Yo. The first few lines of this came to me last night when I was brushing my teeth and I rushed to start/finish it before going to bed. It was a little hard writing this, both because I'm usually a staunch Peter/MJ supporter and because this piece uses more swearing than I'm normally comfortable with.
Just know that I haven't actually read the comic where The Green Goblin killed Gwen; actually, I don't really read Amazing, but my brother is so gosh darn obsessed that I feel like I have. Anyway, I've taken some creative license with stuff.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
This fight has been going on way too long.
I don't know how long they make the fights in movies and comics last. Since donning my Spidey costume I haven't had much time to go to the theater or the comic shop. But I'm guessing the fights last around ten minutes. Well, that's not really accurate. I'd say the average fight usually lasts around twenty minutes. Sometimes, if you're up against someone really strong or determined, or you're really strong or determined, they can last a little longer. But I think twenty minutes is a pretty good average.
This fight, however, has been going on for fifty minutes. Now, every so often a chase can last for a few hours, or even a whole day, or in the case of my good friend Morlun, multiple days. But, as the word "chase" so accurately implies, that means there are intervals of fighting dispersed throughout a day comprised mainly of chasing. This fight has had no chasing whatsoever. This has been fifty minutes of punches, kicks, and webbing.
It's lasted so long I'm past the point of talking, let alone making jokes. In fact, neither of us are talking. The only sound is that of fist hitting flesh, webbing being shot out of cartridges, the occasional sound of a cracking bone. Already I've cracked two ribs and dislocated my left shoulder. It's far from bad considering past fights I've been in. Physically, that is. Emotionally, I'm not doing so good. But then again, I'm fighting the Green Goblin. On the Brooklyn Bridge. And those two, especially in relation to each other, never put me in a good mindset.
The Green Goblin holds her by the neck, her hair and skirt flying softly in the wind.
"Drop her!" Spider-Man shouts, his rage far surpassing the boiling point.
"Drop her? Is that what you want me to do?" The Goblin smiles in that way he has that fuses evil and insanity in such a way as to make Spider-Man's stomach lurch.
"Yes! Drop her now! There's no reason for her to get caught up in this! This is between you and me, Goblin! Now, drop her!"
For a moment the Goblin just stands there, his eyes searching Spider-Man. Then he speaks again. "Oh, alright. I'll drop her." And, his face suddenly expressionless, he loosens his grip. And drops her.
The water below the bridge churns angrily, and Spider-Man, no, Peter Parker wearing a Spider-Man mask, watches as his beautiful blonde angel soars through the air.
Falling, falling, falling…
My thoughts are so caught up that I don't notice he's no longer standing where I can see him, and just as I realize this my spider sense goes off. Before I can even react I feel his fist connect with my back and I stagger forward, over the edge of the bridge. Falling, falling, falling…
I don't even blink as I maneuver myself so I'm facing upwards and shoot off a string of webbing, catching the bridge and swinging myself up and over the guard rail. I narrow my eyes as I pass the guard rail. Guard rail my ass. If it can't protect innocent girls from being murdered by the Green Goblin it's of no use to me. But then again the part of the story that's always made my heart ache isn't the fact that the Goblin dropped her. It's that I've never been able to pin her death entirely on him.
He sprints over to the edge of the bridge faster than he thought humanely possible. Then again, he's not exactly a normal human anymore. His heart beating so hard he's sure it's making the bridge tremble, he leans over the edge and shoots a web out toward her falling figure. And with a tug on the end of the line he sees her stop falling.
But still his heart beats like a drum, because until he sees her beautiful eyes again there is no way he will be able to breathe.
He pulls up the web, the ache in his arms all but unnoticeable. He pulls until she is just a foot below him, and then he reaches down and grabs her waist and hoists her up. But when she is up, when she is next to him, it's all he can do to keep from dropping her. Because she's already gone.
The first thing I notice when I've reclaimed my stance on the bridge is that I'm not staring into the Goblin's eyes, but rather onto the back of his head. I am poised to attack when suddenly I stop. I have spider sense. He doesn't. Why would he turn his back to me? It's no secret that the Goblin isn't exactly playing with a full deck of cards, but turning your back on an opponent? Even the Goblin isn't that crazy.
"Why don't you hit me?" I am surprised to hear his voice, not just because we haven't been talking lately but because it sounds like Norman. I lower my fist, but keep myself in a ready stance. I've fallen for the "It's-Norman-Not-The-Goblin" trick before and don't plan on falling for it again.
"What?" I ask, my voice steely and my eyes cold beneath my mask.
"Why don't you hit me!" On the last two words he turns around to face me, and his eyes betray just how crazy he really is.
I'm silent, unsure of what he's trying to achieve. More than likely he's trying to throw me off balance. And, to be honest, it's working.
"I'm… tired, Peter." He says, and I narrow my eyes.
"We've been fighting for over an hour. If I had to lug around all that crazy for that long I'd be tired, too."
"No, Peter, I'm… tired." Hearing him say my name again makes me angry. How dare he assume he has the right to call me that? How dare he, after all he's done, assume he can call me by the name my parents gave me?
"Goblin, I have absolutely no stomach for your games tonight. Let's just finish this so SHIELD can put you away and I can go home."
"Do you know what it feels like to have someone inside of you trying to escape?"
He doesn't seem to be listening to me, and I take a step back, getting a little freaked out.
"He's inside me, Peter."
"Who?" I ask, trying to figure out his game. "The Goblin? Is the Goblin trying to get out of you, Norman?" Maybe if I can get through to Norman I can get him to back down, if only for long enough so that SHIELD can take over. That is, if that good for nothing Nick Fury takes me seriously enough to answer my calls.
"No." He answers. "No." He walks up to me, and as my spider sense does not go off I allow him to come close enough to whisper in my ear. "Norman, Peter. Norman is trying to get out of me." It is then that I know that whatever hold Norman still had over his body is long gone. It's just me and the Goblin now.
"He's trying to get out of me, Peter," He continues. "I can hear his heart beating and his voice screaming in my ear. He says he won't leave me alone until I do what he says."
"What does the voice say?" I ask cautiously, trying to gauge if this sudden bout of increased insanity is going to cost me any more ribs.
"It says…" The Goblin trails off, and then starts again. "Its say, 'Kill him. He made us this way. Kill him.'"
It is silent as the Goblin puts his hands together in front of him and I try to keep my breathing calm. When he looks up suddenly it startles me, and I take another step back.
"And I think I will." Then he is launching himself at me, and I flip myself backwards onto the guard rail just as his glider comes up beneath his feet. I am swinging along the bridge, and he is following closely in pursuit. I fake a left and move swiftly to the right, causing him to lose his balance momentarily as he tries to reach out a fist towards me. I take the opportunity to give him a good kick in the stomach, and he falls to his side on the glider.
"He tells me to kill you, Peter." His voice is right behind me, and just as the words leave his mouth my spider sense goes off, and I drop to my stomach on the cold cement. The glider passes just inches above my back, and the incidental rush of cold air makes me shiver.
As soon as I'm up he sends a fist into my face, and while I'm trying to adjust my mask so I can spit the blood out of my mouth he comes up above me, launching pumpkin bomb after pumpkin bomb at me. He's not aiming; he's simply throwing, and most of them land two or three feet away from me. But one touches down next to my foot and my pant leg is blown off, my skin burning under the fire and shrapnel.
"He tells me to kill you, Peter. He tells me he will leave me alone when I kill you."
I look up at him, tired and angry. I'm used to Norman trying to contain the Goblin, but fighting the Goblin trying to contain Norman is another matter entirely. There's no one to get through to now, and the only way to beat him is to do it physically, violently. As I spray two strings of webbing at the Goblin, grabbing him by the shoulders and pulling him off his glider, I try to remind myself that despite the body they share, the Goblin and Norman are two different people. And as much as I love Harry, there is no way I'm letting the Goblin win just because he shares a pair of legs with Norman.
The Goblin falls off his glider, skidding to a halt a few feet behind me. Even as I hear him getting up I run to the glider and spray it to the ground, using up a good amount of webbing I'm sure I'll be missing later on. With the glider safely secured to the ground I turn back to the Goblin, and find myself looking into his eyes from not three inches away from him.
"Time to die, Spidey."
He clutches her body to his chest, his breathing getting shallow and forced. The tears have not come yet; right now all there is is shock, but he knows the tears will come soon.
"So sorry."
He turns around to see the Goblin standing on his glider, hands behind his back and face a mask of disaffection.
"Goblin." His voice is no longer his own; it has become an icicle, cold and ready to puncture. "You killed her."
"Did I?"
"Don't play dumb with me, you bastard! You dropped her off the bridge and killed her! She was dead before she hit anything! She probably died from shock!" He trembles, hating that term. To die from shock sounds so terrifying.
"Now, Spider-Man. We both know how unlikely that is."
"Then how did, she die, Goblin? How did she die!"
"She died when you caught her."
That catches him off guard and his head snaps up. "What?"
"Her neck… So fragile. When going several tens of miles an hour and then to stop so suddenly…You killed her, Spider-Man."
He places her cold body on the ground, and rips off his mask, wanting his eyes to be the last thing the Goblin sees.
"Time to die, Goblin."
He kicks my legs out from under me, and as I spring back up I feel him grab my wrists, his grip destroying my web cartridges. Damn. Those would have been useful. But I don't need them, especially when fighting the Goblin. We know each other too well; even without my spider sense I know what he's going to do before he does it. But he knows my moves, too. Maybe I do need those cartridges.
I push myself up and, balancing on my arms, use both my legs to kick him back. But he won't fall for the same thing twice, and this time he's ready. He grabs my legs and, using his backward momentum, drags both of us down. Then, as soon as he's up, he unleashes another barrage of pumpkin bombs.
I'm slightly uneasy as I realize the bombs are nothing more than smoke this time, hardly even exploding on impact. I close my eyes, knowing that in this darkness shutting them will allow my other senses to prevail. When I hear the Goblin I rush to him, ready to strike the first blow.
Things never go according to my plans.
As I near him my spider sense starts going off again, but whether it's because I'm rushing at him, or because I'm going too fast to stop, or whatever the reason is, I keep going, and before I know it he's right in front of me, his arms reaching out toward my… head? No, toward my neck.
He grabs my neck and squeezes, lifting me off the ground. I may have better powers than he does, but the Goblin is a lot taller than me, and I feel my legs dangling above the ground. I reach out for his face, but his arm width is too long, and I can't reach. Instinctively I try to web him before I realize my cartridges now lie on the ground some twenty or thirty feet away from me. I'm starting to realize how good Doc Ock's got it to be able to summon his arms telepathically.
With my legs I kick out, but without somewhere to push off of or even a breath of air my attempts prove futile.
"Time to die, Spidey," he repeats.
Rain has started to come down, but Spider-Man hardly notices it. He's too busy running towards the Goblin to notice much of anything other than his overpowering hatred, a hatred he hasn't known since his Uncle Ben's death.
The Goblin raises his glider and moves up into the air, and Spider-Man takes to his webs.
I'm making mad grabs at his hands, trying to pry them off my neck, scratch them, do anything to make him let go. As I continue struggling, he begins to talk.
"He wants me to kill you, Peter."
I consider trying to talk to him, but I know it'll just be a waste of breath.
"He wants me to kill you, and then he'll leave me alone." His grip tightens around my throat. "He promised me he'd leave if I killed you."
"Just… like you… killed Gwen…" I say between struggling breaths.
I can almost hear him smile.
"No, Peter. You killedGwen."
He is shooting webs out at the bridge, hardly aiming, just wanting to get close enough to the Goblin to give him a good hit. He thinks of nothing but revenge, and he thinks of no one but Gwen. The Goblin and Gwen.
I can feel the darkness overpowering me, and I try as hard as I can to fight it.
"You killed her, Peter," He repeats. He's trying to get me worked up, trying to make me lose concentration.
But if I'm going down I'm not going without a fight.
"I… didn't… kill her, Goblin… You did…"
"I dropped her, Peter. But your webbing snapped her neck."
"No…."
"It did, Peter. And you know it."
"No." I raise my arms, which have long since felt like bricks attached to my sides, and again try to loosen his hands. "No."
"She was falling, Peter. Blissfully falling. Like an angel. And your webbing, the webbing you made to fight evil, destroyed her peace."
"No!" I'm flailing again, and I can just barely feel my fingers slip under his hands.
"It destroyed her, Peter."
"No!" And I wedge my fingers beneath his and pull back, the sound of his fingers snapping more beautiful than a chorus of angels any day.
"I didn't kill her!" I scream, and as my feet mercifully hit the ground I take a few deep breaths, the color returning to my vision. I leap forward and pin him to a wall. Now his feet are the ones dangling.
"I didn't kill her!" With each word I let my fist echo my speech, hitting his chest, stomach, and face. When he starts loosing consciousness I let him drop to the ground and kick him in the side repeatedly. A rib for a rib.
It is only when he completely stops responding that I stop hitting him and drop to my knees.
Wrapped in webbing, a final kick is all it takes to make the Goblin fall from his glider and into the ocean below. Spider-Man drops to his knees and puts his face in his hands. Now the tears come.
Making sure the Goblin is down for the count I sprint over to the emergency phone further down the bridge and put a call through to SHIELD. It's a good thing the phone doesn't require money, because having no pockets I don't have anywhere to carry spare change.
Finally, after what seems like an eternity of waiting, the secretary comes back on the line to tell me a team is being dispatched to pick the Goblin up. I hang up and walk back over to my fallen foe.
Seven minutes later the SHIELD team arrives and after I give them a brief run-through of the fight they send me on my way. As I leave I can hear them snickering and calling me "web-head." What SHIELD has against me I'll never know, but I'm not too fond of them, either.
When I get home I run a bath, and after sitting in the hot water for thirty minutes I dry off and wrap my chest and shoulder, my skin dark shades of blue and purple that I've long since gotten used to seeing on my body.
Crawling over to her, Spider-Man pulls Gwen onto his lap, his tears hitting her lifeless, beautiful face. In the back of his mind he hears sirens and knows the police are coming. He also knows he has to leave. Even with the excuse that the Goblin killed his girlfriend, Spider-Man knows he wouldn't be let off for killing the Goblin.
He gives her one last kiss, her lips cold against his, and lays her back on the ground. As he swings away he put his mask back on, shielding himself from the rainy downpour.
Swinging home he curses the rain, and the police, and the world. What right do they have to go on when Gwen is gone?
I put on my pajamas and climb into bed, too tired to even brush my teeth. Outside I can hear a light drizzle start, and I thank God the fight ended before the rain set in. But feeling the bruises around my neck, I realize there are much bigger things to be thankful for tonight.
END
Alright, I hope you liked this. I've decided I really need to write more Spidey; he's so much fun to write for and there are so many villains and relationships to utilize. Read and review! Thanks!
