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There is something that not a lot of people know about Peter Parker.
He had a secret obsession: Spider documentaries.
Though it might make him a bit of a cliché, Peter adored spider documentaries. It became his go-to background noise when he was home alone. They were all just so interesting!
This was a secret that only Ned knew about since he caught him watching a documentary in the dark while upside down on the ceiling, making a web.
After that, it became a bit of a pastime for both of them. It was a regular in their itinerary for literally every sleepover. It became sort of like a habit: Star Wars and then NatGeo or BBC or what other documentary they could find.
It was during one of these sleepovers at Ned's place that Peter had a thought.
"Hey, Ned?"
"Yeah?"
"I want one."
"…a what?"
Turning to Ned, he said seriously, "Ned, I want an army."
Feeling a bit lost, Ned asked. "An… army?"
"Yeah, like a horde of spiders. An entire army of them. That’s what I want."
Finally catching up to the conversation, Ned made a noise of understanding. "Oh, so you want an army of spiders! Ohhh, man. That'd be so cool!"
Nodding enthusiastically, Peter agreed. "Right?!"
"Dude, they could be like your little spies!"
"OH MY GOD, YES! They'd make patrol so much easier!"
"OH MY GOD, PETER CAN YOU TALK TO SPIDERS?"
"What? No." That was absurd. He couldn’t talk to spiders.
…right?
"I mean… you're part spider so you might, right?"
That… made sense.
"I've actually never tried it. You wanna go look for a spider?"
Ned put his hand on Peter's shoulder. He said with a serious expression, "Dude. I have never wanted to do anything more in my life."
He can't talk to spiders.
Honestly, Peter and Ned felt a bit stupid. They went searching for spiders for around 2 hours and they were pretty sure that the neighbors thought they were a bit high.
Not that he could blame them. When you see two teenagers talking to a corner of a ceiling by the porch and hoping for the best, you'd kind of think they're either crazy or high.
"Man, that’s so sad. I really wanted a spider army."
Sitting on the bed dejectedly, Ned said. "Me too, dude. That would have been SICK."
"It's not like I can just make some of my own."
Hearing that, Ned had a thought. Oh, he had a very, very, genius thought.
Oblivious to Ned's lack of participation in the conversation, Peter continued. "You wanna build some LEGOs instead?"
Noticing his silence, Peter turned to Ned. "Ned? You alright, man?"
"Dude." Standing up and grasping Peter's shoulders, Ned started to shake him slightly. "Dude! You COULD make your own spider army!"
"Ned, what are you talking about. I can't give birth to spiders."
"No. Dude, no?! How is that your first thought? Obviously not! I know how the reproductive system works, just so you know. But, dude. Peter. Here me out." Pointing to him, Ned said. "You work at the most high tech company in the world sans Wakanda. You could, theoretically, build your own robot spider army!"
Finally getting it, Peter jumped up. "Holy shit. I could make Robot Spiders with AIs! Why didn't I think of that?!"
"Pete, Pete! Let's make plans. Dude, I'm like this close to flipping. We could make spider AIs and have them crawl around to scout or something."
Pulling out some paper and pens, Peter looked at Ned excitedly, "Where do we start?"
Come morning, Ned and Peter emerged from Ned's room with bloodshot eyes and eye bags as dark as their shadow but both grinning like lunatics and holding papers filled to the brim with drawings, calculations and rudimentary codes.
Finishing his rounds at the R&D Department of Stark Industries, Peter immediately went to his personal lab. Tony was in Washington for the rest of the week to talk about the UN amendments that Peter recently negotiated last month. As such, he would take over for Tony in the R&D department and then work by himself in the lab in the evenings.
Normally, he wouldn't be enthusiastic about this at all. He liked working with Tony.
However, today was different.
Today, Peter was going to finetune his designs so that he could start making his little spider army.
He planned to make different types of spiders so they'd all have different specialties. Peter and Ned decided to make them as spider-like as possible, just for the hell of it.
Naturally, they'd have to be modelled after real-life spiders. So, they decided to make two types: the Raft spiders which could walk on water and the Jumping spider; both of which would allow him to video and record anything and send it to the AI Peter made specifically for his army, Webster.
Webster was going to be linked to KAREN and would be able to help him in stealth and just spying in general. It was going to be epic.
By the end of the week, Peter was able to make himself a small army of spiders, 50 of each type with one spider being slightly bigger to signify that they were the leader. The leader for the raft spiders was called Jesus, because he could walk on water and the leader for the jumping spiders was called Bugsy, just because.
Collectively, he named them his spy-ders and they all had a rudimentary AI that would allow them to understand Peter's instructions and learn a bit too. They were also equipped with their own little web shooters so they could be as realistic as possible and also maybe a tiny bit of sedative in their fangs for protection.
Not enough to kill but enough to cause someone to faint for a few minutes. He even put a beacon and tracker on them so that he could summon them if he needed a bit of help.
All in all, Peter was happy with his army and just let them roam around SI and his house while he kept the leaders with him at all times.
Humming happily to himself, Peter walked around SI trying to spot his little children. It was quite a fun game, too! He made them to look, act and feel like a spider so that the criminals or people he faced in patrol wouldn’t notice them. As a result, one could easily confuse them with an actual spider.
However, in his excitement, there was one thing he forgot to do. He didn’t tell anyone about the existence of his army aside from Ned.
Naturally, this caused a few… issues.
The first time it happened was during a mission. Some of the New Avengers were on a mission. Apparently, HYDRA was slowly gaining momentum and they found a base near the area. However, they had a bit of a problem. There weren't any cameras in the area.
They only found out about it through sheer luck. A passer-by felt there was something weird going on and left a tip. According to the tip, they noticed a symbol that looked suspiciously like an octopus.
Which is what brought them to their current situation. Hiding behind a few trees in the conveniently placed forest behind the alleged base, Peter, Logan and Ororo were debating whether they would go in there even without any intel.
It was a risky move and because they were so far out, back-up would arrive late should any of them suffer any fatal injuries.
"I could go in first. I mean, I'm sorta immortal so I'd be a bit more protected that you guys."
"No, Logan. Even if you went in first, we'd have to follow you immediately after. We'd still get targeted in the end."
"Could we use some kind of sensor? I mean, just knowing the amount of people we might fight would be a better than nothing, right?"
Peter sighed into his hand. "Yeah, no. I tried that when we got here. Something is messing with my sensors. I can't see a thing."
Suddenly getting an idea, Logan turned to Peter. "Hey, Pete. Do you think you could feel it using your sense or whatever?"
"Hm, no. I don’t think so. I'm still working on that. It's too unreliable right now. I don't think we should rely on it"
Pacing dejectedly, Storm said. "Should we go back to the compound for now? We can’t just go in bli-"
Peter interrupted her, "….actually I think I might be able to do something."
"What could you do, Pete?"
"Well, I could ask a spider to check it out for us?"
…..a what? Logan must have misheard that. He must have. There was no way. "What."
"I swear I saw one of them here somewhere…. Oh!" Walking to one of the trees, Peter grabbed one of the spiders gently. "Hey, do you think you could go in that building over there and tell me what you see?" Going a bit farther and whispering a few things, Peter left to wait for the spider's intel.
Meanwhile, back in the forest, Logan and Storm were standing there slack-jawed. Logan must be hallucinating. This can’t be happening right now. Is Peter actually talking to a spider right now? There's no way. Peter can’t talk to spiders… right? Right?! Catching Ororo's eye who was looking as baffled as what he must look like, Logan couldn't help but second guess himself.
Whispering to her, he said. "There's no way, right?! Peter can’t talk to spiders, right?"
Unsure, Storm shifted nervously. "I don’t know, Loges. I think I remember Tony say that Peter is part spider? Like it's in his DNA or something? Its… a possibility. I think…"
"Fuck."
Fuck, indeed. From what Logan could tell, Peter Parker was their youngest avenger. Still, he was insanely strong. Being picked up by Tony in the Civil War fiasco and mentored by Deadpool and Daredevil made him one of their best. If he could talk to spiders, then… wouldn't that just be overkill?!
Peter was insanely strong. So strong, in fact, that Peter was able to beat Barnes in a spar during Barnes' welcome party. Bucky was the only 'rogue' avenger that was granted pardon because of the whole mind control thing. Not only that, Peter also had super senses or whatever. He could see, hear and feel better than the rest of them. So… if he was able to talk to spiders which he could ask to fight for him, gather intel and do whatever Peter's genius brain cooked up then… wasn't he practically invincible?
Knowledge, after all, was the best weapon.
Suddenly, he was startled out of his thoughts when he heard footsteps close by. Appearing under some trees, Peter cheerfully reported, oblivious to the turmoil currently taking place in Logan's mind. "According to the spider, there's about 10 people who are caught as hostages and about…" Turning to the spider on his shoulder, he asked. "How many guards?"
Nodding as if he understood the animal, Peter turned back to the two. "There's about 4 guards. All armed with a few guns. We'd be able to deal with them easy."
Holy shit. Peter could talk to spiders.
Numbly following along, Logan nodded. "Yeah, we could deal with 4 guards."
Turning to Ororo, Logan tried to silently ask her to take the lead. There's no way he could do it. He had to digest this information first.
By the time they arrived at the compound, Logan and Storm had a new respect for their youngest avenger. He was going places, after all.
(It had nothing to do with the realization that if Peter could talk to spiders then wouldn't that mean that he'd know practically anything if he wanted it?
Nope.
Not at all.)
Peter did, in fact, have a scarily high number of information on most people. Having a lot of time to himself in the past few weeks, Peter had decided to make more spiders that he stationed outside of most of the rooms and houses of people he loved for security as well as released a couple hundred around the city, just in case.
See, he was the type of person who wanted to make sure the people close to him had some sort of protection. Though he didn’t tell anyone, of course. Not because he didn’t want to. It just… never came up.
This was the reason why he found his mentor and dad, Tony Stark, on top of his bathroom counter screaming bloody murder.
Tony had asked to shower in Peter's bathroom because his shower had a water leak just yesterday. Naturally, Peter agreed.
So, Tony Stark had sat in Peter's bathtub contently. Peter had taken great lengths to modify his bathroom since showering in cold water risked him going into hibernation. Thus, Peter had one of the best heating systems in the compound.
Because he was so relaxed, Tony had lost track of time. Without him noticing, he had dozed off in the bath tub for a short while. This was why Tony's temporary guard spider had come in to check on him and had skated on the water's surface to get a better look.
When Tony Stark opened his eyes, it was to what looked like a raft spider happily gliding around the bathtub. Obviously, he started screaming his head off.
Jumping up, Tony quickly put on his bathrobe and climbed on top of the bathroom sink then started screaming for Peter.
"Peter!"
Hearing footsteps coming closer, Tony shouted again. "Hurry! There's an emergency!"
Opening the door in a panic, Peter appeared, huffing and puffing. He must have been in the kitchen. "What's wrong, dad? Did someone call you? Did you slip? I swear I installed anti slip rugs in the bath tub. I'll look into it, I swear! Wha-"
Impatiently, Tony interrupted his kid's rambling. "PETE!"
"Huh?"
"THERE'S A SPIDER IN YOUR BATH TUB!"
Confused, Peter started to ask. "What do you mean?" Turning to the bath tub, he caught sight of the water spider gliding around the bath tub happily. Huh. Tony must have stayed a bit too long and triggered the check-up protocol. "Oh."
"OH?!"
"Don't worry about it. That one is harmles-"
"Harmless? HARMLESS?! Pete, that's a spider!"
"Yeah, and? That’s just Jesus. I asked him to check up on you if you ever had any trouble in the compound. You must have stayed a bit too long in the tub."
"Jesus?! Wha-"
"Yeah, I named him Jesus. He could walk on water and everything! He could eve-" Suddenly pausing and sniffing the air, Peter jolted. "Shit! I left my eggs on the stove!" Panicking, Peter turned to the spider. "Jesus, Tony is safe, you don't have to check up on him right now. Why don't you go glide around in the pool?" Turning to Tony, he said. "It's fine! I need to go to the kitchen and stop my eggs from burning. Just finish up your shower, dad!"
Tony was a little lost. "Wait, wha-"
Click.
The door closed behind Peter, leaving Tony with a lot of questions.
Did his kid just talk to a spider and actually understand it?
What the fuck just happened?
The next time the New Avengers noticed Peter's habit of asking spiders to do some tasks for him was during movie night.
When the New Avengers initiative launched, there were many agents and heroes who answered their call.
Obviously, having new teammates was weird and they had a bit of trouble adjusting to it.
Peter, of course, had some experience working with a few of them since they had to do some joint-missions to take down the occasional drug or trafficking ring around New York. It paid to have good connections in case you were ever in trouble, after all.
Thus, Peter was probably the most comfortable out of all of them there.
Even then, being around new people was kind of fun for Peter. He had new sparring buddies in the form of the X-Men and the defenders. They were all good people all around.
That, of course, doesn’t mean that it didn't get awkward from time to time.
Which is why Peter implemented monthly dinner and movie nights. Everyone had to join and eat a meal together. At first, it was kind of awkward but, after a short while, they soon grew to be each other's family.
Today, they decided to watch a Disney movie, Wall-e, which never failed to make him cry.
A bit after halfway through, Peter started to get hungry. Absentmindedly, he called some of the spiders, saying, "Can you please get me some cookies by the cabinets? Thanks."
Not noticing the strange looks the Avengers were giving him, Peter continued to stretch languidly. He had a long day of school and patrol so he was tired and started to doze off. Taking the cookie from the two spiders, Peter happily thanked them, started munching on the cookies and settled into his pillows.
Meanwhile, as he was getting comforatble, the Avengers were all having a mental breakdown and shared the same thought. 'What the fuck?! What the actual fuck?!'
Gathering his wits first, Rhodey looked at Peter curiously. Did… did he just… ask… spiders to get him… food? And they obeyed him?! What the fuck? What the actual fuck? "Pete… did you just ask the spider to get you food? And they… listened?"
Burrowing deeper into his pillow, Peter sleepily shrugged. "Hm? Oh, yeah. That's my spiders. Their names are Jesus and Bugsy. They're cool."
They're cool?! That didn't answer any of their questions at all!
Tony tried to ask him clearer. "Pete, can you even talk to spiders?" Leaning in attentively, the team got ready for Peter's answer. But…
Unfortunately for them, Peter was already fast asleep, oblivious to the team's inner turmoil which he caused.
It wasn't until seven months later did they find out the truth. Tony and the team just finished a mission that morning and they all had some injuries. Instead of going to the medbay, some of them stayed back to get a drink and snack. Their injuries weren't too severe, after all.
This, of course, triggered their guardian spiders. Their injuries had alerted the check-up protocol, making the spiders come crawling to the team.
However, the team was already quite used to this. Peter had developed a habit of randomly speaking or hanging out with his spiders and thus, helped the team a lot when it came to intel.
So, seeing a few spiders come close wasn't that big of a shock. The team had learned over the past few months that Peter was kind of oblivious and always somehow answered their questions in a way that made them ask more questions. It became a frustrating cycle so they just learned to leave him be. It wasn't such a far-fetched idea after all. Peter did get bitten by a spider and he did have spider DNA. Maybe he could talk to spiders.
Nevertheless, Tony was still curious about it. He's never had too many spiders around the buildings of Stark Industries or the New Avengers compound. So, suddenly seeing a group of spiders regularly was a bit of a mystery.
Deciding to ask FRIDAY, Tony said. "Hey, Fri? Where did all these spiders come from?"
"Peter made them in his lab and distributed them in various places. These spiders have been specifically programmed to guard you and your well-being from what I understand."
What. Peter… made them? Looking around, Tony noticed that the team were all listening in and looking equally lost.
"What do you mean, fri?"
"The spiders are robots, boss. Peter made them a few months ago in his personal lab."
What. But they looked so… real!
As if hearing his question, FRIDAY answered. "Peter had modelled them after the raft and jumping spiders' biology. He designed them to have a small amount of sedatives and a tiny web-shooter each."
You have got to be kidding. How did they not notice?
Looking closely, Tony could see that all the spiders had little joints and a faint glow. It wasn't very noticeable until you knew what you were looking for.
Tony wanted to ask Peter how exactly he made the robots to act exactly like their real-life counterparts but he was, unfortunately, in school. From what he could recall, Peter was currently in his teacher, Ms. Warren's class who had a strict no phone call policy.
Wait. She had a strict no phone call policy!
Turning to the team, Tony started grinning evilly.
"Do you guys want to ask Peter about it? He's currently in Warren's class."
Ms. Warren was a teacher that the team was familiar with because Peter frequently talked about her strict style of teaching. She was responsible for giving him most of his detentions. But what did the team know her best for?
Her no-phone-call policy.
See, to deter students from using their phones, Ms. Warren would tell them to answer their phones on speaker in front of the whole class even though she wasn't normally so strict.
Sharing evil smirks, Carol said. "Well, we are curious about it…"
Meanwhile, at the same time, Peter was currently dozing off in their science class. Being a head intern in Stark Industries' R&D department meant that he learned and knew a lot of things. Thus, their lesson on the laws of motion just couldn't rouse his interest.
Placing his head on the desk, Peter started playing with his pen absentmindedly when he was suddenly startled by… ringing.
In particular, ringing coming from his phone.
Shit. Looking positively horrified, Peter started to say, "Sorry, Ms. Warren. I'll take this outsi-"
Ms. Warren interrupted, looking at him expectedly. "You know the rules, Mr. Parker."
And he did. Ms. Warren was notorious in school for being lenient about almost anything except grades, punctuality, and her no-phone-call-in-class policy. So when his phone continued to ring and buzz, he sighed at Ms. Warren tiredly and took his phone out from his bag.
Catching sight of the contact information, Peter stiffened. Looking at Ms. Warren, eyes pleading desperately, he begged. "Ms. Warren, I don’t think I should take this call. Really. It's not that important. I swear!"
"Well, if it's not that important, Mr. Parker, then you should be fine with the class listening in, right? Why don't you have over your phone, Peter."
Looking at the ceiling, Peter silently sent out a prayer and conceded.
Walking to the front of the class, he handed his phone over to Ms. Warren who presses answer and speaker immediately without checking the contact information.
Immediately, the familiar voice of his father and mentor rang out, loud and clear. 'Hey, Underoos!'
Hearing gasps behind him, Peter didn't have the courage to look at his classmates.
Judging from the look of Ms. Warren alone, he could tell he wasn't going to get out of this easily. Sighing, he tried to end the phone call as quickly as possible. "Tony, I can't really talk right now. Can y-"
'Well, here's the thing, kid. I don’t really care right now. You've been playing us.'
Shaking his head, confused, Peter asked, "What are you talking about?"
'The spiders? Ring any bells?'
Getting even more confused, Peter said, "What's so wrong with my spiders?"
'What's so wrong? What's so wron- can you guys believe this?!' In the background, Peter could faintly recognize the laughter of Rhodey and Bucky. What was so funny? 'Kid, you're asking me what’s wrong with your spiders?! I'll tell you what's wrong!' Pausing, probably for the drama, Tony exclaimed. 'You made yourself an army of spider robot AIs then promptly spread them around town!'
"Well, yeah! What's so wrong about that? You met Jesus, didn’t you?"
'What's so wr- What do you mean "what's so wrong about that"?! Peter, we thought you could talk to spiders for seven months! Seven!'
What. Why would they even think of that?
"Tony, you do know that I am, in fact, human, right?"
'I'm shocked, not dumb. Of cour-'
"Then, why did you think I could talk to spiders?! That's so dumb!"
Hearing their normally shy and reserved classmate call one of the smartest people in the world dumb made Peter's classmates' jaws drop. No way.Â
'It was a logical conclusion!'
Tilting his head exasperatedly, he said. "Tony, do you seriously jump to that conclusion when you see someone talk to a spider? Seriously?!"
'Well, considering you're you know and also you're like a genius! I wouldn't be surprised if you figured out how to talk to animals. You are the heir to Stark Industries, after all. It was the logical choice!'
Abe dropped his pen.
Did he just… Did Tony just out him as the heir to SI?! Peeking behind him, he could see his classmates looking at him with wide eyes and open mouths. Shit. They definitely heard him. Glaring at the phone, he said. "Tony! I'm on speaker!"
'Shit. Uhm… Did they hear me?'
Taking a deep breath, Peter pinched his temple. "Yes, Tony, they hear you loud and clear. Anything else to reveal?"
'Yikes. Uh… We'll be handing out NDAs and you're all required to sign them. I'll pay them all, of course. Oh… Would you look at that? I think there's another mission… yeah… I've got… superhero things to do… uh… bye, Pete!' In the background, he could hear the team roaring with laughter and a faint 'Pepper's gonna kill you, Tones'.
Hearing a beep, signifying the end of the call, Peter closed his eyes, looking like the image of an exasperated mother. Peter mentally debated with himself. Could he become a terrorist now? Rogers was probably planting flowers or some shit in Wakanda. Oh, to be a war criminal with no morals and live without responsibilities. Sighing, Peter thought, he was never going to live this down.
Instead, he reluctantly turned around and met the eyes of his amazed classmates. Making jazz hands, Peter said, "Surprise, Shawty?"