Translations are at the bottom, all translations come from Google Translate, so I have no control over what the internet spews out. If it's wrong, let me know and I'll change it.

I don't own Spider-Man or any Marvel characters that might appear in these stories... (Meaning there might be crossovers)

"Okay, Mr. Parker," the bank associate, Jonathan, said with a smile as he slid Peter a small, plastic card across the desk. "Your checking account is officially open. This is a temporary debit card; your permanent one will come in the mail in a few weeks."

"Thanks," Peter said with a smile as he accepted the piece of plastic.

"Look at you," May said proudly as she ruffled Peter's hair, then shook hands with Jonathan as he stood up from behind his desk. "You're becoming such a man. I bet the girls are all over you," she added with a wink.

"What girls?" Peter asked jokingly, rolling his eyes. May lightly smacked her nephew's shoulder, but before she could respond with anything else, the floor shook, and there was a loud crash from the front of the bank; everyone inside began screaming and crying, but over the din, a loud, authoritative voice could be heard yelling out instructions, telling everyone to get on the ground.

"What the-?" Jonathan asked quietly in confusion. He snuck over to the edge of his cubicle and peered around the corner, trying to see what the ruckus was. "What on earth is that?!" he asked incredulously. His curiosity piqued, Peter followed Jonathan's lead, sticking his head around the corner as well, despite May's attempts to keep him back by her. When he saw what was causing the commotion, Peter's eyes widened.

"Are you seeing this?" Jonathan asked quietly as the two of them watched what was happening out front.

"Seeing...still working on believing," Peter replied in hushed tones.

A large, mechanical rhino was standing at the front of the bank, pointing a gun at the tellers behind the counter. Seeing all the people in danger made Peter itch, wanting to grab his backpack from where he'd left it on the chair and slip into his Spider-Man suit. He knew that there were too many people around though; there was too much risk of exposure.

"I said put money in bag!" the mechanical rhino yelled at the teller, making her quake and cower as the gun was shoved more forcefully into her face. Peter realized there was someone inside the rhino suit, and whoever it was had what sounded like a Russian accent. "Do not make me tell you again," the Rhino threatened. Finally, the bag was filled and handed over. The mechanical beast snatched the bag away from the teller, then motioned to the safe door behind the counter. "Open that," he ordered. As Peter watched the proceedings, he wondered what on earth the Russian had done to end up with such an...interesting piece of equipment.

The teller was shaking like a leaf as she explained that she couldn't open the safe, that it was on a time lock. The Rhino growled and began pacing, and Peter backed up, trying to think. He was torn between risking being seen as Spider-Man, or saving everyone in the bank, but before he could come up with a decision, he noticed something out of the corner of his eye. He hadn't realized that Jonathan hadn't backed up with him, and the man had pulled out his cell phone, probably trying to dial 911. The Rhino seemed to catch the movement as well, because he whirled around and stared straight at Jonathan.

"Get out here!" he bellowed, marching over to the cubicle. The floor shook as the man made his way over, and Peter looked around, finally locking eyes with May.

"Go," she mouthed, glancing pointedly at the young man's backpack, which was still slung over the back of the chair. Peter still felt torn; he knew he needed to stop the Rhino before someone got hurt, but he didn't want to leave May's side. It only took a second though, for her insistent stare to change Peter's mind, and he finally nodded. While Jonathan's back was still turned, Peter rolled over to the chair he'd been sitting in mere moments before and grabbed his backpack. He was about to dive behind the desk, but before he could, the entire cubicle was lifted off the ground, revealing the Rhino standing there. Since the machine had had its back facing them almost the entire time it had been inside, Peter hadn't realized that the armor had a clear faceplate, so everyone could see exactly who was inside.

The man's face was almost square-shaped, and his beady black eyes were about as rectangle-shaped as eyes could get. The eyes were hidden under bushy eyebrows, and his large forehead was covered by a mop of sandy blond hair.

"Thought you could hide, did you?" the Rhino sneered at the three of them, grabbing May by the arm and hauling her into the air, her feet kicking as she was lifted up.

"No!" Peter yelled, abandoning his backpack as he lunged forward, trying to grab his aunt to pull her back to relative safety.

"Peter, wait!" May yelled, but her cry of warning came too late. The Rhino growled and swatted Peter away like the kid weighed nothing, sending the teenager crashing into and tumbling over the desk before falling to the ground. Dazed, Peter started to get up again, but a mechanical hand suddenly appeared and grasped his bicep, lifting him up into the air until he was eye-level with the mechanical beast.

The man inside the suit gave Peter a cold smile, and when he did, he revealed startlingly white teeth; one of the only thoughts going through Peter's head, besides trying to figure out how to get him and May out of this mess, was that the rest of the man's physical appearance didn't support his pearly whites at all.

"You trying to be hero?" the Rhino asked condescendingly. As his arm started throbbing from the amount of pressure the Rhino was grasping his arm with, Peter tried prying the fingers away from his bicep; it was impossible to do that without revealing how strong he actually was though, so after a few moments of trying, he resigned himself to dangling rather uncomfortably while the Russian bank robber laughed. Peter looked over at his aunt, who was still clutched in the man's other mechanical fist, and he gave her an apologetic look. She shook her head at him, letting him know that she wasn't upset at him for not being able to get his suit on.

"You," the Rhino snapped, motioning with the hand holding Peter at the same teller that he threatened before. "How long till time lock is disabled?"

"I-I-I don't know," she stammered. "But ev-even if you were to bypass the time-lock, th-there are still codes that you n-need to get in, and none of us kn-know the codes," she explained, trying to keep a steady composure. The Rhino growled, and looked like he was going to insist that she do something, but sirens began wailing outside. Everyone looked out the window, and they saw that the whole building was surrounded by cop cars; each cop that was outside had their guns out and aimed at the building.

"Fine," Rhino spat. "What I have will do."

He looked between May and Peter for a moment before dropping May to the ground, reaching with his now-free hand and grabbing the bag full of money from the tills that he'd taken earlier. Peter continued to struggle in the mechanical grasp, but it wasn't doing him any good. The high schooler could hear his aunt's frantic cries as she yelled his name, and Peter renewed his struggles to get free, putting a bit more force behind his grip as he tried prying the fingers open. The Rhino laughed as he felt the attempts to loosen his hold on the teen, and he simply tightened his grip. "You are not going anywhere," he assured Peter with a cruel smile. "You are my ticket out of here."

With that, the Rhino turned and burst through the glass doors of the bank, startling the cops outside. Peter felt the shards of glass cut through his clothing and slice his skin, and almost immediately he felt several cuts along his cheeks begin to slowly bleed.

"Hold your fire!" all the cops began yelling as they saw the Rhino carrying a passenger. "Hold your fire!"

"Yes," Rhino chuckled as he saw the torn policemen. "You cannot shoot at me me without hurting little rebenok." He began walking down the street, whistling a small diddy in celebration of getting away from the cops without a hitch.

Peter made up his mind that as soon as they got out of view of the cops, he was going to go full-on Spider mode. He knew that even though Rhino had already seen his face and would know the secret identity of Spider-Man, it was probably the only way he was getting out of the Russian's grasp alive.

He ended up not having to fight back, though. Before the robber and his hostage had even gotten out of sight of the cops, Peter felt the hair on the back of his neck raise, and he turned his head just in time to see a large projectile smack the Rhino in the back of his mechanical head. As the Russian stumbled forward, his hand opened up, releasing Peter and allowing the kid to drop to the ground.

The high schooler landed in a crouch, but when he realized people were more than likely watching, he let himself fall on his butt to make it seem more believable. Peter pushed himself to his feet, massaging his arm as it pulsed and throbbed painfully. He looked at Rhino and wasn't surprised to see the machine taking off down the road, the ground shaking with each step he took.

The high schooler looked around and spotted an alleyway just a block or so down the road, and he thought about running to it and changing into his Spider-Man suit, but he stopped for two reasons. One, he remembered that his suit was in his backpack, which was still in the bank, and two, he suddenly heard May yelling his name. Her tone of voice clearly conveyed that she was panicking, so Peter turned back towards the bank and saw all the hostages running out of the shattered doors; there in the front of the crowd was his aunt, clutching his backpack. She spotted him and immediately ran forward, pushing past others and ducking cops as they tried to contain the situation.

Peter moved forward to meet his aunt halfway, and he let out a surprised "oomf" when she collided with him, wrapping her arms around him so tightly he almost felt like he was back in the grip of the Rhino.

"Are you okay?" she asked as she held him, her hands searching his body as she felt for injuries. He winced as her fingers brushed over the cuts he had from the doors, but he knew those were superficial; they weren't anything that his super-healing wouldn't take care of in a few hours.

"I'm fine, May," Peter assured her. While he was glad to be safe with his aunt, he couldn't shake a sort of dark feeling he had. He knew that the cops would never have taken a shot like that with a civilian in the line of fire, so he began looking for whoever would, or could have made it. Thanks to the trajectory and the angle that the projectile had collided with the Rhino, Peter figured the shot had come from up high, on the rooftops, so that's where he focused his attention. Finally, on the roof of one of the buildings across the street from the bank, he spotted someone in a long dark coat staring down at the scene. Peter squinted, and he was able to make out some sort of white symbol painted on the stranger's black shirt, but before he could figure out what it was, his attention was pulled back to his aunt.

She pulled out of the hug and stared at him. "What was that?" she asked, clearly wondering if it was someone her nephew had run into in the past. Peter shook his head as he stared off where the Rhino had disappeared to.

"I have no idea," he said. "But I'm willing to bet that he's not done yet."

0-0-0

The sun was just beginning to set, and Peter glanced down at his watch. He still had a few hours before he needed to be home, so he paused in his swinging, taking a few minutes to sit on a fire escape, listening to the busy sounds of the city below.

As he was sitting there, thinking about nothing in particular, a loud crash suddenly sounded from somewhere down below, followed by an alarm and several people screaming.

"That's my cue," Peter muttered to himself as he stood up. He webbed a nearby building and began swinging his way over to the source of the commotion. When he reached an alleyway near the ruckus, he dropped from the sky and landed on the ground. Another scream sounded closeby, and Peter looked towards the mouth of the alleyway, which was when he realized that he was right across the street from a jewelry store; his eyes widened slightly when he saw the Rhino standing at the front of the shop, filling a bag full of different pieces of jewelry. Peter was about to move in, but as he made his way towards the street, a shadow suddenly blocked the entrance of the alleyway. Peter walked forward, tapping the stranger on the shoulder, planning to brush past whoever it was.

"'Scuze me," he said. He happened to take a better look at the man, and when he did, he had to do a double take. The long black trench coat, the white symbol splashed on the chest; all of it looked like the man who had saved Peter from the Rhino's clutches earlier.

"You?" Peter asked, not entirely sure what to say. He wasn't positive it was the same guy, but he also couldn't think of many people that would wear a long black trench coat, and the white skull painted on his shirt matched with the white symbol Peter had seen earlier. As he was looking at the man, Peter suddenly had flashbacks to a few months prior, when there had been a massive news story coming from another city in New York, about a vigilante that dressed in a similar fashion and had been dubbed "The Punisher." He was supposed to be dead at the bottom of a river, but apparently the rumors of his death had been greatly exaggerated. "You're...you're the Punisher, right? Frank Castle?" He wasn't sure how to react; from the stories, this man was dangerous, and wasn't afraid to kill people.

"Have we met?" Castle asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Uh, no. I just, uh, remember seeing something about you on the news," Peter stammered. The man looked at him skeptically, but their attention was soon grabbed by the Rhino breaking through the side of the jewelry store, bits of brick and glass flying everywhere. Peter immediately put the Punisher out of his mind as he jumped forward and landed on top of one of the police cars, standing right in front of the mechanical beast.

Rhino pulled up short when he saw the arachnid hero, and his eyes narrowed in annoyance. "Spider-Man!" he growled.

"What? Where?!" Peter asked as he looked all around him, pretending like he was looking around for the hero like some sort of over-excited fangirl. The Rhino grabbed a street lamp and ripped it from the ground, causing the bulb to flicker out instantly as the Russian took a swing at the nimble arachnid. Peter backflipped off the car he was on, dodging the lamp with ease.

"I gotta get him away from the people," Peter thought to himself as he looked at the occupants of the jewelry store, who had all spilled out onto the street to watch the fight. "Hey," the high schooler called out to the Rhino, grabbing the beast's attention. "Yeah I'm talkin' to you. Hey, I got a question. I can't tell...was the suit supposed to make you better, or was it specifically designed to make you worse looking than you already were?" he goaded.

With a literal roar, the Rhino charged forward, using his horn to scoop a couple of cars out of the way. People began screaming as the cars fell towards them, and Peter's eyes widened. He quickly webbed the cars and pulled backwards, jumping into a horizontal twist in order to avoid being crushed by the vehicles hurtling his way. He heard the vehicles crash somewhere behind him, and he let out a sigh of relief as he watched the people begin running away. That sigh soon turned to an "oof" of pain as the Rhino collided with him from the side, tossing the teenager like he was a rag doll. Peter crashed into the windshield of a parked car behind him, and he groaned as he rubbed the back of his neck. He couldn't take much time to recuperate though, as his senses told him he needed to get out of the way quickly.

He rolled off the car right before Rhino's fist descended, pulverizing the windshield where Spider-Man's head had been lying mere seconds before. "Hey!" Peter yelped. "You could seriously hurt someone doing that."

"That is point," seethed the Rhino, charging at the arachnid hero again. To avoid being skewered by the Rhino's horn, Peter backflipped out of the way again, settling himself about halfway up a wall. "Come down and fight like man," bellowed the mechanical beast-man below, clearly frustrated that he was having such a hard time with such a small hero.

"I'm good, I think I'm gonna stay up here for now," Peter replied. "Thanks for the invite, though!"

Even more enraged by the spider's unwillingness to cooperate, the Rhino huffed. "Fine. If Spider won't come down from wall, wall will simply have to come down."

He ran full speed at the wall Spider-Man was clinging to, crashing into it and causing the structure to begin collapsing. Peter wobbled and let out a startled yelp, hopping off the wall at the last second, barely avoiding being crushed by the ton of bricks falling down. While he was mid-air, he felt his spidey senses go off, but he wasn't able to do anything except watch as the Rhino once again swung the street lamp at him again, catching him squarely in the stomach that time.

All the air left Peter's body in one quick "Oompf," and he collided with another wall before falling to the ground facefirst. He groaned softly, but immediately began to push himself to his feet, wincing when he felt his ribs yelling at him in pain. Before he could straighten up completely though, he felt thick, metal fingers grab him by the scruff of his neck, which he honestly didn't think was possible due to the width of the suit's fingers.

As he was once again lifted to an eye-level height with the Rhino, Peter felt like he was back at the bank, though thankfully this time he had his mask on and didn't have to try and hide his super-strength. When he was eye-to-eye with the crazy Russian man inside the suit, he quickly used his webs to block the field of vision on the visor. He heard the man inside mutter some words in Russian that Peter was pretty sure were not very nice.

"You kiss your mother with that mouth?" Peter asked, sounding shocked. While the driver of the machine was distracted, Peter reached up and behind himself, grabbing hold of the metal fingers holding onto his suit and prying them open, letting himself drop to the ground. When his feet touched down, Peter (who was still holding onto the fingers of the Rhino machine) twisted the metal arm up and around, flipping the large machine over until it crashed down to the ground.

Peter knew that wasn't enough to keep the beast down for long, so he immediately fired his taser webs, sending electricity coursing through the metal suit. The voltage wasn't strong enough to kill or even seriously harm the Russian; it was merely enough to incapacitate him long enough for the cops to show up. Spider-Man could hear groaning coming from inside the suit, and when he was sure the Rhino would be down at least long enough to get him out of the suit and into the approaching cop cars, he ceased the tasering.

The high schooler moved forward to open up the Rhino costume, but his spidey senses went off, and he jumped out of the way just before something exploded on the ground next to the Rhino, sending the mechanical beast soaring through the air again. The Russian crashed back to the ground, but the teenager wasn't paying attention to the Rhino at the moment. He was more concerned with what, or who, had fired at the downed man. Peter turned around, his eyes widening as he spotted the Punisher walking forward.

"Who carries a rocket launcher with them?" Peter asked in shock as the man approached.

"Someone who does what's necessary to get rid of dirtbags like this guy," Castle answered as he passed Spider-Man. Peter realized what the man was going to do, and he lunged forward.

"Wait, stop," the high schooler said, grabbing Castle's arm and pulling as he tried to stop the Punisher. "I've got this covered. Everything's under control."

"Yeah?" Castle asked. "And where were you when that kid was attacked and held hostage in a bank by this same lunatic?"

"I was...I was coming," Peter shot back, unsure of how to defend himself in that situation. Castle scoffed and turned back towards the fallen Rhino machine. "No!" Peter yelled, jumping in front of Castle, though his body was begging him to move slowly. "I'm not going to let you kill him," he stated firmly.

Castle sighed in frustration. "Listen. When I'm through with him, he won't be able to hurt anybody anymore. Why can't you guys understand that?" he griped at the young man, moving to brush past the hero. Peter grabbed the arm that tried to push him aside, twisting it in a move that he'd learned during his training with Tony. Castle grunted at the strength of the hero, dropping to one knee as his arm was twisted to the side and then pulled slightly behind his back.

"I'm not going to let you kill him," Peter repeated emphatically. He let go of the man's hand, but before the Punisher could make a move to retaliate, Peter webbed both of Castle's hands to the ground, then stuck his feet together for extra measure. "Someone needs to teach you some manners," he shot at the older man as he walked over to the Rhino costume; sirens were wailing in the distance, getting closer and closer, and Peter let out a sigh of relief. When he reached the metal suit, Peter hopped on the chest and sat in a crouch, staring right into the visor at the square face of the Russian.

"Hey," Peter called out, knocking on the metal rhino head. "You good in there?"

"Ugh," the man inside the suit groaned, opening up the mask and leaning over, emptying his stomach onto the pavement. "I don't feel so good."

Peter leaped away in disgust when the man began retching, though as soon as he was done, the hero hurried back and webbed the Russian's chest, pulling him out of the suit. "If it helps, you look pretty crappy too," he stated. Rhino growled and tried swiping a fist at the spider, but Peter easily ducked the punch. "Now, now," he said with a tsk as he hopped off the Rhino machine and marched the man away from his large and over-the-top machine. "You'll have plenty of time to hone those skills in prison. I hear they offer a great boxing program. Not that I actually think you need any strength training," he added as he observed the man's bulging muscles.

Peter handed the Rhino over to the cops, and they immediately slapped the biggest pair of cuffs they could find on the Russian.

"This is… not over, Spider-Man," the Rhino panted as he was led to a large van that had been brought. "We will meet again...and next time, you won't be so lucky."

"Why does everyone call it luck?" Peter asked in an exasperated voice. "Do people really not think that I have skills?" He rolled his eyes. "And also, really?" he added in disappointment. "Mr. Stark was right; all you bad guys say the most cliche bad-guy lines."

The van's doors were slammed shut, as the cops got into the front seat and began driving away. Spider-Man climbed up the side of a building a short ways, watching the van drive away with Rhino in the back. Even though he couldn't see the large man, Peter could still feel the hate-filled gaze of the Rhino, and it sent a small shiver through the hero. "Have fun wherever they drop you," Peter muttered, giving a little wave as the car turned a corner and vanished out of sight.

When the van finally disappeared, Peter turned back to where he'd stuck the Punisher, only to be met with empty webs. Somehow, the man had managed to cut through his webs and free himself. The teenager held out his hands to his side in a sign of helplessness, and he sighed. While he knew that he would have to at least try and find the Punisher, he had the feeling that if Frank Castle didn't want to be found, Peter didn't have much chance at finding him.

"One day at a time," Peter reminded himself, climbing up the rest of the wall, glancing down and around every now and then to see if he could find the vigilante. "One day at a time."

0-0-0

rebenok=child

Okay, so what are your thoughts? Like it? Love it? Hate it? Should I stop posting it? Print it out and burn it? ;) Seriously though. Please let me know what you think.