Chapter 22: Clean My Room/ Redecorate

There are some announcements to be made.

1) Updates may take longer, or I'll try to make them shorter so they're more often. Why? Because I'm going to apply to grad school! Chemistry PhD, here I come! I'm so excited and terrified.

2) I am going to try to make an AO3 account this week. I'm not sure how that site is yet, so it may take longer for me to post everything on there. Plus this site will probably receive updates first. Unless more of you prefer AO3? Let me know which you like best.

3) Just to be clear, I still don't own Spider-Man. Tom Holland would be a lot busier if I did :)

Pink Lemonade: For any other story, I'm likely to forget character development too. But for this story, emotions tie in directly to the plot, so it has higher priority. Danny's is a tricky POV to write from, but I do enjoy his calmness. It offsets the others' personalities nicely. Also, you may get what you wanted after all regarding May and Peter . . .

AvidWriter14 and Spideytorch659: I'm glad you're enjoying that prospect! Just be patient. Peter probably won't fully forgive Sam for a while, especially not with what's going to happen soon ;)

Peter Parker awoke happily. It was a cloudy morning, so the sun wasn't burning his eyes the moment he opened them. And when he did open them, the first sight that greeted him was his web, which he had successfully fixed last night with Phoebe's help. It had been surprisingly difficult to get back to its original stability without completely changing the design. If too many extra strands were added, it stopped looking like a web and started looking like a blanket. Every patch had to be made right so it all flowed seamlessly. Fixing it up just right was an achievement, and Peter allowed himself a moment to appreciate that.

Also, he had refrained from sleeping in it despite how he wanted to. It wasn't like he had never slept in a web before. He used web hammocks rather often out on patrol or in the Helicarrier. But it felt good to prove to himself that he didn't need to give in to those sorts of desires all the time. It was important.

And as a reward, he would sleep in it tonight. Because really, it was superbly comfortable. Luke agreed. (That was important too).

Proud of himself, Peter started his morning. Aunt May was already up and had breakfast ready. It included bacon, eggs, and syrup, which was, in Peter's humble opinion, the trifecta of a wonderful breakfast. Sometimes this sort of meal was accompanied by the bad news of a cleaning day, but Peter had to report to Shield for training so that wouldn't be a problem. May ruffled his hair and went on with her cleaning once she gave her nephew two full plates of food, assuring him he had nothing to worry about.

He should have worried. Should have realized what cleaning day meant.

Peter bounced back up the stairs with his stomach full, or at least as full as it got these days. He went back to his room to grab his suit and stopped in his tracks when he entered. Gasping, shocked, angry—no, furious, really—

No. Peter bit his lip before he said something he regretted. He shouldn't be this angry. His aunt was only cleaning up his room. Picking up all the silk. Taking down the web.

His web.

Why did that matter? It didn't matter. It felt like it did, but it shouldn't. It was just a web. Just something he'd spent hours on yesterday. Just something he'd enjoyed doing with Phoebe. Just something he'd been looking forward to using again.

Peter swallowed, watching his aunt twist and swipe her broom, taking the web down in seconds. She hadn't noticed him yet because she was too busy singing a Beatles song to herself.

When he was sure his fangs wouldn't poke out, Peter spoke up, forcing his voice to be calm and casual. "Um—hey, May. W—what are you doing?"

It was a ridiculous question. He could see what she was doing. He just didn't know what else to say. A portion of his brain was too busy to think of something else, too busy trying to identify and wrangle the sudden anger balled up in his chest.

May glanced back at him. "Oh, sorry, honey. I'll be out of your way in a moment. I just wanted to take care of all this so you won't have to. You need all your energy for training."

That was nice. Or at least it was meant to be nice. Peter could see that. He really could. So his anger should go away now because he understood.

It lessened a bit. It didn't disappear.

What was wrong with him? This was only a misunderstanding! He knew that! But he was still upset. That had been his web!

Peter turned away, facing his dresser rather than his aunt. He leaned against it with his palms pressed into the wood. Was this . . . Could it be a spider thing? He didn't think it had ever affected his emotions before. Then again, maybe it had. Wasn't that what had happened the other day with Sam's 'purrfume'? It had made him calmer. Did calm count as an emotion? He wasn't sure. He'd have to ask Danny. But what about his enjoyment of the web? And crickets? And—

"Are you all right, Peter?"

He hastily opened a drawer. "I'm fine. Just getting some stuff." He could have said something about the web or how he felt about it, but he was afraid it would come out too harsh. He was afraid of how May would react to his reaction.

"Okay, I'm done now. You can get ready in peace. Good luck today!"

"Thanks, May."

And she left. She didn't even glance back at her handiwork (the destruction). Once she was gone, Peter took a moment to calm himself down. He stared down at the scratched, scuffed, and dented surface of his dresser. The scratches and scuffs were from everyday wear and tear that had accumulated over the years, hardly a surprise for a used piece of furniture. The dents were a little more recent though. The bent handle was the result of his very first morning with spider powers. Peter had lost track of all the knobs and handles he had ruined with his new strength at the time. The series of small, circular indents in the wood on top came a little later, when he lost Ben. He had squeezed a lot of things too tightly that day.

All in all, deforming his furniture was reserved for big moments in his life, not for small bouts of unreasonable anger. So it had to be unscathed when he let go of it now. Taking a breath, Peter released his grip on the dresser. Satisfied to see no new marks, he went to retrieve his suit from the closet.

Speter okay? Phoebe asked as he opened the door. Peter removed the jacket covering her Jungle Box so he could see her holding one of her toy soldiers.

"I'm—um—" Peter couldn't lie to her. Literally he couldn't. And maybe he didn't want to either. "I'm a little upset."

Phoebe nodded understandingly. Speter lost web.

"Are you—Did that make you upset too?"

Another nod accompanied by disappointment not quite as strong as his own. Phoebe sad no sleep on web. But bed still there . . .

Peter smiled softly. "Yes, you can be on the bed later. And now that I'm going to the Helicarrier I can grab some supplies to make you your own bed." He had the clearance to take anything from the engineering labs. At least so long as the items couldn't obviously be used for anything too dangerous. They hadn't let him walk out with the high energy laser last time.

Joy! And Phoebe help Speter make new web?

Peter considered that. The idea was appealing. Too appealing? It wasn't like he wanted a web to be a permanent fixture in his room.

. . . Did he want a web as a permanent fixture in his room?

He shouldn't. He really shouldn't.

And yet he hadn't had any plans to ever take that first one down . . .

"Uh, we'll see if we have time. Making your bed might take a while."

Okay. There was a touch of doubt in the word, as if Phoebe could tell he was just avoiding the issue. Of course she really could tell, but Peter didn't know how to address this yet, so he went on avoiding it.

"Okay, I'll see you later. This training should be a piece of cake after everything you taught me yesterday."

Phoebe hope so!

A few minutes of struggling with spandex later, and Peter was out the window.

"Hello Peter," Dr. Connors greeted as Spider-Man rushed into his office. "Cutting it a little close, aren't you? Fury is expecting you in the Training Room in less than fifteen minutes."

"Sorry, there was a purse snatching on the way." Peter sat at the examination table.

"Which webs did you use?"

"The synthetic ones. It seems kind of gross to cover people in stuff that's coming out of my arms," Peter admitted.

Connors shrugged. "People willingly cover themselves in grosser things. Did you know that whale vomit is used in some of the most expensive perfumes and colognes?"

Peter had not known that, but, as interesting as it sounded, he decided he wasn't ready to talk about perfumes again yet. "I guess you're right. So is there any chance you can get this over with in ten minutes?"

"I'll try my best. Let's take a look."

As Connors brought out the same tools from the other day, Peter pulled off his gloves. He noticed there was a bit of silk build up on his wrists. Did he need to practice using his web shooters again so he didn't accidentally use both at once? Ugh, this was a pain.

Connors pulled open the flaps of skin around the holes and began probing inside with a thin metal stick thing. Medical terminology was not Peter's forte. All he knew was that it felt weird, almost ticklish. He tried not to squirm so Connors could finish quickly.

"Everything looks fine to me," Connors said after a few minutes. "It looks almost exactly like how a spinneret is supposed to look, aside from a few obvious differences, of course." He put down the metal tool and began pressing his thumb into Peter's forearm instead, all the way up to his elbow. Peter could feel something under his skin there. "Yup, everything seems to be in order."

"You mean it goes all the way up to my elbow?" Peter asked, feeling it for himself. There was definitely something long, hard, and skinny in there that wasn't bone.

"Yes, spinnerets are far from simple organs, and the silk formula needs to be kept somewhere. Your body isn't capable of keeping it pressurized like your web shooters can."

Peter sighed, but nodded. Outwardly, they seemed so small because all he could see were the holes. Knowing they went so deep was slightly disturbing.

"Since they're so large," Connors continued. "I have to ask, can you create different silk varieties like a regular spider?"

Pressed for time, Peter explained what he knew about that as quickly as he could. Connors seemed impressed by how much he had learned the previous day. Peter would have to let Phoebe know that she really did do a great job being a teacher.

"Fascinating! Can you give me a small sample of each before you go? Ah, but before you do, I just need to check one more thing." Connors pressed his thumb into Peter's wrist a few more times. Hard. Peter had to concentrate in order to not shoot silk into the doctor's face. "Hm, all right, so no more pulse. Now you can give me the samples."

Peter blinked at him as he allowed the holes to close up again. "No pulse?" He looked at his wrists, noticing for the first time that the 'scars' were almost in the same place where his veins had once been. The same veins that people normally used to check your pulse. The blue hue of deoxygenated blood was gone. "Where'd the veins go? How's my hand getting blood?"

"Don't worry, all the veins are still there. They're just buried a little deeper so I can't feel your pulse there anymore. I'd have to stick my fingers inside your spinneret holes to feel it, which seems highly unsanitary for you. But that's why doctors have stethoscopes." Connors paused. "Well, that's not the exact reason, but stethoscopes are certainly handy for that."

That . . . that bothered Peter. His aunt had always checked his pulse when he got sick. As a kid, he'd enjoyed seeing her act like a professional nurse even when he just had a small head cold. It was cool. And it was nice to know she was willing to go the extra mile for him. Now . . . well . . . it wasn't exactly over. She could still check his pulse on his neck or something. But that's not how nurses normally did it. It would be different now. Like almost everything else.

Why couldn't it ever be the same?

Forcing himself back into a more professional mode of thinking, Peter gave Connors the silk samples and was given the greenlight, which gave him exactly three minutes to get to the Training Room before Fury made him do extra laps or something.

Fury did not tolerate tardiness.

When he burst into the Training Room, everyone else was already there. Fury's eye locked onto him.

"Spider-Man, just in time," he said before speaking to the room at large. "I want you all to treat this as a regular training session with one exception: all of your strategies must involve Spider-Man's webs in a notable way. Ideally, I want to see them in use as projectiles, webs, binds, and also used to disarm enemies. Everything you normally do. The rest of you will assist as usual. Is this clear?"

"Yes sir, the team replied.

"Then get to it." Turning on his heel, the director left to go into the control room. Peter could tell when Fury started up the illusion-making machines because it made the floor vibrate softly. It made the adrenaline start running through Peter's veins. He bounced on the balls of his feet, ready to be back in action even if it was only training.

"You ready, Webs?" Sam asked as he put on his Nova helmet.

"Yup, it's good to be back in tights."

"Hm, I cannot say I missed the tights," Danny said.

"No hero is complete without spandex," Luke said.

"The Hulk doesn't wear tights," Sam corrected. "And Iron Man doesn't either."

"He kind of does," Ava said. "He wears that body suit under his armor."

"Not always, I'm sure."

"Gross! Don't make me wonder if I've fought alongside a man wearing nothing but armor!"

"Hulk wears nothing but pants! How could Iron Man possibly be worse?"

Before Ava could reply, the room disappeared from around them and was replaced by a dim alley. A gang of at least a dozen people materialized soon after. Half were armed with knives and machetes, the other half with hand guns and machine guns. Of course, the blades were blunted and the guns only shot rubber bullets, but Shield made sure they hurt enough as an incentive to complete the training as efficiently as possible.

Peter's spider sense began to tingle warningly. Most weapons were enough to set it off no matter how weak they were. "Okay, team, the usual Surrounded Method. Disarm first before we start taking them out."

"On it," the rest responded, and they all set to work.

While the others ran (or flew) forward, Peter got a head start on Fury's orders. He stayed low, shooting two quick strands of silk at the LMDs with machine guns. They weren't as close as the knife-wielding ones, but Shield and common sense said that machine guns were best to get out of the way first. They were extremely annoying to dodge, especially the ones with extended magazines.

And Peter still imagined a paper magazine attached to the gun instead of the bullet cartridge. Why was that even called a magazine?

Regardless, he was happy to see his webs hit their marks. He yanked hard and detached the strands from his wrists, successfully sticking the guns to the wall. It worked almost exactly the same as usual. Almost. There were all sorts of things going on his wrists now that were slightly distracting, but he could get used it. He had to.

The other weapons went the same way as the first two machine guns. Or else they were knocked aside by the rest of the team's punches. After that, the LMDs were easily taken care of. These only had normal human strength.

"Good," Fury's voice came through the speakers. "The next round starts in one minute."

"Hey, he didn't give us feedback like he usually does," Luke noted. "You think we did all right?"

"We did okay," Ava said.

"Okay?" Peter repeated, pretending to sound outraged. "I thought we broke our speed record just then."

"Speed isn't the only goal, Spidey," Ava reminded him.

"Well, no, but it's one of our goals."

"It is the little victories that inspire," Danny added sagely. Peter gave him a thumbs up.

"Exactly! That's why Iron Fist is our cheerleader."

Danny gave a small snort. "I was unaware of that appointment."

"No? Then I'll make it official now. Iron Fist, I appoint you as the team cheerleader."

"No fair!" Sam interjected. "We didn't vote on it!"

"Who else would you vote for?" Peter challenged.

"Me."

"And who would everyone else vote for?"

"Iron Fist," Luke and Ava said without hesitation.

Danny said, "Spider-Man."

Peter smiled beneath his mask. "Aw, shucks! I—whoa!" He stopped when the room transformed into a rooftop where he was right on the edge. He took a step back from the fifty-foot drop even though his silent spider sense told him that it didn't exist.

Ava chuckled. "Fury doesn't like small talk between rounds, remember?"

"That wasn't small talk! We were discussing the quality of our performance and voting on a team decision!"

She huffed. An actual huff, not a chuff. "Just focus."

Sticking his tongue out at her, Peter began to look around. There didn't seem to be a bad guy yet though. "Huh, Nova, do you see anything with your thermal imaging?"

Sam's goggles flashed. "Nope, but the LMDs might be running cold to avoid being spotted."

"Fair point. Anyone else see anything?"

"Not yet," Luke reported. Danny and Ava shook their heads. Peter slowly turned on the spot, wondering if Fury was going to spring a tough baddie on them just because they'd been chatting.

"Augh!" Danny screamed. Peter looked back to see him floating off of the ground. A small metal disk was stuck to his back.

"Wizard!" Peter guessed confidently. He was the only villain who used hover disks like that. "Where are you?" He still didn't see anyone, but he could hear the thrum of hovering tech. Then his spider sense went off. "Everyone, duck!"

Wizard flew in too fast for the warning to be effective. Ava and Sam were hit too, not that the hover disk affected Sam much. Wizard came to a stop at one end of the roof, laughing.

"Get us down, Spidey!" Ava yelled.

Peter knew the drill. After a few training sessions against Wizard, they'd figured out that his web bullets knocked off the disks nicely without the pain of Nova's blasts. But web bullets were one type he hadn't tried yesterday. Could his spinnerets make hard silk? He focused as hard as he could on making a short burst of webbing and tried not to hesitate before shooting at Danny and Ava. The silk might be coming out of his arms now, but they would probably appreciate regaining gravity.

The silk splattered against disks, further securing them in place.

"Oops."

Ava crossed her arms as she tilted upside down. "I'm guessing you don't come with rubber bullet mode."

"Yeah, apparently not. Nova, can you help them out?"

"On it. This'll sting a bit." Sam shot a small blast at Danny, frying the disc. Ava quickly reached as far as she could to claw at the disc herself to avoid any slight scorching. Sam tried shooting at her anyway, but she dropped just in time.

Wizard threw several more discs around, but now that they were expecting it, the team was able to dodge. Nova flew at him, starting a chase.

"What do you guys think? Send him a Tiger Surprise or make him collide with Bucket Head?" Peter asked the others. He liked to include them in planning when their lives weren't in imminent danger.

"Why not both?" Ava suggested.

"Works for me. Power Man, White Tiger, get ready." Peter watched Wizard closely for a second, aiming carefully. He shot with both wrists at once.

Both missed.

He tried again.

Missed again.

"Having trouble?" Luke asked from the side where he was holding Ava like the world's deadliest javelin.

Peter glared at his bare hands. "There's, like, a delay. My web shooters can shoot them out faster. Give me a second and I'll get the hang of it."

It took several more tries, but finally he attached a line to Wizard. Peter stuck his feet to the rooftop and held on tight. He hoped the silk held. It would be highly embarrassing at this point if it snapped. The line went taut, pulling at his arms. And Wizard was forced to a stop where Nova slammed right into him. Peter breathed a sigh of relief even as the collision made it harder to hold on. But he held them both in place as Luke threw Ava. She was kind enough to separate Sam before attacking Wizard, although she threw him to the rooftop rather roughly. It was probably retaliation for when he tried to shoot her.

With his armor torn away, Wizard was simple to take down. The rooftop simulation melted away.

"Final round in two minutes," Fury said through the speakers.

"Two minutes," Luke repeated. "That's not good."

Peter nodded. The longer a simulation took to load, the harder it was. "Let's take a formation to be prepared. Shall we assemble?" He couldn't help but grin. The word 'assemble' would always remain awesome to him.

"That's not how you're supposed to say it," Sam commented, although he obligingly stepped into place so they formed an outward facing ring.

"I could say 'Team assemble', but that doesn't seem to work either." Peter frowned. "Our team doesn't have a name, does it?"

There was a brief pause as the others thought about that.

"You appear to be right," Danny acknowledged. "Fury has only ever called us 'the team'."

"Or 'the kids'," Luke added.

"We should come up with a name!" Sam said excitedly.

"Can we even just choose our own name though?" Ava wondered. "The Avengers were named by Shield."

"We'll talk about this later," Peter decided. "Let's be ready for this final round."

The form of the room began to change. Some pillars appeared, scattered throughout. Once the new physical landscape was established, the illusion kicked in. Nothing fancy. Just a warehouse. Because really, it usually was almost always a warehouse. If Fury was serious about his hero school idea, there needed to be an entire class devoted to warehouse battle techniques.

Peter refrained from turning to look behind himself. That was what this formation was for. Three sixty vision. "Let me guess, no visuals yet?"

"No, but I'm hearing something. Quiet for a sec," Ava requested. The boys stayed silent for a minute. Peter strained to hear whatever Ava could. Was that a distant buzzing? "I think it's Beetle," she reported.

"Then explosions are coming," Luke guessed.

"Yup, be ready."

The buzzing grew gradually louder, but it echoed around so they couldn't pinpoint where it was coming from. There was no point in breaking formation since Beetle was probably watching them right now. All they could do was wait for him to make the first move so they could hopefully get the upper hand afterwards.

Then the buzzing stopped. Peter's spider sense buzzed and he looked up to find a bomb falling towards them. He immediately shot a web up to stick it to the ceiling. It exploded up there, causing chunks of ceiling to fall.

"Split up!" Peter ordered. It wasn't the best move with Beetle, but it was better than getting blown up or squished all together.

He ended up with Danny and Sam. They ran to one end of the warehouse. The buzzing started up again but grew fainter.

"White Tiger, Power Man, he is headed your way," Danny warned through his communicator.

"I'll go help them," Sam offered.

"Wait a second," Peter said, staring up at the columns. "This seems like the prime time to test a web. Give me about five minutes and then lure him over here, okay?"

"I thought your web yesterday took hours."

"It did, but that's because it was new and I was trying to make it perfect. This'll just be a quick trap."

"Okay, it better be ready soon because I don't want to be bait forever." Sam sped away towards the sounds of battle that had started up.

"Do you want me to keep them away until you are ready?" Danny asked.

"Perfect. I promise I'll be fast."

Climbing up the wall, Peter assessed the layout of the warehouse. The columns were obviously there to give a perfectly sized gap for web making. Fury usually made it harder to see, but he had made it very clear that Peter's webs were the focus of this exercise.

Peter started with thick but non-sticky silk. He had a gut feeling that sticky webbing was harder to make, and Phoebe did too, so he had decided to use it sparingly. It was reserved for the spokes of the web, not the base framework. That's how spiders did it, after all.

It bothered Peter that he had to do it this way too. With his web shooters, he often tried to change things up by making webs entirely sticky. The effect was almost exactly the same, sometimes even better, but, deep down, Peter felt like that would be wrong now. Like it would be too redundant.

He really needed to study his silk chemically. If his mind was playing tricks on him and sticky silk was the same as non-sticky silk, then he was going to be . . . mad? No, probably just more bothered.

"Ready, Webs?" Sam asked through the communicator.

Peter examined his handiwork. His five minutes were up, but was it strong enough? Probably. Hopefully. There was only one way to find out anyway. "Ready."

He quickly climbed up to hide on the other side of one of the columns. It didn't take spider instincts to know that seeing things or people apparently floating in midair was usually an indicator of something invisible holding them there (or nearly invisible. This new silk was shinier, but much more see-through.)

Sam came zooming by, taunting Beetle. Beetle, of course, did not respond, but he followed closely, shooting small missiles at Nova. Peter cringed. If Sam didn't fly right, the missiles would destroy the web before Beetle even got to it. To Peter's relief, Sam turned around and shot the latest missiles before passing above the web. Beetle came right on target.

Somehow, Peter hadn't realized he'd kept a hand on one of the anchoring lines. It thrummed intensely as Beetle collided with the web, and vibrated when his wings kept flapping. It made Peter's next moves clear. He had to climb out there and wrap Beetle up before he could get away.

He paused, taking a breath, trying very hard not to think about how fitting this was. He was quite glad that Beetle didn't exactly seem like prey. The urge to wrap him up was there (the same way it was every time he used a web to catch a bad guy. A gentle nudge to do what he must). But there was no instinct to bite him. That meant a great deal to Peter. This was his first time seeing Beetle (or at least an LMD dressed as him) in a long while. He'd been afraid that the wings and general bugginess of Beetle would be . . . problematic. But it wasn't. That was good.

The hesitation wasn't good though. Beetle ripped at the web, nearly breaking free. Peter leapt at him, grabbing him securely with a sticky grip. Nova flew back to land a solid punch while Peter tied him up in silk. And they were done.

In all honesty, the real Beetle would probably have pulled out some sneaky trick by now that would help him break free. Sometimes Fury even took manual control of the program to set up and intense battle. But today was not one of those days. The Training Room powered down and the illusion faded. Peter dropped to the floor before the columns were pulled back into the ceiling. He wished he could get a good explanation of how the room worked, but Fury insisted it was above his clearance level.

"Well, I think we did great," Peter said as the team regathered in the center of the room.

"Except Power Man nearly caused some structural damage," Ava said. "He took a blast that was way too big to be wise."

"It wasn't that bad. I just dented one of the columns," Luke defended himself.

Peter looked over to see the damaged column bend back to its original shape before it could be retracted. "We'll take a look at how strong the hit was later. Was anyone in danger of the blast?"

"Tiger could have been hit."

"I wasn't nearly close enough to be hit badly!"

"Only because I knocked it off course!"

"Hey!" Peter interrupted. "Again, we'll review the footage to see, but it doesn't sound too bad. White Tiger, remember to go on the defensive as much as offensive. And Power Man, you really don't need to protect us all the time. We can handle being a bit banged up."

They nodded and didn't continue the argument.

Fury came back into the room. He had a tablet in one hand now where he was examining the results.

"That went better than I expected," he admitted. "You all performed well. Spider-Man, your web strength is about on par with the old formula. Connors reports that your thick silk is roughly twice as strong as your old regular silk. Remember that."

"Yes, sir," Peter said. That was cool to know.

"On the other hand," Fury continued. "Your natural silk is not as hard and is therefore incapable of being used as a projectile. This will greatly hinder a number of your attacks and methods. Also, your firing rate is notably less. Preliminary data shows you'll need to account for a six hundred millisecond delay, particularly when dealing with moving targets."

Peter frowned. That was decidedly not as cool. That was over a half-second delay! It didn't sound like much, but it was huge in comparison to his web shooter's two hundred millisecond delay. He had worked so hard to make their firing rate as fast possible! If only he could upgrade himself.

A figurative light bulb went off in his head. Maybe there was a way to assist his spinnerets.

Fury went on with his speech, dragging Peter's attention away from his new idea. "That's as much data as could be pulled so far. You'll all resume your regular training today and tomorrow, so we'll know more by then. I predict you'll be able to go back on patrol by Monday. Is there anything not shown in the data that you'd like to report?"

"No, I think it went rather smoothly all things considered." Peter mentally did a victory dance. He would be back in the swing of things by Monday! Literally, because of his web swinging.

Puns. How could he ever live without them?

"All right then. Take a thirty-minute break and return here for a proper training session." Fury turned on his heel and left, presumably to do either paperwork or some secret spy stuff. Or possibly both. The moment he was gone, the team relaxed into a more laid-back atmosphere.

"Ah, yup, I've missed the training," Peter said only half-jokingly. "How are all of your mornings going so far?"

"Aside from getting up too early, it hasn't been too bad," Sam said with a yawn.

Ava rolled her eyes. "We've been doing this for ages now. How have you not gotten used to the routine?"

"Will power," Sam replied proudly.

"That's . . . will power's supposed to . . . We need to talk about your so-called 'will power' later."

"I've got an iron will."

"Or irony," Ava muttered.

Danny cleared his throat. It might have been covering a chuckle. "Anyway, how has your morning been, Spider-Man? You seem rather exuberant."

Peter nodded. "Yeah, it's been a pretty good . . ." he trailed off, remembering how his day had started. "Actually, can I—um—talk to you guys about something that happened?"

The others all agreed. Peter insisted they went somewhere a little more private (or at least someplace that wasn't overtly designed to have recording devices). They ended up in an unused conference room. Everyone sat down, pulled off their masks, and turned to him. Knowing he had their full attention was a little more nerve-wracking when he wasn't giving a speech or orders.

Taking a deep breath, Peter pulled off his own mask, acutely aware of the veneers he hadn't put on in the rush. He had assumed he wouldn't need them during simple training, but now he could feel them fidgeting along with the rest of him. "So—uh . . . Aunt May took down my web this morning."

"What? Why?" Ava demanded.

Peter shrugged, frowning. "She just didn't want me to have to do it." He swallowed. "And . . . it made me angry, and I don't know why. I'm not talking about being mildly annoyed here. I'm talking actual anger that my web was gone. It's not right, I know that. I shouldn't—"

"Whoa, hold your horses there, Pete," Luke stopped him. "Don't judge yourself like that."

"But I know it's not normal. I've never been upset any other time May's cleaned my room. Well, except for when she didn't know I was Spider-Man and I had to hide the suit. But this is a spider thing. I can tell. And I don't like that. I don't want to be unnecessarily angry."

The others exchanged some glances. Peter couldn't tell what they were thinking yet, and that made him wary.

"Why are you so sure it's a spider thing?" Ava asked. "I get angry too sometimes, but I don't instantly blame the amulet."

"Because it's about the web," Peter answered instantly. Wasn't that obvious? No one else would care about something like that.

"Your web was cool though. And comfy," Luke said. "I'd be a bit bummed out too if someone took my bed."

"It wasn't my bed. It was just . . . like a lounge chair or something."

"I still don't want someone taking away my lounge chair then," Luke persisted.

"Peter," Danny began. "Did your aunt ask for your permission to remove the web?"

"No. It's—It was just a web, right? People clean up webs whenever they want." Peter bit the inside of his cheek. He was not feeling sentimentally attached to his first real web. He wouldn't allow that.

"That wasn't 'just a web'," Sam said, voicing the thoughts Peter was trying to ignore. "It was yours. Your aunt shouldn't have done that."

"She was just being nice. It's me who shouldn't care about it this much."

"Why not?" Ava sounded more confused than Peter expected. And angry. Why was she angry? "I'm kind of taking personal offense here. Are you saying that I shouldn't get angry whenever someone tries to sneak into my room which I've staked out as my territory? I know I sometimes go a bit overboard because of the amulet, but it's part of me. Just like this is part of you."

Oh. That's why she was angry.

"I—I don't know. I don't really mean you. It's just . . ." Just what? Emotions weren't foreign to him. Now that he thought about it, spider-induced emotions weren't either. Hadn't he felt happy yesterday after catching and eating his own cricket? So what was really bothering him here? The simple fact that his web was gone and May didn't care?

. . . May didn't care.

And he didn't know how to make her care.

No, correction, she didn't need to care. She wasn't part spider.

"What is truly on your mind?" Danny asked softly, as if he knew there was more to the story. He of all people probably could tell.

Peter looked down at the table. "Well . . . I guess I got there in time to stop her. But . . . I didn't know how to tell her no. I didn't want—um—" He could see it now, what he was afraid of. The problem was that he was still afraid of it. "I didn't want to prove her wrong."

"Wrong about what?" Danny pressed on.

The first thing on Peter's mind was a lie. It shouldn't be this hard to say the truth. But it was. He could feel his fangs curling at his lower lip, as if he was subconsciously trying to keep his mouth shut. He pulled them back and parted his lips. "You see—um—everything I've told you the last few days . . . I haven't really spoken to May about it much."

"I kind of figured that out already," Ava said. "So I'm going to give the obvious advice of: tell her."

"I've tried! Really, I have! But, I don't know. She keeps telling me not to think about it. I don't think she really believes me. Or else . . ." Or else she didn't want to believe him. He couldn't quite bring himself to say that one. It seemed too accusatory.

"What have you tried to tell her that she doesn't believe you?" Luke asked.

Peter waved a hand vaguely at his head. "About some of the instinct stuff. There was this nightmare I had when I got my venom, and that was my first time using it, and—" he stopped there, realizing that he had only told Ava and Dr. Connors about what he'd done to his pillow. "Anyway, I told her about it and she told me that I shouldn't focus on things like that. She said that I don't actually have spider instincts. I'm just using what I know about how spiders work. Which, I mean, it's understandable. I do know a lot, and I would love for that to be true. But . . . it's not, is it?"

"Why are you asking us?" Sam questioned. "You're the one who knows yourself best."

"Aunt May knows me best. What if she's seeing something I'm not?"

"Or what if she is seeing only what you are allowing her to?" Danny posited. "You kept your vigilantism a secret from her, and then you kept aspects of your spider side a secret from us. I believe I speak for all of us when I say we were rather surprised by your confessions. You do an admirable job of appearing confident and in-control for the sake of others, but that skews what others see of you."

Peter nodded slightly. He knew that. He knew it was probably his fault. "I get that, but I've told her a lot since then. She knows my powers now, and I've kept her up to date about, you know, all of the new stuff." Although he hadn't been perfect with that either. "And she's my aunt. She knows me better than anyone."

Ava looked dubious. "We know a lot about you too, and we still didn't suspect much."

"Yeah," Luke agreed. "And you have to remember that parents can't read your mind, even though they seem like they can sometimes. My parents knew me well before the plane incident, and they knew the powers I would get from the injection. But there's still been . . . a bit of a disconnect now that they're back. Because I'm not exactly the same scared little kid who fell into the ocean. I've had years to grow without them. I'm not saying you're in the same boat, but I know it's hard to catch people up on stuff they weren't there to witness for themselves."

Heart sinking, Peter stared at him. He had kind of assumed that everything had been going well for Luke ever since they found his parents. To hear the truth was . . . rather disheartening. On some level, he seemed to have retained that childlike reverence of his aunt. That feeling that she always knew best, at least regarding his personal life.

What if she didn't?

Then how was he supposed to figure everything out for himself?

"Aunt May at least knows what Spider-Man has been up to though," Luke went on, halting Peter's distressing train of thought. "The only thing that might be a problem is that she recently learned it was you the entire time. Maybe she doesn't need you to tell her too much about what happened. Maybe what she needs is for you tell her how you feel."

"But I don't want to tell her I was angry at her!"

Sam rolled his eyes. "You weren't angry at her. You were angry at what she was doing. And if you tell her, then she won't do it again. Isn't that what you want?"

"No, I don't want to make her change for me." He loved his aunt the way she was. Asking her to act differently towards him would make him feel shallow. Fake.

(But didn't that word describe most of his interactions with people nowadays?)

"You're not asking her to change," Ava said. "You're just asking her to respect your stuff, including your webs. That's not too much to ask."

Peter let out a breathy laugh. "It is too much to ask. Almost half of May's time is spent keeping the house in pristine condition. That includes sweeping up the cobwebs. Asking May Parker to not clean up a huge web is like—like—asking the Hulk not to smash things!"

Sam looked taken aback by that. "Dude, I still have trouble telling a metaphor apart from a simile, but whichever that is, it's so not accurate."

"It's a simile," Luke offered quietly. "And definitely not a good one. Pete, you—"

He was cut off when all of their communicators went off. Their break was over.

"Look, I know May, okay?" Peter stood up and put his mask back on. "And she knows me. The real me. All I wanted to talk about with you all was that sudden anger this morning, and we talked about it, so . . . let's get back to training."

The others looked like they wanted to continue the argument. Peter didn't. He was done thinking about this. His thoughts were a jumbled mess anyway. He felt like he couldn't pin down any specific thoughts. Maybe his brain knew he wasn't ready to deal with this when he still had training to do. Personal crises weren't allowed on the battlefield, as Fury liked to say. All he could do right now was to focus on what needed to be done, and that was to avoid being late for training again.

Fun facts:

- I forgot to mention this in the last chapter, but I'm making Peter mostly part jumping spider rather than regular spider. Many spiders just sit and wait on their webs or under trapdoors for their prey. Jumping spiders actively hunt their prey, performing the sorts of acrobatics that Peter does. They even kind of sorta web swing! But only if they fall. They attach a drag line of silk when they're about to jump far. If they miss, they'll swing down and be able to climb back up to where they started.

- I don't know if this is scientifically proven, but all spiders seem to have the ability to stay completely still for some period of time, so Peter can also be still. When he wants to. And when he isn't freaking out. In other words, he's generally better at moving then sitting still.

- The title of this chapter is taken from Twenty-One Pilot's song "Redecorate". If you want a deeper look into Peter's psyche at the moment, listen to the song.