Set in the shared Marvel Universe, the series is part of the wider X-Men line. Liefeld and Nicieza were the first creative team on the original X-Force (1991) series, and the limited series sees them return to many of the characters who featured in that first run.
The time-travelling mutant Cable finds himself haunted by memories of the distant past and hunted by enhanced humans from the far future. Mutant-hating extremists are trying to revive an ancient horror, and Cable's going to need help to stop them.
Unfortunately, with the exception of his lover Domino, he didn't part from his X-Force team on the best of terms - Cannonball, Meltdown, Warpath and Shatterstar might be the help he needs, but first Cable needs to persuade them that he's on the right side. That might be easier if other time travellers weren’t already telling them a very different story...
X-Force (2004) provides examples of the following tropes:
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Cable's old friend Zed is stabbed in the back by one of the Helix, who's wielding the 'Five Fingers of Annihilation' blade. It's a relatively short sword, but it's thrust with so much force that a length of blade protrudes from his chest.
- Fantastic Racism: Anti-mutant prejudice is a recurring theme in the X-Men titles, but the Helix definitely take it to extremes. Not only have they abandoned their humanity to fight mutants, they're prepared to unleash the Skornn, change history and endanger all of humanity just so that mutants won't win.
- Make Wrong What Once Went Right: The Helix are enhanced humans from 1,400 years in the future, anti-mutant extremists who've returned to the present to revive a mutant-hunting monster, the Skornn. The Skornn will happily exterminate humans as well as mutants, but the Helix still see that as preferable to a world where the mutants win.
- Villain-Beating Artifact: The sword known as the 'Five Fingers of Annihilation' is apparently the only weapon that can kill the Skornn. Unfortunately, it needs a mutant's death to empower the blade before it can affect the Skornn.
- What Happened to the Mouse?:
- In issue #3, new character Xixi Zenaya (aka Lady Anime) swears vengeance on Shatterstar for the death of her father, Zed, and sends her minions out to find him. They play no further part in the series and, as of 2023, have never reappeared elsewhere.
- Jon Spectre comes back from the future to warn Cable's allies, but at the end of the series there's no mention of whether he stays in the past, returns to his own time, or even whether he's reconsidered his views on Cable.
