SCRAMBLE

Lionel Jeffries grew up somewhere in Canada with his older brother, Madison. The Jeffries brothers both developed powerful mutant abilities during puberty – Lionel the ability to manipulate flesh and organic matter, and Madison control over metals, plastics and other inorganic material. While Madison hated his mutant power and became sullen and moody, Lionel relished his and no doubt used it to enhance his skills as a doctor and eventually a skilled surgeon.

To put his abilities to continued good use, Lionel was among thousands of Canadians who enlisted in the United States Army during a war, and Madison joined him as a mechanic first-class. It was during the war that tragedy struck when the squad of which the Jeffries brothers were a part was all but blown apart. Lionel was unscathed by the attack and set about using his powers to reform the severed bodies before him, attempting to bring the dead to life. When his plan failed, however, something snapped within Lionel, which left Madison with no other option than to use his own control over metal to restrain the out-of-control Lionel. [Alpha Flight (1st series) #30]

Lionel was placed into permanent medical care, with his brother becoming his keeper. Eventually, Madison became involved with Canada's Premiere Super Heroes, Alpha Flight, whose team leader Heather Hudson one day overheard Madison refer to having a brother. Using the Alphanex computer system, Heather learned that Lionel was a surgeon at Montreal General Hospital and took it upon herself to investigate Madison's brother further, particularly interested in whether or not he possessed powers like Madison. However, when Heather arrived at Montreal General and used her Alpha Flight security clearance to make enquiries about Lionel, she was shocked to discover he was in fact a patient.

Indeed, Dr. Lionel Jeffries was kept in a restricted area of the hospital, in a padded cell and wearing a suit that incorporated a straight-jacket. He watched this mysterious woman enter his cell and, after being told that she was a friend of his brother, he lunged at her. He shoved the only part of his body not covered by the straight-jacket, the bridge of his nose, at Heather, touching her fingers. This flesh-to-flesh connection set Lionel free, where he proclaimed himself to be called Scramble. After mutating Heather into a deformed version of herself, Scramble set his sights (and his powers) on transmutating all of the doctors and patients in the hospital that he could find. Alpha Flight and Madison Jeffries arrived and were forced to battle the deformed beings that Scramble created. Meanwhile, Scramble made his way to the morgue, where he was found by Madison attempting to once again bring the dead back to life.

Madison was determined to put Lionel back in his cell, but Lionel was not having it, and clearly resented Madison for locking him away for all these years. He was also convinced that Madison resented Lionel's ability to transmutate flesh and bone. A fight broke out between the brothers and, when Madison leapt at him, Lionel was able to take hold of Jeffries and began to transmutate his own brother. Lionel believed that he would not have received his powers if he was not mean to use them to heal people and refused to be locked up again.

Strangely, Madison was able to force Scramble's hands against himself. The two brothers linked together, as Madison held Scramble's hands to his own head and was able to re-wire his disordered brain, using Madison's brain pattern as the model. The strange plan worked, seemingly restoring Lionel's damaged mind. With his sanity restored, Lionel used his powers to restore everyone in the hospital, including Heather Hudson, who offered him forgiveness, even if he did make Heather feel uneasy. [Alpha Flight (1st series) #30]

In the aftermath, Lionel declined an invitation to work with Alpha Flight, preferring to investigate whether he could be reinstated as a medical practitioner by the Department of National Health. As he prepared to say his farewells to Madison and Alpha Flight, an ambulance arrived at the hospital. Lionel examined the naked man found by the paramedics but was unable to revive him – it seemed that his literal soul was missing. This led to the revelation that Scramble had accidentally revived the body of Alpha Flight's enemy, Deadly Earnest, who was now on a rampage through the city. [Alpha Flight (1st series) #31]

Unfortunately for Lionel, the Department of National Health did not see fit to reinstate his license to practice medicine. However, an unnamed, wealthy tycoon, who had at one time benefited from Lionel's abilities, thought enough of Lionel to bankroll the New Life Clinic, a semi-secret facility in Vancouver, where Lionel was able to practice his unorthodox methods on willing patients. Lionel also had his own intern, a young man by the name of Dr. Whitman Knapp. One such patient brought to Lionel was Alpha Flight's own Roger Bochs, who had become trapped in his Box armor after suffering the bends following an underwater adventure. Although Roger did not initially consent to being treated, Lionel was able to use his control over flesh and bone to free Roger from the constraints of the Box armor and, when Roger lamented that his girlfriend, Alpha Flight's Aurora, would lose interest in him quickly because he did not have legs, Lionel proposed that he make Roger whole.

Lionel accompanied Roger back to Alpha Flight's headquarters on Tamarind Island, where the members of Alpha Flight watched in amazement as Roger Bochs emerged from the Bochs armor – with legs and looking very lean. His body was completely transformed, thanks to Lionel using Roger's fat to create new legs. Lionel declined any suggestion that he should be made an honorary member of Alpha Flight, citing his busy work at New Life, before departing Tamarind Island. [Alpha Flight (1st series) #44-45]

It wasn't long before Lionel was presented with another medical concern from Alpha Flight. In a series of convoluted events, Alpha Flight's Dr. Walter Langkowski – Sasquatch – had been reborn in the soulless body of the now dead goddess Snowbird. Walter wished to be made male and asked Lionel to transmutate his new body into that of a man. However, when Lionel placed his hands on the strange body before him, nothing happened. Lionel's intern, Whitman, deduced that the combination of Walter's male essence, Snowbird's female body and the Great Beast biology that was connected to Walter simply meant that there was not enough human flesh for Lionel to transmutate. When Alpha Flight departed, Whitman informed Lionel that he noticed some splotches on Roger's legs, as if the legs were beginning to decompose. Whitman was hesitant to question Lionel, knowing of the radical techniques he employed on his patients. Whitman had reason to be hesitant, as Lionel did not like his methods being questioned and he grabbed Whitman, unknowingly activating the young man's latent mutant power. Lionel also threatened to transmutate Whitman into unrecognizability should he query him again, leaving the boy quite startled. [Alpha Flight (1st series) #46]

Whitman's identification of the blotches on Roger's legs proved correct – they were decomposing. Alpha Flight soon returned to the New Life Clinic, with an increasingly disturbed Roger Bochs, who had been forcibly removed from the Box armor by Madison, his best friend. Roger was placed in a stasis tank and, when asked whether he could cure Roger's madness, Lionel admitted that he could not. He explained that his own madness was cured because he was able to use his brother's physiology to do so, but no one has that connection to Roger to enable that to happen. By now, Alpha Flight's leader, Heather Hudson, was growing increasingly distrusting of Lionel. And with good reason, for when Lionel sealed himself, Madison and Whitman in his operating theater, with the plan of transmutating Roger's stasis tank into something similar to the Box armor. Lionel revealed that he had used flesh from corpses to create Roger's new legs. Wearing an extravagant blue robe, Lionel seemed quite disturbed as he announced his intention to create superior beings by using parts from others, beings called Omega.

Lionel quickly transmutated Madison's flesh, preventing Madison from escaping the operating room and warning the rest of Alpha Flight. He then opened a hatch, which lowered dozens of these “New Men” - the Omega – that Lionel had been attempting to create. When Whitman decided he could no longer tolerate Lionel's diabolical plan, he lashed out at his mentor, only for Lionel to reveal he had already detected the seeds of great power within Whitman. He stated that he would take that power whether Whitman aided him or not. After knocking out the youth, Lionel then set his sights on the vengeful Roger, who wanted to destroy his former friends in Alpha Flight. Lionel proclaimed that his mastery over flesh and Roger's brilliant mind would enable them to create an invincible being to lead the “New Men.”  Shortly, this being emerged, now called Omega. This combined form of Lionel Jeffries and Roger Bochs confronted Alpha Flight in all its horror, swiftly taking out the most experienced and senior members of the team. Eventually, Lionel found himself challenged by Roger, who realized that Lionel was insane. Lionel then proceeded to lobotomize Roger, deciding he only needed Roger's intelligence, not his independent thought.

Lionel soon met his match in the young mutant called the Purple Girl, who put the gluttonous mass called Omega under her control and forced him to transmutate anyone that he had harmed back into their true forms, including Madison Jeffries. Deciding that he had no other option, Madison took control of the Box armor, now transmutated into his own unique armor, and used its weaponry to blast Lionel and Roger, Omega, to smithereens, ending the threat of Scramble the Mixed-Up Man seemingly once and for all. [Alpha Flight (1st series) #48-49]

Even in death, Scramble's legacy continued as the Master of the World came into possession of an enzyme which contained Scramble's essence and used it to cure Puck of an abnormality from which he was suffering. The Master continued his work, creating his own army of Remnant Men, and finally used it to turn his own body into the perfect specimen of man. [Alpha Flight (1st series) #88, 96]

When the mutant nation of Krakoa was established and the gift of mutant resurrection was discovered, at no point was Lionel apparently considered for resurrection, presumably due to his mental instability and vastly dangerous powers.