Moving sucks.
Peter kept digging through all the old boxes May and Ben never unpacked when they took this apartment, trying to decide what could and couldn't come with them to their new apartment. It'd be good to get out of the dirtier part of town, certainly good to have a little more legroom, but still. It was a little sad, leaving Queens after so long. It was a rough borough, but... yeah.
Tony had offered them a really nice apartment in Manhattan after everything had settled down and Peter graduated. He was hoping to get Peter into MIT right away, set him up with a full ride, but Pete made the call to hold off for a little while, stay home and work. Where he was going to find that work, he wasn't quite sure yet, but it couldn't be too hard in a city as big as New York, right?
Peter rubbed his eyes and checked his watch. 2:30. Christ... he was a bit miffed May had asked him to hold off on his nightly patrol to help her sort through the veritable mountain of junk, but what was he gonna do? Say no? Jesus, that'd be awful. He kept on digging through the box in his lap. Old photos, a few old documents, some of Peter's drawings from when he was young (plenty of Iron Man doodles, he noted with a smile)... and then a little shoebox at the bottom. Odd. He pulled it out, and was surprised for a moment at its heft. Giving it a gentle shake, he could hear something metal inside before he popped the dusty lid off.
"Hey," Peter called over his shoulder. "Hey May? What's up with this camera?"
Peter's aunt appeared from the kitchen with a pair of mugs in her hands. "Oh man, I almost forgot about that!" She exclaimed with a sudden grin. "Yeah, that was your uncle's!"
"For real?" Peter's eyebrow cocked as he looked back down at the device. "I don't remember it at all."
"Yeah, he only ever got to use it a couple times," the older woman frowned as she placed Peter's cocoa on the coffee table in front of them. "He dropped a good $300 to get that for special occasions. You know, trips and parties and all that. He was hoping to use it at your graduation..."
Peter looked up with a sober expression. "Trips. Yeah... guess it didn't pan out once..." Once Ben got laid off. The recession hit the Parkers pretty hard.
May nodded. "Well... I bet you could fix it up, find some use for it."
A subtle smile spread across the boy's face. "You mean that? You're cool with this?"
"Yeah, why not?" May ruffled Peter's hair. "I bet you'll be good at it up over the city!"
Peter blushed just a bit; he knew she didn't approve of Peter's "antics", but she didn't stop him. He had too much of Ben in him to not want to help.
"... Hey, May." Peter peeled up as he reached for his cocoa. "I've got an idea."
Peter had been slaving over his uncle's camera for the past three weeks, doing everything he could to tweak it and make it perfect, and figure out how to... y'know, take photos. As it turned out, Pete had an eye for this stuff. Everyone seemed impressed with his photos. May, Tony, Ned, even MJ (and that was saying something; MJ was notably tough to impress... something Peter had figured out on his own by now). And now here he was, out to get his first real job. He grinned as he looked up at the building and read the words.
The Daily Bugle.
Tony laughed when Peter told him his plan. (It only hurt his pride for a second, really.) He has a point, though. Newspapers were on their way out. Corporate media conglomerates were swallowing them up fast, but the Bugle seemed to be one of the last holdouts. It was only a matter of time, sure, but for now the Bugle stood on its own.
Pete took a step towards the door, but the sudden thousand-needle-pricks on the back of his neck convinced him to hop back before he collided with the man striding up from the left. "Sorry!" Peter threw his hands up as he stepped back.
The guy had a few inches height on him, but in stature he was certainly... thicker. Even ignoring the baggy black hoodie that hung off his body, the man had all the bulk of Captain Rogers. He looked down at Peter, a smirk surrounded by a face full of dark stubble underneath a set of sickly green eyes. His black hair was mostly tucked beneath a black grey-striped beanie, save for a tuft of blonde that curled up over the edge of the hat on the left side of his face. "No worries, man," he replied, raising a lazy hand in dismissal. His eyes flicked down to the camera handing from Peter's neck. "Oh... hey, are you here for the gig?"
"Uhh, yeah!" Peter grinned as he held out the folder in his hand. "Brought some of these to show the guy in charge, see what he thinks."
"May I?" The guy reached out an open hand. Pete shrugged and handed him the folder, which he cracked open right away and began thumbing through. He cracked a smile as he handed the folder back. "Better than my last photo guy," he mused. "You're a shoo-in, dude. C'mon, lemme bring ya to the boss."
Without missing a beat, the two zipped through the bustle building and up the stairs to the third floor. There they weaves through more foot-traffic as people bustled about until the man brought Pete into a room with only one occupant: a man behind a large desk who had to be in his late fifties, sporting, without exaggeration, the worst mustache Peter had ever seen, chomping a thick cigar.
"There ya are, gruesome, where ya been all day?" The man barked as he snatched the loose papers out of the guy's hand.
"Sorry JJ," the stranger said with a grin. "You know me, just had to get that cleanup pass done."
"Who do you think you are, Stephen King?" The older fellow replied gruffly. "I don't pay you to revise, I pay you to write and report. Now whaddya have for me?"
"Ah, Michie had me on Kitchen Duty. Y'know, eye out for the Devil." The guy shrugged. "Not much there lately."
"Kitchen Duty?" Wisps of dark smoke puffed forth from "JJ's" mouth as he spoke. "No no, you're better than that. I don't want you on Kitchen Duty, I want you on the Avenger beat."
"Again?" Gruesome rolled his eyes. "JJ, come on, man. This is, like, the fifth time you put me on the Avenger beat since everyone came back to life."
"And three of those five you were front page, quit whining." JJ turned his eyes to Peter. "Who's the toddler?"
"I'm Peter," the boy smiled. "Peter Parker. I heard you guys needed a new photographer, and... uh, yeah." Quickly and a bit clumsily, Peter dropped the folder onto the massive desk of red-stained wood. A few of the photos slid partially from the folder, but JJ paid it no mind as he slid them about the surface of his workspace and eyed them for a moment.
"Not bad, kid..." the old man mumbled through his cigar. "How'd you get these aerials?"
"I know a guy," Peter shrugged. "I used to intern for Tony Stark, and uhh... y'know, I met people there." It wasn't really a lie, he did meet people when he worked for Mr. Stark. It just wasn't important for this man to know that those people were his fellow Avengers.
"Stark," JJ grimaced. "If I never have to print that name on my paper again, that'll be just fine by me. But as long as he's in the news, people will pay to read all about him, so what else can we do?"
"We could write about Oscorp," the stranger suggested slyly. "Any idea what ol' Normie's up to these days?"
JJ chortled. "You're a real riot. Take it to Open Mic Night." The boss lifted his head and squared his eyes directly on Peter. "Alright, you're in. The two of you, Avengers beat. I want you look into this new one, this... Spider-Kid, Captain Spider..."
"Spider-Man," Peter corrected. "It's, uhh, it's actually Spider-Man."
"I'll say," the stranger grinned. "You see those abs? Washboard, man."
JJ glared at the guy for a moment, then shook his head. "Look, just... I don't know about him yet. We might be able to spin it either way, but we'll see how he does. Now get outta here, I want a story on him by this weekend."
"You got it, chief!" The younger man flicked a lazy salute to the boss-man before he slipped out, with Peter tailing close behind.
In a few minutes, the two of them were back outside where they met. The stranger turned to Peter with a smile. "I hear Spider-Man likes to hang out in Queens. Think I'll swing through there tomorrow if you wanna come."
"Uhh, maybe? I'll let you know," Peter stammered, swimming with twenty different trains of thought.
"Sick," the stranger grinned. "Either way, I'll see ya soon." With a quick wink, he turned to walk away.
"Hold on!" Peter stuck out a hand excitedly as his new coworker turned back around. "I totally forgot to introduce myself. I'm Peter, Peter Parker."
The guy grinned as he took Peter's hand and gave it a solid shake. "Edward Brock Jr," he replied. "But you can call me Eddie."