Answers to reviewers' questions or statements:
gunman: Batman doesn't trust anyone and if he does it's questionable at best, just who he is. And as for why they didn't start grilling him over every little detail of his life, well for one they knew that doing so would take a while so they more focused on seeing if he was a potential threat, they'd deal with the more detailed interrogation later since they in a sense are more focused on Doomsday, plus they knew in Peter's current state he wouldn't be able to put up much of a fight, arrogant on their part but it's true. Now over the course of this chapter and the next one the League will start doing subtle pokes at him to gain more information and get a better picture of the guy and they will be asking why he was facing down a civilization destroying monster on his own and they won't be too pleased to hear why especially when they meet the Avengers later. As for the scene with Valeria and Franklin being less than pleased with their parents' decision to cut ties with Peter, it won't be the last we hear of it and Doom himself will have a few things to say on the manner when he pops up.
Daniel's the man 98: A few choice Spider-man villains will be hoping over to have a 'reunion' with Peter but not for a while
Harbinger of Kaos: Black Cat's reaction to Peter's death will be appearing soon, like in the next two chapters
nightmaster000: Mephisto has been to the DC universe and others on a few occasions and in those times, he's already established a sort of network that'll keep him up to date in a sense on Peter's actions while he's back in the Marvel universe
Sync Ryu: At this point and time Peter is around 29, Bruce Wayne is close to 37, Clark is in his early 40's and Diana is around a few hundred years old at least, granted in the New 52 it said she was 23 but it eventually got retconned and said she was born in the antiquity era, so yeah she's old but still looks way to fine to be possible
Disclaimer: I don't own any Marvel or DC characters seen, mentioned or used in this story
Marvel Universe, Triskelion…
"Are you positive that we're finding anything useful here?" Wanda asked Jessica as they, Jean and Carol made their way down the halls of the Triskelion towards the server room that housed all the information that SHIELD has collected over the decades since its creation.
Thankfully they don't have to worry about being spotted thanks to both Wanda's spells keeping them undetected along with Jean using a bit of her reality warping abilities to keep them cloaked from anything that may somehow see through the Scarlet Witch's spell
"Honestly I'm fifty-fifty on this but if SHEILD doesn't have anything concrete, than they may know who or what does" Jessica said as she mentally calculated how far they were from the records room
Now given that they have the likes of Wanda and Jean on their side the group couldn't just teleport into the room thanks to the wards and countermeasures placed in there by a number of SHIELD's allies over the years ranging from Reed Richards, Stark himself, Doctor Strange and even from Thor Odinson believe it or not
"I'll be surprised if there's anything for us to find on Stark in here. For all we know, he deleted that information after he was made head of SHIELD" Wanda said a little bitterly before shooting a slight glare at Carol "Thanks for helping him win that entire shit fest by the way"
Carol at least had the decency to look ashamed "That wasn't my finest moment I'll admit..."
"It could have ended worse Wanda, I've seen and been to realities that showed the events after the Civil War ending up looking like the damn Holocaust" Jean said as she mentally scanned the area for anyone else aside from them and was surprised to sense someone was in the records room.
"Something wrong Jean?" Carol asked as she saw the look on the Omega, hell beyond Alpha level mutant/cosmic entity
"There's someone in the room already" Jean said as she carefully scanned the mind and found some admittedly powerful mental shields. Granted she could easily tear through them with as much effort as it takes for a person's heart to beat on it's own but decided not to 'I'm actually curious to see what they want…'
Jean than turned towards the rest "The person in there, it's…Teresa"
"Teresa?" Jessica said in slight confusion as she looked towards the doors to the room "Who's that?"
"She's Peter's younger sister…" Jean trailed off as she saw the looks of surprise on the other women's faces "You didn't know?"
"Since when does he have a sister?" Jessica said in complete shock at hearing this bit of information
"Since she was born I'd imagine" Jean gave the female spider a deadpanned look
"That's not what she meant and you know it Jean" Wanda gave the equally powerful woman a brief look of annoyance
"You think she knows about Peter…" Carol trailed off not wanting to say what happened out loud
"Considering she's a member of the CIA and she's supposed to be in Madripoor on an assignment now and not here, yes…I think she knows and is thinking of doing something similar to us" Jean said as they entered the room to see that several SHEILD guards were out on the ground and a light brown haired woman that looked to be in her mid to late twenties at a computer terminal hacking through it's fire walls with considerable skill clad in something similar to what Natasha wears with the exceptions being that she was a bit more heavily armed in comparison to the deadly ex-Red Room assassin/spy
"Teresa Parker?" Carol took a small step towards the woman as Jeana and Wanda dropped their respective shields to allow the sister of Peter to see them
Teresa didn't even hesitate to draw her customized nine millimeter and aim it right at the human-Kree hybrid's head with the safety clicking off before her eyes widened at the sight of the four women
"W-What are you all doing here?" Teresa asked with suspicion
"Here to look for information on Stark, considering he's largely re-" Wanda started off but was interrupted by Teresa
"Yeah I know what the bastard did. Kaine called me earlier and told me what happened to Peter before he got black out drunk with some of the X-men" Teresa said as she holstered her pistol and went back to hacking into SHEILD's mainframe
"You find anything of worth yet?" Jessica asked as they made their way towards the younger woman
Teresa shrugged "I found a few things in here but when I tried to follow them i was stonewalled by Stark's custom fire walls. Whatever it is he has in here…he doesn't want it getting out to the public, hell I don't think even Fury is aware what's in here with how good it's hidden and secured"
"Jackpot" Jean grinned as she made her way next to Teresa and examined the girl's work so far and let out a whistle of approval at what she has so far "Your good…"
"Peter taught me how to hack a while back" Teresa said with a sad smile
"Uh not to be mean or anything, but where were you when Ock was in his body?" Carol asked with a raised brow
"Class nine CIA Black ops mission" Teresa said with a scowl of annoyance "And the moment I was done with one I was conveniently slated for another and after that one another"
"Sounds like Ock didn't want you not notice 'Peter's' shift in attitude and was hoping you get offed on one of your missions. He knew you'd see through his ruse in seconds and didn't want to run the risk of killing you and blowing his cover" Carol said with a dark look as she put toghert why Otto would want Peter's last living family out of the way 'That bastard is real lucky he's dead!'
"What's a class nine black ops mission?" Wanda asked with some confusion
"Class nine Black ops missions are when you have to go radio silent sometimes for months on end to infiltrate some sort of terrorist cell or enemy government to either gather information or assassinate someone" Jessica said as she crossed her arms as she remembered her own times doing something similar for either SHEILD or HYDRA "Basically you have to cut yourself off from everyone and disappear until you either complete your mission or you die"
"So like double o seven in real life?" Jean asked with an amused grin
Teresa snorted with grim amusement "Please, James Bond wouldn't last a minute through half the shit I had to go through"
"Amen to that honey" Carol said with a chuckle as she scanned the room
Several minutes of silence passed as Teresa continued her decrypting of the fire walls and decided to pass the time by asking the women what their connection to Peter was. She decided to start with Jean first
"So Jean, how's my brother end up catching the attention of a woman like you?"
Jean smiled sadly as she answered "Wel you can thank the Phoenix in part for that, the rest on the other hand…" she trailed off with a shrug "He has a certain charm to him that I found appealing…"
"What's the Phoenix have to do with you liking Peter?" Carol asked with confusion
"Remember when Peter briefly became a host of the Phoenix force a while back?" Jean asked
"Yeah…to be honest I think he handled that better than when he had the Uni-force" Jessica said as she remembered Peter gaining access to both cosmic forces at different points in time
"Well he was actually supposed to be the original host of the Phoenix" Jean revealed much to the shock of the others
"Wait, Peter was supposed to become the Phoenix?" Wanda sked in surprised
"Well yeah" Jean said with a shrug "I mean it makes sense when you think about it, he's the center of the 'Web of Life' and the Phoenix is the living embodiment of life and rebirth in the Universe"
"If that's the case then why did it pick you instead?" Teresa sked with a frown
Jean sighed at that "Because Peter wasn't ready yet, his connection at the time to the Web of Life was weak and if the Phoenix tried to bond with him than, it would have killed him and very likely corrupted the Web throughout the multiverse"
"So it decided to shack it up with you until he was ready or something?" Wanda asked
"For the lack of a better term yes…but I uh kind of already had a crush on Spider-man at the time and well the Phoenix thought hey what the hell she'll thank me for this later and so it manipulated events so that I'd finally come into contact with Peter eventually and well…"
"But it didn't count on you meeting Scott and Logan" Carol said
"My split affections for them and Peter are kind of why the Phoenix was less than aggregable during those times.
"But what about when Peter had to face down Magik and Colossus? They both had fragments of the Phoenix in them" Wanda pointed out Peter's one on two match with the two-super powered X-men
"They didn't kill him though" Jean stated before she rubbed her forehead "Look explaining why the Phoenix did what it did over the years would take hours to explain and even than there's no guarantee we'll completely understand it. I've been bonded with this thing for years and still can barely predict what it's doing half the time"
"Fair enough" Teresa said with a nod before she glanced at Wand "What about you Maximoff, what about my brother caught your interest?"
Wanda coughed awkwardly at that and looked away "After my…breakdown and I was reluctantly accepted back into the Avengers, Peter and I hung out a lot and we just talked…"
"About?" Carol asked as she watched the super powered woman with interest
"Nothing in particular, I think he just wanted to make sure I wasn't lonely and know that I'll always have someone to count on" Wanda said quietly before she smiled fondly "He also made sure that none of the others could pick on me or give me shit and not expect retribution in some form"
"Would explain why Peter reduced Rouge to tears after she made you cry and lock yourself in your room" Carol said with a thoughtful look on her face "Remind me to rip her eyes out when we make our move against Stark"
"Fine…only after I rip her powers away from her and transport her mind to a nightmarish reality. Logan isn't here anymore to keep her ass safe from me" Wanda said with a scowl on her face
"Ditto" Carol said with a nod
Everyone one than looked towards Jessica who was leaning against the wall with her arms crossed. She gave them a raised brow in return
"What?" she asked
"So how did you and Peter…" Jean said with a smirk
"How do you think? We're both spider themed heroes, operate in New York, have been on several teams together…and we dated for a while" Jessica said the last part quietly
"Wait you guys actually dated?" Wanda asked "When was this?"
"A few days before I was kidnapped by the Skrulls and that bitch more or less destroyed any possible romance between us" Jessica growled out darkly "I mean Peter was willing to give us another chance but…I was going through that whole self-worth crap at the time and pretty much pushed him away and then Osborn took over and well trying to restart a romance seemed unimportant at that time since we were being pursued by the Dark Avengers and HAMMER"
"Least your love for him wasn't announced to the world by a damn alien parasite" Carol said with her brow twitching "Made things awkward between us for weeks before we settled for being casual lovers"
"What's that?" Jean asked
"Basically we screw each other's brains out if neither is in a relationship at the time or we just need to get the edge off" Carol said with a blush as she looked away and let out a cough
"Oh…so friends with benefits?" Jessica asked with a smirk
"Was hoping it'd go farther but then Otto happened and I had to leave earth to help the Guardians of the galaxy and then there was the whole Beyonders destroying the multiverse and all the crap that followed afterwards"
"We can never seem to catch a break with him" Wanda said with a sigh "Just when it looks like we might get a happy ending with him, something comes along and tears it all up"
"Yeah…it sure seems like it" Jean said with a frown at how something like that always seems to pop up when it looks like Peter's luck is starting to look up
It was a little too…convenient
Teresa spent the next several minutes decoding the fire walls placed on whatever it was that Stark was hiding until she finally made a breakthrough
"…You've gotta be fuckin kidding me" Teresa said with a mixture of disbelief and anger
"What is it?" Wanda said as she made her way over to see what it was that Teresa found. She scanned the contents for a few seconds before her face darkened and scarlet energy began to build around her "Oh…"
Jean, Carol and Jessica made their ways over to the pair to see what it was that had their attention and all felt their anger rise to levels that'd impress the Hulk. The tension in the room was so thick, that a blade made of Adamantium would be needed to cut it
"Stark…" Wanda growled out darkly as Chaos energy began to build around her "…When I get my hands around your throat…you're a dead man"
…
Meanwhile in Venice…
Julia stood staring at the back of Natasha Romanov, the last person she was breaking the news to about Peter's death. She wasn't entirely sure what to expect from the red head, her future and her decisions were almost as unreadable as Peter's half the time and this was one of those times
Natasha didn't seem to show any physical reaction to Peter's death, her face was as blank and cold as the tundra during winter.
"Natasha…are you alright?" Julia asked the deadly woman tentatively
Natasha was in the middle of cleaning her widow bracelets when she answered in a leveled tone "Da…it is unfortunate about Peter's… death"
Julia frowned at the seemingly empty tone but pressed on "But…"
"But it was bound to happen one day Julia" Natasha said with a slight shrug, still not meeting her fellow spider themed heroine's eyes "And like you said… you saw him dying"
Julia nodded slightly "Yes I did…but it's not the first-time Peter proved me wrong and defied his fate"
"Guess his infamous 'Parker Luck' finally made a full circle no?" Natasha said as she finished with her bracelets "Now as much as I want to discuss another hero dying Julia, I have a mission to prepare for. So, if you please…"
Julia watched her friend for a moment before speaking softly "Don't you even care that Peter is gone Nat? That he may never come back this time?"
Natasha was quite for what felt like hours before she answered "…He was a good friend and I am saddened that he's dead…but like I said, it was bound to happen one day. Nothing last forever…"
Julia stared at Natasha for a long time before she sighed sadly and quietly vanished in a red flash, leaving the former KGB agent alone in the apartment she was using
Natasha let out a sigh as she leaned back in her chair and stared out the window to see it was beginning to rain "…It was bound to happen one day…"
She slowly reached for the bottle of wine that was given to her when she arrived with shaking hands and slowly brought the bottle to her lips. She didn't plan to drink it since she wasn't a wine kind of girl but…
"It was bound to happen…" Natasha said quietly with her eyes beginning to water as she began to drink from the bottle all the while trying to ignore the sudden pain in her chest at hearing someone she cared for was dead…
"Everyone close to me…dies…" Natasha mumbled out sadly as the tears began to slowly fall from her eyes and down her cheeks, messing up her make up along the way "…Always…"
…
The X-mansion…
"And then…" Logan said with a slight slur in his voice as he leaned in to Toxin, Venom and Scarlet Spider "…Spider-man dropped kick the guy into the window and said 'You got served'!"
Kaine busted out laughing "Y-Your kidding, right?"
"Wish I was" Logan slapped his hand on the table hard and continued to drink his beer "It was the worst one liner I've ever heard from him in all the years I knew him"
"Sounds like Spidey" Flash said with the Venom symbiote pulled back around his face as he cradled his beer that he has yet to drink from
Kaine and Logan were already on beer number thirty something and Toxin was at fifty along with Laura who both seemed to be barely holding on. He looked to his left and saw Bobby still holding a crying Angelica while Deadpool was writing something in his book and occasionally muttering out something about 'disabling armors' and 'ripping out arc reactors'…
As for Hope, well she passed out a while ago and had to be carried back to her room by Storm…after she was talked down by Hank McCoy to prevent her from going on a drunken rampage to Stark Tower and ripping the man apart at the atomic level after forcing him to kill Rhodes and Pepper and castrate himself with his own two hands
'Yeesh that girl has one helluva a mean streak' Flash thought with a shiver at hearing the young mutant go into exact drunken detail on what she was going to do to Stark with some creative input from Deadpool and Scarlet Spider
'Spider…dead…' Venom hissed quietly, wheatear it was in anger or sadness Flash didn't know nor care to push it, the symbiote has been reasonable lately and he doesn't feel like pushing his luck and pissing it off
'Yeah…Spider-man is dead' Flash thought sadly as he finally took a sip of his drink and nearly grimaced at the taste 'Funny I thought nothing could take him down…'
'The end comes for us all eventually…'Venom said before it cut the connection between the pair, leaving Flash to his thoughts on how the world was going to go on with the death of, in his opinion, one of the if not the greatest hero the world has ever known
…
And done.
This is a little short compared to my previous chapters but I thought making it any longer would mess up the tone of this one. I was originally going to also include Peter finally getting out of the tower and down to the world, more specifically Gotham but I decided to hold that off for next chapter and visit the Marvel Universe one more time. We'll come back and catch up on how this reality is fairing with no more Spider-man and the girls getting ready to tear down Stark but that won't be for a while, like six or seven chapters while at least.
So next chapter Peter gets his suit back a heads down to Gotham, after a brief tussle with a Justice League member and annoys the hell out of Batman and help save the day and meets Catwoman and Batgirl!