Chapter Text
New York City had never been kind.
Not in 1932, with the Depression gripping the country and leaving the city crowded with people looking for work, looking for food, and looking for any reason to believe tomorrow might be better than today. The streets were packed from morning until night, but there were plenty of people nobody seemed to see. Men slept beneath newspapers in doorways, families crowded into rooms meant for half as many, and children learned very young that hunger could make a person invisible.
Ben Reilly had spent years looking for criminals hiding in shadows. He had chased thieves through alleyways, exposed murderers hiding behind expensive suits, and uncovered secrets powerful men had paid fortunes to bury. But lately, he had started noticing something else: the people everyone else ignored. The ones nobody bothered investigating, the ones without names or addresses or anyone waiting for them at home.
Like Frankie.
At first, Ben had thought the boy was just another street kid, another hungry thief trying to survive however he could. The first time they met, Frankie had tried to pick his pocket, though badly enough that Ben caught his hand before the boy even realized he'd failed.
"You know," Ben had said, looking down at him, "most criminals try to be subtle."
Frankie had glared up at him. "Most criminals aren't starving."
The answer had stayed with Ben.
Not because the circumstances were identical, but because he knew the feeling behind those words. He knew what it was like to be trapped by circumstances you hadn't chosen, to have the world decide what you were before you ever had a chance to decide for yourself. Frankie had been trying to survive, nothing more, and Ben couldn't bring himself to punish him for that.
At first, Frankie avoided him.
That was understandable. The boy had learned that adults usually wanted something. A favor, a job, a confession, perhaps a little obedience in exchange for whatever scraps of kindness they were willing to offer. Nobody helped without expecting payment, but Ben kept appearing anyway. Sometimes it was a meal left on a doorstep, sometimes a coat when the weather turned cold, and sometimes a few coins slipped into Frankie's hand with the stern warning, "Don't spend it on anything stupid."
Frankie always gave him the same answer.
"I wasn't going to."
"You were."
"No, I wasn't."
"You were thinking about it."
Frankie never answered that one, mostly because Ben was usually right.
Ben told himself he was simply making sure the boy didn't end up dead in an alley. That was all. A detective's responsibility, nothing more.
Except Ben wasn't stupid.
He knew exactly why Frankie bothered him.
Every time he saw the kid sleeping beneath a bridge, hiding in an alley, or running from people who looked straight through him, Ben found himself remembering a younger version of himself. Peter Parker had been an orphan too, though he had been luckier than Frankie. He had had Aunt May and Uncle Ben, two people who had taken him in and given him somewhere to belong.
Before the war, before the experiments, before the bite, before Peter Parker became something that existed halfway between man and monster, he had imagined a different life.
A small house.
A family.
A wife who loved him.
Children running around the yard.
A normal life.
A human life.
Then his aunt and uncle died. Then he joined the army. Then the war happened. Then the experiments happened, and Peter Parker became something else, something unnatural that had to hide from the world. Something that couldn't let anyone get too close, because there was always the fear that if someone saw what he really was, they would leave.
And there was another fear Ben rarely allowed himself to examine.
What if he had children?
What if whatever had been done to him could be passed down?
What if his child inherited the nightmare?
What if they woke up one morning and discovered that they weren't normal either?
Like him.
When Ruby had once asked him about children, the answer had come so quickly that she hadn't even had time to finish the question.
"No."
She had looked surprised. "Never?"
Ben had looked away. "Never."
He hadn't explained. How could he? How could he tell her that the idea terrified him? That he was afraid any child of his would inherit his nightmare and spend their entire life hiding from the world, wondering why they were different, wondering what had been done to them, wondering whether they were a person or something else?
Ruby deserved better than that.
And then Ruby died.
Ben hadn't been fast enough.
No matter how strong he was, no matter how quick he could move, no matter how many lives he had managed to save over the years, he hadn't been able to save hers.
Sometimes strength simply wasn't enough.
---
Ben sat alone in his office one afternoon, staring at nothing in particular while the noise of New York drifted through the window. Somewhere below, a truck rattled over uneven pavement. A newsboy shouted the latest headline from the sidewalk. The city continued moving as it always did, indifferent to whatever ghosts happened to be sitting behind his desk.
Ben groaned and rubbed a hand over his face.
"Why am I thinking about this?"
Then he remembered.
Frankie.
Of course.
The kid who had once tried to rob him. The street rat who had somehow become someone Ben checked the weather for before leaving the office because he worried Frankie didn't have a proper coat. The same kid who had gradually worked his way into Ben's thoughts without asking permission, much like a stray cat that wandered into your life and somehow convinced you that feeding it every day wasn't the same thing as caring about it.
Ben sighed. "I'm getting too old for this."
The thought lasted approximately three seconds.
Then he remembered what Robbie called him: a private dick.
Ben hated the phrase, mostly because Robbie found it hilarious, but the truth remained that he was still a detective.
Detectives investigated.
So he did what he did best.
He investigated.
Not a paying client. Not a missing person case. Not a murder.
Frankie.
Who was he? Where had he come from? Who had failed him? Who had hurt him? More importantly, how could Ben help him, and how could he do that if Frankie didn't want to be helped?
Because Ben understood that too.
Sometimes people who had been hurt didn't want to be saved.
Sometimes they only knew how to survive.
---
The first time Frankie saw the Spider, he thought he was being kidnapped.
It was a reasonable assumption, considering a masked vigilante had just dropped silently from a rooftop into the alley where Frankie had been hiding.
"Don't move."
Frankie froze, then immediately reached for a knife.
Ben sighed behind the mask. "Really?"
"You said don't move."
"I meant don't attack me."
"You should have been more specific."
Despite himself, Ben almost laughed.
Then he noticed Frankie's hands were shaking.
Not from fear.
From exhaustion.
The boy hadn't eaten properly in days.
Ben's voice softened. "Come here."
Frankie narrowed his eyes. "No."
"Frankie."
The boy froze.
"...You know my name?"
Ben immediately realized his mistake. "...I know things."
"That's creepy, Spider Sir."
"Yes."
Frankie stared at him for another moment. "You're weird, mister."
"That is unfortunately accurate."
Then Ben did something Frankie clearly hadn't expected.
He turned around and crouched slightly.
"Get on."
Frankie blinked. "What?"
"My back."
"Why?"
"Because I'm carrying you."
"I can walk."
"You can barely stand."
"I can."
"You can't."
Frankie opened his mouth to argue again, but apparently couldn't find enough energy to do it. After a moment, he slowly climbed onto Ben's back.
Ben felt the boy's arms settle around his shoulders. Then, almost as an afterthought, he fired a strand of webbing around Frankie, securing him safely against his back.
"What's that?"
"Insurance."
"Against what?"
"Gravity."
Frankie frowned.
Ben straightened.
"Hold on."
Then the Spider moved.
He crossed the rooftops of New York in long, effortless leaps, swinging between buildings and carrying a boy far too light for his age through the cold night air. Frankie clung tightly to him at first, but gradually his grip loosened as exhaustion overtook fear.
The sensation reminded Ben of something he had once read.
Certain spiders carried their young on their backs, allowing an entire generation to depend upon one creature for protection.
The irony almost made him laugh.
The world had called him a monster, a creature, a thing that shouldn't exist. Yet here he was, carrying a child through the city and protecting him from the cold.
Doing exactly what any living thing might do for something smaller and more vulnerable than itself.
---
Frankie eventually rested his head against Ben's shoulder.
"You always help people?"
Ben looked ahead as they moved through the darkness.
"No."
Frankie frowned. "No?"
"No."
"Then why me?"
Ben was quiet.
He didn't have a good answer, at least not one he wanted to say aloud. Finally, he gave the only answer that felt honest enough.
"Because someone helped me when I had no one left."
Frankie didn't respond.
But his arms tightened slightly around Ben's shoulders.
And Ben kept moving.
Ben Reilly. The Spider. The thing he had spent years believing was too broken to ever have a family.
He kept swinging through the darkness because perhaps he wasn't meant to have the life he'd imagined when he was young. Maybe he wasn't meant to be normal. Maybe the life he'd wanted had been taken from him long before he'd ever had the chance to build it.
But perhaps there was still something he could be.
Something good.
Even if he was something the world didn't understand.
---
Frankie fell asleep somewhere over Hell's Kitchen.
Ben realized it when the boy's grip loosened and his breathing became slow and even. Peaceful.
Ben glanced over one shoulder.
The kid was completely out.
"...Huh."
He couldn't remember the last time he'd seen someone fall asleep so quickly. Then again, people who lived on the streets learned to sleep whenever they could, and Ben suspected Frankie had become very good at it.
Ben slowed his pace.
He made each landing softer, taking greater care with every leap. He had carried injured people before, including the occasional criminal after a particularly unfortunate encounter with gravity, but this was different.
Frankie wasn't unconscious.
He simply felt safe enough to sleep.
The realization sat strangely in Ben's chest.
Instead of taking him back to the alley where he'd found him, Ben carried Frankie to a small church in Hell's Kitchen.
The old priest, Father Paul Lantom, looked up from sweeping the front steps as the Spider landed silently beside him.
"You again."
Ben nodded. "I have a favor."
The priest looked at the sleeping boy over Ben's shoulder.
"Another one?"
"...Yes."
Father Lantom smiled sadly. "You always bring me the ones no one else notices."
Ben looked away.
"They're easier to find."
The old priest rested the broom against the wall.
"No. They're easier for you to notice."
Ben considered that.
"I suppose."
Father Lantom opened the side door. "We have soup left."
"Good."
"And a cot."
"Better."
"And before you ask..." Ben frowned.
"I wasn't going to."
"Yes, you were." Ben gave him a tired look.
Father Lantom chuckled. "I won't ask questions."
Ben relaxed.
"Thank you."
---
Frankie woke several hours later.
He bolted upright, and for one terrifying second he thought someone had finally caught him. He looked around wildly, ready to run, until the smell of fresh bread, soup, and coffee reached him.
He was in a church.
Across the room, Father Lantom smiled.
"Good morning."
Frankie blinked.
"It isn't morning."
"No."
Frankie frowned.
"...You're confusing, Father."
"I've been told." The priest placed a bowl of soup in front of him. "The Spider dropped you off."
Frankie's eyes widened.
"He... what?"
"Said you needed a proper meal."
Frankie stared at the bowl.
"...Why?"
Father Lantom smiled knowingly.
"You'll have to ask him. It's not my story to tell."
---
Ben tried very hard not to ask Father Lantom about Frankie the next day.
He lasted almost six hours.
By late afternoon, he found himself standing outside the church again.
The priest was already waiting. "I wondered how long it would take."
Ben looked mildly offended. "I happened to be nearby."
"You crossed half of Manhattan."
"...Coincidence."
Father Lantom laughed. "You were never very good at lying."
"I wasn't lying."
"You absolutely were."
Ben sighed. "...Possibly."
The priest folded his arms. "He's still here."
Ben's shoulders relaxed before he even realized they had been tense.
"Good."
"He refuses to stay permanently."
"I expected that."
"He says he doesn't trust adults."
Ben considered that.
"...Reasonable."
Father Lantom smiled. "He also says you're weird."
Ben nodded. "Also reasonable."
---
For the next several weeks, a pattern emerged.
Ben never announced himself.
He simply appeared.
Sometimes Frankie found a sandwich wrapped in brown paper. Sometimes it was a pair of gloves or new socks. Once, Ben even brought him a book.
Frankie held it up suspiciously.
"...A dictionary?"
"You should expand your vocabulary."
"I know words."
"You know twelve."
"I know at least twenty."
Ben shrugged.
"My mistake."
Frankie rolled his eyes. "Mister, you're impossible."
"So I've been told."
It became an odd sort of routine.
Ben would arrive, usually pretending he had happened to be in the neighborhood. Frankie would complain that he didn't need anything, then quietly accept whatever Ben had brought him. Sometimes they talked. Sometimes they didn't. Sometimes Frankie disappeared for a few days, and Ben would pretend not to worry while checking every alley and shelter he knew.
Neither of them ever called it family.
Not yet.
---
Robbie noticed before anyone else.
"You've been disappearing during lunch."
Ben looked up from his paperwork. "I have errands."
"You hate errands."
"I tolerate them."
"Barely."
Ben kept writing.
Robbie leaned against the desk and studied him. "It's the kid, isn't it?"
Ben stopped writing.
"...What kid?"
"The one you've accidentally adopted."
Ben looked horrified.
"I have not adopted anyone."
Robbie grinned. "You've started carrying food instead of cigarettes."
"I quit."
"You've started buying children's books."
"They were educational."
"You spent twenty minutes arguing with the clerk over which one had the better illustrations."
"They're important."
Robbie's grin widened.
"Oh my goodness."
Ben frowned. "What?"
"You like the kid."
"I tolerate him."
"You care about him."
"I find him..." Ben paused, searching for a suitably detached word. "...difficult to ignore."
Robbie burst into laughter.
"Ben."
"What?"
"That's the nicest thing I've ever heard you say about another human being."
Ben muttered something beneath his breath.
Robbie leaned closer.
"What was that?"
"I said he's irritating."
"There it is."
---
A few days later, Ben found Frankie sitting on the edge of a rooftop overlooking the city.
"You'll catch cold."
Frankie shrugged. "Probably."
Ben sat beside him.
For several minutes neither spoke. Below them, New York stretched endlessly into the distance, a maze of brick, steel, smoke, and electric lights. Somewhere far below, a streetcar rattled along its tracks while voices drifted up from the sidewalks.
Finally, Frankie spoke.
"Were you a soldier, mister?"
Ben looked over. "...Who told you that?"
"You walk like one."
Ben blinked.
"I knew soldiers."
It was only half a lie.
Frankie stared out across Manhattan.
"They walk like they're waiting for something."
Ben looked away. "...That's surprisingly observant."
Frankie shrugged.
"I notice stuff."
"I've noticed."
Silence settled between them again.
Then Frankie asked the question Ben had been dreading.
"Do you have kids?"
Ben's heart seemed to stop for a moment.
"...No."
"You ever want any?"
The city suddenly seemed impossibly quiet.
Ben thought about the war. He thought about the laboratories, the years he'd spent trying to understand what had been done to him, and Ruby. He thought about the life he'd once imagined and the life he'd eventually stopped allowing himself to imagine at all.
"...Once."
Frankie nodded. "What happened?"
Ben watched the lights flicker on across Manhattan.
"I thought the world had made me into someone who shouldn't."
Frankie frowned. "I don't get it."
Ben smiled sadly.
"I know."
For years, he had believed that answer completely. He had believed the things done to him had made him unworthy of the ordinary life he'd once wanted, that whatever lived inside him was something that should never be passed to another generation.
But sitting there beside Frankie, listening to the boy's questions and feeling the familiar concern he'd tried so hard to dismiss, Ben realized something had changed.
Maybe he didn't entirely believe those words anymore.
Not while a stubborn street kid could sit beside him and ask questions no detective could solve.
Not while he kept finding himself showing up.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Maybe family wasn't always something you were born with.
Sometimes it was simply the people you couldn't stop worrying about.
New York City had never been kind.
Not in 1932, with the Depression gripping the country and leaving the city crowded with people looking for work, looking for food, and looking for any reason to believe tomorrow might be better than today. The streets were packed from morning until night, but there were plenty of people nobody seemed to see. Men slept beneath newspapers in doorways, families crowded into rooms meant for half as many, and children learned very young that hunger could make a person invisible.
Ben Reilly had spent years looking for criminals hiding in shadows. He had chased thieves through alleyways, exposed murderers hiding behind expensive suits, and uncovered secrets powerful men had paid fortunes to bury. But lately, he had started noticing something else: the people everyone else ignored. The ones nobody bothered investigating, the ones without names or addresses or anyone waiting for them at home.
Like Frankie.
At first, Ben had thought the boy was just another street kid, another hungry thief trying to survive however he could. The first time they met, Frankie had tried to pick his pocket, though badly enough that Ben caught his hand before the boy even realized he'd failed.
"You know," Ben had said, looking down at him, "most criminals try to be subtle."
Frankie had glared up at him. "Most criminals aren't starving."
The answer had stayed with Ben.
Not because the circumstances were identical, but because he knew the feeling behind those words. He knew what it was like to be trapped by circumstances you hadn't chosen, to have the world decide what you were before you ever had a chance to decide for yourself. Frankie had been trying to survive, nothing more, and Ben couldn't bring himself to punish him for that.
At first, Frankie avoided him.
That was understandable. The boy had learned that adults usually wanted something. A favor, a job, a confession, perhaps a little obedience in exchange for whatever scraps of kindness they were willing to offer. Nobody helped without expecting payment, but Ben kept appearing anyway. Sometimes it was a meal left on a doorstep, sometimes a coat when the weather turned cold, and sometimes a few coins slipped into Frankie's hand with the stern warning, "Don't spend it on anything stupid."
Frankie always gave him the same answer.
"I wasn't going to."
"You were."
"No, I wasn't."
"You were thinking about it."
Frankie never answered that one, mostly because Ben was usually right.
Ben told himself he was simply making sure the boy didn't end up dead in an alley. That was all. A detective's responsibility, nothing more.
Except Ben wasn't stupid.
He knew exactly why Frankie bothered him.
Every time he saw the kid sleeping beneath a bridge, hiding in an alley, or running from people who looked straight through him, Ben found himself remembering a younger version of himself. Peter Parker had been an orphan too, though he had been luckier than Frankie. He had had Aunt May and Uncle Ben, two people who had taken him in and given him somewhere to belong.
Before the war, before the experiments, before the bite, before Peter Parker became something that existed halfway between man and monster, he had imagined a different life.
A small house.
A family.
A wife who loved him.
Children running around the yard.
A normal life.
A human life.
Then his aunt and uncle died. Then he joined the army. Then the war happened. Then the experiments happened, and Peter Parker became something else, something unnatural that had to hide from the world. Something that couldn't let anyone get too close, because there was always the fear that if someone saw what he really was, they would leave.
And there was another fear Ben rarely allowed himself to examine.
What if he had children?
What if whatever had been done to him could be passed down?
What if his child inherited the nightmare?
What if they woke up one morning and discovered that they weren't normal either?
Like him.
When Ruby had once asked him about children, the answer had come so quickly that she hadn't even had time to finish the question.
"No."
She had looked surprised. "Never?"
Ben had looked away. "Never."
He hadn't explained. How could he? How could he tell her that the idea terrified him? That he was afraid any child of his would inherit his nightmare and spend their entire life hiding from the world, wondering why they were different, wondering what had been done to them, wondering whether they were a person or something else?
Ruby deserved better than that.
And then Ruby died.
Ben hadn't been fast enough.
No matter how strong he was, no matter how quick he could move, no matter how many lives he had managed to save over the years, he hadn't been able to save hers.
Sometimes strength simply wasn't enough.
---
Ben sat alone in his office one afternoon, staring at nothing in particular while the noise of New York drifted through the window. Somewhere below, a truck rattled over uneven pavement. A newsboy shouted the latest headline from the sidewalk. The city continued moving as it always did, indifferent to whatever ghosts happened to be sitting behind his desk.
Ben groaned and rubbed a hand over his face.
"Why am I thinking about this?"
Then he remembered.
Frankie.
Of course.
The kid who had once tried to rob him. The street rat who had somehow become someone Ben checked the weather for before leaving the office because he worried Frankie didn't have a proper coat. The same kid who had gradually worked his way into Ben's thoughts without asking permission, much like a stray cat that wandered into your life and somehow convinced you that feeding it every day wasn't the same thing as caring about it.
Ben sighed. "I'm getting too old for this."
The thought lasted approximately three seconds.
Then he remembered what Robbie called him: a private dick.
Ben hated the phrase, mostly because Robbie found it hilarious, but the truth remained that he was still a detective.
Detectives investigated.
So he did what he did best.
He investigated.
Not a paying client. Not a missing person case. Not a murder.
Frankie.
Who was he? Where had he come from? Who had failed him? Who had hurt him? More importantly, how could Ben help him, and how could he do that if Frankie didn't want to be helped?
Because Ben understood that too.
Sometimes people who had been hurt didn't want to be saved.
Sometimes they only knew how to survive.
---
The first time Frankie saw the Spider, he thought he was being kidnapped.
It was a reasonable assumption, considering a masked vigilante had just dropped silently from a rooftop into the alley where Frankie had been hiding.
"Don't move."
Frankie froze, then immediately reached for a knife.
Ben sighed behind the mask. "Really?"
"You said don't move."
"I meant don't attack me."
"You should have been more specific."
Despite himself, Ben almost laughed.
Then he noticed Frankie's hands were shaking.
Not from fear.
From exhaustion.
The boy hadn't eaten properly in days.
Ben's voice softened. "Come here."
Frankie narrowed his eyes. "No."
"Frankie."
The boy froze.
"...You know my name?"
Ben immediately realized his mistake. "...I know things."
"That's creepy, Spider Sir."
"Yes."
Frankie stared at him for another moment. "You're weird, mister."
"That is unfortunately accurate."
Then Ben did something Frankie clearly hadn't expected.
He turned around and crouched slightly.
"Get on."
Frankie blinked. "What?"
"My back."
"Why?"
"Because I'm carrying you."
"I can walk."
"You can barely stand."
"I can."
"You can't."
Frankie opened his mouth to argue again, but apparently couldn't find enough energy to do it. After a moment, he slowly climbed onto Ben's back.
Ben felt the boy's arms settle around his shoulders. Then, almost as an afterthought, he fired a strand of webbing around Frankie, securing him safely against his back.
"What's that?"
"Insurance."
"Against what?"
"Gravity."
Frankie frowned.
Ben straightened.
"Hold on."
Then the Spider moved.
He crossed the rooftops of New York in long, effortless leaps, swinging between buildings and carrying a boy far too light for his age through the cold night air. Frankie clung tightly to him at first, but gradually his grip loosened as exhaustion overtook fear.
The sensation reminded Ben of something he had once read.
Certain spiders carried their young on their backs, allowing an entire generation to depend upon one creature for protection.
The irony almost made him laugh.
The world had called him a monster, a creature, a thing that shouldn't exist. Yet here he was, carrying a child through the city and protecting him from the cold.
Doing exactly what any living thing might do for something smaller and more vulnerable than itself.
---
Frankie eventually rested his head against Ben's shoulder.
"You always help people?"
Ben looked ahead as they moved through the darkness.
"No."
Frankie frowned. "No?"
"No."
"Then why me?"
Ben was quiet.
He didn't have a good answer, at least not one he wanted to say aloud. Finally, he gave the only answer that felt honest enough.
"Because someone helped me when I had no one left."
Frankie didn't respond.
But his arms tightened slightly around Ben's shoulders.
And Ben kept moving.
Ben Reilly. The Spider. The thing he had spent years believing was too broken to ever have a family.
He kept swinging through the darkness because perhaps he wasn't meant to have the life he'd imagined when he was young. Maybe he wasn't meant to be normal. Maybe the life he'd wanted had been taken from him long before he'd ever had the chance to build it.
But perhaps there was still something he could be.
Something good.
Even if he was something the world didn't understand.
---
Frankie fell asleep somewhere over Hell's Kitchen.
Ben realized it when the boy's grip loosened and his breathing became slow and even. Peaceful.
Ben glanced over one shoulder.
The kid was completely out.
"...Huh."
He couldn't remember the last time he'd seen someone fall asleep so quickly. Then again, people who lived on the streets learned to sleep whenever they could, and Ben suspected Frankie had become very good at it.
Ben slowed his pace.
He made each landing softer, taking greater care with every leap. He had carried injured people before, including the occasional criminal after a particularly unfortunate encounter with gravity, but this was different.
Frankie wasn't unconscious.
He simply felt safe enough to sleep.
The realization sat strangely in Ben's chest.
Instead of taking him back to the alley where he'd found him, Ben carried Frankie to a small church in Hell's Kitchen.
The old priest, Father Paul Lantom, looked up from sweeping the front steps as the Spider landed silently beside him.
"You again."
Ben nodded. "I have a favor."
The priest looked at the sleeping boy over Ben's shoulder.
"Another one?"
"...Yes."
Father Lantom smiled sadly. "You always bring me the ones no one else notices."
Ben looked away.
"They're easier to find."
The old priest rested the broom against the wall.
"No. They're easier for you to notice."
Ben considered that.
"I suppose."
Father Lantom opened the side door. "We have soup left."
"Good."
"And a cot."
"Better."
"And before you ask..." Ben frowned.
"I wasn't going to."
"Yes, you were." Ben gave him a tired look.
Father Lantom chuckled. "I won't ask questions."
Ben relaxed.
"Thank you."
---
Frankie woke several hours later.
He bolted upright, and for one terrifying second he thought someone had finally caught him. He looked around wildly, ready to run, until the smell of fresh bread, soup, and coffee reached him.
He was in a church.
Across the room, Father Lantom smiled.
"Good morning."
Frankie blinked.
"It isn't morning."
"No."
Frankie frowned.
"...You're confusing, Father."
"I've been told." The priest placed a bowl of soup in front of him. "The Spider dropped you off."
Frankie's eyes widened.
"He... what?"
"Said you needed a proper meal."
Frankie stared at the bowl.
"...Why?"
Father Lantom smiled knowingly.
"You'll have to ask him. It's not my story to tell."
---
Ben tried very hard not to ask Father Lantom about Frankie the next day.
He lasted almost six hours.
By late afternoon, he found himself standing outside the church again.
The priest was already waiting. "I wondered how long it would take."
Ben looked mildly offended. "I happened to be nearby."
"You crossed half of Manhattan."
"...Coincidence."
Father Lantom laughed. "You were never very good at lying."
"I wasn't lying."
"You absolutely were."
Ben sighed. "...Possibly."
The priest folded his arms. "He's still here."
Ben's shoulders relaxed before he even realized they had been tense.
"Good."
"He refuses to stay permanently."
"I expected that."
"He says he doesn't trust adults."
Ben considered that.
"...Reasonable."
Father Lantom smiled. "He also says you're weird."
Ben nodded. "Also reasonable."
---
For the next several weeks, a pattern emerged.
Ben never announced himself.
He simply appeared.
Sometimes Frankie found a sandwich wrapped in brown paper. Sometimes it was a pair of gloves or new socks. Once, Ben even brought him a book.
Frankie held it up suspiciously.
"...A dictionary?"
"You should expand your vocabulary."
"I know words."
"You know twelve."
"I know at least twenty."
Ben shrugged.
"My mistake."
Frankie rolled his eyes. "Mister, you're impossible."
"So I've been told."
It became an odd sort of routine.
Ben would arrive, usually pretending he had happened to be in the neighborhood. Frankie would complain that he didn't need anything, then quietly accept whatever Ben had brought him. Sometimes they talked. Sometimes they didn't. Sometimes Frankie disappeared for a few days, and Ben would pretend not to worry while checking every alley and shelter he knew.
Neither of them ever called it family.
Not yet.
---
Robbie noticed before anyone else.
"You've been disappearing during lunch."
Ben looked up from his paperwork. "I have errands."
"You hate errands."
"I tolerate them."
"Barely."
Ben kept writing.
Robbie leaned against the desk and studied him. "It's the kid, isn't it?"
Ben stopped writing.
"...What kid?"
"The one you've accidentally adopted."
Ben looked horrified.
"I have not adopted anyone."
Robbie grinned. "You've started carrying food instead of cigarettes."
"I quit."
"You've started buying children's books."
"They were educational."
"You spent twenty minutes arguing with the clerk over which one had the better illustrations."
"They're important."
Robbie's grin widened.
"Oh my goodness."
Ben frowned. "What?"
"You like the kid."
"I tolerate him."
"You care about him."
"I find him..." Ben paused, searching for a suitably detached word. "...difficult to ignore."
Robbie burst into laughter.
"Ben."
"What?"
"That's the nicest thing I've ever heard you say about another human being."
Ben muttered something beneath his breath.
Robbie leaned closer.
"What was that?"
"I said he's irritating."
"There it is."
---
A few days later, Ben found Frankie sitting on the edge of a rooftop overlooking the city.
"You'll catch cold."
Frankie shrugged. "Probably."
Ben sat beside him.
For several minutes neither spoke. Below them, New York stretched endlessly into the distance, a maze of brick, steel, smoke, and electric lights. Somewhere far below, a streetcar rattled along its tracks while voices drifted up from the sidewalks.
Finally, Frankie spoke.
"Were you a soldier, mister?"
Ben looked over. "...Who told you that?"
"You walk like one."
Ben blinked.
"I knew soldiers."
It was only half a lie.
Frankie stared out across Manhattan.
"They walk like they're waiting for something."
Ben looked away. "...That's surprisingly observant."
Frankie shrugged.
"I notice stuff."
"I've noticed."
Silence settled between them again.
Then Frankie asked the question Ben had been dreading.
"Do you have kids?"
Ben's heart seemed to stop for a moment.
"...No."
"You ever want any?"
The city suddenly seemed impossibly quiet.
Ben thought about the war. He thought about the laboratories, the years he'd spent trying to understand what had been done to him, and Ruby. He thought about the life he'd once imagined and the life he'd eventually stopped allowing himself to imagine at all.
"...Once."
Frankie nodded. "What happened?"
Ben watched the lights flicker on across Manhattan.
"I thought the world had made me into someone who shouldn't."
Frankie frowned. "I don't get it."
Ben smiled sadly.
"I know."
For years, he had believed that answer completely. He had believed the things done to him had made him unworthy of the ordinary life he'd once wanted, that whatever lived inside him was something that should never be passed to another generation.
But sitting there beside Frankie, listening to the boy's questions and feeling the familiar concern he'd tried so hard to dismiss, Ben realized something had changed.
Maybe he didn't entirely believe those words anymore.
Not while a stubborn street kid could sit beside him and ask questions no detective could solve.
Not while he kept finding himself showing up.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Maybe family wasn't always something you were born with.
Sometimes it was simply the people you couldn't stop worrying about.