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

Issue 112 - Hello Agent Venom

The square was too full.

That was the first thing I noticed.

People moved through it in every direction, shopping bags in hand, coffee cups steaming in the rain-heavy air, phones out, heads down. A family gathered around a street performer. Office workers rushed between trains. Teenagers filmed the giant screens overhead, probably hoping for a viral clip before the storm hit.

Some people knew something was wrong.

You could see it in the ones who kept looking over their shoulders.

The ones who had stopped moving.

The ones filming me.

I walked through the middle of all of them with my hood down and the black suit hidden beneath my clothes, pressing closer against my skin with every step.

My neck cracked as I rolled it side to side.

The urge was getting worse.

Hot.

Restless.

Like something inside me had smelled blood and was tired of pretending it was hungry for anything else.

I did not care what came next.

Then Hawkeye stepped into my path.

His hand rested against the bow strapped over his shoulder. He was calm, which somehow made it worse. No dramatic stance. No drawn arrow. No raised voice.

Just Clint Barton standing there like he had been waiting for me.

"Parker," he said. "You still in there?"

I stopped.

Rain gathered on the edge of my mask.

"What are you doing here?"

"I got a call from Frank."

That made me laugh once.

"Frank called you?"

"Rare occasion," Hawkeye said. "Figured it had to be serious."

His eyes moved over me. The black clothes. The twitch in my hands. The way the suit was starting to climb beneath the fabric.

"He told me what happened," Hawkeye continued. "He told me what you plan on doing."

My jaw tightened.

"Then you know why I'm here."

"I know what you think you're here to do."

The crowd kept flowing around us.

A woman brushed past Hawkeye without looking at him. A man on a phone walked between us, muttering about a delayed meeting. Somewhere close by, a child laughed.

Too normal.

Too many people.

Hawkeye lowered his voice.

"What you're wearing is twisting your view of reality. You're grieving. You're hurt. You're angry. That thing is taking all of it and feeding it back to you until it feels like the only thing left."

I stared at him.

"Come home, Spider-Man."

For a second, I almost heard Mina's voice.

Not the way she had sounded at the end.

The way she sounded when she was annoyed at me.

The way she laughed after I told a joke that was not funny.