Chapter Text
Something was wrong, and I wasn’t sure how to fix it.
Victoria had been looking at me strangely ever since just before we got on the train, and I really didn’t want to blame Ashley for that. I knew she was just being protective, and that she was a worrywart, and I loved her so much for wanting to be there for me. Even over the phone. I knew from therapy that just because someone is your friend doesn’t mean you’re 100% in sync, but...
Well, she was right and wrong at the same time. She was right that they weren’t my parents, but wrong that they weren’t my family. But as the bells had started ringing and the train arrived, I’d seen Victoria’s face change and knew something was wrong. I had quickly told Ashley that I loved her and had to go, then barely resisted the urge to block her from texting or calling us.
I knew from past experience that when you cut people off from making a mess messier, it just makes a bigger mess later. Especially when you’re a kid. It didn’t matter if you were right and they were wrong. You’d be the one who...wait.
I was going in circles. I was avoiding the problem by convincing myself that there was no way to solve it, because of all the times I’d messed up before. I’d been silent for the past few minutes, staring at my knees. Maybe I could make smalltalk, and buy some more time to think?
Victoria started to say something, then saw I had opened my own mouth and closed hers. Our game of conversational chicken continued, and I tried to smile so she wouldn’t be offended by my rudeness. I just needed a little more time to figure out a solution for the problem.
Okay, so the main problem was that I had to correct the mistaken assumptions that Victoria probably had about my family situation. That was kind of the whole point of this dinner, but if she went into it worried about bad stuff then she’d miss all the good stuff.
It was like that time I tried to eat a banana split, a few days after Chris had told me about the secret spiders that hide in bananas. Why did I watch that video?
Focus, Kenzie.
I want to explain the truth to Victoria, but this was the worst possible place for it. No visual aids, no tools, and she’s already three times as nervous as I am. Or is it the other way around? I mean, Victoria’s been a hero for way longer than me, so maybe she’ll understand and is just giving me a chance to be brave? There aren’t that many people on the train, so I guess-
“So, how’s school?” Victoria asked, and I must have jumped because she stopped talking.
“Can I sit next to you?” I asked quickly, and thankfully Victoria didn’t ask why. She must have heard my heart beating out of my chest, or maybe she’d dealt with other kids like me in that place I’m not supposed to ask her about. She was so cool and professional and kind…
“Sure, just watch your step. Sharp stuff in there.” Using the arm that didn’t get hurt, she easily moved her bag of armor stuff out of the window seat and to the floor. “Okay, all clear. You know, we don’t have to talk about school, or anything else. It’s okay to just sit here and relax.”
It was really tempting to take her up on that offer. We were just sitting on a train, two awesome heroes, side-by-side and looking anywhere but each other, waiting for one of us to break the silence that was getting louder as every second passed. But we were a team now, and the very people we were about to talk about had taught me there was more to a team than just fighting.
“No, I want to talk about this. Sorry, but I’ve been a little worried about how you took what Ashley said before we got on. I love her, and she’s awesome...but she’s mostly wrong.” It felt like the whole train car was listening in on our conversation, but I forced myself to look at their reflections in the window and my phone. Seven other people. Four had headphones on, two men were kissing, and a woman was sleeping. “I mean, if it doesn’t annoy you too much.”
“Kenzie, my bar for being annoyed is so high we’d need to be in an airplane to even see it.” She smiled at me, the same grin I’d seen on a poster of her that I had at one point. The one where she had her second costume, the one with the tiara that kept slipping off when she did flips. One such tiara had showed up on eBay, for a whole lot of money. “But if you want to stop at any point, go ahead. A train car isn’t really the most private place to talk, I know.”
As tempting as it was to tell her the surveillance I’d just done a few moments ago, I held off on sharing it. Doctor Yamada said that stuff like that should be saved for when people asked, not just tossed out as though it was the sort of thing people normally looked for. I just smiled at her.
“I don’t think anyone’s paying attention. I’ll try to keep it to low-level personal stuff and talk quietly, just in case.” I went over things in my head, then nodded as she leaned in a bit closer. As if she knew I was about to start with the bad stuff, her arm went around me and she slouched down a bit. “So, let’s start with my real parents. My original parents, I mean.”
It wasn’t easy, but I told her the bare-bones minimum of what they’d done. The bullying, the yelling, and being so bad to me that my school noticed I was hurt. The teachers had me talk to some adults who were supposed to help kids like me. Kids who were in a bad situation, and who didn’t have anyone else to turn to. Kids who needed another chance, another life.
In my case, it had actually taken a few tries to get me somewhere they knew how to take care of me. I jumped straight from my parents to my time as a Ward, and started to worry. Not just because of all the stuff I’d skipped, but because it was a rough time for me. I was a Ward with so much power, and felt like I had a lot to make up for. It was a lot for someone my age.
Suddenly I had so many resources and felt like I had to do a lot of good to make up for all the bad I’d accidentally done beforehand. But the adults kept making all these silly rules, and instead of laughing Victoria just nodded as I shared a few of them. My voice sounded so small in my ears as I admitted I’d bypassed the rules so many times, to try and help people.
“As a former kid hero myself, I know exactly what you mean.” Victoria murmured as I paused to take a breath. “I used to go out on solo patrols all the time, even though Mom tried to give me curfews and chaperones. I’d always get in trouble, and argue with her that it was worth losing a bit of sleep to help save people from bad guys. Sounds like you learned from it though, right?”
I nodded, and was super glad she’d said that. Not just because she totally got me, but because it made me feel okay about having skipped over a lot of my bad stuff. My trigger, Keith and Antonio, and so many other details that could wait for another time. Doctor Yamada was always telling me that dwelling on the bad stuff sometimes made it harder to appreciate the good stuff.
“Skipping ahead a lot, back in early 2014 I was in a special orphanage. They had me just tinkering all the time, and when I asked about field work they said that I needed actual parents for that.” The doctors and administrators had showed me a bunch of studies about long-term psychological effects and other stuff. I tried to explain that sticking me with parents was an accident just waiting to happen, but they refused to budge. “The ones I wanted already had a family, and I’d promised not to bug them. So, I went looking for...my birth parents.”
“Kenzie, please tell me you didn’t find them.” Victoria’s voice was gentle, but there was something in her tone that was odd. Like she was trying to avoid being mean, even though she was saying something kind of mean. I guess they deserved it, though. “I’m not trying to be rude, but after what you said they really don’t sound like they should have a kid, or even a small dog.”
“It’s okay. I couldn’t find them.” It had actually really hurt at the time, because I had this whole plan to bring us back together and make us a family again. If they were still mean, then I’d gather some footage of them being mean and use it to force them to be better. It sounded kind of silly (and dangerous, as Doctor Yamada always reminded me when I mentioned it in our sessions) now, but hindsight was a thing. “I kept trying, though. I had a tiny breakdown.”
I held my fingers apart an inch, and immediately felt terrible. This wasn’t a joke, but instead of telling me off Victoria just hugged me. I wanted to apologize, but there was nothing I could say.
Victoria was really awesome at hugging people. How did I know that? Because I felt better, even without either of us saying a word. After a few moments she pulled back and smiled at me.
Figuring I’d keep the happy train chugging along, I told her about my amazing new family.
The first few months had been rough, so I skipped ahead to the better parts.
Maybe someday I’d tell her about my first night with Ben and May.
It had been a real nightmare...
***
“-and here’s your room.” Ben said, opening the door and hefting my bag over his shoulder. There was a varnish smell that made me wrinkle my nose, but he quickly popped the window open. The flowers I’d seen out front wafted inside, and helped a little bit. “Sorry about that, I had been restoring some old furniture in here, and thought the smell was all cleared out. I can-”
“It’s fine.” I smiled, turning away so he wouldn’t think the tears in my eyes were from something he’d done. They’d let me into this big house of theirs, welcomed me to their family, and all I could think of was leaving. I looked out the window, and wondered if I could reach that big tree from here and...go where? There was nowhere for me to go. I was trapped, again.
“-paint?” Ben said, and I realized I’d been so inside my own head that I missed him talking. He didn’t look annoyed, and I made sure that he could see how appreciative I was of his patience. He grinned right back and repeated himself, waving a hand at the wall. “Oh, I was just thinking that the room is already a bit smelly, so if you want I can repaint the place to a color you like. We can put you in with our nephew for a day or two, and then this’ll really be more your own room.”
“No, it’s fine. You don’t need to make a big fuss for me. I’m just going to unpack, okay?”
Behind me, Ben threw out a few phrases that adults always used when they wanted to leave without actually sounding like they were leaving. He said that dinner would be in a few hours, to let him know if I needed anything, and then he just kind of shuffled off. The door closed, softly.
A few minutes later, I was still staring into my bag, a pair of socks in my hand. I hadn’t unpacked a single item of clothing, because every one of them carried a memory that bugged me. That shirt had come from Antonio, those barrettes from my parents, and even these socks had come from a Ward who loaned them to me just before she went off to fight an Endbringer and...no.
I didn’t want to be here. It was the best option out of a lot of bad ones, but I still hated it.
It felt like I was giving up, coming here instead of continuing the search for my real parents. Sure, I’d already searched a dozen times, but I’d only stopped because I was forced to. Almost a week ago, I was running my new facial recognition program on data from the gate, eyes glued to the screen. They weren’t dead, they weren’t alive, they weren’t hiding, they had to be some-
...and then suddenly I was on the ground.
I dimly realized I’d gone days without food or sleep, and heard someone shouting. Hands started dragging me away from my computer, away from my research, and I fought back.
Pretty sure I bit someone.
After that, they pulled some kind of rule out of their collective butts and put me with a family that was ready to adopt. I tried to explain that this was a mistake, but nobody listened to me. My reputation was in the toilet, and the person making the decision had a big bite mark on his hand.
Oh sure, Ben and May were kind, had a big house, and said their nephew that lived with them was some kind of brainiac. Maybe that was why they didn’t react badly to my tinkering, treating it like something amazing instead of a fantasy. They’d make great foster parents for someone...
But they still weren’t my parents. This wasn’t my home. I was alone.
I felt mad, and threw my socks out the window. It didn’t make me feel better, but I kept throwing and soon all my clothes were in the branches of the big tree out front. Instead of feeling victory or something I just felt stupid. What was I supposed to wear?
I climbed into the big, soft bed they’d gotten for me and wrapped myself up in the blanket.
The house started smelling super delicious, but I felt so sick that when Ben knocked on my door I lied and said I was too sleepy. I could hear his deep voice as he told May and Peter, and covered my ears. I hated what I was doing to them, being such a brat, but I just felt so...bad.
Eventually it got dark outside, the three of them stopped moving around, and it got quiet.
I was too embarrassed to tell them what I’d done, so I just stayed there.
I was hungry, lonely, thirsty, angry, sad, and...just so tired.
Then I realized that I was all alone.
The house was silent.
A sudden fear struck me, and I jumped out of bed, running to the door. I threw it open, not caring as the doorknob hit the wall, and rushed down the hall. I’d barely paid attention when Ben was giving me a tour earlier, and now all the doors looked the same.
“Ben?” I shouted, knocking on doors and opening them one by one. I opened them all, finding empty rooms and boxes, but no people or signs of life. “Hello? Ben? May? Peter? Anyone?”
I started to hyperventilate, running downstairs and seeing that all the furniture was gone. I burst out the front door, and the night was silent.
No cars, no other houses, not even grass or flowers growing out of the ground.
“Someone help me!” I screamed, but nobody answered me. “Hello?”
I spun around, but the house had vanished from behind me!
I started crying, hearing my voice echo in the night.
I had lost everyone and everything.
They’d all abandoned me.
I was alone.
“-wake up, Kenzie.” Someone’s arms were around me, and I grabbed on like a drowning person. I heard an unfamiliar voice, old and creaky but she was so warm and I sobbed into her shoulder. “It’s okay, dear heart. I’m here for you, just breathe. It was only a nightmare…”
“No, everyone was gone!” I babbled, trying to explain the dream even as I kept hiccupping and gasping. “They all left me because I was so terrible and ruined everything and made-”
“We’re not going anywhere, Kenzie.” I turned at Ben’s voice, and saw both him and Peter in the doorway. Ben had a pair of brass knuckles over one fist, and his nephew had what looked like a taser in his shaking hands. “Sorry, I should have known that sleeping in a big house like this would spook ya. Hope you can forgive me, it’s been a while since Petey had his own night terrors.”
“H-hey!” Peter squawked, puffing out his cheeks a little and swatting his uncle. “I didn’t have night terrors! My overactive imagination just led me to have-”
“Oh, both of you get on out of here, you’re spooking her worse.” May’s voice was like a whip, and both male Parkers scattered as if she’d actually cracked one at them. Before I could even react, her tone shifted back to kindness and she gently helped me sit up. “Now, do you want to tell me about it, or would you prefer just to sit for a while?”
“Don’t you need to sleep?” I blinked at her, still kind of confused as to how she’d gotten to me so much faster than the other two. As my vision cleared, I noticed most of my clothes on the bedspread, and a pair of pants draped over the open windowsill. “Wait, how’d you get in here?”
“Oh, I was hoping to collect some apples from our tree, but imagine my surprise when these turned out to be clothes.” She held up the socks that had started it all, then gently set them down. She didn’t mock me or get mad at me, even though it was my fault that a sixty-year-old woman had been climbing a tree at night. “As for my entry, well I just heard you shouting and slipped in the window from there.”
The part of my mind that tinkered wanted to ask how she’d climbed a tree that only had branches starting at the fifteen foot mark, or made a twenty foot leap from tree to window. But the rest of my brain was still rattled by that nightmare, and I started to tell her about it.
May listened calmly, never letting me go for a moment, and promised me that she’d do her best to make sure that was my last nightmare in this house. She stayed with me until I fell asleep, and the last thing I saw was her smile...one that made me feel safe.
The next night, Ben slept on my floor, and talked to me about his garden. We’d had an amazing salad with dinner, and even though I didn’t normally like veggies his were pretty good. He said I could help plant the next batch, if I wanted.
A few nights later, it was Peter sleeping on my floor. I hadn’t talked with him much, since he was busy with college. He mentioned a part-time job as a photographer. Suddenly, we had a lot to talk about.
A few weeks later, May came to my appointment with Doctor Yamada, and we talked about my nightmares. It was scary, even though I was awake, but I felt better with her there. Safer.
A month later, all three of us cheered really loud for Peter at his graduation, because he’d gotten two degrees. Later, he introduced me to his friends as being his little sister.
Even later, I realized I was calling them Aunt May and Uncle Ben. They weren’t related to me, and I still missed my biological parents.
But I was finally in a place that felt like home, with people who felt like family.
For now, that would have to be enough.
***
“-and don’t worry, I won’t tell your brother that you let his secret girlfriend’s name slip.” Victoria tossed a wink my way, and I breathed a sigh of relief. We’d gotten off the train a little while ago, but were taking the long way to my house. Partially so we could keep talking, and also because it was a really nice day outside. “Anyway, it sounds like your family’s pretty amazing. So, why was Ashley so concerned when you mentioned them? Bad first impression or something?”
“Ashley’s got it in her head that there’s something off about them because she’s used to people having ulterior motives and stuff.” It still hurt my heart to hear all the things that had happened to my friend. Even if she was a villain for a while, nobody deserved that. It was one of the reasons I always tried to make sure she knew I loved her. “Ben works at a clinic and likes gardening. May helps around the neighborhood. Peter’s always fixing stuff for free. They’re just...nice.”
“So they don’t have any dark secrets? No skeletons in their closet, or cultist robes?”
“Dang, you caught me, Victoria.” I rolled my eyes the way Ashley had taught me. She’d once told me ‘a droll tone and facetious delivery can turn the truth into a falsehood,’ so this way I wouldn’t have to lie to my friend. “May’s a retired cape, Peter made all her equipment, and Ben secretly fought in World War 2. Please, don’t tell anyone, or it could put us all in grave peril.”
“Fine, fine, I get it.” She laughed, and I felt the last little bit of tension between us dissolve. Maybe someday I’d tell her that I wasn’t kidding, but for right now I could put that on the back burner. “So, anything else you want me to know about them? All I remember about Peter from the minute I saw him before Capture the Flag was thick glasses and a sweater-vest.”
“Yeah, they’re kinda old-fashioned. Like, they dress in older clothes than most people, use old-timey words, and they’re really friendly.” I frowned at that, remembering how early on I’d felt like they were mocking me for some reason. It had taken a while to realize that wherever they were from, people were just generally nicer. “They were some of the first people on Earth Gimel, and kind of helped build the City a little. Oh, and I’m pretty sure they’re not from Earth Bet.”
“How can you tell?”
“It’s silly, but they don’t understand a lot of the references I make to capes and stuff. Not even Peter. I had to teach them about Scion, Endbringers, the PRT, and a bunch of other stuff.” Holding up my hands to make a little rectangle, I grinned. “I made flash cards and everything.”
Those had been fun nights, flipping through cards and quizzing my new family on stuff. I’d made mnemonic devices, taught them the song to remember power classifications, and used my swipe cards to teach them about different heroes.
“So, maybe they were just from a world without capes?” Victoria seemed lost in thought, and shook her head after a moment. “I can’t even imagine what that’s like. Must be so peaceful.”
“No, they had capes, but they don’t really talk about them that much.” I shrugged as she directed a quizzical look at me. I knew that she was a way bigger cape nerd than me, and figured she’d just ask them eventually. “Their Earth had all kinds of capes I’d never heard of, with names like Iron Man, Namor, the Human Torch, the Hulk, and Thor.”
“Wait, like the Norse god of thunder? Wow, ego much?”
“Yeah. Some had really silly names. Paste Pot Pete, Leap-frog, Ruby Thursday, the Whizzer-”
“No way, you’re making that one up!”
“I’m not! They said he even had a yellow costume, and ran really fast.”
Both of us broke into laughter, and stopped for a few moments. Suddenly the way I’d felt an hour ago was like a distant memory, as I stood there just having fun with my friend. She didn’t have any more questions for me, and had obviously accepted that I had an awesome family.
But as we started towards my house again, I felt a little bit bad. Rain, Tristan, Byron, Ashley, Chris, and Victoria had issues with their lives and families. Sometimes it felt like I was bragging about how great my life was. Doctor Yamada said I didn’t have to apologize, but...
I knew that saying something would just bring the mood down. I focused on walking by Victoria’s side, balancing on the concrete divider between the sidewalk and grass. Thinking about it actually made me slip a little, and Victoria caught me without a word.
For some reason, that made me think about how what we were doing right now was kind of like the therapy group itself. Here we were, side-by-side and ready to support each other, but also letting one another walk our own path.
Maybe I was reading way too much into it, but it was kind of like how a family or team was supposed to work, wasn’t it? A good team supported everyone, just like an awesome family.
When I slipped, Victoria had caught me. When I had nightmares, my family helped me. When I was having a tough time, both had my back. It was all the same.
Eventually we reached my house, and I smiled up at my friend, my teammate…my family.
It wasn’t just for her, because I was nervous, worried, or sad.
I was also smiling for myself, because I was so happy.
Because I was home.
****************
AN: What if Kenzie had gotten a better family, a year pre-Ward, rather than ending up with her abusive birth parents? This was a crackfic idea that ballooned into 6 chapters, each from the POV of a different character. It uses Spider-Ma’am, a What-If version of May Parker from Marvel’s Earth-3123, who gained powers from a radioactive spider and fought crime with help from Peter and Ben. How they got from Marvel to Earth Gimel will come up eventually, but for now they’re just a nice family with a big secret and a wonderful daughter.
Just to avoid some worries, here are a few characters/groups that won’t play a part in this story: Amy, Carol, Teacher, Cauldron, the Fallen, Chris, Goddess, Cradle, Rain’s Cluster, and a few others. The story is primarily about Kenzie, her family, and her team. Also, May’s the only spider-powered person in the family, but that doesn’t make the others any less amazing.
Hope you enjoy reading it, despite how silly it might get at times. It was fun to write.