Spider-Man: New Home (18+)

Chapter 2: Transient

The cold winter air blew an icy chill over New York City. Most residents in the city were already indoors, nice and warm and cozy with their families for Christmas night. Fire places blazing. Presents already unwrapped. The streets covered in snow, yet still bustling with crowds for the holidays.

However, the holidays weren't as kind to other residents of the city. Standing on the icy sidewalk stood a massive line of people, bundled as best as they could with dirty, torn clothes, all of their belongings carried with them. The line stretched all the way down the sidewalk for a few blocks and started at a small government office building meant to care for the homeless.

Amongst these transient souls, stood Peter Parker, patiently waiting in line with everybody else. He dressed in a pair of worn leather boots, dirty jeans, and a torn dirty blue winter jacket all of which he found in the trash like everybody else. It may have smelled awful, but it was better than freezing to death in nothing but his integrated Spider-Man suit.

His eyes wearily and sleepily watched up the street toward the front of the line which always took enough time for him to wonder if it was every going to move. His stomach ached in a way he had never felt before, having gone nearly three days without consuming anything more than water. He had considered digging through the trash cans by that morning, but the thought alone disgusted him beyond belief just thinking about it.

He could feel his body getting weaker than it had felt in a long time, however still remaining stronger than most people would be merely due to his powers. Sleep wasn't easy to get for him either. Being the middle of winter, finding a comfortable place to sleep was quite a hard task for him. On the first night after the battle at the statue of liberty, he didn't sleep at all, instead curled up and shivering underneath a bridge, with the only source of warmth being his breath being trapped in his mask. The second night was when he had finally found some warm clothes after seeing some other homeless folks doing something similar.

He never knew when he would be able to get warm enough to sleep, and the only time he did was the short time he could sleep on the subway before being chased off. He never thought these would ever be things he would have to think of.

Where he would sleep that night.
Whether or not he would die of hypothermia.
Whether or not he would be able to eat ever again.

Peter was truly lost.

So now he did the only thing he could think of, which was go to the shelter. According to others he had met who were also living on the streets, this place would be able to feed him and get him a bed for the night, which was nice. However, Peter's main interest in this place was reacquiring his identity.

Not only was his ID no longer valid, but he nearly got arrested because the officer thought it was a fake. He had told Peter than it was the worst fake he had ever seen. So the only thing he could think to do was go to this place and afterwards he would be able to get started on making money and getting off the streets.

He snapped himself out of his sleepy haze as the line moved up a single pace, causing him to groan aloud before he took a step forward. He would likely be in the line all night and most of the next day as well.

Suddenly his attention was grabbed once more as an armored truck came screeching around the corner with six police cars in high pursuit, nearly missing the crowd as they passed by. Peter watched as they sped away with a pit in his stomach. He glanced back to the office building and considered staying in line. However, he instinctively found himself breaking away from the line, kicking himself internally all the while.

"Just could wait a day or two." He grumbled to himself as he walked in the opposite direction before slipping into a nearby alley. "I'm just a guy trying to get his life back in order." He grumbled to himself as he pulled off the backpack he had been using and digging past the dirty blanket he had been using to get to his mask. He didn't bother taking off the rest of his clothes. "I didn't ask for all this cold... Or hunger."