X-Factor #16 gives Skids an important step forward. Rusty’s bargain with Masque puts him in danger, and Sally finally manages to lower the field while trying to protect him. She…

X-Factor #16 gives Skids an important step forward. Rusty’s bargain with Masque puts him in danger, and Sally finally manages to lower the field while trying to protect him. She’s been struggling to control it for ordinary things, and now she needs that control in a situation where somebody she cares about could be seriously hurt. It doesn’t make her power simple overnight. What changes is that there’s a way forward. She can work on it. The idea of touching somebody, handling things normally and choosing when she needs protection starts to become something she might actually achieve. In the X-Terminators stories, that defensive ability becomes useful on a much bigger scale. A group with fire, seismic powers and explosive energy also needs somebody who can protect people when everything around them is coming apart. Skids can help keep the younger members alive long enough for the rest of the group to do anything at all. The movement side matters too. Sliding around on a frictionless field gives her a different way of getting through a dangerous space. It’s a very physical power. The usefulness depends on where she is, what’s coming at her and who she needs to cover. Her connection with Rusty becomes a major part of her story, but her early history gives her concerns that existed before she met him. She already knew abuse, displacement and the awkwardness of a body that wouldn’t cooperate with what she wanted. Being able to help him doesn’t erase any of that. Where I am in the reading, she’s also caught in the same detention and Mutant Liberation Front developments as Rusty. There’s more ahead, but the Sally already on the page deserves attention on her own. She’s had to learn how to protect herself, and then how to use that protection for other people without shutting herself away from them completely.