First Cause • Spider-Man: Homecoming [Unedited]

09

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It was not a good idea, this one. She knows, she knows.

More than four hours later, standing awkwardly in the cramped, surprisingly uncluttered room of the boy's—Peter, is it?–room, as the sun sets to the west and ushers in a warm evening, she knows. And if an Arm were to, out of the clear blue sky, materialize before their very eyes in the middle of that cramped, surprisingly uncluttered room and ask Gadea to justify the rationale of this fresh idea, she doesn't think she would be confidently able to. She knows she wouldn't be.

Because it makes no actual sense. Pursuing a temporary deal of some sorts with one's self-proclaimed adversary is a cliché ridden with areas primed for failure and too many moving parts to honestly expect anything other than someone at some point getting the raw end of the deal. But she's the only party involved in this deal who is aware of all of its many different moving parts.

The Deal, or its earlier version, was birthed to life in the empty halls of Midtown High School. As Herman Schultz and unknown man emerged from a bend in the corridors. As a wide-eyed Peter, his worryingly excited friend Ned, and Gadea, sweating bullets, cartridges and holsters, watched from the safety of the corner of a classroom.

Peter and Ned were stage-whispering nonsensities to themselves while Gadea leaned over the bend and spotted a device that looked like a small, rectangular silver box topped with glowing red and blue lights in Schultz's grip. She saw him stop in front of a door in the hallway she passed when she entered the school, and observed in suspicion as he entered the room, seemingly at the behest of the silver box.

"We gotta get out of here," Ned floated, and wisely, too.

Peter, like an idiot, said, "No, no, no, I gotta follow them. Maybe they can lead me to the guy that dropped me in the lake."

"You mean the guy that we agreed you were going to let me handle?" Gadea fixed him with a cool stare over her shoulder. "Forgotten so soon, hmm? That's rather insulting."

Peter stared. Ned stared. Gadea smirked.

Peter flushed a delightful shade of red.

Then the fool stepped past her with the speed of a bat out of hell, ignored both her and Ned's rushed, whispered warnings to not confront the potentially dangerous villains in the middle of a school day. But now, hours later, Gadea is glad that he did.

Following Schultz and the other man into that classroom while Gadea hung back and reevaluated her next course of action was the catalyst that inspired the Deal. The Deal which has lead her here, to Peter Parker's humble abode. Parker. That's what his notebook says on the front.

The open window over the left side of the bed allows beams of trailing evening sun to warm the side of Gadea's face. In front of her, settled nicely on the edge of Peter's bunk bed is chummy-looking Ned Leeds, content to be tinkering with a piece of Spider-Man's meager arsenal. He must notice Gadea's uncomfortable gaze crawling over his bronze skin the way most people do, as he looks up from the metallic, sleek wrist device in the palm of his hand and dashes Gadea a soft smile.