Miles stared at the Alchemax building from behind the rock, heart hammering. A thought struck him.....was this the kind of hero he wanted to be? One who hides at the first sign of danger?
He lowered his mask and moved.
The ventilation duct was not designed for a teenager who could not fully control his powers. He got stuck twice, nearly fell three times, and lost his way in the labyrinth of metal tunnels before crashing into something solid.
"Peter!" he whispered excitedly.
Peter B. looked at him with a mixture of surprise and irritation. "What are you doing here?!"
"Let me through."
"Wait.....you are stepping on my foot! Go back! Wait outside!"
"No!" Miles’ voice hardened. "I cannot just stand there alone, thinking I cannot prevent another Spider-Man from dying. It will not happen again. This time I will help."
Peter B. went still.
"What is wrong with you?" Miles asked.
"Most of the people I know at work try to kill me," Peter B. said quietly. "Good people like you are almost nonexistent." He paused. "This is a nice change."
Elsewhere in the building, Peter sat at a terminal, fingers dancing across the keyboard. The screen filled with data.
"Well.....that should be enough," he murmured. "More than a week’s worth of research in fifteen minutes. They are genuinely stupid for storing everything on the same server. Their cybersecurity is a joke. Even a twelve-year-old could do better." He glanced at the unconscious scientist slumped in the corner. "What a coincidence. I know one."
He left the room and walked briskly through the corridor until his spider-sense pulsed a warning. A woman rounded the corner at the same moment. They collided.
Papers scattered across the floor.
"Oh, I am so sorry, Dr. Octavius," Peter said, scrambling to gather the documents. "I was a little distracted."
"Don’t worry, I was too," Olivia replied, then looked up at him. Her eyes widened slightly. "Wow."
Peter offered a sheepish smile. "I apologize. I did not think my first encounter with the beautiful and intelligent Dr. Octavius would be like this."
"What?"
"Sorry.....I was disrespectful. I should have said ’brilliant,’ not ’beautiful.’ Wait.....no, I meant.....I had better stop talking."
Olivia blinked, then allowed herself a small, flattered laugh. "You just caught me off guard. Nobody has ever called me that before."
"Really? I am sure they have called you a genius. Amazing. Groundbreaking."
"Not.....the other thing," she admitted.
"Beautiful?" Peter let the word hang for a beat, then covered his mouth as if mortified. "I am sorry. I usually do not say what I am thinking when I am nervous."
"First day?" she asked, amused.
"Is it that obvious?"
"Very."
"I would like to invite you for a drink as compensation, but the new employee’s work never ends.....and I doubt yours does either."
He gave her a bright, slightly flustered smile. "I hope to see you again, beautiful Doctor. I mean.....Doctor. I had better go."
He walked away, maintaining the nervous-newcomer act until he turned the corner. Then his expression went flat and serious. He looked down at his watch. A red dot was moving toward the laboratory.
Through the ventilation grate, Peter B. and Miles watched Fisk stand in Olivia’s lab, pressing his pen with mechanical patience. Olivia rushed in late.
"I’m sorry, Mr. Fisk."
A snarl was her only greeting.
She sat on her exercise ball, pulled up data on the computer, and began her presentation. If the Collider was activated again this week, there could be a black hole beneath Brooklyn. Multiple dimensions were already beginning to collide.
Peter B. nudged Miles. "This is routine for Spider-Man. You get used to it. Watch.....now he will say ’You have twenty-four hours.’"
"You have twenty-four hours!" Fisk barked.
Peter B. winked at Miles.
Once Fisk and Olivia stepped out of the lab, Peter B. dropped from the vent, sat at the computer, and began entering the password he had memorized from watching Olivia type. He handed Miles the USB drive.
"Download the plans."
"Wait.....how do I.....?"
"Figure it out while I play the distraction."
What followed was chaos.
Olivia returned and discovered Peter B. alive. Her scientific curiosity overrode her shock. She examined him, identified the cellular degradation from dimensional displacement, and then.....revealed herself.
"I’m Dr. Olivia Octavius," she said, and four mechanical tentacles erupted from beneath her coat.
"Am I to assume your friends call you Doc Ock?" Peter B. asked, one tentacle wrapped around his throat.
"My friends call me Liv. My enemies call me Doc Ock."
"Run!" Peter B. shouted at Miles, firing a web to blow the doors open.
Miles ran. Behind him, the laboratory erupted into a war zone.
Peter was in a server room three floors down when the alarm blared.
"I feel like I need to hang Peters by the neck," he muttered, looking up at the flashing lights. He sighed. "You pair of idiots."
The chase through Alchemax was pandemonium.
Miles fled through corridors, turning invisible and visible without control, while Peter B. fought Doc Ock through walls, laboratories, and across the cafeteria. They grabbed a bagel. Scientists with weapons pursued them. Peter B. threw Miles off the rooftop to teach him to swing.
Miles crashed into a tree. Doc Ock split the tree in half and came after him.
"I am not a praying man," Miles screamed, dodging tentacles, "but if you are there, save me, Mr. Parker!"
Doc Ock lunged. Peter B., still pixelating and weakened, could not keep up. The computer slipped from Miles’ grasp.
Before it shattered, a tentacle caught it. Before the tentacle could retract.....a figure in a spider-suit kicked Doc Ock square in the jaw, sending her crashing into the forest floor. She caught the computer in a web before it fell.
A young woman in a white-and-teal Spider suit landed on a branch, casually removing her mask.
"Hey, guys."
Miles stared. "Gwanda?"
"I’m actually Gwen."
She freed them from the web. But before she could finish introductions, Doc Ock recovered.....faster than expected. A tentacle shot out, grabbed Gwen by the throat, and began to squeeze. The sound of cracking bone echoed through the trees.
"Wow," Doc Ock cooed. "A female Spider-Man. The multiverse is crazy, isn’t it, honey? Last words?"
"How about you between my legs and me in yours?" Gwen choked out. "You look a little tense."
"I’m sorry, but the last one between my legs died because of my boss." Doc Ock smiled. A tentacle blade spun up to lethal speed. "Goodbye, little spider."
Twip!
The tentacle froze mid-swing. Something yanked Doc Ock sideways with the force of a freight train. A fist connected with her face. Then a spinning kick sent her cratering into the dirt.
A figure in a dark red-and-black spider-suit stood over the fallen scientist, one hand locked around her throat. His mask retracted at the mouth, revealing a pair of elongated fangs. Without hesitation, he bit down on her neck.
Doc Ock’s body went rigid.
Then limp.
He dropped her, wiped the blood from his mouth, and turned. Two spider-shaped shurikens flew from his belt and severed the webbing trapping Miles and Peter B.
"Superior!" Miles shouted.
"Neat!" Peter B. added.