CH15: Halloween (Epilogue)

Gwen Stacy arrived home to a sweeping hug from her father.

"Oof!" the air was pushed out of her lungs. She pried herself free. "Dad, what's wrong?!"

Captain George Stacy was a good, kind, decent man, a role model, and a decent father. He was also notoriously not a hugger, which meant that Gwen was quite surprised at the sneak attack.

"I thought something happened; you didn't come back for hours!" her dad's face twisted into a glare. "That Parker boy didn't try anything, did he?"

"NO! Dad, no, there was just a traffic jam because of the whole Spider-Man thing!"

A second of relief went through George Stacy, before his expression darkened for a different reason, "Right. That."

Gwen rolled her eyes and walked away. "I still don't get why you don't like him. He seems like an okay guy."

When he didn't steal her food, that is.

"He's an unregistered vigilante," George scoffed. "He's just going around, no supervision, doing what he thinks is right."

"Maybe he knows what's right."

"Yeah…"

Spider-Man landed in front of George, his mask lifted up to his nose and holding a villain bound in webs by his teeth. George wondered why he wasn't using the other hand, but saw that it was covered up to the wrist in webs. He wondered if something happened to the kid.

Then he saw the state of the villain.

The armor was twisted and dented everywhere. The helmet was torn to pieces, but George couldn't make out any features under all the blood. The arms and legs were bent in all the worst possible ways, and once he saw the way the armor on his back was broken, he knew that even if his legs weren't shattered at the knees, he'd never walk again.

The officer next to George started to vomit as Spider-Man tossed the villain in front of him.

"What the hell did you do to him?" George asked, horrified.

"He made things personal."

"… I'm not so sure about that, pumpkin."

Gwen rolled her eyes. Her dad didn't know what he was talking about.

She knew Jake on a personal level. She knew he was a good guy, even if he could be kind of annoying.

Harry was bored.

Dad was gone; he'd apparently had some kind of meeting to go to, so Harry was having dinner on his own.

Honestly-

The door was blown off the hinges by the flying body of one of the security officers and Spider-Man entered the room like he owned the place.

Before Harry could hide, a web slammed into his chest and he was pulled to the spider's waiting hand.

He got lifted by the neck of his shirt.

"I'm not in the mood for bullshit," the vigilante said, as Harry's bowels emptied themselves. "Where's your dad's personal computer?"

Harry blubbered, and Spider-Man started shaking him.

"Focus, Osborn! Your father's computer! Where the fuck is it?!"

Harry pointed.

"Thank you."

Spider-Man dropped him and marched off. Five minutes later, he walked back out of the room.

Before he crossed the door, he turned around and said, "Your dad chose to become one of my villains. It didn't work out for him. I installed a virus I had prepared on his computer, so all of his dirty little secrets are being exposed. If I were you, I'd change my clothes and start packing my shit."

Spider-Man marched out.

"… and a ruptured lung," Tony finished, standing in front of a screen that showed what was left of the villain. "Although I don't think that part was on purpose. It was probably an accident from when he was breaking half of his ribs."

Steve rubbed his chin. The kid he'd talked to when they were fighting in the A.I.M. base didn't seem capable of hurting someone as much as Tony reported. Then again, you couldn't really come to know someone after a few minutes of talking and fighting.

You could, however, get to know someone by mentoring them for a little over a month, so Steve turned to look at Matt and Natasha, who were sitting around the back, whispering to each other.

"What are your thoughts on this?" Steve asked, drumming his fingers on the table. "Out of everyone here, you two know the kid the best."

There was a silence as everyone else in the room (Thor, Tony, Clint, Scott and Vision) turned to look at the pair.

Matt's mouth pulled in a wince. "Spider-Man's the type that tries to keep his personal life and his life as a hero separate. Everything that happens to him as a Cape, he brushes off. One time he told me about the time he got electrocuted, and said that he didn't hold a grudge against the guy because 'it's all in the game'."

"Your point being…?" Tony asked.

"He wouldn't do this unless the other guy forced him to take it personal." Matt's usual sunglasses were removed, so they could clearly see his empty gaze turn into a glare. "My guess is that the villain tried to hurt someone he cares about."

Natasha nodded. "I don't think Spider-Man would turn into another Frank Castle, but we might have to talk to him about this."

Once again, Nat's ability to read others left Steve impressed. In a way, the captain hadn't been able to put a name to his fears, but now that she'd said it, Steve could finally understand the gnawing feeling at the back of his head.

"We can't be too careful," Tony said, making a gesture. The screen behind him changed to show a video of Spider-Man rushing an entire gang of twenty-eight adults and knocking them out within four minutes. "He's already been trained by you two, displayed talent in reading enemies and hitting them where it hurt most, and-"

Tony stopped, tilted his head sideways, indicating that he was receiving a report from his earpiece, before slamming a hand into his face.

"-and he just leaked every little secret Osborn had, doing what I'd been trying to do for months. Again."

If the situation weren't so serious, Steve would've laughed at the hit to the ego Tony just got.

As it was, the soldier decided that they would talk to Spider-Man as soon as possible.

"How's he holding up?" Peter asked Ben, as May baked.

"He grabbed my six-pack of beer, went to the roof, and he's been listening to Talking Heads for about five minutes." Uncle Ben grumbled. "So, you know, could be good or bad."

Peter nodded and went upstairs. He opened his bedroom's window, poked his head out, and called out, "Jake!"

No answer for a moment, and then footsteps as 'Take Me to the River' got closer. Jake sat at the edge of the roof, "Yeah?"

"You okay, man?"

"More or less," a loud slurp, "Cat broke up with me, which makes sense."

"What happened?"

"Eh…"

Felicia sat on the other bed with her back to me as Night Nurse fixed my wrist. Night Nurse had yelled at me a little when I showed up, but that was it.

Once she was done, Night Nurse left the room. We stayed in silence for a while, before my girlfriend finally spoke.

"Did you get the guy?"

"He's in the police station as we speak. He's not going to hurt anyone else."

"He's a rich white male; he could get out of jail in seconds."

"Not if someone happened to leak his every dirty secret into the internet for anyone to see. Even still, I doubt he could do much."

She didn't ask what I meant, which was good, because I was having a little trouble swallowing what I'd done.

We stayed quiet for a while longer, before she broke the silence again.

"I was scared, Jake."

"I'm so sorry."

"I know." She didn't turn around. "I thought I was going to die."

I wondered what I was supposed to do. How would this work out for Peter, if he were Spider-Man?

Well, this would probably be the scene where she finds out my identity.

…

Fuck it, why not?

I took off my mask. "Felicia, I-"

"Jake." She said, cutting me off. "You know those scenes in hero movies where the girlfriend gets kidnapped, and the hero saves her and tries to break it off, and she says something like 'you're worth the trouble'?"

"Uh, yeah?"

"I don't think you're worth the trouble."

…

"Oh."

"I'm sorry."

"It's fine, I understand."

"I-"

"Cat, it's okay. I get it, really."

"You're not mad?"

"I mean, I'm not exactly happy, but I understand."

She turned around.

"I'm sorry."

"The only one that should apologize is me."

She stared at me, furrowing her brow, before a chuckle escaped her and she shook her head.

"You're so hard to read with that mask on." She said.

"I get that." I said.

"… It was just typical you-not-me stuff, y'know?"

Peter winced. Jake tended to avoid sharing anything too bad; which it had to be if he just skipped it over like that. "I'm sorry, man."

"Nah, I mean, I get it, right?" another slurp. "We were like, a week together. It was fun, sure, but no one goes ride-or-die that fast. And she wasn't the ride-or-die type, anyways."

"You're not sad?"

"I wouldn't say that," the can was crushed, and another got opened. "I wouldn't say she cut things off in a very gentle way, but she was right."

Peter swallowed, unsure of what to say. He stretched a hand out. "Pass me a beer?"

A web gently dropped one off.

Peter took a drink and immediately spat it out, "God! It tastes like pee smells!"

"Yup," another loud slurp, sounding a bit smug to Peter's ears. "I've been forcing these down for a while."

"Why are you drinking it? You can't get drunk!"

"I dunno, I guess the aesthetic of it all?"

"You spent too much time on Tumblr."

Jake snorted with amusement.

They stayed like that, with Jake drinking and Peter holding the can.

Suddenly, Jake said, "Huh, how about that?"

"What?"

"First snow of the year."

Peter looked up. Indeed, tiny white specs were gently falling to the ground.

"God, this must be giving your angsty ass such a boner."

"Bite me, Pete."

They watched the snow fall in silence.

"Come inside, Jake."

"… Yeah, okay."