177. Silent Venom. (Patreon)

Harry Osborn POV:

I sat at the head of the boardroom table and felt sick.

Not the nausea kind. Not the vertigo kind. This was the I want to peel the skin off everyone in this room, starting with Donald Menken kind of sickness. It crawled under my skull, a whisper just behind my thoughts, urging, needling, push harder. Hurt them first before they hurt you. It was more akin to instinct than a desire.

I clenched my jaw and kept my hands flat on the polished surface.

Felicia Hardy sat to my right, calm as a glacier, voice steady as she ran through quarterly reports. She was doing her job perfectly and somehow that made the knot in my chest worse. I genuinely didn’t understand half of what my dad had allowed Oscorp to become. I was standing in the ruins of a kingdom I’d inherited without a map. Only my half assed intuition and common sense to guide me.

I flicked through the holographic files with a sharp gesture. Standard Parker Information and Communications tech.

I was reading the reports and what I found was failures. Piled on failures.

“A stimulant-injecting healing exoskeleton armor,” I said aloud, my voice clipped, tight. “Designed to work in tandem with a missile-equipped glider with retractable blades.”

Menken opened his mouth.

I didn’t let him speak.

“An armored exosuit modeled after a rhinoceros,” I continued, pulling up the next file. “Codenamed Rhino. Stolen by a Russian mobster... Aleksei Sytsevich then dismantled by Spider-Woman in her Iron Spider Mk. II.”

The old men shifted in their chairs. A few avoided my eyes.

I slammed both hands down on the table.

“Look at these.”

The sound echoed, sharp enough to make someone flinch.

“Dr. Connors’s regeneration serum,” I said, dragging the file open with more force than necessary. “A success so catastrophic it got Oscorp’s entire genetics license banned for eighteen months.”

I laughed, short and humorless.

“One impractical weapons platform after another. Millions burned chasing movie-villain fantasies. Hammer drone investments scrapped by Iron Man and Peter Parker before Parker and Stark Industries swallowed Hammer Industries whole.”

I leaned forward, staring them down. “And then you sit here and ask how we fell this far.”

Menken finally spoke. “With respect, Mr. Osborn..."

“No,” I snapped. “Respect was spent before I walked into this room.”

Silence.

I straightened slowly, breathing in through my nose.

“Oscorp Pharmaceuticals,” I said more evenly, “is the only branch of this company that isn’t actively hemorrhaging credibility. So that’s where we focus. Medicine. Practical research. Things that work.”

A few nods. Reluctant but real.

“One project,” I continued, pulling up a new file, “has genuine promise. The genetically modified electric eel power grid. Sustainable. Scalable. Profitable. Perfect for rural power stations.”

I looked around the table.

“If Oscorp is going to survive among giants, we stop chasing miracles and start delivering results.”

No one argued.

Good.

---

The penthouse was too quiet when I got back.

The city stretched beyond the glass, all steel and lights and indifference. I dropped into a chair at the long black table and began tossing a small cube between my fingers. The Oscorp logo etched into every face.

Click. Catch. Click.

It slipped.

The cube landed on the table.

The surface lit up.

CLASSIFIED.

My breath caught.

Files scrolled into view without a prompt.

PROJECT ARACHNID.

I froze.

Oscorp’s attempt at mass-produced super soldiers with the venom derived from Araneus Oscorpeus. The first successful cross-species genetic integration.

My hands trembled as I scrolled.

Dr. Richard Laurence Parker.

Mary Parker.

The note hit like a hammer.

Subjects absconded with research. Asset retrieval authorized.

I stared at the next line until my vision blurred.

Assassin deployed. Resultant plane crash. Subjects deceased. Child orphaned.

Peter Parker.

The room felt suddenly too small. Too hot.

I checked the system, fingers flying. No network connection. No uplink. Air-gapped.

Relief barely registered before rage swallowed it whole.

I grabbed the ceremonial mace from the wall. Some absurd medieval relic my father had liked and had collected and I brought it down on the table.

Once.

Twice.

Again and again and again.

The screen shattered. Sparks jumped. The cube skittered across the floor.

“Harry!”

Felicia’s voice cut through the noise. She ran in, eyes wide, taking in the wreckage, then me. Leaning over the remains of the table, breathing like I’d run a marathon.

My voice shook when I spoke.

“Did you… know Peter Parker? Back when you were a backup vocalist for the Mary Janes?”

She hesitated. Then nodded. “I saw him around. You, Gwen, him. Nothing more than what anyone saw at school. A reclusive nerd who was too good for Gwen Stacy.”

I swallowed.

“Peter’s revenge,” I said quietly, “is silent.”

Felicia frowned but didn’t interrupt.

“I once asked him to carve custom D&D pieces,” I continued. “I wanted a Green Goblin. He made them by hand. Each one carved from a single piece of oak.”

I almost smiled at the memory.

“During the game, he joked harmlessly about me being the Green Goblin. I reacted like an idiot. Flicked the head off the piece.”

Felicia’s lips pressed into a thin line.

“Gwen got angry,” I said. “On Peter’s behalf. He just smiled. Took the piece away.”

The smile faded.

“That indifference made me furious. So I broke the next one. Just to prove something.”

I flexed my fingers unconsciously.

“He brought it back the next week. Looked the same. I flicked the head again.”

I laughed once, sharp and bitter.

“The pain nearly dropped me. Split my nail clean open. Blood everywhere. Turns out he’d carved it from river stone. Those black rocks you find on riversides. He learned stone carving just to teach me a lesson.”

Felicia stared at me now.

“That was the day I realized Peter wasn’t afraid of fighting back,” I said. “He just didn’t want to become a monster.”

I looked out at the city.

“But suppressing rage has limits. I pushed him past his. Asking Gwen to prom even when I knew he liked her. He saw it as betrayal.”

I exhaled.

“After the lizard incident that injured Peter, I left the USA more out of fear than anything. I spiraled in nightclubs and bars in Europe. While Peter rebuilt.”

The room was quiet again.

Then the intercom chimed.

“Mr. Osborn,” the receptionist said carefully, “there’s a… Mr. Aldrich Killian here to see you.”

The whisper in the back of my head stirred.

I straightened. “Send him in.”