A Day In The Life

Gwen Stacy yawned wearily as she woke up, rubbing her eyes as she took a deep breath to get out of bed. Her sleep last night hadn't gotten much better. In between dreaming about her failure to stop Will O' the Wisp from murdering his ex-wife and her new husband, Gwen had dreamt about the problems she'd run into in her relationship with her boyfriend Randy Robertson and his family. Those dreams were also interspersed with images of the monster who'd begun the nightmares in the first place, the psychopathic costumed killer who called himself Jack O' Lantern.

Gwen showered and dressed before coming downstairs to eat breakfast with the rest of her family. She was upbeat as she talked about school with her cousin Jill Stacy, talked with her Aunt Nancy about what she would cook for dinner, and talked to her mother Helen about their plans for the evening. From there, she made her way to the subway station and then to Empire State University, where she began the day's classes.

Everything seemed normal on the outside for Gwen, and for the most part she felt quite normal as well, thinking about her grades, her relationship with Randy, her friendships with Liz Allan, Kitty Pryde and the rest of her friends, and what she could expect with the new modeling job she got with Vaughn-Pope Cosmetics.

Try as she might, however, Gwen could never quite forget about Jack O' Lantern. Somehow he always knew where she was, following her every movement and her every action.

She was determined not to let it prevent her from living her life, but it continued to stick with her.

Steven Mark Levins woke up with a serene smile, eagerly embracing the new day that lay before him. Ever since he'd escaped from prison in the massive jailbreak organized by the Green Goblin and the Spot, Levins felt as if he had a new lease on life. Thrilled by the opportunity to return to the slaughter, torture and murder that had given his life meaning in the first place, he'd been diligently preparing for his return to supervillainy.

Now, in the hidden backup lair he'd constructed in case he was ever captured, Levins carefully reviewed his agenda for the next several days. He had a lot of preparations to make before he would be ready to proceed to the next step of his plan to ruin the life of Gwen Stacy, alias the spectacular Spider-Woman, and retake his place as head of the Tomorrow Legion supervillain cartel.

Levins wasn't sure if he'd ever been happier in all his life. More than anything, he felt like he was free, free to embrace the truth of who he was, free to resume his destructive, killing ways. The only thing that undermined his bliss was the thought of Spider-Woman, with whom he'd repeatedly clashed as Jack O' Lantern. Spider-Woman was the reason Levins had originally been arrested and sent to prison, and before that she'd continually interfered with his fun.

For all that Levins was sincerely enjoying himself, he couldn't quite shake his thought of Spider-Woman, and the boiling rage it stirred within him.

SPIDER-WOMAN

"A DAY IN THE LIFE"

"Hey, sweetie!" Helen Stacy greeted her daughter as Gwen came home later that afternoon. "How was your day?"

"Pretty good, Mom," Gwen smiled, although the smile was too strained for Helen's liking.

"…What's wrong, honey?" Helen asked, immediately concerned.

Gwen opened her mouth to speak briefly, and then seemed to think better of it. To Helen, it seemed like she was trying to decide whether to say anything or not, until it was clear Gwen came to a decision.

"It has to do with my being Spider-Woman," Gwen said, as she took off her jacket and boots and sat down with Helen on the couch. She then told Helen about her failure to stop Will O' the Wisp from murdering his ex-wife and her new husband, the vitriolic criticism Vincent Gonzalez had thrown at her after the Wisp's murders, and the harassing phone call she'd gotten from Jack O' Lantern, warning her that he always knew where she was and that he could strike at any of her loved ones.

"…I almost don't know what to think anymore," Gwen shook her head. "I mean, I remember everything you've told me, and Grandpa Lieber told me, about all the good I've done and the people I've helped, but then I remember all the times I failed and how it'll be my fault if Jack does anything to harm you or anyone else I care about. And then I remember my responsibilities to myself and how I pushed myself too hard, but then I get ashamed of myself for feeling selfish and-" she began babbling, before Helen put a finger on her lips to stop her.

"You're still blaming yourself for all this, aren't you?" Helen told her.

"…What do you mean?" Gwen asked, her guilt turning to confusion.

"When your father…did what he did to me," Helen explained, choosing her words carefully, "I felt like it was my fault, all of it. I kept trying to tell myself that what he was doing was wrong, but then I started feeling guilty, like I was letting him down. I felt ashamed of myself, like I wasn't being a good enough wife to him. Whenever I got angry at what he was doing to me, I felt like I was being selfish."

Gwen sat silently for a moment as she took in what Helen was saying.

"But that was different," she protested. "Jack O' Lantern and the others-"

"It's not different at all," Helen insisted. "People like Will O' the Wisp and Jack O' Lantern made their own choices long before you ever got involved, Gwen. The only thing you're doing is trying to stop them, which is exactly what you're supposed to be doing!"

"But I failed to stop them," Gwen pointed out. "Jack O' Lantern killed Dad, and-"

"-and you succeeded in saving me, Jill, your Aunt Nancy and a bunch of other people," Helen reminded her. "What about all those sixty people that Jack O' Lantern would have murdered? Wasn't Nancy one of them?"

"But-" Gwen began.

"-what about Vincent Gonzalez?" Helen scoffed. "Who cares? At least you're out there trying to help people! When was the last time this Gonzalez character ever did anything like that? Besides, how was it your fault that Supercharger was insane?" she said in disgust, her voice rising.

Gwen only blinked at the intensity in her mother's voice.

"Are…" she trailed off, not sure of what to say.

"I'm just fed up with you being put through all this crap by people like Gonzalez and those supervillain freaks," Helen explained, an intense light in her eyes, "and I can't stand seeing you put yourself through the same crap that I did to myself when I was with your father. Please don't make the same mistake I did, Gwen-you deserve better than that."

Gwen just sat there for several moments as she let her mother's words sink in. She'd been trying to tell herself the same things over and over again, but for some reason she'd never managed to fully convince herself.

"Thanks, Mom," she smiled up at her mother, as her eyes sparkled with renewed vigor.

"Anytime, honey," Helen reassured her, brushing back a lock of Gwen's hair that was dangling in front of her face.

Steven Mark Levins never felt more comfortable than when he was wearing his ghoulish Jack O' Lantern costume. The costume was a suit of dark-green body armor, with a lighter green chest plate that was crafted to look as if it was covered in tiny skulls, and lighter green gauntlets and boots that resembled grisly skeletal limbs. The costume was topped off by the helmet that gave Jack O' Lantern his name, a helmet crafted to look like an oversized pumpkin with a leering demonic face carved into it. The pumpkin helmet was also illuminated with holographic fires that gave Jack O' Lantern a hellish, demonic appearance.

Levins had taken to insisting that other people call him Jack O' Lantern, preferring his supervillain codename to his given birth name. Ever since he'd arrived at his hidden base, he'd begun wearing his costumes all the time, only removing it to sleep.

Jack O' Lantern was resting comfortably on a sofa, his feet propped up on the coffee table in front of him. The room was lit only by the hellish glow of his pumpkin helmet's holographic fires and the light from the television. Jack was watching the original Halloween, one of his all-time favorite movies. The movie was just getting to the best part-when Michael Myers' psychiatrist described just what he was.

As the psychiatrist carried on his description, Jack O' Lantern began to laugh. His hysterical, insane cackling overpowered the sound of the television, and soon echoed throughout his lair.

Jack O' Lantern laughed like that a lot.

He loved the way the laughter made him feel.

Gwen's knock at the door of the Parker residence the next day was met by Ben Parker, uncle to Peter Parker. Ben hadn't changed much since the last time Gwen saw him, a middle-aged man with salt-and-pepper hair and a kindly paternal manner about him. Aside from Helen and Randy, Ben and his nephew Peter were the only people who knew about Gwen's secret identity as Spider-Woman. Gwen had learned Peter's secret identity as the amazing Spider-Man after he'd been badly injured in a fight against the mutant gangbangers who called themselves the Nasty Boys, and Gwen had in turned revealed herself to the Parkers after she brought Peter back to his house and treated his injuries.

"How are things going today, sweetie?" Ben asked Gwen as they hugged briefly. After Peter's parents had died in a tragic accident, Ben had taken the young boy in and raised him as his own son. He'd provided Gwen with good fatherly advice in the past as well, something for which Gwen was quite grateful.

"They're going," Gwen said with a half-smile as he let her into the house. "Boys, grades, supervillains, the usual stuff."

"I can imagine," Ben chuckled, by now used to the foibles of young superheroes. "Were you looking for Peter?"

"Yeah, I was," Gwen nodded. "Is he around?"

"Yes, he's upstairs," Ben replied. He turned to call out to Peter, but the perceptive Gwen had already noticed the look in his eyes and caught him by the arm.

"What happened with Peter?" Gwen asked in concern.

"It's…" Ben trailed off.

"It's the Green Goblin, isn't it?" Gwen noted. Once before, after the Goblin had nearly murdered Peter's girlfriend Mary Jane Watson, Gwen had seen how Peter was struggling with his anger. Although he'd successfully saved Mary Jane and she'd made a full recovery, Peter had had difficulties coping with his rage at the Green Goblin.

Peter himself came down the stairs, his eyes widening in surprise as he saw Gwen and Ben conversing.

"Hi Gwen," he said in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"I heard about the Goblin," Gwen began, "and-"

"That's my business," Peter said calmly, casting an annoyed look at Ben, "and you don't need to worry about it. I'm fine, really."

"Don't get mad at your uncle," Gwen reproached him. "He only told me because I figured it out for myself. Are you really sure you're alright?"

"Yes, I am," Peter explained, seeming to get a little exasperated. "Is that the only reason you stopped by?"

"No," Gwen shook her head. "I was wondering if you could help me with something at the Daily Bugle."

"The Daily Bugle?" Peter asked in surprise as they sat down with Ben at the table and poured some coffee. "What do you want there?"

Gwen proceeded to explain to Peter about the bullying Marie-Ange Colbert had experienced at Midtown High, Marie-Ange's attempts to gain revenge on her tormentors with her mutant powers as the costumed villain Tarot, Gwen's battles with Tarot as Spider-Woman, Marie-Ange's arrest and efforts to turn her life around in prison, and the abuse she was suffering from the other inmates. Peter frowned sympathetically as he listened, recalling all too clearly the bullying and abuse he himself had suffered at Midtown when he was in high school.

"She's being abused because of the anti-mutant backlash that's coming from all the supervillain incidents we've seen over the last couple of years," Gwen concluded.

"And people blame mutants even when most of these criminals aren't mutants to begin with," Peter spat in disgust. "Typical. But how can I help you with the Daily Bugle?"

"I heard that this J. Jonah Jameson person is really into defending mutant rights," Gwen explained. "Since it's mutant prisoners that are suffering the abuse, maybe Jameson could give it some media attention? I was hoping maybe you could introduce me to him?" she asked hesitantly.

Peter thought on that for several minutes, a pensive look on his face as he considered everything Gwen had told him and how he thought Jameson would react to the abuse of mutant convicts in the prison system.

"…You know, it might just be worth it," he finally nodded. "Jameson's an asshole, but he's definitely on the side of mutant rights. He might be more willing to listen if we both go to see him-when do you have some free time?"

"Would Monday afternoon work?" Gwen asked.

"You bet," Peter nodded. "You'd better brace yourself, though-Jameson's like an active volcano when he gets going."

"Oh, I'm not worried about that," Gwen assured him as she got up to leave. "Compared to some of the villains we fight, he sounds like a pussycat."

They laughed at that before Gwen pulled on her jacket, hugged Peter and Ben briefly, and left.

Gwen could only hope that this would be enough to help Marie-Ange and the rest of the mutant inmates at Riker's Island, especially since she wasn't sure what else she could do to help Marie-Ange.

"They're better than anything you can get from the Tinkerer or the Fixer," Mysterio bragged to Jack O' Lantern as Jack examined the cube-shaped device. "The thing is that I'm a specialist. Those other guys are just generalists-they try to be everything to everyone!"

Jack O' Lantern mostly ignored Mysterio's prattling as he carefully examined the device. Hardly bigger than a six-sided die, Mysterio claimed that the device would act as a perfect image transducer, allowing the user to disguise himself with almost any combination of features he wanted-hair color, eye color, skin color, height, weight, clothing and everything in between. From everything Jack could tell, the device would live up to its hype. While Mysterio was pompous and arrogant, Jack knew that most of that came from his being a showman who wanted to build up the hype for his work.

And right now, Mysterio's work was what Jack needed for the next part of his plan to work. With his appearance now common knowledge in the media, Jack needed a way to get out and about in public without being noticed unless he wanted to be. It was the classic rule of supervillainy-sometimes there was an advantage in making yourself visible, but on other occasions it was necessary to remain unnoticed.

Jack had already preprogrammed the device with the appearance he wanted, and after attaching it to his belt pushed the button. Almost instantly, the ghoulish pumpkin-headed monster was replaced by a nondescript man in his mid-thirties with thinning blonde hair and dull grey eyes. He wore a plain jacket, blue jeans and worn penny loafers, the sort of attire that allowed him to blend into the crowd.

The car was a solid piece of Detroit iron, a classic piece of American engineering and an appropriate symbol for Gwen's first modeling shoot of the day. She had been hired as a model by Desiree Vaughn-Pope, head of Vaughn-Pope Cosmetics, to help market a new line of thigh-high sports socks based off the colors of the various NFL teams. Each NFL team had its own pattern, Vaughn-Pope had assigned Gwen to market the socks of the Detroit Lions. She was reclining on the hood of the car, wearing a white camisole top and deep blue boy shorts, her shapely legs clad in a pair of deep blue socks with white stripes on top that went over her knees and up to her thighs. Gwen had a flirty, winking expression on her face, her eyes focused invitingly on the camera and framed nicely by her perfect white smile.

The shoot continued throughout the day, with Gwen wearing sexy attire or posing with props that matched the themes of the city or franchise she was modeling for. She wore a revealing Revolutionary War uniform for the New England Patriots, a Statue of Liberty costume for the New York Giants and pretended to ride a large stuffed ram for the St. Louis Rams. In every case, the poses were designed to focus attention to the socks Gwen was wearing.

Strangely enough, Jack O' Lantern and all her other problems were the furthest things from Gwen's mind as she posed for the camera. All she could think of at that moment was the role she'd assumed, leaving everything else behind as she performed. It was always like that for Gwen, whether she was on stage or in a modeling session, as she fully embraced the role and made it her own.

Jack O' Lantern only laughed as he worked at his computer, reading about the exploits of Vincent Gonzalez and his anti-superhero group, Citizens For A Mask-Free America. He'd done some digging into Gonzalez's background, and had gotten a kick out of the fact that the Gonzalez family had fallen apart after Vincent's sister Michelle had been murdered by the electrically charged supervillain stalker Supercharger. Michelle Gonzalez had run a Spider-Woman hate site, and Supercharger had murdered her in an attempt to impress Spider-Woman, who he had a deranged crush on. Her disgusted reaction had made him go even more insane than he already was, and he tried to kill her in revenge for "humiliating" him, as he saw it.

Vincent's online hate campaign against Spider-Woman had bemused Jack O' Lantern, particularly when he'd seen the disgusting comments the posters to Vincent's website had made about Spider-Woman, comments that they likely wouldn't have made about Spider-Man or Daredevil. Those comments made Jack O' Lantern wonder just how sincere Vincent really was, and whether he was making an effort to filter such people out of his movement.

Chances were that Vincent really didn't give a damn about what his group was supposedly preaching. All he really wanted was revenge on Spider-Woman, and he was apparently using her failures as propaganda to upset her and make her feel guilty.

Jack O' Lantern smirked at that insight, realizing that he could probably make good use of that.

"So tell me," Louise Robinson asked her son Randy as they had coffee after dinner, "how did you and Gwen hook up?"

"My friend Kitty Pryde introduced me to her," Randy explained, "when I was looking for dancers for that tap video I did last year. We acted in some of the same productions together, and things eventually just started to pick up from there…"

Louise didn't reply, simply picking up her coffee and staring into it as she swirled it.

"Are you sure she's really the right girl for you?" Louise finally asked her son.

"Of course she is," Randy said in confusion. "Why wouldn't she be?"

"Your father and I don't think she's the right kind of girl for you," Louise shook her head.

"Why not?" Randy asked in confusion.

"She wants to be an actress, doesn't she?" Louise asked him. "Just how much of a living can you really make at that, especially these days? Would she be able to contribute her fair share if you start living together, or would you be supporting her most of the time?"

"Well, Gwen does modeling work too," Randy replied.

"And do you really want your girlfriend, much less your wife, flaunting herself for money?" Louise frowned. "Just think about it, Randy-she'd be using her body to sell things. Is that the kind of person who'd really make a good wife?"

Randy wasn't sure to say about that.

"Gwen's not like that, Mom," he insisted, trying not to dwell on the fact that he and Gwen hadn't spoken since they'd met his parents for dinner earlier that week. "She put herself through hell trying to support her mother. That was what she did with a lot of the money she made."

Louise sipped her coffee in response, and Randy did the same, each weighing what the other had said.

"I know Gwen seems like a nice girl," Louise frowned, "and certainly much better than that awful Felicia Hardy," she said in disgust, "but why didn't things work out with Kitty? She was a lot more down-to-earth than Gwen."

"That's…yeah," Randy shook his head. "That was just a temporary thing, Mom-Kitty and I realized that we didn't really have much in common."

"If you say so," Louise sighed. "I just think that Kitty would have been a better pick for you, is all…"

Kitty Pryde tried to concentrate on her homework, but at the back of her mind she knew he was out there.

Her mother had been born Danielle Levins, and took Allan Pryde's name when she'd married him. Danielle had two siblings, a sister named Karen and a brother named Steven, who took pride in his middle name and preferred to be called Steven Mark. Steven Mark had never had any children of his own, instead interacting with Kitty, her cousin Ben Reilly, and the rest of his nieces and nephews as he watched them grow up.

Underneath that friendly, loving exterior a crazed, psychotic monster had lurked, a monster that now openly displayed his true nature with the demonic pumpkin mask he wore. Although he'd originally been defeated by the costumed heroine Spider-Woman, the man Kitty once knew as her Uncle Steve and who had become Jack O' Lantern had left a path of mass murder and destruction in his wake before he was brought to justice. Now, after the mass escape at Riker's Island Penitentiary, Jack O' Lantern was on the loose again, and God only knew what he was planning.

He was a monster, and he was her uncle.

The ugly memory of the Daily Globe's headline flashed across Kitty's mind, the headline arranged by the mutant terrorist Avalanche that publicly exposed Kitty's relationship with the killer.

The next thing Kitty remembered was the way her old dorm room had been trashed by anti-mutant racists, forcing her to leave the dorm and move in with Gwen.

Gwen smiled to herself as she returned home later that afternoon, thinking about the amount of money she'd received from Desiree Vaughn-Pope for the successful modeling shoot. Vaughn-Pope had warmly praised her for the quality of her work, and assured her that they were going to knock Kingsley Cosmetics and the rest of the competition out of the water with the spring ad campaign. They were sure to be a hit among NFL fans-the female fans would definitely want them, while many male fans were sure to buy them for their girlfriends or wives.

Looking around, she realized that neither Helen, Aunt Nancy or Jill were home, and she had the place to herself. Shrugging her shoulders, Gwen decided to go upstairs and catch up on her studies before making some dinner.

Gwen's eyebrows shot up in surprise when she saw the brightly wrapped package on her bed. She couldn't imagine who it might have been from-was it something her mother or Aunt Nancy had left? If so, why would they have done it? Was Mom trying to cheer her up after all the troubles she'd been having?

Opening the package, Gwen suddenly dropped it with a startled scream as the contents popped out at her. The package had contained a hideously grinning pumpkin head, which sprang out like a jack-in-the-box and bounced at the end of the coil it was attached to, cackling robotically as it did so. The pumpkin head's mouth widened, as a long, ugly pink tongue fell out of it and dangled from the pumpkin's head, bouncing back and forth in tune with the rest of the pumpkin.

I KNOW WHERE YOU ARE, SPIDER-WOMAN! the message read, written in jagged, crooked letters.

Rage and horror filled Gwen's mind as she picked the thing up, angrily smashing the package to bits with her superhuman strength and destroying the remnants with her sting blasts, before throwing the shattered remains in the garbage. Her ears were still filled with the pumpkin head's laughter, now blending with the memories of the sick, depraved laughter of the package's creator, a laughter Gwen could still hear in her nightmares.

Gwen slumped down on her bed, trying with every bit of effort she could muster to hold back her tears and repress the angry scream she felt rising up inside her.

She tried, and she failed.

(Next Issue: The effects of Jack O' Lantern's harrassment continue to take their toll on Gwen, even as she visits the Daily Bugle with Peter Parker and tries to get J. Jonah Jameson to take an interest in the plight of Marie-Ange Colbert and the other mutants being abused in prison. Meanwhile, Vincent Gonzalez continues to amp up his vendetta against Spider-Woman, even as Spider-Woman herself begins taking an interest in the beatings that his group is secretly perpetrating. As if all this wasn't enough for Gwen to deal with, the pyromaniacal Firebrand makes his return, as he attempts to murder his entire family! All this and more in Spider-Woman #50: Firing Line!)