Nathan Summers' birth was carefully orchestrated by the geneticist Mister Sinister, who had created his mother Madelyne Pryor as a clone of the mutant telepath Jean Grey.
Soon after, Pryor was corrupted by demonic influences into using baby
Nate as a sacrifice to open a portal between Earth and the
demon-infested dimension Limbo, but was opposed by her husband and
Nate's father Cyclops, his teammates in X-Factor, and his former team the X-Men. Sinister planned to use Nate as a weapon against his former master, Apocalypse,
but Apocalypse learned of this and had Nate captured and infected with a
deadly techno-organic virus. After Apocalypse was defeated by X-Factor,
a member of the Clan Askani - a sisterhood dedicated to opposing
Apocalypse in the alternate future of Earth-4935- offered to save Nate's
life by taking him to her own era. Desperate, Cyclops agreed, and Nate
was taken 2,000 years into the future of Earth-4935, where the Mother
Askani, actually his time-displaced half-sister Rachel, had him cloned
in case the virus could not be cured. Minions of Apocalypse attacked and
stole the clone, taking it to their master, who raised the child as his
heir, Stryfe.
Rachel
pulled the psyches of Scott and Jean into the future of Earth-4935 to
help keep Nate safe, and, as Slym and Redd Dayspring, they raised him
for the next 12 years, teaching him how to use his mutant powers to keep
the virus at bay. After the teenage Nate defeated Apocalypse, he
traveled to the last Askani enclave and was welcomed as the Askani'Son,
"the Chosen One." After the enclave was attacked, Nate regrouped the
surviving Askani into the rebel Clan Chosen. Nate later fell in love
with young novitiate Aliya Jenskot, and soon they were married and had a
son named Tyler. Following one clash with Stryfe, Aliya was killed and
Tyler was captured. Stryfe brainwashed Tyler, and in a subsequent
encounter, Nate was forced to shoot Tyler to save his Clanmate Dawnsilk.
After Stryfe used a time travel device to flee into the past, arriving
in the late 20th century, Nate followed. He arrived in Scotland, years
before his birth, and was taken in by geneticist Moira MacTaggert,
who taught him how to speak English. He adopted the codename Cable, as a
metaphor for being a link between the present in the future. Moira sent
him to visit her friend Professor Xavier in the U.S., and en route he
encountered the feral mutant Wolverine, aiding him against another agent
from his own time, D'Von Kray. Meeting Xavier, Cable helped design the
security systems for his mansion in exchange for lessons on how to live
in the 20th century.
Cable formed the mercenary group the Wild Pack, later the Six Pack, and
took missions from Tolliver, secretly Tyler, which often put them in
conflict with Stryfe and his Mutant Liberation Front. Cable made
occasional trips back to Earth-4935, at one point returning with a space
station he named Graymalkin, after the address of Xavier's mansion.
Returning to Earth-4935, Cable discovered that Sam Guthrie, the New
Mutant Cannonball, existed into the 23rd century. Cable believed Sam was
an immortal mutant, and returned to the present to guide Sam's
ascension. With the aid of his mercenary ally and sometime lover Domino,
Cable reorganized the New Mutants into the strike team X-Force. Later,
Cable's former Six Pack teammate Kane was critically injured in a failed
attempt to oppose Stryfe. To save his life, Cable transported Kane to
Earth-4935, where he was saved and stayed with the Clan Chosen to
recuperate, while Cable returned to the present. During his absence,
Stryfe had made an attempt on Xavier's life and sought to frame Cable
for the deed. Believing himself the true son of Cyclops, Stryfe
kidnapped Cyclops and Jean. Cable came to their rescue, but during the
struggle both he and Stryfe fell into a temporal rift. Displaced far
into the future, scientists of that time saved Cable's life by using
Stryfe's brainwaves. Cable and Kane later returned to the present, but
upon arrival Cable discovered that Graymalkin had been destroyed,
preventing him from returning home. Stryfe's mind eventually took
control of Cable's body, but after being confronted with the truth of
his existence he relinquished that control.
When
the psionic entity Onslaught hampered all telepathic abilities on
Earth, Cable began to succumb to the TO virus. After attacks by
Onslaught's herald Post and a mentally-controlled Hulk weakened Cable further, he found himself allying with his nemesis Apocalypse in order to rescue the young mutant Franklin Richards from Onslaught,
after which Franklin helped Cable suppress the virus. Later, Cable
learned from journalist Irene Merryweather of a plot by the enigmatic
Hellfire Club to obtain Apocalypse's power. Cable was too late to
prevent them from unleashing Apocalypse's Harbinger on the world, but he
managed to defeat it with the aid of the Avengers. Realizing that the
culmination of his destiny was near, Cable asked Irene to chronicle his
life. Soon after, Cable learned that he was one of the Twelve, mutants
supposedly destined to usher in a golden age for their kind. Apocalypse
intended to use the Twelve to boost his powers to allow him to alter
reality and had them captured. Cyclops seemingly sacrificed himself to
stop Apocalypse, and Cable joined the X-Men to honor his memory.
Subsequently learning that Cyclops was still alive, Cable and Jean
tracked him down to Egypt. Jean forcibly removed Apocalypse's essence
from Cyclops' body, allowing Cable to seemingly destroy it. His purpose
in life apparently complete, Cable returned to his mercenary ways,
eventually forming the Underground resistance movement to oppose the
clandestine Weapon X Project. A failed infiltration attempt of the
Neverland mutant concentration camp saw them captured and the knowledge
of Neverland wiped from their minds. Cable later found himself at odds
with the mercenary Deadpool
over the One World Church and their planned use of the Façade Virus to
transform the world's people into blue-skinned beings like themselves in
the hope of bringing about peace on Earth.
Cable ultimately realized that his body would be unable to contain his
vast energies, and so set out to save the world before he died.
Rebuilding his space station as the floating city Providence, Cable
realized that the only way to force the people's of Earth to see the
potential of a unified future was to unite them against the common goal
of opposing him. Initially opposed by the super-spy agency S.H.I.E.L.D.
and the X-Men, Cable faced the cosmic-powered Silver Surfer,
which caused his powers to burn out rapidly. He used his teleportation
matrix to surgically remove the portions of his brain that controlled
his mutant abilities, effectively lobotomizing himself. Deadpool then
enlisted the aid of the Fixer to merge Cable with a techno-organic
embryo, restoring his powers. Cable subsequently reformed X-Force to
oppose the ancient evil named the Skornn, which he was able to destroy
at the apparent cost of his own life. Cannonball
and his fellow former X-Force member Siryn joined Deadpool on a quest
to find Cable, and after finding his life force scattered across
alternate realities, they collected it and returned to their own
universe to discover that Cable had reverted to an infant when the
mutant sorceress the Scarlet Witch
reshaped reality. The mutant technosmith Forge was able to restore
Cable, who began aging rapidly. Faced with being overwhelmed by his
powers, Cable expended them by curing Deadpool of the brain damage he
had suffered years earlier at the hands of Weapon X. As he re-aged,
Cable's powers returned.
