Chapter 17: Into the Lion's Den

Slowly, I slipped my key into the lock of my apartment door.

I thought that, perhaps, if I was quiet enough, I would be able to slip into my bedroom undetected. Surely Gwen would be at school by this time - surely I wouldn't have to explain myself to anyone, yet.

I opened the door just a crack and peeked my head inside. When I had deemed the coast clear, I opened the door wider and stepped into the apartment.

"Where have you been?" Peter's voice caused me to jump. I whirled around to face him as he stood from the couch. He crossed his arms over his chest, brows furrowed as he awaited my reply.

"You again." I rolled my eyes then kicked my foot back to shut the door. "Do you ever leave?"

"You always got jokes, don't you?"

"Only for you, tiger." I cooed, forcing a smirk upon my face. I hid behind my femininity; a defense mechanism that normally disarmed men. But not Peter. Not today.

"Gah!- You're so self-centered!" He raised his voice, words thundering with anger. "You know what your problem is, Mary Jane?" He didn't wait for me to answer. "You only think of yourself! It's always Mary Jane's show, never anyone else's! You always have to be the star!" He threw his hands into the air, "You could've been hurt or -"

For a moment, the line between reality and fantasy blurred. As I stood by the front door staring across the room at Peter's stern face, my surroundings liquefied and melted away until all that was left was Peter standing in a dark room; no floors, no walls, nothing but shadows. The living room became as void as the darkest regions of space. I gasped then stumbled back in a panic, pressing my back against the door, a look of terror ripping across my face.

"MJ," Alarm suddenly enveloped his stern facade. When I did not reply, he crossed the darkness in two giant leaps and gently grabbed me by my upper arms. "Hey, hey," He spoke soothingly, gently shaking me, "What's going on? MJ, what's wrong?"

Please not again, please not again. I didn't dare open my eyes, afraid of who I might see when they opened.

"Hey, come on," He continued speaking, his voice more comforting than I could have ever imagined it to be. "Talk to me."

After a moment of silence, I opened my eyes.

It was just Peter there, looking down at me with his bottomless brown eyes. The living room had reappeared and everything was back to normal. Seeing my eyes open, he offered me the smallest of smiles.

Seconds inched on as we stood there, my back still pressed against the front door, his fingertips still gentled pressed into the tender flesh of my arms, neither one choosing to move away from the other. If I hated his guts so much, why did this feel so natural? So comfortable? So... familiar?

When Peter finally spoke, he spoke in that same low, comforting tone. "You smell like a bar."

With renewed vengeance, I shook free of his grip and pushed him away from me. I began to walk across the living room towards my bedroom. As I spoke, I threw my hands into the air with furious emphasis, "Of all the guys in New York, my best friend has to like you! Ugh! Just my-"

BANG-BANG-BANG!

"OPEN UP, MARY JANE! I KNOW YOU'RE IN THERE!"

My blood froze. My stomach lurched so violently that I feared it was going to empty its contents on the hallway floor. Slowly, I turned around.

Peter stood by the door, right where I had left him. He stared at the door then back at me, his brows furrowed again - but this time, furrowed in surprise.

"D-did you hear that?" I asked as my teeth began to chatter.

BANG-BANG-BANG!

'Who is that?' Peter did not speak but rather mouthed the words in my direction. His acknowledgement of the monster behind the door caused my knees to buckle and I nearly fell upon the hardwood floor.

"Please!" I sobbed out, "Please go away!"

How had he found me? I had been so careful - registering my mail with only "Mary Watson" and never my full name, choosing an apartment so far from his rundown townhouse, never coming within a ten-mile radius of his residence. Aunt Anna would never tell him my address - how could this have happened?

"OPEN UP!"

Tears filled my eyes as fear incapacitated me further with each word spoken from Satan's lips. Peter stepped forward and put his hand on the doorknob to open the door. I screamed, reaching towards him, "NO, Peter!"

He ignored my cries and opened the door just wide enough for him to look outside. "Look, buddy, I think you have the wrong address."

"Like Hell I do!" Fueled by whiskey and gin, my father barreled past him and stumbled into the living room... only ten feet from where I stood.

"Dad," I scrambled backwards until my back collided soundly with the wall; the frightened antelope before the hungry lion. Behind my father, Peter faultered - unsure of what to do.

"You BITCH!" My father righted himself from his wobbly stumble then lunged at me, throwing curses as he did. I turned away and cried out, fear reducing me to a mere child.

Before he could grab me, Peter was miraculously in between us. I don't know how he moved so quickly but in a blur, he was there - blocking me from my father's heavy fists.

"MADELINE!" My father bellowed my mother's name as he swung his fists wildly, "YOU HAVE MONEY! DON'T YOU LIE TO ME, WOMAN! GIVE IT TO ME!"

As if he weighed nothing, Peter gripped him by the throat and slammed him onto his back. Stunned, my father laid there, noxious curses still spewing from his lips like sewage. Before he could regain his senses, Peter grabbed a fistful of his shirt and lifted him from the floor. With one final heave, he tossed him out the front door then locked the door behind him.

Defeated, my back slid down the wall until I was seated upon the floor. So many emotions - fear, embarrassment, confusion - and I hadn't a clue which one to feel.

Peter walked to me, stopping to pick up a magazine my father had been clutching as he attempted his attack. I looked at the cover just as Peter was about to pick it up -

"Harry Osborne's New Leading Lady"

A blown up black and white photo of Harry and I locked in a kiss was pasted across the cover of the tabloid.

Seeing the cover, Peter recoiled from it as though it had just burnt his fingertips. His face hardened then softened to a faint look of defeat. He drew his hand back from the glossy magazine and stood upright.

"Mary Jane-" He whispered my name but I raised my hand to silence him.

"Don't." I shook my head, voice quivering, unshed tears bloating the bottom of my lashes. I dropped my hand and slowly drew myself onto my feet. "Not a word, Peter."

I pulled myself back together as best I could and with the little dignity I had left, I shuffled into my bedroom and gently closed the door behind me.

Omniscient Narrator

Via the fire escape, Mary Jane crawled onto the rooftop and laid upon the frozen asphalt roof staring into the cloudless grey sky. She cried for hours. She cried until her eyes were on the verge of swelling shut. She cried until the sun began to move across the sky, hiding behind the tips of the tall city skyscrapers and then, finally fell asleep. Curled up on the rooftop, she didn't care that it had begun to snow. The snowflakes kissed her porcelain skin, sticking together until a thin layer of snow covered her shivering body. She dreamt of her father, his wicked face looming over her as he screamed his curses. For the first time, she didn't try to wake herself up - rather, she let his curses rain upon her downtrodden body, so weak and defeated.

Who was Mary Jane becoming? Defeat had never been a word in her vocabulary and yet, here she laid: a heart fill of self-pity, the definition of defeat.

She slumbered on, her body trembling with a mixture of cold and fear.

As the sun dipped lower, Spider-Man began his nightly run through the city. Per his usual schedule, he began at Gwen and Mary Jane's block. From there, he would sweep westward, spidey-sense acutely aware of any type of wrong-doings being committed so that he may stop them. This night, however, was slightly different. Things had transpired in his personal life, the life outside of the mask, that had given him reason to be particularly cautious.

Passing by the apartment building, he felt the slightest tingling of his spidey-sense. Sure enough, as he arched through the sky, he noticed Mary Jane's body upon the rooftop of their building.

For a moment, he stood over her. In a matter of just a year, Mary Jane's vivacious fire had slowly begun to extinguish. Spider-Man kneeled down beside her slumbering body and gently brushed a snowflake from her crimson locks.

He let his hand linger in her hair.

'I promised I would protect you but instead,' Bitter thoughts filled his mind, 'I've led you straight into the lion's den.'

His thoughts drifted to Harry Osborne. There was so much to the Osborne family - and while Peter still considered Harry his best friend - he wanted Mary Jane as far away from that family as possible. Harry's father, Norman, was becoming more unstable with each passing day and Peter feared a massive implosion.

His thoughts continued to drift. He began to think of Mary Jane's father and for the second time today, his heart broke for her.

"Let's get you inside." Gently, he scooped her up into his arms and cradled her against his chest, holding her body easily to him. He didn't look down at her. Instead, he looked off into the fading sunset as his anger mounted. How long had the abuse lasted? When had it started? When had Mary Jane escaped? What about her mother? Did she have siblings?

"Spider-Man?" Mary Jane spoke weakly, the throes of slumber weighing heavily upon her.

He didn't flinch in surprise when she spoke. He continued to stare into the distance and when he spoke, he spoke through clenched teeth, his words hardly a hiss above the wind that whipped past us.

"I would have killed him. I was so close to it-... to wringing his scrawny neck for hurting you."

Gently, he lowered her so that she was standing beside him. His words brought her mind immediately back to The Kingpin.

"The Kingpin." She breathed the name, oddly relieved to discover that the Kingpin hadn't been one of her living nightmares. "Where do you think he is?"

Spider-Man turned away from the sunset and gripped her shoulders. "Move away from here, Mary Jane. You have nothing here."

She visibly cringed at his callous words. "But my friends. Aunt Anna... New York is all I really know. I can't leave here."

"Listen to me, the things you've witnessed - they're only the beginning of things to come." He was beginning to frighten her but he continued on in hopes that she would feel the magnitude of his words. "The Kingpin is the least of your worries. You need to get out of New York as quickly as you can."

He began to think of Norman Osborne at their last meeting within the OsCorp lab... the way he spoke like a man with nothing to live for. Lunacy driving his passion for creating a "tool" for the United States' army... a tool that would "end all wars." ...a tool powered by a formula with the power to alter any human who consumed it... for better, or worse.

Mary Jane stepped away from him and with her words, pulled him from the darkest corners of his thoughts. "Tell me what's going on, Spider-Man."

For a long moment, he said nothing. He simply stared at her, frozen in place.

She tried again, "Please tell me."

"... I can't." He sighed heavily, "Not yet, at least. But please, believe me when I say the worst is yet to come."

Author's Note:I'm currently running on 3 hours of sleep (school will be the death of me.) Please critique hard, guys! Was this too quick? Did I put too much action into this chapter? Did it seem "forced"? I'm so tired that I can't even tell anymore! haha so please, do me a favor and nitpick. I love you guys so much!

Firework's Feelings, , The Perfect Secrets, Truboss, IntelligentFish, Kam I Am, Nomad, SpideyBoy: you guys ROCK. I can't even begin to tell you how thankful I am for you guys for sticking around and reading my silly little story. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Alright. I'm delirious. It's time for bed. :)