Staring at the spider silk in his hand, Peter narrowed his eyes behind his glasses, studying every strand carefully. "It's been over twelve hours since the robbery," he muttered. "My webbing normally dissolves within two, maybe three hours at most. It's designed to break down—biodegradable polymer matrix and all. But this one's intact. This copycat didn't factor that in. He just mimicked the look and feel without understanding the chemistry."
Peter turned the thread in the light, noting the artificial glint. It lacked the faint translucency of his own organic compound. This was synthetic. Inferior. A knockoff.
As he stood there analyzing the strand, a sharp voice suddenly called from behind.
"Hey! This is an active crime scene. Who are you, and what exactly are you doing here?"
Peter's eyes widened, and he immediately slipped the webbing into his jacket pocket, then turned around to face the source of the voice. A woman with a ponytail, dark eyes, and sun-kissed skin was approaching with a no-nonsense gait and a hand resting casually on her holstered weapon.
"I'm Officer Rebecca Li, NYPD Major Crimes Unit," she said, flipping her badge for him to see. "You wanna explain what you're doing inside a cordoned zone?"
Peter forced a nervous smile, quickly pointing to the press badge clipped to his chest and the camera bag hanging at his side.
"Sorry! I'm Peter Parker. I'm with the Daily Bugle. I'm here covering the Spider-Man story for the paper."
"Peter Parker?" she raised a brow. "The one who takes all those Spider-Man photos? Yeah, I've seen your byline. Every time Spidey sneezes, you're there with a lens."
Peter chuckled awkwardly and scratched his head. "I guess I've gotten lucky a few times."
Officer Li crossed her arms and smirked. "So, what? Spider-Man forget to invite you to last night's party? You're late to the scene."
Peter sobered quickly and shook his head. "Honestly, I'm not even sure that was Spider-Man last night."
That got her attention. "Oh?"
Peter reached into his pocket and held up a coiled length of the synthetic spider silk. "I found this near one of the rafters," he said. "Thing is, Spider-Man's webbing degrades quickly. I've seen it myself dozens of times. But this stuff—this hasn't broken down at all. Which means whoever made it either didn't know the chemical signature or used completely different tech."
Officer Li narrowed her eyes. "And you picked it up and stuffed it in your pocket?"
Peter blinked. "I… was going to report it."
She sighed sharply and pulled out a fresh evidence bag and a pair of blue nitrile gloves from her back pocket. "Kid, do you realize what you've just done? This is obstruction of evidence. Chain of custody matters. Technically, I could arrest you right now."
Peter raised both hands, contrite. "Sorry! Rookie mistake. I swear I wasn't trying to tamper with anything."
She carefully bagged the strand, sealed the evidence tag, and tucked it away.
"Just this once," she said sternly. "But next time, leave the detective work to the professionals. Student or not, you're lucky I'm the one who caught you. Not every cop gives lectures instead of cuffs."
"Yes, ma'am," Peter nodded quickly, backing away a step. "Understood."
Satisfied, Officer Li turned to walk off, muttering about amateurs contaminating crime scenes. Peter took the opportunity to snap a few high-resolution shots of the interior, especially areas where the webbing had left residue. That would give Jameson something for the headlines, even if it made Peter's skin crawl.
That afternoon, he dropped the film off at the Daily Bugle, trying to ignore Jameson's usual rants about how the photos weren't "damning enough."
Once free of the chaos, Peter returned to his room in Queens and immediately locked the door behind him. From the lining of his jacket, he pulled out the small second sample he hadn't handed over—the thread he'd pocketed earlier before Officer Li arrived. This was his only chance to study it up close.
Sitting at his desk, Peter unspooled the thread slowly, examining the molecular texture. It was sticky, elastic, but crude. A basic mechanical adhesive blend. The weblines were mass-produced, not generated on-the-fly like his own.
"Whoever made this… didn't make it for agility or efficiency," he muttered. "They made it for appearance. For show."
He paused, thinking hard. "Could it be… that guy from the foundation attack? The one in the stealth rig?"
Peter tried to piece it together. The memory resurfaced: the fight at Empire State University, the figure in dark gear with smoke bombs and untraceable movements. He remembered how that villain had shouted something during the clash.
"Damn this sticky spider crap! What is this stuff?!"
Peter's eyes lit up.
"That's right! He complained about spider webs!" he exclaimed. "Which means… he'd encountered it before. But why?"
The scene replayed vividly in his mind: the dark-suited attacker snarling as he got tangled in stray webbing during their rooftop skirmish. At the time, Peter thought it was just frustration—but now it made sense. He wasn't familiar with real webbing. He had only seen imitations. That's why he cursed it. It was different from what he was using.
"That guy must be connected," Peter whispered, spinning in his chair. "He had access to advanced tech. Maybe Oscorp? Maybe someone else?"
His thoughts began to race. The gear. The webbing. The timing. Someone was intentionally trying to discredit Spider-Man—stage crimes with fake web fluid, frame him in public, and let the media finish the job.
Peter looked out the window at the Manhattan skyline, jaw clenched.
"This isn't just vandalism. Someone's got a plan. And I'm going to figure out who."
"The symbiote had already fought someone who used spider silk before the Imperial University incident," Ethan muttered to himself, eyes narrowing. "So that's why, when I used my own webbing to pull his weapon away, he didn't look surprised—he looked familiar with it."
The memory replayed in his mind. That encounter hadn't been their first, not entirely. Not for Venom.
"It was my first fight with him, but not his," Ethan said, pacing across the room. "He recognized the webbing instantly… which means the person he fought last time wasn't me. Someone else, someone with abilities like mine—maybe even exactly like mine—fought him before I ever showed up."
He sat down on the edge of his desk, tapping his fingers against the surface, thinking aloud. "That copycat must've confronted him earlier. Maybe that's why the symbiote was so hostile when we first met—he was reacting based on someone else's actions. Someone who already wore a spider mask and slung webs."
Venom stirred inside him, the voice like a low snarl in his mind. "That other one… not us. Smelled wrong. Mechanical. Fake."
Ethan nodded slowly. "And now, someone's out there using that same fake webbing to frame Spider-Man. They're impersonating him, but their webbing doesn't degrade properly—it lingers. That's how Peter knew it wasn't him. It's too clean. Too wrong."
Everything pointed in the same direction now.
"If I can find that fake," Ethan whispered, "I can find whoever's behind this whole mess."
No hesitation.
He pulled on a black hoodie, stepped into his reinforced combat pants, and let the symbiote seep across his arms and chest like living armor. His boots hit the floor with finality. Within seconds, Venom's gleaming black form had merged with him—eyes wide, shoulders hunched, lean and dangerous.
Ethan opened his window and dropped down silently into the night.
He didn't have a specific trail yet, but the city had a rhythm—darkness always brought out something. And tonight felt like a night that would bring answers.
In a narrow alley smeared with grime and flickering orange lamplight, Ethan was already standing over two fresh corpses. They were thugs—typical low-level trash that New York never seemed to run out of. Their bodies were twisted and still. Their heads remained attached, though Ethan had no interest in their brains.
Not this time.
He hadn't gone looking for trouble. He was just cutting through the alley when he caught them dragging a woman behind a dumpster. Gun drawn. Shirt half-torn. She was sobbing and trembling—seconds from something irreversible.
Ethan didn't ask questions.
He acted.
He got her into a cab, paid the fare himself, and didn't look back until she was gone.
Then came the reckoning.
These two had laughed at first. But after just a few moments in Ethan's grip—faced with a growling voice in their minds and the burning sting of fear—they spilled everything.
What they'd done.
Who they'd hurt.
How many victims they'd left in their wake.
And the worst—the story of a woman who had taken her own life rather than endure what they'd put her through.
That was all Ethan needed.
He broke their necks.
Quick. Final. Unapologetic.
"They were never going to stop," he muttered, staring at their bodies. "If the law couldn't get them off the streets, I did."
Venom's voice crackled in his thoughts. "Good. Useless meat. Not even worth eating."
"They weren't food," Ethan said coldly. "They were rot."
A pause. A breath. Then—
"MOVE!"
Venom's warning came sharp and sudden.
Ethan sprang backward on instinct just as a thin line of white silk struck the ground where he'd stood—and exploded. The web ballooned out like a mine, expanding into a sticky net that would've trapped him if he hadn't moved.
He landed smoothly, crouched low, muscles tensed.
The silk shimmered under the lamplight. Too white. Too processed.
"That's not Peter's," Ethan growled, eyes narrowing. "That's synthetic."
Venom seethed inside him. "The fake. The one who plays spider. He's close."
Ethan looked upward into the shadows of the rooftops above the alley.
"I know you're watching," he called, voice like a low growl. "Come down and try that again."
Only silence answered him.
He flexed his fingers, the symbiote responding with sharp, tendril-like claws.
"So this is how you play," he said, turning slowly in place, eyes scanning every corner. "Trap me. Test me. Frame Spider-Man, then run when it counts."
He didn't get a reply. But Ethan didn't expect one.
He crouched again, ready to leap, ready to hunt.
Tonight, he thought, we end this spider game.