Chapter 6
“You got a razor anywhere?” called Peter, scratching at his stubble in the bathroom mirror. Gray shadow had burglarized most of his jaw.
From the kitchen, amid clanking sounds of breakfast and chatter from the television, Parker hollered, “Should have some extras in my drawer. Top left, brown dresser.”
Morning light filtered through the blinds and did more for Peter’s mood than anything else had yet managed. He wandered into Parker’s room with a spare toothbrush and absently scrubbed his molars while flicking open the drawer. Parker's room was nearly identical to his own as a teenager, right down to the dumpster tech and Star Wars posters. After asking about the old house he'd learned they'd had to sell it after Ben's death.
As he’d feared, the razors were pretty cheap. Parker’s baby face didn’t require much.
He selected one and paused before shutting the drawer. An envelope bearing the venerable seal of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Parker’s name sat in the drawer, opened. Its return address indicated the school’s admissions office and he knew he was looking at an early response to the kid’s college application.
Well, it wasn’t a federal crime to look—he was Peter Parker, too. He took the envelope out and opened the letter with one hand.
Dear Peter,
On behalf of the Admissions Committee, it is my pleasure to offer you admission to the MIT class of 2023. You were identified as one of the most talented and promising students in one of MIT’s most competitive applicant pools ever…
Beneath that envelope sat one from Empire State, containing an acceptance letter of equal enthusiasm; both enclosed full-ride scholarship offers.
Peter knew immediately Parker’s Aunt May could not be aware of these or they would have been pinned to the refrigerator and possibly framed. When his own acceptance letters with their identical scholarship offers had arrived, his aunt had been so proud she’d practically marched down the hall to inform all their neighbors, dragging an incredibly embarrassed-yet-pleased nephew behind her.
Parker came into the room smelling like bacon. “You find the razors?” he asked, and stopped when Peter held up the letters inquiringly.
“Congratulations,” Peter drawled around a mouthful of toothpaste, smiling wryly. “You’ve got your pick of the litter.” He waggled the razor and replaced the letters in their envelopes, tucking them meaningfully back in the drawer. “When were you planning on telling your aunt?”
Parker’s mouth opened and closed as Peter walked past him to spit in the bathroom sink and take out shaving cream from the medicine cabinet. “Well, um, you know how much she loves surprises…”
Peter agreed, “She does. So go ahead and surprise her.”
He slathered on the cream and began delicately drawing the cheap razor down his face, hoping he wouldn’t show up to Stark Tower looking like it’d been his first time shaving. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Parker lean against the bathroom door frame.
“Did you go to college?” the kid asked hesitatingly.
This was a warning sign. “Uh-huh,” said Peter, rinsing the blade, “I picked Empire State. Close to home, and they’re just as good as MIT.”
“And you graduated? Even with—” Parker waved his hand around— “…all this?”
“Yes, I graduated with ‘all this,’ and then I graduated graduate school. I did a lot of graduating.” He slanted a look at Parker. “Why? Are you thinking of not doing a lot of graduating? Or any?”
Defensively, Parker crossed his arms and muttered, “Come on, can you blame me?”
Peter shook his head at his reflection. “No. I can’t. It’s hard and it will get harder.”
“Is it worth it?”
There was a strange look in Parker’s eyes and Peter was suddenly reminded of talking to Uncle Ben like this in his youth, leaning on the door frame and watching as the man shaved, peppering him with morning conversation. It’d become kind of a ritual.
Why were all these echoes returning now, after so many years? Ben had been dead for decades.
Peter flicked foam off the razor and drew it down his other cheek. “You will be broke and beat and stressed but yes, it’s worth it. I can’t tell you how often I’ve had to put those degrees to work, because you know what? Mad scientists have degrees too.”
Clearly uncomfortable with the topic, Parker joked: “They must not go mad until they graduate.”
“Listen,” said Peter. He turned to face Parker, serious-faced despite half of it still being lathered with shaving cream. “I know what you’re thinking. Why put yourself through all this crap if you’re already where you figure on ending up anyway? The Avengers entrance exam doesn’t have any calculus or essays on mid-century American literature.
You’re thinking, ‘I’m smart, I can still learn this stuff on my own time.’ College is your own time. You’ve always wanted this. Don’t let your secret identity become your only identity. Don’t give up.”
Puzzled, Parker asked, “Give up what?”
Peter shrugged. “Everything else you’ve ever wanted.”
Like him. If anything, Parker was just a few years ahead of Peter when it came to abandoning childhood dreams. Much of the indecision Parker was feeling was derived from guilt; how could he possibly spend so much time on himself, with people in constant need of him? How could he justify starting a family, potentially only to put them in jeopardy one day?
Turning back to the mirror, Peter adopted a lighter tone: “Besides, vigilantism doesn’t pay the bills. You can’t set up a GoFundMe and get the checks written out to ‘Spider-Man.’ Oh, and,” he said as an afterthought, “don’t invest in highly conceptual restaurants. And if you just have to, I mean if someone’s holding a gun to your head, make sure the animals they’re serving are exactly the animals they say they’re serving.”
This served only to totally confuse Parker. “Huh?”
“We going or what?” came Ned’s voice from the living room.
.
.
Peter had seen Stark Tower already, as much a blemish on the skyline as it ever was in Peter’s New York. On the train Parker told him it no longer housed the Avengers, who now lived and trained on a compound upstate.
“Like a cult?” Peter had asked, prompting giggles from Ned and a slightly unwilling grin from Parker.
Peter took a bite out of a danish he’d picked up from a corner vendor. “Did you warn Stark about me?”
Parker didn’t look up from his phone, where he was consulting Google Maps. “I told him, but…he said something about Nigerian princes so I’m not sure he’s convinced. Oh, here it is: Broadway-Lafayette’s our stop. Wait—no, Bleecker Street.”
“You’ve lost all your subway savvy,” Ned told him. “You used to know all the lines before New York became your jungle gym.” Parker rolled his eyes.
Swanky area. At this time the place would be starting to swarm with tourists and sneakerheads lining up for limited-edition kicks. Peter frowned, remembering: “Wait—isn’t the Sanctum Sanctorum around there somewhere?”
“Yeah, we’re meeting Mr. Stark there.”
“With Dr. Strange? Is he Stark’s backup or something?” Peter said warily. He wouldn’t be surprised if Stark wanted another impartial Avenger present for the meeting.
“Backup?” said Parker, startled. “Why would he need backup? We thought maybe this stuff fell in his wheelhouse.”
Peter paused, eyes on one of the subway ads crawling across the train car, then said carefully: “Skipping dimensions isn’t like catching the bus. I’ve never heard him talk about any dimensions that didn’t start with ‘Mirror’ or ‘Dark,’ and I don’t come from either of those.”
“Yeah, but he’s worth a shot, right? We’re talking about a guy who can run out to Gdańsk for pierogi any time he wants.”
It was a rational thought, and one that Peter would be lying if he said he hadn’t had already.
His knowledge of Strange’s abilities in that arena were limited. The Dr. Strange he knew—had known—spoke of other dimensions as something to be guarded against, even feared; they sounded more like alien worlds than corporeal planes. The Dark and Mirror Dimensions, described by the Sorcerer Supreme as “pocket universes,” had seemed like extensions of one reality, like different rooms in the same house.
But opening a portal by magic created another problem. Or, rather, it meant his problem was a different one, one Strange couldn’t solve.
“I don’t think magic’s gonna will fix this,” he muttered, sliding down in his seat. “Can’t we meet in one of Stark’s labs?”
Parker nervously adjusted his ball cap. He’d be walking in barefaced, as it was better to be inconspicuous than walk around Greenwich Village in his Spidey suit. “Ah, no, he thought this would be easier…”
“Meaning he thinks I’m gonna blow up another lab.”
Parker flushed and tugged the cap down lower over his forehead.
By the time they reached Broadway-Lafayette, the commuters heading to work midtown had been replaced by a trendier set of people. Ned led the way to the Bleecker exit and up the stairs, holding his hand up against the bright winter sunlight. “I never get down here,” he commented to Peter and Parker. “Oh, but the new Jordans are out!”
Both he and Parker stared longingly at the sneakers displayed in a shop window, currently the object of several other passing teens’ desire. Peter rolled his eyes. “Okay, mosey on.”
Secretly, though, it made him smile to think Miles would have been similarly enamored of the stylish Jordans. He hoped the kid was doing alright.
Shortly after they were standing before 177a Bleecker Street, a respectable-looking brick establishment in a leafy stretch of the neighborhood. Peter looked around the area, impressed. His coat and threadbare sneakers looked even more drab next to the glossy New Yorkers walking around the trendy area in clouds of expensive perfume.
"So this is where the...magic happens," said Ned to the groans of both Peters. Nice to know his humor was cheesy across dimensions.
Peter scratched his head. “Geez…how does the Sanctum pay its rent?” A refrigerator box around here would be out of his price range.
“Maybe they pay in gold coins,” said Ned, smirking, “like Harry Potter.”
Parker walked up to the door and rang an elaborate knocker like he wasn’t sure if it was just for decoration. “Um, it’s Peter here,” he said.
The door swung open into a shadowy foyer. When they’d walked inside, they saw no one standing behind it. Peter fought the urge to roll his eyes straight back into his skull at the theatrics. Cute.
A familiar face was waiting for them before the staircase. Dr. Strange stood with his hands clasped together, looking the very picture of the Sorcerer Supreme Peter knew and wearing a look of patient severity. His gray eyes flicked to Peter, bringing up the rear of the little group and trying to act nonchalant about all this.
“Long time no see?” he asked cryptically.
“Been a while, yeah,” said Peter.
Too fast to react, there was a flash of light. Red ropes snaked around his arms, torso and legs, holding him fast to the floor. Peter recognized the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak but struggled against them out of reflex. There wasn’t much point; these could bind even the Hulk and grew ever more suppressive the more their captive struggled.
“Oh, nice welcome,” he said sarcastically.
Parker was genuinely scandalized. “Mr. Stark!”
Stark emerged from the side and circled Peter even as he addressed the teen. “Kid, what have I told you about bringing home strays from other dimensions and asking to keep them?”
“What are you doing?” Parker demanded, almost moving as though to try and free the man rooted to the floor by the red tethers. Ned’s eyes were wide as saucers, either horrified or elated; Dr. Strange’s were narrowed and suspicious.
Wong strode forward from the other side, golden spells thrown up like shields.
“Your fingerprints don’t match the kid’s,” Stark said to Peter conversationally.
Exasperated, feeling like the Bands were trying to pull him right through the patterned tiled floor, Peter snapped: “Duh. That’s your problem? Why would they match? I’m friggin’ blond in one universe, I’m sorry all the whorls don’t line up.”
“Well gee, you come in and try to steal my property, ruin my keynote speech and get one of my best scientists killed—”
“It’s not my fault your batshit Employee of the Year built a Stargate in your basement—”
“—and now I’m supposed to believe you’re Peter Parker, from a parallel universe,” Stark waved his arm around, “in which you apparently think I’m someone you can steal from?”
He held up a finger and swiveled around to the others gathering close by. “By the way, in my defense I hired Octavius over ten years ago when I was still a bachelor and she had kind of a hot Miss Frizzle thing going on. Her record was stellar.”
“He really is me,” Parker insisted to the two Avengers. “He knew stuff no one else does.”
Stark rolled his eyes. “Everyone hides their Playboys in the same spot, kid.”
“Playboys?” frowned Parker, confused. “No, it was an Elmo.”
Ned spoke up. “He looks exactly like Ben Parker,” he said. Stark looked at him for a moment, then glanced thoughtfully at Peter. Dr. Strange strode forward to look directly in Peter’s eyes, then muttered a few spells and waved his hands around the captive’s head in a complicated pattern, leaving lines of gold light behind in their wake.
After a moment he murmured, “I don’t detect any presence of the Dark Dimension in him.” Slowly, the bright lines he'd sketched faded in the air.
“What, did you think I was a Dark Side clone or something?” Peter asked.
“The exterior is a shell that can deceive the eyes,” said Strange, not yet taking down the Crimson Bands, “hiding the Dark energy within—”
Peter interrupted impatiently. “I once watched you eat three solid bowls of kimchi and chase it down with a lake of soju. Don’t get all metaphysical on me.”
That took Strange aback. Behind him, Wong sniggered loudly. “Karaoke night gets a little wild.”
“Does he still sing ‘Say My Name’ from Destiny’s Child? He always crushed hard on Beyoncé—”
Strange suddenly removed the Bands with a look of disgust. “Maybe you are from the Dark Dimension.”
Freed, Peter primly rubbed at his wrists. The Crimson Bands didn’t hurt, but they gave him a kind of wiggly feeling he shook out of his fingers. Parker drew forward, muttering apologetically.
Stark’s eyes flicked between them, uncharacteristically discomposed. Reluctant belief was little more palatable than the possibility of a spy from the Dark Dimension.
“Hi, Tony,” said Peter dryly. “Wong, Stephen.”
Wong nodded back politely.
He felt them look at him anew, taking in his shabbiness and battered sneakers. Peter tugged at the neckline of his shirt to reveal a sliver of the red-and-blue Spider-Man suit he wore beneath. Parker looked back at the assembly and spread his hands as if to say, “See?”
“Okay, tell me this then,” said Stark, taking a few steps forward. “If you’re Peter Parker and you know us from your own universe, why didn’t you come straight to me when you stumbled into this one? Why go for my megaconductor first?”
There was a note of hurt in his voice.
Peter hesitated and fought the urge to look away. “There wasn’t a lot of time. And Octavius…worked for Alchemax in the last universe, not Stark Industries.”
He could see Stark turning that over in his head. “You thought I was aware of it,” he said finally. “That I was behind it.”
“My bad.”
Stark shook his head angrily. “I’ll say! Why the hell would you think that? Is that something I’d do in your universe?”
“I honestly don’t know,” Peter said tiredly.
Ultron had, after all, been the result of good intentions. So had the Accords. There seemed no inoffensive way to explain that it hadn’t seemed outside the realm of possibility.
Some stories could be read in a glance. Stark was a smart guy. He read in Peter’s wary expression and tense posture and decisions up to this point what had escaped Parker and Ned: that whatever relationship he had to the Stark in his own universe not only wasn’t a mirror of Peter Parker’s in this one, but was altogether of a different nature.
It wasn’t that different, once, Peter could have told him.
Something flickered in Stark’s eyes, and he turned away to Strange. “Well, Doc?”
The sorcerer admitted, reluctantly, “There is—”
Suddenly everyone’s attention was drawn to Peter’s arm, which started glitching as if on cue, fracturing into a multitude of colors and shapes. He gritted his teeth against it, grateful it at least hadn’t graduated to full-body spasms yet. Both Stark and Strange started forward, eyes wide with scientific interest.
“Hold it up!” Stark urged.
Peter grimaced at him. The spasms receded after a moment. “Light show over,” he grumbled.
“Woah,” breathed Ned.
“And this happened in the last universe, too?” Strange demanded, circling him, searching for other glitching. Right then Peter knew it was the medical professional asking and not a magician.
“Yes, and faster.” Peter fought the willies that came from being under such close scrutiny.
Stark’s eyebrows raised. Just then he and Strange wore comically identical expressions. “You mean it’s different here? It’s dependent on the technology used?”
This approached the fringes of the matter Peter was afraid of. He said, “Uh huh,” and waited for them to reach the obvious, depressing conclusion.
“Can you open a portal to his dimension?” Parker asked the sorcerer anxiously.
“It’s difficult, though possible…” said Strange slowly, looking at Peter from beneath his brows, “But…”
Peter sighed, his stomach sinking.
“But it won’t save you.” Strange’s tone was almost gentle, apologetic.
The teenagers stared at him, then Peter. “Why not?” they said together.
Peter answered for him. “Because if you can travel between parallel universes with magic, it means being in the wrong dimension isn’t what’s causing my atoms to freak out—or sorcerers couldn’t do it for long either. The theory of inter-dimensional travel isn’t the problem, it’s the flawed technology Ock used to do it.”
Strange nodded. “Even if I opened a portal right now, you’d likely reenter your own dimension...only to die in it anyway.”
Parker and Ned were horrified. Peter examined one thumb, which glitched teasingly. It wasn’t trying to creep back to his own universe; in their confusion, the atoms were trying to scatter with one shot.
Both times, at Fisk’s urging, Ock had rushed the science at the end. In this universe she’d had more time to work and so the aberrations were less frequent, but it was still a death sentence for anyone who couldn’t get back.
He looked up to see something indecipherable come over Stark’s face. It had been a long time since Peter had watched him try to hide his worry.
Too casually, the Avenger put a hand to his chin and turned to the sorcerers. “Out of curiosity, Doc, when were you going to mention you could hop around parallel dimensions?”
Placidly, Wong clasped hands behind his back, saying, “Our concern is this reality. We do not tamper with natural law, we defend it.”
“It’s kind of our motto,” said Strange wryly. Seeing Stark’s obvious dissatisfaction with this explanation, he added with the patronizing calm of someone explaining the obvious: “It’s best to leave the other dimensions alone—or you’ll end up with more Wilson Fisks, people looking to erase their problems in this universe by stealing solutions from another.”
“Okay, so what do we do with Peter?” asked Parker a little desperately, gesturing at his alternate self. Peter saw the kid was genuinely upset, and not because of any particular kinship he felt to the other Spider-Man, but because he was a good kid who didn’t like thinking there was someone he couldn’t help.
Strange’s cloak swirled as he addressed the dimensional interloper. “If you could find a way to stabilize your atoms, I could do the rest. It will require a period of meditation: opening a portal to your universe is possible, but not easy. Without the proper concentration, the consequences could be…dire. How long can you hold off the glitching?”
“A few days, at least…maybe a week.” He hoped. “If I had to.”
Peter frowned at the tile, noting distantly it was of a different design than he remembered, biting the inside of his cheek. He mused out loud, “I’m going to check out Alchemax. Fisk still owns it in this universe, and it’s where Octavius worked in the last one. She might have kept backups of her work in his lab. Actually, knowing Fisk, I’m sure he insisted.”
It could be a long shot, but it was something. Just the prospect of action was energizing. If he could retrieve her research somehow, maybe…maybe Stark could piece together the missing links. Peter already had his own theories about what had gone wrong; Stark was possibly the only one outside of Wakanda with the brainpower and resources to fix Ock’s work.
Speaking of which… “What’s Wakanda up to now, anyway?” he asked.
As he’d expected this disgruntled the billionaire, who was ever competitive in the realm of technological advancement. “Let’s grab the research first, why don’t we?”
Seeing Peter’s smirk, Stark huffed and twirled a finger. “Okay, what are we waiting for? Everyone on the bus, we’re not making a hundred stops to pee. Wong, Doc, have fun in the library; Ned, nice to catch up.”
Peter almost argued. This was his problem, not theirs; it wasn’t like it had been for Miles, who had been protecting his New York as much as he was the Spider-People who had hurtled into it. They gained nothing by helping him, and he felt certain he could handle this on his own.
Plus, it'd been a long time since he'd teamed up with an Avenger. The team-building exercises he'd engaged in over the past week had been made easier for dealing with other Spider-Things.
Reading his mind, Stark grimaced and waved away all the possible objections. “One: Fisk is a menace and he can’t keep access to blueprints for another collider down the line. If he's there at Alchemax, I'm nabbing him. Two: the two of you need supervision.”
Parker looked indignant.
“Why not the one of me, unsupervised?” said Peter grumpily.
“Because this is our universe, pal. You’re a guest and you forgot to wipe your feet on the mat, so from now on we’re on you like bacteria. Or, here’s a thought: you should kick back here and watch Strange levitate.”
The sorcerer rolled his eyes and strolled off in the direction of his library, cape trailing behind him.
“One: Alchemax might have the same layout I saw before,” Peter grumbled, peeved at having to ask permission to come along on his own damn adventure, “and Two: I’m going anyway.”
“A draw. I can live with that. Off we go. Got your suit on, kid?”
Ned waved goodbye as the two Peter Parkers trooped out behind Iron Man. As the doors closed Peter heard him say to Wong, “Dude, I know where the good karaoke’s at.”
“Oh?” said Wong with great interest.
“Show me how to do a spell and I’ll let you in on the secret.”