#beybeyebyebeye

"Maybe I should ask Percy for a j"

"What're you doing?" Angelina leans on the desk.

John doesn't even finish writing the word 'job' before slamming the book shut in a panic. He looks up at her, in all her beauty, and he can feel his cheeks burning up ever so slightly, "I'm not doing anything."

She crosses her arms and hums, "uhuh, and I just won a million pounds."

"Aren't you technically a millionaire?" John pushes his chair away from the desk, turning it around so he's facing Angelina. He tries not to swivel too hard, but it's difficult with his advanced strength - he ends up doing at least nine spins, he may have lost count at one point. He silently curses himself.

Angelina purses her lips, "billionaire, actually." She inhales through her nose, "but that's not the point, are you going to tell me what you were writing? Or am I going to have to find out for myself?"

"It's.." he fiddles with the cover, "it's embarrassing."

Angelina obviously doesn't take that as an answer as she attempts to grab the notebook. John's enhancements, thankfully, allow him to be just a little bit quicker, and he pulls it out her reach.

She groans, "come on, just tell me!"

John stands up and puts the book into his bag, slinging it over his shoulder, "nope."

"You're no fun at all," Angelina said, gently punching his arm. He winced as her knuckles clashed with a spot that was still bruised from a fight last night.

"I'm plenty fun!"

She laughed, "sure you are."

They walk out of their shared office (which, in reality, is really just Angelina's office, as she's one of the Bugle's best journalists, and he's just a mere freelance photographer who doesn't really need an office) and into the lobby of the Daily Bugle. John catches a glimpse of the TV and pauses to watch it.

Angelina's still talking ("I hope you're all ready for tonight..") but he can't pay her any attention. Another news outlet, the New York Bulletin (one that doesn't drag his name through the mud), is on the TV, and, even silent, it's obvious a villain is out by the way the presenter is panicking.

He sighs and silently backs back into the office. He slides the window open.

-

"Charlie! Long time no see, man!"

In the mask, John does his best to drop his accent - anything to help him become less recognisable.

The creature in the road snarls and throws a car at him. Rude. "Bird."

He swings out of the way and lands a fair distance away from the Raptor. John shoots webs at him to distract him, and yes, he knows that he should've picked a spider-inspired alias, but he was months into the job when somebody pointed it out. He figured it was just too late to change from Pheasant-Man.

"How was your time in the Raft? You're out a bit early, not enjoying it?" John swung by the villain.

He got a lamp post to the gut as a response.

"I'll take that as a no," John wheezed, trying to recompose himself.

Charlie Fitzgibbons, now more better known as The Raptor, was one of RoCorp's top scientists. He went missing one day, and the next time anybody saw him, he was more reptile than man. He became one Pheasant-Man's more prominent villains, being fuelled by rage and-

"Why do you have a gun- two? Two guns? Really? Why?" John was baffled, to say the least, "why do you need two guns? You barely even need one!"

He was so thankful for his sixth sense which alerts him when Raptor shoots at him. He flips out of the way.

"Seriously- why? What's the point?" He jumps onto the side of a building, attempting to get a vantage point to assess his action plan, "you have super strength, so what is the need for two - really big - guns! How'd you even get Raptor-sized ones anyway?"

The Raptor shoots at him yet again, John decides he's getting quite bored of the one-sided conversation. Their shadows get longer as the sunsets, he noticed. Listen, he knows that he shouldn't pay attention to their shadows, but he's a photographer! It's not his fault he has an eye for the finer details.

John webs at the Raptor's leg, pulling it and tripping him over. He drops a gun (thank god), which John webs away, far from the Raptor's reach.

The Raptor snarls again as he stands and John gets closer.

"Okay then, since you don't seem interested in answering any of my questions, how 'bout we wrap this up then? You go back to the Raft, I go home and get a full eight hours," he swivels out the way of yet another bullet, "it seems like a win for everyone!"

"I'm not going back there-"

"Oh good! I was beginning to think you had lost your ability to speak!"

"-and even if you do send me back, I'll just get out again."

Another shot, John rolled out the way this time.

"Let's talk about that, how do you keep getting out, exactly?" John webs both the Raptor's left leg and arm, causing the beast to fall onto his side. John didn't pay any mind to the dent in the road.

And of course the Raptor doesn't answer - why would he? He just gets up and decides to throw a large piece of concrete at him. John dodges it with ease. But then his senses alert him of another piece of concrete hurtling towards him, he barely has the time to move.

It skims his upper arm, making him inhale in pain. It's not the worst injury he's ever gotten, but it still stung. These types of cuts always do.

The Raptor decides he wants to start using his gun again, much to John's chagrin, and began to shoot at him. John dodged all the bullets with ease and, seriously, how many could that gun possibly hold? He hasn't noticed the Raptor reload at all, so he was surely running out.. right?

John sincerely hoped he was.

He heard the helicopter whirring above, finally, it was time to wrap this up. His job was to distract, disarm and incapacitate. The officials had the tranquillisers - that he did help make, by the way, he just wasn't allowed to use them after he accidentally tranquillised a civilian. It wasn't his fault that his sense was going haywire for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

"Sounds like your rides here, Charlie," he said as he rolled closer. All John needed to do was get close enough to take the gun away and to web him to any surface so the officials could sedate him. "I really enjoyed catching up," he kicked the creature and webbed one arm to the side of the nearest building, "I would ask 'same time next week?'," another web that managed to encase both legs (score!), "but I don't really want-"

John's senses began to blare in his ear, badly. A constant ringing that wouldn't stop. Something is going to happen, he knows this, and he belatedly releases that the Raptor's claw that was free was unfortunately the same one that had been clutching his gun.

The world around him began to move in slow motion. A gunshot echoed around him.

Before he could do anything, a pain erupted in the right of his stomach. He brought a hand to it, apply pressure.

John winced, "ow, yeah. That has an exit wound." He mustered his strength, and shot another web at the gun, pulling it away. One last web went to the Raptor's hand, making him fully incapacitated.

"Pheasant-Man!" The officials shouted, which meant he can finally leave.

"Sorry, can't stand and chat," he managed to spit through gritted teeth, "because I'm bleeding out and all that."

"Pheasant-Man, we can help you-"

"Byeeee," he said, all too cheery, and swung away into the night sky.

It was daylight, when he started fighting the Raptor. John supposes that time sure does fly by when you're fighting an ex-scientist turned dinosaur.

-

John scales his apartments side, he lived on the 12th floor, which meant too much climbing in his very humble opinion. Oh, also the stairs are a nightmare, but he barely uses them, so he counts himself lucky in that regard.

He always leaves his bedroom window open for when he needs to quickly get in and out; like right now. He's 79% sure he's left a trail of blood up the building and he's entirely thankful to whatever entity is watching over him that he hasn't passed out from blood loss.

He slides his window open just wide enough for him to slip in. As soon as he's in the safety of his bedroom, he takes his mask off gasping for fresh air and collapses, using the wall to steady himself.

He reaches for his aid kit, and just as he's about to grab it, he hears a thud from behind him.

John turns around slowly, his eyes widens as he notices, "Angelina?"

She's stood there, in the middle of his bedroom, mouth agape and her notebooks on the floor. She points at him, "what-"

"What are you doing in my apartment?"

"Your uncle let me in," she shakes herself, "you're Pheasant-Man."

"No I'm not."

"John, you're Pheasant-Man," she says, matter-of-factly.

"Why are you here?" He tries so desperately to change the topic. John momentarily forgets about the wound, it was a moment of bliss that was ruined by a burst of pain. He winces.

"Holy shit, John," Angelina said as she rushes towards him, grabs his aid kit and gently pushes him onto his bed, "I was coming to shout at you for standing me up at our picnic date, maybe even break up with you, again. I wasn't expecting to have to patch up a.. what is that? A bullet wound?"

"That was tonight?" He hisses as Angelina removes his hand from the wound and quickly replaces it with a blanket, "oh, Angel, I'm so sorry."

"I won't forgive you until you answer all my questions and take me on another picnic date," she presses the blanket a little more than necessary, "oh, also you have to let me help you from now on. That's fair, I think. I don't want to even imagine how you fixed up all your injuries before. I've seen how bad they get, I do work for a news outlet after all."

John knows this is a battle he's going to lose, it always is when it comes to Angelina. He may be able to hold his own against rageful monsters, but when it comes to his on-and-off girlfriend? Yeah, he has no chance.

"Whatever you say, my guardian Angel."

-

"Fitzgibbons has been sent back to the Raft, sir."

"That's a shame, truly."

"Would you like me to begin planning his next escape?"

The man paused, "no, not right now. We've got everything we need for now."

He holds up a small tube, half filled with a red, thick liquid.

"Run this through an analysis, would you?" He hands her the tube. She nods. "Oh, but be careful, there's no other blood quite like it, so handle it gently. Thank you, Mrs. Daltrey."