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A light thump above his head pulled Amadeus from his sleep. At first, he thought it was someone getting up for water or to use the bathroom, noises he was well-used to after a month and a half at SHIELD. He rolled over, mumbling something under his breath.
“Now, now, where are you, Spider?” a soft voice murmured, barely audible in the center of the room.
Amadeus was definitely awake now. Who was after him? Should he pretend to stay asleep or get up, blasters firing?
He didn’t have enough information.
He waited.
It was weird that they hadn’t seen him, though, as it sounded like they had come from the vent in the wall a few feet above his bed. Maybe they hadn’t bothered to look around?
There was a quick shifting of blankets somewhere in the room, and Amadeus tensed again, wondering if they had come for one of the other Web-Warriors.
Someone made a muffled sound, and he winced as he decided it didn’t sound distressed enough to risk his life for just yet. Better to get more information first.
“Felicia?” Spider-Man whispered furiously.
He knew the intruder?
His voice was barely a hiss, and Amadeus had to turn his head to hear fully. “What the hell are you doing here? Fury’ll slap cuffs on you in a heartbeat!”
“Hello to you too,” the intruder whispered back, in a weirdly flirty tone.
“This is so not the time,” Spider-Man said, unimpressed. “Here, come up, you’ll wake up Flash. He sleeps like a rock, but a girl standing in front of his bed would wake up any guy.”
He was letting her onto his bed?! Some random girl? This was SHIELD, and from Spidey’s own words, she was definitely not supposed to be in their dorms!
“All the times I’ve tried to get you in bed, and all I had to do was break into SHIELD?” the girl whispered back, a soft chuckle accompanying the words.
“Oh yeah, you and Fury’s bald head always get me going,” Spidey shot back. “Gonna ask again: what the hell are you doing here? You know full well how bad it’d be if SHIELD gets a hold of your powers.”
“Oh so you can bring in every other teenager in the world, but I’m not good enough?”
“Felicia,” Spidey said in the driest voice, “we both know you would rather die than be ordered around. What do you want?”
“I need your help,” she said reluctantly. “I’ve been trying to get ahold of you, but someone was petty and blocked my number on both his phones, and it’s been harder to map out your patrols lately.”
“Yeah, since I’ve been staying here, I’ve been all over Manhattan.”
“You couldn’t have unblocked me after a month?” she asked, ignoring him.
“What can I say? I was feeling petty.”
“It was just a little pepper spray,” she dismissed. “It was funny.”
“It would’ve been if I wasn’t wearing my mask. Do you know how long that took to get out? Wait, no, off-track. What’s the problem?”
She hesitated. “Is it secure in here?”
“Yikes, that bad, huh? Yeah.” The blankets rustled again, and something clicked. “Fury monitors everything in SHIELD. Obviously, not a fan, so I ran a feed disruptor into my webshooters. Surprisingly useful in fights.”
“You’re such a nerd,” the girl said affectionately. “Lucky for you, I have a thing for that.”
“Oh man, should I be worried? I mean, Cho’s a little too young for you, but there’s a science wing down--”
He oomphed as she apparently hit him, making a sound a second later Amadeus actively chose not to interpret.
There was silence for a few seconds before Spidey let out a long breath.
“Still worried?”
“Not anymore,” Spidey said breathlessly, a little bit louder as he took another breath. Oh gross, were they kissing? In the dorms? “Okay, okay. Fine. The problem. What is it?”
“Fisk.”
The blankets fwupped against the floor as they fell. Amadeus could just barely identify Spidey’s tone then, stiff. “What happened?”
“He didn’t hurt me or anything, you can relax with the white knight schtick,” she said. Spidey let out a sigh of relief. “I… may have taken something I shouldn’t have from his office.”
“Felicia,” Spidey whined, still quiet. “You know you don’t actually have nine lives, right?”
“What can I say? Curiosity kills. Anyway, I can handle Fisk’s people just fine. While I was in his office, I found some papers. Shipment records. I’m sure you know what, given the files you leaked all over the media last year.”
“Again?” Spidey swore. “You know I didn’t do that alone, right?”
“Fine by me,” she said firmly. “I know what it’s like to be a woman made vulnerable at the hands of a man. I’m no hero, but if I can help them, I will.”
“You’re a good person, Kitty Cat,” Spidey said fondly. “I’m guessing that since you showed up here, it’s time-sensitive.”
“Obviously,” she scoffed. “Like I would break into SHIELD on a whim. And the unload starts in an hour.”
“You absolutely would do that,” Spidey snorted. “Alright. How’d you come in, the vents?”
“As fun as it would be to walk in the front door, I did actually want to avoid getting caught.”
“Vents it is, then.”
There was the usual sound of a web firing, and there was another soft thump right above Amadeus’ head.
“After you, my dear,” Spidey muttered, and he heard them shuffle into the vent. Another web fired, and they were gone.
Amadeus sat up, realizing he wasn’t the only one who’d been listening when he saw other heads pop up out of their bunks.
“Spidey’s actually dating Black Cat?” Flash gasped. Amadeus didn’t even need to see him to know who was talking. Only one person still talked about Spider-Man with that much awe.
“Wait, that was the Black Cat?” White Tiger said. “The famous thief?”
“How should I know?” Nova asked. “I don’t keep track of criminals.”
“That’s kind of our job, man,” Power Man said.
Was everyone awake?
“How do you know who that was, Venom?” And that was definitely Iron Fist. “She was unfamiliar to us.”
“Me? Dude, #spideycat was trending so hard last year. It’s kind of died down, since nobody’s seen her in a while, but there were all these blurry shots of them swinging together the night before Spidey took down that huge gangster.”
“You are… way more of a Spider-Man fan than I thought you were,” White Tiger said. She didn’t sound like she thought it was a good thing, either.
“Spidey’s the best,” Flash said, eliciting groans from the original four. “This is so cool,” he said excitedly. “They’ve only been photographed together a couple times, so it was kind of a long shot, but he knows her name? And they totally kissed.”
Nova gagged.
“That was disgusting,” White Tiger said. “I didn’t need to know he calls his girlfriend kitty.”
Iron Fist made a sympathetic sound.
“To be fair,” Amadeus heard himself say, “if her name’s the Black Cat, it kind of makes sense.”
“Still.”
“What else do you know about her, Flash?” Power Man asked suddenly.
“I mean, not a lot, since she’s, y’know, a thief. There’s some pics online. Spidey used to go after her a ton, but then there was this long time when he didn’t. And then somebody in Chinatown got a video of them fighting on a rooftop and she threw a smokebomb at him to get away. And then nothing.”
“Obviously not nothing if she pepper sprayed his mask a month ago,” Nova scoffed.
“It’s not like people see everything Spider-Man does,” Iron Fist pointed out. “It is odd that she has his civilian phone number, though. They must truly be close.”
“Wait, when did he say that?”
“She said he’d blocked her on both of his phones. I thought you were listening.”
“I didn’t hear that part, duh.” A pause. “Wait, does that mean she knows who he is?”
Power Man sounded a little grossed out, too. “Well, I mean, I guess if you were gonna tell anybody, it’d be your girlfriend, right?”
“How did he get a girlfriend before me?” Nova demanded. “His hair is hideous.”
“Your face is too,” White Tiger shot back. “Plus, if they met in costume, it’s not like she would’ve seen his face at the beginning.”
“There’s no way my guy Spidey’s ugly,” Flash denied. “I don’t believe you.”
“His face isn’t that bad,” Nova admitted. “It’s just his hair. And his clothes. And his personality.”
“Spidey’s funny!"
“No, he’s not,” the four of them said in unison.
Flash just scoffed.
Amadeus cleared his throat. “Is nobody else gonna wonder why Spider-Man’s dating a thief in the first place?” he asked. Everyone couldn’t possibly be okay with that, right? Spidey should’ve been putting her in jail, not making out with her.
“Dude,” Flash said, almost patronizing. “She’s so hot.”
Ew. “What does that mean? She’s still a thief.”
“She didn’t sound all that bad a few minutes ago,” Power Man said. “I mean, she gave him a tip and everything.”
“On a shipment,” Nova snorted. “She probably just wants to steal it. We should follow them.”
“No way, dude,” Flash said. “This has gotta be like, the Spidey version of a date. You wanna mess that up?”
“Have you met me?”
“Your eternal inability to get a date doesn’t mean you should make it a mission to crash the Spider’s.”
“Hey!”
Iron Fist lit his hand, filling the room with a warm yellow glow.
Nova was pouting when Amadeus’ eyes adjusted. He could still barely see, but now he could tell that everyone who hadn't spoken was actually asleep and not just keeping quiet, and that everyone else had their legs hanging off their beds.
He pulled his feet free of his blanket and copied them.
Nova hopped down from his bunk, and it was only when his teeth flashed in the yellow light that Amadeus saw he was giving a shit-eating grin to the others.
“I’m gonna follow them. Unless you guys wanna wake up all of SHIELD by trying to stop me, you can follow me or go back to bed.”
The six of them, all awake, shared a look.