To the reviewers!

To moonjava: Thank you. But please don't be offended, sometimes I just wish you'd just tell me what you like about it!

To LadyKayoss: Yes, thanks to all the fanfiction writers, there are a surplus of tentacled people running about; it's inevitable that a couple of them run into each other...

The next thrilling chapter! Will a long-standing emnity threaten to shatter the Smith and Parker families for good? Read and review!

Chapter 10: Silence in the Tortured Soul

"My grief lies all within,
And these external manners of lament
Are merely shadows to the unseen grief
That swells with silence in the tortured soul. "

–William Shakespeare, Richard II

Austin arrived at the Smith home to find it totally empty.

"Oh…god…what has she done?"

We cannot detect Noreen Osborn's presence here.

There are also no traces of her equipment.

No exhaust from her glider.

No smoke from her pumpkins.

Wait! Rachelle Laufey, your daughters Parker Marie and Ottoline, and your son Harry Octavian Osborn said they were going to the science fair. They could be there.

We have the whereabouts of the fair in our GPS system data banks.

You can get there within ten minutes…if you use us.

Austin mulled this over. It was rush-hour time, with all traffic slowed to crawl. The tentacles could go at least fifty five miles an hour, by contrast.

Okay.

High above the ground on Broadway, two girls were jostling each other. "Take me, Doc Ock, take me with you!" they shouted. "Hold me in your six arms!"

Why? Why must they mistake me for my father? It's a rhetorical question, so don't answer that.

Austin Smith swept into the auditorium to total pandemonium. A scientist named Dr. Reed Richards walked up to him.

"So you're Doctor Austin Smith, the Nobel Prize-winning young biologist who transformed the science of stem cells."

Finally someone knew about his own accomplishments.

"I've heard some disturbing things about your family, Dr. Smith."

"Well, I know my mother is a lawyer, but that's no reason to assume I don't have morals," Austin joked.

"We'll talk about your research, criminal father, and lawyer mother later, Dr. Smith. Your daughter, Ottoline…she's had an accident. She's at the Bliss Private Hospital as we speak. I'll drive you."

Parker Marie was sitting with Harry and Rachelle in the waiting room of the hospital. Peter and Mary Jane Parker were there as well.

Peter stood up. "Took you long enough to get here, you little son of a—"

"Peter!" Mary Jane rebuked.

"—octopus," Peter muttered.

"That wasn't what you were going to call him, Peter," Mary Jane replied.

"Well what happened?" Austin asked. "Where's Ottoline?"

"Well why don't you tell your son-in-law where Grandpa's little girl is?" Peter asked his wife sharply.

Mary Jane's voice was low. "Ottoline was in an accident at the Science Fair. She was demonstrating her mechanical actuators. She was electrocuted and now the artificial arms are welded to her back."

Well don't look like that, Brother.

Look at the bright side.

Now you have a daughter that will relate to you.

Shut up

"Well is that all, MJ?"

"Your father, Ottoline's designated guardian in case of emergency, dropped in, Austin," Mary Jane said. "He informed the hospital that they were not, in any circumstances, to perform surgery to attempt to remove the actuators."

"So now we have a third generation tentacle-wielding monstrosity in our family—"

"Peter, be quiet, please!"

"And what's worse, May is missing, her boss told us she checked out of work as usual but didn't come home! And your mad scientist father—"

"Speak of the devil and he shall appear, Pete," Rachelle snapped.

Peter said a derogatory phrase that made MJ poke him in the ribs and snap, "Don't use that language in front of the children, Peter!"

So Peter aimed his comments at the doctor who had just walked in the room.

"Why is it that whenever my daughter is in danger you and your son always show up, Ock!"

"My son has never treated your daughter with anything but the utmost respect and love, Parker!"

"Well you think you're such a genius, you tell me where my daughter is!"

"If you'd just get your blinkers off when it comes to my son, you'll know it was probably Noreen Osborn, just like in college—"

"If Goblin didn't have the hots for your precious boy my May would be just fine! In fact why doesn't he just divorce May and marry Noreen instead, do us all a favor—"

"Don't you dare speak about Austin that way—"

"No need to act all Dr. Perfect Father on us now, especially when you were deadbeat for the first fourteen years of his life—"

"Why you little--!"

"You dirty rotten--!"

Austin and Mary Jane finally managed to forcibly separate the two men. The last thing they needed now was a knock-down, drag-out, hero-on-villain fight right now in the hospital.

"Peter—don't you think you're a bit harsh on Austin?"

"Mary Jane, his father kidnapped you and tied you to a pole while he tried to blow up the city. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, you know."

MJ sighed. "The Green Goblin dropped me off a bridge, but you allowed his granddaughter to be best friends with May."

"It's not the same!"

But Peter knew it was. Mary Jane was right. Otto was right. He'd openly condoned the friendship between May and Noreen Osborn—until she took her grandfather's formula to become the newest Goblin. And he'd expressly forbidden his daughter to even date Austin Smith—and in his heart, he knew he was nothing like Ock.

Years ago, Doc Ock had nearly become Peter's Uncle Otto by marrying his Aunt May. The marriage was annulled, but maybe the thought of Octavius' son marrying his aunt's namesake still hit a sore spot.

"And Parker, if you ever--!"

"And Ock, if you--!"

"For God's sakes!" Mary Jane exclaimed, so loud that the entire group was forced to pay attention. "Whatever superhero-supervillain dynamic you had before, it's time to stop it! You are not Spider-man and Doctor Octopus anymore! You are Peter Parker and Otto Octavius, a teacher and a scientist, a husband and a widower, but most of all you are both fathers and grandfathers! It's time to let bygones be bygones and care for your children more than you hate each other! Now if we are ever to help Ottoline and May, we are all going to have to work together!"

What will happen to Ottoline? What has happened to May? Stay tuned!