The Hunter
It was a Kraven who found them. After three blissful days at the motel, the war for the multiverse had come knocking in the form of a strange gas grenade thrown through the window of Miles’ room. Awoken by his Spider-Sense, Miles had, in a single fluid motion, gotten out of bed, leaped through the door to his room, and ran down the hall waking up the other spiders. They were all awake already, of course, from their own spider-senses. It was a strange phenomenon that the Scientists at the Spider-Society had yet to make sense of, the way that certain particularly close Spider-People’s spider-senses had begun to occasionally detect when each OTHER were in danger, rather than just themselves. Regardless of how it happened, Miles was extremely grateful for it.
In some ways, this Kraven was not particularly unique from any other. The lion face vest, the gaudy fur collar, the physique that immediately communicated “I spend every minute that I’m not hunting doing pushups”, it was all there. But there was something else too, a kind of self-assuredness that could be felt in every movement he made. This was a Kraven who knew exactly what he was, and that only made him more dangerous.
It was Pavitr, who had never met a Kraven before, that got the first look at him. He shot him with a web, and tried to pull him away from Miles, but Kraven stood his ground and grabbed the web, using it to fling Pavitr into Miles, knocking them both over.
“Mr. Osborn would probably prefer that I torture you for information on the rest of the Spider-Society. But there’s so many of you kids, what difference does two make,” Kraven said with a laugh that was really more like a snarl. He pulled out one of a pair of spears in an x on his back and pointed it towards Miles and Pavitr, who were beginning to pick themselves up.
“I hear some of my, shall we say, “contemporaries” wouldn’t kill an enemy while they were down. But I don’t delude myself with such fallacies as honor” the hunter continued. Just as he finished his spiel, the door across from him swung open and he was blasted by a sonic wave straight off the second floor and into the parking lot below.
“Neither do I” said Hobie, gripping his guitar, the source of the sonic wave.
“Seriously man, you just got out of bed, how are you already dropping the coolest one liner of the day?” Pavitr exclaimed. Miles had injured his leg in their tumble, and was leaning against him
“I was totally going to make that one liner, I just didn’t have time” Miles said quickly.
“And I’m sure it would have been totally awesome,” Gwen said sarcastically, walking out of her room decked out in full Spider-Woman costume.
“Guys, what’s going on?” Margo said as she also walked out of her room, still in her regular sleeping clothes and clearly not totally awake. Her lack of a Spider-Sense had apparently left her unaware of the fight going on outside her doors. It also left her unaware as Kraven ripped the door off of a car in the parking lot and hurled it in her direction. Though everyone’s Spider-Sense went off, Gwen was the first to jump forward and grab the hunk of metal before it could hit Margo.
“A CAR DOOR? SERIOUSLY DUDE?” Margo yelled down at Kraven. Hobie and Pavitr swung down to him to continue the fight. Miles ran past Margo and Gwen to get the Web-Shooters he left in his room, but before he could, Margo grabbed his arm. He felt a snapping sound, familiar but new, and when he looked down at his wrist he saw a Web-Shooter. Not his own, but apparently one of Margo’s own constructions.
“How long have you been working on this?” Miles asked, stunned.
“Since the day I joined the Spider-Society” she answered with a smile, snapping the second one onto his other wrist. Their eyes met, and Miles couldn’t help but think that this was exactly the sort of thing the Spider-Society should have been about all along. He swung down to the parking lot to join the fight.
“My computer is back in my room, if I get it I can disable any cameras around that could catch this fight. If versions of the five of us exist in this universe, we can’t let this fight screw things up for them” Margo explained to Gwen.
“Agreed,” Gwen answered, and then swung down to the Parking lot as well. Margo looked down for a brief moment at the fight in the lot, at each Spider expertly maneuvering around Kraven, no one strategy quite like the others, yet all of them unified. It's like a dance, Margo realized, and she had her part to play. She headed for her computer, and logged on.
As Gwen evaded Kraven’s attacks and waited for the perfect opportunity to make her own, she couldn’t help but think about how fun it had seemed to have powers when she first got them. More than anything, she had loved the feeling of swinging on her webs, of that single moment when she’d released one strand but hadn’t made the next, when all the blood rushed to her head and she didn’t have to think about anything. Now here she was, the weight of the multiverse on her shoulders and a guy with lion eyes over his nipples trying to murder her. Maybe she was thinking a little too much, because Kraven managed to grab her by the throat and pin her to the ground.
“I’ve heard Mr. Osborn talking, you know” Kraven began with a sickening note of satisfaction in his voice “he’s got big plans for you” Gwen felt a chill go down her spine at these words, and for a moment she froze over. But once that moment was over, she remembered she was the one here with super strength, and she kneed Kraven in the middle of his stomach. The wind was knocked out of him, and Miles, Hobie, and Pavitr pried him off of her and shove him to the ground. He recovered quickly, and stood up, preparing to go for another round. But before he could, a glowing blue-purple first clocked him right in the face, and he was down for the count. Materializing moments after her fist, the rest of Spider-Byte appeared.
“Guess he was ‘Kraven’ a knuckle sandwich, huh?” Margo exclaimed giddily, looking around for a reaction.
“Nice one” Pavitr finally answered, not able to bear the awkward silence.
“You alright?” Miles asked softly enough that only Gwen could hear. He put his arm around her as they all walked back up to their rooms. Thought the fight was won, and the team would be in another universe before the cops arrived to take in that Kraven, Gwen’s hands hadn’t stopped shaking, and Miles had noticed.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I mean, Spider-Man baseline fine, but…fine. It’s just something Kraven said” she answered, not quite looking at Miles.
“What kind of something?” he asked, concerned.
“Just…just generic villain threats. Nothing special.” at that, she closed her eyes, and focused on making her hands stop shaking. It worked, but Miles still pulled her in a little closer. She rested her head against his shoulder, and smiled. A tired smile, to be sure, but a smile nonetheless.