The Spider Assassin #47
The second floor materialized around him like a fever dream given architecture.
Smaller footprint than below. Office spaces with walls removed, creating an open floor plan that someone had converted into what looked like a laboratory designed by someone who'd confused "research" with "worship."
Tables held chemical apparatus arranged with obsessive precision -- beakers connected to burners, distillation equipment feeding into collection vessels, everything positioned like an altar to fear itself. The scent hit him immediately, so concentrated it made his eyes water even through the mask.
Fear toxin. Pure. Undiluted. Enough to terrorize a small city.
And standing in the center of the laboratory, surrounded by his chemical arsenal like a priest performing mass, Scarecrow waited.
Jake's spider-sense painted him in colors that tasted like academic curiosity wrapped in malice. Not immediate danger. This was the threat that came from someone who wanted to watch you break before they killed you.
But Jake's eyes locked on the burlap mask.
The hunger hit him like a fist through his chest.
Totem.
The mask was crude. Stitched together from material that looked like it had been salvaged from actual grain sacks, the kind farmers threw over equipment they'd given up maintaining. The eye holes were uneven, asymmetric, but the eyes behind them burned with the focused intensity of someone conducting an experiment they'd been anticipating for years.
His spider-sense cataloged the room's geography with automatic precision. Twenty feet across. Metal stairs continuing upward through a hole in the ceiling to the third floor. Windows on the eastern wall -- reinforced, but not unbreakable. Chemical apparatus concentrated in the center. Exits: the stairs he'd climbed, the stairs continuing up, the windows.
No doors. The walls had been removed to create this open space, which meant Scarecrow had wanted visibility. Had wanted to see anyone approaching from any angle.
Smart.
"Spider." Crane's voice was scholarly. Almost gentle. The tone of a professor addressing a particularly interesting specimen. "I'd hoped you'd survive long enough to reach me. Joker toxin. Ivy's pheromones. Kobra-Venom." He gestured with one gloved hand, the motion theatrical. "A trifecta of neurological assault that should have killed you six different ways."
He took a step forward. The movement was measured. Deliberate. Someone who understood that rushed violence was inefficient violence.
"Bane was right to respect you." The admission came with something that might have been admiration. "Your capacity to survive impossible trauma. To adapt. To continue functioning when your brain should be soup." A pause. "Fascinating."
Jake's right hand clenched. The severed arm pulsed against his torso.
Above him, he felt the signatures. Third floor. Multiple. Moving. Preparing. Falcone's defenses waiting for anyone who made it past Scarecrow.
And somewhere up there, Bane. The patient hunter. The one who wanted flames worth breaking.
Which meant Harley was there too.
His chest tightened. The second voice stirred, tried to speak, but Jake crushed it down through pure will. Not yet. Not until the fear toxin burned it out completely.
"I've been preparing for this moment," Scarecrow continued, moving to one of his tables. His hands found apparatus with the familiarity of long practice. "Synthesizing something special. For someone like you."
He lifted a canister from the table. Small. Pressurized. The kind that could fill a room in seconds. The metal gleamed under fluorescent light, and Jake's enhanced vision caught the warning labels: EXTREME CAUTION. CONCENTRATED FORMULA. LETHAL DOSE.
Crane's thumb caressed the release mechanism with the tenderness of someone holding something precious.
"Let's see what you truly fear."
The canister hissed.
Green-gray gas erupted from the nozzle with violent pressure. The cloud expanded faster than breathing, faster than thought, filling the space between them with chemical certainty.
Jake's body moved before his mind caught up.
His right hand fired webbing at the canister. The strand caught, stuck, yanked the device from Crane's grip even as gas continued pouring from it.
The canister flew toward Jake. His hand caught it, crushed it, threw it toward the windows--
Why? Isn't that what he'd wanted?
But Scarecrow had been expecting him. Prepared a lethal dose just for him. It could have unprecedented effects.
Too late.
The gas was already everywhere. Filling his lungs with every breath. Seeping through fabric. Finding mucous membranes. The fear toxin didn't ask for permission -- it invaded with the efficiency of something that had been designed for exactly this purpose.
Jake's spider-sense exploded.
Every corner of the room became threat-red. Every shadow held death. Every sound suggested violence approaching from angles his enhanced perception couldn't properly categorize.
'Run,' his analytical mind screamed. 'Get out. Windows. Stairs. Anywhere but here.'
His body agreed. His right hand fired webbing at the nearest window. The strand caught reinforced glass. He pulled, launching himself toward escape, toward air that didn't taste like terror--
"YES!" The second voice erupted with manic joy. "Run! Escape! Don't let it touch you! Don't let it burn away what makes you PERFECT!"
The words hit like ice water.
Jake's hand released the webbing mid-swing. His body dropped, hit the floor hard. His spider-sense was screaming at him to move, to flee, to do anything except stay in this gas-filled room with a madman and concentrated nightmare.
But he was already running.
The realization crystallized with horrible clarity. His body was trying to escape. His enhanced reflexes were firing flight responses. Every instinct was choosing survival over confrontation.
He was afraid.
When had that happened? Hadn't that part of him died? Drowned when he fell into the vat. Buried by the chemicals and toxins.
Hadn't fear dissolved into nothing more than a concept when he'd cut off his arm and faced the Reaper?
What was there to be afraid of?
Jake's right fist drove into the floor. Concrete cracked. His knuckles split. Blood welled up, bright red, and his healing factor immediately began sealing the damage.
"No." His voice came out strangled. Chemical-damaged. But certain. "No running. No escaping. No fear."
He breathed in. Deep. Deliberate. Pulling the fear toxin into his lungs with the same determination he'd used to steal from Gotham's monsters.
The gas tasted like screaming. Smelled like endings. But he held it, let it saturate his bloodstream, let it find every receptor his corrupted neurology had to offer.
'STOP!' The second voice shrieked. 'Don't-- you're killing us! Killing what we survived to become! She needs--'
"She needs to die," Jake said quietly. "And you're in the way."
Scarecrow watched from across the room, burlap mask tilted in fascination. "Remarkable. You're deliberately exposing yourself. Inviting the toxin to do its work." His voice carried genuine scientific interest. "Tell me, what do you see? What manifests from your subconscious?"
Jake looked around the laboratory.
The apparatus was still there. The chemical equipment. The tables. Scarecrow standing in his theatrical pose. Everything exactly where it had been before the gas.
No hallucinations. No manifestations. No fears crawling from his psyche to terrorize him.
Just smell. Acrid. Chemical. Present but functionally irrelevant.
"Nothing," Jake said. The word came out with something approaching wonder. "I see nothing."
But he could hear the second voice.
Choking. Gasping. Drowning.
'Please--' It was weakening. The manic certainty that had defined it was fragmenting, dissolving under chemical assault. 'Don't-- she made us-- we're supposed to--'
"You're supposed to die," Jake said. "And you are."
He breathed in again. Deeper. Maximizing exposure. The fear toxin was working.
His chest tightened. Not fear. Not terror. Something else. His cardiovascular system was changing. The compromised rhythm that had plagued him since the Time Bank ran out was... stabilizing.
His heart beat. Once. Properly. The kind of beat that moved blood with purpose instead of barely maintaining circulation.
Then again. Stronger.
His adrenal glands engaged. Actual adrenaline flooding his system for the first time since cutting off his arm. The chemical that should have been firing constantly during survival mode was finally, finally coming back online.
Jake's vision sharpened. His spider-sense cleared -- not the synesthetic chaos, but clean threat assessment. The corrupted frequencies that had been painting reality in colors that tasted wrong were resolving into something cleaner.
Functional.
'No no no NO--' The second voice was barely audible now. Fragmenting. 'We were-- you need-- she--'
"Goodbye, Good Night," Jake said softly.
The second voice screamed. Not words. Just sound. The death rattle of corrupted psychology being purged by something even more toxic than the chemicals that had created it.
Then: silence.
The absence was profound. Total. The mental space the second voice had occupied -- the constant commentary, the manic suggestions, the conditioning that tried to turn his hand away from violence Harley deserved -- was simply gone.
Clean amputation. Surgical removal. Excised like the arm that had been killing him.
Jake's mouth pulled into something that wasn't quite a smile. Wasn't quite a grimace. Just an expression his chemical-scarred face could barely form.
"More," he said, turning to Scarecrow. "I need more."
Crane's head tilted. "The toxin isn't affecting you. That's... unprecedented. The concentration in this room should be inducing catatonic terror. Should be rendering you--"
"It's working perfectly," Jake interrupted. His voice was different now. Clearer. The chemical damage was still there but something else was emerging through it. "I can feel it burning. Cleaning. Making me myself again." He took a step forward. "So give me more. Concentrated dose. I want to feel this."
Scarecrow's hands moved to his coat. "You're insane."
"No." Jake's chest swelled. His heart beat again -- strong, regular, the rhythm of someone whose cardiovascular system remembered how to function. "I'm finally not."
He breathed in again. The fear toxin was everywhere now. Saturating the room. Filling every space. But instead of terror, Jake felt... alive.
His adrenal system kicked harder. Adrenaline flooded through him in waves, each surge bringing clarity, bringing strength, bringing the feeling of his body working the way it was designed to.
"YES," Jake laughed. The sound was his own. Not Good Night's manic cackle. Not the chemical corruption forcing joy from horror. Just genuine satisfaction at feeling his heart pound, his nerves fire, his enhanced physiology operating at something approaching full capacity. "Yes. This is-- I can feel it. Everything. My heart. Beating. Actually beating."
His right hand found his chest, pressed against the spider emblem. Each beat was distinct. Powerful. The kind of heartbeat that said the body was ready for whatever came next.
"More," Jake demanded, taking another step toward Scarecrow. "You said you synthesized something special. I want it. All of it. Everything you've created. I want to feel it burn."
Crane's hand moved to his coat again. Faster this time. Not confidence -- survival instinct recognizing that the experiment had gone catastrophically wrong.
Jake's spider-sense painted the motion before Crane's fingers found the syringe.
His right hand fired. Webbing caught Crane's wrist. Yanked him forward with enhanced strength that made the man's weight irrelevant.
Scarecrow flew across the laboratory. Crashed into his own apparatus. Glass shattered. Chemical compounds mixed in ways they weren't designed to mix. Something began smoking.
Jake was already moving. His boots found purchase on Crane's chest before the man could recover. Pinned him. The weight was distributed perfectly -- enough to immobilize, not enough to crush.
"The mask," Jake said quietly. His hand reached down. "I want the mask."
"Wait--" Crane's scholarly tone cracked. "You don't-- the toxin is still active. My face-- if you remove it while--"
Jake's hand found the burlap. Gripped. Pulled.
The mask came off with the sound of tearing fabric.
Underneath, Jonathan Crane's face was exactly what Jake expected: gaunt, angular, the face of someone who'd spent too many years testing chemicals on themselves before testing them on others. But it was the fear that interested Jake.
Crane's eyes were wide. Pupils blown. The fear toxin that saturated the room was working on him, had been working on him the moment Jake removed the protective barrier of the mask.
"Please--" Crane gasped. His hands clawed at Jake's boot. "I can't-- the concentration-- it's too much--"
"Good," Jake said. His hand found Crane's throat. Squeezed. Not killing. Just holding while the fear toxin did its work. "Now you understand."
Crane's body convulsed. His eyes tracked things that weren't there. His mouth opened in a scream that didn't make sound -- the kind of terror that went beyond vocalization into pure neurological feedback.
Jake held him there. Watched him break. Felt his own heart beating steady and strong while Crane's hammered in arrhythmic panic.
Then he released.
Crane collapsed, still breathing but gone. The psychologist who'd made fear into science had been undone by his own creation. Poetic. Efficient. Deserved.
Jake stood. His chest heaved with the kind of breathing that moved air efficiently instead of barely maintaining oxygen levels. His heart beat with the rhythm of something that worked.
He looked down at his right hand. Clenched it. Opened it. The movements were smooth. Controlled. His body was responding properly.
The fear toxin had saved him.
🕷️
Time Bank: 00:09:02
🕸️
Nine hours. Two minutes. He'd spent twelve minutes on this floor.
But his body worked now. Actually worked. The compromised systems were stabilizing. The adrenal function was restored. His heart beat with purpose instead of barely remembered pattern.
Worth every second.
Jake's eyes found the burlap mask in his hand.
The hunger was immediate. Overwhelming. The totem called to him with magnetic certainty.
"T. Finder, register totem."
The interface blazed to life.
🕷️
[Totem collected!]
Category: Uncommon
Reward: +48h to your Time Bank
Redeem totem to receive reward? (Y/N)
🕸️
Forty-eight hours. Two full days. Added to his remaining time would give him--
Jake's finger hovered over the mental command.
His hand fell with the weight of the decision.
The system had failed him. He was in this mess, abused and one-armed, all because it -- or whoever was behind it -- weighed his life on consuming totems. Consuming identities.
Burdened him with a responsibility he didn't choose, all because it had granted him abilities that he worshipped. But they were never meant for this-- whatever it is that he was doing with his Spiderman powers.
The progress tab flickered in his vision, reminding him:
🕷️
[Progress Tab]
Completion: 5.5%
Totems redeemed: 5
Time Bank: 00:09:00
🕸️
Right. 100% completion -- that was the price he needed to pay to achieve his freedom.
Why? He didn't fully understand. What he knew was that he was losing himself with every percentage.
So.
Let Gotham-- let the Reaper finish this before it was too late?
No. Never.
No giving up.
He would fight. Keep fighting and never stop until he obtained his freedom. And then. Maybe, just maybe, the end would justify the means.
"Redeem totem."
The interface shimmered, updating.
🕷️
[Progress Tab]
Completion: 6.5%
Totems redeemed: 6
Time Bank: 00:56:57
🕸️
The Bonus rewards came up next. But Jake was already moving.
To the third floor.
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