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Marvel: King of The Swarm Chapter 40: Gaslighting
🕑 Added 2025-06-20 13:06:38 +0000 UTC"Hello, earth to Gwen?"
Looking up from the tabletop Gwen found her friends staring at her with familiar expressions of concern.
"What?" Gwen's tone was clipped and harsh catching her friends off guard.
"Well someone clearly pissed in your cereal this morning," Betty was the first one to respond with a look that silently asked Gwen if she had lost her mind, "And it wasn't us, so what's with the attitude?"
Gwen let out a frustrated groan as she rubbed her face with her hands, "Sorry, I didn't mean for it to come out that way...I'm just...dealing with some shit."
"You know, every time you get moody like this, that's always your excuse," MJ pointed out with a fed-up expression, "I'm just tired...I'm going through something...but you never tell us what it is. You can't expect us to just take that blanket excuse every single time and then give you a free pass when you're being an objectively shitty friend."
Gwen shrunk back from MJ's scathing and painfully honest words, leaving her no moral ground to stand on, "I'm sorry alright, but I can't tell you guys, and I know how shitty this sounds but it's for your own good."
"It's alright Gwen we believe you," Liz spoke softly as she slid her hand across the table and placed it gently on Gwen's arm, "But you have to think about why you keep doing whatever or what behavior is causing you to be like this. It's not healthy. Maybe you need to stop or look at getting some professional help."
Gwen scoffed and smirked as she pulled her arm away, "There's no professional help for what I'm going through, but I appreciate the advice, Liz."
---
Vaulting onto the roof Gwen let out a heavy sigh as she stared down at her clothes, she had been anxious the entire day wondering when her suit would choose to betray her again.
After being so thoroughly defeated Gwen had spent the entire week trying to find some way to get rid of Genesis' blessing. Gwen had tried, tearing, cutting, burning, melting, dissolving, and even electrifying the suit but the strange living material was practically invincible emerging without a single blemish.
'There has to be something I'm not thinking of...' Gwen thought for the thousandth time as she started to pace back and forth across the roof.
"You look like you have a lot on your mind."
Gwen spun and stared at Harry who stood next to the roof access already lighting a cigarette, "Wanna talk about it?"
"Just so you know, you're the last person I want to see right now, so I strongly suggest you fuck off," Gwen snarled as her hands balled into fists and her mind summarized all the dots she had connected between Harry Osborn and Genesis.
"Hmm, I get that," Harry muttered as he exhaled a plume of smoke from the corner of his mouth, "I am sleeping with two of your best friends."
Gwen let out a shuddering breath as she resisted the urge to smack Harry in the face hard enough to knock his teeth out, "Surprisingly that's not the reason, but thanks for reminding me."
"No problem," Harry replied with another exhale before he looked into Gwen's eyes, "Now, do you want help removing the suit, or do you wanna keep doing things solo."
In the blink of an eye, Gwen's hand grabbed Harry's shirt and lifted him clean off the ground as she stared at him with a piercing gaze.
Staring down at her, cigarette still in mouth, Harry's face was the embodiment of calm and collected, even though his feet were swinging above the ground, "Well this is a sane and rational reaction to someone offering you help."
"Shut up!" Gwen growled as she thrashed Harry, "I knew it...you're him, aren't you! You're Genesis!"
"Oh no you got me," Harry replied in a monotone voice, "Yes it is I the Great Genesis, and you've foiled my plan to take over the world."
Gwen glared at Harry for a moment longer before dropping him back on the floor, "Explanation, now!"
Readjusting his collar Harry smirked, "Not even a please?"
"I will drop you off this roof," Gwen growled which didn't seem to impress Harry much.
"You do that and there goes your only hope of destroying the suit," Harry muttered as he flicked aside his cigarette butt, "Now, you gonna stop trying to kill me with those pretty eyes of yours and let me explain what's going on?"
Gwen was silent for a moment before her posture relaxed but only by the slightest of margins, "Alright then start talking."
"Ugh, where to start," Harry sighed as he crossed his arms, "You know how I was apparently in a coma for three years due to some incredibly rare genetic disease?"
Gwen nodded, "Yeah well it turns out it was less of a disease and more of a series of elaborate experiments by my father to exploit my newly awakened powers."
"Power?" Gwen asked skeptically only for Harry to sigh and hold up his hand which began to glow with a faint golden light, "Without getting too in-depth, I'm a Biomancer."
"You can control life at a cellular level," Gwen muttered filling in the gaps in Harry's explanation, before her eyes narrowed, "But...how does that explain the link between you and Genesis."
"Psychopathic father, remember," Harry emphasized with jazz hands that conflicted with his straight face, "My powers allow me to control and produce what I call Bioenergy, my father tried to use it to create enhanced metahumans. Needless to say, most did not survive the process, however one did."
"Genesis," Gwen concluded her eyes shining as the pieces finally started to reveal themselves, "Who is he?"
Harry shook his head, "All the information regarding the experiments has been erased or at least it's beyond my reach. I've had to slowly piece together information on my own mostly through fact-checking rumors. But I can't move freely and risk my father finding out that I know what's really happened."
"Wait your father doesn't know that you're aware of everything?" Gwen asked confused.
"No," Harry whispered darkly his apathetic attitude slipping away momentarily, "I was really in a coma but my powers kept my mind from shutting off its higher functions. For three years I was a prisoner in my own body, while my father used me like a guinea pig."
The raw vitriol in Harry's voice hit Gwen like a truck, "Oh, Harry...I'm so sorry...does anyone else know?"
Harry shook his head and the split second of vulnerability vanished, "No, I haven't told anyone, I couldn't risk involving them in this mess. Besides I barely know what's going on myself. I feel like I'm on the edge and one wrong step is going to send me off a cliff."
"Tell me about it," Gwen muttered, as she stared at Harry in a new light, "How did you figure out my secret identity? And how do you know about the suit?"
Harry tapped the corner of his eye, "My powers are still recovering from what my father did to me, but I can see the life force of people around me. Those with powers, like you for example, tend to have a lot more than most. After that, it only took a bit of research and inferencing to narrow down the range of possibilities. As for the suit...well I've never seen someone with a second life force bonded to them."
Gwen let out a miserable sigh, "That doesn't sound good."
"It's not," Harry confirmed, "The suit is essentially a heavily modified parasite that's bonded with you on a cellular level."
"But you said you can get rid of it," Gwen clarified only for Harry to shake his head, "No I asked if you wanted help trying to remove it, and then you picked me up like a rag doll."
"And I stand by that decision, you were being an asshole," Gwen muttered.
"Yeah well, being tortured for three years by your own father doesn't leave you many manners," Harry replied with a shrug before he took at his phone and typed something in, "Here I just sent you a location, meet me there tonight and we'll get to work."
Gwen looked at her phone as a notification popped up with a series of coordinates, "What exactly am I going to find there?"
"Oh nothing, just my state-of-the-art off the grid bio lab," Harry answered with a straight face before he promptly turned around, "See you tonight, Spiderwoman and please don't keep me waiting."
