you know you're gonna be okay — open post

[thwipandquip]

tfln overflows, pic prompts, action spam, have fun. eat questionable burgers. profit.

Comments

sharp dressed man: @mauved

[thwipandquip]

[◃]

[im gonna need you to count how many ketchup stains there are on your sweatshirt and then try asking that question again

the words, though typed, ring in his ears for hours afterward, past them grabbing dinner, past using salt & pepper shakers to map out their break in plan — their hands slapping about across the tabletop as they bicker and someone yells across the joint telling them to either shut up or get a room already (rude), and well into the following morning. peter should be long past this drive to prove someone wrong, and yet, his day is filled with tasks that are intended to do just that: a shave to tidy up the worst of his offending scruff, shining his shoes, ironing — oh how he hates ironing, and actually taking the time to play the part. he's been at this gig a long time. he's a professional.

black suit. white shirt. skinny tie. check check check. peter gives his reflection a once over before heading down to catch his ride share. not zaddy material his ass.

traffic is for once on his side, no multi-car pile ups, and a noted absence of the usual (criminal) suspects. maybe kate's onto something with this case of hers after all. it's rare for things to be this quiet on a weekend without something big on the horizon. some twenty minutes and a four star rating later, peter finds himself staring at the now familiar high rise.

he waits across the street, casually leaning against a lamp post until he spies someone who looks very much like kate but who definitely isn't sporting the same edgy twenty-something wardrobe he's used to. guess they both came dressed to party.]

You're late.

[he grumbles, making a show of looking at his watch to hide any trace of pre-work jitters. she's not, but he figures if he's going to have to play the part of a rich jerk, he should warm up before there's an audience.]

[mauved]

[ here's the thing about missions like these; nine times out ten there's way more planning going on in the woman's side than the man's. there's all sorts of extra things to think about outside of layout and exit strategies. the fashion, for one thing. trying to find something that's appropriate but innocuous, blending in while still giving kate the freedom she needs to move around like she has to without also risking a panty flash or nip slip along the way. then there's the heels, oh god the heels. stiletto for lightness or blocked for stability? will straps help keep them on or just be a deterrent if/when she has to take them off on the fly? clutches are the thing now but try hiding a knife or a taser in there and your phone, good luck.

suffice to say, peter should be pretty damn happy she's as punctual as she is. ]

You're charming.

[ oh but she smiles so prettily, like they're already inside wining and dining and she's a good five IQ points lower. the dress is black and backless and the heels are pumps she can fling off when necessary. she's there to laugh at his jokes and be pretty doing it and thanks to her time dolling up she will at least succeed in one of those things convincingly.

but she's not the only one who cleans up nice. far be it for kate to admit as much though, at least not yet, not until she gets her own compliment first because somehow, without ever speaking about it, it's become some kind of competition. she's holding it on her tongue, tucking it away like a secret weapon when he probably least expects it; save for the slow pan of her gaze to take him all in as she walked up the sideway, she maintains her cool, her calm. she's a professional too, dammit.

from her stupid clutch she whips out a silver pin — a black four leaf clover no bigger than a thumbnail, which she moves to decorate one of his lapels with. there'll be no IDs in this event, as is customary for shady dealings, but this pin is all they'll need to get in without worry.

under the golden halo of the lamplight, standing as close as they are now, they make for a pretty convincing pair. even if she is just meant to be the date du jour. pin pinned, her fingers smooth the lapels of his suit back down, and just behind them she can make out the sounds of sleek and expensive cars pulling in, the other guests of the evening arriving. ]

Are you wearing cologne?

[thwipandquip]

[for all peter's protests about kate's lack of subtlety, there's no point in denying the fact that she's actually damn good at what she does. having been to enough important dinners to know that a woman's beauty doesn't actually come as effortless as the end product, he can only guess how much time and thought went into this ensemble that will thankfully go well with one last accessory that's currently sitting in a little black box burning a hole in his pocket. oh if that's not a mindtrip.

he holds still through her fussing with his jacket though his fingers itch to shoo her away, unaccustomed to having had anyone in such close proximity in some time. once kate appears to be done, peter offers her one genuine smile, taking a few more seconds to admire the way her cheekbones cut in the glow of mercury lamps before he responds. of course she'd notice. he'd wanted her to. best not to think too hard on the why of it though.

he swallows hard, nods.]

Yeah. Couldn't very well come smelling like eau de boeuf.

[his follow up witty remark goes unsaid as peter feels that familar pull telling him that danger's near so he glances past her shoulder. his eyes narrow as he swears he sees another familiar face in the distance — wide shoulders, bald head. white suit where everyone else is in black. no.]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but looks like one of my old workplace chums is going to also be there. Things might get dicey. Before we head in though, I've got something for you.

[he fishes the box from his pocket, revealing a delicate chain, arrowhead shaped pendant hanging in the middle.]

It's not a usb arrow, but was the best I could given short notice.

[peter waits for kate to sweep her hair off her shoulders so that he can go behind to secure the clasp. it's not strictly necessary to adjust the chain, but he does it anyway, fingers warm as they lightly brush her skin. returning to face her once more, peter clicks his tongue in approval.

not wanting to delay them any longer, he holds out his arm for her to take.]

There we go. She's beautiful and ready to commit a crime.

[mauved]

[ her lips twitch at his remark, but it gives her more pause than she'd like to admit; the comment further serves to remind her what a stark contrast the image of the man in front of her makes to the peter b. parker she's used to seeing, the one who seems to have nominated himself the poster boy for froot of the loom athleisure. any nerves she might have had about their success rate here is easily dashed by the impressive image he makes, smile charming and look sleek. she's glad she took him up on his offer to help. she's glad he offered at all.

the unfortunate news of kingpin's involvement isn't as unexpected as it should have been, her painted lips now pressing into a grim line as she tries to reassess how any of their plans will change with this news. what she isn't expecting is the — gift? token? — the flash of metal that quickly catches her eye and gives her pause again. (he can't keep changing the script on her like this, her next stumble may be disastrous.) ]

...Thanks.

[ it's beautiful, but admittedly her eyes didn't stray on the pendant for very long, too busy searching peter's face in an attempt to make sense of the gesture. is this a usb necklace? a weapon of sorts? make it make sense, she wants to say, but there's no time for this, and the gooseflesh left in the wake of his lingering fingers have her barely suppressing a shudder that would have been far too embarrassing to explain.

now it's her turn to swallow hard. she kind of wants to punch him for throwing her off so close to game time, but instead she slips her hand through his arm and presses close as they cross to the building. she plasters on a demure smile, even if the words she utters under her breath are still dry. ]

Next time I'll give you notice two days in advance. [ next time? ] Maybe I'll get some matching earrings then.

[ (and, no, she didn't miss the compliment. but she's left feeling more confused than victorious, like the word somehow takes on a different meaning when he says it.) ]

[yuvaika]

[ cont from here. moving bc of captcha, but pls feel free to disregard! :') ]

What is the nicest way to turn a man down after they've confessed their deepest, darkest fantasies?

[thwipandquip]

i think the approach depends a little bit on the man in question. there's not a one-size fits all solution.

is he the kind of guy who'll take it on the chin?
or does he have a temper?
do you want to continue to have some sort of platonic relationship with him after?

at the end of the day, you don't owe him anything even if he's particularly enamored with you, so the honest truth is probably best. short. sweet. polite because you're a good person not because you're trying to spare feelings.

his reaction, whatever it may be, isn't on you.

[yuvaika]

Unfortunately, most of these occurrences happen when I'm in my armor, with complete strangers, so I don't know them very well. I am boring enough in my normal life that most men don't look at me and assume they can tell me they want me to tie them up and pretend like I'm going to eat them in the bedroom when we first meet.

You get those kinds of fans, don't you? People who read rumors about you on the internet and assume even the most outlandish ones are true?

[thwipandquip]

i think my aunt might've said that those are probably the sort who'd think the same thing about you even if they encountered you in your normal life, doing things like buying cheerios at 11 am on a sunday with even your ankles fully covered. "why do men?!?" - you know?

yes, unfortunately, i have had those fans. like groupies for a rock band and sneakier than any criminal mastermind. what am i supposed to do with all those undergarments? don't they need them? also i don't make spider babies. i haven't made any babies, mind you, but i would still imagine they'd be human. ten fingers. ten toes. i don't think the powers would be genetic.

anyway, i'm not sure my approach would work as well for you.

but if you'd like a wardrobe change, i'd be happy to help you come up with something different and we can workshop ways to awkwardly say thanks while making a quick getaway.

minor emergencies - mauved

[thwipandquip]

[▴]

[a casual nod of agreement is his answer. it is for the best, even if it absolutely crosses into that murky morally grey area that he doesn't really love, but ends up in entirely too often. his heart is in the right place though, and that's what counts right? with great power comes... even now he can't finish the statement in his head, instead choosing to replace the voice with his aunt's, no less painful to think of but infinitely more encouraging, understanding.

the bullets and disassembled components get hurriedly swept inside the bag]

I don't want this getting back to the kid or you.

[he responds, in case she wondered where his motivation came from.]

Can you leave the bag for me and head to the roof? The fire escape through the kitchen window will take you straight up there but if your shoulder hurts too much, give me a minute and we can take the emergency stairs at the end of the hall instead.

[peter saunters off to rummage in his closet, leaving her to contemplate, not elaborating why they need to go up, instead trusting her to understand that there's a perfectly logical reason — in this case it's a pair of tanks (oxygen and acetylene) — for the change in location. when he returns it's with a large, hard plastic case and something that looks like a hammer and screwdriver had a lovechild. these join the gun bits and bobs in the duffel which he then hefts over his shoulder, huffing at how unexpectedly heavy it hangs. there's a metaphor here that he's refusing to acknowledge.]

[mauved]

[ there is a flicker of a smile on her lips when he responds, but it’s faint, kate feeling strangely as if it weren’t appropriate somehow. she nods at his request, straightening up a bit in response to show that her shoulder isn’t bothering her at all. and even if it were, she’d push past it. it’s less to do with her pride (though that is still, unfortunately, a pretty big part of it) and more to do with haste. one less door to go through means they’ll be done with this sooner rather than later.

while he gets what he needs to get from the closet she heads straight for the fire escape. the only kerfuffle she hits is when the hem of the hoodie snags just as she clears the window, pulling on her injured shoulder, but other than that it’s with no problem at all. the night air is biting even through the thick sweater; it’s such a stark contrast to the warmth of peter’s apartment and the circle of his arms that she’s even more determined to get this over with faster, taking the steps two at a time. ]

Can I do anything to help or..?

[ or would she just be in the way? ]

[thwipandquip]

[he trails after her, out the window and up to the top of the building, forgoing the path that she took to wall crawl his way. the bag's too big and his shoulders a smidge too wide to try and maneuver up the narrow confines anyway. peter spies her shivering just a little despite the added layer of his clothes and rubs at her back, arms, good shoulder, before tucking her into a loose embrace.

he steps back just enough to answer her.

this may be out of her wheelhouse, but it's not that far a stretch from the sort of things someone might do in chem lab or shop class — just bigger. do they have those sorts of things at whatever fancy rich kid school she went to or was it all uniforms, horseback riding, and golf?]

Yeah. There's two pairs of goggles in the case. Put one of them on while I bring the tanks over. We're gonna cut the gun up into smaller pieces and disassemble the bullets.

I can use the components in a little something for you if that's not too weird.

[mauved]

[ she'd rather not dawdle, and yet is only more than eager to soak up the warmth and attention peter so easily offers her. it makes her especially reluctant to part again, but she knows they have to. still, she sticks close, or as close as she can while still giving him his room to work. she pulls her goggles on, blinking past the plastic. ]

If the situation were different, I'd say that all sounds pretty fun.

[ also, it was more skiing than golf. ]

But I'll take that offer... why not have more nice things come from this evening, you know?

[ is it too weird? maybe. but certainly not any weirder than asking to keep a piece of a piece, the stupid sentimental part of her wishing to have a keepsake of the craziness that this night has become. at least his way is practical.

she suddenly reaches out for his hand, thumb stroking over the back of his palm. ]

—Thank you, by the way. I don't know if I ever got to say.

[mauved]

[ apropos of nothing: ]

theres a bar downtown thats had its lights broken for the past week so it just says COCK LOUNGE and at this point im wondering if theyre keeping it on purpose
you think its driven up traffic?

[ suffice to say: kate's third night on stakeout has not been fruitful. hope you weren't busy, peter. ]

[thwipandquip]

wouldn't surprise me at all.
but that largely depends on their target audience.
the leather crowd, maybe.
hipsters nah.

what specials are they running?
should give you an idea of if it's intentional or not.

[mauved]

seeing more denim going in and out than leather
though i think i caught a pair of assless chaps so maybe that answers that

what would be the special at a cock lounge
screwdriver?

[thwipandquip]

chaps. lovely. western themed?
uh...blowjobs?

because you didn't post him to the pic texting meme--

[mauved]

[ except it's not her picture she's sending, or a picture at all, but rather a link to a tweet of a picture.

a picture of them.

a blurry, heavily zoomed in picture of a rooftop where a tall man who's all limbs and great thighs in a familiar red and blue suit is leaning down to hug a dark-haired woman in purple (also great thighs) somehow managing to avoid getting a faceful of a quiver full of arrows. ]

so
guess whos trending

i was debating if i should or if i should just wait for midnight texting. guess which won out?

[thwipandquip]

[the people in the picture are recognizable even if the quality makes peter want to cringe. he remembers that moment, the calm before the storm that followed as the set off to deal with the latest in threats from an evil scientist.]

good trending, i hope.
i'm not being immortalized as i get hit with a drone this time.
do we have a ship name?

can i suggest 'spider-hawk'?
way cooler than 'hawk-man' which i'm pretty sure is already someone else's alias.

cool bothers you there too i guess

[mauved]

ooh good guess
spiderhawk is currently leading
(no hyphens though hyphens are so 2010)
arrowchnid is the surprising second
kinda clumsy but i appreciate the creativity

hows your arm?

[ she remembers that moment too. about twenty minutes before he pushed her out of the way of the bad end of some evil scientist goon's heavy wrench. ]

[mauved]

please tell me youre still in this universe

[thwipandquip]

[no witty response follows, not even a read receipt. should she call, peter's familiar voicemail greeting will tell her to leave a message at the beep.]

[mauved]

Goddammit, Peter Parker.

[ kate runs, no flies from her place to his, traffic laws be damned. why should she be beholden to them when life so often spits in the face of its own everytime one of these universes bleeds into the other? after running into her whiter, fresher-faced counterpart, kate had had a daunting feeling... and here they are.

the multiverse loves to play its favorites after all. ]

C'mon c'mon c'mon c'mon.

[ get there, keys jingling — no not that one why does she even have that one — busting in, red in the face ]

Peter?!

[ and hoping to whichever god is listening that it's her peter. ]

give me coffee and tv, peacefully: misslieness

[thwipandquip]

[◂]

[for once in his life, he's early, probably too early, getting there around 5:30. there's more than enough for fate or the city's criminal underbelly to conspire against his attempts at reconciliation. part of him almost wishes it would, despite knowing that if he leaves when she's agreed to see him after complete radio silence once the ink had dried on their divorce proceedings that he'll never hear from her again. so even though peter is terrified, more terrified than he was after being bitten, more terrified than he felt after his uncle died, or he faced his first villain, or so on and so forth — the list is oh so long at this point — he stays, grab a cup of drip coffee (black) and two danishes. he waits then waits some more. peter swears the time moves slower than it should, or that the clock must be broken because every time he glances upward, it seems like only a few minutes have passed at best.

he fidgets, unfolds then refolds a napkin, tears it to shreds, doodles up the schematics for a new web shooter on another. it's six on the nose when he feels the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention.

peter swallows, looking up just as the door chimes with her entry. she's exactly as he remembers her and yet somehow even more beautiful. his eyes zero in on where her wedding band should be before he remembers he's got no claim there anymore. it smarts something fierce and he's got no one to blame but himself.

buck up spidey. it's just a leap of faith

peter stands and waves her over, stammers his way through a greeting.]

You're here. [oh the tone of disbelief.] Sorry, I couldn't find any bells on short notice and I didn't think you'd want me to grab one from one of the guys looking for donations for the local children's hospital down the street.

helll yesssss

[misslieness]

[This is probably a bad idea.

She still loves Peter. That was never their problem. He's been her best friend, and then her something special since they were teenagers. Cutting him out of her life is like trying to cut off her arm while keeping her fingers. It hurts, an ache that never really goes away. The months since their divorce was finalized have been the longest she's gone without speaking to him. They've been both the hardest and quietest of her life. No bloody clothes in her laundry, no one crawling through the window at all hours of the night, no more cancelled plans, no arguments over things that were never going to change.

In a way, it had been nice. She didn't have to make excuses for why her husband wasn't around, each one more flimsy and ridiculous than the last. But nice is also another way of saying boring.

Peter was the love of her life. No questions about that. She wants to know how some kid from another universe (and that still sounds as crazy as it did hours ago) managed to knock sense into his head when nothing she said seemed to make any difference. Does she have it in her to give him another chance? She honestly doesn't know.

Mary Jane returns the wave, a neutral smile on her face as she approaches his table.]

The bell was mostly to let me know when you showed up late. [He actually beat her somewhere. Hell really has frozen over. Her smile turns just a little bit fond as her gaze sweeps over his napkin doodles and then back to him.]

It's good to see you, Peter.

[That's not even a lie.]

[thwipandquip]

[when. not if. the jab should hurt, a lot, and it does but it's not untrue and the words aren't unkind, just spoken like a woman who's been through basically everything with him, who's seen him at his highest and his lowest, been the ditched enough times to know that a superhero's work is never truly done and that he carries the weight of more than just this city on his back.

his smile is a little sheepish as a result, not quite going all the way to his eyes — a shadow of his former self. all the same, he agrees with the sentiment, nodding along. he'd seen her already recently — other world her, the widow — and while that had been lovely, in the light of this little coffeehouse, he realizes that there really is no place like home. ]

You look good.

[a pause while he waits for her to get settle in across from him. peter slides the danishes over before doing his best to clear up the mess of napkins.]

Thanks for coming. I uh... I believe I promised you an interesting story.

we've talked about the theory that there's parallel universes out there before. I'm sure.

[he shoots her a look which says if they haven't if she could just go along for a moment. it would be too much to try and explain it in any sort of satisfactory way. there's no fries here and his pen would probably run out of ink before he could draw an accurate diagram.]

Well, a week ago, on another Earth, Kingpin enlisted the help of Doc Ock and built a supercollider. He was looking for a way to get his family back.

Only, in the process of doing so he uh sort of dragged a bunch of us from other Earths to his world.

On that Earth, I was... I'd died.