Hell Week
Sunday
Peter’s no longer sick when he wakes the next morning. Groggily, his eyes come to focus on MJ’s staring back at him, she must have been waiting for him to become alert.
“Good morning,” she says, tapping his hand that lies flat next to his face.
“G’morning, ugh,” he answers as he stretches. His back feels much better, he can’t let them see it but it must be healing quickly with the aid of stitches.
Ned is lounging in the desk chair, and the sleeping bag is put away. “I’m sorry I can’t order us breakfast or anything, Peter blew the funds on all those crab rangoons last night,” he laughs and gestures towards all the wrappers overflowing the trashcan beneath the desk. Peter had eaten eleven, no, twelve crab rangoons and three spring rolls along with his usual takeout box, while Ned and MJ both had left overs in his fridge.
“Well, thanks, 'cause I feel better. I don’t think I’m sick anymore.”
“That’s good to hear, you can pay Ned back with your loving friendship,” MJ jokes as she rises from the bed. If only she knew that he was trying.
He checks his phone for the time, it was around nine in the morning. “I’m not trying to kick you out but you guys should probably go, I’ve gotta shower and all that. You guys should go home and have breakfast.”
The sooner they’re gone, the sooner he can get to DoorDashing. He’ll take it slow, with orders within walking distance of each other and he’ll use the subway. He can’t risk splitting those butterfly stitches open, one wrong stretch and they'd be gone.
“Oh, yeah, okay,” MJ says. She begins to stuff her tote bag with the miscellaneous things from his desk, but she leaves the new medical supplies.
“Wait,” Ned stops at the door. “Let’s check for updates from last night.”
Ned loads Reddit— apparently a subreddit solely dedicated to uploading unusual encounters in New York (however unusual something could be in New York) is where most of the werewolf footage was coming from. Peter opens his phone for the Daily Bugle. He mutes J. Jonah Jameson, unable to bear his scratchy whinging so soon after waking up while Ned reads aloud from his phone. The beast had come close to his apartment complex that night, but not close enough to alert his sixth sense, which was a good thing. There was no discernible pattern as to where it appeared, and Peter couldn’t predict where it could show up next.
“We’re gonna head out,” Ned says, pocketing his phone. “See you later?”
“Yeah, see you later,” he answers. MJ stalls for one last wave before she clicks the door shut behind her.
Peter’s feeling fine, but he takes four Advil, just in case. There’s no chance he can Spider-Man tonight, so the least he can do today is work on repairs. He retrieves the black trash bag from the corner of his room and takes his suit out, shaking off air fresheners that clatter to the floor. Considering he couldn’t wash his poor suit until it was repaired, the air fresheners were a small blessing, he can’t imagine how it would smell right now otherwise. Peter groans as he threads his fingers through the three slashes in his handiwork, the layers of fabric peeling away from each other in his hands and dried blood flakes off of the blue spandex. He’d fashioned his suit with a neoprene base for insulation and comfort, and the outer layer consisted of red polyester and of course the spandex. He doesn’t want to unstitch the entire back to repair them, they will simply have to be sewn up as they are, it’s not like the mending would be visible from afar anyways. He’ll fix it later tonight. He needed to stretch his legs terribly, and make up for days of lost income. Sadly, he doesn't have time to shower– that and he has no waterproof wrapping for the bandaging around his abdomen, and he wanted to wear them throughout the day.
It’ll be fine, he thinks as he slips a blue flannel over his t-shirt. He can feel the difference in his back already as he stretches the fabric over his shoulders— it’s so nice to be able to move and breathe again.
He loads DoorDash to eleven requests available in his vicinity and accepts them all as he descends the creaky stairs of his building.
Yeah, it’ll be fine.
🕷🕷🕷
A delivery of seven meals in one order, and only a five dollar tip. Peter understands that Barano was pricey, and delivery fees aren't any fun, but why order so much if they can’t be bothered to tip him properly? He runs the numbers of the day through his head up to this point now that his mind was clear enough as he ran around town, and it isn't looking pretty. If he didn’t hit some immense lucky streak in the next few days, he simply was not going to be able to make rent.
But Peter’s well aware of his relationship with luck . They weren’t on speaking terms.
He stares at the budget on his phone, refreshing the notes app as if a solution will magically appear. Nothing. Refresh. Nothing.
Peter trudges through Flushings, body thoroughly warmed up from the noon sun and a barely-there itch slowly creeps its way across his back where the medical tape hugs his skin. He almost forgets to pick up more salicylic acid (he never seems to have enough) on his way home; deciding on fixing his suit up in the evening before working delivery around dinner time. At the pharmacy two blocks from his apartment complex, Peter scores three bottles of salicylic gel and carries them in one hand as he approaches the register. A wide man in a baseball cap and black flannel blocks his view of the counter.
“You seen that thing, Deb?” The man sniffs as he places his prescription and a diet Pepsi on the counter.
“You mean the werewolf?” The unamused, thirty-something woman working the register replies.
“It’s not a damn werewolf,” the customer says, looking over his shoulder at Peter. “Is it?”
Realizing the man is actually addressing him, Peter shrugs.
“If it’s not a werewolf, then what the fuck is it?” The cashier’s tone is flat, as if this is her twenty-third werewolf discussion of the day.
“It’s a guy in a suit,” the man says, looking at Peter again for support.
“Uhm,” is all he manages.
“If it’s a guy in a suit, how come the cops can’t shoot it?”
“Because he’s gotta forcefield. If it was really a werewolf, they would be able to take it down, like Bigfoot or somethin’.”
She half-heartedly rolls her eyes. “You know Janice, Mike?”
She’s finished with Mike’s items, and he has his receipt, but they continue their conversation, the man still blocking the counter. Peter rolls the three bottles between his hands now, the wrap around his waist growing itchier by the moment.
“Yeah, I know Janice.”
“She lives in that banged up building with the church behind it, ten-fifteen minutes from here.”
“Yeah, yeah okay,” Mike says. “Whattabout it? That’s where it was, wasn’t it?”
“She told me this morning that she watched videos all night of it circling the block, circling, circling. Fuckin’ nuts, I tell you.”
Mike finally moves aside so that the cashier, whose name tag reads Deborah , can ring him up. Hadn’t the werewolf been near his building last night? That’s why he had Ned and MJ stay over. Deborah places the bottles in a plastic bag and Peter hands her cash.
“She says she sat at the window all night lookin’ for it, but she never saw it,” Deborah says.
Janice. Didn’t he know a Janice? Memories of a woman passing Peter in the stairwell of his apartment block wearing a matching red uniform vest to Deborah’s come to mind.
“Janice told me there were still videos comin’ at five in the morning,” Deborah continues. “That thing was there for hours.”
The werewolf stalked his apartment building for hours.
You smell.
“You got warts, kid?” Mike says, gesturing to Peter’s bag.
“Huh— I’m sorry?”
“You just bought three bottles of wart treatment.” Mike looks Peter up and down, gaze locking on the bag of medicine before meeting his eyes again.
“Oh, yeah. Yup.” Peter laughs and gives an awkward, hopefully friendly smile before pockets his change and makes for the door.
Looks like he won't won’t be able to do delivery this evening after all, and he’ll have to fix his suit tomorrow. When the moon goes up tonight, he needs to be ready and waiting for the werewolf at a location far from crowds. Surely the construction area from the other night will do?
In the meantime, Peter will refill his web cartridges. It was a tedious thing, and he had to keep that in mind when making his suit at home, because so many of the advantages he was accustomed to were gone. This suit was made of four pieces: gloves, boots separate from the body, and the mask. There was no convenient tech for refilling his webs, so the gloves were lined with tiny tubes connecting the cartridges all together to the nozzle point and pressure button fixed in the palm. He liked not having to refill on the go, but they weren’t as comfortable as his other suits (how could anything homemade be more comfortable than Stark tech?) Peter pulls his stash of chemicals out from his closet and gets to work at his desk. The fluid couldn’t make contact with oxygen or it would solidify, so he had a collection of syringes marked with measurements for transferring ingredients into the long cartridges in his gloves. Powdered salicylic acid was difficult to come by without access to a lab, but the gel was also a hassle because he had to neutralize some of the ingredients in it. Peter sighs as he weaves his fingers through the back of his torn suit. It would hold up for tonight— it had to.
The sunset is the color of blood, the sun itself a ruby as he slips out of the window and into the city.
🕷🕷🕷
Peter can hardly find a sliver of the moon tonight because clouds rolled in after the sunset. An awful odor in the wind from something industrial that he couldn’t make out in the distance fills his senses, and thick smoke is visible from the pipes that seemed so far away from where he stood on the scaffolding. Hopefully it won't discourage the werewolf from meeting with him— he still has no idea what was keeping the thing from tearing into his building last night, and it has him on edge.
Chills down his neck alert him to the werewolf’s presence, but he can’t see it. He scans the ground and finds it in the sand, crawling on all fours towards the scaffolding—it must think it’s being stealth. Peter decides to climb to the top level of the structure, maybe a fall from that height could finally disable the werewolf long enough for him to do something about it. He crawls for the top, and Man-Wolf has reached the base of the scaffolding. He stares down at it as it hangs onto the metal bars of a ladder, and it stares back. Perhaps they can talk it out before anything bad happens? Before he can ask it a question, it lunges into the air, climbing the scaffolding with such speed and force that the structure shakes. Peter scrambles for his life to the top and turns to brace for impact but the beast is milliseconds behind him—oh, shit! The werewolf flattens him on his back, its giant knee boring down into his chest while he holds its claw off with both hands. It’s snarling in his face, not trying to bite but he needs to get out of this, quick. Peter consciously sticks his fingers to the beast's skin as if he were climbing a wall before tearing them off, taking chunks of fur with him. Man-Wolf howls, and he does it again, and again, and again. It isn't much, but pseudo-waxing the beast causes it distress, and hopefully a distraction. The werewolf swipes at him as if he were a mosquito, and Peter goes for the chest. Man-Wolf keeps rolling over, back and forth across the platform trying to shake him off and whenever they’re too close to the edge Peter uses their momentum to swing them back around to the center, not ready to tumble off just yet. Its arms are just too big for him to get a good hit at its jaw, but he needs to make progress, because the wax-and-tussle is getting old fast . Going for the top of the scaffolding had been a poor choice, there was nothing for him to propel off of and the werewolf was too close to taking him down with it. It was time to move.
“Follow the leader, buddy,” he calls as he leaps a level below. Man-Wolf howls, and Peter waits in the center, panting with adrenaline.
“I need it!” Man-Wolf screams, almost intelligible as he swings down to the level below like a gymnast.
Peter webs him to the left support pole immediately, then again and again to ensure he stays. Man-Wolf claws at his trapped arm, paying Peter no mind.
“Wolf-Guy, or Man-Wolf, uhm, talk to me, please,” he begs. “I don’t know what you need and I can’t help you until—”
Man-Wolf manages to free himself, which is bad news for Peter— the effort it took to escape the webs sent Man-Wolf spiraling forward, who almost stumbles off of the platform, but not before nicking Peter above the hip with a claw. Peter hisses and jumps back before hopping onto the highest platform and running the length of it for momentum. He leaps and webs the edges, holding on as he swings down leg-first to hopefully land a forceful kick at the werewolf. He succeeds and Man-Wolf is finally knocked off the construction, legs flailing as the werewolf lands face first into a stack of cement pillars and crumples off of them into the sand. Peter joins Man-Wolf on the ground and the thing growls as it rolls over to face him. The lights of the construction site display the entire werewolf to Peter now, no longer hidden in the shadows of the scaffolding. The ruby nestled between the fur in the center of Man-Wolf's chest glistens, but something is off about it, the light reflecting in too many places for a smooth stone. Something shines in the sand near the tubes, but he doesn’t have time to investigate it at the moment.
“I’m sorry I had to knock you down, but you keep saying you need something and I don’t know what to do,” Peter says, heaving with his hands on his knees. Man-Wolf is unresponsive, eyes locked with his but not saying anything.
“Look, man,” Peter says, approaching the werewolf. Man-Wolf is calm, too calm for someone who just plummeted into cement from nine stories up.
“I need it ,” the werewolf says, struggling.
“Dude, I know. And if you say that one more time without telling me what, I might just lose my mind.”
Maybe he shouldn’t have said that, because the werewolf roars and charges for him, whatever moment of clarity they shared three seconds prior long gone. Peter goes under this time and swings up with his fist for its gut, and he lands a brutal blow, but not without the beast's long arms landing a scratch on his thigh in return. Damnit, this thing was tearing his suit to pieces and he didn’t have the money for a makeover right now. Another blow to its jaw, and another before Peter swings himself onto its neck, choking the werewolf with his legs and using his sticky grip to keep the beast’s claws from ruining his suit and skin further.
“Come on, tell me what’s going on—”
Choking, the werewolf swings its arms about like a madman, its strength almost matching Peter’s (which might’ve scared the shit out of him, he hadn’t met a being so strong since Thanos—). Peter imagines he looks like some poor puppet master in a horror flick who’s dolls have grown to full size and tried to kill him. The werewolf finally shakes him off by body slamming itself back on Peter, and he can’t hold back a yelp as he's flattened into the sand. His gloved fingers are covered in the werewolf’s fur and it rolls off of him before standing at full height, howling at nothing since the moon is hardly visible. Man-Wolf looks back at Peter, who is already up and ready to go again, before taking off across the sand in the opposite direction.
“No, wait! Wait, please,” Peter shouts as he chases it across the construction site. What was with this thing, showing up to wrestle with him before randomly ditching, as if this were a scheduled business meeting and it's time to head back to the wolf-office? But the werewolf is too fast, and soon Peter is left alone, standing on the perimeter of the site and staring out into nothing.
Man-Wolf was gone.
It's only round two, but Peter is already sick of this. He can’t do this every night, this routine of meeting up with a werewolf outside the city whenever he’s well enough to fight and hiding out in his apartment as it stalks him while he recovers. The scratches above his hip and across his thigh were shallow and he would be fine, but the distressed skinny jeans look is not suited to Spider-Man, and this somehow irritates him more than the injuries themselves. Peter practically stomps back across the construction site, waiting to catch his breath on the scaffolding before he heads home. Once he approaches the structure, blood on the cement pillars stacked nearby catches his eye. He didn’t see much blood when fighting the werewolf in the moments before it fled, so the thing’s healing factor must be insane. He wonders how many cops actually managed to shoot it, or if guns mattered in the grand scheme of things when it came to this beast.
He dips his gloved hands into the sand and rubs them together in an attempt to get as much of the werewolf fur off as possible before he leaves. But he notices something in the sand— something red, and Peter practically scrambles for it, heart pounding.
A sharp, broken chunk of blood red glass— not glass, the gem, the gem from the center of Man-Wolf’s chest— reflects the LED lights of the construction site as Peter rolls it around in his glove.
The sand sticks to his spandex as he rises from the ground, chest still heaving from all the running and now this discovery. Not a discovery, a confirmation.
Werewolf-magic-something stone gets brought over from France, werewolf shows up in New York City. It's easy math.
John Jameson hasn’t been in the public eye since the day of his return from France, and he was in close contact with this gem, right? It could be him. Really, it could be anybody. It could be a museum worker in charge of handling the display, it could be the janitor, it could be anyone.
Peter feels a little guilty for spending the evening tearing his fur out, whoever it was. But he was also nearly torn in half a few nights ago, so the guilt doesn’t stick around any longer than it arrived.
But what does he need? What does this man need?
Peter knows what he needs, at least. He needs solutions.
With the confirmation of the mystical stone’s role in the werewolf-situation, Peter needs magicians.
🕷🕷🕷
There's something wrong with the Sanctum Sanctorum.
Peter’s tried to enter three times now, but he can’t get a foot in the door— literally. He pushes against what must be some invisible forcefield, grunting, and even bangs his fist on the air, all met with resistance. He can't even access the sidewalk, and his boots slide against the asphalt as he pushes on nothing with all his might.
What the hell is going on?
The ruby shard almost slices his glove open due to the force he’s squeezing his fist with as he braces from across the street to charge at the door. Thank God no one is around, it’s nearly midnight and Spider-Man can't be seen sprinting across the street only to be flung back into the road by a magical forcefield, screaming as he flies through the air.
He knows he can’t break through it, but maybe if he attacks it enough someone inside will notice, since they insist on preventing him from doing something as simple as knocking on the door.
Peter charges for the force field yet again. Hell, is there a way in from the top? He webs the roof, but the webbing bounces off the air and coils on the ground by his feet.
“Stephen,” Peter calls out, frustrated. “Wong! Anyone?”
Silence.
“It’s an emergency, at least I’m pretty sure it is,” Peter whines. He kicks the forcefield, noticing how the air ripples around the cement.
A lone stranger is coming down the sidewalk, and Peter freezes in place, unsure of his next move. He can’t always tell if someone is pro-Spider-Man or anti-Spider-Man, and the guessing game keeps him on edge to say the least. But the man smiles and waves, and before he knows it the man is approaching the Sanctum, easily passing by right in front of the stairs that Peter can’t get anywhere near. He awkwardly waves back and tries to contain his surprise—why the hell can’t he get near the Sanctum?
Once the man is gone, Peter goes back to kicking at the forcefield, because what else can he do? He needs to speak with someone.
“Doctor Strange,” he groans. “Doctor—”
The double doors creak, and Wong’s face pops out, utterly perplexed.
“Spider-Man?”
“Wong! Wong, oh my God.”
“What are you doing here?” Wong’s brows are drawn in so deep, stern, as if Peter is disrupting something extremely important.
“I’m sorry if I’m interrupting—”
“It’s Scrabble night,” the wizard huffs.
Peter feels his brows crumple together under his mask, caught completely off guard by that answer. “Oh, uhm. Okay. Well, I think I have a magical emergency.”
Wong’s expression is unchanged, but he beckons Peter towards him.
“Yeah, uh. That’s the issue.” Peter kicks the forcefield yet again and points at where the contact wrinkles the air.
Wong steps out from behind the doors and descends the stairs, hands shifting through the air in search of something, some magical catch, probably.
“What’s going on, Spider-Man? Are you cursed?”
“I’m—I’m sorry, sir? Cursed?”
‘“This is a protective barrier,” Wong says, solemn. “Cursed items can’t be brought through without protocol.”
Stephen Strange is next to peek his head out the door. “Spider-Man?”
A strain overcomes the back of Peter’s throat when he sees Strange— he needs to speak carefully around him. The last thing he wants is to slip up and remind the wizard of the memory spell, otherwise Strange might seek to reverse it for himself because Stephen Strange is just like that , and Peter does not need that right now. His slate is clean, he doesn’t want those mistakes tainting their new dynamic. Doctor Strange knows Spider-Man, and that’s perfect.
But, if he won’t let Strange know that he cast a memory spell, then he can’t exactly seek the wizard’s aid in restoring Ned and MJ’s memories, either.
He’ll figure it out. It’ll be fine.
“Spider-Man?” Doctor Strange says again, and Peter snaps his head up to face him.
“Right, hi, Doctor Strange. I don’t think I’m cursed,” he unfurls his fist to reveal the ruby shard. “But this might be.”
“Oh my,” Strange says, descending the stairs. He reconfigures something in the air, golden runes dancing before Peter’s eyes until he can feel the shift in the air, and he comfortably steps onto the sidewalk.
“I’m going back inside, I don’t want to know,” Wong grunts as he stomps up the stairs. Strange takes the gem shard from Peter and turns to follow, and Peter trails behind him.
“Can you tell me anything about the werewolf?” Peter asks, sounding smaller than he intended.
“It looks like you’ve got a handle on it, Spider-Man,” Strange says, turning the shard in his hand. He stops in the doorway, blocking Peter from entering.
“Wait— what?”
“You just need to remove the ruby from the host, and it’ll be fine. You’ve already cracked it, just yank the thing out of them. Nothing much to it.”
Peter’s tempted to pull his mask off so Strange can see just how appalled he is.
“Nothing much? That thing almost killed me! It’s strong—possibly Thanos strong, I mean, Stephen, you have no idea—”
“It’s Doctor Strange,” Strange says absently, still examining the shard and paying Peter no mind.
Peter gulps. “Doctor Strange, sir—”
“You already have a handle on it, Spider-Man. I’ve seen you in action, I believe you’ll be fine. The werewolf is already weakened now because the gem is cracked. All you have to do is separate the ruby and the man.”
Peter shifts his weight, uncertain as Strange opens the door, clearly expecting him to leave and be done with it.
He stares at Strange expectantly, and the wizard stares back into the blank eyes of his mask. “Are you sure there’s no magical werewolf advice you could give me? Nothing?”
“It’s just not necessary,” Strange laughs as he looks back at the gem sliver. “This werewolf hasn’t harmed a single person, we’ve had an observer keep track of it, and it’s running around in circles. Poor thing, really.” The wizard pockets the ruby shard and gives Peter a once-over, noticing the already healed shallow cuts on his legs, perfect skin under dried blood and sand.
“It was nice to see you again, Spider-Man,” he says cordially. “Thanks for taking care of the werewolf. Come by another time and I can go over werewolf history with you if you want, just for fun. How’s that sound?”
Something feels deeply wrong, but Strange is right. The werewolf hasn’t hurt anyone, as long as Peter doesn’t count. It appears he doesn’t.
“Yeah, that sounds nice,” he breathes out. “Okay, I’ll see you.” He half salutes as Strange unceremoniously closes the door, and Peter is left alone on the cement.
It would be an understatement to say that was disappointing, even though it shouldn’t be. It’s good news that the werewolf is weak and all he has to do is pop the ruby out— with his sticky fingers, it’ll be as easy as picking the plastic studs out of May’s pleather purse like he used to when he was bored as a child.
Peter’s heart sinks.
He webs his way home, finally unwraps the filthy medical tape holding gauze against his stitches, and checks his back in the mirror— the smaller two claw marks are completely healed, and the third is on its way. Finally! God, he needs a shower. Peter washes his hair two times, three times, and he soaks the butterfly stitches so he can peel them off. One night with them was all he needed to aid the healing, and he gingerly runs a finger along his back to feel the wound. It was still longer than he thought it would be, but from the way it feels, it should be fully healed in the morning. Perhaps it will scar.
Well, that’s fine. It’ll be fine.
It’s late, but Peter's thrumming with energy. Two days bedridden was two too many, and his suit needs repairing, especially with the new rips in the legs. If the new damage was worse, he might’ve just made an entirely new suit, but the little cuts can be sewn up fine. He will unstitch the entire back, though, he now realizes. It’s unsalvageable.
Peter selects a film on his laptop (Happy Hogan may not remember a thing about him, but thankfully Peter remembered his Netflix password)— some action movie from the early 2000s, and sets it up next to his sewing machine on the desk. Carefully, he unstitches the back by hand, keeping an eye on the red spider symbol that was thankfully unscathed. Where would he be if May hadn't insisted he take Home-Ec in ninth grade?
And her sewing machine. This could’ve been done by hand, but he can’t imagine how much longer it would’ve taken.
He wonders who lives in their apartment now.
Monday
Peter works from sunrise to sunset, dreading every moment as he checks his calculations over and over. He can’t ask anyone for help with rent, not even if he wanted to—there was no one to ask. Perhaps there’s something else he could do for a gig, like if he signed up for Uber’s delivery service as well. No, that won’t work, there’s only so much time in the day. The number of requests would remain the same. He was busy, this was New York after all, a lack of orders wasn’t the issue. He’ll have to work through the night. That wouldn’t be a problem, except for the werewolf terrorizing the city at night, practically on the dot every sunset. He needs to catch Man-Wolf tonight.
Peter arrives at the construction site just after dusk, waiting and ready. Doctor Strange insisted Man-Wolf was weaker now, so this’ll be a piece of cake. He knocked the werewolf down once, surely he can do it again.
Except, Man-Wolf doesn’t show up.
The moon rises, and Peter’s legs fall asleep as they dangle over the third level of the scaffolding where he sits. Still no Man-Wolf.
What the hell?
Peter checks his phone so much that the battery drops to 16%. No updates. Not a clip on Reddit, not a word from the Daily Bugle. Man-Wolf wasn’t just not showing up at the construction site, he wasn’t out at all . Once his phone dies, he waits as long as he can before he heads home. If Man-Wolf isn’t going to show, then Peter is going to work as many hours as he can to make up for lost time.
Perhaps he solved it already? What if the cracked ruby fell out on its own, and whoever was imprisoned by it was now free?
Tuesday
“I’m glad to see you're comfortable enough to walk,” MJ says as she slides Peter a coffee.
“Yeah, me too,” he laughs. He’ll need to pretend his back is still torn up for another two weeks, even though he awoke this morning to nothing but a thin scar down his right side.
He probably shouldn’t be drinking coffee at night, but he worked all day , even after he barely slept the night before. If the caffeine doesn’t keep him up this evening, anticipation for the werewolf will. But the sun had set almost an hour ago, and Man-Wolf was nowhere to be found.
“I can’t believe the werewolf just disappeared?” Ned wonders aloud as he slides his phone out of his pocket. He smacks his teeth when he powers it on and nothing happens. “My phone’s dead,” he announces. “I’m gonna go ask laptop-corner-guy if I can use the outlet to charge it.”
“I’ll come with you,” Peter says.
“You okay?” MJ asks quietly, and Peter turns back to her just as he rose from his stool. Ned waits at the counter for him.
“Yeah, I’m okay. Why? Are you?”
“You just seem a little nervous,” she says.
Well, an unconfirmed werewolf-monster-man has disappeared and it might be my fault, and he could be hurt, or he could be free, and the wizards were surprisingly unhelpful and I don’t know what’s going on—
“I’m just freakin’ out a little over rent. I missed a few days of work, but it’ll be fine.”
If Man-Wolf is really gone, he can work these nights and make up the money.
MJ looks at him with suspicion, like she’s holding back another question.
“Okay,” she says.
Okay.
Wednesday
MJ [8:33]: Good morning.
You [8:33] good morning whats up? arent u in school?
MJ [8:34] I think I’ve come down with whatever u had.
You [8:40] oh. im so sorry, i shouldnt have let u come over.
MJ [8:41] No, it’s fine. It’s flu season.
You [8:41] oh. still, im so sorry. ur missing school, arent u?
MJ [8:42] It’s spring break, so no, hopefully not much.
You [8:45] oh my god ive taken ur spring break now!? mj i really am sorry
MJ [8:46] I said it’s fine, I mean it. Not my first flu season living on this planet. I wanted to help u.
You: [8:46] is there anything i can do to help u? do u need anything?
MJ [8:48] No, it’s ok, my moms got it.
MJ added contact Ned to the group
You [9:00] hey ned, r u sick?
Ned [9:03] Sick as hell dude
You [9:03] :( mjs sick too
MJ [9:05] Whoever gets better first owes the other a coffee
Ned [9:06] I dont think i like coffee
MJ [9:06] Then you better hope I get better first!
“Hey,” a man grunts, jostling Peter where he stood in the subway holding a strap. “Getchur head out of your phone, the train’s stopped.”
“Oh, sorry,” Peter says, and he exits the train car, DoorDash order in the crook of the same arm that holds his phone.
Damnit, he should’ve known. He should’ve known they’d get sick, but it’s not like he knew he had the flu, he was sick for only three days. When he was a child, the flu would put him out of commission for over a week, without fail, almost every year.
At the end of the day, Peter’s only a hundred bucks away from making rent. He’ll keep pushing through after he meets that goal as long as Man-Wolf is out of the picture, especially now that Ned and MJ are both unavailable. He needs to get back on his feet, financially, and Spider-Man needs to get back on the street and take care of non-werewolf business.
Still, impending doom drives him through the day instead of relief. Where is the Man-Wolf?
Thursday
Where is he?
Friday
Where is he!?
Saturday
There’s no way Man-Wolf was just gone. He can’t be gone. And if he was, Peter needed to obtain that ruby and deliver it to the Sanctum, they would keep it safe. Who’s to say the cursed gem wasn’t body hopping as he stood aside, running around New York delivering pasta and pizza? This Man-Wolf might have been rescued, but what if another one turns up? It could happen any moment.
Peter snaps a picture of his successful delivery to upload to DoorDash, and a Daily Bugle notification pings his phone. He opens it to find a muted clip of J.J.J. interviewing his own son, John Jameson III. John is a smiling man, sandy hair and a thick navy turtleneck comfortably hugs his neck. He has no mustache, but the same smile and pointed nose are shared between father and son, and John laughs at something his father said. Peter has three more orders to complete in this building, and he unmutes the clip and plays it on low as he enters the elevator, having forgotten his earbuds at home.
“I had a nasty flu,” John says, “I’m dearly sorry I missed my project partners' museum gig.”
“Yes, it is flu season,” J.J.J. grumbles. “It’s particularly awful this time around, reminds me of the bird flu about a decade ago. But you’re back now, and that’s what counts, my boy!”
John looks uncomfortable the way all children do when their parents are too enthusiastic. The camera clips to a headshot of him alone as he shuffles papers, likely to do with his archeology expedition, but his golden eyes the same shade as his hair look all too familiar to Peter.
Flu season is an awfully convenient time to be struck with a magical werewolf condition, if that was the case here. Peter hopes it wasn’t, but at this point he can’t tell if he’s forcing himself to see the barely-there lump in the center of John’s chest under his sweater or if it’s really there. Someone enters the elevator and Peter closes the app and tucks his phone into his back pocket.
Sunday, again.
The full moon doesn't stand out in the sky, swallowed up by street and shop lights, and it goes unnoticed as the crowd goes about their business tonight. Peter's taken to wearing Spider-Man under his clothes as he works through the evening, and he carries his old side-saddle backpack from middle school with him because the gloves and mask are too thick to fit in his back pocket. He must look like a student as he meanders through the bodega, taking his time between deliveries to select snacks to keep at his apartment. He still feels guilty for giving MJ and Ned the flu, and whenever they're better he wants to make it up to them with a movie night or trip (probably a park visit, his apartment isn't exactly suited to a movie night— what would they do, huddle around his laptop on the floor?) He could find a used TV somewhere, or a projector. Yeah, he could hang a sheet over his windows. That'd be nice.
A shriek, an "Oh, shit!" shouted by the man at the counter before he ducks behind it, and one shelf clatters to the floor as a lanky man in the bodega trips as he scurries away through the side door— all follow the knowing tingle down Peter's spine that prompted him to duck as well, to drop the three bags of Doritos and shed his gray button down.
Man-Wolf takes up the entire double-door entrance where he stands, hunched and drooling and so, so angry.
He almost rips his backpack strap open in the frantic search for his gloves and mask.
Slowly, Peter rises from the floor.