Gwen sat in her lab staring blankly at one of the walls. She was waiting for fabrications to complete on several components of her latest project. Lately she felt lost. Today especially, it was precisely one month ago her Uncle Ben had been killed. He had always been her moral compass. When she wasn't sure what to do, she'd ask herself, what would Uncle Ben do? Her lab door opened. She didn't look at it. If it was someone who meant harm, her spider sense would have warned her. She found she didn't have the energy to care. She saw a sandwich appear in front of her on her desk. Happy spoke.

"Peanut butter and jelly."

Gwen finally looked up at him. He pulled up a chair and sat across from her and pulled his own sandwich out of his baggie. He took a bite and swallowed.

"Not going to have any?"

Gwen looked down at the sandwich and sighed. She pulled half out and took a bite. Happy finished the half he was working on.

"So, who are you planning on blowing up?"

Gwen was chewing on a bite of her sandwich she paused mid-bite then finished chewing and swallowed.

"What?"

Happy started pulling the other half of his sandwich out of his bag.

"You pulled the schematics for the RTS-78 tracking-guidance module and the ROM for it. It's from the Jericho missile. I was just wondering who you were planning on blowing up with a precision guided micro-warhead. So, who made fun of you at school this week?"

Gwen smiled and shook her head. Happy had been trying to cheer her up for the entire month.

"How do you even know what that is?"

"It's the Crown Jewel of Stark Industries Freedom line of munitions…"

"Did you read the brochure on the way over here after you got the alert message someone accessed secure data on a restricted weapon?"

Happy took a bite of his sandwich, blinked innocently and shook his head in the negative.

"It's not for a bomb or missile. And the tracking-guidance system isn't restricted. Just the repulser technology is, and I didn't look at that. I could have. I have access, but I didn't. I needed a template to design a smaller version of the RTS-78."

She reached into one of her desk drawers and pulled out a plastic case. Affixed to black foam was a four-legged robot. It was the size of her palm. Happy looked at it, turning the case every which way. He nodded.

"Cool, yea. Amazing!"

Gwen raised a blonde eyebrow.

"You have no idea what it is, do you?"

Happy shook his head. Gwen sighed and spoke.

"It's a tracking device that will crawl and find a dark place to hide in. The RTS-78 doesn't use GPS so it is extremely precise. So, with that instead of knowing a target is in a parking lot, you would know they are sitting in the backseat of a car and leaning forward if it was say, in their ear."

Happy put the case down.

"Looks a little big to fit in someone's ear. Probably pretty easy to find if you ask me."

Gwen shook her head.

"That's with the full sized RTS-78 guidance-tracking system in it."

She pointed at her screen.

"That is what I'm printing right now."

Happy walked around her desk and leaned down. Her new device was smaller than one of her fingernails and would easily get lost in someone's hair.

"That is… wow. Did Mr. Stane approve this?"

Gwen nodded.

"Of course he did. He was going on about how it was a revolution in drone warfare. Guided bullets."

She sighed. She had other plans for the trackers but if she wanted to keep working at Stark Industries, she needed to keep Obadiah happy, and he wanted weapons.

"Next generation will have wings I think, maybe they'll look like actual bugs… I don't know. Whatever."

Gwen pulled the other half of the sandwich out and started eating it. Happy sat back down across from her.

"If you don't mind me saying, you don't seem happy about it."

Gwen had gotten distracted again and glanced up at Happy.

"Huh?"

He shook his head.

"Nothing, just crazy old man talk."

The pair sat in silence for a few minutes then the song I'm too sexy started playing. It was obviously coming from Happy's pocket. Gwen looked at him. After fifteen seconds of him blushing.

"That's me, I should get that."

He walked away from Gwen and had a hushed conversation. He looked like he was in a daze when he hung up the phone. He looked at Gwen.

"That was Tony. He's alive."

Gwen's eyes went wide.

"He is? Oh wow. That's amazing news."

Happy was still in shock he wasn't really paying attention to Gwen. Eventually he looked at her.

"I need to go, he wants me to meet him… Have a good week."

Gwen nodded. Happy left the lab. Gwen sighed and went back to her schematics. She had produced twenty of the trackers she'd demonstrated for Obadiah. Four-legged variety. They were printing right now and would be ready for assembly in a few minutes.

The next set was for her personal stock, an eight-legged variety that were on a different wavelength, and their shell was pink metal. No more having criminals get in their car and escaping her because they went somewhere she couldn't swing from buildings. She had the tracker built already and integrated into her goggle control system.

The fabrication finished and she pulled the trays of product out. Assembling them was painstaking work. She wasn't looking forward to the fifty she was building for herself. She managed to finish them by three-thirty. She finished at four, so she put them in a secure case pinning them on antistatic foam before heading to the main office.

Gwen was half-expecting Obadiah to be gone, he wasn't. His door was open, he was on his speaker phone and pacing with his arms crossed. He was discussing the logistics of getting Tony back to the US. The call was over a short time later and he looked up at her.

"Gwen, come in."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. I was just hoping to get you these before I left for the week."

He motioned to the secure case. It held all twenty tracking devices and the monitor for the trackers. He opened it and looked them over.

"No, you can interrupt me. You're one of our best. These are works of art. Well done. Well done."

He picked up one of the trackers and held it on one of his fingertips.

"You fit a Jericho missile guidance system in this?"

Gwen thought, well in the most basic sense… as usual with Obadiah she went with the simplest possible answer.

"Yes."

He shook his head.

"When you came to me with this idea three weeks ago, I went to our lead research team. I asked them how feasible manufacturing would be. You know what they told me? That it's impossible to get it this small. What is the range on these?"

Gwen did the math in her head quickly.

"Three miles at the outside maximum without an external boost. They'll connect to any open wifi or Bluetooth in their vicinity and call home. Wherever that is designated. So, if they have access to the internet, anywhere on the planet."

He smiled.

"Good job. Enjoy your bonus. See you next week."

Gwen nodded.

"Have a good week, Obadiah."

He nodded and, as he usually did to celebrate, he pulled out a cigar and started smoking it as he looked at the trackers. Gwen made her way out of the office and headed downstairs. Toby was waiting for her already. She got home and was surprised to see her father there watching television. She dropped her backpack by the door.

"Dad, shouldn't you be at work?"

Her father looked at her.

"Task force is on tonight so had to change shifts."

Gwen leaned against their breakfast bar.

"How is the hunt for Spider-Woman going?"

Her father shifted and grunted. The police were getting quite frustrated with her. Gwen hadn't been making it easy on them. Also, the public weren't interested in helping the police. For some reason the attempted murder of a well-known violent criminal that the police were doing nothing about didn't really garner public sympathy.

"It's like she knows what we're planning ahead of time. There is a leak. So now we're tightening things up."

Gwen walked to the refrigerator and filled her water bottle.

"Maybe you should just give up."

Her father had his arms over his knees and leaned forward rubbing his face.

"You know we can't do that. We can't have every person who feels the system isn't working going out and trying to be judge, jury and executioner."

"You know as well as I do, she wasn't the one who did that."

George looked at her.

"She keeps publishing those damn videos of hers. Why hasn't she published that one if she's so innocent?"

Gwen took a drink of her water.

"If she's so guilty, why did she stop and comfort Uncle Ben? Wouldn't she have just run away?"

Her father stood up and walked to the breakfast bar, he leaned on it with his fingers spread out.

"Real life is more complicated than those comic books you and Peter collect. There is no happy ending. People don't come back from the dead. The stakes are real. A good man is dead. If she's innocent that will come out in court. I'm not here to judge her that is for the court system and twelve of her peers."

Gwen shook her head.

"No jury picked in New York City would convict her. James Fisk killed mom. He was openly shaking down people and your cops ignored it; You saw the video. I don't understand why you are trying so hard to arrest her."

Her father stood up straight.

"Gwen, I do not have the luxury of ignoring direct orders from the Commissioner. My personal feelings do not matter. I will catch her, and I will arrest her. I know you don't understand, but I swore an oath. I mean to keep it."

Gwen put her water bottle down.

"You going to arrest me? I made most of her gadgets. Isn't that aiding and abetting? Conspiracy? Oh, obstruction, you can add that to the list since I refuse to disclose her identity! I almost forgot, in exchange for my help I asked her to find the person who murdered mom. So technically I hired an assassin."

Her father frowned.

"Gwen, stop it."

Gwen threw her hands up and grabbed her water bottle and went into her room, she didn't close her door. Her father leaned around the corner.

"Oh, and the school called. No classes until Thursday. Something about health concerns at the school."

Gwen nodded. She opened her laptop and sent an email letting Obadiah know she was available for a few more days. She tapped her fingers on her desk and glanced at her father who was starting to get ready to go to the precinct. She really wanted to go out and fight crime, but on the other hand if the taskforce was setting up a sting tonight, staying in might be the way to go. In the end she decided to be smart about it and stayed in.

When Gwen woke up. She was relieved to hear her choice to avoid going out as Spider-Woman seemed justified. Her father looked grouchy and was complaining about the wasted man-hours. The hit to his budget. Gwen walked out of her room.

"Sounds like the Spider-Woman sting did not go well?"

Her father grunted and mumbled out some curse words before heading to get a shower. Gwen sat down at the table with Erica. She glanced at their bathroom and then spoke.

"So, what did they try to do?"

Erica looked in the direction of the bathroom and shook her head.

"So, one of the members of his task force had this crazy idea. They'd stage a shoot out in an alleyway with blanks. Undercover officers. The rest would be waiting to pounce. They spent six hours shooting at each other. The 911 lines were flooded. They had normal patrol cars responding, even though everyone was warned that there was an undercover operation going on in the location. Worst of all she didn't even show up."

Gwen blinked in disbelief.

"He knows she's not stupid right? Advanced tech? Satellite imaging?"

Erica shrugged and took a drink of her coffee.

"I told him it was a stupid plan. You know your dad, he's a dog with a bone. Also I think even the Mayor is on his ass to do something."

Gwen sighed then a thought occurred to her. She hadn't had the courage to ask it, but something Miles had said about his father hit her harder than she expected.

"Erica?"

Erica smiled at her.

"Yes?"

"I was… Sometimes Spider-Woman sends me videos to edit. I saw… someone said that no one cares if a black police officer is killed. I… well, do you feel like that would happen with you?"

Erica picked up her coffee mug and sat next to Gwen.

"Where they threatening to kill black police officers, Gwen?"

"No, it was about… Captain Davis."

Erica seemed to breathe a sigh of relief.

"That… That was a hard one. Internal Affairs said he was corrupt. They had a mountain of circumstantial evidence. His son, wife, didn't get a pension. He didn't even get a proper police funeral. The evidence stinks of set up. If you have proof he wasn't corrupt, you have to come forward."

Gwen shook her head.

"Its just, just someone raving about how there is no justice for black people. I just wondered if any of it were true. I can't imagine what it's like for you. I want to support you."

Erica rubbed her face.

"Do you have a copy of it still? Could you show it to me?"

"I shouldn't. It… if what is on it got out, someone's life would be in danger. She was very clear about that."

Erica had desperation in her voice.

"Look, Captain Davis he looked out for me when I was coming up as a rookie. If there is anything on it that can clear his name."

"If I show it to you, you have to swear to never tell anyone what you see. He's young. And Fisk will kill him."

Erica quirked her head to the side.

"How do you know about Fisk?"

Gwen shook her head.

"It's not important. I'll show you the video if you promise."

Erica stood up and took another drink of her coffee.

"I promise what I see will not leave the two of us."

Gwen stood up and went to her computer. She logged into the cloud storage she had it sitting on and opened it. Erica leaned in beside her. Gwen started at the beginning. Erica said nothing but her expression turned from curiosity to shock when she saw Prowler brutally beat James Fisk. Erica winced when Prowler landed the blow on Spider-Woman's face. Gwen flinched, remembering how much pain she was in afterwards. Gwen was quick to stop the video before the part when she discovered her Uncle Ben had been shot. She had no wish to relive that again. Erica sat down on Gwen's bed shaking her head.

"She's taking the blame to protect Davis's son. This video would exonerate her. She must trust you a lot, Gwen."

Gwen nodded and closed the video and logged out of the cloud storage site. Gwen turned to Erica.

"It is not just Miles she's protecting. Wilson Fisk put a hit out on me. He called dad the night this happened and told him he was going to have me killed. Spider-Woman told Fisk she'd done this and that if anything happened to you, me or dad, she would finish the job, then kill his wife in front of his daughter. Then his daughter in front of him. She told him she would burn his world down around him. As long as he thinks she's capable of this, we're safe."

Erica blinked at Gwen in disbelief.

"She would never…"

Gwen's eyes went wide.

"No, she would never kill someone. Everything she wanted from me was non-lethal. She doesn't really want to hurt people, that's why she asked for the webbing."

Gwen exhaled a long slow breath. Gwen's phone alarm went off.

"I need to go get ready. Hope dad is done in the bathroom. Please Erica, don't tell anyone what you saw."

Erica nodded then looked at Gwen.

"Where are you off too?"

Gwen rolled her eyes.

"Flash has this big day planned. He thinks it's a giant surprise. The problem is he told Spider-Woman everything he was planning, and she told me. So now I have to spend the day acting surprised. I don't know why he thinks I'd want to go hit baseballs at Yankee Stadium. What about me says I'm interested in sports at all?"

Erica smiled.

"Just pretend you love it; He just wants to see you smile. You haven't been doing much of that lately."

"Thanks Erica. You'll never be my mom, but you are shaping up to be an amazing stepmother."

Erica motioned with her arms.

"Come here."

Gwen leaned down and hugged Erica tightly. Gwen grabbed her clothes for the day. As she was leaving her room she glanced back at Erica.

"And Erica, I know why you told me to keep quiet about James's threats at mom's wake. I appreciate you were trying to protect us."