Inhumans 2099

Inhumans 2099 is one of five one-shot specials in Marvel's Marvel Knights 2099 line, written by Walking Dead writer Robert Kirkman and drawn by Cliff Rathburn. The story does not take place on the classic 2099 timeline of Earth-928 but in another dystopian future: after the Mutant Registration Act is reinstated, the conflict among mutants, superheroes and the government ends in defeat for the heroes, and anyone not purely human is regarded as undesirable. The Inhumans therefore leave Earth aboard a giant starship bound for the stars, with members of the royal family entering sleeping pods and agreeing to awaken together at a great awakening years later. When the years pass, only Black Bolt wakes; the Majesty guarding the ship reveals the truth to him, and he must use the power he was never permitted to use to face the end he himself brought about. A self-contained one-shot, the story opens with the daily life of ordinary Inhuman families so that readers first sympathize with a people doomed to vanish, then closes with the tragedy of the royal family—the saddest, quietest rewriting in the 2099 line.