When Spidey Met Oracle

"Well if you're worried you're too dumb to do things right, then sure..."

"K-I-S-S, Sajani," he said then. "Keep It Simple Stupid!"

"Are you calling me stupid, Parker?"

"Of course not," he sighed. "I'm just trying to live by the standards Kelly Johnson and every engineer worth their salt has ever lived by."

"No, you're being all smug about calling me stupid," she corrected.

Then Parker just gargled this sound that wasn't even a word. Something like "RARRGH!"

Sajani just smiled. She loved coaxing that frustrated grunt out of him. Getting a rise out of this dork was often the highlight of her day. It was almost becoming a sexual thrill.

No. It was just the joy of getting a man to admit he was wrong, is what it was...

So, yeah, Sajani sort of got off on busting his balls. It didn't really mean anything. No matter what her therapist said. It had been maybe her tenth session since she'd started telling Dr. Foster about the new jerk at work when her shrink first suggested that Sajani might be attracted to the guy, and it took another three sessions for her to admit to Claire that it might be true.

She might kind of loathe the schmuck, but that didn't mean Sajani Jaffrey wouldn't hate-fuck Peter Parker within an inch of his life under the right circumstances... That there weren't times at home alone with her Horizon Brand Massage-Wand Mk III that she imagined raking her finger-nails against those tight abs of his until they bled and she came screaming his name, riding that big dick of his into the ground...

But then Dr. Foster suggested the hostility Sajani routinely displayed toward Parker was a mask for actual feelings she was harboring for Peter, and that was insane. Just like Claire's assertion that her focus on extra-terrestrial biology and technology might be a manifestation of her own sense of alienation. Sajani knew exactly how she felt about him. She couldn't stand the guy. That didn't mean she didn't think he was good-looking in a hopeless, geek-slacker kind of way. Hell, handsome guys were almost always assholes, weren't they?

For all of his faults, she certainly couldn't say Parker wasn't in shape. She'd seen him half-naked around the building enough at this point to decide that. Like on his first actual day of work, when the Hobgoblin attacked Horizon to steal her unstable reverbium. Spider-Man came out of nowhere to try and stop him, and of course chaos ensued.

When nobody could find Parker after the web-head and that flying freakshow had fled the scene, Max had been worried enough to break protocol by opening Parker's private lab just to make sure that idiot was still alive. Sure enough, there he was, blasting Broadway showtunes in his boxer briefs while scribbling design notes on a whiteboard. Apparently, that was part of Parker's "process" and that's why everyone was sure to steer clear of Lab 7 afterwards unless it was absolutely necessary. Especially after a similar incident unfolded during that arachnid contagion crisis. This time they opened Lab 6 to find Parker stripped to his skivvies again, hanging out with Spider-Man by the vat of spider-antidote Morbius and Mr. Fantastic had developed with Anti-Venom's pseudo-symbiote. Granted, at the time, Sajani was still shaking off her own near transformation into one of those spider-monsters, but as she recalled, Parker and the wall-crawler both had essentially the same physique, and if the bulge in Parker's tighty-whiteys was any indication, he wasn't just a big brain.

Especially if he was a grower, not just a shower.

Obviously, something else was going on with Parker. Could it really just be as simple as the fact that he was supposed to be hooked up with Spider-Man? The rumor around the lab was that he was the guy who whipped up all of that web-spinning tech for the wall-crawler. When the web-head first arrived on the scene, she always thought the webs were one of his powers -- they were one of hers when she got the spider-flu -- but apparently the real guy used some kind of device to do all that, and Parker had created them. It was supposed to be a big secret or something, given the non-moonlighting clause in the standardized Horizon Lab contract, but once Parker told Grady Scraps from Lab 3, it was pretty much public knowledge. Grady was the worst gossip in the building. Sajani assumed the boss was letting Parker's violation slide because of Max's do-gooder streak. Whatever.

This was the guy safety-checking her research.

"Well, like I said, I think you'd be better off with a white dwarf lens than a Pym Particle emitter," Parker said suddenly, "but no matter how you go about it, I think you've got a game-changer, here, Sajani,"

She felt a bit of heat creeping up from her neck as she sipped her coffee, avoiding his gaze.

One thing Sajani hadn't admitted to anyone, not even her therapist, was that shortly after Parker had introduced his Cryo-Cube 3000 technology -- a portable means for safely flash-freezing organic material, which, despite its ridiculous name was incredibly effective -- Sajani, herself, had tried working semi-nude in the privacy of her lab to see if anything inspired her...

It didn't.

Mostly it just made her feel silly and self-conscious.

And maybe just the teensiest bit turned on.

That cop girlfriend of Peter's hadn't come around with any snickerdoodles for a while, now, so she had to figure that misguided relationship was over.

"Hey, Parker..." she started to say when he cut her off.

"Don't worry, Sajani, your math is sound no matter which way you go with," he murmured before getting up and walking away. "I gotta go, though. Lab stuff. You know how it is..."

"Yeah," she lied as he walked off. "I know how it is."

*

When Max Modell first started Horizon Labs, everyone told him he was just building another "soulless corporation" so it became his goal to create the world's first soulful conglomerate, a business concern whose primary agenda was to make the world a better place. Profits were good, of course; they kept the lights on, but Modell refused to let money become the driving force behind his life's ambition. Somehow, after so many years at this, Max still managed to stick to that value.

It hadn't been easy. It'd been a delicate dance. He'd had to be very careful who he'd gotten in bed with, of course. Despite all his caution, Modell had fallen in love with a lawyer anyway. Max was just lucky his partner, Hector Baez, was a good man. With Hector's legal counsel, Max was still doing that delicate dance, and he wasn't sure that making a deal with Wayne Enterprises wasn't a tango into moral ambiguity.

WayneTech had its fair share of military weapons contracts, after all. Not as many as Stark Industries had enjoyed before Tony Stark had recently seen the light, and certainly not as much as LuthorCorp had enthusiastically pursued since its inception, but Max was a big believer in the doctrine of unintended consequences. He didn't want Horizon involved with the arms trade, and he hated the thought of S.I.S.-adapted bat-tomatons clearing out major cities on a whim... Modell didn't know Bruce Wayne well enough to be sure that could never be the man's ultimate endgame...

Barbara Gordon was a different story.

Max remembered the day he met her, when the girl just wanted a killer new home system and had money to burn. When Miss Gordon expanded those skills of hers to develop Clocktower Systems, he'd hoped it could one day become a company that Horizon could acquire and nurture, only to find WayneTech perpetually hovering in the way. Max always assumed this was based more on Wayne's personal relationship with the Gordon family than any malicious corporate interest, but he felt weary of the playboy's intentions all the same.

Bruce Wayne had a certain reputation. Not as a ruthless businessman or a mad titan of industry. From everything Max had heard, the man's heart was in the right place, but he could be... careless.

When Lucius Fox called on WayneTech's behalf to tell Max that Gordon was now the head of Information Technology and Computer Sciences at the firm and insistent about loading the Big S.I.S. app into their ro-bat programming, Max couldn't help but worry that a phenomenal young talent had been scooped up by a man who just saw a pretty face from his youth instead of a true pioneer in her field.

It was Hector who convinced him to take the meeting, reminding him how much Max liked to consider himself a good judge of character. Modell knew Barbara. She was a believer. Maybe this deal could be a good thing. Of course, the decision wasn't ultimately up to just him.

Legally, everything the members of his think tank produced was work-for-hire and he owned whatever they did -- considering the significant financial backing and unconventional freedom he afforded his employees, Hector had insisted on that clause in their contracts -- but the standards Modell was determined to live by required him to grant them some substantial say in the manner in which their work might be utilized. That's why he insisted that Uatu Jackson, the resident creative engineer of Lab 5, be present at the meeting in which he discussed the license with Gordon.

Max's major concern was that WayneTech would abuse the technology. Like they'd start using it for corporate espionage or some nonsense like that, but Barbara's prospectus made it clear that they had no intention of taking advantage, impressing upon him just how many state and local law enforcement agencies they were currently working with globally that already had access to their software. What really allayed many of his greatest fears was WayneTech's concession to grant Horizon ample oversight over the use of the ro-bat network data stream.

Regretfully, Uatu seemed less than attentive during that part of her thorough presentation.

"So you're telling me the combat A.I. can immediately calibrate an optimal non-lethal offense based on the biometric analysis from our software?" Uatu beamed. "Are the attacks actually based on the real Batman's moves?"

"Mr. Jackson, I think you may be focusing on the wrong aspects of this proposal," Max sighed. Frankly, Horizon's youngest boy genius seemed a little too star struck. "There are some serious civil rights issues to consider..."

"Whatever, Max," Uatu shrugged. "If Batman wants my app, that's awesome! Dude took down the Hulk with his bare hands! If we can help him get the job done, I say let's do it!"

Max knew enough to give up. He loved that Jackson wasn't in this for the money, either. That childlike innocence was part of the reason he had hired the kid. The fact that he was one of the smartest members of the research team certainly didn't hurt. Of course, now that Modell knew that Uatu's main interest lie in building anti-monster defense strategies, he was a little leery. Jackson's vampire restraint equipment had been surprisingly useful in that unfortunate incident with Dr. Morbius, but Max wasn't sure he wanted to encourage the boy. Hopefully this monster-hunting fixation was just a phase Uatu would grow out of with puberty, but there really was no telling with these boy wonder types.

Lord knows Lex Luthor still had his idiosyncrasies. Max remembered when he and the rest of the scientific community considered Luthor a brilliant young crank with a weird thing for extra-terrestrial research. Now look at him.

Modell was determined not to let the same fate befall Uatu. He was just as determined to help the rest of his employees stay on the straight and narrow... even the former ones.

"Well, I'm glad Mr. Jackson's on board, but I was hoping we could discuss a possible quid pro quo in addition to Horizon's licensing fee, Miss Gordon," Max said.

"I'm not exactly sure what arrangements I'm authorized to make on behalf of the company," Barbara said uneasily, "but I can certainly try my best..."

"Doctor Kurt Langstrom," Modell said. "Rumor has it that he's had the misfortune to transform into a man-sized chiropteran on occasion..."

"If you're referring to the Man-Bat, then yes, I have it on good authority that those rumors are true."

"Is it also true that Batman has developed a serum to counteract the metamorphosis?"

"I'm not completely sure about that side of operations," Barbara said. "I'm just tech support, Max. But if he did, and Batman, Incorporated had ownership of such a thing, I think Mr. Wayne might be concerned about sharing that information for fear it could be used to reverse engineer the original formula. It's a dangerous mutagenic compound that's already made its way out into the open before..."

"I only want the antidote to help a friend," Modell assured her. "Michael Morbius."

"The living vampire?" Barbara gawped. "That's asking a lot, Max. We don't even know that it'd work against the specifics of Morbius' condition..."

"I think it's worth exploring at least," Max insisted. "I put Michael in Lab 6 not just because he'd been a friend. His research on artificial plasma could have changed everything we know about blood transfusions..."

"And I appreciate that, but Morbius is incarcerated right now because of the lengths he went to in pursuit of his research."

"What if I sweeten the deal?"

"How do you plan on doing that?"

"If Batman, Inc. wants specialized, non-lethal tech to deal with meta-powered criminal assailants, I have just the man to help you..."

*

It was a hard thing to realize that you'd been doing everything wrong for practically your whole life, but that's where Peter Parker found himself. For the last several months he'd been learning everyday in every way that he'd been screwing the pooch on this whole Spider-Man thing since the first time he'd slipped into those tights.

His first and greatest mistake was that he'd never gotten himself a proper secret lair.

There were a lot of valid, practical reasons for that. When he first started out, he was only fifteen, for one. Slipping out at night to fight the villain-of-the-week had been difficult enough with his poor, bereaved aunt puttering around the house, hovering over him. The chances of him setting up a fully tricked out crime-fighting workspace without her finding out was a dubious prospect at best -- even if he could have afforded one at the time.

In case you couldn't tell, Peter's poverty was another one of those valid, practical reasons he had gone without for so long.

Peter wanted to believe that he'd done an amazing job of making do with the limited resources at hand. There'd been no batcaves or fortresses of solitudes for the Spectacular Spider-Man. He'd been forced to hide all his gear in locked trunks and false-bottom drawers and a shoddily constructed fake closet compartment. And while he'd enjoyed the amenities of Avengers Tower for a brief while and was always welcome at the Baxter Building, he'd never appreciated just how nice it was to have a place all to himself until now.

To the rest of the staff at Horizon, it was just Lab 7, but to Peter Parker, it would always be his first decent spider-lair. A place he could stash his costumes and equipment and, more importantly, a work station where he could build better tech. This was where he'd put together his stealth suit and new spider-armor. Where he'd made color-blending spider-tracers with full audio capabilities. The place where he'd perfected voice-activated web-shooters with magnetic webbing.

This was the all-new, fully equipped nerve-center of Spider-Man's war on crime, and he was paid handsomely for his time there. It was, simply, Peter's dream come true.

Max Modell was the best boss he'd ever had. Of course, that wasn't much of a distinction. After all, Jolly J. Jonah Jameson had made repeated attempts to have Spidey arrested. Come to think of it, so had Tony Stark after Peter's brief consultancy at Stark Industries, during the Civil War...

Of course, this was selling Max short. Max Modell wasn't a great boss because he hadn't sent super-goons after Spider-Man... Max wasn't even a great boss because he'd set up a working environment that let Peter work at his own pace in his own time at his own hours... although that was pretty awesome, obviously. What made Modell his favorite employer of all time was the simple fact that Max got it: the joy of science for its own sake.

That's why, despite a late night with the Avengers dealing with the revenge of Brother VooDoo, Peter had been sure to make it into the lab bright and early. Max wanted everyone on-site for some kind of open house. Pete wasn't completely clear on the details... he'd been pretty busy lately, but if it was important to Max, he was going to keep the man happy. It was the same sense of loyalty he'd seen in all of the Lucky Seven... Even that pill, Sajani Jaffrey.

He figured that was why Grady Scraps was wandering around the building in a tweed jacket and bowtie today, but you never really knew with Grady. The way Bella Fishbach from Lab 4 described it, before Peter started, Grady insisted on pinstripes and plimsoles on these kinds of occasions. Scraps was a quirky guy to say the least.

When he met with the Lucky Seven about the open house, Max hadn't said anything about dressing up or anything, but he had suggested to Peter that he remained dressed for the day, which got a good laugh from the rest of the staff.

Sheesh. One goofy little white lie to cover for the fact that he was changing out of his Spidey suit, and Peter was never going to live it down. And yeah, there was that time he had to give Kaine his Spidey suit after their fight in Lab 6 during Spider-Island... The only good thing about that was Peter doubted anyone at Horizon suspected he might actually be the web-head based on that alone.

Anyway, with this open house mentality at work, there wasn't too much Spidey stuff lying around, not that Peter was in the habit of leaving his gear out.

When he started dating Carlie Cooper, C.S.I., it became imperative that he hide his various spider-stuff in his black box, the secured vault he had inside his lab, due to the ever-likely possibility that his super-sleuth girlfriend might drop by his apartment unannounced and notice a spider-tracer or web-fluid chemicals and figure out his dirty little secret. Not that his caution had helped in the long run. Carlie figured it out anyway and dumped him all the same. Another fun little consequence of that Spider-Island nightmare.

No. That had been his fault. He should have told her the truth. At first, he'd just wanted to be sure that Carlie liked him for him, not the web-slinging superhero, but they'd crossed that threshold. She had told Peter she loved him. Right in his new lair, in fact. On the very work station where he was sitting right now...

When the spider-epidemic broke out, Carlie, the first person whose infection Peter had been aware of, was also the first to figure out that a genetically-engineered super-virus based on the web-head's DNA was most likely the work of Miles Warren, the one-time Empire State University biology professor who'd become The Jackal.

Before she went to the higher-ups at the NYPD with her theory, Carlie and Peter had gone to one of Warren's old labs to look for clues. Peter thought Carlie was probably right, but figured they were about to wander into a long-abandoned and boring corner of his old alma mater. Instead, they ended up in a tussle with Chance, Scorcher, and White Rabbit -- three of Spidey's least favorite C-list villains. Things had gotten pretty hot and heavy, what since the Scorcher had spider-sense and all, but Peter and Carlie managed to take them down.

After dropping the bad guys off in the pokey, Carlie was all hot for Pete to contact Spider-Man, the world's finest Jackal-hunter, so he took her to his lab where he planned to pretend to do just that.