Spiderman Oneshots

A future with no past

Set years after nwh, so contains spoilers. Enjoy!

Harry Osborne's best friend was a guy called Peter Parker. They'd met in university, and Pete had been the only one to not treat Harry like some untouchable celebrity (his dad Norman ran Oscorp, the biological counterpart of Stark Industries). Instead he'd been genuinely understanding - almost sympathetic - about the awkwardness of fame. Within weeks Harry had made arrangements for Peter to be his new roommate (he'd never liked the old one anyway).

Peter was one of the smartest people Harry knew, but otherwise he was pretty normal - the only simple thing in Harry's crazy rich-person world. They stayed close over the years, and Peter ended up getting a job at Oscorp after Harry's dad's incident. Norman had been experimenting with a chemical formula that went terribly wrong and transformed him into a psycho monster. Luckily Spider-Man had appeared on the scene just an hour after the incident with an antidote that reversed the transformation, and advised some mental care to tackle Norman's frequent mood swings that had become more like a dual personality after the incident. Harry still had no idea how Spider-Man had made it so quickly, before the incident had even been picked up by the news, and with a formula he'd somehow synthesised before even seeing the goblin-like creature his dad had become.

Mystery aside, Harry owed the hero a huge debt, even if his dad's mental recovery meant Harry had to take on more and more responsibility within the company. That led to him hiring Peter in an act of desperation to make his own work life better. It worked better than expected: not only was Pete a friendly face, but he was surprisingly familiar with the inner workings of running a large company, and even quite adept at handling the press. He was quickly promoted to Harry's general assistant, providing services everywhere from fetching coffee and listening to Harry rant about businesspeople to acting as a sort of bodyguard against reporters and reviewing important documents or suggesting improvements to the business. They spent almost every waking minute together, in work and outside of it.

So yes, Harry would say that he knew Peter Parker very well. So when they were in a bar one night and there was an announcement of a charity 'how well do you know your best friend?' quiz, Harry was the first one to leap up and claim two sheets from the organiser. He handed one to Peter with a wide grin. "We know each other inside out, nobody else stands a chance."

"I don't know, Harry," Peter frowned as he looked down at the sheet, a myriad of unreadable expressions flickering over his face.

"Seriously Pete? C'mon, we're going to ace this."

"Attention all competitors, please move away from your friends. No communication allowed, for obvious reasons. Everybody ready? Your time starts now!"

Harry positioned himself at a table away from Peter and skimmed over the questions. They were pretty basic - stuff any decent friend would know. This would be a breeze.

He placed the tip of his pen beneath the first question, and paused. 

Who was their first crush?

Harry blinked, casting his mind through a million conversations he'd had with Pete. He'd never talked about a high school sweetheart or childhood crush, only briefly mentioning a disastrous homecoming.  Of course, he'd been there for the horror that had been university dating and the late-night discussions about celebrity crushes (Peter had sworn never to tell anyone that Harry secretly had a thing for Spider-Man). Harry shook himself out of his chain of thought and moved onto the next question. 

Best friend through high school? 

Again, Harry was shocked to realise he didn't know the answer. Sure, he knew Peter had had friends, he talked about how they'd always do homework together and build lego way past the age they should have stopped playing with toys. He'd been in his school AcaDec team - unsurprisingly, really - with some of his friends, as well as some idiot who hated Peter. But Pete had never once mentioned any of their names.