Morning hit him like a physical blow.
Harsh, unfiltered sunlight sliced through the threadbare curtains, landing directly across his eyes. Pavitr groaned, throwing a thin forearm over his face to block it out.
"…Just five more minutes…" he mumbled into the lumpy pillow.
Then, he froze.
His eyes snapped open.
"…Wait."
The memories rushed back. Not with the violent, agonizing crash of last night, but like a cold bucket of water to the face. The blinding headlights. The crushing impact. His own death. Waking up in a stranger's bedroom. Sticking to the wall.
He sat up slowly, the joints of the rickety bed protesting the movement.
"…Right. Not a hallucination. Not a dream."
He took in the cramped, suffocating dimensions of the room. The paint on the walls was peeling like sunburnt skin. A battered wooden desk sat in the corner, and overhead, a single ceiling fan wobbled dangerously, threatening to give up the ghost at any moment.
It was quiet. Too quiet.
Then—
"PAVITR! Are you up yet? You'll be late for school!"
A booming, authoritative voice rattled the thin door.
Sushil flinched, instinctively pulling his knees to his chest.
"…School?"
His face scrunched in visceral horror.
"…No. No, no, no, please no—"
The door swung open.
Standing in the doorway was Uncle Bhim.
He was a broad-shouldered man in his late forties, dressed in a simple white vest and a faded lungi. His face was weathered, etched with the deep lines of a man who carried the weight of the world on his shoulders, but his eyes weren't unkind. They were just… exhausted.
From the tiny kitchen down the hall, the warm, reprimanding voice of Aunt Maya drifted over.
"Don't yell at the boy first thing in the morning, Bhim! Let him wake up properly and eat!"
Sushil blinked. Then he blinked again.
"…They're real."
Bhim's thick brows drew together in a frown.
"What happened? Why are you staring at me like you've seen a ghost? Do you have a fever?"
Before Sushil could formulate an excuse, Aunt Maya bustled into the room. She was a picture of gentle resilience, draped in a simple, well-worn cotton saree. Her face was soft, marked by years of managing a household on a razor-thin budget, but her smile was entirely genuine.
She reached out and placed a cool, calloused hand against his forehead.
"Arre, he does feel a little warm. Pavitr, are you feeling okay, beta?"
That word.
Beta. Son.
Something deep inside his chest seized. For a fraction of a second, the cynical, displaced soul of Sushil vanished. A surge of overwhelming, unconditional affection swelled in his throat. He felt… exactly like Pavitr.
"…I'm fine," he said automatically, his voice cracking slightly.
He paused, swallowing hard.
"…I think."
Ten minutes later, he was sitting cross-legged on the floor, staring down at a stainless steel plate.
Breakfast was simple. Poha. Barely spiced, stretching a few cheap ingredients as far as they could possibly go.
He looked at the meager portion. He looked at the cracked plaster of the walls. He looked at his faded, hand-me-down uniform.
"…I am aggressively poor."
The realization hit him like a freight train. In his previous life, Sushil hadn't been rolling in wealth, but he had lived comfortably. This? This was survival-mode. This was counting every single rupee.
Uncle Bhim sat a few feet away, sipping steaming chai and reading a crumpled Marathi newspaper.
"Eat fast," Bhim said without looking up. "You'll miss the train."
Sushil stared at him, the adult mind inside him rebelling at the concept of high school.
"…Do I genuinely have to go?"
Bhim slowly lowered the newspaper. His stern eyes locked onto Sushil's.
"Yes."
"No exceptions? What if I'm having a mild existential crisis?"
"No."
Sushil pushed his luck. "…What if I told you I suddenly developed superpowers?"
Dead silence filled the small room. Bhim stared at him for a long, unblinking moment.
Then—
"Finish your food." Bhim raised the paper again.
Sushil sighed, picking up his spoon. "…Fair enough."
As he forced down the breakfast, his hyper-active mind began to categorize the absolute absurdity of his situation.
Okay. Let's review the facts:
* I died in a car crash. (Check)
* I woke up in a teenager's body. (Check)
* We are practically broke. (Check)
* I have to go back to high school. (Major negative)
* I have superpowers. (Check)
He paused, chewing slowly.
"…Going back to high school is actually worse than dying."
He thought about it for another second.
"…Okay, no. Dying was definitely worse. But it's a close second."
He stood up, walking back to his room to grab his things. As he reached for his bag, last night's chaotic memories replayed in crisp detail.
The wall-crawling. The sudden, terrifying burst of agility. The way he could hear the neighbor's clock ticking three apartments away.
He stopped dead in his tracks. He narrowed his eyes, staring at his open palm.
"…Wait."
The gears in his head finally clicked into place.
"…Wall climbing."
"…Enhanced reflexes."
"…A strange, buzzing danger sense."
"…The name Pavitr Prabhakar."
His eyes went wide. The breath hitched in his throat.
"No way."
He turned slowly toward the cracked bedroom wall. He placed his hand flat against the plaster. Stick.
He pulled himself up. Without thinking, he crawled halfway up the wall, defying gravity with zero effort, before gravity and logic caught up with his brain and he dropped back down to the floor, landing with a soft, inhumanly quiet thud.
"…NO WAY."
His heart began to hammer against his ribs. A wild, disbelieving grin spread across his face.
"This is literally" He pointed at the mirror. "I'm Spider-Man."
He stood in stunned silence, letting the magnitude of it wash over him.
"…I'm Indian Spider-Man."
He ran both hands through his thick, messy hair, staring at the ceiling as if demanding answers from whatever god had orchestrated this.
"…I got isekai'd into the Spider-Verse? Of all the overpowered anime worlds I could have landed in… THIS is what I get?"
"PAVITR! GRAB YOUR BAG AND GET OUT!" Bhim's voice thundered down the hallway.
Sushil flinched, the superhero fantasy instantly evaporating.
"…Yeah, yeah, coming!"
He grabbed the faded canvas school bag off the chair. It felt incredibly light. Too light.
Curious, he popped the zipper open. Inside were a few worn-out textbooks and notebooks with dog-eared pages. He pulled one out and flipped it open.
The handwriting was immaculate. The notes were detailed, written with different colored, cheap ballpoint pens. Every margin was filled with extra equations and careful diagrams.
It was a physical manifestation of Pavitr's life. Pavitr's desperate, exhausting effort to pull himself and his aunt and uncle out of this poverty.
Sushil's amused expression melted away, replaced by a heavy, somber respect. He traced a finger over the careful handwriting.
"…You really gave it everything you had, didn't you, kid?"
For the first time since waking up, the detachment vanished. He didn't just feel like a parasite wearing another person's skin. He felt a profound sense of duty.
He packed the notebook away and zipped up the bag.
Stepping out of the small apartment complex, Mumbai hit him like a tidal wave.
The blaring horns of auto-rickshaws, the shouts of street vendors, the suffocating humidity, the smell of fried vada pav mixing with exhaust fumes. It was chaotic. It was alive.
But this time, it was different.
Sushil didn't just see the city; he felt it. Every sound was isolated and crystal clear. He could track the trajectory of a falling leaf. He could sense the exact moment a speeding motorcycle was going to swerve around a pothole.
The world was no longer just a backdrop. It was a three-dimensional web, and he was standing right at the center of it.
He paused at the corner of the crowded street, catching his reflection in the dusty glass of a chai shop window.
A teenager stared back. Scrawny, a little awkward, but with eyes that held a lifetime of unearned maturity.
It wasn't Sushil anymore. That life was over. Dead and buried.
He exhaled slowly, letting the morning air fill his enhanced lungs. A small, confident smile tugged at the corner of his lips. It wasn't forced. It wasn't fake. It was absolute acceptance.
"My name is Pavitr Prabhakar," he whispered to his reflection amidst the roar of the city.
A beat.
"…And I'm probably going to fail my math test today."