Kate Bishop remembered the first day of Elementary school vividly. She had been excited, but also really nervous. She didn't know anyone and that scared her, but she was starting school, of all things.

She was a big girl now. A big girl who did not cry about having no friends.

She had no friends and she hated it and wanted to cry.

Until a boy her age with light brown curls going everywhere and deep intelligent eyes sat shyly next to her at lunchtime and introduced himself. His name was Peter Parker.

They became close friends. Peter was mire academic and studious, preferring to read, but he still joined in whenever Kate wanted to play tag or whatnot. Kate was just a ball of energy that would not stop moving. And their parents grew incredibly close too.

And then Peter wasn't at school one day.

Or the next.

Or for the rest of the week.

Kate pestered her parents to tell her what happened. They refused until she threw a massive tantrum and refused to come out until they told her. Hey, she had her ways of getting information. They sat her down between the two of them, Kate's mother resting a hand on her daughter's knee. Kate didn't really know what death was. But she knew that Peter's parents had gone away and weren't ever coming back. Never ever.

So Kate demanded that they do something for him. Kate made him a card while her mother baked cookies, and they went to the small apartment in Queens. A rather tired Italian woman answered the door, smiling fondly at the cookies and handmade card. She called her nephew and out came an emotionally and mentally exhausted Peter, looking like he had aged several years in the span of a few days. Kate gave him a massive hug, promising that she'd always be there for him and gave him the card. He was much more willing to come to school after that.

Peter disappeared again during 3rd grade too. Not even Kate's parents knew what was happening, so she wrote him a letter and stuck it under their door. A few weeks later a letter came for her in the mail. Peter explained that something bad had happened and he didn't feel safe going outside anymore and didn't really feel comfortable about himself. Kate wrote back furiously that he was AWESOME and HOW DARE SOMEONE HURT HER FRIEND SHE WILL PROTECT HIM FOREVER!!!! She told him that too when she finally saw him face-to-face a few months later and he giggled, giving her a small smile. And Kate kept her promise, defending him from bullies and meanies for the rest of elementary school.

Then they went to different middle schools and their paths split.

Kate still thought about him occasionally, wondering what he was doing with his life. She saw him in the papers once, when his decathlon team won nationals. He definitely had grown, but he was still the dorky nerd she knew.

Then half the universe blipped. Kate lost all her friends and often strolled to the memorial with all the names of those who blipped. One day, she found herself looking at the last names starting with 'Pa', and kept looking wondering if maybe....

May and Peter had blipped, but Ben hadn't. Kate swallowed, upset that somehow all of her friends had blipped.

Then everyone came back, five years later, and hadn't aged at all. Kate still spent her time improving her archery and fighting, using Clint Barton as inspiration.

Several months later and the Daily Bugle is blasting on about some guy named Mysterio and Spider-Man killing him. And then he revealed his identity.

Kate gasped, hard. The shy, nerdy, kind kid she had grown up with, who always gave her a hug when she scraped her knees and shared food when she left hers at home was supposedly a murderer and a well-known Avenger??? He had been to space. While Kate had just been moping around with a useless stick with string.

How did he become an Avenger?

His entire life became the hottest topic of conversation. His childhood, his schooling, his family, his love life, everything personal. Though they hadn't found out what happened when he was in 3rd grade, and something told Kate she didn't want to know.

His name was cleared several weeks later, but people still hated and knew him.

Then Kate ran into Peter, for the first time in many years.

Well, he had run into her. They had walked into each other, Peter apologizing profusely as he looked up. He stopped, blinking as he recognized Kate. "... Kate? As in elementary school Kate? Kate Bishop?"

"Yeah," she said, nodding. "It's me. I haven't seen you in a long time."

"Yeah." Peter gave an awkward laugh. "So, how have you been?'

"Eh, so and so. Things have been a bit wild lately, but yeah. How's your family?"

Peter paused. "Well, Ben's dead and May's currently working at a local homeless shelter cause she can't really get any employment at the moment with all the chaos going on..." he trailed off, studying a crack in the sidewalk.

"Oh. I'm sorry, I didn't know." Peter just shrugged, clearly used to it by now. "So this is going to sound weird, but... How did you become an Avenger? Or a superhero? And why?"

"Well... I got bitten by a radioactive spider that made me stupidly sick but also gave me my powers, then Ben died and his thing was always 'With great power comes great responsibility' and so I said to myself 'I have these powers, so I gotta do something good with them,' and so I became Spidey. And then eventually was invited to the Avengers and then died for five years,  it hey, that's life."

Kate nodded, taking it all in. "Do you think that anyone who didn't have powers could still make it to being a superhero?"

Peter nodded. "Yeah. I mean, you have Clint Barton, and Black Widow and Mr Stark, but they're..." he trailed off, waving his hands. "Yeah. It doesn't matter whether you have the powers or the suit, what matters is why you fight."

Kate nodded, understanding "Well, I should get going, but it was nice to see you again."

"Yeah, you too."

"We should properly catch up sometime. Maybe introduce me to your girlfriend, cause she seems nice!"

"Yeah, that'll be good! I'll see you around!"

"Bye!"

They went their separate ways, a smile lingering on their faces. A catch-up would be good.

They never did.
Some of you know why, some of you don't.
But let's just say that that was the end of a beautiful friendship.

Darknesshalltakeover here you go lovely, it's just a headcannon thingy