Toxin: The Devil Within
Purple and Yellow Aren't Great Colours
The Rhino sighed. Life was not always great for a man standing at six foot nine inches and weighing close to a quarter of a metric tonne, especially when he geared up in his full body Rhino protective hide and seconds away from raiding a very lavish jewellery shop. Rhino had been a part of the super villain game since the beginning, fighting such titans as Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk and loud-mouth mercenary Deadpool. With super strength, super speed and being practically invulnerable, the Rhino was always quite a hard villain to beat physically, but not mentally. He knew this, but it is not what annoyed him the most; what did annoy him the most were the situations like the one he was currently in: when a cocky yet idiotic amateur superhero gets in the way of a big heist with his own brand of 'superhuman justice'. Enter, Zapper.
"Stop villain!" The physically unimpressive man stepped out in front of the grey mass, holding up a single hand in defiance.
"Kid, what are ya doin'?" asked the Rhino desperately.
The bizarre attempt at heroics looked positively creative in front of the giant grey hide of the professional villain. The horn atop the animalistic head was deadly when used effectively whilst Zapper stood with a heart of gold; in his tightly worn, dark purple shirt and trousers, with yellow boots and a yellow mask covering the top of his face, from which emerged two large spikes of the same colour. As well as a yellow lightning bolt insignia on his chest, he had one big piece of material – cut into a triangle – sewn onto his costume reaching from his wrists to his elbows and from his ankles to his knees. He left his hands and mouth exposed.
"I'm Zapper and I am here to stop you from your life of crime and to put an end to your reign of terror!"
Rhino sighed once more and continued walking forward. However Zapper jumped back and fired a bolt of energy from a contraption mounted on his arm. The bolt hit the Rhino square in the chest but it did not heed his progress at all; in fact, he barely even felt the blast.
"Look Kid," the Rhino advised compassionately, "First of all, Zapper is a stupid name unless of course you manage to make it big; second, purple and yellow are not great colours; and third, ya in way over ya head, I'm the Rhino – I'm one of the big guns, few people are stronger than me, okay? So unless ya got nothing short of the Hulk with ya, ya petty lightning blasts ain't gonna stop me."
"They're not lightning blasts! They're highly conden-"
"Don't even bother trying to explain! I won't understand and by tomorrow I woulda forgot. Now outta the way."
"Taste this Rhino!" Zapper yelled as he put both of his wrists together and fired a double shot.
Rhino sighed unmoving.
"Have you met my friend, The Shocker? He would be really pissed if he could see ya now."
Zapper stopped to think to himself, 'If my blasts cannot defeat him then I must use my advanced fighting skills!' He suddenly darted at the Rhino.
'Please God no,' thought the super villain but before he could warn the headstrong amateur, the latter jumped into a flying side kick. The Rhino grabbed a hold of Zapper's foot and dangled him upside down.
The crowded shopping centre they both stood on was two stories tall. The shops were presented in an L-shape with the layered car park completing the square. Only metres from the jewellery shop, the pair stood on a walkway between the car park and the shop. Large areas of the walkways had been left open to the ground level in order for the future construction of more stair wells connecting the two platforms to deal with the bustling day-to-day crowds. For now they were surrounded by railings.
The Rhino noticed this, thought for a second and chucked the amateur towards the nearest construction site – much the astonishment of the gasping on-looking shoppers. Zapper closed his eyes as he flew through the air. He heard a slight hiss and felt the resistance of landing on a sticky, but bouncy, surface. Dazed he opened his eyes to find himself laid on a huge, white spider web which stretched across the entire gap.
Stuck to the wall of glass that was the face of the sports shop next door, was the web-slinging wonder himself, Spider-Man starring down at this curious scene in broad daylight. The Rhino sighed his biggest and last sigh; he looked up as the hero addressed him.
"Hey Rhino, is that a horn on your head or are you just happy to see me?" mocked the hero.
"Give it a rest, Webhead. I've had enough for today."
"Aww, Rhiny no want to play with me?"
Rhino shook his head in dismay and turned around to walk away. Spider-Man looked glumly at him.
"Come back here Rhino, we got some talking to do!"
Without looking around, Rhino replied, "Leave it Spider, I'm losing the will to live!"
Spidey paused for a second. "Hey Rhino."
The villain stopped. "What?"
"If you stood still for ten minutes, would you get parking tickets?"
As the villain began to stroll away once more, the hero leapt from his vertical vantage point. He fired a shot of impact webbing, hitting the Rhino's aloft foot before it hit the ground once more and became firmly stuck. Following that he shot a web line to a lamp post and swung towards the animalistic villain who had stopped in vain. As he sped towards the criminal, ready to land on his back and improvise from there, his spider-sense rang through his mind. The professional realised his amateur mistake as he was inches from the hide. Faster than the human eye, the Rhino swung around his great hand and with a backhand slap, he caught Spider-Man hard in the ribs, sending the hero flying back in recoil. Much faster than he had come towards the enemy. Yelling in distress, Spider-Man flew straight through an opening where a stairway had been started and landed heavily on the cold tarmac of the dark ground-floor car park.
As he lay, eyes closed in pain; he could hear the deep thud of the heavy footsteps running away, freed from his momentary trap. Forcing himself to sit up, Spider-Man lifted up his mask, spat out his mouthful of blood, cursed and opened his eyes. Trying to consolidate his thoughts, he sat for a brief moment in complete silence. Before the silence was broken by a friendly but unwanted voice, he really was not in the mood for this.
"Hey Spider!" The hero pulled his mask back over his chin and looked across to see sitting on a structural pillar; suspended two metres from the ground; sticking with his back and feet to the side; a cup of coffee in one hand and a friendly wave in the other; former police officer and now symbiotic superhero, Patrick Mulligan.
"Looking good," muttered Mulligan sarcastically, taking a sip from his cup.
"What are you doing here Pat?"
"Just grabbing a cup of coffee; thought I'd come say hi."
"Did you see what happened?" asked the elder embarrassed.
"Not really, I was just coming out of the shop over there when I saw you land; not one of your best moments," Pat said innocently. "I took down Detonator by the way; old Dexter isn't going anywhere anytime soon."
Rolling back onto his shoulders and hands, Spidey flipped forwards, springing to his feet.
"Good work there Pat, you're building up quite a rogue's gallery now aren't you?"
Yeah, but this time Toxin did it all by himself."
"Is he listening right now?"
"Nah, he's asleep – I told him I was sorting out the accounts for our apartment. It gives me a chance to breathe by myself."
"Missing the good old days by yourself?"
"Not as much as I used to, but I am starting to get some new problems, which I would kind of like to talk to you about. Do you have a minute?"
"Shoot."
Pat flipped down to the ground and the pair walked over to a nearby bench.
"As I was taking down Detonator, I met this woman… This woman who showed an obvious interest in me but I was Toxin then. But I also have my wife who bore my first child. Now I know I should be jumping with joy here Spidey but," Pat said solemnly, "If other women can love the symbiote and who I am – now; then does the other who hates the symbiote and loves the man who I used to be, really love me after all? I just don't know which direction to travel in at the moment, do I continue with the woman who can never truly accept me or move on to the women who can handle this power? What do I do?"
Spider-Man sat in silence, first remembering his tragic love Gwen Stacey then Mary Jane before eventually his dear Aunt May. However, he knew that now was not the time for an emotional flash-back, becoming the emotionless mask once more, Spider-man joked:
"You should be so lucky."
This made Pat chuckle as Spidey relaxed back into the chair, folded his legs and began his life lesson for the younger superhero.
"Well. Over the years, I've met girls who love the man but hate the Spider; love the Spider but hate the man; hate the Spider – hate the man... you get the picture. But I haven't given up hope."
"Why not?"
"Because she's out there somewhere, the girl that will love both the spider and the man and then I will get the family I've always dreamt of. I'll find her one day."
"I hope it's sometime soon," Pat said sincerely as he thought of his own baby son, Edward.
"But that which does not kill us only makes us stronger," Spider-Man remarked in a more upbeat tone.
At that point, a young lady in a white cloak, carrying two bags of heavy shopping in each hand, stopped to observe the curious scene. In response Spidey lifted a thumbs-up and replied:
"Lunch break."
With that the young woman let a small smile creep across her beautiful face and continued with her expensive hobby.
"Back to your problem here. All of us go through changes in our lives, difficult changes that serve no other purpose than to challenge us and make us stronger. This is how we become better people. Whether these challenges come in the form of being accidentally bitten by a radioactive spider or by accidentally turning yourself into a lizard through an experiment to re-grow a lost limb (don't ask) is completely irrelevant when compared to the place where we end up. If someone cannot love you for all the challenges you have faced and changes you have gone through, that's neither their fault nor your own. Maybe it is a challenge for her to adjust or more likely a challenge for both of you to move on and follow separate paths. But all I know is, if someone loves you for the shadow of what you were and not for the shining beacon of what you are today, then they don't love you one single bit."
The hero patted the promising leaner on the shoulder as he got to his feet and was thanked by the student.
"Well, I'm going after Rhino so I guess I'll see you around later." Spidey shot a web line.
"Wait!" Pat cried. "Do you have any more assignments for us?"
Spidey thought for a second, dangling upside down from his web line. "Nope. So enjoy this spare time whilst you have it. Adios amigos!"
With that, he swung away.
Pat got to his feet and thought about this for a second, hand on hips. He suddenly became aware of someone loudly struggling behind him. He turned around and looked up to see a bizarrely clothed man stuck in a giant spider web. After desperately trying to release himself from the sticky web, he eventually managed to break free and stand up on the web. Unfortunately he then lost his footing and fell through a gap in the web, landing heavily on the ground. Pat waited for the reassuring pain exclamations that let him know that the oddly dressed man was at least still in one piece. Pat turned to leave the shopping centre pondering the amateur's questionable fashion sense.
