Trials of Nature

by StormySky1005

Gwen Stacy is Spider-Woman, the unappreciated hero of New York. Miles Morales is the Prowler, the high-tech criminal that keeps evading her. Neither knows the other's identity, but now they go to the same school.

15. In the Jungle

Chapter 15

Third Person POV

The sound of a cane tapping on the floor echoed throughout the Kingpin's new office as Matt Murdock sat at his new desk, thinking over what he was going to say and trying to keep his composure despite the bad news he was receiving. Finally, looking up at the two figures Foggy had announced moments before even though he couldn't see them, Matt said softly, "Alright, let's hear it. What happened?"

Speaking as soon as he was given the opportunity, Spider-Man cleared his throat and said, "I believe I can explain, Mr. Murdock, in the most elaborate and comprehensive way that this situation allows." He then leaned back in his chair and drew a deep breath, then abruptly pointed at the man in the other seat next to him and said, "It was all his fault."

Glaring back at him, insulted, Aaron Davis, the original Prowler, demanded, "My fault?"

"Yes, that is what I said. Do try to keep up, you ignoramus," Spider-Man confirmed confidently.

Aaron began to get up from his seat, his prosthetic arm whirring as it began to charge with power in its clenched fist, and Spider-Man started to stand as well, looking only too eager to meet the threat, but Murdock stopped them both by raising a hand and saying, "I urge both of you to curb your egos temporarily so that we can have a civilized discussion. I want to hear what happened, from both of you, and I will hear it. So take your seats."

He spoke softly, but it was clear to both Prowler and Spider-Man that his words were in fact not a request, but an order, one that they both immediately followed though they continued to glare at one another.

Once they were both seated once more, Aaron asked, "How exactly can you blame me for this?"

"Well, it's quite unambiguous," Spider-Man responded. "You see, Prowler, after you gave us the location of your recently-accessed stash, you insisted that you should accompany me there. You may recall that I denied the request, at which point you pled your case to Mr. Murdock. I knew that you would only get in the way if you came along, and manifestly, I was most veracious."

"And which one of us actually lost the primary target, Doctor?" Aaron asked, his words starting to get heated again.

"Which one of us never even tried to capture her?" Spider-Man shot back.

They were both kept from attempting to begin another fight when Matt abruptly slammed one of his hands down on the desk, creating a loud boom that instantly silenced them. Then, he leaned over the desktop and said, "I understand that neither of you want to admit fault. I understand that it's your instinct to point fingers, but I don't care who you feel messed up the worst. I understand that the situation was… complicated. But what I don't understand is how my two best operatives, working together, failed to best two teenagers with their same powers, especially when you were assisted by three dozen of our best men, most of whom are now in the hospital!"

Throughout his rant, Matt's voice had slowly grown more and more intense and angry until he was actually on his feet and yelling at the end, a rare and intimidating sight for anyone who was familiar with the usual, much more reserved Kingpin, and both Prowler and Spider-Man were now sitting straight-backed in their seats as a result, leaning as far away from Matt as possible.

After a few seconds of silence, Spider-Man cleared his throat again and began, "Yes, of course. We're being unprofessional. Well, Mr. Murdock, as you know, I fought Spider-Woman while Prowler fought Morales. During the fight, Ms. Stacy began to leave the rooftop and I pursued. It was an intimidation tactic on my part, of course, a clever plan-"

"Lies," Matt suddenly hissed at him, cutting Spider-Man off and causing Aaron to nervously glance at the other man as though warning him to backtrack.

Doing just that, Spider-Man paused and corrected himself, "Well… Very well, I confess that I acted rashly. I underestimated Spider-Woman, and she led me away in her own moment of sudden brilliance. Naturally, nowhere near as brilliant as myself, I saw through her plot quickly, but I-"

"LIES!" Murdock said again, this time in a furious yell, punching his glass tabletop so hard that it cracked and split Matt's knuckles, but he didn't seem to notice or care about his blood dripping onto the desk. His yell instantly quelled Spider-Man, stopping the story quite abruptly and making the masked man look down in enraged silence.

Noticing Spider-Man's obvious anger, Matt lowered his voice and asked, "Now, Doctor, do you recall our arrangement?"

His expression settling down quickly, Spider-Man sighed and responded, "Yes, Mr. Murdock. I asked you to keep my ego under control."

"And part of that is calling out your fabrications and exaggerations, yes?" Matt asked. Spider-Man nodded in agreement and Matt continued, "You came back here early this morning mostly blind, Doctor. Mr. Davis, you were scarred and bruised, though your suit protected you for the most part, but I will still assume that both of you have learned from your mistakes last night. Mr. Davis, no hesitating next time. Doctor, a little more hesitation. These particular teenagers are more capable than any of us would like to believe, but we cannot afford to ignore the facts."

Both Spider-Man and Aaron bowed their heads, acknowledging Matt's admonition, and Matt sat back down in his chair to continue in his normal, calm voice, "Good. Now, let's stay focused. What was our greatest error during last night's attack?"

There was silence for a moment, then Aaron answered, "It might be that we chose to attack during the night. Both Spider-Woman and my nephew usually work during the nighttime, and, especially in Miles' case, the Spiderlings didn't stand a chance against them in that environment."

Matt leaned his cane against the desk and intertwined his fingers on top of the desktop as he said, "I see. Doctor?"

"Unfortunately, the Spiderlings seem inadequately equipped for combatting superpowered opponents," Spider-Man said, giving his own analysis. "Their military experience doesn't prepare them for something so far beyond anything they've ever encountered or trained against, and my repulsor rifles can only do so much. They are perfect for stunning our specialized adversaries, but only if the soldiers can actually hit them."

Leaning back in his seat, Matt said, "There's also the matter of finding them. As expected, Mr. Morales and Ms. Stacy have both disappeared completely. They haven't returned to school, nor have they tried to access any more of Aaron's stashes now that they know where his true loyalties lie."

"Then we must simply draw them out of hiding," Spider-Man suggested. "If they fancy themselves 'heroes', then the solution is simple. We know where their loved ones are, Captain George Stacy and Rio Morales-"

"Hey!" Aaron suddenly cut him off, firmly pointing a finger at the other man. "Whatever's going on between me and Miles, Rio's still innocent! And she's my sister-in-law! We're not touching her!"

Spider-Man's mouth moved beneath his mask like he was about to make a contention, but Matt stopped him by saying, "Aaron is correct. For now, Rio is off-limits. We are not yet that desperate. Captain Stacy, as well. We are not such fools as to kidnap or intentionally harm the captain of the police at this time. For now, we shall be content to continue simply monitoring them at all times. However… Perhaps with the surprise disappearance of Captain Stacy's daughter, we could isolate our enemies further by anonymously giving the captain certain information that would nudge him quietly into the fray."

He gave Spider-Man a meaningful look, and the masked man nodded in understanding and said, "I'll take care of it."

"Perfect," Matt grinned in satisfaction. "As for the remaining problem of drawing them out… Well, we know how to do that, and how to make both Spider-Woman and Prowler operate during the day, we've done it before." He turned to face Aaron and told him, "Prowler, I'm going to need you to oversee another prisoner release. Someone other than Mr. Sytsevich this time, but choose wisely. Pick someone… savage. I'll trust your judgment. Our employees at the Raft will assist you if necessary."

"Yes, sir," Aaron said with a bow of his head.

"Then you're excused. Spider-Man, stay for another moment, I want a private word with you."

Prowler wordlessly stood up and pulled on his mask before he walked out of the room, and with a push of a button on Matt's desk, the door automatically locked behind him.

Matt then turned to Spider-Man and said softly, "Doctor, about Rio Morales… I would agree with you, but we can't risk losing Mr. Davis right now. As always, his loyalty is strong and very valuable to me, but I worry that it may be shaken from fighting his nephew. He's on our side for now, and we would like to keep it that way. Going after his deceased brother's wife would surely be crossing a line with him."

"If you have concerns about Mr. Davis, then why not allow me to deal with him now?" Spider-Man asked.

"Because the death of his family has a tendency to only strengthen Miles Morales' resolve, and that's not something we want when he's on the wrong side," Matt explained. "Also, Aaron is not yet an enemy. In fact, he has even truthfully informed me of his hope to convince Miles back to our side."

Spider-Man scoffed at that suggestion and asked, "Does Davis truly believe that he is capable of such a thing? My analysis of Mr. Morales suggests that he is… rather stubborn in supporting what he believes."

"That's exactly why we want him back, and why we're willing to run such a risk to get him. For now, Doctor, we must allow Prowler his chance to persuade Mr. Morales against continuing to clash with us," Matt argued.

"And if he can't?" Spider-Man asked.

Sighing in resignation, the Kingpin responded, "Then you, my friend, will give Miles the same treatment as the last Morales who became too curious in our business."

Nodding in understanding, Spider-Man confirmed, "Understood, Mr. Murdock."

Gwen POV

Sitting cross-legged on the floor, Gwen had her eyebrows furrowed in concentration while she fitted new technology onto her mask lenses, the mask itself turned inside-out while she worked on it.

This was a new experience for her, implementing technology into her suit when she'd previously only used her powers and custom-made web-shooters, but she felt that this particular upgrade would be useful to have. She'd foregone many of the fancier gadgets that Miles had offered to help her add, thinking that many of them would be too heavy or clunky for her agility-based fighting style, but she had decided to add one new addition to her suit: optional flashlights in the lenses.

It wasn't much, but it was useful and was neither a weapon (like many of the things Miles had offered her) nor something that she would be terribly weakened to be without. She hadn't wanted anything that she would become too reliant on, and this had seemed perfect, if a bit simple. When it was finished, it would allow her to emit lights from her suit's eyes to brighten a dark room, and she could also use it as a mobile defensive measure against the Spider-Man's night vision.

Of course, it was unlikely that Gwen would be able to get him with the same trick twice, but if he tried to get her somewhere where he thought he was safe from it, she would have a new move that he wouldn't see coming, and Gwen had the feeling that she and Miles could use as many advantages as they could get with the Kingpin's forces after them.

Suddenly, there was the sound of something crackling above her, followed by a soft curse muttered in Spanish, and Gwen quickly looked up to see Miles sitting upside-down in a rolling chair on the ceiling as he poked around with a small tool inside the circuitry of one of his gauntlets, which had just shot sparks across his hands.

Of course, he only appeared to be on the ceiling from Gwen's inverted point of view, as she was really the one on the ceiling while he was on the ground.

Seeing his expression of annoyance, Gwen asked, "Everything alright down there?"

Gesturing at his gauntlet, Miles responded, "It's this inversion matrix, it keeps overloading every time the ammeter reads a certain amplidyne, but I can't figure out how to safely redirect the bound charge into the boost converter with this overlay fold! And I can't rely solely on the Epstein frame, but I also can't risk interfering with the marginal stability-" He abruptly broke off in the middle of whatever he was saying and looked up at Gwen to ask, "You probably have no idea what I'm talking about, do you?"

Shrugging, Gwen responded, "Not really, no, but I'm all for listening to you talk about it if it'll help you to get it out."

Shaking his head, Miles said, "Thanks, but you don't want to hear what's going on in my head right now. It's a mixture of engineering terms you wouldn't understand and a disturbing amount of silent arguments with inanimate objects."

Smirking at Miles' newly-aroused sense of humor, Gwen nonetheless followed his wishes and changed the subject, pointing out, "You know, we've been here for a couple hours now and I still don't really know where we are. It looks like one of your uncle's stashes again, but… way less nice than the last one. Are we safer here just because this is his most dingy base?"

"This is actually my stash," Miles corrected without looking at her.

Hearing that, Gwen quickly recognized that she had rather put her foot in her mouth and began to say, "Er… I mean, this place has potential. It's kind of nice if you-"

"No, it's not," Miles interrupted her. "After I became the new Prowler, I decided to continue making bases around the city like my uncle did, but this is the only one I managed to create for now. Not much in here, just a couch, desk, chair, and a basic laptop. A bathroom that doesn't even have its own lightbulb and minimal security on the stash itself. But it's the one place I know of that my uncle doesn't, so I figure it's the safest place we're gonna find."

"Miles, I wasn't trying to-" Gwen tried to explain herself, seeing that Miles looked apologetic about their circumstances when she was really just grateful that he'd been able to find them somewhere safe to go, but Miles once again cut her off.

"It's alright, I know," Miles told her, but Gwen still felt like her careless joking question had made him feel like his efforts had gone unappreciated.

Hoping to reestablish a more comfortable atmosphere between them, Gwen spent a few seconds in silence to choose her words wisely before asking Miles, "So what are you working on?"

Miles was currently looking through a diagram on his laptop, but he still readily responded, "My gauntlets are my main weapon, above even my vibranium-powered shoes, but unlike my shoes, I can't wear them in public and I have to carry them everywhere in a bag. So far it's been fine, but I want to make them into more compact versions using the same compression tech I use in my mask, maybe something I can wear on my wrists beneath my sleeves. Trouble is, it requires some seriously advanced programming work and it'll take some time assuming I can even actually make it work."

"Aw, so you want to disguise your weapons as bracelets? And where'd you get an idea like that?" Gwen asked, flattered by Miles' interest in her handiwork.

"Simple," Miles responded. "That Spider-Man guy, you said he was impressive, so I- Hey!"

His exclamation that cut him off in the middle of his sentence was in response to him feeling a sudden sharp pain on the back of his head, where he had been hit by Gwen throwing one of her web-shooters at him in retaliation for his joke.

Gwen smirked at Miles with amusement at his indignation, enjoying messing with him while she was up out of his reach, but her confident expression quickly fell when Miles set his laptop aside and jumped purposefully out of his seat. He then reached down next to his chair and grabbed the web-shooter that Gwen had thrown at him. It would be too small to fit on his wrists, but Miles aimed the web-shooter up at Gwen anyway and pressed the button to fire a web line to stick to her front, then roughly pulled her down.

Not wanting to damage the roof of Miles' stash and enjoying the game too much to really consider it anyway, Gwen didn't keep herself stuck to the ceiling when she was pulled off the roof as she could've done. Instead, she fell down towards the ground with an entertained squeal of surprise, but Miles caught her in his arms before she could land and smirked as he looked her in the eyes and said, "That wasn't very heroic behavior, Spider-Woman."

Returning his expression of mirth, Gwen let out a laugh and responded, "Well, then it's a good thing you were here to catch me, Prowler."

She and Miles continued to gaze affectionately into each other's faces for a moment, causing a certain memory to come automatically to Gwen's mind, the memory of the last time their faces had been this close together.

Just as Gwen was replaying this memory fondly in her brain, Miles' smile abruptly began to slip off of his face, and then he quickly turned her around and set her down on her feet before starting to walk back towards his laptop while saying, "Sorry. We should get back to work."

As Miles went back over to sit in his seat, Gwen remained frozen in place behind him, feeling slightly crestfallen after the abrupt end of what she'd been sure they had both considered fun. Yes, they did have things to work on, and yes, they had powerful enemies that they had to worry about, but they were still teenagers, teenagers who uniquely spent much of their entire lives working. Even more importantly, they were best friends, and they could certainly afford to take a short break to spend some time doing something enjoyable together.

We… are still best friends, right? Gwen questioned mentally. Both she and Miles seemed to enjoy each other's company now as much as they ever did, if not more so, but it seemed to Gwen like Miles was still treating her differently than usual, and it had been going on for a while now, ever since he had found out that she was Spider-Woman. But he didn't seem conflicted about her dual identities, not anymore. In fact, he seemed completely content to share this double-life with her now that they both knew each other's secrets. So why was he still so hesitant about spending quality time with her? Was it the boyfriend thing they'd discussed last night?

She remembered telling him that she had lied about having a boyfriend, and Miles had insisted that she was still hiding something before they'd been interrupted by the arrival of Murdock's lackeys. Well, she wasn't hiding anything else… except that she'd been referring to Miles when she'd mentioned a boyfriend, but she'd decided that their friendship would be better off with Miles not knowing that, hadn't she?

What use would it be to tell Miles that anyway? If he didn't like her like that, it would only make things complicated between them for Gwen to tell him that she did feel that way about him. It would all be pointless if he didn't share those feelings, if he hadn't been reminded just now, as Gwen had been, of the time she had kissed him a few nights ago… Unless maybe he did, and he had been.

Or maybe I should stop fooling myself! Gwen chastised herself mentally. Miles wasn't going to start sharing her feelings just because she wanted him to, and she was only hurting both of them to continue believing any differently.

But at that moment, another memory came to Gwen's mind, of Miles' many various drawings of her in his treasured sketchbook, especially the one in which he had depicted her and Spider-Woman together and written above it, "Mis ángeles", cognates that Gwen could've easily translated even if she hadn't already known the Spanish words to mean "My angels". Looking through those pictures had been the first time that Gwen had really considered the possibility that Miles really did share her feelings.

Part of her suggested that Miles had merely called Gwen and Spider-Woman his angels because he thought that they had "saved" him. After all, Gwen knew him to be remarkably humble. But the other part of her recalled how she'd noted that Miles drew her as a vision of perfection in every image, never changing her appearance from what she really looked like yet still conveying a sense of awe and adoration in every drawing. Gwen knew that she definitely didn't really look like that, but she couldn't deny that she had looked somehow both completely real and completely unworldly in every one of Miles' depictions of her.

If that was supposed to represent the way that he saw her… Well, maybe Gwen wasn't as good an artist as Miles, but if she could accurately draw pictures of him from her perspective, she had a feeling that they would end up conveying a similar sense of majesty to what Miles had given her. And if that was true… then maybe Miles did feel something more for her than she'd understood up to this point.

Of course, the thought raised questions she'd already asked herself and thought that she'd answered, such as why Miles had seemed okay with her having a boyfriend if he cared about her like that or why he still seemed uninterested in her even now, but Gwen thought she knew the answer. Miles was almost pathologically selfless, extremely generous and self-sacrificial to an almost unhealthy degree, and Gwen wouldn't put it past him to think that she was "too good for him" or something like that.

After all, she'd done the same thing when considering her feelings towards Miles before she'd known that he was the Prowler. Now that she did know, she thought that they could potentially be perfect for each other, able to connect to one another in a way that no one else would ever be able to if Miles would have her, but it would be just like his infuriatingly good-hearted self to still consider himself somehow "unworthy" of her love that he had said her boyfriend would be so lucky to possess, especially while Gwen never gave him a reason to speak of those feelings he may have. If that theory was correct, then both Gwen and Miles may have been skirting around each other for some time now, both feeling a mutual attraction that they never spoke of out of fear that it would be unrequited.

Finally, Gwen decided that maybe it was time for both of them to stop assuming in silence that there was no unspoken thing between them and just talk about it. Part of Gwen was still terrified to bring up the subject, but she also could tell by now that she would never have another peaceful moment until she got closure on this matter. It would be risky business, but if they wanted the truth, certain cautions would need to be done away with so they could finally get some straight answers out of each other.

And so, taking one of those aforementioned risks, Gwen asked hesitantly, "Miles… Do you remember what happened the other night?"

"At Fisk Tower?"

"No, before that," Gwen corrected.

She could see Miles tense up at that and knew that he was putting together the pieces, but still he asked, "You mean when my uncle showed up at Madame Masque's place?"

Not letting him continue to dodge around the subject, Gwen told him firmly, "Come on, Miles. You know I'm talking about Monday night."

Slumping forward in defeat, Miles admitted, "Yeah, I know. I just didn't want to talk about it."

"Why not?" Gwen questioned.

"Because I figured you would want to forget about it," Miles answered, causing Gwen's heart to spike for an instant at the way he had phrased it and how it matched with her theory. "It was a tough time for both of us, I understand, and I don't hold the… other thing against you."

To make sure that they were talking about the same thing, Gwen spread her arms and asked for clarification. "What would you hold against me?"

"You know!" Miles said, finally spinning around in his chair to face her with a flustered expression.

When Gwen continued to act like she did not, in fact, know what he spoke of, Miles sighed and explained, "The… kiss. You kissed me. But I'm just saying that it's okay. I know it was an accident, and I didn't want to make you feel weird about it."

Well, an accident it may have been, but not in the way Miles was thinking.

Still shy to be the first one to say something, Gwen asked, "I just wanted to know… What did you think about it?"

Miles was silent for a moment, then asked disbelievingly, "What did I think about… the kiss? When you kissed me?"

"Yeah," Gwen confirmed with a noncommittal shrug.

"Like… when you did it on the cheek or-" Miles began to ask.

Losing patience in her desperation to have this conversation finish, Gwen cut him off, "No, the real kiss, Miles! On Monday! Three days ago! I'm wondering what you thought about it!"

Leaning back in his chair under the sudden intensity with which Gwen repeated her question, Miles blushed as he quietly said, "Well, I mean… It was nice, you know, just… really surprising."

Feeling her heart beating faster in her chest, Gwen asked, "But, like, you would do it again?"

Miles didn't answer for a moment, but then closed his eyes and seemed to steel his nerves before looking up at her and answering, "Yeah, I would. When you kissed me, Gwen, it was like something out of someone else's life. Anyone else's life. Because for the last eight months, I haven't even been sure what my life was anymore, or if I even still had one. But being around you… I don't feel that way, I feel like I have someone who listens to me and cares about who I am and what I do. I feel both normal and exceptional, like I can be myself and so much more when I'm with you. And I don't ever talk about my feelings and I'm probably really bad at it, but I know this much for sure: You saved me, Gwen Stacy. Every part of you makes me better, and I like who I am around you. You're mis ángeles, both of my heroes in one, and the thought of your smile means I can do anything, so just try to imagine what your kiss did to me."

At the end of Miles' speech, finally announcing the feelings that he must've kept hidden for some time now, Gwen was temporarily speechless, having been struck dumb with amazement and emotion at his words. She had been hopeful that Miles might have some small level of concealed attraction to her that she might be able to work on, building and developing it over time to the best of her ability. Instead she'd gotten… this? This was far more than she had ever expected. Hopefully not more than she knew how to handle.

With a low voice, Gwen asked, "So you were okay with it? You don't have any regrets or misgivings?"

Lowering his head, Miles confessed, "I do have one. Even if something like this was ever going to happen, I didn't want it to happen like this. I like you, Gwen. Like, like-like you. But if you don't feel the same way, I don't want this to make things weird between us. I'm more than happy (lucky, really), just to be your friend. I admit that part of me hoped that maybe you'd eventually see me the same way I see you, so our first kiss wouldn't be just some accident, but-"

At that moment, Gwen abruptly cut him off by using her remaining web-shooter to shoot a web line onto Miles' hip, then forcefully tugged him over to her before grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling him down into a deep kiss. At first, he was surprised, but then Miles began to melt into it and placed his hands on her arms as he kissed her back.

As it went on for a few seconds, the height difference between them began to disappear until their heads were almost level with one another, causing Gwen to idly wonder why until she realized that she had instinctively risen up on her toes until she was en pointe, such was her contentment and joy in this moment.

When they finally broke apart, both of them out of breath from the shock of what had just happened but still holding each other close, Miles said with bewilderment, "So… you too?"

"Yeah, pretty much," Gwen confirmed.

Another short silence, then Miles started to ask, "How long-?"

"Since Homecoming. At least. Maybe sooner," Gwen answered before he could even finish asking.

Sighing, Miles said, "So I made you wait that long? I'll do something to make it up to you."

Smiling with amusement, Gwen told him, "You don't need to do anything for me, Miles."

"I want to," Miles insisted. "I want to do anything I possibly can to improve your life, Gwen. Consider it my way of repaying you for doing the same for me."

"Miles, I doubt that you can make my life much better than you already are," Gwen informed him, then smirked humorously and added, "But if you must, I do have a certain liking for chocolate. My dad gets it for me sometimes from this great place on Allen Street."

"Sounds good," Miles said with a grin. "Next time we're not being chased by my uncle, his blind boss, or a mad scientist in head-to-toe spandex, I'll get you some chocolate."

Gwen laughed at that, then both she and Miles leaned in once again for another affectionate kiss, but they were stopped as Miles' phone suddenly began buzzing loudly and repeatedly in short intervals.

Both of them bowing their heads in disappointment at getting interrupted, Gwen asked, "That's probably important, isn't it?"

"It had better be," Miles growled in response before he released Gwen and turned around to pick up his phone from the desk.

He opened the phone to see what had set off his alarm and stared at it for a few seconds, frozen by something that Gwen couldn't see. Then, he set the phone down and instead hurriedly opened his laptop's internet browser, typed something in, then turned the screen so that Gwen could also see as a news broadcast appeared. "...second escapee from the Raft not only in history, but in recent weeks, MacDonald 'Mac' Gargan, otherwise known as the supervillain called the Scorpion, has made a shocking appearance in the middle of Times Square, where we've received confirmation that he killed several people in broad daylight before the PDNY could evacuate the area. Exact number of casualties is unclear for the moment, but we can confirm that it was at least a dozen people including a patrol officer. Fortunately, the PDNY has now formed a powerful perimeter around the area, effectively trapping Gargan, but they are taking no risks. Even the airspace is being temporarily restricted from public use while the PDNY contacts additional law enforcement to combat the criminal that only the Spider-Woman has been able to defeat in the past."

At that point, Miles muted the broadcast, but on the screen, Gwen could still see a picture of the Scorpion, yet another old villain she'd put away.

Ugh, she hated this guy. The image showed him in all his terrifying glory, yellow lenses covering his eyes as part of his mask and a dark green bodysuit that was so tight that it appeared like it could actually be part of his skin, but Gwen knew that beneath that strong material that only appeared to be fabric covering his body rested a surprising amount of technological tools to aid him in combat. His feet were equipped with boosters that allowed him to pounce over twenty feet in any direction within a matter of seconds (not quite as impressive as Miles' Prowler shoes, but still really annoying to fight against). His gloves were equipped with hydraulic grip-assists in the fingers to allow him to recreate the proportionate crushing power of a scorpion's pincers.

But most distinctive of all was his large trademark spiked tail that trailed behind him, hanging from the back of his lumbar region, which Gargan could control with his mind from inside his suit. Oh, and Mac had a tendency to fill the tip of that tail in nasty poisons or painful hallucinogens that he loved to inject into innocent (albeit terribly chatty) spiders. Did she already mention that she hated this guy?

Regardless, it seemed that she and Miles had nothing to discuss on the matter, so with a simple silent glance at each other that conveyed their shared determination, Miles quickly closed his laptop and tossed Gwen her other web-shooter before they each turned to ready themselves for the coming fight.

Miles POV

As Miles and Gwen landed atop the Palace Theater overlooking the center of Times Square, they could easily pick out Scorpion beneath them. This was mainly due to two particular facts. For one, the area being cordoned off meant that the usual crowds were all gone from the area, though they could see with disgust that several bodies were still laying motionless around the merciless killer. And the second reason… Well, come on. It was a grown man dressed as a giant green scorpion. It was the sort of sight that would've drawn people's attention even in the middle of Comix-Con.

However, the most concerning thing about Scorpion at the present moment was neither the bodies surrounding him nor his fashion sense, but the fact that he was just standing there, looking completely relaxed, and Miles got the sense that he was here for more than a desire to be on TV, especially with all of the press cleared out of the area.

Standing up as he faced his partner and pointed accusingly down at Scorpion, Miles pointed out, "Okay, this is a trap."

"What gave it away, the guy's nickname or the way he looks excited to be standing alone in the middle of the street?" Spider-Woman asked.

Ignoring her joke, Miles added, "This is Murdock's work, I'd bet anything. He released Rhino to draw you out before, now he's clearly done the same with Scorpion."

Shrugging in an unimpressed way, Gwen said, "Meh. I beat Spider-Man last night. After that, Gargan's not even a villain of the week, especially not when there's two of us."

"Which is probably exactly what Murdock wants us to think," Miles warned.

"Well, the police are going to start closing in on him soon, so if we're going to do this, we'd better get started and worry about the trap later," Gwen advised.

Knowing that she was right even if he didn't like the idea of them willingly walking into one of Murdock's traps, Miles yielded and said, "Alright, fine. Any suggestions?"

"Watch out for his tail and follow my lead," Gwen responded, then jumped off the edge of the building towards the ground below.

Miles watched her go, then sighed and asked himself, "¿Que esperabas, Miles? A plan? Since when has she done that?"

All the same, try as he might to be annoyed by Gwen's desire to rush into the fight with minimal preparation, he also found it rather endearing. Not unlike everything else about her. Like the glint in her eyes that he had such trouble recreating in his sketches-

Whoa, hold on there, Miles. Stop the bad guy first, then fantasize about the girl of your dreams.

As ever, it would be a difficult task, even more so now that he and Gwen were… something? But Miles had been well-trained to focus on the job at hand, and so without further ado, he jumped down after Gwen, but upon seeing that she had already engaged Scorpion in conversation on the ground, Miles decided to let her keep his attention for now and rocketed sideways in the air to land silently in a crouch a few yards behind Scorpion.

While Gwen continued talking to Scorpion, who naturally seemed to be getting more and more agitated as time went on, no doubt because he was being treated to some of Spider-Woman's natural charm, Miles began to casually walk up behind Scorpion, intending to take him down using the element of surprise. He didn't need to worry about his footsteps making sound so he didn't even have to bother with moving slowly.

The only slight issue he met in coming up behind the bug-themed villain was the man's large tail that Gwen had mentioned waving around behind him. Miles had no idea what the tail actually was, but before he'd been the Prowler, he'd been one of many civilians in the city who had watched it effortlessly crush a car on the news. It was about ten feet long and thicker than Miles' torso, and of course also had to have a giant spike sticking out the end. So Miles wasn't exactly thrilled at the idea of getting close to it, but it seemed to be little more than a fancy addition to the guy's suit, so once Gargan went down, his tail would go down, right?

Stepping up behind Gargan and quietly powering up one of his fists to send a powerful punch onto the back of Scorpion's head that would instantly knock him out, Miles used his other hand to smack the swinging tail aside as he reared back his fist for the hit.

Unfortunately, that simple move turned out to be a big mistake. As soon as Miles knocked the tip of Scorpion's tail aside, it turned back to aim directly at him like a particularly offended camera and suddenly shot a jet of some sort of green liquid at him. Miles wasn't sure exactly what it was, but he kind of doubted it was Mountain Drizzle, and so he reacted by using his shoes to launch himself backwards, barely avoiding the splash of the green liquid, which he watched as it hit the ground near Scorpion and immediately began to melt a small crater in the concrete.

"Even if that was Mountain Drizzle, I'm not sure about the carbonation count," Miles muttered to himself as the green liquid faded away.

Scorpion turned with interest to see who had angered his strangely lively prosthetic tail and smirked at Miles, asking, "Thought you could sneak up on the Scorpion, did you?"

"Okay, first of all, don't refer to yourself in the third person like that, it's really weird," Miles rebuked him, then defended, "And second, it was working just fine until your stupid tail got in the way!"

"That's its job," Gargan said with a disturbingly pleased grin.

Standing in the background and waving her arms for attention, Gwen suddenly called out, "Hey, Mac! I don't suppose we could just go back to our conversation so my partner can try that again?"

"No, I don't think so, Spider-Woman," Scorpion told her. "You see, I rotted in prison for a long time wanting to get out so I could finish you. Having two of you just means I have more to kill!"

"Or it could mean more friends, more fun?" Gwen suggested alternatively, but Scorpion responded by simply whipping his tail around and shooting another small burst of acid towards her.

Gwen did a backwards somersault to avoid the liquid, then jumped back towards Scorpion with a fist reared back while saying, "Oh, you've done it now! I'm totally un-following you on social media now!"

Apparently Gargan didn't think much of her threat, however, as he placed his large tail in front of himself to block Gwen's attack, and when Gwen was forced to dodge sideways midair to avoid getting impaled on his poisonous spike, the tail flew after her and smacked her aside, knocking her over towards a street food vendor stand, which collapsed under her momentum.

Angered by seeing Scorpion hurt his… friend or whatever Gwen was to him now, Miles thrust his hands out to his sides, extending all of his claws with a snapping sound that instantly got Gargan's attention, then began to run quickly towards the supervillain fearlessly.

As Miles was quickly determining to be his style, Scorpion placed his tail in front of himself once more to defend himself, sending the stabby end flying over his back and straight towards Miles at high speed. However, Miles' reflexes were fast enough to counter this particular move, and he stabbed his claws into the tail's metal casing as he grabbed it with both hands just before it could reach his chest.

Sadly, Scorpion was also capable of adapting quickly, and while Miles was still holding onto the tail, Gargan caused the tail to rise into the air, pulling Miles off his feet, then slammed it suddenly and forcefully back down to the ground, crushing Miles beneath the tail's considerable weight. Grunting in pain as he was flattened against the ground, Miles felt and saw the tip of the tail begin to rise up again above him, but he held on tight to keep it from going anywhere. When the tail realized that it couldn't escape Miles' super-strong grip, it directed its spike downwards and tried to stab him in the face, but Miles dodged it at the last second and instead forced the spike to stab itself into the ground next to him, then held it there where it couldn't do any more damage.

Climbing back to his feet while carefully continuing to hold the tail down, Miles looked back towards Gargan himself, who was currently once again occupied fighting Spider-Woman, using his surprisingly-quick hands and armored body to combat her while he couldn't rely on his tail, which continued to struggle in Miles' hands like it had a mind of its own.

Having an idea, Miles called out, "Spider-Woman!" Gwen looked his way in the middle of flipping over Scorpion's head to avoid getting grabbed by him, and Miles gestured with his head towards the straining tail beneath his hands.

Understanding instantly, Gwen dodged further away from Scorpion to buy herself a moment, then turned and fired webbing from both wrists to restrain the tail on the ground.

Knowing that her webs would only buy him a moment, Miles immediately released the tail and instead used his shoes to launch himself towards Gargan, who didn't even have time to turn to face the blur that was Miles before the younger man's gauntleted fist slammed into the side of his face so hard that Miles felt his jaw dislocate beneath it before Gargan was launched into the air, pulling his tail along behind him.

Scorpion crashed through the window of a nearby building, and was clearly dazed when he managed to get back to his feet, grabbing his hanging jaw with one hand to examine the damage before he glared back out at Miles, who was approaching slowly with narrowed eyes. Scorpion pulled his jaw back in place with an audible cracking sound that Miles could hear from several yards away, then demanded, "How dare you strike me? Do you have any idea who I am, you second-rate vigilante?"

"Some guy who's got a bad fashion sense, way too much pride for someone dressed as a bug, and judging by the size of his tail, is absolutely compensating for something," Miles responded easily.

Snarling, Gargan exclaimed, "I'll kill you!"

As Gwen stepped up to Miles' side, Miles extended one hand and gave Gargan a "come here" gesture, and responded, "Bring it on, then. I hear some scorpions lose their tails when they're attacked, and I'm eager to make you one of them."

Miles' voice modulator made this threat sound extra intimidating, which was apparently enough to snap Gargan back to his senses, as he looked back and forth between Miles and Gwen and seemed to finally realize how incredibly outmatched he was. Scorpion then began to look around himself, trying and failing to be discreet as he tried to map out an escape route.

Warning him not to try anything, Gwen told him, "You're going back to prison, Mac. There's no way you walk away from this."

Despite Gwen's discouraging words, however, Scorpion was apparently too desperate to come quietly, and shot one final spray of acid out the shattered window, making Miles and Gwen dodge to either side to avoid it. While they did this, Gargan took his short opening and jumped back outside himself, then tried to jump upwards along the wall behind him, clearly hoping to slip away to freedom.

Unfortunately for him, Miles' shoes allowed him to get around much faster, and he launched upwards right behind Scorpion and grabbed him by the throat, pulling him close to growl at him, "Pathetic." He then spun around in midair and tossed Scorpion back to the ground, where he landed in a heap.

Then, as Miles landed back on the ground behind him and began to approach the trapped supervillain, Scorpion's tail suddenly shot out to try to stab him. Miles caught the tail with one hand, stabbing his claws once more into the metal shell, then tugged hard on it to pull Scorpion roughly towards him. Gargan flew towards Prowler in the air only to be met with a powerful gauntleted backhand across the face that knocked him away yet again.

Then, as Scorpion still didn't appear quite thoroughly beaten, Miles held onto the end of his tail tightly and looked back at Gwen to ask, "Spider-Woman? You ever play baseball?"

Quickly understanding the plan, Gwen nodded and took a few extra steps back to get some distance. Once he had deemed that she'd gone far enough for their purposes, Miles powered up his gauntlets and began to spin around, pulling Gargan along as he went and twisting the Scorpion bodily around in a wide circle. Miles turned all the way around once, twice, three times before he finally let go of Scorpion to throw him directly at Gwen, who met him with a punch to the gut that made Gargan fold inwards and sent him flying across the street ten feet over Miles' head, where he crashed mightily on the pavement and stayed there.

Throwing her arms up in celebration, Gwen exclaimed, "Aaaand it's out of the park!"

Miles chuckled at Gwen's joke and called over to her, "Is that it? Are we done here?"

Right on cue, a voice Miles had only recently learned to recognize and dislike called out from behind him, "Actually, I'm afraid that your toil here is just getting started."

Sighing in annoyance, Miles turned around to look up at the speaker, Spider-Man, who was relaxedly reclining on the top step of the iconic Red Stairs, his arms folded across his chest as he looked down on them, and said, "Really? Did you just say 'toil'? Would it kill you to talk like a normal person and say 'work'?"

"I am anything but a 'normal person', Mr. Morales," Spider-Man responded as Gwen walked over to stand at Miles' side. "And furthermore, I am here with yet another rather extraordinary individual."

Just then, there was the sound of metal against metal behind them, and Miles and Gwen both looked towards the source of the noise to see Miles' Uncle Aaron in his Prowler suit landing on top of a metal advertising stand, posed in a low crouch with one arm on his lap and the other hand cutting large gashes in the side of the stand beneath him while he glared at them menacingly.

However, as intimidating as Aaron was clearly trying to be, Miles thought he might have overdone it a bit, as the advertisement beneath Aaron was for a horror movie and read "The scariest thing you've ever seen!"

So dramatic, Miles mentally rebuked his uncle with exasperation. However, he didn't get the chance to actually say anything about it out loud before Gwen cut him off as she looked back and forth between Spider-Man and Aaron.

Slapping her palms to the sides of her face and letting out a very melodramatically over-exaggerated fake gasp, Gwen exclaimed, "A trap! Oh, goodness gracious, not a trap! We've been duped! Hornswoggled! Bamboozled! This is completely unexpected! Prowler, did you know that this was a trap?!"

"Please stop," Miles begged her.

"Just trying to make them feel better about themselves," Gwen excused herself, then took up a defensive stance facing Spider-Man, letting Miles focus on his uncle.

"That isn't necessary, Ms. Stacy," Spider-Man told Gwen with a smug tone in his voice. "I already feel quite good about myself at the moment. You see, it was through my insightful genius that you have been lured here, the both of you, out in the open, in the light of day, ripe for-"

"Yeah, I think we get it," Miles cut him off, not wanting to listen to another speech.

After he'd said it, he could practically feel Spider-Man's glare on his back as the older man said, "Indeed. Well, perhaps you are correct, Mr. Morales. I believe we've delayed your demise quite long enough."

Looking back over his shoulder, Miles whispered to Gwen, "Hey, assoluta. Do you know what jeté actually means in French?" He purposefully made his message cryptic just in case Uncle Aaron was using his mask to listen to them even from this distance, but fortunately Gwen caught on quickly and nodded as she bent her knees slightly in preparation.

Their timing couldn't have been better, as immediately after they made the plan, Spider-Man stood up abruptly and pounced towards Gwen. However, just before he reached her, Miles grabbed Gwen's wrist and spun her around in a circle before forcefully tossing her up at Spider-Man, who barely had time to widen his eyes in shock before his heroic counterpart crashed into him and launched both of them back over onto the Red Stairs, where Spider-Man crashed and flattened several of the steps before he began needing to defend himself from further attacks from Gwen.

Meanwhile, already knowing what his uncle's opening move would be, Miles jumped straight upwards to avoid getting grabbed by a dashing Aaron, then landed right behind the taller Prowler and punched him in the back to knock him away before he could process that he'd been outmaneuvered.

Unfortunately, though his attack knocked Aaron down, Miles' uncle was back on his feet in an instant and sped back towards Miles, who was forced to meet him in the middle as they both raised their fists to hit one another, but each managed to catch the other's attack at the same time, trapping them in a combat lock as they each struggled against superpowered strength equal to their own.

As this was happening, Aaron looked up to meet his nephew's eyes and told him, "Miles, this is crazy!"

Tilting his head at his uncle with disbelief, Miles asked, "Oh, this is the crazy part? Because you just sent a serial killer in a scorpion costume after me. But yeah, clearly I'm the one acting crazy."

"You got no idea what the Kingpin can do to you, what he's willing to do!" the older Prowler tried to convince the younger one. "What's your plan? Deliver the most successful lawyer in the city to the cops? Put him in front of a court? You honestly think a trial could go against him?"

"Do you honestly see anything else I can do?" Miles asked. "Murdock is worse than every other bad guy I've taken down, yet exactly the same, a plague on this city. And so long as a single person needs the kind of help that I can offer, I'm gonna give it to 'em."

"Then I'm gonna give you this!" Aaron announced, finally pushing away from Miles, then quickly following up with a powerful punch to his momentarily undefended chest, knocking Miles back across the street, where he was forced to stop himself by impaling his claws into the asphalt beneath him, leaving long scars in the road to slow down his momentum.

Still catching his breath while down on one knee, Miles raised his head again to look up at Aaron as he approached with his arms spread as he demanded, "Can't you see that I'm trying to save you, man?"

Slowly getting back to his feet, Miles responded, "Can't you see that I'm trying to save everyone else?"

"What, do you think you're some kind of hero now?!" Uncle Aaron demanded angrily.

Retracting his mask for a moment to wipe blood from the corner of his mouth, Miles glared at his former idol and responded, "I thought you were."

"Don't you remember what happened to your dad?" Aaron asked. "Heroes die, Miles! Stop trying to be something you're not, before you get yourself killed like he did! I thought I taught you this!"

Miles narrowed his eyes at his uncle and put his mask back on before saying, "You taught me to be better than you. I was just a better student than you were a mentor."

At that, Aaron finally seemed to lose all control and stopped trying to reason with Miles, instead just letting out a yell while he thrust out his prosthetic arm towards him. Faster than Miles could react, the hand separated from the arm and launched towards Miles with a thin cable trailing behind it, then grabbed the front of Miles' shirt when it reached him.

Miles tried to quickly cut the wire, but Aaron acted faster, reeling in the cable to pull Miles towards him, then lifted his nephew off his feet and threw him backwards, making him land hard on the ground a moment before Gwen landed right next to him, looking equally roughed-up as she landed on her back with a groan.

Looking at her, Miles greeted, "How's it going? You get thrown here often?"

Sitting up and rubbing her sore backside, Gwen answered, "Surprisingly so, and to be honest? It's not going the best. I don't think Spider-Man liked my suggestion that he should change his name to 'Burgundy Bug-Eye.'"

"Yeah, I would've thrown you too if I heard that, that's a terrible name," Miles admitted.

Turning to look at him, Gwen defended herself, "It was improv! I can come up with something better!"

"Maybe just leave it as Spider-Man for now," Miles suggested instead.

Sighing, Gwen gave in and said, "Fine. But I need some new material if we're gonna keep doing this, 'cause I'm running out of quips."

Shrugging, Miles pointed out, "We could always switch dance partners."

Gwen thought about it for a second, then said, then said, "Alright, why not? I haven't fought the Prowler in a while, could be fun."

And with that decision made, Gwen rolled backwards and launched upwards in a handstand that carried her towards Aaron, who had been approaching them menacingly but now stopped as he unexpectedly began to fight Spider-Woman rather than the other Prowler.

Sadly, Miles may not have thought this plan through very well, because while Gwen was engaged in combat with his uncle, that left Miles with the task of dealing with Spider-Man. Terrific. Still, not one to shy away from a challenge, Miles simply squared his shoulders and turned towards Spider-Man before launching towards him.

However, to Miles' great confusion, Spider-Man simply flipped over his charge, letting Miles pass beneath him harmlessly. Then, as he landed back on the ground and continued approaching Gwen without giving Miles a second glance, Spider-Man commented, "One side, Mr. Morales. You are not worthy of my time or attention. Indeed, you are entirely beneath me."

Insulted by this claim and also determined to keep Gwen from ending up fighting both of these supervillains at once, Miles quickly thought up the first clever retort to come to his mind and called after him, "Racist!"

Upon hearing that, Spider-Man abruptly stopped in his tracks and turned around to glare at Miles, asking, "I beg your pardon?"

Not entirely on board with what he had just said but knowing that he now had to run with it, Miles repeated, "You heard me. You're racist. I bet that under that mask is a privileged white dude, that's why you're talking down on me."

Appearing thunderstruck at this claim, Spider-Man reared back from Miles in shock and argued, "I would never- Well, yes, I am white… Caucasian, I mean- It doesn't matter! How dare you suggest- Just because I-"

"Let me guess, you have black friends?" Miles asked with an unimpressed voice, slowly gaining confidence in this ridiculous plan that miraculously seemed to be working. "I bet you don't even speak Spanish."

"Extraneous!" Spider-Man cried furiously. "I speak several languages! Greek! French! Japanese! Italian! I'm also pretty good with German!"

Barely able to hope, Miles prompted, "But no Spanish?"

Spider-Man hesitated for a moment, then shifted uneasily and quietly admitted, "I- I am not fluent, I admit…"

"Then you're racist," Miles reaffirmed with finality.

Pointing an angrily-shaking finger at Miles, Spider-Man objected, "That doesn't even make any sense! Your argument is invalid! Illogical! Baseless!"

"That's exactly what a racist person would say," Miles pointed out.

Finally letting out a yell of rage, Spider-Man seemed to forget all about Gwen as he jumped towards Miles while announcing, "Enough! I will silence your preposterous lies, you impudent whelp!"

"Yeah, a demonstration of racial violence will prove me wrong!" Miles called back to further enrage Spider-Man as he powered up his gauntlets and prepared to meet him.

Gwen POV

Gwen could vaguely hear Miles and Spider-Man's version of a fight across the street, which seemed to consist of something along the lines of seeing how many languages Spider-Man could list. Maybe Miles challenged him to a "trial by trivia" or something, she didn't know. Nor did she believe that she would get the opportunity to join in, or even find out exactly what they were really doing, because she was currently preoccupied with fighting Miles' uncle, who seemed very eager to kill her.

Unfortunately for him, Gwen's Spider-Sense worked around him whereas it didn't with Miles, and though he could sometimes move too fast for her to react to her senses, her experiences fighting Miles and Spider-Man had given her an incentive to hone her reflexes with this particular skill. So long as her other senses worked along with her Spider-Sense (which is to say that she could see and hear Aaron as well as sense his attacks), the purple-clad man was having a difficult time hitting her.

Even more unfortunately for him, if he couldn't hit her, he stood absolutely no chance of shutting her up.

Doing a powerful handspring to stick to the side of a wall out of reach of Prowler's fists, Gwen commented, "You know, you and Miles sharing a name is really difficult for me sometimes. You know, it just gets awkward to say 'Prowler' and then have to specify which one I'm talking about. Do you think you could change your name? I suggested the same thing to Spider-Man. Maybe you could also change the costume to match? If it helps, I loved your chauffeur outfit on Homecoming night. Maybe you could start there and see where it goes? Just try to tell me that 'the Chaperone' isn't a scary nickname."

With a low grunt of mixed exertion and annoyance, Aaron leapt up towards the wall where Gwen was and smashed his fist into it, the spider-themed heroine just barely managing to get out of the way before Prowler obliterated the place she'd been a moment before.

However, she didn't get far, and Aaron swiftly pulled his fist out of the wall and switched targets to jump towards Gwen once again while she was in midair, grabbing her by the throat with his prosthetic arm as he pulled her back down to the ground with him. Gwen placed both hands on Aaron's offending wrist and tried to pull him off of her, but his grip proved immovable. Changing her method of escape, Gwen instead raised one fist and punched Aaron's arm in the side to make him loosen his grip, but he once again didn't budge and simply continued to glare mercilessly into Gwen's eyes.

Clearly, whatever Aaron's prosthetic was made of was tough, and Gwen waved her sore hand to try to bring some of the feeling back into it as she struggled to say, "Well… someone's clearly been eating their greens."

Aaron didn't seem amused, and merely tightened his grip on her throat further, and Gwen made one final desperate bid for freedom, raising both arms and bringing them down hard on Aaron's arm right inside the elbow. This finally seemed to do something, not making him release her, but bending the arm just enough that Gwen was able to plant one foot on Aaron's knee to push herself away from him, jumping several yards away before rolling to a landing on her feet before rubbing her throat tenderly and looking towards Aaron as she said, "You might want to watch where you put those hands, you could hurt someone."

Aaron didn't respond, just glared at her in silence and narrowed his eyes even more at her with intense not-niceness. Suddenly curious, Gwen asked, "Is there, like, a limit on how much your eyes can narrow at me? Like, if I get you angry enough, will you just eventually not be able to see anything anymore? That's not what happened to Murdock, is it?"

"Do you ever stop treating everything like a joke?" Aaron asked, finally speaking to her for the first time in this fight.

Completely unashamed, Gwen honestly answered, "Well, I can either be constantly joking or constantly panicking. I like the first option better."

Aaron scoffed and said, "I can't believe I ever thought you would be good for Miles. That kid's had a tough time in his life, and you don't help him. You just make things crazier for him."

Gwen hesitated for a moment upon hearing that, then asked, "You know that your nephew jumps off rooftops every night for fun, right? I think he had a taste for 'crazy' before I even met him."

"But he can do those things!" the OG Prowler protested. "And you… You put it in his head that he should be doing things he can't do! You made him think he's something real special, that he's gotta be some sort of hero!"

Shrugging, Gwen responded, "Well, if the ridiculously tricked-out sneaker fits-"

"Prowlers aren't heroes, we're survivors!" Aaron asserted. "My nephew isn't like you, he's like me! Just a little man playing big in a big world, and it's only a matter of time before he gets himself killed trying to be something he's not, trying to be like you and my stupid, selfless brother. And it's gonna happen to you too! If there's one thing that all heroes have got in common, it's that they die!"

"Then maybe that's just the legacy we choose, Prowler!" Gwen argued. The things Aaron was saying, it reminded Gwen of a similar conversation she'd had with herself in the past. She knew that the path she'd chosen was a dangerous one, but that had never stopped her pursuing it. At this point, she didn't know if she even could stop if she wanted to, but she knew the risks that came with her choice and knew that Miles did as well, and it was time for Aaron to stop thinking otherwise. "Maybe we're willing to die if it comes down to it, as long as we go out taking down one last bad guy, saving one more life. I can't stand by when people need me and I can do something about it, and neither can Miles. But that doesn't mean he's like me. He's like himself for once. He chose this path, I didn't push him into it. Like it or not, Miles is a hero. And I won't let you take that away from him."

After Gwen made that statement, there was a momentary silence during which Gwen thought she saw some of the fight go out of Prowler as he looked past her towards Miles. Perhaps Gwen had succeeded and Aaron was finally coming to grips with the fact that this was Miles' decision, and he couldn't keep redirecting the blame. It was an odd experience, to watch a parent figure in the process of realizing how much their kid was growing up, but Gwen also found it really touching, maybe even the kind of thing that could convince Aaron to stop fighting them.

Or perhaps not, as the next moment, Aaron looked towards Gwen once more and growled out, "You took my partner - my nephew - away from me."

Sighing to herself, Gwen muttered, "Well, I thought it was a good speech."

A moment later, Aaron jumped towards Gwen once more, but this time she was ready for him. The last part of her speech still stuck with her, giving her a new determination to win this fight. Miles had come a long way since his days of being just a follow-up Prowler to his uncle, and now Aaron wanted to revert that progress? No way was Gwen going to let that happen.

Aaron spread his hands to his sides as he charged towards Gwen, his claws extending with a snap while his heavy metal boots pounded against the ground, one step after the other in quick succession. He moved quickly, too quickly for any person to even follow his movements with the naked eye, but Gwen's body had the powerful ability of moving faster than her mind sometimes. Without even needing to think through her movements before she found herself performing them, Gwen flipped backwards just as Prowler attempted to pounce on her, his arms sweeping in front of himself and only managing to grab empty air.

While she was in the air, Gwen fired a line of webbing towards Prowler, and being familiar with his ability to cut her webs almost as soon as she could stick them to him, Gwen was careful to only allow the web to stick to his chest at the same moment as she landed on her feet on the ground once again, standing a few feet away from him. Then, as soon as she landed, Gwen stuck her feet in place and quickly tugged hard on the web line, yanking Aaron off his feet and towards her before his mind could even process that he'd been grabbed. The moment he reached her, Gwen thrust her free hand forward to punch Aaron away once again.

Landing on the ground painfully, Prowler nonetheless climbed back to his feet in a rush and cut the web off of himself then looked at Gwen more warily this time, letting her make the first move. More to prompt him than anything, Gwen answered Aaron's unspoken challenge by running towards him at full speed, and Aaron predictably avoided her unknown attack by jumping straight upwards into the air.

What he couldn't have known was that that had been exactly what Gwen had wanted him to do, and she shot a second web line up after him, this time to pull herself to him rather than the other way around. Seeing Gwen coming towards him, Aaron used his claws to slice this line off of himself as well, then flew slightly backwards in the air so that Gwen soared upwards right past him, placing himself out of her reach.

However, Gwen reacted to this move admirably just as well, letting herself be carried upwards, then shooting two more webs down to stick to each of Prowler's shoulders. Then, before he could cut these lines as well, Gwen pulled the webs taut and suddenly slingshotted herself back towards him to kick Aaron in the face hard enough to knock him back down towards the ground. Once Gwen had him on the floor, she quickly shot two different web lines onto Aaron's wrists and pinned him to his sides, but she didn't stop there. Remembering how he had broken free of her webbing with sheer strength in the past, Gwen continued to fire web after web onto every part of Aaron's body, tethering each one onto a different nearby surface, whether it be a wall, a mounted sign, the floor, anything she could find.

Aaron began to struggle against his bonds while Gwen was still in the process of putting them on, but Gwen acted quicker than he could and had dozens of web lines holding him in place within a matter of seconds, so many that even his gauntlets and boots seemed unable to save him.

And apparently just in time, because at that very moment, as Gwen examined her handiwork for any flaws or improvements she could make, her ears picked up the familiar sound of sirens approaching and suddenly remembered that the police were supposed to be sending in everything they had to capture Scorpion.

Whether or not they had brought enough to actually take him down (if Gargan had still been up at this point), however, Gwen didn't plan on waiting to find out, as she imagined that the cops would be only too happy to turn their extra firepower on her instead once they arrived.

With her time short, Gwen left Miles' uncle as he was, needing to forego further securing the webs holding him, and instead ran towards Miles, who was still engaged in combat with Spider-Man. Their fight had now escalated from the trivia into the usual "punching each other repeatedly" phase, and though Gwen saw that Miles was holding his own for now, it was also clear that he was struggling to do so.

Though Gwen hadn't intentionally tried to give Miles the harder job, Spider-Man certainly seemed to be a tougher opponent than Aaron was, just as quick and strong and hard to hit as Gwen was, but with none of her humor or holding back. Watching the fight, it was clear that it was all Miles could do to keep up with the older man, and though he actually managed to get in a few of his own hits, Gwen figured that he would soon tire from this fight and make a mistake, which would be all Spider-Man would need to finish him.

Fortunately, he was no longer fighting alone. As Gwen ran up behind Spider-Man, Miles must've seen her coming, because he set her up for an attack by dashing towards Spider-Man and jumping towards his midsection like he wanted to grab the villain around the waist.

When Spider-Man jumped upwards to avoid it, however, a web line suddenly appeared on either side of him, shooting over his shoulders, and he looked around just in time to receive a kick to the face from Gwen that knocked him across Broadway and into the side of a building, where Gwen began to punch him repeatedly into the wall to keep him in place for a second while Miles made the next move. And Miles did so admirably, thinking quickly and jumping towards the enormous advertising screen above Spider-Man instead of at Spider-Man himself.

While Gwen kept Spider-Man momentarily distracted, Miles jumped behind the screen and began to use his claws to tear off supports around it, then planted his feet firmly against the wall and used his gauntlet-enhanced strength to slowly begin to pry the entire screen off the side of the building.

With a mighty groan of metal, the screen began to tilt forward, an electrically-powered box about half the size of Gwen's entire apartment building, the spectacle of which made Gwen pause just long enough for Spider-Man to suddenly smack her away from him, gleefully telling her, "Foolish girl! You think that you can best me? You cannot even fathom the transience of your miniscule triumph!"

Shrugging, Gwen responded, "Yeah, but I only have to do so much. In my experience, New York does a pretty good job squashing spiders on its own."

Upon hearing that, Spider-Man squinted at her and asked, "What is that supposed to mean?"

Gwen innocently pointed upwards with one finger, and Spider-Man followed her prompting to look in shock at the enormous screen right above him, like he was really just a regular spider about to be crushed beneath the shadow of a giant boot, albeit one that ironically had a picture of a winking Tony Stark on the bottom saying "The future's gonna hit you so hard, you won't know what happened!"

Spider-Man did his best to run out of the way before the screen could fall on him, but it was simply too wide, and a moment later, Spider-Man was crushed beneath several thousand pounds of metal and glass.

Right behind it, Miles jumped down and landed on top of the wreckage, then looked around and announced, "Well, I think that's our pest problem handled."

Smirking, Gwen responded, "Annoying as he was, I hope he's not dead under there. But the police are nearly here, so we should probably get going."

Miles gave her a nod of acknowledgement and jumped back upwards to begin running up the wall, Gwen shooting a web to follow right behind him. As they left the scene, however, neither of them noticed the other Prowler slip out from around the corner of the Red Stairs, newly freed from his web prison, and rush over to the fallen advertisement screen before he impaled his claws into the side and began to tear his way into it.

Line Break

Spider-Man POV

Glaring down at the screen that he had just recently nearly been flattened by from where he stood on top of a building overlooking Times Square, Spider-Man growled out, "And that's the second time Tony Stark had tried to bury me."

Behind him, he could hear Prowler speaking with Mr. Murdock over his earpiece, giving the report on their mission, but Spider-Man couldn't really bring himself to care at the moment. He was currently caught up in his feelings of rage, unwilling to accept that they had lost their quarry… again. Even more embarrassing, they'd nearly been caught by the police after those two teenage vigilantes had left both himself and Prowler trapped.

Unfortunately, Spider-Man had a tendency to forget that despite all his strength, even he was not invincible, and this negligence got him in trouble on occasion. A prime example of this was what had just happened. He'd had no hope of digging himself out from under that screen, not when it took all his strength just to keep it from falling down the extra foot it would take to kill him. And if the police had reached him before Prowler had… Oh, the horror! Even with all his powers, he would've been helpless against their numbers and firepower, specially ameliorated by his own choice to free Scorpion.

They could've easily hit him with a tasing dart or similarly powerful tranquilizer, which they surely would've had on hand to combat Gargan unless they were truly, completely incompetent, and then… He would've been arrested. Unmasked. Revealed. Taken away to the Raft like some common criminal, and no doubt placed under security that would require him to rely on Matt's assistance to escape, waiting for a savior amongst Spider-Woman's other disgraced, fallen enemies.

No. That simply could not be allowed to happen. He was one of the most brilliant minds on the planet! He was above these errors he continually seemed to make! How could it be that after all he had accomplished in life, he kept being outwitted by a pair of teenagers?

Suddenly, the obvious answer made itself known to him. How could he have been so foolish? So hasty to make assumptions? It wasn't his fault that he had been overpowered today. It was Prowler's.

As though he'd heard his name mentioned in Spider-Man's mind, Prowler chose that very moment to speak up, ending the call over his headset and telling Spider-Man, "Well, that's it. The Kingpin confirmed it. The mission was a bust."

Glaring at the slightly taller man over his shoulder, Spider-Man questioned, "And whose fault is that, Mr. Davis?"

There was a small silence, then Prowler began to say, "If you're trying to imply that this was my fault-"

"That's precisely what I'm saying!" Spider-Man cut him off, turning around to get right in Davis's face. He then poked the man in the chest, right in the center of that ridiculous, meaningless symbol on his chest, and continued, "You halfwitted, vacuous, miserable excuse for a super-criminal! I decided not to bring any more soldiers this time because I felt that they would only get in the way! But when you insisted once more on accompanying me, I permitted it as a gesture of goodwill! And you did nothing! Less than nothing!"

"Is that what you think?" Prowler asked, folding his arms across his chest and looking completely unaffected by what Spider-Man said.

Standing by his point, Spider-Man persisted, "It is what I know to be true, you dolt! You made me lower my guard in the midst of a fight by making me think I wasn't alone, but I most certainly was! And why? Because you allowed yourself to be beaten, leaving me to bear both of our burdens by myself!"

"Speaking of bearing each other's burdens, I didn't hear you complaining when I dug you out from under several tons of metal," Prowler reminded him.

However, Spider-Man just waved the comment off and said, "Oh, I don't deny that you have your uses. But you're all brawn and no brains, Davis. So how about this? Next time, you stay back and try to learn something, maybe read a book for once in your life if you can even recognize one, and I'll call you if I need you to punch something."

By the end of that request, Prowler looked like he would very much like to punch something, but he just looked down and took a deep breath (clearly smarter than he seemed if he knew better than to pick a fight with Spider-Man in a place that Murdock couldn't save him), then said, "Alright, whatever, Doc. Right now isn't the time for this. Right now, we need to focus on finding those two kids, because I'm not going back to Murdock empty handed again."

"The ignorance of childish minds never ceases to amuse," Spider-Man taunted with a smirk, then raised one wrist towards Prowler. Out of the projector on his vambrace, a hologram appeared featuring a map of part of the city, along with one bright red dot moving across the rooftops. As Davis examined the map with confusion, Spider-Man then explained, "I set one of my spider-bots on a nearby rooftop, programmed with the order to follow Spider-Woman and the other Prowler if they somehow escaped again."

Suddenly, an unfamiliar voice to Spider-Man's left spoke, saying, "Ah, so you know where they are? Man in red, I could kiss you."

Turning to look at the speaker, Spider-Man and Prowler were both surprised to see Mac Gargan, AKA the Scorpion, standing on the rooftop next to them, his spiked tail hanging over his back as he looked at the red dot in Spider-Man's hologram hungrily.

Rather possessive of his inventions, Spider-Man quickly deactivated the hologram to keep it away from Scorpion's prying eyes as he greeted the man, "Gargan. I thought you were still unconscious on the ground."

"Well, when I saw two people who seem to hate those kids as much as I do, I knew we had to talk," Gargan responded with an unsettling smirk. "So here's my proposal. Me and you, I think we should team up. Work together to get Spider-Woman off the board permanently, and her new boyfriend too. What do you say?"

Spider-Man remained frozen in silence for a moment. He may have committed certain… questionable acts in his time, but he was still a man with standards, and Scorpion was just a basic superpowered thief, a mere career criminal, and an unprincipled killer, all characteristics that Spider-Man refused to tolerate.

Turning away from the man in disgust, Spider-Man began to walk away while informing him, "No, I don't think so, Gargan. We have everything we need. Now, enjoy your freedom, I suppose you've earned it, and let us both pray we never cross paths again. Prowler, let's go."

Spider-Man heard Prowler turn away from Gargan as well, obediently following after him, but then his Spider-Sense erupted with warning in his head, and Spider-man ducked sideways just in time to dodge a quick surprise stabbing attempt from Scorpion's tail as the green-costumed man yelled out, "Where do you think you're going? No one refuses the Scorpion!"

Immediately going into combat mode after Gargan's attempt on his life, Spider-Man spun around furiously and shot a web onto the murderer's chest before pulling him in close and grabbing Gargan by the throat, lifting him off his feet with one hand. As Spider-Man squeezed Scorpion's throat tightly, Gargan thrashed against his grip and struggled to draw in air, and Spider-Man's Spider-Sense tingled once again as the man's tail flew upwards to try to stab him in the shoulder.

However, just before it could reach him, Spider-Man's hand shot out and caught it around the edges of the stinger and forcefully tugged it further forwards before stabbing it into Scorpion's gut. As he was impaled by his own weapon, Scorpion's eyes widened and he grunted with shock and horror, but he didn't manage to say anything as Spider-Man pulled him back down to his level and muttered in his ear, "Evidently, I do, Mr. Gargan. You should've taken your freedom when you had the chance."

He then shot one final burst of webbing to hold the poisoned stinger deep inside Gargan's stomach before throwing him unceremoniously off the side of the building, then carelessly turned once again to leave. Ignoring the way that Prowler watched the supervillain fall with a look almost like pity, Spider-Man announced, "The police can have the body, they worked hard to gather the resources to capture him. Now, Mr. Davis, I will follow the trail of my spider-bot while you return to the Kingpin and ready the cells for when I come back, for I will return bearing fruit. These upstart children, they think that they're so smart, but they will soon be humbled by my incomprehensible might and unmatchable intellect! And if it comes to it, I will leave them both in the same state as poor Mr. Gargan, because they will not go unscathed against me any longer!"

And with that firm declaration, Spider-Man jumped away from the area with determination in his heart, leaving Prowler behind as he set out to seek his enemies.