The Spider and the Web he Weaves of Tragedy and Sin

V

Waking up is torture, going to sleep is worse. Dreaming of bad thing happening to good people and it's always his fault. Always. That's why Peter stays awake most of the time, and keeps his eyes locked away from the clocks, or anything that resembled a mirror. Music passes time by a lot smoother, but it takes away from potential productivity, and that could not be allowed. Not when he could practically taste Tony Stark's blood on the tip of his tongue.

Peter's been working on making his own army of drones from the scraps of ones that had crash landed near his humble abode, and it was working pretty well so far. He'd implemented their prototypes into Ned's system, their code access name being 3-18-15-14-4. Their mission was to deliver vials of webbing when he ran low, and to swarm enemies if The Spider-Man was being overwhelmed.

Tonight was the one night a week when he was only Peter Parker. Pathetic, pale, Peter Parker, who meant nothing to the world other than a smooth running laptop or two. And being Peter meant he had to function like your average nerdy teenager who had no friends other than the ones he built out of found items, and Ned reminded him of that seemingly every other minute.

"Peter, go get something to eat, you're hungry."

"Peter go get something to eat, you're hungry." Peter mimicked him, his focus on trying to correct a minor malfunction in his hamster.

"Are you mocking me?"

"Are you mocking me?"

"Dude!"

"Dude! I'm busy Ned! I know you can see that, and since you're bothering me, go ahead and rename file HamStark to Houdini."

"File renaming process denied."

"Leeds, not right now. Rename file HamStark to Houdini."

"File renaming process denied."

"Alright!" Peter stood up and marched over the desk he'd made to contain all of Ned's processors. "I've had enough of you!"

"No, wait-" Ned pleaded as Peter ripped out the wire that connected the entirety of Ned to himself, leaving the machine crippled. Pete sat down at the desk, opening the ancient computer he'd made to contain Ned and all the information he allowed him to have. He went straight to the HamStark file and renamed it, relatively simple but the information had to run its course throughout the system to be accepted. Pete decided with the time he had to let the issue work itself out, he'd try and tweek Ned's brain a bit and see what he learned about that he didn't need to know.

The earliest file Ned had in him was the manifesto, something that would never change because it was perfect. He looked through everything Ned had taken notes on, ways to annoy him, things he liked, his favourite things about him, and an entire page gushing about how in love he was with his creator, but if he's a robot, or an AI, how does that work, can he even love? Is the love just simply a part of the programming? Apart of peter's plan?

The thing is, it wasn't. Because if Ned didn't love him, everything would be easier, because then he wouldn't have to think about how great he fucked over his best friend. It was weird to seem him naturally develop feelings the real Ned, his Ned Leeds felt. He deleted the file and closed the laptop shut. Going to fix the wire he'd ripped out and convinced himself that he knew what was best because if Ned, a goddamn computer program, fell in love with him, wanted to know more about him, and found out who he was. Who Ned was. There would be no telling what would happen.

"Please don't ever do that again." Ned practically gasped when he came back online.

"I won't."

"It was so weird. Everything was black and it felt like I was there forever, and no time at all and... I was scared? Please don't do that again, ever."

"I promise."

"You promise?"

"Yes."

"Can you promise me something else?"

"Sure, what is it?"

"That you'll actually go out and get some dinner."

"Fine, Ned." Peter sighed, grabbing his hoodie and heading out as the sun sunk low into the sky.

Queens is always beautiful at night, or at least he thought so. There was a lot of things he missed out on after becoming The Spider, and taking in the small things had become one of the for certain. It was okay though, he was never meant to lead a happy life. He was never meant to lead a life at all, actually.

He was a mistake. A bastard child, bringing shame onto his family with every innocent laugh and every knee scab he was closer and closer to bringing about the first death he'd ever cause. The first death that he knew his father was to blame for, but not the first death in any regard. Because making the weapon, putting bullets in it, and handing it over, was just as bad as shooting the person yourself.

Dinner was nice. He ate at this low grade Italian place and sat outside. Tons of wacky characters passed by that he got to make up all fun sorts of stories about. He even say the Sonic hentai dude again, back for revenge writing his own Doctor Eggman/Vault Boy/Mario slash fanfiction because he commented on the other persons fic about how good it was but they never replied and he decided to take that as a sign of aggression. It's now deadly competition of meme references, smut, and gross plot twists.

Peter eventually got up and left, and he had to admit, he was mildly enjoying himself, which really wasn't a good thing. Bad things happen when there's a smile on the teenagers face, mostly to innocent people. He would ignore his sinking feelings until he got home, what he always did.

For some reason his spidey sense was just going wild at him, and of course he never realizes what's about until the last second and his decent day just had to be ruined as he got pulled and pinned in the alleyway. Hey, at least it was his dear old pal Bucky.

"Who're you working for?" Bucky asked lowly, a frown deep set into his face.

"Nobody in particular, just this down to earth, chill dude named Jesus." Pete chuckled, holding his hands up.

"I don't wanna hurt you kid."

"Then don't."

"Then I'm gonna ask again, and please, I need a serious answer. Who do you work for?"

"No one, like not even my parents."

"You should listen to them kid, they know what's best for you."

"How? They're dead!" Pete laughed again. Bucky made a face. "Aw c'mon, cheer up a bit man!"

"Why are you asking me to cheer up, you're the one that just joked about your parents being dead."

"It's funny cause it's true, Bucky."

"Who's taking care of you kid?"

"Uh, me?"

"No aunt? Uncle? Older sibling? Cousin?"

"Nope! To be honest, don't know why you need to know all this, man."

"Jesus, kid." Bucky let go of Peter, allowing him to move freely but not run from him.

"Also, in all transparency, I don't think he likes me very much."

"Do you even have a place?"

"Yeah, and it's sick, and totally not a safety hazard."

Bucky sighed deeply, looking up at the sky as he looked like he was running calculations through his head. He played with his hands for a second. A moment of weakness in front of a child. "You mind if I take you up on that whole "teaming up" offer?"

"Uh-yeah, yeah, yeah! Won't let you down Buck." Pete smiled and walking on his way.

When Peter woke up the next morning he found an odd calm in his chest. Still a quiver in his lip and a chill down his arms, but his face was dry, which was uncommon to say the least. A letter at the foot of his bed sat folded, from Bucky.

"Ned, roll security footage, and please tell me how and why you didn't wake me up for our dear friend Bucky's little visit."