Spiderman Oneshots

Radioactivity

radioactivityˌreɪdɪəʊakˈtɪvɪtinounthe emission of ionizing radiation or particles caused by the spontaneous disintegration of atomic nuclei. radioactive substances, or the radiation emitted by these. "an escape of radioactivity"

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Peter Parker had always been good at chemistry, but it was physics that really fascinated him. Okay, maybe electricity wasn't as fun, but the moment his teacher in high school introduced space, and electromagnetism, and nuclear theory, he was hooked.

Radiation, in particular, held an appeal. Once they'd finished the topic in class, Peter continued his research, learning more about Marie Curie and positrons and radium nuclei. He read recent thesis papers on radioactivity, and even came across some shady documents from Oscorp that carefully skirted around naming any animal experimentation. 

That night, Peter emailed Ned the documents then phoned him giddily.

"Ned, do you think I'm radioactive?"

"Bro, it's almost midnight."

"Look at the reports I sent you. If that's what they did to the spider that bit me, what if it was transferred?" His voice was excited, but dread was mounting. 

There was one constant among the papers he'd read: radiation was bad. Sure, nuclear power was revolutionary (at least until the arc reactors were made) but any malfunction could cause wide-scale disaster. There was low-level radiation around them all the time, but nobody fully understood the effects. Beta ionisation caused serious and harmful mutations. Alpha radiation could be stopped by something as thin as human skin, but if it got inside you...

If he really was radioactive, he was a danger to anyone who came close to him.

"Peter, I have no idea if you're radioactive or not. Ask Tony. And go to sleep."

"You're no fun, Ned."

"Bye, Peter."

"Bye."

Peter sent Tony a text. Tony replied almost instantly telling him to come over in the morning if he was so worried and 'for the love of Captain America's star-spangled shorts go to sleep kid I know how long it's been'.

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Tony Stark was not in his lab when Peter got there the next day, but Bruce Banner was.

"Hey, Peter," he greeted. 

"Hi Dr Banner!" Peter put down his bag. "Is Mr Stark around?"

"He just went to get coffee. You don't usually intern here on Saturdays?"

"I had a revelation and need to check something."

"Ah," Bruce nodded like he was familiar with the feeling.

"Actually, Dr Banner... Do you mind if I ask a bit about the Hulk?"

Bruce carefully put down the test tube he was holding. "Sure."

"It's gamma radiation, right? That caused it?"

"Yes. The experiment was meant to cause immunity to gamma rays but instead, I was given an astronomical dose of radiation and instead of melting me like it should have done, it did this. We're still not sure why. Several people have tried to recreate the situation, with... unfortunate results."

"But you're not radioactive."

Banner gave a bemused smile. "Everyone's a little bit radioactive. But no, I can't irradiate anything around me. My blood, however, is extremely potent and should stay inside my body as much as possible."