One second, Spider-Man was standing still with his guard up. The next, his Spider-Sense went wild. The Sleeper, a hulking creature of bck goo, disappeared from sight. It should have been impossible, the Sleeper was humongous!

  WARNING! WARNING! HORMONE LEVELS WILDLY FLUCTUATING!

  His vision momentarily went white—and he saw the future. A future he could not stop. Bam! He saw bck. Spidey went from standing to being dragged across the concrete. The Sleeper ran and ughed all the way, smashing and grinding him down to the concrete.

  “How is it!?”

  Eating concrete wasn’t fun and neither was being dragged up the wall. His leg attempted a kick to his midsection but said midsection suddenly sprouted a tendril that blocked the blow. His skull bleeding and his brain rattling, he was dragged and dragged until bam!

  ‘Ugh…!’

  His thoughts were disbarred as he was smmed into the ceiling. One arm clinging to the wall, the other kept firm hold of Spider-Man’s skull and bashed him into the ceiling. Again and again and again.

  Bam!

  “How!”

  Bam!

  “Do!”

  Bam!

  “You!”

  Bam!

  “LIKE ITTT!”

  BAM!

  The head of Spider-Man was buried five feet into the ceiling. The underground was beginning to crumble and the Sleeper realized that. Before the viginte could so much as twitch, massive wings erupted from his back. The cackle that followed was no longer human.

  This was something else.

  “HAHAHAHAHA!”

  The sound of the Earth crashing and breaking. The sensation of being pummelled by fists and healing every ensuing injury. The foreboding knowledge regarding where you were about to end up.

  “Nghhhhhh…!”

  “Hahaahahah!”

  Felix was drowning. Suffocating by the huge palm to his face, the grip that it held, the dirt and stone he was subjected to, and the overwhelming strength his opponent faced.

  The distance between the underground and the pizza pza was forty feet. The Sleeper dragged him through all of it. From the perspective of the men stationed there, it felt like an earthquake. The refrigerator and ovens tipped over and the lights flickered.

  “W-what the hell—?”

  “Dude, I-I can’t hold on!”

  But this was no earthquake. What erupted from the flooring of the building was a giant monstrosity and Spider-Man. The Sleeper intended to keep dragging Spider-Man but as they exploded from the floor, he was able to kick away from him, nd on the ceiling, and bounce back at him. The fist the Sleeper hurled at him was effectively hopped over and Spider-Man nded a nasty punch that bled five inches into his gooey face.

  Pulling his punch back, he could feel pieces of the Symbiote return with him and nded a hard kick that bsted him through the wall and onto the street. The hole that was leftover would probably unbance the remainder of the building and cause the colpse of the upper floors.

  There was no time to look. If Crossbones’ men were there, then too fucking bad.

  He leapt outside where the Sleeper was waiting on the street. With one hand, he cwed a car and tossed it at him like a frisbee.

  ‘Goddammit.’ Spidey could have dodged but instead caught it with his two hands, the momentum failing to move him, and gently set it down. ‘Thank you Herbie for telling me this was a brand new car that the guy spent two years saving up for! Now I feel bad if it gets destroyed!’

  Forced to stay still, the next time Spider-Man looked, his opponent was already high in the air with a fucking pole.

  WARNING! WARNING! HORMONES LEVELS WILDLY FLUCTUATING!

  Just as that same warning was issued, the massive Symbiote became one with the night. It was impossible but it was reality. The pole in its hand and its huge, menacing existence—it disappeared in the blink of an eye. All Spider-Man could rely on was his Spider-Sense. It didn’t make sense how it was camoufging past his Detective Mode but it was a thought he couldn’t spare a second toward.

  His Spider-Sense urged him to the right. Too te. Wham! The street pole was what? Thirty feet tall? It was quite the damn range. Spider-Man was bsted through a building, feeling his world roll and seeing the surprised expression of an innocent civilian appear and then blip.

  He was in another street now, one hand and knee on the ground. He looked up, Spider-Sense ringing, and still couldn’t find him.

  Bam!

  He was sent flying again, crashing through several walls and suddenly finding himself in another street too. This was ludicrous. The left side of his body felt crushed. His colon and pancreas was certainly regenerating. He focused anyway, ignoring the pain.

  Speed, strength, and even stealth. The Symbiote had it all. Its abilities were eerily reminiscent of his own. However, there was one thing a Symbiote could not replicate.

  ‘Human instincts.’

  His finger curled.

  Two o’clock above, he heard a flicker of wind.

  ‘Got you!’

  He bsted the targeted section of the sky with all the bck lightning he could muster—and struck. The bck creature came crashing down. The length street pole was dropped, rolling away as a screech pierced the night. Each second drained the muscles immensely. Each second revealed the Symbiote screeching and the flesh of Crossbones clinging to it. It was a disgusting amalgamation of man and alien—of something that was not supposed to be in humans.

  'As if I'm going to hold back!'

  The bck lightning doubled in volume and the screech grew louder. The Sleeper extended a hand, fighting through the pain and the lightning, only to drop to the ground. The spider kept his distance and kept the lightning going. The coursing electricity was too much. Crossbones’ red flesh peaked out. The Symbiote was being forcibly ripped to shreds. The Sleeper raised its yellow hand again, a finger pointing at him.

  Thwip!

  Through the lightning, through the pain, a yellow projectile vented from the tip of its finger. His Spider-Sense fred up but it was too te. He wasn’t able to pull back the lightning in this and thus—

  Hissss!

  The yellow projectile was injected into his neck, piercing his suit. Instinctively, he put a hand to stop the blood.

  ‘W-what is this, acid!?’

  As, it was too te. A second projectile struck his arm. The Sleeper was still on its knees, desperate and weak yet slowly recovering. Lightning was effective but not super effective. The wound on his neck and arm quickly healed from the outside. The inside, however…

  WARNING! HEAVY AMOUNTS OF AEROSAL CHEMICALS INSIDE BODY!

  WARNING, DR. FAETH! SUBSTANCE TARGETING THE BRAIN! RECOVERY TIME ESTIMATE: THIRTY SECONDS!

  Gasping for air, the sound akin to chalk on a board, Crossbones rose and managed to nd a brutal kick to Spider-Man’s midsection. If it wasn’t for his reflexes, he would have crashed into the car. Instead, he flipped himself over to the rooftop of a commercial building.

  The wings on the Sleeper grew in size. With one fp of its wings, it soared into the sky and was able to cloak itself into the night. Felix didn’t understand.

  ‘How is he getting past Detective Mode? I don’t…’

  The smell. Before, it had been covered because of the natural overbearing scent underground. In the city, however, he could clearly smell. A chemical of some kind.

  ‘No, pheromones! It’s using pheromones to completely cloak its presence! And because my brain didn’t know it was even affecting me, it couldn’t react!’

  But now, it did. As soon as he grasped what it was, Extremis kicked in and the Sleeper’s presence returned to view. A second too te and he would have been body smmed into the building.

  Thwip! Thwip!

  Webbing attached itself to the shoulders of the Symbiote and wham! His two feet smashed against its face! Spidey then bounced off and webbed up its left wing, causing the Sleeper to malfunction. It began gliding rather than flying and Spider-Man knew this was to his advantage. He crawled all over the Symbiote, properly avoiding the tendrils that threatened to grab him, webbing the monster up in seconds.

  By the time it crashed on the rooftop, it was a white cocoon that could no longer move. Struggling, screeching, with Spider-Man standing on its back triumphantly. The creature itself failed to break through—

  ‘Oh.’

  Until yellow acid poured from its bck flesh and it melted through the webbing.

  Spider-Man jumped back and rolled to his feet, his eyes narrowing behind his mask. The Sleeper screeched, turned, and then charged. Spider-Man unched himself at Crossbones with renewed fury, fist to fist. The smaller spider was the first to bounce back, kicking at its ankle and then elbowing the back of his thigh. He spun around, adding thwips of webbing to slow it down. In terms of damage dealt, it wasn’t much.

  But it was on purpose. Going for heavy blows would slow him down. Spider-Man could feel it.

  ‘This thing is fast!’

  Every time it reacted, it was done with a sublime reaction time. Sometimes, even with the lightest of attacks, Spidey thought he’d get caught. It was like going up against a raid monster on the same level as you. Going head-on might give you victory. On the flip side though, strategize move sets were better suited to increase chances of victory.

  Bam! Bam! Bam! Elbow to the base of the spine, a palm to the side, a punch to the stomach, a duck that led into a sweeping kick to the thigh. His heel turned and turned, his attacks almost like a ballet dance.

  This was what he had learned during training. This was the Spider-Sense he had honed. Even though it was close, the Sleeper couldn’t touch him.

  His Spider-Sense fred again. It was preparing something so he jumped back and threw a couple balls of webbing. The Sleeper deflected it with a sweeping arm and growled. The Symbiote’s bck gooey arms turned into a dripping yellow acid. Each dropped ended with a kiss that melted the rooftop.

  Herbie was already analyzing.

  CALCULATING CHANGE IN ATMOSPHERE…CALCULATING TIME OF MELTING…UNKNOWN SUBSTANCE.

  ‘An unknown substance…don’t tell me—’

  “RAAAH!”

  His heel twisting, he wound up avoiding the mighty fist and slipping in close. Two palms thrust forward and jerked the giant thousand pound Symbiote. The acid followed and continued to melt through the rooftop. Felix narrowed his eyes, lenses scanning the acid and getting nothing.

  So he decided to go for it after all. He let the Sleeper recover and throw a punch. He dropped his hips, feet digging into the rooftop, and caught it with one hand. The acid melted into his suit, burning his flesh. Spider-Man grit his teeth and dug his fingers in, coating himself in the nasty yellow acid and searing his flesh.

  ANALYZING…ANALYZING…

  ‘Hurry up, hurry up…’

  A second fist was thrown. This time, Felix blocked it with a raised vertical arm. It was like getting hit by seven trucks in a rapid chain. The attacking force of the Symbiote was astonishing.

  SCAN COMPLETE! UPON CONTACT WITH EPIDERMIS, THE ACID RELEASES NANO-SCALE NEUROACTIVE PARTICLES. THESE PARTICLES INTERFERE WITH THE SYNAPTIC RESPONSES RESPONSIBLE FOR HIS SPIDER-SENSE, INDUCING TEMPORARY DISORIENTATION AND CONFUSION.

  ‘So that’s what it is…!’

  Bck lightning began to surge from him. The Sleeper rightfully identified the threat and the acid shifted from yellow to white. Both fists were brought back, only to return to smash down on him. The rooftop caved down. Spider-Man and the Sleeper drifted down into a boratory. Not just any boratory either, this belonged to Stark. Neither cared much for it.

  Smash! Smash! Smash! The Sleeper chased, his giant arms destroying floor after floor, forcing them to tumble further and further down. They exchanged with bone-crunching force with neither gaining an advantage. The entire building seemed to tremble under the intensity of their battle. Spider-Man, bouncing around the walls and going faster with the adding momentum. He nded kicks and bursts of bck lightning. The Sleeper, throwing around steel-melting acid and fists capable of bringing down entire houses. He could never nd a hit but if he did, it would be devastating.

  This wasn’t just a fight—it was a war.

  ‘Chemokinesis that adapts—’

  Swinging his arm, the droplets of white acid struck his mask and melted it. Then suddenly, the Sleeper disappeared.

  'Camoufge capabilities, augmented physical and visual prowess that makes it excellent at reading my Spider-Sense…’

  Except his ears were also hypersensitive and he managed to bst the Sleeper with bck lightning before it could strike him. Even so, it wasn’t enough. The white acid was parrying the lightning, acting as some sort of lightning rod that staved away the great damage it should have taken.

  Because while the bck lightning did do damage, it was very quickly healed.

  ‘...and incredible healing.’

  From the air down to the ground, at long st, the two reached the bottom floor. Luckily, no one was here and everything appeared deactivated. It was a chemical research facility or something. Five rge basins of green and white chemicals were stationed.

  The Sleeper didn’t care. Spider-Man did.