One Step Forward on a Treadmill

Your English Skills:

You've got a great balance of danger and allure.

Your Linguistic Profile:

Current Codename: Storm

Other Aliases: Weather Witch, Beautiful Windrider, White Queen, White King

Hair Color: Silvery White

Eye Color: Blue, but when using her mutant ability her entire eye is white.

Skin Color: Brown

Nationality: African-American


Skills, Abilities, and Limitations

• Storm has the ability to control and manipulate the weather and the forces of nature. This allows her to create all types of atmospherical phenomenon and even at times astronomical changes. For a detailed look at her weather-controlling abilities, view the Abilities page.

• She can fly by creating winds strong enough to support her weight. She can also use the wind to support the weight of others in flight as well.

• Storm has immunity to extreme heat and cold.

• Storm is an expert thief and very skilled with lock picks.

• Ororo's only set weakness is her claustrophobia.

• Logan trained Storm in hand-to-hand combat during her earlier years at the Xavier’s Institute.

• Storm is well trained in armed weaponry, as displayed in X-Treme X-Men.

Before The X-Men

Ororo holds the psionic ability to control every portion of the elements of nature, pertaining to the weather. This control extends over a certain large radius of her vicinity and is greatly affected by her emotions. It is hinted that she holds latent magical abilities that will emerge as she ages. Her other skills include an extraordinary talent at lock picking, hand-to-hand combat, marksmanship, and team strategy.

Ororo Munroe was born to her parents David and N'Dare Munroe in New York City, New York. Her father was a photographer for a newspaper and her mother was a Kenyan princess. Even though she was born African-American, she had unusual features: blue eyes and white hair. Her mother named her Ororo, which means beauty.

When Ororo was 5 years of age, her father was given an assignment in Cairo, Egypt. At the time, Egypt was enduring war and by being in the wrong place at the wrong time, an airplane was deflected by anti-missile weaponry and crashed into the apartment where the Munroe family was residing. Her mother and father died before her very eyes as little Ororo remained trapped under rubble of the apartment. This sad event resulted in Ororo's claustrophobia: fear of closed or narrow spaces.

Now, without a home and with no one to care for her, Ororo begged for food, money, anything she could get on the harsh streets of Cairo. Fortunately, she encountered a band of thieves who took her to their master Achmed El Gibar. She learned all the ways of begging and the best ways of picking pockets and locks.

During this time, she had her first encounter with Professor Xavier. However, it was brief and had nothing to do with anything X-related. Xavier was on vacation in Cairo and little Ororo pick-pocketed him. With a wallet and absolute skill, Ororo would have gotten away if it weren't for Xavier's mutant ability.

About 6 more years passed and Ororo felt a need, urge, and anxiety to go south. Ororo traveled on foot for nearly a year, covering tracks of an estimated 2,000 miles. Ororo's abilities first became known at the age of 13 and after making her way to her homeland of Tanzania, she finally found a place she could call home. The people of the country made Ororo into their goddess, and Ororo compassionately poured rain down on the country, ceasing the drought that plagued them. This went on for quite a long time, until Xavier came...

X-Men: Second Genesis
Ororo continued to role-play this weather-goddess lifestyle until Professor Charles Xavier made an urgent visit to her domain. Charles was recruiting a new team of X-Men to help save his original members from the island known as Krakoa.

"Wh-who are you stranger?" she asked the bald man in the wheelchair who sat facing her, looking at her with blazing eyes of intensity. "What business have you in Ororo's land?"

"I am called Xavier---Professor Charles Xavier," the stranger told her. "And I have come to make you an offer I pray you will not refuse."

"An… offer?" Ororo echoed. "What have you to offer a goddess?"

The stranger wheeled himself closer, his gaze fixing her in place, freezing her to the spot. "You have a land, Ororo," he said softly, "and people who adore you. I offer you a world---and people who may fear you, but people who need you nonetheless. The world I offer you is not beautiful, but it is real---far more real than the fantasy you're living now."

She could feel her heart racing as the words of the stranger cut through her, stabbing her with the truth.

"You are no goddess, Ororo. You are a mutant--and you have responsibilities. I ask you to leave your home and exalted status here, to fulfill the purpose for which your life was intended---the protection and salvation, not of a single tribe, but of all mankind!"

"Come with me," the stranger said, reaching out his hand. "Taste the world outside. You may find its flavor bitter--or surprisingly sweet."

Ororo felt her mind whirling, but all the while she knew what her answer must be. "You present a most peculiar argument," she told the stranger. "Yet I sense a deep sincerity in your words. All right. I will... come with you. Perhaps the time has come for me to leave the nest at last."

Quoted from X-Men: Second Genesis Novel

Leader of the X-Men and Morlocks

After she joined Xavier's quest to save his X-Men, she adopted the codename Storm, reflecting her unique ability to manipulate the weather at its greatest extents. After rescuing the original X-Men, Ororo stayed at the Xavier's Institute. There she battled her claustrophobia with the help of Xavier's mental abilities, and became close friends with Jean Grey. Their friendship was so perfect and well nurtured that they saw each other as sisters. She became well acquainted with Colossus and he became considered her little brother. Her personality was so compelling that she became close with Wolverine, the man with the attitude. He taught her his hand-to-hand combat skills and she taught him just how hard it was for her to control her inner rages.

By X-Men #138, Jean Grey's funeral took place after the entire Phoenix ordeal and Cyclops decided to leave the X-Men, too grief stricken to remain a reliable leader. Storm was the only one capable to take his place, and she did so in X-Men #139. Trouble brewed when Cyclops came back to the team some time later and Xavier began to assimilate into the leadership role as well. Xavier, Cyclops, and Storm were in a twisted and confused frenzy, trying to figure out who was the leader of the X-Men. It was during this tragic time in Storm's X-Career that many of her fans’ favorite battle took place.

At this point Storm had many tough decisions to make, and things weren't getting any easier. The Morlocks had captured Angel, Shadowcat's life was about to be taken, and the X-Men were on the verge of being defeated and killed. Storm, taking a crazy risk, but trusting herself, challenged Callisto, leader of the Morlocks, to a duel. Storm won the battle, without using her mutant abilities, and while facing her fear of closed spaces in the tunnels. She drove a dagger into Callisto's heart, but the mutant survived. It was at this time that Storm was declared leader of the Morlocks and savior of the X-Men.

The tough decisions kept rolling in as Storm began to question herself. She almost killed Callisto by instinct, she was confused with her roll in the X-Men, and didn't know whether or not to consider herself a goddess -- these were all worries and doubts that filled Storm's head. Luckily for her, she met Yukio, a mutant whom she met in Japan while on a mission with the X-Men. Yukio helped Storm to become worry-free and to cut off her dignified status. Storm, fascinated by Yukio's youthfulness, adopted her Mohawk haircut and leather clothing. This was known as her Punk Phase when she secured herself as a leader and wasn't willing to be anything less. This would eventually cause big problems between her and Cyclops.

Cyclops vs. Storm

12 issues later, in Uncanny X-Men #185, Storm was stripped of her mutant abilities by a machine made by the mutant computer genius Forge. Before this, Rogue had been wrongly accused of a crime and the Federal Government was after her. [Storm took the shot from the ‘neutralizer gun’ that stole her abilities while saving Rogue from the attack.] After Peter Gyrich, a long-time enemy of the mutant population, took her abilities away, she was saved by Forge from a river, but didn’t know he was the one responsible for her loss of weather control. It didn’t take long for the two to get into a somewhat serious relationship, but after Ororo found out about Forge’s involvement with the inhibitor machine, she left Forge.

With so much confusion complicating her life, Ororo took a short leave of absence to Africa. When she came back, she learned that “Jean” had given birth to Scott’s child. In other news, Xavier was stranded in outer space with the Starjammers and Magneto had taken Xavier’s place as head leader over the X-Men. In a time where the X-Men were facing some of their greatest difficulties, Cyclops found Ororo’s presence, especially as a field leader, to be a liability. In order to prove herself, Ororo challenge Cyclops to a duel in the Danger Room for leadership of the X-Men. Without her abilities, Ororo gathered the victory. Cyclops and his family left the X-Men and went to Alaska.


Two Thieves: Gambit and Storm Meet

Storm was successful in leading the team without her mutant abilities, but a horrible event took place during this time. Mr. Sinister and the Marauders conspired to kill mutants and supposedly wiped out the Morlocks [who were under the domain of Storm]. After this event Storm knew it was necessary to find a way to get her mutant abilities back. She found Forge and asked for his help in getting her powers back, and during the process their romantic relationship was relit.

Storm quickly took the X-Men to Australia, after their deaths. Her plan was to surreptitiously fight for Xavier’s dream. With the world believing the X-Men were dead, it was a much easier way to strike blind foes.

In Australia during a battle with the Nanny Ororo was supposedly killed, although she had only been regressed back to childhood with little memory of her life as an adult. The next time she was seen was in Cairo, Illinois, worried about her safety because she was aware she was being hunted down by the Nanny and the Shadow King.

In Illinois Ororo became a “goodwill” thief, stealing from criminals and giving to the needy. She was also framed as a killer mutant and was being sought by the police for homicide. Ready to leave Cairo, she found herself ready to commit one less act of thievery, and fell right into a trap of the Shadow King and his Hounds [UXM #265].

Much to Ororo’s pleasure [and her fans!] she maintained minor control over the weather during her transformation to childhood and used her lightning and wind to escape from the Shadow King’s snare. Exhausted from the use of her mutant abilities, she was found by Remy LeBeau, a thief known as Gambit. With his mutant ability to kinetically charge objects and use them as grenade-type weapons, he and Ororo managed to escape to her hideaway, an airplane graveyard on the outskirts of town.

However, her pursuers were not far behind. She managed, at the expense of all her remaining strength, to lift a dilapidated DC-6 into the air with herself and Gambit on board to escape the Hounds and the Shadow King. As soon as they were in the air, however, the Nanny and the Orphan-Maker managed to board the DC-6, but were fought off by Gambit. The two thieves escaped to New Orleans, Louisiana.

As time passed they became partners in crime, stealing through the mid-south United States. However, the Nanny managed to track them down and kidnapped Gambit. When Storm went to rescue Gambit from the Nanny, she oddly regained her full memory. Cladding herself in a suit of exoskeleton armor, Storm fought the Orphan-Maker and when Gambit revived he managed to take down the Nanny. The two managed to escape the ship before it crashed into the Mississippi River.



Forge Repeals His Marriage Proposal

With her memory intact, Storm took Gambit with her back to the X-Men. However, soon after their return Storm found herself in a gruesome battle and was captured and transported, along with Wolfsbane, Rictor, Worlock, and Boomer, in the nude, to Genosha. Genosha is an island off of the western coast of Africa where mutants were taken to be slaves in order to parsimoniously build the economy of the country. On the island, the New Mutants, the X-Men, and X-Factor joined forces in order to escape. Somehow, when she caused an electrical storm as an attack against Cyclops [which she had been ordered to do], Storm’s body was changed back into its adult form. The three mutant teams eventually managed to defeat the Genoshans and escape the slave island.

After Xavier’s return to the Institute, the X-Men split into two teams: the Blue team led by Cyclops and the Gold team led by Storm. Her team consisted of Jean Grey, Iceman, Colossus, Beast, and Angel. Storm was dedicating her entire life – all her time and thoughts to the X-Men and Xavier’s dream. As a result, her relationship with Forge suffered greatly. He proposed to her, but when he “realized” that Storm was 100% dedicated to fighting the good fight he retracted his proposal, leaving her in tears. Her whispered words, as he walked away, were, “I was going to say, ‘Yes.’” Forge moved on to Mystique.