Hello everyone, thank you for tuning back in to The Web of Time. This isn't so much of an actual chapter than a little filler so I can keep up with my old update schedule, but I hope you all enjoy it nonetheless.
To Mad King C, yeah I figured that a lot of times he gets written really villanous in most fics, so I decided to to give him a conscience here. And it was a tad bit gruesome, but I try to keep it to a minimum, you know? This is a Hat in Time story after all, plus I rated this as a T hehe.
To Rook435, thanks so much for the review! I'm glad to see I picked up an avid reader with my story, and it means a lot that you put my fic on such a high level of praise. To be honest I didn't think that my story would do as well as it has, since Spider-Man and Hat in Time don't exactly match, but I'm gad to see I was wrong. Like I said at the beginning of the story, I was mostly inspired by the authors mentioned at the beginning, who have that similar slice of life feel to their stories. Mine just happens to include Spider-Man hehe. Also for reference, I'm gauging Peter to be in college right now as a junior. Old enough to be working an internship at Alchemax like in Edge of Time but young enough to where he doesn't own Parker Industries. But thank you once again for reading, I promise you're in for a treat if you continue on.
To Guest, next chapter you'll find out soon enough (;
"Ouchie!" squealed Hat Kid as Spider-Man finished applying hydrogen peroxide to the wound. It fizzled for a bit before dying down, allowing Spider-Man to stick a bandage on her leg.
"See? Not so bad. You're lucky you have heart pons. All I had was cherry medicine," cringed Spidey as he treated the child.
Right on cue, Cooking Cat came back in with more heart pons. "Here you go sugar, a few more of these and you should be back up in a flash," grinned the little chef as she placed them on her bed. Hat Kid grinned gratefully as she took the heart pons, which had been cooked into sugar cookies by CC for her enjoyment.
Munching on her heart shaped cookie, she could already feel her strength returning, albeit slowly. She lost a moderate amount of blood, so she thought of taking it easy for a bit.
As if reading her mind, Peter suggested, "We've got another night before DJ Groove's shooting. Soooo if you feel healthy enough, how about we have that play day I promised you earlier?" he winked.
Hat Kid's face lit up. I can't believe I forgot about that! She responded with a hearty nod as she gobbled down another heart cookie.
"Let's pla— owww," she whined as she remembered her sore appendage.
"Take it easy champ, can't play Corgi Quest if you bust open your cut," warned Spider-Man.
Nodding, Hat Kid allowed herself to be picked up by the web slinger as he carried her on his Ms shoulder. Setting her down on a pillow, he took the video game case and opened it up, finding the hatted child's prized game inside. Inserting it, he grabbed a controller for him and the girl as they waited on the loading screen, when he heard a familiar but more high pitched theme.
Do not TELL me that this multiverse called ARK Survival Evolved "Corgi Quest" screamed Peter internally. Yet sure enough, there was the logo, with a C instead of the A, same booming theme song and all. Minutes later, when Hattie had set up a new save file, the mutated teen sat back as he watched them spawn into the very same island he had once sunk 250 hours into. Though instead of dinosaurs, various species of dogs roamed the island, and the megalodons had been replaced with goldfish.
"Yes! Usually it crashes the first few times, but it works!" cheered Hat Kid. She then turned to Spidey and explained, "My last save got corrupted, so now we have a fresh start."
"You know, I had a game just like this back home. Lots of weekend went into taming and building. I think I know what to do," explained the web head.
"Good! Then let's get started," Hat Kid replied.
7 hours later, the intruder alarm went off.
"Whaaa?" Spidey said, jolted from the nap he and Hat Kid took mid game.
"Another one? This security system is lousy. I should sue!" grumpily stated Hat Kid, now able to walk thanks to her nap accelerating her healing. They walked into the machine room, armed but drowsy, as they looked for the source of the disturbance.
"Is that...jazz?" the hatted adventurer inquired. Raising an eyebrow under the mask, Spidey rounded a corner, and was surprised to find that an entire band had made their way onto the ship.
"Hey, I remember you, you were playing music while we were running for our lives yesterday," remarked Spider-Man. Indeed, when everything was going to peck around them, they hardly noticed the owl band casually playing sax in the middle of the maelstrom.
"Hi, yeah, after the mess that happened during train rush, we figured it was best to find a new place to practice. We're WOWL by the way," greeted the trumpet playing owl. Shaking Spider-Man and Hat Kid's hands, he then added, "We were wondering if we could stay up for practice? In return, you can request some songs for us to play, or we can play you some tunes we're working on. So, think we can stay here for a bit?"
Spidey turned to Hattie, indicating it was her decision to make. She thought the proposal over; sure, she didn't exactly like strangers barging into her ship constantly, but that didn't stop the Mafia Boss and Cooking Cat. Plus, over time, she's grown to like their company. Well, Mafia Boss was a work in progress, but they were getting there. And, they play music! Without her beloved radio having enough time pieces to get signal this far out into space, she had missed the occasional tune as she traveled through the stars. Thinking hard, she came to a decision.
"Ok! But you have to stay in this room if you're gonna play music. It can interrupt nap time."
The owls all smiled as the trumpet player said, "Thanks! You would not believe how hard it is to find gigs in a desert western section of the planet."
Spidey gave them the thumbs up too. In secret, he worked best in the lab whenever he had music paying in the back. It helped him focus on the tasks at hand. And since he had yet to find a proper outlet for his cell phone, he hasn't been as groovy as he normally is due to conserving battery.
Maybe I can stick an outlet on the Unlimited suit when I'm bored wondered the web slinger.
"Well, since you're letting us stay up here, mind if we play you a tune as a token of thanks?" asked the drummer of WOWL
Hat Kid bounced up and down as she nodded her head. Grinning, the piano owl looked to his compatriots and suggested, "Well, we've been working on a funkier track lately. It's a new take on us Express Owls' favorite song, with a little bit of influence from DJ Grooves. We don't practice it much because the Conductor would probably throw us off the train if we played it."
Spidey raised an eyebrow again before saying, "Well, I see no half bird half JoJo hybrids here, let her rip."
"Sweet, we like to call this one Trainwreck of Electro Swing," proudly announced the trumpet owl.
"Wait, electro swing? No offense, but swing dancing went out of style about a century ago where I'm from," Spidey added.
The trumpet owl waved it off, stating, "Oh don't worry, that happened here too. But like we said, it's got some of DJ Grooves' influence. Just take a gander," before piano owl started up the metronome.
The start caught Spidey off guard, due to the fact that the piano and the trumpet sounded so electric, but that was to be expected from a song with electro swing in the title. He found himself head bobbing to the first part, much to his surprise.
Hat Kid meanwhile was already infected with the groove. After the startup of the song, she found herself dancing to the beat, trying her best to keep up with the rapid track, all the while laughing and bouncing around, just as any kid her age should. Spidey was tempted to join her, but he doubted he'd be any good at swing dancing, especially when his partner would've been 10 years old and 5/8 his height. Though the top hat did fit the occasion.
That is, until the first drop kicked in, and Hat Kid completely switched gears. Instead of the frantic hopscotch she had labelled as dancing earlier, she pointed her hands at Spider-Man in a challenging manner. "Dance off!" she called. She then put her hands up in the air and started rocking side to side. Then, as the cherry on top, she donned her signature smug face, watching as Spidey helplessly dropped his jaw.
I can't believe I'm being punked by a tween in a top hat into a dance off he thought incredulously. At first, he simply shook his head, but the growing smugness was hard to ignore. He even started seeing rainbows of all things emanating from her. "Alright it's on," conceded Spidey at last, causing Hat Kid to change her face to a grin. She stepped aside as she let the arachnid take the floor as the beat started to rise again.
At first, he clumsily threw out some of the old dance moves he picked up before junior prom. It did about as well at wooing Hat Kid as it did at wooing Liz Allen. Seeing Hat Kid don a smug face once more, Spidey decided to go from zero to hero, breaking into a small collection of breakdancing moves he'd practiced in his free time during freshmen year of college. Good thing I had a phase
Starting off with some simple top rock, Peter used his spider agility and flexibility to his advantage as he dropped to the ground and did some footwork. Eventually, he was practically a human pretzel with all the ways he was tossing himself around, twisting and flying through the air as he was.
Hat Kid's smug faced dropped into an amazed smile. He was like those street performers she used to see back on her planet. At the end of the song, she went up and told him, "That was so cool!"
"Glad you liked it, because that means I win the dance off!" panted the web slinger. It'd been a while since he'd really done anything like that. Even with spider powers, some of those moves didn't agree with the human anatomy at all.
"Thanks by the way for the song. Put that on an album and you're golden, maybe even platinum," quipped the hero as he and Hat Kid walked back out of the machine room.
"No problem, those were some good moves by the way, for a guy who runs around in tights," joked the trumpet owl. Spidey casually waved him off.
For the remainder of the time before DJ Groove's next recording, they spent it eating Cooking Cat's delicious healing dishes, messing with the Mafia Boss occasionally, and building their pigeon army in Corgi Quest. In what seemed like no time, the moon had already arched over the planet, meaning it was showtime.
"Alright kid, I see the spotlights from here. What do you say we go win us an academy award?"
"Let's do it!" proclaimed Hat Kid, grabbing the space pods and chucking them out the window. After Spidey had finished manifesting the Unlimited suit, they hopped into the pods and flew down the the moon, waiting to see what DJ Grooves had in store for them.
I may have strayed a little OOC for Spidey by making him break dance, but I think it would work considering how he went from zero to literal hero during his college years in the comics. Plus, it makes sense with his set of powers. Anyways, sorry this is more of a filler than a real chapter, but I'm working on the Big Parade next so don't worry! It just might take a little longer since college classes are back with a vengeance, but I'll still update whenever I can. Thank you for reading!