Chapter Text
Peter Parker never understood death, not truly. His earliest memories were a blur of faces and gentle voices. He was only two when his parents, Richard and Mary Parker, died in a plane crash—too young to grasp the weight of their absence. All he knew was that one day he was living in a bright, warm house, and the next he was clutching a stuffed elephant on the stoop of Ben and May Parker’s modest apartment in Queens.
Ben and May were far from wealthy, but their home was full of love. May was a nurse who worked long hours at the local clinic, but always found time to make Peter laugh with bedtime stories and burnt pancakes shaped like dinosaurs. Whereas, Ben was kind and always made him feel safe. He was a NYPD officer, and had a strong sense of justice. He was steadfast and taught Peter things his brother no longer could, acting as a father he hadn't realized he missed so much. Their little world was humble, yet vibrant, filled with books, street festivals, and late-night Mets games on a crackly TV.
When Peter was seven, Ben and May surprised him with a trip to the Stark Expo. Amid the whirring drones and towering displays, Peter’s eyes shone with awe. It was there, surrounded by scientific marvels, that he fell in love with the possibilities of the universe, and science as a whole. Tony Stark himself had shown up to the Expo and Peter found his first Idol. He begged May to buy him an Iron Man helmet, although it was Ben who eventually gave in and bought the damn thing. They hadn't expected the attack on the event by Whiplash. Peter also hadn't expected to be seperated from his uncle and stupidly decide to stand infront of an active Iron Bot.
After the Stark Expo chaos, Tony Stark invited him to visit his lab occasionally, letting the kid watch from a reasonable distance, so as to not get injured. They rocked out to old rock albums and Tony helped him develop his first project, a rudimentary AI named Karen. For a time, Peter became a fixture in Tony’s world, a sharp, wide-eyed shadow trailing behind the billionaire genius and absorbing his work like an energetic sponge.
But after the Battle of New York, the visits slowed. Tony's visits became infrequent and his gaze distant, and Peter, though disappointed, focused on school. He made friends—Harry Osborn, Gwen Stacy, and even Flash Thompson, who oscillated between buddy and rival.
It wasn't till age ten that Peter’s life changed forever. He was bitten by a genetically modified spider during a school trip to Oscorp. He had a fever for days. White, hot, blinding, pain that crawled under his skin and made him sensitive to the slightest things. Then he began to change. At first, it was subtle: heightened senses, strange strength, a strange sixth sense for danger. He accidentally ripped a socket out of his wall and got headaches everytime someone would turn on a light. Then came the wall-crawling.
It wasn't till he somehow ended up on the ceiling after a nightmare that he actually started to worry about his newfound abilities. He started noticing weird ways he thought and acted that no one else seemed to find normal. Flash told him he had 'creepy eyes' when lunch came around and Harry often threw things at him to dodge when he wasn't paying attention. His oversensitivity, voracious appetite, and sudden jitteriness where all brushed off as growth spurts by his teachers.
The same year, tragedy struck the Parker's yet again. Ben was attacked by a criminal who had had a vendetta against him for a previous arrest. A petty thief who transformed into something more when an experiment with silicon fusion went awry, becoming the monstrous Sandman. Peter could only stand there, terrified, when Ben was attacked. His last moments were spent curled around his nephew, keeping Sandman from hurting Peter. Ben bled out in Peter’s arms on a rainy street corner, whispering words of love and safety. May found him several hours later, still covered in blood.
Devastated, May retreated into herself and they had to move out of their apartment. Everything reminded them of Him. His favorite coffee mug, the indent on the carpet where his chair had once sat, the empty space in the bed next to May. Peter had finally seen death and it shook him to his core.
May had to pick up extra shifts to cover costs and was hardly ever home, so Peter decided to create a suit and became Spider-Man. At eleven years old, he was already learning what it meant to lose everything. He fought criminals, helped kids, and trained himself rigorously. But things kept spiraling. Gwen was killed during a battle with the Green Goblin—Harry’s father, Norman—who had gone mad from exposure to Oscorp’s experimental serum. He never liked Norman, always holding Harry's arms to tight or casting a haughty sneer at Peter as if he stunk up the room. Harry turned on Peter, blaming him for everything, he cried on Peter's shoulder till the social worker took him away and then transferred schools. Flash, left directionless after Gwen’s death and Harry’s departure, turned his bitterness toward Peter, becoming a relentless bully.
Despite the pain, Peter persevered. He threw himself into work, like May had done. To forget. He fixed broken appliances in his neighborhood for some extra cash to keep up with all the food he was eating. He wrote apology letters to everyone he'd wronged and walked to the post office in the rain to deliver them. He stayed out as Spider-Man for hours on end, even if he came back with bruises. He skipped a grade. And eventually — he found new friends—Ned, MJ, and Liz. With them, he could just be Peter again. Even just for a little while.
When Peter was fourteen, Tony Stark returned, recruiting him during the events of the Avengers’ Civil War. Tony gave him a sleek new Spider-Man suit and brought him to Germany to fight Captain America’s rogue faction. He took a bit of a beating it was all worth it to hear Tony say that he was proud of him again.
But after the battle, Peter and Tony argued over the Sokovia Accords—legislation that would regulate and imprison meta-humans and vigilantes like Peter. Paperwork Tony had signed himself to lock people like Peter away. Hurt and disillusioned, Peter returned the suit and walked away.
Back in Queens, he focused on high school and asked his crush Liz to the school dance. That night revealed yet another twist: Liz’s father was the Vulture. Peter stopped him, but the betrayal stung. May, now working at the FEAST shelter, helped Peter stay grounded. He began volunteering at FEAST, fighting crime at night, and tinkering with inventions when Tony—eventually reconciling with Peter—allowed him access to his lab again.
Peter forged new alliances with heroes like Daredevil and Deadpool, helping bring down Wilson Fisk and earning enough to support himself with freelance photos for J. Jonah Jameson. He even found a way to cure the Sandman after working with the famous Bruce Banner, finally giving Ben’s memory a measure of peace.
Then, when Peter was fifteen, Thanos arrived. During the Infinity War, Peter was dusted—his existence erased for five years. His enhanced healing and spidey sense keeping him alive just long enough to know he was dying and feel every molecules in his body burning away. When he finally returned from the soul realm, he was the only one to come back writhing in pain. He returned during the final battle with Thanos, the Endgame. Seeing the way that Dr. Strange looked at Tony, the man he'd so long admired, he knew what had to be done.
It only took a second. He got a hold on the gauntlet at one point and used the power of the stones to obliterate Thanos’s army. But the cost was immense. The stones nearly destroyed him. He was rushed to Wakanda, where he spent months recovering in intensive care.
While healing, Peter studied under Shuri, Dr. Strange, Bruce Banner, and Hank Pym, learning about physics, magic, and medicine. The Soul Stone in particular had left a mark on him—lingering energy that warped his perception, his body, and even his soul. Still, he used its power to restore Vision and bring the Asgardians back to life before returning the other stones to their rightful places. The Soul Stone, however, clung to him, refusing to leave. Unbeknownst to Peter, it split itself into parts, leaving a piece of it's power within Peter's soul.
Back in New York, Peter tried to reclaim some semblance of normal. Despite his young age, he applied for a lab position under Dr. Curt Connors, hoping to use his experience to help others. He still had some trouble looking in the mirror at his gnarley reflection, something he worked on with Deadpool during late night patrolling. But Parker Luck followed him ceaselessly and disturbed the peace he'd managed to attain. A man named Quentin Beck—Mysterio—manipulated Peter, trying to steal Stark technology. When Peter refused, Beck exposed his identity and framed him for the murder of Dr. Conners, whose work at led him down the path of the Lizard. And suddenly, Peter was public enemy number one.
Harry returned as the new Green Goblin, twisted by grief and rage. The Lizard reemerged, and Mysterio allied with both. In the chaos, Aunt May was killed. The Green Goblin snapped her neck like a toothpick and she crumpled to the ground, taking what little hope Peter had left with her to the grave. Peter just barely managed to take down Dr. Connors and Mysterio when he saw her fall, but the damage was done. She was the last remaining light in Peter's life and just like that — she was gone.
Seeing an unmasked Peter, kneeling beside a bloody and broken May, Harry came to his senses. Peter sobbed in his arms for what seemed like hours before the serum started to try to take back his mind. Dr. Strange was able to stabilize Harry long enough for Peter to find an antidote for the serum.
With May gone, Peter couldn't stand to face Happy or their apartment. He couldn't stand to be hated by the city he protected with his life or looked at with pity and fear from his friends. So he begged Dr. Strange to erase him. To wipe him and his Parker luck from the face of the planet and leave no traces. Strange, not a stranger to the pain of losing one so close, agreed. Not to erase him, but erase the memory of him. To give Peter a chance at anonimity. A world with no Spider-Man and no Peter Parker. A blank slate.
He didn't tell anyone of his plan, knowing just the thought of them no longer knowing him would be too much for him to bear. His friends were off at MIT now anyway. Tony was home, raising his real kid, and Team Red was fighting off some kind of ring of ninjas. Both Dr. Conners and Harry were in psychiatric wards, and anyone who even resembled a parent were six feet under. Basically, there was not a single soul who would needed him.
It took him exactly 1 backpack and 1 dufflebag to pack up his entire life. May's photo albums and his elephant and his tools and Ben's jacket. He grabbed whatever he could find and tried not to cry as he packed up his life, but failed after finding a coffee mug with a lipstick stain on the kitchen counter. May's lipstick. On a cup that Ben had always loved because it got just warm enough to heat your hands, but never hot enough to burn. He sobbed into an empty hallway till his face was puffy and his eyes were shot. This time there was no one to wipe away his tears.
He visited his parents graves before he left, leaving flowers, for the last time, by their matching headstones.
Dr. Strange weaved his spell over Peter, but unexpectedly, the soul stone interfeared. In a great show of light and power, the stone modified the spell. Instead of erasing Peter's memory from this world, it removed him from this dimension entirely, sending Peter, and whatever he had managed to pack in his Dad's old bags, out of Dr. Strange's reach.
Moments later, he awoke in Gotham City—alone, unknown, and seemingly seven years younger. No one knew who he was.
He was eleven again. And in this city of shadows, Peter Parker was truly on his own.