Twice Bitten
The school bus rumbles to a stop under the imposing shadow of the Oscorp. Glowing purple letters line the side of the building, the students filtering out of the vehicle, gathering in a huddled circle outside the building. Their science teacher, Mr. Warren, clears his throat gathering, his assistants doing a headcount, flashing a thumbs up to the middle-aged man once they’re finished.
“Alright, children,” the man begins, calling the attention of the students, some listening whilst others mutter to each other in hushed tones, “Thanks to my connection to Oscorp, we have been given special permission to see the facilities.” Pausing before huffing, clearly having expected some kind of applause, Mr Warren continues, “Now, we will be going through our safety briefing. Namely, the buddy system. That’s right, pair up people.”
Looking at Harry, the pair smirk at each other. Peter reaches over to punch his best friend on the shoulder as a shadow from behind them appears, coughing, “Harry.”
Turning to face the person, Peter gulps, eyes meeting the hazel eyes of Norman Osborn as he walks through the crowd of children. Groaning, Harry begins to follow his father, his crutch clicking against the concrete. Norman leans down, next to Mr Warren's ear, whispering something, the teacher nodding in response and smiling at the class.
“Now, Harry here will be part of our tour group, so I’m afraid you’ll have to pair up with someone else, Mr Parker.”
Sighing in frustration, Peter looks around, trying to find someone else to partner with, eyes briefly glancing at Mary Jane before looking away. He doesn’t need to see her talking with her boyfriend . Honestly, he’s still a little pissed that she started dating Flash of everyone… not that he really has any reason to be upset. He never told her how he felt. Continuing his search, his eyes glance around the group; the few people he can tolerate are already partnered up with someone. Eddie with Gwen makes sense, they are dating. There goes four of his friends. Pearl is with Lonnie, Jessica with Liz, and Betty with Cindy. How is it that all of his friends are already in groups?!
“What’s wrong, Parker? Can’t find anyone? Ha! Lonely Parker,” Flash taunts, smirking as he revels in Peter being stuck on his own. The comment sticks like a knife. His class continues to utter the words ‘Lonely Parker’ and snickers whilst his friends give him sympathetic looks.
Sighing, Mr Warren turns to look at the boy, “I guess Mr Parker will-”
“Have to go with me,” Norman Osbron says, looking between his son and Peter, “After all, Peter is a family friend of ours. Come on, Peter.”
Eyes wide, he shuffles through the crowd, gulping as he shrinks under the weight of the stares, “Thank you, Mr. Osborn.”
“Don’t worry, Peter,” Norman replies, placing a hand on his shoulder, “Besides, this way you can keep Harry entertained whilst we work around. I know this place can get boring. Especially when you grow up around it.”
“It’s not that bad…” Harry mutters, averting his eyes as his dad raises an eyebrow, looking down at the boy with a wry smile.
“If you say so. Now, Mr. Warren, how about we start the tour by going to visit your sister? I’m sure your… students would love to see the work of Doctor Warren.”
“Doctor Myla Warren?! The leading genetics expert?!” Peter mutters, looking at Harry, his friend shrugging as if it’s no big deal.
“I mean, we also have Dr Curt Conners.”
“You have the Lizard working for Oscorp?!” Peter hisses, eyes wide as Harry chuckles.
“Yeah, Dad believes in second chances. Besides, Dr Conners didn’t mean to do all the things he did as the Lizard and keeps antiserum on him and in his lab in case he turns back. It’s not that big of deal, especially considering he’s one of the best biochemists.”
Peter blinks rapidly, processing the words as Norman finishes his explanation and rules to the rest of the class, turning and smiling at the boys, “I heard from Harry that you’re also very interested in biology. If you can help during the interactive sections of today's tour, maybe we can organise an apprenticeship.”
“That would be amazing, Mr. Osbron!”
“Just remember, Peter, you must be exceptional for that to happen. After all, with great power comes great respect.”
“Oh, right! Thank you.”
“Mr. Parker,” his science teacher calls out, “Please make sure you’re taking pictures as we start our tour. You are here as part of the school's newspaper as well.” Nodding as he aims the camera up at the Oscorp building, Peter misses the raised eyebrow and smirk on the face of the chocolate-skinned man he was talking to before.
Looking at the photo with a satisfied nod, Peter begins following Norman and Harry, the older of the two dark skinned men talking aimlessly about the tour. Scanning a card as they file through the security of the building, the guards scan the objects and people.
“You can’t bring the camera ins-”
“It’s alright, Terrance,” Norman says, cutting off the guard as Peter tries to enter, “He’s not going to share anything that isn’t already public after all.”
Giving a curt nod, the large, burly, blonde guard that Peter thought must have been Flash’s father motions for Peter to walk through. Following the instruction, Peter shuffles through the metal detector, standing next to Harry.
“So, I guess this means we won’t be seeing any prototypes or experiments then.”
Giving his friend a side eye, Harry raises his eyebrow, “You wanted to see some?”
“I would sacrifice my camera for the chance.”
“Alright, alright. I’ll talk to Dad to see if we can, uh… sneak off during lunch to go see some of the more experimental stuff we’ve been working on.”
“You don’t have to Ha-”
“Nah, I think we both know you’re gifted, Pete. Heck, seeing some of these experiments will probably lead to a breakthrough, so don’t thank me when I’m doing this for selfish reasons,” Harry responds, using his crutch to walk over to his Dad. The pair have a hushed conversation, the occasional glance thrown Peter’s way as he wonders what they’re talking about. Watching the smile on the older Osborn’s face growing wider, Peter assumes the news is good. Maybe not. Honestly, he hadn’t met Mr. Osborn before. He’s normally too busy, so when Peter has hung out with Harry, it had only been the pair of them. Well, and the security guards. Watching as his friend flashes him a thumbs up, Peter grins. Today might actually be going his way for a change.
“Now that we’re all scanned and safe to enter the building, I would like to formally introduce you to Oscorp, home of innovation and the exceptional. Today, we will be showing you our leading research in plant genetics, where we are working on creating new plants that can resist harsh climates.” Walking through the twisting, pristine halls, the plant-lined walls glimmering, Norman leads the group of students to a glass room. “Doctor Warren, our lead geneticist, is just through these doors. We have various plants incubating here, although I don’t know the specifics too well myself,” Norman scans his card against a black tablet as he opens the door to the room, “However, I’m sure Doctor Warren would be more than willing to discuss these details with you.”
The room is bright. Lights flickering above walls of planters and benches, the room smells of nothing, like all humidity has been sucked out of the room. A tall, wirey woman looks over at the open door, her hand still trailing across the leaf of the plant in her hand.
“Oh, Norman! I almost forgot that we had this today!” Turning to look at the students, the woman pulls her goggles off of her head, placing them on her pushy hair. “Please excuse the frizzled hair. Low humidity doesn’t agree with it. Now, who’s ready to learn about the genetic traits of these plants?”
The lecture that follows is long, and students in the class have their eyes glaze over as they blank out. Peter moves around the room, following Doctor Warren as she continues her explanation to Peter, seeming to sense he’s the only one in the room actually paying attention. His camera moves, taking pictures of various leaves and patterns, his hands flying over his notepad as he writes notes on the different compositions of the plants.
“-and so, these plants are using cacti genetics to store and collect water for longer periods and thus produce grains!”
“Really?”
“Well, in theory. The problem, as you can probably see,” she continues, hands running through the green grain growing in one of the planters in front of them, “is the additional water content increases the density of the plant, resulting in an increased amount of hollow and useless material upon harvest.”
“So the actual output is lower than what it needs to be.”
“Exactly! Doctor Foster and I have been working on it, but we haven’t had much luck.”
Pausing his pen, Peter uses the object to scratch his chin, focusing on the problem as he begins doing mental gymnastics, “How about aloe vera?”
“Aloe vera?”
“Yeah, aloe vera stores and compartmentalises water into a gel-like substance that can be eaten. Theoretically, if you could combine and hybridize the traits of aloe with prickly pear inside the grain, you could harvest the flesh of the plant whist drying out the seeds and husks for use in flours.”
“I see… plus, if we increase the flame repellent properties of the aloe vera…” Doctor Warren mutters.
“You also reduce the risk of the plants burning. Plus, if you use the aloe vera as more of a base for the grain, it can be grown all year, and you just have to break off ‘leaves’ when you want to eat it and dry out the leaves. It also increases the amount of seeds and husk producable, and you can use the water stored in the leaves to make bread which-”
“You’re a genius.”
Peter blinks, the words leaving the woman's mouth louder and unexpected. The class seems to stir at the words, blinking and looking around as if they’ve just woken up. Someone begins clapping, and soon the room is filled with applause as Peter stares wide-eyed at this class. His face flushes, and he looks away, not used to the positive attention.
“So, I can assume, Mr Parker has-”
“Norman, we need to bring this boy into the company.”
“All in time, Myla. Now, I think that’s enough of that,” Norman says, looking at the slightly bored and dazed faces of the students. Looking down at his watch, he opens his mouth, about to say something, when a man, his green eyes scanning the room, rushes over and begins whispering something into Norman’s ear before turning to Doctor Warren and repeating the motion. The expressions on the two peoples' faces go dark as they glance at each other. “I believe that now would be a good time for lunch. Harry, would you be kind enough to guide your classmates to the cafeteria?”
“But what about-”
“We can do that after. Something urgent just happened, and I believe Doctor Warren and I will need to attend to it. Please, Harry.”
Nodding in defeat, Harry sighs, quickly pushing through the crowd towards the door, “C’mon. Cafeteria is this way.” Leading the group through the halls of the building, Harry shoves open the door to the cafeteria. It’s sterile. Militantly scrubbed clean with tiled floors and blaring white light. The sprawling food trays are stacked high with various dishes as the students fan out, finding their places at the various tables as they break into groups with the food. Spices and scents burn Peter’s nostrils as he begins to move towards the food before his wrist is grabbed.
“Wha-?”
“Come on, we’re going to go look at something cool,” Harry says, flashing a security card as his eyes dart around to see if there's anyone watching, “Let’s go. In and out, ten minutes tops.”
Groaning, Peter looks between the food and the excitement on his friend’s face before relenting, “Okay, okay. Where are we heading?” he asks as they push through the door, silently treading out of the cafeteria and through the halls of Oscorp.
“Relax. I know how much you like spiders so I asked Dad to give us permission to look at these rare spiders they’ve found in the Amazon. Said something about looking at them because of Roxxon or something. Apparently, these spiders can produce a toxin potent enough to temporarily paralyze animals as large as an elephant without having an effect on humans!”
“Whoa, really?! That’s a huge scientific breakthrough!”
“Yeah. I don’t really know much else about them, but they also seem pretty docile. I think someone was saying they act a bit like dogs.”
“Huh?!”
“Well, come see for yourself,” Harry says, swiping his card on a blacked-out door, the room opening as the pair of boys squeeze into the room. Terrariums line the walls, a collection of various spiders lining the area as Peter walks over examining the varieties of aracnids, “Didn’t you say you were working on some kind of silk styled polymer?”
“Oh! Yeah, I was trying to reverse engineer Spider-Man’s webs. Just to see if it was possible to improve them, you know?”
“Hmm… I don’t think that it’s very healthy of you to be studying, Spidey. You might get abducted by some weird villain.”
Walking over acoss the room to where Harry is standing looking into a terrariums which Peter assumes contains one of the spiders. Leaning down, he frowns at the empty container, “That’s not normal, right?”
“Nope, and now I know what Dad’s dealing with,” Harry says, sighing as he places the terrarium back before pointing to another terrarium above it, “There’s a couple others as well, but if one of them gets out and it happens to be a female…”
“It could cause problems for the ecosystem. That’s bad, Harry,” Peter mutters, observing the spiders in the other container, “Ah!” he yelps, a sharp bite on his neck causing him to flinch as he reaches for the back of his neck.
Pulling his hand back, Peter watches as the spider, an iridescent blue over a reddish-brown, scuttles across his hand. The eyes of the arachnid studying Peter’s face as it seems to apologize to him.
“What’s wron-? Oh. Looks like you found the spider.”
“Yeah, I think… did it just… but they’re meant to be docile…”
Frowning, Harry slowly opens the lid to the terrarium, holding it up to the spider, letting the creature climb back into its container before placing it back, “You feeling good? I know I said the whole thing about-”
“I don’t know where it is! We don’t have a tracker on the- Harry?” Doctor Warren says, entering the room with Norman as they look at the boys.
“Uh, so we found one of those rare Amazon orb-weaving spiders that you were talking about on the way to the cafeteria. We caught it and just putting it back,” Harry lies, casually, looking confident as Peter straightens up and clears his throat.
“You found it? Where was it?”
“Just outside the cafeteria. It was crawling down from the ceiling to the door,” Peter chimes in.
“I see,” Norman says, sighing as he pinches the bridge of his nose, “It must have been hungry. Myla, please increase the amount of food it receives. We don’t need a repeat of this incident.”
“Absolutely, Mr Osborn.”
“Now, you two, I’m assuming you also enjoyed looking at the spiders, but you two are growing boys. Let’s go back to the cafeteria and get you two something to eat.” Following the man as he ushers them out of the room, the pair head back into the cafeteria, grabbing large trays of food, which they promptly shovel into their mouths.
Clapping his hands to gather the attention of the students and staff, Norman looks around the room. As he turns, Peter and Harry glance at the older man, his eyes gleaming as he begins addressing the room, “Now, I hope you’ve enjoyed your food. We will continue with the tour of the facilities. How about something a little more exciting? We have some-”
Peter coughs, gagging as his hand reaches for his mouth. The heads in the room turn to look at him.
“Are you okay, Pete?” Harry asks as he reaches over to touch his friend on the shoulder.
Shaking his head, the brunette goes to open his mouth before gagging again, a horrible mixed metallic taste in his mouth, “Bathroom.”
“Down the hall on the lef-”
Bolting out of the room, Peter charges towards the bathroom. Flinging open the door, Peter rushes to a toilet, opening the stall door before locking it. Violently lurching over the porcelain throne, Peter begins heaving, his entire body shuddering as blood, litres, maybe gallons, spill out of his mouth. The basin is filled with a sickly sweet scent of metal painted red, and Peter feels the contents of his stomach churn and burn. Gagging at the violent sight of his blood spilled into the toilet, Peter vomits, adding to the putrid mixture as he flushes the toilet and starts shaking against the tiled floor. His head pounds, his heartbeat seeming infinitely louder than it should be as he breaks out in a cold sweat. Wiping the blood from his face, Peter slowly stands, legs shaking as he grips the door handle before a knock on the door startles him.
“You okay, Peter?” Harry asks, his voice laced with concern as he hears Peter slam his head against the door.
“I don’t… something didn’t agree with me, I think. I just coughed up blood.”
“What?! You need to go see a-”
“No, it’s okay, Harry. It was just a little,” Peter replies, cutting off his friend as he shakes, thinking about how full the toilet had been with his blood, “I just need to rest. You think you can tell Mr. Warren and maybe call May? Just tell her I was sick.”
“...If you’re sure you’re okay, Pete… I’ll be back in five. Just hang tight,” Harry responds, his crutch slowly clicking out of the bathroom as he opens the door, the restroom door clicking shut behind him.
Peter groans, pulling open the door as he walks to the mirror, staring at the pale and hollow face that greets him. Touching his face, Peter sighs, looking at the blood covering him as he turns on the tap and begins cleaning his face, the blood and vomit caked onto it dying the sink in a putrid mix of brown and red.
“What's happening to you now, Pete?” he mumbles to himself as he stumbles to the door and pushes it open. Walking down the corridors, he absentmindedly follows Harry, the boy having called out to him after seeing him exit the restroom.
His mind is hazy as he steps down, and he feels a pair of arms thrown around him as he looks up. The worried face of Aunt May and Uncle Ben saying something to him that he can’t quite understand. Gripping his head, Peter's mind swirls, hundreds of thoughts suddenly seeming to be appearing in his mind. Grunting, Peter falls to the floor, the world around him blurring. In the distance, he can hear faint shouting. His skin burns, muscles searingly hot. His breath catches, his heart and mind racing with dizzying thoughts.
He closes his eyes, the world drifts into darkness, and Peter rests.