Deadpool POV
I was lying in bed with Vanessa, peacefully asleep beside me after what I will vaguely refer to as another successful Super-Soldier-level cardio session. Seriously, shout-out to Ed for the serum; turns out enhanced stamina is great for both combat and marriage.
Anyway. You, perverts, don't need a play-by-play. This isn't that kind of chapter. Moving on.
I carefully slipped out of bed and stepped onto the balcony, closing the door behind me, so I didn't wake my incredibly hot, incredibly lethal wife.
"Okay," I whispered directly at you, yes, you, "now that we've got some privacy, I'm pretty sure everyone's wondering where this story's going next."
I leaned on the railing, arms crossed.
"So here's the deal. The next arc is going to be decided by a vote on the author's Patreon. Totally free, no selling your soul, no Faustian contracts. Your options are: Saving the Black Widows Arc… or Meet the X-Men Arc."
I paused, then grinned.
"Now, I should be neutral. I should respect democracy. I should pretend I don't have a favorite."
"But I break the fourth wall for a living, so screw it, pick the X-Men."
I dropped to my knees dramatically.
"Think about it. Me. Wolverine. Captain America. All in one arc. The ultimate threesome. Not like that, get your mind out of the gutter. I mean kicking doors down, wrecking bad guys, epic one-liners, and gratuitous slow-motion walks. It's basically a guaranteed banger."
I clasped my hands together.
"And listen, if you vote X-Men, I'll sweeten the deal. I'll spoil more. Not just for this story either. I'm talking about other projects. Other worlds. Other nonsense you probably weren't supposed to know yet."
I snapped my fingers, and a laptop appeared out of nowhere.
"Now, I know what you're all thinking," I said, pacing dramatically. "You're wondering how Cindy and Courtney are going to join Ava, Yolanda, and Franklin's whole… situation. How they squash the beef. Or how Escanor somehow ends up with Amora. Or how Kamala and Franklin finally get together. I know you want answers."
I grinned.
"And believe me, I've got—"
A portal silently opened behind me.
I didn't notice.
The Author stepped out, gun already raised.
Bang.
Everything went black.
The Author casually bent down, picked up the laptop from my limp hands, and sighed."No spoilers."
Then they stepped back into the portal, which snapped shut like nothing ever happened.
…
Worth it.
Peter Parker POV
"Uh… did anybody else just hear a gunshot?" I asked.
"It's probably Ted messing around again," Gwen said without looking up. "Focus."
All of us were gathered at Goliath's Nest for what Gwen officially called a strategy meeting and what the rest of us called a spider meeting.
"Over the last few days, a new vigilante has been active in New York," Gwen continued. "Police reports and criminal chatter say they've got web-slinging and wall-crawling abilities."
That got everyone's attention.
"I made sure they weren't mistaking them for one of us," she went on. "I even asked Delta to double-check. Based on the suit design and body type, this person definitely isn't any of us."
I nodded. "And since Ed always said the last spider disappeared… this could be the person who got bitten by it."
Gwen glanced at me, a small smile forming. I'd caught on.
"I always wondered how that spider vanished in the first place," Miles said.
"We don't actually know," I admitted. "But Ed has two theories. Either the Spider God, Nancy, took it and sent it to whoever was supposed to be bitten… or someone called Madame Web teleported it away and sent it to someone she deemed worthy."
I realized too late that I'd just repeated Ed's explanation word for word.
Judging by the looks on everyone's faces…
Yeah.
They were just as confused as I was the first time I heard it.
"Wow… our lives are actually pretty crazy," Cindy said. "And the weird part is, I'm totally willing to believe all of that."
"Yeah," I said, nodding. "But honestly, it doesn't matter how this person got bitten by the last spider. What matters is that they did get bitten. We need to find them and recruit them."
Everyone quieted down.
"They probably don't know what they're capable of yet," I continued. "If they hit someone too hard, or if they have different spider powers they can't control, they could seriously hurt, or even kill, someone by accident."
"How exactly are we supposed to find them?" Anya asked.
"That part's actually kind of easy," Gwen said. "I've been mapping where they usually show up. Since they're just starting, their patrol radius is really small."
She pulled up a map.
"We'll split into teams to cover the area faster. Once one group finds them, we radio the rest so we can talk to them about joining the Web Warriors. I already got permission from Piggy."
"What are the teams?" Julia asked.
"Peter and Miles. Cindy and me. Julia and Anya," Gwen said.
I noticed it immediately; my girlfriends all looked a little disappointed.
Which… yeah. Still weird to think about. Multiple girlfriends. Definitely not something I ever thought would be my life.
"Okay, everyone, stop frowning," Gwen said flatly. "This is a mission, not a date. I designed the teams specifically to find the new Spider-Person, and I'm not risking distractions. That's why Peter's stuck with Miles."
"Hey," Miles said. "I resent that."
"She's right," I said quickly. "Once the mission's over, we can all hang out together."
That did it.
Their moods flipped instantly, excitement replacing disappointment like someone hit a switch.
Spider team morale: restored.
Queen Maeve POV
I was at the bar with Annie, Kimiko, Anissa, Wendy, and Alana. Ted was behind the counter, mixing drinks like this was his full-time job.
"I'm honestly surprised Ed hasn't heard anything yet," Ted said as he slid another drink my way. "You're all went on a little girls' night out and everything."
"Well, lucky for us, he's been insanely busy, as usual," Annie said, shooting Ted a look. "So as long as nobody says anything, he won't find out."
Ted raised both hands. "Hey, I'm no snitch. And I value my life. I also know exactly what you'd do to me if I talked… or tried to blackmail you."
"Good," Annie said simply. "Just checking."
Wendy shifted on her stool. "Sorry about… what happened that night. I kind of lost control."
"It's fine," Annie said gently. "It happens to the best of us. And it was your first time getting drunk with your powers. Of course, you couldn't control it."
Kimiko signed quickly, smiling."Most importantly, nobody got hurt. And… it was kind of funny."
"It definitely was," Anissa said with a grin.
Annie and the others decided to do a girls' night out with me a couple of weeks ago. She could tell I was still having a hard time adjusting to this new world, and she figured a little fun might help.
Honestly? She was right.
We went to a club, and it was actually a blast. Music, drinks, laughing, real normal stuff. But the funniest part of the night was definitely Wendy. She doesn't get out much, so once she started drinking… she really didn't hold back.
With her super physique, it takes an absurd amount of alcohol to get her drunk. That night, she nearly drank the bar dry. By the time we left, she was giggling nonstop, tripping over her own feet, and accidentally blowing little gusts of wind everywhere.
Wanda kept redirecting the wind so no one got hurt, but things still went sideways.
A group of guys started cat-calling us as we passed. Wendy heard it. Wendy got pissed.
She barely even thought about it, just flicked her hand, and a small tornado lifted their car clean off the ground and smashed it into another one.
We didn't stick around to admire the damage.
We ran.
I ended up carrying Wendy while she laughed into my shoulder like this was the funniest thing that had ever happened.
Afterward, Annie made sure Gamma erased any footage of the incident. Then we all agreed, not a word to Ed. Not because we were scared of him, but because we didn't want Wendy getting in trouble with Mercy.
Wendy looks up to Mercy like a mother.
And I know exactly what it feels like to disappoint someone who means that much to you.
That… was the one thing none of us were willing to let happen.
"So, Maggie," Alana asked, leaning back in her chair, "how are you adjusting to the new world? I know it took me a while, especially with all the weird stuff on this island."
"Yeah," Annie added, "this place has gotten really weird over the past year."
I looked down at my drink, slowly swirling the ice around the glass. "I'm getting used to it," I said. "Honestly? I really like the part where I'm not dead anymore. That's a pretty big plus in my book."
Wendy tilted her head. "I'm still confused about Ed's powers. So… he can bring people back from the dead, but only if they're from other universes, right?"
"Kid," Ted said casually as he mixed another drink, "we don't actually know how it works. But sure. Let's go with that."
"I'm nineteen," Wendy muttered.
"And I'm a talking bear," Ted shot back, pouring the drink and sliding it toward her. "If you want to play the 'obvious statements' game, don't do it with the master."
"Whatever," Wendy said, rolling her eyes before focusing entirely on her drink.
I glanced at Annie. "I've gotta ask, you were the first person Ed ever summoned, right? What was it like?"
She blinked, clearly caught off guard by the question, but after a moment she nodded.
"Honestly?" Annie said slowly. "It was… weird. One second, I thought I was dead, and the next, I was being offered a second chance at life. I took it. And then, boom, I woke up in a bedroom. With Ed. In the bed."
A few eyebrows went up.
"My first thought was that I'd been tricked into becoming some kind of sex slave," she admitted. "But it wasn't like that at all. If anything, he looked surprised to see me."
She took a breath, remembering.
"He asked me how I died. I told him. Then he told me to take some time to process everything and come find him later so he could explain how this world worked."
Annie smiled faintly. "I needed about an hour just to… exist. To wrap my head around everything I'd lost and gotten back. When I finally went to him, we just talked. He explained the world, his ability to bring people here, hand ow he gains new powers every month."
She shook her head. "Then we spent the next two months training and getting to know each other. I was… a handful. I wanted to be a hero right away, no restrictions, no precautions. Drove him crazy."
"I'm honestly shocked I didn't get on his nerves enough to kick me off the island," she added with a small laugh.
Her expression softened.
"After a while, All Might showed up. He wasn't at his strongest back then, but he was still incredible. He taught me a lot about what it actually means to be a hero."
She gestured vaguely around us.
"Then Ed brought Stratos to life. Bought an island. Built all of this." Annie paused. "Even though I lived through it… It still feels like something straight out of a comic book."
I took another sip of my drink.
Yeah.
I knew that feeling all too well.
"Do you ever feel guilty?" I asked quietly. "For leaving our old world behind. For not trying to fix it, even though we died there. I mean… if we could go back with Ed and the rest of the team, we could stop Homelander."
Annie didn't answer right away.
"I thought about that a long time ago," she finally said. "I asked Ed, actually. He told me it's almost impossible for us to ever return to our original world. Even for him."
"Why?" I asked.
"That's just how his power works," Annie said. "He can bring people to his world, but he can't send people back to another one."
Kimiko signed slowly, making sure I understood every word.
"I know you want to right your wrongs. I think all of us have regrets about how things ended in our original world. But we can't change the past. We can't go back. And I know that's hard."She paused."But you have to keep moving forward. This is a second chance, something most people never get."
I sat there in silence, staring into my glass.
I wanted there to be a way back. Even if it was only for a moment. Even if it costs me everything.
I just wanted to kill Homelander. To end him. To wipe out every corrupt hero who ever hid behind a flag and a smile while the world burned.
Because walking away from that world, knowing Homelander is still alive, still powerful, possibly even running things, feels wrong. Like I abandoned everyone.
The only hope Earth has now is Ryan.
And he's just a kid.
A kid shouldn't have to fight his own father…Even when that father is a monster.
"I just wish things had turned out differently," I said quietly. "But there's no point in living in the past. All we can do now is move forward."
I raised my glass. One by one, everyone followed.
"To second chances," I said. "Thanks to Ed."
"Thanks to Ed," they echoed, glasses clinking as we all took a drink.
Ted leaned against the bar, thoughtful for once. "You know… I gotta ask. What do you think the rest of Ed's family is like?"
And for once, the bear had a point.
What is a family of God like?