Chapter 18: The Fantastic Phantom

Eren opened his eyes, finding himself once again in an unknown location with his mask on. His clothes were gone, instead, he wore a blue costume, similar to the ones that the Fantastic Four wore. Oddly enough, this tight-fitting costume felt extremely comfortable to him, it felt as if it were made to perfectly fit his body.

He looked around, seeing that he was laying on what appeared to be some sort of medical bed inside of a white room with all sorts of machines that he'd never seen before.

He was astonished.

The closest he had ever gotten to seeing that much unknown tech was in the workroom at Oscorp, however, he at least had an idea of what he was looking at back then. The boy looked toward the door, seeing a boy and a girl peeking around the corner at him. Upon making eye contact, the two children looked surprised before the boy lept into the room.

"Put yer hands up scoundrel!" The boy said in a country accent, wearing a full cowboy costume as his sister stood behind him.

"Ah, save me, Deadshot Franklin!" His sister said from behind him, playing the role of the damsel in distress.

'What the hell is happening.' Eren thought to himself.

"I said put 'em up!" Franklin demanded in his best country accent once again.

Playing along, Eren put his hands up slowly. "You got me..." The young man said, smiling slightly beneath his mask.

"Franklin! Valeria! Where are you? Are you messing with that boy?" A woman's voice said in the distance. Hearing this, the two kids ran out of the room, knowing they were disobeying their mother's orders by disturbing their guest.

Eren let out a sigh of relief before the members of the Fantastic Four began entering the room one by one.

First was Johnny Storm, walking in with a smile and sharing the same confident demeanor as Harry Osborn. "Good Morning, sunshine!" Johnny said happily as he stood beside the hero.

Ben Grimm, with his rocky figure, stomped into the room. He said nothing, looking at the spider with a stone-faced glare.

Behind Ben came both Reed Richards and Sue Richards, walking side by side with worried expressions.

Confused, Eren began to mutter some words to the family. "What? Where am I?" He asked Reed, prompting the scientist to smile softly.

"You're in our lab in the Baxter building. You passed out after overexerting yourself so we brought you here. We assumed you wouldn't want the police or paramedics to find you and unmask you, right?" Reed told him.

"Yeah..." Eren responded. 'I gotta stop passing out in the middle of nowhere.'

"What's this?" Eren said as he pointed down at the suit on his body.

"Ah, that's a special suit that my wife and I invented. It's made of Unstable Molecules, allowing for it to adjust to your body's temperature and more. It's what allows me to stretch without ripping my clothes, my wife to go invisible without stripping-"

"Hey!" Sue interjected, feeling embarrassed at that fact.

Reed continued. "...Johnny to flame on without burning off his clothes, and for Ben to clobber without clobbering his own wardrobe." As Reed explained this, Eren's eyes were looking up at him intentively.

'No way!' Eren thought to himself, never having imagined that such material was possible. His brain moved at a million miles per hour as he thought of the ways that he could push his powers without having to worry about his costume.

"Your clothes were basically scraps so we thought we'd cover you up. You can keep it if you want." Johnny added.

"Thanks." Eren said plainly, despite his inner thoughts going ballistic with the idea of such an amazing costume being his. "I actually have been meaning to talk to you guys... can we discuss some things in a more comfortable place?"

To his request, the four members of the Fantastic Four led the boy to the living room, having a private chat away from the children as they went off to play somewhere.

"What did you want to discuss... What do we call you?" Reed asked.

"The Phantom Spider." Eren answered plainly.

"No first name?" Johnny asked.

"I have one, but I haven't even told my friends-" As soon he said this, Cindy came to his mind. He missed their date and disappeared on her for an entire day once again.

"My phone! Where's my phone!" The boy asked as he frantically looked around and felt around his new costume.

Reaching into her pocket, Sue pulled out his phone, which she was holding to return to him when he awoke. "Here, sorry I forgot to give it back. It was in what was left of your pants pockets."

Eren immediately took the phone from her hand and began going through his messages, noticing that both Cindy and Harry were blowing up his phone.

Harry: [Dude, are you okay? Cindy is P I S S E D. What happened?]

Attached to Harry's message was a screenshot of Cindy complaining about how Eren always disappears without a word and how she was growing sick of being treated like she's not important by him. Of course, having his back, Harry calmed her down and explained that it must've been some sort of emergency.

'Fuck.' Eren thought to himself before looking at the many messages Cindy sent him.

Cindy: [I'm here.]

Cindy: [Where are you?]

Cindy: [Are you okay?]

Cindy: [Eren?]

Cindy: [Well... I'm going home. Please text me if something happened.]

Cindy: [Just checking to see if you're still alive...]

The messages went on for a while, the most recent one being from twenty minutes prior. Eren buried his hands in his face, causing all four of the others to exchange looks.

"I know what that means." Johnny said with a smirk on his face.

"Girl problems." Ben added as he poked Johnny with his elbow.

Sue, feeling bad for him, attempted to reassure him. "That Cindy girl seems to really care about you, Eren-" As she said this, everyone looked up at her with various shocked expressions. She put her hands up in a panic and began apologizing. "I'm so sorry I saw some of the notifications and she said your name like fifty times..."

"Great job, sis..." Johnny teased.

"I said it was an accident. I'm still used to all of us heroes calling each other by our first names before everyone started departing…" She told her brother. She was so caught up in being in mother mode, that she couldn't help herself and spoke his name.

"It's fine." Eren admitted. "You guys have done a lot for me already. I can trust you if you can trust me."

"We have no reason not to trust you. Now, what's the matter? You wanted to talk about something?"

Having his mind go off track with the whole Cindy Moon situation, he nearly forgot to ask about Project V. "Right, it's about Victor Von Doom. Wasn't he a friend of yours? I think he may be up to something. There's this thing..." As Eren began to reveal the name of Project V, he hesitated. He was getting too comfortable with the team far too quickly. If they're involved, which they weren't, they already knew too much about his life for him to just say he knows about the project.

"It's a weapon. I've been looking into it and I've deduced that it must be a scientist of some sort. One with power. One like you, Doom, Osborn, Stark, Morbius..." As Eren said this, the other four looked around at each other with various confused glares.

"Well, Stark is off-world with the Avengers. He has been for about a year. Victor, we haven't spoken to him in years but he's completely off the grid. Morbius, I have no clue what he's up to. Osborn has been in the weapons industry for a while... I'm not saying it's him, I'm just implying that his domain is making weapons nowadays. I'm sorry we can't be of much help."

Eren shook his head. "No, it's fine. Maybe it's someone else. I've been looking into Osborn myself and I can't find anything."

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"Well, we'll look into it. If what you say is true and if it is Doom, then it's up to us to stop him. He has been quiet for far too long, in fact, I've had the feeling he was up to something. We'll be in contact." Reed told him.

"Thank you." The Phantom Spider shot up out of his seat before dismissing himself. "I gotta go. Thank you all for taking care of me and for the costume." Before leaving, the hero exchanged phone numbers with Reed and left the Baxter building.

As Eren swung through the city, he texted Cindy, informing her of where he was at during their date.

Eren: [Hey. I'm so sorry. I just got out of the hospital. I was near that building that the Fantastic Four saved from falling and a piece of debris hit me and a bunch of people I was walking near. I wasn't too hurt, I just had a concussion. They discharged me just now.)

However, after about thirty minutes, he still hadn't heard from her.

Eren: [I really am sorry. I was really looking forward to seeing you.]

Once again, he received no response.

Once in his room, Eren searched around in his messy space and found a black mask that he had created, though he couldn't get the lenses right. For hours, he worked on his mask and continued texting Cindy, getting no response.

He texted Harry as well, asking him if Cindy was responding to him and she was. When Harry asked her if she'd heard from Eren, she lied and said that she didn't.

Harry: [Dude, she's still pissed. You gotta do something about this.]

Eren: [Yeah, I know. How can I fix it if she won't respond to me.]

Harry: [I'll put you on some game, bro. Write a handwritten apology letter.]

Eren: [...]

Harry: [I'm serious. Girls love that stuff. Maybe throw in some flowers too.]

Eren: [She doesn't like flowers. She said they're useless because they die.]

Harry: [OH I KNOW. PROM. PROMPOSAL]

Eren: [If she's pissed, why would I do that right now. Wouldn't that piss her off more?]

Harry: [Because she's not actually pissed. She's just giving you a taste of your own medicine for being an asshole.]

Eren: [First off, I wasn't being an asshole, I was unconscious in a hospital bed...]

Harry: [Yeah, yeah, yeah. Think about it, you said she blew up your phone right? She was messaging me too about how worried she was. She cares about you, she's just a little upset. Just don't do anything stupid and things should be fine. Girls' brains are... they're like puzzles, bro. She'll be back to normal by tomorrow probably.]

Eren: [I hope so.]

Harry: [You'll see. I believe in you two. And hey, if it makes you feel any better, I'm doing a promposal too. I'm asking out Lily Hollister.]

Eren: [Good luck with that. I heard she thinks you're annoying.]

Harry: [That's code for she's totally into me. Anyway, I'm going to bed, I'll talk to you tomorrow. Unless you feel like disappearing again.]

Eren: [I won't. I'll text you if anything happens tomorrow.]

Eren put down his phone before completing the finishing touches on his mask. Putting it on his face, the hero began focusing and unfocusing his eyes, causing the lenses to open and close. With these new lenses, his eyes could focus better as he soared through the air and flash-stepped around.

"Yes!" The boy celebrated to himself as he pumped his fist. "I should go take some pics of the new costume and send them to Jamison. That'll pay for this month's rent." Since the costume was never before seen, he'd score some extra cash from the Daily Bugle.

The hero then suited up, putting on the costume that he was lent, along with his black mask with adjustable lenses. After climbing out of his window, the hero began swinging around the city and taking pictures of himself with his cellphone from many different angles and with different poses.

During his photo session, the hero spotted a boy wearing black and purple being chased by others who were wearing the same colors. 'That's that gang from yesterday...' Eren thought to himself as he watched the boy seemingly run for his life.

"Please! I'm sorry, I don't wanna be involved anymore!" The young man said to his pursuers as they cornered him with spiked bats and a futuristic rifle in hand.

One of the gang members approached the boy and placed his spiked bat beneath the kid's chin. He appeared to be the leader of that group and slightly older than the rest, perhaps college-aged. They each had various masks, following the same color scheme. The leader, wearing black jeans with a purple sweater and a black hockey mask, began to speak down at the boy with malice in his voice.

"So you think you can just betray the Underground and get away with it, huh?" He told him as he lightly tapped the bat on his chin.

"I'm sorry! I can't do it! I'm not cut out for it!" The boy spoke as tears began to flow from his eyes.

"You know what we do to people who want out? We make an example out of 'em. However, if you want to not become mush, all you gotta do is pass the rest of the initiation test." The leader promised him, putting on a fake nice guy voice.

"Can I come too?" The Phantom Spider asked him, leaning up against a wall behind the thugs with his new black and blue costume. This caused the entire group to jolt in surprise.

Dashing forward, the Phantom Spider grabbed the leader by the shoulder tightly and slammed him into the wall, knocking him out instantly.

His head began to tingle as one of the gang members pointed their futuristic rifle at the hero and pulled the trigger. Eren dodged the blast as it sent an energy shot past him, melting a hole in the fence next to the weeping young man.

Eren's lenses widened as he witnessed the damage before quickly turning back around and webbing the gun-holding thug in the face, pulling him in closer. Once he was close, the hero kicked upward and hit the man directly in the jaw. This sent him soaring up in the air but before he could get too high, Eren webbed him back down and slammed him onto the remaining thug, knocking them both out in one single attack.

The hero then quickly turned around and glared down at the trembling young man on the ground. He approached him slowly and crouched down in front of him before speaking to him politely. "Hey, man. What's this underground stuff?" The hero asked, pointing backwards with his thumb.

'I-it's a gang." The young man murmured as he peeked at the unconscious bodies behind the phantom before him. Seeing this, the spider leaned over, blocking the kid's view before continuing to interrogate him.

"A gang? Are you with 'em?" The hero asked, looking directly into the soul of the boy through his bug-like lenses.

"No! I mean, I was but I wanted to leave! I just wanted to be cool!" The boy yelled in fear.

The Phantom Spider frowned. "To be cool? You joined criminals to be cool!?"

"Yes… My classmates told me about them. They know I'm a pushover so they thought it would make me more hardened if I joined."

"Are your classmates in the gang?" The spider asked.

"Yes." The boy answered.

"Where are they?"

"Fisk Tower, I don't know how but they took it over!" As those words left the boy's lips, the hero's heart sunk from his chest. 'Fisk Tower?' He thought to himself. Those words shook him to his core, he never thought he'd ever have to go to that place again. Before any more words could be explained a police officer shouted at them from the other side of the alley.

"Hey! Put your hands up!" Said the officer as he pointed his handgun at the hero and the scared wannabe thug.

Scooping up the boy, the Phantom Spider web-zipped away with him in his arms and dropped him off somewhere nearby, away from the patrolling officer. He was tempted to ask the kid to continue on with the gang so he can be his informant, but he didn't want to put him in more danger. "Get out of here, don't let me catch you doing some shit like this again." The hero told the scared young man.

"Yes sir! Thank you, sir!" The young man said with his hands together before sprinting away hastily.

After watching the boy run, the hero set his sights on Fisk tower, ready to revisit the place that started it all.

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