Chapter Text
“Great patrol Karen. Text me if anything big comes up!” Peter put his hand under the seam of his mask and suit. It was completely hand sewn, and Peter had put his own AI into the suit, which they named Karen. No, he wouldn’t explain. They carefully removed the Mask and took a deep breath. Once the mask was off, Peter worked on taking off the rest of his suit.
It had been years since they had picked up the mantle of Spider-Man. Peter had only been 14. He was 19 now. They had been saving people, stopping villains who the Avengers don’t care about, for 5 years. They have been shot, stabbed, kidnapped, beat, and brought to near death so many times. Yet he stands. Yet Peter still protects. Protects the innocent people of Queens, New York.
Once Peter gets his suit fully take off, he quickly changes into his binder, a NASA shirt, leggings with jeans over them (purely for the aesthetic of the jeans, Peter can’t stand the feeling of jeans on his skin) , and a black and blue flannel that his friend, Dylan, made for him. It was baggy on them, the end of the sleeves going to Peter’s PIP joint. He was basically swimming in it. It helped keep him warm too, since the inside had a really soft fabric sewn into it. Dylan knew that Peter struggled to thermoregulate, so lav made it that way. Peter put his suit into a backpack, which was filled with some other clothes.
Once he was dressed and had shoes on, Peter grabbed their camera and the bag, then quickly ran out of the apartment. Aunt May had to do a 10 hour shift at the hospital today. So Peter knew that the earliest she would get back would be at 6:30 PM, and it was currently 3:44 pm, or at least it was when they got to the apartment and changed out of their suit. Peter remembered to close and lock the door behind him.
Within minutes, Peter was making a mad dash for another friend’s house, Lexi and Luke. Twins who Peter had befriended shortly after graduating. Lexi was a FireFighter, while Luke was a barista and student at the local college, which is Queens college. Star was majoring in journalism, and minoring in physics. The college is only around 3 miles away, so it was the best option for Luke. They both pay for the apartment, that way they can also pay any bills, buy necessities, and keep a stable lifestyle. Even with their differences, the twins were still stupidly similar. To a point where it could be scary.
From Luke and Lexi, Peter met Dylan, Noah, and Jay. Lexi and Luke are both 20, Dylan and Jay are 21, while Noah is the oldest at 24. The group of them have been friends since Peter was 18. So around 10 months, since they were there for his 19th birthday. They had all been around for Peter, and even found out he was Spider-Man, though it wasn’t exactly his fault, it was fine.
Dylan works as a freelance artist, and lives with Noah. Noah is an accountant, and owns his own house. Noah works mostly from home too, which seems to work out. Dylan has petals on and off days, but overall makes enough to buy groceries and art supplies, while Noah pays the bills for the house. Jay used to work at the Daily Bugle as an editor, but got fired a couple of weeks ago due to her pro-Spider-man beliefs and because J.J.J was an asshole of a misogynistic and sexist. But that's off topic.
They were currently heading to Lexi and Luke’s shared apartment for basically a sleepover, though none of the others (besides Peter) would call it that. They didn’t go to Noah’s house because that was in Manhattan, and most of the others live in Queens. So Lexi and Luke’s apartment is was. It had a good living space for what it was, just a little apartment for the twins to stay in until Luke graduated, and once Luke got a job, they would move to a better place. But for now, Peter just hauled ass to get over there.
After running about a mile or so, taking breaks to take photos of places, plants, and so many other things, he got to the apartment complex and made his way over to Lexi and Luke’s apartment. He knocked only once before the door opened and he was pulled inside the door by Lexi. Ice is one strong woman. If Peter didn’t know he could lift a building full of people inside it, they would think that Lexi was the strong member of the friend group.
“Pete! Just in time! While you were getting your spidery ass here, we came up with an idea. Set your shit down.” Lexi spoke right away. Blonde hair put into a french braid, which meant that people could see her pale skin and dark blue eyes. She simply pulled Peter along. Lexi is a good inch or five taller than Peter. Standing at a nice and tall 6’3 compared to Peter’s 5’9. She was wearing a pink sleeveless crop top, which showed off just how fit she actually is. Along with black yoga pants.
Lexi all but dragged Peter to the living room and placed him on a yellow bean bag that they could swear you would see in the dark of the night. Lexi took a seat on the couch, to the left of Luke. on Luke’s right was Dylan. Though Luke had his legs over Dylan’s while doing stars homework. Lav didn’t seem to mind. Noah sat on a purple bean bag chair which was right across from Peter. And lastly, Jay sat on a blue bean bag, which was two Peter’s left, and was across from the couch. The coffee table in the middle of them all already had the group’s preferred drinks. Noah with a cup of coffee, Peter had a smoothie in front of him, Jay was holding their drink, which was most likely apple juice, Dylan had water, Lexi had a protein shake, and Luke had a barrel kool aid. A random assortment of glasses that Peter knew damn well they got at the local goodwill.
“Okay okay. So we have come up with an idea-” Lexi started, but was cut off by Noah. Lexi quieted down quickly. One of the rules was to never speak over Noah, because Noah’s word is law and that's that. When Noah spoke, no one else did.
Noah had stone grey eyes that just seemed to cut through Peter. Along with black hair, which was currently cut short. The longest part of roses hair not even reach his ears. He was a bit more tanned as well, clearly getting more sun than some of the other people in this group. Noah was wearing a simple black shirt and grey pants. Though that didn't stop rose from being intimidating.
“Correction. Jay came up with the idea. After ze saw what The Daily Bugle had written about DareDevil. She got upset. Jay, please explain your idea to Peter.” Noah spoke with roses normal monotone voice. Peter nodded and looked to Jay for explanation. Jay nodded to Noah and looked at Peter.
Jay had basically flawless dark skin. The type of skin tone that doesn’t burn just ever. She had a bunch of mini-buns to protect his type 3b hair. They wore it with pride too, adding little pins for decoration. Ze was currently wearing a green sundress, which showed cleavage, and had really cool straps, which split at a point and made like a diamond shape on his shoulders. One of the most notable parts of them have to be the eyes. Jay had the prettiest pair of amber eyes that Peter had ever seen on a person. Peter swore that jay could be a model.
“You are a photographer, Luke will be getting a degree in journalism, and will be going into junior year pretty soon. Noah has the ability to print out a large amount of paper at once. Dylan is an amazing writer just by moonself. Lexi has the ideas to catch people’s attention. I was once an editor for the Daily Bugle, so I know how to edit newspapers. I thought that we could all start up our own Newspaper slash news site that could put villains, vigilantes, and anti-heroes into a better light.” Jay explained nicely. Peter listened as he went on with the idea.
It might work somewhat. Peter knew he could take expert photos, since they have owned a camera for nearly 7 years up to this point. And with the others also doing things, that could actually work. Plus, what's the worst that could happen? It fails? The others have other jobs, Peter is currently the only unemployed one, and even then, Peter was only trying to save up money so he could go to MIT with the scholarship, because it didn’t cover the apartment Peter would need to buy, and the other necessities that a trans man would need.
“Sure. Why not? I can take the photos for us.” Peter smiled at the group. Luke finally brought his head out of clouds computer. Luke had the same blonde hair as Lexi, but he was smaller. Around 5’7. He was just as pale as stars sister, but Luke had more freckles. Clouds eyes were also a bright shade of green. Luke was wearing a pink long sleeve shirt and black shorts. The opposite of Lexi. Luke finally spoke up.
“We don’t want just photos of Spider-Man. We will need some photos from a bunch of other vigilantes, villains, and anti-heroes. Which could be dangerous, or even risk your identity.” Luke had a much softer voice, a contrast to Lexi’s loud voice. Peter took another moment to think about it.
They will need him to put himself into harm's way, and risk his secret (not so secret) identity to villains who could hurt Aunt May, vigilantes he doesn’t trust, and anti-heroes who Peter doesn’t know the morals of. They give an answer within only a couple of moments of thinking about it.
“Sure! I can still do it. Might as well put these spider powers to use. I have the time now. And If we can get money doing this, that would be cool.” Peter agreed. Dylan finally spoke up, after all of his conversation. Dylan threw lavs head back with laughter.
Dylan had dyed pinky-purple hair, which was only slightly faded, having been redyed 2 weeks ago. It went well with moons olive toned skin. Lavs hair was pretty long, going down to petals mid shoulder blade. It was currently put into a messy bun, clearly not much thought being put into the bun. Moon wore a white button-up shirt, with a black sweater vest over it. Along with black slacks. The top two buttons were undone, which showed off lavs collarbones.
“Man! He didn’t even think about it that long!” Dylan brought a hand to petals face. Black nails against pale skin just standing out more. Noah nodded and muttered something about self preservation. No one commented on it. Noah just does what Noah does.
“So now we just need a kickass name!” Lexi blurted out over Dylan’s laughter. That seemed to calm petal down. It went dead silent for a moment before Luke suddenly spoke. Peter was almost sure that Luke didn’t even realise he spoke until it was said into existence.
“V-Pals.”
And suddenly, everyone went wild, well maybe not Noah. Lexi laughed, Luke looked embarrassed, Dylan basically cheered, Jay clapped, and Peter too laughed. Noah let everyone lose their minds for a moment before whistling and using roses hands to motion for everyone to calm down. It took a minute, but everyone was able to quiet down for Noah to speak.
“V-Pals? I believe that name could work. Since we will be shining a more positive light on vigilantes and villains. Most people see anti-heroes as one of those two things anyway, so we don’t be excluding anyone. Everyone who agrees, say ‘aye’.” Noah let a little bit of childish behaviour slip out.
“AYE!” Everyone called out. Noah simply nodded. The name has been accepted and agreed upon. Noah allowed the next person to speak when they wished. And speak someone did.
“Now, we just need an idea for the first story. Sure, it could be Spider-Man, but that's not super original. Plus, everyone already has a good opinion on SM. we should start with someone who isn’t as liked.” Dylan had been the person to speak up. The group nodded.
And suddenly, a ding could be heard. One that everyone recognized as Karen sending a message to Peter. He quickly grabbed their phone and checked it. A smile spread across Peter’s face. Brown eyes shining with opportunity. Peter quickly put his phone on the coffee table and let everyone else look at it. It showed a message sent from Karen, whose contact in Peter’s phone was 'bestest AI girl’. Everyone got to see the message. Everyone smiled in some way or another.
‘Peter, Deadpool has been spotted in Queens at (XX,XX)’ was all the message was.
Peter stood up quickly, picking up his camera and getting his suit from his bag. He took out his webshooters from the suit and put it back. He wasn’t expecting to need their whole suit, even if things get ugly. Peter knew he could get away. Peter clicked his webshooters over his biological spinnerets. Allowing the sensor pad to rest carefully over his palm. He used his finger tips to stick to his phone, then shoved it in their pocket. While doing this, opened the window that led to the fire escape. Peter took that route out.
“Good luck Spider-dude!” Called out Lexi.
“Don’t die!” called Luke shortly after.
“What Luke said!” Came from Dylan.
“Get a good photo!” was Jay’s last words.
“Bye Peter.” The monotone voice of Noah said calmly as Peter hopped onto the fire escape and made his way to the coordinates that Karen had told him Deadpool had been at.