"Leap of Faith (Catch Me, If You Can)"
is a Crossover Fic between Batman and the Spider-Man: Home Trilogy.
In which Peter Parker is a fourteen-year-old foster kid adopted by Tony Stark, and then flung into another universe— a place called Gotham.
Now stuck in an alternate dimension with a villain hunting him down, Peter has to figure out his way home— but there’s no reason Spider-Man can’t make the most of his situation.
Meanwhile the Bat Family wonder about the intentions of this mysterious new superhero— and why that weird kid from Queens looks suspiciously similar to Dick.
Leap of Faith (Catch Me, If You Can) contains examples of:
- Abuse Mistake: To be fair, when a strange child shows up at your library with prominent injuries, and is apparently living alone with no adult supervision in freaking Gotham of all places, there’s only so many conclusions that you can draw.
- Actually Pretty Funny: Damian lets Peter deal with the Two-Face hostage crisis because he genuinely finds Peter’s way of handling things hilarious and wants to keep watching the show.
- Adaptational Angst Upgrade: Played with. This version of Peter had his Ben and May both die when he was young, and be passed around less than stellar foster homes. But luckily he ends up with Tony and the other Avengers to take care of him. Let’s hope he doesn’t meet the same fate as his No Way Home counterpart.
- Adaptational Backstory Change: This version of Peter is a foster kid who lost his Aunt May and Uncle Ben as a small child.
- Adaptational Superpower Change: In MCU canon, the Spider-Sense is mostly just an alarm system that warns Peter about immediate threats, whereas in Leap of Faith, it’s treated almost like a mildly precognitive ability— it alerts him to the Bats stalking him even though they mean no harm, senses familiar people (which leads to him discovering the Bats’ identities), and even lets him know when something is perfectly safe.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: In Chapter 7:"You haven’t missed much since the last chapter, is what that means. Peter knows that doesn’t make the cliffhanger any better."
- Born Unlucky: As is standard for Peter Parker. His parents die, his aunt and uncle die, all his decent foster parents also die, and he’s left with the terrible foster homes until he meets Tony, after which he’s kidnapped for experiments. He finally catches a break when Tony becomes his foster parent— and then he gets slingshotted into another universe. You’d be forgiven for thinking he’s cursed.
- Canon Welding: An interesting variant in which this fic’s Peter is apparently the son of Dick Grayson— or more accurately, the Dick Grayson of his home universe.
- Continuity Nod: To the Spider-Man: Spider-Verse films, which seem to take place in the same multiverse as the MCU. The story’s title is a reference to the iconic "Leap of Faith" scene in the first movie— a moment that is recreated by Peter himself, once he finds the courage to step to the plate.
- The Empath: Peter’s Spider-Sense seems to function as this, letting him read the general mood and atmosphere of a situation, as well as being able to sense when someone is happy, angry, scared, concerned, etc.
- Kidnapped for Experimentation: Peter apparently once fell victim to this, which is why he’s very, very guarded about his superpowers/meta abilities.
- Foster Kid: Peter is one of these, and his trust issues stem from his negative experiences as one.
- Loved by All: Pretty much all the Bats fall for Peter right away once they actually get the chance to talk to the kid. Not even Damian can bring himself to dislike Peter, even with his suspicions.
- Papa Wolf: Dick and Jason, both towards Peter. The former feels attached to Peter right away (which is a given since Peter is technically his son) and is in a constant state of concern over the kid. The latter genuinely contemplates murder when he finds out the boy is being threatened by Ohnn (and, as far as he knows, was dumped in Gotham by Tony).
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: Peter admits to Jason that a man named Jonathan Ohnn is responsible for his current predicament and is threatening him and Tony over tech, but purposely neglects to mention certain other details. Jason draws the conclusion that the fresh bruises on Peter’s face were given to him by Ohnn. This is… technically true. Peter received those injuries while fighting Ohnn as Spider-Man, but Jason assumes it was simply a way of threatening Tony.
- Social Services Does Not Exist: Averted. Jason notes that while CPS is pretty useless in Gotham, it’s not so useless that no one would notice a kid walking around with heavy bruising on his face and not want to check in on his home situation. This clues him in on the fact that there’s more going on.
- Trapped in Another World: The basic premise.
