Sue Keeps The Baby

Reed Richards was in his lab, staring at a spectrographic analysis of the Black Sun around which the Wraithworld orbited. Sue Storm felt a flutter of nervousness in her stomach that had nothing and everything to do with the pregnancy. She couldn't stop the shiver, her face flushed with shame. The Invisible Woman had faced down aliens, gods, monsters, and demons without flinching. Now, as she had to tell her husband she was pregnant with someone else's child, Sue needed all of her courage.

"Reed," she said, her voice shaking. "I'm pregnant."

The words hit him like a hammer. He shifted around, alien suns forgotten. He saw the tears in Sue's eyes, the paperwork she clutched in her hand.

"How?" he said, brain on automatic. Then, his eyes narrowed. "Who?"

A sob broke through Sue's resolve. She couldn't look at him as the tears fell down her cheeks. Crying was cheating. She knew that. Reed had less emotional intelligence than a Cotati, but tears would move him, she knew it. An invisible pin pressed into her foot, hard enough to draw blood, forcing the tears to come.

In an instant, Reed Richards was up, his arms wrapped around her, the rubbery limbs encasing her.

"I don't know," Sue said, and as the dam broke inside of her, the tears were no longer ****. She told him everything. The nausea she'd dismissed as the flu, the weight gain, the appointment with the doctor—

Ten weeks.

"I haven't cheated on you," Sue Storm said, and meant it with every ounce of her being. "I don't know how this happened, but I've been faithful!"

Reed Richards said nothing. His cheek rested against her forehead. One finger stretched out and touched a discreet control. A monitor popped up and showed a voice analysis.

Sue Storm was telling the truth, or what she thought was the truth, with 98.3% accuracy.

"I believe you," Mister Fantastic said. Then he paused. "Are you keeping it?"

"I can't abort it," Sue said, her voice quiet. Almost a whisper. An apology.

Reed nodded, slowly.

"Then we need to find out how this happened," he said. "And we need to tell the children that in thirty weeks they'll have a new brother or sister."

Sue buried her face into Reed's shoulder. Her lips met his neck. Grateful that she had married this wonderful, forgiving man.

"Thank you," Sue whispered.

Reed Richards held her for a long time. Yet his mind was already on the tests he would need to run. The access to the Baxter Building's waste water records. If he could narrow down the window of impregnation...

He would find whoever impregnated his wife. And see them pay.