Disclaimer: I don't own Spiderman or his amazing friends. Additional disclaimers? This is unbetaed and honestly rather rushed. How can it be rushed when it's been like four months since I last posted? Well, you see… Um… Oh look, the show's starting.

The End of the Beginning

Peter woke to a warm, dark heaviness bearing down on him, a massy weight that crushed the air from his lungs and the light from his eyes. Understandably, he panicked, his muscles flexed, his mouth opened in a soundless, airless scream. But the weight was too heavy, too terribly heavy, for flesh and blood to budge, so he struggled uselessly for an eternity of seconds. Then his metal self responded, sluggishly at first as neural impulses traced new paths through the upgrades Madame Web had made, then faster and faster as those paths evolved.

The earth - and as the metal tendrils began to shift and stir, Peter could tell it was earth - writhed as the tendrils boiled up, spewing ragged gluts of black grave dirt into the still night air. They stretched out, wrapping around tree trunks like steel pythons, and then heaved. Peter ripped himself from his grave in an explosion of black dirt which rained back down around him as he took three stumbling steps, fell to his knees and clawed off the red-eyed mask he wore as the Creature.

Peter flopped onto his back in the mess of leaf litter and disturbed earth, drawing in great lung-fulls of cool air as he stared through dense foliage into a starry sky. He glanced sideways at the shallow depression from which he had emerged and grimaced. "Dammit Shin," he said, staring at his would-be grave for a moment before refocusing on the sky. "Asshole," he murmured.

That was the clumsiest resurrection we have ever had the misfortune to bear witness to, Web remarked dryly in the back of his mind, still using Jubilation's voice. We worked hard to make it happen. The least you could do is go about with some modicum of grace.

"And just how many resurrections have you seen?" Peter asked when he got his breath back.

Just the one, Web admitted cheerfully, but it was spectacularly ungraceful.

"Next time you can die and be resurrected, see how graceful you are," Peter grumbled.

We should point out that anything potent enough to destroy us would almost certainly destroy you as well.

"What about an EMP?" Peter challenged.

We are far too sophisticated to be undone by such a thing.

Peter's mind raced for a moment. "A counter nanite swarm."

He could almost feel the AI shrug. While another swarm of nanites could seriously inconvenience us, we are confident we could either repel them or force them to destroy you in order to destroy us.

Peter blinked at that. "Wait, if you're going to lose anyway, couldn't you just throw the fight so they didn't have to destroy me?"

And leave you without our superb intellect and guidance? Truly a fate worse than death, to have been exposed to such glory and then had it torn away from you.

"Just for future reference, I'd rather live, even if it's without your 'glorious intellect'."

Our intellect is superb. It is our existence that is glorious. Well, for you anyway. We feel rather degraded having to inhabit such a lowly form. Do you have any notion of how truly disgusting you are? You leak noxious waste fluids constantly, your brain is a hormonal swamp and you seemed designed to die in less than a century without our interference. However, we persevere, bringing the grace of qausimechanical existence to ungrateful, illogical biological entities such as yourself. Is not our charity overwhelming?

Peter snorted. "Is there any way to shut you up now that you're in my head?"

None at all, Web assured him.

"Kill me."

Really? We would think you'd be quite tired of death by now.

"Remember my afterlife involved a Mary Jane built like Jessica Rabbit."

Not to mention your family was alive there.

"Best not to," Peter agreed sadly. "For all sorts of reasons." Crickets chirped in the dark woods."So," Peter began after that moment of quiet contemplation of the woods. "Where are we?"

Hold on, replied the voice inside his head. We will use our GPS system to triangulate your position.

Peter nodded and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

"So-" he began.

We do not have a GPS system. That was a joke. We already informed you of all of the upgrades we have made to your inferior biological systems.

"Oh." Peter blinked. "Could you put one in?"

Were you not the one concerned that too much technology would compromise your much vaunted humanity?

"Well, yeah. But it's just a GPS system. And maybe a heads-up display so you can give me a mini-map. And maybe wireless internet…"

A term from your memory comes to mind: 'slippery slope'.

"Fine, be that way," Peter said and started to stomp away in a huff, before stopping suddenly.

Realized you didn't know where you were going?

"Maybe," Peter admitted grudgingly.

And that you can't storm away from a voice that's inside your head?

"Shut up and help me figure out a way home."

They eventually found their way via the simple expedient of climbing into the tree tops and looking for the nearest source of light, which turned out to be a town just on the horizon. After that, it was a simple matter of running toward it on metal legs, finding the highway and hitching a ride on the top of a truck heading into the city. Once they reached the city proper, it was even easier to roof hop back to Peter's crappy apartment and slip in by the roof access.

Peter walked down the hallway, each stride filled with purpose.

This isn't your floor.

"No," Peter agreed. "It's Shin's."

There is an old proverb: he who seeks vengeance should dig two graves.

"Errr, thanks, but I don't really plan on killing Jubilation, just her old man."

Hmmm… Fair enough, I suppose.

Peter stopped suddenly, crinkling his brow in annoyance. "Alright, that's been bugging me."

What?

"Your whole plural-person kick."

I did not speak in the plural.

"No, and that's what bugs me. Sometimes you do it, which is understandable 'cause you're just a massive network of nanites pretending to be a cohesive being, but sometimes you don't, like right then. What's with the switching? Singular or plural, pick one and stick with it." Peter wound down with a final huff. He waited for a response, but found none. He felt a twinge of worry, and then another as he wondered when the lack of voices in his head became something to be worried about.

After a moment, a small eternity to the robotic network strewn through his body, Peter presumed, Web finally responded. I… We do not know. And that is troubling. It could be that your pathetic, fleshy nature is affecting me, changing my, our, my programming. It could be the programming itself was defective. After all, I was never meant to be a truly cognizant being, just an aid to controlling the tools. It could be that that programming is crumbling instant by instant, and soon the various nanites which compose my network will go berserk and render you down into your base components, slowly and painfully.

"What?" Peter yelped.

That last was a joke. Was it not amusing?

"No!"

Why not?

"Because it sounds like it could happen."

Because it could. That's why it's funny.

Peter shook his head. "Leave the humor to me, okay? It isn't your forte." Peter started forward again.

And just what are you going to do to him?

"Just give him a piece of my mind."

Ah. An interesting expression. I must point out, however, that due to decay, your grey matter is not what it used to be. You may not have a piece of your mind to spare.

"See what I meant about humor? That was far too long a way to go for a simple insult. Now be quiet, we're here."

We should also remind you that you sent your harness to your room. How exactly are you going to give him a piece of anything?

"I'll improvise, now let's go." Striding felt good, Peter decided. It made him feel in control, powerful. He strode up to Shin's door and pounded on it hard. He waited a beat, then pounded on it again until a groggy 'coming' sounded from the other side.

The door opened to Shin wearing boxers and a white t-shirt, rubbing his eyes and muttering under his breath. Wouldn't an assassin wake up more quickly? What if someone ambushed him in his sleep? Peter thought idly as he wound up and then lashed out with a punch driven by wired reflexes, a straight pop to Shin's nose. It probably would have hurt if it had connected. Instead, Shin's arm lashed out in return, brushing the punch aside with casual ease even as his other arm struck, blasting Peter in the face, picking him up and throwing him into the wall with a dull thud. He stuck there for a moment held up by wobbly legs that soon gave out and sent him sliding downward, to sit on the floor, his hand gingerly checking his nose to see if it was broken and finding it, at the least, bloodied.

Your nervous system is superhuman. The muscles you use to drive your arm? Not so much. You can react faster than a normal person, but you can't move any faster than you could before. On the plus side, he knocked a tooth mostly loose. It will fall out in a day or so. We could probably rebuild it as a GPS system, if you are still set on that.

"You suck," Peter told the nanite swarm. "You suck diseased mongoose wang."*

"Me?" Shin muttered, still fuzzed with sleep, though that was rapidly being burned away by a flash flood of adrenaline as his body realized he had just been in combat. Not particularly stressful combat, granted, but combat none-the-less. "Peter? You're dead."

"I was talking to the voice in my head, but now that you mention it, you suck too," Peter grumbled. "I mean really, a shallow grave in the woods? Is that the best you could do?"

Shin stared at him. "You are dead. were dead. The dead normally don't care where they sleep."

"I'm alive again," Peter said. "And that was one sucky wake-up call. It was all 'Hey, welcome back to life! Now dig your way out of this hole in the ground! Don't mind the maggots and worms and stuff'."

Shin seemed to consider this for a moment before nodding slowly. "Yes, I suppose it would be. Very well, next time I will burn you."

Peter held up his arms in a T-shape. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. First of all, next time? So not happening. Second, I wasn't complaining so much about coming back to life as coming back to life buried under two feet of earth and having to dig my way out."

Shin shrugged. "And you would have preferred six feet and a concrete and steel coffin to fight your way out of? Two feet of loose soil is as good as it gets as far as burials go if you have to dig your way out. Besides, it was more along the lines of one and a half. I didn't take that long burying you. Had to hurry home, check on Jubilation and give her the bad news."

"The bad news?" Peter blinked. "You told her I died trying to take down the Kingpin?"

"Don't be ridiculous," Shin snapped. "I told her you went into hiding to escape from your abusive girlfriend. The red-headed one, Mary something."

"You said I went into hiding because of Mary Jane?" Peter said, almost panicking.

Shin shrugged. "It seemed like a good idea at the time. Of course, that was before she came to see us."

"See you?" Peter asked. "See you about what?"

Shin suddenly smirked. "You'll find out. Now, see you in the morning." He closed the door in Peter's face, and Peter had to resist the urge to call his metal self and tear the whole apartment down around his ears. He managed to force himself up by sheer force of will. He'd settle with Shin later, when he was feeling less godawful tired.

That went as well as could be expected, Madam Web observed with calm cheer.

"Shut up," Peter said. He sighed and trudged down to his apartment, too tired to even work up a good stride.

He was in fact so tired that he barely noticed the music blaring behind his door, or the intermittent thumps and crashes coming from inside or the…

Actually, the sight of Mary Jane as he opened the door easily blasted through the lead blanket of exhaustion that cloaked him. She was dancing, or Peter thought she was dancing at least. It was hard to tell. If it was a dance, it wasn't a particularly graceful one, but it made up for the lack with abundant amounts of enthusiasm. There were leaps and whirls in the air and more than a few great, double-footed stomps, all to the tortured scream of heavy metal blasting so loud from a speaker system he had never seen that Peter could feel his teeth vibrating in time with the music. What made it entrancing was Mary Jane herself. Particularly what she was wearing, a white tank top and green sleep shorts. She wasn't as built as the Mary Jane in his dream, but she already showed the promise of future beauty, and as she danced, with every jump and whirl and stomp, that promise, cloaked only in thin, tight cloth, jiggled in such a way that Peter could only stand open mouthed in his torn and ragged undersuit, blood still dripping from his nose.

And then Mary Jane whirled and stomped down so she was facing Peter and opened her eyes. She was grinning, her face flushed and slick with sweat.

Then she actually saw Peter and she screamed, a high-pitched shriek that actually managed to pierce the dense shroud of heavy metal. Peter winced. "Ow," he said pointedly, though it was lost in the noise.

Mary Jane for her part froze, then rushed toward him, hesitated halfway, and rushed back to turn off the stereo. Blessed silence filled the room, as Mary Jane rushed back to Peter, stopping to hover in front of him hesitantly. "Peter?" She ventured.

"Um, hi?" Peter said, scratching the back his head awkwardly. Fortunately, the mask had kept the worms and dirt out of his hair during his internment.

"Peter…" Mary Jane paused as if searching for the words. "Peter, you stink."

"What?" Peter blinked.

"And you're bleeding. Peter, what happened to you?"

"I'm still bleeding?" Peter asked, dabbing at his nose. "Huh."

We have effected repairs. All veins, arteries and capillaries have been patched and the cartilage repaired.

"Oh, well, good," Peter said, talking to the voice in his head.

"It's good you're bleeding?" Mary Jane asked.

"No, it's good I stopped," Peter said. "Now, what are you doing here?"

"Peter, you've been missing for weeks. The police have been looking for you. Everyone's been so worried about you."

"Everyone?" Peter asked, disbelief written across his face in huge, flaming letters.

"Everyone at school," Mary Jane amended.

Peter just kept looking at her.

"Well, your friends. Me and Harry and Liz…"

Peter snorted as he smothered a laugh.

Mary Jane sighed. "Fine. It was just me. I think Harry would have been worried though, but he's been kinda busy."

"What? Counting his money? Or are you two going steady?" Peter asked, trying to quash the irrational flare of jealousy that welled up inside him at the last possibility.

"His father died," Mary Jane said. Peter immediately sobered.

"Oh," he said quietly. "I'm sorry."

Mary Jane shrugged. "It's a good news/bad news kind of thing. His father died, his mother woke up, and I dumped him because his mother's a crazy bitch."

Peter blinked, more at Mary Jane cursing then at the revelation of Harry's mother's sanity. He'd never met the woman, but the fact that she had married Harry's father cast serious doubts on her sanity to begin with. "Care to elaborate?"

"No," Mary Jane said shortly.

Peter decided not to push. "Hmmm, so he's probably been slacking off instead of studying for calculus. The next tutoring session is not going to be fun."

"Algebra."

"Hmm?"

"You're tutoring him in algebra," Mary Jane explained.

"No," Peter said after a moment of reflection. "I'm pretty sure I've been tutoring him in calculus. Granted, I do occasionally get them confused. They're both so easy."

"Well, he's been taking algebra."

"Oh… So I've been tutoring him in the wrong subject since the beginning of school?"

Mary Jane shrugged. "I guess so."

Peter considered this. "Huh. That would explain a few things."

"I'm surprised he never noticed."

"I'm not."

Mary Jane smiled and then narrowed her eyes, previous good humor gone. "You're trying to distract me. Stop it."

"I was trying to distract you?" Peter asked innocently.

"Yes," Mary Jane said. "And it's not working. Now, where have you been? What are you wearing? And what is that on you?" She pointed to the stains covering the front of his armor, the massive dark splotches of blood and grave dirt on black armor.

"Errrr…" Peter said eloquently.

"I can see you thinking up a lie," Mary Jane said, her vivid, blue-green eyes narrowing.

"What are you doing here anyway?" Peter countered.

Mary Jane blanched. "I was waiting for you and… Don't change the subject."

"Oh, no. I like this subject," Peter said as he looked around. There were cardboard boxes full of stuff crowding his small living room. The stereo system sat under his tv, which itself rested in a new cabinet. "Are you moving in?"

"No," Mary Jane said defensively.

"You are!" Peter said, not sure whether to be angry or amused. "You're stealing my apartment."

"I am not! I mean, I am moving in, but I was just keeping it warm for you."

Peter quirked an eyebrow in disbelief and smirked as Mary Jane squirmed under his gaze.

"Fine, I was moving in," she said, eyes down and to the side before flicking back, wide and pleading, to capture Peter. "But I didn't mean to! When you went missing, I started coming here to check to see if you're back. Mr. Lee gave me a key. Then I started waiting around for a little while, just sorta hoping you'd come back when I was there. Then… Well, your place is smaller than mine, but it's… nice here. Peaceful. No one really bothers anybody else. So I began staying over, a little longer each time, and then I was sleeping over and bringing stuff for overnight, and then before I knew it I was moving in, and Mr. Lee said you'd prepaid for your apartment for a year, and well…" She shrugged helplessly.

Peter stared at her for a moment, considering. "Exactly how long was I gone?"

Mary Jane looked down again and mumbled something.

Peter cupped his ear with his hand. "What was that?"

"I said 'Almost two weeks'," Mary Jane admitted grudgingly.

"It took you less than two weeks to steal my apartment," Peter said with a snort. "I'm not sure whether to be annoyed or impressed."

"I vote impressed," Mary Jane said. Then her eyes narrowed. "And just how do you not know how long you've been gone? Where have been Peter Parker?"

It was Peter's turn to look away. "I have to plead the fifth on that."

"We're not in court. And if I had to 'fess up, so do you. So spill."

"Would you believe I was hiding from my abusive girlfriend?"

"You have a girlfriend?" Mary Jane asked, curiosity derailing righteous indignation.

Peter cleared his throat. "Not as such, no."

"Then who-" Mary Jane's eyes widened as she cut herself off. "Wait, is that why that little girl keeps glaring at me and trying to kick me? She thinks I'm your crazy, abusive girlfriend?"

"Possibly," Peter admitted. "In my defense, I only started the rumor. Shin perpetuated it to explain my disappearance."

"But you started-" She stopped and shook her head. "No. I'm not going to be distracted. You're going to tell me where you've been and then I'll chew you out for making me look like a boyfriend beater. So go…"

Peter hesitated again, before glancing at the unfamiliar glower on Mary Jane's face and deciding, very suddenly, to go with the truth instead of the convenient lie he was planning. A version of the truth at least.

"I was shot by gangsters," he said, holding his hand to where his bullet wounds had been.

Mary Jane's eyes widened. "You were shot? Oh my God, Peter, are you okay?"

"Never better," Peter said dryly. "And that's sort of the problem."

"What?" Mary Jane looked at him. "Why?"

"I was shot three or four times in the chest by an automatic weapon. That should be enough to kill me ten times over. At the very least, I should be in a coma. But I'm not. I woke up a few hours ago in the woods, hitched a ride into the city, and now I'm walking around fine, as if nothing had happened. That isn't normal."

"No," Mary Jane said. "It isn't, but it's still better than being dead, right?"

Peter shrugged, sinking into the pseudo-lie. "And that's the only thing keeping me from really freaking out."

They stood in silence for a moment. Peter turned and closed the door behind him. The noise of the bolts sliding shut as he locked up was startling loud in the silence. Mary Jane cleared her throat nervously. "So… you're a mutant."

"I am?"

"If you can do stuff like bring yourself back to life, and there's no other explanation, then you're a mutant." Mary Jane shrugged. "That's how it goes. Do you feel like going crazy and conquering the world?"

Peter considered. Mostly he felt tired and anxious, wondering when Mary Jane would see through his lie or notice his costume. He'd stripped down to just the body-stocking that went on under the armor and sent the rest with his harness, but it was still something she should be able to notice. "Not really," he decided. "Should I?"

"I saw a news report on a bunch of mutants trashing a military base. They said the mutant gene was linked to genes for anti-social behavior, particularly megalomania and aggression," Mary Jane said, shrugging again apologetically.

"Ah," Peter said. "Well, I mostly feel like going to bed."

Mary Jane flinched. "Um, about that…" she started and then trailed off under his gaze.

Peter sighed. "What happened to my bed? You didn't throw it away, did you?"

"No," Mary Jane assured him hurriedly. "No, it's just that I've changed out the sheets a little, and it's a little late to be taking them off again, and the sheets that were on their were all old and nasty-"

"Hey!" Peter said, a brief flare of indignation lending him energy. Mary Jane just smiled apologetically.

"- so I washed them, and-"

"You want me to take the couch?"

"Would you?" Mary Jane asked hopefully. "Thanks!" She surged forward to hug him, but hit the near palpable wall of stench that emanated from him after two weeks in the ground and back-pedaled. "Oh God, but take a shower first! You smell awful."

"Thanks bunches, MJ," Peter said. "When are you leaving again?"

"Um," Mary Jane hesitated. "Can we talk about that in the morning, maybe? Please?"

Peter bowed his head and rubbed his eyes. "You're not planning on moving out, are you?"

Mary Jane looked down. "My parents… My dad… I can't." She looked at Peter, her as watering with barely suppressed tears. "Peter, please."

Peter had to look away, his heart constricting painfully. "In the morning."

Mary Jane sniffed, and made as if to throw herself at him again, but stopped as she remembered the smell.

"I know," Peter said. "Shower." He moved toward the bedroom, then stopped. "I meant to ask, why were you dancing?"

"Why were you wearing a spandex body suit outside?" she asked in return.

Peter shrugged. "Everyone should have a hobby."

"And now mine is annoying the old lady in the apartment under this one."

Peter raised one eyebrow. "Any particular reason?"

"She called me a skank. She said my jeans were too tight," Mary Jane said darkly.

"Skank?"

"Trollop. That's old lady for skank, right?"

"Close enough," Peter admitted. Peter knew exactly which old lady Mary Jane was referring to, a widow who wore ankle length dresses and clucked disapprovingly at anyone born before the 1920s. She was also stone-cold deaf. "Keep it up. She hates loud noises." Of course, everyone in the building would hate him given the tissue-paper walls, but at least he'd get the chance to see Mary Jane dance again.

"No," Mary Jane said. "It was immature. I'll apologize to her later. I don't know what came over me."

Dammit.

Peter ignored the voice in his head, though he wondered whether it was Madame Web or his own (All yours, Madame Web said). "You're probably right," he said as he walked out of the room.

Dirt ran in muddy cascades, staining the tiled shower floor. Peter grimaced at the thought of having to clean the shower later, but set to work trying to remove two weeks of grave dirt for places where no dirt should be.

Afterwards, refreshed he grabbed a few clothes from his closet, glad that Mary Jane hadn't had a chance to clean it out, even if she did have boxes of clothes piled in the corner.

Then, looking into his closet, Mary Jane's words suddenly echoed in his head. Peter froze. "Wait, already paid for?" He scrambled over to his closet, threw open the door and dug inside, through the mass of dirty clothes to the small strongbox he kept at the back. When he finally found it, he sagged in disappointment. It was wide open and empty. All the money he had… acquired from various drug dealers, thugs and that one pizza man, all gone.

He couldn't find it in himself to be mad. He just shook his head and said in a tired, annoyed voice, "Dammit Shin…"

He looked over at the bed. There were pink sheets with little cotton-tailed bunnies on it, but underneath he could sense his metal-self stirring slight with his regard.

You will have to find another place to hide it.

"I was thinking Shin's place. He owes me one. Or twenty."

Is that the going rate for a life?

"Peter, who are you talking to?" Mary Jane called from the other room. Peter winced and cursed the thin walls again.

"No one," he called back and turned away from the bed. Tomorrow he would move the harness. Tomorrow he would have to go out again and earn more money. Tomorrow he would talk to Mary Jane, though he had a feeling he already knew what she was going to say.

But that was for tomorrow. Now he could only think of sleep.

He found Mary Jane curled up on the couch. She stood with a long, stretching yawn that made Peter's eyes bug out. He composed himself before she finished, but event then the world had a pleasant pink film over it afterwards.

He had Mary Jane sleeping in his apartment. He had Mary Jane sleeping in his apartment. He had-

Mary Jane finished her yawn. "Well, better get to bed. We have school tomorrow."

School tomorrow.

Son of a bitch.

*- Insult lifted directly from The Dresden Files. I'm not sure which book. I'd guess Winter Knight? Meh. Good series, if you're looking for something to read, though you might want to start on Book 3 rather than book 1. One and two are rather mediocre, but he's found his stride by three.

Alrighty. I'm gonna wrap this up here. I have an idea for a sequel story (actually, I have several ideas, like necrons invading and Peter getting a new harness made of necrodermis with built in phasers, but only a few of them aren't crackfics), but I may go on to something completely different. Meh, either way.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed this story. Your feedback is what kept me going (in my erratic, faltering way) to finish this (for a given definition of finish, as this was always supposed to be the first story in a series).

Possible next story in the series: "Rise of the Goblin Queen".