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ADVENTURES IN BABYSITTING
xxiii. HOMECOMING

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  WHEN WE THINK OF high school dances, our minds typically shoot to a variety of things. We think of the immensely crowded rooms that high school students and chaperones occupy themselves in like a can of sardines. We think of the cheap decorations, aching feet that come from dancing in the highest of heels, and the pop songs that almost always include the Cupid Shuffle and the Cha Cha Slide. We think of the rubbish food and the old stereotype of "spiking the punchbowl", which never really seems to happen except for in the movies.

   All in all, high school dances really aren't ever that great; however, to Riley O'Dair, the Midtown High Homecoming was like a dream come true.

   She had always imagined what going to a real school dance was like. She would wonder how accurate the movies and tv shows she watched were. While the homecoming dance really wasn't all that impressive, she couldn't help but feel as though she were in a dream of some sort.

   Between the dozens of pictures she took with her friends—yes, friends (the idea of having friends really excited Riley)—and drinking extremely watered down punch, Riley felt as though she were having the time of her life.

   Standing in a small crowd with her friends from the Decathlon team, Riley listened to the very serious debate going down between Michelle and Ned.

   "You can't be serious," said Ned. His arms were folded over his chest. "C'mon, everyone knows that Stuart Little would kick the rat from Ratatouille's ass."

   "Um, that rat has a name," Michelle argued, brushing a strand of her curly hair out of her face, "and his name is Remi. Remi has an entire army of rats. What does Stuart Little have besides no award-winning dish or an army of rats?"

   Laughing at this, Riley shook her head at the two. "I hate to break it to you guys, but Mickey Mouse would eat those guys for lunch," chimed in Riley. She had to project her voice over the music in order to be heard, but from the looks of it, Michelle and Ned appeared to have wished they didn't hear what Riley had said.

   "What!?" shouted Ned in disagreement while Michelle yelled, "Absolutely not!"

   Riley was seconds before making her case to contribute to the admittedly silly argument when she noticed out of the corner of her eye, a face that looked all too anxious. Turning her head, Riley noticed as Peter Parker went jogging toward her.

   Riley took a few steps away from the group to meet Peter almost halfway. "Hey!" she greeted, still having to yell over the loud music. She was just concerned about the distress written on his face. "Is everything okay?"

   "The guy with the wings! We have to go, Riley!" Peter shouted. He grabbed her wrist and pulled her along. His enhanced strength made it look as though Riley was a flimsy rag-doll. He increased his jog into a run once they exited the gym and entered the hallways of Midtown.

   "Wait, what!?" He released his grasp on Riley in order to sprint toward the lockers, leaving her to run after him in heels. He was lucky Riley had experience in doing such a thing. "Peter, what are you talking about!?"

   "The Vulture!"

   "You mean the guy with the wings?" quizzed Riley.

   "Yes!" Peter exclaimed rather frantically. "He's Liz's dad! He's up to something bad, Riley. We have to hurry!"

   With the snap of a finger, Riley's world seemed to do a complete 180. One moment, she was dancing and laughing alongside her friends at her first homecoming dance ever. The next, she was running off with Spider-Man to fight some guy who called himself the Vulture. Riley O'Dair really never got a day off.

   Peter had been yelling nonsense and speaking in sentence fragments as he desperately tried to change out of his suit in the nearby bathroom hall into his makeshift suit from before. Riley waited in the hall trying to piece everything together. Pushing the buttons on her silver bracelets, her white super suit materialized onto her skin. Riley always felt satisfied seeing it—nanotechnology was a gift sent from God herself.

   According to Peter, Liz's father, otherwise known as the Vulture, had been harboring illegal weapons to other criminals by using some sort of alien rock. The night of Liz's party, Peter got a hold of a "glowy thing" from the Vulture's henchmen, which ended up being the bomb that nearly destroyed the entire Washington Monument. The bomb was also the Chitauri energy core that Rob O'Dair had been nagging Riley about for days.

   It boggled her mind so much, she could hardly process it. Liz's dad, Rob, the energy core, all of it. Everything was coming together, and of course, it just had to be on the night of homecoming.

   Now in her suit, Valor was very pleased to have been wearing shoes made for fighting rather than her homecoming heels.

  They hurried outside, leaving Peter to frantically try to put on his web-shooters. Riley took the lead, which she shortly regretted as she was the first out of them to go down. Something shot at them, taking her, then Peter. They landed with a thud, causing Peter's web-shooters to go flying from his grasp. 

   "He gave you a choice," a man said from behind them. Riley's adrenaline was already soaking through her bloodstream. "You chose wrong."

   "Agh..." Peter grumbled to himself. "What the hell...?"

   The bald man snickered. "What's with the crappy costume?" he taunted.

   Riley's eyes widened from behind her mask. Her eyes went to the mysterious weapons clad in the man's hands, then they shot toward where Peter's web-shooters laid on the ground. "Go for the web-shooters," she muttered under her breath.

   "What? Are you sure?" Peter whispered back, instantly worried for the girl's safety.

   "When am I ever really sure about anything?" Riley mumbled to herself whilst rising to her feet. She observed as the stranger's weapons buzzed with electricity. She cracked the bones in her neck and mumbled to herself, "Alright, wannabe Thor, let's dance."

   The stranger observed her for a moment, realizing that he was dealing with an Avenger. "The bosses will be pleased to hear I took down an Avenger," the stranger noted to himself.

   Gritting her teeth, Riley reflexively created a forcefield around herself as the man used his weapon to move a school bus. He threw it at her, but it just bounced off of the forcefield and hit Peter. The bus colliding with his body caused Peter to grunt audibly and drop his web-shooters. Riley's eyes widened at this, but it wasn't like there was anything she could do about it. She was just thankful that Peter was a lot stronger and durable than the average human.

   "I wasn't sure about this thing at first, but..." trailed off the man as he used his weapon to grab Riley and toss her while she was temporarily caught off-guard. "Damn!" Then, he used his weapon again to throw Peter into another school bus.

   Riley groaned as her body slammed into a school bus, creating a dent in it. "Asshole," she mumbled. She pulled herself to her feet and turned herself invisible.

   Approaching the man, Riley tapped his shoulder. The man turned around, ready to hit her, but he was puzzled when no one was physically standing before him. Riley just laughed to herself and punched him in the jaw, turning herself visible once more. However, she really should have been paying attention to the fact that his weapon was on and charged up to be used once more, for once she hit him, the man just sent her flying again.

   Riley landed once more with a grunt, same as before. Now, not only was Riley irritated by the use of the weapon, but she was also perplexed. Riley had no clue how to fight this man whose weapons were made of Chitauri elements. After all, the last time she fought aliens, the entirety of New York was nearly eradicated. Perhaps the proper wording should be that Riley didn't know how to fight him without preventing a lot of damage being implemented on Midtown High.

   Suddenly, a stream of webs grabbed their attacker. But it hadn't come from Peter. Instead, Ned Leeds stood before them, one of Spider-Man's web-shooters in his hand. This gave Peter enough time to gather himself and web the man to the bus.

   "Holy shit," mumbled Riley, staring at the criminal in the spider's web. "Nice shot, Ned!"

   "Dude!" Peter yelled, rushing over toward his best friend. Riley quickly joined them, attempting to walk off the concussion she was pretty sure she had developed in the process. "The dude with the wings is Liz's dad!"

   Ned's eyes widened with surprise. "What!?"

   "I know! I gotta tell Mr. Stark!" Peter declared. "Call Happy Hogan—he's Mr. Stark's head of security! And, uh, get a computer and track my phone for me!"

   Then, Peter turned around and shot a web out at a nearby lamppost, allowing him to swing forward. "Wait, are you gonna be okay!?" called Ned.

   "Hurry!" Peter shouted back, ignoring his best friend's question. "We gotta catch him before he leaves town!"

   Ned looked back at Riley, who had only just now realized that he was standing before an Avenger. This was a lifelong dream of Ned's. "Whoa..." trailed off the boy, admiring Valor. "Shouldn't you... Shouldn't you be going with Peter?"

   Riley's eyes trailed off to see Peter as he disappeared into the city of Queens. She shook her head, making up her mind on the spot. "No," admitted Riley. "This is his time to prove himself and learn... hopefully, without dying. Instead..." Riley's eyes landed on her and Peter's attacker. "I have other matters to attend to." She looked back at Ned. "Use the computers in the library to track Peter's phone. Hurry!"

   Ned nodded hurriedly and took off.

   Meanwhile, Riley stalked toward her and Peter's attacker. The man soon stopped struggling against the webs and looked up at her with disdain. "What do you want, Valor?" he sneered.

   "Ooh, hey, buddy, you're in no place to be so hostile right now," Riley snapped. "I want some answers."

   The man scoffed. "Answers? Why should I give you anything?"

   "Because you and I both know that if our friend didn't show up, you'd be in a worse state than the one you're in right now," Riley said, punching her letters very carefully. When he was silent, Riley continued, "Alright, I tried the good cop approach, but that isn't very convincing. You know, what a lot of people don't know about me is that I've been doing this hero thing since I was two. I know every single way to hurt you to get you to give me what I want. I could start with your kneecaps if you don't value them, of course." She raised a hand and created a forcefield around the man's head. "Or we could just wait until the oxygen in that bubble runs out."

   His eyes widened as he noticed the forcefield constricting his path of oxygen. "Alright, alright! I'll tell you what you want to know if you promise to let me out of this shit," he hissed. "What do you want to know?"

   "Who are you working for?"

   "...Adrian Toomes," the man hesitantly said.

   "And?"

   "No one else, ma'am," the man lied. Riley narrowed her eyes at him, slowly making the forcefield around his head smaller. "Alright! He told us not to tell you we were working for him, but... ah, what the hell. His name's Rob O'Dair."

   Riley tsk'd. "Of course. I was right," she mumbled to herself. "Where is he? I highly doubt he's with the Vulture dude, so you better start giving me answers. Now."

   Starting to breathe heavily, the man quickly said, "They're getting on two separate private jets. Aidan's trying to hijack the jet leaving the Avengers tower tonight. Something about moving day!"

   "Moving day," repeated Riley, realizing that tonight, everything in the original Avengers Headquarters was getting moved upstate to the new location. "Where the hell is Rob?"

   Once the man delivered the address to her, she waved away the forcefield around the man's head. "You got that, JO?"

  "Roger that."

   "Pleasure doing business with you," she said before turning around and beginning to walk away.

   "Hey, you said you'd let me out of this!" the man cried out.

   Riley shrugged and glanced back at him. "You deserve that for giving me this concussion, asshole!" she declared before continuing on her way.

  "Miss Valor, were you really going to suffocate that man?" JOCASTA questioned.

   "Of course not. That'd be pretty bad on my end, right?"

   JOCASTA hummed at this. "You never fail to surprise me."

   "And that's why I'm awesome," joked Riley.

   She looked out at the city ahead of her. Riley sighed before breaking out into a sprint and leaping onto the back of a car in her invisible state.

   This was so not how she was expecting her first school dance to go.