A/N: A Peter-centric chapter! I love getting in his head. Please review! Thanks for the past reviews!

Ch 16

"So, Felicia." Gwen said, and crossed her arms.

She sat across from him in their apartment at the dining room table. Peter ate hungrily, devouring the the pizza he had brought back for them.

"Mmm hmm," He said, with a glance up at her.

Gwen watched him a moment, and when he felt her eyes on her, he looked up guiltily. She was staring at him, her arms still folded.

"What?" He questioned.

"You never really told me about her." Gwen said.

Peter sighed. How could he explain this? He didn't know much about Felicia himself. He knew her name, and he knew she worked at the Bugle, and they had busted up a couple bad dudes, he had sent her to jail a few times... "There's not much to tell." Peter said. "She kind of just appeared out of the blue."

Gwen stared at him, "Out of the blue?"

"Yes."

"And she fights with you?"

"Sometimes."

"And you didn't feel the need to mention her?"

Peter opened his mouth to speak, and then stopped. Hold on here. He took in Gwen's big eyes, her mouth that was curved down in a frown. "Are you jealous, Gwen?"

"Should I be?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, has she ever made a pass at you?"

Peter thought back to her hands traveling over his body, the heat of her mouth on his. "Uh..."

"Oh my God." Gwen said. She got up from the table, and walked into their bedroom, shutting the door with a slam.

Peter sighed, got up and walked to the bedroom door. Why hadn't he told Gwen about her? Oh yeah. Because there hadn't been damn time. Their lives had been in constant danger. And in the end, there was no one for him but Gwen. He knocked softly against the door.

She didn't answer.

"Gwen," He said, and tried the knob. It was locked. Of course she'd lock the door. She wasn't stupid. "Open the door."

"No." She said.

"Please," He said, and placed his forehead against the door. "Please just open the door."

"I'm not that happy with you right now." Came her sharp reply.

"Let's talk about this."

She didn't answer him.

He sighed. "Okay, well if you don't want to talk, please just listen. I get why you're upset. I should have told you about her, Gwen, but there really wasn't any time. Besides, there is nothing to tell. She can try and try and try to get me, but she never will. No one ever will besides you." He sighed. "I love you. I just... love you." He closed his eyes, resigned to spend the rest of his days on the couch.

But the door cracked open, and one of her eyes looked at him.

He breathed a sigh of relief. All he wanted to do was grab her and bring her into his arms, cup her face and kiss her until she could barely stand. Her eyes were so beautiful. She was so beautiful. She was everything to him.

"I promise you," He said, "She will never come between us. I promise."

The door opened more, enough for her to stick her head out, and he could see that she had her hands clasped tightly together, something she always did when she was upset. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," He said with a grin, "of course. You, me, this baby... that's my life now." He reached down, and gently pried her hands apart.

Gwen's bottom lip trembled, and she yanked open the door, and flung herself at it, wrapping her arms around his neck. "I'm sorry. I think it's hormones." She said.

He laughed quietly into her hair, pulling her tight against him. "I just have to go and bring her in because it's what they asked me to do... after that, she is S.H.I.E.L.D's problem, and I am yours."

"You are my problem," Gwen said with a laugh.

Peter laughed too. "Now, eat your pizza or I will. It's friggin delicious."

8888

He was falling through space. No. That wasn't right. He wasn't falling. He had jumped. He had narrowed his body like a bullet, and he was aiming for something... someone. Gears and mechanisms rained down around him.

Was he inside of a clock? How had he gotten here? Where was he? Why couldn't he remember those facts? But they were irrelevant. All that mattered right now was that he reach who he was after. He brought his legs closer to his body, forcing him down, down...

And then he saw her.

Her blonde hair flew around her like a halo, like his own personal angel, and she was falling helplessly through the void. He got a good sight on her, extended his arm, and his web caught her in the middle of her torso.

He had caught her! She'd be fine! He reached his other hand behind him and shot his web up. It caught on the side of the wall.

Tower.

They were inside of a clock tower. It was the only way to describe the gears and ticking he heard, and the endless fall to the bottom. He was pulled up short, but Gwen...

He looked down just in time to see her body come to jerking halt inches from the stone floor, her head smacking against the bottom.

And she was still. She lay there, motionless and quiet, her head back, her blonde hair brushing the floor. "GWEN!" He cried.

He got down to her in a blur, and cradled her in his arms. No, this couldn't be happening. This couldn't be happening...

"Gwen, open your eyes." He pleaded. "Stay with me! Gwen!"

But it was useless. A small trickle of blood ran out from her nose. She had gone where he couldn't follow, and left him, the broken shell of a man.

And he broke down completely, letting the tears fall, repeating her name, holding her close to him.

It had been what he always feared.

She had died, at his hand.

Peter awoke with a start.

Dear God, no. He couldn't deal with these nightmares again. He had them often after Gwen's father had died, and they all ended with Gwen dying. He looked around, trying to catch his breath. He was in the bedroom on S.H.I.E.L.D's helicarrier.

Let her be sleeping beside me, just let her be here, safe...

She was. She was snoring softly on her side, one hand resting protectively over her stomach.

He breathed a sigh of relief, and raked his hand through his hair. He watched her sleep for a moment, and then laid quietly back down on the pillows, throwing an arm over his eyes.

He felt exhausted, and saw that it was still dark out. The clock on the bedside table read that it was just after four in the morning.

And he was wide awake.

His tired limbs and brain willed him to shut his eyes, but every time he did, he saw it again. Her head giving that horrible, final snap. The blood trailing from her nose.

He was not falling back to sleep any time soon. He reached over and lightly brushed his lips against Gwen's forehead, and walked to the door of their apartment. He opened it quietly, and slipped out, shutting the door behind him.

He could go for a walk and clear his head, and then sleep. He needed to be rested for when he left later that day on his mission to find Felicia. The corridors seemed dark, quiet and empty, and he half jogged down one to his left.

He found his way to the cafeteria, and saw that the lights were on, and two figures sat talking over steaming cups of coffee. They weren't kissing, but their heads were bent so close together, that Peter had to do a double take.

Agent Romanava and Agent Barton- Clint and Natasha, sat next to each other in the deserted kitchen. They were looking over a map, and when a strand of Natasha's hair fell into her face, Clint reached out and pushed it behind her ear, automatically. She turned to Clint and smiled, but said, "Morning, Parker."

Peter gave a jump. He didn't even realize she had seen him. He put a hand to the back of his neck, and walked over to them. "Morning. Sorry."

"Can't sleep?" Clint asked, as Peter took a seat across from them at the table.

"No," He mumbled.

"My first few nights here, I couldn't either." Natasha said. "But you'll get used to it."

Peter wasn't sure about that. He was used to the symphony of car horns and yelling that was the lower east side. He was used to seeing high rises and sewer rats. Up here, there was nothing. No noise. No car alarms. No buildings. A big, sterile void.

"Do you guys live here?" Peter asked.

Natasha shared a glance with Clint, and said, "More or less. But hey, it beats paying rent in Manhattan, right?"

Peter gave her a half smile.

Clint frowned, eying him. "Something on your mind?"

Peter shook his head, "Just bad dreams."

"Ah," Clint said, "that, my friend, is a cross we all have to bare sometimes."

"They stopped for awhile, and now, last night..."

"Don't look at them as bad dreams." Natasha said. "Whatever you dream about, whatever happens in them, use them as warnings to make yourself more vigilant."

"Or take an Ambien." Clint said with a sip of his coffee. He reached into his pocket and handed Peter a small pill.

Natasha turned on him. "Really? That's your advice to him."

"Well, it's better than telling him to attack his pillows in the middle of the night with a broad sword."

"I didn't tell him to do that, I was just saying that he shouldn't be afraid of them..."

"He needs his rest, Nat."

"Of course you'd say that, you slept through three ambushes!"

"Oh, you love bringing that up. How many arrows did I get off with my eyes closed? How many?"

"While you were snoring and drooling?" She countered.

"Yes!"

"Good talk," Peter told them. He had become practically invisible to them. He could see that they cared about each other, but once they got to bickering, the rest of the world disappeared. He wondered idly if he and Gwen were like that, and then decided that he didn't care. He walked back to the apartment, took the pill with a chug of water, and was asleep before his head hit the pillow.

8888

"This is amazing," Gwen said, as she followed Bruce and Tony around the lab. It was her first day on the job. She wasn't nervous, she was excited. "It's like OsCorp, but less evil."

Tony chuckled.

"And over here," Bruce said, taking her over to the small fish tank where the had the symbiote. "This little devil is..."

"That's the symbiote." Gwen said. "I remember hearing about it, something that was sent down to Special Projects. It certainly isn't new to OsCorp."

"You know about the Special Projects division?" Bruce asked her as she moved closer to examine it. The black ink of an organism attacked the glass uselessly in an effort to get to her.

Gwen gave him a look, "Everyone knows about the Special Projects division. It's OsCorp's dirty secret."

There was a knock on the door then, and Gwen looked up to see Peter through the glass doors of the lab, a duffel bag slung over his shoulder. She frowned. It was time to say goodbye.

"Excuse me a moment." She said, and walked over to him. "Hi." She said, smiling up at him.

"Hey." He replied.

They didn't say anything for awhile, just stared into each other's eyes. She didn't know how long he'd be gone. Three days? A week? Two months? However long it took to get this Felicia to come with him. This would be the longest they were apart since her brother's kidnapping.

"Leaving on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again..." Peter sang with a small smile.

She reached up and looped her arms around his neck, resting her forehead against his. "Just come back, okay? Safe and sound."

"I will." He said, holding her tightly. "But I really have to go." He kissed her lips once, and then her forehead. "I love you."

"I love you too." She whispered, and watched him walk down the corridor away from her, and toward Felicia.