A/N: Dear reader, in case you haven't heard, I re-read some of my Spiderman stories last week and was appalled by their...well... terribleness. Given, I was six years younger, but still. I know several of you were fond of them and I thought it was a shame how poorly my tribute to Doc Ock and Spiderman did them justice. All that to say, I am revamping probably all of my Spiderman stories, but especially this one, You've Been Rejected, and The Arms. Changing as little as possible, but as much as necessary. If you read these before, please review and tell me how the new versions compare. So far in Precious Daughters, I have only fixed chapters 1-5 and 12. I am steadily revamping, though, so fear not! Anyway, enough of that. I hope you enjoy this revisit to our favorite tentacled physicist.

Chapter One: Reunited

Doc Ock walked down the street in the dead of night. The actuators stomped around him, turning his footsteps into a five four meter waltz. When the tentacles' heads came up from the ground, their bright red beams pierced the darkness beneath flickering yellow street lamps. A very dangerous part of the city, if he remembered correctly. Yet, the longer he dwelled there, the less criminals – or people in general - he saw, which didn't bother him.

Since his tentacles had saved him from a watery death, he had been lying low, fighting the eternal pressure of the actuators to rebuild the fusion reactor.

A month later, he was tired of fighting.

Finding a suitable place for their next attempt was the first step.

Headlights flung Doc Ock's shadow against the potholed blacktop. The top right tentacle looked behind him and noted that it had pulled to the curb and stopped.

"He wouldn't dare approach us," Doc Ock assured his tentacles, looking over his shoulder briefly before continuing onward.

The car door opened and a woman with a nice figure slowly climbed out.

She called a name, but Doc Ock ignored her. "Is that you?" she called more loudly. "Otto?"

Doc Ock stopped, shocked. No one called him by that name anymore. He spun around, his tentacles at attention, gathering data and ready to strike. He approached the woman.

"What business do you have using my name?" he asked with a frown as he stopped ten feet away from her. "What on earth could you want with me?"

The woman peered at him, stepping forward a little. "Don't…don't you recognize me, Otto?"

"What do you want with me?" Doc Ock asked louder. He stepped closer, the heads of his tentacles snapping open. "Tell me!"

The woman jumped and then her eyes began to moisten. "Otto, it's me: it's Rosie."

Doc Ock, no… Otto. Otto peered into her eyes in stupefied disbelief. It couldn't be. He must have finally gone insane: the actuators had finally worn out his mind. He had feared this would happen. Well, if insanity included Rosie, it certainly was better than the sane world he was a citizen of currently.

There really is a woman named Rosie standing before you, the tentacles told him, sensing his confusion.

Otto stepped back in shock, but then carefully stepped closer, still keeping his tentacles close by his head.

"Rosie?" he asked almost to himself. "My dead Rosie."

"Well, I'm not dead," she said with a growing smile. "As I'm sure you figured out, my mad genius."

Their joke. Their… joke. That's right. Rosie called him a mad genius, didn't she? His heart sped; it really was her!

"Rosie!" he exclaimed breathlessly, scooping her up and hugging her tightly. "You don't know how I missed you! The doctors told me you were dead! I...I saw you die! Or, I thought I did. But they lied. They all lied. But you… but you… oh Rosie."

Rosie kissed him rapidly. "I spent a lot of time in the hospital." Otto glanced at her throat, which was covered in terrible scars. He cringed with guilt. "But when I was released, I was told you had died." She paused when Otto held her to his lips with his hand on the back of her head. "No one would give me the particulars, so I found out on my own."

"Oh," Otto said loosening his hold on her and looking to the ground. "I see. I can explain. Or, well… I'll try. You probably won't want me when I do, but I have to tell you. I have to protect you."

She straightened his coat pensively. Oh, how he had missed that! "I have to protect you as well," she stated with calm fortitude.

Otto closed his eyes painfully and took his hands off her shoulders. "Rosie, I can't put you in danger. You know what I've become. Please. Keep your friends. Throw yourself into your writing. You don't deserve the life I have."

"I won't let you face this alone," she said. "And, I'm still living in our house. You can come home."

"I won't be safe there," he protested. "And I'll just cause problems for you."

"Then we'll move," she declared, grabbing his coat and looking desperately into his eyes. "As far away as necessary. We'll change our names. It will work, Otto."

Otto sighed and swallowed. "Say my name again, please."

Rosie smiled. "Otto," she repeated. "Otto. Otto."

Otto felt humanity pulse back into his cold, almost artificial shell each time she said it. His shoulders heaved with a short laugh and a smile spread his face. "You don't know how wonderful it is to hear my name from your lips again."

Rosie hugged him and he wrapped his large arms around her as he breathed in the scent of her hair. "And you don't know how good it feels to say it," she said, tears beginning to come.

"Aw, Rosie," he growled, unable to be angry with her. "You're making it very hard to take the high road."

"Otto," she said with all seriousness. "I'm on the high road. Please come with me. We can move out of the city if you'd like. We could move to Nebraska, even."

Otto wasn't convinced that her way was the best, but his heart ached more for his wife with each beat, and he found himself unable to resist. If things began going badly, he reasoned, if the actuators' influence became too much, he could separate from her.

"Nebraska may be a little drastic," he said with a smile. Rosie smiled back and he kissed her forehead, brushing her dark blond hair around her cheek. Rosie burst into tears and buried her head in his chest. Otto folded around her and tears welled in his eyes as well.

The actuators watched, curious.

Rosie sniffed and wiped her eyes on her sleeve with a silly laugh. Otto wiped his away, too. "Well, get your things together and we'll be off," she said, still trying to control her voice.

His things… right. What things? "Uh…" he grinned and shrugged. "Got them right here," he said, patting one of the tentacles.

"Oh." Rosie seemed upset at the state he was in. "Well, let's go home for tonight, and then tomorrow, we'll start looking for a new house in not-Nebraska."

Otto and Rosie walked together back to the car and Otto managed to shove himself into the passenger seat, barely able to shut the door. Rosie put the car into gear and they rolled towards their house.

"We'll have to get a bigger car, I think," she said pleasantly. Ah, Rosie: always shining. Otto reached for the hand in her lap and held it tight.

You are smiling, the tentacles observed. Does this Rosie woman make you happy?

"More than anything else in the world," Otto answered automatically.

"What?" Rosie asked.

Otto caught his mistake, tongue-tied. "I," he began awkwardly. "I don't really know how to say this, but I… I wasn't talking to you."

Rosie slowed the car and looked at her husband. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"Rosie, do you remember the inhibitor chip on my actuators?"

"The microchip keeping your mind above the artificial intelligence of the machine, yes," she replied carefully searching his eyes, stopping the car.

Otto chewed his lip, then hurriedly motioned forward with his hand. "There's no reason to stop the car now. Just… just keep going, Rosie."

Rosie let the car roll again. "What happened to it?"

Otto swallowed and cringed, willing the words not to come, yet knowing that they must. "It… burnt out."

Rosie gasped. "Did you replace it?"

"No."

She paused. "They didn't take over, though."

Otto shook his head, wishing he were not in the conversation. "The answer to that question is both yes and no. No, because I am still Otto. Right? I'm still Otto. But yes, because they… it's hard to explain."

"Do try." The car had come to a stop again. It was just as well. Maybe she would make him leave when she learned the truth. His heart would break, but he knew she would be safe at least.

"They are always in my head as voices. They know my thoughts and talk to me. And… and I reply. All they care about is successful fusion: a great mistake on my part. Well, successful fusion and me. I guess that's one good thing. But they can be very selfish and… destructive."

"I see," Rosie replied quietly.

Otto sighed in frustration at himself. "I knew this couldn't work," he said, struggling to unlock the door. "I'm way too dangerous now."

Rosie locked the doors again and put a loving hand to his face. "I'm not leaving you," she told him. "And I never will. Til death do us part, remember?"

"I just don't know, Rosie," he replied, deflated.

Rosie set her jaw firm. "Well I do." She stepped on the accelerator and soon the car pulled into the garage: their garage.

Rosie hopped out and stepped towards the door. Otto scraped out of the car and the bottom left tentacle closed the door.

She is not useful, the tentacles warned.

"I need her," Otto replied with more firmness than necessary. What if they wanted her gone? He would not budge an inch with regards to Rosie.

She will cause us trouble.

She is a distraction.

Listen to us.

"No, you listen to me," he hissed. "She is staying. And you will not interfere. You will not… interfere."

Rosie watched him from the doorstep with arms crossed tightly against the breeze. Otto stayed put, staring dumbly at his wife. He dreaded stepping forward and having her step back. If that happened…

"Come inside, Otto," she called softly over the front walk.

Otto came forward, assisted by his actuators. He never walked only on his own feet anymore: it hurt his back to carry four gigantic metal arms alone. Yet, he didn't want to scare Rosie with their aggressive metallic strikes against the ground, so he tried to tread lightly. Rosie opened the door, went inside and stood out of the way. Otto hesitated on the threshold, peering into the house faintly illuminated when Rosie switched on a table lamp.

She returned to the doorway with a smile and gently took one of his large, rough hands in both of hers, small and smooth. She wore a thin wooden bracelet and another tightly woven one. He let her lead him inside but stopped in the entryway once she withdrew her hand.

Otto scanned the cozy room, the sofa, the fireplace… his thoughts receding deeper into himself and leaving his face void of emotion. He knew everything by heart, but like a photograph he had memorized. He was stepping back into the prologue after two hundred brutal pages of madness. Otto didn't know if he remembered how to live in a house.

Rosie closed the door and took off her coat. "I'll make us some tea," she said, giving him a kiss before going into the kitchen.

Otto followed her absently, wondering if he weren't in a dream. Rosie was at the sink, filling up the tea kettle. The kitchen was just how he remembered it. She heard him approach and looked over her shoulder with a smile. She set the pot on the burner and turned up the heat.

"Why don't you take off your coat and gloves?" she offered, moving towards him and gripping the ragged collar.

She had gently pushed it off his shoulders before he began to help. The actuators condensed as well as they could and Otto struggled them back through the holes. Finally, his coat, practically a part of him now, was off and folded over the back of the chair. His tentacles expanded to their normal length. Otto pulled his gloves off as well and set them on the table.

"Have you had dinner?" Rosie asked suddenly.

Otto's eating schedule had gone so awry, he didn't try to distinguish meals anymore. He was sure he had eaten something that day, though it was probably more like lunch.

"I'm fine," he answered, kissing her.

"I know you, Otto," she chided. "'I'm fine' means 'no, but don't fuss.'" She walked to the refrigerator and took out lunchmeat, cheese and mayonnaise. "I haven't been able to make sure you're eating lately, but now I'm back." She pointed a butter knife at him. "So beware."

Otto laughed and shook his head, turning a table chair sideways and easing into it, careful not to crush it under the weight of the tentacles. "I have no hope of winning then, do I? Very well."

When the water reached a boil and the steel tea kettle alerted them with its piercing whistle, Rosie poured the scalding water into her favorite porcelain teapot, with a bag of chamomile and set it and tea cups on the table. She set the sandwich before Otto and sat across from him.

The sandwich was neatly cut diagonally and had lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, and every other good thing that accompanies meat and cheese. Otto picked up a half and took a bite. The flavor rushed across his tongue and his jaw tightened with the unfamiliar sensation. Rosie watched him chew with a grateful grin. But Otto swallowed it solemnly.

"I can't help thinking that you don't realize what you are getting yourself into," Otto told her quietly. "I'm a wanted man. I couldn't bear it if you got a criminal record because of me."

"I have five speeding tickets and four parking tickets," Rosie said, lightheartedly. "I already have a criminal record."

"I'm serious, Rosie," Otto said, sternly setting the sandwich back on the plate. "You and I both know that there is no way I could ever buy property, change my name… anything that requires filling out paperwork. No one could know I exist: we would have to pretend we aren't back together. Do you realize that? Do you realize how much covering you would have to do?"

Rosie quietly poured the tea.

"But the fact is, we are back together," she replied calmly. "And we can't separate again. So, either you come with me to the new house I am going to buy, or I go with you to wherever you've been living."

The latter was absolutely impossible, but the former didn't seem realistic either. Otto smoothed back his hair in distress. "Everything in me wants to say yes, but—"

Rosie put a finger to his mouth and kissed him between the eyes. "Then say yes."