(A/N: I do not own Spiderman. That right belongs to Sony).
Peter had no words to speak or even the capacity to think. He was being held up by the neck by his best friend since the 2nd grade who looked to be in a knockoff version of his father's Green Goblin suit. He had several questions he desperately wanted answered but it seemed his wants seemed irrelevant at the time. Peter didn't know what he could do that could possibly get him out of this scenario without hurting Harry which he desperately did not want to do. The brunette opened his mouth, trying to gain some grasp on what he could say at this moment.
"H…Harry…I…I swear I have no idea what you're talking about" Peter managed to get out. It was a bit difficult to speak when he was being held up in the air by the neck by an arm enhanced with strength by Globulin serum.
Peter could just hear Harry just let out a grunting chuckle under the mask.
"The lies just never stop with you, do they? First you call yourself my friend, then you pretend to care about me yet you've only ever cared about getting everything that I had, you steal my girlfriend and dad's affection…now it turns out the two people that were responsible in ruining my life were one in the same…and you didn't even have the decency to tell me" Harry said, shaking his head. He threw Peter to the ground at that point, allowing him to take in a huge gulp of air.
"Harry…I…I'm not…I'm not him. I…You remember the Bugle-" Peter said, finding it very difficult to lie to Harry, even under these circumstances. However, it seemed to be all for nought as Harry looked like he wasn't buying into it. The redhead boy interrupted him before Peter could ration everything.
"Save it, hero. I don't give 2 shits about what that garbage paper has to say…I've seen everything…and I mean everything…with my own 2 eyes. You can't hide anything from me anymore" Harry said.
The 17 year old boy reached up to his mask to remove it. Underneath showed a red face that was filled with anger and sadness. Peter could even see tears running down his face as the redhead looked down at him from his hoverboard.
"I…" Was all Peter could think of to even say at this point. However, Harry was more interested in continuing his rant.
"How could you, Peter? He…He loved you…much more than he ever loved me. He treated you like his own son, was there for you when your uncle passed away last year…and you go and kill him?" Harry asked, more tears rolling down his face.
Peter just looked up and saw the sincerity of Harry's sadness in his eyes. Had he done this to him? Did he really reduce his friend to this?
"No words, huh? No surprise there. Nothing at all is probably the most truth you've said to me over the past year. Hell, maybe even since we first met. Since I know you're curious as to how exactly I found out who you really were…let's just say I ran into a…mutual acquaintance" Harry said, his sad frown slowly turning into a more vengeful smirk.
Before Peter could ask who he meant, he could sense a familiar presence near him as his spider sense went off again. One that he had been hoping with all his heart he would never face again. His eyes widened as he suddenly was drenched in fear. He all of a sudden felt a slimy hand over the top of his head.
"Hello…bro" The voice that had belonged to Venom said as he slithered into his eyesight like a snake.
Peter could only stare. His worst nightmares were coming true at this very moment….it was true all along. Eddie had still been Venom this whole time. Felicia and Liz had been right all along.
"E…Eddie" Peter said meekly as the symbiote covered body held onto his head and forced it to look at him. Harry let out a smirk behind him as he placed his mask back on.
"Oh, you have no idea how long we've been waiting for this, bro. Months of crawling around a sewer after you separated us from each other. That's something we don't forget easily" Venom said with a hint of a smirk on his slimy face.
"Eddie, don't do this…please. Do you not remember Thanksgiving? How it slithered right off of you when I tricked it? It doesn't care about you. It feeds off your hate to make itself stronger. It'll use your body as a shell as it takes more control over you…and it won't stop until it's the only one in control and you're all but gone. I know it seems like the most exhilarating thing in the world, having all the power it offers you…but in time, you lose yourself to it" Peter said, trying his best to plead with the person he had known as his big brother since they were little kids.
"Your games won't work with us anymore, bro. Your lies aren't going to separate us any longer and there's no gene cleanser or dumb high school jocks here to save you anymore…you're going to die, Peter Parker…tonight" Venom said, practically sneering as he finally let go of Peter's head.
Peter dropped and breathed heavily as he looked side by side to what looked to be a new version of the Green Goblin (Albeit a completely different person wearing the costume) and Venom, two of Peter's most feared enemies that always gave him the hardest time aside from the Sinister Six.
"Now change into your Spiderman costume. I know you brought it!" Harry pretty much demanded.
Peter hesitated but with the looks he was getting from both ends, he looked to have no choice in the matter. He slowly removed his blue shirt, revealing his Spiderman top. He also removed his baggy brown pants just as slowly, revealing the bottom half of his suit.
He continued revealing his Spiderman suit until he was dressed in full Spiderman garments with all his clothes, including his socks and shoes, moved to the side. He pulled his mask from the side of his suit's bottom half and put it on, completing the set.
For the time, Peter Parker had been replaced by Spiderman as he faced both of his former best friends.
"That's right, we prefer to do this with the man himself…because that's who you are now, right? You may have thought you just physically changed that day when the spider bit you. You just thought you got cool powers and super strength…but no. That spider did something to you. Ever since you got your powers, the guy that I had come to know and love as the little brother I never had slowly disappeared until all there was…was this" Venom said, gesturing to the spider based hero. He could hear Eddie doing most of the talking during that little speech.
Peter said nothing in response to this. There wasn't really anything that came to mind at that moment.
"You killed him, Spiderman…you killed Peter Parker and it looks like there's no coming back for him…but he can be avenged" Venom said, his slimy mouth forming into a small grin.
"Yeah…he can. The Peter Parker I knew never would have taken my entire life away and killed my dad. You did that, 'Spidey'. I'm going to enjoy dropping your corpse into the ocean" Harry said behind his mask.
"Guys, please…we don't have to do this. I…I'm sorry. I really am. I never meant for….any of this to happen. I have no excuses…and I'm not asking for forgiveness…but you can't really convince yourselves you want this. This isn't…either of you" Peter had pleaded behind the Spiderman mask.
"Well, what can we say, bro? We both went through a lot of changes over the past year" Venom simply said.
Without any further hesitation or warning, Harry threw a pumpkin bomb from his belt towards Spiderman. Using his Spider Sense, he jumped up and shot webs up at the ceiling.
The hero stuck his hands at the ceiling and made his way towards the balcony door. There was no way he was in any position to fight both Venom and Harry while he was on the serum and had access to his dad's old tech. He would get killed easily. He had to warn Captain Stacy.
However, he was snagged by the foot and he stopped in the middle of his swing. He looked down and saw Venom holding on to some symbiote webbing attached to his foot from across the living room.
"Hey, where you going, bro? The party's just getting started" Venom said, managing to pull Spiderman down and slamming him against a wall. The impact caused some of Norman's old African masks to fall down from their usually precise, postured position on the wall.
Spiderman landed foot first on the ground, groaning in pain. However, he didn't have time to recover. As he looked up, he could see Harry charging towards him on his hoverboard. He could see a sharp knife come out of a little slot at the front like his father's glider had. The hero jumped as the hoverboard's knife crashed into the wall, missing him completely.
"Damn it!" Harry shouted as he attempted to pull the plunged knife from the wall. However he was stopped short in his efforts as he felt his arms pull back as two web-like substances hit his arms. He turned to see his former best friend pulling him back.
"Let me go, you monster!" Harry cried out in anger.
"Harry, please listen to me. I didn't mean to hurt your dad. I only wanted to stop the glider. I didn't know he was going to crash like that!" Spiderman said, trying to explain his actions that night.
"Horse shit! You wanted to kill him so he could be out of your way and you could be free to be all lovey dovey with Gwen. You didn't care about him at all. I'm going to avenge him tonight by taking you down once and for all" Harry said. Despite his enhanced strength, his strength was still just below that of his dad's goblin strength and certainly below Peter's strength level.
However, luckily for him, he had a partner. Venom kicked Spiderman in the back, causing him to tumble over and let go of Harry, who had finally been successful in removing the knife from the wall.
Before Spiderman could get up, Venom grabbed him by the leg and threw him across the room, causing him to land on the pool table, his back colliding with several hard red and white pool balls.
Spiderman groaned again in pain. He was running low on options here and needed to get out of here. However, it didn't seem like either of the two were giving him much choice. He slowly got up and off the pool table but both Venom and Harry were waiting for him. Venom grabbed Spiderman again by the neck and held him up in the air in the middle of the living room.
"Ok…this is the s-second time tonight I've been held up by the n-neck. Have to s-say…not a f-fan" Spiderman managed to get out, choking by Venom's strong grip.
"Always with the stupid little jokes, Pete. Though I guess Spiderman wouldn't be Spiderman without them. Well…it's been a blast, bro but we have a job to do. Alright, Osborn, do what you gotta do" Venom said as he turned his choking hand around, causing Peter to again face Harry on his hoverboard. The knife had again appeared from the slot in Harry's hoverboard.
"It's been real, Peter….I honestly wish it hadn't come to this" Harry had said. He began to move the hoverboard slowly with the knife slowly approaching Spiderman's neck. The hero tried to break free from Venom's iron grip but unfortunately it was to no avail. It looked as if he had finally lost. He closed his eyes behind his mask as Harry continued to slowly move closer.
However, just before the knife could reach the hero's neck, a small pellet went in front of Harry's eyes.
"What the hell?" Harry said, noticing the pellet exploded and set out a flash, practically blinding the new Goblin momentarily.
"Ah!" Harry said, shielding his eyes, causing the hoverboard to stop moving. As the confusion went on, Venom also let out an agonizing scream as Spiderman felt Venom for whatever reason let go of Peter, dropping him to the floor. The teenage hero shot webbing towards the nearest object he could away from the two villains. He landed on the wall of the penthouse, regaining his sight as the flash let off by the small pellet subsided.
"What the hell was that?!" Venom screamed. Spiderman raised an eyebrow at this. He had never seen Venom like this before. He at the moment looked so…vulnerable.
"Hands off the boyfriend" A familiar voice said. Peter's eyes widened behind his mask as he turned his head towards the source of the voice. He almost thought he was dreaming when he saw who it was.
Both Black Cat and Firestar were both nearing the ceiling of the penthouse with Felicia hanging onto the wall with her adhesive gloves and Spiderman had to blink when he saw Firestar holding herself up near the ceiling as her hands faced downward and tiny streams of fire came out of her hand.
"That's new" Spiderman managed to get out.
"I've been practicing," Firestar said with a little smirk, feeling quite proud of herself at the moment.
"What the hell are they doing here?!" Venom shouted as he looked up towards the both of them. One of them was someone he so desperately wanted to avoid tonight…
"Making sure you keep your grubby hands off my guy" Black Cat said as she used her cat claw grappling hook to glide herself across the room and use both of her legs to kick Harry off of his hoverboard.
"Uh, he's my guy too" Firestar said, rolling her eyes as she managed to lower herself as she slowed down the fire stream coming out of her hands, causing herself to lower. She decided to focus her energy on Venom at the moment, who looked to be in slight disarray at the moment.
"What's the matter, big guy?" Firestar asked as she landed softly on the floor and let out a little smirk. "Do pretty girl superheroes scare you?"
"We are not scared of you or anything, little girl" Venom retorted as he raised his hand and shot out some symbiote webbing at the fire based heroine and wrapped it around her torso.
"Uh, Cat, a little help here" Firestar said as Venom began to pull her towards him.
"Kinda busy myself. I'll get to you when I can'' Cat said, trying her best to hold the new Goblin down. Normally someone like Harry Osborn would be laughably helpless against someone of her stature but given his recent intake of his dad's serum, it wasn't as easy at the present time. However, with her combat skills clearly outmatching Harry's, she was able to hold her own.
"Ugh, fine. Just know you brought this on yourself, Eddie" Firestar said. She then formed a microwave radiation field around her, causing intense heat in Venom's web.
Venom let out another screech of pain. The web disapperated and Venom held onto his hand in sheer agony as he continued to seethe.
Firestar raised an eyebrow at this. No one had ever reacted like this to her powers before, at least not to the extent this monster was. It seemed this guy really didn't like heat.
Speaking of whom, Venom clearly was not ready for this fight. He had been planning for a two on one fight with Spiderman, not this. When his hand recovered, he turned to see Osborn still fighting Black Cat.
"Osborn, we need to fall back!" Venom exclaimed to the redheaded teen.
"Wh-what? What are you talking about? We can take them!" Harry retorted, not wanting to back out now as he finally managed to throw Black Cat off of him.
"We have no choice. Now let's go" Venom said before Firestar threw a fireball at him that he just barely dodged. He used the window of opportunity he had to jump towards the balcony doors. He rammed through them, knocking them down as he went out and swung into the maze of the city.
Harry groaned at this. There was no way he could deal with all three of them alone. If only his dad was here. However, there was little time to think about this. Before Black Cat could pounce at him, he pushed a button on the belt of his costume which caused the hoverboard to reactivate and fly towards Harry. He used the opportunity to jump on it and use it to avoid the cat based thief as she missed him and somersaulted on the ground to compose herself. Harry then followed Venom out to the city so they could no doubt regroup.
Spiderman, who had finally recovered from his blows, stood up and stretched, still aching a bit.
"You good there, hotshot?" Cat asked as both heroines (Or at least 1 heroine and one 'anti-hero') walked towards him.
"I'm good, yeah. Thanks for the save…how did you know I was in trouble though?" Spiderman asked, raising an eyebrow towards the both of them.
Firestar said nothing and just gave a look towards Black Cat with a knowing look. The platinum haired woman in response turned towards the Latina heroine with a tiny hint of a smirk.
"What?" She asked with a fake innocent voice.
"You're gonna have to tell him eventually" Firestar said, firmly.
"Tell me what?" Spiderman asked, getting more confused as the exchange went on.
After a few moments of silence and Black Cat looking between both of the people whose eyes were locked on her, she sighed.
"I placed a bug on you after the whole fiasco at the Vault. I've been using it to…make sure you're ok and all that good stuff" Black Cat said, letting out a light smile in place of the smirk she had on a few moments ago.
The silence in the room was deafening after that little announcement. Spiderman was practically stunned at what she had said.
"Uh….I'm sorry…what?!" Spiderman exclaimed.
"Hey, you could hardly blame me after you acted all weird after you had met my dad. I've never seen that side of you. I wanted to make sure you were ok and don't act like it hadn't saved your life on more than one occasion, including this one. How do you think I was able to take you to the hospital those months ago?" Black Cat asked, closing her hands into fist, defending her actions to the utmost.
"I mean…still though. You were listening in on me this whole time?! That's like…stalkery to the extreme" Spiderman retorted.
"It's not like I listened in all the time. I only listen when I notice something off about you and when I felt like you were going to get yourself hurt even after you're warned you're getting yourself into that very situation…case in point" Cat said, gesturing to the mess behind them.
Spiderman just shook his head. He couldn't believe this. However, he decided to let it go and save the talk for another day.
"Can you at least get it off of me? Seriously, I guess in a sense it's sort of nice…but it's still really creepy and I don't really like it" Spiderman said, shivering at the idea of his girlfriend listening in on him all the time. That was terrifying for a variety of different reasons.
"Alright, alright" Cat said, rolling her eyes. She stepped towards her boyfriend and ran her hand down his chest until she felt the bug and yanked it off. It was a small little pellet of a device but it seemed to do its job fine.
"Remember when I poked my finger at you after our business was done at the Vault? I did that for more than one reason" Cat said with a little smile.
"Clever…and I guess it was for the better…though really, I kinda think there was another way of going about it" Spiderman said, rubbing his chest, scratching it a bit.
"While it would be nice to ponder on this for a bit more, we need to get focused on those two. This night probably isn't over" Firestar said, gesturing to the window where both Venom and Goblin escaped.
"Agreed. We need to get to Captain Stacy and let him know that Venom is back and that Harry is the new Green Goblin. I also need to get to the ESU lab for a new vial of gene cleanser so we can get the symbiote off of Eddie. That's how I was able to defeat him last time" Spiderman said with determination.
"Won't the Connors notice one is missing?" Black Cat asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Well…it would hardly be out of the ordinary for them at this point" Spiderman said, recalling the history of gene cleanser vials to 'magically' disappear
*On a rooftop in Manhattan*
"I can't believe this! What the hell happened to you? You can't hold off one newbie superhero who doesn't even have half of Spiderman's strength? I thought you were supposed to be a badass or something" Harry said to the symbiote infested college student while pacing back and forth on a building. The angry expression on his face along with the tone in his voice could very well indicate that he was not happy right now.
"You don't understand. We don't like fire or extreme amounts of heat" Venom announced, sitting down on the roof, contemplating what their next move should be.
"So? No one likes fire or extreme heat! You didn't see Sandman running away like you did. He at least held his own by himself against those three. We could have had them all in one go! I was wrong about you. You're not threatening at all. As a matter of fact, I'm probably just gonna-" Was all Harry could say before he was lifted up in the air by the neck at Venom's mercy.
The redhead looked down and saw Venom's eyelids tilt heavily down in anger as he growled at him.
"Listen here, you slimy little rich boy! We as a species are extremely vulnerable to heat. If she had done any more damage to me, we would have been forced to separate. I get you don't understand that as a little daddy's boy but us staying together is CRUCIAL to us fulfilling our mission of killing Spiderman" Venom practically yelled before throwing Harry to the ground.
Harry held on to his neck and breathed in and out over and over, trying to regain his breath.
"Ok…fine…so what now? How do we continue on with the plan?" Harry said, slowly getting up on his feet.
"We can't continue the plan as is. It's shot now. They're probably on their way to the cops and to the ESU lab to get some gene cleanser at this very minute" Venom said, exasperated.
"So what, we just give up then?" Harry said, a glare growing on his face.
"No…we just have to improvise…Parker has a weakness to him that outmatches any weapon or surprise attack" Venom said, suddenly forming an idea in his head with a small smirk.
"And that would be…?" Harry asked with a raised eyebrow.
"The 2 people he loves most…his precious Aunt May and his darling Gwen Stacy" Venom said as he slithered his black tongue out with an evil grin.