Smoke and Mirrors

Uncle Ben was in the middle of scolding Peter for sneaking off to a bar after school when suddenly, the city is under attack by a massive whale-like monster.[1] Shocked by the sheer size of the creature, Peter grabs his uncle and Liz by the hands and tells them they got to get to safety. As they flee, the Fantastic Four and the military arrive on the scene to fight the creature. Watching the battle, Peter can’t help but think that there is some way he could help. However, he is too frightened and as they flee the scene, Peter uses his agility to pull Ben and Liz away from falling debris and into the relative safety of a park.

When the smoke clears, Peter sees a homeless man trapped under some debris. When Peter tries to help free him, the girder the man is pinned under is too heavy to lift. He is about to write the man off as a useless drunk when the Thing arrives and lifts the heaviest debris off the man. Peter is then able to remove the girder and discovers that he has been impaled by a rebar and watches as the homeless man bleeds out and dies. This deeply upsets Peter and he finds no comfort from the Thing, who tells the young man to move on and help the next person they find. Seeing that the boy is upset, the Thing tries to console him, but Peter tells the man-monster to leave him alone and runs away. The Thing turns his attentions back to the monster since that is the higher priority.

It takes sixteen hours before Peter, Ben, and Liz are able to get back to Queens. After Liz is dropped off at him, Ben tries to talk to Peter. He admits that their problems seem small in comparison to what they witnessed today, but asks Peter what’s wrong. Peter admits that he feels guilty about what happened today, feeling like he could have done more. Ben tells Peter that he learned in the war that the bravest thing you can do sometimes is to just survive. This isn’t good enough an answer to Peter, who points out that the Fantastic Four fought back against the monster and beat it. Ben points out that is the Fantastic Four’s job as they were given great power and with great power comes great responsibility. He then compares to Peter who, as far as he knows, doesn’t have the amazing powers that the Fantastic Four do and said it isn’t fair to measure yourself up to superheroes, saying that he thinks Peter did his best and Ben is proud of him for it.

Peter still feels terrible after it all because Ben’s words didn’t make him feel better, instead, they felt like a knife between the ribs since there was more that he could have done. From there, things appear to be falling apart in the life of Peter Parker. Liz Allan blows him off all day and when he finally manages to talk to her, she tells him that she is getting back together with Flash Thompson. That night, Peter feels restless and goes out as Spider-Man to party with Tiffany Lebeck and their friends at Mayhem. When Tiffany tries to talk about their ongoing contract negotiations with Monty Caabash, Spider-Man tells her that he doesn’t want to do anything but party. Later that evening, the night of drinking has caught up with Peter and he is throwing up in Tiffany’s bathroom. Knowing that something is wrong, Tiffany tries to get him to talk. Although he doesn’t want to at first, Spider-Man tells her how he was in the middle of the attack on New York City and he could have done something, but didn’t. In the end, even when he tries to save a life, that person still died. Tiffany points out that he could have gotten himself killed and that saving the world is not his responsibility. She then starts pressuring him to finally show her his real face. Peter still wants to keep it a secret but when he passes out on the floor moments later, she takes a peek under his mask anyway and realizes that Spider-Man is a teenager.

When Peter wakes up he is incredibly hungover, he also discovers there are mobsters in the apartment, their leader is a man named Mister Angel whom Monty Caabash owes a great deal of money. He gets Spider-Man to watch a news editorial by J. Jonah Jameson who calls Spider-Man a coward for not doing anything when the city was under attack. Angel says that’s enough and turns off the television and says that the both Spider-Man and Tiffany have really screwed up. He has far too much money tied up in Spider-Man to let the gravy train stop now and tells Spider-Man that its now time to become a hero.

Recurring Characters

Spider-Man, Uncle Ben, Liz Allan, Giganto, Fantastic Four (Mister Fantastic, Invisible Girl. Human Torch, Thing), Tiffany Lebeck, Monty Caabash, J. Jonah Jameson

Continuity Notes

1. This story takes place during the events of Fantastic Four #4 when the Sub-Mariner summoned Giganto and sent the monster on a rampage through New York City.

Topical References

• Ben refers to his time in “the war”, but doesn’t specify which war that was. You, dear reader, shouldn’t go assuming what conflict that is either as Ben is a character with a normal life span who existed in the Modern Age of the Marvel Universe and is subject to the rules of the Sliding Timescale. As such, any real-world conflicts would be considered topical anyway.