"Into the Spider-Verse" - Part One

Part One

            I’ll admit my knowledge of comic books was scarce (I didn’t realize until my last regeneration that Clark Kent and Superman were the same bloke). Of course, I knew who Spider-Man was. News photographer Peter Parker by day and masked superhero by night. But this Spider-Man, the one Ryan addressed as “Miles Morales,” was new to me.

            Miles was caught off guard from Ryan’s knowledge of his secret identity. “H-How did you know that…I mean…” He cleared his throat, deepening his voice before he asked, “Who’s Miles Morales?”

            Obviously, he was playing dumb.

            “It’s no use, kid. They know who you are.” Another voice in the area spoke – this one sounding much older and tired.

            From the shadows emerged another Spider-Man, the one I knew all too well.

            “Peter Parker,” I uttered with amusement.

            He unmasked himself, revealing the haggard face of a man in his late-thirties with dark, graying brown hair. “Wow, you’re going two-for-two on the whole ‘secret identity’ thing,” he wittedly said. “You people must clearly be from another dimension.”

            “What gave it away?” I returned his cynicism.

            “Oh, I dunno, maybe the big blue box marked ‘police’ from that weird British sci-fi show,” Parker observed.

            “What weird British sci-fi show?” Yaz asked (I’ll admit the reference went over my head just as much so).

            Miles, removing his own mask to reveal his fresh young face (which was more acceptable than Parker’s, I must say), approached me and deduced, “You guys must’ve got here the same way Peter did. Another rift in space-time.”

            “Another?” I said. “You mean one’s opened here before?”

            Curiously, I took out my sonic and scanned the area. Just as it had in the previous reality, it picked up on dimensional energy that’d been dispersed all throughout the atmosphere.

            “It’s not nuage energy,” I said. “But there is something in the air.”

            “A little scar tissue from the Collider incident,” Parker divulged.

            My interest piqued at this. “Tell me more about this ‘Collider’.”

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            Peter and Miles did us one better and showed us where the Collider, a massive machine capable of opening portals into other dimensions, was once housed before it was destroyed. They provided me with the location, which was an underground chamber underneath a building owned by the incarcerated Wilson Fisk (a.k.a. “Kingpin”).

            The circumstance of this location urged Yaz to ponder aloud, “What is it with these bad guys and underground labs?”

            It was a great question that I’d have to look into at a later time.

            Right now, I was busy scanning the area that was the Super Collider staging chamber. The traces of dimensional energy were a thousand times more massive here than they were above ground.

            “Definitely the source of what brought us to this dimension,” I disclosed.

            “Only there’s no machine around to shut it all down,” Graham (once again) pointed out the obvious.

            “Nope, we made sure to take care of that,” Peter stated.

            “So how’re we supposed to get you guys home?” Miles asked.

            Another great question – one that had me completely stumped on the answer.

            It didn’t help my concentration much with the sound of feet shifting over all the rubble littered on the floor, drawing our attention towards the shadows. We saw a sickly-looking man step out.

            “Hello,” I greeted him in my friendliest way. “Did your curiosity bring you down here, too?” He didn’t answer me. In fact, he hardly looked our way, seeming to be lost in another conversation with someone none of us could see.

            I slowly and cautiously approach him.

            “GET BACK!” he yelled, finally looking at me.

            I recoiled from the outburst, respecting his demand. “Alright, alright. No need to get in a huff. Would it be too much to ask your name?”

            After a few heavy breaths, the man replied, “Eddie…Eddie Brock.”

            “Oh, no,” I heard Peter gasp. “Doctor, get away from him!”

            I briefly turned to him, baffled as to what got him so cagey (wish I could have “Spider-Sense”). Then I detected this unusual gurgling noise from where Mr. Brock was standing. Turning back to him, my body stiffened. Brock was no longer in front of me; instead, it was a tall, hulking black creature with white eyes and sharp teeth.

            “Oh,” I wheezed, blanketing my fear with admiration. “And who might you be?”

            The creature answered in a haunting voice: “We are Venom!”