Black Cat
"Let me get this straight," Sirius started "you're like a superhero and didn't tell me?"
James just rolled his eyes and nodded yes. Since Sirius had seen him fly through his window in a onesie James had been absolutely demolished with questions. "Why didn't you tell me?" "I wanna get bitten by a spider too!" "Dude this is actually so cool." "Can I be your guy in the chair? but like with better hair." Were the main ones, and it had been twelve hours. Needless to say James was a little tired.
"Gosh my best friend is spider boy!" Sirius continued, basically skipping down the hallway at this point.
"Merlin!"
"What?"
"For the last time it's SPIDERMAN." James nearly yelled, glaring at the people in the around him that decided to stare. Spider boy was really insulting. Stupid highschoolers.
"Oops." Sirius said, turning to wink at some poor freshman girl that was staring at him like he was a literal star. Another regular occurrence.
They only walked in silence for a couple moments, because honestly that was the longest either of them were capable of being quiet.
"So,"
James decided he already didn't like where this was going.
"About me being your guy in the cha-"
"Woah, is that my class! I'll see you later tampads."
James was in the air again.
He'd gotten about halfway through his AP physics class before he'd heard police sirens and was out.
He did realize it maybe wasn't the best idea to be skipping class to fight crime but he couldn't help himself.
He soared through the air, relishing the feeling of freedom before changing directions quickly and launching into a slim alleyway.
He'd seen the man he was chasing turn down this way but, now? He just wasn't there.
He turned in a full circle not knowing where the criminal could've gone when he heard a muffled yell from above him. He looked up quickly and frowned at what he saw.
The man he'd been chasing was dangling in the air with his foot tied in a rope.
James suddenly heard a scratching sound come from his left and whipped his head around to see a black figure crawling up the building. It was almost catlike.
He looked back up at the man dangling above him and saw the flashing police lights getting closer, and decided maybe he should see were this other figure was going. He followed as quickly and quietly as he could, not knowing yet if this thing was a threat.
He followed the thing across a few buildings, slightly amazed at the ease in which it moved.
James suddenly lost sight of this maybe person and frowned a little. Again looking around to find where it went when an arm slammed him back against the buildings fire escape wall.
His head smacked into the wall and he blinked quickly, trying to get a hold of himself. He semi got his bearings and snapped his leg up into the person holding him.
The person, that James now knew was a man stumbled back which gave James another chance to snap his arm out and punch him in the face. He pulled his arm back to go in for another punch when a black clad arm just grabbed his fist.
This stopped James for a second. He had super strength and this guy just grabbed his full strength punch like it was nothing?
"What the fu-" James started when he was swung around by his fist and slammed now into the ground.
The man climbed on top of James almost straddling him and pinned him down.
James couldn't lie it felt kinda nice.
"You know, usually I like to go on a date first, but maybe I can make an exception for you." James said, winking.
The way the man above him froze for a second gave James a little urge to laugh, But still he reached his hands up and grabbed the arms that were pinning him down and flipped the two of them over.
Now he was on top.
"Who are you?" James said, putting his serious attitude on. He grabbed the mans arms and tried to keep him down, which admittedly was a bit of a struggle.
"Not really any of your business is it Spiderboy."
James froze for a second, this guy had a hot voice. But he also called him Spiderboy, which was mean. But he sounded so goddamn good.
Shit no.
Think Lily thoughts.
James's little moment had given the other man some time and he flipped them over again. They were now startlingly close to the edge of the building.
The man pressed his arm into James's throat and leaned in close to his face.
James would've like to say he could feel his breath on his face but they both had full masks on, so that couldn't really be the case.
"I'm the Black Cat." The man said in a melodic, aristocratic sounding voice, leaning in right next to James's ear.
He lingered there for just long enough to get Jame's heart hammering before pressing down on his throat very hard one more time and standing up quickly.
"I'm Spiderman." James said lamely, as the Black Cat walked away.
James thought the other boy might not have heard it until he turned back at the other edge of the building and said "Bye now Spiderboy." Before saluting and tipping himself gracefully over the edge.
James gasped a little and practically flew to the edge and looked down. Only to see nothing.
He dropped to the ground and slumped against the little ledge. Only now feeling soreness around his throat.
He sat up a little straighter, again thinking about the soreness around his throat.
James had superhuman strength, healing, durability, agility, and he didn't even know what else yet, and this guy had managed to beat the shit out of him.
Were there other enhanced people now?
This just set James off and he couldn't stop thinking about it.
There goes being the only friendly neighborhood Spiderman.
James walked into his statistics class and slumped down into his creaky desk at the back.
Surprisingly, his little adventure earlier only caused him to miss his third and fourth period, and lunch. And he still had soccer practice to look forward to after school.
He turned his mind back to what had happened only thirty minutes before and replayed everything. Again.
The boy he had seen on that rooftop had been mesmerizing. James hated that he had loved it.
His teacher, Mr. Flitwicks voice snapped him out of his thoughts when he heard him say "Group project."
He suddenly fully turned his attention towards him now wondering what he was on about.
See, he did not like group projects. This was the only class he didn't have with one of his fellow Marauders, so there was nobody fun to work with.
Which is boring obviously.
"We are going to be doing statistical projects with a partner. I'm giving you a set of research questions I want you to answer with statistical techniques, and put together a visual project that will be presented in two weeks time on December 12th. I have also preassigned partners so if you had a preference, too bad. You will also likely be needing to work on this outside of school, so I recommend you get friendly."
James internally groaned. Boring, boring, boring.
He hated stats.
"Emmeline Vance and Pandora Lestrange, Lucinda Talkalot and Dirk Cresswell, Regulus Black and James Potter"
Flitwick kept listing names but James had stopped listening and was now staring at Regulus across the room, who was staring right back at him.
This was going to suck.
Regulus Black walked to the back of the room where James was sitting.
Flitwick had finished listing all the groups and had asked everyone to get started.
James only looked up when Regulus sat at the desk next to him.
"Since when are you in this class?" James asked abruptly.
"Since the beginning of the year."
"I never noticed."
"Funny, you'd think those glasses would actually help you see not just make you look stupid."
James chose to ignore this and instead asked, "What happened to your face?"
He was addressing the little bruise around Regulus's eye that seemed to be only just forming. He must have been punched really hard recently.
"Being around Sirius so often I think you have an alright idea." Regulus said icily. But his eyes darted around a bit like he wasn't quite telling the truth.
"Oh."
James wasn't sure how to respond to that.
He knew about what Walburga and Orion had done to Sirius, but never considered it might be projected onto Regulus.
Shit.
"Could I have your number?" James suddenly asked, not knowing how else to move on.
Regulus looked startled.
"We're doing a project together." James said, doing his best "duh" voice.
"Right."
"So what is it?"
"Just email me or something Potter, I don't need you texting me or something."
"But that's so much work." James whined.
"Ok fine," Regulus said. "On Thursday at six come to my house we can work on the project."
"Works for me."
"Ok then." Regulus said and stood up, grabbing his bag.
He started for the door of the classroom and James frowned a little.
Then the bell went off.
Punctual little bitch.
James thought back to his rooftop encounter yet again. He was replaying what the Black Cat had said on the roof to him when he realized the voice was slightly familiar.
He looked after where Regulus had gone and just shook his head.
There was no way.