Chapter 4

On his way to his next class, Peter bumped into Gwen.

“Peter!” she said, smiling at him.

“Oh, hi, Gwen,” Peter responded, smiling back.

“Hey, I just got an alert on my phone that says they have Wall Street blocked off. Some sort of thing going on at the stock exchange,” Gwen said, looking concerned.

“My dad works down there,” she continued. “I hope he's okay. I texted him but haven't heard back yet.” Gwen's father was a captain in the New York City Police Department.

Peter's first thought was that he'd throw on his Spider-Man costume and swing down to the stock exchange to see what was up. He had actually almost moved to jump away from Gwen and up to the roof. Whenever he heard about trouble, his first thought was always to run off and check it out, and then help if he could.

But he stopped himself this time. He was there at school to learn. He couldn't run off every time he heard something might be wrong.

“Did they say what was going on?” Peter asked.

“Nope,” Gwen answered. “Just some news that blocks were roped off in the area.”

Peter decided to wait until he had more information. After all, the city was protected by one of the world's top police forces. They could easily solve most of the city's problems. And if it seemed like they could use a hand, he'd be there as fast as possible.

“Well, let me know what's up,” Peter said.

“I'm sure everything's fine. You'll hear back from your dad soon. He's just got to be busy with everything that's going on down there.”

“I hope so,” Gwen replied.

For the next two hours, Peter couldn't keep himself focused on his schoolwork. He stared out windows, looking for police helicopters or other Super Heroes rushing toward downtown Manhattan. He fought the urge to go check out the scene. It was in his nature.

Then, just before the dismissal bell rang, Peter heard two kids in his English class whispering about the scene downtown.

“I heard it was another Super Hero scare down at the stock exchange.” One of them said.

If there was any truth to that at all, Peter had to get involved.

Brrrrrrinnnnng! Brrrrrrinnnnng!

Right after the bell rang Peter headed into Manhattan. He sneaked off the school grounds without anyone seeing him and swung quickly under the tracks of the elevated number 7 subway line on his way to downtown.

Before him was the New York Stock Exchange, and standing on top of it was his fellow Super Hero—and his good friend—Nova!