Chapter Text
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Peter gave up on finding his soulmate when he became Spider-Man.
He was not unlike the rest of society when it came to his soulmate, he had wanted to find them at first. He wanted to know how it felt to be able to completely endow his trust to someone, to be able to give all of himself freely to one person who would, if the universe had its math correct, would accept every piece with the total absence of judgment or cruelty. Everyone wanted that, everyone craved it. Some were not so lucky as to experience it when the rare person came of age without a Soulmark, Peter was amongst the commonly fortunate who did. On his eighteenth birthday, a marking appeared, colored like raspberries and splattered across his left side like blood from a deep wound, and it told him that somewhere in the world, that one trustworthy companion existed.
He wanted to meet them so badly, it was almost the only thing he could speak about for months after it appeared.
But it wasn’t long after that he became Spider-Man, and with Spider-Man came lies. And with Spider-Man came danger.
The glee he had once felt, the childlike, almost naïve hope that there was someone out there that he was meant to be with, turned into twisting guilt. To have a soulmate, would be to give himself to someone. To give them all of his darkness, all of the bad guys he had let slip away, all of the battles he limped home from, all of the lives he had failed to save. To have a soulmate was to give them Spider-Man. As much as Peter yearned for the deep companionship, Spider-Man did not deserve a bond so precious.
When he thought about his soulmate, he was only painfully reminded of all the people who had lost theirs due to his inaccuracies. It reminded him of the young boy with a soft, yellow mark on his cheek falling from his grasp into the darkness, eyes wide with fear and pleading. Peter had never stopped wondering who had lost their person so young that day. How could he have someone, or deserve happiness, when he’d taken someone else’s?
And there was, of course, the danger part. Having a soulmate did not mean you could keep them without fear of loss or consequence. Meeting didn’t suddenly make you both immortal or immune. The universe was kind enough to let you join together, but nature was still unforgiving, in the human and sickness senses alike. They could still die, and they could still leave you.
That part scared Peter. A lot. Losing a soulmate was like losing a limb, like losing all of your senses, and the unluckiest of all would lose their match before they had even met. Their mark would turn gray or white, and leave a hole inside that could not be filled. He watched it happen after his Uncle Ben died, when his Aunt May’s beautiful, swirling mark she and Ben had adorned on their hands, had turned like ashes on her skin. She recovered, but she was never the same. Never smiled quite as much or as brightly.
Peter couldn’t imagine dragging his soulmate into his world, placing them in harm's way simply by residing in proximity to him. Or what if he was the one who got hurt, or died? He couldn’t do to them what had happened to Aunt May. Couldn’t leave them with that empty marking. Whoever they were, they deserved better than that. Better than what Peter could offer them.
So when Peter became Spider-Man, he made himself a vow to stop searching. His life had become too complex and the lies too convoluted to force someone else into it. He told himself that he was happier knowing that his person existed somewhere, and that by not interacting with them or seeking them out, he was protecting them from everything he was and everything that he was supposed to be.
But, of course, that plan would go to shit. Almost all of his plans did eventually, but that one had been his longest running.
Peter hadn’t ever planned to meet them, and after almost a decade of picturing them on the opposite hemisphere, or another planet, it hadn’t even occurred to him that they might just accidentally show up one day. That they might have even been there all along.
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Perched precariously on a telephone wire, Peter peered down to the dark alleyway below, scanners on the inside of his mask zeroed in on the scene, illuminating the night with a green glow. Autumn air breezed by, sinking through his suit as he held himself as still as possible. An occasional chill ran through him, calling for a winter-suit upgrade. He had been staking the area for a few weeks, watching as packages and men clad in black went in and out of the backdoor of one of the old, brick buildings lining the alley. It had appeared to be just shipping at first, and the front of the building portrayed a way-too-cute cupcake shop, bustling with customers. Peter had mistakenly overheard an unusually violent conversation from the back room while inside the shop himself, and next thing he knew, he was researching the company from top to bottom. After digging around into the owners, he found that the World’s Cutest Cake’s was more of a literal front for something else. The owner, as he had discovered, was a notorious drug-lord (classic), and though Peter hadn’t yet seen inside of packages constantly flowing in and out, he assumed they were full of less than legal merchandise if the man’s reputation was anything to go by.
Peter was more than eager to have one less criminal on the streets, especially one known for employing minors. Getting them addicted to the game and the drugs young meant they’d be working for him longer. He wasn’t Spider- “Stay in school, don’t do drugs”- Man for nothing.
After memorizing their patterns over the few weeks, that was the night he had finally planned to strike. He had it expertly (in his opinion) mapped out in his head as he crouched at the ready, waiting for the last shipment of the night to exit the building. The leader of the operation, Mr. Ponytail, as Peter liked to call him due to the long, sleek hair always pulled back into a tight tail on his head, was consistently the final man to leave. He was a skeptical man, constantly checking his back, and jingling the locks on the door, one, two, three times every night before disappearing into the darkness. If Peter took him out, the rest would be in chaos with no one to give orders, and they’d be easy pickings from there.
The only issue was that Mr. Ponytail was also consistently flanked by two large and armed guards. The first was Jerry, named for his extremely boring and expressionless face, and the second was Elbows - he was the real problem, with two large spiked horns protruding out of both of his arms. As Peter had watched them leave every evening for the previous two weeks, he had seen Elbows strength and skill on full display - he was quick on his feet for his large stature, easily removing any obstacles that Mr. Ponytail came across. Peter had almost struck several days premature after witnessing Elbows tossing a young boy to the ground on their way out the door, but there were too many of them around at the time for him to take on by himself. All the good it would have done would be to alert them that they’d been snuffed out. It wouldn’t have been long after that that the cupcake shop disappeared without a trace.
Thankfully the young boy hadn’t stayed down for long, standing and dusting himself shortly after Mr. Ponytail and Crew exited the alley. Peter knew that if he wanted to save the kid, and the rest of them working under those criminals, he had to keep himself in check and plan accordingly. And finally, after two weeks of the same routine, and only minorly sleep deprived from the late nights, Peter was ready to take them down.
He honed in as the backdoor opened, ducking low as three men stepped out right on schedule, as if they were programmed to be there.
“Bingo,” Peter whispered to himself. He stood to his full height, rolling his shoulders as he prepared to shoot out a web to the top of the cupcake shop. It would be an easy drop down from there, and judging by the way the three men continued on with no suspicions aside from the ordinary back and forth checks down the alleyway, and the usual one, two, three tugs on the door handle. It would be easy as-
“Yahtzee.”
Peter jumped, stumbling backwards and nearly toppling off of the telephone wire. He caught himself with his fingers, the wire vibrating under his grip. He whipped his head down towards the three men, sighing in relief that they hadn’t been alerted to his position. Quickly, he pulled himself back on the correct side of the wire. Then immediately veered back to the source of the voice, glaring behind the mask.
“What are you doing here?” Peter hissed under his breath.
Deadpool clung to the side of the telephone pole, connected to Peter’s wire, both boot-clad feet dug into the climbing rungs used for repairs. Though his face was covered by the usual, red mask, Peter could feel Deadpool’s grin, the whites of the eyes on the mask turned into half-moons. Peter still had no idea how he did that, his own mask was just as expressionless as any other.
“I was just perusing the neighborhood,” Deadpool replied, keeping his voice low as he climbed up the rest of the pole and gently made his way to Peter’s position, stopping just before he could disturb Peter’s balance. “Saw my favorite Spidey-Babe creeping around and I just couldn’t resist. What are you doing here? Sting operation for the Avengers?”
Peter crossed his arms over his chest, turning his attention back to his three targets. It was a long alleyway, and they weren’t too far just yet.
“You know I don’t work for the Avengers, Pool. I’m here to stop a drug-lord.” Peter explained in commonsensical, tip-toeing down the wire and closer to the other man. Despite the fact that Peter’s spidey-senses comically betrayed him whenever Deadpool, the murderous mercenary was near, he wasn’t actually surprised to see him. At first, the man’s ability to sneak up on Peter had driven him near insane, it had quickly turned to intrigue. He considered that perhaps, due to the fact that Deadpool was constantly only half-alive, that his spidey-senses couldn’t see him as dangerous. He could have overpowered Deadpool, you know, if he wanted to. Peter was both stronger, and more alive than him.
After the first time they had teamed up during a battle against green goo-people, they had ended up falling into a bit of a routine since they actually worked really well together. The routine was straightforward: Peter went out on patrol, Deadpool found him, they fought bad guys together, and then they’d part ways - except for the occasional time Deadpool begged Peter to eat tacos with him to which he always declined. Eating meant exposing part of his face, exposing part of his face meant it wouldn’t take long for a surprising intellect like Deadpool to unmask him completely. It never stopped Deadpool from asking though, proclaiming himself as the biggest Spider-Man fanboy, and that to eat with him would be the greatest honor. It was a joke of course. Deadpool flirted with anything that could walk. Peter played that he didn’t care.
“Ooh, classic drug-bust mission. I’m so in, thank you for asking!” Deadpool rubbed his gloved hands together, eyes catching on Peter’s targets, “Let me guess, Ponytail guy is the boss, right?”
Peter chuckled at how similar their thoughts were, and breathed in a bit of relief, shoulders dropping a hair. Even if they were semi-easy targets, having Deadpool there would speed things up tremendously - and make it more interesting. “Yeah, that’s him. Elbows there, on his left, he’s the one we have to worry about. Plain old Jerry on the right should be an easy knock-out.”
“Knock-out?” Deadpool whined.
Peter threw him a pointed look, “No killing.”
“But-,”
“They’re going to prison where they belong. No exceptions.”
“You are absolutely no fucking fun, you know that, right?” Deadpool said as he pulled out his twin pistols, soon followed by the click of the weapons as he cocked them.
Peter tilted his head at the man, smiling to himself, “And yet you keep coming back for more.”
“What can I say? I love to watch you work from behind, if you catch my drift. ‘cause your ass is out of this world, Spidey-.” Deadpool cut himself off as Peter, face burning, shot a small web into the center of his chest, pushing the mercenary back a step. Deadpool looked down at the web, then back up at Peter.
“You get it,” He surrendered, a smile in his voice.
“Let’s just get this over with,” Peter replied, feigning annoyance. He liked that he could joke with Deadpool. He could play as if the man was the bane of his existence, and Deadpool would just laugh and say something horrendously raunchy that would turn Peter as bright as a tomato behind his disguise. It was comfortable. Easy. Peter kept the mask on, but he didn’t have to disguise his personality like he did with the other heroes in the city. No watering himself down, and Deadpool seemed to enjoy Peter’s banter as much as Peter did. He hoped Deadpool trusted him enough to be just as honest with his own disposition, but Peter suspected that Deadpool had never even thought to mask his personality before, even in front of sensitive company.
“Alright, alright. I'm sure you've got homework to catch up on. What's the plan?” Deadpool asked.
“I am not a student, Pool,” He was, of course, but Deadpool didn't need to know that.
“Whatever you wanna tell yourself, are we doing this or what?”
Peter rolled his eyes, “I’ll drop you at the exit to the main street, and then you hold off Elbows and Jerry and don’t let them leave the alley. Can you manage that?”
“Of course-”
“Without killing them.”
Deadpool groaned and shook his head while rubbing at his mask melodramatically for far too many seconds before ultimately conceding, “Fine. Fine. Subdued and alive. Minorly injured.”
“Copy that, Cap. I've got Mr. Ponytail.”
Peter didn’t hesitate to curl an arm around Deadpool’s waist, securing him to his side as he jumped down from the wire. Deadpool let out a loud whoop! as they dropped, his breath catching in his throat as Peter shot out a web and caught them before they could crash into the ground. Deadpool instinctively wrapped his own arm around Peter, fingers pressed into Peter's side. He'd done it several times before for various different reasons. Whether it was just faster than Deadpool following from the ground, or to save the mercenary from a hoard, or if Deadpool was too injured (i.e. missing a leg or two) to carry himself out of a fight, but Peter would never get tired of Deadpool's delighted hollers when he did. It reminded Peter of the incredible power he had, how lucky he was to be able to leap through skies on a regular basis.
Using the momentum, Peter swung the two of them up, high over where the men were walking in the alleyway, and dropped Deadpool right in their pathway to the main road, effectively impairing their exit strategy.
“Got a flight to catch? Or a child to kill? I honestly don't know what crimes you committed, I'm just here for fun and because Spidey begged for my help.” Deadpool said, keeping their focus on him as Peter quietly found his footing behind the group. He shot Deadpool with a playful glare he couldn't see behind the mask. Deadpool responded with barely-there shrug.
Ponytail stepped back in shock just as his two dutiful henchmen stepped forward, thinking they could possibly be a match against the Deadpool. Peter almost felt sorry for the disappointment headed their way. Jerry confidently cracked his knuckles, and Elbows shook his… elbows. Honestly, how on earth did he not feel a bit ridiculous with those things?
“Wow, look at these guys! You’ve got elbow dildos! Do y’get a lot of action with those things or are they just for show?”
Peter face-palmed and shook his head as Deadpool egged the men on, an expert at pushing buttons.
He turned his attention to Ponytail who took a few more steps backwards as his guards continued their approach towards Deadpool. The guy really did need those guards. He was uselessly not even checking his flank. He nearly jumped out of his skin, yelping as Peter tapped on his shoulder lightly.
“Hey,” Peter greeted. In a split second, he dropped down, swinging his leg underneath the boss’, promptly dropping the man on his ass with a quiet ‘oomf’ as he plopped onto the concrete.
Elbows turned on his heel like a dog after hearing the word treat, focusing his attention on where his boss was looking rather annoyed. Peter moved into a stronger, wider stance, preparing for an attack.
“What are you looking at?!” Ponytail shouted, “Get these freaks!”
“Oh no, we aren't done talking about your-” Deadpool jumped on Elbows’ back, dragging him backwards into the dark again, “-elbow dildos!”
Jerry clamored after them, abandoning his boss, and Peter took the moment of chaos to his advantage, tripping Ponytail just as he’d found his feet again. It was easy to web the man's hands and feet together, he hardly even put up a fight aside from shouting distressed orders at his henchmen. From there, Peter tossed the man against the side of one of the buildings, shooting more webs to keep him stuck to the brick. He covered Ponytail’s mouth just for good measure. The guy must have been really good at the drug business, because fighting skill was certainly not on Ponytail's resumé.
Peter admired his handiwork for only a second before Deadpool's grunts recollected his attention. His eyes found them easily even in the dark, Deadpool a red gash in the dim streetlights, tumbling around with the guards and still babbling on about something to do with dildos. Peter didn't really want to know the details, but jogged over to jump back into the fray.
“Time to play fair, boys! Two on two.” Peter called out to them, all three of the men freezing. Jerry, surprisingly strong for his lackluster appearance, had Deadpool in a headlock on the ground. Elbows was gearing up, hands on his own shoulders, aimed to drop his spiked appendages right into the center of Deadpool's stomach.
“That’s what she said,” Deadpool croaked, clawing at Jerry's arm around his neck.
“That doesn't make any sense.” Peter replied, slinging out a web, and attaching it to Elbows’ forearm. He pulled once, dragging him to the ground. With the web still attached, Peter ran forward and swung Elbows into his partner, breaking Jerry's hold on Deadpool’s neck and effectively creating a pile of bodies.
“It does if you're creative and not lame.” Deadpool quipped, whipping out a Katana as soon as he was freed. He rolled forward before Jerry and Elbows could land on top of him, using the momentum to cut upwards, the blade digging into Jerry's arm with an audible slice. Jerry cried out and flinched backwards, rage growing on his plain features. Peter shot a web at his forehead, tugging forward as hard as he could. Jerry's head smacked down onto the butt of Deadpool's sword, right between the eyes. Then, he was falling backwards again, stunned, and landed heavy on his back. The thud from his fall bounced off of the walls.
“John!” Elbows bellowed. Deadpool and Peter shared a look. John was even worse than Jerry.
Seeing his partner on the ground had seemed to ignite something new in Elbows, huffing heavily as he set his sights on Peter and Deadpool. Peter imagined Elbows would have been clawing at the dirt with one paw cartoonish-ly if he could. Flapping his hands at his side, clenching and unclenching his fists to loosen up, Peter prepared for the charge. Deadpool found his feet, standing firmly beside Peter in a wide stance, Katanas sheathed again and both pistols ready.
There was a moment of question, as if Elbows was angrily considering his options. Still huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf, but made no moves forwards or backwards, only occasionally glancing down at John’s motionless form. Peter wondered if they were soulmates.
“Do you think they've explored each other's bodies?” Deadpool whispered quietly to Peter who nearly choked.
He hadn’t said it quietly enough because before Peter could even laugh in response, Elbows had made his decision and was charging straight at them both even more enraged, with his hands on his own shoulders so that his spikes were pointed at Peter and Deadpool's respective positions. It would have looked pretty comical, if it weren’t equally, weirdly terrifying watching the spikes come right for his face, Peter was starting to catch onto the man’s fearsome abilities.
Peter still held himself tall, taut and ready to strike. His spidey-senses had been on the down low, not much real danger. Elbows was still fast for his size, but not faster than Peter - or Deadpool for that matter.
It was a flash of a second. Just one moment, when Peter was about to strike, fingers curled into fists, body poised for an attack, but a shot, like a bullet, rang out into the night, and a second later gravity took its hold on Elbows, face planting him right at Peter’s feet.
“Deadpool!” Peter chastised, hands on his hips.
“He's not dead!” Deadpool elaborated, pistols swinging around with his expressive hands, “He might be missing a ball. Maybe dos balls, but it's not like he needs them. Do you honestly think anyone wanted his dick over those all-natural sex toys?”
Elbows let out a responding groan. Peter sighed in relief, but he wasn't about to let Deadpool off the hook so easily. Sure, the merc was a good shot, if he wanted to kill, he would have. Peter knew that well, but he also knew that Deadpool could be… unpredictable. Or so his file said in the Stark archives. He surprised Peter often, but not usually in a negative way, but maybe he was just an exception.
A soft thud on the ground took Peter’s attention off of Deadpool again. The thud was followed by the sound of muffled beeping, slowly becoming faster and more fervent.
A zing ran down Peter’s spine. His heart jolted, and the hair on the back of his neck stood on end.
In another flash, another split second, before he could even fully comprehend what the beeping sphere on the ground meant, Peter found himself being thrown backwards flying straight into the wall beside Ponytail’s mock prison. The breath was punched out of him as he made contact, and he fell from the wall and onto his knees hard. Something cracked. Several somethings cracked.
And then everything was loud. Peter’s sensitive ears rang and rang as a cacophony of sound filled the air around him. His hands were too busy clutching the earth to try and muffle the offending noise. It sent his mind into a dizzy haze, struggling to find his bearings as bits of rock and earth whizzed past him and pelted his skin, tearing small holes into his suit. He couldn’t lift his head, as the world seemed to tilt around him.
He could only gasp in the dusty air, waiting impatiently for everything to go still again.
Painstakingly slow, the world did stop turning, and went quiet, even quieter than before. Peter struggled to stand up, bruises no doubt growing across his back where it had met the wall. Ponytail was still there, thankfully, passed out.
Peter surveyed the area, brain slowly loading as he realized what had happened.
Deadpool had shoved him out of the way of a bomb.
Deadpool.
“Pool!” Peter shouted, wiping at the air to try to get the dust to clear faster, “Deadpool!”
He took a few shaky steps forward, coughing, the dust settling around him as he moved forward blindly. The streetlights were out, and the dust blurred his night vision. He kept waving his hands, forcing the dust away until- A gasp burst out of him as the blast center was finally revealed. A small crater had made itself a home in the middle of the alleyway, and at the very center, a smear of red.
“Deadpool,” Peter breathed, rushing forward and dropping to his knees at the edge of the wreckage. Deadpool was a mess. His suit was burnt black, and missing in large chunks around his body, exposing pink and white scarred skin. Most of his midsection was completely missing, leaving only a gaping hole where most of the blast had been absorbed.
Peter didn't dare take a breath, waiting for any sign of life. Deadpool always came back, right? That's what everyone said, often calling him a cockroach. But the wound was intense, Peter hadn’t seen Deadpool with an injury quite so devastating before.
There were a few long seconds of silence where Peter thought he might break, tears prickling the corners of his eyes.
And then Deadpool groaned, and Peter’s shoulders dropped, breath coming out of him heavily. The groan was followed by a shaky chuckle.
“Aw, Spidey cares about us,” Deadpool crooned, and Peter resisted punching him in the arm.
“You dick.” He said instead, eyes still watering and trained on the gouging wound. His eyes widened and his lip curled up as his worry turned to disgust. The wound had begun repairing itself. It was unsightly to say the least.
“Jesus Christ,” Peter gagged.
“That’s my name, don't wear it out.” How Deadpool managed to joke with a majority of his midsection missing was beyond fathom. Peter had seen some nasty things and could say it genuinely did not phase him, but at this? He turned away, covering his mouth over the mask with the back of his hand.
“Yeah, don't look, it's pretty gross.” Deadpool cautioned, “Not as bad as that time Juggernaut tore me in half though. There had been some serious organ-spillage.”
Peter had wanted to tune it out. To give into the squeamishness he thought had long since been buried inside of him and plug his ears like a child. And Deadpool wasn't doing him any favors by delving into the details of the last time he'd been separated from the rest of his body.
But the scientist in Peter couldn't resist another glance.
Ooh. Bad idea.
“Oh god,” Peter blurted, his stomach churning at the sight. Deadpool’s healing factor wasn't like Peter's. Where Peter still needed stitches if he obtained any deep wounds, Deadpool’s injuries appeared to stitch themselves without any outside help. The deadly chunk taken out of Deadpool's side was a bleeding mess of gunk, but at the smallest point, it began filling in slowly, like strings of a corset tightening together. Deadpool winced as it cinched and tied, fingers digging into the cracked dirt for stability.
Peter itched to reach out, but wasn't sure how he could help.
“What part of ‘Don't look, it's gross ’ didn't compute in your big brain, genius?” Deadpool asked with a laugh. He was staring down at the wound too, watching as his own flesh wove itself back together, until there was nothing left behind except the hole in his suit, and a splash of red on his skin.
Peter tilted his head, disgust fading into pure curiosity. The newly healed area was oddly smooth, unscarred unlike the rest of Deadpool's body. It was just a solid gash, the color of raspberries. Peter had assumed that the healing factor would have returned everything as it was before, replacing dead cells with more pale scars like everywhere else, but that spot was strikingly red, standing out against the rest of Deadpool's skin. Were there weaknesses to the healing factor? Peter had assumed there were none.
“Why didn't that part heal?” Peter asked, pointing to the spot. It looked weirdly familiar.
Deadpool peered down again, chuckling when he found what had gotten Peter's attention, “That, my Spider-friend, is my Soulmark. Can't get rid of that no matter how many times it gets damaged.”
Deadpool had a Soulmark? He’d never mentioned it before. In fact, despite how often they were in each other’s company, Peter could not recall a single time they’d talked about soulmates at all. They conversed about weapons, politics and the battle between right and wrong. They mentioned nearly everything between the best episodes of Star Wars, all the way to the controversial topic of Taco Bell versus Taco Time, but not once had Soulmates come up.
When you met anyone, it was usually one of the first topics brought up. Every greeting went “Hey, nice to meet you. What’s your name and are you cosmically tied to another being, or is that just me?”. By not talking or asking about it, Peter had subconsciously assumed that Deadpool was one of the rare who was free to love on their own time. How could a man who had never shut up since Peter first met him not have mentioned this?
Maybe Deadpool was more like Peter than he thought, maybe he was running from his soulmate, too.
Peter considered its shape. Its location. The somehow recognizable curvatures and bends. He could almost imagine how it felt under his fingers without even touching it. He wondered if Deadpool had met-
Something clicked.
He then went cold and still, aside from where his fingers twitched at his left side.
The typical noise of the city that never slept seemed to suddenly fall into silence. All Peter could hear was his heart beat like a jackhammer in his chest, blood roaring in his ears.
Deadpool’s mark. An achingly familiar splash of red, shaped like a splatter of blood decorating his left side. Peter knew that mark. He knew it as well as he knew his own hands. It was the same mark he had once traced over and over again while standing shirtless in front of his bathroom mirror while filled with hope. The same mark he had pondered over and over again about who would be on the other end of it. The same mark that he had swore he’d never give in to. Peter's mind reeled. He had imagined a career driven woman with no time to worry about who her soulmate was. Or a young man, dedicated to his life in the arts, taking a new lover every night without a stress in his mind about who his lover was meant to be. He had imagined they were across the sea, or high in the mountains, or on astronomical missions in space.
He imagined his person to be far, far away. He wanted them to be as far as possible.
This was nothing like he imagined. It wasn't supposed to be this way.
He vowed that he wouldn’t meet his soulmate. He promised he would keep them safe by keeping his distance.
But Deadpool was close, and the universe always loved a good joke. Deadpool was ever-present in Peter’s life and had made himself a comfortable spot there. And Peter, stupid, and reckless, without even knowing the true strength of their connection, had gotten Deadpool hurt. And he’d done it over and over again, dragging the mercenary into fights and risky stakeouts just because he selfishly reveled in his company. Deadpool healed, yes, but he felt pain like anyone else. Peter had heard his grunts and cries, sometimes dramatic and exaggerated, but also honest ones - usually the pain Deadpool tried to mask with wisecracks, but couldn't hide from Peter.
Peter felt like the breath had been knocked out of him again, and this time he didn’t dare try to catch it. If he did, if he breathed, then this would be real. Then Deadpool, the mercenary, would be his soulmate, solidified by the cruelty of the universe.
It couldn’t be real.
“Spidey. Hey- Yoohoo! Spiderman, are you there boy? You look two seconds away from puking and you are standing waaaay too close.”
Peter stumbled back as air rushed into his lungs like a gasp through his nose. How long had Deadpool been calling his name?
Deadpool.
Wade, his mind supplied. He’d never thought it important to consider the other man’s name before, though he’d known it long ago. Everyone knew who Deadpool really was under the mask, it wasn’t something he tried to hide, but Deadpool knew Peter as Spider-Man. He had never pried for more information beyond gentle teasing, and Peter had returned the favor, placing that name in the far corners of his mind.
Wade. It was front and center now, no longer gathering dust.
Wade Wilson. The name was heavy. It sat like an anchor in his chest.
“Look! It's healed! No need for that horrified look- Hey, where are you-”
Peter shot a web at the nearest building and swung himself swiftly away. Far away. Anywhere but where Deadpool was. Where his soulmate was.
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