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As he laid there against a half-destroyed wall, a hand weakly pressing against his gaping and bleeding wound, Johnny realized that perhaps he shouldn’t have gone into this fight alone.
Peter had warned Johnny many times to not face the Green Goblin without him around. Said something about the Green Goblin being one of his most dangerous villains – notably on the list was Doc Ock and Venom – that only Spider-Man was allowed to go in and fight on his own. There was a reason to that but Johnny didn’t listen to Peter’s lecture as he was too busy making them breakfast in Baxter Building after a late and busy patrol that had the web-slinging hero dragging his feet in.
At that moment, Johnny wished that he had listened to Peter.
It had been a simple idea of trying to help Peter out that led Johnny to his current predicament. Peter was down in Florida for some type of science convention with Reed that would last a few days. Being the amazing friend that he is, Johnny offered to watch over the good ol’ NYC while the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man was out of the neighborhood. Peter hadn’t initially been on board with leaving the city but Reed had won him over with a mention of a few of his fellow like-minded peers joining that would love to collaborate with a young and bright mind.
There had been a laundry list of areas that Peter wanted Johnny to watch the most along with his rules of each area. Peter had made sure to get Sue to make Johnny to study the list to make sure everything was in order before they left. Even Ben got on his case to make sure Johnny understood the role that Peter was handing over to him for a long weekend. Before Peter had climbed into Reed’s private jet to fly to the southern part of Florida with Mr. Fantastic himself and Sue tagging along for the trip for business of her own, he had made sure to remind Johnny the most important rule.
Don’t fight Doc Ock, Green Goblin, or Venom alone.
Of course, Johnny ignored that one rule and he was paying for it now.
Green Goblin snickered darkly as he approached, the hum of his hover board low but filling the air along with Johnny’s pain-filled gasps. “You sure gave me some trouble but you are no Spider-Man,” Green Goblin cackled as he insulted Johnny, brushed off a part of his burnt costume.
Johnny did give the Green Goblin a run for his money at the beginning but the Human Torch had been too cocky going into the fight. He had been goofing around in this fight like it was just play as he was just the temporary protector of the city. The calculating way Green Goblin had been carrying himself during the beginning of the fight while he was testing Johnny had completely escaped the hero’s attention.
For as insane Green Goblin was, he had an intelligence that Johnny hadn’t expected from him.
It had only been a moment but it was all Green Goblin needed to throw something at Johnny. The Human Torch had allowed it to happen as he thought it was just going to burn off from his flames but the small metal device had flown through the flames. The flat metal disk had somehow survived and landed flat against his hot skin. Johnny only had the time to blink before the quick, sharp pain of a needle punctured his skin before cool liquid flooded his system.
And it had extinguished his flames.
Johnny didn’t know it worked – Reed would probably figure it out with Peter because they were nerds like that – but it cut off his powers completely. No matter how much Johnny tried to ‘flame on’, his flames stayed off. Green Goblin had waited patiently as he watched Johnny’s panic grow; his cackles starting low and soft but growing in intensity the more Johnny became frantic. It was only when Johnny tried running away that the Green Goblin resumed the fight.
The panic button Reed created to withstand his flames that Sue forced him to carry on every mission despite his resistance was pressed for the first time since its creation. It was connected to a greater server that most of the general superhero population had come to join in case of an emergency. It was something that those with no other choice would press to alert all of those within a certain proximity that help was needed, along with a few that the user could set to alert no matter how far away they were. Thankfully, it was something that Johnny knew had only been used a handful of times which saved the lives of those who set it off.
The Green Goblin was cackling about something while Johnny leaned against the wall of the dilapidated building they had fought in, broken and beaten. Slyly, Johnny looked down the panic button to see who was coming. He knew that he didn’t have much time to wait for them with how the Green Goblin was encroaching towards him. Reed had built it to show who had received the alert and how far away.
Johnny paled when he saw that all the other superheroes that were receiving his SOS signal were too far away to get to him in time.
“You may not be the spider I wish to crush but you shall do,” Green Goblin purred as he approached Johnny on his hoverboard. “I’ve seen how close the two of you are. Killing you will bring him so much pain like the time I killed that little girlfriend of his.”
Johnny wanted to retort but the blood loss was making his head swim. Even now, it felt like he was underwater. The Green Goblin’s taunts were garbled and unintelligible to Johnny. He could see the Green Goblin approaching and Johnny still had enough wit to know that the Green Goblin did not make threats he didn’t carry through on.
The haunted look Peter bore every time he tried asking about Gwen were a testament to it.
Johnny had tried to buy time from when he set off his superhero network panic button but it looked like no one was going to come in time – if they chose to answer it. It had only been less than five minutes and it didn’t feel like enough. Johnny had wanted more time to give Ben time to answer where he was making dinner at the tower while he was on stand-by but it looks like it wasn’t going to happen.
Closing his eyes, Johnny accepted that his end was here. There was so much that Johnny had wanted to do but it looks like it wasn’t going to happen. If only he had listened to Peter about the most important rule.
Johnny just knew that, once Peter joined him in the afterlife many years down the road if he had anything to say about it, his best friend was going to wring him a new one.
“Get away from him!”
Speaking of the best friend in question, that sounded a lot like him. Johnny cracked his eyes open only a sliver as that was what he could muster with his strength. They didn’t stay open long at all and they blinked heavily. He only caught a few glimpses between those blinks.
A flash of red-and-blue jumping in from a sparkling orange portal in the air. A flying foot crashing into the air the Green Goblin had been hovering before, the villain only dodging just in time. The red-and-blue flash landing lithely between Johnny and Green Goblin as a human shield. Two blue-clad figures following after through the portal – one stretching his body and the other raising her hand to throw up a forcefield – before descending on Johnny to pull him in a protective hold.
With a soft exhale, Johnny that he would be safe as the insignia of a black spider set amongst a costume of red and blue displayed proudly on a strong and protective back faced him. Someone had answered his SOS signal. He was going to be okay.
Then everything went peacefully dark as Johnny’s eyes closed and he slipped into unconsciousness.
The next time Johnny woke up, it was to the white sterile ceiling tiles of the Baxter Building’s infirmary.
There was a consistent beeping to one side and he could feel one arm pulled on top of the blanket with an IV placed in. He could hear soft breathing and turned his head to the side to see Sue sitting at his bedside, his hair tumbling into his vision. “Sue?” Johnny asked in dry and crackly voice.
The book that Sue had been reading dropped from her hands, her pale face pulling in a relieved sob seeing him away. Her hair was pulled up in a messy bun and the glasses that she rarely sported were skewed on her face. “Oh, Johnny, you had me so worried,” Sue cried as she jumped out of her chair to pull him in a strong hug.
Sue had pressed a button on her team wrist communicator to alert Reed and Ben before slipping a straw between Johnny’s lips to give him some water to quench his dry throat. They were quick to arrive with Ben leading the charge and Reed following behind with his facial hair looking like it desperately needed a trim.
Ben had been the next to pull Johnny into a strong hug and he had to be warned about being careful after Johnny winced in pain. Reed waited until both of them had their chance to express how happy that Johnny was going to be okay before offering his own relief. “You really gave us quite a scare there,” Reed chuckled humorlessly as he sat in the chair Sue had vacated.
“What happened anyways?” Johnny asked, Ben helping him sit up as Sue arranged pillows behind his back so he could lean against them. He remembered pressing the panic button the Fantastic Four had never used before for help beyond his team but it was foggy after that.
“You were stupid and went against the one rule Pete told you to follow the most,” Ben growled, settling Johnny into place. While his face was usually set in a perpetual frown, the glare was clear behind the rock features. “What the hell, Johnny?! I was here in the tower twiddling my thumbs! You could have called me in the moment you started fighting!”
“Ben, you can scold him later,” Sue tutted softly. She ran a through Johnny’s blond hair, gently picking out the knots. Johnny could feel how her fingers shook.
Johnny winced at the admonition. “I’m sorry,” Johnny murmured. “I didn’t expect the Green Goblin to be that bad.”
“That’s no excuse,” Ben scoffed, crossing his arms over his bare rocky chest. “We’ve all seen how messed up Pete gets fighting him and he used to that bastard.”
“Alright, alright, we’ve established that I wasn’t thinking,” Johnny grumbled.
“Understatement of the century,” Ben said with a roll of his eyes. The anger bled away from the corner of his eyes as the fight went out of his shoulders. “I don’t know what we would have done without you.”
“Don’t get sappy on me, big guy,” Johnny grinned up at Ben to break the tension. “I’m not going anywhere.” He paused to look between his team’s – his family’s – faces and how they fell. “Umm, guys?”
Sue sat on the edge of Johnny’s bed and clasped his hand, her eyes wet. “Johnny…if we didn’t arrive when we did, I—” Sue’s voice caught and she bit her bottom lip as she couldn’t finish her sentence.
Reed placed a hand on his wife’s shoulder in consolation before facing Johnny. “It was really close there for a second. If we had been even a minute later, we would have lost you.”
That was sobering thought indeed. Johnny had been so cocky going in to fight Green Goblin that he hadn’t thought about the possibility that he would lose. The thought that they could have been planning his funeral right now instead of rejoicing his healing his healing in the med bay because of the matter of a minute was chill-inducing.
A memory of Sue and Reed running through the portal toward him flashed in Johnny’s mind. “Wait – you both were in Florida with Pete. How the hell did you get back to the city so quick?”
“Ah, that would be because of our dear Spider-Man.” A proud smile overcame Reed’s face. “You should have seen the way he dropped everything and ran to help you once we got your SOS signal.”
“Pete?” Johnny asked and he couldn’t help the smile on his face. “How did he swing that? Pun intended.”
Before anyone could answer, there was a pounding of feet from down the hall. “Ah, he must have heard us,” Reed commented, remembering just how strong the honorary member of their team’s hearing is. The Fantastic Four as one turned their heads to see the aforementioned Spider-Man out of uniform running past the window looking into the hallway.
Peter came sliding into the doorway on socked feet, missing it at first and catching himself on the doorframe. Running in place on the tiles for a moment, Peter swung himself into the room and stood braced with both hands on the doorframe for a moment. He was breathing hard with his eyes blown wide.
Johnny smirked and leaned back against his pillow – ignoring the twinge of pain in his side – and winked at Peter. “There’s the knight in shining spandex.”
Peter gave an astonished bark of a laugh, a hand running through his hair. The astonishment quickly turned to anger as his hands balled at his sides and he stomped into the med bay. “What was the one rule I told you to follow the most?!”
“Ugh, is everyone going to yell at me today?” Johnny groaned dramatically.
Peter’s face set in a simmered glare but he toned back the anger that he had been feeling before. The lecture that he planned on unleashing on Johnny the moment he woke up was pushed to the back of Peter’s mind. Sue looked between the two best friends and nudged Reed and Ben towards the door. They went without fuss and Ben patted Peter on the shoulder as he passed.
“Don’t chew him out too much,” Ben murmured with a smirk on his stony face. “Leave some for me later.”
Peter snorted and nodded his head. “I’ll try my best.”
Sue stood up from the edge of the bed and brushed off invisible dust from her legs. “We’ll leave you two alone for a bit. I’m sure you two need your guy time,” Sue said after pressing a soft kiss into Johnny’s hair. “Ben already has a stew on the stove for dinner.”
Johnny waved bye to his sister and once she was out of eyesight, he blinked as he remembered what she said. “Dinner?” Johnny asked aloud. He knew for a fact that Ben’s famous stew took at least half a day to cook and it was already past lunch time when he started to fight the Green Goblin.
“You’ve been asleep for a bit now, my dude,” Peter groaned as he dropped down into the seat next to Johnny’s med bay bed that Reed had been occupying.
“How long is a while?” Johnny asked with a raise of his eyebrow.
Peter narrowed his eyes to himself as he thought, counting off his fingers as he quietly listed the days off to himself. “We’re going on four days today.”
“Four days?!” Johnny exclaimed and immediately regretted it as his wound yelled him. He leaned over in pain and groaned. “Four days?” he repeated in calmer voice.
“Yeah, dude, don’t do that again,” Peter huffed and ran a hand through his greasy hair, wincing as he pulled on a knot. “The others haven’t slept more than three hours at a time since Tuesday.”
Peter, now that Johnny was really looking at him, didn’t have room to say anything with how haggard he was looking. The shirt he was wearing was backwards with the tag sticking out, like he had thrown it on in a hurry. His socks were mismatched in colors and length, the left foot having a hole where Peter’s big toe peeked out. Peter’s hair was a mess that stood up in various directions and the bags underneath his eyes that Johnny had tried to make go away by forcing Peter’s to stick to a semi-decent sleep schedule were back with a vengeance.
Johnny felt the guilt that he was the reason they all looked like that settled deep in his gut. If only he had listened instead of assuming, none of them would be in their current states. Dropping his head to look at his lap, Johnny fisted his blanket tightly. “I’m sorry,” Johnny apologized honestly. “I should have listened to you and called for back-up the minute I got into it with the Green Goblin. I’m sorry for not listening to you, Pete.”
Peter was quiet for a long moment before he sighed and slouched in his seat. “I’m not mad at you, Johnny,” Peter admitted and harshly rubbed at his face, the stubble from not shaving the last few days scratching his palms. “I was scared that you went against the Green Goblin without me or anyone there and it came out in the wrong way. I’m just really happy that you’re going to be okay.”
Johnny frowned and held up his hand. He held his breath for a hesitant moment before snapping his fingers. To his utter relief, flames took over his hand and he could feel the heat of it on his face. “Oh, thank god,” Johnny breathed and sagged in on himself, dropping his hand and extinguishing the flame.
Peter snickered at Johnny’s relief and dropped his hands of his face. They hung between his legs from where his elbows rested on his knees. “Reed was able to synthesize an antidote to whatever power-nullify serum the Green Goblin injected you with. Unfortunately, it messed with your healing factor enough that you are to have to wait a bit until you are back to a hundred percent,” Peter answered the unsaid question. “And yes, he gave me antidote in case that booger tries to use it on me.”
Johnny nodded his head firmly. “Good. We don’t need you going against him without powers. After going against him myself, I would rather you never fight him alone again.”
“You act like I don’t know how to handle that gremlin after years of fighting,” Peter snorted breathily.
“Don’t act like you wouldn’t try to struggle bus it through the entire fight alone,” Johnny retorted accusatorially with a narrowing of his eyes. “I’ve seen what he’s done to you with your powers. I’m scared to see what he would do to you given the chance.”
Peter grimaced to himself. “Yeah, I don’t want to see that either.” Shaking his head, Peter looked up with Johnny with a half-grin. “Hey, about the next time I fight him, I call you in for some help. I would feel better having you watch my six.”
Johnny grinned back at Peter. “Give me a ring and I’ll be there in a blink.”
“It’s a plan then,” Peter laughed.
Speaking of a flash, Johnny remembered a certain red-and-blue clothes figure appearing first to save him from the Green Goblin. “How did you do that?” Johnny asked.
“Do what?” Peter replied cooly, picking some lint off his rumpled shirt that Johnny was pretty sure had been stolen from his closet. But then again, after years of friendship and late superhero nights when one needed to bum some clothes from the other, the concept of who’s shirt was who’s was a lost art.
“Don’t act coy,” Johnny scoffed with a roll of his eyes. “You were all the way in Florida with Reed and Sue. There was no way you could have swung from there to where I was in four minutes.”
“I called in a favor,” Peter shrugged, leaning back in his chair.
“A favor?” Johnny chuckled. “From who?”
“Dr. Strange,” Peter answered, interlocking his hands together behind his head. “That wizard had the means to get me there in an instant and he owed me from the last time I got dragged in to a fight of his. Though, to be honest, he owes me some more after how much trouble he put me through that one.”
Johnny squinted his eyes as he thought to himself. “Is that the one where you came back covered in pink slime and smelled like ranch for a week straight?”
Peter pulled a disgusted face. “It was two weeks and yes, that’s the one. Harry and MJ made me sit on the other side of the room every time I went over to either of their places.”
Laughing so much that it made his healing wound hurt, Johnny patted Peter on the shoulder. “Well, thank you for calling in a favor that big for little ol’ me.”
Peter’s eyes turned playful in the corners. “Consider us even from when Venom took me over.”
Johnny’s eyes boggled wide. “No way! You tried to eat me!”
“It wasn’t that bad,” Peter snickered.
“Did I forget to mention you tried to eat me three times?!” Johnny exclaimed in shrill voice. “Three! I feel like you are not getting the point. Three times I had to fight off my best friend trying to eat me!”
“It was Venom trying to eat you, not me. Just know that you’re too smokey for my tastes,” Peter teased with his tongue peeking out playfully.
Johnny dramatically rolled his eyes. “How reassuring,” he grumbled. Shaking his head with a huff of a laugh, Johnny settled into a comfier position against his pillows. “For real though, thanks for the save. Reed said you dropped everything and ran for me. I don’t know what you would do without you watching out for me.”
“You would do the same for me,” Peter shrugged. It was true; Peter was his best friend and if the situation was reversed – which was a very real possibility for the future and Johnny desperately prayed it never happened – Johnny would have dropped everything and gone all out to get there in time.
Johnny held out his fist towards Peter. The web-slinger looked up and saw the fist. Smirking, he curled his own hand into a fist.
And the two of their fists met in the middle for a bump that would describe their friendship in a way words couldn’t.