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Of all the ways for Peter’s secret identity to come out, he’d always imagined it happening more mundanely, like maybe slipping up on his words one too many times. After all, he went to an exclusive STEM school for gifted kids, and MJ had already practically guessed his identity (albeit with a little help from Ned’s loud mouth). As it was, if there was any group of people that had to find out early, Peter was glad it was his Academic Decathlon team.
It was like any other Wednesday, in October of their senior year. Peter, Ned and MJ had met up after their last classes of the day to walk to practice together, just like they always did. Unlike always however, the moment the three friends entered the cafeteria where they always held practice, Peter’s spider-senses made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He stopped in the doorway automatically, looking around for any threat. After nearly three years of having his powers, Peter had gotten rather good at deciphering the little differences in his built-in warning system. There wasn’t any immediate danger, but his powers were warning him to be cautious in the near future.
Neither Michelle nor Ned noticed his pausing at the door, already halfway to the small stage they used for their practice on the other side of the room. He was so distracted by the first warning that he nearly missed his senses spiking again, seconds before Flash’s shoulder slammed into Peter’s. The teen had to make himself lose his balance and stumble, looking up to glare as Flash snickered.
“Watch it, Penis .”
Peter ignored him and made his way to Ned’s side, where the boy had snagged a few chairs right next to each other at the base of the stage, where Michelle was shuffling question cards at the podium. Mr. Harrington shuffled inside along with the last of the team members- there had been no new additions since Liz’s class graduated, leaving only eight members other than Peter left on the team. With six of their nine members graduating by the end of the school year, they really needed to spend this year recruiting new members.
Once everyone was present MJ directed the setup, with Mr. Harrington grabbing their buzzers while Charles and Abe set up a few tables onstage for practice. Peter’s senses spiked seemingly at random as everyone moved around, only getting more and more agitated the more time went on. Once everything was ready and MJ called Sally, Cindy, Charles and Abe up to begin, Peter found that for once, he wasn’t daydreaming about what he and Mr. Stark might get up to at the tower. Instead, he kept his gaze firmly locked on his classmates.
Halfway through practice Peter was called onstage, along with Ned, Betty and of course, Flash. From the second he stepped onto the raised stage his senses kicked up a notch, warning him of incoming danger. Ned noticed how tense his best friend had gotten and nudged him as they took their places behind their buzzers, but Peter was too distracted looking for the threat to acknowledge him.
With Peter’s speed and reflexes, he and MJ had come up with a compromise in which Peter would buzz on every third question, giving everyone else a chance to actually practice their own reflexes. While the vigilante didn’t dare use his enhancements during actual competition, he enjoyed the repetition during practice, as it meant he didn’t have to pay as close attention to holding himself back. This compromise meant that today, when Peter was too distracted looking for a threat to care about buzzing in, MJ noticed quickly.
“Peter! Are you even paying attention?” The captain snapped, interrupting practice and Peter’s concentration.
He opened his mouth to apologize, only for a faint creaking from somewhere above to get his attention; so faint that without his powers, he wouldn’t have been able to hear it. Peter looked up, squinting at the metal light rigging system set up above the stage. MJ was snapping at him again, but Peter only had seconds to realize what was about to happen before his spider-senses were screaming at him, quickly accompanied by the screeching of metal on metal.
Time seemed to slow down as Peter’s enhanced speed kicked in. The entire rigging system was falling down on them, spanning the entire length of the stage. If Peter didn’t do something, Ned, MJ, Betty and Flash would all be crushed to death by a few tons of metal and lighting. Really, there was no choice to make.
Just as those in the room began to scream, Peter jumped at least eight feet off of the stage, catching the rigging system above his friends’ heads, giving them the precious few seconds they needed to duck low enough to safety. When Peter landed, the system landed in his arms, teetering precariously like a see-saw with the unbalanced weight. The teen was vaguely aware of all the screaming, but he grit his teeth and concentrated on not letting the rig tip on either side to possibly crush one of his crouching friends. He held it at his own shoulder height, and while the few tons were nowhere near the crushing weight of the warehouse he’d managed to slough off of himself in sophomore year, it was by no means easy to keep balanced.
“ Peter ?” someone shouted from behind him, finally noticing that the people onstage hadn’t been killed after all.
“Peter!” said MJ shakily, looking up at him from wide eyes from where she’d crouched behind the podium a few feet away from him.
“Penis Parker?” Flash gaped from his own spot not far away. Next to him, Ned was staring at Peter with a mix of shock and pity.
“Can you all please get to safety ?” Peter begged, glaring at them all pointedly as the rigging system wobbled in his arms. “This thing isn’t exactly light!” Well, to him it kind of was, but he was still hoping he would be able to pass this off as hysterical strength.
Thankfully, Michelle came to her senses and managed to drag a sputtering Flash offstage, while Ned hurried to Betty’s side and guided her off. Once Peter was sure they were all clear of the stage, he slowly bent his knees, bringing the system closer to the ground, until he could dump it on stage without blowing out his eardrums. Even a few inches off the ground however, a few tons was a few tons, and the impact seemed to rattle the entire floor of the empty cafeteria, making Peter wince guiltily. If they hadn’t had a clue how heavy the rig was before, they definitely did now.
The teen slowly turned to face his peers, bracing himself for what he might find on their faces. They had all lined up at the base of the stage in a small crowd, each and every one of them staring at him like they had never seen him before. Even Mr. Harrington wasn’t immune, his glasses nearly falling off of his nose. Even Ned and MJ weren’t immune, as they didn’t often get to see the teen’s powers outside of the spider suit.
Mr. Harrington broke first, his words rushing out in a panic. “Peter, are you alright ? That thing weighs a few tons, at least!”
Darn. He should have known Mr. Harrington would know; after all, the stage in the cafeteria had been used in the nineties, when the man went to school here. He scratched the back of his neck, awkwardly looking over each of his classmates. “Um… It was adrenaline?”
Maybe if he was a little more confident in his response, they would have bought it. His chances of being believed were definitely soured when Ned opened his mouth to help. “Right! Adrenaline! Like when mothers can lift burning cars off of their children- that’s totally believable!” The boy gave Peter a thumb’s up, not seeming to realize what he had just implied with his words. At Ned’s side, MJ pinched the bridge of her nose, shaking her head.
At the back of the group, Flash was still staring at him in a bit of a daze. “Parker just lifted a few tons? Peter Parker?” It was a testament to his shock that he’d used Peter’s name for the first time in years.
“Are you even hurt from catching that?” Sally asked, eyes raking over him critically. “Like, shouldn’t your wrists be broken, at least ?”
Peter pathetically took hold of one of his admittedly aching wrists, feigning a wince. “Ow.”
“Oh yeah, because that was convincing.”
“Are we gonna ignore the way he jumped above their heads ?” Abe interjected, voice an octave higher than usual. “It was like, ten feet!”
“I saw that too,” Charles nodded vigorously.
“And you reacted so fast,” Betty said, breathless and still shaking from nearly being crushed. When she met Peter’s eyes, her own were still as big as dinner plates. “I was watching you- You were already looking up before I even heard anything. It was like you knew it was about to happen.”
Everyone fell quiet, waiting for his answers, but Peter had none to give. How did he explain any of this without giving away that he was enhanced? With a sigh, Peter turned his back to the team and brought his StarkWatch up to his mouth, pressing a button. “Karen, please call Mr. Stark.”
“ What ?” Someone wheezed. Peter hunched his shoulders, lowering his voice and keeping his wrist close to his chest to try and hide the hologram as it appeared above the watch. He could do nothing about them hearing his mentor’s voice, though.
“Pete! Did practice end early, kiddo? I can have Happy head over to pick you up early.” The hologram was only fist sized, and just of Tony’s face. It meant Peter could see the way the man’s face fell when he registered the grimace on Peter’s. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“You need to get here,” Peter said, still keeping his voice down. “I think my cover’s blown with my Acadec team.”
“I’ll be right there,” Tony said briskly before hanging up. Peter didn’t turn back around right away, taking a few seconds of privacy to freak out about what he was about to do.
Instead, Cindy Moon stole his thunder. “You’re Spider-Man, aren’t you?”
Peter whipped around to face her, the reaction pretty much an answer in itself. “How did you guess that?!” The rest of the team erupted into a cacophony of noise, irritating Peter’s hearing and making it difficult to focus on one voice.
“No fucking way!”
“ Peter Parker is Spider-Man?”
“It kinda makes sense-”
“Penis Parker is not -”
“I need to sit down-”
“HEY!” MJ shouted, bringing all of the noise to a stuttering halt. She glared at the team members in a silent threat to keep it down before she nodded once at Peter. He smiled gratefully back. His ears were still ringing a little from dropping the rig onstage, and too much more sensory input would undoubtedly put him into an overload at some point.
Taking a deep breath, Peter came to the edge of the stage and sat down so they were more eye level with those standing, while still keeping a bit of space to escape should he need it. Gripping the edge of the stage, he prepared himself to confess his biggest secret. “It’s true. I am Spider-Man.” To Cindy he asked again, “How did you guess that, by the way? Nobody else thinks that Spider-Man is a teenager.”
All eyes turned to her, and she blushed a little bit. “I only guessed because I’ve known you since the sixth grade. Freshman year you suddenly didn’t need your coke-bottle glasses anymore, and I never saw you use your inhaler. Then you catch a few tons like it’s nothing, followed by calling Tony Stark?” Cindy shook her head. “The only thing I can’t wrap my head around is the fighting.”
“Well, Peter’s ripped!” Ned boasted proudly, like it was himself he was bragging about.
“Penis Parker is ripped?” Flash repeated, still dazed. Charles patted the boy's shoulder a touch too harshly.
“Dude, are you good or what?”
“That’s not what I meant,” Cindy rolled her eyes, although she followed it by eyeing Peter, like she might be able to see his muscles beneath his layers of oversized clothing. She wasn’t the only one, making the vigilante feel distinctly watched.
Sally cocked her head, also looking at Peter. “I know what you mean… You’ve always struck me as a pacifist.” Likely because every time Peter had gotten picked on, he’d never really stood up for himself.
“It’s not like I go out looking for a fight,” Peter defended. “It’s everyone else that attacks me first!”
“Is that why you get shot and stabbed so often? Because you let them hit you first?” MJ’s voice was thunderous, up there with Mr. Stark and Aunt May’s level of scary. A shiver ran down Peter’s spine, and he held up his hands in surrender.
“I’ve been getting shot and/or stabbed a lot less lately!” Admittedly because he was more grown into his powers than he had been at fifteen, and thus he had better reaction times and less because he stopped letting his opponents swing first. What Michelle didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her.
“I think Mr. Harrington passed out,” Abe said helpfully, hovering near where their teacher had sunk into a desk. The man in question made a few gurgling noises in protest, letting Peter know he was still conscious, just having his mind blown.
“I’m sorry, I think I’m having a stroke. You’ve been shot and stabbed ?” Charles stressed the words, like he was praying he’d somehow heard Peter wrong.
Peter shrugged. “Getting stabbed doesn’t hurt nearly as badly as you might think.”
“Unless they twist,” Ned said helpfully, referencing the pain scale they’d made for Peter after his enhancements. Peter nodded seriously.
“Twisting hurts worse than only getting shot once.”
“I do not like the way he phrased that.”
“And you’re still alive, how ?” Betty squeaked.
“I ask myself that every day,” MJ muttered.
“If he didn’t have enhanced healing, he’d definitely be dead by now,” Ned nodded, like the betrayer he was.
“Wait, enhanced healing?” Charles cut in, tilting his head.
“That’s right,” Abe straightened up, nodding at Peter. “Spider-Man has never confirmed what powers he has before.”
“Well yeah, that didn’t seem like the smartest idea,” Peter scoffed.
“Will you tell us?” Betty asked, raising her hand like he was a teacher or something. The team all watched him hopefully, all of them clearly bursting to know more. Peter figured they had a little bit before Mr. Stark would get there, so there was nothing to save him.
“Well… Obviously, there’s super strength,” Peter began, jerking his thumb over his shoulder at the busted rigging system on the stage behind him. Before he could continue Sally butted in.
“Exactly how much can you lift? Because you caught a few tons like it was nothing!”
“I’ve never actually tested it before,” Peter admitted, looking down at his hand. “But based on certain… experiences … My best guess is around twenty tons?” The warehouse that had collapsed on him had been at least that much.
“Holy shit ,” someone breathed.
“Twenty tons ?” Cindy squeaked. “While you’re still a teenager ?”
Peter had never thought of it like that before- that he might be able to grow into lifting even more- and the thought admittedly freaked him out, so he pushed it aside to start on his list again. “My metabolism is also about five times faster than the average person, to go along with my enhanced healing. I need to consume about ten thousand calories a day to sustain myself. There’s also enhanced speed, enhanced senses and reflexes…” Peter counted it all off on his fingers, looking to Ned and MJ for help.
“There’s the Peter tingle,” MJ smirked.
“We do not call it that!” Peter said quickly, looking over the team. “They’re my spider-senses , thank you very much.”
Michelle addressed the team. “Everyone calls it the Peter tingle but him.”
“What is the Peter tingle?”
Peter narrowed his eyes at Betty for calling it that, but she didn’t so much as blink, simply waiting for an explanation. Peter sighed and let her get away with it, instead explaining his sixth sense. “It’s like… super anxiety, pretty much. I can always tell when something bad is about to happen, or when I’m about to get hit or something. It’s how I knew something was wrong with the rig system before anyone else did.”
As if to prove its own existence, Peter’s senses flared a moment later, his body automatically reacting by jerking to the side. A textbook sailed past where his head had been moments before, slamming against the rig behind Peter and causing everyone to turn and stare at the thrower. Flash didn’t bother looking sheepish, still staring at Peter with those disbelieving eyes.
“Mr. Thompson, please don’t throw heavy textbooks at your classmates, even if they are Spider-Man,” Mr. Harrington managed to say, his voice muffled with the way his face was pressed firmly against the desk he was sitting in. How he’d seen what happened, Peter didn’t know. Clearly, the man was going through something with the revelation that his best student was also a nighttime vigilante.
“Peter tingle,” Ned declared, gesturing at his friend.
“Yes, thank you Flash,” Peter said sarcastically, getting back to himself. “Also, I’m sticky.” To prove it, he twisted around and slapped his hand against the cover of the offending textbook, allowing himself to stick to it before he brought it back out in front so everyone could see. Multiple jaws dropped with the sight, seemingly more weirded out by this than any of his other powers.
“I thought that was just the suit!” Sally cried, pointing at him accusingly. “You mean you can just- walk on the ceiling?!”
“Yeah,” Peter said. “It’s actually pretty comfortable. There are these microscopic barbs all over my limbs like a spider has that allow me to cling to virtually any surface. I also don’t get head rushes anymore, so that’s nice.”
“What about the webs?” Charles asked, sounding almost afraid of the answer. Peter couldn’t help but laugh at the look on his face.
“Synthetic. I created them in chemistry class Freshman year, after I got my powers. I built my first web shooters in robotics club.”
“How did you get your powers?” Flash cut in, speaking like an actual human for the first time since the reveal.
Peter hesitated. He wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to tell the truth, just in case any of them wanted to try and get powers for themselves. “If I tell you, you have to promise not to try to do it for yourselves. I nearly died, and the only reason I survived is because I happened to have a very specific type of DNA to support the change.”
“We promise,” Abe said, leaning in eagerly. All of them seemed eager to know the answer, even Ned and MJ, who hadn’t heard the story much past Peter’s brief explanations after they each found out.
“It was our field trip to Oscorp Freshman year. I got separated from the class and somehow ended up in a restricted area, surrounded by hundreds of their genetic mutation experiments. One of the radioactive spiders ended up biting me, and then I went to find the class again. Over the next week I was really sick with what I later realized was the early stages of radiation sickness. Thankfully, the enhancements kicked in before the radiation in my blood could kill me, and I became this.” He gestured to himself. Just to drive home the point he added, “Seriously, my blood is radioactive now. Chances are if any of you tried to repeat the experiment, you’d die a slow and painful death as your skin melted off.”
“Duly noted,” Abe squeaked, looking a little green.
“So you just woke up enhanced?” Cindy asked, assessing Peter like a specimen. He should have known a team full of STEM kids would ask the real questions.
Peter’s shoulders hunched, embarrassment evident from the flush on his cheeks. He hadn’t even told Ned or MJ this, too afraid of what they might think. Considering it was a question likely to be asked once his identity was revealed, he might as well get it out now. “My DNA changed after the bite. According to Mr. Stark’s calculations, approximately nine percent of my DNA is spider now.”
They all stared at him blankly, Ned and MJ included. It was Charles who broke the silence after a minute or so. “Yeah, that broke me. Peter Parker being Spider-Man I can handle, but Peter Parker being part spider ?”
“Does that mean your kids will have powers?” Cindy asked, looking at MJ for some reason.
Peter had honestly never considered that before, and the thought of an infant with super strength and the ability to crawl on walls and ceilings made the blood drain out of his face. “Super do not want to think about that, thank you Cindy.”
Thankfully before Peter could dwell much more, the familiar sound of Iron Man’s repulsors caught his attention from a distance. He hadn’t realized how obvious he was being until both Ned and MJ got tense, looking around for whatever danger he might be sensing. Peter hurried to clarify.
“Nothing’s wrong, Mr. Stark is almost here.”
“How do you know?” Cindy asked curiously.
“I can hear his repulsors.”
“ I can’t hear anything,” Flash sputtered, apparently not having quite processed the situation yet. Hearing clomping metal footsteps coming down the hall now, rather than answer, Peter simply held silent eye contact until the doors to the cafeteria burst open. The Iron Man suit stomped through and paused just inside, opening up to let Tony out.
The engineer’s eyes fixed on Peter, noticing the state of the stage behind him. He raised an eyebrow as he lifted his shades. “What happened here?”
Given the team were rendered starstruck by Iron Man’s presence, Peter hopped off the stage with perhaps a bit too much inhuman grace, meeting his mentor halfway. “It wasn’t my fault this time! The light rigging system fell in the middle of practice and I had to catch it!”
Tony’s eyes flashed. “Karen, injury report.”
Peter groaned. “ Mr. Stark-”
Karen was already speaking over him out of his watch. “Some slight tearing occurred in the tendon’s of Peter’s wrists, but as of now, they are 89.7 percent healed.”
“ See ?”
“Don’t you ‘see’ me, when the last time I took your word for it you’d actually been impaled by a-”
“You owe me twenty bucks,” Cindy said to Abe, reminding both Tony and Peter that they weren’t alone. “I told you the internship was real!”
“That hardly seems like a fair bet given what we know now!” Abe whined.
Mr. Stark stepped back, allowing his PR smile to affix to his face as he once again dropped his shades to hide his eyes. “Alright kiddies! You or your guardians should have a whole heaping handful of NDA’s waiting in your inboxes, so sign them and you’re free to leave.”
“We’re not going to tell ,” Betty gasped, looking at Peter. “I wouldn’t do that!” The rest of the team tittered their agreements, seeming earnest- even Flash. Peter appreciated the sentiment, and their genuineness made him feel like a dick for needing them to sign anyway. He struggled with a way to say it without sounding like he didn’t trust them, but earning his nickname, Flash beat him to it.
“We need to sign anyway,” the teen begrudgingly told them, not meeting Peter’s eye. “We’re less likely to let it slip subconsciously, and it ensures none of us can fuck Parker over.” Thank goodness the bully had the common sense not to call him ‘Penis’ in front of Tony Stark. The team accepted Flash’s explanation, given his parents were savvy lawyers and and CEOs. Those that were eighteen checked their emails, while those still underage phoned their parents.
While they were all distracted, Tony slung his arm around Peter’s shoulder, leading him further away and tilting his glasses down to look over them. “You okay, kiddo? I know this isn’t how you wanted this to happen.”
Peter sighed, looking down at his shoes. “I know it’s not ideal, but there’s only ten more months before everyone will know anyway.” Once Peter turned eighteen, he would have to sign the Accords and reveal his identity. Mr. Stark was planning on slowly integrating him in more with the Avengers once he was an adult, so Peter felt it was a fair exchange.
“It’s okay to be a upset,” Mr. Stark reminded him, squeezing his shoulder. “In fact, do you wanna get out of here before the inquisition continues? Maybe start patrol early today while I get this sorted.”
Peter turned big, grateful eyes on his mentor. “Really? You’d do that?” Even as he asked, he was already inching his way towards the door. Mr. Stark laughed and pushed his glasses back up, waving Peter away.
“Go before I change my mind.”
Peter did, turning and darting out of the room before any of his teammates could realize he was gone, leaving his backpack behind for Mr. Stark to grab. He would have to stop at his apartment for the suit, but that was alright- Peter was going to enjoy this last bit of freedom before everything changed again. Having so many more people in on his secret ten months early would be bound to cause some friction, but for now he turned his phone off and sprinted towards his Queens apartment, pretending for just one more day that he was nobody special.