Beau Idéal - Eccentric_Grace - Multifandom [Archive of Our Own] (2024)

Chapter 1: Prologue: Autumn

Chapter Text

"Before I loved you, love, nothing was my own:
I wavered through the streets, among
Objects:
Nothing mattered or had a name:
The world was made of air, which waited."
-Pablo Neruda

The mid-autumn weather had taken its hold in New York. Wind whistled and nipped at the cracking leaves to scatter them everywhere down the street, and the drizzly rain left every block permanently damp and smelling of wet concrete and distantly rotting garbage. Eau du NYC.

Sister Margaret’s was a nice refuge from the chill in the air, and today that’s where a certain merc-with-a-mouth had been, because he wanted Weasel’s filthiest and most expensive drink—and he had money to collect.

Wade cheerily hummed along to an Ariana Grande song as he made his way through the busy crowd of yelling mercenaries and up to the bar. The stuffy location was radiating in heat from the amount of bodies pressed together in it, and the smell was dreadful, something of mold, gunpowder, bodily fluids, and leather.

“Oh, Weasel!” Wade called out, finally making his way to the front and sitting at a stool. He slapped the table. “I would like your finest Anus Burner.”

Weasel gave him an unimpressed look. “Modest as ever.”

He began to assemble the drink behind the counter. “You haven’t been around here in a while. Thought you finally got sick of this place, moved on and got a yipper dog.”

“Aw, but I’ve got you for that.” Wade grinned. The grin fell into something faux-serious, and he slid over a golden card. “But I did come here for my paycheck. Otherwise I won’t be able to pay my cable bill, and you know how I like my Golden Girls reruns. I am in love with those ladies. Do you think I’d have a chance with Bea Arthur? Be honest.”

Weasel rolled his eyes. He slid the card through the reader and then reached under the counter. He returned his hand to smack a thick envelope in front of Wade, then his drink– a neon red concoction with a lime bathing threateningly on the ice. “I don’t think she dates anybody with a face quite as rotting-corpse as yours is. Here’s your money, douchebag.”

“You're a peach.” Wade snuck the envelope into his pocket. He downed the entire shot and made an outrageous face. “Motherf*ckER. That’s gonna hurt later. Pass the kitty the cream.”

“Was the hit even interesting?” Weasel asked, handing him a bottle of whipped cream and then cringing when Wade put the nozzle on his tongue. “Seems like you get a bunch of low-grade sh*t now that you finished taking down the motherf*cker who f*cked your face. Dawn? Method?”

“Francis,” Wade corrected, his expression going sour. “And sometimes, Weasel, I like to have fun. Don’t be a party-pooper. This last hit was absolutely thrilling, and it didn’t require any soap-named-ass-bitch to make it that way. Plus, that guy was like, so 2016. Get ahead of the times, oldy.”

“What was it again?”

“Wealthy milf who wanted me to scare off her abusive ex-husband,” Wade said cheerily. “It was a joy.”

Weasel squinted at him. “Was she hot?”

“Aw, Weas. You know how that maid dress flatters my form. I can be whatever you want me to be.”

“Gross.” Weasel pushed his glasses up. “Whatever. I’ve got a way more interesting hit for you. This guy, super anonymous, says he’s got a job for the best merc in here. So obviously, I gave it to Dave.”

Wade stared blankly. “Gee, thank you, Weasel. Always love to have your enthusing support and encouragement in my career. My best friend, light of my life, fire of my loins.”

“But Dave didn’t want it,” Weasel continued, ignoring him completely. “Because he didn’t think the guy was willing to pay enough for what he was asking him to do.”

“Why the hell would I want it then?” Wade asked, picking at his nails. “You think I’m some desperate broke bitch? I’m made for diamonds, motherf*cker.”

“I thought—“ Weasel leaned closer to him, his voice lowering. “I thought you’d want it because it sounds like a hit on Spider-Man. Seems to be up to your gig. You know, working with superheroes and stuff.”

Wade’s browline raised with interest. He pulled back. “Go on?”

“I can give you the guy’s number,” Weasel shrugged. “From what I know, it’s more of an investigation-type hit. ‘See if he’s sketchy, and if you find anything, take him out’ sort of deal. You better not kill Spider-Man. I don’t care how much it pays.”

“Huh.” Wade looked down at his drink. “Yeah, give me the number. Certainly sounds interesting. Never would’ve pegged Spidey as the type to get a hit on him. What am I looking for, corporate greed? Doesn’t he work for that charity place?”

“I dunno.” Weasel reached under the counter for something else, and then placed a card in front of him. “I heard a rumour that the guy tried to hire Taskmaster but didn’t have the money.”

“Taskmaster?” Wade’s eyes widened. “Holy sh*t! Yeah, I’d settle for me too. That motherf*cker is expensive. Good thing I don’t need cool tech to do my job, right?”

“Just—“ Weasel shook his head. “Go do your job. And start visiting more, or I’ll make everybody fight over your name on the dead pool again.”

“That’s copyright infringement,” Wade shot back, getting out of his seat. “And another old joke. Get well soon.”

He slid the paper off the table and saluted to Weasel before he left.

“Alright, mysterious employer.” Wade looked down at the card, carefully inspecting the number. “Let’s find out what you’re all about, huh?”

Chapter 2: Kubler-Ross

Chapter Text

“And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea.”
-Edgar Allan Poe

Dark.

It was dark in the Oscorp lab. Silence echoed from every wall, and Peter—

Peter was painfully aware of the moving spider that was under the sleeve of his sweater, crawling up his arm at a rapid speed. Tiny legs maneuvering past every little hair, under folds of fabric, all the while he stood frozen against his will.

He couldn't speak. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't lift a finger to scratch away at his skin as the little arachnid moved up from his collar and to his neck.

NO, Peter yelled as loud as he could, but his mouth didn't move and he didn't make a sound. I DON'T WANT THIS.

Gwen smiled back at him, her eyes blank and white. "But baby, this is what you deserve."

The sound of a ringing gunshot filled Peter's ears as the spider jerked and sunk its pincers deep into the skin behind his ear. While he couldn't twinge even a muscle in his face, he stared desperately at Gwen's unfaltering smile, and her eyes stared at him with the same blankness while blood slowly dribbled down from her nostrils.

PLEASE.

"Please," Gwen repeated his thoughts, tears filling her eyes. But her smile never left. "Please. Please. Please. Please. What about sorry, Peter? Are you sorry? Are you sorry?"

Peter couldn't find words to respond with, and the silence that met Gwen's words echoed around them in the empty space.

Her smile slowly faded. Blood slowly sank a river into Gwen's lips. "Are you sorry?" She continued, choking on the blood. She whispered with red-stained lips. "Are you sorry, Peter?"

A sickening crack shoved her into the ground, and with the noise, Peter jolted upwards to try and catch her, to save her, just this once he would fix it, he could save her, and his—

His hands met empty air. A shuddering gasp tore from his throat, his heart pounding out of his chest. His vision blurred as he reeled his head around to try and take in the surroundings of his dingy apartment.

The dark pinks and purples of early daylight filtered in from the cheap curtains left on his window, basking the room in a shadowed glow. His alarm clock read that it was four in the morning, leaving room outside for the mourners to coexist beside the early businessmen and waking sun.

Peter ran a hand over his face and swung shaking legs off of his sweaty mattress. He pulled on the closest clothes and sneakers. Tears were still threatening the corners of his eyes, but he only had one important thought driving his tired body out of the sleeping building—He had to see her.

The trek to the church went quick. Peter moved fast down the sidewalk, made quick work of dodging around cars and other tired people who carried coffees and eyebags from their own graveyard shifts of different meanings. He held back the instinct to mirror the speed of his heart as it tried to race out of his chest.

He kneeled down in the wet grass of her resting place beside the small church and shivered in the cold as it seeped in through his jeans. He took a moment to catch his breath. The bitter frost of the air stung, but he kept taking gasps of it in hopes it would freeze his brain and the thoughts within it.

Gwen always told him he never knew how to properly express how he felt. She used to look at him and rub her nose in the way she always did and she would crinkle her eyes and say, "You think about speaking more than you do speak about thinking. You just have to say it, Peter. Tell me what's bothering you."

Another breath. He could do this, if not for himself, then for her.

"It's bad again," he spoke up, answering the memory. He stared at the carved rock in front of him without the proper words to say. His voice wavered delicately in the quiet wind of crisp morning air. "The nightmares are getting worse. I'm—"

He tried not to think of Gwen like how he remembered her in the nightmare, but her piercing gaze, her empty smile, the blood covering the lower half of her face—It consumed him like a disease.

He sniffed and looked down from the headstone, but looked back up and traced her name with his eyes. "I'm trying to take care of myself. I know it's been months, I know that, but I just— It's getting bad again."

"I just can't let you go," Peter admitted with a sweet laugh. It evaporated in the air as memories of her reaching out, that fear in her wide eyes, fingers outstretched in desperation, rushed through his mind. He felt sick. "I'm so sorry, Gwen. It was my fault. You shouldn't be here.'

'This is..." Peter sniffles. "This is killing me."

The gravestone didn't move. It stared right back at him, the letters not shifting on themselves, her name never leaving, not revealing itself as some sort of sick prank. Peter had bitterly grown to be used to it. After all, a grave never spoke. It only listened.

"I really am sorry," Peter repeated quietly. "I wish... I wish you knew that. I hope you know that."

The silence he received in response was painful, but he sat through it for what could have been minutes or an hour.

When his grieving soul felt at rest with his self-issued penance of the early morning, he forced his legs up and looked upwards. The sun had begun to rise into the clearing, melting at the frostdew left on the grass.

Leaving any gravestone was hard. He couldn't stand sitting there, but he never wanted to leave. It satiated a dark part of himself to sit there in his suffering, to be forced to listen to nothing but his own thoughts and to wallow in the blame and guilt. Still, he left eventually, because he always had to.

He inhaled the air deeply and let the cold sting his lungs some more as he stepped back onto the sidewalk. It had to have been about half past five now, foot traffic was beginning to ramp up in the streets with several other people looking just as exhausted as he did.

Peter had about five hours before he had to leave for work, meaning he had five hours of time to kill.

He almost debated going out as Spider-Man, letting the rush of wind clear out his mind. He was all jittery, woke up that way due to the circ*mstances and it hasn't left his bloodstream. (Of course, Peter's been jittery for the past several years. Always needing to move, to tap his foot or drum his fingers against a surface so that his skin didn't turn from the inside out as it felt that it needed to.)

But Spider-Man came with a cost (the web didn't reach her fast enough, it was all his fault, and he's sorry, he's sorry, he's—), and after the hellscape of a morning he's had so far, there was a very selfish part of him that just wanted to be someplace warm.

He wanted to be someplace where the people there cared if he was late, and not because they were angry that he was, but because they were concerned for him and the reason for the extra fifteen minutes he took to arrive. He wanted to be someplace where he felt appreciated and more importantly, helpful just as himself. He wanted to be home.

Naturally, his legs started moving towards Chinatown. F.E.A.S.T. was a big building, standing sturdy quite a few blocks away. One of a handful of locations in Manhattan, and a beacon of hope no matter the occasion. May wouldn't be here this early in the morning, much less most of the day staff. Twenty-four hour shifts were something that didn't happen unless volunteers were low or there was a particular influx of people that needed help.

Things have been really good lately, everything considered. May had just begun buying property for a location in upstate New York with the funds given by a very generous and successful charity drive that Spider-Man had agreed to help out with—(And Spider-Man was always willing to help, visits every so often when he can, but not nearly as much as Peter Parker did.)—and they had been celebrating the news just early that month.

Peter's smiles may be tired, and may have been tired for the past six months, past ten years, really, but he couldn't deny that there was some pure goodness in his city. It existed in the cracks of a gravestone, and in the bricks of F.E.A.S.T., and in May's smile lines, and in the little bursts of good news that got him through each day.

When he arrived at the building, the clock on the front desk read that it was nearing six.

Peter walked further into the building, taking a look around at the main part of F.E.A.S.T. as people slowly began to wake up. He goes over to the coffee maker and begins a fresh pot so they can have hot coffee if they want it. The thought of coffee didn't actually seem too bad for himself either, and he knew he would be needing some eventually with the type of exhaustion that sunk in his chest this morning.

Breakfast would probably be ready in an hour, meaning that now someone was in the kitchen would be working on making something, and Peter could help make sure dishes or fruit were washed. He moved around sleeping bags and bunk beds as quietly as he could and finally made it to the kitchen.

"Need some help?" Peter spoke up, tying an apron around his neck.

A volunteer jumped and began laughing, turning to look at Peter with a startled expression. This was Oliver, one of the many people on the staff. They were fairly new, but got along with everybody nicely and made great french toast.

"You snuck up on me. What are you even doing here so early?"

"Sorry about that," Peter smiled apologetically.

"You can wash the fruit," Oliver nodded over to a big rectangular tray of fresh fruit in the middle table of the kitchen. "I'm just about to start on a big pot of oatmeal."

"Yes, chef."

Peter picked the tray up and brought it over to the sink, turning on the faucet. He scrubbed the apples, rinsed the grapes, and the smell of hot oatmeal and coffee flooded through the open room by the time he was done.

"I'll wash the tables," Peter said, taking the apron off.

"Alright. Thanks for the help!"

Peter saluted Oliver and stepped out to wash the food tables down. As he took a washcloth and a bottle of surface cleaner from the counter, he heard somebody walking up behind him.

Furrowing his eyebrows, he turned around to meet whoever it was, and softened his expression when he saw May's surprised face looking back at him.

"You're here early," she said. "Very early. What happened?"

Only May would be suspicious right away about Peter helping out around the city. There was nobody who knew Peter better than her, having raised him since he was a little kid with wirey bones and big clunky bottle glasses. Nonetheless, the last thing Peter ever wanted was for May to worry about him. Not after everything they've been through together.

"Nothing happened," Peter shrugged.

May nodded slowly. "Of course. Well, since you're here, do you mind helping me with folding some laundry?"

Peter opened his mouth, looking down at the cleaner in his hand. "Oh, I—"

"It's alright," May said, as if knowing what he was thinking. "Someone else can get the tables. I need someone strong to carry the heavy basket."

Peter nodded then and sat the materials down. He followed May down the next two hallways and into the laundry room, but didn't find any baskets to lift at all. He glanced at May questioningly. "I think someone already took care of it, May."

"Guess they did," May shrugged innocently. "But hey, now that we're alone, you can tell me what really happened this morning."

Peter sighed, the breath drawing deep from his chest. "May, I really don't want you to worry. I'm alright. It was just a... a rough morning."

May's eyes softened in the most sympathetic way, and he knew in that moment that she could see right through him. She was worn with understanding, the kind that could only come from years of the same grief, and Peter swallowed down the hurt that came with the recognition.

"Peter," she said softly. "I know how difficult it can be. Sometimes I still have trouble sleeping, when I'm reminded of Ben."

"I'm sorry," Peter spoke up, interrupting the topic before the pain could grow. "I'm sorry, May. I know you're trying to help, but I swear, I'm alright. Like I said, it was a rough morning, and I— I don't know. I guess I just wanted to help some people before I left for work."

It eased the guilt. That's what Peter told her, on a morning similar to this, about a month after it happened. He was still doing awful then, looked a lot worse, with circles under his eyes that were dark as the night he lived in and skin so pale you could see the riverways of veins underneath. It eased the guilt when he helped people.

May sighed quietly, but nodded with something bittersweet in the purse of her lips. She put a hand on his cheek and gently ran her thumb just under his eye. He leaned into the warmth of her hand. Home.

"Please take care of yourself," she murmured. "Guilt shouldn't mean the same thing as grief."

Peter nodded slightly. "I know."

And there was something in the way he said it. The way his head fogged up when the words were forced past the hesitation on his tongue.

Of course, May would never find out in certain terms that his "I know" was not, 'I know, May.' It was, 'I know that you want to believe that for me, May. But you don't know all the details about what happened that night at the clocktower, and that's okay. I forgive you, and I forgive the fact that you forgive me even though you shouldn't.'

The truth is that grief has always meant guilt, because ever since Peter could remember, one did not and could not exist without the other. They were an entangled mess of a thing, disgusting, longing, desperate, painful, gasping and reaching for a past life, both marinating in the heavy morose of regret.

Peter brought a hand up and scratched at a scar behind his ear. "I know, May."

May's expression held so much in the aged lines. She wanted to say more. Peter could see it in her eyes. She wanted to say more, but she knew that Peter wasn't ready to hear what she needed to say. Never wanting to push further, never wanting to lose him because of his own stubbornness. He hated that expression, because most of the time May was right, and yet he still hated being out of knowledge.

"I should go," Peter spoke up painfully. "I've got some work stuff to do."

May nodded quietly. "Of course. Make sure you get some rest tonight, if you're not stopping by earlier."

"Yeah."

She tilted her head and curled up half of her top lip fondly. "And your hair is getting long again. If you won't let me cut it, go see a barber."

Peter smiled slightly. "Sure, May."

He kissed her cheek before he left.

His apartment was different in the daylight. Earlier this morning, he woke up and looked around to see endless shadows, jagged shapes, and ghosts. He was more awake now, at ease with himself and coherent enough to understand the picture of Gwen burned in his head was nothing more than a nightmare, and he could now see the apartment for what it was.

It's a tiny box of a residence, as New York apartments usually are when living from paycheck to paycheck. This was his fourth apartment this year, which was actually a feat given it was the tail end of autumn. A window was beside his mattress, cramped into a corner of the room with one of May's quilts crumpled at the end of it from where Peter had thrown it off earlier. He frowned and walked over to smooth it back over his bed neatly.

Unopened boxes were piled up everywhere, lining the side of the chipped brick wall with the window and being used as a makeshift bedside table. Disorderly was one word for his place, because it really was a mess. He never had energy to clean. Never had time, either. The result was scattered clothes strewn all over the place, haphazardly placed technology left dismantled and sitting under a magnifying glass, a laptop on a messy scratched up table that he found in the dump one time, post-it note reminders on nearly every surface that were mostly ignored and useless in the long run. They kept a variety of polaroids and other photographs that also covered his walls fairly hidden, a collage of clutter at every corner.

He moved around all of the mess and sat at the table, shoving old Chinese food containers off and into the trash bag beside him. With a sigh, he took his camera from its place on a nearby box and put the card into his computer.

Peter started editing photos for the Daily Bugle when he first graduated college two years before. It was only something to keep himself off the ground, then, and Peter had thought it was hilariously ironic that the person J. Jonah Jameson was giving his paychecks to take pictures of Spider-Man is the same person posing in those pictures.

(He had wanted to get a job in the scientific field, because why else would he get a bachelors in biophysics if not to apply it in the real world, but he refused to work for Oscorp and the only main company competing with Oscorp was Octavius Industries, which Peter learned early on wouldn't work the same moment that he had to pull a mechanical octopus claw out of his intestines—Right before graduation.

Needless to say, his options were fairly closed when it came to being a scientist. But he has hope for one day.)

By mid-afternoon, he had a handful of Spider-Man photos edited and cropped, while the other few hundreds of them went to the trash for being too blurry. The finished photos were added to the Daily Bugle file, and Peter mentally reminded himself to stop by the building later this week to get his paycheck.

He pushed himself away from the table and stretched his arms upwards with a yawn.

This was the part of the day that Peter waited for. The part of the day where he could pretend to be brave, where a mask sheltered the most vulnerable parts of himself and replaced them with quips, the part of the day where people see him and think they're safer.

He stripped from his clothes and pulled on his suit, then took a deep breath. "Alright, Manhattan. Try not to kill me tonight."

And with that, he ceremoniously leaped out the window.

Chapter 3: The Mercenary Overture

Chapter Text

"For love was offered me and I shrank from its disillusionment;
Sorrow knocked at my door, but I was afraid;
Ambition called to me, but I dreaded the chances."
-Edgar Lee Masters

“Alright, New York!” Spider-Man swung between the buildings and inhaled deeply the air that rushed through. “What do you have for me tonight?”

“Robbery? Drug-dealing?” He leaped off the edge of a roof and twisted to the side, continuing along the city line. “Life-altering bad guy villain introduction?”

On cue, the sound of a hacked police tower’s radio crackled in his ear. “Dispatch, we’ve got a 10-34. East Harlem, Lexington Avenue. Possible gang activity. Reports heard of active gunshot, officers be advised.”

“Big-time assault,” Peter huffed. “Sounds fun. Harlem, huh?”

“10-4. En route.”

“Copy that, Chief,” Peter said to nobody. He catapulted through Manhattan’s buildings and skyscrapers. “I really hope the cops don’t mind that I hacked their radio towers. Well, actually, I don’t care.”

The swing to Harlem took only a few minutes, and the potential of police taking care of it before he even got there was always a possibility. But Peter had been doing this for a while— (It was mind-numbing to think that he had been doing this job for nearly half of his life, from fourteen to twenty-four. He was starting to think there wasn’t ever a version of himself without Spider-Man.)—and he knew very well how much things could go wrong if he wasn’t there, at the very least as a fallback plan.

He had a night a few years ago where a major drug deal was going down in a back alleyway down in Brooklyn, and Peter hadn’t wanted to get involved because it was across the bridge and the police sounded like they had it covered. Five minutes passed and he heard on the radio the panic-stricken sound of a cop calling backup, serenaded by a cacophony of gunshots in the background. He had swung over so quickly, only to be met with an empty scene and a bleeding officer on the ground.

At the end of the night, he dropped his suit in a laundry basket, hid it under some towels so he wouldn’t have to look at it when entering his dorm. He showered; scrubbed his skin till he couldn’t smell the blood that soaked its way through from the CPR and immediate medical attention that he gave to the officer with no success. Then he went home to May, ignored the fact he had college classes the next morning, and fell in her arms. It took ten full minutes to convince her the next day that he was fine, nothing had happened, he was stressed from classes.

Peter was nineteen when he learned not to take chances. Routine laid heavy now.

“A little swing to Harlem’s not a problem,” Peter continued to say to himself. “Especially if it lets people get home safe.”

Nearly to Lexington Avenue, Peter’s phone started ringing from where it was placed in a concealed pocket on the side of his calf. With a swift movement, he leapt into the air and reached his leg down to grab the phone, then tapped the screen and held it up to his ear.

“Hey, May! Uh— Sorry, now really isn’t a good time—”

“I just wanted to— where are you?” May asked over the phone, her voice concerned. “You sound like you’re talking from the inside of a wind turbine.”

Peter threw the phone to his right hand and shot a web with the left, turning a corner. He put the phone back up to his ear. “Yeah. It’s uh… The air conditioner in my apartment building is broken. Landlord hasn’t been able to call a guy yet, so it’s kind of noisy.”

“I see. Doesn’t that make it hard to sleep? It really is a racket.”

Peter dove downwards and swung back up, gaining enough momentum to launch forward and land a little ways away from the action. “I think it’s worse on the phone. Anyways. What’s going on?”

“Right!” May chuckled to herself. “I’m sorry, Peter. I got myself distracted. I wanted to ask if—“

A round of gunshots occurred across the street, and Peter flinched. Looked like cops hadn't arrived yet, which meant he had to wrap this up before things got worse for the fight going on beside him.

“What was that?”

“Thin walls,” Peter said quickly. “I think my neighbour is watching Die Hard. Yeah. He celebrates Christmas super early. Ha. Who watches Christmas movies in November?”

“I don’t remember that being a holiday story,” May’s stern voice replied. “That was a very violent film.”

“You’ve seen Die Hard?” Peter furrowed his eyebrows. He lowered down and snuck forward, hiding behind a car. “That’s… Surprising, I guess. Uh— I’m really sorry to cut this short, May, but I really am in the middle of something kinda important. What were you gonna ask?”

“The Thanksgiving food drive,” May finally said. “If you’re not too busy, of course, I’d love it if you were able to come by early tomorrow and help set up.”

Peter opened his mouth to reply, but heard the click of a gun behind him. He fought the urge to roll his eyes and in one simple motion, flipped upwards and landed behind the offender.

He yanked the gun away from the man with a web, and continued holding the phone lazily away from his ear.

“You’re so f*cking dead!” The man yelled, staggering back.

“I’ll call you back, my apartment is getting really noisy! I think the other guy to the right of my place is doing taxes,” Peter said dumbly, then hung up the phone. “Oh buddy. Didn’t anybody ever tell you it’s impolite to talk when someone’s on a call? That was an extremely important business meeting!”

“It’s Spider-Man!” The man yelled again. “It’s—“

Peter clicked his webshooters and shut the man up with a web directly to the mouth.

“Works better than duck tape,” he joked. “Anyone else want a taste?”

He then turned around to fight the other bad guys that had decided to crowd around him in true gang-fashion. Peter sighed and squared his hips. “Alright, you asked for it. Eat up kiddos, dinner is served! Man, it’s really hard being a single father.”

Then he’s flipping through the air, kicking off of other people’s chests and yanking guns away. He took down a handful of some very angry thugs in the span of a few minutes, but there was one last straggler running away with something that looked a lot like—

“Hey!” Peter yelled indignantly. “That’s my phone! You’re really gonna steal from Spider-Man? Come on, man! That is the worst possible idea.”

He shot a web toward the man who was taking off down the street and yanked him back, but in the process, the phone went flying downwards from man’s hand and skidded across the rough concrete of the road with a series of crunches and crackly noises.

“No, no, no!” Peter webbed the guy to a car and then jogged over to the remains of his phone. He picked up the scraped device and held the power button, but was met with a dark (shattered) screen. “Aw, come on…”

He shook the broken glass off and stuffed the phone back into his pocket. Then he turned to the webbed criminal in the car and crossed his arms, giving an annoyed glare. “You know how much phones cost in this economy? You, sir, owe me a brand new phone. This is just disgraceful. You—“

Police sirens showed up late, but they were barreling down the road and he knew he couldn’t stay long. Peter groaned. “You are so lucky right now. So, so, lucky. Enjoy your cell in Rikers, bud. I’m sure the orange will match your eyes.”

Peter jumped up onto a light post and took off swinging as officers scrambled out of their cars to confront him, leaving behind a scene of knocked out or webbed up bad guys (and only minor property damage! Just some cracked concrete here and there…) and cops as they shouted about how they “had the situation handled.”

He landed on the nearest rooftop and took his phone back out for a closer inspection, watching as it fell further apart in his hands. He clicked his tongue in disappointment. “Flex tape can’t fix that.”

Peter sighed and took a seat up on an air conditioning unit, pulling his knees to his chest. Gwen would have laughed at something like this. She would have crinkled her eyes and brightened the room with the same infectious joy she carried, then pulled her hair back behind her ear in delicately placed movements with her hand, and she waited to hear what happened. Peter would have laughed with her.

He did not laugh now.

He blinked the image of her away, replacing it with the view of the criminals he took down being loaded up into the back of patrol cars.

Then there was this feeling; a buzzing at the back of his neck that tingled its way up and down his spine, a tickle of electricity at the base of his skull.

He narrowed his eyes and went still. It was a warning. Somebody was behind him, watching him, staring at him like he was prey.

“…I know you’re there,” Peter spoke up.

There was silence in the response for a few moments, and then the figure behind him started humming something enthusiastically.

Peter furrowed his eyebrows and turned around. “Is that—are you singing the Michael Meyers theme right now?”

There was somebody there, hidden in the dark shadow of a building that rose taller than the one they were on. The night wasn’t making it any easier to see, and Peter squinted to try and make out a face, but there was none to be seen.

What was more odd, and definitely concerning, was the stench of blood and gunpowder that radiated from the figure in waves. It made him just a little bit sick, and very cautious. This was a threat, clearly. It wasn’t like people covered in blood who snuck up on people to stare at them wanted to make superhero friends or whatever. Peter straightened his back and turned to fully face the tall shadow.

“Who are you?” Peter blurted.

A cheerful laugh. “Well, just about the most infamous guy in New York.”

“Well, with a title like that, you better not disappoint. Why have I never seen you in New York, if you’re so popular?”

The figure shrugged in the dark. “You can call it a very long and dangerous business trip in Ottawa! All the fun stuff there. You know, alcohol, partying, casual decapitation, and… Yeah, I’ll just call it a plot hole.”

Peter frowned, trying to roll around the rocky information in his head to smooth it out, but to no avail. He crossed his arms. “You gonna step out of the dark?”

The man hasn’t said his name yet, which Peter noted with another wave of caution. It wavered like a flame when the man does a little dance when he saunters out of the shadows, continuing to hum the Michael Meyers theme.

He wore a red and black suit; a mask with white eyes that moved and shifted as he sang. On his back, two katanas, which were admittedly wickedly cool and Peter sort of wanted to see them up close. (Not too close.) On his thighs, the man had guns strapped and holstered, and a tactical belt around his waist to hold what Peter assumed to be his ammo.

Peter hadn’t met many mercenaries, (or any, really,) but this certainly wasn’t even close to his first idea of one. This one should have been more dangerous looking, with all of these very deadly descriptions, and their even deadlier connotations. He had seen movies, of course. Mercs weren't known to dance and sing songs from 1980s slasher flicks when stalking their victims.

Still, a mercenary was a mercenary. But a human was a human—and Peter could take them on with ease, so he supposed he didn’t have much to worry about.

“And why is a mercenary following me?” Peter asked, eyeing the man curiously. “You working for Oscorp?”

The man gagged in disgust. “Oh, hell no. I hate that company.”

“Okay, so... Why, then?”

“I’m a big fan,” the man stated with a serious tone, nodding and then making a heart with his hands. “Oh, yeah. Huge Spidey fangirl. Just was in the neighbourhood and wanted to see what thee Spider-Man did on patrol, y'know?”

“Uh huh,” Peter scratched the back of his neck.

“So, what was it today?” The man continued, walking towards him casually and taking a seat on the edge of the roof. “What’d you do?”

“Sorry. That’s classified information,” he said lightheartedly. “I don’t even know your name.”

The man gasps, putting a hand to his heart. “You sly little devil, it’s not even the first date yet!”

Then, he cleared his throat. “On the job? The name is Deadpool— Certified sexy motherf*cker, curator of two of the highest-grossing Rated-R movies. That’s a capital R for adult activity, harsh language, intense graphic violence, drug abuse and nudity. My stunts are animated in more ways than one.”

Peter stared at him for a long time. “And what about off the job?”

“Sorry,” Deadpool repeated sweetly. “That’s classified information.”

Peter huffed with slight amusem*nt and stood up. “I guess deserved that. Well, listen. I have other, uh, superhero duties to take care of, so I’m gonna go. It was… nice, I guess? It was nice meeting you.”

“Aw, flirt,” Deadpool snorted. “It was a pleasure meeting you too, Mr. Spidey! Are all spiders that ripped? Genuinely asking. I usually smash them before I can see. Not the fun kind. I don’t f*ck bugs.”

Peter choked on the abrupt laugh and shook his head. “They’re arachnids, technically. Listen, don’t cause trouble, okay? Bye, Deadpool.”

“Mhm!”

Peter saluted then took off from the building, swinging a few blocks away from the site of the crime and landing on the ground to find the nearest payphone. The interaction with the man—Deadpool—was swirling its way over in his head the way a puzzling math formula would. There was something about it that begged for further questioning.

The thought of a mercenary checking up on him out of the blue, someone who killed people so ruthlessly, it should put him on edge, even if they were human. Much to his chagrin, his self-patented spidey senses stopped acting up the moment Deadpool stepped out of the shadows. That just left him so curious.

“Anybody else would be worried, right?” Peter murmured to himself. “Geez, I need therapy.”

The man didn’t seem to be a real threat yet, despite everything about him pointing him the other way, painting him as a walking red flag, easily supported by the blood staining his dark red suit of leather. The eccentricity of it all made him wary and intrigued in one sweep.

“I suppose that’s what you’d expect from some science nerd who goofed his way into superpowers,” Peter mumbled to himself. He reaches back down to the pocket on his calf and pulls out a dollar, smoothing it out.

He sighed quietly and stared at the bill, then up at the $0.25 sticker on the payphone. “This is so stupid. Who even uses payphones anymore?”

Peter stepped away from the payphone and looked around, holding the dollar helplessly in his hand. He made eye contact with a passing woman. “‘Scuse me! Um— do you have a quarter you could spare? I’ll give you a dollar for it.”

The woman hesitated. “Are you Spider-Man?”

“…Yeah, that’d be me,” Peter said awkwardly.

“I don’t have change,” she said. “Sorry.”

Peter watched her continue walking down the path and felt the hope leave him like a deflated balloon. He sighed heavily.

“I’ve got a quarter!”

Peter turned around and was met with… the same familiar mask from before. Deadpool had seemingly followed him across several blocks. How had he even gotten down from the rooftop that quickly? It wasn’t like he could just jump off like Peter did.

“I thought I told you not to get into trouble. Why’re you following me, buddy?”

Deadpool crossed his arms. “Do you not need a quarter, then?”

He considered his options. On one hand, he really shouldn’t be indulging this weirdly fast potential stalker-guy by letting him continue to show up. On the other hand, he really needed to call May, and a broken phone or a paper bill wouldn’t accomplish that.

Peter slowly handed the dollar to Deadpool who pocketed it, and then dug a gloved hand into one of the pouches on his tactical belt. He pulled out a handful of coins, several of which Peter swore looked like arcade coins, and fished through them for a few seconds before finally handing him a silver quarter.

“Thanks.” Peter pushed it into the slot of the phone and then dialed a number. He looked back at Deadpool tiredly. The merc was now swinging on the balls of his feet, back and forth with a pleased expression.

The phone picked up. “Hello?”

“It’s me,” Peter said simply, negating the specifics with the knowledge that Deadpool was in ear shot. It was fine—May would know who he was. “Sorry about the abrupt cancelled call. Things are quiet now, though, so we can talk now!”

“What happened to your phone that you have to call from an unknown number?” May asked, and Peter could picture her confused frown.

“I broke it,” he admitted. “It’s a long story. Anyways. To answer your question, yes, I think I can help with some F.E.A.S.T. stuff. Chinatown, right?”

Peter felt suddenly the familiar warning shiver down his spine. He turned and gave Deadpool a pointed look from where the man was standing, eavesdropping on what Peter was saying with interest. At Peter’s disapproved glare, Deadpool put his hands up defensively and looked away.

“Yes. That’s great, Peter,” May said warmly. “I’ll see you then, okay? Now, get some rest tonight. I wasn’t kidding when I told you earlier.”

“I will,” Peter promised. “Love you. Bye.”

“Love you too.”

Peter hung up the phone. “Dude. Do you ever chill?”

“You said ‘love you’ to someone!” Deadpool sang. “That’s so adorable! Who was it? Who hath captured Spider-Man's heart?”

The previous curiosity Peter had for Deadpool dwindled as frantically as sand through a strainer. In its place, annoyance was beginning to prickle at the seams of his skin. He’s never been patient, and this was certainly testing it. He took a deep breath.

“I should get going for real now,” Peter said, ignoring Deadpool’s antics. He paused, and then clarified further. “Home. So don’t follow me.”

“On the contrary,” Deadpool walked up to him. “I could walk you home! Think of it as a warm introduction, you know? I’m really great at that. I’m a real charmer.”

“I’m sure.” He sighed and looked around. “If I let you walk with me for a bit, will you actually leave me alone? Because—Not that I don’t love my… adoring fans, and all, but I kind of have a secret identity thing to maintain. I can’t have people following me and watching my every move.”

“Deal.”

“Great.” Peter turned around and started walking down the sidewalk. Deadpool cheered and skipped up to him happily.

It was sort of like walking with a toddler. If the toddler was taller than him, and had a criminal background, and was older than him, and was very much not a toddler.

Deadpool just wouldn’t stop talking. This wasn’t a negative thing, of course, especially because Peter knew how much he talked himself, but it was rare to find someone who really could keep up with him in terms of a quickly-thought conversation. The thing that got to him, though, was that the variety of what Deadpool talked about was wildly eclectic.

As they walked down the street— “Man, you must get real hungry just jumping around like a f*cking Olympian. Lemme tell you, today I had a stellar three-course experience that would put that all-you-can-eat place in Tremont to shame. Such weird combinations, but so good together! Like macaroni and ketchup.”

Peter scrunched up his nose in disgust.

As they turned the corner— “I just think sometimes pregnant people are on to something, you know? I read somewhere that Cardi B. was craving Doritos, guacamole, cheese, and sour cream when she was carrying that newborn. That sounds like a one-way trip to the diarrhea zone, and I want my goddamn ticket.”

“Huh.”

As they rounded the block— “Yeah. Diarrhea stains are a f*cking pain to get out of this suit, though. Those dry cleaning bills? Woohee! Almost just as bad as the blood.”

Peter’s thoughts faltered on their aimless track, now being bombarded with Deadpool’s namesake being acted upon on innocent people to stain the red leather darker. He shivered with discomfort.

“I don’t like blood,” Peter said, his voice sounding detached.

“Well, yeah, it’s not a walk in the park. That’s what I just said. But you really can’t get this gig unless you’re willing to bleed a little, right?” Deadpool glanced over at him. “What, you’ve never gotten shot or something? Surely your plot armor isn’t that indestructible, you funky little main character.”

Peter blinked. “No, I’ve gotten shot at. It hurts. I—“

‘I didn’t think it was your blood’ goes unsaid. He cleared his throat, shook the thought away to the back of his mind. “—I think we’ve walked enough. I’m gonna go home now. I better not see you again, unless it’s by pure coincidence, alright? We have a deal?”

Deadpool hummed noncommittally.

“Okay, man.” Peter turned to him and crossed his arms. “If you don’t say yes I’m gonna have to turn you over to the cops or something. I know whatever you do isn’t legal.”

“Well that’s very ironic and presumptuous,” Deadpool pouted. “And as adorable as it is that you think any police station could contain me, I’m going to be honest with you. ‘Cuz why not, you know? You’re the hero type, you should love honesty.”

“…Sure.”

Deadpool straightened his posture. “I don’t like it when people aren’t held accountable for their actions. I don’t like it when they get away with things. Feel me?”

Peter heard a late man’s wise words ring in his ear. The reason he does any of this at all, after all this time. He nodded firmly.

“Good.” Deadpool narrowed his eyes, his tone airing around a threat. “There’s a reason you don’t know me. I only go for the worst of the worst. I may not hide my work, but nobody ever knows that it’s me who does it. Let me tell you, I am very, very, good at my job, because it’s impossible to get rid of me and I don’t stop till it’s done. If you have any secrets, any dark crevices in that suit, I will find them.”

Peter twitched. He planted his feet a little firmer on the ground. The air had grown colder around them. “Is that a threat?”

“No!” Deadpool’s voice grew lighter. “Of course not! You’ve got nothing to hide, right, Spidey? I only kill the guys worse than me. Sort of balances this whole thing I’ve got going… Anywho!”

“Have a lovely night, Spider-Man.” He grinned, then snorted as if he had just thought of something particularly amusing. “Hope I won’t see you around, amirite? Aw, man. Mercenary jokes.”

Peter stepped backwards, not taking his eyes off Deadpool. He doesn’t say a word, not a quip is uttered, before he swings off into the night.

He doesn’t actually get to his apartment for about an hour. He swung all the way through the city before he even thought about trying to sneak back to his own place. Now that he had a mercenary on his tail he couldn’t take any chances.

He had to go to F.E.A.S.T. early again tomorrow morning, and he knew he should try his best to get a few hours. The name ‘Deadpool’ sits idly in his restless mind to ponder. He stared at a pile of dirty laundry in the dark, who seemed to take the form of the masked figure with a blurry collage of red and black.

“Who are you?” Peter said to the dark, as sleep overtook him and slurred his consonants together.

For not the first time in the week, he doesn’t sleep well.

Chapter 4: 9-to-5

Chapter Text

"My eyes are vague blue, like the sky, and change all the time; they are indiscriminate but fleeting, entirely specific and disloyal, so that no one trusts me. I am always looking away."
-Frank O'Hara

Wade held the quarter out to him, and watched as Spider-Man hesitated, and then carefully took it between his gloved fingers. His gaze followed the man as he walked over to the payphone and put the quarter into the slot. It rang for a few moments, and then curiously, Spider-Man’s posture relaxed. He sank closer to the speaker of the plastic phone. Whoever he was speaking to on the other line, he trusted them. This didn’t go unnoticed.

“It’s me,” Spider-Man murmured to whoever was on the other line. “Sorry about the abrupt cancelled call… Things are quiet now, though…”

Wade swung back and forth on his feet, straining to hear any possible responses. The other voice was quiet, more of a crackly buzz than actual words.

Spider-Man’s shoulders shifted around uncomfortably. Guilt. “…I broke it. It’s a long story. Anyways. To answer your question, yes, I think I can help with some F.E.A.S.T. stuff. Chinatown, right?”

Now, that was interesting.

So, yeah.

Last night, he had found concrete proof that the New York vigilante was in some sort of affiliation with this charity thing, whether it was official or not. So, now he was here, standing in front of the F.E.A.S.T location in Chinatown, doing his job— following the lead.

There was a large banner over the entrance, informing the public about the start of their annual Thanksgiving food drive. Wade learned about the same event via Google search, because it was listed on the website as well, so he picked up a few things to fit in. Considering what his face looked like, this was really the least he could do.

The wind was cold on his bare skin, so he trudged in through the front doors before the chill could completely overtake him. He didn’t get here ridiculously early. The event should start in an hour or so. There should be more people here, but Wade can only see volunteers scattered in groups around the entrance, some other people sitting in chairs with coffees, paperwork, the like.

He snuck over to the left of the room and maneuvered around the planning employees to put a cardboard box of canned goods on the donation table. With that done, he could get down to the real plan of action: Find out if F.E.A.S.T. had any corrupt innerworkings, any greasy mucked up gears grinding in the background that Spider-Man used for his own personal gain.

He had sort of a half-formed plan, a cover story to get people off his tail about why he was really there. It was just a little something-something to let Wade W. Wilson live without the Deadpool part of him. All lies are born out of some semblance of truth, and Wade’s was as followed:

He was a special forces vet who had a bad accident with an explosion before he was (NOT dishonorably) discharged. He wanted to volunteer, and he wanted to help out these lovely homeless people! Give back to the community. This is why he was an actor, somewhere, in some universe...

“This is showbiz, baby,” Wade muttered to himself. He walked up to the front desk and took a volunteer clipboard that was on the counter, then sat in the waiting room. He did a quick survey of his surroundings, exactly what he was dealing with as far as social settings went.

Across the room from him, there was a tired lady sitting with a clipboard, her handheld pen lazily resting on the paper, her dark hair falling into her face as she dozed off.

One old man was grumbling to himself and drinking from a paper coffee cup, the heat rising up from the lid and fogging up a pair of crooked, taped glasses that were shoved up on his nose. He brought a hand and wiped the fog away to reveal his displeased scowl.

There was another woman filling out paperwork with a screwed-up face, her nose scrunching and stressed eyebrows furrowing in concentration. A younger kid was leaning on her shoulder, fast asleep.

The point being, from all of Wade’s observations, that everyone here receiving the help was genuine. Real people who were down on their luck and needed real help. There was nothing corrupt about that.

It’ll be a real shame if Wade peels back the wallpaper to find the staff to have rotted insides, even uglier hearts, because there was nothing Wade hated more than people who take advantage of those who are desperate for help. He’s been there multiple times, being the weaker link, looking for something to help him fix the sh*tty cards he’d been dealt. He won’t let it happen to other people if he can help it.

He looked back down at the clipboard. Name and date was easy to fill out, answers were written in a few scrawls of pen. Then the questions start warping.

“Have I ever volunteered somewhere…?” Wade scoffed quietly. “Do I have any special skills— You think they’ll take ‘Skeeball Champion’ as an answer?”

It had been a long while since he’d done any of this official stuff. The last time he can remember being genuinely Wade was years ago, when he had people to live with that didn’t need anything more from him than just being him. This kind of sh*t wasn’t in his cover story.

“Do I even know how to be human anymore?” Wade joked. He shifted in his chair uncomfortably and then forced his eyes up from the paper, desperate for something else to focus on.

As he looked up, three separate people quickly turned their heads away from him.

Cool.

They weren’t judgemental or anything, which could have been a relief. He doesn’t even blame them, everybody would stare at a circus animal if it was just wandering about in broad daylight. It’s the natural f*cking response, but that doesn’t make his skin burn any less. Wade’s stomach turned.

Wade couldn’t do this, really, not today. This whole panicky thing? So not good for business. His hand itched to reach into his pocket for a nonexistent mask, and instead settled on reaching up to pull his hood further down his face.

He’ll find some other way to do his job. At the end of the day, the leather mask still gets work done, whether it was messier or not. He’ll just leave, he’ll tell the desk he changed his mind, maybe throw the whole damn clipboard out in the trash too. His leg bounced anxiously as his eyes were moving from the paper to the other people in the waiting room chairs.

A sudden hand on his shoulder made him realize for not the first time that he was a little trigger-happy, as his hand moved so quickly to his thigh it made his head spin. But then he turned his head to see who the hand was connected to, and Holy sh*t.

Record scratch. Full stop. Heavenly choirs were ringing so loudly in his ear canals that he might just sh*t bibles. That—That was a very pretty boy.

Ruffled brown curls all mussed and sticking out haphazardly. High cheekbones, bushy brows all furrowed in a genuine concern, and his bottom lip was drawn in to be chewed on to add to the whole expression he had going. There were dark circles too, which he wore so casually that they must have been a normal occurrence. He had the look of someone who’d been up all night and wore the moon like a halo, tired disaster adult trope meets giant nerd meets a shot through the heart, and he’s to blame.

“What in the sh*t? Sweet Mother Mary,” Wade blurted. “If looks could kill, you’d be an uzi—Are you real?”

Pretty-boy tilted his head questioningly, a curl breaking free from the unruly mess and landing in a dangling spiral at level with his brown eyes.

“Are you alright?” He asked, his tone lighthearted and so caring that it throws Wade for a whole other loop-de-loop. “Do you mind if I get you some water?”

“Uh, no. I’m good!” Wade assured quickly. His hands fluttered for a moment before quickly lifting up and giving a double thumbs-up. As he did so, the clipboard slid from his lap and pretty-boy caught it with nothing more than a blink.

Pretty-boy glanced down at the clipboard. Then, he did the most outrageous and disrespectful thing that Wade could ever think of— he smiled. His teeth were sort of crooked, but it made it all the more charming, and the smile-lines that were accentuated with the action made Wade’s heart do a flippy thing. “That’s so awesome, you’re volunteering?”

“Yeah, you know.” Wade shrugged. “Gotta help where I can, doing my part for the people who need it. Plus, it beats robbing banks and using the money to let the orphans in the orphanages run free.”

Pretty-boy laughed, but the scrunched up look on his face let Wade know he was laughing at the wildness of the comment rather than the comment itself.

“That’s…” Pretty-boy shook his head. “You make a crazy first impression—“ He looked down at the clipboard, then handed it back. “—Wade.”

“So I’ve been told,” Wade said distantly, smiling up at the boy.

“I’m Peter.” Peter took a seat beside him. “Parker.”

“Ooh, an alliterative name. You must be important to the plot.”

Peter smiled again, then scratched his cheek. “Seriously though, are you okay? You looked like you were about to bolt out of here a few seconds ago.”

“Dah,” Wade waved him off. “I’m totally fine. I just uh—Most people wouldn’t want to drink their morning coffee while looking at a graphic retelling of what Darth Vader looked like when Luke took his mask off in Return of the Jedi. This isn’t exactly the face of the Ryan Reynolds who won Sexiest Man in the World in 2010.”

Peter grimaced and then tilted his head, studying Wade’s face with a thoughtful expression. Wade fought the urge to roll his eyes, because he knew what was coming. He could practically hear the words already. It was going so well.

(“It’s not thaaat baaad,” and “I can barely even see the scars!” were two of Wade’s most-hated phrases on earth. Nobody seemed to get that lying about it didn’t make it actually go away.)

After two painfully long seconds, Peter’s eyes lit up. He gestured to a patchy scar that rested on the right of Wade’s nose. He smiled easily. “I like that one. It’s shaped like a heart.”

Wade stunned into a silent awe, not a joke in his inventory to utter.

“Do you want me to help you?” Peter asked. “With your paperwork. That is, if you still want to volunteer. I can’t assure you that people won’t stare, but I can tell you that mostly everyone here means well, and F.E.A.S.T. will always appreciate the help— scars or not.”

“You—“ Wade smiled, like he still wasn’t convinced he believed this whole thing. “Ok, so like, this doesn’t bother you? Are you some sort of saint? You aren’t even flinching, or, or, or making comments about how I look like Freddy Krueger facef*cked the topographical map of Utah; this is very not normal for me.”

Peter frowned deeply. “Did somebody say that to you?”

“My best friend. What can I say? It’s a hard-knock life.”

“Well, you won’t get that anywhere here. If you do, tell me, I’ll take care of it. There are a bunch of people with scars,” Peter explained with a shrug. “It isn’t something strange or gross. Usually it just means someone has a story to tell.”

Hell of a f*cking story he’d have.

Wade smiled pleasantly.

“So…” Peter looked pointedly down at the clipboard. “Do you want some help?”

“You know what? Sure.”

Peter nodded and reached over, taking the clipboard back. He clicked the pen against the side of wrist and looked up at him expectantly. “Ever volunteered somewhere?”

“I was uh, I was in the special forces for ten years,” Wade answered. “If that counts. I actually don’t know what’s counted as official volunteer work.”

Peter jotted something down with a shrug. “It can absolutely count. Thank you for your service, by the way.”

“Eh.”

Peter’s eyes trailed down the page. “Special skills? Usually that means like, communication, leadership, stuff like that.”

“I can make a mean pancake batter,” Wade said seriously. “Do you fill a lot of these forms out?”

“I’ve been to a lot of job interviews.”

From there, they continued question-by-question. Wade blinked in surprise when Peter’s writing paused and he handed over a finished clipboard. He noticed with quite a lot of enjoyment that Peter’s handwriting was surprisingly neat, and that he wrote his vowels a little smaller than every other letter.

“Peter, was it? Thanks for the help,” Wade said, tapping the pen against the chair he was in. “I should go turn this in.”

“Hey,” Peter spoke up. “I actually have a half hour before I have to go, do you want me to show you around? If you’re gonna volunteer, it might help to know your surroundings. Everybody here is really nice— they’ve got good hearts.”

Good opportunity to get back on track to the job. Wade can’t be flirting for every hour on the clock, after all.

“Would be dumb to say no to a free tour.” Wade stood up. “You obviously know this place pretty well. When did you sign up?”

“Oh, geez.” Peter laughed slightly, following him up to the desk and waited while Wade put the paperwork into a tray. “Must be a few years, now? My aunt started working here while I was in my junior year of high school, and now I’m 25, so…”

“Young and sweet. Only 25.”

Peter snorted. “And how old are you, Meryl Streep?”

“30,” Wade stage-whispered. “But if I say 26 then nobody dares to question it. Benefits of having skin that’s entirely wrinkled.”

Peter grinned and then led him down the hallway to the left of the entrance. “So, way down there is the laundry room, to the right of it is the kitchen. There’s this really nice volunteer named Oliver who comes in every other morning to make oatmeal and things. Maybe you could help them cook those pancakes you were talking about.”

Wade hummed and looked from wall to wall for anything out of place; certain flyers for specific faulty organizations or something or other that would mark the only thing as a red flag. But there was nothing. This all just seemed like a completely normal, helpful charity.

“True!” Wade cheered.

Peter turned the corner into a very large room, filled with scattered bunk beds, chairs, tables, and people who were talking quietly amongst themselves. “This is the main shelter area. I usually refill the coffee whenever I’m here, and just generally check in on regulars or people who need help.”

“Spoken like a true side-quest enjoyer,” Wade said sweetly.

Peter nudged his shoulder playfully and then walked up to an elderly man and woman sitting at a chess table. “How’s the game going?”

The woman at the table scrunched her nose and moved a pawn forward. “I’m beating Cam’s ass.”

Across from her, Cam smiled easily and then took her pawn with a knight. The woman cursed quietly. She looked up and finally settled her eyes on Wade. “You’re new here. What’s your name, kid?”

Wade floundered for a moment.

“Eileen, this is Wade. He’s a new volunteer,” Peter greeted politely. “Wade, this is Eileen. She’s a great chess player, our own local Judit Polgar.”

“Who finally has met her match,” Cam said, the simple smile still on his face. He looked up to Wade and nodded. “Nice to meet you, Wade.”

“Lovely to meet you both,” Wade greeted. “Good luck on your game. I’m rooting for Eileen, I’m a big fan of underdog stories.”

Cam hummed pleasantly. “That’s all fine with me.”

“Ha ha,” Eileen rolled her eyes and then turned back to the chess board. “Very funny, kid.”

Peter smiled and continued on. He nodded to a woman sitting over at a table, a few feet away. “That’s Norah. She’s currently writing a very exciting mystery novel—“

“Which I’ll be done with soon!” Norah said, turning in her chair. “Nice to meet you, Wade. Are you a friend of Peter’s?”

Wade gave her a smile. “I’ll sure try.”

“Any friend of Peter’s is good with me,” Norah assured, then her eyes lit up. She scribbled something down on her paper, murmuring to herself about dialogue.

“I think all the other people I check in on are asleep right now,” Peter said, running a hand through his hair. “The rest of the stuff is upstairs. There’s two main offices, a study room for the kids, some more bathrooms, and—“

Peter stopped suddenly and looked at the clock. “Crap. I gotta go, I’m gonna be late. Um—It was really nice meeting you, Wade! Go ahead and make yourself familiar with the place, though.”

“Sure,” Wade nodded. “Thanks for all the help, right?”

Peter smiled. “It’s no problem. Ask May if you have any questions. Uh… Yeah! I’ll see you around. Take care!”

Peter then turned and ducked out of the hallway so fast that Wade had to double back and really ask himself if he had even been there to begin with. Maybe it was some sort of pre-psychotic break hallucination, the pretty boy with the tired eyes ready to finally send him to Hell. Even worse, he didn’t even have the chance to ask who May was.

He looked around the place awkwardly, feeling lost, but warm, like he had just been given a gift out of the blue and didn’t quite know what to do with it yet.

He walked back to the table of foods aimlessly. More people were coming through the doors now, most of them dropping in to wordlessly put a few cans on the table before booking right back out of the place.

He spotted a woman seated at the table with the name tag on her shirt written as the illustrious “May.” A simple flower was doodled beside it in a sharpie. She was older, worn lines from where she smiled and where she frowned, but her eyes were kind and she carried a certain affability to her appearance that Wade recognized in the boy he had just met.

He could easily walk up to her, ask her about Spider-Man’s involvement with this whole thing, but something in his gut told him the intimidation technique wasn’t necessary here.

If something fishy was going on here, Wade would have sniffed it out by now. He’s been doing this for a while. He knew what to look for, and he found the exact opposite in this place of security.

He had a sense of satisfaction with what he had seen here, what he had heard and experienced. If Spider-Man favoured this charity, then the only thing Wade could pick out from it was that the man was truly a good person, with a good heart to match.

(Of course, that wasn’t a catch-all method of sussing out douchebags, but if someone wanted to imply that this charity was the only thing linking Spider-Man to evil-doing, they would need to find a different thread.)

F.E.A.S.T. was fine by Wade’s standards, if not judging by the amount of kindness built into the foundations than by the content of Peter’s character, the genuinity and helpfulness that he shared with everyone including Wade. So instead of bothering the nice lady with questions, he turned and took his leave.

When he walked through the door of his own humble abode, a chill went up his spine by the sudden contrast of environment.

It wasn’t a nice apartment by any definition of the word. He had the money for something more expensive, but expensive apartments required more security checks, and the landlord he had right now was kind enough not to even comment on the occasional gunshots found in the torn brick walls.

It paled in comparison to the warmth of F.E.A.S.T. Somehow he forgot that at the end of the day, he was still walking back from work to nobody, only to a drafty dingy one-bed-one-bath that had mold on the ceilings and rust on the door hinges. Somehow, he forgot he was alone.

He walked forward and flopped on the couch, then finally pulled the Deadpool mask over his face. He glanced over at the corkscrew board to his left, adjourned with pinned photos of spider-headlined newspapers. “Well. That was a major waste of time.”

He then thought of Peter, and smiled. “Okay. Half waste of time. But still, there’s nothing on Spidey except for some spandex.”

He pulled his phone out and called the number of The Employer. He counted the rings in his best Count Dracula impression. “One, tvo, tvree, ah ah ah—“

“Deadpool.” The graveled voice spoke blankly. Not a hint of emotion, he was full of ice. “Do you have any information?”

“Yeah… I think you got the wrong guy,” Wade answered. “Spider-Man is clean as a whistle. I checked out the main lead that would have told me if he’s scum or not, and I gotta be real, he just seems like the classic hero type. Annoying, goody-two-shoes with a crippling moral complex, but not worth getting murked.”

He was met with silence for a few long seconds before The Employer spoke again.

“You do as I pay you to do.” The Employer’s voice broke into jagged pieces. “Tell me what you learn about Spider-Man, anything at all.”

Wade narrowed his eyes. He shifted the phone closer to his ear. “You do realize you hired a mercenary, right? I’m not a librarian or whatever-the-f*ck, you know? I don’t do research just for the fun of it.”

“…I will raise the reward, or you leave this deal, and you get nothing.”

Wade frowned. “Do you want Spider-Man dead?”

“Not needed at the moment,” The Employer recited. “I want to disassemble him piece by piece like a clock. I want to find out what makes him tick. You don’t understand this to the degree of sincerity it must be taken. I should have known not to entrust you with something of this caliber.”

Wade thought for a moment. “Okay, first of all, I am offended! I take my job very seriously. I could tell you all about how F.E.A.S.T. had no speck of anything as morally confused as you, but honestly I’d rather talk about how you get scarier everytime I call you. That’s talent! Really, I—“

The call beeped, signaling that The Employer hung up.

Wade pulled the speaker away and stared at the offending item. “…Well, I don’t think anybody saw that coming. Especially not second time readers.”

He tossed the phone to the floor. “Okay, Spidey! New plan: Make sure the creepy phone guy doesn’t gut you like a fish.”

He sighed. “This just got a sh*t-ton more complicated.”

Chapter 5: A New Friend

Chapter Text

"Whether you come as a lover or executioner, I am ready to receive you."
-Agustín Gómez-Arcos

With one hand, Peter’s key to the quaint paint-chipped house on a little street in Forest Hills clicked through its lock. He opened the door and walked in with a floral-printed reusable bag of groceries.

“May?” He called out, kicking off his beat-up sneakers at the doorway beside the scuff marks on the wall trim left from years worth of the same action.

Once every two weeks, Peter had a routine of grabbing groceries for May. He had done it all the way through college, nevermind the fact he had moved out, usually making good work of any free period he had to do the shopping and deliver it while May was at work. Despite May’s vehement denial of Peter’s need to do this, he still insisted that it was the least he could do—it was probably the only consistent schedule he’s ever maintained other than Spider-Man.

“Brought the groceries,” Peter said, walking through the house.

The Parker house itself didn’t know change as deeply as the counterparts inside of it. The furniture has been the same since Peter had walked into the house at the tarnished age of four.

In the living room, an old couch from Ben’s side of the family given as a wedding present, a coffee table they picked up at an antique store when Peter was eight that had juice stains on the wood, a lamp that May got at a neighbourhood garage sale with a blueberry-bush-patterned lampshade.

In the hallways, photos framed of various events and do-happenings. Peter’s graduations of every single grade, the smile in each one brightening and dimming and brightening again as the years go by. A family photo of Ben and Peter’s father, as well as his grandparents. A photo of May and Ben’s wedding day. A photo Peter took for a photography contest that he placed #1 in, the blue ribbon proudly pinned beside it on the wall.

He walked into the kitchen and put the grocery bag on the counter, beginning to pull out the contents. On the list for these two weeks there had been the staples: milk, eggs, butter, fresh vegetables and fruits. Peter began to put these into the fridge when May finally arrived at the doorway.

“You could have knocked,” May teased. “Silly boy. Always barging in here as you please.”

Peter laughed and put the milk into the fridge, stocking it on a shelf in the door. “Sorry. I figured you were expecting me.”

May smiled, walking over to the small television on the kitchen counter and turning it onto the news. “I’m just teasing. You know you’re always welcome.”

“I know,” Peter said. He put the butter into the fridge, and then looked up to smile back at her thankfully.

“Your hair,” May reminded him. “Did you remember to call an appointment with a stylist?”

“Y’know.” Peter avoided her eyes and went back to the fridge, putting the vegetables into a compartment in the middle. “Even cutting your hair—Those places can be really expensive. What if I just grow it out? I’ve never had shoulder length hair before.”

May cringed. “Peter, if you need me to cut your hair, just say the word. It’s completely free, I won’t charge you a penny.”

“I might take you up on that.” Peter turned around and began stacking the fresh fruits into the fridge. “Hey, how did the food drive go yesterday?”

“It went great,” May said gently. She took a seat at a stool next to the counter. “I wish you would have said goodbye before you took off, though. Must have been a busy day for you, hm?”

Peter sighed, the guilt creeping in and settling on his bones like mold. “I’m sorry. It’s been so crazy with work, May. Yesterday, I went to go pick up my paycheck from Jonah and he told me I hadn’t taken enough pictures. I sent him like, forty photos, and apparently his intern told me that he only liked five of them.”

May’s eyebrows furrowed in a firm scowl. “You really ought to try and get a new job. That man is… Well, I’m more dignified than to say it. Why haven’t you tried for a job at Oscorp? Your brain is something to be reckoned with, Peter. I truly believe that you have the ability to do some real good in this world. I believe it with my entire heart.”

Peter hesitated, halted where he stood for a second, before forcing his body to move. These kinds of chats, they always seemed to hit a little too close to the target, the target being a giant spider logo in the middle of a giant red and blue web. He never wanted May to know. That’s what made his responses to these grandeur expressions of genuine affection so difficult to formulate.

He picked up the egg carton and put it into the fridge. He cleared his throat and settled his feet on common ground. “I don’t like Oscorp. They aren’t trying to change the world, they’re trying to control it.”

May clicked her tongue. “Yes, I know. But you aren’t like that. Think of what good a break in the chain could do. I know you could be the one to do it. Heck, what if one day there’ll be a Parker Industries? You’ll never know if you don’t keep reaching for the next big thing, and you are destined for great things.”

He never wanted May to know. But he longed to have a genuine response to match. A real conversation, not one where he was constantly thinking ’What would Peter Parker say?’

“…Thanks, May,” Peter murmured. “That means a lot.”

May nodded.

“I met this nice volunteer,” Peter said, changing the subject. He sat next to May at the counter, with the groceries all put away. “He signed up early in the morning, right before the food drive. His name was Wade, have you met him yet?”

Wade Wilson, Peter remembered. He had seen him right as he was about to walk out the doors, but something about the panicked look in his eyes made Peter stop. He introduced him to some people, showed him around, and helped him with some paperwork before he left. Wade seemed like someone he could work well with, and Peter honestly looked forward to getting to know him better at future F.E.A.S.T. events.

May hummed, looking up as she tried to recall. Finally, she shook her head. “No, I don’t think I met him. What made him memorable to you?”

Peter shrugged and picked at his cuticles. “I don’t know,” he said honestly. “He was funny. Sort of out there, but very friendly and helpful. He seems like the kind of person F.E.A.S.T. needs.”

“Well, I’ll make sure to look for new faces later,” May said with a smile. “He sounds lovely.”

“Yeah,” Peter agreed, looking over at the television. “He…”

He narrowed his eyes at the headline of the news station. ‘Breaking News: Remote Oscorp Facility Broken Into’.

“Can we turn this up?”

May glanced over and then reached for the remote, turning the volume up on the television.

“The masked figure was seen breaking into Oscorp late last night,” the anchor spoke, her tone serious as she looked into the camera. A grainy photo of a shadow shows up in her place, and the shadow is pushing a box. “There is no information regarding the suspect yet released, but what the public is most worried about is the contents of what was stolen.”

“Oscorp officials have responded publicly by stating the stolen goods as simply ‘harmless miscellaneous material,’' she continues. “But we have information that the site was previously used to manufacture and design new advanced weapons technology for the US Military, begging a question of validity to Oscorp’s statement on the matter.”

The photo disappeared, and the anchor looked down at her papers for a moment before looking back up at the camera, her face stone-serious. “This will be a difficult recovery to make for Oscorp and their struggle to keep a clean reputation, as public opinion seems to go down with the CEO’s statements. This spike of negative press has only spiraled since their hushed connections to the murders of college student Gwendolyne Stacy and her father, police chief George Stacy.”

Peter watched the news anchor continue to speak, but all he hears is white noise. Everything around the television had gone blurry, and all he could do was stare into the crude pixels of an older screen.

A masked figure who clearly hated Oscorp enough to steal a weapon from it. As far as suspects go, there’s only one name that stuck out to him as a recent variable. Deadpool.

The name hadn’t left him since that night. He’s been wondering, worrying as to what Spider-Man could have done, what he could be hunted for— and now, in a flurry of horror, it has only just crossed his mind that it could have been Gwen.

Gwen Stacy, who had an underground history of helping Spider-Man out. Gwen Stacy, whose corpse was carried outside in the arms of a shaking hero and placed delicately with the coroners. Gwen Stacy, who died because of him.

This had to be what he’s being hunted for. Nothing else made as much sense.

(“I don’t like it when people aren’t held accountable for their actions. I don’t like it when they get away with things.”)

A hand on his arm was what caused him to snap out of it. He blinked quickly and turned his head to May to see her sympathetic face. Would Deadpool go after her, too?

“Peter…” May turned the television off. “Are you—“

“I’m okay,” Peter said, standing up from the stool. “Promise. I’m good.”

He had to get to him before he got to her.

“You need some new friends, dear,” May begged, her voice twisted in a desperate way that Peter knew was of worry. (New friends. New because Gwen was dead. New because Harry’s gone too. New because the newest friends he’d ever made had been through a mask, and he only ever saw them once in a blue moon.)

“You shouldn’t have to go through life alone. Nobody should. I’m an old lady, you need more than that.”

He had to go. The ticking of a clock was his least favourite sound, and it was loud in his ears now.

“I’ll—“ Peter sighed shortly. She’s worried. It throws off his whole deflection plan. He had to think of a new one fast. “I’ll get Wade’s number next time I see him, alright? We’ll talk, I’ll even do my laundry so I’ll make the best impression. I gotta go, I just remembered I had, er, work stuff to do.”

May looked at him with a deep frown. She saw through it everytime, Peter knew she did, but this was for the best now. She slowly nodded, resignation and defeat in her eyes. “Alright. Make sure you call him, Peter.”

“I will,” Peter insisted. “I promise.”

He got up from the kitchen and walked back down the hall to pull on his shoes. “Bye, May. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

He left the house in a hurry, jumping down each little step and then anxiously dodging around people as he sped through the sidewalk. A quick trip to the subway (complete with him tapping his toe the whole time) finally got him back to his apartment in Chinatown, and then he was pulling in the suit and out the window.

Peter’s search for Deadpool started with him scanning every street, every alleyway, every corner as he swung from skyscrapers. His heart was pounding out of his chest, fear growing raging forestry from his veins.

“What did he even steal?” Peter gritted his teeth. “And it’s always something from Oscorp! Why can’t killer mercenaries ever steal from a pet shop? Or—Or a bakery.”

He passed from outstretched construction cranes and the yanks from his arm as he’s swinging are harsher than usual. “It’s never a supervillain with powers of a killer chocolate chip cookie recipe! Nope! Always gotta be something like a murderer with stolen military tech that wants to kill me and possibly my family.”

“It’s always something,” Peter continued, shooting forward from building to building. Below, all he could see were regular, non-masked people, living their regular civilian lives. Peter made a frustrated noise. “Where is—“

Peter’s head suddenly exploded in mind-numbing pain, and in the air he flinched back violently. The motion catapulted him onto a rooftop, where he rolled into the gravel and gasped for breath.

He looked around for the threat, whatever had set off his senses in such a cataclysmic fashion had to have been in the air. He knew Deadpool hadn’t been able to fly—Or maybe he had. That would have explained the ease in which the merc had been able to follow him a few days before.

But there wasn’t a leather mask or katanas that he could see. Peter whipped his head around, his eyes landing on a slim silver metal suit that levitated with a pulsing, purple energy.

“Talk about—“ Peter grunted and stood up, brushing himself off. “—Talk about danger, Will Robinson.”

The suit didn’t say a word. It occurred to Peter that this could be a legitimate robot he was fighting. He read ‘OSCORP’ written in big letters on the chestplate, going up the side of the ribcage of the suit. No biggie. Peter was getting real sick and tired of seeing the name, though.

“So, who’s throwing the first pu—“

The suit bolted forward, shoving Peter down into the rooftop with a surrounding crack. Peter struggled before webbing an air conditioning unit at the edge of the roof by his feet and yanking himself out from under the murder suit.

“Who’re you working for?” Peter yelled. He dodged another attempt from the suit trying to pin him down.

A voice full of anger spoke back in pointed words. “I work for nobody, Spider-Man.”

“So you are a person!” Peter planted his feet firmly. “That makes this way easier—“

A stinging wave of electricity ran up his spine, and he dodged an attempt of the suit trying to punch him in the face, but instead Peter’s legs were swept under him by hard metal and he fell with pained noise.

“Only two legs,” the man growled. “What happened to your other six, spider?”

“That’s a great question,” Peter joked weakly. “I got rid of em, the extra really didn’t help the web slinging. My turn. What the hell is that thing made of and how are you so strong?”

“That’s two questions.”

The suit raised a metal fist and Peter’s hands shot up to catch it before it could hit him. (Because he really didn’t want to be sporting another broken nose.)

Even still, his senses went off again, the whole roof of his mouth buzzing with the sensation. He felt like the stomach acid was about to fight its way out from the electric warning of danger. In all his years of being Spider-Man, his sixth sense rarely acted up in such a way.

In the chaos of adrenaline, one of the suit’s arms had lifted to reveal a small projectile-type weapon. Or, in other words—

“You have a gun in your suit?!”

The resulting noise was a series of pops that sounded like explosions with how close they were to Peter’s ears. His vision was white around the edges. He swallowed back bile.

“This was certainly noteworthy. This will not be the end,” the man’s voice spoke cleanly with its darkness, but his tone was shaking through the robotic mask with what sounded like something of glee at the sight of seeing him successfully beat up. “Count your losses, arachnida.”

The suit took off then, and the force of air blasted Peter back on the rooftop.

“What the hell just happened,” Peter breathed shakily. He looked down at the dull pain that flooded his side like blood.

“Oh. That is blood.” Peter gently put his hand on his side, and pulled away a darker red glove. It gushed faster from the bullethole than the suit’s fabric could even soak it up. He cringed and shuddered as the strong stench of iron finally registered in his brain.

“Oh, god. I think I’m gonna vomit,” Peter’s head fell back on the gravel. He tried to keep pressure on the bullet wound as he caught his breath.

There was some confusion there, too. That was clearly not Deadpool in that suit, so who was it? In a city full of criminals that hated him, Peter was really feeling the heat now, especially with the very warm blood soaking down his arm from where a hand was forcibly shoved on the wound.

“Holy H-E-double hockey f*cks,” a familiar voice sounded. Peter tilted his head up to see Deadpool, in all his brazen glory, standing across from him on the rooftop. “You look super-mega-dead.”

Peter inhaled stiffly. “What, you come to finish me off?”

“Um. Woah,” Deadpool snorted. “Let’s keep it PG, Andrew Garfield-John Bubniak lovechild.”

“What?” Peter asked with pure confusion. His body was shaking now, blood loss was making him loopy now and Deadpool’s nonsense was going in one ear and bouncing around his head like the damn DVD logo.

“Anyways.” Deadpool stepped forward and crouched down to him. “I’m not here to kill you, silly goose. I’m here to do the opposite?”

“Why is that a question?”

“Because I don’t have a lot of experience with saving people!” Deadpool said cheerily. “But you’re bleeding out like, a street away from my apartment, and uh, you know. That bullet isn’t gonna feel very good if it doesn’t pull out soon.”

Peter made a face, to which Deadpool only winked.

“What are you implying?” Peter asked slowly.

Deadpool threw his hands up, rolling his eyes. “I’m implying that I pull the bullet out of your side, or else you’re gonna keel over and die, or something.”

“Didn’t you want to kill me?” Peter glared.

“Plans change, sweaty.” Deadpool crossed his arms. “What do you have to lose? Either you die on this sh*tty rooftop from losing your red liquids, or you heal enough after me pulling the bullet outta your side that you can beat the f*ck out of me when we’re done.”

Peter stared at him. Then he narrowed his eyes. “Did you just say the misspelling of ‘sweetie’ outloud? Like, unironically?”

Deadpool stared back. Peter took a mental catalog of his senses— hair wasn’t standing up, heartbeat normal, no bad gut feeling or tense muscles.

“…Fine,” Peter huffed. “What do I have to lose,” he repeated.

The journey to Deadpool’s apartment, apparently across the street, was not memorable in the slightest. This could contribute majorly to the fact that Peter was fading in and out of consciousness for a large majority of it, and the blood only really slowed in its flow as they walked through the door.

The agony of having a bullet stuck in his side was setting in, now. Every step had him wincing and holding back tears. He could almost feel the skin and muscle trying to heal around where the whole shell had entered and stuck in his flesh.

“Go sit somewhere,” Deadpool gestured to the messy apartment.

Peter stared at a bulletin board of crudely drawn Spider-Man doodles in red and blue crayon pinned beside newspaper clippings and other various information scribbled beside it.

“…Ignore that,” Deadpool said, slowly stepping in front of it.

Peter inhaled deeply, too strung out with pain to really question anything. He took a seat on the couch, tossed his head back restlessly and made a fist with his hands. He could feel his fingernails dig through the fabric of his bloodied gloves.

Deadpool disappeared into the bathroom and came back wearing gloves and holding a set of… large looking… tweezers?

“What are those?” Peter narrowed his eyes at the tool.

“My custom-made bullet-picking-device. It was on sale at Target.”

“I don’t even think you know what you just said.”

“I’m kidding. They’re forceps— sterilized, because I’m a classy gal. Listen, Spidey. This is gonna hurt a lot,” he warned. “I totally get if you wanna back out. Hey, living with a bullet in you isn’t that bad once you get used to the infectious puss and—“

“Holy sh*t, stop talking.” Peter snapped. He yanked his mask up just over his nose and seethed painfully through his teeth. “f*ck.”

“Your curses are so good! It’s a shame you’ve never gotten to drop a real f-bomb on screen, because hoooly smokes.”

“Are you going to do this, or should I just go?” Peter glared.

“Okay, stop yelling at me! Maybe I’m just anxious! Been a while since I pulled a bullet from a guy’s side! What if you f*cking die because of me? Ever thought of that?”

“You already said I was gonna die,” Peter gritted out. “Just stop thinking so much and pull it out.”

“That’s what she said. Bite down on something. Scream into a pillow.” Pool shoved a throw pillow up to him.

“That’s what she said,” Peter mocked angrily, and then buried his face into the pillow.

And with that, Deadpool dug the forceps into the hole in Peter’s side. Peter’s painful muffled scream tore through the room. He fought the urge to jerk away from the agony it was giving him.

Deadpool had gone rigid, entirely focused on removing the bullet. His voice stayed calm and firm, as if he had done this before and reduced it to a practice that he had fallen back into.

“Stop moving.”

A broken crying heave forced past Peter’s yells, all of it sounding strangled by the pillow. Another gargled howl as the pliers hit a particularly sensitive spot in his internal flesh. He flinched hard and yanked to the side.

Without a word, Deadpool moved forward and leaned against Peter with his full body weight to keep him from moving. He angled to the side so he could still work. The sobs increased in their desperation, louder now to Pool as he was closer to Peter’s face, even through the pillow.

“Gotcha.” Deadpool slowly pulled a bullet out of the bloodied hole and then lifted himself from Peter’s body.

With that, the seriousness in Pool’s entire body left. He grinned through his leather mask and dropped it in his hand, then held it up to Peter for him to see. “Woo! That was fun. Same time next week?”

Peter continued to shake. He pulled the pillow away from his face, sniffling and recovering from the pained cries. He chucked the pillow at Pool’s head.

“…I think I hate you,” Peter croaked.

“Mhm,” Deadpool hummed pleasantly.

Peter took a steadying breath and then another, thankful that Deadpool had been silent while he took the time to recover. He supposed that he should be embarrassed, sobbing so openly in front of what was essentially a stranger. There was more than one reason why he wore the mask.

But bullets, specifically ones healed INTO HIS SKIN, were definitely worth crying over, and what was a stranger who saved his life?

It took him about two minutes for the pained tears to stop, but they soaked his mask and had it stick to his skin. He sighed deeply and looked over at Deadpool.

“Did you have anything to do with the Oscorp break-in?” Peter asked.

Pool tilted his head. “Hm?”

“You’re after me, aren’t you? You think that thing with G—With the girl, a couple years ago, that it’s my fault,” Peter continued. “Did you hire someone to break into Oscorp?”

“What kind of f*ckin’ Kardashian-inspired comicbook plot do you think we’re living right now?” Deadpool said with an unamused laugh. “I don’t hire people to do my job. If I wanted to break into Oscorp, I would have done it myself.”

“Oh.” Peter paused. “Wait, why were you hunting me then?”

“Someone is after you,” Pool explained. “Which you obviously found out already. It’s the same guy that hired me. But, I decided against actually going through with it because I do have a moral code, thank you very much, and you do more good than harm.”

“So you saved me instead?” Peter said disbelievingly.

“Well you’re alive now, aren’t you? I could’ve killed you when you were down, but I didn’t.”

Peter went quiet for a moment. Then he stood up and limped to the window, pulling the mask back over his mouth.

“Make sure to take some pain meds for that,” Deadpool spoke up. “Super healing is a bitch, huh? Oh, and drink some water. You kinda lost a lot from the tears.”

“Yeah,” Peter huffed. He hesitated before taking off out the window, instead using a moment to look back at Deadpool. “…Thanks.”

The last thing he saw before leaving was Deadpool smiling back at him through his leather mask.

Chapter 6: Research and Desist

Chapter Text

"Terror strikes lightly at your stillness.
Serene is your bed and your icebox.
Death is your neighbor calmly
Surveying the scene as you strike."
-Thomas Cole

"What in the f*ck-knuckles are you doing here?"

Peter crawled in through the window, worming his way around Deadpool's arms. "I came to talk business."

"Sounds spicy." Pool put a hand on his hip. "Maybe call next time though. What if I was out of my suit, huh? You'd think that Spider-Man of all people would be respectful of the identity, but noooo."

Peter paused, feeling guilty. He brought a hand up to the back of his neck. "Ah..."

Two nights since he had last seen Deadpool—The wound on his side had been healing nicely; it probably won't leave anything more than a faint scar on his skin that would blend easily with the others. Two nights had also been the same amount of time that the Daily Bugle's self-proclaimed 'Oscorp thief' (and Peter's newest assailant) had last been seen.

Deadpool knew about the guy. That's why Peter was here, after all. Remorsefully though, Pool was right. He hadn't thought twice about respecting his privacy, something he himself holds dear. He just stumbled in through the window, not even pondering—

"I'm joking," Pool cut in. "sh*t! How can you master guilt so easily through that mask? You must have world-bending puppy dog eyes. Come on in, silky."

"Silky?" Peter cringed. He let his guard down more with every step into the apartment. "That's horrible."

"It's like a spider! I've got way more up my sleeve, trust me," Deadpool prattled, following him from behind. "Webby. Leg boy. Spidey? A classic. Scarlet Johansson. Itsy Bitsy—Eek, no, that plotline was f*cked up."

Deadpool's apartment was eclectic to say the least. Peter hadn't been nearly coherent enough to care about his surroundings when he was here last, but now that he was standing upright, he could take in all of its idiosyncratic collage.

"I hate all of those names," Peter said distractedly, glancing around the place.

Pop culture had never been so distinct. It was like Deadpool lived in the inner ear of the personified late 80s era. His apartment was in shambles, glued together by bits and pieces of stuff. Where there had been empty space, there was also beat up furniture and sat in threads and patches. Where there had been chipped paint, there were also posters of movies, pop artists, and old television shows.

Despite all of it, it all seemed so... grey. It was as if something had stolen away the life from the apartment, but the shell of it was still there, just waiting for it to come home. Peter bit his tongue when he saw the drawn posters tainted with bullet holes.

"I'll find the right nickname for you one day!" Pool said with utmost sureness. "It'll come out of nowhere, and roll right off the tongue. Just like Jesus."

"I'm not even going to pretend to know what that's supposed to mean."

Peter turned and saw the cork board from before. The entire thing had been restyled, now full of printed screenshots from the video of Oscorp's thief—and several drawn photos of Spidey giving the thumbs up.

"Cute," Peter commented blankly.

"I know, right?" Pool grinned.

"You said you knew this guy?" Peter gestured to the printed photos. "That he hired you, right?"

"Right." Deadpool sat back casually on the couch. "Yeah. I just called him The Employer—It's kind of the customary name for anonymous payers. I never actually met him in person, it was all over the phone."

It washed over Peter for not the first time that he was teaming up with a mercenary. The same type of people he tried to avoid at all costs. Pigs must have flown.

"Right," Peter drew out a breath. "Okay. Um... Did he tell you anything about himself?"

"Nope," Pool tilted his head. "I triple checked. And he used a burner, so I can't track his calls. We just have to wait and let him come to us—Or, you know. You."

There was the mental image of May, frantic for her own life as The Employer knocked around her kitchen in a heavy metal suit. Splinters of wood everywhere, photo frames destroyed and sink pipes bursting, May is backing into a corner, her eyes wide and terror-stricken, she can't find a way out, he's stepping over ruins and cracking his knuckles, he's getting closer, he—

Peter swallowed hard and willed away the momentary horror he had experienced from his own making. "Yeah, that's not gonna work."

"Okay, well," Deadpool threw his arms up. "There goes my professional idea. What do you wanna do then, Léon? Just scroll through the news till they find something for us?"

"Yes," Peter blurted. "Let's do that. Research. I can do research. Do you have a laptop?"

Deadpool's eyes widened. "Seriously?"

"Yeah."

Deadpool got up from the couch and walked over to a table. He picked up a VERY good quality laptop, one of the top models of this year, and handed it over to Peter with such casualness that Peter double checked the model on it just to make sure he hadn't hallucinated it.

"Aww! Your eyes went all big," Deadpool said with giddy amusem*nt. "That was so cute."

"You have a laptop worth thousands of dollars, and you covered the top in Lisa Frank stickers?" Peter's tone twisted incredulously. His hands hover carefully over the top of it, not wanting to be responsible for something he'd have to sell an organ to pay back.

"Uh, yeah? How else would you decorate it?"

"How did you pay for—" Peter looked up at Deadpool, and upon seeing the white eyes of a mask staring back at his own, he then knew. He cringed and shut his mouth.

"Yeah," Deadpool droned out. "Being a mercenary makes ugly money. You can use the laptop, Webs. I know you're not gonna break it, unlike somebody— not naming names but he shares one with CATV."

Peter shook his head and opened the laptop. He was greeted by a selfie-screensaver, starring Deadpool in the front, a rebar stuck through his skull, two teenagers in the background (one disgusted, one amused), a very photogenic woman posing with plaster in her Afro (Peter has no idea how she managed to pull the look off), one severely pissed off cyborg-looking dude, and then freakin' Colossus.

"...I have so many questions right now."

"Ask away!" Deadpool flopped next to him, back on the couch. (The movement made Peter quickly steady the laptop in his lap.) "We should get to know each other if we're gonna be besties!"

"How did you live with that sticking through your head?" Peter pointed to the rebar.

"The power of faith, trust, and pixie dust."

Peter blinked. "Right. And what about the X-Men?"

"They like to keep me outta trouble," Deadpool whispered loudly. "It doesn't work, but bless their hearts, they do try. Well, more like just the big metal Hulk. That little fireball over there and her girlfriend are more or less just along for the ride."

Deadpool smiled, his voice going softer, more fond. It sounded wistful, even. "They're good, though! Haven't seen them in a while, actually. I should do that before their house blows up again."

"How did you even get on the X-Men's radar?" Peter questioned. The curiosity grew with every thought that the question gave him. "Are you a mutant?"

Deadpool turned his head to meet him with a blank, silent stare. There was something about the subtlety in the movement that immediately changed the course of the conversation. Peter felt sorry for even bringing it up.

Then, Deadpool groaned loudly, letting his head drop back to the back of the sofa. "Your questions are so boring! It's my turn."

He sighed and refocused his gaze back on the laptop. He passed the screensaver (because apparently mercenaries don't need passwords) and clicked on the search browser, then finally nodded. "Okay. I guess it's fair if you ask questions, just..."

"Nothing super personal or about your family? Got it." Pool cleared his throat. "What are you doing for the holidays? Got a wife? Husband?"

That's not what he expected. Peter glanced up once and then continued to type 'Oscorp break-in' into the search bar.

"Not married. And I'm spending time with my family," Peter answered. Specifically, with F.E.A.S.T. They were doing their annual Thanksgiving dinner event, anybody who didn't have somewhere to go was invited to come eat for free. It took several volunteers to help make the food and prepare everything, but Peter and May had spent the last few years doing it since Ben passed.

"What about you?"

Deadpool shrugged. "I don't have any plans. Look at this place. You think I'm the kind of guy who gets invited over for Thanksgiving? I'll probably just go shoot some bad guys."

He sighed. Then his eyes lit up and he looked back over at Peter. "Also, technically Thanksgiving was on October 10th, so—"

Deadpool had this habit of giving so much information in such a short amount of time. Even knowing him for a short while, Peter could tell naturally that there would always be so much to talk about.

He decided to pick the most important one.

"You know," Peter cleared his throat, scrolling through websites. "You could always spend some time volunteering at a charity shelter for the holidays. I know some great places if you ever want to give up the 'lethal' part of your 'lethal protector' identity."

"Wow," Deadpool made an impressed face. "That totally sounds like something you'd say. Sorry though, Spidey. I'm the Swiper to your Dora. I can't just stop putting the dead in people's lives, it's in the name. That's literally who I am."

"That's not who anybody is."

"You barely know me," Deadpool argued. "Seriously. Would you give up vigilante stuff to work at a charity? Because that's illegal too, you know."

"It's illegal, but it isn't murder."

Deadpool rolled his eyes, which was a spectacle to see when it was under a mask. "Semantics."

"It isn't semantics, it's—" Peter stopped. "'Weird robot flew by my apartment window.'"

"It's what?"

Peter huffed and gestured to the laptop screen. "I found something. It's an online forum... They said they lived in Harlem, and that last night they saw a 'glowy weird suit thing' fly toward an abandoned construction site around their block."

"You're just gonna trust that?" Wade looked up at him in disbelief. "I don't know what I expected from you, but it definitely wasn't that you were the type to trust offbrand Reddit to solve crime."

Peter shook his head and stood up. "Trust me, it's not by choice. It's a lead. And there is an abandoned construction site up in Harlem, it's right next to Morningside Heights. I swung by it on patrol. It's a lead, what could it hurt to check it out?"

"Alright," Deadpool shrugged. "If you say so."

They traveled to the warehouse on foot, as the sun began to fall and the cold settled in. The mid-November New York weather was hard to handle when all you were wearing was a suit and a mask designed to soar through the air easier, and Peter couldn't definitely feel it now.

His breath came out in soft puffs through the thinner fabric as they walked down the sidewalk. It was chilly, but nothing he couldn't handle. A few kids ran past their path, reckless and rowdy and giggling like mad—But one of them paused to turn to Peter and Deadpool with eyes as big as saucers.

"What the—"

"Careful kiddie, swearing is f*cking bad for the liver," Deadpool spoke up.

Peter elbowed him in the ribs. He had to stop himself from leaning into the warmth radiating from Deadpool's body. How was he so warm?

"I didn't know there were two Spider-Mans," the kid breathed. She then frantically pointed at Deadpool's katanas. "Are those—Are those real swords?!"

"Eh," Deadpool said. "Go run back to your friends, okay, kid?"

"Can I get an autograph or—" The girl shook her head. "Or something? Spider-Man is my hero!"

Beside him, Deadpool twitched in his place. He tried to hide it by crossing his arms, but Peter noticed anyway.

"An autograph?" Peter moved toward the kid and kneeled beside her. He smiled kindly. "I think I can manage that. Do you have a pen or paper?"

"No, I—"

"I've got it!" Deadpool spoke up. He dug through a pouch on his belt and took out a pack of Hello Kitty sticky notes and a red crayon. He stepped forward to hand it over, and then stepped backwards away from them. "There you go, Spidey."

Peter took the crayon and looked down at the small piece of paper. These were moments where he faltered, ones where he was startlingly aware of his impact, particularly with younger people. This is where he could do the most good.

This was just a note—But it was more than that, wasn't it?

He knew full well that this little girl here could take this note and keep it forever, that she would remember how the city's proclaimed hero treated her as an individual. She could go on to treat others the same way. People always remember that, if not by the words themselves than in the way they move and smile.

The words he said are important. What would May do?

"What's your name?" Peter asked quietly.

"Stella," the girl grinned timidly at him, revealing a gap between her two front teeth. She messily pushed her short hair out of her face and looked up at him with such awe in her expression that he had to take a moment to reset his reality again.

He was a hero to people, he knew that. He knew that people counted on this suit. It was just different to see it like this, reflected in the shining eyes of a kid who could grow up to be just like him.

"Stella's a nice name," Peter nodded. He wrote it onto the note. "What are you doing out here so late?"

Stella pointed to a group of other boys and girls across the street, so wrapped up in their game they didn't notice the two figures. "I was playing with them, they wanted to race to the park to play soccer."

Peter scrawled Spider-Man's name on the bottom of the sticky note. "Make sure you stay safe, okay? Do you have anyone who can watch you?"

The girl took the note and held it in her hands with wide eyes. Her smile grew; she was practically glowing. She nodded at him in utmost glee. "Yeah, we're meeting my other friend, and he brought his dad. Thank you, Spider-Man!"

She then turned her head around Peter to look at Deadpool. "Thank you, other Spider-Man!"

"Always great to inspire the youth," Deadpool said. "Better go hang with your friends, it looks like they're already halfway down the street."

"Oh!" Stella whipped her head around and then stuffed the note in her pocket. "Bye!"

Then she took off running, catching up with her friends. Peter heard her immediately squealing about what had happened and huffed softly as he stood back up.

"Does that happen to you all the time?" Deadpool asked, finally stepping forward and taking his side. They began to continue walking. "Wait, sh*t f*ck—Do you have kids? Because that would be a twist I was not expecting."

"What?" Peter laughed from the absurdity of it. "No. I don't have kids—I'm not married, remember? I've got a question though. Why were you so uncomfortable then?"

"You can have kids out of wedlock. Plus, totally wasn't uncomfortable!"

"You were! You didn't want to step forward at all."

Deadpool scoffed. "I'm carrying around two ko katanas on my back. Kids may mistake me for you, but I still very much am not you. I'm sure Bea and Arthur would agree."

"Well, you also got really weird when that kid called you a hero. What, you got a vendetta about the word?"

"Don't you? It's a dumb word!"

There was something more to the conversation, something that matched the twinge of pain in Deadpool's voice. Whatever it was, Peter knew it wasn't a good time to bring it up. They had more pressing matters to focus on, and Peter didn't want to make any more enemies.

He shrugged. "It's not my favourite word, that's for sure."

"Do you have a favourite word?"

Peter thought for a moment and then let out an easy laugh. "Yeah— discount."

After a few more minutes of quiet walking, they found the abandoned warehouse standing partially finished. The half of it closest to the river was built from the bottom, made of enclosed brick walls that crumbled around the edges.

Towards the right of the building, it looked like it had been destroyed from some sort of battle, probably one of the many taking place in New York at any given time. Steel columns and half-finished brick walls, broken windows that were covered by tarps.

A shiver went up Peter's spine, and it wasn't from the cold.

"Wow," Deadpool commented from beside him. "Congrats. Your Internet forum led us to a crackhouse."

"We need to get inside," Peter said firmly. If his hunch was correct, which it usually was when coming from his sixth sense, then there was something going on inside this building that wasn't right.

"Title of your sex tape."

"Deadpool."

Deadpool grinned and walked towards the building, then lifted one of the tarps as a front door. "My liege?"

Peter shook his head and ducked under the tarp.

Immediately he had been bombarded with a multitude of scents. Rot was most prevalent, making him cringe and scrunch his nose. Mildew was a close second, both of them being so strong that it soaked through every pore of his suit.

The warehouse had the illusion of being smaller on the inside, narrow spaces created from the amount of clutter. Old furniture was just scattered around with huge chunks of wood, concrete blocks, littered bricks, and broken tools.

"This is just lovely," Deadpool said as he looked around the large space. "I love what he's done with the place. The antique adds such a nice touch, really paints the right portrait of—"

"Shhh," Peter murmured. "We're looking for criminal stuff."

"Uh... Does blood count?"

Peter frowned and backtracked, turning to look where Deadpool was. Pool pointed at a small puddle of dried blood that was soaked through a white lab jacket. "...Huh. Is the Employer a doctor?"

"Dunno," Deadpool shrugged. "Who's to say this was even his? Maybe this has just been here. All this sh*t looks f*cking ancient."

"True." Peter hummed curiously and stepped back, continuing his trek around the misplaced furniture all over the abandoned warehouse. "Keep looking."

The further he walked into this place, the more uneasy he felt. Something was so wrong here, and Peter needed to know what it was.

He spotted a table among the mess, the surface covered with pieces of the Oscorp suit. Bingo.

"Found it," Peter called out teasingly. "This is definitely our guy. So much for online forum hate, right?"

"Yeah, yeah."

Peter stepped up to the table and looked closer at the suit.

The chest plate had been disassembled to the point of circuits and a hard cover exoskeleton. The helmet was nearly unrecognizable, left to melted glass alterations and several technological chips. The boot thrusters were left on the floor beside it, but the wires in it were pooling out and hanging from the top and the sides.

There were tools on the table, scattered between Oscorp suit's pieces and hidden under haphazardly tucked blueprints. Peter picked one of the papers, and he saw scribbled notes that weren't on the original pages.

He couldn't tell what exactly The Employer had been doing with it—it looked like he was trying to modify it in one way or another. Or maybe The Employer just wanted to learn how the suit worked. There were too many questions left unanswered but the whole thing, too much unpredictability.

Peter couldn't get a grasp on what was going on yet.

He turned the corner and was met with a large plastic tent, glowing from a light source inside of it. He glanced back at Deadpool before slowly unzipping the entrance and stalking forward.

Immediately he halted.

Clothesline was strung from across the ceiling of the tent in several chaotic directions. From the clothesline, a series of clipped news articles, close-up photos of times he had been on patrol, notes on his fighting style, notes on everything.

"What the..."

Peter took another step forward. It sent another wavering shock of electricity up his spinal cord, all the way to the base of his neck and stayed there.

Then he looked down and saw the shelves.

There were eight of them, two for each wall. On each one there were stacks of jars. The oddity of it all allowed curiosity to get the best of him. Everything else thus far had been a mess, even the ceiling of this tent, but these jars— they were perfectly in order, not a single one missing from its place.

He stepped closer. There was something sickly in the jar, something inhumane. It twitched its hairy legs closer to its stomach, and it lay on its back all curled and gnarled up in a knot.

"Oh sh*t," Peter breathed. The understanding hit him like a train. He glanced around the room again.

If Peter were to guess, there were probably about four hundred spiders sitting in this tent with him right now. He didn't know how many of them were even alive. He didn't know how many of them were dying.

"Motherf*cker, I think I'm gonna throw up," Deadpool said from behind him. "What kind of f*cked-up-in-the-head do you have to be to keep any animal like this?"

Peter's eyes scanned every jar with utmost speechlessness. Every nerve in his body was telling him to get out. The buzzing at the base of his neck was screaming now, it was almost painful. He twitched and brought a hand up to the back of his covered ear, and then left it on his shoulder restlessly.

Deadpool walked up and read over the same jars. Then he picked up a clipboard that had been hung up on the side of the shelf. "'Electricity experiment conduction on tegenaria domestica proved successful, frying the body from the inside—' What the f*ck?"

"He's experimenting on spiders," Peter said, his voice coming out weak.

Deadpool turned his head to look at Peter silently.

"That's what he's doing," Peter explained. "He's experimenting on spiders. That's what—That's what all of this is. And he's—"

Peter looked up to the abundance of notes strung from the ceiling and shivered. Without thinking, he stepped back, the electricity of danger growing more with every breath. He cleared his throat. "We've seen what we need to see, we should go."

"Are you kidding?" Deadpool gestured around the place. "Let's destroy this motherf*cker! I'll get the grenades, we'll throw a f*cking party."

"We can't do that. The Employer can't find out we were even here. We just—I need to get out of here."

"Arachnida." That's what he had been called the other night. There wasn't any humanity in it. It was cold. It was unfeeling. Peter didn't know what to do with a supervillain he couldn't talk to.

Peter shook his head again and left the tent in a hurry, then stumbling past old furniture and knocking things over as left the warehouse. The whole time, silence.

"Hey, are you okay?" Deadpool asked, following him out. "You seem kinda freaked out. Not that I blame you! That whole thing was creepy as f*ck, it's just, you know. You look like you were possessed in there or something."

"Yeah," Peter breathed finally as he stepped into the cold outside. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just— Just probably won't sleep tonight."

Peter inhaled slowly. He looked around and then stepped closer to Deadpool and lowered his voice as if he were about to tell him a secret. "I've never... I've never seen anybody this hellbent on whatever this is. I've had someone who wanted my blood. I've—I've had people who've wanted me dead, even, but—"

"None of this looked right," Peter continued. "None of this even felt right. I'm not being treated like an animal. No, I'm being treated like a test subject. That's way worse, Deadpool."

"...I know." Deadpool sighed and tilted his head. "Hey, how about you head home, Webs. Catch some Z's, get your beauty sleep. We'll be back in the game tomorrow. I'll try and figure some sh*t out about this motherf*cker so we can bring him down."

"Yeah, I'll do that. Thanks," Peter said distantly. He shook his head. "Sorry. I'm just kinda... Sorry. I'll see you then, right?"

Deadpool nodded firmly.

Then Peter left.

The nightmares increased.

sh*t.

Chapter 7: Thanksgiving F.E.A.S.T.

Chapter Text

"You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on."
-Mary Oliver

"And then the whole place was full—It was like an all-you-can-eat arachnid buffet." Wade shivered dramatically. "Spidey thinks the guy is trying to run tests on spiders, and by full extension of course, him."

"Wow." Weasel leaned back, removing his hands from where they had been pressed against the counter. He continued looking at Wade with wide eyes. "What happened next?"

"He just bugged out! Pun intended. Left pretty quick. He's probably hanging out with family, or something. 'Cuz you know. Happy holidays."

That was one way of putting it. Wade can't remember the last time he saw anybody that tense. The way Spidey's voice had gone hushed, balancing on a tightrope of nerves as it tried not to falter.

("I've never... I've never seen anybody this hellbent on whatever this is. I've had someone who wanted my blood. I've—I've had people who've wanted me dead, even, but—"

The way the vigilante stood across Wade was so peculiar, because it was as if the earth shook
for him. He wanted to leave so desperately, Wade could feel it.

"I'm not being treated like an animal. No, I'm being treated like a test subject. That's way worse, Deadpool.")

Weasel adjusted his glasses and shook his head. "I can't believe that guy wants to kill Spider-Man. Did he ever tell you why?"

"Nope," Wade took a swig from his beer. "The guy just said a lot of cryptic sh*t and then fired me, basically. Then the drama queen broke into Oscorp, because—I don't even know, he's compensating for something? Maybe he's got a little guy downstairs, and by little guy, I mean small penis."

"I know what you meant, idiot."

Wade hummed and set the beer down on the counter with a clink.

"So, what is he like?"

He looked up.

"Spider-Man," Weasel continued coolly. "Is he like... Cool? Is he lame like you? Or is he scary as f*ck like Cable? Did he take off his mask?"

Wade stopped. "Son of a chucklef*ck, do you have a crush on Spider-Man? I've got some bad news, he doesn't like mercs. Like, at all."

"Eh." Weasel shrugged. "I'm just saying. Spider-Man would treat me right."

"You're so disgusting. I work with that guy."

"Yeah, whatever." Weasel cleared his throat. "Listen, you can hang out here a little while longer, but I'm closing shop pretty soon."

Wade quirked an eyebrow upwards. "You've got plans for Thanksgiving? Really?"

"Yeah, it's a whole thing," Weasel rolled his eyes. "Family reunion or whatever. My brother's psycho boyfriend is still in lock-up though, so it'll probably be boring. Point is, you can't stay here and drink yourself to death again, so—"

"Can I come?" Wade blurted. "I'm great at family reunions. Grandmas love me."

Weasel paused and looked at him with something of mixed pity and regret. He pushed his glasses up on his nose again and recentered his expression into a casual sympathy. "Sorry, man. Not this year."

The hope Wade had swirled down the drain of his ribs. He quickly waved Weasel off, distancing himself back from the counter. He took another swig from his drink."Hey, don't worry about it! I wasn't gonna stay here much longer anyways. I've got stuff."

"Stuff?"

"Pshhh. Yeah," Wade grinned. He absolutely did not have stuff. "I've got somewhere to go after this. I just wanted a drink before I left."

"Stuff," Weasel repeated, narrowing his eyes. He continued staring as if he were rolling the information over in his head, and then made a face of indifference. "Alright, sure. What stuff? Spidey stuff?"

That works.

Wade nodded, the smile dropping from his face. "Yeah. You guessed it. Real serious business with the ol' red and blue tights, he said—"

("You know," Spider-Man cleared his throat, sitting cross-legged on the couch and keeping his head down. He seemed to be focused on the laptop; but Wade knew better by the tone of his voice. That quiet tone of a certain brand of reassurance, one that's so naturally practiced it almost sounds fake.

"You could always spend some time volunteering at a charity shelter for the holidays. I know some great places if you ever want to give up the 'lethal' part of your 'lethal protector' identity.")

The sentence broke off as a new concept took refuge in his head.

Logically, he knew that he didn't have to be at F.E.A.S.T. even a minute more now that he was working with Spider-Man. They had established a sort of trust baseline, especially after Wade saved the masked hero's life. (The one thing he wasn't expecting was Spidey to crawl in through his f*cking apartment window two days later, but hey, it was a lazy Saturday anyways.)

Considering the only reason he had signed up for the charity was to sniff the place out, there really was no reason for him to go back to it...

Then he remembered the warmth of the place. How it clouded the inside of him like a thick fog and soothed the very marrow of his bones. The safety to it, the past sorrows and kindness in everyone's eyes, the mutual understanding and support.

There was a resounding clarity that came with the fondness of remembering it all—As long as he went without the mask, he could almost pretend to be a presence that somebody enjoyed. And there was something about that sentiment that had the walls chip down even the slightest bit.

He let out a quiet breath. Slow. Careful. Cautious.

"—I got a place to go," Wade said with an anxious smile. He stood up and put down a bill on the counter. "Have fun at dinner, Weas."

Weasel huffed a laugh, looking at him with a sort of bewilderment. "And you have fun on your date."

Wade flipped him off as he left.

Of course, having a thought was vastly different than being in public and believing it full-heartedly. Wade had his maroon hoodie pulled far over his face and he still avoided eye contact the whole way there; but there was more enthusiasm in his step on the way through Chinatown's sidewalks than there had been in a long time.

There was a lot going through his head. Mainly, the thought-provoking possibility that he could get to F.E.A.S.T. and Peter Parker could be nowhere in sight. It was a holiday, after all. Would Wade still have the bravery to walk in the doors?

"Call me Rachel Platten, because this is my fight song," Wade muttered to himself.

The building was the same as Wade first saw it, adjourned with banners that gave notice to several of the events taking place. It was about mid-day, so people were walking in and out more regularly than before.

Wade took a deep breath in through the nose. "Maximum effort."

He gathered up all his bravery and no-sh*t-taken attitude and stepped up the front stairs, then walked in without giving any second to doubt himself or his place for being there.

To his surprise, Peter was the first thing that he saw when he stepped through the entrance. Wade could only see him from behind, because Peter was apparently skilled in camera work and was currently taking photos of a group of smiling patrons.

Wade stepped forward like a skittish cat, looking around the place with a strong hesitation. He looked around the place for any new trace of disgust or remorse, anything that would hint to him being unwelcome, and then quickly took his place beside Peter.

Peter turned to look at him before Wade even opened his mouth, and whatever Wade was going to say, it fell useless to the sight of him.

He looked terrible.

Darker circles, and exhaustion in every blink. It didn't look like the type of sleep exhaustion caused by guilt, which Wade's seen before. It's missing the wide shifty eyes. This just looked like someone who had seen something beyond any kind of comprehension. Peter looked haunted.

And then he put on the nicest smile Wade's ever seen and tilted his head to the side. "Wade! It's so great to see you."

"Yeah," Wade trailed off, matching a smile similar to his. "So great to see you too. Did you by chance have a horror movie marathon last night like me?"

Peter laughed quietly and shook his head. "I wish. No, I just didn't get a lot of sleep. My, uh, my apartment is really loud. I need my radiator fixed, I think, it's way noisier than usual."

Total lie. Wade nodded anyway. "Especially with winter coming up, right?"

"Right." Peter lowered his camera and held it in his hands. "It really is great to see you, though. I wasn't expecting to see you on Thanksgiving, but—It's a nice surprise!"

"I didn't know if you were gonna be here either. For all I know, you worked at a Cracker Barrel or something, counting the amount of time people need to stop and go to the sh*tter."

Peter scrunched his nose up and stifled the smallest laugh. "Close enough. I work for the Bugle."

Wade groaned, tossing his head back. The movement caused the hood to fall, but he made no attempt to pull it back up. "That's just disappointing, Petey! Come onnnn."

"I know, I know," Peter grinned. "It pays, though. Anyways, I come here about every Thanksgiving. I think I told you, but my aunt helps run the place, so it's sort of a tradition to help out during the holidays."

"Well, that's very sweet of you." Wade then gestured down at the camera. "So, are the photos for the Bugle?

"Oh! Uh, no. I just take photos for the website sometimes. I also just... It's kind of like a family photo?" Peter shrugged. "I know a lot of the people here, so it's nice to take photos to remember them. With their permission, of course."

He was a goofy thing, stumbling and moving his head around as he talked. Wade couldn't tell if the animation was from pure exhaustion or if Peter was just like that, but either way it was sort of adorable.

Wade smiled and nodded. "Right."

"So, what are you planning on helping with?" Peter asked.

Wade hesitated. How was he supposed to explain the fact that coming here was a last minute decision in the first place? He had no idea what the hell he was supposed to do here. "Ah, you know, just helping out..."

"...How about you help with food preparation?" Peter suggested. He smiled and gestured for Wade to follow him—and what else was he supposed to do with that? Wade staggered forward with an exuberant nod.

"Oliver and May are both working in there. They kicked me out," Peter laughed as he walked to the kitchen. "One too many burnt turkeys, I suppose."

"No kidding," Wade smiled. "Hey, at the end of the day there ain't nothing wrong with some poptarts. Or Mexican food! Can anything really beat a good taco?"

"Very true!" Peter turned the corner. "There's this really good place on the corner of the block that has great enchiladas, have you heard of it?"

Sheeesh. He knew local Mexican food places?

If the way to a man's heart really was through his stomach, then Wade was f*cking starving. That's probably creepy. The point was: Peter Parker was impressing Wade more with every word he said, and Wade had been in this situation before, he knew it'll only be so long until he's absolutely smitten.

"Yeah, I—"

"Peter!"

Wade spun around to the voice, taking a step back from Peter instinctually.

In the kitchen, the woman, May, had her sleeves rolled up as she diced through some carrots. She had her makeup done nice, her hair pulled back with a large clip, and an apron to shield the food from her lavender button up shirt.

"Peter, come on in," May said, waving him into the room.

Beside her, someone with short straightened hair stood with their own matching apron. They looked up and waved hello to Wade. (He waved back, because his mom raised him to be polite, thank you very much.)

Peter strided into the room and stood next to May, and that's when everything clicked into place. They were family. May must have been the aunt that Peter was talking about.

"You must be Wade," May spoke up kindly.

He startled from his spot in the doorway and nodded, stepping forward. "That's me. Gee, am I popular, right? Maybe I should've introduced my name as Glinda."

His heartbeat was louder in his ears than they were before, and Wade was painfully aware of the fact that May was looking at him, and so was the other person in the kitchen—Oliver? And Peter. Three people, three new people, were all looking directly at his face.

So instead of saying anything more, he just... Waited.

May was giving him such a specific expression, one that he had no idea how to read but it intrigued him nonetheless. It isn't in the realm of disgust, nowhere even near it. If Wade were to guess, she looked as if something very profound were about to happen, and she was the only one who could see it.

"I'm May," she introduced. "I have to say, I was very excited to meet you. Peter told me all about how you would be a great help."

Wade opened his mouth, then subsequently closed it. He replaced whatever response he had with a smile. "That's..."

He cleared his throat. "Hey, I'm no hero. My great help is pretty limited. I can chop stuff really well, though."

"You can cut up the potatoes!" The other person chimed in. "Sorry, I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Oliver. But yeah, May's gonna make her famous mashed potatoes. I washed them, but they need to be cut up before they're boiled."

"I can do that," Wade gave them a thumbs-up. He took a breath, rolled up his sleeves, and put on one of the aprons hanging by the door. "Alright. Potatoes."

"They're really good," Peter said with exuberance.

Wade smiled. "Can't wait to try them, then."

He washed his hands before he took a cutting board, a knife, and the large rack of potatoes sitting on the counter. "So do I just cut them into chunks?"

May nodded. "Yes, dear, that would be perfect."

Wade looked up at her with slight awe.

"Hey, Wade, would you mind if I took a picture of you guys cooking?" Peter asked, his hand lingering on the camera hung around his neck.

Wade blinked. "Oh. Well, if you insist. Make sure you get my good side, alright, Parker?"

Peter smiled and raised his camera. "No problem."

He clicked the photo—Wade heard the snap of the shutter as it went. It's then he realized the light smile never left his face.

"That's a keeper," Peter said, looking down at the small screen of his camera. He glanced up. "I'm gonna go take some other photos around the place. Let me know if you need my help."

"We definitely won't," Oliver teased. "There's a reason I only let you wash the fruits and vegetables."

Peter smiled and left the kitchen.

"Crazy boy," May said fondly, moving the diced carrots into a large bowl. "You know, Wade, I think he really likes you. I hope I'm not too forward, but I think you two are natural friends."

"Aw, shucks," Wade shrugged. "Yeah, Peter's nice. I only met him a few days ago, but..." He nodded. "I can tell a good guy."

"He's got a heart like his uncle's." May then frowned. "Which is why I worry."

"Yeah, today he came in looking so exhausted," Oliver added with a frown of their own. "And he came in super early last week too. I didn't want to ask, but I hope he's okay."

Wade nodded quietly, looking down at the potatoes as he carefully cut them into sizable pieces.

May cleared her throat. "Anyways. While the turkey is in the oven, let's get started on the cranberries. Wade, they're already washed, so you can work on boiling them. Oliver, you can–"

For the next two hours, the three of them, including some other volunteers that came and went through the kitchen, worked hard to cook the largest serving size's worth of some gravy-turkey thing, a large vat of mashed potatoes that were quite literally the best thing Wade's ever had, cranberry sauce, and they sliced two large pumpkin pies.

Wade was overwhelmed, to say the least. It was an outpour of the most joy he had felt in a long time. May was great company; she told stories as they all worked to set out the food on the counter in the other room where the fold-out tables were.

Wade learned all about how Peter's first time cooking a turkey ended in a kitchen full of black smoke. (And his second time. And his third.) He learned family recipes. He learned that May has only been running the place for the last 4 years, despite working here for over a decade. He learned they started doing holidays at F.E.A.S.T. after her husband passed away several years back.

Him and Oliver worked on helping people get their plates (if they asked for it) as they started to enter the cafeteria, and it wasn't long at all until the room was full of people chattering amongst themselves and eating their food.

Wade didn't really know how he fit in with all of this, yet. He didn't know people enough to sit at their tables, and people who knew each other seemed to group together. May was sitting across Peter, and he's pretty sure Oliver left to go be their family.

Being the awkward person standing in the corner of the room and holding a plate, there were a handful of people that would glance up at him with distrust, or suspicion. Somewhere Wade knew that they weren't staring at his skin, but they were still staring at him, and he still needed somewhere to sit.

His heart was starting to race again and he was starting to feel as shifty as all the people looking up at him. It'd been so long since he'd had a panic attack, and today had been so nice– Which meant it was time for a reckless Wade thing.

He took his plate and sat next to Peter at his table. "Hope this seat wasn't taken."

"Of course not," May said, giving him a bright smile. "You'll always have a seat here."

Peter nodded in agreement. He was soft-spoken, like the tiredness from his appearance was coming back in waves and was finally wearing down on how he moved and spoke. "Yeah, you guys did a great job. Everything tastes really good."

"Well, I can't take all the credit," Wade waved him off dramatically. "May and Oliver are the real MVPs."

May laughed softly. "Oh, hush. We all worked hard. You're a natural in the kitchen, Oliver thought so too."

Wade smiled slightly. He looked back over at Peter, who had gone quiet—The smile fell.

Peter had an expression of concern, his eyebrows furrowed deeply and his eyes empty. He didn't look like he was in the present, but rather contemplating something that was worrying to him. He chewed his food robotically, and twirled the fork in his hand, all the while staring blankly downwards. It was like Wade could see the gears turning.

"Hey, are you okay?" Wade whispered.

Peter widened his eyes and looked up, nodding quickly. "What? Yeah. I'm okay."

May sighed and put her fork down. Wade thought she looked sad with the way her eyes became gentler, but she didn't frown. It was like she refused to.

"I think I'm gonna go check on some things," Peter said, standing up. He smiled tiredly. "Thank you for the food, again. I'm very grateful for it. I'll be back in a few minutes."

He kissed May on the head before he left the cafeteria, and as he left was when May's mouth finally downturned. She looked down at her own plate with something akin to the most slow, painful heartbreak.

Wade didn't know the full story. He knew there were huge chunks he was missing, and he knew a lot of it wasn't his business. It wasn't his place to ask or press on wounds that weren't his. But it hurt to see either Parker in such a state of distress, because he also knew they didn't deserve any of it.

Then May looked up to him, tilted her chin just slightly and held in her pain. She had such strength in the way she took a breath, and she sighed again. "Wade, can you..."

She paused. Wade was quiet.

She thought about her words for a moment, then began again. "If I go up there, I don't think he would talk to me. I think he's afraid to worry me. I know you don't know each other well, but I— Can you just check in on him?"

Wade recognized desperation when he heard it, as thinly-laced as it may be. He hesitated. "If you think it'll help? I don't want to intrude or anything."

"I trust you."

Wade slowly nodded. "Do you know where he went?"

"He likes to go up to the roof," May said, pulling a strand of hair behind her ear. "The fresh air... I also personally think it grounds him to know where he is physically in all of this."

Wade stood up from the table and left through the same exit Peter walked out of. He looked for the stairs, made his way up, and then found the doorway to the rooftop. What is he doing? WHY DID HE AGREE TO THIS?

Wade wasn't the type to have the monologues and the lengthy speeches on advice. He wasn't a hero. He wasn't Colossus, he wasn't even freakin' Spider-Man. He was practically going to be talking out of his ass, and now even May was counting on him.

He steps out on the roof and as she predicted, Peter was sitting at the edge and shivering from the cold of the late afternoon. The shadow of building fell over his figure, giving him the impression of a tortured soul shaking in the dark— and maybe that's what he was.

Wade didn't even need to say anything to announce himself before Peter turned to look at him with surprise.

"Wade, what are you doing out here?" Peter's teeth chattered.

"Just wanted to check on you," Wade shrugged casually. He walked forward and sat beside him. "Hah! It's kind of like when we met, except in reverse. That's funny."

Peter huffed a quiet laugh. The action blew a visible fog into the sky.

Wade took one more look at Peter shivering, watching him try to hug himself for warmth, and rolled his eyes. He raised his arms and pulled off his maroon hoodie and handed it over to Peter. "Take it. You look like you're auditioning for a Target winter sales advertisem*nt."

"Are you sure?" Peter hesitated. His teeth were still very obviously, LOUDLY, clattering against each other. "Won't you be cold?

Wade shook his head. "I don't really get cold, I'm like a space heater. I just wear the jacket for appearances. Because, you know."

Wade looked pointedly down at his own bare arms, and the many scars that littered them. But he was telling the truth—He really didn't get cold. Apparently that's what happens when your body is constantly healing itself from cancer cells. Who knew?

Peter took the jacket from him with shaking hands and pulled it over himself. He bundled it closer to himself and sighed with the littlest bit of relief. "Thanks."

Wade hummed. He looked over at the cityline, and then took a sneaking glance at Peter. He still looked so far away, even while sitting right beside him. The description of him looking "haunted" seemed to come back even stronger now, which gave him an idea.

"...Wanna know what my greatest fear is?" Wade spoke up.

Peter frowned at the subject, but looked back at him with the kind of consideration that came with someone who didn't know where something was going but wanted to take it seriously anyways. "Sure."

"Immortality." Wade smiled. His chest ached. "It terrifies me. Keeps me up at night, sometimes. The thought of... seeing everything you know just chip away, just one slow day at a time."

(Nightmares of an abandoned city. Nightmares of a world on fire. Nightmares of being the only one left.)

Peter didn't say anything, but he was listening intently.

"What about you?" Wade asked. "What kinda sh*t keeps you up at night, Petey-Pie?"

Peter looked away. He stared at the city, and Wade saw the flash in his eyes that told him he hit a target. Like breathing, Peter raised his hand and scratched incessantly at something behind his ear. Like he was trying to get rid of something. Like he wanted something gone.

And, wasn't that curious?

"What's that?" Wade asked, gesturing up to Peter's ear.

Peter quickly blinked and pulled his hand away from where he had been scratching. He threw on a smile and lifted his short hair up to reveal the discoloured skin, white and healed over in a little mark. "Ah, nothing. It's just a scar."

Wade narrowed his eyes. The pieces were slowly starting to connect, things fitting into place one at a time. Whatever Peter was worrying about–It connected directly to that scar, and that scar was connected to something he was afraid of. Wasn't Peter the one to say that scars were just stories to tell?

"What's wrong with scars?" Wade teased lightly.

Peter paused, and the look on his face was if he wanted to say something incredibly personal, something closer to his heart than to the scar on the back of his ear. There was longing in his eyes, a desperation almost, something frantic and needy—But it's shoved away with such speed and precision that Wade has to blink.

The easy smile returned to his face. He shrugged. "Nothing, I guess. It's just collagen and replaced fibrous tissue."

"Right..." Wade knew he was lying, but in his experience, there was usually a good reason for it, and Wade wasn't here to push his boundaries any further. He softened his expression and relaxed his shoulders to make himself smaller. "It's no biggie, then?"

Peter nodded gratefully. "No biggie."

"Welp," Wade clapped his hands and stood up. "I should get going. You can keep the, uh, the jacket. It looks better on you anyways."

"Okay," Peter said. He gave him a much realer smile, one that was softer and met his eyes. "Thanks for coming today."

"'Course. I'll see you around." Wade gave a thumbs-up.

"Oh! Wait," Peter scrambled up from the ledge and took his phone out of his pocket. "I promised I'd get your number. You know, for F.E.A.S.T. stuff, and like—Yeah. Just in case we need to contact each other or something."

Wade blinked with surprise and found himself nodding before he even spoke. "Uh. Yeah, that's— Sure." He took the phone and entered his contact, then grinned cheesily. "Feel free to call me whenever you wanna binge movies. I've still got the other half of my horror movie collection to go through."

"Sounds good to me," Peter laughed. "Bye, Wade. Have a nice night."

"You too, Pete."

Wade left the rooftop, and a moment later heard the chime of a new text message. He smiled to himself.

"As lord and savior Taylor Swift says," Wade murmured to himself, "it's nice to have a friend."

Chapter 8: Let Her Go

Chapter Text

"In one of the stars I shall be living. In one of them I shall be laughing. And so it will be as if all the stars were laughing, when you look at the sky at night."
-Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

[Wade Wilson: hey pete]

[Wade Wilson: its wade]

[Wade Wilson: I got a coupon for that local place down the block from feast, was wondering if u wanna come w me😈 I heard they got some wontons to die 4]

Peter quietly looked up from his screen. He stifled a tense sigh, looked back down, and grimaced a smile as he typed out his edited version of a truth.

[Peter Parker: Can't do today. Got caught up with work stuff :( How about tomorrow?]

[Wade Wilson: sounds gud, busy bee! dont stress 2 much mk?]

Peter huffed softly.

[Peter Parker: I'll try not to. Thanks, Wade☺️]

[Wade Wilson: 👍]

Peter turned his beaten up phone off and stuck it in the pocket of his suit. The smile left his face as he looked back up at the looming shadow of his surroundings.

"And they say nobody needs a 9-to-5," Peter said dryly.

The warehouse stood at its height of three and a half crumbled floors. Nobody would have known from the outside the sort of horrific experiments lurking within. Peter spent the last few nights thinking of nothing but, the images tumbling in his head like shoes in a washing machine.

Worries about being taken and stuck in a jar like the other spiders in that tent had led him back here. He needed to investigate further. If he could figure out the full extent of research that the Employer had done, he might know what he needs to look out for.

(He didn't want to go in alone. He didn't want to go in at all. But he didn't have his new teammate's—his new friend's—his new—he didn't have Deadpool's phone number, and he wasn't going to show up unannounced at his apartment again, especially this late into the night.)

Peter crawled up the warehouse and climbed in through the exposed chunk in the top floor's wall. The inside was hollow, no furniture and half of the concrete sunken and cracked to reveal the lower levels of the building. There was nothing to see, it was a broken shell of a place.

"I wonder what this place was used for," Peter muttered under his breath. "Y'know. Before some robot mad scientist moved in to lurk in the shadows."

He stuck to the inside wall and inched down the gash in the floor frames to the second level of the building. Bare bones of a warehouse, crawling down each level like individual ribs of the beast, and on each floor there was nothing but dust and broken glass, decay, mold, the rotting remains of birds' meals, abandoned blocks of wood and steel.

Peter dropped down to the first floor and his spine began to buzz, he lifted his chin to see the damage he was working with, the clutter and blood splatters and the—

The large frame of the first level was nearly clear. Clean in its own definition, meaning that the hodgepodge that had looked like it came out of an antique store was no longer there. There was a visible layer of dust on the floor, as well as imprints from where the furniture and building materials had clearly been there. It looked entirely different to what Peter and Deadpool had been looking at the other day, almost indistinguishable in its frightening entirety, except for the godforsaken tent that had grown in size by a few considerable feet.

He twitched.

Peter stepped towards the tent and lifted the tarp, walking in.

The rows and rows of spiders were still stuck in their jars on the shelves. Peter's arm hairs rose and tickled under the fabric of the suit. He scratched it away, then moved closer to the spiders.

Several on their backs, their curled up legs clenched tightly to their frail bodies and not even giving the slightest tremble in their mortality. Peter lingered to read the notes stuck to the jars, each one written in small, uneven handwriting that detailed the species of spider and then a list of numbers and acronyms Peter couldn't understand.

The living ones, at the end of the rows, skittered anxiously as Peter walked down the lane. They silently begged to be let free. Tiny creatures, none of them much bigger than Peter's thumbnail. How long have they gone without food? How long without freedom?

"I'm sorry, guys," Peter whispered. His voice echoed in the quiet, and he could hear his own pain reverberate around him. "I don't know what the Employer did to you. If any of you are all radioactive in any kind of way, it's not safe for you to be out in the city."

The spiders made desperate laps around their contained cells.

He scratched behind his ear and stood up. "sh*t. This is so wrong. Who could do something like this?"

Peter looked over the desk. There was a series of vials propped up in a stand, each of them with labels scratched out and rewritten a few times over. Peter picked one from the collection and turned the vial to the side.

Anti-St. Nbls: V. 384

"Whatever the hell that's supposed to mean," Peter mumbled. A scurrying caught his eye, and he glanced up to see another jar tucked away on the desk, hidden behind papers. Peter moved his hand toward the jar, and then heard a whirring noise outside the tent.

Peter yanked his hand back and swiftly hid behind a shelf. He left the vial on the desk.

There was silence.

The buzzing in his spine grew until it felt like each individual knob was being held by a cord of electricity that pulled apart and then came back together. Peter stayed still.

There were heavy footsteps sounding outside of the tent, as if circling the perimeter. The whirring noise began again, then became distant. Peter stood up and snuck under the tarp of the tent as quietly and quickly as he could.

A few steps forward and his whole body went numb with nerves. Peter heard the whirring of the Employer's suit and swerved around.

"You aren't supposed to be here yet," the Employer growled. He charged forward and shoved Peter against the wall with a loud thud from the concrete.

Peter grunted and jumped upwards. In the slow of time as he leaped up, he webbed the suit's arms and yanked them in the opposite direction as he landed behind the Employer. "Sorry! Just couldn't stay away from you. I'm clingy like that."

Fighting is not the thing he had on his to-do list today. Maybe a few petty crimes, maybe some stress-ice-cream eating for after the trip here, but actually fighting the Employer is going to take more than the two hours of sleep Peter's been running on.

"You little cretin." The Employer yanked the webs away from himself, then the bottom part of the suit's arm unfurled to dual fire bullets at Peter from afar.

Peter leaped up onto the wall. "That's not a nice word! Plus, it makes you sound ancient. How old are you under that suit?"

The Employer flew forward to throw a punch, which Peter deflected and threw one right back. The man stumbled back, then reset himself and lunged again. He was like a freakin' robot, inside and out.

"Are you like one of those synthetics?" Peter babbled. "Like from Alien?"

He swung around the Employer and attempted to kick the man in the metal face; but found his leg to be grabbed. He was thrown into the floor before he could catch himself.

Peter could feel the way his nose had just cracked as it collided into the cold hard ground. His own blood soaked into his mask. His heart pounded in his chest as he got back up from the floor. "Not a fan? I get it. I liked the second one better, too."

"Do you ever shut up?" The Employer droned.

Peter shrugged. "Why are you testing on spiders?"

A fist to the face in response, causing him to fly backwards against the wall. He sat helplessly trying to gain his senses for a moment—His body hurt so badly. It was like this guy's punches were made out of steel. (Oh wait.)

Faster than Peter could catch even one breath, the Employer bolted forward. He got ahold of Peter's neck, then dragged him up the warehouse's levels with blinding speed. Peter's suit scrapes on the rough texture of the brick, causing the thing to rip on places near his shoulders and neck.

Peter's hands fumble blindly to try and pull the Employer's hands off his neck. He choked and squirmed, his limbs flailing. His breath came out in a wheeze, a feeble string of air that whistled like a kettle.

The Employer used his other hand, he brought a syringe out from a compartment and moved it closer to Peter. Peter saw it through his blurred vision and fought harder to get away from it. Bad things happen when people get his blood. BAD THINGS HAPPEN WHEN PEOPLE—

His vision was going white around the edges as he gasped for air that didn't come.

The syringe stuck him in the neck.

The Employer let go.

Peter fell down all three stories, and hit the floor with a crack. He gasped for the returning air despite the pain it brought to every bone, every muscle, every moving thing in his body. He used his best efforts to pull himself up, breathing heavily, and pulled his mask over his mouth to spit the blood red from his mouth.

The Employer landed on the ground beside him, towering over the crumpled hero. Peter tried so hard not to hate him, but he's pretty sure that half his ribs are broken and who knew what else, which made it much harder to have any hope.

Here's what he knew:

He could hear the rush of blood as it flowed through the veins of a body working too hard, too fast.

He could hear the gasping breath of a half dead man whose body fought to stay alive.

He could hear the whirring of a machine that cannot win.

"Please," Peter rasped, coughing up the dark blood. It dribbled down his chin. A smile further opened his split lip he was sporting. "That didn't even sting."

The Employer stayed silent.

"Not even a laugh? Tough crowd." Peter pushed himself up with great effort, squaring his hips yet faltering on one of his legs. "I'm gonna need that blood back."

"Come get it, arachnid."

God, he wanted to go home. Peter got his fists ready for a new smattering of bruises.

"Woa-a-h!" A new voice came in through the side of the warehouse. Deadpool. "Did I miss a memo or something? Everyone was here without me!"

Peter's head swung around to look at him— Deadpool pulled his katanas out, and then he stood at Peter's side as if it were nothing, as if the very notion wasn't going to make Peter cry from relief.

"What are you doing here?" Peter asked breathlessly. "I didn't even show up at your apartment this time."

"Came to do my own scouting." Deadpool swung his katanas in a circular motion. "What's this motherf*cker's deal, anyways?"

"I can still hear you." The Employer sighed tensely. "Never the matter, the audience doesn't matter to me. I have what I need."

"And what's that?" Deadpool asked, narrowing his eyes coldly.

"My blood," Peter stressed. "He's got my blood, Pool."

"Well, yeah, I can see that," Deadpool looked over at him pointedly. "It's leaking out of you. Super gross. Do you need a bandaid? I've got one in my pocket. It's a—"

Peter's senses flared, and he shot a web and yanked Deadpool toward him just as a round of bullets was fired from the Employer.

Deadpool's eyes widened as he looked around at the shell casings, the webs, and finally the Employer. "Is that a f*cking gun-arm?! Since when is that f*cking allowed, you ball-juggling-clown-sonuva—"

A wave of nausea ran over Peter and he stumbled back. Deadpool looked back at him with questionable concern. "Spidey?"

The lines and people were becoming unfocused. Peter put a hand on his head and looked down, groaning in pain. He shook his head defiantly. "Pool, we gotta get the blood."

His voice was slurred, he could hear it flow from his mouth like drool.

Deadpool's katanas made a bright sound as he clashed them together. "Vampire work it is, then."

Peter fell backwards and struggled to pick himself back up, as the room tilted and he shivered and shook. The nausea was coming back again, and he could feel the lack of blood in the way his head pulsed. His mouth couldn't articulate the proper words to explain any of this, but Deadpool must have known somehow and charged toward the Employer alone.

Another round of gunshots pierced through the cotton in Peter's head. The smell of blood was everywhere— He saw Deadpool fall to the floor next to him. f*ck. There wasn't time for horror, his new friend dead beside him, and he was on his way there.

Peter tried to push himself off the ground one last time—

The white faded to black.

She had such an lovely smile.

("What's your name?"

"You don't know my name?")

Thoughtfulness was sewn into her soul like buttons on a summertime jacket. Her perfume of choice was floral, daisies or something of that nature.

("No, I know your name. I just want to know if you know your name."

"Peter... Parker.")

She had the softest of whispers, sometimes it sounded like they lived in the mellow space between a warning and a plea. He could feel her cheeks on his when she smiled.

("Easy, bug boy."

"What did you call me?")

The sky was darker; but the lights were bright. It illuminated the hurt on her face. The tears in her eyes shone, and he needed her, but the guilt was eating him away piece by piece and soon there would be nothing left for it to take.

("What if something happens to you?" He repeated.

"You're Spider-Man," Gwen said reassuringly. Her voice was soft, yet sturdy. "And I love that. But I love Peter Parker more. That's worth it to me."

The clock ticked.

Until it didn't.)

Peter gasped and opened his eyes.

He was outside of a window. He knew the window well, the indents and the grooves on the sill, the marks and smudges on the glass were all familiar to him. Yes, he knew exactly where he was.

He tapped on the glass.

She looked back from her computer and beamed at him—She was just as beautiful as he remembered her to be. She got up from her desk, walked over and slid the window up.

Peter could only stare.

"This is the part where you climb in," Gwen teased, her voice spinning threads of heaven into the air.

Peter did as she asked, then stood with his mouth parted slightly, staring at her face and trying to recount every freckle and dimple.

"What are you doing here, Peter?" Gwen murmured.

“I… Just hold on,” he murmured, his hands trembling as they reached out, and then were pulled back in tight to his chest. “Hold on. I need to get this right. I need… Give me a second.”

I just need more time. Just give me some more time. Let me look at you for a second longer than I had.

Gwen looked at him quietly. Patiently. Peter exhaled slowly.

"People still try and kill me every night," Peter tumbled out. "That's why I'm here. I know how much you hated me getting hurt, so I'm sorry."

("Are you sorry?")

"I don't know how healthy it is that the thing keeping me alive is the same thing killing me." Peter looked down at the carpet, but looked back up at her. "I've—"

He cleared his throat. "I've been trying to figure out how to let go of you. Some days, it's easier. It's less heavy, but it's just... Everytime I see a picture of you, all I can think is that I should have held you more. I—I should have kissed you then. I should have hugged you in that video, and danced with you, but I didn't. I don't know why I didn't. I'm sorry."

("Are you sorry?")

Gwen's expression softened.

"But then there are the bad days," Peter continued like a train running off its track. Where it's like... It's like I'm there in that clocktower again, and I can't reach you as fast as you reached out to me. I'm sorry for that too."

("Are you sorry?")

Gwen moved her bangs up from her eyes and nodded quietly. "I know, Peter."

Peter shook his head. "No, you— I could say sorry for a million different things. I could say it until my throat is—is bleeding, and they still wouldn't mean anything compared to these two: I'm sorry I didn't love you more while you were here, and I'm sorry I loved you at all."

("Are you sorry, Peter?")

The softness in Gwen's expression faded. A frown found its way to her lips.

"Peter Parker," she scolded. "You can't do that to me."

"I'm s—"

Gwen stepped forward and put her hand over Peter's mouth. She furrowed her eyebrows, then gently stroked his cheek with her thumb. "We've had our time. It was perfect the way it was. Forget the ending, Peter, I— I hear your apologies. I hear them, I've heard them for months. I don't want them anymore."

"But-"

"Listen to me," Gwen whispered. She leaned in and kissed the hand over Peter's mouth, then inched the featherlight kisses up to his nose. "Can you do that, Peter?"

"Of course," Peter murmured into her hand. She lifted her hand to run it through his hair. "I'll do anything you need, Gwen. Always."

Gwen smiles again, and her room filled with light. Slowly, she kissed his forehead, and then said:

"I want your forgiveness."

"What?"

"I want your forgiveness," she repeated. "You've spent so much time hurting over what happened. You need to understand, it wasn't your fault. It was not your fault."

"But—"

Gwen shook her head. "No. That's it. I'm here, standing in front of you, telling you it wasn't your fault. I would have liked to live. I would have liked to grow old with you. That wasn't in the cards for me, but I accept that, and I accept you, Peter."

Peter's still where he stands, staring at the golden specks in Gwen's eyes while tears form in his own.

"You wanna keep me alive?" Gwen pressed meaningfully. "Remember me."

"I do remember you." Peter breathed the words painfully. The nightmares tumble through his head. The blank smiles, the blood dripping down her nose. Her limp figure from a distance."I could never forget you."

"No," Gwen said. "Remember me. The girl with the clipboard who helped you sneak into a lab. The girl who invited you to her family's dinner. The girl who... helped you take down the criminals in the city and forgave you when you were late to graduation. The girl who was alive, and in love. That was me, Peter."

Then she smiled again, and Peter swore it healed his unbeating heart. Peter nodded for her, and maybe a little for him, then tentatively smiled back.

"Yeah," he croaked. "I can do that."

He leaned in to rest his forehead against hers, and sighed with something of relief. Peace. The parts of his body relaxed, from his shoulders to his heart, to the hands and feet.

Peter leaned in, and kissed her for the last time for a long long while, then hugged her tightly. He burrowed his face into her neck, let her hair tickle his nose. A gentle tug tried to pull him away.

"Thank you for visiting me," Gwen said softly. "But you still have more people to help."

Peter nodded, then lifted his chin. "I love you no matter what."

"I love you too," Gwen said. "Now, go."

Peter smiled at her tearfully and pulled back. He took one final glance at the way her cheek dimpled, the way she softly smiled at him, the way her eyes crinkled, and he felt so much lighter now. This was Gwendolyne Stacy—and now she could rest.

He let the tug pull him further away in a blur of lights.

There's heavy pressure on his chest, a pounding rhythm. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. A cacophony of exploding bombs at his heart.

There's a voice yelling in his ear, familiar and distant. It moved in and out, got quiet and loud with every consonant.

"Spi—"

His head hurt.

"It's me! It's—"

His mouth was numb.

"Wake—"

He was freezing cold.

"— it!"

Peter opened his eyes.

Under a mountain of blankets, Peter was propped up on the couch of a mercenary who was supposed to be just as dead as he, but the two of them were both very much alive. He was wearing a mask, but it wasn't his own. He could tell from the smell of gunpowder and something spicy.

Across from him, Deadpool sat in a beat-up chair and laughed at a show playing on his laptop.

"You're alive?" Peter spoke up.

Deadpool jumped and looked back at him. "Mother of f*cking father. Did you just wake up?"

Peter nodded. "Is this your mask?"

"Yeah, I got more than one. Don't worry, I didn't look. I just didn't want you inhaling your own blood—Your mask was kinda soaked."

"Ah." Peter sat up and winced. His hand went to his ribs. "What happened to the Employer?"

"After I conked out, he got away." Deadpool closed the laptop and stood up, walking over to Peter. He crouched down. "When I finally entered the land of the living, you were nearly a goner, so I saved your life instead. That's two you owe me, junior."

"Star Wars references," Peter said dumbly. Then he frowned. "sh*t. I can't believe he got away. That's so not good."

"Yeah, we'll have to figure something out about that. Did you find anything when you were there?"

Peter sighed. "I found... just lots of spiders. A lot of them are dead, which is a great sign for me, obviously. But there's also... I found this vial that had anti-something written on it. I don't know what it means, but it definitely stuck out. I think he's perfecting some sort of spider venom thing. Also—" Peter ran a hand over the leather mask he wore, then squinted. "You can't die?"

Deadpool shrugged. "Immortality ain't no joke, just one big f*ck-you to Lady Death and some weird conversations to have with your fiancée."

"Someone told me the other day that immortality was their greatest fear," Peter said quietly. "You must be pretty brave then, Pool."

Deadpool tilted his head and went quiet for a moment. He narrowed his eyes. "...Thanks. Hey, here's a question. Who's Gwen?"

"What?"

"You— Sorry. You can tell me to f*ck off if you want. You said the name a lot when you were out, so... seems like it's pretty important to you."

"Yeah, she..." Peter looked down. He said her name like a prayer, a quiet sigh. "Gwen."

("Remember me, Peter.")

"I was so in love with her I thought it would drive me mad," Peter explained softly. His head leaned back against the couch. "I, uh... I met her in college. Freshman year, actually. She was walking down the hall, and..."

Peter laughed quietly to himself. "I was running down the hall, because crime has a habit of making me late to stuff, and uh—I accidentally ran into her, and all my stuff went flying everywhere. It was—It was like a sitcom. It was so ridiculous, and—and perfect, because she was so perfect, Pool. I don't know any other way to describe her."

"...She used to do this thing, just this little... this little quirk, I guess, where she'd kind of rub her nose," Peter grinned. "And she was so beautiful. She was brilliant, smarter than I was."

Every word gave the feeling of breaking a broken bone in order to reset it in its proper place. It was painful, it ached, but by god it was freeing all the same. It was addicting, the happiness of her, the joy she brought. He opened his mouth with the intention of saying a few words and instead breathed the feeling of it, and an abundance of epilogues poured out instead.

"She knew about Spider-Man, so sometimes I would crawl into her dorm's balcony and knock on her window. She always hated seeing me so beat up all the time, and I knew I wouldn't be able to stay away from her so instead I just learned how to be more careful."

"I saw her." Peter looked up at Deadpool. "When I was... half-dead, I guess, I saw her. She reminded me that I was in a different chapter now, and that it was alright."

“I understand.” Deadpool said, and then was quiet for a moment. Then he nodded. “Yeah. I understand. My girl, uh… Her name was Vanessa.”

"Hm."

Deadpool sat next to him on the couch and glanced over. He held out his hand. "We can just stick together then, huh? Just two guys moving on."

Peter looked down at his hand and then shook it, huffing laughter under his breath. "Two guys moving on."

"You should get some sleep," Deadpool said, pulling his hand away. "Pretty sure you've still got organs to heal."

"Definitely feels that way."

"I'm gonna go see what I can dig up on the Employer," Pool stands. "Rest up, Webs. We've got more battles to fight."

Peter watched Deadpool walk out of his apartment, and then promptly fell back asleep.

Chapter 9: Right In Front of You

Chapter Text

"I need silence, and to be alone and to go out, and to save on our to consider what has happened to my world, what death has done to my world."
-Virginia Woolf

“Pssst. Webs. Spidey. Webs. Webs. Spidey. Spider-Man. Webs. Spidey.”

Peter groaned.

“Wake uppppp.”

He peeled an eye open.

Deadpool sat kneeled beside him, two inches from his face. “It’s like looking into my own masked face.”

Peter slowly sat up. The pull of muscles stretched painfully, and he grimaced with the way his ribs ached. The unusual weight of a leather mask on his face brought back the memories of yesterday’s events, the good, the bad, and the ugly. “What time is it?”

“Time for you to get a watch.” Deadpool grinned. “Also about twelve in the afternoon. Your eyes are the size of the moon. Blah blah blah. Anyways, you can stay here and rest up more if you want, but I have a date in a few hours and I’m gonna be gone.”

“sh*t.”

“It’s no biggie!” Pool said quickly. “Just—y’know, you probably won’t want to look around too much, you might find stuff you don’t want to see. Like my stuffed unicorn collection.”

“No, I mean—” Peter scrunched up his nose. “You have a stuffed unicorn collection?”

“Don’t ask.”

Peter shook his head. “Anyways. I meant that I also have a date, actually, and it’s—It’s also in a few hours. Coincidences are crazy like that I guess.”

“What, a date with a doctor?” Deadpool snorted. “You might fall apart at the f*ckin’ table. ‘Yeah, I ordered a salad, no, that isn’t raspberry vinaigrette–’ No offense. Maybe you're going out with Hannibal Lector and they'll be into it. Seriously tough, those bruises are f*cking gnarly.”

Peter sighed. “Ob-la-di, ob-la-da, amirite? It’s fine, they’ll heal more. It’s not like we’re like… Going boxing, or something. It’s just a friend hangout thing.”

“Right.. Well, if all else fails, say you got mauled by a bear. I’m sure it’ll be believable. It’s not like we live in a Metropolis.”

“I have to get my haircut,” Peter mumbled. He looked down at his body, the torn suit exhibiting the portrait of yellow and purple bruises, the scrapes and dried blood. “I really hate to ask this, but do you have an extra shirt or something? I’ll give them back! Just— the sun is out, it’ll be hard going home with a shredded-up suit.”

Pool scratched the back of his head and stood up. “I think I can find something that’ll fit your… frail, scrawny body, yeah.”

Peter watched him walk down the hallway and into a room off to the side, mumbling as he went about how he was “giving away all his clothes” or something of similar nature. He came back carrying a mesh yellow-black thing that reminded him of middle school flag football, cut off short with big sleeves and ‘TRAINEE’ written on the back, and then grey sweatpants that had grease stains which Peter was going to very pointedly ignore.

“...Thanks.” Peter pulled the clothes over his tattered suit then looked up at him. “How do I look?”

“Like a sent-home contestant at a cosplay contest.”

“Great.” Peter crossed his arms. “Thanks again.”

“Say it one more time and you’ll sound like Ariana Grande,” Deadpool said lightly. “I get it, I’m the Mother Teresa of clothes. Now get lost, leg-freak. That came out wrong. But seriously, you’re gonna be late to your date, spider-stud!”

Peter laughed under his breath and nodded. “Whatever, Pool. I’ll drop these off later.”

Deadpool waved him goodbye as he went out the front door.

Before he went to get his haircut, he needed to make a pitstop at his apartment. He couldn’t show up at May’s doorstep covered head to toe in various physical afflictions or he would be questioned till his ears came off. This would call for some light touch ups with drugstore makeup that he picked up from the corner store every few weeks. Then there was this whole wardrobe situation that left much to be desired.

The subway trip back to his apartment was as normal as any subway trip could be while wearing a torn up Spider-Man suit, sweatpants, and a yellow and black croptop. He had stuffed Deadpool’s mask into his pocket for whatever good that would do, but it didn’t stop any of the confused stares from midday New Yorkers sitting across from him.

He got to his apartment and the first thing he did was take a shower. The lukewarm water additive of the cheap showerhead didn’t help soothe his muscles quite the way he wanted it to, but at the very least he wasn’t covered in dried up blood, which was always a plus. He pulled on the first clothes he could find and then immediately went to the medicine cabinet hanging by his sink.

The split lip he had was noticeable. It couldn’t be covered with foundation, and would warrant questioning, but that was fine. He made sure to blend better around it so it didn’t look like he was clearly hiding any other wounds. The bruises on the other hand were all spot-treated, as they would be something warranting suspicion. By the end of the hour he looked relatively normal— and he was running late.

His phone rang from where he had put it on the counter, and Peter used a web to yank it towards him. He held it up to his ear. “May?”

“You said you would be here at twelve, did something happen?” May asked. Peter could hear the frown in her voice.

Peter kept the phone up to his ear with his shoulder and pulled on his shoes. “Uh—No, just running a little late! I’ll be there in a few minutes. I’m just getting on the subway now.”

Peter grimaced and then walked out the door, shutting it behind him.

“Did you sleep in again?”

Peter ran down the hallway and down the stairs of his apartment building. “Would you know if I was lying if I said no?”

May laughed softly. “Yes, I would.”

He smiled and left through the front doors, feeling the chill of the fresh air rush through his nose. “I’ll be there soon. Love you, May.”

“Love you too, Peter. Be safe.”

After a few quick super-human strength “jogs” to the subway, followed by about 30 minutes of tapping his toe on the moving floor, he finally was at the doorway of one May Parker. He put in his key and opened the door.

“I made it!” He called out. He kicked his shoes off into the wall trim and stepped down the hallway. “Shaggy curls and all.”

A white chair sits in the kitchen, set up right beside the sink. He remembered seeing the same chair, in the same kitchen, from before he could even come up to the countertop in height. Ben would be at the chair, and Peter would sit up on the counter, and he would watch the trimmed hair fall lightly to the sink.

May and Ben would banter softly to each other about groceries, taxes, and other things that Peter found incredibly mundane at the time. (Now he’d give anything to hear it again— sometimes the quietness of the Parker kitchen still got to him, even after all these years.)

“May?” Peter called out, looking around.

May stepped out of the bathroom and held up a pair of hair scissors. “I’m here, I just was looking for these darn scissors. The old ones are so dull, so I bought a new pair the other day, but I misplaced them this morning and— Oh, you don’t want to hear an old lady gripe. The important thing is that I found them.”

Peter smiled and sat down. “That’s alright, May. I don’t mind, you know that.”

May hummed. She stepped up and combed her fingers through his hair. “Nevertheless. How short do you want?”

“I don’t know,” Peter said honestly. “Just enough to get it out of my eyes, I guess.”

May threaded a section of the brown mess on his head through her fingers and ran it through, then stopped a few inches down. “I think I’m going to cut it here. That should keep it out of your face, but it’ll still show those handsome curls of yours.”

“You know best.”

“Hm,” May smiled with amusem*nt. She took a comb that was on the counter and brushed through his hair. Then she raised the scissors and began to snip.

“That’s a new sweatshirt,” May commented. “Where did you get it?”

Peter furrowed his eyebrows and looked down. Oh. He must have picked Wade’s hoodie up when he was changing clothes earlier.

“Uh,” Peter trailed off. He fiddled with the sleeves then stuck his hands in the large pockets. He didn’t know why he felt defensive all of the sudden; especially with May. Maybe he was just trying to convince himself of something that wasn’t true. It wasn’t like that, there weren’t any thoughts that it was going to be like that.

“Wade gave it to me. I was just—I was cold the other night, and he wouldn’t let me say no, so—“

“Maroon looks good on you,” May interrupted calmly.

Snip. A crescent of hair fell to the bottom of the sink.

“I like Wade,” May continued. “He’s very sweet.”

Peter nodded. “Yeah, he’s a good guy. He asked me out to dinner tonight, to this little place in Chinatown. We’re just gonna hang out, get some food. As a friend. A dinner between friends.”

“Yes, I believe I’ve heard of those,” May said. She didn't sound convinced, and the lilt of her voice had a teasing to it that couldn’t be denied. She was amused.

There’s another quiet snip. A curl of hair drifts to the bottom of the sink.

Peter waited for a comment that didn’t come. He waited for the knowing smile of his aunt paired with a gentle, verbal callout of his nonsense. It wasn’t like he was asking for a date, he wasn’t going out of his way to find some new person to fall in love with. Still, he knew what the words sounded like beside each other when he spoke them aloud, and he knew May could read between the lines of all of it like they blended together seamlessly.

Instead his answer came in silence. He could feel the lack of judgement, a mutual understanding between the two of them that this was the closest thing to any kind of interaction with somebody new, friend or more, in several months—May did not think less of him for it. Could she ever?

It made him think again that taking a step forward was… the right thing to do. For him.

“I had a dream about Gwen last night,” Peter said. He laid the events of the night before out in front of him and ate around the parts he couldn’t mention. For May’s sake, he didn’t almost die, and he most certainly didn’t see what could only be described as the afterlife.

May’s hands stilled. The hesitancy radiated from her in waves. Carefully, she resumed trimming another inch off Peter’s hair. “They’re not getting better?”

‘I will tread lightly,’ her hesitancy said. Her heart trailed after it in its uptake of beats. ‘But I will still worry.’

“Generally I guess they are,” Peter said. “There are still bad days. This one specifically was good, though. It was like I talked to her, May.”

May sighed softly with relief. It was quiet, something nobody should have been able to hear, but Peter had a small scorecard of luck to keep track of wins like these. Her heartbeat calmed. “What did she say?”

“She told me I should remember her life,” Peter said honestly. “And… I don’t know, I woke up feeling a lot better, I guess.”

“Hm,” May hummed fondly. She carefully snipped another inch. “Ben used to talk to me in dreams.”

Peter furrowed his eyebrows at this very new information. It was the kind of thing that shouldn’t be stated in such a casual manner, because the moment the words settled in it caused his world to sway for a moment.

“Used to?”

May nodded and stepped to the side of Peter’s head. Another faint snip. “I suppose I needed him still, and he knew that. I stopped seeing him in my dreams when I found purpose. Closure.”

She sighed, then softly laughed to herself. “I still love him more than anything. And I do miss him everyday. If you ask me, Ben knew when he didn’t need to watch over me anymore. I would be okay then to focus on the next important part of my life— and with that, I chose to help people. I don’t regret a thing.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me that?” Peter wondered in a quiet awe. “I never knew.”

“You were quite occupied trying to find yourself in your new role without him,” May explained. If only she knew the full colours of that statement, the red, the blue, the red all over again. The spider web in his windowsill that month had been replaced by muddy footprints.

“Besides,” May brushed her hands through his hair again. She then leaned his head back and turned the faucet on, letting the warm water run through his hair and rinse the stray strands out. “We’ve made our way now. Ben was always so proud of you, I’m overjoyed to carry on that legacy.”

She turned the faucet back off and patted him on the shoulder. She grinned at him, glancing up at her handiwork. “Perfect. You look like a very handsome young man. Except—“

May thumbed over Peter’s chin studiously. “Except for that lip. Don’t think I didn’t notice. Did you treat it correctly?”

“Yeah,” Peter said with a quick nod. He felt the guilt flood his face in red. He expected this, but that didn’t make the conversation any less of an internal struggle. “I did. It was just—“

“I understand,” May interrupted quietly. She gave a sigh, and her eyes softened. “Have fun with Wade, okay?”

“Thank you,” Peter said sincerely. “For the whole thing. The talk, and the haircut. You always know the right thing to say.”

May brushed a wet curl of hair away from his eyebrow and genuinely smiled. “Anytime, Peter.”

With a haircut out of the way, Peter was on with the second goal of the day. He found himself thinking of Deadpool on the way there—The man also had an event, apparently. It made him wonder how he acted under the mask, with the guise of civilian clothing with no set of katanas to hide behind.

Peter chuckled at the idea of Deadpool being this brooding figure, someone who wore a suit with no formal tie, a stern face, dark eyes. The opposite of who he portrayed himself as. He didn’t think Spider-Man was terribly different from Peter Parker— Maybe just a difference in confidence, the way he carried himself. Was it different for Pool? Was he silent as a civilian?

His mind continued to wander as the subway sped along its tracks. Deadpool as he is, sitting on a date. The mask is on, the lenses widen and narrow with glee. In Peter’s head, he cracks an obnoxious joke and is throwing his hands around the air to enunciate every inflection.

Peter snorted at the mental picture and burst into giggles, bowing his head down.

“Oh, someone’s in love.”

Peter’s head shot up to see a pleased-looking old man, crossing his arms and smiling like a happy cartoon character. “Hm?”

“Don’t try and deny it! I know love when I see it. Yes, I do. You have that look in your eyes. Mhm.” He rattled off, his eyes creasing in joyful crescents. “When I was your age—“

“Oh.” The subway halted on the path and the doors opened with blinking lights. Peter stood up. “This is my stop. Sorry, sir. You’re mistaken. No young love here, I just thought of something funny. Have a nice day, though, it was nice to meet you.”

Peter grimaced as he hopped off the subway, sneaking between the people entering through the doors and hearing the man’s angered cries carried on when the doors closed again.

The sky was getting dark, and there was a familiar earthy smell in the air that told him rain would be coming in sooner rather than later. Luckily, the place in Chinatown that Wade was talking about is just a few blocks away. Peter pulled his phone out of his pocket as he walked and selected his contact.

[Peter Parker: Hey! I’m OMW.]

[Wade Wilson: whoop whoop‼️i’ll look for ur face at the door👀]

“He’s already there?” Peter muttered. He shoved his phone away and quickly crossed down the street. He jogged down the sidewalk until he saw the little restaurant tucked in the corner, paper lanterns hanging from the inside windows in colours of red, yellow, green, and purple.

He crossed another street and opened the door—a bell chimed as he walked in. He set his eyes on Wade, who sat at a table in the corner of the small restaurant and grinned at him with a cheery wave.

Peter moved forward to the end of the room and sat across from him at the wobbly wooden table. He smiled back. “Hey, Wade.”

The restaurant was quaint, but cultured. He could tell by the way there were indents and chips in the furniture, cracks in the black and white tiles, a paper menu in the middle of the table with words faded away at the edges where a hand would have held it.

“What happened to your lip?” Was the first thing Wade said. He was casual about it, but the odd thing was that his expression didn’t give away any sort of emotion. Peter had nothing to base an explanation off of.

“Nothing,” Peter shrugged, making sure to keep the smile from faltering. “It’s healing.”

“Also! That is a very nice sweatshirt,” Wade said, leaning back and posing his hand on his hip. “Super stylish. Whoever you got it from has excellent taste. Truly, just the best—Better than Vogue.”

Peter looked down at his—Wade’s hoodie, and facepalmed. His cheeks felt hot with embarrassment. “Oh geez. Yeah, definitely. Really good taste.”

Wade laughed quietly and brought his arm back down to rest in his lap. “It does look good on you, though. I hope it’s keeping you warm. This city can be cold when it wants to be.”

“Yeah, it’s keeping me warm,” Peter smiled. “Thanks again. You look good too. The sweatshirt, I mean. The one you’re wearing, it looks good on you. Too.”

Smooth.

Wade exhaled with amusem*nt and smoothed the wrinkles from the front of his crewneck, better revealing the faded picture of a horror movie’s poster. “Thanks. You a fan of Halloween?”

“It wasn’t bad,” Peter said, raising his eyebrows to prove his point. “It’s got a classic villain theme too. Can't go wrong with that.”

“True!”

Peter smiled and then reached for a menu. “So… Wontons, right? ‘To die for’?”

“Definitely,” Wade assured. “The Chicken Lo Mein is really good too—Pretty much everything here, honestly.”

Then, Wade leaned in with a dramatic whisper. “The owner, Ru, makes all the stuff fresh with his grown up kiddies. He pretends that he doesn’t like me all that much, but I think he secretly loves me.”

Peter snorted, then leaned in and whispered back. “Is that so?”

Wade widened his eyes and nodded with full conviction. “Oh, yeah.”

“Well, then.” Peter pulled back. “I believe you. This guy must have some killer chow mein.”

Wade nodded solemnly. “How hungry are you? We could be here all night with this menu. I’m joking. I’m not joking. I’m joking.”

A laugh startled from Peter’s lungs before he had a thought about it, and he looked back down at the paper in his hands. “You know what? Order whatever. I'm not picky.”

And ‘order whatever’ is exactly what Wade did. In the next thirty minutes, their table was full of Chinese food that smelled like heaven, and Wade was shooting the owner a wink and a thumbs up, which Peter found to be another source of stifled laughter as Ru rolled his eyes and returned to the kitchen as a response.

“So,” Wade turned to his food and took a gargantuan bite, chewed quickly and swallowed the whole thing. “Do anything interesting this weekend?”

Nearly got killed, woke up at a mutant mercenary’s apartment. The usual day-to-day activities.

“Not really,” Peter smiled feebly. “Just work. You?”

“Crazy,” Wade said, raising his eyebrows. “Like… Paper Man (2009) crazy.”

“What happened?” Peter asked, already feeling the freeing beginning of a laugh in his chest.

Wade paused, then shook his head. “I met up with an old coworker. It was a f*cking trip though, because the building he works at now is in desperate need of an exterminator, so much bugs. Really had to shoot the whole place down. Folks at home will get that joke.”

“Right,” Peter smiled. “Well, good luck with your coworker. And the bugs. Luckily my job only extends to taking pictures.”

“Yeah, about that,” Wade pointed out, holding a hand up. He looked curiously at Peter and took another bite of food. “What did you wanna be before you started working for Jameson?”

“A scientist.”

Wade gave an impressive eyebrow raise. “Really? You’re real smart, then? Modern day Isaac ‘Fig’ Newton?”

“It’s just Isaac Newton, and… Something like that,” Peter laughed.

“Sure. What made you quit?”

“I didn’t quit,” Peter defended. “I just… Life happened, I guess. What about you? You got any dreams you gave up?”

“Career-wise? I guess not,” Wade moved some noodles around on his plate. “The place I lived in was pretty much the Monster House, so my dream was always to get out of there. I faked my age when I was about sixteen and joined the Special Forces, and then boom: problem solved.”

“Sixteen,” Peter said in a sort of horrified awe. He didn’t want to imagine Wade as a sixteen year old kid, camo paint on his face and seeing so much that nobody should see. “That’s… Wow. And they just let you in?”

“If you can make it past training, they don’t really give a sh*t. ‘Cuz they already spent their money on you, y’know?”

Peter looked down at his food.

“Hope I didn’t scare you away with all that,” Wade joked. “Not exactly a super funny conversation. We could talk about James Corden’s sudden and meaningless branch into Hollywood, that’s pretty funny. Seriously, I didn’t think he was that bad in Into The Woods, but then he was cast as a f*ckin’ emoji? And don’t even get me started on Cats. I’ve been hurt too many times, Petey. Too many times.”

“No, no,” Peter shook his head. “You didn’t spook me or anything. I was just thinking about something, but it’s not important. Um...”

He stuffed his mouth with food to prevent himself from talking any more, and wondered briefly how the conversation would change if he were able to bring up his own “story.” The reason he was wearing makeup, the reason he had to reschedule this date, the reason he was himself.

“I noticed you cut your hair,” Wade pointed out, fidgeting with his hands. He seemed just as jittery to move onto the next subject.

Peter nodded and quickly swallowed his food. “Yeah, May did it, actually.”

“She did a really great job,” Wade smiled. “My mom used to give me a bowl cut when I was a kid. I looked like that kid from The Shining. The little creepy one who talks to his finger.”

“I can almost picture that,” Peter smiled. “Bet you rocked that style.”

“Totally. Oh, hey! Guess what?” Wade reached forward for a paper bag on the table.

“Hm?”

“Fortune cookies!” Wade poured the bag’s contents onto the table, and several prepackaged cookies fell out. “Choose wisely, Petey. This determines your entire worldview, you know.”

Peter scoffed lightly. Reaching over the pile, he selected one, then unwrapped it and broke the cookie open. Pulling the message out carefully, he read the message in his head.

The love of your life is right in front you.'

Peter narrowed his eyes, daring to glance up at Wade. “Did you write these fortunes?”

“No! That would be cheating.” Wade broke open his own cookie. He read the words off with a goofy grin. “Be passionate and totally worth the chaos in bed.”

Peter blinked.

“…No WAY does it say that,” Peter leaned forward and angled his head to look at the small paper held in between Wade’s fingers.

‘Be passionate and totally worth the chaos.’

“It’s funny!” Wade exclaimed with exuberance. “Here, read yours but add ‘in bed’ at the end.”

“It won’t make any sense, I’ll grab another one.” Peter stuffed the original message he got in his pocket. He grabbed a new cookie, cracked it in two, and then read the new message out.

“Love yourself hard in bed,” Peter stifled, holding back laughter.

Wade howled, slapping his knee. “That’s a good one! Holy sh*t.”

Peter met him in his laughter until his face was cherry red. He couldn’t remember the last time he was this truly happy, like it was something natural, something pure and clean. His chest rose with the light breath he took between laughs and began again.

At some point he wasn’t laughing because the joke was funny, but rather laughing for the sake of the rush, the joy bursting at the seams. He didn’t get to feel like that often, and it was such a nice feeling that it reeled him in at every possible moment. There were a lot of moments with Wade.

“Can I walk you home?” Wade asked, as the energy settled over into calmer waters. His smile was sweet, his eyes were bright, and Peter’s head and heart felt all fuzzy.

“Sure, yeah,” Peter said. “My apartment’s not that far away, but—“

He turned around and looked out the window, watching rain pour down in the streets in thick droplets. “Look like it’s pretty stormy out there.”

“We can do our best impression of Singin’ In The Rain, then.” Wade started stacking the empty plates. “I’ll be Kathy Seldon.”

Peter snorted. “I’ve never seen it.”

“A crime!” Wade groaned. “You gotta see that. It’s playing at an old theatre in Harlem next week, this really bust up place with couches that look like they’re from the 70s, but they're cheap tickets.”

“Speaking of cheap,” Peter laughed quietly under his breath. “I didn’t actually think about the whole bill situation here. I can pay you back later, and—“

Wade shook his head. “I’ve got it, Pete, don’t worry about it. It’s my treat, y’know? I invited you, plus I’m the one with the coupon.”

“If you’re sure,” Peter said hesitantly.

“I’m definitely sure.”

Peter smiled slightly. “Alright, then.”

Wade put down some money on the table, right beside the coupon, and they walked out of the small restaurant together. Rain poured down, splashing on the concrete and pavement, the windows of passing cars, the stretched fabric of umbrellas.

Peter pulled his hood over his head. “Chilly.”

“Sure is,” Wade said. “My hands are freezing.”

“What, your space-heater hands?” Peter teased knowingly.

“Definitely.”

Peter looked down at his hands. “You’ve got pockets, y’know.”

“…Pfff,” Wade stuck his hands in his pockets. “Yeah. I knew that.”

“Mhm.”

As they walked down the sidewalk, Peter looked up at the rain and squinted, letting the drops hit his face. “I think it’s getting lighter, at least. It was worse while we were eating.”

“Yeah?”

Peter looked over at Wade and nodded.

“What the f*ck.” Wade stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, his eyes going stern. “What happened?”

The world slowed. Peter furrowed his eyebrows with his sudden confusion. “What do you mean?”

“I mean the bruises on your face,” Wade said. His voice was… cold. Unwavering, still, calculated. His whole demeanor had changed, his shoulders stiffened, and it became suddenly very clear that Wade was taller than him. “Who hurt you?”

Red alarm bells rang in Peter’s head. He slowly raised a hand to his cheek and pulled it away, seeing the watered down foundation smeared on the tips of his fingers. He looked back up at Wade.

It’s just a lie! He’s fine under pressure!

“Uh…” Peter said dumbly. “I just fell down the stairs?”

Wade subtly narrowed his eyes, a minuscule movement of his facial expression that somehow added greatly to the very protective stature he had.

Okay. Maybe he’s not fine under pressure. What the hell?

Peter scratched behind his head and gave a nervous smile. It was like he was talking to a completely different person. “It’s no big deal, Wade.”

“Are you sh*tting me, or are you being serious?”

“I’m being serious,” Peter lied, the words heavy on his tongue. “I’m totally and completely safe. It was just a freak accident, nothing else. Take a breath, okay, big guy?”

Wade slowly nodded and forced himself to relax. He continued walking, but glanced sideways back at Peter every few seconds as if he expected him to more, like he knew Peter was lying— and he probably did.

Wade Wilson was like a complicated puzzle. He was a sweetheart, he was funny, he was unconventional in the most interesting way. He wore his trauma like a mask, a visible tattoo. He cared a great deal, yet hid it so humbly that he probably didn’t even notice it.

But he asked questions, and questions always tended to get good people in trouble. Peter had to end this curiosity now, or else some domino effect could happen and he’d be sitting at the bottom of a different clocktow—

“I got jumped last night," he blurted. He scratched the back of his ear uncomfortably.

Wade glanced over again.

“It happens too much for my own good,” Peter explained further, choosing his words carefully, as honestly as he could without revealing the truth. “I didn’t want May to worry this morning, so I covered it with makeup. I don’t like it when she worries.”

Wade relaxed genuinely this time, his expression softening as he listened to Peter speak.

“I’m sorry that I lied,” Peter said firmly. It’s all he’s known since he was fourteen. He doesn’t know how to live without it.

Wade hummed with understanding. “Right. Yeah. Sorry I went all Terminator on you. I have this weird thing with honesty or something. Hah.”

Peter hid a wince, just the slightest cringe in his facial expression. He didn’t know if Wade noticed or not.

“It’s good to have someone who worries for you,” Wade said. “I think you and May are similar like that. Always caring about other people, y’know? You look out for each other. It’s sweet. Very familial.”

Peter looked at him thoughtfully. “I guess I never noticed.”

He turned away and let the conversation drift to silence. The rain pattered softly in a dissonant background to their matching steps.

“This is me,” Peter said once they reached the end of the block. “Thanks for the dinner, this was fun. We should do that movie thing you were talking about, some time.”

He was going to make this work, somehow. Questions could be avoided. Something told him that Wade Wilson was worth it.

“The fake age Special Forces thing really didn’t throw you off, huh?” Wade smiled lightly.

Peter jutted his chin out with a smirk. “It takes more than that to scare me, Wade Wilson.”

“Noted,” Wade laughed. “Night, Pete.”

“Goodnight, Wade.”

Peter opened the door and walked into the apartment complex. He entered the elevator and watched the doors close.

His apartment building has a reputation that precedes him, he had heard the complaints before he even moved in. There were drafty hallways, poor insulation in the winter, worse air conditioning in the summer, and rumours of lead in the paint of the oldest windows on the bottom floor.

But if there was a chill in that elevator, he didn’t feel it.

He smiled, stuffed his hands in his pockets, and gathered the hoodie closer to himself.

Chapter 10: Looking For A Gold Card

Chapter Text

"And the danger is that in this move toward new horizons and far directions, that I may lose what I have now, and not find anything except loneliness."
-Sylvia Plath

The snow was beginning to fall faster. Winter was coming. It was apparent in the city every way Wade turned. They put up the Christmas tree, the one up in Rockefeller—Tourists started showing up everywhere, cameras and big fluffy scarves.

He had something he needed to check.

Wade entered an empty Sister Margaret’s, feeling the chill in his bones and an unusual dread. “Hey, Weas.”

“Oh no,” Weasel rolled his eyes with a loud groan. He looked at Wade with exasperation and crossed his arms. “You only show up when sh*t goes south. What did you do?”

“I didn’t do sh*t,” Wade defended. “I came to check something! I’m using my resources. I’m a good boy.”

Weasel looked cautious, with about as much worry as somebody could get with a history of working with mercenaries that had tricks up their sleeves, or in Wade’s case, a leather suit. “Alright, I’m listening.”

“I need you to look someone up in the system,” Wade said. He sighed and looked down, an uneasy feeling came over him just at the thought of asking. “Is there a Peter Parker anywhere? A hit, maybe? Criminal record? Anything suspicious?”

(“What the f*ck.” Wade had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk when he saw it. “Your face. Who hurt you?”

Foundation dripped from his cheek to reveal a smear of familiar colours, the yellows and purples and blues that come with territory that Peter shouldn’t be anywhere near.

That had been concerning enough.

And then he lied about it.

“I’m being serious,” Peter had said slowly. Wade didn’t like how people sounded when they lied often and were bad at lying. “I’m totally and completely safe. It was just a freak accident, nothing else. Take a breath, okay, big guy?”)

“Peter Parker?” Weasel asked. He shrugged and walked behind the counter. “The name doesn’t sound too familiar. This have anything to do with that Spider-Man case you’ve got going?”

“No,” Wade said with a shake of his head. He faked a cheesy grin. “Just a little side mission, you know? Not the main quest.”

Weasel typed the name into his computer. Wade studied his next expressions very carefully.

He was reading.

Scrolling—Wade heard the electronic mouse, bit by bit.

Weasel narrowed his eyes. “There’s a Peter Padilla? Straight red hair, scar over his cheek—”

“Not him.”

“Then…” Weasel glanced up. “Nope. No hit.”

Wade sighed with relief, the air leaving his chest in a big rush. Motherf*cker. He laughed breathlessly. “Great! That’s—Okay. Awesome.”

“Why’d you ask me to do that, Wade? Who’s Peter Parker?”

“Ah,” Wade shrugged him away. “Just didn’t want to end up dating a mob boss again. Mistakes happen, you know?”

“You went on a date?” Weasel raised his eyebrows. “You? Went on a date? And he went on a date with you?”

“Bitch?” Wade tilted his head. “Listen, I know I’m unloveable, but he doesn’t. You better not screw this up for me, Weasel. He’s adorable and kind. And really smart. And he’s slightly beat up all the time, so excuse me for being kinda concerned!”

“Right,” Weasel scoffed. “Well. I’ll be here with the Sea Breezes when that sh*t goes tumbling into a dump like a rollercoaster on the f*cking fritz.”

“Thanks,” Wade said blankly.

Weasel clicked his tongue. He took a glass from behind the counter and poured a drink into it. “Want one?”

Wade huffed and sat up on a barstool. “Just one. I don’t want to be wasted the rest of today, or rather, the next two minutes. I’ve got sh*t to do, people to find, places to be, blah blah blah blah.”

“People to find?” Weasel passed the drink over. He poured himself one too.

“Yeah, that whole Spider-Man thing? Total crazy case, by the way. He’s not the bad guy. The Employer is. He’s got this whole back-alley lab thing going on, with f*ckin’… there are spider jars and it’s all in this abandoned warehouse, and it’s like—“

“What the f*ck are you talking about? The Employer is a super villain? Is that what you’re saying?”

“Yeah. Big time.”

“I would say I’m shocked, but I mean… Some random guy with a creepy voice that won’t say his name versus notorious hero Spider-Man?” Weasel clicked his tongue. “Should’ve seen it coming.”

Wade nodded, picking the drink up and swirling it around in thought. “Maybe he’s being abused.”

“Who, The Employer? That’s certainly a supervillain backstory, but—”

“No, Weas,” Wade interrupted, still looking down. “I don’t mean The Employer. I mean Peter.”

“Oh.” Weasel leaned on the side of the bar. “You got any evidence? I mean, other than the bruises.”

Wade ran his tongue over his teeth in thought, rolling back over all of their previous interactions. Thanksgiving is the one that shows up with the biggest alarms in his head. Peter even from the moment he walked in that day looked exhausted, and it only grew as the evening passed. Then there was the rooftop.

(“What about you?” Wade asked. “What kinda sh*t keeps you up at night, Petey-Pie?”

Peter looked away. He stared at the city, and Wade saw the flash in his eyes that told him he hit a target. Like breathing, Peter raised his hand and scratched incessantly at something behind his ear. Like he was trying to get rid of something. Like he wanted something gone.

“What’s that?” Wade asked, gesturing up to Peter’s ear.

Peter quickly blinked and pulled his hand away from where he had been scratching. He threw on a smile and lifted his short hair up to reveal the discoloured skin, white and healed over in a little mark. “Ah, nothing. It’s just a scar.”)

Wade clenched his jaw. The lying, the scar, the bruises, the distant look in his eyes… It was all suddenly a bigger possibility than he wanted it to be.

“Are you gonna go all merc on him?”

Wade quickly picked his head up to look at him.

“You’ve got that look in your eye,” Weasel gestured to his face. “Not that it’s easy to see with all the f*cking scars and sh*t. But it’s there.”

“No, I’m not gonna ‘go all merc’ on him.” Wade snapped with a frown.

“Don’t look at me like that!” Weasel said defensively. “You literally beat up assholes for a living. If he’s in a bad situation, then you could like.. I dunno. Stalk the guy around a little.”

“Oh, yeah.” Wade said humourlessly. “Great A-class idea. Stalk the guy I like. No. This isn’t a hit, Weasel.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time you stalked somebody you liked.”

Wade glared darkly.

“sh*t, fine.” Weasel threw his hands up. “Just trying to help. Christ.”

“I already got your help,” Wade said, pulling away from the bar. “Thanks for double-checking that my date wasn’t a mob boss. Real appreciated. Now, I—”

His phone started ringing.

“...I am going to answer this call,” Wade said simply, reaching his hand into his pocket. He pulled his phone out and couldn’t help but smile at the contact. “It’s Peter.”

“Answer it then, loverboy.”

Wade flipped him off and then answered the phone, getting up from the bar and pointedly walking to the other side of the room. “Hey, Petey-Pie.”

“Hi, Wade,” Peter greeted cheerily. “Um… So, I know we only went out, like, a couple of days ago, but—”

Wade tucked himself closer to the phone and grinned softly.

“—I was wondering if you wanted to come with me while I went out for some errands?” Peter questioned, his voice stringing higher at the end. It melted Wade’s heart that Pete could be nervous. To prove his theory, Peter cut back in with another fast set of words. “Unless that’s weird. I’m just going shopping for May, it’s not like… fancy, but I like hanging out and— Maybe this is too weird, actually. I’m just gonna—”

“I’d love to!” Wade spoke up. “That sounds fun. I’m not doing anything else, you know? Just, uh… sitting. At home.”

Across the bar, Weasel raised an eyebrow at him and mouthed something mean.

Wade stuck his tongue out back.

“Okay,” Peter said. Wade heard a smile in his voice. “That’s great, then. Um… Do you want to meet me at the station on 71st street?”

“Gotcha.”

“Okay,” Peter said again. Smile still present; his voice was soft. “Cool. I’ll see you there. I’m just picking up some groceries for May, so, it shouldn’t take too much of your day or anything…”

“What time?” Wade asked, laughing quietly. “I mean, I’m more than happy to just stand out there all day, it’s really not an issue, but—”

“Oh!” Peter let out an embarrassed noise and stumbled. “Right, um. How about one? In the afternoon, not the morning.”

“Cool.” Wade looked up at the clock on the wall. “See you in an hour and a half, Petey.”

“Yeah! See you.”

Wade smiled and hung up the phone, then tucked it close to his heart. He looked up at Weasel with an exaggerated expression of adoration, all big eyes and pouty lips. “He’s so cute, Weas.”

“And you’re so not,” Weasel scrunched up his nose with disgust. “Get out of here. Go find out why Petey-Pie looks like the before picture on an illegal boxing addiction advertisem*nt.”

“You’re such an asshole.” Wade groaned obnoxiously, stuffed his phone in his pocket, and headed toward the exit. He waved a haphazard goodbye and left Weasel without a second thought.

There was a lot to ponder on his speed-walk to even lower Manhattan. His mind was like a tilt-a-whirl of everything Peter Parker, a nervous laugh, a scratch to the ear, freckles under his eyelash and a maroon sweater that marks Wade’s favourite grand theft.

Wade always knew that his loyalty was easily won by sweet faces and kind hearts, but he already knew that he had a long list of things he’d do to keep Peter safe. Maybe that made him crazy. Maybe he’s the one who needed someone else to check on him, make sure he was alright in the head—

He was running late. Fifteen minutes up, he hadn’t even made it to the bus station yet. On his way there was a nice flower stall with the most sad-looking half-wilted orange roses on sale, and Wade suddenly felt everything in him jitter with excitement.

He pulled off to the side and pointed to a bouquet of the mopey orange-ish brown flower-resembling things in the seller’s hands. “How much?”

“For the bouquet?” The seller asked, an old woman with deep frown lines on her wrinkled face. “Young man, please— Just take them. I don’t even give a sh*t.”

Wade grinned wildly and reached for a bouquet, then tucked it in the crook of his arm—(a dried petal flew off a rose with an audible crisping noise as it finally broke free from the pack of other dried petals)— and fished a hand into his wallet, handing her a twenty dollar bill.

She took it and raised it to the sky for a moment, looking equal parts grateful and exhausted. “Bless you.”

Wade was back on his way, now adorned with a wrinkled bouquet that he held in an iron grip while he trekked down the street. He felt deeply crazy about the whole thing, a man buying roses for his date to the grocery store just because he could, just because he wanted to. He couldn’t even feel embarrassed by the state of the poor things, and only had the slightest worry that he hoped Peter felt the same careless way about them too.

He jumped on the bus and counted the minutes till it reached his next stop. There was this real judgy teenager staring at him, narrowing his eyes and looking down at the flowers in Wade’s arms.

Wade narrowed his eyes right back.

The bus stopped and Wade got up quickly, trailing in to the station.

When he finally entered, he spotted Peter standing as far away from the band playing as it looked he could, pressed against a filthy station wall and flinching away from other people. He squinted mildly at his phone with earbuds plugged into his ears. Dorky sweater layered with an equally dorky jacket—Whatever, he looked gorgeous. He hadn’t noticed Wade enter yet.

Wade managed a handful of steps forward before Peter’s head jerked up in acknowledgement. The grin that bloomed immediately on his face caused Wade serious heart palpitations, and he had to wrangle his mouth into a matching grin that he hoped didn’t out his absolute disgusting fondness.

“Hope you like dead things,” Wade said dumbly.

Peter raised his eyebrows with surprise. His eyes flickered down to the bouquet. Then back to Wade. He narrowed his eyes and smiled slyly. “I hope you mean the flowers.”

Holy sh*t of ass, Peter was teasing him.

“Duh,” Wade snorted. (He cringed internally. It’s the flowers most of the time, anyways. ) He handed them carefully, but clicked his tongue when he watched another small handful of petals clatter to the ground. “Aww. That’s a shame. Old granny’s losing her hair.”

Peter laughed quietly and held the bouquet as if it may crumble to dust, which it definitely might. His eyes softened kindly as he looked back up at Wade. “Thank you for the flowers. Wish I came more prepared, all I have is a Metrocard and one of May’s reusable grocery bags.”

He held up the grocery bag— Wade glanced at the floral print fabric, his lip quirking involuntarily upwards. “Cute. Looks like something she’d pick out.”

“Yeah, I made them for her,” Peter looped the bag’s strap back over his shoulder.

“Wait, you made it?” Wade smiled wider. “You sew stuff?”

Peter shrugged indifferently.

“I can too,” Wade said proudly. “I sewed up my own suit.”

Oopsie.

“Wedding suit,” Wade clarified, emphasis on lied. Then he got smacked with what he actually said, and clarified again: “Not mine! Not my wedding suit, just– my hobby. I’m not married.”

Peter blinked, opening his mouth and then closing it like a confused goldfish stuck in a coral maze. Finally, he grimaced out an awkward smile. “That’s cool. I… sewed a— a few suits, uh… too.”

Wade wanted to scream loudly. Very loudly.

Instead, the subway pulled up and the doors screeched open. Peter gestured forward. “After you?”

“Yes,” Wade said quickly, walking forward and sitting in an empty seat.

Peter stepped in after him and sat right beside, close enough where Wade could see the knot in his tangled earbud wires, and the faint scar behind the left of his— Wait a second.

“Are you wearing makeup again?” Wade asked, furrowing his eyebrows. “You’re not, are you?”

“No?” Peter frowned and touched a hand to his own cheek. He gave Wade a look of puzzlement. “I’m— Do I look like I am?”

“No, but you—” Wade tilted his head. His bruises were gone. He shook his head and grinned brightly at Peter, albeit still lost. “You look great. Thought you’d be still scraped up though. I only just saw you a couple-a days ago and your bruises from getting mugged looked pretty bad, figured they’d be… you know.”

“Oh.” Peter blinked. “You remembered that?”

Refraining from telling Peter that it’s all his one-track mind could f*cking think about, Wade shrugged and put on the most light-hearted jokey tone he could manage. “Not exactly forgettable. What if you were a criminal mastermind or something?”

Peter let out a soft laugh, glancing down at the floor. He scratched at the scar on his ear again. “Definitely not a criminal mastermind.”

Wade considered him for a moment.

Well, at least that wasn’t a lie.

“Seriously,” Wade nudged his knee. “Where’d you get that scar, honey buns?”

“‘Honey buns’,” Peter repeated with a ridiculous smile. He shook his head. “You’re funny.”

“So’re you. Dodging the question and all,” Wade nudged his knee a second time. He felt someone across the subway looking at him and pulled his hood up over his head on instinct.

“You don’t have to talk about it,” Wade continued. His voice got softer with understanding. “I know what it’s like to not wanna have to talk about scars. Believe me.”

“I do believe you,” Peter murmured. He stared at Wade’s eyes in thought, eyebrows crinkled inwards slightly and bottom lip tucked in as he chewed on it nervously. His hand sank down to his pocket and he huffed quietly, breaking their eye contact to meet the ceiling of the subway.

Wade remained quiet. The ball was in Peter’s court now. He could continue the conversation or change the subject, and Wade would be happy and willing to listen any way the ball was tossed, or however the hell the analogy went.

“I got the scar in an accident,” Peter spoke up. He sighed. “In, uh— In a lab. Got bit by something, and it left a mark. I was fourteen.”

“Lab accident at fourteen?” Wade raised his brows. “Youch. What were you even doing? When I was fourteen I was chucking rocks at cars and flicking pen ink at girls I liked.”

Peter shrugged. “Field trip. And why would you do either of those things? Pen ink, dude?”

“It was readily available and less gross than a spitball. What would you do?”

“Talk to her?” Peter suggested.

Wade burst out with fake laughter, shaking his head and waving Peter off. “Talk to her? You’re telling me you did that? Impossible. No way. That never works.”

Peter grinned, playful with sweet little creases in the corner of his eyes. “I talked to you. And technically you’re still here, so maybe it does work. I dunno.”

“Aw,” Wade gushed, his heart swelling up and causing an uncomfortable lump in his throat that definitely wasn’t the cancer. Hell, he was swooning. Embarrassing. “You’re adorable, Petey-Pie. I’d definitely splash you with pen ink if I had some.”

“Oh. Lucky me,” Peter wiggled his eyebrows.

The two of them dissolved into laughter as the subway plunged forward on the rails. When it stopped on the next station, Peter patted him on the arm and stood up. “That’s us, Wade.”

Wade followed him off the subway, out of the station, up the street— he was like a lovesick puppy.

“Do you want me to hold the bag?” Wade offered as they walked into a small market.

“Sure,” Peter smiled and slid the strap off his shoulder, handing it over to Wade. Then he pulls a post-it out of his pocket and turns it over in one of his hands, reading over the list. (In his other hand, he holds the sadly limping bouquet of dying roses.)

Wade leaned in closer, and he swore it was just to read the list, he swore, but he was close enough to smell fresh soap and vanilla, and he’s pretty sure he’s about to be a victim of spontaneous combustion. Peter leaned close to allow Wade to see the small post-it even better.

“We need to get sugar, milk, cinnamon, nutmeg,” Peter listed off.

“Eggs,” Wade continued.

“Almond extract, dark chocolate chips, yogurt, and maple syrup.”

“May likes to bake?” Wade guessed.

“Yeah. Cookie season.”

“Ah.” Wade held the bag carefully, pleasantly swinging back and forth on his heels. “We should go check out the spices and stuff. It’ll be in the same place.”

“I like your plan,” Peter gave him a grin and took off walking in that direction. He looked back over his shoulder to make sure Wade was following, and called back: “Teamwork makes the dream work, Wade! We could get this done in record time?”

“And what’s your record time, hm? Got yourself a grocery PB?” Wade looked around in the aisle for any of the ingredients he remembered on the list.

“Oh, yeah, don’t you?” Peter joked. He took a small glass container of nutmeg off the shelf and walked over to Wade, who put it into the bag. “Mine is five minutes. I was late for work, it was a whole thing.”

“Sounds like it,” Wade took a jar of cinnamon off the shelf—half off price. He put it in the bag.

“Pretty sure almond extract should also be in this aisle,” Peter said, scanning the aisle with narrowed eyes. His expression lit up, and Peter walked over and leaned up effortlessly on his toes, picking a small bottle off the top shelf and showing it off to Wade with a proud smile. “I was right.”

Hell. He was adorable. Peter walked over and put the bottle into the bag.

“Sugar?”

Peter looked up like a deer in headlights. “Sorry?”

Wade hesitated. “Isn’t that on May’s list?”

“Oh.” Peter’s cheeks and ears bloomed red. “Yeah, it is. Uh—”

Peter looked around the aisle quickly and then reached behind Wade, picking up a bag of sugar and putting it into the grocery bag before he could even think twice. “Got it. Let’s go get the milk and eggs and stuff. Can’t bake without ‘em.”

So the two of them get the milk. The maple syrup, which Peter found as they were crossing the aisle. (Wade was offended when he saw it, pitching a whole damn fit and rightfully so because it wasn’t even the good stuff, the good stuff being anything created in motherland of maple syrup, Canada. He made a mental note to get May a genuine bottle of the right kind as soon as possible.) The yogurt, which they found next to the milk. It all sat comfortably heavy in the grocery bag strapped over Wade’s arm.

“Last thing is eggs,” Peter said, walking down the cold aisle. “Wanna grab a carton?”

“Yep-yep.” Wade strolled over to the eggs and picked up the first carton of twelve he saw, then nearly slipped as he turned around.

Peter widened his eyes and jumped forward, catching Wade and the carton before either hit the ground.

“Nearly dropped the eggs,” Wade said with surprise, slowly standing up straight and regaining balance on his feet with Peter’s help. “You’re like a superhero or something.”

Peter laughed dryly. “Are you alright?”

“I’m great!” Wade put the carton of eggs very carefully into the bag. “Let’s check out and get this stuff delivered though.”

The groceries in total cost twenty bucks. Wade paid for it, much to Peter’s embarrassment and insistence— but Wade was the one to hand the money over first, so Peter could kindly suck it.

On the subway back to Queens Boulevard, Peter shared his earbuds with him. Handing off his phone, Wade got to scroll and pick one of his playlists, and grinned wildly as he looked at his options.

“Holy sh*t, you dork. You named all your personal playlists after 80s movies,” Wade pointed out. “Back to the Future?”

“Those are songs I listened to in high school.”

“The Princess Bride?” Wade glanced up.

“Love songs. Duh.”

“Karate Kid?”

“…Work,” Peter answered after a beat, his ears going red.

Wade hummed with interest and selected the playlist on shuffle. His cheeks warmed as Peter shifted closer, as some unfamiliar tune played softly in his ears. He can’t remember the last time he was this close to someone who wasn’t beating him up or trying to stick a knife through his heart.

(A cruel part of him taunted it was the only reason why he was so happy right now; that Peter had gotten this close and hadn’t hurt him yet. He pushed the thought away before it could fester.)

The subway stopped only a few songs in, to which Peter quietly patted him on the shoulder again and stood up, pausing the music and turning off his phone. He unplugged the earbuds and wrapped them up, tucking them in his pocket. “This is our stop.”

“Cool.” Wade stood and looped the bag back over his shoulder. “To Miss May’s house we go.”

They walked onto the platform.

The way to May’s house isn’t terribly long. It was exactly how Wade would have pictured it— small, quaint, suburban. Paint chipping off the white siding, unbloomed flowers planted with careful hands at the side of the small stairs leading to the porch, all of which looked far more alive than the ones currently in Peter’s hand. Humble is a good word to describe the place. It only made sense that the Parker household resembled their nature, he thought.

Peter walked up the steps and dug a hand into his pocket for his keys, all while Wade stood behind him with a sudden burst of nerves. He thought of the implications, all too late. Surely May wouldn’t mind that he was trailing around, right?

He felt like a f*ckin’ teenager at the absolute ancient age of thirty.

The door opened before Peter could finish even fiddling with the keys in the lock, and May stood in front of them with a pleased grin. She had a holiday sweater on, which Wade absolutely adored. It looked homemade.

“I didn’t know I would get to see both of you today,” May gushed. She stepped aside. “Both of you come in!”

Peter walked in and kicked his shoes off at the entrance— Wade noticed with amusem*nt that there was a pretty permanent scuff mark on the wall from where they had landed. Then he walked down the hallway and ducked into a room. “I’m gonna put your groceries away, May!”

“Thank you, Peter!” May called back to him. She turned her full attention to Wade with a peaceful kind of joy. “This is really good news that both of you are here. Now there are two strong boys to help this old lady with the tree.”

Wade blinked as he looked around the house, taking in the homey furniture and comfortably lived-in antique aesthetics. The aforementioned tree stood a medium height in the corner of the room beside the television stand. He pulled his hood down from his face and smiled politely. “Yeah, I can totally help.”

He hadn’t decorated for Christmas in a few years, never had the heart to do it after… but May asked for his help, and she’d been nothing but kind to him since they’d met. The least he could do is put a few ornaments up, or whatever she needed.

“Can you put the angel up on the top of the tree for me, dear?” May asked, taking the plastic figurine out of a box and unwrapping it from the bubble wrapping. She held it out to him without looking up from the box, continuing to rummage through it.

Wade smiled and took the figurine, reaching up and situating it on the top of the tree. “Nobody’s called me dear in a real long while, May. I didn’t know I still had ‘dear’ status.”

“Of course you do,” May clicked her tongue. “Everybody does.”

“Even criminals?” Wade asked, testing the waters cautiously. He looked up and felt a nervousness in his stomach. Shame. Guilt. “Y’know, people who can’t be saved?”

May looked up from the box, and jutted her chin out confidently. Her eyes were full of conviction, more serious than Wade had ever seen her.

“Everyone can be saved, dear.”

Wade felt a chill run up his spine, and tried to will away the sudden very embarrassing mistiness in his eyes. Gross, emotional vulnerability. He nodded at May quickly and prayed she changed the subject.

Thankfully— May looked back down at the box with a smile. “Come here and look at these. They’re ornaments of Peter’s baby photos.”

“Oh?”

“May!” Peter called out loudly from the kitchen.

May laughed, and pulled out a glass spherical ornament with a cutout of baby Peter, button nose, big brown eyes, pudgy cheeks and all; sitting inside in a puddle of gold glitter. On the front, written: ‘Peter’s First Christmas! ~ Mary and Richard Parker.’

“Holy sh*t,” Wade whispered in awe. “That’s the cutest baby I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“I think there are more in here—“

“MAY—“

Both of them fell into laughter this time, and Peter came walking back into the living room with a pout. “Are you two ganging up on me behind my back?”

“Definitely not,” May said with a hum.

“Yes,” Wade agreed with a sage nod. “And I’m definitely not May’s favourite.”

Peter laughed and stepped forward to dig through boxes, picking out more ornaments to decorate the tree with. May came around to his side and wrapped an arm gently around his back while she explained where she wanted certain ornaments, which Wade watched quietly from a distance.

It was such a loving family, and Wade was close enough that he might be able to pretend for even half a moment what it would be like a part of it.

His phone rang, stealing him from his thoughts. Wade thoughtlessly pulled his phone from his pocket and looked down at the contact.

Unknown number.

The air stilled, became stale at the small inhale through his nose. He flicked his eyes up to the distracted Parkers, then to the window, then back at the phone.

His chest became a cavity of dread, like an ink bleeding on paper, staining the joy from that evening into something awful. He cleared his throat and gestured outside with a fake smile. “I have to take this! I’ll be back real quick.”

“Okay,” May smiled back kindly.

He disappeared out the door and answered it, putting it up to his ear.

(“Spidey?” Deadpool lunged upwards, seeing the unconscious man crumbled on the floor of the empty warehouse. “sh*t! Oh sh*t. sh*t sh*t sh*t. Please don’t be dead.”)

Then he was silent.

Dead silent.

He stared blankly into the air, listening to the birds chirping outside and leaves rustling from wind, old houses and windows creaking from the powerful gusts.

(“It’s me! It’s Deadpool. You know? Guy who yanked a bullet from your body a while back? Saved your ass?” Deadpool heaved the lifeless body out of the warehouse breathlessly. “It’s Wade— Agh. It’s Wade Wilson. f*ck, you’re heavy. Are you made outta solid muscle or something? You look like a twig.”)

He could stand there for several hours if he wanted to. Deadpool’s done it before, just letting his catch mumble and stutter over their own words while he sharpened knives in the corner. Cleaning a gun silently while a hit desperately bargained for life. It was rare, but if he was pissed enough (and don’t get him pissed enough) then it was possible.

His head was crystal clear right now— an almost death was an attempted murder.

(“Wake up,” Deadpool said frantically, shaking at Spidey’s shoulders as the man leaned against his couch. He pressed his ear against his chest— Faint heartbeat. “f*ck! f*cking— Damn it! Come on, Webs. Breathe. Just breathe. Dumbass, idiot hero bullsh*t, going in there alone— People need you, you f*cker! You can’t die. Wake up, damn it.”)

He straightened his spine and held the phone to his ear like a statue.

After a minute of crackled quiet, The Employer spoke up.

“It would be wise of you not to step in again,” The Employer rasped lowly. He took a deep breath, then a scattered exhale. “There could be… consequences.”

“What are you doing with that blood?” Deadpool demanded. “You motherf*cker, I will find you. Don’t think I won’t.”

There’s a laugh, something bitter and twisting in response.

“What are your plans?” Deadpool bit out, gnarling the words in his teeth.

The laughter quieted to a tired sigh. “What I should have been able to do years ago.”

Wade opened his mouth, but the phone clicked as the Employer hung up. He cursed loudly and brought the phone away from his ear.

For not the first time, he needed to find Spider-Man, and fast. This whole case was becoming a real pain in the nards.

He glanced up at Peter and May through the living room window, standing on the cold porch outside. No time to say a cute goodbye to their date, no time to make up a crappy lie.

[Wade Wilson: srry I had to dip😨work emrgncy ☹️☹️ super sux. we should schedule a date to that theater sum time tho… txt me tonite?]

[Wade Wilson: had lots of fun grocery shopping with u rose boy]

The response came in a few moments later, when Wade was already halfway down the block.

[Peter Parker: I had fun too. :) Hope your work thing goes okay - and thanks for helping me with said shopping trip.]

[Peter Parker: P.S. I should be calling *you* rose boy. You’re the one who bought them! :P]

[Wade Wilson: i’ll workshop it]

He turned his phone off and boarded the subway, mentally buckling down for a long trip back to his apartment. He yanked his hood up, and sighed.

Chapter 11: Breach Into Oscorp

Chapter Text

"Like a spider, these days I eat my own heart."
-Nikos Kazantzakis

The city always looked more beautiful at night.

He’s lived here all his life, but how Manhattan sparked alive when the moon rose was something that still took his breath away when he took moments like these. Moments where he wasn’t letting it all go with a wind-rushing glance. Moments where he could just sit and watch the lights twinkle and breathe in the smog and see the people smoke, dance, sing, walk, yell, chant…

Camera slung around his neck from previous job-related activities, he tucked his knees under his chin and leaned forward from where he sat perched on the edge of a very tall, very precarious crane. He chewed on the inside of his cheek.

There was a lot to think about.

As it turned out, Peter Parker may have a crush on one Wade Wilson, enough to invite the heart-speckled man over to May’s house to decorate a Christmas tree. Enough for him to sit as a weight in his pocket as Peter itched to call or text him, to see how he was doing, what he was up to, if he wanted to hang out later.

He hadn’t felt that way since— well, since her. And while it took back some of the guilt to reason through his feelings about this, he came to the conclusion that Gwen would have loved Wade. They may have even been friends, if she were alive. Wade certainly would have loved her. Who wouldn’t? Who didn’t?

As for Spider-Man, the one currently sitting over the distant glimmering sights of people skating in Rockefeller Center, he had more pressing things to worry about than to be a little heartsick. There was still a highly dangerous individual wandering around with an unhealthy obsession to watch his every move, and no, he didn’t mean the one in red and black leather.

The Employer had his blood. Peter’s seen enough from his time of web-slinging to know how badly this little problem could expand, could ricochet. His mind rumbled through the possibilities, The Employer weaponizing his abilities, isolating the isotopes creating his mutation, profiting, selling it to Oscorp, using it himself and slaughtering in his name— it could be catastrophic. Peter couldn’t let it happen under any circ*mstances.

The real trouble lay in the fact that they had no information. Pool knew the same amount about the guy that Peter does, meaning: close to nothing.

The crane vibrated underneath him. He jerked his head up and swiveled it over to where the movement came from.

At the other end of the metal cross beams, Deadpool lay on his stomach and hugged on to the crane for dear life, latching his legs under to secure himself. “Webs?”

Peter spluttered and stood up with ease. Balance not an issue, he hopped over, ignoring the panicked yelps from Pool as the crane shook and trembled. He crouched beside him, scrunching his face up with confusion. “What are you doing all the way up here?”

“I wanted to chill with you!” Deadpool gasped dramatically. “You were sitting up here all thoughtful like! So serene. So handsome.”

Peter scoffed. “I meant how did you get up here, Pool.”

Pool spared a glance up to him. The eyes of his mask were blown comedically wide. “I climbed? How did you get up here, sticky fingers?!”

“I swung,” Peter answered bluntly.

“Is that a camera?”

Peter looked down. “Oh. Yeah. It’s— It’s a hobby.”

Pool made a disgruntled noise, half disinterest and half exasperation. “Can we go chill somewhere else? Like, on the ground?”

Despite his best efforts, Peter let out a gentle laugh. “Yeah. Okay, fine. You did go through all the effort to get up here though, might as well enjoy the view—“

“Oh, no. Nope. I’m good, actually. It’s plenty good from the ground.”

“If you say so,” Peter shrugged. “Hold on to me, okay? I won’t let you fall.”

“How romantic,” Pool wheezed. He held onto Peter with a vice-grip, squeezing the muscle of his arm as Peter helped him stand up. His eyes were still wide and they looked down over the crane before shutting tightly closed.

Peter looked over too, then put an arm around Deadpool’s waist. He found a spot to swing from. “Okay, don’t let go. I’ve got you, I’ll swing us down.”

“I’m in love with you,” Deadpool blurted. “Joking. Not joking. Joking. I’m actually in love with this other guy I think. You can get us down now.”

Peter snickered. He leaped off the crane and Deadpool yelled, loudly, hugging him tightly. Peter shot the web, latched onto the crane they just fell from, and swung through the buildings ahead.

They ended up at a park. The second they landed on solid ground, Deadpool fell to his knees and yanked his mask up over his mouth. Peter quickly turned away, but winced as he heard the familiar sounds of retching. (People normally didn’t like going through that many g-forces in such a short amount of time. Understandable.)

“You okay?”

Deadpool let out a droned-on groan in response.

Peter looked around at his surroundings while his teammate recovered. This was one old playground. Rust flaking paint chips off of the structure, bark chips damp and dark from rain and shriveled up from use. A creaking swing set moving back and forth in the wind, a little ahead of its horizontal pair.

A thought occurred to him, and he quickly looked down and checked out his camera. Not cracked or broken from the swing, fortunately. That would have cost the rent money for the next two years to replace, and he’s already in hot water from the busted phone.

“That sucked balls,” Pool finally spoke up. “Ugh. How do you do that so often? See the— the heights, and the— the not throwing up—“

“I used to be afraid of heights,” Peter replied simply. “First time I swung I did throw up. It gets easier with practice.”

(Practice: or as Peter would call it, climbing to the top of the Empire State Building and swinging from it back to Queens. He couldn’t be afraid of heights after that. Everything else was small potatoes, as far as Peter was concerned then. Too bad problems got bigger when you weren’t fifteen anymore.)

Deadpool let out a breathless noise and pulled himself up. He slipped his mask back over his chin and trudged lazily forward, plopping himself down on the creaking swing. He tilted his head to the side. “Come sit?”

Peter squinted, the eyes of his mask narrowing.

“Swing with me?”

“We just did,” Peter teased.

Deadpool tossed his head back and kicked his feet forward like a little kid. “Webssss. It’s not the same!”

Peter quirked his lips upwards.

“…Ok. I’ll swing with you,” he finally relented. He walked forward and took a seat on the swing beside Pool, kicked himself off the ground and gently swung back and forth. “Happy now?”

“Yes,” Deadpool answered sincerely. “Now. Serious talk time.”

Maybe once, Peter remembered Deadpool being “serious”, and he wasn’t even sure Pool was conscious about doing it. Then again, Peter was barely conscious at the time too.

(Deadpool had gone rigid, entirely focused on removing the bullet. His voice stayed calm and firm, as if he had done this before and reduced it to a practice that he had fallen back into.

“Stop moving.”)

Needless to say… This should be interesting.

Peter silently nodded his head upwards to show Pool that he was paying attention.

Deadpool took a breath. “I’m sorry.”

Just like that, the silence Peter had was not planned. His mind took a moment to rewire itself, then Peter blinked once. Twice. He cleared his throat. “What?”

“I’m sorry for taking the job,” Pool explained. “First things first. I don’t take hits from people like that. Not— Not on purpose. I feel partially responsible for getting you into this mercenary sh*tfest, so… Yeah.”

Then he saw it. Deadpool, his shoulders rising with the stature of a soldier, rigid. It was as if a shadow came over him, and the air grew still. Peter knew, then. Before, Pool had been sincere. Now this was him being serious.

“Secondly—“ Pool began, his voice calm but angered. “The dickstick called me.”

Peter furrowed his eyebrows. He stopped swinging, his feet stilling in the bark chips. “The Employer?”

“Yeah. It was a threat. He doesn’t want me getting any closer to his shady business, or else people will get hurt. My people.”

Peter opened his mouth to ask more about Pool’s personal life, because last time he was disappointed to learn that Deadpool didn’t have ‘people,’ and would be happy to know more about the change of heart— he knew better. He switched tracks.

“Were you able to track the call?” Peter asked dumbly. Then he caught himself, shook his head. “No, of course you didn’t. That’s the first thing you would’ve said, if you had.”

Peter sighed with frustration, getting up off the swing and pacing back and forth. “Why would he have called you? He obviously knows you’re working with me, but why wouldn’t he just go after me?”

“He doesn’t know who you are under the mask,” Pool answered. “I don’t have that special luxury because my asshole best friend is a blabbermouth. Plus, he wants me out of the way. He doesn’t want to run tests on bad ol’ red and black, he wants to run tests on good ol’ red and blue.”

Peter crossed his arms, deep in thought as he kicked the mushy bark chip with his webbed boots.

“But,” Deadpool spoke up, his posture easing up along with his tone. He grinned wildly. “I’ve got a hunch on how to figure out who this guy is.”

Peter looked up at him with interest.

“Think about this, Webs. The Employer sneaks into a level on Oscorp that to public knowledge was empty, just storage for old projects.” Deadpool stopped his swing and stood up, walking across to him. “He had intel. He knew where he was going. Which means he either has a really good informant, or, judging by how this prick can’t work with anybody for diddly-squat…”

“He worked for Oscorp,” Peter said with understanding.

“Bingo!” Pool cheered, throwing his hands up in the air.

“Wow,” Peter exhaled. He couldn’t help but feel impressed, and also admittedly embarrassed. He really should have thought of that, like, yesterday. “This isn’t for sure yet, so… we shouldn’t get our hopes up. But this is— this is a good start.”

Peter thought for a moment. He turned slowly, looking upwards and to the distance. A glowing tower, lit up in hexagonal shapes from top to bottom, a company name written in thin shaped letters across the side and the top. His mind turned.

“Webs? You’ve got a twinkle in your eye. Whatcha thinking?”

“Hm.”

Pool stepped up to him and followed his gaze. Then he looked back at Peter. “Ohohoh—“

“It’s just an idea,” Peter started.

“—you wanna—“

“Just a possibility,” Peter continued quickly. “I don’t even know if I can still do it.”

“—break into Oscorp?” Deadpool finished, grinning like a maniac and jumping from toe to toe with excitement. “Golden-hearted Spidey wants to commit a crime? Baby’s first B-and-E? What a big moment. I remember mine like it was yesterday. That’s a lie. I don’t remember anything from before 17. Ah, trauma. What a silly mistress.”

“It’s not breaking and entering,” Peter defended immediately. He paused, trailing off a little, avoiding eye contact and shifting on his feet. “Because we won’t be breaking anything. We’ll just— We’ll sneak in, and— and see if we can find anything connecting to The Employer. Nothing criminal. Got it, Pool?”

“Baby’s first B-and-E,” Deadpool sang. “Baby boy’s first breaking and entering!”

Peter’s ears went red-hot. “Anyone ever tell you you’re obnoxious? I can be the first if not. Actually, don’t bother answering, I want to say it anyways. You’re obnoxious, Pool.”

Deadpool chuckled and slung an arm around Peter’s shoulders, close enough for Peter to smell gunpowder and leather something distinctly familiar but unplaceable. “Alright, baby boy. Let’s break into Oscorp together. We’ve got it. You and me. Bad besties for life. No, that’s spelt wrong. It's LYFE, L-Y-F-E. Yeah. There you go.”

Peter sighed heavily.

“So how are we gonna do this?” Pool asked.

“I’ve got it,” Peter said firmly. “I can shut down the air conditioning and filtration for a few minutes, enough for me to sneak in through a vent on the top floor.”

Deadpool slowly nodded, squinting at him with thought. “And what about me?”

“I can let you in from the inside,” Peter explained. “How fast can you get up to the southeast side exit door?”

“Okay. Wait, wait, wait. How do you know this much about Oscorp?” Pool laughed lightly. “Don’t tell me Spider-Man works for Oscorp too. That’d be a twist I didn’t see coming.”

Peter looked over, and hesitated. He cleared his throat. “Gwen worked there.”

He waited for a wave of grief that didn’t come.

Wade’s laughter faded easily and he simply patted Peter on the shoulder. “She musta been real smart, then.”

He smiled.

Peter crouched at the electrical box, knees and the bottom of his boots sticking to the side of the building. The wind whipped around his back, and he pressed the phone between his ear and his shoulder, because somehow Pool convinced him to give his phone number to save into the merc’s burner phone.

(“For business!” Pool exclaimed, holding out an older looking cellphone. “C’mon, it’s totally safe! I won’t even look at your number. If you can call me, it’ll make this way easier.”

For not the first time that night, he relented. Peter sighed and reached for the phone, putting in his contact as ‘Webs.’)

“You almost done?” Pool said in his ear. “I’m freezing my keister out here. My balls are turning blue and not in the fun way.”

“I didn’t need to know that.” Peter grunted, fidgeting carefully with the circuits. “Check the lights. Are they flickering?”

“Nope.”

Peter swore. He twisted around, finally tearing a red wire out and cautiously moving it. “This is the last electrical box. It should—“

The whole building’s lights went black with a hum of dying electricity. Peter grinned as Deadpool began cheering in the crackled audio.

He began scaling up the side, up to a balcony door. He ducked down, kicking in a small air vent. “Okay. It should take them five minutes to reboot their electrical, so just hang tight.”

“Got it.”

Peter navigated through twists and turns, dragging forward quickly and quietly— or as quietly as he could while the vents made rummaging metal noises with every inch he crawled. His phone remained tightly in his hands.

He stopped suddenly and put the phone to his ear. “Are you humming the Mission Impossible theme right now?”

“Oh yeah,” Pool confirmed. “Can you blame me? Let’s steal the NOC list, baby boy.”

Peter fought a smile. He shook his head and continued crawling. At the end of the tunnel, he carefully pushed a different vent out and then caught it with his hand. He pulled it inside and looked in the hallway of the Oscorp building. It’s dark, glowing red emergency exit lights that rim the ceiling trim being the only ones active.

Nobody’s in the hallway. He crawled out of the vent, onto the ceiling, and quietly let himself drop to the floor.

“Okay,” Peter whispered. “I’m in the hallway, heading to you. I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

He carefully looked around the corner. A singular intern busy in paperwork rushed into an office room. Peter waited, and when they didn’t return, he took the chance to duck forward and open up the exit door. No alarm went off. Success.

“You did it!” Pool whispered loudly, standing in front of him with the phone still held up to his ear. “You’re just like all the best spies now.”

“Yeah, whatever.” Peter let him step inside, then closed the door. “That was the easy part. Now we need to find out which floor The Employer stole from, and why.”

“Oh.” Deadpool cracked his knuckles. “Leave that one to me. That’s easy sh*t. Go hide on the ceiling or something.”

Instant dread. Peter complied anyway, flipping up to the ceiling. He looked down at Pool with judgement. “I said nothing illegal. Should I be worried?”

“Not unless you stay quiet. Don’t worry, Webs! I won’t hurt a hair.”

Peter narrowed his eyes.

Deadpool loaded a gun, mechanical clicking ringing through the hallway. Then he checked the safety on, and showed it up to Peter. “See? I’m just gonna scare ‘em.”

“I hate this idea.”

“I knew you would.” Pool shrugged. “I’ll be back in like, three minutes. One minute. Two minutes. Four minutes. You know what? We’ll just wait and see.”

He disappeared into the office that the intern had walked into a moment before. Peter crawled along the ceiling and listened through the glass windows of the room.

The luck the intern must have had, to be the only one in an office room while Deadpool stood, weapons branded, staring directly ahead.

“Oh god,” the intern said suddenly, her eyes going wide. Her spine straightened with rigid fear. The name tag clipped to her shirt read that her name was Camilla. “Please don’t kill me, I— please, I’ll tell you anything you want—“

“Perfect!” Pool said cheerfully. “That’s so helpful of you. You’ll never believe the things I have to do sometimes to get people to talk. It’s just… Oof, y’know? Broken pinky toes, lopped off ears, don’t even get me started on the inside-out enchilada. You seem like a really nice lady, so I’m sure none of that will be necessary. Tell me–”

Pool stepped forward once, and his voice grew sweet as he twiddled the weapon in his hand. “How long have you been working here, Camilla?”

“Um, I—“ Camilla swallowed. She pushed her glasses up nervously, eyeing the gun. “I— I got hired, um… two? Two years ago. In the— in the Spring.”

“Aw, Spring hires,” Deadpool sighed wistfully. He slipped into a faux British accent. “You get to stop and smell the roses before blasting brains. Just lovely. I adore the daffodils, myself.”

He cleared his throat, pausing his fiddling of the gun. (Peter eyed it– safety still on. He wasn’t even sure it was loaded. He had a lot of conflicting feelings right now.) Pool stared up at her calmly. “The break-in. The one from a few weeks ago. What do you know about it?”

Camilla shuddered. “I— Um. I don’t— Are you gonna shoot me?”

“Camilla, I thought we were friends.” Pool clicked his tongue. “I won’t hurt you if you just tell me what I need. You’re in no danger, it’s not like you actually run the experiments that go on here. I just need information. We’re just besties telling secrets right now. Gossip slumber party with the lights out. Capiche?”

Camilla swallowed and nodded frantically. She took a breath and looked down. “Um… the break in. It happened on a sub-level. I, um… I heard, that, uh, it used to be used for genetics, like… from some of the older, uh… uh, residents. Scientists and stuff.”

“Take a breath, Camilla. What did you hear?

Camilla inhaled sharply. Her eyes snapped to the gun, then back to Deadpool. “I heard that, the— the guy who broke in, he— he was looking for the old research. But, um, the lab had changed before even I got here, and now it’s— it’s weapons manufacturing, which is why people were so freaked when it, um, got broken into.”

“Got this, Webs?” Pool whispered under his breath.

He did.

“Do you know who broke in?” Deadpool questioned.

Camilla shook her head. “No. No, I don’t. Is that— did— is that all?”

Pool hummed. “One last question.”

Camilla looked back down to the gun. Then to Pool. She looked terrified, and Peter felt vaguely uncomfortable. “…Yes?”

Deadpool put the gun back on his harness. “Do you know where they moved the old research?”

Camilla let out a massive breath of relief, swaying where she stood. She mewled as tears came to her eyes, but nodded quickly. “Yes. I— Yes. It’s sub-level twelve. Massive warehouse of— of old research, all categorized alphabetically. Oh god. Thank you. Thank you.”

“No, thank you, Camilla,” Deadpool said, pleased. He dug his hand into his pocket and took out an old coupon for some ice cream place, then handed it to her. “For your troubles. FYI, red-velvet cookie crunch is the best flavour. Highly recommend.”

He swung around and walked out of the office. Peter watched as Camilla collapsed heavily into a chair, staring at the coupon with wide tearful eyes as she caught her breath.

Peter quietly dropped down from the ceiling. “You terrified that girl.”

“You do your job, I do mine,” Deadpool said simply. “We got information, she gets ice cream. Seems fair to me.”

Peter rolled his eyes. They walked toward the elevator.

“He worked in Genetics,” Peter thought aloud. “That’s why he broke into Oscorp. It must have gone wrong though, because when he went to his old lab, there were only weapons… so he stole what he could and left before security came. That makes so much sense.”

They enter the elevator just as the building comes back alive, lights humming loudly as they turn on. Peter winced from the sensory input but relaxed as it leveled out.

Pool pressed the button for the floor, and the elevator fell down with a gentle lilt.

The doors opened with a dull clanking thud. They stepped out into a ginormous floor full of filing cabinets; a library of information with signs above that stated letters of the alphabet.

“Damn,” Pool said. “Reading.”

Peter sighed with a bout of acceptance and walked toward ‘G’, Deadpool trailing behind. He scanned the boxes of files.

“I think it’s ordered by topic and then scientist,” Peter realized. He turned his head to Pool. “We’ll know his name, if we just find the right file.”

“How hard can that be?” Deadpool asked with tired rhetoric, standing with his hands on his hips in the middle of the aisle. Every shelf was chock-full of file boxes. “Super easy. Easy as pie. You know, that’s actually a perfect metaphor, considering pie crust is really pretty f*cking difficult—“

“That’s a simile,” Peter said, beginning to scan the labels on the boxes for anything familiar. Spiders. He was looking for spiders. “Start on the other end.”

Deadpool groaned and trudged to the other end, but began looking as well.

Minutes go by.

“I’ve got something!” Pool said, yanking his head up. “Webs, come here.”

Peter paused his search and quickly walked over.

“Genetics, Curtis Connors, Arachnology. Genetics, Richard Parker, Arachnology,” Pool read off slowly. He stalled, then continued. “And a few down the line: Genetics, Rory Reyes, Arachnology.”

Peter froze. He reached for the second one first, opened the file with complete silence. He stared down at his father’s photo.

It’s not like it was a surprise to him. He already knew his dad worked for Oscorp. He already knew his dad was the reason the spider bite didn’t kill him. It still stung as a reminder, though, that there was so much he’d never fully understand about his family history.

“Is that the guy?” Deadpool asked, looking over his shoulder.

Peter startled and closed the file. “No. Dr. Parker started the program, though.”

He looked down at the bottom of the page, then pointed to a line of text and showed it to Pool. “It says Dr. Reyes took over the spider research directly after Dr. Parker left.”

Deadpool pulled out the labeled box. Thick papers stacked in files and folders, photographs, everything. He pulled out the first paper in front. “Lead scientist and head of research, Dr. Rory Reyes.”

The two of them looked at the black-and-white photo. A slender face, narrowed eyes and pursed lips. His hair was trimmed neatly, and he looked almost young. Glasses sat on the edge of his nose. He seemed serious, the illusion of feeling esteemed.

“What a dick,” Pool broke the silence. He pocketed the photo.

Peter took a file out of the box. It was labeled ‘Steatoda Nobilis Trial 16.’ He opened the file and began to read.

‘Arachnida in pulmonary oedema: To test the effects of surviving dna strands, it will first be tested the baseline of the subject Steatoda Nobilis spider under extreme stress. The first experiment will be conducted as to how long it takes for the subject to lose consciousness in deoxygenated conditions. Subjects will be put into an enclosed glass area(s) of water and timed to the amount it takes for movement to halt. This will be compared to the results of three other species of spider: Latrodectus mactan, Loxosceles reclusa, Eratigena agrestis.’

“This is awful,” Peter said quietly, his face contorting with disgust. He put the file back into the box and picked up a different one. ‘Std. Nbls. Trial 65.’

‘DNA extraction, second test: Repeated process as test one. Modified genomes from Rattus norvegicus (Brown Rat) and Steatoda Nobilis (False Widow) will be combined in an enclosed space, recorded. Notes will be taken to ensure documentation of every detail.’

Deadpool picked up the photos. “Holy f*ck. I think I’m gonna throw up again.”

Peter spared a glance. He immediately felt nauseous.

‘Spiders after the extraction,’ it said. The spiders were gnarled up, limbs disjointed and crunched off in odd shapes, minuscule hairs and small eyes scattered in the enclosure. The rats… were even worse. Covered in their own sick, their skeletons and insides showing through their small bodies. Melted is the word Peter could put to their appearance, if appearance was a description that could even be used.

“Acute radiation syndrome,” Pool read from the caption. “f*cking hell. This guy is insane.”

He shuddered and closed the file. “Let’s… focus on what we can do. What we… What we know. The Employer is Rory Reyes, and he’s… capable of doing some really… awful things.”

Deadpool put the box back on the shelf. “We know his name. I can do a lot with a name, Webs. We’ll get him before he can do any more of… this, to you. Okay?”

Peter nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, I know. We’ve got this, he doesn’t stand a chance.”

“And I’ve got your number now,” Pool reminded cheerfully. “I’ll call you if I get anything.”

“Same goes for me,” Peter sniffed. He stood up and stretched. “Let’s call it a night. We have enough to go off of. Can you get out of Oscorp yourself?”

Deadpool winked. “You know it, baby boy. You don’t gotta worry about little old me.”

“Ok.” Peter sighed. “I’ll see you around then. Bye, Pool.”

“See ya, Webs.”

It’s always easier sneaking out than it is sneaking in. The air is freezing when he’s swinging home, a chill in his bones that wasn’t helping the horror he was still experiencing from what he’d seen and learned.

He crawled in through his window, spotting a pile of bills to greet him at his door. He walked over in the pitch darkness of his apartment and scanned the contents. The power’s out. He’s being evicted by the end of the month.

“That’s cool.” He huffed and tossed the bills on his desk. “That’s really cool.”

Exhaustion creeped in with the cold.

Carefully, he pulled his camera off his neck, putting it on the desk with a dull thud. He slipped his suit off robotically and left it crumpled on the floor without a second thought. Then crawled onto his bed and curled up, shivering in the dark. He willed himself to fall asleep and forget the events of the break-in.

His eyes closed…

Dark.

It was dark in the Oscorp lab. Silence echoed from every wall, and Peter—

Peter had been here before.

It’s all achingly familiar. He squinted through the darkness and plunged forward, searching for something new, something he could control.

He saw a lamp. Every step toward it felt like he was in a vat of some scratchy liquid substance, as if he were trying to walk through moving black sand. He was being swallowed by the darkness and sunk into it with every heavy movement of his feet. His hand reached forward, stretching himself to reach the lamp, his muscles burning—

The lamp clicks on, followed by a series of linoleum lights on the ceiling, revealing the lab to be full of jars. Spiders in every single one, every jar in a perfect place, uniform along the walls, covering the desks, the counters…

Peter felt something move up his leg, a tickling sensation over his ankles.

He shivered and looked down, and his eyes came across a sea of tiny black spiders coming up to his calves, moving in and out of each other in a tangled gnarled mess. The scritching, chittering noises grew louder, and the crawling continued, moving up his body and clinging under his clothes. His skin felt on fire.

Bile hit the back of his throat and he stood paralyzed, the spiders holding him in place— everything itched. He wanted to scream but was afraid to open his mouth.

A warm liquid ran down the back of his ear, oozing as it dripped into the ocean of tiny scrambling legs. The smell of blood filled his nostrils, a weighty iron scent that coated his lungs and churned his stomach. His ear burned, he couldn’t handle this. He needed to leave. He needed to get out.

“We’re going to test the heart,” The Employer said in one note, his voice echoing around Peter’s head. “How fast can a heart beat before it bursts? I’ve done my research. I’ve tested before. Genus Latrodectus, Araneus diadematus, genus Nephila…”

STOP IT.

“Argyroneta aquatica. Solifugae. Tell me: does your body function with haemolymph? It’s a shame that not all your friends have regeneration abilities,” The Employer continued. “We’ll test it.”

“Peter?” Wade called. He was desperate. He was so afraid. He needed help. “Peter!”

“Poor Wade,” The Employer sighed. “Your friend can’t regenerate like a moulting spider can.”

I KNOW I KNOW I KNOW I KNOW.

”Don’t fret, Arachnida.” He chuckled lowly. “I’ll just make him evolve, too.”

Wade screamed. A vicious snapping sound, like a spine hitting the floor, the neck disconnecting, a bone being bent against its will, knocked Peter awake from his nightmare.

He can’t f*cking breathe.

His hands shake, and he’s jerking up from his bed, frantically swiping at his legs and rubbing his ear against his shirt and trying to wipe his skin free of a sensation that doesn’t exist, then he’s fumbling over his messy floor to get to his phone.

“Crap,” Peter gasped, his lips and fingertips cold while his lungs squeeze and constrict like a coiled snake in his chest. He can hardly see what he’s doing around the tears and black spots and his hand shaking so hard that his phone is merely a blurry image. He put it up to his ear and waited for it to ring, taking greedy panicked gulps of the freezing stale air of his apartment.

Logic was a thing past recognition. The call picked up.

“Petey?” Wade answered, his voice serious and full of concern. “Why’re you calling so late, what’s going on?”

“Oh thank god you’re alive,” Peter blubbered. “I’m— I don’t even— I just needed to hear you. I had— It was just a stupid— and then— sh*t, why is it so dark?”

“Hey,” Wade’s voice was steady. Peter had a hard time focusing on it over his own rocket-paced heartbeat. “Hey, no no no. It’s okay. Take a breath. Are you safe?”

Peter didn’t even clock that Wade asked a question, the breaths heaving in his throat. A moment later, he shook his hand, rubbing a hand so hard over his knee it made the skin red. “I’m just— I’m in my, um— I’m at my apartment. I’m fine. I don’t even— I don’t know why I called you, I’m just— I needed to know you were okay. I thought he got you, and it was—“

“Who?” Wade questioned suddenly, cutting into Peter’s sentence. His voice was hard. “Thought who got me? Who’s he?”

Peter hit his head with the palm of his hand, his muscles burning with a cold sweat.

“Nothing,” Peter breathed out. “Nobody. It’s nobody. Nevermind. I’m— I am so sorry for calling. sh*t, what time even is it—“

“I’m coming over, okay? Just hang tight. Do you want me to stay on the line?”

“No, no that’s not necessary. It was just a nightmare.” Peter made a pained noise. “It’s not a big deal. This is so embarrassing, I’m so sorry. I bet this is only happening because my power went out, you know. I’m usually fine with nightmares, but it’s—It’s dark.”

Absolute lie. The dark probably didn’t help, but the nightmares have always been Peter’s least favourite job of the gig; right under bullet wounds and stab wounds and… actually pretty much any other wound.

“It’s okay.” There’s a clattering noise. A door opening. “I’m heading over now. I wanna pick something up first though.”

Peter didn’t have the energy nor the want to argue. He was tired of dealing with these alone, especially now that he knew he didn’t have to.

The cold was settling in now that the adrenaline was winding down, his teeth chattering against each other. He let out a shuddering breath and climbed back onto his bed, curling up to himself.

“You good?”

“Cold,” Peter said shortly. “Freezing.”

“Put my hoodie on,” Wade suggested.

Peter poked his head up and looked around the room, spotting the hoodie draped over his desk chair. He pushed himself off the bed and walked over, pulling the thing on. It was better.

He turned around and noticed something that he couldn’t have noticed earlier with how much he had been freaking out— his curtains, torn from the newly dented bar over the window and in a scattered mess on the bed from when he awoke. “sh*t.”

“Hm? What’s going on?”

“Oh.” Peter hesitated. “Uh. Nothing. Just— I broke something by accident. It’s fine.”

In his own defense, he shouldn’t be expected to control his strength in his sleep. Plus, it’s really, really cold. He got back onto his bed and bundled the sweatshirt, the curtains, and his thin quilt tightly around himself.

He wiped away tears from his cheeks with his hands and sniffled quietly. “Wade, you really don’t have to come over. It’s okay. I’m all good now.”

“I know I don’t have to. Nobody said I had to, Pete. I’m doing this ‘cuz I can, and ‘cuz I want to. I didn’t know you were this stubborn.”

Peter huffed a dry laugh. “Yeah. May coulda told you that.”

“Do you want to talk about your nightmares?” Wade asked. There’s a bright ding on his side of the phone, as well as sliding doors. Very muffled music playing distantly in the background.

“Um.” Peter blinked hard. In the darkness, he shivered with his arms wrapped around himself. “It’s not… It’s not pretty.”

“I wasn’t expecting it to be roses, Petey-Pie.”

“Orange roses?” Peter asked with a weak smile, his gaze flickering to the dried out flowers on his desk.

Wade snorted. Another series of quiet beeps. Crinkling plastic. “Yeah. Wasn’t expecting it to be orange roses.”

Peter’s smile faded. He chewed on his bottom lip. His head was a flickering movie screen of images, from the desks of a lab to a light shade to the hairs on a spider— a drop of blood on the floor, a dry voice that’s hoarse and sinister, a shelf of jars and broken glass.

“I, uh…” Peter sighed. “I don’t know where to start with it all. It’s kind of a lot.”

How can you condense a lifetime of trauma on top of a month and a half of being stalked into something that won’t cause someone to worry?

Wade hummed thoughtfully. “Well, I’m almost there.”

“That was fast.”

“You’re not very far away from my apartment,” Wade pointed out. “Like. Barely three blocks.”

Peter stood up quickly, leaving the blankets and curtains on the bed. He scanned the room, keeping his phone tucked under his ear, and began to gather any incriminating evidence. His suit. Articles about Spider-Man and his lamer foes. Webshooters. His mask. All of it was stuffed under his bed without much thought.

“Knock knock,” Wade sang. “Open your door! I’m here. I bring gifts.”

Peter stumbled over to the door and cracked it open. He gave a watery smile, but the movement was exhausting and he could feel how broken it was. He pulled his phone away from his phone and hung up.

“You look like you’ve had the worst night of your life,” Wade said with a frown.

Not even close.

Peter grimaced and stepped away from the door, letting Wade in.

“Now,” Wade cleared his throat and opened the plastic bag he held in his hands. “First things first—“

Wade pulled out several small black plastic baggies and ripped one open. He made an awkward gesture and Peter held out his shaky hand questioningly— then watched as Wade poured green glow in the dark stars into his open palm.

“Thought they’d help with the darkness,” Wade explained quietly. “And also you’re a nerd. So you probably like stars. Then again, who doesn’t f*cking like glow-in-the-dark stars? They stick on your ceiling!”

Peter smiled, and his teeth were audibly chattering now. “T-That’s…”

“sh*t, baby boy.” Wade’s frown reappeared and he set the bags down on the desk chair, then gently pushed Peter back onto his bed. “Just— Get warm, mkay? I’m gonna stick a few of these up on your ceiling. Maybe the wall too. That’d be cool, right?”

Peter nodded, pulling the comforter back around his body. He watched as Wade pulled his shoes off and stood up on the bed, ripping the packages open and sticking the stars everywhere he could reach. A crude constellation sat in the corner, causing Wade to wiggle his eyebrows at Peter in an attempt to get him to laugh.

It worked.

Wade placed every last star and then sat down next to Peter on the mattress.

“I’m gonna have to move out in a few weeks,” Peter said. He smiled slightly. “I’m gonna have to take them down pretty soon.”

“That’s alright,” Wade looked up at the green glowing constellations. “For now they can stay. I like the stars. They’re pretty.”

Peter leaned his head tiredly on Wade’s shoulder and nodded, following his gaze to the ceiling. His voice is soft. “I think they’re pretty too.”

Wade put an arm around Peter and the warmth was enough to make Peter melt into his side, still cold under the comforter and the sweatshirt. He rubbed Peter’s arm comfortingly.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Wade murmured.

Peter’s eyes drift closed. He licked his chapped lips. “Um…”

“Do they happen often?” Wade asked instead. He brought his arm up comfortably to card a hand through Peter’s sweat-matted curls.

“I guess they started really bad after my uncle died,” Peter explained shortly. “They come and go. Stuff happens and it offsets it, I guess. They’ve been worse recently.”

“I’m sorry.” Wade said genuinely. “I get it. I really do, I’m not just saying that. My, uh… my fiancée got shot a couple years ago. Those nightmares are no good, I wouldn’t wish them on anyone.”

“I lost my girlfriend,” Peter said empathetically. “That was most recent. You, um… You probably heard of her, actually. Gwen Stacy? She died helping… helping Spider-Man.”

Wade stilled beside him.

He cleared his throat. “Gwen Stacy?”

“Yeah,” Peter sniffed. “But, either way. That’s not… That’s not what my nightmare was about. It’s alright. I’m doing better with that. Moving on and…”

Wade still didn’t relax. Peter pulled back to look at him, and to his surprise, Wade was already making eye contact with him. He had a look of fierce concentration, layered over something extremely complicated and indiscernible.

“Wade?” He questioned with a frown.

“Uh…” Wade trailed off. He smiled hesitatingly. “Nothing. I’m just… sorry. For your loss. Must have been hard with all that attention on the news.”

“Yeah,” Peter trailed off, not entirely convinced. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

Wade’s eyes softened, but he still looked troubled. Conflicted, even. He nodded. “Yeah, totally. I’m good. Are you good?”

“Better,” Peter said with pause.

Wade stared at him for a moment. Peter furrowed his eyebrows as he stared back.

“How about you get some sleep?” Wade asked suddenly. “I’ll sit with you, in case you have another nightmare.”

“Are you sure?”

“Super sure,” Wade confirmed. “Get some shuteye, Petey. Get some rest.”

And of course, for the third time of the night— Peter relented.

He slowly sunk back down, curling close to his pillow and closing his eyes.

He thought it would take him longer to fall asleep with the knowledge that someone was watching him, especially considering the circ*mstances, the knowledge that he’s already being stalked by someone else. But he was wrong.

He slipped into a dreamless sleep easily, and had the strangest notion that he was being protected, that he was safe.

He woke up alone.

Chapter 12: Wade’s Suspicions

Chapter Text

"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth."
-Oscar Wilde

It took Peter eight minutes and thirteen seconds for him to fall asleep.

It took Wade twenty-nine seconds to sneak out of the apartment, and his mind was f*cking reeling.

(Spider-Man, relaxing against a phone box, murmuring close to the receiver of a red plastic phone. “Anyways. To answer your question, yes, I think I can help with some F.E.A.S.T. stuff. Chinatown, right?”

The next day. Meeting him, Peter Parker, angelic-looking and all pretty, cute as a gosh-darn button. Helping out that very day, at F.E.A.S.T., particularly the one in Chinatown.)

This should have been obvious, honestly. Wade didn’t know how to feel. He sort of felt like being sick. The not so-fun kind of blowing: blowing chunks on the sidewalk of this sad little Chinatown street. What the everloving f*ck—

(“Hey, are you okay?” Wade asked, following Spidey out of the warehouse. “You seem kinda freaked out. Not that I blame you! That whole thing was creepy as f*ck, it’s just, you know. You look like you were possessed in there or something.”

“Yeah,” Spider-Man breathed finally as he stepped into the cold outside. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just— Just probably won’t sleep tonight.”

The next time he saw Peter– darker circles, and exhaustion in every blink. Someone who had seen something beyond any kind of comprehension. Peter looked haunted, and Wade finally, finally understands why. The pieces are falling into place with each horrible click.)

How could he have been so stupid?

He crossed the street and bounded for the subway, his head fuzzy as the memories back and forth tumbled like shoes in a washing machine, a constant stream of THUDTHUDTHUDTHUD as his final braincell bounced around the walls of the washy-steel prison.

He walked onto the subway train and stood, gripping the pole with white knuckles and wide eyes. Maybe he should rethink his career choices. Clearly he sucks at being a mercenary, missing the biggest details LITERALLY right in front of his face, and another face that he wanted to kiss, and worship, and sh*t!

(“What the f*ck.” Wade had stopped in the middle of the sidewalk when he saw it. “Your face. Who hurt you?”

Foundation dripped from his cheek to reveal a smear of familiar colours, the yellows and purples and blues that come with territory that Peter shouldn’t be anywhere near. Shouldn’t be anywhere near; unless he was f*cking SPIDER-MAN.)

Maybe he should work as a clown. Or an actor in a horror movie. He definitely had the looks. He could work in those seasonal Halloween houses, just chase people around with his mask off— he would even heal from the punches and kicks from all the scared patrons, it would be the perfect gig!

Wade sighed harshly and dug the steel-toe of his boot into the grooves of the train’s floor. Weasel. Weasel will help him get his head on straight. Weasel will tell him he’s overreacting about all of this— that he’s being stupid and overthinking things like the big dumb (great) ass he is.

(Spider-Man, sweating, panting, half-dead and adding blood stains to Deadpool’s couch. He whimpered painfully, his voice a weak raspy thing, like the chirp of a baby bird with broken wings. Upon being asked, Spider-Man, now conscious, went completely lax against the couch, and Wade heard the softness in his voice. He said her name like a prayer, a quiet sigh. “Gwen.”

“I lost my girlfriend.” Peter had dark circles painted in deep, sickly smears under his eyes. His nose was red, but the rest of his face was so pale, a white that matched the cheap fabric of the torn curtains bundled around his body. The same softness. “You probably heard of her, actually.”

Boy, had he.)

The subway slowed to a stop and Wade yanked himself off the train, heading towards Sister Margaret’s with a heady zeal to iron out his thoughts. It was too early for the place to actually open, meaning that he’d be sitting in his own silence at least until Weasel opened the doors. Fine. Wasn’t like Wade was a stranger to his own head. If anything him and his own head were too close, like two old suburban repressed dads on a fishing trip. Him, the sea, and his head. There's probably a blowj*b joke to be made somewhere there. You can read between the lines.

He snuck in through the backdoor, this rusty thing hidden behind a dumpster, that was hidden behind a brick wall, that was hidden behind the normal mind’s natural instinct to avoid anything that looked as if it could cause bodily harm. Then he took a seat in the back of the dark, dingy bar and pulled his hood up over his head.

He waited.

He thought of the memories over again, and broke them down each bit by bit.

The phone call— the one that started it all. He must have been calling May, Wade realized, because in his grand observations... Peter Parker doesn’t really rely on anyone else. Honestly, Peter didn't even rely on May enough. (Which, fine. He was a grown-ass adult, Wade wasn't going to baby him, but he was acutely aware of how long Spider-Man has been swinging from rooftops— and the math wasn't adding up in a way that made him feel at ease.)

It was just different waves of realization that were washing over him, keeping him under. Wade couldn't seem to get that one breath to stop him from drowning. The facts, laid out: Peter Parker was Spider-Man, and when Spider-Man crawled back home at the end of a day where he got beat up by the city he loved, he called May Parker, and could only lie to her. Wade's shoulders slump further and further down like a sickened dog's.

The dinner at F.E.A.S.T— where Wade saw firsthand the effects Spider-Man had on himself. Peter Parker, who smiled at him so gently, as he carried the heavy weight of an atlas on his shoulders, and he did it alone, he lost sleep and woke up alone, he saw the unimaginable and went home alone. Wade did these things too, but there was a difference. He had a sh*tton of blood on his hands and a permanent stench of gunpowder and death that lingered on all his clothes, and Peter... Peter was everything Wade wouldn't have been.

He wondered how many lies Peter had told in his lifetime. He wondered how many times he hid his face with makeup when it wasn’t hidden by a mask. He wondered how many times someone took the time to notice how hauntingly drained Peter looked when he thought nobody noticed. (Wade wondered, and he noticed, and he knew the answers weren’t what he would like them to be.)

The real kicker, Wade decided, was that he was ready to ignore the insanity of it all– because, and get this, he almost thought, if he squeezed his brain and wrung it out, hung it out to dry on the fire escape, he almost thought he loved Peter Parker. But Peter Parker was Spider-Man. And mercenaries should not almost love superheroes, especially ones considered the “Golden Boy of Manhattan.”

The door creaked open. Footsteps began and then stopped.

“Holy f*cking sh*t,” Weasel said bluntly. He flipped on the lights and lowered his gun down. “You dumbass, I nearly shot you. You’re supposed to text me before you break in here.”

“Bummer,” Wade said dully. He did his best attempt to swing around in the chair, which ultimately resulted in an ungodly screeching noise as the metal legs scraped against the concrete flooring. He yanked his hood down to reveal the crazed look in his eyes. “Maybe next time.”

“Sea Breezes?” Weasel guessed, making his way behind the bar. “Rollercoaster crashed?”

“That’s one innocent way to put the absolute f*cking—” Wade broke off with hysterical laughter. “f*cking one-way ticket right up the devil’s mother’s anus show that just took place.”

“That was creative and disgusting.”

“My new drag name.” Wade sighed heavily and heaved himself off the chair, slumping over to the bar. He collapsed on a barstool and dragged a bowl of pretzels closer to him, and began munching on four at once. “Please welcome to the stage, Creative’n Disgusting!”

“What happened?” Weasel asked plainly, assembling the drink. “Did he finally take off his blindfold and he saw your face? Did the wicked witch give him his vision back and he saw your face? Did th–”

“It has nothing to do with my f*cking face, you dis-righteous dick. Dis-righteous? Unrighteous? Whatever, it’s not alliterative. f*cking listen,” Wade swallowed the glob of chewed pretzel and leaned forward. “What do you do when you accidentally learn a superhero’s identity?”

Weasel blinked at him, and the glasses he wore made his wide eyes exceptionally comedic. “Please tell me this hypothetical question is actually a real question and also about Spider-Man.”

Wade groaned obnoxiously and let his head fall onto the bar with a thud.

“What the f*ck,” Weasel screwed the bottom portion of his face up and resembled his name well. “How is that a bad thing? That’s f*cking— that’s so cool. What’s his eye colour? Does his name start with D? I always imagine him to be like, a David, or, like, something biblical. Like John.”

Petey, Peanut-Butter Pete, Peterific, Pepperoni Pizza Peter, Petey-Pie, Peter Piper, Peterincess, Peter-Peter-Pumpkin-Eater—

“First of all,” Wade held up one finger. “Shut the f*ck up, I’m not telling you any of that sh*t because of the Superhero Bro Code. Clearly you’ve never read Deadpool Annual #2. Shame on you. The hom*oerotic tension in that issue alone singlehandedly ended queerbaiting. Second of all, shut the f*ck up. I'm having a crisis.”

“Fine,” Weasel crossed his arms. “At least tell me this: is he a good person out of the suit? Or is it all for show. I have a running bet with someone on this. Don’t make me lose fifty bucks.”

“He’s the nicest guy you’ll ever f*cking meet,” Wade said without hesitation. “He’s the closest person on this planet to a saint, right under Betty White, may she rest in peace.”

Weasel pumped a celebratory fist. He grinned and then passed the Sea Breeze over to Wade. “So what’s the problem? You know Spider-Man and he isn’t a huge dick.”

“The problem?” Wade guffawed. “Ha! The problem is that he’s in huge f*cking danger, and I can’t help him because he doesn’t know that I know his identity.”

And that he’s hopelessly in love with the guy, and probably ruined his chances just by being himself, but that’s neither here nor there.

“Danger,” Weasel repeated. “What, like the Employer guy?”

“Yeah. His name is Rory Reyes,” Wade drank from the glass and clinked it back on the table. (Weasel frowned and typed the name into the computer behind the bar.) He shook his head. “If I know his identity, this f*ckin’ Rory asshole is more likely of knowing it too. I’m telling you, Weas, this guy is f*cking gross. Not exactly trustworthy!”

“He’s a redhead,” Weasel announced wisely. He tilted the screen over to Wade, and the same picture that was on the Oscorp badge was on the screen. “No criminal record, but there’s an old address listed on his last employment records. If he still lives there…”

Wade downed the rest of his drink. “Send it to me.”

“Got it.”

“This guy, he’s a psycho,” Wade went off. “He calls me, just randomly, and he’s all breathing into the microphone like he’s waited his whole life to audition for Scream, and then he talks about Webs, like, like he’s the Mad Hatter with a dissection fetish! Actually, the Mad Hatter might have a dissection fetish. Okay, maybe he’s just the scientist Mad Hatter. f*cking, whatever, he wants to kidnap Webs for his secret mad scientist motherf*cking bullsh*t, and it can’t happen, okay?”

“Kind of reminds me of…” Weasel trailed off. “Except you know. If Spider-Man got taken, the whole city would freak out. Cuz he’s like, an actual hero. You understand.”

Wade clenched his fists. He glared sharply, warning in his eyes. “Reyes isn’t Francis.”

“‘Course he isn’t,” Weasel said quickly. He almost looked apologetic. He sighed. “Sorry, Wade. I’m just looking at the similarities, y’know?”

“Yeah.” Wade huffed. “The similarities.”

The Employer had the potential to be worse than Francis, which is something Wade unfortunately realized the moment he and Spidey walked into that warehouse. If nothing else, Wade could recognize the machinations of somebody who would go the furthest possible distance to get what they want.

Sometimes if Wade closed his eyes too long he was still stuck in a freezing cold building. Sometimes if he fell asleep he still thought he was choking on ash, dying and re-dying and re-dying once more. Sometimes when he looked into the eyes of strangers, he just saw Francis: with the gaze of someone who he knows won’t ever stop hurting him.

Nobody deserved that.

Especially not Peter Parker.

“Even more reason to beat his ass,” Wade decided with finality.

He pulled his burner phone out, because as far as Peter knows, Deadpool and Wade are different people, and he’s not the one going to break that illusion yet.

[Deadpool: West 139th Street, New York, NY, 10037]

[Deadpool: used my super powers to find reyes apartment]

[Deadpool: see u there tmrw?]

[Spider-Man: 👍]

[Spider-Man: How’d you get the address?]

Wade’s heart fluttered. Traitorous little blood organ.

[Deadpool: u rlly don’t wanna know how a merc gets his info bby boy]

[Spider-Man: Yikes]

Wade sighed, staring at the messages.

“…Do you want another drink?” Weasel asked him. “A hit? You can pick from the gold cards. I got new ones.”

Wade doesn’t answer, running his thumb over the power button of his phone. His other phone buzzed this time, and he switched them out to check the new message.

[Peter Parker: Hey, Wade! There’s a charity event going on at F.E.A.S.T. tomorrow, it’s like a Christmas gift wrap-and-donate type thing.]

[Peter Parker: Was wondering if you were going to be there? It’ll be lots of fun!]

Even with all the dread, Wade’s lip quirked up in a smile. He couldn’t help it. Peter Parker just had that effect on people.

[Wade Wilson: i’ll b there😘😘]

“I want to tell him,” Wade announced. He pocketed his phone and looked up at Weasel. “Spider-Man. I want him to know that I know.”

“I think that’s a dumbass idea.”

“I don’t care,” Wade pushed himself away from the bar. “It’s important to me. He deserves trust and honesty and all that gooey sh*t.”

Wade was gonna romance the sh*t outta Peter Parker by respecting his boundaries and clean moral code. He deserves someone to take care of him, someone he can rely on, fully. May the mighty god of superhero bullsh*t help him on his journey.

Weasel smirked. “Alright, Wade Wilson. Just bring him around to meet us sometime, ok?”

Wade smiled. “Yeah, maybe when Canadians become second best.”

Silly, hopeful, Weasel. That’ll never happen.

The next day, he showed up and F.E.A.S.T. is decorated like Santa worked there himself, that cheery bastard. Garlands over the doors, tables set up in the front lobby with rolls and rolls of colorful paper and Santa hats strewn around like second nature. A fake Christmas tree was assembled just behind the tables, in front of the wall with all of the staff’s pictures on it, and it was adorned with rainbow lights and plastic ornaments, but also a variety of little paper tags with names on them.

Wade stood helplessly with two bags chock-full of children’s toys.

(So far he’s told questioning passerby’s that he had five kids, then it was one but he liked to spoil her, then he worked at an orphanage, then it was that he had a shopping addiction, then it was that he had a whopping eighteen children, and he stopped remembering what he told them after that.)

He dropped the bags to the side of the tables and ventured past the lobby to look for Peter, and as he’s searching the place, there’s a rough hand on his shoulder that has him turn around with a very calm alarm.

An old man gave him a very grumpy glare. “You’re the new volunteer.”

Wade immediately made himself look as non-threatening as he could. He believed firmly that even with his best efforts it would still be akin to putting a cap on an exploding bottle of soda. Soda full of mentos. “That would be me. Do you need—”

“No.” The blunt reply came quick. His nostrils flared. “Heard you were a veteran. I’m a veteran too.”

Not technically a lie, but Wade’s pretty sure that a grand total of nobody would be happy with him calling himself a veteran. Including himself. He didn’t voice that. This guy was probably just justifying his scars. Either way, his spine straightened, his jaw firmed, like he was getting ready for a lecture. Or a fight.

“All of us here,” the old man continued, jerking his head around the full gymnasium. “That Parker kid helped save our lives. He’s family to us, you understand me?”

Oh, Wade got it now. He’s being given a shovel talk.

“I understand.”

“He’s been through helluva lot,” the man continued, his glare deepening with the addition of a sour sneer on his mouth. Aggressively protective. “I haven’t seen the kid look like that for anybody for a real long time. If you even think about breaking his heart, you’re gonna have a lot of angry people at you.”

Something in Wade’s chest shifted. Relief, but in the form of pressure, his heart squeezing. A realization: Peter Parker took care of his community with everything he had, and in return, his community took care of him.

“Good,” Wade said finally. “He deserves people looking after him.”

The man studied him, narrowing his eyes through his scowl and keeping his mouth set in a firm frown. After a long few seconds, he nodded once and left, going back to watching the television set up in the corner.

“Wade!” Peter called, grinning from the west entrance. Wade jerked his head up, took in the sight of Peter with the most ugly Christmas sweater he’s ever seen and a red-and-white pointed hat. His name was written in his slanted scrawl on a nametag that sat on his chest. He stumbled across people to get to him.

Wade’s heartbeat instantly ticked up a few notches. Okay, a lot of notches. He smiled back anyways. “Hey, Petey-Pie.”

“I’ve got something for you,” Peter said, holding his hands behind his back. Wade noticed that the dark circles under his eyes were lighter now, if even just a bit.

Wade’s eyebrows raised, and he pressed a hand to his heart. “For little old me? Petey, you shouldn’t have.”

Peter laughed, the most beautiful sound, and pulled his hands away to reveal— another red-and-white hat. “The most expensive headware, only for you. It’s Chanel, clearly.”

Wade started fanning himself with his hand. The smile was becoming hard to fight. “Oh, I feel faint just at the sight of such a gift.”

Peter laughed more and then gently tugged Wade down to him by his sweatshirt. At the motion, there was a spin of emotions in Wade's chest brewing with the new information he received. This man has the sheer amount of strength to benchpress a building, and he's using it to pull Wade down to his height, so he can fit a Santa hat on him.Peter grinned. “Looks perfect.”

Spider-Man is gonna be his absolute cause of death. It’s official.

“Thanks, Pete.” Wade touched the hat, the cheap fabric scratchy on his fingertips. “So, what can I do here? Are we wrapping stuff?”
“Right.” Peter walked back into the lobby, Wade following behind him, and gestured to the table. “This is basically where the magic’s gonna happen. People can come in here and donate gifts, or they can donate money to get their gifts wrapped. How are your wrapping skills?”

Wade smiled pleasantly. “I know the lyrics to every Salt-N-Pepa song.”

Peter snickered. Wade committed the sound to memory as he wrote ‘Wade’ on his own name tag and stuck it to his sweatshirt.

“Nah, I’m awful at it,” Wade huffed with amusem*nt. “I did bring gifts, though. Got lots of dirty looks from Black Friday Moms shopping this morning.”

“Surely you’re not awful,” Peter tried. He paused. “Wait, you brought gifts?”

“Oh, yeah,” Wade crossed to the other side of the table and picked up the two large bags. “Ta-da.”

Peter’s face softened into something sweet and reminiscent of awe. (Wade thought for one terrifying second how he wouldn’t see it again after he told Peter the truth.) “That’s… That’s awesome, Wade. Let’s start with those ones.”

Here’s the thing that Wade quickly learned: Peter Parker is good at a long list of things. Wrapping is probably number two on that list.

He watched as Peter managed to speed through an entire bag of toys. The lines on the paper folds? CRISP. The tape distribution? Perfect down to the centimeter. The clean cuts and measurements? A seamstress could cry.

“May taught me,” Peter explained. “We always use newspapers at home, though. Less waste. Do you wanna start the other bag?”

Wade looked at the large bag as if it would bite him. He grimaced and took a toy out. He laid the wrapping paper down, a green one with a mistletoe pattern on it, and put the toy– a robotic dog– directly in the middle. Cut a square. Folded the paper over. It didn’t fit.

“Nice,” Wade commented. He cut another square. Laid it on top. Folded the two pieces inward on the toy to ensure it was fully covered, so matter how messy— aaand the paper ripped. Wade froze. He slowly looked behind him, to see Peter watching with a pained amusem*nt.

The first gift ended up being a gross collage of clunky paper. Wade smacked a bow on the spot where the paper had ripped. “Never happened.”

“That looks great,” Peter said solemnly. He went over to the tree and took off a paper tag. “I think Lacey would really like that one, she wants to grow up to be a veterinarian.”

Because of course Manhattan's most famous local hero knows personally what the kids in FEAST want to be when they grow up. Wade was fine. Wade was fine and he definitely wasn't going insane, crazy, and off his rocker.

“I mean, as long as you don’t see the gift, it’s fine!” Wade defended. He taped the paper tag to it.

“Right,” Peter grinned. He took the gift and put it under the tree. Tentatively, he put a hand on Wade's shoulder and squeezed. “How about you focus on putting tags on? I’ll wrap.”

“Sounds great.”

The doors opened at twelve. People poured in and Wade got to watch Peter be incredibly kind to stranger after stranger, asking them how their Holidays are going, who their gift is for, smiling softly and listening to life story after life story. Some people that came in, Peter recognized. People that had used F.E.A.S.T.’s services in the past, that Peter and May had helped get back on their feet.

All the while Wade stood behind the table, cracking jokes, putting tags on gifts, occasionally asking volunteers which gift would better fit a particular kid. There’s a boy who loved cars. A girl who loved chemistry. A kid who loved puzzles. He also became well-versed in all the interests of the teenagers who would sometimes come by for a hot meal.

At one point May had made her rounds, and she was dressed in a matching sweater to Peter with a reindeer headband, and she left a radio playing Christmas music on the table. Peter had turned the volume up and nodded his head along as he wrapped gifts.

“Hello, Wade,” May said with a warm smile. “It’s so lovely to see you. Are you having a nice time?”

“Always,” Wade grinned at her.

“I’m so glad.”

The song ‘Christmas Wrapping’ came on, and Peter stepped away from the table to let other volunteers fill in. He was dancing, bobbing his chin back and forth and moving his shoulders up and down. He tapped May on the shoulder.

May looked over at him and laughed, before she began dancing too. Peter took her hands and led her beside the tables, where he twirled her around and the two of them were laughing and moving along to the music.

Wade smiled from where he watched beside the tree, but then Peter pulled back from May and gestured to him to come over. Wade raised his eyebrows and pointed to himself.‘Me?’ he mouthed.

And just like that, Wade was dancing with May and Peter in the lobby of a charity center, The Waitresses ringing out through a speaker sitting on the table.It almost felt like family.Wade hasn't had one of those in a while.

When the event ended at five, the tree ended up spilling presents all across the floor, all equally beautifully wrapped in fun colours and Christmas-y patterns. (Other than Wade’s which was tucked at the very back.) Each kid at F.E.A.S.T. had gotten about three to four gifts, and they raised seven hundred dollars, which according to Peter was the best results they had gotten for the past five years.

Peter and Wade just finished helping pack stuff back up, tables, wrapping paper, trash, stuff like that. Now was his moment. How do you tell Spider-Man that you know he’s Spider-Man?

“Hey, uh…” Wade swallowed. “Pete, can we have a quick chat?”

Peter nodded, looking at him with a thoughtful concern. “Sure, of course. I’m actually— I’m supposed to meet a friend right about now. It’s really important, they’re expecting me. Not that this isn’t important too! But, uh, can it... I can call you as soon as I'm free?”

Holy sh*t, Peter was talking about him. Him, as in Deadpool. Peter— No. Spider-Man is supposed to meet Deadpool. The irony.

Wade cracked an awkward smile. “I mean. I totally get your mission here, but, you might want to know this.”

“I’ll call you. Soon as it’s over,” Peter promised. He smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry. As soon as it’s over, seriously, and then we can talk. I really gotta go now, though, but I’ll see you soon.”

Wade opened his mouth, but Peter was gone. Slipped away like sand through a sift. Like a slimy eel in a dark river. He was practiced at getting out of conversations, Wade understood, but too bad he didn’t know the right conversations to slip out of.

“‘See you soon’ is right,” Wade huffed. “Too bad Spidey’s got a head start.”

He needed to get his suit.

Maybe Deadpool could tell him, instead.

Chapter 13: Worlds Colliding

Chapter Text

"Finally, in a low whisper, he said, 'I think I might be a terrible person.' For a split second I believed him - I thought he was about to confess a crime, maybe a murder. Then I realized that we all think we might be terrible people. But we only reveal this before asking someone to love us. It is a kind of undressing."
-Miranda July

Peter got the message from Deadpool yesterday morning about Reyes’ apartment— a cheap place in Harlem, a little ways away from The Employer’s warehouse. Deadpool is supposed to meet him here, but he hasn’t shown up yet. He should really wait. He should really wait.

But he didn't want Reyes to get away.

Spider-Man put his ear against the door and concentrated— he didn’t hear anybody. Not the beating tell-tale heart of a criminal, not the footsteps of a thief. He turned his gloved hand on the knob and the apartment door creaked inward slowly.

It’s empty. A breeze from a crookedly opened window flowed in and caused the papers pinned haphazardly across the span of an entire wall to rustle. Peter exhaled quietly and took a silent step forward to inspect them.

The papers are strung across in a similar investigative fashion. Shelves are hung up in the empty spaces between them, and the weight of the journals, notecards and coloured tabs sticking out at odd ends, sitting messily on top of said shelves cause them to bend in a dangerous curve.

Peter looked down at the desk sitting against the wall, littered with items. An ashtray sat on top of a book on Insect Haemolymph, which was precariously close to the edge. Rings from a coffee mug were stained deeply and overlaid several times across the wood of the desk, as well as the papers on top of it, scrawled with messy handwriting. Blueprints. Maps.

Peter frowned. He turned around and stalked to the kitchen, purely out of curiosity, and opened the fridge. He widened his eyes looking at a jar with the sleeping corpse of a spider in it residing by the egg carton. Sure, that's normal. He closed the fridge.

He pulled his phone out to call Deadpool, wondering when he was getting there. After all, they were supposed to be investigating together. He selected the number and put it up to his ear.

The phone rang.

A crunching sound boomed outside, shaking the walls of the apartment. Peter’s neck prickled with a sharp warning pain, the hairs standing up, one by one in quick succession.

He narrowed his eyes.

Another crunching sound. This time, an electric hum followed, loud and buzzing darkly. Peter saw the figure of The Employer rise outside from the crooked window, tilting his head like a puppet on strings. The helmet and trim of the chest plate glowed a vibrant indigo, and he hovered closer and closer, staring directly at Peter.

He felt like prey, like the spider in a jar, like Reyes knew something he didn’t.

The phone rang.

And then it picked up.

“Spidey. Yeah. I’m almost there,” Pool answered. “Do you have time to talk?”

“Not really.” Peter swallowed, keeping his voice as steady as he could manage. “Pool, he’s here. We need a plan, fast.”

“What do you mean?” Deadpool asked suddenly. “He’s there? Like right now?”

“I mean like he’s staring dead at me,” Peter explained slowly, not moving a muscle as he made direct eye contact back with The Employer. “I’m gonna have to just fight him.”

“Webs, you know I adore you, and admire your strength and bravery and whatever the f*ck else, but if you try and take him on, he could f*ckin’… I don’t know, he’s f*cking dangerous, you could die. Get the f*ck out of there and wait til I’m there at your side.”

“I don’t really have a choice,” Peter said lowly. He didn’t know what he’d say if he tried to come up with a reason why he didn’t have a choice. Did he ever?

He was in such a good mood before this. To think, only an hour ago he was having the time of his life.

“He took your blood,” Deadpool insisted. He’s panting lightly now, out of breath. He’s sprinting. “What if he— f*ck the Pacer Gram Fitness f*ck— what if he stabs you with a needle full of mysterious science junk? Just wait, get the fresh motherf*ck out of there.”

Peter licked his lips. His eyes darted to the door. “How fast can you get here?”

“I’ll be there in like, two minutes!”

Peter bit his tongue. A choice had to be made here. He was just tired of making the wrong ones. He exhaled stiffly through his nose. “That’s not fast enough. I’m fighting him.”

“P—“

The window crashed in loudly as The Employer burst through, breaking chunks of the wall and bits of glass in with him. Peter dropped his phone as he flung back.

The Employer charged at Peter, who leaped up to the ceiling and dropped down with enough force to land a kick. The kick was powerful enough to knock Reyes back, but he recovered quickly, sneering angrily.

He blasted up a few feet in the air with the suit’s jet pack, barely missing the ceiling of the crummy apartment, and shooting himself back down to swing a punch. Peter dodged it, grabbing the fist of the suit and throwing it away from him.

“I haven't danced like this since high school,” Peter commented, attempting to trip The Employer by kicking his leg under.

Reyes shook his fist out at his side and the gun extended from his arm. He shot a round at Peter, who jumped around the apartment to escape the raining bullets. The final one grazed his shoulder as he dropped back down to the ground, and he winced, putting a protective hand up instinctively to the wound.

“You’re a pest,” Reyes hissed out. He bounded forward, letting the weapon reload as he instead decided to throw a series of simple punches.

“I’m a delight!” Peter yanked himself up in a high jump and wrapped himself around the back of The Employer’s jetpack, trying to rip the tech apart with his bare hands.

Reyes didn’t like that.

He began to fling himself into walls, destroying the plaster, the woodwork, the furniture, in an attempt to knock Peter off. Peter was denting the jet pack, at least, in his effort to punch the device enough for a screw to break loose.

“What the hell did Oscorp make this out of?” Peter wheezed, his fist already bruising. He slammed painfully into a brick wall but continued holding on.

Finally The Employer reached his gun behind him. Peter’s sense flared and he jumped up just as shots began firing off again, a rapid fire of pops.

Peter rolled away and shot a web at The Employer to pull his arm down, but the stream of bullets caught him by the side. He muffled a pained gasp and stuck the first web to the floor before firing another one to The Employer’s chest. He stuck the end of that web to the floor too and jumped to a different side.

Reyes struggled against the webs and blasted back with his jetpack. He tackled Peter as he did so, and the two of them went right through the wall and into the public hallway.

“Dude, why are you airing our dirty laundry?” Peter stumbled, struggling to find something to grab onto from where Reyes had him pinned down.

Peter blinked quickly and then received a hard punch to the jaw. He heard something crack. He croaked weakly. “Was that an answer?”

“I’ll have to find out what makes your particular species blabber so much,” Reyes remarked snidely, squeezing a hand around his throat and then kneeing him in the ribs with the full force of his armored suit.

Something snapped. Peter nearly threw up as a sharp throbbing pain washed over him immediately. He grimaced. “Oh, that didn’t feel right. Hey, you’re a doctor, right? I don’t have healthcare, but I’ll give you a knuckle sandwich if you can check that out for me, free of charge!”

Another sickening crack to his ribs.

His insides felt warm and bubbly, and not in the fun way. It made his skin crawl, like the acid in his stomach was threatening to escape through his veins. Like maybe, possibly, he had internal bleeding.

“It didn’t have to be like this. This wasn’t part of my plan,” Reyes said mournfully. His tone changed to something sinister and angry. “But then you had to get your mercenary involved, and you had to go searching for things that needn’t be explained to minds as simple as yours.”

“What can I say?” Peter smiled crookedly, his mouth tasting of iron and his lips red of blood. “I’m curious.”

He pushed up with all of his might and regained weak ground, standing with a lean as the world moved tilted in the hallway. He squared his hips and clenched his fists.

The Employer chuckled darkly. “You really are moronic.”

Peter wheezed lightly and grinned back. “Please! It’s my best quality, right next to beating bad guys.”

The Employer lunged again, but Peter punched the jet pack as he flew forward and didn’t pull his strength.

His fist goes right through the box, compacted circuits and all. It sputtered and Reyes fell to the ground. He swiftly turned his head and gave a blank look of seething through the Oscorp helmet.

“Oh nooo,” Peter said, pulling his fist away. He swallowed the blood pooling in his mouth. “Did I do that? My bad, buddy.”

Reyes seemed to twitch before charging at Peter with concentrated rage. Peter saw the attack coming and dodged downwards, swinging his legs under and causing Reyes to tumble to the ground.

Peter grunted with effort as he swung another calculated punch to The Employer’s arm. The suit cracks in two, bullets falling loose and hitting the floor with a series of clinks. He broke the gun, at least. Peter felt the smallest sense of relief at that.

On a roll, he threw another punch at the helmet. A piece of it cracked off, revealing a sliver of grey skin underneath. Peter opened his mouth to quip.

The Employer’s suit glowed a neon violet now, all at once. Peter’s senses barely had the time to warn him before he jerked still, electricity running through his body. He clenched his jaw hard, his vision swam, everything he was looking at was a flashing image of highly saturated bits and pieces of the hallway.

The electricity stopped just as quickly as it began, and Peter fell backwards. He gasped for air. “Fried spider, should be, against, the rules—”

The Employer kicked him back, and Peter rolled willingly, still trying to let his mind regain control over being tazed, or something. He blinked several times and pulled himself up, letting instinct take the wheel where his mind was failing.

Reyes’s heavy boots stomped forward and tried to kick Peter down again, but he managed to roll out of the way and web his foot. Peter yanked the web down and The Employer tripped.

He took his chance.

He weaved forward and webbed The Employer half against the wall and half on the floor where he sprawled out. First by the helmet, then by the arms, the chestplate, the legs, making it nearly impossible to get out. He broke the jetpack. He broke the gun. Unless The Employer had any more tricks up his sleeve, he wasn’t escaping that easily.

He stood up, faltering to the side and leaning against the wall of the hallway. The Employer jerked from the webs, but they held stable.

“I think now’s the time I make a joke about a spider catching his prey,” Peter chuckled weakly. Everything in his body felt like it was on fire. "I'll let you know when I think of one."

He exhaled shakily and limped back to the destruction of Rory Reyes’s apartment. He spotted a phone in the rubble, and fell over his own weak feet trying to walk towards it.

Peter pulled himself up as far as he could, leaning against the wreckage of the fallen fridge in the kitchen. He dialed Pool’s number and held it to his ear, looking helplessly at the remains of a jar, broken glass all over the kitchen. He narrowed his eyes puzzledly at the spider that had previously lay dead in it, who was now skittering over bits of wood on the floor.

“Spidey?” Pool breathed heavily. “sh*t, I’m right at the stairs.”

“I gottem,” Peter slurred. He pulled his mask up over his mouth and wiped away the blood from his mouth. “He’s webbed… webbed up in the hall, so be careful where you step.”

“Are you okay?” Deadpool demanded. Peter could hear him, now: Another pair of heavy boots, bounding up the stairs across the building accompanied by the jingling of weapons, and the rustling of leather chafing against leather. Peter smiled lightly.

“Not feelin’ great,” Peter admitted. “Hey, you’ll— you’ll fix me up, though. You’ve got those tweezers, right?”

“Forceps,” Pool corrected. “You got shot?”

“Don’t remember.”

“You don’t remember if you got shot?”

“Mm. Don’t remember if it went in.” Peter looked down at his body. His ribs were sticking out at odd ends. He couldn’t feel much but the general white heat of his body trying to comprehend the number of injuries he had. “Maybe I did? There’s a lot of…”

The red of his suit was significantly darker, more like a deep burgundy from the blood seeping into it. The blue was in the same state. Blood was pooling out onto the tile floor beneath him.

He thought distantly, and with faint amusem*nt, how funny it was that The Employer missed his chance to easily get his blood. A dazed laugh croaked out of his throat, then died with a wisp of air and a grimace.

“Pool, I know I can trust you now,” Peter murmured, hearing the man in question sprint down the hallway. “So. You gotta tell my family stuff if this doesn’t, uh, pan out. Y’know?”

“Shuddup, Webs.” Pool wheezed and finally got to the apartment, throwing his phone to the side and running over to him. “You can’t help but get yourself beat up, huh? f*ckin’ peachy, is what that little talent is. f*ck. You can’t heal like I can, dumbass.”

Peter smiled up at him. It fell away as the pain grew worse. “Stop bullying me when I’m dyin’. Kinda sucks, I just started dating this cute guy. Really like him.”

“No,” Deadpool said firmly. “You’re not dying. I’m not letting that happen. I'm bringing you back to my apartment, and you're gonna live, you dick.”

Pool looped an arm under his body and helped him up on his feet. He held most of the support, Peter was able to lean fully against him as they walked, but still he cried out in pain just from the movement.

“Wait. We can’t go yet,” Peter mumbled. “Gotta call the cops. Tell ‘em we got the guy who robbed Oscorp.”

“Yeah, I think you’re hallucinating, baby boy. There’s nobody in the hall. Just a bunch of burnt black goo on the wall and overall property damage that’s bound to give at least three people in construction jobs a midlife crisis.”

Peter paused. He looked up. “Wha–?”

Deadpool gestured to the hallway. Peter turned his head to look, dreading what he’d see.

As horrifically expected: The Employer was gone.

“Ugh,” Peter managed, his eyelids drooping. “Why can’t I have nice things?”

He collapsed into Deadpool’s side.

The panicked trek to Deadpool’s apartment took twenty minutes. The taxi cab had sped faster than Peter had ever gone in any car, which Peter supposed was understandable when your passengers are Spider-Man and a mercenary with katanas and guns easily in view.

Now after being hauled around by Deadpool’s surprisingly strong arms, Peter sat on the rim of Deadpool’s bathtub, his suit stripped off with bandages and hello kitty bandaids littered all over fresh wounds. His skin was raw from injury, and stained pink from the blood that had been towel-washed away, said collection of towels sitting in a bloody heap at Pool’s feet, right beside the bullets that were removed as expertly as they could be removed.

All that’s left was his mask, secured on his blood-sticky face. Deadpool stared at it with silence, the question laying unsaid between them. Peter stared back.

“Okay,” Pool broke, sighing heavily. “We gotta talk.”

“You can’t take my mask off,” Peter said immediately.

“Webs,” Deadpool practically begged. “I know you have cuts on your face. We gotta clean them or they’ll be infected.”

“I’ll heal! You don’t need to take my mask off.”

It was a weak argument. They both knew it. But it was Peter’s last defense.

Pool exhaled stiff and slow. Peter knew he was being ridiculous about this, somewhere deep in the back of his head. His identity was one of the only things he had left, though. He couldn’t just—

Deadpool raised his hands to the edge of his own neck, and pulled off his leather mask.Heart-shaped scar on his nose.

Peter’s mouth opened, but nothing came out. He blinked several times, remaining very, very quiet.

“This really wasn’t how I wanted to do this,” Wade mumbled.

Wade, covered in blood, but not in the way Peter feared it would happen. Wade, smelling of gunpowder and leather. Wade, standing tall with weapons strapped to his back. Wade, at his side. Wade, stitching his wounds. Wade, Wade, Wade.

It was Wade Wilson who asked him why he was bruised. Wade who helped him buy groceries for May. Wade who gave him a sweatshirt in the bitter cold. Wade who showed up in the early morning before the sun rose to sit with him after a nightmare.

It was Deadpool who was sent to stalk him. Deadpool who threatened him. Who got him into this mess.

…Deadpool who saved his life. Pool who had his back. Pool who pulled him from that rooftop, and that apartment, and that warehouse…

And yet the question remains.

Does Wade know?

He always tried to be so careful, but Deadpool— Wade had always been smart. For all his practice, his whole life, was Peter ever that good at keeping secrets?

“Deadpool,” Peter said firmly. “I can’t.”

“Why not, huh? What’d you do?” Deadpool, Wade, joked softly. “You kill someone?”

Peter clenched his jaw and stared at him silently. His throat burned from holding back tears.

Wade’s amusem*nt faltered. His eyes went stern, but patient. He was listening completely. “What did you do?”

Peter looked down. “I didn’t… I didn’t kill anyone, I just— the identity thing, it’s—“

“I know,” Wade murmured. Quiet. Steady. He was so… calm.

Peter shook his head jerkily. His voice trembled like the last leaf gripping onto its branch. And it felt like his heart was aching, like it sat in his chest and rotted to the middle, sitting like a decaying fruit and making him sick. “Don’t say that. You don’t get it.”

He can’t know, Wade cannot know.

“Lately it seems like everything I touch just dies.” Peter said, exhaustion thinning his words to something desperate. “I don’t want you getting hurt because you know my identity. I can't do it again. There’s— There’s people I gotta protect. I’m tired of burning down forests, Pool. I’d rather just live in the ash. Might by comfy, I don't know. Warm.”

“Been there, done that. Wasn't as comfortable as you'd think. And anyway, despite the fact it sounds like you just threw up a poetry book,” Wade replied, poking Peter on his masked cheek. “Gimme your hand.”

Peter’s eyebrows furrowed with confusion, but he holds out his hand and lets all the trust in Wade sit at his fingertips, outstretched and vulnerable for the whole world to see. The silence in the room was overpowering, every soft creak in the tiled floor as Pool moved forward echoed throughout the space, and Peter could hear their breaths following each other’s pace.

Slowly, Wade took Peter’s hand, and moved it right to his chest, resting it just over his heart. He stared expectantly at Peter, as if something remarkable had just happened and he was waiting for Peter’s response.

Peter chewed on his bottom lip, staring back at him in the quiet and trying to Pool together the meaning for whatever Wade was doing.

“Webs.” Deadpool huffed a fond laugh. Why was he fond? “C’mon.”

“I’m sorry,” he smiled weakly. His own heart raced. “I don’t get whatever this is. You’ve got a nice heartbeat though. Strong.”

“That’s the point!” Wade insisted. “I’m still here. You have my heart in your hands, and I’m still here. I’m not going anywhere, baby boy.”

Oh.

He knew.

Peter slowly pulled his mask off, and held the crumpled thing in his hands. And now they were just Peter Parker and Wade Wilson, together in a blood-stained bathroom with a bucket full of torn secrets between them. Shame.

Peter looked down at the floor.

He bit hard on his bottom lip, he tried not to show how it was trembling. The edges of his vision blurred heavily with tears and he kept his mind off of it by looking up at the ceiling.

“Peter? Please look at me.”

Peter faltered, inhaled sharply through his nose and the breath stuttered in his chest. He looked at Wade. He tried to reel it back, he tried to corral the agony and put it back into the cage of his ribs.

“I’m sorry,” Peter said quietly, his voice wrecked. “This whole thing. It’s my issue. I’ll—I’ll fix this. I don’t want you in danger, okay? You should stop helping me.”

The Employer got away. Melted webs. Everybody’s in danger now. Wade is in danger.

“What? That’s f*cking ridiculous, Webs.”

Peter sniffled once. Twice. He shook his head to deny it, but the movement let a tear fall down his cheek and gather at the indent above his top lip, and once the first one fell, others fell to match its course.

Wade wiped them away in a simple motion from his thumb. “Baby boy, this wasn’t your fault! Is that what you’ve been thinking this whole damn time?”

Peter stayed silent.

Wade’s thumb drifted over the smoothness of his cheek, and Peter’s eyes fluttered closed as he leant into the touch. Wade cupped Peter’s face, delicately leaving a finger under his jaw and sweeping his thumbprint over Peter’s eyelids.

Gentle; Peter thought. In every movement. From the way his breath slowed to the way he caressed Peter’s face, he was so careful. This was a man who had death written into his skin, who was covered in scars of a bloody past that still left him stained, whose tongue had formed the most abrasive curse words—and yet here he was in all of his darkness, and Peter wanted to drown in its overwhelming safety.

A gentle giant.

Wade carefully brought his thumb further up and brushed it over Peter’s eyebrow, smoothing it out.

“I’m going to help you,” Wade said firmly. “We’re taking him down together, Peter. You and me.”

‘Okay,’ Peter thought.

Wade pulled his hand back. “I’m gonna fix up your face now, alright?”

Peter nodded tiredly.

So Wade began.

His hands moved expertly, sticking a butterfly bandage over a cut through Peter’s top lip. “You should stay low for a while. At least to heal, before we go out and find this son of a bitch.”

Peter was quiet, studying the stress in Wade’s blue eyes and the unnatural lack of lightness in his voice. He couldn’t reply without messing up the bandaging—he had a feeling Wade knew this and was taking full-advantage against his stubbornness.

It was weird to be in this scenario with Wade. He almost couldn’t wrap his head around it. He was used to Deadpool while in the mask, and Peter Parker as an entirely different world that had nothing to do with Spider-Man. But Wade was more careful than Deadpool was, and there was something familiar about that. He could get used to this, maybe.

“I hope you know how I’d do nothing more than sit here for hours stitching you back together after your fights, baby boy, but it isn’t pretty. It doesn’t make me feel good, seeing you all beat up.”

Wade sighed and grabbed another bandage, moving to his eyebrow. “I know I already said this, but— just because you have a healing factor doesn’t make you immortal. That’s my schtick. Get your own traumatic comic book superpower, you know?”

After a beat: “You have such adorable freckles on your nose.”

Peter, despite the tiredness and pain, cracked a smile.

Wade groaned. “Great. Your beautiful smile split your lip open again.”

A soft laugh escaped Peter’s lips—and that’s how he knew he was really tired now, because his ribs erupt away in agony and the smell of fresh copper hit his nose again and he kept laughing.

Wade rolled his eyes and held his hands away from Peter’s face. “Okay, Pete. I get it. You’re high on exhaustion. Let me finish your f*ckin' dressings please so you don’t bleed out on my bathroom sink.”

“I won’t bleed out,” Peter defended, trying to stifle the fighting laughter in the bubble of his chest aiming for his funny bone. (Not anatomically correct, there’s really no accurate description for the sort of loopy-laughter reaction he’s having.)

“Good.” Wade set the first aid box down, presumably giving up on his meaningless task of trying to fix up every little scratch. “Congrats. Your hom*osexual beat me to fixing your lip, it’s healing on its own.”

“Homeostasis?” Peter guessed, still smiling. "I don't think that's the right term."

“I’ve heard it both ways.”

“I thought you couldn’t reference anything from before 2005, Pool.”

“I am in love with you,” Wade said seriously. “Now go get some rest, please. Don’t worry about getting the bed bloody. Or sweaty. It’s seen worse.”

“Wait.” Peter paused, suddenly putting a hand on Wade’s arm. “Was all of this—“

He hesitated. Started again, quietly. “That first time, did— did you only talk to me because you knew I was Spider-Man?”

He didn’t know what he would do if Wade looked at him and said yes.

But he didn’t. No, instead, Wade’s expression went gentle, he tilted his head and exhaled softly through his nose.

“‘Course not. This was a happy little coincidence, Petey-Pie. Should’ve known the best person in the world was also Spider-Man as a side gig.”

“Oh.”

And for just a moment; the worry melted away.

Chapter 14: Threadbare Plans

Chapter Text

"You can put your strength down. I'm sitting here with you at your kitchen table. You don't need to say anything."
-Eden Robinson

Wade hadn’t mentioned anything about him being him.

The entire night went quietly after the whole reveal, and Peter had been so tired after everything that he crashed instantly... Then the sun rose, and the morning came on, and Peter was waiting for something more. A shoe to drop.

Peter was a very curious person when his brain wasn’t too addled on adrenaline and near-death-level pain. He's observant. He pressed for questions in his mind and then answered them, it was part of his whole scientist brain, for better or worse.

He’s sitting on the barstool of Deadpool’s kitchen, who also happened to be Wade Wilson, watching him at the stovetop.

Wade’s expression is calm and pleasant, humming George Michael’s “Last Christmas” to himself as he sprayed down a stovetop griddle with canola oil cooking spray. He had this goofy Kiss the Cook apron on that had Peter’s heart doing silly loops, and he just looked… like somebody who didn’t experience an earth-shattering confession the night before.

As for himself, Peter’s shirtless, with his chest and shoulder wrapped up with some high-quality bandages. Like, the good kind that cost a lot, and not the cheap kind he usually bought in the back of random Manhattan pharmacies while nursing various wounds. He also had on a pair of Wade’s baggy grease-stained sweatpants, which hung low around his waist and he had to keep folded around his ankles so he didn’t trip over his own feet.

(And no, it wasn’t because he was short! He was average height and had a gymnast build! It was not his fault that Wade Wilson was half beefcake.)

Peter watched as Wade poured several dollops of batter on the griddle, waiting for him to bring it up. He didn’t. Peter decided to start some kind of small talk anyways.

“I really should pack up my apartment soon,” Peter spoke up. “Eviction isn’t really, uh… my friend.”

Wade hummed. He flipped a pancake and it sizzled on the pan. “I don’t think it’s anybody’s friend, baby boy.”

Peter pressed his lips together and awkwardly drummed his fingers on the counter.

“It’s alright,” Wade shrugged. He piled the pancakes onto a plate and handed it to Peter with a fork. He gave him a crooked grin. “You can crash with me. I’ll even help you pack.”

Peter gave a half-grateful smile. It hurt against his lip, still on the cusp of being fully healed. “Yeah. Thanks.”

“How’re you feeling?” Wade asked. He looked up at him from where he stood at the stove.

Peter pushed a cut bite of pancake around in syrup on the plate. “I’m…”

How was he?

Physically? One night had only healed half of his wounds, and he still hurt with every move. He did sleep well though, Wade’s mattress was far more comfortable than his could have ever hoped to achieve. He was hungry, but Wade’s pancakes were fixing that up nicely. He hadn’t been kidding. He was damn-good at making them.

Emotionally— well, that was always the kicker, wasn’t it? He let Reyes get away, and he’s out of commission til his wounds heal, leaving him vulnerable. But he still felt grateful that Wade was with him, and that’s what he decided to focus on.

Peter swallowed the bite of pancakes. “I’m okay. We need to come up with a plan though. The Employer is still out there.”

“Just, hold on, cowboy. Even if we have a plan, we won’t be able to execute it anytime soon. You still gotta heal,” Wade pointed out. He piled pancakes on another plate and then turned the burner off. He sat next to Peter. “What can we do right now?”

Now, for this next part… Peter couldn’t help it. He had to ask.

“How did you know?” Peter blurted out, searching Wade’s expression with pinched eyebrows. “If you weren’t looking for me knowing I was Spider-Man, I mean. How did you find out? When was it?”

Wade looked down, stuffing his face with pancakes. “Eh. Just being aware. Listening to things. Being Deadpool gives you some cool social perks, great for figuring out when people are bullsh*tting you. The whole ‘getting jumped’ story you gave me— I thought you were in some deep sh*t, baby boy.”

Peter huffed an unexpected laugh. “Usually people don’t react like you did. I panicked. I’m usually better at lying about Spider-Man stuff.”

Wade raised his eyebrows wordlessly.

“…Well, I thought I was better at lying,” Peter mumbled. "I guess I should really work on that."

Wade smirked, his eyes twinkling with amusem*nt as he looked down at his plate.

“Tell me about Deadpool,” Peter decided, taking another bite. “The real story. Everything that happened.”

Wade paused, his hand stilling on his fork. He looked up at Peter with hesitancy and something almost afraid. “I don’t think you want to hear all that, baby boy. It’s not exactly breakfast conversation. Or fragile stomachs. Or any conversation. Or any stomach.”

“I think I can manage,” Peter promised lightly, nudging his shoulder. “I wanna know the truth.”

He wanted to know everything. He could listen for hours.

Wade sighed dramatically. “Okay. Well, it all started with me being born in a sh*tty little hospital in the grand old maple leaf country Canada. Equally sh*tty little town in Regina, Saskatchewan. My mother—“

“Wade,” Peter smiled.

Wade tapered off and gave Peter a gentle smile of his own. He looked down thoughtfully and pushed pancake bits around with his fork.

“My dad was a piece of sh*t,” he started honestly. “I was ready to do anything to get out of there. Luckily, I was able to fake my way into Special Forces when I was about sixteen. That part wasn’t a lie.”

“Got discharged ten years later,” Wade continued. “I refused to do some heinous sh*t the asshole with the badges wanted me to do, and they sent me home with nothing. I didn’t go to college, there’s only so much you can do with my ‘skill set’ and no diploma to earn cash.”

“Merc for hire,” Peter murmured. He paused. “You knew the X-Men. That photo you have on your laptop—“

Wade laughed slightly. “That’s… a little ways from now. I went into normal mercenary work for about two years, met this really pretty girl. Vanessa. Just as we were about to get married, you know, really take off with our lives, I got f*cked over with a cancer diagnosis.”

Peter’s blood went cold. He furrowed his eyebrows and frowned deeply. “Wade, I—“

“Don’t worry,” Wade said with a grimacing smile. “Because this really… really awesome bag of three-pronged dicks told me he could heal me. And me and Nessa— we’d already travelled the f*ckin’ world looking for experimental cures and all this other bullsh*t, so… I was getting desperate, for her sake. He took advantage of me. Next thing I know I’m getting round-the-clock tortured to spark up my ‘mutant transformation’ or whatever motherf*cking garbage—“

Peter moved his knee to press into Wade's thigh. Wade settled, looking down at his food again. He waited.

Wade took a careful breath, and smiled sharply. “And now I look like this! A walking bag of cancer cells, inside and out. I can’t die, but who would wanna live like this, you know? Anyways. Turns out being a mutant who’s known for murdering people doesn’t sit well with Russian Santa, so him and his little behemoth kid squad started tailing me. That’s all in the past now, though. We hardly see each other.”

“Ah,” Peter said blankly.

He let it get quiet, trying to formulate any kind of response. His mind was void of one. There were a lot of things he wanted to say, a lot of things he wanted to express. He wanted to say some sort of apology, but that wouldn’t come across like he wanted. He wanted to tell Wade about his promised loyalty. He wanted to tell Wade it didn't matter, he'd still be here.

From now on, if there were any doubt, it was now clear: Wade Wilson wouldn’t be going at anything alone. Not if Peter Parker had anything to say about it.

Wade sighed. “I took the hit on you because I don’t like the idea of powerful people taking advantage of those who need help."

That made sense. Deadpool had been honest about it from the start. It's only now that Peter's connecting the dots as to why.

"I investigated F.E.A.S.T. first, heard Spidey talking about it on the phone the night we met— sorry about that, by the way," Wade said brusquely. "Instead of finding evidence of corruption, I just found…”

“…Me,” Peter finished.

Wade nodded. “You. I quit then and there. Figured there wasn’t any possible way that place had shady business running on when I saw how you treated it, and how the people in there treated it. It’s a real good place. Haven’t seen much of those in my lifetime.”

Peter considered this, and then sighed. “I can’t believe you’re a mercenary. I can’t believe you’re—“

“A killer?” Wade supplied, the word coming out with a bitter, tense smile.

Peter scoffed, nudging their shoulders together again, harder. (He ignored the pain from this particular movement.) “No. I can’t believe after all of that you’re still so good.”

Wade widened his eyes with pure disbelief. He fully put his fork down, clinking it against the plate. “Are you still bleeding? Are you suffering from the confusion of major blood loss? I have basically a thesaurus of words my buddy has called me or referred to me as, and ‘good’ ain’t in there, Petey.”

“Okay, well. I think you have a good head on your shoulders. You’re smart, you make hard choices to protect the people who can’t, or shouldn’t have to. That sounds pretty damn good to me.” Peter pressed his lips together firmly, hesitating on his next words. But they were important. And he trusted Wade, and he deserved to hear them. "There have been a few times in my life where I didn't want to be... good. hard. I'm proud of you."

Wade shifted uncomfortably, remaining quiet. It was clear that he didn't agree with him, and that was fine, because Peter would be there to remind him from now on. They could keep each other on their toes, on the right path.

Wade cleared his throat. "What about you, Webs?”

Peter raised an eyebrow at the change of subject. He took another big bite of pancakes and licked the syrup from his bottom lip. “What about me?”

“I don't know, I thought we were doing movie synopses,” Wade said, gesturing between them. “I wanna hear yours. It’s your turn, take it away.”

“I wouldn’t know where to start. You already know about Gwen, because I—“ Peter hesitated, his eyebrows furrowing. “I told you about that twice, didn’t I?”

“Yep. That’s actually how I busted your little masquerade charade.”

“Well, I wouldn’t exactly call it a—“

“How’d you get your powers?” Wade interrupted, leaning into his side. “That’s pretty interesting, hm? Did you get tortured too or were you born with it, Maybelline?”

“Uh, neither, I guess.” Peter smiled wryly. “I was just bit by a spider.”

Wade hummed. “Kinda boring. What about that scar on your ear? I’ve been real curious about that.”

“Sorry to say, it’s the same boring answer.” Peter turned his head and showed the white mark behind his left ear. “I got bit on a field trip to Oscorp when I was fourteen.”

“That scarred?” Wade exclaimed with an unreasonable amount of stun. “A teeny tiny spider bite?”

“It wasn’t teeny,” Peter corrected, and sure, he might be a little defensive. “It was bigger than my thumb, and it was like, really painful. And itchy. And also, like, radioactive, so yeah, it scarred.”

“Oh, sh*t,” Wade repeated softly. Then he gasped. “Oscorp. Oscorp spider. Motherf*cker, Reyes worked with spiders at about the same time, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, I’m…” Peter let out a tired breath. “I'm basically the only living DNA of his spider project, I guess. Probably why he stole my blood, and the other stuff.”

“It’s like he was made specifically to hate you,” Wade said with narrowed eyes. “Seems a bit intentional. On the nose. I can, and will judge character design.”

“I really don’t know what that’s supposed to mean.”

“You’re not supposed to,” Wade said sweetly. “Anyways, I knew it wasn’t just a scar! Definitely a biggie. You seem way too haunted by that thing.”

Peter made a face. Wade wasn’t wrong, but the bluntness of his observations, especially regarding the accuracy of the spontaneous soul-read, was almost scary. Seriously, Wade could be one of those street-psychics in Central Park.

“It’s just a lot of responsibility, okay?” Peter twirled his fork around, trying to find the words. “If I had a sh*tty patrol, I can always just take the mask off at the end of the day. But the scar never goes away, it's always just there.”

He paused and shook his head. “Whatever. That probably doesn’t make sense.”

“It makes sense,” Wade said, softening.

Peter glanced up at him, and Wade slowly lifted his hand to cup the left side of his face. It settled behind his left ear, with his thumb able to gently rest on Peter’s earlobe.

He smiled bright and sharp, eyes full of genuinity, an expression noticeably adorned by Wade when he looked at Peter, and said: “You have a very handsome ear.”

If that wasn’t the most ridiculous thing Peter had ever heard in his life. And yet he could feel his face going hot and the urge to smile back at him was a battle he was finding it hard to lose.

“You’re crazy, Pool,” he replied simply, keeping his expression levelled.

Wade’s smile widened to a grin. “Crazy for you, Webs.”

Peter hummed and looked around at the apartment again. Deadpool’s apartment. The large corkboard in his living room was now full of post-it notes, print out pages of documents from Oscorp’s databases, and of course— scribbles of Spider-Man and Deadpool in crayon, littered along the board and tucked in hiding spots.

“I see the board got an update.”

“Hell yeah, always.” Wade smiled. “Think I got your likeness down? Sorry for mostly drawing ass-shots. It wasn’t intentional. Yes it was.”

Peter rolled his eyes.

“Oh sweet f*ck. That’s what that looks like,” Wade laughed, slapping his knee. “Out of the mask. That’s just, that's just so great. So pretty.”

Peter guffawed, beginning to laugh at the ridiculousness of everything, particularly the whole “Deadpool is his best friend” portion that was spiraling out of proportion as Wade continued flirting with him. (Because hey, Wade kept saying stuff that made his stomach turn inside out in the bubbly crush kind of way, and hey, technically they’re… dating?)

Wade raised his eyebrows, clearly clocking in his mood change. “What?”

Peter opened his mouth to start explaining this revelation, but his phone rings. He pulled the broken thing from his pocket, blinking down at May’s contact. He showed it to Wade quickly before he answered the phone.

“Hey, everything alright?”

“Everything’s well,” May said pleasantly, her voice chiming through the speaker. “No need to worry, Peter. I was just calling to remind you I’m baking Christmas cookies today. Now, I know you also have Wade’s number, so I thought it would just be so much fun if you gave him a call and both of you boys could come over to help.”

Peter looked back up to Wade, who was eating his pancakes and watching him curiously. “Uh, actually he’s right in front of me. I’ll ask him. Erm– Wade, do you want to go to May’s and bake cookies?”

Wade’s face lit up and he shouted exuberantly: “Abso-lutely? May, I wouldn’t miss it for the world!”

May laughed softly. “I assume that’s a yes?”

“That’s a yes,” Peter smiled, his heart comfortably warm. “We’ll head over there soon.”

“I’ll make sure I have everything out by the time you’re over.” May sighed happily. “I’m so glad you made friends with him, he’s such a nice young man I missed seeing you so happy with—”

She broke off and began to laugh again. “Geez, look at me just rambling on and on. I’ll let you go now, but I’ll see you soon.”

“Alright,” Peter trailed off, continuing to watch with a grin as Wade pointedly did a happy dance in front of him. “See you soon. Love you.”

“Love you too!”

The subway had a calming lilt to it as they rode to the 71st Avenue station. Wade began to lean into his side as the train doors closed and the people settled in their seats.

“How’s your ribs?” Wade asked simply.

“Looks worse than it is,” Peter replied. The bandages rubbed against the cotton of his sweater, and truthfully, the pain had gone down with the swelling. The bruises were a yellow-green, well on their way to fully healing. They were sore, but manageable. He had gone out on patrol with worse, so a day of cookie-baking wouldn’t bother him. “I’m alright.”

“Good. By the way, I talked to Weasel,” Wade murmured, speaking close to Peter’s ear. They were maybe four inches apart, and their thighs were touching, and Peter was wondering if Wade always smelled like gunpowder and he only just noticed it now.

“Your friend?” Peter whispered back questioningly. “The… business friend?”

Wade quirked a smile. “Sure. If that makes you comfy. Anyways, he’s keeping close contact on the mercenary gossiping lines. He’s got eyes and ears all over the city, if anyone spots our guy, we’ve got first dibs and he said he’d call me.”

“Keep your voice down.” Peter glanced around, ensuring nobody was looking at them. He didn’t feel anybody’s eyes on him except Wade— which was usual, and comforting. He looked back at him. “Is this guy someone you trust?”

“Unfortunately,” Wade said with a scoff. Then he did this thing; scanning over Peter’s face, and his own expression relaxed into something more certain and solacing. “We can trust him. He’s not gonna do anything scummy.”

Peter nodded faintly. “If you say so.”

Wade hummed, his feet swinging back and forth. “Can I see your phone?”

“You gonna ask for games?” Peter teased, even as his hand went digging into his pocket to retrieve it. “What do you want with it?”

“I’m gonna play music.” Wade took the phone and held it in his hands, staring at it for a moment. He looked up with some expression of pity. “Does this thing work?”

“When the duck tape is on it, yeah,” Peter said. “Just be gentle.”

Wade winked. “I’m always gentle.”

He swiped up and correctly entered in Peter’s passcode, which, honestly, he didn’t even want to ask about. He selected the music app and went to the search bar, typed something in with a grin, and then held the phone’s speaker up between their ears.

Peter broke into a laugh. “Is this Salt-N-Pepa?”

“Oh yeah, baby.” Wade nodded along to the beat. “Hear that? That’s good sh*t.”

“Wow,” Peter said simply.

Wade pulled the phone back and began fiddling around on the app. “I’m making you a playlist. It’s for your own good. What’s your favourite movie?”

“It’s already on there,” Peter looked over his shoulder and pointed to a playlist. “Empire Strikes Back.”

“Nerd.” Wade hummed affectionately. He paused and began to whisper. “Wait, question. Your work playlist is called The Karate Kid, so is that a Spider-Man joke or do you just associate photography with Ralph Macchio? I’m very curious.”

“Of course it’s Spider-Man,” Peter whispered back. “The Daily Bugle job has a different playlist.”

Wade raised his eyebrows.

“Whiplash, because that’s what it’s like working for Jonah,” Peter said.

It wasn’t a great joke, but still, Wade burst into the kind of rib-hurting laughter that rang through the subway car, his head tipping backwards enough for the hood to fall off. Peter’s grin grew, unable to hold back his own chuckles just from watching Wade.

Eventually, the subway stopped at its proper station and the two of them stepped off. They walk to May’s house side-by-side, close enough to share earbuds and their hands to brush against each other. Wade was very enthusiastic about singing along to every song , and Peter’s very pleased to learn that he’s got a great voice.

He also learned little tidbits about Wade as they continued along the sidewalks and streets, just breadcrumbs of information that Wade would drop randomly without thinking about it. An ABBA song played while they crossed a street, and Wade launched into a story about how once he had a mission where the hit’s name was Fernando.

“He was like, totally clean. He didn’t do sh*t that was bad. But I was already there and I wanted to mess with the guy,” Wade explained. “So I hid in the vents and started blasting Fernando— you know, the song– and this guy went f*cking nuts. He thought he was having a stage five mental break, kept yelling at his f*ckin’ Alexa and finally I got to watch with sweet sweet success as he chucked the thing out of a seventeen-story window because he thought it was malfunctioning. Funniest motherf*cker I’ve come across in the last seven years.”

“What did you even do afterwards?” Peter had asked, after he finished laughing his ass off. “Just leave?”

“Yeah!” Wade grinned. “I just snuck back out. After, of course, I left a remote-controlled radio in his vents so I could still spontaneously play the song if I ever wanted to. I have the remote somewhere in my apartment. It’s still connected, so clearly he hasn’t found the thing yet. I like to think he deconstructed his house by the walls and called a seance for his dead Alexa to get it to stop, but to no avail…”

He was hilarious and addicting and entertaining beyond any reasonable belief. Peter could listen to him talk for hours and hours like his favourite science podcast on loop, and he was still laughing when they showed up to May’s door.

“You boys are so loud,” May said playfully as the door swung open. Peter didn’t even get a chance to reach for his keys. “I can hear you giggling down the block.”

Peter swallowed his laugh in exchange for a smile; but it faded within seconds. May searched over his face, her eyebrows creased and an instant dim in her usual cheerful disposition. A deep frown settled on her face.

“Peter,” May tried quietly. She brought a hand up to gently caress the bruises on his face.

“I’m alright,” he said quickly, giving her a grimacing smile. He went into auto-pilot, pushing himself forward and bringing May into a hug– she’s worried sick, and he could feel it. Holding back tears, too, if to go by the shaky tenseness of her breaths while he held her in his arms.

His fault. If he had gotten Reyes, really gotten him, then he wouldn’t have gotten so beat up in the process of losing a fight.

“It doesn’t even hurt, May. I swear,” he continued, rubbing soothing circles on her back. "Wade got me and fixed me up."

She sighed tearfully and pulled back, putting a hand on his cheek delicately as if he were one of the China plates that she kept in the top cupboards. “How do you even manage to get so beat up, Peter? You need to get out of that neighbourhood, it’s so unsafe. Maybe I could write to the Police Department…”

“Hey, no,” Peter insisted. “I’m alright. Really. I’m moving out soon, anyway. Wade said I could move in with him until I get back on my feet.”

May looked overcome for a moment and turned fully to Wade. She gave him the most relieved smile, her eyes brimming with tears. “You’re so good for him, Wade. Thank you so much for looking out for my boy.”

Wade smiled bashfully and scratched the back of his neck. “‘Course. He’s my second favourite Parker, after all. Can’t let anything happen to him.”

May brightened up at that, something Peter was eternally grateful for, and gave a wet chuckle as she waved her hands. “Oh, you. Alright, well– make yourselves at home. I’ve gotten the ingredients out on the counter and Peter, the recipe is in the box, you know which ones to get.”

“Yep,” Peter said. He followed May in, kicked his shoes off, and walked down the hallway to the kitchen. On the counter, several bags of flour, vanilla and almond extract, a large container of sugar, and butter had been set out to soften. A full carton of eggs sat close to the edge.

Wade trailed closely behind him, never lingering too far away. A glance behind him and Peter is pleased to see that Wade was comfortable enough to leave his hoodie at the door. He dawdled to the sink and rolled up his sleeves to wash his hands.

Peter smiled faintly at him and opened a cupboard above the window. He took out a box of pancake mix, null of the pancake mix, wrinkled and faded from age. With Sharpie, “FAMILY RECIPES” is written across the front of the box in Ben’s jaggedy cursive handwriting. He opened the box and went fishing through the multitude of ancient notecards, magazine cutouts, and post-its of cakes, frostings, cookies, casseroles, salads, jellos, and everything in between.

“Wade, can you preheat the oven to three-fifty?” May spoke up as she walked in. She stood beside Peter and helped him go through the recipe cards.

“Of course, m’lady,” Wade slid over to the oven and fiddled with the settings until it beeped. “What cookies are we baking?”

“Oh, I don’t know. We have so many of them,” May smiled. “I’m thinking sugar cookies, because they’re versatile and I have a lot of the most precious cutouts for them, angels, trees, snowflakes, and things. Chocolate chip maybe, and my famous ginger cookies.”

“Ginger cookies are a must,” Peter said immediately. “It’s not Christmas without them.”

“If Pete says they’re a staple, we gotta have them. I’m so intrigued I could die,” Wade backed up, his voice serious and his eyebrows raised.

“Ginger cookies it is,” May chuckled. “We can triple batch the sugar cookies. We got a generous donation earlier this morning of baking goods, so I just thought it would be wonderful to make extra for FEAST.”

“I like that.” Peter reached up on his toes and easily plucked the electric mixer from on top of the upper cabinets. He set it on the counter and plugged it into the outlet. “Plus the kids would have a blast decorating them.”

“I’ll have to call Oliver,” May said, setting the recipes for ginger, sugar, and chocolate chip cookies out from the rest of the pile. “They can pick up frosting and sprinkles for the kids.”

“I could do it,” Wade jumped in enthusiastically. “I’ll buy out every store, I swear it.”

“Oh, dear, you wouldn't mind?”

“Pfff,” Wade furrowed his eyebrows and grinned. “Not at all. Just let me know how much we’ll need.”

There was this moment, then. May looked over at Peter, and Peter looked over at May— and as they made eye contact, there was a very clear line of understanding and communication, entirely nonverbal. Approval, with the creasing lines at the corner of May’s smile, and the softness of Peter’s eyes that knew he didn’t need to ask for it.

“Let me show you how to make these,” May said sweetly, looking back to Wade. She stepped beside him at the mixer.

The first hour was spent adding in dry ingredients, a process which is usually much shorter, except for the fact that Peter was helping.

“I forgot what cup I’m on,” Peter said, hesitating with his arm fully in the bag of flour. His sleeve was covered in white fluffy powder, and a measuring cup half full of the stuff in his hand. “Am I on three? Three cups?”

He probably looked as distressed as he felt, because May put a hand over her eyes and held it there, looking down to hide her laughter. Wade was not as successful in this venture.

The second hour was spent adding in wet ingredients, and Peter had been moved instead to mixer duties. Wade carefully measured out vanilla and butter.

“This is really fun,” Wade murmured.

“I’m really glad,” Peter smiled at him, hand on his hip as he turned the mixer unknowingly on at high speed. Globs of three-batches-worth of unmixed dough began spattering out of the bowl and his smile fell as he rushed to turn the mixer off.

“Peter,” Wade practically cried out, his face red as his wheezing howls and cackles got the better of him. “What the hell. This is so painful to watch. You need a lifetime ban from the kitchen, I swear to god.”

Peter wiped up the small piles of unmixed dry ingredients with a napkin. “Listen—“

May playfully shoved him away from the mixer. “Alright, mister. You can hand Wade ingredients now. He’s my new kitchen partner.”

“Oh, be so jealous,” Wade said, sticking his tongue out to Peter. His eyes were bright. “I’m May’s new kitchen partner. Be so jealous.”

“I’m so jealous,” Peter laughed. “What do you need next?”

“Eggs,” May and Wade answered simultaneously. May smiled. “Six of them.”

“Gotcha.” Peter opened the egg carton and held two in one hand, then moved towards them.

One egg slipped from his hold, and it hit the ground with a horrible cracking splat.

“Oh, sh*t—“ Peter blurted, putting the other egg down on the counter and reaching for a paper towel to clean up the mess. “Sorry! Sorry, my bad. Sorry, guys. It’s all good, just one egg.”

“Peter…” May sighed, but sounded as though she was not surprised in the slightest, trying her best to stifle a laugh for not the first time that evening.

“Take a lap, Parker,” Wade teased. “You’re off the team.”

“Yes, Coach,” Peter agreed with defeat. He wiped up the egg and tossed the towel in the trash. “I think I’ll just sit until you need help uh… with dishes, or something.”

“Good idea,” Wade smiled. “They warned me about your kitchen habits but I really didn’t know it was this bad, but this is bad. Like, I had hope for your Christmas cookies at least.”

“That was your first mistake,” May fired back easily. Her grin was also big.

“Ohhhh!” Wade laughed and gave her a high-five. “Guess Peter’s Christmas cookies aren’t the only thing getting burned today. May Parker, you are feisty.”

“My own aunt,” Peter held his hand against his heart in mock pain. He sniffled fakely and blinked up at the ceiling with a pout. “Horrible.”

“You lost my defense after the third turkey,” May said solemnly, her eyes crinkling with joy.

Peter smiled and sat up at the counter, watching the two of them resume joyfully. It was nicer from there, Peter thought. He got to watch the patient focus on Wade’s face, the coolness in his blue eyes as he listened to May’s instructions.

And as Wade cracked eggs into the mixing bowl, it was such a strange thing to notice, but Peter thought as though his hands were so gentle about the task, as if he were hesitant everytime he tapped the egg against the edge of the bowl.

Ironic headline. Infamous mercenary under the name ‘Deadpool’ is scared to break an egg with his bare hands. Even stranger was that it fit perfectly; although Peter couldn’t scratch his brain right to explain why.

Wade was just gentle with delicate things, wasn’t he? There wasn’t much more to it then that. He can pull the trigger of a gun and turn around to stitch a wound together without slipping in the blood. He can crack a sternum during CPR and later hold your hand gently over his steady thrumming heartbeat, and this dichotomy is what made him… him.

Yes, he was sure of it. Peter was sure of Wade Wilson, and what a lovely person to be sure of.

By the time it hit ten in the afternoon, the house was baking hot from the use of the oven. May was tired, leaning against the counter beside Peter as the two of them listened to the Christmas radio. She had her short-bobbed hair pulled up in a messy ponytail, and her face was pink from exertion and heat.

Wade stacked sugar cookies in a large bin that would be taken to FEAST tomorrow, a variety of trees, angels, snow people, and ornaments to be decorated with frosting and sprinkles by some very happy kiddos.

There’s one more batch of cookies left to be put in the oven, the last of the chocolate chip dough in the mixer. May yawned as the oven beeped again, signaling that another tray had finished baking and was ready to be moved to a cooling rack.

“Hey, May, why don’t you go to sleep?” Peter suggested. “Wade and I’ll finish the cookies off. We’ll lock up the house before we leave.”

“Yes,” Wade agreed quickly. “You need your beauty sleep, May. We’ve got this. I promise I won’t let Peter blow up the kitchen.”

She sighed. “Well, if it isn’t too much trouble.”

“Of course not,” Wade said immediately.

“Yeah,” Peter smiled encouragingly. “Get some rest, May.”

“Alright, then…” May yawned again. She pulled Wade in for a hug. “Thank you for the help, Wade. You’re welcome to come over anytime.”

“I’m so taking you up on that,” Wade said, hugging her back tightly. “Get ready for Golden Girls marathons.”

“I can’t wait,” May chuckled goodnaturedly. She pulled away and hugged Peter, and lowered her voice so only he could hear what she was saying. “Keep that one, he’s so good for you. Invite him for Christmas.”

“I will,” Peter said quietly, his heart warming at the thought. He squeezed her once and let her go. “Night, May. Love you.”

“Sleep well, May!”

“Goodnight, boys,” May said pleasantly, trailing away as she went up the stairs.

Peter pushed himself up and took the cookies out of the oven, then began to scoop them up with a metal spatula onto the cooling rack. Wade stepped up beside him.

“Looking good, Webs,” he said.

The corner of Peter’s mouth perked up. “Thanks, Pool.”

The absence of May in the kitchen let a different wave of peacefulness wash over them. It was just the two of them, and the radio crackled quietly on the countertop, and the oven hummed vibrantly with heat. Peter leaned closer to Wade, enjoying the safety it brought him.

Wade plopped the last of the cookie dough on the sheet and slid it into the oven. Then he shifted, leaning gently into Peter’s space.

Peter glanced over at him and noticed a bit of flour dusted over Wade’s cheek. He fought a laugh and reached up. “Stay still.”

Wade raised an eyebrow but listened, not moving. He watched Peter carefully as he brought his thumb up and brushed the flour away. Then their eyes met, and both of them smiled all over again.

“This is like my favourite scene in all those Hallmark movies,” Wade joked lightly. “Do we kiss now?”

Peter felt his ears warm up, going a cheery red. He grinned easily up at him, shrugging. "I wouldn't mind that."

Wade's blue eyes crinkled with a soft amusem*nt. "Oh, you wouldn't mind?"

Peter shook his head quietly.

He felt restless in his body, caught between wanting to press forward or to pull away out of nerves. But Wade was looking at him with adoration in his eyes and something sticky sweet on his lips, and so the decision was made.

The tile creaked under his feet, slowly, softly, as Peter moved forward. Wade’s heartbeat was a heavy thudding rhythm in his chest, full of hope; the sound humming in Peter’s head. He exhaled quietly, and no words were spoken as he rested his hand on Wade’s cheek, closed his eyes, and pressed their lips together.

There weren't any fireworks. It was special in its own way, a silent promise of something gentle and lacking the violence both of them endured so often. Wade’s lips were scarred just like the rest of him, chapped, and fit nicely against his own.

Wade pulled back, resting his forehead against Peter’s. Then he cracked a sh*t-eating grin. “Weasel’s gonna be so jealous. I’m officially Spider-Man’s bitch.”

Peter laughed. “Wade.”

“Do it again!” Wade said, overjoyed.

Peter rolled his eyes but leaned in again, meeting Wade halfway into the kiss. (And he would do it again, and again, and again.)

Chapter 15: Of Noble Pines And Gift Wrap

Chapter Text

"You love him despite the burden of Atlas
resting on his shoulders,
and he loves you despite the
death clinging to your lips,
and the blood drying at the corners.
What a pair you make."
-L.H.Z

Wade shoved the final box in the back of a very, very packed, beat-up taxi cab. He attempted to shove down the door, but it struggled against the overflowing amount of stuff, like trying to button your pants on Christmas after you’ve shoved a whole city’s worth of Santa’s cookie platters down your gullet.

“Thanks for stopping by, Dopinder,” Wade said cheerily, his voice bordering on breathless as he continued pushing all his body weight onto the trunk’s door. “I haven’t seen you in a while. What have you been up to anyway, you baby-faced beauty?”

“Well,” Dopinder grimaced awkwardly, standing on the sidewalk beside Peter. “I’ve been travelling, Mr. Pool—“

“Oh, good!” Wade grunted. “See the world! I’ve travelled to all sorts of exotic places. Aruba. Jamaica. Bermudas, Bahamas— Pete, gimme a hand.”

Peter huffed a laugh. “It’s not going to fit, Wade.”

“If I had a dime every time I heard that one,” Wade said. He sighed airily. “Peter, meet Dopinder, my usual getaway car with the best taxi prices in the city, and also a tiny bit like Weasel’s intern. Dopinder, meet Peter. Not the one from the sequel. This is Peter Parker.”

“Hello,” Dopinder waved nervously, skittishly, like a mouse. “Are you a mercenary too?”

“Uh,” Peter blinked several times, looking equal parts caught off-guard and amused. He shook his head. “No. Definitely not.”

“He’s more like a sweet little love bug,” Wade supplied happily, looking over to Peter with a knowing smile. “Get it?”

“Yeah, I get it,” Peter said dryly, trying and failing to hide the amusem*nt in his eyes. “Not very scientifically accurate, though.”

“Oh, you.” Wade sighed. “I would have bullied you in highschool.”

“Charming.”

“Mr. Pool?” Dopinder spoke up, meekly. “Where do you need to go to?”

“My apartment, Dopinder. My humble abode. The love-shack.” Wade stepped away from the over-flowing trunk and opened the door to the backseat, then gestured to Peter. “After you.”

“Wow,” Peter smirked. He slid into the backseat, a box under his arms. “What a gentleman.”

Wade bowed sincerely then climbed in after him. Dopinder got into the front seat, starting the chilly taxi cab’s engine up. Festive music played in flute flooded through the speakers.

Wade nudged Peter’s knee. “Not to be Brad Pitt, but what’s in the box?”

“Your Christmas present,” Peter said simply. “Can’t tell you.”

“You got a present for me?” Wade’s brows raised delightfully. “What is it? Oh, don’t tell me. I’m gonna guess. A Dolly Parton-themed toaster? No. The Gwyneth Paltrow vagin* candle? A Super-Soaker water gun? A key to the X-Mansion?”

“Ok, so all of those were awful,” Peter grinned. “And I’m not telling you.”

“Alright then. Keep your secrets.” Wade swung his feet and looked out the window. “So, Dopinder. How’s your blood-thirsty Kirsten Dunst trip going?”

“I changed my mind,” Dopinder said somberly. He shook his head. “Mr. Weasel gave me a job and I chickened out the second they started shooting at me, Mr. Pool. I’m not as brave as you are.”

“Aw,” Wade clicked his tongue. “That’s real sweet of you, Dopinder. What can I say? Bravery is a gift handed out to a lucky few…”

“Is Mr. Parker apart of the X-Force?” Dopinder asked— which, wow, way to be discreet.

Wade opened his mouth to say so, but was interrupted immediately by Peter beside him.

“Just Peter is fine,” he said politely. Peter gave him a quick, questioning glance. “And, no. I don’t think I’ve heard of that.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Wade waved his hand off. “The only living member of the X-Force is Doms. And she’s currently booking it with Cable abroad.”

“What about—“

“Oh, look! We’re here,” Wade unclicked his seatbelt and leaned forward, causing Dopinder to stop the car. He held out his hand. “Merry Christmas.”

Dopinder smacked it. A crisp high-five.

“Until next time, Mr. Pool,” Dopinder said. “I’m happy to hear you’ve finally learned when Christmas is.”

Wade patted him on the shoulder and climbed out of the car, holding the door open for Peter. Tried not to smile when Peter fished out a crumpled ten dollar bill from the pocket of his skinny jeans and gave it to a very flustered Dopinder.

The next three hours were spent hauling cardboard boxes up flights of stairs to Wade’s apartment. (Elevator’s broken. Been broken since before Wade moved in, and definitely not because he once accidentally tricked Colossus into walking into it just to see if the weight would hold him.)

“Thanks for helping me with all this, by the way.” Peter put a large stack of heavy boxes on the floor beside the kitchen counter. “Last time I got evicted I had to chase a garbage truck across the city. They threw out one of my flash drives, it had pretty much all my Spider-Man stuff in it.”

“Aww,” Wade cooed. “Hey, if you’re ever in a pinch, recycling trucks make a great ambulance slash taxi service.”

“I don’t know... if I want to know...” Peter said with narrowed eyes, an amused smile pulling at his lips, “how you know that.”

Wade shrugged.

“Anyway,” Peter chuckled. He opened the box at the top of the pile and pulled out several papers. Out of nowhere, he clicked a button against his wrist and shot a web at the board, yanking it over.

“You really could have just walked over there.”

Peter grunted, more focused on pinning up his own research. He swirled around the living room like dust in a storm, mumbling quietly as he pieced together everything.

Wade watched with fondness, too caught up in the mirth of it all that he was perfectly willing to just wait. For once, it was worth it, because once Peter was satisfied with pulling things out of the box and pinning it to the board in a haphazard collage, he stepped back and grinned.

“There. That’s all my stuff on Reyes,” Peter explained proudly. “Newspaper headlines, security cam photos… all of it.”

Wade wandered over and peeked into the box. “What’s the rest of it?”

“Oh, just—“

Wade pulled out a stack of Daily Bugle headlines and flipped through them.

‘Spider-Man: Threat or Menace?’

‘Spider-Man Causes Rising Crime Rates’

Spider-Man Takes Down Vulture!’

‘Spider-Man's Reptilian Takeover!’

‘Spider-Man’s Sinister Beatdown’

‘Spider-Man Causes Black-Out’

‘Electro: Spider-Man’s Deadly Experiment’

‘Spider-Man: Murderer? Exclusive Stacy Crime Scene Photos!’

…and the headlines went on, and on, and on. A collection of Spider-Man's greatest mortal failures. Wade glanced up wordlessly. He felt, suddenly, sick to his stomach.

Peter moved his hand up– scratched incessantly behind his ear. He had guilt written all over his face; embarrassment too. “I just collect the ones I photograph.”

Wade looked back down at the headlines, and under a black-and-white photo of Spider-Man, it was there at the bottom. ‘Photographed by Peter Parker.’

“You need a new job,” Wade said after a beat. “This is bordering on masoch*stic. You should also, like, throw these out. Burn them.”

“Wade,” Peter huffed, smiling slightly. “That’s ridiculous.”

“I mean, I’ve blown up a few apartments in my day,” Wade said, trailing into the kitchen. “I’ve been told that’s pretty dramatic.”

“Probably because it is.”

“Maybe,” Wade hummed. “Either way, it’s nothing compared to just setting a few papers alight, campfire style. But if you’re so against it–”

He fished through a drawer with one hand for a pair of scissors, holding the stack of newspapers in the other. He raised the scissors and stared Peter down. “May I have the honours, Spider-Man?”

Peter squirmed where he stood, his ears red. He looked torn, but tentatively nodded. “...Yeah. Yeah, whatever.”

Wade cut through each paper carefully. One by one, the headlines fall clean to the floor.

Snip. Snip. Snip.

“These are really good pictures,” Wade commented. “You’re a great picture-taker. Should be in charge of press for my next movie.”

Snip. Snip. Snip.

Snip. Snip.

Snip.

Wade moved forward to the counter and spread out the results: several cut-outs of Peter’s photography, his name typed boldly below each one. He gave a firm nod. “This is way better. I’m framing all of these.”

Peter touched his hand over the photographs, his lips pursed. He looked up at Wade and nodded back.

“Thank you,” he said quietly.

Wade gave him a firm nod.

“‘Course.” Wade spun around and looked at the clock. “Hm. Guess the writer doesn’t have sh*t-else to say in this scene. Are we supposed to be at May’s now?”

“Oh, crap, yeah. Yeah, I’ll call her.”

May’s house was like Will Ferrell had diarrhea in his Elf costume and butt-scooted across every surface. Meaning, it was pretty much decked out the way you would imagine a festive old lady would decorate it for Christmas.

Christmas music filtered through quietly from where May had set up the MTV holiday music channel from the little television on the counter, right now it was playing Santa Baby. The good one with Eartha Kitt, not one of the many renditions from some new singer thinking they had a right to just redo a classic. The noble pine tree that Wade had helped set up was standing tall, shimmering with its eclectic assortment of plastic, clay, and glass ornaments.

There were garlands draping over doorways by command hooks, and mistletoe hung over the entrance to the living room. To top it all off, the whole downstairs smelled like cinnamon, cranberry, and layered spices that could only be associated with turkey and stuffing.

And of course, the moment Wade and Peter entered the threshold, they were both brought into a hug.

“It’s so good to see you both,” May said, pulling away with a bright smile.

Peter inhaled deeply. “The food smells so good. Is it done?”

“Impatient,” May teased. “It’s on the table. Just got out of the oven.”

As far as Christmas Dinners, Wade didn’t have a whole lot to compare them to. As a kid, dinners in general were scraps. Offbrand canned food donations on a lucky day and whatever snacks he stole from kids at lunch on a bad one. (Gifts were their own f*ckin’ thing, and he’s over it by now, but he does know that the year he found a broken GI Joe doll in the trash outside his neighbor's trailer was the highlight of his fourth grade year.)

Sometimes there was hot meals on Christmas when he served in Special Forces; but nobody’s really happy except for the people who had family to go home to or the people who thought they were already home. Wade was in neither group.

The last time he celebrated any holiday really was when he was with Vanessa. They ordered Chinese food from a cheap little place down the street that had more health violations than he could count on one hand. Everytime it was the best meal he'd ever had, a reminder that home was what he made it, and a warmer reminder that he'd made it good. He wouldn’t have traded those crummy eggrolls for the world, but then he lost the world.

This is all to say, it’s been a helluva long time… maybe the first time, that it’s all come together in one place. A home-cooked meal. People who wanted him around, and who he wanted to be around. A home.

The food was delicious, too. May was the best cook he'd ever met, and all her food was quite literally a work of Heaven. Seriously, scrumdiddlyumptious, supercalafragilistexpealadocious, worth-while of a last supper. Like that painting; the one where Adam is reaching out— or maybe that’s a different one.

Whatever.

The night was wrapping up, and Wade had just finished putting the dishes into the dishwasher, and Peter was helping May put leftovers into fitting Tupperware to be put in the fridge. ("You can take it home with you when you leave," she insisted. "I saved extra slices of the eggnog pie for you, Wade.")

“Okay,” May sighed, putting her hair behind her ear. “Peter, make sure you show Wade where he’ll be sleeping.”

“I will,” Peter pulled her into a hug. “Goodnight, May. Love you.”

“Love you too, Peter,” May smiled. She held out an arm for Wade, who only took a brief moment’s hesitation before piling himself happily into the cuddle puddle.

“Merry Christmas, boys,” she said sweetly. She then released the hug and went upstairs.

“Okay, so,” Wade raised his eyebrows, turning to Peter seriously. “Are you gonna show me your old room or what?”

“Right.”

He led him up the stairs, down to the end of the hallway, and pushed the last door to the left open. He stepped in, gesturing his arms out. “So, this is my old bedroom. Most of my stuff is still here, because— I didn’t have room for it in my apartment, so May’s been holding on to it.”

“Wow,” Wade walked in and looked around the room.

The walls were mostly stripped of posters, but Wade caught the occasional glimpse of tapescraps or tiny holes in the wall where things used to be hung up. A bookshelf, mostly clear of books, now holding things that probably belonged to May; fabric piles, a clear box of different coloured threads, crochet needles, etc.

A green and white striped rug on the wooden floor. A twin bed tucked in the corner, a beat-up dresser across from it and a metal desk on the opposite wall, full of miscellaneous things. A stack of books. A globe. A lamp. Above the desk, a map of New York City, with red push-pins in random spots over Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens.

“I can just tell you were a bigger nerd back then,” Wade said decidedly.

“Yeah. Not a difficult conclusion to come to.”

Wade dawdled around the room, poking at random things, before finally sitting down on the bed. “I feel like I’m in an 80s coming-of-age movie and the cute boy is showing me, the hot cheerleader, around his room.”

Peter laughed quietly. “You could definitely pull off a hot cheerleader.”

“Oh yeah. I got a real cute face here,” Wade said with a smile that showed all of his teeth. “Everybody wants to look like this.”

“Asshole,” Peter smiled, rolling his eyes. “I’m being serious.”

“Well, that’s just silly, Petey. I mean, look at me. There’s the whole face thing but that’s not where it stops,” Wade chuckled. “Just miles and miles of a preschooler’s finger painting practice. A teenager on adderall doing their first stick-n-poke. Picasso making a jigsaw puzzle on crack. I could go on.”

“I really doubt it’s as ugly as you think it is. If it’s anything like your face, it’s not ugly at all.” Peter sat down beside him on the bed, and motherf*cker, those puppy-dog eyes were seriously the worst thing Wade’s ever seen. What the f*ck was he supposed to do with those, even?

“If you wanted to see me shirtless, you could have just asked,” Wade joked, his own voice sounding tired and depressed to his own ears. “I mean, geez, Webs… coming on a little strong…”

“Wade.”

There was silence for a moment. Then:

“f*ckin’,” Wade sighed. “When you’re all sweet like that…”

Wade pulled his shirt up tentatively. He slumped his shoulders and kept his eyes down.

Peter reached out and stopped just short of touching his arm. “Do they hurt?”

Wade shrugged. “It’s kind of like living with a permanent healing paper cut. At some point you just get used to it.”

Peter gently rested his hand on Wade’s shoulder. “I’m sorry they hurt.”

“All scars do. I don’t have to tell you that, though,” Wade murmured. He’d seen Peter’s scars while patching him up, they’re fainter, crosshatched all along his back and chest, with starburst indents where bullets have exited with a permanent mark.

Peter sat behind Wade. He could feel his eyes on his back, trailing over the skin. “If they’re always healing and rehealing, do they change?”

“Yeah.”

“They’re like constellations,” Peter murmured. “They’re constantly moving, so slowly it takes hundreds of years to see the movement.”

Wade scoffed teasingly, his voice soft. “I know I called you a nerd already in this scene, but seriously. This is reaching outstanding levels of nerdom.”

Peter made an amused noise. He climbed off the bed and began to pull on a sweater. “Come on. I want to show you something.”

Wade raised his eyebrows and let Peter pull him off the bed. He put his discarded shirt back on and watched as Peter grabbed the comforter and wrapped it over his shoulders, and then he trailed over to the window.

Peter pushed the window up and began to climb out of it. The snow was falling down in big powdery flakes, getting caught in his curly hair and sticking to the blanket. He looked back at Wade with a grin. “Come on.”

“I don’t even know where you’re going,” Wade chuckled.

“I wanna show you something!” Peter repeated. He climbed up, sticking to the side of the house and pulling himself onto the roof.

Wade stuck his head out the window, feeling the chill of the wind. “You are batsh*t insane. What’s life like when you’re constantly playing George of the Jungle? It’s really a miracle you haven’t gotten caught.”

Peter stuck his hand out. “I’ve done this since high school! It’s safe, nobody can see me. Come on, I’ll pull you up.”

Wade scoffed, but held all his trust in Peter to not let him fall. (Even if he did; what’s he gonna do? Die? Yeah, that’s a nice joke.) He grabbed Peter’s hand and was pulled up with alarming ease.

“I keep forgetting you have super strength. You look like a twink in all of the sweaters,” Wade said bluntly, looking over the impressive edge of the house. He kept his tight grip on Peter’s hand, if not for any reason than the uneasy platform of the slanted roof they stood on.

“Wow,” Peter laughed. He gently guided them to sit down, and then he moved the blanket over both of their shoulders. He let out a peaceful sigh.

Wade looked over a beat down suburban neighbourhood, scrapes in the streets and cracks in the sidewalks, bundles of trash outside each house that were slowly being covered in snow. Distantly, he could see Manhattan a ways away, skyscrapers gone high—

He glanced over at Peter, who had a serene look on his face that could only belong to someone remembering a nice childhood. He imagined Peter, only younger: a scrawnier, lankier teen with a scrappy spandex suit, crawling out the very same window and swinging off into the distance. He imagined the same teenager crawling back, beat up, limping back through his bedroom window, and collapsing with nobody to patch his wounds.

Wade squeezed his hand. “Okay. Go ahead, Webs. You brought me up here. Tell me about it.”

Peter looked over fondly, as snowflakes kisses were getting caught in his eyelashes. “What do you want to know?”

“Anything.”

Everything.

Peter bubbled through a soft, endearing laugh. “Alright. Well, I have climbed out that window every day from about the ages of fourteen to seventeen. One time in the fall, it had just rained before patrol, so the next morning May saw the muddy footprints on the side of the house and scolded me for sneaking out. She told me it was safer to just go through the front door, and she’ll just pretend she didn’t hear me leave.”

Wade grinned. “I love her. That’s so awesome, May is just the coolest lady.”

Peter nodded and rested his head on Wade’s shoulder. “Yeah, she’s the best.”

Wade hugged him closer to his side and watched the snow make a thin layer on the street. He thought it looked prettiest decorated in Peter’s hair, but he also liked watching it fall under a streetlamp’s light. Meanwhile, the thick quilted blanket kept the two of them warm as they huddled underneath it.

“What do you want for Christmas, Peter?”

Peter hummed with amusem*nt. “What, other than peace on Earth and goodwill toward man?”

“No, what is this, the Charlie Brown special?” Wade smiled. “What do you really want? More than anything.”

Wade knew what he wanted. He would give anything to wake up without scars, furthermore the ensured future of growing old and dying with the one he loved most. sh*t his immortal ass couldn’t have, probably. He just wanted to be normal, and not Lady Death’s mighty f*ck-up.

It took Peter a longer time to answer than Wade would have. He was more thoughtful about things, so far he always has been. He cared a great deal and this carefulness for others was what kept him alive. (This was not to say Peter was careful with himself. This honey-bun had a heroic self-sacrificial streak that could rival Wade’s, and that was saying something.)

“I want to do better,” Peter finally answered.

He didn’t make any further effort to explain what that was supposed to mean, but he didn’t need to.

Wade looked at him for a moment, and then leaned in. He gently kissed the scar behind Peter’s ear.

Peter pulled back, his eyebrows creased as his eyes rapidly teared up. For a second Wade froze, as if he had just done something horrible, crossed an unspoken line of some sorts— but then a soft smile crossed Peter’s face, and then a rosey blush that definitely wasn’t just from the cold.

He bubbled out a laugh and then hid his face in Wade’s chest. “Ugh. I’m embarrassed,” Peter said, muffled. “That was just really sweet.”

“Aww.” Wade chuckled and carded a hand through Peter’s curly hair.

Peter moved his head up, his chin digging into Wade’s sternum. He grinned. “You know, you’re not anything like I expected you to be.”

Wade hummed in question.

“I’m not used to having someone who really knows,” Peter tried. “Someone who understands what’s going on with me and who can help. I, uh… forgot how nice it was. To feel… strong.”

A heartwarming sentiment from a guy who could bench an entire football team.

Wade leaned down and pecked a kiss on Peter’s forehead. “Of course.”

The silence filtered back in, buried under the growing quilt of snow. Wade’s mind drifted back to the last time he had watched a snowfall with this sort of serenity.

(A winter much like this, only a few years back, where everything wrong with the world was seeping in every cell of Wade’s blood. But, still they sat— he and Nessa, of course— cradled together on the leather chair beside the window. Flake by flake, sticking to the branches of the trees.

“We’ll get through this,” Vanessa murmured. Her head was tucked into Wade’s chest, her hair sticking out and tickling his neck.

“I know,” Wade had lied softly. The words spilled like black ink from his lips, staining everything in his guilt. He cleaned it with a truth: “I just wish I was better for you, Ness.”

Memories of a past not long forgotten, but easier now. A lot of things were easier, now.)

“Okay. I’m gonna leave you to sleep, and I’ll see you again in the morning,” Peter murmured.

“Of course,” Wade said. He smiled sweetly. “But you’re helping me back down first. We don’t want me re-enacting Die Hard this year. I already did that once, wasn’t as— ok, that’s a lie. It was pretty fun in real life. Still, though. Would make kind of a mess on the clean snow.”

Peter snorted. “Well, we wouldn’t want that.”

When Wade woke up, the snow had stopped, and most of it had turned into the usual grey-brown slushy road-trekked mush that littered the edges of roads and sidewalks.

He made his way downstairs, looking over at the living room as he went. Peter was still well-asleep, his arm poking out from a messily crumpled blanket and draped artfully over the edge of the couch, and Wade’s own maroon sweatshirt pulled up just over his belly button. His hair was all mussed up, his mouth open as he snored quietly.

“Good morning,” May spoke up. She stood at the oven, smiling over at him. Wearing her own matching pyjama set with reindeer on them. “Merry Christmas.”

“Merry Christmas to you too,” Wade walked over and lingered a few steps away from the oven. “It smells really good. You’re a natural Paula Deen.”

“Thank you,” May chuckled. “Peter’s still asleep, that silly boy. I don’t have the heart to wake him. I hope you two weren’t up too late.”

“I think he just loves sleep,” Wade stage-whispered.

May’s eyes crinkled in amusem*nt. “Yes, I suppose so. Can you come here?”

“Sure.” Wade didn’t hesitate, coming up to her side at the stove. He looked expectantly at her. “What can I do? Can I help?”

“Yes, please. Flip them when they’re golden brown,” May answered, handing him the spatula. “I’ll have to give you this recipe, it’s Peter’s childhood favourite.”

Wade crinkled his eyebrows and smiled as he poked the wheatcakes with the spatula. “They must be really good then.”

May hummed, wandering over to the dining room. She pulled a shimmery red and green tablecloth from the bottom of the cabinetry hutch and laid it out on the table. She opened the top glass doors and carefully handled three expensive hand-painted porcelain plates, putting them down neatly at their matching seats.

“Thanks for letting me come over,” Wade said. He lifted a wheatcake to check if it was ready. It wasn’t. “This is probably the best Christmas I’ve ever had.”

May gave him a soft smile and she nodded. “Of course, Wade. You’re always welcome.”

Wade only smiled faintly.

May finished setting the table and sat at the kitchen counter, watching him cook. She looked grateful, maybe even a little misty-eyed. “Excuse me if I’m being too forward…”

Wade glanced up.

May sighed, giving a weak upturn of her mouth in an attempt of a smile. “Peter always comes over with bruises, and scrapes, and god forbid, broken bones… he’s always getting himself into trouble, and he never talks to me about it, and that’s okay. It is, really.”

Wade paused, his hand slowly lowering to rest the spatula on the counter beside the stovetop. He looked at May with a careful listening silence.

“But,” May reached her hand forward over the counter, leaning towards him as if she were about to reveal a secret. Her smile grew more genuine, her eyes softer with emotion as the tears continued. “I haven’t seen him this relaxed in a long, long time. He’s only like that with you.”

Wade glanced over at Peter, still asleep on the couch and oblivious to the words being passed back and forth. He looked back to May, words not coming to form a response.

“That’s all,” she said, pulling back. She huffed and wiped her tears away, chuckling to herself. “I just wanted to say thank you, but I’m a silly old woman and my emotions are getting the best of me these days.”

“No, it’s okay,” Wade smiled softly. He shook his head, letting the mood get lighter. “My silly old woman emotions get the best of me all the time. It’s a real problem. Those tearjerker commercials always get the waterworks pumping.”

May laughing, putting a hand over her heart.

“I’ll try and keep him out of trouble,” Wade said firmly— and he meant it. He really did.

“Thank you,” May repeated.

A head poked up from the couch. Wade turned his head and made eye contact with Peter, who was all squinty-eyes and puffy-cheeks, hair sticking up in all directions. He smiled lazily. (Cute, cute, cute!)

“Morning,” Wade said cheerily, taking a deep breath in. “How’s Sleeping Beauty?”

“Feeling well-rested,” Peter responded, his voice low and gravelly. He then yawned, his nose scrunching up, and then relaxing again. “Merry Christmas.”

“Wade, honey,” May spoke up. “I think those are ready to be flipped.”

Wade jerked his head down. He lifted one side with the spatula and saw a side that was definitely a few notches past ‘golden brown.’ He cursed and flipped the wheatcakes over. “Don’t worry. I’ll eat those ones.”

Peter climbed off the couch and trailed into the kitchen, stifling another big yawn. He dawdled into the kitchen and sat happily beside May at the counter as Wade finished up the wheatcakes.

After breakfast (aka about forty minutes of Peter complimenting food with a mouthful of it, featuring a grand repeated motif of May scolding him for talking with his mouth full of food) Wade practically dragged both of them to the living room, because damn it, he was excited.

“I wanna go first,” Wade said, crawling over to the tree. He picked out his gifts— they stuck out like a sore thumb, covered in haphazard strips of tape and shiny green paper that was creased all over in odd places. He first picked out May’s, a small mug-shaped box to hold… a mug. Duh. Not sure what else you were expecting, he wasn't exactly good at this.

He handed the wrapped box to May.

“Thank you,” May said, looking the box over gratefully. “You didn’t have to get me anything, dear.”

“Oh, you’ll change your mind after you see it. This is the greatest thing you’ll ever receive,” Wade said seriously.

May laughed, and then gently unwrapped the present, sliding her hand under the tape folds to pull them up. She pulled out the box, opened it up, pulled out the fluff and stuff that Wade shoved in there last minute, and finally revealed her gift…

A white mug that he had seen in the store window of some antique shop downtown a couple days ago, in the midst of Holiday sales. In big blocky letters, it said: “MY FAVORITE CHILD GOT ME THIS MUG.”

Peter made a noise of protest, but May started laughing harder, burying her face in her hand. It wasn’t too long until Peter was laughing too, and Wade got to sit there with a sh*t-eating grin on his face.

“Thank you,” May said again through her laughs, fanning her face as joyful tears were in her eyes. “Thank you, Wade. Oh, dear. This is a wonderful gift, I can’t wait to use it.”

“It’s good, right?” Wade said. “Game over, I win.”

“No, absolutely not,” Peter pushed him lightly. “You don’t win. Get a load of this—“

Wade leaned back against the couch with a smirk. “Oh, I can’t wait to see your load.”

“Wade,” May scolded lightly, but she was smiling and still hiding her laughter.

“Okay, ignoring that comment,” Peter reached under the tree and grabbed a box wrapped cleanly in newspaper. He passed it to Wade, grinning blissfully. “This one is from me.”

Wade raised his eyebrows. He took the gift as if it were made of glass, and then peeled away the shiny wrapping. It was a thin box, maybe a bit larger than a sheet of paper, and three inches or so tall.

“Oh, wow.” Wade held up the box and sighed wistfully. “You got me a box? Peter, you’re just… You’re so thoughtful—“

“Shhhh,” Peter nudged his arm, his grin widening. “Open it.”

“That’s what she said. Sorry, May.”

May held back her own chuckles behind the palm of her hand. “Nothing I’ve never heard before.”

Wade smiled and opened the lid. Packed tightly in the box, a navy blue sweater sat crumpled and baggy. Wade lifted it out, unfolding it— it was large, definitely would fit him like a glove. Or rather, a sweater.

“Figured it’s good compensation for the one I stole from you,” Peter explained.

Wade laid it out on his lap and then pulled it over his head. The warmth it gave was immediate, but it had started in his chest and the sweater only added to the feeling. He ran his hands over the sleeves, feeling the soft, fuzzy fabric. He glanced up. “Is this cashmere? You spoil me, Petey.”

“I bought it at a Goodwill,” Peter laughed. “Served me well the past few years.”

Wade’s heart was doing silly little loopy things, and he smiled so softly at Peter he thought he might shortcircuit. “This was yours?”

Peter nodded quietly, his eyes travelling over him in the sweater. He looked pleased, finally, giving a nod and smiling again. “Brings out your eyes.”

“f*ck you, it’s my turn—“

“Ah-ah,” May tutted. “I believe it’s my turn. Peter, can you get the small one? It’s just to the right of the tall skinny gift— yes, that’s the one. That’s for you, dear.”

Peter unwrapped the small box— took out a cellphone, an older model, but completely unused and still in the original packaging. His jaw dropped and he quickly looked up. “May, this is so expensive!”

“Oh, hush. You needed it, your old one was falling apart,” May waved him off. “I saved from my paychecks. Waited for a sale. It’s alright.”

Peter exhaled, looking down at the phone. He nodded a few times and looked back up. His voice was softer. “Thank you, May. This means a lot.”

“Of course,” May smiled gently. “Wade, yours is the one in the corner. I do hope you like it.”

“I guarantee I’ll love it,” Wade said, reaching over. “Impossible for me to not to.”

He opened it up, and then pulled out a neatly folded, ironed cooking apron out of the box. “Thank you—“

“Turn it over, dear.”

Wade slowly turned the apron over. He grinned, looking upon an embroidered Bea Arthur on the front. He laughed. “May, you sly dog!”

“I got to working on it right after Peter told me that Bea was your favourite,” May smiled. “And the apron itself was made by me as well, so there won’t be any loose seams or anything like that.”

“You made this?!” Wade exclaimed, his eyes going wide. “Get outta town! May, this is— this is the Season 2, Episode 5 of aprons. This should be hung in a museum, framed—“

“Oh, hush,” May laughed. “You’re so silly, Wade.”

“I love it,” Wade said genuinely, hugging the apron to his heart. He loops it over his neck and ties it at the back, smoothing it over pleasantly. “I can’t wait to spill pancake batter all over this.”

“I’m so glad,” May smiled.

“Oh,” Peter reached under the tree and pulled out a slightly larger gift. Once again, wrapped neatly– Those Parkers are a different breed. Maybe part-elf. “May, this one is yours from me.”

“Peter…” May laughed softly, taking the gift. She unwrapped it, looking over what looked to Wade like a gardening tool kit, all covered in floral patterns. She smiled.

“Payback,” Peter explained. “Probably easier to take care of roses now that a crazy seven year old isn’t running over them.”

“Thank you,” she said, smiling up at him. “These are lovely. If I get started early, maybe they’ll bloom this Summer.”

Peter grinned. “I can’t wait to see it.”

“Last gift,” Wade rubbed his hands together mischievously. Under the tree, a slender, tall box in birthday wrapping paper— he ran out of the green one from the last gift, and birthday was all his Blind Al had laying around, so this is the best he got.

(He’s rambling, going on and on frantically in a breathless voice… Wade’s trying to keep up. He’s at his apartment. He’s okay, but he's so worried...

“Who?” Wade cut in, his voice hard. “Thought who got me? Who’s he?”

“Nothing,” Peter breathed out. “Nobody. It’s nobody. Nevermind. I’m— I am so sorry for calling. sh*t, what time even is it—“

Didn’t even f*cking matter what time it was. Wade hadn’t been doing sh*t else anyway, just sitting on his own and cleaning his guns, literally, not the double entendre, and it didn’t f*cking matter what time it was, because Peter called him and Peter was afraid.

Peter made a pained, strangled noise. Wade listened carefully as he rummaged around his apartment for his coat. “I’m usually fine with nightmares, but it’s—it’s dark.”)

“This one’s for you, Pete,” Wade said, handing it over to him.

Peter nodded gratefully. He took it and ripped the paper off. He stared at the lightsaber lamp in his hands, probably running about twenty inches tall, and looked back up at Wade.

(Wade poured green glow in the dark stars into his open palm. The least he could do. Anything he could do to make it better. Looked at Peter and said quietly-)

“Thought it’d help with the darkness." Wade gestured to the lamp. “Plus, you’re a huge nerd, so… Star Wars.”

Peter turned the lamp over in his hands, nodding quietly. He looked up, and there it was again, the softness in his eyes, but a firm line in his jaw to keep him from being more emotional than he was probably feeling. “Thank you, Wade.”

There’s an undertone to it, Wade realized. This whole thing. This whole day. It was too perfect, like when he went to buy a car for five bucks on Ebay and it looked great in the photos but then came to him in a doll-sized package.

He saw his first movie. He lived by the motto. He’s had a lot of commercial-break moments of happiness lately… and he was dreading the continuing program.

For now, he just smiled back at Peter. Leaned into the kiss that Peter pressed on his cheek. Leaned into the hug May enveloped them both in before they left.

Tried to hold on as tightly as he could, because he didn’t know how much longer this happiness could last.

Chapter 16: A Raw Egg On The Kitchen Floor

Chapter Text

"Bright splash of blood on the kitchen floor. Astonishingly red. (All that brightness inside of me?)"
-Laura Kasischke

Two days after Christmas, the two of them find themselves crashed on the beat-up, blood-stained couch in Wade’s apartment. Wade comfortably leaned on Peter’s side, his arms crossed to cover his hands in the folds of his new sweater. Peter was just as happy, draping his leg over Wade’s lap.

In front of them, a coffee-ring stained low table covered in takeout Chinese food boxes and the television, playing the final end-of-December reruns of Christmas movies.

“It’s A Wonderful Life,” Peter insisted. “That's the best one. That’s always been the best one.”

“Boring,” Wade scoffed. “So boring. I bet you like the original Christmas Carol too.”

“I do!” Peter said with a grin. “And if you’re so judgemental, you better have some stellar favourites.”

Wade shifted. “Well, that’s f*cking easy, I always have stellar favourites. Die Hard, Scrooged, and Love, Actually. Also, every sh*tty Hallmark movie. Every single one.”

Peter leaned his head against Wade’s, smothering a laugh in his shoulder. “Yeah, that’s about what I expected you’d say.”

Wade chuckled, nudging his shoulder up. “What the f*ck is that supposed to mean?”

"I don't know!" Peter exasperated, "you're just funny!"

Wade's eyes lit up, obviously pleased by the remark, and he sat up like he was about to start another round of banter. Peter leaned towards him instead with a kiss, and Wade seemed to like that more. He hummed pleasantly, his hand came up to Peter's neck to just cradle it, like he was something worth cradling.

That was always on the crest of Peter's thoughts when he was with Wade in any capacity. The gentleness of Wade Wilson was such a stark difference to Deadpool, who he'd really, first met— all blood soaked leather, bullet casings, empty threats— and then the more he got to know Wade, the more of him started to shine through. Steady hands. Warm jackets. Soft eyes.

Peter smiled, their noses brushing, and kissed him again. His upper lip, his dimples, the smile lines at his eyes, and then the heart beside his nose, which has since shifted slightly to his cheek— but was still there, never leaving.

When he pulled away, Wade was still holding on to him, looking at him with starry eyes.

"You don't mind the scars," Wade said quietly, as if he was realizing it, admitting it for the first time.

"They're apart of you," Peter told him, smiling. "Of course I don't mind them."

Something in Wade's expression breaks, resets itself, and finally eases. He smiles back earnestly, and then whispers, "I like you so much."

Peter's face brightens. "I like you, too."

Wade sniffed and looked away. "I still think your taste in Christmas movies is lame, though."

Peter laughed and snuggled back into the couch. "Well, I—"

His phone started ringing.

“Oh. Hold on one second, May’s calling,” Peter said, fishing it out of his pocket.

Wade does so, and goes back to resting his head on Peter’s shoulder. He looked up curiously as Peter answered the call.

“Hey, what’s—“

Loud thudding on the other line, layered over heavy breathing. Peter's stomach dropped. Wade seemed to acknowledge the change, the sudden tightness in his muscles, because he glances at him from the side.May’s whispering to him. “Peter?”

The hair on his neck raised. He tapped Wade several times on the shoulder, signaling him to get up, and then stood from the couch. “I’m right here. Why are you whispering, May? Is something wrong?”

Peter scanned over the floor, looking everywhere for his suit— his eyes caught it in the corner, still torn and shredded from his last fight. Doesn’t matter. He marched over and began stripping his warm clothes.

“There’s somebody,” May whispered. “A man from the shelter last weekend, but in a big metal suit. He was— he was knocking on the door, and he just shattered a window. I’m hidden under the stairs. I don't want you to panic.”

Peter froze halfway with his suit around his waist. He looked up to Wade, his breathing coming in short and quick. Wade stared back, his eyebrows furrowed deeply in concern, his lips pursed.

“Okay, May,” Peter said evenly. He went back to putting his suit on, shifting his phone to the other ear as he pulled on the right sleeve. “Is he in the house now?”

“Yes,” May murmured calmly. “I can hear him upstairs. He’s awfully loud.”

Peter spun around, finding his mask on the floor. He shoved it on his face and rushed to the window, cracking the lock off and easily opening it up. “Sneak out through the backdoor, get to the neighbour's. Call the police. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“I know, Peter,” May said. Her voice was shaky. “I’m going to hang up now. I love you."

“I love you too. Be safe,” Peter pleaded. He climbed out the window, hearing the phone call end with a beep. He looked back to Wade one last time. “It’s the Employer. Meet me at May’s.”

At Wade's grave nod, he pulled himself out the window.

As he was swinging through the city, he took lunging gasps of breath every three buildings, his muscles pumping through the air as fast as they could go.

This was what he was thinking:

Sometimes Peter felt just as much wiser as the length of his pinky fingernail, or perhaps the length of fingerprint if it had been unraveled and put in a nice line. Spelling out all his guilt in one easy-to-digest piece for people to study.

Sometimes Peter felt it would be far easier to just not let himself be loved. That, just maybe, it would be easier to roll with the punches when it was the only thing he was used to.

Another thing…

The last time he was this desperate, it was while fighting Goblin, and Gwen had her hand wrapped tightly around a strand of web while she dangled from the top of a very tall tower. She looked so afraid, eyes as big as the reflecting moon above her, breath shallow, her heartbeat a discordant undertone to the clock’s rapid ticking. Tick, tick, tick, tick—

Peter had lost too many nights of sleep to let history repeat itself, and Reyes had officially, finally, pushed it too far.

“Hang in there, May,” Peter said through clenched teeth. He swung over the Queensboro bridge, ignoring the cars blaring their horns, and headed in a straight line to May’s house.

Peter yanked to the right, down his childhood street. He broke off the web and went tumbling into the asphalt. He rolled out of it and into a sprint towards the house.

The large window in the living room was broken, glass scattered on the dirt. Peter leaped upwards and crawled through the window.

It’s a mess.

The old couch had several gashes through it, fluff spilling out the sides that are burned into a blacky char. The juice-stained coffee table broken in pieces; chunks of wood and barkdust were scattered throughout the carpet. May’s favourite lamp on the floor, the blueberry-bush-patterned lampshade fell a little ways away from it. Christmas tree overturned, ornaments shattered.

Peter held his breath and stalked forward over the ruins.

Photo frames on the ground. Glass in shards that crack and brightly fracture under his feet. Holes in the wall, patchy burns beside them, and singe marks going all the way up the stairs. The closet under the stairs, where May kept the brooms and mops and extra aprons, was empty. The door to it is on the floor, slivers of wood and the handle broken off of it.

Peter’s shaking hands clenched into a fist. He grit his teeth and pressed forward to the kitchen. The destruction became processed in smaller doses as he felt his brain turn to static. Overturned fridge. A shattered porcelain sink. Cracked tiles.

A singular drop of dark red blood on the kitchen floor.

The front door went down with a loud thud, and Deadpool ran in, out of breath. Katanas strapped to his back, mask pulled tight, red and black suit donned. He looked around and cursed. “Is he here?”

Peter twitched.

Deadpool walked up behind him and cautiously put a hand on Peter’s shoulder. He flinched back. He didn’t know why.

“Webs?” Wade asked dreadfully. “You okay?”

“No,” Peter said sharply. “No, I’m not—“

He ripped his mask off and swung around like a feral wolf baring his teeth. “He figured out my identity, and now May— May is gone. Reyes took her, Wade. He destroyed— No, I’m not okay. She’s missing and hurt, Wade, do you really think I’m okay? I’m— I’m—“

“Okay,” Wade said easily. “Alright. Yeah. Stupid question. My bad. Take a breather, alright?”

The words go right over his head. Peter shouted in frustration, tightly gripping his hair in one hand and tugging at it. He inhaled shakily, looking around the kitchen. Everything was wrong, and Peter’s on fire.

“Peter,” Wade stepped forward, going to put a hand on his shoulder again.

Peter ducked away from the touch and began pacing, walking across the hallway. The living room to the kitchen and back again. His mind is racing, he had a dangerous itch in his bones that wouldn’t take him anywhere good. He let out another frustrated yell and kneeled down, cradling his head in his hands.

“Okay, you’re freaking me out,” Wade frowned deeply through his mask. He kneeled beside him, but it didn’t take long for Peter to stand back up and start pacing again. “Just, let’s take it down a notch, calm down, and we’ll—“

“I need to think. I need to just—“ Peter inhaled stiffly. “I— How could I not see it coming? How could I not f*cking—”

“Woah. This whole thing wasn’t your fault,” Wade cut in with a scoff. “None of this. Stop. I’m not letting you conduct that train. Off the station, even, okay? Choo-choo—“

“I don’t even know how—“ Peter laughed breathlessly. “I don’t even know how he found out my identity, Wade! How could he have— I was so careful! I’m— I’m always so—“

He faltered.

Wade was staring at him; and he had this look in his eyes, a widened realization. Wade looked down, then back up. Wordlessly. Pleadingly.

“…What is it?”

“I, uh…” Wade shifted on his feet. He groaned. “God f*cking—“

“Pool,” Peter said tightly, his breath caught in his throat. “What did you do?”

“I told him about FEAST,” Wade blurted, rubbing a hand over his eyes. “Before, when I was working for him. He must’ve— f*ck. f*ck, f*ck, f*ck.”

Peter’s hearing buzzed out momentarily, and the world stood very, very still.

“I told him about FEAST.”

Peter took a step back and spun around, staring anywhere else. Distantly he knew Wade was talking to him, rambling about a plan, maybe, or how sorry he was, or how colossally he f*cked up, but Peter only heard one thing playing a loop track in his head.

“I told him about FEAST.”

The room was tilting a little. Peter knew he shouldn’t be angry— he’s already forgiven him before, on the swings, weeks ago— he’s not angry. He’s pissed. No, that’s not right either.

“I told him about FEAST.”

He’s not pissed. He’s just betrayed. He shouldn’t feel betrayed; Wade had always been on his side, even if Deadpool hadn’t been, and the past was the past but it didn’t matter because now May is missing. He wasn’t betrayed, he was just so hurt—

“I told him.”

He wasn’t hurt, he was dying. Peter shook his head quickly. Bile in his throat. Blood on the tile. An itch in his bones. He had to go, and he had to go now.

“I need a minute,” Peter said weakly.

“Peter—“

“It was an accident. I know. I need a minute,” he repeated. “Don’t follow me.”

He pressed past Wade and walked out the kicked-open door. Then he was back in the air, swinging back through Queens with a head full of white noise.

For a sense of comprehension, it boiled down to this.

Spider-Man was nothing but a mask, but it was an invincible one. If you were one of New York’s weekly baddies, you could mess with him all you wanted. Break his nose. Kick his ribs in. When all is said and done, Spider-Man would put you away nice and clean even still. He was used to living like a tightly wound rubber band, letting himself get hurt over, and over, and over to protect this city, letting it pull tighter with every sleepless night.

Meanwhile, when the mask went off, Peter Parker had only a few things that he purposely kept at his fingertips, so far away from the shield that they’d never see the blood of Spider-Man’s battles. May was one of them.

This was where the trouble began, because the rubberband is prone to snap.

He was spiraling; he could feel it like bits of hair swirling down a drain. Dangerously back to his roots. His real roots. The ones he buried a long time ago.

(He’s fourteen. Stalking down an alleyway. It was dark. Raining.

“Oh god,” the man hiccuped. “Oh god, no, please. Don’t kill me.”

“You're making a request?” Peter said quietly, tilting his head. Younger voice. Younger hands, tensed up; he cracked his knuckles and stalked closer. They dripped with blood, but he couldn’t feel the forming bruises. “Quoting someone else from this month.”

“Please,” the murderer sobbed, gasped, scrambling back. His back hit the wall. “Please, I’m sorry, I’ll do whatever you want. You– You want money?”

Peter went silent, stepping forward. He picked him up by the jacket collar and threw him across the alley. A loud crack resounded through the area. The man made a pained noise and attempted to crawl away.)

Of course, Peter didn’t end up…

He learned that night, through all of his horror, that he had the capability to do horrific things. Whether he liked it or not, it was possible, and Peter was only a rubberband snap away from becoming his own worst nightmare.

He ended up swinging to Reyes’ apartment. Swung in through the window, kicking in the glass as he did so. It’s still wrecked from when they last fought here, only about a week ago. The front door is strung over with yellow crime tape. He didn’t even feel human, the way he looked around the ruins in complete silence other than his own heavy breathing. It was like his brain, his thoughts, were all replaced with a cat’s cradle of needles.

Peter threw a punch to the wall— the brick crumbled into several tiny dusted pieces from the impact. He kicked a chunk of foundation that was on the floor. He walked over to the desk of the apartment, looked up at the bookshelves so full they bended under the weight, and began taking out journals.

He scanned for anything that could even be slightly helpful. Pages and pages of research. He didn’t care. He ripped the pages out, broke the spines, and tossed them away before reaching for another journal. He hadn’t gotten far before his eyes scanned over the wall and saw a note tucked on the wall.

He stalked closer, and calmly picked up the yellow post-it.

An address. Southern Brooklyn. And in the Employer’s scratchy penmanship:

Peter clenched his teeth. He stuck the note in his pocket.

There’s a few options now, branches that split off depending on how Peter acted with this new information. He should be smart; but the urgency of the situation prevented from acting slow or being exceptionally careful. Then again, when had he ever been careful?

His suit was in shreds, and he could feel that tenfold as the cold Winter air rushed through his bones from the broken-in window. There wasn’t time to fix it up, or god forbid make a new one. The clock on May’s life was ticking, he could hear it buzzing in his ears. His fight against Reyes was personal, now.

This is why he didn’t spare a second to call Deadpool before climbing back out the window and rushing through Manhattan. This should be fast. Painless. If everything goes down the best way that it possibly can, then Peter will be leaving with Reyes in cuffs, and May will be alive enough to ask about the Spider-Man mask on her nephew’s face.

Southern Brooklyn, then. He’s swinging over the bridge, slingshotting himself through cranes, boosting himself off walls, spinning past turns to get where he needed to be. His teeth chatter in his skull like one of those plastic denture toys.

The coordinates lead him to an abandoned shipyard at the edge of the Lower Bay. A series of old boats were lined up beside it, and some rickety unbalanced wooden docks that were tilting at odd angles. He landed on one of the docks and stumbled, looking around wildly for anything that could point to Reyes.

He took a moment to pull his phone out of his pocket, and he dialed Wade’s number. It rang. It clicked and then Wade’s voice rang through.

“Peter, are you okay? I’m so sorry. I know I f*cked up, I’m looking everywhere I can for—“

Out of the corner of his eye, far along the coastline, something in the water sunk down, big, heavy, and made of metal. A large part that stuck out at the top lowered– Peter zeroed in on the Oscorp logo painted in metallic seaweed-green paint on the side.

“I know where he is. He left an address at his apartment,” Peter answered. “The old shipyard in Southern Brooklyn. I can see him now. Get here as fast as you can.”

“Wait— you’re not going after him, are you? Peter, you almost died last time. This isn’t something you should do on your own,” Wade argued quickly.

“The more time we’re wasting the less time she has!” Tick, tick, tick. “Can you just stop arguing with me and get over here? I have to go, I’m losing him.”

Peter hung up the phone, tuning out Wade’s panicked responses. He broke out in a sprint, jumping over boats, on top of the wooden poles lining the dock. The last of the submarine dipped down into the foamy green water.

He’s never tried to rip a submarine’s door off its seal-tight hinges, but he was pretty sure he could do it. Hell, he might even be able to pull the entire thing back up out of the water. So he did the only logical thing he could think of before the Employer got too far away.

He gasped and dove into the water.

The water is freezing cold, sending a chill so deep that he could feel his lungs slow. His vision was blurry as he blinked through the sluggish dark. He’s most definitely getting his skin soaked with the most disgusting garbage imaginable, but he couldn’t find the mental ability to even think up a joke about it– all that mattered was getting to that submarine.

He made quick work of his quickly-numbing body, but he almost felt like he was growing slower. The submarine was so close, getting closer with every stifled breath. But… his eyes were drifting, his head felt fuzzy, and he’s…

He’s so sleepy. He can hardly remember why he’s swimming anymore. Just that it’s cold, and it’s dark, and he wanted to sink into it like a blanket… Just to rest for one, measly moment.

His hand touched the submarine, clinging to the side. His heartbeat slowed. He gave a slow, heavy blink. Once. Twice. Sleep crept in as subtly and powerfully as the winter did. The static-like tingling of his body took over, and he swayed in the water.

At the surface of the ice-cold water, bubbles of air floated upwards. A series of them. Swimming up, up, up, meeting the rest of the air with quaint semi-circles. Peter doesn’t follow.

In the midst of a busy city; the bubbles stopped.

Chapter 17: A Noiseless Patient Spider

Chapter Text

"Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing,, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need to be form'd, till the ductile anchor hold."
-Walt Whitman

Peter jerked awake, resisting some kind of restraints that kept him sitting in a chair. The air smelled of new paint, smoke, and something stale. Everywhere he looked was a metallic silver; the floor, the walls— heavy pumps lined the sides, concealed easily above him.

A table was set in front of him. A variety of tools on it. A glass tank. A microscope, and surrounding Petri dishes. A syringe full of dark blue liquid, and an empty syringe beside that. Peter had to squint to see it; everything looked dull and blurry. He hadn’t seen anything like this since he had been in middle school forever ago.

His suit was drenched still, and the shivering of his damp body wasn’t making his disorientation of his surroundings any better. There was something bitter in his mouth, like he threw up something, and the acrid taste was lining his mouth in a thick acidic coating. He blinked a few times and squinted at the figure standing in the dark.

He swallowed dryly, his voice hoarse. “I’m guessing you’re not my conscience, huh?”

The figure stepped forward, and in the pale blue light of the submarine, Peter finally could catch a glimpse of him.

The man was haggard. A thin face with lavender blood vessels visible through his paper skin. Slicked-back waves of coppery hair highlighted with strands of grey, short at the neck. His eyes, a deep blue—sunken in and contrasting wildly with the dark circles that worn ragged underneath. He wore rectangular glasses with wide rims firmly on his face.

He had a wiry body. If there was any muscle on his bones, they were concealed under his crisp white lab coat. The sleeves were poorly ironed, spots of blood and some sort of blue stain at the hem. With a slender hand, he inhaled from a cigarette and exhaled a heavy plume of smoke, then put the half-burnt stick out in a Petri dish.

“Smoking kills.” Peter worked his jaw around tightly. “You’re a lot older than your picture. Thought you’d be more handsome in person.”

Reyes stared at him. His gaze uninterested at a glance, but unwavering with the type of concentration that told exactly how closely he was really paying attention.

“What did you do to me?” Peter demanded. He leaned forward in the chair, tugging at the restraints on his arm. “Did you drug me or something?”

Reyes hummed. Flicked the cigarette against the Petri dish once, twice. Bits of tobacco crumbled.

“On the contrary, my quandaries are far more interesting. I’d like to know; are you just simply ignorant, or rather stupid enough to have done it anyways?” Reyes asked. The smoke lightly fell from between his curled lips.

Peter exhaled slowly. His eyes steeled, fingers twitching. “What?”

“I wasn’t even sure it would work,” Reyes continued, his voice like a thin gravel. “After all, there were too many variables. First, I would have to rely on the idea that you would go after me alone, without your little sword-strapped blabbering bodyguard.”

He sighed dryly, finally dropping the blunted cigarette into the dish and rising from his seat. “Most importantly, I had to either hope that the Steatoda Nobilis DNA would act dominantly in scenarios of combined extreme underwater and low-temperature stress…”

“You talk so much,” Peter interrupted. “And I need you to know that my saying it is a sign that you should get to the point, man.”

“Ignorant, then,” Reyes decided. He narrowed his eyes and pushed his glasses further up his crooked nose. “I was so sure a man of your abilities would be familiar with even the basic principles of thermoregulation, but I suppose not.”

Peter grit his teeth and held back a series of rapid-fire quips. There wasn’t enough time.

“Rapid Cold Hardening.” Reyes explained, crossing his hands in front of his lab coat. “The process in which ectotherms, such as the arachnidae, undergo to survive cold temperatures.”

“You see,” he sighed. “Their neuromuscular function becomes futile, and this loss sends them into comatose. When you decided to go deep-sea diving in your, dare-I-say ‘scuba gear’, the spider in you just had to act out. How fortunate for me.”

Peter furrowed his eyebrows. “So you knocked me out with science?”

“You’ve decided to keep up, finally.”

“Good for you, then,” Peter said. He ran his tongue over his teeth, then gave him a wry smile. “You must not be used to your plans working out so well. This is a huge win for you.”

Reyes stepped closer and Peter went still in his seat. There was a very obvious and definitive lack of alarm at the back of his neck that made Peter feel dizzy, floating without anything to ground him. No pressure on his shoulders from where his spider sense used to lie. He was on his own.

“You should let her go,” Peter said slowly. “You don’t have any good reason to keep her here. Just let her go— and you can do whatever you want to me.”

“I don’t need your permission,” Reyes cut in with a sneer. “You’ll see what’s become of Ms. Parker soon enough.”

Instantly, Peter began to jerk against the restraints again. “What the hell is that supposed to mean? Where is she? She’s here, isn’t she? I saw what you did. You trashed the place, you have her—“

“You’re going to cause damage to your wrists. I’d rather you didn’t, we’re going to be needing them,” Reyes said blankly. “You can struggle as much as you want, but as you may have noticed, your strength will not return to you.”

Peter breathed harshly, a wheeze tickling the back of his throat and cinching his lungs. He watched as Reyes paced back and forth in front of him carefully.

“Here’s how this is going to work,” Reyes began, his face stone cold. “I am going to run a series of tests. I will begin with the basics. Hearing. Sensitivity. Sight. We will move on to the physical. Strenuosity. Regeneration. Starvation. We’ll then raise the bar. Burns. Intolerance. Electrocution.”

“You’re— You’re really messed up in the head, dude. Seriously.”

“But,” Reyes pressed on, ignoring him completely. He gave the closest possible thing to a smile, a crooked crack of grimaced teeth. “So far, you will have been the first test subject that isn’t the original species class of spider that has survived spider DNA, which means… I’ll be able to distend far past the research I wanted to accomplish at Oscorp. Perhaps even psychological tests.”

Peter shivered. (From the cold, he promised to himself. He wouldn’t let Reyes scare him.)

Reyes pressed forward even still, smelling of smoke, cinnamon gum, and salt water. “The first hour of testing has already begun. While you were unconscious, I injected an anti-serum composed of venom from the spider that bit you. I will be timing how long it takes for the serum to wear off.”

Peter’s mind swam around. Quickly, he came to two conclusions at once.

The first conclusion being that he was dealing with a top-of-the-line mad scientist, and he was familiar with that type of super-villain. Doc Ock almost killed him, but in the end, it was Peter who ended crawling out on top. He would do it again now.

The second conclusion being that he had no powers at the moment, making this a battle of wits. It was his mind against Reyes. Peter would have to pull out all the tricks in his hat to make it out of here, but hope was not lost.

He took a breath, and then did what he did best: he talked.

“My dad worked on the spider project,” Peter spoke up. “The one at Oscorp.”

Reyes narrowed his eyes.

“I remember he had paperwork everywhere,” Peter continued, trying hard to think back to before— before his life started, before everything. He swallowed dry. “Sometimes he would take home spiders and tell me about them, and I would name them. You seem the type of person to use boring names. Anyways, though. My dad. You might have known him before he died.”

“Richard Parker,” he glared. “Yes, I knew your father. The only way for you to have survived the spider bite was for you to have been related to that blundering idiot. It’s how I learned your identity, Spider-Man.”

Peter stalled.

“You found out because of my dad,” he said blankly.

He thought of Wade’s guilty eyes, the buzzing in his ears.

“Obviously. No need to make things needlessly complicated. It was the quickest research link, as family trees often are.”

Wade had nothing to do with it. And there was horror in that, finding out that the whole time Reyes knew who he was and still waited for the right moment to strike and set out his plan.

He scribbled the memory of Wade reaching a hand to him with an apology on his lips out in his mind until it was nothing but a deep graphite imprint. He would fix it later. He just needed to save May and get out of here.

“…The spider’s dead,” Peter said back combatively. He ignored the quiver in his own voice. “You’re not getting your program back. Oscorp shut it down years ago.”

Rory’s eyes darkened. “I don’t need my program back. Despite my arguing, it paid no matter.”

“Steatoda Nobilis,” he said blankly. “My life’s work. Thousands and thousands of dollars spent on college to get my degree. Countless weeks spent climbing the tower of scientists who were not even a fraction as brilliant as I. Only to lose everything because of a child’s insolence.”

“But…” He tilted his head. The white lab coat he wore seemed blinding in the dim light. “The DNA still exists. You know this. I know this.”

Peter clenched his jaw. “Why go through all the trouble, Reyes? This seems like an awful long manhunt for just an eensy weensy spider that’s dead. Oscorp will never take you back, even if you run all the tests on me you can think of.”

“You don’t get it, do you?” He scoffed. He kneeled down to meet Peter’s eyes. “Oscorp has never meant anything. With you here, I will finally finish my research. My life’s work will not have been for nothing. I lost my funding but not my test subject.”

“You’ve given me hope, little arachnid,” Reyes continued, his voice spiraling into a soft derangement. He smiled something twisted. “Maybe you’re a hero after all.”

The third hour of the test rang through Peter’s head fuzzily. He’d tried to keep track of it, which was proving harder and harder as time went on.

He was sweating bullets, wheezing lightly as it dripped down his forehead and gathered in the crooks of his ears, the cradle of his neck, the damp fabric of his suit. His body shook from it— the cold, that is— but it didn’t seem to stop the chill from settling deep in his bones.

Reyes had sat down across from him, also in a metal chair. A clipboard that he looked over at him from with utmost scrutinization before he’d scribble something down. Peter saw his lips moving— he was muttering, something that he should have heard, even with all the layered noises of pipes and water and machinery, but he couldn’t.

Peter furrowed his eyebrows with frustration, letting out another wheezy breath. He made a half attempt to jerk out of his restraints, but failed miserably and with a note of pain as his muscles burned from the movement. He was weak, and becoming weaker still. He could feel it.

Worse, Reyes seemed to notice this with a deranged, unrestrained glee, his eyes sparking with something as he caught the wince on Peter’s face.

“Did you ever take a course on ethics in college?” Peter spoke up. He’d been talking for a long while now, and he could feel his voice becoming hoarse from it.

Reyes ignored this, looking back down at his paper and continuing to scratch against it with his pen.

“You should have,” Peter continued. He closed his eyes, exhaling through his nose. He couldn’t see that well, anyways. And it wasn’t like he was going anywhere. “I had a friend in college who started a petition declaring all science majors should be required to take ethics.”

(Gwen, and the fierce furrow of her brow, marching to the administrators office after the news of Doctor Octavius first broke out. Peter smiled about it then, nursing his abdomen in dry-bloodied bandages with several bottles of Ibuprofen hidden in his backpack. He would have smiled about it now, too, but…)

“What can I say?” Peter huffed dryly. “She’s always right.”

Reyes slowly looked up, narrowing his raven eyes. His bottom lip curled with an ugly sneer of displeasure and offense. “I minored in psychology.”

Peter’s eyebrows raised, and he peeked one eye open. “Are you lying to me right now?”

“Brainless,” Reyes groveled, his glare darkening. His hands tightened on the clipboard.

Peter always had been good at annoying bad guys. He’s always been even better at talking. Reyes had proven on multiple occasions that Peter had the ability to affect him with both.

He’d learned that, while Reyes was excellent at ignoring conversations around Peter, he was incredibly defensive over his own work. He always rushed to spit something back, or lay claim to his intelligence. Which was great news— it gave Peter an in. Something to chip at, something to wear down for however long he’ll be stuck here, and hopefully something to pull information from.

‘Wade would have a fit if he heard me thinking that,’ Peter thought, a bittersweet amusem*nt twinging at his throat.

He’s reminded of Deadpool in Oscorp tower, interrogating that intern. He wanted to think about what else he subtly picked up from Wade over the time they’d spent together, but he knew that if he spent any second longer dwelling on it, it would tug at a string in his heart and send him spiraling. He needed his head strong now, especially while the strength of his body failed.

“So,” Peter looked at him disbelievingly. “You minored in psychology, or so you say—“

“It’s true.”

“—sure, sure. Why, though?” Peter tilted his head. “If you’re so clearly hooked on studying, uh… What was it? Sted—? Stedo—“

The glare returned, its intensity increasing tenfold. “Steatoda Nobilis,” Reyes gritted out. “If you have my life’s work in your blood, you could at the very least remember her name.”

Peter opened his mouth, but paused for a moment to let himself breathe. His lungs weren’t doing so well, it seemed, with the sudden change in his blood. He inhaled shakily and wheezed out, shuddering as he did so.

He heard the telltale scratching of the ballpoint pen again, and let his head fall forward with a defeated sigh. He’ll interrogate Reyes again in a moment. He just needed to rest. It wouldn’t shock him if he were running a fever.

The fourth hour.

Reyes sat across from him, a machine powered up that looked eerily similar to one of those box-shaped computers Peter used to fish out of the dumpster in 2010. The screen on it was the same fuzzy blue-green-red pixel mesh, other than a square in the center that looked like mud.

He explained it as a sight test. Something about spherical cones and ultraviolet light, honestly Peter didn’t pay attention. His eyes felt like they were going to explode from the pressure behind them. He wanted to sleep for a million years. He wanted dry clothes. He wanted Wade’s hoodie, his loose pyjama pants, the ashy smell of his beat up couch, the warmth of his arms—

“What colour is shown?”

Peter blinked quickly at the tears pricking up in his eyes. He stared at the square on the screen and kept his mouth firmly shut. His eyes flicked up to Reyes, unimpressed.

“Don’t make this difficult. It won’t end well for you.”

“What if I’m colour blind, huh?” Peter spat out weakly. He was trying for a tone that lingered on joking; but god, he was so tired and so pissed off. “What if it’s red or something, and you get faulty information because you didn’t count for a Punnett square. I think my mom was colourblind.”

His mom wasn’t colourblind.

“Your mother wasn’t colourblind. Say the pigment on the screen and stop acting like an impudent child.”

Peter clenched his jaw. His head pulsed. If he had his normal level of strength he’s sure he would have cracked his teeth. He glanced back at the screen. “sh*t brown.”

Click.

“What colour is shown?”

Peter flinched. The most obnoxious shade of green, bright enough to send another shockwave of pain to his eyes. He shut them tightly, relishing in the most minimal sense of relief that it garnered. He exhaled stiffly.

“How long is this test?” Peter gritted.

“Open your eyes and answer the question.”

Peter regretfully peeled his eyes open, squinting at the screen. He blinked a few more times, then shut his eyes even harder after another sting of pain. It was like the worst migraine he’d ever had, and he’s had a lot of bad migraines.

“I don’t know,” Peter rasped, sweat dripping down his face. He felt sick to his stomach, exhausted, his head turning his whole body on the world’s most painful tilt-a-whirl. “It’s just— it’s bright.”

“Open your eyes,” Reyes repeated, his voice sharp, “and answer the question.”

He was so tired. He let his head dip down, letting out a weak groan. Tried to take a deep breath and hold it in his chest, tried to convince himself he was fine.

Footsteps were distant sounds in his ears until they were right behind him. A hand fixed itself on his jaw and wrenched it upward. The light blearily shining at the skin of his eyelids and making his darkened vision all red.

“Open your eyes.” Reyes shook his jaw with a firm hand. He tilted Peter’s head backwards, then used his hands to force Peter’s eyes open. “Answer the question. The colour shown— I will not ask again.”

Tears smeared under Peter’s eyes as he stared at the screen. “Green,” he said quickly. First thing that came to mind. “It’s green.”

Reyes let go aggressively, shoving him a little as he went. His nostrils flared as he walked back over to the machine, then shoved his finger angrily on the button.

Click.

“You’re a psychopath,” Peter sniffed, taking a moment to catch his breath as the machine switched off.

Reyes ignored him, going to scratch away at his clipboard with a furrowed glare.

Peter drifted, letting his eyes close gently, letting himself sleep. Just five minutes…

Just...

The sixth hour.

The clipboard slammed into the desk, clanging metal against metal. Peter shuddered awake, his breath catching in his throat when he instinctively tried to lurch away.

“You cannot sleep until I allow you to,” The Employer said coldly. “There are more tests to be run.”

“Wanna bet?” Peter inhaled shakily, steadying himself. “Because I’m feeling awfully cozy here.”

He stretched his neck from side to side. Self-assessment of himself wasn’t worth the trouble, but he did it anyway. The results were the same as before; his head hurt, his ears were still ringing from the rude awakening. His strength wasn’t back yet, he still felt limp from exhaustion and every muscle was aching something fierce.

“Allow me to begin the second series of tests then,” Reyes said. He turned around, walked over to a tall shelf, stacked with glass ecosystem tanks and cardboard boxes. He slid a cardboard box off from the shelf and carried it to the desk.

“What now?” Peter sniffed. “I’d make a guess, but I don’t think I’m mentally capable of coming up with even half the messed-up stuff you do.”

“That’s why you never succeeded in my field,” Reyes cut sharp. “Degree in Biochemistry, and for nothing. If you continued working for Dr. Octavius, perhaps you could have made an impactful discovery under his influence. It’s a shame to see intelligence gone to waste.”

Peter scoffed. The bitter taste in his mouth returned. Regret, maybe. He tried not to think about Otto anymore, or really at all since it happened. Kept it all silent, tucked it so far down in his chest that only his heart remembered, because it was hard to forget the dull ache it left.

(Again he heard Gwen’s voice. “You think about speaking more than you do speak about thinking. You just have to say it, Peter. Tell me what’s bothering you.” Still, his lips remained in a tight line. This wasn’t Gwen.)

“You really did your research,” Peter said instead. “You just know everything about me?”

Reyes ignored him. He pulled a blocky pair of headphones out of the box and set them on the desk. He then turned back to the machine from the previous test and booted it back up. Peter’s stomach twisted.

“Are the headphones for me?”

“No.” Reyes picked them up and slid them onto his own ears, clicked a switch on the side and a green light lit up from the side of the muff’s casing. “I am going to play a series of frequencies. Your job is to sit there, quiet.”

Peter clenched and unclenched his fists. His wrists were being worn red from the restraints. “Wow, that easy, huh? Feel like there’s a trick.”

Reyes didn’t answer him. He turned a dial on the machine. “First frequency, ten hertz.”

Peter furrowed his eyebrows. He glanced down at the floor and tried to strain his hearing, thinking maybe he missed it. Nothing. There was nothing. All he could hear was the general ambience of creaking metal and the humming of deep water.

Reyes marked something down on his clipboard. He then turned the dial again. “Second frequency. Twenty hertz.

A low static began deep in his eardrums. He cringed at the tickling feeling.

Reyes studied him for a moment, then marked something down on his clipboard. He made a noise, but Peter couldn’t tell if it was interest or disinterest. He then turned the dial again. “Third frequency. Fifty hertz.”

The static grew louder. Peter’s unimpressed gaze stayed still on The Employer, his nose scrunched in displeasure at the vibrations in his ears.

Reyes marked another thing on his clipboard. He pursed his lips for a moment. Flipped to the next page. “Fifteenth frequency. Six thousand hertz.”

He turned the dial, and immediately Peter gasped, his shoulders jumping up to cover his ears. It was loud, the vibrations suddenly jumprocketing and making him feel like his brain was about to melt.

“sh*t,” Peter muttered. A high ringing reverberating on the metal of the submarine and bouncing back to him. “Holy sh*t.”

Reyes’ pencil began to scratch quickly against the paper, and Peter flinched even at that.

“Twentieth frequency,” Reyes said, and Peter quickly shut his eyes as if it would help from the grating quality of his voice. “Thirteen thousand hertz.”

Peter opened his mouth to argue for his own sanity, but Reyes' hand was already on the dial. The ringing that resumed was horrific. Peter thought his ears would start bleeding. He bit down hard on his tongue, blood coating his clenched teeth.

Reyes turned the page again. Peter’s eyes nearly roll back from the sound. More pencil scratching. Then, like a true miracle, the dial was switched off.

Peter collapsed in the chair, his chest heaving. Blood dripped down from his lip, the rest he spat onto the metal floor. His ears were sensitive enough to hear what seemed like everything. The rustling of his own clothes, his own heartbeat in his ears, the raspy breath of the Employer.

Peter shivered violently and glared daggers as the Employer stood, his shoes squeaking as he walked over.

“Interesting,” Reyes said, looking over Peter as he flinched. “While your strength has deteriorated, your senses seem to be lingering longer.”

He kneeled down, studying over Peter with narrowed eyes. He slowly reached his hands out in front of him, and Peter was trying to reel his face away before Reyes can even do anything.

Reyes then clapped his hands together. One sharp sound, right by his ears.

Peter’s eyes roll back, his vision going black.

The ninth hour.

There was a buzzing at the base of his skull. Spiders crawling over his brain and weaving cotton webs through his thoughts. Then, static. This feeling was familiar. He jerked his head up, and his eyes landed on the muzzle of a gun.

The Employer lowered the firearm. The buzzing stopped.

“What the hell?” Peter huffed. He tried to pull at the restraints again. The soreness has decreased in his muscles. His head felt better too, when there wasn’t a weapon being aimed right at it. He made sure not to say any of these things aloud.

“I am running sensitivity tests,” Reyes said clearly. He put the weapon down and instead picked up his clipboard, looking down at it with deep intent as he made notes.

“Oddly enough, your senses towards danger don’t directly attribute to any particular breed of spider, even the ones that were made to genetically modify the Steatoda Nobilis. The hair on the back of your neck rises at the mere presence of a threat, but only wakes you up when my finger moves to the trigger.”

“And?”

Reyes’ expression dimmed. “You’re far more of a bore than I ever could have anticipated. I really had fooled myself into believing you were intelligent enough to understand my findings.”

“I’m just having a hard time understanding why the hell I should care about your results,” Peter glared. He subtly worked his wrists around, wincing at the way the rope dragged against the welts. “I have a question.”

“I’m not inclined to answer. It’s not my job to answer your questions.”

“When you finish your tests,” Peter continued, ignoring him. He swallowed thickly. “You’ll let May go, right?”

“You have so much confidence that your time here will even be worth my effort.” Reyes continued writing, his face the total picture of annoyance. “You’ve been consistently fighting against my direction. What makes you think I will now reward your participation?”

“If my time here is so useless to you, then let me go,” Peter reasoned. “At least tell me where she is. If she’s okay. I’ll do anything you say after that.”

Reyes paused, his hand stilling on the paper. He glanced above the clipboard and narrowed his eyes at Peter, his lips curled into a tight line of displeasure. “Why would I trust you?”

It wasn’t a ‘yes’. But it was more than what Peter needed. A foot in the door, the crack in the window that told him there was a space to maneuver a deal. The Employer’s weakness had always been his research; he should have tried this sooner.

“You’ve been studying me for a while, right?” Peter tilted his head down, trying to make himself look smaller and weaker. He kept his tone light, like he didn’t know what he was talking about. Reyes’ would be easier to talk with if the doctor thought he was stupid. “So you should know by now I don’t take promises lightly, especially when it comes to my family, right? The people I care about.”

Reyes continued watching him. His eyes narrowed further, eyebrows furrowing. He was considering it.

“You can do anything,” Peter said. “Just— As long as I know she’s safe.”

The sound of a pen dragging against paper brought his gaze back up. The scowl fixed on Reyes’ face had deepened, and he was scribbling words on a paper with a fit of childish anger.

“...Doctor?”

Reyes’ hands twitched. He set the clipboard down on the desk and stalked forward. “She’s currently taking refuge in an undisclosed location. Breathing for now. I won’t hesitate to change that.”

If Peter had the safety to break down in grateful tears, he may just have done so. The biggest rush of relief that flooded through him added strength to what was already returning to him.

“Undisclosed location?” Peter pressed further. “Like what, your warehouse?”

The Employer’s eye twitched. It was so subtle anyone else may have missed it. Peter did not.

With that information revealed, Peter reeled back in his chair and shoved himself forward as hard as he could, knocking his head into Reyes’ with all the strength as he could muster.

Reyes let out an angry shout, stumbling back and clutching his forehead with his palm. “Insolent!” He growled.

Peter tried to yank his arms free from the restraints, skin tearing away against the rope with a stinging bout of pain, but it wasn’t enough. “f*ck–”

Time was slipping away fast. This was his open window. He had to get out of here now, or the chances of him and May getting out alive were drastically low. He didn’t have all his abilities back, though. This was a battle of normal tooth and nail, and he was at a disadvantage.

He wrenched himself up from the floor, kicking his feet and trying to thrash his way out of the rope with nothing but brute force. His head, throbbing from the collision, began to buzz. He rolled out of the way just as the desk was thrown to the floor, the machine crashing and splintering into pieces.

In all the movement, he managed to get one leg free. He hauled himself up and turned to run, at least far enough away to not get hit– and just as he turned, a nasty punch was sent right to his face.

He faltered, dizzily. He felt himself being shoved back into the chair, and the restraints on his hands were cinched far, far tighter. The Employer kicked his free leg hard in the shin, making him cry out in pain. The restraints on his legs became quickly re-tied. Triple knots.

Peter’s breath heaved, he looked up at the doctor in front of him, all red with rage and a beautiful bruise blooming on his forehead. His teeth snarling, his slender hands clenching unnaturally in a way that resembled the legs of spiders he’d killed.

“I see the serum has begun to wear off,” Reyes seethed. He smoothed his hands over his lab coat and took a steadying breath.

“sh*t,” Peter breathed out shakily.

Reyes picked the desk back up with a grunt. He set the clipboard neatly back onto the desk, and held the pen as he looked at Peter.

“I studied psychology once,” Reyes said. He stalked forward, twirling the pen between his fingers. “I have a hypothesis that fear is romanticized. People are thrilled to indulge in their little fears. They love to have their hearts race. What do you think of that, arachnid?”

“I’m not a psychology major—“ Peter spat blood out onto the cold steel of the submarine floor. “But I think your parents let you watch too many sci-fi horror movies as a kid, and it really messed with your development.”

The Employer then smiled, something grueling and sinister. He leaned forward, close enough where all Peter could smell was tobacco and cinnamon gum on his breath.

“Listen closely,” Reyes said. His voice was still, dangerous, strung by a tight thread and balanced on the tension. “I know that you think you’re afraid now. I’ve studied you long enough to know the symptoms—The only difference is you now have no mask to hide behind.”

He grabbed Peter’s chin and tilted it upwards, making unblinking eye contact with his beady pupils. Peter clenched his teeth to keep from trembling and stared back. A shiver involuntarily went up his spine and shuddered at his shoulders.

“But you have nothing to be afraid of,” he continued. He scratched the scruff of Peter’s chin with his thumb. “Because we’re only just getting started with my trials. We’ll be testing your fear just as strenuously as the muscle. The worst for you is yet to come.”

Reyes pulled his hand away in one hard movement, causing Peter’s head to jerk. “I’m sure you remember your impromptu lecture on rapid cold hardening, so this next test will be easy for you.”

Peter breathed slowly.

“In severely cold environments, say, the arctic– spiders lose their neuromuscular function. Their ability to control movement and stability in their skeletal and muscular system becomes fraught,” Reyes explained. “I am now going to test how long it takes for your body to begin these processes when water is not a factor. I’ll be back for you at 0600.”

Peter jerked against the restraints, his wrists wet with his own blood. He cursed and swore as the Employer walked away, subsequently shutting the door behind him.

After a few moments, a loud electronic hum began from within the walls of the submarine. From the vents, a thick, cold fog began to billow. He shivered, his teeth chattering, his cheeks and fingers going red-hot.

Time slowed as it grew colder in the room. Against his better judgment, his mind began to drift. His eyes began to shudder along with his body.

His tears left frost on his cheeks.