章 31: CH28: Success, Failure and Everything In Between.
"You see, Spider-"
"Fuck you."
"... Spider-Man, you must wonder-"
"Fuck you."
"... wonder how I-"
"Fuck-"
A metal tentacle whipped out and grabbed onto my shoulder. My entire body started to burn as electricity ran through me, so much that it actually jumped out of the tentacle and onto the metal restraints on my limbs. My body shuddered as it tried to move away from the iron grip the mechanical limb had on me, and a scream of agony tore itself from my throat, raw and primal.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the electricity stopped and I slumped, coughing and smoking. I almost screamed again when I realized the shoulder of my suit was on fire, but another of Octavius' tentacles came up and sprayed a cool liquid onto it, bringing a small relief on my shoulder and nowhere else.
"Now, will there be any more interruptions?" The smug fuck asked.
I'd like to say that I did something awesome, like spit hard enough that it went through my mask and onto his face, or maybe ripped the restraints off and smacked him over the head with them.
I didn't. I shuddered and kept quiet.
"Hm, that's what I thought," the fucker said, before walking over on his tentacles to the computer opposite of me. "Now, Spider-Man, you must wonder how I managed to defeat you so handily? Or even why I'm so determined to destroy you?"
I glared quietly, although internally I was thinking as fast as I could (not very fast, I am a notable dumbass). How did he kick my ass? Did he have a mind control machine? An invisible deathray? Fucking mad scientists, it could be anything and I couldn't remember anything past breaking into his base.
"Oh, you may speak now." Octavius said, as the same tentacle from before approached my other shoulder. "In fact, I encourage you to."
I grumbled, but spoke up, "I'll admit I'm curious about the first part, but I've already got the second part figured out."
"Do you now?"
"You worked for-"
"With."
"... sure. You worked with Osborn, taking his money and orders-"
A tentacle whips out and struck me in the stomach, pushing all the air out of my lungs. I coughed for a couple moments, while Octavius glared down at me.
"Asshole," I finally managed to bite out.
"Continue."
"Fine. You worked with Osborn, and got mad when he went all fucking obsessive, because he was focusing everything on me and replicating me, so your half-mechanical ass was all but kicked to the curb." Octavius growls and I flinch, but he doesn't move again, so I continue. "After I took his ass down and all of OsCorp with it, you were actually on the curb and you blame me for it."
Otto Octavius regards me cooly for a tense moment, before an amused expression crosses his face. "You have most of the story right, I'll admit. I'm almost impressed."
I almost tell him to go fuck himself, but the remaining shakes on my body tell me that's a bad idea.
"You see, it's more than just that fool Osborn's obsession or your impulsive decision to put thousands out of a job," I wince as he shoots me a look along with that barb, "But there's also the matter that I've had to compete with your kind all my life."
"My kind? Capes?"
"Indeed. Every time I invented something amazing, some imbecile from Stark International or the Baxter Building would come over to make sure it wouldn't be used in yet another supervillain scheme." He growls and whips around to look at me. "Do you have any idea how many inventions were taken from my laboratory? How many wonderful gadgets that could save or improve lives were stolen from me? DO YOU?!"
In a second, almost too fast for me to follow, one of the tentacles whips out and smashes into a wall. I flinch, but Octavius doesn't notice, well into his rant.
"Did you know Reed fucking Richards has a Universal Translator? He showed it off in a documentary about the 'fascinating' lives of the Fantastic Four. It was just sitting there, gathering dust until the next time he went to another universe. And nobody ever seems to mind that he's keeping this tech for himself! Tony Stark has a source of clean and nigh-unlimited energy stuck to his chest and nobody seems to care as long as he keeps flying around in that glorified bucket!" The tentacles carried him to me and he grabbed me by the throat with his human hand, forcing me to look him in the eye. I could have shifted my head and looked away with ease, but I didn't. "You can't possibly tell me that's right! The world is flooding and starving and dying and these two maniacs are just hoarding every solution! How is that heroic."
He let me go and walked back a little. "The original concept behind my own tentacles were artifical limbs for people that had been crippled. Do you understand that? Something that could have made someone's parent capable of hugging them again? Something that could make someone's child walk again, after being crippled by some drunk bastard driving? And you know what they did with it?!"
"They told you that it would be put to bad use," I whispered. "They told you it was too dangerous to let it out of your lab."
Octavius actually stops at that, the anger not fading completely, but drawing back to wherever he was keeping it as he suddenly looked at me like he was actually seeing me. "... yes. How did you know that?"
"I... I'm friends with Johnny Storm, and sometimes I spend time at the Baxter Building with him. One time, Richards showed me that same Universal Translator you're talking about, and I asked him the same questions you would have. He said that S.H.I.E.L.D. insisted he keep it private, out of fear that criminals would be able to organize better thanks to it. Same reason for why Reactor Cores aren't powering water purification plants in Africa as we speak." I looked him in the eye, speaking through grit teeth. "I know it's bullshit, that's why I've been looking into it."
"... I see." Octavius made a complicated expression, I couldn't tell exactly what he was thinking. "I didn't expect that from you, Spider-Man."
"Why the fuck not?" I asked. "I know I'm not one of the science heroes, but you don't need to be a genius to realize it's kinda fucked that stuff like that is accesible by those that need it the most."
"Yes, but..." Octavius grimaced, and put on his goggles, looking weirdly uncomfortable. "When you took down OsCorp, many of my co-workers went out of job. I thought you a thoughtless fool that couldn't see past his own nose. I'm alarmed to find it isn't so, and yet you did that anyway."
I grimaced. "Osborn... he... he made things personal. Before that, the whole hero vs villain thing... it was just business. I couldn't in good conscience let any asshole with a mask run around doing what they pleased, but I got that some people are just desperate or they can't help themselves. Osborn was a billionaire with everything he could ever want in his hand, and he still felt the need to go and be a villain, and attack people close to me because of his obsession. I wasn't thinking... well, no, I was thinking clearly, but I couldn't see past me breaking him."
"... I indeed misjudged you, Spider-Man," Octavius said, with a grimace. "I'd apologize, but it's too late."
"You could let me go, maybe?" I asked, slightly hopeful.
"... no, I'm afraid not," Octavius shook his head. "Maybe if I'd learned of this sooner, but...
"... after OsCorp went down, I was actually approached by S.H.I.E.L.D. for a job as one of their lab monkeys, but I did nothing but design weapons and armor for their mooks. It was the last straw, so I decided to give them everything they thought I was." He gave me a smirk, slightly shaky at the ends. "You know, I hacked into their database about a week into the new job? They had me marked as a 'potential supervillain'. Credit where it's due, they hit the nail in the head on that one."
"First time for anything," I muttered.
Octavius chuckled at that, and I joined in after a moment. When the moment of strange sympathy passed, we fell into silence, awkward and somehow vaguely companionable.
"No, I don't think I can let you go," Octavius said, shaking his head. "I... I think I was always supposed to go down his path, maybe. My whole life I never fit in, never felt good with myself unless I was inventing something, showing everyone how smart I am. I never felt more like myself than when I started planning your destruction, or when I put on my tentacles."
"I hear they're studying something like that. Chronic Supervillany Syndrome or something, though it's just a theory. Talked with Electro about it, he said that it'd explain some things."
"Is that so?"
Once more, silence. It was... unsettling, really. Seconds ago, he'd hurt me so much, and I was still profoundly unnerved by him. The thought of him stealing my body and running around in it wouldn't leave my head, but...
But I couldn't help but pity the poor bastard.
"So what now?" I finally asked. "You're not setting me free, so what's next? Not cloning, I hope?"
"I specialize in machines and brain surgery, so no," he said, "Though it's an interesting concept, it's not one I'd pursue myself."
Oh thank god.
"No, I don't think I'll do that at all," he was carried on metal limbs to the computer, his back to me, while one of his tentacles stretched out and grabbed something out of my field of vision and carried it over. My utility belt, sticks holstered and everything. The tentacle put it down on the edge of the desk, while Octavius still tapped away at the computer's keyboard. "This base is set to self-destruct in about twenty minutes, I imagine that should be enough time for you to break free?"
"... make it thirty, your electricity really messed me up," I said.
"Understandable. You should know that the restraints are made of vibranium, and connected to the wall via an alloy of adamantium and titanium, which I seriously doubt you can break."
"You would be right. Where the hell did you get that?"
"Internet," Octavius shrugged, and I snorted. I wasn't sure if he was serious, but either way it was funny.
Octavius typed away some more and then turned to me, one hand on the keyboard. "For the record, now that I've gotten to know you better I'm... almost sorry for all the violence. I had you pegged for a careless fool, but I didn't expect to find you to be so..."
Similar to him. Neither of us wanted to admit it, I think.
I nodded, before taking a deep breath and letting it out in a huff. "You know how I dealt with Osborn?"
"Yes."
"I don't want to kill people, and I've taken more than a few risk to ensure that. Osborn knew my name and my family, so he had to go, but I couldn't kill him." I took a deep breath, my throat still aching from the pain that lingered, and looked at Octavius as determinedly as I could manage. "I don't think I can do the same to you because I don't think you're the kind that breaks the way Osborn was. So if you go after anyone I love, I will put you in the ground myself, understood?"
Octavius looked at me for a second, before scoffing. "How would I do that? I don't even know your face, let alone your name."
"What?" But Osborn-"
"Kept it close to his chest. Killed anyone that knew before he went after you, as I understand it. And I only found your school through my own intellect. You could be anyone in Midtown, and I don't care to continue investigating now. You'd be an unsatisfying nemesis, I'm afraid to say. Maybe a worthy oppoenent, but not a good nemesis."
"... didn't you want to know who I am?"
"I did, and now I know," he pressed a final button on the keyboard and the screen showed a timer counting back from 30:00. "You're Spider-Man."
Octavius left. And I stayed there, shuddering and alone.
MJ was hiding, Ms. Marvel was fighting, and everything and everyone else was fucked.
Mr. Negative (no way that was Martin Li anymore) had manifested a blade made out of that black and white energy, and was slashing enormous chunks out of the streets and buildings around him. So far, Ms. Marvel had mostly avoided damage by shrinking (or desembiggening, whatever) away from all attacks, but she'd gotten a nasty cut on her arm and another on her hip.
Negative wasn't doing too hot either, having caught a couple of embiggened fists to the face from Ms. Marvel. The Cape was clearly better at dealing damage than taking it, seeing how it was already looking a bit woozy just from those few hits she'd managed to land on him. MJ had heard Capes like that described as 'glass canons'. Lots of damage, very little endurance.
Of course, that didn't help someone like Michelle, who had quickly gone down the fire escape and torn off her mask while Ms. Marvel distracted Negative. So now she was just there, sitting in an alley and staring just like every other civilian that got caught up in the mess.
Honestly, why the hell was she even up there with Marvel? What was she thinking? She shouldn't be here, she was just a regular human!
A desperate cry startled Michelle out of her thoughts, and she turned to find a girl walking out of hiding. Her face was red from screaming and streaked with tears as she cried out for her mother. She didn't look older than five, at most.
Oh, right. That's what she was thinking.
With grit teeth and a stream of curses directed at herself in mind, MJ ran out towards the girl.
She stopped herself by all but throwing herself onto her knees so she could be eye-to-eye with her, both hands on her shoulders. "Sweetie, sweetie I need you to calm down. I want to help you find your mom, but I need you to stop crying. Can you do that for me?"
The little girl kept crying, but stopped screaming and nodded.
"Where did you come from?" the girl pointed at an alley, and MJ nodded, "Okay, I'm going to take you there and after the fight is over we can look for your mom together, alright?"
The girl shook her head, "I want my mommy! I want my mommy now!"
If she found this girl's mommy, MJ was going to tear her head off for leaving the kid unsupervised and making her Michelle's problem.
"Okay, let's go find your mom." MJ lifted the girl's chin and wiped her tears with a thumb like she remembered her own grandma doing when she was little, doing her best to distract herself and the girl from the sounds of the Cape fight right near them. "Does that sound good, honey?"
The girl nodded, and wrapped her little arms around MJ's neck as she lifted her up and started walking closer to the sidewalk.
"What's your name, sweetie?" Michelle asked.
"M-Monica," the girl sniffed.
"That's a great name," Michelle assured her, before drawing a breath and shouting, "Monica's mom! I'm looking for Monica's mom!"
Luckily, it only took a bit of running around before a lady with cornrows (seriously?) came up and took Monica from Michelle's arms, thanking her over and over.
"Stop thanking me, keep a better eye on your kid, and run! You have to get to safety, Ms. Marvel's taking care of the villain, so we just have to get to safety, okay?"
The lady nodded, but stopped when she realized Michelle wasn't following, "What are you doing? Aren't you coming?"
"I have to make sure everyone gets to safety," Michelle panted. "Get your kid safe, I'll be right with you."
The lady doubted for a moment, looking at Michelle with wide eyes, but eventually she tightened her grip on Monica, nodded, and ran off.
MJ stared at them for a second, then turned just in time to see Ms. Marvel embigged from under Mister Negative's nose and land an uppercut on his stomach that sent him flying.
"You worry about him, Kam," MJ muttered. "I've got everyone else."
And then she ran off. Helping civilians was the least she could do while an actual hero fought the bad guy. She just had to make sure no one, including her, got caught in the crossfire and distracted Kamala.
Negative was tougher than he looked, Ms. Marvel decided, as she sent him flying with an uppercut.
Don't get her wrong, as far as he knew he was below Sandman in toughness, but that was another matter entirely. Sandman had been hard to fight because he was pretty much immune to physical damage; Negative was hard to fight because she couldn't freaking get near him- crap!
Just like that, the villain exploded in white and black energy, sending Kamala flying back and aggravating the cuts Negative had managed to put on her. Hissing in pain, she forced herself onto her feet. Negative now had two katanas, and was glaring at her. That last part wasn't new, but it wasn't good either. Glaring back, Ms. Marvel put up her embiggened fists and made a 'come on' gesture with one.
"RAH!" With a roar and a burst of power, Negative sent wave after wave of cutting monochrome energy at Marvel, who stretched, shrunk and jumped away from every attack. One took some of her hair, another cut up her leg, and one crashed into the ground in front of her, exploding and sending her flying back again.
Mid-air, Marvel shrunk as much as possible and landed in a roll, before running towards the curb, hiding behind a discarded candy wrapper.
'Okay,' she thought, 'I gotta be smart about this. How do I beat this guy? His power is total bull, but maybe I need to keep it to distance attacks? How come lately all my enemies are basically immune to my usual attacks?!'
"WHERE ARE YOU, YOU LITTLE PEST?!" Negative roared. "YOU'VE RUINED EVERYTHING I'VE BUILT! I'LL KILL YOU, I'LL TEAR YOUR FAMILY TO PIECES AND MAKE YOU WATCH! I WILL-!"
That was as far as the bastard got before a manhole cover, which an enlogated arm of Marvel's grabbed and tossed, slammed into his belly at high speed, pushing the air and everything in his stomach out of him. In his pain, he dropped the two katanas, which evaporated into wisps of energy that floated off and disappeared.
When he looked up, he found himself face to face with Ms. Marvel, who was experiencing an internal revelation.
Kamala wasn't so prideful that she thought she was completely free of issues or wrath. Still, she'd never suspected there was so much anger inside of herself. So much that her heart pounded in her ears, and her fists trembled at her sides.
"What you said just now?" Ms. Marvel said, her voice colder than ever. "Big. Fucking. Mistake."
Jake described to her once a trick Daredevil had used to not go down despite being a regular human in all but his six senses. He'd had to learn to shut off his senses so he wouldn't melt his own brain just standing in New York on any given day, and eventually he figured how to almost completely shut off any of his senses. So in any fight, he'd shut off the pain that his powers would otherwise amplify unbearably through pure discipline and keep fighting.
At first, Kamala hadn't understood how someone could just ignore their senses. But now it was clear.
When she grabbed Negative by the suit to drag him closer and beat him, monochrome energy ran up her arms and wounded her, cutting and burning her.
She didn't care, she just slammed her fist into his face, into his stomach, into anywhere she could get to. Where there used to be pain, there was blind fury. Ms. Marvel had taken the first step towards the Daredevil Method of Not Staying Down, not that she'd realize until later in the day.
Fuck being smart about the fight, she decided. It was time for old-fashioned beating up the bad guy.
Negative burst with black and white energy again, trying to throw her off of him, but she just embiggened and resisted the shockwave, holding Mr. Negative's whole body in one hand.
"No," she said, raising him over her head, and slamming him into the ground. "No more of that."
Negative huffed, and the glow of power that poured from him started dimming down. Kamala didn't let up, she was pretty sure this guy was trying to psyche her out into letting go.
As things turned out, she was wrong in an unexpected way. The veins on Negative's neck glowed white with power and he realeased a roar that made her ears ring, and she let go of him to cover them as Negative kept up the roar, tossing wave after wave of sonic power onto her, until she finally flew back.
Kamala smashed into a car, still giant, before shrinking down. Her vision was swimming and she felt like throwing up, which must've meant her inner ear was busted somehow.
Still, she managed to spot Negative walking towards her, his glow of power dimmed, but he'd managed to conjure another katana.
She tried to get up, but stumbled and fell on her side.
'Get up,' she told herself, 'Get up, get up, get up! Come on, you're going to die if you don't get up NOW!'
Every time she tried to get up, she'd stumble. Her sense of balance was completely shot to hell. So she grabbed onto the car behind her and used a firm grip with embiggened hands to push herself up. Despite the fact that there were three of him swimming in her vision, she tried to glare at Negative.
'As soon as he's in front of him, I'll throw the car at him and disembiggen as much as possible. I'll wait until my healing factor fixes my inner ear, then I'll finish this guy off.'
Negative stopped approaching and lifted his sword up, then it started to crackle with power as he prepared to launch another wave of cutting energy at her.
'Or I'll just die.' Marvel thought, and strangely, the thought was almost amused at it appeared. 'Well, some hero I was. Ah, at least I got to be in two awesome team-ups.'
As the blade grew bigger and brighter, Marvel closed her eyes.
'Abu, Ammi, Aamir, I'm sorry. Bruno, I'll miss you. Jake, I wish we could have hung out more. Same to MJ.'
"STOP!"
'... was that MJ?'
Kamala opened her eyes, and found Michelle Jones, standing there in the path of Negative's blade, arms stretched wide.
"Mister Li- Martin, stop! Please, this isn't you!"
"Well..." the villain said with a grin as the sword finished gathering energy and he wound it back. "You're not wrong."
The sword flew down, and Kamala forced herself to run forward and tackle her friend to the ground.
She didn't need to. Negative's other hand flew up and caught the sword arm mid-swing.
"What?! What are you doing, you imbecile?! We need to kill them!" Negative shouted at himself, and Kamala saw the path to victory.
"Li!" she shouted, and Negative's head snapped to face her as she stumbled to her feet, trying for the first time to force her healing factor to focus on her inner ear. "Li, you have to stop Negative! You're the only one that can! I know it seems impossible, but it's the only shot we've got! Please!"
"You idiot! Li's too much of a simpering coward to do anything himself! He needs me! He's nothing without me!"
Despite his words, the monochrome energy that constantly enveloped Mr. Negative was flickering and slight bits of regularly-colored skin and clothing started to show through as the sword arm kept struggling against the other one.
"You know that's not true, Martin!" MJ shouted. "You have to fight, please!"
Negative shouted in frustration as the energy kept flickering.
In all honesty, Kamala would have liked to take a risk and try to help Martin win from the inside, help him conquer his inner demons and all that. It would have been wonderful. But Mr. Negative was a dangerous criminal and she couldn't risk him running wild on her town.
It was a gamble Ms. Marvel couldn't take. So she punched him with embiggened fists while he was distracted. Repeatedly.
When she was done, all the monochrome energy was gone, and Martin Li looked like hell as he laid on the street, sprawled and pained.
"Sorry," Ms. Marvel said. "Couldn't take the chance of you losing."
"It's fine," Martin coughed. "You made the right call."
And then he passed out. When she was sure he wasn't going to explode again, Marvel let herself fall into a sitting position with a pained sigh, as the adrenaline drained from her body and the pain started flooding in.
"Ow," she said, emphatically, "My everything hurts."
"That was scary as shit," MJ panted. "I can't believe I fucking did that."
"Yeah, me either."
"Hey, screw you, I just saved your ass."
For some reason, Kamala started giggling, and MJ joined in.
After a 15 minute break to gather my wits and stop being in pain, which wasn't enough as my skin still felt horribly burnt and I still smelt like bacon, but it'd have to do.
I'd taken some time to inspect the restraints around my hands and legs, which looked kind of like the ones Syndrome used on Mr. Incredible if you can follow my reference, I confirmed my suspicions that the locks on them were made of a different material than the rest of the thing.
I'd looked it up a while ago, before I was Spider-Man even, and apparently due to their distinctive properties of adamantium and vibranium they weren't great to make locks with, so most people used iron or some other metal. Which Octavius apparently did, if the different color was any indication.
I had a little space to wriggle my hand inside the restraints, so I moved my left around until my middle finger was touching the inside side of the lock and stuck it there with my Spider Cling. I didn't have much more space to move, and definitely not enough for what I was planning, so I put a thumb over my finger, took a deep breath, and dislocated my middle finger, taking the lock with it.
"FUCKING FUCK ON A FUCK!"
Once that was out of my system, I pulled my hand from the lock and looked it over, wincing at the way my finger bent unnaturally. Still, a smug smirk found its way to my face.
"Big powerful adamantium cuffs," I mumbled as directed my attention to the other restraint. "Shitty-bitty metal locks."
With my free hand, I replicated the trick on the other restraint, minus the dislocation. Once my right hand was free, I set my middle finger back in place (a process that involved a lot more screaming) and then freed my legs.
I walked over to the computer desk and checked the time while I put on my belt. 13:20, not a lot of time but I'd worked under more stressful circumstances.
Or hadn't I?
Well, there was that time with the goo invaders or whatever they were called, but it hadn't really felt high stakes even if they wanted to take over the world.
I shook my head to get rid of the idle thoughts and ran out of the room. It took some stretching of my senses, since apparently Octavius had moved us out of the warehouse and into some other place, but eventually I found a stairwell that I felt heat coming from, which meant it either led outside into the sun or into a reactor. And since there weren't any warning labels, I'd take my chances.
The door was locked, so I gave it a punch that sent it flying. Unfortunately, that meant that sand started flooding in, but I forced my way past it and crawled out, into the sun.
And then I looked around and realized I was in a beach, surrounded by baffled civilians.
"Long day," I explained. "Stay away from the hole, it's going to blow up in a while."
Then I walked away, especially since I could tell that it was going to blow up in seconds and I wanted to walk away from it like an action hero.
Naturally, it didn't blow up until I was far away, but I heard that everyone stayed away from the hole the whole time, so that was fine too.
No, I'm not bitter. Shut up.
"So, how do you feel?" Kamala asked, looking all concerned.
She, MJ and Natasha were in my apartment, and we were all looking over my new scar. It started on my right shoulder and ran down diagonally to my left side. It was a Lichtenberg Figure, a scar from electric shock that kind of looked like a tree's branches. The pink skin was still sensible, and the burn on my shoulder was especially bad.
Not even Electro had fucked me up so bad.
"Well, I've been better," I said. "But I think time, love and the blood of my enemies will go a long way to making me feel better."
"This Octavius guy is going down," Nat promised me. "I'll tell you when I find him and you can get your pound of flesh."
I must have made a face, because she blinked and said, "Unless... you don't want that?"
"Well, it's... weird." I said, leaning back on my bad, then standing up with a hissed curse because the scar ran down my back too. "I mean, the guy has to go down, he's still a villain and a dangerous one, but... I think I understand him. Better than I understand most of my bad guys, and I get along pretty good with them."
Kamala and MJ didn't look like they understood, but Natasha's expression softened by a wide margin. "Ah. It's always tough when our enemies strike a chord with us, little spider. But he still hurt you."
"Yeah," I looked down at the Lichtenberg Figure. "He definitely did that."
We fell into an uncomfortable silence for a while, before I forced myself to speak.
"You two did great, by the way," I tried to smile at Kamala and MJ, "Good job with Negative."
"Thanks," Kamala said. "Really, it was MJ who really helped. She got all the civilians and helped Martin fight back."
"How's that going, by the way?" MJ asked Nat, probably to distract us from the darkening of her cheeks and ears. "Is he... uh..."
"I wouldn't say he's okay," Natasha said. "But he's going to get help."
MJ nodded. "That's good. I know that he was helping Negative and all, but..."
"It's fine," I said. "I'm the last person who's going to say anything about getting chummy with villains."
"No kidding," Nat said, "Did you two know that his first girlfriend-"
"HEY GUESS WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT CERTAINLY NOT THAT HA-HA-HA SHUT UP NAT."
"Sheesh, touchy," Nat said, smirking while Kam and MJ gave me very pointed looks. "It was just a fling anyways, don't see why you're so sensitive about it."
I grumbled something unkind under my breath, and the conversation gently drifted to more comfortable subjects as we just hung out for a while.
Once everyone started to head back, I asked Nat to stay back before we bid my friends goodbye.
"So, what did you have to talk about, little spider?" Nat asked, ruffling my hair with a hand.
"I have to settle things with S.H.I.E.L.D., and there's only one way that's happening," her playful expression faded and she matched my frown with her own. "Can you give me some help?"
"Of course."
"I need you to work with me to gather intel and assist me in blackmailing the goverment into doing its job."
"... You're like everything wrong with me and Murdock combined. You know that, right?"
The current Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. was Maria Hill. She wasn't as nice as the MCU films would have you believe.
First things first, she only kinda looked like Robin from How I Met Your Mother. Second, she was heavily prejudiced against anyone with superpowers due to a long and succesful carreer in the Badass Normal business. If you're unaware of what that intails, just imagine beating impossible odds constantly while everyone you grow to care about gets killed or worse, as a regular ocurrence on the clock.
You know, your buddy Jim turns into a crazed cyborg killer, you have to fight your way out of a deserted island full of mutant dinosaurs with only a gun with ten bullets and your wits, and then you have to shoot your buddy Jim because he'll never be the same and in one moment of sanity he's asking you to end his miserable existance before he kills you, and you know its him or you and you still have to make sure the United States don't go to war with every other country by delivering a briefcase with crucial information, so you've got to pull the trigger, and once you're done you know you'll have to go through the same shit over and over and it'll just be another day in the office.
And in an organization of Badass Normals, Maria Hill clawed her way to the top by being one of the most succesful Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and one of the least loyal to Nick Fury and his neverending shadow games, which came in handy when everything went to hell for the Nth time and Fury wasn't an acceptable Director anymore because... fuck, I can't remember. I think he had a cloned son or something? Or was that another thing?
The point is that she was a bona fide badass. But she was also intensely anti-me and anti-everyone-like-me. And I was going to walk into her office and explain how the work of her life was all basically meaningless.
Yeah, I'm a smart cookie, ain't I?
"Director Hill," I said, nodding my head as a greeting as Natasha walked me into her office. Nick Fury Jr. (who looked a lot like Sam Jackson) was standing behind and to the right of the Director, who sat behind an imposing black adamantium desk with her fingers steepled. I felt weirdly underdressed in my tights, especially since my hood was down. "I'd say it's a pleasure, but I'd be leaving myself open to something about how it's all mine or how it's not for you or something."
"I'm glad you can see things from my perspective," Hill said, in a tone so dry I felt the humidity drain from the room, "Perhaps you should do it more often, then you'd stop causing me headaches."
"I'm afraid that, even if this meeting goes right, I'm going to be causing you one last headache," I said, reaching into my desk and pulling a pendrive, ignoring the way Hill and Fury went for their weapons when I went for my belt, "You'll want to look at this."
I left the pendrive on her desk, and without putting her hand away from her gun, Hill grabbed it and handed it to Fury, who walked out of the room and returned in less than a minute with a laptop that must've been more expensive than all my mutated organs together. If I were a gambler, I'd have wagered that laptop was somehow capable of connecting to the S.H.I.E.L.D. databases while not connecting to anything, so no viruses could be shared.
Fury put the pendrive, and started looking over the files. Then he paled and showed it to Hill, who went even paler and turned to me in shock and anger. Probably because that information meant her ass.
"What. The hell. Is this?" she asked, the words cut by the grit teeth they went through.
"Every spy from other organizations Widow and I could find living under your roof. Every asshole from Hydra, A.I.M., or the fucking Illuminati that has been feeding off of S.H.I.E.L.D., right there."
"How in the hell-"
"I've got my own spy network, and I'm telling you now that if I join I'm keeping it to myself. No offense, but I don't like how you run yours." Before Hill could chew my head off for that quip, I walked over and put both hands on her desk. "Do you know why I'm bringing this to your attention, Director Hill?"
"I'm certain it's not out of patriotic duty," she scoffed. "Well go on, don't keep me in suspense. Do your stupid speech so I can deal with this."
"What you are seeing right now is only a fraction of what Widow and I found, on account that that is all we could fit on her state-of-the-art Stark pendrive," I could see them both look gobsmacked at that. Stark Pendrives had a lot of space. "What we looked for were all members of your organization, past and present since the moment it was founded, that belonged to someone else. We did it in part because it was getting honestly a bit ridiculous that your super secret goverment agency was getting so easy to infilitrate, and in part because I wanted to confirm a suspicion of mine.
"For about three decades, maybe a bit more, it's been S.H.I.E.L.D. policy to find any schizo-tech, mad science experiment, and hyper-advanced tech and keep it away from public hands. Some still slipped out, but on the by and large, it all goes to a vault a couple million miles underground. And yes, pretty much everyone in the business knows about the secret tech vault."
That last part was a lie. I hadn't known until Nat told me, and she'd mentioned it was a very high-importance secret. But almost everyone figured that S.H.I.E.L.D. either destroyed everything and hid it, and we'd agreed that I had to keep Hill off of her game for as long as possible if I wanted to convince her.
"This policy was started by Hydra, approved by Hydra, and opposed by A.I.M., which means the good guys weren't even involved in the process. Hydra started it so they could keep grabbing people off-guard with every tiny bit of schizo-tech they got their hands on. And I don't know if you've noticed, but it is crazy easy to get your hands on some schizo-tech. I mean, look!"
I reached into my pocket and pulled a little gray button, which I pressed and it grew into a Sci-fi pistol that I fired into the roof, making Fury and Hill pull out their own weapons and point them at me while I tossed the little thing aside.
"You guys know how long I had to look for that? Less than an hour. Hell, less than half an hour, I just kinda sent a text to a friend and he hooked me up with a schizo-tech dealer."
"It's true," Nat chimed in, "He did it in front of me. It was kind of upsetting."
"I don't know if you guys have ever bought pot, but I'll sum up what the experience teaches you: outlawing stuff only affects people that give two square shits about the laws. There's pretty much nothing you can do by outlawing super tech but hurt people that actually need it, while every two-bit lunatic laughs behind your backs.
"So here's the point. You want me to sign the Accords? You want me to stop giving you headaches? Get your shit in order, because I'm turning sixteen in a month and I just fucking unraveled your organization, and that's fucking embarrassing to both of us."
Honestly, I'd cheated a lot to do this.
To sum it up, I didn't think Fury (old white Fury or new black Fury) or Hill would do something like ban all schizo-tech without a very good reason, and I remembered how the MCU film, 'Captain America: The Winter Soldier' went. So, with a place to start looking and my buddy Bob from Hydra and some of his buddies in all the other 'secret' organizations, it was simple enough to get a starting point.
From there, I just had to do some ol' fashioned detective work with help from the superspy, and it was like pulling the loose threads on a sweater until the whole thing came apart.
Without my meta-knowledge, I'd have been fucked. But Hill, Fury and Nat didn't need to know that.
You want people to underestimate you, you pretend you don't know shit. You want people to be afraid of what you can do, you pretend you know everything.
I was doing my best at pretending both. You'll see my Dumbass Facade eventually.
Hill put a hand on her chin as she stared at the laptop, while Fury was staring at me with... oh shit, was Nicholas Fury Jr. looking at me like I was scary?! Holy shit, new achievement get! This guy was on the same level of awesome as Maria Hill, he was related to a guy so awesome he could escape a nuclear blast while shirtless on a rocket-powered motorcycle and firing a two machine guns (look it up, that happened), and as I heard it, one time he bit a vampire's throat out because it killed his girlfriend.
And right now, he was looking at me like I was the most dangerous person in the room.
"Spider-Man..." Hill said, her words coming out slow and measured. "I... appreciate that you brought this information to my attention."
"... but...?"
"But this is too much," she said. "Too much to make public. Almost too damn much for a private investigation-"
"You can't do this slow, I'm telling you this much," I interrupted. "You do anything but reveal it all at once, to the few people that aren't completely fucked, and the rats will scurry back to their hiding places. And then they'll infiltrate again."
"We'll be ready."
"Any preparations you make will be under watch from ninety-seven different angles. Every move but the one that takes them by surprise will be seen and planned against, and I don't think I can catch them again." I leaned forward. "You have to do it all at once, Hill. I'm serious."
"Listen, kid-"
When she said that, my only thought was, 'Well shit, I guess peace talks broke down'.
"-I know you think your dick's pretty big after finding this, but the simple fact is that if we just reveal this, we could unleash mass chaos." Hill made a gesture and Fury grabbed the laptop. "S.H.I.E.L.D. will keep the public from panicking."
"You should let them panic," I said, "Then we can help them come out of it and improve."
"It's not that simple."
"It is if you make it that simple."
"It's not happening, Fletcher," I flinched, and she smiled. "Oh yeah, I know who you are."
"I didn't flinch because of that, Maria," I said, my voice losing any warmth. "I just flinched because you put the last nail on your own goddamned coffin."
"Oh is that so?" she said, all condecending sweetness, "What are you going to do, run off and tell everyone?"
She snapped her fingers and Fury aimed his gun at me. At the same time, metal shutters went down on the windows and two sections of the roof opened up and turrents came out, aimed at me.
Little red dots on my head and everything.
"Cute," I said, "But you have me mistaken for some B-List villain, or Doom. I don't say what I'm going to do before I do it. I say it half an hour later, after distracting my biggest obstacle with some grand fucking speech.
"You should ask yourself, Hill... how come neither Widow nor I acted surprised when the shutters went down?"
She frowned, then her eyes widened. "You knew...?"
"Well, not exactly," I admitted. "I got farther than expected, had to pull half the speech out of my ass because I thought they'd go down way faster. You're nicer than they make you out to be, y'know."
"What did you do, Fletcher?" Hill reached over the desk and, since the suit was skintight and she couldn't grab me by the neck of it, grabbed me by the sides of my hood. "What the hell did you do?!"
"I had a buddy of mine that owed me a favor stand with a laptop and one of those easy-to-get pieces of schizo-tech. A scope that lets you see couple thosand miles away. As soon as he saw the shutters go down, he was supposed to release all the info into the wild wide web." I gave a pointed look around the room. "As I understand it, when this room goes on lock down, no signals can go into or out of this room, right? In case you need to lock someone in or out of it? It's a nice trick. Would be a shame if someone learned of it and used it against you, no?
"If anything, I just proved my point about how compromised the organization is."
"You little bastard," she let go of me and walked away from her desk, snapping her fingers. The shutters and the turrets went up, but Fury kept an eye on me, though his eyes snapped to Hill and back from time to time as she dialed on her phone furiously. "There's been an Omega Level Security Breach, get me Agent 13! NOW!"
In one of those seconds while Fury Jr. was watching Hill, I quickly grabbed my burner phone and hit the speed dial in the same movement, since it was one of those old flip-phone models. By the time Fury realized I had something in my hand, the call had gone through.
"Hey, Wade? What's up, man? You see me?" I waved at the window, while Hill and Fury stared at me. I swore I could hear Natasha chuckling, though a look over my shoulder revealed nothing but a serious expression on her face.
22 miles away (or 33,7 kilometers, if you have common sense and use metric), Deadpool looked at Spidey with a modified scope his buddy had been able to get for pretty cheap, phone held between shoulder and ear, and with a laptop open next to him.
"Yeah, I see you. A lot of you, actually, don't think I've seen you in that supersuit in person before, and this scope has great definition. Nice pecs."
Spidey covered up with his free hand, like a lady in an 80's flick. "Why, Mister Pool!"
"I know you like it, baby."
"Okay, back it up. I'm underaged, dude."
Well, that made stuff kinda awkward.
"... I'm so sorry, I had no idea," Wade said.
"It's cool, I'm pretty tall so it happens from time to time," I shrugged, "Anyway, Silver done with that encryption?"
"Uh... yep! S.H.I.E.L.D. won't be able to stop it before everyone gets it. Princess said her debt is repaid, though."
"Meh, it was worth it. I'll send you your payment later, if you like."
"Yes! Free pizza!" And with those words that any college student could sympathize with, Wade hung up.
I closed the flip phone, which had been on speaker mode, and smiled at Fury and Hill. The later was literally red-faced with anger and trembling a little.
"Well, I'd say my job here is done," I said, turning around. "The fact that I'm the one responsible for this latest headache of yours is being spread along with everything else, so if you feel like hunting me down and letting everyone think of you as a Hydra sympathizer, feel free to waste manpower that I will quickly send to the hospital."
Hill took a few deep breaths, and eventually spoke. "Some day, I'm going to tear that fucking mask off in front of the whole world."
"If you keep your job that long, I'll hand it to you out of respect, Mary."
She pulled out her gun and aimed it at me, but I was already halfway to the window.
"BYE NAT! BYE HILL! BYE FURY!" By the time I was finishing the goodbyes, I'd already jumped through the window.
I sat on the side of the 40th story of a building, eyes closed and senses wide, wide open.
The final notes of winter faded and spring burst in, breathing life into what little greenery it could find and carrying winds that promised love and opportunity and heartbreak and life. If I listened closely, I could hear two rats killing each other in garbage and a couple getting engaged in a cute little restaurant, to the applause of everyone there. There was a kid playing a guitar too big for him, doing a pretty passable rendition of 'Wonderwall' while a block away, a homeless guy screamed shitty renditions of Bob Dylan songs about how the goverment was eating our brains.
I could hear two teenagers a little younger than me congratulating a friend for losing their virginity, and I could hear a few thugs talking about Overdrive chasing them down over two whole fucking boroughs. There was a train station nearby, and I could hear some people complain about those fucking assholes that keep standing near the doors instead of going to the back like good New Yorkers, and some other people complaining about all the fucking tourists.
I took a deep breath, and jumped off.
If you live long enough anywhere, you learn to love it and hate it in equal measure, with no contradiction in between. It comes to a point that you love the things you hate and hate the things you love, because you've been there long enough to know that it's all bullshit, but you also learn to love all that bullshit.
With the final remnants of snow melting away, you could once more smell all the garbage left to rot with every gust of wind. Central Park was regaining its greenery, and the streets, the veins of my city, ran red with people once more.
The wind whipped around me as I fell, taking in every little bit of sensory stimulation.
I'd been lying when I said New York was home. It was a part of me, as deeply ingrained as the Spider Powers, if not more.
I shot a web, took a deep breath, and as I started to swing, started screaming.
"WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooo-"
People turned, stared and pointed me out as they saw me swing, fly up towards the air, stay up there as if suspended in time, then go down with a new web line.
"-hooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" I finished my whoop by landing on the side of the Daily Bugle building, right on Jonah's office, making him jump and spill coffee all over himself. "I'M BACK, SUCKERS!"
I swung myself before he could finish opening the door to throw stuff at me.
I'd unleashed something big, back in Hill's office. Nat and I had planned so she wouldn't get in too much trouble. Between Hill's full plate, and the fact that as far as everyone knew she never told me about Hill's lock-down protocol, like we'd tell everyone, and her own value as an agent, she'd probably get off scott-free, if with a lot less trust on her.
That was fine. She had a lot less trust on the system once we were done with a quarter of our investigation.
So now, it was just New York and I, once again. Even if MJ and Kam's phone numbers were burning a hole in my pocket.
I'm pulled from my musing by the sound of a bank being robbed. With a laugh, I turn and go in that direction.
Welcome home, Jake.
クリエイターの想い 
CultureBringer
CultureBringer Creation is hard, cheer me up!
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