THE SUIT WAS MORE THAN JUST A 'SUIT' TO THE PARKER BOY.

It was a whole other identity, of course, that much was obvious to anyone - it allowed the boy to show who he truly was under the protection of the red and blue and white armour. It allowed him to shed his quiet and awkward skin and lighten up, cracking jokes and shooting webs as he 'flew' through the air. He could wear a mask and leap around the city without a care, and anyone could understand that from a surface view, looking at the boy, but there was more to the story than just that.

The suit made him a hero, something that I had never been or even known, and someone people wanted to know. Everybody seemed to absolutely love him; even at Midtown High School, students wore homemade shirts with his 'face' on it, supporting the now-beloved character that was supposedly saving New York. While in the beginning, he had been not much of anything, simply stopping petty crimes and helping old women across the street, the Parker boy had stepped out of an invisible shell and become an icon of New York. I had heard conversations on the street about him, people who would never know Peter otherwise gushing about their very own Spider-man protecting them, as though he personally shadowed and acted as the city's guardian angel. It was such a strange concept, yet I could also understand why he loved it so much; he had so much worth, and it could be intoxicating. 

Over the past two weeks, I had managed to observe him multiple times as he whizzed through the city, following him carefully and doing my best to capture as much photo evidence as humanly possible. I was not so stupid as to look at him openly, but kept to the shadows and followed behind as much as I could. Leaping from building to building was near impossible without enhancements as he had, and I lacked his 'spider-like' abilities to keep me going, but it was something.

The tracking device in his bag as well as in his shoe certainly helped. From my vantage point in an alley or in the shadows on a New York rooftop, I could easily watch the boy and wait for him to come back and get his backpack or zoom off to the next location. Sometimes, just waiting in the shadows for him to collect his belongings at the end of the day, was as good as it could be.

It only took minutes for him to whiz back here one day, dropping down off a stray web and behind a dumpster, where I knew his belongings were. I remained hidden and where I could not see his exact actions but knew he was still there, simply for he had to come my way to leave the alley. He was not hurt or harmed in any way, surprisingly, and from my position, I could vaguely make out terms of congratulations towards himself and his work. The Parker boy was a lot of things, but apparently, humble was not one of them - not in his suit, at least. As though he was a totally different character altogether.

"Ah, there you are."

The thud had echoed behind me, and I watched in fear from the shadows as a monstrosity of a man came from nowhere. Peter poked his head out, still half-dressed in his Spider-man costume, and stared in shock just the same as me.

"The Spider-boy."

It was huge - or, rather, he was huge; an enormous man, blue all over and covered in a black suit of a material I didn't recognise, with what seemed like little sensors hooked up all over it, doing something him that neither us knew. However, that wasn't what was most terrifying; the scariest part was his head, for all over the rippling purpling skin, what seemed like electricity sparked and jumped inches off of him, crackling menacingly. All in all, it was a mix of a bad nightmare or some sort of hallucinated dream, nothing I expected to exist in this world or time.

Peter grunted and slid out from behind the dumpster, wearing an expression of fear, shock, and anger quite apparent on his unmasked face. I could tell he was just about to leave, with his jeans covering his lower half and pack slung across his back. "Whoa, okay. Who - what - are you?"

"I've heard a lot about you," the man continued, his slow, snarling rasp echoing through the empty street. He rolled his head in his neck, adjusting with a sickening crack. "How you like to think you're special, the new hero that New York needs."

Every part of me itched to step in, but I could not; there was a chance of revealing who I was, and that would ruin everything. I was forced to watch with bated breath as the two interacted and hold up a shaky hand to record what I could for analyzation. No chance to flee, either, for fear of missing out on just what the hell this being could possibly want.

Peter just shrugged and held up two trembling fists - a move I was not expecting and almost made me scream at the sheer stupidity of that action. It was clear the boy had no idea what he was supposed to be doing - and standing against the electric man with two small fists and a strange grin was far from the best option of his very, very few. "I'm just trying to make the world a better place; isn't that what we're here for?"

The laugh emitted from the man/lightning hybrid was horrifying and sent shivers down my spine, striking a deep chord within me that made me, tucked safely in my hiding place, tremble with fear. "You're an idiot, boy. Why didn't you just stick with walking women cross the street like before?"

I flinched as he shot pure static at the boy, sending him flying backwards with a loud thump. Peter was okay, as he struggled back up to his feet, little shocks prickling at his body, but I had the feeling that would only be one of many defeating moves against him. I had never seen such a fearsome beast, his abilities something I had never seen - as though he had harnassed a грозовой шторм and held it in his very fists.

"So, Sparky's got anger issues," the Parker boy quipped, flying to his feet and dodging another fist. "I've got to remember that."

идиот.

It was like watching a dance, a deadly performance of hits and blows and twirls away from the opponent, avoiding blows and matching them with their own. In a way, I could appreciate the beauty of it, and in another way, I could see why Madame got such a rush from watching us perform. In a way, it was a form of art.

But as the boy's body once again flew back and hit the pavement, causing me to wince in my cramped space, those thoughts flew out of my head, and all that was left was a complete concern for the boy's life and safety. 

However, the creature slowed the speed of deadly lightning and sank to the pavement once more, walking over to stand over the boy and command his attention. "If I were you, Peter Parker, I would stay down. We don't want you or a friend getting hurt."

I was pretty sure the boy pissed his pants at that moment.

...

Peter wore a large hoodie that covered his arms and torso completely that next day, and I knew why. He was more withdrawn this morning, too, though that also made perfect sense. I was surprised he even came to school - although staying home could alert suspicion in his beloved Aunt. There was a lot of words that described the boy, but he was no idiot - most of the time. Aside from the reason he had even contracted his wounds, of course.

I was happy he had shown, for otherwise, the plan I had concocted wouldn't work and his shadow would be back to ruin everything. The food poisoning would only last a few days, and I needed to use all of that time to hatch some sort of beginning to a close and private friendship.

My foot tapped anxiously against the leg of my desk as the teacher grinned at the class, gesturing to the large PowerPoint on the screen. "This project is to be done in partners and is due three weeks from today. You will have three full class periods to work on this, including today, but you will need to meet up with your partner outside of class to finish things up. There will be a written portion as well as a presentation component, so make sure that you're clear on what you and your partner are doing. If you so need, I've passed around a checklist of things to ensure you've done it all."

I didn't care about the paper or the foul way the boy beside me grinned and made contact with my hand as he passed it to me. My gaze was on the Parker boy, who seemed to refuse to look up, only glancing to the left to accept the pile of paper from the girl beside him. 

Finally, after droning on and on about the logistics of the product, Mr Warren shut up and gestured out to the bored, dazed people around him. "Well, enough of my rambling. If you need help finding a partner, let me know, but if not, get to it! Make sure to use your time..."

His last words were drowned out by the scraping of chairs on the ground and the scramble to snatch up a partner, and I doubted anyone was really eager to listen to his dry voice anyways. Careful to avoid the flailing limbs and hurrying idiots around me, I slid into the empty seat beside Peter, watching him as he didn't notice my presence. "We will work together."

He started at my voice, throwing his head up and staring wide-eyed at me. "Oh, sorry - what?"

"We should work together," I corrected, tossing out a smile tentatively. "Well, unless you have another partner in mind, I would like to work with you. I am not familiar with anyone else, here, see, and you seem to be a good person to work with. Would that be alright?"

Though slightly hidden under his hair, the tips of his ears glowed a dull red at my words. "Um-uh-yeah, I don't have anyone as a partner. I mean, N-"

"-great," I replied, careful to cut him off before he could doubt our partnership. "Did you have any ideas?"

"Um, no, sorry. I haven't thought much about it, yet."

Even better. "Well, actually then, I had some-" I trailed off, realising that Peter's attention had dropped from me to the desk, no doubt oblivious to the world, the same state he had been before the announcement of the project. The events of yesterday must have messed with him very much, then, for he had not seemed to pick up a single word I had said in the past fifteen seconds, and he seemed dazed, weary,

Careful to hit an area of his arm I knew to have been hit yesterday, I nudged him, trying to startle him out of his reverie. "Peter-"

"Ah," he hissed, immediately drawing his arm away and gritting his teeth to a pain within his arm. "Um, sorry, just...shocked me. Go on?"

I bit my lip and smiled, shaking my head innocently though I knew exactly what I had done. "It's fine, it wasn't important anyways. Are you alright?"

"Yeah, yeah I'm good. What were you saying?"

Holding out the slip of paper I had carefully made up - last night, though he wouldn't need to know that - I watched him read it. "Do any of these stand out to you?"

"Wow, you've - how did you know all this? He just announced the project today."

"The teacher provided me with a list, beforehand, of this semester as I have arrived halfway through." Not entirely false, for he had; only Inga's was much more in-depth and studious than he would ever be. "I had already got this before he announced."

"Oh," Peter said, blinking away the surprise, "That was nice of him."

"So, what were you thinking?"

He looked down at the paper, scrutinising each one, and laid a finger against the third from the bottom. "I guess the memory loss thing sounds cool. It should be unique, right?"

"Yeah, that sounds great." I hid my disappointment with a carefully placed smile and another shake of my head, though inside I wanted to scream from the fact that once again he had accidentally messed with my plan. He was supposed to choose one of the other ones placed about radiation or biology-based, so I could inadvertently bring up the subject of the masked vigilante he clung to, but we were stuck with a dry topic that I cared little about - and knew nothing about. "Shall we meet up this weekend?"

"Sure, that sounds fine. You can come over to my place - if you want to, and if you feel comfortable coming over because I know that some people don't like to just show up to someone's place randomly-"

"-that'll be fine, don't worry. Saturday?"

"Sure. Do you want to write down my address?"

"Address? Why?"

He stopped in his action of picking up his pen and grinned nervously, meeting my confused gaze. "So you know where to go? I haven't told you where I live, and I thought you would need to know..."

If I had not been surrounded by lower-intelligence and curious individuals who would have acted strangely afterwards, I would have slammed my head into my desk and screamed at my idiocy. Of course, I needed to know his address because obviously, I had never been there before - at least, Emily had not. Emily was a sweet Canadian girl who loved science and definitely didn't know a single thing about Peter, so why would she have been confused by his offer? дерьмо, Freya, you're an idiot. Maybe Inga was right about some things.

"Emily?"

"Yes?"

Peter stared at me curiously, waving a hand over my dazed expression in worry. "You, uh, zoned out there. Everything out?"

"Yes!" No. "Everything is okay! I'll take your address - cause I don't have it, obviously - and we'll meet up Saturday! Is that good?"

He nodded, passing me the small slip of paper and, at the sound of the loud overhead bell, began to pack up his things. The boy still looked dazed and tired, like he had run half a marathon before class, but at least he didn't look quite so dead inside. "Sounds good. See you at lunch?"

"Yeah," I mumbled, though he had already thrown his bag over his shoulder and rushed out. "Sounds good."

As I wandered through the hall, missing my class completely, the two now-ripped slips of paper containing the information dropped and hid among the throngs of feet running up and down the busy hallways. I ignored it and continued on my way; it wasn't like I would be needing it, anyway, for Peter Parker's address was ingrained into my mind like it was my own name.

A small smile flickered, and I leant against the cool wall of the bathroom, sighing in relief. Step one was over; Ned was taken care of for a while, Peter and I were partners, and I had successfully managed to work out dates where we could work. Now, I just needed to figure out how to make him talk.

Preferably, without causing physical pain.

So, yes, you heard it here first, folks; I've decided to make this even more of an AU and have this sit between CACW and Homecoming and bring in Electro. Now, before y'all flip at me because it's rumoured the Sinister Six, including Electro, will be brought out later in the Spiderman series, I know that. There is a reason for that, and that's why he's here. He's also not full 'Electro', I suppose you could say because he's not nearly as strong as he would be with the Sinister Six. Essentially, I chose him as a villain because he wasn't quite so large-scale [yet at least] and he was a good transition.

Alright, well, that's all. I apologise for loads of dialogue, but I promise the next few chapters will [hopefully] be more interesting! I just need to build this up so that when it all gets real, I don't get more hate then I'm already getting on my characters.

I hope you enjoyed!