This is "Foundationed Deep," a feature where we look at particular odd/strange/interesting instances of retroactively connecting different comic book characters (for instance, Uncanny X-Men #268 retroactively established that Wolverine knew both Captain America and the Black Widow from World War II). Today, we look at how Havok first met Mister Sinister!
As you likely know by now, Mister Sinister is, like, super-duper obsessed with "Summers DNA" and with the idea of combining Summers DNA with Grey DNA to form a super-mutant who could destroy Apocalypse (who Mister Sinister has been serving since the late 19th Century and who he was now so sick of he wanted someone else to get rid of him).
In X-Factor #39 (by Louise Simonson, Walter Simonson and Al Milgrom), we learn that Sinister specifically had Scott Summers and Alex Summers split up as kids so that Sinister could study Scott Summers closely...
In Classic X-Men #42 (which came out roughly around the same time as X-Factor #39), in a story by Chris Claremont, Mike Collins and Joe Rubinstein, we saw some of Scott's time at the orphanage in Alaska where Sinister studied him. Now, do note that this story was written back when Claremont intended for Sinister to be a kid who could never grow up but had the ability to create other forms that could serve him, so the big old scary "Mister Sinister" was just this kid's idea of what a super villain should look like. Since Claremont never got around to actually outright establishing that in the comics, the current explanation for these stories is that Sinister is using his powers to shape-shift himself into the little kid, Nate, who was at the orphanage with Scott Summers, so Sinister could keep an eye on him while he experiments on Scott at night.
Sinister was fine with Scott being bullied, as he wanted to see how Scott would react, but when one bully went too far and began to interfere with Sinister's operation, he had him eliminated...
A new doctor at the orphanage, Robyn Hanover, took an interest in Scott Summers and introduced him to a pilot couple that she knew. They expressed interest in adopting Scott.
Sinister couldn't have that, so he captured Hanover and brainwashed her and turned her against Scott and then had the prospective adoptive parents killed...
Super twisted, right?
Anyhow, Scott eventually ran away and lived on the streets until Professor X took him in and he became a member of the X-Men. Seemingly the first (until a retcon established that Jean Grey was actually the first).
Okay, so it seems like Alex got away from the Sinister stuff, right? WRONG!
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In X-Factor #-1 (by Howard Mackie, Jeff Matsusa and Art Thibert), Alex Summers is having trouble with his adoptive family, the Blandings, who are clearly viewing him as a replacement for their star athlete son who died in an accident. Alex's adoptive sister, Haley, is nice to him but also oddly tells him to TRY to be more like her dead brother...
As it turned out, Sinister DID keep an eye out on Alex, and when he saw a bully picking on Alex, he convinced the bully to ratchet things up a notch, as Sinister wanted to see if Alex's mutant powers would manifest...
The bully tortures Alex and Haley and then shoots Haley in the leg and heads off to their parents' home to blow it up, to make Alex into an orphan once again! Alex stops him by manifesting his mutant power for the first time and incinerating him!!
Sinister then appears to them and fixes everything and erases their memories of the incident.
Dang! So yes, not only did Alex meet Sinister in the past, but Alex KILLED A DUDE! And he doesn't remember ever meeting Sinister or KILLING A DUDE. Wow.
Okay, that's it for this installment! If you can think of a good example of two comic book characters being retroactively connected to each other, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com and I might feature it here!