You Make Me Feel, Safer

Ever since Margo was old enough to be aware of family dynamics, she knew hers was...different. Sure, she knew that family wasn't always perfect and that people had disagreements, but that doesn't mean it didn't bother her.

Currently...

"You never fucking listen!"
"You never let me fucking talk!"
"I told you about this leave weeks ago!"
"You know damn well you didn't!"

The argument of the week was about how long Margo's dad would be away for work. Margo's mom was a surgeon at the local hospital and didn't have the luxury of a steady schedule. Her shifts were always random and she felt that Margo needed someone to watch her.
Although, Margo didn't know why it was such a big deal about if she had a supervisor or not, it's not like her parents paid any attention to her when they were around anyway, they were too busy either arguing, or wrapped up in their virtual reality.
Always so close, yet still miles away.

That was the thing about Margo's universe, it really didn't work to foster or enhance interpersonal relationships. Marriage rates were low and divorce rates were high because there wasn't any desire or effort to connect personally with the people around you, when you had everything you needed on a "simple" VR headset.

Margo's parents barely knew the day-to-day goings on with their daughter. They didn't know that she was the internet's Spiderwoman (Spiderbyte, dammit...it sounds cooler), and her universe's real world Spiderwoman as well (another storytime), or that she missed online school sometimes (all the time), or that sometimes (all. the. time.), she went to bed hungry because she couldn't stand how they'd argue over the dinner table.

She wanted her parents to stop arguing, but she didn't want them to...divorce.
She wanted them to ask her about her day..but her grades were slipping.
She wanted to let them know that she was helping the world by being Spiderwoman, but she didn't think they'd understand...or care. In fact, maybe it'd just start a whole new argument.
She wanted them to be proud of her, and she wanted to be someone that they could be proud of. She wanted to please them. She wanted to be the solution to the problem.

Maybe if they saw that she'd become a superhero, they'd realize that their union meant something, that they created someone who was slowly making the world a better place, and they'd created that someone, together.

Despite virtual reality prohibiting her family from personally connecting, Margo was still grateful for it, because it allowed her to escape. There was something calming about travelling to different places within the world wide web and taking out her anger on viruses and cyber criminals.

And when she discovered the technology to transport her avatar to different universes, it was just another opportunity to be farther away from the ticking time bomb that was her household.

It wasn't long before she attracted the attention of the Spider Society. She was all too eager to spend most of her days at the society, fighting cyber crime and running the go-home machine, anything to get her mind off her parents most recent arguments. Besides, when she was here, her parents wouldn't have the opportunity to drag her into the middle of their fights, forcing her to pick sides and then getting upset when she refused.

It was a good system, and since she could do all this from the comfort of her home, she never put a single thought into transporting her physical body to another universe.

Until...

- FLASHBACK -

Margo had been one of the first "recruits" if you will, to the Spider Society. Before her, there was Miguel, who operated permanently from Nueva York, as well as Jessica Drew, Peter B. Parker, Ben Reilly, Miguel's AI, Lyla, and a few other spiders scattered here and there.

The Society was still in its humble beginnings, and Miguel and co. were trying to figure out ways to travel between universes without having to use the unpredictable colliders. As well, they also needed a more convenient way to send villains back to their original universes.

So came the go-home machine, and later, the watches.

Since the first item to be manufactured was the go-home machine, they just decided to test it using a villain. Margo wanted to let the adults know that she could be of use and had something to bring to the table, and being the one from the most "far-flung future" universe, she was more than happy to provide technological knowledge from her universe, and apply it to the machine...she believed it could be used for a good cause.
Re-engineering the technology she utilized to transport her avatar to and from Nueva York, Miguel, Lyla and Margo figured out how to apply that technology to physical beings. They praised Margo for her help, and as the society grew, allowed her to run the machine.
For the first time in a long time, she felt happy, and not like a burden.

About a year before the foundation of the Society was shaken by one Miles Morales, Miguel and co. settled on a watch, for society workers to use, since the go-home machine was really more of a "one-way" trip kind of thing.

"Easy and compact, if we can get this right, it should be pretty low-maintenance" said Miguel one day.

There was a prototype, and now they just needed to test it.

"I-I could do it. You know, I've never traveled physically before, so I'll test it out!" offered Margo. That was her, always so damn eager to please, always wanting to be the solution to a problem.

The adults weren't sure about letting Margo test it, so Miguel ended up testing it first. And it worked. However, Margo argued that one good test run wasn't enough to go on, and she wore the adults down. Thinking back, she wasn't sure why she was so persistent.

Miguel had tested the watch by traveling from the society, to another universe, and back, and it had worked. So they decided that for a second test, Margo would attempt to travel from her own universe, to the Spider Society. Miguel, Jess, Ben and Lyla would wait back at the society for her.

The next day, Margo typed in her home universe coordinates in the go-home machine so that the watch could be transported to her. After sending the watch to her universe, she transported her avatar back to her universe.

"Alright, see you guys in a minute then." she told the group.

"Don't forget about the failsafe if anything goes awry" Ben said in that ominous way of his.

"Not that anything will! This tech is basically foolproof!" Lyla spoke up, giving Ben a nasty glare whilst Jess and Miguel rolled their eyes.

Margo transported home. She removed her headset and began to look for the watch, she had typed in her home coordinates as accurate as possible, so the watch wasn't hard to locate. It was right outside her home door, and she brought it up to her room.

She inspected it for a few minutes, then put it on her wrist.

The thing was a prototype, clunky and awkward, but it felt heavy, and...wrong.

It hit Margo all at once, she'd never done this before, she hadn't ever used the collider or even the go-home machine. But she brushed off her anxiety. She had a job to do, she needed to show the adults that she was serious. Or else they'd...they'd kick her out and she'd have nothing. She was too used to being at the society everyday to let it go, so she'd do this.

Margo typed in the coordinates to the society, and got the watch ready to go. And then...she went.

The trip should've been quick and taken 15 seconds, tops. Instead, the watch began to spark, smoke, and...burn.

The world around her began to warp and Margo was violently thrown around in limbo between universes. She tried to hit the failsafe, but it was no use.

It felt like forever that Margo was tossed between universes before she landed hard on the ground in what she presumed was a different universe. But the difference was, she couldn't see anything, it was pitch black. Her whole body hurt tremendously, she felt like she was on fire, and her heart was beating so fast. Her wrist burned and when she tried to activate the failsafe again, she found that the watch wouldn't turn on. Her eyes began to water both from the pain in her wrist, and the fear of not knowing where she was.

- FLASHBACK WITHIN FLASHBACK -

Now, Margo had been bitten by a "radioactive spider" - it ended up giving her a virus (no, not the virtual kind) but a real one that had her sick and bedridden for weeks. For those weeks, both her parents had sat together at her bedside, holding hands and praying for her to get well.

She had nearly died. Her nearly dying was what it took for her parents to come together again. She was ashamed to say that she was desperate enough to want to be sick again...if only it meant that her parents would come together one more time.

Margo ended up pulling through the sickness, but she was different after. She had powers.

Since nobody really interacted in Margo's universe, she never really used her physical powers in the real world, she only focused on cybercrime, and the real crime that was out there was something that the police always handled.

- END FLASHBACK WITHIN FLASHBACK -

Now, Margo was worried, she became all too aware of her inexperience with physical threats, if something happened to her here...wherever she was, how would she protect herself?

Back at the society, Miguel and co had jumped into a panic. Margo had been gone 20 minutes. And for the past 20 minutes, they'd been trying to get her back.

"Where'd she even go? Lyla, get on the control panel and fix this!" Miguel shouted. He had been agitated the whole time, and in turn was agitating the rest of the group, though they tried not to let it affect them much, as they knew how he was about losing people, especially children.

"We should've never let her go!" Miguel continued whilst trying to assist Lyla in locating Margo. "There's only one watch, why is it so hard to get a steady track on it?"

"I have it! But it keeps moving in between the universes!" Lyla said frustratedly.

It was 5 minutes later when the movement stopped.

"Wait...I got it!" she shouted. "Where is she?!" Miguel nearly pounced toward the control panel. "I-I don't know? This one isn't on the list." Lyla said, now in a confused tone.

"It doesn't matter, just hook it up to the collider and bring her through there." Jessica ordered. Lyla got to work while the rest of the group booked it to Nueva York's collider to hopefully greet Margo.

It felt like hours but was really only a few seconds before the collider started to warp and make weird sounds, the group took cover, but then Margo was thrown through.

She hit the ground hard as the group rushed towards her. The first thing they noticed was that she was crying, the watch was smoking and cutting off the circulation in her wrist, and a huge burn was on her left side, it had torn through her sweater.

"Margo!" Jess shouted. "Oh my goodness" she said quietly, in shock. Meanwhile Ben and Miguel were speechless.

Margo huddled in on herself. "I-I'm so sorry." Was all she could say before more tears came. They gently shushed her and took her back to HQ.

The medical ward was a fairly new addition, but they were able to treat Margo's wounds. First, they had to address the burn from the watch. Margo screamed as the doctors took it off. She didn't want to, but she forced herself to look at the damage...it was bad, terrible actually. It looked as if someone had thrown acid on her wrist, it was a mix of red, pink, and burned skin, raw and bleeding sluggishly. Margo stared speechless at the gravity of the burn, before Jess gently turned her head away. It hurt like a bitch when they dressed it.

Everybody knew that the burn on Margo's wrist was from the watch, but what they were scared to address was the much larger burn, that took up nearly her whole side.

"Margo..." Miguel hesitated, he was afraid of what the answer would be, of what or who could have possibly done this to Margo, but he knew he had to ask. But he blamed himself, so he resigned himself to being tortured with the answer. However, he needn't have been hesitant, because there was no answer.

As the question left his lips Margo immediately shut down and wouldn't answer. She closed her eyes and began to breathe hard before falling into a panic attack, and then all together shutting down and staring out the window. She answered any other questions except ones pertaining to the burn, and whatever universe she was accidentally transported to.

And that's how it was, anytime they asked what happened, Margo shut down, even months later. They never found out. Once everything had "settled," they returned to the control panel to try and use the watch's travel log to figure out which universe Margo went to, and see what had gone wrong. but the universe was untraceable. The last log from the watch showed it going to Margo's universe, and then nothing after. They were all confused, but there was only one person who could give the slightest idea of what happened, and she wasn't talking.

Jessica and Miguel decided Margo would take a few months off from the society. She was hysterical. She knew this would happen, she always managed to mess things up and now they were kicking her out for good. After vehemently reassuring the girl that she wasn't being kicked out, Margo calmed down. She didn't want to admit it, but she was relieved to go home. And that said something, because Margo hated going home. She was always one of the last people to leave HQ.

In her absence, Miguel and Lyla worked hard to figure out what went wrong with the watch. They found out that everything went wrong because they had not adjusted and manufactured the watch for longevity, multiple trips, and vast usage. As one can imagine, universal travel took lots of energy and power, and they had the task of fitting all that into a tiny watch. So after Miguel had used the prototype for his trip, the watch had sort of...burnt out. Once the issue was fixed, they tentatively manufactured more for the rest of the spiders, and things seemed to be running smoothly.

However, Margo's event made Miguel even more paranoid and strict. He decided that not everyone would get a watch, so he and Lyla developed day passes. Miguel knew that the watch topic was still sensitive for Margo, so he was hesitant to bring it up, but he didn't want to hide the news either, so he informed her of the successful development. "Cool" Margo said, eerily emotionless. She subconsciously began to rub the wrist that had been burned, it had become a nervous tick, a habit.

Margo refused to use the watch again. In fact, she refused to physically travel to any other universe again. She only used her avatar to go from her universe, to the society, and back, and nowhere else.
Nobody pushed the issue.

In her absence, many more spiders joined the society, and in that time Miguel had figured out about the events on earth-1610. He had banned anyone from travelling to either earth-1610 or 42, in order to not aggravate the supposed canon. Things seemed to have stabilized, but he didn't want to risk it. Margo didn't think much of it, she knew that Miguel was paranoid, and she had already decided that traveling to multiple other universes wasn't really her thing.
And anyway, it was just another anomaly situation, right? Someone would fix it.

- END FLASHBACK -

Margo had only been back from her...hiatus...for a few weeks when she met Miles Morales.