Spider Man 3

by Peter David

  Peter’s musical effort was mercifully cut short by an irritated banging on the floor from the poor devil living underneath, who didn’t apparently feel like being serenaded, badly, at whatever time in the morning it was. Pulling his hands away from the keyboard as if it had caught fire, Peter said in a lame attempt at self-defense, “Needs tuning.”

  Aunt May grinned as she held the door open for him. Peter pulled his helmet on and she patted him on the arm as he passed. “After you’re married, feel free to visit me. Only come a little earlier.”

  He hugged his beloved aunt, the woman who had raised him, and headed out the door, feeling far lighter in spirit than he had in weeks.

  The feeling stayed with him all the way back to his Manhattan apartment. Although naturally he was paying attention to the road the entire ride, he was still unaware of the passage of time. His mind was awhirl with images of Mary Jane accepting his proposal, of their marriage, honeymooning, having children, growing old together. He savored every one.

  Life was good.

  Almost too good, his ever-sour subconscious warned him, bur he dismissed that sort of thinking. As he pulled his bike up to his apartment building, killing the motor, he decided that he was going to embrace the power of positive thinking. Perhaps things went wrong because he expected the worst-case scenario at any moment. He had even temporarily lost his powers because of his uncertainty and lack of desire to live up to his responsibilities. There was no reason that he couldn’t shape his life to be as positive as he wanted it to be simply by being determined to make it happen.

  He stepped off the bike, removed his helmet, and checked his watch. Four in the morning. He didn’t feel at all tired. Perhaps he should do some webswinging to…

  Nah. How about something normal for once? Drink a glass of milk, watch TV, or read a book until your eyes get heavy. Something like that. You’ve been prioritizing Peter Parker’s life for once, and that’s been going pretty well for you. Smartest thing would be to keep doing exactly what you’re doing, and not switch over to Spider-M—

  His spider-sense went off.

  He acted completely on instinct, as he always did in such matters. He leaped toward the building, figuring to hit the wall and scurry up it, buy a few precious seconds, get a clearer idea of what was happening and where it was coming from.

  It was one of the rare instances when his instincts betrayed him.

  Airborne as he was, he had no protection, no recourse, as something slammed into him. The ground spun away from Peter with dizzying speed as he arced upward, heading toward the stars that he had been admiring from a distance only a few hours before.

  He twisted around, trying to see who or what had grabbed him. He heard the high-pitched whine of a powerful engine and suddenly found himself staring—not into a person’s face—but into a demented-looking, and hi-tech almost familiar mask, covering the lower part of his attacker’s head.

  The Goblin?! The Green Goblin! But he’s dead! I saw him die! Am I dreaming? Did I fall asleep? Am I still in the web hammock with MJ and I drifted off? This can’t—

  The buildings were a blur beneath him as Peter, an unwilling passenger, continued to angle sharply upward. This “New Goblin” grabbed Peter by the hair, yanking his head back. Peter gasped, trying to comprehend what was happening, with the sharp pain and the stinging feel of the wind in his face reinforcing that this was no dream. The New Goblin drew his free arm back, ready to strike, and fearsome blades sprouted from the wrist of his armor. Peter tried to pull away, but he had no leverage. Snagged as he was, immobilized as he was, Peter couldn’t offer more than token resistance as the blades sliced across his chest. It shredded his shirt, raising a thin line of blood, and he cried out in agony. If he hadn’t managed to pull back even the marginal amount that he had, it would have ripped open his torso.

  The Goblin repositioned himself and tried to bring the blades around again, but the pain galvanized Peter. He snagged the Goblin’s arm, strength against strength, holding the lethal weapon at bay. The Goblin was cackling dementedly, but there was a slight hesitation, the briefest uncertainty. Grabbing the opportunity to do some damage, Peter swung his foot up and kicked the Goblin hard in the chest. The Goblin lost his grip on Peter’s hair, although Peter was certain he felt some strands pulling loose from his scalp.

  Peter twisted clear and flipped himself over the Goblin’s head. He let himself go into free fall just to get some distance. He afforded a fast glance behind him and saw that the Goblin was astride a different vehicle than he had been the last time. It wasn’t a bat-winged glider, but instead something that looked more like a supercharged hi-tech snowboard. The armor was also different, far more minimal… a few pieces slapped together.

  Peter kept his arms and legs straight and dove like a parachutist. The ground spun below him, but he’d been in far more dizzying circumstances than this. In fact, the effect was almost calming, the first chance he’d had to compose his thoughts since this unwarranted, insane attack had begun.

  Obviously, whoever his assailant was, this new Goblin knew that Peter was Spider-Man. His secret identity was blown. At the moment, though, his biggest worry was not to get killed; everything else could just wait.

  Believing he’d managed to put enough distance between him and his attacker, Peter fired a webline and snagged a nearby building. He started to swing toward it, then his heart fell as he saw the Goblin swoop down near the adhesion point of the webbing to the building. Then the rest of him fell along with his heart as the Goblin sliced through the webbing with one fast flick of his blades. Cut loose from his momentary salvation, Peter started to fall again, tumbling out of control. Knowing that the Goblin could keep repeating that trick—that he could follow Peter all the way down, cutting through weblines until Peter was out of building and out of time—he didn’t have any other choices and so brought his arm up to fire yet another webline.

  He didn’t even get the shot off. His spider-sense warned him, but he couldn’t do a damned thing about it as the Goblin slammed into him, sending him tumbling literally heels over head and crashing into the side of a nearby skyscraper.

  If it had at least been glass, Peter could have smashed through it and perhaps escaped to the inside. No such luck—instead he impacted with solid brick and mortar, embedding the left side of his body in the side of the building. Peter knew he could pull free, but it was going to take him a few moments to extricate himself.

  The Goblin soared down toward him, and Peter wondered if he was going to have even those precious few seconds. If the Goblin came in hurtling a pumpkin grenade or swinging his blades or…

  But he didn’t. The Goblin slowed and then stopped, hovering nearby. The move surprised Peter. The Goblin had him cold, but he wasn’t pressing the advantage? Why? Did he want to toy with him? Convinced that Peter couldn’t get away, was he determined to make Peter suffer? Or was it that he was reluctant to make the final move because it seemed Peter was a goner? If it was the latter… if the Goblin was conflicted…

  It couldn’t be…

  Of course, it had to be. There was no one else…

  As if intuiting what was going through Peter’s mind, the Goblin touched some sort of mechanism in the palm of his gloved hand. The mask slid back, and the coldly furious face of Harry Osborn glared at him.

  “Harry?” Peter whispered. Inwardly he wasn’t surprised. He’d figured it out. Knowing it, however, wasn’t the same as being confronted by the harsh reality.

  “You knew this was coming, Pete.” The friendly nickname sounded like an obscenity on his lips.

  Harry abruptly angled the “Sky Stick” forward, slamming his fist at Peter in one rapid motion. Peter barely managed to yank his arm clear. He heard and felt a tearing of cloth, and part of his jacket sleeve was left behind, but better ripped clothing than a shattered face. Leaping aside, Peter just avoided Harry’s punch, which smashed brick and crumbled some of the mortar to dust. Peter, landing on another section of the wall some fe
et away, gaped at the destruction.

  Whatever Norman Osborn had done to himself to acquire accelerated strength, Harry had clearly done it as well. And the action had muddled Harry’s mind just as it had Norman’s.

  Or… perhaps not. It might have been wishful thinking, but it still seemed to Peter as if Harry was moving slowly, hesitating at key moments, reluctant to deliver a final, lethal blow. Holding out a slender thread of hope that his erstwhile friend could be reasoned with, Peter called out to him, “He was trying to kill me! He killed himself!”

  “Shut up!”

  Harry shoved his hands into the section of the broken wall that Peter was still perched upon and ripped it clear of the building. Peter went flying, his arms pinwheeling, his jacket flapping wide…

  Aunt May’s engagement ring flew out of his pocket.

  It was the merest luck that his peripheral vision noticed it, glinting in the night. He twisted around in midair, grasping at it. Ironically, it was the only thing that saved him, because Harry dive-bombed right where Peter would have been had he been trying to get back to the wall. But Peter was moving in a completely different direction, toward the tumbling ring, and so Harry missed him clean.

  Peter desperately fired a webline at the diamond ring. As accurate as he typically was, because both he and the ring were falling and it was so small a target, the webline whizzed a fraction of an inch to the side of the ring.

  Don’t take your eyes off it! Don’t—

  As if he were swimming through air, Peter lunged toward the ring, oblivious to all else.

  This time it cost him.

  Harry sped down toward him and sideswiped him hard. Peter was knocked violently to one side. He was completely disoriented, with no idea which way was up or down. A dozen different tactics ran through his brain like a computer sucking down data, and none of them seemed as if it would work. Despair seized him, and then he slammed into another building. His arm went out instinctively to break the fall; even then it only partly shielded his head. He cracked his skull and was positive that he could actually hear his brain sloshing around inside his cranium. Blackness started to envelop him.

  For the first time since this had begun… possibly for the first time since he had acquired his spider powers… Peter Parker was seized with the belief that he was going to die.

  His life flashed before his eyes.

  And then everything went dark.

  * * *

  Chapter Four

  THE LONGEST NIGHT (PART One)

  The rushing of air past Peter’s face roused him to the outer fringes of consciousness. He hadn’t recovered enough to completely register what was happening, but he reacted with desperate reflex.

  He twisted around and blindly fired a webline. He had absolutely no idea which way he was shooting it, and no clue how close to the ground he was—if the webbing went straight up, he was a dead man.

  For the first time since the assault began, Peter’s luck held up. His webbing snagged something. He didn’t know what it was, but as long as it wasn’t moving, that was good enough for him.

  From high above, he heard a roar of disapproval. The Goblin had apparently been watching his descent, satisfied to observe Peter’s final splat from a distance. So Peter was actually far enough away that the Goblin didn’t have an opportunity to cut the webline.

  Peter snapped back upward like a bungee jumper, and as his vision cleared, he saw that the webline had snagged on a stone gargoyle perched atop the corner of a building.

  He landed on the ledge and held on to the gargoyle for a moment, steadying himself.

  Then he remembered the ring.

  Desperately looking around, stretching his already heightened senses to their limits, he spotted it. Ten stories below, the glittering ring ricocheted off a parked car with a hollow tink, bounced into the street…

  … and tumbled straight toward a sewer grating.

  No. God, please, no, not that.

  Shoving his back against the wall for balance, he fired webbing from both arms at the grating. The webbing sprayed out across it, completely covering the openings. Seconds later the diamond ring rolled onto the grating but came to a halt, ensnared in the webbing.

  Peter let out a sigh of relief, but he had no time to dwell on his brief triumph. The Goblin was diving down toward him, a pumpkin bomb in his hand. He threw it, and Peter leaped clear of the building side. The bomb slammed into the gargoyle and blew it off the ledge, sending the entire statue hurtling toward the ground.

  Seizing the opportunity, Peter landed a short distance away even as he fired a webline, snagging the gargoyle. He swung his arm, whipping the statue around. Perfect timing—Harry had wrongly assumed that Peter was going to prevent the gargoyle from falling to the street. Instead Peter snapped the statue around as if it were a mace and sent it slamming into the Goblin with such force that it caused him to lose control of the Sky Stick. Harry pinwheeled across the Manhattan skyline, howling with fury.

  Still holding the webline, Peter swung the statue up in a smooth arc that sent it tumbling onto the roof overhead. He then released it and skittered to the ground, moving with reckless speed. Peter hit the street still running, stumbled for a second, then righted himself and sprinted to the sewer grating. He plucked the precious ring from the webbing, shoved it in his pants pocket—and then for good measure webbed the pocket shut.

  Peter looked around to figure out where the hell he was and realized that the battle had carried them many blocks south into Chinatown.

  For some reason a Woody Allen comment crossed his mind: I’m astounded by people who want to “know” the universe when it’s hard enough to find your way around Chinatown.

  Chinatown was an endless maze of narrow streets and alleyways. Peter had gotten lost there on two separate occasions and had always considered it one of the perks of his powers to be capable of swinging above Chinatown and not have to worry about it anymore.

  That wasn’t possible now, as the cackling of the Goblin informed him. Harry had obviously pulled out of his tailspin, descending toward Peter at high speed.

  It was a blessing to be here. In the open space, bounding between buildings, Peter had had no chance. The Goblin (Harry, dammit, it’s Harry, stop thinking of him as the Goblin) had all the room to maneuver and could hammer him relentlessly while Peter had nowhere to hide and no means of avoiding the attacks except through healthy dollops of luck. Down here, though, in the confines of Chinatown, his agility and quick thinking might give him the edge he needed.

  At least, that was the theory.

  Knowing that his life depended on his being right, Peter vaulted into the nearest alleyway and started running down it. For a moment he wondered if Harry would figure out what his strategy was and refuse to be drawn into it. He needn’t have worried. Without hesitation, Harry descended into the alleyway on his Sky Stick and went in pursuit of his best friend.

  “You can run, Pete, but you can’t hide!” Harry crowed, and laughed once more.

  The alley couldn’t have been more than four feet wide. Peter ran as fast as he could, his heart pounding against his chest. Harry stayed right on him, never more than a few yards back. Peter’s spider-sense managed to keep him ahead, but just barely. He moved right, left, never slowing, vaulting over garbage dumps, trash heaps, and the occasional unconscious drunk.

  Peter cut a corner tight, entered a street that was as narrow as the alley he’d just left, and kept going. He ducked as a blast of concussive force seared the air over his head. Then the ground under his feet exploded, sending him flying and crashing through a storefront display window.

  Harry dove down toward Peter, his right fist crackling as it prepped another concussive blast.

  Peter seized a string of Chinese firecrackers from the ruined storefront display window and frantically threw them just as Harry unleashed another blast. It struck the firecrackers in midair and the entire array exploded directly in front of him. Noise and great gouts of color erupted all
around Harry, confusing him, causing him to roar in fury, and then Peter was off again.

  “You don’t get away that easy, Pete!” Harry shouted, and kept on coming. Peter sprinted down another alleyway, which connected to another and yet another. Harry didn’t slow; in fact, he was gaining, and Peter was starting to get out of breath. His endurance was superhuman, but it wasn’t infinite.

  A Dumpster sat dead ahead. Peter grabbed hold of it as he passed by, turned fast, and with an impressive display of strength sent the whole thing hurtling upward toward the Goblin. Garbage and assorted decaying food filled the air, momentarily blinding Harry (and, likely, grossing him out a bit). Peter headed down yet another alleyway in this labyrinthine neighborhood, his mind racing, trying to come up with any more ideas as his energy flagged.

  He looked up—clotheslines were strung above him. The upper section of the alleyway was going to be too difficult for Harry to maneuver, so he was going to fly low. Quickly Peter fired his webbing at a spot about five feet overhead and affixed it to the wall opposite. He drew it taut, and in the darkness of the alley, the gossamer web strand practically disappeared.

  He heard Harry coming in fast, gunning the engine of the Sky Stick. Peter started running again—Harry had to see him to make the trap work. Peter was halfway down the alley when Harry came roaring around the corner, practically a blur to Peter’s eye.

  Without slowing, Harry sped down the alleyway toward Peter, holding a pumpkin bomb in one hand and announcing that this was it, Peter wasn’t going to get away this time.

  Harry never came close to spotting the webline.

  He hit it at full speed, the webbing cutting across his chest. Harry was knocked clean off the Sky Stick. The device kept going, bereft of its operator. Seconds later it crashed to the ground, tumbling several times before sputtering to a halt.