Earth-TRN702, the room of (a different) Gwen Stacy
'What have you done with him?!'
"Hey. Pst. You there?"
'Hisss, not here, not you, not now! Away!'
"Hey, you hear me?"
'Ah! What the hell! That could have killed me!'
"Come oooon. Can't believe you're doing this…"
'No! Leave! Hissss! Leave me alone!'
'To hell with it. If this house is just like mine, then maybe…"
'... Peter…?'
"Here we go. Now then…"
'I just… just… wanted others to be special… like you…'
"Oh cra —"
In panic, Gwen rose up with a howl and shot her webs in the direction of the noise.
"Gah! Wuh thu fuh?!"
Silence fell quickly in the room, remaining there for some time as the teenager took stock of her situation.
She was on her bed. In her undies. Right. She'd gone to sleep. Hadn't even bothered to get pajamas. That was a logical conclusion. That was what one did with a bed. You slept. Pajamas or no pajamas. Good logical reasoning, Gwen. A for effort. Keep going.
Between the bed and the open window that, for a change, she did remember she hadn't opened since the previous morning, was a woman sprawled face down on the floor, unmoving. Blonde hair just like Gwen's, with a spiked black hairband, dressed in a pink loose shirt, jeans, and sneakers, and her arms crossed blocking her face from sight. Such arms were webbed together.
Gwen looked at her own arm, extended towards the woman. Yup. She still wore her web-shooters. Yup, she had shot a web at the intruder. In her sleep. Or her waking up. It didn't matter, it was probably a technicality at this point.
Slowly, the woman turned around until she was facing up, revealing a face that Gwen knew all too well from the mirror. Well, without the freckles, two earrings instead of her brow piercing, and hair not half shaved.
Yep. That was the older, alternate universe Gwen. She had just webbed her adult self. In her sleep. High five, top marks. Return next week for the test results.
The older Gwen made a disgusted face, spitting to the air. "Really? Of all the places in a room, you had to leave your sweaty socks precisely where my face lands?"
The younger Gwen lowered her arm and looked around her room. "Huh… have you tried not landing on a sweaty sock."
Her older counterpart followed her look over the floor, entirely covered in all kinds of discarded clothes, open drawers, and spread miscellanea. "Nevermind. This is worse than Betty's place," she muttered and then frowned. "Which was mine too anyway… Oh hey, is that a PSX? I haven't seen one of those since I was a little monkey."
Gwen turned to her TV setup, despite the thinly veiled distraction from the whisper-yelled admission. Conveniently covered by a few bras that had turned out to be too big for her size and never got around returning to the shop, was an old video game console that was lent to her before everything happened. And that she never used after everything happened. Hence, the convenient cover. Very clever, all in all. "Uhm, yeah. That was like, everywhere around years ago, though?"
"Really? It sold like crap back home. The Six Four was what everyone had," Elderly Gwen said as she rose up to her feet, and walked closer to the bed, straining her hands inside the webbing.
"You a video game nerd?"
"Nah, just a bit curious. I was more into roleplaying. Dice and paper, dragons and wizards. That kinda thing. Lend a hand? You covered mine good, it'd be faster if you helped. I could just break out or cut through, but I don't want to risk more crap flying into my mouth."
Gwen shook her head, trying to get rid of her sleepiness. "Sorry about that." She sat up and started tearing down the web with her hands. "I wasn't really aiming. Why didn't you avoid it? You know, with your spider-sense."
"My spider-sense is crap." The Most Venerable Gwen gave out an unladylike, suffering groan. "Sometimes I get enough warning to tank a hit for someone else, sometimes I get face tagged by some kid's paint spray. Everyone else can see danger coming, but you have no idea how many punches and swords I had to suck up and shake off. Word of advice: work on your normal situational awareness and your toughness in case you're in the same situation." The webbing was halfway broken when she gave Gwen a strange look. "Do you make a habit out of sleeping with the web-shooters?"
"No, no. I was just tired." Gwen sighed. "A lot has been going on since that particle collider happened. Other heroes here picked up the slack, but people like Doc Ock and the Scorpion had been busy while I wasn't here to keep an eye on them."
"Ok, I'm envious now. A few friends from 616 have helped me out sometimes, but there aren't a lot of superheroes in 65 to help share the load."
"What, it's only you there?"
"Well, the Wasp retired, and Brother Brit-Man was a thing in England like, ages ago. So it's me, Luke Cage, Captain America, Cap'tin 'Muricah Hell Yeah, and Capitana América. And Cap deals mostly with national security crap. But yeah, mostly just me and Cage, and he keeps to his neighbourhood." A frown. "Well, there are more, but I think most people with powers are either spies, black ops, or assholes."
"Now I see why you'd be envious."
"Hey, at least I wielded her shield once, so by rights I am Cap too, yo."
"Nah, that's Mjolnir, turns you into Thor if it deems you worthy… You have Thor there, right?"
"We got the Valkyries, their Mjolnir ain't magical but they use it to break jumbo-sized cheese-filled nachos on stage. My roomie had their vinyl playing half the time, they're metal af." Her world still used vinyl for their music? No wonder the PSX crashed there. The web finally broke down, freeing Decrepit Gwen's arms and allowing her to take the rest on her own. "You need help with your rogues gallery?"
"It's fine. I solved everything I had left last night, even if…" Gwen looked up at her phone. Which wasn't on its recharging pod. She found it on her pillow, and she suspected she had slept with her face over it, judging by the drops of slobber on the screen. She took it and switched on. "Oh no. Three PM?"
"Had a date?"
Gwen let herself fall back on the bed, and sighed. "No. It's not even a class day. But usually, I don't oversleep this much."
"Pfft, call me when you oversleep an entire day and you're late for everything." Geriatric Gwen finished ripping the webbing in one arm and started to do the same with the other. "But is there going to be a problem? Not with the Warriors gig, we got time until we go get the others. But like, with your dad?"
"No, he must have eaten already and gone out to walk the beat. I'll have to check what he left for me."
"The beat, huh?"
"What?" Gwen said as she glanced at Crazy Gwen (ok, she ran out of adjectives, and really needed to find a better way to differentiate between them at some point beyond 'older Gwen').
"No, nothing." She finished ripping the webbing and made a ball with it. "Just curious at the difference. Mine is the precinct captain." She looked around until she found the trash bin and threw the ball inside. "Does he know?"
"No." Gwen propped herself up on her elbows. "I keep an eye out for him, saved him once from getting shot. But I don't want him to worry, you know?"
"Yeah." Her older counterpart nodded slowly, leaning on a bureau. "Yeah, I get it. But, listen. I went through all that already. You'll want to tell him at some point."
"You did?"
"Yeah. Had to. The mayor was pressuring the cops to catch me." The older Gwen saw a bear plushie on the furniture, besides a photo that was facing the wall. She started turning the toy around idly. "We were alone after the Kingpin sent a thug to hurt him. Dad had me dead to rights, facing his gun and intending to arrest me. Taking out the mask was the only way I had to show him I was on his side of the law. That I was doing all I could to honor everything that he had taught me." She left out a long breath. "It was hard, for both of us. But he supported me all the way in. It cost him a lot in lost sleep, blood, and reputation. But Captain Stacy never had a doubt about putting his daughter above his badge. I'm not sure yet what I think of that, but at least I know I can count on him."
Gwen nodded, considering what she was hearing. "I'd like to. I just… I don't know. I don't want to lose him."
"I get it. The only thing I feared more than my friends and family finding me dead in a ditch was losing any of them." The older Gwen shook her head. "But lies… well, not lies per se. The truth. Not telling the truth, that hurts everyone. And there were more than a few moments where I almost lost everyone I cared about. Look, you don't have to do anything I say, and not now. Just, give it some thought, will ya?"
Right. Everyone she cared about. Not that Gwen had anyone else than her dad left, now that she'd stopped talking with the rest of the world.
But that was what she had learned at Miles' world, right? That she wasn't alone as a spider. That, maybe, she didn't need to be alone as a person.
"Right." Gwen nodded softly. "Yeah, I might."
She heard the older Gwen take a breath, and realized she was looking now at the photo. Gwen felt a shiver running down her neck.
It was the one where she and Peter were smiling, together.
Gwen hurried to get up and walked to the bureau, taking the photo and laying it face down.
"I'm sorry." She turned to the older Gwen and noticed she had a strange, slightly saddened face. "It's just, well."
"You lost him too, huh?"
"Yup," she said softly. "Brought you bad memories?"
"It's fine." The older Gwen shook her head. "I spent some time at first when the only version of Peter I could look in the face was a pig. It's not so bad now, but mostly because there are so many of them that it's like white noise."
"I try not to have more than one. Here at home, at least. Is that weird?"
"No. It's not weird. You are afraid of losing them. I was too. But my advice? Don't do that." She retrieved a pendant from under her shirt, a flat metal spider with a hole in the middle and sharp legs. "I got a ticket to the multiverse, keyed to my DNA, and I have friends in at least five universes off the top of my head. But I know I'd go crazy without my people at home."
"How do you do it?"
A hand touched Gwen's, both over the photo. "Can I ask? About him? How… what happened?"
Gwen hesitated for a moment. "Peter had been my nanny since I can remember. And then, the kind of next-door friend that you look up as a big brother. He was a geek, he helped me get a grip on science for school, but he was always dragging me around to do things. I think uncle Ben and aunt May suggested that to him and dad." She let out a sad laugh. "Even things he had no experience with, like camping. He made a mess trying to set up camp. By the time I got to high school, he was a university researcher. I think…"
She took a breath. "See, heroes here, I don't know how they are in other worlds, but all of them act… distant. You hear about Iron Man or Captain America, and they are this thing above the normal people… not like they patronize us or anything, but they keep their distance. But after the spider bite, I decided to go for the —"
"'Friendly neighborhood Spider-Woman'", they chorused together, smiling. "Yeah. I've found most of us spiders do that. That, and the bad pun and banter."
"Yeah, closer to ground, you know. Interact with the people, pose for the selfies, that kind of thing. I told him and... I think he was awed? He grew obsessed. After he made me the web-shooters, he started talking about how all heroes should be also people and not just ideals. Maybe he got it backward at some point and started wanting others to be more themselves, I guess." Gwen closed her eyes. "That's when the Lizard showed up."
"Peter was the Lizard."
Gwen nodded. "Some people were found dead. I followed the track to the labs at the uni, and found him, transformed and out of his mind." A sniff. "I didn't know. I was just trying to stop him, and defend myself…"
The grip on her hand tightened. "My Peter was the Lizard too." Gwen looked up to her older self. "We grew up together. Same age, same class group. He got bullied at school, and I protected him. He… I think he grew resentful of the world. After the bite, I used my powers as a way to have fun. I mean, yeah. I fought crime. But I was a showoff. And he got an obsession to be special too. He found out about the Lizard Mutagen and tried it on himself. I found him breaking shit up on the campus and attacking people. I didn't know it was him, but when I saw that monster, I was thinking 'bully'. I got mad. I got angry. I shouldn't have, but I did."
"Oh no," Gwen breathed out in horror.
"Oh yes. I just kept beating him way past the point he couldn't even lift a hand in his defense. By the time he transformed to normal… Well. You had an excuse. I didn't.
"After that… Dad commented that during his investigation, he never saw anyone act so full of guilt like Spider-Woman. I wasn't having a fun time. I became too focused on what Spider-Woman should do, and almost forgot what being Gwen Stacy meant." The older Gwen clicked her tongue. "It's funny. It took to get my life back on track was to spend a year in a supermax prison.
"And I remember thinking, even while taking the abuse from the other prisoners, all the beatings and humiliations and torture, and refusing an offer from SHIELD of a out of jail card if I worked for them, that it was too lenient, that I deserved more. All the pain. All the fear. All the anger. Every fucking shitty feeling everyone involved in that entire bullcrap was caught on. It all felt so useless and short-sighted. And I realized I chose to be the most possibly stupid and naive person I could have been in my entire life. And — "
Gwen couldn't stop herself. She hugged the taller girl, who shut up instantly.
"… Whoa. Um. Not that I mind. But what's with the hugging?"
"Huh." Gwen leaned her head on the shoulder of her alternate self. "You were trembling. And I uh. Seemed the right thing to do."
"Hey, thanks for the thought," Gwen heard, whispering to her ears as she felt her older alternate's arms surround her gently. "Sorry. I got this thing where I get carried away too easily. But it's fine. I deal with it. Mostly."
"Yeah. Carried away." Gwen snorted, trying to keep her own trembling at bay.
She got hugged a bit tighter. And she didn't pull away.
Crap. Who the hell needed hugs the most in this room?
How long had it been since she'd spoken to her dad with anything more than the minimally needed amount of words for communication?
Apparently not the abused ex-convict, but the loner teen with an attitude.
How long had she gone without human contact before meeting Miles, Peter B., and the others?
'Friends?'
She snuggled into the hug anyway.
"So uh… If you are fine, how it is that…?
"Haven't they told you, kid? I'm a symbiote host. It's not just a 'me' inside here." To demonstrate, the part of the pink shirt just in front of Gwen's face turned black, bubbling and shifting into a small waving tentacle, and producing a handful of small spiders. "It's a 'we'. It knows everything about my feelings and emotions. It still remembers everything I felt inside that place, and it reacts to how I feel. But I'm teaching it to be a productive member of society."
Gwen saw the spider skitter around the shirt. "Huh. That's…"
"Gummy spiders. Yup, they're us, to the last one."
"I was going to say 'very cool'."
"Eh, my dad disagrees. Most people do, actually. But nice to know."
They pulled away from the hug. Gwen felt a bit ashamed, but less so seeing that her older self seemed to be a bit as well.
"Huh, as I was saying," her elder continued, "I was an idiot. Because when I got out… well, no more secret identity for me, but I had my people. I wasn't alone. The people I loved knew everything about me, and they had my back. And people out there rooted for 'Spider-Gwen'." She looked at Gwen directly in the eyes. "That's chapter one of how I do it: I suddenly realized that what I had was more important than what I feared to lose. I'm sure your Peter would want you to know that."
'Friends.'
"Yeah." Gwen nodded. "I think I get it."
"Good. You do that." The elder Gwen turned around and walked back to the window, while her clothes, starting from the neck to the feet, turned into spiders that became her costume. Damn, that was cool. And creepy. Creepy cool. "Because they tell me I have a rep for dopey lovey speeches and I don't want to repeat myself and give them more fuel. Let's go get something to eat? I'm starving and I'm sure you are too."
"Yeah, sure." Gwen snorted at the chevalier attitude. "What about 'chapter two', though?" Gwen asked as she picked her costume from the bed.
"Yeaaaah nope, that's wartime stories. Let's leave that for another day, yeah? We got work to do, and daylight's burning."
Gwen needed to reevaluate her opinion on her older self; she was turning out to be much more interesting and neat than Gwen first thought.
Earth Bet, the roofs of Brockton Bay
"New York Two was bad enough, but this town is even more of a dump."
"Eyes up and careful now this swing, Gwendy, not a lot to cover us around."
The younger Gwen groaned as she followed the older one, leaving web threads behind as they vaulted from a block of skyscrapers to a zone of smaller buildings. They landed in one of them, continuing their journey on foot, running and jumping over from roof to roof.
"I already saw it, I'm not new at this," Gwendy said. "And really? Do you have to call me that?"
"Hey, we need a way to differentiate one from the other," Gwen replied as she tried to mentally map their position. "If only for the benefit of the others. You have no idea how many Peter Parkers are out there."
"Yeah, I figured something was off with them when I met two of them in the world of a third. That's nuts."
They had just left the nice-ish flat part of the city, gone through the business area of Brockton Bay, and were now in the suburbs before leaving the city proper.
And to be fair to Gwendy's assessment, Brockton Bay hadn't exactly been anything impressive. They hadn't seen any trouble yet, but the entire city screamed loss, silence, and sadness.
"And I mean, I was the first Gwen around. Seniority privileges."
"Ok, fine, but seriously? Gwendy?"
Gwen slowed down, stopping in the middle of a roof and turned around. She raised an eyebrow just as Gwendy caught up to her. "What's the issue? It's short, obvious, and I could have gone with something worse."
Gwendy stopped in front of Gwen and looked up to her with her own raised brow. "Worse?"
Gwen shrugged. "Would you prefer Gwenzelle?"
"Ugh. Fine."
"And besides, if anyone's going to be called Gwennie, that's me."
"Your Parkers made you the same mug?"
Gwen smiled fondly. "Winnie the Pooh?"
"Yup." Gwendy chuckled. "The same."
"Gwennie is off limits then?"
"Better be."
"Ok. Just try to think of a second codename to fall back too; something that's yours. There are a lot of Spider-Women slash Girls around. There's a reason why I go by Ghost-Spider outside my world."
"Yeah, I guess that makes sense."
Gwen took a moment to compare herself with the younger Gwen, both of them suited up and masked. They looked similar in costume, of course, enough that people would think they were doing a theme. Black from feet to their torsos, with white covering the rest. Purple for the lines of the blank eyes on the masks, and the web motifs on the elbow pits and inside their hoodies were the finishing touches that made them look kickass.
But even though her symbiote was taking care of the costume, Gwen made sure to look exactly like it had before they were together. Meanwhile, Gwendy's was a bit rougher, homemade. Not that she had anything against it. Gwen's original costume had been so as well and nobody had seemed to care.
And some details differentiated them even beyond the costume itself and their height. For example, most people wouldn't notice, but Gwendy's eyebrow piercing stuck a bit below her mask. It was kind of cute in a punkish way. Better not let Spider-Punk see her, or he wouldn't stop gushing.
Then there were the shoes.
"By the way. Ballet?" Gwen asked, pointing at Gwendy's feet.
Gwen had used Chucks that stuck under her pants, once, and so she had the symbiote emulate them. Gwendy though wore what looked like ballet slippers. Bright blue in both cases.
"They're from when I practiced as a kid", Gwendy answered. "I feel I move easier with them, so I keep buying them."
"Sounds like you go through a lot of them."
"Well, not really that many. It's true they're not done for fighting, but it's just that they were the first thing I tried on for the costume, and I was comfortable with them."
"You might want to move to something more robust, if you really want to wear some sort of shoes. I wore Chucks back then, and those things lasted me forever", Gwen suggested. "Or just do like others and stitch soles into the costume."
"I guess", Gwendy conceded, lightly bobbing her head from one side to another. "Buying slippers does add up when I break them in a short time."
"And you didn't think about someone noticing Spider-Woman wearing the very particular type of shoe a kid is constantly buying would be a better reason?"
Gwendy looked like a deer in the headlights. "I actually didn't, no… Crap, I really didn't think people would notice those details."
"With smartphones, everyone has a camera pointed at you at all times." Gwen chuckled. "Relax, just try to not be so obvious from now on."
But overall, it made Gwen wonder. Neither similar nor radically different costumes were that strange among alternates, but it felt like the younger girl had seen the original design, then tried to copy it from memory. The idea was there, but it felt like looking at a reflection in a convex mirror.
In any case, Gwen decided to file that subject for another time. "So, you don't do ballet anymore then? I did notice your fancy swinging and moving around being a bit fancy."
"Eh, things happened, and me and dad got disillusioned with everything around it." Gwendy shook her head. "I started practicing those moves again when I got my powers."
"You fell back on doing something that felt familiar."
"Yeah. But I don't, like, dance anymore though. I didn't do much for a while, but then I started drumming about the same time, until… uh…"
The awkward silence carried on for a few seconds, and Gwen recognized it for the bad memory lane that it was. "Hey, I'm a drummer too!" she hurried to say, looking for a distraction. There would be plenty of time for that kind of trust another day, if Gwendy ever wanted to talk about it. "At least when I'm not getting bitched at by my band about how I'm behind the beat. Or beat it too hard. Or I'm late to practice. No ballet ever tho."
Gwendy gave out a soft laugh. "My band tells me I'm too noisy. Confusing notes and rythms that I shouldn't and all that."
"Well, that's nothing that practice wouldn't fix."
"Yeah, I guess", Gwendy said with a shrug. "I should catch up with them some day."
At Gwen's curious look, Gwendy dismissed it with another shrug. "I stopped meeting them after Peter…. you know, can we talk about something else? I think I got too many touchy feely times for today already."
"Ok, that's fine. So, you got something?" Gwen asked. "For a second codename."
"Uh…" Gwendy eloquently answered, turning her head sideways as she scratched her neck. "How about Wanda?"
There was way way too much acted out effusiveness in saying that.
"Wanda? What kind of… Wait, let's just file that away for later. Where did that even come from?"
"Well, just before I met the others, I tried to infiltrate in a…" Gwendy snorted. "You know what? Forget that. It doesn't matter."
"No no, I wanna hear it," Gwen said as she put her hands on her hips. "Sounds like something funny."
The hand on the neck traveled to the backside of the head. "We told you guys how this particle collider of Kingpin's brought us to the same universe, yeah? Well, my spider-sense guided me to a high school…"
"You 'infiltrated' a high school." Gwen's voice was flatter than a corpse's encephalogram. "You realize you are a high schooler, right?"
"Well, duh." Gwen could practically see the eyeroll. "I thought my spider-sense directed me there because there'd be something related to what brought me there, but the place had a uniform code. I couldn't just walk around in my costume, so I had to borrow a uniform and books from a locker." Gwendy raised both hands in a dramatic shrug. "Turns out it was just that the newest spider person in that world was attending class there. I made the mistake of laughing at a joke he made in class, and when we met later, he asked for a name and I almost spat my real one. The next hunch gave me what I needed, it got me into the facility where Kingpin had his research. The next hunch gave me what I needed, it got me into the facility where Kingpin had his research."
Gwen's hands fell off her hips, hanging limply for a moment. She then raised one and turned it palm side down. "So, wait. Leaving aside why on earth you thought anything in a high school would help you with multidimensional problems. Not only did you go through all the trouble of getting a disguise, but you also fooled the staff into thinking you belonged there to the point they let you in a class. And did the same later on in a place I'm assuming had real security."
"Yeah?"
Gwen moved the hand sideways. "But instead of thinking of a proper alias, which, fair, alternate dimensions, using your real name could have issues, you didn't think of a fake name until a guy asked you?"
"Meh, he didn't notice. The guy was going through an extreme case of 'I just woke as a spider and I can't control my sticky hands please god help me' and trying to hit on me at the same time, so…"
"Ohh!" Gwen's hand rose up, pointing at Gwendy's head. "So that's why you're so touchy with the hair."
"Just one. More. Word." Gwendy warned with narrowed eyes.
"Well, you didn't get caught, so you got that over me," Gwen quickly deflected with a giggle. "Remind me to tell you about that time I had to go undercover as the clone of a decades long dead Gwen of Earth-616 until her likewise cloned father saw through my cover."
"Wait, what?" Gwendy's mask eyes widened.
"Oh yeah. We thought the local Peter was going to kickstart a zombie clone apocalypse. There was this clone of his, Kaine, and we worked together to solve it. Turns out it was yet another clone of Peter who was behind everything, and smart use of Photoshop had fooled us all."
Gwendy shook her head. "I thought my life was weird. How the hell does one go through that crap and still make sense of things?"
"616, honey. That place is certifiably insane. But stick with the Warriors and it'll look like one more Tuesday to you."
"I dread to ask, but what are Tuesdays for?"
"Blizzard ninja storm in May."
"Remind me why I agreed to join again?" Gwendy said. She was amused, though. Little victories.
"To benefit from my vast and delicate experience in knuckle sandwich delivery." Gwendy snorted, and Gwen threw a thumb over her shoulder. "Let's move, the others should be back already, and I want a report on the city before I get you guys back to your worlds for the day."
Gwendy nodded. "Let's. Because I swear, if I spend five more minutes with you I'm going to catch your weirdness."
"Five more minutes with that attitude and I'm bringing you to my brunches with Cindy and Jess in 616. Then you'll puke weirdness."
"I have no idea what you're talking about and I don't think I want to know."
They started running again towards the edge of the roof. "So, about that guy."
"What?"
"Hitting on you, huh?"
Gwendy groaned. "Just friends. He made me shave my hair, you know?"
"Just?" Gwen wiggled her eyebrows at Gwendy just before they leaped over the street. "I mean, two totems, making eyes at each other? I've done that."
"Are you my mother now?" Gwendy let out an exasperated sigh midair. "I'm not interested in Miles like that."
Hmm, 'like that'? Gwen knew she didn't bat for the other team, but maybe Gwendy did. Or maybe she was reading too deep into it. Crap, Jess and her 'get a life' attitude was such a bad influence on — "Wait, Miles? Miles Moral-PFFT?!"
If anyone asked, Gwen would answer that no, she didn't slip her landing and almost crash face-first against a wall.
And Gwendy was a lying liar who lied lyingly.
Gwen swore, the little brat was enjoying that too much.
Once the buildings were eventually too small and spread out to jump and run over them, they had reached a small warehouse zone at the city limits. Brockton Bay was a port town, and it had a surplus of unused real estate at the docks in a wide area. However, a fast internet-fueled education in a public library about local power plays, and a cursory check of the neighborhood convinced Gwen and Octavia that installing themselves in any of the abandoned warehouses would attract unwanted attention. And the state of those that nobody seemed to want was at some intermediate point between 'rotting away' and 'just plant the demolition charges and do-over'.
The small warehouse park on the outskirts used by transport trucks supplying the city, on the other hand, while mostly occupied by legal companies, provided a small but still habitable selection of buildings they could occupy. They weren't planning to stay for a long time, so any suspicions due to using electricity and running water wasn't a big concern. They chose one that hadn't been used yet that was also big enough to house two full portals away from prying eyes, and able to hold a small emergency Warriors meeting. Not that they expected any of that to happen, but better to have a surplus in space than a need.
As for getting in, roof windows were a favorite of the spiders. Gwen opened one and slipped inside, followed by Gwendy to a landing in the middle of the main area.
"I'm home, kids," Gwen called out as she let her hoodie down and her mask melted into the rest of her costume, leaving her head exposed. Gwendy, lacking her own symbiote, had to pull off her own with a hand.
"Hey. How did it go?" Octavia, the only one there at the moment, waved from the computer she was sitting at, positioned slightly off from the center of the floor, so as to make room for the designated space for portals. There was a storeroom and a small bathroom, and a set of stairs led up to an office level they'd converted into their living room, kitchen and sleeping room.
"It went. I want everyone to be here first before going over everything," Gwen said, glancing at the setup. There wasn't just the computer Octavia was using. There were some tables with unopened boxes and half-assembled esoteric equipment. "I see you got most things up and running already."
"Yeah. We got watch-less comms with Loomworld — Annie says hi by the way— local internet, some information, and a connection with New York. Pavitr just finished setting up. I'll need to finish installing the scientific equipment later; I'll stay here in Bet tonight if you don't mind, to get it done tomorrow morning. "
"Sure, I can drop by to check on you before class. Kitchen is stocked up?" At Octavia's nod, Gwen started towards the office up some stairs. "Neat. I'll get something while the others arrive." A metal arm extended towards her, offering a muesli bar. She took it and started unwrapping. "Or I'll just stay here, loving you."
Octavia chuckled. "I took a few down here when I started working. Didn't want an interruption in case something needed my full attention."
Gwendy gave a strange look behind Octavia. "So those aren't just for show."
The four metal arms turned toward Gwendy and waved. "Hey, if you got 'em, use 'em, right?" Octavia said with a smile but quickly turned to worry. "Did I say something wrong?"
"No no," Gwendy said, slightly uncomfortable, a hand rubbing her neck. "It's just, I've met a couple Doc Ocks already. Let's just say they played rough."
"I'm sorry." Octavia grimaced. "I know how unpleasant my alternates are. I can keep them out of sight if…"
Gwendy shook her head. "It's fine, don't worry for me." She then looked up. "Oh, hey guys."
They saw a man in a long coat drop from the window, followed by a long-limbed metal sphere in blue and red.
Peter, or Noir as they had decided to nickname him, was currently the only male in the group. All the clothes he wore were in some dark shade of gray. Boots, pants, sweater, coat, gloves, balaclava, fedora, gun holsters, and even goggles. All black, gray and white. And then she had seen him unmasked; as handsome as he was, his skin, eyes and hair were just as colourful as his clothes. "Hey ladies," he said as he tipped his hat.
Peni's suit came closer on all fours, the external display showing a smiling face. It waved at them with an arm while Peni came out through a hatch on its back and sat just above the display. She was a short, skinny Asian teen with an unruly mop of black hair, wearing a high school uniform, including a kitty themed backpack and the most excited of smiles. "Hi guys!" She then laid on her belly, propping her head on her arms, and her arms just above the display, which changed to eight dots. Just like a spider, Gwen realized. It was weird to think that the expression was not of an AI in the suit itself, but that of the spider inside the suit acting as a copilot.
Gwendy walked up closer to Peni and knocked on the suit. "Looking good, after losing the other one."
"Yep! We had to spend some time rebuilding dad's armor from scratch," Peni said with a grin. "But we're back to the ass-kicking business."
The suit made a flexing gesture, while the smiley in the display changed to show its own merciless grin.
Gwen chose that moment to swallow what was left of the bar. "Hey dudes. Any problems?"
"Nothing worth mentioning," Noir said. "Observe, learn, and try to go unnoticed, just like you said." He then folded his arms. "We saw some buildings destroyed along the way, though. The dust was still fresh."
"I see. It's fine if you guys stop a small crime or something, but if you find something bigger just ask me first," Gwen explained. "Depending on what it is, I'll tell you to go ahead or wait for me to join the fun anyway, but we wanna be careful. Stay in the shadows, and don't let anybody know you were there. But our main job here is to find the local spider and help Octavia with her research.
"I already got thrown in my face once that, for the daughter of a cop, I was a shitty detective. And that hurt but was also completely on the money, so let's do things correctly, ok? We know little of Bet, so until we get Anya's go ahead, we limit our involvement with this world as much as we can." She then turned to Octavia. "Do we have details?"
"We have lots of details," Octavia confirmed. "Also, before we start, here." She produced a small box with her tentacles and moved it closer to the others. "Your new Web Warrior watches. They can't open portals yet like Gwen and Annie can, of course, but that's a moot point until enough of the Web is repaired anyway. Still, it'll give you global comms on a single world, and allow you to communicate with Loomworld, whenever there's someone on duty there. There's one for you too, Gwen."
Gwen took the box and passed it around the group. "Ok, get your own, everyone." While everyone took a watch and put them on, she turned to Peni. "Have you thought about a new code?"
"You're changing Peni's name code too?" Gwendy asked.
"There's already a Peni going by SP//dr who everyone already knows about," Gwen explained. "It's just to use it to differentiate them if both are present."
"Yup! Octavia already suggested SP//dr-Ln, and I like it," Peni pipped in. "Not a big change anyway. And I like Gwendy too. Will I ever get to meet that other Peni? That would be so cool! But Anya told me she was very busy."
"Eh, if something big happens, for sure. She's always giving us the big 'not you again' glare when we call her, but you can always count on her boot to kick a massive butt when you need it." Gwen frowned and turned to Octavia. "Spiderling?"
Octavia shrugged. "It was Annie's idea, actually. I think it's her way to get her parents to call her Patternmaker full time."
"But Patternmaker sounds weird to use constantly… Whatever. Let's look at what we have on the local heroes? So we know who not to punch."
"Sure. I'll give you the quick rundown." Octavia turned on a holographic projector and started typing on the computer.
"Well I'll be damned," Noir exclaimed as he looked over the light show. Right. He came from the Thirties. He was bound to feel out of his element at some point.
"So. We got the Parahuman Response Team and the Protectorate," Octavia started to explain as the projector formed a figure of what looked like riot gear for Armageddon. Heavy black faceless armor and an automatic rifle. "Anya's team are the ones that will dig the details, but the first is your government-backed paramilitary army. Parahuman is their word for metahuman, or people with unusual abilities. These troopers are normal humans acting as cops all over the States; if there's known parahuman involvement in a crime, they are the ones they get called."
"Who's their designer?" Peni asked. "They should fire him and get someone else because that's atrocious."
"I'm sure that's intended," Gwen said. "It's like when the police go out in riot gear."
"You people of the past have no fashion sense," Peni grumbled anyway.
"They also deal with the legalities of trying to keep parahuman citizens on the good side of the law, try to recruit them for the Protectorate, and provide them with public relations assistance." Octavia then changed the officer image for a collage of photos, all of them of masked people. "The Protectorate is like the organized hero organization in the States. They're backed by the PRT, with all the pros and cons that involves. Less Avengers, more SHIELD auxiliaries."
"They lack for nothing, especially red tape," Gwendy remarked.
Octavia nodded. "The Protectorate team here in Brockton Bay has six members." She then zoomed in on the photo of a man with blue armor that only left visible his mouth. "Armsmaster. The leader. Some kind of inventor, but all I can find to his name are combat applications that mostly he can use." She then frowned. "Which is all kinds of weird."
"Well, he isn't Tony Stark then, what of it?" Gwendy dismissed it.
"Even my Tony Stark found time to commercialize common amenities," Gwen replied. "And while he isn't Iron Man, he's a warmongering butthole."
"Sorry, the weird thing is that it isn't just him," Octavia interjected. "Apparently, all parahuman inventors, or 'tinkers', are the same. Everything they do can only be understood by them. They have no mass application whatsoever. It's as if I couldn't recognize Gutenberg's press except for the fact that it prints books because the way it works is completely alien to me. So nobody can replicate it other than him, and he can only build so many in a lifetime."
"Bogus," Peni said in a flat tone, in between mouthfuls of candy she was taking out of a tub she had taken from inside her suit. "Not sure about lame. Very whack."
"Even I can tell that makes no sense," Noir commented. "And I'm not of a scientific inclination."
Peni glanced at Noir and threw a thumb in his direction. "He had trouble dealing with a Rubik's cube."
"I'm making progress with identifying colors," he proclaimed proudly.
Gwen and Octavia exchanged a look. "Is that going to be a problem?" Gwen asked. "I mean, colors are, like, very important in our day to day life."
Noir produced said Rubik's cube from a pocket and showed it to the others. All sides were solved. "Blue, yellow, and red are the important ones, correct?" he asked as he pointed correctly at each color.
"Alright, I said nothing. Anything else on Armsmaster?"
"Just that he wields a polearm that carries all the inventions his armor doesn't. Basically, expect a swiss army knife of powers out of him. The computer has full details on everyone I've looked up if you're interested." Octavia changed the photo for another of a woman on army fatigues and a bandana covering her lower face. "Goes by Miss Militia. Armsmaster's second in command, she can produce any man-made weapon, except those made by tinkers."
"I've seen fewer flags on Independence Day," Gwendy commented.
A man in a red onesie with racetracks all over the suit. A video had him run around in a blur. "Velocity. Moves fast, but the faster he moves, the weaker he becomes."
Gwen scratched her cheek with a finger. "Kinda lost the power lottery, didn't he?"
A man in greek armor floating over the streets. "Dauntless. Can imbue an item with a small bit of power every day, but that power can be reapplied. He's currently sort of a favorite because he might keep growing in power for a long time." Another man, with a lion helmet and shoulder pads. "Triumph, the youngest. Can control the force and area of effect of sound, and can release it in bursts."
A woman with a deep blue suit with light tracks that might have come straight out of a Tron movie, and a man in a red suit. "Battery and Assault. Kind of the dynamic duo in the team. She charges up energy and releases it, either shoving it into something or someone or launching herself with it. He takes kinetic energy, and uses it to impel himself."
Both Gwens made a face. "Really?" Gwen asked. "Who the hell had that idea for the names?"
"My money is on Assault, apparently he styles himself as a goofy joker, and Battery was there before him." Octavia changed the Protectorate heroes for a gallery photo of some teenagers in costume. "These are the Wards. A sub-organization inside the Protectorate for minors with powers. They get training, but they don't fight unless they can't avoid it. If we meet anyone in the field, I don't think we'll have to deal with them, except to talk."
The kids were swapped out for another gallery photo of several unmasked people in white costumes. "These are New Wave. Hero family. Most of them have powers revolving around energy, like projectiles and shields, and flight, with the odd healing or super strength. Mostly inactive, so kind of like the Wards; just be polite.
"Alright, evildoers now. Three main gangs have been vying for dominance of the town for decades, but one of them, the ABB, has been taken down recently. One of the other two is Coil's gang. Nobody seems to know for sure who is Coil or what his deal is besides drug trade, but he employs professional mercenaries. The military sort. Cloak and dagger, hit and run…"
"Doesn't sound so bad," Gwendy said. "We've fought mercenaries before. Even ones with laser guns."
"Nooo no nooooo," Gwen drawled. "See. Metahumans, you see them coming. They hurt you, you take the hurt and put it back inside them until they surrender. But I've fought ninjas and army veterans. And smart, trained organizations are the ones you should be really careful about. Because they are the ones who are the most motivated to find any weakness before fighting you, run with them, and destroy who you are. Trust me, these are dangerous."
"She's right," Noir agreed. "I had my share of freaks in my world. But there's a reason I enjoy punching nazis so much. They're insidious, like cockroaches sneaking where you can't see them until they control half a government department. Makes getting a victory all the more enjoyable, like taking a bite off that cherry pie that you've spent half a day baking making a mess in the kitchen."
Gwen blinked. "Sure, if that's how you want to look at it, go nuts."
Gwendy exchanged a look with Peni, and they shrugged. "Fine, we'll be doubly careful with them."
Octavia changed the hologram to display the image of a man encased in metal in front of a microphone. "This is Kaiser, of the Empire, or, ahem, the E88."
Noir groaned. "You don't tell me…"
"I'll let him tell you." The image came to life, with the man gesticulating in front of an unseen audience.
<"… And I ask you, brothers! To lend us our support so the one true superior race can survive against the inferior hordes that infest our dear city — !">
Octavia paused the video at that moment. "And that was the tamest piece I could find."
"Alright," Noir said, cracking his knuckles. "Now I know who I'll start with for my teeth breaking routine."
"I'd suggest not, yet. The Empire alone accounts for half the parahuman muscle in the city, and half of them are heavy hitters. If you must, dealing with the flunkies and thugs that manage their business would hurt them a lot more and… hmm?"
Gwen watched as something in a monitor caught Octavia's attention. "Tavia?"
"Sorry, breaking news. It seems like we got an up and coming contestant for a third big baddies group." Octavia typed something, and the hologram changed to show a party room that had been thoroughly wrecked. "The fall of the ABB involved a lot of damage to the city. So the mayor organized a fundraiser event last night to gather support for the Protectorate. A band of thieves called the Undersiders that have been moving up on the big crimes ladder decided that it wasn't lively enough for their taste. They embarrassed all the heroes there, and fled scot free."
"Ok, that's bad. Not 'stealing candy from children' bad, but close," Gwen considered. "Do you have anything on them?"
"There's not a lot out there about them, and considering they prefer hit and run thievery before anybody gets to fight with them…"
"That may mean they don't fight not because they can't," Gwendy commented. "But because they don't want to, or don't want to bother."
"Kid won a prize," Gwen muttered.
The hologram showed a grainy photo of a man in black motorcycle leathers and a helmet with a skull motive. He had a hand extended outwards, producing smoke. "That's Grue, the suspected leader. Known to work as a bouncer, so he can brawl. That smoke causes total sensory deprivation as long as it covers you, kills all electronic signals into or inside it, and has quite a reach. I don't know if your spider senses will be affected, but just try to not get caught inside."
A blonde white girl now, in a purple catsuit and domino mask, and armed with a handgun. "Tattletale. The brains. She claims to be a psychic, though people seem to not believe it. Funnily, the people of Bet claim that psychics are just not a thing."
"Really?" Peni exclaimed indignantly, something shared by her spider, judging by the angry smiley on the display of the suit. "And what are we, chopped liver?"
"It is a bit strange for them to dismiss psychics like that," Gwendy commented. "I haven't met any others than you, but everyone in my world knows about the X-Men. Charles Xavier, Jean Gray, the Phoenix…"
"Yeah! They are, like, ancient history in my world," Peni agreed. "Why would Bet be different?"
"There are no known psychics in my world," Gwen said. "I'm not saying there aren't any, but I can see how it can give the impression. She may just be the first known case here. And we know there is something wrong with this group of worlds being hidden from the Web until now."
"Anyway, Tattletale seems to need to look directly at what she wants to glean information about. Beyond that, her biggest weapon seems to be her mouth," Octavia continued. "Apparently she's on a mission from God to get on everyone's nerves."
"Web her face," Noir said, "web her hands, the kitty is declawed. Easy."
A skinny teen in a renaissance costume came to the hologram, complete with a scepter. "Regent. He can make you trip or react in unwanted ways. Hands, feet, elbows, whatever. The scepter seems to be a taser as well."
"Oh, don't worry." Peni sat up, her face and the armor display showing the same cruel smile. "Leave him to us, we'll finish him quickly."
A disheveled girl surrounded by three giant reptiles. "Rachel Lindt, alias Hellhound. She by herself isn't special. Those monsters though, those are dogs she trains, and she can turn them into what you see. She doesn't provide just muscle, but transportation as well. A known murderer with a volatile personality."
"No kidding, I wouldn't want to get near those teeth," Gwen said. "We'll have to come up with some ideas to deal with these just in case. Is that all of them?"
"Not at all," Octavia said. "Say hi to Skitter, the rising star among the city villains." The hologram now showed a figure covered by a cloud of bugs. Tall, thin, in a black armored suit with a mask that reminded her of a wasp. "She can control any kind of bug at an observed range of a city block, which for the uninitiated are enough bugs to make anyone scream. And lest you think she's all show, she debuted with federal crimes. Robbing a bank, taking hostages under threat of black widow venom, holding another hero hostage with a knife to the neck, and recreating horror movie scenes with the heroes as the unwitting victims of her swarm."
"Yeah, I can tell already that I'm going to hate her guts," Gwen declared to the unanimous agreement of the group.
