"And the atoms areā¦"
Mrs. Sullivan's voice blurs out as my spidey-senses stand to attention. Something's wrong. I survey the science lab. Everything seems fine, Flash, dicking off on his phone, as per usual. Ned, dutifully copying something down in his notes. MJ, staring at the board vacancy.
Where is it? What is it? My spidey-senses don't go off for no reason.
The classroom doors bursts open with a bang, colliding with the wall. Three commandos file inside with shouts to keep quiet. Ah, there. I think dryly. The soldiers look around the room, the assault rifles they're carrying pointing ominously at whoever dares to make a noise or try to escape.
I share a glance at Ned, he's raised his trembling hands above his head.
"Phones on the floor! On the floor! Now!" One of them shouts, waving his gun around. Students hurriedly comply. I am frozen, unknowing what to do. I can't do a 'Spider-man' and fight back, anyway, I don't even have my suit.
Who know if they're even here for me? Because there are other reasons three heavily armed men invade ordinary classrooms.
If I try to do anything it'll put my classmates in more danger, if they start shooting, we're all dead, superpowers or not. Making a quick disucon, I shuck off my shoes with my feet under the table, -just in case things get messy.
"Peter! Peter!" Ned whispers urgently, "are they here for you?!"
"I don't know man, I don't know," I whisper back, casting worried glances around the room. Attracted by the whispering, one of the gurrellias, dressed in black, sees me.
"Here he is!" he shouts, coming towards me, deadly intent on his face. Apparently they are here for me, wouldn't of guessed.
"What-" I manage to get out, then a shiny black gun is pointed at my face along with a ruff order to shut up.
Sure I've had guns in my face before, but that was as Spider-man, not Peter Parker. I freeze, copying Ned's stance with my hands above my head.
"What do you want with Penis Parker?" Flash's voice cuts in, sneering. Yeah, this is the best time to worry about your popularity, Flash.
One of the gunmen turns, weapon aimed at Flash's now regretful face. "Shut up, kid. Keep quiet and this might not get messy," he warns. Flash stays silent, face burning.
The commando next to me calls for handcuffs, the third guerrilla, silent up until this point, passes them along. "Careful, he's enhanced."
"What do you mean he's enhanced?!" Shit. Michelle's incredulous voice cuts him suspiciously.
I wince, "MJ, later-"
"No, no!" she holds up a hand to stop me, getting off her seat. This is it, MJ's gonna die because she couldn't believe that a so-called 'wimp' like me has powers. Great.
"You're telling me that Peter Parker here is enhanced, what like Captain America or some shit?!" She shoulders up to the broad-shouldered, gun toting mercenary nearest her. Yeah, great choice. "No way," she snorts. I'm half-offended by her reluctance to believe, half proud of myself.
The commando growls, "sit down, girl." I laugh internally, you've never dealt with Michelle Jones before, have you? MJ practically snarls but the assault weapon shoved in her direct and cocked threateningly shuts her up. Fair enough, I wouldn't keep going either. The trooper closest to me swings the rifle over his shoulder by the strap, stepping towards me.
"Don't put up a fight, mutant, or I'll make sure your little friends pay for it." he nods at Ned and MJ and I fight back a gag.
He grabs my arm in strong embrace, twisting my wrists together to snap the handcuffs around them. I don't resist, just let the handcuffs close around my hands with only a glare. I can't let anything happen to them. I can't. The masked man tugs me off the bar-stool, dragging me down the middle aslie and towards the door.
The world slows down and my eyes wander around the class, I cast a glance back at Ned, looking shaking and terrified. 'You know what to do,' I mouth back at him, hoping he understands the message, he nods stiffly and I am reassured. MJ is next, wild explosion of hair covering half her face. She meets my eyes determinedly, asking - no, demanding answers, and I don't know what to do but give a shaky little nod back. Flash, actually looking scared for once, eyes wide at me. I stare back unemotionally, picturing every time he's bullied me since I got my powers and how many times I could've stopped it.
I didn't stop it then.
I can stop this.
I cut the legs out from my captor. He falls to the floor with a shout, alerting his teammates. I can hear his leg snap as he falls clear as day. The other mercenaries turn and everything slows down in battle. I rip my hands apart with all my strength, the chain between my cuffs snap, and now I'm left with two shiny bracelets.
"Get down! get down!" I repeat. I see the individual faces of my classmates, shock, horror and sheer terror as they duck under tables. The commando who threatened MJ fires, a whip-crack hail of bullets buzzing through the air towards me.
I leap up unto the nearest table, sending a beaker shattering to the floor. It's lucky I'm so quick, otherwise I'd surely be shot. From the table I backflip onto the ceiling, my bare feet doing their job and sticking to the plaster. I run across the ceiling. That surprises the gunmen, to say the least. I jump down from the classroom ceiling, tackling one of the men in a bone-crunching, flying hold. We both skid across the floor, landing between the rows with students on either sides of us. The remaining shooter rushes forwards, unable to fire at me since I'm entangled with his partner.
The one I'm struggling on the floor with lands a punch squarely on my jaw, snapping back my head. Blood drools from the corner of my mouth.
I growl, jumping back in the fight with vengeance. I push him down, straddling over his torso and landing blow after blow onto his face. His nose snaps, and I know it. My knuckles are emblazoned and dripping with red. I am distantly aware that there's screaming in the background and then the crack of a gunshot, but I don't feel anything, just his face under my fists.
The other gunman rushes forwards, shoving a burning taser into my side. The electricity jolts through my body, I gasp, every muscle tensing up. It feels like I'm getting struck by lightning. My minds screams out again and again in pain. I'm on the floor, twitching, the aftershocks racking my body. This is not good, this is not good. Oh no. Not good.
I've been tasered once or twice, but that was though the suit and it absorbed most of it. This was straight shot. I'd rate about a -42/10. Not fun. Would not do again. Need to rate this on TripAdvisor later, hint, it's not gonna do well.
I hear the door blast off it's hinges and the sound of a repulsor charging up. Scattered gunfire bounces through the room. There's a muffled grunt and the repulsor firing.
As the taser charge wears off, I sit up, the edges of my vision blurring. I shake my head, and everything looks normal again. Mister Stark is here, standing by the immobile body of one of the gunmen, impressive in his Iron-Man suit.
His mask flips up, revealing his well-trimmed goatee and dark eyes.
"You okay, kid?" he asks off-handedly, casually.
"Yeah, just fine, Mr. Stark. Only tasered with 50,000 volts. I'll walk it off." I quip sarcastically, wincing. It feels like I've been up all night patrolling and then decided to do a full-body work out with Captain America.
"Don't get smart with me, Underoos."
I groan, "will you stop calling me that?" I ask, practically reherotically.
"Underoos? Never."
"Hey-!" I start, then I'm interrupted by MJ.
"Peter, tell me why you're chatting with Tony Stark, or I will jump to some very wild conclusions." she says in a constrained voice.
"Er, the internship?"
"No one's gonna believe that." she says
"Why not?"
"Because you just ran across the ceiling." she deadpanned. Continuing, "and then took out two heavily-armed commandos, with Tony FREAKING Stark coming in to help. So yeah, no-one's gonna believe that."
I struggle to my feet. "I gotta deal with this shit now," I say to Tony, gesturing at my open-mouthed classmates.
"Language!" he scolds, "and not that big of a deal. You know how many meta-humans are around nowadays?"
"easy for you to say, Mr. 'I am Iron-Man,'" I shoot back.
"To be fair, I was given a cover story, and decided not to use it. You know, in lieu of giving the truth to the great American public. Some would call that heroic"
"Some," I highlight.
"Yeah well, tell me how heroic you are when you rescue a stray puppy."
"Well-" I fire back, interrupted by MJ.
"PETER!" I snap to attention. She's obviously asked before, but caught up in my argument with Mr. Stark, I didn't hear.
"Sorry," I mumble.
"Tell me the truth." She insists. I can hear sirens in the background.
I look at Tony, who gives me a stare right back, communicating a 'you know what to do, kid' with only a blink of his brown eyes. "I told everyone, I'm interning at Stark Industries. Some might try to take advantage of that," I nod at the sprawled out bodies on the floor, "so in the case of one of these situations, I have a panic button of sorts, which Ned pressed."
"Okay," Michelle nods, accepting it. "Explain the fighting and running across the ceiling, then."
I have a pre-prepared answer for this too. "I'm enhanced. I started training to help control it."
Michelle picks though my words, not looking convinced, but not able to debunk my claims either, at least not now. The sirens in the background come closer. "Why would they care about an intern like you...no offence."
"None taken. And I dunno, I work directly under Mr. Stark. Special projects and all that. There's not that many interns in the entire company, maybe they thought they could ransom me."
Thankfully Ned interrupts me from having to keep talking, "Dude, you're bleeding," he taps me on the shoulder, pointing at my leg. A dark splash of blood stains the blue denim. A bullet must have hit me, luckily it's only traced across the fleshy part of my thigh.
"Aw shit!"
"Language," Tony looks up from his phone, giving me a stare.
"Aw, MAN," I emphasise. "These are my favourite jeans!"
"You should probably stitch that up." Ned says, grabbing my bag already.
"Thanks man," I ruffle around inside, coming out with a tin. Inside is a needle, thread, a lighter, bandages and extra web serum. I put the container down on the table, ripping my jeans with only my bare hands, Michelle whistles.
"Enhanced, remember?" I prompt, too busy sterilising the needle with the lighter to look up. When finished with that, I grab bandages in preparation and TRY to thread the needle, WHY IS IT SO HARD?! Tony looks up to see me we with my leg propped up on a stool and needle in hand.
"What are you doing?" he asks, pacing towards me.
"I got shot," I say simply, trying to thread this god-damned needle.
"So you're sewing yourself up in a classroom?"
"Yeah."
"What. The. Hell. Parker!?"
"Calm down. I do it all the time," after realizing that might not make this any better, I wince, already aliterating, "I mean I would never do that. It would be irresponsible and stupid to-"
"Kid." Tony cuts me off. "I'm already calling Helen Cho, so tell your aunt to meet you at the hospital."
"No!" I protest, "Mr. Stark! It's barely a graze!"
"Not helping your case, kid."
I groan, "but-"
"You just sterilized a needle with a lighter. Steve probably knows more about injuries than you, so shut your face, we're going to the hospital. Period."
"I doubt he does," I counter, making do with plastering a bandage over the still-bleeding wound.
Mr. Stark starts, "How so?"
"I had a docter phase."
"A doctor phase? Like ER, operating room, nurse, hospital doctor?" Tony Stark repeats.
"Yeah. I was 12, and I wanted to be a doctor, okay?"
"I thought when you were 12 you were into Katy Perry?"
"Mrr Starrk!" I whine, blushing and looking around the room to see if anyone heard. Everyone heard. Half the class is in shock and the other half is listening. Intently, I might add. MJ sniggers, melting into cackles when I glare at her.
"Shut up," I mutter, twisting the now-redundant handcuffs around each wrist.
"Don't worry, Underoos, we've all had geeky obsessions."
"It wasn't an obsession, I just like 'Firework' okay? Not that big of a deal."
"Do you ever feel like a plastic bag-" Tony Stark begins to sing.
Tony Stark, billionaire, Iron-Man, my literal idol is singing 'Firework' by Katy Perry. To slam me. Great. Just fantastic. Loving my life.
"No! No! Stop! I'm begging you!"
"-drifting through the wind, wanting to start again," MJ picks up, ignoring my pleas.
"I hate you all," I say sincerely.
"Do you ever feel, so paper thin, like a house of cards, one blow from caving in," MJ and Mr. Stark join up, harmonising perfectly. In that moment SWAT bursts into the room, guns at the ready. Instead they are met with a bunch of scared to death school children, three knocked out gunmen and Tony Stark singing Katy Perry with a high-schooler. Yeah, pretty weird.
