Duane Swierczynski Talks Cable and Rachel in X-Position

Cable writer Duane Swierczynski is the guest in this week’s edition of X-Position on Comicbookresources.com.

Duane talked a lot about what's coming up in Cable for Nathan and the Messiah Baby (or is she the Messiah Girl now?)

He was also asked about Rachel appearing in Cable, and gave a rather nondescript answer:

3) Also, any chance Rachel Summers will appear in “Cable” once she returns from space?
As Tom Petty once said, “The future is wide open.”

Warning, possible spoilers for Cable ahead:

Duane Swierczynski said a couple of interesting and alarming things about Cable's future.

First off, it sounds like the "baby" will be aging quickly, (Duane told X-Position, "So we always intended for the series to show the baby growing up quick") and as the baby grows up, Nathan will be growing older.

What's alarming is how Duane describes Nathan as, "a tired soldier who’s seen it all but has been pressed into service one last time for the most important mission of his career." That doesn't sound promising for Nathan's long term development or future in X-books. Even worse, Duane alludes to the potential that Nathan is not going to be coming back with the "baby".

Duane is clearly writing Nate as being at least in his late 50s and he will age at least 10, and possibly more, years as his young charge grows to be at least a teenager before she returns. Then Duane brings up doubts that Nathan will be returning.

While killing off the title character of a books sound unlikely, it does bring up the ol' "kill Cable off and bring back Nate Grey" argument again, especially when Nathan is being written as an old man in his 60s-70s and an old soldier on his final mission. I can't see Marvel wanting to continue that for very long.

That takes a lot of the joy of the speculation that Rachel and Nathan might, at long last, be reunited. I only started reading X-books again when it was announced that Cable would be in Adjectiveless at the same time Rachel would be in Uncanny X-Men. I assumed that there was no way they wouldn't interact if they were both X-Men at the same time. (Silly me). Now I wonder if it's going to be decades before that reunion ever happens, if ever.