Chapter Text
Soulmates didn't use to be rare.
They were common but joyful and beautiful experiences blessed upon everyone whose souls were fated to be together for the rest of their lives.
They were mystical bonds…
Soulmates were celebrated.
Finding the one that was tied to another soul wasn't easy. They were only revealed to each other through touch, where a unique symbol would appear on their skin after first contact. Neither alike nor the same.
… crafted into a beautiful moment…
Soulmates could've been anything.
It wasn't a phenomenon limited to romance, it extended to friendship and platonic love that united families in ways never seen before. Whether it was with animals or another human being, it was a bond that completed.
… that transformed lives.
Soulmates were everywhere.
Until everything changed.
The sun had set nearly two hours ago and rain started to pour but New York City was more awake than it seemed with neon lights sizzling, umbrellas bobbing up and down the sidewalks, restaurants drafting with hundred different cuisines while cabbies were still trying to clock in a few more fares.
However, deeper in the darker parts of the city between two crumbling buildings where even the street light's barely touched, life wasn't so much of a bustling utopia.
"You know this is dangerous, right? Being back in the city?" Thin fingers absently tugged down on the sleeve that concealed what could get most people in hot water if they were found to be having one on their skin. "We could get killed."
"Sergio, take a breath. No one will find us-"
"No one will find us?! Have you forgotten that we're being hunted, Katie? That we're on the run? Why we left this place behind in the first place?” There was a pause. “We should go. There are drones everywhere, if one of those things finds us, we're roadkill."
"But-"
Whatever protest there was going to be was cut off by a wide beam scanning over the dead-end alleyway.
"Shit!" Terror seized Sergio like an iron fist around his heart, panic overtaking his veins like wildfire when floodlights suddenly lit up the backstreet. They were pinned under the brightness, exposed as if butterflies put up on display for the whole world to see.
It forced Sergio to scramble, trembling hands gripping onto Katie's arm pulling her clumsily with him while they stumbled back from the foot-long silver drone that found them.
Two drones joined its side but Sergio made sure she was pressed firmly between him and the wall behind them, shielding her as much as he could from the view of the drones hovering above their heads.
He knew coming back to the city was a death sentence. He knew that their faces would be recognized as soon as they stepped foot back in New York.
He knew their marks could be sensed through their clothing but here they were. Goddammit.
"Ser-"
"Katie, stay behind me." Sergio tightened his white-knuckled grip around her arm, probably leaving bruises by now with how tight he was holding her but he didn't know what else to do, to say because it didn't make a difference from the reality.
They were found.
Trapped.
"Sergio Hall and Katie Thomas, you are to surrender yourselves." Fuck. Never did Sergio feel so helpless. There was no running. No escaping this time. "There's evidence that you've violated the terms and conditions of the 2012 Illegal Soul Act."
They took a gamble coming back to the city and here they were at the mercy of the drones and Oh God. This was it.
They were going to die.
Or so Sergio thought. He honestly had no idea what happened.
One minute they were being cornered by the three drones and by the next, there was a thwip as something latched to the leader drone's front.
The first drone didn't have time to give a startled loud whir as it twisted frantically in the air, trying to escape whatever had managed to stick onto it before a violent yank launched it into the side of one of the nearby buildings.
Pieces of brick and wood exploded outwards from the force before whatever was attached to it was pulled on again and it was hurled into the other building.
The machine sparked from where it was now permanently lodged in, giving its final whirls before its mechanical life flickered out and bright camera lens dimmed for the last time.
The other two drones didn't have time to react when there were two more thwips and they were yanked up by what seemed an invisible force.
Sergio wrenched his head up, following them but only caught a glimpse of a faint silhouette standing on the overhang above their heads.
A stiff beat of silence passed where the figure was standing, looming over them before without warning, it leaped backward in an elegant arc, disappearing as quickly as it appeared, leaving no trace of its presence ever being there.
"Katie?"
"Yeah?"
"What the fuck just happened?"
None of them knew the answer. However, a few feet above their heads where the first drone was embedded, swayed a delicate string of web.
Peter quietly slipped out of the window from the one-room apartment, his feet landing on the cement with a muted thud.
Standing up and adjusting the backpack on his shoulders, Peter took a moment to breathe in the stale and musty air of the alleyway before starting on his usual route to work.
The first rays of sunlight had barely started spilling over the city while behind him, he could hear the steady pulsing of May’s heart as she slept. It was slow. Peaceful. Constant. There.
There was a reason he avoided going through the front door of their apartment. It was the only way he didn't have to worry about running into their landlady, Ms. Howell.
Being the only occupants of the crumbling building besides Ms. Howell, she made sure hadn’t lifted a single finger since they came here. Instead, she made sure that their lives were a living misery.
May was always forced to do the house cleaning, even if it was non-existent messes, while whatever money Peter managed to scrape together was snatched away from them. When they didn’t do good enough jobs, Ms. Howell would complain about how ungrateful they were that she hadn't turned them in.
That thought alone scared Peter. There were so many times that Peter wanted to fight back because it would be so easy to stand up to Ms. Howell. To say no. However, if they did, it would draw unwanted attention to them, to May. It was the only reason they never fought back or complained, enduring whatever insults or intense labor that was thrown their way.
Powers or not, the risk was too high. Especially with May’s life on the line.
Peter's hands tightened around his backpack straps thinking about how they were treated, how they had no other option, how their lives had changed so much. They weren’t tenants, only slaves.
All because of that damn law.
Everything used to be perfect. May didn't have to hide, Peter had been in school and they were living in a better, cleaner place that didn't have enough violations to send a health inspector into cardiac arrest.
They were happy.
Until the law happened.
Everything they had, it all had been ripped out from under them. Their homes, future, and any shot at a normal life. It was all taken.
Including Ben.
Peter faltered, his feet tripping over each other. He struggled to regain his footing because Ben meant thinking about that night. He took a moment to reel himself in, to stop himself from spiraling out of control—to go too deep— before releasing it all in a shaky exhale.
May was safer staying in their beaten-down apartment with a greying sixty-something old woman than being out in the open and that was fine.
Not great but fine. They were alive. That's all that mattered.
Peter grasped onto the words, repeating them over and over as if they were his only lifeline, and forced himself to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
A long wail cut through the air and between being Spider-Man while being on the streets for so long, it's on instinct when he whipped around, ready to grab the suit in his backpack.
However, Peter stalled when he identified the culprit of the situation: A double scoop of ice cream discarded at a little girl's feet.
It must've fallen out from her cone and she decided to cry about it.
Peter didn't even realize he was holding his breath until his arms dropped back at his sides. He stared at the little girl running back to her mother and took in a shaking breath before he kept walking forward.
There was no need to get trippy over someone's spilled ice cream. Not here.
Not in a safe zone. There was nothing to worry about here in the lower, rugged-down areas in Queen's because they were practically off the grid, invincible. Well, compared to the rest of the city, at least, it was.
When the law came, a lot of people tried to get out of the city, but not many did because, within an hour, all possible escape routes had been clogged up from the masses that were trying to flee.
Highways, airports, streets, everywhere. It all had been blocked. There was no getting in or out in the chaos and that meant people were easily picked off.
Ben had made them hunker down, to wait for the initial craze to die down until nightfall where they would've slipped out of the city under the cover of the darkness.
Except, they were found before they had the chance to leave the front door of their apartment.
— glass shattering, screaming, a bright blue light, the air swimming with blood and —
"Yo, Parker!"
Peter jerked, stumbling forward as he tripped over his own feet, trying to not fall flat on his face. His head yanked up, meeting familiar light green eyes, dirty blonde hair and slightly yellow teeth. It took him a few embarrassing seconds to recognize who it was.
"Trevor.”
Said blonde held one hand dramatically over his chest and despite all the laws of physics while his molded teeth still managed to somehow blind him. "Is that all I am getting this morning? Not even a hello? Wow, I'm hurt, Parker."
Peter didn’t bother dignifying that with an answer, more wondering how he managed to walk two blocks from the apartment iso quickly without really looking where he was going.
It was a jarring reminder that life still moved on for everybody around him. The world still spun on its axis. Emotional reflection be damned.
Shaking his head, Peter looked up and opened his mouth, ready to throw some snark back but closed it again when he noticed something, or rather someone missing. "Where's Mike?"
"Gone to get extra supplies." Trevor shrugged as if it wasn’t a big deal that their boss was nowhere to be seen. On the other hand, Mike was more often than not hidden away in his office or left for home early which meant with more than most cases, it was only him and Trevor to taking care of the Pepperoni's Palace.
Peter could see why the older teen wasn't too worried. "The fridge is empty so we have to wait until Mike gets back to start cooking."
Then again, on a rare occasion that was more elusive than Bigfoot, Mike did get off his ass.
Trevor stepped to the side, revealing the crumbling back entrance to the kitchen. "In the meantime, you can be useful by helping me get the ovens heated up."
That wasn't something Peter didn't need to be told twice. He was shoving already his way past Trevor to the stoves, having half of the mind to chuck his backpack in one of the corners where it wasn't a fire hazard.
Alright, time to work.
Peter hefted his backpack over his shoulder, his forehead sticky and clammy from standing for eight hours in front of the smothering pizza oven.
When he started working in the Pepperoni's Palace greasy and clammy kitchen, it was absolute torture. The intense labor, sweat, and blisters made him feel like his body had been rolled through a rubber factory.
Peter didn't bat an eyelid about it anymore. Instead, the near exhaustion that he experienced over the past two years was second nature at this point.
It was fine. It was. There were lots of teenagers that helped their parents by doing chores. It was no different with Peter.
He was helping May, despite her fighting him tooth and nail about it nearly every day that she should be the one with the job, not him.
His chest squeezed hard thinking about it.
He knew May wanted to do more than to help and she hated it more than everything that their circumstances left him being the one doing daily eight-hour shifts.
She hated it that it was him working himself ragged, not the other way around. That she couldn't do anything to change it.
Peter would never hold it against her. He never could. May was doing the best with the situation she had been given, being trapped inside day and night, not able to step outside anymore without getting killed.
All because she had the soulmate bond.
It wasn't her fault, May never asked for it to happen, Ben didn't either. They never asked to be soulmates, to have their lives bound together through some infinite bond.
No, it wasn't their fault. It never was.
It was Tony Stark's fault.
The name itself was so random, popping up so unexpectedly in his mind, yet it sent a hot, suffocating emotion from his stomach to his tongue and Peter tightened his hands into stiff fists. He tightened his jaw as he remembered the man that stolen everything.
Tony Stark. The man who was supposed to be a hero, one that had saved them many times before. It felt like only yesterday where Peter remembered being saved at the Stark Expo from the Hammer Drones, watching Iron Man fly a missile into a wormhole and for a time after that, it was all peaceful.
However, that changed once Tony Stark revealed his true colors. He was nothing more than a dictator hiding under an elaborate disguise.
It was so unexpected that no one could've seen it happening. Stark seized control over New York in less than a day, bringing down his iron fist upon the city, not releasing it from his suffocating grasp.
Anyone who opposed was either wiped out or quickly kneeled before him, leaving nothing but destruction and death in his wake. Not caring for the consequences of his actions. Tony Stark was the one that outlawed soulmates. It was his fault that Peter and May's lives were torn away from their grasps.
Peter froze, even if it was for a split second, it was enough for his sensitive hearing to pick it up. It was faint but there. He knew the sound from anywhere.
A muffled scream.
It was a muffled scream. Someone was in trouble. In another universe, Peter would already be running and slipping on his Spider-Man suit, ready to save the day.
However, Peter knew the deal he made with May after she'd caught him red-handed sneaking into the apartment in his homemade suit.
No Spider-Manning on workdays.
She didn't want him to be beat-down and exhausted while facing the deadly villains that he'd inevitably encounter while on patrol. Not when he wasn't on his full game where he could get hurt, or worse killed.
He understood that. Peter did but he couldn't let someone else get hurt when he was around and had the power to stop the bad things from happening again.
I'm sorry, May.
Peter slipped both web-shooters onto his wrist and ran.
"May, I'm home!" Peter swung the apartment door open and no, he was not in fact greeted by his aunt but rather with a familiar charred after smell of food that had seen better days…
"Over here!"
He grinned, rounding the corner to see May waving a dishcloth over the sink at her attempt to clear the smoke wafting the air. Peter didn't need to guess twice of what happened. He could see the mass of solidified blackened goop with a partially melted plaster spoon from where he was standing.
"I guess noodles are off the list." May chuckled as she turned to face him, sitting her hands on her hips and her lips pursed to the side in thought as if she didn't almost burn down their apartment again. "So, you wanna order some take-out again?"
Peter nodded and crossed his arms over his stomach, trying to make it less obvious that of the promise he'd broken. "Yeah, that would be best."
"Good." May smiled, wiping off her hands before tilting her head towards him, and for the first time since he walked into the apartment, she frowned. "Well, are you gonna stand there or is my favorite nephew gonna tell me why he came home so late?"
"The subway broke down." Peter shrugged, looking anywhere except for May's face because he knew she could tell when he was lying. He didn't want to see her reaction. "I had to walk."
"Oh." May's shoulders dipped, even if it was for a brief second, Peter saw it. He couldn't tell if it was because she believed him or was too tired to call out his lie.
"I'm going to order our food." She sounded tired, wary. Worn almost and Peter hated it. "Take a shower, honey. Ms. Howell will probably be bursting through the door any second to complain about the smell."
Peter nodded, still not willing to look her in the eye. He couldn't. Not after what happened. He was about to shuffle his way to the bathroom, to clean himself up when he stopped. He turned to his aunt, his last family member, the only person he had left in a cruel world that they were both thrown into. "I'm sorry, May."
He wasn't sure what he was trying to apologize for. The promise. Ben. Their ruined lives. Probably all of it.
May shook her head, an almost involuntary noise coming from her throat, and extended her arm outwards. "Come here, Pete."
He didn't hesitate to move forward, desperate to make sure she was there, not dead. No. She wasn’t gone like Ben and wasn’t just a figment of his fragile imagination. May was here with him. They were in this together.
When he was close enough, Peter leaned forward into May's arms. He breathed when she hugged him, holding him together. Despite the world around them was crumbling down to nothing but dust, here with May, for a brief moment everything felt alright.
There was no Pepperoni's Palace. No Spider-Man. No criminals. No Iron Sights. No Tony Stark.
It was safe.
Even dull ache in his side, where a knife had been less than an hour ago, felt a little more bearable.