CH14: Halloween (Part Two)

It had been about three minutes since I started fighting Osborn.

"Fuck!" I shouted, flying through a window and landing inside a Starbucks.

In those three minutes, I'd landed on my side and started bleeding anew from my bullet hole, gotten damn-near blown up around six times, and I got a cut around the width of my arm because his glider shot a saw at me that I couldn't dodge.

I had the feeling it was only gonna get worse from there. I was right, naturally.

I picked up one of the shards of glass and tossed it with a flick of my wrist. It smashed against Osborn's helmet, making him flinch back. In that time, I jumped forward, landed with both feet on his head, and jumped onto the roof of the Starbucks before running away, limping slightly as I gained some distance going from rooftop to alley walls to rooftop.

'Okay, calm down and think,' I took a deep breath, held it for four seconds, and released it. 'Remember your training. First, the enemy; he looks like the version from the original movie trilogy, so he's armored, and so far I've seen him take explosives, saws and bullets from his glider. I don't know what else he's got. So far, there wasn't much banter, so I can't get a read on what character interpretation I'm dealing with. He knows who I am.'

I let myself fall into an open dumpster and discreetly closed the door, just in time to hear the glider pass overhead. 'What do I have? I broke one of my batons bouncing a bullet, so I have one left, I'll probably have to throw it. My webs aren't good for more than a few seconds of movement unless the area heats up suddenly, maybe I can arrange that? The web bombs won't be much use either, but I think I can use them for momentary distractions.'

The glider passed over again, and I held my breath. A small part of me wondered how bad my infection was going to be for nesting in garbage with a bleeding wound on my gut.

'Couldn't this fucking bastard wait until Halloween? I was already starting preparations,' I grumbled, pulling out my phone and looking up Natasha's contact information. 'I shit on all the fucking early-bird-ass supervillains.'

I sent her a text: I'm in deep fucking shit. There's a villain tied to my origin story that knows my identity, I need you to go to the Parker house and make sure nobody gets shot. Everyone there knows my identity, and also Gwen Stacy. Make sure that if she shows up, you shove her in the house and look after her.

She replied in seconds: copy and good luck.

It was followed by a winking emoji, to which I rolled my eyes.

I mean, sure, proper text grammar while hiding in a dumpster might not be the coolest thing, but that's how I roll, motherfucker.

"Oh, Jake!" Osborn crowed, flying around in circles. "If you don't come out soon, I might just have to bomb the whole area!"

I rolled back on my back, putting both feet against the door. When I heard Osborn approaching the spot over me once more, I kicked with all my strength, throwing the door off its hinges and into him. He crashed off course, letting me jump out of the dumpster.

I saw that Osborn was still disoriented, so I ran in the other direction.

'Maybe I can get help? I'm near the Bronx; maybe I can find Luke Cage and use him as a blunt weapon?'

I heard the glider right itself and jumped out into another alley, crouching to hide in the shadows.

'If I hide too much, he gets bored and bombs everything,' I thought, 'I'm sure he wasn't bluffing on that one. This means I gotta fight him, but I can't. So I'll talk.'

I looked at the maniacally laughing CEO.

'Yeah,' I deadpanned in my brain, crawling up a wall. 'That's gonna go great, I'm sure.'

"Hey! Osborn!" he turned around and laughed at me, moving his feet to turn on the machineguns. "Before you shoot me, mind if we talk?"

He seemed to think about it, before moving his feet again and leaning back, making the machineguns pull back into the glider. "Yeah, I got time."

'Playful, maybe?'

"So, we both know each other's identities," I said, casually waving a hand around. "What I'd like to know is why you're hunting me down. Are you making an army of Spider-Men? Maybe you're trying to get a sample to repeat me?"

"Oh, no, not at all, my dear Jake," he said, voice dripping with honey. "I already got a sample! That's how I can hold up against you!"

'Goblin serum, made him unstable,' I noted.

"Let's be honest here, you're just managing because of your million dollar toys," I smirked as I heard his teeth grit. "I'm keeping up with you with malfunctioning equipment and a bullet hole in my gut, so I think we know who's better here."

"SHUT UP!"

'Ah, that's the ticket.' I grinned viciously.

"That's it, isn't it? Poor little Osborn, always trying to prove himself."

To be perfectly honest, I wasn't sure which Osborn I was dealing with. My first instinct was to say Norman, but it could be Harry too. Didn't really matter at the moment, they both had this need to prove themselves. Harry because of Norman, but still.

"I made you, you insolent worm!" Oh, never mind, it's Norman. "If it weren't for me, you wouldn't be here!"

"Bleeding and fighting some jolly green douchebag on a rooftop?" I deadpanned. "Well, in that case, thank you so much for the opportunity."

He stomped his foot and an orange ball sprung up into his waiting hand. "I'LL BLOW YOU TO SMITHEREENS!"

"Nobody says smithereens anymore!" I shouted back, running down the side of the building. When he tossed the bomb, I shot a web line and swung for a moment before it broke.

'Three seconds, more or less,' I thought, jumping off a building to control my fall and hitting the street running. 'Okay, I think I can win this.'

I was soon proved to be wrong, however.

The footage from a chopper showed as Spider-Man ducked behind a car to avoid bullets. After a few seconds of calm, a gloved hand popped out to flip off the Green Goblin, who then fired again.

The car was then picked up and thrown at the Goblin, who barely flew over it, giving Spider-Man enough opportunity to toss a web bomb to him. It was countered mid-air with a flamethrower from Goblin's glider. Jameson, who always seemed to be ready and eager to give commentary regarding the wall crawler, was giving color commentary about the expenses of that thrown car.

"This is bullshit!" Peter shouted at Black Widow. "We can't just let Jake fight him! He's wounded!"

"He is," Natasha acknowledged. She'd herded the teenagers into the house after they returned from dinner at the Stacy home, and was standing in front of the front door of the Parker house like a guard dog. "But he asked me to look after you, and that's what I'm going to do. Seeing how you want to jump into a Cape fight, he was right to do that."

Peter glared at her, but she didn't seem impressed. Ben was sitting in front of the television, glaring at it like Peter had never seen him glare, and May was at his side, holding his hand and crying silently. Gwen was biting her nails on the couch, her eyes going from the TV to Peter.

"So you're just going to let him get killed by some maniac on a fucking hoverboard?!"

Faster than Peter's eyes could follow; Black Widow's hand flew and smacked Peter across the face. His glasses flew off, and he stared at the spy in shock.

"Listen," she hissed. "I care about him to, he's my student. But he's right about that Goblin person, he's the kind to go personal and attack friends and family. He'd never forgive me or himself for letting you all get killed. Right now, we just have to watch and have faith that he'll make it out of this."

Unbidden, a memory played in Peter's head. It was the week before the science fair in third grade, and Peter was almost sick with nerves. Jake was trying to make him feel better, and Peter asked Jake if he had faith in him.

"Faith is for people that don't have evidence," Peter repeated. "I know he's going to make it out of this, because I'm going to get him out of it."

He stormed off to the basement, missing the impressed look on Black Widow's face.

Felicia entered her mom's apartment and lazily dropped in her bed.

'What a day,' she thought, stretching her body and making her joints pop pleasantly. 'I think I might have screwed myself over.'

That job with Tombstone had been a disaster. He'd been making trouble lately, and Felicia had decided to complicate his life a little by stealing his most valuable possession. And if she made some money by selling it to the highest bidder, that was just business.

Of course, he saw her coming, same way that Spider-Man somehow saw her plans of betrayal coming, and replaced the necklace with a fake.

Oh, and let's not mention Spider-fucking-Man.

Heat gathered in Felicia's cheeks without her permission. She'd been surprised when he returned the kiss, and even more when she liked it.

'Fucker, making me blush,' she growled in her head. She'd heard of things like this. People getting stuck in a dangerous situation together, and falling in love because they confused their rushing hearts for love instead of adrenaline. This was just that, that was the only reason they'd kissed, and no other.

She sat up on her bed and grabbed her remote. 'I need a distraction.'

She turned on the TV, hoping for something stupid and mindless. In a monkey paw-worthy twist, she found exactly that: Spider-Man, fighting someone in bright green armor.

'Dammit,' she was about to switch the channel when the chopper's camera zoomed in, and she saw the way Spidey looked.

His stupid black sweater was torn to shreds, and his suit wasn't much better. The part of his gloves that covered his knuckles was split apart, along with the skin on his knuckles.

The lower half of his mask was a little torn, and she could see his teeth grit together and his lips pull back in a snarl as he dented the green maniac's armor with a punch that sent him flying.

His body was littered with little cuts, some bleeding more than others.

She could see him clutch his stomach as he dropped to a knee.

'The bullet wound,' Felicia realized, hand flying to cover her mouth. 'He said he'd be fine!'

He got that wound catching a bullet for her.

He got it to save her.

To save her.

To save her.

'DAMMIT!'

Black Cat rushed off to save the idiot.

'Okay,' I thought, crashing into a car after I caught a bomb with my face. 'This looks bad.'

I glared up at the Daily Bugle helicopter as it shone a light on me. I raised an arm and flipped it off.

'Huh, when did he cut me there?' I thought, looking at a cut from the buzz saw balls that ran diagonally across the length of my forearm. 'Was that or before the one on my knee?'

"What's the matter, Spidey?" Osborn taunted. There were five dents I could see on his armor: two on his chest, two on his helmet, and one in the crotch of his suit. I was mad that that last one didn't do jack-shit. "I thought you could keep up with me!"

In lieu of answering, I turned the arm I was using the flip off the chopper towards him.

"Charming." He said drolly.

"I try," I smirked. Slowly, I stumbled to my feet more than I actually had to, giving me time to get a feel of the area.

So far, I had made him blow up three cars on the street. The area around us was heating up, and I was sweating like crazy under my suit.

'Okay, this should work, maybe?'

As fast as I could, I shot four webs: two to his chest, and one to each arm.

I grabbed them tight and started swinging him around. When I saw how the webs didn't immediately break, I made a feral grin and spun him faster and faster. I think I heard him vomit in his suit before I let go and tossed him down the street, making him bounce over and over.

"Suck it, Osborn!" I cackled.

Snarling, he flew back towards me. I shot two webs into the turbines, making them stay still. With this, Osborn was unable to dodge the web lines I stuck to his helmet. I swung him over my head into the ground, and back again the other way, like a metronome.

When I was done, he was stuck into the pavement, the glass on his mask was broken, and the armor was more dents than pavement.

I fell on my ass, panting.

"Yeah," I groaned. "Who's your daddy, motherfucker?"

[Another fucking bomb flying at me.]

"SHIT!" I back flipped just in time to avoid being hit by the pumpkin bomb. The explosion still burnt me (more) and threw me further down the street.

I looked up, and saw a sleeker-looking glider, pitch-black and quiet as a grave, floating towards me.

'Fuck everything,' I thought.

"Credit where it's due, that was a solid move, Osborn," I said. "I wish I'd seen it coming."

Cackling came from the crater, as Green Goblin detached from the glider and stumbled to his feet. "I'm so glad to hear you say that, Jakey!"

"Ugh," I recoiled, throwing up a little in my mouth. "God, I take it back. I think I can see your boner through the armor."

He –and I swear to Thor I'm not lying– looked down to see if that was true.

I threw up some more in my mouth and ran the other way.

Behind me, I felt Goblin get on the new glider and rush towards me.

A stab of pain from the bullet hole made me clench my whole body up, and I fell on my face.

'You know,' I groaned, stretching hand forward to crawl away. 'The comics really misled me as to how much bullets hurt.'

My sight was getting blurry, in part because I lost one of my lenses. I flipped to be on my back and I forced myself to lift my head.

Goblin was slowly flying at me.

'Fuck,' I stumbled back, and stopped as pain bolted through me.

Foggy, Karen and Matt where together in the couple's apartment. Foggy and Karen were watching the TV, and Matt was facing a wall. Foggy had offered to narrate how the fight was going, but Matt told him he already knew. That's when Foggy realized that Matt was faced in the direction of where the fight was taking place.

Matt had been holding his cane with both hands in a white-knuckle grip, and it'd cracked in half minutes ago.

He wanted to jump in and help. He'd grown of fond of Jake, despite of how much of a little shit he could be, and now he had what was essentially –to him– a first-line seat to him getting the shit kicked out of him.

He wanted to put on the tights and run there to help him fight back. He'd tried so hard to tell himself otherwise, but in a moment of brutal honesty to himself, Matt admitted that he missed being The Man Without Fear, if only because he wanted to beat that (apparently green) bastard into the ground.

But he couldn't. God, he wanted to, but he couldn't.

He felt the scar that ran down his back and slowed him down with random bursts of pain.

After that fight with Bullseye, Matt had tried to be Daredevil for about a week before Karen, Foggy and Steve staged an intervention for him. They forced him to face the truth that he dodged out of fear of being nothing without the devil in him.

Belatedly, Matt realized that Karen was wrapping bandages on his hands where he cut himself on his crushed cane.

"Thank you," he whispered.

She smiled at him.

Matthew Murdock was sure he'd fallen out of God's favor a few beatings ago.

Still, he clasped his wounded hands together and prayed.

Felicia was running from rooftop to rooftop, using her grappling hook to swing from buildings. She'd never tried before now, but it felt like a good moment.

'Please don't let me be late,' she begged. 'Please don't let me be late.'

She flew for a moment before throwing her grappling hook again and swinging in a pendulum once more.

She could see the smoke from the fight and the helicopter in the distance. She swung off the corner of a building and looked down on Spidey, flat on his back and bleeding, and the green maniac, approaching on his hoverboard –or whatever it was.

She extended her grappling hook to lower herself and landed on the villain with a kick that sent him flying back.

"Nice entrance," Spider-Man coughed.

"I thought you didn't do banter," Black Cat muttered, eyes trained on the green armored bastard.

"I like it, I just suck at it," the hero groaned, tearing off the tattered remains of his sweater and forcing himself to stand. "I think you should run away."

"Is now really the time for macho bullshit?"

"No," Spider-Man replied, eying the maniac in the hoverboard, who was just floating there, staring. "But Osborn here is the type that makes it personal, and tracks you down to your house so he can drown your cats in front of you and slit your throat."

"Well, as charming as that image-" Felicia stopped. "Wait, did you say Osborn?"

The lenses on Spidey's mask did that thing where they looked like widened eyes.

"Uh…" she could practically hear him cussing in his head. "No?"

"That's Osborn?! Richest-guy-after-Tony-fucking-Stark Norman Osborn?!"

"I am so fucking bad with secret identities," Spider-Man whispered.

"It's not nice to reveal your friend's secret like that, Jakey-poo~" Osborn –apparently– crooned. Spider-Man made a gagging sound, and Felicia felt a little nauseous too.

"He's fifteen, dude," Black Cat said.

"Trust me, he knows," Spidey said.

"Also, your name is Jake?"

"God dammit."

Osborn flew forward, two machineguns coming out of the hoverboard and firing on them. Black Cat jumped to one side and Spidey to the other, shooting two webs at the maniac's helmet and blinding him.

'Okay,' Felicia thought, as she shot her grappling hook into the hoverboard and pulled it to throw off Osborn. 'I think we can do this. He's just a bored pedophile millionaire, that's nothing compared to the bulletproof gangster.'

Matt had come running as soon as he got the message from Natasha. She explained everything with the efficiency that could be expected of her, and now he was rushing to where the fight was on Natasha's bike.

The wound on his back slowed him down in almost every way. He couldn't move faster than a power-walk without being paralyzed. More than once he'd tried to rush somewhere and been found on the ground. Luckily, bikes didn't require much movement. There was danger involved, since powers or not, Matt was still blind, but he actually liked that.

On his back was a small bag holding four web cartridges and six web bombs. According to Peter, Jake's 'Guy in the Chair', they should hold up in the colder weather.

Matt drove past the fight, not even stopping, as he tossed the bag vaguely in Jake's direction and drove off. He couldn't fight, but he would do everything he could.

[A female voice saying "What the fuck?"]

[Jake's chuckling as he opened it and put on the new cartridges. "That was a friend. Let's kick this asshole's ass."]

A grin stretched on Matt's lips.

This much he could do.

Things were not going great for Norman Osborn.

First, Jake had surprised him by revealing he was aware of his identity, and started their fight early.

Then, he sassed him! The nerve of the child, acting like some ungrateful brat when he should be on his knees thanking him!

After that, there was the little bitch in the black suit and that random person on the motorcycle that threw his Jake a bag of equipment. He didn't have a chance to wonder what that was about before Jake's last baton flew at his face.

And suddenly, Jake's webs weren't breaking after a few seconds, and Norman realized the difference between himself and his boy.

He outpaced him at everything, whenever Norman tried to gain distance; his glider was pulled off-balance, giving the white-haired bimbo a chance to hit him. Then Jake pulled Norman towards himself and punched him into the ground, or he threw him at a building, or something!

Jake was cheating, he'd gotten help and a second wind after Norman had tired himself out.

The Green Goblin would have to even the odds.

Later.

"ENOUGH!" Norman screamed, activating the only function of his glider that he hadn't already. Clouds of dark smoke and several flash bangs erupted from the glider. While the two were blinded, Norman got the last word. "I'll be back, Spider-Man! And I will have my glorious victory!"

Had he stayed, he would have heard Jake mutter, "God, you're such a fucking ham."

As he flew away, he thought to himself. How could he stage a fair fight between them?

I looked at Black Cat.

She looked at me.

"So…" I coughed into a fist. "How's about that weather, huh? Sure is cold lately."

She raised an eyebrow, unimpressed.

I was currently tied to a bed in Night Nurse's clinic. I didn't need to be tied, but Night Nurse said that I couldn't be trusted to take care of myself, and I felt bad for her having to deal with me, so I didn't break out.

Except for the arm that I accidentally tore free when I coughed into my fist. I quickly put it back in place and kept it still so that it wouldn't look out of place.

"Was that really Norman Osborn?"

"Yup," I nodded. "Yet another millionaire with too much money, time, and weapons. Tony Stark is a real trendsetter, you know?"

"What's his deal with you?" straightforward, not distracted by jokes. She's the type that's a teaser, not teased.

"Far as I can tell, this is how it goes: he has some obsession with me because one of his radioactive spiders bit me. He sees himself as my father for this. However, he also sees opportunity, because of what I can do thanks to the spider. And, since he used some of my blood –which I don't know how he got– to make some kind of… Goblin Serum, he sees himself as my equal." I took a deep breath before continuing my dissection of Norman's character. "As far as I can tell, he sees us as two of a kind, and that makes our thing bizarrely romantic. To him. I think he's a gross lunatic."

"Huh," she said slowly. "That's… thorough. Did you know him before the spider thing?"

"Nah," I shrugged. "I got this from fighting him."

She raised her eyebrows.

"What?"

Before she could say anything, the door opened and Peter ran screaming. "Jake!"

He stopped at my bedside and looked me over. My suit was completely taken off (except my mask) and I was wrapped in bandages like a mummy.

"Oh my god, Jake, are you okay?"

I stared at him, and slowly raised a hand to point at Black Cat.

He looked at her, looked at me, and then looked at her again with a shocked face. Cat smirked.

"Uh," he cleared his throat. "I mean…"

"She already knew my name, relax," I sighed, dropping my arm. "Goblin spilled the beans. Not all of them, but my name."

"Yeah," Cat nodded, leaning on the bed and giving me a teasing smile. "Now I just have to look through every Jake in New York until I find the one with spider powers and pouty lips."

"Excuse you, my lips are not pouty."

She chuckled, and smiled at Peter. "Hey, I'm Black Cat."

"Peter," he said, stretching a hand for her to shake. After she did, he leaned in and whispered, "Sexy cat thief?"

I nodded. He gave me a thumbs up. I flipped him off. I could see Black Cat holding in laughter out of the corner of my eye. I flipped her off too.

"Nice to see you've kept your cheery disposition."

I flipped off Matt as he entered my room, hand behind his back.

"Where are my roses, punk?" I asked, all smirking. "I got a bad boo-boo, I deserve roses. Or chocolate."

"That's Valentine's Day," he pulled a stuffed bear from behind his back. "If you get hurt, you get stuffed animals."

"Hm," I grunted, taking the bear. At this point, I'd broken the bindings on both arms. Whatever, I could take a drug dealer's wallet and give the money to Night Nurse.

The bear was brown, had glittery beady black eyes, and was holding a heart that said 'Hope You Have a Bear-y Fast Recovery'.

"I can live with it," I decided, putting the bear next to my head.

"Yeah, on that note, I should leave," Black Cat declared. She had a bandage around her forearm from the one cut that Norman got on her. Most other wounds she'd either dodged on her own or I'd pulled her away from them. The claws on her gloves were filed down to nubs from using them on Norman's armor. "This is getting a bit too full of heroes."

"Are you not one?" Matt asked, clueless.

"Alright," I, on the other hand, raised a fist for her to bump. "Thanks for your help, you really saved my ass.

She kissed me and left out the window with a wink. When I regained my senses, Peter and Matt were clapping.

"Fuck both of you," I groaned.

That had been a pretty good end to a pretty shitty Monday.

It was seven days until Halloween.

Tuesday:

A lot of people came to visit while I recovered. More than I expected.

The Parkers were all there, of course. May cried and left two tin boxes full of cookies by my bed, which were empty in an hour. Ben smiled and said he was proud. Peter said he'd have all the cartridges replaced with the new formula by the next day, which was when I planned to leave (despite Night Nurse's orders). Gwen was also there, and she gave me a light hug because she didn't want to hurt me. I told her that I could have a hole through the lung and she still couldn't hurt me with her noodle arms. She punched me in the shoulder for that.

Ben mentioned that my biological parents hadn't noticed anything was off, which didn't surprise me.

The Fantastic Four showed up too, with Johnny saying that if he hadn't been busy punching Doctor Doom he'd have helped. I told him I was jealous he got in a fight with Doom, and he said that he was pretty awesome. Ben ruffled my hair, Sue squeezed my shoulder, and Richard offered to build me some kind of Doom Laser, which I turned down because I wouldn't be able to lug it around everywhere.

Strange and Illyana showed up after the Fantastic Four were gone. Strange said that Wong sent his best wishes and a Tupperware full of sandwiches, and Illyana gave me a hug.

Natasha showed up when no one else was there and gave me a tight hug, whispered in my ear that if I ever scared her like that again I was going to be the next guinea pig for her experiments with nerve gas, and disappeared. Her version of saying she loves me.

I woke up from a nap with lipstick smeared on my cheek and a little paper on my bed, which had a doodle of a black cat and a phone number.

Tuesday was pretty damn good.

Wednesday:

I woke up around eight, and immediately snuck out of bed with Cat's number in my hand.

I'm sure that more than one person was surprised to see Spider-Man, wearing a hospital gown and bandages, parkouring around town with one empty tin box in each hand. I heard more than a few wolf-whistles whenever the gown got caught in the wind.

I got to the Parker home, changed into actual clothes, finally took off my mask, and just screwed around with my family.

I fixed a step on the porch with Ben, helped May with changing a light bulb, and talked with Peter about his Baxter internship.

I called my informants and let them know that I was still alive, which got relieved shouting from the Trio and a scolding from Aaron over how I needed to be more careful.

At the end of the day, I called the number Cat left me. She picked up after the first ring.

"Who is this?" she said.

"Just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man," I said. I was sitting on the roof of the Parker home, wearing a new sweater that May knit while I was resting in the clinic.

"And what might a hero want with a criminal such as myself?" she teased in a tone that was perfectly husky.

"Oh, I just wondered if you wanted a go at another crime lord," I looked at my notes, updated thanks to my informants. "Word on the street is of a new player, one Madame Masque, if that piques your interest? We can grab coffee after that."

"Sounds purrfect." She said, and I think I fell in love.

Wednesday was awesome.

Thursday:

I smiled as I looked at Madame Masque as she hung upside down in a cocoon of webs from the roof. Black Cat was checking the pockets of her coat and the wallets of her mooks.

"Man," I sighed. "It's good to be back."

"I'm so happy for you," MM said, glaring at me.

"It's kinda weird how expressive you can be," I noted. "The only parts of your face that move are your eyes, but you portray such a wide range of emotion with them. I've seen you do angry, annoyed, frustrated, furious…"

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you were flirting," Black Cat said from where she was taking someone's wallet.

"And stray from you, my darling?" I said, in as gaudy a tone as I could manage. "Never!"

"Never mind, keep flirting."

"I don't want your boyfriend," Madame Masque complained.

"Yeah, this is what every guy wants," I muttered. "To be tossed around like a hot potato. Really feeling appreciated here."

"Aw," Cat put her arm around my shoulders and hugged me. "I didn't mean to make you feel bad, sweetie. C'mon, I'll buy you something pretty with the mobster's money."

"You two are real cute," Madame Masque commented. "I wonder if you'll stay that way after I skin you alive."

"She really adds to the scene, doesn't she?" I said, tapping her shoulder so she'd turn around.

"Yeah," Felicia said, lifting my mask and planting a kiss on my lips.

After that, we swung (literally) by Vito's store and got two Styrofoam cups of his finest shitty coffee.

Thursday was pretty good too, especially when she kissed me goodbye.

Friday:

"I missed this," I noted, lying on James' bed. "It's been too long since we hung out."

"Yeah, I missed your drain on our pot," Ace snarked, passing me a joint. Duke had declared they were going to try their hardest to get me high five minutes ago, and they were still unsuccessful.

"Get bent, Ace."

She blew me a kiss.

"So, what are you gonna do about that Goblin guy?" Duke asked, tossing a kernel of popcorn into the air and catching it in his mouth.

"I've been focusing on healing for now," I said. "The way these things work, I'll probably have to face off against him on Halloween. So, I'm gonna find him, and I'm gonna break his fucking legs."

Silence formed in the apartment.

"You know," James said, "You kinda have a dark side to you, man."

"Sorry."

"Nah, it's all good." Ace wrapped an arm around me. "It's nice to know we got a maniac like you on our side."

I laughed. "Your side?"

"Sure, the side of law abiding citizens," she said, sucking in smoke from her joint.

I laughed more.

"I think the stuff's finally hitting him."

"It's about god damn time!"

I decided to make time to hang out with the guys more.

I found Black Cat later that Friday, sitting on a rooftop with a picnic basket next to her and gesturing for me to come over.

"Howdy, Cat," I said, sitting next to her. "What's up?"

"Well, I stumbled upon this here bottle," she said, pulling out a bottle of wine older than both of us combined. "And I thought I might as well share it with my boyfriend."

"You should call him, then," I joked.

"Shut up and drink, Jake," she pulled out two paper cups from the basket and offered me one.

After a while, we were watching the street below, sipping on wine.

"So, you stole this, right?"

"Yeah."

"Cool, just checking."

She looked at me out of the corner of my eye. "You're gonna end up being a lousy hero if you keep up that attitude, Spidey."

"If I were a gambling man, I'd bet you stole this from some rich idiot with more beach houses than common sense, right?"

"… You're not wrong."

"Well, there you have it." I finished what was in my cup and tossed it into the basket over my shoulder. "I never liked the bourgeois."

"You're a communist?" Cat asked, amused.

"God, don't even joke about that," I made a face. "I can just imagine Jonah's comments."

She burst out laughing. I was chuckling along, when I heard a mugging on the alley below us.

"Wanna play hero with me?" I asked, getting up and walking down the side of the building.

"I'm good, Jake." She waved me off, and I dropped to stop the mugging. I heard her hum lightly, as if lost in thought, before I was busy fighting.

When I was done, she was gone. But she left a little note that said 'My name's Felicia'.

Seeing how nobody was around to see me, I danced a little and cheered.

Saturday:

Two days until Halloween. I wasn't quite fully healed, but I was feeling well enough for light work outs. Widow spent the whole time in the gym helping Matt train me in dodging by pulling out a fucking Glock out of her purse and shooting at me. I'm proud to say she didn't hit me once.

After that, I went around stopping crimes. I took a bunch of dealers' wallets and gave the money to Night Nurse, with a little note apologizing for vanishing and breaking the restraints. I think she didn't mind that some of the money had coke on it.

I planned out the fight with Osborn in every scenario I could, playing every scenario I could come up with in my head, and figuring out the best ways to solve it.

Somewhere along the like, I got a text from Felicia telling me she'd be out of town. I replied with one that said I'd miss her.

I thought about adding a kissy-face emoji, but that was a bit too much for a four day relationship.

Or I might just have issues.

The point is that not much else happened after that. That Saturday ended peacefully.

Sunday:

"So what you mean to tell me…" I said, rubbing the bridge of my nose. "… Is that you met Thor and you called him a hunk to his face?"

Illyana, sitting on the other side of the table with her red face on her hands, nodded miserably.

"… Was he flattered?"

"He thanked me for my advances but said I was a bit too young," she groaned.

I couldn't help it, I laughed.

She kicked me under the table, "It's not funny! I made an ass of myself in front of the future king of Asgard! I can't do that if I'm going to be the Sorcerer Supreme!"

"You think Strange never made an ass of himself? He did it like five minutes after meeting you," I tossed a French fry into the air and she caught it grumpily with her mouth. "I think you'll be fine, Blondie."

In lieu of answering, Illyana gave her burger a pouty bite.

I sighed and reached over to pat her head. "There, there… I'm sure Thor will forget about it. He must get comments like that all the time."

That actually cheered her up a little. "I guess you're right."

We finished our meals and left the diner to head to the movies.

"What are we gonna see, anyways?" Illyana asked, intrigued. "I've only seen like eight movies, and I hated most of those."

"Oh, I know." I had made her watch all of those movies, and six of those were variations of Sharknado.

They made a whole fucking franchise in this universe. The Marvel universe is awesome.

"Then what…" Illyana trailed off as her eyes widened and she saw the sign on the theatre. A sign that said 'Sharknado VII: Shark Faster, Tornado Harder'. "NO!"

"Yup," I said, watching my blond Hellion friend drop to her knees.

"NOOOOOO!"

I snickered and smacked her shoulder. "C'mon, I'll buy you an extra-large popcorn bucket."

She followed me into the theatre with a grumpy expression.

We came out of the theatre laughing our asses off and mocking the corny acting.

Life was good that Sunday. It was the break I needed before the big day.

"Hey, Jake?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you going to be okay?" Illyana's cloak of levitation was disguised as a red hoodie, and she was sinking her chin into it, not meeting my eyes. "Tomorrow's Halloween, and you said that's when the Goblin guy was going to attack."

"Yeah," I smiled. "I think I'm ready. I planned and everything, which is more than what I usually do."

"… Strange said I shouldn't go out and fight," she muttered. "My training's not really done, and the only way I could help is with the demonic powers, but…"

"Illyana," I wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "It's okay, really. Johnny sent me like a million texts trying to convince me that he could help, but he's got a microverse mission or something, and you have training. I'll be fine; you just worry about training for universal stuff or whatever."

She nodded and leaned on me. "Still, I'm going to get better. I want to save you, to pay back my debt."

"There's no debt," I ruffled her hair, "Only friendship."

She joked about how ominous I made that sound, and I shoved her.

I was really proud of her, how comfortable she'd gotten around others.

I went to sleep on my bed at my biological parents' house, glancing at my phone. Whenever I knew a big event was coming up, I had trouble sleeping. I passed out around 4am, staring at my phone.

Monday again:

I woke up at 12pm, to a chilly room. The Parker's had allowed me to skip school all week, having called the school to explain I'd fallen down the stairs and would be staying at a hospital for a while because I broke my nose.

I burrowed into my blankets, still mostly asleep, when my phone started vibrating. Grumbling, I grabbed it and woke up as I processed what I was seeing.

It was an invite to a video call from an unknown number.

'Fucking hell, Osborn,' I thought, 'Couldn't this wait until, like, noon?'

I accepted and came face to face with the villain himself.

"Jake, baby!"

"Osborn," I rubbed my eye. "Let me guess, you want to make a threat or something?"

"Something like that," he tapped at his phone and switched the camera, letting me see what was in front of Osborn.

Sitting there, tied to a chair, beaten and bruised with a gag on her mouth, was Felicia. She was shaking slightly, and I could see tear streaks on her eyes. It suddenly struck me that she, unlike the Black Cat from the comics, was very much still a child. She didn't have the experience her counterpart did.

My screen cracked from the pressure of my grip.

The camera switched again. "Now, as you see-"

"Where and when?"

"Pardon?"

The screen cracked more and I repeated myself with a growl. "When. And. Where."

An insane grin stretched on his lips. "George Washington Bridge, don't be late, honey!"

"I'm gonna snap your fucking neck," I replied, breaking my phone with my grip.

I tossed aside the useless thing and suited up as fast as I could. I'd planned for this, love interests are always in the line of danger in this god-forsaken universe.

It was minutes before I arrived at the bridge. Goblin wasn't there before me, so I sat there, planning my next move.

I took a few deep breaths, and when I heard the glider, I turned around with both fists raised and ready. Green Goblin was there, holding a tied up Felicia.

"Hello, Jake!"

"Shut your whore-fucking mouth."

Before he could retort, I threw a baton at his face. He barely dodged by tilting the glider to the side, but I stuck a web to his chest and pulled him at me, cocking a fist back.

And then he threw Felicia off of the glider.

Obviously, I let him go. He did exactly what I wanted him to do.

Here's the thing: if he didn't throw Felicia off the side of the bridge, he could use her as a human shield. But he counted on me diving to rescue her, probably killing her in the process.

Instead, I tapped my right webshooter while I shot the other one at a lower part of the bridge.

The next moments felt as if they passed in slow motion.

I pulled the web line to make myself fall faster, until I was passing by Felicia, while webs wrapped themselves around my hand. With the unwrapped hand, I grabbed her and hugged her to me, and I fell in a nosedive with a fist stretched out.

You wanna know a tip in case you find yourself plummeting to your water-themed death? Falling into water from high-up only feels like hitting concrete if you don't break the surface first. If you do, the tension's different, and it's just like hitting water.

Throw a knife, a baton, or a weight, and time it with your own impact and you'll only be wet and scared instead of dead.

Unfortunately, I didn't have the luxury of time, so I couldn't pull of my other baton.

Luckily, I had enough time to use my web wrappings.

My fist hit the water, and if I hadn't been too busy gritting my teeth I would have screamed as an awful 'CRACK!' sounded.

I'm not sure how I did it –between the cold, the pain, and the adrenaline, everything is a blur. But somehow I managed to climb up to the bridge. I was using my uninjured arm to hold Felicia against me, and my injured arm wasn't much good, so I must have walked up the side of the arch with just my legs.

I didn't care. I was exhausted, my arm felt like it was full of broken glass, and all I could do was shake give Felicia CPR.

"God, please, please be alright, please," I begged, almost incoherent. "Please, I can't- I can't lose you, please, I can't fuck this up, please-"

She flopped over and vomited water, and I thought it was almost the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. I hugged her to me as she took desperate breaths.

I swung us to Night Nurse's clinic, her on my back and me swinging with one hand.

Norman didn't approach us, but I knew he was watching us go.

I planned what I was going to do to him the whole way.

"I'm not letting you go out there!" Night Nurse screamed. Felicia was resting in the other room, and I'd wrapped up my wrist with some more webs. It was still horribly broken, but it wouldn't flop around in a fight.

"Oh yeah?" I asked casually. Night Nurse was standing in front of the front door, arms crossed. "Tell me more about that."

"Listen, you're still hurt from last week, and now your wrist? You'll die!"

"Trust me, I really won't."

"Just let someone else deal with that… Goblin! The Avengers, Matt, anyone else!"

I stared at her. I realized that, in fact, she was a good person. She barely knew me, but she was genuinely worried about me.

"What's your name?"

She was taken back, but answered. "My name's Linda. Linda Carter."

"Listen, Linda, the truth is that I respect you. I really do. But you have to ask yourself…" I made a vague gesture in her general direction. "Do you really think you can stop me from leaving?"

She glared at me. I glared back.

"Dammit," she took a step aside.

"Thanks," and before she could hit me with the Taser she was pulling from her back pocket, I was gone.

I didn't know where Norman was.

But I knew how to get him to come to me.

It hadn't taken the Green Goblin much to find Jake's little love note.

After all, even millionaires in power armor on gliders found out when a costumed vigilante slammed into the biggest screen in the Big Apple and roared the name 'Osborn'.

Really, Jakey could be such a romantic~

Deciding to break out all stops for their big showdown, the Goblin activated the smokescreen function of his Glider, coating him in dark smoke. He arrived at the scene with a dramatic cackle, and almost swooned when he laid eyes on his enemy.

He was still sitting on the broken screen. The cracks expanded under him like a spider web. It was so perfect that the Goblin wished he had a camera.

"Hello, Spider-"

And then everything went wrong.

He didn't realize when Jake threw them, but five web bombs suddenly detonated around the Goblin's Glider. His transport was pulled off-balance from the sudden weight, almost throwing the Goblin off, were it not for his magnetic boots.

Then the Spider flew at him and punched him hard enough that he went flying into the ground.

The Goblin bounced once before the Spider, caught him mid-air and swung them both out of the public's eye. He threw him into the floor of some dirty alley.

This was all wrong. They were supposed to have a great showdown for everyone to see. The people of New York were supposed to see the hero they never truly appreciated fight with his all and slowly lose his life at Norman's hands. It was supposed to be the great showdown between Spider-Man and the Green Goblin. Jake Fletcher and Norman Osborn.

Instead, Jake kicked the Goblin into the ground and said, "No."

"No? What do you-?"

Norman was pulled forward with a web and punched to the ground with a web-covered fist.

"We're not doing this song and dance. There's not going to be a showdown. Halloween isn't over, and this isn't personal. Or rather, it is, and that's why it's not." Jake walked over and crouched next to Norman, lifting his helmet with one hand. "You made it personal, so I'm going to do the one thing that will hurt you more than any beating I can give you, and I'm taking the personal part away.

"You're not my nemesis. You're not special. You're not any more of an enemy to me than the Shocker or Electro. You're just another schmuck with power armor."

Jake slammed his head into the ground, breaking the glass of his helmet, before raising his head again.

Norman's fearful eyes met the cold, dead lenses of Spider-Man's mask.

"I'm going to break you, Osborn. I'm going to break your arms, then your legs, then your spine, and then your reputation. I'm going to OsCorp, and I'm gonna pull out every dirty, amoral secret you had out of your computers, and I'm gonna post it for everyone to see.

"Your son will be taken away by Social Services. Your company will either fall to pieces or they will cut you and your name out. You will spend the rest of your life penniless, imprisoned and hated. And I'm going to forget you. I will go on to live a long, long life, and I'll forget you as soon as I'm done with you."

"P-please," Norman blubbered. Spider-Man slammed his head into the ground again.

"You wanted to be my nemesis? You can't handle all my hatred, Osborn. You're just a little man that got high off of some green goop, trying to be a shadow of what I am." Spider-Man lifted his helmet and stared with no sympathy as Norman cried. "Maybe this is me going over the edge. Maybe I should be taking a breather, getting off the shock of almost losing Felicia, and dealing with this with a clear head. But fuck it, you pissed me off."

Norman screamed and begged for mercy for ten seconds before he passed out from pain.