Chapter Text
Spider-Menace Strikes Again!
On August 15th, twelve policemen answered the call to an armed robbery on the corner of 5th and Broadway. When they arrived on the scene, three suspected robbers were found caught in what appeared to be a giant spider web. Their weapons were wrapped in the same substance and rendered useless.
It goes without saying that the presumed obstructor of justice (who resolutely continues to hinder good police work) is none other than the Spider-Man.
Who is this so-called Spider-Man? How does he always know exactly where to find criminals? Why is there a sudden uptick in un-policed supers plaguing our boroughs? These are the questions we, as a city, should be asking ourselves. According to the letter of the law, vigilantism is illegal. Spider-Man does not answer to New York’s finest, and he does not answer to the public. He answers only to himself. He is judge and jury for every alleged crime he intervenes in.
This masked menace must be kept accountable for his actions. He leaves a wake of destruction in his path on his search for vengeance, leaving the rest of New York to clean it up in the form of taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars. Sanitation is still cleaning up the mess he left in Central Park last week.
If our community allows him to go unchecked for so long, it’s only a matter of time before his reckless quest for terrorism gets an innocent person ki—
The hiss from the thin sheets of paper being snatched from his hands cause Davey to jolt in surprise. Swapping the surprise on his face for a disgruntled frown, he swats his arm at the air beside his ear an attempt to reclaim his stolen newspaper. “Hey, I was reading that!”
He watches helplessly as his copy of The World is crumpled up into a sphere and casually dumped into the nearest trash can. He rounds on the culprit, brow furrowed and prepared to give them a piece of his mind until he’s greeted with an all too familiar frown.
Jack Kelly stands in front of him, arms crossed over his chest and glaring expectantly at Davey.
Oh, shit.
Dread pools in the pit of his stomach. This is not a conversation he wants to have. In fact, it’s a conversation he’s spent the entire summer avoiding.
He hasn’t seen Jack much this summer. Hell, he hasn’t seen any of his friends much this summer. No typical high school senior expects the only time he spends with his friends over the break to be at his dad's funeral.
Then again, Davey hasn’t felt typical since the trip to Colombia’s research lab.
“Good to see you, too, Davey,” Jack says mockingly. “My summer was great, thanks for asking.”
Davey allows Jack’s sarcasm to hang over them for a moment before glancing at the discarded newspaper. “ You owe me five dollars.”
“And you owe me a goddamn explanation.”
An uncomfortable noise claws its way out of Davey’s throat.
Play dumb, Jacobs, he tells himself. It’s the only play you’ve got.
“What’s an explanation?”
Not that dumb!
Jack scoffs at him. “I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to be that thing where you tell your best friend why you iced him out all summer. The apology is optional, but definitely encouraged.”
Davey sidesteps Jack, maneuvering around him and towards the courtyard. “I’ve been helping my ma out with stuff at home. Dad stuff.”
It’s not entirely a lie. He really has been sorting through his dad’s belongings and helping his mom determine what they should keep and what they should sell. He simply just doesn’t make it a point to bring up any of his other… summer activities. Specifically, ones that have a tendency to headline The World.
Davey’s spent the past four months trying to honor his dad’s final words to him.
With great power comes great responsibility.
“Don’t go pulling that bullshit with me.” Jack’s voice yanks him out of his head and he bars an arm across Davey’s chest to keep him from turning away.
“Excuse me?”
“I mean, don’t play the dad card when you and I both know there’s more to it than that.”
Davey huffs. “Pardon me for not grieving correctly.”
“That’s not what I’m sayin’ and you know it! I’m talking about the way you’ve been lying to us.” Something behind Jack’s eyes soften. “To me. You say you were helping your ma, but I must’ve stopped by your place a million times and you were never there.”
“Jack, please,” Davey begs, glancing warily around the pavilion. “Can we—can we not talk about this right now?”
“Oh, no, we’re gonna talk about this right now,” Jack points between the two of them, his finger landing square in the middle of Davey’s chest. “This conversation is inevitable.”
“I see someone’s been using that word of the day app I recommended.”
“Had to keep myself busy since my best friend was AWOL for two months. Where the hell have you been?”
Davey sighs. He scans his brain for a feasible excuse. If there’s one topic Jack won’t press, it’s financial issues. “I've been… out. Pounding the pavement,” he lies. “Nobody’s hiring. Les is starting high school and wants to be on the Basketball team and that insurance money my mom got only covers so much…”
The tension in Jack’s shoulders relaxes. “Shit, s’that it? You know you could’ve told me that. You can tell me anything.”
Not anything.
“Tell you what, I can put a good word in with Mr. Jacobi. I know he’s been looking to hire more help ‘round the store,” Jack continues.
The last thing Davey needs is one more commitment to add to his already precariously balanced plate. But he’s dug himself this far into a lie. It’d be too much of a red flag if he didn’t follow through.
“Thanks,” he smiles and hopes Jack won’t see the tightness of it. “I’d appreciate that.”
“I ain't trying to get detention on the first day back, so I’ll see you at lunch. I know a few people who’d love to see you, too. They’ve been missing you, too. Not as much as me, but close seconds.”
Davey tries to protest. He’s still hoping to sneak away during the lunch hour and do some patrolling. “I don’t know if I can do lunch with you guys. I… Have a chem lab to make up,” he lies.
“No you don’t,” Jack counters, grinning. Davey doesn’t even have to ask how Jack knows. Race is in the same section of AP Chemistry as Davey. He’d hoped after their first meeting, he’d been successful in not being spotted; keeping his head down at his desk, taking notes, and camouflaging himself within the class of hooded teenagers.
Evidently, he hadn’t been. Race probably texted Jack before they even finished reviewing the syllabus.
“You don’t think they’re gonna be mad at me?”
“Oh, no, I think they’ll be pissed,” Jack says. “Doesn’t mean they won’t be happy to see you. I know I am,” Jack throws him one final winning smile as he turns the corner, and Davey feels his insides melt.
The thing about Race is that he may be built like a cornstalk, but he can be intimidating when need be.
Granted, that tends to be hardly ever, as whenever there’s an opportunity to lighten the mood with a playful joke at someone else’s expense, he takes it. He’s a goof and smart ass, through and through.
But Davey still gets a shiver from the cold shoulder he gave Katherine when she broke up with Jack in the ninth grade. It caused quite the rift in their friend group—Charlie and Davey begging Race to make nice while Jack and Kath nursed their broken hearts.
Finally, Jack assured Race that he and Kath were better off as friends and all was right with the world. Still, Davey hasn’t forgotten the yelling that led to stares that led to tension. Things have been fine between the five of them since then, but it’s a side of Race that Davey has never forgotten—loyal and protective to a fault.
So as unsettling as the silence between them while they set up for their first lab of the semester is, Davey much prefers it over the alternative.
Racetrack starts clearing the area beside Davey, and he takes his chance while he has the opportunity. “So… partners?” He asks cautiously.
Racetrack shoots him a facetiously bewildered glare and holds a hand to his chest, fingers flayed out in mockery. “Oh, you're done ignoring me now? I’m honored, truly.”
“Race—”
“Ah, ah, ah! That’s Tony to you. Better yet, Anthony. You know what, we havent talked in so long, I don’t even think we’re on a first name basis anymore! Call me Higgins. Mister Higgins. Professor Higgins.”
“Did Jack say—”
Once again, he’s cut off.
“This ain’t about Jack!” Race snaps. He places the beakers required for the experiment firmly onto the table. Davey’s surprised they don’t shatter. “Though I can see why you’d think that being in love with him and all.”
“Why does everyone think—” this time, Race doesn’t need words to silence Davey. The exhausted look he shoots is enough. “Okay. Fair. Care to enlighten me?”
“Jeez, for someone who’s on track to be valedictorian, you’re pretty damn dense, you know that? Jack ain’t the only one you blew off for an entire summer.”
Guilt tightens in Davey’s chest. “I know. I’m sorry.” It’s the flimsiest of apologies, and not a worthy explanation, but it’s all he’s got right now.
“S’fine. Just. Don’t do that shit again. If you need some space, or— god forbid, get the urge to actually talk about your feelings. Keep us in the loop. Otherwise, you’re just being an ass.”
His tone verges on harsh, but he holds out a pair of protective eyewear for Davey.
“We’re fresh out of olive branches,” Race mutters.
The rest of the lab passes without much incident. Davey is pleasantly surprised at how easily he falls into a rhythm of witty back and forth banter with Race. Their conversation ebbs and flows between lighthearted conversation and inquiries about the experiment, and before they know it, the bell dismisses them to their next class.
It’s only the first day back and already Mr. Denton is instructing students to get into groups of three to discuss the summer reading. The summer reading that David did not finish. Or get halfway through. Or even start.
His eyes don’t even finish scanning the room when he hears the cacophony of metal against linoleum and suddenly Katherine and Charlie flanked him with their desks, barricading him from other potential partners.
They’re both smiling, but Davey knows well enough that only Charlie’s is genuine. Katherine could kill him.
“So,” he says, addressing the elephant in the room. Davey has always been a ripping-off-the-bandaid kind of guy. “You two gonna yell at me for going MIA, too?”
“Nah,” Crutchie says easily. “I missed you, but I figured you were grieving. I get it. We’re just glad you’re okay.”
“I’d bite your head off if I thought Jack and Race hadn’t gotten to you first,” Katherine counters. “I wanted to be there for you. But I also tried to remind myself that you appreciate space when it’s needed.”
Davey relaxes a little. Existing always feels like a performance to some degree for Davey, and he can’t always maintain the role when he’s surrounded by people for too long. He gets too self conscious, too self aware of his awkward mannerisms, of not knowing exactly what to say in a conversation, or how to properly react in a situation.
The only person he can spend hours upon hours with and not miss his alone time is Jack. He can be weird around him. He can be awkward, and silly, and rant for hours about the latest book he’s divulged into. He can be himself and still feel loved. He never has to pretend to be something he isn’t around Jack.
At least, until recent developments in Davey’s DNA made that impossible.
As if she’s reading his mind, Katherine veers the course of the conversation in that direction. Because she’s terrifying and psychic. “I can’t speak for Jack, though. I think if you do that again he’ll track you down like a bounty hunter.”
“I’d lose it if the guy I was in love with ghosted me, too,” Charlie says.
“Jack’s not in love with me.”
“You’re an idiot.” Katherine says. She opens her notebook.
“If he’s in love with me, why’s he never said anything?”
“Why haven’t you?” Charlie asks.
Davey opens up his book and starts reading the first page aloud instead of answering.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Katherine says.
“We should start with these questions before we get too off track. I’m not trying to get a D in English,” says Charlie.
“Right, then,” Kath announces, straightening her summer reading packet and prattling off the first question. “What evidence is there of the precarious state of Dr. Manette’s health?”
Both she and Charlie stay silent, staring expectantly at David for an answer.
“Um. You guys go for it. I, uh—”
His face heats up with shame, and honestly he’d rather have his friends be annoyed with them than have to endure the pitiful looks they’re giving him right now. Because it is blatantly obvious that David Jacobs, who read the most books in the entire school for the last three years, didn’t finish the summer reading.
He didn’t even start it.
Kath cups his hand with hers. “It’s okay,” she says understandingly. She shoots Charlie a meaningful glance. “We’ve got you.”
David isn’t used to this.
He’s not used to having to struggle through each class just to keep his eyes open, to stay focused on the lesson and not let his mind drift to what patrol route he should take tonight.
It’s deeply humbling, in the least.
He’s shaken out of his stupor by the familiar weight of an elbow hooking through his arm.
“Walk with me to lunch?” Jack asks, but it’s really more of a demand—Davey never has been able to say no to Jack.
“Sure.”
Once they trudge through the ocean of students, pass the door, and see the lunch tables in the courtyard, something inside Davey does light up at the sight of Race rambunctiously waving his arms around, desperately trying to convince Charlie of something. Katherine sits by them, head resting on her hand and looking fondly amused.
Davey’s chest tightens. He needed to take this summer to figure himself out, to figure out a lot of things, but… he really has missed his friends.
It’s almost like this self-imposed isolation is bad for you or something.
He inwardly rolls his eyes at himself. It’s not that simple, and he knows it.
Katherine is the first to notice his arrival. Her eyes widen almost imperceptibly when she spots Davey, but she must pick up on his discomfort because she makes a point of acting casual. “Hey boys, what’s new?”
Davey lets out a sigh of relief. Then, his mouth twitches. “Jack owes me five bucks.”
“She said what’s new,” Race interjects. “Kelly losing a bet ain’t news.”
“Wasn’t a bet,” Davey laughs, and he can feel the tension melting off him. Right now, all he has to be is David Jacobs—high school senior and resident bookworm within his friend group.
Jack throws an arm around him, so casually tactile in that way Davey only enjoys when it’s coming from him. His stomach is suddenly swooping and his face burns. He hopes no one notices. (Katherine does. As always.)
“I’ll get you a new copy of The World and we’ll call it even, how about that?”
High school senior, resident bookworm, and stupidly head over heels for Jack Kelly since the sixth grade.
Katherine subtly raises her eyebrows at Davey, prompting him to blush even harder, if that were possible. Still, she doesn’t mention it. At least not with her words. The way she excitedly knocks her knee into Davey’s says enough. She’s always been great at having two conversations at once.
“That’s how much my dad’s charging to slander New York’s favorite superhero? You’re getting ripped off.”
Davey finds himself instinctively leaning into Jack’s touch. “I like to stay informed,” he says defensively.
“You’re not being informed, you’re being brainwashed.”
“Much as I can’t stand Pulitzer, he may have a point.”
While the rest of the group bursts out into protests, Davey snaps his head towards Jack, praying that he can’t feel the way his blood has just run cold beneath his touch. Back in April, Jack seemed pretty unswayed in either direction about Spider-Man. Has he spent the summer forming a stronger opinion?
Katherine rolls her eyes. “Just because you work for my father doesn’t mean you have to agree with him.”
“I ain’t just saying that,” Jack says seriously. “I mean, think about it. I beat on someone for ragging on Charlie and I could get sent to juvie or something. But this guy puts on a mask, does the same thing, and he’s a hero? Don’t make no sense.”
“Feel like it’s a little more complex than that,” Charlie replies.
“Yeah,” Race agrees. “The guy’s got super-strength and shoots webs out of his ass or whatever.”
“Wrists,” Davey corrects him, under his breath.
“You have to admit, he’s got a real knack for this hero thing,” says Kath.
“He’s got a knack for slipping away from the cops. Everyone else who does that ends up in prison. Back me up here, Davey.”
Davey, who has been remaining strategically silent, feels his stomach knot up as his friends turn their gazes to him.
“Oh, I’d love to hear this,” Katherine says. “What do you think of our friendly neighborhood Spidey, Day?”
Davey swallows.
How the hell is he supposed to respond to that?
What does Davey think of Spider-Man? He’s faced with that question every time he looks in the mirror.
Right now, he’s just aiming to be someone his dad would’ve been proud of.
“I… I don’t really know enough about him to form an opinion.” He hopes it’s a safe enough answer to satiate his friend’s curiosity.
It’s not.
Katherine shakes her head as if ridding it of a fly. “Sorry, you—David Jacobs, who wrote the winning proposal for the debate team three years running—don’t have an opinion on New York’s current most controversial figure? You made a thirty-slide PowerPoint presentation on why a hot dog isn’t a sandwich.”
“And I’ll die on that hill.”
“You’d die on any hill,” Crutchie interjects. “Tell us what you really think of Spider-Man.”
“I already told you, I haven’t had much time to form any real thoughts.”
Kath rolls her eyes. “Clearly.”
“Time’s got nothing to do with it,” Race says casually. “Jack’s had eighteen years and still ain’t been able to get a decent one out.”
Jack launches a straw wrapper across the table at Race, who ducks out of its way with skillful ease.
“Aw don’t say that,” says Charlie, rushing to Jack’s defense. “Remember when he insisted arugula was a classical instrument? He was wrong, but had the spirit.”
“Oh, so it’s hate on Jack lunch hour now, is it?”
Davey presses his shoulder against Jack’s instinctively. “I still like you.”
“Don’t we all know it,” Katherine mutters under her breath.
Davey kicks her underneath the table.
Surprisingly enough, Davey doesn’t regret taking the open position Jack offered him at the bodega. He’s always been a fast learner, so it comes as no surprise when he catches on quickly to the ins and outs of running the place. Between the two of them, they finish their tasks relatively quickly and have a lot of down time.
Well, Jack has a lot of down time.
Davey sets up a police scanner that both boggles and annoys Jack, and keeps an ear out for any suspicious activity Spider-Man could put a stop to.
“I don’t know why you bring that thing in here,” Jack laments. “You know, other places just play regular radios. With music?”
“Other places are not protecting the best sandwiches in Queens.”
“Right, because someone’s going to come in here, guns blazing, to swipe a pastrami on rye with a sour pickle.”
“You can never be too safe.”
While Jack thinks Davey’s locked in the bathroom, he goes out to stop a grand theft auto. He offers to grab dinner from the street vendor down the block, catches a couple of thugs in the middle of a mugging, and returns with bahn mi for Jack and a falafel sandwich for himself.
This is so much easier than sneaking out of his bedroom window every night. No treading lightly when he steals away in the dead of night, trying not to wake Les. No lying to his mom about going to the library to study. Nobody suspects a thing, and the freedom is intoxicating.
The story he’s spun Jack this time around is that he’s feeling nauseated and is heading out back for some fresh air.
Davey is not expecting Jack to be waiting for him when he makes his way in through the back entrance. Jack is leaned against the wall and he flips his wrist up to check the watch Davey got him for his eighteenth birthday. “Six minutes. That’s a record.”
He jolts in surprise, hand flying up to clutch the collar of his shirt. He hasn’t been able to affix the last button yet. His suit is still a tiny bit visible underneath. “R-record?” he stammers.
“You been taking, like. A million breaks an hour. Don’t think I haven’t noticed.”
So. Maybe Davey isn’t as discreet as he initially thought.
“Bad lunch, I guess. Why are you stalking me anyhow?”
“I’m not stalking you, I’m your best friend and I love you, idiot. I’m worried about you’s all.”
Something inside him twists at Jack’s concern. Of course, he can’t read too much into it. It only makes sense for Jack to worry—they’ve been best friends for years. It’s not like that.
Even if Davey wishes it was.
He’s got a job, an academic career, and a secret identity to protect. The last thing he should be doing is mooning over Jack, and yet. Here he is.
Davey quietly brushes past him, not answering but buttoning up his shirt as he reaches for the mop he’d left behind. He drowns the head in the bucket of murky water and gets back to work on the floors.
Because Jack doesn’t know when to leave well enough alone, he follows.
“You know you can tell me anything, right?”
Davey’s brow furrows. “Yeah…?” he draws out the one syllable word, the lilt of a question shading the end of it.
“There’s nothing you could tell me that would make me doubt our friendship. You’re my ride or die.”
“You do know I came out five years ago?”
“I know.”
“Okay, just checking.”
“No. Davey. I know.”
The mop comes to a halt at Jack’s telling tone. He looks back at him, something glinting knowingly in his eyes. “What?” Davey finally asks, voice shaking.
“I already know. You can tell me. You don’t have to do this on your own, you know?”
For a moment, Davey doesn’t say anything, and he wonders if his short silence was too long, if it’s given him away. He swallows around his rapidly drying throat. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You can try to play dumb all you want, you and I both know you can’t lie. Not to me, at least.”
Fuck. Shit. Fuck shit. Shit fuck.
For at least the next ten seconds, the only thoughts Davey’s able to form are comprised purely of expletives.
Fuuuuuuuuuuuck.
Jack’s made his opinion on Spider-Man very clear. Anytime the topic’s come up in the last few days, he’s held firmly on his stance that he should report to some sort of authority. Which is rich coming from the person who holds the all time record for most write ups in a single year.
Without the mask, Davey isn’t quite the anarchist Jack is, but his values hold the same. Do what’s right. Do what you can. Stand up for the little guy. It’s what draws them together, despite their outward differences.
Clearly Jack doesn’t believe Spider-Man aligns with those values. And now he knows. He knows who it is behind the mask. How long has he known? Has his constant beratement of Spider-Man been his subtle way of implying their friendship is over? If Jack gives up on their friendship, then surely, Davey will never see Crutchie again. He’ll have to carve out time to spend with Katherine and Race separately, as if they were children of divorce. There’s going to be two birthdays, two fourth of Julys, two non-denominational winter holiday friend celebrations. Or, just one Christmas party and one Hannukah dinner.
Still. This is going to change everything—
“I know about your drug problem.”
Davey blinks, slamming the breaks on his speeding mind. “Beg your pardon?”
“It’s okay,” Jack assures him, and he sounds so genuinely concerned, so truly and deeply convinced that he has it all figured out. It's tragically hilarious. And infuriating.
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Fuck off.”
Jack shows his palms in surrender. “Letting that slide ‘cause I know aggression is a symptom of withdrawal. What is it? Dope? Angel dust?”
“Black tar heroin.” Davey says drily, turning to push the mop back against the tile of the floor. “Also fentanyl. Whatever I can get my hands on, really. I’m insatiable.”
Jack’s face twists up in confusion. “You’re fucking with me.”
“No shit.”
“I’m just trying to help.”
“By accusing me of being a druggie? I won’t even hit Race’s vape. I’m not shooting up crack.”
“Well, technically nobody shoots up crack.”
“Case in point.”
Jack returns to Davey’s side. He grips the top of the mop and holds it still, forcing Davey to look at him. “Davey,” he says, voice heavy and pleading, and something inside Davey relents. When you boil it all down, this is just how Jack loves—aggressively and too much or not at all. “I know I’m not the smartest guy in the world, but I ain’t blind, either. I can see you’re going through something.”
“And it’s mine to cope with alone.”
“Using molly?”
“I’m gonna kill you,” says Davey, but he’s not inoculated against Jack’s easy charm and can’t fight the soft grin that overtakes his face.
“Please. You’d never get rid of me that easy.”
It’s less than a beat of silence before the police scanner goes off, spitting out the address of a nearby bank robbery. Every muscle in Davey’s body tenses and he hopes it doesn’t show. He digs out his phone from his pocket.
“It’s my ma.”
He’s lying. They both know it. And there it is again, the intangible but unignorable tension that had just been lifted, if only for a moment.
It’s hard to watch Jack like this, looking like he’s fighting a losing battle. “Go… do what you gotta do, I guess.”
Davey’s already making a break for the back exit when Jack stops him.
“Movie night at mine on Friday. Be there.”
“I—”
“Wasn't a question. Be there and I’ll cover for you. Come on. They miss you. I miss you.”
There’s so much there Davey wants to unpack, but he hasn’t the time. He just nods brusquely and rushes out into the alley.
It takes a few days to settle into the routine, but eventually Davey feels the comfort of being back at school. He does have to sit himself on the courtyard bench during zero period and race to finish his pre-cal homework, but he’s getting better.
Out of thin air, an arm appears across his shoulders.
“Rough day?” Jack asks.
Davey shrugs, pencil still flying across the worksheet. “Had worse.”
Jack holds up the camera strapped around his neck. “I gotta take some shots for Photography. Mind posing?”
Heat crawls its way up Davey’s neck, and it’s not the sun. Jack does this every so often, forcing Davey to be the subject of one of his art projects. He should get someone attractive to do it, like Katherine, with her lean figure and silky copper curls, or Crutchie with this delightful smile. Or even Race. The guy’s a string bean, but he cleans up nice and has really bright, captivating eyes.
Davey has no idea what could possibly be so interesting about himself as an art subject. He’s so plain looking, and before he got bitten by that spider back in April, he wasn’t very muscular either. Why Jack insists on working with him is beyond Davey, but he doesn’t protest; he never has been able to say no to Jack.
Jack looks through the lens of his camera, waiting for Davey to place himself. Reluctantly, he sighs and crosses his arms over his chest, giving a closed mouthed strained smile.
Jack pulls away from his camera and grimaces. “No, no, don’t try to pose, you look awkward as fuck.”
Davey scoffs. “Gee, thanks.”
“Not that I think you ain’t an interesting subject, but I forgot you can’t act worth a lick. Why don’t you just… Read that book you got on ya?”
“How do you know I’ve got a book on me?”
Jack says nothing, just stares at him dubiously.
“Right, then.” Davey pulls out A Tale of Two cities, the story he should have read over summer. Amazingly enough, he finds himself absorbed in the world being spun out around him. Until he hears the click of the camera and Jack slides next to him, angling the screen so Davey can see.
“Oh dear god, what is that face I’m making?” Davey asks, appalled at having to see himself.
“Whaddya mean? That’s your focused face.”
“My what?”
“Yeah when you get real into a book, or you’re writing an essay, you get this little crease ‘tween your eyebrows,” Jack presses his thumb to Davey’s forehead, “right there,” he adds softly, and the gentle smile on his face and the way he’s looking at Davey might actually kill him.
Davey opens his mouth with not a single clue to what he intends to say, before he’s being shoved roughly off the bench.
So much for his Spidey-Senses.
“Oh look at that, Jacobs still flailing around like the useless klutz he is.”
Of course. Oscar and Morris, who apparently still haven’t found hobbies aside from tormenting others for no reason.
In an instant, Jack is up from the bench and riled. “You touch him one more time and I’ll beat your ass.”
“Jack, stop,” Davey says, dusting his hands off on his pants. “They’re not worth it.”
“Don’t I know it. But you are.”
“Don’t bother,” Oscar growls. “We’ve got better things to do than mingle with the likes of you riff-raffriff raff, anyhow.”
“Riff- raff?” Davey scoffs. “What is this, West Side Story? I’m surprised idiots like yourself even know what that is.”
Morris lunges and Davey braces himself, but the blow never comes.
“Leave it,” Oscar orders his brother. He pulls Morris along, tugging at his arm. With that, they’re off and out of the courtyard. Thank god.
“Hey, screw them. Kath and the guys are waiting on us at my place. I’ll walk you over.” Jack places a hand on Davey’s shoulder in an attempt to escort him.
“I know I may look weak, but I don’t need a protective detail.”
“Did it ever occur to you that I just like you? And I wanna spend time with you?” Davey narrows his eyes. “And maybe I want an insurance policy that you’re not gonna bail on movie night?”
“I find your lack of faith disturbing.”
“For the last time, we are not watching A New Hope again.”
Davey argues lightheartedly, but follows Jack’s lead. If he’s being honest with himself, it’s nice to have someone to talk to. Just about his day. About how his physics teacher thinks she can fool nearly everyone in her class by making all the multiple choice answers C. About anything that isn’t about being Spider-Man.
About Davey allowing himself to just be Davey for an hour or two.
It’s been a day, and by the time they reach Jack’s place, Davey is rightfully exhausted.
So if he’s nodding off right as The Titanic hits the iceberg, he really can’t be held accountable. It’s a three hour movie and Davey is tired.
Besides, there’s warm hot chocolate (courtesy of Charlie and his wizardish skills in the kitchen) sitting warmly in his stomach, and Jack’s shoulder cushioning his head.
He doesn’t know how long he's been out, but the sounds of sirens jolt him awake. He startles in Jack’s lap.
“Dammit, Race!” Jack hisses. “I told you it’d wake him up!”
“What happened?” Davey asks groggily, glancing around the room in a panic.
“Nothing, go back to sleep,” Jack says softly. He smooths a hand over Davey’s hair in an attempt to coax him back to sleep.
“Some idiot tried to steal an ATM,” Race answers, gesturing to the tv, which is tuned to a live broadcast.
Davey barely registers Spot, Jack’s brother, sitting awfully snug against Race. He seems to notice Davey looking at them and scoots away. “We uhm, we finished the movie and I wanted to watch the high speed chase.”
“We are getting reports that there is an underage hostage in the car.”
“Holy shit,” Katherine says. “There’s a kid in that car.”
Davey scrambles up, missing Jack’s warmth but knowing there’s somewhere else he’s needed. “I gotta go.”
“Hey just hold on a sec. What?” Jack sits up, brows furrowed while Davey grabs his jacket. “I thought we were all staying the night?”
“I…”
I have somewhere I need to be. I have someone who needs me more. I have to be Spider-Man.
“I can’t,” Davey finally finishes.
He’s out the door despite his friends’ protests, and with a whip of his web onto the nearest building, he’s off into the night.
It’s quiet out, for a Saturday. The police scanner Davey’s set up to spew out info while he’s on duty at Mr. Jacobi’s hasn’t churned out anything good, so he stands silently behind the register, waiting for the next customer while Jack restocks chips.
Davey stiffens, hairs on the back of his neck standing up.
Sirens. In the distance. The scanner goes off, a voice frantically reporting the location of a perp. 21st and Houston. It’s not more than a few blocks away, and if he hurries, he can get there in a matter of seconds.
Jack slows his pace of organizing the chips, noticing the shift in Davey’s demeanor. “Let me guess,” he starts with a wry smile. “You’ve gotta go?”
Davey all but winces. “I’ll be ten minutes, tops.”
“I get to know what this secret mission is?”
Davey shakes his head. “Take care of the register for me? I’ll owe you a shift.”
“I’ll add it to your tab.”
It’s a grand theft auto this time around, and unfortunately, not the video game. Given the amount of times Davey’s been busted by the cops in that game, he’s inclined to say they are much more competent than the NYPD.
They had the suspects surrounded in an empty lot, but one of the squad cars backed away, leaving an opening just big enough for them to bust through.
And that’s how Davey ends up here, landing roughly on the hood of a stolen vehicle that’s zipping through the busy streets of New York at no less than forty miles an hour.
The suspects in question are a team of two. One of them lowers the passenger window and aims a gun at Spider-Man.
“Bad idea,” Davey says. He fires a web and plasters the criminal’s hand to the outside of the car.
“Fuck this,” the man driving the getaway car yells. “Stacey, get him off our tails!”
Without warning, the roof of the car is blown off.
A tiny figure jets up into the air from the cab of the now convertible car. The accomplice floats in the air and Davey sends up a silent prayer, grateful for his mask covering his slack jaw as two banners of shiny darkness unfurl from her sides. If it weren’t for the light of the sleepless city, they’d be impossible to spot given their jet black color, but the neon of new york bounces off them, producing an unmistakably dark iridescence.
Wings. She’s got fucking wings—twice her height in wingspan and stemmig out from her little shoulder blades, are real, bird-like wings.
Of course it would be tonight that he’s got to deal with another super. He has a goddamn English exam in twelve hours.
The rush of air as she flaps her wings warns Davey of her attack, and the hairs on the back of his neck stand straight, sending a tingle up to his head. He propels himself upward from the hood of the car, throwing his weight back into a flip, just in time to avoid the razor sharp feathers that have shot out from the culprit’s wings.
“Stace!” The man driving yells. “I said get rid of him!”
Davey’s head tingles again, and it’s then he notices the age difference between this man and young woman. Woman, actually, is too strong of a word. This girl can’t be more than sixteen. She’s just a kid.
She shoots up into the sky and in a moment of pure adrenaline induced stupidity, Davey latches a web to her back, thinking he can weigh her down.
It isn’t until his feet lift up off the car that he realizes his mistake.
She’s faster than he expected, and much stronger than she looks. The lights of the buildings encompassing them pass by in a blur until both he and the super are high above the city.
A feather shoots out, nearly grazing Davey’s cheek. For a moment he thinks she’s missed, until the pull of gravity takes over, his chest and stomach vibrating with fear.
She hit her mark right on target—the web tethering them has been severed and Davey’s free falling through the sky.
As he falls to his death, wind whipping across his face, barreling through the atmosphere with his limbs flailing every which way, half of his brain is chanting, like a mantra: Don’t panic, don’t panic, don’t panic.
And the other half of his brain counters with: AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!
Between all the internal screaming and emotional regulation, Davey manages to pull out a memory from his Junior Year physics class.
The egg drop project he and Jack struggled with for an entire Saturday. The bigger surface area an object has, the more air molecules collide with it, slowing the acceleration of gravity.
Davey spreads his legs and arms, feeling ridiculously comparable to a starfish, but hopefully a starfish that won’t end up splattered on the concrete of New York.
It slows him down enough to get a good look at the skyline around him, all tall buildings and twinkling lights. It’d be stunning if he wasn’t actively fighting for his life.
As he comes back into the concrete jungle, he shoots a web onto the flying buttress of a bank and holds on for dear life, feeling the torque pull him towards its fulcrum.
It’s not long before the runaway criminals he’d been chasing come back into view. He could always catch up from behind, but they’ll see him coming a mile away. Literally. Instead, he hooks a right and turns off the main road, weaving webs between apartment rooftops.
Davey might not know how Kafka’s The Hunger Artist ends, but he knows the road they’re on eventually curves around. If he’s fast enough, he can cut them off.
Just in the nick of time, Davey reappears out onto the main road. He can see the car speeding towards him, the super who’d just tried to kill him still flying above the vehicle. Staying hidden, he fires a web across the street and pulls it taught, ensuring it’s level with her torso.
She rams right into the web Davey’s attached, flipping over it once, twice, three times before careening down. She’d have hit the floor if not or the net of webs Davey set up to break her fall.
In the split second that her wings curl in on herself, Davey is there to tie them shut with a web, leaving only her face uncovered.
She struggles for a moment, but then decides it’s futile. “Guess we’re even, then?”
“Uh, no. You tried to kill me. I wrapped you up like a to-go burrito. These are not comparable. But if you want to call things even… Do me a favor?”
She glares at him.
“Make better choices.”
“You say that like I have a choice.”
A young policeman steps up, gun pointed at the general direction of the pandemonium. Upon further inspection, Davey realizes the barrel is fixated on him.
Because no good deed goes unpunished, this is a fairly regular occurrence.
“Alright, well, you get these guys booked and processed,” he jabs a thumb behind him, already backpedaling and clocking the additional backup cops slowly trickling onto the scene. “I gotta skedaddle. Lots to do. Kittens to rescue from burning buildings, babies stuck in trees.”
“Not so fast. Freeze! Hands in the air, all eight of them!”
“Eight? Come on. Do you guys really not fact check your statements? I’ve got two hands, just like everybody else; count ‘em. One—” he holds a gloved palm up, open for the police to see its implied surrender, “—and two.”
In a flash, Spider-Man aims his second hand out in front of him, shooting tufts of web out into the barrels of their guns.
With his other free hand, he shoots and latches on to the ledge of a nearby window. Hoisting himself up, he gives a friendly wave to the police beneath him, still trying to reload their weapons.
“Until next time!”
A few moments later, a web falls from his grasp as he lands in the alley behind Mr. Jacobi’s. He throws his pants and jacket over his suit and rips off his mask, stuffing it into the interior pocket of his jacket. He digs his phone out of his pocket and checks the time.
Several near death experiences and crime stopping tactics shoved into eight and a half minutes. Not bad.
He picks up his pace, unable to contain his excitement at being reunited with Jack—
Who has a gun pointed right at his face.
The scene plays out through the window before Davey. A man with a black ski mask is yelling at Jack, motioning to him to fill the duffle bag he’s brought along.
Jack’s mouth moves inaudibly, hands up, and Davey knows Jack. He’s indicating surrender now, but there’s no way the same Jack Kelly who’d threatened Oscar and Morris yesterday would go down in this situation without a fight.
It’s a fight Davey isn’t willing to risk him losing.
He leaves his jacket right there on the sidewalk.
“Don’t even think about trying no funny business! I swear to god I’ll shoot you right in your fucking fa—” a web catches on the gun pointed at Jack’s face, and Spider-Man tugs, pulling it out of the robber’s hands and into his. With a practiced ease, he disassembles the gun and unloads it. He makes a show of dropping the bullets, and the casings hit the tiled floor with a bright metallic noise.
“What’s that saying? Don’t bring a gun to a web fight?”
“Holy shit,” Jack mutters, hands still in the air and staring wide eyed at Spider-Man.
The robber glances down to his now empty hands in horror. Frantically, he digs around in his pocket for a quick moment and pulls out a pocket knife, aimed right at Jack’s throat. “You make one move and you’ll be cleaning his blood off the flo—”
In Davey’s defense, it’s mostly instinct, what happens next. If he sees Jack in danger, he’s going to neutralize the threat.
He fires a rope of web that lands right on the robber’s face, pulling down hard and fast and slamming his head against the counter. The knife clatters to the floor.
“Shit, Spidey,” says Jack, impressed and stunned. “You make that look easy.”
The robber lifts his head back up, groaning in pain and clutching his face as he tries to sooth his bleeding nose and tear away the remaining webs still clinging to him. Davey is not the least bit surprised when Jack rather nonchalantly grabs the guy by the back of the head, hitting it against the counter once more for good measure.
“That was unnecessary,” Davey comments lightly as the thief slumps to the floor, unconscious.
“So was the armed robbery,” Jack retorts.
He shoots out a web to bind the robber’s hands and feet together, effectively immobilizing him. “Touche.”
“Hey,” Jack says. “I owe you one.”
“Just doing my job.” He gives a mock little salute.
A crowd of cops burst through the front door of the bodega, with a familiar face leading the charge.
“Oh, this guy again.” The officer draws his gun. “Hands where I can see ‘em, Spider-Man.”
Davey sighs. “Listen, I know you all are just doing your jobs, and I can respect that, but—”
Without warning, he jets off to the employees only area, where he knows a back exit will be waiting for him. Behind him, the scene erupts into pandemonium.
“What are you doing, don’t let him get away!”
“Permission to fire on sight?”
“Are you crazy, he just saved my life!”
And a few other noises he’s too busy evading the cops to pay much mind to.
When he finally makes it to the alley behind Jacobi’s, Davey clings to the shadows and to the brick walls, high above the noise. Light pours out from the door and into the darkness as Jack bursts through the back entrance, scouring the area for some sort of clue to Spider-Man’s whereabouts.
Something Davey knows he’ll never find.