geek charming, peter parker.

i. concept of the mask.

act one
scene one
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Wind rushed through her senses, tossing her hair back and raising gooseflesh all over her arms as she inhaled the stiff air eighty eight stories up. Music blasted through Dylan's headphones as she balanced atop the edge of the roof without a single shaky bone in her body, at least not until a voice sliced through the silence.

"Please don't jump!"

Dylan's eyes snapped open immediately and the next thing she knew she was ripping her headphones out of her ears as she gaped at the Spider-Man walking horizontally up the wall of her building. He held out his hands warily, as if half expecting his command would only convince her to do the opposite of his request, but she wouldn't. She hadn't planned on it, she would've laughed, but as she took in the sight before her all she could really do was stare because...

"What is on your feet?!" She tried to lean closer to get a better look,"How are you—"

And then she was cut off.

By a string of— web...? (The name made sense, at last). Whatever it was, he directed it straight at her midsection and it glued her down with surprising strength and tenacity.

"Dude!" She gasped, cursing herself for calling him dude and then again for screaming at Spider-Man.

She'd heard of him, of course, he was everywhere: the Daily Bugle, the Daily Globe... Instagram, Twitter, Flash's Snapchat that one time, the guy was an enigma, he was even used as a freaking meme by her friends and had blogs written about him... and he was speaking and she was not listening.

"Hasn't anyone ever told you not to stand on the edge?" He exclaimed,"Especially when your building has seventy odd floors from which you could tumble to death from?"

"You'd catch me." She shrugged, but it was hard considering her whole upper body was glued down, she scrunched up her nose and he noticed.

Then he was in front of her, kneeling and helping her out of the sticky mess before she could blink or even comprehend how he did it. His voice was sheepish as he spoke,"Sorry, you were getting a little too close."

Dylan huffed,"I wasn't jumping."

His disbelief was clear even though the mask.

"I wasn't!" She insisted, rolling her eyes,"Thought has never sprinted across my mind, if it makes you feel any better, cross my heart and hope to... well, not that, but you know the gist." He offered her a hand to get up, which she promptly ignored as she stood on her own before proudly saying,"And it's eighty eight."

"Sorry?"

"You said seventy odd stories, it's eighty eight." She corrected,"My dad wanted to own the tallest building in New York, but pulled the plug on the construction at eighty eight when my mom died, Stark Industries has him beat by five, aaand now I'm ranting to Spider-Man... I swear I wasn't gonna jump— I'm actively trying to avoid an early burnout and that is exactly the kind of thing that would lead to the assumption that I'm currently having one."

"You actually just made it sound worse there." He one hundred percent had to be grinning, she could feel his smug attitude.

She narrowed her eyes,"Says the guy who leaps from building to building as a pastime, ever thought to save someone who's actually asking to be saved? Because, trust me, I'm no damsel..." Dylan searched for an appropriate insult, and when she came up short due to the fact that this was a literal stranger, who wore a mask and didn't look like he was wearing proper footwear, shot out,"Bug eyes."

"It's Spider-Man." He cleared his throat, almost politely.

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why "Spider-Man"? Why spiders? Webs? Whatever that strong sticky stuff was, did that come out of you? No... is it a device? Did you build it? Why blue and red? You patriotic? Is it a Steve Rogers kind of thing? Usually is. And are your bug eyes zooming?! Dude—"

"Uh, that's a lot of questions." He went with finally.

"Yeah, I'm inquisitive, my dad thinks I should be a scientist because of it, but I'm chatty too, and I don't think that'd make for a good combination. You gonna answer any of my questions?" She frowned,"I won't ask the obvious "who are you" since you've got the whole mask thing goin' on and that concept is clear."

"Absolutely." His demeanor suddenly changed as he started backing up, feet hugging the edge of the roof as she had previously before he'd shown up and broken her momentary peace,"Some other time though, maybe? I have somewhere to be now that you're safe— that you turned out to be all along, glad you weren't gonna jump and that the thought hasn't ever crossed your mind, definitely be inquisitive, more, I say, who knows, you might make a great scientist!" He spoke mid-jump, and Dylan watched as he swung away to nothing her poor eyesight could see.

Her abandoned phone made its way back into her hands as she made haste to the elevator doors, waiting for her search results to load anything and everything on Spider-Man while dialing an old phone number...