Spiderman Oneshots

Holding back (1)

Peter hated PE. Not because he was bad at it, but because he had to hide the fact that he was actually awesome at it. 

He changed quickly in a cubicle, letting Flash and the others believe that it was because he was ashamed of his wimpy body instead of because he was hiding his muscles. He pulled a baggy PE hoodie over the skintight uniform, even thought the gym was always too hot, then headed out to join the rest of the class. 

"Okay class," the coach said. "Today there will be a number of activities available for you to try. I've assigned partners, who will record each other's scores on each rotation."

Of course it was Peter's luck that he got stuck with Flash. Their first rotation was on the obstacle course. Flash did well, and would not cease bragging as Peter stumbled through after him, deliberately tripping over the tyres as he counted in his head to make sure he got a believable time for the class nerd.

Next was the long jump. Flash barely made it a metre, so Peter made sure to trip over his own laces and faceplant the sand. The mental capacity required to fail was way more effort than it would be for him to succeed. Flash laughed and stepped over him on the way to the next activity.

By the time they made it to the running track, Peter was beyond fed up. Flash jogged on the spot at the starting line. Peter braced himself beside him until the coach blew the whistle, sending them off. They had to do 5 laps, and it was supposed to be a race so Peter let Flash pull ahead before settling into a slow jog. After one lap, he made sure to begin panting, wiping imaginary sweat from his brow. That was when Flash lapped him, sneering as he slowed down and ran backwards in front of Peter.

"What's wrong, Parker?" he taunted. "Too puny to go for a little jog? I bet you'll drop dead before you get to the third lap!"

Peter scowled, not noticing his pace increase. He just had to ignore him. He proved people like Flash wrong every time he went out as Spider-Man. Someday, they'd realise just how wrong they were. Flash's needling insults rang out in the background. Peter grit his teeth. He was tired, mentally drained from holding back, and sick of Flash Thompson. One day couldn't hurt.

Peter loosened his grip on his self-control, and sped up until he was running alongside Flash, who had given up on insulting him a few seconds ago. They passed the second lap.

"Oooh, Parker thinks he's better than me, huh? Eat my dust, puny." Flash sneered, and sped up. Peter kept pace easily. Flash's eyes widened in shock, then the other boy put on a burst of speed and stuck out a leg to trip Peter up. Peter jumped over it instinctively and continued to put on speed, letting his momentum carry him forward but being careful not to surpass believable human running speeds. 

By lap 4, Peter had overtaken Flash three times. The bully was red in the face with anger and exertion, but he could not keep up with Peter, no matter how he tried. On the sidelines, Peter vaguely registered the coach staring. 

Peter slowed down a bit to normal sprinting speed for the last stop before coming to a halt at the line, barely winded. A minute later, Flash collapsed beside him, wheezing but finally keeping his mouth shut.

Once Flash had recovered, they moved onto their next rotation - rope climbing. Peter was so relieved that nobody had called him out on the running that he let his instincts take over as he scaled the rope with ease, his sticky skin and lots of web-climbing practise making it second nature. He barely stopped himself from jumping down from he top of the rope - his speedy ascent had already attracted enough attention. Instead he climbed quickly down, then slid a few metres and jumped the last couple, hands smarting slightly from rope burn. He barely managed to stop himself from landing in his classic Spidey pose out of muscle memory. A couple of people clapped.

Flash did his best to scramble up the rope, falling on his first attempt before making it halfway then slowly lowering himself back to the ground, fuming. Peter knew Flash would have done something to get back at him if the coach hadn't followed them over, watching with a keen eye.

Next was the balance beam. Flash wobbled across it in good time, which apparently recovered his ego enough to give Peter a superior smile. Peter ignored him and jumped onto the bench, taking a moment to get his balance before he set off across it, staying light on his toes, arms extended more for show than balance.

"Wowww," Flash clapped slowly from where he'd already started exercising on the mats. "Puny can walk across a bench! Impressive," he grinned sarcastically. "What's next, a roly-poly?" He demonstrated.

Peter bit his lip, weighing his options, then decided to push his luck a bit more. Still standing on the beam, he caught Flash's eye, then closed his own, bouncing a couple of times on the balls of his feet before launching into a triple backflip. He heard several gasps as he started spinning, then more as he landed perfectly on his feet in the middle of the beam. He opened his eyes to see half the class watching him. Somebody whistled.

Heating up with the attention, Peter retreated to the corner where he'd stashed his bottle, and took a drink before tugging off his hoodie. There was an exclamation of surprise, and he realised his mistake as everyone turned to look at him. He shrank, but there was no turning back now. 

"Since when did Parker get fit?" Somebody stage-whispered.

Peter shrugged awkwardly. "Gym?"

This seemed to be an acceptable answer, and the hum of chatter slowly resumed. The coach headed over and clapped him on the shoulder.

"I don't know what's gotten into you today, Peter," she said, "but I like it. Keep this up and you'll be Olympic standard in no time."

Peter resisted the urge to tell her he was already at Olympic standard - not that he could ever compete with a clear conscience - and rejoined Flash at the shot-put. He had to take care not to throw the heavy ball too hard and risk injuring someone, but he misjudged his own strength and sent it flying halfway across the room anyway. Luckily the attention had moved on from him by now, and Flash was too busy throwing his own shot-put to notice.

The rest of the activities went by without significance, and soon the coach was blowing the whistle and checking her watch.

"Okays guys, we've got ten minutes left, so feel free to play dodgeball whilst I clear up the equipment."

Still feeling the lingering stares of his classmates, Peter resolved that he would stay at the back of the crowd and do his best not to throw too many balls. Unfortunately, he was so absorbed in deliberately holding back his strength and aim when he did throw that he didn't remember to ignore his Spidey sense. Instead, he blindly obeyed the survival instinct that had kept him alive fight after fight until he looked up as coach blew the whistle to realise he was the last man standing on his own team, and everybody - everybody - was staring at him. He winced, and caught the ball that was heading at his face automatically. Then he realised, and let it drop with another wince.

Ned was gawking at him. MJ, who he was pretty sure din't know he was Spider-Man (at least not until just now), looked smug. Everybody else looked like they were going into shock.

There was a murmur of, "do you think he's on steroids?"

Peter looked between them all, then said in his little voice, "I think I overdid the caffeine this morning."

Flash blinked, looking absolutely terrified, but everybody else somehow seemed to accept this as a reasonable response, and began to file towards the doors. 

Peter sighed, thanking all his lucky stars that he was going to actually get away with this.

Apparently he missed one, though, because the next thing he knew, an alarm sounded.