Chapter 2
The stranger let go.
Finally.
Damian stumbled back a step, sharp boots scraping over ruined earth, the stench of scorched stone and alien ash seeping into his senses. His heart thundered beneath his ribs. His limbs buzzed with fight-or-flight instinct. But he didn’t run. He never ran.
Instead, he straightened his spine, shoulders squared, fists clenched and hovering slightly at his sides—coiled, just enough to launch forward if needed. A battle stance, subtle but unmistakable.
And now that there was distance—now that he wasn’t being crushed in that maddening embrace—Damian got a full look at the man in front of him.
The stranger looked as though he’d crawled through the mouth of a war and barely made it out alive.
His hair was dark brown streaked with silver, sweat-damp and disheveled, plastered in thick strands against his forehead. There was blood smeared across his temple—fresh, sticky. His goatee, a sharp, neatly trimmed thing beneath cracked lips, was caked with dust and grit. Deep lines carved themselves into his face, not just with age but with wear—the kind of exhaustion that spoke of long battles and longer regrets.
He wore armor—or what remained of it.
A bleeding-edge suit of technology, hugging his frame like a second skin. Metallic plating stretched over a black underlay, the kind that shimmered when the light hit it—but now it was torn, fractured. Chunks of it were missing entirely. One side of his chestplate had melted inward, scorched by something powerful, leaving the glowing core at its center—an arc reactor—half-flickering and pulsing with weak, sputtering light. His left gauntlet looked partially fused, fingers stiffened like they couldn’t quite move right. The armor had veins of red and gold, but everything about it was dulled by dirt and damage.
Damian’s eyes narrowed. His brain was cataloging everything in real time. Height—taller than Father. Physique—lean, but built. Injuries—numerous, none fatal. Emotional state—volatile.
The stranger’s eyes—dark brown and impossibly raw—searched Damian’s face like they still couldn’t accept what they were seeing. There was a desperation in them, like he’d just lost something irreplaceable and was now staring at the ashes.
But Damian didn't flinch.
He didn’t care that this man’s heart was cracking open in front of him.
He didn’t know him. And he didn’t trust him.
“Explain yourself,” Damian said, low and cold, every syllable sharp enough to slice. His voice carried a lethal edge, the way it always did when he didn’t have the upper hand but refused to show it.
The stranger didn’t respond. He just stared. Like he was still waiting for the hallucination to pass.
Damian shifted his weight subtly onto the balls of his feet. Every breath he took was calculated. Every heartbeat was a countdown. He was ready to strike. He was ready to end this.
Damian took a step forward, shoulders bristling, voice curling into a low, venom-laced growl. His green eyes were alight with fury, sharp as the edges of a blade.
"Who are you?" he demanded, fists still half-clenched, coiled and ready. "Where am I? What did you do? How did I get here?" Each question hit like a thrown dagger—quick, precise, intended to wound.
The stranger—the man in broken red-and-gold armor—flinched, just slightly, as if waking from a dream laced with smoke and death.
“I—” he started, voice rasping like he hadn’t spoken in hours. “I don’t… wait. You’re not… you’re not Peter.” His eyes narrowed, disbelief giving way to something colder. “Who are you?”
Damian’s jaw tightened. “I’m the one with the questions. And you still haven’t answered them.” He moved again, a slow, deliberate shift of weight that hinted at violence barely restrained. “If you think I’m some idiot who stumbled here by accident—”
“I don’t know how you got here,” the man snapped back, tone cracking under the pressure. “One second he—he was here, and the next…” He stopped himself, blinking rapidly, as if trying to clear an image burned into his retinas.
Damian’s eyes narrowed further. “He?”
The man didn’t answer.
Damian barked, “Answer me!”
But before another word could leave either of their mouths, a shape moved at the edge of Damian’s vision—silent, smooth, otherworldly.
He turned sharply, every muscle tensing.
A woman—if one could call her that—stepped out from the jagged shadow of what looked like a shattered spacecraft hull. She moved like something built rather than born. Mechanical grace. Dead silence. Her skin was blue, a deep, bruised cobalt, and fitted so tightly over her angular frame it looked sculpted from polished stone. One arm was metal—brutal, unpainted, gleaming under the planet’s dying sun. Her jaw, part-flesh, part-machine, clicked faintly as it shifted. Her left eye was some kind of implant, a flickering red light set into a skeletal socket. Her posture screamed battle-readiness—spine straight, chin tilted down, like a blade mid-draw.
Damian’s senses sharpened the moment she stepped into view. Her skin—no, plating?—shone, a cold, dull blue veined with lines of silver circuitry. Her voice cut through the space between them. “Do you work for Thanos?”
Damian’s eyes narrowed. “Who?”
It wasn’t mockery. It was a real question. A cold knot was forming in his gut, not from fear, but from the gnawing, relentless confusion that had been growing since the moment he’d blinked—and the world had changed.
He had no idea where he was.
No idea who these people were.
And now this walking corpse was accusing him of working for someone he didn’t know.
“Liar,” she snapped, already stepping closer.
Damian shifted. Instinct drove him into a defensive stance, one foot back, knees loose, eyes tracking every movement. His cape still hung off one shoulder, torn and frayed. Dust clung to the blood on his jaw. The remains of Peter’s armor—whoever Peter was—still shimmered over parts of his arms and chest, foreign tech fused with grit and bruises.
“I said I don’t know who that is,” Damian bit out. “I don’t answer to anyone. Certainly not someone named Thanos.”
There was no give in her. No understanding. Her glare could have frozen lava.
Before Damian could strike first, the man—the one who had grabbed him when he arrived—raised both hands like he was trying to calm down wild dogs.
"Okay, okay,” he said, trying for control and not quite reaching it. His voice cracked at the edges. “We’re all clearly freaking out—understandably—and none of us seem to know what the hell is going on.”
His eyes were bloodshot behind the battered iron mask. Stubble shadowed his jaw. Sweat slicked his temples, and his breathing was shallow, like someone who’d been running for too long—through grief, maybe, or through war. His armor was broken in places, scorched and dented. His right gauntlet sparked softly, like it was on the verge of dying altogether. And his eyes—his eyes looked like something had been ripped out of them.
He looked at Damian again, slower this time. Not panicked. Not hoping. Just… wrecked.
“Look, Blue—dial it down a notch,” he said, glancing at the woman. “He doesn’t know who Thanos is and he’s like twelve years old. Either he’s lying, or something even weirder’s going on than usual. And honestly? That bar was already underground.”
Then his gaze locked onto Damian again. And Damian hated how gentle his voice got.
“Kid. You said you don’t know who Thanos is. Okay. That tracks. You didn’t know me, either.”
“Should I?” Damian’s voice stayed flat, but his fists stayed clenched. “You hugged me like I belonged to you.”
The man flinched—just for a second. Then he nodded, slowly. “Yeah, well. I thought you were someone else.”
Damian didn’t speak. He let the words hang.
The man’s shoulders sagged, like his bones were tired. “Let’s all just… sit. Or stand. Or scowl at each other in meaningful silence. Whatever helps us figure this out without anybody getting vaporized, cool?”
Damian’s jaw tightened. He didn’t trust these people. Didn’t like being touched. Hated being confused.
But.
He was outnumbered. Outgunned. And, annoyingly, the man was right—everyone here seemed just as lost as he was.
So Damian didn’t relax.
But he didn’t strike either.
Which, for him, was practically an act of god.
The room was blindingly white. Too clean. Too still.
The walls were smooth and white, the ceiling high with recessed lighting that buzzed softly. Everything felt sterile—quiet and humming, like the inside of a very expensive lab, or a very expensive prison. He couldn’t tell which.
His fingers flexed unconsciously on the armrests. His legs were tensed, not quite ready to run, but itching to. He scanned for exits. The door behind the two men. No windows. One security camera in the corner. Minimal vents. He could work with that.
Peter sat hunched in a sleek metal chair, one leg bouncing with barely-contained tension. The walls were smooth like glass, the kind of clinical nothingness that made your skin itch. There was a thin table between him and the two men who’d led him here—one older, tall, dressed like someone who ran the world. The other, younger, with a friendlier smile and an edge just beneath it.
It didn’t help that he was still in tatters.
Dried blood caked on his chin. One of his eyebrows still stung from a cut. The nanotech suit clung to him like wet fabric, jagged and incomplete, flickering at the seams like a dying star. His knuckles were raw. His back ached. And the pain from Titan still coiled deep inside him—like his atoms remembered crumbling even if he didn’t.
Peter didn’t know who they were, but his mind was screaming: bad guys with money. Or worse, government. Not S.H.I.E.L.D., though—he’d have clocked that branding by now. These guys were something else. Too polished. Too calm.
He hadn’t said a word yet.
The atmosphere felt too polished, too calm. It screamed money. And Peter had dealt with that kind of money before—the kind that wore smiles like weapons.
They hadn’t cuffed him, but he knew better than to assume freedom. The younger guy—he’d introduced himself as Dick—was playing the good cop. Trying to ease the tension. The older one, Bruce, hadn’t said much at all. Just stood there like a storm waiting to break.
“So,” Dick said, leaning on the table a little, “Peter, right?”
Peter’s jaw tensed. “Yeah.”
Peter followed Dick’s gaze down to his own chest. What remained of the Iron Spider suit was practically a crime scene—torn open at the ribs, scorched black in places, bloodied, covered in flakes of ash that still hadn’t shaken loose. The nanotech pulsed weakly along the edges, glowing red and gold in intermittent sparks like dying embers. It looked more like a ghost than a suit.
“That thing you’re wearing,” Dick said, nodding toward him, “what is it?”
Peter had half a mind to say Really? He glanced down again, deadpan. The unmistakable, though cracked, spider symbol was still etched into what was left of the chestplate. Legs splayed out in that now-iconic shape. Sure, it was fractured, a little charred, but still pretty damn visible.
Are these guys idiots or what? That’s literally a spider. Not a bunny or cat. A spider. It’s called branding, ever heard of it?
He held back the sarcasm by sheer force of will and tried to come off casual. “Just something I threw together,” he muttered, shrugging one exposed, bloodied shoulder. The motion made pain ripple up his back, but he didn’t show it.
Bruce stepped in now, sharper, keener. The way he was watching Peter—calculating—reminded him way too much of Aunt May on a terrible day.
“We’ve never seen anything like it,” Bruce said. “The material isn’t in any database we have access to. And the symbols on your chest—”
“—aren’t yours to worry about,” Peter snapped back before he could help himself.
The tension in the room ticked up a degree. Dick’s expression flickered with something between surprise and concern, but Bruce? Bruce didn’t even blink.
Peter exhaled slow through his nose, trying not to show how his knees were shaking. The adrenaline was burning off and all he had left was blood, dirt, and sarcasm.
He crossed his arms, glaring as best he could without looking like he’d pass out. Peter’s fingers twitched under the table. If he had to make a break for it—
“Look,” Dick said gently, “no one’s trying to hurt you. You showed up in our home. Covered in blood. Wearing—whatever that is. You can understand why we’re confused.”
Peter stared at them both, eyes darting between expressions. He didn’t trust the calm, didn’t trust how they kept circling questions without giving answers of their own.
“You work for someone?” Peter asked, voice low. “A company? A lab?”
Dick glanced at Bruce.
“We don’t work for anyone,” Bruce said. His voice was rough, like gravel. “We’re trying to help.”
“Right,” Peter said. “Because random billionaires are always just so helpful when strangers just spawn in their mansions.”
Neither of them blinked at the word spawn. That was worrying.
Peter leaned back, looking around the room again. No clear exit, but maybe a vent behind him. Too narrow. His heartbeat picked up.
“So what is this, then?” Peter asked, narrowing his eyes. “Some rich guy’s bunker? Secret villain lair? Gonna experiment on the weird kid who fell out of the sky?”
Dick’s face shifted—just a little. Surprise? Amusement? Peter couldn’t tell.
“We’re not villains,” Bruce said, the calm edge in his tone turning slightly sharper.
Peter didn’t respond.
The silence stretched.
Finally, Dick leaned in a bit and said, “Okay, Peter. If you’re not from here—where are you from?”
Peter’s brain short-circuited. Because that was too on the nose. Too close to the truth.
“Queens,” he said cautiously.
Bruce tilted his head. “Queens… where?”
Peter hesitated. “New York?”
They both exchanged a look.
“We’re in Gotham,” Bruce said slowly, like it should mean something. “You’re not from anywhere near here.”
Gotham?
Peter felt something drop in his chest.
What the hell was a Gotham?
Peter’s brows pulled tight.
“Gotham?” he echoed, blinking like the word had short-circuited something in his brain. “Where the heck even is that? Is that—Canada? Or like… an off-brand Vegas?”
Bruce’s eyes snapped to him, cold and sharp as steel.
“Where’s Damian?”
The sudden change in tone punched the air out of the room. Peter jerked back slightly, startled by the force in Bruce’s voice.
“What?” Peter blinked. “Who’s—?”
“What did you do to him?” Bruce stepped forward, not shouting, but each word landed with brutal precision. “Where is my son?”
Peter’s mouth went dry. Son?
“I didn’t do anything to anyone!” he shot back, voice rising. “I don’t even know who that is!”
Dick stood now too, less aggressive, but still tense. Watching. Blocking the door.
Bruce slammed his hands on the table, hard enough that Peter flinched. “Then how did you get here? Why are you in his place?!”
Peter stood too, chair screeching behind him. “I don’t know! One second I was—” His voice cracked, the weight of everything suddenly flooding his throat. “I was dying, okay? On some rock in the middle of a war and then I blink and I’m in your weird mansion and everyone’s yelling and—God, I don’t even know what the hell is going on!”
The room was too bright. His head was spinning. His hands curled into fists, half expecting webs to shoot out, half praying they wouldn’t.
Bruce’s eyes bored into him, searching, dissecting.
Peter tried to breathe.
“I didn’t take anyone,” Peter said, quieter now. The edge in his voice was fraying, unraveling into something rawer, something more real. “I don’t even know how I got here.”
Another beat of silence. Heavy. Drenched in something unspoken.
Then Dick stepped forward, hands raised in a calming gesture, the exact sort of move Peter’s guidance counselor used whenever a kid looked like they were about to throw a chair.
“Okay,” Dick said, voice soft. “Let’s just… pause. Take a breath.”
Peter stared between them—Bruce still radiating that grim, hyper-controlled fury, and Dick, gentler but still sharp beneath the calm. Both of them were coiled, tense in a way Peter recognized too well.
They were used to violence. Used to situations going sideways.
He didn’t like how familiar that made them feel.
His heart thudded against his ribcage, faster now. Not from fear exactly. But from the pressure—like something big was about to crash over him, and he couldn’t see what yet.
Screw it.
“I know you guys are smart,” Peter said, eyes flicking between the two of them. “So let’s not play games. You’ve already figured it out.”
Bruce’s jaw flexed. Dick tilted his head slightly, confused.
Peter gestured loosely to his ruined suit, the glowing veins of dying nanotech still crawling faintly over his ribs.
“I’m Spider-Man,” he said. “Okay? Surprise. Secret’s out.”
He braced for the fallout.
Instead, Dick blinked. “…Who?”
Peter’s mouth opened, then closed again. “Spider-Man.”
Dick looked at Bruce. Bruce raised a single brow, unreadable.
“You… don’t know who that is?” Peter asked, slowly.
Dick looked genuinely puzzled. “Is that, like, a code name or something?”
Peter stared at them both, disbelief rising like a tide. "Seriously?"
Bruce stepped forward then, voice hard as iron. “Enough. Where is Damian? What did you do to him? What’s your plan?”
And Peter, lips parting to reply, could only think—
Are these guys idiots?
Because he was literally wearing the symbol. Right there. Red and black and cracked and scorched, but still very clearly a spider. Even half-dead, the suit basically screamed superhero.
And yet here they were, acting like he was the villain.
This day was getting worse by the minute.
Peter leaned back slightly in the chair—well, slumped was more accurate—arms crossed over what remained of his chestplate like it was armor against the two strangers across from him.
Neither of them had reacted to the name Spider-Man. Not even a flicker of recognition.
And that… was bad.
Really bad.
He wasn’t on Titan anymore, that much was obvious. But this wasn’t Earth either. Not his Earth. He knew his geography and the city name—Gotham—didn’t ring a single bell. The only Gotham he knew was the neighborhood deli down the block that sold good bagels and maybe illegal fireworks.
But what had really stuck with him—haunted him in the quiet moments between questions—was that moment. The blink.
One second, he was dying.
Not metaphorically. Actually dying. He could feel his cells ripping apart, his skin vanishing into ash, his healing factor trying to stitch him back together and losing the race.
Then... nothing.
No pain. No ash. No Mr. Stark.
Just a blink.
And suddenly he was seated at this obnoxiously fancy dinner table, in a house that probably cost more than Midtown High’s annual budget, with a stranger staring at him like he was supposed to be someone else.
And that was it, wasn’t it?
They’d looked at him expecting someone else.
Damian.
Whoever that was.
The room hadn’t been set for a hostage situation. There’d been food on the table. Silverware. Water glasses with condensation. No panic. No yelling.
It had been domestic.
Normal.
Which meant he wasn’t supposed to be there.
He had taken someone else’s place.
Peter’s brows drew together slightly, gaze flicking between the two men again. The younger one, Dick, was tense but open—watching Peter like someone trying to piece a puzzle together. The older one, Bruce, looked like he could snap a neck with a pinky finger and had already mentally prepared to do so. They were both so sure Peter had done something to this Damian guy.
But Peter had no idea who that was.
Still… maybe that’s what happened. Maybe, whatever was going on with Thano’s plan—maybe instead of dusting completely, he’d glitched through reality. Landed here. In this Damian’s chair. In his life.
Which meant… Damian was dusted? Was Damian back on his reality, where he should’ve been.
Titan.
His stomach turned.
He glanced down at the cracked spider symbol on his chest and swallowed hard.
Wherever here was, he needed to fix this. Fast.