Main story arc Mr. Gone, a
serial rapist with a
telepathic link to Julie, has extensive knowledge of and access to other people's Outbacks. He starts phoning Julie, but she thinks he is merely an obscene phone caller and ignores him. Eventually, the Maxx gets in Gone's way by "protecting" Julie. Gone tries to kill him with assistance from the Outback's main predators, the Isz. The Maxx fights him in both the Outback and the real world. Eventually, Mr. Gone makes Julie see the truth about her past and reveals to her how the Maxx came to be. Gone first met Julie when she was a child as "Uncle Artie", a friend of her father; his
tall tales about a visit to Australia helped shape Julie's Outback. As Julie begins healing herself and the Outback, the series starts following Sara, a
depressed teenager whose mother sends her to Julie for
counseling. Sara is often in conflict with her mother, who disciplines her so she will not grow up to be like her father—Mr. Gone.
Backstory The backstories of several characters are revealed midway through the series. While in college, Julie picks up a hitch-hiker who beats and
rapes her, leaving her to die. To cope, she hides in what is referred to as her "Outback" (a primeval landscape situated entirely in her subconscious, where she has control). In the Outback, she becomes "The Jungle Queen", an all-powerful goddess. She spends so much time dwelling in her Outback that the real world and the Outback gradually become unstable. One night, she accidentally hits a homeless man with her car. Remembering what happened the last time she stopped to help someone, she covers the unconscious body with trash, but in doing so unintentionally creates a link between it and the Outback. After Julie leaves a lampshade in the trash, which had previously brushed the Outback, it expands over the man's body and becomes a mask that consumes and links him to Julie, transforming him into the Maxx.
Second storyline After the conclusion of the first storyline, the comic skips in time from 1995 (the then-present) to the year 2005. Julie and Dave (the former Maxx) having vanished, the action focuses on Sara (as she now spells her name) and "Iago", a giant, murderous
banana slug from her Outback. Iago has a list of people to kill, and it turns out that Julie and Sara are both on it. Sara is hounded by a homeless man named Norbert whom she soon realizes is her Maxx. Sara has constant confrontations with Mr. Gone, who is repentant of his past crimes. He is visited by three special agents intent on arresting him, but he turns them into insects. Later, after reading a diary he leaves for her that reveals his tragic origin story, Sara eventually feels sympathy for and a connection to her father. She also begins developing a strange power that she may be inheriting from Gone. Julie and Dave return to the story after Julie is attacked by Iago and loses a few fingers. It turns out that Julie abandoned her son, Mark, to keep him safe from Iago. She tries to have Dave tell Mark that she's dead so he'll stop seeking her out, but Mark does not believe him. Sara, Dave, Mark, Mr. Gone and Norbert band together to rescue Julie from Iago, who kidnaps and takes her into Sara's outback. Norbert cuts Iago open, apparently defeating him, but Julie has already escaped. Mr. Gone soon reveals that time is unraveling for the group, which now includes Glorie, one of Gone's past victims who now has a friendly relationship with him. Gone returns Dave's Maxx power to him. Sara returns as a being whom different people perceive as a giant Isz, pink fairy, or football. Mark has an odd dream about eccentric kidnappers. Each member of the group begins to disappear from reality to be reborn in another. Before Gone can disappear, the three agents who previously tried to arrest him, now appearing as humanoid beings with insect bug heads, return and kill him, as he expected. Mark is the last to disappear. In Julie's outback, Gone is reunited with Sara, who is now a child again. The Maxx considers attacking him, but the Jungle Queen says to leave him be, because even evil deserves a place to rest. In the new reality, Mr. Gone is a professor and Dave is a janitor at his school. Julie and Mark are still mother and son, but seem to live in better conditions. All the principal characters now lead completely distinct lives, yet retain a small part of their connection to the Outback and to each other. ==Spirit animals==