So Designed By Nature

Ravencroft Institute for the Criminally Insane had never been a pleasant place. These days it had a high-security prison wing that nearly rivaled that of Ryker's Island Maximum Security Penitentiary.

Peter Parker -- and this was ironic on so many levels -- knew that it was harder to break into Ryker's than to break out, and he had a feeling the same would be true of Ravencroft. It'd be safer to come in through the front door as a visitor, all nice and legal and official. Sign his name as coming to see Dr. Otto Octavius, maybe give a few lines about wanting to talk to them for the Bugle.

Yeah, Spider-Man thought to himself, sticking to the side of the building awkwardly waiting for the second pair of guards in five minutes to walk past. That would've been the smart idea.

He'd have had to keep the act up with Dr. Octavius themself, though. Peter had only ever met Octavius the once, and he wasn't at all sure they'd remember him. And he wasn't coming here just for a general chat anyway. The kind of conversation they'd end up having if he showed up that way, if Dr. Octavius didn't just tell him to leave, wasn't why he wanted to talk to... the hopefully former "Doctor Octopus."

He needed to pay close attention if he wanted to get inside unnoticed. He didn't need to be deep in thought, distracted. But he couldn't help but feel uncomfortable in the knowledge, sitting in the back of his head, even as he webbed the employee entrance just slightly open as someone stepped outside, that he wouldn't have come here if not for what Doctor Octopus had said at the end of their fight at the nuclear plant. That he wouldn't have bothered to visit at all if he hadn't been forced to conceptualize the situation in a completely different way.

He'd almost forgotten that he'd met Dr. Octavius once before. Hadn't heard their name, just seen their face for a few moments, on that field trip to M.I.T. in the ninth grade. When Flash Thompson had tripped him straight into Octavius and knocked off both their glasses. At least they didn't break had seemed to set them off, and Peter hadn't known why, had just been kind of uncomfortable with the passionate anger lurking under their response.

They'd called the bullies monkeys, and later, had called the General a barbarian, had called the protestors a lot of disparaging things, it all had come down to what Spider-Man had assumed was a rampant ego. The idea that intelligence made Doctor Octopus better than everyone, that it meant they should be allowed to do whatever they wanted because they were superior.

But then they had begged Spider-Man through tears not to hit them again, and while Spider-Man had still been reeling from that, they had said in such a quiet voice, I would have my glasses... there will be such trouble if I've broken them...

That had been when Peter had remembered. That had been when he'd realized that all that time, since he'd punched them in the face -- and had, damn it, broken their glasses, he was pretty sure in retrospect -- Octavius had been thinking of him as one of their own tormenters. Hadn't they said as much themself? "You're one of them" and "you still behave like the apes you left behind"?

Peter hadn't been listening. To be fair, he'd been in a lot of pain as Doctor Octopus lashed out, spider-sense going crazy, a more dangerous foe than probably any he'd faced before, and he'd confidently taken down half a dozen supervillains at that point. But he hadn't listened then, and in some ways, Octopus hadn't wanted to talk then, either.

It was time to clear the air.

The guards outside seemed to be patrolling more stringently than those inside; maybe it had something to do with giving the inmates a little bit of privacy. Spider-Man was gratified to see, passing quietly through the shadows past mostly empty cells, that they were allowed things like books and playing cards and in one case even a small radio playing quietly, that their beds looked potentially somewhat comfortable, at least. Maybe Ravencroft was actually improving, or maybe this new prison wing was ironically a nicer place than the rest of it. Either way, coming up on Dr. Octavius's cell, Spider-Man was relieved but not shocked to see them sitting at a table, a paintbrush in hand, and all their metal arms busily working on... something else?

Couldn't tell from the angle. Spider-Man dropped down from the ceiling, landed lightly. No inmates in the nearby cells to raise a fuss, thankfully, but he still kept his voice down. "Hey, Doc."

Seeing them painting wasn't a big surprise, but a couple other things were. The speed with which two of those arms dropped what they were holding and moved towards and through the bars was one of them, and Spider-Man held up both hands defensively.

But even as Octavius looked over at him, and they'd already been starting to look over even before Spider-Man had spoken, the metal arms slowed and didn't lash out like he might have expected. Instead the pincers at the ends pressed one to each of his hands, light, unexpectedly delicate, and his eyes widened as he realized-- his spider-sense hadn't gone off. It hadn't even started off as an attack.

"Hmm?"

A quiet, quizzical sound from Doctor-formerly-Octopus. They seemed surprised as well, but more curious than anything, and it was then that Spider-Man had his second surprise, noticing as they rose from their chair that their other arms were holding drawing utensils as well -- a paintbrush, in one case, but also a piece of charcoal. He glanced down to the floor of the cell and saw a third paintbrush and a fountain pen.

There were easels all over the cell, paper on the walls that held finished art. It was impressive was what it was. And as he opened his mouth to speak, he saw the third surprise.

"So, uh, what's this about...? Whoa."

He'd meant to be asking about the 'hands' pressed to his hands. But Octavius followed his gaze to the back wall of their cell, and he saw the doctor's ears turn slightly red. Their metal arms pulled away, retreating back into the cell to pick up the fallen tools.

"...The Vitruvian Man," Octavius said, as if that was an explanation, and it took everything Peter had not to say more like the Vitruvian Spider-Man. Because, yeah, that was the Vitruvian Man, but it was also him. Very obviously him, mask, spider on the chest, and all. Larger than life, taking up a good eight square feet of cell wall at least, and meticulously detailed.

Instead of allowing himself that quip, he asked, lowering his hands finally, "Da Vinci, right?"

"That's right. The quintessential symbol of the Renaissance Man, art and science combined into one flawless whole." That with the ease and immediacy of something long believed and often thought about, almost an air of being on autopilot, and Octavius adjusted their glasses as they glanced back at Spider-Man. "We are so much alike, you and I... I can feel it... Why did you come here?"

There were a lot of ways he could answer that. He tried to meet Octavius's eyes and stop himself from repeatedly looking back to the Vitruvian Spider-Man (hey, just because he wasn't saying it out loud didn't mean he wasn't going to think of it like that!).

"I wanted to see if you were okay. And... I wanted to apologize."

"I'm..." Octavius started to gesture, a motion that was aborted as they stared at Spider-Man, the second part apparently sinking in. "You... Apologize? What for?"

Hard to say if Octavius couldn't think of anything Spider-Man needed to apologize for, or just couldn't imagine him apologizing for any of it. He tried not to wince. Was he not a bully, or did he just not want to be one, or not want to be thought of as one? How much could he go around punching even supervillains and not have them start to flinch away from him?

"For hitting you. I might not have liked what you were saying, but you were talking to me. Maybe I could have talked you down if I hadn't escalated. And I know it..." Hurt them, upset them? Either way, Octavius's brows were knitted, and Spider-Man trailed off at the look on their face. "What?"

"I don't remember." Octavius's voice was calm, though their expression was troubled. "Was this after my 'accident'? I'm afraid the three or so days surrounding the event are quite hazy."

Oh. Shit. If Octavius wasn't Doctor Octopus anymore, maybe this was the reason why -- maybe Mary Alice Anders had been right and that hadn't actually been them, not the way they really were. "Wait, you're saying you don't remember much of anything after your accident?"

"Or shortly before. Yes." Octavius pressed their hands together meditatively. "The doctors say I suffered a psychotic break. I gather there was a great deal of unpleasantness."

"Yeah, you could say that." Peter regretted shooting his mouth off pretty much immediately. "So they didn't tell you... What? Much of anything? What do you remember?"

"I was told of the charges against me." Octavius moved to sit at their table again, though their metal arms adjusted the chair as they did so, turning it to face Spider-Man. "Rather, I was questioned extensively about a number of dead military men and scientists, and my intentions breaking into the nuclear plant. Truthfully, I don't recall killing anyone. It seems the 'accident' which fused my arms to me," and there their voice went fond, almost... parentally affectionate, and Peter blinked behind his mask, "killed a number of people present at the experiment, and then I killed three guards escaping from a military facility, and later four scientists at the plant."

There was a lot Spider-Man could say about all that, but something stood out to him. Octavius was using very specific language... "But you do recall what you wanted to do at the plant."

Octavius hesitated. Spider-Man couldn't read the gesture, couldn't even tell if it was a conscious one, but their arms drew closer to themself and coiled slightly.

Peter held up both hands again, sitting down cross-legged on the floor. "This isn't entrapment or anything. I'm not trying to get you in trouble and you're not going to double-jail."

Octavius snorted, though they didn't look entirely amused. Still, their arms uncoiled and started to clean off the paint brushes and put the utensils away into the cup that was apparently there for storage. "Yes, Spider-Man. That I remember. As if through a fog... but I do remember. You see, my glimpse of the god of the atom was traumatic, I believe. I wouldn't say as much to the doctors here, they are more than useless. But what I saw is seared into my mind, even if I am only vaguely aware of the fight we had after."

"You said the only face it had was the one we gave it. That it wanted to stay captive and be exploited." And they had taken that hard. Even now, the reminder made Octavius's expression shift, and they looked suddenly more melancholy.

"I remember the words we exchanged, Spider-Man," they said quietly. "That is how I remember what I had come there to do. And how I know why I improved the workings of the reactor instead... made it safer. How could I not?" They looked down at their hands of flesh and blood, folded in their lap. "My god had left me, but she had made her choice. I could not force her to be something she didn't want."

"I'm glad you didn't." Understatement of the century. If Dr. Octavius had decided to, they could have killed millions, including Peter, Aunt May, literally everyone he knew and loved... but somehow what he felt now in the aftermath was sadness, sympathy, an urge to reach out.

"As am I. I didn't... I don't want to hurt anyone." There was a sudden hesitance in Octavius's voice, and they looked back up at Spider-Man. "I hated you, then. I thought I understood you. I can't remember what so thoroughly convinced me, but I was certain I knew you completely, and I despised you. I was equally certain that when you saw me clearly, no more pretense between us, that you would feel the same. That that is the nature of knowing another."

We are hideous, are we not?

There was a whole lot more to unpack there than simple self-loathing, but Peter was suddenly glad that he'd answered in the negative the way he had. "I don't think that's inevitable, no," he said carefully. "I'm still not sure I understand you completely. But I do know when I understood a little more about you, I..." Pitied you? Even as someone with a terminal case of shoots-his-mouth-off, he knew that would be a bad thing to say right now. "Well, I stopped judging you as just some megalomaniac, anyway. I don't like you less, now that we're talking instead of fighting."

For a moment, Octavius looked like they didn't know what to say. They looked at him the same way they had when Spider-Man had carefully put their glasses back onto their face -- it had been a moment of disorienting mirroring, Peter catching a glimpse of his own masked face in Octavius's remaining lens, seeing how the lens over one of his own eyes had been shattered in much the same way.

Before they could open their mouth, Spider-Man felt that familiar buzzing in his head that alerted him to danger... or potential danger, or just the presence of someone who might be a problem. In all honesty, he was still trying to figure out exactly how his spider-sense even worked. But it didn't seem to be coming from Octavius, but from around the corner, and Spider-Man shot a strand of web up towards the ceiling on instinct, zipping himself up and using all four hands and feet to stick, pressing himself as close and quiet as possible.

"Where are you going?" Octavius's question was surprised, perplexed, strangely urgent. Spider-Man let go of the ceiling with one hand to put a finger over his lips, though Octavius looking up at him was obvious enough that it could also be a problem. Luckily, when the guard turned the corner and shone her flashlight down the hall, they turned to look over at her instead, squinting.

"Is everything all right over here?" She shone her light around, scanning the area, luckily not searching up. "Who are you talking to?"

"Oh." Octavius gathered himself, turning back to their desk to pull out a sheaf of paper. "Yes, everything is fine, thank you. I... thought I saw a spider on the bars. I must have been mistaken."

"A spider," the guard repeated dubiously, and played her flashlight over the wall of Octavius's cell. Right, the Vitruvian Spider-Man would make anyone think that Octavius had fixated (maybe he had...?), and Spider-Man winced, anticipating some mocking comment. Instead she sounded almost sympathetic. "Think you might want to bring that up to Dr. Kafka later...?"

"No." Octavius's voice was short, and Peter could just barely see them from this angle on the ceiling, as they picked up a pen and started to write, mostly ignoring her. "Thank you."

She hesitated, then shrugged, stepping away from the cell. "It's not my job to advise you," she allowed.

"No, it isn't." After a moment, though, Octavius added, "I'll be wanting more paper soon."

"I'll let them know."

Spider-Man waited until the guard's footsteps had completely died away, then lowered himself down again. Not fully to the ground this time, and upside-down, holding onto the web with his hands and with his feet clasped to it, knees bent outwards. "So... she seemed nice."

"There are worse guards than Officer Cooper," Octavius allowed, and set down their pen. They stood, and Spider-Man didn't move as they approached the bars, metal arms writhing and winding around one another. He idly watched them, mostly watched Octavius's upside-down face, tried to read their eyes and the way their brow knitted between them. "You broke in...? To apologize?"

"I mean, I'm not just gonna walk in through the front door." Definitely not as Spider-Man; the police didn't exactly approve of the ol' web-head, even with some advocacy from Capt. Stacy. But what he said was, "Pretty sure they have a dress code and jammies just won't cut it."

"After what you did, they don't see you as a hero?"

"Some people do. Some people see me as a menace. You should see what the Daily Bugle writes about me," he joked. "I'm a vigilante, not having many friends in official places comes with the territory."

Octavius shook their head, apparently in disbelief rather than disagreement. Or maybe both. "Are they so incapable of recognizing the steps we have taken beyond humanity? Beyond the rules and realities of their lives?"

That made a little alarm go off in Spider-Man's head, though not his literal spider-sense. "You know, maybe you don't remember, but you said some stuff like that before. You wanted to talk to me, when I first showed up to fight you. So... I came here to apologize, but let's talk."

"I see..." Octavius's limbs calmed some, then started moving around, straightening things up as they talked. Geez. It was almost like those arms needed to be doing something, had a hard time staying completely idle. No wonder they had so much stuff in their cell, it would be cruel and unusual otherwise. "I believe I remember the thrill, if not the details. What did I say?"

"Uh, well, you talked me up a lot while your arms were attacking me. You said you weren't making them do that, that they were just protecting you, but I didn't buy it at the time. I probably should have."

Octavius made a thoughtful sound. "I have some recollection of not having conscious control over them, yes..."

"You also sounded like you thought I was fused to a bunch of technology that gave me my powers. And that you could feel radiation in my blood." He admitted, "That's when I got pretty ticked off, because your arms had gotten really grabby and you started getting all 'we've evolved beyond humans and should rule them' about it. Pretty stereotypical supervillain stuff, you either get petty criminals or wannabe-despots and not much in between."

"Hmm. I see why you assumed I was a megalomaniac," Octavius conceded. "But while I would not go to the lengths I did then, I still wholeheartedly believe we have made ourselves into a new breed, superior to humanity. You must have met humans," they added. "It isn't hard."

Somehow Spider-Man hadn't been expecting that. He'd opened his mouth to protest, but had to fight back a wholly inappropriate-feeling laugh. "I think you're just a little more cynical about humanity than I am, Doc." Though with what they'd apparently experienced, maybe even more than Peter Parker had, Peter couldn't exactly say he didn't know where Dr. Octavius was coming from.

Octavius smiled faintly. "It isn't merely a moral superiority... Though I do believe we can be more moral than they. To guide them into a new age. We are superior in ability. There is no shame in admitting to this. The human body and so many human minds are woefully under-equipped."

"Yeah, I too have turned my head and pulled a neck muscle." It was easier to be flippant when Peter could see what they were saying, easier than admitting they weren't entirely wrong. "Real quick, though, before we get into an ethical debate that completely devours us... Can you actually feel my blood?"

"It calls out to me," Octavius said simply. "I could feel that you were here before you said a word."

That... felt weird. Like the hairs at the back of his neck stood up a little. "Well, I do have some radioactive blood, and I still don't get all the powers that come with it, so that's fair."

"Powers?" Octavius looked curious. "I saw you on television. Those delicate metal wrist-pieces that were the source of your webbing... They were magnificent. Do you still use them? Your ability to stick to surfaces, that danger sense you have, do they not have technological sources?"

Peter was glad to be masked; his face was hot underneath it. "I use them, but the rest of it... Nope. Which is why I wasn't expecting you to be able to set off my spider-sense with tech. That was a surprise," he added, "but it won't be a second time, so don't try it again, okay?"

Octavius seemed abruptly to feel as awkward as he did. Their eyes darted away, and they looked down. "I... had hoped your words meant that you could think of me... as something other than an enemy," they said quietly.

"I'd hoped that you fixing the reactor and surrendering quietly meant you didn't want to stay my enemy either." Spider-Man admitted. "The Doctor Octopus rampage thing... Nothing personal, I just stop things like that."

Octavius frowned, looking troubled. "Why do you take so much responsibility for these things? Why put yourself in danger for these people?"

Because he had to. That was the simplest explanation, broken down to its purest form... And the long explanation was absolutely not something Peter could share. With anyone.

Instead, he hesitated, then said, "Because I want to help and protect people. Because maybe... maybe it's not so terrible to have a purpose in serving humanity and making things better."

Octavius's head snapped up to look at him, eyes wide behind their glasses, and Peter felt a surge of guilt he could not source. He remembered what they'd said about their 'god', about exploitation and captivity. "I don't understand..."

"Maybe you understand better than you think, Doc. Is it really that different to talk about wanting to guide humanity into a new age?" Peter didn't want to overwhelm them, though, and didn't want to risk the two of them actually coming to blows again, and stepped back raising a hand up in preparation for web-slinging. "Just... think about it. I'll come back some other time, okay? Just to talk more. If you want."

Octavius's mouth worked for a moment, and then they nodded, once. Their metal arms wound around the bars of their cell. "I'd like that. Spider-Man."

He nodded too. "Right. --Uh. Sorry if that was a bit much."

"No... I have much to think about. There is no harm in an exchange of ideas."

"Right," Spider-Man noted. "Scientist. Okay, then... I'll drop in sometime soon, Dr. Octavius."

Getting back out was, as he'd expected, perversely a lot easier than sneaking in had been. Which was lucky, because Octavius wasn't the only one doing a lot of thinking.