Ultra Responsibility (My Hero Academia X Spider-Man Reader)

Issue 5 - New Friends, New Enemies

Oh! Right! You've gotta meet my lab partner." She dragged me over, grinning smugly. "He's brilliant, a born genius. Not as brilliant as me, obviously, but still top-tier. Yo, Doc! Meet the cousin I was bragging about, Y/N Parker!"

The curtain pulled back, and my eyes widened at the sight: a set of massive mechanical arms suspended in the air. A boy barely older than me, with messy black hair, oversized goggles and a lab coat two sizes too big, peeked out from behind them.

His grin was contagious. "No way, the Y/N Parker?! This is insane! I'm Otto Octavius, but everyone just calls me Doc Ock. It's a huge honour. I hope we can be great friends."

"Otto, yeah, great to meet you. Sorry, it's just—"

Otto chuckled lightly as he stepped toward the towering frame of his creation, the mechanical arms gleaming under the fluorescent lights. "It's fine. Everyone is like this the first time they see my invention in person. Of course, they're only prototypes right now, but I can already see how this will change the world."

I leaned in, studying the frame and the wiring snaking through the joints, my jaw practically hitting the floor. "How does this even work? Wait, don't tell me..." I squinted, piecing it together. "A neuron interface, right? But how? There'd have to be dozens of safety checks: mental state, neural feedback stability, failsafes to stop emotional overload, otherwise you're gambling with the user's sanity."

The workshop went quiet for a beat. Otto stopped adjusting his controls and slowly turned toward me, his expression softening into surprise. He looked at Peni, who gave him an I-told-you-so grin, then back at me. "You're... correct. Dead on. Not many people even understand what this is at a glance, let alone its risks. You really are as brilliant as Peni made you out to be."

I waved it off nervously, though inside I was buzzing. "It doesn't take a genius to work it out. Just imagine the possibilities. A medical breakthrough for people with paralysis, degenerative diseases, and missing limbs. You could wipe that off the map entirely. Or think about the construction industry, one person with these could lift steel beams on their own. Even crime-fighting... these arms could rival quirks themselves."

Otto laughed softly, folding his arms behind his back as if weighing my words. "And that's where your mind goes first? Fighting bad guys? Well... I suppose there's something admirable in that, too."

"Y/N's always been that way," Peni cut in with a teasing smile. "Obsessed with capes, comics, and heroics. You wouldn't believe how many times he roped me into 'heroes vs. villains' when we were little."

Otto adjusted his goggles, studying me with interest. "Tell me, Y/N. Do you have a quirk?"

I froze. My eyes flicked briefly toward Peni, then back to the floor. With a short, resigned breath, I shook my head. "No. I don't."

Otto's brows raised. "Both of you? Are you telling me neither cousin was blessed? That's... rare. Very rare." His voice dipped as if filing the detail away. Then he clasped his hands and motioned to a large whiteboard covered in diagrams, flipping it to a fresh side filled with research notes and statistics.

"Twenty per cent," Otto said, tapping the numbers with the end of his marker. "That's how much of the population is quirkless from birth. Twenty per cent are destined to be cast aside. No matter how intelligent, how creative, or how determined they are, they are looked down on. Their lives are chosen for them before they even open their eyes. At best, they become support technicians, office workers, stagehands for the real stars." He paused, looking at me directly. His eyes behind those round goggles seemed to burn with conviction. "Tell me, why should it be that way?"