PART 1 - Chapter 10 - Write your own story
Where a spider has to deal with misunderstandings, mistakes and misdeeds.
'Did you know, Gotham City's subway trains can reach speeds of up to 55 mph?'
Spider-Man sped on top of the carts of the P-Line Train, the one that crossed near downtown and had Alan Wayne Museum in the vicinity of its route.
'Now, you have a self-propelling object that is running on top of the train, let's say a man with the ability to stick to the ground so that he is not flung away by the wind, at around seventy miles per hour himself.'
At the right moment, near Jefferson Street and Fifth, the (currently) black and yellow hero jumped out of the moving vehicle.
'A perpendicular web line makes the jumping man take a diagonal pendulum trajectory on the Z-axis, the speed will be around…', the costumed hero let go of the line, shooting upwards before he could get tangled into a nearby flagpole. 'A hundred and forty three miles per hour, give it or take, depending on the wind factors, but enough to…'
Three old looking cars, one orange, another black and the third one blue, were speeding off, away from the Museum and at the opposite direction the Spider-themed hero was going
'Completely miss the mark', he felt like facepalm, as he could also see a couple of police cars still at a distance.
"Remember, don't try this at home, kids!", Spider-Man yelled, as he spun upside down and backwards in mid-air, aimed web shots at buildings at opposite sites of Jefferson Street, the lines stretching as much as he could make them, his body stopping right between the patrol cars.
The heavy weight Lieutenant could only stare in shock, as a black-and-yellow vigilante suddenly appeared right next to his window and quickly yelled, "Hey Bullock! Bye, Bullock!"
The hero was propelled backwards, by his improvised slingshot, both police cars swerving to the sides as the drivers avoided causing any crashes.
"Who was that?!", yelled his current partner, Torres, regaining control.
"I would recognize that annoying voice anywhere, that was Spider-Man! Follow that guy!", yelled Bullock to the driver, then picked up the radio. "You too, follow that guy!"
"You think he knows where the thieves are going, sir?", asked Torres, as Harvey Bullock slammed the car's radio back on its hook. Bullock slowly stared at the Officer, who swallowed and muttered: "Following Spider-Man, yes, sir."
Bullock stared back at the 'flying' vigilante, fuming.
Ever since that video where Spider-Man had made a fool out of him had gone viral, Bullock had been dealing with all sorts of commentaries and reprobation, from the City Hall to Parent-Teachers Associations. Even Commissioner Gordon, after pressure from Mayor Hady's office, put the Lieutenant on compulsory Anger Management sessions!
'ANGER ISSUES!? I don't have F#$ temper tantrums! I'm just SO SICK OF THAT-'
'I just sensed something, a… presence I have not felt since... JJ. So weird.'
The three cars turned in the same direction, speeding off one behind the other.
'Lucky, they probably don't know I'm right behind them, so I'll follow these cars and they'll get me straight to their boss!'
"Repeat that again."
"It's just what I said, O.", Batgirl informed, as she propelled herself between roofs, keeping the cars in sight while still cloaked by Gotham's skyline. "Someone, matching Spider-Man's MO, is after the cars, and they are none the wiser to him tailing them."
Oracle went quiet for a second, just to process this information. "That… I mean, they must be the most oblivious museum thieves ever, or they know they are being followed."
"I'd bet it's the second. So, they are not going to their boss any time soon."
"Obviously, they are most likely taking Spider-Man into a trap, and our profile shows that Spider-Man doesn't look like the kind of guy who would fall for such a trick."
"So he probably knows he is being spotted", Batgirl concluded. "Makes sense, smart guy. The thieves will take him to some other place instead of their meeting point, and Spider-Man is confident he can take them on for the loot and information."
"It's what makes the most sense. Your call, Steph."
"I'll keep up the pursuit. Spider-Man may need reinforcements, or maybe I can pick up whatever he doesn't from the goons."
Moments earlier
Three blinking dots showed up on a map in his monitor. The operation had been a success, the cops could not match the speed of the runway cars at the route he had picked for his hired men.
"There is a guy behind us!", came the voice of the driver of the last car, the blue one.
"What?!", asked the man who had organized the heist.
"A guy! Behind us! He has ropes and is following us!"
"Ropes? Like the Bats?", asked the black car's driver, the second one, in worry.
What was happening, his estimates had been clear, the most probable chance of one of the vigilantes interfering would be an hour later. This did not match the predictions!
"I have no idea! You are not supposed to see the Bats before they get you, right?", wondered the blue car's driver.
"Right."
"So what does that mean?"
"It means he is toying with us!", came the voice of the orange car's driver, their field leader.
"What do ya mean?"
"Think about it, Batman and his people would probably follow us all shadowy-like, right? Why?"
"Don't know, to stop us?"
"Dumbass, they would follow us in secret to wait for us to get to the hideout.", the blue car's driver understood the situation.
"Exactly!", came the field leader's voice. "Which means this guy is probably after us, not the boss."
"Oh, I get it! The Bats are tough enough to deal with us ninja style, middle of the night, taking us out one by one, but this guy is probably a newbie!"
'That… makes sense', the mastermind concurred. If this was a new vigilante, he would not be ready to deal with a large group of men. This was it! It was his chance to make it to the Big League!
"New orders, come straight to the hideout, we'll set up a trap for this 'hero'."
"Yes, Boss!"
Spider-Man finally perched on top of the side of a building.
"Well, there is some bad guy's stuff going down, most certainly."
He had been following the three cars across the Narrows, bordering Arkham District, a turn at a bridge under path, then somewhere he was almost sure had to be Gotham's Industrial Sector. The building he used to check on the thieves' hideout was an old chemical factory, the whole area smelled of copper and acid, the partially destroyed billboard several feet away still could be read.
ACE.
'This place actually looks deserted', he wondered. 'Could be a great secondary base - no, focus, Parker. Bad guys to arrest first, leaving this Earth second.'
'Or maybe third, second could still be creating more advanced tech to take back home. Maybe something new to develop myself and actually start my own business like Ted - Focus!'
Around six men left the vehicles behind, carrying bags with them to the annex of the Chemical Plant Complex, the place that smelled the least worse by Peter's supersensory standards.
Using some of the large pipes that connected the main building to its distribution centers, Spider-Man crawled towards the building, keeping an eye on any lookouts.
'Nice and easy, it's just half a dozen thieves, no reason to worry.'
"You are sure he is coming?"
"Pretty much, boss."
"Oh, that is perfect! A new vigilante to clash wits against in my debut!", the leader of the operation fixed his fedora. "Meanwhile, show me the result of our enterprise!"
Some old machinery and rusty equipment had to be moved to create enough space for a temporary headquarters, as the leader and the boss of the operation kept computers and radio equipment to keep the operations on track.
The largest man of the arrivals carried two special suitcases, while the rest had one each.
All of these 'luggage' were laid on a large cheap foldable table that had been set at the meeting point. Seven suitcases had several golden artifacts, silvery weaponry and a number of jewels that at one point in time had been stolen by some historical figure.
The last suitcase, the one with the most protection, revealed a clear case containing a book.
"Yes! It is here! It is finally mine!", the villain cheered, brushing a hand on top of the protective layer, his face gaining a creepy expression that actually disturbed some of his hired forces. "One of Gutenberg's incomplete Bible…"
"A… Bible?", asked the leader of his hired men, the one called… Tom. If he recalled it correctly.
"Not any Bible. One of the first editions of the first printed book ever."
"So, a really old book?", said the second in command of the hired men - Phil, maybe that was his name.
"Fool! Johannes Gutenberg started the Printing Revolution in 1440s with his modern printing process, by means of a completely new machine and ink that he developed himself! Gutenberg printed 180 copies of the Bible in Latin in the next two decades! This is one of the incomplete copies, made out of velum and still bound. It's historical value is… incalculable!"
"He means it is old and valuable, morons", the leader, Tom, took charge again. "Everything we took from the Museum was valuable, that is just his share, as per agreement."
"And what a share! Donated by Thomas Wayne as part of his will, The Incomplete Gutenberg Bible of Gotham City, brought to the United States by Kenneth Wayne prior to World War I, just before the Prussian Army had destroyed its former home during the First Battle of the Marne.", their boss fixed his large lens glasses. "This… is so much more than a book… this is History! This is Humanity's heirloom, so much more important than jeweled combs and shiny blades."
"Hm. Say, Boss, would you say this Bible… is more valuable than the rest of the loot?", asked Tom, in a serious tone.
"Indubitably so!", and, after these words, the man in tan fedora and coat suddenly realized the quietness that befell around him. The armed goons that he had hired and called to Gotham started to look at one another, they were almost twenty and he… was only one. "Oh my. I mean, more valuable in… err… the historical sense."
Tom, who was a rather imposing man, stood next to the rather small 'boss'. "And tell me, 'sir', how much would people pay for the Incomplete Gutenberg Bible of Gotham City? In the historical sense?"
The shorter man pulled on his tie, nervously. "Err… hmm… a couple of millions? Given its state and history, maybe… around…"
"Yes?", Tom drawled on the word.
"... around twenty?"
Tom's smile was anything but amicable.
"I believe, 'sir', I speak for all of my men when I say that our services are being far, far underpaid, for such a job."
All around the former 'boss', many dangerous men collectively realized that things had taken a turn to a more profitable direction.
The man in tan hat and coat barely spoke his next word: "... help?"
Tom took a step forward, before a foot smashed from above and into his face.
"He said the secret word!"
Minutes before
'They were waiting for me.' Spider-Man surprised one of the sentries, pulling him by the arm, the mook's surprised face clocked out by a left hook, then his whole body going limp, still held mostly up by the held arm, no noise made. 'As if it's the first time it happens.', he admired, quickly but carefully laying the man down.
They were in the rafters, easily twenty feet above the men meeting their boss.
The hero took out the men who were guarding from above first, his priority targets every time he had to go into places in stealth mode first.
A yellow and black projectile barely seen, he pushed against metal bars and propelled himself just above the hanging lights, either drop-kicking his oblivious opponents or landing just behind them and silently taking them out.
'Only four armed guys, they were undeniably unprepared. Amateurs or too full of themselves.'
"... our services are being far, far underpaid, for such a job."
Spider-Man had been webbing up the last sentry when he picked the treacherous words. 'Oh no.', Things had changed, it was no longer a 'break-in and subdue' scenario.
Now, it was time to play 'Save the Citizen'.
Or more precisely, save the bad guy from his own goons.
Spider-Man let gravity pull him, as he landed foot first on the apparent leader of the rebellion, then made his obligatory entrance quip.
Then, using the bad man's face as a launching board, he pushed it away, propelling himself backwards, while webbing and pulling away the guns of the nearest thieves and, in one fluid motion, whipped them back to their owners, the sound of plastic, metal and cartilage breaking as they impacted back on their previous owners faces.
He landed, just behind most of the rest of the group, keeping them focused on the big bright yellow target, instead of the man in fedora and coat.
"Hello, this is you delivery man, I have half a dozen orders of bodily harm. Still warm and fresh."
"Pity for you", said a man pulling out a handgun - probably the next in command. "There are way more of us than that."
'So the actual robbers were not even half the group, huh?'
"I see", Spider-Man replied, closing both fists and making knuckle popping noises. "Then I guess you guys will have to share."
Stephanie Brown, the current Batgirl, had arrived around a minute or so ago.
From a vantage point, she had watched the one whom she believed to be Spider-Man taking out the four armed watchers that had been hiding in the rafters in a quick and efficient way.
'Reminder, tell Cass her record had been utterly smashed. Along with Bruce's.'
Then, as things had turned sour below, Spider-Man let go of the ceiling and promptly took out three men in a spectacle of a backflip before even touching the ground.
'Second reminder, tell Nightwing he needs to up his game.'
Steph was not the best in martial arts - okay, she was one of the best in the world, but when one trained with the likes of Black Bat, Batman, Red Robin, Nightwing, Batwoman and even Oracle, when she pulled out the eskrima sticks that she hid on her wheelchair, one had to admit they were not at such caliber. So, she took a page out of Red Hood's book and became a martial brawler, with an emphasis on clubbing (as in, hitting really hard with her clubs) and projectile throwing and ricocheting.
And, most importantly, making fun of the opponents while doing it.
This day, she was supposed to be checking on Spider-Man's skill, but she would freely admit, she was taking notes from the guy.
Nightwing and herself were quippers. They made fun of the situation, they joked around, but Spider-Man was born to do it.
The guy who pulled the handgun fired four times, none even getting close to hitting Spider-Man, who barely moved to dodge the bullets.
"That shot was terrible! Were you a stormtrooper in a past life?", the hero declared.
A couple of goons tried their luck and fired as well, then the rest. Spider-Man started jumping back and bending his body in all sorts of ways, acting like he knew where every shot would be coming from just in time to avoid it.
"Guys, guys, if you don't stop firing ,you can't hear how much I'm making fun of your aim!"
A web-line was attached in the middle of a packed group of men, which Spider-Man used to reel himself into the middle of them.
"You guys ever played Street Fighter? It's kinda like this!"
Steph recognized the moves, but never before had seen such a combination of a crouched roundhouse kick, followed by a standing hook kick, a back push kick and a flip to dodge the new line of firing.
Five moves, three men down, and the nimble hero was already on the move.
'Capoeira. Taekwondo. Karate. Also, something like Nightwing's Gym-kata, where Spider-Man both knocked the man out by hitting him under the chin while pushing him away from stray bullets.'
"You guys need to step up your banter game, I'm carrying the whole thing myself!", a lucha-libre dropkick, then one handstand, while crushing a gun into a man's chest with a kick, the other hand webbing and disarming another. "Ok, real talk, you guys? Kinda bad at this!"
His feet barely touched the floor, then off he was, launching himself on a flying punch, while going with the rotating motion and doing a spinning hurricane kick to one man, and a spinning back kick to another.
He landed in a crouching position, legs spread and arms almost in what she thought would be a shaolin imitation, but it felt more akin to aikido, if his fingers weren't bent like claws.
'Or like spider legs.'
One of the goons, wisely, tried to run away, but got his legs tied and pulled back by a web-string. "Ooh, leaving your buddies behind, not cool!"
"So, I've beaten like sixteen of you guys in the last couple minutes and I have yet to break a sweat. My offer, surrender now, and there might even be cupcakes." They raised their guns, the shaking was evident. "Ok, you got me.", Spider-Man slowly started raising his hands. "The cupcake was a lie."
And that was when he did… something. Batgirl could not see it very well, but Spider-Man made a move and a small device was shot straight to the last men's front.
Then it exploded into a mess of webbing into all directions.
Stephanie stood back, as several web strands had gone up to the ceiling and walls of the building, the four men remained at the center, wrapped up in display in the middle of a giant sized spider web.
"Thank you for volunteering to check my brand new 'Website'. Get it? It's a little over-the-top, I know, I was totally gonna call it Web-Bomb, but, come on, 'Website', it's kinda neat, isn't it?"
"S-Stand back." The last one remaining, the 'boss' (who no longer was the boss), was holding a handgun on one hand and awkwardly hugging the Encased Bible with the other.
"Seriously?"
"I-I-I can't let you have this. You can have them all, take the rest of the stuff, I don't care, b-but, not this!"
"Who are you?"
"Y-you want to know who I-I am? I'm-I'm… I'm the one who will have all the most rare books in the World! I'm the one called The Bookworm!"
Spider-Man stood still. Even Batgirl froze up.
"Dude. Just… dude." Batgirl held her breath, as she saw Spider-Man casually walk towards The Bookworm, as if not afraid at all of the gun pointed at him.
"D-Don't come any closer! I'll shoot you! I will!"
"You won't." Spider-Man's calm reply made The Bookworm lower his arm. "You are going to sit down and wait for the police. By my calculations, they are no more than five minutes from arriving."
"ETA is four minutes", Oracle's voice came into her ears, because of course she had been watching over.
"You will be unarmed and cooperative. And you will confess everything. Everything."
The Bookworm tried raising the arm again, then just let the handgun fall down. "How do you know that?"
"Because I can see it in your eyes. You are definitely not a bad guy, are you?"
"I… I… I…", the 'boss' stammered, then finally dropped his head. "I just wanted to have an adventure."
"Hm?"
The short man went back to the table, laying the encased relic back inside the protective luggage. "I love books, you see. I love stories! That is why I became an archivist! So much to find out and collect and organize. So many adventures, and discoveries. So many stories. And… I always wanted to have my own."
"But I'm not magical, I'm not a fighter, I'm not a chosen one or special in any relevant way. The only thing I'm good at is fast reading books and remembering every word of them. Aside from that, I have always been invisible, unremarkable, unimportant, unwilling.
"To be a hero, or an anti-hero! Ah, what a dream it was, and what a dreamer I had been, 'a great dreamer of day dreams'."
"Then, one day, I realized, why could I not make myself the protagonist? Since I loved books, why not be a dashing book-stealing collector? Be a dangerous gentleman thief, like Arsène Lupin! I got to read about security, and banks, heists, and thieves! I even had my name changed, Arthur Sasassa Scarlet, a homage to my favorite author, his first story published and his most famous character's first book!"
Arthur's head fell. "But I wasn't good at stealing things. It's not like in the books. The thrill they talk about? Never had it. I never ever got a ticket in my life. But it didn't mean that I couldn't make others do the job for me."
"People don't look down on Batman's rogues, they are feared, they have powers, yes, but also intimidation! Theatrics! I got myself a look, a villain name, and then a crew of robbers from another city. All for this… and for nothing."
"In the end, I just wanted to be… less me."
Spider-Man rested a hand on the man's shoulder.
"I'm sure the Commissioner will be lenient with you, when you speak to him."
"And why would he speak to me?"
At that moment, Spider-Man's dark mask and white lenses turned upwards, straight to a spot on the ceiling, nothing different or remarkable there, except the heroine hiding herself behind a metal column.
"I just have this feeling that he is going to."
"Were you seen?", asked Oracle.
"Were you compromised?", asked another voice in Steph's ears, a male one.
"I didn't think so!", she whispered back to her own 'Bosses'.
Spider-man, smirking at the voices he could hear from above, turned back to the 'Bad Guy'-wannabe.
"Arthur, you did something incredibly stupid. But, you were also really brave in admitting it. I'm not gonna lie and tell you there won't be any repercussions, but I have faith that there will be justice for you."
"Who knows? Maybe your story is one of redemption. Get some treatment. Get some help. Trust me, this kind of life? Not worth it."
"... why are you doing this?", asked Arthur, perplexed by the hero's actions.
Spider-Man sighed, then slowly and solemnly approached Arthur's ear.
Whatever he had said, Batgirl wasn't able to pick up, but the reaction in The Bookworm's expression told her enough.
Two minutes later, Lieutenant Bullock and several other police officers came inside the annex, not finding Spider-Man, but a strangely well-dressed skinny man amongst many webbed up criminals.
"I have a confession to make to Commissioner Gordon.", he firmly declared.
To be Continued!
Author's note:
What do you think Spider-Man said? What would you have done instead?
I always loved how, in the best comic book stories, the heroes and villains are not simply fighting, but they actually have motivation, a story behind their actions, and in most cases, a tragedy.
Now, to more serious matters...
FF dot net is giving me a little trouble lately, this and all my other stories have had no view in almost a month, and I know at least a couple of people have viewed them since I still get reviews in the meantime.
I even fear that people are not getting any update notices, if you check the first chapter, the chapter selection box does no show the last two chapters, only nine out of eleven!
Anyone aware of what is going on?
Next chapter: a dinner and a show!