Felicia couldn't feel her leg at all, and there were moments when she feared one of her lungs had collapsed. But she was still breathing, even after the beating she had just taken. The woman was also emotionally broken; nothing like this had ever happened to her. She'd sobbed because she had just been taken away and then beaten...it was a painful reminder of her past, something she thought she'd escaped.

She almost whimpered when she tried to get up slowly, only for Scorpion's tale to wrap around her waist. Into the wall she went,crumpling into a pile once more. The Scorpion and Kraven were sauntering towards her, at least as much as she could see from her swollen eye. "You can't pass out on us yet,Cat! We've been here a few hours."

Felicia gasped, trying to take in any air she could. From the corner of her vision, she spotted Kraven raising a clawed hand, aiming to slash her back swiftly. But suddenly, a very loud gunshot sped through the room.

Felicia's eyesight went black.

SWACK!

Stephanie grimaced when Shocker landed a shot to her gut, and had an arm forced behind her back. She grunted and front flipped so that he was thrown onto his back. Spiderman had trapped one Ock's arms against the wall, and was now dodging the other three projectiles. He somersaulted just in time to evade the swinging weapons and shove a kick at Ock's temple."so, what business do you have here, Doc ol boy?"

"Business from a certain employer, you imbecile!" The villain sneered, recovering swiftly. "One who shares a common interest with Mr Osborne."

"...Norman?" Spider-man paused his dodging, and was smacked into the far corner of the room instantly. Stephanie had just finished knocking Shocker unconscious when she saw Spider-man get hit. Something made her stop completely, almost in complete worry. This hesitation was broken when she noticed Ock making his way towards her.

"And The Joker asked me to say hi to you." The villain chuckled and she glared daggers at him. Stephanie didn't move though; not sure if she could handle a guy with eight limbs. "For him, of course. Speaking of which...we'll be heading back now. Business to attend to, you know."

Batgirl jumped up when one of his arms flew at her, but the mechanical thing merely grabbed Shocker. The young woman sprinted over to Spider-man and helped him up quickly. "They're getting away!"

Spidey shot up as soon as he heard that, running ahead of Batgirl to catch up with quickly escaping Doctor. Stephanie raced after him, but paused when her foot hit something extremely wet and sticky. She stumbled slightly and tried to see what it was on her boot, only for the light of the flare to suddenly burn out. Batgirl shrugged and focused on catching up with the guys.

Spider-man swung swiftly on his webline, aiming his body for the silhouette of the octopus. But when he tried to fire another webline, his shooter only sputtered out bits. His other shooter gave him the same results as well as soon as he let go of the previous webline. "Okay, Spidey...No big deal. Just empty web shooters. We're low enough to the ground, right?"

Spidey wasn't too surprised to see a pigeon flutter just below him, indicating his height.

Batgirl cursed under her breath; her glider hadn't gotten her to catch up with Spider-man fast enough! Now his enemies might have gotten away to report back to the Joker. What was he doing in this anyways? He was already enough of a pain in the butt, and now he had to team up with more pains...

Stephanie was broken out of her thoughts by the sound of a little girl screaming at the top of her lungs. Surprisingly, it was a falling Spider-man making the noise...a Spider-man who was dangerously close to hitting the ground fast. Batgirl angled herself down, and folded her arms to her sides. She zipped at him as fast as a bullet, and wrapped her arms around him enough to grasp his back. "Activate temporary flight!"

Her boots hummed again, allowing them to slow very gradually and then rise up quickly near a rooftop. Spidey had immediately clung to her on instinct when she swooped him up, which was now making this whole thing a little awkward. Spider-man couldn't help but notice that he had a pretty good view of her eyes, as well as her oddly pillowy lips. Stephanie couldn't help but notice that even through the kevlar fabric, she could feel his extremely toned chest press into hers.

Eventually, the heroine set them down on the rooftop, and they immediately parted. Stephanie hated the fact that she had her cheeks visible with this mask, because he could most likely see her blush. "Well...uh...that was awkward."

"...yep." Spider-man nodded once, thankful for his mask. "That really was...your breath,uh, does smell nice though."

"Oh. Thanks." She giggled, and instantly felt that giggling would have made her look like an idiot. "It's, uh...all in the Tic Tacs...Anyways, did we lose them?"

"Yeah, we lost them. Well, I did." Spidey sighed, looking over his shoulder. He suddenly felt that pitting the blame on both of them would be bad. "My web shooters ran out of fluid. I'll have to see if I can't make more."

"Wait, you have to make webs?" Stephanie frowned deeply, looking dissapointed. "I always thought they came out of your arms or something."

"Ha. I wish. Life would be much..." Peter peered closely at her hips, something that only made Steph blush again. "Uh...Isn't your belt usually yellow?"

Stephanie looked down, and was of course surprised to see that a growing film of black was enveloping her quickly. She gasped and tried scraping some of the black substance off, only for it to encase her arms. Spider-man ran forward, trying to scrape the black ooze off to no avail. "H-Hey! What is this stuff?!"

"We have to get it off of you before..." Spider-man trailed off when the ooze finally reached her exposed chin, and seeped into the suit from the neckline. Stephanie shuddered uncontrollably, obviously not comfortable with whatever cold thing was sliding around on her skin. Oddly, the whole thing seemed to stop, as if nothing ever happened. She quizzacly stared at Spidey when he muttered out a string of swear words. A VERY long string. "Uh...what just happened."

Peter groaned again. "The Symbiote."

"Symbiote?"

Unenthusiastically, Spidey looked over her. Her suit looked normal again, but not that thing was in her suit. "It's a long story...Basically in my world, this thing gets attached to my suit, makes it all black and shiny. It made my fighting style better, I was even extremely bulletproof and stronger."

"Then why do you look so pissed?"

"That thing really messes with your head. At first you're all fine. Then your personality gets changed, and your way of doing stuff gets mixed with anger. It makes you think you hate everyone you've loved, so it can feed off your negative emotions. It'll kill you eventually, when it saps your energy away."

"Oh crud. I stepped in that thing back in the warehouse. " Stephanie grimaced. "What am I supposed to do to get it off?"

"Vibrations. Really loud ones." Spidey informed her. "A really big bell works best. Got any of those."

"...Craaaaaaaap!" Stephanie face palmed. "The Gotham City bell is broken, it's gonna be fixed in another three days."

He grimaced beneath the mask, and rubbed the back of his head. "Okay then. We may have to wait until another option turns up...but I promise you on my life, that we WILL get that off of you."

"Your life? That's a pretty big promise." Stephanie smiled softly, against the thoughts of what might happen to her with this suit on. "...Thanks, Pete."

"I should be thanking you." Spidey responded with a shrug. "You did save me from being a bug splat on the ground. So now I've gotta help you with this issue."

"Why don't we both thank each other byyyyyyy..." Stephanie thought for a moment, and then snapped her fingers. " ordering pizza from Domino's?"

"Hmmm...What a Swellagant Idea! I made in the mood for Provolone." The wall crawler looked at the close together buildings around them. "How about a parkour race back to your place?"

"It's on!"

=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/=/

Felicia was at first certain she was dead. Yet, as she opened her eyes to see a fancy ceiling...and feel far too much pain, she realized that dead people don't wince. Yet, that only furthered her confusion. First she was with those monsters, then she was suddenly lying on...a very comfy couch of some kind. The platinum blonde heard something that sounded a lot like a footsteps, and then footsteps coming closer. Before she could attempt to turn her head, Felicia saw a almost elderly man hover over her, dressed in a very nice suit and fancy moustache.

"Ah, you're awake." He spoke, with a kind British accent. "I am Alfred."