Variant Strain

- - -

The tide of rage that had driven Peter to finish Brian off had receded just a fraction of a second too late for him to stop himself.

He watched with sickened fascination as the rest of the Rhino's immense body collapse in on itself and he could feel himself taking control of its twitching arms and legs for just a moment before those extremities erupted into flailing feeding tendrils that began folding into themselves and collapsing upwards into the torso. He could actually feel a set of tendrils firmly clamped onto the Rhino's spine, spreading up and down it's body like a cold wave.

The screaming from somewhere else was louder... no.

Sirens. Those were sirens.

Oh. Wait... there were screams too.

The process had gone too far for Peter to stop himself. It usually occurred far faster than this... far less... intimately. But it was just so huge. There was so much to consume and it was all resisting. Every inch of it. Peter could feel his tendrils reuniting with his hand in some way that made him feel that his right hand was somehow attached to his left wrist for just a moment.

He fought to stop, but it was futile. Instinct and that gnawing hunger demanded everything. He hadn't done enough damage to its brain, and while he knew and understood consciously what that could mean, the strange urges of his body didn't care and reveled the chance to indulge in such a huge meal.

He stared, unable to look away as tendrils erupted through the skin of the Rhino's skull, the horn began to collapse in on itself and he could do nothing but brace himself for what happened next.

The holding cell in the Forest Hills police station. A roiling, festering anger marinated in a half a bottle of Jack Daniels. He was going to make them all pay. That cop. The kid. And especially the dirty, little whore daughter of his and that filthy whore Anna--

-- filthy place. Rats all over. The rest of the scum in here passed out. Weak, stupid drunks. Can't hold their liquor--

-- why the hell was that cop just sitting there staring off into space? Couldn't he hear me shouting over here?! The rat--

-- Oh God. how did I fall this low?--

-- not passing out. Stronger than all of you. Screw you, rat. He was going to sue the damn city for the rat bite. Rabid little piece of crap. Not going to pass out. Not drunk. Screw you, weakass drunks. This was all Mary Jane's fault. He was gonna get out of here and show that little whore--

"I don't know what's going on, but the Old Man just up and left the city an hour ago and it just seems suspiciou--"

-- going to take Mary Jane out of town before whatever it is happe--

-- stupid... filthy... so soft... dirty... disgusting... making me angry. Her fault for being so... for making me do tha--

"You're an alcoholic, Bri. You need to get help."

-- should be stronger than this. Have to be stronger. Can't--

-- God, she looks so much like Anna. I need a drink--

"No officer, she just left me. Let me know if she does turn up so I can give her the divorce papers."

"I know someone, Bri. We can make this go away. Calm down and don't touch the body."

-- why does she keep making me angry?! WHY?!

-- all her fault! Why is she--?

"Madeline looks just like your sister, doesn't she?"

"I now pronounce you--"

"We can't, Brian! It has to stop! If mom and dad find ou--"

"But I love you--!"

Peter let out an explosive, convulsive breath and he fell to his knees, shaking. He didn't want those memories. He didn't want Brian Watson's memories in his head. His damned life. He didn't want to know. He didn't want to understand him. Didn't want to sympathize with him.

He hated the animal. The damned, filthy drunken animal.

Brian Watson hadn't been able to think clearly... addled by the Syetsevich strain of Hydra that had altered his body and the alcohol... but his mind had been almost intact. His rage and will had somehow insulated his mind from the effects. It had probably been a short term effect. If it had lasted long enough, the infection would have fully claimed his mind.

Being crazy helps fight it off, Cletus confirmed and there was a vague murmur of agreement in his mind from other sources. Why else d'you think they offered to test on me?

What the hell does that say about me, then? Peter asked himself.

Except now... Peter had consumed Brian Watson before his mind could fully fragment. Alcohol soaked though they might have been, enough of him lingered to understand the man.

He didn't want to. He couldn't bear to.

He needed to be able to hold on to the thought that he'd just killed an irredeemable monster.

Doesn't matter, the Hunter's blunt voice rang through his head. Some things need killing.

He pitched forward, shuddering and convulsing onto his hands. Hands, a detached and clinical part of himself, maybe even the part that does all the math, pointed it out. Two. Two hands. See? One. Two.

That was something at least.

His stomach heaved and he vomited out red and gray chunks.

When he'd been able to lift his head again he saw MJ beginning to run out of the house to him. Another shudder ran through his body as her delicious scent hit him like a sledgehammer between the eyes. Then almost right behind her... Anna's scent.

He sort of started to rise then, but he caught sight of his reflection, warped slightly by the curve of a car's windshield. Every strain he'd consumed had given him some new structure. Some new advantage. Trackers, like Cletus and Donna had givn him senses, strength and speed. The Vulture had given him talons and the mass-shifting. The Hunters had given him claws. The change from the Rhino was visible as a red glow pulsing through the back of his jacket. There was something starting from between his shoulder blades and extending halfway down his back that looked like an elongated number '8'. Extending out from it were thickly glowing red veins like the Rhino had had in its limbs. He guessed it had probably had the same structure within its body, but its glow had been burried under the thick hide.

It looked vaguely spider-like and the glow pulsed in time with his heart beat.

He was beginning to shakily get to his feet when hammerblows slammed into his chest in three places. He grunted and staggered back from the impacts, managing just barely to keep on his feet as the full awareness of what was happening struck him.

At the end of the street was an armored personnel carrier. Men in the bright yellow hazmat uniforms had deployed around it and were shooting at him. In the air were two attack helicopters. Those were playing spotter for the soldiers on the ground, but the missiles attached to it that he could see were probably originally meant for the Rhino.

But he gathered they would be quite happy to use them on him if he gave them an opportunity to do so..

Anna Watson darted out of the house and hurriedly pulled MJ back inside and Peter was sure Aunt May had been the one slamming the door shut. Good. A little cover was better than nothing.

Bullets filled the air and Peter was very glad that his outermost layer of 'clothes' was something like kevlar, so they weren't quite making their neat little holes in him, but they hurt.

Newly absorbed reflexes kicked in before he could control himself. He bellowed and stooped down, grabbing hold of the undercarriage of the car next to him with both hands.

His body flooded with heat, but unlike before when it rushed out of him in an uncontrolled flare, now it centered across his back and arms and legs. Tightly controlled. More focused. It flooded out of him and into the car at the point of contact.

At the last moment, he realized what he was about to do and boggled.

Sure they were shooting at him, but he had to admit... he did look quite menacing. They were just doing their job and he didn't want to hurt them. He certainly didn't want to kill anyone.

Unfortunately the Rhino's reflexes hadn't quite yet gotten in on the party line. With an explosion of movement, he lifted the car up and over his head. He caught himself just before those reflexes telling him to throw it could fully kick in.

So he stood there, bullets buzzing past him and occasionally thumping hard into his body, holding a car up over his head feeling vaguely embarrassed that he was doing so and simultaneously marveling at the fact that he was in fact holding a car over his head.

It was easy. Over two tons of weight resting on his upraised hands and it was taking almost no effort at all. If he had to he could have held it up there all day. It didn't feel so much heavy as just awkward. Like the whole thing had been built out of styrofoam. He'd been expecting the feat to chew through his stored bio-mass furiously, but there hadn't been any loss at all that he could feel.

He hurriedly glanced up and saw with some relief that it was not, in fact, Aunt May's car.

The move of lifting that car did register with the Thunderbolts and a few of them began to run away from the parked APC.

Everyone was clearly expecting him to throw the car.

Now he was starting to feel just a little bit more embarrassed that he wasn't doing it. Like he was disappointing their expectations. Then again, that's what the Rhino would have done. Mindless aggression. He slammed the car back down on its side, using it as an impromptu barricade to keep the bullets off of him.

Not that it would've stopped the helicopters... so he did the best thing he could think of that would let him avoid having to hurt anyone defending himself.

He ran.

- - -

Knowing the neighborhood gave him a significant advantage. Adding in his speed, mobility and the ability to climb up sheer surfaces... it gave him a considerable number of options that the average person in a chase against helicopters did not have.

He ducked and dodged between houses, between buildings until he finally got to a spot... the make out spot... where he'd simply assumed another form. Donna's form now. In a distinctive bright red flannel top and within a few minutes the helicopters began moving away. The spider shape on his back was gone as well. They were looking for a tall man in a black hoodie, not a woman of average height wearing bright red.

He leaned against the alley wall and panted. He wasn't exactly winded, but he still felt drained by the fight and the chase. The buzz of adrenaline had cleared his mind of extraneous thoughts.

Just running flat out, dodging his pursuers had been... fun.

His smartphone chimed suddenly and he startled, his form blurring for a moment, prepared to fight again... until he realized what it was and fished the phone back out of his pocket. He assumed it went inside him somehow when he wasn't using it... which probably accounted for how well it survived the fights he'd been in.

It was a text message. Actually several text messages one after the other all from the same anonymous source.

"Get clear of the police station before the Thunderbolts arrive. Call me. -Hank."

"They caught sight of you. Get clear. Call me. -Hank."

"How did you stop a Syetsevich? Get clear. Call me. -Hank."

"They've lost you. Call me. -Hank."

The time stamps on the messages matched up to the start of the fight with the Rhino, around the time he'd been running after it, the moment when the Thunderbolts and their helicopters started after him... and finally now.

Whoever 'Hank' was... he had some way of tracking him. He frowned, that didn't seem right. Hank wasn't monitoring him. It seemed more likely he was tracking the Thunderbolts. Well... and possibly the GPS signal from his phone.

That was bad. He stared at his phone for a long moment and considered shutting it down... when it began to ring, startling him once more.

He muttered, "I do not need any more surprises today."

MJ's number. He sighed with relief that she was probably okay and answered.

"Peter?" Her taut, worried voice came across. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine. I lost the helicopters." He answered, trying for nonchalant, but ending up with simply sounding tired.

"Oh, god. I was so worried. Your Aunt May's freaking out." MJ replied quietly. "She thinks you were out on the street when that thing was rampaging."

Peter smiled slightly, "Well, I was..."

"We should probably not tell her that." MJ said confidentially. Her voice sounded slightly more amused now, but it was still tightly controlled. "I'm going to pass the phone to her in a minute. Tell her you were at the library. That's far enough from what happened and she'll believe that."

"Uh... sure."

"Also make sure to tell her everything's fine and you don't know what's going on. Got it?" MJ continued briskly. "I'll fill in everything else and tell her you told me when I called you."

"Yes. Got it." Peter had to admit to himself that she was the expert when it came to this sort of thing. He could barely come up with anything plausible on his own. And he certainly didn't have the practice she had. He blinked as he realized she'd paused before continuing.

"Peter?" The tension had drained from her voice. It was a small thing. Tentative. She sounded so young and vulnerable... "That thing. The big thing that you killed in front of the house?"

Peter licked his lips, finding them suddenly dry again. His mouth felt dry. Her tone worried him. "Yeah?"

"Was that him?" She asked softly. "Was that thing my dad? It kept saying my name."

He swallowed and replied. "What was left of him... after the Hydra was done changing him, yes. I--" He didn't know what to say next. That had been her father. He'd just shot and eaten him in front of her and... how did you apologize for something like that? How was that going to affect her already fragile psyche? He hesitated and would have spoken, but she cut him off.

Her voice broke. "Thank you."

"MJ, wha--"

"I told you you didn't have to, but you did it for me." Her voice, tiny again. Relieved. Painfully, achingly relieved. It almost sounded like something had broken inside her.

"But--"

She continued, her voice still small, gentle and tender. Almost loving. He wasn't sure how else to describe it. "You didn't have to lure him there to let me watch. I would've taken your word for it... but you knew I wanted to see it, didn't you? You just knew I wanted to watch him die."

He swallowed nervously.

"I don't think I've ever met anyone who understood me like you do." She continued quietly. Sweetly.

He replied nervously, "Well... I..."

"I love you, Peter Parker." She whispered. She choked a little... he wasn't sure, but he guessed she was crying.

Something fierce and wild rose up in his chest. It had no words behind it, just raw emotion. Savage and hungry possessiveness.

Something that roared up and snarled wordlessly proclaiming, "Mine."

He shuddered, trying to fight it down and reply, but it choked off his speech, strangling him with the raw, aching need in it.

Her voice shifted suddenly, friendly, but businesslike. "I'll hand you over to Aunt May. She'll feel a lot better.

"Sure." He managed weakly.

"Peter?" Aunt May's voice came from the phone a second later. Her voice raw and worried. "Peter, are you alright?"

"Yes, Aunt May. I'm at... uh... I'm at the library. What's going on?" He wasn't sure if he was convincing, but her own worry and panic were making it simpler than usual. He hated that... but hating himself for lying to Aunt May was actually easier to deal with than

There was a sigh of relief from the other end of the line, but her voice still had that edge of panic to it. "There's been another incident. Some kind of brawl right in front of the house and people with guns. I think they're cordoning off the street. There's men in beekeeper uniforms telling everyone to stay in their houses. There's some kind of terrorists and they're telling us there might be some sort of airborne bioweapon."

"Oh. Oh, man, Aunt May--" Peter began to say, then added, "Are you guys okay?"

Aunt May's voice firmed a little, obviously trying to project confidence for his sake. "We're fine... but you probably should stay away until they're done with the decontamination. It shouldn't take more than a few hours they said. Just stay at the library until then, alright? If it takes longer, just stay at the Starbucks, but call me, alright?"

"I will, Aunt May." Peter replied.

"Good." Despite her worry, her voice turned just a tiny bit sly, "So... MJ has your number, does she?"

Peter sputtered.

"I love you, Peter. Be careful, alright?"

He only hesitated for a second, teenaged embarrassment warred with the surge of honest emotion at her words. "I love you too, Aunt May." Peter said weakly, guilt suddenly surging through his mind. This was his fault. Now she was caught up in this and so were all their neighbors.

She hung up.

Another text message chimed. This time he didn't startle.

It read: "They are safe. For now. Please call. -Hank."

The words "For now." seemed particularly ominous. Just as ominous as the realization that whoever Hank was, he was eavesdropping on Peter's calls.

He tapped Hank's number into his phone, fighting the chill of fear creeping up his spine. He didn't bother using the untraceable pre-paid. There just didn't seem to be a point.

The line clicked on and a synthetic woman's voice... one of those automated attendants began speaking.

"Hello and welcome to Oscorp LLC. Please wait a moment while we direct your call."

Oscorp. The people who controlled Gentek.

Hank worked for Oscorp.

Peter licked his lips nervously while classical music played through the speaker.

"Hello, Peter." The voice that came on was male, with a Mid-western accent and... there was a strangeness to how it spoke.

"Hello, Hank." Peter replied carefully. "Who are you?"

"I was a friend of your mother's." The voice replied. On the longer sentence it was obvious. The words had been chopped up and strung together. It was synthesized.

"This isn't your real voice." Peter said accusingly.

"It is the only voice I have, Peter." It replied. "This line isn't secure. With your permission, I'd like to push an application to your phone to give us a secure connection.

Peter sighed. He'd already come this far... "Go ahead."

There was a small chime from the phone and a small pop-up for a program asked if he wanted to proceed with a software upgrade.

"So just hit Yes?"

"Yes." Then the call disconnected.

Peter did so and the process took far less time than he expected. The phone's display changed visibly. Peter's messy sprawl of icons and rather generic background were gone. Replaced with a very hi-tech looking design that prominently featured the words: "UltronMobileOS"

Another small window opened and an animated image of a man's face opened its eyes. It smiled and from the phone's speaker the same synthetic voice spoke. "Hello, Peter. It's good to finally meet you."

Peter stared. He recognized the face. "You're Henry Pym."

"Guilty as charged." The synthetic voice replied, managing to sound amused. "And you're Mary's little boy. I admit, I hadn't expected that."

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