The young man clomped in from the snow outside, and he leaned his skis and poles up against a corner in the small lodge. He clopped over to the bar, still wearing his ski boots. He unzipped his ski jacket, his lift tags dangling from the zipper and his gloves clipped to his jacket.
"I need something hot," he said to the barkeep in German. He grinned, a mischievous expression on his pointed features. He ran his slim hands through the mat of auburn hair on his head, dislodging melting snow. "And hurry," he added.
Several of his friends joined him, laughing. The bartender served up a number of huge mugs of hot chocolate topped with swirls of crème. The jovial youths shared out the chocolate, then most of them moved to sit on the couches in front of the deep fireplace.
"Harry Osborn," one of the men leaning against the bar said.
The young man with auburn hair started, and blinked. "Yes?" he said in English.
"I'm glad I found you," the man said. He wore a simple coat, almost floor length. His features were sharp, elfin, and pale hair was shaped on his head. "We have something to discuss."
"Are you a lawyer?" Harry asked casually.
"No," the man said, shaking his head. "No, it's more personal than that."
"I don't like personal," Harry said, his hot chocolate forgotten. "I don't like strangers, either. Especially ones that know my name."
"You haven't heard what I'm here to offer you," the pale man said in a deceptively soft voice that chilled Harry deeper than the ski slope had.
"No, I haven't," Harry replied.
The man leaned close to him. "I'm here to offer you Peter Parker's secret power," he murmured, his eyes deep. He leaned back. "You're twice the man Parker is. I think it's time he understood that, don't you?" he smiled briefly, his eyes calculating. "Think it over. We can talk again tomorrow." He turned and walked up the stairs.
Harry stood at the bar, stunned, watching him go.
xXxHarry walked into the lounge as the cold morning light sifted through the falling flurries of snow outside. He looked around. The fire was freshly stoked, and he smelled breakfast cooking in the kitchen.
"Long night?" the stranger from yesterday said, stepping out of the shadow of the fireplace.
"What's the catch?" Harry said. "There's always a catch."
"The catch is the gift," the pale man with white hair said. "It may not be as easy as it looks." His smile grew. "But you've become quite the young businessman. You know how to take risks for tremendous gain."
"What do I have to do?" Harry asked firmly.
"Follow me," the pale, thin man said. He mounted the stairs, walked to the end of the hall, into Harry's room. Harry followed.
"This is the secret," the pale man murmured as he pulled a small thermos from his jacket. He unscrewed the lid and poured a thick black coffee sludge into one of Harry's mugs that was left on the table in his well appointed lodge room. Then he set the thermos aside and offered the mug to Harry, his eyes glinting. "Do you accept it?"
"I… I accept it," Harry said, taking the mug. If he felt the subtle pressure on his mind to accept the challenge, he didn't show it. He took the mug and sniffed it, then sipped it.
"C-cold!" he said, surprised.
"Too late," Mordred purred. "You must drink it."
Feeling somehow compelled, Harry lifted the mug to his lips. He took one swallow before the sludge seemed to come alive. He realized it wasn't liquid at all as it began to climb down his throat.
He choked and gasped, toppling backwards flailing, but it was too late. With malice glinting in his eyes, Mordred looked down at him.
"Now," he said to himself, "it's time to begin this properly." His smile showed his pale, sharp teeth as the darkstone settled into its new home.
xXx
Peter lunged across the room and snatched the phone off the hook right before the answering machine got the call. "Peter here," he said.
"Hey Peter," Mary Jane said with a carefully casual tone. "You were just finishing getting ready, right? For dinner with my parents tonight? They're here from Texas. They'd like to meet you. We had this conversation three days ago."
"Of course," Peter said. "I was just finishing up some prints in the darkroom." He glanced at the clock and blanched. "Yeah, I'm on my way!" he said.
"Just don't be late tonight, okay?" Mary Jane said quietly. "Please?"
"Be right there," Peter said. He tossed the phone on the cradle, hopped into his room, stripped, whipped out khakis and a nice shirt; in a matter of seconds he had changed his clothes and he was out the door.
"Can't believe I almost forgot that one," he muttered. "MJ would kill me."
He made it to the end of the sidewalk when he felt an odd prickle. He stopped, looked around.
In the shadow of a tree, the ghostly outline of a man hung in the afternoon shadow. It gleamed slightly, and Peter could see the tree behind it. If the ghost had been standing in direct sunlight, Peter wouldn't have seen it at all.
"What are you?" Peter wondered breathlessly.
You will forget all about me in a moment, he felt in his mind. When I'm finished with you.
Peter sprang back, but with the speed of thought the ghost had caught him. It passed an arm through his head, and everything went dark.
Mordred's astral form shimmered over him. And for my next trick, Mordred chuckled, you'll learn to sleep. He swiftly cast his spell as the spider ghost cowered in Peter's sleeping form…
xXx
Peter slowly mounted the steps to Mary Jane's apartment, glancing around, haunted. He didn't have a chance to ring the doorbell, as the door swung open of its own accord. Mary Jane stood in the doorway, settled in a wide stance, her arms crossed across her chest, her green eyes bright and her mouth a small line. Peter noticed she was wearing makeup.
"Hi," he faltered.
She didn't need to glance at a watch. "You called to say you were on your way over. Two hours ago. For you, it's a ten minute trip. So explain already." She was doing her level best to keep her temper in check. Give him a chance. Then kill him.
"I honestly don't know," he said, wide eyed. "I blacked out. When I came to, I was in Central Park. I came straight here. I lost two hours?"
"I thought maybe you lost a fight somewhere. I knew you didn't get lost. My parents, Peter. You just stood up my parents. Who came here from Texas. And that's a hell of a first impression."
"I don't know what happened," Peter said in a low voice.
Her jaw was locked, her eyes bright. "You don't make things easy, Peter," she said in a voice that she successfully kept from being cold.
He watched her for a moment. "I think I need to take a walk," he said.
She nodded. "Maybe that's a good idea."
He turned, and headed down the stairs. She did not slam the door to her apartment.
Peter aimlessly wandered the streets, glancing up at the moon. "Okay, genius butt, where the holy hell was I?" he demanded of his spider ghost.
It was quiet. Not absent, but reluctant.
"You?" Peter said. "Reluctant to share an opinion? Okay look. You keep track of the time by cross referencing the increment of a second with the beating of my heart. So what time is it now?"
Ten oh three, twelve seconds, came the reply.
"Oh, fine. So you've been awake the whole time. What happened to me?"
No reply.
"Please?" Peter said. "This is really important. I may have just made a major league boo boo with the most important woman in the world, and you clam up as to what asinine reason could have possessed me to do so. This is worse than when we missed the Chemistry test because I was in jail."
He concentrated on the spider ghost, focused on capturing its feeling.
Fear.
The spider ghost was afraid. Whatever it had seen had rattled it.
Peter blinked and sniffed. "Okay, that's not good," he muttered. He glanced around and noticed that his wandering had brought him to Greenwich Village, not far from Strange's house. What a coincidence.
Peter strolled up the front steps to Strange's brownstone mansion and rapped on the door. He waited. Rang the doorbell. Nothing. He frowned. That was highly unusual. For a second he considered breaking in, but he knew better. With a shrug, he headed home.
Once home, he tossed his clothes off on the way to the bedroom as a peculiar feeling bloomed in him. He realized what it was. Sleepiness. Not something he got a lot of.
Then he toppled onto his bed and slept like the dead…