Marvel owns the X-Men and related characters not me. Feel free to post. Takes place in an alternate third season that diverges sometime after "The Toad, the Witch and the Wardrobe." And, Spyke's powers are not going out of control.

The crime had still not come any closer to a solution four weeks later. The authorities didn't want to get involved, a mutants and mutant-lovers who went to mutie clubs were the only ones hurt. Charles could not locate Dr. Essex or find out anything about him from Erik, who left to do his own search.

Blue. Wanda stared at the stick. This could not be happening.

"Oh, God," she whispered.

Todd stuck his head in the door. "What's up, shnookums?"

Wanda burst into tears. "I'm pregnant!"

Todd narrowed his eyes. "Who?"

"I don't know!"

Todd was surprised at that, Wanda had struck him as being - well - not slutty. "Well, who could it be?"

Wanda looked at Todd. "Anyone."

Todd raised his eyebrows. So Wanda had made it with everyone? Everyone but him? He knew she didn't like him, but she would have sex with everyone else but him? "Who exactly have you had sex with, yo?"

"I don't know."

"What? Wanda, you know, you might want to consider a lifestyle change."

"You moron!" she hexed Toad into the wall. "It happened at Essex's! While we were all, you know, under the influence or something! Anyone could have taken advantage of my state!" She began to get hysterical.

Pietro walked in just then. "If it's any comfort, the person who did this to you was probably not consenting either. So whoever the father is, he's also a victim."

"WHAT?" screamed Wanda.

"Our father says that Dr. Essex likes to do genetic manipulation. Chances are he bred you with one of the boys at the nightclub."

"You make it sound like I am a farm animal."

"Wanda, that's how Essex sort of views us. As farm animals. Or, as lab rats."

Wanda began to cry. For some reason, abortion or adoption did not seem to be reasonable options to her. Either one seemed to her to be abandoning the child, which she just could not even imagine herself doing. People who abandoned their children, she thought, should be killed! Where, she wondered, did that thought come from? It's not as if Magneto had abandoned her. Somehow she felt as if some subliminal gremlin laughed as that thought crossed her mind.

"I'm keeping the baby. But as for the circumstances of my pregnancy, don't tell anyone," she begged. "Unless this has happened to someone else at the club, I don't want this to get out."

"Why not, yo?" asked Todd. "I mean, this way, it ain't your fault. When you become obviously pregnant, people will think you slept around or something."

"Because she would lose control, dolt!" hollered Pietro. Then, in a whisper, "To lose control like this, to be at someone else's mercy - these things are shameful."

"Magneto taught you that?" asked Todd.

"Yes," admitted Wanda.

"Well, what do we say, yo?" asked Toad.

"I'll just claim that I had a boyfriend over and that we... weren't careful. Oops." Wanda was thoughtful. "I'll just cry and Dad won't pry any further."