The Girl and the Superhero{Peter Parker}

Part Nine(Kenzie's POV)

          I thanked Peter's aunt for the ride and got out of the car. Unsurprisingly, I didn't see either of my parents cars parked in our driveway.

          My mind was too jumbled to put together any clear thoughts. There was a mix of emotions, and I started crying for no reason and every reason.

          May had been so kind to me, more of a mother figure already than my mom had ever been in my entire life. I felt overwhelmingly happy that May had shown me the love that she had, but I also felt a loss in the bottom of my heart when I caught a taste of what a mother should be like. It was a painful thing when I realized what I had missed out on. When I realized I may have had a mother physically, but I in no way had one on the internal side of things.

          Seeing Peter in his condition had hurt me the most. Every move he had made looked like it took huge amounts of effort as well as courage. Pain lined every crease of his face at even the slightest of movements. The thing that hurt me the most was that I could see that he was in pain far beyond any external injuries. The hurt I saw in his eyes when he looked at Ned had shaken me to the core. However, the more powerful thing I witnessed was that that hurt came from love. The pain I saw in Peter's eyes was caused because he thought there was a possibility that he could lose his best friend. I was overwhelmed with gratitude in knowing that I had that kind of relationship with Lucy.

          Lucy, I thought. I told her I would call her when I got home.

          I pulled out my phone from my back pocket and dialed in Lucy's number, my fingers quickly pressing the numbers without thought or hesitation. I pressed call, and the phone started ringing as I walked into my house.

          Lucy's voice came flooding through my phone almost immediately. "Thanks for calling, I've only been sitting by my phone for four hours in heightened anxiety, but you know, no biggie. How did the rescue mission go? Were you the hero? What happened to Peter? Is he okay? More importantly, are you okay?"

          "I'm alright, I guess. Pretty shaken up but otherwise okay. Peter will be fine, I think. He looked pretty bad. I'm not going to lie." I started, unsure how to explain everything that was going through my head. My brain felt like an airport with a thousand planes trying to land on the same runway.

          There was a pause before Lucy spoke again, as if she were debating on what to say. "You want to talk about it?" she invited, her voice soft and gentle.

          I laughed, because at that moment, it was easier than crying. "I don't even know how to start. I can barely get my thoughts settled down enough to put together one concrete thought."

          "Maybe talking about something else will help calm your troubled mind... ooh, let's do a movie night at my house!" Lucy sang.

          "You do realize it's almost one in the morning, right?" I smirked.

          "So what? It's not like you wouldn't be up for another hour or two anyways." she accused.

          Lucy had a point. Although I was exhausted, there was no way I was going to be able to sleep with all of the cacophony inside my head. "Touché. I'll be over to your place in a few minutes," I smiled, pressing the end call button on my cell phone.

          I ran up to my room and quickly began putting together an overnight bag. Once I had all my stuff, I turned off the lights and skipped down the stairs two at a time. I couldn't wait to have a distraction from myself.

          I walked through the front door, locking it behind me. I turned around to make sure that all of the lights were turned off, and then started strolling towards Lucy's house.

          "...yeah, Tony Stark and the rest of those so-called heroes will never know what hit them."

          I was a block away from Lucy's house when I heard the low, gruff voice far off to my left, followed by a small mischievous laugh. I stopped dead in my tracks. The voice that had spoken the words had a faint accent, barely profound enough to be noticeable. I couldn't tell for sure where the accent was from by the small sentence I had heard.

          I looked over to the left of me, trying to distinguish the source of the sound in the darkness of the night. I could see the silhouette of what I presumed was a gas station, lit only by the distant headlights of a car.

          I got off of the sidewalk, walking quietly and getting as close as I could to the gas station without making a sound, being sure to stay in the shadows so I would go completely unnoticed. I hid behind a large trash can that was fairly close to the parking lot, squatting so I could get up and run at a moment's notice if needed.

          I strained my ears, trying my best to listen for any more signs of conversation. I pulled my phone out of my pocket slowly and carefully, and started recording. I was squeezing the phone so tightly that I started to lose feeling in my fingers.

          "The boss would kill for these kind of weapons," a higher male voice stated in admiration.

          "How do you think we got them, you idiot? It's not like the United Nations would give them to us for free. Some sacrifices had to be made." the gruff voice responded simply. My heart skipped a beat. The men that were standing feet away from me had stolen from the United Nations. People had died in vain in an effort to keep these weapons away from these guys. Fear started to spread rapidly through my system, but I stayed put.

          The men kept talking, mostly bickering with each other and making jokes that I didn't understand. The guy with the low and rough voice spoke as if he was in charge, yet the other man had said something about their 'boss'. As much as I strained to identify the accent, it was simply unidentifiable. I didn't think I could imitate it if I tried.

          "You know what will happen if the word gets out about this," the higher voice said. "Boss said that either we find the people who let the word out and get rid of them, or we are dead."

          "I know that, you idiot. We ain't going to be the ones dead if the word gets out," the gruff voice said. "I will make sure of that."

          I heard laughing as a car engine started, and I heard two car doors open and slam shut. The engine faded as the vehicle drove away.

          I sat there, rooted against the trash can for a good ten minutes after I was positive that the men were gone, paralyzed with fear. I slowly started to inch away from the trash can, and then broke into a sprint and didn't slow until I reached Lucy's house.

          I started rapping on the door with my knuckles, hoping Lucy would open the door quickly in case somehow the men were right on my heels.

          She opened the door with a smile. "I was just starting to get worried about you. You look like you've seen a ghost... what happened? Hey- where are we going?" Lucy cried out. I grabbed her arm and pulled her along beside me, and then I sat her on the couch. She looked up at me in shock.

          "We need to talk," I insisted.

A/N: 7-11-18
Word count: 1310

Andddd the plot thickens!

THIS CHAPTER IS SO IMPORTANT. And later, you'll realize that there's a lot of hidden foreshadowing here, aside from the obvious stuff. I wish I could just plop the vision of this chapter I have into your heads because it's so clear in my mind! I hope I could at least partly convey it to you all. It's a bunch of sketchy dudes saying sketchy stuff and a crazy/brilliant chick compressing herself into a trash can to be a good person, basically. That makes total sense, right?

~n.s.