PART 1 - Chapter 17 - One's Stars
The fate of a spider is not for men to decide.
"You know you are smelling like the tailpipe of a car, right?", Jurgen Muntz casually asked his younger colleague.
Peter sighed. "Yes, I'm aware." He had barely arrived on time at the separate Air Force Base section that Kord Industries had transformed into a micro Cape Canaveral.
"And it is not by choice or lack of hygiene, correct?", the older voice came from above, as the Chrysalis' leading expert in aerospace engineering and astrodynamics made the last pre-flight check of the fuel tank valves.
"Wha… Why would you say that?", Peter asked in confusion.
Jurgen shrugged. "I was young once. In college, you get crazy ideas, you work on lab for seventy two hours straight, you go back to your dorm, smelling of rocket propellant and not remembering half of the experiments you done. It happens."
"That might actually have been the toxic fumes, Jurgen. Out of curiosity, you sure you had no lingering health issues after?"
"Nah, I lived the seventies and the eighties, Parker", he poked the side of his own head, "after that, my brain is already reinforced against hazardous materials."
"Jurgen, you certainly had some interesting experiences in life", Peter reckoned, checking the readings in the computer station. "The readings are green, the new fuel mixture is stable and ready to be pumped from the tanks into the main chamber."
Jurgen made a thumbs up and closed the access door to the device's inner workings. With a quick jaunt, the older man, in his early fifties, slid down the ladder and tapped his young assistant in the shoulder. "Then we are off, close everything and let's go, the automatic remote system will do the rest. Just follow me and be careful, Peter."
The younger man nodded, shutting down the hatch that hid the secondary computer system and turned to follow Jurgen, who walked on the narrow railed service structure that served as a bridge between the improvised command center and the rocket they had been working on.
Peter took a good look at the device, a thin white tube as high as a grain silo, with just a tenth of its diameter. Jurgen's masterpiece, the Lenore, a more compact and more powerful propulsion rocket than what was currently used to take space shuttles into orbit, for a fraction of the cost to build and power them.
"I know, she is beautiful.", Jurgen stated, looking back at the young man who was admiring his creation.
"Yeah, she is", Peter agreed. "And next you are going to make her smaller?"
The rocket scientist smiled, pulling a piece of silvery foil from his pocket. "This prototype is forty eight feet tall. Next phase, once we get the more efficient propellant stable enough, it will be reduced to fifteen feet to lift off the same amount of weight, by a fraction of the fuel!" Jurgen unwrapped the nicotine gum and popped it into his mouth. "More efficient burn, cleaner residues. Solar system colonization in a matter of a decade, Peter, not a century. Can you imagine it?"
"Sure do. Plans of star trekking across the Universe, Mr. Muntz?"
"No offense, Peter, but if I am to boldly go into the cosmos, I am building me a Millenium Falcon!"
Both scientists laughed as they took the long walk back to the building, carefully holding to the rails to prevent any thirty feet height fall.
"Mr Fox?", Peter asked, surprised to see the older gentleman from the Gala-Fiasco once again.
"Good morning, Mr. Parker. And hello, Mr. Muntz! The Lenore truly is a work of art!"
"Good morning to you as well, Mr. Fox. And she sure is."
"Peter, Jurgen! Everything set?", asked Ted Kord, who appeared to suddenly realize the older man's presence. "Oh, and Lucius, great timing! Parker, you remember Mr. Fox, he'll be here representing WayneTech, which is our partner in the construction of the external structure of the rocket."
"I actually wanted to ask about that", Peter spoke up. "I was wondering, instead of graphene between the layers of the outer shell, could it be replaced instead with a shock absorbing polymer?"
"It is a clever idea", Jurgen commented. "But it would increase the overall weight around the structure."
"Maybe by ten percent, but it would make it more resilient, with the added bonus of a heat dispersal that graphene could not compete with."
Lucius Fox gave one of those smiles that reminded Peter of Professor Connors. "Very astute. However, our graphene layer has been specifically produced in a grid pattern to improve both thermal conduction and stabilization."
"Oh", was Peter's short reply. 'Great one, Parker, that's what you get for talking about what you don't know.'
"But I'm surprised about the idea.", Lucius Fox commented. "I did not see your name as part of the project.", the older man turned to Ted Kord, who smirked.
"Because he wasn't, Peter only came here to help out with the fuel mixture balancing."
"I didn't have enough time to read the whole folder on the engineering development of the project, I'm sorry", Peter added, trying to excuse his ignorance, but, judging by the expression from WayneTech's representative, Peter might have said something relevant.
"It appears to me that Mr. Parker's collection of skills is far greater than you had me believe, Ted. Really making an effort to hide your pupil, I see."
"Come on, Lucius!", Ted retorted with a subtly forced smirk. "Still mad that I got both him and Grady before you?"
"Weren't you the one offering me Mr. Scraps' services just a few days ago?"
"As a matter of fact, I have a recent project of his that could work for Brucie's new satellite array…"
The two… friends? Competitors? They left both Peter and Jurgen behind, still deep in conversation.
Peter got near the German scientist and muttered: "Are they always like this?"
"Yes, Fox might be a scientist like you and me, but he is as cunning and as vicious as any capitalist when it comes to the improvement of Wayne's company, even before Bruce's birth."
"Yeah, I noticed it. Big stake in the company?"
"Familial, as far as I have heard. He was good friends with Thomas and Martha and then… well, you heard what happened, and Lucius was the one that tried keeping the company stable until their son was of age. Lucius Fox is a good man, but good men can not always be nice men, especially when family is involved."
"Noted."
The countdown to the launch had already started, and Lucius Fox could only pay attention to Peter Parker, the young man sitting next to Ted Kord and Jurgen Muntz, the one who had arrived earlier in the nick of time for the final stage of the project.
Peter Parker, the prodigy.
Ted Kord's newest star player. In less than a month, he had come from homeless to one of the most innovative developers of the decade, so many new reinventions and solutions for new materials, new fuels and new approaches to seemingly all areas of science, from medicine to robotics, from fluid dynamics to quantum physics.
And yet, there was no ego plays, no power grabs, no rumors of Parker being stuck up or self-centered. The worst people told him, and that had been a delightful surprise to Lucius, had been that Peter was just so focused on his projects that he would hardly be seen by his colleagues for days.
And then there was that spectacle at the Wayne Gala. Honestly, the young man had a point - a misguided one, in Fox's opinion, but it took courage to face men such as Bruce, who basically owned the world. No common scientist would be that determined to call into attention Bruce's showing off.
Lucius had spoken about his little project to Ted, of how much Bruce's nighttime endeavors could benefit with a mind like Parker's. After all, as much as he hated to admit it, the years had been piling on Lucius' back, and, as far as he had seen, Peter Parker was both brilliant and idealistic enough to be a boon for Gotham's paragons.
But, regrettably, the Kord Industries' CEO had been uncharacteristically hard headed in his rejections. Or maybe not so out of character.
"Lucius, don't.", Ted had told him, as he practically dragged him away from his employees.
"I was just remarking on how impressive Parker's abilities are-"
"No games, here, Lucius. I know what you're doing, and I'm stopping you right now. Peter is the kind of person I think I could have been, before fate intervened and dropped so much guilt and responsibility on my head like a ton of bricks. Forget about the tech, he is a kind hearted genius, someone who can maybe find answers to the world's problems. That is why I won't get him involved in my 'other' business, and neither should you. If you put Parker in contact with the Bat-folk, he would do the worst thing possible for himself: he would give himself completely into helping their cause."
Lucius nodded, in comprehension, though not in acceptance.
"Maybe you are right, Ted, maybe it is not the best idea to offer Parker such a burden. But, if you'd allow an old man's counterpoint, I'd remind you as well that Parker's life is his own. You may want to protect him, chide him away, but in the end, it is his choice of what he wants to do with his own life."
The older scientist laid a hand on the secret hero's shoulder.
"Who's to say that, by depriving him of that, you are not harming the World even more?"
The countdown reached zero. The rocket lit up and sped up into the sky.
The Lenore was a success.
Cheers roared and claps resonated, Jurgen was congratulated by his boss and his boss' business partner, who had to excuse himself earlier and left, not without promises of support for the next prototype, the Brigitte.
Peter breathed a little easier, Ted Kord promising him a soon-to-come end to his work suspension. That was okay for him, since he had also needed some time off web-swinging and more focus back on building up the 'Go Home' project.
That was, until he got a message on his phone, a simple request that rang all alarms on his head.
"We need to talk.
Oracle."
The phone rang once. It rang twice. By the third time, there was a reply.
"Hello, Mister Spider-Man."
"Hello, Scary Lady Oracle."
Peter's voice could not hide his frustration, which he imagined had been quite clear for the mysterious woman that both Red Hood and Black Bat seemed to answer to.
"I... understand you might be feeling angry."
"Only slightly.", the hero sighed. "Well, at least my secondary security system seemed to have worked just fine."
He could hear Oracle's groan. 'Good', he thought to himself, suited up and perched on top of a communications tower, the first one he had spotted while swinging in return from the Air Base to his lab at the Chrysalis.
Oracle's message had been rerouted from his secondary cellphone, a burner he had built from pieces he acquired from a pawn shop, and which connected exclusively to his suit's system's firewalls.
Much sooner than he had expected, Oracle had finally tracked the main entry point of access to his suit, and thus, sprang his second line of defense, which shut her off and only granted her access to his burner phone as a contact, which safely redirected it back to his suit's systems and then from it to his own cell phone.
It was a crude and much simpler version of what Phineas Mason employed to keep himself three steps ahead of SHIELD during his criminal days as the Tinkerer, but it had worked against Oracle this one time, so Peter was satisfied.
"Fine, it worked, and I'm sorry for resorting to such methods, but I had to speak to you."
"And what is so urgent?", he wondered at her tone, not liking the way this conversation was going.
Barbara Gordon sighed, knowing the risk of what she was doing and how the rest of her Family advised her against it. "We lost contact with the Batman.", she finally revealed.
The man on the other side of the line went quiet for a few seconds, then asked in return, "Have you tried family therapy?"
The former Batgirl could not hold herself back and slammed her hand on the table. "Spider-Man, this is serious!"
"Sorry! I'm sorry!", he apologized immediately. "Tell me what happened."
Barbara breathed in, mentally scolding herself over her loss of cool. She respected this new hero for his abilities, his efficiency and, by the looks of his digital security, his keen intellect and resourcefulness.
If only the man didn't act so annoying, though…
"Batman was currently on a case, he had been following up a lead that, according to his suspicions, could prove the potential existence of an ancient secret society in Gotham."
"Don't tell me, it involves stealing the Declaration of Independence, somehow."
"Spider-"
"Sorry, I can't help it - wait, is that the same supposed organization that supposedly doesn't exist but people here sing about them to babies, like some demented parody of Freddy Krueger?"
"So you've heard about - Freddy Who?"
"Nevermind, old reference from back home."
'Sadly, Harry Potter and Percy Jackson are a thing in this world, or I'd be making a fortune by typing those books down immediately!', he wondered to himself. "Please, continue."
"We've already searched his last known location, but we could only find his utility belt, sliced apart and discarded. None of his suit's trackers are responding, either."
That made Peter pause and start doing some mental calculations. "If you give me the frequencies, I think I can jury rig something to help track him down."
"Much appreciated, but we got that covered."
"If you are afraid of me having your private signal frequencies-"
"That's not it, we already have access to the largest signal receivers in the country already operating. If we can't get a response, trust me, no one else can."
Again, Spider-Man was surprised with the kind of technology that the Bats had access to. "So, either his trackers are completely blocked or destroyed, then. What about me?"
"We need your help", came Oracle's direct reply. "We can't have all suits on the ground defending Gotham, since some of us want to search for him. You have proven yourself capable, powerful , responsible, and, above all, well intended. Black Bat and, amazingly, Red Hood vouched for you, after all. So, for tonight, could we count on your help for patrolling?"
Peter lowered the phone and mentally cursed.
With his return to work at the Chrysalis, having to pick the load of patrolling from the Bats would leave him ruined in the following day, especially since he already had a full prior night hunting down the AnarKings with the duo.
'But, if those third-rate gangbangers could cause so much trouble, imagine if any of the A-listers came out to play during the Big Bad Bat's absence…'
"Ok, sign me up."
After he finished reading the instructions Oracle had sent to this phone, Peter turned it off and tossed it on the futon, in frustrated resignation.
'I'm too hungry and too bothered now. Need to cool down a little', The young inventor turned towards his latest project, the finished mask and jacket hanging on robotic arms, then he pushed a button at a console, the mechanical structure carrying the set back into storage.
Peter then pulled a drawer from his desk, picked up several burned pieces of tech and splayed them on the furniture. What he had recovered from his destroyed drone and from Blue Beetle's exploded tech was practically nothing, but they had given him a few new ideas.
He would not be able to rebuild another W.A.S.P.-Spider so soon, but maybe he could do with some new gadgets while in the field, aside from impact webs and the 'website' charges.
In less than an hour, Peter was already closing up his first prototype, after a series of failed attempts and the liberal use of web-solvent to clean up his workstation.
Picking up his tablet, Peter started drawing formulas, taking a leaf out of the Bats' book.
'Now, let's do something to avoid the problems that I had last night…'
To Be Continued!
Author's Notes:
So. First of all, thank you so much for all of you who decided to give this silly fic a chance!
(Also, thanks for the reviews, some of them made me and a bunch of my fellow authors have a good laugh!)
Also, just showing that I listen to (good) critiques, this was originally supposed to be two short chapters, that I decided to post as a single one, because I've read the complaints about posting too many short chapters.
Also, bad news: Next weekend, I'll be travelling, so no new chapter, but after that, next Chapter is the start of a next arc!