The Secret Society of the Sable Spider
Disclaimer: I own no Spider-Man rights. Nor do I own any Fantastic Four rights.
It had all been Ben's fault. Not that Johnny really minded, since it gave him something exciting to do after the rest of the Fantastic Four quit to go live in the countryside, but Sue would be upset if she ever found out, so Johnny felt perfectly justified in saying that it was all Ben's "fault."
After all, even if it was just for a dare, Silver Sable's agency was practically a military for hire, and it may not have been the smartest idea to join up. The only way Johnny had gotten away with it up until now was that the Silver Sable uniform required a full-face helmet, so no one could see that he was actually Johnny Storm, the famous superhero called the Human Torch and well-known friend of Spider-Man.
Still, if he had known that Mayor Osborn was going to call in Silver Sable a few months later to take martial control of New York City, then he never would have done it, even for the dare. But since he was already here, he figured he might as well do what he could to actually help the situation where he could. Besides, it was almost like being a superhero again, but this time with a secret identity. Or maybe it was more like being a spy. He wasn't fully sure, but maybe he could ask Spider-Man someday what it was like to have a secret identity. Of course, his friend would know nothing about being a spy, he supposed, so even that might not give him a workable comparison.
Still, as he patrolled a building top in the Financial District, he could not help but wonder exactly where this was going to go, particularly after Spider-Man decided to join them on the roof. The other Sable agents muttered dismissive comments to hopefully get rid of him, but Johnny just turned and stared. If there was one thing that he never expected Spider-Man to do, it was to completely revamp his look. True, his suit was still mainly red and blue, but this one also had large, white spider motifs and looked anything but homemade.
That was impossible. Spider-Man did not let people get close to knowing his identity. Even the Fantastic Four had only gotten hints of it over the years they had known him, though Johnny personally suspected that Reed had figured it out long ago and was keeping it secret out of respect for Spider-Man. But for Spider-Man to have a professionally-made suit was unthinkable. There was no way someone would be able to make a suit like that and get it to him without being someone Spider-Man was willing to trust, even if the mask never came off.
"Nice suit," he said as Spider-Man walked past. "Is it new?"
"Yeah, I got it after the Fisk takedown," Spider-Man replied, seeming startled that a Sable agent had actually complimented him.
And Spider-Man was not the only one to be surprised. "John!" the agent standing next to him hissed. "We're not supposed to compliment the local vigilantes! You know what Sable told us!"
"I'm not complimenting the vigilante, I'm complementing the suit. What? I'm allowed to appreciate people's fashion choices."
"Ugh," another agent muttered. "Just let the spoiled rich kid gawk at the bright colors. As long as he doesn't mouth off in front of the Boss, we won't get in trouble."
Johnny had to bite his lip at that to keep from responding (not that anyone could tell behind his helmet). He might have been able to hide his identity so far, but apparently he had tells that said he was used to having money. He didn't understand why the other Sable agents treated him badly because of it, after all, it wasn't like he was responsible for his genius brother-in-law having a thousand patents and a strong sense of loyalty to family, even if that family wasn't technically related. And it wasn't just other Sable agents who treated him like being rich automatically made him indolent or unable to take care of himself. Even some of the other heroes had treated him like a kid brother or sidekick in the past, despite all he had done that showed he was a perfectly capable hero in his own right.
One hero who never treated him like that, though, was Spider-Man. Johnny didn't know if it was because they were close in age or because Spider-Man was also belittled by some other heroes or because Spider-Man was just friendly, but the two of them tended to get along fairly well.
So when the other Sable agents started talking about Spider-Man like he was just as much of a criminal as these Demons they were supposed to be rounding up, Johnny couldn't help but feel that he needed to stand up for his friend. After all, it seemed like no one else was doing it.
And so, ever since he arrived with Sable International in New York, Johnny started paying attention to which agents were outspoken against Spider-Man and which were typically quiet whenever the other hero came up in conversation. The agents might not wear name tags, but the lenses inside their helmets would tell them the other agent's names, a feature which Johnny intended to use to his benefit now.
"And now commences the first official meeting of the Society of Sable Soldiers," Johnny said, looking around the room at the other faces. So far he had only found three other agents who seemed to be on Spider-Man's side, but he would take what he could get. Paul, Frederick, and Maria stared back at him. They were all wearing surgical masks and ball caps to disguise themselves if anyone broke into the spacious janitor's closet where they were meeting, but he could still tell that they were frowning.
"That's a horrible name," Frederick said. "It makes us sound like we're some sort of upper-crust martial law group."
"We are a martial law group," Paul corrected, "but only John is upper-crust, so you're kinda right."
"Will everyone please stop going on about how my family has more money than average?" Johnny exclaimed. "It's not like it's my fault!"
"Whatever," Maria said. "We just want to change the name of this whole thing."
"Okay, then what do you think it should be?"
"Is this our first order of business?" asked Paul.
"Yes, it is," Johnny sighed, wishing they could get on with things.
"It needs to have something to do with Spider-Man," Maria decided.
"No, it needs to be a secret society," said Frederick. "I've always wanted to be part of one."
"No one in their right mind wants to be a part of a secret society," Paul argued. "There's too much negativity associated with them."
"Then we can change that! We can be a secret society that supports people instead of tearing them down!"
"People should support each other in public," Maria sighed, "but you are right that it has to be secret if we don't want Sable to find out and fire us for working against her."
"Do you really think she would?" asked Paul.
"That's kind of why we're meeting in a janitor's closet," Johnny replied.
"Okay, so what I'm getting so far is that we should be called Spider-Man's Secret Society," declared Paul. "Wait, that's also a horrible name. We should not call ourselves that."
"What about the Secret Society of Spider-Man?" asked Frederick.
Paul grimaced. "Nah, still too clunky."
"And we should distinguish ourselves as Sable Agents, or else other people could join, too," said Maria. "What about the Sable's Secret Society of the Spider?"
"Sable isn't a part of this," Johnny replied. "Maybe the Secret Society of the Sable Spider?" Three heads slowly nodded, and just like that, a secret society was born.
Everything went wrong the night of the prison breakouts. If half of Ryker's Island and five of the worst villains from the Raft escaping wasn't enough, then there was the emergence of a new villain, Doctor Octopus, the release of the Demon's Breath plague, and the rumors that Spider-Man had been badly injured and may not be able to help much. And even if he wasn't injured, all the Sable agents had orders to take him down by any means necessary. The situation was not looking good for anyone.
Johnny himself was on the verge of abandoning the whole dare and going back to his old job of being a superhero when Spider-Man himself showed up on the streets again. As much as he did not want to abandon his friend to fight all the villains and escaped convicts alone, he realized that there was more than one way to help the vigilante, especially if he could leak important Sable International intel to him or, almost more importantly, try to get the other Sable agents to stop attacking the one person who seemed to actually be single-handedly keeping the city from complete destruction. Johnny knew there were other people helping too, but superheroes tended to be able to handle more as well as being noticeable. Johnny shuddered to think what would happen to the city's morale if Sable actually succeeded in stopping Spider-Man, and so he stayed in the agency, hiding his face and hoping that he was making the right decision.
Kate and Jasper were the two new members of the Secret Society of the Sable Spider, and they seemed rather disappointed with what they found at their first meeting.
"What do you mean we just sit in a janitor's closet and talk about how Spider-Man is doing good for the city? That seems completely useless!" was Kate's response.
"And come on, how can we possibly call it the Secret Society of the Sable Spider when he is not in any way associated with Sable International? It seems a bit like a misnomer."
"Fine," Johnny sighed from behind his surgical mask (which now served an actual practical purpose what with the plague outbreak). "Vote to rename the society again. All in favor say 'Aye.'"
"Aye," said Kate.
"AYE!" shouted Jasper, who was instantly shushed by the others.
"All against say 'Nay.'" To Johnny's gratification, everyone else said nay. "It is decided, four to two. The name stays the same. If you really hate it, though, at least come up with a new one before proposing a name change. We had this out at the last meeting, and this was the best we would decide on."
"Well it still makes no sense," Kate grumbled. "If Spider-Man had a black and white suit like we do, it would make more sense, but even though he as everything from a glowing black and green suit to a punk rock costume, there's no black and white suit."
"Well that's easy to fix," Johnny said. "We'll make one for him!"
The others stared at him like he was crazy. "How can we make a superhero suit? That's a really big deal!" Paul said. "I mean, it's like their identity translated into clothes, and what if we got it wrong?"
"I think you're putting more into it than there is," Johnny muttered, thinking of how most of his suits were blue because his sister liked the color when she first insisted they wear suits.
"Fashion choices are important," Maria insisted.
"Okay, so we'll make a white suit and slap a couple of black spiders on it. We'll keep the eyepieces the shape he likes, and it should turn out okay. If he likes it, he'll wear it, and if he doesn't then at least he'll know we support him and our secret society name will have legitimacy."
There was silence while everyone considered this, and Johnny thought that they were turning against him for sure. But then Jasper spoke up quietly. "My mother did teach me how to sew." At that, Johnny could see the others crumbling, and he knew that the fight was won. Apparently the rest of this meeting would be dedicated to sewing and designing the new suit.
Late during the night when Spider-Man showed up again, Johnny was assigned to work on one of the holding bases scattered throughout the city. He knew the moment he stepped in the place that something was wrong, what with all the boxes of personal valuables scattered around. Another agent, Hanely, saw him looking.
"These civilians were caught robbing a costume jewelry store," he explained with a smug chuckle. "Imagine, they actually thought it was worth it. But now we have to keep these ourselves until we can get them back where they should be."
Johnny nodded obediently, but inside he felt like bursting into angry flames. Hanely was lying. Johnny didn't even have to pick the jewelry pieces up to know that they were worth far, far more than costume jewelry. Sue may not be obsessed with jewelry, but what she had was the highest quality Reed could buy, and like any good brother, Johnny had at one time or other swapped them out just to see if she would notice. She always did, and so Johnny learned how to tell quality too.
There was no way these civilians were caught robbing a costume jewelry store. These pieces must have belonged to them, which meant that these Sable agents were stealing from the civilians. This was not something that Johnny could be a part of, but it was some intel that he could pass on. And so, during the first work break he could find, he wandered off and pulled out his phone, connecting to his private headset he always wore under the helmet.
"911 Emergency, how may I help you?" a tired dispatcher said after he made his call.
"I'd like to remain anonymous," Johnny began, "but I have reason to believe that one of the Sable bases is abusing its authority."
"Aren't they all?" came a tired mutter that Johnny wasn't completely sure he really heard. Then the dispatcher spoke up louder. "Is there any specific report you want to file?"
"Yes, I was taken there, and I saw boxes full of jewelry that one of the guards said was confiscated from civilians. He said it was costume jewelry, but I have a sister, and that was definitely the high-quality stuff."
"Alright, I'll see what we can do. Now which Sable base is this?"
"It's the one by the East River."
"Are you there now?"
"Uh, no. I was released a few minutes ago." At that point, Johnny saw another agent headed towards him and hung up as quickly as he could.
"Hey, John!" the other one, Trevor, called out to him. "You know there's no point in taking a smoking break when you can't take off the helmet, right?"
"I'm not," Johnny said, not willing to explain the whole "I'm the Human Torch and I can produce smoke anywhere but I don't use tobacco because that's unhealthy" irony.
"Then what're ya doing out here?"
"I just needed a break from the bright overhead lights for a bit."
"Ah, you're one of those," Trevor nodded, and Johnny had no idea what he meant, but the man seemed to accept whatever it meant as a good excuse, so Johnny nodded too. "Well," Trevor said after a few minutes of awkward silence, "I'm going back. Since you're one of those, why don't you stand guard outside one of the gates?"
Johnny, still clueless about what the man meant, nodded. Trevor slapped him on the shoulder and walked off, and Johnny moved off to a new place by one of the gates.
Guard duty was boring, let there be no mistake about that, but there was nothing to be done about that. But after about half an hour, Johnny was suddenly yanked upwards and tied to a light post. Craning his neck upwards, he could just barely make out Spider-Man perched above him, and he wondered if Spidey was there because of the call he made to the police. The next few minutes were filled with Spider-Man first performing a series of sneak attacks and then a full one-versus-many fistfight, and Johnny felt slightly gratified that Spider-Man had webbed him up facing the action.
But then the battle was over, and Johnny did not look forward to having to wait while the webbing dissolved. Thankfully Spider-Man perched on his light post again before leaving.
"Wait," Johnny called, "I have something to give you."
"If it's another punch, I don't think so," Spider-Man replied.
"No, nothing like that. We've met before."
"We have?" Spider-Man asked, seeming slightly interested. At that point, Johnny almost and told Spider-Man who he really was, but then he remembered that part of Ben's dare was that no one found out who he was, and somehow he knew that the rule would apply even here.
"Yeah, I complimented you on your new suit the other day."
"I remember you!" Spider-Man said. "John, was it?"
"That's right. Anyway, I think you're doing a good job here, and some of the other Sable agents agree with me, so we got together and decided to make you a new suit, since you're into fashion these days. It's in that box, over there by the stairs." Johnny tried to kick his foot out in the general direction of the box, and Spider-Man seemed to pick up on the gesture. He jumped down and walked over to the box, opening several before he finally found the right one. When he did, he froze for a moment, then he webbed the box to his back and took off again.
"Not even a thank you," Johnny muttered to himself, but secretly was glad that Spider-Man had not drawn extra attention to him by coming back. As much as he did not want to be associated with Hanely and others like him, he still had an undercover job to do.
Johnny didn't know whether to laugh or cry when more Sable agents showed up at the site and got him down from the light pole. "You seemed to do well up there, John," said one. "We're going to put you in a jet pack, put you with one of the patrols, and see how you do."
And so, with absolutely zero training, the undercover Human Torch was sent off to patrol for Spider-Man using flames to fly through the sky, and a couple of hours later, he found him.
If there was anything good about the encounter, it was that Spider-Man was wearing the suit that the Secret Society of the Sable Spider made for him. Unfortunately there was no way for Johnny to signal Spider-Man that he was a friend, and apparently the other superhero had become quite adept at taking down Sable agents, even the flying ones.
And so, for the second time in one night, Johnny storm found himself webbed up, this time to a building, and this time with some bruising. Oh well, at least he had a minor healing factor.
"We're a bit short-staffed right now," they said. "It'll be easy," they said, and without even a break between shifts, Johnny found himself guarding one of the Oscorp buildings, specifically the one with Mayor Osborn's penthouse. Thankfully they were right about it being easy. They took away his jetpack and put him in a back room on the ground floor to monitor security camera footage.
For a long time there was nothing to monitor except disgruntled people who were not allowed back into their apartments, so Johnny stopped paying quite as much attention. After all, he was not actually on Sable's side here.
And then, ten minutes before the end of his final shift of the day, Johnny heard footsteps behind him and felt relief that someone was coming to take over.
And then there was a Taser in his back.
As he passed out, Johnny got a glimpse of his attacker's face. What in the world did a Daily Bugle reporter want with boring security camera footage anyway?
Finally, after the Taser incident, Sable International let Johnny take a break and get some sleep. In fact, he wasn't put on any strenuous duty for the rest of the day. No matter how good of friends Johnny considered himself to be with Spider-Man, he really hoped that he never ran into him as a Sable agent again. Still, there were only a few weeks left on Ben's dare, so he decided that he would stick it out. After all, there was no point in letting this all go to waste.
A few weeks later Johnny was packing up his things to leave Sable International for good. The TV was on in the background and the news was playing.
"For anyone following Spider-Man's latest fashion choices, he's certainly gone in a new direction tonight!" chirped the reporter, and Johnny looked up in time to see a picture of Spider-Man. He was wearing a black and white suit, but it was not Johnny's.
Instead, this suit had a flaming skull head.
"Oh, come on! Really?"
Author's Note: I say that there is no other black and white suit, but I am well aware that the Spirit Spider suit is black and white. In my mind and least, that suit came later in the game story, and I wrote my fic about that suit, "Flamin' Skulls of Fashion!" with that idea. Therefore that is also my working assumption for this story. This is also working with the assumption that Venom is not a villain yet, as all indications in the game hint at that as a possible future, especially if you consider Harry and the Ultimate comic line where Venom was originally a disease cure, not an alien.
About the Fantastic Four suits, I didn't track down and reread the comics for this story, but I believe that it was Sue who originally designed their costumes. I could be wrong about that as I read those comics about seven-ish years ago, so don't quote me.