A/N: I'm glad everyone's still enjoying. Wouldn't want to bore you people! Keep reviewing!
Spiderbob: Technically, Spider-Man is a mutant. He may not have been born with his super-powers, but that doesn't change the fact that he was mutated because of the spider bite and the venom within. The bite caused a sudden, hyper-rapid mutation of his genetic structure; most writers and novelists who get paid to research and write Spider-Man stories tend to agree on this point (example: The Venom Factor by Diane Duane). In which case, there's no need for me to say this fic is AU. Thanks for bringing that subject to light, though; several people have had questions about that.
ShadowShock: I'm glad you like it. As for what happens next, well, you're about to find out!
Sam: I'm afraid I'm not an avid reader of the comics. I'm more into the novels. So I've never seen Spidey try to talk Toad out of suicide. It sounds like it was interesting, though. Your other wish may yet be granted.
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That evening, Spider-Man took to a silent patrol. He knew that he was needed, even if he was wanted by police. He had no idea how many were in Lehnsherr's Brotherhood, but he was sure that if the mutant violence kept up, he'd find out.
So far, I've taken out four mutants who have apparent ties with the Brotherhood. Surely there can't be that many more of them... if five X-Men could take on the Brotherhood in its entirety, surely I can take it on one by one...
But having to do this by myself is unnerving. I really wish I had some help about now... but Black Cat is on their side now, and no one else can be found. Not even the Avengers or the Fantastic Four!
He sighed as he spun webs across the city, making sure to stay well out of sight. No point in taking any chance on people -- like Jameson -- who were more than willing to turn him in, even after they'd seen all he'd done after the robbery incidents.
But how can I prove to anyone it wasn't me? All I've got to go on is my word, and that, admittedly, isn't much. Not to them, anyway. Guess I'll just have to act in a manner that says I didn't do it... but haven't I been using that manner all along?
And who would want to frame me? It doesn't make sense...
He heard police sirens off in the distance... perhaps about twenty blocks away from where he was. His spider-sense tingled faintly. Oh, boy... trouble. Something I seem to be getting into a lot these days.
Well, then, might as well go check it out.
He changed direction and headed to see what the trouble was. If the blue boys can handle it, I'll just stay a passive observer... but if not... oh, well.
***
Sgt. Billy Sanders had never done anything like this before.
Chased loonies behind the wheel? Hell, yeah. Chased loonies on foot? Of course. But I've never chased a loony swingin' on a rope before. That's new on me.
Sanders's cruiser was ahead of the pack, and as such, he was the closest one to the so-called "loony". And that loony appeared to be Spider-Man.
Takin' in Spider-Man? What has this town come to? It's all insanity. That guy couldn't have committed those crimes... it's not in his nature.
And yet here he was, on patrol, chasing down one of the greater heroes of Manhattan.
It doesn't make sense! Why would Spider-Man rip off all those stores? I know the Daily Bugle said it was to take advantage of the trust we had in him, but that can't be it, I just know it can't. He's been around for so long and never done anything like this before... why start now?
But it wasn't his job to figure these things out... right now, his only job was to make sure that Spider-Man was apprehended.
The brightly colored hero suddenly dropped down low and landed on the ground. And he simply stood there.
Sanders's hands were clammy as he pulled up and climbed out of his car. He kept the door open and used it as cover, then brought his gun to bear on the wall crawler through his open window. "Don't move, Spider-Man!"
The webslinger didn't seem very intent on moving. He simply stood there, arms limp at his sides. He carried nothing with him, but that didn't make him any less dangerous. Sanders knew he had to be extremely cautious, both from the advisories over the radio and from past sightings.
Soon, police cruisers had completely surrounded the area, trapping Spider-Man in a circle. On two dimensions, anyway... when it came to Spider-Man, they all knew about the ups and downs he'd mastered. Sanders fervently hoped that Spider-Man wouldn't give any of them reason to fire. The last thing he wanted was to be responsible for the death of a world hero.
He's saved the world a dozen times over... he wouldn't reduce himself to petty theft, would he? It just doesn't make any sense! Sanders's mind roared with such thoughts as other officers shouted orders at Spider-Man, intent on getting him on the ground with his hands on his head.
Spider-Man did nothing. He made no motions whatsoever; it seemed as if he were completely oblivious to the screaming going on around him. He stared straight ahead, as if watching something with intense focus.
Suddenly, almost before he knew what was happening, Sanders found his gun beind violently ripped from his grasp by some unseen force. His finger had not been in the trigger guard; nevertheless, as tightly as he had been gripping the weapon, he was slammed against the open door of his car.
He released the gun on reflex, and it flew far from his grasp. He looked around in confusion, and upon hearing surprised shouts and curses, he realized that the other officers around him were suffering the same problem.
The guns all landed in a huge pile almost directly in front of Spider-Man.
The wall crawler wasted no time in shattering Sanders's heroic view of him... he somersaulted straight through the pile of guns, picked up two, and began firing them at police vehicles.
Sanders ducked under the wheel of his car, huddling himself into as small a ball as possible.
How could this have happened? Why is he doing this?
***
Spider-Man saw it all happening, right before his eyes... and he couldn't believe it. First, the audacity of someone impersonating him.
Second, that that person was using the police's own weapons to try and shoot them down.
He hurriedly released his webline and fired both web-shooters at the pile of guns in front of the impostor, intent on not letting him at any more of them. Unfortunately, this tipped the impostor off, and he turned to aim both guns directly at the friendly neighborhood version.
Spider-Man fired a pair of bolts next, and both of them jammed the guns. The impostor pulled the triggers anyway, which only led to the guns blowing apart in his hands. He began cursing in a low voice, just slightly lower than Spider-Man's own voice.
As soon as he landed, Spider-Man leapt toward his doppelganger... but the impostor moved quickly, very quickly, and Spider-Man caught nothing but air.
"You're a bit slow to be Spider-Man," said the impostor, in that same low voice.
"And you're a bit audacious," replied the wall crawler. "I don't suppose you'd care to reveal who you really are, would you?"
"I'm Spider-Man, of course. And you are?"
"A lot better at the job than you." Spider-Man's arm snaked up and he sprayed a stream of webbing at his double, but again, the other one jumped away too quickly. He leapt high into the air and performed a prodigious upside-down 720, coming to land behind him.
Spider-sense--
Spider-Man leapt high and backflipped in the air as the impostor threw a foot out, meant to catch him in the back of the head. Before he was even back on the ground, Spider-Man fired another webline at the impostor, but his double was having none of it... he rolled out of the way, and Spider-Man's web hit the pavement.
The impostor threw a punch this time, but the spider-sense kicked in once again and Spider-Man ducked under it. He jabbed his opponent in the ribs with his own fist, but the impostor used that and lashed a foot out, catching Spider-Man in his own ribs and throwing him at least ten feet away.
Spider-Man groaned as he tried to get to his feet, but as soon as he was up, his spider-sense went off again. Too dazed and winded to properly counter the hit in time, he only managed to turn slightly as the impostor sailed across the distance in a fierce drop-kick.
Again, Spider-Man went flying... this time, he smashed through a police cruiser's windshield.
He groaned loudly as he crawled out of the car. His costume was now torn and shredded in several places, and beneath most of those rips were shallow slashes from the shattered glass.
The impostor didn't seem content to stop. He ran up to Spider-Man, grabbed him by his costume front, headbutted him in the chin, then tossed him at the nearby street lamp. Spider-Man rebounded off the pole, and he looked up just in time to see the impostor's fist heading for his face.
He ducked in time to save his nose, but his forehead caught the fist, and the back of his head was violently slammed into the pole.
The impostor whipped around in a vicious roundhouse kick and cracked his heel against the side of Spider-Man's head. Spider-Man hit the ground and rolled, dazed and coming closer and closer to unconsciousness.
He saw the impostor's legs pumping straight at him, and he reached out with one hand, desperate. He unleashed another webline, and this time caught the impostor -- of all things -- by the toes. He jerked back as hard as he could.
The impostor sailed into the air, but at the same time, didn't even seem to slow down. He turned the flight into a bizarre, moving backflip that landed him closer to Spider-Man than he had before.
Spider-Man rolled to the side and kick-jumped to his feet. The impostor lashed out with another roundhouse kick, but the wall crawler was ready this time and limboed under the strike. When he came back up, he lashed out with a fast punch that caught his opponent across the jaw, followed with an uppercut that sent him flying backward.
The impostor hit the ground, and Spider-Man quickly webbed his wrists and ankles to it. He then stood over his opponent, wheezing. "You give a guy a real workout."
"I'm so glad you approve," the impostor responded, sounding not the least bit angry or resentful about the situation. In fact, he almost sounded smug. This was not lost on the webslinger.
"What're you so happy about?" Spider-Man asked.
"I know something you don't... and it's something you want to know."
"Such as?"
The impostor's form suddenly seemed to warp and melt, twisting itself into something else. Spider-Man could only stand there, amazed, as he watched this almost exact replica of him transform into the image of Black Cat.
The impostor now spoke in a youthful feminine voice. "Such as where she might be."
Her (its?) form again changed, this time to an image equally as familiar... that of Erik Lehnsherr.
Lehnsherr's voice. "Or what he's planning to do."
"You're one of the Brotherhood, aren't you?" Spider-Man hissed, drawing nearer to the shapeshifter. "Why did Lehnsherr send you to discredit me?"
"To keep you out of his hair. Look what a good job that did."
"What are you talking about?"
"Nothing, unless you want to meet my conditions for hearing it."
"I'm listening."
"I want a one-on-one, no holds barred..." The shapeshifter glanced at Spider-Man's wrists. "...web-free, hand-to-hand fighting match with you. If you win, I'll tell you everything you want to know. If you lose... well, you'll be missed, I suppose."
"We've already taken a beating from each other. I could just take you in and have the blue boys give you a healthy dose of sodium pentothal."
"Truth serum doesn't work on me. Never has. If you want me to tell you anything, you'll have to hear it on my terms."
"And how do I know you won't withhold the information if I defeat you?"
"You've got my word."
"That's not much, coming from a shapeshifter."
"True enough. But it's what I have to give. Just like your word was all you had to give in the matter of robbing the jewelry stores."
Spider-Man frowned, the knitting of his brow visible through his mask. This person, whoever or whatever it was, had a point. Still he wasn't sure whether he could trust it or not.
"Think of it this way... if you say no, there's no way you'll get the information out of me."
Spider-Man thought for a few moments, then glanced up at the police cruisers. The cops were still huddled inside, their guns still inaccessible.
I shouldn't let her go... but she may well be right. And if she has information like that that she's willing to share if I beat her, it could go a long way towards finding Lehnsherr, the true mastermind behind all of these attacks. And she also said he was up to something... I have to find out what.
If this is the only way...
He looked back down at the impostor. "Show me your true form, and I'll do it."
Obligingly, the shapeshifter's skin and clothing transformed again, and this form brought the most surprise to Spider-Man.
This was most definitely the form of a female. She was young, definitely no older than twenty-five. She had red hair that extended to her shoulders. Her yellow eyes were full of contempt and malice for a world of humans that refused to accept mutants. And Spider-Man could tell, without looking too hard, that her body could and probably had attracted many men... he could tell this because she was naked, every last square inch of her blue skin exposed. Scales graced her extremities and made them look more lethal.
She grinned up at him. "Mystique's the name, and faking is the game."
"Obviously." Spider-Man bent down and released one of her hands, which she subsequently transformed into something razored and nightmarish. She used it to slice the rest of the webbing away. Then she leapt away from Spider-Man and crouched into a form of battle readiness that he's not encountered before.
Spider-Man brought his fists up in the standard drunken boxing form, and readied himself for her attack. He gave her a respectful distance, and he waited for her to make the first move.
She charged forward with a merciless drop-kick. He leapt high over it and crouched upon landing, only to have his spider-sense ringing in his ears again... she made a lightning fast turnaround and lashed out with her other foot. She caught him in the chest, and he was knocked back into the wall of a building.
She advanced as he got to his feet, rushing in quickly while at the same time providing as little a target as possible for him. She drove a fist into his jaw, then swung around with her other fist. He ducked, but when he rose back up, she reversed her swing and cuffed him across the temple. He was knocked to the ground.
I have to do something quick...
He pushed through his inhibitions about hitting women and slammed a foot into her abdomen. She recovered quickly, but not fast enough to keep him from performing a reverse somersault and getting back to his feet.
She spun around and lashed out with raking talons for fingernails. He ducked again and swung his right leg around, sweeping her own out from under her. She turned her fall into a cartwheel and lashed out with her bare foot again. He ducked once more, then drove a fist out and struck her in the temple.
She whirled about and roundhouse-kicked. The heel of her foot whacked him in the eye socket and sent him spinning. She advanced and slammed her knee into his abdomen; he doubled up, and in desperation, threw his fist out and caught her in the same area.
He stood straighter as his spider-sense went haywire again. She was kicking directly forward. He caught the foot firmly in his hands and gripped it tightly, so tightly that he thought he might shatter the bones within.
She jumped up off the other foot, whirled around in the air, and brought it up to strike him in the head again.
But the spider-sense warned him of it, and the world seemed to slow down again, this time close to stopping time altogether. He watched the foot come up and around, and felt her other one twisting around in his hands. He released her foot and ducked under the other one.
She landed lightly on both feet, but he didn't give her enough time to recover. He kneed her sharply under the ribs as hard she had done to him. She cried out and soared backwards.
He leapt up after her and, in midair, shoved his foot into her abdomen once more. As her form bent over his foot, sandwiching it, he lashed out with his other one and struck her in the forehead, momentarily clamping shut a vital vein inside it.
They both landed next to each other.
He landed on his feet.
She landed on her back.
And that was where she stayed.
He waited for a few moments, wanting to make certain that she wasn't just "playing dead." But no... she wasn't moving at all, save her chest, rising and falling with each shallow breath.
A few more tense moments passed.
Nothing.
If she was going to continue, she would have gotten up by now. Spider-Man bent over her form, grabbed her wrists, and webbed them together, then did the same with her ankles. No sense in letting her get free if she was to awaken at any given moment.
The police swarmed out of their cars after a few more tense moments, seeing that Mystique was finally down.
Spider-Man sighed as soon as the cuffs were tightened around her wrists. Now there would be no more imitations of him... at least, for now.
The police captain approached him. "Spider-Man, under the circumstances, we'd like you to come down to the station with us, if only to clear up this messy business. You've got at least fifteen cops that'll attest to hearing that... thing... admit to impersonating you. And if any information is gonna come out of her, it might as well be to you."
Spider-Man nodded. "Of course. But I'll be coming my own way." He launched a webline at a nearby building and turned in the direction of the precinct station.
"Very well," the captain agreed. "See you in five; the men have to get their guns first."
Spider-Man nodded again, then took to his web.
There you have it, Lehnsherr. Your shapeshifter has fallen... and I wouldn't doubt if she were one of your more loyal companions. Now it's time to find out what you've got in mind.
And why you want me out of the picture.
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