Homesickness

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Location: NYC’s International Science Convention

Time: 8am

Peter Parker’s P.O.V

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“Alright, move it a little to the left,” Flash directed to Peter and Ned, who were on step-stools on either side of their little booth. “No, no, no, my left dickwads,” Flash huffs while Peter and Ned rolled their eyes and proceeded to move the sign. “Hmmm, you know what, the right was looking a little good, move it back.” Flash commanded proudly, but that’s when Michelle kicked a step-stool she found towards Flash’s direction, hitting him, knocking him over.

“Sorry, not sorry,” Michelle called out from her seat by their designated booth as she closed the book she was reading. “Why don’t you move it yourself Eugene, you’re obviously not doing anything.” Michelle declared, sending Flash a scathing glare.

“Well I’m obviously giving moral support Jones, it's not rocket science,” Flash brushed himself off as he picked himself off the floor. Conveniently, their booth was situated next to another school’s model rocket display. Flash chuckled as he pointed at the rocket upon realization, “Pun intended.” Michelle rolled her eyes so far back, Peter thought she was poessessed for a quick second.

“Flash, why are you even here, your not even the Robotics Club?” Ned asked, he and Peter were finally able to get off the stools.

“Looky here nerds, if it wasn’t for me, you guys would be riding the public bus to get here. The real question is what did Penis here contribute?” Flash argued. Peter in-turn, couldn’t help but raise his eye-brows in confusion. 

I literally didn’t even say anything. 

“He’s literally the reason why we’re here,” Michelle quick-fired as she crossed her arms over her chest.

“Yeah Flash, if you were actually in the club you’d know it was Peter’s robot that won the club’s battle royale and got us, excluding you, invited to the NYC’s International Science Convention,” Ned recalled.

“Don’t get smug about it Penis, just know I physically got us here too,” Flash got a bit too close to Peter’s personal space and poke his chest threatenly. “Now if you all need me, don’t,” Flash in-turn glanced around like a lion looking for prey.

“That’s what we’ve been trying to tell you,” Michelle dryly announced as Ned and Peter chuckled in-response, but it seems like Flash didn’t hear since his focus was on two girls that were way older than him and way out of his league.

“Science babes, wait—up” Flash cried as he ran in their direction.

“He says it like his parents weren’t the ones paying for the charter bus,” Michelle complain as she reopened her book.

“You win some, you lose some” Peter sighs.

“Forget about that, Tony Starks aka Iron-man aka Avengers’ gonna be here for a presentation later,” Ned was brimming in child-like wonder, just like the time when he mistakenly found out Peter was Spider-man. “Oh man! Do you think he’s gonna bring any other Avenger with him, I heard him and Bruce Banner are science bros,” Ned was talking a bit too fast at this point.

“Who knows,” Peter shrugs. Mr. Starks was having a panel today. How did I not know this?

“Umm, you totally do,” Ned counters, which made Michelle lift her head from book to stare pointedly at the both of them.

“He means because of my internship of course,” Peter said quickly as he subtly elbowed Ned.

“Whatever losers,” Michelle closed her book and headed away from them and their booth, “Later.”

“Wait, where are you going,” Peter calls out.

“There’s a panel on toxic chemicals and flesh-eating bacteria,” Michelle continued walking as she flipped the bird without turning around. Peter couldn’t help but smile, his heart was doing that flip it always seems to do whenever Michelle is just...Michelle. He puts his hand over his heart.

What does this mean?

Evidently his thoughts were cut off by Ned. “Dude I’m freaking out!” Ned said, if Peter didn’t know any better he’d think Ned was gonna faint from all the excitement.

“Alright, alright, Ned calm. When’s the panel?” Peter asked, prompting Ned to take out his event time schedule.

“Three hours from now,” Ned groans.

“With that amount of time, we can explore this place,” Peter offers.

“That’ll do, I guess,” Ned sighs as he continued to look at his event time schedule. “Oh! There’s a game-coding competition here too! I wonder if they’ll let people test it out before the judging.”

“Only one way to find out. Lead the way, you will,” Peter gave is best Yoda impression, making them both giggle. They try to follow their map to the game-coding area, but between the massive food-court, crowds of people, and stopping to look at every interesting booth that crossed their path, Peter thought they’ll never get there until...

“Peter, Peter, Peter!” Ned shook Peter’s arm.

“Yeah Ned?” Peter look in the direction Ned was pointing too.

“Oh my gosh, I can’t believe they have it!” Ned ran over to one of the booths. “Can I test it?” He asked the girl behind the booth, who seemed about their age, who in-return shrugged an uncaring okay. Ned puts on the VR headset and takes the controller laying on the table. “Oh my god Peter, it plays just like Side-Walk Bashers on the PS4. I’m facing Kyu as Ren and the graphic are ultra-realistic,” Ned was really mesmerized.

“Sorry about him, he just really loves this game,” Peter chuckled to the girl manning the booth, she in-turn gave him a bored ‘whatever’ as she went back to scrolling her phone. Peter decided to wait on Ned till he got tired of the game, but this was Ned he was thinking about, Ned’s never gonna get tired of it. So Peter tried to find something to occupy his attention till Mr. Starks’ presentation. No way Ned would pass up Mr. Starks’ presentation over a game...hopefully. Peter continued to look around the game-coding section, but then, he heard a familiar sound, that unlock a buried memory.

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Flashback— 2 years ago

(Everything in the memory seemed so blurry to Peter. You couldn’t exactly see the faces of the people who were with him either, but it seems like he and two other kids were at an arcade, playing on one of the coin-op machines.)

“Oh my gosh guys, this is the last row of rocket-ships!” A masculine voice called out from Peter’s left.

“Shush, you’re jinxing us,” A feminine voice spoke from his right side.

“It's not jinxing cause we're totally gonna win this time around, right Petey?” The masculine voice called out, but before Peter could remember anymore, his flashback got interrupted by his Spidey-senses flaring up.

(End of Flashback)

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Peter’s flashback disrupted his rely response as he felt a sharp pain on in his lower back region.

“Wow, you Northerners just fall asleep anywhere huh?” A familiar voice chuckled from him. I should’ve known. Peter rolled his eyes before turning to said person direction.

“Harley, what are you doing here and was that you just now?” Peter felt something tiny was attached on the back-side of his shirt. The only way he could see it is by taking off his shirt, which he’ll definitely not doing since it unprofessional, embarrassing, and just plain creepy at a science convention.

“What am I doing here? Peter Parker, I have you know I am a very important man,” Harely grinned.

“Man? Pssh, you’re like ten.”

“13 and a half, thank you very much. And that’s rich coming from a guy who isn’t 18 but calls himself Spider-man,” Harely whispered the last part since they were in an area with loads of people just walking around.

“Harley!” Peter whisper-yells.

“Relax, spider-boy, no ones’ super close right now. So what are you doing here anyway?”

“I literally asked you first but whatever. My school’s Robotic Club got invited to showcase our model. And you?”

“I had a presentation earlier,” Peter gave Harley the dryest look that would even impress Michelle, not that she’d admit it. “What? I’m not lying!”

“How?”

“When you know Tony, you know certain people and by certain people, I mean rich snooty higher-ups. So I asked Tony if I could show off my latest model here to get some varying opinions on how I can improve my potato guns. This is one of my latest ones.” Harley reached into his back-pack to pull out a potato gun, but it looked different than the ones Peter normally saw. “Look different right? That’s because I reconfigured this one to be held on ones’ arm instead of their hands,” Harely demonstrated by sliding the potato gun on his arm holster. “Unlike the regular potato gun, you don’t need to pull a trigger to activate it. All you have to do is clench your fist and that’ll send the potatoes flying at mach 15. None of that ‘gun falling from my hands’ cheesy Hollywood stuff,” Harely takes it off the holster and tossed it Peter for further examination.

“What’s the Mark by now? 25? 26?” Peter asked.

“32 but lucky guess. That’s weird though. Tony didn’t say anything about you being here.” Harely wondered while Peter shrugged.

“I guess he didn’t know, I mean I didn’t exactly tell him either — not that I didn’t want to, it's just that the trip sprung up on me last-minute,” 

“Hmm had he’d known, he’d definitely would have came to see what you’ve been working on.”

“Mr. Starks’ a busy guy, I doubt—Wait, you make it sound like he’s not here now.” Peter hands the potato gun back.

“One, we all know he doesn’t do anything but play mechanic in his lab. The real boss is Pepper. Two, he isn’t here.” 

“But what about his presentation at 11pm.”

“Pepper’s taking over with me as her assistant.”

“That kinda sucks.” Peter sighs.

“Ouch Peter, I'm right here. Wait’ll Pepper hears how you really feel about her,” Harely takes his phone out of his pocket and began scrolling through it.

Wait, that ‘s not what I meant. A friend of mine was super excited about meeting Mr.Stark— What is that,” Peter paused upon catching sight of Harley’s shiny pearl colored futuristic phone.

“You like? This is actually what were presenting later. It's called a Stark phone,” Harely tossed his phone, to which Peter caught on reflex.

“It’s amazing,” Peter’s eyes widen as he scrolled through. 

“Its’ also fire, water, and destruction proof. Perfect for spider-boying. Yours is at the tower, by the way, since we didn’t know you were gonna be here.” Harley explains after Peter hands him back his phone.

“Wow, I get one too.” Peter was lost in a happy daze.

“So this super-excited friend, its’ this Ned-guy you’re always talking about, the one that know your secret right?”

“Yeah, now that you’ve mentioned it, he would love to meet a F.O.S.”

“F.O.S.?” Harley questioned.

“Yeah, it stands for friend of Spider-man, super cheesy, I know, but I couldn’t bring myself to tell him that,” Peter chuckled.

“You’re too much of a softy Pete, let’s go meet him,” Harely announced as Peter back-tracked them to Ned.

“Ned, you’ll never guess what just happened!” Peter amped his enthusiasm to a hundred.

“What?” Ned replied behind his VR headset, he sounded like he was not completely there for the conversation.

“I just so happen to bump into a f.o.s?” Peter thought Ned would take off his headset by now, but he didn’t surprisingly.

“Yeah sure.” Ned continued to mashed the buttons at a rapid pace.

“He actually saved Iron-man,” Peter replied.

“On more than one occaision,” Harley quipped.

“Yeah cool.” Ned still sounded like he didn’t really listen. That’s when Peter completely gave up, and turned his attention to Harley instead.

“Wow he’s far gone. Sorry about that Harley,” Peter giggled as he nervously scratched the back of his head.

“Ouch Peter, you said this guy really wanted to meet me but haven’t even looked at me. I’m getting mixed message man,” Harely as he playfully wiped his crocodile tears.

“Maybe later I gue—,” Peter heard the familiar sound again.

“What?”

“Shush, follow me.” Peter can hear the sound coming closer as he walked towards its direction. “Oh my gosh, I just can’t believe it.” Peter found himself in front of a booth.

“Alien Troopers? Isn’t that that old arcade game from 80s?” Harley asked as he looked at the booth’s logo.

“Yeah, 1978 to be exact, I can’t believe it's here. When I was in middle school, I’d go to the arcade all the time after-school to try to get the highest score and stuff.” Peter picked up one of the many VR headsets on the table.

“Hmmm.” Harley picked up one of the headsets as well. “Took a lot of coding to replicate the game to fit a 3-D virtual reality muti-player simulation. Whoever did this, is an even bigger fan than you,” Harely analyzed as he picked up one of the info-pamphlets.

“I know right, I gotta meet them.” Peter then turned his attention to the guy manning the booth. “Could I speak with the person who coded this please?”

“Oh, you mean G, yeah sure,” The guy went out back after Peter quickly thanked him.

“Watching having this little nerd freak out kinda brings back memories of when we first met. Do you act like this with any person, place, or thing that catches your eye?” Harley teased as Peter got noticeably red.

“I guess. I just can’t believe how they were able to make this muti-player compatible. Me and my friends would always take certain buttons and man the controls all at once. I was in-charge of the joystick.”

“Ohhh, that sounds like Cheating 101. Don’t let these hard-cores hear you.”

“Okay maybe, but it was really freaking hard alone.”

“Wow, Ned seems like the type who doesn’t condone cheating though. How’d you convince him?”

“No, I didn’t know Ned in middle sch—”

“Sorry for the wait.” A feminine voice interrupted Peter’s declaration. A voice that sounded so familiar. Is that— When Peter turned around to face said person, his heart was nearly beating out of his chest as the VR headset slipped from his fingers. Thankfully, Harely notice and snatched the headset before it dropped.

 “Peter—Peter Parker is that you?” The girl looked just as wide-eyed as Peter. Peter in-return couldn’t take his eyes off her, not in a ‘creepy’ way, but more of a ‘I can’t believe my eyes’ way. Everything from the girl’s shoulder-length blonde hair, to her blue eyes, to her white long-sleeve button up under her blue argyle sweater-vest and gray skirt with black leggings. Harley couldn’t help but feel awkward in this little stare-down interaction, like a third wheel or something, since Peter hasn’t said a word to get the conversation rolling. So he took it upon himself.

“So you know her Peter, cause she sure seems to know you.” Harely spoke up. “Sorry about him, he’s a bit of an idiot when he’s around girls.” Harley took out his hand, the girl in-return complete their transaction by shaking Harley’s hand, a handshake. “Come on Peter, get over here and introduce us already.” Harley mouthed that last sentence in Peter’s direction.

“So there’s other girls.” The blonde giggled in Peter’s direction, thankfully Peter shook off his daze but he felt his face get all heated. God, I’m probably really red now.

“What?—No!— I mean...um,” Peter never felt this nervous in his life, a close second would be the time when he confessed to Liz or meeting the Vulture while picking her up for Homecoming. But this— this was different feeling, something similar to how he felt about Liz or maybe...Michelle? He pushed all those thoughts away and took a deep breath. “Harley this is my friend from middle school I was talking about earlier, Gwen—Gwen Stacy.”