The Day After (Spiderman Fanfiction)

Part 8 - Not a Virgin

Peter opened the door and immediately raised his hands.

Ruby was sitting on the floor with her gun pointed at him. "Oh Spider Kid," she put the gun down, the bandages on her arms looked redder, she huffed with pain, "I was wondering whether you'd make it."

Peter got closer to her, trying to help her up, "hey Ruby, why don't we switch your bandages, where do you keep 'em?"

Ruby clutched her stomach and pointed at the bathroom. The apartment wasn't lived in, there were only her tools, a workbench and a pizza cardboard box laying around.

Peter walked in the bathroom, again, there wasn't anything normal in there, there was a thrown toothbrush, one spray deodorant and tons of bandages lying on the floor, some of them had blood in them. Peter sighed and looked for a few clean bandages, he grabbed some sanitising gel and returned to the living room. Ruby sat on some old dirty couch, Peter hoped this wasn't where she usually stayed.

"Come on let's get you fixed up." He dropped to the floor next to her, starting to take off her bandages.

"You got it?" Ruby breathed out, she could barely mask her pain now.

"I did, I did" he assured her. "Just stay still, I'll handle it all." He reached down to her chest, suddenly realising he had to take off the tank top she was wearing, Peter knew it didn't matter, the girl was bleeding to death, but still he couldn't get past it without over thinking.

"Spidey kid, don't tell me you're a virgin." Ruby huffed. Almost chuckling if it weren't too painful.

Peter started stuttering, "no, I uh.., I'm not a virgin it's just that uh..." Peter blushed furiously, thankful he had the mask on. He knew that usually kids his age usually past all this, but honestly, he and MJ decided to take it slow, seeing they both got super embarrassed when it came to it. Although they did other stuff, they never did the thing. And come to think about it, Peter did see boobs in his life, and not just in porn, there was this time in eighth grade, where he went to a party with Ned and this weird girl who was in chemistry with him took him to the bathroom and just flashed him, Peter was so embarrassed, he just raised his thumbs up and then left the room.

Ruby groaned again, Peter shook his head, he didn't have time thinking about all this, it wasn't a question, he had to take off her bandages, later on he would even had to cut a part in her chest to put the arc reactor he needed to build.

He breathed deeply, Ruby grabbed his wrist and looked up at him, "it's okay, we'll make it, I'll do it with you." Peter nodded, and started taking of her arm bandages, sanitising the area and placing a newly clean bandage.

Ruby yelled once the sanitiser hit her cuts, she wondered if it was all even worth it, cutting her chest open, inserting some Stark technology into her, just to get back to running away again.

After Peter replaced all of her bandages he laid her down on the dirt sofa, "take a rest, I'll get working on the arc reactor."

At this point Ruby was so tired, she barely got any sleep in the last days, so she was already half asleep. Peter didn't know this but this was the first time Ruby trusted someone in a long time, it was a relief really, not being constantly on her toes.

Peter walked to the work bench, truth is he was dying to take off his mask, he couldn't remember the last time he had to put in on for this long. He used Karen to help him, carefully taking out the Palladium out of Tony's projector and inserting it into the small container Ruby was already working on. It something like an hour and a half but eventually he did it. He wondered what would Tony think of him. He tried not to dwell on it too much.

"Ruby," Peter turned around and saw her small figure laying asleep behind him. She looked nothing like herself all of a sudden, but a lot more calm. She didn't longer had her body tensed, every single muscle of her ready to jump. For a second Peter could picture Ruby as a normal teenager, who cares about boys and grades, and not knowing how to use a gun. He thought for a second about letting her sleep, but decided against it, her time was running out, every second the shrapnel are getting closer to her heart. "Ruby," he shook her shoulder, "wake up."

Ruby opened her eyes, scared look taking over her until she remembered where she was, and who the masked man in front of her was. "You did it?" She looked at him with disbelief. Peter nodded and showed it to her. It wasn't fine as Stark's but it was sure something. Ruby smiled widely, an odd sight for Peter, but he liked it. "Wait so now there's the hard part" she came to her senses, looking worried again, she looked up at him, "I don't assume you're a doctor at your spare time do you?"

Peter shook his head. Ruby sat up, "it's okay, I've done stitches before," she nodded to herself, after a deep breath she looked up again at him, "there's a stitching kit in the bathroom."

Peter walked there, after a second he came back, Ruby was setting a flash light to her chest, using all the help she could get. Yeah, sure, she did stitches before, had she cut someone's chest before? Not exactly, but what could possibly go wrong? I mean, she thought, more than it already had?

"Hey," Ruby spoke, Peter looked at her, trying to hide his nervousness. "If this doesn't work, then I want to just say that, this isn't on you. You really done more than a lot, thank you, really, but if this doesn't work out, that's on me, okay?"

Peter just stared, not sure what to think. Ruby repeated herself, "okay?"

He just nodded, not sure he meant it.

"Here goes nothing." Ruby pressed down her knife, doing the best she could pretending it wasn't her.