QUARTER FINALS: SPIDER-MAN VS. SURGE

The place of battle for the first match of the Quarter Finals was that of the United States, more specifically, New York Times Square, where people have gathered around as if they were about to celebrate New Year's Eve, and were all standing behind energy ropes that formed a twenty foot wide circle at the square with two teleportation pads set up in the center. Not to mention some police officers, all stationed there by Captain George Stacy himself to prevent any fans that dumb enough to try and get past the ropes and run into the battle station. Suddenly, two flashes of light appeared above the pads, and sure enough, both Spidey and Surge arrive at the scene, causing the people to go wild.

Something that surprised Spidey greatly as he looked around his surroundings. "We're still in New York?!" thought the stunned Web-Head, for while he knew that Time Squares was one of the places that Tony looked up for traps, he never expected that he would be the one to fight here. He then looked at the crowd, from the the cheering Avengers fans and the booing Thunderbolts fans. Sadly, it was the hatred and hackling form the people who adored the Thunderbolts that the disheartened Wall-Crawler was all too familiar with, because thanks to the influence of his boss at the Daily Bugle, J. Jonah Jameson, he was seen as a menace rather than a hero who puts his life on the line saving the city and it's people. "Well, its nice to know that at the very least, HALF of the city doesn't hate my guts, most likely that I'm fighting with the Avengers." As he continued to look around, he then spotted his opponent, Surge, who by this time was still angry and covered with electric streaks, all which worried the Web-Slinger. "Still, whether they like me or not, these people are watching me fight Lightning Butt here, who not only wants to zap me, but he also might shock these spectators whether he means to or not. True, they may be at a safe distance thanks to these laser ropes, but if there's one thing I've learned from all the times of fighting my favorite unhinged living lightning bolt is that's always full of surprises. The kind that always put people at risk. Which means, for the sake of everyone here, I'll have to end this quick...all while trying not to get fried"." Suddenly, through the corner of his left eye, Spidey caught a glimpse of a man dressed black and holding a television camera on his shoulder, which caused the Web-Head to let out an annoyed sigh, as he knew that a certain flat topped, cigar smoking, short tempered editor watching the tournament. "And I just got reminded of somebody who may not be as bad as Osborn, but like him, would love to see me electrocuted into a charred husk."

Meanwhile, back inside the editor's office of the Daily Bugle, Jonah, along with Robbie and the rest of his staff, were watching Spidey and Surge's arrival at Times Square on TV, with Jonah's having a wide and almost sinister grin on his face. "All right," said the gleeful editor. "We'll see if Dillon can finally squash that Wall-Crawling menace!"

It was here that the worried Robbie spoke up. "Jonah, I'm hoping you're not forgetting that that's-"

"I know who it is, Robbie!" Jonah chimed in irritably. "And yes, I think that walking light bulb is dangerous, but at least Osborn's keeping him under control. Now let me watch this match and see that little web-spewing puke get zapped like the bug that he is!"

Robbie only sighed and shook his head in disappointment, knowing that at this point, it was pointless to argue with his longtime boss and friend. As such, he went back to watching the match, and silently prayed for Spidey to come out of this a winner, as well as not more injured than he already is.

Back in Times Square, the Ref Bot is seen just arrived right in between Spidey and Surge, performing its usual protocol of showing the announcer's face and making sure that both combatants understood the rules. After receiving a quick nod from Spidey, and a small nod from Surge, who still had his eyes glued to his web-slinging opponent, the announcer knew right away that it was time to get the Quarter Finals underway. "All righty then, let's get this show on the road!" said the announcer in a excitable tone, then mentally commanded the Ref Bot to fly up high in to the air so he can start the match. "AND BEGIN!"

Upon hearing those words, Spidey soon got into a readied stance. "Well, I hope you had your fun while it lasted, Max. Because it stops now, as well as whatever crazy plan Goblin has!"

Surge did not feel the least bit threatened by the Web-Head's words, nor did he took kindly to calling him by his real name, or at the least the name he went by when he was nothing but a 'weak human.' "Web-Head," he growled angrily as streaks of electricity surrounded his body. "The only thing stopping here...is you!" With that declaration, Surge channeled his energy into his right hand, then held it up and fired a lightning bolt from out of his palm, with the Wall-Crawler being the target.

Luckily for Spidey though, he saw this and thus jumped over to the right side to dodge it.

However, though he missed the nimble Web-Head, Surge refused to let this stop him. And thanks to the nano-tech circuitry in his mask, Surge mentally commanded his lighting bolt to pull up and stop in mid-air, causing it to revert to a ball of energy. Once he saw Spidey land safely on his feet, Surge sent out a mental command to the electric ball to transform back into a hissing electric snake and speed down to the right and straight towards the Wall-Crawler, aiming for the red spider symbol on his back.

But thanks to his spider-sense, Spidey cartwheeled to the left side to avoid the snake, which was just about to hit the ground instead.

However, even with that attack avoided, Surge saved the snake construct from hitting the pavement by pointing his left finger up, and thus directed the snake to go up into the air and once again where it floated in the sky and curling his head back like it's about to strike. Something that made the electricity controlling Thunderbolt chuckle as he looked up at the now floating ball up in the sky. "Well," said Surge with sadistic glee. "Osborn wasn't kidding about the suit giving me better control of my electricity." Surge then look straight forward and set his sights on Spidey, who by now was still standing in a defensive posture. "Gotta remember to thank him after I fry your sorry butt!" With that said, Surge held up his open right hand and fired another electric snake construct, one which headed towards the Wall-Crawler's belt buckle.

Spidey easily spotted this and thus jumped and flipped right over the electric snake, saving his belt buckle and keeping himself in the match.

Unfortunately, though it failed in hitting Spidey, the electric snake ended up hitting something else: the base of a traffic light post on the left side of the electric roped made ring. Upon striking it's base, the post soon tilted to the right, and before long, it began to fall straight towards the scared spectators below. Though two officers tried their best to lead some people away from it, there were still those who were to frozen with fear to move and were sure to be crushed.

That is until Spidey heard the screaming, and as he turned to look over his right shoulder, he saw the post falling. "Oh no!" he thought, then spun around, shot two web-lines out of his wrists, and once the lines hit and stuck to the shaft of the post, he yanked hard on his end and away from the still mortified pedestrians, saving them from being crush. As for the post itself, it landed right in front of Spidey's feet, and as the Ref Bot floated right in front of Surge to admonish him for the careless way he fired his blast, the Wall-Crawler himself was more scared than ever when it came to the safety of the people watching this match. "Well, now that Max just confirmed my 'full of surprises that kill people' theory, I better wrap this up now!" thought the concerned Web-Head, then took a deep breath to calm himself. "Come on, keep a cool head, Spidey. After all, you and Tony hatched a couple of plans on how to beat Electro back at the mansion, so go with the first one...which is having Electro make that electric snake thingie again. And as you found out earlier, that shouldn't be too hard." Suddenly, the Web-Head's thoughts are interrupted when he felt his spider-sense once again, prompting him to quickly jump down into a crouching position. As always, his sixth sense for danger served him well, as he narrowly avoided getting hit in the back of the head by Surge, who jumped in and swung a hammer construct on his right hand. While still crouching down, the distressed Web-Slinger watched Surge stop himself and turn around to face him. "Staying alive on the other hand!"

Surge, now seething with how Spidey once again dodged his attack, quickly changed the hammer into that of a serpent's head, then thrusts it downward to make it shoot out of his hand and straight towards his crouching opponent's belt buckle.

As before, Spidey quickly jumped up and flipped over the serpent, causing Surge to save the construct by mentally commanding it to pull itself up into the air. Moments later, the Web-Head landed just two feet away from the electricity spewing Thunderbolt, which served as the second part of the 'game plan.'

However, while Surge may have followed the 'shoot first, ask questions later' mentality, he wasn't completely stupid. He had an idea of what Spidey was planning, but he decided to play along for the sake of giving his wall-crawling enemy a surprise. As such, he mentally commanded the serpent to spin around and zoom downward, with the target being the Web-Head's back once again.

Spidey, on the other hand, just waited for his spider-sense to alert him once again, and once he felt it tingle, he jumped up and flipped backward over the serpent, causing it to head towards Surge's belt buckle. A tactic that was not unlike the one Iron Man used to win his match against Titanium Man.

Unfortunately, this was something that Surge expected, and thus held both of his hands in front of his buckle and allowed the serpent to make contact with both of his palms. Strangely enough, instead of sending the Thunderbolt flying over the ring ropes into one of the large TV's above a nearby building, Surge displayed another ability that his suit grants him, in that he actually absorbs the construct through his hands! Once he consumed the construct completely, electric streaks once again ran through his body, and as he let out a loud roar, the added electricity destroyed his mask, and thus showed the world the glowing yellow, sparky headed face of Electro.

Needless to say, everyone in the area were surprised upon seeing Electro's new ability first hand, especially Spidey, who upon landing on his feet watched his opponent absorb the snake construct in disbelief. "Okay, so much for Plan A," thought the stunned Web-Head, then looked through the corner of his left eye and spotted what was the most important part of the second plan. One that could be used if any part of his suit exposed his electric body, and was now perfect since Electro had his mask off . It was a fire hydrant that was located on the far left side, one which was not only located in the inside of the energy roped made circle, but was near an empty corner, with no bystanders around that would get . the Web-Head turned his attention back to Surge and got in a readied stance. "Plan B it is."

With the construct now back in his body, Electro faced front and narrowed his eyes at the ready and waiting Spidey. However, just before the unmasked villain could charge up another blast, he is alerted by what appeared to be sparking sounds coming from the right side. Curious, he turned to the direction of where the sound was coming from, and sure enough, he saw electricity sparking out of the opening of the now broken traffic light post that he destroyed earlier. It was a sight that actually made Electro grin maniacally, as it gave him an idea on how get himself 'fully charged.'

Spidey was naturally confused as to why Electro was looking away from him, and as he turned and looked at the same direction that his opponent was looking, his eyes grew large when he saw the broken post, and more importantly, the electricity spewing from it. Though Spidey was glad to see that the nearby officers got the spectators away from that area, he knew that they, along with everyone else in the city were still in danger, for if Electro could absorb his own electric snake, he could do the same to the electricity sparking from the post, and make him stronger than before.

A fearful scenario to which Electro would be happy to make real, and not wasting any more time, began to run towards the post.

However, allowing Surge to become stronger and more harder to beat was the last thing Spidey had in mind. As he showed by jumping up into the air, then pointed his left hand downward to the right and shot webbing out of his wrist which not only hits the top of the post, but also covered the entire opening upon contact. Afterwards, Spidey quickly turned to look down at the befuddled Electro to turn and look at him, then pointed both of his hands down at the villain and shot more webbing which made a large net that completely covered Electro causing him to struggle violently in getting it off of him. After landing right in front of the post, Spidey set his sights on his old foe, then pointed both hands forward and shot two web-lines, which ended up hitting the ground, and more importantly near the sides of the netted up Electro's feet. From here, the Web-Head made his attack by jumping up and pulling hard on his end of the lines, propelling himself straight towards Electro and as he got close enough, kicked both of his feet forward, intending to mule kick the villain's chest and send him flying into the fire hydrant and cause him to short out.

Sadly for the Web-Head, getting entangled in web caused him to let out and rage filled scream, and the electricity he emitted from his body actually dissolved the webbing. He also noticed Spidey coming his way, and thus focused his energy into his right, created a large, wide human hand construct and actually swatted Spidey once he got close, sending him flying to left side and landing hard on the ground. After dealing with his young opponent, Electro dissipated the hand construct, also point both hands at the ground and fire two electric bolts that propelled him into the air, then straight towards and landing right in front of the the broken post. Once he reached his intended target, as well as cause more of the nearby spectators to back away, Electro pulled the webbing off of the opening of the post to show the still sparking wires inside. "All right, no more screwing around!" said Electro, with his grin now wider than before, a just like a child digging into a bowl full of candy, he used both hands to grab the wires, and screamed as he absorbed all the power coming from the post.

If all this was not scary enough, Electro also appeared to be taking more than just the posts electricity. For as he continued to absorb more and more juice, all of the lights within the large TV's and buildings around Time Square appeared to flicker on and off, indicating he was taking power through the entire area as well. Not only that, but the power consumption changed the color to Electro's sparky head from yellow to brilliant blue. Finally, after a good twenty to thirty seconds, the now overpowered Electro jumps away from the post and into the air, where he shoots blue electricity out of his hands and below his feet to create a make shift hovering platform construct, all while laughing loud enough for the whole city to here his now almost auto-tuned voice. It was a sight that scared all in attendance, from the Avengers fans, and even some of the Thunderbolt fans.

For the fallen Spidey, hearing Electro's maniacal, almost god-like laughter was enough to get him out of his daze, and as he shook his head, he looked up to see his opponent now airborne and more powerful than ever, all which caused the Web-Head further grief. "Well, this is no better!"

Upon hearing Spidey's distressed words, Electro looked down to get his young enemy in his sights, then pointed his right hand downward and fired a blue lightning blast, aiming for his entire chest instead of his belt buckle.

Needless to say, this caused Spidey to roll to the left side to not avoid the bolt and make it strike the pavement instead, leaving behind a hold. Even as he popped back up on his feet, the Wall-Crawler knew he wasn't out of the woods yet, as he looked up to see Electro fire another lightning blast, thus forcing him to jump and flip backward to dodge that attack as well. As he landed on his feet, Spidey looked over his right shoulder to see the fire hydrant, and immediately started to think back...

...To the study of the Avengers Mansion, when he, without his mask and enjoying some time he had left as Peter Parker, was with his teammates and were all looking at hologram projection coming from the unmasked Tony Stark's armor, all trying to come up with winning strategies for Peter's match. And it's here where Tony pointed to where the fire hydrant is located. "And if you manage to tear Dillon's suit, you might want to consider shorting him out with the hydrant here. It's not a place where any civilians are allowed to stand, meaning there's no chance for people to get shocked. But, since you said that just touching the guy is too risky, kid, you'll probably have to trick him into blasting it and soaking himself."

"That won't be a problem," Peter replied both quickly and confidently.

While some of the Avengers like Wasp and Tony had confidence in Peter's ability win this match, others such as Luke Cage and Ms. Marvel remained somewhat skeptical. And strangely, of all people to voice their concern for this was not one of the Avengers, but rather Gwen, who was overhearing the whole thing. "Well, not to speak out of line," said Gwen, trying to be respectful to the rest of the Avengers, then walked over to Peter with a worried look. "But Pete, we all saw what Electro's capable of in his last two matches. How can you be so sure that you can beat him?"

Peter understood Gwen's concern, and thus gave her a reassuring smile before answering. "Don't worry, Gwen," he told her as he placed his hand on her shoulder. "When it comes to Electro, I know something that can get him right where I want him. In fact, it's what helped me beat when it came to saving you when you were kidnapped last New Year's Eve."

Naturally, this caused Gwen to give Peter a confused look. "And that is?"

With smile still present, Peter told the girl his plan in three words. "His real name..."

...back in Time Square, the fully suited Spidey looked away from the hydrant and back into the air to see super charged Electro floating over him.

"Face it, Wall-Crawler," said Electro as he began to charge up both hands. "You might as well just stand there and let me zap you! You're only making it worse for yourself!"

Despite being outmatched in pure power, Spidey let out a scoff as he stood ready to jump for he knew that he was going to entice great rage in his old foe for what he was about to say. "Story of my life...Max!"

As expected, hearing his old name, back when he was a frail, flesh and blood weakling, spurred great anger within Electro, "How many times do I have to tell you...!" he grumbled, then fired a lightning blast from out of his left hand and down towards the waiting Web-Head below. "DON'T CALL ME MAX!"

Spidey easily jumped over to the left side to avoid the blast and saved himself from getting electrocuted, for the moment anyway. "Okay, got his attention!" thought the Web-Head, then looked back up at Electro to continue egging him on. "Aw, still bothered by that?!" he said in a lighthearted, albeit sarcastic tone. "It's a lot better than 'Surge', sounds like something you call a soda! Which, in case you aren't aware, is causing you 'Maximum' embarrassment!" Suddenly, Spidey saw Electro fire another blast out of his right hand, and thus jumped and back flipped up into the air to not only avoid the blast, but also landing and crouching right on top of a fire hydrant. Moments later, the Web-Slinger looked up and saw that the furious Electro followed him and was now floating right above him, which was exactly where he wanted him. "You know, maybe it won't seem so bad if we rework it into a new hero name for you," quipped the Web-Slinger. "Like maybe...'Max Charge'! 'Captain Maximus!' Now wait, I got it...'Maximum Overdrive!'"

Hearing Spidey's endless name calling only seemed to enraged Electro all the much more, as he began to physically glowing bright and brighter. "SHUT UP!" With that scream, the super charged villain literally shot a lighting bolt out of his mouth and straight towards Spidey.

Fortunately for the Web-Head, this was what he was waiting for, and wastes no time in jumping forward and allowing the bolt to hit the fire hydrant instead, causing gallons of water to shoot from out of the ground and hitting Electro himself, electrocuting the villain in the process. As the villain screamed in pain, the electricity from his own body actually shattered his belt buckle, causing the yellow energy to consume him in seconds, until he was frozen completely and fall to the ground.

By the time, Spidey had already landed safely on all fours and watched as his frozen and defeated opponent fall and hit the ground, causing him to let out a sigh of relief.

With the battle now over, the Ref Bot hovered down to Spidey's side, and with the announcer's face looking utterly shocked with what just transpired. "H-Here is your winner...SPIDER-MAN!" the announcer told the crowd, causing the Avengers fans to cheer for the Wall-Crawler, as well as boos from the Thunderbolts fans, though not may of them, for some chose to side with the Avengers after seeing Electro's unhinged behavior.

Meanwhile, back in the Daily Bugle, one person showed his utter disdain for how the match ended. It was that of J. Jonah Jameson, who is now out of his chair and his face visibly red with rage. "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!" he screamed, loud enough for everyone in the entire floor to hear. "THAT WALL-CRAWLING FREAK CHEAT HIS WAY TO VICTORY AGAIN?!"

Robbie, as usual, said nothing and allowed Jonah to go on his anger driven rant. For while he didn't agree with his boss in regards to Spider-Man, he also didn't wanted to get fired. He then went back to watching the tournament, and smiled in seeing the hero secretly been rooting for win.

Back in Times Square, Spidey was still in the middle of catching his breath, but glad that this match with his mentally disturbed enemy was finally over. Moments later, he looks down at the now frozen Electro on the ground. "Good ol' predicable Max," he thought to himself while feeling a small ounce of pity for the frozen villain, but glad that he stopped him before he could have hurt everyone else in the area. As he looked around the Square, Spidey noticed a small stand among the cheering people of a man selling T-Shirts, and other CoC merchandise, and what caught his eye was an action figure modeled after the Iron Patriot, causing him to narrow his eyes. "But as utterly insane as all of this was...I know for a fact that the worst is yet to come!"

WINNER: SPIDER-MAN