History of CruciForm X

On Earth-1, it’s the future. The year is 2082. The world is in flames.

The ChristoFascists have triumphed over the forces the reason, scorching the earth with their war engines, sapping the planet of its resources. They have outlawed hope, sex, and most of all … Heavy Metal. America rules the world.

Only one Metal Warlord struggled to resist. He was Steven Tyler, grand warlock of the underground and supreme commander of Revolution X. From remote strongholds in forgotten mountain ranges, from clandestine dive bars in the heart of Earth-1 metropolises, Tyler marshaled a desperate rebellion. His ragtag bands of musicians and counterculture commandos fought valiantly against the totalitarian theocracy, sabotaging its propaganda, disabling its corporate support structure, and exposing its oppression and hypocrisy with their lyrics and thrashing solos. Music was their weapon. Also, swords and machine-guns. But it was too little, too late.

In the decisive battle, a single band led the hopeless charge against the jackbooted theist armies. They were Cruciform, warriors of the resistance, musicians of tomorrow, the loudest fastest Metal act in history.

Brandishing guitars and battleaxes, eight men and women strong, Cruciform dove into the fray. The ChristoFascist horde trembled before their blades and crushing riffs. The warfield echoed with their war song. A power-drum solo split the sky asunder, and the valley was drenched in rain and blood.

Yet even mighty Cruciform could not withstand the onslaught forever. For all the countless soldiers piled dead at their feet, countless more poured over the hills. It was Metal’s last stand. The Band raged impossibly, though the artillery of all the world’s corrupted nations was gathered against them. The barrage was ceaseless – the Devotion Bombs, the Dogma Cannons, the Puritanks – and at last, brave Cruciform fell one by one.

Only two members survived, gravely wounded and battle-crazed, dragged half-conscious from the wreckage by the last of Tyler’s bodyguards. They were swift-armed Jeff Stone, lead vocals, and grim-faced Emory Herbertson, rhythm guitar. Nursed back to health, they woke days later in a subterranean shelter, last refuge of Revolution X. There, in those lonely caves and forgotten tunnels, they found their broken general. On a Black Deathbed lay Steven Tyler, pale and sweat-drenched, pierced by an arrow near his heart. His Metal Wail had been silenced forever; his ropy arms would never thrash again.

“Our bandmates have fallen!” cried Emory, his jaw still clenched with berserker fury, his eyes clouded with Metal tears. “Steven Tyler, why do we live?!”

“Seriously, dude!” protested Jeff. “My blade still thirsts for Christofascist blood!”

“Survivors of Cruciform,” spoke great Steven, his voice a hoarse whisper, “Even in defeat you remain the most loyal and badass of my Metal armada. And that is why you cannot yet die. You have one last task to complete. Earth-1 is lost. For too many years I was blind to tyranny’s quiet rise. We struck too late.” He paused to hack up a drop of blackened blood.

“But there is another Earth … across the dimensional rift.” He lifted a shaking arm and directed them a glowing room, its narrow interior crowded with glistening silicon and arcane runes. “Behold, the Temporal Cleaver! Through its cryptic lens, my scientists have glimpsed another Earth. We call it ‘Earth-2,’ for it is an Earth not unlike our own. Only it’s the past there.”

For a moment, Tyler hung his weary brow. Then he trembled and shook his head, as if to cast away the creeping march of death. “On Earth-2, it’s 2007. There, hope remains. But not for long. Even now, the forces of greed and ignorance grow daily in strength. Earth-2 must be warned, before they suffer our own fate, and Heavy Metal is silenced across the Multiverse forever!”

With his last ounce of will, Steven Tyler lurched forward, grasping Emory and Jeff by the shoulders. “Go forth, Cruciform! Pass through the dimensional rift! Thwart time and space and cosmic unreality! Find Earth-2! Reform the band! Another world awaits, if only you have the will to… to… SAVE IT!”

And with that, Steven Tyler, Earth-1’s last Heavy Metal prince, dropped to the cave floor, dead as a stone.


“We came from the Future of There, to save the Now of Here.”