Spiderman Legacy

Chapter 2

May walked into the kitchen and found Peter at the table hunched over a mountain of papers, his pencil worn down to a nub and his eyes bloodshot from lack of sleep. "Hey, sweetie," she said, touching his back. "It's late. You should get to bed." Pete smiled a bit at his mother's concern. "I know I should," he replied, "I just have to finish this." He scribbled away furiously at the biological chemistry paper, working out the trans-species genetics formula as fast as he could.
    "I thought you said you didn't have any homework," the worried mother said, looking intently at the filled paper. "This isn't homework," Pete said as he turned to look at his mother's face, "this is a project that could change the world." He smiled and turned back to the formula. May backed off and raised a skeptical eyebrow where her son couldn't see. "It could?" She asked, trying to hide her critical tone. Pete sighed. His mother, too. Nobody would grant the idea credibility in their minds, and especially not the funding and resources for an experiment to Pete and his fellow interns. "It could, if we weren't a bunch of nerdy teens." He scribbled down a few final figures and let out a rasping chuckle, spreading his palms. "I... We did it," he whispered just audibly. His mother sighed. "I'm sorry if it seems like I don't believe in you. I do! This is just a little... Science-fiction-y, don't you think?" Pete turned in his chair. "You do realise that there's a world full of superheroes out there, right? The Fantastic Four, imbued with radioactive abilities by a solar storm; the Avengers, a group of misfit mutants, mistakes and geniuses, and the X-men, who are literally mutated human beings. But, most importantly, and right here in Manhattan, we have and have had Spiderman and Spiderwoman. Nobody knows quite how their powers originated, but friends and I at Stark Industries think they're connected to a little experiment Norman Osborn had conducted to try and cure himself of insanity." Peter pulled a paper from the stack. "Project Arachnae. They took genes from several spider species and other species, and combined them into one little invincible arachnid. Something few people know, though, is that Norman had the spider injected with a neutral virus that stole the spider's DNA. They formatted it to a human's genome, mom. Oscorp created a virus that could turn a man into a supersoldier." May raised an eyebrow. She did her absolute best to impose criticism upon her face. Inside, though, she panicked. Her whole life she had tried to tie up loose ends, lock away bits and pieces, and keep her children from ever finding out the truth of their ancestry. But, here was her genius son telling her a story she'd locked up tight years ago -- the truth about how Spiderman came to be.
     "Anyway," Pete said, turning back to his paper, "the spider disappeared before they got the chance to sample it's venom, and Spiderman appeared months later." May smiled. "Maybe you're really onto something." She turned out of the kitchen entrance. "Don't stay up too late." "I won't," Peter called after her.
Peter looked back down at the schematics paper on the Spiderman theory. He pulled it aside to look at the cross-species genetics formula. For some reason... Some unidentifiable reason, he felt he could relate with Spiderman. Maybe it was because his father was John Rogers, Steve Rogers' son who had taken up his father's mantle. Or maybe it was something else. Peter was convinced there was something more. Something he had to be missing, or something he just didn't know yet... He pushed air between his lips and stacked the papers, walking out of the kitchen and turning out the light.
((Again, I know this was short, but Ch.3 will be here soon. Tbh that'll probably be short, too, but I hope you're enjoying the story!))