Compared to Peter and Gwen's relatively gentle awakenings, Cindy's morning was a full-blown disaster.
She was not woken up by family or an alarm clock.
She was woken up by a mosquito.
In her hearing, that mosquito was dozens of times more unbearable than it would have been to a normal person. Her new abilities still couldn't sort or filter things properly.
The flood of sensory information was overwhelming her.
"Please... please stop..." Cindy groaned, covering her face in misery.
She stumbled toward the bathroom, hoping a splash of water would clear her head. But the moment she reached for the faucet, webbing shot straight out of her fingertips.
It fired without warning and splattered across the mirror, instantly covering the whole thing.
She had absolutely no control over it.
Worse, somewhere in the back of her mind, she could even sense where another person was.
But she could not think about that right now.
She was shooting webs.
Actual webs.
"What... what the hell is this?!" She tried to tear the webbing off, but it was absurdly strong, sticky and elastic at the same time. She barely managed to rip part of it away, only to end up gluing her own hand to it instead.
Just as she was about to cry from sheer frustration, the phone on her bed started ringing.
She rushed over and answered it with the hand that was not stuck.
"Cindy, it's me, Peter." Peter's voice on the other end immediately steadied her a little. "I know you might be scared, and you might not be able to explain what's happening with science yet, but Clark, Gwen, and I are on our way to your house right now."
The second she heard that, tears sprang to Cindy's eyes.
The timing could not have been better.
"Peter!" she nearly cried into the phone. "I've turned into a monster! I can shoot webs! My hand is stuck too..."
Peter froze on the other end. He had not expected Cindy's changes to be this different.
He glanced at Clark, who was still driving, then answered quickly, "Don't panic. Gwen will help you when we get there, and then we'll go somewhere safe."
Clark sped up.
They arrived quickly, Gwen helped Cindy get cleaned up and straighten out both her clothes and the mess in the house, and then the four of them headed back out.
An hour later, they arrived at the place Clark had used for training before, the big abandoned factory.
Clark had driven the family's second car and parked it inside a hidden warehouse bay.
From what he knew, the traces he had left behind from his own earlier "stress relief" sessions had scared off even the boldest homeless squatters.
The car doors opened, and four teenagers stepped out.
Peter, Gwen, and Cindy stood together, all three looking awkwardly at one another, the mood equal parts weird and oddly intimate, like three people who had just discovered they were all aliens.
Of course, the actual alien was standing off to the side watching these Earthlings.
Clark just smiled and said nothing.
Cindy kept having little strands of web appear on her hands and had to awkwardly clean them off. Gwen was the calmest of the three, though it was obvious she was at least partly trying to look composed in front of Clark. Peter, meanwhile, kept rubbing his hands together like a nervous fly, as if trying to discharge static electricity.
Clark leaned against the hood of the car with his arms crossed, radiating the air of a seasoned older guardian, silently evaluating the three kids in front of him.
"All right. Now that everyone's here, there's no point hiding it anymore," Clark said first, his tone firm and certain.
"In Osborn's lab yesterday, I saw the two spiders fall from the ceiling. They bit Peter and Cindy, then one bit Gwen. Norman Osborn is covering it up."
The three of them all inhaled sharply at the same time.
None of them had expected that.
"So... we're Spider-Men now?" Peter said, blurting out something no one had been ready for.
That only made Cindy feel worse, because out of the three of them, she was the one who felt the most literally spider-like.
She could actually shoot webs.
Peter was exactly the kind of person who only realized he had said the wrong thing after it was already out of his mouth.
He immediately started waving his hands, trying to explain that he had not meant it like that.
Clark, meanwhile, could only stare at his brother in disbelief.
How did he always manage to bring up exactly the worst possible thing?
Then Clark pointed toward the abandoned factory behind them. "Forget the spider part. The real issue is that none of you understand your powers, and none of you can control them. Unless you want everyone at school tomorrow finding out your secret."
Gwen had no issue at all with Clark training them. She still remembered what happened when they were kids.
Clark was definitely not ordinary.
Peter, meanwhile, trusted every idea his brother had. If Clark said it, Peter would do it. If Clark thought it, Peter would follow through.
And as for Cindy, she did not have especially strong opinions of her own. She tended to go along with the flow, and as a classic nerd type, she was more than happy to let someone else take the lead.
"Come on," Clark said. "Let's figure out your limits."
This time, Clark did not take them to the same section of the factory he had used before. He chose another area instead.
Otherwise, he would have exposed himself immediately.
All three of them were too smart to miss the clues.
"Peter, you're up first." Clark pointed at a machine that had to weigh several tons.
He wanted Peter to test his strength on it.
Peter looked at the machine, then at his own body, then back at his brother.
His eyes were full of question marks.
He trusted Clark.
That did not mean he believed he could lift that.
But seeing the serious look on Clark's face, Peter let out a sigh and walked over anyway.
"Ahhh!" He planted both hands on it and used every ounce of strength he had, even shouting with effort.
Then his expression changed.
"Huh? Wait, why is this so light?"
He lifted it in one go.
Then he started laughing, his face lighting up with excitement.
Peter even began treating it like a barbell, doing reps with it.
Clark nodded, silently noting the rough threshold of Peter's strength. Next time, he would probably double it and test again.
"That's enough, Peter. Stop there. Gwen, your turn."
Gwen stepped forward and lifted with all her strength.
It was clearly nowhere near as effortless for her as it had been for Peter, and Clark nodded, then immediately shifted her to a different test, speed and agility.
He pointed up at the maze of steel beams overhead.
"I don't care how you do it. Get from this side of the factory to the other in under ten seconds. But you're not allowed to touch the floor."
Gwen looked up at the beams hanging dozens of feet overhead.
Without these new powers, trying that would have been suicidal.
But now, as she stared at the steel framework, her mind had already mapped out the perfect route.
She took two steps back, then sprinted.
Her legs drove hard, and she launched upward.
In midair she twisted gracefully, grabbed a beam with perfect precision, and used the momentum to swing herself toward the next one.
Her movements flowed without the slightest wasted motion, like a world-class gymnast performing in zero gravity. Her hands and feet had incredible adhesion, letting her stick securely even to smooth metal surfaces.
In only seven seconds, she had crossed the entire factory.
Then she landed against the far wall in an absurdly stylish superhero pose, standing vertically against it as if gravity had decided not to apply.
"That was awesome!" Peter shouted from below.
Clark nodded and even applauded.
He agreed.
Gwen's mutation path leaned much more heavily toward pure agility, flexibility, spatial balance, and aerial control. She might not match Peter's raw strength, but in a complex environment, her mobility was easily the best of the three.