Chapter Text
Beep. Beep. Beep.
"Ugh…"
Mizuki groaned, rolling over onto her side. Beep. Beep. Lifting a weak arm up to wipe away the sleep in her eyes, she stared at the digital alarm clock in front of her as it screamed at her mercilessly.
Beep. Beep.
Strands of thread dangled from the ceiling as the cellphone stuck tauntingly out of reach. Beep. Beep. Mizuki hadn't bothered to grab it down from the ceiling last night. But, now she needed it.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
She sat up with a yawn, staring up at the phone.
Beep. Be-
"Can you please shut up already."
The alarm clock unsurprisingly shut off as Mizuki's fist smashed the poor machine into a pile of spare parts. Her eyes widened in surprise (and awe) at her sudden strength before the realization brought along despair. All her symptoms were way worse now.
Was she really going to have to be some weird mutant thing now? Not to mention, she'd have to buy a new alarm clock. And then there was her phone. Her gaze darted between the ceiling, the webs, and her hands, and she thought of a truly ingenious solution.
After tugging on the web, the phone came down successfully, as well as some of the popcorn ceiling. Where the phone once was was now bare and untextured and Mizuki cringed at the thought of having to explain that to her sister. That was, however, for another time.
Mizuki hastily threw on her school uniform, smoothing it out in front of her mirror and fiddling with it until it was somewhat cute. It was kinda like how they say constraints necessitate creative solutions, or something like that. She put her hair up into her distinctive side ponytail, finishing it off with a bow.
"Mizuki!" The call came from the kitchen along with the sound of jangling keys. "I'm heading uptown to meet with a client. I made some quick eggs for breakfast, so make sure to eat!"
"Thank you!" Mizuki said, opening her door. "Good luck with whatever you're doing!" She smiled, waving goodbye while herself making her way to grab a quick bite.
"Goodbye, I'll see you tonight." Her sister returned the smile, closing the door.
Mizuki quickly scarfed down her breakfast and finished her morning routine. Shutting and locking the front door behind her, she began to make her way towards the subway station. Absentmindedly, she took her phone out to be greeted by the unanswered text from Enanan last night. Mizuki wasn't sure whether to jump for joy at her calling the nickname cute or to despair in anticipation of having to face her that day.
Homeroom was a bore, as was every other class after that until world history. Thankfully, Ena was seated on the other side of the classroom by the windows. Mizuki was nearest to the doors, which was honestly fine since she didn't mind being the designated door holder. Plus, it gives her a headstart on getting to lunch! And today, it would serve to help her avoid Ena.
Mizuki sat hunched over, her head resting on her crossed arms on the desk. Mr. Parker's lecture droned on and on. She'll admit that his class is usually fun, but that's when he's not lecturing. She turned her head lazily to look over her shoulder around the classroom to see a quarter of the class asleep, the rest fighting it, and… Ena furiously scribbling in her notebook.
She looked so focused, and Mizuki thought it unlikely to be notetaking. Her brow furrowed as she turned her pencil to erase something. Ena redrew something, again yet erased, and appeared to mutter something under her breath. It was kinda cute. Mizuki always wondered what was in her sketchbooks, but she never felt they were close enough to press the issue any further. Ena looked up, her face still contorted in a look of determination, at least until her eyes widened upon meeting Mizuki's.
Mizuki quickly turned away, burrowing her face in her arms. Did she catch her staring? Mizuki's face flushed in embarassment, and she was all the more anxious to get out of class.
"How much longer do we have left?" Mr Parker asked the class to no response. He looked at the clock and then his watch, nodding to himself. "Alright. That's enough lecturing for today. Please use the rest of this time wisely in working on your assigned projects."
Mizuki's heart nearly stopped. The sound of seats scooting around and chatter between groupmates filled the classroom.
"Mizuki, you weren't here last week, but Ena volunteered to be your partner. She'll catch you up."
"Ah… Thank you, Mr. Parker." Mizuki lifted her head up, looking over to see Ena already making her way towards her desk.
"Hey, Mizuki."
"Hi, Ena," Mizuki said, gesturing to an open desk next to her.
Ena dropped her backpack onto the ground, taking the open seat. She turned away, reaching into her backpack to take out her laptop. Mizuki did the same.
Mizuki opened a tab to research the… guy. She honestly forgot all the people she wrote down, so she went to take the notesheet from her folder.
"Enanan." Ena's sudden use of the nickname caught Mizuki off-guard. It rolled off her tongue as if she were playing arond with the name.
"Huh—What?" Mizuki stammered, nearly falling out of her seat as she looked up. Ena was looking away.
"Like I said yesterday, it's cute. I wouldn't mind." Her tone was quiet.
Mizuki stared at her in bewilderment for a moment before bursting out in laughter. "You had to bring it up again now?" Mizuki said, laughing even further at Enanan's sudden embarassment. Her reaction was just as cute as the name.
"Knock it off."
"Sure thing, Enanan." Mizuki handed the note sheet to her partner. Her own embarassment seemed to dissolve when faced with how Ena's was ten times worse.
The pair worked diligently until the bell. And by diligently, they spent five minutes actually researching with the rest of the time being Mizuki complaining about the project and teasing Enanan. The project isn't even due for, like, a month, so it was fine.
Once the bell rang, the pair walked out of class . Shockingly, they were the last ones out—it was not Mizuki's fault that she hadn't been paying attention to the time, leaving their notes and laptops still neatly set up atop their desks while all their classmates clammered out
"Well, Airi is waiting for me. See you later, Mizuki," Ena said warmly, waving behind her as she made her way down the hall.
"Bye-bye, Enanan!" Mizuki called, staring after her like some kind of pining loser (which she certainly was not).
"Well, you look smitten," Rui teased from behind her. "Do you plan on heading to lunch or just staring at the ground she walked on?" He walked up, nudging her with his elbow. "I heard you two giggling as I was passing by, and I thought I may as well stay for you."
Mizuki rolled her eyes. It was pointless to argue, unless she wanted to dig herself into a bigger hole. She and Ena were only friends and thats how it would have to remain.
"You missed the huge celebration they had for us yesterday," Rui said as they walked to class. "Fireworks and a marching band and a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a golden statue of us."
"No, they didn't."
"Yeah, they didn't. But they did have a blueberry muffin and a congratulations balloon. You missed the balloon, but if you go down to the front office they're saving your muffin for you."
"…I'll think about it."
"No time like the present. Come on, let's go get your lunchtime dessert," Rui said, redirecting them downstairs towards the front office. The halls were mostly empty, the majority of the school having gone to the cafeteria.
It turns out there was a congratulatory balloon, however it seemed a bit deflated. The muffin was fine, though. The pair sat on the rooftop, eating their own lunches they grabbed quickly from the cafeteria.
"I assume your history project is going well," Rui said in between bites. "You and Ena seem closer than before."
Mizuki nodded, putting a hand up to cover her mouth as she chewed. "I liked hanging out with her. Only thing was—" She stopped herself, thinking about all the strange things that had been happening to her. It certainly wasn't normal.
"…Was?"
She decided against it. She couldn't burden him further. "Was that she apparently had a brother? I've never seen him."
"Oh, Akito? Orange hair? Yeah, I know him. Broody fellow."
Mizuki scoffed at the blunt description, and a little bit towards her own disbelief at seemingly being the only one out of the loop about Ena's mystery brother.
"Pretty hard to miss," Rui continued.
"Now you're just saying that to tease me."
"Why the rush? Is there somewhere you have to be?" Rui asked. Mizuki hastily stuffed her worksheets into her bag haphazardly. Her calculus folder was already overstuffed. She shuddered at the thought of having to do her homework later. Arcsine. Gross.
"Kinda, yeah," Mizuki responded bluntly. She flung the backpack over her shoulder as she made her way out the classroom door, Rui in tow.
"Sorry we can't chat," she continued, turning around to face Rui as she spedwalk backwards. "Text me later!"
She turned back around and ran down the hall, nearly tripping over her untied shoelace and falling flat on her face.
"Careful not to fall now! See you, Mizuki!" Rui yelled from down the hall. Mizuki flashed a peace sign behind as she disappeared out the door.
She ran until she reached a small alley, only a few blocks away from the school. A fire escape ran alongside the wall of one of the buildings while the other was plain exposed brick. The alley itself was… fine. Fine for an alley, anyway. She kicked a can towards the dumpster, nearly jumping out of her skin as what was probably the hugest rat ever scurried out and into the darkness.
Nevertheless, this location was just perfect. If she were going to have to deal with newfound weirdness, she may as well have some fun with it—privately, of course.
Mizuki placed her backpack down on a (relatively) clean spot of the alley, cracking her knuckles.
"Alright, let's do this."
However, she did not know what "this" really meant. All this was pretty confusing without any direction. She decided to try out that web thing from last night.
"Abracadabra!" She exclaimed, pointing a finger at the wall. No result.
"Shazam?" Finger guns didn't cut it either.
"Rock, paper, scissors, says shoot!" Nothing happened, even though she did the whole routine and did a pointy gun motion thing towards the wall. Disappointing.
"…Please?"
She must've spent a half hour saying different magic words and different hand motions. Slumped against a wall, she was out of ideas, and thus resorted to staring at her wrists. At the least, now Mizuki knew where it was supposed to come out from.
Could it be a blood pressure thing? Or maybe something with the tendons? She sighed in frustration. She was not a medical kinda person. What even was a tendon? She took a moment to look it up.
Maybe it was like a button. She pressed her middle finger and ring finger down towards the bottom of her palm as if trying to activate it. To no avail, though. But, maybe like a fabric that you stretched taut? If she stretched her wrist and also did the button hypothesis…
Zoop.
Finally.
She practiced and experimented with this for a while, eventually able to control it, how to release, and even pulling herself along by it. Remnants of practice webbed between the walls and the ground and basically any free surface. It would've creeped her way out if she didn't know it came from her. Or maybe that was what made it creepy.
Her hands stuck too. She tried climbing, slowly making her way up the brick wall. Relax. She recalled what Enanan had said when she helped get her finger unstuck. She felt like a gecko, or more aptly, a spider. She looked down to the street, hoping that no passerbys would bother to look down the alley and see a high-school girl climbing up a wall.
She eventually made it to the top of the building, probably the result of climbing and climbing without bothering to think of when to stop. She flung herself over the parapet, unsticking her hands as if it was natural at this point. She looked over the skyline, just now realizing that the sun was setting.
"Come on now, you know the deal. Pay up." A gruff voice sounded from the alleyway down below.
Mizuki peeked over curiously, watching the exchange. Should she do something? She reached for her phone, only to touch an empty pocket. She must've left it in her backpack. Shoot.
"Hey, I don't got it on me!" A frantic voice responded, "Tell him I'd get it to him next week."
A metallic glint flashed her. A weapon of some kind. She couldn't just sit by and watch this guy get hurt… But she couldn't let herself get hurt either. Yuki wouldn't let her leave her sights ever again. She glanced over at the mass of webs further down in the alley, her own work. Surely there was something she could do.
"You said that last week. We can't keep floating you." Mizuki saw the knife now. "Pay. Cash or jewelry or whatever. I'm not leaving here empty-handed."
Fine. Mizuki untied her bow, wrapping the ribbon around to conceal her face. She was not ready to be making enemies.
She carefully climbed halfway down the wall, careful to be silent and to stay in the shadows. She looked down as the pair's argument only got more heated. At least it seemed that the mugger didn't want to hurt him—low bar.
Mizuki shot a web to the other side of the alley. Swinging across, she had terribly miscalculated the amount of web to shoot, and her arc left her crashing down into a pile of trashbags. She was a good few yards away from the men.
"What the fuck? Are you trying to kill yourself?" The gruff voice asked in pure bewilderment. He seemed to have forgotten his main task. A perfectly placed distraction.
"You!" Mizuki yelled, coughing. She sprung up to her feet, pointing an accusatory finger at the mugger. "That's… not very nice. Let him go!"
"…How old are you? You shouldn't be here. This doesn't concern you." The robber exclaimed, waving his knife in the air. "Get lost." The victim nodded in agreement.
"I'd count myself pretty concerned." Mizuki shot a web towards the knife, plastering it against the wall. She silently celebrating her aim, even though her nerves were going crazy. This was an awful idea.
"F-freak!" The thug said, stunned. "What the hell was that?"
Mizuki shrugged it off, shooting another two webs to stick the assailant's arms to the wall, followed by a flurry of more webs to ensure that he was stuck stuck. With him immobilized, she turned her attention to the victim.
"Hey, you okay?" She asked, reaching a hand out. The frightened man stared at her a moment before booking it away.
"Come on, man! Not even a thank you?" She yelled after him. Police sirens were audible from down the street. "Well, I should probably get going. You have fun, though." She webbed her backpack to her, throwing it over her shoulder.
Mizuki considered shooting another web to fling out of there, but considering last time, she thought better of it. She ran out of the alley and down the street. Once she was far enough, she took her improvised mask off.
"Never… again…" Mizuki sputtered out in between breaths, her hands on her knees. Being a hero was hard. A hero? Like, a superhero? She dismissed the thought. By now, the sun was completely gone. Yuki was probably worried sick.
She was right. As soon as she had gotten home, her sister rushed straight to embrace her.
"Where've you been? I tried to text you all afternoon, but no response," she stammered, "Even Rui had no idea. Said you 'ran off,' whatever that was supposed to mean."
"I was just out wandering. I'm fine though," Mizuki said dismissively. She cringed internally at the blatant lie, and she was sure that Yuki could tell.
"You had me really worried. Ever since you got back from the science fair. Look, if you need to take another break from school—"
Mizuki pushed out of the embrace, looking Yuki in the eye. "I really am fine, I swear. You don't have to worry. I promise. I can handle myself." She flashed a grin towards her sister, who was still unconvinced. Rightfully so, after that stunt she pulled. "I'll go up to my room now, because I'm exhausted."
Yuki stared at her for a moment, as if trying to make sense of her thoughts. "Okay," she said, smiling softly. "Goodnight."
"Goodnight. Love you, sis."
"I love you too. Grab something to eat!"
Mizuki tossed a thumbs up behind her, grabbing a quick snack before skipping off to her room.
Superhero. The word seemed to linger in Mizuki's mind. It really was such a flashy life, and one of danger. What was that one superhero movie she watched? Batman? He was kinda broody. She wouldn't wanna be like him, if she ever did become a superhero—not that she ever would. She did enough hero-ing for a lifetime.
Then again, she grabbed her fashion sketchbook off of her desk. She flipped through numerous sketches of outfits and dresses and accessories until she reached a blank page. No harm in sketching something.
She started drawing an outfit before pausing. Any good superhero worthy of a suit had some kind of symbol. She sketched a few designs, trying to incorporate things about herself as well as the nature of the spider-y powers.
Eventually, she was facing a design she was proud of. A stylized pink spider was laid out on the page, its front legs curved inwards so the whole thing would resemble a bow. It looked nice. She could see herself wearing it, emblazoned upon her chest.
Then again, the thought terrified her. Superhero. Her? No way. The drawing made it too real to her. The possibility scared her.
Superhero.
Mizuki ripped out the sheet that the symbol was on, crumpling it into a ball and throwing it into a corner of her room to be lost among the fabric scraps. This was just for fun. Not being a superhero. Just for fun.
She flopped her back onto the bed, taking her phone out. Just a regular girl. As regular as she could be. She scrolled mindlessly until she remembered what she told Rui earlier.
[8:32 PM] Mizuki: hey ! whatcha doinnnnnn
Within a forgotten storage container, Rui stood quietly in his makeshift lab staring at at an empty terrarium for a spider that wasn't there. The hustle and bustle of the city outside was muted in here and almost deafeningly silent. He didn't check the notification on his phone.
He thought back to a few nights ago when Mizuki had mentioned being bitten by a spider, and he scolded himself for being so reckless. He pinched the bridge of his nose, pacing back-and-forth in the small enclosure.
"I should've been more careful," Rui muttered under his breath only to himself. His words echoed off the metallic walls.
Mizuki was never meant to be caught up in this. This was for his own personal enjoyment—to stretch the possibilities of what could be.
However, this could all merely be coincidental. The spider that bit Mizuki could have been entirely unrelated. He could be overreacting. This was reasonable.
Rui sat down in a rolling chair, kicking off against a desk to roll to the other end of the container. He would have to monitor her. Discretely. Despite how much he truly wanted to be transparent with his best friend, it simply was not possible here.
He wasn't sure what he would do if she really had been bitten. He hoped he would never have to contend with that.
