"So, when do I get to meet your mom?"

Peter closed his locker and jiggled the lock before adjusting his backpack straps. It had been a week since school started back up in the new year and it was like the world glowed a little bit brighter. He'd gotten bonus pay from Mr. Weasel for this super bulk order, his mom came over for New Year's because apparently them and May re-connected, and he beat his record of how long he could last in the ring against Wade by a whole twenty-two seconds!

"Anytime you want. She's off Mondays and Tuesdays and her job's only open to the public Friday to Sunday."

"Can she show me her cool alien powers?"

"Ned!" Peter shushed as he looked around the half-empty hallway and to the other students who didn't pay them any mind. "Dude, c'mon."

"Okay, yeah, but can she?"

"... Yeah, and it's pretty awesome."

Ned, in some burst of common sense, leaned forward and whispered. "Can she turn me into an armadillo?"

"If she really wanted to? Probably."

"Yes."

"But you can't just ask her to do magic tricks like she's a birthday party magician—"

"Magicians can get paid an average of three hundred per party. Do it as a regular daily, they can make fifteen hundred a week." Peter spun on his heel and Ned latched onto his arm just as MJ appeared out of nowhere—nowhere—with the book of the week in her arms and her intense stare boring into the both of them. "Then again, their equipment can range from five to ten thousand, up to twenty-five for the bigger shows."

"... Neat." Ned's heartbeat got back to a normal tempo. "Like, three hundred dollars for the whole day?"

"For an hour performance."

"That's a rip-off!"

"Try explaining the exploitation of children's wonderment to my niece who says my argument has 'too many big words' and is therefore 'uber wrong.'" MJ straightened one of the straps on her backpack. "So why are you losers talking about magic?"

A panicked look passed between Peter and Ned and, when the next few seconds passed of no one speaking up, Ned very-so extra-subtly elbowed his best friend in the ribs.

"Oh, uh, so it's like this." Peter cleared his throat. "I've got a friend who, uh, who's into magic and Ned's got a dream of... getting turned into an... armadillo?"

MJ nodded along. "Yeah. Okay." She huffed a short laugh and threw up a lazy wave. "Don't be late to practice, weirdoes."

"Oh yeah, totally! You know we're never late to practice because, you know, it would look bad on our school and our team and we definitely have to keep up this on-time attendance thing because we're defending our title and..." Ned trails off just as she turns the corner and whipped towards his friend. "Dude! You can't just tell girls about the armadillo thing!!"

"And we can't just be talking about aliens in the hallway!" He scoffed. "You didn't even pick a cool animal."

"Peter Benjamin Parker how dare you slander their good name—"

::

He didn't have a shift today so he took to pacing his room with a dash of ease knowing he had nowhere to be, but also a smidge of guilt at the fact that he was even in this position in the first place.

Both the StarkSuit and the PeterSuit 3000 were laid out on his bed, glaring up at him from messy blue sheets. He really, really, really likes the new suit and it's been the one he'd been taking with him to the Hellhouse every time there was work—folded up and stuffed at the bottom of his backpack right under school binders and extra bullets—but he hadn't gotten the chance to actually use it. The StarkSuit was still the daytime patrol suit and, if he was honest, it was the easiest to explain. He stayed off the radar, Happy and Mr. Stark didn't get suspicious.

And it wasn't because he was scared of anyone else finding out about all the friends he made at his job, it was just—the PeterSuit still needed some modifications. Yeah, maybe he could figure a way to transfer Karen over and maybe change the suit name to something else.

PeterSuit didn't exactly make criminals shiver in their boots, and the new suit needed a little pizazz. New suit. New suit? Nu-Suit. Oooooooo, actually...

Peter picked up the mask that was more blue than red and glanced out the window.

He'll go out in the StarkSuit again today. But tonight, though, when it was darker and there were less people to catch him on their phones, he'll stick to the shadows and put Wade and Mr. Weasel's gift to good use.

::

A kid no older than a middle-schooler put a bag of M&M's back on the shelf and stuffed his hands into his jacket pocket while he stood behind one of the chip racks this Friday night, hidden from the camera and just out of sight of the cashier near the front. But the old man stacking the shelves saw the quick movement and whispered into the cashier's ear just as the kid slipped out the front doors.

The cashier just so happened to be the owner of this small corner store. He wasn't that upset, not really. Some stolen M&M's wasn't the hill he was going to die on, but he'd feel bad if the kid grew up to steal bigger things or turn to violent crime.

So maybe the beat cops could scare the kid a bit? No harm in that, right?

About a block down from the corner store the kid saw two dark uniforms down the sidewalk and angled to cross the street as smoothly as possible, but he heard the call sent his way and hunched his shoulders on instinct, "Hey! Kid in the pastel blue hoodie!"

Pastel winced and sighed, turning around to wait as the two cops made their way over. They were easy-going and smiling, empty-handed, and he started to sweat. He could hear Gran's warnings ringing in his ears, seared into his head from all the times she'd lectured him in front of a full stove.

"You listen to everything they tell you. Don't make any sudden moves, keep your hands where they can see them, don't say anything even if they're wrong."

He'll never forget how scared Gran looked.

"I won't lose another baby," she'd then mutter. "Not another one."

The uniforms stood on either side of him, one with his arms crossed behind his back and the other with his hands on his hips, and Pastel couldn't help but think how close the latter's hands were to the holster on his belt.

"It's kind of late to be out, huh, kid?" Officer Hands mused. Officer Back nodded emphatically.

"Um, ye-yeah. Just went for a walk around the neighborhood," Pastel replied. It took everything he was not to lower his head or look away as much as he wanted to because he didn't trust the hands on that belt or the hands hidden behind a back. If there was a sleight, he'd miss it, and he didn't want to think about what it would be like to die on this empty street.

"Fresh air?"

"Stretching your legs?" Back piped up.

"Hanging around corner stores?"

"Hanging around corner stores a little too much?"

Pastel didn't hear much else when his heartbeat started to rattle between his ears. The uniforms kept talking, kept looming, kept joking, kept posturing. He was getting nervous. Really nervous. There was sweat under his arms and the hoodie was too stifling even in the middle of a January chill.

He felt like choking when his mouth moved on its own and he spoke a little too loudly. "Can I please go home, officers?"

He didn't think he sounded like he was trying to cause trouble, but he had to crane his head to look up at the two people who had guns on their hips and a license to use them and fingers to flip off the cameras on their chests, and it made him feel like he'd never felt before. He didn't even do anything. And sure, maybe there was a passing thought of snagging those M&M's back at the store but he didn't—he couldn't get in trouble for empty pockets, but if he took out his hands now would they think he had a weapon on him?

The humor slowly slid off Officer Hands' face.

"Go home?" He laughed a bit, scratchy and condescending. "You think you can just lift from any store you want and get to go home after? That's not how any of this works, and you don't know how lucky you are that you're not getting booked right now."

Pastel swallowed. He was getting light-headed.

Hands stepped forward and the boy flinched, ducking his head slightly but never ripping his eyes away from the front and suddenly, it was like the uniform's bigger and broader and the badge on his chest caught under the streetlight in an unholy gleam. Pastel's never been religious, not that he'd ever tell Gran who dressed up every Sunday or Ma who'd had the same rosary since she was a toddler, but never in his life had he wanted more than to believe in the divine than in this moment.

'I hope I make it to Heaven.'

But something changed in Officer Back's face, almost nervous, but it smoothed out when he grabbed his partner's shoulder and pulled him back. "C'mon, he's just a punk kid. He's not worth the trouble."

"Punk kid? Hey, that's what they call me!"

Spider-Man flipped onto the scene and some of Pastel's fear faded into awe. His favorite superhero had a cool new suit that was more blue than red with the sickest looking spider on his chest. He leaned against one of the utility poles and propped a hand on his hip, somehow oozing cheer through his mask as he looked at the cops.

"What's up with the costume change?" Hands snarked, his hand twitching closer to his holster as he shrugged off Back's grip. Back wrinkled his nose at the appearance of New York's most annoying vigilante, but kept quiet. "The other one needed some laundering?"

"I really needed to take a load off the other suit. It's a small sockrifice, but I threw in the towel and took this suit out of a spin," Spider-Man deadpunned, and Pastel pressed his lips together to stop himself from laughing at those awful jokes. He snuck a glance at the uniforms and saw their irritation spike in their clenching jaws and narrowing eyes. It almost got his stomach to drop, but an arm slung around his shoulders and tugged him close—his eyes went from the blue hand on his right up to the Spider-Man mask on his upper left, and even if he couldn't see through those white lenses, he couldn't help but feel kind of comforted.

And had... had Spider-man always been kind of short?

"So what seems to be the problem? I heard the kid wanted to go home, and if it's not too much trouble for you Mr. Officer and Mr. Officer, I could walk him back myself. I'm actually pretty good at that kind of thing, and it's right in my resume with helping old ladies cross the street and balancing the teams on the basketball courts right outside—"

"The kid's a thief," Back cut in.

"What'd he steal?"

Pastel burned a bit red. "I didn't steal anything," he muttered as he stared down at his shoes. The arm on his shoulders jostled him lightly, and when he looked back up at Spider-Man, he felt like the hero was smiling reassuringly.

Hands rolled his eyes. "He nabbed some candy from that corner store."

"I used to steal candy from people's houses on Halloween all the time. You know when they say one but you say all?"

Pastel cracked a small smile too.

Hands scoffed, gesturing toward them with a forceful hand. "You condone this behavior? You, butting into people's business and trying to weasel them out when they should be disciplined? Seems real responsible coming out of a vigilante."

He spat the word out like it was poison. The sweat made Pastel's palms tacky.

"I just think you've spooked him enough. He said he didn't steal anything, and even if he did, it's not anything he should get sent to juvie for," Spider-Man tried. Pastel wondered how he could sound so peppy all the time. "I'll talk the talk when I walk him on home, sirs."

"You don't police these damn streets," Hands growled. "So take your wannabe-ass out of here and leave the jobs to the professionals."

"And you're a fine professional! Come on, give the kid a break. We'll get out of your hair and you officer can, you know, do whatever it was that you were doing before this. You won't see me for the rest of the night, scout's honor."

Spider-Man snapped his free hand to his forehead in a salute.

And something in Officer Hands changed.

Pastel didn't have a father figure in his life. Or, well, he had his Uncle who used to stop by once every couple weeks. But the older he got the less he saw of the man, and it became one of those things he just had to get used to. It had just been him and Ma and Gran and the framed photo of a stranger dressed in Navy blues in the living room, but sometimes he'd like to imagine what it was like to grow up with dad jokes and a huge, comforting hand on his shoulder. He imagined the stranger in the photo would pick him up and swing him around, and maybe they'd watch movies together with kettlecorn popcorn and laugh, or maybe on the weekends his dad could spare some time to go with him to all the science museums in the city.

His dad would've been nice and funny and kind of lame.

And he would never look at him the way Hands was looking at them now.

Pastel shrunk into Spider-Man's side.

Officer Back must've seen something too, because he turned halfway and took Hands' upper arm with a firmer hold than the last time he made a grab. "It's not worth it."

"While letting Spider-Guy boss us around? I don't think so."

(When it happened, Pastel didn't see it all. But he heard it.)

He felt Spider-Man tense just before he got pushed behind him, his vision full of blue as the hero put both hands up.

"Hey, hey, hey, I'm not looking for trouble, I swear. I was just, you know, swinging around the neighborhood like all spider dudes do, cruising over like a tide. Ha, Tide. Get it? Like the, uh, like the detergent."

Pastel peeked around Spider-Man's side and saw the exasperated look on Back's face before he turned to the other uniform. "And honestly, I'd rather not hear anymore of the wannabe's stupid jokes or else I'll get a headache. Seriously, let's get back to the car. We've wasted enough time on them."

"Oh yeah, I'm super bad with time management. Best wipe me off your shoes before I make you late for anything."

Pastel nervously shifted from foot to foot and must've moved back a bit too much, because his Nike's bumped into an empty beer bottle and knocked it to the side with a muted clatter.

bang

Spider-Man staggered into him and they both stumbled a few steps back before blue covered heels dug into the sidewalk to find their balance, twisting slightly to the side, only a tad, but enough that when Pastel reached out to grab the torso in front of him to catch himself, his fingers brushed against something warm and wet and when he looked down, he saw dripping red.

He screamed.

Then the wind was in his hair and the startled face of Hands with his gun and Back with his horror grew smaller and smaller in the distance. And just as quickly as he was in the air he felt his feet on solid ground—a roof, he didn't know how far, and he didn't stop himself from sinking to the ground as Spider-Man pressed one of his hands against his darkening side.

He just...

"Oh, wow. That kinda sucked," the hero joked. A small wobble wormed its way into his voice. "So, where do you live? I'll make sure you get home."

Spider-Man got shot, and he wanted to make sure he, some random kid who stole some M&M's from the store, got home.

"I can wa-walk," Pastel stammered. They were already somewhere on the edge of Queens and he'd walked a couple blocks from his apartment to that corner store anyway and oh god Spider-man got shot and it was all his fault, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, you got hurt, oh my god, you got shot—"

"Hey, hey, hey, it's okay!" Spider-Man crouched next to him and gave a small hug with his uninjured side. "Cops just don't like me, that's not your fault. Plus, they were giving you way too hard of a time. You didn't deserve that." He shrugged. "Just be good, 'kay? You got someone to go home to."

Ma. Gran. The stranger in Navy blues.

Pastel nodded, his eyes beginning to burn. "They're at home and, and I didn't think, oh god, I really didn't steal anything I wouldn't do that and I-I—"

"It's okay," Spider-Man repeated softly. "I believe you." The back of Pastel's eyes ran hot and he didn't know if it was the nerves or the panic that made him hear things, but Spider-Man really believed him? Him, just some kid from Brooklyn? "I'll be good as new in a couple days anyway, so no need to worry." He pulled away, a blue hand gently patting the boy's shoulder. "Just... don't let them get to you."

Pastel sniffed and swiped at his nose as he kept nodding and nodding, like maybe it would erase everything. "I won't, I promise."

Spider-Man held out his fist for a bump that Pastel met shakily, and in a grand gesture the former hopped onto the roof ledge with his injured side out of view. With one hand he makes a peace sign and he flips into the breeze like he was made to fly,

(and under his other hand, the stain grew bigger as he fell.)

::

It took a long time for Neena to fully embrace Lady Luck for the goddess she was, but when she did, there was little that actually managed to take her by surprise. She could walk in the middle of a busy street and not get swiped by a single car, or reach into an acre of clovers and pick the four-leafed one on the first try. So when she suddenly got the itch to take a different route home back from the post office, she listened.

Her feet carried her three streets down and a block to the right from the usual. There was a gun in her jacket and more than enough small knives in her boots, and the package she'd picked up stayed tucked under her arm as she passed the alley a few buildings away from her door. She paused at the sound of something tapping against the bulky dumpster pressed against the brick and backtracked a few steps to peer past street lights and shadows.

Neena expected to spot a drunk whose name got printed on a Gold Card or some idiot passed out with a duffle of goodies ripe for the taking, so she strode towards the noise, unconcerned, and brought out her phone to shine a light on the body she found slumped on the floor.

She expected to find a stranger.

She found Spider-Man instead.

Or at least someone she thought was Spider-Man because he had some new digs and he held on tight to his torso, blood soaking the suit. She leaned against the opposite wall and stuck her phone into the front flap pocket of her jacket, the light just poking out.

"You the real deal?"

For a few moments there was only a rumble of engines and the distant siren blares, then he turned his head to the side so that both whites of his lenses flashed. "Y... Yeah..."

She nodded, a bit sympathetic, but she knew her place. Mercs helped mercs by keeping their mouths shut and minding their own business, and if those mercs happened to be friends, maybe they'd share safehouses or stock up first aid kits for more than one person. But vigilantes? Heroes? nah, they didn't mess around with that stuff. It just wasn't their world.

Seeing Spider-Man like this was a little sad, though. She'd watched videos of him doing things like handstands when kids asked him to do something cool or going to some animal adoption event just to pet the puppies. He was harmless. And the longer she stared, the more she noted that he was also kind of... small.

Teen-sized small. Too small. But there was no way.

"Who got you? Looks like you took a bullet wide open."

"Cop," Spider-Man strangled out. "Scarin' a kid. 'ccused 'im when he din' do 'nythin'..." He gulped down a few breaths. "Hated me, so..." He threw up his free hand and finger-gunned while muttering a quiet pew-pew.

She huffed a short laugh. Gotta keep positive, she guessed. "Well, you know what they say about getting shot."

He bobbed his head, the top of his mask scratching against the ground as his words trickled out in a winding slur. "'m gon' wanna be th' one beh'nd the gun 'stead of 'n fron' it."

Neena's amused smile slowly dropped at the edges. Spider-Man was here, bleeding out all alone in an alley with a bullet that didn't make an exit wound, and all her intent to leave him was sapped up and replaced with suspicion. "Yeah," she replied, eyes flickering around for cameras or good hiding spots. "Exactly that."

Because that, word for word, was exactly what she said about getting shot, and this guy had no business knowing that.

"Should've kn'wn 'bout th' gun. M'ved f'ster. Been better." Muffled rambles pushed out the mask and she found herself carefully leaning forward as she strained to hear him. "'M sorry. Should've... listened t'you 'bout guns." His hand shifted and a small gush of blood made the stain on his side spread. "Wade gave me'a gun. W's f'r Pet'r. Didn'... know'd be f'r Spid'r-M'n too..."

Neena pressed a couple fingers against her mouth, closed her eyes, and counted to five.

One, her favorite thing to hear was a steak on a grill. Two, her favorite thing to see was a sunrise on a beach. Three, her favorite thing to taste was a french fry dipped in a Wendy's frosty. Four, her favorite thing to feel was the grip of a gun she'd used for years. Five, her favorite thing to smell was pine trees in Germany.

Six. What the hell is this.

"Fuck," she sighed before crouching down to throw his arm over shoulders and guiding him onto unsteady feet. At this point she wasn't quite sure what she was more grateful for: the fact that she found the kid before all eight pints of blood emptied out onto asphalt or that he ended up practically on her doorstep.

But thinking about whatever the reason that had him end up here could wait. She hefted him down the sidewalk, to the elevator with the busted security camera, and into her apartment where she lowered him onto her gray couch. She tossed her throw blanket onto the recliner and moved her rug to the other side of the living room; the ottoman she pulled closer before plunking down and slipping out the first aid kit from under the couch.

As she set it on her lap and popped open the top, she glanced over when blue shifted in her peripheral. Spider-Man dragged his free hand up towards his face, scrabbling for the lip of the mask on his neck and pushing it off his head. Slowly, it went over his chin, mouth, nose, cheekbones, screwed up eyes, sweat-matted hair.

Peter Parker blinked at her through pain-hazed eyes, and she swore.

"Fuck," she repeated. "You're so lucky that I'm lucky."

He did his best to crack a smile, but it ended up nothing more than a wince and a tighter grip on his side. Neena sorted through the gauze rolls and pads. She didn't know how long he'd been bleeding out, but judging by the size and growth of the stain and the pallor to his skin, maybe it's been an hour. An hour and a half at most. "You enhanced or is it the suit?"

He put up one finger.

"Healing a part of it?"

He lugged his chin down to his chest in a half-nod. Alright, meant he probably wouldn't bleed out, but she needed to dig out the bullet before it got stuck in him when his body started to pull itself back together.

"Get out of your suit, or at least get it to your hips. I need full access to the wound if I'm going fishing for that bullet," she ordered. She went to nab a lighter from her bedroom and a pair of tweezers from the bathroom and, after quick deliberation, took the couple towels already ruined by that purple hair dye from a few years back. By the time she stepped into the living room once more, Peter had painstakingly peeled the suit off his lower abdomen. It was red and sticky and angry looking, but the edges weren't as raw as they should be and the makings of scabs started to lick through dried blood. "Yikes. I hope you know this'll hurt like a bitch, since I'm guessing you burn through over-the-counter meds like their Smarties?"

He strained a grunt in reply. At least they were on the same page.

She took her seat back down on the ottoman and wet a small stack of pads with some rubbing alcohol to clean around the work area.

"Ned," he mumbled while she flicked the lighter and ran the end of the tweezers through the flame. "Text Ned... 'n text May... tell Ned to pr't'nd 'm at his... tell May I went ov'r..."

Neena cocked a brow. "She doesn't know you're Spider-Man?"

"Does." He coughed. "But don't wanna worry 'er."

"Ehhh, I don't know about that. Looks like you're up to a lot of worrying things." With the entry wound held open with her left pointer and thumb, she dug the metal into his body and began her search. Peter's muscles tensed and some of the veins in his arms grew more pronounced, but otherwise he was the picture perfect patient. God, when she was fifteen she hot-wired cars and lifted liquor bottles in broad daylight—and this fifteen year old swung around like Tarzan and fought crime? "Interesting costume choice, though."

"Wade n' Mr. Weasel got it. Chris'mas." He pouted, his dry lips turning into more of a grimace. "Aw man... s' got a hole in it now."

"I don't think they'll mind," she remarked dryly. The tweezers clinked, and she quickly drew out the soaked bullet and dropped it on one of the towels. Next out of the first aid kit were the needle and thread; at the sight of them, Peter shifted himself to a better angle for when she started to sew. Which was oddly considerate and oddly... odd.

"You've done this before?"

He bobbed his head once.

"By yourself? Like this?"

He bobbed his head again. His eyes looked a little more cloudy.

"Then it's time for the fun part. Disinfect your hands and hold out your dominant one." Neena connected some surgical thread to the swaged end of the needle and set it in his outstretched hand. "It's better if I see it now instead of later, especially when you look this bad." She pointed to the wound. "Sew up half of this. I want to see if you've been doing it right."

He sort of blinked real slowly, taking in her words one syllable at a time, before he wiggled some semblance of a shrug, cast his foggy attention towards his lower abdomen, and pierced skin.

And just like the time they spend at June's range, she was suitably impressed.

Peter's no professional, but he was far from sloppy. He stabbed through his own skin with shaky fingers and wet his lips as blood smeared, a testament to how many times he must've hidden away in his bathroom to fix up every stab, cut, slash, and shot he'd taken as Spider-Man.

She saw the videos. He'd taken a lot.

At a little over the halfway mark Neena grabbed his wrist to still it when he made no motion to stop. "Not bad, but I'll take it over from here. It's a little crooked, not tight enough, but it does what it's supposed to." Gently, she plucked the needle from his grasp and re-positioned it right next to the last suture. "Watch."

As much as he looked like he was one whole lecture away from passing out right then and there, he made a herculean effort to hold his eyes wider than a squint. Blown pupils tracked the neat, even lines of her work. It was cute in a weird, morbid sort of way—and after seven perfect loops of stitch, she wiped her hands on a towel and stood.

"O-kay," she sighed. "All we've got to do is bandage it, but otherwise you're all good to—"

His head tipped back against a throw pillow and he was out cold before she could even finish.

"—yeah. That looks about right."

She took a gauze pad in one hand and the adhesive tape in the other, but for a moment she stared at the teenager on her couch. "Fuck," she repeated for the third time.

Neena had always known where she was going in this life. When she lived in the Essex house she told herself she'd escape, so she did. When she said she was going to make herself a name in the business, she climbed her way to the top on a ladder of bullet casings and blood splattered. But this?

Mercs never dealt with vigilantes or heroes or all the other names plastered on the headlines every day, but of course Weasel picked up the one kid in New York with baggage the size of the Empire State Building. A bubbly high school sophomore who laughed alongside some criminals but also webbed up the ones he wasn't friends with—damn, thinking about it too much would give her too much of a headache. For what it was worth, it'd be better on her life as a whole if she cut her losses now and told Wade never bother her with Peter again.

She twirled the roll of tape on her finger.

But he always had her order ready when she went to the bar. And she finished those cookies he baked for her in just a couple days. And he wasn't a snot-nosed asshole.

So just as she taped a gauze over his stitches, she swiped his phone from the sewn-in pocket on the inside of one leg and used his thumb to unlock it. It took a bit of snooping in his messages to find and text Ned under Guy in the Chair, whatever that meant. Next she texted May who thankfully was only under May, and then updated her own contact photo under Ms. Domino to a selfie of her and a passed out Peter.

"You're in way deep shit," she told him as she tucked the phone back into his pocket and threw a blanket over him. "But for your sake, I hope you know what you're doing."

::

It was the middle of the night.

While Neena snoozed away after a small nightcap and Peter reached the deepest stage of sleep, his skin started to ripple. The skin around the stitches darkened blue and spread outwards—up and away it traveled, and by the time it glanced at his throat, his breath fogged and flowed out icy.

The blue receded around the time the sun peeked out over the Atlantic, and by then his gunshot wound was light pink and shallow.

If someone touched it, they'd feel like it was a little bit too cold.

::

Peter woke to a fuzzy blanket tickling his nose and a side so sore it was like he ran right into a counter corner like that who-want-lasagna mom. He laid there, eyes trained on the ceiling of an unfamiliar apartment, and let the memories of last night run him by. He hoped that kid got home okay. And the cops? Hm, he guessed one of them wasn't the worst. The other, though...

He pursed his lips. With his luck a Daily Bugle article would roll out in a few days spinning the incident so bad it was going to look like he kidnapped the kid instead of trying to get him away from pushy, trigger happy cops. Man, that was going to suck. Should he hire a PR manager?

He shut his eyes and exhaled. It could've been worse.

But better him hurt than the ones who couldn't protect themselves.

The sound of an opening door had him prying open his eyes again and Neena walked into the living room in running shorts, a baggy hoodie, and another throw blanket over her shoulders.

"Here's some stuff you can wear. Should fit." She set a bundle of clothes at the foot of the couch as he eased himself into sitting up. "Hey, were you cold last night?"

"Um, not really? I was pretty pancaked."

"Huh. It was freezing when I woke up at like, three to turn on the heater. Doesn't look like it did much."

... Oh god. Did he go blue last night? Code Blue?? Did he literally fulfill the prophecy of getting beat black and blue?!

"I have a super high cold tolerance, so I was all good. Thanks for letting me borrow these," he said, swinging his legs over the side of the couch. "But if it's so cold, why are you wearing shorts...?"

"I'm not going to wear pants if I don't have to. And in my own home? That's disrespectful." She pointed to the half-cracked door on the opposite side of the room. "Bathroom's that way, spare towels are in the linen closet inside, extra toothbrushes are under the sink. You like those egg McMuffins from McDonald's?"

"Sure?"

"Nice, I've got Jimmy Dean's in the freezer."

Peter smiled and slipped away as she strode into the kitchen. He made his shower quick and suds his hair with shampoo that smelled like coconut and flowers; the water didn't run pink as it spiraled down the drain, and the bruises on his legs from catching a car just before meeting the kid were outlined yellow.

He ran a ginger touch over the wound on his stomach. It was healing pretty quickly and he'd probably take the stitches out sometime tomorrow morning, but if it was healing this fast, maybe it wasn't as bad as he thought.

Still, he ended up in front of a clear shot. Maybe if he didn't just keep Wade's gun and Mr. Loki's dagger on him when he was just Peter everything would have...

He turned off the lukewarm spray and toweled dry as quickly as he could before pulling on the black track pants that had a flaking A Day to Remember print down the side of the left leg. Rubbing the towel against his hair, he leaned against the sink and stared straight at his reflection.

Pale. Weary.

That... cop really hated him, huh?

What else can you do besides getting cats down from trees?

Peter dragged a hand over his face and took out his phone to two unreads.

Guy in the Chair: CALL ME WHEN YOU CAN [11:23 pm]

May: {thumbs up emoji} np sweetie! Tell Ned I said hi and txt me when you're on your way back! [12:17 am]

"It's a new day, Parker," he whispered. He tugged a purple hoodie over his head, NYU emblazoned on the front. "Call Ned. Check in with May. Swing around that same block from last night to show you're okay. Because you're okay. You're chillin'. You're alive."

He looked back at the mirror and at the exhausted teenager in it.

"You're alive." He swallowed. "You're alive, and you're going to do better."

By the time he stepped out of the bathroom with the Nu-Suit tucked under one arm, Neena was pulling two sandwiches out of the microwave and moving one to another plate. Post-hardcore music spilled from the tiny speaker next to the stove and he slid into the chair she set one of the plates in front of.

He was really bad at this secret identity thing, wasn't he? Like, astronomically bad. So bad that it actually should be illegal for him to have any secrets because sooner or later the outrageous was going to happen, like his identity getting blown up in Times Square by J. Jonah Jameson. Yeah, sure, like Triple J would ever find out Peter Parker was Spider-Man.

Then again, the list of people who knew who he was only got longer. Dang.

"Thanks for last night," Peter said once she took her seat and took a bite of her sandwich. "I was heading home, but wanted to do another sweep of the neighborhood and maybe it wasn't the best idea after getting, y'know, shot, but I'm really sorry you had to take care of me. I promise it won't happen again!"

She waved him off. "I would've felt bad if I left you in the alley."

"I swear I'll make it up to you."

"I mean—"

"You name it, I got you. Extra ammo, text updates on supplies, more oatmeal raisin cookies. You know, I'm actually really proud of those! The recipe I used was from this old card in May's family stuff when I was helping her clean the—"

"Pete."

He shut his mouth and finally picked up his own sandwich that cooled with his rambling. Neena finished chewing. "While I'm definitely not going to turn that down, I didn't help you because I wanted something out of it. I did it 'cause we're cool." She stood. "Coffee? Orange juice?"

Peter hid a smile behind his sandwich. "I'm not allowed to have coffee."

"Yeah, coffee shits are the worst," she replied as she tapped the 'on' button on her coffee maker. At the sound of heating water, she leaned against the counter and leveled him with a look. "So. Spider-Man?"

He stuffed the rest of his sandwich in his mouth and dusted his fingers over his plate. "Okay, I think I have the basic rundown this time." He rubbed his hands together. "Basically Oscorp does a ton of shady stuff on the down low and when I went on a field trip there a year ago, I got bit by a genetically engineered spider and now I'm a mutate that can swing from buildings. No, the webs don't come out of my butt and no, the webs aren't organic." His head tilted slightly. "Uh, so the list of people who know are Wade, Mr. Weasel, May, Ned—my best friend and the only one on the list who's my age—uh, I'm pretty sure MJ doesn't know but that's kind of 50/50 actually, um, Mr. Stark, his head of security named Happy, and there's also my mom who you haven't met yet but might because she likes coming to the bar to visit even though last time she threw Wade into one of the pool tables. And now, you!" He beamed. "Hooray?"

Neena blinked. And for some reason, she looked like she was counting to five?

"... They really let you go outside all by yourself?"

Peter sighed. "I guess I deserve that."

"No, seriously, you're a lint roller for crazy. If you told me you had a lizard that can blast lasers from its eyes I'd hate you because it's probably true."

"Neena," he whined, a laugh bubbling up right behind it. One hand fell against his stitches as his other stacked his plate atop her empty one so he could put them in the sink. It was nice to have another person in his corner that begrudgingly took it and just... just tried to help him survive.

Maybe he could really get through this.

His hand pressed closer to his side, a sharp burn of pain racing through his nerves.

He had to.

(For the first time in a long time, he didn't think of Mr. Stark.)

::

Hotdogs.

Peter loved them so much that he still put them in his mac n' cheese to spite May.

The vendors liked to give him one now and again too—as Spider-Man, not Peter, usually as thanks for helping the cousin of someone their cousin knew, and things along those lines. So on one of those days where he felt like a hotdog would help him warm up through the breeze, he stopped by his favorite one run by the Polish grandpa who loved to tell stories about his grandkids and took a snack break on the tallest building in Long Island City.

Me: but i'm doing my hw rn [5:56 pm]

Guy in the Chair: arnt u spidermanning rn? [5:57 pm]

Me: snack break!! [5:57 pm]

Guy in the Chair: ah, the snakciest of breaks [5:58 pm]

He moved the StarkSuit mask to the side and reached into his backpack for his English notebook. If anything, he could at least turn in a rough draft and get credit if he didn't manage to both type and print the essay before second period tomorrow so MJ didn't mad dog him until lunch.

Me: if it really was the snackiest of breaks i'd have those pretzles from th

spike

He snatched his mask and rolled out of the way of the lightning bolt that crackled down from the clear sky. Just after it ripped into the ground where he was just sitting, a figure followed—landing with enough force to shake the building.

"My apologies!" a voice exclaims, and Peter gaped at the sight of blond hair, a flowing red cape, and a warhammer. "Heimdall assured me that my landing here would be most suited to my endeavors, though there is little doubt he had told me so knowing you would care naught for my appearance. To whom am I addressing?"

"Um." Peter looked down at his mask, then back up at him. "I'm Spider-Man?"

"Well met, Spider-Man! Truly, a fascinating name." A grin. "I am Thor Odinson of Asgard. Perhaps you've heard of me?"

A torn green backpack and burnt notebooks lay around Thor's feet.

Peter wondered which was more believable: his non-existent dog eating his homework, or the God of Thunder frying it to ash.