just breathe ⇒ peter parker

C H A P T E R T W O

"Who did Lottie punch?" Lia asked. I looked out the window and saw that we were nearing my neighborhood.

"This asshole at her school." I responded, shoving my phone in my backpack. Enough of that for one day. "He said something about Antonia and Danielle." she nodded understandingly.

"Are those your parents?" Peter piped up. His voice was a bit higher pitched than I remembered.

"They adopted me a few years ago," I relaxed back in my seat. "Uh, left here."

Lia put the turn signal on and drove down a smaller street. "It's the third street on the right, correct?" I 'mhm'ed and put my backpack on my lap, playing with the straps. Somehow she remembered which one was my house even though she had only been there to pick me up a few times. It was a two story, but it wasn't ginormous like some of the other house nearby.

"Thanks, Lee!" I chirped, jumping out of the car into the cold again.

"Say hi to Lottie for me!" with that she drove off. I walked up to the front door and opened it, yelling for Lottie as soon as I stepped inside.

Lottie was a cute little thing. She had curly black hair that was normally pulled back in braids, and big brown eyes. She was pretty small for her age, and her skin was a russet, reddish-brown. No one would assume we were related in any way- which, we weren't. I had straight, light brown hair with light blue eyes. My skin was pale which burned and freckled very easily. I was average sized, around 5'7, but a bit more toned than some of my peers due to my nightly activities. My entire family looked nothing like each other; Danielle was white too, but she looked like she was a native Californian (which she was), blonde hair, green eyes, tan skin. Antonia was latina and had gorgeous tanned skin, deep brown hair and golden-brown eyes.

We used to joke about it before Danielle's accident. I haven't heard Danielle joke at all since then.

"You swear you're not mad at me?" Lottie asked, clasping her hands in front of her.

"I'm not mad, but Antonia will be." I ruffled her hair, to which she responded by slapping my hands away. "Woah, okay, Lottie."

After that interaction she ran upstairs to her room, and I went into the kitchen to do my homework. I only did my work in my room when the adults were home, otherwise I liked to do it where the food was.

I made dinner at 5:30, and Antonia and Danielle came back at 6:00. They were yelling at each other when they walked in, which abruptly stopped when they caught sight of Lottie and me at the dinner table. Antonia smiled fakely at the two of us, walking over and kissing Lottie on the forehead. "How's it going, mijas?" I gave Lottie a look.

She started her story, and I slipped away so I didn't get dragged into the conversation. I could still hear Antonia yelling from my room, but somehow Danielle's silence was louder.

A few minutes later it quieted down, and a few hours later the entire house was silent. I slipped out of my house with my suit on at 11:00, hoping to be back by 2:00.

I had made my suit from scratch, so it was nowhere near as high tech as Spider-Man's randomly became a few months ago. It was made from spandex, as that was the easiest material to move around it, and it was almost completely navy blue. To cover my hands I had sewn on black gloves that went about to my elbows, and I also had black boots that went halfway up my calves. There was a black utility belt around my waist that held duct tape, my phone, a police scanner, and a small knife. My mask covered everything from my nose up, but left my hair free. I normally tied it up in a ponytail, but sometimes I left it down so I would feel like Supergirl.

I flew myself to the actual city, doing a few loop-d-loops as I went. It was a pretty quick journey, and I found myself in Manhattan fairly soon. I covered Manhattan normally, but since I could fly I helped with some of the bigger issues in the other boroughs if necessary. Spider-Man had Queens covered so I barely ventured over there. He didn't like me much, mostly because of my unconventional ways. I never killed unless necessary, but he never killed period. I had only met him one other time and I could tell immediately that he didn't appreciate that part of my vigilanting. Sometimes my powers only gave me the ability to save one life, and I always chose the innocent one. He probably never had to decide whether to send a bullet into the chest of the shooter or to let it fly into the victim, which was sometimes my only two choices.

Oh well.

The police scanner came to life and reported a hostage situation a mile east from me, and I flew over to go help.

The information I had was limited; two armed men were in a small mexican restaurant, and they were holding a waitress, the manager, and the head chef in the kitchen. They weren't listening to the police or hostage negotiation at all, so I decided to take it into my own hands.

There was a huge vent on the roof that I crawled down, following the sounds of raised voices and crying. I eventually made it to another grate I could easily fit through which looked out into the kitchen. Two men dressed in all black were yelling at each other, both of them brandishing huge guns.

Three people were tied up to a metal table, two women and one man. One woman was actually a teenager and looked like she was crying, but the other two were trying to compose themselves. All of them had duct tape over their mouths.

"I thought you said that they had fucking money!" one of the gunmen was yelling. He was bigger than the other, and guessing by how much the other one was cowering I thought that he was the boss. "Do you know how many cops are out there? And for what, a hundred bucks? You idiot!" He looked like he was going to either shoot the other one or hit him with the gun, so I decided to make my entrance.

I used my powers to send the grate crashing to the ground, making everyone in the room jump. I dropped, but caught myself a foot above the floor so that I was floating. "Put the weapons down so I don't have to hurt you." I stated, crossing my arms. It was silent for a moment.

Then all hell broke loose. Or it would have, if I wasn't a gifted individual. Both men raised their guns at me, but I easily controlled the air around them and threw the weapons across the room, then crushed them. The smaller main squeaked, and then threw his hands up. "Please don't hurt me!" I rolled my eyes. The other one ran and swiped at me, but I ducked under his fist and did a spin kick into his gut, knocking the wind out of him.

"Bih-itch," he wheezed, trying to punch me again. I grabbed his outstretched arm and used it to flip him over my shoulder, pinning him to the floor. The smaller one took a tentative step towards me, but I shoved my hand out which caused him to be thrown into the wall and knocked out. The boss was still struggling under my boot. I leaned down and pressed down on his pressure point in his neck, knocking him out.

I used my powers to gather the both of them into the center of the room, then duct taped them together. I whirled around to face the victims, who were looking at me in fear.

I walked towards them, but the younger girl cringing made me freeze. I knelt down so I wasn't towering over them, hoping that they would calm down if I seemed less intimidating. "I'm going to untie you now, is that okay?" All three of them nodded, albeit hesitantly. I pulled the knife out of my belt and cut away their bonds, helping the youngest one get to her feet because of how much she was shaking. "Once I leave, you're going to slowly walk out with your hands up. Tell the police that the robbers or whatever they were are in the kitchen, and then they'll tell you what to do from there. Okay?"

"T-thank you." The older woman said. I nodded and smiled, then flew up into the vent, and then out on the roof. I watched as the hostages walked outside, causing a large ruckus amongst the first responders. A team of people holding plastic shields and weapons ran into the restaurant, which I took as my cue to leave. I flew up and landed on a tall building nearby the restaurant and took out my police scanner.

"This is dispatch, there's a 215 called in from 51st street. Suspect is presumed armed and dangerous."

I flew off, heading towards the carjacking. Maybe stopping crime wasn't the best stress relief, but it worked for me.