Work Text:
Ned Leeds has always harbored some small fantasy of being Super.
He’s not, probably. He’s not a mutant, and he doesn’t have a powered suit or superspy training. He’s just Ned Leeds, high school senior and future computer engineer. He thinks that, if he does well enough at MIT, he can probably end up as somebody’s Guy In The Chair, which would be totally awesome.
In pursuit of this goal, he spends a lot of his free time coding. The things he codes aren’t the most complex or super, really, but learning to do mods for video games is still practice. When he’s really lucky, he gets to use the school’s 3D printer to make the kinds of tools that he think the superspy kind of heroes might use. He’s not exactly great at it yet—that kind of thing is proprietary, and he needs classes on the topic before he can actually do anything like that—but it’s fun.
MJ’s been encouraging him. He’s pretty sure she thinks it’s kind of dumb, but she doesn’t say so. This is incredibly nice, for MJ.
Lola keeps telling him he’s got magic in him, and it comes out in his coding, but he prefers to think it’s the hard work and endless practice. He’s a nerd, and he’s proud of that.
It’s just that sometimes… it feels like there might be more.
--
Ned doesn’t initially pay much attention to Peter Parker. The guy is just one of Michelle’s customers. He’s about their age, and seems to be in a shitty enough life situation that it’s notable, but he’s just some guy. The only reason Ned really notices the dude is that he probably has a crush on Michelle, and it’s kind of Ned’s job, as her best friend, to scope the guy out a bit.
Unfortunately, Peter Parker apparently has no internet presence. There isn’t even an out-of-date Facebook account or anything. Parker just… doesn’t seem to exist. It might be a fake name. It probably is. That’s not actually a big deal, though. Giving strangers the wrong name in places like donut shops isn’t sketchy.
Ned vaguely notes it when Parker starts working for a lawyer. MJ mentions it, and the job shift means that Parker is now wearing a button-down instead of pizza delivery clothes. He doesn’t come in smelling vaguely of grease and tomato paste anymore. He drops by a little more often than he did, and sometimes gets a donut instead of just coffee. It’s a good sign, Ned thinks, but also not really his business.
Except then MJ catches his attention, and does the wide eyes that mean ‘do what I say, or I’m going to lecture you about it later.’ Ned does as she says, because his best friend is kind of intimidating, before he processes what she’s even trying to tell him to do. She’s jerking her head and doing the ‘pay attention’ expression, and Ned follows the gesture to… Parker.
The guy looks beat to shit.
Exhausted. Bruised, both under the eyes and across the cheek. Raw-red knuckles and an angry cut on his temple that Ned really hopes isn’t going to get infected.
“Go talk to Ned,” he hears his best friend order a boy who might as well be a stranger.
“Um, that’s not—I mean, I—that’s—”
“He’s bored and I’ve got customers. You’re both loser nerds, it’ll be fine.”
Why the hell does Parker look like he’s going to cry at that? Yeah, it’s an insult, but it’s not a particularly intense one, and MJ had even insulted Ned in the same breath. It’s chill.
Parker glances at Ned and, on the spur of the moment, Ned flips MJ off. She returns the gesture, fake surprise across her face.
Parker looks torn between laughing and fleeing.
Maybe there’s an issue with his home life or something.
Ned is legitimately surprised, if only a little, when Parker actually does as suggested and joins him at the counter. He looks nervous. He won’t meet Ned’s eyes.
“So, how’d that happen?” Ned asks, waving vaguely at Parker’s face. He already sort of knows, because he’s overheard Parker talk about living in a rough area before, and people usually take that as a neutral topic. It’s New York. Fights happen.
Parker meets his eyes, blinking like a stunned lemming. “Uh—what?”
“You get mugged?” Ned tries to clarify. “You’re kinda banged up.”
“Oh! Yeah, um, sorta?” Parker looks away again. “I was on my way home and some guys were harassing these girls in club clothes and I tried to step in to distract them while the girls got a Lyft. Wasn’t planning on having it turn into a fight, but…”
“Dude, that’s so cool,” Ned enthuses. “Like a little hero moment, right?”
Parker flushes. He also goes pale. It’s a very strange and uncomfortable look, sickly and unpleasant. “Not really? I mean, the second people started throwing punches, the bouncer noticed and finally got involved. I barely got a hit in.”
Ned isn’t sure if that’s true. Parker’s definitely spindly enough that Ned can see him not doing too hot in a fight, but something tells him it’s more complicated than that. “Still cool that you helped them out, though.”
“Yeah, I’m—I mean I guess?” Parker just really does not stop stuttering. “It’s not, uh, not a huge deal or anything.”
Ned tries to think of something to say. He’s got nothing.
“So I hear they’re completely reworking the sequel trilogy now that everything’s mostly settled from the Blip,” Parker says, and just like that, they’re off.
--
“Dude, he was about to cry on you,” MJ says. She does not say ‘kinda pathetic’ or ‘wow, what a loser,’ because they’re both more than aware that it would be in bad taste at this point. Parker’s in a bad place, and mocking him for it, even where he can’t hear, would be an asshole move.
Even MJ, who takes pride in occasionally being an asshole, isn’t that kind of jerk.
“He was not,” Ned says, because he’d have noticed, thanks. “It was just the lighting or something.”
“Nah, he’s in love with you,” MJ says. There’s a lot more she isn’t saying, things that are a lot less fun and a lot more sad, but she holds it back. “Or at least has a big, fat, massive cru—”
“He wants to plant one on you,” Ned shoots back. “He looks at you like you hung the moon, bitch.”
She shoves him off the couch. This is fine, mostly because there’s a shag carpet that MJ’s mom refuses to get rid of, and they’ve both roughhoused enough to know that it’ll cushion the fall. He moans and groans in exaggerated pain anyway.
“Nerd,” she accuses.
They more or less end the conversation there, because there’s midterms to study for and exes to gossip about—Betty got a really nice internship, recently, and everyone’s really excited for her—and Parker, as weird as he is, is just a guy.
--
The noise isn’t that loud, comparatively. The shop has the heaters going, and the ovens are constantly humming, and then there’s background music on top of it. The drop of a full coffee cup just blends into the rest. What catches Ned’s attention, honestly, is the way MJ swears right after.
He looks up. He sees the stains on Parker’s shirt and the coffee all over the counter and ground, the way MJ is almost frantic as she mops it up with a wad of napkins, and the expression on Parker’s face. It’s not great. He catches only a few words out of whatever Parker says to MJ. He looks like death warmed over.
Parker flees to the customer bathroom when MJ points him.
Ned hesitates. MJ’s got a line of customers to deal with, but Ned’s free. It’s not his business, it’s not, but Lola says that if he can help someone, he should. He can help Parker. Maybe.
He goes to the door, and leans in to listen. If Parker’s on the phone with someone to calm down, he can just leave, right? Because it means that Parker’s got a way to solve the problem?
Parker is not the phone. Parker is hyperventilating, possibly sobbing, so loudly that the ventilation isn’t even managing to cover it up. It’s ragged and pained and ugly.
Ned knocks on the door before he can stop himself. “Hey, buddy, is there anything I can do for you?”
The sobbing stops for a moment, cut by a sharp and ugly gasp, and then Parker chokes out, “I’m fine.”
It’s not at all convincing.
There isn’t much use in sticking around and trying to help when Parker doesn’t want help, and he’s barely more than a stranger, so it would be rude to pry. Ned goes back to his seat and tries to focus on his programming homework. It’s due on Thursday, so he’s got time, but he’s got a feeling the process is going to throw a curveball at him at some point in the project. That curveball looms, unfound, because his mind keeps drifting back to Parker’s breakdown in the bathroom.
He gives up after a bit and goes to visit MJ while she cleans what’s left of the coffee spill.
“Is he okay?” she asks. It’s been twenty minutes. Parker still hasn’t left the bathroom. Ned has no idea what kind of answer she’s expecting out of this.
“Dude, he was like… full on sobbing,” Ned says. “I don’t think he’s been okay for a while.”
MJ grimaces, and Ned grabs some napkins to tackle the spots she missed before more customers can distract her.
Ned isn’t part of the conversation when Parker leaves, too absorbed in a tangle of code that he doesn’t even notice the bathroom open. He catches the conversation, though, short as it is, and can’t help the pained expression he shares with his best friend when Parker’s back is turned.
--
MJ’s acting shifty.
Ned doesn’t prod at first, because MJ has the right to be uncomfortable and secretive if she wants. It might not be any of his business. It’s more likely to be his business than most people except her mom, on account of Ned being her best friend, but still. He won’t pressure her about it.
A few days after this all starts, they’re alone in her room and eating grilled cheese while slogging through their Lit homework, and she says, “Spider-Man almost bled out in my bathtub on Saturday.”
Ned doesn’t spit out his sandwich bite in surprise, but it’s a near thing.
He stares, and finishes chewing, and swallows.
“What the fuck.”
MJ gestures, wide and wild and suddenly intense. “I know! It’s weird as fuck! Apparently I’m the only person he knows in Brooklyn, and it’s weird.”
“…cool that he came to you for help, though,” Ned says. “Did he say you can tell people?”
“He came by to ask me if he could pay me back somehow,” MJ admits. “He said I can tell you about it, but nobody else.”
Spider-Man trusts him. Awesome. Flash is going to… Flash would be so jealous, if Ned could tell him.
“I think…” MJ hazards, and then bites her lip. “I think I might know who he is.”
“…oh.”
MJ hugs her knees, grilled cheese forgotten. “He doesn’t know I figured it out, probably. But I think I know his identity.”
“I won’t ask who,” Ned says. He’s not dumb. It’s one thing for MJ to dish that a superhero visited her in an emergency, and quite another for her to out the man’s identity. “Are you gonna do anything about it?”
MJ shrugs. “I don’t know. I just… thought you should know what’s going on. You deserve to know these things.”
There’s something strange hanging in the air between them, like a secret they’ve both forgotten, or a person needed to bridge some truths. Ned brushes off the sensation and shifts closer to MJ, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
“I almost threw up, you know,” she tells him. “When we were washing the wound.”
Yikes.
--
Spider-Man shows up at Ned’s house.
He knocks on the window, and they both panic. They let him in.
“Heya, folks,” he says, his voice rough and odd with a deep tone that Ned thinks might not be natural. “So I was thinking about how to pay you back for saving my life a few weeks back—”
“I told you not to.”
Spidey tilts his head, mask eyes unblinkingly wide and terrifying. “—and I figured that even if I can’t really pay you back, I can do a favor for your friend there.”
Ned doesn’t let himself gape. Much. He points to himself. “Me?”
Spidey curves unnaturally into the room and hands Ned an envelope. It says, Do not open. Deliver in person to Stephen at 177A Bleecker Street. Wait for response.
Spidey hops right back out the window. “You’ll thank me later!”
He backflips away like the cryptid he is.
Ned looks to MJ. He looks back.
He’s going to have so much trouble with the history test tomorrow.
--
177A Bleecker Street is… a mansion.
That’s really the only word for a building this size, this close to Central Park, that isn’t broken up into separate units.
“Do we just… knock?” Ned asks.
MJ reaches out to do so, always the first to push past her fear, but the doors swing open before her knuckles can even touch.
They glance at each other. They go inside.
It’s dark. It’s not ugly or gross, and the lights don’t flicker, but they are sparse and dimmed. The whole place feels… rich and deep, all dark wood and brass, grand staircases and giant windows, and… Ned wants to compare this place to dark chocolate, with nuts in it.
Rich and heavy and with pops of something interesting, and not evil, but… unexpected.
“So, who are you two?”
They whirl around, and see a tall white man floating down from the balcony. An invisible wind ripples his cape, and his arms are crossed. He’s middle-aged, maybe older, and he looks downright imperious.
Ned thinks that adds up to ‘like a bit of a douchebag,’ but he’s not going to say that.
“Hi?” Ned tries. “I mean, uh, I’m Ned Leeds, and this is MJ. We were told to bring this to you?”
He thrusts out the envelope to the tall man. Then he pulls it back, before the man can take it. “Wait, are you Stephen?”
The main raises an eyebrow. He looks very ready to roll his eyes. “Yes, I’m Dr. Stephen Strange.”
“Doctor of what?” MJ challenges.
“I was a neurosurgeon,” the man says, voice flat. MJ looks like she regrets poking the bear. “Best in the world before I lost my fine motor control. Who gave you that envelope?”
“Spider-Man,” Ned says. He holds it out again, a bit sheepish. “I don’t know why he did, but… I think it might be important? He wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t, right?”
“I don’t exactly know him well enough to say,” Strange tells them. He scans the instructions on the letter, makes a face—maybe because they’re supposed to wait for him to answer, and he wants them gone?—and tears it open.
“Not afraid it’s booby-trapped?” MJ asks.
“There’s wards on the door,” Strange tells her, absent in the way that means he’s busy reading the letter. Ned can see just enough to know it’s handwritten. “It would have caught fire if that were the case.”
Oh hey, that’s terrifying.
Strange ignores them, still reading, and then looks up at Ned. He’s judging Ned, and Ned isn’t exactly the kind of person who gets high hopes about being judged by… a wizard? Sorcerer? Warlock?
“Do you have a title?” MJ asks, apparently deciding that she wants to get as much information out the guy as possible while he’s at least a little busy multitasking. “A hero name?”
“Used to be the Sorcerer Supreme, title transferred with my death in the Blip,” he says. That’s a surprisingly direct answer. “And no, it’s just Doctor Strange.”
Is he still annoyed that MJ questioned his credentials? Ned thinks he might still be annoyed that MJ questioned his credentials.
“So, uh, Doctor Strange,” that’s really cool, that he can just say that, “what was the letter about?”
“The incident at the Statue of Liberty,” Strange tells them. He turns on his heel and flies up the stairs. “Follow me.”
They do, because they’ve come this far, and Ned kind of wants to know what’s going on, and what it has to do with him.
“Take this,” Strange tells him.
“Uh—”
“It goes on your hand.”
“…like a knuckle duster?”
Strange’s face goes pained. “If that’s how you choose to describe it. Pointer and middle, bar up.”
“What’s it called, then?” MJ asks.
“A sling ring.”
It’s really hard not to laugh. Ned manages. MJ does not. A ‘snrk’ noise makes it through.
“Please don’t throw us out,” Ned begs.
“Tempting,” Strange says, drawing the words out. “Put the ring on.”
Ned puts the ring on. It’s cold, but it warms up fast. It looks like it might be brass, which makes sense with everything he’s seen so far.
“Um. Now what?”
“Stand like this,” he does, “and circle your hand like this. Think of a place or person you’d want to contact. Try to avoid anyone that you don’t want to surprise in the shower or reveal personal information to.”
What?
Well, there’s Lola. Betty would have been an option, but she’s with the Daily Bugle now, so that’s not happening unless he knows she’s not at work, which he doesn’t. The obvious first choice is MJ, but she’s standing right next to him.
“Wait, are you testing to see if I have magic?”
“If you keep stalling, then no.”
Lola it is! Ned holds the position he was given, and circles his hand, thinking hard about his grandmother.
There are sparks.
There is a circle.
He’s looking into his kitchen, and his grandmother shrieks when she notices him.
…cool.
--
Ned has magic classes now.
He’s not going to be a real, proper wizard, because he’s leaving for MIT in a few months, and he’s going to be a programmer, which means he can’t do what Doctor Strange did and make it his life. He can learn a few things to be able to protect himself, if supervillains happen nearby, which Strange agrees to. Apparently, he’s been a little bored since coming back to life, because he’s not the Sorcerer Supreme anymore.
Ned still doesn’t know what that means, but Wong seems like a cool enough dude. He’s glad that an important position like that is with an Asian guy. Represent, and all that.
(He namedrops a few really cool people, and Strange taunts him about doing cage fighting. It’s insane. Ned wants to be him.)
(Except not, because Ned’s got his heart set on computers, and having magic isn’t going to stop him.)
It’s a small but important part of his life, and it means he’s not in the donut shop quite as often. MJ loves hearing about his classes, though, so he still swings by whenever he can. He’s there inconsistently enough that he manages to miss it when MJ asks Peter Parker on a date.
He finds out because she texts him in the middle of his magic class, and it’s full of exclamation points and question marks. He’s lucky enough to be on a break—magic is exhausting—and can respond with the appropriate enthusiasm and excitement on her behalf.
He asks her about it, after, and she tells him the plans—movie and fast food, probably peppered with work gossip or weird boss stories—and when he asks why she asked, why she made a move on the guy they don’t know much about besides ‘messed up as hell,’ she says that she just… thought some things through and realized they’d maybe work well together.
“Figured out his deep dark secret?” Ned jokes.
She doesn’t look at him, when she says, “Yeah, something like that.”
--
Peter Parker gets more erratic through the summer, especially around Ned. He’s skittish, almost, and MJ always grimaces when Ned asks her about it, and says that it’s not her story to tell. This is true and fair and many such things, but Ned still wants to know. He doesn’t ask, and doesn’t spy, even though he totally could, because he has magic, which is still totally wild.
Doctor Strange always looks kind of annoyed when Ned points it out, but like. It’s magic. It’s awesome.
“So…” he says one day, because Parker’s looking weird in the cheeks, and MJ’s got ‘I just made out in the bathroom with my boyfriend at work while we had a slow moment’ hair, which he’d worry about, except they’re leaving for college in a week, and she no longer needs this job. “What was that about?”
“What?”
“Like, okay,” he says, and pauses. He’s a bit frozen, actually, as he tries to put the words together. He breathes in and keeps going, “I can tell you were getting a little rowdy in there, which, like, not my business or anything—”
“You’re right, it’s not.”
“—but I’m pretty sure you guys also… talked,” he finishes, a little lamely. “I’m guessing about the relationship going into college? Since we’re going to Boston and he… isn’t.”
MJ makes a face. “Yeah.”
This doesn’t explain the weird expressions. He tries to prod about that part, since it’s the bit he’s allowed to ask about without it getting weird. “So… long distance? Breaking up?”
“Long distance and open-ish?” MJ says. “I don’t know. We’re still going to be together, but allowed to take a shot with other people? Not hookups or one-night stands or whatever—”
“You don’t do that stuff anyway.”
“—shut up, college could be different,” she says, elbowing him. “Anyway, we’ve agreed that we can flirt and date otherwise, but if it gets as far as a date, then we gotta let each other know.”
That sounds more than reasonable, Ned thinks. “You think it’ll hold up? You’ve only been dating for a few months. Might be easier to just break it off.”
She makes the weird face again. “No. I, uh… I don’t think that’s the best idea.”
Well, that’s not ominous or anything.
“Which one of you suggested it?” Ned tries instead.
“I did,” MJ says, and smirks. “Apparently one of Mr. Murdock’s clients flirted with him a few weeks ago and keeps dropping by, and they’re friends now, but…”
She trails, eyebrows raised, and tilts her head meaningfully.
“You’re trying to give him permission to go for it,” Ned concludes.
(Is it a conclusion if she was leading him to it by the hand?)
“He seems excited about the guy and being friends with him,” MJ says, “and like… I dunno. He doesn’t have a whole lot of friends except us, and his boss. What if he gets worried about infidelity and draws away from this guy because of the anxiety when I’m not even that concerned with monogamy? Better to just skip that whole mess.”
Ned thinks parts of that sound really… care-y. Caretaker-y? Something about doing the emotional labor for a guy in a way she shouldn’t be obligated to. And, yeah, okay, Parker’s really messed up, and MJ and Ned are pretty healthy on the mental and emotional front, so it makes sense, but still.
“You’re sure he’s worth it?” Ned asks. She glares at him, and he raises his hands. “I’m just saying, if you had to put this much effort into being careful of someone else’s mental health in a relationship with one of the guys at school, you’d have dumped him already.”
“It’s not about… it’s not like that,” MJ says. “Besides, most of the guys at school have parents or siblings or something, college acceptances, all that. Peter’s life is way more stressful than any of ours. Being careful about his triggers and mental health isn’t overwhelming for me, so I can do some of the work to make both our lives easier.”
“I just don’t want him taking advantage of you,” Ned says. There’s a lot of ways it could happen, since Parker’s bigger and stronger than her, white and male, and has a lawyer on speed dial. Ned doesn’t think any of those ways will happen, so much as just the guy maybe taking advantage of MJ trying to be nice, but he just doesn’t know the guy well enough to say. It takes all types, and a lot of shitty people can hide it behind a smile or a nervous demeanor.
Ned likes the guy, but MJ’s his best friend. He’s got a side, and most of human history backing him up on ‘beware of white dudes.’
“You doing Christmas or something with him?” Ned prods.
“Hannukah, maybe?” MJ says. “I don’t think… we haven’t really been together for long, and I think he’s spending most of his holidays with Mr. Nelson and his family. Might just be the big ones like Rosh Hashanah, though? And Hannukah’s eight nights anyway, but… Maybe New Year’s Eve, since that’s pretty secular? I dunno, it’s like months away.”
Oh. He’s Jewish.
Ned revises the ‘white guy’ thing in his head. In conjunction with the bi thing, Parker’s not quite as conceptually threatening anymore. It’s been offset, so to speak.
“I didn’t know he was Jewish,” Ned says, because it’s the most neutral thing he can think of. “I guess that’s on me for assuming.”
MJ elbows him in the side. “Sure is, nerd.”
“We both got into MIT, MJ. We’re both nerds.”
“Yeah, but you’re, like, a loser nerd.”
Ned rolls his eyes. “You’re keeping me updated on this ‘Peter likes a guy you maybe approve of’ thing, okay?”
“Well, duh.”