note:
So I decided to continue. Hopefully once a week there will be an update. Each chapter will range from 4k-6k depending how creative I'm feeling. Feel free to add any input you think would help the story move on. Such as things you want to see happen or something you like about other fics that you think will fit into this one! I'm kinda writing as I go so if something doesn't make sense let me know I probably forgot I said something and wrote something different later on. Thanks for the votes and input on the 1st chapter! Anyways enjoy the second chapter!
word count: 4514
==========================================================
It had been a couple days since the run in with the Bats. Peter avoided the library like the plague, not wanting to risk being ambushed there. He spent most of his time job searching, however, most places didn't seem too interested in a sixteen year old that looked like a nerd and dressed like he was homeless. Which he technically was. The days were getting colder and he was running out of options. He decided he would stop by a shelter that he had seen on his map that had a free breakfast every morning. Peter walked into the shelter as the sun rose. The line for the breakfast wasn't very long so he got his food quite fast. He was tired, wet, and cold from sleeping in odd spots to keep away from the Bats. It had started raining again last night soon after he settled in on a rooftop he deemed safe. But he was of course run out of the spot by the downpour. He thankfully found an empty dumpster in what seemed to be an abandoned area. It took him a while and he ended up back in Crime Alley as he figured it would be quicker to get to the shelter. So even though he was protected from the rain most of the night it didn't help that he was already dripping wet when he found the dumpster. His suit had already blocked as much as it could but it isn't magic so he was soon soaked all the way through.
Peter quickly found a spot to sit with a family sitting next to him. He quickly ate his breakfast when he was stopped while throwing his trash away, by a girl about his age with blond hair. "Hello, im Steph, I couldn't help but notice your clothes are completely soaked" she gave him a kind smile. he looked down at himself seeing his sopping clothes and back to her "Oh, um, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to get the floor wet. I'll leave, do you have anything I could dry it up with, I'm sorry" He held the hem of his shirt, trying his best not to cause anymore water to drip from him. "No, no you're fine, I was just going to show you to our clothes box. The Wayne Foundation donates to these shelters all the time so we get clothes for the homeless people as often as possible. Here come on, I'll even show you to the shower room" Steph motioned for Peter to follow her. "Oh, um, thank you" He said. He thought about arguing but if he was being honest. A hot shower, dry clothes, and a free meal. It sounded like heaven to him, then after this he would find a dry place and sleep. He followed steph as she went over to a stack of totes in the corner. "Here" She gestured to the boxes. "What sizes are you? If you give me a shoe size I can check the back for shoes" She said, giving him a smile again. Her smile made peter feel more at ease as he gave her all his sizes. Steph pulled down a box with shirts and a box with pants then grabbed another that had miscellaneous items in it such as socks, underwear, gloves, and hats. Peter thanked her and began scouring the boxes. Steph went into the employees only door next to where the boxes sat telling him she would be back in a moment. Peter found a plain dark gray t-shirt, some darker jeans that would be comfy enough to sleep in but nice enough that he hopefully wouldn't look as ratty, and pulled out a pair of socks and boxers from the other tote, leaving the hats and gloves for everyone else. Soon after he put the totes back Steph came back out holding a pair of all black sneakers in her hand, a black heavier hoodie, and a cheap black backpack. "Oh, thank you for putting them up for me!" She exclaimed happily, handing him the items she came out with. "Here, these should all fit you.The backpack has some toiletries and a couple other things we provide for everyone. Here, this way is the shower room." He told him not giving him a chance to say anything. "Alright! Don't forget, if you come back by 5pm we also do dinner here! I won't be here but be sure to be here as soon as you can because beds fill fast here." She gave him a small pat on the back and left him by a door that said Mens over it. Peter called out a thank you to her and walked into the shower room and looked for a shower that seemed fairly clean. A couple of guys already occupied a couple of the showers blocked by half walls. They turned their heads at the door opening and stared at him with looks he couldn't quite place before whispering to each other. He did pay much mind to them feeling awkward enough as it is. He settled for one towards the back a few showers away from everyone else and grabbed a towel from the basket that said clean and started his shower. After carefully tucking his suit beside the bench to where no one would see it but him, he hopped in the warm water and began washing up with the 3-in-1 soap he had found in his bag. He stayed in there for a good 20 minutes just soaking the warmth the water brought him but decided to end it as a lot of people began to come in after their breakfast. He dried himself off with the towel and got dressed. He rang out the suit as best he could and stuffed it into his backpack before making his way out of the showers feeling refreshed and ready for a nap. The clothes fit him nicely, the jeans hugged his legs a bit more than he thought but they weren't skinny jean tight. The hoodie was a tad too big but he was fine with that. Once he had the sneakers on he tossed his old ones, there was no point in keeping them. The toes busted through when he was running the night before. He may have pulled it off but he tripped over the edge of the building when he went into the alley causing the bottom to rip a bit. Normally he would just duct tape it shut but he didn't have duct tape and he already got the new sneakers so throwing the old ones away would help save room in his bag. Peter was still quite hungry due to his enhanced metabolism. Lucky he hadn't been injured while here so his healing factor hasn't had to break into his already low calorie count.
—----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A couple hours of job hunting later, Peter stopped at an old building that hadn't seemed to be in use by any other homeless person. Probably because he had to use his abilities to even get inside. But either way he climbed into what looked to be an old warehouse. It was fairly small for a warehouse. It was probably about the size of a football field, maybe slightly bigger. The doors and windows were completely boarded up with 2x4's and metal sheets. He came through a rusted out bit on the top corner of the 30 foot tall building. It was dark and smelled sorta weird but it was better than nothing. He stayed in the light from the hole he came through, the sun giving him enough light to see. He dumped out his bag, not fully having gone through it when he showered. He came out with his wallet, old clothes, suit, a box of 6 granola bars which he instantly opened two and ate them, a thin rolled up blanket, the soap he used earlier, a travel size deodorant, and a few extra pairs of boxers and socks. He reorganized everything in there, keeping all his wet clothes out and hanging up his suit and clothes on an old railing that ran along the side of the building. He laid out his small blanket on the concrete floor in the middle of the sunny circle. Setting his backpack on top and checking the rest of the warehouse to make sure it was safe and there were no other openings. After walking and climbing around the warehouse twice, once to check the second one because he was sure he might have missed something. He found a small mouse house and a busted window too high for anyone to reach but him. He nodded in satisfaction and laid down on his blanket to get as good of a rest he could for the upcoming exam. He slowly fell into a not so peaceful sleep as he dreamed about his universe.
'He felt like he was watching a movie. He couldn't move as scenes flicked by. He was forced to watch as Tony drifted in a spaceship accompanied by nebula. Then it jumped to Tony and a little girl, a daughter. It made Peter's heart swell at the thought of him having a daughter, not only from sadness but happiness as well. Then it cut again to Tony staring down at a picture. It was a picture he had taken with Peter with his inverted diploma. Then it was Tony working on something. Peter couldn't tell what it was but Tony held a saddened face as he worked. He said something that flipped what he was working on to invert it but Peter couldn't hear the words. It just came out as muffle that kept getting louder and louder that soon brought a painful ringing and a blinding flash of green'
Peter sat up with a choked scream and looked around. It was dark now, the only light being the start of the sunrise. He took some gulps of air and thought about the dream. It felt so real. Like he was actually there watching them but he couldn't move or say anything. Sorta like sleep perilous. He felt a tear roll down his face and brought his hands up and wiped them away. He didn't realize he was crying when he woke up. His head was hurting as a migraine started to make its way to the surface.
Peter got himself ready for the day and made his way to the roof of the warehouse to finish watching the sunrise. He continued to sit there till the sun came up enough to stop the orange from flooding the sky but instead a foggy blue to take its place. Later that day he spent half of his $20 on a bucket and a jug of laundry soap to be able to wash his clothes. Luckily the warehouse had a working spigot out back so he had a mostly clean water source. He would never drink from it as when he was about to his spider senses screamed at him. So that day he spent cleaning his clothes and hunting for anything useful in the garbage around his 'home'. Of course it was the other way around. It would be silly to clean his clothes just to hope in dirty dumpsters. He hoped for some good scrap for him to be able to fix Karen.
========================================================================
The exam for Gotham Academy was today and he was making his way to the library where the testing is held. He was reluctant to go back to the library but he didn't have a whole lot of choices. When he made it to the Library he was surprised to see a pretty large group of kids around his age talking amongst themselves. Almost all of them are in their own friend groups or reading a book at a table. Tables were set in a couple of rows with two chairs at each. He made his way to the front desk where Barbra sat greeting the kids and having them sign in on a sheet of paper. When it was his turn she seemed surprised but also sorta confused. "Peter, Hey how have you been? I haven't seen you in a while!" She smiled brightly as she handed him the pen. He took it from her hands while looking at her, not really sure if he should be petty and not answer her or be polite and say hello back. They sat in an awkward silence as he wrote his name down then signed next to it before he decided that he should probably be polite. "Hi, I'm okay thanks." He didn't answer her last question because he wasn't sure what to reply with 'Oh yeah, I just haven't wanted to see any of the caped crusaders and since you keep tattling on me I haven't really wanted to come hangout where you work either.' She didn't say anything about him not answering the last question as he was pretty sure she already knew what he was thinking anyways. She gave him the rundown of what to expect of the test and the rules before handing him a number two pencil and a seat number.
Peter made his way to his seat as everyone else did and sat down. Then a woman went to the front and re-explained everything in a little more detail. Peter was only half listening as he tapped the pencil on the desk as he grew more and more nervous by the minute. He was starting to panic a little. He was in a different universe meaning everything he knew could be completely wrong. Not to mention the history of this universe was likely to be totally foreign to him. Not only that but he could feel the holes being burned into the back of his head by Barbra. He hadn't seen the earpiece in when he was signing in so he was hoping she hadn't contacted the Bats and that if she did, that he had enough time to get the test done before they got there. 'What if they bust in here and call him out? Would he not be able to attend school? Would everyone be on a man hunt for him and he wouldn't be able to show his face ever meaning he would die either by the hands of someone else or the more probable thing being starvation? Not to mention-' "Dude do you mind? The tapping is driving me nuts." A boy around his again the seat next to him had a frown on his face as he whispered to Peter. "Oh, sorry." He stopped his tapping as he paid attention to the lady, or as he now knew, was the counselor of the school, started handing the tests out to each person. He was the last one with a test but he quickly started flipping pages. He remembered her saying something about the test taking up to three hours in total. The test is 6 pages long. One history, two math, two English, and one science.
He read over the whole test in the first ten minutes and determined this universe wasn't totally different from his. The history as he guessed wasn't going to be the hardest part of the whole thing but it wasn't terrible. Most things also happened in his world; the only thing he had to worry about was all hero related things.
Peter had gotten everything but the History done within the first 45 minutes. He was halfway through the History section but was still stuck on the hero stuff. 'How am I supposed to know the year when the Justice League became an official hero team?' He signed as he decided his best bet was to guess everything rather it be a clue from what he read in his one day of research or glancing around the library for any posters or book titles that may help. Luckily he did get one answer from a poster but it was the bonus points answer that asked 'Name every Justice League member' Which the poster was the group in a hero pose with their names written either above them or below them. There were also a couple he was able to answer about the bats because of his run ins with them.
After He triple checked his work and wrote his name on the top he glanced around realizing everyone was still working. He debated waiting till someone else was finished but he didn't want to risk the wait and possibly get stopped by a Bat that Barbra might have sent on his trail. So he grabbed the paper and made his way quietly to the counselor who sat at a desk reading a book on mental therapy. She looked up at his face then down at the test in his hand before setting the book infront of her pages down as to not lose her spot and in a quiet voice spoke to him "Hun you do realize this test is meant to take around three hours we only started" She looked down and checked her watch before continuing "An hour and a half. Are you sure you're ready to turn this in?" He gave her a smile and a nod before letting go of his end of the paper. "Alrighty then. The results will be posted on the bulletin board Monday afternoon at 12pm. otherwise if a email was provided then you can also check there for a possible early confirmation or denial of the scholarship. Have a nice day" She gave a soft smile before continuing her book. Peter gave her a mouthed thanks before making his way to the doors. Peter was just about to open the door to leave when he heard his name being called "Peter, could I talk with you for a moment?" Barbra asked him wheeling up to him in her wheelchair. He frowned a bit at her but did stop. When she got to him she glanced around making sure that no one was around to listen in. He noticed she now had the earpiece in meaning she already told them about him being here so he was on a time limit if he wasn't already going to be ambushed as soon as he opened the doors. "Look Peter, I know you and the Bats are sorta on bad terms, but they're just worried for their city. They have had too many bad run-ins with people like you and can't risk another. Please consider just giving them a chance. Let them ask their questions. They won't harm you unless you try to harm them first." She sounded genuine but he still couldn't bring himself to trust her. Not to mention the 'people like you comment' kinda stung. "Sorry, but none of you have really given me a reason to trust you. Besides 'my kinda people' don't always mean dangerous." she flinched slightly at his words and he felt a bit guilty for being harsh with her but still turned and left the library. He knew he shouldn't have talked like that to her but he was getting tired of getting chased around town because he was slightly more flexible than everyone else and he could climb walls.
Peter was prepared for an attack as soon as he left and was sure to check every corner and roof as he left making sure that he was okay. He didn't see or hear anyone and his spidey sense was only ringing a bit so he cautiously made his way down the street. He marked down a couple more places to check out for a job as he couldn't survive off of soup kitchens and homeless shelter the rest of his temporary life here. He also started to get pretty cold in the open warehouse and wanted to get more blankets and a few new sets of clothes. He checked out the last two jobs on his list, however both denied him a job. He was starting to lose hope at this point. He has tried 28 different places but every one of them didn't want a 16 year old homeless kid working for them. It was now around 5;30pm and Peter was headed to the soup kitchen he had been going to the last week he's been in Gotham. It was the one in Park Row he met Steph at. He hadn't seen her since that day but the food there was good and the showers were mostly clean. He made it there just in time for the rain to start up again and a cold wind to blow. He got inside with only a few rain spots on his hoodie. When he walked in his senses immediately started buzzing. They had gotten used to the normal hustle and bustle Gotham had so they weren't present all the time so now when they go off he does become slightly on edge. He looked around to see if there were any obvious reasons for it to be go off but everything seemed normal. Until his eyes fell on a red helmeted vigilante talking to one of the volunteers. Peter quickly went to the back and sat down and laid his head on the table hoping he wasn't going to be there for very long and Peter would go unnoticed till then. He tried listening in on what he was asking the older woman that normally greeted him whenever he came in but he couldn't hear past the voices of all the chatter that the full cafeteria looking room brought. He kept his head facing the table below him as his arms made a cave for his head to set in. He was growing more and more antsy as the time went by and he was starting to worry if he was going to be able to get food before the time was up. He decided to risk a look at the clock to determine if he should chance getting food or if he should just make a run for the door and skip his meal for the night. His stomach yelled at him after that though but to be fair, hungry and safe was better then hungry and probably not safe if Red Hood caught him. Peter slowly lifted his head out of his arms and looked over at Red Hood to check if he was till there or not. As soon as he saw the Red helmet it turned in his direction. Peter quickly slammed his head back down. He accidentally slammed it pretty hard making a couple of people stop to look at him but they soon went back to their conversions much to Peter's gratitude. He was praying that he Red Hood didn't notice him and was back to talking. He waited a couple more seconds before he tried again. This time when he looked there was no Red Hood standing there but his senses still tugged at him so he kept cautious. He started to get up to grab food as he only had ten minutes left. He looked around once more to be sure before he turned to get up only to stop as someone was standing behind him. He slowly trailed his eyes from the combat boots up to the black pants then the leather jacket and lastly the shiny red helmet of Red Hood. Peter stared a moment eyes wide as he gave a small nervous laugh before diving to get past Red Hood hoping to be able to get out the doors and as far away from there he could but was stopped by an arm that shot out to grab his shirt. "Ah ah ah a ah" Red Hood spoke like he was scolding a dog. "We've been looking for you" Peter could hear the smile he had as he spoke. He was proud that he finally caught the escapee by catching him off guard. Peter tried to get out of his grasp again but nothing was working to get out of his grip. Every one was staring at them in silence as Peter resorted to super strength. But just as he was about to he felt a small poke to the side of his neck and he felt a bit dizzy. Of course it wasn't enough to make Peter pass out but disorient him? Defielty. Red Hood seemed to be shocked that he was still trying to escape. It was definitely sloppier than before but now combined with malnutrition and disorientation he wasn't having luck getting himself out of the strong grasp of the man. Peter didn't want to but he decided to get loose, he would have to lose one of his two shirts. So, he slipped down leaving an empty shirt in his place before Red Hood snapped back out of daze of whether or not he should give the kid a second dose or if that could kill Peter. This led to a very short chase of a shirtless Peter getting a couple streets down in the barely visible streets from a cold downpour before ducking into an alley hoping he wasn't seen but of course he was. Why would he have such luck not to be. Red Hood slowed at the one opening to the ally as he walked up to a slowly sobering Peter as he pulled out a gun. This brought Peters already alarmed senses blaring "h-hey man. Y're really going to shoot a kid?! Aren' you a good guy" Peters voice was a bit slurred as he spoke but he got ready to dodge anything he shot at him. "Sorta, if you came with me like a good kid then shooting you wouldn't be necessary" Red Hood said as he shot at Peter. He dodged the shots as Red Hood grew more and more frustrated. "What the hell?! How are you dodging every damn one?!" Peter laughed at him as he was now basically all himself again. He was hoping to run him out of bullets but at his last shot he expertly switched guns and was shooting again before he even blinked an eye so now he was on plan B. Up. He knew the bullets weren't really bullets aimed to kill as they had a small red flag at the end which meant they were probably meant to knock him out to be transferred back to whatever cell was waiting for him in their evil testing lab to ready for experimenting. But, as this night's luck would have it, as soon as he went to take his leave he felt not one, not two, but three pricks hit his side and shoulder. "F-fuuuck" Peter sputtered out as he grabbed the wall and tried pulling the silver and red blurry blobs from his shoulder before looking over to see a cheering Red Hood as he finally got him before his eyes rolled up and he met the concrete hard.