Spider-Man

by Stefan Petrucha

  On the one hand, Cicero sounded sincere. On the other hand, that was his job, and he was good at it. Peter had brought the photos of the thief. He thought about showing them to Cicero, but held back.

  If the Maggia is behind this, I don’t want them to know about any evidence I have. If not, I don’t want to give them any reason to get involved.

  He tried a different tack. “Did Silvermane have any family?”

  Cicero laughed. “If he did, they’d sure as hell be hiding from me.”

  * * *

  THE WAREHOUSE had been scheduled for demolition for years, but not everything dies as it should. The owners had planned to put up a new high-rise on the lot, but their funding had collapsed along with the fortunes of their largest investor, Wilson Fisk. Now the building stood neglected, occasionally shedding hunks of rusted steel and shards of glass like rotting teeth or thinning hair. So much of the structure was already gone that whatever nature the city allowed would soon claim all of it, without the need for a wrecking ball or human will.

  Those few people desolate or desperate enough to ignore the hazard signs were kept away by the constant creaking that threatened a final collapse. In fact, every form of life stayed away, rats and roaches included—except the boy.

  The always-angry boy.

  While he couldn’t be sure whether he’d been here before, he somehow felt he belonged. He’d found the half-collapsed stairs that led to the basement easily enough. There, the concrete walls and foundation remained as solid and silent as a tomb—or better yet, a memorial, a shrine he could build for himself.

  For his anger.

  No, not a shrine, a palace—a memory palace, like in that book he’d found, Rhetorica ad Herennium. It was written by Cicero, a name he associated with treachery. But this was some other Cicero, a Roman. The book said to pick a place in your head, a place you know, and fill it up with the stuff you want to remember. Then, whenever you needed to remember something, you could find it where you left it.

  But when he got here, the boy could barely remember anything on his own. So he decided to one-up the Roman smart-ass by making his palace real— and filling it up with memories he could actually touch. And so here it was, lit by stolen candles and stolen flashlights, furnished with stolen chairs and a stolen bed. The only thing he hadn’t stolen was the cinderblocks. There were plenty already lying around, so he used them to build the stepped platform at the center of his place. The platform that led to his throne.

  He didn’t know why everything had to be stolen. Maybe because nothing was really his, but stealing made everything his. Stealing felt important, so he went with it, tearing pages out of library newspapers and books when he could, using stolen credit cards for the printouts when he had to. Old things felt important, too, like the 1928 Thompson submachine gun he’d swiped from the antique gun shop. Old things made him feel safer, as if he were less likely to lose them because they’d been around for so long.

  That didn’t make sense, exactly, but again, he went with it.

  He knelt before the cinderblock throne—not to bow before a great power, just to make it easier to reach the pictures he had of the really old thing. The tablet. That wasn’t his yet, but he wanted it most of all. After all his work finding it, the guy in the costume, Spider-Man, had stopped him. Touching the image, though, let him imagine he was touching the stone.

  Sometimes he imagined so hard, he thought he might actually remember his past.

  When he was done with that, he pulled out the only thing he thought maybe he hadn’t stolen, the only thing that might really be his. Gently, he brushed away the bits of concrete and wetness from the cover of the flip-over notebook, rolled the rubber band off, and found a particular page. Reading the words, he tried to sing.

  “Drink, drink.”

  It was wrong. His voice was wrong. The melody was wrong.

  He tried again, raising his tone on the first word, lowering it for the second.

  “Drink, drink.”

  Still not right. He knew the words—he’d memorized them from the notebook—but the notebook didn’t have the melody, and he couldn’t read music even if it did.

  So he had to remember it.

  He tried starting low, then let his voice fish around for anything that sounded familiar.

  “Drink, drink!”

  No! That wasn’t it at all!

  The answer had to be somewhere—if not in the palace he’d made, then locked inside himself. Locks didn’t scare him. He had a pretty strong feeling he could pick any he came across.

  But first, he had to find the right door.

  EIGHTEEN

  WELL after 1 a.m., Detective Darryl Tanner was still buried in papers. He was so absorbed in his work that his partner, Miles Langston, had to rap twice against the door frame to make him look up.

  “Done with my filing, so I thought I’d say goodnight. Or good morning.” Seeing the stacks of paper, Miles gave a low whistle. “What’d you do to get on Connolly’s bad side?”

  They’d been working together for a few years now. Darryl had always been sort of jealous of that whistle. He wondered how Miles got it so deep and loud. Darryl could never whistle.

  “Nothing. I asked for it. Need the overtime. Things are tight back home.”

  Tight was an understatement, but there were reasons he kept the specifics of his financial problems private. When the Kingpin had vanished, Darryl’s take-home had dropped by half. These days, the Maggia gave him a little something, but not enough to keep him from having to raid his daughter’s college fund to pay the mortgage.

  Miles was single and seemed carefree, but he nodded sympathetically. “I hear that. Want me to put on another pot for you before I head out?”

  “Nah. I’m almost done, but I thought I’d run up the clock a bit, you know.”

  Miles wagged his finger. “I didn’t hear that. Say hi to the family.”

  Freaking kid thinks he’s funny.

  Darryl gave him a weak wave. “Will do.”

  He watched Miles walk down the hall and enter the elevator. He kept watching until the little light above indicated his partner had reached the lobby.

  Satisfied he was alone, he turned back to his work. It had taken the boys on site at the old annex half a day to clean up the mess from the break-in. Most of that time was spent picking things up and matching them with their boxes. It was Darryl’s job to match what they found with the old paper logs. Half the time the files weren’t in the same format as the log. The rest of the time he couldn’t read the handwriting.

  He checked things over twice more. He was right. There was only one box missing, placed there under the authority of the late Captain George Stacy.

  Putting aside the master list, Darryl flipped through the physical carbons, found the matching number, and tugged the sheet free. Though the description was vague, he knew what it meant. He folded the paper and put it in his pocket. Then he went back to the master and logged in the only empty box, so the rest of the world would think it was still there, safe and sound.

  He read the news until nearly 2 a.m. Then he got up and headed to the chief detective’s office.

  Darryl had no idea why Connolly always worked so late, and he never felt like asking.

  At her door he cleared his throat. “Chief?”

  She gave him a tired smile. “Got that report for me, Darryl?”

  “Yes, ma’am, I do.”

  “And?”

  “Six different kinds of forms, three databases, and everything’s accounted for. Guess we owe the integrity of our evidence annex to Spider-Man.”

  She rolled her eyes as he handed over the lists. “Unless he was the one doing the breaking and entering.” She scanned them. “This is good work— glad I had an old pro on it. Take an extra hour on the time sheet, but no more.”

  “Thanks, boss.”

  Rather than head home, he walked a few blocks and then pulled out the burner he used for special calls. His contact picked up on the fir
st ring.

  “I think I’ve got something. That old tablet the Maggia stole a couple years ago? All this time it’s been in the evidence annex—at least until yesterday. Someone lifted it. Judging from the webbing on the scene, Spider-Man either has it himself or has an idea who does. I figure knowing it’s back on the streets is worth something.”

  The voice on the other end laughed. “You figured wrong. Cicero doesn’t want anything to do with that thing.”

  “What, it spooks him? I know it’s supposed to be magic, but—”

  “Spooked? No. More like he doesn’t want anything around that reminds him of Silvermane. You’ve been with us a while, so I’ll tell you, but you didn’t hear it from me. Gossip upstairs is that the wall-crawler paid a visit today. After that, the Big C needed a four-hour massage just to take a nap. My advice? Forget about it.”

  The line went dead. He stared at the phone.

  Damn. All that work for an extra $200? If I’d told the chief a priceless artifact had gone missing, I could have been up for a bonus. Now there won’t even be a case file on the theft.

  The only other number in the burner’s contact list caught his eye. It was old, probably useless, but thinking about that college fund, he gave it a try.

  After three rings, a woman answered. “Hello? Who is this? How did you get this number?”

  He’d only seen her once or twice, but that sad singsong voice was tough to forget.

  “Mrs. Fisk? Darryl Tanner. I don’t know if you remember me.”

  “Detective Tanner. Of course, from our holiday party three years ago. This is…a surprise. It’s very late. Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing wrong. I was just working on a case that reminded me of your husband. It’s about something I know he wanted very badly.”

  At least she was listening. If he played it right, the information could be worth something, after all.

  * * *

  IF WESLEY weren’t in prison, he would have answered that call; instead it had gone to Vanessa Fisk. She wasn’t sure what she’d hoped to hear, what pale ghost she’d imagined might speak to her. She wasn’t even sure why she cared enough to keep the phone here, let alone answer. But she had, and what she heard stirred her dormant heart.

  Having taken to sleeping in the center of the colossal bed she’d shared with Wilson, she had to use her legs to pull herself across the width before reaching the edge. For the first time in 16 hours, she put her bare feet to the floor. By rote rather than modesty, she donned an opaque green robe to cover her negligée. She remembered the way her husband had looked at her, and nearly ventured a smile.

  But that was back when love had been something other than cruel.

  When love was the heart of creation.

  She pressed her forehead to the glass and watched the surf. She remembered him warning her to avoid windows, always fearful one of his many enemies would come for her.

  There was no reason for anyone to threaten her now. The only thing of value she’d ever held was the Kingpin’s heart, and it was forfeit. The two guards downstairs, and the two on the grounds of the beach house, had only been kept on to honor her husband’s loyalty to his people.

  Why had she answered the phone?

  When Wilson had been healthy…no, the word healthy didn’t do him justice. When he’d been the brutish force whose very presence screamed life, she’d had no interest in his business dealings. Even now, when personal necessity should have been enough to force her involvement, she only paid enough attention to his moribund empire’s intricacies to ensure the continued payment of his medical bills. And in that case, she allowed the lawyers to tell her which papers to sign—she never, ever cared.

  Ever since he’d entered that horrid torpor, she’d had little interest in anything. She often startled herself with the number of hours she could spend staring off into nothing.

  But the tablet could change everything. There were many things she recalled about Wilson: his moods, his delights, his demons. But she particularly remembered the sparkle in his eyes when he’d first decided that the artifact had to be his.

  And among the few things she knew about the underworld, she was aware of the rumors that the stone had somehow made Silvermane young and whole again. She’d also heard rumors about the dread result, and wondered whether that was due to Wesley’s interference.

  Her head and heart had been empty for so long, the world drained of meaning. Her favorite dishes tasted like ash; paintings that had once taken her breath away were hollow scrawls. Music that had once lifted her soul jangled like a distant cacophony.

  But this new thought echoed so strongly, it filled her:

  Could the tablet do the same for my love? Could it make Wilson whole again?

  If so, there’d be no need for Richard’s guilt. With the right words, she could convince the proud beast-father to forgive his only son. She knew she could. And then, they could all be together again.

  The possibility—no matter how distant, no matter how slight—kept her from going back to bed. Even if it meant caring again, even if it meant embracing the darker side of her husband’s dealings.

  Because love was once the heart of creation.

  And creation could be a bloody, bloody thing.

  NINETEEN

  THE FOLLOWING morning, Peter emerged to greet Harry. His thoughts were dominated by his aunt and the tablet, but he was still determined to make an effort.

  “Hey, Harry. Got to head to the Bugle to drop off some photos, then get to class, but I’ve got some time. I thought I’d see who was hanging at the Coffee Bean. Want to come with?”

  The death-stare Harry gave him stopped him mid-stride. Harry picked up his breakfast plate, still half-full of food, and tossed it into the sink so hard it sounded like the dish cracked. Peter had seen his roommate afraid, arrogant, and irritable when struggling with drugs—but this was different.

  “What’s up with you?”

  Harry pushed past Peter, grabbed his cardigan from the thrift-store coat stand, and stuffed it under his arm. The slamming door shook the wall, rattling the kitschy Big Eye poster MJ had given them as a joke.

  “Harry?”

  Peter tried to think of anything he might have said or done, or anything he hadn’t said or done, that might’ve set Harry off. But he couldn’t. They barely spoke anymore.

  I could follow him as Spidey, make sure he’s clean. But I don’t want to start eavesdropping on the poor guy like he’s some super villain unless I’ve got a good reason.

  Peter’s arrival at the Coffee Bean made the point moot. Harry still looked grim, slouched over a hot cup of java. Mary Jane, Randy, and Flash Thompson— home for good since his tour had ended—sat with him. They didn’t look particularly happy, either. In fact, when he tried to pull up a chair to join them, they all gave him the same death-stare.

  “What? Did I rob a bank in my sleep or something?”

  Harry’s face twitched. Flash clenched a fist. Randy turned away.

  Mary Jane pursed her lips. Wrapping her hand around her mug, she turned it left and right as she tried to explain.

  “Tiger, Aunt Anna told me what happened at the hospital last night. She was very upset.”

  Had there been more bad news about Aunt May? No, the doctors would have called him. When he furrowed his brow, she spelled it out.

  “The transplant. The doctor wanted to test you, but you refused?”

  His heart lodged in his throat. “Oh.”

  Flash looked him in the eyes. “I spent the last two years taking enemy fire for people I didn’t even know, and you’re afraid to save your aunt’s life because…what? You’re too much a coward to go under the knife?”

  The old accusation didn’t hit him as hard as it once had, but the disappointment in all their eyes did.

  He felt himself stammering. “It’s not that.”

  “Then what is it?” Randy asked.

  Peter opened his mouth. Nothing came out.

  The silence str
etched until Harry pressed a fingernail hard into the wooden tabletop, trying to scratch out one of the old stains.

  “I know what it is,” he said. “We all do. Maybe… it’s only Peter being Peter, thinking only about Peter, just like Peter always has.”

  Mary Jane gave him a sharp glance. “Hey, take it easy! His aunt’s really sick.”

  He picked his head up and glared back. “And my father’s dead.”

  Mary Jane sighed. “It’s been a rough year for all of us.” She looked at Peter. “You know me, I keep it light whenever I can. You like to be the silent brooding type. But I think we’ve all gotten old enough to know you can’t always be what you want. Some things you just have to deal with. So please, Petey, why don’t you tell us what’s going on?”

  He tried to conjure some explanation that would at least make some sense, but he couldn’t. Or maybe, after all this time, he just didn’t have the heart.

  So he said, “I can’t.”

  And he left.

  Thinking that for once dealing with Jonah wouldn’t be the most painful part of his day, Peter made his way to the Bugle offices. Betty was out sick; a polite but befuddled intern was trying to cover the phones in her absence. The intern let him pass without a second glance.

  On the way to Jameson’s door, Robbie Robertson stepped up and put a sympathetic hand on Peter’s shoulder.

  “Randy told me what’s going on with your aunt. I hope she recovers.”

  Peter managed a brave smile. “Thanks, Mr. Robertson.”

  The City Editor tapped his knuckle to his lips as if debating whether to speak his mind. “Pete, before you head in, I want to show you something.”

  His back to the staff, Robbie slightly lifted his white shirt to reveal a five-inch scar down the center of his abdomen. “Appendectomy, when I was in high school, before laparoscopy. The ER surgeon left some bleeding, so they had to go back in to cauterize it. Was I scared? Sure. But I made it. You can, too.”

  Not sure what to say, Peter nodded dumbly.

  “Did I hear that lazy ingrate who calls himself a photographer come in?”