Not far from the warehouse, Clark lay flat on the roof of a tall building, watching Peter and the others get absolutely humbled by Matt.
In one hand, he held a hot dog he had just bought from a five-year-old street cart. The kind fried in oil that would send most people sprinting for a bathroom afterward.
Clark, naturally, was completely fine.
He was even eating it with real appreciation.
"Not bad. Who said this stuff gives you stomach trouble?"
His super-vision pierced through the roof and the upper floors, letting him see everything happening below.
"Putting my adorable little brother and sisters through their paces, huh?" Clark muttered. "Good. Don't go easy on them."
He had no intention of interfering.
A veteran was teaching the kids a lesson. What was wrong with that?
Matt had been fighting on the streets for years. Having a teacher like that give them a class was worth more than any training session Clark could provide. Technique like that wasn't something Clark could teach.
Clark could watch over them, sure, but he'd never truly go hard on them.
Power was too tempting a thing.
While he was at it, Clark also took a look at Matt's body.
"His eyes are completely dead. Optic nerves atrophied. But his hearing, smell, and touch are hundreds of times sharper than a normal person's. His brain has even formed a strange sonar-like imaging system. He's technically blind, but in practice he sees more clearly than most people with eyes."
Clark was genuinely impressed by Matt's spirit and will.
If every human heart was a light, then Matt's would be one of the brightest at the very top.
"Letting them suffer a little is fine. Pain is the best teacher."
Clark kept eating his hot dog, content to be a quiet spectator.
What he didn't notice was Matt glancing briefly in his direction.
Whether it was coincidence or not was hard to say.
Inside the warehouse, Peter broke free from Matt's hold.
Matt had taken him down in one move, but he hadn't actually hurt him.
"Okay, fine, you've got some moves," Peter said, putting up a boxing stance that looked a little ridiculous. "But we were just careless!"
He was battered, embarrassed, and stubborn.
His mouth refused to lose even if his body already had.
Matt withdrew his baton.
He had no intention of continuing the fight. He had already figured out what these three were.
Powerful, good-hearted, inexperienced rookies.
"I'm not here to fight you," Matt said. "I came tonight to trace where this weapons shipment was going."
He turned and tapped the wooden crate full of weapons with his cane.
"After Kingpin fell back, Hell's Kitchen didn't get quieter. It drew in more flies. Do you know who this shipment was originally meant for?"
The three of them knew absolutely nothing.
They had just stumbled across a crime and jumped in.
So they all shook their heads.
"The Ten Rings," Matt said. "An evil organization hidden mostly in Asia, but with connections reaching all over the world. Their agents in New York have been buying up high-tech scrap like this as fast as they can. They're also connected to the Hand."
His voice grew more serious.
"But that's not the worst of it."
Matt turned his head. Though he couldn't see them, he still faced Peter, Gwen, and Cindy with unnerving accuracy.
"Last night, while interrogating a dealer, I heard a rumor about Oscorp."
The moment Oscorp was mentioned, all three immediately paid attention.
"What about Oscorp?" Peter asked.
"There's a bounty circulating in the underworld for the locations and schedules of Oscorp's board members. The person who posted it claims to be a demon from Hell. They say his laugh alone can scare children awake from their sleep."
Matt tightened his grip on his cane and warned the young vigilantes in front of him.
"This city is brewing something worse than Kingpin. If you insist on playing vigilante, pray you don't run into that lunatic. Otherwise, those suits of yours will become burial clothes."
With that, Matt ignored them and went to the rescued girls. After a few quiet words of reassurance, he turned and disappeared back into the darkness of Hell's Kitchen.
He had work to do.
Evil didn't take nights off.
The three rookie vigilantes stood there, watching the veteran leave, unable to calm down after the warning he'd left behind.
"A demon? Oscorp's board?" Peter murmured.
He thought about Harry's disappearance that afternoon.
And Clark's warning.
Be careful around Norman.
A chill ran down all three of their backs.
Just then, police sirens wailed in the distance. Several patrol cars came racing toward the warehouse, lights flashing.
"The cops are here. We need to go," Gwen reminded them.
She absolutely did not want her father, or any officer, discovering her secret identity.
She could become a lawyer someday. Or work in some branch of justice.
But being outed as a vigilante?
That was impossible.
Too dangerous. Too uncontrollable.
The three fired their webs and quickly left the scene, leaving behind the webbed-up gangsters and the weapons shipment.
Night soon fell.
Manhattan.
At the top floor of an exclusive private club, inside a luxurious private dining room, an extremely discreet banquet was underway.
The guests were the six core members of Oscorp's board of directors.
They wore tailored suits, swirled wine glasses in their hands, and smiled with the smug satisfaction of victors.
They looked exactly like the kind of rich old money people imagined when they pictured the worst kind of corporate elite.
"Gentlemen, to our coming new era!" the chairman of the board, a gray-haired, potbellied old man, raised his glass.
"To the new era!"
"Tomorrow morning at eight, that arrogant madman Norman Osborn will be thrown out of our company for good. Without him wasting money on his insane experiments, we'll be able to restore our cooperation with Stark Industries and the military. The stock price will rebound in no time!"
Another director laughed as he agreed.
Clearly, he had bought plenty of shares at the dip.
Among these old-money vultures, no one cared how much sweat and blood Norman had poured into Oscorp.
They cared only about dividends.
Then, just as their glasses touched and laughter filled the room—
A sharp, piercing sound came from outside the club.
It grew louder.
And louder.
The old men froze.
Then fear hit them all at once.
A plane?
For one awful second, panic seized the room.
They scrambled to leave.
But before anyone could escape, the glass exploded.
Countless razor-sharp shards blasted through the private room like buckshot. Several directors failed to dodge in time and were sliced open, screaming as blood sprayed across their expensive suits.
No one was laughing like old money anymore.
Through the rain of shattered glass came a wild, arrogant laugh that made every scalp in the room prickle.
"Hahahahaha! Gentlemen! How could you hold a dinner without inviting your host?"
A figure slowly glided into the room on a bat-shaped aircraft.
He was encased head to toe in dark green armor.
The Green Goblin had arrived.
***************************
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