The ringing in her ears faded, replaced by a familiar, lively hum in the back of her skull. May shook her head, a determined grin spreading across her face as her Spider-Sense settled into a clear, guiding pulse. It pointed toward her friends and Kamala's trapped Eevee, who were all still a bit dazed from the blast.
She spotted a HYDRA agent moving in, his stun baton crackling. With a quick, fluid motion, she ducked under his swing and sent him sprawling with a well-aimed punch to the jaw. He hit the ground with a grunt.
Joltik buzzed past her shoulder, a tiny yellow blur. It zipped straight toward a second agent, who was raising his own weapon. A precise Thunder Shock hit the baton's power cell, making it fizzle out in a comical shower of useless sparks. The agent stared at his now-dark weapon, baffled.
May and Joltik shared a quick, triumphant look. That had felt good.
Behind them, Kamala and Doreen started to stir, groaning softly as they tried to get their bearings. Kamala pushed herself up onto her elbows, her voice still wobbly.
"Eevee, use… use Sand Attack!"
Her Eevee, still tangled in wires near the shattered console, gave an awkward, wobbly stretch. It managed to kick up a pathetic little puff of dust that barely traveled a foot before settling.
Doreen, meanwhile, concentrated hard. She tried to summon a spark of her own squirrel-powered energy, but all she managed was a small, fizzy pop of static from her fingertips. It sounded like a soda can opening.
May watched them, a small, understanding smile touching her lips. They'd get there. They just needed another minute.
"Okay, okay, we're working on it," Doreen said, shaking her hand as if she'd touched something sticky. "The squirrels are… recharging."
"My brain feels like it's buffering," Kamala admitted, rubbing her temple. She looked at her Eevee's sad little dust cloud. "And I think Eevee's is, too."
The remaining HYDRA agents, having seen their comrades taken down by a kid and a fuzzy spider, exchanged uncertain glances. The one with the dead baton took a hesitant step back. May planted her feet firmly between them and her recovering friends, her expression shifting from amused to fiercely protective.
"Joltik and I are still fully charged," she said, her voice steady. "You wanna try your luck?"
The ground beneath them gave a low groan. It wasn't a sound of protest, but of surrender.
May felt the floor shift, then buckle entirely under her feet. Before her brain could even form the word 'earthquake,' the whole section collapsed.
She tumbled down into darkness with a startled "Oof!" Her landing was soft, cushioned by a tangled nest of sparking wires and what felt like a broken circuit board. Her Spider-Sense gave a little yelp of surprise, but it was more like getting tapped on the shoulder than a warning.
"Whoa," she breathed, pushing herself up on her elbows. This new level was a maze of dead machinery and thick cables. It wasn't a threat—it was an exciting new puzzle to solve.
From the ragged hole above, a small, cylindrical device dropped down. It landed near her with a soft thud.
It immediately began to whine.
The sound was a high-frequency pulse that drilled straight into May's teeth and made her skull vibrate. She grimaced, instinctively clapping her hands over her ears. The determination in her eyes, however, didn't dim.
"Oh, my fluffy tail!" Doreen whimpered from somewhere above, her voice full of more good-natured complaint than actual pain. She covered her own ears.
Emolga let out a series of frantic chirps and buzzed with erratic sparks, looking profoundly flustered by the awful noise. It zipped in a tight, annoyed circle.
Kamala's Eevee gave a soft cry and tried to hide behind her trainer's leg, its fluffy tail shaking. It clearly did not approve of the sonic assault.
"Okay," May said through gritted teeth, the sound making her words tight. "New puzzle. Very loud puzzle."
The throbbing in May's head was a constant drumbeat, but she forced her eyes to focus. She scanned the chaotic room, past the sparking consoles and the nervous HYDRA agents.
There. Mounted on a cracked control panel, a small, black, humming box with a blinking red light. The sonic device. Her target.
Her mind worked quickly, calculating the path. A rusted, sagging pipe ran from the wall near her, up to a jutting beam. From there, a dangling cluster of sparking wires led right to the panel. It was a wobbly, dangerous route. But it was a route.
She took a deep breath, steadying herself. The plan was simple. Get to the box. Silence the noise. She had to move now.
Just as she launched herself toward the unstable pipe, a shadow fell from the hole in the ceiling above. A weighted net, deployed with military precision, dropped directly toward her.
May saw it coming a split second too late. A flicker of surprise—they had backup up there—but her momentum was already committed. She was going to be caught.
"Joltik!"
With a brave, high-pitched chirp, the tiny yellow spider zipped into the air. It didn't hesitate. A focused arc of brilliant yellow electricity shot from its body, striking the center of the falling net.
There was a sharp, satisfying POP! and the smell of burnt synthetics. The net spasmed, every conductive fiber fried in an instant, and fell in a smoldering, harmless heap beside May.
May landed on the pipe, her heart pounding with a sudden rush of gratitude. She looked at Joltik, who hovered proudly for a moment before zipping back to her shoulder.
"You're the best," she whispered, her voice full of fierce pride. Her partner had her back. Now, she had a job to finish.
Stun batons clattered off the twisted metal around her, and tranquilizer darts zipped past with little thwip sounds. Up above, the remaining HYDRA agents seemed to have decided on a full-on barrage, which May found kind of over the top and, honestly, a bit silly. It was like a really bad party where everyone was throwing the wrong kind of confetti.
"I want a visual on that pest! Get down there!" one particularly angry-sounding agent yelled.
May glanced up just in time to see one of them hook a cable to the railing and start to rappel down into the wrecked chamber. Okay, so they weren't giving up. The situation was officially a multi-directional, slightly goofy onslaught.
Her eyes met Joltik's big blue ones. He was perched on a piece of conduit, watching the descending agent with focused intensity. They didn't need words. A plan formed between them in that shared look, simple and clear.
"Joltik, String Shot! On the rope!" May called out, her voice cutting through the noise.
Joltik didn't hesitate. He reared back and fired a thick stream of sticky silk. It wasn't aimed at the agent himself, but at the rappelling line just above the man's gloved hands. The white strands splattered against the cable, instantly gumming up the mechanism.
The agent's smooth descent turned into a jerky, tangled halt. He let out a grunt of surprise, dangling awkwardly about ten feet off the ground, one hand stuck fast to the line. He flailed his free arm, trying to peel the sticky webbing off, which only made it worse.
With the rappelling agent turned into a temporary decoration, May's entire focus snapped back to the primary goal. That high-pitched whine from the sonic device was like a drill in her skull. She had to shut it up.
She became a blur of red and blue motion. Darting under a falling stun baton, she twisted around a support column, using the debris as cover. Every movement was fluid, instinctive. The projectiles kept coming, but they might as well have been moving in slow motion.
Her world narrowed to the path between her and that humming, blinking piece of HYDRA tech. She vaulted over a sparking console, landed in a crouch, and pushed off again. Nothing else mattered. She just had to reach it and silence it for good.
"Leave my friends alone!"
May's shout was small but fierce, a bright point of defiance in the ruined room. The lead agent paused, the containment emitter in his grip crackling inches from the trapped Eevee. He saw a child standing on shaking legs, a tiny yellow spider sparking on her shoulder. He saw a target.
He did not see the calculation in May's eyes, the quick flicker of her gaze from the emitter to the exposed console beside her. Spider-Sense painted a line between the two. Her body still ached from the explosion, but her mind moved fast.
She lunged, not at the agent, but past him. Her small fist, powered by everything she had, slammed into the side of the humming console. Wires tore. Circuits snapped with a shower of yellow sparks.
The containment field around Eevee flickered and died with a pathetic fizzle. The device in the agent's hand went dark. He stared at it, then at May, his surprise quickly hardening into anger.
"You little—"
He never finished. A web-line shot from May's wrist, snagging the useless emitter and yanking it from his grasp. It clattered across the rubble.
***
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