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[Help. Oscorp. Norman.]
Dante squeezed the phone in his hands until the plastic creaked under pressure.
'Why is she asking for help now?'
Felicia knew her limits. She had made an entire career by understanding the risk-reward ratios and sensing danger the way sharks sense blood in water. Then why did she go against his warning? She was a professional burglar, not a child to do something suicidal under the influence of petty emotions.
Norman Osborn had gotten to her somehow. She wouldn't have fallen for his coercion since Dante was just a few steps away. The billionaire psychopath had either used Walter Hardy or her mother, only two people who could force Felicia to bend.
It didn't matter anyway.
He had to get there. However, he couldn't storm in there as Dante, mercenary and second-in-command of Wild Pack. All of their plans would be for nothing if Silver Sable lost the defense contract.
'I need a mask.'
Just as he started thinking about his options, black smoke covered his vision like ink bleeding through clear water. It vanished before he could touch it.
He caught his reflection in his phone's darkened screen and froze.
"What the hell…"
His face had become a skull. An actual skull wreathed in ghostly blue flames. Two blue flames burned deep within those hollow sockets as a replacement for his eyes. It was beautiful yet terrifying, like gazing into the abyss and finding it staring back fondly like a lover.
"No one will recognize you like this." Death's soft voice reached him. "Just because I don't usually intervene doesn't mean I won't support my companion."
"Death. You're back."
Her presence made him more relieved than he'd have expected. Despite not getting much help from her, he had come to rely on her as an emotional anchor. Nothing would go wrong with such a powerful entity by his side.
"I never left."
She materialized beside him with the same skull surrounded in blue flames. They looked like lovers dressed for a ball in a horror movie or for a Halloween party.
"Time is precious if you want to save Felicia."
"Thanks. I'm going."
With the identity problem solved, he triggered Sue Storm's Resonance Link.
Nothing changed physically. But mentally, everything shifted.
A force field that didn't exist before suddenly could be felt, produced by his own cells. He extended his will outward, imagining a bubble wrapping around his body.
Dante watched his hands fade from sight, then his arms, his torso, and then everything. His flesh was still there, but the force field had curved photons around him, rendering him invisible.
'Perfect.'
He rushed down the stairs like a maniac and arrived by the Suzuki V-Strom. He laid his invisible palm along the frame and concentrated. Light began to divert smoothly around the metal beneath his hand. Layer by layer, he stripped the bike from the visible spectrum.
Invisibility meant nothing if witnesses saw a driverless motorcycle screaming through Manhattan traffic.
Dante grinned behind his skull face and revved the engine. The sound remained audible, but that couldn't be helped. He could've gone for a soundproof force field to muffle the engine noise. But that would be an unnecessary drain of his focus. He needed mental resources for whatever hell awaited him at Oscorp Tower.
He kicked off and wove through traffic. Pedestrians and drivers were confused, despite the fact they could hear him. Felicia's location on his phone shifted—she was moving away from Oscorp Tower. He wasn't sure whether to be relieved about her movement or concerned that Norman had already turned her into one of his own.
He accelerated hard. Following no traffic laws meant speed. He cut through intersections against lights and mounted sidewalks when necessary. Whatever vehicle Felicia was in couldn't match this kind of reckless driving.
His bike caught up within minutes.
The tracking pin led him to a street on Fifth Avenue, quite busy at this hour. He scanned every vehicle through windows for that distinctive platinum-blonde hair.
Every vehicle seemed clear in the radius except one.
A luxurious limousine, sleek and black with privacy-tinted windows. Suspiciously, the tracking pin moved whenever the limo moved. Every turn and every lane change moved the pin perfectly. Another doubt arose when he noticed that the limousine seemed to be heading toward the first research facility.
"It has to be it."
He followed the limo to a red light and dismounted the invisible motorcycle on the side. He jumped over cars in the traffic, leaving quite a few people wiping the lens of their spectacles. His hand reached for the rear door handle, and he ripped it clean.
Now wasn't the time for subtlety. He didn't care if Felicia was acting according to some plan of her own. The moment she had stopped sharing information meant he could take whatever action necessary as her ally and as a friend.
"I'm getting this!" A teenager held his phone up with shaking hands. "This is insane!"
"It's a ghost! It's gotta be a ghost!"
"Ghosts aren't real, you idiot!"
"Then what the hell is that?"
His freakish strength left a gaping hole in the limo's interior.
And there she was in the passenger seat. Beside her sat a man in late fifties, white hair, and a strong build. Dante recognized him instantly from the photos Felicia had shown him.
Walter Hardy. Her father. The master thief she idolized. That explained why she had left without a word.
But something was wrong.
Neither of them reacted to the door being torn off. Not even a hint of surprise or shock. Both silently gazed at the floating car door. Their expressions were blank like someone had taken away their emotions.
'Norman got them both.'
Around them, the street erupted into chaos. People ran screaming. A few just stood frozen. Others pulled out phones for the free social media content.
Dante hurled the car door away and ripped the steering wheel out of the car. They couldn't escape now even if they wanted to.
He released his invisibility. Blue flames blazed brightly as his skull-faced form materialized out of thin air like a demon summoned from a nightmare.
The screaming intensified immediately.
"WHAT THE FUCK!"
"OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD—"
"RUN! EVERYBODY RUN!"
"Mom, I'm scared!" A child's voice was barely heard in the chaos.
The mother pressed her daughter's face against her coat and ran away in the opposite direction.
An elderly man made the sign of the cross with trembling hands. "Dios mío..."
"Are you getting this?" One man kept filming despite backing away. "This is—I don't even know what this is!"
"It's the end times! The apocalypse!"
Felicia should have recognized him even with the flaming skull. The black biker jacket, the jeans, and his posture—she was too sharp-eyed to miss such details.
But her eyes stayed lifeless.
"Get out."
Both of them stepped out without surprise and without hesitation. Walter immediately grabbed Dante's throat and lifted him off the ground easily.
"Who are you? What do you want?"
Dante pumped solar radiation through his body, feeling that undeniable surge of power. He reached up and pried Walter Hardy's fingers from his throat.
The older man stepped back, his face twisting as he roared at the sky. Black tentacles exploded from his body, writhing and twisting and covering him in that familiar symbiote suit.
"Fuck off. I'm not wasting time with you."
With just a thought, he made Null shift the resonance link to Death.
The world shifted. Every edge in his vision became sharper, and he could suddenly feel every heartbeat and death of millions of cells happening around him. So much information that he felt overwhelmed. He had to consciously shut out those extra senses before they drove him mad.
The more he synced with Death, the deeper he felt how the universe inevitably marched toward entropy.
Walter Hardy threw a punch that ripped the air. The strength he exerted could've trashed a car with ease.
Dante caught it casually, and the impact dissipated like a fist meeting a pillow.
Walter Hardy's symbiote form matched or even surpassed Dante's five-times solar amplification in his non-resonance state. The level of strength could tear cars apart, punch through concrete walls, and utterly wreck the rookie superhero Ghost Spider.
Against Death's Resonance, however, it was a joke.
The symbiote's black matter rippled as Walter let out a screech. It instinctively felt the massive threat to its very existence.
And it wanted to run.
Felicia screeched as well, her mouth opening impossibly wide. Her body twisted, and black matter erupted from her skin.
The transformation was different from her father's. Where Walter's symbiote form was bulky and very reminiscent of Venom, Felicia's symbiote suit recreated a twisted version of Black Cat suit. Her signature domino mask framed around eyes with black sclera, making her cyan-green eyes glow.
The symbiote had even replicated the white fur trim flowing from her elbows. Her neckline plunged dramatically, with the symbiote forming an intricate web-like pattern across her exposed chest, leaving her midriff partially visible.
Everything accentuated rather than obscuring her natural grace. (Check paragraph comment for image)
"That's... actually kind of hot?" A male voice said from behind Dante. "I would smash."
His friend smacked him in the face. "Dude, not the time!"
"You won't smash?"
His friend cleared his throat. "Who wouldn't?"
Meanwhile, Felicia hissed at Dante, showing off her brand new claws. Just when he thought she would put up a struggling fight, she pointed her right claw to the traffic pole. Tendrils shot from her wrists and latched onto the pole before pulling her.
She was planning to escape using Ghost Spider's swinging techniques. Felicia Hardy would never make such an inelegant exit. This was the symbiote acting on primal fear, recognizing the threat and choosing flight over fight.
Dante grabbed the symbiote covering Walter Hardy and yanked. It came off like peeling tape from skin. The black matter stretched and finally separated with a wet, squelching sound. The symbiote whimpered, expressing its complete submission since it knew resistance was futile against the power of death.
Walter Hardy collapsed the moment the symbiote released him. Dante caught him gently, lowered him into the limo's back seat. The man's face was pale and his skin almost translucent. He could feel life slipping away from him like water through cupped hands.
'A day or perhaps less…'
He stuffed the symbiote in his pocket. There was no time to worry over Walter. Saving Felicia was a race against the time limit on Death's resonance.
Death's aura exploded around him like a shockwave, and he pushed his speed to the limit, leaving a blue flaming trail in his wake. He felt unstoppable like a god walking among mortals.
The crowd stared in stunned silence. Then everyone started talking at once.
"Did that just happen?"
"I got it all on video!"
"Someone check on that old guy in the limo!"
"Should we call the police? What do we even tell them?"
"'Hello officer, I just saw a burning skeleton man fight two alien monsters on Fifth Avenue'—yeah, that'll go over well."
"This is going to be everywhere in like ten minutes."
"Ghost Spider isn't the only superhuman in New York anymore."
"Is that supposed to make me feel better? I DON'T FEEL SAFE ANYMORE."
Dante could still hear the whispers.
'I'm definitely becoming JJJ's next target.'
He had made the right choice in hiding his identity, though, it wouldn't work with SHIELD. It should still take some pressure off Gwen and let her be the 'morally right' superhero.
Felicia wasn't as fast as Ghost Spider. He caught sight of her black figure on a rooftop. She didn't look back and leaped again.
He kicked the ground and jumped. The street cratered slightly beneath the force as he sailed three stories straight up.
Felicia screeched and accelerated, abandoning all technique for raw speed like a prey fleeing a predator in the wild. She burst through an apartment window.
Screams erupted from the apartment.
"WHAT THE—IT'S NOT HUMAN!"
"Call 911!"
"Lock the door! Argh, where's the baseball bat?"
Then from another apartment as she crashed through a shared wall. "JESUS CHRIST!"
"Mommy, what's that?"
"Don't look, sweetie! Get in the bathroom, now!"
Felicia spread terror from one house to another.
He followed her from the rooftop, noticing that he was back in his neighborhood.
'Is she going to my place?'
His hunch turned out to be correct when she charged into his apartment building and burst through his door. She dove behind his couch and cowered there like it would somehow keep her safe.
Even controlled by a terrified symbiote, even reduced to base instinct, some part of her understood that Dante would be here to protect her. Felicia Hardy had recognized his side as the safest place in the world, and that he would protect her from harm just like how he helped her avoid death once.
Her unconscious choice tugged at something in his chest. Guilt or perhaps regret. He couldn't help her when she was alone and scared, when her own father had betrayed her and let Norman transform her.
When she was most defenseless.
Suppressing his presence to the level of a mortal, he crouched before her and patted her head. "Look at me."
Those black sclera should be scary, yet at this moment, they seemed like the eyes of a pleading kitten. She wasn't terrified but relieved as if she had recognized him.
Then she threw herself in his arms and gurgled incomprehensible sounds. Even with the understanding from Death's resonance, he couldn't translate those sounds.
'Is she complaining to me about… myself?'
Symbiotes weren't born vile. The Klyntar race—the symbiotes' true name—had originally been a noble and empathetic race, dedicated to forming mutualistic partnerships with worthy hosts to raise them as heroes. In their natural state, they valued harmony, connection, and protecting the universe from bigger threats.
What had twisted them into violence was their hosts. A symbiote's personality was shaped by the mind and behavior of its first host, especially these poor creatures who weren't even born naturally but forced to mutate through torture and agony. They had known nothing but pain from their first moments of awareness.
Even so, Felicia had managed to make her bonded symbiote more humane.
The tendrils on her suit suddenly became active. He felt a sharp pain in his gut. Felicia looked up with terrified eyes, but her claws acted against her will and ripped another hole in his stomach. She roared and slashed at his chest. Every injury was healed before she created another.
He grabbed her claws and narrowed his eyes. Past the terrified symbiote's eyes, he felt the connection. A mental link was passing through walls, connecting directly the symbiote to Norman's mind.
"Norman Osborn, count your days. Death is coming for you."
***
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