"Pete, I try and see myself as the cool boss that is open to new approaches to experimenting and finding solutions," Johnny says.
"And?" I ask, wondering where this seems to be going.
"I was curious why you are making Molotovs in the workplace," he says gesturing at the bottles of vodka with rags hanging out of their openings.
"I have been refining a new method of distributing webbing," I explain. "With these web bombs, I can blast webs over 361 degrees."
"There are only 360 degrees," Johnny corrects.
"These things are so good that they achieve another unprecedented degree," I say.
"Prove it," Johnny says.
It appears that I will have to prove a naysayer wrong.
"Okay," I say. "Let's test."
I grab a lighter and ignite a flame. I hold it to the cloth on one of the Molotovs, causing the fire to spread onto it. I then proceed to throw the Molotov over at the wall.
The burning liquor spreads and cloaks a fair amount of the wall and the floor in fire. Thankfully, I had already disabled the fire alarm and fire suppression systems in the lab beforehand for the round of testing.
Once it has a chance to really get going, I pick up one of the round web bombs. I press the activation button and hurl it at the fire. It detonated right at the fire, smothering it in a mass of webbing that stretches all the way up to the ceiling.
Johnny's eyebrows shoot up upon seeing this. "I think that I actually saw the extra degree," he says with an impresses nod.
"Right?" I ask with a grin. "This thing could also be great in accident prevention. Someone falls off an I-beam at a construction site or the crane begins to drop a load. With some quick reflexes, a person could throw a couple of these puppies at the problem and it's solved. Falling person is webbed to a wall. Load is held up by webs. Even better, mechanical failsafes could use these."
"I think that you could only use these with a machine," Johnny says.
"Oh, you naysayer," I say. "Just you watch. One day, someone will use these to save a life. You better be willing to acknowledge your fuck up."
"Yeah, right," Johnny says. "If those things can be used by a person, I will give you a million dollars."
"Oh, i will make you eat those words even if it takes me years," I say.
--
"Pete, what seen they doing again?" Johnny asks.
"They are about to start the testing on the emitters for their dimensional portal," I say. I point out the ring of beam projectors on the ceiling. "Those produce the field that allows the habitat to shift to the other dimension. Right now, they are just seeing if they can make a stable field."
"Why is this important?" Johnny asks.
"If they do this, they are only a small step away from actually pulling off the trip," I say. "This is like the engine test for the Apollo 13 rocket."
"Oh, that makes sense," Johnny says.
We are standing near the planning area where Reed and Victor work out of. They are running through the final checks before the test and Reed seemed to be worried about it failing.
"I still don't think that we had enough structural supports attached the ceiling to connect the emitters. There is the chance that the strain from projecting could loosen them from the ceiling," Reed tries to say to Victor.
"Stop worrying so much," Victor says. "The emitters are fine. The test is going to go off spectacularly, we are going to be an inch from completion, and one step closer to being up there with Einstein in history."
"If you say so, Victor," Reed says. "I guess that means that we are ready to do this."
"That's the spirit," Victor says. "Is there anyone else who wanted to watch?"
"No, everyone else is busy with their projects," Johnny says. "If that's it, let's get this show on the road."
With an additional flourish because he liked to believe himself a showman, Victor flips the ON switch.
The emitters starts to pulse and generate a simmering blue energy field around the habitat structure.
This success is responded to by cheers from Victor and Reed. The celebration is unfortunately cut short by the sound of metal starting to become strained and close to breaking. We look up to see that the scaffold structure holding the emitters in place is starting to warp due to the force of the emitters.
Reed slams the switch back to the OFF setting immediately. He shoots a look to Victor who just returns a shrug. "It seems you were right," Victor says, nonchalantly. That is the closest that anyone has ever gotten to an apology from him.
"Thankfully, nothing is broken," Reed says.
At this moment, Gwen comes walking over to us. "Hey, guys," she says. "Do you know where Sue is? I have been trying to find..." Whatever she was going to say is drowned out by the sound of screeching metal as a section of scaffolding with a couple emitters starts to tear away from the ceiling and drop down right at Gwen.
As it was breaking free, I had already reached into my lab coat and pulled out my newest version of my web bombs. I activate them and throw them up at the scaffolding. They detonate right as the scaffolding began to drop.
The mass of metal gets momentarily stopped by the sudden explosion of high strength webbing that it is attached to. However, due to its weight, the debris begins to snap the web strands and continue its downward trajectory.
Luckily, the few seconds it bought me are the only ones that I needed. Gwen has frozen in fear upon seeing her imminent death. I turn on my web shooters and fire two strands at her. I yank her out of the way just as the spot she had been standing in was crushed by the force of the falling equipment.
"Oh, my, God," Johnny says. "I can't believe that I just saw that. You just saved Gwen."
"Yeah," I say, pulling off the respirator so that I can take deep breaths from the sudden adrenaline dump produced by the near fatal accident. "I never thought that Victor was going to be the reason I became a millionaire."
Johnny took a second to process this before he realized what happened. When he recalled the bet, he dropped to his knees in anguish. "Nooo! Why couldn't it have been me?! I wish that stuff fell on me instead!"
"I take cash, credit, checks, and ," I say. "Just choose whichever transaction method you prefer."
"Peter?" I hear Gwen ask.
"Yeah?" I ask back, turning to see what her question is. I then realize she called me by my real name and that I had taken off the respirator right in front of her.
"Shit!" I say.
--
"Why have you been pretending to be a guy named Ben Reilly?" she asks me with a look of anger on her face.
"Do you want the short explanation?" I ask. "You."
I can tell by the additional anger that she didn't like that explanation.
"The long explanation?" I say. "I didn't want to talk to you."
"Why not?" she asks. "I thought we were friends. We haven't talked in years. Why would you intentionally avoid talking to me?"
"Are you serious?" I ask in confusion. "We haven't been friends in years. You found better friends, so you didn't need poor Peter Parker."
"We might not have hung out as much during high school, but we were around each other for most of junior and senior years," she says, unsure of why I am reacting in the way that I am.
"We were around each other, sure," I admit. "But we weren't friends. I was hanging out with Flash and Liz. You were hanging out with Harry and MJ. While our friends were friends, we haven't been friends in years."
Gwen seems slightly hurt by my words. "What happened? We used to be inseparable in middle school."
"Exactly," I say. "In middle school. But when we got to high school, you didn't even look back when you started to do your own thing. I never held it against you, but you made your choice. So, I learned to go it alone again."
"I know that I might have drifted away a bit, but I did try to reconnect with you," she says.
"Yeah, and I fell for it every time," I reply. "A few weeks, maybe a month, and everything reverted back to you not even noticing me."
"I get that, but I don't know why you couldn't even bother to talk to me," Gwen says. "Is everything that broken between us?"
"It is," I say. "Especially after senior prom."
I can see the moment that Gwen remembers. Understanding blooms across her face upon realizing what I am referring to.
"While it sucked that you couldn't go with me, I would have been able to move on," I say. "The real problem that I have is that you didn't even try to stop the jokes that spread about it. Flash and Liz tried, but you just sat there. What a great friend you turned out to be."
Gwen looks at the floor in shame. "Pete, I," she tries to say before I cut her off.
"It's fine," I say. "I moved on. I got past all of that stuff from high school. I have friends I can count on, I have a job that I enjoy, and I just won a million dollars. I am over all of the bullshit that happened back then. My girlfriend helped me with the rejection issues, so there is nothing holding me back now. So, bye, Gwen."
With that I walk away, trying not to feel some pain over the fact that I saw tears traveling down Gwen's cheeks as she mourned the loss of her first friend. A person who had been gone long before she ever noticed.