The evening air was quite balmy tonight as Arryn Belladonna sat in front of her laptop, typing furiously to add more words to her current Magnum Opus. She was focused so intently on her sacred work that her room could be on fire and she wouldn't have either noticed or cared.
There were fictional characters to ship together, after all.
"'How dare you invade our sleeping quarters like this!' Akko shouted at the black-clad intruder, already drawing her tanto knife from its hiding place, 'State your intent, ninja!'"
This was going to be the best Samurai Passions fanfic she'd ever written! (...until the next one, of course.)
"'...I've come for you, Akko,' the dark figure said, drawing a blade of her own from her back, 'Tonight you will be mine.'"
She paused her writing only to take a few gulps from the water bottle she had on the desk next to her. Things were about to get ...spicy, and she couldn't afford to lose concentration on her fantasies, not when she was so in the zone right now.
"Then...as Akko beheld her opponent Kuroko's glistening steel leveled at her, the detergent of death but a hair's breadth away from them, only one thought raced through her head: 'Now that's a kata-'"
"Hey, Arryn!" a familiar voice called from her open window, causing the dark-haired girl to shriek and flail about in shock for a moment before slowly turning around to see who had spoken.
Sure enough, a familiar mop of red-tinted hair and a face one could objectively (or subjectively for some…) describe as "cherubic" attached to a red and black colored spandex suit sat casually on her sill, giving her a quick, friendly wave.
"What's up?"
"...Lindsay...how long have you been waiting there?" Arryn dreaded what the answer might be, but her curiosity needed to be satisfied.
The young superhero shrugged. "Since you started describing Shiroko's nightwear in explicit detail," she said, "You seemed like you were really on a roll, so I didn't want to bother you. Why?"
Arryn felt her soul completely shrivel up and crumble to dust as she slid onto the floor and curled into a ball under her desk.
"Uh...you ok there, Arryn?"
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
So, note to self: text Arryn next time I pop in for a visit so I don't interrupt her "fanficiton time". Seriously, she stayed like that for almost an hour until Kara got here and was able to coax her back out with promises of Japanese soda. (Which I'd had once before on Arryn's insistence; it was aight, nothing special, though.)
Once that was taken care of the conversation steered towards what had just happened with me and Spider-Jen and my realization that she had a Grimmbiote that had somehow been missed last time. You know, aside from that other one I tussled with a little while ago.
"This is bad," Kara unnecessarily noted, frowning, "in fact, this is probably the worst outcome I can imagine for you, Lindsay: a foe your Spider-Sense can't pick up, and on top of that, both Jennifer and the Grimmbiote have an unhealthy hatred towards you...frankly, I'm surprised you're still alive right now."
Wow, way to sugarcoat the situation, Kars.
"I don't know why, but no one ever suspects that I'll use my size-changing powers, so I'm just not gonna question it."
"Social's blowing up about it," Arryn noted, turning her laptop for us to see. Apparently "hashtag SpiderCatFight" was trending. "Some of the nicer posts I've seen were debating which of you would actually win, or giving their two sense about the situation in general."
"...and the not nice ones?" I asked. I had a feeling I already knew what the answer would be, but I still had to know.
Arryn coughed once before answering, her face getting red. "...they, and I quote, 'wouldn't mind getting caught in a web between both of you', unquote…"
Yeah...that figures.
"Forget about that for a moment," Kara said, "we need to come up with a plan for how to deal with Jen now that we know why she has the same powers as you do."
"Yeah, I know, and I already thought of that." I peeked out the window again (which was closed on the off chance any of our voices carried) but didn't see anyone. "There's one more person that should be a part of this conversation before we start getting serious."
"Who," Arryn wondered, "you mom?"
"No, I don't want her to yell at me out of motherly love just yet."
"Then who?"
I gave both my friends a devious smile. "Only a little someone known as Tiger Queen. She's an up and comer in the superhero game, perhaps you've heard of her?~"
Arryn's eyes immediately lit up when I dropped TQ's name, but Kara glared at me.
"No need to act so smug about it…"
"Sorry. But yeah, I gave her a call on my way here, and she's sending someone to pick us up for a rendezvous in town." Her suggestion when I summarized my encounter with Jen Nikos. "They should be here any minute now…"
Sure enough, a fancy-looking grey sedan pulled up in front of Arryn's place about five minutes later, an absolute GIANT stepping out and holding up a small sign that read "Belladonna & Co." for a few seconds before heading up to ring the doorbell.
And when I say "giant", I mean it; Mr. Belladonna is a pretty big guy himself, and the driver was easily about as tall as him.
For the record, you could fit two Mrs. Belladonnas in one Mr. Belladonna and still have room left over.
"Arryn, sweetie?" Mrs. B called up to us, "There's an...impressive-looking gentleman here who says he's the taxi for you and your little friends?"
"Yeah, we'll be right down, Mom!"
"Just gimme a sec to put my civvies on," I informed my friends, "I don't want to give your mom a heart attack."
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
Ok, so I know I said "sedan" before, but this car was actually more like a limousine but without the long middle. Like, Mom's little coup had a sunroof, and for the longest time, I'd thought that was the height of luxury.
This car had vibrating seats.
Vibrating.
Seats.
So you could get a massage while going to get some chips at the pharmacy, you know?
Needless to say, only Kara remained unimpressed by how Ritzy the vehicle was on account of she probably saw stuff like this every day.
"So where are we going again?" Arryn asked once we were underway.
"Somewhere secure," the driver, Joe, responded without taking his eyes off the road. "Miss Khan will be waiting for you."
"Wait…'Miss Khan'?" Kara had an astonished look on her face now. "You mean Monica Khan, the tech mogul and philanthropist? One of the most powerful women in the whole city? She's Tiger Queen?"
"Miss Khan would appreciate some level of discretion for this meeting," Joe said, "Given the topic of discussion you'll be having, it wouldn't do to let many people overhear the conversation, right?"
Kara harrumphed and sat back in her seat, pouting.
Sorry, Kars; heroes gotta protect their secret identities.
...why are you all staring at me?
"So how much does Miss Khan know about the 'situation', anyway?" I asked. "I mean, I know I gave her the cliff notes version before, but what does she know beyond that? I wanna make sure I know if there are any gaps I can fill."
"All in due time, Miss Rose." Joe took a smooth right turn before continuing, "Sufficed to say, she's been keeping tabs on our mutual friend since they began acting out."
...real informative, this guy.
"Are you Japanese?" Arryn suddenly blurted out, looking excited; her weeb was showing again.
"Soreha kenren shite i nai ga, hai, shi ha soudesu."
She probably would have swooned if I hadn't poked her right as she sighed.
The rest of the ride mostly passed in silence, apart from the general sounds of traffic and Arryn muttering to herself under her breath about how cool Joe was. Eventually, he pulled into a parking garage, parking in a secluded corner before he flipped open a panel on the dashboard and hit a few keys in sequence. The floor then started to sink, and for a moment I thought this was an elaborate trap. (My Spider-Sense didn't go off, but that's also been not-so-reliable lately, so…)
"There's no need to worry; Miss Khan has numerous measures in place for clandestine meetings," Joe explained, "whether on a civilian level, or a Heroic one."
That helped a little to set my mind at ease. Kara looked a little bit concerned, but she didn't say anything. Arryn was eating all this up.
After a moment our descent came to a stop, and Joe shut the car off and got out, opening up the door for us.
"Welcome to the Cave," he said.
The whole place was huge! Like, how'd they even get it under the city in the first place without anyone noticing? It was like someone took a four-story house, put it in a hole they dug, then built a parking garage over it. It was both surreal and impressive, not gonna lie. And on top of that, every level was staggered in a way that everything was on different platforms spaced out from each other. Come to think of it...it kinda looked like that weird chessboard in that really old sci-fi tv show they rerun sometimes.
"Miss Khan will be here shortly; please refrain from touching things, Miss Belladonna."
Arryn had the good sense to look sheepish as she pulled her hand back from one of TQ's suits she was about to caress.
"…sorry…"
She still glanced at all the cool swag TQ had while we waited, though.
Never change, Arr.
About ten minutes later Tiger Queen stepped out of a hidden elevator (part of the wall on our platform slid open briefly) and headed over to us.
"Spider-Girl," she nodded, also giving Kara and Arryn a nod in turn, "we clearly have a lot to discuss."
"Tell me about it! I was actually starting to get concerned for my life when Jen and I were fighting before." For real, there were times I couldn't rely on my Spider-Sense in a fight, but that usually cleared up before too long. This didn't look like it'd resolve itself so easily. "Please tell me you've magically come up with an easy win solution for this problem?"
"Sadly, I'm not sure there is one," she said, "It was all we heroes could do just to keep these beings at bay during the initial invasion, and that was when it was clear it was these 'Grimmbiotes' in control by themselves. For what your message it sounded as though his Jennifer girl and her Grimmbiote have a much more symbiotic relationship than the initial invaders did." She exhaled, "I'd hate to think what destruction an army of these more fully bonded creatures would be capable of…"
"Maybe that's the solution…," Kara mused from next to me.
Ok, that's gonna need an explanation.
"What is?" Arryn asked from my other side, "…getting an army of them?"
"Yeah, no gonna lie, Kars, I don't think we're quite at that point yet."
She wasted no time in flicking me in the forehead.
OK, rude! And how come Arryn didn't get a flick, huh? She's the one who brought it up!
"No, you dolt; Jen Nikos!" She paused for a moment, looking at us all expectantly. "...*sigh*...Jen is apparently obsessed with showing that she's superior to everyone else, Lindsay in particular. There has to be some way we can use that compulsion to our advantage, right?"
Actually...that wasn't really a bad idea. Better than trying to reason with an alien goo entity who might want me unalived for unaliving the rest of its race that showed up here.
"Any advantage that requires the least violence to make use of is worth taking, in my book," TQ said, "I wouldn't say we should stop planning yet, but that's certainly something to keep in mind."
Kara was practically beaming from the praise she got.
"But what about the Grimmbiote part of her?" Arryn spoke up, "Isn't it basically the Jagi to Jen's Rei?"
...wut?
"...Iago to Othello...?"
"Hmm…" TQ rubbed her chin. "...your metaphor may not be as precise as you were hoping, but I think I understand what you're getting at: with the symbiote lifeform aiding her, it's less likely that any attempt to reason with her will work, correct?"
"Uh...yeah, pretty much, I guess?"
"That is certainly a possibility, but without a way to reliably examine their connection to each other it's just a risk we'll have to live with."
"It was a good thought, though," Kara said, putting a hand on Arryn's arm.
...was it just me, or did her eyes have faint, little hearts in them just now?
Eh, probably nothing.
"Alright, we're making progress!" I clapped my hands once. "So, we know Jen has a hate-on for me, she's more naturally athletic than me, she wants to see me crushed under her foot, and she's got an alien that gives her superpowers like mine. ...how do we make that work for us?"
BRB guys, I need to use 100% of my brainpower for this. I'll let you know how things go, but I'm confident that between the four of us (five if you count Joe, though he hasn't really said anything yet) whatever we come up with is guaranteed to work!
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
Where is that girl? Dr. Rose fretted, pacing in front of the oven. The last text she'd gotten from Lindsay was that she was getting some fast food before heading back home...but then the news had mentioned Spider-Woman fighting her doppelganger over in the Mistral district and apparently winning.
That was four hours ago, an hour after Lindsay's text.
Dr. Rose braced herself on the edge of the kitchen counter, mindful not to bump any of the numerous confections sitting there onto the floor. Baking usually helped soothe her nerves, but that only lasted so long
Fear for her daughter's safety usually won out in the end.
She absently grabbed a cookie from one of the plates in front of her, chewing it worriedly. "I really hope you forgot to charge your phone today…"
It took a few rings before her mind finally registered the sound of the doorbell ringing; whoever this was, they'd picked a bad time to call.
The current batch of cookies for the moment, she headed to the door- grabbing a modified aluminum bat on the way- taking a deep breath to center herself before undoing the lock.
"Look," she opened the door a crack, "I know my life won't be the same after I buy whatever you're selling, I've heard the pitch before. But I'm not interested, so maybe you'll have better luck at one of the- ...other…"
What greeted her was someone's MASSIVE torso, barely contained but the suit that covered it.
Good grapes, you could land a plane on that thing…
"Mrs. Rose?" a voice spoke, forcing her to look up to see where it was coming from.
"...yes?"
"My name is Joe Daichi, I work for Monika Khan."
"I'm sure you do. Is there something I can help you with? I'm actually in the middle of something right now."
"I have a message from your daughter." The man reached into an inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out a folded piece of paper, holding it out to her.
She cautiously reached out and took it, keeping her other finger on the switch that would activate the bat's taser function, and unfolding the paper with a deft flick of her wrist.
There were only three words written on it in Lindsay's unmistakable handwriting: "BRING THE VENOM".
The bat clanged as it fell from her grip, clattering to the ground.
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
I'm gonna be honest with you, Fam, I don't know what I was expecting when Mom finally showed up in TQ's pad. I'd only realized that I never actually told her I was OK after my fight with Jenbiote (Eh...not punchy enough.), but upon checking my phone I found that it was totaled from that fight, so I feel slightly less guilty for forgetting.
Still bad, but there was technically nothing I could do even if I wanted to.
Anyway, the four of us had finally settled on a plan of attack against AliJen (Better, but not quite there yet…), which required the use of the Venom sample Mom kept locked away. Tl;dr, it's kind of supposed to be a Hail Mary if everything else fails.
With any luck, I won't actually need to use it.
For a moment, neither me nor my mom said anything.
"...uh, my phone broke," I said, rubbing the back of my head sheepishly. You know how sometimes, you have a million thoughts swirling around in your head, and you can't seem to pick any of them to go with? Pretty much what's happening here. "Sorry…"
"It's fine, sweetie," she said, "I'm just glad you're still safe." She held up a small, latched case. "I hope you know what you're doing."
"Me too…" I took the case, chucking it over my shoulder to Tiger Queen (who caught it, judging by the soft thud I heard). "Good thing I'm not doing this alone.~"
Thankfully, my quip did the trick, causing her to chuckle.
"Yeah, that's true." Then she held her arms open, "Hug Time?"
"Hug Time.~"
It was about due.
"..."
"..."
"By the way...after this is all over, you're grounded for making me worry like this."
...well, this was nice while it lasted.
"Oh come on!"
"If I may interject for a moment…" We both turned around to see Tiger Queen holding a tablet with a bunch of Science™ on it. "I need Dr. Rose's help in refining the Venom if we want to have it ready all the sooner rather than later."
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
For the most part, things were kinda boring for the next few hours: Mom and TQ did Science stuff that made my eyes glaze over (just cuz I'm bright for my age doesn't mean I'm not still in high school, you know), Kara let her older sister know about the Jenomorph (still not good…), and Arryn split her time between trying to touch all the cool Tiger Queen gear and pestering Joe about what "Nihon" was like.
He apparently lived in the US his whole life and didn't have the intimate knowledge of Japanese culture Arryn wanted.
As for me, I mostly just hung around and kept to myself, letting everyone else do their own- …that was a spider pun, wasn't it?
Welp, hello there, guilt complex. Been a while, huh?
Anywho, when I wasn't making myself sad, I was mulling over what I was going to do about Jen Nikos and her Klingon. Knocking her unconscious was all well and good, but the Grimmbiote was a different matter altogether. As far as we cloud tell (and by "we" I mean TQ and her gadgets) this was the last of those things, so if we could deal with it while leaving Jen relatively unharmed I would go with that option first. If I couldn't, well…
Then I'd have two nickels for needing to perform a mercy unalive.
Man, where is that Crimson chick when you need her? Or that Yang girl? They'd both be able to wipe the floor with Jen without breaking a sweat.
…and now I'm just imagining Crimson reenacting a scene from that one comic book noir movie, so I think it's time to switch gears. Maybe Kar or Arryn can lift my spirits a bit.
Come to think of it…where'd they go, anyway? I coulda sworn they were just hanging around the main hub of TQ's base just a minute ago. Man, I must have been really lost in thought if I lost track of Miss Weeaboo.
After sparing a quick glance at Mom and TQ (still doing Science) I started swinging between the different platforms in search of my friends, bumping almost literally into Joe after a bit.
Seriously, he looked big enough to tank a hit from Arryn's crazy Ex-boyfriend and not flinch.
"Spider-Girl," he nodded.
"Oh, uh, just call me Lindsay. It's not like you don't already know who I am."
"A professional courtesy," he remarked before holding up a tray with what can only be described as the daintiest sandwiches I'd ever seen. "I figured you all would be getting a little hungry by now. Please, help yourself."
Yeah, half of those are mine now.~
"Fenkf!" I said, having already shoved one in my mouth hole. I made sure to swallow it before asking "Have you sent my friends around?"
He nodded. "I believe Miss Schnee wanted to speak to Miss Belladonna privately about something, so they're back in the parking garage."
Really? Huh, I wonder what Kars wanted to talk about?
I really hope it's not about what they'll do if I don't survive this, but I'm pretty sure that's just my nerves talking.
He pointed behind him, "There's an elevator right over there. But Spider-Girl?"
"Hmm?" Mouth full, can't talk.
"If it looks like they'd rather be left alone, please oblige them."
I nodded, yoinking a couple more sandwiches before I headed over to the elevator.
I of course made sure to scarf the rest of my delicious loot down before I reached the top again; I don't want to be impolite and be talking with my mouth full.
…what do you mean I do the same thing all the time at Four Guys? You don't know me!
Anyway, it only took a few seconds for the elevator to reach the top. It took me a second to locate my friends once I stepped out, but that was only because they were sitting in the Fancy car again.
Not wanting to startle them too badly, I gently rapped on the window, giving a small wave.
They both jumped a bit but relaxed once they saw it was me.
I motioned for them to roll the window down.
"Hi. Uh…am I interrupting anything?"
They glanced at each other briefly before Kara responded "No, we were mostly finished talking anyway."
"Oh, cool!" I leaned on the open window. "So…what were you guys talked about?"
It was only then that I noticed a faint blush on both their cheeks.
"We…having something to tell you," Arryn said, looking a little sad. "You have a right to know, since we've all been friends for so long." She bopped her fingers together just like in her Japanese animes. "Y-you see…Kara and I…"
"Arryn has agreed to give dating me a try," Kara finished, "I've had feelings for her for a while, and she's decided to accept them." She then interlaced her fingers with Arryn's. "So starting today, we are officially Girlfriends."
Boy am I glad I finished eating in the elevator, cuz my mouth was practically reaching the pavement with how far it hung open right now.
"…wut?"
"Yeah, we're dating now," Arryn confirmed.
Surprisingly, that didn't magically clear things up for me.
I mean…Arryn agreeing to this I understood; her crush on me was not as subtle as she might have thought she was, so I always figured she swung (not a pun, I swear!) in that direction, even if she never explicitly stated it out loud. It probably also helped that her previous partner was a supervillain waiting to happen, thus encouraging her to lean the other way. Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if she wholesale gave up boys altogether after that experience, but I don't want to put words in her mouth.
That said, I was SO not expecting this from Kara, though!
"…ok, first, congrats. Second, when did this happen?" Seriously, Kara either had an epiphany in the last hour when I wasn't looking, or she was really good at hiding that side of her until now. "Also, how long were you guys up here? I didn't notice you leave the Den."
"When did I realize I had feelings for Arryn? ...I'm not sure, really, but after that attack on Four Guys by Garret I remember realizing that I dreaded the thought of losing her."
"And I really appreciate you dealing with him for me and taking the lumps," Arryn added, "I do…but Kara did stick by me and helped keep me calm… Oh, also, we've been talking for about an hour." Her blush got a little deeper. "...Daichi-san told me to stop touching Tiger Queen's stuff…" She sheepishly scratched the back of her head.
"I offered to keep her company, then one thing led to another, and...well, I just told you what happened."
I gave a thumbs-up, "It's cool, don't worry about it. By the way, Arr, I kinda wanted to tell you I don't swing that way for a while, so I'm glad I didn't have to let you down hard."
"Uh…thanks, Linds."
"And Kars? ...best of luck breaking the news to your dad."
"I appreciate the sentiment, Lindsay."
"Cool beans. …so, should we hug it out now, or...?"
"Hang on, let me open the door first."
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
After the hugging jag we all made our way back inside the Tiger's Den (call me, TQ; I'd make a great brand consultant) where TQ and Mom were waiting for us.
"How'd the science go?" I asked.
"It was…illuminating," TQ said, frowning, "Quite frankly, I'm surprised that you didn't suffer any more violent mutations from this substance than you did." She tapped the tablet she held, a large screen behind her which showed a bunch of information that I only barely understood, "To make a long explanation short, exposing you to more Venom than you have already would potentially enhance your current abilities at the expense of further rewriting your genetic structure. …I'm to understand you and your mother are already familiar with this fact."
"That's…one way of putting it," I said, though Mom suddenly found the floor incredibly interesting. (Not that I really blame her.) I couldn't see behind me, but I imagine Arryn and Kara wearing similar expressions to Mom's.
"If you were to be exposed to a second dosage, at best you would potentially take on the more literal aspect of your namesake. At worst the results could be…painful."
I'd be a former Spider-Girl, in other words.
"However-" I suddenly perked up at that. "-now that I have a better understanding of how Venom works, I should be able to synthesize a similar compound with drastically reduced side effects."
"For the record, I'm behind this option one hundred percent," Mom noted.
Same, ftr. "OK, so what are the drawbacks?" Cuz there's always a catch when something seems too good to be true.
Looking at you "All you can eat Extravaganza" at Kerry's Diner; you should make claims you aren't prepared to back up!
"Essentially it would supercharge your existing abilities to the point where you'd be theoretically comparable with Jennifer Nikos, possibly superseding hers slightly," TQ explained. "The drawbacks are that this would only be a temporary boost, and once it wears off your metahuman abilities would effectively be shut down for a short amount of time."
Yup, there it is.
"…how long exactly?"
"We're not sure," Mom jumped in, "not without testing it first, but we think it would depend on the dosage of the boost you receive."
Ok, that made sense.
Then Kara asked "How long exactly do you mean by a short while?"
Actually yeah, that does seem like pertinent information to know.
"About ten minutes." TQ hit some buttons on a console under the giant screen, which somehow got a bunch of gadgets to the side going. "That should hopefully be enough time to pacify your friend."
"She's not my-!" I started to say before a video feed popped up on the bug screen, showing something that was happening downtown. It looked like someone's camera feed they were live streaming over a middling to poor connection, but that's not as important as what it was showing.
Jenny Cray Cray (still doesn't sound right!) was throwing hands with some thrust who looked like they were in the middle of robbing an armored car, seeming to get riddled with bullets from someone just out of frame, not that it seems to affect her at all. The microphone on whatever device that was streaming this on apparently wasn't that good, cuz it was hard to make out what everyone was saying. (Though given how many thugs I've tussled with in my time, I could make an educated guess at most of it.)
What I (and everyone else too, I guess) could make out was when Jen straight up decapitated one of the thugs, pulling his head off in one fell swoop.
I glanced over at Tiger Queen. "How soon did you say this stuff would be ready again?"
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
Hi, still alive! Yes, I'm still working on this story, and there's only a bit more to go I can officially wrap it up. We'll see if my Muse doesn't suddenly want to work on something completely else instead... Fingers crossed, right?
Anywho, nothing to do but move forward. So until next time, stay safe and be Excellent to each other.