Saving People

After handing little Jack over to his father, Peter flipped over the bridge railing and jumped down.

He wanted to track down the giant lizard that had vanished into the water.

However, after waiting atop the bridge pier for a long time, he found nothing.

The vast sea had erased every trace.

Left with no choice, Peter flipped back up onto the bridge deck.

By then, Captain Stacy, blocked by the jammed traffic, had led a group of officers on foot from the other end of the bridge.

In the distance, fire trucks had arrived outside the bridge as well, but they too were unable to get in because of the massive traffic jam.

When Peter returned, they were agonizing over how to rescue the people in the several cars that had been thrown off the bridge.

Several firefighters were strapping safety ropes onto themselves, apparently preparing to climb down and rescue them.

Seeing this, Peter's eyes lit up.

Wasn't this exactly what he had planned to do earlier?

On the bridge, the firefighters moved slowly, each step cautious and deliberate.

There was no helping it, since the fire trucks were stuck outside and could not get in anytime soon.

And no one knew how long those thin strands of webbing could hold.

They had just watched a car stuck to the webbing fall down.

Some people had even seen the webbing holding cars to the bridge and concluded that the masked spider man who used it was the culprit behind everything. They were cursing and accusing him.

The officers actually believed them. Several of them were even collecting so-called "testimony" on the scene, seemingly intending to pin the blame on Peter.

Peter thought, Good thing I came back. Otherwise, how could I possibly bear this enormous scapegoat charge?

He could already imagine the news he would see when he woke up tomorrow morning:

Was it the collapse of morality, or the distortion of human nature? Last night, the masked madman Spider-Man finally extended his claws toward innocent New York City residents—Daily Bugle

Terror running rampant through the streets, a shadow hanging over New York! Who exactly is Spider-Man?—Daily Bugle

How can citizens' property be protected? And to whom should they entrust their personal safety?—New York Economic Times

Shocking! The widely praised Spider-Man did something like this to innocent citizens on a bridge last night—UC Shock Department New York Branch

Peter shook his head hard, shaking those utterly terrifying images out of his mind.

Without further hesitation, he jogged along the edge of the bridge, waving as he called out, "Hey, let me do it! Let me do it! I can save them."

"Spider-Man!" Captain Stacy and the other officers immediately drew their guns and aimed them at Peter.

Peter froze for a moment, then hurriedly raised both hands. "Hey, I just want to save people. I'm not carrying any weapons!"

"Save people? That webbing on those cars was your handiwork, wasn't it?" Captain Stacy shouted.

"Yes, but—" Peter hurriedly tried to explain.

"You threw them out, and now you want to save them again? Do you take us for fools?" Captain Stacy snapped.

Peter: If you weren't Gwen's father, I'd kick your ass so hard with my spider combat boots that flowers would bloom from it!

But he knew that if he really did that, Gwen would definitely be wearing her sexy little riding boots as she planted one hard on his ass.

Peter sighed. "Captain, ask the people nearby carefully, then take a look at the claw marks on some of those cars."

As he spoke, he gestured to his hands. "Do you think these tiny hands of mine could make claw marks that terrifying?"

Captain Stacy continued to watch him warily. As a police officer, he trusted no masked madman, especially one with a record of interfering with police work and casually resorting to violence.

He tilted his head slightly. "Omar, check the cars nearby. See if they have the claw marks he mentioned."

"Yes, Captain Stacy." One officer holstered his gun and ran toward the nearby vehicles.

Peter cupped his hands around his mouth like a megaphone. "Don't forget to check the ground! There should be marks on the ground too!"

Officer Omar stopped when he heard that and looked at Captain Stacy.

Captain Stacy nodded.

The standoff continued.

At that moment, the firefighters' rescue operation ran into a problem.

The cars were suspended by only a single strand of webbing, while the firefighters themselves were hanging from a single rope.

And they were above the river. Whenever the wind blew, both the cars and firefighters swayed.

Trying to safely bring two swaying objects together was extremely difficult.

After struggling for quite some time, several firefighters were still hanging upside down beneath the bridge, without having rescued a single person.

The fastest progress anyone had made was pulling someone out of a car.

That rescued person was Niles.

Then, a stronger gust of wind suddenly swept past.

The safety rope was already stretched tight under the weight of two adults. When the wind blew, it scraped fiercely against the lower edge of the bridge, producing a chilling series of ripping sounds, as though it might snap at any moment!

"Ahhh!" Niles let out a terrified scream, wrapping himself tightly around the firefighter.

But his actions did nothing to make their situation safer. Instead, they made it even more dangerous!

"Stop moving!" The firefighter was so furious his nose nearly twisted. They only had to wait for the rope to settle, and the people above would pull them up.

But with Niles thrashing around, the safety rope swung even more violently. How were they supposed to get up now?

Worse still, the friction between the safety rope and the bridge grew more intense!

The rope was sturdy, and under normal circumstances, it should not have worn through.

But the harsh scraping sounds made everyone's heart race uncontrollably.

Yet such a warning seemed useless to someone in the grip of panic.

Still panicked, Niles snapped angrily, "I'm Niles, head of the Biological Research Department at Osborn Group. You have to get me up safely, or I'll definitely sue you!"

The firefighter rolled his eyes.

If not for this job's annual salary of eighty thousand dollars, who the hell would want to rescue someone like this?

But now, he could only patiently calm Niles down and hope his teammates would pull them up as quickly as possible.

However, fate was not on their side.

The wind over the river grew stronger and stronger. Then, with the sound of tearing cloth, a gash suddenly opened in the safety rope!

Terrified screams rang out.

This time, there were two of them!

On the bridge deck, Peter, who was still confronting Captain Stacy, heard the sound of fabric tearing with his sharp senses.

Without hesitation, he jumped down!

"Spider-Man!" Captain Stacy thought he was trying to flee and rushed to the bridge railing with the other officers, only to see Spider-Man shoot out webbing, stick it to the two people below, and pull them upward.

Every officer froze.

He really was saving people?