The chase!

Not missing a beat as soon as he was in freefall, Spider-Man shot out another web line and pulled hard, propelling him across the city at break-neck speed. Making sharp turns and diving down the surface of a skyscraper only to duck and swing across another, he occasionally kept an eye over his shoulder to check if he was being chased.

“YOU CAN’T GET AWAY FROM ME SPIDER-MAN!” He heard her scream out loud enough to hear in a sing-song tone of voice.

“YES, I CAN!!!”

Yes, she was chasing him alright. From his vantage point as he swung over an apartment building and jumped off a water tower to spin into his next web line, he found her matching him both in speed and skill… Then again, the symbiote was helping in that department. Every time he managed to cut a sharp corner or duck through a thin alley way in the hopes of losing her, the anti-venom symbiote would snap out a tentacle to pull her in the right direction or fire out a black web line to change trajectory and keep up with him.

“I can make it QUICK and PAINLESS Spidey! I’ll even give you a KISSssss if you’ll be good!”

“NO MEANS NO LADY!” Spider-Man called out over his shoulder as he ducked and swung up over to the metro lines criss-crossing each other. “YOU KEEP THIS UP AND I’M GOING TO CALL YOUR HUSBAND!”

The hissed screech she gave him made Peter’s blood run cold as he diverted his attention back to what was ahead of him and swing more desperately for distance.

“Mental note; do not anger the Invisible Woman!” Seeing he was coming up to the apartment blocks, Peter looked over his shoulder and felt a cold sweat run down his back to find her getting closer. “Okay then, you got the swing, but do you have the skills?”

Launching himself after firing two web lines at once and pulling himself forward like a slingshot. Closing his eyes, he could feel the world slow down around him as his Spider-Sense mapped out every danger in front of him, flying into a narrow alleyway barely two feet wide with blurring speed. With his eyes still closed he began to crouch his legs close and conduct his arms out, firing web lines at key moments to change his trajectory. Like a pinball, Spiderman darted between narrow passages, through fire escapes and dove feet first into a ventilation shaft for a construction crew overhead dumping debris down the shaft. Shooting down between his legs and pulling with all his might, he flew out of the shaft and fired out the other end of it like a cannonball, spinning and summersaulting to change the angle he took before landing gracefully against the brick wall of a building a block away.

“Phew…” Ejecting his now empty web cartridges, Spider-Man reloaded his web shooters. “I think I lost her for…”

A crash could be heard in front of him as the debris shaft exploded with a rain of soot and multiple thin, white legs clawing their way through everything Spider-Man had carefully navigated through. The woman instead choosing brute **** to barrel through all of it and landing on a car with enough momentum to crush it under her hands and feet. Looking in every direction and shaking the dirt off her body, she finally caught sight of Peter across the street and hissed, her many arachnid legs gripping the ruined car underneath her to get footing and prop her up so she could tuck her human legs in and stand using her new appendages.

“THERE you are! You can’t get rid of me THAT easily Ssssspider-Man.”

With his web shooters restocked, Peter audibly gulped. “Of COURSE, I can! BYE!”

Scurrying up the wall as fast as he could, he jumped and yelped when he barely missed her claw swiping the ledge of the building’s roof and his backside along with it. He was running out of ideas fast and he knew he couldn’t play this game of keep away forever. Sooner or later, she was going to catch up to him and that was going to be the end of the city’s neighbourhood Spider-Man. Hearing a chime from the metro train station and looking up to see that two trains were coming at different directions to take in and depart passengers, he got an idea and began to swing low under the super structure of the overhead monorail.

Swinging in a serpentine pattern between the support pillars, Spider-Man played a game of cat and mouse with Lady Anti-Venom, avoiding her every move and yelping in a panic when her claw swiped over where his head was a second ago on the last dive, raking deep grooves into the metal work like knives through butter. Making an escape, he swung up to where the two trains were going as they accelerated at high speed and grabbed hold of the surface of one to make his escape. Tricking Susan only briefly as she landed on the roof of the station, looking around confused and screeching with fury. He was travelling blocks worth of distance within seconds away from her now. But looking around to get his bearings, he knew better that this wasn’t over. He couldn’t see her, and his spider-sense wasn’t working around her, but he knew she wasn’t gone. The entire trip he got the feeling she was nearby, a passing shadow, a change in the air, she was out there... And she was completely invisible!

“Okay Spidey… If I were a symbiote wearing person strung out from days without sleep and on a sugar rush, where would I…?”

A form suddenly came into shape at his side, bearing down on him and pinning his arms to the room of the metro car as the passengers inside looked up at the human shaped indent on the roof. Struggling against her claws keeping him down, Spider-Man looked up at the smiling Lady Anti-Venom as she opened her mouth and slithered her tongue over his mask.

“Got you NOW my tassssty little chocolate bonbon!” Susan practically salivated as she extended her tendrils from her back and made ready to ‘cure’ Spider-Man of his radiation poisoning. “Any requestssss?”

“Yeah, can you sit up a bit?”

Sitting up a little bit, Susan looked down at the Wall-Crawler with a raised eyebrow.

“A lil more…”

Leaning higher up, she still didn’t get what he was getting at… Until the arch of the metro tunnel struck her at 75 miles per hour, prying her off him and leaving Spider-Man giggling as he clung to the roof of the train. Looking to his left where the light of the tunnel grew further and further away, Peter sighed with relief.

“Whammo!”

It was a few minutes of travel before he finally came out the other end of the tunnel and could roll onto his side and get to his feet. When the train came to a stop at a station, Spider-Man simply hopped off the roof and joined the rest of the crowd who exited the metro train, a little surprised to find the wall crawler there crouched and catching his breath.

“Whelp… That was traumatising.” Said Peter under his breath, looking around to find a crowd building around him and taking pictures, just as he shot a web line up overhead and swung away from the station to land on the wall of a building nearby, and crawl up its surface to the roof. “I should call Reed, let him know his wife is acting like some eldritch horror going around offering kisses for boo boos.”

Padding his sides to find his cell phone, he plucked it out of the sleeve in the pants of his suit to dial Mr. Fantastic and give him the bad news. “Hope she didn’t eat him or anything, from the way she was sounding all nuts like that, I wouldn’t put it past her she tried to eat his brains or something.”

Looking up as he dialed, Peter sighed.

“Figures…”

The impact was like being hit by a wrecking ball… And was just as devastating as he was blasted through the brick wall and ended up in the destroyed living room of the apartment, dazed as he laid in the rubble of a broken couch, television, and coffee table. Looking up with dazed eyes, he never got the chance to move as a series of limbs pinned him down. The owner of the apartment screamed as she backed out and hid under the table of her own kitchen, screaming at the sight of some terrible, tentacle ridden creature pinning Spider-Man down and screeching down at his masked face like some terrible banshee.

“STOP FIDGETING AND TAKE YOUR MEDICINE LIKE A GOOD LITTLE BOY REED! I’M HERE TO HELP YOU! I’M HERE TO HELP ALL OF YOU!”

“Doesn’t feel very helpful to me…” Peter groaned. His vision clearing, all he could see was the manic smile of the symbiote wearing woman glaring down at him, the tentacles from her back and arms sprouting black toothy mouths that hissed like vipers down at him.

“Jussst give me a few seconds, and this will ALL be a BAD memory you can forget about…”

The beep of a phone was heard by the two as Susan paused dead in her tracks when she heard a familiar voice.

“Hello, this is Reed Richards from the Future foundation, I’m not available to take your call right now but you can leave a message after the beep.”

Confused, Susan looked around, not recognising where she was or even what time it was. Looking down, she blinked and tilted her head in confusion. “Spider-Man? What are YOU doing here? What am I doing here?”

Taking a better look around and finding the apartment owner shivering under the kitchen table with a frying pan in her hands, Susan scratched at her head in confusion until she spotted the clock on the wall.

“Twelve o’clock? GASP! My kids bake sale!” Waving her hands frantically and looking around for an exit, she looked over her shoulder to the gaping hole behind her and got up to her feet, dancing on the spot in a panic as she made her way over to the hole in the wall and looked back at Spider-Man on the ground. “Sorry! I got someplace to be… I’ll come back for you later.”

Seeing Susan leap out and fire a web line to head back home, Peter finally dropped his head to the debris underneath him with a sigh of relief. Rolling onto his side and sit up to get his bearings and hold himself together, Peter got up on shaky legs.

“Yeah… Sure… I’m never going to your clinic again.” Leaning against the wall, Spider-Man groaned as he waved when the woman in the apartment asked if he were alright.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah… Yeah… No worries. I just broke my wrist, a few ribs, my neck… Probably everything.” Slowly turning around, Peter looked down at the heap of destroyed furniture all around him. “Say… Have you seen my phone anywhere?”

Stepping into the living room and rummaging through the debris and rubble, the woman pulled out a smash and destroyed phone that sizzled as soon as she placed it in Spider-Man’s hand. The screen shattered and frame crushed but it DID manage to leave the voicemail he left.

“Just my luck…”