By Peter
Part 4
Disclaimer: No, I’m not Stan Lee, so I don’t own Spider-Man. Peter, MJ, Harry, JJJ, and the rest of our colorful cast are the property of Marvel Comics. I don’t own them.
Rating: PG-13
Category: Peter/MJ. Come on…like there’s any other fan base out there yet.
Spoilers: Takes place after the movie. Say…a week.
Empire State University. It was, by far, one of the most impressive learning institutes in the area. At least that’s what Peter Parker thought. ESU had one of the better research facilities, as well as the staff to take advantage of it.
He felt like the proverbial kid in the candy store.
Peter slowly turned the focus on his microscope, examining the complicated device under it. It was the central processing chip that he had removed from the projector he found in the park last night.
“And we’re doing what?” a voice called from behind him.
The voice belonged to the teacher, Dr. Curtis Conners.
Curt Conners was a genius, and someone that Peter looked up to. He was an expert in biology, and the effect DNA has of different species. Peter felt that, by learning from Conners, he might be able to find out more about his powers and the effect they have on his body.
Not that he hadn’t had a few setbacks so far. His full-time career as Spider-Man tended to make him late on several occasions. Because of that, he had gotten fired as Dr. Conners’ lab assistant. Even so, it was a decision that Curt made with a heavy heart.
“Trying to find out what this thing does,” Peter answered. “I found this projector out on the street, but it looks really complicated. This is the CPU from it.”
Conners raised an eyebrow.
“I thought your major was biology, not electronics,” he asked.
Peter removed his eye from the microscope to look at Curt.
“Yeah, but I’m trying to explore several fields,” Peter answered. “You know, expanding my horizons.”
Conners nodded, then smiled.
Peter sometimes didn’t understand how he could be so…calm. He had served in the army a few years back. Using his scientific knowledge in the field, analyzing defenses for the enemy’s chemical weapons. Unfortunately, accidentally tripped land mine ended up taking one of his arms from him. Even though this handicap cut his work in half, he still pressed on…working twice as hard.
He turned towards the back and called out…
“Hobie?” he said. “Could you come here for a minute?”
An African-American student, about the same age as Peter, walked over to the desk.
“Yeah, doc?” he asked.
“Peter found something on the street that looks a bit out of my league,” Curt explained. “Can you make anything of it?”
Hobie pulled up a chair and sat down next to Peter. Peter smiled triumphantly. Bringing that thingamajig to school was turning out better than he’d hoped.
Hobie Brown was probably as smart as Peter was. The difference being that, while Peter was perfectly at home among his test tubes, Hobie tended to prefer the tech labs. He was an electronics genius, having put together his own computer using spare parts. If it ran on electricity, Hobie could figure it out.
Even so, he was stumped.
“Pete?” he asked. “You said you found this on the street?”
“Yep,” Peter answered. “Why?”
“Because anyone who just throws something like this away is either stupid of Bill Gates,” he replied. “Was there anything else or just the CPU?”
“Oh, it was a projector-like thing…” Peter tried to explain. “Do you know what it does?”
Hobie took a deep breath and leaned back in his chair.
“Ok Parker, here’s the deal,” he said. “I’ll explain on one condition…”
“Name it!”
He grinned.
“When you’re done with this thing, you give it to me,”
*****
Across campus, Mary Jane storms out of the lecture room, upset out of her mind. Of all the arrogant, self-centered, idiotic…
“If he’s such a expert, why isn’t he making movies instead of insulting would-be actors and actresses!” she said out loud.
Honestly, she should have expected the land of higher education would be even worse than she remembered it. But Mary Jane didn’t want to be stuck and some dive restaurant for the next several years. Maybe getting some acting lessons would be just what the doctor ordered.
Unfortunately, Mr. Stick-Up-His-Butt was the least of her problems. All those other courses she was taking, while necessary, completely mystified her. Especially the science class.
Hmm, she thought. Maybe I can ask Peter for help. He’d know a few things. While I’m at it, maybe some self-defense too. And acrobatics…
She smiled. It was so surreal. Her…friends with a super hero? Yeah, sure, she wished they could be more than friends, but the prospect of being a confidant who saved lives was…well…exciting.
“Is it possible you’re hotter than you were the last time I saw you?” a voice called out behind her, accompanied by several wolf whistles.
She knew that voice.
“What are you doing here, Flash?” she asked.
Flash Thompson, her ex-boyfriend, was standing behind her. Behind him were three of his friends, many of whom she recognized from high school.
“I go here!” Flash said proudly. “Big old college football scholarship got me into ESU.”
Mary Jane forces herself to smile.
“Congratulations, Flash!” she said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me…”
She turns to leave, but Flash grabs her arm.
“Hey!” she exclaims, trying to pull away.
“Come on, baby,” he tells her. “I miss you.”
“I don’t!” she spat. “Let me go!”
At that exact moment, Peter arrives a few feet away. He sees Flash manhandling MJ, and his eyes narrow in anger.
“Let her go!” he said, causing all five of them to turn his way.
“Of, you gotta be kidding me?” Flash complained. “If it isn’t Puny Parker? Buzz off!”
“Not this time, bonehead!” he answered.
This caused Flash to pause, let go of MJ, and slowly walk towards Peter.
“What did you call me?” he asked, challenging him.
“I believe it had something to do with the contents of your skull!” Peter retorted.
Flash's friends all laughed.
“Shut up!” Flash told them. They complied. He then turned back towards Peter. “Relax, Parker…I’m not going to hurt her. Even if I was, I wouldn’t want to piss off her little boyfriend.”
“I’m not her boyfriend!” Peter informed him.
His response was Flash laughing at him.
“Oh man, I wasn’t talking about you, Parker!” he pointed out. “Come on, its obvious her and Spider-Man got something going on. Why else would that freak in the green suit go after her like he did? Then there’s those times he was looking after her at the park and whatever.”
Behind them, MJ’s mouth hung open in surprise. This was something she hadn’t planned on.
“So you’re not afraid of Spider-Man?” Peter asked, not believing him.
“Why would I be?” Flash asked. “The guy’s a hero! He’d never hurt anyone.”
Now it was Peter’s turn to be surprised.
“So you don’t believe what they’re saying in the Bugle?” he asked.
“That rag?” Flash commented. “I always knew you were a geek, but I didn’t think you had the guts to backstab someone like Spidey. You’re the one who’s taking those photos that make him look bad! Too bad the guy’s too much of a straight shooter to teach you a lesson!”
“Yeah, should have expected this from you, Flash!” Peter commented with a slight grin. “Looking up to some testosterone-ladden nutcase in a mask!”
Flash gritted his teeth in rage, and stared at Peter.
“I’m gonna let that go,” he spat. “Cause I know you’re just jealous. You probably wish you were a tenth of the man Spidey is! Come on…let’s go guys.”
Flash and his two friends walk off, leaving Peter and Mary Jane there alone. After a moment, she turns to him.
“Wow!” she says with an amused tone. “Looks like you have a fan.”
Peter scoffs.
“Yeah, a fan who hates my guts,” he adds. “How’s that for irony?”
MJ giggles.
“Come on,” he said. “I’ve got something to show you.”
*****
A few minutes later, Peter and Mary Jane find themselves in one of the laboratories. It was late, so odds were that no one would interrupt them.
“There, we should be able to talk in here,” Peter said.
MJ looked around herself, unsure.
“What if someone comes in?” she asked.
Without answering, Peter turned towards the door, and flicked his wrist. A strand of web shot out from it, sealing the door shut.
“That should keep them out,” he said. “Nothing short of a drill will get through that now.”
He turned towards MJ, who has a shocked expression on her face. She gently pushed up his shirtsleeve and examined his wrist.
“Your web stuff,” she said in surprise. “It…it comes out of you? I just thought that…that maybe you made it. Like some sort of machine or something.”
He became uncomfortable for a second, fearing she was afraid of him. That she thought he was some sort of freak.
He was quickly proven wrong, receiving a compassionate glance from her. He soft fingers slowly gliding over top of the strange gland on his wrist.
“Does it hurt when it comes out?” she asked.
Peter shook his head.
“It tingled at first,” he explained. “But I’ve gotten used to it. It’s really cool after awhile.”
Mary Jane let go of his wrist, and started looking around. She had a sense of familiarly. As if she had been there before.
Then it occurred to her. She had been.
“Wait a minute, I know this place!” she said out loud. “You took my picture, remember? In front of the glass cages with the spiders.”
Peter’s eyes went wide. She was right, this was the lab. The same lab where in happened, and he didn’t realize it. The neutron microscope in the center should have gave it away, but he was so preoccupied that he didn’t even notice.
“Wow,” he told her. “You’ve got some memory there, MJ.”
“It was the first time you really talked to me,” she replied, blushing slightly. “That makes it pretty memorable. You were so cute that day.”
Peter blushed.
“Thanks,” he said.
She was right, though. It had been a memorable day. For him, though, it was for a whole other reason.
The display she was referring to had been a genetic experiment the university had been working on. Genetically altered arachnids, cross-breeded to such a degree that each one had all the talents of the various species of spiders known to mankind. The fastest, the strongest…all of their genetic traits combined into one super species. In a case of pure luck, one of those test subjects managed to escape. It was small…the runt of the litter…and died soon after.
But not before it crawled onto Peter’s hand and bit him.
These mutations had never been released before, so there was no telling what they were capable of. Later, it was discovered that their venom was so toxic that it could kill a full-grown person in under an hour. Miracle of miracles, the spider that bit Peter was so small that its venom wasn’t nearly as potent.
No, it didn’t kill him…in changed him. Into something much more than human. Suddenly, he was faster and stronger than ever before, he could leap great distances, and even stick to wall. He became a virtual human spider.
“Peter?” MJ asked.
“Huh?” he uttered, snapping out of his daze. “Sorry, I was just thinking.”
“About?”
“I couldn’t find out the why of what’s been happening to you,” he admitted. “But I think I know the how. That dinosaur…well, I couldn’t touch it.”
She nodded, following him closely.
“Well, the words of Sherlock Holmes…” he recalled. “Once you eliminate the possible, whatever’s left, no matter how improbable…”
“Must be the truth?” she finished for him.
Peter smirked.
“Elementary, my dear Watson,” he said with a British accent. “So, if I couldn’t hit it…or touch it at all. Then the only possible answer would be that it was never really there.”
MJ looked at him, even more confused than she had been before.
“Peter…” she said. “I saw it, you saw it…everyone in the park saw it.”
“But nothing showed up on film,” he reminded her. “I took like a dozen photos of it, and in each one old scaly never even showed up.”
Without a word, Peter reached into his bag and pulled out the projector. He placed it on the table.
“What’s that?” Mary Jane asked.
“Something I found at the park,” he explained, switching it on. “Turn around.”
She did, and towering above her was the very same dinosaur she saw at the park…looking at her hungrily.
“AHHHHH!” she screamed, stumbling backwards into Peter’s arms. “Oh my god! OH MY GOD!!!”
“MJ, relax!” Peter told her. “He can’t hurt you.
He turned the projector off again, and the monstrous benomoth disappeared.
Mary Jane looked at Peter disbelievingly.
“How did you…?” she asked. “I mean, what did…?”
Peter pointed at the projector.
“It’s this thing,” he explained. “Somehow, it projected that image of a dinosaur so realistically that it fooled everyone.”
“Like a hologram?” Mary Jane asked.
Peter shook his head.
“No, holograms become transparent from far away…this thing looked solid all the way through,” he replied. “But whatever this thing was, it’s expensive. I asked Hobie…”
“Who’s Hobie?” she cut him off.
“Hobie Brown,” Peter informed her. “He’s this techno-wizard guy in Dr. Conners’ class. He said that this equipment costs a fortune.”
“But why would someone spend a fortune just to scare me?” she asked. “Especially if they were going to try and kill me the very next day?”
Peter shrugged his shoulders.
She was right, Peter thought. It didn’t make any sense.
Then, he had an idea.
“Unless he wasn’t trying to scare you specifically,” he suggested. “That guy at the audition yesterday…Jenkins? You said that he was at the play too?”
Mary Jane’s eyes widened.
“That’s right,” she said with a smile. “He was the only person those ILM rejects didn’t try to roast.”
Peter smiled.
“Then this had nothing to do with you at all,” Peter said out loud. “Thank god…”
MJ smiled at him, noticing his relief that she wasn’t in any immediate danger.
The moment passed, however, when Peter realized that his worries weren’t over. MJ might be safe, but Jenkins…
“Oh my god!” he explained. “I’ve been protecting the wrong person!”
He raced towards the door, MJ following close behind.
“Peter?” she asked. “What is it?”
“You might be safe, but Jenkins isn’t!” he reminded her. “I’d better keep an eye on him.”
The two of them examined the door, which was still sealed shut by the webbing from earlier.
“I think you’ll have to unweb this thing first,” she said, a smirk on her lips.
“That’s impossible,” he explained. “I don’t know anything that will get rid of it. It dissolves by itself in about an hour.”
“So we’re stuck in here for an hour?” she asked.
“Not exactly,” Peter said, clutching the handle.
With a sudden pull, the sound of screeching metal was heard. Then the door broke off the wall, taking both the webbing and the door frame with it.
Mary Jane stared at it, her mouth hanging open.
Peter turned around and smirked at her. He motioned towards the doorway.
“After you…”
Once both of them were out, Peter picked the door back up, and held it in place. Using his spider strength, he bent the steel wall so that the door frame would be kept in place…at least as long as the webbing was there.
Once it dissolved, well…he didn’t plan on being around when that happened.
“Any idea where Jenkins is?”
*****
Elsewhere, on the rooftop of the Daily Bugle.
The publisher, J. Jonah Jameson and his editor-in-chief Robbie Robertson were holding a press conference there. Famed director John Jenkins was letting the public know that they had nothing to fear…and that the people responsible for the ‘pranks’ at his studio would be brought to justice.
He didn’t see the need to let them know about the people who died. The police knew, so that was enough for him.
Over in the corner, Jameson had a smug smile on his face, while Robbie’s showed more of a scowl.
“Come on Robertson, smile for the cameras,” he encouraged his employee. “It’s free publicity…you can’t buy something like this.”
“And you wouldn’t if you could, right Jonah?” he asked.
Jonah grinned.
“Probably,” he muttered. “But that’s the beauty of something being ‘free’. You don’t have to.”
Robbie sighed.
His face, however, brightened up when he saw Peter and Mary Jane walk through the rooftop stairwell.
“Peter?” he asked. “Well, this is a pleasant surprise…”
“Parker?!” Jonah spat. “What are you doing here? No wait…never mind…a kid like you has gotta take the initiative. That’s what got me where I am today.”
In that case…remind me never to take the imitative again, Peter thought.
“Why aren’t you taking pictures?” he yelled. “Go…I want a great shot of me standing among these Hollywood bigwigs!”
Just then, Robbie noticed Mary Jane. She seemed familiar to him.
“Hello, Miss…”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Peter apologized. “Mr. Jameson, Robbie…this is MJ.”
“Humph!” was JJJ’s reply.
Robbie, on the other hand, shook her hand.
“Weren’t you the girl that was involved with that whole Green Goblin thing a few weeks back?” he asked her.
“In a very reluctant way, Mr. Robertson,” she joked.
“Oh, I’d imagine,” he said. “I’d love it if you’d give us your personal account of what happened up on that bridge. As a ‘look back’ feature?”
“I’ll tell you what happened…” Jameson interrupted. “That pajama-wearing loony and his pal in the fright mask endangered a bunch of kids, that’s what happened!”
MJ stared at Jonah, not understanding. The guy obviously had his wires crossed.
“Actually, Spider-Man saved us,” she corrected him. “He held that tram car up until the rest of us got to safety. He was so brave…and courageous…and…”
Peter smiled proudly.
“Ha!” Jonah commented. “You like him so much, why don’t you marry him?”
Now she started to become annoyed.
“Just what is your problem with Spider-Man, anyway?” he asked angrily.
“My ‘problem’ is that he’s a menace!” he explained. “A costumed maniac with no respect for the law or the common man. Heck, the Green Goblin never even showed up until after Spider-Man did…it was probably his fault.”
“You can’t really believe that, Jonah?” Robbie asked him.
“Of course I do!” he responded.
Just then, they heard some commotion coming from the stage. Someone was forcing his way past the guards who were looking after Jenkins, beating them up one by one.
Oh no, Peter thought.
He had been so preoccupied with Jonah that he wasn’t doing what he had come there to do in the first place.
However that wasn’t what surprised him the most.
It was that the person beating up the guards was…SPIDER-MAN???
“HAH!” Jonah exclaimed, pointing at the intruder. “What did I tell you?”
Both Peter and Mary Jane looked at him disbelievingly.
“That’s impossible!” Peter said. “That can’t be Spider-Man!”
Jonah looked at him.
“How would you know?” he asked.
Before Peter can answer, ‘Spider-Man’ leapt right in front of him.
“Take a good, long look here people,” he yelled. “This is what happens when you cross the wrong people, Jenkins!”
“What do you want?!” Jenkins hollered from atop the stage.
He turned back towards him.
“To see you suffer!” he answered. “To ruin you like you’ve ruined so many others. Maybe I’ll start with…”
He turned towards MJ.
Suddenly, Peter leapt at him, grabbing him in a strangle-hold.
“LEAVE HER ALONE!” he yelled.
Before Peter could do anything, Spider-Man shot a strand of webbing at him, pinning his arms to his sides.
He then picked Peter up by the collar of his shirt.
“Oh well, one’s just as good as another…” he sighed. “So you like to play hero, huh kid?”
He lifted Peter over his head.
“How about you fly like Superman?!”
Then he threw him over the top of the roof.
“PETER!!!” Mary Jane screamed.
She could only watch helplessly as Peter Parker fell to a certain doom.