never be the same || spider-man

streets of poison

"Hey, squirt." There's a hand on his shoulder to accompany the voice. It shook him gently, slowly rousing him out of sleep. "C'mon, Pete, get up."

Peter grumbled into his pillow, shoving his face further into the cool material. At some point in the night, the covers had been pulled over him. While he was still in his suit, he didn't particularly care as he pulled his blankets tighter around his shoulder. "Five more minutes."

Chuckling softly, Tony sat on the edge of Peter's bed. "We were able to get all the Ryker's inmates." Oh, right. In his barely awake state, Peter had completely forgotten. "Took most of the night. We weren't able to locate Scorpion, Rhino, Martin, or Otto, though."

Turning his head towards his dad, Peter slowly blinked awake. Tony looked like he had barely slept. Peter felt much the same. "I got Electro and Vulture last night."

"I saw. We patched up your side last night. Seems you've inherited my ability to sleep like the dead." Tony chuckled softly, running a hand through Peter's morning nest of hair. "Go get ready and join us for breakfast. We've got some news for you." He stood up and hovered in the doorway for a moment. "By the way, your school is closed until this Devil's Breath thing passes. They don't want it spreading any more than it already has."

Peter managed a thumbs up towards his dad before hauling himself out of bed. In the bathroom, he peeled off the old bandages and tossed them in the trash. The wounds were still tender to the touch, but were mostly healed enough that they shouldn't bother him too badly, nor need new dressings. The shower helped the ache in his body that never seemed to fully go away.

Steve pushed a full plate of eggs, bacon, and toast towards him the second he sat down at the kitchen island. More awake now, he practically inhaled the food.

"When's the last time you ate?" Steve asked, concerned.

"Can't remember, honestly." He turned to Tony. "What's the news you were going to tell me?"

"Michaels called me this morning and told me they're working on an anti-serum down at Oscorp. Now if you ask me, that's a risky move–"

"Tony."

"Right, anyway. He said he wasn't sure when it'd be fully ready, but they're making good progress." Tony tapped on the counter in front of him. "I just hope it's soon."

Peter nodded in agreement before finishing up the last of his breakfast. "Thanks for the food, Papa. I'm going to check on Ned and see how he's doing. Maybe get some patrolling in while I'm out there."

Without waiting for a response, Peter dashed into his room and slipped on a back-up suit. Thankful for having spares for when his others got too torn to wear, Peter booted up Karen in his current suit. Only downside of multiple suits was that he had to manually load Karen into the new one. Tony offered to change it, but it wasn't anything that bothered Peter enough to want to mess with it.

Getting to Ned's didn't take too long, but he was surprised to see MJ there before him. She was wearing a medical mask over her nose and mouth, typing away at something on her laptop. "Hey," he greeted, slipping in through the window in Ned's room. "How're you feeling?"

"Could be better." Ned's words were followed by a wet sounding cough. Peter's heart dropped when MJ handed him a tissue to clean the blood off his hand. "MJ has to wear a mask so she doesn't get sick. I'd keep yours on."

"What are you guys working on?" Peter sat on the other side of MJ on the bed and peeked at the screen. "Whose blog is that?"

"Ours. The Bugle is still letting me publish stories, but we wanted to get information out there without having to edit shit out. I'm using the pen name Mary Jane. Ned's using Ganke." MJ looked up just enough to look at Peter. "Any news on an anti-serum?"