Chapter 32: No Rest For the Wicked
Miles landed before a door. He rang the doorbell and waited for a bit. After a few minutes had passed, the door opened and Aunt May appeared before him.
"You do know that most people are sleeping around this time, right?" Aunt May teased, letting Miles into her house. "You look like you've gotten quite the beating."
"This? Nah, I'll just put some ointment on it, and I'll be good as new." Miles waved her off, taking off his mask. "What I am worried about is the suit. Ganke and I had just added a few new features to it, but they stopped working after my fight."
Aunt May took a moment to look at Miles, noticing the state of Miles' suit. "Hm, not even I'll be able to return it to normal."
"Figured," Miles sighed, shaking his head. "Guess I'll be bothering you for a new suit, Aunt May."
"Go right ahead, kid. No one else is going to use them."
"Thanks. I'll grab a suit and head out. I still got class early in the morning."
"Nonsense, Miles. You're staying here; I will get something for that burn you got. You'll have to worry about your suit tomorrow in the morning."
Seeing Aunt May's stern gaze, Miles had no choice but to agree. Besides, he was too tired, even to try to object.
"Now go grab some of Peter's old clothes. After that, go take a shower."
"Yes, ma'am," Miles said with a groan, doing as Aunt May said.
After a nice warm shower, Miles was sitting in the living room, wearing some pajamas, while drinking some tea Aunt May had brewed for him.
While not an expert at providing first aid, Aunt May tried her best to fix Miles up, which he appreciated. There wasn't really any obligation from her to help him, so her doing this showed Miles that Aunt May was a good person.
"Thanks for keeping me alive, Aunt May. It's nice to be able to count on someone to help when I need it."
"Please, it's the least I can do, kiddo. God knows how much good you're doing out there." Aunt May smiled, placing a hand on Miles' shoulder. "You should have some rest. Take Peter's old room; you can pick out a suit when you wake up."
"Sure thing."
After the two parted ways, Miles walked over to Peter's room. Upon closer inspection, Miles could see that the room belonged to Peter. There were posters related to science up on the walls, and his bookshelves were filled with educational books.
"Man, Peter sure was a pretty big nerd. Still, he's done a lot more in his life than I'll ever be able to do." Miles said, lying down on Peter's bed. As he lay there awake, Miles started thinking about his fight with Mister Negative. While he did end up winning in the end, he felt that the fight could have gone either way.
Were it not for his spider senses, Miles would have most certainly been defeated, or worse, forced to use all of his strength. Miles knew how dangerous Spider-Man could be if he didn't hold back. It wasn't pretty, to put it lightly.
"I need to find a way to get better at fighting," Mile muttered to himself. The last thing he wanted was to use his full strength and end up murdering the person. It would be pretty hard to be called the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man after that. "I'll have to think about it later when I'm not hurting all over."
Turning to his side, Miles closed his eyes and drifted into sleep. He was going to find a way to become a better fighter. After all, his name was on the line.
...
"If you don't pick one, you're going to be late to class." Aunt May grumbled, standing behind Miles.
"Yeah, but there's so many to choose from." Miles sighed, scratching his head.
Miles and Aunt May were both in the house's basement, where Miles was currently looking at an outfit change after his old suit became unusable during his fight with Mister Negative.
"There's no more black suits left," Miles said, looking the suits over one more time. "Well, I guess I'll grab the old classic and fix it up when I get back to the dorm."
Donning the familiar suit for the first time, Miles couldn't help but feel a little stoked about it. But right now wasn't the time to lose his cool. He could do that while he made his way to school.
"Alright, Aunt May. I'm heading back to the dorms. I appreciate the help you gave me."
"Take care, kid, and make sure not to mess up any more suits."
"You're asking for too much!" Miles smiled, leaving the basement.
Making sure he wasn't seen by any neighbors, Miles swung through the streets. As he moved through the streets, Miles noticed that the people below were all making a commotion. If he had to guess, people were talking about his outfit change.
Once he was a few blocks away from the academy, Miles made sure to cloak himself before entering his dorm.
Inside, he found Ganke getting ready for class.
Turning to look at him, Ganke's eyes widened when he saw Miles wearing a different suit. "Woah, new suit?"
"Yeah, the other one got messed up during my fight with Martin Li," Miles said, removing his mask.
"I was kind of worried after I lost connection with you."
"Yeah, when I gathered all that electricity, it kind of fried all my stuff." Miles pulled out his phone and showed it to Ganke. "Even my phone."
"That's something we're going to have to work on. Peter didn't have any lightning powers, so he must not have accounted for sudden overloads." Ganke muttered, his mind trailing off into space.
"We can worry about it later. Right now, we should both head to class."
"Right."
Miles finished putting on his uniform over his suit and the two headed out of their dorm. While Miles wasn't the most thrilled about school, he had to say that it was pretty nice not having to worry about anything for a few hours.
...
Time passed as Miles sat in class. His head tuned out whatever was happening as Miles snuck a peek at his phone.
He was currently texting with Ganke, and the two were talking about Spider-Man-related things.
[Dude, you're going to want to see this.]
Ganke sent a text along with a link.
Tapping on the link, Miles was greeted with a live broadcast of a police standoff. And surprise surprise, Mister Negative was standing in the middle of it as his energy affected those around him, turning them into a psycho mob.
'Dammit! Someone must have touched him.' Miles cursed inwardly before he turned to look at the teacher. Raising his hand, he asked the teacher to use the restroom. After a few tries, he managed to get permission.
Quickly, Miles got out of his seat and sprinted toward the nearest stairwell that reached the rooftop. Once at the top, Miles began to remove his clothes, leaving only his spider suit on as he shot a web at two separate buildings.
Like a bullet, Miles slingshot through the air as he made his way to Martin Li. If he wanted a second round so badly, Miles was going to give it to him.
...
A few moments later, Miles arrived at the location. His eyes scanned the place, but there were no signs of Martin Li anywhere.
The only thing left behind were the people who he had mind-controlled going at it and ripping each other to pieces.
"Dammit!" Miles couldn't help but curse once more. His track record was not looking good right at this moment. But he could worry about his crap record later. For now, he had to find a way to subdue all of Mister Negative's "thugs" and assist the police.
From what Miles could tell, it didn't seem like Martin Li was the only one to escape, as there seemed to be some sort of inmate bus that had been flipped over.
"Guess I'm going inmate hunting," Miles said before ducking. A body flew over his head before falling to the ground with a thud. Before the person could get up, Miles shot a ball of web which stuck them in place. He looked around and saw that he was being surrounded by the mind-controlled civilians. "Come on guys, do you guys not like the suit?"
They didn't respond as they charged at Miles. Miles had to do his best to dodge their attacks. Jumping and evading them as he tried to find a way to subdue them without hurting them.
"You know you can use your words, right? No need for violence!"
Miles had to resort to using his webs to take down the mob of mind-controlled people.
Fortunately for Miles, It didn't take him that much effort to subdue them, as while they did have a bit more strength than normal, they weren't that well coordinated.
With the mob taken care of, Miles turned to look at the police officers who were nearby.
"Everyone okay?"
"Thanks to you, we're okay." One of the officers said, tipping their hat at him.
Another officer gave Miles a nod of approval, "It's nice seeing Spider-Man in his original colors."
"Don't get used to it. My other suit's currently in the dryer." Miles shrugged, raising his hands. "Jokes aside, do you guys mind telling me how many convicts were on that bus?"
"Counting that black and white guy, twelve. They all went in different directions, though."
"We've already sent an APB on the criminals who escaped. We should be getting back up soon."
Miles waved them off, "Oh, you guys ain't got to worry about that. Just get another bus prepared. I'll be right back." After saying that, Miles swung away, starting his search for the inmates. His eyes looked around the streets.
"They're all wearing orange, how hard will this be?" Miles said to himself, his eyes narrowing, "I didn't just jinx myself, did I?"