MAB86: Thanks. Yeah, things won't stay calm for too long for the heroes. Indeed, she'll need them for what's to come and who else better than Cap himself.
The Story's Shadow: It's fine. I'd figured it would be good to switch it out between the Spiders and the heroes. Indeed they do. Cap is the best when it comes to speeches. We'll just have to wait and see.
Noble Six: Thanks. Glad you're excited.
Earth-69826
In the middle of an open desert, a blue portal suddenly opened up, and out came the Spiders as they all walked out of the portal and entered the new world they entered.
Drifter stood front and centre of the group and looked around his surroundings to see the type of world he had just entered. "A desert...of course it is," Drifter thought to himself as he went towards his device as he tried to recalibrate it to best suit his settings. "The sooner we can find the spider the better..." Drifter thought to himself.
Meanwhile, the rest of the spiders were currently getting used to the new world they just entered, and luckily, without the strain like they had before in their previous travels.
"Wow, finally I don't have the feeling of utter pain when entering a new buggering world," Hobbie said.
"Yeah, lucky us," Peter said. "So, does anyone know where we are now?" Peter asked as he looked around his surroundings to see where they were now.
"It appears that we have travelled to a desert-like area." Spider-Drone observed. "And I am detecting no immediate life signs in this area."
"A desert?" Gwen said with slight annoyance. "Really? We couldn't find our spider at a much nicer place?"
"If there even is a spider at all." Steam stated. "Like Drone said, there isn't any life sign out there,"
"Let's not jump to conclusions too quickly," Spider-Man said. "We haven't even begun looking for him or her yet,"
"I don't know, mate, it doesn't look like anyone lives out here," Hobbie said as he gestured to the surrounding area.
Spider-Man looked around and did see that Hobbie did have a point. "Well, it's a good thing we have Drifter with us, and now that his device is fixed, we can get by just fine," Spidey said with a smile under his mask. He then turned his head in the direction of Drifter, who was still focused on his device. "Right, Drift?" Spider-Man called out.
Drifter didn't give a response to that, or even turned around to face him or the other spiders, still primarily focused on his readings. "Okay Drift...good to...Good to know." Spidey said, feeling a little awkward. And apparently he wasn't the only one.
"Is...He okay?" Gwen asked, a little concerned over Drifter's current state.
"Hard to say." Hobbie said. "He seems…off. And considering what just happened, I can't say I'm surprised." Hobbie said, referring to the incident back at the Translucent and the beat down he gave to the Chameleon.
"I wonder what set him off like that," Gwen wondered.
"Whatever it was, it wasn't good, that's for sure," Hobbie said.
"That's one way of putting it…" Sheriff said in a serious tone with his arms crossed.
Peter didn't say anything as he gave his own look of worry under his mask at Drifter. He seemed so cool and calm before, then suddenly, he just went mad in a second and had beaten that Chameleon guy to a pulp. He never thought he had it in Drifter to do something like that to someone. Even at his angriest, Peter never went that far with any of his villains.
But while Peter was worried about his older counterpart, Sheriff Spider wasn't feeling the same way. He was suspicious of Drifter since they left the nightclub. He was a little suspicious of him when they met and had a feeling he shouldn't trust him, but that came from years of experience and thought that he should at least give him a chance. To see that hopefully he was wrong.
But what solidified Sheriff's distrust of Drifter even more, was the fact that Drifter had a supposed deal with Dmitri Smerdyakov, or as he was more commonly known from where he was from, The Chameleon. The man was someone he had to deal with back on his earth and none of the encounters they had, started or ended well. And to say that The Chameleon he just met was anything like the one he knew was an understatement.
This made Sheriff worried and concerned for Drifter. True, it wasn't like he was evil or anything, but he'd preferred it if Drifter would at least explain himself, but he hadn't seemed to do so as of yet.
"You...okay, Sheriff?" Spider-Man asked his wild west counterpart, noticing that he was currently in his own thoughts.
"I'm fine, kid," Sheriff dismissed his younger self, who was still concerned by Sheriff's dismissal.
Spider-Man wasn't quite convinced of that but let it go nonetheless, thinking that he could help him at a much better time than this.
"Okay, the scanners are still getting used to this world," Drifter informed as he finally turned to face the rest of the spiders. "We just need to give it a little more time before determining if there's a spider on this earth or not." Drifter said. "So let's get moving on." Drifter ordered as he turned around and started to move.
Spidey shrugged. "I guess we're moving then," Spider-Man said as he began to follow Drifter to wherever they could find the next spider, as did the rest of the spiders as they traveled through this barren wasteland.
The Spiders followed their quiet leader throughout the rocky terrain for a good thirty minutes and the only thing that they could find from this place was nothing but sand, rocks and desert creatures, not big enough to pose a problem for a spider. But for some of the spiders, it felt like an eternity for some of them as there were no nearby buildings to swing to, by the looks of things, it looked like no one lived anywhere near here.
"God, do I wish for a single building to hook onto," Punk groaned as he felt the heat of the desert on him. "Don't know how much more walking I can take."
"You're telling me," Gwen said in agreement. "I just hope that we find our guy quickly so we can just get out of here as soon as we can."
"Considering these circumstances, I don't think anyone lives out here." Spider-Man said. "Hopefully, Drifter will let us know so that we won't spend any more time here."
"Yeah, that is if he even bothers to speak to us at all," Punk remarked. "He hasn't spoken since we started walking."
Spider-Drone spoke up in defence of Drifter. "He is trying to coordinate the exact coordinates of the spider. In addition, the scanner is still adjusting to the new power source."
"I suppose," Gwen said. "I just wished we could at least hear something from him." Gwen said as Peter looked ahead and saw that Drifter was following a guideline on his scanner, not even paying attention to the spiders at the back, making Peter worry a bit. Though he will ask Drifter how he is when they get off this world.
Meanwhile, at the back of the spiders, Sheriff and Steam were together, albeit reluctantly, looking over to where Drifter is.
"So...are you gonna confront him?" Steam asks.
"About what?" Sheriff questions, even though he knew what Steam was referring to.
"Don't play coy, you know what I mean," Steam said. "Back at the bar, where the Chameleon was nearly killed by Drifter. Are you gonna talk to him about that or continue glaring holes in the back of the head." Steam asked.
"Why don't you do it?" Sheriff asked with a raised brow as he finally turned to his steampunk counterpart.
"I would," Steam said. "But I feel like coming from me, the others would just say that I'm being a jerk." Steam said.
"Can't imagine why." Sheriff said with clear sarcasm in his tone. "Besides, I thought you don't care what they think of you?"
"I don't." Steam said. "But Drifter will put me as being as disagreeing with him, as will the others, whereas you can at least get his attention, if he's not completely involved with that device."
Sheriff stared at Steam for a few seconds before sighing in response. "You're right, for once." Sheriff said. "It's time I talked with him." Sheriff said as he began walking closer to the group, to where Drifter was.
Sheriff walked past the other spiders as he managed to reach up to Drifter as he walked next to Drifter. "We need to talk," Sheriff said in a serious tone towards Drifter as he walked up next to him.
Drifter however was primarily focused on the device. "It'll have to wait,"
"No, now." Sheriff insisted, still keeping the same tone. "This can't wait, it's important." Sheriff insisted
"Well evidently, it can," Drifter said in a stern tone as he moved up ahead of Sheriff, further angering him by his refusal to talk.
"Drifter, I'm being serious..." Sheriff said as he moved back beside his counterpart. "We need to talk about what happened back at the nightclub."
"No. We don't" Drifter affirmed in a serious tone. "What's done is done, and all I want to do is move on from that."
"Well that's not exactly gonna be easy now is it?" Sheriff said.
"Not with you constantly talking about it, no." Drifter remarked, causing Sheriff to glare at him at this attitude.
Sheriff was still persistent, and was even getting a little angry at Drifter's refusal to even speak to him. "Drifter. Peter. This is not something I can easily ignore. This needs to be talked about!" Sheriff said, raising his voice a little as the spiders behind him heard his tone and was confused.
"Sheriff, I don't have the time to-" Drifter said in a stern tone until Sheriff snatched the transporter away from him.
"Then make time dammit!" Sheriff yelled at Drifter as he stood there in front of Sheriff as salience rang out throughout the desert. "I ain't waiting another goddamn second, Drifter!" Sheriff said. "We need to talk...now."
The spiders were shocked to see this from Sheriff, usually he was far more calm and collected, the one referred to as the voice of reason. But to see him so angry like this was really stunning for the spiders.
Drifter just stared at Sheriff who was sending his own glare at him."Fine," Drifter said in a restrained tone. "You wanna talk? Fine then, what do you want to talk about Sheriff? Considering you seem like you have a problem."
Sheriff glared back at Drifter. "You're damn right I have a problem! I want you to explain what the hell that was back there!" Sheriff asked Drifter, his tone was a mixture of questioning and anger.
"It was something that grew into a problem that didn't need to." Drifter explained. "I was backstabbed by someone I thought I could trust. But I handled it."
Steam lightly scoffed. "Yeah, that's putting it lightly." Steam said as he stood near the pair, as did the other spiders who were worried about the exchange.
Spider-Man stood up before Sheriff and Drifter, hoping to put an end to this argument. "Sheriff, I can understand why your upset with Drifter, but I'm sure he has his reasons,"
"To which he ain't bothering to explain to begin with!" Sheriff retorted "I wanna know why you could even trust a man like the Chameleon, of all people, that's who you chose to go to for help?!" Sheriff said in anger.
"Why is he like a bad guy where you come from?" Spider-Man asked.
"Dmitri Smerdyakov, or most commonly known as The Chameleon, is a criminal known for impersonating other people." Spider-Drone explained. "He has also been charged with serval counts of murder."
"What?" Spider-Man said in a shocked tone. He then turned to Drifter. "Drift, is that true?"
Drifter sighed in response. "In most...situations, yes." Drifter admitted. "He has been a villain since I've known him."
"Yeah, and I know full well what a man like Chameleon can do to people." Sheriff stated.
"Your Chameleon isn't like the one I knew." Drifter tried to argue. "He gave up that life and ran the Translucence."
"Considering the way he tried to kill us, I find that hard to believe." Sheriff said.
"It also makes me wonder how he even got to that power." Steam ponders.
"I...never been able to find that out." Drifter admitted.
"Just why would you go to him of all people!? There could have been other options?" Sheriff asks.
"Trust me, there isn't." Drifter said.
"Well that's not entirely true," Spider-Drone said. "There are multiple people highly intelligent enough to help us with our cause, such as Tony Stark, Reed Richards, Hank Pym and..." Drone tried to list out the possible options but was interrupted by Drifter.
"No." Drifter outright rejected. "We don't need their help." Drifter said, sounding a little defensive.
"Why not?" Gwen asked. "If we use that thing to find even one of those guys, we could get more help in stopping Dark Web." Gwen suggested.
Drifter however was not inclined to do this. "No. We are gathering a force of our own to stop Dark Web." Drifter said. "We can't rely on Stark Richards or any of them for help."
"Why?" Spider-Man asked.
"Because I said so!" Drifter said in a serious tone.
"That ain't enough!" Sheriff said. "I'm just saying it'd be nice to know if we could actually trust our leader!" Sheriff loudly proclaimed, keeping his stance against Drifter. "If you could just tell us everything, this might not be happening!"
Drifter then turned his head back to Sheriff. "Trust!?" Drifter exclaimed. "You have never trusted me! Ever since I met you, you never trusted me for a second! You even admitted it to my face back when we were on that train!" Drifter yelled at the Wild West Spider.
"Wait, is that true, Sheriff?" Spider-Man asked his wild west counterpart, stunned at the revelation.
Sheriff sighed and admitted "Yeah, when you left us, I said it to Drifter that I didn't trust him. "And with stuff like this happening, my reasons are justified!" Sheriff shouted back.
Gwen spoke up to the cowboy spider. "Sheriff, while I do agree that maybe we should have gone to someone more trustworthy then the Chameleon, Drifter must have had his reasons." Gwen said.
"Because for the longest time, since I became the sheriff I've dealt with too many people that either stabbed me in the back or whose secrets cost something that can't ever be back." Sheriff said.
Drifter sighed. "Look I know you've had a bad past and been betrayed, trust me, I've been there." Drifter said. "But I'm not actively trying to get you to distrust me. All I want is to stop Dark Web." Drifter said.
"We don't even know who Dark Web is!" Sheriff cried out. "All we hear is that Dark Web needs to be stopped and that he wants to kill every spider and yet we don't know more than that."
"That should be enough for you." Drifter stated.
"He...does have a point there, mate." Hobbie said in agreement with the wild west spider. "I mean, do we even know who he even is?"
"Hobbie, trust me, I don't know." Drifter assured.
"Oh really?" Steam said, unconvinced of Drifter's words as he looked at Steam with annoyed expression. "Because I find that hard to believe considering you've been doing this longer than we have."
"I looked under the mask myself and saw no one I recognised, I only saw an evil bastard under that mask and nothing else!" Drifter yelled.
"Okay, let's just take a breath and..." Spider-Man tried to keep the group calm.
"There's also the issue with your story about Dark Web." Steam-Spider brought up.
"Issue?" Drifter said with a perplexed look. "What issue?"
"The whole thing about him wanting to kill every single spider in the multiverse." Steam said. "If the Multiverse is infinite as you say, then it would take him a lifetime to kill them all. So unless he can be everywhere at once, it's downright impossible."
"I have also come to that conclusion as well." Spider-Drone said in agreement.
"Look, it's not just the spiders at stake, but it's everyone!" Drifter said. "With the army Dark Web has, he could rule over the Multiverse if he wanted to!"
Steam scoffed at this notion. "Oh please. His so called army is filled with nothing but useless goons and dumb brutes. I doubt he could even take over Rykers, let alone the whole Multiverse."
"You have no idea what Dark Web is capable of!" Drifter yelled with intensive fury.
"Oh what, is Dark Web gonna send even more expandable gilders to us?" Steam scoffed. "I'm starting to doubt that he's even all that dangerous as you claim him to be."
Drifter snapped his head towards Steam with a glare, and if Steam could see under Drifter's mask right now, he'd see that he had a look of anger upon it. "Do not take him lightly, Steam!" Drifter warned the steampunk counterpart.
"Dark Web is more dangerous than anyone could ever imagine. He is worse than Osborn, he is worse than the entirety of the Sinister Six, hell, he's even worse than any of the Inheritors ever were." Drifter said with a very serious tone to his voice.
"Who?" Spider-Man questions.
"Trust me, you don't wanna know," Drifter said in a serious tone.
"Well, despite your claims, we're still nowhere close to stopping him." Steam remarked.
"Well if some people were with actual good intentions, that might not be an issue." Drifter said, looking directly at Steam when he said that.
"I'm sorry, when did this become about me?" Steam asks.
"Well considering the way you act like an ass towards other people, I'm surprised this wasn't brought up sooner." Gwen states with her arms crossed.
"And because you don't know the damn meaning of great power comes great responsibility." Drifter said. "That is something you fail to understand."
"Oh, well I'm so sorry that I don't embody everything that you're used to," Steam sarcastically said.
"It's something that should mean something to you." Spider-Man said in a serious tone. He could handle a lot from Steam, but he was not gonna put up with him not caring about the greatest lesson he ever learned.
"Oh don't start you!" Steam said, looking at Spider-Man. "I've had it up to here with your constant judging of me!" Steam said.
"Hey, you didn't even join us because you wanted to help us!" Spider-Man pointed out. "You're only here because you want revenge on a guy you haven't even met!"
"Because you people screwed up my chance to take down Osborn!" Steam snarled at Spider-Man's face. "If you hadn't showed up in my world, I would've finally finished Osborn."
"You mean kill?" Drifter asked in a serious tone.
"If that's what it takes..."
"Boy, if you weren't Peter Parker, I'd almost mistake you for Frank Castle." Spider-Man remarked, causing Steam to glare at him briefly before turning his attention back to Drifter.
"You don't get the right to judge me, Drifter." Steam-Spider. "Osborn took everything away from me and all I want is revenge."
"Kid, I'm telling you now, revenge ain't a path you wanna go down." Sheriff advised. "You think that you do, but trust me, it's gonna eat away at you."
"What? Because you think that because you're a Sheriff, you get to lord over me with your ethics and morals and act better than me?" Steam asks.
"Least I have morals." Sheriff stated. "And the good sense to understand when people actually need help instead of proving that I don't care about a damn thing."
"And the addition of brutalising people." Spider-Man added.
"You what?" Gwen asks.
"I use fear as a weapon against scum like the men who work for Osborn to show them that they will never let them rest." Steam said in a serious tone.
"Right, because all you do with your power is lord it over people and use it as a source of fear," Drifter said. "That sounds something Osborn would do," Drifter stated, creating an air of silence to fill the area.
Steam turned to Drifter with an angered look of his own under his helmet. "Don't you dare...compare me to him." Steam said in a low tone, indicating that he was truly pissed as he stood in front of Drifter, and he stood off against Steam as well as the pair glared at each other.
After a long silent pause, Drifter sighed. "This bickering is pointless." Drifter said. He then looked to Sheriff. "Whether you trust me or not, I don't care if you do. But you should care enough that there are still worlds in danger and the more time we waste, the more worlds are in his grasp!"
The spiders didn't say anything in response to Drifter as silence filled the air, unsure what to think of at this moment. Before Drifter could speak, his transporter beeped. He looked at the device and sighed. "The scanners finished it's readings, there are no spiders here."
"Great." Steam said. "Now let's get out of here."
"Fine." Drifter said as he prepared to leave this world with the spiders. But before he could put in the coordinates, strange sounds were heard nearby, gaining the spider's attention. They all turned to the left to where the sounds were coming from and it turned out to be a forming portal.
"Oh great, as if this day wasn't crappy enough we got more gilders coming to us," Punk groaned in annoyance.
Spidey sighed at this. "Looks like we got another fight on our hands," Spidey said.
Steam scoffed and rolled his eyes under his helmet at this. "Oh come on, why are we acting like this is such a big deal?" Steam asked. "We've handled these gilders countless times already, they're barely even a threat." Steam said as he stood by the spiders, waiting for the gilders to come to them and fight. But after a few seconds, no one came out yet.
"Why haven't they come out yet?" Gwen asked, a little confused on why the portal was still there and yet no one came out of it. "They usually immediately come out of the portal and come right at us,"
"Somethings not right here," Sheriff muttered to himself, his senses indicating to him that there was a different type of danger coming their way.
Suddenly, a cloud of smoke escaped the portal, engulfing the entire area the spiders were in.
"Everyone prepare yourselves!" Sheriff called out as he pulled out his revolvers and the rest of the spiders got into position.
The sounds of people exiting the portal could be heard as Drifter looked to try and see who was coming out of it. But strangely enough, he could only see six individual figures in the dust. And they didn't look like Gilders.
When the figures in the dust start to become more clear, Drifter's eyes widen in shock. "Oh no, not them." Drifter muttered at the six forms in the dust.
"Drifter, what is it?" Spider-Man asked until he turned his head to see what was making Drifter so worried. He saw the dust settle and what was in the cloud before, were six, deadly mutations standing before the spiders with murderous intent.
The first member of this group was a mutated version of Doc Ock. Wearing a yellow and black jumpsuit with a pair of red glasses that looked to be surgically attached to his face. His appearance resembled that of an octopus, with two long tendrils on his face and even having six squid like legs on his body and four tendrils on his back
The second member was, with long flowing silver hair. But that wasn't the thing that stood out to the spiders. Rather, her mechanical body stood out to them. Wither her claw-like hands, a slim cybernetic body with one red glowing eye. This being is or what used to be, Silver Sable, now converted to a horrific cyborg.
The third member of this group was what looked to be Kraven the Hunter, except he didn't look remotely human, his appearance was no longer human and now looked animal-like, bearing sharp fangs, feline-like eyes and deadly claws. Spots like a jaguar, teeth like a lion and the ferocity of all deadly animals. This Kraven was truly a deadly predator.
The fourth member of this group was what looked to be giant hulking made from what was pure mud, baring a grimacing look to its face, which looked like it was in deep conversation with itself. This Mud-Thing in reality, was a horrific fusion combination between Flint Marko, The Sandman and Morris Bench Hydro-Man. Forced to become one singular being.
The fifth member of this group was A robot, except that his appearance and features resembled that of a spider, even having a terrifying blue spider logo on his chest. He nearly looked like a human, but his skin looked metallic and instead of eyes, he had a blue visor. He also bored two spider-like talons on his back, similar to Steam, except these looked like they were bonded permanently to him. This man was once known as Alistair Smythe. He was more machine than man now, twisted and evil. He was now the Ultimate Spider-Slayer.
The sixth and final member of this group was a mutant, man spider creature with six arms, six eyes and snarling fangs that were dripping with poison. Though it did wear a tattered outfit that was somewhat similar to Spider-Man's outfit, except it was red and was even wearing a dark blue bandana. In another life he was known as Tarantula, a former revolutionary turned criminal and now a horrific spider mutation.
Cyborg Sable stepped in front of the group with a devious smirk on her face. "Greetings, Spiders, how wonderful it is to finally meet you all." The Cyborg greeted her voice with a mixture of sounding human and a cybernetic tone.
The Spiders, barring Drifter, were all shocked by these monstrous people that resembled their old foes, but now what looked like they came right out of a horror movie. Drifter himself couldn't believe that Dark Web would stoop to using the mutations against him. He didn't think he was willing to use them, but then again, Dark Web always did find a way to surprise him, even now.
Spider-Man spoke up to his older self. "Drifter, who...what are these guys?" Spider-Man asked as he looked upon the new group of mutations with worry. Some of them he knew, while he didn't recognize the others.
"They're terrifying is what they are." Hobbie commented at the sight of the six mutations.
"Yeah, no kidding," Gwen scoffed in slight fear in response as she was in a defensive stance. "Nightmarish monsters from hell would have been another good name for them."
"The Mutations," Drifter said in a grave tone as he looked at each horrific mutation.
Spider-Man looked at Drifter in confusion. "The what?"
"When Dark Web invades a world, it's not just the heroes who tried to fight against him...It's also the villains," Drifter explained. "But instead of killing them, he takes them, experiments on them."
"My god," Sheriff muttered. "This...is what he does to them?"
"The ones that are lucky," Drifter said. "The rest he either kills or doesn't make it," Drifter explained. He then stood in front of the spider group to address the mutations. "And last I checked, there were seven of you." Drifter pointed out.
"Oh yes, Stegron," Sable said with a disinterested look. "Unfortunately for him, he decided to go against Dark Web and now...well, you can imagine the results for yourself." Sable said.
"So what do you want with us?" Spider-Man asked as he stood next to Drifter but still kept his guard up.
"We're here because Dark Web wants you all dead!" The Mutant Ock snarled as he attempted to charge at the wall-crawler, but Sable raised her arm, prompting Ock to stop in reluctance.
"We are here to bring you to our master," Sable said. "Don't bother fighting, it won't end well for you all." Sable advised with a dangerous glint in her eye.
"Not that it would've to begin with," The Beast known as Kraven spoke up.
Sheriff turned to the beast with a look of shock on his face. "Kraven? Is that...really you?" Sheriff asked.
"Kraven let out an amused scoff. "It is my old foe, and as you can see, I have evolved to a heightened state."
"We all have," The robotic Spider-Slayer spoke out as well, sounding fully robotic instead of edging on humanity like Sable was. "Even losing our humanity to get where we are."
"Alistair Smythe as well?" Sheriff said. "Just how many old foes has Dark Web tested on?"
"You'll find more than a few familiar faces among us, Spider," Sable said with a small smirk. "Now back at the matter of hand, you are to come with us to Fortress Web, where your fate will be determined by our master."
"And if we don't?" Steam asked with his arms crossed.
"Yeah, probably best not to challenge them, mate." Spider-Punk advised the steampunk spider.
"Look, I don't know what he's offered you, but trust me, it's not worth it" Drifter said to the Six, trying to warn them. "You have a chance to leave and live your lives again, just take that transporter and venture off elsewhere and we will never see each other again."
"Live?!" Ock snarled. "You call this...living!? This isn't living! This is...mockery!"
Let's kill them!" Mud-Thing groaned, wanting to charge at and kill the spiders, as did Tarantula, who just snarled like a rabid animal.
"No, you fool!" Sable hissed. "We were tasked to bring them alive, if we fail, Dark Web will kill us." Sable reminded me of the six armed mutation.
Ock hissed at her. "What makes you think that you...know what...best for us!?"
Sable just glared at the mutated Octavius. "Know your place, Ock, you are not smart enough to form cognitive sentences, let alone lead anyone anymore." Sable glared as Ock reluctantly complied.
"Wow, and here I thought Ock was ugly before, but this really takes the cake." Spidey commented, causing the Octopus Otto to snarl at the Web-Head.
Sable spoke up again. "While I appreciate the offer, I'm afraid I cannot." Sable said. "We will be taking you to Dark Web, one way or another." Sable said in a threatening tone as the rest of the Mutations prepared themselves to take on the Spiders.
"Listen, while we would love to hear about how sad and crap your lives must've been, we actually have better things to deal with than whatever Dark Web keeps in its basement to come to us and make boastful claims." Steam-Spider spoke up to the mutations, not feeling intimidated by them considering they would've been easy to deal with considering what he and the other spiders have had to deal with.
"You're one to talk about making boastful claims." Spider-Man muttered under his breath, something that Steam didn't hear.
"So if you don't mind we'll be leaving now," Steam said. He then turned to Drifter. "Just activate that thing and let's be off." Steam said as he turned around away from the group.
Sable just smirked at this. "Of course, I understand." Sable said in a false understanding tone. "It can be very challenging for people who are better than you in every way...especially those who you know that you will never be good enough."
This made Steam stop in his tracks the moment she said those words to him. "What was that?" Steam said in a low tone as he turned his head to the cyborg.
"Steam, do not engage!" Drifter ordered his fellow spider, but Steam ignored him.
"What? Don't like it?" Sable said, taunting the Steam-Spider even further. "It's a wonder that you lasted this long with that attitude. I have to wonder if you're even strong enough to take even one of us on." Sable mocked.
"By the looks of it...it looks like you are too much of a coward to do what needs to be done." Sable mocked, making Steam grow more and more angry by those words, the same words he had heard throughout most of his life, from a certain someone who despised that reminded the cyborg of him.
"By the looks of it...You just don't look like you can do anything right." Sable said, making Steam glare at the cyborg for those exact words thrown at him, making him downright pissed off.
"Okay, that's it!" Steam growled in anger as she suddenly snapped around and charged towards Sable.
"STEAM NO!" Drifter yelled out to the Steampunk Spider.
Steam ignored this of course he managed to get close enough to Sable and manage to land a punch on the cyborg, sending her flying away from the group as she crashed into a nearby rocky wall, making a large hole in the process.
This action shocked all of the spiders for Steam's reckless action, as well as angering Drifter. The Mutants were also stunned themselves as one of the seemingly weak spiders just took on their leader like that.
"Whoops," Steam responded with a smirk under his helmet. "My hand must've slipped," Steam said as he stood out of his stance, all the while the creature shook out of their stunned states and growled at the spiders and prepared themselves for a fight.
"God damn it, Steam!" Drifter yelled at the steampunk spider for his brash action. "I told you not to engage!"
"Please," Steam scoffed as he held his hand. "She was barely even a threat, the rest are gonna be easy if there is anything like..."
Suddenly, the sound of chuckling could be heard, but not coming from the spiders. They all turned to see the source of the laughter came from the same hole that Sable was currently in.
The sounds of mechanical gears could be heard as Sable got herself out of the hole and stood up right, with an amused look on her face. "That was quite impressive," Sable complimented as she cracked her head.
"Now it's my turn..." Sable said gravely as her robot eye turned red. She let out a yell as she charged at Steam-Spider at a mighty speed.
"Oh hell!" Steam growled as his arms shielded his body in an x shape as Sable came charging to the spider and threw her own punch to the spider, managing to give the same effect he gave and sent the steampunk spider back a few feet away from the spiders.
"Get them!" Ock snarled as he and the rest of the sinister mutations charged after the spiders.
"Spiders, defend yourselves!" Drifter ordered as he took on Mutant Ock, along with Spider-Man.
The rest of the spiders took on a member of the mutations, Punk took on Man-Tarantula, Spider-Gwen fought with the Mud-Thing, Spider-Drone took on the Ultimate Spider-Slayer and finally Sheriff-Spider took on the beast like Kraven. The spiders indeed were going to have a tough time dealing with the Sinister Mutations, and considering their advanced abilities, it wasn't going to be easy.
Thanks for reading this chapter of Rise and Fall
So, the spiders have met the insidious mutations of Dark Web, and wouldn't you know it, there are six of them in total. Go figure. This took me a long time to make and I kinda need a small break for a bit.
As you can tell, some of the mutations are quite unique. I based Cyborg Sable off of her father, Silvermaine, Beast Kraven from the Spectacular Spider-Man, Mud-Thing is a thing from the comics, Ultimate Spider-Slayer is based on the spider-Man villain Alistair Smythe, Mutant Ock is somewhat based on his appearance on the final Ultimate Spider-Man episode and I thought of Man-Tarantula on my own.
Originally Spider-Slayer and Mud-Thing were going to be a fusion between Electro and Shocker and a Spider Slayer version of Scorpion. But after talking with Batman-Who-Laughs, I decided to change them out with Mud-Thing and Spider Slayer.
Sorry it took me a while to do this, I was a bit stumped on how to write this. I was gonna write the beginning of the fight, but decided to save it for the next chapter.
Anyways. Thanks for reading this chapter and next time, The Spiders will face off against the Six Mutations with expected complications. Thanks and see you around!