Spider-Man: Year One- A Spider-Man Fanfiction
Summary: Lonely sophomore Peter Parker was the most gifted student at Midtown High, until one day when a bite from a genetically modified spider turned him into something else. Now, he's just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man. Follow his journey. Rated Teen.
Disclaimer: I do not own Spider-Man
Chapter Sixteen
"What time will your aunt be home?" Liz asked, a playful smile etched across her face.
The two were currently sitting in Peter's bedroom, right after school, as they had done for the last few days since they entered their relationship. So far, they had not gone any farther than a few chaste kisses, in large part due to Peter's incredibly limited experience and Liz not wanting this to be all about physical activities. She had no problems with the physical activities, nor should she, but there was a chance for something deeper with Peter that she wanted to explore.
Peter, on the other hand, found himself in the rare scenario with Liz where his book smarts wouldn't provide the answer she was looking for.
"Um... I don't know. She usually gets home around five or so. So, we maybe have an hour," Peter replied in an uncertain manner. In truth, Aunt May's return from work was often at the mercy of the day's traffic. But Peter had grown accustomed to that. That was hardly the reason he felt so uncomfortable.
Liz was staring at him in an almost predatory manner and he, at least to himself, admitted he liked it. It was nice being the object of affection for a girl who very well take his breath away. It made him feel good about himself in a way that was uncommon for him to experience. He wasn't Eddie Brock. Girls didn't often show interest in him outside of needing help on their homework. And even then, it was always with the stipulation that they would only be friends, maybe. To finally have a girl look at him the way Liz was looking at him now made him feel empowered in a different way than being Spider-Man. It made him feel special.
The, admittedly, fantastic opening riff for "No Matter What" by Badfinger was the only sound in the room for a brief minute. And while it was a love song of sorts, Peter realized that it wasn't the type of song he needed for this sort of mood. If he was being honest, he never expected this sort of mood to be one he would ever notice. At least not while he was in high school. He and Harry had long speculated about the kind of girls they would meet in college. The kind of girls who would appreciate Peter for his brains or Harry for his... well, Harry was working on a defining characteristic. But that was all wish fulfillment stuff. The kind of daydreams teen boys have when they bullshit together to seem more experienced than they actually are.
But right now, Peter found himself in a situation where mood music would be appropriate and he was at a loss. Maybe he should have talked to Eddie before Liz started to come over every day. Though Eddie usually had something almost witty to say about Peter and his girl problems, when Peter needed help the older teen was always there. And, now more than ever, Peter needed help.
"Shit Parker," Peter thought with an inward groan. "Liz is gonna expect some kind of clever line or turn of phrase. But I honestly got nothing. Great time for my mouth to go on vacation."
"I like this song, Petey," Liz said with a smile. She got up from the bed and danced around the room to the music, throwing a smirk over her shoulder in his direction. Then, without warning, she started jumping around the room to the beat of the song, giggling all the while.
"Come on, Petey, I can feel how tense you are from over here. You need to loosen up. Tell me what's wrong with you."
Peter looked up and gave her a weak smile. "You're right. It's just... wow, this is going to sound lame. But... it's just... I don't know what I'm doing, okay? In any of this."
He blurted the last part out as quickly as he could, stumbling and red-faced all the while.
"Dammit, you're supposed to be a superhero."
"Is that all?"
"What?"
"I'm not expecting you to be a genius at everything, Peter. I'm not expecting anything, really."
"What do you mean?"
"Relationships take work and effort. They're hard. And this one is brand new. Your first girlfriend is always going to be challenging," Liz said in a mock sage voice, before smiling at Peter again.
Now it was Peter's turn to raise an eyebrow. "And how do you know you're my first girlfriend? I'll have you know plenty of women comment on how much of a catch I am. My aunt, in particular, tells me I'm really special."
Liz laughed. "See, there's that humor that got me hooked. But, seriously, Petey how many girls at school even talk to you other than me?"
"I don't know... Mary Jane, I guess," Peter replied with a dismissive wave of his hand.
The smile on Liz's face died instantly.
"Did I say something wrong?" Peter asked, honestly confused at the murderous glare he was receiving. Just a minute ago they were joking around.
"Why don't you ask Mary Jane?" Liz responded with a huff.
Then it clicked for Peter. She was jealous of Mary Jane. He had two options in front of him. He could either continue to play off her jealousy or tell her there was nothing going on between him and Mary Jane. He knew what the cool guys would do. He knew what Flash would do. He wasn't going to do that.
"There's nothing between me and Mary Jane, Liz. We're just friends."
"Friends with the prettiest girl in the history of high school. Yeah, right."
Peter got up from the bed and approached his girlfriend. "I promise, just friends. Is she pretty, sure, I'd be lying if I said otherwise. But, we wouldn't work as a couple. We're just not in sync like that. And, there's one more thing."
Liz looked at him with slightly dubious eyes. "What's that?"
"I fell for you."
"What?"
"I don't have feelings for Mary Jane, because I have feelings for you, Liz. Only you."
She smiled at him. "Good line, Petey. Are you sure you haven't done this before?"
"It wasn't a line. I have feelings for you, Liz. It's impossible for me to even think about her like that."
He pulled her into a hug and a chaste kiss which she returned. "I guess you were right, Liz."
"About?"
"Relationships take work on both ends."
…
The day day at school, after dropping Peter off at his Honors English class, Liz approached her own locker. She had Bio this period. And, she had to admit, her grades had improved to the point where she was hoping to more up into Honors Chem next year, instead of just regular Chemistry. She knew the work would be harder, but she had begun to like studying science. Or, rather, she liked studying science with Peter.
The other problem with the regular academic class was approaching in the form of her best friend, Sally, and her boyfriend, Rand. Following behind, with an arrogant smirk as always, was Flash.
Since her decision to date Peter, Liz had barely spoken to the "popular crowd". In fact, she had spent more time around the likes of Harry Osborn than she did around her friends. While she still talked to Glory and Rand, when he was alone, she hadn't said more than passing words to Sally during cheer leading. It was painfully obvious to all who knew about the situation( read: the entire school) that the two girls were avoiding each other. It was also painfully obvious that Sally felt Liz dating Peter should have been enough to remove her from the cheer captaincy next year, despite Felicia and the coach's refusal to change their minds.
But as Liz watched the group approach, she could tell the other girl was looking for a fight. Liz had known Sally long enough to get a pretty accurate read on her body language. And the spark in her eye screamed out that she was itching to fight Liz.
For the last few days, Sally had been increasingly hostile towards Liz whenever she saw her. It started small. Taunts and jokes. Liz had decided to take the high road and not respond to the girl. However, that only seemed to encourage Sally to do more.
Although Liz participated in the bullying process up until recently, she was never the major instigator. It was always Sally. But, she had been involved enough to know the signs. The arrogant swagger. The look of restrained glee. They were both their in abundance. Sally was going to make some passive-aggressive, or just plain aggressive, comment and expect that Liz would act like any of the unpopular kids at school. But Liz wasn't one of those kids. And it was high time that Sally remembered her place.
The three students, Rand looking thoroughly uncomfortable, approached and Sally began as Liz thought she would.
"Hey, Liz," Sally sneered. "How is it slumming it with the nerd squad?"
Predictably, Flash chuckled behind the girl and Sally grinned.
"Stay calm. Don't even acknowledge her. Talk to Rand, that will do more damage than responding to Sally."
"Hey Rand," Liz began. "How is it slumming it with the short bus?"
The statement drew a lot of laughs from the students that had been watching the scene unfold. And though it was wrong to go there, and Liz felt remarkably guilty for saying it, she wanted this over soon. She needed Sally to crack and get angry first.
"What did you say?!" Sally shrieked.
Mission successful.
"I asked Rand how it felt to date someone as slow as you," Liz responded in a bored tone. "Or do I need to use smaller words next time?"
"Listen, here, you..." Sally began.
"That's enough," Rand out in, holding out his arm to stop Sally from approaching Liz further. "Let's just go to class. We don't want detention for causing a scene, do we?"
Sally allowed her boyfriends to pull her away, but not before sending Liz a withering glare. Flash stopped for a second and turned to Liz, looking like he was going to say something as well. The emotions played across his face, and for a second Liz thought she saw sorrow stretched across his features. Liz wanted, watching for whatever he did, before Flash set his mouth in a grim line and walked into class.
The rest of the crowd left as well, seeing as a cat fight was not going to break out in the hall. The moment she was alone, Liz sunk against her locker and sighed.
…
In his readings of Sun Tzu, Shocker had taken one truth to heart more than others. The best way to defeat an enemy was provided by that enemy themselves. He would never confront Spider-Man without an understanding of the man beforehand. That was the biggest mistake that fool Mysterio had made. He made his move too soon. He had called Spider-Man out, believing himself to be the superior combatant. Another mistake Sun Tzu would have frowned upon. One should never consider themselves the better fighter unless it was a known fact to both combatants. Arrogance is the single biggest cause for mistakes. Shocker himself had taken out numerous people with superior fighting abilities by playing on their arrogance.
Mysterio also seemed to lack a plan in the beginning. He stood in the middle of street and preformed parlor tricks to get Spider-Man's attention. He didn't have a trap set-up. There were no hostages. Nothing to take Spider-Man's focus away from the fight. Another mistake.
His fight at Oscorp was slightly better. Holding Osborn hostage was a good move. But, from what Shocker read, Mysterio never capitalized on having a hostage. The hostage was never in any danger, other than being in the periphery of a fight between two super powered individuals.
Shocker wouldn't make the same mistakes Mysterio made.
He had planned the perfect bank heist. Some local small timers, no one of importance. A bank out of the way. Perfect for attracting the attention of Spider-Man.
This was phase one of his plan. Analyze Spider-Man's fighting patterns and movements. YouTube videos could only get him so far. He needed a personal view of the subject he was hunting.
He contacted the criminals through an alias. One of many disposable aliases he had. No reason to burn something he could use later. They would never know they would never know they were working for the Shocker. And, hopefully, he would keep his clean, real name out of the grime for a while. He needed to look into how the Kingpin had discovered his identity. It wasn't good to have that information out in the open.
After contacting the criminals, he had offered them $50,000 to rob the bank straight up. If they succeeded, they would get half of whatever they managed to rob. The $50,000 was easy enough to part with. No big loss on his end. And, he didn't expect them to succeed, so it wasn't like he was taking a loss on that end either. No, he banked, pun intended, on these guys believing he was a first time planner. The criminals who accepted the job believed they were smart. The best kind of marks, if you asked him. Arrogance and stupidity were a wonderful combination.
He settled on two criminals to contact. Just enough information to understand Spider-Man's fighting style and abilities. Not a big enough crew for anyone to get suspicious.
Over the phone, and a voice changer of his design that modded his voice only slightly, he gave them a time, noon, and a place to drop his half of the money when they completed the job. He expected them to try and stiff him when the time came. It didn't matter. They weren't going to succeed anyway.
On the day of the bank job, he dressed in an overcoat, tan, and a decent suit and went to the deli across the street from the bank. Ordering himself a nice Reuben on rye and a Coke, he waited and watched over the top of the newspaper he pretended to read. Unless someone was particularly scrutinizing his personal details, they would never know how intently he was watching the bank. And why would they analyze him? He looked like any other middle-aged man on his lunch break from wherever he worked in middle management. The further benefit of scheduling the heist for noon.
At exactly noon, Shocker smiled. Across the street, he could hear the bank alarms going off and the panic from the other patrons in the deli rang in his ears. To protect his interests, he feigned panic along with everyone else and rushed to the window of the deli to see what was happening. He loved it when the bystanders made his job easier. Now, all he needed to do was wait for Spider-Man to show up.
But he never did.
Despite the commotion, and the eventual police chase, Spider-Man never showed up to foil this robbery. He doubled back to the meeting place he had proposed to the criminals and, as expected, found none of the loot left for him. Typical.
But that hardly mattered now. It was a calculated risk that he was willing to take and the fifty grand hit he took was nothing in the grand scheme of things.
There was something else that needed his attention.
Why didn't Spider-Man show up? Was he busy? Or did he not know about the heist? Or did he simply not care?
But then a thought struck Shocker so simple that he almost smacked himself. Spider-Man had some sort of job, or engagement, that kept him busy at noon. Too busy to notice something going on in the city.
This left him with one viable course of action. Part one: Plan a new job that takes place during the evening. And this time, he could fight Spider-Man by himself. If he killed the hero, good, but that wasn't necessary. Worst case scenario, he learns something that can be useful for when he actually means to kill the hero at Oscorp.
He should have known better. When one wanted recon done right, they did it themselves. Shocker wasn't going to make that mistake again.
End of Chapter Sixteen
A/N: Sorry it's been a long time everyone. And sorry for the shorter chapter. This was very much just needing to set up the night few chapters and the conclusion to the story. I hope everyone enjoyed it though.
Herman Schultz/ Shocker
Age: 45
Hair Color: Brown
Eye Color: Brown
I.Q.: 145
Schultz was born in East Germany and lifted the typical peasant farmer life until his parents were able to smuggle him to America to study. After their deaths, he turned to crime as a way to support himself.
Schultz is a shrewd and clever man, one who believes that in order to win, you must be the most educated person in the fight. Power is fine, but power alone cannot beat planning. Since he left his prime, Schultz has made up for his declining physical abilities by studying marital arts and tactics. If one is not the most powerful, one must be the best prepared.
Above all else, Schultz is a professional. He cares nothing for the thrill of the fight, only for the paycheck he can receive. He won't take a risk unless he can benefit from it directly and would prefer others get their hands dirty before he does.
Since creating his gauntlets, Schultz now has the power to back up his tactical mind and maybe one of the most dangerous criminals in New York.