Marvel: Death Dealer

Miles had always been cool with George Stacy.

The NYPD captain never showed up empty-handed. A spicy meal from that joint on the corner, a used graphics card, expensive pastries, limited-edition sneakers, or tickets to a basketball game—George always showed up at the apartment with the right gifts. Gifts that made Miles’s whole week, but George never made a big deal of it. He'd drop the loot and sit with Miles to ask how his classes and life were going. George was a good uncle.

And Miles, for his part, never missed a chance to sing the man's praises afterward.

He'd say the same about Gwen, too, on the rare occasions their paths crossed. Once or twice a year, maybe. Sometimes more depending on their schedule. But every single time, Miles came away thinking the same thing: Gwen Stacy was something special. Compassionate without being soft and quick with her words. She was also incredibly intelligent as she solved complex problems without breaking a sweat.

So when the buzzer rang that morning and he walked over to find Gwen and George standing on the other side of the door, his first instinct should have been a smile.

Instead, he felt very uneasy.

They were standing there with solemn expressions like two people barely holding together.

"Uncle George. Gwen. Hey." His voice came out a bit too bright and too eager as he tried to ignore the feeling in his chest. "I, uh… where is dad?"

"Miles, mind if we come in?”

"Yeah—yeah, of course."

Miles guided them to the living room couch. "C'mon, come in, sit down. Give me a second, I'll get you guys something to drink. I think we've still got—"

George placed a heavy hand on Miles’ shoulder. The touch was gentle, but it carried weight.

"Don't worry about that, son." The captain guided him backward, around, easing him down into the armchair like Miles was the guest in his own home. "Just sit. Sit down for me."

Miles sat and looked up at the two of them standing over him. They couldn’t maintain eye contact like they were dealing with guilt or apology. He felt it more from Gwen, somehow. He didn't understand why. She had no reason to look at him like she'd done something unforgivable.

‘Could be the symbiote attacks.’

He'd been sick with worry since yesterday, if he was honest. The reports out of the harbor were horrifying. His dad had been pulled into overtime protecting civilians on that island. Miles had texted him twice last night and gotten one short I'm fine, study hard, love you back, and nothing since.

“Uncle George,” Miles said, unable to stay quiet under the circumstances. “What’s this about?”

George crouched down in front of the chair so they were level. He took a breath and he started to speak.

“Miles… there was an incident during the attack on the island last night.” He paused, like the words physically hurt to say. “Your father… he didn’t make it.”

Miles stared at him without blinking. “No, that's not—you're wrong. He texted me. Last night, he said he was fine, he said he's not—he wouldn't… you've got it wrong…”

George just looked at Miles with heavy sorrow in his eyes.

Miles turned to Gwen desperately, but she lowered her gaze to the floor and shook her head.

Something inside Miles cracked.

***

Miles didn't remember much of that day or the next.

He remembered crying until his eyes burned dry and his throat was raw. He had already lost his mother who died bringing him into the world. His whole life it had been just him and his dad. Two of them against everything.

And now there was one.

Many people came. NYPD by the dozen and his dad's friends he had known since he was small. Many faces, many hands on his shoulder, many arms around him, and the many voices they used to tell stories about Jeff’s heroics. Your dad was the best of us, they kept saying. He always puts others first, how good of a man he was, a hero, and how proud he was of his son.

Nothing changed at the end of the day. Those stories wouldn’t bring his father back. He was gone forever.

The funeral came and went like a bad dream.

George and Gwen sat on either side of him in the front row. A state official stood at the podium and spoke about Jefferson as a hero—how he gave his life protecting the people of New York and how the city would not forget.

Miles was too lost in his own collapsing world to register much of it. He sat hunched and stared at his own hands, drowning in all the good memories he'd never get the chance to make.

The ceremony ended and the crowd slowly left as the sky turned darker and darker. Still, Miles stayed hunched in that front-row seat, unable to make himself move.

George placed a gentle hand on his back. “Miles. Hey. C'mon, son. Let’s go home."

Miles looked up at him and Gwen behind him. George looked pained and helpless, and Gwen’s eyes were red and swollen.

"Can you… Can you guys just… leave me alone for a while?" He hunched over even more and looked at the ground. "Please."

"Alright," George said softly. "If you need anything, we're right here… You're not alone in this. I promise you that."

Gwen patted his shoulder and gave him a small, then the two of them stepped back, leaving him the quiet he had asked for.

Miles looked up once they were gone and stared at the life-like statue of his father that had been placed near the grave. It looked so real as if the real Jefferson could step down from it at any moment and tell him everything was going to be okay. He could almost imagine the stone statue doing that.

The plaque read: Jefferson Davis. Beloved father. Devoted officer. A hero who gave everything for his duty.

"That George guy funded this whole thing, you know."

Miles's eyes went wide at the voice. That voice buried deep. A voice from a part of his life he felt half-convinced he’d dreamed.

On his left, a tall man stood there in the dark, holding two steaming glasses cradled in his hands like he'd been there the whole time. A bit different from the man in his mind but unmistakably him.

“Uncle Aaron…?”

Aaron crossed the short distance between them and pressed one of the steaming glasses into Miles's numb hands. He lowered into the seat beside Miles, his eyes fixed on the statue.

"Jeff…" Aaron exhaled through his nose, his eyes wet with tears. "He’d have hated it. Your old man was ashamed of himself, you know. Right down to the bone."

"…Why?"

Aaron lifted the glass to his lips and took a slow sip. "Jeff and I, we grew up in a hard place, sonnie. Jeff wasn't always cops and medals.” His voice was rough as he went through the old days with his brother. “We did a lot of bad shit, your dad and me, just to keep eating another day.

He glanced at Miles. "You get what I'm saying?"

Miles looked down and stared into the ripples on his drink. He never knew his dad used to be a criminal.

"Tell me something." Aaron's gaze drifted back to the statue. "A cop father with a past like that. Wouldn't he be ashamed of that? Carrying all that around behind the badge?"

“...I don’t know.”

Aaron suddenly crushed the plastic cup in his hand and threw it to the ground. He gripped Miles’ shoulder firmly, forcing the boy to look at him.

“Listen to me, kid,” Aaron said in a serious voice like he was making a vow to himself or Jeff’s statue. "Whatever the hell this world's got waiting for you, I'm gonna get you ready for it. I'm gonna make sure you're never the one lying in the dirt."

***

Ever since that night, Miles went through hell for a few hours every single day.

George Stacy officially adopted him the day after the funeral. Miles now had a new home and a new family, which he’d never fully know how to repay. But Aaron continued mentoring him away from George’s eyes. Whenever Gwen wasn't at home, he leaned on the easy excuse of just going out for some air and slipped away to his uncle.

Aaron, it turned out, was no ordinary man. He was a legend in the criminal world—a thief who used cutting-edge technology to pull off jobs only a few in the world could. Every skill, every technique, every trick of stealth and infiltration and survival in Aaron’s arsenal—he beat it into Miles until it became a second nature.

Eventually, Aaron handed him the Prowler gear.

And for a while, things were good. Or as close to good as Miles could imagine getting.

His adoptive father recovered, slowly settling into not being the captain because of Gwen. Gwen seemed happy with Dante. Miles still cringed whenever he remembered walking in on them that one time, but he was glad she had someone. As for himself, he buried every ounce of grief under the brutal training.

Then Gwen suddenly changed. She wasn’t eating properly. She barely smiled anymore. The light in her eyes had dimmed. She was barely the shadow of that quick-witted girl Miles had always admired.

If there was one thing his father had drilled into him, it was that the family looked out for each other. And Gwen was officially his sister now.

So he steeled himself and went to her room to check on her.

What he found through the doorway made him realize he wasn’t imagining things. Gwen sat before her mirror, staring at nothing. Usually she was too busy yapping to sit still like this.

Miles slapped both his cheeks.

‘Come on, Miles. You got this. Just talk to her.’

He took a breath and raised his hand to knock when a familiar golden portal opened inside Gwen’s room. He’d have screamed if not for Aaron’s training. Because he knew that portal. He had seen it so many times in the viral clips. These fiery rifts proclaimed the arrival of Skullfire. What in God's name did Skullfire want with Gwen?

‘If he's here to hurt her…’

Miles felt his muscles go tight.

‘I… I won't let it happen. I don't care who he is.’

His readiness to throw himself into a fight to the death proved entirely unnecessary.

Because the man who stepped out of the portal wasn’t Skullfire. It was Dante. Gwen’s boyfriend Dante and Skullfire were one and same.

‘Could Gwen be one of Skullfire’s allies?’

Skullfire had many female allies. With this reveal, it wouldn’t be an out-of-the-world possibility for Gwen to be one of them.

Miles stayed completely still, barely breathing as he pressed himself against the wall. The two of them were wrapped up, so absorbed, that neither noticed Miles listening to them through a small crack in the door.

What he overheard left him utterly bewildered.

Why did Harry—MJ's boyfriend, of all people—want to torture Gwen's father? What did she mean about protecting George and Dante? None of it made sense.

He stuck around to catch more, to understand what the hell was going on, but then he heard Gwen's footsteps approaching the door to lock it. He had no choice but to slip silently away into the hall.

From then on, the whole thing lived rent-free in Miles's head.

Wasn't Skullfire the man surrounded by his "bride" and a harem of other women? Or was all of that just internet speculation, rumor piled on rumor? If not, wouldn’t he be cheating on Gwen with others? And the bigger question, the one that wouldn't let him sleep—who really was Gwen?

He considered confronting her to find the truth. But when the moment came, the words died in his throat. How was he even supposed to start that conversation? Hey, sis, I know your boyfriend is Skullfire. Are you one of his superhero colleagues? Phoenix? Ghost Spider? Black Cat? Or that skull-faced Bride of Skullfire? That would make him cringe harder than the time he accidentally found her being intimate with Dante.

“Miles, let’s catch a movie this weekend. I’ll drag Dante along too.”

The first part had him smiling in approval as it would be a good opportunity to ask her, but the last part made him freeze. He was officially screwed. If anything gave away that he knew Dante’s second identity, he would be scorched and buried or teleported to the Himalayas. Maybe Skullfire would lock him up in a prison until he died of hunger.

He pulled at his hair with a groan. “Wait, why am I scared?”

Weren’t they superheroes? Somehow, he had started associating Dante and Skullfire as someone quick to anger, probably because of his appearance. However, Miles knowing Dante’s secret identity wouldn’t be the end of the world as long as he promised to keep it a secret. Or so he hoped.

He thought hard about it and reached the conclusion: he had to make a good impression. He had to start helping people like Skullfire and his allies. That would ease his anger when he finds out about Miles’s little stunt.

‘Before that.’

He walked upstairs to Gwen’s room and did what he absolutely wasn’t very proud of—he searched Gwen’s room with a thief's careful hands. The truth of her secret identity was tucked in a bag, hidden deep in a secret compartment in her closet.

Ghost Spider's costume.

“That checks out.”

He wasn’t the least bit surprised. Gwen had the flexibility and intelligence to be Ghost Spider.

‘Did she go out to beat criminals?’

He frowned and checked the social media feed. The phone nearly slipped from his fingers. Alien insects had descended on the city in thousands. His first instinct was to get the suit and hide somewhere, waiting for this mess to settle. But he recalled Gwen was still out there and she wouldn’t cower and hide. She would be out there on the frontline, in the thick of it, fighting to protect every terrified stranger she could reach.

‘I have to help.’

He might get obliterated in such a swarm, but he had to try at the very least. His father would’ve done the same. Even though it went against every teaching from his uncle, he still donned his suit while trying to reach Gwen through her phone. Despite his numerous attempts, she never answered the call.

‘I’m heading to Silver Sable International.’

He left the house and locked the door. The skies on this side were clear, but he couldn’t say the same about the next block or the one next to that.

‘Dad, wish me luck.’

He was going to need it. A lot of it.