Disclaimer: None of this is mine. The characters, concepts, dialogue and settings all belong to Marvel, Sony, Sam Raimi, various writers etc, etc. Parts of the "flying scene" were inspired by jjonahjameson's tremendous MJ POV story "Walking in the Spider Web." Her MJ, her handling of POV, heck, her everything is better than mine, so run, don't walk, to read her stories.

A/N: Gee, it's amazing how one negative comment can suck the fun out of something, isn't it? Thank you to all the reviewers who helped put it back with their thoughtful comments and encouragement. This chapter, with all its improbabilities, faults and silly fluff, is for you.

P.S. Reviews and constructive criticism are always welcome!

Memories and Revelations

Part V

This is heaven, thought MJ blissfully. Being held so closely yet so lightly in Peter's protective embrace was thrilling her to the core. The earth seemed to fall away as they soared upward and she felt as buoyant as if she were floating on air – which she supposed she was, in a manner of speaking.

All at once, their upward motion was suddenly but gently arrested. When they stopped, high above the docks, MJ felt herself seem to settle even further into Peter's firm chest, so far in that she could feel the steady, slowing thrum of his heartbeat resound deeply as if from within her own breast. MJ put her head down again, curling up on his chest to listen to it. As she did, he shifted his hold on her, dropping his arm around her waist and pulling her up slightly until she was resting on his hip. She realized that he was gripping the steeply sloping metal arm of a cargo-loading crane with one casual hand and a bracing foot, and that she was practically reclining on him. He felt warm and tangible, and he set her body tingling at every point where he was brushing against her. She closed her eyes with a delighted sigh, wanting to keep lying with him like that forever.

Suddenly she heard a faint whoosh behind her. She couldn't place the sound. She craned her neck over her shoulder, but it was difficult to make anything out in the darkness.

"Don't look down," Peter advised quietly, so she looked up instead and lost herself for a second in the blueness of his eyes. She felt him tremble a little as their eyes met, and he gently shifted her position again until she was lying flush alongside him, her weight supported by one arm loosely wrapped around her waist. Then he visibly gathered himself and asked, "Are you okay?"

MJ noticed that her own heart was beating at something like triple the rate of the even, steady drum beats she could still feel from him, but she knew that fear wasn't the emotion spurring it on. She wanted to reassure him, to dissipate some of the tension she could feel in his taut, alert body.

"You mean apart from being kidnapped, tied up for hours, chilled, drenched, almost burned, and nearly crushed to death?" she said lightly. Peter's eyebrows lifted as he grinned, and she thought she could just detect a slight loosening in his joints and muscles, a momentary relaxing of his shoulders.

"I'm fine, I think," she went on more seriously. "It's my dress that took the worst beating."

Peter chuckled a little. "Tell me about it." he said ruefully, for the second time that day. "I've got to come up with some better material for this suit than neoprene and lycra – something more durable. And less hot and itchy."

At this remark, they both laughed. An awkward silence fell for a moment, broken briefly by that strange, soft sound again. Then Peter, his eyes still holding hers in a sea of blue, added softly, "It's too bad about your dress. You looked really nice in it."

MJ beamed at him, feeling a rosy warmth blossom inside of her. His hand on her waist clasped her to him more tightly, his breath hitched, and for a second she thought breathlessly that he was going to kiss her. His eyes had darkened to a deep indigo, and they gazed intently into hers, vulnerable and hungry. But all at once he shuttered them, pulling back slightly, and the moment was lost.

Then Peter shifted her again, releasing the firm hold he had on her, and she found herself slipping out of his embrace to one side, onto something light and springy. It felt a bit like a hammock, strung up improbably high and pulled impossibly tight. Surprised, she put a hand out and touched a slender strand of something like a whipcord, stretching tautly away into the darkness to the side of her. She looked over Peter's shoulder to see several of these pale, glimmering cords converging behind him to connect in a thick, knotty clump to the arm of the cargo crane, just below where his hand was resting. Then, in wonder, she turned her head away from Peter in the opposite direction to see the other sides of these faintly shimmering lines fanning outward and upward away from them, spreading out to form the skeletal structure of a giant wheel-web. She could just see the glimmer of a line stretching straight up over her head, connecting with the midpoint of the crane's arm, and yet another dimly gleaming line forming a tenuous bridge across to a series of steel cables hanging from the same crane, and a few more strands, below and beside her, also extending to link with the other side of the cargo crane's base. Amazed, she understood in a flash that during their brief conversation, Peter had been casting web lines around her, beginning the construction of a huge web to support them high over the city.

"It will hold; you don't need to worry," Peter said encouragingly, noticing her scrutiny of the webbing.

"I'm not worried," said MJ coolly, raising sparkling eyes to his again, and to prove it she took her other arm, which she'd had curled around his neck, and, rolling over onto her back with an arch smile at him, fully extended it to take hold of yet another web line just above her head. Something flickered in Peter's eyes for a moment as he watched her stretching, but he merely said, "Hang on, and I'll be right back. I'm just going to reinforce the other side. Then we'll talk."

With that, he crawled rapidly up the arm of loading crane, and from there, swung across to the series of steel cables hanging opposite, sending a few web lines in different directions across the web as he landed. One long strand looped down through the center of the space, swaying lightly in the wind as he crawled to the base of the structure. Then he sent forth a web line to catch it as it hung down, pulling it tightly into a Y shape as he did so. She turned toward him, watching in awe as he constructed a frame on the other side to match the one she was resting on, anchoring all the threads that he had held gathered in one hand around a metal beam at the base. After he was done, he cast a new line and swung himself wildly back up to the top of the first support high over her head. Then he poised himself there, improbably still, sending down several more web lines into the center of the web. He looked like an acrobat balancing on a high-wire, or trapeze artist swinging crazily and dangerously between different poles of a circus tent without a net. But he wasn't. He was Peter Parker, Amazing Spider-Man.

He vaulted back across the wide space again, and she caught him glance in her direction while he began moving agilely up and down the crane cable opposite, sending line after line of shimmering silk into the center of the web, until all of its radii were bisected and crisscrossed with threads extending neatly and symmetrically out from the end points of the Y in every direction. He was showing off for her, she realized, with a smile stealing across her face. It was sweet and romantic and strange all at once, but she liked it. She supposed that Peter had never before had a truly knowing, appreciative audience. Or no, maybe that wasn't strictly true. She had certainly been his audience, if an unwitting one, on more than one occasion in the past.

The pavement below came rushing up with incredible speed, and the wind blew into MJ's eyes so hard that they stung. She squeezed them shut, screaming mindlessly ... but, at the last moment, a strong arm encircled her waist. Someone pulled her securely into a warm chest, shifting his grip on her and smoothly turning her the right way again in the air. Then she felt herself shooting back upwards at top speed. Hysterical, her throat raw from her screams, she kept her eyelids clamped shut, hardly believing her senses and holding desperately onto whatever was holding her while she waited in terror for the pavement to strike.

All at once, the wind changed direction, and now MJ felt as though she were flying, flying so fast that it seemed unreal. Something shifted her body around and, instinctively, she wrapped her arms around someone's neck, hanging on for dear life. Eventually, her mind caught up with her body to tell her that she wasn't going down any more. She opened her eyes carefully and saw that her arms were resting around a pair of lean, sturdy shoulders which were covered in a glossy red material ribbed with web patterns. The skyscrapers behind these shoulders looked peculiar, rising and falling drunkenly as they rushed past. Astounded, she turned her head to look at the blank red mask of the man swinging effortlessly with her on a fine thread that was almost invisible, except for the occasional shimmer it gave as it caught the sunlight.

Where was the webbing coming from? she asked herself in wonder. A second later, she perceived it really was emerging from his wrists, projecting itself out through tiny slits in his costume with a tiny sibilant thwip to adhere to the cornices of buildings and the flat, polished surfaces of windows. Watching in fascination as he launched then caught each glittering strand with a deft hand, MJ began to relax, leaning into the vigorous and agile body against hers with a sigh of contentment. Although he was constantly shifting her from one arm to another while changing hands to fire his webs, she was completely comfortable in his gentle grasp. His chest felt rock solid against hers and his grip on her waist was sure. Their motion, too, was soothingly regular – a swift downward descent, as exciting as a roller coaster drop, followed by a quick, steady climb back up to the sky. She sensed that he was making the ride as smooth as he could, even though they were hurtling forward at a breath-taking speed. Turning her head to regard her hero's masked face again, MJ smiled joyfully. Her fear was completely gone, replaced by a sense of exhilaration that she didn't know she could feel.

Who was he? she wondered. Who was this incredible man holding her improbably safe and secure so high above the ground? Even in the midst of her awful terror earlier, she had noticed Spider-Man performing some amazing, mind-boggling feats: diving down into the square below to prevent a child from being crushed by a toppling wooden arch, running faster than the deadly machine gun bullets which that goblin-man had directed at him, and bouncing swiftly towards her across the huge carnival balloons like a gymnast on a trampoline. Watching him had been an unforgettable experience, its strangeness compounded by an odd little incident that suddenly stood out in her memory. Hanging frantically onto her slipping fragment of balcony,she could have sworn that she'd heard him call out her name – her full name, Mary Jane, which almost no one but her mother ever used any more. This inexplicable incident gave her the curious feeling that he had somehow singled her out in the middle of all the chaos.

Being carried through the concrete canyons of the city in his arms was giving her that feeling too. She clung to him more tightly, savoring the solid warmth and reality of his body – the only thing between her and certain death in the streets far below. Her fingertips tentatively explored the dense wall of muscles across his back and shoulders until she felt him shudder at their light touch. Then it occurred to her that maybe he was ... could it be? ... ticklish. A ticklish super-hero, how funny. Embarrassed, she stilled her fingers and stifled a giggle. She didn't want him to think she was a silly little girl.

Much too soon, the wondrous ride ended. As they swooped gracefully around the spire of a cathedral, heading towards the romantic rooftop garden of a fancy hotel, Spider-Man let his latest line go. He alighted on the lawn carefully, holding her off the ground as he ran a step or two, making sure she didn't touch the grass of the garden until his momentum had slowed enough to let her down smoothly. Once she managed to stand, he looked her over from head to toe, making sure she was all right, before he finally took his hands off her waist.

"Well," he said, slightly breathless, "beats taking the subway." His voice was young and strong, but his tone was mischievous. MJ grinned at his playful quip.

Suddenly she noticed they weren't alone on the rooftop. "Don't mind us, folks," Spider-Man was reassuring a stunned young couple who had been sitting on a stone bench next to a perfectly manicured flower bed, looking as if they were about to kiss. The man and woman gaped at them, their faces incredulous at having their romantic moment interrupted by another pair literally dropping out of the sky next to them. But he went on lightly, "she just needs to use the elevator." Then he turned to leave.

"Wait!" MJ cried excitedly, clutching his arm quickly to stop him. She didn't know why but she couldn't let him get away without at least finding out his name – or something other than what the newspapers were calling him – masked freak, webslinging wonder, criminal vigilante. She knew now that he wasn't any of those things, but she longed to know who he was instead.

"Who ... who are you?" Her hushed voice was tinged with hope.

"You know who I am," he replied in a low voice. Something MJ couldn't identify passed between them, something that felt like a buried recognition. For a dreamlike moment, MJ thought he seemed familiar, but she could not quite put her finger on why. Perhaps he reminded her a little of someone she knew ... but the shadowy figure, whoever he was, lingered on the edges of her consciousness, refusing to step into the light of day. "I do?" she asked doubtfully at last, still wracking her memory while she scrutinized his impassive masked face as if it could offer her a clue.

Was that a trace of disappointment in the air? Almost before she could register it, his cheerful voice said teasingly, "Your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man." Then he pulled his arm easily out of her grasp as he bounded towards the low garden wall. Springing into the air, he did a double front flip that would have been the envy of an Olympic gymnast, and dove off the terrace.

Stumbling a bit in her high heels, MJ rushed to the edge of the rooftop to lean out over a stone parapet. Fascinated, she watched as Spider-Man caught the corner of a building with a web, then went slinging his way down the street on his tenuous-looking elastic web lines. He swung across the street with lightning speed, then, holding onto a new web line, ran sideways on a row of windows to pick up his momentum before propelling himself forward and sweeping out of sight. The faintest echo of a jubilant "Whoo-Hoo!" floated back to her as he faded into the distance. She felt like cheering too. The intoxicating feeling of soaring through the air in his embrace lingered. Wow, what an incredible experience. What an incredible man ...

Recalling the rooftop garden, MJ smiled to herself and decided that, like her, Peter was a complete romantic. Before she'd known his true identity, she'd assumed that her rescuer had simply picked a convenient location, a pretty spot to drop off a pretty passenger. Now she understood that he'd chosen such a romantic setting deliberately for her, Mary Jane Watson, the girl he loved. Maybe, on some level, after his dramatic rescue of her, he'd been trying to tell her not only who he was, but also how he felt about her. His cryptic words, "You know who I am," reverberated distantly in her brain. Remembering, she grew almost certain that Peter had wanted to tell her who he was more than once, but couldn't, for some unknown reason, bring himself to reveal his identity. Why not? she wondered, wrinkling her brow. He was still such a mystery to her – he'd apparently always had feelings for her, and he'd had the means literally to sweep a girl off her feet. So why hadn't he pursued her more openly, in between saving people? She would have fallen into his arms.

Instead, Peter had given her the oddest little clues, clues that were hard for her to decipher. It was as though he both wanted and didn't want to reveal himself to her. She recalled another tell-tale moment – on the night they'd shared that spectacular kiss, he had jumped into the fray too quickly, fighting for her without his mask and only narrowly avoiding her inquisitive gaze. Had he secretly hoped she would catch him? That same night, he'd told her twice, once as Peter and once as Spider-Man, "I was in the neighborhood." In retrospect, he had been so obvious that she wondered how she had missed decoding his secret on her own.

She remembered, too, their intense conversation in Aunt May's hospital room. He'd given a brief, rueful laugh at her girlish profession of love for Spider-Man and she'd thought for a second he might be laughing at her – but he was laughing at himself, she now realized, at the absurdity of their situation, at their odd, two-person triangle. She recalled how neatly he had deflected her eager question about Spider-Man's opinion of her, giving her what amounted to a heartfelt declaration of love from Peter Parker in its place. He'd actually driven her fantasies of Spider-Man out of her head with his sincere words. In fact, they had moved her so profoundly that, anxious to free herself from another entanglement, she'd barely waited for the door of Aunt May's room to close behind them before she had dumped poor Harry. Then she'd gone home to continue her daydreams about Spider-Man, only to find to her bemusement that in her imagination Peter Parker's face kept superimposing itself on Spider-Man's mask.

High on the other side of the crane, Peter was done weaving his gigantic web, having just connected all the radii with a thread spiralling out from the Y in the center to join all the angular spokes in an exquisite circular pattern. She watched him climbing lithely back down to her on his web, and marveled that she had never before noticed the flexible ease, the unconscious liquid grace, with which he moved. Or no, maybe she had noticed it, she thought, picturing him drop fluidly into the chair across from her at the Village Deli just that morning. But it was only now that she saw him crawl nimbly across a huge wheel-shaped web of his own making that she grasped the true significance of his unnatural grace.

Perhaps, MJ thought, she'd always known Peter was Spider-man, deep down inside. It was as though she'd had all the pieces of the puzzle before her, and but hadn't quite managed to assemble a complete picture of the whole man. Some part of her, though, had known without words. That was why she had kissed him so eagerly, searched the skies so tirelessly, and defended him zealously before strangers.

As Peter arranged himself neatly beside her on the web, she silently drank in the sight of him, dear, achingly familiar, no longer strange at all in his torn red suit. They looked at each other for a long moment, then, having anchored herself by looping her fingers around a taut silken strand beside her, MJ hesitantly voiced her thoughts. "I think I always knew ..." she said softly, "all this time ... who you really were." She gave him a gentle, wholehearted smile.

Peter's face was open and vulnerable as he returned her gaze. A faint scrape along one cheek was the only residual evidence of all his heroic exertions during that long evening. He regarded her with the same intensity in his dark, ocean-blue eyes which had been there the whole time he had held the warehouse wall up off of her.

For that reason, MJ found Peter's next words simultaneously surprising and inevitable. "Then you know why we can't be together," he said seriously, raising his eyebrows slightly for emphasis. "Spider-Man will always have enemies." His tone was pleading, and his eyes appeared more blue and deep than ever, set starkly off against his pale, earnest face. They held hers, begging her to understand. She swallowed painfully. She knew, she just knew, where this was going – but not where it was coming from. Why oh why did they keep playing out the same script over and over? What was this now, the third time he'd explicitly rejected her? It hardly seemed possible, but this time hurt even worse than the previous two had ... perhaps because she had just finally recognized Peter for who he truly was.

Her sad face seemed to strengthen his resolve. He gave her another tender look, saying emphatically, "I can't let you to take that risk."

She fought tears as she grasped the silky, interlocking strands of the web, noticing idly that they were adhering to the skin of her fingers ever so slightly. She would not cry.

"I ..." Peter struggled to continue, lowering his eyes with a pensive expression on his face, as though the weight of the world was resting on his shoulders. "I will always be Spider-Man." His voice cracked slightly under the strain of his feelings, and his indigo gaze returned to hers, regretful and resolute at the same time. "You and I can never be."

The pressure of the emotions inside MJ became overwhelming, and she found herself at a loss for words. She could feel her chin trembling as she swallowed her grief, so she looked down to the darkened streets underneath them for the first time in an attempt to collect herself. On the slick, rain-wet road below, she could see a long line of police cars, with sirens blaring and lights flashing, quickly approaching the docks. But MJ wasn't interested in what was happening far beneath her. She lifted her eyes to Peter again, and was transfixed by the tenderness in his gaze. She couldn't help but allow all her feelings of love and sorrow to show in her own eyes, and he gave her one of his sweetest, most loving smiles in response. It was a look of encouragement but also a look of farewell, she realized. Then he handed her something, a slender satiny strand. In surprise, she took it and wrapped both hands around it, marveling afresh at its springy, silken, elastic consistency.

"I'm going to lower you down to the upper deck of a tugboat below us," Peter told her quietly. "It's a long way down, but you'll be perfectly safe. If you hold onto the web and keep looking up at me, you won't even be frightened." With those words, he straightened himself up, and lifted her right off the face of the web, hoisting her effortlessly into the air with just one hand. Not even with a hand, actually – after a closer look, she realized in wonder that the web was still connected to his wrist.

For a second, she didn't think she'd be able to find her voice, but finally she managed to say, "I know." Then, desperate to prolong the moment, she added shakily, "Thank you. For saving my life, I mean." He was crawling off the edge of the web now, bringing her smoothly after him, but he paused at her words.

"It was nothing." He closed his eyes momentarily. When he opened them again, they were full of joyful relief. It occurred to her that she would never again have to wonder what Peter was thinking behind impenetrable blue eyes. They were so open and transparent that she could read him like a book now, at least when it came to his feelings for her.

Then, bringing her after him carefully with his arm extended to make certain she wouldn't bang her shins against the girders of the crane, Peter climbed up and over the metallic arm where they had been resting so comfortably a scant few minutes before. He held her suspended in midair for a second, giving her another tender smile that made her heart ache. As he bore her up, she felt weightless and free ... until he began lowering her slowly back to ground far below, somehow spinning the web strand right out of his wrist. Then gravity seemed to pull her down, dragging her further and further away from him. She did as he said, though, keeping her eyes on his face nearly the whole way down ... not because she was afraid of heights – if she ever had been, he would certainly have cured her of such a fear by now – but because she had no idea when she would see him again. She wanted to memorize his expressive face, a mirror to her own, full as it was of such powerful, conflicted emotions – love and pain, joy and sorrow, acceptance and loss.

Far too quickly, her feet touched down softly on the wooden deck of the tug moored by the base of the cargo crane. She opened her hands, letting go of the web line, and saw him release it too with a flick of his wrist at the same moment that she did. The wind caught the filmy stuff and lifted it as light as gossamer. It drifted and furled on the breeze for a second, tangling itself up, before it blew completely away, vanishing as though it had never been. Once again MJ's tears threatened at the loss of this last tenuous connection with him. She realized anew that she didn't know when, or even if, she would see Peter again – certainly not before her wedding, the day after tomorrow. She strove to keep her vision clear, though, so she could keep looking up at the remote figure, balancing far out on top of the metal arm of the crane in a long, angular crouch, small and impossibly still. His face was a pale, distant beacon against the black sky and the distance between them had never seemed greater.

Far away, she heard cars stop, a car door opening, then rapid footsteps. Someone frantically called her name, "Mary Jane!" She glanced over her shoulder long enough to see that it was John – good, kind John – who was running toward her by leaps and bounds. He jumped easily from high off a staircase to the dock beside the boat, stumbled hastily on board and scrambled to climb the rickety stairs to the top deck of the tug. She watched him for a moment, her hand resting on the railing in front of her, and then she looked back at Peter, feeling an almost unbearable ache in her heart.

She found herself thinking distractedly of a line in the middle of the second act of Wilde's play, spoken by Cecily to Algernon when they learn that they must part after they've only just met. The line, "even a momentary separation from anyone to whom one has just been introduced is almost unbearable," had never had much meaning for her. MJ, often a little impatient with the effervescent, shallow Cecily, usually delivered it flirtatiously, with the animated sparkle of a coquette sure of a conquest. But tonight, now that she had finally seen the true face of the man she loved for the first time, the line echoed in her heart with an eerie new resonance. No longer a throwaway joke, it seemed almost too painfully true.

Suddenly she needed all the comfort that she knew John wanted to give her. She clambered down the stairs from the operator's deck and threw herself into his arms, allowing his warm hug to engulf her. He pressed his face to her neck through her hair, kissing it over and over, and she buried hers in his shoulder ... but something was off somehow. MJ couldn't help noticing that John seemed slighter, more insubstantial and, well, more ... spongy than before, despite the fact that he was taller and broader in stature than ... Peter. Then she realized what she was doing and scolded herself for comparing an ordinary person – one who was remarkably good-looking and fit to boot – to Spider-man. It wasn't exactly fair.

Perhaps it was inevitable, though: after all, the last man who had held her in his arms, mere moments ago, had been Peter. Eyes closed, MJ relived the paradoxical power and gentleness of Peter's embrace and the intense sensations it had evoked for one last moment. She had never experienced anything remotely like the unique feeling of being held so lightly and tenderly in such vigorous arms. Once more, MJ swallowed the bitter, acrid taste of loss. She raised her eyes to look back at Peter.

He was masked now and standing on the crane's arm with the air of someone who had just completed a difficult task. As she watched him, he turned to go, giving her one last parting glance over his shoulder, before he cast a web line and swung away so swiftly and silently that she didn't even see which direction he'd taken. He was gone.

It was only then that MJ allowed the first few tears to fall. They inched down her cheek slowly and seeped into John's cloth-covered shoulder.

"Oh, God, MJ, I've been so worried about you." John pulled back from her to look in her face, and began wiping the tears from her cheek with a thumb. "Everyone's been so worried. I hung around the police station waiting for word all day. Your mom's been calling my cell phone almost every five minutes, your friend Louise called six times, your director called. No one had any idea what had happened to you."

"It was pretty wild," said MJ in a shaky voice, nervously wondering all of a sudden how on earth she was going to explain the evening's bizarre events to outsiders. She wasn't even sure she understood everything, except for the crucial fact that she was not, after all, merely a bit player in Doc Ock's apocalyptic scenario, as she'd originally believed. No, amazingly, she was actually the leading lady in the scene, just as she had been, without knowing it, when the Green Goblin had tried to drop her off the Queensboro bridge. Peter loved her ... had loved her enough to save her life on four, no, five different occasions now. After their recent farewell conversation, this was a bittersweet revelation.

John put an arm around her waist and began guiding her slowly down the narrow stairway. She went gingerly, finding her movement forward hampered by John's almost constrictive embrace. He seemed afraid to let go of her, as though she would disappear if he removed his arm. "How are you feeling?" he asked, looking down at her anxiously. He took in her torn dress along with the streaks of dirt on her face and arms, but she ducked her head under his scrutiny.

That's the question of the hour, isn't it? thought MJ. She had no idea how she was feeling, and doubted she could articulate a single emotion out of the unruly tumult swirling around inside of her. She guessed it was lucky that those weren't the kinds of feelings about which John was asking. "Uh ... I think I'm okay," MJ replied quietly. John grabbed her hand to lead her across the gangplank between the tug and the dock, and then, as soon as they were on solid ground again, he pulled her back into his side, tightly.

"Just to be sure, I think we should have you checked out at an Emergency, or one of those all-night walk in clinics." John was saying, as they moved awkwardly along the docks. Ahead, MJ could see police officers climbing out of cars and, of all people, John's father, J. Jonah Jameson, striding out in front to meet them. He was rapidly approaching, his open overcoat flapping in the breeze in time with his long strides. It was hardly surprising that he would be one of the first on the scene. She suspected he was not there solely as a supportive father-in-law-to-be. He probably wanted to have an inflammatory headline for the early edition of The Bugle the next morning. The question of what she was going to tell people about the incredible events of evening suddenly started to seem urgently pressing in its importance.

"Well!" said Jameson gruffly, as he reached them. "This place looks like a bomb hit it." As he spoke, MJ looked around, noticing for the first time the row of darkened street lights bent and twisted sideways like pipe cleaners, a bunch of wrecked cars piled up against each other like a demolition derby, the metal girders of some ruined shells of buildings bent over at grotesque angles, and the fragmentary remains of the warehouse revolving around in a circular swirl in the water at end of the pier. "Looks like Spider-Man has left his usual wave of horrible destruction and costly damage to public property in his wake," J. Jonah Jameson remarked disgustedly.

With a painful jolt, MJ woke up out of her heartsick daze. She looked at J. Jonah Jameson furiously and snapped, "Spider-Man saved this city tonight." Suddenly it struck her afresh that she was the only witness to the evening's bizarre events. She quailed inwardly as the pressure of what to say loomed large over her. Then she pulled herself out of John's tenacious grasp and squared her shoulders at the blustery man towering over her. "I should know," she said with dignity, "because I saw it all."

Jonah Jameson's steel-grey eyes took on a speculative gleam at that, and MJ shut her mouth, remembering that everything she said would probably wind up in The Daily Bugle tomorrow. "Is that so, Miss Watson?" he inquired coldly. "Like the way he caused a train wreck thanks to his dangerous abilities this afternoon?"

MJ stared at Jameson for a moment in mystification and then looked wonderingly at John, who was rolling his eyes at his dad's words. He saw the question in her face and explained, "Spider-Man somehow stopped a runaway train with his webs this afternoon, before it could run out of track. No one was hurt – the survivors are even saying he saved them. It's all anyone's been talking about in this city the whole evening on the news, on the radio, on talk shows. There've been interviews with experts, interviews with witnesses, interviews with survivors from the train ..."

"That train wouldn't have been speeding out of control if it hadn't been for those two brawling maniacs," an irate Jameson interrupted. He glared at his son. " ... bashing huge dents on city property, breaking windows, folding the front of a train like a fan and generally using it like their private playground. They didn't care that hundreds of citizens were going to be hurt ..." This is too surreal, thought MJ, wondering distractedly if Peter's life were always like this. Did he have to listen in silence to other people attack Spider-Man, impugning his motives and misrepresenting his actions? How did he stand it?

Jameson went on: "those two lunatics also did thousands of dollars of damage to the West Side Clock Tower, which has stood untouched for over a hundred years." He was obviously heading for the kind of full-blown tirade of which he was so fond. But as he was speaking a short, dark-haired man, who reminded MJ of nothing so much as a little black Scottish terrier, darted to his side, and began hovering at his elbow. "Mr. Jameson," he interjected, a little hesitantly, "Eyewitnesses in nearby office buildings reported that Spider-Man pulled Doc Ock off that tower ..." he broke off hastily, as Jameson turned a steely glare in his direction.

MJ recalled her long afternoon and evening of captivity, which she had spent wondering if Peter would be able to find Spider-Man and doubting whether Spider-Man would come for her. The whole time, he had been fighting for her, fighting for ordinary people in the city, trying to prevent a madman from carelessly taking lives ... and stopping a speeding train full of passengers! Even holding up a five-storey wall was nothing to that. All at once, the issue seemed too crucial to be determined by fear. She couldn't keep silent because of qualms that she might say the wrong thing; she didn't have time to be intimidated by Jameson's bluster – too much was at stake.

No, MJ looked at Jameson's scowling face and realized that she had a once in a lifetime opportunity to do something she'd longed to do for ages. She couldn't say anything, of course, about the train or the clock tower, but she could make sure that people, for once, would get the real story of the fusion reaction – or as much of it as she could tell safely, without compromising Peter. And she could have the satisfaction, just once, of making J. Jonah Jameson publicly eat his insulting words about Spider-Man.

"Mr. Jameson," said MJ, with exquisite politeness. "Do you want to know what happened here tonight? Do you want to print it in your newspaper?" The four of them had turned and were heading back toward the police cars. MJ was walking, her back ramrod-straight, in between John and his father. Ahead of them, she could see cops milling about with walkie-talkies, cameras, notepads, checking damage on the streets and buildings. One of the officers, a portly man who looked like he was in charge, started to approach her, but Jameson impatiently waved him back.

"How much do you want?" asked Jameson brusquely, looking down into her face. He was striving for a neutral expression, but she could see the anticipatory gleam in his eyes that he was attempting unsuccessfully to suppress. She could tell that he was picturing a glossy full story in the early edition, probably accompanied by some of Peter's old photographs, leading hopefully to a massive sell-out and extra editions printed throughout the day.

"Oh, I don't want money," said MJ, calmly returning his probing gaze. "I do have a price, though." She stopped for a moment, turning to face him, and the others stopped with her. "I will only tell you my story of what happened, exclusively, on one condition – if you print my exact words. " She raised her voice slightly, her eyes snapping sparks. "There will be no slurs at Spider-Man, no smears on his character, no dredging up of old, so-called 'crimes,' no biased adjectives, no negative slant, no inflammatory editorial comments." After saying this, she held her breath, waiting to see what Mr. Jameson would do. Almost anything seemed possible in that moment.

For a second, J. Jonah Jameson stared down at her, his face impassive. Then his mouth twisted in wry dissatisfaction and he grudgingly stuck out a large hand. "Done," he said, gruffly.

MJ looked at the offered hand, remembering something that Peter had told her about Jameson a while ago. On one of their rare dates, before she'd started seeing John, she had complained to Peter about The Daily Bugle's treatment of Spider-Man, saying that the chief editor must be the lowest, vilest, most unprincipled scum. Peter grew thoughtful and remarked mildly that he believed Jameson subscribed to one basic journalistic principle at least. Then he told her that once, while the blustering editor's life was being threatened by a dangerous madman, he himself had seen Jameson refuse to name a source.

MJ paused before she put out her own hand. "Is that a promise?" she inquired coolly. She gave Jameson a hard stare. "I want your word as a newsman." Catching a slight twitch of movement at her shoulder out of the corner of her eye, she turned to see John looking at her with admiration and surprise.

Jameson lifted his wintry grey eyes to the heavens as if to appeal for patience in the face of silly hero-worshipping young girls. "You have my word as a newsman," he returned crossly. They shook hands, a brief pump. Then he turned to the small terrier-like man who was still hovering at his elbow. "Hoffman, you got that tape recorder?"

"Right here, chief," said Hoffman, in a subdued voice. He too was looking at MJ with an expression of respect in his eyes.

"Dad, now's not the time or place for an interview," put in John Jameson anxiously. "I'm taking MJ to a hospital to get her checked out."

"I've got to get her story now, if we want to make the early edition," retorted Jameson. "She doesn't look injured to me."

MJ glanced over her shoulder at her troubled fiancé. He could be so over-protective sometimes, but she guessed it was sweet. "It's okay, John," she assured him. "I feel mostly alright and this is really important."

Then she turned back to Jameson. Her heart was pounding but she knew it was with anticipation as much as with nervousness. "Spider-Man saved the city tonight," she began again, leaning forward slightly to speak into the tape recorder that the man named Hoffman was holding up to her. "A man called Dr. Otto Octavius had built a huge machine over there in that wrecked warehouse. He was trying to create a reaction – I think it was a fusion reaction, like the one that went wrong last month – and Spider-Man came and stopped him." She closed her eyes, remembering, because it was important to get all the details right. "When he showed up, Spider-Man said, 'Shut it down, Ock; you're going to hurt a lot more people this time.' Octavius said that he was willing to take that risk, and Spider-Man replied, 'Well, I'm not.' Then he tried to pull the plug on the machine. Dr. Octavius tried to stop him, and they fought this terrible battle, which Spider-Man won."

She paused a minute, as new, overwhelming memories broke over her like a wave – Spider-Man putting his whole soul into pulling her out of the fire, Peter yanking the mask off to try to reach Octavius with a familiar face, Peter's loving eyes gazing into hers from only inches away as he strained to hold that immense wall up with his back ... You do love me ... I do ... She quailed a little, feeling an echo of the night's intense emotions running over her consciousness like a seismic tremor. It occurred to her suddenly that Peter had saved the city, not Spider-Man. She had to remember to be careful of what she said – she had to give Jameson a carefully edited version of events, or she would risk exposing Peter.

"Well?" said Jameson impatiently, "Then what?" A nervous Hoffman held the tape recorder closer to her lips, as if to hurry her along.

She took a deep breath. John tried to slip his arm around her shoulders, but she shrugged if off, trying to concentrate on just how to describe the way things had transpired in a believable and safe manner. "Spider-Man tore out this huge mass of electrical cables, bigger than he was, trying to shut down the reactor," she stated, shaking her head. "It didn't work, though, because the reaction was growing larger and larger – it looked like a small sun, maybe the size of a little house, by now. It was also incredibly hot, and it was sucking everything metal into it – the whole warehouse was imploding all around us. I was chained to a pipe and it nearly sucked me in – only Spider-Man caught me with a web and pulled me out." She heard John give a small gasp behind her, and turned to look at him, smiling gently at the obvious consternation in his face.

Then she thought for a moment again. Although she wanted to give Peter the whole credit for what had happened, she suddenly remembered Dr. Octavius's keen, intelligent face just before the end, and his determined stance as he strode down to his death. She owed it to him, for saving Peter's life, at least to mention his sacrifice as well. She continued more softly, "Spider-Man realized he couldn't stop the reaction that way, so he went to his enemy, who was lying stunned near the reactor, and he said, 'Tell me how to shut it down.' After that ... it was so amazing, but Spider-Man talked Dr. Octavius into stopping that mini-sun himself. At first, Dr. Octavius said, "It can't be stopped. It's self-sustaining." After that, though, they figured out together that it would have to be drowned in the river. Then Spider-Man turned to do it." MJ gave an involuntary shudder, and drew a ragged breath. Then she got hold of herself and continued, "but before he could, Octavius prevented him, and instead went to do it himself." She lifted defiant eyes back to Jameson's face, and finished quietly, "And that's how Spider-Man saved the city tonight."

Mr Jameson's face broke into a broad, jubilant smile, "I knew it! I knew they were working together!" he exulted. Amazed, MJ could only stare at him for a second. He had just heard the truth, he knew that Spider-Man was a hero, and he still wanted to interpret the events she had just related in his perverse way. What did it take to convince some people? Then she got mad again.

"Spider-Man is a hero," she said in a low, quivering voice. "He was the only one who could have stopped Octavius and he did. He shut down the reactor. When that didn't keep that mini-sun from continuing to grow, from consuming everything, he used his head: he convinced his enemy to help him. He would have given his life for this city ..." her voice broke "... but luckily he didn't have to, so he can, and will, continue to protect us. And that's what I want you to print."

"And what about you, Miss Watson?" said Jameson, his steely eyes resting on hers speculatively.

"Me?" said MJ, taken aback.

"Didn't he save you too?" Mr. Jameson asked, giving her a keen look from under iron-grey eyebrows. "What does this make, the third time he's saved your life?" She caught her breath, remembering her incautious words at that dinner party a few months ago, and took an inadvertent step backwards, bumping into John. But her questioner pursued her doggedly, commenting sardonically. "Spider-Man seems to have a special interest in keeping you safe, Miss Watson."

For a second, MJ was paralyzed, and then she told herself desperately, Wake up! You're an actress – Act! She feigned an amused smile and tossed her head. "What you are talking about? Spider-Man's saved thousands of people in this city."

"Not more than once, I'll wager," said Jameson shrewdly, still watching her face closely. "And not under such interesting circumstances. A balcony full of executives are vaporized at the World Unity festival, but not you. The Green Goblin tries to throw you and a tram car of kids off the Queensboro bridge - then totally disappears. Today, Doc Ock grabs you from a café and Spider-Man emerges from his month-long retreat, looking for him. Why did Ock kidnap you, anyway?"

"I don't know," said MJ faintly, reaching the unpleasant realization that she didn't have a plausible explanation for her capture at that very moment. Maybe she should have thought this plan to defend Spider-Man through more carefully. She pulled herself together. "Doc Ock – Dr. Octavius hardly talked to me. Instead he chained me up and forgot all about me while he worked on his machine. He probably just wanted a hostage."

Jameson opened his mouth, presumably to disabuse her of that foolish notion and to continue his pursuit of her, but his son stopped him. "That's enough questions for tonight, Dad," John Jameson said authoritatively. Hearing the distress in her voice, he slid a protective arm around her shoulders, and this time she allowed it to remain there. "I'm taking MJ to be checked out, and then home to sleep," he continued. "Any more questions you have can wait until tomorrow."

He started to steer her away from Jameson and Hoffman, toward the waiting police cars, but at the last moment MJ had a new thought and pulled away from her fiancé, turning back to face them.

"Just one more thing, Mr. Jameson," she added politely. "I'd like you to keep my name out of the story, please. I don't want countless news outlets or reporters calling me, looking for extra details, on the day before my wedding."

Jameson's mouth dropped open in outrage, but before he could say anything in response, he caught sight of his son folding his arms implacably beside MJ. Their eyes met over MJ's head, and then Jonah shut his mouth with a snap and growled, "Fine!"

John offered MJ his arm and she took it. As they walked back to the cars together she could hear Jonah Jameson ranting to Hoffman that he didn't know what this city was coming to, with freedom of the press disappearing and green hero-worshipping girls dictating the contents of news stories to seasoned newspaper editors.

She whispered, "Thanks for getting your dad off my back."

"Don't worry about it," John said in his easygoing way. He shrugged dismissively. "Dad's an old news hound, always imagining sensational stories everywhere. I don't know what he thought he was suggesting this time, though, that you're Spider-man's girlfriend?" He laughed in his easy manner. "Hilarious! Come to think of it, that'd be a pretty good story."

MJ gave him an unsmiling look, reflecting once again that her life had become totally surreal. John felt her scrutiny and turned to look affectionately down at her, giving her arm a little squeeze with the arm linked through it. "I'll tell you one thing, MJ" he said, winking at her. "You've finally convinced me that Spider-Man's a hero."

"Really?" she said, a little gratified. "How?"

"Anyone who saves your life even once – let alone three times – is a hero in my books," said John smiling warmly down into her face, "no matter what else he's supposed to have done." MJ squeezed his arm back gently, giving him a small, tremulous smile in return. John's sweet words were ever-so-slightly easing the ache in her heart and bringing the world back into focus. The night's incredible revelations had left her numb and shell-shocked. Now that her ordeal was over, and now that the adrenaline raised by her encounter with John's dad was also leaving her, she felt weak and shaky, uncertain of what to do next. She knew what Peter wanted her to do, or thought she did ... he'd given her another chance at life, not for himself but for her own sake. He wanted her to stay far away from him, to go and live happily – and safely – ever after with another man. And here was that good man, looking after her, trying to cheer her up, walking her to a car that would drive her to a hospital. She supposed she was walking off with John into the rest of her life. So why did it feel like an ending instead of a beginning?

End of Part V

A/N: I don't really know where to go from here – with MJ, I mean, not with the story. (Obviously, since I own the DVD, I've now seen the movie many times). Much as I like the scene with MJ as one more runaway bride in a long line of runaway movie brides, I've never really liked the fact that MJ leaves poor John standing at the altar with nothing but a note in his hand. So I'm not sure how to get MJ from dazed heartbreak to the realization that since she loves Peter and he loves her, she can't marry John. I guess I'm warning you that I don't have anything further written. Consequently, I don't know when I'll be able to make another update. I hope you enjoyed this part, though!