Part Two

"Hand over the money." The thug asked of the old Asian man behind the desk of the deli.

The Asian owner was an old man of fifty years; his white hair was slicked back revealing a maze of wrinkles across his face. "I have only a little." He said opening the register and giving the thug just a fifty-dollar bill.

The thug raised his eyes angrily and pointed his gun straight at him, "What's this crap. Where's the money?" He looked across the empty deli and then back to the Asian man, "Where's your safe."

"I have no safe." The owner replied shaking his head nervously, "Please, that's all I got. Just take it and go."

He knocked over the register and angrily pulled the owner across the counter, "Where's the money?" He demanded pressing the front of his weapon against the Asian man's temple. "Where? Tell me or I'll blast your head away."

"Excuse me." A voice from the entrance of the deli suddenly called out.

The thug aimed his gun towards the door, "What the hell is it?" He barked angrily. Upon seeing what was in his sights, his mouth slowly hung open in shock.

Spider-Man, in all his glory, stood near the entrance to the store, "I was going to ask if you had any Cheez Doodles but it looks like you've got some cat and mouse thing going on right now."

"Ah!" The Thug pulled the trigger and fired a spread of bullets straight for Spider-Man.

Peter Parker under the mask clenched his teeth as he leaped across the deli narrowly dodging the bullets. "If you want the last bag, that badly, just say so!" Peter said as he landed behind a display rack.

He could hear another bullet being cocked. "Go!" He told himself and leaped over the rack. He landed beside the thug and brought down his leg on the arm holding the pistol.

Immediately the weapon fell onto the ground and the thug let go of the Asian owner. The thug immediately made a break for the door realizing he had no hope of beating his new opponent.

Peter raised his arm, "Let's see if these web-shooters work." With all of his fingers stretched out he brought down his middle and ring fingers. One of the capsules on his web-shooters popped and exploded. "Damn it!" Peter exclaimed grabbing his arm in pain. He watched the thug slip put of the store, "Some hero I am."

The Asian owner got up off the ground and cautiously approached an irate Spider-Man, "Thank you for helping me."

"What?" Peter gazed towards the Asian for a moment and shook his head angrily, "What are you talking about, he got away!" What upset Peter the most was his hurt pride. He had been wiping the floor with dozens of those types of thugs, and he was beginning to realize that there was nothing he could lose to. Peter was practically invulnerable.

"He won't be back, and I'm alive, thanks to you, that's all that matters." The owner said before looking at Peter's wrist. The cloth there had burst and revealed blood pouring out of wounded flesh. "Come to the backroom, I'll treat it."

Peter raised his eyes and looked at himself and then to the Asian owner. "No thanks, I think I've embarrassed myself enough today." He said before quietly slinking out the front door.

"In other news today, known criminal, Flint Marko was found yesterday in what police believe is a weapons deal gone wrong." The television facing Norman Osborn in his study continued to relay information to him via the self-absorbed anchorman, "He is in critical condition and is being held at St. John's hospital."

Norman raised an eye and rubbed his chin, "He survived? I should've finished the job when I had the chance." Osborn turned his attention towards the documents that he had wired over here by a rather reluctant friend of his in the Justice Department. The sun beamed in through the open windows.

Osborn had worked with the world of crime before. After all, nobody got rich these days by being squeaky clean, nobody. He had employed criminals in simple things, mostly dumping waste, maybe a murder once in awhile. Nothing any self-respecting businessman would be ashamed of.

The documents gave him all sorts of information that few had any notion of. It seemed that in recent months nearly two-thirds of all crime in New York had fallen under the control of some enigmatic figure calling himself the Kingpin.

Marko had been one of the Kingpin's associates a rather important one as well. The Goblin's attack would surely make splashes in his organization and cause panic.

However, Norman's work was far from done. Right now, all he might be is a rumor, a name that was dropped every now and then on the streets and then forgotten after a month or two passed. He realized that he would have to hit Kingpin and hit him hard.

"Dad?" Harry Osborn opened the door to the study and peeked his head in, "Are you here?"

Norman Osborn stood suddenly out of his chair and gazed directly at Harry with a furious expression, "How dare you. Get out!" Norman barked covering his face with his arm angrily.

Harry raised his eyes in shock, "Dad, are you alright?" He said concerned at his father's behavior.

"I said get out!" Norman declared angrily continuing to cover his face any way he could, "Get out, you insolent wretch!" Harry took an awkward step back and closed the door. He grabbed the ends of his table nervously, "He almost saw me that time. Things are no longer safe here, I run the risk of being exposed." He prepared himself and went through several actions hiding the truth, "I'll need a base, something more discrete."

He made sure he looked fine and after a heavy sigh shrugged his shoulders, "Come in, Harry."
His son quickly entered with a meek disposition. "Dad, what happened back there?" He asked closing the door behind him.

Norman shook his head, "Its none of your concern, Harry." He was silent for a moment, "Why are you here?"

"Dad, I need you to come into school, Monday." Harry said, "Some counselors are coming in and they want to meet our parents."

"Counselor?" Norman asked with a suspicious tone of voice, "This isn't another one of your ploys to try and get me some help, as you put, is it?" Harry shook his head, "I don't think I can make it."

Harry sighed, "Dad, I don't want to be the only guy there without any parents."

"What are you implying?" Norman inquired.

"Dad?"

Norman took an aggressive step towards Harry; "You've always blamed me for your mother's death."

"Not this again." Harry remarked wearily.

"Shut up!" Norman barked, "I have important things to do here and you're holding me back like you always do. Why don't you bring along some replacement, God knows you wish I wasn't your father, and I'd like you to know the feeling's mutual!"

Harry stood there silently for a moment unable to even speak. "Dad, I want you too come. Please."

Norman lowered his eyes for a moment. "Fine." He nodded his head, "I'll come along."

"Thanks." Harry said opening the door and preparing to leave.

"Wait." Norman called out before his son could close the door. "Harry, I didn't mean those things I said." He frowned, "I just… I guess I've never gotten use to this whole dad thing. Even after all these years. I really am sorry."

Harry nodded, "I understand, father." He said just before closing the door.

Ben Parker knocked on the door to Peter's room, "Hey, kiddo."

Peter turned around in the seat that faced his worktable suddenly surprised. "Oh! Hi, uncle Ben!" He suddenly moved the objects he had been working with under the table and held them there with his hands, "Is everything fine?"

"Yeah." Ben said, "I just wanted to see how are you doing?" He looked at Peter for a moment and then spotted a white bandage on Peter's arm, "What happened?" He said suddenly concerned.

Peter gulped and managed to slip the damaged web-shooters into an open drawer without Ben spotting his movements. "There was an accident in workshop."

"Let me see." Ben said warmly as he walked deeper into Peter's room, "Why didn't the school call or something?"

"It wasn't that bad." Peter replied. He showed Ben his arm; several parts of the mechanical web-shooters had splintered off into his arm after the explosion and Peter had been forced to tear them out.

Ben shook his head looking at the red stain visible on the bandages, "This looked like it hurt."

"I guess."

"Look, Pete. You need to tell me these things." Ben said inspecting the bandage, "Who put this on?"

Peter shrugged, "I did."

Ben raised his eyes somewhat surprised, "You did?" Peter nodded, "Good job, although next time you may want to apply more pressure."

"Thanks." Peter replied. "Oh, Monday, you need to come to class. The school is hosting some group counselor thing."

"You got it, kiddo." Ben answered back taking a step away from Peter, "I'm going to be working on the car, call me if you need anything. Oh, and I want to take a look at that wound in the morning. See how it's doing."

Peter watched Ben leave the room and once he was sure he was downstairs he pulled his web-shooters out of the drawer. He inspected where the break had occurred, "I need to find a way to keep the pressure from building like it does. I'm going to have to get a better and stronger container for the web formula and that's going to cost money. I guess there's no rush, though, its not like anybody has proved to be enough of a threat to actually force me to use them."

He walked across the room and opened his messy closet. He pushed aside some clothes that were on the floor and grabbed his duffel bag. After opening it he inspected the contents: only three hundred dollars remained from his original prize money that he had won wrestling, most of it had already gone to getting spare costumes, the chemicals for his webbing, and the metal for the web-shooters themselves. It was just enough to buy the new containers he had in mind.

For a moment, Peter gazed at the dollar bills and wondered if it was blood money. He closed his eyes remembering that fateful day and his failure to act with a great deal of pain. He shoved the bag back into the closet and returned to conducting repairs on his shooters.

Harry Osborn grinned as he sat among several friends at a local diner. "Did he get caught?" He inquired.

"No." One of his friends from school replied, "The thing is Dr. Connors never saw him sneak out the lizard from the tank." He shrugged, "He might catch us on Monday but it sure was a funny joke. Besides, he said he'd return it."

"So where's Peter?" The blond, Gwen Stacy asked leaning forward towards Harry, "You said he was going to come by."

Harry shrugged, "He was supposed to." He brushed his brown hair and felt a tinge of jealousy develop, "Peter's always been like that, he's not reliable at all."

Gwen shrugged, "Maybe." She looked around the diner at the rest of her friends gathered together, "So what do you guys think about this Spider-Man?"

"Isn't he just a rumor? I mean there's not been one decent picture of him." One of them asked.

She laughed, "If he's a rumor, he's the best kissing rumor I've ever met."

"You kissed him?" Another asked, "You're lying. Bull."

"Don't take my word for it." Gwen responded, "Harry saw it, right?"

Harry once again feeling like he was coming in second or third place nodded, "Yeah."

Gwen placed her hand on her cheek, "I gave him my number but I never got called back." She laughed, "He was just dreamy."

Norman Osborn swooped down towards his target atop his glider in his purple garb. "Honey, I think I'll buy that one!" He said before madly cackling.

He flew over the abandoned steel mill, his glider's engine roared loudly. Norman flew towards the main structure and saw the mill was completely empty. He could still smell the old sulfur, even this high up.

"This'll do just fine." Norman would have to begin moving his Goblin equipment here, but after two or three days everything would be readied. His yellow eyes glowed brightly as plans began to form behind the focused exterior of the Green Goblin.