Shout Outs: Thanks to MythologyStar for reviewing the story. Thanks to Master Skywalker 121 for reviewing the story. Thanks to Spiritual-Sister for reviewing the story. Thanks to Phoenix X 2 for favoring the story.

Chapter 6: Murders and Disappearances

A dragging noise was heard like the sound of sandpaper cutting through something. The substance eventually formed into a humanoid creature—the one that was causing mayhem around the city. The creature where Daily Bugle decides to give a name.

The Sandman.

The Sandman narrowed its eyes as he stared at the house that was across from him. Dragging his feet, the Sandman went across the road and reached the door. He knocked heavily which earned footsteps from inside, coming towards the entrance.

"Coming!" the voice from the inside spoke. The person opened the door but when she did, she looked up only to give out a scream.

Peter frowned as he read through the Daily Bugle newspaper. So far, four people had been missing and the kidnapper left nothing but sand. He was right, after all. He was sure that this…creature…this Sandman—as how the Daily Bugle now calls it—had connections with these sudden disappearances.

But the question was…

How was the Sandman going after these people?

"You're still reading the Daily Bugle?" Ned asked, scooting towards him.

It was lunchtime and the cafeteria was crowded with chattering students while the lineup for food was to the other side. All the white tables that were scattered throughout the hall were filled with people.

"Helps me keep updated. This is the fourth person that went missing," Peter responded. "What does the Sandman want with them?"

Ned shrugged. "I don't know. I'm not a bad guy—I wouldn't know how they think."

"There's Parker," whispering voices announced which gained Peter's attention.

He glared when he found out that it was Flash and his gang, walking towards him.

"Hey Parker!" Flash shouted. "I heard you fainted."

Kong pretended to faint since he moved his hand in a fainting motion. The rest of the gang sniggered. Peter diverted his attention away from them.

"How did they know I fainted? Michelle and I were the only ones at Oscorp."

Ned shook his head. "Ignore them. They're bunch of pricks anyway."

But as Peter resumed skimming through the articles, there was a certain piece which got him riled up, making Ned jump with startle.

"What?!" Peter roared with anger. "That's absurd! Listen to this: In the recent attack with the Sandman, it had been showed that everyone's most favorite superhero was incapable of handling such a creature. Many people believed that it's best to let the police force handle this troubling situation. This is cruel! I'm trying my best here…"

"What do you expect from people though? After all, you're only human…er…half human. Not even you can do all of it," Ned replied.

"I defeated the freakin Vulture a few months back. Surely, that's enough to let people trust in me just a bit more."

Ned shrugged. "That's why I keep telling you not to read Daily Bugle. Jamieson's garbage."

Peter sighed. "I know…" he mumbled, ruffling the paper before he rolled it.

"By the way, how's Michelle doing?" Ned asked.

Peter shrugged. "The last time I saw her, she was badly shaken and now…she's not talking to me."

"Of course she isn't," Ned muttered. "No offence but you have got to have the worst luck with girls—I mean, you can't keep a girl from running away from you."

"Thanks, Ned. Thanks. Now shall we?"

Ned sighed. "I suppose so…I'm really not looking toward Math."

"Aww, come on. Math isn't so bad," Peter said as the two walked away.

"Sure, whatever you say."

Spider Man released his webs, attaching them to the window before he used it as a sling shot to get to the higher part of the building. He crawled to the side as he saw an open window, allowing him to enter in before he resumed web slinging across the halls until he reached his destination.

He walked towards the room and stopped when he saw Tony who was talking to the next person in a heated discussion. Peter walked in further, hearing the arguing voices.

"…but we can't go in blindly, we have no proof. We need evidence, Hogan…"

The person, Happy, was about to speak when he felt there was another presence in the room. He lifted his head up to see Peter, staring at them. Seeing the pause, Tony stopped what he was doing and looked to the left.

"Ah, Peter. So glad you could join us," Tony spoke.

"Hey…" Peter shifted eyes to Happy and gave a short nod as to indicate that he had acknowledged Happy was here.

"Is something wrong?" Peter asked, referring to the discussion.

"No. No, nothing's wrong. It's just some…adults' problem. It's really quite boring—wouldn't interest you. Anyways," Tony responded as he changed the subject. "Glad you actually came here since Happy here had developed some new gadgets for you."

"Really?" Peter asked as his curiosity peeked.

Happy smiled, knowing he gained the young one's interest and he went towards a table and picked up a small round object. He opened his hand once Happy faced Peter again and the boy stared at it with a curious look.

"This is what I like to call Spider Traces," Happy answered as he handed the small device to Peter who took it, allowing him to examine it.

The device was small and red, taking the shape of a spider, with legs for aerodynamic flight.

"Its purpose is to track down the enemy once you put it on them. Once it is on, you can trace the signal. What's really cool is that this device allows you to follow the signal through your spider sense, allowing you to know if you are in the proximity of the tracer. However, if say, the tracer got attached but the enemy went somewhere far, you will lose the signal, letting the tracer become useless."

Peter grinned. "That's really cool. This would help out a lot for this situation. Is it working?"

Happy nodded. "Of course. Use it at your own pleasure."

"Just…don't do anything I would do," Tony replied as he gave a small wink which made Peter shift awkwardly in his spot, staring at his mentor.

"Why would I want to that? Argh, Tony," Peter complained.

Tony chuckled. "I'm just kidding. And before you go, we did found some things based on the sand you gave us."

Peter's expression fell as it turned to a more serious one. "What is it?"

"This sand is actually a part of him. His body is literally is own weapon," Tony reported, making Peter be a bit perplexed.

"But…but how's that possible? How did this Sandman gained this ability? Surely, something gave him those powers. One person couldn't really be born with them."

"From the data and research we've collected," Tony started as he went to the screen and pulled out some images so the holograms appeared in the air. "It appears that this er…person got the powers from an accident—at a remote testing facility that was filled with radiation. Behind all of this sand is an actual real live person—Flint Marko. The only reason why he's doing what he's doing was because at that time, he was unemployed and needed to pay treatment for his daughter who had cancer. He led a criminal life and things sort of went downhill from there."

Peter suddenly felt sympathy for this villain. Perhaps, under all of that sand, he truly isn't a villain—just misunderstood.

"But…isn't there another choice?" Peter asked. "Do you really have to go that bad when things are terrible?"

"That's the crime of life, Peter. Sometimes, in order to do the things you need to do, you've got to make some choices and sometimes the options you make aren't very smart at all."

"The Sandman wasn't really a bad guy though."

Tony made a faint smile. "No one said life would be easy. Now then. I'm going have to kick you out early. Happy and I…got some things to discuss between certain members and you're not part of that group just yet."

Peter pouted. "So…when will I become 'part of this group'?"

"When you're older," Tony replied, wrapping his arm around Peter's shoulder. "Just not now. You already have enough on your plate. And besides, Aunt May is probably worried about you."

"Yeah…" Peter mumbled, being slightly disappointed about not being able to join Tony's 'secret group'…whatever that was. In light of what he had just found out, Peter was happy about one thing.

He was able to keep the new device of what Happy had made.

Peter sat on the edge of his bed, being deep in thought, not hearing the radio. He was still unnerved about what he had found out about Sandman. He really wasn't a bad person…just some unfortunate bad luck.

"…10-31…crime…"

Peter snapped back to reality as he stared at the radio.

"We got a 10-31 crime. Suspect appears to be made out of sand."

Peter narrowed his eyes as he got up, unzipping his sweater to reveal the blue and red suit. He pulled the mask on but and landed on the window's ledge but before he got out, he turned his head to the side, glancing at the new device Happy gave him and then he released his web shooter, pulling it towards him.

It might come in handy.

He then flew into the evening sky, zipping building after building until he reached the destination. Once there, he saw that the area was covered by several police cars; few of them were questioning the witnesses of what they saw. A small number of buildings nearly got destroyed as some of the sides got demolished from a heavy impact while there was another structure that appeared to be smashed almost completely since there were bricks scattered throughout the ground.

Spider Man flipped through the air before he landed on his feet, staring at the mess.

He stepped over the piles of rubbles that were from the building. How can someone do this much damage?

"What happened?" Spider Man asked.

"Eh, what's it to you?" a gruff voice from Officer Watson spoke.

Spider Man narrowed his eyes. "This business is much as mine as it is yours. People trust me. They put their faith in me."

Watson scoffed. "Yeah sure. I can totally see the Daily Bugle is giving you the royal treatment. Go back to school, kid and leave this to the professionals," he gave a small grunt. "If I wanted to, I would've turned you in already but our Captain decided against it. Don't know why but he puts his faith in you."

Spider Man growled softly, slightly glaring at the officer. But at the last sentence, behind his mask, he gave a softened expression, staring at the officer with a slight confused look. Why would the Captain trust him? He then turned his attention to an overwhelming witness who was covered in dirt. She had a blanket around her as though to comfort her from the rough scene she endured.

"Excuse me, ma'am but if I may…What happened here?" the vigilante asked.

"It came too fast…" the woman spoke in a frightened tone with her eyes being wide. "I…I don't really know it myself…all of a sudden, I saw a shadow looming over here…"

As she spoke, somewhere in a nearby corner, a mysterious shadow started to walk behind the walls. Spider Man suddenly shivered as he felt a tingling sensation coursing through his body and he slightly turned his head to the side, eyes narrowed as he stared at the nearly demolished walls.

My spider sense is on…but there's no one there…?

"You wouldn't believe it. He had no eyes, the ground began to sink…"

And then, the ground away from Peter began to crawl as though it was coming to life, having a mind of its own.

"And…it came."

As though right on cue, the ground suddenly became alive which made the woman scream with horror as Spider Man all of a sudden felt something strong wrapping around his neck before he got harshly thrown to the damaged wall.

Spider Man groaned as he tried to get up, glancing to the side just in time to see dirt and sand forming to the humanoid creature.

Spider Man saw the woman scrambling up from the corner of his eyes before he too got up to his feet.

"Sandman," Spider Man spoke, lifting his head up to see the large creature.

The beast gave out a might roar then turned its attention to Spider Man who widened his eyes.

"Oh boy…I think this is a fine time for me to…run!" he exclaimed, instantly shooting his webs to get out of the harm's way.

Spider Man continued to zip around in hopes to confuse the brute but it was futile. Unfortunately, the web crawler painfully got smacked by the arm and went flying across a few walls before he roughly crashed on the ground.

Man, is it just me or did he suddenly become stronger than before?

Peter coughed from the dust that went into his mouth. His suit, needless to say, was covered in dirt and small tears were slightly shown in the suit. He looked at the creature before having a thought in his mind, trying a different tactic.

Maybe fighting him wasn't the answer.

Going with that, Spider Man released his webs to get out of the spot and went higher in order to actually face the Sandman.

"Flint! I know why you're doing this. There's another way. You don't need to this," Spider Man called out as he grunted, his body being sore from the impact he had received earlier.

"No…one understands me!" the Sandman spoke in a deep rough voice.

Spider Man gave a blank look as he stared at him. "Woah, you can speak? Uh, I mean of course you can. You were a human before," he muttered the last sentence.

He then resumed web slinging around, trying to get the beast's attention.

"I do. I understand what you're going through. I know you have a daughter with cancer and you want to do anything to save your little girl."

Sandman briefly stopped what he was doing, captivated of what this young hero has to say.

"You don't have to do it this way. There is help," Spider Man continued and he extended his hand out. "I can help you but you need to trust me."

For a brief moment, Spider Man felt a flicker of hope rising in him as he saw the Sandman looking at his hand, being tempted. It was as though he wanted Spider Man's help but something was holding him back. But then, Spider Man's slight hope was shattered when the beast's face turned to a frown and he snarled.

"You lie," he spat. "There's no help for me."

And then, bullets from the side came, shooting at the fiend.

"Wait, no stop!" Spider Man shouted.

Angered and hurt, the Sandman swung his deathly arms around and brushed the police away as though there were nothing but mere insects who were in his way. Spider Man landed a few meters away from the police. It wasn't until then that more police came, this time holding a firehose.

"Stop. Don't engage!" Spider Man cried out.

But it was too late.

The firehose got unleashed, sending huge amount of water at the beast who roared, feeling its sand dissolving away. Spider Man's cry was faded in the background and the last thing the Sandman saw before he disappeared was Spider Man.

It was late in the night. The once active scene faded into silence. It wasn't until then that something began to form once more. It was small and it seemed to be born from the deformed pile of grime. Slowly, it had enough power to be able to make a small distorted figure but it was weak. It needed something to be fueled.

And then, the pile of dirt began to drag away into the unknown…

Author's Note: Aww, I actually feel bad for Sandman :3 but I hope that this chapter was a bit dark; I'm planning to make the books to be darker as we go on so that should be fun. And Peter didn't get the chance to use his new gadget because of the police :3 Oh and 10-31 is a police code which means 'crime in progress'. What happens next? Find out! Toodles!