Ahab enters Days of Future Present with a job that reaches beyond catching one fugitive. Franklin’s arrival threatens the history his side wants preserved. Ahab treats an opport…

Ahab enters Days of Future Present with a job that reaches beyond catching one fugitive. Franklin’s arrival threatens the history his side wants preserved. Ahab treats an opportunity to escape a terrible future as a threat to the future’s proper operation. That is an ugly position for a time-travel villain to occupy. The heroes look at what might happen and see a disaster to prevent. Ahab looks at the same suffering and sees an outcome to protect. His confidence comes partly from being able to tell people that their resistance has already failed in the world he knows. The first annual establishes him through the response to Franklin’s appearance. His later use of Hounds makes the human cost of that response impossible to miss. He has people to deploy alongside machines, and he speaks as though the people are simply another part of the system. It is worth separating command from courage here. Having others attack on his behalf does not make Ahab a brilliant mentor or a demanding leader whose methods happen to be harsh. His organization depends on taking away the choice to refuse. A Hound following an instruction supplies no evidence that the instruction has earned anyone’s trust. His weaponry and cyborg appearance make him visually recognizable, but the more important thing is how casually he claims the right to decide what another person will be. The Hound label reduces someone’s identity to a function. Ahab wants a tracker, a fighter or a weapon, and the life that existed before that assignment is treated as an inconvenience. For this point in the reading, Ahab can remain Ahab. Later explanations of his identity are unnecessary to understand the threat in these annuals. The man on the page is already clear enough: someone who considers another person’s freedom a flaw in his control.