TWIN DEMONS by Georgia Kennedy
Author's Notes
Cheers was the name of a highly popular situation comedy on American television, which starred Ted Danson as Boston bartender Sam Malone, Shelley Long as Diane Chambers, and later, Kirstie Alley as Rebecca Howe.
Part of Eddie Brock's dialogue near the end of this chapter comes from, The Origin of Spider-Man episode from the 1967 series, in which Spider-Man confronts the robber who murdered his uncle Ben.
Disclaimer
This is a derivative work of fiction featuring characters copyrighted and trademarked by Marvel Characters, Inc. It is based upon: Spider-Man, copyright 2002 by Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., all rights reserved; Spider-Man 2, copyright 2004 by Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., all rights reserved; Daredevil - Director's Cut, copyright 2004 by Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, Inc., all rights reserved; and Hulk, copyright 2003 by Universal Studios, all rights reserved. The author is not connected with nor is this work authorized by Marvel Characters, Inc., or any of the aforementioned motion picture studios. This work is intended solely for posting on Fanfiction, for the benefit and enjoyment of its intended audience. No commercial or financial benefit accrues or is intended to accrue to the author as a result of said posting. Any unauthorized copying or redistribution of this work might subject the party responsible for such unauthorized copying or redistribution to legal action by the owners of the aforementioned copyrights and trademarks.
XXVIII
TICKET TO THE PENTHOUSE
O'Hern's Celtic Pub was jam-packed with stockbrokers, investment bankers, and other assorted Wall Street types, as it was every Friday evening. Established in the late 1880s, it was the last of the old-time Irish taverns that serviced lower Manhattan. Its ancient brick walls were lined with portraits commemorating the sons and daughters of those brave souls who had fled the potato famines in search of a better life. Over two dozen major league baseball players from the Emerald Isle, including Jimmy Archer, Joe Cleary, and Patsy Donovan, graced one wall alone.
More than a few patrons affectionately regarded the place as New York's own Cheers. They would come in to unwind after long days in the trading pits, on the phones, or in front of their computer screens. Or, in the case of one Friday night regular, on the news beat.
"Two days," Eddie Brock grumbled as sat on his customary barstool, nursing a Heineken, his favorite import. He clutched his new Sanyo CG65 videocam tightly in his lap, treating it as if it were an extension of his person.
"How's it going, Ed?" It was Shari, the attractive brunette behind the bar who he sometimes used as a source.
"Lousy," Brock replied. "I lost two whole days on the biggest story of my career because of that gasbag."
Shari was looking particularly sharp in her white shirt and black tie, the required attire for servers at this century-old establishment. Eddie had often spouted off to her about the trials and tribulations of the journalism dodge, particularly the shortcomings of his colleagues, both inside and outside the Daily Bugle. And in Shari, he had found an attentive, curious listener.
"Let me guess," she said. "Joe Robertson."
"You got it, sis." The object of the smarmy reporter's ire was his immediate supervisor, the City Editor of the Daily Bugle. "I can't understand how the boss put up with that guy all these years."
From listening to Brock's colorful war stories over these last months, Shari was able to match names with personalities. But being the astute observer of human character that her craft had made her, she could not help wondering whether the Bugle would have survived as long as it had without Mr. Robertson there to hold things together. She had long since pegged J. Jonah Jameson as sensation-peddler and Brock as his reflection, an ambitious corporate climber and butt-kisser. She had learned to take his barside gripes with a grain of salt. And yet, she actually looked forward to seeing him on Friday nights, knowing that a little entertainment and a few laughs would always be on tap.
At the same time, she was grateful that he was never of the mind to ask her out, though she conceded that he would probably be better company than her ex.
"If I can ask, Ed, what's this big story all about?"
Brock clammed up fast. As much as he liked her, he would never tip his hand to anyone about a major scoop, much less one of this magnitude. "Let's just say it's a Pulitzer-Prize winner and leave it at that."
"Oooookay," Shari replied, trying not to laugh. Even to a non-journalist like her, the thought of the Daily Bugle winning a Pulitzer was hilarious, if not far-fetched. Shari was not even a twinkle in her mother's eye the last time the Bugle won that most coveted of journalistic prizes. "Joe doesn't share your enthusiasm, I take it."
"That's about the size of it. Now, how about that chaser?"
"Coming up." In no time, a bottle of seltzer appeared in front of him, next to the almost-empty beer bottle. Being a man on the go all the time, Eddie was careful to limit himself to a single beer, always an imported brand like Heineken, Molson, or Kirin. Suffering from a phobia that even a single drink might dull his edge, he would always have a club soda or two right afterward.
And he never, ever, drank from a glass.
As Brock sipped his seltzer, his accumulated frustrations began to boil over as he mentally replayed the knock-down drag-outs he had been having with Robbie Robertson over the past two days. The morning after he witnessed that altercation between Peter Parker and Mary Jane Slutson, he had bought the videocam and was getting ready to put his onetime colleague under surveillance when Robertson called him on his cell phone and ordered him to cover the grand jury proceedings in the Oscorp probe . . .
"No can do. The boss has got me on a really big story."
"I'm your boss, Eddie. And right now, the last thing we need is a follow-up to your 'Spider-Man-in-cahoots-with-terrorists' piece. We got flooded with so many e-mails that our website had to be taken offline."
"Public's gotta know the truth, Joe, even if they don't want to hear it."
"Just get your ass over to that courthouse, Eddie. Right now!"
Then the click— followed by silence.
His ears were still ringing from the dressing-down Robertson had given him. Much as he wanted to tell the City Editor where to stick it, he knew he could not. Brock may have been Jameson's star reporter, but in certain respects the Chief was very old-line. In disputes between subordinates, the one who was higher up on the seniority ladder was always in the right.
For over six hours, Brock had waited on the steps of the courthouse with the rest of the local media, constantly checking his watch, fuming silently at the possibility that he might lose his opportunity to catch Spider-Man in the presence of Mary Jane Tartson. And when the grand jury had announced its decision to drop the case, Eddie was furious. He had called Robertson again to tell him that the Oscorp story had been a dud, but the City Editor simply told him to get back to the office and have the article on his desk in time for the evening edition.
Brock had briefly considered going back to that Watson broad's place, but decided against it, figuring that he would never be able to get a bead on Spider-Man unless Peter Parker were close by. He would have to call it a night and pick up Parker's trail first thing the next morning.
But no sooner had he woken up when Robertson had another assignment for him.
"I got a tip from one of my few remaining sources inside the Police Department," Robbie had informed him. "There's a major sting operation about to go down. I want you on it."
Against his better judgment, Brock had spent the entire day tailing a squad of narcotics detectives as they painstakingly lined up all their ducks for what would turn out to be one of the largest crack cocaine busts in the Big Apple's history.
As the hours, minutes, and seconds dwindled away on the police stakeout, Brock periodically glanced skyward, hoping that Spider-Man might show up. But the webslinger was nowhere to be seen.
In a truly rare suspension of Murphy's law, the bust itself had gone off exactly as planned, with nary a shot being fired. Still, Eddie had a considerable flair for producing an article with enough drama and suspense to make it a headliner, which was what justified the obnoxious reporter's paycheck and made it extremely difficult for Robbie Robertson to convince Mr. Jameson to fire him.
With ten minutes to go until the evening edition deadline, Brock had burst into the City Editor's office and handed him the hard copy.
"Don't bother," Brock brashly told his boss when he saw Robbie's red pen poised over the article's final sentence. "Mr. Jameson will just put it back in."
"This is straight news, Eddie," Robertson had snapped. "It's not an editorial. Mr. Jameson's been around long enough to know the difference. Make these corrections and get it back here in five minutes."
"Pompous bastard," Eddie hissed under his breath as he turned around and walked out of Robertson's office.
"What did you say, Eddie?"
"Nothing."
But the City Editor was not through with him, yet. "Oh, and in case you forgot, you're to leave Mary Jane Watson alone, period. Those are Mr. Jameson's orders, not mine."
"That's not what he said, Joe. He promised John he would not do anything that would jeopardize Miss Watson's career. He never said anything about keeping an eye on her now and then."
"You're obviously not listening to me, Eddie. Let me spell it out for you one more time. If you so much as get within a mile of Miss Watson, you're ass is history around here. Do I make myself clear?"
"Whatever you say, boss-man," Eddie tersely called out over his shoulder. He knew that Robertson was just uttering empty threats. The Bugle wouldn't last a week without him, and that overweight windbag knew it.
Grumbling as was his habit, Brock had returned to his office, two floors below. The article was still on his desktop. He blocked off the sentence which Robertson had been about to strike: "The fact that the NYPD was able to plan and execute this operation without interference from Spider-Man was proof enough that this city has no need for costumed vigilantes."
Taking another look at the text before deleting it, Eddie noticed that the attribution clause he had intended to put in was missing. "He's right," Eddie realized as he quickly typed out the words, "According to a well-placed source within the department," at the start of the sentence and e-mailed Robbie the modified version of his article.
With the firewall between news and opinion once again restored, Brock was finally free to get back to his top story.
But not before enjoying another Friday afternoon happy hour at O'Hern's.
Or, in his case, a happy half-hour.
"Gotta go," Eddie told Shari brusquely as he slid off the barstool and dropped a ten-dollar bill into the oversized brandy snifter that served as a tip jar. He did not even bother looking at his watch. He could tell from the bright orange glow outside that the sun was beginning to go down.
"Have a good one, Ed," Shari called out. But Brock never heard her. He was already out the door.
At least he was a generous tipper.
XXXXXXXXXX
"Where the hell is he, goddammit," Eddie muttered as he ran a check on his new videocam for the seventh time. He had been perched in front of a skid-row liquor store across from 8742 Carmine Street, waiting for Peter Parker to show his face while the sun was still up. But the once-and-probably-future photojournalist had neither entered nor exited the building during the last two hours.
Now that night had settled over the city, the logistics of trying to capture the webslinger and his red-haired squeeze on video had become extremely cumbersome. Without specialized equipment, a night shoot would be impossible to pull off.
His frustrations mounting once more, Eddie paced back and forth trying to figure out what to do next. As he ran yet another test shot under a street lamp, it occurred to him that Parker had never brought in any Spider-Man videos. Probably can't afford a cam, Brock thought. If that's the case, then why not . . . Of course!
It had suddenly dawned on Eddie Brock that he and his onetime associate had common interests. Why not team up with Parker, just as Jameson had originally intended? Parker could track the webslinger while Brock shot the video. Of course, Jameson would not be able to claim exclusive rights, and he would probably balk at having to collaborate with a competitor, but at least he would have something to show for it.
His heart pounding with excitement, Eddie made his way across the street, reasonably confident that Parker would go for his proposal. He had proven himself to be a bona fide hustler when he jumped into that taxi in an attempt to corner Spider-Man's whore.
He just hoped that Parker would be enough of a business man to put their rivalry behind him and see the benefits of mutual cooperation, at least on this one occasion.
XXXXXXXXXX
Man, what a shit hole, Eddie thought as he stepped into the lobby of 8742 Carmine Street. The inside of this rundown apartment building looked as slummy as the outside. The stairs were rickety, the paint in the corridor and on the banister was peeling, and there was dust everywhere.
No elevator, Brock thought grimly as he trudged up the stairs. While I'm at it, why not nail a slumlord for building code violations and do my good deed for the day. He almost felt sorry for Peter Parker, thinking that if he were living under these conditions, he wouldn't hesitate to extract a few bucks from a sucker either.
"Let's see . . . 501." It was the first apartment to the right of the stairs on the top floor, opposite the common bathroom and the landlord's penthouse, if indeed it could be called that. The door was opened slightly and a faint light streamed through the open crack. Brock cautiously made his way over.
He knocked tentatively. "Parker?"
There was only silence.
That's strange . . . he's out, but he leaves his door unlocked . . . well, not that he'd have anything worth stealing.
He pushed the door open just enough to peek inside. What he saw shocked him.
The apartment was not just clean. It was completely bare. The only telltale signs that someone had been in the room at all were the open French doors and a single, dimly lit bulb, devoid of any kind of fixture, hanging from the ceiling on partially exposed wiring, swinging slightly in the evening breeze. Other than that, it was as if no one had ever lived there. The room had been so thoroughly scrubbed that there was not even a speck of dust.
As a dumbfounded Eddie Brock stared at the Empire State Building off in the distance, he heard footsteps coming up behind him. He whirled around to confront a very thin, almost waif-like blonde with twin ponytails standing in the doorway, a For Rent sign in her hand. She jumped back, startled by the abruptness of his movement.
"Are you interested in the apartment, sir?" the girl squeaked. She had such a woebegone air about her that Eddie immediately thought of a mouse.
"I'm looking for a friend of mine, Peter Parker," Brock said carefully. "He told me he lives here."
"I'm afraid you just missed him," Ursula Ditkovitch replied. "He moved out last night."
Brock was stunned. But he was careful to keep his expression and body language neutral. As a seasoned reporter, he was accustomed to playing his cards close to the vest, letting down only to the extent necessary to obtain information.
Thinking fast, Eddie slapped the side of his head, as though jogging his memory. "Oh, that's right. Pete reminded me a few days ago that he was moving across town." He smiled deceptively, pretending to be fumbling around his pockets looking for a piece of paper. "You know, I wrote his address down and I thought I put it in my pocket, but for some reason, I can't seem to find it." He looked at Ursula a little sheepishly. "I figure it must've slipped my mind. By any chance, did he leave you with a forwarding address?"
Ursula shook her head, the sadness in her downcast eyes quite obvious.
Brock forced his face into a mask of sympathy, figuring that he might as well pump this girl for the dope on Parker's whereabouts.
"You like Peter, don't you?"
Ursula nodded.
"Did he ever ask you for a date?"
She shook her head, her mournful expression becoming more pronounced. "His girlfriend came by last Saturday," she practically whispered, turning away from him as if ashamed. "He must've moved in with her, I guess."
Brock was instantly alert. A girlfriend? Peter Parker? He would never have figured that in a million years, especially not if he was living in a dive like this. What girl could possibly stoop so low as to even want to hang out with that loser? "Wow," Eddie feigned. "Pete sure is full of surprises. I guess he was waiting to spring it on me. Any idea what she looks like?"
"Well, I only saw her once. Kind of tall with red hair and green eyes. Oh, and she was wearing a bridal gown. That I remember."
This time, Brock could not hide his reaction to the lightning bolt that had just struck him between the eyes. For a few seconds, he just stood there, dazed and immobile, like a deer caught in headlights.
Recovering,, he peeled a twenty out of his wallet and thrust it into Ursula's hand. "Thanks for the tip, Suzie."
To his surprise, Ursula refused the money. Her eyes narrowed and her demeanor turned ice cold. "You're not really Peter's friend, are you?"
"What difference does it make?" Brock sneered as he bolted down the shaky stairway. "He probably never liked you anyway."
He did not stick around long enough to see Ursula's eyes fill with tears at having her secret feelings for Peter being carted out and trampled upon so callously.
XXXXXXXXXX
There's something dreadfully wrong with this picture, Brock thought as he stalked out of the tenement and back into the night. He wandered aimlessly around Greenwich Village for a few blocks, trying to collect his thoughts. Mary Jane Watson? PeterParker's girlfriend? Impossible! Why would a climber like her walk out on a rich stud like John Jameson and throw away the opportunity to live like a spoiled princess for the rest of her life? For what? A bum like Peter Parker? It made absolutely no sense, especially after she sent him packing with a slap across the face.
And yet, the spontaneity of that girl's answers made it crystal clear to Brock that she had told him the truth. He had been in the news business long enough to know whether someone was on the level, and she clearly was.
With growing fury, Eddie realized that Parker and Watson had taken him for a ride the other night. They were only pretending to be fighting to throw him off the trail. That slap must have been faked. What a fool he had been, falling for their ploy so easily.
What the hell do I do now? he wondered. There was no Spider-Man-and-his-girlfriend story. Sure, Spider-Man had rescued Watson, maybe more than once. But he had rescued hundreds of other women as well, maybe thousands. The webslinger obviously had no special feelings toward her. It was all in Jameson's mind; he was always blaming Spider-Man for his misfortunes and setbacks. The truth is, it was Peter Parker all along, incredible though it seemed. He was the one who made Jonah Jameson look like a fool in front of the whole city. Anger suddenly gave way to grudging admiration at the way Parker had taken a page right out of The Godfather, quietly swallowing Jameson's abuse for months, waiting patiently for the right moment to deliver a knockout punch.
And boy, did he ever . . .
The balls on that son-of-a-bitch, Eddie thought. He remembered hearing about Jameson's vow to make life a living hell for Mary Jane Watson's boyfriend. Let's see what happens to him when the Chief finds out, he snickered. Eddie had no doubt he would still get that bonus, not to mention the eternal gratitude of the man he hoped to one day replace.
But first, he would need airtight, incontrovertible evidence to back him up. Without a video of the two of them together, Jameson would never believe him. And even with the video, he would still have to convince the Chief that he did not doctor it.
His sense of mission renewed, he headed back to Mary Jane's apartment building.
XXXXXXXXXX
Eleven o'clock, and still no sign of them.
Eddie had parked himself near the entrance to the subway across the street, the same spot where he saw them get out of the taxi in the rain. From this vantage point, he would have a clear view of the well-lit revolving door in front of him and the subway exit behind. He would have no trouble obtaining the video he needed.
But it was late. From his secret "escorts" over the course of Watson's relationship with John Jameson, he knew that she usually took her last curtain call just after ten o'clock, and had normally arrived home between ten thirty and ten forty-five. No doubt that Parker would pick her up at the theater and they would come back together.
But by the time eleven-fifteen had rolled around, they still had not appeared. At that point, Brock decided to go proactive. Spotting an all-night pizza joint in the same shopping center as the Safeway, he quickly went in and ordered a large cheese pizza to go.
"I'll give you twenty bucks to borrow your cap," he said to the proprietor.
"For that kind of money, you can keep it, mon," the man responded in a thick Jamaican accent.
Pizza in hand, he made his way across the street and passed through the revolving door.
"Hi," he said to the desk clerk. "I have a delivery for a Mary Jane Watson."
"You must be new," the desk clerk replied. "Hang on a minute. I'll let Miss Watson know her pizza's here."
"Thanks." He had no idea what he would do if Parker wasn't with her. But at least he would find out the best place to set up a stake-out operation.
"Excuse me sir, but could you tell me what apartment you're looking for?"
Brock immediately reverted to his lost-address trick. "That's funny, I had it in my pocket. At least I thought I did."
The desk clerk checked her computer screen. I'm sorry, but I don't see a Mary Jane Watson listed here."
"How can that be?" Brock asked, doing a convincing job of looking confused. "She just placed her order fifteen minutes ago.
Suddenly, the desk clerk recalled the reason Mary Jane's name had not appeared on the screen. "I just remembered. Miss Watson moved out this morning. Her apartment has already been leased to another tenant."
For the second time that night, a shocked Eddie Brock stomped out of a building, realizing that he had been foiled once again.
"What about your pizza?" the confused desk clerk called out.
"Enjoy it!" Brock told her as he pushed his way through the revolving door.
He threw his new cap on the ground out of sheer frustration as he watched his whole search turn into a debacle right before his eyes. It was too late to head back to the Lyric. She was probably gone by now, to wherever she and Parker had moved. He would have to find out where that was, and fast, even if it meant disobeying Jameson's prime directive.
By now, Brock was starting to become fatigued. He decided to call it a night and head for home. As he rode the subway back to his Midtown co-op, he thought about Spider-Man again. For the briefest instant, Brock had actually entertained the ridiculous thought that Parker himself was Spider-Man, a notion he had chased from his mind with a derisive laugh. That scrawny little wimp? No way . . .
Curiously, an image of Peter Parker putting on Spider-Man's costume kept nipping away at the outer edges of his mind.
How can Peter Parker possibly be Spider-Man? For Christ's sake, he takes pictures of the guy.
He kept trying to dismiss those idiotic ideas, but they refused to stay dismissed. They bounced around inside his skull all through the ride, giving him a headache in the process. When he finally returned home, he slammed the door, popped a couple of aspirin, sat down in front of his computer, and entered the Daily Bugle's intranet, where all of the newspaper's content was stored. As a senior reporter, Brock had access to everything, including the enormous collection of photographs that Peter Parker had taken of Spider-Man since he came aboard. They had all been scanned in and converted to a digital format.
How in God's name could he have shot these? Brock asked himself as he scrutinized Parker's photographs. From the backgrounds, he could tell that none of them were taken from ground level. He had once heard Parker tell Robertson that he had to be creative in finding a good perch from which to shoot. Did he have some kind of signal system worked out with Spider-Man? And how could he have gotten out on all those high places without asking permission from the property owners?
As he scrolled through photo after photo, one that never made it into print caught his eye. It had an extremely curious feature, which became more apparent when he magnified it. The picture showed Spider-Man nailing a couple of carjackers. It appeared to have been taken from two stories above the ground. But there was a milky white line that bisected the photo. At first, Brock thought that the camera lens had cracked, but there was none of the jaggedness normally associated with broken glass. Even stranger still, upon further magnification, the line looked like a few very fine wires twisted together. If he did not know better, he could have sworn it was . . .
Webbing?
Was Parker's camera being held in place by . . . webbing?
No, no, no, NO!" This time, Eddie felt as if a boulder had fallen on him. Every single one of those shots had been rigged.
And it was Peter Parker himself who had rigged them.
Brock gasped as he poured over the implications of the impossible turning out to be true. For two years now, Peter Parker had been generating his own headlines. This had to be a far bigger fraud than the one committed by that New York Times reporter who made up his own stories a few years back. Parker could be thrown in jail for this, if not sued into oblivion by all the people whose property he had damaged over the years.
He picked up the phone, intending to call Mr. Jameson at his home on Long Island. But as he started to dial the number, he realized that if he opened his mouth too soon, he would blow the deal of a lifetime. He was not about to let Jameson off the hook for a measly thousand dollars. What would Spider-Man's identity be worth? Fifty thousand? A million? A Pulitzer Prize perhaps?
As he set the phone down, reality had once again put the brakes on his plans. All he really had at this point was a suspicion and a few clues. What he really needed was proof as solid as the bedrock that anchored Manhattan's skyline. He would have to keep quiet, bide his time, and assemble his evidentiary edifice, brick by brick, regardless of how long it took. Only then would he be able to extract the maximum possible leverage from his serendipitous discovery.
As he was trying to sort things out, thoughts of Mary Jane Watson once again forced their way into his mind. Oh my God! he realized. Jameson had been right all along. There is a Spider-Man's girlfriend story. That bitch must have found out who he was just before her wedding, most likely when he had saved her from that juiced-up weirdo, Doc Ock.
Yes, it was Mary Jane Watson who held the keys to the kingdom. Finding her new address was no longer an option. Once he had that information, nailing her super-hero boyfriend would be a cakewalk. All he had to do was point his videocam at their window, wait for the right moment, and shoot.
And as for Robertson's restraining order, to hell with it. To hell with both of them, he grimaced, With the mother lode he was sitting on, all bets were off. He would not need to be in the good graces of Jolly Jonah Jameson or Joseph Robertson for very much longer. In fact, if the Chief could not come up with his asking price, he would simply sell his story to the highest bidder. There would be plenty of takers, he assured himself. He might even start his own publication.
He stepped out onto his terrace and stared up at the hazy night sky. "Parker, you son of a bitch," he murmured softly. "There's no goddamn place on Earth you can run to escape me. You're gonna write my ticket all the way to Trump's penthouse!"