On infinite earths, in infinite universes, it still surprises “him” when—cast adrift during some interdimensional battleworld event—“he” finds this one.
The first time “he” bursts into spiders to traverse a wall and save a citizen from a mugging, she doesn’t scream, not at “him.” Not when “he” webs up the crook. The mugger bursting into flies—that’s new, and exciting to parts of “him” that the Parker memory doesn’t like to think about.
But the victim doesn’t run even when “he” swarms back to “himself” after—after the meal.
“I just killed someone,” “he” says. He’s staring at the jittery stacks of arachnids that make up his hands.
“He was already dead,” the mugging victim says. “I wouldn’t choose flies, but I guess—it’s not always a choice. I guess they found him.”
And that’s a trip, a real trip, and results in fumbling “his” mask-spiders. She doesn’t seem to recognize Peter Parker, and that’s good. The two (two-and-many?) of them tuck themselves away in a little cafe where she orders a coffee and “he” gets some kind of pouch full of fluid—Peter Parker won’t think about it, but it’s really good in a way most food isn’t anymore, since the—loss? Takeover? It’s like a weird Capri Sun, and that makes him a little homesick, or nostalgic. “He” mostly can’t eat anymore because “his”—bodies—can’t eat the way “his”—mind—wants to, but this seems to be tailor-made for “him.” Them.
Her name is Nita and her father is a nest of carpenter ants.
Out of providence (or, or maybe this is all a self-delusion but he/they’ll let it last as long as he/they can)—it’s actually typical for people here to give their dying or dead bodies to insects, and for those insects to carry forward the consciousness of their... victims? Donations?
“Sometimes they use it as an opportunity to tidy up their loose ends, and say their goodbyes,” Nita says. “Butterflies of whatever kind are popular for that. Let them sip up the blood and three weeks later you’re dissipating for good. Some people—my dad—know what they want with their life and want to keep doing it.” Nita tilts her hand back and forth. “I’ve never put much thought into it, me. Maybe I’ll lay down in a milkweed field and go with the monarchs. I always wanted to see Mexico.”
She tilts her head. “Why’d you go with spiders? And—are the heroics your last hurrah, or your path forward?”
And that is a conversation for a few more coffees, and pouches. What comes out is a tangled web of narrative, and guilt, and loss and despair at his home dimension.
He/they’re used to people staring. He/they’re used to fear, disgust, and pity from Peter Parker’s loved ones. This is like—this is like when he overheard a guy admit to someone in sophomore year that he didn’t have his own bed, his own stuff, until he escaped to the dorms. How a pillow he chose, as many blankets as he wanted, were better than he ever imagined. And Peter took it for granted, until he heard that. And now he has a body that no longer sleeps that way at all.
Nita’s face says she was taking this weird afterlife for granted. And she—she actually rests her hand, gently, on the carapaces and seething shapes that “Peter” has shaped like hands.
“Hey,” she says. “You can stay here. I imagine going back might be the hard part. You can stay here, and—my dad and I can help you with a memorial for Peter Parker, if you like. And you can dissipate, or you can keep saving people’s purses. But that’ll be your choice, in a place where either choice is valid.”
He/they aren’t sure whether the other heroes involved in the latest battleworld fiasco make it home, and for a little while, they don’t care.
Gwen Stacy is dead here, too, but her dragonflies have kept on going; she’s an engineer with a focus on structural safety. Her bugs get along with the spiders well enough.
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