Hope Summers (character)

Hope Summers is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Mike Carey and Chris Bachalo, the character first appeared in X-Men #205 (Jan 2008, during the "X-Men: Messiah Complex" storyline). She is the first mutant born after the events of the "House of M" and "Decimation" storyline.

Hope is the first mutant to be born after the Decimation, an event in which the Scarlet Witch uses her reality-altering powers to remove the powers of all but 198 mutants. The moment Hope is born, the mutant-locating computer Cerebro explodes, and soon afterwards the hunt for her begins.

Hope's town is attacked by the Purifiers, who use information given to them by the time-traveling Nimrod who warns them of her arrival. Although all the children in town are murdered by the Purifiers, the X-Man Cable manages to save Hope. According to Cable, the baby is a Messianic figure destined to save both mutant and humankind. The Purifiers and Bishop, however, recall a timeline in which Hope will become the mutant equivalent of the Antichrist, and kill a million humans in an instant. This event, known as the "Six Second War", will turn humanity against mutants once again and lead into a new era of mutant persecution, creating the dark timeline into which Bishop is born.

Later, the baby is kidnapped by the Marauders and delivered to the mutant Mystique, disguised as Mister Sinister. Mystique makes the baby touch the comatose Rogue with the intention of waking her from her coma. Gambit intervenes and takes Hope. Gambit is amazed to find not only is the baby unharmed, but also Rogue has been awakened from her coma. After a battle between the Marauders, the X-Men and Predator X, Cyclops decides the baby would be better off with Cable, and allows him to take her to the future. However, an adamant Bishop decides to track Cable and the baby through time to kill her.

During one of the first battles with Bishop, Cable's time traveling device is damaged, so he can only jump into the future, instead of the past. After several jumps into the future, Cable has taken her to the secluded safe haven of New Liberty in the future, where Cable marries a woman named Hope. Finding peace there, he raises her with Hope until she is seven years old. New Liberty is then invaded by humanoid insects. Cable fights them and leaves New Liberty with his wife and girl. After spending months in wastelands, the family is attacked by the leader of the insects, who Hope fatally injures. Cable questions the leader and finds out that Bishop has destroyed all the continents in the world except North America, in order to box them in. The family moves on and encounters a settlement, but are met with resistance. Cable fights them but his wife is shot and killed. Cable and the young girl depart and arrive at a church, where Cable decides to name her Hope Summers, in honor of her adoptive mother.

In the Messiah War storyline, which ran through Cable and X-Force, Hope Summers was the center of conflict between the forces of Stryfe, Cable, and X-Force. Hope was kidnapped by Cable's clone Stryfe, in league with Bishop. Hope and Warpath are then rescued by Cable, Wolverine and Elixir. After a fight, Cable and Hope were forced to time travel again, Hope resisted because she wanted to stay with her new friends. She kicks Cable mid-jump, stranding them two years apart. They eventually reunite, with Hope now eleven years old.

In the four-part series A Girl Called Hope, Hope is shown with the Phoenix emblem reflecting in her eyes, with a promotional image for the event released depicting a version of Hope surrounded by the Phoenix Force.

During the "X-Men: Second Coming" story arc, Hope manifests the powers of other X-Men, and kills Stephen Lang and Graydon Creed. Nightcrawler saves her from Bastion, dying in the process. With the assistance of the X-Men, she eradicates Bastion and shatters the dome surrounding San Francisco. At a celebratory bonfire, Emma Frost notices the flames around Hope take the shape of the Phoenix, and triggers a flashback to the Sisterhood storyline where Jean warned her to prepare. Emma runs to Cyclops but before she can, he tells her that Cerebro has found five new mutants that have appeared around the globe.