And the Answer Is...

The Answer, Kingpin's newest costumed enforcer, meets with the crime boss to report his findings on Spider-Man's battle with the Blob. With this information, the Kingpin allows the Answer to go out and attack Spider-Man directly, in order to learn the Wall-Crawler's weaknesses.

Meanwhile, Spider-Man and the Black Cat are sharing a romantic interlude from their nightly patrol. Spidey expresses the fact that his time with Felicia seems to be the only time he doesn't foul things up, and starts talking about how he skipped on dinner with Aunt May to battle Jack O'Lantern. The Black Cat stops his worrying with another kiss before handing him off his camera, with the pictures of his battle with the Blob, and then departing for the night. Spider-Man considers how lucky he is that he has Felicia, and then remembers that he ditched Flash Thompson to battle the Blob and wonders how he is doing.

At the apartment that Flash shares with his girlfriend Sha Shan, Sha is worried as Flash didn't come home all night. When Flash finally arrives he appears to have been roughed up. When Sha Shan asks him what happened, Flash brushes her off and goes to bed without any explanation. Spider-Man swings to the Daily Bugle and changes back into his guise of Peter Parker, then has the pictures of his fight with the Blob developed. Going into the main office, Peter makes the mistake of showing the pictures to J. Jonah Jameson who is now Editor-in-Chief of the paper, drawing the ire of the new editor Joe Robertson for not consulting him first. Joe calls Peter into his office and gives him grief for breaking the chain of command, but when he realizes it was an honest mistake on Peter's part, he apologizes for snapping at him. Joe praises the better quality of camera work and pays Peter. Although he's glad to have the money because he's so cash-strapped, Peter feels guilty about taking credit for Felicia's pictures. Going to the bank to cash the check, however, his account doesn't have sufficient funds for the bank to credit him without clearing the check first. This leaves Peter in a bind because he still won't have any money until the middle of next week, and his rent is due and the bills are piling up.

While complaining aloud at his mailbox, Peter has to quickly hide when Miss Muggins comes out to look for him, to collect his overdue rent. Finding an application for a credit card in his mail, Peter decides to sign up for it and then retires to bed. That night he's woken up by the Black Cat knocking at his window, telling him that someone has been following her. Freaking out, Peter quickly changes into Spider-Man and rushes out the skylight, upset that Felicia could compromise his secret identity again after he told her to be more careful. When he scolds her, he sees that she is legitimately scared, and decides to go and check things out.

Detecting the stranger with his spider-sense, Spider-Man calls him out. The Answer responds and attacks the duo, Spider-Man hands Felicia his camera and swings into action to battle the Answer. Spider-Man figures the battle will be a breeze but is surprised when the Answer gains the upper hand with his superior strength and speed. As the Answer pummels Spider-Man, the Black Cat gets into the middle of the fight. The Black Cat finds that the Answer moves too fast for her to land a blow, and somehow has managed to negate her bad-luck powers by not attacking her. The Answer is distracted long enough for Spider-Man to snare him in a web net.

With the Answer out of the way, Spider-Man leaps over a chimney stack to get to the Black Cat, and somehow misguides his leap, striking his knee on the chimney, tearing his costume. However, the costume repairs itself quickly, intriguing the Answer. When they begin questioning the Answer as to why he attacked them, he surprises them by pulling off the webbing net and tossing it on the two lovers, trapping them. While snared Felicia realizes her bad-luck powers only work when she's being attacked directly. With the battle over, the Answer is satisfied and departs, vowing to return again to defeat the two lovers. Spider-Man has a lot of questions, including why the Answer wouldn't fight Felicia, however, the Black Cat, not wanting to tell Spider-Man about her powers and how she got them, distracts him by suggesting they enjoy the more intimate possibilities of being stuck in his own webbing for a few hours.

Later the Answer reports to the Kingpin about his findings and how the Black Cat's bad luck powers are starting to affect Spider-Man as well. This pleases the Kingpin who seeks to secure the Answer's services in the future.

Recurring Characters

Spider-Man, Black Cat, Kingpin, Answer, Sha Shan Nguyen, Flash Thompson, J. Jonah Jameson, Joe Robertson, Mamie Muggins

Continuity Notes

• Spider-Man's battle with Jack O'Lantern occurred in Amazing Spider-Man #254.

• The incident with Flash Thompson and the battle with the Blob both happened last issue.

• Peter congratulates J. Jonah Jameson on his public confession in his creation of the Scorpion. This confession occurred in Amazing Spider-Man #251. Jameson funded the creation of the Scorpion back in Amazing Spider-Man #20.

• Spider-Man mentions the properties of his new costume. He obtained this costume on Battleworld in Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #8.

• The Black Cat gained these powers from the Kingpin in Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #89, and has been keeping them a secret from Spider-Man since.