Crule is considered to be an External mutant...which means he is harder to defeat. He is no stranger to the X-Force, clashing on several occasions because once X-Force member Cannonball was like him an External.
The most recent encounter with X-Force had Crule pitted against Shatterstar in X-Force #53 when they discovered Gideon to be presumably dead, even though he was an External, which virtually meant immortality. Shatterstar was at this time still being troubled by his newfound alternate identity, and quickly wanted to fight Crule to see if indeed he still had his warrior's touch. The fight quickly ended up with Shatterstar almost beheading Crule, but at the last moment, Domino stopped him from doing it.
