A Spider's Big Four
Chapter 08
Arrival at USJ
Ditching the jacket was starting to become a better and better idea as the day went on, it was slowly starting to get warmer and warmer.
It was one month before June anyway, he might as well ditch it before summer got started, right? Besides, he could just add it back with some small changes when he needed a winter costume.
Clad in his hero suit minus the jacket he usually wore was Peter Parker, who was currently walking towards his homeroom teacher that was idly standing about 50 feet away from the bus.
Peter had decided to remove it two days ago and had just got the all-clear from the support department that the change was approved.
It was gonna be so annoying having to wait for someone to approve a change to his costume, you know? He was the one making it now!
Today was Friday, the end of his first week at UA, and the day his class would go on some sort of rescue training field trip.
Peter hadn't been paying much attention to Aizawa when he was talking about what they would do, but you couldn't blame him.
After what had happened on Tuesday, that being the nightmare about Mizuku and his talk with Aizawa, the brunette had ended up taking both Wednesday and Thursday off to try and do what his teacher told him.
Grieve.
It was... pretty rough at first, but he had to admit he felt better after taking those two days off to let his emotions out.
Most of it was spent crying in his room, not really doing anything by he guesses that was part of the process.
While he is still far from getting over... it, he's getting there.
At least he hopes he is.
Continuing his pace, Peter soon came to stand beside the underground hero.
"Morning, scarf man." Peter greeted, putting his hands in his pockets.
Peter would always be grateful for the support company not messing up his suit and making it skintight.
Who knows? Maybe there was an alternate universe version of him actually going around in a skin-tight suit.
Man, that guy must look like a loser.
Switching his gaze from the bus to the boy next to him, Aizawa gave a hum before turning back to the bus.
"Parker." The man said flatly, Peter couldn't really read the guy's expression since his hair was covering his eyes.
The two stood in silence for a bit more, Peter checking his phone and seeing they still had about 2 minutes before they had to get on the bus.
Wait, wasn't All Might supposed to be here?
Pretty sure Aizawa said something about that on Tuesday.
"Are you alright?" His teacher asked, his tone somewhat gentler than normal but still flat and uninterested.
Aww, that meant he cared!
Probably.
Smiling under the mask, Peter gave a small nod.
"I... will be, I think. Thanks for helping me out and all, it really means a lot; I'll get you a mug as a gift or something soon."
He couldn't help but throw in the joke at the end, but Aizawa didn't seem to mind.
"Have you talked to your aunt?"
Peter frowned, his lenses mimicking the expression.
"Yeah, we uh, talked on the phone but that's about it. She's busy with work in Tokyo so we couldn't really see each other."
The brunette watched Aizawa give a small frown at that.
"She doesn't live with you?"
Eh, Peter might as well explain what was going on with that.
He didn't want Aizawa getting the idea that May was a bad aunt or anything, you know?
"Well, she had to go live at an apartment she rented in Tokyo since her new job is there, and we kinda need the money, you know? That and she helps run the F.E.A.S.T center over there. It happened after I got back from the exam so it's... new for me, but I'm figuring it out; she should be able to visit in a couple of weeks anyway."
Silently, Aizawa only nodded and looked away from his student with an unreadable expression.
Peter smiled softly behind the mask, the boy standing by and rolling his shoulder.
He enjoys their talks.
Although, he did have a more serious question to ask.
"Hey, did you... tell them about what happened?" Peter asked, his voice low.
Switching his gaze to Peter, Aizawa gave a nod; a weight that Peter didn't even know what there was suddenly lifted off his shoulders.
"It was the most logical thing to do, so I told them both about the cause of your distress and your vigilante activity; although they'll most like not to bring it up."
You know what? That was good.
While he didn't want to keep them in the dark or anything, a part of him didn't have it in him to tell them about all that stuff at once.
"Thanks, Aizawa." He smiled, Aizawa gave a short nod and turned back to the bus.
Yeah, he was gonna get him a mug to thank him for all he did the past few days.
It's the least Peter could do, right?
"Field trip!" The voice of Togata reached their ears, just in time for the blonde boy to pop out of the ground with a blinding smile.
Honestly? He really missed his friends the past few days.
Who knew Peter would be in a position to even say that? That spider not only gave him powers but also a social life.
What a wonder of science.
Too bad he killed it though.
At least he's pretty sure he did.
"Field trip!" Echoing his cry, Hado came flying in while carrying an embarrassed-looking Amajiki; dropping him on the ground next to Togata, the girl did a loop in the air before landing next to Peter.
He couldn't help but let a smile cross his face behind the mask.
This was nice, you know?
Hado was bouncing up and down in excitement while Togata was trying to hype up Amajiki for the coming exercise.
Well, more like a field trip.
Cause it was totally a field trip.
"Alright, let's get going to the training location," Aizawa grumbled, beginning to usher in the teens onto the bus. "And it is not a field trip."
Peter, Togata, and Hado looked at each other for a moment, Amajiki idly standing by.
"Dude, it's totally a field trip." Peter chuckled, earning a few snickers from both Hado and Togata.
Aizawa glared at him for what felt like ages.
"You three have detention for annoying me, now let's go."
"Aw, what! Why doesn't Tamaki?"
Amajiki looked between the three teens and Aizawa for a few seconds, full-blown panic in his face.
"F-Field trip..."
The man glared at the boy, Amajiki shrinking where he stood.
"Detention for Amajiki, too; Let's go." Aizawa rolled his eyes and stepped onto the bus.
"Yeah!" Togata suddenly wrapped Amajiki in a bear hug and carried him to the bus while his friend(maybe more?) hid his face with his hood.
Peter and Hado stood there for a few seconds, simply watching them go before the brunette broke the silence.
"Am... I the only who feels like we're third-wheeling them? Cause it feels like we are."
"Wait, really? I thought that was just me! They look super cute together though." The girl laughed before starting to make her way to the bus, her hair trailing behind her as she hovered towards the vehicle.
Following behind, Peter tried to ignore the scent of apples her hair left behind the short way there.
"I always wanted to ask..." Amajiki began, anxiously bouncing his leg as Togata sat next to him. "What is in that backpack, Parker?"
They were on the bus now, sitting on the two continuous seats that faced each other that we're towards the front, with Peter and Hado on one and Amajiki and Togata on the other.
It brought him a sense of nostalgia, you know? Kinda reminded him of the subways back in New York.
Reaching behind him, Peter grabbed the backpack and put it on his lap before opening it up.
When designing it, he kinda made it to carry the items he may not need as frequently, while his belt had stuff like extra regular webbing cartridges, gauze, and bandages along with his phone.
Reaching inside, Peter pulled out a spare set of web-shooters and goggles."
"I got these, in case I need a backup, you know? My lenses have a tendency to crack and my web-shooters sometimes get crushed." Amajiki shrunk in his seat, Peter had honestly forgotten that the guy cracked his lenses with a coconut during the battle trial.
In all honesty, he couldn't even be mad, you know?
Getting hit with a coconut was super funny.
And painful, it kinda rattled his teeth.
"Oh! Oh! Can I use your web thingies? I always wanted to!" Hado began bouncing up and down, Peter throwing one of the wrist devices at her, the girl catching it and snapping it on.
Surprisingly, she actually fired a web that Togata phased through while playing with the line, no one ever thinks to double tap!
Suddenly, the four jumped at Aizawa yelling at them to not use support gear on the bus.
But, who was it gonna distract? The driver?
It was a literal robot from the exam wearing a hat that said 'Bus Driver' on it! Scarf man was just being un-fun.
Throwing the goggles and web-shooters back into the bag, Peter then pulled out a few web cartridges that he held between his fingers, the word 'Cement!' was written on them in bold English letters.
"These are some quick-dry cement webs! Have 'em saved up if I need to like reinforce a building since they dry up when exposed to air and become pretty durable, but I can't use them as my regular webs since they take like 13 hours to dissolve and don't get affected by my regular dissolvent."
He threw the cartridges back into their respective pockets inside the bag, Hado leaned towards Peter and started to peek inside it.
Yeah, he was gonna ignore how close she was.
Which was incredibly close, by the way.
He was just gonna ignore that.
Rummaging through the bag, Peter ignored the stress ball that had somehow found its way inside before pulling out what looked to be a see-through plastic container that had a clear liquid filling it and the cap of a spray can.
Shaking it, Peter sprayed it on the line of webbing that Hado had shot earlier, the group watching as it dissolved into nothing.
"Woah! Cool! So you just carry that in case you need to get rid of the webs, right?" Togata tried looking at the floor as to try to find something that was left of the web, only to give up after finding nothing.
Peter nodded and smiled behind the mask, throwing the can back inside the backpack.
Reaching back inside, Peter pulled out a camera and a black flip phone.
Amajiki tilted his head in confusion.
"Why do y-you have those?" He asked, the two other teens looked at the objects with equal levels of confusion.
"Oh, the camera is for my job! I kinda need money so I work as a freelance photographer for a newspaper, I just take pictures of heroes or big villain attacks that happen." Peter looked at the camera in his hand, giving a small smile before putting it back into the bag.
He had found it on a rooftop when swinging back home from one of his daytime patrols, conveniently next to an ad that said that the newspaper he works at was hiring; it was apparently one of the best cameras from the 21st century.
"Why the phone though? I've seen you with a phone before!" Hado reached into the bag and pulled out the spare goggles, the girl toying around with the lenses.
Peter didn't care, he could repair them anyway.
"Well, just in case I need to call the police, you know? I can take the battery out so they don't track me while I get out of there."
A beat of silence sounded through the bus, his friends looking at him as if he was stupid.
That's exactly when it hit him.
"Wait! I'm doing this legally now!"
He wasn't a criminal anymore! He completely forgot! Why would a hero need to escape the police after capturing a villain?
Man, he felt kinda stupid now.
Now that he thought about it, that's probably why the idea for spare clothes in the bag was rejected by the support company since Peter had added them in case he needed to get out of costume.
It'd take time to get used to that.
That and the fact that both Togata and Amajiki knew now, but Peter could handle that.
Putting the objects back in the bag and making a mental note to throw the phone away, Peter pulled out the last items.
It was a black hardcover notebook with a sticker of a red version of Peter's spider symbol around the lower right, in Peter's other hand was a set of sticky notes and a few pens of different colors.
Opening it up was a mess of notes and sketches for many different things, some being gadget ideas, chemical formulas, or costume designs and materials.
"Your handwriting kinda sucks." The girl beside him squinted at the notes, Peter noticing that she was now wearing his goggles.
Pulling them off her and putting them back in the backpack, Hado gasped at her vision changing.
"Oh, now it looks normal! Your goggles make stuff look weird."
Peter only rolled his eyes, handing the notebook to the girl and throwing the sticky notes and pens back into the bag; Togata stood up and sat next to Hado, looking at the book with Amajiki following suit.
Wait, how were they reading that stuff? It was in English!
Although, didn't Japanese schools teach English? It must be like the Spanish classes he took in middle school.
Except with a different alphabet cause Japanese was a weird language like that.
Flipping through the book, the three scanned over the different pages of the book, flipping through the random assortment of scribbles and random post-it notes until coming across a specific page.
Hado looked up at him while doing her best to hold in her laughter, Amajik, and Togata doing the same while Peter only raised an eyebrow behind the mask.
"Did you really design a spider-mobile?"
Peter froze, groaning and dragging his hands through his face.
"I... was going through a phase, alright?"
Designing the spider-mobile was not a fond memory for him, that nor the fact that he did It while running on 2 hours of sleep
It was either the lack of sleep or the painkillers he took the night before after he got shot making him woozy that made his brain come up with the spider-mobile.
"Can't y-you climb walls? why would you need a-a car?" Amajiki questioned, looking at Peter over Togata's shoulder.
"Man, it was a cool idea at the time! Shut up!"
Togata snorted, reaching over and giving Peter a strong pat on the back. "Whatever you say, Batman!"
Having friends was not as cool as it was about 15 minutes ago.
A spider-mobile would be way cooler than the batmobile, anyway.
Wiping a tear from her eye, Hado turned the page again before they all burst into laughter.
"Aizawa-Sensei! Parker designed a spider-copter!" The blonde called between laughs, Peter could easily see Amajiki chuckling quietly as Hado took a picture on her phone
The masked teen simply shrunk in his seat while covering his face with his hands.
They won't be laughing when he actually gets the spider-mobile, Peter was sure of it.
"Welcome, children! To the USJ!" The astronaut-looking hero greeted, Peter couldn't help but let his lenses go wide.
That was the Space Hero: Thirteen! Peter got to meet them once when he visited a space museum when he was 7! They even signed an autograph for him!
From what he knew, not only were they a renowned rescue hero and had a powerful quirk, they even helped with things like space research! Pretty sure Thirteen even helped out NASA every now and then.
All in all, thirteen was pretty cool.
And from the way that Hado and Togata were gushing about meeting them, his friends thought the same.
Even Amajiki seemed excited!
Aizawa was standing next to the rescue hero, simply tapping his foot impatiently for his students to settle down.
It took about 2 minutes, but could you blame them?
"Yes, yes, I am always glad to meet young fans! As you kids know, I am the Space Hero: Thirteen! UA's resident rescue expert! Additionally, we have a special guest to supervise training!"
His spider-sense rung lightly, just in time for Peter to turn around and see the front door to the facility slam open and hear the booming laugh that echoed through the facility.
"I am here!" All Might boomed, flipping through the air and landing in between Aizawa and thirteen before proudly standing before the teens while Aizawa groaned in annoyance.
Oh, that's where he was.
The guy really liked the flair in things, huh?
Well, Peter was pretty much the same.
He was a showman at heart, after all.
Thirteen waved a hand at All Might to present their guest instructor, the tall man simply grinning and flexing in his yellow pinstripe suit.
Peter paused, eyes lingering on the suit.
Had he... seen it before?
Before he could try to piece it together, All Might clapped his hands together to get the teens' attention while Aizawa lazily held out a card with the word 'Rescue!' on it.
"I hope you kids are ready, for today we shall get started on some rescue training! While combat gets more general coverage, rescue work is the other side of the coin of being a hero! One must know how to save civilians and act accordingly in respective disasters, young heroes!" All Might laughed, with thirteen following up.
"All Might is correct, rescue work is a huge part of being a hero for it involves interacting with civilians the most! While some quirks are better for either combat or rescue, to be a good hero you must know to do both! Today, we will be doing some disaster rescue!"
Disaster rescue? Looking past the three heroes and into the USJ, Peter could easily see what must be different types of zones scattered around; he guessed it was to emulate different situations.
All in all, it seemed cool! Peter always rescuing and saving people more than fighting, anyway.
Seeing the two other heroes looking at him, Aizawa sighed and rolled his eyes, running a hand through his messy hair and reluctantly following up.
"As you all may know, the USJ was specifically designed by UA to emulate natural disasters and rescue situations such as collapsing buildings and landslides. Today, you shall start off in rescuing someone in the ruins zone, any questions?"
Pointing with his thumb behind him, Aizawa presented an area with what looked to be several buildings in different types of decay, with some of them barely staying up and off the ground.
That seemed unsafe for some reason, you know?
Eh, UA probably knew what they were doing.
Hopefully.
Aizawa looked the four teens over, his eyes finally landing on the barely raised hand of Amajiki who shrunk where he stood at seeing everyone looking at him.
"U-Uh, who w-will we be r-rescuing, s-sensei?" He asked, getting a sigh and an eye roll from the man.
Peter simply raised an eyebrow at the response, the four teens watching as he gestured to the man beside him.
Grinning wider, All Might flexed again.
"That's a very good question, my boy! If you must know-" He pointed towards himself, puffing his chest out. "-you kids shall be rescuing none other than me!"
The students stood silent and stared at him, Peter couldn't help but let out an accepting sigh.
Please tell him he wouldn't have to carry All Might out of a falling building.
After a reluctant nod from Amajiki, All Might laughed loudly and made everyone in the facility wince.
Why did he have to be so loud?
"Your exercise is to find All Might somewhere in the ruins zone and get him back to the starting area safely and in one piece, Thirteen and I will be there to make sure no one gets seriously hurt, understood?" Aizawa announced, grabbing a bottle of eye drops from his pocket and casually applying it.
Peter raised his hand, quickly getting called on by the man.
"Uh, I know this is an exercise and all but, can't All Might shrug off buildings falling on him? Why aren't we rescuing someone who, you know, can't do that?" He asked, getting an annoyed look in return.
Something told him that Aizawa didn't agree to this whole thing with All Might.
Now that he thought about it, did scarf man even like the guy?
Aizawa rolled his eyes again before responding.
"Pure and utter irrationality."
Uh, alright then.
Cool.
The students began to get ready for the exercise to start, Peter and Amajiki tightening their vests while Hado and Togata simply began to concentrate on their quirks, with Hado going a few inches off of the ground.
"Now, remember! This is disaster rescue training, you shall learn every other type of rescue when the time comes! Rescue can even mean saving someone from things like muggings and even suicide, I-"
Once those words reached his ears, memories began to flash in his mind.
A masked boy stood on a rooftop in front of a hooded girl edging closer towards the ledge. The memory flashed to the boy screaming into the night as he sobbed and gripped his mask tightly, alone on the roof.
Peter coughed as his breath hitched, the boy looking away while gritting his teeth as to not show a reaction. His gloved hand balled into a tight fist as his body tensed, that familiar suffocating feeling beginning to surround his chest.
While he grieved, he still hadn't forgiven himself for what happened that night or completely come to terms with the memory.
He still needed more time.
A lot more time.
Peter was sure All Might was still talking about something, but the world seemed drowned out with only a few words being able to be heard by the boy.
Beginning to take deep breaths, the crushing feeling in his chest began to slowly dissipate but it didn't fully disappear; a few seconds passed before Peter finally turned back to the heroes, muscles still tight.
Everyone except Thirteen was glaring at All Might, the man seemingly not realizing anything was going on as he continued his speech on whatever.
Now, Peter knew he couldn't blame him, you know? He didn't know but it was still hard being reminded of what happened.
Intentionally or not.
Yeah, he was gonna call May when he got home.
Soon enough, All Might finally finished talking and gave one last oblivious laugh before jumping away and towards the ruins zone, disappearing amongst the buildings.
Alright, he needed to focus.
He just... just needed to finish today and will get back to grieving right after.
"You all may start, and good luck," Aizawa announced, his voice sounding a bit more miffed than usual as he started a timer.
Shaking his head, Peter turned fo the side to see his three classmates getting ready to go, with Togata ready to phase and Hado beginning to pick up Amajiki.
They all looked a bit reluctant if he was being honest, simply waiting to make sure he could still do the rescue.
All Peter could do was give a silent nod and push the thoughts to the back of his mind for now; quickly holding out his right wrist and tapping the trigger, Peter shot a web that stuck to the USJ's ceiling and began to swing away toward the ruins zone.
Looking back, he could see Togata phasing his way toward the zone while Hado flew herself and Amajiki the way there.
As the buildings drew closer while he swung, he couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief at the chance to distract himself for a bit.
It couldn't hurt to swing around buildings a little bit to calm himself down
All there was left to do was find All Might.
And a new chapter! Woo! Here we see Peter ditching the jacket, interacting some more with his classmates, and arriving at USJ to do some rescue training that doesn't involve a fight for survival! Bit of a shorter chapter but whatever.
Real quick, sorry for not updating for a bit. I can't even blame it on testing or anything, I just kinda needed a break and ended up procrastinating. I'll keep writing, but idk about updates every 2-3 days anymore.
Peter's suit will be getting small updates every now and then, like how the jacket will now be part of the winter version. Next changes are probably gonna be a better backpack and the lenses of the goggles being directly on the mask.
We will be touching on Peter coming to terms with Mizuku's death every now and then, since grieving and acceptance take time to do, you know? Gotta make stuff realistic and all.
Also, I just randomly had an idea as to where to take this story one day, might sound kinda crazy but hear me out.
You guys ever watch Young Justice? Where a group of teen heroes gets sent out on covert missions to handle the smaller stuff that the justice league didn't wanna bring attention to? It's one of my favorite shows... well, ever and it gave me an idea
I was kinda thinking that we could go that route later on when the kids are at like, second year or something and have the Hero Public Safety Commission send them on missions that have to be kept on the down-low, you know?
And since they can't just go on missions alone, we'll throw Hawks in since he's cool.
Would you guys be down for that? Idk, I'd only do it if you guys wanted to.
And another thing, would you like for other marvel elements to be in this universe? Like, having Peter meet other marvel characters?
Please let me know!
Next chapter will be the rest of the rescue training, without the villain attacks!
Like always, thanks for reading, and see ya next time!