Ultimate X: Orgy at Emma's

"That's easy to say when you're not the one feeling the heat."

"She was," Peter said. He stood on the stairs. Dark jacket, white T-shirt, and black jeans. He didn't look like he'd be moving.

"Peter, this is—"

Peter's eyes were locked on the SHIELD woman. "Make your pitch."

Carol pursed her lips. She'd sort of been expecting May to be the tough one. "Your cover would be as an intern in a SHIELD science program. That would be the explanation of why we're here, if and when your friends ask. In reality, you would be working for a SHIELD office liaising with the NYPD. You'd be something like a SWAT team, going on patrol and given calls just like any police officer, but being 'swept' toward large-scale problems."

"The problems I deal with, police tend not to care about."

"That's not really my line."

"Sure it isn't." Peter cocked his head. "That the end-game?"

"No. When you're eighteen, you will be given options. And these options have not been set in place yet, but you'll know what they'll look like. Programs like the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, the Ultimates—in whatever shape they've taken—you'll be in a system. Until then, you'll be given training—"

"No."

Carol blinked. Once. "We have volunteers. People like Iron Man, Captain America—people who'd like to lend you their expertise."

"Don't need 'em. Don't need you. There's the door."

May stood. "Peter, I think there's something to be said for this plan."

Carol chimed in. "I understand your hesitation..."

"You really don't. Guess how many of the problems I have are because of you people. Guess."

"That's not my bailiwick—"

Peter's hand gripped the bannister, but not to steady himself. "Ever since I've been in this, you people have been telling me how it is. No negotiations, no—you just tell me. In your leather trenchcoats and your Italian sunglasses, you come to me and you talk to me like you have some right. And I stand there—listening to you—and I worry. That you're going to throw me in jail or experiment on me. But you can't even keep your own house clean. Do you think you could stop me, if I went out that door right now? Do you think you could hurt me worse than I can hurt you?"

May's lips were tight. "Peter, this is not the way to talk—"

"You know what I see when I look at you? I see people who bust into a house and wave guns around. Do you know what I do to people like that when they don't have badges-?"

The bannister cracked.

***

The street that the Parker home laid on was mostly barren. In the wake of Magneto's attack, many had fled the city. The rest were staying indoors. Schools and shops were largely closed, the jails fully packed with looters and false arrests. It would all take time to sort out. So there were few people to observe Agent Joshua Tad, New York branch, standing outside his SHIELD-issue Humvee. If anyone had peeked outside to see it, the logo on the side would be enough to send them either out of the neighborhood or into the basement. No one was taking any chances.

Thus, there was no one but Tad to bear the brunt of Liz's gossiping.

"He's a mutant, isn't he? That's it—Peter Parker's a mutant. I knew there was something off about him! I knew it!"

"Ma'am, I can neither confirm nor deny—"

"If he's a mutant, you have to tell me, don't you? I go to school with him! Imagine me going to school with a mutant this whole time! What if he used his mutant powers to cheat off me? Or make me go on a date with him? Or make me mess up a cheer routine! That is so irresponsible if you're not telling me! I could sue!"

"Ma'am!" Tad said firmly. "I'm just an escort. I wasn't briefed on anything except the route to drive here and the route to drive back."

"So you don't even know what his mutant power is? What if it's turning into flies? I hate flies!"

While Liz and Tad argued by the Hummer, Gwen and Mary Jane sat on the porch swing silently. Gwen put her hand on MJ's thigh comfortingly, seeing the worry written on her face, but Mary Jane was quick to remove it.

"What?" Gwen asked.

"What what?"

"I can't touch you now?"

"No, you can't grope me in front of government agents and/or classmates, I thought that went without saying."

"I was comforting you. You look upset."

"Of course I'm upset, we're under armed guard, Peter's being interrogated, and you're trying to finger me."

"First time you've said no to being fingered. Guess it's not the same without Peter around."

"And what the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Don't play dumb."

"You really want to do this now? Now?"

"You'd rather listen to that?" Gwen asked, jerking a thumb over to the Hummer.

"I heard that there are these aliens, okay, right?" Liz was saying. "And they're helping the Brotherhood because aliens created the mutants, right? Give me a nod if there are aliens. Can you not nod? Is that not allowed? Could they be able to tell? Okay, blink if there are aliens. You blinked! Wait, was that a deliberate blink? Don't blink if you don't mean it, jerk."

"Okay, you got me," MJ said. "What is it you think is going on with me and Peter? You think I'm cheating on you?"

"No, I think you're trying to make him jealous."

"Please." Mary Jane tossed her hair. "If I wanted him jealous, I wouldn't have to try."

"You're different with me when he's around. You always call me babe or sweetie, which you never do when he's not here. And when it's just the three of us, you jump me."

"I jump you plenty!" MJ argued.

"Yeah, but how many times has he walked in on us? I know he's not trying to, so it's gotta be something—"

"You're being ridiculous."

"And I didn't put you up to getting that tongue piercing."

"You love my tongue piercing."

"You click it when Peter's around. You click it against your teeth—"

"Oh my God, are you a crazy person?"

"I counted. During the attack, when Peter was off being—working for the Bugle, you never clicked it. He came back, you immediately started clicking. You went seventy hours without clicking, MJ."

"You want me to click?" MJ tapped her piercing against her teeth. "There! I'm clicking without Peter Parker. Now you can stop thinking I'm not over him—"

"You said it, I didn't."

"You were implying!"

They didn't notice the van crawling up the street. Nor did Gwen, expositing about the space pirates she had heard were being hunted by the mutant aliens, one of whom was Cyclops's father. But Tad eyed it as it came to a stop, and when the people inside climbed out, he recognized them by the trill of his psi-filters against attempted intrusion and the faces that were drilled into every SHIELD trainees' psyche. Scott Summers. Magneto's daughter. They were here, in Queens, right in front of them.

He drew his sidearm even as he tongued on his communicator. "Mutant!"

***

Carol's bodyguard came in from the other room. "There a problem here?"

"We're fine, Fenson," Carol said. "Back to post."

He eyed Peter suspiciously. Peter didn't like the look. He took a step down. Fenson kept eying him. His hand was by his rib cage, that lump that the cut of his suit was meant to hide. Peter took another step. Another. The stairs creaked under him. He smiled.

"Fenson," Carol said gently. Too gently.

Fenson moved to the foot of the stairs. Looking up at Peter. His sunglasses holding in a smug look. You had to mess with people like that. Peter's hand tightened on the bannister as he circled over it, coming down on the hardwood floor, just as Fenson's earpiece screamed "Mutant!"

He reacted automatically. Drew his sidearm and Peter went for him. He only meant to push him back, that's all, but it was like he'd just gotten his powers again. He was so much stronger now. Fenson went flying. Hit the wall and it cracked. May was stunned speechless. Peter's gaze whirled to Carol, daring her to do something. Then he heard the gunshots outside. He took no chances. Peter webbed Carol where she sat and rushed for the front door.

***

Tad's first discharge was a snapshot, hasty, unfocused. It shattered the windshield of Scott's van, two feet to his right. Scott responded instantly. His eyes glowed for a split-second, long enough for Tad to duck behind his Hummer, and then an optic blast lanced out of Scott. It hit the hood of the Hummer, punching right into the engine block. The Hummer skidded on its locked tires, slamming into the curb it'd been parked next to. Liz was hit by the careening vehicle. She fell screaming to the lawn, a large gash on her leg.

"Back in the car," Scott ordered Wanda and the Masterminds, but he didn't follow, advancing on Tad's smoking cover—the ruptured Hummer leaking oil and engine fluids into the gutter.

Wanda drove as Tad tried to get a shot off, but Scott sent another blast through the car roof, turning the thing into a convertible. He quick-drew his weapon as the front door flew open and, without looking, laid down suppressing fire.

Peter ducked back behind cover as bullets thudded into his house's doorframe and façade, some shooting through the open door and into the floor or stairs.

Tad assumed Scott was distracted. He leapt out to fire and caught an optic blast directly in the chest. It sent him flipping across the lawn, knocking flat the shrubbery in the neighbor's yard. He laid still, his only movement the smoke oozing from his body.

Scott covered him anyway, training his pistol on the still body as he looked at whatever threat was coming from the Parker residence's front door. So he saw the webline shoot out, unerring hit his gunhand, and jerk the pistol from it. He watched it go with some astonishment. SHIELD was a surprise. Spider-Man was—shocking.

"If you're who I think you are," he called, "I'd really prefer avoiding a confrontation. I admire what you've accomplished, all on your own. Real mutant excellence."

"If you're who I think you are," a voice replied from inside the house, "then I think I fucked your girlfriend."

***

Fenson recovered quickly. Being embedded in the wall had knocked him for a loop, but the firefight outside quickly roused him. He came to to find his commanding officer cocooned to the couch, May Parker freeing her with a steak knife. So far, she'd managed to uncover Carol's hands.

"Front yard!" Carol ordered. "Go!"

Fenson undid his pocket knife and tossed it to her. He ran for the door so fast, he didn't even notice his suit jacket snagging on a nail of the ruptured wall. It tore a streak of fabric right off.

***

Spider-man dove outside, landing in a crouch on the footpath. He'd changed into his costume so fast, it almost seemed like he'd merely thought about it and it'd happened. He was in the zone. He thwipped at Scott, Scott blasted his webs out of the air. Then, the element of surprise lost, they both stared at each other. Both waiting to see what the other would do.

Liz ended the stalemate. She'd been frightened enough: hit by a car, seeing a man blasted by a mutant terrorist in front of her. It was all she could take. Seeing Spider-Man jump out for a confrontation was more. She exploded. Literally.

Scott's reflexes were honed from years of dealing with mutation. He saw the warning signs. Rolled over the trunk of the Hummer and ducked behind its hull as she went off. Bursting into glorious white light.

Her father's mutation burned in her.

Peter blacked out instantly. His newfound strength, speed, it just shut off. Confronted by the flame, he went limp and was buffeted away by the shockwave, thrown clear. Gwen and Mary Jane shielded their eyes, but the blast still knocked them for a loop. They went down hard.

And Fenson looked out just in time to see his goddess alight.

"What the hell?" he heard behind him, and looked back. Carol had quickly freed herself with his knife's mono-blade, drawn her weapon now. Fenson's mind worked fast. He couldn't let her threaten the goddess. Couldn't let her do anything to prevent him from taking his goddess to his masters. The decision was made quickly. He pivoted on his heel, aimed at Carol, and discharged his weapon.

Carol was down before she even knew what was happening.

***

Liz walked to her friends not understanding what was happening. Where was that light coming from? What was burning? It was only when she saw her shadow fall over them that she noticed the shades of the smoke curling off her silhouette. It was her. She was on fire.

She collapsed, her flame snuffed out like a candle, as Agent Fenson shot his boss.

***

If Fenson had been looking when he stepped out onto the front lawn, he would've seen Cyclops knocked out by the pressure wave of blast, sagged against the Hummer's smoking ruin. Or Spider-Man, rolled across the lawn, unconscious in the rosebushes. But he only had eyes for the goddess. He saw three of them—three unconscious young girls collapsed by the porch swing, clothes singed. Which of them was it?

Fenson swore. He had no time to decide. He ran to May Parker's car—the tires dripping melted rubber—and smashed through the window with the butt of his pistol. Unlocked the car, dropped his gun in the passenger seat. Opened the trunk. Luckily for him, he worked out and the three girls were thin as only teenagers could be. He fit them all inside the trunk with room to spare. His frantically working mind made a note to find out the make and model of the car later. He'd have to look into buying a newer model with the money his masters would surely reward him with.

Sitting down, he quickly hotwired the car and drove out of there, seconds before the Brotherhood's van returned. He did it all so fast, he didn't even take time to brush the glass off the driver's seat. It would pain him for several miles as he drove into the city.

***

Wanda ran to Scott, finding his ears bleeding. She shook him, working all her energies—changing whatever injuries he might have suffered to the mildest, the most miraculous outcome. In a moment, he was blinking awake. Sure focused on the mission.

"That was her," he gasped, coming awake. "Blob's daughter—mutant!"

"We have to go," Wanda said, pulling him to his feet.

"No. Not yet." Scott quickly took stock of the situation. Spider-Man was useless to him. Just a would-be hero sticking his nose where it didn't belong. But the agent he'd fried was beginning to stir. Scott pointed to Tad. "Bring him. We need to know where his partner went."

"And the arachnid?" Wanda nodded to him.

"Fucked my girlfriend," Scott said wonderingly. "Getting to be a big club."

***

Peter woke up from a nightmare of fire. He limped back into the house to the tune of sirens, finding Carol Danvers down from a gunshot wound, Aunt May putting pressure on it. He'd seen enough to know it wasn't serious—a hurried through-and-through.

"Where are the girls?" he asked.

May looked up at him. "Peter, what is—"

He refocused on her. Felt like he was iron sights swiveling between targets. "Get out of here. Find a friend, someone who lives in the city, and lay low. I'll find you later. I'll take care of her."

She thought it over, just for a second, then nodded him closer. Had him put his hand on the dish towel she was using to stop Carol's bleeding.

"I don't know what you're going through. You're not all the boy I remember raising. Please, whatever you're going to do, don't break my heart." She pulled him to her. Her hug was quick and desperate, as tight as she could make it.

"I won't let you down," he told her, feeling the words like a sting.

He watched her leave, making sure she was really gone, then attended to Carol. Took the towel away. A little bit of webbing staunched the bleed. It didn't look like she had any other injuries.

"Who did this?"

"Agent Fenson. Guy you put through a wall."

"Why?"

"If I knew that, I would've shot him first."

Peter felt himself rushing through the questions; impatient, desperate. "Did you order the girls taken?"

"What girls—"

"Gwen Stacy, Mary Jane Watson, Liz Allan! They're gone! I saw him loading them into a car—"

"Look at me, Peter. You really think I was in on it? He was just hired help—a SHIELD agent in our New York branch, I never met him before today. Peter, we'll find out who he's working for, we'll get your friends back..."

The sirens were closer. Inside the neighborhood. "No. You've done enough. I'll find him. And when I do—" Peter took her hands and put them on the webbing, motioning her to apply a little extra pressure. He left her to the coming paramedics and went to the hole he'd put in the wall. A scrap of fabric dangled from a nail. The guy couldn't have dropped his wallet...

Peter took it. Who did he knew that could track someone from just a bit of tailoring?

***

Fenson was ushered through the club, slowly, slowly. Only allowed a glimpse of the pleasures inside, never allowed to linger and listen to the music beyond the colored doors. The valet had the car. By now, they would know of the girls in the trunk, but there was no avoiding that. The Mistress would still want to hear him explain. The Mistress was kind. The Mistress was merciful.

He still couldn't believe his good fortune in meeting her. For so long, he'd thought he was a freak. Even online, there were only a few like-minded individuals, and none of them would admit to feeling what he felt. The things he pictured himself doing, with Sondra, with Alicia, with little Evan... no one understood, no one. He'd started calling phone sex lines, paying people to understand, to share his fantasy. It must have been because he was in the FBI that she found him—he wasn't an idiot. He knew there was a reason. There was a reason for everything the Mistress did.

She had found him and she had told him—for the first time in his life, he had heard someone say it—he wasn't sick. He wasn't wrong. He was special. Different. Unique. What a wellspring of pleasure it was to hear someone say it, most especially the Mistress, the perfect-perfect Mistress. Specialdifferentunique. Born in a world that didn't understand. He was like the mutants, but his mutation was in arousal, in eroticism. Why, if it weren't for people like him, there would be no pornography, no orgasms, just—procreation. In the dark. Missionary position. Men like him, they pushed the boundaries.

Specialdifferentunique.

With her help, he had conquered himself in her name. She scrubbed him and his record clean of those messy misunderstandings that SHIELD would look for before they hired him, and without those obstacles in the way, with the Mistress's blessing, he had soon found himself on the ground floor of SHIELD itself. A suitable position to be of use to the Mistress.

He wasn't an idiot. He knew the Mistress's power. As much pleasure as she brought him, she wasn't really doing those things. And that was only right. No one as perfect as her should be with someone as lowly as him, even with how specialdifferentunique as he was. But she was so generous, his Mistress. She let him actually pretend she might do those things. Those special things, those different things, those unique things.

She didn't keep him waiting long. Sometimes, when it wasn't urgent, she made him wait for hours. Days, once, because she was so important. She worked so hard, that she couldn't even make time for him some days. But this... the Goddess...

It was blasphemy, but having seen all three of the potentials, he thought not even put together were they as perfect as the Mistress. But perhaps that was just his love for her talking. The Goddess could forgive his love...

She came out in her violent white, skin and clothing, and her golden hair, and her blue diamond eyes. God, to look at her—to see her...