Part Four

            "Harry, my God it's you. I can't believe you're here." Norman sprouted loudly totally forgetting about his ever present foes and maneuvered his glider towards the young Osborn. "Harry, I didn't think this possible."

            "It is father." He replied coldly keeping his eyes locked on the Green Goblin.

            Norman stopped just a few feet away from his son, "This is wonderful, this could only have happened in my wildest dreams." He stared back at Roderick and Peter both in a silent state of shock, "Quickly, Harry, we'll destroy these cretins together!" He reached out to Harry with his yellow eyes glowing brightly.

            "No." Harry replied quietly to Norman's surprise, "I didn't come here to help you, I came to stop you!" He accelerated the glider towards his father clumsily. Norman maneuvered out of the way as only someone with experience could manage.

            "What?" Norman barked furiously facing his son, "You dare to try and kill me when I've done nothing but care for you?" He grimaced, "That's it boy, this breaks the camel's back!" He flexed his hands, "I'm going to give you the beating of your life that I should have years ago. You want a piece of your old man, Harry? Come on and take it."

            Harry roared furiously and powered his glider again for another charge. He's inexperience showed, Norman could see his son had no plan, just anger. Norman backed away his glider to the sides while his son flew by swinging wildly towards his father.

            Norman cackled at his son's misfortune, "Always coming up short, aren't you Harry?"

            Meanwhile, Peter sat on a tree branch stopped by the shock that his best friend, someone that he had confided in during some of the darkest points in his life had been twisted by his very own father, another man Peter trusted. He began to feel a sudden chill down his spine as the reality set in of what had happened here already.

            He turned his head to the side to see the HobGoblin pulling away with a joyful expression on his face. "Hey, buddy, you're not thinking of leaving are you?" He fired a web-line that grabbed Roderick's glider and gradually pulled it back in, "This is your party isn't it? You're the host, right?"

            "Let go of me!" Roderick screamed and fired a charge from his zap-gloves blindly. "I want no part of this!"

            Peter grimaced, "You want no part? You drag us all out here get us to beat the snot out of each other and when you get a little bloody nose you want to turn tail and run? No chance, Hobby."

            The HobGoblin flung a pumpkin grenade from his satchel towards Peter, "That's exactly the idea, Spider-Man!"

            Peter barely managed to hurtle himself away from the tree before the grenade exploded enveloping the tree in flames. He landed on a nearby branch on another tree panting from his near escape.

            "You've really gotten on my bad-side, Spider-Man." Roderick maneuvered towards the arachnid vigilante, "That was dumb."

            Across the city, in a small modest home far removed from the chaos taking place elsewhere, Gwen Stacy looked at an old picture of her and Peter holding each other in an embrace, it had been taken some time ago just after the Sandman incident. She frowned and sighed, dejected.

            Her psychiatrist was right, she had to tell someone, she had to know she wasn't alone otherwise this was going to eat her up and leave nothing but an empty shell. There were only a few people that she could reach out to. She needed guidance, reassurance somebody with a level head.

            Gwen's eye-lids suddenly opened with a spark of life, there was somebody she could talk to after-all, he'd understand better than anyone else.

            Back at Central Park, Peter struggled to break out from the HobGoblin's grasp, "That's it, struggle, you're already dead." He proclaimed holding Peter high above Central Park with his hands wrapped around the web-slinger's neck.

            "Hey, Hobby, hold on a sec." He said beneath the coughs and slowly wrestled Roderick's hand from his neck and pointed to the HobGoblin's scarred face with his free hand, "That's never going to heal if you don't stop picking at it."

            Roderick furiously pushed Peter away, "No wonder Osborn's mad, that kid never stops." Peter fired a web-line that connected with the HobGoblin's glider halting his descent. "Just die already, this is becoming ridiculous."

            "This coming from a guy who's flying on a mechanical glider dressed up like a Goblin?" Peter replied.

            Roderick smirked, "Point taken."  He dropped his entire compliment of pumpkin bombs down on Spider-Man eagerly.

            Peter didn't need his spider-sense, already screaming at him demanding he'd get out of the way, to see what was coming. He fired a web-line that connected with a much lower tree and let go of the line connected to the HobGoblin's glider. He swung forward barely escaping the resulting inferno to Roderick's dismay. 

            And though he did survive, Peter was far from safe. He was tumbling, he knew it. Despite getting a web-line secure the angle of his fall was all wrong. He slammed against a tree branch snapping it in half and ramming against a mighty trunk denting it deeply. Peter rolled onto the soil surrounding the tree weakly. He groaned and immediately realized he was hurt. Peter clasped his shoulder, dislocated from the fall and aching severely.

            Norman and Harry squared off in the sky, "I must admit, it's surprising to see that you can fly my glider, it's not an easy device." He reached into his satchel slowly, "How did you figure out how to use it?"

            "I saw you enough times on it after you had broken me." Harry replied, "I might have been dead on the outside but I was watching very carefully on the inside."

            "Impressive." Norman remarked, "Maybe there's more to you than I expected!" He flung a pumpkin in Harry's face which exploded. Luckily, for the younger Osborn it was only a flash grenade and not one of Norman's incendiary versions. He sped forward on his glider and landed a blow to Harry's gut while making sure to hold a great deal of his strength back.

            Harry pulled back holding his stomach feebly. "This is what you always wanted, right dad?"

            Norman grimaced, "Still playing the role of the bastard son, eh, Harry?" He laughed slightly, "You whined to all of those precious counselors and therapist about how bad a father I was and how much I hated you."

            "Well you want the truth; you want what none of those doctors could tell you despite an impressive wall of diplomas?" Norman continued furiously, "I don't hate you, Harry."

            "What?"

            Norman nodded firmly, "I never have. Harry, I am a man of many failings. My life has been troubled, my father was a weak man who attacked us any chance he got, I loathed him and well, when my mother decided to slit her wrists to escape him that was more than he could take and used a rifle to end his own miserable existence."

            The rage on Harry's face broke, "You never told me that, you said your parents died in an accident."

            "It's not something I like advertising." Norman responded, "When Emily died giving labor to you, I was…afraid, I contemplated following my father's example." He said with difficulty, "You have no idea what it is to fear that you will become your father, suicide has always been strong in my side of the family so when I saw you for the first time after finding out your mother was dead, I resented you." Norman sighed heavily remembering those difficult times, "Not so much you but what you meant, you showed me how weak I really am. I hate you because I can't stand myself, is that what you wanted Harry? How is that for psychoanalysis?"

            His son was silent; he absorbed the information and almost fell down on his glider because of it. The face on his father was a mix of anger and torment. "Dad, you never said nothing about this." He gulped slowly, "You don't hate me?"

            "No, I don't." Norman honestly replied, "There were times I envied you, I took away your innocence and for that I am sorry."

            "Somebody cry me a river!" Roderick proclaimed approaching the duo, "This is a lot of crap! I love you son, I love you too, dad! Come on, Harry look at what he did to you, you're going to let that go? And Norman even if you live to see another day I will make sure that you go down in flames, I'll never rest." Norman began to laugh, "What is so funny, Osborn?"

            Norman laughed, "I find it ironic, that you who proclaim how great and superior you are to me enabled me for the first time in my life to connect with my son, thank you."

            The HobGoblin snarled, "You want to connect? You can connect with him when you're both a pile of burnt flesh!" He raised a pumpkin in his hands, "Die, Osborn's!"

            Spider-Man emerged from the tree cover using his web-lines like a bungee and tackled Roderick with his good shoulder.

            "For the first time that arachnid is really worth something." Norman commented, "Harry, I'd love to continue our chat but you should leave, now."

            Harry was quiet for a moment, "Are you going to help, Spider-Man?"

            "Help him?" Norman snickered closing his fist, "Oh I've allowed him to escape from our little encounters unscathed for far too long."

            "Dad, he saved us." Harry pleaded, "Don't, I'm begging you."

            Norman sighed, "Harry, he saved himself, my imitation would never have allowed the web-head to live; he's a loose end."

            "Dad, please!"

            While Norman and Harry argued on the course of action, Peter and Roderick struggled against one another in a more physical sense.

            Roderick brought his elbow down on Peter's dislocated shoulder causing the latter to scream painfully, "Does that hurt, Spider-Man, it should." He laughed as his opponent gasped for air feebly holding onto him with one arm, "I'm going to do what a slew of costumed freaks never could remove your constantly annoying presence." He pulled out a pumpkin grenade and began to bring it down on Peter's head.

            Looking back on it later, Peter realized that it had been a suicidal move performed out of desperation but at the time it seemed like a good idea. He fell back letting go of Roderick beginning a tumble towards the ground. The pumpkin had just left Roderick's hand. Firing a short burst of webbing he impacted it, changing its course safely away from him.

            The second the trajectory changed he realized his mistake and screamed. The pumpkin fell towards Norman. There was no time for him to react, he was doomed. Or, Peter assumed he had been. Mid-way, still relatively close to Roderick, Harry intercepted the pumpkin allowing it to impact on his chest, exploding violently.

            Peter crashed on a branch that luckily held allowing him to see what happened next. The explosion reached out for several feet enveloping a shocked Roderick. Norman was thrown back several dozen feet but survived. That was more than he could say for Harry and Roderick. When the flames died out, there was no sight of either one. Peter had seen the fury of those grenades before, they were gone.

            He could see Norman screaming for Harry for some time. He roared and languished. After giving up the search Norman turned his sights on Peter and approached him.

            "You, you're responsible." Norman uttered to Peter who still lay on the branch slowly recovering from getting the air knocked out of his lungs.

            "I didn't mean for that to happen." Peter replied, "Osborn you have to believe me."

            Norman grimaced, "You did this; you killed my son." His face became consumed by hatred, "You killed him. So that's what it's come to. I will ensure that you suffer for this, Spider-Man, oh your pain will be unique; I promise that." He reached out for Peter's mask, "Let's see who you are."

            "No!" He fired a spray of webbing into Norman's eyes.

            "This will buy you only time!" The Goblin screamed tearing the webbing off his eyes, "You can't escape?" He looked around for Spider-Man but found only the blackened trees and crater-marked hills of the park. "No, I won't let you win." He murmured.

            Peter slipped back into his homestead it was late, Ben and MJ were already asleep; the trip home had been long and difficult considering his shoulder. When he came into his room he fell on the floor, gasping for air. He lay on the floor crying quietly in his torn Spider-Man costume.

            Norman stared at the fire in his study grimly, "He's gone." He told himself quietly; "I never gave him what he needed; I was never there, not once."

            There was a gun hidden in his bookcase, he considered using it. Norman wept into his hands. Just as he had decided to take the easy way out and was making final preparations a knock came to the door. Norman grimaced and would have ignored it not for the urgency of the knocking. He dressed himself appropriately and opened the door to his penthouse, "Hello?"

            Gwen Stacy was standing on the other side of the door, "Mr. Osborn, please I need you to hear me out."

            "It's very late." He replied preparing to close the door and carry on with his suicide.

            "Wait!" Gwen said putting her foot in the doorway, "I need to talk to you. Peter trusts you; I guess you're sort of like a father to him." She gulped, "I need to tell somebody something that will understand."

            Norman frowned, "Just what exactly do you want to tell me?"

            Gwen hesitated for a moment and wondered if this was a mistake. But she could go no longer on with this burden, "It's about Peter, he has a secret."