Your Friendly Riverdale Spiderman | RIVERDALE/SPIDERMAN CROSSOVER ¦

8.

"You want to do what?" Joaquin asked in disbelief, clearly not sure if Jughead was kidding or not as he explained the plan.
"You're getting a make over," Betty said. "Who wouldn't want a good old Betty Cooper makeover?"
"Uh, me?" Joaquin suggested, shaking his head.
"Come on, Joaquin," Archie, who had been brought in on the plan too, said. "Think of it as a way to make up for stabbing me."
"Wait, why did he stab you?" Peter asked. What was with this town? 
"Doesn't matter," Betty said, grabbing Joaquin firmly by the arm. "You're doing it. Please."
Joaquin was silent, looking between Betty and Jughead, his leader, before finally sighing in defeat. "Fine," he said. "What do I have to do?"

A few hours later, Peter paced outside the bathroom back in Betty's house. She had been in there with Joaquin for what seemed like a very long time, and he was beginning to wonder if everything was alright. Nothing had been said for quite some time.
Peter was about to knock on the door and ask how it was going when it opened from the other side and a rather bedraggled yet triumphant Betty emerged.
"That guy," she said, shaking her head. "I cannot believe the struggle he put up. But I think we've got his hair done."
"What did you do?"
"Take a look," Betty said, grinning as she stepped aside. 
Peter walked into the bathroom to see a rather grumpy Joaquin inspecting himself in the mirror. His hair, previously black and nearly to his shoulders, had been dyed a light brown similar to Peters, as well as being trimmed to match Peter's hairstyle.
"We'll style it up properly tomorrow," Betty said, running her hands through her handiwork. "Plus the make up, it should be very like you. He's even around your size, Peter, which Charles wouldn't have been."
"You guys owe me one," Joaquin muttered. "Not once in my life did I ever, ever, want a hair cut like this."
"Oh relax, it'll grow out," Betty said, smiling sheepishly. "And I'll dye it back after you've supposedly left town."
"And didn't you owe them one since you stabbed Archie or something?" Peter asked, still keen to hear the full story on that. He remained disappointed, however, as the only response was a dirty look thrown his way by Joaquin.
"I'm doing this to clear things up for you," Joaquin snapped. "And I don't owe you anything."
"He's going to be a huge help to the serpents in the future though," Betty pointed out. "He'll be our little spy."
"'Little' spy?" Peter repeated. Betty just laughed.
"Okay," she said. "We're going to need to get up early tomorrow morning to finish everything off before we go to school. Joaquin, come with me to go over what is going to go down tomorrow and practice a bit. Peter, you can head to bed if you want."
Peter nodded and as the other two went to Betty's room, he found his way to Jughead's.
But Peter had no intention of sleeping. They may have another plan in place, but he could still help as Spiderman when nobody was looking his way.

The next morning, Peter awoke before sunrise to yelling coming from Betty's room. Expecting more intruders, he rushed down the hall and threw open the door, only to find Betty standing over Joaquin, who lay on the floor with his eyes screwed shut as she applied a heavy layer of make up to his face.
"What is going on, I thought someone was getting stabbed in here," Peter said. Betty laughed, a knee on Joaquin's shoulder as he squirmed beneath her.
"Peter can you help me hold him down? He's not being very cooperative."
"I'm plenty cooperative!" Joaquin snapped as he turned his head to the side to avoid the brush Betty was using on his face. 
"You don't even look like you anymore," Peter said in awe. 
"I've done my best to make his whole skin tone a lot lighter," Betty said. "But it meant using a lot of make up, and I have to try and make it look natural."
"You might want to add some to his neck to. It's like, a completely different color" Peter pointed out.
"No, my neck is fine, don't do my neck," Joaquin said, then shrieked as Betty started to attack his neck with the brush. "No! That tickles! Stop!"
Can you hold his head?" Betty asked, planting herself on Joaquin's chest as he tried to wriggle away.






Peter found Casey waiting for him at their lockers when he arrived at school later that morning. 
"What's up?" Casey said, grinning.
"Not much." Peter attempted a smile back, but he couldn't get it out of his head that Casey was a spider and he had seen first hand, with Sweetpea and then last night when he went out, what the spiders were capable of.
"So, I was thinking," Casey said, grabbing his a couple of books and waiting for Peter to do the same so that they could head to class. "If you're keen to start messing with that Betty chick, we might as well start today."
"Yeah, we can do that," Peter said, nodding. "What do you reckon I should do?"
"Well, just gain her trust to start with," Casey said. "Just act like you want to be friends."
Peter nodded slowly. He could do that. That was essentially part of the plan today anyway.
"That shouldn't be too difficult," Peter said to Casey, though his mind was elsewhere. The first part of the plan was supposed to take place any minute, and he was a key part of it.
As Casey walked and talked slightly ahead of Peter, Peter took out his phone and, as subtly as he could, sent a text to Betty before dropping to one knee. "Wait up," he called to Casey, "I just gotta tie my shoe."
Casey turned back to face Peter as he took his time tying his shoe, hoping Betty and Jughead would have time to get to where they were, hoping he had given a correct location, hoping he hadn't screwed this whole thing up.
"Dude, there she is with her boyfriend, I told you they hadn't broken up!" Casey hissed, and Peter sighed with relief, standing up.
"I can't believe you!" Betty shouted, shoving Jughead away from her. Beside Peter, Casey's eyes widened.
"This has got to be an act," he whispered, though he didn't sound entirely sure. 
"Me?" Jughead yelled back. "You're the one hooking up with every guy you see!"
"You never even really loved me, did you?" Betty shouted, once again impressing Peter with her acting skills as she started to cry. "You were pretending the whole time."
"You're right," Jughead snapped. "How could I love such a control freak? You literally drive me insane!"
"So why would you let me believe you all this time?" Betty wailed. 
"You can't put all this on me!" Jughead exclaimed. "You've been cheating on me!"
"So have you!"
"At least I kept it hidden!" Jughead said. "Not having hook ups over to the house where we both live!"
"That was one time."
Casey leaned closer to Peter so that he could whisper in his ear. "She'll be vulnerable after this."
"When this is over," Peter said softly back. "Should I go after her?"
"For sure," Casey said, nodding vigorously. "Perfect opportunity."
"You know what?" Betty said loudly. "This is over, Jughead. This is too much right now." Turning, Betty stormed away from her boyfriend, pushing though the crowds of people that had stopped to watch their argument.
"Okay, I'm going in," Peter whispered, glancing at Casey, who nodded with a mischievous grin on his face. Peter left him, moving quickly through the people that were starting to move again, everyone talking in hushed tones about the fight they had just witnessed. He passed Jughead who didn't even give him a second glance, not wanting to give anything away, and pushed through the crowd after Betty.
"Betty?" He called softly, entering a room she'd disappeared into that she'd told him earlier was the Blue and Gold room fr the school newspaper.
"What do you want?" Betty sobbed, clearly still acting. Peter let the door close behind him, glancing back at the glass window in it partially covered by a poster. What if someone looked in? He didn't doubt Casey would do something like that.
"I just wanted to see if you were okay," he said softly, walking towards her. Betty shook her head, reaching for the tissues on the desk. Peter glanced back at the door and lowered his voice. "What now?"
Betty threw herself at him. Wrapping her arms around Peters neck and pressing her tear streaked face into his chest. "Now," she whispered between sobs that Peter was starting to question the fakeness of. "You comfort me."

Peter stayed with Betty in the Blue and Gold room throughout all of first period, speaking in hushed tones and keeping close together, for the benefit of anyone who might look inside the room. They needed this to be believable.
"So," Peter said as they got to their feet at the sound of the second period bell. "See you soon?"
"Definitely," Betty said with a sad smile. Peter turned to leave the room and she grabbed his arm, pulling him back. "Peter..."
"What is it?" Peter asked gently, taking in the troubled look on her face."
"I didn't really think about this before, but this whole thing is making me look like a total slut isn't it?"
"No. No!" Peter said. "No, of course not."
"It definitely is." Betty sighed, shaking her head. "Anyway, see you later, Peter."
Peter made his way to his next class, physics, where he took the same seat beside Casey as he had done yesterday.
"Peter!" Casey said enthusiastically. "You missed English! I take it the little plan went well then?"
Peter laughed, trying to act casual about it. "Better than you would've thought."
"That's what I'm talking about!" Casey laughed, slapping Peter on the back before lowering his voice. "You're in the game. Now, we just gotta figure out what we're gonna do."
"Sounds good," Peter said, grabbing Casey's untouched text book and opening it to the page the teacher had instructed them to. 
"I say we start small, yeah?" Casey said. Peter nodded, his eyes scanning the pages. He'd done all this already at his school in Queens. "Start small so that we can build up to the bigger stuff and she won't ever see it coming."

Peter was on his way to lunch with Casey when they passed Betty in the hall. She smiled at him as they passed, and when they got out of earshot Casey pulled him to a stop, grinning with what seemed like a little too much enthusiasm. 
"Dude, this is perfect!" Casey said excitedly as Peter turned to glance back at Betty. "She's already smiling at you. First step to her becoming your- Oh good God who is that?"
"Who?" Peter asked, looking back the way they were going. "Uh... I've never seen him before."
"He better be a new student here," Casey said softly as Joaquin, not looking one bit like Joaquin anymore, approached, a denim jacket flung over his shoulder and a pair of sunglasses hooked into the front of a white t-shirt. His now brown hair looked similar to Peter's, only a little more tousled, and Peter couldn't tell for one moment that he was wearing make up to lighten his skin tone. Once again, he found himself marveling at Betty's abilities, though he couldn't help but think she'd really just created a new and improved version of Peter.
"Betty Cooper!" Joaquin said loudly, causing everyone in the corridor that hadn't already stopped to watch him go by do so. 
"Oh, is he serious?" Casey said, exasperated. "Does everyone here have a thing for Betty Cooper? This is so unfair!"
"Casey!" One of Casey's friends, another spider, approached quickly, pulling him away from Peter and saying something into his ear too low for Peter to hear. Whatever it was caused Casey to turn back to Joaquin, eyes widening, mouth hardening.
"What are you doing here?" Betty said, coming back towards them, passing by Peter without a second glance and approaching Joaquin.
"I'm heading home," Joaquin said, taking hold of Betty's hands as she reached him. Everybody in corridor was silent aside from a few murmurs and whispers. "I wanted to see you again and say goodbye 'cause I don't know when I'll be back in town."
 "You're leaving?" Betty said, moving closer to Joaquin and running her hands across his chest. Peter scanned the crowd for Jughead and found him half hidden in the crowd looking considerably unhappy with what was going on.
"I have to." Joaquin smiled, his acting almost as good as Betty's. "Thank you for showing me such a wonderful time."
"Well," Betty said. "Thank you for saving me the other night."
Out of the corner of his eye, Peter saw Casey's face. It had worked. He'd fallen for it. And by the look of it, so had the other Spiders.
Joaquin leaned in, one hand on the side of Betty's face as he pressed a lingering kiss to her cheek before moving his lips to her ear and saying something far too softly for anyone else to hear. 
Peter, along with everyone else, watched as Joaquin turned and walked back out of school, leaving a helpless looking Betty standing alone in the middle of the corridor. Peter had just taken a step towards her when Casey grabbed his arm, pulling him back around.
"Not right now," he hissed at Peter. "We need you."
"What?" Peter glanced back at Betty and saw that the red head that had separated them yesterday was pulling her away from the crowd. He sighed, turning back to Casey. "Why?"
"Just come on," Casey said, rolling his eyes. "We've got to discuss something."