The New York morning sun is always splendid with rays piercing through the bustling city, rippling between skyscrapers. And darting between these skyscrapers was a figure dressed in red and blue.
There's a "splat" as a stream of spider silk stuck onto a high-rise's glass curtain wall. Spider-Man swung low, creating a chorus of gasps, then swung high again. He curled his limbs before drawing strength from his core to flip forward in an acrobatic maneuver, earning a round of applause from the New Yorkers on the ground.
Soon, his figure disappeared at the end of this street. But this was happening on every street he passed, until he got closer and closer to the city center of New York.
A strand of spider silk clung onto the sign of the Stark Building. Spider-Man followed the silk up to the building's rooftop, walked through the doorway, and into a room designated for him to change clothes. After Peter changed, he swiftly descended the building to a lab.
In the lab, Stark was busy at an experiment station. Doctor Connors was sitting at a nearby table writing a paper on his laptop, while Banner and Ethan, standing in front of a filing cabinet, were whispering over a stack of documents.
With a "thud," the door swung open and Peter rushed inside. Everyone looked up at him. Holding both his hands high above his head, Peter hollered:
"I'm in college now!!!!!"
Everyone glanced at him briefly, returned to their tasks, leaving Peter stunned. He waved his arms above his head before saying, "I'm a college student now! I've had my orientation today! I've moved all my stuff into the dorm! Starting today, I'm going to college!"
No one responded, except Doctor Connors who continued typing on his laptop, "New York University is closer, so you can make it to the morning meeting if you come early."
Peter put his hands on his hips and said, "I've graduated from high school and successfully got into New York University. Isn't this worth celebrating?"
"Peter, you've asked the same question every day since your high school graduation. Of course, it's not that this isn't worth celebrating, but..." Banner pointed towards people in the room, "We would rather you share your joy when you obtain your third or fourth Ph.D..."
Expecting Peter to slink away disheartened, he, instead, energetically said, "True, I should study hard. Doctor Connors, I have an idea about the plans you mentioned last time. Let me draw it for you now…"
Peter dashed to the filing cabinet, grabbed a stack of paper, and started sketching on Connors' table. After a while, he handed the sketches over to Connors and then zoomed over to Stark's side asking, "Mr. Stark, do you need any help?"
"Keep your distance, don't get in my way." Stark, engrossed in his experiments, waved Peter away. But Peter was undeterred. He then joined Ethan and Banner's discussion.
After a while, Connors finished reviewing Peter's sketches. Peter zipped over, answered a few queries, then hurried to Stark to see if he needed help. Then he dashed back to Banner, and then again...
The whole lab watched as he darted back and forth.
The main lab used by Stark was huge, occupying more than half a floor. Between the three groups, Peter must have run hundreds of times, all while multitasking complex intellectual tasks.
But after everything was dealt with, he jumped out of the window with a "whoosh", shouting excitedly as he swung across the New York sky, until he disappeared beyond the horizon.
After Peter's exit, Stark put down the model, turned around with his arms crossed, and stared in the direction Peter had just gone. "What's up with this kid? Hasn't he gotten a bit too hyper lately?"
"Perhaps he's genuinely excited about going to college." Connors shook his head.
"Ten days before his high school graduation, he started yammering about it. He was pumped the entire day of the graduation ceremony and then kept talking about it for half a month. Now it's the university induction ceremony, probably going to babble on for three months." Banner sighed.
"Haven't you noticed his symptoms are getting worse lately?" Ethan walked over, opened a computer and entered a news website. He said, "Look, the front-page headlines are all about Spider-Man performs stunts in mid-air…"
"Here are at least 4,000 photos, all taken within this week, which means Peter is photographed an average of 600 times a day, making at least four or five rounds outside? Also, swinging around every day performing these complex stunts, where does he get all that stamina and energy?" Ethan asked incredulously.
"You know, boys at his age do act like this. Haven't you stayed up till 3 AM playing basketball before?" Stark shrugged.
"But…" Ethan opened another picture and pointed, "how do you explain this?"
Stark craned his neck, squinting at the image. It was a bit too far to make out clearly, so he turned on the projector. A spider web appeared on the wall. Stark glanced at it and said, "So, what? Isn't it just an ordinary spider web?"
Ethan slowly minimized the image with his keyboard, and only then did Stark see that the background of this spider web was the Empire State Building in New York.
There were many high rise buildings around the Empire State Building and the giant spider web had been formed between these buildings. Looking at the image, Banner adjusted his glasses and remarked, "Gotta say, the web is quite well spun, it has an aesthetic appeal."
Doctor Connors also nodded in agreement. The spider web depicted in the image was beautifully spun. Centering around the Empire State Building, it had 21 radial lines, with their distances and angles arranged perfectly identical. Between every two radial lines were staggered connecting lines, arranged neatly.
"It's more artful than some modern art pieces," Doctor Connors noted, "I appreciate this kind of pattern. Too bad my laboratory will never allow the existence of such a thing. Otherwise, it would have made a decent decoration."
"The problem is that this web might have been spun by Spider Man," Ethan sighed, "Yes, he's called Spider Man, but he is a human. Why would he spin such a big web in New York's skyline?"
"Probably has too much free time, wasn't he on vacation recently?" Doctor Connors reverted his attention back to his paper. However, Stark sensed something was off. After studying psychology, he understood one thing - every human behavior has an underlying cause.
Human behavior is driven. It could be driven by interests or emotions, or even mundane actions that seem useless may be ways of releasing pressure.
"Why on earth would Peter do this?" Stark asked in bewilderment. By then, Doctor Connors had already dialed Peter's phone number. He asked on the phone, "Peter, I saw on the news. You spun a giant spider web in the heart of New York. Why would you do something like that?"
"What? Gwen asked you if you knew how to spin a web, and you spun one for her?...Okay, that makes sense. Got it, goodbye." After hanging up, Doctor Connors explained, "Remember that Peter confessed his identity to Gwen recently? Gwen became curious about how Peter got his abilities from a spider bite, so they did a test."
"It turns out that Peter could spin webs. Even though he can't naturally produce silk, he can still create a perfect spider web with a silk launcher. That's just how it is." Doctor Connors put down his phone and everyone fell into silent disbelief."
Ethan shrugged, intending to close the news tab, but just as he was about to go back to the main screen, the page refreshed and a live news update appeared, accompanied by a picture of another giant spider web.
Ethan thought it was the previous report, so he didn't give it much thought. But just as he was about to shut down the computer, he realized the background of this spider web seemed a bit different.
Frowning, Ethan moved closer to the screen, then zoomed in on the image. As soon as he saw its background, he was taken aback. After a moment of pause, he said to Stark, "Tony, I have some news you should know about. But I think you will want to try not to get too angry."
Stark, who'd been occupied with his miniature models, turned to him and asked, "What is it? What news? Spit it out, I won't get angry."
He toyed with the model in his hand and added, "Lately, everything has been going smoothly. My temper has much improved. You have to believe me, I am not the same Stark as before..."
"Alright then…" Ethan opened the projector again, then cast the picture onto the wall. "About three minutes ago, Peter spun a giant spider web on top of the Stark Building..."
Seeing the huge Stark logo in the picture, everyone rushed to the window. Looking up, indeed, there was a massive, orderly, aesthetically pleasing spider web hanging between the Stark Building and the surrounding skyscrapers.
"Peter Parker!!!!!"
Stark's outraged roar echoed throughout Stark Tower. He stormed over to the table, grabbed his phone, and called Peter. "Peter! What the hell? Why did you spin a web on top of the Stark Building?! Pepper is a clean freak! When she sees this, she's going to lose her mind!!!"
Without waiting for Peter to respond, Stark hung up the phone then said loudly to Jarvis, "Jarvis! Quick, quick, quick! Get a cleaning company here. I need this web gone before Pepper gets back, or I'm screwed!!!"
"Forget it, a cleaning company won't make it in time. Mark!"
In an instant, Stark was fully clad in his battle suit. He quickly flew up to the top of the building and began to clear away the spider webs.
Actually, Peter's research ability was indeed impressive. Especially after being guided by many people, his talent was totally brought into play. Consequently, his spider silk launcher had also gone through multiple upgrades, resulting in incredibly durable spider silk.
The Iron Man in the battle suit had to hack and slash away. He finally managed to clear away the main part of the webs with the help of a swarm of drones. As Stark, panting heavily, landed back on the rooftop, he turned around to see a red and blue figure spinning circles around a nearby building.
"Jarvis, zoom in!"
Before Stark's words could finish echoing in the air, his panoramic view zoomed in. And there it was - another giant spider web, hovering in New York's skyline.