Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

May 19th, 2023, New York City, Oscorp Industries. A high school senior by the name of Peter Parker is visiting the new genetics laboratory of Oscorp with his High School, Midtown High. Peter had always been fascinated by biology, by science in general, and he he had already applied to a molecular biology program in college.

Peter seemed like your ordinary nerd, shy, obsessed with science, movies, comics and video games, but he was also quite an extrovert when he wanted to be. Standing at a solid 5’10”, he wasn’t the tallest of his friends and seemed to be more on the scrawny side of things. His shaggy brown hair and hazel eyes didn’t make him stand out much either.

And here he was, in the laboratory of one of the most famous industries in the world: Oscorp. Of course, Peter’s best friend was Harry Osborn, another 5’10” brown haired man, who just so happened to be the son of Norman Osborn, CEO of Oscorp. Peter’s connection to Norman had allowed him to visit this lab the day it had opened, six months ago. He had to say, it was a lot more impressive today than back then. There had been many new developments in genetics, thanks to this department, and the exhibit they were touring now was one Peter had never had the chance of seeing: The Genetic Modification Unit (G.M.U. for short). This section of the lab was brand new, only having opened the exact same week they were visiting.

Upon entering the section, Peter heard Flash Thompson speaking to his girlfriend, Liz Allan.

“Babe, let’s ditch this stupid exhibit, it isn’t even worth our time.”

“Flash, honey, no, this is interesting, and we’ve already skipped class so many times, can’t you stay for just one field trip?”

“Well I’m heading out. Feel free to talk to that nerd Parker over there if you’re so into this shit.” Flash said, storming out.

“Mr. Thompson. Where do you think you’re going?” asked Mr. Cox, the teacher supervising the trip.

“Out of here.” He responded.

Mr. Cox had dealt with Flash Thompson enough times to know not to stop him, and therefore, let him go away.

Flash Thompson looked exactly how you’d imagine him to: A 6’2” Caucasian blond man with an American football background. The exact stereotype of the “Jock”. His girlfriend, Liz Allan, on the other hand, was a slightly shorter, 5’9”, Hispanic woman with long black hair running down to her elbows. She was a cheerleader on Midtown High’s Cheer leading team, which is where she and Flash had met originally.

Since their Freshman year, Liz and Flash had had an on and off relationship, yet, miraculously, they’d never had any partners apart from each other. Both teenagers were regarded highly at Midtown High as the School’s Power Couple. On the outside, they tried to keep up the facade of being the perfect couple, but anyone who had ever spoken or interacted with them knew this to be false.

But since Midtown counted over 10 000 students, there weren’t a lot of people who had gotten the misfortune of meeting them.

Shortly after Flash had left, the one-armed scientist supervising the group, Dr. Curt Connors, brought the group into the arachnid section of the laboratory.

———————————————————————————————————

“We are currently in the process of isolating a specific gene in arachnids that lets them know how to create their own spider silk. Many scientists have tried to achieve this in the past, but no one has ever gotten as close as we have.” Said Dr. Connors. “As most of you probably know if you’ve ever watched the news, Oscorp is the leader in genetic research and modification. This has allowed us to receive grants from the government which allowed us to build this- ” Connors continued before he was cut off by Peter.

“If one were to apply to work here, what would be the minimum requirements in terms of education?”

“Well since our department mainly deals in microbiology, I’d suggest you’d get a Master’s degree in that domain before applying here. Of course, we also have our student internship programs, but those won’t even get you onto the second floor. Now, as I was saying, the grants have allowed us to build this state of the art laboratory…”

“Psst. Peter.” Whispered Harry from the back of the room. Hanging against a door, he stated “I know this place by heart. I know where they keep the cool specimens, come with me.”

“I’d rather stay with the group Harry.”

“Come on, I’ll make it worth your time…”

After a moment of hesitation, Peter decided to follow Harry into the next chamber.

“This place is like a labyrinth” Peter said.

“You’ll get used to it.” Harry replied

After a minute of exploring the Oscorp hallways, Harry and Peter arrived to their destination.

“Behind these doors are the wildest specimens you’ll ever see Pete. If you get lucky, someday you might even work with them.”

Harry proceeded to open the door for Peter as they entered the circular room.

In front of them stood a giant circular vivarium containing hundreds of spiders. However, as soon as they stepped through the door, a projector went off and showed a computer screen going through all the different spiders, making sure each and everyone one of them was there.

“Harry, this is amazing!” Peter said as they moved to the back side of the room, examining every single spider they saw.

“Yeah, it is. One of the nice things about your pops being the CEO of a major scientific corporation is the perks it comes with.” He stopped, taking a look at all the spiders before continuing: “Being at the front of every scientific breakthrough in the last decade.”

“That does sound pretty nea-”

Before Peter had a chance to reply to Harry, an alarm started going off from the projector. “ROOM 1264, SPECIMEN 134 MISSING. ROOM 1264, SPECIMEN 134 MISSING.”

When the alarm went off, Harry ran to the door, hearing footsteps.

“Shit Peter, hide! Dr. Connors is coming, I’ll try to keep him at bay as long as possible but I can’t guarantee anything. There’s a door right behind you, escape from there, I’ll take the blame for this.”

“Harry I can’t let you do that.”

“Yeah, but you will, because or else you’ll never be able to work here. I’m the CEO’s son. I won’t get into trouble.”

“Harry!” Peter cried out, but it was too late, Harry had already gone out the door.

Peter went up to the door Harry had pointed out, but it seemed to be locked. As he was trying to find a way to open it, he heard the faint voice of Harry talking to Dr. Connors. “Hey… Dr. Connors! What- What brings you here?” He said as the alarm blasted again. “ROOM 1264, SPECIMEN 134 MISSING.”

Unbeknownst to Peter, specimen 134 was making its way down to here.

The spider was one of the most important projects Oscorp had been working on. They had managed to introduce human DNA to the spider and were waiting on a blood analysis to determine whether it had worked.

When the spider landed on Peter’s left shoulder, it made its way to his hand. Peter was still trying to unlock the door when he felt a pinch on his left hand. Instinctively, he slapped his hand, where he found the spider, now dead. But it was too late. Peter’s fate had been sealed, the spider had chosen him, and he would have to live with the burden of its power for the rest of his life.

Peter didn’t think anything of it at the time. All he knew was that a spider has bit him and now his hand hurt, and he didn’t even have time to think about that.

The door in front of him unlocked just as Dr. Connors entered the room. Somehow, Peter then managed to escape the room and leave the building without being caught.

After making his way back home, he noticed his uncle and aunt weren’t there, but he felt an extreme wave of fatigue wash over him, so he ignored that, went to his room, and proceeded to pass out on his bed.

Chapter Text

When Peter woke up the next morning, feeling like he’d just been ran over by a truck, the voice of his uncle Ben screaming “PETER WAKE UP” certainly wasn’t what he wanted to hear.
His head was killing him and for the first time in a long time, Peter just wanted to sleep. He was feeling very comfortable under the weight of his sheets. So he stayed in his bed for a couple more minutes.
But the sound of his uncle banging on his door woke him up again.

“Peter, it’s 11AM, I have an appointment at 12:00 and you said you’d come with me to go there. You have 30 minutes to prepare. Come on Pete!”
An annoyed and sleepy “ugh” left Peter’s mouth as he woke up. He reached for his glasses and put them on before starting to get dressed.
After taking a few steps forwards to properly wake up, Peter realized his vision was still blurry even after putting his glasses on.

“Shit”, he said, whilst taking them off. “I guess I’ll have to book something with the opt-”

Before he could complete his thought, he realized that he didn’t need to book an appointment because he was seeing perfectly clearly. In fact, he was seeing things even better than he could before. He noticed the slight flicker of the light emanating from his lamp ever so slightly, he noticed the individual filaments embedded in his pants, and he noticed the lean man staring at him through his mirror before opening his blind and…

“Wait. No, that can’t be right.”
Peter said, as he did a double take and realized that  the lean man starring at him in the mirror was actually his own reflection. Gone was the skinny teenager he knew before. In front of him was standing a much more muscular version of him.

Not believing his own reflection, Peter began to look down at himself, and as he was pinching himself, he realized that he wasn’t dreaming. He flexed his bicep and touched it. “Yep that’s definitely real. What the hell is going on?” He stood still for a minute, looking back at his reflection and at his new abs that hadn’t been there the night before.
“Fuck. I gotta go get this looked at, this isn’t normal.” He thought before remembering he was completely broke and the doctor would probably tell him there was nothing he could do. 
“Welp! I guess I’ll just have to deal with having… muscles from now on.” Too tired to think more thoroughly about it, he grabbed a baggy shirt and sweatpants as he headed to the bathroom.
Peter grabbed his tooth brush and applied toothpaste onto it but as he went to open the water from the sink, the handle broke.

“For fuck’s sake.” He paused, looking at the water flowing everywhere. 
“Uncle Ben!”, Peter shouted. “The sink’s broken again!”
He heard the voice of his uncle coming from downstairs say “Put a towel on it in the meantime, we’re gonna be late Pete!”
So Peter obliged and packed his things, preparing to leave with his uncle.

He went downstairs and said good morning to his aunt May as he kissed her on the cheek. “Oh! Before we leave, May you might want to call the plumber, the sink upstairs is-”
“Broken, yes I know Peter I head you screaming at Ben, I’m not deaf you know.”
Peter chuckled at that and told her he loved her before following his uncle out the front door.

“Ah the sweet, sweet Queens polluted air!” Pete said as they both approached the car. Ben spoke “Pete you should drive it. You’ve had your license for two years and you barely ever drive. Some practice might be good for you, you know?” 
Ben looked at Peter and Peter looked back.
With an exasperated look on his face, he said: “We live right outside New York! I’ll probably never need to drive!” 
Peter looked at Ben and Ben looked back at him with the same look on his face that he made when he wanted peter to do something.

“Fine.” Peter said, walking towards the car.

About thirty minutes later, they had arrived at the parking garage next to the clinic where Ben had to go. Ben stepped out of the car, and waited for Peter, who was dealing with his own problem.

Peter had gone to open his door, but when he closed it, he had found his hand still stuck to the door, and was now unable to move it.
“What the fuck”, Peter whispered. “Why the hell can’t I move my hand.”

“Uh uncle Ben?”

“What’s up Pete?”

Peter was about to explain the situation, but decided not to, so he wouldn’t worry his uncle.
“Uhm… you go on ahead without me. It’s just a regular check up right? I don’t need to be there?”

Ben looked at him as a sliver of sadness passed through his eyes.

“Yeah Pete, it’s alright. Just don’t get into any trouble.”

“You know me!”

“Yes. that’s why I’m saying that. Don’t get into trouble. The actual appointment shouldn’t take long, maybe 30 minutes. I’ll call you when I’m done.”

“Okay! Good luck!”

As Ben slowly walked away from the vehicle and towards the clinic. Peter started talking to himself, still trying to move his hand away from the door.
“Come on you stupid thing! Move! Why are you stuck, did someone put crazy glue on here??”
At that moment his phone started ringing.

“That can’t be uncle Ben…”
And in fact, it wasn’t, when peter pulled out his phone with his other, unstuck, hand, the image of his best friend Harry Osborn was showing, so he answered it immediately.

“Harry!”

“Peter! Holy shit you’re alive!”

“Yeah, somehow. I managed to escape. What about you, how’d you manage to get out of trouble with Dr. Connors?”

“Oh well after you left, my dad showed up. I got into a bit of trouble but it wasn’t that bad.”

“Well glad to know you’re okay man.”

“Right back at you. So what are you up to?”

“Oh I’m waiting for Ben, he had a check-up with his doctor today.”

“Is he alright?”

“Yeah, yeah, like I said, it’s just a regular check up” Peter said, scratching his nose.
Peter looked at his hand as he lowered it down, a look of shock on his face.

“Uh…  Harry, I gotta go, sorry man, I’ll talk to you later.” Peter said about to hang up, “OH! And thanks for saving my ass yesterday, I owe you one.”

“Haha, no problem Pete-” Harry said before he was cut off by Peter hanging up.

Peter looked at his hand, and back at the car door where his hand was stuck a few minutes prior.
And then back at his hand.
And then back at the car door.
“What the hell. Something is definitely wrong with me.”

After he stopped freaking out, Peter approached a pillar in the garage. Making sure no one could see him, he slowly put his hand against the wall, and contracted his fingers in a way he somehow innately knew how to do despite never doing it previously. He tried pulling his hand back, but just like before, it was stuck. This time, however, when he put enough force, part of the wall came off with his hand.

“Holy shit.”

He tried to focus on what happened earlier, when he was on call with Harry, in order to “unstick” the pieces of wall from his hands.
He focused on relaxing the same muscles he contracted in his fingers, and somehow, the pieces of the wall fell from his hand.
Peter looked up at the wall and placed one hand on it, jumping up and placing his other hand a little higher. That’s when he realized the muscles he’d gained were helping him pull himself up with nearly no effort. Peter focused on relaxing the muscles in his hand, and when his hand unstuck itself, he brought up higher, sticking it to the wall once again.

“I can climb walls?” He asked himself.

“I can climb walls!” He repeated, a lot more excited.
After dropping down, Peter realized he managed to absorb the impact a lot better than before. 

“This is amazing…” Peter thought to himself. “Wait. Is this because of that spider that bit me yesterday? No… No it couldn’t be… right?”
But before he had time to answer his own question, his phone rang again.
Peter picked up the call after seeing it was his uncle calling.

“Pete? Where are you, I’m back at the car.”

“Oh! I’m coming, my bad.”

“That’s alright, I’ll drive on the way home, is that okay with you?”

“Yeah, sure."

Peter hung up and made his way back to his uncle’s car.

“Hey Uncle Ben.”

“Where’d you even run off to?”

“Oh uh, I got bored of the scenery.”

“Alright come on get in.”

Peter reached for the door and opened it, sitting down in the passenger seat of the car.
“Oh, by the way Pete.” Ben said to him, reaching for something in his pocket.
“I picked this up in the waiting room.” He gave Peter a Daily Bugle newspaper. “Apparently Oscorp is hiring new interns. Maybe you could ask Norman for a position?”
Peter flipped the page until he landed on the Oscorp ad.

“Oh, interesting.”

“Yeah I just thought I’d mention it to you.”

But the Oscorp ad wasn’t what Peter was finding interesting, no, rather it was the ad below it.

It read:
SEARCHING NEW WRESTLERS FOR THE CHANCE TO WIN 2000$ IN A BATTLE AGAINST CRUSHER HOGAN!!!!!
And suddenly Peter knew exactly what he wanted to do with his new abilities…

Chapter Text

Chapter 3: The Entertainer

After spotting the ad in the Daily Bugle, Peter asked his Uncle Ben if he could drop him off at the library the next morning. The excuse he’d given him was that Harry had asked him to meet him there to prepare for their finals. 

Of course, Ben accepted without hesitation, without knowing that Peter was planning on competing in a goddamn wrestling contest. Ben told him he was supposed to go to work anyways, so he didn’t mind.

Now, what Peter had said wasn’t a complete lie, as Harry had actually texted him to ask him if he wanted to meet up at the library with him the next day, but Harry had to leave by 6PM, and Peter had told Ben to pick him up at 10. That’s because right in front of Queens’ public library stood the venue for the wrestling event stated in the journal.

That night, Peter went to the website listed in the ad and created his account. In order to do so, however, he created a new e-mail address, one that couldn’t be directly linked with him. Since of course, if he was going to use these newfound powers of his, they would have questions and he didn't want to be experimented on. After he was done setting up his account, he completed the registration sheet. Shortly after, he received an e-mail saying he had successfully entered the wrestling contest against Crusher Hogan, and the only thing going through his head was “That was way too easy.”

But then he started the real work… a wrestling costume to hide his identity

The next morning, Peter could barely contain his excitement. In fact, he was so excited, he'd nearly forgotten to do his homework, but thankfully Peter was a very organized person, and a reminder popped up in his phone reminding him to do it.

The Calculus homework only took him a few minutes to solve, but he hit a wall with his English essay which was supposed to be on the Shakespeare play Macbeth, or at least, a written adaptation of the play.

Now, Peter Parker was a genius. No one could argue that. Every single one of his teachers had said it… except for his English teacher. Peter really sucked at English. Thankfully there was one person in his household he could turn to and who could help.

Peter opened the door to his room for the first time that day. “Uncle Ben!” He yelled, his voice still rash from waking up.

“WHAT?” was his reply.

“I NEED HELP WITH ENGLISH!”

“AGAIN? ONCE SECOND I'M COMING UP!”

And a few minutes later, Peter heard a knock on his door.

“Mornin’”, Ben said

“Mornin’”, Peter responded 

“Whad'ya need help with, kid?”

“I finished most of my studies but I have this essay due in a few days on uh…” Peter checked his notes, “‘Abuse of Power in William Shakespeare's Macbeth'. I'm just really confused Uncle Ben.”

Ben sat down on Peter’s bed.

“What's so confusing?”

“Well we read Macbeth and all but I don't think it was power who corrupted Macbeth, you know, it seemed like that was just who he was from the start.”

“Hmm.. well it's been a while since I've read Macbeth but let me see what I can remember.”, he said, lying down on Peter’s bed and putting his hands behind his head.

“Okay,” he continued, “So at the start of the story, even though he may have that personality, he still doesn't act on anything, right? Because he doesn’t know for sure how it'll end for him.”

“Yeah.”

“That is, until the 3 witches come to him and tell him he'll be king. Once he has that confirmation, that's when he kills… What's the guy's name again?”

“Duncan?”

“Yeah, Duncan.” Ben sat up. “So, without that power of premonition from the witches, nothing would've happened right?”

“Presumably”

“Well Macbeth wouldn't have had the balls to do it, even with Lady Macbeth pushing him. And from there on Macbeth abuses his power as king pretty much any time he can, and it leads to a lot of death around him throughout the play.”

“Mhm.”

“Well there you have it. Macbeth had all the power he could've had, but he didn't have the intuition to use it responsibly. When you have power like that, you have a moral obligation to use it responsibly. And Macbeth didn't know that.”

“Okay, okay. I think I get it. Thanks Ben, I think I'm gonna write about that. Just gotta find some quotes now.” Peter's head hung low, knowing how much work he would have to put in for this assignment.

Ben smiled. “With great power, there must also come great responsibility. There's a quote for you right there! Wow, I should have that quote framed.” He stood up and patted Peter on the shoulder. “Hey, you still need that lift to the library to meet up with Harry?”

Oh shit. Peter thought, having completely forgotten about that. “Uh yeah! What time do you need to go to work?”

“Well… shift starts at 2, ends at 10 so, what if we leave at 1:30?’’

“Works for me!’’

“Great! I won’t be able to pick you back up though so you might need to hitch a ride with Harry or take the bus.’’

Oh shit, Peter thought, again, having completely forgotten about getting back. “I’ll figure a way back…’’

“Coolio, well whenever you're hungry, come on down, May's making us sandwiches.”

“Sandwich for breakfast. Yum.” Peter said, sarcastically.

“Hey, that's on you for staying in your room till 12.”

And that earned a genuine smile on Peter's face. “Alright I'll continue this for a bit and meet you downstairs.”

May Parker was looking through the fridge. “Ah damn, Peter, we're out of milk and eggs. Could you stop by the store after your meeting with Harry? You’ll be coming back before Ben, so it might be simpler..”

“Yeah, no problem May.” Pete said without paying much attention. His attention was turned towards the TV.

“Now, in case you haven’t heard folks”, the anchor started, “News broke out over the last few days about an incident regarding Oscorp's genetics department. Although C.E.O. Norman Osborn has denied these claims, multiple eyewitness reports have said that an alarm went off regarding unauthorized entry into one of their restricted sections.” 

Peter sweat just a tiny bit.

“Although no video surveillance exists in these areas, multiple intruder detection systems went off during the incident 2 days ago. Not much is known about these sections, since Oscorp keeps most of their research close to their chest, but what we do know is that this is very cutting edge research, and that if something was taken from these labs, it could be very dangerous for the general population. Here’s what Dr. Osborn had to say about the incident.”

The television switched to a different scene, where Norman was giving a press conference.

“Our team is aware of the problem and is currently fixing it. Thank you.”

…

Everyone in the room went silent for a few seconds.

…

But that silence was soon stopped by Ben’s laugh echoing through the kitchen

“I swear that`s the worst thing I’ve ever seen on TV. What was that?? He didn’t even make an effort!”

And Peter laughed along with him.

“Hey Pete, you know that Macbeth thing we were talking about earlier?”

Peter nodded.

“Well here you have a prime real-life example.” He pointed to the TV. “Norman goddamn Osborn. You’d think he’d be different in person, but whenever he came here with Harry, he acted the exact same way. Always the business man, always direct to the point. Not always a bad thing but definitely not always a good thing…” Ben looked back at Pete” “You know what I told you about great power, great responsibility, yeah? Well I think Norman really needs to learn that second part.”

Peter grabbed his jacket from the entrance closet, put it on and put his backpack on as well.

“Alright May, I’ll be back late tonight.”

“Don’t forget the eggs! Or the milk!”

Peter nodded back to May.

“Oh right, say hi to Harry for me. Oh and Ben call me when you’re done with work, won’t you?” May replied, leaning in for a kiss, which Ben reciprocated with a “I’ll see you later Honey’’, followed by a kiss on the cheek.

To which Peter replied with faked disgust “You two make me sick…’’ And all three laugh.

Peter was the first one out the door. “Later May!’’, he said.

A short drive later, Ben was dropping off Peter at the library, where Harry joined him soon after.

The two boys sat down in a quiet corner and took out their books.

“So why you leaving at 6?’’ Peter asked Harry a few minutes into their study session.

“Mom’s got a surgery tonight so I’m just gonna visit her before she leaves.”

“How’s she doing?”

“Not great… Some of the medication helps her health just in general, but she’s really in pain so she’s been put on a lot of sedatives. Means I can’t talk to her as much as I used to.”

“Shit, Harry.. I’m so sorry.”

“Nah, it’s alright. This surgery’s supposed to help boost her immune system, and Oscorp’s still working on a cure. I don’t really want to talk about it right now.”

“All good man, let’s kick this calculus ass.”

Harry laughed. “Let’s.”

4 hours later, Peter and Harry were both packing up their bags and heading out of the library. Outside, by the stairs, a limousine was waiting for Harry. When Norman Osborn stepped out of the backseat, both Harry and Peter were surprised.

“Damn, your dad’s picking you up, you’re in troubleee”, Peter teased Harry.

“Oh shut it. He’s probably here to see you anyways.”

“Pfff. Yeah right.” 

Norman approached the two boys with a sorrowful look on his face. “Hello Harry. Peter.”, Norman made a slight nod towards him. 

“Mr. Osborn.”

“I’m afraid I’ll have to take Harry away from you for a while.”

“That’s alright.” Peter said, extending his fist.“Keep me updated Harry.” 

“Will do.” Harry bumped Peter’s fist. “How are you getting back home?”

“Ben’s driving me”, he lied. “Don’t worry about it.”

Norman wrapped his arm around Harry and they walked into the limo which drove off a minute later.

After making sure the Osborns were gone, Peter made his way down to the wrestling venue, putting his mask on before entering through the main entrance.

A man was sitting behind a run down desk, looking at his phone. He only briefly looked up when the door slammed shut behind Pete, who was shutting down his own phone and walking towards the man.

“You here for the wrestling event?”, the man asked.

“Y-Yeah.” 

“Alright, tickets are 40$, spectator entrance is to the side.”

“Oh, uh” Peter started to doubt himself. “I’m here as a wrestler.”

And that made the clerk look up. Well, rather, look him up and down.

“You sure? Seem a little scrawny for a wrestler.”

“I signed the papers.”

The man sighed, looking down at the pile of papers on his desk.

“Under what name?”

There were about 8 other people in the waiting room with Peter. One after the other, they were all called into the main venue room until finally, Peter was called in. Walking into the event, he was hearing the chants of the crowd. A crowd, mind you, much larger than he was expecting. All chanting after Crusher Hogan had defeated the prior contestant. The announcer was standing next to Peter, and patted him on the back.

“Kid, whatever happens out there, you only have one job. Make it a hell of a show. Got that?”

“Yeah.”

“Fantastic.” The announcer grabbed his mic. “Ladies and Gentlemen, I want to thank you all for coming here tonight. We received a much larger crowd than we ever thought, and that’s why we’ve prepared something special for you all tonight!” The announcer winked at Peter, who was utterly confused. “As our last match of the night, I’d like to introduce you all to...” The announcer covered up his mic and leaned towards Peter. “What’s your stage name?”

“It’s… The Arachnid.”

“The Arachnid?” The announcer looked him up and down.

“Introducing… THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN!”

A blinding light flashed towards Peter, revealing his red costume with a spray-painted black spider on it. The mask he was wearing covered everything except his eyes.

“Sorry kid, Spider-Man sounds much better than The Arachnid or whatever.” The announcer told Peter. “And you still get the whole spider theme you're going with, you know?”

Peter stayed in the spotlight for a while, in shock at the size of the crowd.

“Kid come on! Go in the ring!”

Peter’s body betrayed his thoughts, filled with doubt, as his legs moved one after the other until he was in the ring. A large bearded man stood in front of him, nearly twice his size, and that’s when Peter finally figured out that he was in over his head. 

What the hell had he been thinking, signing up for a wrestling event when he’d found out he could stick to stuff. What part of his brain thought the rational thing to do upon figuring that out was to sign up for a wrestling event. All these rattling around in his head led Peter to forget where he was, until the bell rang and the man in front of him rushed towards him.

LOOK OUT: FRONT

A message from deep within Peter’s subconscious was resonating out and forcing his body to move by itself. Scared by this sudden involuntary movement, Peter tried to restrain himself, but Crusher Hogan’s punch, however, wasn’t stopping and was still going straight for his head.

 Peter finally listened to what his body was telling him and dodged a fraction of a second before the punch landed. 

The crowd gasped.

Peter’s hand moved by itself, with absolutely no experience in fighting, it still somehow managed to hit Hogan’s jaw. Crusher had no idea what was happening. One second he was about to knock out this lanky kid and the next he was flying upwards as the crowd cheered, and during the third second he found himself losing his consciousness after hitting the ground.

“ONE”, The announcer started counting. The roar of the crowd was getting louder.

”TWO”, he continued as the crowd erupted in applause. One spectator yelling out loudly: “Now that’s what I came here for!”.

”THR-”, but the announcer wasn’t able to finish his count down as Crusher Hogan’s head was no longer on the ground.

”Alright Spider. You want to give these people a show?” He put his fist against the ground as he struggled to stand up. He smirked as he raised his fist upwards.

“LET’S BRING THE CAGE DOWN FOR THE SPIDER-MAN, BOYS!”

Around the ring, four grid metal walls dropped down with another on top. Peter was, quite literally, caged in.

Acting purely on instinct, he jumped onto one of the walls, facing towards Hogan. The crowd gasped.

“How the hell?” Crusher asked.

“I'm Spider-Man!” Peter answered, “I can do whatever a spider can!” He paused and looked down, whispering to himself “including jumping really high apparently.” 

Spider-Man took a look around him, at the crowd cheering and spotted some familiar faces in the crowd, including J. Jonah Jameson, New York renowned editor of the Daily Bugle screaming “GET HIM SPIDER-MAN!”

To his right, however, was a face he hoped he wouldn't see until later that night.

LOOK OUT: RIGHT

His uncle Ben was sitting in the crowd, watching him with a sorrowful look on his face.

And then a chair hit him from the right.

He'd been so distracted by the sight of his uncle that he hadn’t reacted in time to the warning, despite his subconscious seemingly yelling at him, he was knocked to the ground, prone.

His vision seemed to tunnel in after the hit. Areas he should normally see clearly seemed to be darker, less visible.

LOOK OUT: ABOVE

This time, however, he heard the message, dodged to the left, and hit the incoming obstacle with all the force he could muster up.

“ONE”. “Get up Spider-Man.” Peter told himself as he struggled, but ultimately managed to stand up.

“TWO”. The announcer continued, to Peter's confusion, but the darkness in the corners of his vision seemed to be slowly clearing away.

“THREE”. Peter's vision was now fully back, and he realized that the obstacle he had hit was none other than Crush Hogan himself, who now seemed to be knocked out, on the ground, on the other side of the ring.

“AND WE HAVE A WINNER”. Peter approached Hogan, but jumped in fear once he saw his face. His jaw seemed to have been dislocated, and multiple teeth were lying on the ground. He was brought back to reality thanks to the announcer grabbing a hold of his arm.

“THE AMAZINGGGGG SPIDER-MAN!” He lifted Peter’s arm up, and the crowd went wild. Peter however, had two things going on in his head.

Had he really done that, had he launched back a man twice his size and dislocated his jaw at the same time?

He looked at his right hand in silence.

His uncle Ben, why was he here, did he know it was him under the mask?

But his thoughts were interrupted once again as he was ushered away from the ring and brought to a counter. A man was sitting down, counting money from a duffel bag.

“Here's your cut Spider-Man.” He handed him a load of cash. Peter couldn't believe his eyes. In fact, he didn't, so he counted the money.

 “Hey, what the hell?", he asked, “There's only $1,000 in here, the ad said $2,000?”

“Kid you're lucky you're even getting a cut after what you just did to our best wrestler.”

“Are you kidding me? I just gave you more entertainment than the audience has seen in their lifetime!” Peter responded.

“That's not my problem kid.”

Peter stared at the man. 

“Now move, there's other people who want their money.”

Peter looked behind him and saw 5 other wrestlers waiting to get their cut, the first of which looked very nervous.

Looking back at the teller, he took his money and said “You guys are dicks.” before promptly going towards the exit. 

Right as he was about to open the door, he heard the sound of something hitting the floor followed by footsteps running towards him.

 “HEY! STOP THAT GUY!” 

Peter turned around and saw the wrestler that was behind him in the line running straight towards him. The voice had come from the person at the desk, who was now on the floor, struggling to get up.

The wrestler was carrying what was clearly the duffel bag of money that was on the desk, and he had taken of his mask,

revealing shaggy dirty blond hair.

Peter opened the door for him.

“That's not my problem”, he said to the teller as he walked out the door himself.

There was rain. There was a lot of rain.

Shit, he thought, I have to find uncle Ben.

A loud bang echoed from across the street, Peter flinched in response.

Screams of panic started all around him and he saw the blond wrestler running from the noise.

A man was lying on the ground. A man that Peter could have recognized anywhere.

He sprinted across the street.

“NO!” was the only thing he was able to say.

“No, no, no, NO!”

He made his way towards the body, dropped to his knees and grabbed his uncle's hand.

“B-ben, please…” He put his hand on Ben's wound, attempting to stop the blood.

“You can't go like this, PLEASE!”

Peter bent towards his uncle, tears falling down his face and landing onto Ben's blood and rain soaked shirt.

“I need you, May needs you. BEN!”

Peter looked around.

“SOMEONE CALL AN AMBULANCE, PLEASE!” He cried out.

“P-peter?” His uncle called out.

“Y-yeah. It's me Ben, please stay with me.”

“Peter.” Ben smiled. “My boy.”

“I love you uncle Ben. Please stay.” Peter's tears blended in with rain. “The ambulance is on its way.” He applied more pressure to the wound, but the blood didn’t stop pouring.

“Pete… I saw you there. I tracked you down… I saw the news about Emily, I couldn't find you at the library and I-” He struggled to catch his breath, and with all the strength he had left, he raised his hand and put it on Peter's.

“Peter, you have a gift…Use it well….” 

He paused. 

“Remember what we talked about this morning..? What I saw pete, I- I can't explain it.”

He coughed.

“But Peter, you have great power, and with that power… there must also come great responsibility.”

Ben didn't have any more strength left in his hand. He let go of Peter's.

Peter cried out as Ben said his final words.

“Tell May… I love her.”