Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It’s raining heavily from the grey sky above, and Peter has never felt the weather matches his mood perfectly like today. He is standing in the middle of the rain, alone, in the Harlem cemetery. The cold of late autumn makes his skin lose all color and his hands freezing cold but it is still not enough to snap him out of his thoughts.

Every time he feels like he can not comprehend his emotions anymore, he always finds himself here, in this cemetery, and talks to Aunt May and Uncle Ben. Today, he also feels hopeless and lost but right now he is in front of another person's grave.

Harry…

‘I can’t keep my promise to make Emily-May Foundation come true. I can’t even keep May’s house… I don’t even know what to do…’

Peter doesn’t even know if tears fall out of his face or if it’s just rainfall in his eyes anymore. His life just spiraled downhill after Aunt May passed away. He tries, he knows that he has tried to float above the surface but he keeps sinking.

“Pete, does this job ever get easier?”

“Some of it yeah… Somethings never get easier though…”

He is the one who said that to Miles, yet, sometimes he thinks he still can’t imagine how hard life could be. Six months have passed since the funeral of Harry Osborn yet the sadness he feels seems like everything just happened yesterday.

How many people does he know end up lying here in this graveyard because of him? Harry is here. He could see Aunt May and Uncle Ben's gravestones together a few steps ahead under the big tree. And then in the left corner of his eyes, he can see Jeff Davisons – Miles’s dad's grave.

Even while having all this jumbled thought, Peter could hear someone land and light footsteps walk toward his behind. Spidey-sense doesn’t flare or even hum so he could guess who approaching him

“Pete…”

He turns around and sees Miles in his Spidey’s suit, the black spandex suit with a red web pattern from the head to the top half of his torso, a red spider symbol across his chest, and below is the V shape red line stretching from his stomach to shoulder. It is truly a magnificent suit to look at and it’s screaming Miles’s name. Peter feels very proud of Miles after everything they went through together. His reflection is on the white lens and Peter knows Miles is looking at him worrying.

“You patrol this early?”

Miles shakes his head.

“I actually suit up looking for you”

A bang of guilt hit Peter in the gut. Sometimes he feels like he is not even the mentor or brother figure to Miles anymore because of how often he keeps messing up and Miles has to look out for him.

“Sorry--“

Miles puts a hand on Peter's shoulder and he squeezes lightly.

 “No, Pete, we talked about this before. You don’t have to feel sorry about others taking care of you. You are not alone and never will be. I am here, my mom, Ganke, MJ, Matt, and even other people who don’t know about your identity look out and care about you. Ok?”

“Yeah… Alright… So, what’s happened? Do I need to suit up?”

“No. No. MJ and Matt just called me, they said you didn’t pick up your phone and Matt said you have been out of the house since the morning and it’s started getting dark”

“Oh… Yeah, I forgot the time… and my phone died”

“Have you eaten anything all day?”

“…Yes…”

“Peter, I know you are lying”

Miles pats his shoulder.

“Let me get you to my home. Mom makes a lot of food tonight and she loves to have you at dinner”

Peter steps back a bit and weakly offers Miles a smile to show that he is fine. But his smile doesn’t seem to reach his eyes and looks more like a grimace.

“No, it’s fine. I’m fine Miles. I will get back to Matt’s place and call MJ. Don’t worry”

Miles hesitates and is silent for a few seconds before he talks again.

“OK, fine. Go back to Matt’s place I will get home and bring you some of my mom's homemade food, I think Matt is going to love it as well.”

“You don’t have to. I’m fine, really--“

“Go home Pete, if you don’t, I will find you again and personally drag your ass to my apartment”

Pete chuckles and puts his hands up in mock surrender.

“Fine, jeez, pushy aren’t you?”

Miles stays still and watches him walk away. Peter can feel Miles’s eyes on him until he turns to a corner to walk in the Hell’s Kitchen direction. It gonna be a long walk and his clothes already dipping wet sticking to his skin. He feels the cold soak into him now he has stopped his escalating negative thoughts. He can’t catch a cold or get a sore throat and rhinitis anymore because of his healing factor from the spider bite. Though the cold could be the problem, also because of the spider's ability, he can’t thermoregulate like normal people so if it got too cold he could go into hibernation and shut down in the middle of walking. Thinking about it now, he starts waking faster, the pavement is empty of people walking because of the heavy rain and the cold of November.

After almost half of hour, he finally reaches Matt’s apartment building. He dips rainwater all over the floor to the elevator. Finally, reaching Matt’s house before he could even open the door, it opens and reveals a very worried Matt Murdock in a gray T-shirt and black sweatpants. He doesn’t wear his iconic red glasses, so he has been home for a while and relaxing.

“You are soaking wet, go change. Miles said he would come in a bit”

“Yeah, ok”

After a hot shower and putting on fully dry clothes, he decides to charge his private phone and the burner phone for Spider-Man business as well. As both of the screens lit up he checked Peter’s phone first, a bunch of missed calls from MJ, Matt, and Miles. He calls MJ first and she picks up after the first ring.

“God, Peter Benjamin Parker, where have you been? Is your phone just for decoration?”

“Sorry, I just went out and my phone died, I think I forgot to charge it yesterday”

MJ sighs and after a few seconds of awkward silence, she speaks again but now her tone is a lot softer.

“Peter, you can’t keep sinking with that start-up foundation. I know that is what Harry left behind but you need to move on, you struggling with your finances for a while you can’t keep burning your money on that project anymore.

“Harry doesn’t want to see you like this either you know…”

He feels his throat burn and he can’t answer MJ right away. They all have been friends for a long time so MJ of course knows Harry doesn’t want Peter to keep trying like this. He just doesn’t want to admit it, facing the truth that he truly fails. He thinks a piece of him died because now Harry's passion can’t come true.

MJ speaks again, moving his attention back to her conversation.

“I want to meet up with you today to talk about our jobs. I got an opportunity at The Bulletin and I will go to Metropolis tomorrow.

“But that is not the only news I want to talk about… I know, what I was doing is crossing the line, but I actually made you a CV and sent it alongside your thesis paper about replacing X-rays with proton beams to some tech companies that I already known they are legit and invested in making the world a better place through science. I think you may get an email reply, and I believe it because I know your achievement, Pete, you are a genius and you can’t waste your life and talents like this.”

“Congratulations to you MJ. And… About my job, yeah, I maybe will check my email”

“Yeah, that’s good. Check it and update me on the news”

“MJ…”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you, I don’t know how to make it up to you after a lot of trouble that I have made you go through”

“Pete, you saved my life tons of time, you even saved the world. I think some small stuff I did to you doesn’t mean that much”

“No MJ, because of me--”

“No, Pete, no. Ok? You are fine and it’s never been because of you. It’s my choice to be your partner.

“Take care Pete, and say hi to Matt and Miles for me, I think I bother them too much”

“Yeah, goodbye MJ, safe fly tomorrow”

The call ends and Peter just stares at the phone screen he can see some email notifications that he didn’t pay attention to earlier.

The first one is from Wayne Enterprise Technologies

Chapter Text

Peter knows about Wayne Enterprise, of course, who doesn’t? They are the biggest corporation in Gotham City and owned by Bruce Wayne - the man that people believe to be even richer than Tony Stark. He has read how Wayne's single-hand funds almost every soup kitchen, homeless shelter, and open free clinic in Gotham. Bruce Wayne and his family contribute so much to Gotham that Peter can’t even understand why he is not the Mayor of the city yet.

The email said the company is interested in his work and they are giving him a chance to interview next Friday morning at the Wayne Enterprise building in Gotham.

Peter looks at other emails. The next one is a decline by the Stark Industry which he was not surprised by. He was Otto’s student who became Doc Ock and released a bioweapon Devil Breath in the middle of Times Square in New York. After that, he worked with Harry who associated with the Symbiote evaded New York incident. Even though Norman Osborn tried hard to cover Harry’s identity when he was being manipulated by Venom, there are still witnesses, and rumors still spread out like wildfire. He is not sure if Tony Stark even checked in with the recruiter department but his working track record is pretty bad even for others to look at so their decline is reasonable.

Some other emails are from smaller companies that Peter is not familiar with. He guesses that MJ has applied his CV to a lot of companies that she could think of.

Peter sighs, he would love to work at Wayne Tech but if he accepts the opportunity he has to move to Gotham. He has been living his whole life in New York and the only time he was out of New York was on a mission with the Avengers or went on vacation with Harry. Moreover, he is the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man from Queens, he is taking a break but that doesn’t mean he will abandon New York people.

He turns off his private phone screen and looks at his Spidey phone, there is a bunch of unread texts.

Wade Wilson (10:36 yesterday) Hey Spidey, r u ok? It’s been so long since we met.

Wade Wilson (22:04 yesterday) Babyboy, lil Spidey said you are still on a break and you are safe but I miss you :((

Wade Wilson (23:45 yesterday) I think Baby Spider blocked my text

Wade Wilson(23:46 yesterday) Can you ask him to unblock me? I will be on my best behavior.

Wade Wilson (8:01 today) He was so upset with me because I nearly maimed the left arm of a goon on his patrol last night.

Wade Wilson (10:31 today) Tell him I’m sorry~ And tell him to unblock me, please!

Wade Wilson (10:32 today) Anyway, I know you need your me-time but could you show up and we have a little Team Red reunion plus little Spidey Boi and maybe Flame Head? How about Taco Tuesday?

Peter cannot help but smile when he looks at the thread of text from Deadpool. Honestly, Deadpool is such a nuisance he doesn’t even know how he and Matt could team up with Wade. Their work and relationship are weird but it turns out good in the end. Wade is a good friend, he even trusts Peter so much that he leads him to meet up with his daughter - Ellie. It makes Peter sometimes question his decision about keeping his identity secret from the man. But he knows he can’t risk it because if others know about his identity then they could make the connection and know about Miles's identity as well. Especially, now that Miles become the only Spider-Man, Peter trusts Miles's ability to protect himself but he cannot help but feel worried, and keeping his identity a secret is the least he can do. Wade understands that and he has never pressured him to talk about this topic.

He decides to reply.

Spider-Man (20:00 today) Fine, alright, we could meet next Tuesday. But you buy the food then.

Wade Wilson (20:00) OMFG, YES! Anything for you Spidey. Can wait till Tuesday though! Could you also ask little Spidey to unblock me, please?

Spider-Man (20 :01) Well, I can’t help with that Wade. If I saw you maim a person I could also block you for a day.

Wade Wilson (20:01) That criminal arm is still intact with his body and he is not dead yet. You are so mean. :< But I like u so I will let this slide bb.

Spider-Man (20:02) See you, Wade.

Peter checks other texts

Johnny Storm (10:33 yesterday) Hey Spider, Susan wants to invite you to dinner and game night at Baxter Building tomorrow night. Text me if you can come, ok? Lil Spidey told me he would think about it.

Johnny Storm (23:45 yesterday) Could you check in with Lil Spider and let me know if he is alright?

Johnny Storm (23:46 yesterday ) And could you tell him to unblock me? I swear I won’t annoy him anymore.

Johnny Storm (9:06 today) Hey, Spider-Man are you alright? Did something happen to you too? You haven’t even read my text.

Peter curiously looks at his screen. What did happen and why did Miles block both Wade and Johnny at the same time? He knows his friends feel a bit protective of Miles since Miles first made his debut. Peter is not that tall but Miles looks even shorter and smaller and he sounds so young, wearing his training suit with a hoodie and black leggings. Wade said he wanted to adopt Miles and Johnny even though he had never said it out loud, he went out of his way to look out for Miles while Miles was on patrol.

So that means, something bad happened and Miles hasn’t told him yet.

Spider-Man (20:05 today) Sorry I forgot to charge my phone, I don’t think we could go to game night tonight. Tell Susan I’m so sorry.

Spider-Man (20:05 today) And I’m fine. Little Spider is also fine, I just met him. Did something happen last night?

Johnny Storm (20:06 today) That’s good that he is ok. Don’t worry about game night. And, he hasn’t told you?

Spider-Man (20:06) No, what’s wrong?

Johnny Storm (20:07) I think you should ask him.

Spider-Man (20:07) Is this something I should be worried about?

Johnny Storm (20:08) Yes? No… I don’t know. Maybe?

Spider-Man (20:08) I will talk to him then. Also, Wade wants to do a Taco Tuesday next week.

Johnny Storm (20:09) Yeah, I know, you really in right? Wade has been texting me like crazy since you accepted his invitation.

Spider-Man (20:09) Yep, see you on Tuesday.

Peter now feels even more strange about it. He definitely needs to talk with Miles right now. He hears three knocks on the window outside Matt’s living room. Well, speaking of the devil, Miles’s here.

Peter steps outside as Matt opens the window to let Miles in. He wears a backpack and is still in his Spider-Man suit. Peter guess the rain has stopped because Miles looks completely dry.

“Hey guys, we have Caldo Santo and Jibarito, sit down and eat while it is still hot”

He sits on the couch and takes off his mask. His hands quickly open his backpack and take out the containers. Matt smiles

“I can tell it is great even before tasting it. Could you tell your mom I said thanks and her food is wonderful”

Miles laugh softly

“She gonna make a big fuss about how the grumpy Daredevil loves her food so much.”

 Peter can smell the food as well and his stomach growls loudly. Matt looks at Peter and his smile turns to a frown

“I can tell you haven’t eaten any shit all day Peter”

“Yeah…”

They all settle down on the couch and start eating.

And Peter decides to jump right to the point

“So Miles, what happened last night?

Miles stops eating instantly and avoids Peter’s gaze.

“Just tell me Miles, and you know you can’t lie, I will know right away and next to you is the lie detector”

Matt arches his eyebrow and asks Miles.

“Did something bad happen to you that I don’t know about?”

Miles sighs and puts down his container of food.

“Fine, nothing really bad happened though. I just got distracted and got a crowbar in the head while patrolling last night and was unconscious for a few minutes. Wade was on patrol with me and kept bugging me about you as usual and Johnny was there as well. They were panicking, and Wade maimed the goon's arm nearly off. They were scared that I could get brain damaged so they had to take off my mask to check. I woke up and they asked me a few questions and they said I had a concussion. They kept apologizing for revealing my face so I told them it was fine and told them my name because I trusted them. After that, they bothered me about taking me home like I was a baby even though I said I could swing back and the concussion would be healed the next day. They texted me a lot and even called so I blocked them”

“Miles… It was bad to swing while you had a concussion you could have fallen mid-swing. Why didn’t you call me?”

Peter’s voice is a little higher than normal, he is worried about Miles.

“Peter, we talk about how we trust each other judgment. I know I could swing back. And you know I have dealt with Roxxon and Symbiote, I can handle myself.”

Matt's calm voice speaks as Peter turns silent

“You know your limit Miles but Peter is right, you could still danger yourself swinging in a condition like that, you should accept Wade and Johnny's help though.”

“Yeah, maybe, I think I was upset because they make such a big deal about my identity too. I trust them, so I think it’s fine”

Matt nods in agreement

“Yeah, Wade and Johnny actually know my identity too.”

Now both Miles and Peter are surprised

“What? Really?”

“Yeah, a while ago, I told Wade when I met him in his civilian clothes one night. I think he was going out for shopping. And I told Johnny when he tried to disguise to blend in the restaurant. His date stood him up so I had dinner with him that night”

Miles looks a bit dazed and Peter doesn’t know what to say about this. He always thinks Matt is the one most secretive about his identity. Finally, Miles cheerful takes back his food to eat and says.

“Yeah, see, my identity is not that big of a deal that they make it seems like”

Peter speaks quietly.

“I’ve been thinking about telling them for a while actually but I was scared that they would find out about Miles’s”

Miles gasps.

“God, I kept my identity because I was afraid that they would find out about yours”

Then Peter and Miles both laugh out loud.

Matt puts a hand on his face and looks defeatedly

“You guys are really the same, my god. Both of you are idiots”

Peter is still grinning, it’s been a long time since he laughed like that. He calms down as he says

“I think I will tell them next meet-up on Tuesday”

Matt says.

“Yeah, Wade already texted me about it.”

Miles silently speak

“Maybe I should unblock them soon…”

Peter suddenly thinks about the job offer from Wayne, maybe he should talk with Miles and Matt. He feels really indecisive about this. Part of him loves the opportunity and he always wants to work at a upstanding corporation like Wayne which focuses on helping others but part of him feels sad that he has to move away from New York and put a break on Spider-Man responsibility even longer.

“Actually, I need your opinion about this”

Miles and Matt both look at him.

“Yeah?”

“What is it?”

Peter honestly talk

“MJ has applied for me to some companies. And I got an offer from Wayne Enterprise Technology. If I go there for the interview and end up getting the job, I have to stay in Gotham”

Matt hums in acknowledgment while Miles is stiffly silent as Peter continues.

“I don’t know what to do, to be honest”

Miles speaks up and he sounds certain about this

“Take the job, Pete. I know you love to work at some company that wants to make the world a better place”

“Yeah… But I can’t leave my duty”

Matt says and he also sounds assured about his speak

“You have Miles here, and you could be Spider-Man there, you know?”

Peter laughs dryly

“Well, I don’t think Batman will be happy if Spider-Man suddenly shows up in his territory. And I know I trust Miles but what if something big happens like the Symbiote and I’m not here to help?”

“Who cares the Bats? Gotham has the highest crime rate in the country, you are the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man looks out for the small guys you won’t change the rules of Gotham and a bit of help out could only do good. Besides, since when are you scared about trespassing territory of other vigilantes, you kept showing up in Hell’s Kitchen even when I was chasing you away. About Miles, you don’t have to worry, he is capable and we are here and we know Miles’s identity now and it will be easier to look out for him”

Peter chuckles

“Touché. But I think I am afraid of Batman more than you, Matt. You are just a gloomy catholic”

Matt looks sullen as he grumbles somethings. Miles cheery says.

“I bet Batman even more emo than Matt. I mean look at his outfit. And the way he speaks. Honestly, I think Gotham looks a bit depressing so that is understandable for Batman to be like that”

Peter and Matt both nod and agree with Miles on that. They resume back to eating Rio’s delicious food. Peter determinedly speak

“Yeah, maybe I should take the chance, it’s not like I could pass the interview right away”

Now both Miles and Matt snort at the same time in synch.

“Of course, you gonna get it, Pete. You are so intelligent and you keep downplaying yourself. You could even get to work with Stark if you apply”

Miles protests but Peter just sadly smiles

“MJ did try but they rejected me. I think it was because of my association with both Otto and Harry”

Matt pensively speaking.

“If you sign a contract, send me and I will check it to make sure they won’t take advantage of you”

“Thank you, Matt. I will pay back the rent for the time I was living here”

“You don’t have to, Peter. I don’t mind having company, it’s nice.”

Peter feels thankful to have his friends around to help him through this tough time.

Chapter Text

Peter Parker (10:30 today) I forgot to tell you, I got an email for an interview on Fri from Wayne Tech in Gotham two days ago. How do you do with your new job at The Bulletin?

Mary Jane (10:31 today) Awesome news, Pete! How about Stark Industry?

Mary Jane (10:31) I think I get the hang of the new job and feel good working here. God, I don’t even know why I let J. Jameson. Jr be my shitty boss for so many years. And I get to know amazing people as well, the Kent and Lane couple help me a lot. We had a party last night. My colleague said they wanted to officially welcome me to the team.

Peter Parker (10:32) It’s nice to see you have a good time.

Peter Parker (10:32) Stark Industry rejected me but I knew that already. It’s fine.

Peter Parker (10:32) Oh, I think Miles hasn’t told you yet, but Sat night last week he got a concussion, Wade and Johnny helped him and they know his identity now.

Mary Jane (10:32) Is Miles alright? I should call him.

Peter Parker (10:33) Oh, he is fine. But he is sulking and has been blocking them since.

Mary Jane (10:33)  Oh, I’m glad he is fine. Updated me about Miles, ok? He and you are so alike, always hide if anything bad happens to yourself.

Peter Parker (10:34) Yeah, I will. And no, Miles and I are not like that. :/

Peter Parker (10:34) Also, I think I will tell Wade and Johnny my identity.

Mary Jane (10:35) Well, about damn time. I’m tired of hearing you, Miles and Matt talk about them all the time, I want to talk to them too you know.

Peter Parker (10:36) Oh… I will send you their numbers. If I got the job at Wayne, I have to move to Gotham so they would look out for Miles. You could text them to get an update on Miles.

Send Wade and Johnny’s number

Peter Parker (10:37) You should contact them after tonight, I will tell them my identity tonight.

MJ doesn’t reply so Peter thinks she goes back to her work. But around twenty minutes later. Peter’s phone gets a new text.

Mary Jane (10:57) So, Wade threatened me and kept asking me how I got his number and Johnny tried to act like I got the wrong number. I said OG Spidey give it to me and I am a partner with both Spider-Man and I know their identity. Well, Wade video call me and I think he was next to some guy called Weasel and asked him to track my phone. I convinced him and sent him a bunch of pictures of Miles with me throughout all the time we knew each other. Johnny blocked me so I asked Wade to text him and read out loud Johnny's number. Anyway, Wade believed me and Johnny unblocked and called me. Things sorted out and we have a group chat now. I sent him a bunch of pictures of baby Miles that Rio sent me a long time ago and they were swooning. And I say I could tell Miles to unblock them.

Peter Parker (10:58) Weasel is Wade’s friend and he is the owner of Sister’s Margeret bar. He is good with tech, and he definitely already track you down. How are you so good at convincing them? Also, what is the group chat about? Can I be in it?

Mary Jane (10:59) Of course I’m good, I’m MJ the journalist. The group chat’s name is Spiders Protection Squad. So no, you can’t be in this group chat. I added Matt to this group as well and the typical Matt just read the text and didn’t even reply.

Mary Jane (10:59) Tell them your identity and I will make a group chat for all of us. Also, I tell Miles to unblock them, and they screaming through text right now

Peter chuckles at MJ's text, he can imagine the chaos of Wade, Johnny, and MJ.

======

Matt, Miles, and Peter are waiting for the others to show up at their usual meet-up rooftop in Hell’s Kitchen. This is the first spot where Matt, Wade, and Peter decide to meet up together at their first team-up. It was 5 years ago and Peter didn’t even know this was Matt’s apartment building rooftop.

“Spidey! I miss you so damn much! And why did you change your suit to white? We can’t be Team Red now if your uniform looks like that!”

Wade cheerfully says as he climbs up the stairs of the fire escape to the roof. Right after that, Johnny flies with his flame toward the roof and he says.

“I can’t believe you guys really use that stupid name”

“We are not, just Wade keeps calling that. And Wade, this suit is the new me”

Peter didn’t even think about it really. He can control the remaining symbiote inside him as his will after the help of Martin Li and Miles. Now, he can just suit up his Anti-Venom suit anytime he wants and it wraps outside of his clothes, it is very convenient. He still wears his old suit underneath to use the gadgets, the com connected with his phone, the police radio scanner as well as the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man app. But today he just showed up for Taco Tuesday so he didn’t bother to change out of his civilian clothes.

“Well, it does wrap up your ass nicely and show your big boobs better”

Matt gasps and puts two hands to cover Miles's ears as he yells at Wade

“Wade, there are children here!”

“Yeah, right. Sorry”

“Damnit guys! I’m not a kid”

Miles protests and moves out of Matt's hands and all of them laugh happily. Wade gives huge bags of tacos to Peter and Miles then he hands the normal-size bags to Matt and Johnny. Peter unwraps the first taco and takes one bite, Wade always knows the delicious taco place even though Peter has been living in New York his whole life and he doesn’t know this many good Mexican food places. It’s like his power at this point.

“Actually, I have something I should tell you guys…”

Peter as awkward as he always has been, trying to open up about his identity. He has never really told anyone. Most of them found out by themselves, except Miles of course. That time, he was just so excited that Miles got the same power as him so he did the first thing in his mind that is jump up to the ceiling with Miles. So technically, he hasn’t told Miles, he just showed Miles.

Now, he doesn’t know how to talk about it, and his anxiety getting all over his head.

Johnny looks tense and Wade stops abruptly his eating. Johnny carefully askes

“Is this about last Saturday?”

“Yeah, kind of”

Wade walks up to Peter and says with his earnest voice.

“I know we fuck up but Baby Spider was injured at the time--”

“No, I don’t worry about that, Miles trusts you guys and I trust you as well. So yeah… Just… Let me show you then.”

And the white symbiote moves down to show his head.

Wade and Johnny both shock and gasping like fish out of water. Wade is the first one to speak up first, his voice up an octave.

“Holy Fuck! You are the famous Spider-Man’s photographer”

Now Johnny looks dazed and confused and Peter is the one who feels shocked right now. How the turn table.

“Wait what? He is a photographer? I thought he is a science nerd working in a lab. Reed keeps talking about the genius who published complicated equations and had some kind of robotic arm project for disabled people”

Now both Wade and Peter ask Johnny

“What?”

“How do you know about my project just from seeing my face?”

Johnny looks fidgeting and uncomfortable

“Well, he showed me your face and talked about you a lot so I remember”

Matt just snorts and his lip turns up lightly to a micro-smirk. Johnny glares at Matt but he doesn’t say anything else.

Wade chippers

“My goodness, artistic and nerdy, that’s the whole package”

Peter crosses his arms and looks at Wade

“You still haven’t explained how you knew about my photographer gig though”

“Fine, I love Spider-Man photos from the Daily Bulge a lot but I hate the paper. So I asked Weasel to hack into their systems but I got nothing about the photographer's information. So I bribed Weasel again to hack into their security camera systems, he had to look at a lot of footage to find you though. Anyway, I followed you right after that and I saw you helping an old lady cross the street, you even refused to accept her money as her thanks, and you then fed a stray cat before finally going home. So I already knew you were a good person but I was curious so I asked around and knew your name and texted Weasel after I got your name. He sent me your email and some of your social media which is mostly private, so I didn’t want to annoy you any further and left it at that. But I did try to follow your private Instagram account multiple times because your profile picture is a really good picture of Queens Bridge”

Peter chuckles

“You are Unicorn69flyintherainbow?”

“YES!”

Peter does the facepalm

“Wade, I set that account private because that is where I post photos from a really high and specific angle of New York, people will know that I’m Spider-Man.”

Miles suddenly speaks up

“Well, his picture is actually super good. New York looks a lot prettier through his camera lens”

“You have to unblock me and accept my request now!”

“Fine. But wait, let’s do this properly…”

Peter holds out both of his hands to Johnny and Wade.

“Hi, I’m Peter Parker and I’m the original Spider-Man”

“Hello, Petey Pie. Wade Winston Wilson, at your service baby boy”

“Johnny Storm but you already knew it”

They both shake his hand and grinning.

Wade gasps like he just noticed something

“Wait a minute, is this why you sent MJ our numbers? Oh my god, it makes so much sense now. I’m calling her now”

Miles looks surprised

“You guys talked to MJ?”

Johnny laughs

“Yeah, and we had a bunch of your baby pictures as well Miles”

“WHAT?”

Wade grinning from ear to ear

“Yeah, your pseudo-mom has so many adorable photos of you”

“She is not my pseudo-mother!”

Miles yells at Wade. Suddenly, Wade’s phone in his hand speaks up and Wade turns around to show others MJ’s face who is on video call right now.

“Yes, Miles, I’m your pseudo-mom and Peter is your pseudo-dad and we are that kind of healthy divorced parent that even though we don’t love each other we take good care of you.”

“Oh my god, I hate you all”

Miles defeated cries out and everyone is laughing hard even Matt is chuckling along with them all. Johnny asks MJ as he is still laughing.

“Wait, wait, are you and Peter in a relationship?”

MJ nods.

“Yes, but we broke up for like half a year now. Anyway, it’s good to talk to you all but I have a deadline to do right now. I will make a group chat for all of us later”

“See ya MJ”

Peter and Johnny wave at the phone screen. Matt only gives MJ a nod and Wade snickering and tells Miles

“Says goodbye to your mom Miles”

“God damnit, stop or I will block you all!”

The laughter of Wade dies down right after that. Miles immediately catches on and his face looks smugly. Peter guesses that now Miles knows about the power he has on his friends and he gonna abuses it for sure.

=======

Later that night

_Partners in (Crime) Laws_

MJ (02:56) Well, this is our official server and I also added Ganke in here. He is Miles’s bestie and Spider-Men guys in the chair. And he set me as admin so I am the ruler here, don’t challenge me or my sons or you will be banned.

Ganke (02:56) Hi guys. Oh my god, I can’t believe I’m in a superhero server!

Johnny (02:57) Why the sons is plural?

MJ (02:58) Ganke is also my son as well.

Ganke (02:58) Am I?

MJ (02:59) Of course.

Peter (03:00) Oh well, MJ adopts everyone at this point.

Wade (03:00) Hi children, I’m your cool uncle.

Miles (03:01) No you are not cool, Wade.

Miles (03:01) MJ, Is this because you keep calling my mom and exchanging my pictures that now you want to be my mother?

MJ (03:01) Yes, Rio loves it when I show her photos of you in the suit or when you hang out with Peter. She showed me a lot of you and Ganke pictures as well so now I adopt you all.

MJ (03:02) I also have a lot of Pete photos, he looked so cute when he was in his first Spider-Man suit.

Peter (03:02) What! How could you have pics of that? I only told you?

MJ (03:03) You shared with me your online image storage password you know. I have everything you took from your camera.

Peter (03:03) Oh my god, I forgot about that. I should change my password.

MJ (03:04) Don’t you dare Peter. Or I will have to tell Ganke to hack it.

Wade (03:04) Yes, please! Show me everything related to Spider-Men!

MJ (03:05) I also have videos of Miles and Peter sleeping and purring. That is my stress relief video.

Peter (03:05) No! Don’t share that!

Miles (03:05) I swear to god MJ, that video is embarrassing.

Matt (03:05) He and Miles can purr? I don’t even know or hear anything while Peter is living with me.

MJ (03:05) Yes, but they can only purr when they are safe and happy, kinda like a cat.

Ganke (03:05) I think I have only heard them purring once though.

MJ (03:06) Oh, I have a bunch of vids, they purr when they are with each other a lot of time.

Wade (03:06) OMFG! Send it now!

Johnny (03:06) Yep! I want to see it as well.

MJ send 5 videos

Peter (03:07) Omg, this is blackmailing

Miles (03:07) MJ! Stop!

Ganke (03:07) This is actually really cute

Matt (03:07) Their sounds are really close to cat purring but kind of higher frequency a bit. Now, I want to hear this for real though.

Johnny (03:08) They were even cuddling while sleeping and purring

Wade (03:09) That is the cutest thing that I have ever heard in my life

Chapter Text

Peter decides to spend the week preparing for his thesis presentation. He did some research about how Wayne Tech interviews their potential employee but they have a lot of different methods and he can’t predict which method he will be facing this Friday. Most people said they had to answer basic questions like every other corporation, but some said they had presented their ideas based on the situation the interviewer made up, some even had to make some gadgets with the equipment that they showed you. Peter doesn’t mind making some gadgets or electronic devices in front of them but he is not confident in presenting his ideas. He can be a good chatterbox and joke around but he has never been a good speaker, especially in serious and formal situations.

Therefore, these past few days he just mostly locked himself in his room in Matt’s apartment and paces around in front of his small bathroom sink mirror and trying to be better with his speech about replacing X-rays with proton beams. Since the Tacos Tuesday with all his friends, he has been really focusing on his practice and preparing the paperwork for this. Peter even tries to improve his theory and statistics in his research because he wants to catch this opportunity. He can’t continue to be a freeloader at Matt’s home. He forgot to eat every day and always missed his lunch but thanks to Matt’s threatening to break down the door, Peter had to give in and get dinner.

Peter has planned his travel to Gotham. He is really broke right now so he doesn’t want to spend on motel room in Gotham and stay the night before his interview. So his solution is he will travel on the last bus from New York to Gotham, and he will arrive at his destination at around midnight. There he will stay in a 24-hour coffee shop near Wayne Enterprise Technology and he will wait there till the morning and go in for his interview.

Matt asks about his traveling on Thursday morning during their breakfast and when Peter tells him about it Matt tries to change his mind and explain that he will be too exhausted if he stays sitting in a chair in a coffee shop all night. Peter explains to Matt that he had gone out as Spider-Man all night and was still perfectly awake and finished his presentation and even defended his thesis when he was still in college. Matt is definitely not satisfied with Peter’s answer but he decides to drop the topic and goes to work.

Peter gets back to his room and packs his possessions, he thinks if he somehow does get the job he could ask Matt or Miles to send him his stuff later but at least he should pack it up first so they don’t have to go through his belongings. He only brings a small backpack with him to Gotham tonight which contains his research paper, some related work documents, his camera, and Spider-Man gear.

Even though Peter is still in his break from Spider-Man he always wears his web shooters with him. The only time he is not wearing his shooters is when he takes a shower but it’s not because the web shooters can’t handle water. After a decade of being Spider-Man, this is one of the habits he caught on to. Even in some situations where he is in his normal clothes and can’t do anything without revealing his identity, the weight of web shooters on his wrists helps to calm him down. He has changed the shooter design a lot of times and now they look like two metal bracelets, though he has to agree that Miles’s design looks more fashionable than his.

His suit is safely hidden in a secret compartment of his backpack. He also brings it with him all the time. Even though he can now freely use his Anti-Venom anytime he wants his original red and blue suit always holds a dear place in his heart and the tech in that suit that he has spent a lot of time upgrading he can’t recklessly leave it somewhere else.

Some other Spidey gear is his trusty tool, some gadgets like Trip Mine and Web Bomb, and finally Spider-Bot. He loves it dearly and Spider-Bot could go through some small vents or help him investigate like that time when he tried to find some information in The Bar With No Name.

Time passed by fast and he once again forgot his lunch he only realized that because when he looked out of his window the sky already was dusky. It’s not because he isn’t hungry so he forgot to eat, it’s actually the opposite. He is constantly hungry nowadays because he is broke so he can’t eat until he is full and he doesn’t want to bother Matt and others with his high metabolism. He is too familiar with the hunger now it’s just like background noise. It’s the same with his enhanced senses, especially his hearing, he can hear crime a few blocks away, and if he can’t prevent it in time he has to blur it to the background. It's also something that he has to adapt to after a decade of being Spider-Man, he understands that he can’t be everywhere and can’t always show up in time as Spider-Man or even in his civilian clothes.

Peter sighs.

He got sucked in his and Harry’s old research papers because he got sidetracked when he packing his stuff. Fortunately, he has almost done with his packing, just some documents need to be put into the cardboard box. As he is trying to finish his task, three knocks fill his silent room. He puts the final file in the box and then he opens the door.

“SURPRISED!”

A loud pop echos his ears and confetti flies everywhere.

“I swear to god Wade! You have to clean this stupid confetti before you leave because I’m blind”

“People all know that it’s just an excuse”

Peter sees four people in front of him. Well, maybe he was too concentrated on the reading that he could not hear any of them go into the apartment. Matt and Wade are still bickering about the color paper littering on the floor. Johnny just pinches the brick of his nose and he is clearly tired of Wade and Matt's argument. Miles offers Peter a weak smile

“We throw a farewell party for you”

Peter looks at them and he has a lot of emotion to sort out. He is grateful that he has friends to look out for and care about him when they go through trouble to hold a party for him. But he also feels the sadness creep up in the back of his mind that if he got accepted by Wayne Tech he would have to leave all of his friends behind.

Johnny looks with a worried gaze at Peter who is still silent and freezes at his doorstep and asks

“You ok?”

Peter chuckles weakly.

“Yeah, more than ok? Thank you guys. You are all here and even throw a party for me. I don’t know what to say…”

Matt and Wade have stopped their nonsense argument and look at Peter. Matt has a small smile on his face while Wade is smiling brightly at Peter. Wade is wearing his civilian clothes which is a rare sight and it also shows how he wholeheartedly trusts and is comfortable with all of them. His blue eyes light up with happiness

“Don’t worry about it, Petey. We are all here and happy for you”

Miles tuck Peter’s arm and pull him to the living room.

“Alright, alright, we should start the party now instead of standing like a bunch of idiots in front of Pete’s room”

Peter sees in the middle of the living room the dining table with a lot of food. Some are definitely from Rio’s homecooked. Others are Thai takeout which is from Peter’s favorite place, he can recognize their container. There are also Wade’s pancakes. How did he know that? Who else put pancakes at a dinner party other than Wade?

Johnny pulls a chair and Miles pushes Peter to sit down. After that, they also sit down on the right and left side next to Peter, while Matt and Wade sit across the table.

Miles claps his hands and announces.

“Let's dig in”

Everyone starts eating. Peter takes some pad thai to his dish as his stomach rumbles loudly at the sight and smell of all the dishes. His first bite of delicious Thai food melts in his mouth and he can’t help but let out satisfied sounds.

Matt and Wade all talk at the same time.

“My god, I might need to call you every day to remind you to eat lunch”

“I should feed you Thai food more often if you keep making sounds like that.”

Peter feels conscious about himself a bit and he flushes

“I just forgot the time today, I will remember to eat my lunch tomorrow. And it’s been a long time since I had Thai ok?”

“Oh, it’s totally fine boo, it’s just the sounds you made are cute”

Wade chuckles and Peter feels his face burns with embarrassment

“Shut up, Wade”

Johnny clears his throat and starts talking in a more serious tone

“So Pete, you know you didn’t really tell Wade and me about your job in Gotham, right?”

Peter awkwardly answers

“Well, yeah, I planned to tell you all on Tues but I forgot. And we have talked so much about our identity behind the mask so… Yeah… Sorry, I should have told you guys sooner”

 Miles sighs but smiling

“Yeah well, he tends to do that a lot, you guys should get used to that. After the Symbiote stuff happened, we spent a lot of time talking pretty much every day but he completely forgot to tell me that he decided to take a break. And he only remembered that when I mentioned why he didn’t go on patrol with me”

Matt hums in agreement

“Yeah, he is such a mess”

Peter sheepishly says

“Can I have dinner without being bashing?”

Wade and Johnny snicker

“Oh don’t worry, we love you either way.”

“Yeah, you just have to let us dote you more”

Peter’s mouth twitches

“I’m not a baby that needs to be doted on by you guys. I’m just forgetful sometimes”

Miles giggles

“Welcome to the baby club, Pete. Did you know they have a group chat to gossip about us?”

“Yeah, MJ told me about that. Spidey Protection Squad or something like that”

Johnny smirks

“Yeah well, that group works perfectly. MJ wants to join us tonight too but she is on deadline right now”

“You guys are even closer with MJ than me now”

“Are you jealous Petey pie?”

Wade wiggles his eyebrows at him and Peter laughs

“Nope, I’m happy that all of you are friends now”

They continue to eat and chat about how patrol has been quiet lately. Matt suddenly speaks up

“So Peter, we actually booked a hotel room near Wayne Enterprises Tower for you in Gotham”

Peter's eyes widen then his face turns into a grimace

“What? No. What? Please tell me that’s just a joke”

Wade insists

“Honestly Pete, just fucking take it okay. It’s just one night and it’s not that fancy of the hotel. We even plan to drive you there but I can’t rent a car. Johnny is too famous so if he drives to Gotham the Bats can sniff him out and complain to Fantastic 4. Matt is blind. Miles doesn’t know how to drive and Dopinder goes back to India for a few days now. So yeah, we tried but can’t”

Peter groans

“My god guys, you don’t have to do that. I don’t want to bother--”

Johnny throws his hand in the air as he frustratedly objects because of Peter’s stubbornness.

“It’s nothing. It’s never a bother, ok? I think if Reed knows about your identity he even wants to hire you to be his working partner. You could even don’t have to go to Gotham.”

Peter flusters at Johnny’s praise and waves his hand dismissively

“No, he won’t. He is Mr. Fantastic. I’m just the amazing Spider-Man. I’m not at his level yet”

Wade chuckles at his joke while the other three only roll their eyes. Matt pretends like nothing happened and he continues the discussion.

“We have already paid for the room and can’t cancel it so you have to stay in that hotel, tonight”

“Fine. You guys don’t know when to give up”

Miles smugly says

“Well, that’s the basics of superhero 101, you don’t ever give up on your friends”

The night after that goes smoothly and all of them stay until nearly midnight when it is Peter’s time to leave to catch his bus. They all give him a hug and say goodbye to Peter before he goes through the door to Matt’s apartment with his backpack on his shoulders.

Peter inhales deeply and exhales fast to reassure himself

“Alright, Gotham, here we go.”

Chapter Text

Matt and Wade convinced him that the hotel was not that expensive but Peter knew that definitely was not the truth the first time he stepped foot in the front of this hotel.

The front door has a staff hold the door open for him when he arrives. The guy even asks to hold his backpack for Peter and Peter awkwardly refuses. The first floor shines in a nice golden light by three big chandeliers with light balls shaped like a candle and crystal chains and it's all hang on at least twenty feet height ceiling. There are white sofas for the waiting area on the left of the room, a big fountain in the middle which is surrounded by some kind of dark red-ish tulip, and four elevators at the end of the room. All of these scream filthy rich and Peter feels so out of place with his black jeans, grey shirt, and dark blue jacket in this hotel. He secretly thank himself for not wearing his usual flannel plaid shirt for his travel.

Peter walks to the reception desk and checks in. The receptionist is a nice lady in a red uniform and smiles politely despite it being 1 am. She gives him the card key for his room on the fifteenth floor after confirming his room has been fully paid till noon and reminds him breakfast time will start from 6 am to 10 am tomorrow. She wishes him to enjoy his time in Gotham and asks another staff to lead him to his room which he refuses again.

When Peter opens the door to his room, he already sees a nice view of the balcony and the night sky of Gotham. In the middle of the room is the queen-sized bed and across is the 75-inch television on top of a brown TV stand with some drawers. On his right hand near the door is a big closet. Next to it is a glass shelf with a bunch of cups and wine glasses stacked up on the upper shelf, on the lower shelf there are a lot of snacks, instant coffee, and tea packs. He sees a sign “For Free” on the shelf and he thinks about finishing all the snacks and hoarding up all the instant coffee and tea packs. Under the shelf is a mini fridge, Peter opens it, and inside are two 1-liter bottles of water, a few cans of soda, and beer next to the “For Free” sign.  In the right corner of the room is a comfy sofa chair with a tall reading lamp. There a also a nice coffee table with an ashtray on top of it and two rattan chairs on the balcony outside.

This is the fanciest place that he ever stayed in his lifetime. Peter feels like he doesn’t deserve this room at all.

Peter grabs all of the snacks and a bottle of water with him and goes to the balcony. He sits down at the chair and sets the food down. Gotham’s sky at night also has that smoky air and is hard to see through, but it is familiar. He grew up in New York and has spent all his time there so he likes city life. Wade has talked his ear off about how Peter should try to take a vacation in a nice countryside with clean air and surrounded by nature and he can see how filthy New York is, but Peter just laughed it off. Maybe if Peter gets older he will change his mind but he just loves to see a lively environment, and he loves people-watching, he can’t see himself living in a quiet place by himself in the countryside. He is the Friendly neighborhood Spider-Man after all, helping people is what he always does and after a decade of being Spidey he can’t just stand not doing anything to help others. He may take a break but he still actively helps out in the F.E.A.S.T. center, maybe Peter should volunteer in some shelter in Gotham as well if he gets the job.

Peter opens his backpack and takes out his camera. He snaps a few photos of the distant star and the new moon hides part of it in the cloud. Johnny has told him that the Earth also just looked like a star when he was on the spaceship because Earth also reflects the Sun’s light. Peter loves to hear Johnny's space story and he also loves to spend time looking up at the stars and moon despite how the polluted air in New York makes the task harder. It is comforting to know that he is just a speck of dust in the grand scheme of the universe, and it makes him feel that all of his problems become smaller, even mundane compared to the whole galaxy.

===========

Peter for the first time in his life wakes up before his alarm goes off. He feels refreshed but anxious as well because of the upcoming interview. He quickly gets ready and changes into a simple black suit that he used to wear to present his project with Otto all those years ago. He realizes how much weight he lost because the suit is bigger than him now. He has never really cared about his weight because of all those Spidey activities and the spider-power keeps him in shape but he thinks he has lost at least ten pounds since two years ago when May passed away.

May…

Peter shakes his head and moves on with his morning. He should take advantage of the free buffet breakfast and eat as much as he can.

He checks out of the hotel at half past 7 and has a full stomach in the morning for the first time in a while. He checks the map of Gotham on his phone and starts walking to Wayne Tower. Currently, he is in Old Gotham district near G.C.P.D., the interview starts at half past 8 so he has plenty of time because the walk only takes fifteen minutes max. Peter smells a good coffee bean in the air from the nearby small coffee shop named Meeker has a red sign hired for a part-timer. Matt always complains about how Peter puts too much sugar and milk in his coffee that he destroys the original taste of coffee and Matt can smell the sweetness four blocks away, but despite all that, Peter knows a good type of homemade coffee when he comes across it, with a bit of help from his enhanced nose of course. For a fancy hotel that Peter had stayed at last night, their coffee felt like typical industrial coffee taste which is good but it is not good enough for a fancy place like that. Not that he complained because he chunked down like three cups of it this morning but he wished he could switch those three cups to a cup from that Meeker coffee shop.

Peter sighs and continues walking because he knows he is too broke to waste his money on more coffee now.

The architect of Gotham is unique, Peter feels like he is lost in an old European city, especially in this Old Gotham district. As he walks to Wayne Tower, the scenery changes to a lot of skyscrapers with more modern architecture and Peter knows he is now in the Diamond district. This is the rich part of Gotham similar to Midtown or the areas surrounding Central Park in New York. The Wayne Tower may look less modern than the Stark Tower but it fits with the style of Gotham City.

========

Bruce is tired.

He and Tim finally burst the human trafficking rings after three days of working non-stop and following the lead that they left behind.

So…

Bruce is exhausted, but he has promised Lucius that he or Tim will attend the interview meeting with the new workers today. Tim is banned from working for a day by Alfred so Bruce has to go.

He has skimmed through all of the profiles they all had a major or experience in engineering.

This is good because he can call Lucius to prepare a test for them. He will let them make automatic grabbing hooks. Even though the grabbing hook concept is straightforward, people seem to not know how to make a realistic and useful grabbing hook. He has only asked his intern team to make it once and they failed it badly. He thinks it's because they love to make it more complicated, and mostly they haven't used it before so they couldn't make it practical.

========

Peter has been standing in front of Wayne Tower for a while and just admired the tower. He has calculated the height of this building, it is a bit shorter but wider than Stark Tower. The photos taken from up here will be fantastic and Peter can not wait for an opportunity to scale up this building.

Peter hears footsteps walking behind his back so he turns around to move out of their way. He doesn't expect to meet up with Bruce Wayne in the flesh.

=========

When Bruce arrives at the Wayne Tower, he sees a young man with brown hair and wearing a typical black suit just standing at the doorstep of the Wayne Tower. As Bruce walks up the stairs to the door, the man turns around and moves out of Bruce’s way. His face looks surprised when he sees Bruce.

He meets up with Lucius, and Tamara is also there as well. Lucius informs Bruce that they have prepared for the test and there are four contestants. Bruce absently nods, he doesn't give much thought about their new employees because most of them will fail the test anyway and the one who got the jobs is mostly chosen by Lucius. He trusts the man's judgment, he has keen eyes for the intelligent worker. Furthermore, Tamara is a great businesswoman, and she knows how to lower the new employee’s expectations and get them to the right attitude because people tend to get arrogant after they land a job at Wayne.

All three of them get into the meeting room and the four contestants have already sat in the chairs, in front of them is the crafting table with a lot of tools, wires, screws, and other complicated parts. Bruce sees the same young man that he had met on the stairway to the door of the Tower. Unlike other competitors who are anxious and nervous when looking at their table, he looks relieved and happy, his hands fidgeting like he is eager to touch the equipment. Bruce rarely sees new employees or interns happy when they have to craft devices, people mostly want to plan things first before they make their product. Tamara said people hated it when Bruce decided to turn the interview into a crafting test like this, they discuss this a lot on social media and forums and how Wayne makes people feel unprepared.

========

Peter is so relieved when he finds the right room and there is a crafting table there with a lot of expensive tools and actual new wires, brand new screws that don’t have any dirt in them, and metal claw parts that are so shiny that he can see his reflection. Honestly, he always makes spidey devices from stolen parts and dumpster diving, so new equipment made him excited, and why would he have to buy new equipment when he could just make it from things he had?

Besides, a crafting table means he doesn’t have to present for his research. Yes, he has prepared his whole three days and talked in front of his bathroom sink mirror like an idiot but he knows he still would be bad at it anyway. So, he takes the chance to make devices any day rather than make a fool of himself in front of Mr. Wayne and the HR team.

If he can’t get the job, he hopes they don’t mind that he will bring home the device that he making today. Brucie Wayne is a rich billionaire playboy, yeah, probably the man won’t mind.

=========

Bruce lets Tam introduce all of them and Lucius informs them about the concept of grabbing hooks, basic rules, the limit of time, and safety warning. Peter, Diane, Carolyn, and Fred are the four candidates for the new employee position today, and Peter is the young man Bruce running in this morning. When the timer starts running Peter takes off his suit jacket and carefully hangs it on the back of his chair, then he rolls up his sleeves and assembles the claw part first. Interesting choice, most people start with the gun part first.

All of them concentrate on their work but their face shows all of their emotions. Diane doubted herself a lot so her speed slowed down every time she finished a part of the hook, her work speed was slower than her rivals. Carolyn has a complicated idea, she makes a lot of small parts with several buttons for the firing gun. Fred tried to calculate the length of the cable part of the hook, but the material he chose was strong but stiff, and with Bruce’s experience, the length of the cable was quite short. Peter doesn’t write down any of his calculations, he just makes the devices like he used to do this a lot, the firing gun is small and fits in his hand, and he also makes his cable by combining different rope and wire material, the cable looks flexible but firm.

=========

Peter looks at the timer, he still has more than fifteen minutes, his automatic grabbing hook was finished half an hour ago and he just tried to make a minor improvement and made unrelated devices. Sue him, it’s a rare opportunity for him to get his hands on new types of equipment and fancy tools like this so his tinker brain is running high.

Suddenly, he feels his spider-sense blaring. Peter looks up and sees Fred do a trial fire of his grapnel and Lucius is standing on the side concentrating look at Carolyn's process. Everything after that is just like a slow motion…

=========

Bruce looks at Peter’s working bend and he sees this young man making random small compartments that are unrelated to his grapnel. Before that, Peter improved the tips of the hook and turned it magnetic so it could easily hook on the rail.

Suddenly, Peter’s body tenses up and he stops working abruptly. In a split second, Bruce doesn’t even comprehend what is going on, Peter jumps over his table and yells “Look out.” He then tackles Lucius to the ground and two pieces of the claws of the hook fly in Lucius’s direction. One piece flies over Peter's head and another piece stabs deep into his biceps blood oozing out of the wound.

Bruce quickly moves to their place, but Peter quickly stands up and apologizes to Lucius with a worried voice

“I’m so sorry sir. Do you hurt anywhere?”

Tamara runs to her father and she is on the verge of panic, but then she calms down when she realizes her father is unharmed. Her concern quickly changes to Peter's bleeding upper arm. Lucius still looks dazed after everything, he shakes his head and answers

“I’m fine, but you are not.”

“Oh, tis but a scratch”

Fred's face is white as a sheet while Diane and Carolyn also have horror looks on their face. Fred walks to Peter's side and terrified states

“You’re bleeding… it’s my fault… I’m sorry. I-I-”

“No, really, it’s fine. I’ve been through worse.” Peter tries to reassure the man but it backfires

“What?”

Bruce decides to calm everyone down.

“Everyone stay calm, as the accident has happened, you will leave all your devices and equipment on the craft table and leave through the exit. The result will be sent to your email tomorrow after our scientists review your inventions. Thank you for coming today”

Bruce then turns to Peter while the other three leave the room.

“You’re coming with me, we need to go to the hospital. I don’t think our infirmary and first aid can properly treat your wound, the claw still stucks in your biceps”

Peter gasp

“You guys have an infirmary in the tower?”

Lucius nods

“Well yes, accidents happen sometimes Mr. Parker, and if our employees are too tired they can rest there. But that’s not the point right now.”

Peter's face lit up but then he quickly frowns

“Actually, can you review my work right now? Uh… I am tight on money so I don’t want to spend on a motel to stay the night while waiting. My friends are right, if I stay in a twenty-four hours coffee my back probably hates me. And I kinda want to bring the grapnel back home if I fail to get the job.”

Tamara speaks in a higher tone of concern

“Peter, you are hurt and you are worried about the test now?”

“It is not that bad”

Bruce calmly walks to the table and picks up Peter’s grabbing gun. He fires it to the vent cover on the ceiling and it forcefully opens the cover and hooks to the side of the vent. He presses the gun and it pulls him up flawlessly until his head almost into the vent, Bruce stops. Tamara furious says

“Bruce, this is not the time for that”

Bruce presses again and tries different buttons on the gun, he can pull up quickly and slowly, and the same with going down. He lowers down near the ground, jumps down, and presses again to reattach the hook, the hook part folds and hides in the gun. It takes two minutes for Bruce to test this and he knows this is the first time someone other than Lucius and some of his senior scientists can make a practical grabbing gun. The whole device is small and fits in Bruce’s hand. Moreover, Peter didn’t need to sketch his devices or write down his calculations, he finished it in only an hour faster than even Lucius. The cable is flexible, Bruce feels like it will help him swing around even better than his own grapnel. Peter definitely has the engineering talent, he will need to look at Peter’s profile after this.

“This is working, you are hired”

Three people in front of Bruce all say at the same time

“What?”

“Bruce…”

“I agree”

Peter is now gasping like a fish out of water, he stumbles at his word

“Mr. Wayne. W-wait a minute, that’s it? Did you just hire me? But you haven’t looked at others. What about my profile, uh… and other paperwork? I mean I’m happy that you hired me, and I’d love the opportunity to work at a place like this… and--”

Lucius this time cuts off Peter’s ramble

“Peter. Breathe. Yes, you’re hired, I saw your process, and you knew what you were doing. But on a more important note, we need to treat your injury”

Peter nervously and awkwardly laughs

“Oh, it’s fine Mr. Fox, I can treat myself… I… Uh… Don’t like going to the hospital?”

Tamara raises her eyebrows

“Why did the last part state as a question? What do you mean by treat yourself? We can’t do that.”

Bruce sighs, this young man seems to have no self-preservation, he turns to Lucius and Tamara

“Lucius and Tamara, you guys can review the other's work and I will help Peter with his wound”

Peter opens his mouth to protest but Bruce just gives him a hard stare. The young man knows he can’t get out of this so he sighs and gives in. Bruce leads the way to the elevator, he takes Peter’s backpack and suit jacket with him as Peter follows him. The company's normal infirmary only has a normal first aid kit so he leads Peter to the highest floor where his office is located. He has stocked his office with large bandages, medical threads, more effective painkillers, and other surgical equipment.

“Mr. Wayne, this is your office.”

Peter says as Bruce opens the door to his office. Bruce smiles

“Yes, because I don’t think our infirmary had good enough medical instruments for your wound”

“I… Okay. If this is too disturbing to look you can just give me your first aid kit and I can do it myself”

Bruce shakes his head

“Peter, I know how to treat a wound.”

Bruce tells Peter to sit down on the sofa. He walks to the right side of the room, opens the shelves, and takes out a blister pack of morphine tablets, bandages, gauze pads, absorbent cotton balls, surgical thread, gloves, kidney tray, scalpel, needle holder, different types of forceps and tweezers, all of this in plastic bags and sterile. He puts all of it on a clean metal tray, walks up to the sofa, sits down at the side, and puts the tray on the coffee table. He cleans his hands with surgical hand sanitizer and puts on medical gloves.

“Woah, I have only seen this many forceps a few times I went hospital. I only have one tweezer. Actually, do you even know how to use all of this? I mean, you’re Mr. Wayne. You’re in the… different class”

“Well, I am perhaps a rich playboy but I’m quite clumsy as a person so my butler teaches me how to treat wounds and injury. Now, stay still, I will cut off your sleeve”

“Woah woah woah, hold on, this is my good shirt, I can’t let you cut off the sleeve. With a thread and enough bleach, I can still make it usable.”

Bruce does the facepalm, how poor is this man that even in a dire situation like this he still insists on keeping his shirt?

“Peter, the first rule of treating an open wound is to remove the cover or anything that can stick to the wound. It reduces the chance of catching infections. I will buy you a new shirt”

“Oh, no, I can not let you buy me a shirt, Mr. Wayne”

“Call me Bruce, now, stay still”

Bruce watches Peter's painful emotions on his face when he cuts off the right sleeve of his shirt and he has to fight the urge to smile or chuckle at his dramatic reaction. The young man does not even complain once all the time since he got stabbed by a hook but he suffers when someone cuts off his good shirt.

“It looks really bad Peter”

Bruce looks at the wound now exposed. The claw stabs deep for nearly two inches, and blood is dripping from it. He puts a lot of gauze pads and cotton balls around the wound to slow down the bleeding and gives Peter a morphine tablet to reduce the pain and three antifibrinolytic medicine tablets to prevent further blood loss.

“Take this”

“Woa, you have morphine, the only type of painkiller that I have is paracetamol and it can not do much”

“Do you imply that you usually hurt yourself this bad?”

“No… not really, maybe sometimes, I’m also very clumsy”

Peter takes the pills and he seems to avoid Bruce's skeptical gaze because he turns to look around at Bruce’s office. Bruce waits for a few minutes for the painkiller to absorb and reduce the pain so he starts making small talk

“How old are you Peter? You look so young.”

“I’m 25. I may have a vampire curse that I look immortal young even though my mental age is probably as old as a one-hundred-year-old man due to all the events in my life. It sucks how people keep asking for my ID every time I ask for alcohol.”

Bruce can’t help but let out a chuckle at that self-deprecating humor, he says

“If you said you are 20, I would even believe you”

“I have my paperwork here if you don't believe me”

Peter opens his backpack and gives Bruce his profile. Bruce skims through it, he has read the young man's profile but he didn't give it much thought at the time. Peter is talented, he has bachelor's degrees in two majors which are biophysics and engineering. He got an internship at Oscorp but then moved to work for Otto Octavius after that.

“It’s sad that a man like Otto turned into a criminal. I had read some of his research with his unknown partner in the past, he had a genius mind and he did want to help the world. Rumor said his hatred for Norman Osborne turned him to evil”

Peter’s face twists and turns into a bitter emotion.

“Yes, he used to be a good man.”

Bruce decides to drop the subject as he sees Peter’s sad face.

“We should move on to remove the hook as now the painkiller and other medicine are probably working. Is it less painful now?”

“Yes, just pull it out, I will be fine.”

Bruce pulls out the claw, uses forceps to put in more gaze, and presses it to reduce the blood flow out of the fresh wound. Peter simply frowns a bit but he looks fine if not even less in pain when Bruce cuts off his shirt.

Suddenly, Peter’s phone goes off with some indie rock songs as his ringtone. Peter takes out his phone with his other hand and presses the answer button.

“Hello?”

Bruce can hear a young voice from the other side. He is sitting close to Peter so he can hear the conversation even though it is quiet.

“Peter? Have you got the job? Wait… are you ok?”

“Well yes, I’m totally fine.”

“Are you sure? Do you remember the time I called and said I jumped off the bridge? I think I understand your feelings now, my sense tells me that you are in trouble”

Bruce is now the concerned one, who is this child and why did he jump off a bridge? The person from the other side sounds like a teenager.

“Nope. Unhurt. Probably healthy as a Rhino today.”

Peter is lying through his teeth

“Fine, I will let it slide. How is your job?”

“I got it. I can’t believe I got it”

“What did I say, Pete? And why didn't you call to tell us the good news? Did you even send Matt the contract before you signed it?”

“I haven't got to that part yet, but they said I got the job. And I will be fine, don’t want to add another workload to Matt, he is busy with his firm these days, and I have signed a working contract before. Well to be real, a lot actually, which is probably not a good thing to say out loud…”

Peter laughs sadly.

“It's almost noon why was the interview taking so long? What happened?”

“Nothing at all, they held a test to make an automatic grapnel so it took longer than normal”

“Have you got a place in Gotham?”

“I will find it eventually, you can send me my stuff tomorrow. Anyway, you got classes after lunch and I gotta go. Stay safe. Bye”

“Yeah, stay safe, Pete”

Bruce decides to hide his concern because it would be rude to listen to others' phone calls. He has changed the gauze pads a few times and the flow of the blood has slowed down a lot. He warns

“I will disinfect the wound and it will stink a lot but bear with me ok?”

“Yes, ok.”

Bruce cleaned it with the saline solution first to remove the dirt and then he gently used antiseptic to clean the wound. The blood still leaks down a bit and it mixes with the golden brown of betadine and turns the liquid to an orange-brown color. The cut is deep but it narrows about an inch and a half. Peter doesn’t even faze a bit only frowns his eyebrows a bit.

“Your bicep is a quiet muscle so it is not deep enough to the bone and it misses your brachial artery and median nerve, do you feel any numbness or paralysis in your right arm?”

“Nope, totally fine.” Peter moves his hand and finger. “See. You seem to know a lot about anatomy”

“I mean it helps when I injure myself”

“Yeah, that’s true”

Bruce finishes the disinfecting process and changes his gloves to move on to stitch the wound. Peter looks fine during the whole stitching process, he doesn’t even frown on his eyebrows anymore. Bruce is not sure if the painkiller is that effective or if Peter just has a higher toleration of pain. Morphine is a good painkiller but Bruce usually injects it into the dermis or Alfred has to set up an IV line of paracetamol solution, he rarely uses tablet painkillers, so even though he knows the dose, he is not sure how effective it is. He finishes bandaging the injury as he offers

“I can give you my shirt because your shirt is damaged now”

“No, Mr. Wayne, I already take too much of your time, I should go now”

“Peter you haven’t signed your contract yet”

“Oh, uhm, right. I’ve not forgotten that at all” Peter sheepishly laughs. “I mean I should go and change. I have spare clothes, I will go change now.”

Bruce quickly stands up, walks to the shelves, takes out Tim’s black shirt, and puts it in Peter's hands

“Change to this. This is my son’s spare shirt, I think it will fit you.”

“Why did you have your son’s shirt in your office? Is this like some secret rich people things?”

Peter raises an eyebrow at Bruce and Bruce shrugs

“He will soon be the head of the corporation. He works here sometimes even though he has his own office”

The real reason why Bruce has Tim’s spare clothes is that his son is a workaholic and can’t stop working even when he is injured. Bruce sometimes has to change bandages or even re-stitch his wound in this office. So he tells Alfred to prepare some spare clothes for Tim in his office. Bruce’s office is only accessible by Bruce, Tim, and Alfred, other people have to have his permission to enter this.

“Oh… But, Mr. Wayne this is an expensive shirt and it was your son’s. I can’t take it.”

“Peter, take the shirt, change, and get back here so we can move on to the working contract”

Peter is hesitant but he again gives in when Bruce uses his Batman stare at the young man. Bruce finds it funny how the stare is effective on Peter even when he doesn’t wear his signature Bat costume. He wishes it had this much effect on his sons and daughters.

When Peter’s back, the shirt looks wider than Peter a bit especially in the stomach and waist part. There is a knock on the door, after Bruce calls to come in, Lucius and Tamara walk in. They all settle down, and all three of them sit on the opposite side of Bruce. Tamara talks first

“First, I want to say thank you for saving my father. Now, we have reviewed others’s devices and it didn’t work so only you get the job this time.”

“They still have fifteen more minutes”

Lucius reasons

“No, it wouldn’t work. Fred's device was broken down on the first try. Carolyn made it too complicated she wouldn’t make it in time. Diane is the second best after you but her device can’t pull even a child, the material of her choice is too weak. Your grabbing hook device works flawlessly, it’s flexible, can swing around, easily attach to the surface, and can hold up to 400 pounds. I think it’s even better than my invention.”

Tamara gives Peter the contract

“This is the working contract, you can take as long as you want to read it. I only want to tell you the important part you should read thoroughly is the first trial month. You will only receive half of your salary in this first month and your work will be evaluated at the end of the month.”

Bruce is surprised

“Wait, he is that talented, can we skip the half-salary part?”

Tamara shakes her head

“Bruce, this applies to every employee, we can’t make an exception. Other employees will envy his special treatment if they find out. His salary is in our system so the board members and heads of other departments can question your choice as well. If you want to do that, we need to hold a whole company meeting and I don’t think it a good idea”

Peter says quickly

“It’s ok, I don’t mind the trial month.”

Bruce isn’t satisfied with this but Tamara is right, he can’t do anything about this. Lucius thoughtfully says

“What’s about his position? I’m the head of Research & Development, I can choose him to work with me directly and under my supervision right?”

Tamara nods

“Well yes, but that’s also his choice due to the contract statement. The head of the department can choose anyone to work alongside as long as the employee accepts. However, the salary stays the same for new employees in the first year to prevent employees makes quick money from our corporation and then quitting and moving to others or opening a start-up company. Moreover, as per this contract, any employee who quits can not publicize or continue to work on any unpublic project or idea from Wayne Enterprise. So even if employees get a chance to work on important projects with the head of the department they can’t leak the information.”

Peter reads his contract and thoughtfully says

“That’s reasonable. I actually agree with that, leak information could be a big problem.”

Bruce reads Peter’s current page, it is about lunch and absence at work. That’s interesting, Peter is good at multi-tasking, he is still reading quickly while listening to the conversation.

Tamara goes on

“So what is your choice?”

Peter looks up from the paper and smiles

“Of course, I would like to work with Mr. Fox, I have read some of your research.”

Bruce sighs

“So to sum up, he still has half of his salary in his first month, and his first-year salary is the same as every intern of this company but his workload could be more due to being Lucius's working partner. Are you ok with that Peter? I don’t think that is a good choice.”

“No no, it’s great. I didn’t even think I would land the job at first. Now the door is open, I should be a good proton and look into the future.”

Bruce and Lucius raise their eyebrow while Tamara’s face is confused. Peter awkwardly clarifies

“Uhm… Stay positive… Because you know… Protons have a positive charge”

Bruce can’t help but twist his lips to a small smile, Lucius just smiles widely while Tamara gives Peter a weird look. She clears her throat and continues

“Do you want to review any detail in the contract or consult with any law firm?”

“No, it’s fine”

Peter says as he finishes reading the contract and signs it without looking at it twice. He gives it to Tamara and her hand extends to shake his. She smiles

“Welcome to the corporation, Peter Parker.”

“Thank you for letting me”

========

Peter walks out of the Wayne Tower with a job to look forward to on Monday, wearing the heir of Wayne Enterprise’s shirt, his phone has his new boss and respectable scientist’s phone numbers, Lucius Fox, and the famous richest playboy philanthropist of Gotham, Brucie Wayne, who told him to call anytime he is in trouble, who also bandaged his typical Tuesday stabbing wound after fighting goons, even though this time, this wound is not Spidey business related. This is the only time he is thankful that his speedy healing factor is slower down due to his casual starvation because he does not want his new big boss to find out that he is mutated, or in the terms that Gothamites usually use a metahuman.

Peter remembers he only has around fifty dollars in his wallet and he needs to find a place to stay in Gotham and probably another way to make money because as stated in the contract, he will receive his salary at the end of the month.

Peter sighs and pulls up his sleeves a bit.

He needs to find another job, probably a part-time job, quickly. And of course, it has to be legal.

As he rolls up his sleeves, he realizes there is something in his chest pocket. Peter pulls it out and five one-hundred-dollar bills are folded neatly inside, Peter starts panicking. The first things that come to his mind is to call Bruce Wayne. Mr. Wayne picks up instantly.

“Peter?”

“Hi, Mr. Wayne. I… Uh… There are five hundred dollars in your son’s pocket. I should give it back to you. He probably forgot in there and I should have checked the pocket before I wore his shirt. Are you still--”

Bruce Wayne, one of the richest men alive, laughs interrupting Peter’s spiraling words. Yes, the billionaire audibly laughs with that typical rich man laughs that people often hear on movies and TV shows.

“Peter, that’s the money I gave you. I want to give you more but the pocket won’t fit.”

“Oh… Wait what? I haven’t done anything.”

“Oh yes, you have done a lot of things, but the most important thing is you saved Lucius”

“Mr. Wayne, anybody in my position would do the same thing. My Aunt always says you help someone, you help everyone. That’s the right thing to do, I can’t take the money for that.”

Bruce is silent for a few seconds

“How about that’s the money for your grabbing hook design?”

“But I’m your employee. Of course, I should contribute my design for you.”

“You hadn’t been my employee at that time, Peter”

Now it’s Peter’s turn to stay silent. He can even feel Mr. Wayne's smile on the other side of the phone.

“You can’t argue with me, Peter. I have faced hell before and it calls the press”

Peter sighs

“How about I go back into the Tower and give it back to you?”

“I am not at the Tower anymore.”

“What? How?”

“I’m rich, I have my way”

“Oh my god…”

Peter sighs again

“How about I give it to Mr. Fox or Ms. Fox?”

“They won’t hand it back to me Peter, so you won’t give it back to the rightful owner even if you try”

“Oh my god, I can’t even handle you anymore…”

Peter sighs defeatedly for the third time and Bruce chuckles

“They don’t call me Brucie Wayne for nothing you know. I have my way to get people to do what I want. See you on Monday, Peter.”

And with that, Mr. Wayne ends the call. Peter sighs again and decides it would be a good idea to put five hundred dollars in his wallet. Gotham is the most crime city in the US, he doesn’t want to be the target for mugging in board daylight on his first official day living in Gotham.

Yes, he still needs part-time jobs and a place to stay, which has to have a heater as well because his spider gene can not deal with the cold winter. Peter remembers the Meeker coffee shop has a hiring fly hang on the glass window, it can be a good start.

========

Peter walks into the coffee shop and approaches the counter.

"I saw that you need a part-timer, how can I get an interview and apply for the job?"

The girl behind the counter wears a yellow dress and has curly hair that ties neatly to the back of her head. She looks at him surprised then smiles and points to the room behind her.

"You can walk inside and talk with the owner. She will be happy to see you"

Peter knocks and then walks into the staff room, a pregnant woman is looking through the goods and ingredients. She turns to look at him sighs in relief and smiles widely

"Are you here to apply for the part-time job?"

"Yes. My name is Peter Parker."

"Wendy Meeker. Are you free every Friday from 6 pm to 10 pm"

"Uhm... yes?"

"Good, do you have any experience working at a coffee shop?"

"Yes. I used to work in a local coffee shop for a month"

"Fantastic. You're hired. Your shift starts from 6 pm to 10 pm today"

Peter is confused, he has never had a quick interview like this before.

"Mrs Meeker, you don't even want to check my ID? What if I lie about my name or my experience?"

"Peter, call me Wendy. This is Gotham and it’s just a part-time job, nobody cares as long as you do the job. Honestly, you have that type of naive face that I know I can trust you. And more to that, I'm a seven-month pregnant woman that desperately needs a staff to help me on the Friday evening shift because that Sherwin dick head decides to quit without even informing me first. I had to work by myself the last three Fridays because Tiana and Chloe can't work that day."

Peter looks concerned and Wendy easily catches on and smiles at him

"It's fine. You are here now, that's what matters"

Peter nods and then he remembers why he needs a part-time job.

"Actually, can you pay me at the end of my shift?"

Wendy sighs and shakes her head

"Sorry, I can't do that. I know it's hard to live in this place. I used to pay part-timers after their shift because I knew how it felt but after Sherwin Lemond dropped his shift I had to change my way. He used to be my full-time barista then changed to part-time one shift after he sold his first painting and then completely quit when he sold his second piece without even telling me first. Can you believe that I encouraged him to chase his passion? God, what an ungrateful asshole. Making my blood boil."

Wendy puts a hand on her hip and another hand fans her face. She looks furious but she tries to calm down a bit.

"Sorry, lost my cool there"

Peter is now very worried that he has triggered the pregnant woman so he talks in a quiet voice

"It's alright. I just have to find a cheaper place to rent and another part-time job. Thank you, I will be here at 6 pm for my first shift"

Wendy surprises

"Oh, so you are really a new face in this city. Hmm... okay, for another part-time job, you can get information in Gotham Public Library. Don't trust online recruitment, I heard a lot of people got kidnapped and murdered because of it. And I know a place with cheap rent but I am not sure you could handle the danger area though.”

Peter looks hopeful, he smiles confidently

“I can handle myself, I’m from Hell’s Kitchen in New York”

Wendy raises an eyebrow at him and her face looks skeptical

“You look too nice, I don’t believe you from Hell’s Kitchen. But anyway, Crime Alley is worse than Hell’s Kitchen even though Red Hood has handled a lot of crime there and it is a bit safer…”

“I’m tougher than how I look”

Peter tries to find something to convince her that he is capable of defense himself, but he can’t find anything without the fact that he is actually a mutated human, so he just looks at her and pleading her with his eyes. Wendy looks at Peter's hopeful face again and then she sighs

“Fine, but you work till 10 pm on Friday, and Crime Alley at night is dangerous, change your route each time you find someone following you, stay away from any dark place, stay away from people, and just straight back to your place, don’t get yourself killed.”

She turns back to the shelf and gets a pen and a notebook to write down something, then she rips the paper from the notebook and gives it to him.

“Here is the number of Mrs.Stinson and her building address. You can call her before you go. Her building is quite decent at a reasonably cheap price, it also has a functional heater, stove, hot water, and maybe some furniture which is probably the best quality you can find in the Crime Alley. If you don’t have enough money for the first month, you can tell her that you work for Wendy Meeker, she can sum up the debt for the next month.”

“That’s great, thank you so much for the help Wendy”

Wendy just smiles at him and gets back to her work. Peter gets out of the coffee shop after waving goodbye to Tiana, the yellow-dress girl who is now taking orders from a policeman.

Wendy is right, the library is a good choice now, and he can get electricity to turn up his laptop and “connect” to the police scanner of the area and learn more about Gotham now that he will be staying here for his job. His ten-year-old laptop keeps wanting to break down but he tries to keep it alive. Its battery has stopped working for a while and he can’t seem to find a suitable part or doesn’t have time to make one, so it needs to connect to electricity to work. It’s pretty much like a PC more than a laptop now.

He should gain more knowledge about the areas because other than Batman, Robin, and Batman’s nemesis Joker he hasn’t had time to catch up with the news.

There is a reason why he was so busy. In the last ten months after the Symbiote, Peter took up tons of part-time jobs while trying to make Emily-May Foundation work out. He was in large debt with the bank, part of it was because he tried to keep May’s house, and another part was because he applied for a bank loan to start up the foundation. When Mr.Osborn called Peter to tell him that Harry had his last breath, it was devastating news to Peter at the time, so he was trying even harder to make Harry’s dream come true. But he guessed that it wasn’t always about how hard you tried, you also had to face reality and stop stubbornly clinging to the past. Matt and Miles found him passed out from hunger and exhaustion in May’s house after MJ told them he hadn’t answered her call all day. In the end, Peter understood that he couldn’t keep May’s house, so he moved out and stayed at Matt’s place. He still tried to make the foundation work while Matt and Miles kept him from passing out again. After so much talk and convincing, and finally, MJ hiddenly applied his CV to many companies, so here he is in Gotham, starting a new chapter of his life. Peter is always grateful for his friends and he wants to keep them safe and help them as much as he can.

He takes out his phone to check the map to Gotham Public Library, it’s in Diamond District quite close to the Wayne Tower, so he has to go back. When he gets to the front of the library he sees a redhead woman in a wheelchair frustratedly clicking the button on the glass door in the front of the library but it doesn’t seem to do anything. Peter looks up and sees the sensor still lit up, which means the electricity to make the door open is malfunctioning and the button panel is not working. He calls out to the woman

“Excuse me, miss, I think I can fix the door for you, can you move away a bit?”

The redhead looks at him, nods, and wheels back a bit. Peter worried warns her

“Please be careful, there are steps behind you”

“I know. I’m a librarian here”

She defensively says and crosses her arms. Peter takes out his multi-tool, finds the right screwdriver head, and starts to take off the panel on the glass door. He awkwardly said as he continued working with the wires and the electric board inside the panel button.

“I’m sorry if I make you feel uncomfortable.”

The woman chuckles a bit, her tone is more relaxed than earlier.

“I should be the one to say sorry for snapping at you, you didn’t do anything wrong. I left my phone inside and the door didn’t budge so I feel a bit frustrated because of how I can’t do even the smallest thing like get myself inside to continue my work or call for help.”

“Don’t be too hard on yourself, it’s fine to be angry sometimes, it’s healthier to let it out rather than bottle it up.” Peter chuckles. He told her that but he still bottled up his emotions and that was the reason why Venom could easily manipulate him. How ironic. “Anger is fine if it doesn’t harm you or others”

Peter closes the panel, clicks on the button to check and the door slides open. He smiles and turns back to talk to the young woman

“The button working now but I haven’t connected with the sensor above because if the sensor works then it will keep sliding open and I can’t work properly. For now, you need to press the button to go through instead of it automatically sliding open like in the past. If you can fully shut down the electricity of the door then I can fix it for you.”

The red hair woman waves both her hands in with a clear no motion as she says

“No, no, I will call the repairman, you already helped out a lot.”

“Oh, it’s nothing.”

They continue their conversation as they move into the library.

“What’s your name? I see that you are new to Gotham Library?”

“I’m Peter Parker. Yes, I’m new here.”

“Barbara Gordon. Are looking for something specific?”

“Yeah, can you tell me where to look at the hiring flier and part-time job?”

“Oh, it’s on the bulletin board on the left. Actually, do you want to work in the library? We are short of staff on the weekend morning because one of our part-time librarians is taking a break for pregnancy. It’s fine if you decline, I know a librarian job can be tedious”

“No, I love working in the library, I would love to take your offer. Do you want to check my ID or look into my profile?”

“That would be great. Follow me.”

She moves to the library staff desk and Peter follows her. When they finally settle down, Peter gives her his ID and he also shows her the same profile he has shown at Wayne Tech. Barbara types quickly as she says

“I can’t believe you are older than me a year, you look so young. And your profile is quite impressive, why do you want a part-time job again?”

“Oh, uhm… I have a bit of a financial problem right now, and it would be great if you could pay me after my shift ends or at the end of the week.”

Barbara hums and continues to type, her finger moving smoothly on the keyboard. She furrows her eyebrows but the emotion quickly disappears right after and then she looks back at him.

“I can do that, of course…

“Uhmm, do you still want to look for more jobs? I heard that Harmony For Animal Vet needs a receptionist and helper during the weekend. It’s on the east side of Old Gotham, near the Gotham Zoo and not too far away from here. I can give you the address and phone number of Mrs. Emily Goldfinch, she is the head of the vet. You should call her first before you get there, she can’t be a bit cold and distant at first but she will open up eventually, just do what she says and you will be fine.”

Peter smiles brightly as Barbara gives him the note with the address and phone number.

“Thank you so much. I will call her later. Honestly, you help me a lot. Do you need to interview me?”

“Oh no, it is fine, you are overqualified to work here Peter. The staff here also have a staff card which is an exclusive version of the normal library card, can borrow 8 books a week, and can print papers up to 300 pages a day. Your salary is 10$ per hour and I will pay you at the end of your shift. I will schedule your shift from 8 am to 11 am every Sat and Sun, your first shift is tomorrow, do you want any change with that?”

“No, this is so great. That is much higher than what I make per hour in my old part-time job.” Peter laughs nervously and Barbara has a small smile but her eyes look at him worried. “Oh, actually can I move my first shift to Sunday, my friend will send me my personal belongings tomorrow morning so I may need some time to unpack and arrange it”

“Oh, that’s fine then, I will move your first shift to Sunday.”

“That’s great” Peter smiles “Oh and where can I charge my laptop?”

“You can sit at the desk next to me, that will be your place to work as well. But you will have to move around a lot to return books to the shelf”

“Again, thank you for this opportunity”

Peter moves to the desk next to Barbara and opens his backpack to take out his delicate ten-year-old laptop. He plugs in the charge and as he opens his laptop, a small gasp is next to him.

“Oh my god, how the hell is that poor thing still working, and did you change most of the parts from this laptop?”

Peter smiles and turns on his laptop, Barbara looks impressed and she continues saying

“It starts even quicker than most average laptops, it took like 4 - 5 seconds. It's just the screen has so many cracks and looks like someone beat it up. What did you put in this laptop?”

Peter laughs out loud because of how accurate her statement is. This laptop got beat up multiple times during his Spider-Man career because sometimes he can’t just web his backpack in the sketchy alley without worrying someone may take his laptop. It also contains his research both from his job and Spider-Man duty so he tries to keep it safe.

“Most of the part I recycle from broken devices so it looks weird and I can’t find a suitable screen recently, it’s quite hard to find a good laptop screen just by dumpster diving”

“You make this monstrosity thing by dumpster diving? Will it explode?”

“Hey, you can’t call her monster, she is my beautiful ten-year-old princess. And no explosion, she is safe, she may want to retire early but I force her to keep working for me.”

“Oh my god, if I bought you a new laptop will you let this beat-up laptop rest in peace?”

Peter is surprised and he turns to look at Barbara with wide eyes

“What? No. Barbara, please don’t buy me new stuff.”

Barbara laughs

“What was that reaction? Why are you so afraid of a new laptop? And you can call me Barb as now we are co-workers”

Peter feel blood rush to his face

“Oh… Sorry for overreacting. I have a group of friends a bit overprotecting. They tend to sneak new things into my room. I mean food is fine but other expensive things, I don’t want to take advantage of them and I don’t want to bother people with my little problems.”

Barbara smiles at Peter

“It’s ok to take the help sometimes, Peter”

“Well yeah, but the important word is sometimes, not all the time”

“They know their limits, and friends help each other because they care”

“Yeah, I know that they care, I just don’t want to be a burden”

Barbara laughs softly

“A wise man said to me that I shouldn’t be too hard on myself. Maybe you should also take his advice”

Peter laughs along with her

“Maybe… or maybe that man is not that wise”

Suddenly, a loud noise from Peter's stomach interrupts both of them. His face turns red with embarrassment and Barbara frown

“Peter, you haven’t had lunch?”

“I… forgot. But it’s fine. It’s already 3 pm.”

Barbara literally did the facepalm. She takes out her phone and calls someone

“Mimi? Can you take over my shift? I need to go out a bit, I will pay you for the time you cover for me. No, you can’t decline the money, Mimi. No, for the last time Mimi, you know that is a limited section so you can’t take it home or print it.”

Barbara then ends the call and looks at Peter

“You go with me. Now.”

“W-What? You have work and it’s fine Barbara.”

“No. It is not fine. Work was covered by Mimi. You go now or I will kick your ass”

Peter’s embarrassment now turns to a new shade of red. He groans but stands up and follows Barbara to the library door. They go outside and turn left to a small diner at the street corner. Even though Peter protests while they walking there, he has to surrender when the delicious smell of food hits him. Peter orders a burger and fries, he is starving so he wants to eat greasy food while Barbara orders some pancakes. After the food is brought out, Peter and Barbara start to eat. He does try to slow down his eating but he still eats faster than normal people while Barbara smiles and eats her pancake.

Their “lunch” drags out a lot longer than expected when Barbara finds out that Peter has quite the knowledge of coding.

“Woa, with skill like yours, you could easily nail a job at Wayne”

Peter chuckles, he feels proud but also embarrassed by her compliment.

“I did, that’s why I need to stay in Gotham”

“Where are you from?”

“I’ve been living in New York my whole life. This is the first time I have moved to another city”

Barbara smiles

“Living in Gotham is cheaper than New York, but it’s also more dangerous as well. You should call Mrs. Goldfinch so you can start your job soon. Have you had a place to stay?”

“Yes,” Peter says as he takes out his phone to save the number of Mrs. Goldfinch and he sees the time on his screen. It’s already six to five pm. “Oh shit. I need to go now or I will be late for my first shift”

Peter waves at the waiter to pay for his meal but Barbara interrupts him

“You should go, I will pay”

“But--”

“Go or do you want to be late?”

Peter stands up and swings the backpack on his shoulder

“I will pay you back, I promise”

“Don’t worry about it.”

Peter calls Mrs. Goldfinch while he is running to the Meeker coffee shop. After two rings the other side picks up.

“Hello?”

“Hello Mrs. Goldfinch, I’m Peter Par--”

“You are hired. Barb already told me about you. Be here at 1 pm tomorrow and be on time.”

She then ends her call before Peter can say anything. Honestly, Peter can’t help to feel a bit weirded out by these Gothamites people.

=========

His first shift is quite uneventful at the Meeker, the coffee shop is not really busy in the evening but seems like a lot of policemen go here for their late coffee. Around 9 pm, Wendy’s husband, Mike, shows up and he seems satisfied when he finds out Peter works this shift instead of Wendy. Mike gives Peter a spare key to the shop and tells him to close the shop when his shift ends then he takes Wendy home.

When he closes the door of the coffee shop, Peter realizes that he forgot to do something really important

“Apartment! Damnit!”

Peter curses out loud as he facepalm himself. God, he is such a dumbass. He should do it sooner, what if Mrs. Stinson rejects him then where else will he stay tonight?

Peter dials her number but the line is busy. He decides to take his chance and walks to the apartment building. Crime Alley area makes his spidey sense buzz to life so he leans to his instinct and his enhanced sense to avoid danger.

The building is located in a small lane, and Peter easily finds the right lane but he can’t find the right building because there is no number on all these buildings. It is similar to some parts of Hell’s Kitchen where buildings don’t properly put up sign numbers.

An old blonde woman is standing at the door of the building smoking her cigarette. Peter feels his spider-sense doesn’t react around this old lady so he takes his chance and asks her

“Excuse me could you show me directions to building number 62”

“This is 62, are you Peter Parker?”

“Yes?”

“My god, I have been waiting for your call since afternoon. I’m Loretta, owner of this building”

“I’m so sorry Mrs. Stinson, I should have called you sooner. I tried to call you at 10 pm but your line is busy”

“That is time for daily calls from my sons and granddaughter. They live in New York because my son's job is influencer and he needs to attend a lot of events.”

Peter feels his inside turns at the word influencer. His encounter with Screwball still makes him annoyed to this day and he hates how she ruthlessly did everything for the thrill of her game.

“Uhm… that’s an interesting job, is he like live streaming or something?”

“Oh no, he has a blog critic about suits and alcohol. People invite him to events to try out their product. Honestly, he already has a shit ton of money, he just does it for fun. He even convinced me to move in with him but I like it here. I used to live here when I was young then moved to Staten Island to raise my son. After he had his stable life, I moved back here and he bought me this building as a gift.”

Mrs. Stinson seems like a nice old lady who is proud of her family. She is definitely a lot nicer than his old landlord. Even though she talks a lot, Peter finds it endearing and she reminds him a bit of May.

“I will take you to the apartment. Follow me”

She leads him to the elevator and presses the fifteenth floor.

“My apartment is also on this floor and there is another person who rents it up here. There is a laundry room up here as well, but other rooms are mostly storage. Meeker is right, you look too naive so I will let you rent up here, only people with elevator chips can get to this floor so it’s safer.”

Before Peter can say anything, she opens the apartment door, walks in, and continues her speak

“This is it, a bit smaller than mine and the others but it still has one small bedroom and an open room with a kitchen and bathroom. It has wifi, heaters, hot water, a dishwasher, a stove, a closet, and a desk. Other things you will need to buy for yourself. I can lend you the mattress and bed sheet, and you can ask Jay for a pillow and blanket, he has friends stay over a lot.”

Peter looks around and awkwardly says

“This is really nice, a lot better than my old apartment but I don’t know if I can afford this Mrs. Stinson”

“Just call me Loretta. It’s 850 per month not including electricity and water because if you go out a lot it can save you money. After three months of renting, I can lower the price to 750 per month because I like familiar faces.”

Peter sighs and opens his wallet to check

“Uh… I have five hundred and sixty dollars here. Oh, and six dollars as well. And my bank account has one hundred dollars total six hundred and sixty-six dollars…Huh, weird number… I don’t think I have enough for the first month.”

Loretta chuckles

“Are you planning to summon a demon or something?

“And it’s fine. You work for Wendy, I will take five hundred for this month and you can pay me the rest with the next month's rent”

Peter just stands there and can’t find a word to say. Rumors always say that Gothamites are mean, and don’t care about others but Peter keeps meeting good people who help him.

“I… Thank you so much. I will pay you the rest as soon as possible”

Loretta waves her hand dismissively

“It’s fine. Do you have a girlfriend?”

Peter curiously asks her back

“Why do you ask?”

“Boyfriend then? I don’t know you just look like a sweet handsome boy and remind me of my son, people would easily fall for you.”

Peter laughs out loud, this is the first time someone complimented him like that.

“No, I am not with anyone right now. I’m just plain and boring, I don’t think people will interested in me, Mrs. Stinson.”

A knock on the open door catches both of their attention and a huge young man is standing at the doorstep. He has a white streak of hair highlighted in the middle of his forehead. He is wearing a dark shade of red leather jacket outside of his brown sweater, black jeans, and nice black boots. Loretta smiles brightly

“Ah, Jay, good to see you. Here meet up with your new neighbor. Peter, this is Jay Todd. Jay, this is Peter Parker”

Jay nods at Peter

“So you rent up here?”

“Yeah. This is a really good apartment and Mrs. Stinson is so nice”

Jay nods again then turns to Loretta and gives her a small envelope, he simply says

“This is this month's rent”

Loretta opens the and takes out one thousand and five hundred dollars.

“Jay, you don’t have to give me this much”

“Just take it. I know some of my… friends may cause trouble by being loud and fighting in the apartment sometimes.”

“No, it’s fine. I sometimes need something exciting for my boring life. Oh, can you get the spare mattress and bed sheet in the storage?”

Peter quickly says

“No, no, Mrs. Stinson. I don’t want to bother him. I slept on the floor all the time, this is much better”

Both Jay and Loretta both look at Peter with a concerned emotion on their face. Jay furrows his eyebrows as he says.

“What do you mean by this is better? The bed here only has the wooden slats as the foundation, how do you plan to sleep on that?”

Peter rubs the back of his head as he tries to find a way to defuse the situation.

“Just forget what I say. Don’t worry. I will be fine”

Jay groans loudly and he goes out of the apartment. Loretta asks him and her voice sounds a bit upset

“Are you being abused by others or something?”

“Oh, no, no… Seriously, don’t worry about it. I’m just tired sometimes”

“Oh my god, you were so exhausted that you fell asleep on the floor?” Jay is back with a roll-up mattress on his shoulder and a bed sheet in his other hand “That’s even worse”

“What? No! It’s not like that”

Loretta narrows her eyes and looks at Peter.

“Stay here tonight. I forgot to print the contract so I will give it to you tomorrow and you will pay me then.” She moves out of the door then points two fingers to her eyes and points back at him. “I will keep an eye out for you Peter, can’t let you live in a bad condition like that, you already look too skinny”

Peter lets out a long sigh when Loretta gets out of the apartment and goes to the bedroom where Jay sets down the mattress and opens it up. Peter helps him spread the bedsheet as he says

“Is she always worried about others like that?”

Jay snorts

“Yeah well, the things you said sound really bad.”

“It is not like that. I probably should shut up. My quick mouth gets me in so much trouble”

Jay shakes his head and states

“You know that’s not the problem right?”

Peter rolls his eyes and avoids Jay’s question but after a few seconds he goes on

“Thank you for your help by the way. It’s so late already, you should go back to your room and rest”

“Nah, I will get you a pillow and blanket as well. Don’t want you to freeze up in this pre-winter weather.”

Peter smiles at Jay

“Thanks, again”

Jay looks at him and stays silent for a few seconds before he clears his throat and looks away

“It’s nothing. Wait a bit.”

Jay walks out again and Peter follows him to the empty living room. Jay goes into the door of an apartment opposite and he gets back quickly.

“Here” Jay gives Peter a fluffy pillow and a really soft blanket “You can just take it, I have a lot of it in my place”

“I will give it back after I buy mine. I can tell this is expensive and good quality”

“Don’t give back or I will throw it away”

“W-what? Why?”

Peter is surprised while Jay chuckles and his face looks smug. He moves out of the apartment again and this time he closes the door of Peter's newly acquired apartment. Before he fully closes it, Jay looks at Peter and seriously calls out.

“Peter?”

“Yeah?”

“I know you are new to this city and this is a dangerous place so if you ever get yourself in trouble, you can tell me, and I will help you”

It’s funny to witness a civilian like Jay try to protect Peter who is a mutated person and Spider-Man, so Peter can’t help but laugh out loud. His laughs die down quickly when Jay raises an eyebrow at him.

“I appreciate it but I can handle myself. New Yorkers are tough. Even an alien invasion can’t kill me.”

 Jay just snorts loudly again but his lip turns up to a smile and he closes the door.

And this is the end of Peter's first twenty four hour in Gotham.

Chapter Text

It’s a nice Saturday morning in the Parker household, and Peter and his Uncle Ben are making an automatic feeding birdhouse in their garage.

“Can you show me where is your injuries?”

Peter's small body of a child at the age of nine tenses up and he stops working with the wires. His right hand holding the electrical tape loses his grip but he doesn’t look up to look at Ben.

“What are you talking about? I don’t have any injuries”

Uncle Ben sighs and he crouches down with one of his knees touching the ground. He looks at his nephew’s face but Peter avoids his gaze

“Peter, you have been wearing a long-sleeved shirt for two days in this hot weather. It’s okay, show me. I’m a paramedic remember, I can help you.”

Peter’s tear starts rolling down his face but he doesn’t sniff or sob, he is a brave boy so he won’t sniff.

“Just… don’t tell May, ok? I don’t want to worry her.”

“Peter, you have to let others help you”

“No, you have to promise”

Peter looks down at his shoes, he is still avoiding his uncle's eyes but his face is frustrated and determined. Uncle Ben sighs again but he knows how stubborn his nephew is so he gives in

“Fine, just show me”

Peter hesitates pulling up his long sleeves. There are bruises littering from both his wrists to his arms, these all black and purple, some even swollen and bulging. Peter hears a small sharp inhale next to him and he looks up to his uncle.

“This is bad Peter. Is there anywhere else?”

Peter can’t help but the tears keep falling out of his eyes and his vision becomes blurry because of how his uncle's warm voice speaks to him. It reminds him of his father's warm voice that sometimes he dreamt of. It’s been four years that he living with his aunt and uncle, and he loves them. But he sometimes still cries in his sleep whenever he dreams of his parents or dreams of some old memories he had with them.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay. Let me help you. Ok? Just tell me where are you hurting. I will be here…”

Peter's eyes are still blurry but now his uncle is lying on the ground while Peter’s kneeling beside him. There is a shot wound on Uncle Ben’s stomach, his eyes are losing the light, and blood is soaking his shirt and spreading on the dirty pavement.

“Ben! Please, speak to me! No! No… I’m sorry… I’m sorry. It’s my fault…”

The deafening sound makes his ears ring and when Peter opens his eyes he sees the chaos happening around him. MJ is crying and calling his name, and people around him are hurt and injured. He was here but he can’t help others to stop the bomb. Where is Officer Jefferson? He remembered seeing the man cover the bomb with his body. This is all his fault, he should have seen this coming, he should be better…

Peter crawls on the ground after getting stung by Scorpion, he knows he can’t beat five villains at the same time and he feels helpless. But he is surprised and then terrified when a familiar claw grabs his wrist. Peter is in pain not only physically by being beaten up but also mentally when he sees his mentor's face. The man who wants to help the world now becomes a villain. Peter calls his name to confirm if this is really Doctor Octavius. Otto speaks, his voice is the same but its tone becomes sinister, cold, and dangerous. This is not the same mentor whom Peter has known for five years. The claws, Otto’s own project, have corrupted his mind, Peter should have been there. If he helped Doctor Octavius with his work, his mentor wouldn’t become like this. This is all his fault…

May’s breath becomes shallower every time she talks. The sweat covers her forehead and her hand is cold. She knew… She knew all the time and Peter kept making her worry about him. Her life is fading away, yet she fully trusts his decision. Peter wants to be selfish, he wants to use the cure on May, and she is the only family member he has left. He is angry and frustrated at himself and at the world for putting him in a situation like this. He’s crying. This is all his fault, he should have been faster, he should be better… He always helps people yet he fails the most important person in his life. The long beeping sound echoes in the small room and May becomes still and lifeless on the small white bed in F.E.A.S.T.

He and Miles are fighting and the anger controls Peter. He hurts Miles. No. He doesn’t want to hurt Miles, he only wants to be better. He can’t let anyone get hurt, but he is hurting Miles. No. No. This is wrong. He doesn’t want to feel the pain of losing anyone anymore. This is all his fault. If he protects Miles better, they won’t be in a situation like this… All of his pain and sadness vanish after he gets the symbiote, now the only emotion he has is anger. But he needs this suit, it helps him to become a better Spider-Man. All he wants is to save everyone, but why he is so angry, why do people not see that he is trying so hard to be better? He is not the problem, not anymore. Right? He doesn’t want to hurt anyone… But Miles is hurting right in front of him…

“I’m done either way, Pete”. Harry breathlessly says.

“No, no, we still have time”

Peter is in pain, he is in denial. No. No. He can’t lose Harry, he can’t lose anyone else. He should have found a cure for Harry sooner, he should have been there for his best friend.

“No, we don’t. It will kill them, and it will kill you”

They are fighting again and Harry is shouting at him to pure the symbiote with his Anti-Venom energy. The grief is too much, another person’s life who is dear to him is ruined by him. This is all his fault…

MJ tells him about the time when the symbiote took over his body and hunted her but he didn’t have any memories about this. The dread is all over Peter’s mind. He could have hurt her or even worse, he could have killed her. He needs to isolate himself from others…

What if one day he hurt his friends? MJ, Miles, Matt, Johnny, and even Wade who is immortal still get hurt.

It’s all his fault…

========

Peter suddenly sits up. His body is covered in sweat and he is in an unfamiliar bedroom. His heart is beating at a frantic rate, his mind is full of images of his friends getting hurt, his chest is in pain, his hands are shaking, and his breath is shallow.

He can’t breathe. He can’t breathe at all. He needs air. He needs to go out.

Peter quickly opens the window and climbs on the wall. He crawls like a spider to the roof. Tears have been rolling down his face since when he didn’t even remember. He is standing at the edge of the rooftop and trying so hard to inhale the air. The tears and the pain didn't stop. His breathing has become harder.

He is panicking. Peter knows that he needs to calm down, he has been through this before.

========

Dick has finished his regular patrol. It’s been some time since he settled back in Gotham and moved his job to GCDP. However, he doesn’t move back to the mansion. It’s not because he doesn’t love his family or anything like that, but he wants to have a little boundary both for him and his siblings. They’re tired of his overprotectiveness and he sometimes feels a bit burned out because of the oldest child's responsibility. Moreover, his apartment is in the Upper East Side District, it’s near his young siblings's school and it’s easier to go to Crime Alley where Jason's apartment is located.

He knows Damian has never admitted it but the young boy looks happy every time Dick decides to pick him up from the school. Dick still spends a lot of time at the mansion but all of them also spend time in his or Jason’s apartment because Jason still finds it hard to come back to the mansion after all the time has passed. Bruce and Jason had “the talk” a long time ago but Dick knows they still act cautiously around each other. Dick knows Bruce still blames himself to this day that he didn’t rescue Jason in time. Jason still has some side effects of the Lazarus Pit, even though, he is quite in control of his actions he is still afraid that he will hurt his younger siblings and sometimes Dick notices how Jason reacts badly when he hears the sound of metal dragging on the ground.

Speaking of Jason, Dick is planning to go to Jason's apartment to check his wound. Jason got a cut on his calf when they were on patrol last night, and Leslie has told him to stay put for a few days so Dick wants to check to see if Jason really takes his rest or not.

When he gets to the alley of Jason's apartment building, Dick sees a man wearing a white T-shirt, black sweatpants, and flip-flop standing at the edge of the roof. The young man grips his chest tight like he is in pain, his breathing is not in rhythm. This is not how Dick wants to end his night patrol. He gently dropped down the roof but not in a stealthy way, he just didn’t want to startle someone who wanted to harm themselves. He let his footsteps tap on the roof floor in the early morning and let the young man with brown messy hair know that Dick was approaching him. The brown hair man still didn’t notice his present, so Dick decides to speak up

“You shouldn’t stand close to the edge like this”

As Dick predicted, the young man is startled and jumps up really high, at least four feet above the ground which is impressive if he doesn’t jump out of the roof while he is in the air. He quickly flips mid-air to turn his face toward Dick and Dick also quickly grabs the small of his back when he falls and pulls him back so they both stand on the concrete of the roof.

“Ugh… Thank… but that’s unnecessary”

“You literally fell off the roof. What do you mean unnecessary?”

Dick is frustrated, how did this young man can be this calm after almost falling to his death.

“Well, before I explain, you should probably let go of me first.”

Dick realizes he still holds on to the shorter man and his sound got muffled because Dick’s embrace is too tight. He is the same height as Tim, around five feet seven, but he is skinnier than Tim. Dick quickly releases the young man but still holds out his right hand just in case he will fall again.

“It’s fine. I won’t slip again”

Dick shakes his head.

“We should move to the central of the roof”

He then holds onto the other man's wrist and leads him to the middle of the roof.

“As I said, that’s unnecessary”

He can now see the young man's face clearly under the moonlight of the night. He looks in his twenties, maybe even younger than Jason. His skin is pale, his brown curly hair is a mess like he just out of bed, and his brown eyebrows are straight and thin. His eyes have a nice brown chocolate color, underneath are black eyebags and Dick sees a few faint forehead wrinkle lines. He has bandages shown up from the hem of his short sleeve on his right upper arm so he has already been injured. Dick crosses his arms and asks.

“Explain to me how that is unnecessary then”

==========

Peter has already calmed down from his panic attack after the nightmare. Well, to tell the truth, he actually calmed down because he almost fell off the roof, the familiar danger and falling snapped him out of his panicking stage. He didn’t even hear the vigilante get on the roof, he only realized the others were present when his voice broke the silence of the night. He also is flustered a bit because the others saved him, he doesn’t need to be saved from a simple fall off the roof of a fifteen-floor building like this. He fell off from a much higher place than this. And he already flipped back so he can easily stick on the wall, another solution well, he is wearing his web shooters. He is Spider-Man after all, and falling is a part of his job description.

“I mean I already flipped around, I can hold on to the edge of the roof”

“I’m not letting you dangling and holding for your life on the edge of the roof”

==========

Dick sighs and he is frustrated. This young man clearly doesn’t have any self-preservation which probably shouldn’t be a surprise if he plans to harm himself in the first place. The shorter man looks surprised and he is silent for a few seconds before he realizes something

“Oh… Oh my god, you thought I was planning to unalive myself.”

Then he chuckles. Dick raises his eyebrows but his heart thumps loudly in his chest, maybe it’s because of the stunt this young man just did. The shorter man doesn’t seem to be in the mental breakdown stage that Dick saw before and he looks too relaxed when he talks about the suicide topic, even though “unalive” seems like a weird choice of word to say. He continues to say before Dick can give any comment about his weird actions

“To make it clear, I was not planning to do it. I fell because you startled me.”

“Fine, then why did you get on the roof then? And how did you get up here? I know the fire escape of the building is broken”

“Oh, I just need some air because I was upset. And how I got up here… Uhmm… I climbed up here by a rope but it broke when I planned to climb back down”

Dick skeptical look at the shorter man. He avoids Dick’s look so that’s only half of the truth or straight up a lie. Suddenly, there is a loud rumble noise coming from the brown hair man's stomach. Dick can see the other man's face hit up into nice pinkish color under the moonlight.

“Damn you, stomach, you keep embarrassing me lately”

This time it’s Dick turns to chuckle and he sees the other man's face turn redder. Dick quickly pretends to cough and lets his laugh die down because he doesn’t want to make the brown hair man uncomfortable.

“Sorry… Anyway, what’s your name, I don’t want to keep calling you “the brown hair man” in my head”

“Oh, right, I’m Peter.”

“So Peter, do you want to grab a bite with me?”

“I don’t want to bother you, you are patrolling, right?”

“Oh, no, I’m done for the day… well, technically the night. We can grab a Batburger now if you want.”

“Whoa, Batman has his own chain of fast food. I’m jealous. Wait a bit you are the first Robin, right? What is your alias now?”

Dick raises his eyebrow again

“You are really not from Gotham then. I go by Nightwing now. Where are you from? And why are you jealous, you want to have your own fast food brand or something?”

Peter still has the pink color and he shyly smiles. Dick suddenly feels his heartbeat skip a beat.

“I’m from New York and well, you don’t see IronBurger or SpiderBurger there. Actually, SpiderBurger doesn’t sound delicious at all”

Dick nods in agreement

“Yeah, BatBurger rhyme, SpiderBurger just sounds like someone wants to put spiders into my food. No offense to Spider-Man though, I like him, he is my favorite street vigilante and non-associated hero.”

“Oh. Really? Which one? Why?”

Dick thoughtfully answer

“I mean I like both but I like the OG better. His red and blue color scheme looks great, but I’m not sure about his new white suit I saw on the news during the Symbiote Invasion but I think it grows on me with time. Sadly, he hasn’t shown up after that incident, I hope he is doing fine like Little Spider-Man’s statement on the Danika podcast”

Peter nods

“Yeah, I guess he is fine like the other Spider-Man said. But are you just like him for his suit?”

Dick smiles and shakes his head

“No, of course not. I think he became a vigilante at the same time or a bit earlier than me. I have Batman’s guidance but he has no one, yet he still does great work every day and helps others even with the smallest problem like getting a cat from a tree. I think he even has much more experience than some other heroes because he has been doing that for so long. I’m not sure how old he is but he always sounded young when he did the interview so I guess that he could be around my age. Maybe or even younger. Avengers, JLA, and other associates can do wonders for the world but we need heroes like him. Honestly, I fully understand why he needs to take a break, he has been doing it for so long, saving New York so many times and even joining with Avengers sometimes to save the world.”

Peter becomes silent for a while before he finds his voice again

“I didn’t expect Gotham’s hero to know so much about another city vigilante.”

Dick chuckles

“Well, you need to keep your eyes and ears for colleagues. We are in the same field of work after all. Anyway, enough about my favorite people, are you scared of heights?”

Peter smiles brightly and Dick's heart again has that weird beat.

“No, not at all. Are you planning to swing me to the Batburger place?”

“Yep, hold on to me”

==========

It's such a weird feeling to be in a civilian role this time. He kind of understands why Wade likes to hold onto him and let him swing around NYC so much when they are patrolling together. Actually, he got Miles to swing him a few times, but all those rare occasions were when Peter was heavily injured and unconscious so he can not remember the feeling.

Nightwing is experienced with his grabbing hook but Peter knows his web and his agility makes his signature Spider-Man swinging more fun and a lot faster than this. And well, if he can look at Nightwing's grabbing hook, he can improve it to become better. Wait, that's probably not a good idea, he didn’t bring his trusty tools with him.

==========

Dick sometimes sneaks a look at Peter but he can’t guess what is inside the other young man's head. Peter’s face lights up but he doesn’t look that excited for someone who loves the thrill of height or first time swinging around by a vigilante. He doesn’t look scared either, his face has complicated emotions with some forehead wrinkles like he is deep in his thoughts. Peter’s body is skinny and lightweight but it has muscles hidden under his oversized T-shirt. He has a fresh citrus smell of some kind of shampoo and shower gel but it is faint and Dick only realizes that because they are really close and his left hand holds tightly around Peter’s waist. Peter didn’t even bother to hold on to him, he just put his left palm on Dick’s upper arm.

The trip takes fifteen minutes, and they now are standing in front of Batburger in Burnley District. Dick leads Peter into the fast-food restaurant and he cheerily offers

“You can order anything you want, the whole menu is fine if you can eat all of it”

Peter rolls his eyes but his face looks smug

“So you are the rich vigilante type huh? Don’t underestimate me, I can make you broke if I eat with my full potential.”

Dick crosses his arm and he smirks. Peter is quite confident about his statement so Dick wants to test to see if Peter is just joking or not.

“Do you want to make a bet? You can order the whole menu but you have to finish all of that. If you win I will pay for everything and you can ask me to do a favor for you, as long as it’s legal I will do it. However, if you lose, you have to pay for everything you order. And well, it’s common knowledge that all Gotham’s vigilantes are rich”

“I can eat as much as I want and do not have to pay for it. Deal”

There is no one in the restaurant except for two employees and one of them didn’t even bother to wear the cosplay. Peter orders the whole menu, he even gets two Bat-mite meals because he wants to get more figures. Peter asks if they can eat on the rooftop and Dick cheerfully fulfills the request.

They sit down in the central on the roof because Dick refuses to let Peter sit at the edge. If they have a blanket to lie on the floor then, it will look like they are having a picnic.

Peter peels off his first Batburger and finishes it after three bites while Dick just looks at him in awe.

“That’s so fast, what the hell? Are you starving or something? Did you even have dinner before this?

Peter peels off the next burger as he says

“I forgot dinner but I had a full breakfast and brunch today. I eat fast because I want to eat the food while it is still warm, and I don’t want to make you wait.”

Dick suddenly becomes concerned

“You have to eat more, you are way too skinny. That’s maybe the reason why you are short. And, you don’t have to worry about my time, I enjoy your company. Just don’t choke on your food”

“Hey, leave my heights out of this ok? I’m short so I can be flexible.”

Dick laughs out loud

“That is definitely not true. I’m quite tall and I’m the most flexible Robin.”

Peter has finished his third burger and he moves on to the Night-wings

“Well yeah, you won’t understand. Let's just drop this topic.”

“Fine I will drop it for now, but just know that I’m tall and flexible”

“Yeah, yeah”

Peter has already finished the chicken wings and he is eating a Two-face sandwich now. Dick didn't order anything except a Bat-soda so he picks up a fry cover in Jokerize sauces. Peter slaps his hand so he accidentally drops it then Peter quickly takes the fry.

“Mine. If you want to eat you should order for yourself”

“W-what? How can you move so fast? And you have all of this food, I just want some fries.”

Dick is sulking a bit. He always loves to share food with others so of course he pouts when Peter doesn't want to do the same. Peter narrows his eyes but his face quickly relaxed and his big brown eyes turn worried when he saw Dick’s sad face. To be honest, Dick’s upset has fade away when he saw Peter’s concern but he want to keep his façade a little. Peter quietly says

“Fine, but don't you dare say that I did not finish all the food because I didn't eat the fries you ate”

Dick is surprised and then laughing

“Oh my god, I’m not that petty.”

Peter’s face flushed a bit

“Sorry, my friends love to play dirty when we betting sometimes so I have to be cautious. You can eat anything you want then.”

Dick grins

“Maybe you need better friends”

Peter shakes his head and then smiles sweetly and looks at the night sky

“No, they are great. Sometimes a bit of an asshole but they are caring and they are important to me”

“That's good then. Your friends remind me of my family”

Even though they are talking, Peter’s speed of consuming food doesn't slow down. Dick asks Peter about New York City and Peter tells him about the people there. He has a lot of knowledge about NYC citizens. Peter states that New York is not that much different from Gotham but may be less gloomy. Dick tells Peter about how Gotham has late winter but it rains a lot. After around twenty minutes Peter only has two Bat-mite meals left and all the other food has gone into his stomach. Dick is impressed by how much Peter can eat. That is a lot of calories. Peter opens both boxes and takes out the figures. He got Nightwing and Red Hood. Peter clicks his tongue and continues finishing his late-night dinner. Dick curiously asks

“You didn't seem to be satisfied with the figures. Do you want anyone specific?”

Peter looks at the figures and shrugs

“Not really but it could be cool if I got the big man himself”

“You mean Batman? Well, I understand that a lot of people like Batman.”

“It's not really that I like him per se but he reminds me of a friend of mine. You know people who are mysterious, terrifying to others, and being a protector in the dark”

Dick thinks about Peter’s comments and it is not that far off from what Bruce does while he is in his Bat persona

“What about Nightwing and Red Hood?”

“I mean, I don't know much about Gotham’s vigilantes but I heard people compared Red Hood to Deadpool. And, Nightwing is fine, but he should be more careful when he makes a bet with a stranger.”

Peter finishes the last sip of his soda and he smugly looks at Dick. Empty boxes surround him and all the food is gone.

“Seriously, how can you eat that much?”

Peter chuckles

“That's a secret I will tell you one day”

Dick smiles

“Fine, I owe you a favor. What do you want me to do for you?”

“I haven’t really thought about it at all”

Peter frowns his eyebrows and then he shrugs

“Just keep up your good work I guess, people need you to look out for them”

Dick again surprised so many times in this one night

“Peter, that is not a favor and I am already doing that either way”

“Nah, it is fine. I don't want people to owe me anything”

Dick raises his eyebrow

“You don't want to keep it so I can do it for you in the future or anything like that?”

Peter snorts

“Nope, I can handle myself. And you should get going, it's late”

Dick looks at the time on his phone and he nods

“Yeah, it’s 3 a.m, I should take you back home”

“Oh no, it is fine”

“Peter, I am not letting you wander around back to Crime Alley”

Peter wants to protest, but he seems to not be able to find a good reason so he opens and closes his mouth a few times, in the end, he gives in. He tucks two figures in his sweatpants pocket, then he puts all the papers and empty boxes in the takeout bag and carelessly throws them below when he is standing near the edge of the roof. Dick peeks down and the bag has been neatly sitting in the trash bin on the ground level.

“How did you do that?”

“Lucky throw I guess”

Dick senses that is a lie but he lets it slide this time. Dick holds on to Peter’s waist and even through the glove and Peter’s T-shirt he can feel Peter is cold as ice.

“You are freezing Peter.”

Peter shrugs

“Yes, a bit cold. But I’m fine. It is worse when winter hits”

“We should get you home quickly then, I don't want you to be sick”

“I can't catch a cold so it's fine”

“Everyone can catch a cold Peter”

“I can’t catch a cold if I’m this chill”

Dick snorts but his lips quirk up to a smile

“That’s a terrible joke”

Dick swings them both back to Crime Alley. Surprisingly Peter tells him to get down at the front of Jason’s apartment building and Dick only now realizes this is the same rooftop where Dick has found Peter standing.

“Thank you for the food”

“It’s nothing”

Dick waits for Peter to go in but he just stands there silent. Peter then awkwardly says

“You should go now”

“I won’t go anywhere until you get in your building safely”

Peter looks at the locked front door and then looks back at Dick. He hesitates to go in and Dick patiently waits for him. Finally, Peter sighs

“Uhm… I actually didn't have the key with me”

Dick facepalms himself in defeat. Dick is worried about Peter’s poor choice and his well-being.

“Then why do you keep telling me to go? How do you plan to go in then? Do you want to spend the night on the street?”

“I uhm… can call someone to open the door for me.”

“I know you don’t have a phone with you, Peter.”

“Fine, let's just say I am stupid, can you get me to the window of the fifteenth floor?”

The fifteenth floor is the same as Jason's. Wait a minute, Peter isn’t like living with Jason or anything like that right? Why didn’t Jason mention anything about Peter? Dick asks without thinking and his voice is a little louder than normal.

“You are on the fifteenth floor?”

“Yes. Is there something wrong? It’s not like this apartment building is haunted or anything right?”

“No, no, nothing. Which window then?”

“The left one”

Dick doesn’t even realize that he let out a sigh of relief after knowing that Peter and Jason don’t live together. He clears his throat when Peter gives him a suspicious look.

“Oh… okay. Hold onto me”

Dick gets Peter and himself through the open window. He looks around and the room is much smaller than Jason’s and doesn’t have much furniture or any decoration except for a bed, a closet, and a backpack on the floor. The turquoise pillow is on the side of the bed and the dark blue blanket almost fell off the bed which means Peter just got out of the bed. They are familiar, if he guessed it right, it’s his spare pillow and blanket that he left at Jason’s apartment. Look like Peter has just moved into this apartment and his belongings haven’t been here yet.

“Thank you.”

Peter smiles, his eyes are shining because they reflect the light of the streetlamp outside the window. Dick feels his heart just does a flip inside his chest.

“Don’t mention it. I still owe you a favor you know. You can ask me for help anytime”

“I thought I already told you what to do. Technically, I just used it another time, I asked you to help me get in. So maybe, I owe you this time because I used my favor twice”

Dick chuckles

“That’s not how it works, Peter. I’m a vigilante, of course, I have to help civilians like you.”

Dick waves at Peter before he jumps out of Peter’s bedroom window. He leaps into the dark early morning sky and goes back to his apartment in the Upper East Side district. He thinks back on his interaction with Peter and without any reason Dick feels happy.

Chapter Text

Jason knocks the third time on the door of his new neighbor and he feels a bit restless. Jason doesn’t know why but he is curious and worried about his neighbor. Well of course he is worried after all of those shocking statements of the other man but Jason feels there is something more than that. The way Peter's eyes light up when he smiles makes Jason stunt for a few seconds. Peter seems like a funny person who loves to joke and laugh but Jason can see there are some things that pressure Peter, his eyes hidden all the pain behind like he has seen it all. Maybe that's why Jason wants to help him.

Jason feels a bit worried after he knocks on the door for the fourth time and gets no answer. He tries the doorknob and is surprised when the door doesn’t lock. Jason hesitantly steps into the apartment and closes the door behind him. Right after that, he hears the sound of the door open from his right side and Peter walks out of the bathroom. His hair is still wet, his face is flushed probably because of the hot water in the shower, and he only wraps a towel around his waist.

Jason knows he should not stare and should definitely turn away to be polite and give Peter some privacy but he just can’t move. He can see Peter’s white skin and his lean but defined muscle. Peter has a large brown scar across his chest, a deep brown scar on the left of his stomach that looks like a stab wound, some faded scars here and there on his skin that Jason only realizes because he is intensely staring at the shorter man. Peter also has a freshly stitched wound on his upper right arm.

Peter speaks up and cuts Jason from his thought

“Sorry for keeping you waiting, I heard your knocks but I was in the bathroom”

“What happened to your arm?”

Peter looks down to his arm and he acts like he just realizes the wound is there.

“Oh this, this is just because of a small accident from yesterday's interview?”

Jason frowns

“What kind of job injured their employees on the day of their interview?”

“Well, it is not their fault, I just jumped in to help so I got a small cut. It’s not that big of a deal”

“Peter, the cut is so deep that you need to stitch it with the needle”

“Oh, it’s not necessary, but Mr. Wayne looked very scary at that moment and I can’t find a way to reject his help”

Jason is surprised.

“Mr. Wayne as in Brucie Wayne?”

“Uhm yeah. I was interviewed at Wayne Tech. That’s actually the whole reason why I have to move to Gotham.”

Jason cannot believe that his new neighbor is also his old man’s new worker. This is such a weird coincidence. His new handsome single neighbor is Bruce’s employee. The world sometimes feels so small.

“It’s good that he stitched your wound, it looks quite deep.”

“Are you looking for me?”

“Yeah, do you like eggs and bacon?”

“I love every type of food, I’m not picky. Why do you ask though?”

“Uh… I made too much breakfast so do you want to eat some”

Peter chuckles

“I have never seen anyone over-made their breakfast before. If you want to invite me to eat breakfast with you, just say it. Food is an exception that I never refused.”

Jason suddenly feels embarrassed after being called out by Peter

“I will keep that in mind then”

“You should go, I will go after I get dressed”

Jason nods but he realizes that he doesn’t have any intention of moving out of Peter’s apartment.

Peter walks into his bedroom and then even before Jason can look around Peter's empty apartment, he has already come out of his room.

“That was so fast!”

“Uhm, yeah, I just put on some clothes and grabbed my phone”

“I mean, I have never seen anyone who can do this fast, you--”

~And I am the devil that you forgot--

“Matt?”

Peter answers his phone. Jason cannot help but feel a bit curious about who called Peter.

“No, afternoon it’s fine, I can call my work to reschedule”

Jason again wonders why Peter has to move his work for this Matt person.

“Yes… Thanks. Also please don’t send me anything other than my stuff… Yes… Don’t worry. I won’t forget lunch today. Bye Matty.”

Jason raises his eyebrows, Peter and Matt are probably quite close if he calls this guy by a nickname and what did Peter mean when he said he won’t forget his lunch again? God, this young man is such a disaster. Peter looks at Jason and speaks

“Uhm, I think I need to make another phone call so you should go first. I don’t want you to be hungry because you have to wait for me.”

“It’s fine, I can wait unless you need some privacy”

“Oh, it’s nothing important”

Peter press calls, and after a few seconds the other side picks up

“Hi Mrs. Goldfinch, I’m so sorry but could you reschedule my first shift? I have an urgent situation that has happened so I--... Thank you so much… Yes, Sunday is fine, I will be there. Thank you.”

Peter ends his call and Jason probably doesn’t hide his curiosity very well because Peter looks at him and explains

“My friends send me my stuff from New York to Gotham but the delivery got some problems so its arrival will be delayed to the afternoon”

“Oh... Wait, Wayne Tech works on Saturday?”

“No, that’s my part-time job”

“Busy bee huh? You got Wayne’s job and another part-time job. I hope you didn’t work yourself to death”

Now, Jason is worried. He already eavesdropped last night that Peter only has six hundred and sixty-six dollars in total so it’s understandable that Peter needs to pick up a lot of jobs. After Peter’s concerning statements last night, combined with his many jobs, Jason really hopes Peter doesn’t work himself to death.

“I won’t. Don’t worry. So, I assume that we will eat in your apartment?”

Jason snorts and looks around Peter’s apartment

“Well of course, unless you want to sit and eat on the floor”

“I mean I don’t mind that”

Jason facepalm himself while Peter smugly looks at him

“What is it with you and the floor?”

“Floor is great, did you know that sleeping on the floor can help with your back pain?”

Jason rolls his eyes

“That’s definitely a lie. You defend the floor and make yourself sound like a dwarf or something. Are you secretly a dwarf? Is that why you are short?

Peter narrows his eyes and he looks like a displeased cat

“You better leave my height out of this conversation”

Jason cannot help but feel delight when he looks at the short brown hair man who tries so hard to look threatening in front of him.

“Fine, let's drop that. Come with me”

Jason leads the way and opens the door of his apartment. He can feel Peter look around his apartment but Peter doesn’t say anything. Jason thanks himself that he had cleaned the apartment before this. Well, he is quite an organized person, it is just that sometimes he leaves some Red Hood gear in the living room. He leads Peter to the dining table and they sit down. There are already bacon and eggs on the plates, two glasses of milk, and some fresh fruits. Jason suggests

“I will warm this up”

“No, it’s fine” Peter takes a bite of the bacon “It’s still warm and it’s great.”

They both start eating and Jason realizes Peter’s speed of consuming food is very fast. Peter looks at Jason and realizes his stare so he slows down his eating.

“So, uhm, Jay, what is your job?”

Peter asks and Jason is perplexed. He wants to talk with Peter, that is one of the reasons why he invited Peter for breakfast, but he didn’t prepare for small talk at all. He definitely cannot tell Peter that his job nowadays is mostly being Red Hood and part-time Crime Lord. He didn’t take part in as much as in the past when he just returned to Gotham, but he still has some control over some gangs. Well, he better keep his cool and use his usual lies.

“I’m a bodyguard, my shift is mostly at night”

“I thought you were a mechanical engineer, maybe own a garage or something because you have a lot of tools for motorbikes. And sorry for bothering you, you probably need sleep in the morning, I should get going after--”

“No. No. I don’t sleep much and I have a day off today. I enjoy your company”

“Oh…”

Jason continues, he is quite impressed that Peter knows what the tool for the vehicle is.

“And yes, I also work as a mechanic, I own a motorbike and sometimes I fix for others. Do you own a motorbike as well?”

Peter smiles and Jason feels butterflies in his stomach.

“Oh no, I have a friend who is a great mechanic. He has a motor but he loves cars more. Sometimes, I steal some of his tools because it's very useful for some of my projects”

Jason chuckles at Peter's honesty

“Well, cars are good but motorbikes are more fun. You know, the wind and the feeling rushing through the street”

“I can't say I know because I don't ride or drive. Well, I don't think I even sit on the motor once”

Jason is surprised

“Wait, you don't know how to drive or ride? And how the hell you haven't sat on the bike if your friend owns a motorbike?”

“Well, I live in NY so it’s not necessary to learn that. And I never accept his offer to ride on a bike with him because I don’t want people to be misunderstanding that we are dating or anything like that. He is fa-- handsome and people love to gossip about him”

“Oh... yeah, probably you should keep your distance”

Peter raises an eyebrow and Jason realizes he may sound a bit weird with that statement so he changes his subject

“So, what about you? What do you do at Wayne Tech?”

“I’m scientist, I just got assign to be working partner with Lucius”

“You must be pretty great at your job to be partnered with Lucius? Anyway, what exactly happened on the day of the interview though?”

Peter chuckles

“I’m not that smart. And you won’t let this go huh?”

And Jason nods. Yes, of course, Jason won’t let this go that Peter got himself injured. He doesn’t want to ask Bruce because B will be a pain in the ass if he realizes his worker is Jason's neighbor. Bruce could even be paranoid and maybe keep an eye on Peter, Jason doesn’t want Peter to be uncomfortable, he just moved to Gotham. Actually, if Peter got Batman to follow him maybe it would keep him safe in this brutal city.

Peter sighs but there is a tiny smile on his face

“Fine. But I warn you, it’s a boring story”

“It's ok, tell me”

So, Peter starts to tell him about his first day in Gotham. Peter was very excited that Bruce decided to let them make gadgets instead of presentations or normal interviews. Jason chuckles at how anxious Peter described himself when he went into the room. He also realizes how crazy smart Peter is when Peter detailed his device concept just from his memory. Jason enjoys Peter's comments on his opponents flaws and strengths. He can feel Peter struggling a bit when he tells him that he saw Fred tested his device, it feels like something Peter left out. Peter just glosses over his hero act, but Jason can imagine how Peter jumped in and shoved Lucius off and saved him in a split second. Jason felt his stomach flip when Peter told him that a claw stuck in his upper arm. Peter tells him that all the people were overreacting because they kept insisting him to go to the hospital and his wound was not that severe.

“Then, Mr. Wayne calmed everyone down, tested my device, told me I got the job. He gave me a very scary stare, dragged me to his office, cut off my favorite shirt, treated my wound, and gave me his son's shirt. I signed the contract, got his and Mr. Fox’s number, a free shirt and five hundred dollars. Mr. Wayne sneaked it in the pocket. He is definitely smarter than all though tabloids and magazines give him credit and I need to pay him back somehow.”

Jason is stunted. He likes that Peter was brave and looked out for Lucius but he doesn’t like that Peter was so reckless and didn’t let people get him to the hospital. Jason is glad that Bruce was the one at the interview, if it was Timbo, he definitely won’t be able to convince Peter to treat his wound. Man, he knows Peter is stubborn but he cannot even imagine he could be such a disaster like this. Bruce handled it well, he can even predict that Peter will refuse the money so he put it in the shirt pocket. Guess his greatest detective title is not just for show. He needs to learn his technique to help Peter. Wait a bit, Peter only has six hundred and sixty-six dollars but that was after Bruce gives him five hundred. Oh my god, this guy is so broke. 

“Peter, you don’t have to pay back. He is a billionaire. People even stole millions from him and that doesn’t make him any less rich”

“I mean maybe he doesn’t care, but stolen money is wrong. But for my situation, I don’t know. I don’t think my action needs to be paid by money.”

Jason thoughtfully hums and askes

“So, did you tell him that? I guess that you have already tried to give him back the money.”

“Yeah, he told me he paid for my grabbing hook because I was not his employee when I made it. And then he just ended the call.”

Okay, Bruce is very clever to think about that.

“That's reasonable, you should just accept it”

“Yeah, you're probably right… It just feels weird…”

Jason decides to change the subject so Peter doesn’t think about the money too much.

“So how do you find out about Loretta?”

“I got a part time job at Meeker Coffee and she gave me address to Mrs. Stinson building”

“The coffee shop near the Gotham Police Department, right?”

“Yes. Are you a familiar customer there?”

“No, I don't like coffee that much, but my... friends like that place”

Jason knows about Meeker because that is Tim and Dick’s favorite coffee shop and they cannot shut up about it. Tim is the first one to find out about that place, and it looks quite small and nothing special or stands out but the coffee is really good. Dick got curious and tried it out after he moved back to work at GCPD, and then he refused to drink anywhere else, his only exception coffee is Alfred's coffee. He heard that Loretta is good friends with Meeker but he doesn’t know much about her.

Peter thoughtfully says

“Maybe I will meet your friend during my shift”

“I definitely hope not though”

Jason makes a face and quickly replies. Peter chuckles

“Why not?”

“They are a bunch of annoying assholes”

“Oh, I definitely related to you with that. But yeah, my friends are my weirdos.”

Jason feels curious about Peter’s friends. To be honest, he is curious about everything around Peter.

“Any friends of yours live in Gotham?”

Peter eyes turn sad and that make Jason feels bad for asking

“Sadly, none though.” Peter then smiles and looks into Jason’s eyes “You are my first friend in Gotham. Well, if you want to be my friend though”

If Jason refuses to believe that he has any non-platonic affection toward Peter before, now he definitely cannot lie to himself any further. He feels butterflies all over his stomach and lost in the beautiful chocolate eyes in front of him. Jason stunts and stays silent for a minute.

Peter smiles fade and he worriedly asks

“Are you alright? Isn’t that horrible to be my friend, right?” Peter chuckles in a self-deprecation tone. “I mean, I know we just meet and I maybe not that great of a person and maybe I ask too--”

“No. No. I would love to be your friend. I just. Sorry. I was lost in… thoughts. And you are great. Don’t give yourself too little credit like that.”

Jason looks at Peter who sighs in relief. Peter is very kind, friendly and humorous, he is also very stubborn and brave, but he seems to be uncertain about himself and anxious around relationships. He seems to always undervalue himself, like how he doesn’t think he is great at his job or how he just minimizes his bravery acts he doesn’t think about his kindness needs a repayment. If he has some family issues and grows up in Gotham, Peter is definitely Robin’s material. Actually, with how Bruce treated his wound, who can say that Bruce hasn’t already mentally adopted Peter. Jason doesn’t know how to feel about that though, part of him wants B to look out for Peter because he now knows how Peter won’t ask for help, but part of him doesn’t want Bruce to know too much about his neighbor.

They finished their breakfast and Peter grabs the plates

“Let me wash that and thank you for the food. I should let you relax on your day off”

“No, I have a dishwasher.” Jason takes the plates from Peter's hand and puts them in the machine. “Do you have any plans for today?”

“Let me see, I need to meet up with Mrs. Stinson to pay my rent and sign the contract. After that, I’m free, I just need to be here in the afternoon to receive my possession, probably it will arrive at 2 or 3 pm.”

“That’s good. Do you want to go shopping with me for your new home?”

“Uh… I don’t think I have the luxury to do that… My money is kind of tight at the moment”

“But you at least need food, right?”

“Well, sure, but maybe just packed and canned food. I don’t have a fridge for fresh food. I can join you with shopping if you want company.”

“Oh… Okay, we can go shopping. You should go see Loretta, I will meet you in her apartment after… uh… probably 20 minutes”

Jason now knows what is the first thing he needs to give his new neighbor.

=========

Loretta is bored. Well, she knows Joe is upset, he is a great friend with her son and she does sometimes look out for Joe like her own son. But this is the tenth time he comes to her place to complain about something he should know will always happen in this Gotham city.

“Mrs. Loretta, I really need someone, I’m so tired--”

Three knocks on her front door and Loretta instantly stand up. She opens the front door and she sees the young Peter looks fresh and with more energy than yesterday evening and that makes her happy a bit. She doesn’t know why but the first time she sees Peter, he reminds her a lot of her son. Well, to be honest, Peter feels like Berny when he was in twenties, when he was still innocent and naive. Still though, even when her son became resentful because some dickface stole his girlfriend, she still can see that innocent and hurtful boy underneath. She is glad that after Berny became a single dad, he slipped out of that resentful phrase and became a better person for his daughter.

“Good morning, Mrs. Stinson, I’m sorry to bother you while you have a guest over but I want to say when you have time can we sign the contract and I will pay my first month rent”

Peter is so polite. Yeah, Berny definitely cannot be this good even when he was younger. She definitely made the right decision when she let him rent up this floor. Loretta knows she could be stupid and fell in love with the wrong person when she was young but after so many years living and working in Crime Alley, she is proud to say that she has very good judgment on people.

“Good to see you, don’t worry about Joe, he is a friend of my son and I treat him as family. You can come in and sign the contract right now.”

“Okay, if that is what you want.”

Loretta opens the door and lets Peter in. She leads him to the sofa to sit down and she opens the cabinet to get the contract. She always has this in here but last night she lied to Peter because she wanted him to get early sleep. He looked exhausted and she couldn't help but find Peter looking exactly like a stray cat in the rain, even though it didn’t rain last evening.

“Mrs. Loretta, I am here for some emotional support and you just straight up ignore me.”

Joe definitely doesn’t like that she abandoned him

“Shut up Joe, find someone to fill the job, that’s it. It’s always that simple”

Joe groans

“I know, of course, but how? And who?”

Loretta comes back and sits down on the couch next to Joe and opposite to Peter. Peter awkwardly asks

“Sorry, I know I shouldn’t intrude but are you in trouble or do you need help?”

Joe sighs and tiredly answers

“Yeah, kind of, I need someone to work on the weekend at my bar. But I can’t find anyone and my last employee just got shot last week. Thank God that he’s alive but I really need another worker because the weekend is very crowded. I know I shouldn’t be surprised because it’s Crime Alley after all but it really bummed me out. I can keep my employees safe when they are in my bar but I cannot guarantee their safety outside it.”

“I can help you with that. I have worked at the bar before so I know the basic and you don’t have to worry about my safety, I can handle myself”

Loretta definitely doesn’t imagine Peter will say this, and she also doesn’t approve of this at all. However, Joe's eyes shine up and look hopeful.

“Peter, no, I know you work late at Wendy's but this is very different. Joe’s bar opens till 3 am and it is in the middle of the Crime Alley. His bar has a lot of goons and sometimes some crime bosses or mercenaries may show up. You can become the target if you work there.”

“It’s fine Mrs. Stinson, I have dealt with a lot worse. I grow up in Queen and live in Hell’s Kitchen and I have deals with gangsters and crime bosses before”

Ok, that is not something Loretta wants to hear. Queen doesn’t sound too bad but Loretta knows some places Hell’s Kitchen is bad. And what did he mean by he has dealt with criminals before?

Joe asks, he seems very convinced by Peter, and that just shows how desperate he is.

“Do you know any martial arts? Any self-defense techniques?’

“Yes, I know self-defense, I learn from a lot of different types so my style is a bit different. I can fight but I don’t want trouble, I only defend myself when it’s necessary.”

“Oh damn, you sound like those characters in Jackie Chan’s movie”

“Well, yes, his old 80s movies are good, I learn a lot of parkour from that”

“His stunts look fun but they are too dangerous without any support devices though.”

Loretta decides to cut off because she still of course do not want to encourages Peter to take the job

“Boys, I still don’t think it’s a good idea though”

Joe disagrees, well again, he is desperate

“He looks build even though he is skinny, but his arms have muscles, I believe he can handle himself”

“That’s right, Mrs. Stinson. And the job will help me pay the rent next month”

Loretta sighs, she doesn’t need the rent that much. Berny is rich as hell, he sends her money every month, she just rents the place for fun to keep her life active and filled with people and entertainment. An example is that she likes it a lot when Jay’s friends, those Wayne's kids, come and hang out at Jay’s apartment. They are very chaotic but they are also very kind and caring.

“Peter, the job is very dangerous”

“I will be fine, don’t worry. Can I sign the contract for my apartment now?”

Loretta gives him the two copies of the contract and the young man just signs it without reading it though. He then gives her an envelope and she already know the amount inside.

“I will make sure to pay it full next month”

“It’s fine. But you know you should read the contract, right?”

“It’s alright, I skim through it and it’s similar to what you said last night”

Loretta skeptical looks at Peter. It’s true that her contract is exactly what she said last night, but could he read that fast or did he just make up that lie because he trusts her?

Joe clears his throat, he definitely doesn’t want to drop the opportunity to have a replacement for his poor injured employee.

“So, Peter, right? Do you want to take the job?”

“Yes, of course. When will I start? Where is your bar though?”

“Tonight, if you can. Your shifts are on the weekend. We can exchange phone numbers and I will send you the address. Your shift will start at half past ten pm, but you probably should get there at ten on your first shift. I will need to check your ability in mixing drinks and I also have some rules and advice for you.”

“Okay, great”

Loretta looks at the boys exchanging their numbers and she feels bad that she can’t talk Peter out of this. Joe then stands up, and of course he gets out of her place right after he found his new worker. Sometimes she hates that she keeps tolerating Joe. Fine, he does send her flowers on Woman’s Day and Mother’s Day but that doesn’t make him less ungrateful with how frequently he runs off like this after he achieves what he needs.

Knocks on her door echo once again. Joe quickly says:

“I will get the door for you on my way out.”

Joe goes and opens the door and standing there is Jay in his “I’m going out” outfit. Until this day, Loretta still doesn’t understand how she can see through this young man. Jay is the first person she decided to rent up this floor. He was injured at the time with a bandaged hand and a bruise on his cheek. His eyes were very sad. Maybe that was why she knew underneath that distant and violent attitude were just a boy needing support. He was the exact representation of Crime Alley’s kid. He didn’t have any paper on him and he didn’t tell her where were him before he found her place. She still thinks Jay is involved with some gangs even to this day but she doesn’t care that much, he always keeps her and this place safe. He opened up after a year or so. After that, he looked a lot happier and his friends started appearing. At first, they didn’t stay the night and he looked very grumpy when they came to his apartment but then he accepted them. Even though she still sometimes finds it weird how she didn’t even hear or see them use the elevator.

“Carl, what are you doing here?”

“Jay, my regular, I see you still live up here”

“Yeah”

“I’m of course here to visit dear Mrs. Loretta. Come by my bar when you free, you seem busy these past few weeks”

“I will, maybe tonight, but no promises”

“See you around”

Joe goes after waves at all of them. Loretta sighs and turns her attention back to Peter. She gives Peter his apartment’s keys and the elevator chip.

“Here, this is yours now.”

Peter chuckles

“Oh yeah, I totally forgot that I don’t have the key to lock my door. Thank you so much”

“Is that why you didn’t lock your door this morning?”

Jay asks and Peter looks back at Jay and answers

“Yes, the front door need key to lock even from the inside”

Loretta explains

“I specifically make that so if someone breaks in through the window, they cannot fully access the other room in the building. Every floor has that same design.”

Peter praises

“That’s actually very smart.”

Jay agrees

“Yes, I have never really thought about that”

Loretta likes that Peter and Jay get along, they have something very similar that Loretta doesn’t know how to describe but she feels it is there. She asks Jay

“Do you need something, Jay?”

“Oh no, I just here to get Peter to go shopping”

“Yes, he probably needs more supplies for his new home. You boys should get going, I have plans to play cards with some friends. I need to get ready. I need new strategy”

“Probably don’t get it over your head.” Jay warns her before talking to Peter “Are you ready?”

“Yes” Peter stands up and he smiles at her. His eyes look shining and she has to say that he has very nice eyes, even though brown is a very common color. “Thank you again and I hope you have fun with your card games”

“Oh, I will.”

Loretta smiles and thinks about how she will defeat her friends this time. She aware that Jay looks at her with concerned eyes while Peter looks at her with amusement.

Chapter Text

Jason and Peter are side by side on their way to the safe house five minutes’ walk away where Jason keeps his motorbike. Peter looks around Crime Alley but the way he walks is confident. Maybe, he is capable as he claimed.

“She seems very enthusiastic about the games”

“Well, of course, she absolutely loves card games but you should never play cards with her”

“Why?”

“She is good but she is a very salty player. She will get upset with you for a day if you beat her”

“Oh… Is this… money involved or something?”

“No, they bet on desserts like cookies, cakes, and jellies”

Peter laughs

“That is such a weird bet”

“Well yeah, I joined her game once and she decided to give me the silent treatment for a day because I managed to beat her and got some of her flan. She did apologize after that though”

“Yeah, she is very sweet so I think she won’t be mad for long”

“She is a good person but she is quite mischievous if you get to know her, I heard she had a wild past before she had her son”

Jason can see that Peter looks a bit surprised at Jason’s claim but the brown hair man says nothing. They continue to walk side by side in comfortable silence until Jason stops in front of some run-down building and a typical rolling shutter at the end of some typical Bowery’s alley. He unlocks the big lock along with a bunch of chains and then pulls up to show his bike is inside. When he turns back, he can see Peter's eyes shine up a bit, seems like the young man likes it. However, Peter then breaks the silence.

“You do know that we are going on shopping, right?”

Jason looks at Peter, his face cannot suppress the smugness.

“I know”

“Then how can we bring back the shopping goods?”

Peter raises his eyebrow and looks at Jason, but Jason just chuckles in response.

“Come on, we can send let the store deliver it back. You said you have never sat on a motorcycle so I just give you a chance to try.”

Peter just looks at Jason as if he just grows another head.

“What? Deliver back? That’s such a waste of money. And what is the whole point of going shopping? Why don’t you just shop online then?”

Jason crosses his arms, he finds it funny how Peter worries about his money. He is a Crime Lord and his adopted father is the billionaire Brucie Wayne, money has never been his problem since teen. Jason’s face looks amused as he tells Peter.

“Relax, that’s my money, you don’t have to worry about it”

Jason doesn’t even leave any time for Peter to protest more as he takes out the motorbike and closes the rolling door. He gives Peter a helmet after he puts on his and then he jumps on the bike and turns on the engine.

“Come on”

Jason pats the seat behind him while Peter still holds the helmet in his hand and looks at him with skepticism.

===========

Peter looks at the helmet in his hand and then looks at his neighbor Jay who is now just sitting on the bike waiting for him. What kind of blasphemy is this? Who gives this young man the money to waste on delivery when he just goes to the shop to look at the item himself?

But again, Jay was right, it is his money after all, and he could do whatever he wanted. Peter feels a bit jealous about how confident the other says about letting the store ‘deliver’ back. This guy is either incredibly dumb or absolutely rich.

Peter sighs and puts on the helmet. Well, at least he should enjoy the first time being on motor right? He remembers how Johnny kept bugging him about getting Spidey on his bike. But of course, Johnny is famous as hell, if he accepts the invite, Peter swears to God that not only Jameson and the Daily Bugle will write articles about it, even the New York Times will jump in.

Peter gives in and climbs on and sits behind. Honestly, he is a bit excited.

===========

Jason definitely smirks satisfied behind his helmet when his neighbor finally gives in, though, Peter sits far toward the end of the bike, he doesn’t even hold on to Jason or put his hands on the back gas tank. Jason says to Peter.

“You should put your hands on my waist or to the gas tank if you don’t want to fall”

But responding to his worry is Peter’s chuckle and his confident answer.

“I won’t fall”

Jason turns his head to get a glimpse of Peter but the young man just gives him a grin and closes the face shield. Jason looks amused and speaks.

“I will hold you on that”

And without any warning, the bike starts moving.

===========

Peter should have lost balance and held on the Jay when the other man started to move the bike without warning, but Peter is freaking Spider-Man. The wind rushes to him and he enjoys this new feeling. It’s similar to the feeling of falling from a high place and swinging but without the up-and-down movement. The adrenaline runs through his veins.

Peter lets his feet stick to the bike and he holds his hand up to feel the wind and the speed better, and he laughs. It’s been a while since he feels the thrill circulation in his vein like this since his break from the Spider-Man duty.

Damn… Peter really misses the thrill, the swinging and being Spider-Man. He knows that being Spider-Man is a responsibility and it is never about the thrill or adrenaline… But, still.

===========

Jason almost has to slow down when he turns back to see how Peter doing after his sudden run without warning, but to his surprise, Peter looks freaking excited with his hand in the air and all that.

Jason blurts out with a hint of amusement.

“You are enjoying it huh?”

Peter just responds with delight.

“I am, and as I said before, I won’t fall, just ride like you usually do”

Jason is now intrigued by his neighbor's cocky claim.

“Alright, don’t cry to me if you fall out of the bike”

And with that, Jason accelerates and speeds to the street of Gotham, he definitely runs over the speed limit but he doesn’t care, and this is Gotham anyway. His plan at first was just to let Peter relax and try out what riding on a motorbike feels like, but now, Jason has a different plan.

He speeds around the Gotham and even goes to the highway, his body leans up with the force of the speed and sometimes leans to side and side following the curve of the road. This is probably the first time he rides like this without his Red Hood suit on.

And Jason could be absolutely confident to claim that his motorcycle skill could even be better than freaking Bruce Wayne, the Batman himself.

===========

Meanwhile, Peter has to bite his tongue to stop himself from getting out some yell of excitement. This type of speed reminds him of the time he put on his suit with the web-wings and just slingshot himself in the air and glide in the wind across New York. His record was when he slung himself across the Hudson River from Downtown Queens to Midtown.

His hand now sticks to the back of the bike, and his feet and legs stick to both sides of the seat, he knows he won’t fall, his spider power much stronger than this. Even if he falls, his anti-symbiote suit will prevent him from harm.

His body naturally follows the curve of the road and the lean of the motor. Peter glides in the air, he knows how the speed and force of wind work.

===========

After riding around Gotham’s outskirts and highway for a while and Peter still doesn’t need to hold on to him, Jason has a new respect for his neighbor and also feels weirded out as well. No one could handle this type of speed, even Bruce himself sat behind Jason once could never handle Jason ride with this much speed. Even Bruce has to put his hands to Jason to hold on and of course, Jason rubs it in his adopted father’s face every time he mentions the story.

How the hell Peter didn’t need to hold on to anything and enjoy the ride? It’s like he sticks his butt to the seat of the motorbike or something.

===========

Jay finally decides to back to the plan of shopping and get back to the main part of Gotham and stop at a shopping mall after an hour of riding around. Peter gets off the bike when Jay stops and he chuckles as he pulls off the heavy helmet.

“That is very fun”

Jay takes off his helmet as well, he looks at Peter and raises his eyebrow.

“I didn’t know you were a speed demon, and how the hell you didn’t fall off the bike?”

Peter laughs and gives Jay his helmet back.

“I’m just that good or maybe you are slow”

Jay laughs along but his eyes glisten with mischief.

“You don’t want to say that especially I will take you back after the shopping”

“Try me then”
 

===========

Of course, despite Jason’s best attempt to speed and maneuver on the street of Gotham on the way back to the apartment, Peter still sticks in his seat without the need to hold on to Jason.

Peter didn’t buy anything the whole shopping trip except for some canned food and instant noodles packets, which Jason shouldn’t be surprised but he still grimaces at the sight. And when they all get back, the gift Jason bought for Peter finally comes.

Peter looks very annoyed and glares at Jason when he sees the fridge in the corner of the kitchen.

“What is this? And how did you even get it inside?”

“Loretta has a spare key and she let the deliveries in, of course. Let's just think of this as my housewarming gift for my new favorite neighbor”

Jason grins and isn’t afraid of Peter’s annoyance.

“I won’t accept it”

Peter crosses his arms and protests, his brown chocolate eyes annoyed gaze from him to the new fridge.

“I guess I have to throw away then”

“What?!”

Peter exclaims. And Jason knew it, the only threat that was effective on Peter was throwing stuff away and wasting money. Jason smirks and mirrors Peter, he crosses his own arms and says with a satisfied tone.

“If you don’t want it, I will throw it away”

“No! This is a perfectly new fridge, do you know how many good parts I could get from an old broken fridge”

Peter throws his hands in the air in frustration. Jason just laughs in amusement and speaks.

“Well, either you take it or I will throw it away”

“You are a dickhead, who forces me to accept stuff. Inside the fridge even have food”

Peter opens the fridge and yes, inside the fridge indeed has the food that Jason ordered, meat and vegetables, and some other snacks. Jason laughs at that, he loves to see how annoyed Peter is and the brown hair man clearly cannot do anything about this.

“I would say ‘dick’ is a word that lost the insult purpose for me since a long time ago. But anyway, yes, it has food, and you said ‘Food is an exception that I never refused’ so I just put some inside”

He smirks and says while Peter protests again with a sigh “Yes, but this is different, this is the whole fridge and with food!”

“Well, I guess I have to throw it away then” Jason pretends to walk toward the fridge but then Peter gasps and exclaims again “No! Fine, I will take it”

Jason's satisfied grin and he loves how he finally found Peter’s weakness.

Chapter Text

Joe looks at Peter who just gets into the bar and the young man gets there even before ten. Joe silently nods to himself and appreciates how Peter seems to take this seriously, and he seems like a hard worker. The bar hasn’t opened yet so there is no patron around and only Peter and Joe inside of this place. Joe looks at Peter and speaks.

“So, first of all, let me introduce myself properly, I’m Joe McLaren. But in the bar, people call me Carl the bartender”

Peter nods, he seems not surprised by the alias and Joe continues.

“You also need an alias yourself. Never give any patron here your real name”

“I see, but they could still find me just by my face, right?”

Joe, he surprised by how quickly this young brown hair man got the situation.

“Yes, but normally clients and patrons won’t bother to look up your face. Unless you make them hate you too much. Patron tends to be aggressive and hurt you right on the spot, and if you make them mad too much, they would follow you or well, search your name. Name is valuable, all kids in Crime Alley are taught to never tell strangers their real name.”

Joe looks Peter up and down and says

“You said you have some self-defense technique, right?”

Peter nods, he looks very certain and confident. Joe nods in response, he won’t check because Joe is desperate… he just hopes Peter can stand the job till he finds another buff man to replace him. Honestly, Peter’s face looks a bit naïve.

Joe then leads Peter to the mixing area and speaks.

“You will mostly bring the drink to the table but if it is too crowded, you probably need to help me with the mixing. So, do you know anything about this?”

Peter nods again and the young man smiles confidently.

“I can mix the basic”

Joe gestures to Peter to try, and the young man starts mixing the first drink and it is ‘Long Island Iced Tea’, one of the signature cocktails. Peter's move is fluid and he definitely knows what is he doing which is very impressive. When he pours the mix into the cup of ice and puts the straw in, Joe decides to look at it skeptically before he takes a sip. To his surprise, the mix is very good, and all portions are in the right amount, impressive.

Joe smiles and says to Peter “Damn, this is good. You said you worked at the bar before. How long?”

Peter sheepishly chuckles and his brown eyes look nice “A month actually”

Joe raises his eyebrow and asks “A month? And you could do this perfectly and even put on a show while mixing? Damn”

Peter just smiles and states “It’s like a chemistry experiment, everything needs to be in the right amount and well, the show is easy, I could even do some tricks”

Joe laughs at that “Well, this is much better than I expected.”

After some more mixes like ‘Tequila Sunrise’ or ‘Pink Lady’, Joe could be confident that this man in front of him could clearly mix a good cocktail.

“Well, if you ever lost your job, you could work full-time here”

Joe jokes as he takes another sip of ‘Tequila Sunrise’ while Peter just snorts a small laugh and shakes his head. Joe then continues asking Peter.

“So, what is your alias?”

Peter thinks for a while but before he can answer, Joe’s wife opens the door and gets in. She looks at Peter and smiles before giving Joe a kiss on the cheek.

“I see that you find a new staff?”

Joe smiles widely, he always loves how affectionate his wife is. He gestures to Peter and speaks.

“Yes. Peter Parker. Yasmin McLaren, my wife. Patron calls her Jasmine”

Peter holds out his hand and shakes his wife’s hand. Joe goes on

“Yasmin job is mostly in the kitchen but she will go out if it is crowded. Depend.”

Joe continues with some rules of the bar and he repeats very carefully that if the patron fights call him. Despite being desperate Joe didn’t want Peter to actually break the fight, he just needed Peter able to defend himself if the patron decided to mess with him.

“So, I forget, what is your alias again?”

Peter answers, he seems sure of himself.

“Aragog”

Joe raises his eyebrow but he doesn’t ask, he feels like that name is quite familiar but he cannot pinpoint where it comes from. But then suddenly Peter asks.

“Why did the bar name ‘The puzzle’?”

And with that, Joe smiles widely, it’s been a long since someone asked this question and he absolutely loves to give his answer.

“Because that's the puzzle.”

Joe loves it when Peter looks at him with shiny eyes and then laughs.

============

Mimi walks through the door of the library and she looks at her coworker. Barbara Gordon, daughter of Commissioner Gordon and Mimi let out a dreamy sigh. Mimi always wonders how and why Barbara seems to always be in the library. Barbara is a very beautiful woman and Mimi has a little crush on her. But will she act on that feeling? Of course not.

She sets down her bag and before she can open her mouth, she sees a brown hair young man run through the Gotham Library’s door, so Mimi raises her eyebrow and asks her crush.

“Is that the new guy filling in for Rita?”

Barbara looks up from her screen and her beautiful green eyes look at Mimi. Mimi doesn’t know that she is holding her breath.

“Yes, he is Peter Parker. He will work the weekend shift”

Mimi nods her head and looks at the young man running up to the two of them. He smiled and wasn’t even breathless when saying.

“Thankfully I got here in time”

Mimi looks at Peter who just put his bag down, and holds out her hand.

“Nice to meet you, I’m Mimi”

Peter's smiles widen and he shakes her hand.

“Peter, Peter Parker. You were the one filling in for Barb on Friday”

Mimi is surprised and nods.

“Yeah, I don’t mind helping Barbara”

And before Peter could say anything suddenly, he stopped abruptly, and then he walked toward the library door. Someone holds a bunch of books high over their head while walking in. The tower of books starts crumpling down, and Peter quickly catches the books and takes some books off the person. When the book takes off, Mimi can see the person holding a bunch of books is Richard Grayson, the first son of Bruce Wayne.

Dick is familiar here and he is quite close to Barbara, people rumor that Dick and Barbara had some history and Mimi didn’t surprise by that at all. Barbara is gorgeous and Dick is good-looking, and they are friends. Actually, not just Dick, all of Wayne’s kids seem to close with Barbara. So, Mimi wouldn’t be surprised at all if Dick and Barbara were dating or still secretly dating now. They would be a power couple of Gotham, like imagine, daughter of Commissioner and sons of the richest playboy billionaire of Gotham.

Mimi hears Barbara sighs and shakes her head. Barbara is probably too familiar with Dick’s stunt now, but let's be honest, Mimi is also quite familiar with Dick’s antics by now. She turns her eyes to look at the two, Dick is now cheerfully talking with Peter and walks toward the front desk.

“Morning Barb, you said that a lot of children's books are damaged so I want to donate some. I told you about this a few days ago”

Dick cheerful says to Barbara and she just nods her head. Dick turns to Mimi and speaks.

“Hi Mimi”

Mimi waves her hand at Dick and Barbra says with a casual tone.

“I know. Peter and Mimi, could put the book in the right section. Those books need a library mark. I already have the name list so I will add those into our system”

Dick suddenly says

“Actually, let me help, the books are heavy”

Mimi shrugs and then goes along with the two men and two piles of books. She trails behind and she can hear snippets of some of their talk, but she doesn’t put much mind into that. Dick Grayson is a charming and talkative guy and sometimes Mimi just tunes out his talking because the guy talks too much.

While Mimi is still lost in her thoughts, Peter suddenly turns back and talks to her.

“I’m still new, so… could you instruct me on how to do this properly?”

Mimi looks at the young guy, and he has an aura that screams ‘I’m nice and here to help everyone’, honestly, not very far off from Grayson’s energy but less annoying. So, she smiles and speaks.

“Let's see, I could stamp the marks and write the date of the books, could you help me put it in the children’s section and sort according to the alphabet on the name tags”

Before Peter even answers, Dick already chimes in “I could show and help him to the children's section”

Mimi shrug and nods, of course, Dick is like an over-enthusiastic golden retriever so he will help out.

It takes some time to finish the whole piles of book so when they come back it’s already half an hour. Peter seems comfortable chatting with Dick and again Mimi only trailing behind them back to her seat. When they reach the front desk, Mimi sees the little Wayne or Damian standing there with his usual arms crossed and talking with Barbara. Damian Wayne perks up when he sees Dick Grayson, he clicks his tongue and says with a little scoff but Mimi always sees it as a little pout.

“Took you long enough, Richard”

Mimi always finds it a bit funny how the little Wayne always addresses Dick as his real name Richard instead of Dick. The kid raises his eyebrow at Peter which Peter smiles back and does a little wave, and then when Damian’s eyes turn to Mimi, his eyes soften a bit.

Probably because… Mimi and Damian both sneak into the restricted section of the library. Their little escapade got hidden away that even the amazing and beautiful Barbara didn’t know. That time, Mimi needed some material about murder and old torture methods of Gothamites for her writing. Has she mentioned that she is a horror genre author but working part-time here because the author’s salary is very… broke? Damian is also interested in the material, though Mimi never understands why the kid wants to read about that, but who cares, they become a little partner in crime for sneaking around the library.

“Hi Mimi”

Damian says with a nod, and despite trying to be very subtle, the kid has a very tiny micro hint of a smile on his lips. Mimi nods and smiles widely back.

Seems like the Wayne children got a plan, so soon enough Dick Grayson takes little Wayne out of the library after showing his charming teeth and waves.

Mimi rolls her eyes and says to Peter who still standing next to her.

“Dick is always like a little chatterbox”

But then Peter chuckled.

“The guy is funny though”

And with that, Mimi only let out a small snort, apparently, another person fell into Grayson’s charm. Hope the heartbreaker Grayson won’t break nice man Peter’s heart.

============

Tobey Chavez is a veterinarian at the Harmony of Animal Vet which is the best choice of his life, actually, the second-best choice of his life, because the best choice of his life is to marry Maude. Tobey could be anything but has a keen eye on people, but even he could see that the new guy, Peter, who applied for a receptionist for the vet is a very nice person.

He is very sure that even his cold and very stoic boss Emily would feel the same. And of course, his wife, Maude would also feel the same about that statement.

The reason?

It’s the scene that happens in the vet right now.

Peter just came to his first-ever shift in the vet and Maude just instructed him a little about being a receptionist which Peter quickly learned. The usual customer Dick Grayson and Damian Wayne, who always bring stray animal and injured animals to the vet, (can you believe that the kid Damian even brought an injured raccoon into the vet one time?), just brings in a very big grey cat and Tobey pretty sure that cat is at least ten years old. And of course, disaster happened, and Tobey shouldn’t be surprised because that always happens when they have to deal with older stray animals.

The cat jumped out of the makeshift cage of Damian instantly when he opened it, and the stray cat quickly jumped around and panicked and scratched and attacked everything.

Peter did something that Tobey is definitely sure this is a thing that a nice person would do, but it’s a bit… dumb even to Tobey’s standard, and people always say that Tobey is not very bright actually.

Peter jumped over the counter of the front desk and quickly grabbed the cat, and he DIDN’T have any protection vet equipment, no gloves, no thick sleeves. The cat of course, also quickly reacted and scratched a very long and deep line through his shirt and down to his arm and he is bleeding through the shirt and dripping to the floor right away.

But he was successful sustain the cat, in the concern and awe of all the people in the vet, and the cat actually calmed down in the brown hair man’s arms. However, it still had that scared and anxious look.

Emily comes to Peter’s side quickly with the right protection clothes and takes the big grey cat from his arms. Her face is still stoic as usual but there is a hint of worry in her eyes, Tobey starts to be able to read his harsh boss. She says to Peter.

“You know the cat is a stray right? You could get rabies, you need to get the vaccination now”

She looks at Tobey and he understands her instructions, so he gets to the emergency kit. There is always a rabies vaccine in the kit of a vet. Maude rushed Peter to the sink cleaned the wound with soap and disinfection it. Both Dick and Damian also look worried and they are also now by Peter’s side.

Tobey prepares the equipment and when Peter turns back, his sleeve is lifted up and shows the injuries. It looks nasty, very long and deep, the cat really has the claws. Tobey winces at the sight.

“The vaccine could give the injection’s place swelling a bit, but don’t worry alright. And you need a shot of this every seven days for twenty one days, so next week, your next Sunday’s shift, you will need another shot”

Peter looks a bit of grimace at the statement of Tobey but the young man didn’t protest or say anything. Honestly, Tobey feels like the young man didn’t even feel pain, he acted like nothing until they mentioned the vaccination.

Maude says with a small sigh, that she is always very emotional and empathetic with people.

“I cannot believe this happened on your first day”

Damian says with a quieter tone.

“I should have opened the cage slower”

Peter just smiles at them and he seems to lighten the mood.

“It’s alright, not your fault, and not the worst injury I had this month”

The statement of course left all the people at the vet to stop what they were doing and look at Peter, and Peter very quickly tried to fix it.

“I mean, uh…”

But before he fixes his statement, Tobey sighs and pulls up his other sleeve for a vaccine shot. And again, the vets all stunt when they see another injury on Peter’s other arm, on his bicep. It looked red and deep with stitches on it and he didn’t even bandage the wound.

Dick says with a very worrisome voice.

“You are such a disaster. That wound looks deep and painful”

Even Damian has a frown on his youthful face.

Tobey officially feels the need to look out for his new coworker and he also agrees with Dick that Peter is a walking disaster. When he turns his look at Maude, his wife, she also looks back at him, and he is quite sure that his wife has the same thinking.