Dark Matter

When Peter wakes up, it’s to the sound of gentle snoring at the foot of the bed, and two beating hearts. One on the bed, the other beside it. He blinks down at the bed and finds Tim facedown in the blankets, asleep, as still as a log. Peter does his best to move his legs away from his sleeping friend to keep from waking him and looks over to his side, still mostly asleep.

Dick Grayson is sitting in a plush chair on the other side of Peter’s nightstand, focused on his cell phone. He’s dressed casually and looks a bit tired and vaguely stressed. Peter can only guess at how long the man has been sitting there, and hopes he didn’t sit there all night. That can’t have been a good use of his time.

Dick looks up from his phone and smiles. “Hey, Pete.”

He bites back a cough and rubs his eyes. It takes him a moment to orient himself, to recognize that the weird light coming from the windows is sunlight, and that morning has come. It takes him a second moment to realize that the tickle at the back of his throat is from a laughing fit and not a coughing one.

“Ugh,” Peter responds, his voice thick and gravelly. He slaps at his nightstand for his inhaler. Dick plucks it from the nightstand and hands it to him. Peter snatches it up, uses it, and then sighs in relief when the medicine starts to work. “Thanks.”

“Anytime,” Dick replies. He considers the Nightwing figure on Peter’s nightstand for a moment and picks it up, amused. “You know, they never did get this costume right.”

“They didn’t?” Peter asks, putting his inhaler down on top of the Stark radio and sitting up. He runs a hand through his hair and sighs, feeling wrung out and sick. Which he is, but still, it’s a little rude for him to feel this much of it.

“Nope,” Dick says, setting the figurine down with great care. “They never bothered painting the wings across the chest. Someone I met once told me branding was pretty important for that kind of thing.”

Something tickles the back of Peter’s mind when Dick says that, but the connection doesn’t quite form. Typical for waking up with a horrific cold. “Oh. They were right.” He yawns, stretches carefully, and stares at Tim for a moment before asking, “Is he okay?”

“Tim doesn’t keep to a normal sleep schedule, and when he does sleep, it’s usually done in a way that’s, at best, vaguely concerning,” Dick replies dryly. “Trust me, he’s fine.”

"Should we move him over to his room?"

Dick shakes his head. "No. Tim’s a heavy sleeper, but he doesn’t like getting forced awake. He'll act on instinct if someone grabs him or startles him when he's asleep. His training will kick in."

"Training?" Peter asks, standing up from the bed. He tosses a blanket over Tim’s sleeping form. Tim responds by curling up inside it like a caterpillar.

"Martial arts training," Dick explains. "It's a family tradition around here."

"That's an odd tradition to have," Peter says.

"Given recent events, it's probably a good one to have," Dick says, shrugging.

Fair enough. Peter thinks on that and relaxes. "That's where he got those bruises from, isn't it? When we were changing for gym class awhile back, I saw these bruises on his ribs and...well, kind of assumed the worst."

"He had a pretty rough sparring match awhile back, yeah,” Dick says, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’ve got a few bruises of my own from a little while ago.”

Peter feels himself relax. Tim’s bruises have been bothering him for awhile now. “I wondered. You guys should probably pull your punches when you spar together. That was a really nasty bruise.”

Dick’s smile turns wry. “Our sparring partners don’t always agree to that. Actually, you should think about taking some lessons with us when you’re feeling better--” His phone beeps, and Dick snatches it up, and swipes open the screen, frowning down at it. He sighs.

"What were you working on anyway?" Peter asks, silently thanking whatever god interrupted that thread of conversation.

A quick boxing match at school that doesn’t last longer than three minutes is one thing, a prolonged self defense lesson is another. He can suppress his innate fighting instincts for only so long. And given how weird his moods have been lately, that might not be the best idea. The Waynes seem to not care and accept his weird meta abilities, but they might not be so forgiving if he flings Dick through a wall on instinct.

“Moving,” Dick says simply. “I live in Blüdhaven, but my place isn’t exactly....Uh.” He pauses. “Suitable for taking in another person? It’s a little cluttered like my car, you know, kind of--”

“It’s a total dump, isn’t it?” Peter asks, amused.

“Absolute trash fire,” Dick replies with a rueful grin. Peter finds himself warming up to Dick a bit more; sure, he grew up rich and pampered, but he has the same down to earth practicality as Tim and Duke. “Anyway, I thought it would just be easier to stay in the manor instead of dragging you over to Blüdhaven. I was trying to get into touch with a friend to help me move back into the manor, but Wally isn’t answering his phone for some reason.”

Peter tilts his head. “Is that weird?”

“Very weird. Normally if I call him, he’s at my door within the hour, but he’s not answering at all. And that’s just not like him. Maybe I should call Barry,” Dick replies, speaking half to himself. He rubs at a spot on the back of his head and frowns down at this phone for a moment. Then he shakes his head. “Nevermind. Are you hungry?”

“Starving,” Peter admits.

“Clean up and meet me in the kitchen,” Dick says, standing up from the chair and heading for the door. “There’s someone I want you to meet. And we should talk anyway.”

“Right,” Peter says. “Meet you downstairs.”

Dick smiles, nods, and shuts the door behind himself. Peter gets up and stretches, briefly touching the gunshot wound in his side. It still aches and burns, but it’s a healing ache now. Alfred’s cooking has done wonders for his healing factor, thank god. If this keeps up, he might be close to full strength in a month. Maybe less. Depending on the Joker toxin, he supposes.

He makes a mental note to look into that toxin when he gets the chance. Though where he’s going to find a lab, let alone one stocked with everything he needs, is anyone’s guess. He’ll need to find one soon, if only to get more web fluid. He can probably cobble together a cheap suit from the clothes Alfred has bought him...

He’s getting distracted. He sighs, throws the blankets over Tim’s sleeping form, and heads for the shower, curious about this person Dick wants Peter to meet.

* * *

He has his answer the moment he steps into the kitchen, still a little damp from the shower and wearing warm clothes.

Dick is sitting at the kitchen island with a beautiful woman wearing a purple coat. He perks up when Peter steps inside the kitchen and waves him over to a seat that has a steaming meal resting in front of it. Peter is eager to hop up onto the stool and grab a fork.

“There he is,” Dick says. “Kory, this is Peter. Peter, this is Kory, my girlfriend.”

The first thing Peter thinks when he meets Kory is: wow, she’s beautiful. And she is. She stands a few inches taller than Dick and carries herself with a quiet self assurance that somehow conveys both confidence and appreciative curiosity about her surroundings. Her hair is a shade of red that seems just a bit out of the range of normal human color, but is no less beautiful for all that.

Of course, he’s kind of got a thing for redheads.

The thought that follows immediately after that is: she’s meta. Her eyes are just a hair too bright, her movement just a bit too uncanny, and her heart beats a bit too fast. Oddities like that are common for meta people like him, especially those that have enhanced strength. Captain America’s heart was the same way.

Oddly, despite the faster beat, Kory’s heart seems to match Dick’s heartbeat as much as possible.

“It’s nice to meet you, Peter,” Kory says, smiling warmly at him. “You’re Dick’s son now?”

“Uh--” Peter starts, thrown by the question.

“Technically, he’s my ward,” Dick says, cutting in smoothly. “I haven’t--the paperwork is more like a guardianship. I’m responsible for Peter, but not his father. A caretaker.”

And Peter hears, distantly, a different voice sneer, “I’m a little confused as to the relationship here. What is he, your ward?”

Kory frowns at this, not quite understanding. “Like Bruce did for you?”

“Until he adopted me, yeah,” Dick replies. “Think of the tower, back when we all moved in together.”

That seems to click for her. She smiles at Peter. “I see. Well. Welcome to the family, Peter.”

"Thanks," Peter says, sitting down beside her. "What did you want to talk about, Dick?"

"I wanted to touch base with you, that’s all. You’re going through a lot. You’ve gone through a lot, too,” Dick says.

“Bruce gave me the rundown. Something about paparazzi, and--uh.” Peter pauses. “And I think I threatened him if he made me do rich people nonsense.”

“The standard threat we’ve all given him at one point or another. To his credit, he’ll do his best to protect you,” Dick says. “So will everyone else, but you’re kind of the hot topic on the internet at the moment.”

“What? Why?” Peter asks.

“You’re involved with the Waynes. It’s just something that comes with the territory, unfortunately. The press is going to have a field day over you for at least a month, assuming nothing else bombastic happens in the city,” Dick explains. “They can’t reach you here, and Alfred and Bruce and I can chase them away here at the manor, but they’re too rabid to deal with right now.”

“I would’ve thought Spider-Man would’ve been bigger news,” Peter says, squinting at one article. ‘Newest Wayne Heir: Peter Parker’. Heir? What the hell is that about? “You know, since he’s out of action after that thing with the crane.”

Dick freezes for a moment, and visibly fights back some kind of strong reaction. Anger, maybe. Definitely grief. That surprises Peter; he’s never seen Dick in Crime Alley as Spider-Man or in his regular day to day life. And he would’ve noticed him. Dick’s far too easy going and clean cut to blend in with the usual Crime Alley types.

“You would think that, wouldn’t you?” Dick replies, his tone even and calm. Kory reaches out and gently places her hand on top of his and Dick shakes his head. “I just wanted to warn you to be careful. Not that it matters since you’re recovering from being sick.”

“Well, noted. I’m not completely clueless, believe it or not. Tony taught me some tricks awhile back.”

“Oh, yeah?” Dick asks. There’s curiosity there, but a lot more wariness. “I haven’t seen him recently.”

Shocker. Peter tilts his head, looking at Dick for a long moment. Finally, he asks, “Did Tony really sign over custody to you?"

"Would he normally do that?" Dick counters.

Peter pauses. If Tony had literally appeared in this universe, found out what Peter had done, and knew he had only a short amount of time to help Peter, then yes. Hell, Peter wouldn't be surprised if Tony wouldn’t have managed to sketch out some rough design of a transdimensional device in the process. If May were here (the thought of her name is enough to cause a burning ache in his chest), she would probably do the same thing.

But Tony wasn't at the conference. Loki was. And Peter has no idea what Loki would do.

"Believe it or not, that is an unbelievably complicated answer," Peter says.

"We're still looking for him, for the record," Dick says. “If only to tell him where you are.”

"You won’t find him," Peter says. "He's gone."

Dick frowns. “I’m pretty good at finding people. If you don’t mind telling me about him--”

His phone goes off before Peter can even think of an answer (thank god), and Dick glances at the screen, frowning at it. The name on the screen reads Barry Allen. He hesitates, glancing between the phone and Peter.

“You should take that,” Kory says. “I’ll stay with Peter.”

Dick shoots her a grateful look and stands up, grabbing his phone and patting Peter’s shoulder on his way by. He steps out of the kitchen and into the hallway. Peter can hear brief snatches of conversation: ‘Hi, Barry, what’s up?’ and ‘No, I haven’t seen him, I thought he was busy with you?’ before Dick’s voice fades from his hearing completely. The joys of abnormally thick and weirdly soundproof walls.

“So, Kory, where are you from?” Peter asks after a moment of awkward silence.

Kory smiles.

They spend some time speaking. By the end of it, Peter realizes he still doesn’t quite know where Kory is from, just that she lives in New York with a bunch of roommates. That works as a springboard for the rest of the conversation, at least, until she excuses herself and leaves him alone.

She seems nice.

After eating half of the meals Alfred left for him in the kitchen’s industrial sized fridge, Peter excuses himself and heads back upstairs, grabbing one last smoothie for the road. This one is green, and smells strongly of healthy vegetables, completely at odds with the strawberry banana smoothie he drank dry while speaking with Kory. He taps the door to his own room and peeks his head inside.

Tim is sitting up on his bed, wrapped tightly in the blankets Peter threw across him earlier, clearly half asleep. His hair is sticking up in every direction, and his eyes are open to bare slits. Judging by his heartbeat and breathing, he just woke up.

"Dude, you look like a zombie," Peter says by way of greeting, walking into his room.

Tim’s response is a grunt.

“I brought you a smoothie,” Peter says. “Since I don’t think you had dinner last night.”

Another grunt. A three second pause, and then Tim slithers a hand out from under the blankets and reaches for the smoothie.

Peter is beyond amused and a little concerned. He hands Tim the drink and flops down across his bed, sinking into it. It’s way too soft. He wonders if Alfred would be insulted if he found Peter sleeping on the floor.

Tim drinks his smoothie, gradually waking up. He watches Peter carefully. “How do you feel?”

Peter shrugs, and aims for honesty. “I’m good until the next mental breakdown hits.”

He’s only half joking. He feels okay now, but he’s also tired, and a little jittery from the inhaler. He can’t remember his dreams, but the thought of them sets his teeth on edge. He’s exhausted and needs sleep, but he knows the moment he closes his eyes, he’ll be dragged over the coals by his own memories. That’s going to spell disaster sooner or later.

“I know how that feels,” Tim says, taking a deep drink. “As a heads up, I might get a little, uh, focused over the next few days.”

“Yeah, it seemed like you were super into your project last night. What were you working on?”

Tim pulls his phone out of the blanket cocoon and swipes it open. It’s much more high tech than Peter’s, filled with apps that look to be custom made. Peter idly wonders if Tim and Ned would have been friends if they’d had the chance to meet.

The grief that follows that though sours his mood a little.

“Just checking up on a friend I haven’t heard from in awhile. Then I got sidetracked by something else,” Tim says, holding out his phone. There’s an image of a tall, broad shouldered teenager standing in front of a modest farm house near a field of sunflowers. A kid sits on his shoulders; the two look like brothers, and both of them are wearing shirts with Superman’s symbol across the front. They look like brothers. “This is Conner. He’s my best friend. He sent me this a month ago when he and his brother went to visit their grandparents. It’s the last I’ve heard from him.”

Peter is fascinated by the turns of fate that allowed an over-caffeinated old money genius to become best friends with a Kansas farm boy who looks able and willing to juggle a herd of cows with one hand tied behind his back. Actually, he looks weirdly familiar.

Peter squints at the picture. "He kinda looks like Superman.”

"He gets that a lot,” Tim says. He drains the rest of the smoothie down, and stands, leaving Peter’s blankets behind. “I should let you rest and get some coffee.”

“Sure. Go easy on the coffee,” Peter says, fighting back a yawn.

“No,” Tim says, walking for the door. He hesitates at the doorway for a moment. “Hey.”

Peter, already half buried in the blankets, blinks up at Tim.

“Call me or Duke if you need anything, all right?” Tim says. “I might be distracted, but I’m still here if you need me.”

“I know,” Peter says. He pauses. “Thanks for putting up with me last night.”

“I don’t ‘put up’ with family,” Tim explains patiently. He pauses. “Minus Damian, I guess, but also not really. Anyway, don’t think like that. You’re not a burden, Peter.”

“Nightwing said the same thing to me once,” Peter says, amused. “He told me you’d say that, too.”

“Nightwing’s a pretty smart guy,” Tim says, with an air of familiarity that’s surprising to Peter. He pauses again and adds, “And he’s right.”

He leaves after that, stepping through Peter’s door and shutting it behind himself as he goes. Peter stretches out on the bed, annoyed by how exhausted he feels. He got up, showered, ate, and spoke to three whole people and he’s ready for a nap. Is this how old people feel? God, this sucks.

His phone vibrates on the nightstand, and he grabs it on autopilot.

New Message

Dick: Hey, sorry I left in such a hurry. I’m going to be a little busy moving back to the manor, but I’m here if you need me. Day or night. Okay?

Peter:yeah, got it! Good luck with your move!

Okay, so that wasn’t the most elegant or smoothest end to a conversation, but he couldn’t just leave Dick on read. Peter sets his phone down on the nightstand, gently bumps fists with the Nightwing figurine, and then turns out the light.

His room is dark, quiet, and warm. He sleeps.

And dreams of his family.

* * *

His cold lessens by the hour; after a little bit of good rest and better food, Peter finds himself almost back to full strength. If it wasn’t for the occasional burst of laughing seizures, he’d be back to normal. Or, at least, normal enough to start up his patrols again.

The problem is this: good rest means he’s no longer distracted by hunger and exhaustion. His temper becomes hotter and sharper. Harder to control. It’s strong enough to pull him out of a sound sleep.

His dreams about May and Ben become nightly affairs. They’re not quite nightmares, but they aren’t pleasant either.

They end with May trying to speak with him. It almost feels too real for a mere dream.

* * *

The nightmares become a problem two days into his new life with the Waynes. To his utter shock, they aren’t made uncomfortable by his screaming nightmares. In fact, they’re treated as almost routine, as if each of them expected this or has personal experience with nightmares of their own. Maybe that’s true.

He’d bet good money that they definitely don’t have the same nightmares as he does.

He dreams of Ben and May. Of Titan. Of the Vulture. He sees the Joker grinning at him from the shadows, bloody crowbar in hand. The worst nightmares are a combination of all of the above. And the absolute worst ones are chased away by indistinct figures wreathed in orange and gold. Peter gets the sense they hurt themselves doing this.

He starts to avoid sleeping. Not a lot; his body is just too beaten up and exhausted to allow much insomnia. Just enough that the nightmares stop becoming a nightly occurrence because he’s simply not sleeping on a nightly basis. He’s balancing his mental health against his physical health at the moment and feels as though he’s walking a tightline between two separate disasters.

Not exactly an elegant solution, but a solution nonetheless.

* * *

“You should sleep, man,” Duke says. He invited himself into Peter’s room a few minutes ago. It’s the first thing he’s said to Peter, and unfortunately, it sets off a level of aggravated annoyance that Peter’s wholly unprepared to hide.

“No,” Peter says. He’s been pacing his room for hours now, staving off sleep minutes at a time. His tone is sharper than he intends, and his fists are clenched at his sides, and he’s moving just a hair too quick for a normal human. If Duke wasn’t currently in the room, he would literally be crawling the walls to stave off sleep for just a few more minutes.

That he can’t indulge in his weird spider instincts is another annoyance to pile on top of the others. Including the sound of the rain tapping his window, the sound of Duke’s heartbeat, and the sound of electricity running through the walls. If he was less tired, he’d recognize the telltale sign for an impending migraine; oversensitivity is usually a big clue for him.

Duke is quiet for a moment, clearly concerned, and then tries again.

“Peter, seriously, I think you should lay down at least--”

Peter crosses the room, grabs Duke by his shirt, and slams him against the wall before he realizes what he’s doing. He glares up at Duke. The anger is quickly boiling over into a simmering rage. His vision actually starts to turn red; a thing he never thought possible before.

Distantly, a voice calls to him. Something golden from far away shouts, “Peter! Enough!”

It sounds like T’Challa, calling out across a fathomless void. It distracts Peter away from his tantrum long enough to realize how tired he is, and that drains away more of his anger.

Duke is watching him warily, and with a steady, almost unnerving amount of calm. Either people lose their shit on him constantly or he’s not very impressed with Peter’s tantrum. Peter sets him down gently and takes several big steps back, covering his face with his hands, breathing in deep, heavy gasps. A few come out in chuckles, and he takes that for the warning it is. He staggers over to his nightstand, snatches up the inhaler, and uses it to head off the crazed laughter. He stays hunched over his nightstand, dropping the inhaler down with a heavy sigh.

A very tense silence follows.

Duke hasn’t moved from where Peter set him down. His heart rate is elevated, and so is breathing, but only from dwindling shock. Peter’s spider sense isn’t touching off, but well. It hasn’t pinged against anyone in this house. Peter sighs.

“I need to be left alone right now,” he says, trying to keep his tone even. It comes out harsh and bitter at the edges. After a few seconds, he grinds, “Please.”

Duke says nothing. He simply leaves, gently shutting the door behind himself as he goes. Peter lets out a long sigh and holds his head in his hands.

What the fuck was that all about?

* * *

BATCHAT

Duke (11:20pm): Dick, where are you?

Dick (11:22pm): Crime Alley. Bane broke out of prison, Jason and I are trying to track him down.

Dick (11:23pm): Correction: I’m trying to track him down. Jason might actually kill him.

Duke (11:24pm): Peter needs you. Drop the patrols for awhile.

Dick (11:25pm): What happened?

Steph (11:26pm): A pit reaction. A pretty bad one, but Peter controlled himself.

Dick (11:27pm): Where is he now?

Steph (11:29pm): asleep. Cass is keeping an eye on him right now.

Dick (11:28pm): I’ll be back as soon as I can.

Jason (11:32pm): What’s that old phrase? History repeats itself?

Jason (11:34pm): How many times did Bruce leave you alone in that manor to go chase the fucking Joker when you were a kid?

Dick (11:46pm): Point made.