Spider-Man 2099 #2 — Nick Peron

Feb 22

Feb 22 Spider-Man 2099 #2

Nothing Ventured...

Back at his apartment, Miguel O'Hara continues the story of his strange transformation for his holographic digital assistant, Lyla. Though he had been changed, he was so numbed by the experience that it hadn't quite registered. He stared at his hands, his vision to out-of-whack to see them for the claws they had become. There was a buzzing in his ear, which he still couldn't quite make out as the voice of Aaron Delgato. Unbeknownst to Miguel, the older, higher-ranking Aaron had just sabotaged the genetic template process Miguel had just undergone in an effort to do away with the young upstart. Fearing for his life, Delgato pulls a gun on the now monstrous scientist, but Miguel manages to leap effortlessly away from the blasts. Miguel is barely able to recover his ability to speak before a stray blast hits a large canister labeled "DANGER". The resulting explosion punches a large hole through the Alchemax building and sends the two men flying.

Miguel manages to catch Aaron by his arm, holding him stories above New York. Miguel holds as tight as he can, but Aaron resists, claiming the skin is being flayed from his arm. Finally freeing himself, Aaron Delgato falls to his death. Confused and horrified, Miguel finally notices that each finger is tipped in a razor-sharp talon. "Talons... Heightened vision... leaping like a spider...Dear Lord... the spider program... I'm a freak!" This startling realization is interrupted by a heavily armed squad of Public Eye security agents, who have Miguel (with his face covered) in their spotlights. Preferring death to be a freak, Miguel leaps from the building just before the agent’s open fire. As he falls Miguel just hopes to die -- for all of three seconds.

"What am I, nuts?!" Miguel screams for help, grasping at the building's smooth metal facade. Miguel manages to dig in his claws, slowing himself, and finally comes to a stop when talons on his toes dig in as well. Resolving not to look down, he begins a slow descent.

As more Public Eye and Fire Control arrive on the scene, Miguel looks on from a nearby rooftop. Aaron's bumbling attempt at homicide has left Miguel a monster, and now he doesn't have the guts to finish the job either. With "Public Eyeballs" crawling everywhere, there's no chance for escape. Or so it would seem until he hears a strange voice from above.

"Repent! Repent all of you! Repent Tyrants of Alchemax!" yells a man dressed as Thor from his personal glider. The man is a Thorite, a devotee of the Church of Thor, heralding a new day when Thor will return to "smite the Frost Giants of industry". Miguel calls after him, and leaps for the so-called "sky-kite", trying not to rip it to shreds. When the Thorite demands to know who he is, Miguel replies, "Easter Bunny. Santa Claus. Spider-Man. Take your pick." The name Spider-Man strikes home for the Thorite. Surely the return of one of Thor's legendary allies proves his own return is nigh! The two crash the kite into the ground below. Miguel is sorry about the ruined sky-kite, but the Thorite encourages him to take the torn fabric to fashion a mask. ("Spider-Man must be masked!")

In his office, Tyler Stone takes a tense call with Tiger Wylde, ruler of Latveria.[1] Wylde shows stone what remains of his "assassin", stating that Alchemax must have declined sorely after he left the Corporate Raider program. Stone disavows any knowledge of an assignation, but Wylde just cuts him off. Enraged, Stone demands to see Dr. Crane and Venture, but his secretary informs him that Venture is already in the building, inspecting the damage site.

Down in the lab, the Elite agent known as Venture surveys the damage. His cybernetic eye can still pick up the thermal imprints left by Aaron Delgato and Miguel O'Hara, from their footprints to full body-shaped imprints where the men hit the floor. Venture's presence visibly shakes the investigators from Public Eye. When one whispers to his comrade that the Elite gives him the creeps, he is hushed. "Quiet! I bet he can hear you no matter how you whisper!"

"You'd win your bet." On that note, Venture departs. Back in his office, Tyler Stone vents his frustration on Dr. Crane. The doctor is flabbergasted at the mission's failure, insisting that the body armor he designed was impenetrable. Stone angrily informs the doctor that the armor's occupant was not so fortunate, and warns him that his future intelligence work with Alchemax had better be an improvement over this fiasco. Venture enters the office to deliver his report. Ejecting a small silver disk from a slot in his head (where his left ear used to be), and loading it on to Stone's big-screen console, Venture demonstrates how the mystery target fell to his belly while Delgato hung over the edge. Once Delgato has fallen and Public Eye intrudes, the mystery man vaults out of the gaping hole in the laboratory wall then climbs up the building. Whoever he is, Stone considers the mystery man well worth pursuing. Stone puts Venture in charge of tracking him down, considering the job to be above Public Eye.

Back in his Babylon Towers apartment, Miguel awakens. He is shocked to find the previous night was not a dream, and that his spider claws have torn his sheets to shreds. He orders his digital assistant Lyla to darken the room, as his eyes are now to light-sensitive to endure sunlight. At that moment, Gabriel O'Hara again calls to check in on his big brother. Gabe had by now spoken with a very shaken Dana D'Angelo, and insists on coming over. "Terrific." With Gabe on his way, Miguel begins to consider how expensive it will be to replace his wardrobe with unstable molecule fabric. With his new claws, any other material may be torn to shreds with a careless gesture. As it is, the only UMF outfit he has is an old Day of the Dead "death's head" bodysuit that he used to wear to the festivals. The only good news seems to be that his claws reflexively retract to avoid damaging Miguel's skin; with any luck, Miguel may learn to control his claws deliberately.

Gabe O'Hara soon arrives and immediately tries to interrogate Miguel about Alchemax, Dana, and the Rapture to which he's now addicted. Miguel insists he's beaten the Rapture, but Gabe knows that it binds to DNA, and no one beats it. Gabe can appreciate that he feels a certain degree of loyalty to Alchemax - they discovered him, educated him, shot him up through the corporate ranks and gave him free rein -- but he can't turn a blind eye to all the evil that they do forever. Miguel's eyes are sharper than Gabe thinks, however, especially after the accident. From his mile-high apartment, Miguel is able to recognize a figure at street level as Venture, a psionically-enhanced heat tracker and cyborg Elite, whom he recognizes from old files and his horrific reputation. Venture had managed to follow Miguel's heat trail from the crashed thorite glider all the way back to his apartment and will arrive in moments.

Miguel quickly shoves his brother out the door. Venture is tracking the spider-man who escaped from the lab, not Miguel O'Hara, who wasn't even supposed to be in the lab that night. With Venture's ability to track by heat signatures, the only way to save the latter is to somehow give up the former. Thinking quickly, Miguel attaches the partially-shredded airfoil from the thorite glider to his UMF death's head costume. Bursting out of the window, Miguel falls for stories before the foil finally catches an updraft, sending him crashing into Venture on the street below. With venture knocked down and flat-footed, Miguel tries to find something to say that will shake the seasoned combatant, something that doesn't reveal how terrified Miguel is.