~Broken Family~

Duty

A/N This chapter is dedicated to @FortheloveofGodnbook. You sped through my book so fast you have inspired me to stop dragging my feet and finish this out :) Thanks for your cool comments and kind words!!

The battle was a blur. Gwen's mind went into a state of panic as all her fighting moves left her brain, forgotten to five years of dust and cobwebs. 

It was no secret the Ghost-Spider had dropped off the earth almost as much as Spider-Man had, but Gwen hadn't thought her expertise would suffer from her long-term break. Her kicks were late, her punches were weak, and she received a few blows and scratches. It was only because of her spidey-sense that she wasn't decapitated yet.

Maybe another thing, she thought as she one-handedly webbed herself away from the latest alien-hoarde in retreat, is this Gauntlet.

She cradled the wretched thing close to her chest, imagining she could feel the power pulsing from it. The most powerful objects in the universe all combined to make one ultra-weapon. If this fell into the wrong hands, all would be doomed.

"Pass it here!" a voice yelled as the aliens closed in, grabbing at her ankles. With a squeal, she threw it towards who turned out to be Captain Marvel. She remembered Tony telling her about her and saw the warrior queen lady on a video call once. She'd been eating cheetoes in her fuzzy socks.

Immediately, a weight was lifted from her shoulders. She breathed a sigh of relief and crashed to the ground panting, flexing her tired wrists. She realized she was standing in a small clearing, surrounded on all sides by fighting heroes and snarling aliens but not having any after her own skin for the first time in four minutes.

And then, a buzz. Just below the surface of her being.

Whipping around, she glanced up to see Spider-Man swinging towards her. With a grunt, he skidded to a stop on the ground and his mask receded back, much like her own nanotech she had now.

Her breath hitched. It was like looking down a time capsule to the last time she'd seen him five years ago: cheeks and eyes still youthful, jaw promising a swiftly coming manhood, hair the same soft brown. 

A strangled cry escaped her throat as he rambled on about something. None of it reached her ears. Tears jumping from her eyes, she pulled him into a bone-crushing hug.

"Peter," she gasped, relief and gladness and sorrow and rage and pure joy squeezing her heart. "It's...it's really you..."

"Yeah!" he pulled back before Gwen was ready, expression ignorantly cheerful. "Why wouldn't it be me? Now, you, on the other hand, I'm not... I mean... Wow, you're old."

She crossed her arms across her chest, the five-year gap fading quickly as she scowled. "Gee, thanks," she said sarcastically.

"I didn't mean it in a bad way!" he protested. "I mean, with age comes sophistication!"

"Sure, Pete."

Squinting at his hands, she realized something was different about them. Was the armor on his suit a different color there?

And suddenly, with a pang, she remembered.

Peter getting stabbed, infused with the power stone. Peter groaning in pain each time his second powers were activated. Peter's head twitching as his eyes turned dark and purple. Peter calling her in the middle of the night or in the middle of school, sick on the bathroom floor after another outburst.

The power had been too much for him.

"Peter, your hands," she reminded him. "Try to calm---"

"I'm not going to be calm," he shot back, a twinge of surprising aggitation lacing his voice. "My powers are helping us win! Just look how many I can take out."

Hardly looking over his shoulder, Peter clapped his hands together, forming an energy ball, and shot it at a hoard of aliens. They immediately dropped to the ground, but Peter's knees shook and the veins in his face darkened, becoming visible through his pallid skin. For a fraction of a second, they almost looked like cracks in his skin. Panic sprouted in Gwen's chest.

"Peter, you can't---"

"Heads up!"

The shout reached Gwen just as the Gauntlet reached Peter's hands, which she realized were smoking and still glowing.

"Don't touch it!" she shrieked, webbing it up from him.

Just like keeping Stefan safe, Gwen suddenly felt attached to the Gauntlet. It was now her duty to protect it, her duty to keep it safe from the enemy. And, she didn't want to admit, keep it safe from Peter. She didn't know why---Maybe both of not wanting him to snap his fingers to save everyone (which would totally be something he would do) and not wanting his hands to burn the stones. And besides, the power stone was here, the thing that had given him his powers. He had a connection to it; maybe something bad would happen if he touched that particular stone.

After half-heartedly shouting her concerns at a confused Peter, she webbed herself away from the nonhuman heads that were hungrily turned in her direction, to the stones.

But no matter how much the sense of duty crushed her shoulders and weighed heavily in her one hand holding the weapon, she found she had to pass it on after only a moment or two. The aliens were simply after the Gauntlet like dogs after a bone.

And while she was swinging, she finally saw how outnumbered they were. How totally, utterly, completely outmatched.

Oh, Odin help us. How are we all going to get out of this?

She couldn't help but wonder if at least one person close to her wouldn't make it out alive.