Chapter Text
Eddie Brock sped across Manhattan on his motorcycle. The wind whipped in his leather jacket and bit at the skin on his knuckles. His helmet was strapped tight to his head, a reflective visor lowered over his eyes.
He turned a sharp corner and slid into the Daily Bugle parking garage.
He had taken a job there recently, just about a month ago as a reporter. Naturally, he was hired immediately, because if there was anything J. Jonah Jameson appreciated it was a good scandal.
He had initially intended on only briefly staying in New York. He was there to solve a case as an undercover reporter set to "expose" Spiderman. Personally, he thought that the work that the young hero had been doing was incredible. It was helpful, feasible, casual, and most importantly, in the best interest of the people. He stopped muggings, robberies, and assaults of all sorts. His work was honorable, and Eddie only wished that he could be something like that, do something like that. Instead, he did his public service covering the Brock Report and exposing corporations that he believed needed exposing.
So here he was, at the Daily Bugle, taking the elevator to floor 46. The top floor. That was a very high floor.
Eddie strolled super casually to Jameson's secretary's desk. It totally wasn't obvious that he was avoiding looking near the windows, and neither was the totally not-nervous expression on his face.
The secretary raised her eyebrows at him from behind her monitor as he dropped a stack of files on her desk. Eddie ignored it.
"Hey, Betty," he greeted calmly. Betty scoffed at him.
"Hey Eddie," she smiled at him. She liked Eddie. He was a good person, she had decided. She was an exceptionally young secretary-slash-journalist at age nineteen, and she appreciated the respect he showed her nonetheless. New York had too many creepy and entitled people in it.
Betty Brant had spent her entire high school career looking up to him and his work as a reporter. She used to dream of being on the Eddie Brock Report as one of the featured aspiring reporters. Let's be real here, she still did. Too bad it seemed that Eddie had thrown in the towel on that one, what with settling down with this newspaper. Now she was blessed by the presence of her childhood idol every weekday from eight AM to five PM. The best part, she thought, was that he kind of had to answer to her. It was ironic, to say the least.
"Is this the article pitch for Wednesday?" Betty asked, knocking the folder on the desk. For as successful as he was, Eddie Brock was not an organized fellow.
"Uh, yeah. Yeah," Eddie confirmed, nodding his head a little bit.
"Okay," Betty said gently. Eddie's fear of heights was painfully obvious to her and anyone else with eyes. When she had found out that he had transferred here she had already made sure that there would be an office space available for him towards the middle of the room. "Make sure to have it all done and typed up before you leave tonight."
Eddie nodded and returned the smile. She jerked her head in a gesture that meant that he was dismissed back to his desk which he made a beeline for the moment he was given the opportunity.
He sat down in his desk chair and started up his computer. Once his files were all pulled up and his sources were on the screen he took some deep breaths to right himself before he began.
It didn't take long for Eddie to lose himself in his writing. His fingers flew across the keyboard, and he was finished with the revised draft by noon.
Eddie sat back in his chair and laced his fingers behind his head. He couldn't keep himself from grinning. This was just another shitpost of an article, just the kind that J. J. liked to snap up the moment that it landed on his desk. He pressed print and went to punch his code into the keypad. All of a sudden a boy, who couldn't have even been twenty, burst into the office from the direction of the elevators.
The boy was thin with curly brown hair. He was drowning in his sweater and button-up and camera gear and bags. Eddie counted at least three; MIT themed backpack, a duffel bag, and a boxy over-the-shoulder purse that was stuffed to the brim full of papers. Not to mention the camera bag and camera slung over his shoulders. He actually didn't seem too different from himself, Eddie thought.
There was something about him, though, that he just couldn't shake. His brows knit together as his eyes followed the photographer to Betty's desk.
What was it?
"Hey Miss Brant!" he called out while he was still halfway across the room. She looked up at him and the smile returned to her face.
"Hey, Pete!" she greeted. They quickly began a conversation and Eddie accidentally found himself trying to catch snippets of their chat. The only things he heard were random bits like pictures and Spiderman . Nothing too noteworthy, he decided.
The two laughed at a joke one of them made and Betty waved Peter into Jameson's office. The boy shouldered his many bag straps and hurried off into the room with a thank you. A loud "PARKER!" was shouted at the boy when he flung the door open.
Eddie stared after him, a bit confused. There was something about this kid that he was missing. His face seemed vaguely familiar, but it might've been because he'd seen him around the office sometime before. And, if his detective skills told him anything, he was a Spiderman photographer, so it was no wonder the name struck him as familiar.
"I know, he's a looker, ain't he?" said a voice from beside Eddie.
He glanced over at the person who said it. He was an older guy, probably about ten years older than Eddie and in his forties. He had this weird look on his face as he examined Peter through the windows into Jameson's office. Eddie thought he looked like a Kyle.
"He turns heads everywhere he goes, man. There's just something about 'em."
Eddie's confused look quickly turned incredulous at the man's audacity. Peter was a boy . This was a grown-ass man over here, talking about him in a way that nobody at his age should be talking about somebody at Peter's.
Eddie was just about ready to smack this creep show upside the head before Peter was rushing out of the office and back into the hallway with the elevators. The guy beside him took a sip out of his coffee mug and headed back to his desk after a quick, "mmm, mmm, mmm !"
Eddie's eyes stayed wide as he processed what had just happened. That was disgusting . Men were disgusting. Eddie icked out, shivers, tongue, and all while he inserted his code into the printer and waited for his article to come out.
Swinging by his desk he grabbed a paper clip and stuck the article together and in one swift motion, he had it laying on Betty's desk.
"Here you go," he informed her.
"Okay, thanks Eddie," she appreciated. She pulled a sticky note off one of her many pads and scribbled something on it in blue pen before attaching it to the article and handing it back to Eddie.
"I'll enter the submission into the book and then you can go in and give it to Jameson."
Eddie nodded. "Okay, no problem."
He waited a moment while Betty added the review of the article to Jameson's schedule. When she was done she buzzed him in and nodded him off towards the door behind her.
Eddie thanked her before knocking out of courtesy and waited for the bellowed, "COME IN!" to sound through the glass door before actually entering.
"Hey, Brock! What do you have for me today? Better make it quick 'cause I'm only giving you three minutes before I'm kicking you out."
Eddie laughed awkwardly. "Yeah, hey Jameson." And then he began his pitch.
Just a quick summary of the article that he pulled out of his ass. It was some random bullshit about how Stark Industries was working with this company for whatever reason, but Jameson seemed to fall in love with the idea.
"That's great Brock!" Jameson practically screamed as he pulled the smoking cigar out of his mouth. Eddie was pretty sure that smoking inside of a building was illegal but he shut his mouth and took in the ill-advised praise.
"Wait! I just had the best idea!" Jameson proclaimed as if he had just had the best idea. "What if you did a piece on, get this, Spiderman !"
If Eddie's jaw wasn't attached to his face it would've been on the floor. There was no way he was gonna-
"Take down Spiderman! Take him down! Show the city what a menace he really is!" Jameson looked like he had the whole world figured out. Eddie's eyes were wide as he kept rambling.
Eddie didn't really realize that he had interrupted him until he was already talking. "I'm sorry sir, but just one quick question. Why?" he asked, "Why me? Why not just do it yourself or have somebody else? That Peter kid seems to-"
"No, Eddie, I want you on the story. I would do it, but I'm a busy man and Parker's not a reporter." He stopped. Eddie felt the oncoming doom of another great idea.
"I just had ANOTHER great idea! What if I had you AND Parker tag-team this story! He's gotta be close to the Spiderman with all those pictures he takes, and you would be perfect for taking him down! Maybe even discovering his identity ! Parker owes me a favor anyway as of five minutes ago, and it's nothing he hasn't already offered to do.” Jameson paused, shrugged. “Also as of five minutes ago."
Eddie felt a little frightened by the man in front of him. He was crazy, absolutely mental. Eddie had the thought of maybe doing a bit on the Daily Bugle for the Brock Report when he was done with his piece here and laughed at the idea. Too bad there wasn't actually any incriminating evidence on the company or Jameson. He was just insane.
"So, whaddya think?" Jameson asked confidently, expecting something along the lines of, "I think it's perfect! You're such a genius, Jameson! You've got Spiderman this time!"
But since Eddie wasn't that weird, he only stuck with that first part.
"Wow, Jameson! That's- That's great!" Eddie forced out a chuckle. He cleared his throat. "Just- uh, when do you think that you'll want the story done?"
"I don't care!" Bullshit. "Just as long as you get it in by March sometime, I'll let you keep your job. I need all the dirt you can get on the Spiderman in order to make the city see his pure intentions." Ah. There it was.
"Yep, that sounds- that sounds fair!" Eddie tried to give his most convincing fake smile, but it just came out looking pained. "When do we start?"
"Not sure yet. How about tomorrow? You and Parker can get the story set up and figure out how you're going to go about it. Do we got a deal?!" Jameson decided, excitedly.
"Yeah, for sure," Eddie agreed, but his voice fell flat. He just kind of wanted to get out of there.
"Alright, now GET OUT OF MY FACE AND GET TO WORK!" Jameson shouted, still grinning, so Eddie knew that he wasn't trying to sound like a bi-polar asshole.
Eddie flashed a weak smile and scurried out of the room and back to his desk. Once he got there and was resituating himself, he accidentally caught Betty's eye from across the room, who gave him an apologetic smile and returned her gaze back to her computer screen.
Eddie knew that he looked sick. He knew that the whole world thought he was sick. It was just that the pitying looks that he got from everybody crushed his already floundering ego, even though he knew that they were just trying to reassure him. Maybe even make him feel safer, better. Saner.
Eddie sighed. At least he wasn't hearing any voices yet.
~