The Stacy-Parker Christmas dinner concluded without a single alien invasion, explosion, or hostage crisis. For Peter, that was a holiday miracle in itself.
Back in the quiet of his bedroom, Peter sat on the edge of his mattress, rolling a small, crumpled piece of cardstock between his thumb and index finger. It was the gift Gwen had handed him on her way out.
Osborn Tech Expo.
It was the original ticket stub from the science demonstration that had permanently rewritten his DNA. It was physically worthless, but the weight of it in his palm felt heavier than Thor's hammer.
In return, Peter had given Gwen a small, heavy box containing his original, stripped-down web-shooters.
He didn't have a logical explanation for it. She didn't have powers. She couldn't swing from skyscrapers. But a quiet, persistent itch at the back of his skull—a gut feeling—whispered that she might need them someday.
He slipped the ticket stub into his desk drawer. The clock on his nightstand read 10:30 PM. He grabbed a roll of tape, preparing to pack up the rest of the gifts, when his cell phone buzzed. Unknown number.
Peter picked it up, leaning back against the wall. "Please tell me this is Nick Fury calling to sing me a Christmas carol."
"Hey. Peter... Parker, right?"
Peter blinked. It definitely wasn't the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. "Illyana? Is something wrong?"
"No, no. I'm fine," she said, her voice sounding unusually hesitant. "Sorry to bother you so late. I know it's Christmas Eve and you're probably busy, but... do you have a minute?"
"It's ten-thirty. The turkey is gone and the dishes are washed. I'm officially off the clock," Peter said, genuinely puzzled. "Do you need help with something?"
"There's a convenience store near the entrance to your neighborhood. I'm standing under the streetlamp. If you're busy, you don't have to come."
The line went dead.
Peter sighed, tapping his phone against his chin. He stood up. Venom instantly surged out from his collar, washing over his clothes to form his suit in a matter of seconds.
If you could physically force the word 'no' through your teeth, your relationship problems would drop by exactly fifty percent, Venom's deep, rumbling voice echoed in Peter's mind.
"I am not going on a date, V," Peter muttered, sliding his window open. "She just survived a demonic invasion. She probably needs help with some leftover magic stuff."
That is exactly the problem, Venom retorted. You help too many girls.
Peter ignored the symbiote. He dove out the window, firing a web-line into the snowy night.
A few minutes later, Peter dropped lightly onto the snowy pavement in the alley behind the convenience store. Illyana Rasputina was leaning against the brick wall, her breath pluming in the freezing air. When she saw the white spider emblem on his chest, her eyes widened.
"Oh," she said, scratching the back of her head. "I didn't expect you to actually come. Especially in uniform."
"So," Peter said, crossing his arms to ward off the chill. "What's the emergency?"
"No emergency. I just wanted to talk." Illyana stepped away from the wall. Her eyes glowed with a faint, crimson light. "Come on. Let's go somewhere else."
A portal sparked to life. But it didn't open in the air like a Sling Ring gateway. A glowing, brimstone-scented stepping disc expanded directly beneath their boots, sinking into the ground.
Illyana paused, looking at Peter before the disc dropped. "You can still back out."
"I'm already out in the cold. Let's go."
"See? I told you," Venom grumbled just as the ground vanished beneath them.
They dropped through the floor of reality and landed squarely on their feet inside... a bar.
Peter blinked his lenses, looking around. It was a cramped, dimly lit pub that reeked of cheap vodka, sulfur, and stale wood. It looked exactly like a dive bar in rural Russia, except for the massive, horned demon quietly wiping down glasses behind the counter.
"If I remember correctly, you aren't legally old enough to drink," Peter said, eyeing the demon.
"Who cares? This is Limbo, not Queens." Illyana hopped onto a barstool and snapped her fingers. The demon bartender immediately began mixing a cocktail.
Peter took the stool next to her. The pieces clicked together. Strange had left her in charge of the dimension. "So. You took the throne. You're the Lord of Limbo now?"
"Not quite," Illyana said, swirling the dark liquid in her glass. "The depressed Strange told me I could fully merge my soul with the dimension, just like Belasco did. I said no. I don't want to be a demonic god. So, I took the alternative route. I'm the Sorcerer Supreme of Limbo now."
She took a sip. "I've been down here for a month or two. Limbo time is weird. I beat every surviving demon horde into a pulp, secured the borders, and built this bar. You want a drink?"
"I don't get drunk, thanks to the metabolism," Peter said, declining the glass. "And if you get drunk, I can't drag you home. I don't know how to drive a stepping disc."
"I'm not going to get drunk," Illyana muttered, her gaze dropping to the scarred wood of the bar. "I just... I miss them. But if I talk to anyone else back home about it, they won't understand. They didn't see what happened to the older versions of my friends. They didn't see them die."
She offered a weak, hollow smile. "So, I tracked down the one guy who was there. Talking to demons is boring."
"You shouldn't drink away the trauma," Peter said softly. "It doesn't work."
"Don't worry," Illyana replied, entirely ignoring the advice. "The flow of time between Limbo and Earth isn't fully synchronized yet. Even if I pass out here, Christmas Eve won't even be over by the time I wake up."
Peter just sighed, resting his elbows on the bar. It was going to be a long Christmas Eve.
Ned Leeds sat at his cramped kitchen table in his Manhattan apartment, rubbing his bloodshot eyes.
As a field reporter for the Daily Bugle, Ned had spent the two weeks Spider-Man was missing hunting down street-level leads. J. Jonah Jameson had outright refused to print stories about the new Spider-Woman named Silk, forcing Ned to cover mundane city beats.
That led him to a bizarre kitchen explosion at a high-end restaurant. The NYPD wrote it off as a gas leak. But Ned had found fragments at the scene. Small, curved pieces of heavy-duty orange plastic that didn't belong near a gas main.
For half a month, Ned had spent his evenings meticulously supergluing the jagged shards together.
Tonight, he clicked the final piece into place. He leaned back, frowning at the object resting on his table.
"Is this... a pumpkin?" Ned muttered.
It was a ribbed, orange sphere. A hollowed-out Jack-o'-Lantern shell. A bizarre, crawling sense of familiarity scratched at the back of Ned's mind, but he couldn't quite place it.
Why did I just spend two weeks gluing a plastic pumpkin together? Ned laughed, shaking his head at his own obsession. He stood up, tossing the pumpkin over his shoulder toward the trash can. It clattered against the rim and rolled onto the floor.
Ned didn't care. He walked into his bedroom, wiping his face with a towel. He reached out and pulled open his closet door to grab his pajamas.
Ned froze. The towel slipped from his hands.
Hanging inside his closet was a suit of tactical armor. A sleek, grey exoskeleton. A tattered, hooded orange cape draped over the metallic shoulders. Resting on the floor beneath the armor was a bat-winged flying glider.
And stacked neatly on the shelves, right where his shoes used to be, were rows and rows of identical orange pumpkin bombs.
Ned's heart hammered against his ribs. What is this? How did this get in my apartment?
"Welcome, Ned Leeds."
The raspy, distorted voice echoed from the shadows of his bedroom.
Ned spun around. Standing in the corners of the room were several men wearing identical grey armored suits and tattered orange capes. Their faces were hidden behind grinning, demonic yellow masks.
The Hobgoblins stepped forward, their eyes glowing in the dark.
"This is your destiny," the lead Hobgoblin hissed, pulling a sparking pumpkin bomb from his belt. "You will become just like us. Welcome to the Goblin Nation."
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