Spider-Verse: A Tangled Web We Weave
Eighteen
"Today's the day!" Ned declared excitedly as groups of students set up their various projects in the early morning.
"Okay, we have the poster we made to explain what the Spider-bot can do," Cindy Moon noted, looking over the display.
"Looks good," Miles agreed.
"Should we have included the mods we didn't get the chance to build?" Cindy frowned.
"Why not?" Ned shrugged. He added brightly, "We can show them how good it could be."
"All right, have we done tests on the bot? Gotta make sure it's running," Miles added.
"I'll do it," Cindy volunteered.
Taking the modified remote control she ran it through basic functions, tested the wall crawling function, and swapped in the net launcher and grapple arm.
"All set," Cindy patted the small mech.
"Wanna look at the other entries?" Miles suggested.
"Might as well," Ned agreed, "we can see how bad they'll kick our asses."
"At least no one has a Iron Man, other than Riri," Cindy noted.
"There's that," Ned agreed.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Unknown to everyone, HYDRA was moving into position.
"Hydra ONE, in place," the first squad reported.
"Hydra TWO... unm, we're kind of caught in traffic."
"What."
"There's what MIGHT be a movie filming.. or an actual disturbance. There's a golden goblin dude.. on FIRE."
"WHAT."
"Never mind!" a third voice cut in, "Just get to the school as best you can."
"Yes ma'am," Hydra TWO said sheepishly.
"Hydra THREE, in position," the third team reported in.
"We don't want to move until Hydra TWO checks in," the leader mused. "All teams, stay undercover I'll signal you."
All three teams chorused "Hail HYDRA!"
Of course, they were unaware that SHIELD knew they were up to something... and others enemies, too.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Gwen Stacy, commander of the New York SHIELD office, was NOT happy.
"How did we drop the ball on this?" Gwen demanded, the blond haired woman glaring at the staffers assembled.
The agents in the meeting room all shifted uncomfortably.
Sally Avril bravely spoke up, "We DID find out about the planned attack on the Academy from our contact."
"Only days in advance," Gwen sighed
Another male agent nervously spoke up, "Our intelligence indicates that this is a relatively small Hydra cell."
"Oh, that's comforting," Gwen snarked. They all knew that 'relatively small' left a LOT of room for things to go wrong.
Sally coughed. She reported, "We have an agent in each cell, once they get the go order, we'll sweep them up."
Annoyingly, they couldn't just arrest them in advance. Just being in a Hydra cell wasn't an actual crime, and unless they actually broke the law there was nothing SHIELD could do. Baring them being wanted for earlier stuff.
"Should we deploy Moon Knight on the op?" Dr Ashley Kafka asked, the psychiatrist also sitting in on the meeting.
"Keep him nearby, but we're not deploying him unless superhumans are in the Hydra forces," Gwen ordered.
"The reports don't say there are any supers," a agent offered.
Gwen shook her head, "We had a report on Pym Particles being stolen not long ago. I am not taking chances that Hydra might have it."
"Should we coordinate with the local police?" Sally asked.
"Yes, but not until the very last minute," Gwen replied. She scowled, "There's a leak in the police force, and I do not want them having the info long enough to use it."
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Captain Jeanne DeWolff sneezed.
(She was, thankfully, unaware of the myth about sneezing when someone talked about you. And she'd be sneezing a lot if it were true, too.)
"What the hell?" another officer cursed.
In the middle of the street a horribly mutated man was standing, swaying slightly as fire danced around him. He looked like a weird hybrid of a gargoyle and a lizard, and his face was weirdly half human, full of pain.
"Davies!" Jeanne yelled from where she and a few other officers were crouched, "Have we got a ID on the perp?"
"The computer is unsure," Jefferson replied, crouched by a regular cruiser that was helping block the street, "but..."
"Yeah?" Jeanne pressed.
"He KIND OF looks like Harry Osborn, when he went Goblin," Jefferson admitted.
"Shit," Jeanne cursed, having heard about THAT cluster fuck.
Harry Osborn had been exposed to the goblin serum that Norman created, but in his case it manifested later. Some months after Norman transformed, Harry suddenly became an orange, monsterous being with fire powers, and fought Spider-man and SHIELD. In a confrontation with his father, Harry was beaten to death...
"Isn't Harry DEAD?" Jeanne wondered aloud.
"Like that's stopped the Green Goblin?" one man noted.
"Point," Jaenne admitted.
The 'Hobgoblin' yelled something incoherent, then fired off several flame bursts all around him.
"GET DOWN," Jefferson ordered as street lamps nearby exploded into flames.
"Everyone okay?" Jeanne demanded a few moments later, as the smoke cleared. A chorus of yeses came back.
"I think he's deliberately trying not to hurt anyone," Jefferson mused. He added, "Someone should talk to him."
"NOT IT," several officers blurted.
"Cover me," Jefferson ordered, stepping out from behind his vehicle with his hands up.
Hobgoblin tensed as he drew near, but did not blast him.
'Good sign,' Jefferson thought. He held out his hands, "I'm Officer Davis, I'm here to help."
"Hrrrr," Hobgolin grunted.
Jefferson continued, "Let us help you. What is it you want?"
Hobgoblin shuddered visibly. "I... I don't know," he managed, then suddenly reverted to human form, collapsing as Jackson caught him.
"Medic!" Jackson yelped.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
"Well, this is certainly a thing," May Parker noted mildly.
The display was using electromagnetism to 'float' a sphere of constantly moving liquid metal. It was both pretty and eerie.
"How much power does this take?" May asked the kids curiously. While she wasn't a genius herself, she hung around Peter enough to talk knowledgeably about it all.
"There you are," Liv Octavius hurried up, smiling warmly at her.
"Liv, I was just looking around," May noted.
"I wanted to show you something," Liv lead her off.
"I wanna be like that when I'm that old," one of the teens mused, impressed by how well the older woman had kept up
"Agreed," another nodded, impressed that she had (apparently) been ablew to get a date with the usually aloof Liv Octavius.
Everyone was unaware that Hydra and SHIELD agents were trickling in...
To Be Continued...
Notes: Poor Harry Osborn. I was rereading his backstory... poor bastard got put through the wringer. Which, admittedly, does NOT mean I'll go easy on him.
Next chapter, Fisk and the Six get involved...