Peter broke.

The pool balls scattered around the table, both a stripe and a solid tumbling down holes.

"Ain't that always the way," he muttered to himself. "I guess I'll just play both sides."

The front door of the bar opened and closed, and Peter knew who had come in. He sank three balls with an expert shot. "Stripes first," he said to himself, "then we get solid."

The man in the leather coat and cowboy hat walked up behind him, moving quietly without even trying. He watched Peter sink another three balls.

"What's up, kid?" he asked in his gravelly voice.

Peter stood and turned. "Thanks for coming, Logan," he said.

Logan perched on a bar stool and tugged off his cowboy hat. His hair… unfurled. "Beer!" Logan barked at the bartender. Logan looked at Peter. "Somethin's on yer mind, I can tell. You old enough to be in here?"

Peter returned his attention to the game as Logan got a cold beer. "Money trouble," Peter said, the words costing him, effort forcing them out. "Aunt May needs an operation, my car was wrecked, I'll be kicked out of school… it runs along the lines of a suburban country song." Half the balls on the table slid down the pocket holes. "I can't get my act together and get pictures, I can't eat, I can't sleep. I don't want to tell you all my troubles, Logan, I was just wondering if you had any ideas."

Logan watched his back as he finished off the table. He sniffed, nodded once. "Don't do anything stupid. I'll see you here. Tomorrow. Got that?"

"Okay," Peter said in a small voice. Logan got up, paid for his beer, and left the bar. Peter put his head down on the table.

"Great, Parker," he said. "Smooth."

He went home.

xXx

"Showtime," Beck said. He stood by the door to the office, up on the balcony. He was in the dark greenish suit, and he had a cloak pinioned on his shoulders. Under his arm was a big glassy bowl like an astronaut's helmet. Beck launched from the balcony and fell, slapping down on the ground. He stood easily. They noticed he had added greaves along his forearms, probably for blocking. They were bladed like the suit was.

"I like this suit," he said. He smiled at them, then clamped the reflective bowl on and spun it a couple times, so it was firmly attached to the socket on his shoulders. The socket was strapped under his arms and across his back, providing ample support to keep the globe on should it be hit.

"Great," Grummins muttered. "I work for the magic eight ball." Wylde giggled.

A faint chilling mist rose up from the floor, coiling around the dark figure with the glassy helmet. "The time has come for a reckoning," whispered a sepulchral voice, coming from everywhere at once. "The spider ghost will submit… or perish." The mist engulfed the entirety of Mysterio's form, then they saw the helmet in the mist become translucent, begin to glow—

Within, the eerie glowing visage of a greenish skull took form. A deep laugh rolled from the air around them, then the cloak swooped once, violently shifting the mist. It broke up, leaving the area hazy, but Mysterio was gone.

"Er," Grummins said, "Maybe we shouldn'ta made fun of his helmet."

"Wow," said Wylde.

From the rafters, Beck looked down with a satisfied smile.

Tuesday, November 26

Someone touched the front door. Peter did a kippup in bed and whirled noiselessly behind the bedroom door. Then he woke up, checked back along his senses to see why he wasn't in bed anymore.

Ah.

He opened the door to his room noiselessly as the front door opened. He had forgotten to lock it. Great. He squatted up at the top of the stairs, watching.

Mary Jane.

Peter sprang back, darted into his room, and dressed rapidly. In moments he was back at the top of the stairs.

He heard her in the kitchen, heard the coffee maker start up.

"MJ? Is that you?" he said.

She poked her head out of the kitchen. "Accept no substitute," she said. "I thought you could use a ride to school. Since you missed each and every one of your classes yesterday, boy genius."

"How's Harry doing?" Peter asked, leaning against the wall.

She shrugged. "Harry's feeling sorry for himself. Only so much 'Woe is me' I can handle before I want to smack him."

"Did you?" Peter asked.

"Of course not," she said. "I don't believe in beating your boyfriend. Shows poor upbringing. How are you holding up?"

"Peachy," he said. "Don't really want to go into details. I just keep telling myself everything will work out."

"I see," she said. "It's like that. Hang in there, tiger." She glanced back in the kitchen. "Great. You're all up and dressed and now we have to wait for coffee."

"You know," he said, "it was a lot less unnerving when you hated my guts."

"I didn't hate you, Peter," she said. "I hated who you pretended to be. But there's a lot more there, isn't there." Her green eyes shot right through him.

"I wish I could take that night back," he said. "Keeps me up at night, thinking about what kind of danger I have put you in."
"Don't," Mary Jane said, perhaps too sharply. "I'm glad I know. I accept the risk. It's an exciting secret. And you have to tell somebody. Or you'd pop."

"It's not just that I'm the spider ghost," he said. "I mean, I'm—"

"That's far enough, mister," she said with a very serious grin. "Drop it. Enough angst. You'll get some on my new boots. Besides, coffee's up. Let's down it so we can get out of here."

Not much to say to that.

xXx

"I hate how it gets dark so early," Mary Jane said as she pulled up in a parking spot. "Here we are at the hospital again."

"Thanks for driving me to school this morning. And to my home away from home," Peter said. "I can take it from here." He smiled at her. Then he got out of the car and slammed the door. He turned to walk away when the window started buzzing down behind him. He turned.

"Hey Peter," Mary Jane called after him.

"Yeah?"

"Don't forget you can fly," she said, just loud enough for him to hear her. Then the car pulled away, its window scrolling up.

Peter couldn't possibly have guessed how forlorn he looked as he watched her drive away.

He turned and walked into the hospital. His pace was slow as his mind whirred at high speeds, trying to figure out what to do, looking for the way out, the needle in his haystack of bills.

xXx

Peter closed his eyes and hit the cue ball. The pool balls scattered across the table, and he listened as his senses tracked which ones went where. Without opening his eyes, he walked around the table, lined up, and fired again. The bumpers paffed with the impact of the hard pool balls, and Peter kept each ball distinct as his senses tracked by sound and vibration. He half smiled to himself. He could always shark people for money.

The door to the bar opened and closed, and the distinctive scuffle of boots headed his way. A short and very heavy man. Peter opened one eye.

"Logan," he said.

"Glad to see you, kid," Logan said, hefting his gym bag and putting it up on the counter.

"That your workout gear?" Peter asked wryly.

"Somethin like that," Logan nodded. He glanced at the barkeep and nodded. The bartender got him a beer. "How's yer week goin?"

Peter chuckled. "I got turned down for financial aid next semester and almost expelled. Barely feel it at this point. On the bright side, my best friend's girl seems to have taken a shine to me after I got him in a car wreck. How about you?"

"I had a great day," Logan said, leaning back against the bar. The bartender brought him his beer, and Logan tipped his hat.

"I'm tired of this game," Peter muttered. He fired the cue ball at the side of the table; it smacked into one, two, three balls, and they caromed across the table in their own course. Five seconds, and the last ball on the table slowly rolled and tipped into the corner pocket. Only the cue ball was left on a field of green.

Peter rolled it to the corner, where it rattled down. He turned to face Logan.

Logan had his back to Peter. He unzipped the gym bag as he swung it around and put it on the table. For a long moment, he looked into Peter's eyes. Peter looked back; what was Logan thinking? It was impossible to tell.

The short hairy man reached into the bag and pulled out a crisp packet of fifty dollar bills. He put it on the table, then looked at Peter with a wild grin lurking in his eye. He pulled out another packet. Another.

"There must be thousands there," Peter said, trying not to gasp.

"Aw, hell," Logan said. He upended the bag, and with heavy thuds the packets of bills cascaded down into a chaotic, sliding pyramid.

Peter stared, his face drained of color.

"Three hundred thousand dollars," Logan said with a nod. "Should cover it, doncha think?" With a very satisfied grin, he tucked a cigar into the corner of his mouth.

"I… I can't take this," Peter managed.

"It's all legal," Logan shrugged. "Ahem." He put his hand up to highlight the words: "The Anthony Stark Meritous Scholar Award. Three hundred thousand dollars. All yours, kid." He slapped Peter on the back.

"Logan," Peter said, visibly struggling, "I can't take this kind of charity. This is… this is a lot of money."

Logan's expression darkened. "Kid, you think this is charity?" he said. "Look at me." Peter looked at him.

Logan stared him in the eye, just one step from fierce in that moment. "First time I met you," he said, putting a thick finger up, "you saved me from a fate worse than death and you didn't even know who I was. First time you met Stark, you kept him from being killed in his armor in the middle of his complex. And to date, neither one of us has had a proper chance to thank you." Logan looked away and lit his cigar. "Now I'm not sayin this is adequate repayment for such things as you've done. But I am sayin," he said, looking Peter in the eye, "this is not charity. Stark an me think more of our lives than that." His eyebrows lowered menacingly. "Only two words can come outa yer mouth that won't make me need to smack you."

"Thank you," Peter said softly.

"Thosr them," Logan said with a curt nod. "I gotta go. Bag's complimentary. Sides, you think Stark's gonna even feel this loss? I bet he's got this much just in one of his pillows." He grinned at Peter, slapped him on the back, and flicked a five dollar bill on the counter. Then he jogged out of the bar, chuckling to himself.

Peter watched him go, speechless.

He looked down at the money and let the idea grow in him, the idea that it was all his to do with as he pleased, no strings attached, money he earned. As the spider ghost, no less.

A grin welled up in him that just wouldn't be stopped.

He swiftly packed and headed out into the night.