Spidey

"Good enough reason?" she giggled again and climbed back out of the window. "See ya tomorrow Pete."

He watched as she ran across the back lawn of his parents place, lithely jumping the dividing fence and turning to wave briefly at him with a mischievous grin on her face before disappearing into her house.

"Wow," he said softly, then turned back to the arachnid in the jar. "Right then Spidey, let's get you some food and then we can start on our experiment."

Clad in black, the shape moved stealthily from tree to tree across the school grounds, stopping by the caretaker's entrance to make sure that no-one else was around. Pete was sweating under his balaclava, the warm summer's night and tension not helping to reduce the uncomfortable rivulets of moisture that ran down his back. "I'm sure ninjas don't sweat like this," he thought to himself. Reaching the side door, he tapped the four digit code into the keypad and entered the school, using the same code on the alarm system just inside the door, the double beep signifying that the alarm had been deactivated. He'd watched John the caretaker carefully and, when the alarms had been tested the week before, had made sure that he was strategically placed to see the code used. A similar exercise early one morning had confirmed the man's lack of imagination in using the same code for both alarm and door, and a quick test at school the following day meant that he had armed and disarmed the alarms during a trip to the toilet during a lesson. Satisfied that the police weren't going to come screaming down the road to investigate his nocturnal excursions, he moved through the darkened corridors to the head's room.

"First things first," he said, the memory of a warm kiss distracting him momentarily. Some quick work with a screwdriver and minutes later a sign was nestling gently in his backpack. Grinning in satisfaction, he moved on toward the science labs in the east wing.

"Morning Petey."

He looked up from his desk at Helen and smiled at her as the early morning sun glinted from her hair, watching as she scrambled into his room, a pair of old jeans and trainers completing the usual tomboy image but highlighting her athleticism. Her dark eyes sparkled with suppressed humour as she grinned at him, a quick tease ready on her lips.

"I didn't hear any alarms from the school last night," she said. "Lose your nerve?"

Pete stood and moved close to her, also grinning as just for once he knew that he held a trump card to her incessant teasing.

He lifted a piece of paper from his desk exposing the wooden plaque underneath. "I think I'd like to claim my kiss," he said softly, watching in pleasure as just for a change Helen was the one who blushed.

"Oh hell Pete, what have you done, I was only kidding?"

"You can put it in the bin later," he grinned. Leaning close, he kissed her, softly, lingeringly, a gentle brush of lips that increased in passion until they broke apart a few seconds later, gasping for air.

She chuckled. "Well my little nerd, you've certainly changed in 12 hours. What else did you take?"

He grinned again, excitement lighting his eyes as he reached into his rucksack. "This," he said and lifted a small box from the bag. A garish yellow sign stared at her from the lid, the radioactive symbol fluorescently blatant in its warning.

"Oh God Pete, what do you think you're doing?" Slightly scared now, she moved away from him and went to the window. "The sign is one thing, but you have to take that back, that's not good."

"I need to try something. Something that'll stop me being so afraid all the time," he waved a vague arm at himself. "I'm fed up with being so damn normal."