Venting out the goggles time

The next day, Patience cornered Gwen before school and asked with a tale of confusion and concern on her face, "What was that all about, yesterday?"

Gwen looked back at her with confusion, then realization, then narrowed her eyes. "Yesterday? Oh, when I ran out after you told me about the picture. It's just that Peter ran out of the lab during a... volatile experiment to get that picture, and jeopardized the lab."

Patience shrank back at the hostility in Gwen's voice, and made a mental note that Gwen was scary when angry and not to piss her off during the day. Seeing her current mood towards Peter, Patience could see her drawing a knife on him.

It was only later in the day that Patience asked herself what sort of genetics experiment could be that volatile to bring about that sort of ire. Which led to her asking Peter during lunch about what sort of experiment he ran out on last night. Which led to Gwen glaring daggers at both Patience and Peter.

Peter uncomfortably responded, "I'd tell you, but it's kind of a secret lab thing which Doc Conners has been working on for a while, and if I spill it, it could lead to someone else stealing his idea. I wish that he didn't let me go, but I know why he did." He then glanced towards Gwen to see if she was still giving him a look that could result in bones defying the laws of chemistry and physics to turn into lead. Her glare was only slightly less intense.

Harry muttered, "Must have been some experiment." Gwen giving him the same look as Peter received then closed all options of that line of discussion continuing.

Shaken by Gwen's response, Patience asked cautiously, "So, any plans for tonight? Any of you want to hang out?"

Peter gave a small smile and replied, "Sure. Maybe we could walk around down town?"

Harry said, "I'm in," with a shrug.

Gwen directed her response to Patience and Harry with a friendly smile. "I'd love to, but I don't think I can be around Peter right now. I'm still mad at him about last night. You guys can have fun, however."

The two who were talked to could only say one thing, and directed the semi rhetorical question at Peter. "What the hell did you do?"

That night was the first time Patience had seen Peter outside of lunch or school, and she decided to take advantage of it. To her, that meant she went on a quest to see how nerdy he was.

"Wait, you're into Magic, Death Note and Superman?" Patience asked.

"Yeah, why?" Peter responded in between eating his ice cream.

"It just seems like an interesting combination." Patience's eyes then widened in excitement as she threw the napkin that came with the now finished cone into the trash. "Hey, are you guys into Doctor Who?"

Harry smiled. "Of course. What kind of nerds would we be if we weren't? I like Christopher Eccelson."

Peter shook his head. "The tenth is obviously the best."

Patience then took up a thoughtful expression as she said, "But Matt Smith is promising. Anyway, what do you guys want to do now?"

The boys looked at each other conspiratorially. Reading each other's expressions, they nodded. At this, Patience tried her best to figure out what they were thinking.

"Let's go to the arcade. My treat," Harry said.

When it came to the fighting games, Patience's method of random button mashing and a few good combos fared decently against Peter's prowess. At DDR, she shined. At the hoop shooting, she failed miserably.

"Not so much strength! Stop trying to strong arm it in," Harry said.

"Aim lower. You need to angle it right," Peter advised.

Patience rolled her eyes, but did as said. However, she proved to use too much strength and it bounced back at her.

"Well, that was better. Have you ever been to an arcade before?" Harry asked.

"Once or twice. However, I have a friend who's dancing obsessed and she made sure I could play DDR well. I once beat a seven foot song with her," Patience confessed with pride.

Harry and Peter shrugged as they left. Then Peter received a call. He turned to them with downcast eyes and a slight frown.

"Sorry guys, but that's my call about my curfew. I've got to go home," Peter professed.

Patience shrugged. "Alright. Auf Wiedersehen!"

"Bye! See you guys on Monday!"

Harry looked at Patience. "Auf Wiedersehen?"

"What? I like to say things more awesome then 'Hi' and 'Bye'. Anyway, I guess we should go home too now, it is pretty late and I'd like be able to have a shower and wake up before eleven AM tomorrow."

Harry shrugged. "Sure. Do you know the way home?"

Patience smiled. "Of course! You go take the... I have no clue."

Harry rolled his eyes, and pointed at the nearest bus stop sign. "You live in that area, right? So take the bus with the matching number to your area, and then you're home."

Patience smiled. "Thanks Harry." She then mentally shrugged, and hugged him. Then the bus pulled up and seeing it was the one she needed, she stepped on and paid for her fare.

The next day was not only Saturday, but a day that Patience had arranged to hang out with her friend who was in college. They began talking about Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time at Katie's dorm and ended up discussing their new lives at schools in New York when Patience began talking about her new friends.

"Harry's cool, but seems quiet and shy even though he isn't. I don't hang around Peter much, but he seems busy and nerdy. Gwen's cool, but she seems wrathful enough to kill people with her glare. I mean..."

Katie interrupted Patience. "Wait, Harry Osborn? Isn't that the name of a character played by James Franco?"

Patience looked at her and blinked. "I don't think I heard of that movie. Could be a weird coincidence."

Katie frowned. "The movie came out in 2002, and I remember everyone talking about it. I thought that as a comic book fan you'd know the name."

"That's weird, I don't. Ah well, I'm sure it'll come to me. Maybe I'll look up my friends' names on Google or something."

"Want to do so now?"

Patience looked taken aback, and then grinned. "No way. I want to meet and annoy your fellow dorm members."

Later that night, Patience stared at the Google home page. At the back of her mind, she had a nagging feeling that she should be looking something up. After ten straight minutes of staring and trying vainly to remember, she closed her lap top and went to bed.