She fell. Faster and faster while gravity and the wind beneath her battled to keep her in free fall. With each passing second she saw the ground coming up closer and closer until she closed her eyes and braced for impact...

But something unexpected happened.

Chelsea felt a tug on her far flung strand and suddenly soared up through the air like a trapeze artist. She felt her ears pop and opened her eyes to see the busy streets beneath her became smaller and smaller. As her body arced over a tall building she reeled herself in, spun through the air, and landed with both feet firmly planted atop a high-rise apartment complex without a single scratch.

Though she landed physically unscathed, she was left emotionally and mentally shaken from what she had done. She felt her body tremble as her heart pounded against her chest and pumped liters of adrenaline through her veins. Her legs became heavy and forced her to take a knee as her mind looped back on the last handful of seconds during her death-defying feat. It was one thing to vault in the air with a padded springboard underneath her, but it another thing to swing through the air between LITERAL buildings with nothing but the hard ground and asphalt below. She knew it was a reckless. She knew it was a stupid thing to do. And now she was left rocking herself on the soles of her feet while trying to calm herself from going into a full on panic attack.

Meanwhile, the symbiote reveled in the abundance of chemicals it could imbibe from its host, but it realized that she was immobilized by shock. It had assumed that she was accustomed to hurtling through the air with ease, but had not anticipated an adverse reaction. Although it knew she was secure in its hands, it was remiss in neglecting her comfort during the experience. It needed to do something fast before she entered a state of regret. It needed to soothe her nerves. It needed to reinforce her resolve and hang in there. And by all means, it needed to avoid being torn apart from its host.

As Chelsea continued to catch her breathe and stare at the shiny roofing, her eyes trailed along the bottom half of her suit and noticed something odd with her suit. Back at her dorm, she recalled feeling as if she was wrapped in a soft mesh that gently hugged her form. But now her suit felt tighter and resembled more like a second-skin that pinched every inch of her form. She rubbed her gloved hand over her ankle and inadvertently triggered a cascading comforting sensation that bubbled from her neck down to her toes. It felt as if her suit was hugging and calming her during her time of need atop a random luxury apartment in the middle of the night.

After taking a few minutes to collect herself, she straightened up and turned around to see the large gap between where she started and where she was. And as her eyes scanned the large chasm, she came to a realization that even though it had been a stupid stunt... at least she survived. Not only had she lived to tell the tale, but she had also gained some insight into how she might do it again. Looking down the boulevard, she saw a series of tall buildings lining the road at a modest distance apart. While she was (once again) understandably reserved from continuing, she felt a tad more confident and subtly encouraged herself to maybe take another step.

Besides, she wasn't a quitter.

She had trained her whole life to perform and push herself to the limit and this, honestly, wasn't fundamentally any different. In fact looking back, no mere mortal could have done what she did.

"Or a robot..." She snickered as she took a step towards the building's edge.

The symbiote was pleased by her shift in attitude and sent one last comforting buzz through her body before taking a step back and watching the fruits of its labor. It had sensed her strong will and grace from the moment they met in San Diego, and now she was starting to embrace a new form of travel with its help. Perhaps she was a contender to be blessed with more of its hidden wonders before the inevitable; full bonding.

Chelsea felt a sense of reassurance as she made up her mind and brought her hands out in front of her. She pointed her hands towards the corner of an adjacent building and focused her sights and automatically shot a pair of thick strands of webbing to latch themselves onto the sidings before leaning forward and leaping off her perch once more.

---

As the gymnast swung through the suburban streets of Los Angeles, she discovered ways to maximize her abilities and stay airborne. Drawing on her gymnastics training, she extended and tucked her limbs to maintain momentum during each upward swing. This simple technique helped her synchronize her movements and grab onto new buildings at an ever increasing speed; surpassing sixty miles per hour. In fact, she wasn't just going over the road legal speed limit she effortlessly passed rows of stalled cars that stretched on for miles.

"Don't need to worry about traffic anymore," she giggled to herself as she to Santa Monica Boulevard and performed a somersault in the air before landing on the roof of a tall financial building.

Chelsea stood tall with a new found sense of confidence, gazing out over Beverly Hills as a chilly breeze lifted her hair like a cape behind her shoulders. The thrill of the moment was like nothing she had experienced before. Her roommate had been right; she had been cooped up in her dorm and gym for so long that it kept her trapped in a stifling bubble. But now, she was charting a new course and embracing the chance to live life beyond. It was time to break free and get into some trouble.

As the thought crossed her mind, a prickling sensation began to crawl down the nape of her neck.

She initially dismissed it as goosebumps from the cold, but the sensation persisted and she couldn't shake it. Suddenly, a shadowy figure leaped from one building to another, landing effortlessly on the top floor of a nearby parking garage. Chelsea shook her head did a double-take as she tried to make sense of what she saw. While she was able to jump around town, thanks to her training as a gymnast and her slick outfit, she couldn't imagine anyone else be nimble enough to parkour between buildings with such ease. She curiously leaned over the edge and squinted in the distance before deciding to tail the mysterious silhouette.

Chelsea followed the elusive figure until she arrived at the deserted parking garage that she eyed earlier. It had been a while since she had ventured this far away from campus and needed a vantage point to get her bearings. She walked up to a ledge, jumped on top, and took in the sight of an empty street bordered by towering palm trees and brightly lit storefronts. As she looked around at the names of the shops, it suddenly dawned on her that she wasn't in just any old LA neighborhood, she was on Rodeo Drive; the most expensive street in the world. She recalled visiting when she first toured UCLA as a rising freshmen, but she hadn't either the time or the money to do more than window shop and gawk at dresses, purses, and jewelry worth more than hundreds of thousands of dollars a piece. As she continued to scan the area, she noticed that one store in particular not only had its lights turned off but also had a piece of its roof detached from its skylight. Chelsea aimed her sights for a path across and leapt onto the top of a palm tree before spinning a strand to vault onto the roof of the store in question; Balenciaga. She approached the wedged open panel of glass and looked around to see if the coast was clear before jumping through the rift and landing on a soft orange cushion with a muted hiss.

In the store's dark interior, Chelsea found herself surrounded by racks of exquisite clothes and sought-after accessories that could appeal to any girl's wildest fantasies. She looked around and stared down a narrowing hallway on the other end of the store. While she didn't have any reason to press forward, her curiosity about the shadowy figure got the best of her and she started moving deeper into the store as quietly as possible. Upon passing underneath a marble archway, she encountered rows and rows of emptied out jewelry display cases with their lids unlocked and open. She had a hunch that the store's employees didn't intentionally leave it in this state...

As she took another step, she felt something beneath her sole and began to bend down to see what it was. But as soon as she did, she felt a familiar tingle run down her neck and felt a presence sneak up behind her. In a split second, she leapt forward and her heels to get a better look at the approaching figure. The first thing she saw underneath the dim moonlight was a voluminous head of platinum blonde hair that sat above a leather eye mask that was snuggly attached to a sinister woman. She wore a glossy bodysuit with a puffy fur collar surrounding her shoulders and a pair of gloves with sharp edges at the ends of her finger tips. Looking back up at the mysterious figure's face, Chelsea noticed a smirk grow across the lady's face as she flicked her hair back and stepped forward.

"Well loooookie here..." The lady casually teased. "Another city, another spider tailing me around."

Chelsea remained still as she became enthralled by the individual and missed the last part of what she said. As the figure approached, Chelsea noticed a designer messenger slung over the lady's shoulder and filled to the brim with, undoubtedly, valuable goods.

"Oh no matter," she sighed as she stepped towards a dim shaft of light.

"Ya can keep a secret between us, right?" She asked and made a hush gesture with her index finger before swiftly lifting herself up through an open skylight with a grappling hook. Once she was up out of the store, she gave her adversary a sly wink and dropped a sliced glass panel through the opening which instantly shattered into a million pieces upon impact.

The shattering glass set off a deafening alarm that made Chelsea instantly dizzy. She shut her eyes and tried to cover her ears as she felt her stomach sink and her strength begin to fade. Out from the corner of her eye she noticed the once cohesive fibers of her suit were beginning to tear apart as tendrils began to loosen and jet out in a dozen different directions. It was almost like the suit was in pain from the wail of the store's security system. Seeing her lucky outfit in distress flipped a switch deep down within her and made her determined to save it from being ripped to shreds. She quickly eyed the same skylight opening and focused in to eject one last strand of webbing to sling herself up and out of the store in one piece. With a quick focus, she slung a strand of webbing and swung herself out and away from the store.

Now that she was in the clear and away, she felt the seams of her suit start to heal and weave back together into one piece. She let out a sigh of relief and was glad she didn't have to find her way back to her dorm in the . Chelsea quickly propelled herself away from the infamous street as she heard a rush of police sirens congregating to where she was.

"That's enough adventure for tonight," she thought to herself as she discretely made her way back to her dorm for some well deserved rest.

---

On top of a different roof that looked over Beverly Hills, Black Cat watched as more and more police cars spilled onto Rodeo Drive; where she just was moments ago.

"And there I was thinking I'd gotten my evening nicely planned. A little innocent theft followed by hot cocoa and a steamy chick-flick..." She mused to herself before peeling off her eye mask and turning towards a roof access door and back down to her hotel room before her competition the next day.