New York City, April 1943

The bell above the bodega door jingled with the hollow cheer of a tinny relic, its sound swallowed by the damp chill of the morning. Peter Parker wiped his chapped hands on the frayed apron tied around his waist, the coarse fabric scratching against his skin like a reminder of all the things he couldn't afford to forget. The shelves around him stood half-empty, their sparse offerings a testament to ration stamps and the slow bleed of war. Coffee substitutes, canned beans, and powdered milk—staples for a city holding its breath.

He was sixteen, though his shoulders had begun to curve forward like a man twice his age. The mirror above the sink in the bodega's back room showed him a face caught between boyhood and something harder: cheeks still round with youth, but eyes shadowed by the kind of grief that didn't fade. The draft notice had come for Mr. Delmar last week, and now Peter manned the register alone, the sour smell of old newspapers and dust clinging to his clothes.

Another day, he thought, arranging cans of Spam in a pyramid that wobbled under his trembling fingers. Another day, and maybe another letter from May.

But the letters had stopped coming two months ago.

Flushing, Queens – November 1939

Uncle Ben's laugh had always been a warm, rumbling thing, like the subway trains that rattled beneath the city. Peter remembered it best in the evenings, when Ben would sink into his armchair by the radio, a newspaper folded in his lap and his pipe smoldering faintly. The apartment on 45th Road was small—cramped, even—but it had smelled like safety: May's rosewater perfume, Ben's cherry tobacco, and the faint tang of metal from the workshop where Ben tinkered with clocks on weekends.

"You ever think about fixing something bigger, Ben?" Peter had asked him once, perched on the arm of the couch. He was twelve, his feet dangling inches above the floor. "Like cars? Or airplanes?"

Ben had smiled, the lines around his eyes deepening. "Not everyone's meant to fix the whole world, Pete. Sometimes you just fix what's in front of you."

But the world didn't wait for small kindnesses.

It was a Thursday when Ben collapsed at the shipyard. A heart attack, the doctor said, quick and painless. Peter hadn't believed it. Painless for Ben, maybe. For the rest of them, it felt like a bomb had gone off in the apartment, shredding the wallpaper and the routines and the way May hummed show tunes while she darned socks.

At the funeral, Peter stood stiff in a borrowed suit, the wool collar itching his neck. May's hand gripped his shoulder like she was afraid the wind might carry him off too. The sky had been the color of wet cement, and when the pastor recited Psalms, Peter thought about the way Ben's voice had cracked when he'd tried to sing God Bless America at the Fourth of July block party.

Gone. Just like Peter's parents.

December 1941

The radio crackled with static, President Roosevelt's voice slicing through the apartment like a knife.

"Yesterday, December 7th, 1941—a date which will live in infamy..."

May set her teacup down so sharply the saucer splintered. Peter watched the amber liquid seep into the lace tablecloth, spreading like a stain.

"They'll need nurses," she said quietly.

Peter's throat tightened. "You're not going."

"Peter—"

"You're not. They can't make you. You're... you're too old." The words came out harsher than he meant them to, and May flinched. She was forty-seven, her dark hair streaked with silver, but her hands were steady as they reached for his.

"I'm a trained nurse, and they're asking for volunteers. If I don't go, who will?"

"Someone else!" He jerked away, the legs of his chair screeching against the linoleum. "You're all I've got left. You can't just—"

"Peter Benjamin Parker." Her voice was soft but firm, the way it had been when he'd skinned his knees as a child. "Look at me."

He didn't want to. He stared at the broken teacup instead, the way the cracks mirrored the ones in his chest.

"Your uncle..." She paused, and he heard the tremor she'd hidden from everyone else. "Ben used to say that when he was in the trenches, he'd see boys—kids, really—freeze up when the shells started falling. But the ones who moved, the ones who dragged their buddies to safety... they weren't any braver than the others. They just understood something."

Peter finally looked up. May's eyes were bright with tears, but her jaw was set.

"With great power comes great responsibility," she said.

He snorted. "You're a nurse, not a soldier."

"And that's my power. Keeping people alive. If I stay here because I'm afraid, then what kind of person does that make me?"

The argument lasted for days. Peter threw himself into school, into work, into anything that drowned out the fear clawing up his throat. But when he came home one evening to find May's suitcase by the door, her army-issued nursing uniform neatly folded inside, he knew he'd lost.

She kissed his forehead at Penn Station, her lips cold. "I'll write every week. And when this is over, we'll go to Coney Island, just like we used to with Ben. I'll even let you beat me at Skee-Ball."

He didn't hug her back. Not until the train began to pull away, and then it was too late.

Parker Apartment – June 1943

The whiskey bottle was half-empty, its label peeling at the corners. Peter slumped against the wall of the apartment, the revolver cold in his lap. Ben's old service weapon, kept in a shoebox under the bed like a shameful secret.

It'd be quick, he thought. The war had taken May—swept her into the ground along with some bombed-out hospital in France. The official letter had called her a hero. Gave her life saving others, the army man had said, his own leg ending abruptly at the knee. You should be proud.

Peter wasn't proud. He was hollow.

The room spun, the whiskey burning a path down his throat. He lifted the revolver, the barrel trembling as he pressed it to his temple. His finger hovered over the trigger.

"With great power..." May's voice, warm and stubborn, cut through the haze.

"Stop it," he slurred, squeezing his eyes shut.

"...comes great responsibility."

"You left me!" he screamed at the empty room. The gun clattered to the floor.

He passed out there, tears drying on his cheeks.

Recruitment Office – July 3, 1943

The line stretched down the block, a shuffling procession of young men in worn-out jackets and too-shined shoes. Peter stood stiffly, his hands shoved deep in his pockets, his stomach churning with something that wasn't quite fear—just the heavy, sick weight of inevitability.

He had filled out his enlistment form with careful, deliberate strokes—Parker, Peter Benjamin; age: 18; last living relative: deceased (Aunt May Parker, Army Nurse Corps, KIA France). The clerk at the front had barely glanced at it before directing him to the medical screening area. A bored-looking corporal took his height and weight and waved him toward the examination benches without comment.

Peter sat down on the chairs, the scent of antiseptic and sweat thick in the air. To his left, a scrawny guy in a white wife beater, like all of them, shifted restlessly, his fingers tapping against his knees.

"Rogers, Steve! Quinn, James!" a nurse called out. Then, "Parker, Peter!"

The recruit sitting in front of them was reading the paper and muttered under his breath, nodding toward the posters of soldiers charging into battle. "Lot of boys gettin' killed out there. Makes you think twice about enlistin', right?"

Steve, the scrawny guy, didn't hesitate. "Nope." He stood, shoulders squared, and moved toward the examination line.

Peter followed.

The army doctor barely looked up as Steve stepped forward, flipping through his file with a deepening frown.

"Sorry, son," the doctor said, shaking his head.

Steve stiffened. "Look, just give me a chance."

The doctor sighed, tapping the paper. "You'd be ineligible on your asthma alone."

"Is there anything you can do?" Steve's voice was quiet, but there was steel in it.

The doctor met his eyes. "I'm doing it. I'm saving your life."

For a second, Steve looked like he might argue. Then his jaw clenched, and he turned away without another word, walking out without so much as a glance back.

Peter watched him go, something twisting in his chest.

Then it was his turn.

The doctor flipped open a fresh file. "Name?"

"Peter Parker."

"Age?"

"Eighteen."

The doctor glanced up, eyebrows raised. Peter's hands curled into fists at his sides. He had practiced this lie in the mirror all morning, smoothing out the tremor in his voice.

The doctor's eyes flicked to his height notation. "Your height's good," he admitted, "but you look about fourteen, kid."

Peter swallowed. "I'm seventeen," he amended, his voice cracking. Damn it.

The doctor sighed, flipping through the form. "Parental consent?"

"They're dead."

A pause. The doctor's pen hovered. "Guardian?"

"Aunt May. She—" Peter's throat tightened. "She was a nurse. Volunteered for the Army Nurse Corps after Pearl Harbor. Died in France when her field hospital was bombed."

The doctor exhaled slowly, setting down his pen. "And you still want to enlist?"

Peter met his gaze. "She was the bravest person I ever knew. She didn't have to go—she chose to. Because she could help. Because it was the right thing to do." He took a breath. "I don't want to kill people, sir. I want to be an army medic. I want to save lives while other people are taking them."

The room was quiet for a long moment.

Then the doctor reached for his stamp—not the 4-F, but the one that mattered.

"Welcome to the U.S. Army, son."