THIS IS NOT MY WRITING. My lovely sister wrote this one shot of farkle as spider-man, and wanted me to publish it on my account. Everything written in the story was all of her work.
I do not own Girl Meets World or Spider-man. The characters in this story are not mine. All rights belong to Disney, Marvel, and Disney Channel.
Responsibility.
I stared at the word in bemusement as Mr. Matthews wrote it on the blackboard in his usual fashion. Haven't we learned about this before? After years of having him as a teacher, you would think this is a topic we have discussed already, but, whatever, I'll indulge in whatever Mr. Matthews has planned for us today.
"Okay, class. I'm sure you have all heard of the recent developments happening in New York City. You can't just be looking at Instagram and Tinder on those phones of yours..." Mr. Matthews started, only to be met with blank stares and silence from a majority of the classroom.
I raised my eyebrow in amusement. Of course I knew what was going on. I'm Farkle, I know everything. And everyone knows that I know everything.
"Really?" He cried, slightly exasperated by the adolescents in the room. He took a deep breath. "So just to recap, the NYPD has been uncovering networks upon networks of underground crime, and with this the rates of crime are going up. More robberies, kidnappings, and heists are happening around the city. Any of this ring a bell?"
Still silence.
"Jeez Louise. Okay, I'll just cut to the chase. We're going to be talking about Spider-Man." Mr. Matthews threw his hands up in defeat.
Suddenly, he was met with every one of his students raising their arms eagerly, waiting to be called on, but yelling their opinions of the subject anyways… which was kind of counter-intuitive.
Well, except for me. I have something to confess.
Since we're talking about your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man…
That's me. I, Farkle Minkus, am Spider-Man.
Let me rewind to when it happened. I had a summer internship at BioCorp, Inc. My now-colleague Isadora Smackle was able to talk to the scientists there into getting me in, since she's been doing research there since middle school. I couldn't let my 15-year-old untapped talent and potential go to waste at such a young age, so I became the second-youngest person to work at BioCorp, Inc., right after Smackle.
There was one evening where Smackle and I were in the lab pretty late. I was in the other room centrifuging some samples while I analyzed them in the spectrophotometer. I'm not sure which clumsy scientist left a cage open, but one of the spiders they were observing escaped and bit me at the back of the neck. My neck was irritated at first, but Smackle applied Neosporin onto the site of contact and I felt better. You could say a lot better.
I was taking the subway home later that night. It was just this one girl from Mr. Matthews' history class-his daughter, actually, Riley Matthews-and I in the car. She was standing, although there were plenty of seats around she could sit, engrossed in whatever she was reading on her phone. I sat as far away from her as possible, to avoid any awkward contact. I always thought she was one of the most beautiful girls I have laid my eyes on-the other being her best friend Maya Hart-and she was really nice and quirky, but I haven't really had a conversation with her… or ever felt the confidence to say anything but hello.
I heard the breaks of the subway car engage harshly before it happened. Call it an awakening of a sixth sense, if you will. What happened next felt like I was living in slow motion: I felt my body jolt as the subway car's velocity was decreasing rapidly, but I was able to resist the force. It was enough to loosen Riley's grip on the pole completely and she started falling backwards. I was able to stand up, run over, and catch her without losing my balance and giving her a concussion.
It sounds crazy, but it's true. She was baffled that I was there to save her, considering she saw me on the opposite end of the subway car, but thanked me anyways. I was so disoriented because of these newfound reflexes that I didn't even say "You're welcome." I was also blushing because that was the longest I've ever made contact with a girl; although it was only a few seconds, it felt like minutes considering how slow everything moved in the moment.
If you take a look at me, you can tell by my looks that this super-speed superpower-y thing, or any kind of romantic contact thing, was not normal at all.
I returned to the lab the next day and did some digging because there was no way I could dismiss what happened. BioCorp, Inc. was doing some pretty shady research with radioactive spiders, which I'm pretty sure was illegal. Despite this being the internship of my dreams, I didn't want to be associated with a company like this, just in case they're exposed and my affiliation with said company would affect my college applications, and resigned from the internship position… but not before taking a few copies of the shady research with me. It looked like whatever chemical or radiation that contaminated these spiders were transferred to me when the spider bit me and that gave me spider-like senses and abilities.
It took me a while to get used to these powers… of this sixth sense I call my "spidey-sense," being able to climb walls, super speed and strength… but I like to hide it. Sure, they're okay to have, but my real powers are my intelligence, my mind. Everyone at school knows it, so I don't want to seem even more superior than I already am.
I'm not sure if it was this "spidey-sense" or I just became exposed to the bad in the world after seeing what was going on behind the scenes at BioCorp, Inc., but I became hyper-aware of what was happening around the world. Murders, kidnappings, theft, fraud… there was so many unfortunate things happening in the world… in New York City alone.
I've said before how I want to become a world leader. How can I rule Earth if there's no one left in it? On a serious note, I felt the need to do something because I was capable of doing so with these powers. That's why I decided to save humanity and stop these crimes from happening. That's how Spider-Man was born. Not the most creative name, but I had to give homage to the creature that gave me these abilities. I finish my homework in less than an hour anyways, what am I supposed to do with the rest of my time? I somehow convinced Smackle to get me a bunch of stuff from BioCorp, Inc. without tipping myself off. Or maybe she already knows because she's the smartest person I know, besides myself. I learned how to sew off YouTube and made a suit and spent hours upon hours perfecting a device that shoots out a strong, web-like substance.
Now, you can see why this would be an uncomfortable topic for me. I hide behind a mask for a reason. I don't want anyone to know this web-slinging crimefighter is just someone they go to school with. Not only would that bring the kind of attention I don't want to myself, but that could put myself and my family in danger. I also don't want to get arrested.
I sunk in my chair and stared at the blackboard. I'm a genius, and even I didn't know this would be the topic of the lesson today.
"Whoa, quiet down everyone. Let me connect this to the big picture here." Mr. Matthews waited for silence before speaking again. "The NYPD have their hands so full with this sudden outburst of crime that they might be spreading themselves way too thin. So some criminals have been getting off the hook. At least by the police. But there's someone else there to stop them, whether the police like it or not."
Oh man. I can see where this is going and I'm not sure I want to be here. I contemplated going to the bathroom until the end of the period, but before I got the chance to raise my hand to ask to be excused, Mr. Matthews continued. "Some say that he is a vigilante that needs to be stopped, to let the system handle the criminals. Others say that he is needed since the police can't stop all the crime from happening. What do you think, class? Should Spider-Man take that responsibility to stop all these people, or is it not his to bear?"
Was it even possible to sink lower in my chair?
Before anyone got the chance to say a word, Maya spoke. "I think that Spider-Man is doing a good thing, but he should keep the responsibility to the police." I was surprised this answer, coming from the resident classroom rebel. "There's a limit to the good he can do, and he could make everything worse once that limit is reached. I'm not exactly sure how they could even regulate his involvement since he, you know, can swing from webs and is really strong and stuff. He shouldn't have to take the responsibility. It's not his to begin with." A lot of the class nodded in agreement and verbally affirmed her point of view.
"We can't rely on him too much. If he were to somehow be influenced by these bad guys and turn to the dark side or go rogue, he would become a threat to us. At this current moment, I'm not sure the police even know how to deal with him if he did become dangerous." Lucas Friar chimed in. Lucas is usually an impartial and indecisive guy, but he recently started dating Maya. And I'm pretty sure she wears the pants in the relationship. She could easily scare him into agreeing with her if they were to argue about something. But they're cute together, I'll give them that. He's smarter than he looks.
Zay Babineaux took the silence following Lucas' answer as an opportunity to contribute intelligently to the dialogue. "I agree with Lucas and Maya. I think. I don't know. I'm just here to add an opinion of a person of color to this conversation because no one else has said anything. Diversity." Maya rolled her eyes.
I sighed. I definitely should have left the classroom earlier. I need to leave before this turns into a full-on Spider-Man roast. I raised my hand to ask to go to the bathroom.
Riley turned around to face Maya, also taken aback by Maya's and Lucas' answers. "Well, I believe Spider-Man is doing good and should continue fighting for us. I doubt that Spider-Man is a bad person if he's willingly sacrificing himself for us. And sometimes the system fails and needs that extra helping hand. He seems to be the only person wanting to provide that."
My ears perked up as I heard Riley defend me-I mean, Spider-Man-and I sat up straight in my chair. I put my hand down back onto my lap.
"And besides," she continued, her eyes sparkling, "with great power comes great responsibility. I see that he has good intentions to help others despite it being against popular opinion. He has these powers that none of can really explain. He doesn't have to bear this responsibility to save us, but he's doing it because he can."
I knew I liked this girl. She understands. Spider-Man is controversial, a vigilante, a catalyst for more crime, a person a lot of people are on the fence about, but this is my city. As long as there are girls like Riley Matthews out there that believe I'm doing right for them, I'll continue what I'm doing.
Crime has to stop happening eventually. And there could never be anything more than these typical crime cases that can happen. Right?
AUTHORS NOTE
THE CONCEPT: Corey Fogelmanis as Peter Parker/Spider-man.
One day I was just scrolling through my Twitter timeline and I saw someone cosplay as Peter Parker and it looked exactly like Corey. After that, I tweeted about the concept and I could not get it out of my head afterwards. I've tweeted Corey multiple times and many have seen it and also supported the idea, including my sister who wrote this fic. Let's make it happen haha!
I hope you enjoyed this little one shot my sister wrote for everyone to enjoy. Don't forget to leave a comment with criticism, suggestions, and what you liked/didn't like! Until next time. xoxo, M.
