Adventurer
Catholic Priest in Training
Circus Acrobat
Mutant Rights Activist
Excellent hand-to-hand combatant with skills as a swordsman.
Above average intelligence with skills as an aviation mechanic.
Note: Nightcrawler's teleportation is followed by an imploding sound and the smell of sulfur, which is from the atmosphere of the dimension he travels through.
Azazel
Legion
Proteus
Pyro
Stryfe
X-Cutioner
Excalibur Vol. 1
Nightcrawler Vol. 1 & 2
Uncanny X-Men
X-Men Vol. 2
Because of her husband's sterility he became suspicious of Raven's pregnancy, which prompted her to murder him and hide the body. After her child's birth and his demonic appearance, the stress shocked Raven into revealing her true form. Fearing for her own safety she fled her manor and tossed the child from a cliff to his death.
Before plunging to his death the child was rescued by his father, who used his ability of teleportation. Azazel left the infant in the care of the gypsy queen and sorceress Margali Szardos, who took the baby to the small Bavarian circus where she worked as a fortuneteller; a cover for her activities as a sorceress. The circus performers, who harbored no prejudices against so-called "freaks" adopted Wagner and Margali acted as his foster mother.
A Texas millionaire, who wanted to cast Wagner in a freak show, bought the Bavarian circus. The young mutant quit and fled to the German village of Winzeldorf, where his foster brother Stefan was living.
Wagner discovered his foster brother had gone mad and had slain several local children. Wagner tracked Stefan and fought him, hoping to end his rampage. During the struggle, Wagner unintentionally broke Stefan's neck. Discovered by the villagers Wagner was assumed to be a demon responsible for the child killings. They were about to kill him when Professor Charles Xavier intervened, psionically paralyzing the villagers, recruited Wagner into the X-Men as Nightcrawler.