Araña - Heart of the Spider #7

Aug 5

Aug 5 Araña - Heart of the Spider #7

Assigned to write a paper about her childhood, Anya Corazon thinks about her childhood in Mexico. How her mother died when she was very young and his father moved them to America where he became an investigative reporter in Brooklyn. She remembers how her father told her the truth about her mother’s death, that she was killed by a crime boss. She was too young to understand, but as she grew up and learned about her native country she vowed to return one day and avenge her mother’s death. She crumples up her recent attempt to write down her thoughts, finding the details too complicated to put to words. Thankfully, she gets a call on the phone given to her by Webcorps. It’s a reminder that she is late for her daily training. When she arrives at Webcorps HQ she is given a lecture by Nina Smith, one of Anya’s handlers. Nina makes it known that she resents that Anya was selected to become the Hunter since she had been training to become herself, and now that Anya has taken that role she is nothing more than a shadow. As Nina begins attacking with no restraint, Anya deflects all the blows wondering why she is allowing to keep her resentment. Nina tells her to get used to it as that is how her enemies will treat her. Their sparring match is ended when Anya’s partner, Miguel Legar arrives and compliments Anya for how he fights training going. Anya takes this as a cue to clean-up for a mission and leaves the pair to talk. Miguel appreciates what Nina is doing, but warns her that she might be pushing Anya too hard. Nina, however, knows just how hard to push Anya. Still, despite Nina’s resentment toward her, Miguel appreciates her taking up Anya’s training while he’s still on the mend as she’ll need it during their operation against the meeting of crimelords especially after hearing the news that Lady Chi is to be among them.

At that moment, Vincent and Anum are watching the plane carrying Lady Chi arrive at the airport. Since Lady Chi has refused the Sisterhood of Wasp’s offer for protection. As such, Anum is ordered to shadow Lady Chi from a distance to make sure that nobody attacks her. Aboard the plane, Lady Chi prepares for a shopping expedition before going to the meeting. When one of her bodyguards promises they’ll protect her, she shows how she doesn’t need protection by killing the bodyguard with a single touch. Her father, Fei, asks if she is ready to deal with the Wasps, and points out that while the Sisterhood has been around for over one thousand years, her organization has been around for a thousand years longer. As Lady Chi leaves the plane, Vincent tells Anum to ignore her gang’s insults and reminds him to watch her before teleporting away to attend to other business. As Lady Chi’s car pulls away, Anum uses his Rewi to follow after her unseen.

Meanwhile, back at Webcorps, Anya Corazon is working on souping up a scooter that she plans on using. As she works, Miguel continues to brief her on how dangerous Lady Chi is, reiterating that her touch is poison, making her incredibly deadly. When Miguel asks where she got the scooter, she tells him that it was approved by Mister Sanderson, one of the Webcorps board of directors, and that he also got her all the appropriate licenses and permits. When she says it’ll allow her to move about when Miguel is incapable of doing so he takes offense. When she asks how he plans to take out Lady Chi’s father, he tells her that he doesn’t have to answer to her and storms off.

Later that day, Lady Chi and her bodyguards have taken over a Jen & Berry’s ice cream parlor when they are suddenly ambushed by Araña. When her minions fail to gun down the superhero, she decides to deal with her directly. Outside, Fei hears the gunshots and tries to go inside to protect his daughter, but is confronted by Miguel. Fei knows that Miguel is no match as a martial artist, but the mage doesn’t need to fight and quickly incapacitates Fei with a web of mystical energy. When Anum arrives on the scene, Miguel drops Fei into his arms. He tells the young assassin that, while he’s not allowed to kill anybody, he vows to make Anum’s life miserable every day from now on since the youth tried to kill him. Back inside, Araña tries to keep her distance from Lady Chi, but this is only a ruse to make her think that she is vulnerable to Lady Chi’s poison. Chi eventually gets close enough to grab Anya’s arm, but she is protected by a spell cast by Miguel and quickly knocks her out after the mage enters the room to tell her the precautions they took before coming after her. This creates enough distraction for Araña to knock Lady Chi out. Soon, soldiers from Webcorps to collect Lady Chi. When Araña asks what is going to happen to her, Miguel doesn’t get into too many details, only that they will be contained. At any rate, Anya needs to get home and complete her assignment about her family history. Miguel knows a bit about it, and when he learns that Anya doesn’t remember much — particularly about his mother’s death — he is relived, telling her that as painful as the past can be, sometimes bringing it into the present can do much more harm. Not far away, Amun is still trapped in an web of mystical energy being asked by a birthday clown if he is late for a birthday party that was scheduled at Jen and Barry’s.