Closing In

After her dimensional adventure, Gwen Stacy, aka Spider-Woman, resumes the fight to clear her name for her best friend's death, whilst dealing with some other problems in her civilian life, but is glad that she's able to keep in touch with the friends she made in the multiverse. However, shortly after returning home, Gwen finds herself faced with newer and bigger problems, particularly in the forms of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers. (Spider-Gwen (Into the Spider-Verse) in the MCU)

Chapter 1: Prologue

When another Spider-Man approached Gwen with a device capable of traveling to different dimensions without the consequences of glitching, how could she say no?

Of course this other Spider-Man, Miguel O'Hara, who's from a dimension of Earth where the year is 2099, told her it wasn't a toy. Gwen casually quipped that she wasn't nine years old either and she got the gist of it.

Miguel had also entrusted Gwen with additional watches to be handed to the other spiders she was with in Miles's dimension, as they had all known her already and would most likely be willing to welcome her more than Miguel O'Hara, who was a stranger to them. Miguel had also muttered something about a dispute with another Spider-Man on Earth-67, which he was unwilling to talk about.

Gwen's first order of business with the watches was to visit Miles. She said before that she didn't do friends anymore after Peter, avoiding distractions whilst distancing herself while saving everyone else. Obviously that rule didn't really hold up after being thrown into Miles's dimension and meeting Miles, Peter B, Peni, Ham, and Noir. Miles on the other hand is still new, but unlike herself, Peter B, and the others, he was not alone. Miles has people who are just like him and could be looked to for help very early on into his superhero career. Out of all the Spider-People she had met initially, Gwen found herself getting along the most with Miles, with the admittedly not so significant age gap of fifteen months with her being older. They had similar tastes in music, foods, and they genuinely loved hanging around. Last time she checked, Miles had yet to tell anyone (barring his roommate) that was the new Spider-Man.

The second spider she had visited and currently visits the most after Miles was Peter B, wanting to see how he was doing with his own dimension's version of Em Jay. Of course it was weird enough to know that a great many Spider-Men are versions of her dead best friend or at least a Parker in some capacity. And it was of course weirder to know that in many of those instances it was Em Jay he fell in love with. Gwen wouldn't know until a bit later that in many of those same instances, it's Gwen Stacy who dies instead of Peter, a fact she still felt very weird about. A disheartening thing Gwen had noticed with Peter B while they were trapped on Miles's dimension was the fact that he almost seemed like he was eager to die. Gwen and the others would've stayed behind to destroy the collider even if it meant their deaths (like the self-sacrificing fools they kind of all were), but Miles came through and knocked some sense into him it seems. Thus far, Peter B had been well on the way to making amends with his Em Jay, though it was too soon to tell if they'd actually remarry.

Gwen visited the others dimensions as well to deliver the watches. She went into Peni's futuristic dimension and met the younger girl in her workshop. Peni had been focusing rebuilding SP/dr, since the original mech made by her father was destroyed by Scorpion, and she making was making good progress on it. Noir's dimension, much like himself, was a monochromatic and devoid of color, so naturally the skin-tight and brightly colored spandex of her suit drew some attention. However, Noir had stated his intentions to open an exhibition, with the only item in that dimension with color asides from herself at the time, the Rubik's cube. Ham's dimension was of course the weirdest, yet again it makes sense that a cartoon pig would hail from a dimension with cartoon physics. When Gwen first met Ham again, she was none-too pleased to see him wearing a hoodie that was clearly patterned after her own suit, and to know that it was in fact a promotional item from a fellow superhero named 'Spider-Guin'.

Yep. In Ham's universe, Gwen is a penguin with spider powers.

While visiting all those dimensions is all well and good, they're obviously no substitute for home. Though she admittedly has problems she neglected to share with the others.

"HANDS UP SPIDER-WOMAN!"

Like that.

"I didn't kill Peter Parker!" Oh what was she thinking? Of course they don't believe her, much of the city is pretty much against her. None more so than that blowhard J. Jonah Jameson who was the face of the smear campaign towards her, which she would come to learn is a multiversal constant.

Gwen casually took aim and webbed the feet of both cops to the ground and webbed the guns out of their hands and into hers. Both of the officers' shock quickly gave way to fear, as they worried she was gonna shoot them. Instead, Gwen, looking back on the time that her father had her learn to use a gun at some point, expertly removed the magazines, ejected the chambered bullets, detached the slides, then threw the emptied and disassembled weapons into an exceptionally smelly dumpster.

"Have a nice day officers." She didn't spare another glance at the two as she swung off towards the nearest building.

Obviously humiliating New York's finest wouldn't improve her image, but she'd rather not get sent to jail for something only she can truly prove she's innocent in. Not to mention her father was a cop, he became a captain recently actually. But he doesn't know about Gwen being Spider-Woman, and though she saved his life when he was still a sergeant, it was clear George had a lot of enmity for Spider-Woman for killing Peter. Ben and May Parker were close family friends after all, and Peter's death obviously affected Gwen. Despite this, Gwen can deal with the hurt of being called menace by her father, he's but one voice in a city of millions who don't know the whole truth.

Right now, Gwen's priorities are to prove her innocence and help out however she can. She only hopes that those kinds of victories will truly add up over time. Hopefully she can keep her secrets for a bit longer before something really bad happens.

On the bright side, there haven't been major players such as S.H.I.E.L.D. looking to bring her in for whatever reason other than Peter's death. They've left her alone after all this time anyway, hopefully it'll stay that way.

"So what can you tell us about Spider-Woman?"

Captain George Stacy stared at Black Widow and Captain America seated in front of his desk. At an earlier point during the investigation, she would've shrugged off help from the feds as well as S.H.I.E.L.D. and even the Avengers. He had his own stake in bringing down Spider-Woman. But after many a fruitless endeavor to bring her in. He was willing to accept help from the latter when the commissioner had accepted.

"Not much more I can tell you aside from the reports. Other than that she's a murderer and a menace." George said pointedly with some underlying vitriol nobody missed.

"This assessment doesn't seem to be solely cop-based." Natasha asked.

George sighed and looked her in the eyes. "As you may have heard I knew the Parkers for many years, so I had a stake in this investigation from the beginning. Peter was a good kid and my daughter Gwen was best friends with him, and Peter's Uncle Ben and Aunt May were basically his parents and have been very good friends. After Peter died, everything's been... falling apart. Ben Parker's more angry than he lets on, May Parker's still nursing a broken heart."

"And your daughter?" Steve asked thoughtfully.

"Gwen. She just... closed herself off from almost everyone. She quit her band, she's been hardly talking to anyone, and she's become so cold and aggressive even." George decided to omit the part when she punched a kid in school, hard enough to break his nose. George would later come to learn that the kid Gwen punched was actually one of Peter's bullies and that he was the only one with enough lack of decency to do so. That still didn't make the punch acceptable of course, and Gwen narrowly managed to avoid expulsion afterwards.

"And you also said Spider-Woman saved your life?" Natasha asked looking up from a manila folder she picked up from the box of Spider-Woman case files.

"She did." George admitted. "But she later hurt people very close to me. I guess I should be grateful for that, but I can't overlook this."

"Duly noted." Natasha put the file back in the box and held her hand out for George to shake, which he took. "Thank you, Captain Stacy. We'll be sure to keep in touch."

"Don't thank me for this. You still need to catch her. You both have a good day." If anyone can take down Spider-Woman for sure, it'll be them. Hopefully whatever happens, George hopes that Gwen, May, and Ben will get some closure from this. However, George had noticed Gwen getting a bit better over time, so it doesn't seem to be a total loss. But that still doesn't absolve what Spider-Woman had done.

As George watched the pair exit his office, he resumed his work and pushed any unneeded thoughts to the back of his mind.

Back in school, she mostly received some sideways glances for punching the bully, but that quelled down after a while. Nowadays she gets some glances for the new haircut she was forced to give herself due to Miles ripping out a patch of her hair. The longer she had the hairdo, the more she actually came to like it. She honestly felt like more of a badass than a lesbian, which many tend to associate the hairdo with. Not that she actually explored her preference or anything, she had that 'no friends' policy after all, but she was still willing to apply it in some capacity.

Due to habit, Gwen still took to keeping pieces of her suit underneath her clothes. It wasn't truly a onesie, it's design hid that fact. She takes off the gloves and tucks the hood in the shirt she wears above it. The lower costume is assumed to be tights or yoga pants, people don't pay her pointe shoes much mind. Obviously she had to say goodbye to crop-tops and other certain types of clothing that would expose her costume, but it wasn't too much of a price to pay if she were being honest.

As she knelt, sorting out her things between her locker and backpack, she noticed a more than familiar trio of girls making their way towards her. Gwen had already made herself quit the band a little while ago. So there's no way the Mary Janes would come to berate her about missing practice for the umpteenth time in the month.

Mary Jane 'Em Jay' Watson is the band's lead singer. Fun to be around, laidback, and admitted attention whore. But she's got the vocal's for it though. Seeing an older version Em Jay in Miles's dimension was still kind of weird to her. It was also disheartening to see the attention that Em Jay received on television was not because she was in a famous band, but rather mourning the death of her superhero husband whom she clearly loved.

Glory Grant is the band's bass player. Glory was a lot like Em Jay, but unlike the latter she was often seen as the band's voice of reason, which at times helped serve as a foil for Em Jay's self-absorbed tendencies. The Em Jay in Miles's dimension was most likely straight, but Gwen came to notice that Glory had been dropping hints of liking Em Jay, so hopefully something nice will come of it if it hadn't already.

Elizabeth 'Betty' Brant is the the band's lead guitarist. She's the most chill of the bunch and didn't waver all that much when it comes to the drama that tended to come and go. Despite this disposition, Gwen was reluctant to remember that Betty had appeared to be just as saddened by her quitting.

"Hey Gwen."

"Hey guys. Something you needed?" Gwen asked thoughtfully. The 'no friends' policy didn't forbid her from at least having good terms with people after all.

"No actually we just wanted to see how you were doing." Betty spoke. "Nice haircut by the way."

"Thanks. Anyways I'm doing okay, there's no hard feelings about me quitting back there, right?" Obviously there are, but it's sometimes better to just rip out the band-aid.

"Don't worry about that." Em Jay said. "We actually got a new percussionist."

"Oh, sweet. Have I met this person before?"

"No actually." Glory interjected. "We hosted auditions and we got a guy from Brooklyn High came around."

"Ooh, the only male member of the band. Do be gentle." Gwen jested, and to her slight surprise they all chuckled at that.

After that, Em Jay's expression, quickly softened. "You're not upset that you're being replaced are you?"

Gwen let out a sigh at that. She stood up, and put her arms in the slings of her backpack and looked Em Jay in the eyes evenly. "I'm not. Honest." Okay maybe a little. "I knew something like this would happen. I don't want me leaving the Mary Janes to drag you all down beyond just being absent. If you were able to find another and better drummer, then good for you. Don't let it fall apart because of me. That sound good to you?"

Em Jay, Betty, and Glory, all exchanged glances. Not entirely sure what to make of Gwen said, they were likely expecting a different and more harsher response from Gwen.

"Yeah, sounds good." Em Jay agreed softly.

The bell then rang, signalling that it was almost time for class.

"Well it's time to go." Gwen patted Em Jay on the shoulder. "Later guys."

The Mary Janes will always have a special place in her heart, but after Peter, she had to do things differently. Hopefully she could keep the second guessing on the down low.

Gwen then felt her phone vibrate, and she noticed that it was a text from Miles asking if she was free later tonight. Her phone was patched into her watch which helped enable inter-dimensional communication. She smiled and texted that she was and asked where to meet and when. After getting the time and place, she gingerly stuffed her phone in her pocket and was prepared to move on with her day.

A/N

Well shit, it's been what? Three years? Since I've posted a fanfiction. I've been reading. I've been reviewing. I also know since then that the only two stories I posted on RWBY all those years ago were well received for the most part. I hope I still got it.

So in response to the apparent lack of Spider-Gwen stories in most of the platforms I've been on. This was my response. This is essentially my take on Spider-Gwen in the MCU in place of MCU Peter Parker. Elements of Spider-Gwen's story from the comics, and what little is provided in the Into the Spider-Verse film, supplants MCU Peter Parker's story and involvement.

My assessment on the version Spider-Gwen from the Spider-Verse film is that of a mature, responsible, and seasoned superhero despite her age, more mature than MCU Spidey and most other renditions of the high school-going Spidey. I place Gwen's age, in relation to Into the Spider-Verse Miles Morales at 14-15 years old, as Miles himself is still within middle school age as he stated he wanted to go back to attending his own school (Brooklyn Middle) rather than Visions Academy. Also there's that "puberty" stuff he was going through, when it was in fact his powers altering his body after getting bitten by the spider.

By the way this story won't be entirely compliant with the MCU setting. Just a heads up.

I intend to make other stories around Spider-Gwen, another one I'm currently making is where she ends up on Earth-26496, the designation of which the events of The Spectacular Spider-Man cartoon series take place.

To those still following my RWBY stories and those who have actually put me on the author's list. I thank you for your consideration. But at the same time with regret I report that I may or may not continue them. Much has changed after Monty Oum died in 2015 and I just lost touch with what enamored me with the story. I don't know what exactly it would've been, maybe it was the direction of the world-building, the story itself, or maybe the action no longer pleases me to the same capacity. Maybe it was just one of those or collectively.

If you guys really want me to continue those stories. Then I'll try to consider it.

Anyway, wish me luck and pray to whatever deities or belief systems you have that I do not get distracted (ADHD dude here).

A/N End