Written in the Cards

"And five, six, five six seven eight!" Randy Robertson called out.

Right on cue, Gwen Stacy joined in on the tap routine she and her fellow dancers had rehearsed for over an hour and a half before. Clacking and hammering sounds echoed through the theater Randy had booked for the filming of his student film, a documentary chronicling the influence of black hoofers like Gregory Hines, Savion Glover and Sammy Davis Jr. and their influences on modern tap dancing.

Even without her spiderlike speed and agility, Gwen would have been among the very best, her feet poetry in motion and moving in perfect harmony with the beat as she left all her troubles behind. For her, the dance studio had been a retreat from the misery of home, and her mother would often stay to watch the classes, even joining in to teach every now and again, as Helen Stacy had been an aspiring actress and dancer before she had met the man who would become her husband.

"…And cut!" Randy finally ordered when he was satisfied with the footage he had gotten. "Great job, ladies! Take five!"

Sweating profusely despite the coldness of the theater, Gwen walked back to her schoolbag took a drink of water, before sitting down in one of the theater's seats and stretching her legs in the process. Looking around the room, Gwen raised an eyebrow as she caught the number of guys staring at her, most of whom quickly turned in embarrassment when she met their gaze. Sighing, she didn't notice Randy sitting down next to her until he spoke.

"You've got some amazing moves," Randy complimented her. "Have you ever thought of any other types of roles you'd be good at, like Dancin' or A Chorus Line?" he suggested.

"I'd love to," Gwen smiled ruefully, "but there's no way I could get a prominent part like that without some more experience under my belt. I'm stuck in the whole no-job-no-experience cycle right now, you know?" she shrugged.

"You mean how you can't get a job without more experience, but you can't get any experience because no one will give you a job?" Randy asked.

Gwen just groaned and leaned back in her chair.

SPIDER-WOMAN #8

"WRITTEN IN THE CARDS"

"I'd love more experience in just local community roles…but with things the way they are now, I really need the money right away," Gwen said, rubbing her eyes in frustration.

"Well, why don't you try for this off-off-Broadway production of A Streetcar Named Desire that they're running?" Randy suggested her. "You could land the role no problem, I'm sure!"

Gwen hesitated.

"Well…you really think so?" she asked slowly.

"Come on, don't be like that?" Randy said, waving his hand dismissively at her hesitation. "It's a paid role, it's a famous play, you'll get plenty of recognition! And besides, what have you got to lose if you don't get it?"

Gwen brightened at this.

"You know, you're right!" she finally sat up. "…And Randy?" she asked him as he stood up.

Randy turned around to look at her.

"…Thanks," she smiled at him.

Randy only smiled and winked, giving her a thumbs-up before he turned around again.

"Alright everybody, places!"

Walking home after rehearsal that afternoon, Gwen idly reflected on Randy's words, before thinking of her father and his derisive comments on how she had been wasting his money with her foolish choice of major.

Eyes narrowing, Gwen felt surer than ever of her choices.

The smell of smoke on the cold breeze brought Gwen to her senses, and before she realized what she was doing, she found herself running towards the source, running two blocks before she finally saw the burning house and the screaming woman outside it. Curiously, the fire department was nowhere to be seen, catching Gwen off guard.

Once again, instinct took over as Gwen began looking for a place to hide where she could change her clothes, before she remembered that she was not wearing her Spider-Woman costume, and in fact had not worn it since before Christmas. Now, several days into the New Year, she had not even thought of putting it back on.

Shaking her head, Gwen simply ran towards the burning house and the almost hysterical woman in front of it.

"What's going on?" Gwen asked, grabbing the woman to get her attention.

"An electrical fire!" the woman babbled, half out of her mind with panic. "Fire department hasn't arrived! My mother! Top floor!"

Letting her go, Gwen looked around hastily, before she simply kicked the door down and ran inside. Looking around the burning house, she cursed as she saw the stairs in the front hall had given way. As if by reflex, she kicked off her boots and ran right up the wall with her wall-crawling abilities, barely noticing the heat through her thin leather gloves and wool socks.

Looking around the top floor hastily, Gwen saw that most of the rooms were empty, save for one that was blocked by falling debris. Kicking it aside with barely a moment's consideration, Gwen could make out an elderly woman lying unconscious on a bed, not moving. Making it to the woman's side with a single leap, Gwen hastily wrapped the woman in a sack she made with her webbing, her hands weaving almost by themselves as she wove a pair of large straps attached to the sack. Threading her arms through the straps and hefting the woman on her back, Gwen darted back out into the hallway and cursed as she saw that the fire had spread to the walls, making them too dangerous to climb down.

Looking around hastily, she saw that the lower walls in the main hallway were still standing, and again she spun a web between them, which she quickly leapt down and bounced off to land safely on the floor, cradling the unconscious woman in her arms to cushion the impact. Using her special secretions, which could repel any kind of adhesive, Gwen quickly peeled her webbing off the unconscious woman, draping her over her shoulders in a fireman's carry before she ripped the web trampoline off the wall, quickly burying it beneath debris so it would not be discovered by the firefighters. Stopping only to reel in her boots and slip them back on, Gwen finally emerged from the house and handed the unconscious woman over to the paramedics and fire crews who were just now arriving at the house.

Gwen sat on the back of the ambulance, sipping a cup of hot chocolate one of the paramedics had provided for her after she had been checked for smoke inhalation. Finally, after the elderly woman Gwen had rescued had been put in a second ambulance and taken away, one of the nurses who remained walked up to Gwen.

"I don't know what you were thinking, dear," the nurse began. "But it's lucky you were here."

"How's the old woman?" Gwen asked. "And where were you when the fire broke out?"

"Three blocks away," the nurse winced, sitting down next to Gwen. "New York traffic is murder, especially at this time of year, when the roads are so bad because of all the snow. The old lady should be alright-just some minor smoke inhalation, again-but if you hadn't come by when you did, I don't know where she'd have been. Too bad the superheroes don't always come by when you need them…"

"Pardon?" Gwen asked, her mug pausing in midair as she looked askance at the nurse. "You actually like superheroes?"

"Well, yes!" the nurse laughed. "Everyone just sees the property damage and injuries that can be caused by superhero battles, but what most people don't realize is that things would be a lot worse if the villains were able to get away with what they had planned. Most of those psychopaths will just as easily hurt innocent bystanders just for laughs! Believe me, I know," she shook her head sadly.

"But what happens when the heroes get out of control?" Gwen said, shaking her head in confusion.

"It's a problem, true," the nurse agreed, "but they need to remember something a very wise woman once told me."

"A wise woman?" Gwen asked.

"A lady by the name of May Parker, a nurse like me. Bless her soul, she was a saint-treated the patients like they were her own children-until she was killed by a burglar who broke into her house. Spider-Man caught the burglar, but there wasn't anything he could do for poor May…"

Gwen just looked at the nurse in surprise.

"Anyway, what May always used to say was, that with great power comes great responsibility. Too many people, good and evil, forget that sometimes," the nurse finished. "Now, are you sure you're alright?"

"Yes, I am," Gwen smiled. "Thanks for the hot chocolate."

"And thank you, child," the nurse said gently. "You've got a bigger heart than you realize, running in like that to help that poor woman out."

As she walked home, Gwen found her thoughts continually leading back to the words of that…May Parker, was it?

Gwen suddenly felt better than she had in weeks.

As she returned to her apartment and went to go to the bathroom, she was astonished as she saw herself in the mirror. Singed and smoking, her outfit absolutely ruined, Gwen looked down at her hands, and then quickly took off her socks, astonished by the mild burns she had suffered.

She had run into the burning house without thinking, used her spider powers without thinking, been injured without thinking, all to save that older woman.

For perhaps the first time in her life, Gwen Stacy did not know how to react.

Once again wearing her Spider-Woman costume underneath her clothes, Gwen sat with Liz in the Coffee Bean the next afternoon, noting with concern how harried and stressed Liz now seemed.

"I haven't seen him for weeks, Gwen," Liz fretted as she downed another latte, her shoulders slumped in frustration. "Harry hasn't signed up for any classes, and he disappears for weeks at a time, meeting with some strange men!"

"What's he doing, exactly?" Gwen queried.

"I don't know, he just says it's some sort of 'special project' that he's going to use to pay back his father for some reason," Liz shook her head. "He just seems so angry at his dad…"

Gwen could not hold back a scowl at this.

"And he won't talk to you?" she asked Liz.

"No," Liz replied sadly.

"Well, if you can't get him to talk, maybe I can give it a shot," Gwen answered. "I've had some issues with my own dad-maybe he'll open up to me a little more?"

"Thanks, Gwen," Liz said with a sad smile. "You're a true friend, you know that?"

"I…am?" Gwen blinked, trying to hide her surprise. "What…I mean…"

Her confusion was suddenly interrupted by a loud crash as the front window of the Coffee Bean was smashed in. Standing just outside the broken window was a sight that was bizarre even by the standards of modern New York-a large chariot pulled by a pair of lion-like creatures with wings (sphinxes, Gwen realized they were), with a small, slender figure all in black robes, with a white hood and cloak, billowing towards the black. Ignoring the confused yelling of the patrons around it, the figure pointed directly at Gwen and Liz, as the sphinxes roared and charged into the restaurant, as people scrambled to get out of its way.

Liz screamed and tried to run, as Gwen stepped up to defend her, wondering how she might do so without giving away her secret identity. It was a moot point, however, as the figure riding the chariot merely gestured and another strange figure seemed to materialize out of thin air, this time of a tall man dressed in medieval armor and wings, carrying a large trumpet. Before Gwen could react, the winged man blew the trumpet and unleashed a horrible blast of sound that knocked Gwen and Liz off balance, stunning them as the winged man again vanished and the sphinxes gathered the two women up in their arms. Paralyzed with horror, none of the other patrons could even move to stop the bizarre entities as they took to the air, with Gwen and Liz unconscious in their arms.

Recovering from the sound blast after a few seconds through her resistance to injury, Gwen was shocked to see herself rising into the air, clutched in the hands of the black sphinx drawing the chariot. As she struggled to free herself, realizing she had to change costume immediately, the sphinx growled and tried to keep her restrained, until she punched at it and sprayed a glob of her webbing in its face, causing it to howl and drop her. Now regaining consciousness, Liz screamed as she saw Gwen fall.

As she tumbled towards the ground, Gwen saw the cloaked figure staring at her impassively, before it contemptuously nodded once and directed the chariot further into the sky, with Liz still firmly in its grip. Having timed the sphinx to release her over one of the many tall trees on the Empire State University campus, Gwen's spiderlike agility allowed her to twist her body so she managed to catch the branches and swing herself into the tree, before quickly climbing down to the ground.

Looking around, Gwen realized in frustration that the mysterious chariot had disappeared once again, until she suddenly felt that same strong, overpowering urge she had experienced before, when she had been trying to track Liz and Harry after the Brothers Grimm had abducted them. Looking around carefully, she managed to fight off the urge long enough to sneak into the nearby athletic center and quickly change her costume, before she took off again as Spider-Woman, webswinging in the direction her senses were urging her.

What's wrong with me? she wondered as she swung towards the outskirts of the city. Is this some sort of spider-sense I have, or something?

Spider-Woman then realized that the last time she had heeded this strange sense, it had led her straight to her friends, and she otherwise had no idea which direction the chariot had taken Liz, so she had nothing to lose by following it.

When Liz regained consciousness, she found herself securely bound and tied to what seemed like a single pole, but was in fact part of a bizarre framework of almost two dozen poles, all linked together by horizontal wooden beams, forming a wide circle around the chariot, the sphinxes, and their bizarre owner, who sat impassively, completely wreathed by its hood and cloak. Tied to each pole was another person, most of whom, to Liz's amazement, she recognized from Midtown High. On either side of her, screaming and thrashing to be let go, were Felicia Hardy and Sally Avril, Felicia's main sycophant and yes-woman.

"What happened, Felicia?" Liz called, getting her attention. "How did this happen?"

"We were kidnapped by some rampaging lion-thing!" Felicia shrieked. "It knocked out our friends, took us to this fucking place! Doesn't that asshole realize how cold it is out here?!" she yelled, gesturing with her head towards the cloaked figure, who now turned around to face them.

Slowly, the cloaked figure reached up and pulled back its hood, revealing a strange, rounded white mask that completely covered its head. As it stared at the girls, Liz was certain that whoever was behind the mask was smiling.

"I trust that the Hanging Man has made you all comfortable?" the figure laughed triumphantly in a female voice. "Whether it be the Strength, the Chariot, or the Justice, all have brought you here to bear witness to the revelation of my power…"

"The hell do you want with us, bitch?" Sally yelled, her piercing voice cutting through the confusion echoed by the rest of the prisoners. "Why'd you kidnap us?"

"This is an exercise in justice," the masked woman said harshly, her voice somehow amplified. "I am the avatar of the spirits, their channeler and master. They have come to me, to repay your kindnesses in full!"

"Who are you?" Liz called in amazement.

"I…we," the woman began before correcting herself, "are Tarot. We are one, heirs to the power so long denied…"

"What are you going to do with us?" a man called out from the crowd, whose voice Liz oddly recognized as that of a former teacher from Midtown High.

"As we had previously said, we will exact…justice," Tarot began, speaking slowly and coldly. "We have the power, and we will use it."

Spider-Woman swung down between the trees, following her "spider-senses" (what else could she call them?), when she was caught off guard by a roaring blast of sound that she barely noticed in time. Dropping her webline and rolling to the ground, she came up only to see three bizarre figures come almost out of nowhere-a large, humanoid lion, a man in medieval armor carrying a large broadsword, and a second man in armor, this one with wings and a trumpet in his hands, the being Spider-Woman recognized from the Coffee Bean.

Looking around in alarm, Spider-Woman instantly leapt into the air as the lion-man and the swordsman charged at her from different directions, but was blown over and crashed heavily into the snow as the winged man took flight and struck her with his horn, which seemed able to emit horrible blasts of sound. The lion-man and the swordsman came at her as she staggered to her feet, again coming at her from different directions. Rolling out of the way of the lion's claws, Spider-Woman caught the sword of the knight in her hands as he swung it at her in a downwards stroke, before twisting them so the sword broke. As the knight recoiled in surprise, Spider-Woman kicked him viciously in the gut and punched him in the face as he stumbled, knocking him out cold.

Had Spider-Woman remained to look at the knight, she would have been surprised to see him vanish into thin air, but she was too busy dodging the blows of the lion man and trying to strike back. Forced to dodge out of the way of the trumpet-bearer's next blast, Spider-Woman could not avoid the lion man as he caught her and tore at her arms and her back with his claws, causing her to scream in pain as he caught her up in a vicious bearhug. The arachnid heroine struggled to break free, but realized to her horror that the lion possessed superhuman strength far beyond her own, and he held her tightly in his grip and he brought his fanged mouth forward to tear her throat out.

Thinking quickly, Spider-Woman placed her hands directly against the lion's body and fired her sting blasts at point-blank range, causing it to howl in agony as it released her. Catching it with a webline, Spider-Woman began spinning in place, sending the lion whirling through the air. Like an athlete throwing the hammer, Spider-Woman finally let go after building enough momentum and sent the lion slamming into a nearby tree with a sickening crunch, before she dodged the next sound blast coming from the winged trumpeter.

Firing sting blasts at the winged man as she dodged his sound blasts, Spider-Woman finally lowered the winged man to a gap between two tall trees. Before he could escape, Spider-Woman quickly wove a thick web anchored by the trees on either side, before blasting him out of existence with a double sting blast. Looking around in surprise, she saw that the humanoid lion had vanished as well. Even checking the tree where he had crashed into after she had released him, Spider-Woman found no tracks leading away from it.

With the rush of battle fading, Spider-Woman suddenly found herself seized by that strange sense of urgency again, that again led her to leap into the air and begin webswinging from tree to tree to find and rescue Liz.

Liz stared in amazement as she saw Tarot begin twitching and jerking as if she was having a seizure, screaming in pain for no apparent reason. Immediately, the sphinxes attached to her chariot turned around and began to comfort her, even as a man, long and slender and clad in a medieval jester's outfit, suddenly seemed to materialize out of the wooden framework that Liz and the rest of Tarot's prisoners were tied to, before running to her side.

Baffled as to what was going on, Liz suddenly felt her bindings fall loose, as she dropped to the ground. Looking around in amazement, she saw Spider-Woman blasting people free of their bindings with her electrical sting blasts, who immediately scattered and began running. Running along at a remarkable speed, Spider-Woman blasted the people free one at a time, and before Tarot and her bizarre attendants could recover, almost all of her prisoners were freed.

"Damn you!" Tarot screamed in a rage, as the jester-dressed man scowled and the sphinxes roared. "Was it you that interfered with my justice?" she shouted over the screams of confusion and the melee of fleeing prisoners.

"You mean your kidnapping!" Spider-Woman shouted as she leapt into the air and used a web to swing off the wooden framework, instantly felling the jester-clad man standing next to Tarot with a sting blast. Again, Tarot recoiled in agony as she suffered some sort of reaction to the jester-man's demise. Before she chanted and gestured once more.

"You brought this on yourself, Spider-Woman," Tarot said darkly, as a reddish haze began to form in the air next to her and materialized into a hideous monstrosity. More than seven feet tall, with a brownish-red hide the color of dried blood, the thing had large batwings sprouting from its back, cloven hooves, and a horned bull's head that spat fire. Roaring in rage, the devilish creature spat a fireball at Spider-Woman, who barely managed to dodge out of the way.

"Kill them all, Devil!" Tarot screamed, as she cracked the reins of her chariot. "Chariot, away!" Improbably, the sphinxes snarled in response and took to the air, dragging the chariot bearing Tarot behind them as the Devil spat several fireballs at the fleeing hostages, Spider-Woman barely managing to save them by catching them with her webs and quickly dragging them out of the way of the flames. Finally, as she spun a web-shield to defend herself, she tagged the Devil with a sting blast to distract it. As the creature whirled around angrily, Spider-Woman deflected his next fire blast with her shield, before giving him a full on double shot of her webs to tie the creature down. As it thrashed in a rage, its powerful leg muscles sprung and it took to the air, ripping free of the ground before Spider-Woman's webs could set and spitting its fire at her.

Deflecting the first blasts with her web shield, Spider-Woman was forced to let her guard down to once again pull a passerby out of the way of one of the Devil's fireballs, and left herself wide open to a full on blast from the monster, as it came crashing down to the ground and slammed into her with a bull charge, driving her up against a tree and tearing free of her webbing.

As the creature pinned her against the tree, preparing to set it on fire with its flaming breath, Spider-Woman hit it in the face with a sting blast, distracting it long enough to break free of its grip and roll away, catching it with a webline and spinning it through the air the same way she had the humanoid line, before leaping into the air and slamming the creature down with every ounce of strength she could muster, driving it through the snow to leave a massive crack in the ground.

Catching her breath as the Devil finally vanished, Spider-Woman looked around and saw the lights of approaching police sirens-evidently one of the hostages must have had their cell phone with them when they were abducted. Realizing she was no longer needed, Spider-Woman spun a webline and took off, making haste to return to Empire State University to retrieve her clothes and schoolbag.

There were times when New York City police detective Jason Phillip Macendale really fucking hated his job. Never happy about being assigned to the department's Superhuman Activities Unit, he had grown progressively angrier about the superhumans that had seemed to spring up in his city like weeds, and the accompanying chaos they seemed to bring with them.

"So let me get this straight," he rolled his eyes. "You're saying a bunch of freaks that come out of a damn storybook kidnapped you and brought you into the woods, where this lady in a hood and mask said she was going to exact 'justice' on you all?" he snorted.

"What, you don't believe us?" one of the kidnap victims was telling him, as more police arrived to bring the people home.

"So, care to explain how you escaped?" Detective Macendale sneered. "Did a knight in shining armor come riding along and slay the big bad dragon?"

"No, the knight was one of the bad guys," the kidnap victim looked at him strangely. "It was Spider-Woman that saved us. Weren't you listening the first time?"

It took all of Detective Macendale's willpower not to lay into this idiot for talking back to him. Taking several deep breaths, Macendale comforted himself with the knowledge that he would have made the man's life hell in the military. In some ways, Macendale preferred the military-you didn't have to deal with these civilian pussies talking shit about you while you couldn't do anything about it.

That was what Macendale had liked about machinery when he was a military technician. It never talked back to you, and always did exactly what it was told.

"Oh, Gwen! Thank God you're alright!" Liz said as she hugged Gwen, who emerged from the athletic center in her street clothes as soon as Liz had returned to Empire State University. "How did you survive that fall?"

"I landed in a tree," Gwen grimaced. "Got some pretty nasty scratches out of it too," she winced, exposing the long scratches on her arms.

Liz just shook her head.

"What could that Tarot person have wanted with us?" she wondered, describing the kidnapping to Gwen. "She didn't ask for any money, she just said she was going to get 'justice' on us all…"

"Justice?" Gwen asked in surprise.

"Yeah," Liz answered. "I don't know what she'd want with you, me, Sally Avril and Felicia Hardy, along with a bunch of other people from Midtown…"

Gwen suddenly turned pale.

"Oh God…I think I might know who's responsible for this," she groaned.

Still reeling from the effects of the destruction of her creations, Marie-Ange Colbert dismissed the Chariot and removed her mask and costume, sneaking into the back door of her home and trying to ignore the smell of the alcohol as she snuck upstairs. Annie Colbert was already asleep surprisingly early in the day, even for her. Marie-Ange didn't even have to go into the living room to realize that her mother had already downed all the gin in the house, and would probably want her to go on another beer run before too long…

Scanning the mail Annie had left on the kitchen table, Marie-Ange nodded as she glanced over her father's alimony checks. Working two jobs out of state, Jean-Jacques Colbert sent much of the money home to support his wife and daughter…not that Marie-Ange could truly blame him for not being able to look either of them in the eye, given that he'd been reduced to marrying the woman he'd gotten pregnant by mistake

Nor could she truly blame her mother for her heavy drinking, either, which explained why Marie-Ange hadn't included her in the kidnappings she had directed her "friends" to orchestrate as Tarot. As she struggled with another coughing fit, Marie-Ange was bitterly reminded of just why her mother had begun drinking, and why Dad was stuck out of state, sending back money to pay for support. Medical bills were expensive, after all, and most people couldn't pay tuition and the expenses of their sick children at the same time.

Her precious cards, her charms, her love of the mysterious, the magical and mystical, had been her rock, her anchor of support all through the years of school, particularly high school…Marie-Ange felt sick just remembering those years…and it continued at the hands of that bitch Felicia Hardy and her catty mob in university, even while Stacy, Little Miss Popularity, was trying to get rid of her guilt.

Marie-Ange just snorted at the idea.

When the dreams had begun, the tales of the Empress, the Sun and the Moon, the Tower, the Hanging Man, the symbols of the tarot cards she so cherished, appeared in her mind, telling her of the power she could command as their bearer, their gateway to the real world. She could bring the power of the cards to life, gifting them with amazing abilities that defied anything she had ever seen, abilities that were hers to command.

While reflecting on this, Marie-Ange recalled what her father had told her that with great power had to come great responsibility.

Really? Marie-Ange wondered to herself.

Then why did no one live up to their responsibilities to me?

With a scowl on her face, she sorted through her tarot cards, recalling the identity she had taken for herself. In all likelihood, someone would have noticed the similarities in all the people she had abducted, and she would have to go on the run…

But it doesn't matter, she realized as she began gathering supplies. I can destroy them one at a time…show them the true power of my friends…

…destroy them one at a time…

…and Spider-Woman most of all.

(Next Issue: Gwen begins to try and track down Marie-Ange Colbert, even as she is confronted with the equally difficult decision of how to respond to her father George's threats. To make matters worse, Gwen must simultaneously deal with the increasing pressure Harry Osborn finds himself under, even as the Will O' the Wisp returns to confront Spider-Woman! All this and more in Spider-Woman #9: Blinded By the Light!)