limited server space
Peter knows more than most that sometimes, science really is just as cool as in the movies. He is well acquainted with being at the pinnacle of science so impressive he often can’t believe it isn’t science fiction; from revolutionary prosthetics and state-of-the-art bee drones saving the bees, to saving the world from a symbiotic alien invasion using a goddamn particle accelerator.
But sometimes science is this; Peter Parker, alone in what is now his garage-turned-office staring at a screen full of code at 8pm on a Friday, surrounded by energy drink cans and blankets evidencing the brief power-naps he takes in lieu of proper sleep. He focuses his bloodshot eyes on the screen, fatigued from wrestling with the software all week. The model is finally running, but it’s mind-numbingly slow, seemingly stuck at around sixty four percent. It’s a large model, encompassing spatial data on several pollutants around the city and the results are long past overdue to being sent off to the rest of the team for the next stage of analysis. He misses the speed at which these damn things would run in the EMF labs, where thanks to the wall-to-ceiling server rooms he could do this sort of analysis at the click of a button, or even the less impressive but still practical set-up at Otto’s lab; instead he has to settle for the ‘server corner’, composed of scrambled together pieces of tech he has been able to find across the city that emanate an unsettling heat he should probably be more worried about than he is.
He has had a hell of a day, and spent so long setting up the code to work that he can’t give up now; last week, he had made the mistakeof not babysitting his computer as the model ran, thinking he could step away and have a nice date with MJ and return later that night to the analysis results safely stored, but something must have overheated, and he returned to a dreaded blue screen and his efforts unsaved. He would fill up his time with one of the many other overdue tasks - helping MJ research for her latest podcast episode, scrolling through medical journals in the hope of finding something to help Harry, consulting with one of the other researchers about this current EMF project - but from the sound of the fans desperately trying to cool down his PC set-up, he worries one wrong move could set things aflame. Quite literally.
Shit. He’s good at many things, but sitting around and waiting? Most definitely isn’t one of them. He is antsy lately in a way that he can’t shake. He knows that this ‘Spider-Man Sabbatical’ is the best thing for him, for his mental and physical health, for his relationship, but he still can’t get used to it. He’s itching to get out into the city, for the sense of gravity tugging on his limbs, for the just-right tension of his webs as he builds momentum.
And it’s not like he’s given it up completely. He lets Miles take on the more full-time stuff - daily patrols, monitoring the city, the big stuff - but he’s available on request, or for cover or back-up as needed, and sometimes dons the suit for a variety of other things; photography, the convenience of various EMF research tasks, keeping an eye out for Yuri. It’s just different. He’s used to being at the beck and call of Spider-Man duties, of his life being determined by the rumblings of the city, to not having a life.
Balance. That’s what this whole hiatus is supposed to be about. Balance. He doesn’t know the meaning of the word. Has never known the meaning of the word; even before the bite and his powers, there was studying and robotics club and AV club and volunteering at F.E.A.S.T. and worrying about money. The same habits of skipping meals and treating sleep as a hindrance are things he still hasn’t managed to shake. His role at the Foundation is a full-time job, but he goes beyond the forty-hour week on a regular basis, and that isn't even counting the hours he still commits to volunteering at F.E.A.S.T. With great power comes great responsibility is a motto so tied to his experience as Spider-Man, but he has never known it to bleed into his Peter-Parker life like this.
The projects at EMF are important; beyond important. The responsibility isn’t just for the neighborhood now; he feels responsible for the world. The Emily-May Foundation is pioneering research on making sure the world has food and resources; on making sure there is even a world to feed years from now. He knows logically that said responsibility is shared across the several hundred other employees at the foundation, and other similar endeavors across the world, that the research they are doing isn’t just his burden to share but it’s hard to drill that into his brain when he has been a lone-wolf (or lone-spider) for so long. He is used to being the only employee; the only one holding all of the responsibility. The only vacation he has ever taken in his adult life was a working one as MJ’s photographer in Symkaria, and he doesn’t know the meaning of taking a sick day; he is well accustomed to swinging through the city dosed up on cold medicine trying not to cough up his guts or delirious with fever or trying to ignore the pain from several broken bones. Now that he is allowing himself to take at least a semblance of a break from Spider-Man duties, he cannot help but channel this age-old philosophy into his new responsibilities.
And there’s also Harry. Oh god, the sick sense of guilt he feels when he thinks about Harry. His responsibility to the Emily-May Foundation is a responsibility to him most of all; to continue what his best friend had started.
He’s been working too hard for far too long now. Today has been relatively easy, relative being the important term. The past couple of weeks have been filled with late hours and burning the candle at both ends, trying to keep things afloat. He’s chronically stressed, brow forever furrowed with a headache these days. The Emily-May Foundation is doing well, but it takes a lot of work to keep it that way. Pete’s role as a lead researcher takes up most of his time now that he has managed to delegate the more managerial and administrative tasks to others, but he still finds himself crunching the numbers more often than not, or taking on side projects as if his own duties aren’t enough. He’s often working longer hours than he would web-slinging, and although less physically taxing, he can’t help but worry that he is filling the Spider-Man shaped hole in his daily life with something that feels even less like a break.
The model results sit at around ninety percent complete when MJ arrives home. She too is partial to the same kind of philosophy as he is when it comes to work - last-minute dashes to the nearest scoop no matter the hour, late nights editing audio files and compiling research - but she is better accustomed to taking care of herself in the process, evidenced at present by the bag of takeout pho from their favorite place that she drops onto Peter’s desk, jolting him from his bleary-eyed daze.
“Wakey wakey, tiger,” she teases. “Have you been in here all day?”
“No,” he says, pausing for a moment. “Maybe.”
She sends a glare in his direction, but there’s no malice behind it; and besides, she can talk. She had been out since the early hours of the morning following a lead for the next episode of her podcast, her voice worn from the hours of interviews, and the takeout food she has brought is her first proper meal of the day.
“Is this the-” Pete begins, before MJ cuts him off.
“Yeah, exactly how you like it,” she smirks.
“With the-”
“Yep. With the mushrooms.”
“Have I ever told you I love you?”
“Not often enough,” she grins. “Now come on, wrap up whatever your doing so we can eat.”
A long drawn out groan erupts from his throat. He stares at his computer screen, then to the food, then back at the computer screen. Ninety-two percent.
“You’re not eating it out here,” she lifts the back, taking it out of arm’s reach, the sweet umami smell becoming more distant. “We can’t have a repeat of The Great Coffee Incident of two weeks ago.”
(Long story short; The Great Coffee Incident of two weeks ago involved one large cold brew, a brand new laptop and a great big heaping of despair trying to fix the damage.)
“Hey, it won’t happen again,” Peter turns to look at her, but the puppy-dog eyes aren’t fooling her. “My spidey-sense will kick in.”
“Didn’t work the last time, did it?” she says, taking a step back. “Come on, you’ve been at this all day, you look beat.”
“It’s nearly done.”
“And I’m willing to bet that you haven’t eaten anything all day.”
“Hey, I had a granola bar. I think.”
“Wow, Pete. I’m impressed. You really are at the apex of proper nutrition.”
“What if I ask you really really nicely?” the goddamn eyes again; it takes everything MJ has not to cave.
“Nope, uh-uh,” she stands her ground, already stepping outside of the garage.
“You’re evil, you know that, Mary-Jane?” he says simply, before he pushes his seat back and rises to stand, shifting his focus from his computer screen to his phone. “Okay, okay, I’m coming. Just give me a sec to set up a spider-drone to keep an eye on this and I’ll be right there.”
“Two minutes. And if you’re even a second late I’m eating yours too.”