Spider-Man: Throne of Atlantis

Chapter III: Back to Work

Peter loved being a scientist. Sure, he loved being Spider-Man too— well, at least most of the time. In some ways, he never felt freer than when he was in the suit. With his powers, he could be anywhere in the city in a matter of seconds and pull-off seemingly impossible superhuman feats.

But the thing was, Peter had never asked for his powers nor ever dreamed of becoming a superhero. He did always wanted to be a scientist, though. With an aptitude for science, Peter was motivated at a young age to pursue a career in said subject. Fast forward to the present, and the last project he worked on created a monster octopus that nearly destroyed Manhattan. Nevertheless, the benefits of being a scientist were apparent. For one, he could sneak in time at work to upgrade his spider-suit, which was exactly what he was doing right now.

After Otto's incarceration, Peter quite naturally lost his job. As always, Norman Osborn was most eager to offer him a position at Oscorp. Despite the man's ethically questionable business practices, Peter was half-tempted to accept Osborn's offer, given his financial predicament. Peter was ready to make the call when out of nowhere, Alchemax, New York's lastest up-and-coming tech company, approached him with a generous proposal. They had offered him the position of a research scientist, which he readily accepted. As part of the package, Peter had a decent wage, semi-flexible working hours, and even the privilege of his own personal lab. Not bad for a kid from Queens if he'd say so himself.

His lab resembled a scaled-down version of any other modern-day scientific laboratory. There were computers, canisters, spectrographs, prototypes, and other mechanical equipment scattered around. At the center of his desk, Peter was now making some adjustments to his suit's mask. He worked on the interior circuitry of his mask and was replacing worn-out transistors with newly improved ones. He had just installed a pressurized mask in the headpiece interior, which could store up to fifteen minutes of highly compressed air. While still a work-in-progress, Peter felt it was worthwhile to install it anyways, considering the likelihood of him being in an underwater confrontation in the future.

Satisfied with his progress, Peter shifted gears and went back to focus on his actual work when he felt sleep calling him. To his credit, he had spent half of last night clearing out Hammerhead's hideouts. The rainy morning weather wasn't helping either, to say the least. A minute or two of rest wouldn't hurt, Peter told himself. He was about to doze off, only to hear a knock on his door.

"You never change, do you?" said an amused voice.

"I'm awake!" Peter jumped up. Embarrassment washed over him as he turned to see Liz Allan, who was his boss and Alchemax's current CEO, leaning against the door.

Who would've thought Midtown High's resident cheerleader would go on to become CEO of the fastest-growing tech startups in the city? Liz was always charismatic and resourceful, though, so that must have helped, Peter noted.

Liz was his first-ever crush, and even until now, it was easy to see why. She was fair-skinned and had long blonde hair with sapphire blue eyes and a modelesque figure. She was dressed in a plain white dress shirt with rolled-up sleeves and black pants with black Bottega pumps.

"Oh, Peter. You haven't changed a bit since high school. I remember you sleeping in class, stumbling in late every other day," Liz said, walking up to him with a tablet in one hand. "That said, you always were the smartest of us. Valedictorian, remember? It'd be a waste if you were sleeping on the job."

"Point made, Liz." He gave her a sheepish look. "I was just up late, but I'll get back to work."

"Trouble sleeping?" she asked.

"Well, actually there's this girl—"

"Girlfriend?" she interjected, her eyes narrowing slightly.

"No! I mean, not really. She's new to the city, and I've been volunteering to help out," Peter said as he tried his best to keep the details vague.

"Anyways, I want you to look over the engineering department's latest designs," Liz said, her expression softening. With a tap on her tablet, she transferred the files wirelessly over to his computer. "See what you can do to improve them."

"Got it, boss," Peter replied. In an instant, he had opened the schematics on his monitor and immediately got down to work.

There was a faint smile on Liz's lips as she watched Peter worked. He was twirling a stylus pen in one hand as he looked through the various designs. She would've commented on Peter's habit of pen spinning, which he'd been doing since high school, if not for the sudden alert on her tablet.

"Great. The board wants to hold an emergency meeting tomorrow," Liz said with a sigh, dreading the amount of paperwork she was going to have to get done over the night to prepare for the meeting. "I have to go."

"You're gonna kill it, Liz," Peter said, taking his eyes off the screen for a moment to look at her.

"Got that right." Liz flashed him a confident grin before she turned to leave.

She lingered at the doorway for a moment before the door shut.

Mera liked how quickly things moved in New York City.

While Atlantis was amazing in its own right, life under the sea went by too slow for her liking. Owing to her royal heritage and position within the government, Mera had to attend daily council sessions. Those meetings often droned-on for hours on end, hence creating the appearance that time passed by slower in the underwater kingdom. Having lived in Atlantis her entire life, the week or so she had spent in New York was a nice change of pace. Everyone here seemed like they knew what they wanted and wanted to get things done quickly.

Mera had spent the morning exploring city sights when she received a call from the Bugle. She'd just submitted her portfolio and résumé the day prior and was offered an impromptu interview later in the afternoon with the editor-in-chief. That was fast.

Here she was, a few hours later, seated at a corner of the office. As she waited for her turn, Mera took in the surroundings of the office place.

Rows of workstations were lined across the newsroom. Computers, swivel chairs, stacks of files were scattered everywhere and were accompanied by the occasional shouting and endless clatter of keyboards that filled the workplace. To her side, there was a queue of hopeful applicants like her seated at one corner of the room.

"You're Elmira Elles, right?"

It took Mera a second to register that she was being called. Elmira was the cover name she came up with. She looked up to find a dark-haired woman smiling at her. "Yes."

"Betty Brant," the woman said, as she motioned Mera over to the editor-in-chief's office. "I'm Mr. Robertson's secretary, so I took a look at the pictures you submitted. They're good."

"That's very kind of you," Mera said, as she followed the secretary as they weaved through a crowd of office staffers.

"How'd you get your photos to look so good?" Betty asked as they stood outside the editor-in-chief's room.

"Trade secret," Mera replied, chancing a wink at the other woman.

"Well, I don't want to hold you up, so good luck," the brunette said with a relaxed smile.

Mera thanked the woman once more before quietly making her way into the editor-in-chief's office. The room was fairly spacious, with large glass windows. On one side of the office, there were a couple of framed newspaper articles, one of which featured Spider-Man in a heroic pose. A soft smile appeared on Mera's face when she saw the photo credits, P.P.

"Take a seat," Robbie Robertson offered. He was in his mid-forties, graying at the temples, and had the look of a seasoned, toughened journalist, with the experience to back it up.

Being one of the Bugle's earliest staffers, Robbie worked under J. Jonah Jameson as city editor, and it was by no means an easy job. However, serving under Jameson had its perks. After J.J.'s tenure as chief editor had ended, he appointed Robbie himself to be his successor, to continue the good work exposing "Spider-Man for the menace he was." To Jameson's dismay, the Bugle effectively stopped publishing baseless accusations against Spider-Man after he stepped down. Robbie had actually turned out to be an ardent supporter of the wall-crawler.

Mera nodded, taking a seat on one of the two empty chairs inside the room. "Thank you, Mr. Robertson."

"Robbie is fine," he said. He had printed out her submission. A sign of his age and that he hadn't yet moved on with the trend to go digital.

"Of course," she acknowledged.

Robbie held up one of her photographs. "You're a talented photographer," he said. "Your photos, I quite like them. They almost remind me of the shots a previous photographer of mine used to take."

"Thank you—"

"Having said that, I've got a long list of aspiring photographers hoping to work for the Bugle," he stated. "Add that to the amateurs thinking they are professional photographers just because they can snap pictures on their smartphones, and you can see that I'm in a tight spot."

"I... I don't quite understand," Mera said.

"My point is that the Bugle has its hands full right now. At least when it concerns photographers," Robbie explained. He gave her a meaningful look.

Mera nodded understandingly, though her eyes faltered.

"With that in mind, we didn't call you up all the way here just to waste your time, Miss Elles," Robbie said.

A sigh of relief escaped Mera as she visibly relaxed.

"You're a good photographer. Not the best yet, but very good," Robbie reiterated. "So I'm offering you the chance to cut the queue by working as a freelancer for the Bugle with the option to work with us full time if you perform well. What do you say?"

Mera brightened up. "That would be delightful."

"Good, but I've noticed you tend to go for pictures on crime and super-heroics," Robbie noted, referring to her portfolio.

"I want to do my part," she said, without missing a beat. While Mera had initially planned to just observe and blend in with the surface world, she couldn't just sit by and let injustice run rampant in the city. Given her need to maintain a low profile as per Atlantis' archaic laws mandating that it had to remain a secret to the surface world, running around in a costume like Peter was a strict no-no. Mera figured being an investigative photographer would be a good middle-ground between inaction and being a full-fledged superhero.

"You're not the first to tell me that, and you'll certainly not be the last." Robbie chuckled before his expression became noticeably more somber. "That said, when you're assigned to an assignment, you're expected to do the job we hired you to do. If we send you to photograph a marathon event, you'll do that. If its the lastest science fair, you'll cover it too. That's the job I'm offering. You might get 'lucky' occasionally and be assigned to photograph something crime-related, but that's not always going to be the case. Are we clear on that?"

"Perfectly," Mera replied. After all, she was going to be a freelancer. Robbie couldn't dictate what she'd do in her own time.

"Excellent. Wait for our call, check in with my secretary on your way out, and please close the door," Robbie said.

You won't be disappointed, Mr. Robertson— Robbie," Mera said.

"I know," the editor-in-chief returned in kind, confident of his judgment.

She smiled, thanked the man, and left.

Mera had made it. She had landed a job at the Bugle. It wasn't exactly the one she wanted, but it was a step in the right direction. She couldn't wait to tell Peter about the news and wondered how he was faring...

"Haven't you guys heard the saying by now? That crime doesn't pay?" Peter quipped as he dodged a right hook aimed at his head.

Aside from his blunder earlier in the morning, the day had gone by pretty smoothly for him. Well, until now. He'd just got out of work minutes ago and was hoping to catch up on some much-needed sleep when two of his lesser-known adversaries, Man Mountain Marko and the Ringer, decided to break into Alchemax at rush hour of all times.

True to his name, Man Mountain Marko towered over the average man. He stood a full seven feet in height and wore an unbuttoned brown shirt with grey pants. Undergoing an experimental treatment by the Maggia, Marko was imbued with superhuman strength and durability that allowed him to go toe-to-toe with Spider-Man.

On the other hand, Marko's partner in crime Anthony Davis, better known as the Ringer, possessed no powers of his own. To compensate, he donned an armored suit that was outfitted with an assortment of metallic ring-based weapons, ranging from explosive shaped-rings to constrictor rings that could coil around and crush a man.

"Stay still, you web-freak," yelled Man Mountain Marko, who was becoming increasingly frustrated as he failed to land a second punch.

Avoiding a series of punches, Peter retaliated by flipping the man over and sent the bruiser crashing into a wall. "No can do, Marko-boy."

The titanic-sized man, who was now seething in rage, attempted to rush down the spider-themed hero, only to trip over a web-line and fall face-first onto the floor.

"Heh, classic," Peter remarked. He was about to deliver the knockout blow when he felt a faint buzz at the back of his head. Taking heed of his spider-sense, Peter swerved his head to one side and avoided a barrage of razor-sharp ring projectiles.

"Yeah, yeah. Keep talking ya bug, and I'll zap you out of your misery," the Ringer said, sending another wave of ring projectiles at the wall-crawler.

"Isn't zapping Electro's thing?" Peter quipped as he pushed an office assistant out of the way of the attack. "Hold on, does Sparkles know you're trying to steal his thunder? You wouldn't like him when he's angry. Trust me on that."

"What? No, no...stay away!" The Ringer panicked at the idea of having to face Electro as he tried to fend off the wall-crawler with an exploding ring.

"I mean, c'mon, you don't even have taser rings for crying out loud." Peter quickly closed the gap and smacked the supervillain into the side of an office desk, sending bits and pieces of furniture and paper stacks flying into the air.

"Shaddap, you two!" Man Mountain Marko yelled. Recovering from the earlier attack, he picked up a workstation and threw it at Spider-Man.

Peter rolled out of the way, though he winced at the thought of all the collateral damage. First, the Daily Bugle and now Alchemax, it seemed like every place he worked at had to get wrecked at some point.

"We're getting nowhere," the Ringer noted to his partner in crime. Spider-Man was damn near unhittable.

Peter nodded his head in approval. "Finally someone who gets it. Say how about both of you quietly surrender, and I'll promise not to beat you guys up too badly?"

"Ain't gonna need to hit you to get you," Marko said, as he took a good look at the office place. The room had descended into chaos as the various office workers attempted to escape the place. "Ringer, blast them to hell!"

"Happy to oblige." A devilish grin formed on Ringer's face as he fired a set of constrictor rings at the helpless civilians.

"No!" With no time to spare, Peter lunged forward and placed himself in the way of the attack. The constrictor rings coiled and tightened around him upon impact, with enough force to crush anyone who didn't possess superhuman levels of durability.

"I've been waiting for this!" Marko yelled before he delivered a haymaker punch that sent the distracted hero flying into the air.

Peter was sent crashing through a wooden door and into an office room, which he immediately recognized. Great. He had landed in Liz Allan's office. Just his luck.

"Spider-Man?! What are you doing here? Get out!" Liz ordered. "What have you got us into this time?"

"You know, I'm not so sure myself," Peter admitted before he snapped himself free of the vice-like grip the titanium rings had around his body.

Relying on his reflexes to guide him, Peter managed to move himself and Liz out of the way in time to avoid an explosive projectile from the Ringer. The subsequent blowback of the explosion, however, knocked him onto the ground though he quickly recovered. This was starting to get embarrassing, Peter thought. He was getting sloppy. He shouldn't have so much trouble beating a couple of d-listers. It was time to end this. Fast.

"Payback time, insect," Marko said as he stepped into the executive's office room along with the Ringer. There was a triumphed look on the bruiser's face before his eyes shifted to Liz with a gaze that unsettled Peter.

In response, Peter fired a web-shot that temporarily blinded the supervillain. "Hey, eyes on me, Marko!"

Liz, for her part, gave the two criminals a hard stare that was downright intimidating. The woman could be scary when she wanted to. Peter knew that firsthand when they dated years ago.

"I'll rip you apart!" Marko went into a frenzy as he ripped the webbing covering his eyes and charged straight at the wall-crawler.

Peter easily leaped out of the way, spun around, and followed up with a kick.

Meanwhile, the Ringer, launched a second explosive round behind the spider-themed hero, hoping to catch the hero by surprise.

"Seriously, when has sneaking up on the 'spider-guy' actually ever worked for anyone?" Peter quipped as he yanked the explosive projectile with a web-line and hurled it straight at Marko instead.

Upon impact, Marko was engulfed in a fiery explosion, though his toughened skin did provide him with some degree of protection. Just barely recovering from the blast, Marko rose to his feet before he caught a shadow amongst the cloud of smoke.

Peter appeared almost like a blur, delivering a rapid succession of strikes before following up with a shot of taser webs. Man Mountain Marko was down for the count. One more to go.

In full-blown panic mode, the Ringer decided to ditch his ally and made a run for it, only to collide head-on with a fire extinguisher.

"This is for wrecking my office," Liz said as she swung the fire extinguisher like a baseball bat, knocking the criminal out cold.

"So that happened," Peter said. He secured the two-man team inside a web cocoon. "Thanks for the assist."

"Hmm, I should be thanking you instead. For wrecking my place. Again." Liz huffed.

Having been one of Peter's classmates, she had her fair share of encounters with Spider-Man and his fights. For a while, it seemed like Midtown High was a hotbed for supercriminals because the school was attacked so often. While Spider-Man himself would swoop in and save the day, let's just say he tended to leave a mess behind.

"How did you even know to be here? Don't you have places to be at?" she questioned.

Peter was in the process of coming up with an excuse before Liz's words registered in his head. Places to be— uh oh. He had agreed to meet Mera tonight. Scratch that, he was supposed to be there in fifteen minutes. Peter really hope he wasn't going to be late.

"Right. Gotta go!" Peter said before he leaped up into the ventilator shaft and quickly disappeared out of sight.

Just then, an office assistant peeked into her room. "Ms. Allan! Are you all right?" he asked.

"Fine. I'm fine..." Liz sighed to herself before a thought crossed her mind. She quickly regained her composure. "Our windows. Are any broken?"

"Uh... no, I don't think so," the office boy said.

"Verify it yourself. Once you have, I want to see all our employee records," she ordered.

"All of—?"

"Everyone. From the top execs to the mailroom guys," Liz said as she walked over to her desk.

The office assistant noted down her orders but couldn't help himself from asking why she wanted the records.

"Spider-Man never just walks in through the front door. He comes in through a window. And since our windows are sealed, he'd have to break his way in," Liz explained as she sat down at her table. "If he didn't, that means he was already here. And if he was already here, that means he works here."

"Or he could have been an outsider having a meeting here," the office boy suggested.

"True. Get me a list of all our visitors as well."

The office assistant nodded.

"But no, I think he's an employee." Liz thought out loud. "I believe I have a hero on my payroll. And if that's the case..." There was a subtle grin on her face as she interlocked her fingers. "I'm going to make sure he winds up superheroing for me."

Fifteen minutes later, and at another part of the city, Peter was in an abandoned alleyway hurriedly changing into his regular clothes. He stuffed his spider-suit inside his backpack before making a mad dash to the place where they had settled to meet.

Please be on time, please be on time, Peter silently prayed. In a daze, he almost ran into Mera, though he managed to stop himself in time, his face just inches away from hers.

A faint blush appeared on her cheeks. "Hey, Peter—"

"Oh god, I made it," he panted, bending over to catch his breath.

She raised one eyebrow. "Were you going to be late?"

"Well, yeah." He gave her a sheepish smile. "Supervillain attack. You know, the usual."

For a few moments, a comfortable silence settled between them as they walked side by side through the streets of New York under the nighttime sky.

"I got the job," she said.

Peter broke into a grin. "That's so great!"

"Mm-hmm," Mera hummed. She returned his smile.

"So this is it..." he said as they arrived at the entrance of The Museum of Modern Art or MoMA for short. Something wasn't right. The place was dark and practically deserted as a sudden realization dawned on him. "Oh, it's closed."

"For how long?"

"Till next year." He gave her a nervous laugh. Just when he had worked his butt off to make sure he wasn't late, this of all things had to happen. Good ol' Parker luck.

"Seriously?" Mera asked in a mocked tone.

"Sorry. I mean... I should've checked the website, but..." Peter rambled on as he rubbed the back of his head, trying to find an excuse to cover his blunder.

She burst into laughter. "I was just kidding."

The man could be adorable sometimes when he was nervous, Mera mused to herself, noting the man's flustered reaction.

"There's this new sandwich place we could try out instead," Peter suggested, letting out a breath he didn't realize he was holding.

"We could," she said. "But I've got a better idea."

Peter eyed her curiously as they made their way away from the museum and walked along the sidewalk.

"Let's go out to the sea."

"What?" Peter blurted out.

"Having second thoughts?" Mera frowned. "I did promise to give you a tour of my submarine."

"You don't really have to this, you know. I was just joking that time," he said.

"Don't tell me the rumors are true. That spiders are afraid of water," she teased.

"No!" Truth to be told, he was. "Okay, maybe. Just a little." Peter admitted as memories of the time he nearly drowned in the Hudson River, and his countless battles with Hydro-Man flashed in his mind.

Refusing to take no for an answer, Mera hooked her arm around one of his arms and dragged him along.

"Hey, hey! Let's talk about this first." Peter tried to reason as he found himself being pulled along, struggling against the woman's grip despite his own enhanced strength.

"Come on, it'll be fun," she said. "What could go wrong?"

A/N: And the third chapter is (finally) up! Hoped you all liked it. So Peter's job is finally revealed and its Alchemax! I thought it would be neat to take a page out of Spider-Man 2099 (the 2014 comic series) and repurpose it for this story. I tried a go at writing from Mera's perspective this time around, but I'm still trying to nail her "voice" down. Also, Man Mountain Marko and Ringer's outfits are based on their appearance in Amazing Spider-Man LGY #803. Please leave a review if you can and stick around for more!

Answers to reviewers' questions:

Mashot Tito: Peter has gone solo for the most part. Plus given the DCUE is in a mix right now with the Batman reboot and whatnot, I think I'll just focus on Spidey and Aquaman-related characters for now. As for Sable, you'll just have to wait and see.

treyalexander63917: Fair enough. Although Peter's chances will vary depending on the context. Without a water source, I'd say they are relatively matched but say they're in the middle of the sea, and Peter loses almost every time.

Spooder-Boi: I hear you, not gonna rush anything. Yes, other DC characters exist, but the focus is just on Aquaman-related ones. As for Peter, while he doesn't have affiliations with other superheroes/teams, he has teamed up with a couple of them before.

Death Fury: Yeah, in an alternate timeline, I would have loved to see MCU Peter with a closer bond with Cap instead of Tony.

Celestial Glowhead: Thank you so much for the in-depth review of both chapters, I really appreciate it! I've made some changes to the first two chapters based on your suggestions and tried to make them flow better. And yes, the Spectacular Spider-Man has always been one of my favorite iterations of the character, so it has influenced me quite a bit. Hope to hear from you again soon.