Marvel's Princess – Read Fanfic

A sharp beeping echoed from behind the door. Bella, cheeks puffed in embarrassment, stood with her hand still poised over the button. Natasha looked at her with disdain. Could you have been any faster?

“I just can’t control my hands. My fingers are very agile, you’ll see someday. Hey, look, the door is opening!” Bella attempted to cover her impulsive action. The hidden door slowly opened, revealing no nuclear explosion, no super monsters bursting out, and no missiles falling from the sky.

It seemed like a standard door-opening mechanism.

They cautiously peeked inside. The space behind the door wasn’t large, and there was no further sound.

“Let’s hurry and see what’s inside. And no touching random buttons without my permission!” Natasha said sternly.

“Oh, okay, got it.” Bella’s tone was as nonchalant as it could be.

They carefully entered, finding a high-tech control room. Several men in lab coats lay sprawled on the ground, each with a bloody hole in either their hearts or foreheads. The computers on the desks were destroyed, paper documents were scattered everywhere, and fresh blood stains made the scene even more eerie.

“You remove the hard drives from the computers, and I’ll look for clues.” Despite her earlier reckless mistake, Bella’s authority remained intact. She directed Natasha to remove the hard drives while she wandered around the small control room.

What were these people monitoring? Who killed them? What was the motive? Bella used her memories of writing Conan-style detective stories and some knowledge imparted by Shaw to analyze the scene.

The result of her analysis was inconclusive.

The Conan cases weren’t reliable—they were fictional, after all. Shaw’s knowledge was also somewhat suspect. Even when she was alive, Bella suspected that Shaw wasn’t particularly shrewd. If she was a special agent, she was the particularly reckless type. Combining the two sources of knowledge didn’t yield any significant insights.

Watching Natasha dismantle the hard drives, Bella sighed inwardly. Natasha wasn’t even a novice in this field, and her own skills weren’t particularly strong either. They would need to find solid leads.

Fearing the spider army might catch up, they hastily removed a few intact hard drives and quickly left.

Before leaving, Bella poured gasoline around and set fire to the hidden control room, burning it to ashes.

The events behind Prosperity Town were far from simple. Whether it was the watchers or the killers, they were powerful. If these people returned to the scene and found traces of Bella and Natasha, would they come after them?

She could dodge a handgun bullet up close, but definitely not a sniper rifle. Human technological weapons still posed a significant threat to her at this stage.

Finding the control room was just an interlude. Regardless of the truth they uncovered, it wouldn’t help their current situation much. Natasha was furious, hating the masterminds who destroyed her home and killed many of her friends. Despite her anger, she continued to drive the pickup truck, leading the spider army north.

Normally, spiders have territorial instincts and will return once they leave a certain range. The spiders from Prosperity Town were beginning to show this behavior.

Bella and Natasha had to occasionally reverse to let the spiders see them, thus keeping the bait effective.

Meanwhile, Samantha and Charlie took the opportunity to clear obstacles on the road, dealing with any remaining spiders in the mall. They shot whatever they could, leaving the rest.

They broke through the front door, everyone got into their vehicles. Those without cars or with damaged vehicles helped each other—after all, they were all small-town residents who knew each other well.

Despite Samantha’s best efforts, the townspeople still fled somewhat disorganizedly, heading south towards Tucson.

“I have to go save Bella!” Charlie was frantic, his mind filled with images of his daughter being devoured by spiders.

Fortunately, his phone rang just then.

“We’re okay, just go! The spider army is retreating!” Bella’s urgent voice came from the other end.

Charlie didn’t insist on finding his daughter anymore. He quickly hopped into Samantha’s police car, joined the convoy, and speeded south.

Bella and Natasha eventually lost the spiders, or rather, the spiders lost interest in them. After chasing them for a while, the spiders gave up and returned to town.

The two women drove the pickup around the sandy outskirts of the town for a while. An hour later, they caught up with the main group of refugees.

The convoy of a thousand people had dwindled to less than eight hundred. The pursuing spiders occasionally caught vehicles, but some spiders had also given up and returned to town. To the spiders, there was no need to chase if there was already plenty of food.

“Bella! Are you okay? Thank God!” Samantha was overjoyed, grabbing Bella’s shoulders to check for injuries.

Auntie, we’re not that close, are we? Bella felt awkward but saw Charlie fussing over Natasha nearby. She felt a bit like covering her face.

Regardless of how she felt, the gesture was kind. Bella allowed herself to be hugged by Samantha, even snuggling a bit.

Charlie couldn’t be so affectionate. Natasha was, after all, someone else’s daughter. Even if they were legally connected, he had to avoid any overly intimate gestures. So, he settled for a pat on the shoulder to show his concern.

The road to Tucson wasn’t devoid of towns. As they passed through a small town seven kilometers away, Samantha and the local mayor and sheriff recounted the events at Prosperity Town.

Their initial reaction was disbelief.

Samantha didn’t waste time convincing them. After restocking on food, gasoline, and water, she continued south with the convoy.

A few spiders were still chasing them, but there were still some.

Soon, the residents of the next town saw the calf-sized spiders for themselves.

Their reaction was identical to those in Prosperity Town—they fled in panic.

The same happened in the next town and the one after that. By the time the convoy neared Tucson, the National Guard’s investigation helicopter had just taken off.

Although the response was somewhat slow, they finally mobilized. The helicopter surveyed the area, quickly sending back photos. Over a thousand National Guard troops were urgently assembled. Both the state and federal governments were alerted. Armed with modern weapons, various teams were prepared to exterminate the spiders and investigate the cause of the mutation.

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