Chapter Text
THE SPECTACULAR SPIDER-MAN: HEARTS OF THE INFINITE
The universe, Peter Parker decided, had finally found the one kind of humiliation that could make being unmasked in front of J. Jonah Jameson seem restful.
He stood beneath a chandelier made from slow-burning stars, on a floor so polished that it reflected not merely his body but several embarrassing possible versions of his body, including one in which his hair had never recovered from a high school chemistry accident, one in which he had somehow agreed to wear a tuxedo over his Spider-Man costume, and one in which Aunt May appeared in the reflection behind him with the calm, devastating disappointment of a woman who had not raised her nephew to be broadcast across fourteen dimensions as a romantic underachiever.
Around him rose the amphitheater of the Heartspindle, a palace carved from the inside of a nebula, where constellations reclined like gossiping socialites and cosmic entities occupied opera boxes draped in auroras. There were Kree generals, Shi'ar nobles, Skrull dignitaries pretending not to be Skrull dignitaries, several abstract beings whose applause sounded like collapsing mathematics, and, somewhere in the velvet-dark upper tiers, a betting pool had already begun concerning whether Spider-Man would survive the opening monologue.
At the center of it all descended the Arbiter.
He, she, they, and something older than pronouns appeared in a robe woven from first kisses, last chances, and legal loopholes. Their face changed whenever Peter tried to focus on it: a stern aunt, an amused judge, a celestial game-show host, a marriage counselor who had seen too much, and once, horrifyingly, Mary Jane raising one eyebrow.
"Peter Benjamin Parker," the Arbiter intoned, and the universe leaned closer.
Peter swallowed. "Okay, so, when you use the middle name, that usually means I either forgot to take out the trash or accidentally got cloned again."
"You have been chosen."
"Historically, not my favorite sentence."
"For too long have you stumbled through love like a man carrying priceless crystal through a revolving door during an earthquake."
"That feels unnecessarily specific."
"You have been blessed with courage, wit, compassion, and cheekbones that fluctuate in quality according to artist interpretation, yet you persist in a cycle of longing, guilt, secrecy, abandonment, reconciliation, and spectacular romantic detonation. The cosmos has grown weary."
Peter looked up at the audience, then down at his shoes, which had, without his permission, become formal black dress shoes with tiny spider-emblems on the buckles. "I'm sorry, the cosmos has grown weary? The cosmos has Galactus. The cosmos has wars with names like Annihilation. The cosmos has planets where they eat soup with knives. But my dating life is where we're drawing the line?"
A ripple of laughter moved through the amphitheater, vast and shimmering. Peter felt the old reflex rise in him, bright and brittle, the instinct to keep talking so no one heard the panic underneath. He had fought gods, monsters, mad scientists, vampires, symbiotes, robots, and once a living mountain of spiders that had made him reconsider every career choice since freshman year, but this was different, because this room was not trying to kill him in any clean, honest way. This room intended to watch him be known.
The Arbiter smiled with the serene cruelty of a producer who had already signed the contracts. "Welcome, Spider-Man, to Hearts of the Infinite, the first courtship trial calibrated for romance, survival, and character development."
"Character development?" Peter said. "I'm from Queens. We call that 'Tuesday with property damage.'"
The chandelier flared. From the light came images, enormous and glittering, each one appearing like a stained-glass saint in a cathedral built by paparazzi. Gamora, green-skinned and sharp-eyed, blades crossing her silhouette like judgment. Mystique, blue and gold and red-haired, reclining on a throne made of stolen identities, her smile a knife pretending to be silk. Amora the Enchantress, radiant in Asgardian splendor, her gaze heavy with spellcraft, amusement, and the ancient boredom of being adored incorrectly.
The audience roared its approval.
Peter did not.
He watched the images, and beneath the absurdity, beneath the sudden certainty that Johnny Storm would never let him live this down if any of this made it back to Earth, something uncomfortable settled in him. The show had chosen women the universe considered dangerous, beautiful, dramatic, commercially viable. The kind of women spectators could reduce to categories before they ever spoke: assassin, deceiver, temptress. The kind of women a lazy story would hand him like tests designed to prove his masculinity, his purity, his charm, or his inability to keep his mouth shut.
Peter had been reduced often enough to understand the shape of a cage even when it was gilded.
The Arbiter extended one luminous hand. "Your first date awaits."
Peter sighed, and though fear fluttered in his stomach like a trapped bird, he straightened with the stubborn dignity of a man who had been late to enough disasters to know that showing up still mattered.
"Fine," he said. "But I'm not calling it a date if there are death traps."
The Arbiter's smile widened.
Peter closed his eyes. "There are absolutely going to be death traps."