Summary: Spoilers for Spider-Man: No Way Home."It's only the two of them, now: Spider-Man and the Green Goblin, just as it started." The Peters knew that fighting and curing their old foes would be no easy feat- but Peter-Two wasn't prepared to relive this very moment in present time. Why would he be? But, sometimes, fate can't be changed once it's set. One-shot. AU.

A/N: Peter-Two (Tobey Maguire) is simply referred to as Peter, given this fic is from his perspective. Just to clear up any confusion.

The title refers to something mentioned in What If episode four: an "Absolute Point" is a moment in time that shapes a person's destiny and cannot be changed or broken no matter what is done to prevent it. In the near impossible circumstance that it is broken, the respective universe will collapse on itself.

Absolute (Set In Stone, Cast By Blood)

Peter doesn't notice the Goblin slip past him at first, too focused on holding the glider steady between himself and Peter-One, too focused on silently urging the youngest Spider-Man to stand down. The Goblin had been on his hands and knees, defeated- or so Peter had thought.

Peter's suddenly being thrown to the side, away from Peter-One and the glider, toppling over himself with a startled sound of alarm. He's already pretty sore from fighting the other villains- he hasn't fought so hard in years, and he's nowhere near as young as he had once been- and it takes him a moment to regain his bearings. His back aches. He gives himself a shake, lifting his head as he rises up into a crouch, just in time to see the Goblin hurl the youngest Peter out into the ocean with a deep grunt of effort; he's as exhausted as the rest of them- reasonable, really, after the beating Peter-One had given him.

With his biggest threat aside, the sadistically twisted face of Norman Osborn turns on him. The early light that halos him makes the sight all the more intimidating, but something about it reminds Peter of how he had once held the man's very son as he died on a similar morning, the dawn quiet and bright and something sorrowful. Something twists in Peter's gut, and he tries to shove it down. Now is not the time to get lost in sentimental thoughts.

Both Peter-One and Peter-Three are occupied, one looking over the others, the other swimming back to the fallen shield. It's only the two of them, now:

Spider-Man and the Green Goblin, just as it started.

Just as they each know it is going to end.

"This time, I'm going to finish the job." The Goblin snarls, tapping something on his vambrace as he unsheathes the sword attached to the other, starting forward.

Peter rises fully to his feet, tries to sound placating as he raises his hands. "You don't have to do this, Goblin. Mr. Osborn, please, I know you're in there. Let me help you."

"Like you helped him the first time?" The Goblin mocks.

Peter's eyes widen. He knows what happened?

"Oh, I know all about what you did to us, to them." There's an angry, angry smile, and a flippant gesture back towards the cured villains back by the Statue. His eyes harden. "You have blood on your hands, Spider-Man. It's time to pay up."

The Goblin lunges forward.

Peter's breath catches in his chest.

He leaps back, out of the way of the slashing long blade, ducking beneath a second swing with a spin. The Goblin growls in frustration, lashes out again, misses again. Peter tries to sweep his legs out from beneath him, but takes a loose, armored fist to the face instead. He grits his teeth, regains his balance, and dodges the sword that follows before it can behead him.

They're both slowing down in their movements, both running out of energy, both too tired of fighting each other. But the Goblin is unwilling to give up- because, for him, giving up means extermination. Peter can't give up either; he has to rid Osborn of his parasitic, murderous alter-ego.

He's already failed once. He will not fail twice.

The multiverse gave him this chance for a reason.

So, when Peter takes a rough gauntlet to the chest and is slammed onto his back, he leaps right back up to his feet and twists out of the way of the Goblin's next attack, flipping back to gain some distance.

"I don't want to hurt you!" He pleads, breathless, sweat leaking down the side of his face.

The Goblin just laughs, lips curling back in bitter hatred. "Haven't you already? Don't fool yourself, Peter, I won't stop until I die."

Peter isn't sure if he's referring to their own past battles, his death, or Peter-One's brutal beatdown. But he's not going to let the Goblin get to his head, not this time. He takes a deep breath, meets the other's sneer with calm eyes.

"Neither will I." He declares, taking a complementary step forward. I will save you.

Osborn's face settles into something hard, something of finality. "So be it, Spider-Man."

Peter's sixth sense triggers just as he hears the engine of the battered, mostly-intact glider rising up behind him, just as he hears Peter-One call out a warning from where he stumbles onto the edge of the fallen shield and collapses.

"Peter-Two, behind you!"

The Goblin's eyes blow wide in dismay and he launches himself forward in one final, desperate attack, sharp blade cutting through the air and slashing across the red of the fabric covering Peter's arm. Peter panics and pushes him back, leaps up in a backflip to gain height over the glider as it swoops in, blades extended-

Peter doesn't think. He doesn't think to shove the Goblin aside, to throw him up into the air, out of the way.

He messes up.

History repeats itself.

The glider passes below him, and, as he lands, he watches it catch on the Goblin's side when he is too slow to move completely out of its path, those malicious eyes filled with horror and then a sudden pain.

A cry tears through the air, ripping from the Goblin's throat, as he is skewered and thrown back, the glider's engines dying not quite a moment after.

Peter's own scream is lost to the chaos as Goblin and glider hit the shield, a resounding thud echoing out upon first impact, the horrible screeching of metal following as the momentum drags them on a little ways.

Then, it's silent. It's no longer just the smoke that makes his eyes burn, leaves his throat so painfully raw and dry. No…

"Oh my God..." Peter-One chokes out from behind him, sounding utterly horrified.

Peter just stands there for a moment, staring at the body sprawled out beneath the glider, his legs weak. He has to push himself to move.

He stumbles forward on jelly legs that threaten to collapse at any moment, trying to keep his eyes from focusing on the trail of smeared blood that leads up to where the Goblin lays, unmoving. It takes his all to fight the bile rising into his mouth, the nausea growing in the depths of his stomach. Oh, God…

"Is he…?"

"I don't know." He hears himself say.

Blood drips from the cut on his arm. He feels dreadfully numb, cold, as the last of the adrenaline fades. This can't be happening. Not again.

The man on the ground coughs, wet and heavy, green-armored hand dragging up to the point of contact between the glider and his body. His head rolls, tries to raise, falls back. He groans long, deep, and so obviously in pain.

Peter's last steps are slow, tentative with the sudden reminder that he doesn't know who is in control. Tired eyes flicker over him when he peers down at the man, but he can't tell, and the man offers no words.

He half-heartedly gestures to the glider. "I'm going to pull this out of you, okay?"

He receives no response other than a grimace and the visible tensing of muscles beneath the green suit- a very un-Gobliny move. The villain must have relinquished his control once the shared body been incapacitated. Just like last time.

Peter, for the first time in two decades, is looking upon Norman Osborn once again.

He blinks back the tears that come with that realization and swallows, placing his hands upon the glider and feeling for a grip. He tries not to remember how it felt the first time, freeing Osborn's cooling body from it.

He takes a deep breath once he finds a good hold, makes sure the wounded man knows he's ready, and gives it a harsh tug, foot flying in to keep from pulling Osborn up with it. The sound of torn, moist flesh sucking at the retreating blade is not pretty, nor is the sound that tears from the scientist's throat. A long string of blood flows down from the blade as soon as it clears the edge of the wound, dribbling down onto the green armor and giant shield.

Peter tosses the glider aside, with ease, and lowers himself to one knee. "Mr. Osborn, I…"

"Peter." Blood leaks from behind his lips, and one hand clutches feebly at the entry wound- like before, the blade had completely punctured his body. Yet, even as he lays dying, his breath harsh and raspy, there's a conflict in his eyes.

"He's talking to you." Peter murmurs in quick comprehension. His eyes burn just a little more, and he's not sure how his face is still dry. Nothing he could say sounds quite right, so he indulges on the tiniest curiosity he feels, hopes that it can distract him from the growing pit of despair he's sinking into. "What's he saying?"

Osborn just laughs, a broken, breathless sound that exposes bloodstained teeth. He shakes his head. "It doesn't matter, now- none of it does. He'll be gone soon." I'll be gone soon goes unspoken, but it lingers in the air all the same.

"I am so sorry." Peter blurts, sinking further down onto the shield, folded legs slipping to the side. Shame and guilt eat away at him. "I can't believe I let this happen again."

Unfocused eyes observe him. "You and Harry, I missed your whole lives because of my own greed. I'm sorry, Peter. If anyone's to blame for where we're at, that would be me."

His jaw drops. "What? No, none of this is your fault. It's not your fault that you're dying-"

"-Peter. It's alright." Osborn's voice is soft, weak. He swallows, and his free arm- his sword arm, weapon having retracted during the fall- flops in Peter's direction, hand open in a gesture to provide reassurance for them both. "Just…stay. Please."

Peter nods quickly. He'd stay anyways, even if the man didn't ask. He has this opportunity to speak to the late father of his late best friend, and he'd be damned if he let it slip by. They shouldn't be here- in this universe or speaking to one another like this- and they both know it all too well.

He takes the outstretched hand, feels how slack the other man's grip already is. "Yeah, I…I'm not going anywhere. I promise."

"You're a humble man, Peter. Don't ever change." There's a mix of pride and reverence to his voice, an admiration that Peter doesn't feel he deserves and is honored to receive.

His chest clenches to the point where it aches and breathing almost hurts. "I won't, sir."

Osborn's eyes shift away, seemingly satisfied, and flicker up to the sky in silent awe. When Peter follows his gaze, he is faced with the same purple cracks as before, endlessly expanding and growing larger, longer, wider; separating the very fabric of reality; splitting the beautiful pink dawn apart.

It's a glimpse of the beyond, of the infinity of the multiverse. Something you only see when the reality you stand in falls apart around you. Something you only see when you're not supposed to. Something more terrifyingly beautiful than any other sight one can behold. It's breathtaking.

MJ would have loved to see it. But Peter's glad she's not here. This world isn't theirs. They don't belong here- him, MJ, Doctor Osborn, Otto, Flint, Peter-Three and his two foes.

This isn't their home, but Peter is glad that he got to meet them here.

He's glad that the multiverse gave him the chance to say goodbye, properly, and make a few friends- brothers- along the way.

He sees the wizard on top of the Statue Of Liberty, firing blazing orange beams of light at the violet cracks, trying to seal them. Someone should probably help him, but Peter can't find it in himself to move, to leave Osborn's side.

"Have you ever seen anything like that?" Osborn wonders quietly.

Peter looks back up at the sky. "No."

"It's beautiful."

"Yeah. It is."

He can feel Peter-One's eyes on him, can sense the boy preparing to confront the problem himself. He still makes time to approach them and murmur a heartfelt apology, despite everything that has happened in the past several hours. And then he swings away, up towards the sorcerer, to help seal the sky shut.

Peter's grip tightens around Osborn's. He doesn't have anything else to say, and the man seems content to watch the fracturing sky, but he offers his presence anyway, part of him wondering what will happen when they're returned to the moments in time that they came from.

He thinks about string theory, of what his younger self will think when Norman Osborn turns up suddenly dead. He wonders if things will be better or worse for that version of him. He wonders if things will turn out better for that version of Harry. He hopes they find closure, that things don't derail between them as bad as they had the first time. He hopes for the best.

Osborn's hold is growing increasingly weaker, and his heavy breaths more quieter. His time is nearly up.

"I don't know what I've done in this universe, but tell him…tell Peter that I'm sorry."

"I will." Peter promises around the lump in his throat, lowering his gaze from the sky to meet Osborn's own. He's fading fast. "I promise."

A small smile breaks through the man's deathly pallor.

There's a sudden thud on the metal, but only Peter has the strength to look up and see what it is- and it's nothing alarming, thankfully- he doesn't have it in him to fight anything else for a while. It's only Peter-Three that he sees, trotting over from where he's just landed, something clutched in one of his hands. The last cure.

"Oh, God." His eyes are wet too, shining in the morning light, despite never having met this version of Norman Osborn himself. He crouches down next to Peter and holds the cure out to him, stumbling over his words in his emotional sympathy. "Hey…Do you think- he should have this. I mean, even if it's just for- you know…He deserves to be free too."

Peter nods, no longer able to hold back his tears. "Yeah."

He slowly takes the cure from his other self, and positions it over Osborn's neck. The man is completely spaced, lost somewhere between the beauty of the sky and the voice of the Goblin inside his head.

Peter takes a deep breath, sets the end of the contraption against skin, and presses down on the syringe-like button. The device hisses and Osborn blinks, a ragged sigh leaving his chest as the antiserum washes away the ill within him.

His eyes flick over to the Spider-Men and he offers that small, genuine smile once again, those eyes filled with a little more clarity than before.

"Peter. Thank you."

A single, tiny moment of gratitude.

And then he's gone, arm falling slack in Peter's hold, eyes stopping half-lidded.

Peter lets his hand fall from the cure, numb. He stares at Osborn's face, half-expecting to see his eyelids complete the blink they had been in the midst of. But they don't, and he lowers his head, wipes at the tears that trickle down his cheeks with a sniffle.

Peter-Three reaches out in a gesture of comfort. "I'm sorry, man."

"Thank you." Peter says.

He knows he's crying, but he smiles.

Perhaps Osborn's fate had been set in stone, bound to happen no matter the circumstance, but he had died free, this time. He had died happy. That's all that matters, isn't it?

They sit there in a companionable, understanding silence until a ripple of orange tears across the pink sky, sealing the cracks in the universe, and their bodies light up a brilliant gold, fading away, leaving, returning home.

And part of Peter feels exonerated of his past.