Rusty comes into the New Mutants with real experience leading younger mutants through danger. His fire powers are useful, but so is his habit of taking responsibility when someb…

Rusty comes into the New Mutants with real experience leading younger mutants through danger. His fire powers are useful, but so is his habit of taking responsibility when somebody has to decide what happens next. He has already been that person for the X-Terminators. The move aboard Ship and the merger around #76 ought to give him more support. Instead, his story soon separates from the others. In #78, he and Skids stay behind during the confrontation with Freedom Force while their teammates try to get Dani help. It is the kind of split a superhero team expects to repair after the immediate emergency. The repair never comes easily. The Asgard trip takes the others out of reach, and Rusty and Skids end up imprisoned in #82. The contrast in settings is striking: one group faces Hela while the other faces authorities who can put an official explanation around what they are doing. Rusty's instinct to protect people survives that treatment. When the Vulture escapes and threatens to release Nitro in #85–86, Rusty gets involved because innocent people could die. He is still trying to prevent a disaster even while the system regards him as part of the problem. That persistence makes his separation from the team particularly frustrating. He has not lost interest in helping or decided that his new teammates are unimportant. Events have cut him off from the support that should have been available to him. His place in this era deserves more than a name in a roster list. Rusty carries a parallel story about how easily a young mutant can be isolated, discredited and left with fewer choices, even while doing the things a hero is supposed to do.