"Saw the video yet? Yeah, that happened. Couldn't help myself. Someone needed saving. Suit worked perfectly. Thanks for the upgrades. We should talk. Soon. Big things coming."
Peter texted back. "Congratulations on the successful flight. Suit looked amazing. Happy to help anytime."
"You're going to help a lot more than that. Trust me. This is just the beginning. Iron Man is real. And the world is going to change."
Peter set his phone down. Stared at his laptop screen. At the tactical suit design FSIS had created. At the enhancement protocols progressing faster than planned.
Everything was accelerating. Tony was already Iron Man. Peter had spider powers. MJ and Gwen were enhanced. The timeline was compressing. Events that should have taken years were happening in months.
'The world is changing,' Peter thought. 'Faster than I expected. I need to be ready. Need to be prepared for what comes next.'
A notification appeared on his screen. FSIS alerting him to something.
"Police scanner activity. Armed robbery in progress. Three blocks from your location. Suspects are heavily armed. Multiple hostages. Police response time estimated at eight minutes."
Peter's spider-sense tingled. Not warning him of personal danger. Warning him that people needed help. That he had the power to make a difference.
'I'm not ready,' Peter thought. 'I haven't trained enough. Haven't perfected my control. This is too soon.'
But people were in danger. And he could save them. He had the abilities. Had the suit. Had everything needed except confidence.
"FSIS, is the suit really ready?"
"All systems are fully operational. Web shooters loaded. Sensors calibrated. Biometric monitoring active. The suit is ready, Peter. The question is whether you are."
Peter sat very still. Stared at the wall.
His enhanced hearing was already picking it up now that he was focused on it. Shouting. A woman crying. The crack of something breaking. Three blocks away.
'Eight minutes for police. People could die in eight minutes.'
He thought about Uncle Ben downstairs. About breakfast this morning. About that phrase he'd heard his whole life in this body.
With great power comes great responsibility.
Ben had said it so casually. Like it was obvious. Like it needed no explanation.
'Maybe it doesn't,' Peter thought.
He stood up. Crossed to his closet. Pressed his palm against the hidden biometric panel installed in the back wall. The dimensional access point shimmered. His suit materialized in his hands.
Dark blue, almost black. Red accents along the muscle lines. Spider symbol on the chest. White lenses.
He held it for a moment.
'First time,' he thought. 'Once I do this, there's no going back.'
His spider-sense pulsed again. Urgent. Insistent.
People. Now.
Peter put on the suit.
---
Eleven seconds to suit up. FSIS had designed every clasp and seal for rapid deployment. The white lenses activated and Peter's vision expanded dramatically. Suit sensors overlaying data. Heat signatures. Structural weak points. Movement tracking.
"FSIS, feed me the police scanner live."
"Done. Current situation: convenience store on Maple and 43rd. Four armed men. Owner, two employees, three customers confirmed inside. One warning shot fired six minutes ago. No injuries yet."
Yet.
Peter moved to his window. Opened it quietly. The night air hit him. Cool and sharp. Queens stretched out below. Normal streets. Normal lights. Normal people with no idea what was happening three blocks away.
He stepped onto the outside ledge. His adhesion activated automatically. Feet gripping the brick without thought.
'Just like training,' he told himself. 'Except real.'
He jumped.
---
The store appeared below him inside of twenty seconds. Brightly lit. Front windows intact but the door was propped open. Shadows moving inside. Raised voices clear to his enhanced ears now.
Peter crouched on the rooftop edge across the street. Watched. Listened. Cataloged everything.
Four men. All armed. Handguns. One had a shotgun. Moving fast. Voices too loud. Amateurs, his trained mind assessed immediately. Desperate amateurs. Which was worse than professionals in some ways. Professionals were predictable. Desperate people were not.
The hostages were clustered near the back counter. An older man who was probably the owner. Two young employees. An elderly woman clutching her bag. A man in a delivery uniform. A teenage girl who was very carefully not crying.
Six people. Four armed suspects. Police still four minutes out.
"FSIS, roof access?"
"Hatch directly below your position. Store security system is running. I've accessed the feed. Displaying now."
His lenses populated with four camera angles. He could see exactly where everyone was. Suspects near the front. Hostages near the back. Fifteen feet of open floor between them.
'Okay,' Peter thought. 'I can work with this.'
He'd trained for this exact type of scenario. Hundreds of times in his dimensional space. Extraction protocols. Threat neutralization. Non-lethal takedowns. He'd run the simulations until they lived in his muscles.
But simulations didn't have scared people. Or real bullets.
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