Spider-Man of Earth 65

His Spider-Sense had never hit him so hard. Adapting, adrenaline pumping and boosting his speed. Time slowed to a halt.

Think.

Think about everything. 

'I know Eleanor. I know Alistair. They wouldn't kill each other. No way. It's impossible. This must be a set-up. This…' 

Don't be stupid. Consider everything. Think, analyze, then conclude. 

'First, the Advanced Glasses are recording everything. So if at any point the crime scene does not look like this when the police come, it means something is up.' 

Yes, the police would come. Not now, but soon. 

Time still slowed, his eyes swept across everything. From the door, the crime scene was arranged as such: on the far left, pressed to the wall was the king-sized bed with Eleanor Bishop lying. Blood was dripping down from her wound to her toes. Her heels were dangling and lightly touching the floor. Her eyes were wide open and in shock. 

In between was a large fluffy white carpet stained by blood. Wheel marks flattened much of it. A window too, screwed shut, with a wide, black dresser with a snowball and a high school science fair award. 

To the far right, head leaning on the wall was Alistair Smythe. Dead in his wheelchair. 

The Advanced Glasses confirmed their deaths. For an autopsy, he would need to come closer.

Except…

'My fingerprints. The door, the elevator, it's all there! And I told the butler I would be going to the bathroom!' 

Shit, shit! No matter which way you picked it, this looked horrible for him! Did someone set him up? Or was this just shitty timing?

Think.

Think.

This crime scene…the sealed window…the malfunctioning cameras…

'It looks like a double kill.' 

In conclusion: Felix Faeth was not being set-up. Not likely. This was just bad timing. So what next? What should he do?

His emotions finally kicked in. 

Felix didn't know where to look. He didn't know who to go to. Both were confirmed dead. "Alistair!" 

He decided to go to his friend. 

He saw the boot prints left on the carpet. He had to avoid disturbing them for the police. Felix closed his eyes and activated his invisibility. He jumped to the ceiling and proceeded to crawl over to Alistair's side.

'With invisibility, I don't leave behind fingerprints. Dammit, I should have done this from the start. I got arrogant.' 

He stopped a foot short of his dead friend. Head leaning back on the wall, the wheelchair eerily still, his eyes were closed. Alistair's scowl was gone. No more tension, no more life. His vessel had once housed some of the greatest discoveries in human history. 

Felix's expression contorted from sorrow to anger to nothing.

'Alistair…' 

Alistair started everything for him. He created the spider. He had been there at the attack on Oscorp. He defended Reed.

He didn't deserve this.

'...or did he?' 

That horrifying thought seeped into his head. Why did Alistair die? Who killed him? Whoever had set this up clearly intended for Eleanor to take the fall. 

He eyed the wound on his forehead. Blood was trickling and there was a large swell. Felix squinted. 

'Blunt force trauma,' Felix noted. 'Nothing too crazy but…' 

In the fluffy white carpet was a circular stain of blood. Overall, there were two main marks of blood on the carpet: one was a long, river-like stream that emerged from Eleanor and her stab wound. The second mark was at the edge of the carpet due to the blood from Alistair's bullet wound that fell and then coursed toward it. 

'It really does look like a double murder.' 

From this view, from Alistair's view, deducing what happened was simple: Alistair must have hidden a knife and stabbed Eleanor with a sudden charge. Eleanor gasped, reeled back until she sat on the bed, and proceeded to shoot Alistair.

It really was that obvious. The blood trails supported it and so did the wheel marks.

Felix tapped at the Advanced Glasses. 

'In the world of forensic, luminol spray can find traces of blood, even if the blood is cleaned or removed. Spray it all over a room, turn off the lights, and voila. Bright blue blood will appear.'

The Advanced Glasses via Detective Mode could replicate the blood analysis without luminol spray. Except…

'Nothing. The blood is as it seems. On the carpet.' 

No, no, no. He had been hoping for a difference. For proof that something else had gone on. 

"Did Alistair and Eleanor really kill each other?"

The stench of blood thickened. Felix was silent, invisible while attached to the wall. He decided to crawl over to Eleanor's side. Except…

"Huh?"

When he came above the door, he saw something behind it. Since he had flung it open, the front of the door had been hidden to him. But above, now that he could see it…

'It's not blood. The Advanced Glasses are picking up chemicals! I knew it! Somebody used heavy cleansers to wipe the blood in places!' 

Carefully, he pushed the door so he could get a full view. He did not dare to go down, he remained attached to the wall. His Advanced Glasses did the rest.

Sniff, sniff.

"No smell so it has to be some kind of modified bleach." 

Anyone that watched crime shows or, in Felix's case, worked at a forensics lab once, would know that bleach was effective not in cleaning blood but ruining its ruined biological make-up. In other words, with bleach, the blood cannot be matched. It just becomes "blood stain" instead of "identified person X's blood stain".

'If I didn't have the Advanced Glasses, I wouldn't have been able to detect this at all. Moreover…'

CHEMICAL MATCH FOUND: CLARIOX: SILENT PURGE COMPOUND. SOLD ON THE BLACK MARKET.

FORMULA: A PROPRIETARY MIXTURE OF CHLORINATED COMPOUNDS, MOLECULAR DESTABILIZERS, AND EVAPORATIVE AGENTS.

APPEARANCE: CLEAR, WITH THE VISCOSITY OF WATER AND A SLIGHTLY GLOSSY FINISH WHEN FRESHLY APPLIED. UNDER BLACKLIGHT, IT EMITS A FAINT, PALE BLUE GLOW FOR THE FIRST FIVE MINUTES. THEN FOR ONE MINUTE IT IS IN A TRANSITION PHASE WHERE IT IS INVISIBLE TO THE EYE BUT NOT IN THE DARK OR WITH PROPER VISION. FOLLOWING THIS PHASE, THE BLOOD DISAPPEARS. 

So right now it was in the transition phase? Felix decided, 'To hell with it.' He reached forward with a finger and scooped up the blood. 'Alright, so in ten or twenty seconds, this blood is going to disappear unless I do something. My options are…' 

Ah! Got it!

Bzcchht! 

Black lightning coursed through his finger and suddenly, it was back. The once invisible blood was completely red. 

"Nice!" 

He reached forward, finger flat on the door, and let the black lightning do its work. See, this bleach was contingent on being a molecular destabilizer. 'Lightning is capable of destabilizing or stabilizing those molecules if you know what you're doing.' 

Felix Faeth was a genius scientist that worked at Oscorp. Of course he knew what he was doing.

Bzchhht!

It was a miracle. Once invisible, now totally red and visible. Blood trailed down from the back of the door.

So…what did this mean? 

"It likely means Alistair's head hit the door wall. Let's imagine the crime scene here. Me, Yuri, and Alistair come into the mansion. Alistair goes upstairs to change and take a shower. Alistair rolls through and the door…it's automatic. He's disabled, so of course it is. It will open and close by itself. When he comes inside…"

Bang.

"Alistair gets shot, rolls back, and his head hits the door hard. Blood splatters and trails down like how it is now. The murderer applied the Clariox at the end, roughly five minutes ago. That means the killer is likely nearby but…I...I can't…" 

He couldn't chase after them! He just couldn't! Not when he was supposed to be in the bathroom! Not when he had his own fingerprints to clean up! The cameras too…they were inactive.

"I need all the cameras in this mansion to be activated. I need an alibi." He looked to his left, right, then up. "There. I see it. The primary security room. Directly above."

Felix crawled out of the room and thwip! Shut the door! He crawled and crawled and then climbed on the railing to the next floor. He flipped to his feet and darted close. "No fingerprints on the door knob. This killer was careful."

He went invisible and turned the handle. Inside, he was greeted by the light of seventeen monitors. Seventeen monitors for the seventeen places cameras in the mansion. His eyes flicked over to the lightswitch beside it. This room was totally dark but someone definitely flicked on the lightswitch. But no fingerprints again. No fingerprints anywhere. He went to the monitors and checked the recordings.

"Cameras have been scrambled but I should be able to reconnect them," Felix murmured. In thirty seconds, after some typing, the cameras were on. "This isn't good. All the data for the security cameras has been destroyed. All except for the front door but even that's only limited to the last three days."

CONNECTION CONFIRMED. INSERTING ALIBI FOR DR. FAETH. 

Herbie was the most advanced AI in the world. Forget looping or whatever, Herbie could generate and fake any type of content. Audio, images, or videos, it did not matter. Herbie could fake it. 

"The front door footage is available though. Why is that?"

He rolled the footage back to one hour ago. His heart stopped.

"No…no, it can't be."

Carrying an unconscious Eleanor Bishop was—

"No."

He had to clean up his fingerprints. Now.

***

"Ah, you took your time." 

Felix pretended to be surprised. Standing just outside the bathroom, arms crossed with an unreadable expression, was Yuri Watanabe. Her presence was unnervingly steady, her sharp eyes giving him a once-over.

Felix managed a casual shrug, cocking his head slightly. "Did I? Sorry, it was the toilet. There were like… three modes." He scratched his neck, looking back into the bathroom with a half-smile.

Yuri's gaze softened just a bit. "Yes, it's what Mr. Smythe wanted," she replied, almost as if explaining some unusual quirk about her employer's preferences. "Alistair preferred his home… advanced." After a brief pause, she looked up at the hallway. "Though, come to think of it… he's been gone for a while now. I should check on him."

Felix's mind raced, but he kept his expression neutral. "I'll come with you," he offered, casually pressing the elevator button nearby. Yuri accepted since there was no reason not to. 

The elevator ride up to the second floor was a quiet one. Felix's heart was pounding, but he focused on keeping his face calm, breathing slow. He couldn't afford to look suspicious.

The second-floor corridor stretched out, dim and silent, with the final door at the end looming ominously. Yuri's pace was brisk, unsuspecting, and Felix matched her stride as they reached the door. She knocked twice, and, hearing no response, gave him a brief look before turning the handle.

The door swung open, revealing the room exactly as Felix had left it.

Felix's heart lurched, but he kept his expression schooled, his shock masked behind a carefully maintained neutral stare. Alistair Smythe was still slumped in his wheelchair, head angled forward, lifeless. The choke marks around his neck stood out starkly against his skin, and the bloodstain from the bullet wound in his stomach had darkened, spreading ominously across his shirt. On the bed lay Eleanor Bishop, a knife buried in her chest.

"Oh god…!" 

Felix feigned shock and a gasp. 

Yuri's eyes and mouth went wide, her controlled demeanor slipping for the first time. She rushed to Alistair's side, her hands hovering over his shoulders as if she wanted to reach for him but was paralyzed by the realization. "Mr. Smythe…Mr. Smythe…! Mr. Smythe!"

No answer. He was dead. Alistair Smythe had been dead for fifteen minute now. 

Felix was already pulling out his phone. "I-I'm calling the police," he said. No amount of acting was necessary—his shock and grief were genuine.

As he pressed the phone to his ear, Yuri turned to him, her face pale but composed, her professionalism swiftly taking over. "Stay here," she commanded, standing up abruptly. "I'll check the cameras on the third floor. Perhaps they caught something."

Felix nodded numbly as Yuri hurried out of the room, her footsteps fading down the hallway. As he connected with the police dispatcher, his voice was hollow. "There's been a murder. Two people… they're both dead."

Ah, the emotions were flooding through him again. Rage, fear, confusion, and most of all, sadness. 

The dispatcher assured him that officers were en route, but Felix barely registered the response. His gaze lingered on Alistair, his mind reeling. Alistair was a colleague, an ally—someone he'd trusted, however guardedly. 

To see him like this… it struck a nerve he hadn't expected.

Deep, deep down, Felix hoped this didn't happen because of him.

***

It didn't take long for the NYPD to swarm the estate. The mansion, once so quiet and pristine, now buzzed with voices, radios, and the sounds of flashlights sweeping across the walls. The kitchen had been converted into a temporary holding area where Felix sat at the far end of the table, his head low, exhaustion settling heavily into his bones. 

'Officer Grimm is here. Thank god. That means the likelihood of there being a coverup is next to none.' 

NYPD Officer Ben Grimm—a big, gruff man with a presence like a boulder. The one officer that Spider-Man could trust. The one officer Felix could trust. 

Officer Grimm held a water bottle in his hand, which he extended to Felix. "Here," he said. "Take a minute."

Felix accepted the bottle silently, his fingers curling around it as he stared at the table. He hadn't realized just how drained he felt until that moment, the grief and confusion finally catching up with him. Taking a few sips of water, he managed to find his voice, though it was low and heavy.

"Thanks." He set the bottle down, watching as Grimm took the seat across from him. 

"We've met before, haven't we?"

"Y-yeah, we have. Oscorp Tower, remember?"

"Even Alistair Smythe…knew it." Officer Grimm pulled out a notepad. "Look, I gotta ask you some questions. Walk me through what happened."

Felix inhaled sharply. "I was here as a guest," he began slowly. "My first time here, actually. Alistair invited me for dinner after we bumped into each other at the concert."

"Which concert?"

"Black Cat. Felicia Hardy, I think her name is. It happened at the MetLife Stadium."

"You said it was a coincidence?"

"I knew he was going, just not where or anything. I had a neighbour's son with me. It was, well, there's a bit of context there but—"

"No need, just move on. What happened here when you came? Nothing suspicious? A smell maybe?"

"Not really. Alistair was alive and he smelled and acted normally. He said he was going to take a shower and change, so Yuri took me to the kitchen. After some minutes, I excused myself to use the bathroom."

Grimm scratched his chin, listening intently.

"I… took a little longer than usual because I had issues with the toilet and the sinks," Felix continued. He wasn't lying. If an officer were to go and check the toilets and sinks right now, they would be struck by how futuristic they appeared. "When I came out, Yuri was waiting outside. She mentioned Alistair was taking a while, so we decided to check on him." Felix glanced down, fidgeting with the water bottle cap. "When we got upstairs, we found… them. Alistair and Eleanor, both dead."

"Eleanor?" Officer Grimm looked up, his gaze sharp but not unkind. "You know the woman?"

"I…we went on a date not too long ago."

Suspicion crossed him. "And you were in the bathroom the whole time?"

"Yeah. You can ask Yuri, I was only in there for four or five minutes. And when we came up, it was just… like that."

Grimm's expression was unreadable as he set his notepad aside. He hesitated, his next words careful. "Right now, we're treating this as a murder investigation," he said. "But we don't know all the details yet. It could be a murder-suicide, or it could be something else entirely."

Felix breathed steadily, his fingers gripping the edge of the table. "Do you think… someone killed them both?"

Grimm raised a hand, silencing him gently. "I can't say anything concrete just yet. We have to be thorough, especially with a high-profile case like this. But for now, both you and Yuri are considered persons of interest. That means we'll need to bring you both in for questioning."

Felix swallowed hard, the reality of the situation setting in. He'd expected this, but hearing it confirmed felt like a punch to the gut. 

He nodded slowly, meeting Grimm's gaze. "I understand," he said quietly.

Because while Officer Grimm said person of interest, what he really meant was suspect.