Prolouge is based several months/a year into the future after the first real chapter. This is based on a mixture of comics and movie, as it has aspects from both. Keep in mind, this is how I see the Doc, so I don't consider him OOC, because this is how my mind portrays him. Anyways, disclaimer time. Doc Ock, Spider-Man, Marvel Universe belong to Stan Lee. And no matter how many times I beg and plead, he just won't surrender them. However, Ariane and the plot are mine. Of you steal them, I will throw you into the pit of evil where several of the evillest things await you. Such as cotton candy machines that will rip you apart. Enjoy, and please review!! ................................. Life is never fair. I remember my father speaking those very words to me as we sat on the porch, nibbling on warm Poptarts and watching the beautiful Georgia sun sink below the horizon. I had been a young child of seven at the time, with dusty feet and dirty cheeks, staring up at him as if he was the greatest man on the planet. And to me, he was. It was the middle of summer. The dog-days of summer, everyone called them. Those were the days where the sun just baked the entire world, until outside your home was cooler than the inside. He glanced down at me, and spoke those truthful four words to me. There had been a gentleness in his eyes and, at the same time, a wanting, a need, for me to understand. It is one of the precious, precious memories I have of my dear Dad. We were thick as thieves, two peas in a pod. We were student and teacher, doting father and adoring daughter. He taught me lessons I have yet to forget. Bless him, because that was one of them. He knew what he was talking about, my father. From my mother's abandonment to the loss of a dear friend far too early, life has never been fair to me. And, judging by the choice it was presenting me at the moment, it never would. This choice that wasn't even a true choice. My throat closed as I gazed upon the two people that meant more to me than anything. They were his at the moment, but it was up to me to choose who would be returning with me. It was a decision that was ripping my heart clean in two. One of them was a man I admired like my father, respected and trusted. I adored him as I adored my Dad; I protected him as I would if he was the little brother I was never gifted with. I gazed upon him now, and felt the knot form in my stomach. Was I to be his judge and jury now? The other was a person I saw walk out of my life, and vow never to return. I should not have feelings for the one who abandoned me at the time they were needed the most, but I did. And it was only making it harder to gaze upon their unconscious form now. The knot became a punch in my stomach, stealing my breath. My eyes finally tore away from the beaten forms of those I cared for, and rose to he who had done this horrible crime to us three. His lips curled upwards, displaying the handsome he hid beneath cruelity and hatred. It was a smile that haunted me constantly in my dreams, and now has become part of my living nightmare. "Make your choice, my lovely Ariane." He spoke to me now, instead of merely staring. The Gamemaster was taunting me now, just to see the pain in my eyes. "As much as I enjoy the emotions rolling off you, the turmoil you are going through, I grow impatient with your silence. Though it is attractive, nothing truly compares to your beautiful pain. I have offered you two doors, Dearest. Pick yours." I would have gone for the third door, had it been unlocked to me. My life for the two of theirs. After all, that was his game, was it not? Out of three, two would survive. Why not let it be me who dies, instead of the two I care for? Simple. He enjoyed seeing my tears, my pain. If he wanted me dead, I would already be dead. As it were, though, I was not the pawn he considers me. I am the Queen of this game of Chess. Everything rested on my shoulders, the strength of my head versus the strength of my heart. Why couldn't they live, and I die in their place? Why did it have to be this way? And, as if hearing my thoughts, my torturer responded with, "Life isn't fair, little Guardian. You know this as well as I do. Decide now, or loose both." I couldn't. "Five seconds." Who was I to decide who survived, and who faced death? "Four." I am not God. "Three." But neither was this man. "Two." No,[I] please.[/I] "One." I love them both! "Now, Ariane!" God, help me.