Chaos Revisited
Part 3
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Peter Parker tried to keep a low profile as he walked into the Bugle's office. So far, so good. Nobody noticed him. He walked past the main receptionist's desk as she surfed the web on her lunch break. A TV that was tuned to a news channel replaying the Sentinels' attack had caught most people's attention.
Just as he walked by, the shot of the Sentinels exploding and him flying away unharmed appeared. The receptionist's jaw dropped. "Oh, my·"
He quickly turned the corner before she saw him. Then he passed several people chatting and standing around the water cooler. One of them was Robbie Robertson, the Editor-in-Chief. Another was Ben Urich. The third was Jim Johnson, one of the accounting managers, whom Peter didn't know very well.
"Parker?" Robertson asked, glancing up.
Peter couldn't help but look disappointed at having been caught. He held up his hands in mock-surrender.
Robbie chuckled. "Trying to be invisible only works if you have that particular ability," he remarked.
"Yeah, I know. How mad is he?"
"Jameson? When he saw you on TV, he went into his office and slammed the door shut so hard that it knocked a Styrofoam cup of coffee over. He hasn't come out since."
Peter looked worried. There was no way he was going to get out of this without being fired. He knew it. Robbie and the people he'd been talking to were thinking it. Losing his job was the inevitable outcome. What made it worse was the potential that Jameson had figured out his secret identity. He sighed and ran his fingers through his brown hair.
"I'm dead," he muttered. "I might as well quit if he's just going to fire me anyway."
"You can't quit," one of the other employees said. He was an accountant named Jim Johnson. "We need you here."
"Me? Why?"
"You're the only one who's not afraid to stand up to Jameson." Hell, he thought, you're the only one who can.
"No," Peter replied. "Robbie's not afraid of him. Neither is Betty. Ben Urich's not afraid, either, and none of them are mutants."
"Right," the accountant said. "Well, some of us have work to do. See you later, Robertson. Hey Urich, we should do lunch sometime."
Ben nodded.
"Jameson's not going to fire you," Urich added. "He'll probably yell and swear a lot, but he won't fire you because he still needs you around."
"Me?" Peter asked. "What for?"
"Like Johnson said, you're the only one who can convince everyone that they don't have to be afraid of mutants. If it weren't for you, we'd be the only ones left working here."
Parker looked stunned. Yeah, he'd been catching quite a few paranoid thoughts lately, but that was normal when Jameson was having one of his temper tantrums. "You're kidding. It's not that bad, is it?"
"At least you have the ability to keep him from reading your thoughts. The rest of us aren't so lucky." Ben wondered if Jameson knew that he knew Daredevil's secret identity and suspected that Parker was Spider-Man. Then his eyes widened as he realized Peter must have heard that. He looked embarrassed. "See what I mean?"
He knows? Peter's jaw dropped. "Uh, yeah." If he knew that, than Jameson probably had figured out his secret identity. He sighed. "Man, I am so dead."
Robbie shook his head. "Keep your chin up, Parker. Good luck."
"Thanks."
Jonah did not even look up when the boy - young man, he corrected himself - entered his office. Parker was not a boy anymore. He'd matured from the recent high school grad Jameson had first met into a young man with a knack for getting good pictures at the right time, and a brilliant mind that could be useful for investigative reporting. That was one of the reasons he'd encouraged Peter after the terrorist attack. Jameson suspected that he could become a great reporter if he really wanted to.
Peter also had his fallacies - he was cocky, even arrogant at times, with a strong stubborn streak that often got him into trouble. Jonah thought it came from having been bullied so much in school. To deal with the other students, he must have been forced to develop a backbone. But up until the mutant terrorist attack, Jonah had always assumed that Peter was an average, ordinary human. That was a mistake - he could see it now.
Peter Parker and Spider-Man were the same person.
Jonah couldn't figure out how he'd missed it. Peter was the first person to ever get a clear photograph of the wall crawler. He often came in with dozens of blurry shots and one or two decent ones. Then there were the camera angles, which were usually so off-kilter that Jameson often wondered how anyone could have taken them at all. The only way for him to do it would've been to use an automatic camera.
Jonah hadn't really suspected until today. The footage of Parker fighting the Sentinels costumeless had done it. Sure, all Peter did was fly, and he hadn't used any obvious super powers besides that. But the way he dodged the robots' attacks, as if he'd been reacting to a sixth sense or something - that was what how most witnesses described Spider-Man's fights.
Jameson knew without a doubt that if Peter hadn't used any powers besides flying, the Sentinels would have fried him. He had to have super fast reflexes. Not to mention, there were the smart remarks he made during the whole thing. They were exactly the type of comments Jonah would have expected the web-slinger to make.
Peter looked as if he'd rather be anywhere else. In fact, he eyed the large window nervously. There was a sliding screen on it to let the breeze through, but it could be easily opened.
Not a smart move for someone with a secret identity, Jonah thought.
Peter gulped. He knows. I'm screwed. Then he steeled himself for what he figured was going to be one of Jameson's famous tantrums. After all, if he could take on the Green Goblin, Doctor Octopus, and a pair of mutant-hunting robots, surely one enraged boss wasn't that bad.
Jonah finally looked him in the eyes. "I could fire you," he said. "Hell, I probably should, but that would be too easy. Then you'd never have to face me again."
"S·Sir?" Peter stammered.
"Give me one reason why I shouldn't print the story of the century on the first page of the afternoon edition."
It took him only a heartbeat to come up with an answer. "Mary Jane."
