The sun had gone down since Spider-Man had left the Avengers, having gotten over his surprise that they'd simply let him go when he realized that they had his identity and home address, if they wanted to find him then he knew they would.

"So..." he said to himself, swinging quickly through the city "We just took care of an electric man who says he was juiced by Oscorp... I figured Oscorp was up to some shifty stuff but I didn't think they'd have started human testing yet" He landed on the side of a building and stick to it, looking down over the illuminated city.

"Hold up, I'm getting ahead of myself here, I'm talking as if I had a clue what was going on at Oscorp, all I knew about was that they had some freaky-deaky spiders brewed up and one of them bit me" he corrected "If... if they've got more stuff like that in there then I need to find out about it" With that he oriented himself to remember where the Oscorp building was before throwing himself off the side, plummeting down to the ground before shooting a web onto a nearby building and swinging forwards rapidly. The journey to Oscorp took no longer than a few minutes, his entry to the building being made easier through a side vent on the wall.

"Alright" he whispered under his breath "Sector Seven was closed off last time, which is where they kept the spiders, so I'm guessing they keep their other diabolical instruments and creations there" It was after hours in the Oscorp building and on top of that they'd all been evacuated after the attack from the talking Christmas light earlier. He removed a cover on one of the vents and dropped down to the ground, lowering himself into a low and spread out crouch, surveying the area before moving forward.

"Where am I now?" he asked quietly.

"Somewhere you're not supposed to be" an angry female voice said behind him. His Spider-Sense flared up and he threw himself forward just in time to dodge a kick from a blue-haired woman with fury in her eyes. Spider-Man landed on his hands to soften his roll but the woman moved faster than he'd expected her to. She had landed on her other foot before pivoting on it, without lowering the other one, and attempted a spinning kick. Spider-Man ducked underneath the attack but once again the woman showed an expertise with martial arts he'd never seen before. As soon as she finished her rotation she bent her knee before leaping into the air and coming down with a powerful overhead kick.

"Holy fuck!" Spider-Man yelled, throwing himself to the side once more in a pitiful dodge, having to remain on the defensive the entire time. The woman slammed her heel into the ground, performing the splits before pulling her legs back together and using the friction gained to push herself back up to her feet. Spider-Man stood up straight and bent his legs, ready to pounce away if he needed to.

"Wait..." he said in shock upon seeing the woman's face "Luna?"

"That's Princess Luna to you" she snarled.

"Why are you here?" he asked her.

"I could ask you the same thing" she said, her blue eyes bright and angry "You're trespassing on private property, leave now"

"I can't, I need to get deeper into the building to-" he began only to be cut off by a furious princess dashing towards him. She thrusted her palm forwards in an attempt to knock Spider-Man off balance but he caught her wrist.

"Ha!" he yelled. It was at this moment that he realized just how badly he'd under-estimated Luna. Displaying strength far superior to his she lifted her arm high above her head and, with a quick pivot on her heel, she threw him over her shoulder and into the wall down the corridor. Spider-Man used his webbing to slow his movement before landing on his feet on the wall, dropping into a low crouch only to have Luna's boot catch him in the back of the head. She had followed him up the corridor after throwing him and had once again flipped herself over and brought her heel down in an overhead kick, this time making contact. Stars flashed in Peter's eyes as his head was knocked down, only sticking to the wall through instinct rather than will. He threw an awkward punch at Luna only to have her grab his hand and yank him forward. His fingers did not come away from the wall but small chips of the wall and paint remained stuck to his fingers as Luna's incredible strength tore him free.

"What the hell?" Spider-Man asked before Luna adjusted her hand placement and grabbed him by the throat, shoving him back up against the wall "Get off me!"

"You're not supposed to be here" Luna stated.

"I know that" Spider-Man coughed, his oxygen supply running low.

"Then why are you?" she demanded.

"I'm trying to help" Spider-Man choked. Luna rolled her eyes and placed her hand on his head, tightening her fingers around the top of his mask.

"I've heard that many times before, from another one who acted as you do, Daredevil was his name I believe, a cripple in a red rubber suit who tried to make a difference" Luna growled, beginning to slowly slide Spider-Man's mask off his face "I never found out who he was so I could never track him down, you however, aren't going to get the benefit of my mistake" Spider-Man's mouth had been revealed and Luna was preparing to yank the mask off completely when a gloved hand landed on her arm.

"Drop him Luna" the familiar, deep voice ordered.

"I don't answer to you Fury" Luna spat "Get out of here" It was then Luna seemed to notice the barrel of a handgun being pressed against her head.

"And I don't answer to you, let go of him" Fury stated.

"Get that gun away from me or I swear I'll-" Luna began only to be cut off as the sound of fury cocking the gun echoed in her ear.

"You'll what?" Fury asked "You're fast Luna, but I don't think you're fast enough to move your arm before I can move my finger"

"You wouldn't dare" she hissed, her eyes darting to Fury.

"Why wouldn't I?" Fury asked "I'm the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D, and thanks to the agreement that you signed my organisation and I operate above and out of your jurisdiction, as you do ours" Luna looked back at Spider-Man once more before sighing, dropping him to the floor and holding up her hands.

"Fine, he's not worth it anyway" Luna growled, turning around and walking back through the corridor. Fury chuckled, putting his gun away and extending his hand to Spider-Man.

"You good, kid?" Fury asked.

"Yeah" Spider-Man nodded "I'm sick of getting my ass kicked today" Spider-Man took his hand and pulled himself up, pulling his mask back down over his face and setting it back into its proper resting place.

"Did you expect to beat her on your first try?" Fury asked.

"I shouldn't have?" Spider-Man asked.

"Hell no boy, Luna's a category five mutant and on top of that one of the best fighters in the world" Fury laughed, clapping Spider-Man on the back and guiding him forwards "She's been alive for over six thousand years and has seen the creation of most forms of martial arts in existence and mastered each and every one of them in her travels around the world"

"What?" Spider-Man asked in shock "Seriously, all of them?"

"All of them, she's a master in hand-to-hand and armed combat, short, mid and long range firearms as well as an explosives expert and master survivalist" Fury continued "She helped train Captain America after he first got his super-powers and stands as our shining example of perfect soldier" Spider-Man stared down the corridor at Luna who had stopped to talk to someone, the voice too far away to make out.

"But I thought Celestia was stronger than Luna" Spider-Man commented.

"In terms of sheer strength, yes, Celestia outdoes her sister, but Celestia didn't train for nearly as long and nowhere as hard as Luna did... if I had to put money on it I'd say Celestia would come out on top if she could land maybe twenty solid hits consecutively on Luna but I'm damn sure Luna could run rings around Celestia without taking so much as a hit from her" Fury added.

"Christ" Spider-Man said in awe.

"So, moral of the story is don't piss her off" Fury smirked "Now let's go talk to our good friend Norman Osborn" The two of them walked up to where Luna was standing and discovered that she was talking to Celestia, who seemed very surprised to see Spider-Man.

"Oh" she said, putting a hand to her mouth "I didn't expect to find you here"

"Yeah, neither did I to be honest" Spider-Man nodded.

"Can we make this quick?" an irritated voice asked from across the room. They turned to see Norman Osborn standing against a desk with a glass of scotch in his hand. He looked up and noticed Spider-Man for the first time.

"Ahhh, so this is the infamous Spider-Man I've been hearing about is it?" he asked, walking towards the group "I've been very interested in you young man, they say you can do incredible things"

"I can do whatever a spider can" Spider-Man shrugged "But this isn't about me, I'm guessing my friends here are asking you to explain that little bundle of fun we had to play with outside... well, I did, they just sat back and watched" Luna rolled her eyes angrily before stepping forward and looking down on Osborn.

"So tell us Norman, where did it come from and why did it want to kill you?" Luna demanded. Osborn glared at Luna for a long second before taking a sip from his scotch.

"He came from one of the Delta labs upstairs, they work on renewable energy sources for the benefit of the environment" Norman said "I don't know exactly who he was but my guess is that he got to close to our new breed of electric eels"

"Eels?" Spider-Man asked with a scoff "That sounds dumb"

"I wouldn't expect you to understand the benefits of them" Norman said in his own scoffing tone.

"Actually I think I do, having an animal instead of a generator or piece of complex machinery means that you don't need to spend money on maintaining or repairing it, they're smaller and much easier to transport and they're easier to dispose of once they're dead" Spider-Man suggested.

"Something like that" Norman said "Tell me, do you have any idea how I might've made them into living generators?" Spider-Man thought for a second before nodding his head.

"Normally I would say that you reworked their bio-electric energy by amplifying the charge of the electrons and protons in their atomic make-up in order to make them produce more electricity" Spider-Man began "And then because of the links the atoms had to each other their entire build-up would've been electrically charged..." Spider-Man took a deep breath before continuing on his scientific rant.

"But, due to the fact that the electric eel already has three abdominal organs able to produce electricity naturally you simply did a little bit of genetic modification while they were in their embryonic stages in order to get their organs to constantly produce the electricity at a higher wattage" he finished. Osborn looked at Spider-Man for a long second before clapping quietly with an impressed smile.

"Now that surprised me... I didn't expect you to have such an incredible intellect" he congratulated "You wouldn't mind trying to spread some of that intelligence to my boy Harry would you, the boy can work a room but he needs to be as smart, if not smarter, than me if he wants this company to grow further"

"Alright, enough of this" Luna said, clearly sick of the scientific babble "How would the electric eels have turned him into some kind of bio-electric generator instead of just killing them like normal eels would have?" Norma stared angrily at Luna, speaking through gritted teeth as he answered her.

"As of right now, Your Majesty, I am unsure, the lab was destroyed by that lunatic, as were the eels and the scientists who worked on them" Osborn answered.

"And call me crazy for saying this, but I'm sure a multi-billion dollar project like that would've taken extensive notes, photos and documents on the research in case such a thing happened" Luna remarked.

"Which we have, but since the alarm went off today in the building both the data storage hardware and Oscorp's personal cloud system have been shut down for security reasons and won't come back online until tomorrow at noon" Osborn explained "I'm sorry that I couldn't be more help now but I'm going to have to ask you to return tomorrow and I'll try to figure out what the issue was" Luna stared for a second longer before moving away from Osborn.

"Very well" she nodded "Twelve sharp Osborn, we'll be back"

"I look forward to it" Norma said, feigning a polite tone. They left the room and closed the door, Spider-Man noticing Luna's hands clenching down by her sides. Celestia noticed her reaction too and placed a hand on her shoulder, smiling softly. Luna shook off her hand and stormed away from the others.

"Wow, that's a dick move" Spider-Man noted.

"She's angry" Celestia said to him softly "She just needs time"

"Why? I get that people died today but it's not like it's her fault or anything" Spider-Man asked.

"Because she takes her responsibility as co-ruler and peace keeper very seriously and she often blames herself for the loss of innocent lives" Celestia answered "She tries her best to help people"

"Then why did she attack me?" Spider-Man asked.

"I... I wasn't aware she had" Celestia said in surprise "I'll talk to her about that, but, I feel that she may have done it because she has a strong dislike of people taking the law into their own hands, she believes that vigilantes only seem to add to the trouble and danger in the world"

"But... we try to help people, not hurt them" Spider-Man countered.

"Yes, but some vigilantes are more extreme than others, while you try not to kill there are heroes like Wolverine and the Punisher whose method of saving innocents is to slaughter those who try to harm them" Celestia replied.

"They might see it as the best way" Spider-Man shrugged.

"Even if they do, the law does not" Celestia said "As we've seen many times before, a small group of people doing something different can lead to a whole village, town, city or nation following suit"

"Like how in high school when the popular kids get a new piece of clothing everyone else feels like they need to get it themselves?" Spider-Man suggested. Celestia looked at him with a puzzled expression for a long moment, a question between her lips, before asking it.

"How old are you?"

"That's... a weird question, why d'you need to know?" Spider-Man asked.

"Because I find it very strange that the first example you went to was the social status in a schooling environment instead of something like celebrities picking something and having their fans follow them, or a sportsman performing a certain warm-up exercise and then have his fellow team mates copy him... to me that shows a lack of experience in the cultural, or adult, world" Celestia explained "And those without much experience in that kind of world are usually very young" Spider-Man was silent for a brief second before coming up with an excuse.

"Sorry, it's just that the conversation I had with Osborn back there got my mind thinking about high school science and then high school itself, I was in my teenage brain mode for a second there" he answered.

"Of course" Celestia nodded, not completely convinced but deciding to withhold further questions.

Osborn sat down at his desk with an angry expression, filling his scotch glass and quickly downing it. There came a ringing from his office phone. He considered ignoring it for a second before deciding it could be important. He picked up the phone and held it against his ear.

"Osborn" he stated.

"Greetings Mr Osborn" a deep, rough voice said in a chuckling tone "I was hoping I could reach you tonight"

"Who is this?" Osborn asked, unwilling to partake in pleasantries.

"Not so fast Mr Osborn, I wish to ask you a question first" the voice said "Are you aware that you've been placed under investigation by the NYPD?"

"Until now, no, I wasn't" Osborn answered "Is there a point to this conversation or are you just wasting my time?"

"Indeed there is my friend, with the recent unfortunate incident at your tower the NYPD now will have enough evidence to get a search warrant for your workplace and as we both know, that would surely lead to them uncovering your... less desirable projects" the voice continued.

"I don't know what you're talking about" Osborn said in a droll tone "Goodbye"

"You mean those photos, videos and recorded phone calls with the mole I placed in your company aren't real?" the voice said in a faux surprised tone "Such a shame that this little beauty isn't real" There then came a recording of Osborn himself speaking to his head scientist Otto Octavius about their gene splicing machine and how four of the five test subjects had died during their initial tests. Osborn gritted his teeth angrily, tightening his grip on the phone.

"Alright, what do you want from me?" Osborn demanded.

"I wish to make a deal, I'll use my contacts to keep the police off your scent for as long as I can as long as you promise to use that little splicing machine for me when it's completed" he offered.

"Who are you?" Osborn asked again.

"I can't give you my name, but my associate Hammerhead will be visiting your penthouse at twenty-one hundred hours tomorrow night, make sure you're there" the voice said "So do we have a deal?"

"I don't really have a choice do I?" Osborn asked "But, you never told me what you wanted the splicing machine for"

"I'll use it in a way that'll be beneficial for us both, I promise" the voice said before hanging up. Osborn stared at the phone for a long moment before placing it back on the hook.

"What the hell did I just get myself into?" he growled, pouring himself another drink and downing that quickly. Next Chapter: Complications Estimated time remaining: 12 Hours, 51 Minutes