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Things had gone wrong. Things had gone so wrong, and this has always been his worst fear—this was why he hated when she insisted upon helping. She always got herself into too much danger, too much trouble, expecting him to bail her out, but he had told her that he was too far away, he’d told her to wait for him.
Why didn’t she listen?
She had been sneaking into another Fisk base, looking for the secured computer that held the data on the latest bombing in Harlem, sure that Fisk was behind it, and she was determined to prove it. But this base was the largest, hence why Spider-Man hadn’t taken it down yet, despite knowing exactly where it was. This base was the most secure, with the most weapons, and the highest level of security.
And if that wasn’t scary enough, Fisk himself often visited—and by often, he meant all the time.
She’d called him, told him her plan, and asked him to take out some of the guys to make it easier to sneak around. She was in upper Harlem, and he was chasing a car through Queens. Even at top swinging speed, he was at least a half-hour away!
So he’d told her to wait, and she promised she would, but her promises always ended up in the trash when she was in reporter mode—Peter never blamed her for it, never held it against her. Lord knows he’s broken his share of promises too.
He was just worried, swinging as fast as he could, and she wasn’t answering.
She wasn’t answering, and she always answered, even when sneaking around.
Fisk himself often visited and MJ wasn’t answering her phone.
Peter didn’t think he’d ever been so scared in his life.
When he arrived, he didn’t even try to be stealthy, just needing to find MJ and get her out, so he vaulted straight down, sending a shockwave through the concrete flooring. The closest henchmen stumbled, falling, easy pickings.
He wasn’t even thinking through his punches, didn’t care how bad he hurt these guys, as long as MJ wasn’t the one hurt.
He’d cleared the first and second floors and was about the raid the third when a goon decided to try talking to him. Clever, given his emotional state. He’d give anything to hear that she was okay.
“The more of us you take out, the angrier boss is going to be—“
This guy had nothing to say, he was just riling him up or stalling for backup. Pete shouldn’t have wasted time on those words. He knew she was in trouble, his spidey-sense was in a completely different state of panic, and she couldn’t wait.
“—and-and-and that pretty little reporter?”
But then the man said that, and Peter froze, his brain starving for information, desperate to hear the words spoken.
He had a hand fisted in the man’s front armor and the other posed to strike, and the man took the hint, continued rambling, pleading, “Yeah, we already grabbed her—the boss—Fisk, ain’t happy none that someone was snooping around as—like-like she was—“
Spider-Man shook his head as if saying no this couldn’t be happening, no this wasn’t happening, no no no and his voice wasn’t as composed as he would have liked it when he cut the guy off, “Where is she?”
Before the man even had a chance to answer, Pete brought his free hand to grip the front of the armor parallel to the other, lifting the man higher off the ground and closer to his mask. He wasn’t exercising self-control very well.
His voice broke, “Is she alive?”
The man took notice, shifted his attitude, smirked as if he had the upper hand, “If you hurry, she might still be breathing,” and he glanced up at the penthouse—why was it always the penthouse, the top floor? It was too far away!
Pete didn’t hold back like normal, knocked the guy clean out easily, dropped his body uncaring, and decided to skip the elevator and stairs and just run straight up the outside of the building, over the windows till he got to the very top.
He would regret this panic when he looked back on this moment, because he didn’t scope the place out, didn’t even look through the window to see what he was joining before his panic launched him feet-first through the glass to land on the wall opposite.
He’d broken into a conference room. Twelve men saw him shatter the glass, and MJ was in the corner handcuffed to her chair, duct tape silencing her—but she was okay, and that was all that mattered.
In the two and a half seconds before the henchmen jumped into action, Peter noticed four things:
1) Wilson Fisk was at the head of the table with MJ behind him while Pete was at the end.
2) This briefing was about new weaponry, with shiny, new displays all over the table.
3) Wilson Fisk was already holding what appeared to be a rifle.
4) Every single man in this room was holding a brand new weapon and looking at him like it was Christmas morning.
Oh, shit.
His spidey-sense was screaming, warning him of so so much danger, and that if a fight broke out in here, it was extremely likely that MJ would get hurt in the crossfire.
This was so not good. His only option was to not fight—but not fighting was basically handing himself over to Fisk, and if that happened, he was as good as dead—would Willy even kill him or would he keep him alive to torture and taunt him, flaunt him like one of the weird art pieces in his gallery?
Any other scenario would inevitably end with MJ hurt—or dead—or worse, expelled.
If he fought only at this end of the table, where everyone would be facing him and facing away from MJ, there was the small matter of kicking or punching someone too hard, and them turning around, accidentally pulling the trigger, and shooting MJ. Trying to snatch the weapons away wouldn’t work simply from the sheer number of spares lying on the table. Who knew if they were even loaded. Even if he could find a way to disarm them and take them out, Fisk was a smart man, and he’d inevitably stick his own gun in MJ’s face.
So what should he do?
If not fighting, he could jump back out the window, acting like he didn’t see MJ, intending to go through the door instead. But they would scatter and leave the room—and they would never leave her behind, at least Fisk isn’t that stupid.
There really wasn’t any other option. He had to sacrifice himself.
After two and a half seconds of surprise, every man in the room turned their weapons on him, and he knew from experience that they wouldn’t hesitate to open fire at first sighting, so as fast as he could, he threw his hands up and screamed, “Wait!”
They inched forward, threateningly, but nothing happened. They were giving him a chance.
“The only way this will end is with her hurt, and she’s innocent, so let’s not do anything rash.”
Fisk took only a second to contemplate before grabbing a smaller handheld from the table and approaching MJ, prompting Peter’s heart rate to skyrocket again and words to flow from his mouth, “No, no, no, wait, don’t! Please! She didn’t do anything!” He’d stretched an arm out as if reaching for MJ to remove her from harm’s way, but Fisk just smirked, knowing full well he had the upper hand.
“She may not have done anything, but she’s far from innocent.”
There was a beat of silence—that Peter was fairly sure he wasn’t supposed to interrupt if he wanted the villain to dialogue his whole plan—in which Fisk waved forward a few of his men who traded their weapons for odd-looking ropes, all the while Fisk continued to talk—how did evil villains communicate so well with their henchman without words?
“One does not attempt to sneak”—Fisk spit the word out like it was poison, crouching down to MJ’s level, and the henchmen were upon him now, but Pete didn’t fight back—“if one did not think there was reason to not be caught, and where there is reason to not be caught,”—with his free hand, Fisk grabbed MJ’s jaw and gently turned her head to look in his eyes—“there’s danger around every corner.”
They pulled his arms behind his back and tied the strange rope around his whole midsection—the rope was definitely weird, stiffer than rope should be and cold—Fisk released her and stood, facing Spider-Man, “She knew what was here and what she was getting herself into.”
Every word sent shivers down Peter’s spine, completely unrelated to his spidey-sense, and with every word, the tension in the room thickened, the light seemed to seep away, and the utter helplessness of the situation solidified itself in Peter’s gut like nausea after eating too much candy.
“As did you.”
Peter knew without a doubt that Fisk wouldn’t mercy-kill him, and he resolved within himself to not go down without a fight. He knew Fisk was good for his word, whether spoken or unspoken, and now that he had Spider-Man in his clutches, he wouldn’t hurt MJ. He might not let her go, but her health was what Peter traded himself for and he wouldn’t compromise that.
He needn’t fear for her safety, at least to the same degree.
The henchmen put pressure on his shoulders, implying they wanted him to kneel—like hell he would—but he was strong and steadfast and didn’t budge. They kicked the back of his legs, and while that smarted a lot—were they equipped with steel-toes boots?—he still didn’t crumple.
The smirk dropped from Fisk’s face, and then in an instant, scathing pain raced up Peter’s arms and down his legs and through his whole body. It burned, and he twitched, and his muscles gave way, collapsing him to his knees, and he would have fallen forward if they hadn’t held him up.
The ropes were electrified, hence the stiffness in the fibers, and electricity was one of his weaknesses—not much could bring him down, but electricity did the job faster than others.
His muscles were out of his control, as well as his thoughts and bodily reactions. These weapons were obviously upgraded for threat levels above the standard policeman’s head—most likely threat level Spider-Man.
His lungs stuttered to a halt, his jaw clenched to an ache, his eyes screwed up tight, and every other muscle in his body burned with a fierceness only a volcano could replicate. He wanted to scream for all he was worth, but the lava pumping through the veins in his lungs ensured every molecule of air evaporated before he could inhale it.
Not a thought crossed his mind, nothing could pass the infinite ravine of pain, so Peter was unblissfully unaware of the laughs and jeers of the henchmen, of the muffled screams of MJ, or of the unsatisfied glances passed to MJ from Fisk himself.
Only fifteen seconds passed before it stopped, up and vanished into a void, leaving Peter shaking in the goon’s hands—how did they avoid the shocks?—trying desperately to inhale regularly, hide how badly that little stunt left him gasping and weak.
Fisk approached him with a frown on his face, displeased with something Peter knew not what—and he thanked God his mask hid his true expression of terror—and terror it was, because Fisk was supposed to be overjoyed that he’d captured his longtime nemesis, so why was he so upset?
“I am so”—and suddenly, a large meaty fist swung right at his face, unexpected and un-braced-for, cracking his nose, and ripping his mask on the cheekbone—“tired of you causing trouble for me and my men,”—two large, meaty hands gripped the sides of this head and slammed it down onto an up-swinging knee, sending his head spinning, his ears ringing, and his lips bleeding—and there in the background suddenly was a muffled scream, muffled yelling, and Peter thought it sounded as if MJ were trying to help somehow—he really wished she wouldn’t, cause she didn’t need Fisk’s attention. She couldn’t heal as he could.
“Always sneaking around,”—a fist to his stomach, doubling him over as much as the goon holding him upright would allow—“spying and spilling our secrets to the press,”—smashing the back of his neck while he was bent over, and the goon released him to fall fully on the floor, and he curled his legs inward as much as he could—even though he had super-fast super-healing, it still took a hot minute to mend the damage.
And MJ was still yelling at them. Peter couldn’t see her, but he knew her well enough to know exactly what she was saying, or trying to say—if her words were audible and understandable, she’d be threatening them with what the press could do, warning them—
Fisk lifted him with the back of his suit from one hand—yelled “Shut Up!”—and with the other, swiftly grabbed a handheld from the table and shot MJ through the chest, silencing her.
“I hate reporters.”
Peter took one second to watch as the wound started bleeding, one second to gaze fearfully into MJ’s angry eyes, one second to watch as the blood spread throughout her shirt, bleeding onto her jacket and scarf, and another second to lock eyes back onto MJ’s, watching as fear overcame the anger and her eyes widened.
The fifth second was when he felt the true, terrified fear creep into his heart, and he needed to see her, needed to stop the bleeding, needed to make sure she was okay—she wasn’t okay, he thought she’d be okay, but this wasn’t okay!—so he struggled against Fisk and against the henchmen whose arms came back to brace him.
“No!” He yelled, voice laden with panic and despair as he continued to struggle, escalating into full-on thrashing, “MJ! No, no, no!”
He wanted to turn to Fisk and demand to be released, demand answers to why he would do that—Peter miscalculated, and boy! was he good at math—he miscalculated because Fisk wasn’t supposed to do that, Fisk wasn’t the spontaneous type, he wouldn’t do that—he did though—it wasn’t in his character—he ordered hundreds of men to kill on his behalf, of course killing someone himself shouldn’t have been that far of a reach.
Peter overestimated Fisk’s honor—what honor? He was a mob boss—everyone had some degree of honor and integrity, and Fisk prided himself on having more than others.
Clearly not.
Maybe this was the side of him that he kept hidden, the side that’d impulsively murder a young reporter because he was annoyed—murdered her—Pete’s eyes hadn’t left hers and didn’t waver as Fisk ordered Spider-Man be taken away, didn’t waver as MJ’s eyes started to droop, didn’t waver as he fought the bindings and thrashed against the men, breaking away toward MJ, desperately needing to be with her, needing to hold her and tell her how much he loved her just one last time—
But Fisk wasn’t having it, and the ropes surged with electricity again, dropping him on the spot and hindering all thoughts.
In a way, it was merciful, removing the utter hopelessness of watching Mary Jane bleed to death and the distress that overcame his whole being. But he couldn’t be there for her, and it was cruel to make her watch him writhe in pain as she literally bled to death.
The electricity continued to bake him from the inside-out, and his body’s enhanced healing decided he needed to breathe more than he needed the pain to stop.
Fisk himself was the one to drag a screaming and flailing Spider-Man away from the poor reporter that he couldn’t save, knowing just how intensely Spider-Man would hate himself for this blunder.
This was all Fisk ever wanted.
This would absolutely break him.