Spider-man and the Lingering Monster Beneath

Peter Parker rolled around in his bed restless, wondering why can’t he sleep.  Folklore notions passed through his consciousness; was it because someone else was dreaming of him?  Was that the rule because if that was the case, he felt he should be sleeping like a baby right now?  He knew he had a busy day at work, exhaustively swinging from one end of New York to the other.  Then he thought, maybe it was that hit to the head earlier tonight that did it.

He looked at his clock on his nightstand reading 03:23 AM.  Aunt May wasn’t making any noise out there, she must be sleeping so he got up.  He kept his spidey suit at the bottom of his underwear drawer because he and Aunt May had an arrangement that she is never to go in there.  A man’s underwear is his own business so it was the perfect place to hide it.

He took off his pajamas and pulled the red and blue tight suit on over himself.  He looked at himself in the mirror wearing it, thinking that it has been almost two years now since Uncle Ben died.  Two years since being bitten by a radioactive spider that would change his life forever, for better or for worse.  Peter pulled his red mask over his face and became Spider-man.

Spider-man walked to his bedroom window and opened it looking out in the quiet Forest Hills night for any possible people walking by.  He was free and clear, he thought that’s all he needed was the cops at his door in the middle of the night, thinking Spider-man was breaking into some sweet lady’s home for no reason.  Jamison down at the Bugle would have a field day with that sort of news.

There weren’t any tall buildings around his house so this ended up being the hardest part of being Spider-man oddly enough, was the travel to and from the city. Thankfully in the last few months they’ve been putting up cellphone towers in a lot of these old Queens neighborhoods so Spider-man has been using them to get to Manhattan.  

Once in the city he could go anywhere, all he needed to do is just stretch a hand out as he is swinging from his web with the other hand.  He could just point, shot, and hit some tall structure to keep him swinging forward.  On this night he swung his way to the Chrysler Building to sit up on one of the gargoyles.  He loved it up there, he could see the city from any angle and it was peaceful.  He was up so high that the crazy New York traffic below only hummed and thankfully didn’t roar.  He wasn’t feeling so great and had a bit of a headache coming on.

As he sat there on the edge looking off into the city a spider crawled on his hand.  He looked down and watched it maneuver its eight legs along his red costume-covered fingers.  He held his hand close to his face wondering what the hell is that spider doing way up here?  He tried to focus of the spider crawl around his hand and not the migraine that was seeping into his mind.

Earlier that day he was applying webbing to a man that was escaping a convenience store with a bag of money when his spider sense alerted him of something amiss north of Manhattan in Yonkers.  He could hear the police sirens so he knew that they would handle this robber.  He smiled for someone’s cellphone camera while he swung away, spinning his web from his wrists as he pulled himself from building to building while thinking, why does he continue to smile for these photos knowing that his mouth is covered by his mask?

Spider-man arrived at a power plant, landing on a roof of one of the many buildings within the highly fenced off facility.  He made his way inside and looked around; his spider senses to this day still amazed him.  They reminded him of a silly game his class would play in grade one.  You would have to wear a blindfold while the rest of the class would guide you through a course that was laid out on the gymnasium floor.  They would all be yelling and screaming to go left and then go right, to bend down and crawl through the tube.  All the while you are blindfolded and at their mercy.  His teacher thought this exercise was a good way to teach the students how to work together and help each other.

His spider sense was at times like a pinball machine on busy days.  This he had to learn to control early on, in order to maintain his sanity because this sense never wanted to close shop for a bit and let him relax.  He had to come to terms that he couldn’t be everywhere so as a result, he had to compartmentalize it.  Guilt for many months consumed his thoughts, especially when he would hear about a rape or a murder and he wasn’t there to help.  It took him a long time to get over the fact that his responsibilities weren’t limited to the entire city.  All he could do is make judgment calls much in the same way as the NYPD does and hope that everybody’s day doesn’t end badly.

Spider-man walked along an upper level and looked down across the massive room he was in at a power reactor.  Five men were standing by a machine while one of them was filling a cylinder with some reactive fluid.  He secured the valve and carefully passed the cylinder back to another man who put it in a silver metal case along with six other cylinders.  Two other men stood by holding machine guns, when Spider-man spinned two cycles of webbing at each machine gun.

The other men instantly looked around as the two men fumbled with their jammed up weapons.  One man pulled his hood down revealing his burnt face as he looked around revealing that his face was sealed in glass.  He was different from the rest of the men, he was their leader.  Spider-man yelled to the men that if they decide to steal reactive fluid that next time they should make an appointment.  The mystery man found no humor in that as he pulled out a handgun from under his jacket and fired it two feet to Spider-man’s left, missing him, and then throwing two purple smoke bombs at him.

Spider-man yelled out; ‘You missed.’  To which the mystery man replied, ‘Did I.’ The men pack up and run away as the reactor next to Spider-man builds up pressure.  Alarms sound loudly throughout the facility as Spider-man spins his web to pursue the fleeing men only to take a metal pressure valve in the face.  Spider-man smashed against a steel wall and crashed to the floor unconscious.

Radioactive gas escaped the reactor before it automatically shut itself down.  The gas strayed all over Spider-man as his body began to tremble and convulse as he laid there on the floor.  His suit in places begins to melt to his flesh as a cooling system in the building activated and filled the room.  Doors leading to the reactor valves all automatically locked down.  Spider-man was alone for now, spiders from all over began to crawl their way to the place Spider-man was held up in.  They swarmed across fields and crawled through cracks and out of pipes; they tumbled over one another as they are instinctively drawn to Spider-man.

Spider-man laid on the floor as spiders blanket it around him creating a rug of creepy-crawlies three inches from his body, never touching him.  Later he woke up and the spiders were all gone, he walked to the top of the facility when men in radioactive suits notice him and began to yell and scream, ‘You can’t be in here.’ yelled one man.  Spider-man climbed to the roof and swung away.  When he got home he sneaked into his bedroom and took off his suit, having to pull on some areas where it appeared his suit melted onto his flesh.  He thought thankfully at this point, he had a couple of suits at his disposal for these situations.

Wearing a bathrobe Peter walks to the bathroom when Aunt May yelled up, ‘Peter is that you?’ ‘Yes, it’s me Aunt May, I’m just taking a shower!’  Peter went in the bathroom and turned the shower on and looked at himself in the mirror, he looked at a red mark on his cheek bone, rubbing it.  He got in the shower and let the hot water slash down his face as he breathed while he thought about this crazy thing he does to himself to help others.

Back on the Chrysler Building Spider-man set the spider down on the building and watched it crawl along the edge.  He wondered what those men wanted with the reactor fluid?  He noticed that they were wearing military style protective gear but it was still one hell of a risk to take.  He thought this city had its fair share of villains but maybe there is a new one in town.  As if he doesn’t have enough on his plate with Octavius currently up to no good and the Goblin, who went off the radar but that doesn’t mean he’s hanging up his glider.

Peter had always admired Albert Einstein but the one aspect of Einstein he’s always loved the most was his tenacity.  Einstein didn’t see himself as a genius, he saw himself as someone who didn’t stop asking questions when most people did.  Peter thought that Spider-man should heed to that sentiment and not give up on New Yorkers when most people have.  He felt there was something very wrong with society’s current system of operating itself and as a result, criminals are its very own negative energy.  But because they can’t run their house properly, that doesn’t mean innocent people should have to suffer, people that just want to get by in this life, without having what they worked so hard for stolen, or being attacked for being in the wrong place in the wrong time.

Spider-man swung around the city for a couple more hours, crawling alone walls, then went home and finally went to sleep.  In his dream he woke up, surrounded by serrated black bars, he got up quickly and looked around like any prey would, looking for the predator to jump at him from the shadows.  He looked down at his body as his Spider-man suit, in liquid form on the floor crept up his body and dug its claws into him.  Spider-man aimlessly started to fire webbing out into the darkness beyond the black bars.  Then suddenly the bars moved forcing him to move with them and then he looked up and saw the body of a tarantula thus realizing that these black bars were not bars at all but rather legs.  At this point the spider instinctively squatted down, pulling its legs inward and setting its body down on Spider-man, who started to suffocate.

Peter woke up in a cold sweat; he bounced out of bed and rubbed his body down, searching for spiders on himself.  He looked at his clock, 02:13 AM, he then looked at his cellphone and realized he’s been sleeping for three days.  Aunt May busted into the room asking if he was okay.  Peter just told her that he hasn’t been sleeping well for weeks and this is his body cashing in on that debt.  Peter felt weird so he stayed in the shadows of his room as he calmly convinced Aunt May that he’s okay and just needed some time alone.

After offering hot soup or a hot turkey dinner, Aunt May finally left Peter alone.  He went to his bathroom and splashed water on his face then looked at himself in the mirror, first he noticed bruising on his body along both sides of his ribs and then he looked at his eyes.  Blackness crept in from the edges as he pulled on the flesh around them and revealed that there is some kind of black goo in his eyes.  He splashed more water on his face and tried to wash his eyes out.  He looked again and the black goo was still there, he instantly thought what the hell is happening to him.

Wearing sunglasses and carrying a black bag, Peter went down stairs and quickly told Aunt May that he’s going to spend a couple of days at Harry’s place in the city.  He then just walked out without even giving her a chance to talk to him.  Aunt May opened the front door and watched Peter briskly walk up the street with his head down.

There is an abandon apartment that Peter would stay if his Spider-man duties were so frequent that he didn’t have time to go home and sleep.  He’d go there and nap and then get up and go again.  Peter walked into that apartment with a bag of junk food and sat on the mattress on the floor.  He touched around his body and was sore almost everywhere he touched.  He wondered what was happening to him because ever since he was bit by that radioactive spider he hasn’t been sick.  Just as that thought finished in his mind he ran to the bathroom and vomited in the toilet, he then fell to the floor as his spider senses stormed into his mind like a hurricane.  He was receiving sound bites of a woman being mugged in the subway, a man opening a window on 87^th floor to jump to his death, a gang beating in Brooklyn, a police officer shot in central park.  They kept flooding in and seeping into his consciousness, invading his thoughts, corrupting his being.  Then they all stopped giving Peter a micro-second of relief before he passed out on the floor.

In a dream he woke up on a frozen lake looking up at the sky.  He suddenly started to feel the cold on his body as he turned around realizing where the cold was coming from.  He looked into the frozen lake and saw Uncle Ben within the ice in the same position as he was when Peter found him on the sidewalk on that fateful day.  Peter started to cry as his tears fell from his face and hit the ice, when each tear hit the ice it turned into an ice spider and started to tunnel into the lake and then into Uncle Ben’s dead body.  Peter started to slap them away but couldn’t as they began to consume Uncle Ben’s body.  Peter couldn’t stop crying so the ice spiders kept digging into the ice and started to lay eggs all over Uncle Ben as they consumed his flesh.

Peter woke up and punched his fist through the toilet spilling water all over the floor and himself.  He got up and opened his black bag and pulled out his Spider-man suit and in what appeared to be a drunken stupor, he put his suit on and fell out of the window, almost hitting the ground but spinning his web and swinging into the city.  He swung toward a high-speed chase between a bank robber and three police cars.  Spider-man landed on the roof of the bank robbers car, leaned down and violently ripped the driver’s door off and tossing it into a populated area of people.  He spun his web into the cab of the car, discombobulating the driver long enough to pull him out of the car and slam him against a brick wall, breaking many bones in his body.

Spider-man swung away as police arrived, calling for medical assistance as they see this man bleeding badly and on the edge of death.  Spider-man then stopped a little girl from being hit by a car and then yelled at her mother for letting her out of her sight.  He then landed on the Dakota building looking out into Central Park, while holding his head.  What the hell is wrong with you he thought, what are you doing?  This isn’t you and you know it.  While he is thinking about his behavior he simultaneously watched four men run up to another man and throw him down and beat him.  Spider-man watched them check this man’s pockets, take his wallet and then run off.  He leaned back and pulled off his mask and rubbed his face which was now bruising a little bit.  His eyes were almost all the way black.   Peter sat up and looked at the man on the grass unconscious, helpless.  He put his mask back on and swung away, leaving the helpless man holding himself in pain.

Peter sat in a hospital waiting room looking down at his blue costumed legs and then over beside him at red legs.  He looked up that suit and saw two D’s over lapping each other on the left chest of the man seating next to him.  Peter looked at his face and recognizes him.  ‘Are you okay, Peter.’ says Matt Murdock.  Peter focused and nodded yes.

Matt leaned toward Peter to reveal a spike in the side of his stomach.  He looked Peter in the eyes and says, “Bullseye.”  Peter smirks as he looked into Matt's blind eyes.  Matt told Peter that he understood that this hospital was a neutral zone but do they have to sit here and watch the Lizard get operated on.  After everything they did to keep them villains off the streets, who’s bright idea was it to patch them up?  Peter points to a logo on the wall that reads; OSCORP.

Matt shook his head and then looked at Peter closely, into his blackened eyes.  ‘What happened to you?’ Matt said.  Peter shrugged, ‘I don’t know.’  Through a glass window Matt and Peter watch the Lizard get skin grafted only for the lizard side of him to over compensate, regenerating the skin back into lizard flesh, Matt looked at Peter shaking his head.

Peter sat on a hospital bed when the doctor entered the room holding a file in his hand.  The doctor told Peter that to their amazement, for some reason his arachnid side appeared to be accelerating in his body.  He told Peter that they have always been unsure as to why the initial acceleration, when he was actually bitten by the spider in the first place, stopped.  But for whatever reason, whether its evolution or fate, the process has begun to continue.  Peter asked what does that mean to which the doctor gave him one word; mutation.  Peter asked if he’s turning into a spider or not?  The doctor told him that it is uncertain what he’s changing into only that he’s changing.

Peter looked at the doctor feeling lost, he then said is he okay with letting him go, knowing that he might end up being a danger to others?   The doctor told him that it is not the policy of this “hospital” to intervene on any negative behavior their patients may possess upon release from this facility.  He reminded Peter that this hospital was to heal the wounded and care for the sick, not to judge beyond these walls.

Spider-man landed on the window sill of the abandon apartment he was staying in.  He looked out into the city and then looked up and saw thousands of spiders hanging above him from webs.  He went inside and shut the window, in the bathroom he looked at his eyes as the blackness has consumed his pupils leaving his eyes voids in his face.  Peter began to cry but stopped himself, slapping himself.

Peter looked onto his computer at websites on spiders as he touched his forearm, noticing that it was becoming hard for some reason.   He stumbled onto a blog by an arachnologist code-named Venom, he clicked onto it and looked over the site.   Peter sent a quick message:  This is Spider-man and I need to talk.  He then sent it.  Peter stood up and lifted his shirt and examined the bruising on his body noticing a black-spikey substance protruding his lower left ribs.  He then looked back at his computer with a response from Venom - his address.  Peter put his mask on and jumped out his window and swung through the city night.

Spider-man arrived at the place and sat on the window sill.  A shaded figure opened his blinds in absolute celebrity amazement.  The first thing he said to Spider-man before he even invited him in, is how much he obsesses over him.  He then introduced himself as Venom then told Spider-man to call him Eddie.  Spider-man entered Eddie’s place and looked at cages and fish tanks all around ensconced in darkness.  Eddie showed Spider-man his scorpion collection before showing him his spider collection.  They walked to a tank with a large black widow spider in it.  Eddie told Spider-man that the venom in that spider could kill any man.  Eddie then showed him his Symbiote in a secure tank, telling Spider-man that he acquired such a rare specimen from a military base in Nevada.  He went on to say that apparently a Special Forces group deep within the American government military apparatus called S.H.I.E.L.D claimed that this substance is the most dangerous thing on this planet.

Spider-man sat on a chair looking at Eddie, not really sure if it was a good idea to even come here.  Eddie told him that he can help but he had to see the problem to properly diagnose it.  Spider-man quite reluctantly removed his mask showing Eddie his face.  He then lifted his suit up to reveal his body filled with bruising.  Eddie assures Peter that his identity is safe with him, he then told Peter that the people at his special hospital was right in telling him that his spider side is beginning to overtake his human side.

Peter told Eddie about the reactor exploding in his face as Eddie looked into Peter’s black eyes and over his body.  Eddie shook his head in disbelief; he told Peter that whatever made him into Spider-man is taking his whole body over.  Eddie went on to tell him that no man deserved to live in a body that betrays him.  He assured Peter that he will come up with something but he’ll need to do some tests.  He also reminded Peter that the aggressive animalistic side of this creature will soon consume him.  Eddie recommended taking it easy for the next few days while he synthesized an antidote to reverse the effects, from the spider specimens he has in his lab.

Spider-man swung through the city when he got a cramp in his side breaking him from the security of his webbing.  He smashed into a random apartment window and passed out.  Peter woke in a dream in a room of black bubbles, but soon he saw irises looking at him through many spider eyes.  He was glued to the ground as spiders dig up from the Earth and held him down as they formed huge spider legs at his sides.  He looked up and saw a rainstorm of spiders falling from the sky and blanketing him into darkness.

Light flickered in as Peter slowly opened his eyes and saw Uncle Ben stand above him.  Uncle Ben says, ‘With great powers comes gre…’.  An older man who was not Uncle Ben stood at the side of the bed as Peter woke up.  Peter looked up at him and saw that it wasn’t Uncle Ben but he still felt safe.  An older lady walked up to the bed with a bowl of soup and handed it to Peter.  He took it and ate it down and then looked up at them both arm an arm looking down at him.  The man looked at Peter, ‘Son you don’t look so good.’

The old man pointed to the chair next to the bed where Peter’s Spider-man suit was laying.  The old lady said she tried to iron it but it didn’t iron so well.  Peter sat up knowing that he doesn’t know these people.  The old man assures him he’s okay.  Peter’s spider senses exploded in his brain, he said thank you but he had to go.

Peter stood at the window wearing his Spider-man suit and holding his mask in his hand.  The older lady told Peter that he always has a place here with them if he needed it, then left the room.  Peter looked at the older man looking at him.  ‘Son, get yourself straight however you need to.  You are a force in this city, a force for good, I believe that, but clear whatever this is up, you’re needed.’  Peter put his mask on and looked at the man thanking him and then jumping.

Spider-man arrived at a trucking company where he saw those men from the power plant loading a huge weapon on a flatbed trailer.  They shot at him as he swung to avoid the gunfire and landed in a swamp.  Hours later he woke up and looked around like he lost seconds and not hours.  After realizing it had been hours, he walked out and through a tractor into a group of trailers and then disappeared into the city.

Spider-man began to smash and bang into cars and people along Broadway Avenue when Daredevil, with his weapon pulled Spider-man toward him and through him against a wall.  Spider-man spinned his webbing at Daredevil but Daredevil bent around it and kicked Spider-man into a building.  Inside Daredevil looked at Spider-man, ‘Peter, what are you doing?’  Spider-man punched Daredevil in the face and then grabbed him and tossed him through a wall.  Spider-man spinned his web catching Daredevil in the chest as he pulled him toward him and booted him into another wall.  Daredevil crashed through a banquet dinner setting and landed in the crumble of a wall, he stood looking at Spider-man, seeing that his friend was gone for whatever reason, Daredevil launched himself at Spider-man smashing him through a wall and into a lecture hall.  Thankfully there were no people around as Daredevil jumped on Spider-man and started to smash his face in.  Spider-man formed a web bubble between him and Daredevil and exploded him to the ceiling, Daredevil fell and landed into a seating area.

‘What are you doing, Pete? Stop this now.’ Daredevil yelled.  Spider-man fired multiple web balls at Daredevil and then formed a big ball around him and then booted him out of a window and into the city.  Daredevil landed on the roof of a building and then broke free from the web ball; he jumped from building to building and arrived back where they were fighting only to see that Spider-man was gone.

Back where he was staying, Spider-man took his mask off to reveal heavy bruising and bleeding on his forehead.  He picked at a cut on his forehead only to reveal a black eyeball; he picked above his other eye and revealed yet another black eyeball.  He then destroyed the bathroom, punching and kicking and then continued on with the hallway, the kitchen, the living room and then the building's outer walls.

The mystery man had his men load those cylinder cases into his Sinister Six chamber device that looked like a huge revolver gun.  They drove toward the city with this huge gun pointed at the heart of New York.

Eddie arrived at Peter’s apartment only to see Peter on the floor looking up at him with eight black eyes, wearing his Spider-man suit and with black legs piercing his ribs.  Eddie took a syringe out of his bag while looking at this animal that was once Spider-man.  Eddie said that the S.H.I.E.L.D files that he hacked revealed this stuff would give him strength so what the hell.  Eddie poured the black alien symbiote onto his arm and suddenly drops to the floor.  Spider-man ran up and grabbed him and fired him through a wall and into another apartment.  Eddie smashed back through the wall and pushed Spider-man to the floor.  He confirmed that S.H.I.E.L.D was right as he held Spider-man down and pulled a small bottle from his pocket.  As elongated teeth and an alien organism began to overcome his body, Eddie held Peter’s throat as Peter filled the room with webbing; Eddie poured the liquid into Peter’s mouth.

Peter lied on the floor as he looked to his left and saw a black figure, screeching and then leaping from his window sill into the city.  The bruising on his face faded along with the black eyes.  Peter stood up and went to the broken bathroom and picked up a piece of mirrored glass off the floor.  He checked his eyes and saw that they were clearing up, as he breathed a sense of relief.

His spider sense alerted him as he put his mask on and headed out toward the city and to the source of the problem.  When he arrived Daredevil was fighting armed gun men, Spider-man fired web balls at their guns and allowed Daredevil to disarm the device as they enter the city.  The mysterious man jumps from the truck and disappears in the woods.

Spider-man covered the whole area in webbing and then walked up at Daredevil.  He shook his hand and apologized for their fight.  Daredevil assures Spider-man, with a smirk that he went easy on him but if it were to ever happen again…..