Work Text:
A for Español
Ganke doesn’t look up from his K-drama when an interdimensional portal opens in the middle of their shared dormitory. A figure steps out, the mask of their glowing tech suit opening to reveal the face of Miles Morales.
When it becomes clear the visitor will not be greeted, and in fact has taken mild interest in the show’s subtitles, Ganke yells in exasperation, “Miles! Doppelganger!”
To which Miles hops out of the bathroom, still in one sock.
“Heeey, wow. It’s me. In that. At school,” Miles says with a stressed smile. “What’s cooking.”
Miles-42 finally breaks away from the subtitles. “Need your help.”
The “Let’s go” is unspoken, as Miles-42 begins to dial for a portal back to his world.
Except Miles-1610 isn’t suiting up, only smiling at him with that same stressed-out smile, now with an additional eye-twitch.
Miles-1610’s expression falls.
“I, uh, can’t,” Miles-1610 confesses, dropping his shoulders. “I’ve got a final today.”
Miles-42 waits for the punchline.
There is none.
Miles-1610 shrinks apologetically.
Miles-42 steps up, and he is two inches too short to be as intimidating as he is, but damn, that glare is a knife.
“My world… my family… is in danger. And you can’t. Because you’ve got a final today.”
“Okay, okay, look, you don’t understand. It’s the Spanish final—” Miles-42 raises an eyebrow “—and I already got a B last semester—” The other eyebrow follows. “—and if I don’t pull that shit up, my mom’s gonna chew me out!”
“Your mom’s going to do nothing,” Miles-42 says calmly.
Because Miles-42 is going to do that for her, as he proceeds to cuss at Miles-1610 in the strongest Spanish comprehensible to the ear.
“How the hell did you get a B,” Miles-42 hisses.
“Oh like you’ve never gotten a B.”
“4.0,” Miles-42 says, eyes flashing. “Because mama didn’t raise no underachiever.”
“I have Spider-Man duties!”
“And I have vigilante shit.”
“Oh that’s not a fair comparison, and you know it! You can walk away from that anytime. I have a genetically-wired arachnohuman tingle that literally makes it impossible for me to ignore all the city’s problems.”
“Sounds like poor boundaries to me.”
Before Miles-1610 can protest, Miles-42 has already found and thrown him his Spider-Man suit. He then proceeds to unzip out of his own Prowler suit.
“What are you—”
“You’re me with spider powers. You can deal with the threat on your own.” But hell will freeze over before Miles-42 lets the Rio of any universe get a disappointment of a son. Miles-42 zips up Miles-1610’s hoodie. Freaking Spanish!
Realization dawns on Miles-1610, his heart skipping as he watches Miles-42 collect all the books on the bed.
No way— does that mean—
He gets a free pass out of finals?!
That’s a hell of a cheat-code. But is it cheating if it’s technically him… just from a different dimension? And all the studying is technically done… just by a different version of himself. A version that he totally could be, if only he didn’t need to save the world all the time!
“Wait, hair," Miles-1610 says.
The two Miles look each other up and down, considering the possibility. Then they look at each other some more, waiting for the other to concede to a few aesthetic life changes.
When neither does, both their gazes turn to Ganke.
“No,” Ganke says automatically.
“You can borrow my Jordans when I'm out,” Miles-1610 offers.
“Deal.”
Ganke throws them his beanie.
And so, Miles-42 heads for class while Miles-1610 giddily swings through Earth-42 as their temporarily-borrowed friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.
B for Bussing
The first time the former Jefferson Davis, now Jefferson Morales, meets Miles-42 is when he conveniently “forgets” to knock on his son’s bedroom door, hoping to catch him red-handed with his mysterious visitor.
As he swings open the door, he, of course, finds no such mysterious visitor, only Miles awkwardly standing alone in the middle of the bedroom.
“Yes?” Miles asks tightly.
Jefferson does another furtive scan of the bedroom to confirm, nope, no one. Just his son. Talking to himself. Again.
“Ah… dinner’s ready,” Jefferson announces, laughing weakly. “You mind coming set the table, bud?”
To his surprise—and the surprise of the invisible Miles-1610—Miles-42 automatically drops whatever he was doing and steps out into the hallway without further word. No fuss. No whine. No “just a minute” or a groan for privacy.
In the kitchen, Jefferson watches as Miles is suspiciously attentive to Rio, gathering dirty bowls and utensils for the sink, wiping countertops, and lifting the heavy pot out of Rio’s hands. The table isn’t just set, it’s wiped down, done so fluently that Jefferson has to do a double take.
“You don’t plan on eating with us today?” Jefferson jokes.
Miles freezes, realizing he has set the table for two, not three.
“Sorry sir—d-dad.”
For the rest of dinner, Miles tries to make himself as small and unnoticeable as possible. He avoids eye contact with Jefferson, but, infuriatingly enough, immediately looks at Rio with unadulterated attention, almost doe-eyed reverence, whenever she speaks.
“That’s a really nice beanie, Miles,” Rio says.
“Yeah,” Jefferson drawls. “I don’t remember us buying that for you.”
And there it is again. The tense up.
“It’s my roommate’s,” Miles mumbles.
“Ganke gifted that to you? How nice of him,” Rio hums.
“The jacket. That from him too?” Jefferson says.
Miles’s only response is a choked noise.
Miles stays long enough to help with the clean up, but not a second longer, the door to his bedroom slammed shut behind him.
“I think I’ve figured it out,” Jefferson tells Rio in private. “Our son’s secret.”
“Please tell me you’re not pressuring Miles to tell us before he’s ready,” Rio says, shaking out the bed covers.
“You knew?!”
“Well, I’ve had my suspicions.”
“And you’re okay with it?!”
“Absolutely. He’s our son. I support him no matter what.”
Jefferson sputters. “Well, I—! I… can’t! Not this.”
Rio’s eyes narrow. “You can’t?”
“How can you? We’ve given him everything! And he knows we would give him anything if he just asks. Yet he’s still willing to jeopardize it all and throw everything away for… for no reason!” Jefferson cradles his head. “Other than to get away from us.”
Rio softens. She sits by Jefferson in bed, holding his arm.
“Miles is just trying to figure himself out. Which, as difficult as it is for us, means allowing him the space to grow.”
“You mean, grow up.”
A heavy silence.
“So you’re really okay with Miles part-timing?” Jefferson asks.
“Of course I— what?”
“The part-time job.”
“ Job?” Rio bristles. “That’s ridiculous. Why would our baby need a job? We buy him everything he needs. We buy him everything he needs, right? The clothes, the shoes, the toys, the tech, the shoes, the… the art supplies! What on earth makes you think he’s got a job?!”
Jefferson raises an eyebrow. “Have you seen him set the table today? Kid’s clearly bussing. Also the new clothes, the watch…”
“You didn’t buy him that?” Rio’s eyes widen. “No wonder he’s always showing up late. And skipping classes!”
Turns out, Rio is not okay with it, not okay with it at all, already out the door, marching through the hallway in her slippers.
“...dare exploit my son. This is New York, not some third world country, how is this even legal, whatever happened to child labor laws… Miles! Miles, we need to talk,” Rio says, furiously knocking on Miles’s door.
She finds an empty bedroom.
Oh that boy is so grounded.
C for Capitalism
“I want Sunday dinner.”
Miles-1610 jolts up from his dormitory desk. Apparently his spidey sense doesn’t ever activate for himself, or at least, the alternative dimension version of himself.
“What! Hell no!” Miles-1610 swings his chair around to face his visitor. “You nearly exposed us to my parents last time. How is it that me is so bad at pretending to be me?”
Miles-42 is unfazed. “You get to hang out with my Uncle Aaron any time. Why can’t I spend time with your dad?”
There's an unrehearsed dryness at the edge of that question.
Miles-1610 falters. Then the guilt sinks in.
"Alright, alright. Just don't blow our cover. I am not ready for the Spider-Man convo with my parents yet."
"Who's Spider-Man?" Miles-42 mimics Miles-1610's accent and shrugs. “I'm not Spider-Man.”
Miles-42 drops the act, grinning at Miles-1610's reaction. He may or may not have been practicing in the mirror in the time leading up to his request. Snatched up a contact lens and everything.
"And I'm not," he says back in his natural voice. "Can't blow your cover when I am the cover."
It’s settled. Miles-42 gets dinner with Miles-1610’s parents on Sundays.
It is considerably less depressing than eating by himself while his own mom has to take the long shift. Instead, he gets to be in a warm kitchen where a version of his dad is still alive, and he is being asked about his day and how things are going at school, and fuck, he is not going to break character and cry into his asopao, because as blasphemous as it to admit it, Rio-1610 is also the better cook.
(To be fair, Rio-42 agrees.
Her heart melts when she finds the box of leftovers in the fridge, with a sticky note from her sweet boy.
A spoonful in, she stares at the bowl in alarm, wondering where the hell her son got his abuelita’s recipe.)
Meanwhile, Miles-1610 finally, finally has the sweet freedom to do what he needs to do, without the constant worry of appeasing his helicopter parents. Instead of scatter-mindedly going back and forth across the city, suit on suit off jacket on jacket off, he now has uninterrupted time to hone his skills.
Back when they had tag-teamed during that whole interdimensional collapse shenanigans, it had not done his ego well to learn his alternate self can, despite having no spider powers, fight better than him and swing better than him, say what.
Yeah yeah, other him’s got a head start. And, you know, the tragic backstory. And desperate times calling for desperate measures. But! But. What if Miles-1610… was that much cooler too.
After all, the world is gaining no favors from Spider-Man stuck in the house being grounded.
It’s a win-win.
It’s a win-win… right?
“What the—!”
The NYPD police squad watches dumbfounded as the regularly scheduled fight between Spider-Man and random mook of the day is interrupted by a sudden mysterious third party, who has blasted Spider-Man off his web midswing and straight into the eighth floor of a nearby parking lot.
The mook, after blinking, blesses his luck and makes a run for it.
The police react a second later, shouting “Hey! Stop!” and running back to their cruisers.
Meanwhile, in the eighth floor of the nearby parking lot, Miles-1610 groans.
“We need to talk.”
Miles-1610 stares at his alternate version in dismay. “You? Now? Can’t you see I’m in the middle of—”
“This wasn’t part of the deal,” Miles-42 says grimly.
Miles-1610 pats himself up. “What do you mean? Thought the deal was you be me, and I be Spider-Man.”
“No, the deal was I get to spend time with our dad, which I can never do if he is always chasing after Spider-Man.”
Fuming, Miles-42 proceeds to then recount all his thwarted attempts at father-son bonding, including but not limited to:
Movie night, until the radio went off for Spider-Man.
Charades night, until the sirens went off for Spider-Man.
The ball game, until it was interrupted by the sudden web-slinging appearance of, you guessed it, Spider-Man.
“Wait, you guys went to a ball game? Just how bored were you?"
A ball game hasn’t been interesting since Miles was, like, eight. And sitting there, for hours, with his dad?
Miles-42’s eyes flash dangerously.
Miles-1610 immediately amends that thought. Privilege. Just going to check that. Pack, unpack, pre-check that, ha.
“Okay, understood, sorry. But I also can’t just let all these guys go loose,” Miles-1610 says, beckoning to the general city.
“Sure you can.”
“What.”
“Have you learned nothing from The Spot,” Miles-42 growls. “Wouldn’t have exactly risked interdimensional collapse if you had just let him take the stupid money from the ATM.”
“Okay, no way could I have known he’d go berserker. I was just stopping crime!”
“And that’s your problem. He was not the criminal. The criminal is Alchemex, for withholding workplace injury compensation and disability leave. The criminal is your government, for vetoing against discrimination protection. The criminal is the bank, which deserves to be robbed for literally robbing everyone else. The Spot was just one normal guy, out of hundreds of thousands of normal guys who got fucked by the system, and who you have turned into the villain by making your enemy.” Miles-42 releases a long exhale of pent-up frustration. “Sometimes I question whose side you’re on. I thought the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man was supposed to protect, you know, the hood. I thought the whole point of your thing was to stand up for the kids who got none.”
Miles-1610 closes his mouth.
“Damn, you sound like Hobie.”
“No, I sound like any kid with two brain cells, any kid who hasn’t forgotten who we are and where we come from.”
Miles-42 turns his back. He closes his eyes.
“I know it’s dad. He really got to you, huh. Man means well. But…I think we both know… what’s best for us, what’s good for us, isn’t to be like one of them.” He glances back. “We can’t be playing by their rules.”
Miles-1610 softens. He peels off his mask and stares at it, then at his alternate self. He thinks back to his city's former Spider-Man, and how he's still subconsciously trying to pick up where the old Peter Parker left off, following his formula, his template. A template that, the longer he looks at his mirror image, is obviously never intended for him.
“Nah, we gotta do our own thing,” he agrees, gripping the mask tight.
Pleased, Miles-42 readies to leave.
“Wait, what do I do now?” Miles-1610 calls out, having a mini existential crisis now that 99% of his Spider-Man duties have been wiped from his plate.
“Don’t you have a girlfriend?” Miles-42 says blandly.
“Okay, first of all, not my girlfriend. Second, I am still mostly no longer entirely mad at her, okay, I’m not mad at her, it’s just… awkward. I mean, there’s been a shortage of interdimensional collapses lately, what excuse have I got to just, you know, drop by now, as opposed to… well, months ago?” Miles-1610 laughs nervously.
“Say you need a practice partner.”
Miles-1610 brightens at the idea. “Huh, yeah. In web shooting?”
Miles-42 lowers his eyelids. “How about Spanish.”
D for Dance (Dance Revolution)
Miles-1610 closes his locker to see a classmate excitedly shuffle toward him, waving.
“Miles! Miles!”
Oh, so he is waving at him.
Oh no.
“Heeey…”
Miles sweats profusely, smiling and nodding as the classmate begins chatting. He sweats harder when the classmate appears to be fully intent on walking together with him down the hall, going on something about Chemistry.
Chemistry…
Chemistry…
Right, this is the kid who sits next to him in Chemistry, the kid whose name is eluding him, and Miles is left feeling like an asshole, because he’s got to be the only student in school who hasn’t memorized everyone in their grade yet.
It’s got to begin with an M.
The conversation has pivoted to some K-drama and is somehow still going strong, glued entirely together by tight-lipped “yup”s and “mhmm”s from Miles’s side.
Mar—? Mi—?
“Anyway!” The classmate stops at an intersection in the hallway. “About homecoming. You aren’t going with anyone, right? You want to crash it together or…? I’m also down to finally hit up that arcade.”
The classmate smiles, holding the straps of his backpack, blinking expectedly.
Oh. He’s waiting for an answer.
“Homecoming, you say? I, ah, that’s great, appreciate the hangout offer…”
The classmate beams.
“... but I’m good, thanks. I’m going with Gwanda,” Miles says, smug. Seeing the classmate’s confusion, he quickly clarifies, “She’s from out of town.”
The confusion intensifies, and Miles can practically see the gears in his brain turning. Then, the classmate breaks into a laugh.
“Oh! I get it. ‘Gwanda .’ Let me guess, from Wakanda, am I right?” the classmate jokes, punching Miles in the arm.
“What, no! She’s real. And it’s South Africa for your information.”
The classmate’s expression changes.
“Oh.”
Miles makes it back to his dorm room and it is only then that he blurts out, “Mingjie!” startling the alternate version of himself that is perched on Ganke’s chair.
“What?” Miles-42 asks, breaking away from the monitor.
“His name! Mingjie Wu.” Miles-1610 does know it, thank god. He drops his backpack on the floor. “Just bumped into him in the hallway. Well, more like got followed through the hallway. Damn, that guy can talk the ears off anyone.”
“What did he want?”
“Oh nothing. Just asking about homecoming plans. Do I give off pity vibes or something, for guys to just assume I’m going to be alone, ‘cause I didn’t think we were that—”
Miles-1610’s eyes fall down to the paused K-drama on Ganke’s monitor, then at his tense alternate self, then back at the drama.
“—close.”
And that is the moment two neurons connected.
“Him and me– I mean, you and him–? You guys…?”
“We’re friends,” Miles-42 says blandly, resuming his show. “Better not have been rude to him.”
“What, no! No.” Not with that threat.
“So what you tell him?”
“What?”
“Homecoming. What you tell him.”
“Just that I’m going with Gwanda— I mean, Gwen. I’m going to ask Gwen. Obviously. And…” Miles-1610 doesn’t know how to continue when he sees his alternate self give off stronger gloomy dark vibes than usual. “I’m sorry, did you want— were you hoping to—?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Miles-42 says calmly, intensely staring at the subtitles. “It’s your school and your dance. Makes sense you get dibs on it.”
The gloom is palpable. The color palette has shifted. Miles-1610 can see the lines of depression sinking in with that lie.
Oh for Marvel’s sake.
The door to the Morales residence rings on the night of homecoming.
Rio opens it to find a sunny boy at their doorstep, a basket of fruit in one arm and a bouquet of flowers in the other.
“Mrs. and Mr. Morales, hello, good evening! ¿Cómo está usted?”
“Mingjie! Come in, come in, Miles has told us all about you,” Rio says, opening the door wide.
“I highly doubt he’s told us all—” Jefferson is shut up by a jab of his wife’s elbow.
“Oh, that’s so sweet, you brought something for us?” Rio accepts the basket of oranges. “And you got Miles flowers!”
“Oh no, Mrs. Morales, these flowers are for the family too. Miles told me sweet peas are your favorites.”
“Ah, why yes they are, thank you,” Rio says, half delighted, half baffled, handing the heavy basket off to Jefferson to receive the flowers. She has a pointed look at her husband that says, I like this one more already. “Miles! Your date’s here!”
“Mom!” Miles-42 bursts out from the bedroom. “He’s not my date.”
“I’m not his date,” Mingjie agrees, nodding amicably. Then he catches sight of Miles-42 in his formal wear.
“Whoa! I love the hair!” Mingjie says, wide-eyed.
“Thanks,” Miles-42 says warmly, rolling down his sleeves. “You look good too.”
They smile at each other, until Miles-42 notices the parents staring at them, Jefferson not-so-subtly reaching for a camera.
“Not my date,” Miles-42 reiterates, suddenly feeling deep empathy for Miles-1610. “I’m not about that stuff.”
“Allonormativity is so 2020,” Mingjie sighs.
“Is that blowdry?” Miles-42 asks upon closer glance.
“Yeah, you like?”
“It’s real nice,” Miles-42 says approvingly.
They are nearly out the door when Miles-42 remembers. “I’ll be back by 10.”
“Take your time,” Rio says. “You’re ungrounded for tonight.”
“I am?” Miles-42 asks.
“He is?” Jefferson double-checks.
“Yeah, he is,” Rio says.
Miles-42 beams.
The parents watch the two boys go.
“... glad Gwanda canceled, I was looking forward to this all year.”
“Same…”
The door closes.
Jefferson breaks his silence. “What the hell is allo-whatawhat? Is that some new letter in the alphabet we should be aware of now. And the hair, did you, did you help him with that hair?”
Rio throws up her hands in surrender, because even she has a limit as the cool "hip" mom.
“To be perfectly honest with you, half the time, it feels like there’s a whole other person raising our boy. I don’t know who they are, I don’t know what they’re teaching our son, but…”
“But?”
“But they’re taking good care of him.” Rio stares fondly at the bouquet of sweet peas. “And they’re making sure he’s loved.”
Meanwhile, on Earth-65…
“What do you mean change of plans?” Gwen asks.
“Ah, turns out my school dance is at, um, maximum me capacity?” Miles-1610 winces. “But no worries, we’ll go to yours!”
“What! No way.”
“Why not? You’re not embarrassed of me, are you?”
Gwen sputters. “Of course not. But if we show up at my mine, no way word won’t travel back to my dad, and he already saw our photo and then I’ll need to explain and ha, my avoidant attachment style says nope on that—” Gwen takes a deep breath.
“Okay, okay, we don’t got to do that.”
Gwen jumps. “Oh, I know! Why don’t we just go to Hobie’s?”
“Hey, yeah!”
One interdimensional portal later…
“Uh, why is London on fire?” Gwen says, very alarmed.
“Oh, great timing, mates.” Hobie swings down, joining them in the middle of the chanting, marching crowd. “Revolution is evolution and we’re just kicking off ours, yeah? See you’re dressed for the event, very sharp, highly guillotine appropriate.”
Pavitr waves enthusiastically.
“Pav?! What are you also doing here?”
“Why wouldn’t I be here?” Pavitr gasps. “The monarchy just got canceled, and I’m not talking about the show. Don’t you know we’ve been waiting three hundred years for this moment? Whoo! Go protesters go, Mumbattan supports you~”
As Pavitr cheerleads and Hobie strums his guitar, Miles-1610 and Gwen exchange a look. They shrug, then mask up, joining the dancers in the street.
Then everyone has cake. One to web sling at Parliament. And one to eat.
Because this is the Spiderverse, and it’s time to let the people have both.