Enter, Troubadour
Peter
A scorpion suit.
A FUCKING SCORPION SUIT.
Peter dodges as the large robotic tail whirs and whips at him.
“I’m not going to lie, Mac, that suit looks pretty cool. Did you know that Scorpions and Spiders are like cousins?” Peter yells, running along the wall towards where Gargan had his claws sunk into the brick. He kicks him in the chest, knocking him back off the wall. He yells when Gargan’s other hand comes up and grabs his ankle, the claws digging into his calf.
“Stop calling me Mac.” He roars as the two men meet the ground. Gargan springs up, using his tail to lift himself. He lifts Peter up to eye level.
“What do you want me to call you then? Scorpion? That’s pretty on the nose.” Scorpion whips him against the ground and Peter swears he can feel his brain rattling around in his head as fireworks erupt in his vision.
“Okay, Scorpion it is then.” Peter groans, webbing up Scorpion's eyes, blocking his vision. At the same time, something crashes into Scorpions head, sending him reeling backwards, letting go of Peter.
Peter looks up and meets eyes with Matt, dressed in his Daredevil suit. Peter grabs his billy club from where it landed on the ground, throwing it up to Matt, who catches it with ease. He disappears for a moment, reappearing on the ground beside the building. Peter shoots a couple more webs at Scorpions eyes, where he was scratching at the webs to get them off.
“I thought you had work today?” Peter asks.
“I’m my own boss, I can do what I want.” He pauses, tilting his head towards Scorpion. “I thought you had work as well.”
“I just got off. Dodge.” The two men duck as Scorpion's tail whips out at them again.
“Is this the guy that was coming after you? You didn’t mention anything about a scorpion suit.” Matt says, clicking his billy clubs together and throwing one. A cord extends from one to the other, wrapping around Scorpion's legs. Matt tugs and Scorpion falters a little. Peter quickly grabs the cord and pulls with Daredevil, finally pulling Scorpion to the ground.
“Yeah, it’s new. I don’t think he really understands how to use it yet. He’s pretty-” Peter is cut off as Scorpions tail wraps itself around him, chucking him against the closest wall. He feels the air in his lungs get punched out as he makes contact with the hard brick. “I was going to say clumsy, but I think he’s starting to get the hang of it.” He wheezes, knowing Matt would hear him.
Matt is tossed against an opposite wall, Scorpion using the cord from his own billy club to throw him. Scorpion finally starts regaining himself, ripping the webbing off of his eyes and unwinding the billy club from around his legs.
“You two are starting to get on my nerves.” He grinds out, stalking towards Matt. Peter jumps up, running at Scorpion, dodging his slashing tail as he goes. He launches himself onto the man's back, wrapping his arms around his neck.
Scorpion stops, whipping around trying to get the spider off his back, his arms come up to try and grab Peter, but he dodges it, putting more pressure around the man's neck. Scorpion freezes up and Peter is prepared to let go before the man passes out, but Scorpion simply turns his head.
“Better watch your back.”
“Spider-Man!” Matt yells, launching up towards Scorpion. Scorpion easily pushes Matt back down, resting a foot on his back to keep him down. Peter unwraps his arms from Scorpions neck as his spidey senses tingle at the base of his neck. He whirls around just in time to see the spikey barb at the tip of Scorpion's tail plunge itself into the flesh of Peter’s lower back.
Peter screams, first from the pain, then from being thrown, once again, like a ragdoll towards another building. He hears Matt grunt as Scorpion applies more pressure to where his leg was resting on his back.
“And now, I will crush you like a bug.”
Dink.
Something pings off the side of Scorpion's suit and he turns to where it came from.
“Aren’t you supposed to be crushing Spider-Man? He is the bug after all.” Deadpool shouts from the roof, shooting at Scorpion again.
“And the one you originally wanted dead.” He adds. Scorpion growls, moving his leg off of Matt, squaring up his posture as he turns to face Deadpool.
“Didn’t I kill you?” He shouts out. Deadpool nods, ricocheting another bullet off of his suit.
“And now it’s my turn.” Deadpool jumps down, and Matt cringes at the crunch his ankles make as his feet meet the ground. Deadpool sheaths the gun, pulling out a sword instead.
“Hey sexy, want to get webs out of here?” Matt’s jaw slackens for a moment at what the man said.
“Excuse me?”
Deadpool stops, turning to look at him.
“You heard what I said, get the fuck out of here.” He manages to say before he is also whipped by Scorpion's tail. He manages to keep a grip on his sword as he’s tossed through the air.
Matt runs, dodging and weaving past Scorpion to Peter, who was still laying on the ground in the alley.
“Pete, Peter, are you okay?” Matt whispers, finding himself accidentally using the nickname. Peter nods.
“Having a hard time moving. I think his tail was tipped with something.” Matt feels himself panic for a moment before bending down to help Peter up. It was like lifting dead weight, with Peter almost unable to hold himself up.
“Okay, that’s okay, I’ll take you back to your apartment.” Peter nods, trying and failing to move his legs. He wound up just being dragged by Matt.
“Did you beat him? Why are we leaving?”
“Your red friend is handling it.” Matt responds, adjusting his arms, still trying to find the least awkward way to drag Peter.
“Deadpool?” Matt nods.
“M’kay.” Peter is quiet the rest of the way back, not passed out Matt observes, just quiet.
Matt manages to get into the back alley behind their apartment before realising something.
“Peter, I can’t get you up.” Peter nods, clumsily unwrapping himself from around Matt to lean against the wall. His feet begin to slide out from under him and he adjusts himself.
“I think I can move a bit now. You go up and I’ll shoot a web to you. I can’t pull myself up alone.” Matt nods, climbing on top of pieces of garbage around him to vault up.
“Okay, shoot it up.” Peter curls his middle and ring finger into his palm and a web shoots up towards Matt. He grabs it and immediately wants to let go. It’s cold and slimy, both things Matt can feel through his gloves. He pulls instead, ignoring his discomfort to help Peter up.
Peter holds on to the web, climbing up the wall with surprising grace for his state. Matt hauls him over the edge once he is high enough. It’s still light out and Matt has to be careful to make sure no one is watching as the two make their way inside of Matt’s apartment through the roof door.
“Take off your suit, I’ll look at your back and get you some clothes.” Peter nods, pulling his mask off once he gets to the bottom of the stairs. He chooses to sit on the floor, not wanting to get blood on Matt’s couch. He struggles to get his boots off, feeling like a child trying to take off their rainboots.
“Matt, I need some help.” He says, embarrassed. Matt emerges from his bedroom, his mask off as well, carrying a small red bag.
“You only need your shirt off for now Pete. Arms up.” Peter lifts his arm and Matt reaches out to help lift his shirt. Peter hisses as the shirt pulls away from the wound on his back. Matt hovers his fingers over it, trying to figure out how bad it is.
“It’s pretty deep, but not too long. I think your skin tore around the initial wound when he threw you though. Are you ready to get some more Matt Murdock stitches?”
“Mmm, my favourite.” Peter jokes. Matt fetches a towel, laying it on the ground. Peter insists he lay on the ground so he didn’t get Matt’s couch bloody. He rests on his stomach as Matt cleans around the wound, preparing to stitch it up.
“I can definitely smell something other than blood, I’m not too sure what it is though.” Peter nods.
“I can’t really feel what you’re doing right now but my fingers and toes aren’t numb anymore.”
Matt felt better knowing that Peter couldn’t feel what he was doing. His father used to let him have a sip of his alcohol when he needed to be stitched up, a habit Matt carried with him long after. He stopped the habit once he realised that he had more skin that had been stitched than not.
The last thing he needed in life was an alcohol dependency.
He stitches Peter up tediously before applying a bandage over top of it.
“I would get you to stay so I can make sure you are healing okay but I can hear Karen making her way up here.” Matt says, leaving the room to grab Peter some old clothes that he didn’t wear anymore. “I figured you wouldn’t want Karen seeing you like this?” Peter nods.
“Yeah, thank you.” He slowly pulls the sweater Matt handed him over his bruising skin, and then the sweatpants over the bottom half of his suit.
“Call me or Karen if you need anything, okay?” Peter nods, grabbing his shirt and mask from the floor, shoving them into the sweater pocket. He shoves his boots into his sweater, moving to the door barefooted.
Matt can hear Karen intercept Peter in the hallway once he leaves. He uses this as a chance to change out of his Daredevil suit and into a shirt and sweatpants.
“Peter, your forehead is bleeding.” He hears Karen say from the hallway. Matt cringes. He didn’t notice a wound on Peter’s head.
“Oh yeah, I hit my head, don’t worry, Matt already mother henned me.” Peter lies easily, laughing. Karen nods, making her way past him.
“Matt is home?” Peter nods.
“Yeah, we got home from work at the same time and that's when he started fussing over me.”
“Got it, I’ll see you around Pete.” Matt hears the sound of Peter's door opening and closing at the same time as his own.
“Matt.” Karen calls out. Matt emerges from the bedroom and Karen hurries over to him, checking him over.
“Are you okay?” He nods.
“Just some scrapes and bruises. Peter honestly got worse than me.” He replies, going along with the story Peter was making up in the hallway.
“Yeah what happened?”
“Got too close to the big green guy on his way back from work, took a piece of brick to the head or something.” Karen nods, believing him.
“Did you beat him?”
Matt shrugs.
“Spider-Man got hurt and some other dude showed up, he told me to get Spider-Man out of there so, I assume he’s handling it.” Karen nods, eyebrow quirking a bit.
“You sure you’re not too hurt.”
“I swear. I’ll be stiff for a while but I’m okay. Spider-Man took the brunt of it.”
He catches Karen up as she cooks dinner for the two of them.
“A thank you for saving Hell’s Kitchen.”
“I didn’t”
“Shhh.”
Matt sits at his dining room table, explaining everything he knew about Mac Gargan and Scorpion to Karen as she cooked. He’s in the middle of a sentence when he is suddenly interrupted by the sound of loud, repetitive, banging coming from Peter’s apartment.
“What is that?” Karen asks, turning towards Matt’s bedroom where the noise was coming from.
“I don’t know, it’s coming from Peter’s room.”
Karen snorts, cheeks flushing slightly in embarrassment.
“Sounds like someone’s having a good night.” She jokes.
“Shh.” Matt stands up, moving closer to the bedroom,not liking what he was hearing.
“Jezz Matt, voyeurist much.” Karen continues to joke.
“Karen, quiet for a second.” Matt enters the bedroom, putting his ears against the wall. His head shakes with the wall as another bang resonates out.
And then a shout. Matt rushes out of the bedroom towards his front door.
“Karen, stay here.”
Karen’s joking demeanour immediately leaves, her face paling.
“What’s wrong?”
“Just stay here, okay, I think there might be someone in Peter’s apartment?”
Matt exits his apartment, moving towards Peter’s door. He knocks.
“Peter, are you okay?”
He’s met with the sound of something crashing to the floor in front of the door.
“Stop. Please, I’m sorry.” He hears Peter whisper. He strains his ears, trying to hear another heartbeat in Peter’s apartment. All he can hear is Peter’s own racing heart and wheezing intake of breath.
“Peter, what’s wrong?”
He turns as Karen leaves his doorway, slowly inching closer to him.
“Karen, you need to go back into my apartment, something isn’t right.”
“No Matt, let me help.” She cringes at the sound of more banging.
“Karen, it’s not safe for you to be out here.” Matt urges, moving to push her back into his apartment.
“Why, what’s going on?”
“I can’t hear anyone else inside. I… I think he might be hurting himself or something, I don’t want him to hurt you.” Karen gasps.
“Come back inside. Please. I have an idea.” Karen says, grabbing Matt’s hand and pulling him inside.