Currently in the Fenton residence, the atmosphere in the living room was so dense it felt like gravity had suddenly doubled.
Danny sat heavily on the center of the worn, comfortable sofa, flanked by Sam on his left and Tucker on his right.
Despite the plush cushions beneath them, the three looked anything but comfortable.
Danny, in particular, looked like he was nursing a migraine of epic proportions.
He rubbed his temples with two fingers, squeezed his eyes shut, and let out a deep, drawn-out sigh that echoed in the quiet room.
Right in front of him sat the root cause of his current headache.
Perched on the opposite sofa were Peter, Mary Jane, and Gwen. All three of them were huddled so close together they were practically on top of each other.
They looked nervous, terrified, and entirely out of their element, clutching their knees or gripping the armrests as if simply touching the furniture might cause it to shatter into a million pieces.
And given their new physical states, that wasn't an entirely irrational fear.
Their appearances had changed drastically overnight.
Gone were the average, unassuming high school frames. Their body construction, height, muscle density, and posture had all been fundamentally rewritten.
It was as if someone had shoved the three of them into the legendary SCP-914 machine, set the dial to 'Very Fine,' and watched as the absolute peak-human versions of them crawled out the other side.
Peter's shoulders were impossibly broad, Gwen moved with a coiled, athletic grace even while sitting still, and MJ looked like she could snap a baseball bat over her knee without breaking a sweat.
Lizz and Harry were stationed nervously beside them, keeping a cautious distance.
Lizz was perched on a small single-seater sofa, while Harry stood behind her, leaning heavily against the backrest with his arms crossed.
How did a regular day escalate to this absurd point?
It was all thanks to Mister Parker.
The moment Peter had woken up in the middle of the night, realizing something was deeply, fundamentally wrong with his body, his first instinct was to call Danny.
Unfortunately, New York's resident phantom was deeply unconscious in his bedroom, dead to the world.
Panicking, Peter had called Tucker.
Tucker, jolted awake by the frantic rambling of a newly buff Peter, immediately called Sam. Sam, annoyed but concerned, tried to call Danny—again, to no avail.
Frustrated, Sam had then called Harry and Lizz, who both tried blowing up Danny's phone.
Still no answer.
Meanwhile, Peter had checked in on Gwen and MJ, only to discover to his absolute horror that the two girls were going through the exact same terrifying biological metamorphosis.
One chaotic tree of 'phone calls' later, the entire gang had realized that Peter, Gwen, and MJ had spontaneously developed superhuman abilities, enhanced physiques, and an overwhelming sensory overload.
Tucker had actually taken the liberty of testing some of their new elements when they first met up earlier in the morning.
A few bent steel pipes and crushed cinder blocks later, he had definitively confirmed that the trio was, without a shadow of a doubt, dangerously enhanced.
After much frantic inquiry and retracing of steps, one glaringly obvious common factor was discovered.
Spider bites.
Sam had eventually stormed over to Danny's house to physically wake him up—a wake-up call that had devolved into them getting a little too touchy and kissy before remembering the crisis at hand.
Meanwhile, Peter, MJ, and Gwen had fabricated their respective excuses to sneak out of their homes, rushing straight to the Fenton residence.
And now, here they were. The whole gang, sitting in a standoff in the dead of the afternoon.
***********
"Okay. Let me get this straight," Danny finally spoke, his voice breaking the suffocating silence.
The three enhanced teenagers perked up immediately, sitting bolt upright with terrifying synchronization.
"YUP!" they blurted out in unison.
Danny pinched the bridge of his nose. "The three of you, last night, got bitten by three strange spiders."
"YUP!" they nodded simultaneously again, their heads moving with such identical, snappy precision that it made the tense scene look completely comical.
"And when you guys finally gained consciousness," Danny continued, gesturing awkwardly at their completely transformed physiques, "the three of you were magically enhanced in all possible physical departments?"
"YUP!" The synchronized nodding returned.
Lizz leaned forward, her brow furrowed in deep confusion. "You know, I still don't get it. How can a simple bug bite do all of this? I mean, it's not like they were magical, mystical spiders cooked up by a wizard, right?"
"It is absolutely possible if those spiders were genetically enhanced," Danny replied smoothly, his scientific mind already churning through the variables.
The entire room turned to look at him, eyes wide with shock.
Danny sighed, leaning back against the sofa. "Think about it. After Captain America was presumed dead, for the next sixty years—and even right now—dozens of governments and private corporations have tried to recreate the Super Soldier Serum, right? They've used radiation, genetics, biochemistry, you name it. If my guess isn't completely off the mark, these spiders must have been part of a highly classified biological experiment trying to replicate those exact enhancements."
"Yeah, actually, that makes total sense now," Tucker chimed in, adjusting his glasses as the pieces clicked together. "And as for how they breached containment? The spiders must have been experimented on and kept locked up somewhere in New York."
A sudden thought struck Danny like a lightning bolt. He leaned forward, locking eyes with Peter.
"Hey, Pete. Didn't your parents work for Oscorp as geneticists?"
Peter froze. "Uhh... yeah. Yeah, they did. If I remember correctly, they were working on cross-species genetics, spiders or something. I caught a glimpse of their files once when I sneaked into their office and—"
Peter's voice died in his throat. His jaw dropped as a horrifying realization dawned upon him.
"Holy shit," Peter whispered, the blood draining from his face.
Harry snapped his fingers, his eyes widening. "It all makes sense now! When the Oscorp building was wrecked a while back by those giant meat monsters, the structural damage was catastrophic. There might have been a massive containment breach in the lower labs. The spiders must have escaped during the chaos."
"And three of those radioactive, genetically altered spiders ended up biting these three," Sam finished grimly, crossing her arms as everyone stared at the terrified trio.
The look of realization that washed over Peter, Gwen, and Mary Jane quickly morphed into pure, unadulterated horror.
"Oh my god," MJ and Gwen gasped at the exact same time.
"We got bitten by sci-fi, experimentally mutated spiders?!" MJ shrieked, her hands flying to her face as a full-blown mental breakdown initiated. "What if it causes something horrible? What if our DNA degrades? What if we get some weird super-cancer, or AIDS, or—or our organs just liquefy?!"
"What if we turn into giant mutant spider-monsters and eat our loved ones?!" Gwen yelled, clutching her head in sheer panic, her enhanced strength nearly tearing her own hair out. "What if I lay eggs in someone's chest?!"
Peter was faring no better, hyperventilating as he stared at his hands, fully expecting them to sprout pincers at any given second.
CLAP!
A sharp, deafening clap echoed through the living room. Danny stood up tall, instantly drawing everyone's frantic attention towards himself.
"Okay. First of all," Danny said, his voice dropping into a serious, authoritative tone that brooked no argument. "No one is turning into any sort of mutant spider. No one is eating their loved ones. And absolutely no one is laying eggs in anybody. Not on my watch."
The trio blinked, their panic halting just enough to listen.
"As for what exact types of changes have occurred in your body down to a cellular level, I know exactly how we can test and find those out," Danny said with unwavering resolve. He looked around the room. "And to do that, I need to take you guys to our lab."
Everyone blinked a couple of times.
The word 'Lab' hung in the air like a foul smell.
Of course, they all knew that Danny and his eccentric parents had a massive, sprawling laboratory down in the basement where they did God-knows-what.
But sitting in the presence of someone who had just casually theorized about super-soldier spiders, the word 'lab' was not sitting well with them.
Not one bit.
Sensing their hesitation, Danny offered them a reassuring smile.
"Don't worry, guys. The tests will be completely safe and secure. We are professional scientists, not mad monsters."
Unfortunately, his attempt at a comforting expression twisted into a rather sinister, unhinged grin.
It made the entire gang flinch backward instinctively.
Smack!
"Ow! What the fuck, girl?!" Danny exclaimed, rubbing the back of his head where Sam had just swatted him.
"Stop smiling like that, you dumbass," Sam scolded, rolling her eyes. "It was seriously creeping us out. You looked like you were about to dissect them."
"Oh," Danny muttered, his cheeks flushing slightly as he quickly fixed his posture and dropped the grin. "Right. Sorry. Well, since I've said my piece, let's get going."
He gestured for them to follow, turning on his heel.
They all stood up slowly, trailing behind him with hesitant steps, still entirely unsure of what to do with their newly overpowered limbs.
But their collective unease spiked even higher when they noticed Danny wasn't leading them toward the basement door in the kitchen.
Instead, he was walking toward the door that led out to the garage.
"Uh, Danny?" Tucker asked, pausing in the doorway. "Why aren't we going down to the basement?"
"Oh, the lab down there is still a massive mess from the last... incident," Danny replied casually, not looking back. "So we decided to move the lab elsewhere."
They didn't like the sound of that at all.
Sure, they knew the basement lab had been heavily damaged in a recent accident, but shouldn't the Fentons have fixed it by now?
And what exactly did 'moving the lab elsewhere' entail?
The gang cautiously followed Danny into the dim, spacious garage.
They actively made sure to give Peter, MJ, and Gwen a wide berth, staying a few feet away from the spider trio just in case their unpredictable senses or strength acted up again.
Sitting proudly in the center of the garage was the vintage yellow Cadillac from the 1960s.
An old junk that once belonged to Danny's grandfather.
But now?
It didn't look like an old junker anymore.
The car was newly painted, gleaming under the fluorescent garage lights like an absolute beauty. Danny had clearly poured hours into repairing it.
Judging by the slightly altered chassis, the expanded interior, and the subtle, high-tech modifications bolted onto the frame, it had been heavily upgraded. It was now more than comfy and well-spaced enough to fit the entire gang.
Danny stepped up to the driver's side, popped the door open, and slid into the leather seat.
JUGH, JUGH. VROOM, VROOM!
He turned the key, and the heavy engine roared to life with a deep, powerful purr that vibrated through the concrete floor.
Tucker stood frozen, his mouth hanging wide open in pure betrayal.
"You absolute asshole," Tucker pointed an accusing finger at Danny. "You completely repaired and modded this masterpiece, and you still used that rickety old bicycle of yours to ride to school every day when you could have been driving this?! Just what else are you hiding, man? Do you have a stealth tank parked somewhere?!"
Danny just leaned out the window and flashed them that same unsettling, ear-to-ear grin.
"Oh my god. There is that smile again," Lizz muttered under her breath, shivering slightly as she hugged Harry from the side.
Seeing them overreacting and standing around making fun of him, Danny rolled his eyes playfully. "Get your asses inside this instant before I leave you all here to figure out your spider-powers on your own."
That broke the spell. They scrambled, quickly piling into the heavily modified car and claiming their respective seats.
The expanded interior easily accommodated everyone, though Peter still looked terrified of ripping the leather upholstery.
Sam slid into the passenger seat, buckling up and shooting Danny a skeptical look. "Do you even have a driver's license?"
"Yup," Danny said, popping the 'p' with a smirk.
He pumped his foot onto the accelerator, the engine growling in response. With a smooth shift of gears, the yellow Cadillac peeled out of the garage and sped off into the streets.