“I’m telling you, they’re all dead Curt.” Norman whispers again into Curt’s ear, pulls away and covers his mouth with shock.
Curt looks dead in Norman’s eyes, “#&#& ARE YOU SER...”
“Will you keep your VOICE down!” Norman whispers, grabbing Curt by his arm and pulling him into a glass office.
Holding his head in shock, Curt turns around as Norman closes the door behind him.
“You’ve GOT to keep your voice dow…”
“Cohen, Fitzgerald, Hart, Friederick, JEFFRIES…” Curt rattles off in shock, “…OH GAWD JEFFRIES!”
Curt shouts covering his mouth in shock, “Are you SERIOUSLY telling me that they’re all dea! The Boar! Oscorps BOARD and CEO…”
“FBI called me not even an hour saying that the entire BOARD was not murdered..." Norman Osborn interrupts, ready to weave the rest of this story, "...but executed by some West Coast…Californian gang called The Pride…”
“THE WHAT?” Curt shouts in disbelief, "Remember New Years Eve? The night Richard Parker died, you think they came..."
“I dunno Curt some West-Coast group. We cut ties with any connection to them but it DOESN’T MATTER NOW….” Norman says, pointing to himself, “…the bigger point here is that I have to single-highhandedly fill the position that NINE people had to fill or the company crumbles before the WEEK goes out! I have to lead Oscorp!”
The weight of those words sits in Conners heavily. He wasn't sure if Norman was petrified to lead a multibillion dollar company of hundreds of lives depending on him for work - or just excited to be in power.
“Norman that really is sticking your neck out!”
“Yeah, but I am NORMAN OSBORN." He exclaims, "...and this company that WE, you and I."
Conners lowers his head, "Richard Parker too."
"He cut and run." Norman growls, "You need to accept that. He started and then left, it was on good terms. All of this that we have now, is ours, and I won't let it go under!” Norman says, and points at Curt, “Heck we’re gonna beat the press and all the scandal and be known as a family company and those brats -I mean I students out there, will be the icing on the cake my friend! They’ll be our IMAGE recovery story.”
“But the Feds Norm…”
“Don’t worry about the Feds, I’ll hand them. You just help me be sure NO ONE has any reason to sue us!” Norman says.
Conners looks at his friend and now boss, Norman Osborn, with a look of concern drenching his face.
At that moment, a red light cuts on. An alarm goes off and screams are heard from the outside the office.
Norman and Curt look at each other with wide eyes and turn to the glass doors, seeing all the touring students gathering around someone on the floor.
“%^& ME NOW WHAT!!” Norman shouts, running out the glass office with Curt swiftly behind him.
Marvel - The Beginning: The Amazing Spider-Man:
Arc 1: Everything is Connected
Part 5
Kneeling over Peter Parker laid out on the floor, Gwen sobs and cries over, “HE'S DEAD OH MY GOD HE'S DEAD!!” she sobs.
“MOVE ASIDE RUNTS!” Norman shouts, pushing his way through the group of scientist and students, "NO ONE DIES IN THIS BUILDING! ITS A POLICY! EVERYONE SIGNED WAIVERS!" he shouts, barreling his way past students until he sees Gwen Stacy huddled over a brown haired boy laid out on the white floor with a huge red bump on his forehead.
“OH GAWD SOMEONE PLEASE tell me this kid didn’t just DIE ON MY NEW FLOOR!” Norman shouts.
Curt, right behind Norman, sees Mary Jane standing up on the other side of Peter, hopping up and down with a fire-extinguisher crying, "I didn’t mean it, oh gawd I didn’t mean it." she repeats.
“So ya wanna know what happened huh?”
Curt and Norman turn around to see some 9 year old kid wearing a blue shirt with a number ‘4’ on it, biting into an apple, and as happy as can be.
“Talk. Now!” Norman demands. .
“Well you should’ve saw it, it was amazing, spectacular, so much better than what it could've been.” Franklin exclaims, “See this kid laid out on the floor all pathetic-like…” he points, “…was gonna take a picture of blondie the cheerleader over there, but somehow, by some DIVINE, UNIVERSAL LAW OF ORDER…all of your radiated spiders got out, and maybe one, or two, literally bit the crap out of him…”
Norman closes his eyes feeling his knees turn to water.
“Oh gawd we’re gonna get sued.” Norman mumbles.
“Am naht dohn…” Franklin chews, taking another bite of an apple, “Ahn…some-ow…” he says between the chewing but puts his finger up, swallowing his chewed morsel.
“C’MON KID SPIT IT OUT!” Norman shouts.
“Alright alright alright…” Franklin sighs, “SHEEESH…anyway, yeah, somehow the Red-head for whatever reason grabbed a fire-extinguisher and cold clocked the kid, completely missing the spider…but then blondie comes over and smashes the thing on his NECK! HA it was amazingly hilarious.”
Curt looks at Norman in complete horror, “Norman this is bad.”
"I know..." Norman mumbles, "...that spider was probably worth millions of dollars in research."
"NORMAN THE KID!"
"Right right." Norman nods, waving his hand, "Priorities. Yea this kid." he mumbles.
Franklin smirks, looking at Peter Parker laid out on the floor, “Told’ya I’d get ya back.” He mumbles with a smirk before biting into his apple once more.
Norman grabs Curt and pulls him aside, “That kid wakes up, we gotta have a plan to take care of this or we’ll have the most amazing, sensational, spectacular lawsuit ever filed by a freakin’ 16 year old and he'll get the Ultimate settlement!”
Curt looks at him with a raised eyebrow, “Well what the heck do we do Norm?!”
Norman looks at Curt for a moment and then turns to Peter laid out on the floor and narrows his eyes, "Conners, call accounting."
~*~*~*~*~*~
36 Hours Later...Peter’s House
~*~*~*~*~
Sliding the Oscorp Check across the table, Norman Osborn leans back into his seat.
He hated the floral couch but he looks at Uncle Ben with a smile anyway, watching him stare in bafflement at the numbers on the check. Uncle Ben leans forward in his recliner with a raised bushy gray eyebrow, his leg lifted onto the other and wearing his NY METS cap and paint clothes.
Clearing his throat nervously, Norman turns from looking at Uncle Ben to Aunt May sitting beside Peter Parker, now sporting a black eye and big red bump on his forehead as he sips on a glass of chocolate milk.
Norman clears his throat once more while patting his sweating forehead dry with a napkin.
“So as agreed, Oscorp will take care of his future college tuition and his summer internship will be paid, how’s that?" Norman nervously asks, "It works out very well for Mister Peter here, in that, by the time he finishes college, he’ll be well connected in the Science arena, if that’s what he chooses of course, no pressure. Everyone knows what you do now effects you later, everything’s connected and this’ll be a great…amazing, sensational, even spectacular start for him actually.”
Uncle Ben raises his eyebrow and looks at Aunt May who looks down at Peter sitting next to her,
“Well is up to you Peter.”
Peter, seeing everyone’s eyes on him, smiles widely, “HECK YEAH LETS DO IT!!!”
Norman lets out a sigh of relief as Uncle Ben extends his hand, “Thank you.” He says, meeting Norman with a pleasant demeanor as they both shake hands.
Happy to see everything come to a peaceful conclusion, Aunt May leans over to Peter, "Petie, please go get my cellphone. I want to call your brother, see if you finished up his shift at his new part-time job.
~*~*~*~**~*~**~
Meanwhile on Mulberry Street and Canal – China Town
Standing on the corner in a black t-shirt and black jeans, Eddie looks at his vibrating cell phone, seeing Aunt May’s name on the caller i.d. before the screen changes to ‘One Missed Call.’
Stuffing the phone in his pocket, Eddie looks around at the busy evening, the street filled with tourists as they all move to and fro along the avenue looking at illuminated store fronts selling souvenirs, fake-knock-off Gucci & Prada bags while others enter and exit Chinese Food restaurants hanging red lanterns with gold lettering. Growing impatient, Eddie looks at his watch until he feels a hard pats on the back.
Looking up, Eddie sees the tall curly red-headed man in his black hoodie before him, Cletus.
“Thought you weren’t gonna make it bro.” Cletus smirks.
“Yeah whatever…” Eddie says, looking around nervously but then notices Cletus black suitcase,
“What's in the case?”
“None of your business.” Cletus snaps, jabbing his finger into Eddie’s chest, “Remember what I told you before, see nothing, say nothing, ASK nothing!” he says, lightly smacking him across the face and staring into Eddie’s green eyes, “Get me!”
“yeah yeah.” Eddie mumbles, looking around embarrassingly.
“Alright, lets go and follow my lead.” He says, hastily walking around the corner and into a lonely ally.
Following behind Cletus, Eddie looks around as they walk behind several warehouses and abandoned buildings, “So you ready to make some money or not?” he asks.
“Yeah.” Eddie mumbles, pulling out small ziploc bag of white powder.
Glancing at Eddie showing him a small ziploc bag before stuffing it in his pocket Cletus smiles, “Good.” He says, walking up to a graffiti door on the side of a building. Anxiously looking up and down the alley, Cletus and Eddie both turn their attention to the door opening as a bunch of Chinese teenagers with ‘N’ tattoos on their necks, dressed in black suits and white shirts swing open the door and point their guns at their face.
“HEY YO WHOA!” Cletus exclaims, holding up his hands and briefcase.
“WHAT YOU WANT WHITIE!” one of them say.
“I’m here to see Lin!” Cletus exclaims, staring at them all.
“How many times do I have to tell you moron….”
Eddie looks past the other gangmembers lower their guns and part the way for a Chinese man dressed in a glowing white suit, pitch black shirt and glowing white tie. Eddie’s eyes open wide as Cletus smirks at the man brushing aside his glowing white hair as his skin glows with negative light,
“...it’s not Lin, it’s Mister Negative!”
To be continued….
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