Monday wasn't going great. For one, it was a Monday, but more importantly she'd heard some girl talking smack about their band, saying their dreams were futile, like that was even any of her business . Gwen almost punched that girl right then and there, but then, she knew better than to attack people.

But it didn't end there, if that was all she'd have had a bad moment in an otherwise normal morning. No they also had a surprise test she bombed in her first period math class and Natalie just happen to see her disappointed frown and immediately flaunted her perfect math grades.

The rest of her day wasn't much better and by fifth period she was already so done with the day. Of course Bradley just had to pick that day to distract and annoy her for the whole period.

That guy really needed to take a hint (maybe she should tell him she's into girls), and he really needed to stop chewing his gum in the loudest way possible.

"Hey, check this out." Bradley put his phone on her textbook.

He'd been trying to show her clips of him playing football and of him in the gym for almost half an hour at that point.

She pushed his phone from her book. "I don't care about your stupid football throws or whatever."

"No no no." Bradley decided to put his phone back, right on the spot she was reading. " This is me in the gym, benching 120 kg flat!"

"Still don't care." She pushed the phone back off.

"How about this then?" He put his phone back again, this time with a video of him and some other guy in a fist fight. It was obvious from a glance that neither of them were used to it, they were leaving themselves open for too many counters. "It's me, defending this girl from this one guy that was harassing her."

"Woow, I'm sure you didn't even try talking him down before you threw the first punch."

"No, but-"

She stood up, letting her chair hit the desk behind hers. "How many times do I have to tell you that I DON'T CARE? Let. me. study."

"Gwendolyn," her teacher chided, "keep your voice down, you're disturbing the rest of the class."

"And I haven't been able to study at all because this dickhead wouldn't let me!"

"Jeez I just wanted to show you-"

She took his phone and threw it out the window, the still closed window, then left.

"I hope you're going to the principal's office, young lady."

Gwen ignored him, walking straight to her locker to get her things, last period be damned. As she left the building her Spider-Sense went off alerting her to someone following her, two large men that were walking less than a block behind her.

She'd make sure to lose the tails before going to the base.

When Kamala entered the base, Daisy and Rayshaun were the only ones there (America was upstairs in the garage, but she was working so it wasn't the same thing). Daisy was off in the command room, doing whatever it was she did in there, and Rayshaun was in the lounge area planning their next training session.

She decided to not bother them and started working on her homework. It didn't take too long for Doreen to show up.

"What's up Ms. M?" She put her bag down next to the table while Tippy scurried over to the couch.

"Not much, just doing some homework while we wait for the rest to show up."

"What about you, Ray?"

"I'm still trying to figure out our new team formation so that Ghost-Spider doesn't get hurt by Inferno or Quake," he answered. He was sitting on the couch, now with Tippy at his feet, leaning back on the arm-rest.

"Isn't that a team leader's job? Where is Daisy by the way?"

"She's in the OPS room," Kamala answered.

"She's working on tracking down Exile. We're pretty sure he's somewhere in the territory he's claiming but we can't be sure, and even then: we'd need to narrow it down," Rayshaun said.

"Exile's claiming territory? As in gang territory?" Kamala hadn't heard about that yet.

"Yeah, we found out yesterday, along with finding out what they stole from S.H.I.E.L.D."

The lift came down again and Kamala stretched her neck to see Gwen swing down and heading straight to the training room, and not a minute later she heard something slam into the walls.

Daisy called The Cage. It had been weeks since the breakout and a lot of specialized cells had been repurposed to fit the latest inmates.

Most superhuman prisons where equipped with all sorts of teleportation blocking tech, designed to stop teleporters from freeing prisoners, more than to stop them from escaping but it would hold Exile all the same.

It didn't mean they could contain his Dark-force form, which was why he still needed a specialized cell, just like how the vents weren't designed to stop Fume from using his powers, not to mention Hollow's electric cage.

It had taken her a while, but she had narrowed down Exiles potential hideouts so the next step was securing cells for the special cases. Prison cells, not jail, because Exile's gang consisted of escapees rather than suspects.

As the dial tone rang her mind wandered and she found herself thinking about Saturday, and especially the evening when she and Gwen had...

As the warden picked up she sighed and resolved herself to dealing with it later.

Carol Danvers got a text.

[Daisy Today: 16:03

I need your help, can we talk?]

[ 20:00, Marlin cafe?]

Daisy didn't need help often, in fact the last time she'd asked for help (rather than just advice) had been over a year earlier, so to get a message like that worried her but at least it wasn't urgent.

[Carol Today: 16:12

Of course]

She was about to take a peak around the blue spot of the moon when Iron-Man called her to the mansion to talk about some new Avengers gear, probably something space related.

Gwen dropped down in an alleyway, changed her surface and went home. It wasn't a long walk, short enough that she preferred to walk rather than using a bus or subway, but it wasn't as short as she'd sometimes like.

There were a few alleyways where she changed relatively often, just to make sure no one followed her, even if her Spider-Sense made it a relatively useless concern, and that day she'd picked the one furthest from her house so it'd be an even longer walk.

Eventually, a short bit before she reached her neighborhood, she felt eyes on her. Not something she'd think of as dangerous, at least not short-term, but it wasn't just a casual glance or her Spider-Sense wouldn't have gone off.

She hurried up.

When Daisy got there Captain Marvel had already arrived, both of them wearing their super-hero costumes.

"So what's up?"

"Well, a lot." She collapsed in her chair. "You know how Ghost-Spider got herself Symbioted?" Carol nodded. "Well like all Symbiotes she's weak to both fire and sound now, which means mine and Inferno's powers hurt her.

"Oh, and I think I might really like her and it's impacting my ability to stay calm during training."

"When you say like you mean..." Carol tried to keep a straight face, but there was an unmistakable smile growing on her face.

"We've been on two dates and at this rate I might actually fall in love with her."

"That's great, I'm happy for you." She took one of Daisy's hands and gave it a squeeze.

"No, it isn't. I mean, she definitely likes me too, and that is great, but I'm not sure I can lead the team like this."

"I'm sure you'll work it out. Right now you aren't used to it but soon enough, while you might still worry about her, you'll be able to focus on what's important when you're in the field, you'll probably even let her do the risky parts of the job without letting it distract you."

"You sure?" Daisy looked somewhere between 'kicked puppy' and hopeful, not an A+ pep-talk but definitely passable. She usually did better though.

"Yes, I'm sure. You just have to give these things some time."

Her dad was making dinner when Gwen got home and sat down in the kitchen with a sigh.

"What's up Gwendy?" He asked and she winced. "Sorry, I meant Gwen."

Her dad still slipped up a lot, especially at the start of conversations, but she knew he was making an effort, which was enough in her book.

"Thanks, dad, and not much."

"It's just that you usually go straight to your room when you come home, or to the couch." He glanced at her, still mixing the meat sauce for the spaghetti he was making.

"Right, well, I wanted to ask you about your day, if there are any big cases giving you trouble, or maybe one that should be giving you more trouble?"

"Gwen," he said with his cop voice, "you know I'm not supposed to talk about ongoing investigations, even with family."

"Sure, just... Is there any case that would have me followed?"

He thought on it. "No... Could it be that super villain from last time? Should we call S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

"I don't think it's related," the ninjas were usually stealthier than that, "but I guess I'll call them later just to be sure."

She took some time to think about who would follow Gwendolyn Stacey and not just Ghost-Spider, because other than her dad's enemies or Murderdock there weren't a lot of people who'd do that, mainly just one creepy-ass biology teacher.

After a silent couple of minutes her dad hummed.

"Your school called today."

She could imagine why. "Yeah..."

"I hope I don't have to tell you that you really can't afford any more absences."

She didn't really have any excuse, other than that it was better than beating up Bradley.

She said nothing.

Gwen crawled up the wall a bit more, further into the shadows.

Daisy had a pretty good idea of where Exiles Gang was probably hiding so the team had decided to stake the area out that Tuesday, with the goal of capturing Exile, who had always been the hardest person on his team to capture.

They weren't exactly back at their best yet but hopefully it would work out. Because if it didn't, if the worst came to pass and they never got back into shape, she'd have to find a new team.

They weren't too far from where the Inner Demons used to have their hideout, in fact Gwen was on the roof of next building over. She had changed her surface to blend in with the old buildings before sending her spiders out and was currently surveying a few blocks worth of alleyways and side streets.

They had been canvassing the area for a while. Gwen was moving slower than anybody else because her swarm wasn't fast but it was more thorough, covering every alleyway in her area, and even letting her see in through the windows if she wanted to.

She wasn't too thorough in searching inside buildings because it would be violating people's privacy but she at least saw that they were lived in rather than some obvious evil hideout.

She moved along, letting her swarm encompass the next area, another couple of blocks to the south. Her swarm reached across a big crossroad, glancing into the stores covering the lowest floors of the buildings, climbing up the rundown buildings to see inside the apartments above as the ground force spread into the alleyways and saw a man with horns, traveling with three others.

"Exiles here," she said while silently moving both herself and her swarm to get closer. "Maple St. and Marble Ave., together with Furball, Hollow and... fuck ."

"What's going on, Gwen?" Daisy asked over the comms.

"They've got a new member with them, and it's the Jackal."

"Why does that name sound familiar?" Squirrel-Girl asked.

"He's from my rogues' gallery, a mad scientist who gave himself enhanced strength and reflexes. He specializes in cloning though and I'll guarantee that he's got a Carrion out there somewhere."

"Carrion?" Patriot probed.

"A clone of him. It'll be able to fly and spread a deadly virus through touch. Iron Heart should take him."

"But she's our best shot at handling Hollow," Dante countered. Iron Heart was one of only two that came with electric components already attached, and she was faster than Daisy.

"Then you take him, but you'll have to stay at a distance, you absolutely can't let him touch you or anyone else, got it?"

"You think he can handle the Carrion?" Daisy asked.

"Carrion's might not degrade as far as most of his other clones, but they'll always end up more zombie than man relatively fast. That means that he'll be a lot slower than Jackal but he's a stupid version of a genius so he's still smart ."

"Do you think being on fire would help?" Dante asked.

"If the fire's over 100 degrees Celsius, 212 Fahrenheit, it should sterilize everything." Iron-heart answered.

"Jackal should also have another version of himself running around, one without any enhancements so he'll look like a civilian, but he doesn't leave their lab too often."

"Can you take Jackal?" Daisy asked.

"Yes." Even though she hated fighting him.

Doreen wasn't too worried about their fight. They hadn't expected the Jackal or Carrion to be there but with Sheath behind bars after their last fight Exile's team was only up one fighter, and maybe not even that.

It took them about a minute before they established everyone's priorities.

Doreen's job was backup, in case anyone needed her, with Exile as her main target otherwise. America was supposed to handle Exile, Kamala was on Jack Chains. Either Daisy or Rayshaun would take on Furball while the other helped against Exile. Riri took Hollow, since she and Daisy were the only ones that came with flowing electricity he couldn't faze through, and if he was out when Carrion arrived she'd be his opponent too. Otherwise that would fall to Dante, and he'd leave Fume to somebody else.

When they were done planning, all of them had gotten close and Daisy gave the order, "Engage."

She jumped out of the alleyway she'd been hiding in to see that Gwen was already in the thick of it fighting Jackal. Riri went after Hollow and Daisy after Furball while the rest of them attacked the only real heavy hitter on the opposing side, Exile. The only exception was Dante, well, him and Lockjaw.

Dante and Lockjaw were their lookouts, which meant he'd be able to fight Fume or Carrion as soon as he spotted them. Fume wasn't a big threat to them, not as long as they had Inferno, but if left on his own he could really hurt them, and according to Gwen Carrion would be a serious threat, so it was the right call even if it left them with one less fighter.

Even so, a five on one (because of course Tippy counted no matter what anybody else had to say about it) wasn't a fair fight, especially if they didn't let Exile activate his Darkforce form, but that was sort of the point, to overwhelm him as soon as possible. If they could knock him out, stop him from teleporting away, then they could actually capture them again.

America was the first to land a hit on him and as you'd expect he teleported away but Ms. M, with her arms embiggened, quickly reacted, punching in his direction.

That effectively turned the fight into a game of whack-a-mole, the rest of them serving as extra hammers, for a while until Tippy and her friends managed to latch on to him stopping him from running away.

Then the ground shook.