Tangled Web - 3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

::Danger Room::

*****

I stared at him blankly for a few minutes.

“Ben Reilly?” I asked.

He nodded, giving me a strange look.

“Your dad is Ben Reilly?” I asked him again.

“Yes,” he said a little impatiently. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Your dad is Ben Reilly!” I said just as impatiently, as if that explained everything.

He bent down and scooped up his photo album. “If I’d known you were gonna freak out, I wouldn’t have shown you,” he muttered.

“But your dad is Ben Reilly!” I almost yelled now. He wasn’t getting it. Probably because I wasn’t explaining anything.

He looked at me, exasperated, and threw his arms up in the air. “Yes! Yes, my dad is Ben Reilly. Now please tell me what that has to do with anything?”

I didn’t answer, but I moved over to my bag and started digging through it. After pulling out nearly all the contents, I found the picture of my dad and I at the bottom. I held it up for Peter to see.

He was looking at the underwear that was now strewn about my bed. My briefs. I usually wear boxers, but sometimes I wear briefs if I feel I need some extra support. Worse, there was a pair with cartoon superheroes on them right on the top of the pile. What can I say, I’m nerdy.

I unconsciously squeaked, sounding a bit like a mouse, and with a red face I hurriedly threw my underwear back in my bag. When I'd finished, he was looking at me with a smile on his face, and sitting closer to me than he was before.

“That was cute,” he said.

Then he kissed me.

He kissed me. Worse than that, I kissed him back. It was apparently an unconscious reaction I have to being kissed by an incredibly hot boy.

Finally, I came to my senses and pushed him back. Not too harshly, because I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. He gave me a confused look, and I picked up the picture of my father and I. I held it in front of his face.

“What the hell?” he asked, surprised. “What are you doing with a picture of my dad?”

“That’s my dad,” I told him. “Peter Parker.”

“That’s ridiculous. My dad was always faithful to my mother. He wouldn’t have some secret life with some other woman,” he said. I smacked him in the back of the head.

“That isn’t your dad. It’s two different people,” I told him.

“So wait, we’re like, cousins or something?” he asked. “My dad never mentioned having a brother.”

“Sort of, but it’s more complicated than that,” I told him. “Your dad never mentioned Peter Parker? My dad told me all about Ben Reilly.”

“Well, I knew Peter Parker is Spider-Man, but I haven’t really kept up with his life,” he said. “I mean, before today, I didn’t really have a reason to. I don't even really like the idea of being a superhero, I just wanted this school to teach me to use my powers.”

“Your dad was a clone of my dad,” I said. His face scrunched up adorably, and after a moment he looked at me as if I had two heads.

“That’s crazy!” he said.

Frustrated, I raised my hand up, middle and ring fingers pointing at my palm, and shot a web to the ceiling. I grabbed a hold of the web, and by pulling on it slightly, I used its elasticity to slingshot me into the air where I flipped and landed gracefully onto the high ceiling.

Upside down, I looked him in the eyes.

“Crazier than that?” I asked.

“Well, no, I guess not,” he said reflectively. “But still, clone?”

“It didn’t make a lot of sense to me either,” I said. “Some crazy scientist got a sample of my dad’s blood and tried to make clones of Spider-man. There were two or three other clones made before he created your dad. Apparently, the other clones weren't successful, or something. Ask my dad, he’ll go on and on for hours.”

“That’s the most confusing thing I've ever heard,” Peter said with a look of confusion on his face.

“I know, it sounds like a bad plot line from a comic book,” I agreed. I jumped down from the ceiling.

“So…does that make us…cousins, or something?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “Our dad’s are essentially the same person…what does that make us?”

“Brothers?” he said. “Half brothers? I don’t know if there’s really a term for it. I don’t suppose this situation happens everyday.”

He looked frustrated all of a sudden. His brow furrowed in concentration, and then he looked up at me.

“I think I kind of remember my dad talking about an old best friend he had,” he began. “The name might have been Peter, but I don’t remember. He told me the story when I was like ten, and worried about not having very many friends. He told me that one best friend was worth a hundred regular friends, and then he told me a little about his best friend.”

“What did he say about him?” I asked, eager to hear what he’d heard about my father.

“Not really a whole lot, just that he was brave and very noble, and always concerned about the people close to him,” he said. That sounded like my father, alright.

“Did he say why he doesn’t see him anymore?” I asked. It just didn’t make much sense to me why he would just disappear like he did.

“No, I asked, but he didn’t say much of anything to me about it,” he said.

“This is all so strange,” I said. I sat back down on the bed next to him. “Everything has changed so much in the past few days, I just don’t know what’s true anymore. What’s real and what’s fake.”

He looked over at me with sympathy. “I’m real,” he said. “And that’s the truth.”

I smiled, and looked over at him.

“That’s just it though,” I said, scrunching up my brow. “I feel like I’ll wake up tomorrow and this’ll all be a dream.”

The rest of the evening actually passed without any further instances of mind-numbingly confusing paradoxes. We decided that there was nothing we could do about it for the time being, so we were better off putting it out of our minds. So that’s exactly what we did. We sat around for the rest of the evening watching mindless entertainment in the form of hot shirtless guys on some show about surfers on TV.

I actually went to bed fairly early, which is a rare occurrence for me. But as I lay there, trying in vain to drift off into dreamland, my mind kept returning to the situation of who our fathers were. Had my father lied to me? The thought was horrible, making me actually cringe from it. I trusted my father completely. As far as I knew, we’d been nothing but honest with each other.

I finally drifted off in the wee hours of the morning, and managed to sleep well past noon. Peter woke me up and told me to get dressed.

“If you don’t get up now, all the best food will be eaten by the time we get there,” he said, hand on his hip and tapping his foot. Grumpily, I got up and threw on a red T-shirt, and a pair of fairly stylish faded jeans.

We left the room, me wiping sleep from my eyes, and proceeded down the hall toward the cafeteria. The trip was uneventful, and we made it to the cafeteria well before they stopped serving lunch. I grabbed a sandwich and an apple and followed Peter to the table we’d sat at yesterday.

Antoine and Kate were already seated, but it looked as though the others hadn't arrived yet.

“Hey Kate, hey Antoine,” Peter said, greeting his friends. They both nodded, and then looked at me.

“You okay?” Kate asked me, obviously referring to the way I’d left the cafeteria yesterday.

“Yeah,” I said timidly. “Just got a little freaked out.”

“I’ll say,” Antoine said with a grin. “For a white boy, you turned pretty pink yesterday!”

Everyone had a small chuckle at this, and as I once again turned pink, there was nothing I could do except laugh at it.

“I see you guys are embarrassing the poor lad again,” Alexandra said as she walked up to the table. “Leave him alone.”

“Thank you!” I said, still laughing. I was beginning to warm up to them. “I need someone to help me fight off these ruffians.

“Did you just say ruffians?” Peter asked me, shaking his head.

“Yes, you nincompoop,” I said, rolling with it. They looked at me for a second, then laughed at me again.

“Who pooped where?” Kyle asked as he and Josh walked up to the table.

“Benny did, and it was in your hat,” Kate said. Kyle looked at her funny.

“I don’t wear hats,” he said, still having no idea what we were talking about.

“Nevermind,” I said. “So what’s on the agenda for today?”

“Well, it’s Saturday, so it’s pretty much a free day,” Peter said. “We usually go do something in the gym, or the activities room.”

“Activities room?” I asked, clueless.

“There’s game systems set up on big screen TVs, computers you can use if you don’t have one, and a few table games,” Kate answered. She struck me as the type that preferred that to anything in the gym. I couldn’t agree with her more. “There used to be a pool table, but it needs to be replaced since Gigantor broke it.”

“Gigantor?” I asked, laughing. “Is that some kind of nickname or something?”

“Oh, no,” Kate said. “It’s her code name.”

I looked confused, and they all looked at Peter.

“You forgot to tell him about the code names?” Kate, Antoine, Alexandra, Kyle, and Josh asked at the same time, incredulously.

“It slipped my mind,” Peter said, him blushing for a change. “We all have code names, as a part of our training. It’s an Xavier institute tradition, ever since the first team of X-Men that Charles Xavier put together.”

“Oh,” I said. It made sense. “So do we get to pick them?”

“Not at first,” Alexandra said. “Professor Logan tests our powers in the Danger Room, and assigns a temporary code name. Once you’ve proven yourself in the Teamwork Skills class, you get to pick one.”

“And he has a terrible sense of humor, too,” Peter said. “So don’t be surprised if your first code name sucks.”

“Okay,” I said. “So what are yours?”

“I’m Unix,” Kate said. “My mind works like a computer, it gathers information and stores them in much the same way as a hard drive does. I can easily access any memory, even tiny, insignificant ones.”

“Alchemist,” Kyle said. “I can change one substance into a similar substance. Like I could change a screwdriver into a wrench, a piece of steel into a baseball bat, etc.”

“Foresight,” Alexandra said. “I can see a few seconds into the future. Ms Frost thinks I’ll be able to extend my power, but it’ll take practice.”

“Con-Man,” Josh said.

“What’s your power?” I asked him.

“Let me have your apple,” he said. I handed it over without thinking.

“Now your watch,” once again I handed it over, only thinking it was slightly strange.

“Now take your shirt off,” he said, and immediately my hands went to the hem of my shirt and lifted it up. My mind screamed at me to stop when I had it to just below my nipples, and it felt as if it was taking all of my willpower to keep my hands in place.

Josh looked at me, confused. “Take it off now,” he said.

I continued to fight it. The look on his face showed me that this had never happened to him before.

“No,” I said finally, and whatever spell he’d put me under was broken. I easily put my shirt down.

“I said…” he started to say, angrily, but Antoine stopped him.

“That’s enough!” he said loudly. “You made your point!”

“What the hell was that?” I asked, a little freaked out.

“He can make people do what he says,” Peter said. “No one’s been able to fight it before. He had me in my underwear my first day here.”

I shook my head, and looked over at Josh. He was shyly smiling. “I’m sorry,” he said, and I nodded.

I looked over to Antoine. “What’s yours?”

“I’m Spartan,” he said. “I understand fighting styles like I understand the alphabet. Complex styles are no problem whatsoever for me. I was a black belt in fifteen different martial arts when I was ten.”

“Wow,” I said. I then looked over at Peter. I wondered if his power was the same as mine, seeing that his father is a clone of mine.

“Dodge,” Peter said. “I feel an attack coming at me and I can dodge it most of the time. I can dodge about thirty percent of Antoine’s attacks.”

“Is that good?” I asked. It sounded like he had Spider-sense, but I decided I’d talk to him about it later.

“Well, Professor Logan can only dodge forty-five percent,” he said, smiling proudly.

“What’s yours?” Josh asked me. But it was more than him asking me, I could feel him using his power on me.

“Nnngh…” I grunted, trying to fight it. Sweat broke out on my forehead, and finally I felt his hold on me give out.

I lifted my right hand and without a thought I shot out a wad of webbing that hit him in his mouth, sealing it shut.

“I don’t like it when people mess with my mind,” I said angrily. His eyes widened, and he cursed into the webbing as he tried to claw it off his face. “Don’t do that, you’ll only scratch up your face. It’ll dissolve in about an hour.”

Antoine laughed so hard he nearly fell out of his chair. Soon the others, except of course for Josh, followed suit.

“Man, you really deserved that,” Antoine said. “So you shoot out sticky goo? That’s kind of a lame power.”

I grinned, and shot a line of web that stuck to the table in front of him.

“You know who Peter Parker is?” I asked everyone. They all nodded. “He’s my dad.”

“Awesome!” Kyle exclaimed. “So you can swing around and stick to walls? And Lift five hundred times your body weight? And you’ve got Spider-sense?”

We all looked at Kyle, amused by his enthusiasm.

“What?” he asked, indignantly. “He was my favorite hero as a kid…”

I laughed at that. “Mine too, but no, I only inherited the webs, and his agility, and I can stick to walls. Believe me, the Spider-sense and the strength would have come in handy at my last school.”

* * * * *

Monday morning, bright and early, it was time for Teamwork Skills. Peter and I had that class with Kate and Antoine. Antoine was the head of the class, Peter had told me the night before. He’d done his best to tell me what I had to expect in this class, and I had to say, I was pretty nervous. I’d never been in any kind of combat situation, real or simulated, so by the time my alarm went off, I was shaking like a leaf.

Peter spent so much time trying to comfort me that we forgot all about the time, and realized we were running late.

All of a sudden, I felt an all too familiar itch in my head, near the back of my eyes, and I knew that once again, my privacy was being violated. It felt different than when Josh had done it, and I knew immediately where I’d felt it before.

“Report to class at once,” Miss Frost’s voice echoed inside my head. By the look on Peter’s face, he’d heard her too.

“But he’s…I mean, we’re…uhh…” Peter said brilliantly. Basically the same thoughts were whirling around inside my head, but apparently my brain has a better ‘know when to shut up’ filter than his does.

“I am well aware of the situation, but simple nervousness doesn’t give you the right to skip class,” her voiced echoed again. “Both of you, report to room X-19 immediately!”

The faint itch in my head suddenly vanished, and I looked over at Peter.

“Is she always so annoying?” I asked him.

“Hey,” he said, with a look of shock on his face. “She might still be listening!”

It was my turn to look surprised. “You can’t feel it when she’s in your head? You don’t feel that itchy sensation in your head?”

He looked at me as if I were purple.

“No…” he said, still eyeing me as if I was crazy. “But in any case, we need to get moving. We’ll talk more after class.”

With that, Peter turned, and walked out the door, and I had to hurry to keep up with him. He was in a fast walked, when he looked back at me, smiled, and started jogging. I grinned back, and chased after him.

Five minutes later, we were running as if our lives depended on it, neither of us wanting to lose the race to the other. As we approached room X-19, the teacher for the class was standing outside with the most unpleasant look on his face I’d ever seen. I skidded to a halt near the door, having already lost, but the race was now the furthest thing from my mind.

The teacher, Professor Logan, was rather short, with wild brown hair and ridiculous sideburns. He was wearing a collared shirt that would have been nice had it not been untucked, halfway unbuttoned, and stained with grease. He looked as if he’d just stumbled out of bed with a horrible hangover.

“Detention,” he snarled at us. “The both of you. I don’t care if your dads were Xavier himself, no one comes late to my class. No one.”

With that, the short, hairy man turned, and entered the classroom. Peter and I followed him inside, and found our seats quickly at the only open table left, in the front, right in the center. There were about fifteen other students in the room. The teacher glared at us, and then began the class.

“We’ve got a new student in class today, and since ya ain’t blind I’m gonna assume you knew that,” he said, his voice gravelly, as if he were constantly growling. “But with this crowd I shouldn’t assume anything. Leave your things here and follow me to the Danger Room.”

He walked out of the room, and the class followed. I just stuck close to Peter, and tried to do as he did. We walked into a locker room, and I found that I already had an assigned locker, one away from Peter’s. I opened it and found a blue and yellow uniform inside, much in the same style as the original X-Men’s uniform, except that it was form-fitting.

And really didn’t leave much to the imagination. Every muscle (or lack thereof) was clearly outlined in the thin material.

“Is it normal to feel ridiculous in this thing?” I asked Peter once I had my uniform on. I was having a bit of trouble with the zipper in the back.

Peter walked over and quickly zipped it for me. “Yes, I still feel ridiculous in it half the time.”

I followed Peter into the actual Danger room. It was round, nearly spherical, and the walls were made of either steel or some other metal. The walls were in sections, and it looked as if some of them opened, probably as part of the features of the room.

Professor Logan, wearing an altogether different uniform of mostly bright yellow and a few spots of blue, pressed a button on a control panel. There was a quiet “beep” and one section of the wall slid open, a basic-looking robot rolled out.

“New kid, in here you’ll address everyone in this class by their code names, which are printed on their uniforms,” he said. “Mine is Wolverine, but for the most part you will call me sir. Now, Spider-Boy, stand back and watch as Spartan demonstrates this simple training exercise.”

Spider-Boy? Damnit!

“Alright, here’s how it works,” Antoine, AKA Spartan said to me. “There’s a field emitter on your belt that protects you from the robot’s attacks. It links in with the one inside of the robot, and as long as both are on, you won’t be hurt by it’s attacks.”

Wolverine pressed another button and the robot punched Spartan in the face, his head rocking back from the force of the punch. I gasped in shock.

“The field generated by the emitters bounce off one another, making the part of your body move as if it were hit,” he explained. “There is no pain, but it will disorient you, so expect it.”

He nodded over to Wolverine. “I’m ready,” he said.

Wolverine pressed another button, and the robot seemed to come to life, it’s upper body moving like a trained fighter. It didn’t have legs, but I imagined that if it did, it’s footwork would have mirrored Spartan’s.

It lashed out with a punch, but Spartan blocked and countered. It rolled back a few inches, but otherwise was unharmed.

“The point of this exercise is to evaluate your skill level, and for you to use your power to defeat the robot,” he said. “This will also evaluate your problem solving skills in a tense situation.”

The robot launched into a combination of moves, all easily blocked and countered by Spartan. Finally, Spartan gave the robot a powerful kick to the head, and the robot snapped back into the position it was in before the exercise started.

“Hit it hard enough to knock out a human combatant and the exercise is over,” he explained. “Disable it in any way, and the exercise is over.”

“Your turn,” Wolverine said, looking at me. I audibly gulped, and stepped forward. My hands were shaking, and it was taking nearly all my concentration to keep from peeing my pants.

Antoine looked in my eyes as I passed him, and he said, “It’s no sweat. Just use your head and it’ll be over before you know it.”

Wolverine pressed the button to turn the robot on, and it once again moved into a fighting stance. It moved closer to me, so I took a step back. It moved again, faster this time, and it’s arm swung out at me. I jumped back.

My mind flashed back to the thousands of times I’d watched my father fight. I smiled, and my fear nearly melted away. I crouched down to the ground, my left hand touching the floor, fingers spread out. My right hand was ready in the web-shooting position. My legs were ready to spring off the ground at a moments notice.

The robot backed away slightly, as if evaluating my strange move. Then it quickly moved forward and threw a punch downward at me. I shot a web to the ceiling and catapulted myself into the air, landing behind it. It spun around, and I kicked it in the chest. It rolled back from the force, but before I had time to catch my breath, it rolled forward and punched me in the face.

The field emitter that was supposed to protect me…didn’t work. I felt the full blow of the punch, and was sent sprawling to the ground. It was on me in a flash, and kept hitting me. I covered up my head, rolling into the fetal position.

“Come on!” I heard Wolverine yell. “There’s no pain, so get away from it and fight back!”

They didn’t realize what was going on. I lifted my head to yell for him to stop the robot, but before it could it hit me in the face again.

They all saw the blood fly out of my nose and splatter on the ground.

I heard the “beep” as Wolverine pressed the button to stop the robot. It kept hitting me. He pressed it again, to no avail.

“Ah, Hell,” he growled, and I heard what sounded like metal scraping against metal. My father had described that sound to me before, calling it the “SNIKT” sound, and I knew without seeing it that Wolverine had extended his claws.

Wolverine cut the robot down in a matter of seconds, leaving it in a smoking heap on the ground.

“Dodge, Unix, get him to the infirmary as fast as you can,” he said. That was the last thing I heard before I passed out.