Amazing Spider-Man (vol. 3) #4
This story takes place during the events of Original Sin #2….
At Parker Industries, Peter Parker is running a test of his new Electro containment unit, with one of his employees wearing a suit that imitates Electro’s powers. That’s when he gets a call from the Avengers. He is happy he got the call because it is an omega level threat, which means the team trusts him again after Doctor Octopus took over his life.[1]
As he slips away to change into Spider-Man, Anna Maria Marconi warns Peter that he can’t keep stepping out on his company and suggests he get someone to fill in for him. However, Peter points out that there is nobody that can do what Spider-Man does and leaves. This leaves Anna Maria to come up with an excuse when their partner, Sajani Jaffrey, comes asking where Peter is.
When Spider-Man arrives in midtown he finds members of the Avengers and the X-Men fighting an army of Mindless Ones. When Spider-Man joins the battle he tries telling everyone that he was mind swapped with Doctor Octopus until recently.[2] Wolverine tells Spider-Man to stow it because the foes they are fighting murdered the Watcher and stole some of his technology.[3] One of the men responsible is the Orb who reveals that he has taken one of the Watcher’s eyes. He then unleashes a truth bomb on the gathered heroes and their minds are suddenly flooded with some of the Watcher’s greatest secrets.[4]
For Spider-Man he is taken back to the day that he was bitten by the radioactive spider that turned him into Spider-Man.[5] However, this time he sees what happened after he ran out of the demonstration on radioactivity. The spider actually bit another person, a young girl named Cindy Moon.[6] Returning home, Moon suddenly discovered that she could fire organic webbing out of her finger tips but couldn’t control it. That’s when Cindy’s parents were visited by Ezekiel Sims, a man that Peter knows very well, who offered to help train Cindy to control her powers.[7] The last thing he sees is Ezekiel running tests on the girl and determining that she is progressing too fast. With no other choice, he locked Cindy away in a shelter and uses the passcode 616001 to seal her inside.[8]
When Spider-Man snaps out of it he discovers that their foes are gone and the rest of the heroes are still shaking off the effects of the truth bomb. Spider-Man decides to take off because he knows where Cindy Moon is trapped and wants to free her. As he swings on, Spider-Man is reminded of something Madame Web had told him before Octavius stole his life. She offered him the opportunity to retire as Spider-Man, saying the Great Web will find another Spider-Man to take his place.[9] That’s when he arrives at the building where Sims once ran his company. He recalls how Sims almost convinced Peter to seal himself away in the building and thinks Sims was lying to him. Getting into the basement, Spider-Man is greeted by a pre-recorded message from Ezekiel. It was recorded before Spider-Man first fought Morlun and as he tries to explain why he kept the existence of Cindy Moon a secret Spider-Man shatters the screen with webbing, as he no longer wants to hear anymore of Ezekiel’s lies.
Cindy heard his arrival and speaks to him through the intercom in her bunker. When Spider-Man tells her he is going to free her and begins typing in the code, she warns him to stop because in doing so he will draw Morlun. Spider-Man, thinking Morlun has long since been defeated, ignores her warning and opens the cell. Cindy then attacks him for freeing her, telling him that she has doomed them all to death.
At that moment, somewhere very far away, Morlun gets out of bed and sniffs the air. He can detect what he calls the Spider-Bride, and decides that it is time for the Great Hunt to begin.
Back on Earth, Spider-Man evades all of Cindy’s attacks and is impressed by her skills. Unaware of how long he is, Spider-Man convinces Cindy that Morlun is long gone.[10] Realizing that she is finally free, Cindy wants to go out into the world and celebrate but Spider-Man suggests that she disguise herself before openly using her powers in public. Cindy quickly weaves a make-shift costume by spinning webbing from her finger tips. She then reintroduces herself to Spider-Man as Silk. She then rushes outside and begins web-slinging across the city, heading for one place in particular ignoring Spider-Man’s requests to stop so they can talk.
Meanwhile, the Black Cat has broken into Parker Industries and looks for something to take that will draw out Spider-Man. Spotting Sajani Jaffrey leaving another angry voice mail to Peter Parker, the Cat finds her mark and abducts the disgruntled scientist.
Elsewhere in the city, Spider-Man continues to follow Silk, wondering how his spider-sense drew him to her when it only used to draw him to danger. Silk eventually stops at her family apartment and discovers that her parents have long since moved out.[11] She begins cursing the spider that bit her as it has separated from her family. Catching up with her, Spider-Man offers to help her locate her parents and promises her that things will turn out for the best. She then asks him how long it has been since Morlun was destroyed and Spider-Man admits that he has defeated Morlun — seemingly to the death — on two different occasions. She calls him a fool and slaps him in the face because they are still in grave danger. When she tries to fight him, Spider-Man tries to get some distance but she yanks him back with a web-line that surprises the web-slinger because unlike his, it’s barbed. She then pull him close to punch him in the face when suddenly, the pair begin making out unable to stop the sudden lust they both feel for each other.[12]
Recurring Characters
Spider-Man, Silk, Orb, Exterminatrix, Black Cat, Anna Maria Marconi, Sajani Jaffrey, Ezekiel Sims, Avengers (Thor, Hulk, Black Widow, Wolverine, Nova), Luke Cage, Falcon, Storm, Shadowcat, Thing, Daredevil, Morlun, Albert Moon, Sr., Nari Moon
Continuity Notes
There are multiple mentions to how Doctor Octopus took over Peter Parker’s life. See Amazing Spider-Man #698-700 and Superior Spider-Man #1-31.
Spider-Man specifically asks that the rest of the X-Men be told. This is because the Doc Ock Spider-Man had a problematic run-in with the mutants in Avenging Spider-Man #16.
The Watcher was discovered dead in Original Sin #1. It’s later revealed in the 8th issue of that series that Nick Fury was the one who killed the Watcher. The Watcher will remain dead until Empyre Fallout: Fantastic Four #1.
This story focuses on the Hulk, Luke Cage, and Thor, three characters who were deeply affected by what they saw from the truth bomb:
For the Hulk, it was the revelation that Tony Stark may have tampered with the gamma bomb that created him. See Original Sin 3.1-3.4 (aka Original Sin: Hulk vs. Iron Man)
Thor would learn that he had a sister and go to Asgard, to defend Asgard from the mysterious 10th Realm. See Original Sin #5.1-5.4 (aka Thor & Loki: The Tenth Realm)
Luke Cage learned that his father had his own team of Avengers 42 years ago. See Mighty Avengers (vol. 2) #10-12.
You know, way back in Amazing Fantasy #15. For point of reference, the events of that story happened some 13 years prior to this one.
We first got a glimps of this in Amazing Spider-Man (vol. 3) #1.
Ezekiel Sims appeared in Peter Parker’s life to train him against Morlun and train him on how to harness the mystical aspects of his power and claiming his legacy as a spider-totem. In the end Ezekiel attempted to sacrifice Spider-Man to a spider-god in exchange for his own spider-powers but learned the errors of his way and gave his own life to save Peter. For more on Ezekiel see Amazing Spider-Man (vol. 2) #30-35, 47-49, 55-56 and Amazing Spider-Man #506-508.
616 is significant because it is the index number for the Prime Marvel Universe. Earth-616 was first coined in Daredevils #7.
Madame Web made this offer to Peter in Amazing Spider-Man #673.
As far as Peter knows, Morlun was dead after he slew the villain after becoming a host to the Other. See The Other: Evolve or Die (Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man #1-4, Marvel Knights: Spider-Man #19-22, and Amazing Spider-Man #525-528) Morlun cheated death because he and his family have a back-up system that downloads their minds into cloned bodies after the moment of physical death. See Scarlet Spiders #1-3.
Cindy will later discover her brother is alive in Silk #7 and later find her parents in the Negative Zone in Silk (vol. 2) #11-13.
This is a little complicated to explain. See the Master Weaver deemed three entities that were central to preserving the Web of Life or destroy it. They were also the key to stopping Morlun and his family, the Inheritors. They are the Bride, the Other, and the Scion. Peter was originally chosen to be the Other, but that has since been transferred over to the Scarlet Spider, Silk is the Bride, and the Ben Parker of Earth-982 is the Scion. See Scarlet Spider (vol. 2) #13-15 and Amazing Spider-Man (vol. 3) #9-15.
