Boom-Boom helps investigate at a computer. In New Warriors Annual #1, she enters the collected energy signature into Cerebro and searches for a match. It is part of the group’s…

Boom-Boom helps investigate at a computer. In New Warriors Annual #1, she enters the collected energy signature into Cerebro and searches for a match. It is part of the group’s work to understand the threat, and it gives Tabitha something consequential to do beyond supplying an explosion. The distinction matters because a recognizable personality can become a trap in an ensemble. Once someone is understood as the loud one, the funny one or the disruptive one, every appearance risks being used to confirm that description. A joke then takes the place of a judgment, and an entrance becomes more important than a contribution. Giving Tabitha investigative work avoids that narrowing. She can remain herself while doing something the others need. Competence does not require an announcement that she has become more serious, nor does a useful action have to erase the qualities that make her difficult company. There is a quieter point about teamwork here as well. Information has to become usable before anyone can act on it. Gathering fragments is not the same as making a connection, and arriving at a computer does not make the computer understand the question. Someone still has to work with what the group knows. That labor is less visually dramatic than a fight, but it helps determine what the next fight will be about. A team that only reacts can be directed by whoever chooses its next target. Investigation gives it a chance to choose for itself. Tabitha’s place in early X-Force therefore benefits from attention to the work rather than the volume. This scene lets her participate in deciding where the story goes. Her personality remains visible without being allowed to stand in for everything she contributes.