Chapter Four: Superheroes? In New York? Gimme A Break…

*TIME SKIP: ONE WEEK LATER* (A/N: because Hiro really needs to learn some stuff 'bout this world – Lucky)

Hiro was starting to get into the swing of things in this world. Peter's annoying and severely beat-up alarm clock would ring, Peter would stumble around looking for clothes while Hiro would slink rather unsteadily down to the kitchen for breakfast. Even cats weren't immune to that thing they call morning.

Aunt May would set out his breakfast, which wasn't exactly cat food, but milk and a little dish of fish or meat from a can with an embarrassing picture of a cat on it. Hiro would send that cat a disturbed or disappointed look each morning for disgracing the species and/or being high on something, because cats weren't supposed to be that wide-eyed and smiley. The wonderful lady would then go out to her workplace after pointing Peter towards the cabinet of cereal, they would eat breakfast, and Peter would wave 'bye while jogging to catch the bus.

Hiro then had free roam of the house for the rest of the day until May would pull up from work and Peter would arrive later from whatever after-school activity, Hiro assumed, he had. Dinner, friendly chatting, etc., then bedtime, where he had discovered a brilliantly cushy pillow in the corner of the upstairs hallway chair to sprawl out on. And repeat.

It was the best time of his life, when he didn't have anything to agonize over or anybody looking to him for solutions to problems the adults of the world should've been handling. After a couple days of just enjoying this feeling, Hiro had started slyly reading whichever book Peter had laying about in his room, which was insanely easy because the boy left them laying open all over the place and seemed to bring new ones home every few days from the library or school. All he had to do was carefully hook each page to turn it and remember which page Peter was on, even if Peter himself had forgotten.

Today, though, his sensitive ears caught the telltale squeak and failed prevention of a closing clang that told him Peter was home early, before May. He hastily nosed the novel back to the original page to was on – or close to it – seconds before the doorway was filled with Peter, Peter's bag, and Peter's olive-ish dark green jacket with the grey hood hung over an arm.

"Hey, Hiro!" he greeted enthusiastically as always. "Aunt May's out of town with a friend of hers for tonight, won't be back 'til tomorrow afternoon." That explained that. But what made this day any different from last week, when Peter was gone for a couple hours every day after school? He thought that he had clubs or something all the time from what was implied, though not directly mentioned, around the house. Academic Decathlon, tutoring, or something. Maybe there just wasn't a meeting or session today?

"I thought I'd drop my backpack here first, so I don't have to stow it somewhere. That time with the Dumpster was a stinky disaster." Peter grimaced at the memory as he dropped his bag with the heavy thud of schoolbooks by the headboard of his bed. Hiro was now very interested in whatever came to explain this.

He bounced his way from the ground to the mattress up to the footboard and watched his not-owner happily fling open one of the closet doors, grabbing something black and red to toss on the bed, nearly clipping Hiro's ear when he let out an annoyed mew. The boy gave him an appropriately apologetic glance, but he was more interested in sniffing the costume – because it looked like something out of Comic-Con.

The parts were all in a disorganized, spread-out pile of colors and cloth. Peter began systematically pulling it on in a rapid fashion that suggested he'd done this a hundred times before, yanking things out from under Hiro's nose and thoroughly irritating him. There was a pair of tight black jeans with dark, flexible fabric kneepads and tall red Converse whose white trim had seen better days, but still maintained its color. Black fingerless biker-gloves up his forearms, bug-eye goggles with reflective yellow-tinted lenses, a lower half-mask kerchief that was red with a black spiderweb pattern on it. The multicolored hoodie somehow rounded it all out. Blue sides and underarms, black on the chest, back, and the back of the hood and abdomen, a white spider emblem on the chest and back, red with the same black web design on the hood and arms, plus a red elastic lining around the bottom. But it somehow all fit and actually looked pretty wicked, if Hiro did say so himself, when Peter pulled the hood up around his brown hair.

The teen looked over at his cat with a wide smile, having not yet pulled the mask up, and spread his arms in a "Ta-da!" motion. "What do you think?"

Hiro flopped his head to the side, his left ear folded forwards a bit, in an unintentionally adorable maneuver while studying him. "I mean, it's not the best," Peter went on, "but I have a budget and it works for a teen superhero." The last words caused both pointed ears to perk up in surprise. A superhero?

Oh, boy, Death really understated this world's problems, didn't she?

"And whatever you hear, I swear, I did not choose the name 'Spider-man.' That was the press' fault," he finished with a double-handed swipe in an X in front of his chest and then moving over to the window. The fingers that poked through his gloves fiddled with the window lock for a second before sliding the sash up by placing his fingers on the glass pane itself, which explained why the window constantly had prints all over it, and not from Hiro's nose. Most of the time.

"I'll see you 'round dinnertime, 'kay? Okay!" With that, the superhero swung out the window feet-first, which unfortunately closed before Hiro could get out, and disappeared with a light thwip noise. The closing of the window seemed to snap the kit out of his shocked trance and the former human shot down the stairs muttering to himself, though it came out as a series of quiet growls, hisses, and meows had anyone been listening.

Something about stupid heroic friends that were going to get their stupid selves hurt. Peter's actions hit a little too close to home for Hiro only a week after Ron… why did he pick the people most likely to give him heart problems as friends?

The first night he was here, he'd basically initiated a nightlong vigil for everyone who died and been a little too mopey the following day than was probably normal for a cat. He wasn't sure he could handle losing anybody else this soon.

So, if he went straight to the couch and pawed at the "ON" button for the television so that he could watch Pe- uh, Spider-man, and make sure he wasn't hurt, cut him some slack. At least the wizard could use the muggle technology, Harry had lived with the Dursleys for most of his life and Hiro kept a careful watch over Peter and Aunt May's shoulders whenever they would use modern tech. The latter was proficient with all the kitchen machineries and the former was clearly a major computer geek, that was clear after even a week.

With the TV now on, and tuned into a 24-hour news station, he was instantly hit with a culture shock of superhero stuff. The stories ranged from a technological, flying Gryffindor suit operated by a billionaire to a Norse god in the middle of the New Mexican desert to – finally – reports of Spider-man on what was evidently a daily patrol. Those were the most common, the Norse incident from a while back and "Iron Man" only appearing on the way to one of the buildings its pilot – Tony Stark, right – owned. Hiro watched "Spidey," as the stations and people seemed fond of calling him, leave a mugger strung upside-down on a light-pole by what seemed to be spider-webs, crawl up a wall after cocooning a bank robber, and catch a car with his bloody bare hands.

He studied everything his eyes caught, managing to catalogue many of Spider-man's powers from the news. Increased strength, speed, agility, some weird sticky thing, seemingly enhanced senses, seeing as he completely changed directions to go after a sound the camera crew didn't get and beat up a purse snatcher, but Hiro remembered the glinting metal devices almost hidden on his wrists and correctly assumed that's where the spider-silk came from. If he ever got out of this form, he'd demand a full explanation of this… after slapping, hugging, or doing both to the brunet.

Yeah, Death left out a bit more than a little. And I will admit to borrowing Stan Lee's line for the title of this one. RIP, dude. You were the absolute best. I just wanted to honor that guy's genius.

Anyways, Hiro's rather overprotective after everyone he loved pretty much just died. There's no way he's letting his kind-of crush get hurt. And I know he's recovered sort of fast, but that was necessary for moving along with my storyline, plus he's been through a lot at a young age. He's not new to any of this and, as sad as it is, is almost used to it and knows how to handle it.

To hitomi-tama: First of all, you're welcome, I'm glad you like my story enough to continue reading. Two, I wasn't planning on it… but things may change. So, I'm not exactly sure, you'll have to wait and see!

To Guest: Thank you! =)

Lucky