Part Two
"That's him?" Steve asked in the passenger's seat of the black sedan watching the subject carefully. "He's just a kid, that can't be him."
The young and beautiful agent Morris nodded, "Trust me, after over two months of surveillance we are sure. His name is Peter Parker; the redhead walking with him is Mary Jane Watson. She's officially under the custody of Ben Parker until this November when she becomes eighteen. Watson is also Parker's girlfriend."
Steve brushed his blond hair back for the umpteenth time, "I remember the old days, back when the Soviets still scared everybody. Back then anyone with special…power was older, seasoned and typically put through a program, now what do we have? Kids who have probably never even driven a car tearing up half the city like this is some sort of Saturday morning cartoon. Still breaks my heart."
"You're done?" Morris asked.
"Yeah, so when do we meet?" Steve inquired.
Morris checked her watch for a moment, simply for the sake of being thorough, "He'll be on patrol tonight, like clockwork. We'll intercept him then."
"I promisssed Fury I'd deliver an army to fulfill hisss dream." The Lizard said to Jan while they both watched from the observation room outside the main launch area nestled safely inside the building. "Of courssse asss you know General Fury hasss departed usss sssince then ssso I make thisss offering inssstead to you."
She stared at the new future that the Lizard had created. New soldiers designed to take anything the nations of the world could offer them and continue on. "If the data you supplied me with is correct, they're unstoppable."
"Indeed. I felt it prudent to ssstrive for perfection." The Lizard remarked with a sense of pride swelling up in him, "Though it'sss a ssshame I wasss forced to terminate the original sssymbiote the sssacrificesss it underwent did provide the key in the completion of the Carnage project."
There was no doubt that this was a leap forward from the Lizard's original vision. These new creatures, their very nature was more intimidating than even their father, Venom. The Lizard had used the genetic information of his old Lizard-men, after improving upon his serum, as a substitute for a host to the new symbiotes siphoned off from Venom. It had taken, weeks, months of work, but the Lizard had eventually made this unholy bond work creating what stood before them now in the launch chamber. Only twelve existed at this point, the amount of genetic material the symbiote had needed was staggering but soon more would be on the way.
"Marvelousss aren't they? Now they can fulfill a noble and worthy purpossse." The Lizard said in between several very quiet snarls.
"What purpose would that be, Dr. Connors?" Jan asked warily.
The Lizard seemed to snicker at her, "Why, whatever purpossse you sssee fit, of courssee. Now if you will excussse me, I have data to go over." He slinked out of the observation center leaving Jan alone to stare at the abominations his work had produced.
"Yeah, I understand where you're coming from Gwen but I thought there were no hard feelings about what happened." Peter said over the phone in the hallway of his home in the midst of a heated conversation with her, "You told me you didn't resent MJ, you said that to my face."
He sighed rubbing his forehead wearily, "So you lied?" He asked, "Listen, it's not that I don't expect you to not have feelings, I was just hoping that you would have told me something so that it wouldn't come to this."
Peter waited while she replied almost furiously, "Because look what happened. Will you at least apologize to Mary Jane?" He tapped his foot nervously on the floor, "She said she would. Gwen, I'm just asking you to be reasonable. Okay, okay. I'll talk to you tomorrow. Bye."
He leaned against the wall and spotted Ben standing in the doorway to the kitchen, "I thought fighting a guy decked out with four mechanical arms was tough." Peter sighed, "That was a cakewalk compared to this."
"Women troubles are beyond the understanding of men." Ben replied half-jokingly, "You'll only go crazier the longer you think about it, come on kiddo Jeopardy's coming on."
"That's alright you go on. I need to go out." He replied gently, "I really need some fresh air."
Peter was in costume with the exception of his mask, held tightly between his fingers when he knocked on Mary Jane's door. She opened up with a look on her face that would have sent him running had it been anyone else. "You okay?"
"Yeah, tiger, I'm fine, it's just that…I don't know, I guess I'm still peeved about Gwen." She answered. "I feel like doing something and I can't!"
"Hey, be careful." Peter commented, "Going off the deep-end is in my job-classification, okay?"
She smiled, "Okay, I'll let you do all the freaking out from now on. You're going out?"
He nodded, "Yep; shouldn't be for too long."
"Take care of yourself, tiger." They quickly passed on with a short kiss before he went to his window for a quick-exit.
Spider-Man moved across from roof to roof with startling agility. His spider-sense reached across entire blocks looking for danger to which none could be pinpointed. Peter landed on the roof of a large office building in between two taller buildings.
He stopped coming to the ledge and suddenly pulled back his mask only to vomit forcefully. "This really sucks." He said unable to suppress his rage any longer, "Freaking Osborn walks around like he's God's gift to the world while I have to sit around and pray that he's not going to show up one day looking for my head."
It had nagged at him for weeks and he could barely take it anymore. The urge to drop by Norman's house and start beating the snot out of him was almost overpowering. He sat down and grimaced rather frustrated with everything. "Yeah and if beat me than MJ and uncle Ben would be open to anything he felt like doing to them which knowing the Green Goblin would not be something at all pleasant. And this damn buzzing isn't helping me to think either." His eyes widened, "Oh crap."
A helicopter emerged from behind one of the buildings. They weren't police but that only served to worry Peter. He fired a web-line with the intention of escaping but another helicopter emerged in front of him. "No, this is not good." He tugged on the line only to be hit in the back by what felt like a jack-hammer. He stumbled onto the ground clumsily and fell as blinding pain rippled through his spine. Peter turned on his back and saw the culprit. What had felt like a jack-hammer had been a black shield with a white star emblem on it. The owner grabbed his shield as it returned to him and jumped down on the roof when the chopper lowered down. He stared at Peter, "You're Spider-Man?" His costume was almost totally black, made of some kind of chain-mail, except for the white star on his chest, a blue red and white pattern along his waist and his red gloves and boots.
"I-I know you." Peter exclaimed, something had been on the edges of that shield he was feeling sleepy; "You're Ca…" His eyes became heavy.
"It doesn't matter who I am. On the other hand what is important is that you've just become the official property of the U.S. Government. You've made a big mess, son."
Peter frowned, almost gone, "Mess?"
The man in black stared at him for a moment, Peter struggled to remember who he was; it had been so clear a second ago, "You should've killed him when you had the chance." He remembered; Peter had now come face-to-face with Captain America. "Now Connors has everything he needs."
"Connors…"