Chapter Fifteen – Burdens: Lifted and Regained

The sun shone through the curtains onto the sleeping body of Harry Osborn next to me. I took a moment to examine his shirtless torso in the light, before stretching myself awake. For the first time in a long time I woke up without dark thoughts on my mind, without feelings of anger. Whatever that thing, that symbiote was, it must have been the parasite causing my change. Or at least making it worse…

The night before, once sealing the creature into the vase, I had phoned Professor Steven. He had informed me that the creature was being studied by the Life Foundation and they had previously thought it 'terminated' in the fire which spread in the building. He was the one who directed me of a secure place to leave it, which I had. It felt good that whatever the creature was no longer had any influence over me, although I had made a mental note to regularly get in touch with Steven to keep a check on what Life was doing.

I pushed the covers off myself and rolled out of bed, grabbing my towel and toothbrush and heading into the shared bathroom. I poked my head into Ned's and Flash's room and saw the blonde, dressed similarly in just shorts, doing some sit ups on the ground. Flash looked at me quickly but didn't slow the pace of his crunches.

"Ned already at the Bugle?" I asked.

Flash grunted a yes in my direction, and I walked back to the bathroom and closed the door behind me. I hung my towel on the hook near to the door and turned the shower on, letting it warm up whilst I brushed my teeth. I was only now that I realised that I'd been neglecting my personal hygiene whilst that creature was attached – I'd began doing my teeth every other day, had reduced my showering to once a week, and I was definitely in need of a shave. I finished my teeth and turned the shower off whilst I headed back to my room to grab my razor. A minute or so later I reopened the door and locked eyes with Flash, towel in hand, just about to get in the shower himself.

"Don't you dare." I said.

He made a rush to the shower and I dived, tackling him to the ground. I underestimated just how heavy Flash was as his body weight dropped onto me, his knee pushing roughly into the small of my back. I tried to twist and grab onto his legs, holding him to the ground.

"Get off Parker." Flash grunted trying to pull himself free. "You know I'm stronger."

"Yeah but I'm quicker."

"No you're not."

"I'm not letting go."

He tried to kick out and broke my grasp but I was quickly back on top of him, my forearm around his neck trying to pull him back in my need to be in the shower first. Once more though I misjudged the circumstance and he pushed himself back, the pair of us toppling over and his elbow this time landing uncomfortably on my hip.

"I was going in first Thompson."

"I'd just worked out."

"What the hell does that have to do with anything?"

"I'm sweaty."

"There are four perfectly good beds that you two can have fun in rather than the bathroom floor." Harry muttered. Both of us looked up from the floor and in disbelief watched him step into the shower, close the door, and throw the pair of underwear he was wearing over the top of the door. A few seconds later the sound of water coming from the shower head began.

"You're a prick Osborn." I said loudly.

In response Harry began singing a Beach Boys song very loudly and very out of tune. Flash and I detangled our bodies from each other and sat up, facing each other scowling and breathing heavily. After a few seconds we began laughing at the ridiculousness that we had just gone through.

"You seem happier." Flash said eventually.

"What do you mean?" I asked curiously.

"The last few weeks you've sort of had this dark cloud over you. You just didn't seem you, if you get me. I'm glad the cloud is gone."

I smiled at Flash's comment.

"Can you two have your cute little moment somewhere else? I'm naked and showering at the moment." Harry shouted from behind us. The pair of us walked to my room and both collapsed onto my bed, reminiscing and chatting about the future, both the near and far. Eventually Harry came out from the shower, towel wrapped around his waist and hair soggy. Flash and I decided to settle the shower debate like the men we were, so after I had won two of the three rock-paper-scissors matches and Flash had said some unkind words to me I was feeling the warm water running over my body. It felt like it was washing away all the bad thoughts and feelings. Of course the memories still remained, those of Gwen, those of O'Riley, but the venom which ran through those memories had been removed. As I lathered my hair with the shampoo my memory turned to the Silvermane. I had gone to far, and I couldn't even blame my actions on the symbiote. That was me, my anger and rage. I could do better, and I would do better.

I switched off the water and stopped out the shower, towelling my hair off which had lost its curls in the dampness, then wrapped it around me the same way Harry had. I stepped back into my bedroom and Flash pushed past me, attempting jokingly to grab my towel as he went.

"About time Pete, what the hell were you doing in there?" He moaned jokingly. "Actually, don't answer that." The door shut and I soon heard the sound of the shower begin again.

I grabbed a pair of shorts and pulled them on then wrapped my hair in the towel, just like my Aunt May used to do for me when I was little. I then proceeded to my wardrobe to pick out an outfit for my midday lecture. In the end I selected a pair of black jeans and matching t-shirt, with a red tartan pattern jacket to protect me from the February chill. I laid them on my bed and looked at Harry. He was lay on his bed in shorts, one hand behind his head, casually playing on his phone. His message tone beeped and both of us shared a glance – we both knew who it was.

"It's not going to be a long term thing Pete." Harry said, almost apologetically.

"You do what you do Harry, who you sleep with is your decision, just can you try to keep it with single people?"

He smiled softly. "Those are pretty high standards for me."

"You're my best friend, got to hold you to a higher standard than the likes of Flash and Ned haven't I?"

"Suppose it'll reflect badly on you if I fuck up?"

"You always reflect badly on me Harry, and that's just cause you're still shit at doing your eyeliner."

He flashed a middle finger at me and chuckled. I pulled my jeans on as Harry sat up, walking to his own wardrobe to find his clothes for the day. He was wearing something a lot flashier than I was, which wasn't unexpected. If there was one thing Harry Osborn was it was glamorous. He grabbed a makeup bag from his dresser.

"I'm going to go shittily put on my eyeliner." He winked at me.

"Want me to help you with it?" I called after him.

"I'd rather trust you cutting my hair."

"Deal."

"No deal."

As he stepped into the bathroom I saw Flash in his room, getting himself ready for his history lecture. I pulled my sneakers on and grabbed my back, slinging it over my shoulder, and headed out the door, shouting a quick "bye" to the two guys. Time for some science.

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My phone buzzed quietly on the table. I tapped the screen and saw a message from Harry. It contained a link and he words "can't reach Ned". I quickly swiped up to unlock the cell phone and clicked on the link. It took me to a news site. Along the top of the page was the title 'BUGLE OFFICES RIPPED APART!'. My breathing shallowed, reading words such as 'unconfirmed number dead', 'multiple injured', and 'editor missing'. There were pictures of the offices, tables over turned, windows smashed, furniture ripped apart, as well as a video later down the article. I clicked the play button and my lungs stopped working.

It was a CCTV footage with a grainy black and white camera feed. People were running in fear then suddenly, into the image, came the figure of a massive creature. It must have stood at almost eight feet tall, and seemed to be almost as broad. From the contrast on the video it appeared almost jet black, then the head turned towards the camera. Two white eyes and a large toothy maw faced me, and I felt like those eyes were looking right through the screen at me. The creature was larger than it has been, but it was unmistakable. That was the symbiote that I had so recently left at the Life Foundation. At first I had thought it must have been a second one, but looking at the jagged, almost unrecognisable now, spider symbol on the chest I knew it couldn't be anything but the one which was attached to me. I forced a breath into my lungs and sent a text to Ned asking where he was. The message read delivered, but went no further. I began sweating, my hands and face growing warm as worry began to rise. The lecture proceeded for another agonising forty minutes until I could grab my bag and leave.

It wasn't until that afternoon when the five of us got the confirmation of the death of Edward Leeds. We were all sat together, and as soon as we found out that our friend was dead Betty burst out in tears and spent the next hour or so crying into Flash's and Liz's chests, the pair of them offering useless words of comfort. Overall there had been seven pronounced dead at the Bugle, sixteen injured (including Robbie), and no sign of Jameson. Witnesses in the Bugle had said the black creature had burst into the building through the windows, torn through the offices leaving devastation in its wake, and made off with the editor of the Bugle.

My mind remained fixed on the black monster. It was unmistakably the same creature which had used my body as a source of sustenance, and now it had killed one of my friends because of my actions. I felt arms around me and turned to see Harry. He pulled me into a hug and my body sank into the embrace. I felt that, even if it was just this moment, the responsibility of what I had to do was shared. The mountainous task of tracking down our friend's killer, the killer who used the tools that I had essentially handed to them, felt manageable. Either way it didn't matter: I was going to find Ned's killer.

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"But it's not your fault, Peter."

Aunt May had phoned me that evening once the names were released. She remembered Ned from when we were younger, the small bespectacled blonde boy who would occasionally get into trouble with Harry and myself.

"But if I were there-"

"Then you would have probably ended the same way." The soft tones of my Aunt interrupted. "There was nothing you could have done."

I knew differently.

"Everything seems so difficult." I said, my voice cracking.

"I know darling." I wished I could reach through the phone and hug my Aunt, feel her fingers run through my hair like when I was younger and upset.

"I don't know what to do." I felt tears well in my eyes, a few of them escaping down my cheeks to fall on my t-shirt.

"You don't have to do anything." She said, her tone stern. "All you need to do is carry on. Don't worry about doing your best, or pushing yourself, just survive."

"What do you mean?"

"I know you want to help, you want to be there for your friends, but you can't do that if you don't look after yourself." She replied.

"But I need to fix things."

"Your Uncle would always say 'with great power comes great responsibility', but not everything is your responsibility Pete." May told me. "You can't see the future, you can't stop other people from acting."

"I suppose." I wiped my face with my forearm.

"We'll always face hard times in life, but remember what it feels like to be on the other side of those. Think of the joy and happiness." May's voice calmed me, and I felt what had been my increasingly rapid breathing begin to slow. "If we didn't struggle we wouldn't get to experience those moments."

I took a deep breath. "I know."

"You'll struggle through, and you'll come out the other side." May assured me. "And most importantly: you're not alone."

"I know."


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