Ben settled on the highest crossbar of the ferris wheel to wait. He’d move around once Peter got there if this called for a more comfortable sitting, but for now, that urge for high and open needed to be scratched. To have more air around him than the ferris wheel carts offered. Basically the very little the void had to offer in regards to sitting on a skyscraper or webslinging to help process the swirl of thoughts.
He’d been expecting this moment, although not quite like this. Obvious considering that when a television suddenly sounded ‘Spider-Man’ with a familiar voice, his first assumption had been ‘well, here we go, what are they going to be showing of my life’ to only be hit with the image of a different but familiar suit and familiar names, but not faces. Well, most of the faces. Somehow JJJ seemed to remain unchanged (other than the serious lack of hair). It would be like him to be so set in his ways that even the multiverse could only recede his hairline in terms of physical changes. So, he’d been expecting it, but the graphic novel delivery vehicle was a swerve. A graphic novel with Spider-Men on the cover. Definitely him. And definitely Peter.
He also knew this topic was coming. He would need to explain it eventually. To Peter for obvious reasons, but also… with trying to fix his memory, he’d need to explain just why this would need to be gentle work. Especially if they were going to go digging around in his head. He probably could have just ripped the bandaid off with Peter on the network, but he didn’t know exactly what image Peter might have in his head now. Just Spider-Men. One maskless. He probably should have asked if they were fighting or not, but that also felt like a dangerous path. ‘Hey, can you keep staring at this thing that you really want to look inside to give me a few more details of what moment you’re getting a glimpse of?’ wasn’t really the question to keep asking to ease Peter’s twitchiness, even if it gave him a better read on the situation.
If he even remembered the moment…
His eyes closed as he blew out a long breath, as if he could dispel that annoying itch of a thought with that much ease.
The easiest way onto the ferris wheel was actually to climb up the Peaslee (hoping that no Lokis were present) and then jumping the distance across to one of the compartments. Easy wasn’t always a priority, but trying to hold onto the book while scaling things made for an interesting combo. Backpacks were always key for webslinging, and it struck Peter that he’d been without one for a while now. Maybe one of the stops would have a trusty Jansport.
Or, part of his mind chimed in, he could just scour what was a university for a bookbag. Smart, Peter. Real smart.
Either way, he’d gotten as far as the roof of the Peaslee and made the quick jump onto the amusement ride. The compartment creaked and squeaked a little under his weight, but he was just as fast to scramble up and out of it. Up, up, up.
He caught sight of Ben already looped between the structural bars near the top, and so it was a short scramble to make his way to one of the nearby compartments and plonk himself down on the interior bench.
“I didn’t bend it up too bad, but the cover might be creased,” Peter started. As if that was the most important thing. ‘Sorry, I boxed the corners of this weird comic book rendition of your life.’ He knew Ben wouldn’t care, but it felt like the best icebreaker Peter could manage in the moment.
The vibrations and general noises were enough of an announcement to Peter’s presence. After all, there were few who would actually take those routes along the ferris wheel. He still waited for the other spider to speak though before cracking open his eyes to get an actual feed on where Peter had settled. With a stretch, he eased out of his perch and lowered himself to take up a seat across from Peter with a dramatic sigh and a shake of his head.
“A creased cover? Man, and here I was hoping for maximum resale value at the local comic shop,” he joked back, keeping that ice breaker moment going. He raised his eyebrow, his eyes searching Peter before settling on where he held the book. “So how’s that temptation avoidance going?” He let out an amused puff. “Although if you’d caved, I’d probably still be waiting up here. Once you get one little taste, it’s kinda hard to pull yourself away from all the ‘oh wait, so that’s that person? And that’s… wow…’” His head ducked slightly. “Which, sorry, again, so your ears can get it as well as your eyes.”
“The good news is that climbing means no hands. So… I didn’t read it.” Peter shrugged. He put the graphic novel on the bench next to him and looked at it. As Ben had already said, the masked Spider-Man was his Peter. Which meant that all theories that had formerly been accepted that Ben was just the Peter of his world were probably misfires. How, Peter didn’t know. But Ben did.
“I guess…” Peter looked up at Ben. “I guess I’d rather you just tell me whatever might be worth knowing? I had my life turned inside out for every human on the entirety of the planet before. Not a fan of people getting shoved into that, y’know? I mean, yeah, guess you know. Now. Because…”
Peter frowned. “Irony loves me. The moment of my life that was about me getting publicly outed, on the TV… so I can get outed about being outed.”
An odd mixture of feelings cascaded through Ben at getting a proper good first look at the cover. How weird was his current situation that the first and strongest one was relief? Sure, the exact scene maybe didn’t happen, but it was a cover, right? It was meant to summarize a book. A scene. And he remembered that one. Which would account for the rest of that tumult of feelings. Guilt, of course. Shame. Sadness. A bit of fear. Because he remembered, but he could feel that frayed edge on it too. The one that tangled and wove from a life in New York City to starting over in Las Vegas. Anger. Anger that only grew as he grabbed the book and turned it over to see the bane of their existence gliding on the other half of the wrap-around cover. Ugh. Goblins.
“The universe really needs to learn that we’re the ones that are supposed to tell the jokes, not it,” he puffed out, mouth moving even while his mind was elsewhere. “It’s nice though, right? Getting to see them, even if…” He waved his free hand, knowing that brain spiral considering the things he knew that happened in Peter’s life. Everything was double edged. “You just stay on the optimistic side and it’s nice. I’ve never seen her that young. Aunt May. By the time they took us in, both were old and grey already. So it’s nice…”
He knew he was rambling. Focusing on the easier topic. Maybe the one he’d rather talk about because it eased some of that homesick longing, especially when the book in his hand just reminded him of the time when they thought they had lost her. Except they hadn’t. Obviously. How that had changed… He shook his head to derail the thoughts and the ramble. Letting out a soft chuckle, he looked up at Peter.
“Honestly, I don’t know if I’m the best judge about what’s worth knowing, Pete.”
After all, past him had decided that punching holes in his own mind was better than living with whatever had been there. A decision that he wasn’t sure he agreed with. But, ok, ok, he’d also opened this can of worms. He could have lied. The multiverse had already been invoked plenty of times. It was an easy out. He didn’t have to say that the Spider-Man on the cover was his universe’s Peter Parker. He could probably even still slip into that story if he wanted. Swap it around. He’d landed there from a parallel world and, well, can’t have two Peter Parkers, right? But no good ever came from them lying to each other and hadn’t there been enough of that?
“Seems like getting your life turned inside out is just something we can’t escape, huh? I’ve lost count of all the times it’s happened. I mean, not on the public outing scale, y’know? Just…” He puffed out a breath. “I guess I should start that everything I’ve told you is true, Pete. No lies. There’s just been more to the story… And I’m pretty sure the big question to start with here, but if you’ve got one on the tip of your tongue-” He threw up a hand. “-ask away.”
Maybe this would’ve been better at night. At least the blanket of darkness felt like it trapped some of what they were saying, prevented it from drifting along to nearby ears. Not that Peter thought anyone would care enough to eavesdrop, but this whole thing was a prickly matter that made him feel twitchy. More twitchy than usual, anyway.
Peter sucked in a breath, held it for a second, then puffed it out. It was probably better to just ask the obvious thing. “So…” A finger tapped the cover of the book. “Were you adopted, or…?”
“Or,” Ben supplied as the immediate answer. Or was better. Even if the whole ‘adopted’ had a twinge of truth, it didn’t ring clearly true. Maybe because that family dynamic only extended to a few people. “Once our circles crossed more, we told people I was a cousin from upstate, even if we called each other brothers.”
He took a deep breath, trying to figure out the best start. He wondered if past him who’d wiped whatever memories had an easier time of just spitting out the truth. After all, apparently Beyond already knew something he thought he was keeping such a good secret. And here he was tongue tied, still wanting to skirt around the topic despite everything. Looking for a way to ease in instead of just laying it out there.
“You said… one of the Peters, he had a Gwen, right? We did too. She was in our science classes in college. Favorite student of one of our profs and…” Another sigh as he ducked his head. “Things got bad and we couldn’t save her. The prof, he took it hard, and he had samples from both of us. Me and Gwen. And… and he figured…”
He looked up at Peter, an amused, knowing tilt to his lips. “We can be our own worst enemy, right? He figured best way to fight a Spider is with another one.”
“Yeah, a Gwen. He said she was like his MJ,” Peter ventured. He felt off his footing here -- he didn’t have any information beside what Ben was giving up, and that meant trying to navigate the logic. A stage had been set: Gwen, Peter, Ben, and a professor. But the picture was murky. Or maybe it was that thing that happened when you looked too closely at something and all context was lost.
Peter shook his head. “You and Gwen -- like DNA samples? But where does…” A frown shaped up on Peter’s face. “I don’t think I’m following.”
“She was for us too in a way. That first, hey, maybe this could be forever, but…”
Ben shrugged as he blew out a long sigh. He was going to have to just spit this out. He could do this. After all, this Peter… even if he’d done stuff with the Avengers and space and Thanos, he was still oddly green. No Doc Ock or Electro or Sandman or Lizard until they came through with the multi-verse event. Even if there was Mysterio wrecking his life and he’d seen it, it didn’t have that same feel of the enemies they had made back home. The constant ragging of Jameson. Norman. Warren. That wasn’t even counting in Kraven and a whole lof of other ‘bad guys’ who kept popping up.
“Blood samples, but… He was a genetics professor. On the edge of ground-breaking research in cloning.” As he spoke, he idly flipped through the graphic novel, the flashes of scenes very familiar. Spotting a familiar location, he stopped, the resemblance between the blond and brunette obvious even with the artistic flair of the drawing. He turned the book around to show Peter. “Revenge provided him with good inspiration to go over that edge. I was his first ‘successful’ experiment.”
The compartment creaked and squeaked a little in the quiet left in the wake of Ben’s explanation. There were connections being drawn in Peter’s mind and it was taking some time to process them. At least he’d been primed to accept the strange by proxy of his entire life so far, and then Derleth’s unique chaos on top of it.
His eyes scanned the page Ben had opened up to. Realization dawned when everything said so far finally connected with the c-word.
“Oh,” Peter said.
“Oh,” Peter said, more emphatically.
“That is some epic beef that professor had.” That was a safe thing to reply with, right? He wasn’t used to navigating ‘so, you’re a clone’ conversations.
“Mmmhmm…” Ben hummed, lips pressed together in a tight line as he nodded. So far so good at least. It was a big bit of information and, well, the younger man was taking it better than they had at 20. “There was some string pulling behind the scenes. Making him lean into that beef more, but…” A shrug as he closed the book and put it back on the seat beside him. “Yeah… so… that’s a thing that happens.”
He wasn’t sure if this was the time to bring up how often it happened. It wasn’t like he could predict if any of the other clones would come through. Or Warren for that matter. If he was lucky, this little admittance would be all that this Peter would even hear of cloning in regards to Spider-Man.
“So… uh… questions? There’s gotta be questions running through your head, but I’ll probably be bad at guessing them considering any time this topic comes up it’s just a-” He pointed at Peter. “- ‘You?!’ situation before punches fly. And the other times, well, you’ve already seen the ‘no really, Spider-Powers’ demonstration, so…” He held his hands out to the side, opening the floor - or, well, ferris wheel compartment - to Peter.
“Maybe not right now,” Peter replied, as he mustard his best attempt at a reassuring smile. Again: clones? Not the weirdest. And regardless of everything else, Ben had been known to him as a friend first. “The questions, I mean,” Peter added.
Because it was a lot to chew on, and then to ask questions about another world? Maybe it didn’t need to be complicated. Maybe it could just be a footnote on who Ben was. Little font at the bottom, where you had to seek it out.
“Not everything’s gotta be a thing, right? You’re Ben. I think let’s leave it there for now.”
The answering smile was warm and grateful, even if tiredness hung a bit around the edges. That was a nice thought, after all. One that on the better days they tried to embrace, but then there was always something or someone that would open the can of worms and make it a thing again. Some meaning well. Some for just the purpose of stirring the pot. But here and now? Well, Ben could embrace it for however long it lasted.
“That’s all I ever want to be,” he admitted. “And whenever anything does pop up in that head of yours, my window’s always open.” He stretched as he webbed up a bag, slipping the graphic novel in it (out of sight and out of mind) before slinging the bag over his shoulder. “It’s still just Derleth, but up for a round the college rematch? I promise not to go easy on you.”