Work Text:
Spider-Man couldn’t be dead… no, that was just silly. He was the hero of this story, the Batman to Deadpool’s Robin, the Sophia to Deadpool’s Blanche, the-
He was aware he was panicking, heart too fast, too loud in his ears, almost drowning out the slow and determined pulse beneath his palm. Deadpool may not have been the smartest man alive, but even he (am I having a panic attack? No just normal panic, like the kind we want to instil in our enemies, but not Spidey, never Spidey) couldn’t miss the palm laid flat on his chest.
For a moment he stared, brain mercifully and completely silent.
Spider-Man’s hand was so small compared to his own and Deadpool felt bile raise in his throat. How could Spider-Man even stand to be around someone as disgusting as him? What Deadpool definitely couldn’t miss was the push to his chest, just from a single hand, just from motionless to motion.
The brick was unyielding and cold as his comparatively fragile body broke against it, darkness rushing in to claim him.
Deadpool woke with the feeling of skeletal hands in his, and the scent of grave dirt in his nose. The first breath burned but he pushed through it, well-practiced by now at this particular business of dying and resurrecting.
Spidey was still lying where Deadpool had last seen him, body twitching, gagging. Choking. He was choking. Deadpool staggered to his feet, nerves still crawling down his legs, stumbling like he was lost at sea, storm raging.
Ignore that, move past it. His own pain wasn't important now, mind focused on getting to Spider-Man. Deadpool knew what choking felt like, was intimately familiar with the pain of struggling for breath that was never coming, panic and confusion disrupting everything else.
Deadpool's skin ripped on the seams of Spider-Man's suit as he grabbed at him, roughly yanking his mask up too free his mouth, his blood lost on the red fabric as he rolled the other man onto his side, half dragging him onto his lap to try and clear his airways.
Spider-Man was surprisingly light, too light, all skin and bone compared to the compact silhouette he had been just a few months ago. Spider-Man coughed, clear liquid and bile splattering the ground as he retched, limp in Deadpool's lap.
"I'm sorry," Spider-Man murmured, so quietly it was almost swallowed by the horns of traffic far below them, the sounds of city in motion even at three in the morning.
"You don't have to be sorry baby boy," Deadpool soothed, mind a whirl, almost too fast for him to keep track of, emotions slipping through his fingers before he could settle on one. Worry raced through him, heart beating loudly in his ears as Spider-Man shook in his arms, continuing to vomit up his stomach contents, all liquid.
"I let him die," Spider-Man groaned finally after what felt like a lifetime, voice cracked and broken, and it broke Deadpool's heart. They were friends, Spider-Man had said they were friends, had stitched Deadpool back up and, while the masked hero complained about Deadpool killing people (and he was getting better, he was solving his problems other ways and wouldn't Spider-Man be proud?), he never tried to change Deadpool.
He held his hand and didn't flinch away from the disgusting mess of his skin, complimented his dresses and it seemed genuine.
And now Spider-Man was hurting. And this wasn't a problem Deadpool could solve with his guns, or his swords, even his arsenal of witty catchphrases and comebacks.
The merc with a mouth wasn't needed here. Instead he was just Wade, Spider-Man's friend, and he held the sobbing, definitely drunk man closer, rubbing one hand along his thigh comfortingly while he made sure he didn't choke and let him ride it out, unable to do anything to make it better.