Yerin and I sat on a bench, both wrapped up in winter clothes as I munched away at a hot dog. A kid walked past us, led at the hand by her mother. She waved at both of us, beaming and Yerin giggled to herself as we both waved back. The mother smiled at us and the two disappeared down the street as Yerin’s smile remained.

“She was adorable”

“Yep” I mumbled, taking another bite out of my hot dog.

“You know I think we’d have pretty cute kids” she said.

“What?!” I said, choking on my hotdog.

“I mean like, not in a weird way or anything, but you know. I think they’d be totally adorable”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah”

“I guess. If we even make it that far”

“Don’t say that”

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding” I said. “Of course, we’ll make it that far and have amazingly cute kids. Totally adorable with pinchable cheeks and all”

She’d chuckled before taking another sip of her hot chocolate.

“So, how much do I owe you for those science fair tickets?”

“Wait, they cost money?”

“Lucas?! Did you not get them?”

“No, I got them. But through a friend”

She’d burst out into laughter.

“You need to double check those tickets”

“I’m pretty sure their legit. He’s a real scientist”

“Oh, you just know some swanky scientist guy now?

“Yeah. I… uh… know them through Maria. From where she did her internship”

“Ah. That makes sense”

“Hey!”

Then she’d laughed again, that same snorting, joyful laughter.

-

I blinked awake, confused for a moment before rolling over. I groaned as a wave of memories from my dream washed over me

“Can we not do that please brain?” I mumbled. “I’d really prefer if we didn’t do that”

The bed creaked underneath me as I sat up, massaging my temple as I sighed. I’d been doing so well, and now my dreams had to go and ruin it all. I stood and stretched, rubbing the sleep from my eyes, before groaning, pressing my head against the door.

“Is he still sleeping?” Maria said, her voice reverberating through the wood of the door.

“Yeah” Sofia muttered back.

“Wake him up”

“Do I have to?”

“Do you want to set the table?”

“Fine, fine”

The sound of footsteps skipping across the floor rung in my ears before knocking at my door made me pull away.

“Lucas” Sofia said. “The takeout’s here”

I swung my door open, and yawned

“Wasn’t asleep?”

“Doesn’t seem like it” Sofia muttered to herself.

“Don’t start you two” Big Sis said, taking a seat at the table, as Maria brought the last of the forks. “I heard you went out today. How was it?”

“Good” I said, taking a seat opposite her. Sofia sat next to me, and Maria next to Big Sis as she handed out the takeout boxes.

“Wasn’t there like a huge building disaster?” Maria said.

“Yeah. Some guy fused with the brick, but we managed to get him out” I said. They all stared at me, then glanced to each other. “I’m realising now, that sounds a lot weirder when I say it out loud”

“No shit” Sofia muttered.

“Sofia” Big Sis warned.

“Sorry, sorry” she said, piling her shrimp fried rice onto her plate.

“So how was it? Inside the building?” Maria said.

“Oh come on Maria” Big Sis said. “You don’t have to tell us Lucas”

“Seriously? Probably the most exciting thing any of us has ever done, and you want to talk about something else” Sofia said.

“I just… I don’t want to make you relive it if it wasn’t ok” Big Sis said, looking to me.

“It’s ok. I’m fine to say”

“You sure?”

“Yeah” I responded. Big Sis nodded satisfied and began putting her noodles into her bowl.

“Well spit it out then” Sofia said.

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Sofia”

“It’s fine” I chuckled. “Uh… well for starters, it was dusty”

Suddenly the sound of several police sirens blared through our window, the cars rushing past at ridiculous pace. We all looked to the window, then to each other.

“Should you…” Sofia said, glancing to me.

“Probably” I said standing.

“L-lucas?!” Big Sis said.

“What?”

“W-we’re eating” she mumbled, her voice losing some of its certainty.

“And someone else might be getting mugged. Or their house could be on fire. Or there could be like a mass sh-”

“Sofia” Maria said, shaking her head. Big Sis glanced between the two of us, then sighed.

“Right, right. Sorry” she said. “Just, stay safe ok?”

I nodded, then quickly rushed to my room. The suit from earlier lay in a plastic bag, and the stench of sewer water and iron emanated from it. I guess I was putting on the purple and black. I reached under my bed, and pulled out the tattered costume, before quickly putting it on.

There were still a ton of holes on it, and horrendously large bloodstains, but at least it didn’t smell as bad. I pulled on the mask, then webbed over the holes threw open my window, leaping out into the air.

I fired a web and swung off, the warmth of summer night’s easing my nerves slightly. With a half-practiced grace, I curved around the buildings, and swinging onto the street with the cop cars. There were four in total, and they zoomed across the asphalt, almost desperately. I swung quickly, but even then, it took a while to catch up to them.

They turned a few more corners and then slowed, another cop car and an ambulance stopped outside an alley, with police blocking off the road. With a web I pulled myself to a wall face and stopped looking over the scene.

A cop sat in the back of the ambulance, his face pale as someone tended to a gash on his head. The rest of the ambulance crew stood in a group all talking amongst themselves, shaking their heads. I looked around, over the crowd of people that’d gathered, with their phones out.

The initial cop car had bullet holes in the windshields and windows of the car, glass covering the floor along with a trail of blood. I inched closer to the scene, following the trail of blood to a covered body. Someone had gotten shot and died. From the number of cars, probably a cop.

“Dammit” I muttered. I crawled further around, and stopped over the corner into the alley, looking down. The alley was mostly empty, apart from a few forensic scientists taking photos of various places on the ground, as they bagged a few items across the alley.

I crawled down the wall face, then leapt to the floor, a few people in the crowd

“Oh Christ” one of the cops said walking over to me, “What the hell do you want?”

“Did you catch the guy who did this?”

“Does it look like we caught the guy?!” the cop shouted. “Instead of asking obvious shit how about you fuck off? Huh?”

“Or maybe do what you claim to do and find this fucking guy?” another cop spat.

I stepped back from the two, eyes narrowed.

“I will”

I leapt up and fired a web, pulling away. Assholes. I was just trying to help. Actually, now that I thought about it, the dislike could’ve stemmed from all the stuff to do with Kingpin. I shook my head. What a mess.

I continued swinging, before coming to a stop against a building wall. I paused, looking over the street, then let my spider sense stretch out as I searched for anyone hiding in nearby alleys.

For a moment there was nothing. Then my attention fixed on a particular spot, my spider sense buzzing peculiarly. There was someone nearby, in an alley. I jumped down and swung towards them, with speed, landing against another building wall before racing across the surface.

“You can deal with a gun” I muttered. “You’ve dealt with guns before.”

I landed against the wall above the alley and looked as the masked figure breathed heavily, hands on his knees. He pulled a flip phone from his pocket and began frantically dialling, his breathing still erratic. He hadn’t heard me. I fired a web at him and yanked him upwards by the feet. As he flew up, he screamed, the grating scream of a breaking voice.

My fear turned to confusion as I brought him to a stop beneath me. I’d been so preoccupied by fear I hadn’t even sensed for a gun. He didn’t have one, and now that I looked, he was way too small to be an adult.

I pulled him up completely and jumped onto the roof, setting him down as I perched on the ledge. He sat up quickly, then scrambled to his feet, pulling the spider-man Halloween mask off, revealing a black balaclava underneath.

“Woah” he muttered, staring at me with wide eyes. He was definitely a teen. I looked over him, noting the spider-man hoodie,

“What’re you supposed to be?”

“S-spider-Man” he said, puffing out his chest.

“You sound like you’re twelve”

“Thirteen actually”

I stared at him deadpan as he remained silent.

“I don’t have time for this” I said. “Go home kid. There’s a gunman running around tonight”

I said, turning to leap away.

“W-wait!”

“What?”

“I have powers” he said.

“Oh really?”

“Yeah. Just watch” he paused for a second, then did a backflip with ease. My eyes widened.

“Well shit” I said.

“Does this mean I can join you guys now?” he said, excited.

“J-join us?” I said. “No way! You’re thirteen. Wait a few years. Maybe five”

“What?! But I’ve got the powers” he said. “I can help”

“The powers aren’t the problem”

“Wait, wait. I can do this cool shock thing” he said. “Let me show you”

“I don’t have time. Gunman, remember?”

“I’ll be quick!” he said, desperate. “Just watch”

I looked back to him and watched as he clenched his fist tightly and squatted, groaning to himself. Oh, what the hell.

“You look like you’re trying to take a shit”

He continued groaning to himself, ignoring me.

“Goodnight”

“Wait!” he cried. I ignored him and leapt to swing away. He jumped and grabbed a hold of me, sticking to me.

“What the hell?!” I shouted.

“S-sorry!” he cried. I slowed down and landed on the opposite side of the alley, before pulling myself up to the roof. He pulled off of me, then stood sheepishly, staring at the floor.

“So… am I in?” he mumbled.

“No”

“… please?”

I stared at him and sighed.

“I’ll see what I can do. But don’t count on anything. Meet me here tomorrow, and maybe, I’ll get permission to train you from the original Spider-Man”

“Seriously?!”

“Yeah”

“Holy… Ganke’s gonna be so excited”

“What?”

“Noth-”

We both turned at the sound of a shout, followed by a gunshot.

“S-stay here” I said. The kid nodded and I rushed off, leaping between the gaps in the buildings before landing above another alley. I looked down to see one man stood over another, a gun on the floor slightly away from them.

“How’d you like that, huh?!” the man shouted, pummelling the other guy’s face. “How’d you like that?!”

I leapt down, and hit him over the back of the head, before webbing his feet to the floor. He stumbled backwards, but tore the web easily. Shit, he was a meta. I raised my fists in preparation when the man looked up at me.

“Joshua?!” I said in surprise.

“Spider-Man?” he said, confused. Then a figure leapt out of the darkness landing a top him with crackling hands of blue. He grabbed Joshua’s shoulders and… nothing happened.

We all stood in silence for a moment before the kid calmly, jumped off of Joshua and backed up, standing slightly behind me.

“What was that?” Joshua said.

“I… don’t know” I said, glancing to the kid, frowning. Then I looked to the man on the ground, blood pouring for his face as he crawled across the floor, reaching for the gun. I webbed it away from him and rolled it up into a web ball, before looking back to Joshua.

“What the hell’s going on?” I said.

“I stopped the guy. I was out to buy milk and he was robbing this old man when these cops stopped and tried to get him. He started firing, hit one of them, then ran” Joshua said.

“And you chased him?”

“Yeah” he said.

“That… wasn’t smart. Cool, definitely, but not smart” I said. “You’re not hurt are you? I hit you pretty hard and there was a gunshot”

“Nope. The bullet bounced right off. Think I’m made of stone now”

“Guess we didn’t completely fix whatever happened back at the building”

“You know what’s happening to me?” he said.

“You’ll need to talk to P- the other Spider-Man”

“You’d get him to meet with me again?”

“Uh… yeah. You should probably go see the Dr first though”

“I don’t know” Joshua said, looking down to his hand. “This power, I can help people with it”

“You mean like a superhero?” I asked.

“Yeah” he said, smiling sheepishly.

“Well, I’ll see if Spider-Man’s interested in a new addition to the team. We could even meet up tommorrow”

“Seriously?”

“Well, I mean you said the bullet bounced off of you. Not many metas are bullet proof”

“Thank you” Joshua said, wide eyed. “Thank you so much”

“Can I come?” the kid behind me said. I looked to him, then back to Joshua as the crook groaned behind us.

“Uh… sure” I said. “Probably have to turn this guy in first though”