It was one of the weirdest nights in the young life of Peter Stark.
He hadn't thought much when he went to Central Park after hearing that there was a monster that attacked unsuspecting joggers and people walking their dogs. He just decided it would be a good idea if he found out what's going on.
That was how he got here, neatly cocooned in the slimy tentacles of a twenty-foot tall monster.
Everything happened so quickly. Even his spider-sense hadn't been much of a help. He tried desperately to free himself, but the monster was more powerful than Spider-Man's super strength, so he wasn't able to loosen the metal grip of the creature for an inch.
Finally, he gave up. "Karen, please call help," he muttered and hung his head. He wasn't looking forward to the lecture he would get from Tony, primarily since their relationship was still very strained after the whole homecoming disaster. Nevertheless, he preferred it over being eaten by a tentacle monster. Or being molested by it. (Of course, that was one of his top concerns. Peter was a teenager with access to the internet after all.)
A couple of minutes later the creature was hit by a red and gold flash. Screaming unearthly the tentacles released him. Iron Man, covered in purple slime, freed himself of the pulsating mess.
"It might not have been the best tactic to throw myself head first into this thing." He shook himself to get at least some of the slime off. "Are you unharmed, Kid?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. A bit squished, but fine," Peter answered and tried to shake slime off his costume. "Look out! Behind you!"
But it was too late, one of the tentacles had already grabbed Tony. He fired one of his repulsors at the beast and severed the limb holding him right off. He jump-started into the air to get some distance between him and the monster, in time to see that the appendage grew back immediately.
"Oh, yeah! My day keeps getting better and better!"
"What do we do now?" Peter asked.
Iron Man readied one of his mini-missiles for the launch. "We end this before it gets out of hand."
"No!" A strange man in a blue tunic and a red cape ran towards them. "Don't harm it! It isn't evil! It's just lost and scared!"
"Who are you?"
"I am Doctor Stephen Strange, Master of the Mystic Arts, and Keeper of the New York Sanct-" That was all he could say because the creature grabbed him too and started to envelop him in a cocoon of fine tentacles.
Under the helmet, Tony rolled his eyes.
"Who ordered that clown?"
"I've never seen him before!" Peter said with a shrug.
"Oh, great! Now I have to save this numb nut too?"
Glistening yellow light from the creature answered his question. From the middle of the monster erupted the stranger, his red cloak billowing around him as he soared into the air and coughed up a large chunk of purple goo.
"That was… a bit undignified," mumbled the man in blue.
"No shit!" Tony yelled. "What is your plan, Strangeling?"
The other man didn't answer. He cast blue sparks around his fingers and catapulted them towards the beast, where they fizzled a bit before they disappeared.
"What was that supposed to be?" Iron Man asked.
Strange looked at his hands and sighed. "A sleep spell. I never tried it before. It seems I did something wrong. Maybe I was too far away."
Carefully he hovered closer to the beast. However, he miscalculated the length of its tentacles and got caught again. Iron Man reacted quick, trying to pull Strange back, but the creature was even faster, and he got caught too.
Pressed together face-to-face by slimy appendages, Tony and Stephen were conveyed even closer to the center of the tentacles.
"Tony, what can I do to help you?" came Peter's panicked voice over the comm.
"Nothing! Stay out of reach! I don't want you to end up in here too."
He tried to wiggle a bit, but it was no use. The hold of the creature was to tight.
"Any Ideas?" he asked the sorcerer.
"I think it doesn't like heat." He put his arms around Iron Man's shoulders.
Tony felt inexplicable warm all of a sudden. "What are you doing?"
"As soon as it loosens its grip, fire your thrusters!"
"What?" The heat in Tony's armor became nearly unbearable. This mad wizard was heating up the suit! Tony wanted to shout at him to stop it, but suddenly the tentacles retracted. With one, powerful blast he catapulted himself and the sorcerer into the air. He wanted to land nearby, but the additional weight of Strange and the heat that disturbed his systems distracted his trajectory. Far to fast, they crashed into the ground, and Strange hit his head on Iron Man's helmet.
"You okay?" Tony asked.
Strange rubbed his head and nodded.
"Seems I was lucky that you didn't cut through my face-plate with those cheekbones," Tony joked.
Strange raised an eyebrow and looked at him. "Are you flirting with me, Mr. Stark?"
Tony scoffed and shoved the sorcerer off of him, "Certainly not!"
"What a shame. Maybe I would have liked that." He stood up and looked around until he found Peter sitting in a tree, observing from a safe distance. "Hey, you! Spider-Boy!"
Peter protested, "I'm Spider-Man!"
"Yeah, later. That creature seems to be immune to magic, so my powers are not much of a help. Can you cocoon it with your web-thingy? Preferably as broad as possible."
"I'll try." He created a fine mesh with his web-shooters. With Tony's help, he draped it over the monster, but the thinner tentacles were able to slip through the holes. Finally, they tightened it together, and the beast was trapped.
"Watch out for those tentacles!" Tony warned Peter, then he turned and looked over to the sorcerer. "Hey, Gilderoy Lockhart! Are you going to help or will you stand there, watch us do all the work and look pretty?" he shouted annoyed.
The sorcerer stepped beside Iron Man and grinned. "Oh, Mr. Stark… So, you think I'm pretty?" Casually, he wiped purple slime out of his hair. Behind him, the trapped creature growled and hissed.
"You got some nerve!"
"And do you know what else I have?" He raised the hand with the sling ring. "A plan!" Slowly, he circled the other hand in the air before him, and a portal opened under the creature, but instead of falling right though, it got stuck – the entrance was not big enough.
Tony opened his helmet to let Strange see how absolutely and completely done he was. "Really? I'm starting to think you're doing this on purpose!"
"I didn't expect that." The sorcerer scratched his head. "In my defense, I have to say I'm still learning this magic stuff."
"Make the hole bigger!"
"I don't know how!"
The three of them just stood there and looked at the quivering mass of tentacles.
"What now?" Peter asked. "We really should do something! I don't know how long my web will last."
"Right. I'm on it!" Strange rose into the air and dropped himself feet first onto the beast. With a sickening squish sound, both of them plopped through the opening in the ground.
When the sorcerer reemerged, he looked disheveled and extra-slimy.
"I think it thanked me for bringing it home." He sniffed the slime and wrinkled his nose. "Gentlemen, it was a pleasure to meet you, but I'm in urgent need of a shower." Quickly, he closed the portal on the ground and turned to go.
"Wait! That's it? You come here, dump a slime monster into a hole in the ground and vanish into the night like fucking Batman?"
"Problem?"
"I have no Idea who you are, what your deal is! Where do I find you, if I'm looking for a 'Master of the Mystic Arts'?"
Strange opened a portal in front of himself, then turned and grinned. "The name is Doctor Stephen Strange, and the address is 177a Bleecker Street. Good Night." He winked and left.