"Where's Parker?" Ava asked as she walked home from school with Luke, Danny and Sam. Luke shrugged. "No idea. Haven't seen him since the Goblin got away this morning. Anyone else seen him?" They all shook their heads. "Well I'm sure he'll turn up. He always does." Luke said, and they continued walking home, joking and talking as normal. They watched TV, ate and then did their separate things. Ava was reading, Danny was watching Luke and Sam play video games against each other, but Peter still hadn't appeared. It was soon late and they were heading off to bed before they realised that he hadn't even come home at all. "It's the weekend now, so we'll go out to look for him in the morning." Ava told them, and they agreed. Even Sam, who didn't like getting up early at the best of times. Ava found it hard to sleep. She couldn't explain it, but she was worried about him. Her last thought before sleep tore her away was 'He better not have taken a beating without us again...'

The next morning, they had just finished breakfast and had gotten suited up before their communicators went off. "What is it Director Fury" Ava said, answering her communicator. "The Trapster is at the bank. Get down there and stop him." Fury ordered. "Wait, Director Fury, do you know where Peter is?" she asked. "He's fine, don't worry. Now go stop Trapster. Fury out." and the screen went black. "We better get going then" Luke said and they left the house and headed for the bank.

As they arrived there was no sign of Trapster. "Where is he?" Sam asked impatiently. "Let's go look" Luke said, running off towards the bank, closely followed by the rest of the team. They slowed to a stop in front of the bank as they saw Trapster hanging upside down from a street light in a cocoon of webbing. "Too late kiddies. Spider got here first." Trapster said. Ava turned to the others. "Something is wrong. He didn't come home, he got to the fight first and took down this creep with no collateral damage, and he didn't stick around to gloat. We need to find out what has happened." they nodded and turned to leave when Trapster piped up once more. "You have no idea..." They stopped and looked at him. "What do you mean?" Luke asked, walking towards him. "Not a word during the fight, crazy strength and precision. It was scary." They were speechless. "Shield will be here to pick you up soon. Sit tight creep" Sam said as they left for the helicarrier.

They entered the control room and Fury quickly finished his conversation with an agent as they walked towards him. "Trapster is where he belongs. Good job kids" Fury said in a slightly more happier tone than usual. "We." Danny said, gesturing at the others, "didn't do a thing. He was already secured when we got there, and the only sign of Spiderman was Trapster in the web cocoon." Fury crossed his arms. "That doesn't sound like the Spiderman we all know.". A silence fell between them but was broken by Ava. "Trapster said something about Spiderman before we left." Fury raised an eyebrow at her as a cue to continue. "He said that Spiderman didn't talk during the fight and had crazy strength and precision, and that he was... scary." Fury nodded slowly as he took in the information. "We need to get to the bottom of this and find out what happened." he said. "That may be difficult. We haven't seen him since our run in with the Goblin yesterday morning." Luke said. "Do you know where he is?" he continued. "Yes. Follow me." Fury replied, walking swiftly towards the doors. They followed him, wondering where they were going.

"Training?!" Ava said, very surprised. "He never trains and now this? This is weird." Fury turned to them. "You mentioned that he didn't come home at all yesterday... Well I know why." They stared at him, eager to hear what he had to say. "He was here. He trained all day yesterday and through they night. I've tried telling him to take a break but he has only stopped twice in the last 24 hours. He stopped to eat for about 10 minutes, and to go deal with the Trapster today." He turned to the intercom to the training room. "Parker. We need to talk. Get out here." Peter grabbed a robot and threw it like a baseball pitch taking out another two. "Not now!" he shouted, punching a hole through the middle of another robot and watching it drop to the floor. "Now, Mr Parker." Fury demanded. "Fine..." Peter replied, webbing a robot and swinging it around his head, destroying the remaining robots. He turned and walked out of the room, stretching his arms in the air as he strode over to the seats on the opposite side of the corridor and sat down, staring at the floor. Fury walked up to him and put his hand on his shoulder. "What's happened Parker?" he asked. "Get your hand off me. Right. Now." he said, still looking at the floor. The rest of the team all shared a glance and they didn't know how Fury would react to being spoken to like that. "Listen. We need to know what happened, and-" he began to say before Peter interrupted him. "No, you listen to me. We have nothing that we need to talk about. Nothing happened to me, now get your hand off me before I make you regret putting it there" Fury removed his hand but he was angry now. "You are suspended from all shield operations until I allow you to come back. Is that clear?" Peter didn't reply, or even acknowledge what had been said. "Pete-" Ava started to say, walking towards him but he shot out of his seat "Drop it Ava" he snapped and headed down the corridor and off the helicarrier. "Wow. This is serious" Luke said as Fury left, heading back to the main control room. "As crazy as this is going to sound, it is true. The only one who can tell us what happened is the Goblin." Ava said. None of them said anything but she knew they agreed with her. "Let's just go home and let him cool off. He will talk to us when he is ready" Danny said and they left and went home.

Over the rest of the weekend they had been called out by Fury to stop the Beetle, the Rhino and Electro, but every time they got there the villain had been dealt with by their wall crawling friend, but as with the Trapster he had disappeared without a trace. They were still worried about him but tried to put it out of their minds as they headed for school. They got there just in time and got to their first lesson. They shared every lesson with Peter and were sure he wouldn't be there, but as they walked into their first lesson of the day – maths – they saw him sat in his seat at the back of the room moving his pen through his fingers. They walked in and took their seats beside him, but he didn't say a word, nor did he seem to realise that they had even arrived. "You okay bud?" Danny asked him as he sat down. "Fine." he replied, not looking up from his pen. "Dude, I can't believe you said that to Fury. I mean Fury! What would have happened if he hadn't let go of you?" Sam asked, and they were all interested in his response. "I would have done what I said. Made him regret it and made sure he wouldn't do it again." Ava, Luke and Danny shared a worried look, and were soon joined by MJ and Harry completing the group. They all greeted each other except for Peter, who didn't move his gaze from his pen or speak. MJ nudged Ava and whispered to her "What's wrong with Pete?" only loud enough for her to hear. "Nothing is wrong MJ. Don't worry. I'm fine". She didn't understand how he could have heard her. "If you say so... You can talk to me if something is up you know." she said. "I know, thanks." he replied before the teacher walked in and the lesson began. Peter didn't speak while he was working, finishing the lessons work in less than half the lesson. He spent the rest helping the others with what they found hard, but spoke as little as possible. Next was art class, and they were told to draw whatever they wanted. The seven of them were sat on a table near the front of the class. They all drew seemingly normal things, Ava drawing a tiger for example. Peter however spent the lesson drawing an extremely detailed Spiderman costume design. It was mostly black and purple, and the spider logo was white, as were the eyes. Ava was on Peter's right, and Luke on his left, and they both wondered why he was designing a new costume. "What's this for Pete?" Luke asked. "It's my new costume. The old one was getting a bit... well, old." he replied. "So you are going to make a new one?" Ava asked. "Going to? I already have." he answered. "Can we see it?" she asked. "When we get home." he said, smiling. "So you are actually coming home today, since you haven't been the last 4 days?" Luke asked him. Peter nodded as the teacher came around to look at what they had done. "Good job Sam. Very nice Mary-Jane. You sure do like tigers Ava" he said, laughing. "Yeah, I do." she replied. Peter tried to hide his but the teacher saw it. "Incredible. I love it Peter. Great work, keep it up." He continued to complement Luke, Danny and Harry on their drawings before class ended. Everything was normal for the rest of the day, like nothing had happened. That was until they were about to walk home, when Flash turned the corner. "Oh puny Parker!" he called, walking towards Peter. "Locker knocker time" he said, with a grin. "Screw off flash, I'm not in the mood" Peter snarled, pushing past him and walking towards his friends. Flash grabbed the back of his shirt, stopping him. Peter turned around and grabbed flash by the scruff of the neck, lifting him off the ground and pushing him against the locker. "Leave me alone" he said through gritted teeth and walked off towards his friends once again. "Good job Pete" Harry said, smiling and patting him on the back as the group left the school. "Thanks Harry." he replied and they walked home, laughing and joking all the way. Harry and MJ split off from the group when they passed their houses and soon enough they arrived home. As soon as the door shut behind them, Luke said "Show us the costume!". "Yeah! Seconded Ava. "Okay, be right back." Peter said, going upstairs and putting on his new costume. "What do you mean?" Sam asked. "He's got a new costume, and he's going to show us." They sat down on the sofa and in the chair awaiting Peter in his new Spiderman costume. A few minutes later they heard Peter walking to the stairs and all turned to look. As he walked down they noticed the white spider on the chest and on the back, followed by the purple and black body. Danny and Sam were more surprised by what they saw since they hadn't seen the drawing of it in art. "How do I look?" Peter asked, doing the Usain Bolt pose. "Really cool!" Luke said, getting up and walking over to get a better look at the suit. "Makes you look more...powerful" Danny said. "You do look better now Web head, but we all know I'm still the coolest." Sam stated, getting a few eyebrows raised at him. Ava would never admit it to anyone, but she thought that it made him look strong, powerful as Danny had said, but most of all it made him look hot. She felt herself want to be close to him and she wanted to run over and kiss him. She felt her heart race as she looked at him, and barely noticed as he asked her what the time was. "Uh... it's 4:48." she said. "You seem distracted" he commented. "Anyway, I have somewhere to be, so laters" he said, walking out of the house and swung off towards the city. "That was weird." Luke said. "Yeah..." Ava replied. "Should we follow him?" Luke asked. Ava opened her mouth to reply but their communicators going off stopped them. "What is it Fury?" Sam asked after answering the communicator. "The Goblin has been sighted near the Daily Bugle building. Get down there, and since Spiderman won't be coming with you I've arranged for Iron Man to help out. Fury out." They ran to get suited up before going to the city to meet up with Iron Man.

Spiderman was on his way to the Daily Bugle before even Shield knew Goblin was there, since he already knew. Goblin told him during their last fight to meet him there at 5 o'clock and they would settle things then and there. He let go of his web and landed on top of the building. "Where are you Goblin?" he thought to himself. He looked around before seeing him flying down the street on his glider towards him. Spiderman swung down to the street and the Goblin drew to a halt in front of him. "I assume you took my advice? A new, more impressive suit for a new, more impressive Spiderman. I saw what you did to Trapster, Beetle, Rhino and Electro. Very impressive... All that's left is for you to cast off Shield and join me and you will be flawless, truly my equal." Spiderman laughed a bit. "You know I can't do that. I became Spiderman to protect people from villains like you, but I have to admit, you were right about this... I've never felt better, and for that I have to thank you. But I'm still me, and as such I will protect this city even if it kills me." The Goblin shook his head slowly at him. "I heard about your run in with Fury. Seems to me you would be better off without Shield dragging you down." "Fury and Shield have done more for me than you could imagine. I'm not going to join you, so if you just came here to talk we are done and you can go." The Goblin laughed. "It would just have been to talk if you have joined me, but since you won't..." He flew higher on the glider before throwing a pumpkin bomb at Spiderman. Spiderman jumped, webbing the bomb as he spun in the air and launched it at Goblin. Goblin dodged it and it exploded in the air. He flew at Spiderman and tried to punch him as he flew past. Spiderman dodged the punch and as Goblin went past he webbed him in the back and pulled him off his glider which crashed into the street. Spiderman walked over to where the glider crashed. He picked it up and snapped it into 4 pieces. He then threw them all away and turned back to the Goblin who was back on his feet. "You should have ran while you could, Norman." They settled into their fighting stances. "You think I need that glider to crush you?" he laughed. "No, I think you need it to be able to run away fast enough." They ran towards each other. Spiderman dodged a few punches before delivering his own to Goblin's stomach. "You still won't release your full power. Pathetic." Goblin sneered, kicking Spiderman in the chest sending him flying into a car. Spiderman saw Goblin running at him, and he leapt to his feet, webbed the car and swung it at Goblin. He hit Goblin and sent him flying across the street into a shop window. Goblin climbed out to see Spiderman had prepared to slingshot himself. He released the tension in his webs and flew across at Goblin. He couldn't react fast enough and was kicked full force sending him through a few more walls. Once again the Goblin got up and Spiderman began to wonder what it would take to deal with him. He walked forwards out of the building, but was finding it hard to even stay on his feet. He emerged onto the street and stopped. He was moving about on the spot like he was dizzy, finding it hard to keep his balance. "Pathetic, am I?" Spiderman said, anger in his voice. He walked towards Goblin, who was still finding it hard to stand. "Lights out ugly" Spiderman said as he punched him, knocking him out cold. He webbed him to the floor and was about to swing away when he heard Iron Man shout "Stay right there. We need to talk." as he landed a few yards away, followed by White Tiger, Ironfist, Powerman and Nova. Spiderman turned to face them. "Sup Tony. What brings you out to play?" he asked. "First of all, loving the new look kid, and Fury wanted me to come help your team deal with big green since he banned you from all Shield things. Why is that exactly? Fury wouldn't tell me" said Iron Man. "Well I basically threatened Fury" he said, sure Iron Man would tell him he shouldn't have done it and got him to apologise, but it was quite the opposite. He burst out laughing. "Seriously? Nice one kid. Kind of annoyed I didn't get to see it, but seriously, what's the deal with you and Goblin?" he asked. "That depends, how much did you see?" They all gave him a disapproving look. "We saw everything Web head. We saw him arrive and all of the fight, and we heard the nice little conversation you were having." Ava replied. "Now we want the full story. From the start." and they all agreed. "We most certainly do" said a voice from behind him which he recognised as Director Fury. He walked up to them before continuing. "Tony, I don't appreciate you encouraging his behaviour, and you, " he pointed at Spiderman, "I thought I told you that you were banned from all Shield operations.". "Well with all due respect Nick, I was here first, so it wasn't a Shield operation, therefore I didn't break your little rule, and if you must know the full story we better deal with him first, and then go to the helicarrier."

Fury and the teen heroes assembled in the meeting room on board the helicarrier. Fury sat at the head of the table, and the others sat along the sides in their usual places. "Okay Peter, tell us what happened." requested Ava. Peter didn't want to tell but he started to speak regardless. "It all started during the fight with Goblin, You four were down injured and it was just me and him. He told me how my talents were wasted on a fool. You know, the usual kind of comments from him. He told me that I should release my full potential, embrace the Venom side of my abilities. The side that makes Venom as strong as he is. He offered to help me become better and stronger, but he expected me to join him. I told him I didn't need his help and we began to fight again. I was about to mount another assault on him when he said to me 'She will never love a weak Spiderman.' and I hesitated, and that was the opening he needed to get away. As he flew off he told me to meet him at the Bugle at 5pm to finish our fight. That's how I knew where he was going to be before all of you." Spiderman finished the story and looked around to see if they had any questions. "Who's the girl Parker?" Sam asked. Peter went a bit red and sighed. "It's not important Bucket Head." he said "Come on. Tell us" Sam pleaded. "No. Now drop it." Peter snapped. "Just tell us!" Sam yelled, and Peter webbed his mouth shut. "I told you to drop it." he said, crossing his arms as Luke helped Sam get the webbing off his face. "So Peter, why have you been acting like you have been? Training all the time, not coming home and even threatening Director Fury." Ava asked, her face a little red from her brief little fantasy she just had about her being the girl that Peter liked. "Because I realised afterwards that if I had been a better Spiderman then you guys wouldn't have been hurt. I realised that he was right and I needed to be better, so I started unleashing the aggression that is inside of me that I have kept suppressed. Through the hours of training I learned how to control it and keep calm, and as for the thing with Director Fury... I'm sorry. I shouldn't have acted like that." It was Fury he spoke next. "Well it seems you have learnt your lesson and I think you are ready to re-join the team. Now all of you go home and try not to get into too much trouble." They all stood and said "Yes Director Fury." before walking out of the room.

That night, Peter was sat on the roof, thinking about the events of the last few days, while the others were inside. It was Ava who came out to check if he was okay. She sat next to him on the roof. "What brings you up here?" he asked Ava as she sat. "I'm worried about you, and I just wanted to check if you wanted to talk about anything." Peter didn't say anything for a few seconds, but he turned to look at her. "I don't know what to do." Ava put her hand on his knee. "Is this about the girl?" she asked. Peter nodded. "Yeah." Ava sighed. "Listen Peter. Whoever this girl is, she is lucky to have a genuinely nice guy like her. Go for it, you never know what will happen" He shook his head. "Thanks for the help Ava, I really appreciate it, but I can't." he said, getting up to go back inside. As she got up to go back in with him, she got an idea. "Seeing as it's my birthday tomorrow, I want you to ask her. No ifs and no buts. It's my birthday and you have to do it." she said, sticking her tongue out at him. "Fine, I will." He said, smiling at her "You opening your presents before or after school?" She thought about it for a moment, "After. We barely make it to school on time as it is" she said, smiling at him. "Yeah I suppose so."

The next morning they all said happy birthday to Ava and ate breakfast and headed off to school as usual. Their first few lessons were very uneventful and they passed by quickly and soon it was lunch time. They all sat on their usual table and talked about the usual stuff. The boys talked about sports and the girls talked about various other students, things like who likes who and such. As lunch ended they all headed of to class, but Ava pulled Peter aside. "Have you done it yet?" she asked hurriedly. "No, not yet." he replied. "Well you better hurry up, only two more lessons left before we go home and you have to do it." she said. "Yeah yeah, I know." he laughed, and they ran to catch up with the others. Their lessons were like they had been all day, uneventful. The only positive was that they now got to go home to celebrate Ava's birthday. Ava, Sam and Danny were waiting by the main doors of the school for Luke and Peter. Luke arrived and told the group that Peter had to go for some 'Shield thing'. Ava looked really disappointed and as they walked home she barely spoke. All the way she was wondering if he was actually off doing something with Shield, or if he had asked that girl and they were on a date. She really hoped it was the first because even though she had told him to ask the girl he liked out, she secretly wanted it to be her. They arrived at the house, and Ava went and sat on the sofa as the boys went to get her presents. She noticed something on the table. It was a rectangular box, wrapped in white wrapping paper. There was a note by the side that said "Happy Birthday Ava, from Peter." She wondered when he put it there but then she remembered he was last to leave the house, so she figured that was when. The boys came back downstairs, presents in hand and sat down around her. From Sam she got a shoebox with a 20 dollar not inside, accompanied with a bit of paper that read "Didn't know what you wanted so I gave you the money." From Danny she got an iPhone case that had white tigers on it, and from Luke she got a big white tiger cuddly toy. "Thank you guys." she said, giving them all a hug. "What did web head get you?" Sam asked. "Don't know, haven't opened it yet. I was going to wait for him to get back before I did but he might be a while." Ava replied. "Well open it then!" Sam said enthusiastically. "Okay okay." She slowly opened the wrapping paper to reveal a wooden box. She slid open the box to see a glass cube, around an inch in dimensions. Inside it was a purple and red spider, positioned on top of a pin. "He got you a spider? Lame." Sam mocked. "There's a note." she took the note out and opened it up and read it. 'I wanted to give you something special for your birthday, so here it is. A very special spider for a very special day. Happy Birthday' She was speechless. "What does it say?" Luke asked. She handed him the note as Danny held the spider up to the light, examining it. "Oh my God. Is that... the actual spider? Woah..." Luke said after he read the note. "What's going on?" Sam asked impatiently. "This is the spider that bit Peter and gave him his powers" Danny said. "No way!" Sam exclaimed. "I'm gonna go put these away" Ava said as she got up, picking up all the presents and going upstairs. When they were sure she was gone, Sam turned to Luke and Danny. "Why would he give that to..." he trailed off as he realised. "Oh my God. You know that girl Parker was talking about in his story? It's her! It has to be!" Luke and Danny looked at each other. "It does kind of seem that way, I mean that present is like Sam giving her his helmet." Luke said. "It would explain why he wouldn't tell us yesterday when she was there..." Danny agreed. "Well I say when he gets here we need to find out, and I think she likes him. I saw her blush a bit when he mentioned the girl, how she volunteered to go talk to him on the roof, and she was totally checking him out yesterday when he was showing us his costume." Sam explained. "Well either way we will have to wait and see how this resolves itself" Danny said as Ava came back downstairs.

The rest of the night they did whatever Ava wanted, and by the time they were going to bed Peter still hadn't returned. Ava was laying in her bed trying to sleep. She had been trying for at least half an hour when she heard something land on the roof. She knew it was Peter so she got up and went into his room and shut the door as he crawled through the window in his new Spiderman suit. He was so surprised to see her stood there that he almost fell back out of the window. "What's up Ava?" he said, taking his mask off and sitting on his bed. "Where have you been?" she asked, crossing her arms. "Helicarrier. Fury wanted me to do some tests and stuff like the ones we all did when we joined Shield. Said he wanted to know how my abilities had changed. Oh and Iron Man, Captain America and Thor were there, along with Dr Bruce Banner." Ava was glad to hear that he wasn't on a date or anything like that, but was shocked that four of the Avengers were there to watch Peter train and research him. "Why were they there?" Ava asked. "Dr Banner wanted to research into this angry more powerful side I've got going on, but as for Cap, Iron Man and Thor... I have no idea." Peter replied. "Well I guess we'll find out eventually." Ava said. She walked across the room and sat down next to Peter. "Thank you for the present. Is it seriously that spider?" she asked. "Yes, it is that spider." he said, taking Ava's hand. "Promise me you'll keep it safe." They both blushed when they realised they were holding hands and their hearts began to race. "Yeah... Of course I will. Now as long as we're on the subject of promises, did you do it?" Peter blushed more as he shook his head. "I couldn't. I would be about to and then I would think of a reason not to and doubt myself and end up not doing it." he replied. "Well, since you didn't do it you have to tomorrow, and since you didn't you have to tell me who it is." Ava said. Peter shot up off the bed, letting go of her hand to look out of the window. Ava got up and put her hands on his shoulders. "I won't tell anyone Peter, I promise." He took a few deep breaths as he prepared himself for what he was about to do. "If I'm wrong about this it will mean serious pain, but if I'm right... Well here goes." he thought to himself. He spun around and out a hand on either side of Ava's waist and pulled her towards him and he kissed her. She didn't kiss him back and he was thinking "Damn it! This is going to hurt" but he felt her kiss him back. At first it was a bit weird but as they got used to it they settled into it and it felt nice. Ava broke the kiss after a few minutes. "Best birthday ever" she said, smiling at him. "That was amazing Ava." Peter said, a little out of breath. "What is going to happen now? I mean like are we dating or was this just a one off?" he asked. "Well that depends. What do you want to happen" she said seductively as she leaned her head on his chest. "I want to be with you. To make you happy." She took her head off his chest and looked into his eyes. "Right answer" she said and kissed him again. This was a passionate kiss that took his breath away. It only lasted a few seconds before she pulled away. "I'll see you in the morning." she said, turning and walking out of his room, shutting the door behind her. "What were you doing in there Miss Ayala?" Sam said smugly who was standing outside his, Luke and Danny's room. She didn't react how he thought she would. "What do you think we were doing? Now if you tell anyone at all I will hurt you." she said smoothly, smiling at him as she walked into her room and closed the door. "Damn..." Sam said to himself before going back in and going to sleep.