Hi again! Here is the awaited sequel to Down Came the Rain. If anyone out there hasn't read my first fic, it would probably be a good idea to at least read the first chapter of it so you get the basis for an essential detail later to come in this story. Curious you say? Well, stick around and see where this goes…
Disclaimer: I don't own Spidey and no matter how many times I write him into my Christmas list, Santa just never delivers…
In the city of New York- the so called city that never sleeps- the twilight sea of stars would, for the most part, be considered impossible to see through the haze and overcastting glare of the lights that shined up from between the concrete canyons and streets. But in the darkened patch of uncultivated earth known as Central Park, circled on all sides by the pulsating hub of the metropolis, dim pin pricks of natural light spotted the darkening sky of black velvet.
Strolling beneath the faint glimmer of starlight, a young couple made their way through the winding walkways that snaked through the thick groves of trees of the huge park. Muffled behind the sounds of their hurried footsteps on the path, the occasional distant honking of an irate motorist drifted through the chilly night air.
With no street lights to shine upon the path, the couple spoke in hushed voices if only to comfort each other from the eerily dark shadows cast by the looming trees that thrust their branches over the narrow path.
"So did you like the movie, Liz?" the boy asked quickly to start a conversation, no matter how artificial it seemed. Hugging his date closer, he quickened their pace in attempts to shorten their time in the deserted park.
"Yeah," came a bland reply. Glancing warily around them as if expecting danger at every turn, she whispered, "Steve, why did we come this way again? Nobody in their right mind comes through Central Park alone at this time of night. We could be mugged and nobody would find us until morning."
"Oh, stop worrying," the young man snorted even as he hastened his already brisk pace more, "We're not going to get mugged or anything like that. This is the quickest way home even if we took the subway or a cab."
"You're just too cheap to pay for a cab," Liz chided with a smirk, giving him a playful slap across the arm.
"Hey! I bought you dessert, didn't I? That should count for something," he smiled back defensively as he hugged her closer.
As they continued their way into the inky darkness that blanketed everything, a slight rustle of leaves and braches from the right side of the path caused both to stop dead in their tracks, their breaths catching in their throats from fear.
"Wh..Who's there?" Steve called out in a false voice of fearlessness. He was beginning to question if the subway had really been that bad of an idea.
Giving no reply, the rustling moved along the length of the path. The branches of the bushes planted along the pathway swayed heavily in successive waves as if a bulky body was skirting along them. Soft clinks sounded against the sharp snapping of branches.
Giving a small yelp of fear, the girl clutched her date's arm tightly as the mysterious figure glided in the shadows just several feet away from where they stood frozen in place.
Another crescendo of hollow clicks sounded through the air as the movement suddenly stopped just ten feet before them to the side. The sound vaguely conjured up the mental image of a person clucking their tongue against the roof of their mouth, only in a constant rapid succession of varying tones and intensities that rose and fell almost melodiously.
Deafening silence stung the couple's ears as the clicking suddenly stopped, allowing the hush of central Park in the dead of night to hang heavily in the air. Holding a collective breath, the couple stood as still as statues, staring intensely in the direction of where the sounds had resonated from.
Giving no warning, a huge shadow separated itself from the surrounding darkness and launched itself into the overhanging braches of the large oak trees fifteen feet above the ground that lines the sides of the walking path.
"What is that?" Liz cried as she clung to the young man's jacket. Above their heads sounded the groans of branches sagging and shifting under the weight of a huge body as it stepped quickly along the interlocking mesh of foliage from either side of the path. For reasons that seemed to defy physics, the mysterious presence that crashed about like a herd of elephants didn't fall through the trees' canopy and to the ground.
"I have no idea," Steve answered in a voice seized by fear, "Whatever it is isn't human. Nothing that I know of can move and jump like that."
Coming to a halt right above them, the crashes of heavy movement died away into the night only to be replaced by the gentle rustle of the branches swaying back into place.
"We need to get out of here," whispered Steve as he began to back away slowly, his head craned upward to the thick blackness of the canopy of leaves and branches overhead. Giving no resistance, the girl quickly followed suit.
Turning on their heels to flee for their lives, the soft series of clicks from before froze them in place as they looked on in horror. Not even ten feet in front of them hovered the rounded outline an almost human head dangling down from the branches upside down.
What little light pierced the night, illuminated only the outline of the figure, shrouding its features in darkness. But the couple didn't need to see its face to know it was staring intensely at them through the blackness.
Too shocked to utter even a shout of surprise, the couple stood like deer caught in the headlights of an on coming car. In the lull of time it takes to take in a tense breath of air, a shrill high pitched scream shattered through the nighttime air. The sound that pierced the air was that of a deadly predator ready to pounce on its helpless prey.
The air vibrating shriek rang through the distance, as the solid ground beneath the startled couple vibrated in shock as a heavy mass fell from somewhere above to the small path they stood on.
Stunned by the ear splitting cry, it took a moment before the electrical impulse of pain registered in Liz's brain as she was forcefully batted into the massive trunk of a nearby tree as if she was nothing more than a rag doll.
Gasping a rattled breath of air as she tumbled to the ground in a heap, another sharp predatory scream sliced through her ear drums. Clamping her hand over her ears in attempt to block out the noise, she frantically looked for any sign of her date.
Disoriented by her abrupt collision with the tree, Liz stared in half coherency at the sight she beheld. At first she thought she was dreaming, then she thought it was some freakish nightmare. But as another blood curdling scream pierced the air, she knew what she saw was real. Not even her subconscious was creative enough to concoct the scene she beheld several feet from where she had fallen.
Dangling four feet off the ground by the lapels of his jacket, Steve kicked the air frantically in search for solid ground. On his face was chiseled the expression of pure horror and fear. If he had had the conscious control of his vocal chords, she was sure his screams of terror would have filled the night instead of the soft inhuman clicking of his captor that hummed in her ears and seemed to vibrate the air itself.
Shrouded in the shadows as if it wore them as a second skin, the monstrous outline of a spindly almost humanoid shape arrested the frightened girl's attention.
Standing almost twelve feet off the ground on its back legs at what she assumed would pass as its shoulders, the creature held its captive like he weighed nothing more then a feather at the ends of its long slender arms that bent at a slight angle to pull the boy's pale face within only a foot or so of its own.
Planted solidly on two spindly legs, the creature slowly pumped the air with two more sets of leg- like appendages that sprouted from the long and narrow trunk of flesh that made up its body. Just before its pair of thicker muscled supportive legs, its stomach bulged to a massive swell, giving the creature a somewhat awkward appearance.
But 'awkward' was not one of the words Liz would ever use to later describe what she saw. As it lowered its head frighteningly gracefully to within inches of her date's face the following scene moved in such rapid fluid movements, she doubted she had witnessed it at all.
Cocking its head slightly to the side as if evaluating its catch, the creature gave another round of hollow clicks before it suddenly tossed Steve's body into the air like a coin. As his body tumbled in the air, the creature quickly shot out twin streams of liquidy material that covered his body completely in a full body cocoon within seconds.
Plucking the falling body out of the air like it was standing still, the creature tucked the stiff human package between its first and second set of legs.
Stifling a scream of terror from what she had just seen, Liz sat motionless as the creature's head slowly swiveled about on its thin neck to scan the surrounding area. Pausing as its gaze locked with hers, she could almost feel more then hear the hiss that emanated from the bobbing head that stood hidden in shadows.
Gracefully covering the short distance that separated itself from the paralyzed girl on all eight of its stilt like appendages, the creature lowered itself almost parallel to the ground to stare eyelevel with the girl's fear gripped face. As the round head entered into a shaft of dim light cast by the distant skyscrapers that lined the huge park, her heart froze at the strangely beautiful silver orbs that seemed to glow in the darkness at her.
Unblinking, the creature's large bug like eyes spanned across almost half of its head. But as if to counter balance the strange beauty of the thing's eyes, beneath the shimmering orbs sat a pair of mandibles that snapped and clicked as they swung out horizontal along the things mouth and clapped together menacingly. Beyond those hung a narrow jaw edged with fang like protrusions.
As the creature stared into her eyes, Liz felt the distinct feeling she was about to die. Fearing what she was sure was to come, she tightly clenched her eyes shut and winced her head away from the creature's mouth with a frightened sob of repressed fright.
The night had suddenly seemed to become still, so much so she swore the creature could hear her heart thundering against her ribs. Over the roar of blood in her ears, she could make out the muffled cries of Steve coming from somewhere in the cocoon that was tightly held between the creature's spidery legs.
She could feel the creature's hot, sticky breath against her neck as another hiss sounded in what seemed like only an inch away from her ear. Wincing further away as she curled her legs to her body, tears of terror stung the corners of her eyes that were almost painfully squeezed together.
'Oh God, I don't want to die. Please don't let me die,' her thoughts echoed again and again through her skull like a mantra.
There she sat, waiting for her death for what seemed like eternity. After what was in reality only a few moments, the girl slowly peeled an eyelid up.
Nothing. It was as if there were no other living things in the area. In the distance, the soft chirping of crickets sung a subdued nighttime lullaby.
Gasping a lungful of air that could have passed for relief, surprise, incomprehension, or unbridled joy for life, she pulled herself shakingly to her feet.
Following her feet that seemed to move with a mind of their own, she stumbled back onto the path where her date and her had walked along unsuspectingly only a few short minutes before. 'Had it really only been that long ago?' she wondered in a daze.
Steve. She had almost forgotten about him. Looking hurriedly around she vividly remembered him being tied up into a condense package by some strange fluid then carried away by the creature.
"No…" she muttered in distress, collapsing to her knees on the cold pavement. Chocking back the rocking sobs that threatened to rip from her mouth, her eyes fell onto something just within her reach on the ground. It looked like a glob of pure white foam.
Slowly stretching a shaking hand towards it, she gasped in surprise as her fingers brushed against the sticky surface of the strange substance. It was warm, almost hot to the touch. Quickly withdrawing her hand, her stomach lurched as several fine gossamer threads of the stuff stretched themselves between the greater mass to the tips of her fingers.
Suddenly appalled by the stuff, she frantically shook her hand to free herself from the entangling threads of adhesive goo. Getting the majority of the stuff from her hand, she remembered the eerie glow of those eyes that had seemed to stare into her very soul. Shuddering involuntarily, she swore she could still feel their unrelenting gaze on her skin as if sight were a tangible thing.
Standing with a jerky start, Liz quickly pulled her strength together and fled as fast as her feet could humanely take her. All the while she ran from the park towards the nearby police station in an hysterical state, she could almost feel those silver eyes on her, watching from somewhere nearby from the shadows.
Those eyes would forever haunt her and follow her for years to come even when she closed her eyes and slipped into the deep void of sleep. Those eyes; their shimmering glow; the cold, raw feral power that radiated from them would always stay with her.
But she knew it wasn't the first time she had seem them. The moment she saw them she recognized them from the daily newspapers, only more against the scarlet backdrop of a masked man then from the blackness that shrouded what she had just seen.
She wasn't sure of what she had just seen, but what she did know was that those had been inhuman eyes. Those had been the eyes of a spider. And that had been the unearthly scream of a spider that still rung fresh in her ears and sent cold shivers down her spine…
***********
4 days later…
Peter Parker swayed steadily to the rocking rhythm of the rickety elevator as it ascended towards the tenth floor city office of the Daily Bugle. Trying to tune out the horrible elevator music that played from some hidden speaker overhead, the young photographer shifted the strap of his black messenger bag uncomfortably on his shoulder as the other people in the car jostled about in the cramped space.
Inside the large bag were numerous photos of his alter ego, Spiderman, stopping a large bank robbery that had taken place the previous night. He was hoping the pictures would sell for enough money to cover this months rent. The photos weren't exactly the best his automatically timed camera had ever shot, but they were good enough to pass off for a few quick bucks to get through the month on.
Peter just hoped Robbie Robertson was up for them. If not, then the aspiring photographer might have to take up a part time job at McDonald's to keep his apartment and feed his belly.
It seemed like only yesterday instead of two months ago that he had been saving New York, and for that matter the whole United Stated of America, from a terrorist bent on releasing a terrible biological virus that could have wiped out half the nation's population. Not to mention the 'minor inconvenience' of having been shot from saving a political figure and his boss, J. Jonah Jameson.
His wounds had healed completely within two weeks of his little escapade and had become just another addition to his growing collection of battle wounds. Luckily nothing more then the usual common muggings and robberies had taken place since then, allowing the young man time to recover instead of having to battle some insanely powerful megalomaniac bent on conquering the world. That could have seriously set back any attempts at bed rest…
As the rickety elevator car came to a jerky stop on the tenth floor, Peter stood by patiently by as a small swarm of hurried reporters forcefully pushed past him to be first out of the elevator. Shrugging off the rude jostling, the young man stepped off into the noisy chaos that was the Daily Bugle's city room an hour before deadline.
Walking warily between the desks that were crammed into some semblance of symmetry in the huge room for fear of some intern suddenly popping out from behind a desk and ramming into a particular free-lance photographer, Peter waved a few casual hellos to some of the writers he had become associated with since starting a working relationship with the newspaper. Some of those familiar faces included Betty Brant and Ben Urich who Peter had the pleasure of getting to know better over the past few months.
"Hey, Pete," Betty called over from her secretary's desk in front of Jameson's office as she waved the young man over for a quick conversation, "Where've you been lately? Haven't seen you around for awhile."
"Busy," he replied with a helpless shrug, "It looks like you're a bit busy yourself."
"Nothing more then usual," she chuckled heartily, giving a vague gesture out to the buzzing news room, "So what did you bring us today of your star photo subject?" referring to the city's superhero arachnid.
"Just a bank robbery that happened the other night by some bungling wannabe crooks," he said as he pulled a manila folder from his messenger bag and opened it to show the photos proudly to Betty.
Leafing through the enlarged 8x11 photos of miscellaneous shots of trussed men in black ski masks caught in a huge spider web that spanned across the front of the bank and others of Spiderman swinging in and exchanging a few punches with the surprised crooks, Betty remarked in an impressed tone, "How do you always know where Spiderman is going to be all the time? It's like you two have a walkie talkie system going to know where the other is and set up the photo shoot. Come on, you have to tell me, Pete. Do you know Spidey on a personal basis?"
Giving an enigmatic smile, Peter said, "I'm just lucky, I guess."
Shooting him an you're-not-giving-me-the-whole-story look, Betty was about to press the matter further before a loud uproar rang across the city room from within Jameson's office. Both giving a half-hearted glance over their shoulders towards the source of the outburst from the sheer fact of being used to what was about to be another famous Jameson-rant, Betty and Peter caught the fleeting image of a white faced intern running at full steam out from the editor's office.
"-and don't show your face in front of me again until you learn to file those papers right!" Jameson shouted at full lung capacity after the fleeing boy as the editor's body filled the doorway of his office.
Accustomed to Jameson's frequent rantings, the city room hardly even paused to acknowledge the loud scuffle as writers hurried to meet their deadlines. Surveying the room with the eyes of a vulture ready to swoop down on any dawdling reporter, Jameson chewed the end of his stinky cigar that always managed to leave its distinct odor in its wake.
Quickly slumping her shoulders over the papers laid out on her desk, Betty pretended to be deeply engrossed in her job, leaving Peter to fend for himself as Jameson's gaze fell onto the young photographer.
Puffing a huge cloud of smoke from around his cigar, Jameson stalked towards Peter. "Parker! You'd better have brought me some decent photos today! And by 'decent' I don't mean anything with that underwear wearing wall crawler in it!" he barked as he neared the boy.
Caught off guard by this, Peter stuttered unintelligibly, "Uh…well…"
Not giving the him a chance to form a coherent sentence, the older man snatched the small stack of photos that sat on the edge of the desk. Flipping through them and tossing them with the flip of his wrist back onto the opened manila folder, Jameson muttered in a huff at every toss, "Crap…Crap…No way in hell…Crap… Parker, I thought I told you no Spiderman pictures!"
"Well, Mr. Jameson, its just that I thought that this being the first full scale bank robbery in a long time, that you'd want pictures of it," Peter recovered quickly as he tapped his photos into a neat little stack in the center of the folder.
Snorting, Jameson bellowed, "I'm not about to have this paper glorifying that so called 'superhero' that always seems to know when a robbery's going down. I think that he's in on the job and only stepping in for the publicity. It's people like Spiderman that's causing the downfall of American society!"
Peter merely rolled his eyes passively at the familiar accusations of Spiderman's supposed dubious nature. Glancing down, he caught Betty's mirrored reaction of his own as she turned to pound away at her computer's keyboard.
'He'd blame me for global warming if he ever thought of it,' Peter thought as Jameson began to get so worked up that cinders from his cigar began to tumble down in small sooty showers.
"Now what are you getting so upset about, Jonah? Haven't you scared enough people today or are you batting for a perfect 500?" came a familiar voice of calmness from the side of the room, interrupting Jameson mid sentence of even more accusations that had sprung from the editor's head within the past few moments.
Turning gratefully to the welcome distraction, Peter gave a tight thankful smile to 'Robbie' Robertson as the older man made his way gradually towards the excited editor and photographer. Returning the smile, Robertson pervaded an aura of calm authority that somehow managed to quiet Jameson a tad.
"I'm sick and tired of running pictures of Spiderman and wasting perfectly good paper-space on this masked freak when there are hundreds of better stories out there for us to report!" the man responded with a snarl as he threw the last picture onto the pile Peter had made.
"Oh, come on, Jonah," Robbie soothed as he picked up the pile and began shifting through them slowly, giving each shot equal attention, "I'm sure there's something in here we can use. That bank robbery is a pretty big story. Those robbers almost got away with an armored trunk load of newly minted bills."
Standing silently by, Peter couldn't help but smile as Robertson glanced up at him and shot a secret smile towards the young man that almost said, 'Don't worry, Peter. I'll take care of this.'
"Aha!" the aging black man cried as he pulled a particular picture from the middle of the stack, "We have a winner. I think you'll like this, Jonah. No Spiderman in sight but enough to get the point across of who stopped the robbery."
Holding the photo up from the upper right corner so not to smug it, Robertson allowed the others to view his pick of the litter. In the picture was an artistically shadowed shot of five of the robbers hanging upside down from a shimmering spider web on a streetlight with a bag of money spilled out across the sidewalk beneath them, the bank front forming the backdrop the entire scene.
"Just see the secretary on the way out for the finders fee," Robbie smiled at Peter as he tucked the photo into a folder and handed it to a nearby intern saying, "Get this down to printing and make sure it's in the evening edition."
"Thanks, Mr. Robertson," Peter said enthusiastically. Looks like he wouldn't have to be flipping burgers after all…
"Robbie! We shouldn't run this! Not after everything that web slingers been doing lately," Jameson cried loudly as the intern disappeared quickly into the maelstrom of activity of the city room towards the print offices.
"Why not? Spiderman just stopped a huge bank robbery last night," the other man sighed in exasperation.
"Haven't you been watching the news lately?" the editor growled back, "That bug's been kidnapping people all over the city for the last few nights. There have been eyewitness reports of seeing that criminal grabbing innocent people and hauling them away, tied up in that webbing he always uses. One girl was brutally attacked four nights ago in central Park when her boyfriend was grabbed."
Peter's eyes narrowed as he listened intensely to what the older man was saying. Kidnappings? And supposedly by Spiderman? Could there be an imposter going around masquerading as him or had the editor just found a new angle to portray Spidey as the city's number one public enemy?
"Come on, Jonah…." Robertson moaned as he rubbed the pinch of skin between his eyes tiredly, having heard multiple variations of the same allegation that Spidey was out to wreak havoc on the city.
"It could have been somebody else," Peter ventured as he interjected himself into the conversation, "You know, somebody out to frame Spiderman…"
"The girl that was attacked positively identified the thing that nabbed her boyfriend as Spiderman. She said she recognized the criminal's mask," Jameson exclaimed as he waved his arms frantically in the air, "And police found webbing all over the area where the kid disappeared. How many other people in this city wear a red bug mask and can spray spider webs like that freak can?"
"You're still on this even after Spiderman saved your life not even a few months ago and stopped those terrorists?" Robbie said as he stared at Jameson incredulously, "I think you have a very short term memory."
"I just wasn't fooled like the rest of the people in this city. I know when I see a dangerous criminal biding his time to strike when we least expect it! And now he's done it!" the graying editor retorted in total conviction, now shouting as he quickly worked himself into a tizzy, "Six people have been reported being grabbed by him and who knows how many more that we don't know about. We need to do something about this. And since nobody else is doing anything, I'm offering a reward for anyone who brings that wall crawler in to the cops! Ten thousand dollars!"
Despite close deadlines, the majority of the city room had stopped its activity to listen in on Jameson's speech. But even with a substantial lessening of the city room's usual roar, a steady tapping of keyboards and flutter of papers set the steady background noise of the scene.
Peter felt his insides tighten. What could this mean? Was there really a look alike swinging around the city kidnapping people right off the street? But why? There were too many questions right now that Peter didn't have an answer to.
And now with yet another reward out on his alter-ego's head, Peter was going to have to hurry to clear his name before he had half the city out in a full scale search with blood hounds on his trail.
Turning quickly on his heels, Peter beat a hasty retreat for the elevators as Jameson began loudly shouting details for his plan to capture the city's superhero. As the young man tapped the call button by the side of the elevator impatiently fast despite curious glances by passing Bugle staff, Peter felt the urgent need for Spiderman to take a closer look into the matter before any more innocent people disappeared….
To be continued…
If you like the fic, all I'm asking for is a generous donation of comments and feelings in the form of a review for a particular fanfic writer. Please… the more reviews I get, the bigger incentive I have to come out with another chapter very soon!
-LAXgirl