Peter strolled up his usual path through the cemetery, his legs operating entirely on muscle memory. It was a short trek he had made so often over these last ten years that he could do it in his sleep, and he was pretty sure that there were some instances where he had done almost exactly that. Despite the minefield of headstones in the area, he eventually made his way to the one he had come to see.

Gwen Stacy: Beloved Daughter And Sister.

Peter came to a stop about fifteen feet from the headstone, taking a seat on the soft grass. He had so much to say but struggled to decide where to begin.

"Hey, Gwen," he finally said, "I'm sorry I haven't been around the last few days. Things have been weird for me recently; like, even more so than normal. Apparently, the whole theory of the multiverse is true after all, so there's that. Guess you were right after all."

Peter had had many discussions/debates with Gwen about whether the theory of the multiverse was actually feasible or not. He was always the skeptic, citing all the different ways that physics and quantum theory couldn't allow for such a possibility. On the other hand, she had consistently pointed out the small holes in these theories that could potentially point to it being true, which he had always said was a "slight possibility" at best.

Of course, as was the case with many things in their short time together, Gwen Stacy had indeed been proven to be right...again.

"Anyway," Peter continued, "I also met two other versions of myself. It was strange, because none of us looked alike, yet we all had so much in common: we were all just kids when we got our powers, we all lost our uncles, we all ended up making a career of taking down bad guys, and we'd all lost a lot along the way."

Even after all this time, Peter still had to fight from getting a little choked up at the mention of all the people he'd lost at some point in his life.

"May's still doing well," he said, changing the subject. "It's still crazy to me how fast she worked her way up to head nurse at the hospital, but if anyone could do it, she could. Naturally, she still worries about me, just like she did even before she put together that I was...you know."

Peter could recall like it was yesterday when he found out that May knew he was Spider-Man. In a way, it had been a wakeup call to how much more careful he needed to be with his secret identity sometimes. To be fair, May did live with him during his first few years as the web slinger, so she had a distinct advantage over the rest of the world, but still.

"As for me," Peter spoke up, "I'm doing okay, I guess; same as ever really. Still trying to find a job where I, you know, actually USE the degrees I took way too long to get. The Bugle's still good though; Robbie's been great, and it's just a much better place to work than when Jameson ran things. Plus, it just meshes well with my 'other job'.

Peter glanced out in the direction of the sky, observing that the sun had almost completely disappeared.

"Well, I guess I better get to it," he said. "It seems like I've got a lot of catching up to do. I never could leave this city alone for a day or two without something happening. I'll be back soon though, I promise."

Walking up to the site, Peter transferred a kiss from his lips to the stone via his hand, leaving it there for a moment.

"I love you," he said.

Peter released his web, casually doing a backflip in the air before grabbing onto a pole at the top of a building. He'd been on patrol for about an hour, but there wasn't much criminal activity to speak of so far. The only illegal scenarios he'd stumbled across so far were a man running away with a woman's purse and a drug deal, the handling of which took less than three minutes combined. Twelve years had taught him a lot about how to handle these things efficiently, and all while getting in some hilarious quips, of course.

All this time with just him and the city hadn't helped clear his head like he'd hoped though. Instead, his mind kept coming back to his conversation with May earlier that evening. He tried to forget it, but he just couldn't leave it behind him, and that's how he knew that she was right.

Peter had tried to come up with reasons to the contrary, like he did during dinner. He really was content with his life overall; he liked his job, even if it wasn't what he'd dreamed of, and he got to help people as Spider-Man. Few people got to say they made as much of a direct impact on the lives of the people around them as he did, and Peter knew he was very privileged to say that.

Plus, he was all caught up on rent as of this past month, which was EXTREMELY rare. Granted, that would likely change as soon as he needed to repair his costume or build something that would aide him in stopping a bad guy, but it would all work out. It always did.

Still, when it came to his life as Peter Parker, his existence was very...basic. He got up, went to work, ate food, and all the other fundamentals. Sure, he could probably be doing a little more to socialize, but he was just too busy for that kind of thing. Besides, he got plenty of time to socialize as Spider-Man, talking with anyone from scared kids to old men playing checkers at a table. As a bonus, he'd even learned a little Spanish from some of his interactions, so he was branching out!

Yet, all these reasonings were sounding as convincing as one of his made-up excuses for being late somewhere. Thankfully, the police radio in his mask picked up something, so Peter turned his attention to it, welcoming the distraction.

"Security alert: backup needed at a warehouse on Fifth and Chelsea. Guards under attack by...some sort of two-legged bull things! Repeat, assistance requested!"

Two-legged bull things? Minotaurs? Yep, sounded just like Mysterio alright.

Firing his web, Peter launched himself in the direction of the action. He was pretty close already, so it only took him a minute or two to get there. Making his way into the building, he soon found the site of the disturbance: two rent-a-cops were trapped by two large minotaurs exactly as described.

"Hey fellas!" Peter shouted down. The creatures spun to look at him, making low growling sounds. Now that he had their attention, he fired a web in the direction of one of them. If it went straight through, then it was an illusion, and he would just need to find where the device projecting them was hidden. If they were robots, then things would be just a tad messier.

His question was answered as the beast he fired the web at grabbed hold of it almost as soon as it latched on, yanking hard and pulling Peter off his perch.

"Guess that answers that," Peter thought.

Without missing a beat, he somersaulted in the air to increase his momentum before slamming his feet into the machine's chest, puncturing a hole in it and causing it to fly back against the wall. However, it made a surprisingly quick recovery, standing to its feet.

"Wow, I'm impressed," Peter said right as his spider-sense kicked in, alerting him to the other one coming at him from behind. With precision and fluidity, he leapt backwards over top of the machine, landing on his toes and fingertips as the machine ran well ahead of him. The two robots turned and looked at him.

"Torro, Torro!" Peter called out. How convenient that he was already wearing red.

The undamaged one came charging first, followed by the other one. Peter performed a powerful sweep kick on the first, sending it tumbling to the ground, before getting the other one on his feet as he moved to his back, kicking the machine upward. He leapt after it, and, once he reached its level, extended his leg as he performed a quick somersault, performing a powerful kick that sent the robot crashing back to the ground on top of the other one.

Just for good measure, Peter fired a web at the floor, drawing his fist back as he sent himself careening back to the ground, driving his fist through the chests of both machines as he landed. The small lights he could now see in their eyes went dark as they shut down.

"Thanks Spidey," one of the security men said as he and his coworker came up to Peter. "So, they were just robots?"

"Yep," Peter responded, "oh, by the way, you gentlemen don't happen to know where you keep any kind of state-of-the-art technology around here, do you? Like, particularly something that might have shown up recently?"

"Uhm, we did get a shipment of microchips that just came in," one of the guards said. "But what does that have to do with this?"

Peter stood up.

"Where are they?"

Peter made his way down to the basement of the building quickly, eventually coming to the door. He peeked inside where, sure enough, he could see good Ol' Fishbowl Head himself, collecting the chips with a magnetic device. He slowly opened the door, climbing along the wall as he entered. Mysterio didn't seem to notice, so Peter gave a moment for his spider-sense to assess the situation. While Mr. Beck had never done quite the same amount of damage as the other's earth's version did to that world's Peter Parker in exposing his identity, Peter had underestimated his world's version too much early on, almost paying the ultimate price as a result.

His spider-sense never went off, so after a moment, he leapt forward, landing quietly just behind the man, tapping him on the shoulder. Mysterio spun around behind him, looking almost startled in his body language.

"You!" he shouted.

"Oh, don't act so surprised, Beck!" Peter said, grabbing Mysterio by the front of his costume.

"I thought you were dead!" the man shouted.

"Man, I take an unexpected vacation to an alternate dimension for a few days and the underworld just assumes the worst," Peter said sarcastically. "Well, now that I'm back, how about you catch me up on what you've been up to recently?"

"Sorry, wall crawler," Mysterio replied, "but I'm afraid you'll just have to be surprised!"

Peter caught on too late as Mysterio dropped a small square device from his hand. As soon as it hit the floor, a blinding light flashed all through the room, causing Peter to let go of his grip on Beck as he covered his eyes, staggering backwards. When he opened his eyes, he was suddenly surrounded by a tropical rainforest environment, and Mysterio appeared nowhere to be found.

Having been through this before, Peter disregarded what he was seeing around him. He needed to trust any sense except his vision right now, so he listened. His enhanced hearing wasn't something he used too often, but it came in handy in situations like this. Sure enough, Peter heard the faintest sound of rapid footsteps heading towards the exit on the side of the room. Zeroing in on his opponent, Peter fired a web, and he heard a tripping sound.

"No!" he heard as he dragged his catch back to him. Once he had Mysterio in hand again, Peter located and smashed the device on the floor in front of him, causing the fake environment around him to dissipate and Mysterio to become visible once again. Drawing his fist back, Peter smashed the front of Beck's helmet, revealing his face.

Man, that never got old.

"Easy, easy," Beck said.

"Just wanted to look you in the eye," he said. "Now, where were we? Oh yes, you were about to tell me what's been going on with you recently."

"I don't know what you mean," Beck replied.

"Oh, come on, Beck," Peter said, gripping the man's outfit tighter and drawing him closer to his face. "You're a showman; you can't stand the thought of people not seeing you when you're out here doing your thing, which means you must be working for someone."

"But you still knew it was me," Beck countered. "My reputation is strong enough now where I don't need to be present anymore."

The man's expression appeared proud on the outside, but Peter could see just the slightest crack in the façade. Maybe he wasn't that bad an actor after all.

"You see, this whole thing with you giving me the runaround tells me that I'm right," Peter said, not bothering to indulge his enemy's ego. "Now the only question is, who?"

This time, Beck remained uncharacteristically silent.

"Beeeeck," Peter grumbled.

"Or what, wall crawler?" Beck countered. "You're nothing but a boy scout underneath that suit. You won't do anything to me."

Peter clearly wasn't getting anywhere, so he webbed Beck up, making sure all the microchips were returned. He stayed behind just enough to make sure the pseudo magician didn't pull off some last-minute miraculous escape as the police arrived, finally satisfied once they took him away. Just like all his other foes, Mysterio likely wouldn't stay down for too long. The man was especially slippery despite having no powers, his brains and technical know-how generally allowing him to escape even the most secure prison.

For now, though, the man was behind bars, but he hadn't been as useful as Peter had hoped. He was convinced now though that his hunch was correct, that Beck had been working for someone.

That just left the obvious question: who?

Mason looked at his watch, gradually coming to accept the fact that Quentin Beck was going to be a no show this time. Despite the man's tendency towards theatrics, he had previously been reliable these last few days. However, something had clearly happened tonight, and he had a feeling it had something to do with the reemergence of a certain superhero.

Taking out his phone, he dialed a number.

"What is it, Phineas?" the man on the other end of the line asked.

"Beck's a no show tonight, boss," Mason replied. "I'm guessing this means the rumors are true about Spider-Man being back."

"Of course they are," the man on the other end replied. "Spider-Man is not so easily killed. He and I have nearly a decade of battles to prove it."

"So, where do we go from here?" Mason asked.

"Come back to base," the voice replied. "We will have to begin the more serious work on our project now that Spider-Man might be onto us."

"What about the microchips?" Mason asked.

"Not to worry," the voice replied. "Mysterio isn't the only supervillain I have at my disposal."

Hope you all are still enjoying this!

Continuing to pray for you all; stay safe and healthy!

"I, even I, am the Lord, and apart from me there is no savior. I have revealed and saved and proclaimed— I, and not some foreign god among you." Isaiah 43:11