XXXIII. Examination

The next day was Halloween. Peter and Gwen were both back in school that morning, having suddenly recovered from the "flu". Once they'd left Xavier's school last night, the rest of the evening had been far less interesting than they might have figured on: their time at SHIELD Headquarters really had been spent on nothing more than a few questions and answers to debrief all the spider-heroes, and a bit more blood-work on Felicia. As near as Dr. Banner and the other SHIELD scientists had been able to determine, Felicia Hardy's powers were due entirely to a low-dose application of the genuine super-soldier serum. She wasn't quite as strong or fast as Captain America, but in a pinch her bad-luck powers kicked in to make up for that. She had the potential to become a formidable hero indeed, provided she really was willing to reform and leave cat-burglary behind.

At midday, Peter, Mary Jane, and Gwen sat at one of the outdoor tables during their lunch recess. Harry spotted them right away and sat down next to Gwen, a tray full of hot dogs and French fries in front of him. He was wearing an expensive new pair of sunglasses and had an ear-to-ear grin on his face. He whipped off the shades before he started eating. "Hey, guys. Long time, no see. You feeling better?"

"Loads," said Gwen. "You're looking pretty chipper today."

"You could say that," said Harry with a nod. "I just made a couple of… sweet deals last night. For Oscorp, I mean."

"Such is the life of the boy executive," laughed MJ. "When do your best pals from school get their stock-options?"

"Best I can give you is a tip," said Harry. "Buy low; sell high."

Neither Pete nor Gwen reacted to Harry's (admittedly ancient) joke. Harry commented, "Jeez, you guys must have been really sick."

"You don't even want to know," said Gwen. The truth was, she and Peter and Mary Jane had all been up pretty late last night, and so they all looked like death warmed over now. Only MJ was even trying to keep up appearances, but then, she was a natural actress.

"You want to hang out after school today?" asked Harry. "Maybe find a costume-party to go to tonight?"

"I can't," said MJ. "Drama club. School play's next Friday night, so it's really crunch-time now. But I hope you'll all be there for the big night!"

"Wouldn't miss it," said Peter. "Count on it!"

"What about you guys?" asked Harry.

"We've got a shift at the lab this afternoon," said Gwen. "Maybe later on?"

"Okay," said Harry with a nod.

That was when Kenny appeared and plopped down into the seat next to MJ. His tray was even more loaded-down than Harry's was, and he stared at the pile of food as if it were the only thing the world. He didn't even start eating once he'd sat down; he just kept staring, lost in thought.

MJ cleared her throat. "Earth to Kong?"

Kenny jumped. "Wha…? Oh. Hey, guys."

MJ glanced over at her friends—they were all staring at Kenny, wondering at his odd behavior—before she continued. "Is… something the matter?"

"Maybe he's lonely," suggested Harry. "Now that Flash is spending all of his time with the new girl."

"Aw, is that it?" asked Gwen. "The big guy needs new friends, and we're all that's left?"

"It's nothing like that," said Kenny. "I've just been thinking a lot lately… about… stuff."

"Stuff," said Peter. "Sounds deep."

"I mean, like, super-people and stuff," said Kenny. He leaned over the table and lowered his voice down to a conspiratorial whisper. "I think our lives are, like, in real danger here! Think about it. Freaking aliens invaded New York over the summer, and all these super-heroes showed up to stop them. But now we've got, what, mutants and spider-men and vampires running around? And they all seem to be attacking the places that we hang out!"

"The world's a crazy place these days," said Peter.

"Yeah, but why?" asked Kenny. "This is gonna sound kind of… I don't know, kind of 'conspiracy-theory' crazy, but… what if it's a big Twinkie?"

Everybody stared again. "I don't follow," said Peter.

"You know, like in that movie, Ghostbusters. How, as soon as they started looking for ghosts, suddenly they were all over New York, 'cuz something big was coming. You remember that part of the movie, how they said it was like a giant Twinkie?"

"So… you're saying this is all, what, like some kind of sign?" asked Mary Jane.

"I don't know," said Kenny. "But it's something. I mean, all I know is, a vampire attacked our school the other night. A girl died. And I saw it."

"Maybe you should see the school counselor," suggested MJ helpfully.

"I don't think there's anybody in the world qualified to counsel people over this," said Kenny.

"That… is probably true," said Peter.

An ominous pall fell over the five teenagers. Then a chill winter breeze blew over all of them, causing them to shiver. "Maybe we should take this inside," suggested Gwen. "Uh… you know, 'cuz I don't want to get sick again so soon."

"Good idea," said MJ. They picked up their lunch trays and headed back to the cafeteria.

Along the way, Kenny wandered off on his own, once again lost in thought; and Harry was stopped by the ringing of his cell-phone, a business call that he had to take in private. So, soon enough it was just the spider-trio, looking for a new table to sit at inside the school building.

"What do you think?" whispered Peter. "Tonight, should we try and get to the bottom of this vampire business?"

"On Halloween night?" asked MJ. "That's almost too perfect… but I won't be able to join you until after practice."

"And I still need a new costume," said Gwen. "But I don't know how to sew."

"I'll help you with that," said Peter. The girls shot him a pair of funny looks. "What? Where do you think I got my costume? How do you think I mend my costume?"

"This is a side of you I never knew about," said Gwen.

"Oh, I always knew about it," said MJ. "I'm just too nice to bring it up."

• • •

That afternoon, Peter and Gwen raced over to ESU. Gwen had brought a ski-mask so that she could hide her face and web-sling along with Peter. They sped across town, letting out shouts of "woo!" and "yahoo!" the whole way. Peter pondered a newfound realization that web-slinging with a friend really was just plain fun.

But when they arrived at the lab, they found that most of the lights and equipment were off. It was as if the place were shut down again. They went inside, only to discover Curtis and Martha Connors going over some video footage in Curtis's office. Peter cleared his throat; Curtis looked up. "Peter; Gwen. Are you both feeling better?"

"Completely recovered," said Peter. "Right, Gwen?"

"One-hundred percent," she said with a nod.

"Well, I'm sorry to say that there won't be much for you to do today," said Curtis. "The lab's going be closed for a while. Again." He looked over at Martha, a question in his eyes.

"I think you should tell them," said Martha. "They're smart kids. They can handle it."

Curtis cleared his throat. "Um… there's been another break-in."

"Oh no!" said Peter. "What got stolen this time?"

"Not much in the way of equipment or supplies," said Curtis. "But… well, maybe you should see this." He pointed at the video monitor that was temporarily rigged up on his desk.

"What is it?" asked Gwen.

"After the last break-in, I decided to have some security cameras installed," said Martha.

Gwen felt her heart sinking into her stomach. "When… was that?"

"They only finished a couple days ago," said Martha.

Gwen sighed with relief.

"But it was a good idea," said Curtis. "The cameras caught something. Watch." He started the video again, and a series of grainy images in black-and-white played out on the monitor: a window opened; a man-like creature crawled in and then stood on the floor; he came into view, looking like a human being with vampire-bat features.

"Is that…?" started Peter.

"We think it's the vampiric mutant that they're talking about in the news," said Martha. "The one that attacked your high-school."

"No way…" said Gwen.

The images continued. Debra Whitman came into view. She spoke to the vampire briefly, leaning in close to him, maybe even kissing him. Then someone else appeared in the lab, a man wearing combat gear and carrying all kinds of weapons. A moment later, this newcomer was tackled by what looked like a werewolf of all things, who came crashing in through a window. They fought; then the vampire picked up Debra and flew away, and the werewolf went after them.

"Holy crap," said Gwen. "That was… I've never seen anything like that, and I've seen some pretty weird stuff lately."

"The fact is," said Curtis, "both Debra Whitman and Michael Morbius seem to have gone missing. We can't find either one of them. And there have been some government types poking around here too, asking all kinds of questions… so until we can find our grad students and get this business cleared up, we're going to have to suspend lab operations again."

"Do you think… that creature in the video could be Michael?" asked Peter quietly.

Curtis sighed. "If so, he wouldn't be the first scientist from this lab to turn himself into a monster. I… I honestly don't know what to think, but I'm hoping there's some other explanation."

"Well, um… maybe, just in case, you ought to have some more of that lizard-cure all ready to go?" asked Peter. "If that is Michael, your gene-cleanser could fix him."

"We already thought of that," said Martha. "As a matter of fact, some men from SHIELD were here this morning, and they suggested the very same thing."

"Really? SHIELD?" said Peter, trying to feign surprise.

"I was… strongly encouraged to give them the formula," said Curtis. "They said it would help their investigation."

"And did you?" asked Gwen.

Curtis nodded. "They're better equipped than we are to track down a dangerous mutant. They have agents, solders… we have, well, just the four of us at the moment."

"I just hope they don't hurt anybody," said Martha.

"Yeah," agreed Peter. "Me too." After an awkward pause, he said, "Well, if there's nothing here for us to do, maybe we should get a move-on…"

"One sec," said Gwen to Peter. "I'll catch up with you; I just want to grab some of my stuff."

• • •

Peter waited outside the lab. Gwen emerged a minute later, shaking her head. "I can't believe it. Bastard broke into my locker!"

"What?" asked Peter.

"My locker was broken open," said Gwen. "And the serum that I made from your blood? It was gone!"

"Then it probably was Michael," said Peter. "Your serum, Miss Whitman's bats… I guess it all kind of fits together. Somehow."

"When I get my hands on Michael, I'm gonna slap a little sense into him," said Gwen.

"Because he did almost the exact same thing you did?" said Peter.

"Yeah, exactly!" said Gwen. "Come on, let's go make me a new costume."

"Hold it," said Peter. "You head on home; I'm gonna go by the Bugle office first. Maybe there, I can get a lead on where Michael might be hiding out."

"All right," said Gwen. "Meet you back at casa de Parker then." She put her woolen ski-mask back on and went web-slinging off in the direction of Queens.

• • •

Ben Urich stood by while J. Jonah Jameson looked at Peter's most recent crop of pictures. These had been taken by his belt-mounted miniature camera during the kerfuffle in Central Park yesterday; as a consequence, most of them were simple shots of Sable, Kraven, and various SHIELD agents standing around. "You want me to pay you for these?" scoffed Jonah. "Not an action pic in the pile! You couldn't get one of the Spider-Monster they were there to hunt?"

Peter shrugged. "I don't think there ever was a monster. Just a bunch of agents and mercenaries, looking around, not doing much. If there had been some action, I would've shot it."

"All right," grumbled Jonah, writing out a payment order. "We can use these with Robbie's editorial about Sam Bullit. 'Candidate Pulls Trigger on Empty Crosshair'… hm, not quite. Have to work on the headline."

Peter glanced back over his shoulder at the ruined office—the wreckage had mostly been cleared away, but a lot of the desks and computers hadn't been replaced yet, and the big gaping hole in the wall was only taped over with big plastic sheets. "Uh… what happened here, anyway? Did a bomb go off?"

"Even better," said Jonah. "I was attacked—by the Hobgoblin!" Before Peter could say anything, Jonah continued, "But my son, the astronaut—a real hero—he was here, and he caught him! You're never going to believe who he was!"

"You unmasked him?!" exclaimed Peter.

Ben cleared his throat. "It was… Ned Leeds."

"I don't believe it," said Peter.

"Frankly, neither do I," said Ben. "That's why I want to talk to him at the hospital, before the cops arrest him."

"I don't see what good that'll do!" said Jonah. "He was in the costume. He was flying on a glider. He crashed through my window! He was clearly after me!"

"But don't you want to know why?" asked Ben.

"It's because he's a nut and a criminal, and he has been all along!" shouted Jonah. "And he was even clever enough to get me to assign him to the Green Goblin story. It must have been a clever plot to steal the tech that the Green Goblin stole from Oscorp and—and—"

"And, what, fly around looking scary, setting off bombs and crashing through windows?" asked Ben. "What kind of sense does that make?!"

"Did you miss the part where he's a nut?" retorted Jonah.

"Um… Ben, do you mind if I tag along?" asked Peter. "I'd like to see how Ned's doing."

"Sure, Peter," said Ben.

Jonah muttered an inarticulate "Feh!" and waved them both out of his office.

• • •

Ned Leeds had been taken to Beth Israel, which was incidentally the same hospital where Miles Warren was still comatose and slowly convalescing. Peter asked after Dr. Warren, implying to Ben Urich and the nurses there that he was concerned for his old boss from the ESU lab; but, of course, he was in truth quite relieved to hear that Warren hadn't awakened from his coma. After all, the Jackal knew that MJ was the Scarlet Spider, which made him an especially dangerous enemy. For the foreseeable future, though, as far as the doctors there could tell, he was out of commission and still showing no signs of awakening.

Leeds was a different story: when Ben and Peter came into his room (which had an NYPD officer outside, standing guard), he was awake—even lucid. "Ben! Peter! You've gotta help me!" he exclaimed when he saw them. "The doctors won't tell me what's going on!"

"Let's start with what you remember," said Ben, pulling a chair up to Ned's bedside and sitting down. "What happened last night?"

"Weird dream," said Ned. "I was flying through the air… and then I hit something. And I woke up here."

"Then… you don't know?" said Peter.

"Know what?" asked Leeds.

"That you were dressed up like the Hobgoblin," said Ben. "You were flying on a goblin-glider, and you crashed into the Bugle office."

Ned stared blankly at Ben for a long moment before he burst out laughing. "That's a joke, right? You're putting me on—"

Ben, still straight-faced, shook his head. "I'm afraid not."

"But that's… that's crazy," said Ned. "I'm not the Hobgoblin! That's not even remotely possible!"

"It's what happened," said Ben. "Look, let's just back up here. What's the last thing you remember before that?"

"Uh… I, uh…" Ned scrunched up his face; he was having difficulty remembering. "I was following up on a lead. I got an anonymous tip to check out a warehouse in the South Bronx. I went there… it was like a damned armory inside. There were weapons everywhere—big racks of bombs and missiles. It was goblin stuff." Ned's eyes went wide when the memory came back to him. "One of the bombs went off! I remember this orange gas, and then… nothing."

"It sounds to me like you got suckered," said Ben.

"Somebody figured out that I was looking into the goblin story…" said Ned.

"And then they knocked you out, put you in the costume, and stuck you on the glider," said Peter. "To mess with us."

Ben nodded. "I think the kid's instincts are spot-on. Someone was screwing with you, Ned."

"A frame job," Ned muttered. "This is nuts…"

"Well for what it's worth, I believe you," said Ben. "Now it's just a matter of convincing Jonah."

"Oh God…" Ned groaned. "Don't tell me…"

"Yep. He was there when you got unmasked," said Ben. "But that's not the worst part."

Ned looked at Ben questioningly.

"You've been missing for over a week. Betty's been freaking out, but Jonah thought you were just skipping out on us."

"Oh crap… I am so fired…" said Ned.

"Nah," said Ben. "I'll talk to Jonah. I'll convince him."

"Do you really think you can?" asked Peter.

"Um… I'll talk to Robbie and Hoffman," Ben amended. "I'll convince them. I'm sure that between us and Betty, we can see to it that Jonah doesn't press charges."

Ned groaned again and slumped back down onto the hospital bed.

• • •

After parting ways from Ben Urich, Peter raced home. He went in through the front door and found, to some small amazement, that Gwen and Aunt May were both there, busily working together at sewing a new black and white Spider-Woman costume. When Peter came inside, May got up and embraced him. "You're all back, safe and sound," she whispered. "I'm so relieved."

"Actually, it was kind of cool," said Pete. "We got to meet some of the X-Men. And Captain America."

"I know," said Aunt May. "Gwen's already told me all about it."

"Cap was nice," said Gwen. "A real class act. Unlike that Nick Fury guy…"

May sat back down on the couch and asked Peter, "Have you spoken with Colonel Fury much?"

"Uh… no, not really," said Peter. "I've only met him twice. Why?"

"Well… what has he told you about your mother?"

"I know that she was a SHIELD agent," said Peter. "But that's pretty much it. I got to talk to Dr. Banner about my dad last night, though. They worked together for a while—"

"—Before you were born," said May with a nod. "That's right; I'd forgotten. I only bring it up because… well, your mother worked under Colonel Fury directly. And—you must not remember this; you were so little—he was the one who brought you here, to me and Ben, after your parents died, nearly twelve years ago now."

"Nick Fury?" said Peter, gaping. "In person!?"

"That's right," said May. "He was a dear friend to Richard and Mary, back in the day—they even asked him to be your godfather. But instead, he brought you here. He knew how much Ben and I loved you."

"Huh," said Peter, falling down into an easy chair. "I never woulda guessed…" After a wistful beat, Peter looked up at May and pointed at the costume she was sewing. "Uncle Ben would've absolutely loved all of this."

May answered with a sad laugh. "I think you're right. He would've gotten such a thrill out of 'Spider-Man'."

After another quiet moment, Gwen held up her new mask. This costume was going to be different from the one that MJ had designed: mostly white on top, with dark gray leggings, and a hood lined with pink web-highlights that would go up over the mask to hide her hair. "Sometimes I wonder if all that destiny BS doesn't have something to it. It seems like you were always close this stuff, Pete."

"Maybe," said Peter. "But it was still dumb luck that I ever got bit by that spider." He pointed at the half-finished costume and said to Aunt May, "I'm surprised to see you helping with this."

"Well, I know you both," answered May. "I know that I can't stop you from running around in long underwear, swinging around and saving lives. So I might as well do what I can to make sure you look nice while you're doing it. Which reminds me, young man, that costume of yours is getting a little ripe. Make sure that you wash it before you go out again."

"Yes, ma'am," said Peter.

A moment later, the oven timer in the kitchen went off. May went bustling off to finish preparing dinner. Peter took over for May, helping to finish sewing up Gwen's new costume. After that, they all sat down to eat; and then they waited for MJ to get home.

• • •

Mary Jane came home a little after six that night. Anna Watson was working another late shift, which meant that MJ was free come right over to the Parkers'. May had saved her some food, knowing full well that Anna kept a busy schedule and couldn't really cook for her niece.

"So," said Mary Jane, once the spider-trio was together again and hanging out in Peter's basement, "what's the plan tonight? I'd like to catch up with Harry, but if there's a vampire flying around eating people—"

"Hence the whole 'power, responsibility' thing," said Peter. "Sometimes this gig sucks. This is one of those times."

"Hey, at least we've got Halloween costumes for tonight," said Gwen, who was now wearing her newly-sewn costume, minus the mask and hood. "If we stop the bad guy early enough, we could still hit a party."

"Maybe," said Pete. "But it might be kind of suspicious, the three of us showing up somewhere dressed like the Spider-Squad."

"Hey, I like the sound of that," said Gwen. "Spider-Squad… not bad."

"It's got a ring," agreed MJ.

"We'll have to run it by Felicia," said Peter. "But anyway… yeah, I think we have to go looking around. Especially if it really is Michael Morbius. We've got to help him, if we can."

"Did you get any leads at the Bugle?" asked Gwen.

"No; sorry," said Peter, "I got a little side-tracked there with some Hobgoblin weirdness… long story."

"Then what do we do?" asked MJ.

Peter and Gwen both fell silent, thinking.

After a moment, Gwen said, "Aha! Webs!"

"Webs?" asked Peter. "How will that solve our problem?"

"Oh; it won't," said Gwen. "I was just thinking of a nickname for myself. You know, 'cuz Spider-Woman's a mouthful, and you can't just call me 'Gwen' while we're out there. Spidey's already taken, since that's you; she's Red; I can be 'Webs'. You know, since I can make my own." She emphasized the point by spinning a little cat's-cradle of organic spider-webbing between her fingers.

"Bad guys already call me 'Web-Head' all the time," said Peter. "That could get kind of confusing."

"I guess I'll come up with something else then," grumbled Gwen. She summoned up some of that bio-electric energy, causing her hands to glow green and burn the webbing away.

MJ laughed and suggested, "How about 'Sparky'?"

Gwen looked at the glowing aura around her hands and corrected her. "How about 'Sparks'?"

"I guess that works," said Peter. "What do you suppose that stuff is, anyway?"

"Some kind of bio-energy," said Gwen. "That's as near as I can figure. Hmm… maybe I ought to test my powers out before we leave. See what I can do."

Peter and MJ agreed, and so they devised a few quick and simple tests to put Gwen through her paces. She was able to arm-wrestle Peter to a standstill, but MJ beat her handily every time—clearly MJ was the most powerful of the three in the strength department. After flicking web-balls at each other from different angles, seeing who could best dodge them, catch them, or avoid them blindfolded, they discovered that Peter was far and away the best with reflexes and spider-sense—while MJ and Gwen tied for a distant second in that area.

"Humph," snorted Gwen, folding her arms after they'd finished. "MJ gets super strength, Peter gets super reflexes, and I get, what, my own webs and a bio-blast light-show?"

"I think it's a little more than that," said Peter. "I've got a theory here. Wanna test it?"

"Okay," said Gwen, "lay it on me, professor."

Peter started pacing back and forth across the room. "Spiders are able to stick to surfaces because of static electricity. When I stick to a wall, I'm actually creating a static field around my hands and feet, or whatever part of myself I want to make sticky. I can control it, to some degree… but Gwen, I think your energy is the same stuff, just… with a current instead of static forces. You can induce a flow of bio-energy by willing yourself to be… uh, super-duper-sticky."

"I'm not sure I follow," said Gwen.

"Well…" said Peter, "try this. Put your hand on the wall and stick it there."

Gwen walked over to the wall and stuck her hand in place. "Okay. Now what?"

"Now… I don't know how this works for you, but if it were me… imagine someone's trying to pull you away from the wall. And you don't want to pull away. So you will yourself to stick there harder. Try to think your hand… stickier."

Gwen faced the wall and narrowed her eyes, focusing all her concentration on her hand. After a moment, her hand started to glow, and the paint and the drywall started to burn and smolder under her palm. She gasped and pulled her hand away; there was a blackened, burned handprint left on the wall.

"Whoa…" said Gwen. "Did I just…?"

"Basically, you just microwaved your handprint onto the wall," said Peter. "I wonder just how much energy you can produce…"

"I wonder what that would do to a person," said MJ with a shudder.

"Well… we can test that too," said Peter. He stood in the middle of the room, spread out both arms, and said, "Zap me."

"Wait, are you crazy?" said MJ. "You could get really hurt!"

"I'm tougher than someone without powers," Peter pointed out, "and I heal pretty fast. We've got to figure this out sometime; I might as well be the guinea-pig."

"If you're sure about this…" said Gwen.

"Not really," said Peter, "but we've got to know what you can do."

"All right…" Gwen summoned up the energy again. Now there was a yellow-green aura around her hand. She stood about five feet away from Peter and pointed her arm at him, palm open. "Fire one…" She released the energy; a green bolt streaked across the room and struck Peter on the chest, knocking him to the floor—and out cold.

"Peter!" gasped Mary Jane. She knelt down next to him and felt for a pulse. He was completely unresponsive; and he wasn't breathing. "Gwen, do something! Peter's not breathing!"

"Do what?!" cried Gwen.

"I don't know… zap him again!"

"What, you mean like a defibrillator? I don't know if I can do that!"

"Just do it before he dies!" snapped MJ.

"All right," said Gwen, making both hands glow. "Clear!" She touched both hands to Peter's chest.

Peter convulsed and gasped. "OW! Holy crap," he cried in a whiny voice, "that was the dumbest thing I've ever done!"

"Well… top five, at least," said MJ, who collapsed onto the floor in relief. She pulled Peter close to her and said, "Come here, Tiger," before kissing him deeply.

Gwen started to feel a little bit uncomfortable. "Um… you guys want me to come back in five minutes, or…?"

MJ broke the kiss and said, "Don't you ever do anything like that ever again!"

"I promise," said Peter. "Scout's honor," he added, holding up a three-fingered salute.

"That's Girl Scouts," said MJ with a giggle. She kissed Peter again.

"Oookay, I'm just gonna… go now…" said Gwen. "I'll be waiting in the kitchen when you guys are ready to… you know… okay then." She scurried upstairs.