Story cover art is by MisconToku, who you can find on Newgrounds.
A/N: Here it is, the showdown at May's and beyond! I'm really pleased with this chapter, and I already know what I wanna do for the next one. My original plan for the order of events following this chapter has changed a bit, but overall I have a clear idea of where I wanna take things from here. I intend to now devote my writing time solely to this fic. It's been split all over the place these last few months as an anime fandom I write for was enjoying a second season. Of course, now the Olympics is taking up my time instead xD I'd like to say I can get the next chapter out in two weeks, and originally I actually reckon I could've done it in one, but with everything going on it may take closer to my usual time of 3 weeks to a month. After the Olympics though, it's all in!
Thank you SO MUCH for still reading this! I know it's been a heck of a journey. I can feel how much my writing has improved overall, as well, and I HOPE I can make the last few chapters really outstanding (though I should say, we're not at the end of the story yet). I'll be doing my best! For you, for myself, but also for Peni! She's such a cool character and she deserves more content.
Every review is a treasure, but even if you don't review, or fave, or anything, I appreciate you sticking with me. Thanks so much!
Recap of last chapter: Last chapter, Peni struggled to make sense of the sparse data gleaned from her 'covert' invasion of Oscorp. But when Peter B and the others arrived with a computer in tow, it looked like everything was going to click into place. Unfortunately, it was at that exact moment that they learned that they were all slowly disintegrating - all except Miles, that is. The stress of the whole situation pushed Noir over the edge, which pushed everyone else over the edge, and Miles fled May's house in a panic. Overnight, Peni finally worked out not only how the collider achieved its incredible dimension-hopping feat, but also how she could reprogram it to take them back to each of their universes. When Miles returned the next morning Peni had just finished crafting the goober. However, he'd not come alone... he'd been followed by Fisk's men, including the sinister Doctor Octavius. Now the spider-gang are forced to fight their way out of Aunt May's...
Chapter 17: Heart-Shaped Box (Part 10)
Hiding behind the arm of Aunt May's sofa wasn't my proudest moment. With SP/dr still holed up in the mech in the back yard, the only thing I could do was curl up into a ball and watch the storm of fists and tentacles fly overhead.
Then I took a deep breath and reminded myself:
"I'm Peni Parker, child genius, the hero of New York. I can do this. We can do this."
He burst through the wall like an avalanche. My partner, my co-pilot. A red and blue boulder. In his path was one of Fisk's goons, a man with gray skin and ash white hair. He looked like a zombie. He looked even more like a zombie after SP/dr smooshed him into the carpet.
"Get 'em SP/dr!" I cheered.
Next up in the wrecking ball's path was some kind of cybernetically enhanced human. He had metal legs and an enormous metal scorpion tail, and one of his hands had been completely replaced with a jagged pincer. The top of his bald head was lined with tiny spikes, and his bare chest was absolutely covered in tattoos. He looked tough, and he was. Without budging an inch he raised his muscular arms and blocked SP/dr head on. SP/dr stalled, spinning in place. The scorpion guy growled something in Spanish and began to liftthe mech up like a dumbbell.
"No!"
Quick as I could I sprinted towards the villain, leaping over Ham and ducking under an errant coffee table soaring through the air. As I reached him I hopped, stepped on his steel knee and jumped up, pulling my legs in. My standard issue, mud-crusted school shoes found their way to his teeth as I leveled him with the most powerful dropkick I could muster. He reeled back, more surprised than actually injured, and dropped SP/dr to the floor. The mech's hatch opened. I felt SP/dr calling me.
Coming, buddy.
I dived in, the hatch closed, then THWOMP, Peter B was kissing the window, Octavius's translucent claws around his neck. I could feel the mech's nanomachines working.
Yes…
I could feel the mech's limbs and my own, overlapped, feel even the air around us — whirling with punches and kicks, filled with the splinters of broken furniture. Quieting my unsteady mind I listened to my spider-sense, and together with SP/dr, I felt the future.
The scorpion was up, stinger ready. Fear trickled down my arms. My lungs were empty. No amount of breathing was enough.
Gotta pay attention.
I felt him lunge long before his body betrayed his plans. As his stinger pierced the floor I was already well out of range, shoving the zombie man (who had somehow got back to his feet), into May's fireplace.
Sorry Aunt May.
The tentacle would be coming for me in three, two…
Got it!
Octavius's synthetic arm was like a string of spaghetti in my robotic hands. From the other side of the room, Ham caught my eye.
"Peni, catch!"
He pulled out a vicious pair of scissors and lobbed them right at me.
"I haven't got any hands free!" I yelled, holding onto Octavius's tentacle with all my might.
From beside me a melodious voice said, "I have."
Gwen, casually backflipping over the chaos, caught the scissors in mid-air. Before her feet even touched the floor she cut Octavius's tentacle clean in half. The doctor's scream was so ugly it turned my stomach.
She couldn't really have felt that, right?
The distraction got the better of me. The zombie, who was back up again, punched SP/dr and me off our feet like we were a beach ball. I watched Miles's eyes widen in shock as we flew away, out the window, into the street, into a car.
"Ugh…"
Then, out of the me-sized hole in Aunt May's house, came Doctor Octavius. Everyone else was still inside, beating the crap out of each other. She hadn't come out here for anyone else. She was out here for me.
Does she know…? She can't possibly know. We're from different universes. My Octavius is nothing like her.
Whether she knew or not she was coming, one tentacle at a time — and she'd caught me off-guard. My chest ached all over from where my electromagnetic seatbelt had saved me from splattering against the window, and my skirt was riding up in all the wrong places. Don't even get me started on my headache.
I'm blaming the headache on you, SP/dr. I felt fine this morning.
Octavius drummed her fingers together, closing in step by step, "You're not like the others."
I jeered, "Tell me something I don't know."
I had to pull myself together, and fast. That meant one thing and one thing only.
Candy time.
Stuffing my mouth with as much candy as it could hold I filled my soul with pure unadulterated sugar and rocket-launched myself into the air, full-throttle. The mech's smart screen told me we still had plenty of fuel.
"You snooze you lose, Octavius! You're never catching me up here!"
She grinned a bone-chilling grin and flexed her tentacles, digging them deep into the road, cracking the tarmac. I stayed hovering, which in hindsight was a big mistake.
My spider-sense kicked in exactly too late. With a single, powerful thrust Octavius propelled herself skyward, right up to me, face-to-face. She coiled herself around me, around us, and squeezed.
"Aaaagh!"
"That's more like it," she sneered, "Iron Man was the same. So cocky in his metal cage. Yours looks special though. Alien technology. I can't wait to take it apart!"
The mech's armor was tough. Blast resistant, heat resistant, deformation resistant and bullet proof. As if that wasn't enough, the magnetic energy used to keep the limbs in place also formed a light forcefield around the cockpit, preventing anything from piercing through to the vulnerable pilot(s). It was near indestructible.
So why does this hurt so much!?
We hit the floor with a deep crunch, but somehow she was still on top, constricting the life out of me breath by breath. Her tentacles were unbelievably powerful. She was applying so much pressure that my shock absorbers were starting to dig into my heat exchange unit — which in case you don't know, is not a good thing. The cooling ducts weren't faring much better, nor was the mainframe managing my steadily discombobulating limbs. Every gear, servo and actuator was being pushed to its limit. The mech's sensors were screaming and so was I.
"How are you so strong!?"
She smirked, "How are you so weak?"
That was the last straw. A beating I could take, but I'd had enough of listening to supervillain snark.
I strained against her tentacles' grip, "I… am not… weak!"
She squeezed harder, forcing my arms back into uselessness.
No!
In my mind I heard Mysterio's arrogant voice, mocking me for relying on my mech.
Our mech.
As soon as I thought it I knew it, deep within me. Our mech. SP/dr and me. Partners. The mech wasn't just some suit. It was the one way for SP/dr and I to combine our powers, the only way to truly understand what it means to be each other. This mech had allowed me to become a spider, if only for a moment, and it had allowed a tiny spider, a rejected lab experiment, to become a hero.
In my mind, bright as the sun, SP/dr shone an image of us, together. Him on my hand, me smiling down at him, and I knew.
Friends.
"Partners."
Octavius's face crumpled up in confusion, "Excuse me?"
The left arm's elbow joint was immobilized, but the lasers weren't. I tilted my hand towards her, still pushing at the tentacle with my right.
"Eat this!"
She had it coming — and boy did it! The laser sliced right through her tentacles and dissolved the front-right side of her suit. She leapt back, gritting her teeth in anger. My sensors told me I'd inflicted one heck of a burn on her, but if she felt it she wasn't showing it.
Adrenaline, probably.
I was in control now. Punching her, just hard enough to knock her away. She was fragile. Without her tentacles she was just a woman, just a random woman. I pinned her to a toppled minivan with the palm of my metallic hand.
"I'll let the police deal with you."
Then I heard it. A gunshot. My first thought was that the police had arrived. But police didn't activate my spider-sense, not in the mech. They weren't a threat.
What—?
On instinct I turned back to look at May's swiss-cheesed house. I didn't need the mech's screen to tell me what I was seeing. Two silhouettes on the roof. One adult, one child. Miles… and an unknown entity. The unknown was falling, limp. Lifeless. My spider-sense kept throbbing, wrenching at my brain, drawing me back to street level. I couldn't believe my eyes.
"Fisk…? That's… that's really him. Wilson Fisk."
He was a man mountain, a bald rock as big as a bear. His suit was black, unlike his iconic crisp white in my world. In his chiseled fist was a gun that in any other hands would've looked enormous. I didn't know why he shot his own henchman, but I wasn't about to wait around and find out.
"MILES!" I yelled, releasing Octavius and rocketing towards my friend at full speed. But I wasn't the only one. Out of nowhere came Peter B, swinging into Fisk just as he fired off another round. The bullet went wide, Fisk went down, and Miles, carrying the mortally wounded henchman, leapt away along the rooftops. In his place came the grim chorus of police sirens.
We've gotta get out of here.
If the police here were anything like my police, they really weren't gonna like how much damage we caused. I scanned the area for Fisk's men. They were all gone, even Octavius.
Dang it!
Peter B gave me a look and thumbed for me to follow him. Reluctantly, I pulled myself away from the crime scene and swung behind him. One by one the others joined us. I hated leaving May to pick up our mess, but being arrested wasn't an option, not if Fisk was still on the run.
Mayor Fisk, a killer…
When it comes to alternate dimensions, even having the same basic laws of physics is pretty incredible. I shouldn't be surprised that someone could have a whole different personality. Even so, seeing it happen right in front of you, watching your own mayor shoot someone in cold blood…
My Fisk can't be like that, right?
As we landed amongst a thicket of snow-drowned trees I remembered Mr. Osborn telling me, years ago, about his contracts with the mayor.
Mr. Osborn has contracts with a lot of people. Doesn't make them all evil.
Noir's voice fuzzed through my mech's audio system, "Why are we in a cemetery?"
B glared at him, "It was the first place I could think of, alright? I didn't exactly have a lot of time."
Gwen stepped round a lopsided gravestone, "Where's Miles?"
"Gone. He took that guy, his uncle, with him."
I gasped, "The henchman was his uncle!?"
Peter kept his eyes on the ground, "I'm as shocked as you are, kid."
"Well we have to go find him! He could be in danger!"
Ham dropped down from a tree branch and landed on Noir's shoulder, "We've all lost someone dear to us once in our lives. I could never have dealt with that kinda pain on my own. He needs us now more than ever."
B said, "If we go after him now we'll just lead the police right to him."
"Not necessarily."
"Oh, not necessarily huh? I guess a flying pig and a red and blue mech are just everyday occurrences in your world!"
"Well actually—"
Gwen interrupted, "Alright, maybe going as a group isn't the best idea, but leaving him on his own is an even worse one. Pushing him away is exactly what led to this situation in the first place."
Peter B rested his hands on his hips, "The best thing we can do for him is to take down Fisk and get you all home."
"And who's gonna destroy the collider?"
The USB stick round B's neck glinted in the midmorning sun, "I am."
We all raised our voices in protest, but he didn't relent, "I'm the oldest. I'm basically retired. My world doesn't need me anymore. Not like Miles. This world needs him. When he's a bit older, a bit wiser, he'll be ready to protect it."
Suddenly Gwen was in B's face, "And what about you, huh?"
"I just told you."
"And I'm supposed to just accept that? Just accept you throwing your life away!?"
"Gwen, listen—"
She poked him in the chest, "No, you listen. I've lost one Peter already, there's no way in hell I'm losing another."
Peter scowled, "Well one of us is staying here, whether we like it or not."
"That's not necessary."
"Yes, it is. Miles isn't an option."
Gwen was pleading now, "B, I know what I said about him before, but I was wrong."
B shook his head, "No you weren't. Look what happened just now. He let himself be followed, and now May's house is wrecked."
"He wouldn't have even left Aunt May's if not for us."
B sighed, "You were hard on him last night. Too hard, for sure. But it wasn't just you. I put too much responsibility on his shoulders. It should never have been down to him to fix this. I'm the veteran here. Taking Fisk down is my responsibility."
I opened up the hatch and stepped out of the mech, into a bitter gust of wind. Things were heading in the same direction as last night, and I was not gonna let that happen.
"No one has to die. Miles is ready," I insisted.
Ham gave me a sympathetic look, "Peni—"
"No! Sure, he accidentally led the bad guys to Aunt May's house, but he helped us fight them off, didn't he?"
B looked off to the side, "He spent most of the time dodging."
"That's not true and you know it!"
He sighed in frustration, "I'm not trying to be mean, Peni, I'm just stating the facts," he wiped his face with his hand, "God, I'm starting to sound like Jonah."
Noir stepped in, "Look, the kid needs some work, but that doesn't mean we should just abandon him. He's one of us. A spider. And I don't know about you fellas, but I ain't willing to lose one of the only people in the universe who understands what being like…" he looked at his hands, "this…is like. And that includes you, B."
"Come on B," I said, "Even if you don't trust him—"
Peter growled, "I do trust him! What kinda person do you think I am, huh? You think I don't care about him? You think I think he's just some… some kid? Just some nobody? I'm willing to die for him, alright? If it meant he'd be safe…"
He leaned his hand on a nearby gravestone, "I used to think I was invincible. I know better now. I've lost too many people, Peni. I'm not gonna lose a single goddamn person more. Not to Fisk, not to anyone."
Noir spoke quietly, but firmly, "Forget about the collider for a second. Even if you're the one who turns it off, there's nothing stopping Fisk's men from getting to Miles while we scout out his headquarters. The kid needs a bodyguard."
Peter nodded, "Alright, fine, we'll find Miles together. But he isn't coming with us to Fisk tower."
My blood was boiling, "You don't get to decide that."
"Look, I get that you feel bad about what you said to him before, but think about how much worse you're gonna feel when he's six feet under."
I felt SP/dr stir in the mech behind me. We both pictured it at the same time. Miles, lifeless on the ground. A name on a tombstone.
My silence was all the answer B needed, "Exactly. We all know it. We'd all rather give our own lives than let him throw away his. And like I said, I'm the oldest. I also have the least to lose. My Aunt May's gone, my wife left me years ago. I'm no one. I barely even don the suit anymore."
The wind howled through the cemetery, rattling the bony branches dangling above my head.
B sighed, "We're wasting time here. Let's go find Miles, before Fisk or his goons do."
After hours of searching we eventually found Miles in his dorm room at Visions Academy. It had a bunk bed and a small desk, but not much else. It was a pillbox, the kind my mom and dad probably used to live in before Dad got his job at Oscorp.
Peter B rested a hand on Miles's shoulder, "Hey kid."
We talked for a long time about what happened. The henchman Fisk shot was indeed his uncle, just as B said. His villain name was The Prowler, but Miles didn't dwell on that for long. Instead he told us about his uncle's ability to always know just what to say to cheer him up, about how he supported Miles's passion for street art, about how kind and sincere he was. In turn we all told him about the friends and family we'd lost. I tried really hard not to cry while talking about my father. I felt completely naked in that tiny room, in front of everyone. But they all listened patiently, kindly. They understood. It confirmed for me something I'd known instinctively from the moment I met Ham and Noir: we were made to be together. All of us. For all my celebrity status I was still a loner in my own world. Here, with them, I belonged.
When B ushered us all out of the room, all of us except for Miles that is, that image of my dad, standing there in that explosion all those years ago, forced its way into my head. I went to barge back through Miles's window, but Noir stopped me.
"Noir!" I whispered.
He shook his head, "Let B handle it, Peni."
"Miles should join us!"
"He's not ready."
"B's literally gonna kill himself when he doesn't have to."
"I'd do the same for you."
"But I don't need you to."
"Peni, we discussed this."
And he was right. We did discuss it, and I disagreed with it then too. From beyond the window I heard Miles resist, "It's not fair! You've gotta tell them I can do this!"
Peter B's voice, resigned to his fate, "It wasn't their decision."
"I've gotta make Kingpin pay! You have to let me make him pay!"
"Miles you're gonna get yourself killed."
"But I'm ready. I promise—"
I watched in horror as Peter B leg-sweeped Miles off his feet. Suspended from the ceiling and holding Miles aloft by the scruff of his way-too-small Spider-Man costume B calmly said, "If you're ready, then venom strike me right now. Or go invisible on command so you can get past me."
Miles struggled to free himself from B's grip, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn't summon the energy to unleash an electric venom strike. Perfectly visible in the setting sun, Miles dangled there limp as a trapped fly. B gently lowered him to the floor, then without warning webbed him to a chair.
"Wait!" Miles yelled, but his cries fell on deaf ears.
B's final words before climbing out the window were, "I'm sorry."
With tears in my eyes I climbed back inside the mech's cockpit. Together we swung away, leaving Miles stuck in his dorm room.
We chose not to head straight for Fisk Tower. We could've been there in minutes at the speed we were swinging, but if we really were leaving Miles behind, we had to sweep the area first.
Noir noted, "Supervillains are like rats. You never know when they might pop out of the gutter and bite ya."
We checked everywhere. From Cypress Hills to Brooklyn Heights, Carroll Gardens, Bay Ridge and beyond. We checked everywhere. Noir went with Ham, B went with Gwen, and I traveled alone, flying right down to the blue expanse of Gravesend Bay. I stopped a single mugging and almost crashed into a police car, but mostly my patrol was uneventful. Much more uneventful than my usual patrol back home. I thought about what B said.
"My world doesn't need me anymore…"
My world needed me more than ever. Mysterio had been running wild for god knows how long. After all, there was no guarantee that time ran at the same speed between universes. I could get back and ten years could've passed.
Please no.
I had to hope they ran at the same speed, that there hadn't been any dilation, that I could get back there and set things right.
Except I couldn't do that. I couldn't let B take his own life.
It has to be me. One way or the other.
We met up at Brooklyn Bridge just after sunset, on top of the arch nearest Brooklyn itself. B's logic was that we'd all recognize it — assuming our Brooklyn's all had a bridge. My backup map of my New York, an archived copy of the most recent satellite download, certainly showed a Brooklyn Bridge, but the one he meant was what I called the old Brooklyn Bridge. In my world it had been submerged, half-destroyed and rebuilt time and time again, but it was still standing in the same place it always had, a relic of a bygone age. I'd always wondered what it looked like in its glory days.
"We kept the American flag," I explained to Noir, "but the rest, not so much."
He stared at the cars buzzing by down below, "I'm just glad to see it's still here."
A few moments later B and Gwen joined us.
"All clear?" Peter asked, and we replied, "All clear."
"Good. Then it's time to get this thing over with."
B crouched down, preparing to swing back to Brooklyn. Noir clapped a hand to his shoulder, "You sure you wanna do this?"
He replied without hesitation, "I have to do this."
"Let me do it."
"No. I'm not going over it again, Noir — it's gonna be me, and that's final. Now come on, we've got a world to save."
Once again we traveled in silence, though not for long. Fisk Tower wasn't far from the bridge, just a few blocks back from the East River, near the navy yard. The yard was lined with cargo cranes, and we clambered up the tallest one to observe our target from a distance.
As we climbed Noir remarked, "Probably uses this place to smuggle in his supplies."
The view from the top was incredible. You could see the whole city laid out like a 3D map, right to the horizon. It was nothing like my New York. The evening sky stretched on forever like a black ocean, interrupted only by the narrow cluster of skyscrapers littering Manhattan. No floating cargo ships blotting out the sun, no cloud-piercing communication towers or gloomy sea walls. Outside of Manhattan the were buildings were all little splotches of gray and brown, tiny dominoes clumped together in concrete islands. The parks were like lakes, outbursts of green amongst the man-made forest, and every inch of the city sparkled in streetlights and lit windows. It was beautiful, and yet somehow alien. It didn't feel like a different version of New York, it felt like a different planet.
"Peni?"
Gwen's voice. I'd let myself get distracted.
"Sorry."
I focused my eyes on our goal: Fisk Tower. From where we were standing you couldn't miss it. The tower jutted out from the buildings around it like a concrete torch, glowing from head to toe, with a crystal roof and a red carpet and what appeared to be some kind of grand reception hall on the ground floor. It didn't look anything like a supervillain hideout. At all.
Oscorp HQ looks more villainous than this.
Gwen explained, "B and I heard some bad news while we were on patrol. Apparently tonight Fisk is holding a gala in celebration of, wait for it, Spider-Man's life."
Ham groaned, "You've gotta be kidding me."
Noir added, "That no-good scumbag…"
B said, "Just means we'll need to be prepared," he looked in my direction, "Peni, you're the one that went through the computer. How do we get in?"
Now it was my time to shine, "Fisk has a private elevator that leads from his penthouse straight to the collider."
B's eyes widened in shock, "Man, didn't think it'd be that easy."
"It's not. Gwen's right about the gala. The top floor is swarming with people."
"The mech tell you that?"
"My dad was an excellent engineer."
B laughed, "Guess that's something else we have in common. Alright, so we need to crash the party. No big deal."
"It's not just that. It's… okay, so about the collider…"
Now everyone's eyes were on me.
"…Obviously you guys know I wrote a program to get us back home… sort of."
Gwen quirked an eyebrow, "Sort of?"
"Well, needless to say, they weren't trying to summon Spider-Man when we got brought in. See, the way it works is, there are these subatomic particles, Reilly particles, and they open up wormholes to things they collide with. But humans are made up of a huge number of atoms. Unthinkably huge. Hitting a human foot wouldn't open up a wormhole to feet, it'd open up a wormhole to, I dunno, somewhere with carbon or something."
B was getting impatient, "And? If it brought us here it can take us back, right?"
"Of course!"
"So what's the problem?"
"Well, it turns out Reilly particles interact with each other as well. What that means is, if you fire enough of them at something, you really can open up a wormhole to a specific object. This world's Spider-Man must've fallen into the beam."
"Right, got it. Jump into the beam."
"No! It's not that simple. You need to fall in at the right moment."
He sighed, "I knew this wouldn't be easy. God damn it."
SP/dr scowled at him with a grumpy emoji face. I asked, "Are you done interrupting?"
He raised a hand in apology, "I'm sorry. I just… this needs to go right, you know? If this doesn't work, then…"
You'll die for nothing.
He didn't say it, but we all understood it. Except what he didn't understand was that there was no way on Earth that I was gonna let him take the bullet for me.
"I get it. There's no room for mistakes," I continued, "That's exactly why I'm telling you all this. So that we can get it right, first try, together."
He stared out at Fisk Tower, "Alright Peni. Lay it on me."
I took a deep breath, "So, the program I made is based on data from when we came through. There were five blips, smooshed together and hard to read, but definitely five distinct energy levels."
Ham said, "Us."
"That's right. I programmed it to cycle through them in the order you guys said you arrived in, and, most importantly, I set it to send matter forward into the wormhole rather than drag things through. Remember what I said before about the particles opening up holes to things similar to the stuff they hit? If you hit that beam when it's pointing to the wrong world, and especially if you do it before the USB is plugged in, you won't go home. You'll either end up in some random place, stuck forever, or you'll just bring in yet another version of yourself."
B wiped his mouth with his hand, his eyes dim, "That's a lot more complicated than I thought it would be."
"Just don't fall in," I explained, "Don't fall in until the USB is where it should be."
Noir nodded, "No problem."
"And don't throw baddies into the beam, either. That could get messy."
"Oooh!" Ham exclaimed, "Didn't think of that!"
"Spacetime is a real doozy."
Gwen cracked her knuckles, "I think I've heard enough. It's time Fisk got what's coming to him."
Noir got in position to swing towards the tower, "Now you're talking my language."
B joined him, "We're about as ready as we'll ever be."
"Taking a hit is never easy," Noir said, "You can't teach yourself to be ready, you can only teach yourself to be strong enough to bounce back."
B chuckled bitterly, "Well I'm hoping we won't be taking too many hits if it's all the same to you."
"A fight's a fight."
I flexed my robotic arms, "Don't worry, I'll protect you."
Ham joined me, "Me too!"
Then Gwen, "Me three!"
B waved us away, "Yeah, yeah! Save the mushy stuff for after we've won."
Noir grunted, "Let's go."
"All together now!"
We leapt off the crane and swung over the navy yard towards Fisk Tower. A spider-team. A spider-family. United.
Getting to the elevator was a real trip. Gwen, Noir and Peter B disguised themselves as waiters, Ham was a main course, and I… was a table. Or at least, I was supporting a table on top of my mech. If Fisk hadn't decided to dress all his staff up in Spider-Man costumes for the event our plan never would've worked, but luckily for us the tyrant had no taste. We served up some bread rolls, snuck off into a hallway, and waited. The door to the elevator was guarded by two men armed to the teeth with all kinds of weapons. Cautiously we crept closer, inching along the ceiling, out of sight. None of them could hurt me, of course, but if we took out the security before Fisk went down to his pet project he'd know something's up, and then we'd never catch him in the act. Sure enough, Fisk came, his body so broad he took up almost the entire hallway by himself. His guards let him in, the elevator slid down, then we pounced. They never saw it coming. Two quick web lines zipping them up to the ceiling. Their lips were sealed, their hands bound. They weren't going anywhere.
We, however, had a date with a collider.
Noir kicked the elevator doors in with a single heavy boot. They thundered down the shaft. Not exactly subtle, but at that point we didn't need to be. He leapt in without hesitation. Ham followed, then me. I felt Gwen and Peter jump after. I felt all of us in that dim tunnel, my spider-sense humming gently in the back of my mind. SP/dr readied the shock absorbers. We were gonna need them — it was a long way down.
Noir landed running, immediately leaping out of the huge dent he left in the floor. Ham did the same with his little pock mark. My landing wasn't so graceful. I left a full crater behind. B and Gwen had to slow themselves with web lines to avoid crashing into me. Then we were all running. Running along the collider's innards as it glowed redder and redder.
Overhead a female voice droned, "Initiating collision in five…four…three…"
On we went over a maze of pipes and girders. The collider was spinning, bringing the Reilly particles in from the network of tubes built under the city, a machine as big as Manhattan, maybe even bigger. Pre-empting it was out of the question now.
"Two…one…"
The beam in the distance coursed into the beam flaring out from the emitter below. We were in a tube, a vast tube, a chamber as tall as a small high-rise, and twice as long. The beams burned in every color you could think of, swirling into each other as they focused on whatever target Fisk had in mind. It was now or never.
Gwen looked at B, "Peter, you don't have to do this. Let me be the one to stay."
Hissing through his teeth as a wave of glitching tore through his body, he replied, "It's okay. I've made up my mind."
I couldn't even imagine how painful it would be to die like that. To slowly disintegrate, atom by atom.
He should've let Miles come.
Though I didn't want Miles to get hurt, either. There was no perfect way. No perfect way except to send them home myself.
There'll always be another hero for my New York. Someone will find a way to stop Mysterio, one way or another. I could even send you back without me, SP/dr.
SP/dr didn't like that.
No, you're right. If we stay, we stay together.
B swung off across the top of the beam of accelerated particles. The rest of us followed, joining him as he stuck himself to the chamber's ceiling.
"I'll put the goober in and take over the beam," he called, looking over his shoulder, "After you're gone, I'll blow it up. Good luck guys."
He went off on his own, punching each of the chamber's tightly-packed hexagonal tiles, feeling for the one that hid the emergency control unit, till suddenly—
I gasped, "Peter, wait!"
Even the early warning wasn't enough. In a flash Doctor Octavius burst through one of the panels and punched Peter B away with her translucent tentacles. As I went to chase her down the mech's sensors registered laser fire overhead.
"Oh no…"
They were behind us. A small army, all carrying laser weapons, lasers that could eat through any of my friends in an instant.
Gotta stop those first.
Back we went, back the way we came towards Fisk's gunmen. Scrambling across the thin platform they were lined up on I webbed as many as I could and slung them away from the beam, into the collider's network of pipes, but I was still surrounded — and there were even more above me. I saw Noir leap towards them, gun in hand, then he glitched too, just like Peter did before.
Is the beam making us decay faster!?
I didn't have time to work it out. I jumped in front of him, blocking the laser fire with my mech's shielding.
"Don't worry, I've got you covered!"
Deeper in the pipework Gwen was knocking out goon after goon, but then she started glitching as well.
I webbed up the guys shooting Noir and dived for Gwen, "Hang on Gwen, I'm coming!"
Then, as if it couldn't get any worse, I saw the one guy I really didn't wanna see.
"The scorpion…"
Dodging wasn't an option. He was too close. I took a direct hit from his claw and went reeling down to the base of the collider's chamber.
"Aarrrghh! Why is he so fast…!?"
We spilled over into the chamber proper. Up above me the beam burned sun-bright, forcing me to squint. SP/dr tinted the glass just in time for the scorpion to jump on top of us. He reared his stinger back, thrusted it forward, then—
I caught it. In my metallic hands I caught it, just barely holding it back. But I wasn't the beaten girl who came to this world. No, I knew better. I had people who needed me, and I had no intention of letting any of them down.
"You call that a stinger!?" I snarled through gritted teeth, sweat rolling down my brow, "I'll show you what a real stinger looks like!"
I let one of my magnetic hands fall off to reveal the serrated saw hidden in my arm. It was supposedly unbreakable.
Guess I'm about to find out.
Mercilessly I drove it into his tail. He didn't even flinch as sparks flew off of it, scattering across the glass like molten snowflakes.
"Get OFF!"
With all my might I kicked at his chest, sending him flying. I ran over and reattached my hand. As I did, the ground began to shake.
"What now!?"
A huge tower rose up from the floor, climbing towards the beam.
"Oh no…"
They were gonna bring something in, warp something to this world. As soon as it touched the beam reality would begin to deform to make it happen.
Gotta stop it!
I called out, "Guys, there's—!"
I looked up and was struck speechless by what I saw. Miles, in the flesh, beating up Doctor Octavius.
"Miles!" I cheered. He knocked Doctor Octavius out of the air and gave me a wave. But the good mood didn't last long. The tower had begun to intersect with the beam, and I could feel the difference.
"Oh god…" I whispered, clutching my stomach, "Is this what it feels like to have your atoms disintegrate?"
The entire chamber started deforming all around me. Buildings and vehicles and random lumps of metal started bubbling up out of nowhere in a rainbow mess of non-euclidean geometry. My spider-sense was going haywire.
"Can't tell where anything is!"
Suddenly something heavy whacked me in the back. Instant headache. Then I was up, on a cruise ship, on a sign, on a skyscraper tipped on its side. The scorpion was in front of me, clacking his single, menacing claw.
"Why won't you leave me alone!?"
I got to my feet, threw some sloppy punches. He dodged them all.
Rockets…
Explosives always did the trick, and there were no civilians around for me to worry about, either.
"Alright mister, you asked for it!"
From out of my back rose a chamber of six missiles. More than enough to level a building. With a normal human I'd never use this much force, but I had a feeling this guy could take it. I launched all six of them simultaneously. In the blink of an eye they shot across the building's glass face, way too quick for him to dodge. Before he even had a chance to register his own doom they were right in front of him.
Then I glitched.
"No!" I garbled. The missiles glitched just the same as I did, passing harmlessly through the scorpion's chiseled body.
He laughed, "Nice try, little girl."
I stumbled towards him, readying the laser in my left hand. I didn't get to use it. Whipping his tail into position, he stabbed the joint in my left leg and sent me back down to the floor.
Crap!
He punched the mech's window with his human hand. Over and over. Splintering it with every strike.
How can he be so strong!?
I saw the claw, outlined in danger red on the screen. If his bare fist was enough to fracture the class, the claw would go right through it — and me. I swung my arm out to grab it, quick as I could, but I wasn't quick enough. He caught me mid-swing, and finally, with murder in his eyes, thrust his stinger straight through the mech's reinforced window.
If not for the sheer force of the mech's magnetic armor the gigantic needle would've made short work of my skull. Luckily for me the mech was made of tougher stuff, and his stinger became lodged where it struck, jammed in the jagged hole it made. I readied my laser once again.
This time I'll get you.
He was still focused on dislodging his stinger. The laser finished charging, maximum power. I aimed it as best I could, then I unleashed the energy all at once. It burned through his human arm, searing skin. He tried to pull away, but his stinger wouldn't let him.
Go down already!
In a fit of rage he grabbed the arm firing the laser and in a single savage motion snapped it in two.
I screamed in agony as all the nerves in my human arm began to burn. SP/dr immediately cut my connection to the mech, sparing me any more suffering. Now I was just a girl in a fancy seat.
"SP/dr…"
He had no choice but to endure that pain, and I had no choice but to watch as the scorpion finally wrested his lethal stinger free of the glass. He leered at me like a cat watching a goldfish, then he wound up for one last punch. The glass wouldn't protect me from this one — the structural integrity was all but zero now. On the screen I saw SP/dr redirecting all energy to the emergency forcefield.
What are you doing!? That forcefield won't protect you!
Like a bubble it would shield the human pilot. But in turn the mech would lose any magnetic protection, becoming nothing more than a well-built metal shell.
I leaned forward, ready to key in an override. Luckily I didn't need to.
"OOF!" the scorpion huffed, grimacing in pain as a colossal anvil cracked down on his skull.
The culprit strolled up to him with an innocent look on his face.
"HAM!" I cheered. The relief was so intense that I almost started crying there and then.
The scorpion, who was easily ten times Ham's size, snickered, "What are you, some kind of silly cartoon?"
Ham's expression darkened, "You got a problem with cartoons?"
The scorpion didn't wait. He immediately threw a titanic punch at Ham's small head. But Ham was fast. He dodged the blow easily, and struck back with his own. Every attempted strike by the scorpion was met with ten from Ham, and slowly but surely the scorpion began to get disoriented.
"You pest!" he roared, and he leaped into the air.
Ham was ready. Pulling his trusty mallet out of his back pocket, he took aim like a batter on the home plate. As the scorpion swooped in Ham home-run'd him straight in the jaw, sending him spinning.
"GO ON HAM, YOU CAN DO IT!"
One more on the head, in the back, once on each arm for good measure. The beast was down for the count. From behind his splayed body came Noir. His gun shone emerald green in the beam's ethereal light.
"You son of a bitch," he growled, placing the gun to the scorpion's head, "this time stay down."
Suddenly the building shifted beneath us.
"Whoa!" Noir cried. His chance was gone. The scorpion had already come back to his senses. He snatched the gun and crumpled it in his claw.
"I'm not afraid of your toys, little man," he said in a low voice.
He rammed his tail into Noir and crushed him into the glass below. The building continued to tilt further and further, making the mech slide.
"SP/dr!"
But I already knew, from our psychic connection, that he couldn't stand now. The mech was totaled.
"Gotta get you out of your cockpit."
As I keyed in the sequence to free SP/dr I heard Ham cry out behind me. I turned and saw that the scorpion had him by his feet. The monster was readying his claw, aiming it at Ham's head.
"NO!"
Without thinking I shouldered my way through the mech's fractured window. I tumbled to the floor, got up, kept running. In front of me: the mech's dislocated arm, the scorpion, and the collider's endless streaming rainbow. I went for the arm.
Too heavy.
I thought, yet still I grabbed it, and somehow, lifted it. That got his attention.
"Not as puny as you look!"
Those were the last words he said. Straining every muscle in my body I prepared to swing.
I'm Peni Parker.
Dragging the arm up, round.
Child genius.
Charging towards him, screaming at the top of my lungs.
Hero of New York.
The arm thundered into his exposed gut, winding him.
"Stay! DOWN!"
Off his feet, into the glass, rolling and rolling. I released the mech's arm and it sailed after him, clunking into his face. Like a dead fish he tumbled off the edge into the chaos below. Struggling for breath, I collapsed face-down next to Noir.
"Damn, Peni," he coughed, "Didn't know you had it in ya."
I laughed feebly, "Nor did I."
From above, Ham said, "I know you guys are having fun, but in case you forgot, we've got a job to do."
Noir dragged himself to his feet, "You got that right."
I tried to push myself up, but my arms were jelly.
"Ugh," I grunted as my cheek met hard glass once more. Then a pair of gentle hands lifted me up.
"Noir…"
"Come 'ere," he said, flopping me onto his back.
"We have to save SP/dr…"
"Way ahead of you."
The mech's emoji screen was flickering erratically. My connection to SP/dr told me that the power was fading.
I tapped on Noir's shoulder, "Put me down, I have to get him out."
Shakily I dropped down onto my own two feet. I searched round the mech's exterior for the emergency exit. It was dented, stuck in place.
"Hang on buddy."
With the last remaining strength in my arms I pried it open and he came scampering out, rushing up my arm to the safety of my hair.
I stumbled backwards, "Okay Noir, I think I'm ready for you to carry me again now."
Ham joked, "You sound drunk."
I managed a laugh, "If this is what being drunk is like, I'm never gonna ever drink alcohol, no matter how old I am."
Noir asked, "Need me to carry your mech?"
Ham gave me a sorrowful look. I explained, "No… it's…"
Gone.
Beyond repair. My dad's mech. My mech. The mech we designed and built together.
I felt a tear fall down my cheek, "It's gone… that was all I had left of him, and now…"
Noir took my hand, "As long as you have your memories, he'll be there, Peni."
I wiped my eyes, "I guess so."
The building gave another violent lurch. The mech began to slide away towards the technicolor vortex below us. Then from the ceiling we heard—
"Guys, I got control of the beam! Get over here!"
"That's our cue," Ham said, "and not a moment too soon."
"But—" I sobbed.
Noir lifted me onto his back, "Sorry doll, Ham's right."
Far too quickly we leapt into the air towards Miles. I looked back over my shoulder and watched as the building, and what remained of my mech, sunk into the beam and disappeared.
Goodbye…
SP/dr showed me images of us together at some work bench somewhere, drawing up blueprints and tinkering with computer chips.
You're right… the important thing is that we're together. You and me forever, SP/dr.
Miles smiled at me as we latched onto the ceiling, "Nobody told me it'd all be in Japanese."
Through bleary eyes I examined the control panel. Writing in Japanese is an old habit I got from my dad. Japanese characters are much more efficient to type, and especially to read. I must've been so tired I didn't even think that someone else might be using it.
Well, I was gonna give my own life, after all.
But now I didn't have to. Calming myself down as best I could, I explained everything to Miles, and he easily figured out how to configure the beam to point to my home universe.
"Alright, portal's open. You first, Peni."
I had so many things I wanted to say, and yet somehow my mind was completely blank. For a moment I just stared at them all, one by one, in the soft purple light that the beam had taken on now that it'd been stabilized to my universe.
There was so much to say, and so much that could never be said. Will I ever see you again? Will you still remember me years from now? Will my memories disappear once I go back?
In the end, the words that left my lips were, "It's nice to know I'm not alone."
Miles grinned, "I never thought saving the multiverse would get me so many friends."
I'm gonna miss you so much. All of you.
"Thank you guys…" I said, trying my hardest not to cry, trying my hardest to make sure that they remembered me smiling and happy, "…from both of us."
We all hugged then, stuck there on the ceiling, suspended above an impossible wormhole. It felt good, like the hugs my dad used to give me. Then it was time to go.
"Goodbye."
As the tears forced their way out I gave a quick salute and dived into the stream of pure energy. My friends got smaller… and smaller…and the light got brighter, till finally they all but disappeared.
Suspended in nothingness, no one was around to watch me cry, so I let my tears flow freely.
"I loved them," I sobbed, "And now I'll never see them again."
"Peni!?"
I yelped and jumped back in shock. I was in the main hallway at Mason Banks, near the front entrance — at least that's what it looked like. The reception desk was there, albeit unmanned, and the doors looked the same, and there was—
"Harry!?"
He grabbed my arm and dragged me to the side, "Where have you been!? Everyone's looking all over for you."
"I—"
"You know what, forget it, we haven't got time. You need to hide," he looked around frantically, "Is there like, a secret lab here or something? We can't stay here, Peni, we can't!"
"A secret lab? I don't think so. Harry, what's going on?"
Now he was crying, "They're coming for my dad. Mysterio and his army."
"His what…!?"
"They took Cindy…"
"They took Cindy!? How long was I gone?"
He could barely string a sentence together through his sobbing, "I don't know, maybe a week? I lost track of time."
"What day is it? Where are the teachers?"
"There is no school. Everything's gone crazy! Dad told me to hide here till things were under control. That was two days ago! I tried calling him but he won't pick up!"
"Oh boy…"
No mech, no Cindy, no spider-friends, and apparently no Mr. Osborn, either. The odds were stacked against me about as much as they possibly could be. I thought of Ham, Noir and the others back in old New York, and my heart ached.
I miss them already.
I didn't even want to think about never seeing them again. I had to see them again, and to see them again I had to set things right here, in my own world.
I took a deep breath, "We need to go to Oscorp."
Harry looked at me like I'd just popped my head off my shoulders, "Oscorp? Are you serious? It'll be swarming with Mysterio's creepy cultists."
"We'll just take the fun route."
"The fun route?"
"There's more than one way into a place, Harry."
Like straight down a private elevator, for instance.
He paced away, shaking his head, "You're crazy."
"Waiting here is crazy."
He kept pacing, "I guess in your mech it'll be fine."
I averted my eyes from his gaze, "Yeahhhh, about that."
His face dropped, "No."
"Look—"
"You didn't."
"Well, I didn't—"
"Peni you can't be serious."
"I can fix it. Well, more like rebuild it."
"Oh my god you're serious…"
It was gonna be a tough journey. Near impossible, probably. The whole place could be wrecked, everyone could be dead. I didn't know how bad things had gotten, and nor did Harry. We were both blind in that respect. A week ago I might've given up, just accepted Mysterio's victory, but not anymore. I'd seen how things could be. I'd learned what real freedom felt like, what friendship and teamwork felt like. With SP/dr's help I'd finally defeated Octavius, and though I lost my mech in the process, I'd even defeated a cybernetic super scorpion with my own two hands. I was ready.
I can do this. We can do this.
SP/dr, the best eight-legged cheerleader in 3145 AD, sent me his support through our psychic connection. He'd always believed in me, just like I'd always believed in him. As Harry and I collected supplies for our journey he sent me every ounce of positive energy in his tiny body. As we walked back to the main entrance, weighed down by makeshift armor and half-baked weaponry, he colored my thoughts with images of us swinging freely through New York's maze of sky-piercing towers. As the school's autodoors opened onto a strobe-lit night, he gave me bright daydreams of the mech sitting happily in my aunt and uncle's backyard. And though the sky was dark, and the world was broken, in that moment I felt certain that I had what it took to set things right.
