Marvel Novel Series 08 - The Amazing Spider-Man - Crime Campaign

by Paul Kupperberg

  His left arm dangling uselessly at his side, he dropped again. But this time, less than thirty feet below him, was the overhang of the RCA Building’s front entrance on Fiftieth Street. He landed on his feet on the canopy’s edge, his legs flexing at the last moment to absorb the impact of landing. He tottered at the edge for several seconds, unable to use his dislocated left arm to regain his balance. He fell the final dozen feet to the sidewalk, but even before he landed in a crumpled heap, unconsciousness claimed the youth called Spider-Man.

  The blackness before Spider-Man’s eyes began to disintegrate. First, tiny pinpoints of light pierced the dark veil, expanding slowly into muddy gray and white patches. Then, rich pastel colors swirled into his vision, settling finally into a hazy view of the scene around him. He was in a small, partitioned-off section of a hospital emergency room, lying on his back on an examination table. He brought his hand quickly to his face, feeling the thick material of his mask beneath his fingers.

  “Don’t worry, son, I didn’t peek.”

  Spider-Man tried to raise himself on his elbows to face the speaker and he winced in pain as he put his weight on his left arm. “Here now, lad,” the voice said quickly, “you’d better watch that arm of yours. Let me help you.” He felt strong hands brace his back, lowering him to the table.

  The speaker stepped around into Spider-Man’s line of vision. He was a craggy-faced man, in his late forties probably, but his freckled, weather-beaten face made him look older. His hair was shocking red, connoting an obvious Irish heritage, a fact backed by the small name plate on his white doctor’s smock: LIAM O’CONNOR, M.D. He smiled pleasantly at Spider-Man.

  “How’re you feeling, son?”

  “H-how did I get here?”

  “Now, now. We’ll answer my questions first and then yours, all right?”

  Despite his weariness, Spider-Man smiled. “You’re the doc.”

  “That’s true. Now, how do you feel?”

  “Fine.” Considering I just fell a couple dozen stories from the top of the RCA Building.

  “Double vision? Headache? Any problems at all?”

  “Just my arm, Doc. Did I break it?”

  Dr. O’Connor shook his head. “No, lad, but you have dislocated it. I took X rays and it should be as good as new in about a week, provided, of course, you take it easy.” He laughed. “I don’t suppose you do much of that, do you?”

  “Not very much, no,” the Web-slinger admitted. “You’re certainly pretty cool about having a superhero stretched out on your examination table, Doc.”

  O’Connor waved this aside, smiling. “Son, I’ve been practicing medicine in this city for twenty-two years now. Do you honestly think there’s anything left out there that’ll surprise me after that?”

  “I concede the point.” Spider-Man sat up, careful to keep his weight off his bad arm. It didn’t hurt as long as it was not jarred. In fact, his shoulder was pretty much numb to all sensation. Novocaine, he guessed. I’m in for some real, honest-to-goodness hurting when that wears off. “Not to change the subject, Doc, but would you mind telling me who brought me in here? In fact, would you mind telling me where ‘here’ is?”

  “Of course. You’re in Roosevelt Hospital. As to who brought you here, I’m not sure I got her name.”

  “Her?”

  The doctor nodded. “Beautiful woman,” he said wistfully. “She’s waiting outside to talk to you, I believe. Would you like me to send her in?”

  “Are you kidding, Doc? A beautiful woman? I may be able to crawl up walls, but don’t let the costume fool you. I ain’t crazy!”

  O’Connor laughed, shaking his head in wonder. He pulled aside a curtain and left Spider-Man alone in the small examination room. Spidey took the opportunity to slide off the table, gingerly testing to see if his legs would hold his weight. They did. Mr. Parker, either somebody up there likes you a whole heck of a lot, or you’re the luckiest hero since Dick Tracy married Tess Truehart. Hubba-hubba.

  The curtain behind the head of the examination table opened again and the woman entered. She was beautiful, all right.

  She was also the Kingpin’s wife.

  Behind his mask, Spider-Man gaped in undisguised astonishment. But Vanessa did not see that very human expression cross this bizarrely garbed creature’s face; rather, she saw the immobile façade of the web-patterned mask. It looked as eerie, as frightening, as it always had to her. It was the face that invaded her dreams, reminding her constantly of the humiliation and defeat her beloved husband had suffered at Spider-Man’s hands.

  Spider-Man recovered his voice. “Er . . . I think I owe you a heap-load of thanks, lady.”

  “No.” Her voice was a barely audible whisper. “I did not do what I did for thanks, Spider-Man. You were hurt, nearly killed, by my husband’s hand. I-I could not leave you there, possibly to die . . .

  “My husband has garnered more than enough of his share of sins in his lifetime. I could not add your death to that list.”

  “Fair enough.” Spider-Man knew what emotions this woman must feel for him, her husband’s archnemesis. “But that doesn’t change anything between me and Kingpin. He’s involved in something and I aim to stop him if I can.”

  “You always have in the past,” she said. “That is why I am asking you not to this time.”

  “What?”

  “He has sworn to me this will be his last operation,” she pleaded. “He would not lie, not to me! But he is a proud man, Spider-Man, prouder than you can ever know. Do you know what defeat does to a proud man? It makes him bitter, yearning for revenge.”

  “I don’t see what that . . .”

  “Don’t you see? It can never end that way. It just goes on and on and on until there is no longer a man left, but merely an embittered shell who can do nothing but plot and scheme his way into insanity.”

  “But he’s breaking the law! I can’t let him get away with it.”

  “Why not? Has God appointed you as the final arbitrator in such matters?”

  Spider-Man shrugged. “It’s what I do.”

  “Then I cannot change your mind,” she said at length, turning to leave. She stopped short of the curtain, turning to face Spider-Man again. “You are more like him than you think, Spider-Man. Could that be why you hate him so?”

  “I don’t hate him,” he said softly. “It’s the game we’ve both chosen to play. Neither of us can change the rules. That’s the way it is.”

  Vanessa’s eyes filled. “As you say,” she said, her voice choking with emotion. “Fair enough.”

  She swept aside the curtain.

  “Hey, Vanessa!”

  She stopped, not turning.

  “You’re a hell of a good woman. The Kingpin’s a lucky man.”

  Her shoulders heaved slightly as she swallowed a sob. And then she was gone.

  Thirteen

  Dr. O’Connor walked back into the examination room, a look of confusion on his weather-beaten face. Spider-Man was in the middle of the small room, his head slightly bowed.

  “Spider-Man?”

  The Web-slinger looked up. “Oh, sorry, Doc. Guess I kind of lost my way there for a second.”

  “Are you feeling okay?”

  “Oh, yeah. It’s just that something pretty heavy just went down in here. Gave me something to think about.”

  “I know. I saw the lady leave. She was crying.”

  Spider-Man merely nodded. O’Connor was not a particularly curious man in matters other than medical, but now, standing with this man, he wished he could see through the thick material of his mask for some clue to an emotion. What sort of man was this, anyway? No, he corrected himself, this so-called Spider-Man was just barely a man at that, at least chronologically. He could tell that much about the boy from his examination. Dr. O’Connor sighed mentally. He was almost sorry he had resisted temptation and hadn’t looked at the face beneath the mask—just to see what such a person looks like.

  “Say, Doc, you, uh . . . didn’t happen
to notice any gents in blue suits out there looking for anybody fitting my general description, did you?”

  The doctor raised an eyebrow. “Police?”

  “Yeah. They tend to take exception to my work habits from time to time, and to tell the truth, I don’t feel like hassling with them right now.”

  “So I’ve heard. No, there were no police that I saw.” He went over to a cabinet and rummaged around for a few seconds before pulling out a canvas sling. “Here,” he said. “Let me help you on with this. It’s best to keep that arm immobile as much as possible.”

  With the doctor’s help, Spider-Man got into the sling. It wrapped around his left shoulder and across his chest, keeping the bad arm tightly strapped across the spider-emblem on the front of his costume.

  “The local anesthetic I gave you for the pain should hold for another hour or so, and if it’s too painful after that, I can order something else for you.”

  “Sorry, Doc, I can’t hang around here that long, if you’ll pardon the pun. I’ve got felons to catch.”

  “You don’t understand, son. I’m checking you into the hospital. You’ve done some damage to that shoulder, and I want to keep an eye on it for a day or so.” The doctor turned, reaching for a clipboard on top of a medicine cabinet. “I’ve arranged for a private room in a nearly deserted wing. You won’t be disturbed.”

  But when Liam O’Connor, M.D., turned back to face his patient, he was gone.

  The gentle flapping of the curtains was the only evidence Spider-Man had ever been there.

  I hated to cut out on the doc like that, but I haven’t got the time to play Dr. Kildare reruns.

  Spider-Man climbed slower than usual up the wall of his Chelsea apartment building, slightly hampered by his dislocated left shoulder. It hadn’t been until he was outside the hospital that he remembered his web-shooters were useless, smashed by the Kingpin, making transportation home more difficult.

  But not impossible!

  He had merely leaped onto the roof of a Chelsea-bound commuter bus and rode home clinging by his toes and fingers.

  He perched on the sill outside his bedroom window, which he kept unlocked for just such an occasion. I wonder how the other tenants would react if Spidey sauntered in through the lobby, stopping to pick up his mail, nodding good morning to old Mrs. Muggins and her gift-leaving poodle.

  He lifted the window and stepped inside, pulling off his mask with a sigh of relief. His face was pale, slightly drawn from the events of the day. I could use about three weeks of sleep. He gingerly unstrapped his arm and peeled off his costume, pulling on a tattered terry-cloth robe. Already, his shoulder was beginning to throb with a low, dull ache. Remember, smiley, it gets worse before it gets better. Ouch!

  Peter Parker pulled open the bedroom door that led into his rather eclectically furnished living room. There, seated at his Salvation Army Original desk, was Cindy Sayers, intently reading through something from one of the drawers.

  “Cindy?”

  She yelped at the sound of his voice, knocking over the chair as she jumped to her feet. “Peter!” she gasped. “What’re you doing here?”

  He smiled wearily. “I do believe that’s my line, pretty lady.”

  “I-I was waiting for you,” she replied quickly. “After you disappeared from Rockefeller Center, I figured you’d head back here eventually. Your . . . uh . . . landlady let me in.”

  She surreptitiously pushed the desk drawer closed with her backside before walking over to Peter and putting her arms around his neck. “You look awful. Where’d you . . . ?” She stopped, her forehead wrinkled in sudden thought. “Hey, how’d you get in here, anyway? When I got here I knocked and nobody answered, and this apartment isn’t so big that you could’ve sneaked by me.”

  “Would you believe I came in through the bedroom window?”

  “No.”

  “How about, I was asleep and didn’t hear the door?”

  “Better.”

  “Glad you like it. Explanations while you wait, y’know.”

  “In that case, sir, how about one to cover your disappearing act this afternoon. A girl just hates being left out in the cold like that.”

  “It’s gotta be in the seventies out there! Anyway, I was searching around for an aspirin for this headache of mine when Spider-Man showed up. I took off after him to get some pix for kindly, old Uncle Jonah.”

  “Did you?”

  “Did I what?”

  “Get pictures, dodo.”

  “Nope. By the time I got a fresh roll of film into my camera, they’d both split.” He shrugged his shoulders and immediately regretted it. He grimaced in pain.

  “What’s the matter, handsome?”

  “Nothing much,” he muttered without thinking. “I must’ve sprained my shoulder.”

  “You, too, huh?”

  “Translation, please,” he said, feigning ignorance. That’s real clever, motor-mouth! A couple more slips like that and my secret identity’ll be worth about as much as one of Jolly Jonah Jameson’s cigars!

  “You have been asleep! Spider-Man nearly ripped his arm out of its socket when he saved himself from a several-hundred-foot fall.”

  “Sounds impressive. Is he okay?”

  “Uh-huh. A doctor at Roosevelt Hospital treated him for a dislocated shoulder.”

  “Do tell?”

  “I do.” Cindy smiled mischievously. “And it was a dislocated left shoulder.”

  Uh-oh!

  “You know me,” Peter said. “I can’t resist following every old trend that comes along. I even had a Nehru jacket.”

  “Do I detect a note of evasiveness there?”

  “No, what you detect is a whole symphony of exhaustion.”

  “Can’t take the pace, eh?”

  “Well, some young lady, whose name I’m too much of a gentleman to mention, has been forcing me to keep some pretty late hours these nights. And this growing boy needs his sleep!”

  Cindy growled and kissed him. “Okay, lover. I’ll let you get your sleepy-bye. But we’ve got a date for the morning!”

  Peter stood by his front door, watching Cindy walk down the stairs. Am I just getting paranoid, or does that lovely lady really suspect something?

  And can I stay awake long enough to figure it out?

  He couldn’t.

  Cindy Sayers deposited a dime in the telephone in the booth down the street from Peter’s apartment. She dialed a number and stood waiting through half a dozen rings, her foot tapping impatiently on the ground.

  “Hello?”

  “This is Cindy.”

  “Where the blazes have you been? I’ve been trying for the past two hours to get in touch with you.”

  “I’ve been doing what you’re paying me for, Mister! I’ve been checking out Peter.”

  The gruff voice on the other end of the line sounded interested now. “And?”

  Cindy closed her eyes as she spoke, massaging the bridge of her nose between her fingers. “Nothing. When Spider-Man showed up at the Forester rally, Peter took off. I don’t know where he went.”

  “So you didn’t actually see it, then?”

  “No. Like I said, I have no idea where he went.”

  “Damn!” Cindy could hear the man slam his fist against a desktop over the wire. “That punk’s hiding something!”

  “I don’t think so. I went through his desk while I thought he was out and didn’t find anything. Besides, he walked in on me while I was going through his stuff and didn’t even notice. That doesn’t sound to me like somebody who’s trying to hide something.”

  “Maybe not, but I’m still not convinced.”

  “But . . .”

  “Need I remind you of who’s paying the bills, Ms. Sayers?”

  “I think you’re wasting your money.”

  “It’s mine to waste, my dear. I suggest you carry on, and I’ll let you know when I’m tired of throwing it away.”

  “I’ll keep in touch.”

  Cindy retu
rned the phone to its cradle and stood for long moments in the phone booth, staring intently at nothing.

  “Lady, how do you get involved in these things?” she asked herself aloud.

  Fourteen

  The seven crime bosses of New York sat waiting patiently, for the most part, in the oaken-paneled conference room in the Kingpin’s waterfront hideout. All but the tall, silver-haired man named Silvermane was in his appointed seat. He paced back and forth across the plush carpeting, his eyes blazing in anger.

  “I don’t like this,” he said. “I don’t like being ordered around by the Kingpin like some peon! What right does he have to demand our presence at such short notice?”

  “Be cool, man.” Alim Nassor calmly dug under his fingernails with a penknife as he spoke. “We all agreed Kingpin was runnin’ this show from the start. Why you suddenly gettin’ so uptight?”

  Silvermane stood behind his chair at the foot of the table, glaring at the tall black man. “Because, Nassor, unlike you, I’m used to running my business as my own! I’ve never needed another man to tell me what needs to be done.”

  Nassor looked up from his nails, a flat, humorless smile on his lips. “ ’At’s true, man. Hell, I’ll bet you didn’t even need anybody else to tell you to let Spider-Man beat you spitless, right?”

  Silvermane started to reply, but Milo Milkerstein held up a hand, cutting him off. “Gentlemen, please!” the old man pleaded. “What percentage is there in fighting amongst ourselves, hmmm? We are, after all, part of the same team.”

  “Are we? I wonder, old friend.”

  Every head in the room turned at the sound of the deep, rich voice from the doorway. The Kingpin, when he was sure all eyes were on him, closed the double doors behind himself, then walked over to the long conference table to take his seat.

  “What the hell are—”