RNP Chapter 24 Past Events
Chapter 24 Past Events
Chapter 24 Past Events
When Peter pushed open the door, exhaustion washed over him like a tidal wave. Several days of bank robberies had left him completely overwhelmed, and his part-time application to *The Daily Horn* was still going unanswered—not because someone had beat him to it, but because they had simply rejected him. The job posting for a website maintenance intern was still up in the school's internship section.
But what weighed heavily on his mind was the atmosphere at home.
"Where has he been lately? He comes home so late every day..." Aunt Mei's voice came from the kitchen, filled with undisguised worry.
"Don't worry, Mei, I'll talk to him." Uncle Ben's voice was gentle but firm. "He's a good kid, he won't cause trouble."
Peter stood in the doorway, sighed silently, and pushed the door open to enter. Aunt May seemed about to say something, but Uncle Ben quickly stepped forward, gently patted his shoulder, and led him outside: "I'll talk to Peter. May, everything will be alright. Come on, son."
The garage lights were dim, and the air was filled with the smell of engine oil and old leather. Uncle Ben rummaged around for a while, then pulled out two pairs of boxing gloves from the pile of junk. He tossed one pair onto the hood and expertly slipped the other on his own hands.
"Gwen told me some things about you, Peter," Uncle Ben said calmly, adjusting the straps of his gloves. "But I think that's not all. There's also something about the spiders, isn't there?"
"I just..." Peter opened his mouth.
"Stop talking," Uncle Ben interrupted him, gesturing with his chin to another pair of gloves. "Put these on, let's practice."
Peter silently put on his gloves and assumed the fighting stance that Uncle Ben had taught him.
"Now, listen carefully." Uncle Ben raised his hands in a defensive stance. "You attack, I defend. After each punch misses, think carefully about why you didn't land it, and then throw the next punch—come on!"
Peter threw a straight punch, which Uncle Ben easily dodged. Just as he was about to adjust his stance and throw a second punch as Uncle Ben had instructed, he received a solid light tap on the forehead.
"Aww!"
"See, Peter? There's no point in dwelling on the past. Whether your last punch landed or not, it shouldn't affect your next one. Standing here, the only thing you should be thinking about is what's coming next."
"I know, Uncle Ben, I just can't forget it."
"Then think of something else, Peter."
As Uncle Ben spoke, he took off his boxing gloves and then took his old laptop out of the car: "After Gwen told me, I knew you should see this, so I brought the computer down. I should have shown this to you a long time ago."
Peter covered his forehead and walked over to Uncle Ben. Uncle Ben turned on the computer, and the screen lit up, displaying a fire report.
Do you remember this fire?
"Of course, this was the first time I used my abilities to rescue people from a fire..."
Have you seen this before?
Uncle Ben clicked on a bookmarked webpage, which redirected to a video. In the video, a mother's eyes were red-rimmed, and her voice choked with emotion:
"I don't know who you are, or even if you'll see this... but I have to say thank you. When the firefighters stopped me, you rushed in and saved my daughter..."
The video showed a mother expressing her gratitude, and she became somewhat incoherent towards the end. It was the first time Peter had ever seen a video like this.
Then came the second one, and from here on, Spider-Man appeared.
Spider-Man assists the Bureau of Disaster Control in fighting thugs, Spider-Man helps firefighters extinguish a high-rise fire, Spider-Man takes a bullet to save a police officer on duty...
Helping an elderly person find their lost pigeons, cleaning graffiti off a shop owner's wall, or even simply finding someone's lost cat.
Peter himself can't remember all the big and small things Spider-Man has done, but others do. They don't know how to contact Spider-Man, so they can only express their gratitude in the simplest way—someone created a website to collect these clips.
"I...I've never seen any of these before." Peter's voice trembled slightly.
"But you should look, son." Uncle Ben placed his hand on his shoulder. "Don't always focus on what you haven't accomplished; look at what you have. No matter how your enemies slander you, no matter how Jameson smears you, those you have helped will always know the truth."
He paused, his gaze resolute.
"Spider-Man gives people hope, Peter. What are you regretting? Feeling like you haven't done enough? Look at this—you've already made so many people's lives better. My nephew is already a hero who brings smiles to the world."
What you accomplished is far more important than what you failed to accomplish.
Peter's throat tightened. He had always thought his actions were just a small favor, never considering that they could truly change anything.
"These people... their lives have improved because of me?" he murmured, as if asking Uncle Ben, or perhaps himself, "Could I really have done this?"
Uncle Ben smiled and nodded.
"You did all of this. Look at these videos. Your help to them will always be there. Your past isn't just about what you didn't do; it's such a small part compared to what you've already accomplished."
"I am so proud of everything my nephew has done, and you should be proud of it too, Peter."
"I... thank you, Uncle Ben. I don't know what to say."
Peter watched the videos, seemingly pondering for a long time, before finally choking back tears and laughing: "So, Spider-Man brings hope to everyone. If even friendly neighbors aren't happy, who can make everyone happy? Right? I will carry a smile and hope every day."
"Ben! Peter?!" Aunt May's voice came from inside the house.
"Alright, go apologize to your Aunt Mei." Uncle Ben lowered his voice after saying that, "If you keep coming back this late, you won't be able to fool her anymore."
"No, never."
Back in his room, Peter retrieved an old briefcase from deep within the closet and took out an old notebook—Richard Parker's keepsake, containing some of his initial ideas from his work, the very source of Spider-Man's synthetic web formula.
But the old-fashioned cobweb fluid was no longer sufficient to handle the terrifying threat. Peter turned on his computer, consulted his notes, and began trying to improve the formula. He had never imagined he could improve his father's invention. But now, looking at the formulas and the hand-drawn diagrams of the cobweb structure he knew so well, Peter memorized all the chemical reagents he could find at school and began building a new cobweb model on the computer, one that would be different with the altered cobweb fluid structure.
"It seems that one has to push oneself to the limit." He muttered to himself, never imagining that he could do something like this in the Marvel universe.
He pulled bottles of chemicals from the closet and stuffed them into his backpack; the rest of the supplies were available at Midtown High School. As a representative high school collaborating with Osborne Technology, it had all the necessary equipment.
No teacher would likely mind "borrowing" some chemical materials. Theoretically, the new spider web's strength could be increased by about 20%, which would be sufficient to deal with the horror.
No... there's another very important point.
Thriller is now very cautious, acting alongside others and choosing to evacuate quickly during bank robberies, giving no chance to others. If you can't find Thriller, even if you think of a way to defeat him, it will be useless.
Fortunately, he has two good friends: one is suspected to be the world's seventh genius, and the other is suspected to be Osborn's successor. Together, they joined a detective agency, whose president is a superhero who works as a detective... though he doesn't have superpowers yet.
As darkness deepened, Peter checked the time and figured he could sleep for another hour or two. He decided to put his laptop back in his bag and go to bed.
He touched something inside the bag—Richard Parker's old Canon camera. For some reason, he turned it on and tried it, discovering that the camera still worked.
The Daily Bugle also appears to have published an acquisition announcement for Spider-Man photos?
Peter put the camera on the table, lay down on the bed, and closed his eyes.
"Alright, Herman, it's my turn to come to you this time."
(End of this chapter)