[GROWING PAINS] ARC

Chapter 5:

Working on Spider Deficiencies

Last night, you found a bagged up computer hard drive and a bag that said it was property of your father, Richard Parker, in a concealed area of your basement. Seemed like the thing hadn't been touched for years, probably left there by your father before the accident.

Stunned by the sight of it, you grabbed them along with a general chemistry book and moved up to your room, closing the compartment behind you and making sure things were left like you came in before you moved up to your room, making sure your windows blinds were shut and your door was locked.

You tried to open the bag, only to see that there was a lock on it. While you could have forced it open, it might have caused enough noise to wake your Aunt and Uncle. So you sat there and stared, wondering what your father could have put in these things to cause him to hide them away in a secret compartment…

Not to mention, meeting with Eddie Brock. The newspaper you bought the other day sits on your table with the article on the Black Cat and J Jonah Jameson's talk of a reward on top, the author's name, after giving it a look is certainly Eddie Brock, which brought you back to remembering what you had heard that morning.

And, of course, there's always that matter of Smythe hanging over your head, like Damocles' sword.

Needless to say, you didn't sleep much that night.

Your alarm blares in the morning as you blearily wake up. You glance over towards your closet, where the bag and hard drive have been hidden.

There's many things adding up, this is just one more. You're exhausted, but you could possibly go to school.

You drag yourself out of bed and get ready for the day. You look back over at your closet. Honestly, its probably better to put them back where they were, but there's no way you can do it right now. Its best to leave them there, for now. You slip the newspaper back into your backpack.

You go down the stairs and grab a quick breakfast, Aunt May giving you an amused look. "Up late reading again, Peter?"

You give her a weak grin and nod. She shakes her head. "Well, best hurry on your way. Don't want to be late."

You give her a kiss on the cheek farewell before heading out the door.

You think about trying to run and meet up with Gwen, but you're just too tired. Yawning, you walk to the bus stop and wait. The skies are overcast overhead as you sit on the bench nearby and wait.

You look over at the newspaper stand and see another article on the Black Cat. Seems like he plans to strike in a week, according to the title.

Shrugging, you get up and board the bus, approaching your usual seat and sitting. Next to you Harry quietly whistles.

"Burning the midnight oil again, Pete?"

You nod before leaning your head back against the seat and doze off. Harry, ever the constant friend, lets you get a few more minutes of sleep in.

Your classes begin and you sit through them, keeping yourself conscious through sheer force of will. The day seems to blur past you and before you know it, the day's done.

Packing up your bags, you close your locker and decide on what to do. Tonight isn't a scheduled tutoring day.

You go to the school phone, only to see it used. You wait until the people ahead of you finish up before you approach the phone and dial Gwen's number. The phone rings a few times and you think she's not answering before, finally, she picks up, her tone annoyed.

"What is it?"

"Hey, Gwen, its Peter. I'm calling from school."

When she responds, her tone is friendlier. "Oh? Sorry about that Peter. I forgot you don't have a cell phone. I've been dealing with a lot of prank calls lately, especially from this number. What's up?"

Your eyebrows furrow in concern. "Prank calls? What's this about someone prank calling you?"

Gwen's tone is dry but amused. "You sound like my father, Peter. Yeah, someone's been prank calling my phone for the past few days. I expect I know why, but it isn't any big deal."

She tries to brush it off, but you can tell it does bother her. You decide to change topics.

"So, did you want to do anything this afternoon?"

You keep your tone as light as you can but it's obvious why you'd be asking to the two of you. "I can't tonight. My father's got the night off for once so we're spending it together. How's tomorrow?"

"Uh, yeah. Sure. See you tomorrow."

"Bye, Peter. See you tomorrow."

You hear her hang up before you hang up the phone as well.

You decide to go home. You're tired and it would probably be best to work on a lesson plan for Felix so that you're more prepared. Not to mention, you can investigate whatever's in that bag.

Yawning, you walk away from the phone and head on home.

It doesn't take long to walk home as you walk up to your house. The door's locked, so you use your key to unlock it and head inside. "I'm home!"

You look around, but see another note pinned to the bulletin board. Seems like Aunt May and Uncle Ben will be at your neighbor's again. Which is good. At least you'll be to have some privacy.

You go up to your room and lock the door behind you, checking your closet, but the bag and hard drive are where you last left them.

You grab your books, the hard drive, and your bag and take them downstairs to the basement. You set them on the desk next to the computer and start it up. Logging into your email, you see a few replies, all with the same theme 'thank you for your application, but you are not what we're looking for a this time.'

Closing out your email, you bring up a word document and begin working on a lesson plan for Felix.

You take your time and begin writing up a lesson plan. Even though this is your first time doing this, it seems pretty easy. But maybe that's because you seemed to have gotten a good amount of insight into Felix's ways of learning from looking at his notes.

So, naturally, you make a great lesson plan, in your opinion, to help take care of those problems. It takes you an hour or two before you feel satisfied with your results. You save the lesson plans to the computer and a flash drive, as well as print them out. These will be useful in the future.

When you're done with that, you grab something to eat, heating up a can of soup and making yourself a sandwich. You turn on the TV as you cook and eat. Seems like Reed Richard's mission has met with some minor problems according to a message they've received. Seems like they're coming back early in the next few days.

Turning off the TV, you wash up the dishes you dirtied and head back downstairs. You take a chair and go to one of the open tables with the bag. There's a lock on it.

You search the room from top to bottom, even using your spider powers to help, even double-checking the secret compartment. There's no key that you can see. Its taken you a while to look over the place, but there's nothing there.

You sit down in the computer chair and let out a sigh. Looking over at an old picture frame with a photo of you and your parents when you were young, you pick it up. "Dad… where did you put the key? Where would you hide it?"

You look at the picture before staring at it more closely, hearing something as you slightly shake it. More specifically, you start staring at the thickness of the frame. It's to thin for that glass, so where did that sound come from? The photo didn't move, so what did?

Turning it over, you open it op and look at the thick backing of it. Using your spider powers on an odd part of the inner lining of the case, you pull it free. Inside, you see a key and a note. Opening it, you see your father's handwriting.

-"Just in case anything happens, Peter."-

You stare at it and bite your lip before taking the key and closing up the frame again. Taking the key, you unlock the lock and open the bag. Inside, there seems to be some sort of trap that was there if it was broken.

Inside seems to be different things your father worked on. Notes, blueprints, formulas. These things… why were they hidden away?

You figure out the basics of some things, mainly those related to chemistry and engineering. The higher level physics stuff you don't have too much experience with, after all. Though you do recognize what's clearly a replica of the blueprints of Tony Stark's giant Arc Reactor in California. You roll that back up. That's a keeper.

But there's some chemistry, and some bio-chemistry but that's also out of your range, too.

There's simpler stuff, but the two that catch your eye seems to be the sheer-thinning liquid adhesive and the object designed to go along with it to disperse it. According to the notes for it, it seems like your father had plans for an invention for police officers to more safely restrain criminals. Furthermore, due to its nontoxic nature, it could be temporarily used to do stuff like clot wounds.

The most important part that caught your interest? You could /understand/ the formula. It isn't even that hard to make! Looking through the things here, a lot of it is too high level for you to get yet, but this- this does have potential…

You spot a paper that's had some of it ripped off. You line up the fragment from the photo to it.

A perfect match.

-"This is everything we've worked on. None of it is patented. Like I'd want that slime ball getting his hands on anything we've worked on. This message is left to you just in case anything happens, Peter. Don't ever trust Norman Osborn. Everything Carl and I worked on, I leave to you, my son. Be safe. Be happy.

Your mother and I will always be proud of you.

-Richard Parker"-

You stare at the paper before looking back at everything on the table.

You stare at the papers as your teeth grit. There's an implication here- an implication that makes something deep in your chest twist into something foul.

Norman Osborn.

CEO of Oscorp- who is in charge of Alistair Smythe. Who was after what you father and Carl -Carl Brock no doubt, were working on.

You want to go to Norman Osborn's house and throttle the man, make him hurt until he tells you what you want him to, until he gives you the answers you desire.

But, instantly, your temper chills. No, your parents, Aunt and Uncle taught you better than that. Raised you better. Not to mention, you couldn't do that to Harry. And you'd ruin your own future. There's nothing Peter Parker can do here.

You turn off the computer and turn off anything that could allow it to transmit wirelessly before removing the hard drive and hooking up the old one. You take your time and are very thorough, just to be sure. Turning on the computer, the screen boots up to one word and an entry prompt.

-Password?-

You tiredly rub at your eyes before powering off the computer and returning it to normal. Considering that it might be trapped, this can be done another time. Especially if it holds something important.

You don't want to risk messing it up.

You repackage the hard drive in the bag it was in before looking over at the notes, especially the ones about the adhesive and its applicator. Honestly, if you went and picked up a few things, you might be able to make it.

But should you?

Yes, might as well work on something to clear your head.

You put away the rest of the notes and hard drive- storing them for later in the compartment. You put the key back in its hiding place.

But this? You need to work on this. A link between your father and you?

Putting them away, hidden beneath a box, you head out of the basement. Nobody's home, probably won't be for a while. It's a little after six-thirty, so you have time to make a quick run to a store or two. And, though you hate dipping into it, you have some money to spend that you've been saving up, originally, for a car one day.

But this is worth it.

You put on a hat and light jacket- the air's a bit cooler out now.

You make your way to where you normally get metal for whatever you try building. There's a shop you frequent, run by a nice old man. As you walk in, he gives you a grin. "Ah, Peter! Here to make something to change the world again?"

You give him a tired grin. "Yeah. I'm working on something and I need more materials to work with."

Listing what you need, you pay for it and the man nods before going into the back. Twenty minutes later, he comes back with what you ordered. "Alright, here you are. So, what are you working on this time? A robot again?"

You shrug. "Something like that."

Taking the metal, you lift it, sure to show that it takes a little effort, and make your way back home, taking the parts down into the basement. Setting them on a workbench near the metal-working tools down there, you double-check the things you need. For the adhesive.

You finish marking the metal and then go to cutting and working the metal into the right shapes. Like Uncle Ben always said, though, Measure twice, cut once. You carefully do the work and when you're finished cutting and making the pieces, especially the delicate nozzle, you set them to the side.

Taking a momentary break, you stretch and take a break before getting back to work.

Time seems to fly and before you know it, you have two adhesive applicators in front of you, with the number of cartridges you need for it to work. The assembly was a bit tricky, but you figured it out easily enough.

You double-check everything before you put them on. Giving the mechanics a quick test, you smile as they respond perfectly.

Taking them off, you set them to the side and begin cleaning up. When you're finished, you look at the time. Though you finished the metalworking much earlier, assembly and cleanup took you longer than you thought.

It's currently two in the morning.

You take the applicators and the blueprints and put them into a bag in the secret compartment.

Following that, you pack up everything and try to get some sleep.

Tomorrow's going to be a busy day.

END

TO BE CONTINUED...

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