On the ever so rare occasion, we can become instilled with a new sense of purpose in life. The road to the future becomes paved in gold and all the silver linings shine through the cloudy skies. It is in these moments we regain our passionate vigor in existence and strive for a life not once lived. Tomorrow will be the day we become the person we have always dreamed of being. Tomorrow will be the day we push through the noise of our dreary, depressing thoughts and make the best of everything. This momentary enthusiasm is the essence that breaks our fragile lives.

"Just?" he questioned her as she trailed off. "Just what, Gwen?"

She vigorously shook her head and pressed the heel of her palms into her eyes. "Just nothing," she replied as she lowered her hands. "Can you just… Help me out? Just get the glass out, I don't need any bandages."

Detective Terry Lee had heard the bad news, but not through the usual police channels where information traveled at the speed of sound. Instead, he heard the news on the news; or rather, he saw the news. He had been watching the Yankees square off against the Astros before his dull enjoyment was interrupted by the panicking yet affable newscaster Dillbert Trilby. Trilby reported live from the scene of immense chaos near Central Park where a giant monster (Immediately being dubbed as the Lizard, to no surprise) had attacked a group of innocent New Yorkers. But the icing on the cake was that the Lizard, according to witnesses, had targeted Captain George Stacy who was out with his family at the time.

"Out with his family…" Lee repeated the words to his television screen.

"Gwen?" Lee stepped around the yellowing white curtain that acted as a partition in the small room. He caught the wide eyes of young Gwen Stacy who, to his dismay, had a blood-stained bandage wrapped around the better half of her skull. She had been sitting cross-legged on the bed with her back facing the tall, white stranger he'd seen her with at the PBA charity. He's a doctor, Lee inwardly scoffed. Of course, he was a doctor.

Her eyebrows turned down at the detective. "Terry? What are you doing here?"

"Investigating a quadruple homicide," he lied. Terry had nothing to do with the investigation into what happened only an hour prior or had yet anything to do with it. Giant lizard attacks in Manhattan weren't exactly his forte.

Without raising his head to the detective, Strange commented, "I don't care who you are or what you're doing here; this is a private area and I would qualify your actions as trespassing."

"Imma cop; I have permission," which again, was a bit of a lie. Dillbert Trilby had mentioned the surviving victims of the incident were being carted off to New York-Presbyterian in East Side Manhattan, so it wasn't much of a stretch that Gwen would be there, too. On top of that, flashing your PD badge at random, confused, panicked hospital staff would get you places.

Strange moved his hands away from Gwen and finally lifted a scowl towards Terry. "I'm afraid that isn't relevant. I'm in the middle of treating a patient. Have some common decency."

"Gwen, are you alright?" ignoring the doctor, Lee was mesmerized by Gwen's bloodied and tattered appearance.

Stephen stepped out from around the bed and approached Lee. "Leave now, before I have you removed."

Terry examined the doctor noting that he was an inch shorter than himself and certainly not as wide. If the doctor wanted to pick a fight, he'd soon regret it. "I know the captain's daughter; I'm doing my duty as a fellow officer and checking in on her."

"She's in very capable hands," Strange flashed a tiny grin at the silent woman. "Likely the most capable hands she's ever been in."

Lee narrowed his gaze at Strange. Most capable hands, he thought. What was that supposed to mean? Maybe Gwen had felt the need to lie to Terry about the details of her relationship with the strange man.

"I won't ask you again," Strange's voice snapped through the air. "Leave."

"Imma cop," Lee repeated. "I'm allowed to make sure my coworker's daughter is okay."

Gwen rubbed at the side of her face, looking between the two men. "Terry, I'll be fine," she finally added.

With exaggeration, Stephen rolled his eyes at Terry. "I could have told him that considering I am the only one in this room who could possibly know that as a fact." Strange grabbed the yellowing curtain with his gloved, blood coated hand and jabbed his finger over the detective's shoulder. "Now I've already explained that I won't ask again and I'd truly hate myself if I went back on my own promise."

Lee's continuing frown of concern stayed locked on Gwen's bandaged head. He took a step back from the doctor and let out a sharp sigh, "Fine." He wasn't there to pick a fight, no matter how much of a dick this doctor was nor how much he deserved to have his teeth rattled. "I'll talk to you later," were the last words he offered Gwen before turning around.

Strange twisted his head to smile at Gwen's downturned face. "Is that your boyfriend?" he spoke playfully. "It's always loved ones who put up unnecessary fights against innocent doctors and nurses."

Bending her neck forward, Gwen replied to the doctor with a long sigh, "He's not my boyfriend. What is with people and their obsession over my relationship status?"

"Just teasing you." He stepped back behind Gwen and continued to pull shards of glass from her torn up back. For the most part, the cuts were superficial and not nearly as damaging as what happened to her face, but he noticed something else in the process. Down her spine, there were scars from various surgical incisions.

"He helps me out," Gwen admitted after the doctor removed more shards from her back. "I'd go to him as Spider-Woman for help."

"I see," Strange stopped moving. "But here he is coming to Gwen Stacy, so he knows you're Spider-Woman?"

"Yeah."

"I don't know the details of life as a super-hero, but you could assume that revealing your secret identity to an officer of the law is a no-no." Stephen reached for another shard and let it clatter to the metal tray beside him.

"It's complicated," Gwen wasn't in the mood to explain the unusual relationship she had with the detective. "And he's kinda one of the few people I trust."

"I can see that. He appears to be… Enamored by you." It was impossible to miss the pain that crossed the officer's brow the moment he laid eyes on the poor Gwen Stacy.

"I…" How was she supposed to respond to a statement like that? There had been a few moments in the past where she suspected that Lee's feelings towards her might be something more, but she knew Lee had mistakenly placed her on an unreachable pedestal. He saw pureness and kindness in her that she did not see in herself.

"You don't feel the same?" Stephen prodded further.

"I like Terry and I trust him," her head swiveled to Strange. "Is it so wrong to just see him as my friend? Why does there have to be something? Why do people always assume that there has to be some sort of romance?"

"Because it is clear that romance is on his mind."

"And you met him for what? All of five seconds?" her body followed her pivoted head as her toes touched the hospital floor.

"Its… How it seems, is all."

"Thanks," she said with her face pointed at the floor. "I appreciate your help. I do."

"I believe you," he discarded the latex gloves from his hands and lazily tossed them in the bin of trash. "I would recommend that you should rest for a few days, but I somehow doubt you'll heed my advice."

"Yeah, probably not," she nodded in agreement. "I hate to ditch our date, but…"

"I expected as much." He wasn't surprised that she eventually came up with an excuse not to go out with him. How precarious, unbalanced, and complicated the fragile creature could be. Maybe one day he'd get to her; deep down. "Don't worry, I understand."

"Raincheck, maybe?" Gwen didn't want to commit to something she'd immediately back out of. "Everything that's going on right now…"

"New York needs Spider-Woman; I'll admit that."

"That thing was going after my father. I need to find him." Her mind burned with rage at the thought.

"I noticed something… odd," Stephen carefully spoke as he watched a flood of anger fill her eyes.

"What?" Gwen briefly shook her head to dissipate the feeling. "Noticed something?"

"I noticed something odd about you, Gwen," he paused to analyze his statement. Of course, he noticed many odd things about Gwen; she was a peculiar woman after all. It seemed odd in itself to imply that he noticed something odd about her when she was the oddest person he'd ever met. "The scars on your back. The ones along your spine… I bet that was painful."

She wasn't sure what to say at that moment. Should she tell him to fuck off or maybe something a bit kinder? Maybe tell him something closer to along the lines of not wanting to talk about it at all. But she had already confessed so much to him and him so much to her. There was the possibility that she felt comfort when she brought all of her darkness out and into the open when she was with him. Stephen Strange had a veil of darkness that surrounded his being, and it felt as tangible as her own. Dark souls can easily sense the weight that other dark souls carry on their shoulders.

"Some of it was, some of it I can't really remember exactly…" her words trailed with the memories of staring endlessly at a polished, white tiled floor. "They cut us open a lot… Put stuff in us; took stuff out," she cringed with a squint at the recollection of those many surgeries. "I just lost track of everything. There was a point where I just expected it; I was prepared. When whatever they gave us wore off and the pain just came… Thinking about it makes me sick."

"I apologize," Stephen pursed his lips at her. "I shouldn't have said anything."

Gwen slowly released her weight from the bed and tried to gather her composure. "Oww," she mumbled as she reached up to her damaged face. "Everything hurts."

"I can give you something for that," Stephen spoke as he stepped over to a small cabinet mounted next to the bed. "I'm sure we can find something for you in this delightful hamlet."

"I think it had something to do with genetic mutation," Gwen continued to pursue the uncomfortable.

"Excuse me?" Stephen turned back to face her with a pill bottle in hand. "What had to do with genetic mutation?"

"What they were doing to us; the experiments." Gwen offered a brief pause, shifting her weight between her feet. "I… I think- I don't know. They were trying to turn us into something else. Something stronger than a human, I think."

Stephen's gaze shifted away from Gwen and to the worn, tile floor. He placed the small bottle on top of the bed, the thought of why he even had it leaving his mind entirely. Experiments on humans? Genetic mutation? All of it ran uncomfortably familiar to him.

"Can you tell me more?" Stephen wasn't sure how far Gwen was willing to go, but he needed to know what happened.

"A lot of it felt like the same thing over and over again. There was someone else with me, but she died." Gwen recalled the swollen, puffy face of a girl who couldn't have been older than eight at the time. Very clearly, she recollected the distinct bruises that constantly surrounded the young girl's blood-filled eyes. She had rested in what looked like a hospital bed adjacent to Gwen's. The pair were always concealed behind a ring of dark curtains; Gwen could never make out what color they actually were, not that that ever mattered. Occasionally, those dark curtains would reveal streaks of orange light that glowed behind them, but Gwen couldn't remember seeing any direct sunlight for those seven years.

"You'd mentioned her before." He could see her eyes glazing over as she stared off and up at nothing in particular. "What happened to her? How'd she die?"

"They were making us sick. Sometimes we got better, but she kept getting worse and worse…" Gwen thought back on the girl's rambling, murmuring, screams of agony and of madness. If ever Gwen did sleep, when she did, she would wake up swearing she was still there hearing that girl howl endlessly. "She would talk to me, but most of the time it didn't make a lot of sense. She would talk about animals; how they talked about animals. Saying it out loud, I don't know… It'll just sound ridiculous."

Animals. They were experimenting on humans with animals? Just as before, it all sounded strikingly familiar to Strange.

"Go ahead." He wanted her to finish her train of thought.

"She smiled at me once… She said that one day, I'd be like a bird, or a spider, or an eel. Maybe all three. I don't know if I liked hearing that…"

"You still look human to me, although maybe I can see the bird thing a bit," his attempt at levity was met with an ineffectual stare. "What was her name?"

"I don't know; I never knew. She said she would be like a fire-ant someday. Her English wasn't the greatest, to be honest. I know she spoke Mandarin, like the doctors who were there."

"You're right, this does sound ridiculous. Ridiculous, but not unheard of." He wrung his hands together and let out a prolonged sigh.

Gwen raised a brow at him and lifted her chin. "What do you mean? How is this possibly not unheard of?"

"Just look at your friend, The Lizard," he shrugged back. "If that isn't mutation, I don't know what is."

"I don't think the two are the same at all. Have you seen The Lizard? He looks like an actual lizard. I look, more or less, the same as I did before."

"Maybe you were lucky."

"Can you explain to me what you're getting at?" Gwen crossed her arms as a grimace struck the doctor's face.

"You got away; you escaped." He cupped one of his hands over her shoulder. "But what happened to the people who did this to you?"

"I… uh-" Gwen could feel heat rise to her face as it turned red. "I don't think there's… As far as I know… They're all… dead."

"Dead?" The doctor's head perked up. "How do you know this?"

"It isn't important," Gwen let out a shaky gasp. "The point is, is that I know. I know they're all gone."

"And their research?" Stephen didn't have to be telepathic to know that Gwen had no intention of revealing to him what truly happened to all of those doctors. Hopefully, they got exactly what they deserved. "What happened to all of their research?"

"I hoped it died with them… I uh, I don't actually know. I just assumed…" Her words trailed off.

"Assumed what?" He pried.

"I just assumed that it was gone because no one ever came after me or told the world about me or said anything about me or did anything about me." Gwen let all of this out in one quick breath.

"I'm not so sure about that, Gwen."

Gwen narrowed her eyes at him in suspicion. "What are you getting at? Why won't you just tell me?"

"I told you, I did some work for Oscorp. Albeit, rather briefly and for good reason." He stopped to observe Gwen's reaction, but she only provided him with a motionless and empty stare. "They were trying to splice human DNA with other non-human species. Such as, but not limited to, lizards, for one. Me telling this to you; however, could land me in prison for life… If I'm lucky."

"Did you… Did you help them make The Lizard?" She felt her chest growing tight. "Did you… Did you… Peter?"

"I had nothing to do with what happened to Peter Parker, Gwen." He wrapped his fingers around her cold hands. "I worked for them for two weeks before I realized what was going on, so I left. I save people's lives. I wasn't interested in helping anyone commit unethical and illegal acts. They were willing to let people die. I couldn't abide by that."

"But you haven't done anything?" Gwen's voice rose in pitch. "You knew they were hurting people and you did nothing about it!"

"Gwen, there was nothing I could do. They threatened me." Stephen let her go at tapped at his own chest. "They would destroy my life and take away everything I have."

"And what do you have that's so much more important than the people who died today?!" Gwen shouted directly at Stephen's face in response. "What do you have that's so much more important than what Peter had?! You even said yourself that you're an asshole and that you aren't capable of caring for anyone else. You'll lose everything you have, but people lost their lives."

"Was I supposed to go to the police with no evidence, by the way, and tell them what? Tell them that I suspected they were doing immoral, illegal, unethical research? All for what? So I could get killed and nothing would come of it?" Stephen kept his voice at an even tone in hopes of suppressing Gwen's displeasure. "There was nothing I could do."

"You can always do something!" Gwen took a step back from him. "We say there is nothing and that we had no choice just to comfort our ourselves. You always have a choice; you can always do something."

"I'm doing something now." He held his open arms out to the mess of a woman. "I'm telling you the truth. I'm telling you that Oscorp had something to do with you and something to do with The Lizard."

"I can't believe it…" Gwen dropped her shoulders. "I can't believe you didn't say something to me sooner…"

"Gwen," Stephen bridged the gap between the two of them. "I never meant to-"

But before he could finish, George Stacy barged his way through the thin, yellowed curtains. "I'm tired of waiting around and I'm tired of filling out goddamn papers," he barked at the young nurse who anxiously puttered behind him.

"I'm sorry, Doc," the young male nurse meekly spoke. "He refused to listen to me."

"That's alright," Stephen waved the nurse away.

George's round eyes widened even further when he saw Gwen. "Gwen, you're a mess. I can't- are you okay?"

Gwen let her frown fade and turned to her father. "I'll be alright."

Stephen folded his arms over and took a step back from Gwen. "Her wounds were superficial," he added. "Nothing severe enough to keep her bedridden, that's for certain."

"Gwen," George shook his head at her. "I can't believe you. I can't believe you did that. Were you trying to get yourself killed?"

Almost always, Gwen thought to herself. "I wasn't thinking; that was my problem."

"You could have been killed."

"You could have been killed," she quickly retorted.

"I'm a police officer, Gwen. It's expected of me to put my life on the line for others." He explained with a tint of pain in his voice. "It's what I do."

"It was your birthday; you were off duty."

"Gwen, you're a hundred-ten, five-foot-something, girl. What were you expecting would happen to you?"

Stephen scratched at his brow. "One-hundred-sixty-five," he murmured at no one.

Gwen scrunched her eyes to frown at Stephen; she was always listening and she could always hear everything whether or not she liked it.

"I don't know," she finally replied to her father. "Like I said, I wasn't thinking."

"Are you okay to go home?" He asked Gwen, but he was staring at the doctor.

Stephen tilted his head and gave George a small, silent nod.

"Shall we go home and get a drink?" George surrounded Gwen's shoulders in his thick arms. "I think we both deserve one."

"Aren't I an alcoholic?" Gwen grumbled underneath the large man's grasp.

"Well, we'll just have the one." He released her and kept her close all the way home.

Dim lights barely lit George Stacy's kitchen table in the darkened house. May had already gone to bed and George quietly watched Gwen drink a glass of scotch slower than he had seen anyone ever. He looked over the bandage that coated half of her face and she still wore the same blood-stained and shredded The Church band t-shirt.

Gwen caught her father glancing at the filthy shirt. "This was my favorite shirt," she smiled.

"We'll get you another one."

"Yeah, but this one was vintage." Gwen plucked at the baggy shirt and examined the stains of her own blood. "And you know, it was mom's."

"I know." George tapped the side of his glass, looking down at his own drink. "I've lost almost everything, Gwen Stacy, I don't want to lose you, too."

"I know." But there was always more to everything. If anything, she didn't want to lose him. What would Gwen have left after her father was gone? May was there, but May was May. May was Peter's aunt, she was Ben's wife. And all of them here together and broken, found each other. But regardless of her feelings towards May, Gwen's father was the final string that tied her to this world. As it stood now, it was hard enough finding anything worth fighting for. Especially now that New Yorkers on the street rioted against her. Everyone needed someone to blame for their problems and she had become their scapegoat. But what would they be without her? Who would be left to accept their rage if not the ever-present and great Spider-Woman? Who would really protect these people?

"Gwen, promise me something?" His words cut through her thoughts like an intruding knife. "Promise me you won't ever do something that stupid again, okay?"

"I promise," she responded, but obviously this was absurd. Spider-Woman was everything stupid all the time. It was stupid and even if other people had powers like her, no one should ever do half of the stupid shit she did. And now that she knew Oscorp was behind The Lizard, things were about to get a lot stupider.

"I'm gonna have to go out there and look for that thing, Gwen." The uncertainty he felt sounded through his words. "It's a manhunt now."

"Are you going now?" Gwen bolted up from out of her chair.

"I came home with you to make sure you were okay, but I have to find whatever this is, Gwen."

"He was trying to kill you!" Gwen let out a harsh ring. "If you find him or if he finds you, he's going to try to kill you again."

"I'm not going to be alone, but more importantly, I'm not going to let this maniac continue to rampage through the streets of New York."

"Do you even know where he is?" Gwen almost laughed in frustration. "You're going after a maniac, who you have no idea what he is capable of, and you don't even know where he is?"

"We'll find him where ever he is and we'll flush him out. I'm not letting this stick bastard get away with murdering my people." George stood up from his chair and showed Gwen a smile of condolence. "I know you're worried about me, but I'll be okay. This is what I do; I am a cop after all."

"I know you'll be okay. This many years later, you've always managed to come home. I know you will." And I'll make sure of it, Gwen thought to herself. Because if anyone is going to protect you from that lunatic, it'll be the Spider-Woman.