Spider in Gotham - Chapter 15

"Heart to heart conversations are best had with a hot meal." Steph smiled at him as they took a seat in a nearby booth.

The place was a shared space of a convenience store and a small restaurant. Everything they served was fried. They had quite an impressive menu for such a small place. Burritos, various types of chicken, cheesy fries, and mozzarella sticks.

"So." Steph opened a foil wrapped burrito. "Tell us about yourself, Pete."

"What do you want to know?" Pete asked with a sigh.

"Everything." Steph smiled brightly. "This is going to sound weird, but we've tried to find you. Not, like, now, but your past. We've found nothing. Not a sing paper trail, fingerprints, face scan, until you strolled out of an alley like a month ago. An alley that had been previously empty."

"Wow." Peter looked from Steph to Cass. "That doesn't sound creepy at all."

Cass nodded.

"Sorry." Steph blushed. "I like puzzles. You, my friend, are the Holy Grail of puzzles."

<<She bet you're an alien.>> Cass added.

"Rude." Steph gasped. "Yes. Tim and I made a bet, but he's just as curious as I am."

"You're not making me feel all that calm." Peter said. Oddly enough, his spider-sense hadn't kicked up.

<<That's fair.>> Cass nodded.

She sighed and bumped Steph with her shoulder. The two had a quick conversation in sign language out of his line of sight.

"You're right." Steph directed the statement to Cass. "You're right."

The duo turned back to face him.

"I'm sorry." Steph gave a weak smile. "I know I'm coming off as weird. I've been on desk duty for the last couple of months. Broke a bone, tore some muscle, and disconnected some tendons. Even with space healing, it took a while."

"Space healing?" Peter asked.

"Kryptonian Tech." Steph whispered and motioned to his shirt. "We can't make another one, but it can heal some amazing things. How else do you think we're able to keep going? I swear the Old Man stopped aging like twenty years ago."

Peter stole a quick glance at Cass.

"Voice… del… i… cate." Cass croaked.

"The more intricate body parts aren't easy to repair." Steph squeezed Cass' hand.

<<The healing is focused.>> Cass swapped back to sign. She shrugged. <<I would have to go in to target my voice. I've lived this long without it.>>

"I know it doesn't make up for me being rude, I'm just bored out of my mind." Steph groaned. "Would it help if we traded secrets?"

"We all know about our night jobs." Peter shrugged.

"Origin stories?" Steph wiggled her eyebrows.

"Here?" Peter motioned to the store around them.

"Good point." Steph tapped her chin with her finger in thought.

<<Apartment.>> Cass suggested.

"Are you sure?" She asked.

Cass nodded.

"Ok." Steph nodded. "Would you like to talk at our apartment? It’s a short drive from here."

"I don't have a car." Peter replied.

<<I drive.>> Cass countered.

On one hand, he would be going to an unknown location and Selina didn't have a reason to suspect anything would be wrong. On the other, he was reasonably certain they didn't have any powers. He didn't want to sound overconfident, but he was pretty sure he could take them.

"Sure." Peter shrugged. "Lead the way."

"Yay!" Steph bounced to her feet.

She pulled Cass along. The silent girl gave her an all-suffering look, but there was a spark of joy in her eyes. He chuckled as he followed behind them. The walk to the car took longer than the tour around campus. Mainly because they had used the student parking structure that had five levels and the stairs were arranged in a weird order. Each side went up two floors, then you had to cross over to the next for the next, and roof access was a stairwell completely separate from the others.

"I know. I know." Steph said as they trudged up the last flight of stairs. "It looks weird, but it's for disaster preparedness. Each level can be sealed to prevent outside contamination, special vents can blanket this place in foam if there's a fire, every angle is covered by cameras, and additional emergency exits open up if they need to."

"Wow." Peter blew out a breath. "This place is crazy."

"Gotham is a crazy place." Steph sighed.

A car on the far side of the fourth level chirped as they neared. Aside from the heavily tinted windows it looked could have been easy to overlook it. Even then, it wasn't the only one with darkened windows. It wasn't until they got in that Peter realized it had been urban camouflage. The interior looked like it belonged to one of the cars in Tony's garage. Minus the station for F.R.I.D.A.Y.

"Nice car." Peter commented.

"Bullet resistant windows up to small arms, tires can take a few seven-six-two, reinforced frame, multistage inertial cushioning, and a few other toys that I'm not supposed to talk about." Steph smiled at him. "We could punch through the wall and keep going once we hit the street. Four. Levels. Below." She dropped her voice deeper with each of her last words.

Peter chuckled.

She slid into the backseat and motioned for him to join her. Cass didn't seem bothered, so Peter joined her. The seats looked like leather but felt different. It took him a moment to realize they were made from the same material as his suit.

"Buckle up." Steph prompted.

Peter did and was instantly thankful for the prompt. Cass drove like a madwoman. She sped through the parking structure like it was a racing track. The car barely slowed when it took the turns, and they caught a bit of air as they made it to the street. His spider-sense was screaming at him.

"You were kidding about the punching through walls, right?" Peter shot a wide-eyed look at Steph.

"Yes." Step sighed. "You do it one time and suddenly they won't let you drive!"

Peter caught the look Cass shot the blonde in the rearview mirror. He met her gaze and saw the mingled love and amusement they held.

"I'll start." Steph said. "Stephanie Brown, the origin story."

Peter chuckled.

"I told you about my dad a little." She continued. "He really liked puzzles. So much so he became a costumed villain that went by the name The Puzzler. Kind of like the Riddler, but not. I didn't like that he was hurting people, so I started giving the answers to the puzzles. I took the name Spoiler, you know, since I was spoiling his stuff. Bats put my dad away and offered me a job. I did a small stretch as Robin, but it ended badly. When I was finally back on my feet, I picked up cowl as Batgirl."

"Then you got hurt?" Peter asked.

"It happens in our line of work." Steph shrugged. "Physically, I'm healed. It takes some work to get my brain to accept it. That's a side-effect of the alien tech. Most humans have a hard time adjusting to their body healing so quickly. Your brain tells you, don't do that, it needs to heal, but your body is fine."

She sighed.

Peter let the thought settle in. He had some stutters when he first started too. Back then he was mostly focused on getting his strength and speed under control, but the healing had some issues too. Now it was second nature but had freaked out the first time a broken bone healed in less than a day. It was probably the reason it hurt so much when he got dusted. He didn't like to think about it. The experience wasn't something that just went away. His very being fought against it.

"Peter." Steph spoke softly and touched his hand.

Peter shook his head. He blinked. His eyes were wet for some reason. He wiped the unshed tears away.

"Bad memories." He gave her a weak smile. "I've got a lot of them."

Steph nodded. Movement upfront caught her attention.

"Are you sure?" Steph asked Cass.

The quiet girl nodded.

"Cass' origin story is kind of like mine." Steph continued. "Her father was a costumed villain too. Still is. Slade Wilson, he goes by the name Deathstroke in the mask. The world's greatest assassin." She rolled her eyes at that last bit. "He trained Cass to be the perfect killer. That scar is where he sliced her vocal cords. Sick bastard. She came to Gotham, met Bats, and he showed her how to fight without going for the kill. She was Batgirl for a while before she became Black Bat."

Peter let the information sink in. Obviously, neither story was detailed, but he didn't really need to know all of it. That would come later as they got comfortable around each other.

"You'll have to get the others to tell you their stories." Steph said. "If you want to meet them. You probably will eventually. There aren't that many people on the rooftops as the papers say. The bad guys stay on the street, or underground for the most part."

The car pulled to a sharp stop. Peter looked out the window to see that they were in the parking lot of a ten-story apartment building. It was in weird neo-gothic style that the city loved. Now that he thought of it, classic glass and steel skyscrapers were rather rare in Gotham. There was a cluster of them in the business district. For the most part, the city was made of stone and glass. He had lost count of the gargoyles along the streets.

Cass and Steph led him into the building. A doorman waved as they entered. The lobby was sparse with only the desk and there were three unmarked elevators. Each required a keycard to activate. They scanned the card and stepped into the middle one. The apartment was rather well kept considering two college students slash vigilantes lived there.

Steph stopped by the door. She pressed the screw above the light-switch. The windows darkened and a gentle white noise filled the air.

"Privacy setting." Steph explained. "All of our places had surveillance in case of emergency. No one wants to hear everything. That way, this stays between us."

"Thanks." Peter gave her a soft smile.

"Now." She grabbed his hands and led him over to the couch. "Spill. I've got a bet to win."

Peter chuckled. Cass took a seat behind Steph. The blonde leaned back against her, and the quiet girl casually pulled her closer.

He took a deep breath. How much did he want to tell them? How much would the believe? Did Selina deserve to know first? She had taken him in, but they hadn't actually had many conversations. Their talks were about possible jobs, comparing observations of their patrols, and reviewing information they had gathered during various gatherings. He knew next to nothing about her, aside from the fact that she was a thief and had a complicated relationship with Batman.

"I got my powers when I was fourteen." Peter said. "I was on a field trip with my science club and was bitten by a genetically altered spider. It nearly killed me. I slept for like three days straight. When I woke up I was stronger, faster, and could stick to walls. We didn't have a lot of money, so I thought I could use my new abilities to get some cash. There was a talent show kind of thing. Like a circus blended with American Idol."

They shrugged at the reference.

"Not important." Peter waved it away. "Someone robbed the place. I didn't stop him. The guy stole a car and shot the driver. My Uncle Ben had just arrived to give me a ride home."

"Oh, no." Steph whispered.

Peter looked down at his hands. He didn't want to see them.

"I couldn't find the guy." Peter continued. "They found the car ditched by the river. He set it on fire before he left. We hadn't had it for long. Everyone was still recovering from the Chitauri Invasion. The Avengers tried to keep it contained, but Queens is just across the river from Manhattan. We were homeless for a while but were one of the lucky ones. The Stark Foundation covered the cost of getting an apartment before things got crazy."

He took a breath.

"After Ben died I realized that I was wasting my powers." Peter forced himself to continue. "I made a costume and started to help people." He chuckled.  "Man, it was bad. I had a hoodie, a ski mask, and these swimming goggles. Mister Stark, Tony, he saw some videos of me saving people, and asked for my help. He gave me a new suit, much better, and that's when I really started doing the hero thing. I stopped mugging, car theft, that kind of thing, until this guy in a mechanical suit made from reverse-engineered Chitauri tech started getting out of hand. They called him The Vulture. It turned out he was my girlfriend's dad. She was kind of my girlfriend, we had one date that I had to leave in the middle of it to fight her dad." He scrunched his brow in thought for a moment. "I guess she was a girl I liked. She moved once her dad was arrested. After that, I went back to car thieves and muggings. At least until Thanos showed up. I hitched a ride into space with Tony. We, the Avengers, we fought Thanos and lost. He snapped and half of everything turned to dust. I turned to dust."

The breath he took now had a shiver in it.

"One moment Tony is holding me. The next, it's five years later. Tony died to save everyone." Peter swallowed. He tried to force the lump in his throat away. "We came back to Earth, and things were bad. Millions of people gone for five years and then suddenly came back. It was a mess. May, my aunt, was amazing. She set up a charity to help people. If you help someone, you help everyone. She liked to say that. Then Mysterio happened. He framed me for his murder and told the world who I was. Peter Parker was Spider-Man. That was my name."

He flashed them a sad smile.

"I even had web-shooters." Peter cleared his throat, that lump was stubborn. "It ruined my life. My friend's life. My aunt's life. I did the one thing I could think of. I asked Strange for help. He was going to erase the memory of my identity from everyone on the planet. I tried to get him to change it so May and my friends still knew." He sighed. "It caused some issues."

He gave a single, dry laugh.

"Issues." Peter closed his eyes. "It opened dimensional rifts. It let in people from other worlds who knew Peter Parker was Spider-Man. They couldn't be good guys, or like rich relatives. Supervillains, legit super-powered villains. There was a guy with these metal tentacle things, a guy who could control electricity, an eight-foot tall lizardman, a guy made out of sand, and Osborn."

He clenched his fist.

"It wasn't all bad." A shade of a smile fought the sorrow in his voice. "I met two other Spider-Men. They were awesome. The three of us tried to help them. Osborn killed May. I couldn't save her. I couldn't save her, I couldn't save Ben, I couldn't save Tony." His next words came out as a whisper. "Why did I save Osborn?"

"By then the walls between dimensions were about to break." Peter steadied his voice. "The only way to save the world was for them to forget me. Strange used his magic to erase Peter Parker. One moment I'm with my friends, the next I'm in an alley in Gotham."

Peter finally found enough strength to open his eyes. The two girls stared back at him with expressions so sorrowful it hurt him.

"Then I met Selina." He slumped back into the couch cushion. "Then I met Cass and now I'm here."

"Fuck." Cass croaked out.

Despite everything. Peter laughed.

~~~
AN:
Tried to give my own spin on things.