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olsenmyolsen · 4 months

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This Is Me Trying - Two - (A Y/N Parker Spider-Woman X Kate Bishop Story)

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Summary: The Hawkeyes and you seem to be on the same track...

Word Count: 3.5K

Content: College stress, Flirty Kate Bishop, Clint being a dad

"Kate Bishop! Your crush! Asked you that!? No way!" Ned, of course, couldn't believe it. But this was the same man who didn't realize he was going out with Betty Brant for two weeks

"What did you say after she asked?" MJ questioned when she looked up from behind her laptop on the couch.

"I said, "yeah!" and "that's awesome." Was that good?"

MJ shook her head. "Truly a wordsmith." Sarcastic as ever. MJ went back to her screen to basically ignore you and Ned.

"Well, anyways, congrats," Ned said, getting up from the dining room table where his and Peter's LEGO Death Star was kept. Why was it in your dorm and not there's you had no idea. But MJ helped from time to time, so you figured it was okay.

Ned and you walked into your room and closed the door.

"You know it's a good thing everyone knows you're gay, or else the amount of time we go to your room alone would be suspicious." You froze and thought about Ned's words. "Yeah, I guess... I wonder what MJ thinks we do?"

"I think Peter said we watch movies that she'd disapprove of."

That made sense. "Hmm, alright." You walked over to your bed and flopped onto it while you waited for Ned to do what he needed to do.

3...2...1. "Okay, got it." He said as your fingers formed into a 0. "Alright, what am I looking at?" Ned had pulled up security footage from a traffic light from three weeks ago.

"Okay, this was when that building on 10th in Hell's Kitchen burned down." Ned played the video, and it showed a group of guys in Tracksuits fleeing from the building as they piled into a black SUV moments prior to the building going up.

"Okay. So the Tracksuits are back.." You thought out loud as Ned moved his cursor to another video.

"This was from last week on 3rd in Harlem." The video played and was almost identical to the third one. Except the SUV and the plates on the car were different.

You stood in thought as the last video started. "This was last night."

You recognized the building immediately as you remember zipping past it last night. Just like the other two videos, it played out the same. When the video stopped, Ned looked at you.

"Okay, so as bad as their fashion choice is, they're not idiots. They have different cars and plates every time. Their faces are covered, and let me guess, if we follow the cars light by light, they end up at a chop shop?"

Ned nodded.

"So... it's gotta be the buildings." Ned tilted his head. "What do you mean? It's not the chop shops?" You shook your head. "Chop shops are easy to bust. It's like they want you to follow them there. The buildings. The ones they burn. That's the real money."

Ned looked from you to the screen.

"So you think these tracksuit guys are burning the buildings for insurance money?" You shook your head and entered your closet to change into your Spidey Suit.

Just because you're gay doesn't mean you want guy your friend Ned to see you.

"No, I think someone is hiring these guys to do it." You huffed as you remembered who had the tracksuit mafia in his pocket last time.

Wilson Fisk. The Kingpin.

He was a roach you could never squash just right.

If he owned the buildings, that means there was a lot more at play.

"Okay." You stepped out of the closet and quickly scarfed down a leftover slice of pizza Ned had. "Do you think you could find out who owns these buildings?" Ned nodded. "It's probably a bunch of shell companies, but I can do my best." You patted him on the shoulder. "Thanks, man." You hurried across your room and grabbed your mask.

"Oh, and when Peter comes over, could you maybe not tell him I went patrolling? Tell him I overheard something on the radio." Ned gave a flat smile.

Lying was not his strong suit.

"If you do, I'll-"

"Hey, Y/N, are you still in there?" You gave a panicked look to Ned before putting on your mask and twhiping away before MJ wildly opened the door.

She looked from the open window to Ned.

"Where's Y/N?"

"Uhhh..." Ned was really bad at lying. "She left..ago- a while ago!" He was in trouble. "Yeah?" MJ crossed her arms and leaned against the doorframe. "How come I didn't see her leave?"

Ned's brain scrambled.

"Blindness?" Ned said, making MJ stand up straighter. "I turn a blind eye to many things, Ned, but this won't be one of them." She uncrossed her arms and stretched her arm out to grab the door handle to the room. "By the way, nice camera footage, totally not suspicious at all." She thinned her eyes and hummed as she closed the door.

After swinging for what felt like a good enough distance away from campus, you stood on the roof of an old pizzeria.

Your phone chimed, and you had a text from Ned. "Did my best. Sorry. 😭😭😭"

You laughed and reassured him that he wouldn't be fired from his guy-in-the-chair duties.

"Keep me posted on the buildings." You sent your final text and put your phone away.

You then stared out into the boro you find yourself in. In the distance, you can see what remains of a shootout you helped rescue people from two months ago. You think about a girl you saved who said she wanted to be like you when she grew up.

Your heart warmed, and you told her to stay in school and that she'd be better than you.

Which was looking more and more accurate by the day as you leaped off the pizzeria, ignoring a text from your brother about the essay you still needed to do.

At the same time, Kate Bishop entered her dorm room, walking past her blonde roommate and fast friend Cassie Lang at her desk before Kate collapsed facedown onto her bed.

"What's wrong?" The slightly shorter of the two, Cassie, turned around and asked. "Tired." Kate's muffled voice spoke.

"How late were you out last night?" Cassie asked as she stood up, approaching her friend's bed. "Past 3," Kate said, making Cassie go wide-eyed. "Kate Bishop! The rule was 2:30 at the latest!"

Kate rolled over and lifted herself up. "I'm sorry." She pouted at her friend, who instantly pulled her into a comforting hug that turned into Kate leaning on Cassie's shoulder. "What else is wrong?" Cassie asked as she saw how exhausted Kate looked.

"Nothing," Kate said, but Cassie wasn't so sure. "Are you doing some overthinking?" Kate froze eventually before nodding. "What about?"

"Clint and the Tracksuits."

Kate spoke freely about her other life to Cassie.

Kate used to tell people openly about how she was working with an Avenger, but after what happened with her mom and Kingpin last year, she toned it down.

Now, the only people who know are Cassie, Pizza Dog, and a rouge assassin for hire. Plus, Clint and his family.

Cassie only found out when she woke up in the middle of the night to see Kate in her Hawkeye outfit on the floor.

Kate tripped, falling through the window, and busted her chin.

Kate wanted to tell more people like you. But as previously mentioned. She liked you and didn't want you to get hurt because of her.

So, she kept her Hawkeye circle small.

However, Kate couldn't get the idea out of her head... what if she told you?

"Kate?" Cassie poked the forehead of her dorm mate. "Where'd you go?" She asked.

Kate sat up and cracked her neck, ignoring the question. Cassie noticed as she raised her eyebrows and returned to her desk. Choosing schoolwork, Chemistry in particular, over prying answers from Kate.

"Do you think I should tell Y/N?" Kate spoke up and waited for Cassie to turn around. But she didn't.

"Cass?" Kate asked as she stepped off her bed and walked next to her friend. "Cass?" She asked again before realizing Cassie had put in her AirPods.

Cassie turned to her left and jumped, startled, before pulling them out. "Oh shit. What's up?!" Kate opened her mouth. "I..- nothing. I just was going to tell you that I.. wanted to.."

She couldn't do it.

"I wanted to invite Y/N to my archery practice!" Kate put on a smile and watched her friend's face light up.

"Oh my God, I love that! Please do it! Ugh, she's so pretty!" Cassie was happy for her friend finally doing something about her crush. "She is," Kate replied with a blush. "Think she'll show?" Kate then asked.

"Why wouldn't she?" Cassie tilted her head, entirely focused on the conversation.

Cassie and you had hung out briefly when your friend group and Kate's got together, but she has never witnessed how your superhero life affects you.

Kate shrugs. "Lately, Y/N has been... flaky isn't the right word.. but not here? I guess? She's always tired too. She bails on plans with her and Peter sometimes."

Cassie raised an eyebrow. "How do you know?"

"I've seen it at the library. Their study block is next to mine." Cassie nodded. "Plus, MJ's told me."

"Michelle Jones?" Cassie questions, making Kate nod. "She's roommates with Y/N, right?" Kate nods again. "Well, what does she think." Kate folds her lips into her mouth and raises her eyebrows.

"She thinks Y/N is The Spider."

Cassie's mouth drops before forming into a smile of laughter. "What?!" Kate nods with her own smile. "It's true. She's convinced."

Cassie laughs, making Kate giggle. "She took pictures of The Spider over a summer once. That doesn't mean she's THE Spider." Kate nodded as her smile naturally faded. "That would be funny," Kate said, making Cassie laugh again.

"Well, good luck with having your crush at practice tomorrow." Kate waved Cassie off as she went to the bathroom to shower and change. "Going out?" Cassie yelled through the closed bathroom door.

"Not till later. Why?" Kate replied as she took her top off. Her eyes finding a yellow bruise on her chest. "Looks like it's gonna snow."

And snow it did.

It started to come down after you stopped an armed robbery. Armed being used lightly as the men committing the crime were carrying toy guns.

Plus, the bank they chose to hit was a block down from a police station.

So, as you swung back up onto a nearby roof, snow hit your mask. You smiled and lifted up the mask to expose your mouth and nose. You inhaled and exhaled, watching your breath hang in the air.

The snow touched your face and melted against your warm pink cheeks.

It was cool and calming.

A few seconds of much-needed peace.

"I love snow." You whispered to yourself as the wind blew, making you shiver, but you remained now sitting on the roof with your smiling face to the darkened sky.

After enough time, you pulled out your phone.

"I should see if anyone needs any help." But before you could check the Friendly Neighborhood Spidey App, you were receiving a call from an unknown number.

"Ew, who calls anyone after 7?"

You weighed the options of answering it due to your fear of talking on the phone, but after three rings, you caved. "Hello?"

"Yes, hello, I'm calling for a Y/N Parker." The male voice on the other end sounded familiar.

"This is she." You said, standing up. "Ah, Y/N! Nice to put a voice to a list of your academic achievements." The male chuckled. "This is Dr. Otto Octavius." You physically stopped pacing and smiled. Holy crap! You were speaking to THE Dr. Octavius!

"Dr. Octavius! Hello! Wow, I can't believe you called. I take it Dr. Connors passed along... well, my life." You sent a small laugh Otto's way. "He did." He replied with a smile. "And I must say he was right; you're a bright student, Y/N."

You made a "yeah!" gesture with your arm.

"But-" Oh no! "I agree with Connors when he says you've been struggling. I can see just by looking at your grades and past reports that you're lazy. Brilliant but lazy."

"I- I'm trying to do better." You paved around the empty rooftop. "I've just had a lot of personal stuff happening lately."

The other side of the line went quiet.

"Parker, intelligence is not a privilege. It's a gift."

You opened your mouth to defend yourself, butDr. Octavius stopped you. Do you think you'll be free after the holidays?" You perked up at that and stood on your tiptoes.

Was he saying what you thought he was saying?

"Uh yes- yes sir! You'll have my undivided attention!"

Dr. Octavius hummed.

"On the second Monday after the new year, I'd like to speak with you face to face. From there, we can see how we'll proceed with one another. That's about a month away, Parker. That should give you time to get your other affairs in order."

You nodded your head. "Yes, sir. Thank you!"

"I'll email you the information and where to meet me two weeks from now. Happy Holidays."

The line went dead, and you cheered. You just got an interview with Dr. Otto Octavius. He called you lazy, but he also said you were brilliant!

You put your phone away and jumped off the roof of the building with an aloud cheer that you were certain people did not appreciate.

Meanwhile, Kate was unlocking the door to her aunt's place to meet up with Clint. What she wasn't expecting was for Clint to be there already.

"Trust me, I don't plan on missing two Christmas' in a row."

Clint was on the phone.

Kate quietly closed the door, dropped her bag, and quiver on the floor.

"Laura..." Clint sounded tired. "With Kingpin back, I'd feel awful if I left and something happened." Kate's lips formed into a flat line. "Yeah, no, she's great. Kicking ass on her own." Clint said and laughed when his wife replied back.

Kate tried to remain quiet, but a floorboard creaking under her left foot gave her away. Lucky's head shot up from Clint's lap, making the archer turn around. "Hey, babes, Hawkeye just arrived, so I gotta go. Yeah. Yeah. I'll be safe. Love you too."

Clint smiled before hanging up. "She says hi." Kate nodded and told Clint to tell Laura hi the next time they spoke.

Kate grabbed a spot on the loveseat next to the couch.

"I didn't hear you come in," Clint spoke up as he put his phone away. "Don't know if that's my old age or..." He tapped his ear. "Maybe I'm just getting better at sneaking around," Kate replied with a smile.

Clint nodded his head with a chuckle. Kate was saving him from embarrassment.

Clint was still struggling with his hearing loss.

"Yeah, well... maybe it's all three," Clint said as he looked away from Kate. His hand still petting the dog.

Something in the room always shifted when talks like these happened. It reminded the two archers that time and missions with one another were limited.

Clint couldn't do this forever.

He didn't want to do this forever. He had a family and a life outside of being Hawkeye.

But damn, if he wasn't going to miss someone, he considers family—an annoying girl who was somehow more skilled than him but clumsy as hell, Kate Bishop.

Clint kicked his tongue and scooted Lucky off his lap before getting up and grabbing a water from the ridge and a laptop from his bag. "While you were at school. I got a friend to do a little research."

Clint returned, sitting at the edge of the couch closest to Kate. He opened the laptop and clicked on a folder of files. Blueprints. Bank records. Phone calls and messages all popped up on the screen.

"A friend?" Kate asked with a knowing smirk.

Clint ignored her as he took a sip of water. Clicking on the map of the city. Certain buildings highlighted in red. Others in grey. "What am I looking at?"

"The red ones are the burned-down buildings." Kate took a look at the map again. "And the grey... Potential targets?" Clint nodded before clicking on another file. It was a picture taken by Clint last night. "This is a zoomed-in photo of the blueprint on the Tracksuits wall."

"Their next target?" Kate asked. "I think so. We find one of the grey buildings that matches this blueprint." He pointed to the screen. "We can stop them."

Stop them, hurt them, make them confess, give us the details and whereabouts of Wilson Fisk.

You know, that kind of stop them.

Kate looked at the screen again. She moved pieces of her hair behind her ears before leaning into the screen. "How do we know they'll target one of the grey ones?"

Clint moved the cursor on the screen and clicked on an open tab. Finical records. "The ones burned down and these ones." The ones highlighted grey. "Are all owned by different shell companies, but when you really start digging deep, you find that they all go to the same place. Red Lion National Bank."

"Kingpin," Kate said.

Clint nodded. "He owns them all."

"So what he uses these buildings as cash houses and then burns them down when they aren't needed?" Clint shrugged. "It's a working theory. I'm sure there's more involved than money." Kate agreed.

"This one looks like the blueprint. But... but so does this one." Kate said as she clicked between two different buildings.

"It's probably built by the same company that's why they're not so different." Clint thought. "We could go stake out one and see how much movement happens."

"Sounds good to me. Doesn't look that far away. I mean it's far but- you get what I mean." She flopped her hand at Clint.

He laughed.

"Alright well, let me go get changed and we'll be off." Clint stood up and clapped his hands. "Oh, I also already fed Lucky and took him out so no need to worry."

Pizza Dog perked his ears up.

"Awww did Uncle Clint already take care of you?" Kate turned on her baby voice as she leaned over to kiss and pet the dog. "You're such a good boy!" Lucky's tail started wagging. Clint playfully rolled his eyes as he walked to the bathroom.

As she waited Kate's mind started to wander.

"Alright, we just about ready?" Clint asked as he zipped up his vest and grabbed his bow. Kate stood up putting her phone into her pocket and nodded. "My stuff's by the door."

"Great." Clint and Kate made their way to the front door to finish gathering what they needed. "Oh, here." Clint tossed Kate a purple beanie.

She smiled and looked at Clint. "Occasion?"

"It's cold and snowing outside. Can't have you getting sick." Kate's heart warmed at that whether it was sarcastic or not. "Thanks. Where'd you get it?" She asked a she released her hair from its ponytail

"Stopped by my place in the city earlier. Found it in the closet."

What Clint failed to tell Kate is that the beanie wasn't store-bought.

It was handmade.

And before you ask. God, no Clint didn't spend hours crocheting a hat together.

Natasha Romanoff did.

"Looks better on you kid." Clint smiled as Kate dawned it with pride. "Hawkeye and Hawkeye. One with a beanie the other with a hearing aid!" Kate posed as if she was shooting an arrow and exaggerated her voice.

"Had to ruin it didn't you?" Clint teased as he opened the door.

"Bye, Lucky!" Clint waved to the dog before entering the hall. "Bye, Pizza Dog! Be good!" Kate flipped all but one light switched off and locked the door.

As the two archers made their trek to the location marked on Clint's phone he spoke up simply because he couldn't help himself.

"So... who were you texting earlier?"

Kate looked to her right confused. However, she knew what Clint was talking about. "Come on. Don't give me that look. I may be deaf at times but I'm never blind." Clint bumped into Kate as they kept waking. "Don't forget I'm also the father of a teenage daughter."

Kate had him there.

"A friend." She said. "Oh, a friend! Are they nice?" Kate nodded. "She's nice." Clint smiled. She. "Does she know about this?" Clint pointed to the arrows on Kate's back.

Kate shook her head. "She knows I do archery but that's it." Clint looked at Kate's side profile. "But you want to tell her?" Kate looked up. "How'd you know?"

Clint exhaled.

"Because Kate you like this friend of yours. You're young. Oh, and you're terrible at keeping secrets."

"Am not."

She was.

In Clint's eyes, it was a miracle the whole world didn't know the real identity of the "new" Hawkeye.

"Regardless, are you going to tell them?"

Kate shrugged. "I don't know."

Clint patted her shoulder. "That's alright." Kate smiled. "I invited her to my archery practice tomorrow and to study afterward. The text was about her coming over."

Clint raised his eyebrows. "Oh well as long as you're safe."

Kate furrowed her eyebrows and tilted her head. But before she could reply her phone buzzed.

It was a text from you.

"Sounds great! 🎯"

You smiled as you hit send.

Your fingers remained tightly gripped around your phone as you twhiped yourself through an alleyway.

You thought about double-texting Kate. Asking her how she was or what she was doing. Or why the sudden invite to her archery practice?

Was it just for fun? The want to hang out with you? Or did Kate truly just want to show off her toned arms and skills with a bow?

Could it be all of the above?

You closed out your messages app before you could accidentally send a double text and focused on your tingling.

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lunarfleur · 4 months

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Christmas Is The Time To Say I Love You ~ Earth 42! Miles Morales

Summary: On the corner, carolers are singing. There's a touch of magic in the air. From grownup to minor no one could be finer. Times are hard but no one seems to care

Warnings:Cursing

A/N: Happy Holidays, everyone! I know it’s late, but I wanted to get something out for everyone! Enjoy!

Tagging: @juneberrie @sluggmuffin @hiyaitssans @nagi3seastorm @luvjunie @milesmolasses @n1cole-ghost @kombuuuu

This is x fem! reader!

On the corner, carolers are singing

There's a touch of magic in the air

The mixed smell of foods filled the building. Hams, mashed potatoes, green beans, freshly-baked rolls…the whole complex was warm.

The lobby was decorated with a big Christmas tree, ribbons hanging off the walls, and fake presents tucked neatly into separate corners of the room. People marched in and out-happily chatting with one another while they carried plates of food.

From grownup to minor no one could be finer

Times are hard but no one seems to care

Truth be told, Miles never cared for parties much. He knew his mother liked them, she enjoyed talking with the other adults in the building. It made her feel relaxed, as she spent too much time working to make any friends.

But, as per usual, Miles sat in the corner. His plate of food sat in his lap. Miles’s Sony headphones covered his ears, Wu-Tang playing loudly. The corners of his lips stayed down, frowning at the sight of so many people.

But his eyes stayed on her.

Miles couldn’t find a word, in either English nor Spanish, to describe her. Beautiful didn’t come close. Maybe heavenly was the word?

Christmas Eve and all the world is watching

Santa guides his reindeer through the dark

He watched her eyes glance up, lighting up at the sight of him hunched in the corner. She smiled, a bright beam that could melt all the snow in Brooklyn, and hurried through the crowd of people over to him.

“Miles!” She cheered. “You have no idea how glad I am that you’re here.”

“Hey,” he shrugged, smiling lightly.

“The parties in this place never seem to get any easier," she sighed, chuckling. Miles snorted, nodding in agreement.

Miles tossed his plate to the side, pulling his headphones around his and grabbing his jacket in his hand.

“Let’s get outta here,” he said, nodding.

But from rooftop to chimney, from Harlem to Bimini

They will find a way into your heart

New York winters never seem to get any warmer, and [Name]’s clothing choices never seem to get any smarter.

A thin layer of snow covered the roof. The air seemed to bite at the skin of anyone who touched it. A chill ran up her spine as the two teens overlooked the city.

Miles glanced between the girl and his jacket. His hands were tense and numb. Yet, despite the fact, he reached over behind her to place the clothing gently around her. It hung off her shoulders.

“You’re gonna get yourself sick.”

A sheepish chuckle left her lips as she tucked her arms inside the sleeves. It smelled of his mother’s candles and his cologne; sandalwood and cleanliness.

Across from them, they could see the large mural Miles had painted for his father. ‘Captain Jeff Morales,’ it read, ‘Husband, Father, Hero. Rest In Power.’ She knew it well.

[Name] often found herself going up to the roof when she needed inspiration. She’d looked at that mural a million times, at least, and she always found herself going back to Miles. Her sketchbook was filled with him, the same way her heart was.

“Sure as hell am glad we’re on break,” Miles scoffed. He wasn’t the biggest fan of going to Visions. Sure, there was getting to room with Ganke and taking the cool art class, but he was too far away from his mom. He missed her while he was at school, and has come home on school nights many times just to be in his home again.

“Yeah,” [Name] chuckled. She tucked herself further into his jacket. If she could, she’d sew it onto her skin so she could smell it until she died.

“Lemme tell you, I hate Mrs. Sanchez.” Miles shook his head, frowning at the thought of his least favorite teacher though.

“But don’t you have over 100% in her class?”

“That ain’t got nothin to do with it.”

[Name] laughed, nodding her head in understanding.

A tense silence hung over the two. The cold air was numbing their skin, but Miles swore he was on fire. His crewneck didn’t do much for him.

Just outside the window, snow is falling

But here beside the fire we share the glow

“Miles?”

Looking over at her, [Name] was staring down at the busy New York streets. There was a bit of hesitation in her normally smooth voice. It sounded weak.

“Hm?”

“Do you remember when Ms. Brown made us do that free-writing assignment? About something we felt strongly about?”

“Yeah.”

Of course he remembered. Of all things he could have written about, he had to choose her. His English teacher had given him a knowing look, smirking at him. He had gotten an A on that assignment.

“What did you write about?”

“Well, love…I guess.”

“Love?”

Maybe Miles was imagining it, but he wished to every star above that the look she had in her eyes was hope. He prayed for it.

Miles nodding. [Name] did the same.

“Me too.”

Oh.

Love? Was there someone? Was it him?

“Is there…someone?” He couldn’t hide the disappointment in his voice.

“Do you believe in soulmates?”

Of moonlight and brandy, sweet talk and candy

Sentiments that everyone should know

It was a sudden question. It caught Miles off guard.

“Soulmates? Why?”

“Do you think it’s true? That everyone has someone meant for them?”

Miles thought for a minute, rubbing the skin of his hand to make some friction.

“I don’t see why not.”

[Name] brought the sleeve of Miles’s jacket up to her nose. His scent was addicting, almost. It gave her chills in the way it was so relaxing to her.

“Do you think we’re friends in every universe?”

Miles glanced at her. His face heated up at his response, the only one he could come up with.

“In every other universe…is that all we are?”

[Name] turned toward him, eyes big with curiosity. The wind blew, and she watched as Miles’s braids swayed in the wind.

“I don’t understand,” She finally admitted

His body now facing her, [Name] had Miles’s full attention. The lamp lights reflected in his eyes, spots of yellow in brown and green. He stepped forward.

Memories of the year that lays behind us

Wishes for the year that's yet to come

“I’m saying that I wanna be with you.”

“You what?”

His breath fogged in front of his face with every exhale. His hands were hot and sweaty, a big difference to how they felt before. This was happening, unplanned and far too in-the-moment for his own good.

And it stands to reason that good friends in season

Make you feel that life has just begun

“I dunno know how to explain, but there ain’t a single day I don’t think about.”

“Miles?”

“Since the day I met you, [Name]. I…”

“Are you…being for real?”

“Every day up until now, I counted the number of times you’d smile at me. I just about died on days you didn’t.”

Christmas is the time to say "I love you"

“I don’t wanna just say “I like you” and leave it at that. I want you to understand me.”

“Wow, Miles. I never thought you..”

“[Name]? Do you understand me?”

Share the joys of laughter and good cheer

“Yeah, I do.”

“And?”

Christmas is the time to say "I love you"

“Of course I have feelings for you, Miles.”

And a feeling that will last all through the year

“Are you being for real?” Miles echoed.

Miles laughed. [Name] saw the way his nose scrunched. Miles didn’t normally smile so big. It was bright, like a little kid getting a pony on their birthday.

“More for real than ever.”

So when spirits grow lighter

And hopes are shining brighter

Miles leaned against the railing. He played off the way his heart was threatening to explode, the way his body was on fire. She was closer to him now than she was before.

Then you know that Christmas time is here

Love is not proportional to volume. It does not obey the laws of physics. This girl, one simple girl, was pulling Miles toward her with more force than the sun and every planet could give.

She gave him a smile andleaned closer to connect their shoulders. Flowers bloomed under his skim.

847 smiles from the day they met.

#Spotify #christmas #earth 42 miles morales x you #earth 42 miles x you #earth 42 miles fluff #earth 42 miles x reader #earth 42 miles morales #earth 42 miles morales x reader #atsv #across the spiderverse #spiderman #spider man: across the spider verse #billy squier

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cinemajunkie70 · 2 years

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We do not produce great men like Larry Cohen anymore and we are the poorer for it. The summer of 96, I rented a lot of his movies. I was 15 and they made a vivid impression on me. Especially Q: The Winged Serpent!!! Please help me wish a very happy birthday to one of the best to ever do it, Larry Cohen!!

#larry cohen #king cohen #q the winged serpent #itt’s alive #the stuff #black caesar #it lives again #maniac cop #it’s alive 3 #the ambulance #maniac cop 2 #god told me to #hell up in Harlem #cellular #phone booth #original gangstas #movies #filmmaker #a return to Salem’s lot

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homiesondaweb · 7 months

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Anybody order some Jefferson and Aaron angst😁😁😁 CUS I AM DELIVERING IT HOT AND FRESH 🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️

Also give me Aaron and Jefferson background or give me death!

_______________________________

Aaron sat on his motorcycle in the private alley behind his and Jefferson’s new studio apartment since they've moved operations from Harlem to Brooklyn. Snowflakes whisk around in the swift chilly breeze, its just start to stick to the ground as sleet. Aaron's Prowler gear is hidden under his bomber jacket as he checked his messages, refreshing over and over again but the top one still remained that same.

JD: 210, grabbin beer rn. Game should be on channel 12.

Code for: Urgent, meet me at 9pm at the base.

Aaron glances at the glaring 8:57 at the top of his blackberry. Sighing as he fully parks and cloaks his bike before using the fire escape to make his way up. There he finds his older brother pacing nervously, four black and milds burned to the plastic nub, he anxiously shakes a blue can of spary-paint and some jagged design that Aaron can only describe as panic personified is on the far wall that conceals some gear.

"JD! What the hell man? Had me buggin', Cottonmouth give you some BS or something?" Aaron asks, coming over and clapping a hand on his brother's shoulder. Jefferson blows his current cloud of tobacco high out of Aaron's face before squashing the tip out and adding some flawless circles to the piece.

"I…Ri…we gotta get outta this shit bro." Jefferson bumbles for a moment and Aaron frowns a look of confusion.

"What? Fuck is you talking bout ? What about Rio?" Aaron asks and Jefferson groans and flops to the floor, letting the can roll away. He gives no care to his white hoodie as he sags against the wall of wet paint. Aaron feels creeped out by how young and dumb his brother looks at the moment. Like he's 15 and not 25. He doesn't like it at all.

Aaron squats down next to him and tries to pat out the glassy look in Jeff's eyes. His brother starts to breathe heavily, panic bubbling.

"Rio is pregnant! Like with my baby and I…."

"Damn." Aaron slides to fully sit and Jeff slumps forward and rests his head in his hands, forcing his own head between his knees and thring to steady his breathing. One of those recenter-ing tactics that Rio showed him probably.

"Jeff, if y'all need money fo-"

"She's pregnant wit my kid and Cottonmouth just had us stalk out and scare that one lady who was pregnant and what if that was Rio and-and that fucked her up. We've busted houses and collected in places with kids before what-wh- STOP!" Aaron shakes Jefferson's shoulder hard and the broader of the two of them sits up ramroad straight.

"Calm down nigga, you doin' that spiraling shit that Rio was talking about JD!" Aaron tells him loudly. He gets up and digs around in one of the drawers at the kitchen counter before pulling out a blunt then grabbing a forty of Olde English. He dumps the self medication in his brother's lap and Jeff just huffs and looks at it.

"So, Rio is pregnant. Is she too far out or something for the clinic? You know all we gotta do is call Bunky and she'd find a hanger lady for her."

"Fuck no! I'd never endanger Rio like that, fuck you nigga!" Jefferson curses as he pops the bottle and swings back the first quarter of it. Aaron holds his hands up to disengage him.

"Don't shoot the messenger for the truth bru. With the way you've been sloppy with Cottonmouth's and that new dude King's menace missions lately. I'd hate to have a vulnerability like that. We're getting to a new level in the game bro, that ain't just jacking bank trucks and doing snow drops anymore. A baby will fuck it up. And Rio will not be for this shit. Hell, she might even snitch you out when she finds out that your money from "Security" work ain't so clean."

"Rio would never snitch on me." Jeff glares and Aaron laugh around a puff of the blunt then passes it over.

"Yo girl not mine. All my pussy know what kinda life we live. Live the life we live. Work how we work. You the one who went over to the Heights and got a PR princess that's smarter than you in two languages. Rio's gonna learn the truth if y'all go through with a baby." Aaron tells him and Jeff continues a hard stare to the floor.

"... and just what should I tell her, Master Splinter, since you're so damn wise." Jefferson chuckles darkly with another deep drink. Aaron rolls his eyes.

"She's 23 and just graduated nursing school. She shouldn't fuck her life up with a baby and a bum nigga."

"I'm notta fucking bum!"

"Pretend Jefferson! Either give her the cash to get rid of it and y'all continue on. Or drive her off. She doesn't know the shit we do and we both know what it's like to be raised in the game. Hell, Cottonmouth knowing we brothers is already a slippery slope. You havin' too many folks you care about, known about? Will end up with them dead, we know this. It's why sissy stays down in Jacksonville and mind her own business. Prowler and Lurk have nothing to do with Lady Blue. Shit like that, keeps all of us alive." Aaron reminds him. Jeff growls out in frustration and drives a fist into the plaster of the wall. The blue target he painted earlier crushed within it.

"Fuck!"

"Jeff, what th-"

"What if I don't wanna do this no more."

Both brothers go quiet at the slurred confession. Jefferson gets up and finishes the bottle, Aaron sighs as Jeff rolls the wide bottle between his hands.

"JD le-"

"I don't wanna do this no more. It isn't helping anyone. It's not good for us. I-I keep seeing… keep seeing the eyes of those kids scared outta they minds because I have they daddy or mama's head bashed into the kitchen title. I'd never hurt a kid but… do they know that? What if, they saw me just on the street taking Rio out somewhere or just in the Bodega.."

"That's why we wear a mask, Jeff. Calm the fuck down."

Jeff let's the bottle roll to the floor. He goes to his closet and throws his black and red costume to the floor. The mask isn't much really. A dark red base with three horizontal black lines over his brows, nose, and mouth. Red circle lens adjusted to his prescription over the eyes.

This mask is the face of Lurk. Where Prowler dragged claws behind him to make up for his lean from. Lurk's knuckles were studded, they would beat and beat and beat fear into whoever was his assignment.

He hasn't killed anyone yet. Just destroyed lives. Scarred people. All for money.

Jeff didn't want Lurk's face over his anymore. Not when he saw the most beautiful thing in the world in the form of a gray blob on a sonogram.

"I feel like the baby is a boy, mi vida! I know we have to wait a few more months to know but…I just know!" Rio teases as Jeff snuggles her belly while they rest in her bedroom. Her belly barely has a pudge past her usual shape. She's only a month and half along in the pregnancy at this point.

A person that is half of him and half of the angel who landed in his life three years ago. Who already had a big head for 9 weeks and Jeff's heart in their hand.

"He's going to be a smart baby! I used to like reading, you know, if I had the time, then maybe. But lately, I can't seem to keep a book out of my hands, I crave them like Maduros! Isn't that funny Jeff?"

His son. Does Jeff really want to be part of a world that is already so cruel? A world made scary because of guys like him and Aaron? Is Jeff even a real man to have Rio bring his son into a life like that, just like his father had done for Jeff and his siblings.

"You're too pussy to wear this mask JD. Too weak to be Prowler. Look at your baby brother, Aaron does what needs to be done for real success. He's a real man, he can pick up the claws but you? A waste of muscle, you're gonna be a goonie all your life. At least your sister is a business woman. What the fuck are you?"

"She's 4 months along." Jeff whispers and Aaron shoots up at that.

"What! Why did you wait so long to tell me?"

"You were on a long mission. I didn't want to mess you up when you were on such a touchy mission."

"Jefferson! Be fucking forreal bro!"

"I am! Gotdamit, I am! I'm….I'm done Aaron. Rio had an appointment today and I was staring at that grainy ass black and white picture and… my son, he's beautiful already. Not even here yet I… I can't have him in this life… Miles deserve better. I deserve better… even you and Brynn. Dad was so fucking wrong for putting us into this shit. We deserve better! We need to j-"

Jeff is cut off from his ramble by Aaron punching him in the face. Jeff quickly takes him down right back, the two physically fight. Knocking into the walls, into the coffee table then to the floor. Jefferson pins Aaron under him, one of his knees painfully drives one of Aaron's shoulders to the floor while Jeff struggles to peel Aaron hand from around his throat.

"Why you always gotta prove dad right! You're fuckin weak, you ain't no damn man. You ain't logical!"

"At least I ain't playing dress up in my daddy's damn clothes! I'm tired of this goon shit!" Jeff yells before wrenching Aaron's hand off and twisting it away. He jolts when Aaron cries out as a sickening pop echoes through the room. He scrambles back at that, hands shaking, whatever highs they had somehow chased crashed in an instant.

He just hurt his brother. His damn baby brother.

"Aaron… Ronnie baby… I-"

Aaron lets it go with a strong exhale. He breathes in again and holds his wince as Jefferson carefully brings him to a sit, then leans him against the wall. Its plaster crumbles even further around them, probably asbestos.

"Just shut up Jeff. Just shut the fuck up!" Aaron yells out as he tries to breath through the pain of a shoulder twisted out of socket. He breathed deep, real deep, pulling at the sense of numbness their father had taught him how to do on his first kill missin. To stop him from shaking with pity for a human being (sympathy, empathy, he didn't want to fucking do it but his dad had never shown so much pride). Pity halts a clean kill and a big payday.

Jeff takes Aaron's swift punch to the chest, right above his heart. It winds him up a little. He lets Aaron do it again.

And again.

And-

"Dad gave us this. We're legends to the crime world."

"We are their favorite goons and that's it."

"Fuck you, Jefferson. Put my shit back in place and get out then."

"..."

Jefferson does as such. With a swift and practiced tenderness he puts Aaron's shoulder back into place. Slips it into a brace and hands his baby brother painkillers and anti-inflammatories custom from Doc Ock. Aaron drinks it down with half of the last forty in the fridge.

As Aaron simmers on the couch, Jefferson rolls up Lurk's costume and studded knuckle dusters in a bulky bundle. He sets the keys to his motorcycle on the kitchen counter along with his business only burner phone. He gets to the door and looks back at Aaron who stares coldly ahead at the 10 o'clock Breaking News broadcast. Some big name witness that would have broken a cartel case has been found dead. Thoats gouged out, nearly decapitated with clawed slashes.

"Your cut is in the trunk." Aaron says, his voice all soft, deep, and robotic. Jeff closes the door, he numbly makes it down stairs. He floats as he gets into his Cadillac and drives across Brooklyn to Jamaica Bay.

He burns Lurk to ash, the mask and embers impression in the fire before he buries it in the sand. Jeff lumbers back to the car and opens the trunk. Sure enough, there in a black duffle bag is Jeff's cut of, 75,000$. A one-third of the mission price him and Aaron did a joint job on. That was always the deal with the Davis siblings. Everyone gets one-third. Even Brynn taps a PO box twice a month with profit from her blow and information business. They send her their one-third back to her laundered through jewelry.

Jefferson throws up behind the car. Flashes of blood, crushed in faces, broken limbs, slurred pleas through broken teeth, a screaming child crying for the parent Jeff was crushing in his hands, dance through his mind at each retch.

He leans against it after a few minutes of that then rests his forehead to the cold metal of his car. Praying it cures his fever of alcohol and emotions. He can't believe how warm and flushed he feels. The snowflakes melted instantly and join the sweat on his forehead and neck.

"¡Ay bendito! Jeff! You've got to learn how to regulate yourself better, papá!" Rio would chide him for being so worked up this late at night. Or this early in the morning. It was nearly 1 am.

He closes the trunk on the money. He knows he'll need it. He got an apartment to buy, a home to stock and a nursery to make now.

Aaron wakes up sore, and aching. The TV watching him and the world is white and bright through the window. The weather lady drones about last night's blizzard. He goes through the motions of resting up, thanking God Jeff pulled all that foolishness during his down period after the mission of the night before last. He pads into the bathroom and takes the hottest shower possible, careful to clean his face and hands of dried blood.

He cringes in the mirror but applies a bandage to the cut over his cheek and rubs cooling salave over the bruises. He pauses at the grainy black and white photo of something with a big ass head tucked in the corner of the bathroom mirror.

In Rio's loopy handwriting with a white maker she's made a text bubble in the empty space next to the baby's head.

"Hey Tio' Aaron :D! I'm Miles!"

Aaron huffs, lips twitching up before he washes his face and head back to the couch to have the rest of his beer for breakfast. As he dips his head back he ponders that grainy photo, ponders a childhood of being raised to follow their fathers footstep into the legacy of mercenary work. Jeff is too fucking soft, their father handed them the skills of success on a freaking platter and he's letting a Spanish Mamí and a baby stop that?

When nephew' gets here, I'm just gonna drop some stuff off to Jeff for congratulations and then I'm bouncing to Philly for a bit. Yeah, forget New York for a while. Forget Jefferson and what he swears I deserve.

#miles morales #1610 miles morales #spiderman across the spiderverse #spiderman into the spiderverse #spiderman across the verse #jeff morales #uncle aaron #aaron davis #miles morales angst #aaron davis headcanon #Aaron Davis angst #jefferson davis #Jefferson Davis angst #family angst

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nkjemisin · 8 months

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You should try to go see public works Tempest in central park, it’s really incredible and reminded me of the city we became. It’s super insane and beautiful and wild and hard to describe, so even though it’s insane to ask someone to go stand in line all day to see a play based off a random tumblr message I really think you should!

Oooh, I haven't done the line for Shakespeare in the Park in years. Not sure I still have it in me, since it requires getting up at 3 or 4 am and spending hours fighting line-jumpers and so on. But I've been hearing good things about this year's Tempest so maybe I'll muster up the energy. Thanks for the recommendation!

Since you reminded me of it, here's a deleted scene/alternate opening I once wrote for THE WORLD WE MAKE. I decided on a different opening for the final version, obvs, but maybe you'll enjoy what might have been. Cutting because long.

He's just a man standing on a rooftop. The outfit he's wearing is bespoke, by a Harlem tailor who came in second on Project Runway's last season. The jacket is rich brown suede, fine-stitched, over olive-tan pants and a piqué shirt of deepest royal indigo, and he's wearing the hell out of it. If there were anyone around to see, they'd think he was a model, standing in the kind of casual-at-attention pose that only men in magazine photo shoots ever do, with one hand in a pocket and his gaze thoughtfully locked on the cityscape horizon. The model aesthetic is reinforced by the fact that he's got a lean, strong figure and the kind of racial ambiguity that Hollywood diversity advocates love: brown skin that's not too brown, lips full enough to be either natural or recent collagen injections, thick eyebrows that are as sculpted as his cheekbones, eyes with just enough epicanthic fold to qualify as "exotic" but not in like an ethnic way.

He's not a model. He's just Manhattan, human representative of New York's contributions to the fashion, media, and sex work industries. He's not even trying particularly hard to look good. He has simply stopped resisting what comes naturally.

But he's about to be late for work -- and while New York custom permits a degree of conspicuous tardiness as a social power move in certain situations, this particular job is too personally important to him for such games. So he steps up onto the low wall that surrounds the roof, and then he steps off.

It's fine. The building is twelve stories tall; anything over five stories is required to have an elevator per city ordinance. He's been practicing, too, so all he has to do is shut his eyes and imagine, and the city's power holds him aloft in midair as solidly as if he's stepping onto flooring. (He is; it's just flooring that exists in several other iterations of his universe.) Even with this, however, he makes sure to take a step or two forward before calmly turning away from the cityscape. People don't usually stare at the back of an elevator, after all -- and verisimilitude is key. "First floor, please," he murmurs. In earlier days of the city, building elevators were a complicated luxury that required trained staff to operate. In current days of the city, many elevators run on voice activation. At Manhattan's request, there is an electronic ping of acknowledgement, followed by a very faint echo of blended, long-vanished voices: "Watch the door, please, watch your hands, going down." Then he begins to descend. It's smooth, slow; this is only a mid-sized building, not modern or expensive enough to have an express elevator. Only the fact that he's descending through thin air makes it odd.

Just above the sidewalk his descent slows, letting him drift to a gentle halt. There are a few dozen people on the street in this moment, and some of them notice as he just stands there for a moment, letting the metaphysical aethers settle and the metaphorical elevator doors open. The ones who stare are tourists. New Yorkers generally don't react to strangeness, but they do notice it, if only to shake their heads and murmur "This fucking city," to themselves before moving on. Manhattan catches the eye of one of the starers, winks and smiles, then strides off down the street.

As he walks, he hums John Coltrane's "Central Park West" -- not for power this time, but simply because he's walking along Central Park West and likes the song. It's also a beautiful day. Here at the heart of the city it is clear that autumn encroaches: Central Park is across the street, dense with color-shifting trees. Their whispers speak to the part of Manhattan that was more, once, than just concrete and cars; the island has always been here, after all, crossroads for many peoples, and those millennia of commerce were enough to form the building blocks of the living entity that it is now. But mostly, he just likes that rustling sound, and the flickers of color and movement, and the faint whiff of chemical sugars forming and breaking down within the leaves. Something about that scent, and the wind's occasional brisk sharpness, speaks to him.

There is the lightest of touches upon the part of him that is more than a man. Just a ping, to get his attention. "You wanna focus, or you gonna just keep spacing out about the pretty pretty trees, Mr. I Was Bebop Before It Was Cool?"

They've all figured out that words work better than thoughts. They are one city, the six of them, and if they ever need to, they can function as a single brain and heart and will -- but doing that is as overwhelming as it is thrilling. New York isn't supposed to be any single thing, see; the distinct characters of its boroughs are part of its strength. More personally, Manny's probably never going to be super-comfortable with letting his fellow parts of the city into his head, because he's got enough going on in there already.

But he's right in reminding Manny to focus. "Just getting into the spirit," Manny replies, waiting for a gap in the traffic before trotting across the street. Then he vaults the low stone wall around the edge of the park. It's a twelve-foot drop beyond, but he manages it easily enough, landing in a crouch in a wooded thicket already carpeted in red and gold leaves. Doesn't even make his knees twinge. Nothing can hurt New York, in New York, except New York.

Well. And one other thing.

He moves forward at a brisk Midtown pace, pushing aside the branches of small trees as gently as he can so as not to damage them. He starts finding white tendrils almost immediately. Just small patches here and there: three wigglers on a broad, still-green sycamore leaf, one on the tree's gnarling roots nearby. A patch shaped like a handprint growing atop a hooded garbage can; that one's especially nasty, positioned as it is to infect anyone who actually tries to deposit their litter in the can instead of just tossing it somewhere. "Rude," Manny murmurs. He's getting rid of the patches as he passes them, just by touching the wood or ground or metal near each cluster and letting a little of "Central Park West" riff through his mind and down his arm and out through his fingers. Earworms can be handy. Good for killing other wormlike things.

(Not so long ago, it would have taken everything Manny had to get rid of these things. He had to replace all his credit cards after symbolically buying all the real estate around a particular rock in Inwood Park. Now, however, the city is whole -- and these tendrils, tenacious as they are, are tourists from another urban locale who've overstayed their welcome. It's easy to obliterate them, but it's more important to find the bus they came in on, and deal with that.)

"Red alert!" says Padmini -- Queens -- suddenly. She tugs on the shared part of their consciousness, projecting an image onto it that is stunning in its precision: a three-dimensional and topographical map, with a moving cursor at its center and a GPS coordinate meter in the bottom corner. Padmini abruptly zooms them in on the cursor, and then she presents them with a simplified view through her own eyes.

There, jolting slightly as Padmini runs, is their quarry. To most other people in Central Park, the young man who slips down a leaf-thick hill and then scrabbles his way over a tumbled, mossy pile of bedrock is just another cross-country runner, or maybe a parkour practitioner with a greater love of natural settings than most. He's a lanky Indian-looking guy, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt -- but through the lens of Padmini's vision, Manny sees the rest. The guy's got patches of white fronds all over him, and as he runs they waft back like long hair which just happens to be growing from his forearms and shins and ass. Manny's used to this, people who look like yeti crabs, however horrible it is. Far worse is the tendril which projects from the back of the young man's neck, thick and veined in a disturbingly umbilical way, forming a long white cord which twists up and out of sight amid the trees. It stretches up into the sky, Manny knows from three months' experience, attenuating until it disappears from human eyesight with distance -- but wending southward before it does. They all know where that cable terminates.

"Mike check," says Veneza, and Manny's mental eye shifts to her view. She's standing under one of the park's stone bridges, her vision bouncing a little as she crouches to stretch out her ankles. Getting ready to run. Manny feels her excitement as the tendril-covered man comes into view, jogging over a grassy hill covered in early-afternoon sunbathers. But who's he kidding? They all enjoy this. "That's it. Come to mamãe. Drive him like a li'l doggie on the range, Queeny McQueenyface."

"I can't believe you mixed like three metaphors in ten seconds," Padmini replies -- but she zigs left, across one of the roads of the park. Manny catches his breath as she veers into a bike lane, because Central Park bikers all think they're in the Tour de France, but in the same moment he feels her latch into the bikers' sense of hurry and entitlement, drawing their power into her legs. Her pace speeds up sharply, until she's nearly flying down a sloping sidewalk, veering now and again to move around walkers and a small crowd near a pretzel vendor.

"That's the Jersey in me. Metaphors are our pork roll."

"Your what?"

"Pork roll. Look it -- wait, shit, hang on."

Tendril man has seen Veneza and stopped, halfway down the grassy hill. It's eerie to Manny how still he is. After all the running and climbing he's done, he should be out of breath, shoulders heaving, dripping sweat, but he isn't. It's just like the other cases of this they've encountered in the past few weeks; they're running on something other than human power. These tendril-people aren't avatars, however; they're more like drones, sent forth by some other malevolent consciousness and endowed with supernatural power only temporarily, and for their task. And if they don't catch this poor guy before that power gets done using him -- Well. Manny picks up the pace.

Padmini skids to a halt. (A man nearby does a double-take, then nods in a grudgingly impressed way at her athleticism.) "Shit. He's going to bolt, isn't he?"

In lieu of any reply, they all see Tendril Man bolt. He jumps off the steeper side of the rocky hill -- a ten-foot drop; Manny really hopes the poor guy was in shape before he got drafted as a spectral conduit for a hostile extradimensional essence, or he's going to feel that in the morning. Then Tendril Man takes off, moving with truly impressive speed up a paved hill-path.

"FUCK," two of them think. (Manny doesn't curse, but he empathizes.) They all take off running too.

Tendril Man is running toward a big, round building at the top of the hill. Its vendor doors are shut and there are only a few people hanging around near it, but abruptly he zigs toward a big wooden gate labeled PERFORMER ENTRANCE -- and vaults it, with the ease of a master gymnast. Manny might be able to think of a way over it too, if he gives himself a minute; surely there is some quintessentially cityish concept, like elevators for tall buildings, that he can harness to grant himself the ability to jump like that. In the fluster of the moment, however, he can't think of anything. Gotta work on that, do better at having a "jumping" construct ready to go under duress.

In lieu of leaping, however, he manages to remember the grating sound of garbage trucks barrelling down the street at oh dark thirty in the morning, usually with wonky transmissions and brakes that screech loudly enough to set off car alarms. Manny's seen several of them scrape or bang into cars without bothering to stop -- and so he draws into himself the desperate need to hurry and finish a shift, the hulking size and diesel-fueled strength of the trucks, the cheerful pragmatism of the tough workers who chuck heavy bags and kick rats with unflappable equanimity. And as Manny runs at the gate, the world blurs a little and an eyewatering stench surrounds him, and he finds it almost impossible to care about collateral damage because he's got a job to do, come on, come on, let's go...

He remembers enough of himself to dip his shoulder a little as he hits the gate. It only looks like wood; underneath, there's plenty of metal, and he sees that the gate has an electronic number-lock. Probably pretty solid. But his supernaturally-powered shoulder smashes the gate wide open, actually cracking the whole frame in half, too, and part of the fence beyond it.

Oops. Well, he'll make a donation on the website, because now that he's through the gate he sees: THE DELACOURTE THEATER WELCOMES YOU TO SHAKESPEARE IN THE PARK.

Tendril Guy is running down the steps of what Manny now sees is a huge open-air amphitheater. He leaps again, a pretty impressive standing jump onto the stage -- and then he stops abruptly. There's a set being deconstructed here; Shakespeare in the Park only runs during the summer months, so someone's in the middle of stripping gigantic rolls of fake grass off the stage floor. And now, from within a huge prop built to look like a small apartment building, the avatar of New York steps forth to confront their enemy.

He's calling himself "Neek," these days -- a phonetic pronunciation of the initials for New York City. He hasn't told them his real name. Manny's not sure it matters anyway; doesn't Manny, of all people, understand that they are no longer who they were? The knowledge and joy and danger of eight million people has found its focus in Neek, and like any of their fellow great cities, this makes him strange. São Paulo was the same, whenever Manny had time and peace enough to study him: a young-old man who radiated urbane cynicism and eerie wisdom all at once. Hong Kong too. Maybe this is the difference between those who represent boroughs or neighborhoods, and those who are whole cities in themselves.

Or maybe it's just Neek. "Yo, man, take a breath," he says to Tendril Guy, as he slouches out of shadow. "Touch some, uh, astroturf. You keep letting that shit run you, won't be anything of you left."

Tendril Guy immediately turns to run, but by this point Manny has reached the other side of the stage. Veneza is in the ampitheater, trotting toward them from the other direction, and from somewhere backstage they can hear Padmini cursing and shoving something heavy aside, because apparently backstage is a mess amid the set breakdown. Unless Tendril Guy can fly -- and Manny puts nothing past the Woman in White -- then he's got nowhere left to run.

It's a dangerous time, though. In the past, whenever they've cornered one of her minions... Tendril Guy backs up, looks around, starts to get tense. Manny tries to think up a construct, and finds himself looking around. At the stage.

Neek's gaze flicks to him, and the little smile on his face widens.

"Two cities," he declares suddenly, spreading his arms wide and raising his voice. The Delacourte's acoustics are perfect, of course, designed to facilitate an outdoors theatrical performance. "Both alike in dignity! In fair Manhattan where we lay our scene."

Of course the theater absorbs this slightly-fudged homage, echoes it, amplifies it, and sends back a reverberation of energy: the faint murmurs and anticipation of a crowd, a lilt of music from a nonexistent orchestra. For just a fleeting moment Manny can almost see the suggestion of bodies in the amphitheater seats, shadowy heads that turn to each other or crane their necks or flip through Playbills. Ready to be enraptured.

Manny finds himself grinning -- but then he panics a little as Neek raises his eyebrows pointedly, because Manny doesn't have any Shakespeare memorized. But Broadway is only a few dozen blocks away; maybe he can use that instead? He sifts quickly through the grab-bag of random quotes in his head. Can't think of an actual line from an actual play, but it's a direct reference, so he clears his throat awkwardly and sings: "They say the neon lights are bright on Broadway. There might be city magic in the air."

Stage lights, multihued but mostly white, appear above the seats. The lights aren't real. Manny can see most of the lighting equipment disassembled and stacked up to one side of the stage. Tendril Guy flinches suddenly and violently, staggering back. Steam rises as Tendril Guy raises his arms defensively, the tendrils on him whipping and hissing wildly as the city's light begins to burn them away.

They have to keep it going. Veneza giggles and runs down the steps, leaping to a crouch as if she's acting out some play or another, and sings, "Now is the time to seize the day! Answer the call and don't delay! New York can be righted, boroughs united; let us seize the day!" In response, loose cables curled on one side of the stage suddenly come to life, whipping around Tendril Guy's legs to keep him from running again.

One of the doors on the prop building slams open dramatically. Beyond it they can see Padmini pushing aside a rack of clothing that persistently keeps trying to roll toward her. She manages it, stumbles out, and glowers around at all of them. Veneza gestures frantically for her to take up the thread; Neek spreads his hands too in the universal sign of Come on, hurry up. Finally, with a little growl, Padmini snaps, "Oh, fine. 'Immigrants: We get the job done!'" This doesn't seem to have any effect at first, but then Padmini shoves a large, heavy-looking wooden desk out of the way with ease; she's much stronger, now. Enough to get this job done.

As performances go, it's all terrible. Slapdash, random, corny; Manny won't be surprised if in the morning they all receive a clipped-out review from a theater magazine that exists only in some alternate reality, panning all of them for defiling the stage. But as a construct, drawing on the power of three boroughs and the delight of a thousand audiences, from the Delacourte to the Fringe Festival and back, it's exactly what they need.

Then, his voice muffled by his own extradimensional growths, Manny hears Tendril Guy -- or maybe the guy within the pelt of tendrils -- try to speak. "A-all the w-world..." he murmurs, his voice thick, too deep, flanged in a way that sounds like bad special effects. He's steaming all over, now. Ah, and at last Manny sees the tendrils burning away, peeling off and curling into nothingness. As he lowers his arms, Manny sees that he's sweaty-faced and visibly exhausted... but he is smiling. He turns to face the whispering, flickering audience, and all at once Manny can feel him. Tendril Guy is part of New York, again -- and he knows it, and some part of his soul rejoices with the knowledge. Probably helps that the guy is a former theater kid himself; Manny can feel that, now that the Enemy's influence has been broken. Neek grins at Manny; he can feel it, too.

So then Neek goes over to Tendril Guy, leans close, and blows on the now-shriveled cord attached to the back of his neck. It snaps free as if Neek's breathed fire onto it, uttering a faint creel of inhuman pain -- and then the cord is snatched away upwards, into the darkening evening sky. Manny catches a fleeting hint of sinuous movement against the clouds, southward, and then it is gone.

Tendril Guy, who is now just Some Guy, beams at Neek. Then he steps back and lifts a finger. "All the world's a stage," he says again -- clearly this time, in a pleasant baritone, projecting with the ease of long practice. "And all the men and women merely players! They have their exits and their entrances, and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages."

He does the whole monologue then, perfectly. Not that Manny would know if he got it right -- but the Delacourte does, and as Manny glances out at their whispery audience, he sees smiles, hears soft "ahs" and giggles of approval with every precisely-enunciated line. As Some Guy finishes, applause breaks out, echoing with unreality but loud and enthusiastic. The artist formerly known as Tendril Guy beams in delight and extends his hands for Manny and Neek to take. They do. Padmini, her pique fading now that she's no longer fighting furniture, shakes her head and takes Neek's hand; Veneza giggles and runs up the steps to take Manny's. The applause goes on as, uh, Theater Guy leads them in first one bow, and then another. Someone in the audience whistles. Someone else yells "Encore!" It's intoxicating. They bow a third time. As at last the applause fades and the lights start to go dark... Theater Guy collapses, between them.

"Oh, no," Veneza says, her delight vanishing. "Please, not again -- "

"He's fine," Manny says, crouching by Theater Guy, though he checks Theater Guy's neck-pulse and breathing just to be sure. It's there, though the guy's skin is clammy with sweat.

"Close," Neek says. He's looking up at the sky, after the ugly cable that had been attached to the guy's neck.

It's only the second time that they've successfully rescued one of these agents of the Woman in White, sent forth from her bastion in Staten Island to... well, Manny's not exactly sure what their purpose is. Are they superspreaders meant to reinfect the city, and thus help her regain the foothold that she lost three months before? Are they drones of a sort, reconnoitering enemy territory? Either way, the result is always the same, if Manny and his fellow avatars don't catch the tendril-bearer and cleanse them in time: the person burns out and dies, all of their strength used up by the alien intelligence that has worn them like a puppet.

Not this time, though. "Let's get him outside," Manny says, grunting as he pulls Theater Guy up. "Easier for an ambulance to get to him out there."

"But what about after?" Padmini asks. She comes over to help him wrestle the guy into a sitting position, so that Manny can pull him into a fireman's carry. "Uff, he's heavy! But if somebody calls his family and they take him back to Staten Island, will she just take him over again? What if she's mad at him for getting caught by us?"

"It's fine," Neek says. He's still turned away from them, facing southward. There is an odd note in his voice, however, which makes Manny frown at his back. Neek sounds... distracted. "Most of the folks on Staten are fine. The ones who commute here lose their little wigglers when they step off the ferry, unless they've got one of those bigger cable-things attached to them. Grow 'em back on the after-work ride. They don't even notice."

"Remember what it was like when she was all over the city," Manny adds. "All those people she... infected. She used them if she needed them and ignored them otherwise. They became part of her, but they didn't seem to mean anything to her, any more than..." He shakes his head, to the degree that he can with Theater Guy on his shoulders. "Individual hairs on a person's head. How often do we notice when we lose one, or when it grows back?"

"We shouldn't let him go back at all," Padmini says, scowling. "We know she's doing something to all those people. He's safer here!"

Neek focuses enough to turn and eye her over his shoulder. His tone is mild and his expression neutral, but his words have a sharp point. "You gonna spring for an apartment for him somewhere? Let him go crash with ya auntie and the fam?"

"No, but -- "

"I know a good spot under the Williamsburg." Neek's relentless. "Probably still good even with all the cleanup and construction since the bridge broke. Warm on cold nights, hard to see so the kids and assholes don't fuck with you. We could dump him there."

Padmini sets her jaw. "Fine. Point made. But Staten Islanders are still people, and we should try to help them."

Veneza, who was peering into the orchestra pit in fascination, turns back to them, plainly uneasy at the tension she's picking up. "We are. But I mean, Pads... that's not really our job."

Now they all fall into an uncomfortable silence, because sometimes the truth is hard. And the truth is that the avatar of Staten Island is not here with them today because she has rejected them, and thrown her people to the interdimensional wolves by doing so. They are all of them New York... but they are not Staten Island, not anymore. Theater Guy's ultimate fate isn't theirs to make.

"Ay yo fuck that bird," Neek says, scowling at Veneza, who blinks in surprise. "Her and Squigglebitch tried to kill us, remember? Tried to eat you. Let Staten Island die."

Padmini stares at him. "Wait. What? Let a whole borough die? Are you crazy?"

"Fuck them." Neek gestures sharply, southward. "Everyone on Staten Island. Buncha racist redneck Republican dumbasses, nobody needs them. They're the reason she's still here, hanging over this city like a fucking guillotine. I'm tired of stressing about this shit! Let her flyover country ass die with the rest of them nobody-nothing sons of bitches."

Manny flinches, despite himself. That's beyond harsh. And something about this little rant feels... off. He's known Neek for all of three months, but in that time Neek has been a quiet and low-key leader of their group, unusually even-keeled for the personification of a city known for its aggression. Are you okay? rises to Manny's lips, but he refrains from saying it, aware that it could sound patronizing. He's wondering it, though.

All at once different lights snap on within the theater -- not stage lights, but all the rest. Padmini frowns at this. "Hey, we don't need these anymore. Which one of you -- "

Abruptly a piercing electronic alarm sounds throughout the theater, and the lights all turn a startling, awful red.

"What the shit?" Neek says. He blinks as if dazed, turning to stare up at the lights -- and then he stiffens. "Manny. You doing that?"

Manny can barely hear him over the noise. "No, why would I? Can't you stop it?" Neek is New York. He has better control over the city's power than any of them... but all of a sudden, the city feels strange. Sluggish and reluctant, when Manny gently urges it to shut off the alarm. It's responsive, but unreliable and slow in a way Manny's never noticed before.

And to Manny's surprise, Neek takes a step back, his very posture radiating unease. "I... can't. Nothing's happening. What the fuck." He shakes his head.

"Yo, uh, we should go," Veneza says, bouncing nervously on the balls of her feet. "If that's a break-in alarm -- I mean, we did break in, but -- "

The Delacourte sits the middle of Central Park, in one of the city's toniest neighborhoods, and is the site of one of its most popular attractions. "Out," Manny snaps, when it becomes clear that Neek has been so thrown by the situation that he's not reacting quickly enough. "Now."

Veneza's already moving, running to the edge of the stage. Manny follows her as quickly as he can with Theater Guy, and Padmini grabs Neek, dragging him along when he doesn't move fast enough. "Cover your faces!" she cries -- and, yeah, if the city's magic suddenly isn't helping them anymore, that's a good idea. But Manny can't, unless he wants to drop Theater Guy, who's been through enough.

There are people milling around in front of the Delacourte, mostly looky-loos reacting to the continuous beeeeeeep of the alarm, but Manny sees how many of them have smartphones in hand. It can't be helped. He crouches and carefully sets Theater Guy on a patch of soft grass, and catches the eye of an older lady who is staring at all of them. "Call 911," he says, with as much urgency as he can. They can't stop people from filming them fleeing the scene of an apparent break-in, but maybe the sight of someone in distress will distract most of the onlookers. "This man is hurt and needs an ambulance. I don't know what happened to him, he just collapsed."

The lady gasps and starts punching at her phone. Veneza grabs Manny, tugging so he'll leave Theater Guy there on the ground. He doesn't want to. If the cops arrive first, there's a strong chance they'll arrest Theater Guy for the break-in. If he could just make sure the paramedics arrive first, and that the cops think the alarm is just a mechanical error... He touches the ground next to his knee and reaches into it, groping for the feel of city power --

He finds echoes of old audience frustration and annoyed staff and prematurely shutdown vendor services... but these energies will not move in response to his will. What's there feels different from all the other times he's ever used city power -- clotted, somehow.

"Dude," Veneza says, giving him a hard yank. They can hear sirens outside the park, coming closer. "Come on, man, I ain't doing Rikers for you!"

Grinding his teeth in frustration, Manny lets Veneza pull him away. They book it for Central Park West again, zigging southward first since there are woods and rock hills in that direction that can obscure their route for anyone trying to put them on TMZ.

In their wake, the Delacourte's alarm blares until sirens drown it out.

TWWM Deleted Scene 1 by N. K. Jemisin is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

#the world we make #the great cities #deleted scene #answered asks

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