"Again!" Peter called out.

Rage burning throughout her body, Gwen spun around again and began hitting the punch mitts that he was holding up. They had been down in the basement for almost two hours now and during that time, she had managed to master the basic punch.

"Okay, that was good! I think you've pretty much nailed it." He praised her.

Ditching the mitts, the next thing he planned to teach her was blocking. But before moving on, he waited a moment as he noticed her breathing had rapidly increased and during the past couple of hours, her punches had become much harder than they should have been for someone who'd only been at it for that long. He could already see that her anger had reached its boiling point and was ready to explode, though he wanted to make sure that it was released in a way that was safe for her.

"I'm not ready to stop yet." She informed him, clearly mistaken.

"No, no. I wasn't packing away. It's just that other than punching and fighting, you also need to learn how to block off attacks." He stated.

"Peter, please… Can we stick to fighting practice for now?" She begged.

"I want to say yes really bad because I know that you're hurting right now, but learning only the fighting and not the blocking isn't going to do you any good." He said gently, trying his hardest to put it in a way that she would understand it despite her blind rage.

"Fine! Don't bother! I'll do it myself." She snapped.

Taken aback by her anger; even though he knew that it was coming, he didn't bother to respond to her as it would only lead to a fight and that was something that he was trying desperately to avoid at the moment with her being fragile.

"No, wait!... We can continue, it's fine. But tomorrow we start on the blocking side of the process, alright?" He told her, being firm but gentle.

"Don't worry, you have made yourself perfectly clear! I can handle it on my own." She retorted.

Kicking himself for rejecting her wishes in the first place, he sighed, unsure of what he could say that wouldn't push her further over the edge.

"I'm just trying to help, okay. It's fine, we can do more fighting practice for now. I'm afraid that you're losing yourself to your rage, Gwen, and I don't want to waste time arguing with you." He said, his voice exhausted.

"Don't want to waste your time?... I'm sorry, I won't waste your time anymore." She said angrily.

"Wha- Uh, that's not what I meant and you know it!... Please stop and think…" He snapped defensively.

"No, I'm aware of what you said… But if you can't see past the arguments then I think we have bigger problems." She cried, raising her voice.

"I really didn't want to say this but you leave me with no choice, we are not the problem Gwen, you're the one who has a big problem. You have too many emotions and you don't know what to feel." He yelled.

Reaching the end of her patience, she snapped and before she knew what was happening her hand flew through the air and struck him in the face.

"You… You think that I am the problem?" She questioned, hurt.

"No. I said you have a problem, not that you are one." He corrected her, rubbing his hand against his cheek.

"That's not how it sounded when you were yelling it at me." She whispered.

"This hurts me. I know you're hurting right now but what you're saying is hurting me too." He told her, tears pricking his eyes.

Seeing him cry sent a wave of shock through her followed by a pang of guilt. Suddenly she was speechless. Her hand flew up to her mouth as she tried to hold in a frustrated shriek. She turned away, feeling the worst she had all night, only for him to grab hold of her hand and pull her back. Her heart pounded in her chest as she looked up at him, then she finally caved in as soon as she felt his arms around her and burst into tears.

"I'm so sorry." She choked.

Still trembling himself, he stroked the hair out of her face and continued to hold her into him. Although hurt by her behaviour towards him, he knew that it wasn't truly her and that it was just the anger talking.

"Shh… It's okay. You don't have to apologize, I know what you're going through and it's okay to be angry, please just let me help." He pleaded, struggling to keep his voice steady.

"No, I can't… It hurts and I… I can't stop, it just hurts so bad." She admitted.

"Let it out… It's okay, I'm here and I'm not going anywhere no matter how much you try to push me away." He reassured her.

"I… I shouldn't have hit you." She stammered, her chest heaving as she struggled to breathe through the crying.

Without a word, he swept her off of her feet; her exhaustion radiating off of her, and carried her back into the kitchen and upstairs to his bedroom.

"W- What are you doing?" She asked sleepily, her cries dying down as her eyes began to sting.

"You need to rest. It's been a long and tragic night, and I think that you will be able to think better once you get some sleep." He explained.

Shouldering the door to his bedroom, it opened wider and allowed him to carry her through. Placing her on the bed, he removed her shoes and his own, then climbed in himself, holding her close to him as she began to fade into slumber.

Heading back to the mansion that once belonged to his father, Harry was beyond happy with how smoothly his plan was going so far. He already had his next move in line, and now that he was back home, he would map out the rest of his wicked plan.

Now that he had taken away her family, he knew that within a matter of days; possibly weeks, depending on how good of a teacher Parker was, that she would be coming for him. Everything was already in perfect motion, and the only work that needed to be done was to help her find him.

Logging onto his computer, he searched through the Oscorp database until he found Gwen's email. His fingers hovering above the keyboard, he needed to choose his words carefully. If he could successfully lure her out without her suspecting a thing, then it would be easier for him to take revenge on Peter without having to worry about her getting in the way.


Back inside the clock tower, Peter held on to Gwen's lifeless body. He looked around at the rest of the bodies that were scattered around. Her mother, her two brothers and, of course, her father. Guilt set in like a thousand knives stabbing at his heart.

He closed his eyes for a second, trying to take himself off to a better place, then opened them again when escaping this horror was impossible.

Jumping in his face out of nowhere was Captain Stacy. Peter backed away as the man got closer and closer, until he was backed into a corner. Leaning close, the blood soaked man looked into his eyes with stone cold hatred.

"You promised me you'd stay away from her, and then you broke that promise. This… This is your fault. You killed her. You killed my little girl!" The captain snarled.

"No! I didn't mean to… I tried to save her, but I couldn't… I'm so sorry, I tried." Peter cried.

"But you did! You broke a promise to a dead man and now you killed his daughter too." He raised his voice.

"No!" Peter yelled.

He closed his eyes again, willing for Captain Stacy to go away. Instead, he saw him even through his mind's eye. The man was everywhere and as the clock began to chime, his voice echoed throughout.

"You killed her! You killed my little girl!" Peter covered his ears.

"You Killed Her! You Killed My Little Girl!" His voice got louder, Peter tried not to scream in frustration.

"YOU KILLED HER! YOU KILLED MY LITTLE GIRL!"

KI-KI-KILLED HER!


Waking up with a huge gasp, drenched in sweat, Peter looked next to him to see Gwen still sound asleep. Not wanting to wake her, he wiped his forehead with the back of his hand and slowly, limiting his movement, he got out of bed and took himself off to the bathroom.

Running the taps, he let the water run over his hands and then splashed some on his face to get rid of the lingering smell of sticky sweat. He lifted his gaze and caught sight of the mirror. His reflection stared back at him, but something else stood behind him with eyes of fire.

"You killed her!" The words echoed in his mind.

Startled, he spun around causing a dizzy spell, but quickly recovered and saw that he was alone in the bathroom. His breathing relaxed, but his mind raced with a thousand thoughts. This time, despite the panic, he squashed it down. He did not want to bother Gwen with his own trauma right now. Until she was doing better herself, he would just have to try and hide it.