Cross-posted from AO3 same day.

Apologies for posting so late in the day but... greetings from Sherlock Seattle.

Fighting

It was only a week after Peter first met Deadpool that he saw the mercenary again. Except this time it wasn't on a roof, but in a warehouse used for slave trading, and he was using his excessive weaponry to kill Peter's suspects.

"Hey, baby boy!" Deadpool sounded way too cheerful for someone in a one-on-mob fight with actual Italian mobsters.

Peter scowled and kicked a goon in the face on his way into the fray. "Don't call me that. It's weird. And I'm older than you which makes it double weird- NO KILLING!" he shouted hurriedly, shooting out a glob of web to block the… barrel? Nah, that didn't sound right… Shooty hole? No way. Fuck it. Peter shot a glob of webbing at the shooty hole of Deadpool's gun which had just been aimed at someone's head. "No sword killings either or else I'll string you up with the rest of these tools."

For a split second, Deadpool went still while staring at him and Peter's Spidey sense went wild, and he wondered if the mercenary was going to turn on him too. But his senses went quiet just as quickly and Deadpool saluted him.

"Whatever you say, snookums!"

Peter glared. 'Snookums' was worse than 'baby boy'.

In spite of the Avengers' warnings, and Peter's own trepidation, he found himself having an unexpected amount of fun, because working with Deadpool was fun, weird nicknames aside. It was hard enough finding a worthy opponent for verbal sparring, and usually whoever Peter was fighting with or against told him to shut up. Not Deadpool. Deadpool started talking and didn't stop, spitting out puns and references like a machine.

However, despite the verbal fun, fighting alongside the mercenary felt a lot like babysitting a teenager. A particularly murderous and rebellious teenager. He ended up shouting "No killing!" as often as he traded barbs, and he had to keep an equally careful eye on and out for his temporary partner's weapons as well as his opponent's.

Later, after the cops arrived and took the baddies away (during which Deadpool somehow disappeared, and after which he reappeared by dropping down out of the dark like some ninja wannabe), Peter finally asked a question that had been niggling at him since he'd first arrived.

"Why were you here anyway?" Because Peter hadn't actually expected to see the man ever again, not when he wasn't a super-villain who was trying to kill Spider-Man specifically.

"Oh yeah!" Deadpool exclaimed and snapped his fingers.

Peter waited.

And waited.

And wait- "You gonna finish that thought?" he asked impatiently.

"Oh yeah!" Deadpool exclaimed and snapped his fingers again, the tone and gesture so identical to the last occurrence that it gave Peter deja vu.

'There's a glitch in the Matrix,' he thought.

"I wanted to show off my mad skillz," Deadpool announced with a grin so wide Peter could see it through the mask. "I don't do it a lot but I could totally pull a Jason Statham and go all Protector on that ass if it should ever fall in battle."

Peter tried to decipher Deadpool's statement against the beginnings of a headache. And then had to run it back through when he remembered that, the last time they'd met, Deadpool had tried to do a spider's mating dance to 'court him'. "That's Transporter, but- So- You wanted to... show me you could be a strong mate?" he hazarded a guess.

"Spot on, Watson! 'Course, we also considered just gift wrapping 'em up all pretty and leaving 'em for you to eat at your heart's content so I could sneak up from behind so I could have my wicked way with your behind-"

Peter cleared his throat loudly and uncomfortably, unable to ignore the heat in his cheeks and his ears. 'Forward' was a good word to describe Wade's 'courting' style, and yet, it wasn't the kind of courting Peter had ever had to deal with. If Wade was even serious about it. Not to mention the disturbingly large age gap.

"You do know that I have to be at least ten years older than you, right?" he asked, shifting nervously.

Deadpool stared at him. "My brain's in pieces, Spidey, but not that many. I can still do basic math. Most of the time. Some times. Enough times. And who doesn't love a good age dif' anyway? I'm legal, you're legal, we're all good to poke each other wherever with whatever. So what do you say?"

Peter gaped at him. "Ahhh, no," he finally managed, super glad for not the first time that he wore a mask that could hide the embarrassing flush spreading across his face.

"Oh." That one syllable sounded so disappointed that, when combined with the dropped shoulders, Peter almost felt bad for turning down a stranger's proposal for… courting. Then Deadpool apparently got over his disappointment because he perked right back up. "Time for Plan B!"

Peter took a quick step back. "No, no plan B. No murder, no cannibalism, and no plan B. And no beating me to my criminals again."

Before Deadpool could argue with him, Peter shot out a web and bailed, glad that that was the end of that.

That was not the end of that.

Deadpool began to show up everywhere. Fight at the docks? Deadpool. Fight in the city center? Deadpool. Fight on a rooftop dangerously close to Daredevil's territory? Daredevil. Just kidding it was Deadpool.

Peter wanted to be annoyed by the fact he seemed to have gotten a stalker somewhere along the line, but the silver lining on the situation was so thick it was easy to forget. Because it didn't take long for him to realize that every second the mercenary spent with him was a second he wasn't spending killing people. Which, secondary bonus: after Peter had made it explicitly clear that he wouldn't tolerate murder, Deadpool kept his guns holstered (mostly), and used his katana only to maim, Dobby-style.

However, it didn't take long for Peter to realize there was a downside too: he was actually starting to enjoy watching Deadpool fight (score one for Deadpool). Not that anybody should be able to blame him for that because as an accomplished mercenary, and ex-Special Forces, Deadpool should not only know how to fight, but also how to use every bit of his body to his advantage. And that he did. Which lead to the second downside: Peter was actually starting to get attracted to the man. Physically. Because even though Peter was stronger than Deadpool, watching those muscles at work was oddly satisfying. And arousing. Oh, and, well… Hat trick: he was starting to like Deadpool.

Spending more time fighting together led to spending more time together after fighting, which led to actually hanging out. Not at Peter's place, he still didn't trust the man enough for that, or with knowing his face and name, but apparently he trusted Wade enough that when Wade had first extended the offer to make pancakes, Peter hadn't even hesitated in accepting. In fact, he was at Wade's apartment for an hour before he even realized that he'd had no trepidation stepping into a mercenary's home.

Although, 'home' was a strong word for the ruin of an apartment Wade lived in, as evident by the fact that it was currently dubbed Safe House #1 since Wade apparently couldn't remember where the others were at the moment. Still, it housed a surprisingly comfy (if not grossly stained) couch, a television on a stand, and several gaming systems. Not that they ever used them all. Wade seemed particular to Nintendo games, and it wasn't until Peter had a controller dropped in his lap that he found out how aggressive a of Super Smash Bros. or Mario Kart could get. But when Wade got into a game, he really got into it.

If they weren't playing games, they were watching the Golden Girls or musicals or singing along with Disney movies. Even though Peter, as a nerd, had no room to talk in liking childish things, seeing Wade interact with all the child-like material helped keep in mind how young Wade was, helped him remember that, no matter how much either of them had seen of the world and its tragedies, Wade was still so much younger than him and should date someone his age, not someone like Peter. But even with the Avengers' insistence that they stop hanging out, that Spider-Man should just turn Deadpool in, Peter couldn't help himself. He couldn't even imagine a life without Deadpool now that the man was in it.

At last, he'd hit rock bottom. But! That meant there was nowhere to go but up.

Turns out one can still go down from rock bottom.

TBC

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