A/N: Well for those reading welcome to my second story. This story will actually be four or five chapters and will set up three separate stories. It's a little ambitious, but why not. For those wondering I am working on the next chapter of Peter Parker: Maintenance Man and I'm hoping to finish it in the next couple of days at the earliest or the next couple of weeks at the latest. So before I let the cold medicine I'm taking causes me to ramble on some more; on with the story. Oh and as always I don't own anything.
Prologue 1: Fall of the Fox
New York City, the so-called city that never sleeps, with the bright lights that never take a month, week, day, hour, minute or even a second off. During the day the masses use trains, busses, cabs, bikes or just walk on foot to reach their destination. However at night… well there is a reason why people call it the city that never sleep. Where in the day, most people are on the move to make a living, at night most people are having fun, seeking entertainment to distract them for the night, until the process repeats itself again. New York City was also considered one of the most dangerous cities in America. Now it is in the 100's; the reason…
"I'm going to kill you and rip out your heart you sun' of a."
"Wow you greet your mother with that mouth," a figure clad in red and blue spandex chided a poorly dressed man as he dodged a lead pipe swipe from another poorly dressed man. After deftly dodging a second attempt to connect with the spandex-clad person, said person decides to shoot another quip as he shook his fist and raised his voice another octave. "Junior if you ever speak like that again I'm going to rinse out your mouth with soap."
Said criminal, whose patience was as thin as single-ply tissue paper, finally took a flamethrower to his patience and yells, "That' it your dead Spider-freak," as he rushes the boisterous man as the red and blue clad man knocked out thug 1 with a swift kick to his temple.
"Well looks like Junior has had enough, what about you Sparky?" 'Spider-freak' continued as he caught thug 2's arm as he was about to clobber him with a crow bar. He then squeezes the thug's arm, which causes the miscreant to drop his crow bar. Then with deft movement he maneuvers the now disarmed thug in the path of the enraged thug, whose fist buries in the face of his now out cold cohort.
As the last conscious thug backs up a step to survey his dwindling chances of escape, the only other man in the area decided to add his two cents, again.
"Jeez Junior, you have some major anger issues to work out. The good news is you'll have plenty of time to work them out once you go to the slammer."
'Junior' having enough of the oddly dressed man and realizing he was running out of options, decided his best option was to pulled out a concealed switchblade.
"Didn't your mother teach you never to play with weapons? I think it would be better is you use that knife to clean the gunk off your teeth. Dude, when is the last time you brushed?"
With his final quip spoken, the thug rushed the other man with righteous fury, only for all his swipes being deftly dodged by his opponent. After swiftly moving to miss a stab from the last remaining thug, he decides to end it with a swift chop to the back of his foe. The criminal drops to the ground, drifting into unconsciousness, as the man who unleashed the chop went to check on the lady on the ground, who managed to back her way to a brick wall on the right side of the alley.
"You ok ma'am," the masked hero asked as the lady nodded. "Thank you for saving me Spider-Man."
He rubbed the back of his head in a shy manner as he replied, "Aw shucks it's nothing," he commented as he examined his web cartridges, determining if he had enough to web sling home and secure the criminals. With the calculations determined he walked over to the thugs and webbed them up to the light pole. He turned to the lady, who finally exited the alley, and decided it was time to go as he started to hear sirens in the background.
"Well that's my cue to go, do you mind if you explain to the cops what happened," Spider-man asked as the female just let out a soft 'yeah'.
As he webbed away, he looked back to see the cops arrive on the scene, which let the hero turn around and focus on what was in front of him as he made his way to his home. As he took a quick glance around to make sure no one was watching, he slid into an unlocked window and locked said window as he too off his mask. His brown hair matted down as his hazel eyes show the tiredness of a long day, the face of Peter Parker is shown. He removes the rest of his costume, carrying them as he quietly moves to the kitchen as he gets a glass of water. As he finishes it he slowly trudges his way to his bedroom. One of the reasons for his movements is the tiredness of his day; the other reason is he doesn't want to startle the other occupant. He gently lifts the dirty clothes basket and inserts his costume as he moves into his bedroom slowly slipping under the covers as a mop of red hair turn around to greet him.
"Hey Tiger," the red head greets groggily as she begins to sit up, the covers slowly moving down to reveal a white nightgown. "How was your patrol?"
Peter leans in and kisses the woman lying in the bed. "It was okay, not much going on," Peter yawns as he begins to speak again. "Sorry for waking you MJ I was trying to keep quiet."
Mary Jane, or MJ as her friends call her, descends back into the bed as she closes her eyes. "Its fine Peter, sleep well."
As Peter lowers his head into the pillow he takes one last look at the clock by his bed, 1:30 illuminating the night as he closes his eyes.
30 minutes later the sweet dreams Peter was hoping for eluded him as he began to have a nightmare. However this nightmare was unusual for him. Instead of reliving some of his worst moments in life; like the death of his Uncle Ben, the death of his former girlfriend and first love Gwen Stacy, or the many close calls that both he and his longtime girlfriend Mary Jane had. No this dream was focused on a blond haired boy. The boy seemed unrealistic as his hair was spiked out in multiple directions as his blue eyes shine with determination. A yellow cloak surrounds his frame as he stares down a man with jet black hair. He looks to have a few inches on the boy with yellow energy as one eye is red with black dots surrounding his eye. The other eye is purple with white ripples extending from the center in a circular pattern. Peter can't make out what is being said, but the next thing he sees is the golden-haired boy is having something physically ripped from his body. The orange energy is slowly being pulled out and the boy's yellow cloak is slowly dropping. The other people that surround him are looking shocked as the boy falls to the ground.
"NARUTO," a pink-haired girl cries as she meets him on the ground and sticks her hands over his body. A green energy surrounds her hands as she begins to tear up. As a man with a ridiculous green jump suit and brows as bushy as a caterpillar attempt to fight the man with dark hair a man who is almost a carbon copy of the now identified Naruto begins to flash towards him. However a silver-like object is thrown towards the orange-clad youngster as a blue force-field begins to surround him and the pink-haired female. As Peter turns to see who tossed that his eyes rise in shock as the visage of Dr. Doom appear a few feet away.
"I'm afraid you can't be allowed near the boy," Doom speaks as the yellow haired man forms a blue ball in his hand and tries to bust his way through the dome. The attack begins to shoot sparks from it before the attack dissolves and the force field remains unaffected.
'What the hell is Doom doing here,' Peter thought as he tried to assist the person attacking Doom. However, much to Peter's dismay, his attack went right through him . He tried to use his web shooters, but the devices weren't on his wrist. Peter resigned himself to the situation he is in as Doom began to speak again.
"Your utter disrespect is astounding if you think your attack could damage the brilliant machinations of Doom," the metal-plated man sneered as the man as the yellow-haired man dressed in what looks like a white trench coat looks at the younger version of himself with sad eyes. His eyes then dart towards Dr. Doom as he pulls out a three-pronged weapon, which Peter thinks it looked like a sai, but its shape was different. As he tosses it at Doom he disappears and begins to flash towards Doom. The dictator blasts the weapon away as he tries to focus on his opponent. He attempts to blast him, but the man keeps disappearing before the blasts hit. As Doom continues to miss the man in the white trench coat, the man then appears where his weapon was blasted away. With incredible movement he picks up his weapon and tosses it again. Doom blasts the weapon again, but the man suddenly reappears behind Doom with another blue energy ball in his hand. Before he could make contact he had to dodge a spear swipe. He dissipated his energy ball as he looked at the man with the spear. The blond then pulled out the sai again and tossed it towards the spear-wielding man. The blond disappeared and when the weapon was halfway to the intended target the man yelled "Chatsuka Ratana," which caused the sai to explode. The blond then reappeared where the sai exploded. The ninja attempted to recover with a roll, but Doom's hand extended as the blond was caught. As the blond struggled to break free the spear-wielding man grabbed his face and looked at the ninja. The ninja then realized he was beginning to petrify, which Doom noticed as he dropped his hand, which dropped the blond ninja. The black-haired man walks up to Doom and gives him a smug look.
"Doom did not need your help Cao Cao. Doom was about to kill him."
As Cao Cao walked up to the yellow-haired man, who just finished turning into stone, he proceeds to smash the stone statue until the rubble was left on the ground.
"It didn't look like it Doom. I believe the rest need a hand with the other reincarnated beings," Cao Cao commented as both he and Doom flew away. Peter looked on in sadness as he read the lips of the petrifying man, who whispered 'Naruto, I'm sorry' as he finished turning into stone before he was smashed. Peter tried to figure out what was going on, as he attempted to stop both Doom and Cao Cao, but all he could do was watch. It infuriated Peter as he tried numerous times to help these strangers, but to no avail. Like a TV show, where the scene would shift to another person Peter looked on helplessly as it shows the pink-haired girl attempt to resuscitate Naruto, with little success. Peter looks on as it looks like she has her hand in his chest, which if Peter had to guess was to try and manually pump his heart. As the tears flow down her face she begins to pound the ground with her other free hand.
"Naruto damn it don't give up on me. You always talk about never giving up, well now is the time to get up," the girl cries as the fist she is striking the ground with begins to cause craters. After a couple minutes of trying a silver-haired man with an eye patch appears outside the dome. He looks on in sorrow as Peter realizes the look on his face; the look of loss, especially of someone important. As the man with gravity-defying hair starts to move his hands to form different hand-signs, the dome disintegrates. The man goes over to medic and pulls her into a hug as the girl begins to cry.
"Sensei, he's gone," she bellows through her tears as the one-eyed man starts to hug her as she asks, "What are we going to do?"
As Peter looks on in sadness he begins to move towards the black-haired man with the mismatched eyes as a gigantic stone statue appears behind him. He stares in the distance as the fighting continues as he then shifts his head and appears to stare right at Peter.
"It is time," the man whispers as he yells, "Infinite Tsyuokumi!"
In the next moment Peter's world turns dark and then Peter shoots out off his pillow.
"Gah," Peter gasps in surprise as he looks around the room… his room. He sees the picture of him with his Aunt May and Uncle Ben on the dresser, which sits next to the picture of him and MJ wrapped up in a hug. He looks next to him and watches as MJ's chest slowly rises and falls. Peter breathes a sigh of relief as he slowly descends to his sweat-covered pillow.
"Man what the hell was that," he whispers to himself as he doesn't want to disturb his partner's sleep. He looks over at MJ as she didn't seem affected by the sudden jolt he did when he woke up. The images of what he dreamt made him think about all the trials he has been through in his life as Spider-Man, and how much Mary Jane had suffered because of him. 'I don't deserve someone like her,' the brunette thought as he ran his calloused hand through his wet, matted hair. 'The late nights, the occasional close calls, the loss of our child and even Norman Osborn. She has been through it all and she still wants to be with me. What did I do to deserve her love,' Peter finished thinking as he slowly descended towards his girlfriend and kissed her forehead, causing her to shift some, but didn't wake her up. He looks at the clock, which reads 4:30 as he closes his eyes again.
"Man I need to lay off those chili dogs' after 9," Peter mutters as he attempts to fall back asleep, which eludes him as the image of the man with those creepy eyes haunt his dreams. The image of the pink-haired girl's sorrow over the death of the blond also left him unsettled.
He woke up to the sound of the alarm blaring. Not reaching restful sleep again, he slowly got up to start his day he goes into his morning ritual as he showers, eats breakfast and shows his affection to his lover. As he kissed her and told her he loved her and walked out the door trying to make sense of what the dream had showed him. 'I have to put it on the backburner, I have to get through this day first,' Peter thought as he shut the door and went on his way.
Unfortunately, this will be the last day of living for Peter Parker aka The Amazing Spider-Man.