Dad!miguel - Tumblr Posts
₊ ⊹ the price of the name.
synopsis: reader has had a hard life, and now she’s an orphan. but someone just as lonely comes into her life to take her under his wing.
warnings: angst. lots of hurt, very little comfort. miguel is a hardass who pushes people away. death.
platonic!miguel x daughter-like!reader. no seriously, reader is eighteen and young. this is found family, not romantic.
the intention is for this to be multi-part. how many parts? idk.
word count: 1.3k
pt i : fate
. ˚ * ✦ . . ✦ ˚
being a spider person was always unfair. mercy from whatever divine being that controlled their universes was hard to come by.
you were no exception.
your father died early, shot by a man who ran with someone’s purse. you didn’t know him well, you were only three after all. but your mother fought hard to teach you about him, to make sure you remembered some semblance of him.
and all was well for a time. you went to school, made some friends, started working for some extra cash under the table.
you were reaching up into your attic when the sharp sting of a spider bite zinged up from your hand. you killed it with a slap, but nothing could stop the venom that now traveled through your veins.
the rest was history: you became your universes one and only spider woman, learning her trade as she went.
the cannon event hit later, and it was different from the others.
you had no uncle to find dead on the street.
but you did have a mother.
she was working the late shift at the hospital when a spouse of a dead patient burst through the doors and demanded to see a doctor. apparently, the man wanted revenge for the hospitals failure to save his wife, and he had come to instill justice.
your mother had raised her hands and tried to plead for him to stop, to calm down, to lower his gun.
the shot made your spider-senses go haywire, and you practically flew to the trauma center. the security guards had no idea what to do, so you just ran past them to find your mother bleeding on the cold white tile.
it took everything in you to remember that behind your mask, no one knew you were this woman’s daughter, and you’d have to respond carefully. you watched as the officers called the next of kin, and you were thankful that you had had the mind to put your phone on silent that day.
no one noticed the tears streaming from your eyes behind the suit. you swung back home as fast as you could, answering your phone when they called you again.
pretending to not know what was going on was the second worst thing you had to do that day. you had to fight from chocking on tears as you answered the call.
eighteen and orphaned, standing over your mothers open casket. a part of you thanked that you were older, because it meant that you didn’t have to go into foster care. but nothing could truly quell your grief.
and then the universe decided to send you a big middle finger in the shape of a Doc Oc right after the funeral ended.
you knew that you couldn’t keep going like this. no one should process grief this fast. but as the villain sent a tidal wave through the streets of new york city you relized that you didn’t exactly have a choice.
with great power comes great responsibility.
and saving these people was your responsibility, no matter what mental state you were in.
this Doc Oc looked to be from some other dimension. instead of mechanical tentacles like that of your Doc Oc, he had real ones, and he apparently threw actual octopi at people when he was pissed off.
it was no easy task, and at one point he had thrown you against the wall and knocked your head. as your vision swam, he picked you up with one of his suctioned limbs and squeezed.
it all happened so fast.
a flash of orange and yellow swirling at the edge of your vision. orange silk shooting into your captors face. and then someone shot forward and sliced the tentacle that held you.
you sank to the ground as you caught your breath, vaguely hearing someone say “Lyla, run a diagnostic. what’s the best way to take this guy down?”
as you wheezed, a large hand rested against your shoulder, and a soft voice greeted your ears.
“Sit tight, kid. I’ll handle this.”
you didn’t have time to argue when the hand vanished, and you peered up just in time to see a large spider-man in a blue suit throwing himself at the villain.
you stood as you caught your breath, rushing right back into battle to help the man that had saved you. the Doc Oc dragged you both to the bay, sinking down into the water. it was advantageous for him, being a water dwelling creature, and you and the man struggled. it took another spider, a woman on a motor cycle, showing up to help defeat him.
but it was you who dealt the final blow, wrapping the villains limbs to a nearby pier to keep him underwater. when the pair of new spider people got him all tied up and prepared to take away, you just…collapsed.
everything came down on you at once. your exhaustion, your sadness, your loneliness. everything.
you barely heard the spider woman murmur to the brash man across from her, and it was only when you felt a pair of strong arms wrap around you and pick you up that you snapped back to reality.
but just as quickly as you zeroed in on the feeling, your brain whispered sleep in your ear, and you passed out.
₊ ⊹
you woke to a strange bare bedroom and an odd watch that flickered with light on your wrist. noticing the glass of water on the bedside table, you chugged it, coughing when you got too eager.
“You’re awake!”
you screamed, a small voice coming from right beside your head unexpectedly. you turned to see a small woman illuminated in the light from your watch.
“no need to be afraid. i’m lyla.”
lyla. that rang a bell.
“where am i?” you asked as you noticed the clothes folded in the corner of the room. you cast a sideways glance at the projection, and lyla turned to give you the illusion of privacy.
“miguel will answer all your questions. i’ve alerted him of your new condition.”
you slipped on the black sweatpants and top gratefully, relishing the feeling of soft cotton against your skin. as your hands moved over your body, you quickly noticed various cuts and bruises.
that’s right, i passed out.
“where is this miguel?” you asked as you studied the watch, noticing the flickering ‘EARTH-928’ across the screen.
almost immediately, little glowing footsteps were projected from the watch, making you whip your hand away from your face.
“i guess that’s my answer?” you asked lyla, and the woman nodded.
you sighed, figuring you might as well follow them.
fantastic survival skills from the one and only spider-woman.
well, you thought, not the one and only.
₊ ⊹
the man before you seemed almost nothing like he was when you were fighting Doc Oc.
he seemed…infinitely tired. his shoulders hunched, head ducked down. you supposed that you were distracted during the fight.
but his expression revealed much more than his body language. he had deep eye bags, and his cheeks were sunken in a way that expressed not just natural bone structure but also a lack of eating and sleeping properly.
miguel looked drained.
you were still processing what he had told you, about the cannon and the ‘Spider-Society’ and the ‘Arachno-Humanoid Poly-Multiverse.’
you had actually openly scoffed at that one, and he looked dejected by your reaction.
“but i can’t just send you home now. i’m pretty sure jess would actually web me for all eternity if i did.” he was saying, rubbing his brow.
“so what exactly am i doing here, then?” you asked, curious but hesitant.
he turned his back to you, looking forlornly at his screens.
“i’m going to train you.”
“why?” came your response, surprised and uncertain. you may have only known miguel for less than an hour, but you could already tell that taking on a young apprentice wasn’t exactly in his character.
he didn’t turn to you. he just kept looking at a picture of a young girl on one of his screens.
“because you remind me of someone.” he said quietly. then he looked at you, and you were struck with the amount of guilt and suffering that lived in his eyes.
“and because you remind me of myself. and i can’t let you become like me.”
masterlists | part ii
