Nightcrawler
Mystique, who resembled him almost exactly in appearance. Wondering if they might be related, he asked her how they could resemble each other so much. She gave him no answer though, and he was left wondering for several years. Brave and noble, Kurt fought many battles alongside the X-Men; his friends and family, and he might have remained with them always, if not for fate.
returned to public view, and Kurt reunited with his old family, albeit for a brief visit. He had come to feel that his place was now with Excalibur, and did not return to the team. Shortly following, Kurt received a call from Forge, instructing him to come back to America on a matter of utmost importance. He met up with Rogue, and soon found himself pulled into a chain of events which led to the discovery of his origin. Mystique had given birth to him, but much as the angry mob had chased Kurt for his appearance, they now chased the mother and her newborn child. Throwing him over the falls in order to save her own life, Mystique left him to die. But being a mutant, Kurt survived the fall and was found by Margali Szardos. With this revelation also came the realization that the mutant-hater, Graydon Creed, was his half-brother, and Rogue, having been raised by Mystique, his foster sister. Kurt returned to Excalibur to reconcile with this new information, and had it out with his foster mother, Margali, angry that she had never told him the truth of his birth mother. But Kurt had little time to dwell on these things, as Excalibur found itself being drawn into battle after battle.
Strength level: Nightcrawler possesses at least the
normal human strength of a man of his age, height, and
build who engages in intensive regular exercise.
Unusual features: Nightcrawler has only 3 fingers (including an opposable thumb) on each hand, and only 2 toes, each longer than an ordinary human's, on each foot. Nightcrawler also has a prehensile tail about 3 1/2 feet long, which can carry his own weight. His body is almost entirely covered with a fine indigo-colored fur, making him so dark that he seems to blend into deep shadows. (Contrary to appearances, he does not literally turn invisible in deep shadow.) Nightcrawler also has pointed ears and pronounced fang-like canine teeth. His spine is more flexible than an ordinary human being's, allowing him to spend much of his time in a semi-crouching position without damaging his posture and enables him to perform contortionist-like feats.
Known superhuman powers: Nightcrawler is a mutant with the ability to teleport himself, the clothes he is wearing, and, within limits, a certain amount of additional mass which is in contact with him. He teleports by displacing himself into another dimension (the nature of which is as yet unknown), travelling through it, and then returning to his own dimension at a certain distance from his point of departure. He consciously determines his point of return. The entire process occurs so quickly that Nightcrawler is unaware of being in another dimension at all. Nightcrawler guides himself through the other dimension by an unconscious, natural direction-finding sense. Although Nightcrawler controls his teleportational ability with his conscious mind, his power to teleport is not psionic. Rather it is the result of an unknown biochemical/biophysical reaction which he triggers mentally.
When he disappears in teleporting, Nightcrawler leaves behind smoke with a stench reminiscent of burning brimstone. This is a small portion of the atmosphere of this other dimension that escapes while the aperture is open. His teleportation is invariably accompanied by the muffled sound of imploding air rushing to fill the vacuum left where Nightcrawler's volume was.
The longer the distance over which Nightcrawler teleports himself, the harder and more exhausting it is for him to make the teleportational "jump." It is easier for him to teleport between north and south (along Earth's magnetic lines of force) than it is for him to teleport between east and west (against the magnetic lines). Under optimal conditions, teleporting only himself and his costume, Nightcrawler can displace himself a distance of about 2 miles east-to-west, and up to 3 miles north-to-south. Making a vertical teleportation upwards is difficult and dangerous. Nightcrawler has made a vertical teleportational "jump" of 2 miles by pushing himself to his physical limits.
Nightcrawler has a very limited unconscious extrasensory ability that prevents him from teleporting himself so that his feet, for example, would materialize below the surface of the local ground. Because this ability is so limited, however, Nightcrawler will not teleport into any place that he cannot see or has not seen in the past. If Nightcrawler teleported himself into an unfamiliar area, he would run the risk of materializing partially or entirely within a solid object. If too much of his body materialized within a solid object, he would probably be killed.
Nightcrawler's powers automatically displace liquids and gases when he arrives in the course of a teleportation. Nightcrawler's momentum is retained throughout the process of teleportation: he arrives with whatever amount of inertia he left with. For example, if he were falling from a great height, he could not teleport himself towards the ground in order to save himself; he would land with the same velocity that he teleported with. He can subtract this inertia by teleporting short distances upwards (as though taking two steps back for every one forward).
The limits to the amount of weight that Nightcrawler can carry with himself while teleporting, and the limits to the range of distance over which he can teleport himself with such additional loads, are unknown. When he transports a passenger over even moderate distances, they both feel weakened and ill, to the point of exhaustion. Teleportation over further distances could be fatal. Through practice, Nightcrawler has increased the mass he can teleport with him. (He once teleported himself and Storm from the center of a small island into the water just off its coast without harming either of them). The upper limits of this capacity are as yet unknown.
Other abilities: Nightcrawler is a superb athlete and an
Olympic-class acrobat. He can do a standing high jump
of about 8 feet. He is skilled at hand-to-hand combat
and is a master at fencing, which he can even perform
with his tail.
Nightcrawler has had
