Midtown New York. Early evening, March 2100.
The Junior League.
“Courageous and unrelenting!” The teenager in the black-and white-costume adopted a karate stance, introducing himself as, “Spiderite White!”
“Articulate and precise!” The lanky teen wearing black and blue stood straight up, gave a thumbs-up gesture, and introduced himself as, “Spiderite Blue!”
“Spiritual and hopeful!” The tall girl wearing pink and black clasped her hands together in a prayer pose. “Spiderite Pink!”
“Honest and compassionate!” The short girl wearing yellow held out her arms, as if expecting an embrace. “Spiderite Yellow!”
“Fast and irreverent!” The teen boy wearing black and green took a step back and planted a foot, as if he were about to break into a sprint at any moment. “Spiderite Green!”
Spiderite White spoke again, standing straight up and adopting a military salute. “Defending justice in the name of the Spider!”
The five costumed teenagers all assumed a crouching stance, splaying their fingers to show off the talons on their fingertips. “Spiderite Five!” they introduced themselves in unison.
Spider-Man found himself staring at five teenagers who wore stylized Day of the Dead costumes similar to his own. All five costumes were primarily black, but the spidery designs on each were a different color. And for some reason, they felt the need to name themselves after those colors.
“Oh, come on! What do you think this is?” Spider-Man shouted. He returned his attention to the Man-Spider standing before them, an arachnid monstrosity whom Spider-Man – as Miguel O’Hara – had once known as Antoine Tarantella. He’d been a nutcase then, and he was even worse now.
The Man-Spider studied the five newcomers with multiple beady eyes. “More spiders … just means more prey.”
That did it. Spider-Man whirled back to the Spiderites. “Get outta here, now! Before he kills you!”
“This guy?” Spiderite Green retorted. Even with his mask on, it was obvious the kid was smirking. “He’s just an itsy-bitsy spider. And a ridiculous-looking one at that.” He pointed at the bracket-shaped protrusions on the sides of the Man-Spider’s head. “I mean, what are those things? Antlers? Handlebars?”
The other Spiderites snickered. “He’s right,” Spiderite White agreed. “We can take him – right, guys?”
”Right!” the other Spiderites agreed, adopting a thumbs-up pose.
Spider-Man held out his hands, exasperated. “But you don’t even have any powers!”
“Sure we do,” Spiderite Pink replied, clearly confused. “I would’ve thought you of all people would know that.”
Spider-Man scratched his head. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Looks like a demonstration is in order, guys!” Spiderite White declared. “The great one wants to see how we’ve progressed in our training? We’ll show him. V-Attack Formation, now!”
Both Spider-Man and the Man-Spider watched as the Spiderites moved into position: White stood at the rear of the group, with Blue and Green standing next to each other in front of him. In front of them, spaced slightly further apart, stood Pink and Yellow. Their positioning was in the shape of the letter ‘V’, which made sense, Spider-Man supposed.
Blue and Green abruptly leaped upward, tucking into forward rolls as they flipped over Pink and Yellow. The girls braced themselves with their forearms as Green and Blue straightened back out in front of them, kicking off of Pink and Yellow’s forearms to push themselves toward the Man-Spider.
Once Blue and Green were launched, Pink and Yellow backflipped toward White, who held out his hands to push their outstretched feet and launch them as well.
Four of the Spiderites were now soaring in midair, but when Blue and Green extended their fists to strike their opponent, Man-Spider had already skittered to the side, causing them to have to roll to a stop in order to avoid landing on their faces. Pink and Yellow, surprised by this turn of events, landed on their teammates.
“I don’t understand!” Blue complained as he and his teammates untangled themselves. “We practiced that attack for weeks! Why didn’t it work?”
Green shrugged. “Maybe ‘cause we were expecting him to stand still through all that?”
“No time to worry about that now!” White told them. “Standing Formation, now!”
Blue and Green moved into position, standing next to each other and holding each other’s forearms. They held steady as Pink and Yellow leaped onto their shoulders; the two girls held each other’s forearms the way Blue and Green did.
“What am I watching?” Spider-Man wondered. “A gymnastics competition?”
White leaped toward his assembled teammates, soaring through the rectangular space between the other Spiderites’ bodies. Gliding with the lyte-byte fabric of his cape, he closed the distance between himself and Man-Spider, slashing at the grotesque creature with his finger talons.
The Man-Spider was easily as fast as the Spiderite, and he sidestepped the talon slash. However, he wasn’t as able to avoid the sequence of kicks and punches White followed up with. Even Spider-Man was impressed; the kid had some moves.
Moving behind White, the Man-Spider grabbed the Spiderite’s arms with four of his hands, then leaped out of the reach of the other Spiderites, who were running toward them. “Tim!” the pink one shouted, racing ahead of the rest to catch up with the Man-Spider, who was now leaping from rooftop to rooftop with his hostage in tow.
Spider-Man caught up with the group, just as determined as any of them to ensure White’s safety. If anything, he felt personally responsible for these kids’ wellbeing, since they were putting themselves in danger trying to emulate him. Even though in this case, their attempt at imitation resulted in a very bizarre version of flattery.
Blinding lights caused them to stop short on the rooftop. Judging by the Spiderites’ howls of pain, Spider-Man could tell that their vision worked the same way his did: excellent low-light vision, but on a sliding scale that made bright lights unbearable.
“Give yourselves up, Spider-Men!” an amplified voice ordered them. “By order of Stone Enterprises Enforcement Division, you are under arrest for destruction of corporate property, assaulting SEED officers, and reckless endangerment!”
Terrific, Spider-Man thought as his vision slowly readjusted. I forgot I was still in SEED territory. And these kids have just become my accomplices. He could see the officers surrounding them, riding on flybikes – twenty this time, as opposed to the six he’d dealt with less than a half-hour before.
“I repeat,” the SEED captain shouted, and Spider-Man realized it was the same captain he’d knocked out earlier. “Give yourselves up! You have--!”
Spiderite Green was in motion, leaping toward the captain and snagging him with a webline. With a tug on the line, Green pulled the captain off his flybike, even as Blue was yelling, “Chad, WAIT!”
Green intercepted the captain with a flying kick which with captain’s armored chest. He and the captain landed back on the rooftop. “You wanna get arrested, be my guest. Me? If I’m getting’ taken in for assaultin’ cops, it’ll be ‘cause I actually did that!”
“That’s the worst logic I’ve ever heard,” Blue remarked, but his words were almost inaudible over the hum of flybike engines and the clatter of gunfire. His three teammates were already in motion, evading the gunfire and attempting to take out the SEEDs themselves.
Spider-Man couldn’t believe any of this was happening. “Hey, what’re you kids, crazy or – why do I even bother?” He doubted they could hear him, and they were operating without their leader. At this rate, they were going to get themselves killed.
Acting quickly, he webbed up a SEED officer and yanked him off his flybike. Taking the officer’s place, he anchored two weblines onto the nearest pair of flybikes, then he attached the ends of the lines to the bike he was perched atop. Setting the bike to autopilot, he gunned the engine and hopped off, dragging them through the skies.
One SEED officer managed to single out Spiderite Pink, who had to perform some impressive aerial acrobatics to dodge his gunfire. Twisting around, she fired streams of webbing at the flybike’s gun barrels, clogging them. “For Spider’s sake! Are you people really shooting at a bunch of teenagers? What kind of message are you sending?”
Yellow leaped onto the underside of a flybike, where the officer riding it couldn’t lock on. Unfortunately, another officer hovering nearby had no such difficulty. He opened fire on her, forcing her to hop off and webswing to safety.
Blue came glued at this. “Nat!” Furious, he leaped onto the flybike and kicked the pilot off for daring to shoot at Yellow. Then he turned the bike’s onboard guns on the other SEED officers, firing on their flybikes. He managed to shoot down three of them; the SEED officers had to bail from their damaged vehicles and engage their parachutes as they watched the flybikes drop into Downtown and crash.
But by that time, another officer had flown behind Blue, preparing to fire at him. He was interrupted by a black-and-yellow motion blur that swooped in on glider cloth and kicked his lights out before he could make the shot.
Hearing the commotion, Blue glanced over his shoulder and found Spiderite Yellow perched on the flybike behind him. Or more accurately, in the lap of the slumped-over officer she’d defeated. “Guess this means we’re even, then?” he asked, shouting to be heard over the high winds.
“Why keep track?” Yellow wondered, shrugging. “We’re in this together, right?”
Spiderite Green leaped from flybike to flybike, punching out as many officers as he could. Passing by Blue and Yellow, he shouted, “hey lovebirds! Wanna keep your heads in the game so you won’t get ‘em shot off?”
Couldn’t have said it better, Spider-Man mused to himself, having overheard the exchange. He busied himself by gliding after the falling officers, webbing up nets in order to catch those who failed to pull their parachutes in freefall. With the Spiderites knocking out so many SEEDs, quite a few of them were falling out of their flybikes. Which of course meant riderless flying vehicles were crashing right and left. The kids meant well, but they needed to work on the concept of collateral damage. He had to wonder if they were like this around their leader – the one wearing the white designs.
Midtown New York Alley. Meanwhile.
Vision Quest.
A cold sweat drenched Tim Komori’s face within his mask as he stumbled through the alley, unsteady on his feet. His veins burned with what felt like lava; his pulse pounded in his ears. He stared ahead at the mouth of the alley, but his vision blurred and swam so much he couldn’t keep his balance. That certainly wasn’t helping his quivering stomach. “Feels … wrong….”
Reaching out with one hand, he spread out his talons and dug them into the nearest wall to keep from falling over. With his free hand, he quickly rolled the bottom of his mask up to his nose and threw up all over the pavement. Coughing, he wiped his mouth with the back of his gloved hand, tasting poison and bitter acid.
Soon, after he’d caught enough slow, deep breaths, he gingerly reached around to the back of his neck and touched the raised welts within his costume. The lightest touch burned, and he hissed, fangs bared.
It had bitten him. The Man-Spider had buried its fangs in his neck when it had gotten far enough away from Spider-Man and the other Spiderites to web him up in a coccoon on the roof of a building. The bite had burned worse than anything Tim could have imagined, and he’d lashed.out against his captor, shredding his cocoon with his claws.
He wasn’t sure whether or not he’d managed to tag the Man-Spider, and ultimately it didn’t matter. Without the coccoon to support him between buildings, Tim had fallen several stories into the alley, hitting pavement. But he refused to black out or let the venom paralyze him. Instead, the pain focused him.
A voice off to one side caught his attention, but he couldn’t make out what was being said. The words sounded garbled and distorted. He glanced over to the speaker to find six figures approaching him … all of whom appeared to be only vaguely human. Their faces looked like melting wax, and their eyes glowed bright red.
The nearest creature reached for Tim, who hissed again and backed away. He didn’t want any of these … things anywhere near him, especially considering the bite the Man-Spider had taken out of him. “Get away,” he warned them, his own voice sounding slow and inhuman.
His back touched a brick wall behind him, and Tim found he couldn’t back away any further, and the six creatures were still approaching him. He didn’t know who or what they were, or what they wanted, but ultimately it didn’t matter. The time for retreat had passed. He rolled the bottom of his mask back over his face to mask himself completely.
He was Spiderite White. He was every bit the hero that Spider-Man himself was. And he wasn’t about to be done in by a bunch of horrorvid rejects.
The nearest creature was saying something garbled, holding its hands out toward Spiderite White, who stepped forward and launched a forward kick into its midsection. The force of the kick sent the creature flying backward, bowling over two of its brethren in the process.
They were shouting now, and one of them grabbed Spiderite White’s left bicep. He responded by forcefully pushing upward on the creature’s elbow. The creature not only let go, but Spiderite White could hear the satisfying crack of breaking bone. He followed up with a reverse punch to the creature’s solar plexus, which doubled it over.
As adrenaline surged through his system, he found himself shaking off the effects of the Man-Spider’s venom, replacing it with an amazing amount of speed, strength, and clarity. The fight became his entire world, with his opponents lurching toward him at a sluggish pace compared to the speed and precision of his movements. He weaved in and out of their reach, dispensing a punch here, a block there, a roundhouse kick there.
Somehow, two of the creatures managed to grab onto him, each one holding an arm. Spiderite White simply held onto them and leaped upward, carrying them to the ledge of an apartment building rooftop. Once they landed, he let go of them and slammed his elbow into one’s face. That one slumped to the roof like a sack of potatoes while Spiderite White shoved the other one off the ledge. Once the creature was in freefall toward the alley below, the Spiderite leaped after it, delivering a flying kick to its chest. The creature landed on the pile of its brethren; Spiderite White landed in a crouch a few feet away.
Clenching his forearm muscles, Spiderite White sprayed the pile of misshapen creatures with his organic webbing, trapping them in a net. “All these monsters taken down,” he muttered, admiring his handiwork, “and I didn’t even have to use my claws.”
Though … now that his head was clearing and the rush of adrenaline was subsiding … he took a closer look at the creatures. Moments ago, he was certain they were monsters, but now … they looked human.
His eyes widened. They were human. And they were now dead or dying.
Tim Komori studied their broken bodies with mounting horror. He’d believed they were inhuman, and thus capable of withstanding his full strength. So he hadn’t held back.
Hearing chattering voices and hushed whispers, he glanced up to see a crowd of onlookers at the mouth of the alley. Some were recording the incident with their handheld devices; most were staring at him wide-eyed. He plainly saw fear and revulsion on quite a few of their faces. He clearly heard “Spider-Man” on quite a few of their lips.
He glanced downward at his costume, seeing the black-and-white outfit stained with drops of blood. Especially on his hands. This was not how a Spiderite should act. This was not how Spider-Man himself should act … and clearly, these people seemed to think he was Spider-Man.
“I-I’m sorry,” he muttered. “I’m not—“ Then he glanced upward and noticed the Public Eye security camera mounted on a pole near the alley’s entrance. It no doubt saw everything.
Panicking, Tim sprayed a webline at the camera, covering it with a glob of webbing. Tugging on the webline, he leaped upward and swung on the line, clearing the rooftop on which he dispatched one of the people he’d fought.
People. He’d maimed and killed people, not creatures. His mind raced faster than his body could keep up as he fired weblines and swung from building to building, trying to get as far away from the scene as he could.
But where would he go? Home? He should take off the costume, tell his parents, and turn himself into the Public Eye. There was no way he could face his fellow Spiderites – much less the Spider-Man – after what he’d done.
He decided home was the best place. His mother and father would know how to handle this. They would find a way to make this right.
In short order he made it home, swinging on weblines and gliding on air currents until the his family’s dojo and the apartment above it were in sight. Clinging to the wall with his talons, he crawled up the wall to his bedroom window. Next to it was his parents’ bedroom window, and he risked a peek into it, seeing the light on. Sure enough, they were there, sitting on the bed, and their voices could be heard through the window.
“…still not answering his phone,” his mother said, clearly worried. “I don’t know where he could be at this hour.”
“Have you tried his friends’ numbers?” his father asked, placing a hand on her shoulder to calm her down. “He’s usually with them.”
“I’ve left messages with them, too. I just hope he’s not out getting into trouble.”
“Now, Kimiko, we both know Tim is more responsible than that. He’s always followed the rules. It’s what’s made him a good son and a good dojo instructor.”
Tim felt his gut clench at that. If they knew their ‘good son’ was out in a costume, and had just gone on a violent rampage….
“That’s another thing that worries me. It’s going to break his heart when he finds out about the dojo.”
Raising an eyebrow, Tim listened even closer.
“I know,” his father said. “It’s always been his dream to take over the family business. But what could I do? Stark-Fujikawa was adamant about buying it. They strong-armed me. Our finances being what they are, I couldn’t afford to refuse.”
Tim sucked in a breath. His father sold the dojo to Stark-Fujikawa?
“Why do they even want it so badly?” his mother asked.
“They wouldn’t say, but it seemed like they had plans. Don’t know what or why … but honestly … it-it doesn’t matter. The matter is settled. But we need to get a hold of Tim so that we can tell him about this.”
Tim gritted his teeth, digging his claws even further into the wall. Everything was coming unglued around him. It was a mistake to come here.
Letting go of the wall, he sprang off of it, his heart pounding in his chest.
Abandoned building, ‘Downtown’ New York. Meanwhile.
The Masks We Wear.
All the Goblin had to do to was repair and upgrade his equipment. His heart just wasn’t into it.
It had been a couple of weeks since his encounter with that accursed Spider-Man. The intricate technology within the green-and-purple bodysuit and mask had been damaged in that encounter, and it had taken time for Gabriel O’Hara to go through his usual channels and track down the replacements he needed. Then of course, in the time between his first placing of the illicit order and picking it up from his Black Market contacts, he’d come up with ideas to improve the technology.
Sadly, those improvements required software and components that were completely incompatible with his existing tech. Incompatible, because they’d been developed by the Synthia corporation, not Stark-Fujikawa. He’d always preferred Synthia’s tech to Stark-Fuji’s; the operating system was much cleaner and user-friendly. Even though the Goblin’s technology was based on pirated Stark-Fuji tech.
As he sat cross-legged on the dusty floor of the ratted-out Downtown tenement he’d adopted as his temporary home, Gabri stared at the purple facemask in his hands. He turned the mask inside and out, gazing at the pressure-sensitive tech systems that allowed the flat material to adhere to his face and adopt a ghoulish parody of its shape.
The question kept circling in his mind: If I can’t stand Stark-Fuji ware, why on Earth did I make an entire costume out of it?
He tried to recapture the thought process involved. Miguel knows about your feelings about operating systems. He’s listened to you rant about it often enough.Using a system you hate would keep your brother from immediately tracing the Goblin tech back to you.
But that didn’t quite work. Mig’s not a tech-head, Gabri. He wouldn’t spot the difference between Synthia and S-F, especially not on the inside of a Goblin costume. He wouldn’t even think to look for it. Besides, if you really wanted it to be such a secret, why did you go out of your way to hint at it to him last time?
Tossing the mask to the side, he stood up and stretched his legs. It … seemed like the thing to do? He closed his eyes and shook his head, trying to compose his thoughts. You know why you did that, Gabri. You showed him the face under the mask for the same reason you showed the faces of other people in his life: you hate him. You want to hurt him.
He took Dana away from you. He’s taken away so many people in your life that you loved. Dana cheated on you with him, and now she’s dead. Kasey fell in love with his S-Man mask, and now she’s left you.
It’s why you became the Goblin in the first place. To make him pay. Make him see what he’s done to you.
He doesn’t respect you. He constantly belittles you. He ruins your life, and he doesn’t even know it.
Make him see. Make him pay.
Gabriel snapped out of that train of thought. For some reason, he was getting seriously creeped out. All this dressing up as the Goblin, all this tech, all this malice … it wasn’t him. It didn’t feel like him.
But it had to be him. This was what he wanted.
He stared at the green-and-purple bodysuit once again. He was Gabriel O’Hara. And Gabriel O’Hara was the Goblin. The bane of Spider-Man’s – and Miguel’s existence.
Wasn’t he?
Midtown New York. Soon.
So Speaks Spider-Man.
“Wasn’t that awesome?” Green asked, gliding in on his cape of lyte-byte cloth. Now that the SEED squad had been handled – if temporarily – the Spiderites converged on Spider-man’s location. “Not bad for a bunch of rookies, huh?”
“Yeah, I guess,” Spider-Man muttered, crouching on the building on which they were standing to get a better look at the webbing coccoon attached to the underside of the ledge. The cocoon seemed to be made of an odd texture completely unlike his own webbing ... it had been ripped open from the inside. “But it looks like we have bigger problems.”
Spiderite Pink bounced over to him, practically giddy. “Yes, please let us help you on your quest to defeat the monster that has perverted your image.”
Spider-Man tilted his head to the side. Is this girl for real? “Uh, no. I’m going after the Man-Spider. You are all going home and putting away those costumes. Er, so speaks Spider-Man.”
The Spiderites seemed visibly deflated by this. “So it’s just like that?” Green asked. “All that stuff we did, and we’re still not good enough for you?”
Pink tried to calm him down. “Spider-Man did make his pronouncement. We have to honor it.”
Undaunted, Green got right in Spider-Man’s face. “Are you all on Chain or somethin’? Tim’s still out there. We gotta find him!”
“So leave that to me,” Spider-Man shot back, his voice tight with annoyance. It took quite a bit of self-control not to drop this kid where he stood. “I have experience fighting the Man-Spider; you don’t.”
“So how’re you gonna find him, huh?” Green challenged him.
“I’ll think of something.”
Spiderite Blue pointed at a trail of splattered liquid that led across two more rooftops. “Just as a suggestion, we could follow that trail. It looks like those spatters might be the Man-Spider’s blood. Tim must have clawed him up trying to escape the cocoon.”
“Yeah, something like that,” Spider-Man replied.
“Good, then let’s go!” Green leaped off the rooftop and followed the trail of blood. It led down into an open manhole situated in an alley. He spread his arms and glided down into the alley.
Shrugging, the others followed him. “Y’know, if we’re all gonna be on this little expedition,” Spider-Man commented as he and the others entered the sewer, “I should at least lead it.”
“Hey, you’re the Spider-Man,” Green replied, still racing ahead at a breakneck pace in the narrow tunnels. “So of course you can lead. Now all you have to do is keep up with me.”
Spider-Man shook his head. “I think after tonight, I won’t want to see another spider as long as I live.”
TO BE CONTINUED
Next Issue:
Spider-Man journeys deep into the sewers with four of the Spiderite Five to track down the Man-Spider. But will they get more than they bargained for when they find him? What will happen to Spiderite White?