Peter looked at himself in the mirror, his eyes trailing across his upper body.
A scar on his shoulder, one on his wrist around where the web-shooter had dug into his skin, and a couple more around where his ribs were. At least the broken nose got fixed up fine, so he was still the same handsome devil as always.
His hand touched the scar on his shoulder, it served as a reminder about how close he was to actually biting it back there; he'd have to live with just the rest of the scars on his body.
What was that that Rumi said about them? To wear them like a badge or something? That sounded about right.
Maybe he should take her advice.
And also ask May what to do when you like a girl, but he doesn't know how much of it would apply to Rumi.
As he ran a hand through his hair, he pulled a shirt over his head and started to head to his room before a buzzing from his phone caught his attention.
It was an unknown number.
[ ??? ]
Knuckle: Hey kid, I heard about the attack.
Knuckle: You alright?
Spider: yeah, who is this btw?
Knuckle: It's Knuckleduster.
Spider: wait, seriously??
Spider: not that I'm not glad to catch up, but how'd you get my number??
Knuckle: Eh, I got my ways.
Knuckle: I'm glad you're alright, it was still crazy to hear how you went from a kid running around in a sweatsuit to a UA student.
Knuckle: See ya around, Parker.
You cannot reply to this conversation.
...
Alright then.
That was… something.
At least the guy was still out there, part of him thought he ended up getting arrested.
Speaking of his old vigilante friends, he wondered how Crawler was doing? Last time Peter saw him, he said something about 'Finding a better way to help people'
He hoped he was alright, he always did look up to him a decent amount.
The brunette grabbed his phone and headed out of the bathroom, meaning to go to his room and get some much-needed sleep.
"Peter! Come here!" May called from the living room, Peter resisted the urge to sigh and just heeded the request.
It was the least he could do for almost dying on her, you know?
"What's up, May?" The boy asked, taking his place on their small couch beside his aunt. He turned his head to the TV only to see what looked like a press conference that All Might and Nezu were holding.
The two simply watched as the two got bombarded with questions and camera flashes, every now and then a reporter could insult them over the attack that had happened.
It amazed him how Nezu kept a calm face, Peter noticed his All Might's smile started to became forced as the insults went on and on.
May grabbed a hold of his shoulder and squeezed it tightly as they watched, the woman leaning her head on her nephew.
He could remember how he used to have to look up at her, now they were about the same height.
That did wonders for his confidence.
"Peter, did you know they were holding a conference? It's only 6 PM, so they must've scheduled it right away."
"I can't see them being able to defend themselves too well right now, at least. It's just damage control."
May only nodded as they continued to watch.
The chimera called on a man with some sort of mutation that made his head a bunch of coral.
"Principal Nezu! How can you justify the attack on the school today?" The man asked, the room going quiet.
"Well, from what we know, this attack appears to have been both scheduled and planned, taking into account class schedules. They were able to get through our defenses through some sort of warp quirk, but out of the 364 villains in the attack, 362 have been arrested and put into custody. "
362? What happened to the other 2? They had to be high levels if they managed to get away. If what Nezu said was true, then that mist guy must've been their way in and out.
The coral-headed man simply nodded and sat back down, the principal decided to call on a lady that wore her violet hair in a ponytail.
" Where was All Might at that time? If he were there, would the injuries those five students suffered have been prevented? "
In a move that surprised Peter, the blue-eyed man simply stood up from his seat and bowed low in front of the conference room.
"I take full responsibility for today's events, I had to be held back on campus due to reasons we cannot disclose. I humbly apologize to my students, their families, and the public for my failure today; I can only hope you all forgive me. " He apologized with a somber look and sat back down.
Seemingly satisfied, the woman wrote down what she heard and sat in her seat. The room broke into chaos until Nezu called on a man with slicked-back hair and a goatee.
"Excuse me, but did you have any knowledge of the video depicting your students fighting against villains alone and thus getting injured?"
He almost missed it, but he saw how Nezu's expression faltered for half a second before he regained composure.
The man simply pulled out a phone and pressed a button, a holographic screen being projected from the device. From what Peter understood, only some unreleased models had that feature.
As the video started to play, Peter's heart dropped.
It seemed like a villain in another zone had pulled out their phone and started recording the fight in the plaza. The video started with Aizawa getting hammered into the ground before fast-forwarding to Tsu getting hit by the hand guy's quirk and screaming in pain.
Fast-forwarding yet again, it showed Peter's bruised and battered body getting thrown around by the Nomu before Nejire, Todoroki, and Rumi flew in to fight the creature.
It fast-forwarded once again to Rumi getting her leg broken by the Nomu and Todoroki getting slammed into a crater, it then gave a clear shot of Peter being beaten into the ground by the Nomu.
The thing that made Peter sick was how all the sound in the room stopped, letting the video's audio be heard.
The crunching, the screaming, the fear, the desperation.
All played on live television.
Finally, the man pocketed the phone and stared at Nezu in the eyes while he waited for a response.
It amazed Peter how the creature kept such a calm face, All Might looked like someone had ripped his heart out.
"No, UA did not have any knowledge of this footage, and I humbly apologize to any who have seen it."
"We don't want apologies, we want answers. How are you supposed to care for the next generation of heroes if you can't protect them from a bunch of street thugs attacking them in school? What will you do to make sure this doesn't happen again? How will you be able to pursue this 'League of Villains'?"
He wasn't pulling back any punches, huh? God, this hurt to watch. May's arm around him tightened and brought him a sense of comfort.
Pulling out his phone, Peter opened up Twitter only to see the first 24 trending spots being filled with topics about the USJ attack.
The same video the reporter played was being shared and spread through the internet at an unbelievable speed, Peter had to see dozens of people posting the same frame that showed him accepting death at that moment.
Over.
And over.
And over.
Him nearly dying was used to slander a school; he was being used as a tool by people who were just trashing on UA for being unprepared for a mass-scale villain attack.
This just felt wrong.
Just…
Just wrong.
"We intend to implement a dormitory system and turn UA into a boarding school to better protect our students and teachers from any future threat we may face. Along with that, UA is hiring the best engineers to boost our school's defense tenfold. Again, I humbly apologize to all those affected by the attack; thank you all for coming to this conference."
Just like that, All Might and Nezu simply got up and left. The reporters chased after them for follow-up questions until they were stopped by security guards that allowed the two to exit the room just as the cameras were cut.
Not a second later, Peter's and May's phones buzzed with a notification. Simultaneously, the aunt and nephew checked it only to see it being an email notifying both parents and students about how teachers would be coming to houses to get students into dorms and to wait for further information.
He couldn't have been happier about just being able to relax for the next five days and be thankful for his identity not getting leaked.
Maybe he should ask to get some counseling for this whole mess.
...
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