This feature is basically a counterpart to our Left Unresolved feature. That feature is for plotlines that were, well, left unresolved. In this one, though, we spotlight examples of long unresolved stories that WERE ultimately resolved by later writers. The only rule is that at least four years have to pass between the plot point being introduced and it being resolved.

Today we take a look at long wait to find out what the deal was with the "Witness" to the X-Traitor!

In Uncanny X-Men #287 (by Jim Lee, Scott Lobdell, John Romita Jr. and a bunch of inkers, primarily Scott Williams), Bishop first discovers the existence of the X-Traitor. I covered that resolved story here in the very first Provide Some Answers.

In that same story, Bishop goes to visit "the Witness," who presumably was, you know, a witness to the X-Men being betrayed...

So when Bishop comes to the present and meets Gambit in 1992's X-Men #8 (by Jim Lee, Scott Lobdell and Art Thibert), also known as Remy LeBeau, he presumes that Gambit is the X-Traitor...

And he later encounters Gambit...

(The fact that the Witness RAISED Bishop is such an odd piece of information. It doesn't really seem to fit everything else, right?)

The Witness would pop up a couple of other times in Bishop-related stories, like the XSE mini-series, where we reveal he remained involved in Bishop's life later on.

But in 1999's Gambit #10 by Fabian Nicieza, Steve Skroce and Rob Hunter, we get a major hint that the Witness IS Gambit.

Gambit is on the hunt for some special jewel that keeps popping up at various points in time that can show you the future or some such stuff...

And at the end of the issue, we learn that the jewel was initially sent through time BY the Witness...

Two years later, though, the Witness was finally revealed...

In the 2001 Bishop/Gambit mini-series, Sons of the Atom, by Scott Lobdell, Joe Pruett, Cary Nord and Mark Lipka, we finally get the Witness' whole deal explained...

And at the end of the series (by Lobdell, Pruett, Georges Jeanty and a bunch of inkers), the Witness seemingly disappears...

Although in X-Men #200 (by Mike Casey and Humberto Ramos), he is seemingly killed by the Marauders...

So while his story was wrapped up, I suppose we never got definitive proof that he was NOT Gambit (well, Gambit as an old man, that is), but either way, his story was resolved.

If you have a suggestion for a future Provide Some Answers, drop me a line at bcronin@comicbookresources.com