With the ability to morph her skin and shift into any form she chooses, the mutant Paige Guthrie has lofty goals of joining the X-Men. She trains at Xavier’s Institute and fulfills her dreams of becoming one of the merry mutants who fight for justice.
Runs in the Family
The second of 10 children, Paige Elisabeth Guthrie grows up in Cumberland County, Kentucky. She and the Guthrie family lose their father Thomas Zebulon when Paige is quite young. When her older brother Sam’s mutant powers manifest, he joins the New Mutants as Cannonball, and as such, Paige desires to be a mutant hero herself, though she initially fails to demonstrate powers.
Eventually, she discovers her ability to shed her skin, revealing varying forms underneath. She conceals this information from her family until the day Sam and his X-Force teammate Tabitha Smith, AKA Boomer (later Boom-Boom), visit the farm. Paige, helpless to do anything, watches Sam and Tabitha get abducted by Siena Blaze, a member of the Upstarts–a group capturing young mutants for points in a competition under the telepathic Gamesmaster. X-Force teams up with the New Warriors, whose member Firestar had also been captured, to oppose the Gamesmaster. Paige secretly follows them in the form of an insect and convinces the Gamesmaster, in a game of wits, to train young mutants instead of killing them. Paige expresses her dismay that Sam joined X-Force instead of the X-Men, which, at the time, she hopes to join one day.
Omni-Morph Mutant
Husk can alter the sub-molecular structure of her body underneath her skin, allowing her to shed her outer epidermis to reveal a new layer of varying properties. While Husk has demonstrated the ability to shift in nearly any form she chooses, she prefers to change herself into a form resembling her own, but composed of different elements, such as stone, steel, and rubber, with the appropriate properties of these forms, including potential increases in strength, durability, and speed.
In some forms she gains super strength (up to Class 10) and/or speed. At her strongest, she appears to have Class 10 strength and at her most durable, she has been able to deflect bullets. She has also been able to transform into forms that allow her to move at just under subsonic speeds. She can most easily shift into any form that does not exceed her body volume, and she prefers to maintain her normal shape. Husk has used the following forms in battle: rocks, gold, glass, rubber, metal (including steel), a reflective surface, diamond, crystallized carbon, crystal, silver, wood and scales.
During times of stress or trauma, Husk can shed skin uncontrollably, leaving a patchwork of forms, each with its own physical properties. She can cause her skin to mimic her environment, giving her a chameleon-like ability to blend in with her surroundings, and can shed her skin at a moment’s notice to protect herself from explosions or other imminent dangers. Husk’s transformations usually last an hour unless she changes form. She can change forms several times in a short period, after which the new material sheds to reveal normal skin underneath. Her skin retains its form after it has been shed and can be used for raw material if desired.
Husk can heal minor injuries with an inert healing factor by altering her form, although this apparently does not work against greater injuries. If trapped in mid-husk, or forced to husk before ready, the process can be very painful. In addition to her mutant abilities, Husk is adept at programming and operating computers.
The Guthries
Born into the Guthrie family to parents Thomas Zebulon and Lucinda, Paige has 10 siblings all with the last name Guthrie–nine of them blood relatives and one adopted brother, Raymond Jr. Her mutant siblings include Cannonball, Joshua, AKA Icarus, Melody, AKA Aero, and Jebediah. She has four sisters, Elizabeth, Cissie, Joelle, and another sister, though she remains unnamed. When her human sister Joelle grows jealous of her mutant siblings, she joins a fanatic anti-mutant group, but Husk and Cannonball convince her to leave the group.
Paige joins the Xavier Institute student body to learn how to use her powers. She later joins the X-Men, Sean Cassidy, AKA Banshee’s militaristic X-Corps, and is a founding member of Generation X and co-founder of Mutantes Sans Frontières.
During her time at Xavier’s Institute, and with the X-men, Paige engages in a romantic relationship with Jonothon Starsmore, AKA Chamber. They have their ups and downs, and do not always stick together, especially when Chamber has an affair with a music star. She gets involved with Warren Worthington III, AKA Angel, and they start a global outreach program for mutants together in Zanzibar.
Formidable Foes
Paige goes up against the Gamesmaster in a battle of wits to save her brother Cannonball and his X-Force teammate Boomer from his competition. She convinces him to train the young mutants instead of kill them and her actions are pivotal in her brother’s release.
She battles other Super Villains including the energy vampire Marius St. Croix, AKA Emplate, suffering severe injuries, the demon D’Spayre, Dracula, the Hellfire Club, and the alien Skrulls when they invaded Earth.
Husk’s History
Soon after, Paige was kidnapped by the techno-organic alien Phalanx, who sought to learn how to assimilate mutants into their collective. Paige and her fellow abductees were rescued by an ad-hoc X-Men team, though young mutant Blink was killed in their escape. Several of these students were recruited to the new Massachusetts Academy branch of Xavier’s school, becoming founding members of Generation X. Paige takes the code name Husk and trained with her teachers, Banshee and Emma Frost, and befriending her new teammates, most notably Chamber, a telepathic mutant who had lost his mouth and upper chest when his powers manifested. Husk aspired to lead the team and worked hard at her academics and physical skills, even trying to disguise her Southern accent, which she felt made her sound ignorant. In the team’s initial battle with the vampire Emplate, Husk was severely wounded until teammate Jubilation Lee, AKA Jubilee, husked her skin, saving her life. Wounds she later received from new student Penance (actually Monet St. Croix, AKA M, possessing Penance), however, she retained even after husking her skin off.
Distraught upon learning of the mutant-killing Legacy Virus, Paige got drunk and was comforted by Chamber, whom she impulsively kissed. Taken by surprise, Chamber lost control of his powers and destroyed the girl’s dormitory, an event for which he claimed full responsibility. Paige struggled with her attraction to the repressed Chamber over the following months, putting off teammate Angelo Espinosa, AKA Skin’s interest in her. Husk and Cannonball helped convince their sister Joelle to leave the mutant-hating Humanity’s Last Stand organization. Generation X battled fairies and dragons in Ireland; Barrington (a disguised Black Tom Cassidy), to save teammate Mondo; and Omega Red, whom Chamber defeated. When Emplate forced Husk to battle her mind-controlled teammate Everett Thomas, AKA Synch, she was briefly trapped in a painful, half-husked state. As Generation X battled the Toad, Emma Frost was affected by the evil psychic being, Onslaught, who caused her to telepathically manipulate the students. Jubilee emerged as a natural leader of the group, disappointing Husk, who sought that role herself.
When Onslaught seemingly killed many of the world’s heroes, the orphaned Franklin Richards came to the school and Husk befriended him, helping him cope with his loneliness. Husk took Chamber back to Kentucky for Thanksgiving, but the two ended up arguing about their relationship, and Chamber left. Husk avoided him afterwards until, after a battle with the demon D’Spayre, they were among the students shanghaied aboard a raft in the ocean by Black Tom Cassidy, and Husk was wounded, again caught in mid-transformation.
When the reality-manipulating Thomas Gideon, AKA Glorian, tried granting the students their fondest wishes, Husk was Chamber’s girlfriend until reality restored itself and Glorian transported the students to Los Angeles. After fighting off Sentinels, the students hid, and Chamber apologized to Husk for their fight. After finally returning to school and battling the Circus of Crime, Husk’s diary was stolen by local human Tracey Authier, and Tracey came to the school to investigate; seeing the team’s adventures with Emplate, magical beings (including a Token and a Pooka), and an interdimensional battle with the possessing Dirt Nap, Tracey promised to keep Paige’s secrets. Generation X battled the Fenris twins; Bianca LaNiege and her dwarves; and Asgardian trolls, whom Husk made peace with by giving them some of her husked gold skin. Paige briefly went home to tend to her ill mother, then officially broke up with Chamber, feeling he had been too distant from her. Generation X soon joined Nate Grey, AKA X-Man, in a battle against the terrorist Gene Nation.
The Massachusetts Academy brought in human students and the mutants started wearing masks while adventuring to conceal their identities. Human student Tristan Brawn discovered Paige was a mutant after she battled his father Hunter Brawn. Tristan blackmailed Husk into going out with him, but despite this forced start they soon hit it off, dating until Tristan left the academy. Emma’s sister Adrienne became temporary headmistress, bringing in Tom Corsi to train the students in their powers, and the students aided the super-mercenary Paladin against the criminal Rising Sons in Madripoor. The team again defeated Emplate, despite the villain briefly controlling Husk. After the corrupt Adrienne caused Synch’s death, Husk felt helpless and focused on better controlling her powers. Generation X subsequently battled the deadly Dracula, aided the New Warriors against the deadly Biohazard and encountered a wild sasquatch.
Looking into several missing children, Husk helped shut down an evil House of Corrections facility, and she soon renewed her friendship with Chamber. After helping a ghost take care of unfinished business, Husk heard the school was shutting down; aimless, she said goodbye to her friends and moved away to help a group of environmentalists, and Generation X disbanded.
Banshee soon recruited Paige into his new X-Corps venture, and with the help of Jubilee and Stacy X, she stopped Blob and Mystique from taking control of that group. Husk moved into the X-Men’s mansion, where her relationship with Chamber grew more complicated when he had a very public affair with music star Sugar Kane and Paige’s attraction for winged X-Men founder Archangel (later Angel), came to light.
Paige’s interest in environmental issues led her to discover corruption within Worthington Enterprises, the company owned by Archangel. Investigating, they encountered mutant werewolves, the Dominant Species, and Paige was almost killed. Archangel healed her, and they became romantically involved, with Husk helping Archangel get over the death of his former love Elizabeth Braddock, AKA Psylocke. After a nasty argument with Chamber over her new relationship, Husk was horrified when the Church of Humanity crucified several mutants, including Jubilee and Skin, on the X-Men’s lawn; Jubilee survived, but Skin did not.
After the X-Men fought the demonic Azazel, Archangel abruptly ended his romance with Paige. Though she continually tried reconciling with him, he refused to talk to her. While fighting racist humans in Kentucky, Archangel confessed that he was scared of losing Paige and they renewed their relationship. Archangel and Husk soon started up the Mutantes Sans Frontières, a global mutant outreach program, in Zanzibar. They fought against the Hellfire Club’s attempt to destabilize the country via the mercenary Weaponeers and the mad anarchist Viper and repelled the invaders with the help of the super hero Jono Baraka, AKA Askari.
Husk and her brothers Sam and Jay were among the world’s relatively few remaining mutants following “M-Day.” After anti-mutant crusader Reverend William Stryker killed her brother Jay, Husk returned home to support her family while Sam stayed with the X-Men, though he later visited, expressing his frustration at the mutant situation before rushing off. However, the X-Men briefly recruited Husk again to help fight invading alien Skrulls in California, and she resumed her flirtations with Angel (Worthington) during that mission.
After the psychic vampire Selene resurrected an army of the X-Men’s former friends and foes to attack the merry mutants, Husk joined the X-Men to investigate a warning given by the resurrected psychic Irene Adler, AKA Destiny. They traveled to Muir Island–the former home to mutant researchers–and upon reaching the lab complex, the reality-warping mutant Proteus possessed Ruth Aldine, AKA Blindfold, and attacked the team. Husk fought her/him off with the rest of the group but Proteus possessed each of them, even pitting Husk against her teammate Anna Marie, AKA Rogue. It wasn’t until Magneto reached into Proteus’s energy matrix and destabilized it, defeating the villain.
Husk later fought off the Nimrod Sentinels in San Francisco with Dominikos Petrakis, AKA Avalanche, Roberto da Costa, AKA Sunspot, and Boom-Boom. During the fight, Husk used a more corrosive form to combat the Nimrod but the robot nearly ripped her apart.
During the Curse of the Mutants event when vampires descended upon San Francisco, Jubilee gets infected with a manufactured vampire virus. She infects Wolverine, who had nanobots that shut down his healing factor allowing him to turn–a plan formed by team leader Scot Summers, AKA Cyclops. When battling the vampires on Utopia, Husk changed her arms and hands into wooden spikes. She takes out several of them until Wolverine knocks her out.
After the X-Men split into two groups, one led by Cyclops and the other Wolverine, Husk sided with Wolverine and became a teacher at the Jean Grey School for Higher Learning. Even though she experienced moulting, a consistent shedding of her skin, her powers allowed her to defend her class and the rest of the Institute in opposing the notorious Hellfire Club. She also destroyed an invading N’Garai at the school but her moulting continued and her mental state deteriorated as well. Believing she would be fired, Husk quit the school and joined the Hellfire Academy where she worked as a librarian, hall monitor, librarian and fell in love with Toad. When Wolverine’s X-Men sought to rescue the Academy students, Husk fought against Toad and the Academy teachers. After that Husk sought help for her behavior and to control her powers.
She then began working for Earth’s Watchdog organization, the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division, AKA S.H.I.E.L.D. in their Non-Human Resources Department. When the organization fell, she stayed behind with the fauna. When Chameleon posed as Deadpool and attacked her, she joined with Peter Parker, AKA Spider-Man, and the real Deadpool, Wade Wilson, to defeat him.
Alongside many other mutants, Husk opposed X-Man when he attempted to remake the world, which led X-Man to expel Husk and the others into another reality. There, Husk taught agriculture at the Summers Institute for Higher Learning. Husk and the others were eventually returned to their reality after X-Man realized the error in his ways.
Husk later lived in Krakoa, the sovereign nation-state that Charles Xavier, AKA Professor X, and his allies created for mutants. She joined Cyclops’s team to destroy Mother Mold, an artificial intelligence designed to create Sentinels, prior to Nimrod’s creation. The team was attacked during their mission and both Husk and Archangel perished. Back on Krakoa, the slain were resurrected by The Five, a group of mutants that combined their abilities to bring back the minds of their fallen comrades into cloned bodies. Both Husk and Archangel were hailed as heroes for their efforts.
