Post by Drake on Apr 10, 2016 14:19:57 GMT -5
#18: Marked for Destruction Part 3
Tangled Web
By Drake
…
“By the decree of Lord Doom, you are under arrest.”
“Um…how about ‘no,’” Spider-Man retorted.
The webbed wonder fired a glob of webbing, but Lady Latveria managed to incinerate the projectile with a swipe of her sword.
“Note to self: avoid the Blazing Sword,” Spider-Man muttered.
Lady Latveria pounced upon the hero, driving him to flip away and land on the wall of a shop. By this point, the spectators were few and far between, most civilians smart enough to run away from a superpowered brawl. A couple lone teenagers remained, transfixed by the battle. One raised something Peter could only assume was a camera, and began to snap pictures of him.
Spidey webbed the camera to his hand and smashed it against the wall. “No Snapchat! I’m a spy, genius!”
“Pozhe kra—“ the teenager began in Latverian, before Spider-Man waved him off.
“Run, you idiot! RUN!” the hero shouted.
It took Lady Latveria’s continued assault of Spider-Man to scare the kids off. The local warrior impaled the wall on which Spidey had just been resting. The webbed wonder had leapt away to safety in the nick of time, just seconds before the sword would have made contact.
“Not that you care, but I just came up with the best pun. Spy-der-man. Hilarious, right?” Spidey joked.
“RRAAAH!” Another leaping strike drove Spider-Man to roll underneath his attacker.
“I take it they don’t teach ‘Humor 101’ in super soldier school,” Spider-Man quipped, bouncing off the ground with his hands to land a kick.
Lady Latveria blocked his strike with her shield, and swung her sword down upon his neck. Spidey managed to roll back to avoid the blow, and came up swinging. This time, instead of blocking, Lady Latveria thrust her hand out, sending Spider-Man flying. The webbed wonder crashed through a tent, before coming to a stop. Groaning in pain, he pushed himself up onto his feet.
“Someone’s been spending time on Dagobah...” Spider-Man grumbled.
“Why do you speak so incessantly?” Lady Latveria wondered, stalking toward the injured hero.
“Do you want the Freudian answer, or the one I've been saving for Oprah?” Spider-Man replied, firing two weblines.
Lady Latveria allowed the lines to connect with her shoulders. Spidey tried to swing her around, but the super soldier merely planted her feet to stop him. Then, she tugged on the weblines, pulling Spider-Man toward her.
“If that’s how we’re gonna play it…”
As Spider-Man rocketed toward the Latverian, he tapped his spider emblem thrice, switching it to fire proof mode. When he neared her, the super soldier attempted to decapitate him, but the webbed wonder managed to contort his body such that he could stick his hands onto the top of her sword. He then flipped himself over it, and kicked Lady Latveria in the face.
Landing gracefully, Spider-Man bowed, “Hold the applause. I’ll be here all day.”
Lady Latveria looked up, eyes red with rage, blood dripping from her nose. “Outsider, you have made a big mistake.”
“Ruh roh,” Spider-Man muttered.
Lady Latveria extended her hand, and began to telekinetically drag Spider-Man to her. He instinctively pulled away with all his might, but it was no use. This time he was on a collision course with the backside of her shield. Spidey tried to maneuver around it, but had no luck. The super soldier swatted him to the ground, and immediately attempted a finishing blow with her sword.
Spider-Man rolled to the side, narrowly avoiding death. He sprung off the ground with his hands, and wrapped his calves around Lady Latveria’s face.
“If you think my calves are rock hard—” Spider-Man said, flipping backwards. “Wait till you feel the grou—WHOA!”
He successfully sent the super soldier crashing headfirst into the ground, but she immediately responded by dragging him down with her. She flipped the advantage, and pinned him to the ground. Spidey struggled against her grip, but couldn’t make significant headway.
Her blade just an inch from his throat, Lady Latveria growled out, “Spies are not welcome in Latveria.”
Struggling for air, Spidey managed, “I realize now…admitting that…was a bad idea.”
“Any last words?” the super soldier asked.
“Yeah,” Spider-Man said, “Heads up.”
The webbed wonder head-butted the super soldier. This gave him the opportunity he needed to flip her over, even if he saw stars while doing it. Spider-Man crouched in a three-pronged position, pinning her down with his legs and one arm. He raised the other, preparing to pound on her.
“You seriously need to watch more movies. ‘Any last words’ is code for ‘deus ex machina alert!’ Good guy’s about to win! You shoulda just shut up!” Spidey teased.
“Attention, Spider-Man! Stand down or be terminated!” came a new, all too recognizable voice.
“Son of a…” Spider-Man looked around. He was surrounded by dozens of flying Doombots, whose repulsor rays had already begun to warm up.
“You were saying,” Lady Latveria jeered.
Spider-Man stepped back and put his hands in the air. Lady Latveria grunted as she rose up onto her feet, and picked up her laser sword.
Sheathing it, she said, “Spider-Man, as I was saying, you are under arrest by—“
“It works every time,” Spidey whispered.
“What—“
THWIP!
Spider-Man fired a webline, and swung away. Doombots raced after him and unleashed a torrent of repulsor fire, but none managed to make contact. They could only fire so often, for whatever reason unable to do so whenever their shots may cause property damage or injure a civilian.
Spidey swung around in mid-air, latched onto a Doombot with a webline, and brought it down to him. He used it to block the rest of their repulsors, while he tapped his emblem until he reached stealth mode.
“Charlie Maverick,” he said, and disappeared. The Doombot slipped to the ground.
“Target out of range. Scanning….target out of range,” the Doombots repeated.
Meanwhile, Spider-Man ran for half a mile, before slipping into an alley and collapsing onto the ground.
I have to go after Otto now. They’ll kill him…no. No, they won’t. They’ll use him as bait. For now, I need to rest. Catch my breath. Otherwise…
Peter’s thoughts faded as adrenaline left his body and he fell unconscious.
…
“Who are you?” the armed man asked Gwen.
Hands still raised, she replied, “My name’s Gwen Stacy. I’m Dr. Octavius’ assistant.”
“Miss Stacy is in the database,” the drone said in monotone. The enforcer looked between Gwen and the drone, unsure of what to do next.
“I have an ID card,” Gwen slowly began to reach for her pocket. “If you don’t shoot me, I can show it to you.”
“Keep your hands up. I’ll do it,” the man said.
Gwen nodded and resumed the position, so the enforcer holstered his pistol. He patted her over, and rummaged through her pockets.
As he produced different items, Gwen listed them off, “Cellphone. Wallet. House keys. Dorm key. ID card. Flash drive.” The man looked up at her inquisitively. She remained casual as she responded, “You can check it. It’s just got basic info, lab reports, et cetera.”
The next item changed the game. He withdrew Otto’s ID card.
“Was wondering how you got in here,” he admitted.
“Dr. Octavius gave it to me. He transfers funds to his mom’s bank account every month. When he’s not in town, he has me do it, hence the card,” Gwen explained.
That was half true. Otto did send money to his elderly mother every month, but the transfer was in the bank’s computer system. He hadn’t manually done it for a long time, and he certainly had never asked Gwen to do it.
“Adam, is she telling the truth?” the enforcer asked the drone.
Adam responded, “Dr. Octavius’ mother is still alive, but there are no records of this transaction. However, OsCorp does not keep track of how its employees spend their wages.”
“Raniero Drago, Dr. Octavius’ nephew, works at the company. He can back me up,” Gwen interjected. Things could very well get bad very quickly.
“Raniero Drago is in the database,” Adam agreed.
“I have his phone number. You can call it,” Gwen said.
However, the enforcer wasn’t listening to her. He stared at the communicator in Gwen’s ear.
“What’s that?” he asked.
Gwen pulled it out and showed it to him. “A Bluetooth headset.”
The enforcer didn’t seem convinced, but he turned his attention to Gwen’s phone nonetheless. He tried to open it, but couldn’t, as it was locked with a passcode.
“Password?”
“Um…can I just type it myself?” Gwen wondered. A glare quieted that notion. “Right. Never mind. My passcode is, uh, it’s peterparker, no spaces, no caps.”
As the enforcer searched through her contacts, he said, “Is the boy in your wallpaper Peter?”
Gwen nodded, “Yeah. He’s my boyfriend.” She hurriedly added, “His password to his phone is my name. It’s not that weird.”
The enforcer glanced up at her incredulously. “Girl, I have my wife’s name tattooed on my left arm. Relax.”
“Right…” Gwen mentally slapped herself.
The enforcer dialed Blackie’s number. He picked up after two rings.
“Gwen?”
“No. You’re Raniero, correct?” the enforcer asked.
“Where’s Gwen?” he replied.
“Put me on speaker,” Gwen said. The enforcer did. “Hey, Raniero. I just need you to back me up on something. Your uncle, Otto, transfers money to his mom every month, right?”
“Um…yeah. Yeah, he’s mentioned that before,” he agreed.
“And Gwen, when he’s gone, she transfers the money for him?” the enforcer asked.
“Yeah,” Blackie immediately replied. Gwen silently thanked God for her friends.
“…alright. Thank you, Mr. Drago,” the enforcer said.
“No problem.”
The enforcer hung up and handed Gwen back her phone. One by one, he began to return her belongings as he spoke.
“Just call a software engineer if you forget the password to a computer again, Ms. Stacy, and save us all the mess of having to sort this out.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Have a good night,” he said, and exited the room. Adam followed him without a word.
Gwen let out a deep sigh of relief, and moved back to the desk chair. She collapsed onto it, massaging her forehead. As she turned the computer on with one hand, Gwen slipped the comms piece into her ear.
“I’m fine,” Gwen stated. She could hear Mary Jane take a deep breath on the other side of the line and mutter ‘Thank God.’
“I’m going to stay here overnight and find out as much as I can. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” Gwen said.
“Yeah, okay. Just remember to get here early. The dorms close tomorrow at noon. You need to pack up before then,” MJ replied.
“Will do. Good night, Mary.”
“Wait. Just one thing…why do you think OsCorp’s working with the mob?”
Gwen frowned, as the Project SANDMAN file appeared before her. She opened it.
“OsCorp was trying to create super soldiers for a private contractor. Who in the private sector needs a human weapon?” Gwen rhetorically asked. She continued, “There’s no way they were trying to make a superhuman for a corporate rival. Flint Marko, Sandman, used to be muscle for an old mobster. It just adds up.”
“Shit,” MJ whispered.
“Go to sleep, Mary. Let me worry about this, at least until tomorrow,” Gwen pushed.
“Fine…night.”
“Good night.”
MJ hung up, and left Gwen to her devices. To that end, she had a long night ahead of her. So, without further ado, she delved into the files, beginning with Project SANDMAN, but eventually moving past it into documents she had previously uncovered, secrets she hadn’t known about when she first hacked Otto’s files all those months ago, and emails between Norman Osborn and his highest ranking employees that mentioned an unnamed man, constantly referred to as ‘The Partner.’
…
Peter awoke when a teenaged girl tripped over him. Scrambling back beside her girlfriend, the young Latverian stared at the hero’s invisible leg. Fear replaced confusion, and everything got worse when Peter spoke.
“Boo.”
The girl screamed, grabbed her partner’s hand, and sprinted off. The other cursed at her as they ran, but did not fight back.
Peter smirked as he rose, but his amusement quickly got driven away by the ‘shooming’ sound of repulsor flight nearby. A Doombot zoomed toward the teenagers and scanned over them.
“(Citizens, you are out past curfew. Until the outsider has been found, you must stay in your homes between 2200 and 0600 hours local Latverian time, as per the orders of Lord Doom,)” the robot declared in Latverian.
“(We…uh…)” the girl who had tripped over Peter now stumbled over her words.
“Run!” Peter yelled.
The Doombot looked toward the source of the noise and began to float to it. The teens took off.
Peter agilely flipped between walls until he landed on an adjacent rooftop. He considered taking the Doombot down, but it was too late. Others swarmed in around his general position. The original had already contacted reinforcements.
“Outsider, reveal yourself,” the Doombot ordered, scanning the area.
Peter silently thanked SHIELD for the stealth tech as the bot’s scans failed to pick up his signature. Free to move, he quietly leaped off the building and ran away. He was safe, hidden, and relatively healed. Now he had to save Otto.
Where should he look? It really wasn’t that hard to figure out. An enormous stone castle loomed over the city, and appeared only slightly less imposing than the statue of its despot owner before it.
Peter took a deep breath, and began the trek to the castle.
…
“George, wake up. Wake up, man!”
The source of the voice, one Vincent Maroni, shook the drunken cop awake. George blinked to make out the man’s form in what seemed to him bright light. He rubbed his eyes, reached into his pocket, and placed a twenty on the table.
“George…” Vinny began, but thought better of it. The twenty didn’t cover his bill, but he knew the man was strapped for money. Also, George was a customer he could count on; he came in nearly every day.
“Listen, George, buddy, time and time again I bend the rules for you. I let you stay overnight, ‘cause I know you’re a decent guy, and you’re prob’ly not gonna make it home if I don’t, but here’s the deal: this is gettin’ bad. I gotta cut you off,” Vinny explained.
“What? No,” George began, attempting to massage away the pain in his head, “Vinny, please. I already got kicked out of Mann’s—“
“—And if you’re no good for a cop bar, George, then I can’t put you up. I…you gotta understand, I’m doing this ‘cause I like you. You can still come in here, but I can’t just watch you get slammed every night,” Vinny said.
“Yeah?” George slumped back onto his feet. “Yeah, what are you gonna do when I let slip what all you sell here? You think I haven’t seen the off-script contraband you push, or the poker games you host every Saturday and Wednesday? That 12 gauge behind the counter, is it legal?”
“George, don’t be like this. You talk, and I report your addiction to the police chief…oh yeah, buddy, I know the police chief,” Vinny threatened in the same friendly tone.
George grimaced, and began to head for the door. ’Goddamn New York City, where superfreaks walk the streets and a dirty bartender spends the holidays with the chief of police and Silvermane’s brother-in-law.’
“George, you know you’re still welcome here!” Vinny called after him as he left the building.
Sunlight hit George like a jackhammer. Thankfully, someone came to his rescue.
Darkened shades slipped into his hands as a man said, “Here. I got an extra pair.”
“Kinsey?” George wondered. Even with sunglasses on he was forced to squint to make out his fellow officer.
“Yeah, Detective. I was, uh, told I could find you here,” Kinsey explained. He motioned to his cruiser.
George frowned and reached for his own car keys, but quickly realized finding them didn’t matter. His vehicle was gone. Someone had stolen it.
“Your car’s safe. You left it outside your apartment. Was told you wandered here, actually,” Kinsey assured him.
Sighing with relief, George followed the man to his car. Neither spoke until they got in and Kinsey started the vehicle.
“You sent to fetch me?” George asked as Kinsey handed him a coffee. He nodded in thanks.
“’No. I came looking for you. I…need help with something,” the younger cop explained, pulling out from the parking lot.
“Marko,” George realized.
After a moment, Kinsey admitted, “Yeah…Marko.”
“No way in hell. Leave it to the supers,” George immediately replied.
“I don’t think so,” the other officer said, shaking his head. Something steeled in his eyes. His anxiety was suddenly gone, or at least under control. “I mean, we like to pretend like those guys, the—the superheroes or whatever, that they’re on every block, especially here in New York, but how often do you actually see one? The Baxter Building’s right in the heart of Manhattan, and I’ve seen the Fantastic Four maybe two or three times. Spider-Man? Once, from a block away. Spider-Woman’s the first I’ve ever seen up close, and—pardon my French—I’m a damn beat cop! I deal with crooks on a daily basis. So, we just leave Marko to them? No. No one will stop him before it’s too late. You say we should leave Marko alone? I say ‘hell no.’”
“Spider-Woman’s on the case—“
“Screw Spider-Woman! George, come on. People don’t trust cops anymore. We can do something about that. Imagine the headlines if we take down Marko. ‘COPS CAPTURE SANDMAN’—all over the city.”
“So, what, this is for glory?” George spat.
“No, this is for pride! Don’t you feel like you’ve been fucking castrated by the freaks in tights? I know you do. I was told as much. That’s why I came to you. I know you want to get your pride back. I know you’ve got a vendetta against Marko. C’mon. This case has got your name written all over it,” Kinsey pushed.
George bit his lip, and looked out the window. “Yeah, yeah, so if we were to do this, how would we go about it? How do we find Marko? More importantly, how do we arrest someone who’s made of sand?”
Kinsey smirked. He was making ground. “I’ll show you.”
For the first time, George realized they weren’t headed for the precinct. “Where are we going?”
“Just trust me.”
“Kinsey…”
They pulled into the lot of an abandoned warehouse. Kinsey parked the car, shut it off, and turned to George.
“Follow me, Detective,” he said, opening the car door.
George did as he was told, and allowed Kinsey to lead him to the warehouse. The beat cop produced a key separate from the rest and used it to unlock the doors. He slid them open, revealing an enormous room stashed with weapons and armor.
“Holy shit. You’re dirty,” George muttered.
“No. No no no!” Kinsey hurriedly said. “I’m clean, I swear! Cross my heart.”
“Then explain this,” George demanded, motioning to the armory.
“My…my brother…” Kinsey struggled for the right words.
“Your brother is in the Maggia!” George exclaimed.
“Yes! But—but that’s not why I… I wouldn’t do it, unless…unless it was for a good cause. We could take down Marko. You could get revenge,” Kinsey argued.
“Who is it? Is it the Kingpin? Is he alive after all? Does the Kingpin want revenge? Is that why he’s put the hit out?”
“I don’t know!” Kinsey shouted, grabbing George’s shoulders. Suddenly there were tears streaming down his cheeks. He slumped to the ground. “Please. He has my family.”
George’s expression softened. He gazed down blankly at the young officer. “Why do they want you to do it?”
“Not ‘they,’” Kinsey mumbled through his sobs. “’He.’ My brother. He pissed off someone up top. Thinks taking down Marko would be a good way to earn back their favor. He came to me, took my wife and daughter…please….”
“Shit,” George grumbled. “Shit.”
He looked up at the armory, and then back down at Kinsey.
“Kinsey, how are we supposed to find Marko?”
The young officer sniffled, and rubbed the tears out of his eyes. He met George’s gaze. As he began to speak, he broke down again.
“Kinsey!” George demanded.
“I’m sorry,” the man sobbed. “It’s just…God, forgive me…”
“Kinsey, how do we find Marko?” George repeated, dread creeping up into his chest.
Kinsey managed to steady himself, but he didn’t look up. Staring down at the ground, as if at the gates of hell, he said, “That’s the thing, Detective. There’s only one surefire way to find Marko: we go to his daughter.”
George’s eyes widened in shock. “His daughter?”
…
“Flint Marko has a daughter?” Gwen muttered, staring at the computer screen. She rubbed her eyes and found the same line again to make sure she wasn’t seeing things.
“Jesus,” she whispered, leaning back. “That’s why he…”
Gwen sighed, and looked back at the computer screen. She caught sight of the time. 7:52.
“Shit!” Gwen cried, hurriedly turning off the computer. “Shit shit shit shit shit!”
She was supposed to meet Adrian Toomes for breakfast. There was no way she’d make it on time.
’Nice going, Gwen,’ she thought, mentally slapping herself.
In her hurry, she didn’t notice her phone buzz. It tried to alert her six times that she was being called, before going to voicemail. This happened twice, at first. Her father’s name appeared on the screen, as, far away, the man silently begged her to answer. She did not. Within minutes, as she left OsTower, her phone vibrated again. This time it was Mary Jane. Yet again, she did not answer.
…
Mary Jane hung up, not bothering to leave a voicemail. She looked down at her ‘missed calls’ list. Rich Rider came up twice, once last night and once this morning. She flipped to her texts. Her three most recent were from Rich, each asking her to call him.
MJ sat back onto her bed, a suitcase packed beside her. She tossed her phone to the side and massaged her temple.
“God, please, Gwen, I need your help…you are so much better at this bullshit than I am…”
…
The royal castle was perched atop a tall, jagged mountain, so it could—like its king—brood over the troubles of everyday Latveria. To Peter, it seemed like something taken straight out of a medieval fantasy flick. Dark, grim stone bricks, a shadowed, foreboding gate, and the face of its owner and king—Victor von Doom—embellished over the entrance, mask and all, staring right down into Peter’s soul. Of course, then there were the robot sentries. ‘Anachronism’ didn’t even begin to summarize its paradoxes.
“Get smart, double-oh-webbin’,” Peter muttered to himself, sitting casually a dozen yards away from the gate’s guards. “How do you break into an impenetrable fortress? I was bourne to complete this mission impossible. C’mon, you man from hunk-le. Think, and think fast, before the King’s Man finds you.”
“…I have a problem,” he quietly lamented.
“Audio detected. Match. Peter Parker, alias Spider-Man,” a Doombot mechanically stated, raising his hand to fire at the webbed wonder.
“Wait, what?” Spider-Man exclaimed. He flipped over the repulsor blast and ran away before other Doombots could attack the general area.
“Oh, yes, I know quite a lot about you, child,” came a voice Peter knew to dread.
The teenaged hero looked up, only to come face to face with Victor von Doom. He can see me?!
Spider-Man tried to scramble away, but found he couldn’t move. Suddenly, he was floating in the air toward Doom. The Latverian tyrant calmly stated something in a language Spidey couldn’t understand, his hand gently glowing green.
“Baxter, you know I don’t speak Spanish! In English please!” Spider-Man garbled.
“Boy…” Doom began, only to be interrupted by Spider-Man.
“It’s Spider-Man, Dr. Evil.”
“Do not struggle. There is no hope for you, Parker. You are beneath me—a pathetic arachnid caught underneath my boot,” Dr. Doom declared.
“I heard cleverer insults in high school, and let me tell you, that's saying a lo—AGH!” The invisible field holding Peter tightened, knocking the air out of his lungs.
“Your attempt at humor is pathetic and asinine,” Doom spat.
“Heh. You said ‘ass,’” Peter retorted. He screamed in pain as the field squeezed again.
“Silence!” Doom roared. The Doombots stepped back. Beneath all their gears and programming, they feared one thing: the rage of their master. Neither they nor any soldiers came to support Doom. He did not need it, as Peter quickly realized.
“Doom will not entertain your childish antics,” the mage said.
“Jesus, just finish me already,” Spider-Man blurted.
Doom frowned behind his mask. Spidey looked up, air difficult to come by but not impossible. His lenses closed in, as he glared at his captor.
“What is it with all of you evil genius assholes? Why is it you feel the need to berate the good guys before you try and fail to kill them? It's so goddamn childish, and coming from me that's saying something!” Spider-Man shouted.
“Good and evil are social constructs developed by small-minded individuals like you,” Doom argued, but something about what Peter had said clicked with him. His magic grip on him loosened.
“Okay, Captain Tumblr, let’s talk like adults for a second. Why the hell haven’t you killed me? Clearly you’ve got some magic deus ex machina I can do nothing against. You’re probably smarter than me. The battle’s over. Just kill me. Please, if you have any compassion hidden beneath that badass mask, do it quickly. Don’t talk me to death.”
“…no,” Doom began.
“SIKE!” Spider-Man declared, suddenly pushing out with all his might. He tore through his invisible restraints, and flipped nimbly to the ground. “God, you are evil if you were going to talk me to death. I get enough of that at work.”
’Child’s play,’ Doom thought. He attempted to encase Peter in another magic shell, but the hero managed to avoid the attack.
“Booyah! You do have weaknesses!” Peter fired webbing at the villain, who incinerated it with a blast.
“Doom is your superior in every way, child! Submit!” the tyrant ordered, blasting energy that was equal parts repulsor and magic.
Narrowly avoiding each beam, Peter spat back, “You know, I’m getting sick and tired of middle-aged jerks telling me what to do!”
Doom suddenly burst forward on rocket boots and attempted to clasp Peter’s throat. The young hero agilely propelled himself off of Doom’s shoulder to flip over him. However, while he was in mid-air, Doom quietly spoke a spell, and trapped Peter in his magical grip yet again.
“You do not comprehend the presence whose power you bask in,” Doom roared, cutting off Peter’s air supply. The boy gasped, but couldn’t do anything to break free this time. His will was too strong.
“Doom is not just my name. It is my identity, my very existence,” the tyrant coolly declared. “Remember that.”
Suddenly, Peter felt a cracking sensation, and everything faded to black.