Karima Shapandar

Omega Sentinel (Karima Shapandar) is a fictional character associated with the X-Men and its spinoff Excalibur. She first appeared in X-Men Unlimited, vol. 1 #27 (June 2000) and was created by Chris Claremont and Brett Booth.

Fictional character biography

Prime Sentinel

Shapandar was a police officer from India who was transformed into an Omega Prime Sentinel by Bastion of the Operation: Zero Tolerance program. It all started when Karima was dispatched to look after Neal Shaara (who would later become known as Thunderbird). Neal was looking for his brother, Sanjit, who had gone missing while researching some mysterious disappearances in Calcutta. A bond quickly developed between the two, and they were on the verge of beginning a romantic relationship when they were attacked and captured by Bastion. Neal learned that Sanjit had become a Prime Sentinel, programmed to seek out and destroy mutants. Bastion intended to do the same to Neal and Karima, but the morphing process catalyzed Neal’s latent mutant power, which destroyed the building around him. Sanjit fought his programming long enough to disable the other Sentinels, but died in the process.