Hey Hey people, issex here.

I had a lot of conflicting ideas with this chapter, see. Even rn, I'm not all too happy with the finished product but I hope it holds up.

Anyway, join AizenTheGoat's server. The code is: HM34WDTQtA

As well as MADB's Overseers. The code is: 2gd5MTCjgK

Eyepatches were a funny thing. You knew they existed and you knew people used them, but you didn't see eyepatch–wearing individuals enough times to not feel the urge to stare whenever you saw one. Disabled individuals were always a spectacle; a person in crutches, a cast or a wheelchair was always bound to get attention whether they wanted it or not, but there was always something so…eye-catching about a person with an eyepatch. Maybe it was the mystery of what lay underneath. Wheelchairs were often indicative of paralysis, a cast meant a broken bone and crutches meant an incapacitating injury but an eyepatch could hide anything. It could mean anything, from a simple fashion statement to an injured eye to a missing one altogether, depending on one's imagination.

For Naruto, it only meant annoyance. The gauze felt wet and sticky from goop and tears and clung uncomfortably to his eye that still itched. He'd scratched and scratched until common sense told him it'd be dumb to continue and just as the people who wouldn't stop looking at him as he walked around, got on his nerves, the sight of the white patch served as a constant reminder of what he'd lost—the goggles were gone and with it, the protection they had offered his eyes. There was no spare pair and he doubted he'd be able to get it fixed, much less replaced by something of a similar quality; ballistic goggles didn't come cheap if they were even original, which meant that until he purchased another pair, if he got caught off guard again, it would mean the end.

He'd gotten over-reliant on the warning sense.

The thought made little sense when he thought about it and Teach would most likely disagree, but it was true. There was no way around it. Save for the things he'd learned from experience, he had no real knowledge of what to look for in fights. No real knowledge of fighting or shooting or how different weapons sounded like or what people reshuffling meant.

Most close calls he got were from weapons or actions he had never encountered before. He had no real way to categorize anything and he had no formal training; all he did was attack the people he saw and wait for his senses to alert him about the people he didn't. It had worked so well for him over the months that he'd never even entertained the thought of it ever warning him too late. All it had taken was a man taking a potshot at him while he was distracted and he'd almost died. If he hadn't turned when he did, Tsunade would be identifying him at the morgue while some clean-up crew power-washed his brains off the pavement.

And I'm about to go up against an arms dealer. Alone.

Naruto halted. The memory of the previous night recalled itself without his permission in all its uncomfortable detail. The sweat flying off the man he'd bludgeoned with a shotgun, the sound he'd made when the firearm struck him a second time. The acrid stench of gunsmoke that made his throat feel dry. The deafening noise of gunfire and the uncomfortable whizz of bullets barely missing him. The pain on the man's face when he'd been forced to catch his friend mid-flight. The muzzle flash of the pistol that had almost cut his life short. He'd felt the impact before the noise of the shot had even registered. He'd seen it beforehand but hadn't processed it fast enough to prompt a proper reaction.

Nothing but stupid luck had saved him.

Peter had said what he did looked cool on camera but for him, it wasn't. It was dangerous, painful and ugly for himself and the people he faced. More than he'd anticipated. Far more than he'd ever thought possible. He'd nearly died more times in a matter of months than he had in all the years he'd been alive and even though he tried to hide it, the constant grazes with death had begun to take their toll on him.

He heard gunfire in his sleep and had been jerked awake by his own fists swinging. His own fan blowing air in his face made his heart race. What had once been mundane sounds lit his senses aflame, being among crowds made him feel surrounded and he had to fight the urge to resort to violence every time a stranger within what he'd come to recognize as knifing distance. He unconsciously tensed every time he saw someone with their hands in their pockets and he found himself scanning every car that passed him by. He'd become a walking nerve.

And it was even worse in school. He'd been given detention more than once for lashing out at an unlucky student who bumped into him, it took effort not to crush the hands of people who touched him from behind and his worsening temper had scared off many an acquaintance. He was oftentimes too exhausted to focus in class and he didn't have enough time to catch up in the afterhours. His grades were beginning to slip, even with Peter's help, and his behavioral changes had attracted the attention of even the principal who'd threatened to bring his situation to Tsunade's notice unless he agreed to see the school psychologist.

He tried to keep both lives from interfering with each other but he couldn't help it. He missed out as a vigilante during the day and his nighttime activities negatively affected his regular life. It was like juggling two balls that collided with each other in mid air and chipped off bits of each other onto his hands and it wouldn't be long before one eventually broke or fell out of trajectory and he wouldn't be able to catch it in time.

Maybe he wasn't ready. He liked to think he'd done a good job so far, in fact most would call him brave but he knew he wasn't. At first, he'd been angry, vengeful: he'd gone out looking to hurt someone and find a way to get Peter's attackers behind bars. Everything else was confidence, the sort of confidence that would make a man with bulletproof skin, swagger into the middle of an active warzone, unbothered to ask himself whether his own body would be able to continue to protect him at all times.

He had done the same: he had thrown himself into it all, confident in his own abilities, his own senses, to help him along the way. He'd gone on a semi-coordinated search for answers, cocksure that he wouldn't be betrayed by his own senses. Senses that had almost failed him. Senses that would continue to almost fail him if he continued as he was until they eventually did fail him. One day he would see the attack coming too late. One day he would see it but simply wouldn't be able to react in time and his luck would have run out as well too. On that day, he might not even see it coming. He probably wouldn't even feel it. He'd just die.

He rubbed his eye through the gauze with a heavy sigh, his body suddenly feeling heavy. If he went on, the chances of his worries coming true, rose even higher. Some random goon looking for extra firepower had almost gotten lucky and now he was going after an organized gang. An organized gang that had ties to an even bigger, more organized gang.

They'd know about him by now and if things went as Dean and him discussed, they'd know he was after them and would prepare accordingly. If that happened, he'd be up against people who didn't simply spray and pray and hope they got lucky enough to take him out. And to think he'd only started all this to find who shot his friend.

How had things gotten to this? How come he had to take out a gang just to sift through the remains for just two people? Was it even worth it anymore? Peter was recovering and he didn't even seem to really care if they were found. Ben and May didn't give a shit who robbed them so long as Peter was alright. Even MJ didn't seem as hung up on it anymore. It seemed the only person who couldn't seem to want to move on was him and just as everyone was starting to worry about him, their worries were becoming more and more justified.

Why was he still doing this?

He focused on the front of a pair of automated doors and watched the transparent glass slabs slide apart in response to a duo of smock-clad men dragging away a stretcher. As they passed by him, the smell of strong bleach and antiseptics reached his nose, forcing it to crinkle. He hated hospitals—even more so since he'd started fighting criminals at night. For most, it was a symbol of help: a place that had the solution to everything. He'd had people, from injured civilians to dying gangbangers begging him to take them to the hospital.

Some survived, most didn't. Some died mid-journey, their deaths never coming to his notice until he unwrapped them at the hospital lobby. Some died in the hospital, their deaths only being made known to him whenever a doctor or nurse bothered to tell him the person he brought hadn't made it. Some passed on where he met them, their pleas trailing off into a final sigh as their chests fell, never to rise again. It didn't matter if they'd taken half a magazine to the torso or had a steering shaft lodged firmly in their chest. It didn't matter if they had more blood than air in their lungs or if they'd been beaten so hard their organs ruptured, they all said the same thing. The ambulance, they'd say. Call an ambulance, they'd plead. Take me to the hospital. You've got to help me, man, I don't want to die…

Naruto shook his head and trudged away from the hospital door, trying to ignore the rapidly approaching sirens in the distance.

Everyone died, nobody escaped it just because they didn't want to. Some died sooner than later, some died completely avoidable deaths. And that would be him if he continued. Maybe it was time for him to call it quits. So what if he didn't find the two guys? Nobody cared and Peter didn't want him doing this anyway.

And he sure as hell didn't want him to die doing it.

His wrists itched.

…

"Pete…Pete. Hey, Pete. Come on, wake up."

Peter Parker's eyes slowly opened and his face scrunched as he was shaken out of sleep by a firm hand on his shoulder. "Wha? Who…" he squinted at the familiar figure sitting beside him. "Naruto?" He felt for his glasses on the bedside cupboard and upon finding them, put them on to see his friend staring at them, his countenance uncharacteristically morose.

Naruto nodded apologetically. "Sorry I woke you up."

"It's fine," Peter muttered, clearly still groggy. "I'd been asleep since afternoon anyway and-" his eyes shot open. "What happened to your eye!?"

Naruto smiled sheepishly. "Occupational hazard. Let's just say the goggles came in handy."

"The goggles came in handy…" Peter parroting confusedly before realization struck him. "Oh God, you got shot."

"You're still too sharp for your own good." Naruto glanced at the gently beeping monitor near Peter's bed. "And it's better if you calm down; you'll bring one of the nurses here if the machine starts making noise."

"How do you expect me to calm down?" Peter half-yelled. "You almost died last night!"

"Emphasis on almost," Naruto stressed. "Besides, I'm fine. I just got a bit of glass in my eye but granny took care of it for me." To prove his point, he raised his eyepatch to reveal a terribly bloodshot eyeball that had begun to yellow in some areas.

Peter winced at the sight. "That's not very convincing." The second part finally registered and he sat up. "Wait, Miss Tsunade patched you up?"

"Yup."

"So you've-"

"I told her I got mugged," Naruto said. "Took a rock to the eye but the shades blocked it for me."

"Naruto…" Peter shook his head, the disappointment visible on his face. "Rocks can't send glass flying into your eye like that. At least not one that somehow couldn't even get past your glasses."

It was something he'd realized in hindsight too. "It was the best I could come up with," Naruto sighed. "It's not like I could tell her my glasses somehow stopped a bullet."

"It wouldn't have made a difference anyway, I'm pretty sure she doesn't believe you one bit."

"She doesn't," Naruto agreed. "But she's not pressing."

"You could just tell her the truth, you know" Peter offered.

Naruto shook his head. "You don't know her like I do, Peter. She wouldn't be able to handle me going out every night, she nearly had a heart attack when I came back with a bleeding eye last night."

"And if you end up with something worse, you're going to have to come up with a more believable lie than a mugging," Peter objected. "And it'll go on like that because you think you're protecting her but you'd actually be making her even more worried."

"So I'll find someone else," Naruto said.

Peter chuckled derisively. "Are you kidding? Who? You don't know the first thing about these things, you've only even made so much progress because of the detective helping you out."

"There's other vigilantes out there, I could find one of them," Naruto insisted. "I mean, there's The Devil of Hell's Kitchen. I don't think he'd be going to his mom's place for bandages everytime he gets an injury."

"Even if you find him, what are you going to say?" Peter challenged him. "Oh hi, I'm The Queens' Spider and I want to be able to keep lying to my family so can you point me to your private doctor so I don't have to go home leaking blood?"

"That's real funny, Peter," Naruto scowled.

"How would you even get there every time?" Peter asked. "Imagine you got stabbed in the gut or something. You'd have to swing twelve miles just to get help. You'd bleed out on the way! You're not keeping from telling her because you're trying to protect her, you're doing it because you're afraid of how she'll react."

"I know how she'll react, that's the whole reason I haven't said anything!" Naruto growled. "You think I don't want to tell her?"

"I know you don't want to." Peter's response sounded far too confident for Naruto's liking. "Because you're afraid she'll make you stop. You know she can't make you stop if you don't want to but you don't know what's going to happen if you don't when she asks you to. That's what you're afraid of. Somehow it's easier to go out and risk your life then go home and lie to her face about where you were but it's somehow hard to tell her the truth because you're afraid of what happens next."

Peter's glare, but he noticed Naruto look away and in spite of his irritation with the boy, his scowl softened to a concerned frown. "Naruto?"

Naruto clenched his jaw and looked down at his own shoes with his hands clasped together. "What if I do want to stop?"

Peter blinked. "What?"

"I don't know, Peter." Naruto sighed heavily and looked up at him. "I…I'm sinking, man. I'm spiraling. There's no pattern, there's no fallback, there's…there's nothing. Ther-"

"Naruto, what are you talking about?" Peter interrupted him. "I don't understand. Sinking?"

"I'm slipping, Pete." Naruto shook his head. "I hear…I have nightmares. I wake up fighting. My grades are slipping, I don't know where to start from. I can't find balance. Every night I go out. I don't even know why the fuck I go out anymore but every night I go out and I fight and I almost die but then I don't and I go home. I'm failing, I'm crashing, I'm burning bridges I didn't even know I had and…I almost died last night, man."

He pinched his thumb and index finger together, only leaving a space so small, Peter had to squint to see it. "It was this close. This fucking close! I felt it hit the goggles, man. I saw it hit the glass. If I hadn't been wearing them or if the bullet had been of a higher caliber, it would have gone through me. It would have blown my brains out. I'd have been dead. You'd be seeing my obituary on the news instead of talking with me here. There'd be pictures of my brainless head on reddit or Twitter or something, and people would have been making memes and making fun of me or something gently and calling me some wannabe."

"I'd have died, Pete," he repeated, his voice cracking. "Shit, I was pissed when it happened yesterday. I threw a whole AC unit at the guy who did it." At Peter's horrified look. "I wasn't aiming for him," he clarified. "But then I knocked his lights out. I didn't think of it after granny patched me up. I didn't even think of it this morning or this afternoon when we talked. Can you believe it just dawned on me on my way here?"

He chuckled self-deprecatingly. "I said I started this because I wanted to find the guys who shot you but you've told me you don't care anymore. MJ doesn't care. Nobody cares. Hell, I'm not even sure I care anymore. I'm out there risking my life for something nobody cares about."

He looked back at a silent Peter who stared at him intently. For several seconds, the beeping of the monitor was the only noise in the room but for Naruto, there was much more. He heard the commotion on the lower and upper floors. He heard the cars outside, the ambulance outside looking to deliver new patients. He smelled death somewhere down the hallway and heard the monotone of a flatline. He heard shoes pattering and a door clicking open as the flatlined monitor was turned off and voices reached his ears, frantic and grieving. It didn't take long before a wail loud enough for even Peter to hear filled the floor.

That seemed to jolt them back from whatever trance they'd been in and Naruto, willing himself to ignore the proceedings outside of the room, asked, "what do you think I should do, Pete?"

Peter gulped. "I…I don't know." Upon seeing Naruto's frown, he quickly added. "But, you have powers, Naruto. Even if you didn't choose them or expect them, the fact is, you have them. I'm not superstitious or anything but you've got to admit some things happen so specifically, it's like they were meant to happen."

"At the expo," Peter recalled. "You said a spider bit you. Think about it. It could have bitten anyone except you but it bit you. I think it chose you and maybe it knew it or not, it gave you powers. You can't say that's some coincidence. It's too convenient. And then after you got powers, I got shot. You got angry and you went out to use those same powers you got from a bite to get justice for me."

"What are you saying?" Naruto asked. It was beginning to sound more like a conspiracy theory than anything.

"I'm saying everything that's happened, happened for a reason. It happened to steer you in the direction you're heading now," Peter said. "And if I'm right, it means that if you were chosen, it's because whatever chose you believed you'd be the best option for it. Maybe even the only one. If I'm right, you're on the right path. Do you get it, Naruto?"

Naruto chuckled. "I thought you don't believe in destiny."

Peter shrugged. "I don't believe it's set in stone but I do believe, Naruto. So long as the flow of time is real, so is destiny. If you jump off a plane without a parachute, chances are if someone jumped two hours into the future and went to check on you, you'd be pancakes on the floor. It's a predetermined path paved by your own choices. I'm not saying you're just doing what you were scripted to do, but you might be getting steered on the right path, even if you don't think so yourself."

"You might not have made much leeway in finding the guys who robbed me, but you've done so much more, Naruto." Peter swung his legs over the edge, his excitement now obvious. "You lowered the crime rate all by yourself. You've stopped so many crimes. You've saved people-"

"-I've seen people die."

"You can't save everyone," Peter smiled sympathetically. "It's sad, but that's just the way it is. But you tried. The point, at least for you and maybe even them is, you tried. And just as you tried, you did save people. You might be a criminal in the eyes of the law, but to the people, you're a hero."

Naruto smiled dully. "You're just saying that because you haven't seen me in action."

"Maybe not, but people have. And they still think the same," Peter argued. "Point is, you got powers and even if you haven't done the good you set out to do, you're still doing good. People love you, even if they haven't seen you. You are on the right path. You're a hero, Naruto."

"And if this path takes me to the grave?"

Peter hesitated. "That…you can still choose to stop, you know. Nobody's going to hate you for it. Hell, I sure as hell won't. Tell you the truth, I really don't want you doing this."

"And yet you keep helping me," Naruto scoffed. "I'm beginning to think this is you trying to fulfill a fantasy."

"Uncle Ben once said something to me," Peter looked up. "He said, with great power, comes great responsibility."

Naruto frowned.

"It just means if you have power, the least you can do is use it to help people who can't help themselves. To fight for people who can't fight for themselves," Peter explained. "It's not given just to be abused. Nobody's going to fault you for not wanting to risk your life, but at the same time, you don't have what you have for no reason."

"To whom much is given, much is expected," Naruto hummed contemplatively. Peter's words rang true to him. He could claim it was for Peter that he'd started all the while but on top of his own selfish desire to vent, he'd done it for the simple reason that he didn't like seeing people get away with their crimes, more so when it was done against his friend. And it was that same reason that saw him interfering in more and more incidents. Eventually, even his anger had cooled over and he'd been left with nothing more than a drive for justice for Peter and a desire to keep criminals from going scot free.

And eventually, the urge to help people had joined in. At first, it had been because it gave him a sense of fulfillment that had been easy to get used to, but now he did it more for doing sake than anything else.

I don't believe it. He hadn't even noticed it himself, but he'd gone from a wannabe avenger to an honest-to-God vigilante.

He was still afraid of dying, of getting injured more severely than he could handle. Of what would happen if he were ever exposed. But what the heck. He'd been doing fine so far, it was just a matter of getting better. He had to train himself. Experience wouldn't cut it anymore. It wasn't enough that he learned as he went.

And if he died…well, it was better not to think of it.

"You know what," Naruto began. "You're right. I am doing the right thing. Even granny would be mad about it, but she wouldn't be able to say I'm wrong. It's…its difficult and I'm still scared-"

"Iron Man was a POW alongside Tony Stark," Peter said. "I'm sure they were both terrified of what would ever happen if they got caught working on the suit but they did it anyway. And look where they are today. Stark's the most brilliant man on Earth and Iron Man's basically the second face of The Avengers. Life's all about risks, Naruto."

Naruto smiled. "Geez, when'd you get so wise, Pete?"

"Hospital gives you time to think," Peter smirked. "And after almost dying, I did a lot of introspection."

"You were ready to die to protect Uncle Ben," Naruto nodded respectfully. "Hell, I think the spider should have bitten you instead."

"Maybe in another universe it did," Peter joked. "But seriously, I'm not sure I'd be able to do what you're doing even if it did. I'm selfish, Naruto. If it were a stranger's house that got broken into like mine did, I'd have just stood by and let it happen…but that's what sets us apart, isn't it? The whole reason we even started talking was because you couldn't stand seeing Flash bully me."

"You give yourself too little credit," Naruto said, standing up and stretching out a fist. "Maybe you are selfish, but I can count on you, right?"

Peter chuckled and raised his fist to meet the blond's. "Anytime."

Naruto dropped his hand. "Good…now if you'll excuse me, I have a club meeting to attend and an arms deal to crash."

"Does that mean you'll continue?" Peter asked, stopping Naruto as he got to the door. "You're really going to keep this vigilante stuff going?"

Naruto grinned ferally. "Till I die."

With that, he exited the hospital room, closing the door in his wake and making his way downstairs. The noise from the dead patient's room was gone. He paid it no mind; the dead were dead and the living were alive. He couldn't help those who had gone, but while he still could, he'd do his best to help the ones who remained.

And first, he had to break up the deal. No guns meant no shooting. No guns meant fighting gang wars would be a lot harder. No guns meant criminals would be a lot more hesitant to go out to do crimes. If he was going to make any real headway in his fight against the gangs, he had to keep the weapons from exchanging hands and take the dealer in. Carradine had to go down.

And after Carradine, Shultz was next.

…

By 19:07 pm, Naruto reached Midtown and walked into a random pizzeria he didn't bother trying to learn the name of, ordered a small box with a large soda and went into the bathroom to clean out his eye. He was washing his face in the sink when Teach unceremoniously appeared on his shoulder and gazed at the mirror, examining his eye along with him.

Your eye has healed, the spider remarked.

"It stopped hurting yesterday but I thought that was just it," Naruto said as he pulled his eyelids further apart. "It's like I never even got injured in the first place."

You heal fast.

"It looks like it." Naruto glanced down at the sink that now housed a removed eyepatch. "That makes for a better explanation as to why I'm not feeling anything from that crash anymore. I just thought I wasn't as hurt as I thought."

You weren't, Teach said. It takes more to harm you than you think.

Naruto snorted. "I must not be thinking of the right things because if it wasn't for those goggles, the cops would be powerwashing my brains off the ground; say what you want about them, the army has some pretty powerful stuff."

You're not invincible.

"I guess I'm not," Naruto admitted. "It's just kind of funny, I can stick to walls, see the fallen eyelash on the face of the guy standing a meter away, talk to spiders, shoot webs out of my hands, see things a moment before they happen but the universe draws the line at me being bulletproof."

Teach shrugged as best as a spider could. Does it matter?

"I mean, it'd be pretty cool to have. I'm just bummed out about the goggles; it's pretty much useless now with one of the lenses gone and I wasted money on a replacement eyepatch." He juggled the white eyepatch between his hands. "I can't even give it to anyone and I still have to put it on anyway."

Your guardian doesn't know you're well.

Naruto pursed his lips. "That's true…I hate lying to her, Teach."

You can tell her the truth, Teach suggested.

Maybe it would be better if he did. At least then she'd know why he left so early and came back so late everyday. She'd know why he didn't pick her calls often. She'd understand why he never had time to spend with her and why he defended the vigilante everytime the topic came up.

"I will," he said. "When I get home."

Teach didn't seem to believe him. She'll find out eventually, one way or another.

"I'll cross that bridge when I get there," Naruto slung the patch over his eye. "And it's not like I've been dropping many clues for her, she won't find out on her own."

Peter did.

Naruto sucked at his teeth. "He's too smart for his own good sometimes."

It's good that he did. The boy…he's useful.

"You don't say," Naruto looked at his phone again and reopened the picture he'd received from the boy in question. Peter had been thoughtful enough to make and send him a transcript of the recorded conversation rather than leave him listening to the call everytime he wanted to remember something. That was good considering where he was going.

Speaking of, he checked the time again. Quarter past seven. In another minute or two, his order would be ready. And when that was done, it'd be action time. In another four to five hours, he'd have hopefully dealt his first real blow to Herman Shultz.

"What are the odds that Shultz himself is at the club?" he asked Teach lowly.

Low.

"Yeah, but a guy can hope." Naruto sighed. "The detective better get back to me fast, there's no point in going there if I don't even know who I'm looking for."

Peter could not?

"He can't access police databases other than the public sites, especially not while he's using someone else's computer," Naruto replied, absently looking into his phone. "No need to make him try when I've got someone on the inside-"

"Who are you talking to?" someone asked from the stall. His voice was rough, but slightly slurry, as if he just woke up.

Naruto's head whipped in the direction of the voice and he looked below the toilet door to see a lowered pair of jeans draped over black sneakers. The smell of pizza dough and tomato sauce that filled even the bathroom might have hidden the smell but he was sure he'd have heard someone taking a shit.

"Hey? You still there?" the guy called again before lowering his tone to a murmur. "Is this guy a schizo or something? Shit this feels like something out of a slasher movie. I knew I shouldn't have left my taser in that bag…"

"How long have you been in there?" Naruto asked.

"What's it to you?"

Naruto shrugged. "Nothing, I guess. But come on, you've been in there for a while in and I've been here for almost ten minutes now. People usually don't poop that long."

"Maybe I have diarrhea."

"Do you?" Naruto asked.

"Mind your business!" This time, both man and spider heard the sharp inhale followed by a snort.

Naruto glanced at Teach. The spider seemed to glower at him. No.

'Come on, it's not like I can crawl in the stall.'

I will not watch a man defecate.

The guy's obviously not taking a shit, Teach. Just look at what he's doing.

Teach remained rooted on his spot before conceding and making his way to the stall, climbing up the wall till it was inside. He's falling asleep. There's salt on his hands.

Naruto's eyes narrowed. 'Salt?'

He couldn't see the spider but he felt Teach shrug. It's white. Like salt. Glistens.

Oh.

"Order fifteen is ready for Uzumaki Naruto!"

Naruto stared at the stall pensively, trying to decide what to do. When he heard his name called again, he looked back at the mirror and adjusted the eyepatch. 'Let me know if he's about to leave. I'll be right back."

Teach's curiousity reached him but the spider refrained from asking. Instead, it simply agreed and returned to watching the man snort his 'salt.' Knowing it'd stay, Naruto left the bathroom.

Three minutes later

"I hope you've sniffed up enough of the happy stuff, 'cause you're not going to be too cheerful about what comes next."

The man jumped and looked up to see a black clad figure sticking to the ceiling above the now open bathroom window. In his shock, he dropped the wrap. "No way…."

Beneath his mask, Naruto grinned. "Yes way."

…

Apprehending someone in the toilet was hardly a noteworthy achievement but the small caught-a-bad-guy buzz helped take his mind off thinking about the things that could go wrong in the club and the fact that Dean was late by an hour and going in giving him the most important detail about Carradine: his face. But the buzz had died out a dozen minutes ago and having nothing else to do, Naruto decided to go to the club area and watch and wait and hope something happened.

Which was where he was now. After two straight hours of playing Tetris, he'd gotten hungry and decided to examine 'Carby's' while he ate.

The exterior of the club itself was far too…last age, in his opinion. It had what looked like three floors but the parking lot was a bit too small, purple neon lights that contrasted unpleasantly with the night sky lined the walls and it's name was written on the roof in a manner not very different from the way a doctor would write you a prescription. Carby's spirit was probably stuck in the nineties if he thought the design was great.

However, the long line of people ranging from skimpily dressed women to what was obviously teenagers trying too hard to look like adults waiting outside said not to judge the place by it's appearance. It had to have some sort of repute if people were ready to squeeze together like sardines to get in and arms dealers thought it was a good spot to buy drinks and sell guns. A man of the people, Carby.

Naruto, still clad in his regular clothes, ate the leftover pizza he'd kept in a ziploc bag as he watched the bouncer push away a man who looked more beardless than clean-shaven with large rings on his fingers and what looked like two chains on his neck. The man screamed something that failed to reach his ears over the music and shoved a card in the bouncer's face. The bouncer snatched it out of his hand and snapped it in two before screaming something back at him and giving the man a much harder shove than the first time.

"Not much of a surprise that they check for fake ID," Naruto muttered, watching as the man who was probably a teenager stumbled backwards and fell. A female with heavy makeup rushed to his side and helped him back up. They both screamed curses as the bouncer who'd turned his attention to someone else as they left.

"Which leads to the same question I've asked about three times now. How exactly do you plan on getting in?" Peter's voice came out from the phone he placed next to the radio.

Naruto glanced at the radio again. Dean was really taking his sweet time with getting back to him. "I'll see if I can get in through a window. There's got to be at least one somewhere."

"So do you see any?"

"There's only about a handful large enough for me to fit through," Naruto replied, opening the soda bottle to take a giant swig.

"I checked a few videos of the interior on the internet but none of them have any clear view of a window. If those windows lead somewhere, it's definitely not the dance floor."

"I'm not sure where they open up to either but I'm thinking of taking the one at the back of the ground floor. Hopefully, it'll lead to a closet or something."

"And you can't get in to check?"

Naruto dusted his hands on his jeans. "I can climb in through one. But I'm waiting for the detective to get back to me first."

The loud clacking he heard over the phone told him Peter was typing something. "It's a real shame this guy doesn't have any public criminal record."

Before Naruto could respond, the radio crackled and its screen lit up, showing a code he had come to know by heart. He quickly accepted the call. "Detective. I was starting to qthink you chickened out."

"Not on your life, kid," Dean's voice came out as tired. "Long day."

"I can tell." Naruto got up and stretched. "What about what we talked about? You've got the guy's face?"

"Yeah, we picked up a clear shot of his face from some surveillance footage after one of the guys you brought in identified him from an old picture. I'll give you his most recent one."

A few seconds later, Naruto was staring at John Carradine's face.

In movies, arms dealers were always either extremely rich, well groomed people who never showed up anywhere without a suit on or shady looking, leather jacket wearing men who liked to meetup at abandoned places with bags of guns. Carradine was somewhat in the middle. His short, dirty blond hair was rough and his clothes looked as if the power had gone out while he'd been ironing them but he had a somewhat neat yet still rough looking face, as if he'd only just started a skincare routine. He might have started off rough, but the guy was beginning to move up in the world.

"He looks pretty average," Naruto commented.

"Most of them do," Dean said. "He'll be there soon if what you said about the call you intercepted is correct. We don't know how long it is since he took this picture but he couldn't have changed that much. Best be on the lookout."

"Sure." Naruto looked back at the line. A few cars had parked at the entrance. "I think he's here."

Dean coughed. "Shit, kid. Look, I don't want to demotivate you or anything but…are you sure you want to do this? Gangsters don't play around with their money. If it reaches SHK that you're the reason something as profitable as an arms deal went south, you're going straight up from their shitlist to their hitlist."

Naruto pursed his lips as he watched people leave the cars. "And what do you suggest I do?"

"I don't know, listen in and just drop the location. I'll get some guys over there as fast as I can."

The men who got out of the car seemed to know each other because as soon as they saw each other, they shared an elaborate handshake, seemingly talking to themselves as they did. The bouncer didn't bother checking them in. Apparently, Carby didn't let the rules apply to criminals.

"When they get there," he started. "Carradine's guys are probably going to be waiting for them assuming they haven't already left. And some gang members are definitely coming with the leader or representative. If you guys show up out of the blue, you'll have yourselves a firefight against what's basically two teams at once. And that's assuming you even meet them there because no offence to New York's finest but you guys aren't the fastest when it comes to response."

Dean grunted. "You understand that if you go there by yourself, you'll be on your own against said 'two teams', right?"

"Isn't that how it's always been?" Naruto shrugged. "Besides, this isn't the first arms deal I've busted. The last one didn't go so bad."

Save for the part where you nearly got your head blown off. And you've got no goggles to protect you this time. Be careful

"Yeah, except for the fact that you didn't have people actively hunting you down then. Gang affiliations don't show on the face, kid. You won't know who's SHK till he's trying his best to pop you the moment he sees you."

Maybe it was time to switch clothes. Most people wouldn't be able to identify him if he wore something different. At least until he started shooting webs.

"You let me worry about that, Detective," Naruto replied.

Dean muttered what sounded like 'fucking idiot' under his breath before speaking up once again. "Fine. You want to deal with this yourself? Go crazy. Just let us know when you're done. And don't die"

"You know I will, detective." Naruto got up and walked towards the edge to scan the crowd better. The gangster was supposed to meet up with Carradine, not the other way round.

"I'll see if I can get some guys ready to move when your call comes in."

If it came in. "Get them ready before the call comes in. I'll give you a location anyway."

Dean sounded like he was scratching his hair. "Wait, what about this? You get the location and call us to report shots fired or something. That way, we get a good reason to mobilize and get there in time."

"We both know that's a gamble, Detective."

"And what you want to do isn't?"

"I guess that's true." A shock of blond hair entered his vision, putting him on alert before it's owner, a dark skinned man came out of the crowd.

"So you'll call?"

"We'll see."

"Alright. Good luck, kid."

Naruto didn't respond. After another few moments, the line went dead with a beep.

"You're not going to call him, are you?"

"What are you talking about, Peter? Of course I will." Naruto took out his 'work' clothes, gave them a sniff that made his nose wrinkle and put them back into his bag.

"Naruto…"

The blond sighed. "There's no way to end this deal without things getting nasty, Pete. I have a better chance of at least taking some of them out before bullets start flying than the cops do."

"You're putting yourself in too much risk with that attitude, Naruto."

"You don't think I know that?" Naruto watched as a man made his way out of the crowd with four other men and swaggered towards the bouncer with a card already out. He didn't look too different from the other people in the line but his hair, dirty blond in colour and his face, rough yet smoothening out due to a comfort only money could buy, made him stand out in the eyes of a person already searching for those features.

John Carradine really hadn't changed much since the picture was taken.

Got you.