The Invincibles (16 page)

However, the Spider-Specter ducked and dodged every shot, even firing webs and jerking the poor neighbors paralyzed with shock and fright out of the way of errant blasts. The Spider-Specter shot a web directly into Killjoy’s face and jerked him up close to slap the guns out of his hands. Then he stomped down on the guns hard and smashed them to pieces. He roughly seized Killjoy by the collar. The electro-shock of the Spider-Specter’s touch flashed and crackled through the air. Killjoy shook and screamed.

“
Don’t kill him!” Nightshadow shouted, scrambling back up to his feet. He grabbed Killjoy and tugged him back, breaking him free from the Spider-Specter’s electro-shock grasp and tossing him down onto the curb.

“
You should have stayed out of this, Night!” the Spider-Specter said, lunging forward with two tightly clamped fists. Nightshadow nailed him with a quick, hard chop to the throat that sent him stumbling back. When Nightshadow went to follow up with another strike, the Spider-Specter leapfrogged over him and caught him with a sidekick in mid-air. The side of his foot bludgeoned into Nightshadow’s head, momentarily knocking him senseless and sending him toppling over back down onto the street.

Killjoy still lay on the curb and moaned. His eyes rolled into the back of his head. The Spider-Specter loomed over him and Nightshadow began furiously crawling and scampering over in that direction. Before kicking in Killjoy’s face, the Spider-Specter paused and looked around. For the first time, he seemed to notice all the neighbors trembling, cowering away, and repeatedly pounding 911 into their cell phones. Sirens wailed in the distance and that took the Spider-Specter’s attention and gave Nightshadow the chance to slip a pair of brass knuckles out of his utility belt.

Years ago, he’d discovered that the Spider-Specter possessed a sixth sense that warned him of any danger. After compiling enough data, he eventually determined that scent triggered this “danger sense” and developed a chemical compound to counter it. Earlier this evening, he’d coated his wing-suit in that compound, making it immune to that danger sense.

He ghosted up to the Spider-Specter from behind with the Spider none the wiser and walloped him with a haymaker punch to the side of the head. That staggered the Spider-Specter and allowed Nightshadow to score another punch and then back-fist him. With the brass knuckles and force he was using, the assault should have been enough to break an ordinary man’s skull. However, the Spider-Specter stayed standing and flipped up his mask, revealing two yellow, gleaming fangs. When Nightshadow swung again, the Spider-Specter grabbed his arm and bit down through the wing-suit’s duramax armor right into the meaty part of his forearm.

Nightshadow roared at the hellishly hot bite. Within seconds, his body numbed, and he collapsed down into a helpless, twitching little pile. His brass knuckles slipped off and clattered down onto the street. With all his concentration and strength, he raged against his paralysis, trying to kick and thrash around, but to no avail. His limbs simply refused to move.

The Spider-Specter appeared over him.

“
Sorry, Night,” he said and webbed him up just as a squad car swerved onto the street.

“
Freeze! Hands up!” the officers shouted, barreling out of their car and drawing their guns. Any civilians who’d stuck around to watch now kept a safe distance or had slunk back into their houses or down behind parked cars for cover.

Calmly, the Spider-Specter put his hands up and spun about on his heel. Quicker than the eye could see, he fired off some webbing, snagging the officers’ guns away and bringing a wide net down onto them. He bundled them up tightly and hung the net from a nearby tree before snatching both Nightshadow and Killjoy with webs. Dragging them one-handedly behind him, the Spider-Specter shot a web and leaped off into the night just as a whole army of squad cars sped onto the scene. The police emptied their guns after him, but never managed to make a single hit.

***

The Spider-Specter web-slung through the tall trees, deeper and deeper into the lush upstate woods. He towed Nightshadow and Killjoy along behind him, both still caught up in webs and banging together against trees, rocks, and each other. After a great distance, the Spider-Specter jumped down, thumping his feet heavily into the dirt, and tugged his captives over to him. They both crashed down into a heavy pile at his feet. Killjoy remained unconscious, but despite his paralysis, Nightshadow felt every scrap and welt he’d gotten tonight.

The Spider-Specter spun two tight, silky-smooth webs onto two opposite-facing trees and stuck Nightshadow onto one and Killjoy the other. Then he paused before clamping his hand around Killjoy’s chin and giving it a good, hard twist. Killjoy’s neck audibly snapped. Nightshadow howled senselessly. His helplessness infuriated him. He should have been able to stop that! He would have, too, if not for this damn paralysis!

The Spider-Specter slumped down onto the grassy dirt and rubbed his head. He sniffled, and it sounded like he was crying. Nightshadow stretched open his mouth and moaned, spitting as he tried to speak. His voice came out hollowly. “D-D-Danny…L-Lethe…why?”

“
That was you in Dawnson, wasn’t it?” the Spider-Specter asked. “I sensed you coming and got the hell out of there.”

Nightshadow’s jaw felt less swollen and more feeling flowed through it the more he talked. “Y-Y-You s-s-suffocated Lethe, Danny. Your…your webbing dissolves…pretty quickly, so you thought there…there wouldn’t be a trace. But I was there. I found it. It was awful, Danny. Worse than a lot of murders I’ve seen.”

“
He deserved it,” the Spider-Specter said.

“
Why, Danny? What happened?”

“
What always does? Someone found me out somehow! Again!”

“
Who was it now, Danny?” Nightshadow asked

The Spider-Specter shook his head. “I don’t even know. All I do know is that they sold the info to the Glow.”

“
The Glow?”

“
Yep, and I’d never even met the guy before, not even when I lived in Salome City! He’s turned tormenting me into his retirement hobby. He can’t stop taunting me and sending every asshole he can find after me. He might even expose me to the press once he gets bored. God, he found almost everyone I ever put away and now they’re all chomping at the bit to come after me! Damn it, Night! I was retired! I was done with all this shit!”

“
Where’s Carly, Danny?” Nightshadow asked. “Does she know you’re doing this?”

The Spider-Specter tightened his hand into a hard, shaking fist and beat it against his chest.

“
I told her everything, Night,” he said. “When we got engaged, I told her all about me being the Spider-Specter, and it scared her to death. That’s why I was giving it up. We were going to settle down in Sunda City, and I was going to get a real job and finally be a grown-up. Then the Glow started sending his people after me. Carly left me, Night. She broke off the engagement and hid and I couldn’t blame her! But they kept finding her! And me! They always knew where we were! She was never safe anymore! So…so…I went and found Lethe. I busted his old lab assistant back in the day when he was selling cybernetic parts on the black market and knew where to find him. I made him tell me where his old boss was.”

“
You thought Lethe could use his memory tech to help you hide your identity?” Nightshadow asked.

“
That and I wanted him to make Carly forget about me being the Spider-Specter! She didn’t need to know anymore! I was supposed to be done with it! But Lethe fucked me! I don’t know if the Glow paid him off or not, but it doesn’t matter. He made Carly forget everything about me! She didn’t…she didn’t even know my name when Cold Snap…when he caught up to her.”

Nightshadow hung his head low, imagining how he’d feel if someone had frozen Piper to death. “I’m sorry, Danny,” he said. “I’ll find Cold Snap. I’ll see that he pays.”

“
I already found him,” the Spider-Specter said. “I ripped his heart out, Night.”

He saw Nightshadow staring at him and heartlessly chuckled.

“
What?” he asked. “Did you think Lethe was my first? They even got my mother, Night! My mom! Hydra-Man tore her apart! They recorded it and emailed the video to me! These animals have to be put in the ground! Jail’s too good for them!”

“
Danny, you should have come to me,” Nightshadow said, fidgeting and twitching as more feeling returned to his body. “You should have come to me before Lethe.”

“
And then what, Night?” The Spider-Specter shot up to his feet and ripped his mask off. Pitted black circled his sleepless eyes and creased his face. His skin looked pale and withered.

“
What could we do?” he said. “Change my identity again? That didn’t work! Not any of the times we tried! The memory tech was my only hope!”

Danny ran his hands through the shaggy, dark mess of hair on top his head. A few whites noticeably poked out. “I’ll turn myself in when I’m done, Night,” he said. “I promise.”

“
Danny,” Nightshadow said. “Please let me help you.”

“
Don’t waste your time, Night,” Danny replied. “It’s too late for me.”

He pulled his mask back on. “The toxin should wear off before the hour’s up,” he said. “The webbing should start to give too.”

As he shot a web and swung off through the treetops, his spider-camouflage allowed him to blend in so perfectly he became practically invisible. Later on, after Nightshadow tore free through the weakening webbing, he took a tracker out of his utility belt. While they’d been fighting, he’d slipped a tracer onto Danny. Following its signal, he rushed through the woods only to find the little tracer caught in a spindly, little spider-web between a pair of tree branches a few miles out.

***

He stole back to where his motorcycle was hidden in the alley, careful to stay out of sight, though his limbs were heavy and sore. His body felt like one gigantic black eye, and he fumbled with his clothes as he got changed in the cold, smelly dumpster.

S.I.L.E.N.T. had cordoned off the incident area from before with Killjoy. After Nightshadow called in an anonymous tip, they’d find Killjoy’s body in the woods. For now, their white-suited agents were supervising the clean up here on the street, calming down civilians, asking them questions, and watching out for more suspicious activity. They seemed to have everything well in hand and Nightshadow didn’t feel up to dealing with a barrage of questions from them and having to explain his actions right now. He’d simply send a debriefing to Paul Wrath later. So he fired up his bike and skirted by S.I.L.E.N.T.’s perimeter, taking alleys and dirt roads to slip their net across the bridge back into the city.

He swung by Torchlight and the Glow’s large, boisterous townhouse in uptown to check on the surveillance cameras and hearing devices he’d left there. He snuck around and rearranged them with Danny’s spider-stealth in mind. With different positioning, they might catch some type of motion from him, even if he was camouflaged. Also, Nightshadow set a number of small gas bombs, enough to put the whole block to sleep. Even Danny would have trouble not tripping one of them.

Nightshadow had patrols and other cases to work on, so he couldn’t constantly stake out the Glow’s properties and wait for Danny. However, if Danny struck, the bombs would put him and all the Glow’s men out, giving Nightshadow, S.I.L.E.N.T., and the police enough time to respond.

***

Finally, Nightshadow dragged his sore, sorry carcass back to his Triangle Park lair. He cleaned and rubbed disinfectant onto his wounds, though the sting had already gone out of the bite Danny had given him. He took a short ice bath to help soothe his cuts and bruises. When he climbed out, he let the lair’s heat massage his tender, prickled flesh and bandaged himself up.

Once he’d thrown on an old shirt and slacks, he collapsed down into the chair in front of his supercomputer. The massive screen’s dim glow pulsed over him. News reports and footage from dozens of websites and TV stations scrolled quickly down, his eyes catching every detail.

“
Fuck!” he muttered, pounding his fists together.

While he’d been pissing around in the suburbs, the Holy Terror had shot up a whole string of churches, synagogues, mosques, and even a Hindu temple downtown. One picture showed the Terror in satanic black papal robes, blasting away at a large life-like crucifix with a smoking saintly white shotgun. The police and S.I.L.E.N.T. had brought him down, but suffered many casualties in the process.