Comic Book Questions Answered – where I answer whatever questions you folks might have about comic books (feel free to e-mail questions to me at brianc@cbr.com).

Reader Tracy P. wrote in to ask:

What issue did Cable learn the truth that he was Cyclops' son?

Cable had been around for almost two years before a big issue showed up that looked like it would change things a lot.

X-Factor #68 (by Whilce Portacio, Chris Claremont, Jim Lee and Scott Williams) showed Cyclops' son, Nathan Christopher, get infected by the techno-organic virus and Cyclops had to decide to save his life by sending him into the future, even thought that would mean he would quite possibly never see his son again...

Okay, once the whole "Wait, Cable is from the future and Cyclops' son was SENT to the future" idea began to circulate around fandom, everyone assumed that Cable must be Cyclops' son.

A problem, though, was the New Mutants #100 reveal that Stryfe, Cable's armored evil rival, looked just like Cable underneath his helmet!

Finally, in the X-crossover, X-Cutioner's Song, the final part in X-Force #18 (by Fabian Nicieza, Greg Capullo and Harry Candelario), seems to suggest that STRYFE is actually the son of Cyclops and Cable is the CLONE of Stryfe!

And Stryfe certainly acted like Cyclops was his dad...

However, Cable would then force Cyclops to press the button to trigger a bomb that would suck Cable and Stryfe into a time vortex and hopefully kill them so that they could be done with Stryfe. Cyclops is all about how he gave up his own son AGAIN!

Okay, so obviously Cable and Stryfe weren't REALLY dead. Cable showed up in the future. So, he returned to the present and in Cable #6 (by Fabian Nicieza and Dwayne Turner) he visits the grave of Madelyne Pryor, who he thinks is the birth mother of Stryfe, but not himself...

We see ANOTHER Asakni person come back in time.

Then Sinister shows up and explicitly tells Cable that HE is the biological son of Cyclops and Maddie Pryor...

Cable acts all confused, but Sinister is pretty straightforward about it all. Stryfe takes control of Cable's body.

The next issue, Cable's friend, Domino, warns the X-Men and tells Scott that Cable IS his biological son...

In the final part of the story, they all manage to get Stryfe to give up Cable's body, while also learn the truth about Stryfe and Cable. How, when the baby was brought to the future, he was so infected that they cloned him. Then the original boy survived and the clone was kidnapped by Apocalypse who raised him as his heir.

Once Cable gets Stryfe out of his head, he and Cyclops get a nice "father/son" moment...

So the answer is Cable #6.

Thanks for the question, Tracy! If anyone ELSE has a question they'd like to see me address, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!