Disclaimer: If you recognise it, surprise, I don't own it.

 

Chapter 18– Batman Begins.

 

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I quickly hasten and dart out of the wall, narrowly avoiding another beam that impacts the wall in which I was just embedded and sending bits of concrete flying everywhere. Whoever is wielding that thing is a real dick because I am way too far away for them to get a good look at me, and they just blasted me into the wall, and yet they just shot at me again—what a ruthless bastard.

 

I only have a second to relax before I am again diving out of the way of another beam and then another and another. they are coming at me in quick succession, so much so that I question how advanced the technology actually is.

 

This is a high-tech exotic piece of weaponry that is shooting dangerous beams at me, which means it has some kind of special fuel in it powering it. But the rate at which it is firing leads me to believe the gun has an inbuilt generator. Otherwise, the wielder would not be shooting it at such rapid fire, worried about running out. Unless they are an idiot, but I find that hard to believe since an organisation like AIM prides itself on intelligence.

 

Of course, there is no such thing as perfection in a world like this, so any moment now- yes, there it is. The rapid bursts suddenly stop, and my excellent eyes pick out the AIM goon wielding the gun in the distance, pulling the trigger, but there is no result from it.

 

Naturally, there must be a drawback with a weapon like that, and since it is most likely a weapon with its own built-in generator, there are a lot of different energies being built up in it besides the beam that shoots out. So it has overheated from rapid use, and it allows me an opportunity to get rid of this annoyance.

 

Seeing my chance, I delve into my utility belt once more and divulge a single Batarang from its depths, which I draw back and aim precisely at the hand near the trigger of the gun, aiming to embed this Batarang in his hand and stop him from shooting anyone else. Yeah, it might be overkill, and yeah, he might never use that hand again since I am going to slice through a few nerves in his hand, but who told him to be a dickhead and shoot energy beams at people.

 

I start to move my arm forward, ready to let this sucker fly and permanently cripple that asshole. But inescapably, the rest of my movement comes to a stop, my actions now being unnecessary.

 

*Bang!*

 

His head explodes in a shower of blood and gore, and I can only look on as blood continually pours down from where his face used to be until about two seconds ago. It seems he was caught up in trying to get a shot off on me that he turned his face away from the baseline and forgot about the Shield agents down the line, who were only taking cover because of the goon's continual fire down the passageway. And seeing the opportunity, one of the shield agents quickly took out their biggest problem and shot the agent straight through the head.

 

I pause for a moment, shocked that someone just had their head popped off, and it was essentially my fault. The part of me that comes from the otherworld feels mostly disgusted from the shower of blood and bits of brain, but apart from that, I feel apathetic. The guy was shooting to kill, so he only has himself to blame.

 

And yet the part of me that is Peter, that is Spider-Man, feels tremendous guilt and shame. I know that is stupid, and those feelings are idiotic, but I still feel it, Peter's moralities and sensibilities making up part of me. That guy was only blasted in the head because he was trying to pop my own. Otherwise, he would have kept up-.

 

*Bang!*

 

I am shaken out of my thought by another big bang, and my dazed eyes quickly refocus in time to witness another yellow hazmat suit-wearing body drop to the ground, their outfit soaked in bright red blood that was leaking from the cracked vizor on the head. It seems that while I was distracted by idiotic thoughts, another AIM agent went to try and pick up the advanced weapon, and the Shield agents obviously gunned him down before he could.

 

Quickly getting back into the swing of things, I fling the Batarang in my hand out to slam into the arm of an AIM agent before darting out and jumping up to lay a brutal haymaker into the face of some random goon. Then I twist around to slam the back of my foot into another guy's face, feeling his nose crunch on the sole of my foot.

 

Smoothly transitioning into a combat roll to avoid some gunfire fire, I get back up on my feet in front of another idiot whose arm I grab hold of and pull, wrenching it out of its socket, drawing a guttural scream from the man. Swinging the man around by his dislocated arm, I slam him on top of another agent before heaving him through the air to smash into another pair of assholes.

 

Spinning around, I catch the arm of another dickhead who was about to slam the butt of his gun into my arm. I pull his arm down and knee into his elbow, producing a sickening snap that results in him dropping his weapon before I grab him by the shoulders and thrust my forehead into his face sending him to the ground.

 

I continue to attack more and more of the bastards that surround me with nearly lethal ferocity fueled by anger and disgust. But it was not anger and disgust at the scientists for what they had all been doing in the facility. Instead, it was aimed at myself. I was angry at myself for just standing there like a fucking idiot in the middle of a battle, being distracted by useless shitty thoughts, and more than that, I was angry at myself for having those shitty thoughts.

 

Thoughts that I shouldn't have, thoughts that would be better suited for Peter, who is an actual hero and not me, who is just pretending to be one for the time being because it suits my needs. I shouldn't be having these thoughts and feelings because they are useless and will only get me in trouble in the future, which is why I have begun my savage attack on the people surrounding me.

 

I act with unneeded ferocity and attack with severe brutality, dealing out multiple crippling blows that will affect these people for the rest of their lives. And with each arm I break and each bone I rend into two, I can hear the parts of me that are Peter Parker scream out in anger and pain, unable to accept such lengths, knowing that I could have been much gentler.

 

And it drives me to keep going, to crush those sentimental and goody-two-shoes parts of me that are just too naive for this world I am trying to thrust myself into. I have the capacity to take these guys down with the utmost efficiency and with minimal force, and yet I make a point of it to be as damaging as possible and stretch out the amount of pain each of these goons feel before they are knocked into unconsciousness.

 

Working my way through the surrounding crowd, a tornado and of fists and kicks, I eventually find myself holding an unconscious man up by the throat, the rest of his compatriots having been taken down already. Looking stoically at the man, I release my hold on him and let him flop down to the ground, having taken a lot of my anger out on these bastards.

 

"FREEZE, STOP RIGHT THERE! WE ARE SHIELD, AND WE COMMAND YOU TO TAKE OFF YOUR UTILITY BELT AND THROW IT AWAY AND THEN GET ON YOUR HANDS AND KNEES!" I hear a voice bellow from down the tunnel, and I turn my head to the left to spot an entire squad worth of Shield agents lined up and aiming their weapons at me, telling me to surrender.

 

Hmm, I guess these guys are pretty smart. When they saw me taking action and fighting all these guys on my lonesome, they pulled back, content to let us fight it out. Either I would get killed, or I would take out the AIM agents, either way, it worked for them, and so they sat back and let us brawl it out, not wanting to waste ammo and men when they didn't have to. And now, they take action, probably thinking that I am all tuckered out. Well, I am far from tired, I am wired right now, and adrenaline is coursing through my body.

 

"...There are prisoners through the double doors, waiting for rescue. They are staying in the armoury, on the bottom floor." I take a moment to calm myself and try to stifle the blood rapidly pumping through my body, and then speak in my modulated voice. I ignore their calls for my surrender and inform them of the prisoners, telling them that they are resting in the armoury. The fact they have access to a lot of weaponry is unspoken. Hopefully, they will understand the warning and not bust through and try to be gentle with them. Otherwise, they might get some bullets shot their way.

 

"SURRENDER, NOW! YOU WILL NOT GET A SECOND CHANCE. WE WILL OPEN FIRE IF YOU DO NOT COMPLY!" They ignore my words and scream again, trying to cow me with their loud voices. Honestly, I thought if I were ever to interact with Shield at some point in the future, it would be with the big wigs, like Nick Fury, Phil Coulson, Dum Dum Dugan or Clint Barton, AKA Hawkeye. Or even with some of the Femme Fatales like Maria Hill, Bobbi Morse, Sharon Carter and the ultimate Femme Fatale, Natasha Romanov, AKA Natalia Romanova, AKA Black Widow. Not these forgettable faced rank and file in their onesies with big guns strapped to their backs.

 

Acting before they can even react, I reach into my utility belt and pull out a bunch of smoke bombs, throwing them out evenly between myself and the Shield agents, completely covering myself in the following mists and blocking me from their view. Then, I leap up onto the side of the wall and begin to dart across it, going as fast and silently as I can as they begin to fire down the hallway because when your vision is compromised, you obviously fire at your enemy's last known position.

 

I am not planning on sticking around because as much as I would like to meet those Femme Fatales that are as alluring as they are dangerous, I am not risking going anywhere near Nick Fury, that paranoid son of a gun. So, running straight by them, I continued on towards the exit. Clearly, they were not expecting me to be on the wall, and they didn't even turn their hands as I ran by.

 

The mist clears as I run on, but they don't even turn back to look behind them, leaving me with a clear way out, at least until I run all the way back up to the exit where there is a barricade of Shield agents and other members of law enforcement waiting. It seems like there are a bunch of different organisations here, Shield, the NYPD, the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, and a bunch more. It seems that the cop I called ended up alerting all the higher-ups, and while those Shield agents went down into the tunnel, the rest of these guys have stayed up here and are arguing about whose jurisdiction this is in.

 

This works out well for me as I effortlessly sneak out on top of the ceiling and make my way out of the underground parking garage. None of those guys even looked up, so absorbed in their argument. Once outside, I pull my grapple gun out and zip myself away up onto a building, and then off into the night. All in all, this was a good night. I broke up a human trafficking ring, busted an AIM facility, really stuck it to Fisk and- Is that a billy club?

 

I come to a sudden stop, my feet skidding to a halt on the roof's gravel flooring. A billy club narrowly skimmed past the tip of my nose, bouncing off the side of a brick wall and then off of a water tower before finally zooming back straight past me to whence it came. And the crazy thing is, my spider sense didn't pick up on it at all, even though it travelled with such speed and power, enough that it could bounce off two different things and still maintain its momentum.

 

Which means either that billy club is magical or something and can evade my danger sense (I have to remember to call it that, not spider-sense) or that it wasn't thrown towards me with the intent to harm. And out of the two, I am going to go with the second one, on account of it being a goddamned billy club, and there is only one guy I know that uses those.

 

I only caught its movement out of the corner of my eye, and if I didn't stop then, it would have probably thunked off the side of my head. But it was not thrown to hurt me, and I think even if I did not stop it and I did get hit in the head with it, I would not have been that injured, such is the accuracy of the man that threw it.

 

I look back over my shoulder, and in the distance, standing menacingly on an entirely different rooftop is a dark silhouette. It is hard to make out in the dead of this New York night, here on the rooftops high about the street lamps, where the lights are dimmed and few in between. But my enhanced vision lets me see the figure in sharp clarity, though the darkness impedes me from seeing anything except the sharp outline.

 

Clearly, a man, given his broad stature and firm stance, muscular arms firmly held at the side clenching onto cylinders connected by a thin wire or rope, and two tiny little horns jutting out of the top of his skull, horns very much smaller than my own. I resist the urge to smirk at the size comparison, knowing that even if my face is hidden behind the mask, my current opponent would probably sense it.

 

It seems like Marvel's own vengeful crusader has come to seek me out for a brood off, to see whose pain is more tremendous and whose cause is juster. Well, unfortunately for him, after the night I have just had, I am not in the mood for such a competition. In fact, after everything that has happened tonight, I am not much in the mood for anything except going home and slithering into my comfortable bed.

 

I stare at him a moment longer to see if he is going to do something now that he has my attention, but it seems he is content to just stare back from a distance. I ponder on what to do for a moment before mentally shrugging my shoulders and deciding to ignore him. If he is not going to come to me, then I am going to leave, not wanting to waste my time.

 

I quickly resume my previous course as if nothing had happened, but this time I go at a more leisurely pace. Still fast, mind you, but it is clear that I am taking it easy, showing that I am not running away from him or scared of him, just that I am leaving. I move with no interruptions for about ten seconds before I am rudely interrupted again by something getting in my path, but this time it isn't a billy club.

 

I come to a stop once again, but this time it is a gentle stop since I wasn't going too fast, and I blandly look across from me towards the man staring just as blandly back at me. A sturdy man dressed in leather-like fabric, though I do not doubt that the materials are much more durable than that. A pair of dark red boots adorn his feet, coming to a stop halfway up his calves, similar to his gloves which stop halfway down his forearm. His arms and legs are covered in muted yellow material, not as sturdy looking as his boots or gloves, but looking much more flexible to allow for ease of movement.

 

A much more durable-looking dark red material covers his torso, shaped like a leotard. No doubt much more resistant to protect his vital organs, and why not stretch it down to preserve his gonads as well, an equally important organ? He uses the same dark red material for his devil-like cowl, a half mask that sits on his face showing off his strong chin with a fuzzy layer of hair growing on it and a stern mouth.

 

He has a utility belt strapped around his waist as well and a big D imprinted on his chest in a slightly lighter red, confirming precisely who this man is if it wasn't clear already. It seems like this one has the yellow and red suit variation at the moment, surprisingly very stealthy for being made up of two primary colours. Also, looking at the costume without bias and ignoring the helmet, I would say this suit is designed like a sports outfit, like a wrestler or a boxer. It seems like he has some very big daddy issues, still chasing after his dear father, a former boxing champion.

 

"...Do you need something?" My modulated voice rings out into the abnormally quiet New York air as if the entire city had suddenly gone silent in anticipation of this confrontation. Daredevil stares back silently, and for a moment, I think he seems puzzled or something before I blink, and whatever it is disappears.

 

"Just wanted to see who it was impersonating me..." Oh, I guess he found out about the multiple calls I made to the police pretending to be Daredevil. I think when you are a superhero, you want to make sure your name is not being used without your permission and not for nefarious purposes. People trust your name, they look toward it in hope and or fear, and if someone besmirches that, then they will be less effective. Your reputation is half the game. It is why Spider-Man is not all that effective when hated by the entire public, and man, am I glad I am not him anymore.

 

"Needs must. I am sure if you know that much, then you know why I needed to." I say this because clearly, a guy like Daredevil seems like someone who does his due diligence. If he knew about the call, then he obviously followed it up and learned about the criminal base which held people. Possibly he may have even found out about the AIM facility because a lot of people are over there right now trying to take credit for shutting it down.

 

"Hm. You know, something about you is very familiar." He says, making me still for a second, and my heart beats a little quicker, a fact which makes my heart beat even faster because I know Daredevil is picking up on all this with his enhanced superhuman senses. He already knows that I have reacted abnormally to his words, meaning that there is something there. I have memories of meeting this man while I was garbed in the red, blue and webbed, which means this man is already familiar with Peter Parker's movement, heart variability and smell.

 

No doubt he is sensing some of this off of me since I am a perfect copy of Peter Parker's body, and I can only hope that I have changed so much that he won't realise it, but it is hard to change yourself in such a way. It would be like changing from writing with three fingers holding your pen, which you have been doing all your life, to only holding it with two. It is doable when you make a conscious effort, but muscle memory and habit take over, and you don't even realise it when you revert to the original way.

 

"...I imagine you meet a lot of masked men in your line of work." I try to carry on, but I already know I have been rumbled, and this is now just a pretence. How are you supposed to keep anything secret from him when he can literally hear the beats of your heart, the blood flowing through your body and sense every movement you make, even the tiniest of micro reactions. He is like a human lie detector test, except much worse since he can gather much more information off of more than just your heartbeat.

 

"I do. And I find it is better to introduce yourself to people in the same business... I'm Daredevil." He speaks, his gaze pinned on me. I don't know what this guy is up to, but he is being unnaturally friendly for some reason. If I were to guess, I would say he is currently confused by me since I am probably familiar to him and yet just as unknown.

 

"...Batman." I see his mouth tighten slightly, either wanting to ask why or stifling a reaction to the name. He puts the two billy clubs he has clenched in his fists into the sheaths attached to the sides of his legs, essentially disarming himself, showing that he doesn't want to fight me. Though his hands stayed near his sides, ready to react and pull his weapons out for a fight at the drop of a hat.

 

I stare at him, waiting for him to ask something else while he stares back, but no one says or does anything. This is nothing like the epic faceoff I would have thought would happen. Instead, we are just awkwardly watching each other in silence. I think he was initially on his way to come and have a fight with me, warning me not to use his name again or something. But then he sensed me and got confused when I was familiar to his senses, stopping that course of events in favour of a more amicable approach, clearly a method he is not used to.

 

"...Good talk," I say, tired of this farce. Either say something or get out of my way, any other time, I would have been fine to indulge him, but today I am not in the mood. Plus, the longer I hang around him, the closer he gets to figuring out why I am so familiar to him. So I walk calmly, continuing my course again, walking by him and towards the edge of the rooftop.

 

"Wait..." He calls as I reach the edge, pulling out my grapple gun and aiming it off towards another rooftop. I pause in my movements, looking back over my shoulder to see him looking at me, but he hasn't moved from his position. I wait for a moment, and when he doesn't say anything, I raise an eyebrow, which he clearly senses as he says something straight afterwards.

 

"...Be careful. This is a dangerous game." Daredevil says, giving me a warning. I think he stopped me from leaving, wanting to say something else, but he couldn't find the words, and so he left me with that.

 

I turn away and use the grapple to zip off into the air, spreading my wings in midair to glide off into the night. I have had a long night. I just

want to get back into my bed and go to sleep.

 

---

 

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