Marvel: The Enlightened One-Chapter 54: [] - The Lizard, Deceived by the Devil (Bonus)

Chapter 54: [54] - The Lizard, Deceived by the Devil (Bonus)

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Things are about to get interesting from the next Chapter onward...

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By the time Hawk and Gwen made it to the second floor, the Lizard was gone.

In its place was Dr. Connors, reverted to his human form. But the wound in his chest remained—a gaping, irreversible injury.

Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, but as he saw Hawk approaching, he forced a painful smile.

"Thank you!"

"..." Hawk said nothing, just raised an eyebrow as he looked at the dying man.

Gwen, however, was still trying to understand. "Doctor, why did you try to kill me?"

She couldn’t make sense of it.

If Connors was angry about what happened on the Williamsburg Bridge, he should have been after Spider-Man.

If he was after blood, he should have gone after Hawk.

Why her?

Leaning against the wall, completely drained of strength, Connors let out a weak, wheezing laugh.

The movement made his chest heave, and a flush of red spread across his pale face. He coughed up blood, his breathing growing dangerously shallow. As his eyes began to flutter shut for the last time, Dr. Connors whispered his final words.

"I don’t know."

"I think..."

"The devil made me do it."

"I’m... so..."

"...sorry."

Thud.

With that final, strained apology, his eyes closed completely. His lone left arm slapped against the floor with a hollow, final sound.

Dr. Connors was dead.

Hawk’s gaze shifted from the body to Peter standing nearby.

"Are you going to leave or what?"

Peter, who was still reeling from the shock of seeing Connors killed with a single punch, snapped back to reality. "What about you?"

"The Spider-freak killed him. What’s that got to do with me?"

"I’m not a ’spider-freak.’"

"Then the webs..."

"I’m leaving!"

Peter cut the conversation short. He turned, fired a web, and swung through the air, shattering the glass of the skylight with the tip of his boot before disappearing from sight.

Just then, Gwen’s eyes went wide. "The security cameras!"

She grabbed Hawk’s arm and started pulling him toward the library’s security office downstairs.

"Don’t worry. They didn’t see anything."

"Huh?"

"The angle where I hit him was a blind spot. They’ll only see the Lizard flying backward, not who did it."

It was probably just a coincidence.

He honestly didn’t care if he was exposed or not—he hadn’t known it was a blind spot when he threw the punch. He only realized it afterward. 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

Maybe, just maybe, God—if he existed—had decided it wasn’t his time to be revealed.

...

Half an hour later.

The NYPD had arrived and were carrying out the body of Dr. Connors, which was already cold to the touch.

Captain George Stacy of the 19th Precinct was on the scene.

"Gwen!" The moment he got out of his car, he rushed over and pulled her into a tight hug. "Thank God, you’re okay."

"Dad."

Gwen eased out of his embrace, glanced at Hawk, then took his hand. "Hawk saved me,"

George’s eyes turned to Hawk.

Hawk gave a polite, familiar greeting.

"Mr. Stacy."

"Thank you." This time, George didn’t ignore him. He looked him straight in the eye and gave a small, almost imperceptible nod of gratitude.

Hawk smiled. "I just did what I had to."

George said nothing, but his eyes darted for a split second to where his daughter’s hand was firmly intertwined with Hawk’s. He looked back at Gwen. "Call your mother. She was worried sick when she saw the news about the attack at Midtown."

Gwen gasped, realizing she’d forgotten. She quickly pulled out her phone and stepped away to call her mom.

Once she was gone, George stood beside Hawk, looking toward the body bag being loaded into the coroner’s van. "So, the Lizard was Dr. Connors. But what was he doing at the school?"

Hawk’s expression didn’t change. "I don’t know."

But he was thinking about Connors’s last words.

The devil made me do it.

What kind of devil would convince Connors to ignore Spider-Man, the one he had a grudge against, and ignore Hawk, whose blood he supposedly needed, just to make a beeline for the completely harmless Gwen Stacy?

It made no sense.

Unless this devil wasn’t playing by the usual rules.

A moment later, Gwen returned, visibly relieved after talking to her mother. She walked right up to Hawk and naturally looped her arm through his. "All clear with Mom."

George’s eye twitched almost imperceptibly at the casual gesture. He decided it was time to leave.

If he stayed any longer, he might just shoot the kid.

...

Another half hour passed. After the NYPD and Captain Stacy had cleared out, Midtown Tech announced that school was dismissed for the day.

The students, who had still been buzzing with the aftershock of the Spider-Man vs. Lizard battle, immediately erupted into cheers. Praising the school’s wise decision, they bolted for the parking lot like wild horses breaking free from a pen.

Hawk just shook his head, deciding to stop wasting time thinking about Connors’s motives.

The man was dead. Dwelling on it was pointless.

That weekend, Hawk was in his apartment, surfing the web on the laptop he’d bought from Skye, connected to the hotspot from the phone his girlfriend had given him.

He finally had some downtime and decided to look for a way to sell the five Chitauri weapons he had stashed under his bed.

He had to...

He needed to make some money. Otherwise, he wouldn’t even be able to afford a tux for prom.

Theoretically, he didn’t need to worry about money anymore.

But—

When the original Spider-Man had been corrupted by the symbiote, the darkest thing he did was buy himself a cheap suit.

Hawk knew he wasn’t as morally upright as Peter, but he couldn’t be that much worse, could he?

As he was searching for a black-market connection...

A soft thump sounded at his window.

Hawk looked up.

Clinging to the fire escape outside his window, peering in, was the very Spider-Man he had just been thinking about.

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