Batten down the hatches, not to mention    Oprah Winfrey's on-set furniture:    Tom Cruise is having a baby.

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The amped-up star, who spent the summer on Spinal Tap 11, declaring his mad love for    Katie Holmes on talk shows, in magazine interviews and atop the Eiffel Tower, is expecting a child with his "magnificent" bride-to-be.


News of the joint production was first trumpeted Wednesday afternoon by People magazine. Lee Anne DeVette, Cruise's publicist and sister, and the Cruise-Holmes spawn's future aunt, confirmed the pregnancy to E!


"They are so happy," DeVette said of the expectant parents.


There was no word on when the child, the couple's first, was due.


Cruise, 43, who once successfully sued a German magazine that claimed he had a "zero sperm count," is the father of two children, Isabella, 12, and Connor, 10, both of whom he adopted with second wife    Nicole Kidman.


Holmes, 26, who, per a 2003 London Sunday Mirror profile, once pledged to "remain a virgin until marriage," is a rookie in the world of dydees.


Even in fast-moving celebrity circles, where Renée Zellweger can go from newlywed to awaiting an annulment in four months, Cruise and Holmes have evolved at lightning speed.


Before April, when the duo began making very public displays of affection, it seemed unlikely that Hollywood's reigning box-office king would ever share a handshake, much less a clinch on the red carpet, with the onetime Dawson's Creek TV star.


Last fall, in an interview with Seventeen, Holmes spoke of the nearly 20-years-older Cruise in hypothetical, schoolgirl-crush terms. "I think every little girl dreams about [her wedding]," she told the magazine. "I used to think I was going to marry Tom Cruise."


At the time, Holmes was due to marry American Pie star    Chris Klein, 26, her longtime fiancé. But the pair announced their split in February.


By May, Cruise was jumping up and down, and jumping up and down, on The    Oprah Winfrey Show in a demonstration of how the former Joey Potter had made him a happy man.


The louder the buzz got that Holmes was more prop than girlfriend, the louder Cruise got. On June 17, Cruise held a press conference in Paris to announce that he'd popped the marriage question to Holmes atop the Eiffel Tower that morning. Although a blushing Holmes didn't speak to reporters, her ring did the talking. Nothing, or no one, however, could outdo Cruise.


"Today is a magnificent day for me," Cruise boasted. "I'm engaged to a magnificent woman."


Cruise's Paris proposal coincided with a publicity stop for War of the Worlds.


While it's unknown if the resulting media crush aided Cruise and Holmes' respective summer films, it didn't seem to hurt. With a $233 million take, War of the Worlds became Cruise's biggest-ever hit at the domestic box office. Holmes, whose film career is still at the modest stage, enjoyed her highest-profile role yet in Batman Begins ($205 million gross).


But not all, or even most, of the publicity from Cruise's War of the Worlds/Katie Holmes world tour was positive for the usually bulletproof star, who took a blast from a water gun on a London red carpet. In interviews, the actor's sound bites about his    Steven Spielberg blockbuster got lost amid his spiels about the dangers of prescription drugs and psychiatry, two no-nos for Scientologists such as Cruise.


On Today, Cruise sparred with Matt Lauer, and accused the cohost of being "glib." On Access Hollywood, he suggested    Brooke Shields' career had suffered because of her use of the antidepressant Paxil following the birth of her daughter.

In a New York Times op-ed piece, Shields shot back that Cruise showed an "utter lack of understanding about postpartum depression and childbirth in general." The American Psychiatric Association branded his comments "irresponsible."

Cruise didn't back down, and the Catholic-raised Holmes told reporters she was "excited" about learning more about Scientology herself. In the end, Cruise prescribed vitamins and exercise to women with postpartum depression and moved on to the shoot for Mission: Impossible 3.

Cruise and Holmes still don't have a wedding date--just a stork date.

ew..i can't believe she's pregnant.

i watched the thing between him and matt lauer. cruise was definately an ass about it.