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It was an ordinary day in the town of New York City, (or, more the rather large ant-nest made of metal filled up with millions and millions of busy human workers), as they all went about their daily tasks running around the Island of Manhattan. Well, it was normal, all but for one thing that an upside down, odd looking, arguably strangely dressed figures' head was currently following backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards, in a residential street.
Chickens. Lot and lots of chickens.
Now, this may be an ordinary occurrence for most small towns and farms, but for a city, not so much.
"John! Get those ones over that way before they escape. No that way!" a middle-aged woman yelled, who was wearing slightly run-down clothes with a splotch of mud on them here and there.
"I can't get them honey, they're too fast!" the man wearing a plain blue shirt and trousers who had slightly greying hair yelled back, and Spidey was a very lucky observer, for it was right at that moment, that the man slipped in a puddle on the ground, (that was slightly damp from the rain the night before), and fell flat on his face.
"Oh John! Look at you, useless as always, face first in the mud," the woman said to him with a mixture of disappointment, tiredness, and possible amusement, as she stood with her hands placed firmly on her hips.
"Well it's not my fault you decided to buy a whole flock of chickens, in New York City. I don't even know if it's legal," he snapped back grumpily, while sitting back on his heels and wiping mud from his face, flicking it away in disgust.
The woman huffed, "I've told you, I hate the eggs here, they're so unfresh and-and tasteless. I prefer the old ones from back at the farm. Why ever did we move here John?" she gave as explanation. The entire street could hear their conversation, as their voices were so loud, they were practically sounding off to the heavens. It was hard to miss, even for those without Spidey's sensitive hearing.
"I told you Cass, it's because all the best jobs are here in NYC, and I got given a good offer, so that's why we moved. Seriously, how many times do we have to go over this?" John replied, starting to get frustrated. In the midst of their argument, the chickens were getting further and further up the street, currently having a field day in some poor folk's veggie patch to be accurate.
Spidey thought he'd seen enough, (hanging from his tree), and decided to move from his position, extending his wrist and shooting a web across the street. He'd just had an idea, if a rather excellent one (in his opinion).
John sighed dramatically, looking down the road. "Oh, look, how are we going to get them back now?" he whined, extending his hands up and then flopping them down with more force than necessary in the direction of the escapee chickens.
"Well it's your fault. You're the one who fell with your face in the mud," Cass complained, and John moaned, before walking back towards the chickens.
"Here chookie, chookie, chookie," he called. He got no response though, as one of them just looked at him with oblivious, unimpressed eyes, before carrying on eating with the rest of its pals, who were making small noises of conversation amongst themselves.
"Hiya! Need a hand?" a cheery voice unexpectedly offered from slightly above his head, and without thinking twice, John tilted his head back to come face to face with the wide looking, goggled lenses of none other than Spider-Man's mask. He was hanging upside down from a branch.
Spidey curiously tilted his head to the side.
John let out a big, deep sigh, as he looked straight ahead again, and said in the most exhausted, dead flat, annoyed tone - without shame, "Oh now look what you've done Cass, you've gone and got the attention of the local idiot who thinks he's a spider."
"... I beg your pardon sir, but I think you'll find that I am a spider, and contrary to popular belief, am certainly not an idiot," Spidey came back in chirpy annoyance, while slowly unwinding himself from his upside down position, until his feet finally touched the ground, and he was standing upright in front of John.
"Oh good, maybe he can catch them then, with all his spidery abilities, he can web them all up, so long as he doesn't eat them," Cass commented from further behind them.
"Oh look, see even she agrees with me," Spidey said, pointing a gloved thumb in her direction over his shoulder.
John sighed, giving up. "Oh whatever, knock yourself out. Just don't make too much of a fuss!" he said, looking tired and defeated, before beginning to walk off towards the woman, leaving Spidey standing there by himself on the sidewalk, with a bunch of rogue chickens wandering the street.
"Come on John, let's go get a cup of tea. This should be quite interesting," she said, taking his hand and dragging him off to their house.
"Don't worry sir, I'm Spidey, this'll be a piece of cake," Spidey yelled back at them, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.
"Oh no," John said quietly to himself, shoulders slumping, as Cass lead him up the stairs to their front porch.
5 minutes later
"Hey! Hey get back here. No! Ughh," Spidey grumbled, as he landed stretched out on the dirty ground, having missed (yet again) the chickens he was chasing. "Whaaaattt? This is not fair," he moaned, "I mean, How are you even...? I'm Spider-Man for goodness sakes, how are you dodging my reflexes, let alone my web? This is...this is impossible!" he said, complaining, as he stood up again.
The chickens just settled down once more, continuing to eat the owner of the yard's garden, while giving him completely oblivious looks.
"How long do you think it'll take him to catch them?" said Cass from her position on the porch.
"No idea," replied John with a sigh, as he sipped his cup of tea.
"Ok, ok, this is ridiculous, even supervillains can't dodge me like that. You're not supervillains in disguise..., are you?" Spidey babbled, watching the chickens ripping up mulch. He sighed, "Oh enough moaning Spidey, you can do this, they're just a bunch of chickens, right?" he said. "Maybe if I use more of my spider side I can catch them. Yes, yes, I should use more of my instincts, that's a better idea."
He slowly crouched down low to the ground, and closed his eyes under the mask, focusing on his senses, before opening them again, ready for the attack. He started creeping closer to the huddle of happy birds every time they weren't looking, crawling along the ground in bursts of movement, like a cat stalking its prey. When he was only about a metre away, one of them looked right over at him, staring into his lenses, cocking its head all this way and that, Spidey also tilting his head to the side in response. He swore it was the same one that had looked at the man earlier.
Quickly shaking the thoughts from his mind, Spidey prepared himself, fingering the trigger on his web shooter, before leaping towards his prey.
The bird that had looked at him squawked, and then all the birds took off in a flutter of wings and feathers, avoiding his web trap by seconds, and causing Spidey to crash straight into the ground, feathers and web flying everywhere. But it wasn't over yet, as his spider-sense chimed, and before he could react, he slammed his head into a wooden fence pole just a little too hard, sticky web surrounding him.
"Ow!" Spidey squealed, as he coughed from the feathery dust.
"What's going on? Who's messing with my garden!" an angry voice suddenly yelled from inside the house, and a grumpy man wrenched open the door, peering out with a scowling face, only for it to soften into one of complete baffled confusion when he saw Spidey lying there, along with the state of his garden.
Reacting quickly, Spidey stood up, removing bits of web and feathers from himself. "Uh, sorry sir," he said, swaying slightly and obviously dazed. "I swear those chickens are trying to kill me," he said, and pointed vaguely in the direction of the now once-again-happy flock.
The man's eyes widened when he saw the mass of chickens, before turning back with confusion again as Spidey started to walk towards them and momentarily lost his balance. He nearly toppled over, before slowly getting up again, and continued to trudge in the direction of his newest worst enemies.
Several hours and a lot of confused neighbours later, Spidey finally marched round to the chicken's pen with the last one in his hands, wrapped up in a nice little cocoon, so it couldn't escape.
Placing it in with the others, he shut the door, looking at the mass of safely cocooned up chickens with pride. It would take an hour for the web to dissolve, but at least it meant none would be trying any tricks for a while.
He sighed, leaning against the wall of the house with exhaustion. He was covered in white feathers, all sticking to his form thanks to the web he'd gotten mixed up everywhere.
He now thoroughly felt like a fool, and rather looked like one too, as he officially classed chickens at the very top of his list of enemies.
"Thank you so much Spider-Man! I don't know what we would have done without you!" Cass said sweetly, as she watched him with pride.
"Yeah, thanks, any time," Spidey puffed.
"Would you like a biscuit?" John said, holding out a packet from where he still sat in his seat on the porch, when Spidey began to walk round the front.
"Ah, no thanks, but I appreciate the offer," he said, he was too tired to do anything more now, he just wanted more than anything to go home and collapse on his bed...and get rid of all the feathers smothering him: he swore he had some under his suit.
"Oh alright then, well, you have a nice day and stop some bad guys for me," John replied, holding his drink up in the air momentarily at him.
"Right," Spidey replied, too busy staring at all the unwanted attention he'd gathered in the form of neighbours standing outside watching him attentively from their porches.
"It was nice to meet you Spidey!" Cass farewelled, and he weakly waved his hand at them, before swinging away back home, aching for his soft bed to rest his sore muscles.