Chapter 4: Chapter 4: Within enemy territory Part 2
"Say...fucking...what?" I whispered in shock enough that Harry and Gwen, as she walked towards us at that moment, could hear. Peter Parker, working for Oscorp, for the goddamn enemy. How? Why? Since when is this a thing?! I can somewhat understand Conners since he did work here in that 2012 spider-man movie, and the same can be said about Gwen, which gives me a whole new thing to worry about. But Peter, of all people working for Norman, something isn't right here. As Dr.Conners continued to explain how he would use the regeneration ability found in the genes of lizards to allow humans to grow back limbs, I pulled my brother aside; I needed answers...now. "Peter, what the hell are you doing?" I whispered.
"What does it look like I'm doing? I'm trying to impress my new boss." he whispered back, clearly unconcerned about what I was saying.
"That's the fucking problem! Out of all the giant high-tech companies to get an internship for, you choose Oscorp."
"And so what if I did? Oscorp is the second-biggest company in the world, with some of the greatest minds, like Dr.Connors, working together to benefit humanity. Harry's dad told me himself, of course, I want to work here. I'm not getting what's even you're problem with it?"
"You gullible dumbass, a company like that doesn't become as big as you said without doing some shady actions. Your only focus on the things on the surface while ignoring what could be hidden underneath."
"Oh, right, and I'm supposed to trust your "bad feeling." on your word alone? Without any evidence to back up your claim?" he annoyedly asks. This mother..., when have I not been trustworthy?
"*grunt* Look, I know it's a long shot, and I can't explain it, but you know I never lied to you. So trust me when I say that working here is bad news. How about working at Stark Industries instead? I'm sure you could make some amazing inventions there-" Pete then cut me off with a look of rage.
"Stark! Seriously, how hypocritical can you get?! First, you want me to quit the career I barely started where I can help people in my way. Now, you want me to make weapons for the world's most egotistical billionaire."
"You don't know that. Sure, he can be an ass, but maybe Tony Stark can change himself and his company for the better."
He scoffed. "Tony Stark change for the better, right, and magic is real. This proves my point: you don't know what you're talking about."
"Well, if it means anything, I've heard that Stark Industries employees can go to wicked parties thrown by the boss himself. So It cannot be bad to work for them, right?" Harry said, trying to ease the growing tension between us. It didn't work.
"Not helping, Harry!!" As we both said in complete unison, that's twin magic for you.
That was when Gwen stepped in, "Alright, that's enough; the two of you need to stop this right now! You're causing a scene here!" she said, pushing the two of us from each other. I glanced around the lab seeing everyone looking at us; Gwen was right; I needed to calm down. My plan and I will be thrown out the window if security is called in. Peter, however, was still having none of it as he tried to fight out of Gwen's grasp.
"Look, Pete, when will you understand that I'm only trying to help you? If you listen to reason, we can-" He cut me off again.
"See, that's YOUR problem; you think you're helping me?! Do you think that I need it?! Well, news flash, Alex, I don't; I don't need you getting in my way all the damn time! So for once in my life, stop being a fucking obstacle and step aside!"
....
Silence
....
The "pen dropped, and the whole room could hear it" type of silence. No one moved an inch; the tense air made it too awkward to do so. Even the lizards, maybe even the spiders, stopped moving and paid attention to what was happening. I didn't see what the rest of the class was doing, but I didn't care. I noticed that Gwen, Harry, and Peter had their eyes widened, and maybe my own were as well, but I couldn't tell what they were thinking, nor did I care. I couldn't think of much of anything; I was too stunned. There was a ton of emotion going through me; Oh, I was angry, embarrassed, but most of all, hurt.
"W-what?" that was the only thing that came out.
"Is everything alright over here?" Dr.Connors called out. "If you two are having a dispute, I would kindly ask you to please take it outside, as this is a place of research." Gwen was about to say something, but Peter was the first to speak.
"No, we're sorry for describing your speech, Dr.Connors. It was just a little family talk, nothing significant to trouble yourself with." he then turned his head slightly toward my direction. "Nothing...at all." after saying that, he made his way to the rest of the class to join the tour.
"Peter, wait..." Gwen tried to get him to stop, but he kept going. I stood there watching as my twin, who told me to fuck off, left. I clutch my fist to hold back my growing anger.
Harry places a hand on my shoulder, "Alex, I'm sure he didn't mean what he said. I bet the two of you will be back as the dynamic duo after a month. I can see it now, going to every nightclub in the city, competing in those video game tournaments that you guys love to play in, and... you're still pissed off, aren't you?" I didn't bother to answer him when I had a mission to complete. I brushed his hand off and made my way from the gathering of students along with Peter.
"Whatever, keep an eye on him, would you? That dumbass is prone to accidents; I'll be...you know." I said, making it clear that I was not talking about this and wanted to be left alone.
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It's been at least 30 minutes since the whole thing with Peter went down. That entire argument still weighed heavy on my mind; I mean, what the fuck is wrong with him. Here I am, trying to give him an olive branch, and he slaps it out of my hand. After all the work I put into helping him, my training, and the things I pushed myself to learn, he threw me away like garbage. Fine then, if Peter wants to this lone wolf act and learn the hard way, let him. I'll keep my word and help him once he becomes Spider-Man, but since he signed up for it, my twin will find out what Oscorp is like. Also, since he doesn't want me to be a part of his life anymore, he will have to learn to ropes about being Spider-Man without my help, but there's no way I am letting Uncle Ben die, not on my watch. If need be, I will be the one to give Peter that little speech that Ben gave him, even as I would have to try to beat it into him first. Although that's after the spider bite, I need to focus on the now.
As I observe everyone from my side of the lab, they are off doing their own thing, from texting on their phones to chatting with their friend groups, so your everyday teenage things. I didn't see any sign of Gwen; Harry was on the phone with someone, and my asshole of a brother was distracting; I mean, talking to Dr. Connors. so no one was looking my way, fantastic, well if you don't count the security camera that is currently on the ceiling facing everywhere. It's a good thing I knew that possibility, and I am professional, something that will help me with this situation, the art of misdirection.
"Now let's see here, notes, notes, more notes. Here, at least one reptile textbook talks about Komodo dragons, sweet." Using my okay acting skills to pretend I'm looking for a book that happens to be next to one of the lab's computers. Making probably sure that I wasn't being watched nor my hands were visible for the camera to see, I shook my hand a little, having a tiny device in the shape of a black cavalry lance from my makeshift sleeve pocket I made to hide it from metal detectors.
For obvious reasons, I had made this little thing in preparation for this day when I doubted the Lancer. It may not look much, but this little finger is a device that can be magnetically attached to any electronic device without short shorting it. Once that's done and the device it connected to turns on, within about a couple of days, this little thing can happen through all firewalls within the entirety of Oscorp servers. Here's the kicker all the way out to anyone even knowing. Leaving me to access all of Oscorp's data, from employee data to whatever secret project is in the server database. Though there is a catch that it takes quite a while for me to do that, it's better to do it now than later, and I only got one chance to do it.
After making sure that the Lancer was well hidden, thank god these CPUs were colored black, I continued skimming through the textbook until noticing someone around checking out the spiders. Curious and not having any better to do, I set the book down and walked over there. The said person was a young girl, maybe a year young than me so she might be a freshman. She was of Asian descent, a simple gray shirt and jeans. As I studied her, I got that same deja vu feeling I usually get. 'Why does she looks oddly familiar?'
She watches the spiders move about in curiosity before seeing me approach.'I'll have to be honest; she's kinda cute.' "It's weird, Isn't it?"
"What is?" I ask back.
"They're a cage filled with spiders in a place like this. Doesn't it seem a little weird to you?"
I play along, "Yeah, you got the point there. For a guy whose research is heavily based on reptiles, having all these spiders lying around is quite the big or the small elephant in the room." she let out a small giggle at that.
"I know what you mean. I've asked Dr. Connors about them to see if they were part of his project, but they weren't; he said something about the abysmal regenerative properties of spiders for this project and that spiders only accomplish it once in their short lives."
"Then why are they still here then?"
"I've asked that too; they were a part of some other lab experiment before he came to work at Oscorp. Some fires still destroyed most lab equipment and research, but these spiders were. I'm going to have no one knows why the fire happened, but these spiders with us left here at storage before he came in." she explained.
I cocked an eyebrow, "Really, really, and what are you doing over here?"
"Counting them"
"You chose to count spiders for God knows how long?"
She shrugged, "Do you know about anything else to do around here?"
"Touche, so how much have you gotten so far?"
"Hmmm...about close to 500 at this point. I'm planning on naming the 500th of them when I get there." she said after pondering for a while.
"Neat; any idea what will be?"
"I was thinking, Goddess."
"Come on, after all that work. You can come up with something better than that." I say, shaking my head in mild amusement.
This time it was her time to raise an eyebrow, "Oh really, then give me a name right now if you can do better."
I thought on it for a little bit; 'Goddess, Goddess, God- I got it.' "Okay then, how about. Dea."
"Dea?" the young girl asked.
"Yeah, it means goddess in Italian. See, you take a simple word, put a different language, and it makes for a good name."
She widened her eyes in surprise, "I wasn't aware you knew Italian in the first place."
"Solo alcune delle cose che pratico nel corso degli anni. It took a damn amount of effort to learn, though. Speaking of learning, I'm sorry, but I failed to know your name."
She scratches her hair sheepishly, "Yeah, that's my bad. My name is-"
"Alex!" shouted another female voice from behind me. One that I already recognize.
"No, that's my name." I say jokingly before Gwen approaches me from my side and grabs my arm.
"There you are, I don't have much time on my break, and we need to talk now." she then faces the young girl I was talking to earlier. "I'm sorry, but I need to take Alex away for a bit, maybe more, depending on how this goes. You have fun now." Not giving me a chance to protest, she drags me a little bit further away from everyone else.
"W-wait, Gwen, would you stop pulling me? Ugh, sorry about all of that; I'll talk to you later. Okay?" I tell the unnamed girl while being pulled along by Gwen's deceiving strength.
"Uhh, yeah, that's cool, I guess." She awkwardly said before going back to counting the possible radioactive spiders. Gwen took me only a short distance from where I was, just toward another corner.
"Alright, Gwen, what do you want to talk about?" I asked, even though I knew exactly what she wanted to talk about.
" I just wanted to know if you were right. You know, after that fight."
I pause, "...No."
"So, do you want to talk about it?"
I pause again, "...No." upon saying this, Gwen gave me her infamous look that could make both Peter and Harry crack.
"Alexander Benjamin Parker." Oh, full name as well; she means business. Sadly, for her, so was I.
"I said no, Gwendolyn Stacy; why are you even asking me? I'm sure you heard everything that happened as well as the whole class." she then dropped her look, then sighed.
"I did; I haven't heard you guys fight that seriously in a long time. You don't like Oscorp that much, do you?"
"I just don't trust them and have my reasons too."
"I see, and you expect someone to take your word on that alone. Alex, I know you will never lie to us, and I trust you but trust me and believe me, you want two different things. You have to understand that this internship is essential for Peter and I. it allows us to make a difference in the world, especially for Peter since he always wanted that. Aren't you happy for us?." Gwen said, giving me a sincere expression.
*sigh* "I am Gwen, truly I am; I'm just worried about the two of you. I care how about you guys a lot, and I don't want to see you get hurt." She smiled at that.
"Thanks, Alex, and I'll take your words and consideration. But you don't have to worry too much. Who knows, you might be wrong. all I'm saying is to not worry about such little things like that, okay?" Gwen said with concern; though I know I was right, I couldn't say no to that face. I nodded back.
"So, you think I'm in the wrong, huh?"
She gave me a koi smirk, "Yep, you both were. Don't worry; I will talk to Peter about this later. What he said to you was completely out of line."
"Yeah, I-I wouldn't worry about him too much. As much of an asshole as he might be, he's still my brother. I know him better than anyone, and he will learn responsibility soon-" 'What's on my neck?'
*shink*
Pain, a sharp pain, was all I felt coming from the back of my neck. It was like someone threw a dart and stabbed it at me. The pain was so quick and sudden that I had no time to cry out, only managing a *hiss*. My hand moved on instinct, feeling where the pain came from. I thought I had knocked something off of me, so I searched my surroundings for whatever caused it. That's when I saw it...
"Nooo..."
A tiny black, red, and yellow spider skittering on the ground toward where the spider cage is. I went over to pick it up or stop it, only to find my steps becoming uneasy. My head started to hurt as my vision began to spin.
"Alex, are you okay? What's wrong with you?" I hear Gwen next to me, asking me questions, but everything she says only becomes further and echoey as the seconds pass. I looked at Peter and saw him talking happily with Dr. Conners—not clutching his hand. No spider bit.
"Nooo...Nooo...Nooo," I manage to say. 'This...can't...be...real., This...can't...be...happening.' I look at my hands, feeling something go through me as form neck to my whole body starts to burn. The veins in my arms slowly became visible as it was pumping with blood. This was so...painful. I looked over at Gwen as my body felt weaker than ever.
"G-Gwen,"
Even with everything I was going through, I couldn't help but smile at the irony of what I was about to say.
"I don't feel so good."
The last thing I heard was Gwen shouting my name and a cry of sharp pain off in the distance before everything went black.
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