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Ned swung his legs over the side of his bed. “This isn’t weird at all,” he mumbled, a bit panicky- apparently Peter wasn’t here?? But his body was?? And oh god DID was so weird and it was so freaky getting used to someone else being in your friend’s body-
“Ned? You… good there, buddy?” Peter- no, someone else- asked, hesitant. Ned’s head shot up, the voice snapping him out of his rapidly-spiraling train of thought.
“No! No, I am not okay!” he cried, jumping off of his bed to nervously pace in circles around his tiny bedroom. “My best friend is here but he’s not actually here, he’s in some weird inner head thingy, and apparently there’s someone else in his body??”
Not-Peter looked amused- a stark contrast to how Ned felt at the current moment. “Ned, sweetie, you literally interact with the alters every day.”
Ned could feel the color drain out of his face. “I- I do?”
“You’ve talked to Spiderman before,” Not-Peter pointed out.
Ned paused. “I guess that’s true.”
“Right?”
“Right.”
“So why don’t you sit down, and I’ll help you with that LEGO set you and Peter were building.”
Ned nodded, biting his lip. His heart gradually stopped racing after he sat down on the carpeted floor, turning his attention back to what Peter originally came over to accomplish. It’d only been a few days since Peter- well, since MJ, really- let him in on his DID, and it was… a bit confusing, to say the least. He couldn’t remember half of the people he’d been told about if he was being honest, only Peter and Spiderman really stuck out to him at the time.
Not-Peter was definitely… neither Peter nor Spiderman, which meant he was dealing with a personality- or rather, an alter- that he had no idea how to interact with.
Which was just fantastic.
“Um, Ned? You good? You look like your brain’s about to fry up in there.”
Ned jolted. He kinda forgot Peter- er, Not-Peter- was there.
“Y-yeah, I’m good,” he squeaked, hating how his voice cracked. “Um, who… exactly are you?”
“Alex,” Not-Peter smiled, sticking out his- their? her? he didn’t know- hand.
Ned tentatively took it, shaking their hand.
“Um, what are your pronouns?”
“She/her,” Alex beamed, “I’ve met you before- don’t know if you remember, but we’ve chatted it up a few times. It’s nice to officially meet you.”
“That’s not creepy at all,” Ned mumbled, wiping his sweaty hands on his jeans.
“Most of the alters have met you, Ned,” Alex laughed, “we were all just in Peter’s body when we did.”
“Right, right, DID stuff,” Ned muttered, “I’m- sorry, this is still a little weird for me, y’know? I had no idea Peter lived with trauma or alters or anything like that. I just thought he was… normal? I guess is the word I’m looking for? I- I don’t know what I’m saying, I’m sorry.”
“Hey, don’t apologize,” Alex scolded lightly, sitting down cross-legged across from Ned, “I get it. It’s… difficult to fully understand, especially if you’ve never dealt with things like this before.”
“That’s the understatement of the century, but go on.”
Alex cracked a little smile. “To be completely honest, Ned, I had no idea I was a part of a system either.”
“Wait, really?” Ned gaped.
“Well- I knew something was up,” Alex laughed- it was strange, hearing a different laugh in Peter’s voice. “I fronted a lot, especially when the body was little, but I didn’t fully grasp that we were a system until we got diagnosed.”
“How can you just… not know?”
Alex picked at the carpet. “It’s not as hard as you might think,” she explained, “My main job is to take care of the littles. I didn’t interact with anyone else, other than Keagan.” She paused. “This might sound a bit silly, but I thought I had a superpower or something.”
“You mistook a mental illness for a superpower?” Ned asked, “how does that even work?!”
“I have no idea,” Alex threw her hands up, then brought them back down into her lap, “I just thought… I don’t know, that maybe I was sent to protect this poor little kid who couldn’t take care of himself.”
“By ‘kid’ you mean…?”
“Peter, yes.”
“Huh.” Ned’s head was spinning. “That’s-”
“Pretty stupid,” Alex let out a little laugh.
“Pretty awesome,” Ned corrected.
Now it was Alex’s turn to look surprised. “How so?”
“Pass me that four-by-six,” he said. Alex obliged. Ned picked up a piece and connected the bricks together, then turned to connect it to a larger connected set of bricks. “I mean, you saw a kid you’d never met before who was probably in pain and going through some messed up things, and instead of running away like a lot of people would have, you helped him. I’d say that’s pretty heroic.”
Alex stared at him for a solid ten seconds. “I guess I never thought of it that way,” she said, tilting her head down to stare at her lap. “I’ve always seen Peter as one of my boys. I remember thinking… ‘this poor little kid needs my help, and I’ve been sent to help him.’” Alex shrugged. “I can see now how that’s a little weird, but at the time I didn’t question it. I just… did it.”
Ned smiled, connecting another series of bricks together. “That’s really cool, man.”
“Thanks, Ned.”
Ned nodded, cheeks flushing a bit. Alex reached out and ruffled his hair. “Gah!” Ned sputtered, “that’s still super weird! How do you deal with being stuck in Peter’s body like that?”
Alex burst into another fit of laughter. “You get used to it after a while.”
“Still!” Ned flattened his hair back down. “It’s gotta be at least a little freaky.”
“Not really,” she shrugged, “my body actually isn’t built too differently than Peter’s. It’s not that much of a change. Some of the others, on the other hand…” she smoothed out the wrinkles in her pants, “let’s just say some of them don’t take too well to being in the body.”
“The bathroom incident?” Ned questioned.
“Exactly.”
“Hm,” Ned pondered, “is your body different… uh, inside? The head?”
“Yeah,” she answered, “wanna see my faceclaim?”
Ned nodded furiously. “Uh, duh.”
“Alright,” Alex grinned, pulling out her phone. She tapped on the screen for a second before holding the device out for Ned to see.
Ned gaped. “Is that Graceful Addison?!”
Alex’s eyes brightened. “You know them?!”
“Uh, of course I know him!” Ned grinned, “They're a bisexual icon! Peter showed him to me a couple months ago, and I’ve watched all of his videos at least ten times over by now.”
“Oh my god, that’s amazing!” Alex cheered, “nobody ever seems to know who he is.”
“So, you’ve always just looked like him?” Ned asked.
“Not always,” she said, her excitement calming down just a tad, “I actually used to look more like the character Barb from Stranger Things. Addison became kind of a safe person for the system, in a way- the boys used to binge their videos for hours- and I kinda picked up some of their traits.”
“That’s so cool,” Ned whispered, eyes wide.
“Right?” Alex grinned. She tucked a lock of curly hair behind her ear and turned her attention back to the LEGO set. “Alright kiddo, how’s this done exactly?”
“Doesn’t Peter have like, a million LEGO sets at home?”
“I’ve never used them!” Alex shot back, “the most I do is kick them out of the way so I don’t step on them in the middle of the night.”
“The most painful way to die,” Ned whispered hauntingly.
Alex snickered. “It really is. C’mon, show me how to do this.”
Ned smiled and picked up the instruction booklet, handing it over to the curious girl. Maybe alters weren’t so weird after all.
Actually, scratch that- the whole concept of alternate personalities was still a little weird, but maybe Alex could help him understand.
“Ohhhh, so that’s where that goes.”
Ned grinned. “Duh!”
It would just take a little time before he did, and that was perfectly okay.