A/N: AU sequel to "Promise", another one-shot fic I wrote, you can find it on my profile. This can be read as a stand-alone though. Done as a request for a reader on AO3.
I take requests for Spider-Man stories! PM me for details!
Flashing lights and screeching sirens pierced the darkness. Blurs of red and blue… swirling dizzily. Faces… voices… what they were saying, she didn't know. She couldn't distinguish the words. The ground was hard and cold… too hard and too cold. Slowly, gingerly she sat up, pressing a hand to her forehead with a groan. Her head was pounding, her side throbbing. Her fingers came away sticky with blood.
"Are you okay, Miss?" Someone was crouching at her side, looking down at her, eyes filled with concern.
"Wha… what happened?" Mary Jane spoke shakily as she searched her mind frantically for any memory of the last few minutes.
"No one really knows," came the answer, vague and unsatisfactory. Mary Jane groaned again, bending over as she clutched her head.
Cracking cement, falling debris, hundreds, maybe thousands of people screaming, running. Had there been an explosion? Bolts of lightning in the darkness, savage roars… had it been a monster?
"Mary Jane! Hold on!"
The voice echoed across her mind like a dim memory. She remembered… falling… clinging desperately to a ledge… where had she been falling from?
"I'm coming! Hang on, sweetheart!"
She had clung tighter, fingernails clawing at cement, legs thrashing helplessly in midair. Then she was falling again… screaming… reaching blindly into the air. More explosions rocked the ground, debris showering down around her, as if in slow motion. And at the last moment, a pair of strong arms wrapped around her waist, words whispered into her ear.
"It's okay. I've got you now. You're okay."
"I can't remember anymore," Mary Jane groaned aloud. "It's all… it's… black…"
"It's over now," a new voice came at her other side as an older man stood over her. "Thank God, it's over. Are you okay?"
"I don't know… I don't know…" Mary Jane murmured, shaking her head wildly. A vague feeling of terror hung over her.
"EMS here, Miss. We're gonna get you to a hospital." More people… more faces… more voices. Mary Jane only wanted to be left alone.
"We've found a dozen more victims, all in critical condition," another EMS worker approached as the first bent over Mary Jane. "We need to take care of them first."
"I… I'm okay," Mary Jane asserted as the rescue worker glanced at her, hesitantly. "Go… go help the others." As they hurried off, she slowly rose to her feet, standing unsteadily as half a dozen hands reached out to support her. And then… someone asked the fateful question.
"Anyone seen Spider-Man since it ended?"
"Oh no…" Mary Jane gasped, pulling away from those who stood near her. "Spider-Man… I've got to get to him! Where is he?"
"Behind the police blockade," someone answered.
"Hey! You can't go over there!"
Mary Jane ignored the warning cries as she pushed her way through the crowd, reaching the makeshift enclosure the NYPD had set around the disaster scene. A department store… that was what the blackened ruin seemed to resemble… but she couldn't be sure. Vague scenes flickered through her mind as she began to regain her memories of the past couple of hours. Shopping… she had been shopping… with Peter. And then… the world had seemed to blow up.
"...more reinforcement on the way… looks like… suspect vanished…" Distant shouted orders and the crackled static of voices over police radios reached her ears in jumbled, disjointed sentences.
"...explosives… may still be inside… send in bomb squad…"
Mary Jane managed to slip over the borders unseen, the law enforcement too preoccupied with a hundred other things. She wandered through the piles of debris, blinking in the bright flashing lights from police cars and search lights.
"...Spider-Man… on the scene… collapsed… unstable condition…"
"Hey! Miss… you can't be in here!"
She ignored the shouting until she felt a firm hand on her arm, a deep voice near her ear.
"It's not safe here, Miss. I need you to stay behind the blockade with the other civilians."
"No… no…" She tried to pull away. "You don't understand. I'm… I'm looking for… my husband…"
"If he's in here, we'll find him. Here. I'll escort you back."
"No! I can't…" She glanced around frantically in one last desperate effort to find him. A strangled cry escaped her lips and she clutched her throat with her free hand. She had caught sight of him… just barely… a crushed form lying prostrate on the ground.
"Peter! No… no… Peter!"
"Please, calm down, Miss. I need you to come this way." The officer was still speaking to her in firm, measured tones. But she wasn't listening. She writhed madly in his grip, kicking at him in her wild fear.
"No! I won't go! That's my husband… I need to go to him…" In her terror, she had forgotten to conceal his secret. Secret identity was suddenly the last thing on her mind. Her only thought was to reach him… before it was too late. With one last desperate effort, she broke away, ducking under the officer's outstretched arm and running to her husband's side. The policemen surrounding him stepped aside in astonishment as she flew past, dropping to her knees in the debris, not even noticing or caring when broken glass dug into her flesh.
"Peter… Peter… are you okay? Please… tell me you're okay!" She pulled his limp body into her arms, cradling his head against her chest. An officer knelt on his other side, glancing uncertainly at the distraught woman, before reaching out and slipping the mask from the fallen hero's head.
"No… you can't do that," Mary Jane murmured weakly, though she made no attempt to snatch the mask away. She could hear the shutter sounds of cameras as the light of flashbulbs continually lit the scene, but she somehow didn't even care anymore. All that mattered at that moment was him… and him alone. He was covered in blood and bruises, a jagged gash running from his chin and down his neck to the shoulder. She pressed her hand against his face, gently caressing his cheek, her heart beating swiftly in relief as his eyelids fluttered and he slowly opened his eyes.
"You okay, Tiger?" She stared into his deep blue eyes, feeling an overwhelming sense of love rushing over her. He smiled faintly and nodded.
"I'm always… okay… when… when you're… here…" he whispered huskily, licking his swollen lips.
"Where're you hurt?"
"Everywhere." He laughed weakly, but the next moment clenched his eyes shut, pressing his hand to his chest as violent coughs racked his body. Mary Jane felt her heart restricting at the sight of blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. She wiped it away with trembling fingers, but it didn't stop flowing.
" 'S the… end of… end of the line… for me…" he rasped, gasping for breath. " 'M sorry… sorry, MJ…"
"What are you talking about, Tiger?" Mary Jane tried to laugh, but the sound caught in her throat. "You're gonna be okay. You always are. We're gonna get you home and get you put back together again."
" 'M in too many… pieces… this time…" he grinned wryly.
"You quit talking like that." Mary Jane's voice was soft at first, but it heightened, rising to a shrill pitch of anger as he shook his head. "You quit talking like that, do you hear me? You are not… you are not going to give up on me. Do you understand?"
" 'M sorry…" he whispered again as she held him tighter, tears streaming down her cheeks. He reached up to gently wipe them away.
"You'd better be," MJ bit her lip. "You had no right going and getting yourself blown up like that."
"No… no choice… had to…" He paused, his body wrenching with the force of his coughing. The trickle of blood from his mouth had become a stream and MJ's eyes widened with horror. "Keep the city… safe… for you… for everyone… it's… 's my responsibility…"
"Don't give me that line again," Mary Jane sobbed. "It's worn out now, Tiger."
"I tried…" he murmured, his voice no more than a hoarse whisper. "Tried…"
"Not tried," Mary Jane bent to press her forehead against his. "You succeeded. You're a hero, Tiger. My hero."
He opened his eyes again, seeming to summon all his strength as he smiled at her and she felt a pain shoot through her heart… sharp as a dagger. And at that moment she knew. Her heart knew what her mind refused to accept, even as it shattered into a million pieces. One last time, she pressed her mouth on his, everything inside of her trembling as she felt his blood, warm against her lips. He kissed her back, but his kiss was weak. And as she pulled away, she saw death in his eyes.
"I sure… sure… hit the jackpot…" he smiled again, his breath coming in short, shallow gasps. "I love… love you… Mary Jane Parker."
With one last shuddering breath, the life left his body. She clutched his lifeless form against her heart, rocking back and forth in the midst of the debris and the flashing emergency lights, not noticing the crowds surrounding them.
"Are you mad at me?" His voice… his words from long ago… echoed through the distant memories in her mind.
"Never, Tiger," she had answered him, laughing. "Just as long as you always come back to me."
"I will," he had answered her with a kiss. "Always."
Always… always… always…
The word hung over her head like a sentence of doom.
"You broke your promise," she whispered, resting her head on his as she let her tears fall.