Mistakes
By
Coopland
The following short story takes place during the storyline "Spider-Verse", as such there will be some spoilers within. The characters contained within are the property of Marvel Comics and are used without permission for entertainment purposes only, no profit is being made from this story.
She looks at May "Mayday" Parker and she is overwhelmed with guilt.
She see a lot of her Peter in the lithe brunette. The anger in her eyes is familiar and isn't true anger at all but rather the unrelenting despair of knowing there is something you once had but will never have again.
"I just wanted to be like you..." His voice whispers in her ear.
And for the first time Gwen is glad for the mask she's forced to wear, it hides the fact that her tears are fighting to break free.
She can't let them, she won't.
If I do, She thinks, I don't think I can make them stop.
The worst part is that Gwen watches the young heroine hold her baby brother, she sees the anger fade away and there for an instant is the girl she should be. That girl is warm and full of love and even though she's heartbroken the smile she gives little Benjy just lights up the area.
Eventually Gwen can look no longer and turns away from her fellow webslinger, only to look directly at Peter.
Not for the first time, she wonders how she can dare to live with herself knowing that she cost her world it's Peter Benjamin Parker and by extension its version of his daughter too.
Thankfully though, Peter isn't watching her and instead is staring at May just as she was. She notices that there's a look of confusion on his face, as though he's trying to remember something important but he can't. Raising his right hand to his temple, he walks over to Gwen.
"How you doing?" He asks her
She smiles even though he can't see, that's the fifth time he's asked in the last two hours.
"How am I doing?" She asks rhetorically, "Let's see, I've been recruited for a war against monsters that eat people with spider powers by Lord Spidington over there..."
She gestures to "Spider-UK" while musing silently that it's a stupid name – apparently he doesn't disagree but it was a name given to him by the Captain Britain Corps.
"Everywhere I look I see the face of boy I couldn't save and even if we do survive this I have to go on the run from my own dad because he knows my secret identity. I've had better days."
His brow furrows with an all to familiar guilty expression, "Sorry." He says softly
"None of this is your fault, Pete." Gwen replies, "Are you okay? Having leadership of an entire... species, I guess forced upon you would give anyone a stress headache."
A quizzical look formed on the face of the Spider of Earth-616.
"Yeah it would but it's not that." He informs her, "Every time I look at May, I feel as though I've forgotten something important and when I try and remember I get a sharp pain in my head. Maybe it's because of who her mom is." He pauses and frowns before adding, "Was."
"Who's that?"
"Mary Jane Watson or rather, Mary Jane Watson-Parker I guess."
Gwen's eyes go wide with shock, rock chick MJ got with bookish Peter Parker? There really is a world for every possibly eventually to play out, she muses. If Peter can tell, he doesn't let on.
"Whenever I look at her I feel like I made a terrible mistake," He continues, "One I'll never be able to put right."
Finally, Gwen pulls of her mask. For now it doesn't matter that she doesn't trust every Spider here; Peter needs her.
"You're Spider-Man; Peter," She tells him, "Never say never. Any mistake you've made, I'm sure you can fix it."
A look flashes through his eyes.
Not all mistakes can be fixed, Gwendy. It seems to say, she knows because she sees it in the mirror often enough.
There's a silence that lasts forever, it's over in seconds.
"Ready to save the world, Ms Stacy?" Peter says at last.
"I'd love to, Mr. Parker." Gwen replies.
Author's Note:
I'll say this right now, I am a huge fan of the Spider-Marriage and I loathe the fact that the people who now write these comics are abusing their power (in my eyes, if you're a fan of the current run more power to you). That being said, the idea behind Spider-Verse is a good one and Gwen Stacy has rightly taken her place in our hearts as Spider-Gwen, but the execution has been poor. I don't know exactly where this story is supposed to fit in with the main event but since Marvel doesn't really worry about those sorts of things any more neither will I. At a guess I'd place my little drabble took place not long after they reached Earth-16 but before the Inferior Spock showed up.
If there are any short stories you'd like to see me tackle, let me know and I'll see what I can do!
Until next time,
Coops.