#across the spiderverse miles | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

cat3ch1sm · 7 months

Text

🌲~ hi everyone! im back with another gwen Stacy angst, again written by the wonderful star on tiktok! if you don’t know what im talking about i began a series a little while ago where i basically write fics for their angst atsv headcanons that will continue indefinitely. so far it’s been a blast :3

🌻~ i am also still working on requests!! i promise lots are coming out soon! 💚💚 thank you all for your patience

🌿~ below is the headcanon i will be writing for!

💚𓆩♡𓆪☁️ suicide, death, suicide attempt, pills, graphic descriptions of depression

enjoy the writing <33

Jess Drew made her way to Miguel’s office in a huff, swerving around other Spider-People and storming down the hallway. She had just barely parked her motorcycle at her headquarters in her own dimension, having just returned from a mission, when the AI Lyla appeared out of nowhere, telling her that Miguel wanted her at HQ. Seriously, she was several months pregnant and couldn’t even sit down for a second before Miguel called her in. But her position as Miguel’s right hand was demanding, and physical limitations were hardly ever able to deter Jess. So despite her annoyance, she entered Miguel’s office.

When she walked in, the disgruntled man had his back to her, as usual, and the glowing hologram of Lyla by his side turned to look at Jess as she went in. “Alright, Miguel, this better be good.” Jess sounded impatient as she tapped her foot. “I’m not usually supposed to be here right now, and you know I have things to do in my home dimension.”

Miguel closed the glowing windows he had open on his console before turning to face Jess. He seemed world-weary as usual; his frown lines looked deeper. “Yeah, I know, and I apologize for that inconvenience,” Miguel told her, a little disdainfully. “But we have a bit of a problem. Gwen’s disappeared again.”

Jess almost let out a groan of exasperation, but caught herself, folding her arms across her chest. “Again?” She rolled her eyes to the ceiling and blew out air from her lips. “Miguel, are you sure she isn’t just with that boy- Hobie- like she was last time? Every time she’s off our radar, she’s usually over there.”

Lyla chimed in this time, teleporting to Jess’s side. “Nope. Already checked myself, and Spider-Punk says he hasn’t seen her today. But the part that concerns me is that I can’t pick up her status in my systems anymore- her location, her video and audio feed, nothing. Which means Gwen’s taken off her watch.”

“My guess is she went to that one kid’s dimension- the one she won’t quit talking about,” Miguel intoned stiffly, his eyes narrowing.

Jess’s frown of aggravation had turned into one of slight confusion as she took all this in. “Taken off her watch?” she murmured, placing her tongue in her cheek and knitting her brow contemplatively. “That means-“

“Yeah,” Miguel cut in, sounding more irritated than ever. “She probably thinks she can escape in that other dimension- what was it?”

“Earth-1210,” Lyla supplied.

“Right,” Miguel continued. Considering we ordered her personally to stay away from there, she could be hiding from us.”

Jess, however, wasn’t satisfied with this explanation. “No- no, that doesn’t make any sense. Gwen ain’t stupid. She knows she can’t last long in a dimension that isn’t her own without a watch. And I been told her to stay away from there. I don’t think she’d go against me again.”

“Meaning that Gwen is in fact in her own dimension.” Miguel looked slightly irritated as he turned around with an irritated sigh. “We go through all the trouble of taking her away from there so she doesn’t get arrested by her father, and what does she do? Go back there.” He let out an annoyed huff. “Dios mío, cada día me arrepiento de haber dejado entrar a los adolescentes en esta sociedad. Demasiados problemas.”

Jess frowned. Gwen hadn’t spoken much about her home ever since Miguel recruited her to the Spider-Society, at least not to her- so it was odd that she would just suddenly return without even letting her friends know, not to mention shutting off her watch. Alarm bells were starting to sound in Jess’s head. Something was amiss.

Lyla noticed the change in Jess’s demeanor, her small hologram appearing beside her with a brief flash of light and pixels. “Jess? You gonna go after her?”

Miguel turned to face both women, expression hard. “Why bother? If Gwen wants to disappear, let her. Especially if she’s taken off her watch. If she wants to drop out of the society, let her. I have no time to be chasing kids.”

Jess ignored Miguel, flicking her gaze towards Lyla from the corners of her eyes. “Yeah. I’ll head out now.”

“So quickly?” Lyla queried, seeming slightly caught off guard. “You just said you-“

“I know what I said, Lyla.” Jess held up a hand to cut Lyla off. “But I’m going anyway.”

Her tone was more severe than usual, and when Lyla detected the change in demeanor she didn’t protest any further. Miguel gave Jess a look, but was silenced with an equally stark glare, and he said nothing when she left the room, already getting her watch in gear.

——————————————————————

Gwen Stacy was perched precariously at the back edge of the Brooklyn Tower. Her legs dangled in the air as her feet overlooked the bustling city below. It was dusk, and a beautiful sunset illuminated the sky and the city with a peaceful golden glow. All the constantly glaring lights from the buildings and cars and the general rush of of New York made this a rare sight, and it was certainly worth the wait.

But Gwen wasn’t paying attention to any of that. She was so still she could have been mistaken for a statue. She wore her Spider-suit, but didn’t have the hood over her head. Her watch from the Spider-Society sat beside her, screen cracked and wristband broken. Her face was stone and her eyes were vacant.

Gwen’s spirits hadn’t exactly been high after she left home with Miguel and Jess. Day after day, she’d spent hours swallowing back tears because of how much she missed her father, and her old life. But Gwen had found friends. Much of the Spider-Society had welcomed her with open arms and comforting words. She had met Hobie and Pavitr- who came to feel more like a family than anything else eventually. But deep down, the whole time, even when Gwen was happy on the exterior- there was a hole, more like a void, that sucked things in- that started out small but slowly grew inside her. The void engulfed every moment she ever felt happy away from home. She had tried to avoid it, deny it, lie to herself and tell her that she was alright without her old life. The band that she deeply regretted quitting. Her school friends. The memories of Peter and her mother.

Her father.

And then Gwen wasn’t okay anymore. Every moment she spent with Jess as her mentee- and sometimes her friend- gave her painful reminders of having a parent. Being someone’s daughter again. It was when Jess would celebrate Gwen’s little victories with her and every now and then gossiped about Miguel to her. When Jess taught her how to be a better hero and offered solace when the hole within Gwen sometimes felt bigger than her heart. Even when Jess scolded Gwen, it only made her think of home.

And then Gwen had befriended Pavitr and Hobie. They had become her closest friends. Hobie became like an older brother to her and Pavitr like someone she had known her whole life. It should have been nice. But the void just pulled that in too. All the good Gwen felt when she was with them just was ripped away, leaving only dark thoughts of Peter and how much she longed for his presence. And the terrible guilt that was left, constantly screaming at her for replacing him. And Miles? God. He was too painful to even think of for a second.

Gwen felt as if she was letting everyone down somehow. All this charity and kindness and friendship she had received and she was still plagued with depression. She felt so ungrateful. Shouldn’t having friends and a whole new support system make her feel happier? She was so lost and confused. Why did things that used to make her happy now just feel like a chore? Gwen hadn’t been near a drum set in weeks. She never swung on her webs like she used to unless Jess or Miguel told her that she had a mission. Her Spider-Suit she was wearing now was dingy and worn.

So the hole grew bigger.

All this had made Gwen think that she would be happier if she just went back home. For a moment she did consider simply going back. She ached for the warmth of her father’s hug, for the embrace of a home that knew her better than she knew herself, to be within walls that had comforted her without fail every time she was down.

Which was why it hurt her so, so much to recall that that home wasn’t a thing that existed for her anymore.

The look in his eyes, the authority of a cop in his voice when he pointed a gun at Gwen- his little girl- it was a memory that tortured her every single day. She had never felt so completely betrayed and utterly alone. The same hands that had wiped her tears when she sobbed over Peter- the hands that had held and hugged her for hours when she lost her mother- were the same hands that lifted a firearm from his belt and pointed them at her- straight at her. Gwen could see straight down the barrel. Every time she closed her eyes, that was all she saw. The same memory stuck on repeat, that tore a little bit more from her very soul every time she relived it.

The void had made it so that this pain was all Gwen felt. Her chest and lungs ached constantly. It made her limbs heavy and eyes tired. She had not slept in what felt like weeks- the way that the hole left by the home she no longer had and the mind which she no longer felt safe in made sleep impossible. Gwen had done a decent job of putting up a facade, but in truth she felt like a ghost. She no longer fought back the sting of tears in her eyes or swallowed lumps in her throat. She was numb- and exhausted in every way imaginable. The pain felt like it had so far exceeded her threshold that she simply was unable to manage it anymore.

And that was when Gwen started to think of death.

At first it didn’t seem like anything too awful. She mostly thought of it when she was alone, maybe lying in bed or something. ‘Maybe I’d be better off dead.’ But she would scold herself, call herself selfish, and toss the thought aside- but not away.

But these thoughts began to plague her more and more often. It swallowed up all her reason. She thought nothing of being Spider-Woman or of her friends. Was death really so bad? Being alive was more painful than dying ever could be. Lately she just felt like she was sleepwalking, or like she wasn’t in her body anymore. Everything was gray and dull. Even when Gwen wasn’t consciously thinking about things that made her sad, the weight of the feelings still dragged her down. The thoughts of death became more than just thoughts and formed into a monster, one that was always chasing after her with claws outstretched, one that she could never outrun no matter how she tried. And she was so tired of running that after a while, death began to seem more like an angel rather than a beast, one sent to deliver her from the hell she had been tormented by for months.

Gwen finally showed some sign of life as she looked up over the city, just as the last beams of sunlight faded into the night sky.

The monster inched closer and closer. It was creeping. It knew it didn’t have to run anymore.

Gwen fell over the edge.

She didn’t consciously realize she had fallen, but something within her that had been fighting and scratching at her very being for months suddenly felt settled.

Her eyes closed.

Jess flew through the night air at what seemed like light speed and caught the girl seconds before she hit the ground.

————————————————————

The trip back to headquarters was wordless. Gwen neither spoke nor showed any signs of actual life without being prompted. Jess’s grip on Gwen’s wrist was so tight it would’ve hurt Gwen had she not been so detached.

Jess had brought Gwen back to Miguel’s office, keeping the girl at her side the entire time. Miguel had been ready to object at the intrusion, but upon seeing the expression on Jess’s face and the state of Gwen beside her, he bit back his words. Lyla had been all over the two with questions, seeming frantic and concerned enough for an AI- all of which Jess answered in a flat but somehow very pained voice. Gwen didn’t even seem to be conscious of what was going on. Her hair hung over her face and her head was kept down so that a shadow concealed most of her eyes.

Gwen was ordered to remain at headquarters by Miguel, where she would be provided a bedroom that could be kept tabs on over surveillance. Lyla popped in from time to time. Nobody tried to get Gwen to speak. It was clear that was a futile mission. Eventually she had to be given sleeping pills.

It would not be the first time Gwen attempted to end her life. She got ahold of the sleeping pills before dawn the very next morning and made a second attempt, after which it was deemed that she wouldn’t be able to stay in the room alone. Jess wound up staying with her until morning, but eventually had to leave. Before departing, she told Lyla to make sure Gwen was not left alone, to which Lyla agreed and later summoned Spider-Punk.

Hobie was never seen without Gwen for several days after. Despite his disdain for being at the Spider-Society, he stayed with Gwen the whole time, who was not allowed to leave headquarters alone. He waited for her outside the bathroom and stayed awake with her until he watched her fall asleep. But after some time Hobie had business to attend to on his home world, and Jess wound up convincing Miguel to have Lyla remain by her side unless she was asleep or in the bathroom.

Gwen made three more attempts on her life before it seemed like she had decided to give up, or at least give it a rest. Even Miguel became concerned after the fourth time. She remained under constant surveillance for weeks. When she did leave headquarters eventually, Hobie, Pavitr, or any other acquaintance she had would always be with her.

But Gwen still hasn’t slept well.