[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/QLPeQ5j.png?1[/img][/center] She's falling. The world has slowed to a near stop. Rain drops hang suspended in the night sky, glittering orange from the flames below. Smoke curls upward in noxious black tendrils. The gout of blood spraying out from my stomach gleams bright as it catches hints of moonlight that peak through the rainclouds. A scream tears at my vocal chords, forced through gritted and red-stained teeth. She's falling. She doesn't scream as the cold black waters of the river below rush up to meet her. She just gasps, more out of surprise than fear. She never thought something like this could happen to her. Not while I was around. I'd sworn on her father's grave that I'd protect her. We loved each other with a fire that could ignite the stars. She was the happiest girl in the world, and I was her unbeatable hero. It was all so perfect. It couldn't go this wrong, this fast. Now it's all gone to hell. She's falling, and I can't catch her. Over the sound of my own screaming I hear his laughter, that awful cackle that makes my skin crawl and my blood boil. He's won. He's gotten everything he could have wanted from this moment. This is his perfect revenge. I feel a sudden weightlessness, my guts lurching upward as I begin to fall after her. This time I can do it. I can reach her. Save her. I can make it right.... The wind batters at my face as I will myself downwards, straightening my body out to increase my speed and catch up to her. Acting on instinct, I throw out a line to the bridge, to turn the sudden stop into a gentle swing. Just as the line begins to go taut, I reach her, pulling her close. For an instant, I feel her body against mine once again, the pounding of her heart resonating throughout my every sense. I can hear her voice as she calls out my name, smell the lavender she uses in her hair. She looks at me and I see the sparkle in her glittering blue eyes, the trust and love she's had since we were children..... .....then there's a shooting agony in my chest. I look down and see her hand, wrapped in shadows, has grown claws that she's sunk into my heart. [img]https://i.imgur.com/1LVYG8E.jpg[/img] [color=LightSkyBlue]"Ohhh,[/color] [color=MediumAquamarine]Peter,"[/color] she says, her sweet and loving tone turning lascivious and vile as the shadows wrap envelop her entirely and her voice turns into his. [color=MediumAquamarine]"[i]My[/i][/color][color=LimeGreen][i] hero.....[/i]"[/color] I hear them laughing together as she cuts my web line, and he scoops her up in his arms. A long, slavering tongue erupts from her mouth and plunges into his, then she flings me downward with one hand, discarding me like garbage. Even as I fall ever downward, the horrific wet smacking of their lips and tongues writhing against each other is right in my ears, a million smaller voices laughing at me from the darkness below. Mocking me for being such a fool. For trusting, for [i]loving[/i] someone like that. For being so weak. For letting them destroy me so thoroughly. In the blackness below, a mouth opens. A cavernous, slobbering maw lined with jagged fangs, gnashing hungrily as I fall toward it. There's nothing I can do. I'm falling. I'm falling. I'm-- [hr] [color=YellowGreen]"Pete!"[/color] Harry says as he shakes me awake. Looking around with bleary eyes, I see I'm on the living room couch, the black suit still retaining the form of my clothes from last night. [color=YellowGreen]"Dude, you scared the shit out of us, man. After you ran out on the party, nobody could find you. I didn't even see you come in this morning."[/color] [color=Red]"Yeah?"[/color] I ask, shaking my head to try and remember where I was, what I've been doing. I get the distinct impression that I don't really want to know. [color=Red]"I'm sorry, man. I just had to, I dunno.....get away. I didn't want everyone to freak out or anything, I just...."[/color] I'm not able to complete my sentence, because I honestly don't know what I've done. I remember talking to Mary Jane about baseball or something, then Eddie shows up, and he shows me pictures of-- [color=Red]"....oh God,"[/color] I groan, holding my head in my hands as I remember what I saw. [color=Red]"Eddie showed me something last night, did he tell anyone--"[/color] [color=YellowGreen]"I know,"[/color] Harry says, pulling out his phone and scrolling through his news feed. [color=YellowGreen]"The story's been all over the news today. It's all they're talking about."[/color] He holds the phone out to me, the screen showing today's edition of the [i]Daily Bugle.[/i] Not wanting to see it but knowing I have to, I take the phone and start reading. [quote][center][img]https://i.imgur.com/xoLfVyr.jpg?1[/img][/center] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/qdKsOSZ.jpg[/img][/center] [h1][center][b]SINS PAST[/b][/center][/h1] [h3][center]Startling New Evidence Suggest Illicit Affair Between Norman Osborn and Final Victim[/center][/h3] [center][i]Story by Frederick Foswell. Photos by Eddie Brock.[/i][/center] [indent]The tragedy that took place last year on the George Washington Bridge sent shockwaves throughout the City, making New Yorkers painfully aware of the dangers of living in a city full of masked vigilantes and super-criminals. However, new evidence has led some to conclude there was more to the deaths of Spider-Man, Norman Osborn, and Gwen Stacy than anyone had previously believed. It is well-documented at this point that Stacy was an intern at OsCorp, and had been close friends with Osborn's son Harry. It is also now public record that OsCorp was embroiled in several illegal activities, including industrial espionage and sabotage, the development and testing on human subjects of technology restricted by the Sokovia Accords, and the smuggling of unregistered alien weaponry. That doesn't even include Osborn's personal criminal record, which, under the guise of the Green Goblin, includes multiple counts of arson, assault with deadly weapons, destruction of public and private property, and over three dozen counts of first-degree murder. Until now, the prevailing thought among conspiracy theorists was that Osborn targeted Stacy because she had discovered one or more of OsCorp's illegal operations, and the destructive battle between the Goblin and Spider-Man was all a ruse to silence her and make it appear as collateral damage. However, a set of incriminating photos now suggest that Osborn did it to hide something else: a torrid affair between himself and his 19-year-old intern. These photographs, allegedly taken on the 16th of July 2017, just two weeks before Stacy and Osborn's deaths, show the two of them meeting in Osborn's penthouse on 57th Street, apparently engaging in romantic conversation before--[/indent] [/quote] [color=Red]"[i]Shit![/i]"[/color] I hiss through gritted teeth as I hurl Harry's phone against the wall. It shatters into a thousand pieces, glass and metal and plastic shrapnel showering the living room. It takes me a second before I realize what I'd done. [color=Red]"Oh! Oh, Jesus, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to--"[/color] [color=YellowGreen]"I can afford another phone,"[/color] Harry shrugs. [color=YellowGreen]"Honestly, heh, I'll just go by OsCorp and get another one for free, considering I own it now."[/color] I laugh weakly, then sink back into the couch. Harry continues. [color=YellowGreen]"What really gets me is that there's other stuff that should've gotten the front page. I mean, that Venom guy? He trashed some dive bar about four blocks from here. Little hole-in-the-wall called the 'Big Sky Lounge.' Just busted in through the back door and started breaking bones like he was Steven Seagal. Three guys are in the ICU, beaten up so badly they might not make it. But [i]this[/i] shit's what they lead with instead. Like they've got nothing better to do but kick us while we're down."[/color] I wince as he tells me what Venom was doing while I was out. I know about the Big Sky Lounge-- it's a regular hangout for Tombstone's gang, run by one of the Kingpin's old Enforcers. It sounds like we were letting off steam by running down our checklist of acceptable targets and just smashing whoever was nearest. Groaning in dismay, I bury my head in my hands again. [color=Red]"This can't be real. I mean, this is [i]Gwen[/i] we're talking about. I knew her since fourth grade. There's no way she could--.......I mean, could she?"[/color] Harry doesn't make eye contact with me. He just shrugs and looks away. [color=YellowGreen]"One thing you learn about living with a psychopath,"[/color] he says, [color=YellowGreen]"is that they're really good at hiding it. They don't have empathy, they don't feel things the way you and I do, but that makes people suspicious. So they pretend. They pretend like they care about other people, they pretend to be sympathetic when you're hurting and supportive when you need it. They pretend like they love you. And they get so good at it, they can fool everyone around them for years."[/color] [color=Red]"Yeah, but....I can't buy that. I can't see her doing something like this. It's just..."[/color] [color=YellowGreen]"I know, man,"[/color] he says, giving me a pat on the shoulder. [color=YellowGreen]"It sucks. It really does. I mean, what's it say about the world we're living in if you can't even trust someone that close to you? Just makes it all feel like it's not worth it."[/color] [color=Red]"....yeah....."[/color] Harry claps his hands together like he's had an idea. [color=YellowGreen]"Well, I think I know what we need,"[/color] he says in a darkly chipper tone. [color=YellowGreen]"Go wash up and put on some comfortable clothes. We're gonna get drunk as hell, and then we're gonna break stuff."[/color] I shake my head. [color=Red]"That's a really stupid idea, Harry."[/color] He nods. [color=YellowGreen]"Yeah. It is. And you don't have a better one, do ya?"[/color] I try for a moment to come up with an answer, before throwing up my hands. [color=Red]"All right, drinks and breaking stuff it is,"[/color] I concede. It's a bad idea, and I know it. But all things considered, a little property damage is far from the worst thing I've done in the last twenty-four hours. Maybe it's better that I just break some things instead of breaking more people. ....then again, if this City's so damn intent on hurting me, maybe it wouldn't be so bad to start hurting it back a little....