xXx

Illyana leaned against the side of the building, just out of sight of the forensics crew that gave the back of the church the feel of a kicked anthill. She let her eyes drift half closed, she opened herself to the auras and vibrations that were left behind by the violent entry.

She took a deep breath, and then shook her head and let the images go. A flare of light carried her to Limbo.

Her feet twisted into hooves and her knees slid back to bend the other direction as she squatted before her scrying pool. "Okay," she said. "Show me the intruder."

The pool shifted, swirls of impressions crossed it. But whatever she hunted was concealed and dispersed somehow. She frowned. Then she stood up, her legs shifting back to full human. She wiggled her toes and stepped into some clogs she kept by the throne. A gesture at the scrying pool pulled up an image of Peter. A stepping disk swirled up around her with a snap hiss and a spatter of dark eldritch fire.

She politely knocked on the door, and Peter answered it. "Come on in," he said. "I've been expecting you."
"You sure got here fast," Mary Jane noted.

"The shortest distance between two points is not really a straight line," Illyana replied with a wink. "Now to business. The signal was funky as hell, but I managed to figure out what kind of boogeyman you've found this time. It's a vampire. I'm sure of it. All the signs are there, up to and including the drained victim."

"Didn't have teeth marks in the neck," Peter said doubtfully.

Illyana rolled her eyes. "Vampires feed on the life energy of their victims. The circulatory system carries life and air through the entire body, keeping it alive, in lock step with the heart. Therefore, that's the fastest way to plug into and drain life force. Vampires can use other energy sources, but that's the quickest and easiest and surest way to get energy for them. This joker didn't use his teeth. But he did drain the victim. I said it was funky, didn't I."

"So did you find it?" Peter asked hopefully, flexing his hand into a fist.

"No," Illyana said, glancing to the side. "The vamp is hidden in a network somewhere. They can diffuse their consciousness and energies through a system. That's what keeps them up, being able to draw from a network of power. Everything in that network is slowly degraded by the vampire's constant absorption of energy from it."

"For example?" Peter said, blinking. "You lost me."

"For example," Illyana said, sitting on Mary Jane's couch in her front room. Peter and Mary Jane followed and sat on chairs. "A vampire might settle on something as simple as a city block. In the tenement house on that block, violence would increase. Police would be afraid to go there. People living there would become listless, violent, ill at ease, haunted as the simple presence of the vampire grew like a tumor. It would feed from time to time, but the longer the vampire was there the more deeply ingrained it would be in its territory, drawing life force from the inhabitants in a way they could not even imagine. Other networks could be a corporate office, a courier service, a bridge club, it can be just about anything and it has a lot to do with how powerful the vampire is."

"So you can't see the vampire because it's submerged in one of those network things," Peter clarified.

"Right," Illyana said. "I can't really pinpoint it more than that. I'm getting these conflicting images. On the one hand, the signature feels pretty old. But the vampire must be a newcomer, it's got a very fresh feel to the aura." She shook her head. "In any case, it's possible this guy had it in for the Reverend and you were just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Doesn't matter at this point," Peter said with a shake of his head. "We can't risk that. And even if the attack had nothing to do with me," he added with a shiver, "I have this thing for vampires. I was almost turned into one myself. I'd like to see this through."

"It might be about you," Illyana said, looking at him steadily. "Seems you're in the middle of this permanent disaster zone."

Peter nodded. "Can I ask another favor of you?" he said.

"It'll cost you your firstborn," she deadpanned, then she grinned. "No really, just kidding. What's your favor."

"Mary Jane and I can look out for each other, but I have a lot going on… would you mind keeping an eye on Aunt May for me? I'm just… I'm worried, you know? I've dealt with things that targeted her before just to get to me. I really don't want that to happen, and this is as much warning as anybody can ask for."

Illyana sighed. "Okay. I'll try to keep an eye on her. I can't promise twenty four seven protection, as you know."

"Right," Peter said quickly. "I would really appreciate it."

"Well," Illyana said, rising. "It's been fun, next time we can toast marshmallows while we talk about ghost stories. In the meantime, I've got to go do my homework."

"You're still in school?" Mary Jane said, raising her eyebrows.

"Not quite so simple," Illyana said with a wry grin. "Tonight I'm going to be immersed in the wacky world of golem creation and destruction. Do contain your jealousy. I'm Strange's apprentice," she explained.

"Ah," Mary Jane nodded sagely as all became clear. "Drive safely," she nodded with an amused smile.

Illyana strolled to the back hallway and in a flare of light she was gone.

"That woman is seriously creepy," Mary Jane said with a little shiver. "She's totally cool."

Peter laughed a bit nervously, then heaved a deep sigh. "It's not too late for you to get out of this," he said.

She stood, pulled him up out of the chair, and led him over to the couch. They sat down together, and she looked at the floor to collect her thoughts.

"Peter," she said, "you get threatened by this monster, and your first instinct is to protect your aunt. I won't lie to you, I'm scared," she said, meeting his eyes. "But I expect there's going to be a lot of that. It's up to you to make it worth my while," she said softly as she leaned in close.

After a brief kiss, she leaned back. "After all, Peter Parker," she murmured, "somebody has to look out for you in the real world while you're off fighting monsters." Her eyes narrowed with determination. "That's gonna be me."

xXx

Mary Jane made a check on her list. "Pew decorations," she said.

"Got the stuff here," Peter said, carrying a cardboard box in and setting it on the floor.

"Check," she said, making a mark. "Catering arrangements."

"Finalized them yesterday," Peter said.

"Check and mate," Mary Jane said, tossing the list aside. "We rock. Let's get these pew decorations put together."

"But this is girly work!" Peter mock protested. He sat on the floor with Mary Jane as she pulled out her sample bow with silk flower and ribbon.

"This is what it looks like," she said. "Go nuts, spider boy."

"I could have been one hell of an interior designer," Peter muttered as he pulled a length of ribbon out, cut it, twirled it into a bow, affixed it to the flower, the tule, stapled it in one smooth flourish of motion. Mary Jane just sat back.

"What?" Peter said. "You going to get in on this?"

"Peter," she said with a gentle smile, "if I work my butt off on this I'll get maybe three done before you're finished. You just take over."

Peter looked at her for a moment. "You're mean," he said. "Fine. I'll do your dirty work. But you have to keep me company." He glanced down and finished another decoration, scooped up the materials and started on the next.

"Deal," Mary Jane said.

Peter shook his head slightly as he tossed another finished one over towards the growing pile. "I don't know about this," he said. "A critter that targets a preacher. I was raised better than that. I always figured preachers were, you know, like the Red Cross. You don't target the medics and chaplains, you know what I mean?"

"I know," Mary Jane said, watching with fascination as his hands twirled through the process of making the decorations.

"I can't help but feel somehow responsible for what happened," Peter said, shaking his head slightly. "I have this horrible feeling I should move away from everyone so I could just roll into town like they do in the movies, and come out of nowhere to settle the bad guy gang that's going to blow up the mine and run everybody off the rancher's land and do other bad stuff like that. I feel like if I build a life I'll just be the stereotypical action hero where people I love get killed and I go on a spree of death." He sighed. "But sprees of death are fun only in fiction. In the real world, killing your way to the top is grim and messy business to be avoided. If I didn't know that before, Fisk taught it to me."

"But you didn't kill anybody," Mary Jane said.

Peter's voice was even as he kept his eyes on his work. "Call it a dry run. Neither of us wants to know what would have happened if Voorhees had killed you, or if Beck had killed Aunt May."

He worked in silence, and she had nothing to say to that.

xXx

"Damnation, you're boring, woman!" Illyana yelled at the scrying pool as Aunt May meticulously polished the plate. "The plate is dry! Put it down!" She returned her attention to her reading.

A smaller demon was keeping her company, hunched over and watching Prime with idle fascination. It grunted and bounced a bit. Illyana looked back into the scry.

It was full dark outside, Aunt May was doing the dishes, and in the dining room a window was slowly sliding open.

Illyana was on her feet in a moment, and a stepping disk swirled around her.

She crouched on the roof, looking down into the back yard of Aunt May's small house. She hopped down, checked the window. Slight scratches, and it was half open. She slid it closed, and looked around.

"Well well well," said a voice laced with a European accent. "I've been waiting for you. I thought I sniffed a wizard back at the church."

She turned to see the shadowed figure standing with his back to a tree in the corner of the yard. She squared off with him, feeling the cold energy that radiated from his heavyset form.

"Who are you and what do you want?" Illyana coldly demanded.

"Hah," he replied. "Who are you? Why are you interested in this frail old woman?"

"A name, chuckles," she said. "Or we can have a disagreement," she added with the best lingering malice she could manage.

"I am Doctor Otto Octavius," he replied proudly. "You may call me Doctor Octavius. As for what I want with the old woman, that is simple. I will break her brittle bones, crush her skull like an eggshell, and leave her shattered remains in Peter Parker's pillowcase." A wicked smile creased his squat face. His thick horn-rimmed glasses were powdered with dust.

"Over my dead body," Illyana said with fierce determination. She flexed her hand, and reached into a small stepping disk. She whipped her gleaming blade from Limbo, the sword glittering in the faint light.

The squat figure hissed, a sharp intake of breath. "Illyana Nikolievna Rasputin!" he said. "How old are you now?"

"What?" Illyana said, the sudden shock of hearing her full name from the stranger leaving her numb. "Who are you?"

He chuckled. "Something like a great uncle, perhaps," he said with a twisted grin. "Your grandfather would be proud of the fine figure you've grown into."

"That's it," she said harshly, and she flared a stepping disk around him to carry him to Limbo.

He didn't move, but he did shake his head slightly.

"You have no place protecting old women," he said. "You should join forces with me. It would be like the glory days."

"The glory days?" she said dubiously. Her knees were shaking.

"Yes," Octavius sighed. "When the Red Skull was rising to ascendance, when the earth faced a thousand years of darkness, when monsters tore the Allies." He sighed with nostalgia.

"Look, bub," Illyana said tightly, "I'm a scion of the Sorcerer Supreme and we're going to deal with this right here, right now." She squared off, gripping the sword with both hands.

"You should see reason," he replied softly, "or I'll tell your grandfather you've been misbehaving."

"Who is my grandfather?" Illyana demanded. "Dammit, answer me!"

He had already faded back into the shadows. Illyana snarled frustration, then whipped through a stepping disk and dropped to her knees by her scrying pool.

"Gone," she whispered as images almost formed then failed to. "Dammit!" She slammed her fist on the rock by the pool.