On Shiller's first day back in Marvel New York, a downcast Peter showed up at his clinic with a sling on his arm. Shiller gave him a once-over, saying, "Your trip out West doesn't seem to have gone too smoothly."
Peter sighed, sat opposite Shiller, put his backpack on his lap, and accidentally bumped his injured arm. He let out a yell, then sighed again, saying, "Putting everything else aside, I might not be cut out to be a superhero."
"What's the matter? Run into a tough opponent?"
"The opponent actually isn't hard to handle, but..."
Next, in Peter's account, Shiller heard about his and Captain America's hilariously disastrous Western adventure.
Steve is a veteran, rich in experience, but as Captain America, the team members assigned to him in the past were also elite warriors, already well-honed. Even newcomers were not lacking in combat skills, just somewhat short on real battlefield experience.
But Spider-Peter, well, he was a completely blank slate, still relying on street fighting and pure physical endurance for defense, let alone any tactical expertise.
To train Spider-Peter, Steve intentionally didn't let S.H.I.E.L.D. set up the itinerary, and instead set out with Peter on his own.
The first hiccup in their road trip was Peter's insatiable appetite.
Spider Peter's accelerated growth phase from his mutation wasn't over yet, and he had to eat a lot of food each day. Even though Steve had money, those who've watched road films knew you couldn't always find decent places to eat. Most times it was just grabbing some fast food to-go, taking a bite if you felt hungry.
But Peter really could eat. The supplies they had stashed in their backpacks would be eaten up by him in less than two meals. So the pair had to alter their plans. After catching their first lift, they detoured to the nearest small town.
The cost of living in the small town wasn't high, but Peter still managed to consume thousands of dollars' worth of food. Since the place didn't take credit cards and Steve's cash quickly ran out, their yet-to-start journey ended abruptly.
Steve had no choice but to call Coulson for a money transfer. In the end, it was S.H.I.E.L.D. that sent a car to take them to their destination, solving Peter's food problem along the way.
Ever since Shiller took Spider-Man and Pikachu to raid S.H.I.E.L.D.'s food supply last time, they'd hastily developed a new type of compacted ration with nutritional liquid that could supply an extraordinary amount of energy beyond what a normal person needs. It helped avoid the embarrassing situation where Peter ate every restaurant's supplies dry on the road.
Once they arrived, Steve began to guide Spider-Peter in tracing the ninja's movements. While Peter learned quite a bit, he messed up a lot of things.
He was endowed with superhuman strength and healing abilities, but he also had one tiny flaw: he was quite talkative and overly energetic.
At the beginning, when Peter didn't know anything, he just followed Steve faithfully, observing how he gathered information. However, once Peter learned a little, he got restless and started blabbing away.
Peter learned a few tricks and thought he could do better than Steve. If Steve wanted to climb over a wall, Peter would jump directly on top of it. If Steve planned to sneak up on a security guard and knock them out, Peter would opt for a direct frontal assault, greeting the guard before punching him in the face.
In short, the two of them, with completely contrasting fighting styles, messed up all their reconnaissance missions due to a lack of teamwork.
Fortunately, the ninjas seemed sure that nobody would come after them in the desolate West, so their traces weren't hard to track. Before long, Steve and Peter found their hideout.
What happened next was even more absurd.
The enemies they were supposed to face were merely low-level ninjas. Steve's estimate was correct. Their trip was merely a warm-up. Although the ninjas leaped around and suddenly disappeared, they were not effective fighters.
But the problem lay in the disappearing act. Steve smacked a shield at a ninja who disappeared, leaving Peter, who was trying to sneak up behind the ninjas and make a face at them.
The sturdy shield hit Peter's arm with a "thud," resulting in an immediate fracture.
For the first time in his life, Captain America had accidentally hit an ally, with impressive effect.
"Steve told me that attacking these enemies from behind might be better, so I swung from a beam to sneak up on them. But who knew he would switch to a frontal attack? I never knew he was that strong. I was sent flying and crashed into a wall..."
"He knocked those ninjas out in a few hits, but he also knocked me out in one go," Peter said a bit pitifully.
Shiller struggled to hold back his laughter. Peter grumbled, "Go ahead, laugh. When I got back, Coulson, Natasha, and Matt had already been laughing at me for days."
Shiller suppressed his laughter and comforted Peter, "Don't be upset. You should feel honored. The last person to be sent flying by Captain America's shield was the head of Hydra."
"I know I talk a lot, but I can't control myself when I get excited ..."
"Maybe you've heard this before, 'Sometimes, words are mightier than fists'," Shiller said.
After a moment, it wasn't Steve who showed up, but Natasha. The female agent said in frustration, "Stark went to talk to Director Nick about something and ran into Steve. They're turning the place upside down."
"What do you want to see me for? I can't break up their fight."
"The Director has managed to pull them apart, but the problem now is that Steve keeps bringing up Stark's dad, and Stark adamantly refuses to believe that Steve is his father's old war buddy, Captain America."
"Or perhaps he does believe it, but just doesn't want to admit it," Shiller added.
Natasha held her forehead and said, "Anyway, as a senior psychological advisor to S.H.I.E.L.D., you need to mediate now..."
Seeing that Shiller wanted to refuse, she said, "Listen, here's the situation. Iron Man and Captain America are arguing fiercely. Director Nick wants to mediate, but they've teamed up to lambast him."
"Coulson tried to break it up, but all three each believe that Coulson is siding with the other party. Nick thinks Coulson should be helping him to resolve the two's conflict, Stark knew early on that Coulson is a staunch fan of Captain America and believes he will be biased. Captain America considers Coulson a good person, who shouldn't be misunderstood by the other two... "
"To put it simply, it's a case of all three holding different views, not trusting each other. But there's really no more trustworthy fourth party available on site."
"Clearly, Nick's intention was to get them both to join the ranks of S.H.I.E.L.D., so that's why we're in this current predicament, right?"
Natasha was a little surprised at Shiller's perceptiveness, but she still said, "I think it's a plan that would benefit everyone. After all, if the two go their separate ways, it will pose many problems, such as what happened with Steve and Peter..."
"But evidently, the lack of success in Steve and Peter's actions is Peter's problem, not Captain America's," Shiller said.
Peter's resentment deepened, he said, "Hey, doc, you were just comforting me!"
Shiller said, "Speaking of mediation, I do have a better candidate."
With that, he hoisted Pikachu, who was sitting next to him, by its neck and threw it into Natasha's arms.
Natasha held Pikachu's little short hands up to her face and said, "I know you have a talking yellow rodent, but what good is that? It can't even beat the weakest of the three, Nick."
Shiller said, "Trust me, sometimes words are more powerful than fists."
Several hours later, as the sky darkened, there was a loud pounding at the door of Shiller's clinic.
As he opened the door, Steve, Stark, Coulson, Natasha and all showed up, with Pikachu held in Iron Man's ironclad hug, and Stark forcefully covering the rodent's mouth with his hand.
Shiller opened the door and let them in, then said, "You'd better not get photographed doing what you're doing now, Stark, or animal protection organizations will go nuts."
"No animal protection organization would protect such a rodent!" said Stark, brutally picking up Pikachu by its tail and tossing it to Shiller.
Coulson appeared to be ten years older. Natasha leaned against the doorframe and said, "Doctor, you've indeed provided us a truly effective solution!"
She gritted her teeth as she emphasized "truly effective."
Shiller handed his phone to Pikachu to charge. Steve held his forehead and sat down, saying, "God, I don't even know what just happened..."
"I thought Peter was the most disruptive person in the world, but I never thought..." He showed a painful expression. It seemed that the recent torture was about to drive good-tempered Steve mad.
"He is indeed the most disruptive person in the world because Pikachu is just a rodent," Shiller said.
"It used all kinds of swear words I've never heard in my life, cursing everyone present. Nick couldn't even get a word in, with a Canadian accent, cursing every bit of S.H.I.E.L.D from Nick Fury's eyepatch to the glass water cup on his desk."
"It kept talking non-stop for at least six hours and didn't repeat a single word. S.H.I.E.L.D.'s walls are almost etched with its voice..."
"I don't even understand how such a tiny body can hold so many words!!" Coulson said somewhat shakily.
"In order to shut it up, we had to feed it, but it ate an entire month's worth of donuts from the office and drank all the drinks in the juicer. To stop it, we all had to intervene personally!"
"And it electrocuted four mobile phones and one of Iron Man's mechas," Natasha said. "This includes Nick's high-security phone, which has forced him to personally head to the repair department to recover the data inside."
"But at least the mediation was really effective, right? When you guys teamed up to catch it, didn't you feel the joy of unity?" Shiller said, taking delight in their disaster.
The biggest loser, Stark gritted his teeth and said, "Yes, I can hardly believe I actually managed to chat with this old fossil about how to cook a rat for half an hour!"
"I suppose you guys now get the phrase I always say..."
"Yes..." Steve started, then Stark looked at him. Sparks flew between their eye contact, but they both said in unison, "Words are more powerful than fists!"