Our Beauty

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Peter's Pov:

A year and a fortnight* before the day of my seventeenth year, the one woman I would ever love unconditionally passed away.

She was my silent wisdom, and my exuberant hope.

Her grey hair, which was once teeming with color, spread across her neck as her body laid on the floor.

She was killed, and I knew this, because of the bullet hole that stuck out against the wall above the staircase.

But who would do such a soul shattering thing, is beyond me.

I sat in front of her, my phone in my hand, the police call already made. They would investigate. They would bring justice to my aunt May's old soul.

At least, I thought they would. But I was wrong to believe in them.

They came, took her body without a word to me, cleaned the place, took the bullet, had someone fix the wall, and left. No questions were asked, no answers given, only that it was probably a robber, and that I should pack my things and move.

They never called for information, and I wasn't allowed access to her funeral. I was only allowed to see her grave once every three days, for a few minutes each time.

I steadily became a husk. A shell of the once Amazing Spiderman, as aunt May always used to call me.

By the time a year passed, I had placed all of my time into my studies, and was at the top of my senior class.

In just three days, I would be a graduate from Marshwood highschool/college with a degree and GED, and be thrown into my career choice.

•~•~•~•

I was so cold inside, and when my graduation came and passed, I didn't feel it.

I didn't feel anything when everyone around me was crying tears of elation, and I didn't feel anything unless I was seated in front of aunt May's grave. And then, all of I felt was a sinking pain stabbing my heart.

I no longer felt anything. Not even my ex girlfriends Mary Jane Watson, Gwen Stacy, or Betty Brant, could bring me out of it.

I couldn't stand them touching me, I couldn't stand anyone touching me, looking at me, or talking about me.

I often found myself locked away inside of Aunt May's house, and though I owned it now, it was still hers in every sense of the word.

Sitting on the last step, the step her blood soaked into most before being mercilessly cleaned, I contemplated my life.

After assessing the events of my life over and over, I found that I was as plain as those nameless, faceless people believe.

Besides being able to produce silk like webs, climb up walls, reproduce, and regenerate at fast speeds, I was no different than the others in my graduating class of 2458.

The heat slowly seeped out of the open windows, turning the house into a near frozen wasteland.

Silent tears fell from my cheeks, but I didn't bother trying to wipe them away, I never did. My heart constricted, and I realized that I really had nothing to live for.

My mind pulled up old stories, ones about a beast who killed for money, about how he was once a prince before his mind abandoned him, and his subjects, and family, left him for dead.

I remember the stories telling of his vulnerability, and him giving up on life.

Soon, my mind remembered that he lived not too far from town, and that if I paid him to kill me, he might actually do it.

Well, I'm a genius, death by beast...

Now how do I get to him without raising suspicion...?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Around eleven days later I was ready to begin my birthday, like any other day.

Get up, eat, go to work, come home, think depressing thoughts, stand from my seat on the last step, go to sleep, and deal with the nightmares.

I sighed, getting out of bed, heading to the bathroom.

For a few minutes I stared into the mirror, wiping the dried up tears from my face.

'I'll do it soon...' I thought. 'Just go to Deadpool and pay that monster to kill me... No, it's not a monster, it's like me in a way, only doing what it does best, for fear of something shattering its soul.'

Without any warning, there was a banging sound from my front door, the wood creaking in protest, which caused me to race down the stairs just in time to see it broken down by the police.

"How much so you know about today?" One demanded to know.

"It's the 23 of March... It's my seventeenth birthday, and I have to get to work in two hours."

"Ok, walk with us." Another officer said as he grabbed my arm, throwing a jacket and shoes on me before leading me forcefully out of the door.

"Wait! What?! Where are you taking me?!" I asked incredulously.

"Not to work, sexy that's for sure." He smirked at me, with a glint of something mischievous and maleficent in his eyes.

Just as we came to a clearing, I was met with the sight of all the students from my past classes looking to be in the same state as me, bags full and next to them, each with their name sewn haphazardly across them.

"Alright, listen up!!" The officer said, thrusting me forward in between my older ex boyfriend and now reporter Clark Kent, and the track star Wally 'The Flash' West.

"You little sluts and bastards are getting the chance to save Marshwood. In only a few words, the beast you were always told about, he's real. The monster has made a compromise with us; protection for a century, in exchange for one of your sweet asses." He let the words sink in for a moment before continuing.

"Now, we expect you to try to woo him, so to speak. He's beginning to give up, and having him as a threat to us, is far worse than the monsters under your beds at night. He could destroy us in hours, his powers beyond any we've ever fucking seen. We don't know what he is, but he has more parts to him than a rubix cube. I want to see at least one less of you by the end of next week, and I don't mean dead! Now that you all know, we're going to be taking all of you to Deadpool, to get chosen to protect this country with your every breath. This is a privilege, a duty that all over sixteen must fulfill. You are adults, so do not cry, or plead, and you may come back alive. You will be with him for a week, and each day, many of you will be sent back here. If you aren't dead and in a casket, you will head to the city hall to sign off that you were not chosen, then you can carry on with your lives. If you are chosen, may God bless your soul in heaven." The man said, his last words echoing through my mind, as we were herded into large vans.

"Wait! Chosen for what?!" A guy by the name of Tony Stark asked, cockily.

"I don't know, if your chosen, he will do with you what he pleases, its not for us to question his actions." He said, before his face disappeared behind the van doors.

The large hovering machinery took off towards the end of what we knew, pushing us all into a one way ticket to death, that personally, I welcomed.

~~~~~~~~~¶∆¶~~~~~~~~~

*Fortnight - fourteen nights (Old English Origin).

Ok, end of chapter one!! I'll see you next chapter.

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