8969/Along came a Spider....Man

Along came a Spider....Man
Date of Scene:	27 August 2019
Location:	Cindy Moon's Apartment, Cobble Hill
Synopsis:	Peter comes to see Cindy and they talk about the past. There's a button. Fin.
Cast of Characters:	Silk, Spider-Man

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Silk has posed:
    Cindy is sitting cross legged on the floor of her flat, bowl of ramen in hand as she eats away at it. Its not the cheap kind and the entire large room smells of the hours of work cooking the broth and the components remains filling the air and probably clinging to her - save that she took a shower. She cuts through with a sort of freshs scent as she picks up a piece of pork and eats it.

    She's stripped out of her sweatshirt and sits crossed legged listening to a ballet opera in her tank and leggings. She closes her eyes, humming - not entirely on key but she's not bad.

    There is a part that makes her smile and she carefully pushes the bowl forward along the floor before she rises and gets to her feet. She begins to move through the motions slowly, stretching but then her first elegant pirouette. She's a ballet spider. The large windows give her a start dark city line as she dances, the dim light from the kitchen just enough to illuminate for her to dance.

Spider-Man has posed:
It is no doubt that Cindy feels him long before he actually gets to her apartment, it's impossible for one to sneak up on the other afterall. What Peter is doing in Gotham is anyone's guess, but he's definitely swinging in her direction through an unfamiliar city that seems designed to make his spider senses go off constantly, "Oh look a mugging... oh great a robbery... wow, is that identity theft /in progress/? How does anyone get anything /done/ in this city?"

He's not here for that and besides, if he got started cleaning up this terrible places problems it would become a full time job. So it is that he lands against the big window as lightly as a leaf blown by a strong breeze. Crouching against the glass in his Red and Blue costume, white eyes adjusting on his mask, one hand up a little with two fingers and his thumb spread out against the bricks above said window so as not to pull it loose by his weight.

There's no way he should know where she lives, but just like she could track him anywhere?

So can he.

His knuckles wrap lightly upon the windows glass, "It's raining out here.. does it every not rain out here?"

Silk has posed:
    The first moment he becomes clearer she falters. THe music continues but she falters. Cindy looks up and then around her apartment. SHe quickly picks up her food and her senses are going nuts. It was near painful at his party not to cling to him and now? She is jittery and the broth spills along her arm and to the floor. She sets the bowl down on her jankie counter and then grabs the towel to mop up her mess...but she spilled more than the realize.

    HE lands.

    She's surprised and her foot catches in a messy puddle. SHe should be more gracefull but gravity works against her. He can see as her foot flies out beneath her and she ends up in the air for a second before she lands hard on her back and lays there a moment. Lovely.

    Cindy rolls over, some of the broth dripping from her hair and her tank top smelling like ramen to open the window. The industrial pane pushes outwards and she lets him in. "What are you doing here?" She asks of him, taking a few steps back to allow him room. "Peter." Everything about him is like a flame and she no longer feels a spider but a moth.

Spider-Man has posed:
Oh the tribulations of poor Cindy's plight... There's no part of him that doesn't wish he could get in there as Pete sees this happening in slow motion and he even tries to do so, but he wouldn't make it in time even if he /could/ bring himself to kick in her window. Which he cannot do.

Suffice that beneath his mask he's grimacing as she makes her way over with roman broth dripping from her long dark hair to open the window and allow him entrance. Both hands go to either side of that small crack and his body folds like a piece of paper to slide inside, landing in a crouch with the crack of thunder from the ever present storm that hangs over Gotham City like a blanket lighting him up and sending a harsh shadow across her loft. "I... don't know."

As he says it, voices the fact that he's not entirely certain why he'd come all the way to Gotham, UP HILL BOTH WAYS, he reaches up to pull his mask off. The tiny little rivlet curls are wet and hang like a sloppy mop across his face and the way he stares at her.. it even makes /him/ feel a little awkward.

Somehow he hoped that distance and time would dull that draw, but it hasn't. Not even slightly.. and looking away does little to eleviate it, but look away he does. "Should I go?" It's an honest question. Blue eyes looking sideways out the window, "Feels like I'm intruding and... I don't know, I should go."

Starting to put his mask back on almost as soon as he's pulled it off.

Silk has posed:
    Cindy is tense and doing everything she can not to grab at him. Her hands clench into fists at her sides ands he draws a sharp breath when he reveals himself. A shiver runs up her spine and she bows her head when he looks away. Her dark eyes close and she says, "I should not have come to the party. I just..the way we left each oth...the way I ran.." She swallows and rubs at her other arm when he says he should go. Everything within her cries out and she bridges the gap quickly, snagging that mask free of his hand in a quick second. She stars at it, her mouth working before she looks up at him.

    "Please...I mean...I don't know what I mean. I left for you, Peter. Me being there made things complicated for you but do not think I ever wish you to go." She swallows and then wrings the mask in both her hands. "You can go, if you want. but I won't chase you out. If I am being fully honest? I never wanted to leave...I do not want you to go. But we both know its going to be disastrous for you and others if we stay too close."

    She holds that mask out in her hand to him. Giving him the option to do as he wishes. "I forgot...forgot how hard it is when you are so close."

Spider-Man has posed:
Pete closes his eyes trying to block it out and rolls his shoulders a little until his neck pops... it does nothing to ease the tension running up his spine. "No... no I'm glad you were there." He looks back to her suddenly hand out, it almost runs along her arm near his mask until he jerks it back and instead leans upon the window seal trying to look casual. Which he does not feel.

She's a fiery beacon to him. Blazing bright enough to dull the colors of the room around her, bright enough that even the flash of lightning through the windows does little to dull her against his gaze. "I... did not handle that situation very well either." He admits, reaching up to scratch at the spot at the base of his skull, a nervous tick he's had for... well nine years. A clear tell that he's nervous or feeling out of sorts as if trying to will his spider senses into telling him everything is okay by physically touching the place from which they originate.

"I shou-.. I don't know what I should have done. I-" Looking at her is almost painful for how difficult it is to grab her, so he looks down at the floor and tries to think about literally anything else. "I'm sorry, Cindy." Squinting down at her carpet.

Silk has posed:
    Cindy almost looks expectant, watching him flow through mannerisms and nervous ticks. She is still, though her foot curls and she drips ramen slowly from her hair. Broth only. His mask remain in her grasp, like he'e anchoring himself there and it makes her breath briefly quicken.

    The apology comes and its all she can do not to lose her composure. She lowers her gaze and looks aside. "I wish you had give us a chance," is all she can say in a tight voice. "But its better I am here...better to be in Gotham." She does not comment on her second fight ever as Silk, the fact she did so poorly. She can do this! "I am glad you are happy. You seemd happy. So many people...you need that world. I would have ...I mean not really fit for that. Kitty is perfect for you." She manages to say with a smile and slowly offers his mask back to him. "I fit here in Gotham." Dark, moody, lonely spider amongst lonely bats. Nevermind birds eat spiders.

    "Happy Birthday. Really." She admits and smooths his mask out, reaching for his hand to take it and turn it over. She sets it in his grip.

Spider-Man has posed:
Peter looks down at his mask in his grip, hand closing around it as Cindy puts it down in his palm. His hand stays up like that for a few seconds then drops down to his side, the other hand curled around the edge of the window seal as he unpacks precisely what she said. His eyes slide closed as he pushes from the window seal and begins to slide his mask back on, palms laid flat against it to adjust it against his features so it lays precisely where it should against his cheek and eyebrows. Each eye adjusting to make sure they move appropriately before he looks up at Cindy with a hard sigh and quickened heart-beat.

"You'll fit in anywhere you want to." He jumps up on the window seal so easily it may as well just be a foot off the ground and begins to climb out through. "You do too." He says of her, gazing back and down from where he's half crawled out through the crack of the open industrial pane windows. "Look happy I mean. I can feel it... as well I can feel it in myself. I'm sorry things weren't different, that I got scared by something I couldn't explain. I don't know what it would have changed... I just know that I feel like I lost a very important friend over it."

Unless she stops him, he pushes the window closed with the ends of three fingers.

Silk has posed:
    Cindy lifts her hands, curling them around her arms as she criss crosses over them. When he covers his face a part of her stomach flips and she closes her eyes. Is she happy? He seems to think so and maybe thats enough. As she can feel him pulling away she opens her eyes to look up. Every part of her wants to grab him, pull him back in and she knows she can't do that to him. She winces a little, trying to hide it with a turn of her head. Gotham is thick in her head and he's this brilliant light and draw that makes it all melt away.

    Swallowing he starts to close the window and its the first time since the moment he arrived. She reaches out and grasps at his wrist, her eyes lifting to look at him. She's staring at his mask and she shakes her head. "You have not lost anything...I thought.." she doesn't know what she thought anymore but all she wants to do is wrap herself around him in drown in his scent and body heat. SHe blinks a few times, tears there but not falling.

    Her grip is strong and every part of her feels like a live wire when connected with him. She slowly releases him. "Sorry," she breathes out and then lifts that hand to her face.

Spider-Man has posed:
Peter isn't deliberately stalling his departure, but it feels like it to him. People don't seem to appreciate how strange time is to someone with such a keen spatial awareness, how relative it can become with the small details that happen in a second. /A Watch pot never boils/ they say. He watches her take that single step to the window and grab hold of his wrist and immediately grabs her's in response... the sharp jolt of that touch sends a shiver down his spine, sharp enough that when she releases him he pulls it back as if he'd grabbed a live wire.

"For what?" The rain really doesn't bother him... that or he isn't aware of it. Staring through the glass at Cindy touching her own face with tears welling up in her eyes. He would be lying to every part of himself if he said he didn't want to crawl back in and wrap his arms around her, do something that he might not regret, but would definitely be done out of his control... The fact that he barely even moves is a testiment to just how strong his willpower is.

He can't control his heart beat, though.

There is no part of him that doesn't love Kitty and he knows that..

Even she is a distant thought when this close to Cindy... and that scares him.

"You didn't do anything wrong, it's a... it's just another situation. This is my world. It has been since I was fifteen years old." Motioning around, then back and forth between them with one hand going forward while the other comes back, "No, no it's not, but..." It's just so hard to communicate intelligently around her.

His arms lay across his knees, sitting so low in his crouch that his butt nearly touches the glass. "What did you think?"

Silk has posed:
    This can not be healthy, the way she seizes up and feels part of her just rattling her inside to jump him and cling to him. Cindy does her best not to cry, clearing her throat and swallowing again as she moves her hand from her face and curls it so she can press her lips to it. She clears her throat again and she looks up at him. "Its been my life too, Peter..for just as long as you. I just did not have others. Or an Aunt May..or anyone..until you opened that door." She says and closes her eyes, willing herself to calm as her heart races in her chest and throat constricts. Control Cindy. She hisses through her teeth to try to distract herself.

    "I thought maybe there was something. I realize now all you feel is some forced connection with me. That you are happy. I am not angry at you, not like I was. I felt more alone in your apartment than I did in the bunker...I can feel everyone around me...I don't know how you do it but its miles and miles of others and yet here I am alone." SHe says and shakes her head, a bit of broth flying free of her hair.

    "They won't quiet. Nothing is quiet like it was in the bunker and its maddening at times. Knowing they are there, feeling you so far away and yet." She draws a slow breath, again, tethering her success of focus and calm on breathing.

    "I am not your responsibility. I never want you to feel like I am. You found and freed me..." She lifts a hand to the side of her head, rubbing at her temple. "Thank you."

Spider-Man has posed:
Pete closes his eyes, but as small as the eyes on his mask will get are tiny little circles, so it may just appear like he's squinting at her. If not for his head hanging a little, rain pelting against the back of his neck in silence except that pattering sound as it hits his suit, spreading a darker crimson as it absorbs into the fabric and runs along his back beneath. "I know." He does, but it doesn't feel good to say it.

It makes him feel terrible for talking her out of that bunker, even if he would do the exact same thing today as he had then.. "I don't know what I felt then and that was the problem." He admits without glancing up, "I ran away, which is... not like me, but I did it. I'm not proud.. and I am very sorry." He does look up then, "But I am happy..." Even if he doesn't feel very happy right now having to have this conversation with her when he wants to crawl through the window and comfort her rather than let her cry.

If he didn't know how dangerous that would be, that much physical contact, he definitely would... and moves as if he might, only to stop himself from sliding through the open window.

"You have my number. If you need me for anything, use it. No matter what happened or happens or will happen.. I /am/ your friend. Gw-.. Ghost Spider, I told her to come find you. I think you two will get on well and... I think she would be good for you, in a way I haven't been." He's failed her. He's failed Miles too, if he's being honest... Gwen can take care of herself though. He seems to have faith in that, at least.

"Pick something." He tells her quietly, "One spot, just pick it.. out there.." Jutting his chin towards the city, "In there.." Jutting towards her window, "And focus on it." He pulls a button from a pocket on his belt and lets it slide down on the sloped glass towards her, "It's from my Uncle Ben's jacket.. the one he was wearing when he died. I've always focused on that... back when everything just rushed at me without any sense or reason, I'd focus on that and the world slowed down enough for me to do what I had to. It's small steps, Cindy... all of it is tiny steps.. but you have to make them. You've got to much heart to hide for the rest of your life."

Silk has posed:
    "I..." Cindy has no words. The pain is there in the slick of her throat as it tightens and for a moment she pictures Miles. He's so far away too. They all are. The spiders. Each and every one of them. She feels her shoulders tense as the waves of others spill in around her and she has to try to curl up and close herself off. "I am glad you are happy." Is she? She wants to be at the very least with how she says it. He moves a bit and she senses it, the look upon her face is one of a battle as she does her best to shutter everything away. "I wanted you to be but I know," she says. Its like some self inflicted problem that never gave them a chance, that he did not trust and they still can not given the situation now.

    "I have tried..Peter...how far can you feel? It feel endless, like I could disappear." she whispers and then that button. Her senses are keen and she steps closer but does not reach for him rather deft fingers take hold of it, using her nail to turn it into her hand. "I..." she can not take this. A slow shake of her head begin and then he says that.

    "It might be easier to hide," she says, growling to try to hide the pain and the stretch of her voice around the emotion. She curls her fingers around the button and presses it upon her chest. "Thank you." She's said that several times now and she glances up. "I will try. Now you should go," Echoing what he said when he first arrived. Her hand tightens about the button, wanting to drawn near to him but reaches up to take the windows. "Be safe." She bids him, a few raindrops hitting her in the face and her hair. Making this linger will only hurt them both.

Spider-Man has posed:
Peter watches her go through it and aches for knowing he caused it in a small way. So he stares at her as she take sthe button and holds it to her chest, "Easy isn't always the right thing to do, though." I hope everyone in the room is ready for this because it's the first time he's ever said this in /this/mask, "My uncle said something to me before he died... the day he died..." There's only a brief hair pause.

"With great power comes great responsibility."

It's so cliche, but so core to who he is. Should he have given them a chance? He doesn't know.. part of him screams that he should, but it's the same part of him that wants to crawl back in the window now... the part he's unsure of. The reason he's standing outside the window now and why he ran, against his own advise now.

"I ran... I wish I hadn't. I can't change that now though. We play the game with the cards we're dealt... and maybe we find a winning hand in it. A lot of the times we just get hurt.. I'm sorry." He means it, but it's a finger in the dam.

"Don't try, do. You're stronger than you give yourself credit for, I can see it even if you can't. You never needed me to free you, you just needed me to open the door. It's open." His hands open wide, motioning behind him at Gotham, the world... the universe? Who knows. "I'm not far away... I couldn't get far enough away to be far enough away if I wanted to be that far away... I don't. You're not my /responsibility/, you're my friend."

"I'll do anything for a friend. No matter how hard it is.."

She bids him to go and he nods, leaping backwards off the window with the trained grace of a lifelong acrobatic *THWIP!* catching a line in his palm to guide him... shit... he has no homing beacon to get him /out/ of Gotham.

"Dammit..." Glancing back over his shoulder at Cindy Moon standing in that window with a heavy lump in his throat and his gut in a knot.

Silk has posed:
    Cindy can not seem to summon words. What else can she say? Her eyes go distant but she nods, nods again and once more. "I'll do." She finally says. Cindy can't seem to look at him, best not to with how fragile she feels right now. Its everything they both can do not to bridge that gap again. "Friends.." she smiles a bit but its not full, its not radiant not like that one day they had together. She finally looks up at him and reaches up for the window. She can not seem to close it as she watches him go, right through the heaviness of Gotham. Her eyes stare after him and wait until she can not see him anymore.

    Slowly the window closes and catches. It clicks to screech and lock into place before she turns, still holding the button. She gets halfway across the room and opens her hand, staring down at that which is in her hand. It rests there against her skin and she smiles again but its gone quickly.

    The pain blossoms full now that she's not holding back and she lifts the back of her hand to her eyes. Quietly she tries to shut out the drone of the world, the spikes of warning and she turns up the symphony on her player. It fills the room and a woman's voice sings in an aria as she slowly lowers to lean into the wall and sit there, moving the button in her fingers as she stares ahead, trying to focus on what he gave her. It's not that easy though, her senses are stronger than his and exhaustion that always finally helps her sleep.