End Of Beginning

Peter

Peter sat on the edge of a roof, craning his neck to hear better. He had seen Daredevil do it almost every time that they had worked together over the past week, which wasn’t as often as Peter, nor Deadpool, had hoped.

It did practically nothing, the words of the men in the building next door were garbled whispers.

How did he do it?

Peter would have to get closer. Or hope that Daredevil showed up to do his freaky listening.

Maybe that’s his superpower or something.

Peter swings over to the opposite building and slowly scales the wall down towards the window he had seen the men through. They were the same three men that he had seen the first night he had met Daredevil.

He still couldn’t hear them.

Slowly, he inched closer to the window, moving his arm towards the bottom of the window.

Please be unlocked.

He curls his fingers under the bottom of the window, his knuckles brushing against the chipped paint of the windowsill, and pushes up. The window slid open smoothly, not making a sound.

Oh thank fuck.

Peter slides down the wall, moving so his head is next to the window, he cranes his neck again, and this time, he can actually hear.

“You got another cigarette?” A scratchy voice asks.

“No, you already smoked a whole pack of mine, you owe me.”

Peter moves his head away from the window, cringing as the loud shrill of a phone ringing fills his ears.

“Would you two shut up, he’s calling me.”

The phone stops ringing as he answers the call and Peter moves closer once again.

“Yeah what’s up.”

Silence.

“Yes we understand, and I don’t mean to say I told you so, but we said that he’s not in Queens anymore.”

“Oh my god, gimme the phone.” A different voice angrily interrupts.

“Hello.” The angry voice says. Peter assumes he took over the phone call.

“Yeah no, what an idiot, it was smart of you to check Queen’s first… mhm, Midtown Manhattan next… yeah, we’ve been hearing that Spider-Man has been showing up in Hell’s Kitchen lately if you want to try checking there… um, yeah let me ask.”

He hears the beep of a button as the guy mutes whoever was on the other end.

“How’s the suit coming along?”

“It’s almost finished, we can deliver it to him by Monday.”

The phone beeps as it is unmuted.

“We can get it to you by Monday… yeah, see you then.”

The phone beeps as he hangs up and Peter finally pushes open the window as wide as he could, flinging himself inside.

“Hey guys, fancy meeting you here.” The men don’t move, shocked that Spider-Man was standing in the room with them. Peter looks around at the kitchen that he appeared to be in. From what he could see, the apartment was sparsely decorated, with only a few pieces of furniture. It looked like it was rarely used.

“Wow, this place is nice, I really need to hire whoever decorated this place to decorate my apartment.” Peter says sarcastically. The men took that time to finally spring at him.

Peter webs up the first two easily, but the last one gets too close for him to web up. The man aims a quick punch towards Peter's face, which he easily ducks, twisting behind the guy and pushing him into the wall, webbing him up as well.

“C’mon, you guys really need to learn how to put up a fight, that was so boring.” Peter shouts as he moves away from the men, peeking his head into another room.

It was completely empty.

“So.”

He ducks back into the kitchen, moving down the hallway and into another. A dirty bathroom that reeks of mildew.

“Where’s this suit you guys were talking about?” He shouts once again, cringing as he hopes no one else in the building could hear him. The walls appeared to be thin, judging by what he could hear in the other apartments around him.

Finally, after moving down another hallway, he finds a bedroom. One small single bed and a pull out couch filled the space. Peter ducks down and checks under the bed, groaning as his bones creak. There was nothing but cobwebs.

“Hello, there spiders.” He springs back up and moves on to opening closets.

Coats. Shoes. Guns. More spiders.

He walks back out to the three guys in the kitchen. All of whom are struggling to try and escape the webbing.

“Well, I found nothing but spiders.”

He sits down at their small folding table, rocking the folding chair as he lands in it.

“Wonder if any of them are related to me.” He snorts, and then is cut off when he sees a phone next to him on the table.

Bingo!

“So uh, how much did the guy you were on the phone with pay you?” Peter asks looking up. He props his feet up on the table, crossing one over the other, attempting to go for a bad cop look. He crosses his arms for added effect.

“It must have been a lot if you broke someone out of prison.” The three men don’t speak, only making groaning and strained shouting sounds as they continue to try and get out of the webbing.

“Okay, you’re not going to talk.” Peter stands up and grabs the phone from the table, shoving it in his pocket. “I’m going to take this, and I’m going to call the police. You three will get to see the beautiful place that you broke that guy out of.” He walks over to the window and begins to crawl out, feet first.

“Welp, see ya fella’s.”

~~~~~~

There was nothing on the phone. It was a burner. The only important thing on the phone was the name of who they were calling. Mac Gargan.

Stupid of them to even put his name in if they just had to get rid of the phone.

“Are you sure there’s nothing else on the phone?” Deadpool asks through the phone. Peter found himself on the phone with him more often than not lately. Finding himself answering Deadpools calls with less hesitance, somehow enjoying his company.

“Yeah DP, I’ve checked.”

“Did you check the camera roll?”

“Why would I do that?”

“Evidence, blueprints, dick pics, you never know.” Peter rolls his eyes and goes into the camera roll. Nothing.

“Nothing.”

“What about recently deleted. If you were able to figure out the password to get into the phone you can get into the recently deleted.”

Peter checks the recently deleted as well. Once again, nothing.

Peter groans, digging his palms into his eyes.

“There’s a man that broke out of prison right under my nose, and he’s after me. I can’t stop him if I don’t get more info DP.”

“Webs, baby, don’t stress, you’ve got those spidey senses of yours, they should keep you safe if you don’t think you can keep yourself safe.”

Peter shakes his head, a stressed laugh escaping his lips.

“I don’t even have those to keep me safe. They’ve been all out of whack lately. I thought I had finally figured them out a couple years ago when I was on a trip in Europe but that just fell flat a couple months after.”

“Spider-Man in Europe, that sounds fun. Didn’t know you could have fun.”

“Shut up, I have fun all the time.”

“Patrolling doesn’t count as fun.”

“That’s not fair.”

“Yellow agrees with me, for once.”

“Tell yellow to shut up.”

“Yeah I do that a lot, it doesn’t work… Hey, have you tried just searching up the name of the guy in the phone, what did you say it was, Max Gardner?”

“Mac Gargan. No, I did not.” Peter pulls his laptop over and enters the name Mac Gargan into the search.

“Bingo.”

“What did you get?”

“MacDonald Gargan, arrested in 2016 on counts of multiple felonies including illegal weapons deals and homicide, recently broke out of prison.”

“No wonder he goes by Mac, who the fuck names their kid MacDonald. Do you recognize the name?”

“Kind of, I don’t know, I’m better at recognizing people by face and not name.” Peter clicks on pictures and finally understands where he recognized him from.

“Yeah, I recognize him. He was dealing with The Vulture like ten years ago, they cut a massive boat in half.”

Peter cringes just thinking about it. He was so sloppy when he first started being Spider-Man, even with all the fancy tech and suits that Mr. Stark had given him.

“So do you think he’s getting a suit for The Vulture, or taking over for him or something?”

“I don’t even know.” Peter sighs, slouching over. He could feel exhaustion seeping into his muscles and bones.

“What’re you up to right now DP?” He asks, changing the topic. He pushes his laptop to the end of the bed and flops down onto his flat pillow, choosing to give up for a bit.

“Stake out.”

“What kind?”

“Usual mercenary stuff. Big money to take out some traffickers. I’ve got a sexy new rifle to test out, but don’t worry spidey, I will NOT be shooting them in the head.”

He goes quiet for a second.

“I’m winking right now.”

“Mhm, got it. Y’know, you’re not supposed to tell me that, it gives away that you’re lying.”

“What if I was just winking because I have an eyelash in my eye.”

“You told me you don’t have hair, so that probably means you don’t have eyelashes.”

“What if I borrowed some of my wife’s really long fake eyelashes and one got into my eye.”

Peter smiles at the thought of Deadpool with long eyelashes. He had never seen Deadpool under the mask so he could only picture him with eyelashes on his mask, which sounded even funnier.

“I’ll let you have your fun with your stakeout. Try your best not to kill anyone.”

“Can’t make any promises, sleep tight sweet cheeks.”

Peter hangs up and pulls his computer back close to him, continuing his research.

He finds out that Adrian Toomes had died a year prior, and Peter was ashamed to admit that it made him feel a slight bit of relief. Other than that there wasn’t much else to find out about Mac Gargan. No sightings, no updates.

Peter chooses not to sleep that night, or at least convinces himself that it was his choosing and not his usual insomnia and anxiety. Instead of sleeping he watches out his window as people and cars pass below, the street and city lights blur as his eyes go in and out of focus.

His eyes, when they aren’t focusing and unfocusing,fall heavy, multiple times. They snap open every time the billboard changes colours across from him. The advertisements from the billboard are imprinted in his eyelids by the time the sun rose.

Travel agency, energy drink, lingerie, repeat, flashes every time he closes his eyes for too long.

Staying up for days on end had been much easier when he was first bitten by that spider, but now he felt exhausted constantly.

Peter decides to shower. That always helps.

And it did help. The water stream in the shower is bearable and the water stays hotter for a few minutes longer than it did in his last place.

The mirror is fogged up when Peter gets out and he drags his fingers over it, scribbling shapes. The moisture beads under his finger.

In the mirror Peter sees that his wavy hair, which appears more curly now that it’s wet, easily reaches past his ear. He can’t seem to remember the last time he had cut it.

May used to always cut his hair, and MJ had touched it up a couple times but other than that he wasn’t sure if he had actually cut his hair since. Had he really been letting his hair grow for almost three years?

Grabbing a strand he pulls it taunt. The strand reached just above his jaw. He let it go and it springs back into a halo around his earlobe.

Brushing his teeth, Peter gets ready to leave his apartment for the day. He didn’t have to go to work for a few more hours but being in his apartment was starting to make him feel claustrophobic. The warm air from the bathroom causes sweat to bead on his forehead and the dust particles in the air tickle his nostrils uncomfortably.

His finger twitches towards the top drawer of his bedside table where he keeps his suit.

Patrolling would do for now.

He grabs the suit and pulls it on, struggling to pull the pieces on as they stick to his still damp skin.

Finally, with his suit on, he pushes open his window, crawling out and swinging away.

He catches a quick glimpse of Matt and Karen in Matt’s kitchen as he swings by. Smiling when he sees the two.

Just friends my ass.