JMJ

ELEVEN

It was the very place to which he had taken his childhood self before returning him to his appropriate time. The windows and the boards were far more intact, Doctor Octopus saw, which could mean that there had been a fight here in between now and when he will have arrived here with the boy. Perhaps a fight with his future self was eminent, but if all went well there would be no physical conflict.

After having explained how the time machine worked to his younger self and that he did not want to appear somewhere other than the old building, he had sent 2008 Otto into a taxi to wait for him there. He had told him quite seriously, "If we're not where I want to be when I reach you in the pod, I will be most irritated." He had arrived later with his time machine after locking it onto himself from this time period so that he would have the pod with him when future Octopus arrived. If he needed an emergency exit he would have it.

Everything set so far.

"What are we going to do exactly?" asked Otto hesitantly.

"You're going to stay on the opposite side of the building," said Doctor Octopus coolly, and he pointed with a claw across from where he and the time pod were situated. "When my future self arrives I want only this moment's Otto known at first."

Rubbing his arms as though from cold (although it was as warm as a morning in August for late September), Otto said, "But what will you do? Surely if he's our—Uh! I mean, my future self he'll know of this?"

"He doesn't remember everything," retorted Doctor Octopus in the same careless tone.

He had a strong feeling however that if he did not succeed in this that he would end up with his memory being wiped by his future self; thus the explanation for why his future self could never truly predict what winter 2009 Octavius would do.

"But I'll make it quick," Doctor Octopus added.

Here from an inside pocket in his coat, Doctor Octopus revealed a tranquilizer dart. He had not forgotten that he had to be careful with the delicate health of his future, but his past was more important at present. Before coming to this location he had gone back in time to a place where he could obtain a mild enough sedative to hopefully reduce the risk of harming his future self. He had developed it himself, in fact, and the dart which held it. A day's work and he had had everything he needed ready; a day's more had been taken for needed rest before returning to this time for the action. He felt completely at his best now: calm and confident. He just needed his future self to be unable to fight back long enough to erase his mind back a day or so and then decide what best to do with him in his time period.

Doctor Octopus turned to the unhappy Otto near at hand. "Get to your station. He'll be here any moment."

"But—"

"I won't repeat myself."

Otto nodded, but not without a queer sort of glower before slipping directly across from the time pod and Doctor Octopus.

None too soon either.

Hardly had Otto turned around to face the pod when a second time pod began to appear like a mini ghost ship out of the fog.

A shroud of fear was cast over Otto. One could almost see the shadow cloud his face. As he watched helplessly the emerging of the pod, he pressed himself against the wall behind him as a cornered mouse before an impending cat; and if a cat, it would have to be called a dragon of cats.

Doctor Octopus' eyes narrowed; and with a concentrating pout he lifted the dart in his claw and awaited his future self.

The hatch opened.

Otto let out a cry and nearly fainted to see what the future had in store for him with more option than one. Either he would become that cyborg zombie before him or die at his mercy (or lack of it). Doctor Octopus paid no heed to the poor little man dropping his knees turned to fins out of water beneath his body.

The only thing that Doctor Octopus was not prepared for was the fact that the future Octopus did not seem to care or possibly even know that he was anywhere unusual for Otto to be. He had to move faster than he had anticipated when a future tentacle swept towards Otto in order to throw him as he had the first time. In the panic of that split second of miscalculation Doctor Octopus nearly dropped the dart and certainly gave away his position with his sudden gasp. It was only fortunate that he was able to catch Otto from flying into the balcony with a pair of his own arms.

Otto let out a cry on impact, but he was safe. Doctor Octopus had been easily able to keep his younger self steady.

Then the future Octopus swung towards his past self. He saw quickly the other time machine and the dart too still in one of Doctor Octopus' claws. His raging turned into a sneer.

"You think it will be that easy?" demanded the future Octopus, and throwing out one of his arms he snatched the dart away as easily as snatching from a sleeping child. His arm was faster, stronger, and all around better than his past self's arms. Tossing it aside his sneer only grew.

But Doctor Octopus was not done yet. With a growl, he threw Otto into his time pod, and backed up towards it as quickly as he could.

At this point that the future Octopus also moved for his pod. Jumping in first he turned it on again. He did not close the hatch before throwing a great future arm against the other time pod and smashing it on the top.

Just pulling himself to his feet Otto almost received a spark from the ceiling of the pod and stumbled. He steadied himself only to lose his balance to the leaping of Doctor Octopus into the pod. The middle Octavius shoved Otto aside, and threw an arm to the other time pod with two arms to smash the top of that one in retaliation just before it disappeared. Locking onto his future self's time pod then he had to hope that this would work a second time or that it would work at all with how it sparked and sizzled from the ceiling.

Just as he shut the hatch he snatched the dart with a claw and snapped it inside. Time and space then took hold of the pair of Octavius, and they awoke together in silence.

Doctor Octopus, who by this time was used to the experience, only stood very grim and thoroughly annoyed by the whole situation. He turned roughly to his past self shivering with his knees on the floor of the pod and looking around as he tried to gather up his wits. At least, as well as a witless coward could. After a moment or so he looked up at his future self as he adjusted his glasses and rubbed his shoulder.

"So I have the TARDIS now?" growled Otto sarcastically, but he still sounded tremendously shaken.

The brows of Doctor Octopus lowered.

With a shake of his head Otto climbed to his feet but still stood rather crumpled into himself. "Sorry. I—I'm just nervous."

Doctor Octopus closed his eyes scornfully a moment. "No," he said. "You're nervous every time you have to crawl out of bed every morning. You're not nervous; you're a nervous wreck near death."

"Well, I don't understand how you aren't! How long has this been going on that you can deal with this so composedly?" demanded Otto. "You cannot be that much older than I am and yet—"

"I believe I've already explained had you been listening instead of whimpering like some lost puppy," retorted Doctor Octopus, and he quickly opened the hatch for he had only set the pod for a few moments before his future self's pod.

When he emerged he found that they had appeared on top of a grassy hill and there was no sign of another Otto Octavius aside from the one still in the time pod behind him.

"It's broken," said Otto, and he paused.

"They're both broken now," said Doctor Octopus. "But we aren't too off track. This is still a place of Otto Octavius' time line."

"I know," Otto retorted. "Of course, I know. This is the hill overlooking the high school, but he could be anywhere trying to kill me. How come neither of us has been affected already?"

"Well, it stands to reason that I succeed," hissed Doctor Octopus, and he lifted himself upon his arms further along the hill to the view of the high school through the trees.

The sun was setting, and school was over. They would have to catch sight of high school Octavius before the future Octavius did.

Putting a claw to his chin Doctor Octopus mused. If they stood in Wednesday or Friday Otto would be at science club. If not he would already be home. Lifting himself back to the pod over the top of Otto's head he checked the date. Thursday. May 1992. The end of freshman year. He could be at his intern job, but finals would be pressing. Otto would be at home studying.

"It's so strange to think that I …" Otto's voice trailed off.

Turning sharply towards Otto, Doctor Octopus watched him stare distantly out over the hill upon the building poking up out of the young spring leaves. He was probably reminiscing in a way, but not about happy memories. Otto had ever been one to hang onto unhappy memories far easier than positive ones.

The only one who had truly appreciated him was his science teacher. Oh, he was no pariah, really. He had one or two people that hung around him who one might consider his friends. One in particular, Tim McKean, had been his friend since elementary school. But after he had betrayed Cal by not telling who had stolen and trashed her bike for weeks out of fear for the ape who had done it, he had lost most credibility as a person more than the ape himself. After all, she had been supposed to be his girlfriend. Cal had learned the hard way not to make a serious relationship with someone just because you feel pity for him, for even after that she tried to give Otto one more shot. He failed that too by freezing up instead of going for help when a guy from out of town tried to harass her.

Back to the Future much, Otto, Doctor Octopus thought sarcastically as he leered upon the Otto before him. "Dr. Octavius," he then murmured.

As Otto turned, Doctor Octopus snatched him off the ground and ignored his protests. If this fellow anachronism had to be with him now, he was not going to let him out of his sight. Thus climbing around the back of the hill they arrived easily at the place where Otto Octavius still lived in the early nineties.

A miserable little house with white peeling paint, a sunken-in porch with a bench swing that had been patched into the ceiling about a dozen times, and a yard full of weeds uncared for by his scatter-brained mother. It was a few months before she had met Sam Hoffman her future second husband after Arthur Octavius had died in 1979. Mandy was in college now in Albany before she would be leaving for England. Thus mother and son lived alone in the house at this time. Mrs. Octavius would be at work still and Otto Octavius would be studying.

And yes, there he was in the window with nose in a book, which did not hide his acne. His shaggy dark hair fell into his eyes, and his white shirt was rolled up to the elbows as he enjoyed the pleasantness of the evening. Of course Doctor Octopus was still too far away to see these details, but he knew them nonetheless. He stood within that creaky-floored, drafty little bedroom through his mind's eye. Memories streamed along a heavy current. Scientific honors. Social failures. People he should have trusted and people he should not have.

It had been his science teacher who had introduced him to Tricorp from the beginning, and it was through them that the majority of his scholarship was had. Mother had been proud beyond reason. Otto had floated away on his teacher's and mother's balloons, and where did that all end up? A low paying job where nothing was his own, and even Oscorp looked better after a while. He had had no problem allowing himself to be stolen away by Mr. Osborn if only to snub Twaki in that melancholic manner that no one feels the burn of save the one doing the snubbing. Although the real reason was because Oscorp agreed to fund all his experiments including his arms for which Tricorp found little use for. They had not agreed to his "sun in a garage" project as Twaki called it.

But that was more than digressing. He could not allow himself to get sidetracked now. His future self certainly would not. He would leave the pining to pre-Octopus Octavius suspended in his mechanical arm.

"Are you sure you should be out here with everyone able to see?" said Otto.

Doctor Octopus had better things to worry about and did not bother answering. For instance there was that time pod that just emerging in that elementary schoolyard a block behind.

Now grade school was something he certainly did not need to be reminded about.

Without warning to Otto, Doctor Octopus swiveled around leaving a studying high school student to look up suddenly at a sound upon the otherwise quiet street. For a moment he thought he saw something like a metal snake in one of the trees, but upon standing up and leaning out the window he saw nothing but a branch moving a little as though a squirrel had just leapt from one branch to another. After a further thoughtful pause and a quizzical brow, the student of rational thought returned to his book as though nothing had happened.

Unaware of this occurrence Doctor Octopus dove into the yard behind the chain link fence, and the pod had emerged rather TARDIS-like this time as though breathing heavily in and out of time until it reached its solid position near a foursquare tattooed into the blacktop. Doctor Octopus dropped Otto onto the ground and rammed against the pod with his arms to hold them shut.

"If you break out, you will destroy the pod!" he growled to the pilot inside. "Or kill me, and then you won't be able to continue, will you? You can't afford to kill me! I'm right in the midst of it!"

The future Octopus did not answer. In fact, after an angry bang from the other side of the hatch, hardly had Doctor Octopus finished his words when the time pod began to vanish with a grinding sound.

"What do you mean by that?" asked Otto.

Doctor Octopus simply plucked Otto off the ground again and made his way back to their time pod.

Why can't he afford to kill me in your time? What is he trying to accomplish?" demanded Otto once set down in the pod.

Without a word Doctor Octopus locked onto his future self's pod, and again Doctor Octopus went through time and space. This time when they awoke from their eternal slumber, Otto seemed to have come to far quicker than the first time. It probably had something to do with the alarm going off.

Doctor Octopus opened the hatch with his sedative in claw.

He should have waited for his future self to come out of the pod last time. He should not have wasted the opportunity. Now again, he did not know what to expect.

They were at Oscorp. For a split second Doctor Octopus thought he was back in the September day before the creation of Sandman, but it did not take him more than two seconds longer to know where they had gone. He heard the scream of his past self. That scream he had felt and could feel now. He shoved September Otto back into the pod and saw his future self. In a split second movement his lightning-fast tentacle grabbed the sedative dart a second time and jabbed it into Doctor Octopus' neck.

Doctor Octopus growled.

Future Octopus' pod was working better than his was. He had timed this perfectly. He would kill Otto Octavius the moment before he became Doctor Octopus and destroy the other three anachronisms with him. Granted the only one that needed to die in order to black out all the others would be September 2008 Otto still in the time pod and somewhat protected from the effects.

He jumped back into the pod himself now for he was already crying out from the radioactive pain; though it was also from his rage. His future self banged the pod, but September Otto was making himself useful despite his near November's agony just outside. The time pod was already disappearing and amidst the scream of his past self and the impending explosion, he heard also the rage of his future self.

Would that mark the end of his future? It could not end that way. Besides. What damage would two Dr. Octavius' found in that room cause?

The sedative was quick. Already Doctor Octopus was losing consciousness as he collapsed on the pod floor. Or maybe he was being knocked out a second time from the beautiful exploding sun he had created and which had blown up in his face. The work of Spiderman, he had known from the beginning. Destroying his work and attempting to kill him. He had not succeeded!

He had not succeeded!

No one would succeed in destroying Doctor Octopus! Not even Doctor Octopus himself!

They disappeared into blackness, out of everything even beyond the sight of blackness. It was out of sense itself…

#

"I … will not be weak …" croaked the voice of Doctor Octopus a whirl of dreams sweeping away like a twister and leaving his mind in ravaged confusion as to where his thoughts had previously been. It left him in a void of nothingness, save for faint images of a weak and miserable past.

Breathing heavily he found that he was not nearly as in pain as he thought he would be. Lifting himself to his knees he opened his heavy eyes and saw that Otto was seated on the floor beside him, staring in a hollow sort of manner at the arms upon his back. He had previously been staring at the puffy burnt skin around the inhibiter chip seared into his body, and although Doctor Octopus did not know this nor care, he found that his coat had slipped from his shoulders a little. He pulled it back up around him and propped up the collar around the back of his neck with the use of his claws.

"What happened?" he demanded still feeling a little woozy.

"You've been out a long time," said Otto in an empty sort of way.

"How long?" demanded Doctor Octopus again. "Where are we?"

"I followed him."

Doctor Octopus made a face. "Followed him? He should be dead!"

Slowly Otto shook his head. "No. He escaped. But I did as you've done. I followed him and went back five hours. It's New York City; though, I don't know where. I have looked outside, but I haven't seen him. Maybe we've missed him altogether. It's been over five hours now."

"Has it?" groaned Doctor Octopus rubbing his aching skull as he stared at the now empty dart on the floor and then felt at the hole in his coat and suit at his upper arm. Angrily he stepped on the glass of the dart and crushed it.

Then opening the hatch himself, he stepped out onto a windy roof. He kicked the glass out with his as he did. Otto followed not far behind, and Doctor Octopus paid him no heed. A nip filled the wet cold air. As he was still waking from the sedative he felt the shiver run through his stiff limbs and he held his arms of flesh against his chest and rubbed his elbows as his mechanical arms took him to the edge of the building. The glare of a bear woken in mid hibernation clouded his face, and he could not tell if the ghostly city lights below them in the shadows of fog were of the true state of the morning or the cobwebs of his own head not quite cleared up yet.

And speaking of telarian tricks … Doctor Octopus thought as he caught sight of a patch of red flashing by on a roof not far from their perch.

"It's Spiderman!" gasped Otto ducking behind his older self.

At least he was not calling out to help him like his childhood self.

Doctor Octopus had no time to react to the nebbish behavior of the Otto behind him either way however, for not far behind the appearance of Spiderman was the sudden appearance of sometime's Doctor Octopus self yelling out at Spiderman. Spiderman called back with his usual quips and glib performance as though he stood on stage for an adolescent audience to laugh at his adversary and cheer their hero on. At first Doctor Octopus found himself watching their fight across rooftops and in and around buildings like a pair of fighting insects, but as he slowly recalled his younger self beside him, he turned his head ever so slightly to get enough of the effect of Otto's guppy gaping mouth.

Turning back to the fight; though no longer watching it, he reached out a mechanical arm and positioning it beneath the lower jaw hanging as on a hinge, he closed the mouth for Otto. Otto jumped and swiveled towards the source of the arm, and frowned.

Doctor Octopus was already returning to the pod, and he pulled Otto with him by the chin a few paces.

"Where are you going?" squeaked Otto when Doctor Octopus released him, and he bounded after him like a hobbit in the mountains he had never known.

Without looking back, Doctor Octopus replied, "There's no reason for my future self to remain here. It's possible he's already left. We have to be ready for the next move before any damage he's made takes effect to us."

"I think I may almost be feeling it already," said Otto shivering and clenching his fists.

Doctor Octopus swung his head to Otto with raptor penetration.

Otto did look ill. It might not have been anything but him reacting emotionally to all this insanity, but he was beginning to feel something himself in a strange empty sort of way more unexplainable than time traveling.

Roughly he shoved Otto into the pod, and although Otto was prying himself to his feet he seemed to look slightly shadowy as though being swallowed up in a delirium.