Chapter 9:
October 5th, 2010:
After making sure that all the bugs in the house were disabled, I collect them to study and Siri tells me what the agents did while they were in my house. Turns out they tried to do a lot. They tried to get into the lab by hacking into the passcode entrance. But Siri retaliated by hacking their tablets and turning them off from the inside. That's the beauty of an AI. When you try and hack her, she hacks you back.
"Siri, have I told you how much I love you and am extremely proud of you?" I ask her.
"Yes Sir. Twice every day, actually. It feels... good and warm?" My baby girl is learning!
"And don't you forget it. Creating you was the best decision of my life." I say with a lot of pride in my voice.
It took about 15 hours for the smell to leave the suit. I had to scrub it clean myself in the end. I manage to build a suit for Peter, in his red and blue colours. I haven't told him yet. It was made from the same materials as mine and strong enough to take a punch from Abomination and not break. I learned my lesson during the fight. The suit looked exactly the same as his old spandex with the only addition of an HUD in his face mask, except without an AI to help him with everything. This suit will be reserved for when he has time to prepare and something big is coming.
I had given him an idea for a new suit based on the Unstable Molecules suits from Fantastic Four. Since they do not exist in this universe, I don't think they'll mind me stealing their idea. With thinking speed like Peter's it'll take us a maximum of 2 months to crack it. And no, I'm not exaggerating; the movies always underestimated his intelligence. This Unstable suit will be for everyday use and it can even be stored in the corner of our bag.
Other than that my days were normal. I started going College again to attend lectures and I was about ready to give all my exams to pass out of college. What? I'm smart! And I need to get at least a masters in engineering by 2012. My nights included Patrols with Spidey and stalking the few drug dealers to their home bases and marking them. I'll either deal with them later or have Peter do it.
It was two weeks after his initial visit that Fury called to make an appointment, surprised me too actually. Maybe my talk had an actual effect on him? Nahh..
I show him into the house and to the Lab when he gets here since I wanted privacy for what I was about to ask of him. Without any small talk, Fury shoves a file at me. It detailed the prospects for the Avengers Initiative which at this time only had me, Bruce Banner, Tony Stark and Peter Parker. Which was understandable since they hadn't found Captain America yet, didn't know about Thor while Black Widow and Hawkeye were active agents so Fury probably won't tell me that they're being considered.
I read the file, look at him and raise an eyebrow and calmly say, "You still haven't told me why I should join the Boyband."
Fury raises his eyebrow in answer and answers just as calmly, "You are an asshole, you know that? Just tell me. What do you want in return?"
I answer without the normal shit eating grin on my face this time, "The age of Heroes is coming soon. Just look at how many super heroes as well as villains came out in these last 2 years." I pause here to collect my thoughts and continue. "There will come a time when aliens other than those Skrulls will enter the Planet. Probably in America coz this seems to be a hotspot for all weird things. I want you to call me when first contact happens. Even if it is some fallen piece of alien technology I want in on the research. I'll probably bring in Peter with me if he agrees." I say skrulls with a sneer that'd make Snape proud to convey my exact feelings for the race of beings. Taking the risk of sounding typical American, they come into our lands without permission and impersonate our people. Of course I'm mad at them.
He looks at me for a while, making the situation almost uncomfortable and says, "I'll agree to it. What about training?" He raises his eyebrow at me.
I channel my inner Jon Snow and say, "I don't want it. I'm not going to be fighting your fights for you. You have your hired agents for that. I'm going to be there if you encounter someone your agents can't handle. Meaning something stronger than normal humans and only if they're being a danger to society. The regular training won't sit right with me. I don't know if you noticed, but I'm strong. Any trainer you give me will have to be faster than me to land a hit and it won't help me even a little. They'll hurt themselves and its not overconfidence, its fact. And that's if they hit me. I already have a training partner in Spiderman so either find someone who's the best at hand to hand combat like Shang Chi, if you can convince him or no training for me."
Fury shows his title as a master spy when his only reaction is to raise his eyebrows a little. He searches for something in my eyes and looks like he found it when he says, "Okay. No training for you. Anything else?"
I think for a bit and then say in the most serious voice I can manage, "Destroy all the DNA samples you have of me as a show of trust and give a guarantee that you won't take any more samples to try and replicate what I've become like I'm some science experiment. Consider my situation as a lucky accident and leave it at that."
He once again looks furious, which just shows how angry he is to be visibly upset and nods reluctantly. "If that's all then we'll meet if there's need for you. I'll call you on your personal phone." I don't ask him why he has my phone number and he doesn't offer a reason. He leaves without saying goodbye. I once again sweep for bugs and find 5 more. Disabling them, I add them to the collection to replicate and add to my suits.
It was about a week after Fury's visit that I ask Gwen out for a date. On October 29th we went out for dinner which was a nice date; I took her to a normal restaurant, nothing too fancy as I didn't want to look like someone who flaunts his money. Surprisingly, I actually enjoyed her company a lot. We both being Scientists understood each other, even if our subjects were different. She worked at my company in the first place so I understand some Genetics already from reading different reports. She was currently trying to get a doctorate in Cross species genetics to carry on Connors' work now actually. So some of her talk still went over my head. I told her about my Bachelor's studies in Engineering.
All in all it was a nice date. We agreed to meet again in a week and we had already exchanged numbers so we decided to plan it on text. But frankly? I don't see myself being romantically involved with her. Not because she likes Peter. Well, kinda because she likes Peter. But also because I don't even have an inclination to date anyone yet. Well, we'll see what happens. If it stays, it stays.
4 days later:
Well it stayed. We went another date at the amusement park when she kissed me at the top of the Ferris wheel. It was my first kiss in this life actually. It was a nice feeling; we weren't madly in love or anything, we were just trying to see where this takes us. I started going to Oscorp every now and then to surprise Gwen. Bernard gave me disapproving looks for that a lot since he had to handle the business in my stead and I was out here flirting in front of him. Hehehe. Suck it!
After meeting for about 10 times within 3 weeks, we were officially together. We never went beyond kissing, but Peter was still jumping with joy.
November 26th, 2010: Thanksgiving.
The Parkers invited me to Thanksgiving dinner this year too. I invited Gwen to come with me as she is my girlfriend. And Peter brought his girlfriend MJ. Ben and May teased me a lot for finally getting a girlfriend while Gwen and I blushed and MJ and Peter laughed at me. Assholes.
"So Gwen, what do you do?" Ben asked Gwen after some small talk and light teasing.
"I work at Oscorp actually. I'm a geneticist working on faster healing medicines." Gwen answers, and you could actually see the passion she has for the subject.
"She's really smart. Probably as smart as Petey here." I smirk at Peter. He still hated that name. Peter maturely showed me the middle finger which I happily returned.
May gasped, "Peter! Harry!"
"Sorry Aunt May!" we both say together shamelessly and smirk at each other. I had a lot of good memories of this family from when I was younger.
"How'd you meet her then, Harry?" Ben asks me.
"Well she used to be in our school actually. I was friends with her due to being one of the few people to understand her passion for science. Peter was still a wallflower at the time. Then she skipped grades to get a Masters in Genetics at the early age of 16 and started working at Oscorp, though we still kept in touch. I started meeting her again when I started joining Bernard for some of the meetings and just asked her out one day. One date turned into more and now, here we are." While talking she held my hand under the table and smiled at me lovingly.
The rest of the dinner went well. Gwen did not sneak glances at Peter which I was kind of expecting her to do, so that's nice; at least she's over him now. At 11 PM I dropped her at her house in my car, a Jaguar Sedan and went home.
In December, I give all the exams for my Bachelor's course and pass out as an engineer. That was easy since I already had the necessary knowledge, but I still had to fill in the required theory and research papers. In celebration, Gwen took me to a bar. Well more like she drove us there and I got us into the bar. She wanted to drink and who am I to refuse?
I noticed after an hour of drinking and dancing that she was getting really touchy-feely with me when drunk. My healing factor meant that I wasn't as drunk as she was. I tried to stop her from doing something she might regret, but she was relentless. So I lock her hands and stay holding her in my side.
"Harrryyyy! Why won't you kiss me?" She asked with a cute pout on her face. Her words were starting to slur a little.
"You're drunk, Gwen. Let's get you home. You have work tomorrow and I have to prepare for my Masters." I say softly into her ear. She moaned in disbelief and stubbornly sat down on the floor.
"No! You always have to study or work. You don't pay attention to me anymore!" She pouted at me.
I sigh audibly and pick her up. "Let's go home, Gwen. We'll talk tomorrow when we're both sober."
"Pinky promise?" She looked at me seriously and asked.
"Yes. Yes. Pinky promise." I smile at her sadly and pick her up. She nods, rests her head on my shoulder and goes to sleep on me. I pay the tab and drive home. I was still sober enough that I could drive properly so I didn't have a problem. I take her straight to my home and sleep her in the guest room. After covering her up and adjusting the thermostat, I go to sleep in my own bed.
In the morning I wake up at 5 again and follow my daily routine of warm up and exercises. At about 9 Gwen wakes up and comes down. I resist the urge to laugh at her state and give her a plate of full British breakfast and Orange juice.
The silence was getting uncomfortable so I sigh loudly and look at her. She looks up at the sound and has tears in her eyes. We both know what's coming.
"We both know it's not working out." I blurt out.
She nods at me. She says, "Just because nothing went wrong doesn't mean it went right. We were good as friends. We thought we might work out as more, but.." she leaves it hanging and looks at me sadly.
I get up and go to her. Kneeling before her I put my hands on her knees, and say softly, "Gwen, I'm sorry, I really am. I didn't give you enough attention and I know that now. I could have made it work but I didn't, and there's no excuse for that. I just.. I don't think I'm ready for a relationship. And I don't want to lead you on. I'm sorry. Please forgive me." I knew it was my fault. I didn't have feelings for her but I didn't even try. She knew she didn't have feelings for me but she still tried.
She nods sadly and starts tearing up. I get up and hug her for all it's worth. She hugs me back tightly, and says, "I'm sorry too. Sniff. I tried too hard for something, sniff, something that was not."
I look her in the eyes and for the first time in our short relationship, initiate the kiss. It's a soft chaste kiss. Nothing to read into it. She kisses me back and smiles into the kiss. I can still see the tears running down her cheeks so I raise a hand to her cheek and wipe them.
"Still friends?" I ask her after a while still hugging her.
"Yeahh.. Friends." She whispers. I get the feeling that she's more upset than she's showing herself to be. So I hug her tightly again and slowly separate myself from her. Gwen smiles at me, wipes her tears off and goes to the guest room to gather her stuff. After she comes back down I go and drop her home. It was nice while it lasted. But we were better off as friends. It just took us time to realize it. I just drop down on the couch after coming home and sit there the whole day, not doing anything and just watching the TV. At night,after having a light dinner I lay on bed just thinking.
"Did I go about it the wrong way? What do I even do? Mom! What do I do? I miss you mom!" I whisper. For the first time in the 14 years since I've come here, I cry for my old life and sleep hugging a pillow. Not a good month for me, frankly.