A man with grey hair and a porn mustache exited the elevator. He was a fairly well built man all things considered although he would not be one to stand out in a crowd. He exited the elevator with a briefcase in his hand. He walked down the hallway at a building that was the main headquarters of Trask Industries.
His name was Bolivar Trask and he looked like a man on a mission. His eyes pointed forward when he continued to walk. He stopped at his secretary's desk that was situated outside of his main office.
"Good morning," Trask said. His demeanor was entirely professional. His secretary, a young woman with curly blonde hair, gave him a smile.
"Good morning, Mr. Trask," she commented. She drank a cup of coffee. "Just so you know, you have a meeting with Norman Osborn scheduled shortly. And you know how hard it will be to reschedule it, especially with a man as busy as Mr. Osborn."
Trask suddenly snapped his fingers and smiled. "Yes, Osborn, of course. Thank you for reminding me, I had almost forgotten. I won't miss it…..I just got something to take care of in my office before the meeting. It shouldn't take that long."
Trask bid his secretary a goodbye before he walked into his office. The man lightly set the briefcase on top of his desk. He sat down in his chair for a moment. He reached up to rest his chin on his hand. He took a brief second to look through his office with narrowed eyes.
When he was done doing that, he reached underneath his desk. He pushed in a concealed button. He waited a few seconds before he heard something that was music to his ears.
There was an audible click. One of the nearby book shelves split open to reveal a large metal vault. Said vault had an extremely high tech lock but that was no matter to him. He walked towards the fault. It had two pronged security. There was an eye and finger print scanner hooked into the vault.
Trask accessed the vault and slipped inside. He made his way inside a cryogenic storage vault. He looked around and found what he was looking for. There was a miniature vault with the word "Parker" printed on it.
Carefully, he accessed it and retracted a canister from it. Now that he got what he came for, Trask opened up his briefcase. Anyone who looked inside could see a high level refrigeration unit. He could carefully store the briefcase.
No sooner did he do it, a candle flickered to life. He heard the office door open behind him. Trask's secretary led Norman Osborn and Donald Menken into the office.
"Mr. Trask, good morning to you," Osborn said. He reached forward and gave Trask a firm handshake.
Trask's grip was firm but not too firm.
"Mr. Osborn, a good morning to you as well," Trask said. He casually picked up the briefcase off of his desk. He snapped his fingers. "Something fairly important came up and I was hoping to deal with it before the meeting started."
Norman Osborn nodded in response. "Yes, I run a business, I know how these things can go. Take your time. I cleared out my entire morning for this; we both know how important this is."
"Thank you," Trask said. He scooped the briefcase up and took it out of the room.
Osborn and Menken both sat down on the chairs in the office. They had no reason to suspect that anything out of the ordinary was happening.
Seconds later, the office doors opened up. An extremely ragged looking Trask returned to the office. Osborn raised his eyebrow. He wore a different suit than the one he previously left them in.
"Mr. Osborn, my apologies…"
"No need to apologize," Osborn said. His hand casually waved it off.
"I've been running late this morning, the traffic has been backed up, and I had a new driver today who didn't know his way around town," Trask commented. He was rambling on and didn't really realize it at the time. "And then there was construction on top of them. But I'm here now and we can have this meeting."
Norman took a few minutes to process this information in his mind. Something was up.
"I'm surprised by this, Mr. Trask," Osborn commented. The man turned to Osborn and wondered why he would be surprised like this. "I just spoke with you a matter of moments ago and you said that you had to run off."
That caused Trask's eyes to widen suddenly. The full scope of what Osborn tried to tell him visited him. He wondered if it was a coincidence that he was late to the office.
"Let's get on with the meeting," Trask said. He tried not to seem too worried. There was a chance that Norman Osborn could be mistaken. He doubted it and he wouldn't say it to the man's face but there was a chance.
It was time for Gwen to test out what her brand new costume could really do. She perched herself on the roof top of a building, ready to go.
'Can you hear me?' Harry asked her.
'Loud and clear, Harry,' Gwen thought. It was close to sunset so the building she stood atop of basked in a golden light.
Harry parked himself out on a table outside a nearby Café. Earlier in the day, the two of them accessed the NYPD's Criminal Database using Gwen's father's computer. Granted, one could argue that they hacked it but it was just a quick log in and a quick log out. It was nothing that was out of this world.
'Your father really needs a better password,' Harry commented. Gwen snorted at his blasé and nonchalant statement. True as it might have been. 'But it was easy to get in and get out along with getting the program that we needed on them. And now we used it to bring up the Sytsevich criminal rap sheet.'
'It's a mile wide though,' Gwen thought. 'Or a mile long rather, but regardless it's a pretty extensive one, isn't it?'
'Yep,' Harry agreed. He consulted the notes that he made which summed up things quite nicely. 'He's got a criminal record and back in Russian, he was part of a medical experiment. Details have been restricted. He's had a few aliases as well that are known, one of them being Alex O'Hirn.'
Harry paused and allowed that information to sink in.
'But the list of locations he's known to frequent is what's interest to us,' Harry mentally continued. 'First one didn't go so well. '
'Yeah a club with heavy Russian influence, nothing there,' Gwen admitted. 'And the second was his last known address. Looks like he hasn't been around there for a long time but you never know until you check. That might be what he wants us to think.'
Harry would have to agree with this point. 'The third is a warehouse close to the docks that belong to a group of so called legitimate Russian business men.'
'Used as a front for them to sell guns and drugs,' Gwen thought. She held onto her perch point. 'With the first two crossed off our list, it's now onto the third.'
She really did need some training. The problem was that they needed to act on the information Schultz provided while it was still hot and before her target could get tipped off. Harry was in place, functioning as mission support from a café that was nearby. He could jump in if things got a bit uncomfortable.
The bond allowed him to watch things through her eyes.
'I'm hacking the cameras now,' Harry thought. 'So, how are you finding the new costume?'
'Good, really, it's excellent,' Gwen said in with a smile. 'Got the hang of the jumping thing too. First time, I nearly splattered myself on the wall.'
'It's all about timing your jumps,' Harry advised her.
Gwen agreed with that. She made her way as stealthily as she could across the rooftops to the warehouse.
'The sooner we wrap this up, the better I'll feel,' Gwen thought. There was a part of her that thought she was nuts going in there.
'There's a pair of guards across from you, mind them,' Harry thought. 'If someone raises the alarm, this situation is screwed before it even gets going.'
Gwen took note of the security guards that were on the roof. She decided to wait to act until they were separated.
She came down behind the first security guard. She crouched down and when he turned around, she webbed his mouth shut. That caused him to not be able to yell out in surprise or pain when she nailed him right in the ribs with a sudden and unexpected attack. The guard was strung up upside down by the webbing. Once the guard circled back around, she would have him and it would be glorious.
She pulled him off of the shadows and dangled up off of a perch point. She laid in wait for the other security guard to come over to check on his buddy.
The other guard scrambled over as quickly as he could go. He saw his fellow guard down on the ground.
The first reaction was shock. The second reaction was to radio in for some back up. Unfortunately, he never got that chance to radio in for help.
She sprung down off of the rooftop and nailed him across the back of the head. Gwen was pleased that she used her momentum with one swift shot.
'Knocked out,' Gwen thought. She used the webbing which she was getting more comfortable with using to web him down. 'So are there any more security guards around for me to smack down?'
'Nothing,' Harry thought. He double checked the cameras to ensure that her path was clear and open. 'You are free and clear to go, Gwen.'
Gwen tried not to look too overtly smug. 'Excellent.'
Gwen slipped her way in through the skylight.
'I believe the term you're looking for is Spectacular.'
Aleksei Sytsevich, better known as certain circles as the Rhino, stood in the shadows, his arms folded.
"Make sure to get that stuff on through, I don't want any fuck ups," he said. He dressed himself in a stylish suit and was also built like a tank.
He made sure everything ran smoothly as the gangsters were in the middle of unloading a delivery truck. Once that was unloaded, they can load it up with different cargo. The electronics moved out of the truck and they were replaced by guns in the truck. These would make them loads of scratch by selling them on the open market.
In the shadows, Dennis Carradine trailed behind the Rhino.
"Looks like we're going to have a good haul tonight," Sytsevich said. He turned to the men to make sure they were doing their jobs. "Careful, bust one of them and I bust your heads.'
The Rhino turned to Carradine.
"You look jumpier than a cat underneath an entire room full of rocking chairs."
Carradine couldn't believe that he was treating this situation in such a blasé way. Not all of them were blessed to be as dangerous as him.
"So, I guess that you're looking for some place until this shit blows over," the Rhino said. Carradine nodded in response. "I'll see if I can hook you up. But it ain't going to come cheap. And I need to figure out how much your life is work. And I've got a few more problems than that."
Carradine couldn't really bring himself to care about the Rhino's problems. Not that he would say that to the man's face because he had a feeling that he made enough powerful enemies with this one old man.
"We've got a serious fucking problem though and you might as well," the Rhino growled. Carradine turned towards him and he raised his eyebrow. "It's fucking Schultz. You know that bastard got brought in again. Granted, it's nothing new. He seems to be in and out every other day."
Rhino turned around to address his workers.
"Bring that fucking thing in nice and proper like."
Rhino clutched his fingers together. He returned to the conversation that he was having to Carradine. "He's the type to snitch if someone pulls his leg hard enough. Or promises him a lighter sentence, so we got to worry about him."
"How much does he know?" Carradine asked. He suddenly felt more nervous than ever before.
Rhino gave him a grunt. He walked over to ensure that all of the orders were filled. That left Carradine hanging.
He hadn't slept since it happened. The Parker man shouldn't have come home early. It threw him off of his game. After all of his crimes, this was the first one where he was seriously considering the consequences.
"Schultz doesn't know any more than he needs to know, if that answers your question," Rhino said. All of the crates were switched out. Anyone who looked on the outside wouldn't have seen anything but computers and television on the outside. No one would mess with the crates if enough money changed the right hands. "Fucker might think he knows a lot, but he doesn't."
"Does he know enough to….implicate anyone?"
"As long as you do what I say, you won't have to worry about that," Rhino said. His growl was loud. "So, now that this is done, why don't we talk shop?"
Carradine nervously looked over his shoulder.
"Relax, it would take an act of God and enough fire power to bring him down than to get inside," Rhino said. "I've got this place locked up tight. No one's going to get inside. Even the Big Man wouldn't dare."
"The Big Man?" Carradine asked in surprise.
"Never you mind, that's on a need to know basis, and don't ask questions that you might not like the answers to," Rhino growled.
Carradine held up his hands. He didn't mean to offend this man. This man who could break him in half pretty easily if he wanted to was the last person he wanted to offend.
"So, are we going to take care of this, now?" Carradine asked.
Sytsevich shook his head. "Yeah, we're going to have to head our way up to the manager's office. He's going to tell you what you need to do to make sure your debts are fixed."
Carradine felt a growing feeling of dread in his body. The manager's office was upstairs. It overlooked the floor where the Russian mobsters were heavily at work. The two men went over to ascend the stairs.
Gwen hung upside down and she couldn't believe her eyes.
'There he is, the bastard that did this,' Gwen thought. She would have done a jig if it didn't give away her position. Also she didn't want to look absurd of doing so. 'It's both Rhino and Carradine there in the same place. I can get him, and it's over tonight.'
'Never expected both of them to be here,' Harry thought. He snapped his fingers when realization dawned upon him. 'That means that Carradine knows that he's a wounded dog, so be careful. His bite could be bigger than you think.'
Gwen ran into another problem. There were many armed mobsters. If she was seen, these guys were the type to shoot first and ask questions only when they were standing over her bullet ridden corpse.
'Don't say it, Harry, 'Gwen thought. She closed her eyes. 'Don't be seen.'
Gwen made sure she saw the mobsters.
'The three on your left would be the easiest, and work your way around the room counterclockwise,' Harry advised it.
'You know it would be a lot easier if you just pop in here and magic then unconscious or something,' Gwen said. She almost could see Harry raising his eyebrow though the bond link. She sighed. 'Right, not fun, gotcha.'
Gwen could certainly do this. Harry had faith in her, more than she had in herself. Gwen aimed the webbing and caught the mobster closest to the back. She pulled him back and slammed him down onto the ground.
The other two mobsters were pulled up. Gwen thought for a moment that she would alert the others.
'Keep moving,' Harry prompted her urgently. 'Don't overthink things.'
Gwen was caught off guard by this unexpected piece of advice. Regardless of what she thought, it was a good idea not to overthink things.
The blonde caught the next pocket of mobsters. The next thing she heard caused chills to roll down her spine.
"SOMEONE'S HERE!"
That lead Gwen to the particularly articulate conclusion she came to next.
'Fuck.'
She panicked, she had to work quickly. She knocked a stack of crates over onto the pocket of mobsters. This was a good news and bad news situation.
The good news was the stack of crates knocked out a few of the mobsters. The bad news was that the stack of crates alerted the mobsters she didn't knock out to her exact position.
She used her agility to avoid the gunfire. It was just as she feared. The mobsters drilled her with their rabid fire attacks.
Bullets would hurt her and Gwen kept moving. She managed by sheer miracle not to get hit.
"Get whoever that is, and bring her down, I want to have a few words with her."
One of the mobsters fired at her. Gwen used her reflexes to avoid being riddled completely full of bullets. There were far too many close calls for her liking.
Gwen unhooked a hook from the ceiling and sent it flying down. It took out two of the mobsters.
'Just keep your head in the game,' Harry thought to her. 'And watch out for the Rhino.'
Rhino charged Gwen from behind. The spider powered heroine just barely jumped up. Rhino flew forward and she grabbed onto the back of his head. He flung her off like an angry bull the first time.
"I'll rip you apart with my bare hands!"
He charged her again and Gwen webbed onto his head this time. She used his momentum to run over several of the mobsters. She took careful note how they were more reluctant to shoot at her.
'This might just suck a little bit.'
Gwen had that thought through her mind when both of them crashed through the concrete wall.
The two of them ended up outside on the docks. Gwen took a moment to allow herself to catch her breath. Her costume held up well despite being smashed through concrete.
Screw her costume, she held up well despite being crashed through concrete. And so did the Rhino.
Gwen winced; she felt a stabbing pain in her forearm. That wasn't good as all. She saw Rhino get up to his feet. That was even worse. His suit shredded when he went through the wall. The man ripped it off the rest of the way, revealing nothing but a thick gray armored bodysuit underneath it. The bodysuit fused to his skin. There was what looked like ports in several places. Gwen observed they were about the area of his forearms, shoulders, and chest.
'Are you still there with me?'
'Yeah, I felt something crack….'
The buzzing in the back of her head prevented her from getting her skull caved in by a Rhino punch. He spun around and grabbed her arm. He hoisted her up over his head like she was as light as a feather.
He had experience on his side and Gwen flew backwards. She webbed onto a light post on the side and swung around. She tried to kick her enemy in the face on the rebound. The only problem was that he blocked her feet with both of his large hands.
He pushed her down onto the ground where she crashed down hard. The wind got knocked out of her when she started to breath heavily.
Rhino rushed over again. Gwen knew that her best bet was to duck and hopefully find a way to burn him out.
'Just keep cool and look for a weak spot,' Harry thought.
Gwen used her webbing to blind Rhino. He tried to pull it but it stuck to his hands.
'We might have used a bit stronger of an adhesive we needed on that batch,' Gwen mentally commented. She threw her hands up and smiled. 'And for the record, I'm not complaining, just making an observation.'
Rhino ripped the webbing off of his face. It took Gwen seconds to find out how pissed that he was. His attacks were a bit sloppier now that he took the earlier humiliation so personally.
Gwen gained a bit more confidence now that she knew what she was going up against. One shouldn't make her confidence for arrogance.
She needed to lure him into position to take him down. Then her path to Carradine would be completely and utterly clear.
Shaw made use of his contacts in the Intelligence Community. It gave him the information that lead him straight to Carradine. All he would have to do is wait things out and he would have him.
Now that Osborn Junior was in California, Shaw really had no place better to be. Along with the money that this person paid him to do this job, he could afford to be patient. He camped himself out on a rooftop across from the warehouse. There was a clear view of the exits from his vantage point and there was a sniper rifle in his hand.
The sounds of obvious battle only mildly interested Shaw. He didn't know if it was a gang tiff or what it was. All he knew was that it would likely flush one rat out of the warehouse.
The doors of the warehouse burst open. The paranoid looking Dennis Carradine rushed from the warehouse, looking quiet frantic. He rambled about her being after him. Who she was, Shaw didn't know. It wasn't in his job description to know.
He watched Carradine fumble with his keys. He entered the car and started the ignition. It was some tin pot car that had trouble turning over.
Shaw lined up the shot. He was going to make his target.
No sooner did Carradine manage to start his car and put his foot to the gas, Shaw fired a bullet right into his head. The resulting impact caused the car to spiral out of control.
The car went flying several feet and Carradine smashed through the windshield as the car crunched over the telephone pole.
"Scratch one off," Shaw muttered underneath his breath.
Shaw packed up and left. His job was done. As for whatever else was happening, it would work in his favor to properly mask his escape.
Gwen slowly but surely formulated some kind of plan to deal with the Rhino.
"You know, you couldn't hit the broad side of a barn door."
She noted pretty quickly she could make him pretty angry. To fight him hand to hand was likely going to get her killed and fairly quickly.
"I'd say that's a face that only a mother could love," Gwen continued. "But your mother must have been pretty blind or drunk to love that mug."
"Don't you dare, you dumb cunt!" Rhino growled. He charged her.
Gwen smiled, she lured him right into the trap. Rhino hit the fence hard.
"Oh, come on, some big tough mobster like you can't take care of some girl," Gwen said. "But then again, you're about as dumb as you look."
Rhino envisioned ripping her apart. He charged her again.
This time Gwen had him right where she wanted him. She sent him crashing hard into an electrical substation. She was leading him over towards it this entire time just waiting for the proper moment.
Rhino gave loud screams of agony. The rough as nails mobsters felt a shock that caused him to launch into the air and knock him out.
Gwen made sure that there was one package, extra crispy waiting for the police.
'Gwen, something's happened, meet me back on the rooftop across from the café, change out when you do so,' Harry thought to her.
'Did Carradine get away?' Gwen asked.
Harry answered her question briskly. 'Not exactly.'
"I'm really at a loss of what happened."
Gwen's statement matched her words. To say she was in shock would be putting things mildly. They managed to track Carradine down. He slipped out during the confusion. Then bang, someone killed him, just like that.
"I figure out that we're not the only ones who wanted Carradine," Harry said. The crime scene was really close by. "And these people were playing for keeps you know."
"Would you have killed him if you had gone after him?" Gwen asked.
"Well now we'll never have a chance to answer that question because he's already dead," Harry said calmly. He didn't know what he might do if he was that ran into Carradine. "They say the first one is the hardest though even if it's done to protect those around you."
"Dad said the same thing, even as a cop, the most chilling thing is having to gun down a suspect even if it is out of self defense," Gwen said. "Did you…"
"I've done many things of questionable morality, and you might have to someday whether they're accidental or intentional," Harry said. He placed his fingers together. "Sometimes the line between the two are so fine. And sometimes we're the hero in one person's story and the villain in another person's story."
Harry decided that was a moot point again. Gwen looked like she wanted to ask more but the pain through her arm distracted her.
"Who other than us wanted Carradine dead?" Gwen asked.
Harry thought about the conversation that he had with Peter but he dismissed it off hand.
"He must have made some enemies in the underworld and if he stiffed someone, well that answers a question," Harry said. He ran his hand over the top of his hair and looked thoughtful. "He was pretty much small time, connections to the Russian mobsters or not."
"One mystery down, another one right in front of our faces," Gwen said. She wouldn't rest until she got answers to this one.
She saw Harry's unreadable look on his face. She could tell he wanted answers as well.
"That's not important for now," Harry said. Gwen opened her mouth to protest. He cleared his throat, not having any of it. "The most important thing is to get you back and have your arm checked out. Then we can worry about unraveling any mysteries later."
Gwen couldn't argue with that one. She allowed Harry to wrap his arm around her. He teleported her away from the scene in a blink of an eye to get checked out and left this mystery to be solved. It just seemed to raise more questions than answers.