Classification: Automated biological weapon of mass destruction

Location/Base of Operations: Science City 53, Russia

Known Members: Unnamed and inapplicable

Affiliations: The Russian military and intelligence, both in the Soviet era and today

Enemies: Major Valentina Rychenko, X-Force (Pete Wisdom, Cannonball, Meltdown, James Proudstar, Jesse Bedlam), inhabitants of Science City 53, all humanity

First Appearance: X-Force I#102 (May 2000)

Powers/Abilities: The Meatspores' capabilities are unknown. Some of them clearly had bladed limbs and sharp teeth, which could presumably slice through flesh. They're probably stronger, faster, and more durable than normal humans, though to what degree is unknown. They're quite good at slaughtering civilians, to the point that Major Valentina Rychenko thought they might wipe out an entire Russian Province. Some are capable of ground-to-air attacks.

Traits: Meatspore Stormtroopers aren't intelligent; their mental capabilities are presumably on the level of animals, and not very smart animals at that. They have two functions: Reproduce, and kill humans.

The Meatspore Stormtroopers are 'cellular automata,' robots made of flesh who only have two functions: Kill humans, and reproduce. They consist of a flesh carrier medium, and some brain tissue wrapped around a simple computer processor. Although they're composed of flesh, they aren't alive in any "true" sense.

History: (X-Force I#102/112 (fb)/[BTS]) - Russian intelligence records say they stole the Meatspore process from Cuckoo, an American intelligence agency, in 1953. In truth, the Meatspores were built by Dr. Constantin Racal, a Soviet scientist, as an extrapolation on what the Russians learned from Cuckoo. The Meatspores proved too unpredictable, and were kept, deactivated, at Science City 53.

(X-Force I#102 (fb)/[BTS]) -- Eventually the Meatspores were triggered, presumably by their own instability. They began to storm the base. Moscow refused to commit troops to a location that wasn't on any map, so Major Valentina Rychenko called for help on the Old Spooks Network, a multination network of former intelligence agents.

(X-Force I#102) -- 12 hours into the Meatspores' rampage, former Excalibur member Pete Wisdom, a veteran of British intelligence, arrived with his new team X-Force. X-Force landed and engaged the Meatspores on the ground, until Jesse Bedlam created an electromagnetic pulse that destroyed all the Stormtroopers.

COMMENTS: Created by Warren Ellis, Whilce Portacio, and Gerry Alanguilan.

Quite an interesting concept, totally torpedoed by the artist. The script called for a heavy reliance on visuals to tell the story, and Whilce Portacio didn't prove to be remotely up for it. For almost the entire fight scene there was no sense of their surroundings; each individual panel took place in its own little world. Unfortunately, the same was true for all the issues of X-FORCE that Portacio did.

Profile by Flank Mclargehuge.

CLARIFICATIONS: The Meatspore Stormtroopers have no known connection to:

• Meat Harp 2099, which John Herod used to paralyze communication systems @ DOOM 2099#33
• The Meat Puppets 2099, who served Puppetmast Inc. via their implants @ 2099 UNLIMITED#10
• Meatmarket of the Lilin @ GHOST RIDER III#28
• Meathook of Earth-UV @ SOLUTION#1
• Meatrack of Earth-UV, a KGB assassin @ ULTRAFORCE II#2
• Spoor, an amoeba-like pre-Marvel monster @ TALES OF SUSPENSE I#11
• Spoor, the Scottish mutant member of the Acolytes @ UNCANNY X-MEN#300
• Spore, the Deviant mutate @ WOLVERINE II#17
• Sporr, a Fomalhauti mutant @ THOR I#256
• Sporr, mutated by Gena-Sys @ CODENAME: GENETIX#1
• Sporr, an Inhuman @ AVENGERS I#376
• Any other 'stormtroopers,' or anyone else with 'meat,' 'spore,' 'storm,' or 'trooper' in their names

---

Science City 53

According to the Nato Paliamentary Assembly: "During the Soviet period, the country's scientific complex was concentrated around three major cities, Moscow, St. Petersburg and Novosibirsk, and also in 60 restricted areas, or "cities", created between the 1930s and 1970s and basically divided into four categories: (1) the "classified" cities of the Defence Ministry, where weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles were developed, produced and tested; (2) the military research centres; (3) the centres for academic and experimental research; and (4) the applied sciences centres, also devoted to space science."

City 53 was presumably either a Defense Ministry city, or a military research center. Like the other Science Cities, it wasn't recorded on any Russian maps, even today. SHIELD mislabelled it as 51.

(X-Force I#102 (fb)/[BTS]) -- The Meatspores were presumably developed at City 53. They were kept on-site, even after the City was redirected to other research in 1961.

(X-Force I#102) -- Something triggered the Meatspores, which went on a 12-hour rampage through the City, slaughtering the inhabitants until they were destroyed by X-Force.

Appearances: X-Force I#102, 112 (fb)

One of the crew of Major Rychenko's helicopter as she observed the Meatspore situation from a safe distance.

Appearances: X-Force I#102

Images:
X-Force I#102, p7, pan3 (Pilot Korolyev)
X-Force I#102, p8, pan2 (Science City 53)
X-Force I#102, p8, pan4 (several Meatspores)
X-Force I#102, p10, top half (large Meatspore)

Appearances:
X-Force I#102 (May, 2000) - Warren Ellis (plot), Ian Edginton (writer), Whilce Portacio (pencils), Gerry Alanguilan (inks), Jason Liebig (editor)
X-Force I#112 (March, 2001) - Ian Edgington (writer), Jorge Pereira Lucas (artist), Matt Hicks (editor)

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