Chapter 5: Hanging Out

After the field trip we decided to go to the coffee shop in our area. The one called Excelsior. We always hang out there although our group gradually grew bigger from just Harry, Peter, and I to our current much larger one.

So, after going home, changing and putting the spiders in the habitats I had for previous pets I left. Yeah, I kept pets, some goldfish a hamster used to have a lizard as well as a couple spiders and a snake. That was before we started moving a lot.

"You guys taking the usual," the shops owner, Stan asks us when we enter. We smile and walk to our spot in the corner. When we're about to take a seat Ava and Sam walk in, they notice us then move in our direction.

 "You guys played hooky today, didn't you," Peter asks with a small smile some of that heavy air leaving him. Sam shrugs returning the smile while Ava replied, "We really aren't science people like you guys, we like to have fun once in a while."

We laughed at that while Luke said, "So do I but I was there." Sam looks at him pointedly while saying "That's because of Jess over there and we all know it." "Not my fault you're all-single dogs," was the reply given as the teasing continued.

We take our seats while MJ, Lyn, Cindy and Elle sort of gravitate towards Peter. This went unnoticed since it was pretty common although I noticed it seemed to be somehow more serious than before. I ignored that wanting to avoid too much thinking and we kept on talking.

While they were teasing each other I looked back to the counter and froze. I realized that the owner Stan wasn't just anyone after I took a closer look at him. It was the Stan, the number one inspiration behind a majority of my favourite comic book characters Stan motherfucking Lee.

He smiled at me and walked towards us. When he reaches, he looks at me and starts to talk to us. "You know the world isn't exactly like I thought it would be, but it isn't that bad, at least my symbiotes are the same and overall its better than what those idiots did after they took over. Be careful of robots with a stick up their ass though and the spiders, their sex drive's been dialed up to eleven."

I immediately felt relieved hearing this although those close enough to hear what he said were confused, until they noticed the earbud he had on and thought he was on a call. 'So, the Scope-verse influenced this world but not as much as I was worried about,' I think. <Meanwhile in the authors universe 'Should I add some more things from Scope-verse?'.> I instinctively shiver for some reason.

Stan then pulls the ear buds off and catches our attention. When he does have it he looks at all of us making sure we're paying attention. "I'll be leaving the store soon and I wanted to give some advice to some of my greatest regulars." We blink our eyes in shock at what he said.

"I named the place excelsior because I wanted it to a be a place were people come to relax themselves and gather the strength to keep on moving forward. All of you are about to step into the next stage of your lives, all of you will probably do great things, create great things and have some form of power that someone would deem great whether its physical or not. I had a friend who once told me with great power comes great responsibility."

We all groan and he chuckles, "But I also want to tell you that in the face of hardship, you all should keep moving forward and not give up. Hold onto what makes you strong and always keep the word excelsior in mind and strive to go ever higher." We blink in shock before Peter stands up, "Thank you Mr. Lee, for everything." Stan Lee just smiles and leaves the store.