“You can’t beat me!” Miles called out to the Warden, who ran for the whip. Miles bounded from the wall, drop-kicking the Warden in the chest—returning the favor from before—knocking him back against the Davis painting; the huge frame smacked loose from the wall, crashing down on the Warden. The frame landed on his neck, and the painting fell over him, the canvas stretching and bowing over the old man’s head. By the time he pushed it off of him, Miles had already grabbed the nine-tailed whip.
“You don’t know what to do with that. You don’t have it in you,” the Warden snarled, flashing a gap in his teeth. He slipped his tongue in the space, then spat blue slime on the floor. “You don’t even know who you are.” Miles started swinging the whip slowly so as not to accidentally hit himself. He zeroed in on the Warden. “You don’t even know who I am!” And like changing the stations on a television, the Warden’s face switched. First to Miles’s father’s. Switch. Austin’s. Switch. Jefferson Davis’s. Switch. Uncle Aaron’s. “You’re just like me!” Switch. Back to the Warden. “An insect! Something to be crushed under a thumb.” The Warden let out a cackle, and again, reached out his arms, gripping the room, peeling it from the world like a sticker. This time, Miles turned to one of the huge windows. His heart jumping, his mind reeling, trying to convince himself that all this was real. That this wasn’t a dream, a nightmare where you wake up still in a nightmare. Wake up. No, you’re awake. You’re awake. Out in the field he could see Chamberlains running toward the house. An army, ready for attack. Miles adjusted his eyes, pulling his attention away from the horde of evil coming toward him, and focused on his own reflection. He knew the Warden was folding the world up again, and it was best this time to brace himself for it. So he stared at the faded image of himself in the glass, rays of sun cutting through the top half of the reflection of the black-and-red mask.
And then…CLAP!
Darkness. And then whiteness. Blank. It was as if Miles had been sucked into a vacuum. An echo chamber. A humming in Miles’s ear, a piercing sound ringing louder and louder until it abruptly stopped.
Silence.
Can you hear me? Hello? Can you hear me? Can you hear us? Listen to us. Listen closely. Our names are Aaron, Austin, Benny, Neek, Cyrus, John, Carlo, Sherman. Benji. Our names are Rio, Frenchie, Winnie, Alicia. Our name is Miles Morales. We are sixteen. We are from Brooklyn. We are Spider-Man.
Darkness.
This is all in our minds.
Darkness.
This is all in your mind.
This is all in your mind.…
And then, light. It had only been a split second. A blink. And Miles was still in the house. Still holding the cat-o’-nine-tails. Still looking at the window, his reflection in the glass. Nothing changed.
“What?” The Warden staggered back, shaking his head at the failed attempt at another mind warp. Miles smiled. But his smile was cut short by the Chamberlains surrounding the house, trying to force themselves through the broken window, climbing up onto the porch, slamming into the door like the undead.
Miles knew he wouldn’t be able to beat them all, so he turned back to the Warden and started toward him, the cat-o’-nine-tails clutched tight by his side, the tassels dangling, barbed. Again, he started swinging it lightly.
“Don’t do that,” the Warden said, holding up his hand. Miles stepped forward, still swinging it. “You don’t know what you’re doing, boy. You don’t know how to wield that kind of power!” the Warden shouted as Miles swung the whip, the tails circling round and round like propeller blades. As they cut through the air, the whir got louder and louder. Without stepping any further, Miles simply let it go. The momentum of the tails carried the whip across the room, and just like when the Warden had thrown it, in midair, the whip morphed into a cat.
Just then, the door slammed open and the Chamberlains came charging in like troops infiltrating a camp. There were a few who finally got through the shattered window. Miles assumed a fighting stance, ready to take on whichever Chamberlain jumped first.
“Help me!” the Warden called to them. But before they could even make a move, the gigantic cat speared the old man with one of its tails.
Every Chamberlain froze. The cat struck the Warden with another tail. And another. Tail after tail darting into the old man, pushing through his body, nailing him to the wall in the same spot his friend Jefferson Davis had been hanging for years.
There was no more sound. Not from the cat, or the Chamberlains, or Miles. Not from the old grandfather clock. As if the world had been muted. And then, loud like a gust of wind, the Warden exhaled his last breath.
Fur from the nine-tailed monster blew through the room like a blizzard, leaving nothing but a house cat. No whip. The Chamberlains snapped out of their stupor, and in a quick moment of reflex, Miles camouflaged himself. They all looked around at each other, puzzled, but didn’t say a word. They just walked out of the house and headed across the field, leaving Miles standing in the doorway staring after them, the prison in the distance and a white cat—two white cats—affectionately rubbing up against his leg.
Miles climbed back through the window of their dorm and fell into the room. Ganke yelped, then paused the Nintendo game he’d been playing and rushed over to Miles to help him up.
“Jesus, man. You look like you took a beating,” Ganke said, hoisting him up.
“Yeah, well, not nearly as bad as the one I gave.” Miles pushed the words through his winces and yanked the mask from his face. “It was weird. He could see me, man, even when I was camouflaged. He looked right at me. Said that when you’re as old as he was, you can see the things that people don’t think are there.”
“Oh man, he really is the boss of Mr. Chamberlain. Our Mr. Chamberlain. Talking all that crazy stuff. Like, what does that even mean?”
“He looked me in the face and said, opportunity.” Miles shook his head. “Like I was the opportunity.”
“Well, I bet he didn’t expect ‘the opportunity’ to beat the hell out of him.” Ganke reached out his fist for a pound. But Miles waved it off, afraid his wrist was too sore. “You did beat him, right?”
Miles nodded. Ganke sat back in his chair, relieved. Also a little proud.
Miles told Ganke the rest of the story, what the Warden said, the mind warping, the giant cat monster with nine tails, the way the Warden tried to sic the Chamberlains on him like zombie attack dogs.
“But when it was over, they just walked away. It was like they had all awakened from a dream. Like they had been sleepwalking and suddenly decided to go home. It was wild.” Miles shook his head slightly. “But what really threw me, and it’s still messing with me, is that they didn’t say anything. They didn’t wonder why or how they ended up at this crashed-up house behind the prison. They just kinda snapped out of whatever trance the Warden had them in and walked off. So what if…what if the trance wasn’t like a full trance? I mean, if they knew where they were, and they didn’t seem surprised, then maybe it wasn’t a total mind control thing, right? Maybe it was a little mind control, and a little…I don’t know, willingness.”