Noble Six: Thanks
Guest: My version of Ultimate Spider-Man is a different one.
MAB86: That's right. It wouldn't be Spider-Man without Six deadly enemies of his. It wouldn't be an easy task for any of the spiders. And more of Drifter will be shown within this story.
The Story's Shadow: Well, it is understandable considering what's been happening recently. You'll soon learn Dark Web's goals soon enough.
Earth-69826
To say things weren't going well for The Spiders was an understatement as they were currently facing off against the Sinister Mutations of Dark Web, being sent by him to retrieve the Spiders to him. And least to say, it went as expected as a fight had broken out between the Spiders and the Mutation Six, not that they had a choice to begin with.
Now they were each facing off against a member of the Mutation Six with Peter and Drifter taking on Octavius together, Gwen facing off against the large but unintelligent Mud-Thing, Sheriff against the beast like Kraven the Hunter, Spider-Drone was fighting his fellow robot the Ultimate Spider-Slayer, Steam was facing off against the Cyborg Sable who proved to be quite the challenge and finally Spider-Punk was in his own battle against the mutation of the Man-Tarantula.
Hobbie himself was having problems evading the man spider formerly known as Tarantula as he proved to be quite fast in trying to tear out his guts while Hobbie managed to jump away before he could land a blow onto the rocker spider.
"I guess we're doing this!" Spider-Punk exclaimed as he was suddenly attacked the mutant Tarantula as he leaped at him, causing Punk to leap away from the man spider. he had hoped to tire him out before coming in to attack, but by the looks if it, it doesn't look like Man-Tarantula is even slightly tired, just more and more feral.
"Y'know mate, maybe you should give it a rest and crawl back wherever you came from instead of attacking us." Punk suggested. "That could be good. How about it?"
Suddenly, Man-Tarantula opened its mouth to fire an acid projectile towards Punk, causing his spider sense to go off in time for him to jump out of the way of the attack.
"Woah!" Punk exclaimed in shock. "Acid?! When do Spiders shoot freaking acid out of their mouths!?"
The Man Tarantula just hissed and snarled at Punk before it attempted to lunge at him once more with the intent of killing him. He managed to tackle Punk who only managed to hold him off by pushing him back as he snapped his jaws at him.
"Argh! I hope the others are doing as well as I am." Punk said to himself as he continued to fend off against the feral Man-Tarantula for as long as he could.
Elsewhere on the battle ground was Spider-Man and Drifter, currently facing off against the mutated Doc Ock together as a duo. While this would look unfair to Ock, he actually managed to prove to be quite the challenge of the pair of spiders due to his tendrils chasing after them, seeming like his normal tentacles from a regular version of Doc Ock, but far more coordinated and powerful than his old metallic ones.
Drifter grunted as he was almost caught by one of the tentacles but managed to dodge in time, using his rifle he had on him, he fired at Ock, but never managing to get a single shot on the mutant Octopus, too fast for him to hit. Meanwhile, Spider-Man was taking this with relative ease, casually dodging all the attempts made by Ock to grab him, frustrating the former scientist.
"Y'know Ock, I used to think that you weren't that much of a looker when we first met," Spider-Man quipped as he bounced around the place. "I mean with that hairstyle, I didn't take you as a mad scientist but rather a guy who never left his mother's basement in years."
Ock snarled at him as he poured more effort into crushing this version of his nemesis as he sent all of his tentacles after him, causing Spider-Man to take in more effort when it came to dodging them.
"But this? Man, I knew you were committed to your animal motif, but this is taking it too far!" Spidey exclaimed after effortlessly dodging a tendril.
Ock snarled and hissed at being bound by his most hated enemy.
"Woah, easy Ock! It's not my fault that you're this ugly, then again, you haven't always been easy on the eyes to begin with. Have you tried looking up beauty products?" Spider-Man quipped while still restraining the Ock mutant.
"Don't underestimate him, Spider-Man." Drifter advised as he kept his guard up against Ock. "He's not like the one you know, he's far worse."
"Yeah, if his face was obvious enough." Spider-Man quipped.
Ock snarled at Spidey before firing an ink projectile from the tendrils on his face. Spider-Man didn't have time to react as the ink got on his face, obscuring his vision.
"Ack, gross!" Spidey exclaimed in disgust as he tried to remove the ink from his eyes. "I know your name is Doc Ock, but you don't have to hit it on the head by splashing ink all over me."
Drifter then got behind Ock and fired a grapple line at the Mutant Octopus. But one of Ock's Tendrils managed to grab onto Drifter's grapple line before it could reach him. He then pulled the line, causing Drifter to be pulled towards Ock as he snapped around to face Drifter as another tendril shot towards Drifter and wrapped around his neck as brought Drifter towards him.
"I may be sending you to Dark Web, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to make you and every spider here suffer!" Ock snarled.
"Oh, trust me..." Drifter grunted as he struggled in Ock's grip. "I'm suffering enough just by looking at you." Drifter remarked.
Spider-Man managed to tear off the inky substance from his face. And once he did, he saw that Drifter was currently in the grasp of Mutant Ock. He looked around and saw a big rock nearby. He fired two web lines and swung it around to gain momentum.
"Hey Davy Jones! Heads up!" Spider-Man yelled out as he threw the large rock towards Ock, who turned his head to see the rock coming right at him and hitting him in the face, knocking him away from Drifter as he dropped to the ground.
Spider-Man ran up to Drifter and helped him okay. "You okay?" Spidey asked.
"Been better." Drifter said as he got back up and looked to where Ock was taken out, "Good shot." Drifter complimented.
"Thanks." Spidey said as he looked to where Drifter was looking at. "Have you ever faced off with any of these guys before?" Spider-Man asked.
Drifter shook his head. "Not all at once. A few of them weren't as strong as they were now."
Spider-Man panted. "Okay, so how do we beat them?" Spidey asked.
Drifter stood in a defensive stance against Ock, who was looking to go another round with the two spiders. "We do what we always do, Spider-Man."
"Annoy them into losing?" Peter asked as he turned to Drifter.
Drifter turned to Spider-Man and nodded. "Until they cry out for your demise." Drifter said as he and Spider-Man leaped towards Ock for another fight with the mutation.
Sheriff was in his own situation as he dealt with the animal monster version of his old foe Kraven the Hunter. He had dealt with him back on his own Earth and often if not mostly beaten him. But unlike the other times where he fought him before, this time it was entirely different from before as this Kraven was far faster, stronger and deadlier than the one he was used to, causing Sheriff to make more of an effort and before more on his guard.
Sheriff was mainly on the defensive as he could only dodge Kraven's swipe and claw attacks. He managed to get a few feet away from the beast Kraven so that he could fire at him using his Web Revolvers in the hopes of at least slowing him down.
But Kraven just gave a feral grin at this and just used his claws to swat away the web bullets, practically becoming paper to be torn in his hands, much to Sheriff's frustration.
"Damn! this is really something else..." Sheriff-Spider thought as he breathed in and out and kept his distance from Kraven. "He isn't like the Kraven I fought for years, except he's far uglier and deadlier."
"Ah, Spider, it is so good to be fighting you again!" The Beast Kraven said with a proud tone. "For too long my skills have been neglected, too long as it has been since I felt the blood rushing through me."
"Well, I'm glad to have given that to you." Sheriff said in a sarcastic tone. "I just wished it was pointed in my direction."
"Ah, but no foe is more worthy of a challenge than you!" Kraven exclaimed as she let out a roar as he then leaped towards Sheriff-Spider.
Luckily for the wild west spider he had managed to dodge away from Kraven's leap, but that didn't stop the feral man for attempting to swipe and claw at him relentlessly, aiming for his chest for he could disembowel him like he always wanted to but the Sheriff was too on guard for that to happen.
"So, what exactly do you gain by working for Dark Web?" Sheriff asked while in the middle of dodging his swipes. "He doesn't strike me as a guy who treats his employees like family." Sheriff asked.
"I gain so much more by doing his bidding than I ever did being trapped in a cell for the rest of my years!" Kraven growled as he attempted to swipe Sheriff's face off, but Sheriff managed to duck in time as he fired a web shot to the animal man's face, causing him to growl at being blinded as he took a few steps back away from the cowboy spider.
"So What? If you deliver us to him, does he change you back?" Sheriff asked, keeping his revolvers trained on him as Kraven finally removed the webbing off of his face.
"Change me back!?" Kraven scoffed as he then cackled at the notion, confusing Sheriff. "Why would I ever want to go back to my lesser self!?"
"Well for one thing, there'd be less shedding on account of your hair and I guess you don't have to buy as much cat litter for another." Sheriff Spider jokes.
"Please, I gain more in this form then I ever have. Unlike the others, I am grateful for my new form!" Kraven snarled as he went for an uppercut that Sheriff managed to dodge in time. "This form will finally give me the power I need to end the hunt with honor!"
"Yeah, fighting for a mad man who wants to kill every spider. That's certainly honorable." Sheriff remarked sarcastically as he fired a few rounds at Kraven.
"I will be more than enough to end your life!" Kraven roared as he ran past the web bullets and leaped towards Sheriff-Spider. The cowboy spider knew that this battle wasn't gonna be easy, but that didn't mean he was gonna make it easy for him either.
Spider-Gwen herself was currently facing off against the wretched Mud-Thing in battle. At first, she thought it was going to be a difficult challenge due to its size and sheer strength of the Goliath, but she found it easy to distract the dumb brute as it was as slow as...well, mud. She managed to maneuver around the mass of mud.
It was easy to distract the Mud-Thing into missing her by simply taunting her as he tries to strike at her, only for its attempts to land on the ground or the surrounding rock walls.
"Y'know, I was really worried that I was gonna have a problem with you big guy," Gwen called out to Mud-Thing, who simply growled and attempted to crush her with a fist, but Gwen just swung out of the way before it could reach her. "But this is actually really easy for me. I mean, even the lamest villain in my world proved to be a little of a challenge then you buddy, and the worst he can do is rob Bodegas." Gwen remarked.
The Mud-Thing could somewhat understand her taunting and roared at her in fury. It went in for a punch, only for it to be dodged again, as per usual at this point.
"Swing and a miss!" Gwen remarked towards Mud-Thing.
The Mud-Thing let out a mighty growl at Spider-Gwen as she stood her ground against it, completely confident and thought she could beat this thing.
"Drown the Spider!" Mud-Thing groaned as he lifted his fist up, ready to smash her where she stood. But then suddenly it raised its arm back down as it looked away from Gwen, confusing her. "No! The Mud-Thing said to itself in anger. "Bury the Spider!"
"Uh, what's happening?" Gwen asked as she watched the sand and water fusion argue with itself.
"Drown!" The Mud-Thing yelled as he turned to the left. It then turned to the right and yelled. "Bury!"
Gwen watched in mild fascination and confusion as she continued to watch the creature argue with itself.
"Drown! Bury! Drown! Bury! Drown! Bury! DROWN! BURY!" The Mud-Thing yelled out as he constantly turned his head back and forth.
"Man, this is...something else." Gwen said to herself as she watched the thing endlessly argue with itself.
It then stopped yelling as it had a look on its face that looked like it was coming to a realization. "Kill spiders, with both?" Mud-Thing asked itself. "Yes." Mud-Thing growled at itself, seemingly agreeing with itself as it stomped over to Spider-Gwen.
It raised its hand at her and suddenly fired a power beam of concentrated water at Gwen. Her spider sense went off as she quickly jumped off the rock she was on as it was completely obliterated by the water beam.
Spider-Gwen landed on a nearby wall, but was met with Mud-Thing's oncoming fist, causing her to fall off the rock as he punched her off it. She quickly fired a web line to another rock wall and zipped herself to it.
She hung off the wall as she watched The Mud-Thing roar in satisfaction.
"Great, two different personalities but at least they can agree on killing me," Gwen remarked, trying to think of a good and better strategy to combat this mutation.
Steam-Spider was in his own battle with Cyborg Sable, and despite what he had previously thought, this battle was indeed a tough one for him. For most of his life, Steam has mainly fought against common street thugs or the occasional super powered foe. But he always won out in the end due to his opponent either being too weak or managing to outsmart them.
But with this Cyborg, he found it incredibly difficult to handle even a single hit onto her, frustrating the steampunk spider. Even though he didn't want to admit it, he may have finally found someone who proved to be a challenge to the steampunk spider.
"Damn it! Every move I do she learns and counters it!" Steam thought in his mind as he also continued to block her punches which were slowly making a bigger impact by the second.
"I was hoping that you proved to be a challenge," Sable remarked with a smirk on her face. "But I see that you're all talk."
Steam growled in anger. "How about I show you what I'm capable of!" Steam yelled out as he used his spider talons to push her back, giving him an opportunity to strike back against the Cyborg, managing to get a few strikes into the cyborg, even using his spider talons against her as well.
He stopped as he waited for Sable to strike back, but she just stood there with her head down, not moving herself. Steam let out a brief laugh in success at this. "So how was that?" Steam said with a smirk under his helmet.
Then he heard the sounds of Sable chuckling as she looked back up at Steam with a smirk on her face, causing Steam to look at her in shock at shrugging off his attacks. "Is that all?" Sable asked with an amused look, not even fazed in the slightest. Suddenly, Sable's fist managed to connect with Steam's chest, causing him to grunt and heave in pain as he was forced to his knees.
"So far, I am utterly unimpressed." Sable snidely commented towards the downed spider with a smirk on her face as Steam looked up at Sable and glared at her in rage.
Steam growled in anger at the cyborg. "That's it!" Steam gritted his teeth as he leaped up from the ground, landed a few feet away from her and began to charge his spider talons to higher power, even nearly going past their limit. "I'm done going easy on you!"
"Easy?" Cyborg Sable smirked. "Funny. I just assumed that you were weak."
Under his helmet, Steam was glaring at Sable with utter rage, the words piercing through him "Well, now whatever happens...will be on you..." Steam-Spider said coldly. Then, with his Spider Talons charged way too highly, he fired at Cyborg Sable with the intent to greatly harm.
Sable's eyes widened in shock as the blast was coming at her at a fast pace as she soon realized that this blast would be a powerful and damaging one. Unable to move out of the way in time, she was quickly blown away into a rock wall behind her, creating a huge hole.
Steam smirked as smoke came from the spider talons and he disengaged them so as not to burn them out.
Sable climbed herself out of the hole and stared at Steam-Spider with fury on her face, as most of her body was burned and damaged after the blast. She was slowly repairing herself, but the pain was still there.
"Oh, what's wrong?" Steam mockingly asked with his arms crossed and a smirk under his mask. "Did that hurt? It looks like it did. I bet that felt really painful."
Sable growled as her cyborg eyes glowed bright red at his words.
"Then again, I don't know if you actually feel anything anymore." Steam-Spider said insultingly. "I don't think a washing machine would feel bad if it was a broken piece of crap."
Sable was mad. She was downright furious as the Steampunk Spider for his mockery of her and his taunting of what she no longer had. She wouldn't let this stand.
"Don't worry, if there's anything to learn from this encounter, it's that no one gets the better of me." Steam said.
"The only thing I've learned here is that you would look much better- WITHOUT A HEAD!" Sable roared as she shifted her arms into large blades of metal, two shoulder mounted cannons appeared and her eyes began glowing brighter than ever as she charged towards Steam with the extreme intent to kill.
Spider-Drone was facing off against the Ultimate Spider Slayer, a machine that was nearly similar to him. But unlike Drone, he was far more willing to kill his enemies and seemed far more emotionless than Drone acted. Slayer then proceeded to fire a barrage of missiles toward the robot spider, who fired off a round of web shots from his hands at the missiles before they could reach him.
Slayer then zoomed over towards Drone with its rocket propelled boosters on its back as Drone braced himself as he clashed with the Ultimate Spider-Slayer as they stood defiantly against each other, pushing each other back.
"As I recall from my memory banks, you were key in the role of the Spider-Slayers, being one of their creators. What I may ask is the logic behind Dark Web turning you into this?"
"Dark Web only upgraded my form with tech and ammunition." Slayer responded, still pushing back Drone. "The Decision to remove my emotions, as well as my original human form was my own."
Drone titled his head at this, "So you have become a machine yourself?"
"I have become much more than that." The being formerly known as Smythe said. "I have truly become the Ultimate Spider Slayer. This process, to remove my humanity, should've been accomplished a long time ago."
"There are some that wish to even have an inkling of what it feels like to be human." Drone said, his tone sounding serious.
Smythe just glared coldly at Drone. "Then they are wishing to be nothing more than to be weak and illogical. Like you are"
"Agree to disagree." Drone calmly said as then fired a web blast from his wrist onto Slayer's eyes, blinding him as he staggered back away from Drone and tried to rip the webbing off.
Spider-Drone then proceeded to web up Spider-Slayer in a web-cocoon, completely encasing him. But Slayer was prepared for this as created a buzz-saw from one of his hands and proceeded to tear through the webbing. Drone acted fast as he fired a web line onto Slayer and began to swing him around the area. Drone increased in speed as his body rotated around with increased speed as he suddenly came to a halt and the web line connected to Slayer snapped off and his sent flying across the grounds.
Spider-Slayer got back up after that and glared at Spider-Drone. Still up for the fight and ready to take down his fellow robot.
Drone titled his head once more. "This might prove to be challenging." Drone said to himself as he needed to think of more solutions to this. Perhaps with the help of the other spiders. He turned around and went to find the rest of his team for hope of battling the six together.
Back with Spider-Man and Drifter, they were currently right back where the first arrived on this Earth, back to back as they were looking around the area for any member of the six to suddenly attack them or hopefully a member of their team.
"So how long do you think that glue bomb will hold him?" Spider-Man asked. They had used a device to hold Ock in place as they didn't want to be held up by him any further.
"Not for long." Drifter said. "Knowing Ock, he'll have found a way to break through from it and will have tracked us here."
"Right." Spidey breathed out. "Drifter, I'm gonna be honest, I don't know how long I can deal with this guy. He's far more powerful than the version of Ock I've fought with, as well as ugly."
"Glad to hear we're not the only ones having problems." A voice called out to the two, prompting them to look up to see Spider-Gwen coming down there with them. One by one the rest of the spiders were all gathered around each other, all looking a little worse for wear.
"So... how long do you guys think it'll take before they suddenly decide to surrender." Spider-Man panted as he kept his guard up, though he wasn't sure if he could keep going against the rest of these mutations.
"Knowing them...probably never." Sheriff remarked as he kept his revolver up at them.
"So does anyone have a plan on how to deal with these guys?" Gwen asked. "Because I don't think we can keep fighting them for this long."
"I'm not beat yet." Steam growled while holding his ribs.
"You will be if you keep taunting Sable like that." Sheriff said as he kept his eye out for any of the Mutations to suddenly come in and attack them.
"I have one idea..." Drifter said. "Don't know if it'll work or not."
"Well, it's better than nothing." Sheriff said as he then looked ahead and his eyes widened. "And I'd hurry up fast, because we got company coming." Sheriff said as the rest of the spiders looked to where Sheriff was looking at and saw the Mutation Six gathered again and heading towards the spiders.
"Okay, everyone gather up!" Drifter ordered as the rest of the spiders came to him. "These guys may be enhanced, but that doesn't mean they're invulnerable. I have a few ways of beating them, but we need to do it as a team. We can't beat them the way we are now. We need to work together."
Each of the spiders looked at each other in response and all turned to Drifter.
"We're with you, Drifter." Spider-Man said.
"Yeah." Gwen nodded.
"Indeed." Drone said.
"Hell yeah," Hobbie said in enthusiasm.
Steam was the only one who didn't say anything. A nudge from Gwen finally prompted Steam to respond. "Ugh, fine." Steam grunted in admittance. "So, what do you have for these freaks?" Steam asked.
"Something that'll give us an advantage." Drifter said. "I have a few things here that can help." Drifter said as he looked within his bag. He pulled out two small sprays and tossed it at Spider-Punk and Sheriff-Spider. "Hobbie, Sheriff uses this on Man-Tarantula and Kraven, this can dull his senses and cause disorientation."
"Sounds good to me!" Hobbie said while the Sheriff nodded in response.
Drifter then turned to Steam-Spider. "Steam, can you adjust your spider talons?" Drifter asked the steampunk spider.
"Yeah, why?" Steam asked.
"If you can adjust them to a certain degree and damage output, you might be able to disable Spider-Slayer's systems. It won't kill him, but it'll make her less of a threat, the rest will be up to you."
"That I can handle." Steam said.
"And Gwen, use this." Drifter said as he tossed Gwen a small capsule. "This will help with Mud-Thing."
"What is it?" Gwen asked as she inspected the capsule.
"It's a form of concentrated hydrochloric acid," Drifter explained. "It should be enough to break down Marko and Morris."
"Cool thanks!" Gwen complimented.
"Huh, didn't expect you to have that in your arsenal." Spider-Man said.
"Trust me, it's not the first time I went up against either one of those two, especially when they combined into that thing." Drifter said.
Spider-Man then turned to Drifter. "And what about Ock? What thing do you have that'll help us deal with him?"
Drifter pulled out something from his bag, "Trust me, there's always one way to deal with Otto." Drifter said.
Spider-Man thought about it and turned to Drifter. "Ego?"
"Ego." Drifter nodded in response.
Spider-Man grinned under his mask as he, Drifter and the rest of the spiders stood in their defense poses as the Mutation Six finally caught up with the spiders, ready to attack them.
Sable grinned. "I see you're all here together again. It makes it that much easier to bring you to Dark Web." Sable said as she transformed one of her arms into a blaster.
"I will offer you all one last chance to turn back now." Drifter said. "If you don't, we will be forced to stop you."
Sable laughed this off. "I'd like to see you try."
"As you wish." Drifter said.
This prompted the Six to charge towards the Spiders as they defended themselves from each member of the six. Punk and Sheriff teamed up against Man-Tarantula and Kraven, Steam helped Gwen with Mud-Thing and Spider-Slayer and Spider-Man and Drifter were facing off against Sable and Ock, Sable looking confident while Ock wanted to tear the spiders apart.
"You should be grateful it was us who brought you to Dark Web." Sable said. "If he decided to get you himself, well, I wouldn't see most of you coming back alive."
"Yeah, look at us, we're just so grateful." Spider-Man rolled his eyes under his mask
Sable smirked. "Keep that humor while you can. There's no chance at beating us."
"Oh, I don't know, there's always this." Drifter said, prompting Sable to raise an eye in confusion. "Everyone! Now!" Drifter called out to the rest of the spiders who looked ready to use Drifters tech against the Six.
Sable looked confused by this. "What are you-" Sable was about to ask until the sounds of one of her comrades screaming in pain interrupted her.
She turned her head to see the Spider-Slayer begin to shake its head, malfunction as its body began to twitch and jolt itself as sparks flew off different points of its body.
"What is happening!?" Sable exclaimed as she looked to see that the Man-Tarantula was snarling and hissing all around in random directions, looking like it was being attacked in every direction as it acted like a wild and savage animal. Kraven was also having problems, while his senses were dulled as well, he still fought to his best, unfortunately for him, the spray was too much for him and the Mud-Thing was beginning to decrease its mass, thanks to the hydrochloric acid, making him from a tall Goliath into the same height as a Hulk, but its strength was also decreasing as well.
"What-What is this!?" Sable exclaimed in fury.
Ock couldn't care less what was happening to his teammates as he wanted purely to kill his most enemy. He moved away from Sable and charged after the two spiders. Drifter then pulled out a device and blasted it Ock, which caused him to rapidly shake his head and snarl violently.
"What was that?" Spider-Man asked.
"It's a device that causes disorientation." Drifter answered. "Like with Kraven and Tarantula, but more design for something like Otto."
Sable watched this downfall of her victory in anger as she snapped her head towards Drifter. Then in a single second, she bolted straight at the veteran spider.
Drifter's eyes widened at this as he pointed his blaster at her, only for Sable's hand to reach around his throat, lifting him up in the air as she proceeded to choke him. Spider-Man was about to leap in to help Drifter out until Ock blocked his way, looking mighty angry and attempted to attack Spidey.
"You think that was going to help you win!?" Sable exclaimed as her arm turned into a large knife.
"Yeah…But there's also this!" Drifter exclaimed as he suddenly threw a small E.M.P. disc onto her chest, causing her to spark out in pain, dropping Drifter to the ground.
This gave the veteran spider the ample opportunity he needed while Cyborg Sable was convulsing in pain. He kicked her a few feet away from him. The rest of the spiders managed to fully combat their respective enemy as they put them in the same spot as Sable, inducing Peter, who swung Ock around in a web cocoon and tossed him with the rest of the group. Drifter quickly grabbed his transporter, adjusted the location to be as long and as far away from them as possible and pointed at the ground the Six were standing on.
Sable looked up at Drifter in horror, realizing what he was about to do to them. "No…" Sable muttered.
"Enjoy the trip." Drifter coldly remarked as he fired the portal gun right under the mutations. "Because there's no return."
"NO!" Sable yelled out as she fell into the portal along with the other mutations, falling into another world that they did not know of and how to get out of without a usable transport. Sable looked up in fury as she leaped up for a chance of escape, only for the portal to be closed before she could. The Mutations are now gone from this world and into another unknown world.
"What...what just happened?" Spider-Man asked, wondering where the Mutation Six just went.
Drifter panted as he stood back up. "I just sent the six throughout the multiverse, right into the depths."
"So, they're gone?" Gwen asked in a hopeful tone.
"For now." Drifter said. "Right now, they're currently in a world with very little intelligent life." Drifter said as he looked over his device. "Considering I damaged their transporter, it's unlikely we'll be seeing them again. But I wouldn't hold my breath."
"So... we won?" Punk asked.
"Looks like it." Gwen said.
"Oh, thank god." Peter breathed out as he took a knee. "I was pretty sure that was gonna go on for a while."
"Good thing it didn't,'' Gwen said in agreement.
As the spiders talked on and rested after their encounter with the six, Drifter watched from his spot as Sheriff-Spider suddenly came up to him, standing right next to him.
"Looks like we won this." Drifter commented.
"Yeah, guess we did." Sheriff said, though he wasn't sounding exactly thrilled or excited. His confrontation with Drifter was still fresh in his mind.
Drifter turned to Sheriff, who was looking down at the ground. Drifter sighed, remembering their argument before the Six arrived. He spoke to him. "Sheriff, I know you don't trust me, and I get why." Drifter said. "But I keep secrets for a reason. I don't want to, it's just…something I have to do." Drifter explained. "I know you might trust me fully. But there's a multiverse that needs our help. I've seen what Dark Web does, I don't want to risk anyone else to his wrath."
Sheriff sighed and looked back up at Drifter. "Drifter...throughout my life, I've dealt with people who either betrayed my trust that caused hurt to people I care about...or my lack of trust caused people I care about to be hurt." Sheriff said. "I can't go through something like that again. It's part of the reason why I stopped in the first place. And I don't want them to go through that." Sheriff said, referring to the rest of the spiders.
"I understand." Drifter said. "I really do." Drifter said as he then looked to the rest of the spiders, who all looked pretty worse for wear.
"Can you promise me, that whatever you know, won't put their lives at risk?" Sheriff asked.
Drifter looked at Sheriff, who had a very serious look on his face.
Drifter was quiet for a few moments before giving his answer. "...I promise." Drifter said.
"Okay." Sheriff sighed as he went back to the other spiders. "You wanna...make sure the others are okay?"
"I will." Drifter sighed and spoke up. "Alright everyone, listen up." Drifter said, gaining his teammates attention. "I understand things are tense right now, and that I haven't been explaining all the details."
"That's one word for it." Steam muttered.
The Spiders listened in as Drifter continued. "I know that I seem like I'm not telling you everything. And there is some stuff I need to say. And I want to. It's just that we don't have enough people to properly combat what we're fighting. It's why I've been like this. And I just need you to trust me."
"Drifter, we do trust you." Peter said, speaking up. "It's just that maybe it feels like you don't trust us."
Drifter sighed and nodded. "You're right to feel that way. I promise to each and every one of you, I will explain things to you all." Drifter said in a genuine tone. "And I promise to be honest with all of you. If you can trust me."
Peter looked to his fellow spiders, who all looked convinced by Drifter's sincerity. Peter turned to Drifter with a hopeful and determined expression on his face. "I trust you, Drifter." Peter said towards his older self.
"Me too." Gwen said in agreement.
"And me." Hobbie added.
"I have no reason not to." Drone gave his own.
The only one who didn't speak up was of course Steam, who rolled his eyes and shrugged.
They all turned to Sheriff, who let out a small sigh and turned to Drifter and slightly nodded to his counterpart.
Drifter nodded back to him and turned to the rest of his team. "Good. I promise that when we have time and enough people, everything will be explained properly, in time." Drifter said. "I know it can be stressful, but trust me, I know what I'm doing."
"We know, Drift. We know." Gwen said.
Drifter managed to give a small smile at this. "Good." Drifter said. He then turned around and fired a portal to the next world. "Let's go, people." Drifter said as he opened the portal for the spiders, and they proceeded to enter through into the next world.
One by one as the spiders entered through as Steam was the last man to go through. But before he could enter through the portal with the other spiders, Drifter blocked his way by standing in front of him with a stern expression on his face.
"What?" Steam said, sounding annoyed.
"Before we continue on any further, we need to talk." Drifter said in a serious tone.
"About what?" Steam asked, sounding like he was mildly inconvenienced and not even looking at Drifter.
"About you." Drifter said, causing Steam to properly look at him in response. "Because of your arrogance, we got caught into a fight with the Six." Drifter said. "A fight That could've been avoided if you hadn't acted rashly."
"We won, didn't we?" Steam pointed out.
"This time." Drifter said. "But the next time may not be the same if you keep acting like this." Drifter said in a serious tone. "I don't know if any of us almost got killed because you need to prove yourself when in actuality, you're proving to be a reckless, immature bastard who I'm surprised made it this far."
Steam glared at Drifter in anger. "Who the hell..." Steam was about to say until Drifter raised his hand up, pointing his finger up.
"No." Drifter stopped. "You don't get to talk back to me." Drifter said as Steam glared at him under his helmet. "I've put up with a lot with you, Steam, the insults, the mockery and all that...I put up with it because of what happened to you. I can put up with a lot from you, Steam." Drifter said in a serious tone. "But I will not put up with it if it compromises or endangers any of us, like you just did now with the Six."
"But I'm warning you, if you ever pull a stunt like this again, I swear...I will find the most dangerous, monstrous, uninhabitable, nightmare world I can find in the multiverse that not even Thanos, Doom or even Solus or his Inheritors would ever go to...And I will leave you there." Drifter said towards the Steampunk spider, who was silent by this as he hung his head down. "Are we clear?"
Steam brought his head back up at Drifter and stared back at him. "Crystal." Steam said.
"Good." Drifter sighed a bit. "Now let's go." Drifter ordered, sounding a little calmer but still had a serious tone to it as he entered through the portal.
Steam stood there for a few seconds, still visibly angry at what Drifter just said to him, part of him really wanted to deck him across the face. But Steam let out a deep breath and followed into the portal, deciding it wasn't worth his time. For now.
Thanks for reading this chapter of Rise and Fall
Sorry this took a long while, I was busy with my other stories. But I am glad to have finished this chapter.
Well, The Spiders have had their first fight against the Mutation Six, and it was one hell of a battle, that's for sure. And each of the spiders had their own unique battle. Will it be the last time they see the Six again? Or will they return, you'll just have to wait and see.
I'll be focused on finishing on one of my other story in the meantime, but I will publish this story while I can. And next chapter will go into a world of black and white world...or rather, Noir. Subtlety is not my strong suit if you couldn't guess who's next. Thanks and see you around!
