by Neil Kleid
(Deeper, Peter, we’ve got to go deeper.)
A second monument. “Here lies…Joe Face.” Joe, meek and unassuming, stood before his simple obelisk with hands clasped before him. Peter tried to go to him, to talk with him; but Joe’s marker was already sliding away, disappearing from view.
Tombstones encircled Peter, penning him in, shoving accusatory names into his field of vision. Ghosts wailed and keened above and around him, begging for answers, asking why Spider-Man had failed to save them, had let them die. Victims that Peter had never known, and enemies he’d long forgotten. Friends and confidants whose faces haunted his dreams each night. Police Captain George Stacy, killed by a ledge dislodged by Doctor Octopus during a heated battle with Spider-Man. Gwen Stacy, the captain’s daughter and one of Peter’s great loves, thrown from atop a bridge by the Green Goblin. Countless others, dead and gone. Lives lost, wasted because of their connection to Spider-Man. Because of their ties to Peter Parker. Lives that had been ended because the Spider could not save them, because the Spider did not exist.
Peter dropped to his knees, doubled over in pain and grief, fingers tearing at his mask. “Because of me, always because of me…”
Their voices surrounded him, growing louder in volume, harmonizing in time to the hypnotic sound of the drums, the roar of the thunder and gunfire. Peter crawled away, but the cackling voice of Ned Leeds dogged his heels, driving him farther into the graveyard, deeper into his pain and shame. The dead accused him of not using his power responsibly, of not coming to their aid or the aid of others because he was too busy playing the joking, foolish hero—too busy pretending to be a Spider.
And like a Spider, Peter scuttled away on hands and feet, trying to escape the hounding, persistent ghosts he’d carried with him ever since first donning the mask. The spectres did not relent. They followed him down row after row, pointing out important names and forgotten faces, driving the dagger farther into his back.
Until the pounding of thunder overpowered their voices. Peter escaped, dragging himself through dirt and mud and away from the graveyard, into the white. He headed for the pervasive, percussive sound of the drums, but found himself confronted by a final marker. When he looked up to find that he was finally alone in the quiet limbo, he realized that the rhythmic, consistent sound of the drum was hardly a drum at all.
It was a heartbeat.
FOUR
(THUMP)
Exhausted, Peter sank into the mud before the last looming tombstone and looked down at his body. The deep crimson of his bright, once-proud costume marked him as guilty and profane, like Hester’s scarlet letter. Spider-Man’s mask, dirty and dull, seemed foolish in this place of remembrance. Tears sprang unbidden from the corners of his eyes; he could not bear to look up, to read the words carved across the face of the final headstone. All was quiet, calm, but he could still hear the throbbing, pulsing heartbeat beckoning in the distance. And that scared him most of all, because now he knew whose heartbeat it was.
(thump thump)
“It’s mine,” he said to the ground. He felt weak and embarrassed, like a child confessing sins and transgressions to his parents or teacher. Peter understood now what had been jumping inside his chest, against the black brand stitched upon his breast. The sound came from a powerful machine trying to kickstart itself back to life.
“It’s mine,” he repeated, “it’s mine, and I’m dead. I should be dead. I deserve it.”
Death. Peter’s whole life, everywhere he turned, he’d been surrounded by death. Gwen, Ned, Norman—all sacrifices to his webbed, cursed second life. “Because of me, always because of me.” Peter wept and sank deeper into the mud, his head bowed—still unwilling to face that last marker and his greatest, earliest mistake.
“Why should it be fair that my heart starts again—that I get a second chance at life—when so many lives have been lost because of Spider-Man?” Peter gave in to the grief and guilt. He let himself fall farther into the earth covering the lone grave, overwhelmed by failure and the accusing throb of his own unworthy heart.
(thump thump)
It isn’t yours, Petey. The heart, I mean.
“No. No, leave me alone.” Peter shook his head, trying to shut out the voice, to focus instead on the heavy, hypnotic heartbeat. He closed his eyes and turned away from the tombstone, trying to avoid having to speak to this last tormentor.
Ah, Peter. Whenever anything goes wrong, you wonder what you could have done to prevent it. You always blame yourself, don’t you?
The heartbeat strengthened, and Peter felt a presence—a light, kindly touch at his back. He tried to shake it off and pull away, but the kindly presence clasped Peter’s shoulder and squeezed affectionately. Peter tried to grab the hand, but there was nothing there—just his own shoulder. He finally looked up and saw—through tears and Spider-Man’s wide, white eyes—the inscription on the tombstone.
(thump thump)
HERE LIES BEN PARKER
“Uncle Ben,” Peter whispered, reaching out to touch the stone. “Uncle Ben, please help me. Aunt May takes such good care of me, but you…” Peter’s voice trailed away.
Then a warm, welcoming laugh enveloped him in its fatherly embrace. Peter felt the hand at his shoulder once more, soothing him, helping him to his feet.
Anytime one of the other kids got hurt, Pete, you wished you could have stopped it somehow. You worry too much, little man. A boy your age shouldn’t be worrying.
“…you understand me,” Peter finished. He hugged the base of the tombstone with all his might, pulling himself up out of the earth and mud.
Better than you understand yourself, Ben Parker answered. How many times’re you gonna go through this, Peter? It’s like a loop that won’t stop running through your head. The guilt rearing up, tormenting yourself for—
“For letting that man get away? The one who killed you?” Peter lowered his head again, too ashamed to face his uncle. “I…I know it was my fault, Uncle Ben. I’ve done my best to make up for it, haven’t I?”
Ben Parker chuckled inside his nephew’s head. Oh, Peter. You don’t get it, do you? This isn’t about me.
(thump thump)
“What? Of course it is. You’re the reason I became Spider-Man. You’re the reason—”
Peter, that isn’t your heartbeat. And it isn’t mine.
(thump thump)
Clutching his chest, feeling for the low, insistent throbbing, Peter panicked. He looked around. “What do you mean? If it’s not mine, then—”
You know. Do you recall the last, most important lesson I ever taught you?
Peter nodded. “It’s how I’ve lived my life. My gift and my curse. That’s why I worry, it’s why—”
No, Peter. The guilt you bear—the responsibility that weighs you down—it doesn’t stem from your incredible powers, nor the fear that your gifts have cursed everyone around you. It’s something you’ve always carried with you, even before you were bitten by a radioactive spider. You have great power, yes, and great responsibility. But being a hero also means making great choices...whether those choices have earth-shattering cosmic repercussions, or simply affect the ones you love.
(thump thump)
Ben Parker’s hands rested on his nephew’s shoulders. This time Peter was able to take them in his own, using their strength to pull himself up.
Spider-Man’s mask isn’t there so that Peter Parker can hide behind it. Your power, your responsibility, isn’t there to consume you with guilt and fear. It’s there to protect those who need protecting, whoever that might be. It’s also there to protect the ones you love, and you have done that as best as you can.
In the end, Peter, you’re just a man. And a man does the best he can with what he has, spider-powers or not. He makes mistakes, he tries again—but no man is perfect. Not even a Spider-Man.
(thump thump)
“Uncle Ben, there’s so much I’ve wanted to…”
Peter reached out again, but his fingers slippe
d through whispers and wind. His uncle’s ghost was gone.
The strange heartbeat continued, growing stronger. Peter walked around Uncle Ben’s tombstone, touching it one last time, then stepped forward into the white. The heartbeat grew more insistent, more inviting
(thump thump)
and as he moved upward, he found himself leaving the white and entering the darkness again. The tunnel shrank until he was forced to crawl once more on his hands and knees.
(thump thump)
Peter clawed forward, dragging himself up the tunnel toward the thunderous drums. The whispers and accusations slipped away, replaced by the steady pounding of the mysterious heartbeat
(thump thump)
and the soft, welcoming whisper of a loving voice
(come out COME OUT COME OUT)
(thump thump)
and he scratched and pulled his way toward the surface, digging at the thick, black void and asking himself who wanted Peter to return, who wanted him back
(COME OUT PETER COME OUT NOW)
(thump thump)
and suddenly he felt it inside him once again— the urgent, pulsing, forceful call to life. He scrabbled with both hands at the darkness and found it was nothing more than dirt. “I’m coming,” he screamed to no one, to anyone who might be listening, as he kicked and fought to be free, to live, to breathe
(thump thump)
and he shouted into the twilight, asking for a name, and the memory of his uncle’s voice floated back in return
That isn’t your heartbeat, Peter. And it isn’t mine.
(thump thump)
“Whose, Uncle Ben? Whose heart?!” Sweat and grime poured down Peter’s brow. Spider-Man’s mask clung to his eyes, hair, and face as he hooked both hands into claws and dug as fast as he could. And then he knew. He knew exactly whose heart called to him, who urged him forward not as a Spider, but as a man. Peter Parker was both his weakness and his strength, and he clawed toward the beating heart
(thump thump)
With great love, Peter, comes great responsibility.
(thump thump)
(COME OUT COME OUT COME OUT)
(thump thump)
Face it, Tiger. You just hit the jackpot.
“I’m coming!” he screamed, “I love you! I’m coming, Mary Jane, I—”
FIVE
SPIDER-MAN burst out of the grave.
Beaten and numb, he fell back against the tombstone. Rain and mud caked his costume, splashing against his mask. He gripped the top of the large marker with weak fingers, doing his best to steady himself as wind whipped through the graveyard. Air escaped his lips, barely emerging from vocal cords that hadn’t been used in weeks. His chest ached. But with great effort, Spider-Man breathed three words to a woman he could not see.
“I love you…”
Spiders scuttled off the grave, black and shiny. They moved around their newly revived human counterpart on tiny legs, climbing over each other to flee the tall, granite marker as Spider-Man sunk his fingers in the dirt and pushed himself up. Thunder sounded above. He tried to walk and then fell onto his back like a newborn calf.
Worn and bleary, Spider-Man lifted himself out of the mud once more. He forced himself to move through the sodden graveyard and toward a nearby townhouse, barely glancing back at the tombstone.
Eventually he reached the townhouse. He pushed wide the door, and entered silently in a trail of mud and arachnid followers. He glanced around, his eyes still adjusting to the sensation of sight, and found himself in a dimly lit stairwell leading upward. Grabbing the railing, he slowly dragged himself up four flights until he found another door. He wearily pushed it open and stumbled down a short hallway to a third door, which he also opened. He walked through into a large room with shimmering marble floors. Muted lighting— from a series of low, wall-mounted braziers—cast shadows upon serene, intricate statues, picking up the colors of stained glass in windows all around the room. The space felt like a chapel, a place of worship.
He stumbled around an empty stone bier and shakily made his way down a wide aisle to a welcoming, warm library just beyond. Books lined the walls; copies of the Bugle had been discarded across a plush, expensive, purple-and-gold rug. Spider-Man dropped to his knees to read the headlines, barely noticing the water pooling beneath him as it soaked both the carpet and the newspapers. He leafed through the tabloids, swiftly reading the headlines that jumped out in thick black ink.
CANNIBAL KILLER ASSAULT. CANNIBAL KILLER GOES CRAZY IN NEW YORK. HERO OR MENACE? SPIDER-MAN BERSERK.
The headlines didn’t capture Spider-Man’s attention as much as the dates above, set in smaller type beneath the Bugle masthead. Forcing himself to focus, to squint through water and dirt, he checked once more to make sure he hadn’t misread.
Two weeks.
Two weeks!
Anxiety gripping his chest, he shuffled through the newspapers again, quickly scanning articles and gathering as much pertinent information as necessary. Eventually, he tossed them aside, scattering the pages in anger.
Two weeks. In the ground. In the grave. And while he had been lying there, trapped, Kraven had been out on the streets—wearing his costume, abusing his name.
Usurping his life.
Spider-Man tried to catch his breath. He stood up, using the wall for support, his movements jerky and unfamiliar. He left the study and made his way down the hall to the rear of the townhouse, where he found a small, curtained antechamber. Pulling the drapes aside, Spider-Man entered a dark, mysterious room. His spider-sense hadn’t flared up, but he decided to proceed with caution. There was no telling what had happened to his senses during those two weeks underground.
As he moved farther into the room, he found himself treading on broken glass—and the corpses of thousands of tiny spiders. A small table had been upended to his left. He kept walking, kept moving, afraid that he might lose the use of his legs again if he stopped to think.
He passed a collection of fierce, stuffed trophies: great beasts of prey mounted on the walls or set into large ornate bases that rested on the floor. Now he knew whose room this was. Eyes narrowing, face flushed with anger, Spider-Man rose to his full height and passed a lifeless tiger, stuffed and mounted mid-stalk on a fake wooden log. He turned to the right, noting a crocodile, and reached out to test the texture of its scaly hide. Incense burned somewhere in the room, filling the air with a low fog of sweet-smelling smoke. Spider-Man burned with hatred for the man who had lit it—the man who had stolen two weeks of his life.
What did you shoot me with, Hunter? Spider-Man asked his absent enemy. Not bullets, that’s for sure. One of your jungle potions or roots or whatever. Shoot me up, lay me down as good as dead—a zombie in the grave.
Spider-Man roared with impotent rage. He lifted the crocodile, turned, and threw it at its feline counterpart, dislodging the tiger from its spot with a single blow.
“Two weeks!” he shouted. “In the ground! In the grave!” Spider-Man tore through the smoky antechamber, ripping apart Kraven’s trophies, using them to satisfy his burning hatred for their missing master.
What had his family been thinking while he’d been rotting down there? Aunt May…Mary Jane… his life. Two weeks...
He dropped to all fours, trying to catch his breath, regretting the sudden exertion in his weakened, vulnerable state. I think I’m gonna be sick.
No. No, not yet.
Movement behind him. Spider-Man glanced up over his left shoulder and saw two men enter the room, both in solemn black suits, each with hands as wide as shovel heads. They approached tentatively, then fell back, assessing the situation.
“You were right,” one said. “It is him.”
The second man nodded in agreement. “I…uh, I think we should get out of here.”
“Why? Look at him. He’s weak. He can hardly…”
Spider-Man crouched low and swiveled around, eyeing the men through the haze of incense. Not yet. He spread his hands, bent his knees, and p
repared to pounce. One man stepped back, eyes widening, and the second man moved toward the curtained entrance.
Spider-Man sprang from the shadows of the room and grabbed both men by their collars, lifting them up against the wall. He stared at them through the blank, white eyes of his mask. Hate and vengeance filled his breast. He wanted to lash out, to pour his frustration into his fists and release it in a satisfying barrage of punches. He wanted revenge, and he felt it from head to toe—but not from these two men. Not now.
“Where?” he asked, the words barely leaving his lips. He could not raise his voice above a whisper, and the two men struggled to hear what he’d said. Gripping their suits, he pulled them closer and focused his voice into the single word, rasping it out with as much menace as he could muster.
“Where?” he repeated, and their faces bleached of all color. They were terrified; they thought he planned to rip them apart, to tear them to pieces. And a part of him—not as deep inside as he might like—wanted to do it.
Thunder sounded again, far away and yet so close, mingling with the insistent heartbeat that never left his ears. He had to make a choice. Jungle drums and endless thunder, or welcome heartbeat and waiting love.
Spider-Man dropped the men to the floor and turned away, heading back into the sanctum. He stalked toward the back wall, to the source of the smoke and fog. He came to a low table filled with herbs and potions, as well as a burning stick of incense. He swept it all aside, smashing everything on the antechamber floor.
Then he turned to the left. A small window looked out on the city, away from the wide, open graveyard behind the townhouse.
I’ll find Kraven, he thought. I’ll deal with him. But not like a Spider.
He leapt through the window, shattering the glass, and headed toward the city—leaving the two men behind.
Like a man.
SIX
MARY JANE sat in her apartment, flipping through the channels, too tired to go out, but too anxious to sit still. The rain kept coming; the clouds, like her mood, were black and bleak. She ran her hands through photos and clothes again, wiping tears from her eyes. Exhausted by the weight of her decisions, she threw the remote control across the room with a burst of pain and frustration. It sailed toward the wall, heading for a French print she’d acquired in her days on the Parisian catwalks. But before it could strike the frame—
