Without listening to the suspicious police officers, Peter used his spider-webs and incredible strength to quickly pull up the firefighter and Nils together to safety.
The firefighter and the other firefighters were all very grateful to Peter for saving them.
Nils stood aside, staring intently at Peter.
The tremendous strength and agile movements displayed by Peter suddenly made Nils realize: if they were talking about a super-soldier, wasn't the person in front of him exactly that?
If he could obtain some blood samples from Peter for research, wouldn't that be much more promising than the experimental drug from Dr. Conners that hadn't even gone through clinical trials yet?
"Hello, your name is Spider-Man, right? Thank you for saving me, I'm Nils, the head of the biological research department at Osborn Corporation," Nils approached, trying to get close to Peter. He had a calculating look in his eyes.
However, Peter, who had previously merged with Noir Spider-Man and inherited part of Noir's insightful nature, had already sensed something off about Nils' demeanor and tone. Peter recognized that look in Nils' eyes - it was greed and scheming!
Just like a fox watching a little chick, waiting to pounce!
"Um, hello," Peter merely responded flatly before leaping off the bridge again. He wasn't going to stick around.
This time, the police officers didn't stop him from leaving.
Not every car thrown off the bridge had people inside.
There were seven cars in total (one had already fallen earlier), and including Nils, there were only three people trapped.
The other two didn't give Peter any more trouble.
Peter quickly rescued the firefighters who had gone down to the area below and the passengers trapped under the fallen vehicles.
Amidst the grateful cheers from the firefighters and those he rescued, Peter walked back to Captain Stacy's side and obediently raised his hand, "Captain Stacy, sorry, I had something come up so I went out for a bit, but I'm back now."
At this time, the officer named Omar finally returned as well.
He brought the results of his investigation.
Indeed, some huge claw marks were found on nearby cars and the bridge surface, preliminarily deduced to be from a giant crawling creature.
At the same time, they also learned two important things from statements by some pedestrians:
First, not long ago, a humanoid giant lizard monster appeared from the Williamsburg Bridge near Manhattan, causing destruction along its path. It was the panic caused by this monster that ultimately led to the incident on the bridge.
Second, the vehicles now dangling outside the bridge were all thrown by that giant lizard monster, not Spider-Man. On the contrary, Spider-Man stepped in to catch those vehicles after seeing them get thrown. In fact, even before the police arrived, Spider-Man had already rescued a young boy trapped in one of the cars.
All the evidence indicated that Spider-Man was not a criminal, but rather a heroic rescuer - a superhero!
Some onlookers had already started to applaud and cheer for Spider-Man enthusiastically.
Captain Stacy waved her hand, signaling the other officers to lower their guns.
"Spider-kid, I hope you'll always stay this way as a hero, and I never have to find out you're up to no good!" Captain Stacy said sternly, but with a small smile.
"Sure, sure, Captain Stacy, heheh," Peter laughed, relieved.
He knew he had finally achieved his goal of being seen as a hero, not a vigilante.
Although Captain Stacy seemed to still not fully trust him by her words, her actions during this event showed that her view of Peter had changed for the better.
At the very least, they were no longer adversaries.
This was a very good sign that Peter was being accepted!
Peter couldn't wait to tell Gwen and the others this exciting news, but then he suddenly remembered that he's not actually the Peter from this world, so it might be strange for him to go tell Gwen about what happened.
Peter was jolted awake to the realization that the longer he stayed in this alternate reality world, the deeper he merged with this world's version of himself, the more he would unconsciously forget the fact that he was originally from another universe entirely.
"It seems the use of abilities in other worlds also can't be abused, it must be restrained. I don't know if these worlds are parallel universes, or some other kind of existence. But in any case, that other world is the real one that belongs to me. As for the other worlds, I'm just a visitor passing through."
However, perhaps he could leave something helpful behind for this world's version of himself before leaving.
Amidst the enthusiastic cheers of the crowd, Peter swung away from the Williamsburg Bridge.
Retracing his memories, he came to an abandoned shack in the rundown neighborhood of Queens.
This was one of the chaotic, poorer areas in Queens, with many homeless people and rough crowds.
But it was also precisely because of this neglected state that some things could be more easily hidden here, out of sight.
The original Peter of this world had found an unwanted abandoned house here, which after some minor modifications and repairs, became his own secret workshop and hideout.
In the workshop were some basic equipment and tools Peter had scavenged from various junkyards, recycling centers, and dumpsters around the city.
His rudimentary web-shooters had been made here with these scrap materials.
However, it was obvious that the slightly behind technological level of this world compared to Peter's main universe, coupled with the original Peter's basic skills, meant that his web-shooters were quite low-tech and clunky.
This was the reason for the previous jam in his web-shooters during the bridge incident.
As for Peter from the advanced future, being from the age of the information explosion and having close encounters with alien invasions like the Chitauri army, his understanding of materials science and engineering was far greater than the original Peter's.
Plus, he also had a suit of Iron Man's highly advanced armor from his era.
Iron Man's technological capabilities were absolutely cutting-edge and at the pinnacle in Peter's time.
Although Peter had just recently obtained the Iron Man armor, with his exceptional intelligence and learning ability, he had already gleaned quite a bit from studying it.
Soon, Peter found some materials among the existing scraps that could be used to significantly improve and upgrade his web-shooters, and then proceeded to modify and enhance the two web-shooters he had.
About half an hour later, the upgraded modification work was successfully completed.
Peter checked the time - five hours had passed without him realizing it while working, and dawn was about to break in his home world's timeline.
So before leaving, Peter took out a piece of paper, wrote down some helpful notes and instructions on it, and left it on the workbench table for the other Peter to find. He then closed his eyes and summoned that glowing spider-web from his consciousness, severing the glowing spider-thread attached to it.
Boom--
Peter felt his consciousness turn into a point of light, traversing the dark and profound space between realities, entering another radiant dimensional portal--
Back in his home neighborhood of New York, Queens.
Peter opened his eyes, looking at the familiar ceiling of his bedroom, knowing he had returned to his own world and timeline again, safe and sound.
Tonight's adventurous experience traveling to an alternate universe was truly too exciting!
In his own native world, he had never encountered so many intense situations and challenges before in one night.
The only regret was that he didn't get to directly face off against that giant Lizard monster, as it had fled the scene before he could confront it after rescuing everyone.
He didn't know if he would have a chance to battle such a formidable foe again in the future.
Peter pondered these thoughts, unconsciously glancing at the small point of light still glimmering in his mind's eye.
He was stunned for a moment.
"Huh? Why is that light point still there, does this mean I can revisit that other universe again?"
At this moment, a message suddenly appeared in Peter's mind:
Marked Universes:
earth-90214 (Noir Spider-Man, temporarily inaccessible)
earth-120703 (The Amazing Spider-Man, accessible)
(End of chapter)