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"My fingers and little fingers itch," Miles announces gravely, eyes distant, fingers and toes wiggling like writhing worms. "Feed them crayons, auntie."
Aunt May complies, putting a crayon in Miles' jerking fingers.
"This is pink! They need salmon red, auntie. Salmon. Red."
He shakes a yellow crayon in May's face, who switches it for blue. Miles bites the crayon in half, spits out one end onto the bedsheet, and colors.
"Thank you, ma'am," he says, content. "Love you."
The Spiders get a call from Aunt May that evening, demanding someone watch over their newest.
“I have a date tonight,” she says, pinching the bridge of her nose, the Parker relation never more clear. “I’m too old for this.”
'Abnormally high levels of sedation' is the basic prognosis. And Miles?
"Oh, he'll be fine," Aunt May says when the team convenes at her house. A wrinkled hand is bat at their worried grimaces. Harder hits mean higher levels of anesthesia, ya'll can handle it, something about your genetics being partially spider, she says. It’s just good to have someone nearby as a precaution.
At worst, you have a half-drugged-half-violent spider-man. The last time her Peter came to post-surgery he, like, apparently dug a fist into her wall. Everything’s a threat when you’re half-drugged. Even floral wallpaper.
At best, it makes for excellent receipts.
The lady wasn't lying.
Miles has surprising focus for a kid partially out of it.
"How you holding up?" Peter B., the first watch-over-bedridden-Miles-and-record-everything volunteer, asks.
Peter agreed to everything but the "record everything" part, because he's not a gremlin. Gwen and Peni have that covered.
Miles looks at Peter like it's the first time he's noticed him. He punches his finger down on the coloring book in his lap. "Coloring."
"Uh-huh. I see that. Wanna try coloring inside the lines? Just a thought."
Miles looks horrified, puts down his crayon, and turns to Peter.
"Don't tell mom."
"Okay." Peter relents, wanting no further clarification from the drugged-up teen.
"Shh! Shh..." Miles slurs gravely, reaching up to lay a serious hand on Peter's shoulder, missing entirely, and dragging it sloppily down the man's jaw. "Listenlistenlisten. Dad. Listen. You can't tell mom. Ok?"
"You got it, bud."
Miles gives Peter a conspiratorial finger-gun with an equally shaky smile and says something in Spanish.
Peter can't relate, so just gives a thumbs-up right back. Miles snuggles into his pillow and is snoring in seconds.
"I'm gonna fight him."
Gwen isn't startled. She just asks Miles to elaborate on that sleepy declaration. Louder, this time, so the phone can pick it up.
Miles, frustratingly, doesn't, and instead switches topics in a slur. "Spider-boy okay? He make it?"
Gwen looks Miles up and down. "Eh. Been better."
"Hope he's good. He got messed up. Bad, real bad. Saw it all. Crap knocked outta him. Gonna fight the guy who did it."
"Trust me, he's alive. You can chill out."
Miles sighs with relief, once on the verge of tears and now giggling with relief.
Gwen can’t help herself, "Guess what? Spider-Man?” She jabs Miles’ arm. “That's you."
"No..."
"Yeah, dude. That was you."
"Don't play, Gwanda. I'm... Spi-Boy?"
"Gwen. Spider-Man. Yes'sir. Scared the shit outta us."
"Dope, dope." He looks at Gwen then, voice diving octaves. "Hey. Come here often?"
"Shut up, Miles. Go back to sleep."
"Dope, dope."
Miles mumbles something.
Noir leans closer.
"What was that, kid?"
"...A large fry."
"Come again?"
"You heard me," Miles mumbles to Noir, something about black and white as he squints. "Large fry, officers. Large fry. Cheeseburger. Then I'll talk. Deal?"
"... Deal."
"Bet. Nice hat." Miles nods approvingly, then passes out.
"Woah woah woah. This is crazy, man. There's a pig, man."
"I know right?"
"Gotta tell Ganke," Miles bobs his head as he raps. "Gotta get to class. Class gonna start. Test today. Ya dig, pig?" Miles giggles and repeats the line again.
"Nice one. But class? On a Saturday?"
"Class is ass!"
"That's right, kid,” Porker supports blandly. “Sock it to the American educational system."
"Class is ass! Class is ass! Class! Is! Ass!"
Miles beatboxes and recites Newton's laws as he falls back asleep.
"Let my people go," Miles demands, sitting up from sleep.
"In five more minutes!"
Peni is all too happy to indulge Miles, despite being warned by Noir that he still ain't all there, sunshine, so don't antagonize him, ya hear?
Please. And pass up an opportunity like this? Yeah okay sure, Noir, hand on heart, I promise I won't do anything to--
Lies.
Miles repeats his demand again. Peni grins maliciously. "Nope."
Miles considers this with suspicion. "Release me. I need to be with my people."
"But we are your people, Miles!"
Peni needs SP//DR’s help to keep Miles from falling off the bed as he kicks off his sheets.
"Soon," Peni reassures, patting Miles on the head as he falls back to the bed with a whimper. "Soon."
"Okay. My fingers hunger. Pass me Mr. English Vermillion," Miles says with the ugliest English accent Peni's ever heard. He giggles at his own unspoken joke.
Peni passes Miles a blue one, as Aunt May instructed. His favorite color. Miles hums, content. Then, he whines.
“I love you guys. So much.”
At that, Peni giggles. This time, no bullshitting.
“We love you more.”