Chapter Text
✧ ✦ ✧
“Two mission reports, completed,” you say, and you stare flatly at the man entrenched in his screens and recordings.
Miguel raises an unimpressed brow as he picks them up and reads through your writings. He holds out a hand, holographic suit fading away to expose a slip of golden skin.
You rest your hand in his, and the electric jolt of human contact lends to an uncharacteristically sweet smile spreading across your face.
Your gaze meets his momentarily, just a second, if you could even count it as one. His crimson eyes drag to your incisors gleaming in the low light, settling on pointed teeth.
Your grin drops, and you break away.
Your mother always told you that you had an ugly smile.
✧ ✦ ✧
When he found you, shivering, curled in on yourself, a wretch against the decrepit and lifeless backdrop of the bedroom, you’re a broken half-shell of a person.
“This is the one?” he asked, seemingly to the surrounding nothingness, and your shaky hands struggled to pull yourself up.
“W-Who are you?” you choked out, your voice a horrible, garish sound. Made you want to tear your ears out just to see blood; red upon the dirty, wooden floors caked with grime and mold.
He looked at you, like you’re an insect pinned to a board, writhing under his cold glare, and you knew intuitively that this was the day your life changed.
For better or for worse, but the lines are terribly blurred, and it’s difficult to tell.
Your heart leans toward the latter.
✧ ✦ ✧
He likes to assign you missions deemed suicide runs.
It’s nothing personal. You’re an expendable asset, a lost cause, secondary to the lives of the thousands of other Peter Parkers and spider variants.
Take anyone from the pool of Spider-Society, and they could be boiled down to pure altruism, to selfless heroes ready to make their mark on the world—or, worlds.
Simple, easy. White and black—that’s how they see morality.
You, however, prefer to take comfort in the gray, basking and dancing in the shades in-between.
It’s a boring fact of life: they’re good people, and you are not.
Still— you think as you play with Miguel’s hair, twisting the umber locks between nimble fingers —it would be lying to assume that he’s a good person as well. You stare, as per usual, at his sleeping face. Peaceful, without his eyebrows furrowed and mouth twisted into a fine line.
Miguel—your direct opposite in standing—seen as someone who shines under the spotlight, the savior of the multiverse. Atlas withstanding the weight of the world.
But would a decent man do this? To you?
One harsh tug at his hair, and he wakes up, palpable annoyance at your rude interruption. You blink.
“When’s my next assignment?”
“I’ll give it to you later,” Miguel grunts.
You rest your cheek against the edge of the leather divan, face level to his.
“When will I be able to leave?” You ask the same question again and again, but you know the response; it’s memorized, ingrained.
“Soon,” he says.
(He lies.)
✧ ✦ ✧
“I’m poisonous!” you shouted, and you wriggled away from his probing hands. “Don’t touch me!”
“Calm down," the mysterious man said sternly. "It doesn’t affect me.”
Your eyes widened. “What?”
“While you were incapacitated, I ran a few tests. Your poison affects nearly every single being in the multiverse. Except, for me.”
“How… how is that even possible?”
“Likely because of my DNA makeup.” He chose not to elaborate.
You shook off his explanation. “I—why am I here?! Take me back home!”
“Home,” he scoffed. “Why would you want to stay in a place like that?”
Your lips twitched, as if you’re about to say something, anything, but you couldn’t.
You couldn’t even muster a half-decent response. Silence in the place of paltry words trapped in the back of your throat.
The man ignored the deafening quiet. Instead, he introduced himself, “I run an elite task force dedicated to upholding the arachno-humanoid poly multiverse. My name is Miguel O’Hara. What’s yours?”
✧ ✦ ✧
It’s no secret that you’re the liability.
Whispers, murmurs, rumors surround you.
The assassin, the weapon; you exist as a tool for the greater good.
Hundreds of masked eyes look at you with disdain, with overwhelming fear.
It’s not as if you can blame them.
Your days in Spider-Society are spent drifting, appearing in meetings and disappearing within seconds, like you’re a vanishing act. You work as the silent, deadly interventionist in anomaly captures gone awry; you’re just a means to an end for an ambitious man.
You have no choice, and you know that he doesn’t either.
For how long you’ve worked with him, there’s no official contract, just vague favors and exchanges.
“Envy looks good on you,” Miguel murmurs into your neck, peppered with hickeys and love bites.
“Jealousy? Really,” you huff, wandering hands grasping at his broad back.
You find yourself flush against a wall, trapped between Miguel’s arms. His lips nip at your skin.
“What makes you say that?” you ask, fingers toying and tangling his hair. You like playing with it, and you choose to believe that Miguel likes the way you pull and tug.
“Nothing,” he says childishly. You roll your eyes, pinch his cheek, and he obliges.
“You seemed angry today,” he admits.
“It’s my natural state.”
“Angrier than usual.”
“Fair,” is all you say, and you rise to stamp a wet kiss on his forehead. He scrunches his eyebrows, and for a second, you can trick yourself into thinking that this is normal. That you’re a normal couple, together by coincidence, willingness.
(Not just a litany of favors, a series of deals—master and servant.)
“Tired of me yet?” he asks under his breath.
Your gaze drifts away from his.
“I think—you know the answer.” Your expression is a sad one. He traces your brow bone with his thumb.
✧ ✦ ✧
The first time you kill a man, you convince yourself it was an accident.
You were feeling off that day; throat raw and itchy, heat rising to the top of your head, and vertigo latching onto you with every shaky step.
“Just allergies—hay fever.” You waved off your mother with a laugh, smile plastic as she scrutinized you with harsh eyes.
“Don’t let it affect your studies,” was all she said in response.
Of course. You couldn’t afford to miss a class, to let your grades drop, to let your scholarship slip between grasping fingers.
So you threw back a couple of pills and carried on as if nothing changed.
You made it the whole day without passing out; a miracle. At that point, the pain of your “seasonal allergies” was excruciating. Head-splitting migraines refused to leave your skull, and every swallow you took was a choking gasp.
Your friends asked if you were okay, mutters and murmurs about the sweat dripping down your face and your exhausted pants of breath. You lied over and over again and ducked away from wandering hands offering to check your temperature.
You were finally on your way home, mind focused solely on staying conscious, one step in front of the other. You felt someone’s fingers brush against your forearm, halted in your tracks.
“You dropped something,” he said, and you plucked your student ID from his grasp as you whispered your thank you’s. You turn away from the man, relieved that you were one corner away from resting in the confines of your room, until you hear a heart-stopping crash.
He wasn’t breathing. Dead, within seconds.
His name was Allen Foster. Gleaned from the driver’s license tucked into his wallet, next to a polaroid photo of his wife and daughter.
911. Call 911. Get help. Tell someone, your mind screamed at you, unadulterated terror spasming from your chest. You could barely breathe as you stared at the body.
But you knew. A hunch, a sense, even.
You were the one who killed him.
It was a pathetic sight. You, dragging the body to your home.
You simply had nowhere else to go.
A scream pierced the air.
In a laughably cruel twist of fate, your mother was the one to witness you cradling a dead man, a horrific sight on the cold kitchen tiles.
“I’m sorry!” you scramble to explain yourself. “It’s not my fault, I swear! I don’t even know how this happened; I didn’t mean for this to happen, I—”
Your mother held out a knife in front of her, pointed directly at your chest, your heart.
She looked at you like—like you weren’t even human.
✧ ✦ ✧
You dream of flying away from here. Not back to your original Earth, not to the oppressive halls of HQ. Just—to be able to spread your wings and go to someplace tranquil and serene, as immature and idealistic as that sounds.
You're willing to do just about anything: kill, capture, silence; the target doesn’t matter. Anything to get away from the turmoil of your current day-to-day, the never-ending battles and missions and conflicts and scars.
But dreams are still dreams, useless idlings to dwell on, and you have no choice but to grapple with the uncaring reality of your situation.
A migraine pulses in the back of your head.
“You’re distracted,” Miguel comments.
“Tired,” you mumble in response, and you lay your head against the steel of the meeting room desk. “Lights are too bright.”
You and Miguel—diametrically opposed.
And yet, the two of you are strikingly similar; annoyingly so. The same fangs, the same claws, and the same aversion to light; although, you tend to be more sensitive than he is. Side-effects of your poison production, as Lyla calls it.
Resentment: it pools at the bottom of your stomach. You’re not human anymore, a single spider bite robbing you of your life, your family, your future. The outside world calls your name, but the blinding glare of the sun is enough to force you back into the shadows.
Your anger tastes bitter, astringent upon your tongue.
“Lyla, dim the lights. Thirty-five percent.”
The fluorescent lights reduce to a comfortable, muted darkness, and you tilt your head at his unusual thoughtfulness.
He continues, “The next mission I have for you—”
You cut him off, “Capture the anomaly, don’t call for backup unless absolutely necessary, and avoid creating further anomalous disruptions on the Earth.” Memorized, ingrained.
“Bored of my spiel already?”
You can’t tell if he’s joking. It doesn’t suit him, you think sourly.
You rise from your seat, stalking towards his imposing stature, drowning in his shadow. It's enough to swallow you whole, but you hold his gaze. He looks down on you.
Condescending, arrogant carmine eyes; it makes your blood boil.
"I want to leave," you say.
"I know."
You brush a hand against his cheek, drag your thumb across his lips.
(You curse every god you know for making him the one being you can touch and hold and feel with your pitiful, trembling fingers.)
"I'm exhausted."
"I know," he repeats.
"I hate you." You laugh, and it's a short, jarring noise. Grates against your ears.
"What a shame," Miguel retorts, and you briefly consider strangling him.
How unfortunate, your cruel master is your sole savior.
He doesn't stop you as you lean in for a kiss.
✧ ✦ ✧
Perfection is your standard.
Engraved in your bones, it’s built upon years of sayings and stories and greeting cards from your dear mother; endless instances of her touting its beauty, its ultimacy.
You're her only child, her only pride, her only way out. Perfection is just what's expected of you.
You lay a bouquet of flowers beside her grave. Clasping hands, wandering thoughts—you close your eyes and pray.
You ignore the chill, the steady pitter patter of the rain falling in drizzles of varying intensities in the graveyard.
It’s peaceful for once. Quiet, roiling ashen clouds splitting across the once-clear skies; undulating waves of murk spilling onto the earth below.
Mud clings to your dress shoes.
“You’re going to catch a cold.”
He holds an umbrella over you, and instantly, it’s the absence of rain drops streaming in rivulets down your shoulders. You keep your eyes closed.
“Why’re you here?” you mutter, calm belying your anger.
“Isn’t it obvious? I’m looking for you.”
“Good job; you found me. I’m right here.”
He disregards your snark. “Why aren’t you at HQ?”
“What, am I your dog?” you grit out. “Do you want me to come at your beck and call 24/7, tail caught between my legs?”
Miguel doesn’t say anything, just steadies the umbrella shielding you from the rain. You unclasp your hands and straighten your posture, turning to his miserable visage. His hair is wet, his usual perfectly coiffed styling a deflated mess, and you want to laugh at his obvious discomfort.
“Didn’t think you were religious.”
“I’m not,” you say automatically.
“Then—why do you choose to pray for her?”
“It’s—” what’s expected of me. You fall silent, but you know that he understands the words left unsaid
Miguel sighs and moves to rest his own bouquet of flowers next to yours. His are perfectly pristine, probably purchased at a premium, and yours are wilted, haphazardly hand-picked and rain-soaked. Tragic.
“Do you think she would be proud of you?” Miguel asks.
Your eyes shift, dragging down to the drowned grass, the space between his oxfords.
“No,” you answer lamely. “I don’t even think she could bear to see my face.”
You’re not lying, not to yourself, not to him; you don’t see the point in it. Imagine that, your mother, taking in the sight of you with sharpened fangs and monstrous claws, the poison practically seeping from the pores of your skin.
The sight of the blood on your hands.
You don’t realize you’re crying until you feel Miguel gently wiping away the tears tumbling down your cheek.
“Don’t.” You grab his wrist and stop him from rewarding you with tenderness you do not deserve.
He retracts his hand and gives you the same look as always. Condescending; this time, with a hint of pity.
You despise it.
“Let’s go,” he says.
You’re used to eating your words, used to your overwhelming hypocrisy.
You follow him.
✧ ✦ ✧