The cell was carved from black stone that seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it. Chains of some unknown metal—not durasteel, not cortosis, something other—bound Ahsoka's wrists to the wall behind her.
"You can't keep me here!" She pulled against the restraints, Force-enhanced strength straining metal that refused to yield. "Do you hear me? Let me GO!"
She reached for the Force, trying to manipulate the chains' molecular structure, trying to corrode them, trying anything. The power flowed through her—and stopped dead at the metal, as if the chains existed outside the Force's influence.
"Save your strength."
Ahsoka's head snapped toward the voice.
A small creature sat in the corner—no more than a foot tall, with elongated ears that drooped past its shoulders. Lavender skin, almost translucent, stretched over a thin frame. Beady black eyes reflected no light, making them appear as holes rather than organs.
"What—who are you?" Ahsoka demanded.
"Someone who's been here far longer than you've been alive." The creature's voice was high-pitched but carried unexpected weight. "You're here to die, little Jedi. Might as well accept it."
"I won't." Ahsoka pulled at the chains again, her montrals sensing the cell's dimensions, searching for weaknesses. "I'll find a way out. I always do."
The creature let out a wheezing laugh. "They all say that. The ones who end up here. So confident. So certain their masters will come, their friends will save them." It shambled forward on stick-thin legs. "I've watched them all break eventually."
"I'm a Jedi." Ahsoka lifted her chin, refusing to show fear. "We don't break."
"A Jedi?" The creature tilted its head, examining her with those empty eyes. "You're barely more than a child. Where is your master? Where are these friends you're so certain will rescue you?"
"They're coming," Ahsoka said with absolute conviction. "Master Skywalker, Peter, the others—they'll find me."
"And if they don't?"
"They will." No hesitation. No doubt.
The creature moved closer, climbing the wall with disturbing ease to bring its face level with hers. "Such faith. Such trust." Its voice dropped to a whisper. "What happens when that trust breaks? When they fail you? When you realize you were never important enough to save?"
"That's not—" Ahsoka started to argue, but felt something shift.
The chains loosened. Not much, but enough that she could move her wrists freely within the restraints. She rotated them experimentally, working feeling back into numb fingers.
"Thank you," she said cautiously, not quite understanding why this creature would help.
"Oh, the chains are easy." It dropped to the floor, standing directly before her. One tiny hand pointed at its own head. "What happens here is harder." The other hand moved to its chest. "But here? Here is where you truly break."
The creature circled her like a vulture. "Forget your master. Forget your friends. If you want to survive, you must let them go. Accept that you're alone—"
"I'll never—"
Something grabbed her arm.
Ahsoka looked down just as the creature's mouth opened impossibly wide, revealing row upon row of needle-sharp teeth. It latched onto her forearm, those teeth sinking through skin and muscle with surgical precision.
"AHH!" Pain exploded up her arm, white-hot and all-consuming.
The creature released her and stepped back, its expression shifting from pity to cruel satisfaction.
Blood welled from the puncture wounds, but that wasn't what made Ahsoka's stomach drop. Something else pulsed beneath her skin—moving, spreading from the bite like venom through her veins.
"Why?" She clutched her wounded arm, feeling wrongness crawl up toward her shoulder. "What did you do to me?"
The creature smiled—and its form rippled.
Lavender skin darkened to pale gray. Those black eyes blazed red. The small, pitiful thing grew, unfolded, became him.
The Son.
"You're mine now."
Terror froze Ahsoka in place as she watched her captor transform, but worse—much worse—was what she felt inside.
Darkness. Not metaphorical, not philosophical—literal darkness spreading through her body like ink in water. It burned and froze simultaneously, eating away at something fundamental in her core. The corruption flowed from the bite site, racing through her circulatory system, touching every cell.
Her arm went numb first. Then hot. Then wrong.
"No—" She fell to her knees, the chains clattering as they fell away completely. "No, please—"
The darkness reached her chest. Her heart stuttered, caught between beats as something rewrote its rhythm. The Force that had always felt like light and warmth twisted into something sharp and hungry.
"Anakin..." She gasped his name like a prayer. Tears streamed down her face. "Peter... someone... help me..."
The corruption spread to her mind.
Thoughts that had been hers—loyalty, compassion, faith—crumbled like sand castles before a tide. New thoughts, vicious and cruel, rose to replace them. The Jedi had failed her. Her master had abandoned her. Her friends were weak, useless—
No. That's not true. That's not—
But the voice of her true self grew quieter with each passing second.
Ahsoka's body went still. The tears stopped. Her breathing evened out.
Then her eyes opened.
Where healthy blue skin had been, sickly yellow now dominated. Red veins pulsed at the edges, spider-webbing across her face and arms like cracks in porcelain. Her eyes—previously bright with youth and determination—had gone cold. Dead.
She stood slowly, testing her limbs, and smiled.
The smile was wrong. All wrong.
The Son watched with satisfaction as his newest weapon rose to her feet.
Elsewhere in the tower, Peter Parker had his own problems.
His body ached everywhere. The adrenaline that had carried him through the aerial chase and Force lightning attack had worn off, leaving him with the bill for every impact, every slam against stone, every second of electrical agony.
"Okay," he muttered, limping through the tower's corridors. "Inventory time. Ribs: probably cracked. Shoulders: definitely sprained. Spider-suit: totally trashed. Chance of finding Ahsoka: has to be better than zero, right? Right?"
His spider-sense maintained a low, constant buzz—not screaming danger, but aware of wrongness permeating this place. Every shadow felt hostile. Every doorway could hide a threat.
The suit's damage was extensive. Burn marks from the Son's Force lightning carved across his chest in lightning-bolt patterns. Tears and rips exposed skin underneath. Worse, the HUD in his lenses flickered and died, taking Karen's interface with it.
"Karen?" He tapped the side of his mask. "KAREN, you there?"
Silence.
"Great. Just great." At least he'd backed up her AI core on Coruscant. Small comfort when he was alone in a hostile tower searching for a captured friend.
He explored methodically, checking every room, every corridor. The tower's architecture made no sense—stairs that led nowhere, doors that opened into walls, geometry that hurt to look at too long.
Then he found it.
A chamber opened into a vast space, four pillars arranged in a square at its center. Suspended between them, held in place by what looked like a gyroscope of dark metal, floated a black sphere.
Peter stopped at the threshold, spider-sense prickling with intensity it hadn't shown since arriving.
The sphere was perfectly smooth, perfectly black—not the black of night sky, but the black of absence. Like someone had cut a sphere-shaped hole in reality itself.
"Okay, weird floating mystery ball," Peter said to the empty room. "That's definitely a trap. Obviously a trap. Should not touch the trap ball."
He moved closer anyway. Curiosity had always been his weakness.
The sphere began to move as he approached, rotating within its gyroscope housing. And as it turned to face him—
Eyes appeared on its surface.
White, angular, shaped exactly like—
"Is that..." Peter leaned closer, disbelieving. "Is that thing mimicking my mask?"
The sphere's surface rippled, and the white eye-shapes blinked.
"Nope. Nope nope nope." Peter backed up. "That's too weird. Way too weird. I'm leaving—"
But he didn't leave. Something about the sphere called to him. Not audibly—deeper than that. Like it recognized him. Like it had been waiting for him.
"This is a terrible idea," Peter whispered.
Then he shot webbing at the gyroscope supports.
The structure collapsed. The sphere dropped—and Peter caught it.
The surface wasn't solid. It felt like...gel? Liquid latex? Something in between. Warm. Almost body-temperature. The material compressed slightly under his fingers, then expanded back to its original shape.
"Okay, caught the creepy ball. Now what—WHOA!"
The sphere moved.
Not falling, not slipping—spreading. The black substance flowed across his hands like water finding its level, but it didn't drip. It adhered, climbing up his forearms with disturbing speed.
"Get off! Get OFF!" Peter tried to shake it loose, but the material moved faster, racing up his arms toward his shoulders. It didn't hurt—that was almost worse. If it hurt, he could fight it. Instead, it felt almost...comfortable. Like a second skin settling into place.
The black substance reached his chest and exploded outward, covering his entire torso in seconds. It moved through the rips in his suit, flowed around his web-shooters, even seemed to repair the damaged fabric while incorporating itself into the weave.
"NO! Stop! I don't—"
It covered his face.
Peter's scream cut off as the material sealed over his mouth, his nose, his eyes. Total sensory deprivation for three endless seconds—
Then the world came rushing back.
Peter gasped, staggered, and collapsed to his knees.
The substance wasn't suffocating him. It was...helping him breathe? His damaged ribs suddenly didn't hurt. His sprained shoulders moved freely. The burn marks on his chest had vanished, replaced by smooth black material that flexed with his movements.
He looked down at his hands—black. Not suit-black, but living black, the material seeming to shift and flow even while perfectly still.
"What..." He touched his chest, felt the organic texture beneath his fingers. "What is this?"
A thump echoed in his mind. Not sound—feeling. Like a heartbeat that wasn't his own.
Peter stood shakily, caught his reflection in a polished section of wall, and barely recognized himself.
The red and blue suit was gone. In its place, sleek black material covered him from neck to toe. White spider emblems stood out on his chest and back—larger than his original logo, more aggressive. His lenses were stark white against the black, making his eyes look alien, predatory.
"This isn't—I didn't—" He pulled off his mask with trembling hands, needing to see his own face, needing confirmation he was still him.
His face was unchanged. Same brown hair, same wide eyes, same features.
But when he looked back at his body, the black suit pulsed as if responding to his observation.
"Okay." Peter pulled the mask back on, his analytical mind trying to process. "Okay. So I touched a weird sphere and now I'm wearing...what? Alien clothing? Sentient fabric? Is this alive?"
Another thump in his head. It almost felt like...agreement?
"You can understand me?" Peter whispered.
Thump. Thump.
"Oh, that's not creepy at all." He clenched and unclenched his fists, testing the material's flexibility. It moved perfectly with him—better than his original suit ever had. No friction, no resistance. It felt like wearing nothing at all while being completely armored.
And somehow, despite the horror of having been covered by an alien substance against his will, Peter felt...good. Better than good. Strong. Confident. The aches and pains from his earlier beating had vanished completely.
"This feels wrong," he said aloud. "This should feel wrong. Why doesn't this feel wrong?"
THUMP.
The suit seemed pleased.
Then—distantly—a scream.
"Why would you do that!?"
Ahsoka's voice. Terrified. Angry.
Peter's enhanced senses zeroed in on the direction, and he moved before conscious thought could catch up. The new suit responded to his intentions with frightening efficiency, every step feeling lighter, every motion more powerful.
"Ahsoka!" He shouted, sprinting down corridors that blurred past. "I'm coming! Hold on!"
Whatever this suit was, whatever had just happened to him—that could wait.
His friend needed him.
And with this strange new power coating his body like living armor, he'd tear this entire tower apart to reach her.
Behind him, the empty gyroscope stood as silent testimony to a transformation that would have consequences neither Peter nor anyone else could yet imagine.
The symbiote had found its host.
And on Mortis, where reality bent to the will of gods, two corruptions now spread through the beings of two young heroes.
The Son's plan, whatever it was, had just taken a terrible step forward.