Chapter 1
Miles loved doing stealth missions. There was something about them that was so exhilarating. The holding of the breath, the way he had to be aware of the sound every footstep and spider web made. It scratched something in his brain, it made his spidey sense hum at a frequency that didn’t cause him headaches like the usual blaring alarm he knew it to be. Stealth missions posed a challenge, something more than punch things and web away. He had to be careful and be calm. It was doing wonders for his anxiety, learning how to regulate himself when his cover was almost blown.
What made it even more fun, is when Miles asked Hobie to tag along. Hobie was probably the loudest guy that Miles knew, what with his don’t care attitude and love for punk music. Watching him slink through the shadows, trying to mimic Miles’ invisibility with his gentle footsteps was both parts hilarious and intriguing. Miles loved how Hobie could go from stomping around his combat boots to silently sticking to walls over the head of an enemy. It was the duality. Doesn’t mean Hobie was any good at it. No, Hobie sucked at being stealthy. Miles thought it was part of the fun of bringing him along.
New London had been absorbing all of Hobie’s time lately. It made sense, and Miles wasn’t offended. He was happy for Hobie and his band and he got free tickets to the concerts so it’s not like he could complain. Things were looking up in New London with Norman gone and Miles could see it in Hobie, just how much brighter he was. It had been a good summer.
But Hobie was in Miles’ dimension for the weekend. It had been so long since they had done a mission together that Miles suggested they go do an errand for his dad that he had been putting off.
Now, an errand for your dad when your dad is a police captain and you’re a superhero isn’t as easy as swinging to the grocery market and getting the right kind of mangoes. Jefferson had asked Miles to do a favor for one of the detectives in his unit. There was something up with a power plant, apparently, and employees were suing the company for negligence. An employee had told the detective that there was evidence that the company was aware their practices were harmful and so Miles was set to sneaking into some big lab called Roxxon to dig through their computers.
And it had been going great! With Hobie helping out, all the strangely armored guards had been webbed up and tucked away. Miles left the tech to Hobie- he was always better at piecing things like that together, especially after Riri started showing him the ropes. That meant Miles got to spend the afternoon dipping in and out of invisibility, swinging through a giant compound and causing distractions so Hobie was able to find the information he needed.
And then. Well. One of the distractions distracted a little too well.
It wasn’t Miles’ fault! Well. It was. But he didn’t mean for it to happen! The compound had a metal bridge that hung over two vats of some suspicious looking liquid. Miles had already webbed the scientists who were poking at it to the wall, but there was a guard walking along the bridge, headed towards the room Hobie was holed up in with a hard drive and the computer. Miles may have, perhaps, broken the bridge. He then, also, kind of saved the guard from falling into the bubbly, neon yellow vats by webbing him to the ceiling. And apparently- Miles wasn’t expecting this part, okay? Apparently, the room was rigged with alarms, so a red light started flashing and this big, ambulance-esque sound vibrated the walls.
And more guards came. Lots of guards. With guns. Aimed at Miles. Hobie hadn’t found the right documents yet- cheques that were evidence of bribes, damage reports, medical reports, employee complaints, you name it- so Miles had to create a distraction. If he went invisible, they would have found a way into Hobie’s room!
So, then it was 18-1. One Miles Morales with a wee bit of God complex and his electric web shooters and 18 Roxxon guards armed head to toe with red armor guns and handheld cannons that made a vvvhirrrrrr sound every time they charged up. There were several holes in the walls by the time Miles had finished tying each of them up and swung back into the streets of New York with Hobie in tow. So much for being stealthy.
They landed on a rooftop nearby. Miles had taken his mask off, grinned, getting that giddy, almost high feeling from a successful mission. Hobie took his mask off, and Miles was expecting a kiss, but Hobie whipped his mask into the pebbles covering the rooftop and snarled.
“What the fuck was that, huh!?”
Miles’ heart sank. “W-what?”
“You could ‘ave been killed, Miles!”
“Well, yeah.” Miles laughed nervously. “That’s kind of my whole thing. Spiderman, and all that.”
He shot two webs into the air. Hobie did not smile. He actually got up into Miles’ space, looking down his nose at him.
“You got cocky and could ‘ave gotten us both killed. You shoulda told me you were handling that many blokes by yourself!”
“I was fine.” Miles snapped back. He could feel his heart rate picking up again. Not in the excited, woohoo, another day saving the city kind of way. More like in the get away from me, what did I do, don’t talk to me like that kind of way. “I got us both out of there, didn’t I?”
“That’s not the- bloody hell, Miles, that’s not the point. What’s the point of me being ‘ere if you’re gonna fight the baddies alone?”
“I am fully capable.” Miles said, a little offended. “I handled it, Hobie. You were busy with something else, so I pulled on my end. That’s how teamwork works.”
Hobie’s hands came up and framed Miles’ face. His grip was pinching, a little, his thumbs digging into Miles’ cheeks and his pinkies into soft spot behind his ears. Miles felt a little trapped. He felt his breath coming fast. He thought of the last time someone held his face when they were angry like that. He tried to push that thought down, Hobie was not Miguel, but it wasn’t like Miles could will away the nausea building in his stomach at the memory of it.
“I’m not trying to say that you’re not capable, Miles. I’m trying to tell you that you scared me and you need to tell me before you pull shit like that again, yeah?”
“Don’t talk down to me.” Miles shoved Hobie off, actually shoved, two hands flat on his chest with all of his spider strength behind it. Miles felt bad for a moment, but Hobie caught himself with a web on the ground in front of him before he fell. Miles stuck out a finger at him. “Don’t act like you know better than me! I had it under control. I’m not a kid!”
Hobie’s lip lifted in a sneer. He puffed out his chest in the way Miles knew he did when he felt cornered. He used another web to pick his mask up off the floor and waved it around. “If you’re not such a fuckin’ dustbin lid, what happened to ‘stealth’ Miles, ey? I’m here trying to ask you to put some trust me and take care of yourself and you’re throwing a fit!”
“Because I don’t fucking need your help, Hobie!” Miles shouted. The second the words left his lips, he regretted them. He saw the way Hobie dropped his shoulders. Miles saw the way his eyes went wide for a second. Miles saw how his words affected Hobie, even on the text of his face, his arms, his outline. Miles had fucked up saying that and should have apologized, he knew that.
But it’s never that easy. Apologizing doesn’t just roll off the tongue. Miles always knew, you give an inch, they take a mile. He was hardheaded and confident, but that is what was good about Miles. His defiant nature is what got him onto that rooftop wearing a Spidersuit with the respect of people across the multiverse. He wasn’t going to risk that by backing down in an argument with his boyfriend. That was childish, and it was stupid. So yeah, some part of Miles wanted to apologize, wanted to hold Hobie close and tell him that he didn’t mean it, but Miles just his jaw and waited for the reply.
Hobie snorted. He pressed his tongue against his lip piercing, a nervous tick Miles had taken notice to months ago, and he shook his head.
“Right.” He said. He reached into the pocket of his war vest and tossed the hard drive to Miles before opening himself a portal on his watch. “I’m out. Take your stupid fuckin’ hard drive.”
And he left.
Miles wanted to stop him. Wanted to say, no, wait, come back. He wanted to say I do need you Hobie. But he didn’t. Miles waited for the portal to close and snarled, hit himself on the forehead and kicked the pebbles of the roof.
“Goddamnit, stupid, stupid!” He cursed himself up and down before dropping to the floor and taking a seat. The sprawling New York skyline looked back him with the uncaring glance of sunlight off skyscraper windows. The Roxxon building was close enough that Miles could hear the sirens and could see unmarked vans and police vehicles gathering. He knew the news that night was not going to paint him very favourably. But he didn’t care about that, not then. He cared about how hard it was to be Spiderman and keep relationships. He was starting to really wear on him. Gwen. His parents. Now Hobie. Fuck.
Miles wanted to let people in. He did. He was the one always ragging on his dad to talk about his mental health more. But there he was, sitting on the rooftop alone having just yelled at his boyfriend for the crime of being worried about him. With Gwen, you know, that was the first time Miles had ever been into someone. And it did not end well. He still got this prickly feeling whenever he thought about it, Gwen betraying him only to lead the team to come save him. He wanted to be thankful but couldn’t help but to think that it all could have been avoided if she had just said something. Miles hated how bitter he was. He hated how twisted he felt towards her. He hated that he felt that way, and maybe that’s why he was nervous to open up again. To pour everything he had into Hobie like he did Gwen.
But it was more than that. Miles had his personal shit to work out, sure, but the professional shit always hit him worse. Literally and figuratively. Miles still woke up some nights, shaking, gasping, crying. He could still feel the claws in his side or digging into his face. It wasn’t Hobie’s fault that he had triggered a bad memory for Miles, but he wished he could have stopped the way he reacted to it. Miles felt so powerless against it all. He could swing off buildings and stick to walls and turn invisible, but he couldn’t escape the ghost pains or his habit of pushing people away and away and away until it all fell apart.
Miles slotted his hand against his side. If he pushed, he could feel it. The searing pain of torn skin, the way his entire body wanted to compact inwards to protect itself. He took his had away and shuddered. No use reliving it.
He looked at the hard drive. It was Hobie’s. The case was black with Hobie’s name scratched in with something sharp and it pulsed in Miles’ hands. Little diagrams of lightning and spikey newspaper clippings would pop out before settling back in. Miles felt bad, he did. But he was also so, so angry.
Why was everyone always underestimating him?
Hadn’t he proved that he could take of himself? Hell, he was going to be an adult soon, and people were still treating him like some lost kid.
Miles needed to get this hard drive to his dad. He couldn’t spend the rest of the night brooding on a random rooftop. So he tucked the hard drive into his sleeve and began to swing across the city. The Roxxon building was in Harlem and he was destined for Brooklyn. Miles loved swinging over the river. It was hard, obviously, but he would use the rail tracks or passing ships or the bridges. There was something different about swinging over water. When he was swinging through the streets, there as more risk. More obstacles, a harder fall. That in itself was exhilarating, but when Miles swung over water, it felt like the world was quiet.
The wind rushing past in his ears. The smell of the water (as dank as it was). The security Miles felt knowing that if he fell, the river would rush up to meet him and he could find his way back to shore. As long as he wasn’t swinging too high, that is.
How could someone think that the guy who saved the multiverse and is crossing the East River via spiderweb is childish? Or incompetent, for that matter. Miles felt it again, that spark of anger. He was so frustrated with people talking down to him. Miles had proved himself again, and again, and again. When were people going to start treating him with some respect?
He would be home soon. The sounds of the city bubbled up from beneath him. He could feel the rumble of burnt-out tires and the music pouring out of the nearby bodega on the soles of his feet, like Miles was walking on it. A quick peak to make sure no one was watching and Miles webbed to his bedroom window before climbing inside.
Hobie had left his bag.
Miles scowled at it. The black duffle bag that had the corner taped together with grey duct tape and the handle sewn back on with red threads. It shook a little, like it was also upset that it was still in the wrong dimension. Miles shoved it under the bed so he didn’t have to look at it.
He left his room after that. Miles couldn’t stand the infernal buzzing emanating from under his bed and he had a flash drive to return. He put on a hoodie and took off the mask and gloves, though, because he knew his mom didn’t like seeing him in the suit. His watch sat abandoned on the bed.
“Hey, dad?” he called out into the apartment. Jefferson looked up from the dinner table where he was reading the news.
“Hey, Miles.” Jefferson smiled. He looked his son up and down, eyeing the spidey emblem on his chest. “Did you have a good day?”
“Yeah! I uh, got that information for you. Here.” Miles said. He reached into the sleeve of his suit. There was nothing. He gave his dad a nervous glance, laughed a little, and reached into the other sleeve. “Uuh. One second.”
Miles jogged back to his room and grabbed his gloves. He shook each one out, even checked the fingers, and felt nothing. He could feel his dad in the doorway and worse yet, Miles could feel the disappointment radiating off him.
“You lost it.”
“I didn’t lose it, just dropped it.”
“So you know where it is?”
“I don’t.”
“God, Miles.” Miles turned around, his shoulders up around his ears, his face getting hot with shame. Jefferson had pushed his glasses onto his forehead and was pinching the bridge of his nose. “I appreciate you doing me a solid, I do but- the legal system doesn’t wait for Spider people to deliver. The offense needs to have their documents turned in by Friday or-”
“I’ll figure it out, dad.” Miles said. He couldn’t bare the thought of letting someone else down or failing again. “I’ll go back. I’ll go back right now, and I won’t drop it this time.”
“Miles.” Jefferson said flatly. He looked unimpressed. “Roxxon already reported the break in. If you think you’re getting past-”
“I’m Spiderman, dad!” Miles said, puffing his chest out. “I got it. Give me like. Two hours. I’m super sneaky.”
Jefferson was scowling. Miles hoped his dashing smile would’ve change his mind.
“Do you know where you dropped the drive?”
“I- I mean, I don’t but-”
“Anyone could get their hands on it- that’s dangerous information, Miles- this could be a disa-”
“Can you just say your proud of me?” Miles shot back. He shook his head and laughed as he shucked off the hoodie and started to wrestle his gloves back on. “I just broke into an energy plant for you! I am literally Spiderman. I got the information and everything and all you can focus on is how- is how I screwed up!”
“Miles-”
“I don’t want to hear it.” He said, opening up his bedroom window with his mask in hand. “I’ll be back in a bit.”