grey to their ranks as their new Black Queen. With a ruby quartz muzzle covering his head, Cyclops puzzles over how Mastermind was able to take control of Jean, who envisions that she is a decadent woman and a member of the Hellfire Club in the 18th century. She sees the X-Men not as her friends but as several captured thieves and a runaway slave who have betrayed her.

Nightcrawler asks Shaw what he wants from them. Shaw explains that the captured X-Men will serve as guinea pigs in lab experiments in order to advance the club’s aim of genetically “custom building” their own mutants to serve as their slaves.

On Muir Island, Sean (the former X-Man Banshee) is finishing up a jog and checks in on Moira. She is exhausted after extensively studying Jean's Phoenix powers. She admits her fears that Jean’s near-infinite power levels could threaten the entire world.

In New Mexico, the Angel and Professor X await word from the X-Men. Charles expresses the frustration he’s felt at watching Cyclops lead the X-Men without his input.

Back at the Hellfire Club, Wolverine takes a dumbwaiter up to the main floor where the party is still in full swing. He considers options for slipping by party guests undetected when a guard gets the drop on him, putting a gun to his temple.

Cyclops recalls the private picnic he and Jean had atop the butte (during the events of last issue). During that encounter, Jean asked to establish a psychic rapport between the two of them. Realizing that he and Jean still have the rapport, Scott tries to telepathically communicate with her through it in an attempt to shake Jean free of Mastermind’s control.

Scott’s mind is transported to the astral plane. To his dismay, he finds his own image transformed into a colonial-era outfit and that Jean appears as the Black Queen as well. He’s stunned, though, when Jason Wyngarde appears as well despite the fact that Scott knows Mastermind has no telepathic abilities. The two get into a sword fight with Mastermind warning Scott that whoever dies here will likely die in the real world as well.

Downstairs, Wolverine gets the better of the guard who caught him and tosses him into the middle of the party. Abandoning any hope for sneaking by, Wolverine attempts to storm through until he is confronted by a whole cadre of the Club's security guards who pile onto him, clubs swinging.

Scott's psychic sword fight with Mastermind ends with Mastermind stabbing Scott through the chest with his sword. In the real world, the X-Men watch in horror as Cyclops suddenly keels over. As far as the X-Men can tell, their leader is dead.