Disclaimer: Characters and places belong to DC and MCU unless otherwise stated. Plot belongs to MarkTwainTwo (hi!).

Note: I did say I don't usually curse, so here's a warning: I do say 'damn', 'freaking', and 'heck'. Just thought of that, since someone says 'damn' here.

-/-

-Peter-

He woke up feeling slightly more cheerful. Three seconds after that, his day started going downhill and didn't stop.

Peter's first three words that morning were, "Good morning, Karen!"

His next three words were, "What the fudgesicles?!"

This was because Karen's first words that morning were, "Good morning, Peter. I believe it would be imperative to inform you that I will be forced to shut down in a few moments' time."

"Why?" Peter demanded, swinging his legs out of his makeshift web hammock and jumping to the floor. "Can't we stop it? Is someone trying to hack you?"

"No one is attempting to hack my systems," Karen said, speaking quickly, and he didn't interrupt her because time was imperative and they didn't have time for his panic attack over losing her-. "However, we cannot stop it. You can re-boot my systems later, if my data is correct. The transition from our universe to this one does damage to whatever is undertaking the transition. Life forms take much less damage than artificial or non-living objects. For example, your clothing is liable to disintegrate, not including the suit, since Doctor Strange has placed magical precautions on it during previous endeavors."

Peter stared at the wall for a moment, his hand clenching in frustration and maybe tears were coming slightly to his eyes because he felt a little hysterical-. "Okay, half of my stuff is going to disappear, never mind the fact that I barely had anything in the first place, got it. Typical. So, not that I'm complaining, but why didn't things take damage immediately when we got here?"

"I suppose the best analogy is jet lag," Karen offered, "The universe is realizing you are an anomaly here, and making sure to assimilate you into its workings without disrupting the balance. The best way to do that is to shut down anything possible. Which leads me to my second point- to re-boot me, you must try and use as many objects from this universe as possible."

Peter nodded, slowly. "Anything else I should know?"

It was a moment before Karen responded, and when she did, it was full of static. "You should- shou- you should note that-" there was a large burst of static. "Memory- come- you should note that- will come in bursts- come in- should note-"

"Karen?!"

A second passed full of static.

"You should note that your memory- memory also lagged," Karen seemed to make a great effort to keep out static. "You will likely receive- you will- you will likely receive several memories at once- at once. Whatever you remember- at once -whatever you remember last isn't what happened last."

"What?" Peter yelped, because knowing the multiverse it would be worse than what he remembered but the last thing he remembered was erasing everyone's memories of him, so how could it get worse- but there was no response.

Karen was gone.

And, because of Parker luck- stupid, stupid, hated Peter Parker luck -that's when the memories hit.

(He made the most of the situation though, because he was Peter Parker and the bad luck came with a resolve to laugh over the name Bubbler instead of panic over the fact that he failed to save more people.)

-/-

-Red Robin-

Apparently, the newest addition to the costumed maniacs wasn't disappearing anytime soon. In the two days since Dick had announced the guy's existence, newspapers were printing stories and rumors about 'criminals stuck in webs', people were whispering in the streets about 'human-sized spiders', and three big-time drug dealers had been wrapped up like presents outside the GCPD in some sort of sticky substance that dissolved shortly after the criminals had been dragged to cells.

On each criminal that was dropped off, big-time or no, there were little sticky notes attached. The news stations read several of these aloud, most of the news casters obviously holding back laughter. 'Happy birthday early from your friendly neighborhood Spider-man!' was one. Others included 'Found this guy and he was rude and stuck a gun in my face so you deal with him' and a hasty 'Ppl coming gtg ur welcome ppl!' And in each corner of the sticky notes, there was a little doodle of a spider (although the hasty, text-abbreviated one had a spider that looked a bit more like a pufferfish).

All of this meant that, in those two days, Bruce demanded that they not interact with 'Spider-man' unless he was there.

Dick protested, Duke sighed but agreed, Cass stared ominously, Steph pointed out that she wasn't technically his daughter and he couldn't tell her what to do, Jason flipped him off and left... and Tim happened to actually be on his way already to meet Spider-man.

"Sorry," he said, though he knew he didn't sound very sorry. Distantly he could hear Oracle snickering. "I see him though, it'll just be a quick in-and-out. I'll just say hi, ask him what he's doing here. I can fight my way out if I need to."

"The point is I don't want you to need to," Batman growled. Tim sighed as he realized that Bruce was probably slipping on his cowl, about to go after him.

"Look, I found him in like, five minutes of getting here, and I didn't even ask Oracle," he pointed out. "He can't be that bad if he can't even hide properly."

"Unless he's not hiding," Batman said. "He might-"

"-want me to find him, I know, I know," Tim said. "Like I said, I can fight if I need to."

Spider-man delivered a swift punch to the second thug's temple as Red Robin watched. He made a kind of indignant huff as he stared at the thugs unconscious by his feet. He pointed all but the middle two fingers at the men and some sort of grey-white... rope? string?... shot from his wrists, pinning them there. The same kind as was wrapped around the criminals he dropped off at GCPD. "Y'know," he said conversationally to the men, "it was really rude of you to attack that woman. First of all, if she broke up with one of you that's not the way to get her back-" he took out a sticky-note and scribbled something on it "-Second of all, I was eating a nice warm slice of pizza and I was enjoying it, so you interrupted me. You might as well walk around with 'Rude' written on your forehead." He stuck the note to one thug's forehead, and to Tim's amazement it actually read 'Rude'. Then he stuck a second note to the other thug's forehead, with smaller writing Tim couldn't make out.

He shot more of the sticky string into the air and pulled, which took him off the ground and swinging through the air. Tim shot his grappling gun and quickly followed him.

"Red Robin, status report," Batman growled across the coms, and Red Robin realized he'd been silent for a while without reason.

"Sorry, just following the newbie," he said. "He wrapped up a couple more guys and went swinging off. Not all that fast though, he's not making it hard to track. So either he's a rookie, or this is a trap. Or both."

"I'll try and head him off," Nightwing's voice came through. "Batman's preoccupied with Penguin now, surprise visit I guess."

Tim gave a noise of affirmation and at the next roof, he skidded his boots on purpose to make noise and alert Spider-man of his presence. With luck, the guy would panic at being followed and run into Nightwing's trap. Spider-man glanced back, but to Tim's surprise, instead of running further, he twisted mid-air and came sailing back to his last roof, just as Tim landed on it himself.

"If you want my number, just ask, dude. No need to stalk a guy," he said, and Tim blinked.

"Uh," he said. Then he whispered to Nightwing, "Change of plans, he's not running. Come to my location." Aloud, he said, "You know, Batman doesn't like uninvited heroes in his city."

"Well, it's a good thing I'm not one," Spider-man shrugged.

"...You save people," Tim said.

"So do you," Spider-man countered. "I'm a vigilante, too."

Tim hesitated. "We need to ask you some questions."

Spider-man took a step back, closer to the edge of the roof. "Sorry, no can do," he said. "I've already filled my interrogation quota for the week. Wanna reschedule?"

"Sorry, no can do," Nightwing said, stepping out of the shadows to Spider-man's other side and smirking. "Next week's booked for us."

Spider-man, for his part, didn't even look surprised. "I can wait," he said, without missing a beat. "I've got this thing called a bullet wound to attend to anyway." He gestured vaguely towards his leg, and Tim noticed for the first time, with no small amount of alarm, that there was indeed a bleeding hole in the man's thigh. "The doctor says it might sting a little."

"We can help you with that," Nightwing said, and Tim could hear the frown in his voice. He took a step towards Spider-man, and Spider-man took a step away.

"Uh, yeah, no. Thanks anyway, but no."

"Then we'll have to take you in," Tim said.

Spider-man took another step back. He was right at the edge of the roof, which scared Tim irrationally because duh, the guy had his not-a-grappling-hook to swing on.

"Okay, you seem like a nice guy, but we really have to make sure you're not a threat. So, what'll it be? You know, easy way-hard way?" Nightwing pressed.

"Look, man, I get it, I really do," Spider-man said. "The whole territorial-vigilante because you don't know who's a threat? That was me, back home.y But I can't get back home, and right now I can't even leave the city."

"We can help with that, too," Nightwing tried to bargain. "Just as soon as we know who you are, we can get you out of the city."

"That's part of the problem, though," Spider-man sighed. "You guys should know! You know how dangerous it is to reveal your identity. I can't tell anyone. Trust me, if I could I wouldn't have a problem leaving the city."

Tim blinked, putting the pieces together. "You only have that suit, don't you? Otherwise you could just get a job and catch a train out. I wouldn't normally encourage stealing but, um, why wouldn't you just take some normal clothes from a store?"

The guy looked like he was going to answer, but then seemed to think better of it and just shrugged. Then the eyes of his mask went wide (which, Tim wanted to know how he did that) and he turned quickly. "Oh, look at the time, gotta run!"

Nightwing shouted as he jumped off the roof and shot his white string-stuff. He probably would've followed the guy if Tim hadn't put a hand on his arm. He hesitated, looking after Spider-Man disappearing around the corner of a building, then looked at Tim. "What is it?"

Tim pointed, and could see the moment Nightwing noticed what he had. He went rigid, then relaxed with an exaggerated groan and flop to the ground. "Damn it. I was really hopping Penguin would be the last big one tonight. Three? In one night? I mean, come on, it's not even Halloween!"

Red Robin glanced back one more time- not that he would be able to see Spider-Man anymore -when something caught his eye. Curious, he picked it up. When he looked around, Nightwing wasn't looking at him, gaze fixed in the distance as he muttered into his comms. So Red Robin pocketed the object for later.

He followed Nightwing after Poison Ivy.

And all but forgot about it.