No Regret
And now we do the second option in the poll.
For the first time, you save Miguel during a mission and get injured, and he’s not happy with you in the slightest.
Warning(s): Violence, blood, hurt/comfort, trauma
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“Miguel!” the sound of your voice reached his ears only a split second before your body crashed into his violently, “Move!”
You were smaller than him but, despite that fact, had used enough force that your collision knocked him off balance and he stumbled away with a growl. He was confused, whipping around to eye you angrily. It wasn’t like you to be so reckless in the middle of a fight and Miguel should have known that there was a reason but his first reaction had been to shout at you.
His voice died off in the back of his throat when he saw you, now standing where he previously was, with wide eyes filled to the brim with concern. For him. In the time it took him to register your emotions the weapon of the split anomaly you’d been fighting collided into your body and sent you flying through the air with a pained scream. He winced at the sound of your body smacking unceremoniously into the wall, bouncing off and into the banisters of the warehouse, descending to the floor with repeated thuds.
You didn’t even have time to sense the pain in the first hit. It had been hard enough to knock you unconscious. Miguel yelled your name, Spider name that is, before diving out of the way of a second attack. He seethed behind his mask. Thanks to you, he now had two things to focus on. Stopping the anomaly and keeping you from being hurt worse.
The anomaly had split from two into three when his attention had shifted. One copy moved toward you, the other two toward Miguel, and he struggled to decide what move was best. Though, it confused him as to why he was stuck. The obvious choice should have been stopping the anomaly but, for whatever reason that he couldn’t figure out, he worried about you. The mission was the important part.
Why was he so focused on you?
Miguel’s web shot out, an orange streak in the darkness of the room, and snatched the back of the anomaly stalking in your direction. He yanked on it roughly forcing it to topple over. He leapt to the side and swung his fist out into one of the copies. The blade on his forearm tore into its stomach forcing it to fade into nothing. He needed to find the original if he wanted to end the mission and get you back to headquarters.
Two more copies formed out of nowhere and Miguel had to throw himself back, balancing awkwardly on a crate, and analyze his situation before advancing. At the rate it was multiplying he wouldn’t find the real one in time. He bared his fangs and talons and launched himself at the one that was eyeing you sideways.
He swiped at it wildly, landing square against its torso, talons digging in and causing it to vanish like the others. Bouncing from anomaly to anomaly, the man showed no mercy in his attacks but no matter how many he took out there were always more. His watch was busted and yours wasn’t accessible at the moment which meant he couldn’t call for backup. There was really only one option.
Miguel webbed himself across the warehouse and landed softly next to your unmoving form.
“Alright idiot we gotta go,” he grumbled, hooking his arms under your frame and lifting you up.
He bolted through a doorway, gritting his teeth at the pain that spread through his body when his shoulder hit the door, and kicked it shut violently. He sat your body down against the stone and scanned the environment. A metal pipe laid a few feet away and he shot a web to it, racing back to the door the second it snapped into his grasp, and stuck it between the bars of the door. With his strength it was beyond easy to bend the pipe over to form a makeshift lock.
Miguel groaned, knocking his forehead against the door. Now he was going to have to tag the anomaly and come back at a later date. Which was beyond dangerous for the multiverse but he could only hope he’d stop it in time. His mask peeled away and his head turned, hair snagging on the crack between the two doors. You were completely motionless apart from your chest rising and falling as you breathed.
The man backed away from the door and wandered over to your side, crouching down and lifting your head up gently. He gripped the top of your mask and tugged it off in a swift movement. Your face was bloody and bruised.
“You better not have a concussion,” he said.
Miguel used his thumb to lift one of your eyelids, watching to see if your pupil reacted to the small amount of light in the room, though it would be more accurate with a flashlight. He decided it wasn’t worth the trouble and released your face, dropping down onto the ground and tugging your head into his lap. He brushed a thumb over your cheek.
“Shouldn’t have brought you along,” he muttered, “you’re just a distraction.”
He didn’t really know where his words were coming from or why he was so hung up on you instead of his work. It wasn’t like him at all.
After that, Miguel didn’t take you with him, actually, he didn’t send you on any missions at all. He put you on what was essentially desk duty, only giving you busy work or not even calling you in. It was punishment for acting to recklessly and though you had an argument with him about it he seemed set on his decision. He was beyond angry at you for what you’d done.
His exact words had been, “you behaved in a manner that led to the anomaly getting away. I won’t tolerate that kind of reckless abandon when we have such an important job.”
At first you went with his unnecessary order. Taking it as a time to heal up. But then it just kept happening. Everytime you entered headquarters he would either send you home or give you random paperwork to file. What made it worse was that you never got any other explanation than the same old repeated sentence.
You knew how important protecting the multiverse was to Miguel but it felt like an excuse. Soon enough you started to pick up on what was actually happening. Miguel didn’t have to say it but Peter B was easy to get confirmation out of. All you had to do was promise to watch Mayday for his and Mary Jane’s next date night and he spilled.
“He’s not great with people protecting him. He feels like it’s his job to to that with others,” Peter explained, cramming down a sandwich in the mess hall while you held his sleeping daughter in your lap.
“Elaborate?” You coerced.
“Well,” Peter glanced around the hall to see which spider people were near, deciphering whether it was okay for them to hear it, most were out apart from Hobie and Gwen having a conversation in the corner, “Ever since he lost Gabbi he feels a duty to keep people safe. It’s one of the reasons he hates calling for backup, other than his pride of course.”
Hobie huffed out a laugh from where he sat, clearly not at whatever Gwen was saying, and you hummed.
“He’s closing you off from work as a coping mechanism. Someone getting hurt for his sake makes him get all weird,” Peter crumbled up his burger wrapper and tossed it on the tray, “give him time.”
“So he’s mad at me because… I protected him?”
Peter paused halfway through standing from his chair and brushing his robe off.
“Kinda? I haven’t seen him go so extreme with it before. It must have triggered his trauma pretty bad,” he said.
You passed Mayday to him across the table and he wormed her into the carrier managing to not wake her up.
You spent the next few days thinking about what he’d said. Only after the next time he gave you his excuse did you let yourself snap back at him. Maybe it was wrong knowing the reason. But you couldn’t take it anymore. Being sidelined for doing nothing wrong made you feel… itchy. You wanted to get back out and help with the anomalies.
“Reckless abandon I know.”
Miguel eyed you from his descending platform, trying to ignore Peter B and Jess at your side for their own missions. You yanked your mask off aggressively and stepped towards him.
“Damn it Miguel. I’m sick of being on desk duty,” you complained.
He was a little taken back by your forwardness but didn’t show it. He kept that poker face, the one he used when things got heated, and his fingers twitched at his side. Your injuries had healed up nicely and seeing your face free of blood and bruises was nice for him.
“That’s too damn bad,” he spun around to face his screens, giving you a direct cold shoulder that made you burn with rage.
“I get that you’re mad at me-”
Peter shuffled awkwardly, hiding his face from the glance Jess gave him.
“You’re pissed off because I saved you,” the sound of your steps bounced off the walls as you wandered up onto his now grounded area, rounding his desk to face him through the translucent screens, “but I shouldn’t be punished for doing my job.”
Miguel felt a pang in his chest. Of course he knew that’s why he had put you under new orders but hearing to vocalized made him feel stronger.
“Your job,” he spoke through gritted teeth, “is to follow orders and stop the anomalies before they destroy the canon.”
You rolled your eyes and slammed your hands down on the desk.
“That’s my job here. My job as a spider comes first,” you said.
A silence filled the room. An extremely tense and uncomfortable one. Peter puffed his cheeks and blew out some excess air hoping this would go well and not result in Miguel saying something he didn’t mean. All bark no bite didn’t always mean no harm.
You watched Miguel’s face for a reaction. Anything to provide you evidence that he was taking in your words and not just letting them filter through his head and out the other side. He blinked, eyes focusing on images on the screen and not your blurry shape, his fingers tapped on the table rapidly. He just wanted you to stay safe. Why didn’t you just listen? And why was he once again more worried about your well being than the multiverse? You were too good to keep off missions and yet…
“A spider’s job is to protect those around them no matter what-”
“I didn’t need protecting-”
Peter took a small step forward in the case that he needed to cut the tension.
“I saved you because I wanted to, Miguel,” you stood up straight, raking a hand over your face, “and I’d do the exact same thing every time.”
Miguel’s tapping stopped.
“I don’t see why I would need to be punished for protecting someone I care about.” You sighed.
Jess let out a little gasp. She wasn’t surprised by the words, everyone knew, but she didn’t expect you to outright say it to his face. Peter however smiled softly.
“And I won’t apologize for saving you,” backing away from the desk you crossed your arms, “I’m not sorry.”
Miguel stared at the unmoving image on his screen, ignoring the way the light pained his sensitive eyes, refusing to speak or look at you. You were clearly angry, practically steaming actually, and you stepped around the desk in an attempt to head to the door. Something in Miguel snapped. He didn’t want you to leave. Your words gave him new meaning.
As soon as you were passed his desk he spun around, snatching the back of your suit with a web, and tugged you backwards. You turned on your heel in time to hit his broad chest. His arms wrapped around you tightly. One hand held your head carefully, fingers scratching mindlessly, and the other gripped your suit in a fist. He hunched over, letting his chin rest on your shoulder, his nose bumping your ear as he practically melted against you.
Your own arms stayed suspended out, parallel to the ground, and your heart raced wildly. Jess and Peter shared a glance.
“I don’t deserve to be saved,” Miguel mumbled, hot breath tickling your ear.
A wave of sadness washed over you. Because you could tell, just with the inflection of his voice, he really believed that.
“Of course you do,” you whispered.
His hold on you tightened.
“In this universe and the next. You deserve to be saved.”