Chapter Text
PROLOGUE: OBLIVION (PETER PARKER)
Peter Parker was in a state of unfortunate oblivion. Well, that's not so accurate—he was not the one in oblivion, it was everyone else who was. Walking down the streets of Queens with his hood down, not needing to escape the thousands of cameras and reporters demanding to know about his life as Spiderman was... quite gratifying. Yet it was heart-wrenchingly painful when he walked into the Peter Pan Donut & Pastry Shop, seeing MJ in her signature cyan uniform, wearing a guarded, professional smile on her face that Peter had never seen before. Glancing at Ned in the corner, a bright smile on his face—just one that was not directed at Peter. So quietly, Peter ignored the coffee he had bought and headed back to his apartment.
True to Dr. Strange's words, he was gone to the world. His papers, his documents... all gone. Yet he did have a way to acquire new ones: the Blip. After the Blip, billions of people who had been dusted went back to Global Repatriation Council hub to match their DNA sequencing. And although it was true that Peter Parker had been blipped, he had already gotten his files back... files that had now disappeared because of Strange's spell. But Peter Parker was still a hacking genius, and the Hub was a laughingly weak government system. His fingers flew across the keyboard in the library as he looked around him to make sure that no one had caught on to what he was doing. Just a few hours working through the system, and Peter Parker now existed.
"Hey, it's been over a year since the Blip," a begrudging worker scowled as he brought Peter into the back of the storage facility, where the GRC hubs, which were beginning to catch dust from lack of use, had been sitting. "Yeah, um, it was a lot harder for me," Peter lied. "I'm... an orphan. My aunt and uncle took care of me, but they both died. And I just turned 18."
The worker turned around, his eyebrow raised in sympathy. His tone mellowed. "Hey, sorry kid. Must've been hard."
Technically, nothing Peter said had been a lie. His parents had passed when he was young, Uncle Ben had passed away when he was 11, and Aunt May...
Peter winced, feeling the hurt come back. The metaphorical wound was still fresh—he could still see Aunt May's warm smile, her bright eyes, and the look on her face when the Green Goblin had—
"Just put your fingerprint on the pad, kid. I can tell you've been through some stuff, you don't have to do the retinal scan or urine sample or all that," the worker said gruffly, cutting off Peter's train of thoughts. He blinked a few times as he nodded, glad that he had uploaded his fingerprint onto the database. He nervously pressed his finger on the pad, his thoughts whirling until— ding! A green light showed on the machine, and Peter let out a sigh of relief. The worker trudged over to the printer on the other side of the machine where Peter's social security number, passport, and ID shot through. "If you had a driver's license, before, you'll have to retake that, 'cause the Hub didn't save that. And if you ever lose these documents, you can always come back to the Hub," the worker droned out as if he had said this speech a million times—he probably had.
"Gotcha," Peter said, accepting the documents from the worker and walking out of the building with a thrill. Peter Parker finally existed.
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Once Peter had gotten his technically forged documents, the rest wasn't really a hassle. A little unethical hacking into a random high school that gave him decent grades, good recommendation letters, and a sob story about his dead relatives that got him into NYU—a good school, a school that he'd like to go to to continue his education, one that was decently close to his life in Queens. Retrieving Aunt May's inheritance and bank account was probably the hardest part, since in legal records, he never had a connection to Aunt May. But a little more of that (true) sob story, a bit of hacking into registers, and accusations to the Blip, Peter had acquired not only her bank account and inheritance, but also... thankfully, her old apartment.
Peter glanced around the musty apartment, choking back tears. The apartment was a bit worn out and dilapidated from a lack of use—the landlord said that after Aunt May had passed, no tenants had been in there. Of course, everyone thought that she had died of natural causes—a stroke, or something. Peter sat on the floor, a small layer of dust rising as he stretched out his legs, looking at the empty space. He would have to get... a bed. His bed, probably not, but a bed. Get a couch, or something. Books. A computer. He ran the costs in his mind, chewing at his bottom lip. A job. He now had Aunt May's inheritance, but NYU, even after the scholarships he had gotten as an independent, no-income orphan, was expensive to him. And he could have easily gone to his public library again and hacked 30k out of the fund that Mr. Stark had left for him, but... it just felt wrong. Or he could have gone up to Pepper and revealed his identity, giving him access to the resources that Tony had literally left behind for him, but... Peter didn't want another fiasco to happen again. It couldn't happen again.
So Peter learned to move on. He was still friendless, but his landlord, Ryan, who had recently divorced his ex-wife because she couldn't deal with his odor, came pretty often with a pizza box and a couple of beers. He probably knew that Peter wasn't 21 yet, but one look at Ryan's pitying, bearded face made Peter reach for the beverage.
At least until orientation had started, Peter had gotten a job to help support his funds. He considered working in Peter Pan Donut & Pastry Shop—perhaps even if they didn't remember him, he could kindle a new friendship with MJ and Ned—yet one look at their smiling faces through the window that of the shop that he visited too often discouraged him. They were better off without him, he convinced himself. Look, Peter Parker was gone—and they got into MIT, the school that they truly deserved. Surely adding a Peter Parker back to the equation would skew their lives in some way for the worse. So Peter got a job as a pizza delivery boy with a meager salary, but still, seeing the added payment to his bank account every week made him feel a little better about himself.
Living in the apartment with Aunt May's ghost of a memory was still hard. Peter would wake up in his small, hard cot in the corner of his old room, gasping for air as he swore he could smell her old rhubarb pie wafting through the air vents. He would jump out of his bed, scramble to the kitchen... only to find it dark, gloomy, and empty, just as it had been for the last few months. It hit harder when he would come home to an empty house, though. Only one set of keys in the little drawer next to the door, only one chair, only one bed... it was endless.
Another thing that Peter had to tackle: the "missing Spiderman" articles. Obviously, when Peter Parker was obliviated from the world, Spiderman was not. The people still expected Spiderman to show up in his flashy red and blue metallic suit. Only problem? Peter Parker no longer had access to the flashy red and blue metallic suit. He would have to make a new one, one that probably would be much shoddier than the one that the Tony Stark had made for him, but until then, Spiderman was on an unofficial hiatus. The articles began popping up the month after Strange had erased Peter Parker but had died down soon enough. "Spiderman's gonna come back, he's probably just on a break," piped a young boy on a TV station. "He has to!"
Ironically, ever since Spiderman's occurrences had died down, so had the crime rate. The police could handle minor accidents such as robberies, yet even in the usually dangerous New York, there were rarely ever major catastrophes. No villains who demanded to face Spiderman. For the first time in a while, it was oddly... quiet. And Peter liked it that way. No Spidey sense tingling, no burning buildings, just... a burnt stove, perhaps.
Even though Peter claimed that he wasn't, he was secretly counting down the days until the NYU orientation would start, checking his secondhand computer every single day, marking an X on the calendar until the fated day. Because in college, everyone had new beginnings—not just him. Everyone was coming to a new school, meeting new people, and it was probably the first time that Peter would feel normal about being unknown—after all, he wasn't the only person who was unknown.
The morning of the orientation, Peter sprang out of his bed with a little too much enthusiasm, bonking his head on the ceiling. He rolled his eyes as he dressed himself, looping the belt through his buckle quickly and slipping the straps of his worn backpack behind him as he headed out the door, a piece of old toast in his mouth as he ran towards the nearest subway station. His shirt was a faded purple after the colors of NYU with a picture of a dancing donut on it, and he had saved a little money to get some merch there. Be a normal college student. Maybe even get a job on campus. Get access to their labs, where hopefully... Peter could make his fluid and perhaps his suit. He would just have to do so undetected.
He walked into the main building with a confidence that he hoped would portray beyond his exterior, his hands shoved nonchalantly into the pockets of his jeans, his sneakers squeaking against the floor.
"Uh, hey, are you here for the orientation?" he asked the girl in front of him, who seemed to fit into the school like a puzzle piece with her colorful clothes. She turned around and nodded. Peter couldn't shake the feeling that he had seen her somewhere before, with her dark hair gathered into a high ponytail and her colorful scarf and black boots. "Yeah, NYU, right? I'm honestly terrified," the girl laughed.
She extended her hand, colorful books and binders and a fluffy pen in her other arm. "I'm Lara Jean," she said, grinning at Peter.
"I'm, uh, Peter. Peter Parker." He shook her hand with an easy grin. "I like your scarf," he said, pointing at the colorful scarf. "Thanks," she said brightly. "My sisters and my dad knitted it for me before I left for college. It's a bit of a mess, but I love it." Peter felt an aching pain at the thought of siblings, of warmth, of secondhand items he would never receive. "I like your shirt," she said in exchange, pointing to the faded picture of the dancing donut. "It's really happy to be here," he joked.
"Next," called out the voice of a tired student in a purple NYU sweater a little in front of them, an array of ID badges in front of him and a name tag pinned to his chest. "Oh, that's me," Lara Jean said with a bright smile, her dimples showing as she walked to the desk, leaning down, her earrings jingling. "Next," another student called out. Peter momentarily paused before he walked forward, receiving his orientation badge in a hurry and slipping it around his neck. He stepped into the large hall with hundreds of seats, blinking back, a bit overwhelmed. He saw the familiar face, the girl he just talked to, slip into an open seat in the middle of the hall. "Hey," he said, walking next to her. "Is this seat open?"
Lara Jean nodded, smiling as she opened a tin of what seemed like baked goods. "You want one? I baked them before I came here," she said, motioning to the muffins. Peter reached over and took one. "Sure, I'd never turn one down." He bit into it slowly, feeling the rich taste of nutmeg and cinnamon and pumpkin come over him. "Wow, these are amazing," he said honestly, a note of pure wonder in his voice. Lara Jean laughed. "Hey, can I ask what you taste? I don't think I've quite finished this recipe yet." She pulled a rainbow notebook from her backpack, along with a fluffy pen. "Sure, I thought I tasted, uhh, nutmeg, and pumpkin, and uhh... cinnamon. It was really nice. And sweet," Peter said, stumbling over his words a bit. Lara Jean laughed as she noted it down in loopy, familiar handwriting.
Wait. Familiar, loopy handwriting? Where had he seen this handwriting before? Peter squinted as he stared at she furiously scribbled down notes. A phrase popped into his mind, without him even thinking about it.
"Um. Lady Blackwell?" Peter asked slowly before he even had time to think about what he said. Lara Jean's face whipped towards his quickly, a shocked expression on her face replacing the gentle smile she had previously. "Poster Boy?" she asked, her eyebrows furrowed in deep concentration, her pen coming to an abrupt stop and making a sharp line across her paper. Before Peter could even remember why he had said Lady Blackwell, or why he was Poster Boy, and why Lara Jean seemed so familiar, the projector in front of them lit on.
"Weeelcome to NYU!" exclaimed a group of students dressed in deep purple and a mascot dressed in a bobcat costume. The projector turned on and Peter was unable to utter another word to Lara Jean, but the confusion and remembrance radiating off of her was overwhelming enough. As soon as the presentation was over, they got split up into orientation groups, and Peter was predictably separated from Lara Jean. But as she walked in the opposite direction, her face said: this is not over.
Yet Peter didn't even know what he started.