Black Light

“They're not technically broken, only cracked-”

“Oh, my god! Y/n, that's still horrible.”

A.I.M. had returned you safely home shortly after your run-in with Mr. Adams. You told Stacy that you'd been mugged and the attack had broken your ribs—or, more accurately, had cracked your ribs. Stacy had gone into full on mom-mode, setting up a whole recovery station in the living room, bringing out your pillows from your bed to the couch so you could watch TV and be comfortable without climbing in and out of your tall bed for things like food or the bathroom.

“Have you called Peter? Does he know?”

Your stomach dropped, recalling the threats Mr. Adams had made against the two of them. There was no way in hell you'd ever be able to shake off Stacy to protect her, but you could at least keep an eye on her given that you lived together. But Peter...

“No, I don't want to freak him out-”

“Y/n,” she said, drawing your name out in a scolding tone like only she could. “You guys are kind of serious, you gotta let him know when stuff happens to you.”

You sighed, and winced at the dulled pain in your ribs. “But it's-”

“Call him,” she said firmly, handing over your phone.

Reluctantly, you unlocked your phone and pressed the small phone icon next to his name. It rang three times before he picked up.

“Y/n? What's up?”

“Uhhh—I was—just calling to-”

“Are you okay? You sound like you're in pain-”

“Ah, yeah, so... I was walking back home, right, and uh—I'm home now, for the record—I had this sort of run in with some guys and I guess my ribs-”

A moment of shocked silence. “I'll be right over.”

“Wait, Peter-”

Beep beep. He'd hung up.

“What happened?”

“He hung up on me, and now he's coming over. I told you, he's freaking out now-”

“Well, yeah! You're his lady, his gal, his boo, and you broke your ribs! Of course he's freaking out!”

You let out a long, slow grumble, closing your eyes and waiting for your surprisingly strong painkillers A.I.M. had supplied you with to kick in. It didn't take long, luckily, and it didn't take much longer after that for Peter to show up either. You were beginning to drift off, in fact, when there was a rushed knock on the door. You registered footsteps padding towards the door—Stacy—and the click of the door as she opened it.

“Hey Peter, she's just on the couch. She might be kind of out of it, those painkillers are pretty strong...”

More feet, louder this time, thumping towards you-

“Hey, Y/n, you okay?”

“Mmmhhhnn.”

“Y/n.”

You opened your eyes with a surprising amount of difficulty. What even were in those painkillers?

“You okay?” Peter was crouched beside the couch, eyes concerned. He stroked your hair and held one of your hands.

“Mmyeah, 'm good.” You blinked, nodding.

He let out a nervous and relieved chuckle. “What happened?”

“Said she got mugged,” Stacy supplied from somewhere in the kitchen behind the couch.

Peter's mouth thinned and his brow furrowed.

“Apparently she broke the guy's nose and he didn't get a chance to steal any of her stuff, so there's that.”

Peter looked from Stacy back to you, still a serious glint in his eye, but now surprise as well. “I didn't know you were so tough.”

“Y/n's one of the toughest people I know. You want some tea?”

“Tea would be great.”

The whole exchange went in one ear and out the other, you now felt like you were floating in lukewarm saltwater.

“Pete, I feel like 'm floatin'...”

Peter laughed slightly. “The hell kind of painkillers did they give you?” He stopped stroking your hair and turned and picked up the bottle off of the coffee table to examine the label, frowning. Through your hazy blinking you thought you saw him pocket one of the pills, but forgot about it almost instantly when Stacy brought over tea for Peter and a smoothie for yourself.

“I have to work tonight, if you're free-”

“I can come back and take care of her. I have to go drop off my final project for...”

You tuned out the conversation as Stacy handed over the smoothie, and all of your senses focused in on the smoothie like a cat on a laser toy.

“Hey Y/n, you awake?”

Blinking heavily you pulled your consciousness out of sleep like a swimmer heaving themselves out over the side of a swimming pool.

“Yeah—yup I'm up, I'm up—ow, shit. Hey, what're you doing here?”

Peter was sitting on the floor in front of the couch you were laying on, a rom-com playing on the TV, and eating yogurt covered pretzels. “Stacy had to work so I'm taking care of you because your painkillers are, apparently, very very strong.”

You nodded, yawning. “Reasonable.”

“I was about to make some food, hungry?”

“Sure. What are you watching?”

“'Ten Things I Hate About You.' I kind of forgot how much of a babe Heath Ledger is,” Peter grinned at you as he shifted and rose to his feet. “How you feeling, need any painkillers before I go cook?”

“I think I'll be okay for now,” you said, reaching for the bottle as soon as he was in the next room to check the label.

Sure enough, there was the A.I.M. logo hidden in the corner of the label. Clearly these were no ordinary pills.

Peter finished cooking some simple pasta, helping you sit up so you could eat when he came back. You checked your phone while you ate, a few social media notifications here and there, and a text from A.I.M.

Don't let anyone else get hold of your pills. They are not meant for those without powers. Do not miss a dose, they will heal your ribs faster. Delete after reading.

You deleted the message with a frown.

“Hey, Y/n, what do you know about A.I.M.?”

You nearly snorted a noodle out of your nose.

“What?”

“A.I.M., the tech company?”

“Uh, I know they're one of Stark's main competitors and they offered me a job post graduation, why?”

Peter shrugged. “I noticed their logo on your meds.”

A chill ran down your spine. “Oh. Yeah, they've been expanding into different stuff I guess.”

Peter nodded, eyes ahead on the TV screen. You watched him out of the corner of your eye, suspicious.

Does he know?

Peter looked at you. “Did I ever tell you about my ex Gwen?”

You shook your head, a jolt in your stomach reminded you that she was the girl on Harry's fridge. “No.”

“We met our first year of college, she was studying English and literature and stuff, I was studying all my nerd shit. Harry introduced us.”

You swallowed, looking at him.

“We dated for about two years, she was my first serious girlfriend.”

“What happened?"

“She uh... Green Goblin... Well, I guess she was trying to help Spider-Man, and Green Goblin saw that... She died. Fell, I guess.”

“Oh, my g- Peter, I'm so sorry. I had no idea--”

Peter was looking down at his food. You could tell he was tearing up. “I'm so... I'm so sorry, Peter.”

“And my Uncle Ben, too. He raised me, basically, him and my Aunt May after my parents died. He died in a mugging.”

Suddenly everything hit you at once. Peter had lost so much, his Uncle, Gwen, his parents. And here you were, secretly using his best friend in a plot to commit a murder that could easily get either or both of you hurt or killed, and you hadn't even thought-

“That's why I rushed over as soon as you called, I just remembered my Uncle Ben, and I remembered Gwen and-” Peter turned and met your eyes. “Y/n, I know we haven't been together that long and I don't want to freak you out and you don't have to return it and you can even ignore it but—fuck, I realized when you called that I can't lose you too. I just- shit, I love you, Y/n.”

Blank. That's what your mind was, blank. You couldn't remember any words, you just stared, images of Harry, drunk, agreeing to help you kill Spider-Man. You were destroying his best friend, and he loved you and—you hated to admit it, but even with everything going on, you were starting to love Peter too.

You were just staring now, and the silence was going past what was probably acceptable.

“Peter...”

“Don't say anything, I just wanted to tell you. I won't mention it again, I promise, until you know how you feel or-” he didn't even sound bitter. He genuinely meant every word.

“Peter, you're amazing, did you know that? Come here.”

He laughed, and shifted around so he could accept your awkward and delicate hug.

You hid it, but you were completely healed and ready for a fight again only three days later. You couldn't let Peter or Stacy know, otherwise they'd be suspicious of your ridiculous recovery time. But A.I.M. knew, and had you back on the clock immediately.

Another visit to a politician, some more thieving, etc.

And then they asked you to sink a ship before it docked. Not a passenger ship, of course, but a cargo ship, bringing in who knows what. They didn't tell you, you didn't ask. It was your job to just destroy everything on it.

It was easy to get onto the ship, you just lounged about on a crane until it passed nearby, and then you launched yourself across the water onto the deck like a glowing indigo meteor. And, like a particularly large meteorite, you made a pretty sizable impact, crashing through the surface of the deck and crashing into the belly of the ship. Not too shabby of a start, you thought to yourself as an alarm started to sound.

You smashed your way through each floor of the ship down to the bottom, careful to leave the stairs and escape routes intact. You weren't about to drown yourself, or intentionally trap anybody else for that matter.

“FREEZE! HANDS WHERE I CAN SEE THEM!”

You turned slowly from the closed door in front of you, raising your hands slowly, letting the glow fade from your gloved fists. “Oh, hey there. What can I do for you this fine evening, gentlemen?”

Two guards in combat gear, complete with night-vision goggles, were pointing rather large guns at you.

“On your knees, NOW.”

“Oh dear, this is awkward, I have a pretty bad knee, once I get down there's almost no chance of me getting back up again, it's a whole ordeal-” you stalled, backing closer to the wall.

“I said on your knees, NOW!”

You spun, fist quickly lighting back up, and punched through the wall behind you. The sound of gunfire was quickly drowned out by the sound of water rushing in through the hull, and you jumped aside, running towards the two men, knocking them aside, and running towards the exit. So much for the engine room, looks like it was gonna be an old fashioned Titanic hull disaster. Except instead of an iceberg, it was you.

You ran back up a level, punched some more holes, and repeat. You found a fire on the third one up, where you'd crashed through something apparently highly flammable. People were struggling to put it out.

“GET OUT, GET OUT! IT'S SINKING!” You yelled, chasing them out. You may be a hired villain but you weren't going to willingly let people die who were just doing their jobs. With the room cleared, you thoroughly trashed all the contents as the fire spread, waiting until the very last second to escape up to the deck. The crew were evacuating, packing into lifeboats—

BOOM.

Crates exploded at the end of the ship, the fire had eaten through the floor and was now spreading to the deck, and whatever was in the crates was reacting very, very poorly to the heat.

Most of the small crew was off the boat, the lifeboats trying as best they could to get away from the fire and explosio-

BOOM.

You were knocked to the deck, landing face-first on the salty surface.

A pair of hands, helping you up, gripping your shoulders-

“WHAT DID YOU DO?” He had to yell, everything was too loud, or you wouldn't have been able to hear him.

Spider-Man.

You stumbled to your feet. “MY JOB, IDIOT,” you pushed him away, taking a defensive stance.

Two more explosions—B-BOOOM.

“LOOK, WE CAN DO THE WHOLE HERO VS VILLAIN THING LATER, BUT WE NEED TO GET EVERYONE OFF THE SHIP-”

“THE CREW IS ALL OFF, I'M A DICK BUT I'M NOT A TOTAL ASSHOLE.”

“EVEN THE CAPTAIN?”

You turned towards the bridge. The fire was getting closer to it, and there was clearly someone still inside. You looked at Spider-Man, and the both of you started running.
The bridge was raised up higher than the deck, but the stairs up were blocked by debris from a destroyed cargo container. You reached for your grappling-hook gun, but Spider-Man beat you to it and swung the both of you up to the top of the stairs.

“CAPTAIN?” Spider-Man ran into the bridge and ducked, shielding his face with his arms as a window exploded into the room.

You stood behind in the doorway, looking around. You could—no, you should just kill him and leave the captain there too.

“Spider-Man!” An astonished voice came from behind a rather large—something. You didn't know what it was called.

Spider-Man rushed over to him. “I'm here to get you out, is there anyone else on board?”

You saw the Captain shake his head, but couldn't hear his reply as another explosion went off, shattering just about all of the remaining windows. You stumbled and braced yourself in the doorway.

“SPIDER-MAN, GET HIM OUT OF HERE.”

The captain and Spider-Man both turned to look at you.

“BLACK LIGHT?!”

“Let's go, Captain!” Spider-Man helped the captain out, you moved quickly out of the way to let them through the door. Spider-Man stopped as he passed you, turning his head back. “You coming?”

“Gotta finish my job, Bug-Boy.”

“I'm gonna save this guy, then I'm coming back to take you in. You aren't getting away with this.”

“Sure, sure,” you waved him off, and he zipped away.

The ship was now starting to angle itself into the sea, the fiery cargo sinking under as the bridge started to raise into the sky and the fire, naturally, spread upwards. You braced yourself against the control board, and looked out at the fire-

BOOM.

Might as well destroy all the ship's computers while you were here. With a bit of a struggle you set about smashing everything with lights and buttons you could find on the bridge. Given the sharp angle of the ship it took you quite a while to move about and get it all done. The fire was getting much, much closer.

“TIME TO GO, BLACK LIGHT.”

You turned around, not realizing you'd been staring out of the bridge at the sinking ship. “GO WHERE, BUG-BOY?”

“JAIL, PROBABLY.”

You followed him out of the bridge, following his instructions to hold him tightly around the waist as he shot a web onto a large crane hanging over the water quite some distance away and swung you off the ship. He pulled the two of you to the top of the crane, where he sat, catching his breath for a few moments. You crouched a few feet away.

“Why the hell did you do that?” He was looking at you. “Why did you sink that ship?”

“My boss told me to.”

“Why?”

“I didn't ask.”

“So you just did it?”

“Don't really have a choice, do I?”

News and rescue helicopters arrived, circling like vultures around the sinking ship.

“There's always a choice. Why did you stay on board? Was it just to finish the job or were you actually doing what I thought you were?”

“Depends on what you thought I was doing.”

“Saving people.”

“I didn't save anybody, I just was making sure everyone was off.” Pause. “So they wouldn't stop me while I finished up.”

“Bullshit. There's good in you. You were making sure nobody would die.”

“The only thing left in me at his point is caffeine and spite, honestly.”

“Why do you do what you do when you could help people? You have amazing abilities, Black Light.”

“I can't back out of my job, Bug-Boy. I'm not just doing this for fun. Stop pushing it before I decide to zap you instead of just letting you go.”

“Letting me go? I'm the one who's about to take you off to jail-!”

“Sure you are, buddy,” you said, inching closer and lighting up your fists.

He groaned loudly and almost comically. “You gotta be kidding me, I just saved you and now you're gonna attack me? Today is just a clusterf-”

You swung at his head and he ducked, bending backwards at an angle only a gymnast could achieve. He dropped and spun his foot out to knock you off your feet, and you jumped, stumbling when you landed back on your feet.

“Careful there little miss light-bulb, we aren't exactly on solid ground here-”

He was cut off quite abruptly when you tackled him, the two of you tumbling over the edge of the crane. He shot out a web and missed, shot out another one—and jolted away from you, having attached himself to one of the news helicopters. You took out your grappling hook and shot back towards the crane, catching it on the first try, and as you were reeling yourself back up, a spotlight landed on you.

Well, I guess everybody knows it was me now. How am I gonna outrun the helicopter without Harry?

The helicopter started circling, spotlight fixing on you. You could see Spider-Man hanging onto the outside of the door. The asshole had pointed you out to them!

Another helicopter started circling, adding another blinding spotlight onto you. You raised an arm to shield your eyes from the light.

BOOM!

Simultaneously, there was an explosion from the sinking boat, and one of the helicopters exploded, the blast knocking you off of the crane. You panicked, vision blurry from the blinding light, and struggled to unhook your grappling hook from your belt when you were caught from the side and suddenly zooming through the air away from the shrapnel.

“I got you!” A distorted voice yelled.

“Goblin! Spider-Man-”

“Where?!”

“Back on one of the helicopters—we should go, get him next time-” You could tell he was hesitating, but your vision was filled with spots and your ears were ringing. “Harry, I can barely see and my ears are ringing from the explosions, we'll get him next time, I promise.”

You felt the air tugging at your hood as the glider picked up speed and the Green Goblin took you back to his penthouse to patch you up.