(One) The demon with chalk-white skin dressed in green smiled. "I suppose starting off with 'Welcome to my Nightmare' would be too on the nose." May Parker looked around. She was clearly not on her deathbed. She realized she was standing, but somehow could not move. She was not in the Stoddard Institute, but it was not clear where she was. It was not so much that there was light as darkness visible.
"And yet, there is something odd," Nightmare continued. "On the one hand five decades have passed. And on the other hand it seems that nothing's changed at all. People live with the same songs on the radio, the same television shows, the same movie references. It's like it's an eternal present. Who would think you were the same age as Pat Benatar, or at the very most Jessica Lange?"
Aunt May had trouble getting her bearings. The music was strange, at times unearthly, at times atonal in a way she had heard only half a dozen times in her life. The air was full of strange scents, of rich, unbelievably ripe fruit, of unbelievably expensive perfumes filtered with tincture of decadence. And in some strange distance an obscure bird of night sang.
"And the reason the present is eternal is because for decades there is no hope. Only the illusion of it. Things happen. Things change. The Soviet Empire collapses. There's globalization. Elections take place. But it makes no difference. You don't get to choose; you only choose to acquiesce.
"Do you remember when your nephew told you what singularity is? Of course you do. It's the perfect explanation of utter death and the eternal life of damnation. Travelling down a black hole till you cross the event horizon and confront it. From one perspective the death is eternal. And from another it's the shortest possible instant, long forgotten by the rest of the universe."
Extreme Unction
(Two) "Let's start with your memories. What is the most shameful thing you've ever done? What fills you with a guilt you can never get rid of? Let's start with sex! That's always fun!
"Let's go back half a century!" And with a thought of Nightmare, Aunt May found herself somewhere else. "Let's start with your late husband!" And an Uncle Ben in his twenties appeared. "And what about your in-laws?" And just then Peter's parents, Richard and Mary, appeared, also both in their twenties, but just a little bit younger. "And finally, there's you!" And a younger version of Aunt May appeared.
"Oh dear," Nightmare sneered. "Half a century of wrinkles removed and you're still not very attractive. I just guess that can't be helped! Still, let's go back to your days of happy and wonderful youth! Let's start with Coney Island." And an image of the famous amusement park appeared with the four young Parkers looking at the attractions.
(Third) "Now is this really Coney Island in the seventies? Or come to think of it, the eighties or nineties? Maybe we're thinking more of the forties and thirties? I don't imagine you're really a Woody Allen fan. Who is nowadays? Who's going to admit they like Radio Days, let alone Wonder Wheel?"
The images shifted slightly. Aunt May looked around, and saw her younger self look around at a variety of waterfront attractions that one might expect here almost unchanged since the Coolidge presidency. There were various stands where one could compete for cheaply made dolls. One involved trying to throw balls through a deceptively formed circle. A more honest one involved shooting at a target with a target with a water pistol.
There were also places where you could buy food. Hamburgers and hot dogs were most popular. There were pizza slices and fried chicken, and then were a few examples of the more Asian/Latin American cuisine that had become more popular in the last half-century. The stands displayed a century of prices, and while some of them increased Aunt May's appetite after weeks of cancer therapy, they all shared the quality of being distinctively more expensive than she was comfortable spending.
Aunt May looked around this world trying to get her bearings in Nightmare's dream world. In the corner of her eye she noticed Sandman, dragging an unknown woman roughly the same age as him, to a fortune-teller's stand. "That man…"
"Hey!" Nightmare shouted. "Your brother-in-law's ass is over here!" And he shifted Aunt May's perceptions.
(Four) Aunt May now found herself looking at Richard and Mary Parker walking away approaching some of the amusement rides. As it happened, there was nothing especially provocative about any of their clothes.
"Let's get it a little warmer, shall we?" And now Aunt May found herself on a beach with the other three Parkers. Her bathing suit was a conservative one-piece, but Richard's was now wearing a rather short suit, much shorter than the somewhat larger men's suit popular for the past few decades. As it happened, Richard's attention was focused on Mary, who was wearing an attractive two-piece suit which could conceivably have been worn in the forties (it was covering her navel). The two were just by the waterline and splashing each other.
"Isn't he handsome? So much so than your own husband?" And Aunt May turned and saw Uncle Ben who in an instant had aged at least ten years and gained twenty pounds.
"You're being so strange," Aunt May said. "First, you're narrowing the age gap between Ben and Richard to a few years, now you're expanding it to twice its length."
(Five) "You're not being honest, Mrs. Parker. Haven't you always considered your brother-in-law handsome? And when I say that what I really mean is haven't you shamelessly lusted after him?
"But that's too crass, isn't it? I imagine you'd be much more subtle. Let's start with the occasional teasing comment. The slightly off-color joke to break the ice. And then the occasional pantry lunge, where he gets a good look at your cleavage. Well, yours isn't very impressive, but we can borrow Anna Nicole Smith's. After all, she's been dead for decades. And let's not forget the old Reilly brains. You play the housewife Iago, finding ways to keep Richard and Mary apart, finding ways to make Mary annoyed and irritable. And then offering Richard a commiserating shoulder. And then a little more. And then everything.
"And there you are, tearing a condom open. A condom that happens to break. For that is the secret you've always hidden. That you aren't Peter Parker's aunt by marriage, but his mother!"
Only Nightmare could be seen as he made this declaration. There was only darkness around him. So Aunt May could not be seen when she replied, "But that's silly."
(Six) 14:02
Meanwhile Spider-Man was carrying the Sandman as the two fled from Morlun, heading south. "Can I ask you a question?" the Sandman queried.
"Go ahead."
"If you've fought Morlun before, why don't you just the same thing you did to defeat him in the past?"
"Good question. Well, the first time we thought, he wanted to feed on my lifeforce, and I was able to irradiate myself slightly so he couldn't. But I'm not able to do that now, and Morlun is quite happy just ripping my head off.
"The second time he did kill me, or come close to it, but I was able to evolve into a secondary spider-form that was able to beat him."
"Oh. There isn't any chance of that happening again?"
"Nope. And then there was when his whole family attacked, but I was able to call on alternate Spider-Mes from a whole range of alternate universes."
"But they're not here right now?"
"Right now, you're all I've got."
"Oh. Do you have any plans?"
"Well Flint, right now I am really open to any suggestions."
(Seven) "What you're saying makes no sense," Aunt May objected, now appearing in front of Nightmare.
"So you deny your chastity has even been compromised?" Nightmare says.
"That's not the issue. For a start, if Peter is my child, why wouldn't I raise him as my son to begin with?"
"Because it was obvious that your husband couldn't be the father."
"Really? Because that's not how I remember it. And more to the point, why would Mary pretend to be Peter's mother?"
That point confused and embarrassed Nightmare. "Ummm…, she's kinky? Look, couldn't we pretend this happened, and I castigate you accordingly?"
"I really don't see the point."
But he quickly rallied. "The point is that you always envied Mary because she had the child you couldn't. You wished the worst for her, and you were so happy when fate dropped her son into your lap."
"That isn't true at all. Ben and I were shocked when Richard and Mary died. And the false accusations that they were traitors meant we couldn't get any help from Mary's side of the family. I was sleepless with worry at the thought that I could ever raise a child, especially considering the age difference. If Peter himself hadn't been such a good little boy…"
"Oh, shut up you miserable woman! I'm tired of this. I need to know what secrets lie deep in your soul; I need to know your darkest sins. AND I ASSURE YOU THOSE SINS WILL BE KNOWN NOW!"
(Eight) It was a couple of decades earlier. Or was it? Certainly, Ben Parker was still alive, and in fact he was having a conversation with one of his acquaintances.
"I don't like this. I don't like this at all." Ben declared.
"What's not to like?" his acquaintance replied. "All we're doing is protecting our property values and making sure crime doesn't increase."
"You're not being frank."
"I'm being perfectly frank. Our homes are basically our only source of wealth. Imagine what would happen to May and your nephew if, God forbid, something happened to you."
"But your solution to these problems is to keep Black people out."
"That's… an exaggeration. All we're doing is trying to maintain a certain quality. I mean, look at Canarsie."
"You say 'quality' but you mean 'melanin.' There aren't any Blacks you want in."
"It's not our fault there aren't that many Negro lawyers and businessmen."
"And you're not being frank about what you want to see done. There are threats, there's vandalism, there's assaults. I mean just look at Chicago three weeks ago…"
"Chicago has a lot of Southern migrants. They bring a lot of bad blood with them."
"But the same things also happen in Detroit. They're Catholic UAW members.
(Nine)
"Look, what you want is very simple. You want all the respect and admiration for opposing bigotry and racism, but you want all the advantages of a segregated society. And isn't 'segregated' just a euphemism? The begged question, the passive voice, when clearly we're trying to exclude Blacks from everything that we want for ourselves? May, help me out here."
Aunt May was embarrassed when the attention was turned to her. "I… don't want to be disagreeable. I'm sure there must be some kind of compromise."
And there were other scenes. The momentary awkwardness when she first met Joseph Robertson. Annoyance at Robertson's son's conduct when he was Peter's roommate. A dislike of loud rap lyrics as she walking down the street. A certain nervousness when a young African American man sat beside her on the subway. The realization, of course, that very few of the many dangerous costumed super-villains that has threatened her life were actually black.
(Ten) "That's what you're guilty about? That's what you're ashamed about?! I don't have time for this petty parochial nonsense!" Nightmare shouted, if in fact it is possible to shout in a nightmare. "I will get to the bottom of this! I will break you into a million shards of glass! You will tell me what I need to know, before your eternity in Hell begins!"
And once again, Aunt May found herself in Nightmare's strange darkness visible, and she found herself spiraling down, down, down into the darkness, becoming smaller, before vanishing…
(Eleven) And then she found herself in Norman Osborn's office. Except she wasn't actually there. "What's going on? That's Norman Osborn over there. But he can't see me," she thought.
"Hello? Hello?" But Osborn showed no sign of acknowledging Aunt May's presence, if she was in fact present at all.
"Let me think. It's like I'm a ghost. But that's not necessarily the case. I could just be invisible. But if I were only invisible I should still be tangible and I could touch something." She tried to do so, with no success.
Meanwhile Osborn was looking very intently at his laptop. Aunt May thought again. "Let me see." She "peeked" over Osborn's shoulder. "That strange creature has been going through my memories, at times twisting them for his own purposes. But although I know Osborn, I've only met him on a few occasions. I've never actually been in his corporate headquarters, let alone his office. But his laptop makes clear that this is today. So, this isn't a memory I'm re-experiencing.
"Everything suggests that I'm still in my bed at the Stoddard Institute. But I'm not wracked by pain the way I was a few minutes ago. Let's think through things carefully. That creature said I was going to die, so there's the logical possibility that I actually am dead.
(Twelve) "Which begs the question. If I'm dead, what do I have to do with Osborn? He's employing Peter right now, but he gave Peter leave to take care of me during my illness. So, there shouldn't be any direct connection with Peter today."
Aunt May took another look at the laptop, which was difficult since Osborn, even in his best of moods, was a naturally cautious man who kept his cards close to his chest. All she could see was some footage of Morlun, still chasing Spider-Man and Sandman.
"That strange grey creature. I've seen footage of him before, but I can't remember him properly. Let me think… that poor scientist who tried to cure his rare blood disease and became sort of vampire. Morbius! Michael Morbius! Yes, Peter mentioned him a couple of times and the Bugle had pictures of him . He was grey and threatening just like that figure."
Something made Aunt May stop. "Wait a minute. Morbius is just a very strong human. He doesn't have any magical powers. He can't fly or leap around like that. And Spider-Man and Sandman should easily be a match for him. I'm confusing him with someone else, but whom? Somebody who's grey like Morbius, who's attacked Spider-Man in the past, and has a similar name. But why can't I remember it?
"Let's go back to why I'm here. Suppose I am dead. Then I'd be here haunting Osborn. But I can hardly be haunting him if he's completely unaware of my existence. Perhaps it's some kind of telepathic process. Although telepathy involves mental contact and Osborn isn't noticing me."
(Thirteen) And just then everything changed for Aunt May. She was no longer in Osborn's private office but in a corridor full of people walking back and forth. She quickly reoriented herself. "I'm at LaGuardia." She saw a clock that confirmed the time. Looking a little further she saw a television showing CNN, which confirmed the date.
"Now why am I here?" But just then she saw Mary Jane Watson walking by, pulling along one of those wheeled luggage contraptions and grimly looking at her phone. "Of course. Mary Jane said she was coming back to New York to help arrange accommodation for Anna.
"Oh goodness gracious! I just remembered something!" She did not see Nightmare, dressed in ordinary businessman's suit with some winter clothing, tactfully spying at her from behind a newspaper. She certainly did not see him subtly smile.
"Good heavens! I completely forgot about it over the last month!" But whatever it was that Aunt May remembered, it was not what Nightmare was looking for. He scowled with annoyance, and disappeared, if he was really at LaGuardia at all.
Aunt May followed Mary Jane who, just like Osborn, was completely unaware of her presence. "She's looking at the same person Osborn was examining, the one who's attacking Spider-Man."
(Fourteen) Then she noticed a reference to Morlun on a newscast as they were walking by. "Morlun! That's the name of that creature!
"But that only raises further questions. First, why did I not realize that name before? Because I have heard of it before. I may be dead, but I'm not senile. I can certainly tell garishly dressed super-villains running around. I can even tell Electro and the Shocker apart. I didn't simply confuse him with Dr. Morbius.
"Second, why are both Norman Osborn and Mary Jane concerned about this creature? They don't have any connection with him as far as I know. Are they concerned about Spider-Man? But why would they particularly care about him? Yes, that strange man seems to be involved in my life much more so than other costumed people. I need to think…
"Third, why I am following these two people in particular? Is there some connection between the two? Yes, Mary Jane once dated poor Harry Osborn but that was more than a decade ago, before Harry even met his wife.
"Hold on. I think Peter mentioned this once to me. What was it called? Yes, astral projection. Supposedly Dr. Strange does it. While your body is lying in one place, as my body obviously is, you can project your spirit to look around other places. But why am I projecting these two people? Wouldn't I be trying to contact Peter?"
Then a horrible thought came to her, as Mary Jane approached the shuttle buses that would take her to Manhattan. "But I couldn't contact Peter if he were dead…"
(Fifteen) 14:03
At that moment Spider-Man and the Sandman ducked from a large chimney Morlun tore off from the top of a building and had just thrown at them.
"This is not getting any easier," Spider-Man muttered.
The Sandman was looking around. "Wait! I just saw something!"
"What?"
"On that electronic billboard down below! There was a chyron giving a number for you to call!"
So Spider-Man, with the Sandman still hanging on to him, swung down to take a closer look. As it happened it took a few seconds, since the chyron had left and they had to wait for it to reappear again. To make things worse, Morlun was getting closer.
"OK, I've got it!" The two quickly managed to find a ledge that was, for at least a few seconds, out of Morlun's sight.
(Sixteen) "OK, dial the number and give it to me." The Sandman quickly did so, handed it to Spider-Man. Then the two left again, just as Morlun found their ledge.
"Hello darling," said a very sensual voice on the other edge.
"Felicia?" Spider-Man asked, recognizing the voice of his onetime lover and occasional ally, the Black Cat. "Where are you?"
"I'm in Baltimore!"
"Ah. Well, I'm not, and I really can't get there right now. Why did you call?"
"I need your help! Actually, I'm planning a heist tonight! And I need your help."
"Why should I do that?"
"It's for a good cause! OK, I will also get rich, but I'm sure I could give some money to charity."
Spider-Man hung up, and landed on a roof just long enough to give Sandman back his phone before they started swinging away again.
(Seventeen) "Something wrong?" the Sandman asked.
"Well, there's a good chance I'll die today. I suppose I should be grateful that call reminded me that I shouldn't regret never being married."
"Huh."
"What?"
"Well my marriage didn't end up well, but I wouldn't say it would be better if I had never been married."
Meanwhile Aunt May was back at LaGuardia, or apparently so. She was watching Mary Jane looking with some frustration as she realized the next shuttle to Manhattan would not be for another twenty minutes. "Although come to think of it, I'd always thought that Mary Jane would just take a taxi, regardless of the expense. Perhaps she's cutting costs, Christmas is coming up after all. And there is poor Anna's situation. And it was not as if she had to impress anyone right this…"
And just then, Aunt May found herself removed from LaGuardia. There was a great rushing sensation, even though it wasn't clear to Aunt May that she had a body in her current form. Where she was rushing to or from wasn't clear. "I'm clearly not in New York anymore. I must be back in the unpleasant world that strange man had me in."
"You're so correct, May Parker!" Nightmare cackled into her head, or "head." "No way to sense up or down, right or left, hot or cold, even dark and light. But you are moving, Mrs. Parker. Where are you moving to?
"You can't really conceive anything in this world. But don't worry, I can conceive everything in this world."
(Eighteen) Aunt May got a briefly clear perception. It was as if she was floating above a tiny version of the Milky Way.
"Cute isn't it," Nightmare sneered. "But now it's time to remind you that I am the Master here.
" I AM THE LORD OF HELLFIRE AND I BRING YOU FIRE!"
And with that Aunt May found herself wrapped in flames. And then she found herself an insignificant little dot in the midst of some vast inferno.
"And I bring you ice!" And just like that, Aunt May moved from unbearable heat to unbearable cold in a world of massive, enormous icebergs. And to her horror she found herself facing an enormous avalanche of very cold, and very sharp ice.
"But there's so much more! How about a river lava ice, filled with horrific maggots?" And just then Aunt May found herself leaping from perilous floating log to floating wreckage to avoid the boiling, verminous stream.
(Nineteen) "Let's focus on one particular fear. Remember when you were so horrified by Jaws? I do!" And just then Aunt May found herself in an ocean, desperately trying to escape a great white shark the size of the entrance to Grand Central Station.
"How about lions?!" And Aunt May now found herself on some Serengeti running from a three-headed lion, one of whom was apparently a vampire lion with appropriately intimidating teeth.
"You've never thought much about elephants. But you will now!" And now Aunt May was running from a horde of absurdly large battle elephants, 100 feet tall, covered in armor, though one had horrific tentacles.
"You've never read H.P. Lovecraft. So allow me to introduce you to the unholy Cthulhu!" And now Aunt May was running from the horrific creature.
And then Aunt May was running from a similar creature, except it was made of broccoli and wore a yarmulke. "And this is another Lovecraft monster, which he dreamed up after a bad meal and an evening spent whining about Jews."
(Twenty) And then all the creatures Aunt May had been running from reappeared together and lunged at her. There was a tremendous crash and then everything with Darkness Visible again. A stunned Aunt May lay in a small circle of light. Nightmare walked over to approach her. "Mercy!" he said in his best (and quite good) imitation of Elvis Presley.
"So, as you can all too evidently see and feel, I am clearer the master of the universe you find yourself in. You are nothing but a little toy, to be toyed with and tortured, now and for the end of eternity. Which doesn't have an end, just to be clear. And while your soul has strictly limited interest to me, there are an infinite myriad of demons just waiting for the opportunity to show their malevolence. Now what do you have to say about that?"
Aunt May turned to Nightmare. "I am not afraid of you."
(Twenty-One) "Oh you aren't? Americans usually are defiant. Up to the instant when they realize there's no hope. Then they cry like a bunch of little babies."
"I know who you are."
"Everyone who dreams knows who I am. That doesn't help them."
"No. You see, for a brief period, I was married to the father of the mayor of New York. And as part of his duties, the mayor gets security briefings about all the super-powered threats that could endanger his city. Most of them are top security, but not all of them.
"And one of those briefings was about Dr. Bruce Banner. How for most of the time he could not control himself and prevent his green self from rampaging across the country. But there were two times when he was in control, only to lose it again. And the first time that happened was because of you, working within his dreams to shatter his control.
"So you see Nightmare, there's a record about you. You are a demon. You are a very powerful and evil demon. But you are not the devil. You have fought Dr. Strange, and some of the Avengers, and other super-heroes. And you have not always won. You can be fought; you can be faced.
"And whatever I have done and whatever I failed to do; I know you have no claim on my conscience. I don't know what game you are playing, but I do know you will only have me for a very short time."
For an instant, Nightmare was speechless. But that did not mean he was not filled from rage.
(Twenty-two) And then there was only darkness, only briefly interrupted by a dark evil lightning. Instead of a humanoid form and a vaguely human voice, now Nightmare spoke like this:
"DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM! I AM OLDER THAN YOU CAN CONCEIVE! I HAVE KNOWN EVERY HUMAN WHO HAS EVER LIVED, FROM THE GREATEST STATESMAN TO THE HOLIEST SAINT! ALL OF THEM FEAR ME! ALL OF THEM HAVE BOWED DOWN TO ME! DO YOU THINK A MISERABLE ORDINARY OLD WOMAN CAN BEAT ME! I AM THE COMPLETE AND UTTER MASTER IN MY REALM! THE ONLY RULES AND LAWS HERE ARE THE LOWLIEST SLAVES OF MY WHIM! I HAVE NO NEED TO KEEP YOU ALIVE AT ALL! FOR NOW YOUR LIFE ENDS!"
And where Aunt May had been, there was nothing but a thin whisp of smoke, vanishing in the darkness.
To be continued?
[Well yes, but quite frankly, it doesn't look good.]