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Pressure starts at the shoulders for Parker. It always feels like this weight hanging around his neck, hanging heavy and weighing with an intensity that is foreign to the young man. Oh he feels the pangs of responsibility, guilt, has for a long time now. But that was before everything started to go to crap. Before he quit his job. Before the world started to go crazy. Before the president died. Before Eddie Brock scooped him on a story that was rightfully his. He was top photographer, he had the juice. And now…
Right now Peter was swinging across the skyline, flipping into the air and lighting upon the lip of an apartment building. The black suit clinging to his silhouette tightly as he scowls behind the mask. White eyelets shift as he looks around, no tell-tale tingle of his spider-sense warns him of anything happening, no crimes are occurring far below. On a glance there's naught, just the crowds… subdued, travelling along the street. The world feels like it's on pause, on hold, waiting for the other shoe.
But for now, Spider-Man scowls, and then notices where his swinging had taken him. The Bugle, quitting time, across the way there. He looks down at the front doors, perhaps expecting to see someone… perhaps not.
*
Eddie's had his ups and downs lately: losing a couple fingers counts as a down, but its not his good hand, and really, in return he got a scoop that might just get him a Pulitzer. Then he got another scoop. It's like the Gods of News are smiling upon him: sure they needed a little bit of a sacrifice, but when it comes down to it? Eddie will survive and everyone will know his name.
And that's all he's ever wanted in life: for everyone to know his name. The fame he knows he so rightly deserves. It might be his! He might finally be coming into his own. So, with an expression that's more then a little bit smug, Eddie wanders out of the Bugle. He's got a backpack slung over one shoulder, and his camera in the other, pausing by the street to look around and decide: "Where to, Eddie, where to. One more scoop and I'll be the trifecta."
*
Dropping from the side of the building, Spider-Man disappears into the alleyway and even as he falls the black form-fitting suit shifts shape smoothly with barely a rustle into civilian clothes. A sweat shirt, jeans, sneakers, even the back pack he often uses. It all appears again in place leaving him clear of anything hinting to his vigilante activities. The only thing that remains is the sternness in his gaze and the scowl upon his features.
It's from that alley that he emerges, his voice lifting to perhaps catch Eddie's attention as he catches up and rests a hand on the man's shoulder. "Hey /buddy, long time no see. What's been up?" And suddenly there's Peter standing in front of Eddie Brock, his blue eyes meeting the other fellow's gaze but not quite the jovial manner he's had in the past.
*
Eddie blinks, immediately trying to shrug— but then he notices its Peter. He tries not to smirk, fails, and tries to turn the smirk into some friendlier sort of smile: halfway succeeds. "Parker, hey. Oh, it's been pretty great, mostly. Miss seeing you around the office— you should get some shots of Spider-Man and see if JJ will take you back. He's been in a good mood lately, paper's got some really solid exclusives. He might take pity on you, man. I mean, its the Bugle, where else you going to work after that?" He senses something is.. off with Peter, but… He doesn't quite read the menace he should perhaps read. But Eddie is pretty sure he could kick Peter's ass two ways from sunday even missing a couple fingers, so. He's confident.
*
"Yah, I can imagine." Peter seems to pretty much not hear what Eddie's saying, as if it wouldn't make a difference. It's almost as if he's rehearsed this moment mentally before and really Eddie's just there to witness it since, really… he's been judged guilty in the webslinger's thoughts. "By the way, thanks for standing up for me when everything went down. Guess I realized what kind of friend you really were, huh?"
His jaw tenses and he steps forwards and suddenly that hand on Eddie's shoulder isn't exactly friendly, it's insistent and then there's no hesitation as it /hurls/ the other reporter into that alleyway roughly. "Thanks for standing on the side of right and all. But good to see you made what time you could. So did you wait a full day to steal my desk and my job or were you already kissing Jameson's ass as soon as I left?"
*
When the hand on his shoulder tightens, Eddie reaches up intending to grab and force the little punk's hand— and shit, then he's flying through the air and hitting the ground with a grunt, sliding as he looks back at Peter freaking Parker. Peter freaking Parker who just bodily THREW him? "What the fuck, are you on steroids or something?! Look, I just did my job, its my job! Jameson didn't fire you because of me and you damn well know me standing up to him would have just gotten both of our asses fired." He rises up with a wince, brushing at his clothes, "The fuck man, how the hell—"
*
"Sit /down/ Brock," And as he says that last his voice _resonates_ even as Peter pushes Eddie towards the ground and against the wall in the back of that alley. "I get so tired of having to always be the nice guy. Always do what's right. While a guy like you… a guy like you just leaks through the cracks and gets what's coming to other people through hard work and…"
But there's a haze that touches Peter's eyes as his jaw clenches, shaking his head. "I guess I just thought that friendship might've meant something. But nah, that's expecting too much, huh?"
"Gimme one reason to not clean your clock right here, right now."
*
Eddie is bodily forced against the wall, and with a fury in his eyes he tries to swat Peter's arms away— and he's completely ill-equipped to manage Parker in this current stage, "I got what I deserved, Parker, and sorry to tell you this, but so did you. I don't know how you managed to get all those shots with that freak Spider-Boy, but obviously you were in league with him. Passing him half the pay, right? You're a shit journalist so you cheated and finally got what you deserved. I actually worked hard for everything I've ever gotten. You?" He spits on the ground beside them, "We were never friends. We were competitors, and guess what, you lost."
*
"Competitors!?" Peter's eyes suddenly glaze over and suddenly the collar of that shirt /slithers/ forward to slide over the unemployed reporter's face, covering it in darkness with those wide white eyelets, only instead of a passive mask to hide the young man's identity, a long crimson tongue slithers out from between a huge gaping mouth with entirely too many teeth, teeth that seem to reach out and sprout forth from the suddenly fleshy fabric that gleams wetly like a nightmarish shark's maw.
His voice is resonant, and those eyes gleam wildly even in the dim light of that alley. And the graveyard breath ravages him as suddenly the Peter-thing presses him down, maw parting as if to try and wrap fangs around his head "// YOU ARE PREY UNWORTHY OF US! WE WILL CRUNCH YOUR BONES, YOUR MARROW WILL FALL UNTASTED! //"
And suddenly it may seem as if everything was over. Just going to be over.
*
…
Eddie barks out a shout and tries to get AWAY, back, RUN AWAY, because dear lord there are TEETH WITHOUT END and this tongue thing and SHIT, there's a WALL. He tries to scramble to the side, but he has absolutely no defense against PeterVenom's strength. "Get away from me you freak!" he shouts out, even if perhaps being nice in this particular time, would be good? Eddie just can't. The revulsion is too strong and too powerful. So he struggles, "Help! SOmeone help! There's a monster trying to eat me!"
*
For a moment that toothy maw looms viciously. But then for a moment something human touches the eyes again. Peter staggers back, shaking his head as just as quickly they appeared, the teeth disappear and the black 'fabric' sluices away from his features. A look of fear lights on his features, filling his eyes as he staggers back and then quickly he turns and /breaks/ into a run away from Eddie, rushing towards the end of the alleyway. His footfalls are heavy, skittering, shuffling, and as soon as he rounds the end of the alley there's a /thwip!/ and he's out of view…
And should Eddie come around the corner he'll see no hint of Peter Parker anywhere.
*
Eddie breathes deeply: that monster thing almost ate him. Peter Parker is a monster thing. Whoa. For a long time he slumps there, breathing, but sooner or later he pushes himself up, and heads off. Time to go to church: he should try this praying thing, really.