Although the Bowery had a great deal of pawn shops and cheap furniture, it lacked in the one thing Peter was looking for this day : books.
It made sense. Unless they were exceedingly rare or signed by a famous author, those didn't tend to go for that much secondhand. People who could afford buying new books wouldn't be living in this area of Gotham in the first place, and people who had to buy their books used didn't resell them as they tended to be too damaged by then.
That meant Peter had to go away from the Bowery and into one of the richer districts to find what he wanted. He ended up walking over to Old Gotham, which he at least was more familiar with than any of the other more stable districts due to his trips to the GCPD headquarters.
The Clocktower cast its shadows on the streets of the district as he entered it, looming over the buildings. It was impressively tall, for a construct of its kind, and he wondered what the view looked like at the top.
Maybe next time his shift ended early he could swing by and check it out. He had promised himself he would take the time to climb Gotham's skyscrapers and, although this one tower was ancient and smaller than most of them, it had an old school charm to it.
Yep. He would definitely climb the Clocktower. He even felt somewhat eager at the idea, a nice change from the darkness that had been plaguing him recently.
Due to the GCPD Headquarters being located in its heart, Old Gotham had a much higher police presence than any other districts he'd been into. Despite that, he could still see some signs of gang activities, further from the main streets and down into the back alleys.
No one was passed out high on the sidewalk, though. The place was a lot more put together than the Bowery, and it evidently came with a rise in rent as the people walking the streets alongside him were all wearing new, quality clothes.
He felt a bit out of place with his pizzeria hoodie, baggie pants and torn shirt but no one seemed to mind. Apparently, he wasn't the first poor kid to make his way out to the better districts. The fact he wasn't wearing a gun, probably helped with that. Most of the civilians in this district were not carrying firearms, although he could see and smell some on the occasional passerby.
Interesting how much the mere presence of a larger police force seemed to keep most of the gangs away from the daylight. They had been so blatant back in the Bowery that he had almost forgotten that this was not regular behavior.
Then, the Bowery wasn't the only district with rampant violence. East Side, when he had been there, and Park Row, which was at the border between different neighborhoods, both could be worse than it sometimes.
Park Row especially. He had never been to Crime Alley without ending up in a fight of some kind. Even before Firefly's bombs became the GCPD's main concern, the place had been rife with drugs and brutality.
Peter shook his head, wishing he could head back out as Spider-Man to help in those smaller ways. He wasn't so foolish to try and fight a major villain, not when he had so little intel, but with a full suit and his webs he could easily take care of a few street level thugs.
He didn't have a suit, though, and his web fluid was almost completely gone. He maybe had enough left for a couple swings, but even that was optimistic.
He wondered if he would be able to find a chem kit in the Bowery's pawn shops. Considering the drugs problems in the area, it would probably be a common item, he just hadn't looked at that kind of merchandise last time he visited the stores. That was a necessary expenditure, unlike his older, alternate self, he wasn't able to produce his own strings.
They had talked about it, while waiting for the big fight. The man needed even more food than the two of them to sustain his abilities, but thankfully not as much as a regular spider would need, proportionally.
The webs had been much stronger and stickier that what should have been possible, he remembered, thinking back to the fight. He had to carefully design his own fluid and this other Peter just happened to be gifted with the perfect ability right after his bite.
He had avoided recalling their meeting, not because he didn't like them, quite the opposite, but due to everything that happened around it. As odd as it seemed, meeting two alternate versions of him hadn't been as impactful as what had come after. He didn't want to think about that, though, not in public.
To distract himself, he looked around, taking in those surprisingly orderly Gotham streets.
The stores in Old Gotham had bigger windows than any of the ones he'd seen previously, and their doors were clean. The displays were obviously worked on thoughtfully, with many of them shining and twinkling with Christmas lights and fake snow.
He hadn't seen this many lights in a while. He found himself dragging his feet and looking into the stores. Expensive clothes, chocolates and technology. Gifts for the holidays. It made him nostalgic, yet bitter, in a way. He didn't have anyone to buy anything for, even if he had the budget.
Peter turned away from the colorful displays, clenching his fists inside the pockets of his hoodie. Just his luck that he would land in a world about to celebrate the one holiday during which you saw family and friends just when he had lost all of his.
Bookstores weren't hard to find but he had to look into smaller, dimmer streets to find some that weren't dedicated to new releases. He eventually managed to find a shabby little store, only a few streets away from the Clocktower, filled to the brim with old and used books.
An old man looked up at him from behind the counter when he entered the shop, which didn't look so little anymore now that he was under its roof. Another employee perked up as well, a much younger girl, probably a student. Peter could see some other clients walking in-between the full shelves. Each section was indicated by a little sign on the low stone ceiling, above the corresponding row.
He made his way to the "Tourism and Travel" area, hoping to find a map that wasn't too outdated, or maybe a guide to the city.
A lot of the books he found there were about other places in the world, including some he had never heard of before. He almost grabbed one about Metropolis, which sounded familiar, but decided to save it for later. Even if the differences between universes were fascinating, he had to focus on what was of importance to him right now.
First, research for his apartment, then some time online at the library. He could look up Metropolis then, but also dig into some of the names he had heard over the week. He needed to know more about Gordon if he was going to work with him. Since the man was the commissioner, he could most likely easily find intel about him online.
After a bit, he found a small shelf, the bottom one, filled with travel books about Gotham. He flipped through their covers and spines, trying to find the most recent one.
One of them had only been published two years ago. Small and compact, with a sober black cover, it was welcomingly titled "Surviving Gotham". The under title did not inspire much more confidence either as it read : "A guide to America's most murderous city". The author was left unnamed, probably a native, then.
It had detailed descriptions of many of the districts Peter already knew and a whole section on the safest places in town. He grabbed it, interested to find out more about the neighborhoods he hadn't been able to identify yet.
All of the others documents on the shelf were too old to have usable info but he did find an outdated map, stained and yellowed by age that, when unfolded, showed a surprisingly artistic and detailed rendition of the city. He took that as well. He would use it as a starting point for his investigation into Gotham, it was the perfect size to be clipped onto a board and then on the wall. He had always secretly wanted to do that.
Maybe he should grab some red strings, then it would be exactly like in a movie.
Amused at the idea, Peter decided to stay a bit longer to browse the shop. He liked it, the overflowing shelves and occasional piles of books and magazines, the sheer size of the store, which had many more sections than one would think when looking at it from the outside. It went down into the ground into an even bigger area. It felt comfortable.
In the "Biology and Genetics" area, he found a document penned by several researchers, none of whom he'd ever heard the name of before, explaining the origin of the discovery and everything known about the meta gene. This one was a must have for him. He was not a meta but, to everyone else in this world, it would be the first assumption if he was seen using his power. It had been the first assumptions the journalists reporting on his involvement with Firefly, after all. He had to make sure his powers were accurate to what was known by the general public.
To his surprise, he found several books on alien biology, based on encounters that the people of this universe had had with them. Extraterrestrials were a thing there, and a thing that had been studied in more depth than back in his own home. Once again, the names written were unfamiliar. No mentions of Asgardians, for example.
Strange, how whole civilizations had disappeared in between those universes yet New-York and much of the cities he was familiar with had remained.
Aliens were a fascinating topic but not one that would help him immediately. Instead, he headed to the "World History" section. As he had suspected, he found a whole trove of superheroes and villains oriented books. It had been the same, back at home, hundreds and hundreds of works had been written after the Invasion, and even before, about Captain America. He even had a couple of the comics, when he was a kid!
His hands were starting to get a bit full, as he got three books from that section. One of them was quite soberly titled "Superheroes in the contemporary world", but two were focused on Gotham: "A short history of Gotham's organized crime" and "The Bat Clan : A new form of vigilantism".
All of those, added up to the one science fiction book he allowed himself to pick up, a classic Foundation anthology, by Isaac Asimov, cost him barely twenty dollars. Peter really, really liked used bookstores.
The store's owner rasped a laugh when he saw the books he had selected.
"New in town?" He asked him, scanning his items with a machine that looked like it had seen better times. "Should head back home if you can."
"You're not the first person to say that." Peter sighed.
The old man hummed, unsurprised, and handed him his books, safely packed into a paper bag. He didn't have any weapons on him but, when he reached out to grab the bills Peter was handing him, the teenager could smell metal and powder on his hand. A firearm was hidden somewhere, and he knew how to use it.
It seemed like self defense was a necessity for shop owners in Gotham, even if the only thing they sold was old books.
Five books richer, Peter headed back to the Bowery. There were many things he needed to buy in order furnish his research and workshop areas, including more pens and a board for his wall. He hoped to have enough on him to find a sewing machine as well, although that wasn't a priority yet. He still hadn't extracted anything from the Iron Spider.
He now blended in well enough that he didn't have to be overly careful when walking in the streets. He still kept track of any suspicious civilian he could see or feel in the area, and especially of whoever was walking behind him, of course. He didn't want to be jumped for appearing to relaxed.
No one targeted him, though, and he made it to his destination without any trouble. Immediately, he started digging around for a chem kit. As expected, he found several of them in the back, some looking dirty and used, some relatively new.
He knew from previous gifts that new chem kits could run quite high, even without any chemicals included. There were only utensils in those, most of them made out of glass and fragile.
The prices ranged from twenty dollars, which included dirty and occasionally damaged kits, to three hundred, which were of obviously professional quality. He could smell substances coming out of both, some he was able to recognize, unfortunately.
Yep, someone had definitely been either synthesizing or testing drugs with those.
It hurt a lot to grab a 150$ kit out of the pile. It was large and would probably have been heavy to a non meta, stored inside of a sleek metallic case, all of its pieces were in perfect state and looked brand new. It was a good compromise between the broken, dirty bags and the luxury items he definitely could not afford.
The back of the case proudly announced that this was "the perfect compromise for a professional on a budget". Since labs usually payed for equipments as long as they stayed inside of their walls, this was most likely not aimed at researchers. He sighed. What kind of people owned this kit before him and how the hell did it end up in this shop?
He didn't feel comfortable handing this much money over but he had no choice. He hadn't thought about having to pay so much for a quality kit : May had gifted him one for his fourteenth birthday and he had been using it ever since then. He didn't expect them to be this expensive… His heart twisted at the memory. His aunt had always spoiled him, as soon as she got the opportunity to.
His hands shook slightly as the cash changed hands and he made a beeline for his apartment. He didn't want to walk around with something this fragile (and expensive) in the Bowery. It only took him a dozen minutes to reach his roof, which he was very careful walking around on. He could not afford to drop the case. He slid into his room slowly, using a bit of his unusual ability to stick to items to keep a safe grip on the expensive equipment.
Setting the supplies on his desk as gently as he could, Peter sighed, rubbing a hand through his hair. He felt exhausted mentally, disappointed in himself for spending so much money. Maybe he should have gotten one of the cheaper kits, but they had been damaged and…
This one was bigger, allowing him to make more web fluid in a batch, and the fact it was clean would significantly boost the synthetic webbing's quality. It was a good compromise and a good choice.
Now, he had to find all components.
Back in his world, it had cost him quite a bit of his allowance to gather them all up, and he didn't know if he even had enough on him right now. He would probably have to chose between his webs and his suit at first, he just didn't have the budget to start working on both right away.
First, he would need salicylic acid, which was around thirty dollars for a large bottle. Then, toulene, one of the cheapest items to procure.
Methanol, however, tended to be more expensive than those two, and he also needed it for his formula. Between the first three components, it would likely cost him at least a hundred.
And there was, of course, the carbon tetrachloride issue. The product had been deemed a restricted substance by the government back in his universe and, if it was also the case in this one, it would make the price shoot up. He just had to hope for the best.
Potassium carbonate would be easy to find. His last ingredient, however, could go for as much as 90 a bottle. Ethyl acetate had been hard for him to get back in the days.
He hadn't thought it through, he should have done the maths earlier. All of this would probably add another 250 to his expenses, and he hadn't even started working on the suit yet.
Peter took a deep breath. Panicking now wouldn't solve anything. Stocking up on vigilante supplies was expensive, more than what he had expected, but he would just have to live with that.
Not wanting to go out and spend more money quite yet, he started setting up his little lab, having to pull some of the clutter on the desk into his locker. The shotgun felt extremely awkward to handle when he moved it. He would have to work on the thing as soon as he could, he already had some project ideas for it.
He would need webbing for it to work, though.
After eating a disgusting lunch of ramen and onions, which he was growing more and more tired of, Peter headed back out. He hadn't brought any more cash with him, still rattled by how much he had had to spend. Even when he got the exclusive Avengers game, the only video game he had ever bought new, with all of his pocket money back when he was fifteen, he didn't have to spend much more than fifty or so dollars.
Old Gotham looked exactly the same as it had earlier in the day, with now even more people spilling in the streets, heading to their mid-day break. He looked at them enter restaurants or order at food trucks, wishing he could do the same. His mouth still tasted like onions and noodles. He couldn't spare the money, however, not when his Spider Arsenal was completely empty.
Barbara wasn't at the front desk of the library, he noticed. Instead, another student was manning it, greeting him with a glazed, distracted look on their face. He couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed at that. He barely knew her but the woman was a familiar, friendly face in a sea of strangers.
The computer room was empty, allowing him to sit in front of one of the most recent models. It even had a flat screen and a bluetooth mouse! He wished he had enough to get his own computer, or even a phone, but this would have to be enough.
He could probably get the last of the two, if he spent all of his remaining budget on it. He didn't want to grab something too cheap as he would eventually modify it to hijack police radios and, hopefully, also some gang communications. It also needed to be able to connect with the trackers he hoped he would be able to salvage from the Iron Spider.
His latest suit had been designed to send them out with a simple command from him but he would have to design another, simpler contraption to use them now. He missed his Stark connections almost everyday. It had been so easy to work on upgrades and repairs, back when he had access to all of that brand new, often secret and exclusive technology.
Back into the guest session, he began his research.
Looking into Gordon revealed a goldmine of information. The man had been in the police force since he had graduated, and the articles went back a lot. He had first been promoted to captain after helping rat out corruption inside of the GCPD. A good sign, to say the least.
A lot of controversies came from other cities' law enforcement due to Gordon's habit of working with vigilantes. That also made him breathe a sigh of relief. Some vigilantes in Gotham were metas, that he was willing to work with them, or at least with the one Peter knew of, Signal, showed that he wasn't one to judge too quickly.
Gordon was also linked with several arrests of many criminal figureheads, including the mafia network of the Falcons family. Almost all of the city's rogues had, at some point, been put in jail thanks to him. He was incredibly popular in most of the population, and had often been targeted by the mob.
Now feeling much more comfortable at the idea of working with the Commissioner, and not wanting to look too much into his private life, he started reading news articles related to crime in the city. Everyday, dozens more seemed to pop up, but he restricted the search to the ones that were related to gangs or vigilante intervention.
The villains of this town were apparently known to rally behind them dozens if not hundreds of street criminals. Some of them, like Killer Croc, worked alone, though. A man named "the Penguin", or Oswald Cobblepot, was cited as one of the main suspects behind a lot of the more unsavory activities in the city.
He focused on him, finding a disheartening high amount of "Penguin freed again!" articles in the midst of all of the "Penguin suspected of being involved in shoot-out/heist/assassination" ones. He was the kind of man who was very careful to keep himself clean from all evil deeds, then. Dangerous.
He had never really went against someone like that, it was way above his pay grade, and he didn't feel confident doing it even now. As Spider-Man, he specialized in recon, small street fights and all out super powered battles. The last and middle ones, though, were also the only fields of vigilantism, outside of tech, that he had any experience in.
He was aware that he would make a good spy, with his unnatural flexibility and his ability to stick up any solid surfaces, but he had never had time to focus too much on it. Maybe he should, if he wanted to be of any use against a man like the Penguin.
From what he could read, the only way he would be able to defeat the criminal would be to get his hands on some incriminating material. Those were often disproven by corrupted judges and jurys, though, so they had to be absolutely water-tight. He would have to infiltrate some of the man's hideouts to have a chance to find any of that.
He shook his head. He didn't have enough experience to deal with Penguin right now. Hopefully, the other vigilantes were better at handling him.
Closing off the Cobblepot tabs, he started looking into more of Gotham's rogues. Killer Croc was one who sounded like he could potentially be useful against. Extreme strength, protective scales, giant teeth, extended breath holding abilities, enhanced speed and stamina… outside of the teeth and scales it sounded a lot like a version of his own powers.
A weaker version of his powers, he soon discovered, finding a report written by doctors who had studied Croc in what was only referred to as "Arkham", a prison, if he remembered correctly. The meta human could lift a maximum amount of two tons. He knew for a fact that his limits, proportional to a spider's, were much higher.
The scales would be the real challenge. They were as hard as iron, the report said, and no civilian should under any attempt try to hit or shoot Croc, as it would result in more arm than good.
Yes, because apparently bullets bounced off of the meta's scales, unless they were very carefully aimed at weak spots and scars. He wouldn't be able to pull his punch with him, even if he wanted to.
That was someone Peter could potentially fight. Low levels of situational awareness and decision making skills were also noted in the public files. He felt like it was a bit shady, to put it all online like this, but Gotham seemed to care more about the safety of its civilians than the privacy of its villains.
It still felt invasive to read that Croc had been diagnosed with a severe mood disorder that caused him to blow up in anger at non augmented humans. He squirmed in his seat, uncomfortable. This wasn't the kind of things you were supposed to learn about someone when you didn't even know them.
Still, the explosive nature of his crimes meant that he very rarely planned to do anything devious during them and simply lashed out in anger. That, he knew pretty well. He could handle it.
It was odd, how much better he felt now that he knew that he wasn't completely useless in Gotham. Most villains, he didn't have any experience with but someone who focused more on brawl than brains? He could fight that person.
Now, he would have to keep looking in the rogues, finding the ones he could potentially fight and the ones he had to avoid at all costs. Excitement made his heart thump faster, his fingers flying over the keyboard as he typed and read. He wouldn't remember all those names, but he still had the pamphlet at home. This time, he would be able to keep working on it while away from the library.
Bane was another figure with potential. The man showed significantly more cunning than Croc and tended to have henchmen along with him, but he had a very obvious weakness, one Peter could exploit relatively easily. Unlike the previous criminal he had researched, this one relied not on the meta gene but on a mysterious serum to draw his strength from.
There was a lot less information about him than there had been about Oswald Cobbeplot or Killer Croc, and nothing about the contents of his serum. Maybe a mix of stimulants and steroids paired with some muscle enhancing-no… It was more likely to be something more like Captain America's own-… No what if-
He shook his head, stopping his train of thoughts before it could get too far away from him. Bane. He had to focus on that.
If Peter could cut the supply of serum, which was constant, it would give him an edge. He could see from the few pictures of the man after being defeated, that the tubes leading to the back of his neck were often off.
Maybe, if he was on a good day and had all of his gear, he could take Bane. He needed to look more into him, but his time at the library was running out and he would soon have to head to work. He wanted to get some more leads before.
Now focusing mostly on metas and other augmented rogues, Peter started looking through the amount Gotham had to offer. Those people, extraordinary due to their bodies first, would be the least likely to trick him.
Something in the list caught his eye and he blinked, incredulous.
Man-Bat?
Wasn't the main vigilante in Gotham named Batman? Was this a copy-cat or-… He clicked the link and sat in stunned silence as a picture slowly loaded. A giant bat-Human hybrid. An angry giant bat-Human hybrid.
In a city where the lead hero was bat themed, they also had a bat themed villain? That seemed like an incredible coincidence.
He was unable to focus on anything after that, coming back again and again to the sheer ridiculousness of it all. Batman and Man-Bat fighting each other… what would it look like? If it happened, it would be hard not to laugh at it.
He ended up leaving early, more reading was pointless in his state. He felt almost like he was in a good mood, it was surprising.
The Christmas lights still hurt as he walked away from Old Gotham's center, but he was able to push the bitterness down and instead enjoy the thought that this city, no matter how dark, was also incredibly silly.
At least now he knew that Spider-Man wouldn't be useless against some of the rogues. He would just have to restrict his involvement to the few villains he thought he would have a chance against.
Things were starting to look up a bit for his vigilante career.