Ellen was frozen, eyes wide and locked straight ahead. This was going nowhere good. No. Only towards government warehouses and points of no return.

"It's rather telling that despite everything else Harry did, getting 'Norman fucking Osborn' – your words, not mine – involved was worse than invading your privacy and stealing a dangerous item from you." Coulson said, expression still level, not giving away anything as he pinned Ellen to her seat with his eyes. "Yet, everything S.H.I.E.L.D. has on the man is no worse than any of his peers. A bit of dabbling in super soldier formulas in the past, a couple minor hiccups in accounting… Nothing to justify the fact that you just froze up just hearing his name."

Ellen opened her mouth, but words failed to come out. She tried again. "I don't trust suits." It was weak, wavering, and had all the defense of wet cardboard, but it was something.

"Yet you're perfectly candid with me."

"You're not a suit."

He gestured at his perfectly pressed black suit.

"You wear a suit." Ellen clarified. "You aren't corporate. You actually do not-awful things."

"Thank you. I'm still waiting on you to answer my question."

Damn. Ellen swallowed. "This is going to sound insane."

The corner of Coulson's mouth quirked towards a smile. "I work with superpowered teenagers and have personally met a god of thunder. I doubt you can surprise me."

"Norman Osborn is a supervillain."

Coulson stopped smiling.
Ellen exhaled. "To be fair, in an alternate universe for sure. Here, not yet."

Silence reigned.

"'Not yet'?"

Ellen gave him one of his own looks. "If the Green Goblin was around already, you would have heard of him."

Coulson raised an eyebrow. "Loud?"

"Insane. Possibly some kind of split personality, but it's gotten really unclear in light of recent events. Incredibly violent. Obsessed with Spider-Man. Prone to murder, torture, other assorted awfulness. And, yes, you could say loud." It would be awfully hard to ignore a screaming man in green and purple spandex riding a smoke-spewing glider, even before he started chucking bombs around like Halloween candy.

"And you know for certain that Norman Osborn is, in an alternate universe, the man behind the mask?"

Ellen forced herself to relax and not lash out with an 'of course I'm fucking sure, I've read all the comics'. "He's been publicly unmasked, though he's gotten various patsies to take the fall prior to that."

"And yet you're friends with his son in this universe. How does that work out?"

She saw red for a second and the armrests of her chair splintered under her grip. "Harry isn't Norman."

"I'm not saying he is, but just by being friends with him brings you into Norman's orbit." Coulson tilted his head minutely to the right. "He's already approached you, hasn't he?"

"Showed up at the punk house I'm crashing in about ten last night. No invitation, no warning, no fucks given about being in Alphabet City at night in a damn limo."

"Are you afraid of him?"

Ellen laughed. "Look, I don't know jack about Norman Osborn in this universe, except he's rich, connected, and setting off all kinds of danger signals every time I see the man, but the one I'm familiar with ran a partner's ex-fiancé off the road and, when that didn't kill her, arranged for her blood transfusion at the hospital to be tainted with HIV, just because he felt that the partner was too 'sensitive'. He kidnapped the twenty year old girlfriend of one of his enemies, snapped her neck before tossing her off the George Washington Bridge, and twisted the entire situation to make the hero think it was entirely his fault that she died. He took over S.H.I.E.L.D. by killing a Skrull queen at the opportune moment on live TV, even though everyone already knew who and what he was. He was willing to have his own son publicly murdered in exchange for a smidgen of public sympathy and has murdered at least several dozen, if not several hundred of his own minions the very second they either became inconvenient or he felt like it." She leaned forward. "Coulson, I am scared to death of Norman Osborn. I could have the power of a god and I would still be scared of him. Does that answer your question?"

Norman Osborn sat in his office considered his options.

The Venom project was, for the moment, shelved. Even if they could get another sample made, without the ability to improve the project leaps and bounds ahead of where it was today, it would be pointless, as each outing for the current model had displayed far too many exploitable weaknesses. One or two would be excusable, and could be turned into good product design in the event of a rogue element, but the plethora of inconveniences like the weakness to electricity, sonic weaponry, certain superheroes seemingly tailor made in response, and common sense added up to dead weight.

If Octavius wasn't an integral part of the whole line of Spider-projects, Norman would have cut him for that failing. No matter. He turned his mind to other possibilities that had yet to materialize.

If Harry's newest friend was the face behind Spider-Man, he needed confirmation. Something a bit more tangible, like a testable blood sample or, better yet, photos of the transition between civilian and superhero would be ideal.

Odds were, she wasn't, but it was still a venue worth exploring. After all, Octavius had consistently tracked Spider-Man to Midtown High, and the quick response of the hero to the Venom crisis was telling of how close he'd been in the first place.
The fact that other superheroes, many of which were distinctly 'teenage' in their manner, had displayed similar response times was... interesting, though the S.H.I.E.L.D. presence often accompanying them was just as irritating.

He rubbed his chin, studying the city down below his office window. In the hours between noon and the four o'clock release, the usually hectic streets were almost sedate, though to any unfamiliar with city life would still call the pace of the ants below 'busy'. It would be an hour or so before he could check on Harry, see what information he could get from his son. Maybe even 'unground' him so he could invite some friends over.

Norman smiled.

Yes, now that sounded like a plan.

Coulson sat alone in his office. He had been alone for about ten minutes now, silently turning over what he'd just learned in his head. He'd assumed that confronting Blake about her secret would have simplified the issue and helped neutralize a variable outside of S.H.I.E.L.D. control.

He'd been in the business long enough to know better than to assume.

Alternate realities were technically under the purview of A.R.M.O.R., one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s subdivisions, but they'd mostly covered areas like the Mojoverse, Negative Zone, and the tangled web of 'possible futures, all terrible' that was constantly growing as more time travelers appeared on the radar, not to mention the various 'Deadly Cans' that they worked so hard to keep sealed. A single, mostly harmless vigilante from some neighboring 'verse was hardly something they would care about.

The information Blake had presented was tantalizing and, as shown by her knowledge about things that she should have been completely ignorant of, fairly accurate.

Spider-Man's secret identity, Venom's very existence, his own status as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent… Eleanor Blake could very well end up being a resource into predicting and countering the entire super-powered community.

But that was assuming that her universe was running on the same tracks as theirs. Another assumption that could prove even more dangerous than underestimating Eleanor Blake.

Norman Osborn in his universe was a shrewd businessman who at his worst had dabbled in unstable super soldier formulas despite less than promising test results and the usual under the table arms dealing. In another universe, Norman Osborn was apparently a mass murdering psychopathic supervillain without scruples, standards, or even a stable mental state who was able to usurp armies with minimal effort.

And Blake had implied, ever so lightly and probably without even realizing it, that the only difference between the two was time and one bad day.

Coulson rubbed his temples, trying to assuage his growing headache.

He needed a drink.

By the end of the school day, Ellen was wishing she was of legal drinking age in this universe. Her headache had failed to fade into anything less than a dull omnipresent skull thumping throb and, while Harry was being incredibly considerate of her condition, the teachers were considerably less so, droning on about their various subjects and piling on homework in anticipation of the weekend.

Truly, in the struggle between superhero work and school, school was the worst of the two evils.

The sweet, sweet release of the final bell was music to her ears, and judging by the expressions of every other teen hero in residence, it was a mutual feeling.

"I am so ready for my Saturday siesta." Sam Alexander yawned as Ellen passed him in the hall.

"True, after the struggles of the day, some rest is well-deserved and well-earned." Rand said.

"Does everything have to be a fortune cookie with you?"

That was the last snippet of conversation she caught before she'd passed out of earshot and into arm's reach of her locker.

"Are you okay?"

Ellen jerked back from her locker, fingers fumbling the combination. Parker had appeared behind her without even registering on her spider-sense. She slowly turned to look down at him.

The shorter teen shrugged and tried to look casual, though his attempts to lean on thin air weren't helping his cause. "I mean, you ran out earlier, you come back barely able to walk straight…" Parker finally managed eye contact. "I know we're not 'buddy-buddy', but we are friends, right?"

Were they? Ellen had never given Peter Parker the time of day, really only interacting with him as an extension of Harry. It would have been too easy to fall into his orbit otherwise, and she had no doubts that that's where she would have let slip the worst secrets. Still, they did interact and she didn't dislike him. It was just so hard to both equate and separate the sixteen year old clumsy, awkward excuse for a comic book genius with the Spider-Man she'd spent her childhood following in print and video.

Parker shifted awkwardly, reminding Ellen that she still hadn't answered the question, even almost a full minute after he'd asked it.

"I… guess?" She said lamely.

He nodded at that before pulling out his cellphone. "And that's why you're coming over to my house after school."

"Wait, what?"

Two hours later, Ellen was still staring blankly into the floral wallpapered walls of the Parker residence. May Parker, though thankfully not the fragile geriatric spindle that Ellen was expecting, was somehow even more terrifying than her comic incarnation, immediately deciding that Ellen was going to be a 'project'.

Whether that project was getting her to drop her grunge-goth look or simply mothering her into a productive member of society, nothing could ease the sense of foreboding that was currently chilling Ellen's spine.

In the back of her head, Anti-Venom snrked.

Watching Venom slug it out with the Hulk on the evening news cast, Ben Reilly was beginning to think he had less of a leg up in this universe than he'd initially anticipated. Anti-Venom hadn't been the only symbiote covered curveball the universe had to offer, as evidenced by a Carnage-looking guy who was decidedly on the good guy side of the fight and a handful of superheroes he couldn't even name – wait, was that Power Man and Iron Fist in the mix? –, not to mention the presence of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents all over the scene.

Well, at least they did more than just ruin things from the shadows in this universe.

Ben sighed, sinking back into his sofa. With the paycheck provided by his work for Reed Richards – he still couldn't get over it, working with the smartest man in the world –, he'd been able to get an apartment in the Baxter Building. Even if some of the neighbors were less than neighborly, it was without contest the best digs he had ever had in the history of ever.

Still, the highly variable schedule made it difficult to get out in costume, despite the fact that he worked for a team of superheroes. He managed, but it was a struggle to maintain anything resembling a regular patrol.

On top of that, he hadn't gotten a chance to call back Gwen Stacy. Her number was still sitting on his phone, gathering electronic dust as he internally argued for and against it.

She'd be in danger.

She works at Oscorp.

The last time he – really, it was Peter, but they were Ben's memories too – got involved with her, both she and her dad ended up dead.

She works with Norman Osborn already. If that's not a danger zone, what else is?

It could so easily end in heartbreak, for one or both of them.

It would be so worth it.

Ben picked up the phone and dialed.

"Yeah, Gwen? It's me, Ben. Ben Reilly, from the symposium? I was wondering if you were free next Friday…"

Okay, kind of short (I think the shortest chapter yet), but it's something and anything more felt like it would just be clutter. Was kind of tempted to do a teaser with Venom, but thought better of it.

FUN FACT – the Green Goblin's first glider was called 'the flying broomstick' and looked like a really shitty dieselpunk version of one. Obviously, it didn't last long (exactly one issue) because it was pretty much him flying on a semi-steerable missile tucked between his legs. Main universe Norman might be nuts, but not nuts enough to risk his nuts for something that can barely be steered.

Alright, the end of the first Symbiote Saga has come and gone, and it ended up being a bit different than intended, mostly in that Venom didn't come back for a proper round two (I WAS PLANNING ON IT, BUT HEY, let's put that somewhere else. Take a little break).

Anyway, every single event detailed by Ellen in reference to Norman Osborn happened all in the Main Universe of Marvel and that's not even half of what he's done (considering that he was responsible for the Clone Saga (the second one) and most, if not all, of the Siege event. If I shared a universe with Norman Osborn, I'd avoid him like the plague and probably start saving money to get Deadpool to kill him in a way that couldn't be bullshit through by a weirdly effective yet slow as hell healing factor.

Possibly by stealing a Fantastic Four rocket and shooting him into the sun. But I digress.

I had some trouble with this chapter (a depressing trend lately), but I'm still trying to work at it. I made it a breather because, let's face it, action has been flying thick and heavy for a while and Ellen is fucking tired by now. Life's been a little busy on my end too (not quite superhero level insanity), between trying to get my dog trained (it's kind of a 'one step forward, two steps back' kind of process atm), therapy for my depression and anxiety, and day to day living with the energy and ambition of the average sloth, but I'm doing okay.

Also, lot of plot bunnies kicking around in my head (like only one or two for Spider-Man, tho, and none that are applicable to this fic) that I really want to work with but know that I can't really do justice. Wah.