When it rained, it poured.
Peter had no idea who first said that, but he felt like it fit today perfectly.
First he fell into some random hole and got dragged into another universe for no reason.
Then, right after that, he ran into a crime scene. He had originally planned to pretend he saw nothing, but then some idiot fired a bullet at him.
Sure, with his current physique, even if he got shot full of holes, he could recover.
But Peter was the kind of person who never let things go. This whole mess had absolutely nothing to do with him, and then one bullet dragged him into it anyway.
He summoned his spider arm-blades and pulled a mask out of his backpack.
To avoid unnecessary trouble, he decided not to wear the full suit. That way, even if he killed these men, the police in this universe would probably just assume he was some Spider-Man fanatic, and the blame would land on this world's Spider-Man instead.
At some point, Peter silently appeared behind one of the Black gunmen. Watching the man still firing enthusiastically, Peter casually reached out and tapped him on the shoulder.
"What the hell do you want?! Can't you see we're trying to take these idiots out?!"
The gunman turned around viciously and immediately started cursing, assuming one of his own men had bothered him.
Then he saw it.
A black mask with red eye lenses, looking very similar to Spider-Man's.
"Say goodbye to this world."
Peter clamped a hand over the man's mouth, and the spider arm-blade on his wrist quietly sliced across his throat. The gunman widened his eyes, unable to make a sound, then crumpled to the ground.
Only after three seconds did a thin cut begin to appear on his neck, followed by blood slowly spilling out.
"Shit! The boss is dead!!!"
"What's there to panic about?! If the boss is dead, then I'm the boss now! Listen to me, everyone, focus all your fire on that masked freak!!!"
Apparently that was the second-in-command. Seeing the boss go down, he was not scared in the least. If anything, he looked thrilled.
A chance to move up had just landed in his lap.
Rat-tat-tat-tat!
Every gun instantly swung toward Peter.
Under the rain of bullets, Peter twisted, leaped, and flipped his way through the barrage with ease, then vanished from sight.
"Where'd he go?!"
"Shit, slippery bastard, I swear I'm gonna..."
One of the gunmen had just started shouting when his throat suddenly went cold. He touched it instinctively, found his hand covered in blood, and collapsed on the spot.
"The second boss is dead too!"
"Then I'm the third boss now!"
The remaining three men screamed and aimed at Peter.
Peter caught a bullet in midair, crushed it flat between his fingers, then opened his hand and let the mangled slug fall to the ground.
Clink, clink, clink...
"Oh no..."
"We're screwed..."
All three of them went blank with terror.
A light breeze passed through.
Peter calmly greeted them.
"Don't worry. You'll be checking in with him in a second."
Then he launched himself forward.
His body moved with terrifying agility as he weaved through the three men, and one after another, all of them had their throats cut and fell where they stood.
After that, Peter vaulted away with a few quick jumps and disappeared from everyone's sight.
"Oh my God... was that Spider-Man just now???"
"No way. Since when does Spider-Man use blades to kill people?!"
"Maybe some crazed Spider-Man fan?"
"That's... new."
The police saw the whole thing clearly.
But since Peter had not used webbing or wall-crawling, they could not confirm that it was actually Spider-Man.
And with how precise and efficient his killing methods had been, it did not really match Spider-Man's usual style either.
So they came up with two possibilities.
First, it might be some fanatical Spider-Man admirer who was highly trained, maybe even former military.
Second, it might be one of Spider-Man's enemies trying to smear him by using similar imagery.
But considering Spider-Man's reputation in this world was already bad enough, trying to smear him even more felt pointless.
So in the end, the first explanation seemed more likely.
...
On the Brooklyn Bridge, traffic was terrible, just like always.
This was New York. If it was not jammed, something had gone wrong.
Peter had come here right after slipping away from the earlier crime scene and had already removed the mask.
He did not actually know why he had come here.
He just had the strong feeling that his spider instincts were guiding him, telling him that this was where he was supposed to be.
Then his Spider-Sense exploded.
A section of the elevated roadway ahead began breaking apart piece by piece.
Men shouted. Women screamed. Children cried.
Panic spread across the bridge almost instantly.
So something was happening here too.
Of course.
That was how Spider-Man's life worked. Wherever he went, something crazy happened.
Maybe that was Spider-Man's reverse blessing.
"Everybody get off the bridge! Move!"
Hearing the shout, Peter looked toward the source of the voice and saw a red-and-blue Spider-Man standing on top of a car.
But the suit was clearly made of nanotech, and with Peter's eye for materials and engineering, he could tell immediately.
This Spider-Man had some of the best gear out of any Spider-Man he had seen.
Peter had a feeling this was the same red-and-black Spider-Man who had gone swinging by earlier yelling like a maniac.
Exactly how many suits did this guy have?
Could he possibly have more than Peter?
Boom!
A long mechanical tentacle smashed through the concrete sidewall of the bridge, flung a taxi aside, and planted itself on the ground.
Then, out of the rolling smoke, more mechanical tentacles emerged.
A man in a black coat stepped onto the bridge.
From a distance, he looked at the nanotech-suited Spider-Man and greeted him.
"Hello, Peter."
"Holy hell. Otto?! He crossed over too?!"
Peter started doubting reality again.
This definitely could not be Tobey's universe.
But the Doctor Octopus standing there was absolutely the one from Tobey's universe.
So there was only one answer.
He had ended up here too.
This universe really was a mess.
Doctor Octopus glared at the nanotech Spider-Man and demanded, "What did you do to my machine?!"
"Machine? What machine?" the nanotech Spider-Man asked, even more confused. "I seriously have no idea what you're talking about. What machine?!"
"The power of the sun in the palm of my hand! It's gone!"
"Wait!" the nanotech Spider-Man said, still completely confused, but clearly trying to de-escalate. "Listen, sir, can you maybe stop wrecking cars for a second? We can work together and figure out where your machine went, okay?!"
"Do you think I'm stupid?!"
Doctor Octopus roared.
Two of his mechanical arms lashed out and grabbed two nearby cars, then hurled them off the bridge.
"Go save them, little spider."
Doctor Octopus clearly knew Spider-Man's habits and used the same trick that had probably worked many times before.
The nanotech Spider-Man panicked at once.
One of those cars still had people inside.
He had heard them screaming.
He shot forward instantly.
And then, bang.
He misjudged the trajectory and slammed hard into one of the cars.
"What the..."
The nanotech Spider-Man sprawled across the roof and then realized the car was no longer falling.
The cars that should have gone off the bridge were both flying backward instead.
"You're the worst Peter Parker I've ever seen, buddy."
A voice came from behind him.
The nanotech Spider-Man immediately turned, only to see another Spider-Man standing a short distance away, wearing a very similar suit but with different colors.
It was Peter, in his self-made Wraith suit.
At this point, he was no longer in a hurry to get home.
Things were starting to get interesting, and now he really wanted to see what happened next.
His left and right hands each shot out a strand of webbing, both attached to the two flying cars.
"You are..."
"Peter Parker. As you can see, I'm Spider-Man. Your friendly neighborhood one."
Peter lowered his voice and smiled, his mischievous streak fully awake.
(End of Chapter)
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