Chapter Six
Riebeau clapped his hands. "OK, everyone, let's focus for a minute here." The assembled cast and crew looked at him obediently. "We all know what's going on. Someone's trying to shut this production down, make it impossible for us to keep going. We're going to prove them wrong."
Peter, leaning against a wall in the back of the room, noticed the glare Riebeau shot Manny Alzamora, although Manny didn't. Way to go, spook the guy, he thought. He was beginning to realize that theater people were the worst people in the world at acting normal. He'd told Mary Jane all about his investigations over lunch, and she had been much, much too cheerful to Manny when they'd bumped into him a few minutes after they'd returned. Manny had passed on Riebeau's announcement of a general meeting in the conference room at three and headed off without noticing anything, fortunately. Peter loved the way MJ blushed.
Sliding a glance of his own over at Beck, who was slouched in a chair nearby and chewing on his nails, Peter reviewed his own fruitless morning. He had searched Manny's office without finding anything, and made a start on Beck's – but it was such a mess, piled with molding pizza boxes and half-finished projects, that it would take months just to sort through it. What else could he do, except hang around, keep an eye on the suspects, and wait for their mystery attacker to make the next move? On the other hand, this meeting made him nervous. It might be necessary to motivate the frightened employees of Apex Studio to stay at work, but he hoped Riebeau wasn't also trying to play amateur detective. He snorted in amusement at his own thoughts. Who am I to talk?
In his rumbling voice, Riebeau continued, "I know there are a lot of rumors flying around. I know a lot of you are worried that the Green Goblin is out to get the show." Here he glared at Beck and Peter rolled his eyes.
Mary Jane's dresser, Peggy, poked Peter in the ribs and hissed in his ear, "I told you. I told MJ. This whole movie is cursed." He looked automatically at MJ, sitting up front with the other actors, legs elegantly crossed, an attentive expression on her face. Peggy poked him again to get his attention back. "The Goblin won't give up."
"But we aren't about to give up," Riebeau boomed. "We've got a great crew, we've got the best people in show business, and we're going to make a film we – " His words were drowned out by the hugely amplified maniacal chuckle that suddenly filled the conference room. The lights went out.
With a hiss, white smoke began pouring along the walls, lit by flickering green strobe lights in the ceiling. Several of the crew members murmured appreciatively at the effect, while others gasped or squealed. With a startling thunderclap, a burst of flame illuminated a shinning, green face with glowing yellow eyes floating in midair over the dais at the front of the room.
"It's him, it's the Goblin!" Peggy screamed suddenly.
Riebeau, standing on the dais to deliver his pep talk, held his ground only a few feet from the apparition. The dumbfounded actors in front, backing out of their folding chairs and huddling together, transferred their attention as an audience from their director to the lightshow.
"Fools!" The voice echoed through the large room at twice Riebeau's volume. Twin jets of flame spurted on either side of the giant Goblin mask as it spoke. "How dare you defy me!"
Peter slipped along the wall toward the exit prepared to dart into the hall and dump his street clothes but paused as, like the actors, he was caught up in the performance. Mary Jane was there at the front with one of the leading men – Peter had forgotten his name – clutching her arm and whimpering. She turned to look over her shoulder and spotted Peter. He gave her an incredulous "what the heck?" shrug and she raised an eyebrow in response before turning back to the stage. He felt behind him, through the smoke, for the door handle.
"I am the terror of this city! I am the Green Goblin!" Boom, flash. "You will do as I demand, or pay the consequences!"
Riebeau, for once his life a tiny silhouette dwarfed against the glowing mask, yelled back, "To hell with your consequences!"
Peggy moaned with fear, but character actor Grant Newman called out, "You tell him, Jon!" and waved his pocket flask. There were a few reluctant laughs, and a short pause, with the Goblin mask remaining speechless. Spider-Man, crawling unnoticed across the ceiling among the lights and rising smoke, chuckled and wondered how long it would be before the crew started waving lighters. Apparently, whoever was orchestrating this hadn't counted on people actually enjoying the show.
"Silence!" the mask bellowed at last. "A new script has been delivered to your office, Jon Riebeau," it went on. "You will follow it, or you will suffer a disaster such as you have never known! I will be honored!"
"Hey, isn't this supposed to be my movie?" The crowd turned and gasped as one to see a garish, red-and-blue masked man hanging upside down over their heads. "Who do you think you are, anyway, the Wizard of Oz?"
"Silence!" the Goblin bellowed again. The audience faced him, again in unison, reminding Spider-Man irresistibly of a tennis match. "Obey, or suffer the consequences!"
"Yeah, you said that already." Spider-Man cocked his head, conveying puzzlement although his face was hidden. "So – a new script? Come on, I didn't like the first one either, but that's no reason to blow your top."
"What?" That was Manny, slack jawed and wide eyed but with professional pride breaking through his shock. "I mean, hey, that's some of my best work – " Everyone ignored him.
"Silence!" bellowed the Goblin mask. "Do you need a demonstration of my powers?" There was a crack. Two sections of the ceiling shattered, long metal bars breaking through the sound proofing and scissoring in deadly arcs toward the packed crowd below.
Thwip. Thwip. The soft sounds were lost as people ducked and screamed, then waited in confusion when nothing happened. Mary Jane, crouched on the floor, looked up and saw two heavy pendulums, each tipped with a razor-sharp blade, arrested in midair by thin, glittering webs. Peggy, who had been in the direct path of the sweeping weapons, stood up slowly and stared at the motionless blade over her head. "Jeeze Louise," she whispered.
Suddenly, with a wild yell, Quentin Beck stood up and charged the stage. "Get back, you monster!" he shrieked, shaking his fist ludicrously at the green face.
There was an amplified chuckle, and the mask spoke once more. "Little man, you have courage. You will play my role in this movie, and play it well, or you will suffer my wrath." The jets of flame punctuated the Goblin's speech again, and then the mask faded out with one last thundering threat: "Follow my instructions, or there will be disaster…"
"I give it, oh, two stars out of five."
Riebeau jumped and swatted at the coffee that spilled down his front. "Crap." Spider-Man pushed the window all the way open and twisted his way through, skipping easily across the walls to the spot he had occupied the night before. Riebeau scooted his chair away.
"Been reading the new script?"
"New script, my fat behind." Riebeau picked up a sheaf of pages from his desk and tossed them at the trash can. He missed and the pages fanned over the carpet. "It's not like Manny's stuff is high art, but this makes him look good."
Spider-Man, sitting with his feet flat against the wall, leaned his elbows on his knees. "Yeah, but I'm guessing it's put you, me, and the police all on the same page. Beck?"
"Beck." The director sighed and picked up a pencil, tapping it against his desk. "I think that kid's been watching too many movies."
"Kid. Try killer."
"But why?" Riebeau exploded, throwing the pencil after the script. "This can't all be over getting a part in a stupid movie."
"Why not?" Spider-Man set his chin in his hands. "Don't a lot of people dream of being the center of attention? Every actor wants that big break. He's just willing to go further than most to make it happen."
"Like you?"
Spider-Man stiffened and went still. "What do you mean?"
Riebeau waved a hand at the man sitting on his wall. "Isn't that what this is all about? Showing off, grabbing the headlines, making sure everyone notices your name? You're doing a great job of it, by the way."
"Oh, man. You've been paying way too much attention to the Daily Bugle. I don't do this for the attention."
That earned him a skeptical snort. "Sure. The red and blue jammies are great for fading into the background."
Spider-Man looked at his own hands, covered in red fabric and black webbing, and remembered the first time, the first costume, the blood. "This costume means something to me." Changing the subject, he asked, "Has Beck been arrested?"
"Nope. The cops took him in for questioning, but unless they find something to connect him with the murders they're going to have to let him go. That rotten performance of his this afternoon convinced me, but that's not proof." Riebeau scrunched in his chair to get comfortable, and turned to look Spider-Man in the eye for the first time. "They also advised me to play along until Beck trips up."
"I think they're right. Do you – "
He broke off as someone knocked on Riebeau's office door and swung it open. "Jon? Do you have a minute? Oh!"
"Come on in, Mary Jane." Riebeau stood up and gestured her to a chair. Spider-Man jumped off the wall, standing awkwardly as MJ shot an apologetic grimace in his direction.
"Oh, um, I – I didn't realize you had, well, company. I can come back later?"
"No problem, Mary Jane, we were about done." Riebeau got himself settled behind the desk again and raised his eyebrows in Spider-Man's direction. "Of course, you two know each other."
"What?" Peter prayed that hadn't sounded as panicked as it felt.
"From the Unity Fair?" Riebeau smiled in MJ's direction. "I didn't think even a guy who likes tights would forget rescuing this particular damsel."
"Oh, I'm sure – well, you know, it was a long time ago," MJ babbled, then stopped and smiled brightly.
"No, right, I remember." Spider-Man stopped too. Riebeau looked back and forth from the actress to the vigilante with an unpleasantly enlightened expression. "Well, I'm sure you two have things to discuss," he went on desperately. "I'll be – around." With an awkward little wave, he back-flipped to the open window and squeezed out.
Mary Jane and Riebeau watched him go, and then turned to look at each other. MJ smiled again, this time more naturally, and said casually, "I had a few questions about the shoot tomorrow."
"Damn, damn, damn, I am so sorry, Peter," Mary Jane said for about the fortieth time.
"MJ, it's not your fault. I wasn't any better," Peter said. He rubbed at his face and threw himself down on the couch, pulling his knees to his chest. "I just never thought about us running across each other like that."
She leaned back in her chair, legs tucked under, and sighed. "Still, I'm an actress. And it wasn't like I didn't know you were around. I just – I don't know, lost it. I'm so sorry."
"Don't be. I shouldn't have ducked out and left you there." He stood up and started pacing again. "You said Riebeau didn't say anything afterward?"
"No. Didn't even seem curious. It might all be our imaginations, you know," she grinned up at him, "just our guilty consciences."
Peter grunted and came to a stop, forehead wrinkling. "You could be right." He stretched and sat down on the edge of the couch. "And now we know who's giving Apex it's round of bad luck."
"I guess." MJ didn't seem one hundred percent convinced. "It was kind of cheesy, how he jumped up on stage to attack a projection and got handed the part he wanted so badly. So what happens now?"
Scooting back, he shrugged. "The cops will be shadowing him, trying to catch him up. All the stuff he's been doing must take a lot of preparation, so if he tries something else they'll get him doing it. Or possibly they'll find some physical evidence to prove he was in the lobby that day."
"Then you won't be hanging out on Jon's wall anymore?" she said. "Does that keep people off balance?" The joke fell flat as he frowned again and picked at the cushions. After a couple of seconds, MJ said, "Peter? Hey, I was teasing."
"Sorry." He took a breath and let it go. "Sorry, it's just the second time today I've gotten accused of showing off."
"I wasn't accusing you – " she started, but he jumped up and interrupted her with a quick peck.
"I know. Sorry. It's just – look, forget it."
Fighting back her irritation – did Pete really have to jump all over her? – Mary Jane took a good look at her boyfriend and realized he was really bugged by this.
"Peter?" He looked at her. "Why are you being too sensitive?" She kept her tone soft and sincere. He responded with an honest, blue-eyed ruefulness that she found charming.
"I don't know. I guess it's – I don't show off. I don't go out there shouting, 'Hey mom, look, no hands!' or anything. I get a lot of that from Jameson and it's a pain."
Mary Jane knew that was true, but something told her that wasn't all of it. "So? Usually you shrug it off. Jameson's not the only voice in the world. A lot of people think you're a hero."
"People think Spider-Man is a hero. Sometimes." Peter sat down – again – and shoved his hands in his pockets.
"Do you, well, miss that people don't see that, when they see you, I mean the Peter Parker side of you?"
"No, I really don't. In fact, it's nice to be able to take off the mask and be normal. But I don't – I don't know how to explain it." He sounded frustrated, but MJ thought she was beginning to get it. There were a lot of little things she'd noticed since she'd found out about Peter being Spider-Man that were clicking into place now.
"And when you are being Spider-Man, sitting on the wall, or shooting webs, or, I don't know," MJ searched the ceiling for another example and came up with, "hanging upside down – that's not you showing off. That is you being normal."
He looked at her. "Yeah."
"You don't ever do any of that when you don't have your suit on," she went on. "I've never seen you, you know, just around the house, do anything, um…"
"Freaky?"
"You're not a freak, Peter." She said it more sharply than she meant to, and winced. Peter laughed and nudged her foot reassuringly.
"Believe it or not, I'm not having some kind of crisis about whether or not I'm normal. I'm pretty sure I'm not," he said. MJ grinned back at him. "I just wish – sometimes it feels like I can never relax, not really."
"Well, around here, you can," she said. "If you want to sit on the wall, or think better upside down, or absent-mindedly scratch the back of your head with your toe, I promise not to freak out or accuse you of showing off."
He hid his face in his hands. "I really didn't mean to say that."
"I know, Tiger." She tilted her head and waited. He raised his head and took a deep breath before going on.
"It's probably better if I don't make a habit of doing, um, spider-stuff when I'm not in costume. But, sometimes…" Smiling, he kicked off both of his tennis shoes and vaulted over the back of couch to the wall. She watched him get comfortable, surprised that he didn't look odd to her perched there in jeans and a t-shirt, socks resting against the paint. With a smile, she got up and stretched herself out on the couch, resting her head on the arm where she could look up at him.
For a minute, they stared solemnly at each other. Then Mary Jane cracked up, and Peter started to laugh before he joined her on the couch.
Much later, he whispered, "Thank you, Mary Jane."