Chapter 35: Regrets
I apologize in advance for the short chapter, but it had to be done. The cliffhanger demanded it.
Guest 1: Huh, so they taste the same way flies do with their hairs. I don't know if I'll give Peter that ability though, because can you imagine how bad the air in New York probably tastes? And what about when he goes to the sewers?! Ewwww. I'm not so cruel.
Guest 2: This Black Cat is actually more Marvel than DC aside from her power set. I've been reading several stories on Archive of Our Own where Felicia gained her cat powers through experimentation, and I thought that could spice up her backstory.
Shikarai: You're absolutely right, Peter has so much experience lying that he should be an expert. That's why I'm aiming for here. And because of those lies, Peter's mind is getting stretched to its limits as he tries to keep up his facade while still being wary. There are now so many points of view to write from that Phoebe may take a little backseat for now, but she'll be back soon. And yes! That scene from Andrew Garfield's movie is what first made me fall in love with spidery!Peter, but nothing else happened after that and I was so sad, and as cute as Tom Holland is he's even less spidery. They need to fix that. I'm having a lot of fun writing creepy Amadeus, as you'll see. And if you're wondering why I sometimes say weird things about cats, I actually can't stand them. My username is ironic and based solely on Felicia Hardy. But cats have clawed their way into my brain (and slightly into my heart), and so I'm forced to interact with them all the time.
Anthony performed his first vaguely playful act by bumping Felicia's shoulder. "I told you he could be a great fighter."
"Oh, shut up."
Earlier:
Peter was sleeping a lot more soundly than he had expected, even with the web. Not that he could tell, since he was asleep, but he had anticipated remaining in his more conscious 'spider nap' mode. Instead, he was so exhausted that he remained blissfully unconscious. No dreams and no worries. No thoughts at all.
Until something touched his web. Then his brain kicked back into gear in an instant.
Or at least parts of it.
His spider sense had always been the quickest to react to vibrations.
Peter sat up and hissed in the direction of the movement. He was still half blinded by sleep, but he had no trouble climbing down and identifying the exact thread that had been touched. If it were May, Peter would apologize profusely for being so rude. But it wasn't May. It couldn't be May. He was surrounded by enemies. He remembered that much.
And one of those enemies was touching his web. No, worse than that. One of the thinner lines snapped.
Peter hissed again, rubbing his eyes to get the sand out of them, then he would be able to tell what was going on. But there was a surprise. Something wrapped around his wrist, his right wrist, the injured one that was now doubly sore from working on the web.
Peter inhaled sharply. The pain wasn't the worst he'd ever felt, but it was enough to remind him why his spider sense could never be quiet here.
His spider sense was always right, so he followed its instructions now, pulling that thing closer and biting it.
There were screams and shouts and something else came up to try to hit him in the face, but Peter simply shot a silk strand to attach it to his web. He paused then, wondering if he should use venom or not. There was a little pressure today, built up from a night surrounded by danger. The trouble was that Peter didn't know what he was up against yet. Was it the Rhino? Was it Kraven? How much should he use? He forced his eyes open, blinking against an awfully bright light. Where had all this light come from?
Suddenly, he was swallowed up by welcome darkness. He released his fangs' hold so he could retreat into it, but the darkness came at a price. For the few seconds he was within it, it grew teeth and jagged claws of fear and hate. Before it got to be too much, he was released back into the light. His spider sense rang as something big collided with him. All the air left his lungs.
Peter panicked further. He couldn't breathe and he couldn't see and there were too many sounds. He hissed in warning before trying to bite again, but he was thrown against a wall. The thing came back around, and Peter dodged to the side, shooting more webs at it. When it didn't come back, he climbed higher, catching his breathe.
What was going on? Why was everything attacking him? Peter hissed lowly as he tried to open his eyes again, but the light was even brighter somehow. And then someone else screamed, and the light flew into him without a single warning tingle from his spider sense.
And everything seemed a lot more . . . mellow.
Peter relaxed against the wall, slipping down a few inches. He stayed there for a long moment, mind muddled with a content haze. It felt as if someone had just reached into his soul and patted him on the back with a wordless 'good job'.
At last, something felt good. Felt right.
All too soon, Peter's head began to clear, and he noticed that the room was a little dimmer. This time when he opened his eyes he could actually see. He blinked at the scene in front of him, trying to comprehend it.
Those were the enemies. The attackers. The people he'd played trivia with.
Adrien was in Vulture form, using his beak to cut the web that bound him to the floor. Tandy was helping him with one of her light daggers. Ty was crouched behind Peter's big web, trying to cover Amadeus with his trench coat. Amadeus was . . . crying? Peter caught a glimpse of his bloody hand before the two disappeared in a swirl of shadow.
Oh.
Oh god.
No.
He didn't—
He couldn't—
He would never—not again—
Peter ran his tongue over his fangs, discovering they were completely extended, having broken straight through his veneers. Blood lined his mouth, reminding him that he was still hungry from his relatively small meal last night—
A mangled mix of a sob and a gag escaped Peter as he leapt off the wall towards the bathrooms. He made sure to lock himself inside before emptying his stomach in the toilet.
There was a knock at the door. That was odd. It was too early, too soon.
May looked through the peephole, then checked the new scanner Shield had installed. It was a simple X-Ray machine, but it would prevent Taskmaster from sneaking in under disguise. The scan conformed that this really was MJ at the door. May let her in.
"Hi, Mrs. Parker," MJ greeted politely and somewhat awkwardly, which was strange. She had known the Parkers for nearly ten years. "I wanted to stop by and . . ." she trailed off, ending that sentence with a shrug instead. Her lip was quivering.
May's brow furrowed. "Are you alright, dear? Come inside before the guards get suspicious. I can make you some tea."
MJ gave a flat smile as she followed her inside. "I'm fine. I guess I'm just . . . coming to terms with all this information? Like, I sort of knew about Pete before, but now it's really hitting me. And I also wanted to make sure you were okay."
"I see. I understand the feeling," May replied sympathetically. "I'm fine. You don't need to worry about me. Actually, I've been meaning to ask about you. Exactly how long before did you know? What did you know?"
"Oh, right, well—"
"And don't tell me whatever cute little story you appeased Fury with. Ever since I learned about Peter's secrets, I always knew you would figure it out. It was just a matter of when, and how much."
MJ grimaced. "I'm sorry I'm so nosy. Ever since I took that investigative journalism workshop, I've been seeing stories everywhere, and I promised myself I would never use my curiosity against my friends, but then all that stuff happened with villains from Oscorp and Peter started acting weird and—"
May laid a hand on her shoulder, guiding the poor girl to sit on the sofa. She sat next to her. "Sh, sh, it's okay. I'm not angry. Peter probably won't be very angry at you either. I only want to know where you're at, to understand what you know and what you need to know."
"I don't want to sound cliché, but I don't know where to start."
"Then treat it like a regular story. Start at the beginning."
"Um, okay then." MJ steadied her breathing. "I normally need to revise all my stories at least twice, so this probably won't be too great, but here goes: I didn't really take notice of Spider-Man at first. He was such an overdone headline, and he was just like most other heroes, so I didn't care. Then the Daily Bugle started dragging his name through the mud and I got upset at their abuse of journalism. I decided to use the topic for one of my class presentations, so I studied it like everything else. The team started around then, and I rushed to include them in my presentation because Jameson rarely targets the rest of them. He only goes after Spider-Man which is just the most blatant form of bias I've ever seen!"
May frowned. This story was set much earlier than she had expected. "You knew from the beginning of the team?"
MJ shook her head. "Oh, no! Of course not. I'm good, but I'm not that good. I'm just explaining why I was researching Spider-Man and his team. Because it's not like I'm obsessed with him or anything."
"Okay . . . Continue."
"Right, let's see, so at that point I was learning everything I could about them, but I never imagined they might all be kids at our school. I only wanted a good grade. But then the Venom attack happened at Harry's party. A lot of our classmates were there, including Pete, but when we were evacuating, he was nowhere. I was so afraid for him that I stuck around, which was not my smartest idea, although I did get to see the team in action for the first time and it was awesome! Anyway, that was the first time I noticed Peter was missing while Spider-Man was around."
May listened, frown still on her face. She wished she had been aware of Peter's absence that day. Perhaps she would have realized sooner.
"The next day," MJ went on. "I tried to tell Pete all about what happened because I thought he missed it, but he didn't want to hear it. He looked so guilty. That was the first time I knew something was up, but I didn't know what yet. I initially thought he felt guilty because he was with Flash when Venom first came out. Now I know—" MJ blinked. Then blinked again. "Whoa, hold up, Venom is made from Spider-Man's blood which means that it's made from Peter's blood?!"
May nodded sadly.
"Wow, okay, I'll come to terms with that later. Where was I? I was getting a little suspicious of Peter . . . Yeah, I thought it was strange how he seemed so tired some days, and constantly guilty. I was worried about him, so I . . . uh . . . I didn't stalk him. I want you to know that. I never stalked your nephew. I only paid really close attention to him whenever we did meet, which was getting to be less and less often." MJ looked at May with wide eyes, practically begging for forgiveness.
"It's—it's fine. I appreciate that you were looking out for him." Was that all it took? Just a bit of close attention? May had paid attention to him, as much as she could. It wasn't her fault she worked so much. She did the sports competitions in order to win enough money to take time off, but her performance was declining over the years. Sometimes she needed to work overtime so that Peter's pay from Shield went entirely to his college fund.
MJ's shoulders relaxed. "Okay, thanks. Because it was only because of my close observations and notetaking that I noticed the pattern. Peter wasn't ever around when Spider-Man came out. And he made these four new friends who happened to have the same body types as the rest of the team. It was too much of a coincidence."
May nodded dejectedly. "When was this?"
"Hm, maybe around four or five months ago? But then Goblin kidnapped Peter which really confused me because Harry swore that he saw Spider-Man saving Peter with his own eyes. It made me doubt myself a lot, but I had this gut feeling. So I wasn't one hundred percent sure at that point. I just thought it could be true." MJ blushed. "And maybe I wanted it to be true."
So May's own suspicions were confirmed. MJ had at least suspected Peter's secrets long before May ever had. But what was this? Why would MJ want Peter to be a superhero? Then it hit May. "Mary Jane Watson, did you romanticize the idea of Peter being a hero to sweep you off your feet?"
MJ's blush was nearly as red as her hair. "What?! No! But—uh—like I said. Harry almost convinced me that I was wrong, which might have been for the best to be honest. I decided that it was too rude to ask Peter about something that sounded so ridiculous. And it got me thinking that, if it wasn't Pete, then it was still some other New Yorker underneath the mask. That's when I started writing the play. I . . . I sort of had Peter in mind at the very beginning, but I completed it to inspire people to see anyone as Spider-Man." Unable to get even redder, her blush spread. "Oh god, but now that I know the truth, I basically did just write an entire play for my best friend."
May smiled knowingly. "Peter was extremely honored when he heard about it. You made his entire year."
MJ grinned back. "I can't wait to see the look on his face when he knows that I know." Then both of their smiles disappeared. "But . . . he's kidnapped . . . Mrs. Parker, is it true what Fury said? Is Peter in mortal danger right now?"
May managed a small nod as she held back her tears again. "Taskmaster is an accomplished assassin. He once wanted to recruit Spider-Man for his team, but Peter refused, naturally. Since then, Peter has been quite the thorn in Taskmaster's side. And Taskmaster . . . he doesn't tolerate thorns."
MJ looked horrified. "But he doesn't know Pete is Spider-Man, right? He can't!"
"I don—" May's voice cracked. She tried again. "I don't think so. Taskmaster sent me a letter trying to excuse what he did. It didn't sound like he knew anything."
Tears were starting to appear in MJ's eyes too. "He can't. All this time, even though I wasn't sure Pete was Spider-Man, I always imagined he was. I would imagine him saving me and I would off his mask and he would look ridiculously shocked and then we'd—" She stopped, sniffling. "He can't be gone forever. I never told him how much he means to me—to the world. He can't . . ."
May pulled her into a hug. "They're looking for him. Shield is looking. The team was out for hours last night searching. They'll find him."
The reassurances felt hollow this time, as if they meant nothing. For her and MJ, maybe the words truly were empty. They cared so much about Peter. MJ didn't know it yet, but you could never tell someone you love them enough. There was always more, always something else that you never got to say. Despite decades of confessing her love to Ben, there were a thousand more conversations on the tip of May's tongue. With Peter she vowed to try her absolute best to tell him these things every single day, every single time he needed reassurances about his powers.
Now today she could tell him nothing, and tomorrow was uncertain.
It was never enough. Time was never enough when you wanted to spend it with the ones you love.
