Work Text:
Hobie Brown looked at the small, unassuming building and fought to suppress a shudder. There was absolutely no reason that the little bar with its faded sign reading “Sharon’s” should have sent such a wave of dread through him- he’d been sneaking into pubs since he was 13 years old! Walking into one as a legal adult to order a beer and take a look around shouldn’t be scaring him this badly, but it was. Every cell in his body was screaming at him with the effects of his Spider-Sense to get the hell out of there. But Miguel O’Hara had ordered him to go in there and get a feel for the place. Apparently some of the most dangerous criminals in the multiverse were using it as a sort of secret hideout, a place to plot their dastardly deeds without the prying eyes of the PDNY or any Spider-Men. And Miguel couldn’t have that.
He hadn’t told anyone too much about what had happened, and nobody seemed to have seen Peter B. Parker in a while either, who had apparently been involved as well, but it seemed that the villains had committed some kind of mass attack on a winery, of all places, on Earth-616. According to Miguel, it had been only quick thinking and a miracle that no civilians had been injured. If Peter B. hadn’t been there, Miguel had said, who knows what would have happened? The older man had done some research and traced two of the villains back to this reality- Mr. Negative, and the woman he’d been escorting at the time of the attack. The woman was apparently the landlady of this pub.. The information Miguel had been able to dig up on her showed her to be a 53-year-old widow called Sharon Lawson Vuong. She’d apparently lost her husband when her reality’s Alchemax had blown up in the 90s, and had, recently, taken to hanging around a band of hardened interdimensional criminals. Miguel seemed to think they were all a serious threat to the multiverse. And now Miguel wanted Hobie to go in there, take a look around, see what the bad guys were up to, and then report back to him.
And honestly, Hobie could see why he’d been chosen for this mission. He knew his way around bars- he had since he’d been a boy back in London, charming his way into pubs and drinking even as a young teenager. He knew his appearance wouldn’t immediately set off any alarm bells either- his punk style would probably fit in along with the (he assumed) rather sketchy clientele without drawing too much attention. It just made sense. So why was he so panicky? He was Spider-Man! He could more than handle anything these supervillains could throw at him. And if he really got in over his head, he could always call for backup.
Taking a deep breath, Hobie prepared himself and opened the door, slipping into the bar. Immediately, the reason his Spider-Sense had been going off so strongly became apparent. What seemed like every bad guy the Spider-Society had ever had to fight was in the room. There was the Lizard, and the Vulture, playing billiards in the corner while Electro and the Rhino cheered them on. There was a second Electro- a woman- engaged in a deep conversation with the Spot, while some random common riff-raff sat around a table littered with the remains of the revelry. And there was Mr. Negative, talking to the bartender, who was acting like this was the most normal thing in the world. Hobie watched incredulously as the woman laughed, patting Mr. Negative’s hand in an affectionate manner, as though the man couldn’t tear her apart on a molecular level if he felt like it.
“You really are too kind to me, Martin. I can’t accept anything else from you. You already bought me a car worth a hundred times what the other one was. I can’t possibly pay you back.”
“I’m not expecting you to pay me back,” Mr. Negative replied. “You’ve already done more for me than you can ever know. For everyone who comes here. But you know you’re not safe where you live, and I want to make sure you’re secure. You’re a single woman living alone- at least allow me to upgrade your security system.”
“It was one prowler, and I’m an old woman. He was probably just after whatever valuables I had lying around. The next-door-neighbors had someone break in and steal their kid’s Playstation last week,” Sharon dismissed his concerns. “He was probably hoping I had money or jewelry sitting out in the open.
“You don’t know that,” Mr. Negative said.“And you’re only 53! There are so many crazy people in this world, you don’t know what they were planning!”
“Yeah, there’s a lot of crazy people in this world,” Sharon replied. “And they all come here for drinks at my bar!”
Well, this was interesting, Hobie thought. Apparently someone was creeping around the bartender’s home, and Mr. Negative was… worried? Odd.
“Sharon, this is serious!”
“And I’m being serious, Martin! I’m not a young woman and I have a gun. I also have a cell phone, and I know how to call 911. And, for that matter, I have all of my regular customers’ phone numbers saved in the phone! If it really got bad, I could call for help. Aleksei alone would stomp anyone trying to break in into paste.”
“We can’t get there instantaneously, Sharon!”
“Jon can get there pretty damn fast,” Sharon replied. Hobie watched in shock as Mr. Negative made a sound that reminded him of a stepped-on squeaky toy as he let out a breath, conceding the point.
“We all worry about you,” he said.
“YOU worry about ME?!” the bartender replied incredulously. “I’m the one that’s always worrying every time the news alerts go off on my phone that I’m going to find out one of you got killed because you got mixed up with HYDRA, or one of you got dragged off to god knows where by Spider-Man, or that you got assassinated by a rival boss or something! For awhile I was worried I was going to get a call that Jon got low again and jumped in front of the subway, or that Max overloaded while he was messing around with the power grid, or that Aleksei got shot while he was doing that gun running operation! Do you know what it would do to me if any of one of you were killed?!” She was getting a bit heated, and she looked like she was about to continue, but then, she noticed Hobie.
“Hey! You got an ID on you, kid?”
Hobie fished in his pocket for his wallet- he’d made sure before he’d come out to switch to an all-new fake ID, one he’d never used before, and handed it over. The woman looked suspiciously at the UK driving license, then at him, then back at the license, while Mr. Negative craned his neck to see what was going on. Eventually, she handed him back the little plastic card.
“You’re pretty far from home, aren’t you?”
“Yeah,” Hobie replied cautiously. “Visiting my cousins. They moved here for work a few years ago.”
“Hm,” Sharon said skeptically. “You don’t hear that very often!”
“Not really,” Hobie replied. “Brexit made finding work more difficult.” Thinking quickly, he came up with what he thought was a believable cover story. “My cousin and his wife were pharmaceutical researchers, and the company they worked for had a hard time getting the chemicals they needed. When Pfizer offered them jobs they took them.”
“I guess every country is going through it, huh?” Sharon said, softening a little. “Well, as long as you’re in town, you’re welcome here. I’ve always wanted to go to the UK, but I’ve only left the US once. We went to visit my husband’s family in Da Nang after the relations with Vietnam normalized in 1995- we went for Tết 1996.”
“ I see,” Hobie replied, not sure what to say to that. There was a photograph behind the bar- a much younger, thinner, less careworn looking version of Sharon with blonde hair pinned up in an elaborate bun stood next to a rather gangly Vietnamese man with thin wire-frame glasses, both wearing elaborate áo dài beamed at the camera. She noticed Hobie looking, and smiled sadly.
“Yeah, that was our trip- we were outside of Sam’s grandmother’s house when we took that picture. Probably the best one we ever took.” Then, she shook her head. “Well, that’s enough of that, you didn’t come in here to hear me reminisce about the past. What are you drinking, son?”
“You got an IPA?” Hobie asked. Sharon rolled her eyes.
“Oh god, the hipster beer plague has even spread across the pond! You and Jon will get along great. You want Voodoo Ranger or Stone IPA?”
Not being familiar with either one of thos e particular brews, Hobie told the bartender to surprise him. She laughed, then pulled a pint for him. “Here you go, Stone IPA, it’s Jon’s favorite. I’ll start a tab for you.”
Sipping his beer, Hobie kept his eyes on the happenings in the bar. Despite what Miguel had told him, there really did not seem to be anything particularly evil going on. He watched the Lizard belt out terrible karaoke while the Electros danced together. He watched the Vulture drunkenly get into an argument with the Rhino over politics, and even allowed himself to get drawn into it himself when the Rhino had given a particularly unhinged take on the usefulness of this dimension’s looniest tech billionaire allowing a previously-banned politician back on his social media website.
“Seriously, mate, what possible good would letting him back on do?!” Hobie exclaimed. “So he can try to start a coup?”
“Is better than hiding it in the dark, yes?” the large Russian man replied. “Then we see what he wants to do! Is useful for FBI and GRU! And us! Perhaps they will be needing weapons, yes? Is good for business!”
Now THAT was a little concerning, Hobie had to admit, but given the fact that multiple universes were apparently under the thumb of the fucking Green Goblin, the Rhino wanting to sell guns to whoever would buy them was probably not a big deal. Although, of course, he had to tell the Rhino exactly what he thought of the idea of selling weapons to fascists, regardless of whether they were Russian, American, or anything else.
“Ahahaha! I like this kid, he is very funny! He still has, ah, principles! You will lean when you get older, there are no principles other than that of money!” The Rhino laughed, clapping Hobie on the back with enough strength that it would have sent an unaugmented human sprawling on the floor.
“Ah, knock it off Aleksei, he hasn’t seen what we have,” the female Electro said from her perch on the male one’s lap. “Give him a few years, he’ll be back here with us!”
Interestingly, Mr. Negative and the Spot seemed to be much less open to him. Both were watching Hobie with barely-disguised distrust (or at least, that was the vibe he was getting from Spot- it was pretty hard to tell with his face being the way it was). Mr. Negative seemed outright hostile every time he spoke to the bartender, scowling darkly into his drink or exchanging dark looks with Spot. The two seemed to have some sort of understanding. Mr. Negative especially seemed to keep looking at his wrist- Hobie didn’t think he would recognize his watch as being Spider-Man tech, but it was a little unnerrving to wonder.
Eventually, arguing politics with the Rhino and the Vulture got boring, and Hobie really decided he needed to keep himself from getting too drunk, so he called it a night, paid off his tab, and left the bar. The Rhino and Sharon had told him to come back any time for as long as he was in town, and with that, Hobie walked out. He stepped into the alleyway behind the bar and walked a little ways down, fiddling with his watch. He was going to have to report back to Miguel- although he had the feeling that the other man wouldn’t want to hear what he had to say. Whatever this group was up to, it didn’t seem to affect the multiverse in any way. The most nefarious thing he’d heard all night was the Rhino’s plan to apparently sell guns to insurrectionists, and the fact that the Electros apparently had a electricity kink (seriously, that had been way more information than Hobie had ever wanted to know about any villains and simultaneously the least surprising thing he’d ever heard). He was so focused on everything he’d learned and how he was going to report it back that he didn’t even notice the blow that came from behind.
Hobie sprawled onto the pavement, the wind knocked out of him. To his shock, the Spot had actually got the drop on him. Before he could scramble back to his feet, the man had kicked him again in the stomach, and a blast of dark energy from even further back down the alley thwarted any further attempts to fight back.
“ Stay down ,” Spot growled, his voice an octave lower than it had been in the bar. “You should have known better than to come here, Spider-Man.”
“How did you know?” Hobie tried to assert confidence. Spot laughed. It was not a particularly nice sound.
“I will never forget the man who ruined my life. I’d recognize that energy anywhere. Even if you’re not the one who threw a bagel at me.”
“ What do you think we should do with this sneaky spider, Jon?” Mr. Negative asked, voice absolutely dripping with sarcasm as he walked up , keeping a bead on Hobie with his dark matter.
“I’ve never been a fan of spiders,” the Spot replied. “I usually just squash them if I find them in my apartment.” Then, he said, “what do you want to bet he was the one lurking around Sharon’s house the other night?” The thought just seemed to piss Mr. Negative off, and he snarled wordlessly. This just seemed to egg the faceless man on, who continued. “He’s a bit young for her, don’t you think? Somehow I don’t think Sharon would go for a Spider-Man young enough to be her son!”
“Look, mate, I don’t want any trouble,” Hobie said quickly. “I was just passing through and really just wanted a beer, that was all!”
“I don’t think you quite understand the position that you’re in,” Mr. Negative said coldly.
“So let us tell you all about it,” the Spot added. “We’re going to give you two options. One, we figure out if it’s actually possible for a human to survive being thrown into the Hudson River from crusing altitude. Even with your spider powers it will be unpleasant at least.”
“I know a good concrete place, too!” Mr. Negative added, snickering slightly as Hobie’s eyes widened. He wasn’t afraid- not exactly. But it wasn’t exactly fun to be threatened by two unhinged villanious men.
“Or,” Spot continued, “you go back to wherever all the Spider-Men are holed up, and you tell all of your comrades that they stay the hell away from this dimension, and especially this bar. There is nothing for any of you here. As far as you are all concerned, this is just a regular bar visited by regular people. Nothing that goes on here is any of your concern.” If he’d still had a face, the Spot’s would have been twisted into a crazy rictus grin. Mr. Negative’s certainly was.
“I think he’s got the picture, Jon,” Mr. Negative said, recalling his dark matter to himself and allowing Hobie to get back to his feet. The Spot shrugged.
“You got it from here?” he asked. When the billionaire responded in the affirmative, he tore a slash through the multiverse and stepped through it, likely back to his own dimension.
Mr. Negative reached forward and patted Hobie’s face twice, smirking the whole time. “I trust you’ll make the right decision,” he said. When Hobie nodded, he drew his hand back and made to go back inside. But before he did, he turned around again, and said his parting words. “If I catch any Spider-Men back here, you’ll wish Jon was the one who got ahold of you.” His dark energy crackled around his body menacingly. “Use your imagination.”
Hobie didn’t need telling twice. Feeling very lucky that he was able to escape with only getting knocked around a bit, he set his watch to go back to Headquarters. He was going to tell Miguel he was done with this shit- it wasn’t worth it.
/END