It's official; the X-Men's Cyclops has the craziest family tree in comics. The X-Men comics have often been compared to superhero soap operas, to the extent that even Cyclops has joked about how incestuous they can get. And he should know; frankly, you could create a small mutant army out of his wider family.
The story of the Summers family actually begins in Victorian England, with a man named Oscar Stamp who had been hired by a twisted scientist named Nathaniel Essex. Essex paid Oscar to abduct people for genetic testing, and one of his victims was an orphan named Daniel Edge. Fortunately, time travelling mutants from the future - Cyclops and his wife Jean - intervened, and inspired Oscar to grow a conscience. He and Daniel fled the country, ultimately ending up in the United States. There, Daniel chose a new surname; "Summers," after the married couple who had saved their lives. Yes, that's right, Cyclops is technically the inspiration for his own surname. Nathaniel Essex, incidentally, went on to become the X-Men villain Mr. Sinister after crossing paths with Apocalypse.
Mr. Sinister, for his part, has always maintained that the Summers genome has remarkable potential. He's been proved right by the sheer number of Omega mutants who are tied to Cyclops - making this the most powerful mutant bloodline of all. Let's explore the superhero family tree.
Corsair and Katherine Anne Summers
Fast-forward several generations to the 20th century, and Christopher Summers, the son of Philip and Deborah. A celebrated NASA pilot, Christopher Summers took his wife Katherine and their young children to Alaska for a holiday, but their plane was attacked by an alien race known as the Shi'ar. Chris and Katherine attempted to save their children, and were unable to escape the plane themselves; they thought their sons died when they watched a fragment of the plane impact the boys' parachute and set it aflame.
Chris and Katherine were taken to Shi'ar space, where Katherine was forced to become a member of Emperor D'Ken's personal harem. She was killed in front of Chris' eyes, and he was sentenced to live as a slave. He escaped and became leader of a group of intergalactic pirates known as the Starjammers, refusing to return to Earth for years. Ironically, he was reunited with his children when the X-Men headed into space themselves, and he realized that their leader Cyclops was one of his boys.
Cyclops
Scott Summers is the most famous member of the family, and he's possibly the X-Men's greatest leader. The air accident left Scott in a coma for years, and upon awakening he was taken into an orphanage that was secretly run by Mr. Sinister, who knew he was destined to be a mutant. As a teenager, Scott developed barely controllable optic blasts, and these brought him to the attention of Professor X. Codenamed Cyclops, Scott became the first member of the X-Men, and it didn't take long for him to fall in love with Jean Grey when she ed the team as Marvel Girl.
Havok
Scott's younger brother Havok is another mutant powerhouse, with the ability to generate devastatingly powerful cosmic blasts. Havok was introduced back in 1969, and his powers were amplified when he crossed paths with another mutant called the Living Monolith. Although Havok has typically felt he was lost in his brother's shadow, he's the Summers sibling who led an Avengers team. In one future timeline, Alex Summers married the Wasp and they had a daughter together; that timeline involved the Earth's destruction, and it was averted.
Vulcan
The third Summers brother is Gabriel, and he's the most powerful of them all. Katherine Anne Summers was pregnant when she and her husband were kidnapped by the Shi'ar, and Gabriel was born in Shi'ar space, and aged to become a slave. Gabriel was sent to Earth to work for a Shi'ar operative there, but he escaped and was found by Moira MacTaggert. Vulcan's story is a tragic and twisted one, because he was sent to the living island of Krakoa to rescue the original X-Men, and there was believed dead. When he returned, the experience had broken his mind, and he sought vengeance on all who he blamed for his past sufferings. Vulcan is an energy manipulator on a cosmic scale, and he headed off into Shi'ar space, actually conquering the Shi'ar Empire for a time.
Cable and Stryfe
After Jean Grey's death, Cyclops married a woman named Madelyne Pryor - in actual fact a clone of Jean, created by Mr. Sinister as breeding stock. They had a child, Nathan, but Cyclops was forced to send him into a distant future timeline in order to save the baby's life when he was infected with a technoorganic virus. He became the man named Cable, a time traveling warrior who is caught up in a never-ending conflict with Apocalypse. Cable has lived a long life, and has married at least twice. He has a step-son from one marriage, Tyler, who himself became a time traveling supervillain.
Stryfe is a clone of Cable, who was created as part of the process used to get the technoorganic virus under control. Where Cable's (sometimes Omega level) telekinesis is restrained by the fact he's always fighting the technoorganic virus, Stryfe has full access to his abilities. He was brought up by Apocalypse as a potential host, but was rejected; Stryfe burns with hatred towards the Summers family, and in the classic "X-Cutioner's Song" he brought the X-Men to the brink of destruction, almost killing Charles Xavier.
Kid Cable
There's a new Cable in town, a younger version from across the Multiverse who believed the older one was failing in his duty to protect the timeline. Kid Cable killed the traditional version, but then balanced the scales by resurrecting Cyclops. He's still a very fresh, very new character, and writers seem to be struggling to give him a consistent voice. Kid Cable currently appears in both X-Men and Fallen Angels.
Nate Grey, a.k.a. X-Man
Nate Grey is an alternate-universe version of Cable who was created by Mr. Sinister in the Age of Apocalypse reality. He's one of the most powerful mutants ever to be born, a telepath and telekinetic whose abilities are off the charts. During the climax of Age of Apocalypse, Nate wielded a fragment of the M'Kraan Crystal as a weapon, and unwittingly triggered an interdimensional discharge that brought him to the main timeline. He remains active to this day, and was last seen in the appropriately-named Age of X-Man event.
Rachel Grey
Speaking of future timelines, Rachel Grey/Summers is the daughter of Cyclops and Phoenix in the "Days of Future Past" timeline. She was the first Omega mutant, and is one of the few Phoenix Hosts to contain its power without going insane. Rachel traveled back from her own time to the present, and still serves as a member of the X-Men today. Meanwhile, there have been various alternate future versions of Rachel as well; one of them, who went on to become Mother Askani, created the mutant cult who saved Cable from his technoorganic virus.
Ruby Summers
Hailing from Bishop's future timeline, Ruby Summers is the daughter of Cyclops and Emma Frost. She's a mutant freedom fighter who battled alongside her father in the so-called Summers Rebellion, a mutant uprising that was a key event in that timeline. Ruby possesses a form of her father's optic blasts, and can also transform herself into a beautiful ruby form. She was last seen in Jonathan Hickman's Multiversal Secret Wars event back in 2015.
Katie Summers
Cyclops isn't the only one to have had children in averted future timelines. In one timeline, the Earth was destroyed and humanity was all but wiped out by the Celestials. The survivors - mostly mutants - established a mutant utopia, Planet X. But the Avengers never stopped trying to rewrite history and save the Earth. Foremost among them was Havok, who married the Wasp and had a daughter, Katie; Beast tested her genes and determined that she was human. Havok couldn't abide a reality where the world would be prejudiced against his daughter, and came up with the clever idea to send the Avengers' minds back to the past. While the timeline was changed, Katie was protected by Kang, and remains out there somewhere.
Hope Summers
Incredibly, we now move to the next generation, because a couple of mutants have ed the wider Summers family. Take, for example, Hope Summers; the erstwhile Mutant Messiah, who was essentially adopted by Cable. Hope is another Omega mutant, with the ability to mimic the powers of others and - as far as the Jonathan Hickman relaunch - to help others to synergize their abilities. She's one of the Five, the mutants being used to implement resurrections on the mutant nation of Krakoa.
Hyperstorm
In another alternate timeline, Rachel Grey married Franklin Richards, the son of the Fantastic Four's Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman. The two had a son, Jonathan Richards, who eventually became the tyrannical Hyperstorm. He was one of the most powerful mutants ever born, able to manipulate the four fundamental forces of the universe - gravitation, electromagnetic, strong, and weak forces - that apparently come from hyperspace. The Fantastic Four were transported to Hyperstorm's timeline, and defeated him by resurrecting Galactus. Incredibly, the two were evenly matched, and were last seen locked in what appeared to be eternal battle.
