Cable/Deadpool #18

Writer: Fabian Nicieza
Marvel Comics, $2.99

Deadpool is traveling through a series of alternate dimensions searching for a missing Cable, followed, after a three-minute interval, by Cannonball and Siryn. After returning to his own dimension during the time that it had been altered by the events of the "House of M" storyline, Deadpool watches the world turn to normal, mistakenly believing that this change is another jump across dimensions. Returning finally to the version of his own dimension that he had left, Deadpool finds that he has taken a passenger from the "House of M"--an infant Cable.

Forge--who had been assisting Deadpool--determines that this infant is, in fact, their dimension's version of Cable, and that he had left a trace of himself in each of the alternate dimensions through which Deadpool had followed; This explains, somehow, his chronological devolution. Further, Forge observes that the teleportation harness that Deadpool had been using somehow collected each of these traces, and that it's possible to restore Cable to his previous state, at which point Deadpool draws a gun on the infant Cable, revealing that his purpose in searching out Cable was to kill him, believing him to be the greatest threat to all mankind. Siryn puts herself between Deadpool and Cable, and Deadpool, torn between his love for Siryn and his mandate, shoots himself in the head.

Deadpool wakes up to find that Cable has aged rapidly, physically and even more so mentally. Cable is able to determine that Deadpool was brainwashed by the villain Black Box, although Deadpool himself is unable to remember it, his amnesia even more apparent than usual. Cable realizes that he's the only one that can help Deadpool, and decides to do so, undergoing a process that will join all the traces that had been picked up by the teleportation harness, even though the process might leave him vulnerable to the techno-organic virus. Ultimately, the process is successful, and while X-Forces searches--fruitlessly--for Black Box, Cable cures Deadpool, although it's still unclear to all, including Deadpool, what that means, exactly.