Peter Parker

As David and I made our way to his home, none of us said a word. David was quiet. I wanted to ask him if he was okay, but something told me that he was intent on being silent until we got to our destination. I was more than a little bit worried. Something told me that David had something heavy to tell me. There had to be a reason why he chose the moment I was talking to Claire to decide to tell me what his powers were.

It didn't take us long to get to David's apartment. He was living right outside of Harlem. Once we were inside, I took a quick look around as I took off my shoes. The living room consisted of a sofa and home entertainment system, the latter having a Nintendo Switch and PS5 hooked up to it. The kitchen was slightly bigger than the one in my apartment, and there was a small hallway that I assumed led to the bathroom and David's bedroom. It was nowhere near as fancy as the X-Men's apartment. But it definitely put my apartment to shame by a good margin.

"Cozy place you have here," I said.

"Thanks," David commented. "I ain't living lavish like Scott and company, but it's comfortable in here and it's not that far from Empire State. I don't really need to ask for much more."

I smiled slightly. "I bet." I then turned and faced him. "But why are we here?'

"Yeah, about that…" He walked past me. I turned as I followed him with my gaze before he sat down on one of the armrests of the sofa. I walked up to him before I stopped short a few steps. "Like I told you before, it's probably a good time to explain to you what my powers are. I'm a psychomimetic." I tilted my head – I never heard that word before. David shook his head as he chuckled. "Sorry, I keep on forgetting that that's not exactly a wide-known term. Basically, I got this low-level form of telepathy that allows me to mimic the skills and knowledge of anybody that's reasonably close to me, all the way down to the mastery level. Like, right now, since I'm close to you, I know the formula of the substance you make your webbing with, a lot of Star Wars lore and…" He paused for a moment. He then tilted his head "…Spanish. You know Spanish." He raised his eyebrows. "Are you Hispanic or something?"

I shook my head. "No. I took Spanish when I was still in Midtown, found I had a knack for it, and I decided to keep up with it. It came in handy, too, because Mr. Delmar – the owner of Delmar's – would say some suggestive things about my aunt. Nothing too crazy, but it still felt very good to catch him slipping."

David laughed. "Now that's funny."

I smirked. "It is. But, yeah, your power is awesome! I bet it helps a lot in school." Come to think about it, such a skill would be great for a lot of things. For a brief moment, I thought about the things one could use that power for, such as being able to speak a language in a foreign land or to quickly adapt to a new job.

David brought his right hand up and did a "so-so" gesture with it. "Sort of. The problem is, once a person leaves my vicinity, any skills and knowledge I get from them is gone. So, when I'm in class, I'm taking as much notes as I can before I go studying by my lonesome, away from any other students. I got to put double the effort into actually learning what I'm being taught."

I grimaced. "That sounds burdensome."

He shrugged. "It's the story of my life. But we're not here to talk about my life as a college student. How well do you know Claire?"

"Honestly, I don't know her that well. Including today, I can count on one hand the times we've interacted face to face. The only thing I really know about her is that she's a licensed nurse and she provides healthcare for the vigilantes in this city."

David nodded. "I see. Well, what about Scott?"

I raised my eyebrows. "As in does Scott know her well?" I asked. David nodded once more. I thought about it for a moment. I then remembered the night that Craig and I fought (the fake) Scorpion and how Scott assured me that Claire (or Night Nurse, as Scott called her) would be able to take care of Craig after he was injured. "I would think so, considering that Claire's the main person the X-Men turn to whenever we need to be treated off the books. Why?"

"I need to ask Scott a couple of questions about Claire," David explained. "Some of the knowledge I was pulling from her got me raising eyebrows about her. I don't want to make assumptions, though."

I felt a bit alarmed and I started to have questions. Still, I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. "I'll call Scott right now."

After dialing up Scott's number, I put my cell on speakerphone. As the phone rang, I wondered what it was about Claire that had David seeing red flags. After three rings, Scott picked up.

"Hello, Peter," Scott greeted. "I hope all is well."

"I don't know if it is," I replied. "You're on speakerphone right now. I'm with David."

"Hey Mr. Summers," David spoke up.

"…Hi." Scott went quiet for a bit. "…This isn't a social call, is it?"

"Far from it, Boss. See, Peter and I was on our way to visit Craig. We stopped at this bodega along the way ran into Claire while were in there. Because of my you-know-what, I picked up on a couple of things. Peter figured you know Claire quite well."

"I like to think I know her well enough. Why?"

"Well, I have a couple of questions. Is she fluent in Russian and does she know Sambo?"

Scott didn't answer at first. David and I glanced at each other. After some moments, Scott spoke up.

"She might know a little bit of Sambo, but her grappling is mostly based in Jujutsu and Judo. As for Russian… no, I don't believe she knows the language… at least not to the point of any level of fluency."

David took in a breath. "That's not good."

I looked at him. "What? What's not good?"

"Going off of what Scott just said, that wasn't Claire," David said.

I shook my head. "Then who…?" I paused for a moment. "Can't you tell who it is?"

David shook his head. "My you-know-what only allows me access to knowledge and skills. I can't read a person's mind for anything else."

I shook my head. "So it could be anyone." I frowned. "Could it be Mysterio?"

"Maybe, maybe not," Scott replied. "But regardless of who the person impersonating Claire is, both Claire and Craig are in danger. You two, I want you to head to Claire's clinic as soon as possible and see what's going on there. I'm going to head over to Claire's apartment."

"You got it," David said. "Be careful, Mr. Summers. We'll keep you posted."

"Please do."

The call ended right after that.

"We need to swing by my place so I can grab my suit," I said.

"There's no time for that," David replied as he stood up. "We're going straight there."

My eyes went wide. "But what about our identities?"

"I'm going grab a couple of shiesties we can use. We'll be out of here in a just a minute." He walked into the hallway. I assumed he was going into his room. I looked off to the side in thought for a moment. I then looked back at the hallway.

"…What's a shiesty?"

Sometime later, David and I were on top of a building, looking down towards Claire's clinic. Each of us had on a ski mask – or a sheisty, as David called it. Using my Edith glasses, I was able to zoom in on the front of the clinic. Much to my surprise, there was three black SUVs parked in front of it, along with a black van that looked like some kind of ambulance.

"What's it looking like?" David asked.

"Four vehicles – three black Suburbans and an E-Series that looks like an Ambulance," I replied.

"That doesn't seem good. We're probably looking at G-Men."

I grimaced. "Sounds like a normal day to me." I was only being partially sarcastic.

"So how are we doing this?"

I shook my head slowly. "I don't know. I don't want to go in guns blazing, especially since I don't have any of my equipment on me. We might have to…" I trailed off when I saw the doors of the clinic open. Out the front, multiple people stepped out, wheeling with them a stretcher. On top of the stretcher was a figure that was in a hospital gown and had their arms, legs, and head wrapped in gauze. "…Oh no…"

"What's wrong?"

"They're wheeling off someone. I think it might be Craig!"

"We need to get there now!"

David and I quickly made our way out of the building. As much as I wanted to make a beeline towards the clinic, I followed David as he took an alternate route. I felt my heart beating against my chest. I couldn't let Craig get taken away. If he did, who knew what his captors would do to him, especially if they were the government. There was a part of me that was wondering if I was being too paranoid. I almost laughed at myself. Of course I wasn't being too paranoid. Between what happened to Carmilla and the X-Men's history, I had little reason to anything past the U.S. Government.

By the time we reached the front of the clinic, two of the SUVs and the ambulance drove off. I thought about shooting a strand of webbing, but stopped myself – I didn't even have my shooters equipped, let alone on my person.

David and I came stopped in our tracks.

"What do we do?" I asked.

"I can think of a couple of options," David replied. I looked over at him and saw him looking at the black SUV that was still there. I raised an eyebrow.

"Why would they leave this vehicle behind?"

"They probably got a couple of people doing sweeps in the building right now." David walked up to the vehicle and tried to open. Of course, it was locked. "I should've seen that coming." He looked over his shoulder at me. "See a rock or something?"

"We won't need it." I walked to the SUV. I beckoned David to stand aside. Once he did, I dug my fingers into the B Pillar seam and pulled slowly, forcing the door open.

"That's one way of doing it," David commented. "Good one."

"Thanks," I replied. I climbed into the vehicle and into the front passenger seat, allowing David to take the driver's seat. "Hey, Edith, can you scan the vehicle to see if there's any security measures in the vehicle?"

"Scanning now," she replied. After some seconds, Edith spoke again. "There's a kill switch installed in the vehicle, along with a GPS tracker. I'm disabling them both now. Also, I see the vehicle is push to start. Do you want me reprogram it for use?"

I smiled. "Would you kindly?"

"Reprogramming the vehicle now. Reprogramming… reprogramming… Vehicle is now able to be started."

"Thanks Edi." I looked towards David. "We're good to go." David pressed the ignition button. The SUV roared to life. I barely put my seatbelt on in time before David peeled off. As we drove, I spoke to Edith again. "Can you check the traffic surveillance network? We need to find that black ambulance."

"Let me see," Edith replied. From the lens of my glasses, I saw the different feeds being flipped through. I guess about 25 feeds flashed by in a few seconds before she landed on one. "I think I spotted them – they're on 128th, about to turn northbound onto Madison Avenue."

"Madison Avenue," I whispered to myself. I shook my head. "Why there?"

"You think they're taking Craig out of the city?" David offered.

"I don't know, but I'm not sure I want to wait to find out."

I looked over at David just in time to see him shake his head as he smiled wryly. "So much for an easy day."

I frowned. "I'm sorry."

"Low key, it's my fault. Scott told me I didn't have to help him out with X-Men related stuff. But I did so knowing full well that getting involved with the X-Men in any way, shape, or form would likely leave me in the middle of some superhero bullshit."

I looked forward as David kept driving. "We'll owe you big time for this."

"Don't worry about it. I'll take it from Mysterio's flesh when it's all said it done."

I didn't say anything. I merely nodded.

With Edith providing updates on the location, we ended up on I-87. As I feared, we were headed out of the city. After about ten minutes, we finally spotted the black SUVs with the black ambulance. They were about a fives cars ahead of us.

"There they are," David said. "How do you want to play this?"

"…Good question," I said. Right now, David and I weren't fully equipped for this. I didn't have my gear. Masks aside, we were both wearing what we went to work with. We really should have been calling Scott. The thing is, though, if we let off now, what would happen to Craig?

I'm going to kick Mysterio's ass for all of this.

"Edith," I said after some moments. "Please contact Scott and let him know our situation." I then looked at David. "We have to keep following them."

"I figured as such."

"Did I ruin your evening?"

"Not really, I was just going to go home, study, and see what Tinder and Grindr was looking like."

I nodded before I cracked my neck.

This was going to be a long drive.