Chapter Text
For what felt like the millionth week in a row, the sun beat down on New York City with an unrelenting heat. Practically everyone was inside blasting the A/C, and if they weren't, they were lathered in sunblock and drinking bottle after bottle of water. Nobody was stupid enough to be out here for more than a few minutes, right?
That's what Miles Morales thought to himself with an exhausted sigh, swinging through the shimmering city. Why did he even need to patrol today? No criminal would even bother on a day like this, right? Yet here he was, checking anyway, sweat soaking most of his suit.
He landed on the side of a skyscraper, hissing in pain and cursing under his breath as the sun-touched glass under his hands and feet was hot enough to hurt, though thankfully he didn't burn.
The blonde woman working at a lab table right by the window looked up and rolled her eyes at the spider hero now crawling through one of the open windows.
"You know you can use the door, right?" she smirked, adjusting her microscope.
"You know you can shut up, right?" Miles muttered as he pulled his mask off and sighed in relief. “Jeez, it's hell out there. Why is this window even open? You trying to blow all Mr. Stark's cash with the A/C?"
Gwen laughed. "I think that would take a lot longer than this heatwave will last. But fine, close it. Don't want a pigeon to fly in or something."
"Don't even talk about those flying nuisances," sighed a brown-haired young man as the elevator door opened and he walked into the room. "I swear, those birds are my true nemeses..."
"Hello to you too, Peter," Gwen hummed without turning as she continued staring at her work. "Meeting with Stark go okay?"
"Yeah, it went great, actually," Peter said, leaning against an empty lab table. “If all goes well, we should be receiving some new neurotransmitter equipment for Department C any day now.”
“Good.” Miles nodded. “It’s been so annoying having to make them here from scratch. Getting a shipment of previously manufactured ones is gonna make that easier.”
“Any word on other business?” Gwen asked, pointedly using a web to grab a box of microscope slides from across the room without looking up.
“Nope, all good for now. Last major threat was that stint with Loki a few months ago.”
“I’d argue this heatwave is a major threat,” Miles half-joked as he started heading to the elevator. “And if you try to make me take next patrol, I’m electrocuting your ass.”
“Yeah, yeah, we know,” Peter sighed. “Sorry you’ve had to take so many lately.”
At the last minute, Peter seemed to remember something, and called after Miles. “Oh- hey, Miles, Max found the old portal machine he- well, uh, Venom- built a couple years ago. It needs some repairs, but we thought it would be a good idea to fire it up again and expand on its tech. You know, maybe use it for something a little nicer than bringing an invasion of symbiotes to Earth. You think you can handle that project for now?”
“Roger.” Miles stepped into the elevator. “I’ve got free time.”
“And Miles, if you see Anya, tell her I’d like her to come up and look at this research,” Gwen added, looking up from her microscope. “I wanna get her opinion on the alterations I made to this specimen for further research.”
“‘Kay, I’ll tell her if I see her,” Miles answered distractedly as the elevator door closed in front of him.
He sighed, taking the elevator down a few floors and emerging in the locker room. It was mainly there for staff to change between lab attire upon arrival and streetwear upon departure, but it made a convenient place to secretly switch in and out of Spider-suits too. Switching into a black T-shirt and jeans, Miles stuffed his suit in his locker and put on his lab coat.
He headed another ten floors down, opening the storage area. Scanning the well-kept shelves, he found a carefully packed, high-security case labeled “M. Modell CLASSIFIED” and seemingly placed relatively recently in the room.
“There you are,” he muttered, gingerly taking the case. He huffed slightly as he did so, not having expected it to be as heavy as it was. Still, the weight was no problem for him as he jabbed the elevator button and headed back up to the shared lab.
Gwen glanced in his direction as he entered again. “Hey.”
“Hey,” Miles replied, nodding in her direction as he placed the case on his assigned lab table across the room from Gwen’s.
Throughout the rest of the morning and several hours into the afternoon, the two of them worked in relative peace. Apart from the occasional buzzing of electricity or the soldering iron as Miles fixed the circuitry of the portal, or the scribbling of Gwen’s pencil on her notepad, the lab was quiet.
Around 3 PM, Gwen finally sighed and closed her notepad. “Hey, I’m gonna head out on patrol. Hold down the fort in here, ‘kay?”
Miles gave a thumbs up as Gwen left to put on her suit and swing into the city. There’s the benefit of having four of us, he thought to himself. He took a bite out of the bagel sitting next to him before going back to tightening screws meticulously.
Unbeknownst to him, a small crumb fell from the baked good into the fine circuitry of the device’s power regulator.
He finished putting together the last piece of the frame, clicking the last wire into place and stepping back to admire his handiwork.
“Here goes nothing,” he muttered. He picked up the remote, carefully entering the coordinates of a nearby park before flicking a switch.
The machine hummed to life, the frame lighting up and beginning to show the park’s trees and paths. The image was faint at first, barely even there- Miles had to wonder if he was really seeing it, or if he was just imagining it. Slowly but surely, the mirage became clearer, more tangible. Something seemed to finally shift into place, and there it was- a perfect window in space.
Miles clenched his fist, anxiously watching as the image grew clearer and clearer. Once he was sure it was ready, he took a small chunk of bagel and threw it into the portal, watching as it successfully went through the gateway and landed in the grass. A flock of pigeons immediately began attacking the bread, a flurry of feathers rising in the air. An old man on a nearby bench glanced in the direction of the disturbance, his eyes widening in surprise as he spotted the portal, before shrugging it off and going back to his book.
“Yes!” Miles pumped his fist, preparing to turn the machine off now that his little test was finished. But his celebration was premature. The portal began to warp, the park’s image snapping out of view and becoming a white void. Miles furrowed his brow.
“Fuck, fuck fuuuck,” he hissed, trying frantically to shut it down. The portal frame began to shake, the gap in space itself beginning to twist and contort. Random places began to rapidly flash- a tropical beach, a wintry mountain, an office building full of shocked employees- before the small screen displaying the programmed coordinates began flashing and glitching, the numbers and letters shaking and disappearing only to reappear in random corners of the display. The portal began opening to unfamiliar and indescribable sights, almost as if it was ripping through existence itself.
Suddenly, a shockwave pulsed from the device, sending Miles flying against the wall. He groaned, blinking the shock out of his head.
“Oh, shit,” he muttered. The remote was crushed in his hand.
The portal seemed to stabilize with the blast- the image had settled on a suburban road, with a cloudy sky above. On the other side, a teenage girl was walking towards the gap, phone in hand and unaware of the situation. But something looked… off. The other end was more… detailed? Like his brain was having trouble with his depth perception on that side.
Before Miles could even react, the portal started shaking again, and everything started to gravitate toward it. Miles held onto the wall as well as he could, but flew towards the portal. He shot a web, swinging on the metal frame to grab onto it. “Ohhh, that’s not good.”
On the other side, rocks and leaves on the ground began shaking and being pulled towards the portal as well. The girl looked up and stopped in her tracks, eyes wide. She backed away, panic filling her gaze. “Whoa- whoaa, whoa, what the fuck? What the fuck? Shit, shit, shit-”
Her feet were pulled out from under her as she got caught in the pull as well, screaming and grabbing frantically at the asphalt. But it was no use. She came flying through, flung across the lab and into the window. She thudded against it, cracks forming in the glass, before she fell and crashed into Gwen’s desk.
Miles gasped. “Ohhh, that’s really not good.”
He grabbed onto the frame, searching for any way to shut it down. An idea popped into his head.
“Never before have I hoped so badly that I forgot to insulate some wires,” he muttered. He gritted his teeth, powering up his Venom Strike. In an instant, bright red electricity shot into the device, quickly short-circuiting it. The portal emitted another shockwave, sending Miles flying once more. Then, it exploded, pieces of metal flying all across the room. Miles’s Spider-Sense warned him just in time as he ducked to avoid a piece of shrapnel.
Silence fell across the room, save for Miles’s breath catching up to him. He was about to sigh in relief that it was over when he heard a groan and his heart dropped. He slowly turned his head, curses running through his head as he saw the girl lying in the splintered remains of Gwen’s table. The microscope was broken on the floor, glass slides scattered all over the place. The small terrarium, that Miles hadn’t noticed before, was absolutely shattered, whatever was inside it long gone. And the girl lay there, dazed, her form no longer incomprehensibly layered- instead in the normal appearance Miles was used to.
The girl slowly began to move, sitting up in the broken mess. She blinked, looking around. Her brow furrowed and her eyes widened. She looked down at herself, her breath hitching.
“What the hell- Why do I look like this?” she muttered. “Jeez, I must have hit my head or something, everything looks two-dimensi-”
She froze as she saw Miles, and her heart started pounding so hard Miles could hear it easily with his enhanced senses. He raised his hands carefully, beginning to slowly walk towards her. “Hey, it’s- it’s okay. I’m not gonna hurt you. Uh- you- are you okay?”
He reached the wreckage, crouching down and tentatively extending a hand. “Okay, this might seem bad, but we’ll get it sorted out, okay? You’re safe here, I’m sooo sorry this happened, I-”
But he froze, his jaw dropping and his heart stopping as the girl gasped one word.
“Miles?”