Chapter 1736

When Spider-Man woke up, he found himself lying at the end of a dark alley. The light of a flashlight was vaguely shaking in front, and intense screams echoed in his ears. Spider-Man blurted out: "Stop..."

But the voice he made was not as powerful as usual. More than half of the voice line was breath, which didn't sound like stopping, but rather like begging.

Spider-Man found that he couldn't move.

The moment he made a sound, the flashlight shone towards this side. When the field of vision lit up, Spider-Man barely saw a few half-grown children standing by the wall. The big one looked like he was thirteen or fourteen years old, and the smallest one might be only about ten years old.

They were beating a child much smaller than them.

Spider-Man originally thought it was just a fight between ordinary children, at most group bullying, until he saw the biggest child holding a crowbar stained with blood.

Sticky, cold liquid flowed down from his forehead. Spider-Man found that he had changed his body. After the initial tension dissipated, he found that one of his eyes couldn't see, and the field of vision of the other eye was constantly shaking.

"Bang!"

The crowbar smashed into the head of the child who was beaten by the group. After the last scream, he died.

The others walked towards Spider-Man. Fear spread in Spider-Man's heart. He used all his strength to struggle, but there were not many limbs he could control. Most of his body was in a state of being completely unable to feel.

Spider-Man opened his mouth to make a sound, but couldn't say a complete sentence. He only heard the leading big child say: "If you don't want to die, don't steal things in your next life!"

"Bang!"

Spider-Man lost consciousness. After a long darkness, he found himself appearing in a room with dim light. His right leg hurt badly, but at least he was no longer dizzy.

A girl's face appeared in his blurred field of vision. Her fingers waving were thin as a skeleton, but her face had a little baby fat. Words with a Cat Getan accent rang in Spider-Man's ears.

"Jayne, are you okay? You were beaten by Johnny and hit your head. I thought you were dead."

Spider-Man barely sat up. He shook his head and said: "I'm not... I'm not..."

"I know, I know, don't worry. We all ate very full two days ago. It doesn't matter if we eat one less meal today, even the most powerful Golden Hand on the tail alley side has missed."

"Yes, yes, Jayne, don't worry, we can work now too." A more childish voice came from behind the girl.

The girl turned her head and scolded: "Jimmy, I told you long ago that you and your sister are too young and not tall enough to steal things. You are not allowed to go out."

"But Jayne is injured. If we don't go out to work, no one will have food to eat." The childish voice protested: "Besides, my brother and I will be eight years old next year."

Spider-Man took a deep breath and shouted: "Stop, who can come and tell me what's going on? I'm not on Apokolips..."

"Jayne, what's wrong with you? Are you having a fever?"

Suddenly, several children surrounded him. Except for the girl called Lan, there were a pair of twins who looked like brothers and sisters, two thin boys, a girl with braids, and a little girl who looked like three or four years old.

Spider-Man swallowed a bunch of words back into his stomach.

Because these children looked too miserable.

The older girl was a little better, her face had some meat, but judging from the exposed wrists and fingers, her body must be thin as a skeleton. The twins were completely thin and small, and the remaining few children were not only thin and small, sallow and emaciated, with sunken eye sockets, but also dressed in rags.

In Spider-Man's view, the Queens district where he lived and the Bronx district next to it were already considered poor gathering places, and he hadn't seen such children there. This was simply like the child survivors filmed in those war reports.

No, it was actually worse than that, Spider-Man thought. Child survivors were just ragged, with the ashes of gunfire on their faces, but one could see from their body shape and face that they were living well before. But this group of children looked like they had been hungry for years, and their bodies hadn't developed at all.

Spider-Man recalled that the sister in the twins said they would be eight years old next year, but these two children didn't look like second graders at all. The five-year-old children in the kindergarten next to his house were much stronger than them.

Spider-Man was speechless for a while, not knowing what to say.

He struggled to sit up, gently pushed away Lan's hand touching his forehead and said: "I don't have a fever, can you tell me where I am now, and who are you?"

"God, you didn't break your head, did you?"

"I'm fine, but I do remember a little bit." Spider-Man searched his gut to make up lies. He was afraid that telling the truth would scare these children. He could clearly feel their concern and expectation from these children's eyes. If Spider-Man told them that Jayne might have already died, they would probably cry in fear.

Suddenly, the children began to explain to Spider-Man in a jumble. Spider-Man summarized it after listening. Simply put, this is a thief gang.

They used to steal things in various groups led by fathers and mothers, and later were driven out or ran out because of various incidents. For survival, they formed their own small gang, fishing for some scattered work at the junction of several large thief groups to barely make a living.

This boy called Jayne is the organizer of the group and the oldest child. He is eleven years old this year. He took the initiative to escape from a thief group. Before coming out, he was the most powerful child in the thief group, and he ran out because of a dispute with the mother in the group.

Now only he and Lan can go out to work, but Lan has a short apprenticeship time and poor skills. Even if she is busy all day, she can't steal much. The whole small gang basically relies on the things Jayne steals to support.

Spider-Man opened his mouth. He is very righteous, but his conscience makes him unable to say "stealing is wrong" to such a group of children.

He clenched his fists angrily, wanting to reprimand the parents who gave birth but didn't raise these children, and wanting to scold welfare agencies and community staff, but now only what Lan said before is circling in his mind: they might have no food to eat in the next few days.

Spider-Man took a deep breath and wanted to stand up, ignoring the pain in his body, but thought that standing up was useless. He was not Jayne, he wouldn't steal, and he didn't want to steal. Is there no other way to get some food?

Spider-Man explained his point of view to several children, but what made him feel uncomfortable all over was that several children didn't agree or refute after listening, just stared straight at him with a look Spider-Man couldn't understand.

"... It's just food." Spider-Man said like this: "It's enough to fill the stomach, right? Or, or can you not consider the taste?"

Lan sat down in silence, lowered her head and repeated: "Yes, it's just food."

Suddenly, the sister in the twins let out a scream. She shouted at Lan: "You can't go back! You can't go back to that heartless old woman again. Those men will kill you!!!"

Lan was silent for a while, and said with a crying voice: "It's just food."

Spider-Man suddenly understood what they were talking about. He looked at this little girl dumbfounded. Although she was big among the children, she was completely a child.

Spider-Man took a deep breath, the flame of anger almost burned his heart. He instinctively hammered the floor, and then froze.

He looked down at the floor, nothing happened, not even a trace was left.

He is not Spider-Man anymore.

The flame of anger went out with a "whoosh", leaving Spider-Man with cold sweat and vague fear.

He is not Spider-Man anymore, no great strength, no agility, no perception of danger, no advanced equipment given by Mr. Stark, and no Uncle Ben and Aunt May who will always make hot meals waiting for him.

Spider-Man felt tears spinning in his eye sockets, but he held them back hard. It wasn't that he didn't want to cry, it was because his kindness made him know that he couldn't cry, because once he cried, this group of children would have to cry, and they didn't even have food to eat after crying.

Find food, find food, find food...

Spider-Man gritted his teeth, reached out and pushed Lan who was a little distracted, and asked: "I really can't steal now, but we can't have no food to eat. Besides stealing, don't you know any other way to get food?"

"If there were, we wouldn't steal. A thief's life is the least valuable. If you get caught, you can be beaten to death."

Spider-Man thought of his last experience of death. It seems that his last self was also a thief, just unfortunately caught.

Thinking of this, Spider-Man felt his heart sinking heavily, and the chill climbed to his neck along his spine. This means that these few living people are very likely to be beaten to death because of one mistake.

Stealing reluctantly will be beaten to death, not stealing will starve to death. Spider-Man found that he was not so anxious when facing Thanos snapping his fingers to destroy half of the life in the universe.

Because at that time he only had one path to choose, which was to fight to the death. Even if the end was a dead end, he could say he tried his best. But now he knows that both are dead ends, but he still has to choose one. The moment of choice means that someone will definitely die.

These children cannot all survive.

Spider-Man's reason told him this. Jayne fell too suddenly. They had no preparation. The people who could work in the group were not connected, and they couldn't find another way out within three days. The youngest girl definitely couldn't survive.

Where is the way out?

"What about turning over the trash can?" Spider-Man suddenly said: "If it's just to fill the stomach, discarded food is not impossible."

"Trash cans are managed by child gangs. Before the garbage truck dumps, they will guard there." Lan shook her head and said: "Their bodies are much stronger than ours, we can't grab them."

The brother in the twins shrank his neck and said: "And getting close to them might be beaten, they especially hate thieves."

Looking at the disappointed expression on Spider-Man's face, Lan gritted her teeth and said: "Jayne, your craftsmanship is famous, all the fathers and mothers nearby know it. If you go back to them, you won't starve to death. As for us, we can find a way ourselves."

"Lan! You just want to go back to that old woman. Have you forgotten how Jayne saved you back then?!"

"Anyway, I would have died anyway!" Lan gritted her teeth and said fiercely: "That's just food!"

Spider-Man took a deep breath and said: "Stop talking, I will find a way, I will find a way to let you all live."

Spider-Man failed.

Long-term malnutrition caused the youngest girl to have almost zero resistance to hunger. Her body did not have the nutrients to temporarily deal with hunger, or she might have been hungry for a long time before this.

But in short, she starved to death in front of Spider-Man.

And Spider-Man hadn't spoken for a whole day.

Until this evening, he saw a grinning boy under the street lamp at the entrance of the base, carrying a bag of bread and walking towards him.

"Long time no see, Cat Getan's good neighbor Spider-Man."

Spider-Man froze for a moment, looking at the familiar smile on his face, Spider-Man instinctively shouted: "Joker?!!!"