Chapter Text
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The trial didn’t change a thing.
The courthouse smelled of disinfectant and dust. It was the sort of place where time seemed to slow, the mood so thick you could cut it with a knife. Peter sat in the back row, slouching with his hands shoved into his jacket pockets, trying to be as innocuous as possible.
Trying to not look at the man who had pulled the trigger.
He didn’t look special. He wasn’t some nightmarish figure. Just some guy— a wiry figure, bad haircut, a tick in his jaw as he whispered back and forth with his lawyer. Peter hated him more for that. He could at least strive to look like the scum he was.
The court officials spoke words that might as well have been in another language entirely. Chain of custody. Procedural error. Reasonable doubt. The judge simply nodded along to the arguments, every tap of her papers causing the jury to shift in their seats, waiting for the next bit of information. They hadn’t been there. None of them saw Ben Parker bleed out on the pavement, breathing shallow and desperately. None of them had heard his voice go quiet.
The gavel came down with a dissatisfying thud. “Case dismissed.” That was all.
The accused stood, confusion quickly turning to an unworthy relief. His lawyer patted him on the back, saying something that made him crack a smile. To an unknowing observer, it’d appear like a happy ending, moments before the man walked out of the front doors with sun shining upon him like a sort of blessing.
Peter stared blankly at the floor in front of him. If he made any sort of eye contact, he was sure he’d do something— say something. His fists ached in his pockets. Beside him, the newly bereaved May Parker let out a noise. Not a sob, so much as the air being wrenched out of her lungs. She reached for his hand. He let her take it.
As the courtroom emptied, May’s grip tightened. “Let’s go home.” She managed, whispering under her breath.
Peter nodded. Words failed him enough once this week.
Outside, the reporters swarmed the two, microphones shoved in their faces, paparazzi flashing their camera.
“Mrs. Parker, do you have a comment? Do you believe justice was served? Young man, what do you think about the verdict?”
May kept her head down, pulling Peter alongside her. His jaw was clenched so tight it’d take a surgical maneuver to loosen int— if he opened his mouth, he was sure to say something he couldn’t take back. The voices blent together.
One stuck out to him. “Do you think this proves the system is broken?” Called a reporter.
Peter stopped— just for a second. It is broken. He felt the words bubbling up in his throat, bitter and just waiting for release. May tugged him once more, grip firm, and he managed to get his feet moving again.
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The cab ride home was silent. Jazz on the radio whined out like a wounded animal. As May stared blankly out her window, Peter counted the seconds between the streetlights against the thud of his pulse in his ears.
Once they got to the house, May unlocked the door to make a beeline straight to the kitchen, casting her purse off to the side. “I’ll make some tea,” she mumbled. It’s what she always said when there was stress afoot.
Peter stood aimlessly in the living room. The house felt smaller now. Ben’s armchair lingered in the corner like a memorial, the indentation of his body still pressed into the cushions. Just looking at it made Peter’s chest tighten. He wanted to crawl out of his own skin.
Instead, he went upstairs, closed the door to his room behind him, and pressed his face into his pillow until the world blurred out around him.
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The weeks that followed didn’t seem to pass, so much as bleed into one another. Wake up, meander through school, come home, eat, lay in the dark. Rinse, repeat.
At school, the faculty gave him looks of pity on the regular. Everyone knew what happened. News spread fast, and Peter was branded.
“If you need to take time off, Peter… if you want to talk…”
They said it like it was charity. Stupid platitudes.
Classmates weren’t any better. Quiet ones gave him space, which was… arguably worse. The loud ones gossiped when they thought he couldn’t hear. “Parker with his dead uncle” was his defining trait now. Not a nerd, not a wallflower, just a modern-day tragedy.
Even though academia was awful, home was the last place Peter wanted to be. May tried. She cooked dinners that she barely touched, and did her best to ask about Peter’s life. All he did back was offer scraps. Short, concise answers— every word like pulling teeth.
She sat across from him at dinner one night, her fork untouched alongside a piping hot plate of baked ziti. “I was thinking… Maybe we could, I don’t know, go see a movie this weekend. Something light. You always liked those Star Wars films, didn’t you?”
Peter stared at his food. His appetite had taken an abrupt exit weeks ago. He just pushed the pasta around with his fork.
“Peter?” May asked gently.
“I don’t feel like it.” He managed. May nodded, having grown accustomed to the response. She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. Peter hated shutting her out, but his throat seemed to close up whenever the elephant in the room reared its ugly head. Better not to speak at all.
Nights were the worst. Sleeping comfortably was a pipe dream— whenever he tried, Peter would wake in a cold sweat, his uncle’s last moments burned behind his eyelids. After he’d wake abruptly, Peter would creep down the stairs to sit in Ben’s armchair. He’d stare at nothing in particular, waiting for some bit of familiarity to make its way back into the cushions.
Spoiler, it never did.
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One morning, May sat next to Peter at the counter as he picked at his cereal. She slid a folded piece of paper towards him. “There’s a field trip today,” she said. “Oscorp is hosting a science expo for local schools. I signed the permission slip for you.”
Peter frowned. “Aunt May, you really didn’t have to.”
“You should go. It’ll be good for you to get out of the house. To see something you’re passionate about—”
“Fine.”
Her shoulders loosened just a bit. “Good.”
Despite Peter’s ennui, Truman High was abuzz with anticipation. The bus ride there had all the students chatting it up, fascinated by the marvels Oscorp could have. They were the future, after all— or, at least that’s what the commercials advertised. They were just the cutting edge of most scientific advancements.
On the way, some dopey upperclassman, Seymour O’Reilly, turned to offer his wonderful opinion to Peter. “Don’t get your hopes up, Parker. You’re not smart enough to get what they’re talking about anyway.”
Peter didn’t bother with a response.
The bus eventually pulled up to Oscorp Tower– it was a monolith of steel and glass that loomed over the city, the company’s logo polished and plastered across the entrance. The walkways were filled with students from half-a-dozen schools, teachers doing their best to corral them like they were herding cattle.
The lobby inside was massive, high ceilings overhead, with walls lined with display after display of Oscorp’s achievements. Holographic screens broadcasted everything from prosthetics to renewable energy grids. An orchestral corporate anthem played softly over hidden speakers, giving off the air of self-importance. Cue the oohs and aahs. Students gawked. Teachers pointed. Seymour elbowed some poor freshman in the guy and guffawed about it far too loudly.
Peter hung back, trying to look innocuous, but even he was fascinated by the place. Rows of glass cases held all sorts of prototypes. Microchips smaller than fingernails, drones that hovered effortlessly, chemicals in vials that looked fresh out of a science-fiction novel.
And then, there was the genetics wing. The crowd was moved into a wide room where a series of terrariums and plexiglass enclosures lined the walls. A wide array of animals sat in them, making it look more like a zoo than a lab.
“This,” the guide announced, with a smile far too clean to be natural, “is the culmination of Oscorp’s cross-species genetics program. The next frontier of human development.” In one enclosure, a spider spun a web that glistened in the light. Another held one that could leap from one side of the container to another. Every specimen Peter could see had a clipboard attached to their cages, taking stock of their capabilities. “By harnessing these traits, we aim to revolutionize medicine itself.”
The guide continued his speech, droning on about “gene-splicing protocols” and “evolutionary bottlenecks.” Most students tuned him out, whispering amongst one another or fiddling with their phones. Seymour mimed squashing a bug with his feet to get a kick out of his friends.
Peter fixed his eyes on the glass nearest to him. Inches away, a small spider, its body marked with jagged red and blue patterns, scuttled across its enclosure restlessly. It didn’t look like anything he’d seen in a textbook before. It eventually crawled onto the glass, giving Peter a clear look at the underside of its body.
The guide clicked a button, making the lights dim as a screen projected diagrams onto the far wall, DNA spirals and cross-sections glowing. “Here at Oscorp, we believe that humanity’s future lies in integration. As opposed to a slower recovery process from standard medicinal methods, why not accelerate the progress? Imagine victims from disease getting back on their feet with the strength of an ant, or those with eye trauma restoring their sight with the sonar of a bat, or—”
Peter’s eyes glazed over as the speaker’s voice grew faint in his ears. The spider had begun rapping its front legs against the glass. A rhythm that only it understood. Like it was trying to get his attention.
He wanted to walk away. But the spider kept tapping.
Soon, the group was moved towards other displays— modified lizards, a tank of jellyfish glowing with a borrowed bioluminescence. Peter lagged behind, slipping away back to the other room. The lights had returned to a harsh fluorescent brightness the moment the crowd moved. Looks like it was just a bit of pandering. The enclosure was silent now, the spider hanging by a web, coiled and ready.
Peter got closer, breath fogging the glass. “You’re stuck too, right?”
The spider twitched. Peter smirked bitterly. “Guess we have that in common.”
He pressed his palm against the glass, just for a second. The spider moved in his direction, stopping dead-center in front of him, legs splayed wide. Then–
A hiss of machinery. A vent above the enclosure let out a blast of air, so small that the teachers and guides went unaware of the error. Peter reeled back, but by the time he opened his eyes, the issue was apparent.
The spider wasn’t inside anymore.
He jerked his head left, then right. Nothing. His heart pounded in his chest. Looks like it was waiting for this exact moment.
There was a sharp sting, sudden and precise, right in the crook of his hand. Peter yelped, swatting reflexively. The spider tumbled to the ground, vanishing in a shuffle of shoes before he could see where it went. Two pinpricks swole up on his hand, angry and red.
“Parker? What happened?”
A few individuals came towards the noise. They’d seen it.
Seymour noted Peter clutching his hand. The moment it clicked, he had a grin that stretched ear to ear. “Did a bug just bite you, freak?” He turned to his friends. “Look at Puny Parker! Can’t even survive a field trip without crying.”
They howled with laughter, teachers quick to silence them. Peter muttered, “Shut up,” and shoved past them. The voices followed him like a leash.
The rest of the tour flew by— Peter felt sick. His vision swam as he tried his best to fight the throbbing pain on his hand. Seymour tried a few more jabs at him on the ride home, but they might as well have been gibberish. Peter’s body was too busy betraying him to care about any “wonderful” insult.
By the time he got home, he could barely stand. He stumbled through the front door at home, saying something to May about a “headache” before she could question anything. Upstairs, he collapsed onto his bed, fully dressed, clutching his burning hand before falling into a tense sleep.
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He was falling.
Falling down an endless chasm strung with webs, stretching out into the aether, spiders the size of cars scuttling overhead, eyes boring into him. Threads wrapped around his limbs, binding him, and pulling him down, deeper into the depths.
He tried to scream, but the sound couldn’t escape his throat— he couldn’t breathe. He couldn't think. Only the bite, a fire spreading until it consumed him whole—
Peter jolted awake.
His sheets were soaked with sweat. His body was shaking, nerves tingling. He put his right hand to his chest. His heart was rattling in his chest, but he was alive.
And, healed apparently. The swelling on his hand was gone. “What?”
Peter stared close at his hand, before his eyes travelled down his wrist. The skin was smooth and unmarked, almost as if the bite hadn’t happened in the first place.
He sat up, staring further at his hands. Fingers curled, then uncurled. Then again. He felt exhilarated, and he wasn’t even out of breath. For the first time in a month, he felt awake.
Too awake.
The air in the room seemed clearer, almost. Peter could hear the gentle hum of the refrigerator below him, as well as the light steps of May’s slippers against the floor as she moved in the kitchen. Even his heartbeat, previously erratic, had stabilized, even if it drummed in his ears.
He walked over to the window, before throwing it open. The air hit him like a truck, feeling the cool breeze in every cell. The city’s pulse resonated with him. It was like someone put his senses on maximum overdrive.
Peter gripped the windowsill until his knuckles whitened. “What the hell is happening to me?”
Streetlights below flickered in his widened pupils. He was just about to close the window, but before he could grab it— his hands needed to stop sticking.
Initially, he thought it to be sweat making his grip a tad stickier than usual, but upon loosening his grip, Peter had the realization that—
“I can’t… let… go!”
He tugged as hard as possible, and his hands came loose… along with broken chunks of wooden trim, splintering as he tumbled backwards. From the ground, he looked up at his palms. The pieces dangled from his fingertips, and his attempts to shake his hands and fling them off failed. They defied logic, refusing to fall.
He rose slowly, pressing his thumb against his palm. The skin felt normal. His eyes darted to his desk chair. He pressed his fingertips against the plastic backrest, then tried to pull away.
SNAP!
The chair toppled as Peter rushed back. It lifted with his hand for a few moments, before clattering to the ground, the thunk echoing in the night.
“Peter? What’s going on up there?” May’s voice came from the kitchen, concerned.
“I— I’m fine!” His voice cracked as he replied.
He leaned against his wall, clutching his hands to his chest. The shrapnel fell off his fingers after that small scare. His eyes flicked around the room, taking in detail after detail. A cobweb in the corner, the green LED of his alarm clock, the bag of chips peeking out of a trash can nearby, so much, too much, too loud, too real.
Then an intrusive thought worked its way into his brain. No. That’s insane.
But before he knew it, he pressed one palm flat against the wall, pacing himself. His skin latched instantly, akin to a suction cup. Then, he raised his other hand, pressing it higher on the plaster. That stuck too.
“No way.” He laughed, filled with half intrigue, and half horror.
Bracing himself, he lifted a knee, then put his right foot against the wall. It slipped at first, but then caught, attaching to the wall. He planted his other right foot, and it followed suit.
He was climbing .
It took a second, but he caught a rhythm. Hand over hand, foot over foot. He made his way upwards, creeping up the wall, weight shifting as he went. Within seconds, he was hanging from the ceiling like it was the most casual thing in the world.
A laugh rose out of him. A real one.
May’s voice came up again, muffled from the hall. “Are you sure you’re alright?”
Stuck to the ceiling, Peter called back, “Yeah, I’m fine!”
As he heard her footsteps fade, Peter let go, plopping onto his bed. He laid, staring up at where he just was, hands shaking with ecstasy. Something was happening to him. This was insane.
And frankly, Peter was excited.
Notes:
Next Issue: Spidey makes his first public appearance!
Chapter 2: Masks
Summary:
"No Money, some Problems"
Or "The one with obligatory exposition."
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
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May was the first to notice something was off about him.
The night after at dinnertime, she sat at the table, watching Peter wolf down his meal after weeks of a self-induced fast. After that, he carried both their empty plates to the sink. No stumbling whatsoever— just surprisingly delicate steps that spoke of confidence.
She dabbed her mouth with her napkin. “You seem different lately, Peter.”
He froze with his hands in the dishwater. “Different… how?”
“Oh, not bad! It’s almost as if… there’s more of you standing there, that's all.” Her smile was kind, but her eyes glinted with the tiniest hint of suspicion. “I just can’t put my finger on it.”
Peter rinsed off the plates, before setting them in the drying rack. “Getting older, probably.”
“Maybe so.” She dropped the subject.
But the words still lingered on his mind.
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Practice runs were late at night, when he knew nobody would be walking by. Only black clothing and being as inconspicuous as possible would do.
Peter stared at the brick siding of his home for a solid twenty minutes before putting his hands on the wall. One after another, feet pressed flat. His muscles tensed, but the wall held him as he moved higher and higher. In less than half the time it took for him to act, he was able to reach the roof.
He laughed breathlessly, as if the sheer sound of it might’ve thrown him off balance.
Then he actually did lose his balance. “Shit!”
Peter hurdled towards the ground, but upon impact, he landed with a roll that should’ve left him with broken bones, but only knocked the wind out of him. He sprang back to his feet, stunned at first, before a wide grin spread across his face.
Next was strength. While he didn’t develop random muscles, what little gains he did have felt like iron when he poked it. Testing it was easy— he didn’t need to try and flex like a bodybuilder. Uncle Ben’s old toolbox in the garage was always a bit too heavy for him. Now, Peter could lift in with one hand like it was made out of cardboard. Impulsively, he yoinked a wrench out of the box, and bent it in the shape of a “v.”
His heart swelled with the feeling of sheer power coursing through him— before sinking.
He just destroyed something his uncle used on a daily basis.
Peter set the tool back into the box carefully, before whispering a soft apology.
The next night, acrobatics were up. Backflips, leaps of faith from the shed, and other feats that a normal human could never perform became reality. Every time he landed, it was in stances he’d only ever seen in Kung-Fu movies. May caught him after one of them.
“Peter, what on Earth—”
“Just exercise, Aunt May!” He waved her off, pretending to stretch. That managed to get her to go back inside.
When he was finished, he collapsed against the shed, staring up at the sky, mind buzzing with all the possibilities of things he could do.
And then the high ended.
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May made her move at the dinner table. She waited until Peter was in the middle of chewing before saying it, like ripping off a band-aid. “Peter, we’re going to have to move.”
Peter nearly choked, dropping his fork. “What?”
May met his shocked stare with a mournful look of her own. “The mortgage… the bills… It's more than I can manage on my own. The bank’s been lenient, but… patience doesn’t last forever.” She tried to give a small smile, but it cracked halfway. “I found a smaller place a bit away from here. You’d have to go to a new school, and it could be tight, but we’ll make do.”
Peter managed to swallow the half-eaten food sitting in his mouth.
“But… this is our house.” He said.
May reached across the table, squeezing his hand. “We’ll always be together, Peter. A house is just wood and nails.”
He nodded, but the words felt hollow. He thought of the porch they’d sit on every summer evening, the roof Uncle Ben had fixed with his own hands— the last vestige of him.
And so he sat there at the table, long after May went off to her room. He eventually wandered into the living room, flopping onto the couch in an emotionally-drained heap. He reached for the remote, and absent-mindedly flipped on the TV— he needed something to drown out the silence.
Then he saw it.
The channel showed off a live broadcast, a late night special that filled the quiet room with colorful lights and raucous applause. A handsome broadcaster came onstage, beaming to the cheering crowd as a caption popped up on the bottom of the screen:
Uncanny Valley Productions Presents: Beyond Belief
A Variety Show headed by CEO Quentin Beck.
“Ladies and gents, boys and girls, dreamers of all ages— We’ve got a lovely slew of contestants tonight! Thrills and prizes of various shapes and sizes await whoever can impress our lovely crowd!”
Peter nearly fell off the couch, his eyes laser-focused on the screen. If people could see what he could do, if he could market it to their taste— there could be a chance to make things better for both him and May.
He moved like a racecar to his room, throwing open the doors to his closet, pulling aside all sorts of clothes to find something that could hide his face. His hands closed on a crumpled plastic mask from Halloween several years ago— Red, with a black visor and silver teeth printed across the mouth. A Power Ranger. He slipped it on, the tight elastic band awkwardly pushing against his hair, the plastic itchy against his face. It was ridiculous.
And it was absolutely perfect.
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If the Oscorp skyscraper was a monument to scientists in NYC, then the Uncanny Valley office had to be one to glitz and glamour. It loomed over Manhattan like a glowing cathedral— Peter could see it beaming from blocks away when he biked there in the dead of night. Spotlights spanned across the night sky, posters of actors and Beck covering the front doors. A crowd pressed against velvet ropes, watching screens adorning the entrance broadcast the show from a distance maintained by various security guards.
Good thing he didn’t need a direct way in. Peter pulled into a side alley, taking a few minutes to gather hit wits. He didn’t bring a bike lock, and the last thing he needed was to run the risk of it getting stolen. He pressed his hand against the handlebars, thinking of an option—
Thwip!
Before he even registered what happened, a line of webbing shot out from his wrist, sticking itself, and his bike, against the far wall. It was as if a pressure built at his wrist, like a static set to discharge, just released. The substance was silky, and oddly tough. He tugged on his bike, yet it remained in-place.
“Oh my god.” His voice shook. “Oh my god.”
He examined his arm. Near the base of his wrist, right before it connected to his hand, he noticed a small slit. It looked like the webs came from there. When he prodded it with his finger, it felt sensitive, hair rising on the back of his neck. He thrusted his arm out— no luck coaxing it out.
He closed his eyes, focusing, before aiming his right arm at a dumpster nearby. Wiggling his fingers didn’t work either, but maybe… He pressed his ring and middle finger against his palm.
Thwip!
A second strand of webbing shot out, latching on to the metal with a noise that made Peter stumble back, eyes wide. He stood there for a minute with a mixture of shock and awe, before a car honked somewhere in the distance, snapping him back to reality. He couldn’t be standing here acting like a fool all night.
He shot one last glance at his bike, before scurrying up a wall near the fire escape, and creeping in through an open window to navigate his way to the stage.
By the time he snuck backstage, hanging from the ceiling, Peter was stunned by how gaudy the place was. Dancers spun in elaborate costumes, lights and sparklers pulsing in timed bursts. Standing on a pedestal in the middle, facing a massive crowd, Quentin Beck stood triumphant. He gestured to a redhead in a spotlight nearby, who began singing a tune for the audience, voice clear and strong. She couldn’t be more than a year older than Peter, but the crowd loved her.
For a second, Peter froze. He was just himself, gawking at a girl who looked like she belonged everywhere he didn’t. Then the moment passed. As he pulled the mask over his face, he remembered why he came.
Here we go.
Beck raised his arms to the lights, his voice echoing throughout the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen! Tonight, I seek something rarer. Not any sort of casual smoke and mirrors, but something rarer. Courage.” The word hung in the air as he savored the murmurs. “Who among you wishes to dance with the impossible!”
The crowd shifted uneasily. Beck’s smile sharpened, the light gleamed off his teeth in an almost artificial way. “No volunteers? A shame! I’m sure that this crowd has to have at least one brave soul. One willing to embrace the unknown!” As he spoke, he scanned the rafters, the isles, the wings of the stage. “Come on!”
Peter didn’t wait. He scrambled up the wall, before flipping into the air. Gasps. Shouts. Security rushing forward. He landed in a crouch, before flicking out a webline to a scaffolding overhead. He whipped himself onto it, literally hanging over the crowd as their shock turned to awe, the audience erupting in cheers.
Beck stood a few feet away from Peter, but his aura still loomed over the scene as if they were right next to one another. His eyes gleamed like they were glass the stage lights would reflect off of. Security hesitated on the side of the stage, and Peter could swear Beck waved them off with a flourish that had a hint of annoyance. Sweeping his arm wide, he approached, wrapping it around Peter’s shoulder with a hearty laugh.
“Oh my, oh my! Look what we have here, viewers! A true Marvel!” He turned to Peter, that glint in his eyes almost… predatory. “Tell me, what’s your name?”
Peter froze, throat tightening under the mask. He hadn’t thought that far.
“Oh! Uh… The Spider. Is that—?”
Beck gripped Peter’s wrist, raising his arm into the arm with the crowd’s screams of joy as fanfare. “Ladies and Gentlemen, The Spectacular—”
“No, I—”
“The Amazing Spider-Man!”
The name rang through the room like a bell. The audience erupted with applause, whistles, and words of encouragement. Peter’s nerves felt like they were on fire. From the wings, that girl clapped along with the crowd, her eyes lingering on him with curiosity. His heart rattled in his chest like a marimba.
The crowd was still hooting and hollering, and Beck basked in the positive response, savoring it like a fine wine. He leaned into Peter’s ear, and whispered in a low voice. “Play along, boy. They love you already.”
Peter numbly nodded, adrenaline keeping him on his feet.
After a few moments, the curtain finally fell. Beck whisked Peter off-stage past the other performers and a series of befuddled security guards. In a few moments, Peter ended up in a small dressing room with him, sat into a velvet chair as Beck stood in front of him.
“Well, that was a stroke of luck.” He said, pulling open a drawer. He rustled in it for a few moments, before taking out a sleek mask, a crimson fabric patterned with thin black lines akin to webs, with white lenses for the eyes. “Yours is cute, but if you’re gonna earn the name, you’ll need something with a bit more style.”
Beck pressed the mask into Peter’s hands, and the boy stared at it for a moment, words in his throat.
“It’s an old prop from a cancelled series we had in mind. With the get-up you have, no offense, kid… you kinda look like a dork.”
Peter managed a nod.
Beck clapped his hands sharply. “As for the matter of payment…” He reached into his jacket pocket, and pulled out a small wad of bills. Arguably the most money Peter’s seen gathered in one place. “Consider it a way to keep our partnership interesting. I do hope we see you again.”
Peter took the money with his heartbeat pounding in his ears. It was hard to breathe. He’d done it.
So why did life still weigh on him?
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The streets outside were a different story. The crowd had diminished a bit, and Peter had barely managed to get his bike out of the alleyway to begin the trek home. Trash skittered across the sidewalk in the gentle night air. Peter walked quickly, the mask and money stuffed in his pocket, fingers brushing against it on a regular basis to make sure it was still there.
For a few moments, he imagined strolling back into the house and laying the envelope in front of May. Peter brainstormed potential explanations on the sudden cash. An odd job, lucky break, just— anything but what it really was. He couldn’t lay the bombshell on her. Hey, the child you’ve had to raise is some freak of nature!
The realization sank in, sour and heavy. Even when he sets himself up as some sort of showstopper, it wasn’t enough to keep the home from slipping through his and May’s fingers. Peter kicked at a bottle on the sidewalk, and winced as the fragments shot down the block.
He almost missed the voices at first.
“Come on, lady, don’t make this any harder than it needs to be.”
Peter froze, and looked down the block. Three men crowded a woman against a wall, her knuckles gripping her purse tight enough to crack knuckles. A man on her left shoved her shoulder, and she whimpered, eyes darting towards the street.
“Hey!”
The word left his mouth before he could even register what he was doing. All three thugs turned to face him. The nearest squinted. “The hell are you?”
Peter’s fingers fumbled the mask from his pocket, quickly slipping it over his head. The world almost shifted as it set into place.
“Try me.”
The man was silent. Then he laughed. His buddies followed suit, the three of them chuckling like it was the funniest thing they’d seen all day. It was ugly and hollow, and made Peter’s stomach twist. He felt his brain rattle in his skull, vision swimming.
Then one lunged.
The swing came wild and fast. Peter jerked to the side, barely dodging it, and instinctively shoved back without thinking. The thug sailed into the air with a scream, before hitting the ground in a heap that barely moved, groaning in pain.
Peter staggered back, horrified.
Another thug wrapped his arms around Peter, pinning his arms to his sides. Suddenly, as if his body moved on its own, Peter sharply bent forward, rolling, and the man flew over his shoulder like a ragdoll, hitting the pavement with a wet thud. The sound made bile rise in Peter’s throat.
The third thug gaped at his friends, and then Peter. “S-stay away from me!” He shouted at the top of his lungs, then took off running, leaving Peter and the woman alone on the street.
The boy froze, staring at his trembling hands. He hadn’t thought— it just happened. The alley went silent, save for the pained groans of the men on the ground.
Then the woman’s voice broke the silence. “Thank you! Thank you so much!” She bolted, heels clicking against the pavement as she vanished towards the city.
After all that’d happened today, Peter’s breath came in jagged bursts, knees on the verge of buckling. “Did… I actually do that?”
Too much strength. Too fast. Too real.
As he fled, a feeling clung to him. It felt heavier than the money in his pocket.
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The dreaded day arrived a few weeks later. Beck’s payment wasn’t anything that could reliably solve all their problems. No amount of positive reception could pay off a mortgage.
The house slipped away, just as May had told him.
Peter sat on the porch steps, staring at the final nail in the coffin— a For Sale sign jutting out of the yard, obnoxiously contrasting against the grass. Every board of the house he sat in front of felt like they were on the verge of breaking.
The screen door creaked open. May eased herself beside him, putting her hand around his shoulder. She looked tired, but her voice was firm. “I know you didn’t want it to end this way, Peter. Some things have to happen, good or bad.”
Peter opened his mouth to respond, but all that came out was a choked sob. He blinked hard, tears stinging his eyes.
May pulled him close. “It’ll be alright. As long as we’re together, we’ll be okay.”
Peter nodded, pulling himself together for the time being.
It was all he could do for now.
Notes:
Having several layers of plans in mind for an AU that I have to trudge through world-building to get through is hard.
That being said, Beck enters stage left! I'm sure we'll see a lot more of him.
Next Issue: Fast Times at Midtown High!
Gatuxs on Chapter 2 Sat 04 Oct 2025 04:13PM UTC
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