Spider-Man fanfic (Raimiverse): The Storyteller, 4/5
Title: The Storyteller
Author: sarah531
Rating: PG13
Fandom: Spider-Man, 2002 movieverse / Raimiverse/ whatever you want to call that particular universe
Pairings: Peter/Harry, Peter/MJ, Ursula/Peter
Summary: Peter’s kidnapped, MJ’s injured, Harry’s dead, and Ursula Ditkovich has mere hours to save half of New York.
AN: This has literally been sitting around in various forms for years. Having unexpectedly found myself back in Spider-fandom, I thought it was high time I finished it…
Too afraid to have struggled much, too afraid of everything now, Ursula lay where she had been thrown…
…until she slowly rose.
Crying a little, she leaned against a desk. She tried to think of a way out of the situation, but nothing came to her. She thought of her father- although she herself would almost certainly die before the day was over, her father probably wouldn’t have much time left to mourn her. Should she call him…?
But in the end, she didn’t, she couldn’t. Not yet. Instead, she reached into her pocket and plucked out the envelope. She spent far too long examining her name on the front, thinking of Peter, thinking of them all, before she opened it.
Ursula-
If you’re reading this I’m almost certainly dead, and I’m sorry about that. I left some money under my mattress to pay any excess rent. If that isn’t enough, your father can sell whatever’s left in my room, whatever doesn’t go to my aunt.
These letters are always really hard to write. I know you liked me and I’m sorry I couldn’t like you in the same way. I’m sure there’s someone out there for you. Hopefully someone more reliable and with less secrets than me.
The truth must be out if you’re reading this letter. I’m sorry you didn’t know. You and your father had every right to know, you were living under the same roof as me, but I thought the truth would only put you in danger. I hope it didn’t. I hope you’re okay, and that you go on to live a long and happy life.
Take care of my friends. I’m asking you that because you take care of everyone, including me. And you’re braver than you know: it took me years and years to approach the person I liked and offer them a bite to eat, but you did it in a matter of months. Because you thought I could use a friend.
I think that’s all I need to say. -Peter
She read it again and again- and then the lights in the corridor went out and she was plunged into darkness. She panicked, grasping the letter to her chest. Then some sort of emergency light came on somewhere, and the room lit up with a dull green glow.
She took a deep breath. She put the letter away, every word of it already stamped on her heart, and stood up. What should she do now? What could she do? This door didn’t have a keypad, she couldn’t pick the lock, she couldn’t climb out of the window-
She couldn’t climb out of the window?
But she could! Technically, she could. She was nine stories up, if she fell it was certain death, but she…could. Peter did it every day, he had superpowers admittedly, but it still took bravery and apparently she’d had that all along. It would be terrifying, it would be horrible, but-
She ran to look. There was a ledge, wide enough for her to walk on. And a very long, dark drop beyond that. All she had to do was break the window and walk to the next one. And break that too, while stumbling about in midair. She wasn’t really going to do it, was she? Her! But she was, she was, she was.
In the end she couldn’t bring herself to send a text to her father, it was too final and the thought of him reading it too terrible. She had to survive this, there was simply no alternative. She picked up a keyboard from the nearest desk, and plowed it into the window until it smashed, and stared out at the blackness beneath.
She seemed so high up, and her task seemed impossible. But she did it: she cleared away the broken glass with the keyboard and she stepped out. She didn’t allow herself to think about it: one moment she was in the room and the next she was out on the ledge. She had lived all her life behind windows: now she had finally stepped out.
Hands on the wall, shaking, she begin to walk. Her thin frame gave her an advantage, and so did the lack of wind- it was a still night. She moved along, not looking down, so terrified. But the next window was closer than she realised-
-she heard voices down below.
She pressed herself against the wall, heart beating crazily, and in the quiet of the night she could hear them. The men who’d locked her up, and a few others, gathered down a black car down below.
“Any idea who that girl was?” said one of them.
“She’s gotta be something to do with Parker or Osborn,” said the man who’d hit her. “We found this stuff in her bag.” Ursula saw him take out Harry’s diary and drop it on the car hood. “Parker’s girlfriend or something, maybe. Whatever she is, she ain’t long for this world.”
“Screw her. Where’s Parker?”
“Locked up on the top floor. Best place, if you want the body to still be identifiable.”
“Good…”
They were starting to get into the car. The last thing Ursula heard was, “This has been a great day,” before the doors closed and they drove off. Ursula didn’t allow herself even a moment to breathe, she walked slowly towards the window, one foot in front of the other. She reached it, with a little gasp…and then she cursed her stupidty: she’d forgotten to bring anything to break the next window with.
Alone and in peril, she felt like just sobbing. But she couldn’t. Her stomach was lurching, her eyes were dripping, but there was too much at stake. People like Peter and MJ and Harry had sacrificed so much for people like her: it was time to pay them back. So, standing on a ledge nine stories up, in the middle of the night and with a black pit beneath, she knelt. She took her old brick-like phone from her boot, and, shaking, stood up.
She slammed it hard as she could against the glass, but it didn’t break. Crying, she did it again and again and again, well aware of the danger, well aware of the ticking clock- she did it again and again-
And then, finally, it cracked. And then it smashed. She fell through it, cutting herself all over, but she was so relieved to be on solid ground that for a second she almost didn’t care. As the pain came, horrible stinging pain, she started to properly cry.
But the building could explode any minute and she knew where Peter was now. She became aware of her surroundings for the first time- she was in a restroom. She could take a few seconds to wash her cuts, but she knew there wasn’t time. Leaving a trail of blood, she started to run. Her arms were the most torn-up part of her; her legs were mostly alright. They propelled her out of the door and down the corridor, to the next stairwell, up the stairs. She was on the top floor, she started to yell…
“Peter!”
She didn’t expect an answer, and indeed none came. And there were loads of locked doors, and he could be behind any of them. She fled down the corridor, pounding at all the doors, leaving streaks of blood across them. She was bleeding badly, and she was starting to properly notice. It was absolute agony. “PETER!”
“Here,” came a voice.
It was Peter’s voice all right. It was weak, as if he’d saved his strength up for hours to be able to call. Ursula ran to the right door, knowing she had no way of opening it- but she was in luck; this one opened from the outside. She heard the click of the lock disengaging and she charged in.
Peter was lying motionless on the floor, but his eyes were fixed on her now. They widened. And he whispered, “You’re bleeding!”
“Yeah,” she whispered.
“Is MJ okay?”
“Yeah, she is.”
“Good…” His voice, already quiet, was starting to fade. “Ursula, I can’t move, I can barely talk. My laptop’s set up over there, and…and I think you’ll be able to use it to stop the explosion. You need to listen closely.” But he was falling into unconciousness, Ursula had seen it once already, she could tell. “I…there’s a backdoor password. There’s a tiny button on the back of the laptop, press it…”
She did, and she heard the insides of the laptop whir. And then she heard something else, a voice echoing through the building.
“Evacuation in one minute. All personnel proceed to emergency exits. Evacuation in one minute.”
For the first time she properly accepted it: she was going to die there. The computer was stuck on a password screen, and she turned to ask Peter what it was, but he was lying with his eyes closed. She ran over and shook him.
“Peter! Wake up! Please!”
“Don’t die,” Peter whispered, and Ursula knew he wasn’t talking to her. He was delirious and far away. “You saved my life…don’t die.”
“It’s me,” Ursula whispered back to him. “Peter, help me!”
But he couldn’t. He was out of it, and she was all alone. She shook him again, helplessly, praying he wasn’t dead. He was clutching a phone in his left hand, Harry’s phone- could she use it? She could call her father, apologize for dying. But he would be dying too. Half the city would be! Unless, of course-
“Evacuation in forty-six seconds,” said the voice.
She ran back to the computer. She had no idea how many tries she got at the password, but she knew, she had seen it.
Harry, she typed. The screen flickered, it suddenly lit up in a white glow, and then a message read PASSWORD ACCEPTED.