"Really? But how is that possible?" Tobey-Spidey's first reaction was disbelief.
Peter (Earth-616) tilted his head slightly: "Want to talk upstairs? Can you even move right now?"
"Of course I can move! Who do you think I am?" Tobey-Spidey retorted boastfully. He reached out to shoot a web toward the nearby buildings.
THWIP— A web shot out, and his hand reached to grab it. But perhaps due to the severe injuries and slow recovery, his reaction was delayed, and the web slipped through his fingers.
Peter watched, slightly amused. This young Spider-Man, unlike the middle-aged versions he had met, still possessed a youthful spirit and an unwillingness to back down.
"I know exactly who you are. You're Bully Maguire (The iconic nickname for this Peter Parker's brief antagonist phase) ~" Peter laughed as he walked over.
"Bully Maguire?" Tobey-Spidey turned his head, confused. "Who is that? Sounds cool, I guess? But I don't know him. You've got the wrong guy."
"Alright, Peter, come with me," Peter shook his head helplessly, no longer teasing him. He grabbed his shoulder, shot a web with his right hand, and swung them both up to the rooftop.
Tobey-Spidey initially thought about resisting; the force on his shoulder wasn't strong, and he could have broken free. But seeing the web shoot out from Peter's hand, and hearing his exact name, he wisely chose to remain still, allowing Peter to pull him up.
"You really are Spider-Man! That's incredible. I thought I was the only one..." Tobey-Spidey started rambling excitedly as they swung through the air.
Peter ignored him.
They landed on the rooftop. Peter let go of Tobey-Spidey, casually removed his mask, and then pressed his chest, shedding the Nanometal Suit.
"Wow! Wow, wow, wow!" Tobey-Spidey's attention was instantly drawn to the transformation. His eyes shone with amazement: "Dude, that is so cool!" Tobey-Spidey looked down at his own tattered suit, then back at Peter, whose clothes underneath were spotless and new. He was instantly envious.
Look at his suit! It shrinks instantly! And his? It faded every time he washed it, and if he accidentally put it in the machine with other clothes, everything was ruined. After it faded, he had to manually color it back in with dyes, or his image as Spider-Man would suffer.
Not only that. Without needing a close look, he could tell Peter's suit was superior in protection and functionality. Damn... Thinking about it, Tobey-Spidey felt even more intensely envious. Envy nearly pulled his soul out of his body.
"Cool? I think so too," Peter chuckled. "Why don't you make one for yourself?"
Tobey-Spidey was clearly tempted. But he quickly grew crestfallen: "I don't have the money."
Tobey-Spidey was indeed very poor. In Peter's (Earth-616) world, this version was considered the most classic Spider-Man film, and even the subsequent generations paid tribute to it, incorporating elements like the inverted kiss or the train-stopping scene with variations. But Tobey-Spidey was also the most "down-to-earth" hero. Without the suit, he was just a regular, even slightly mediocre, person. He didn't have the superb inventive genius of Andrew-Spidey, nor a rich "sugar daddy" like Holland-Spidey. Instead, he was poor. He worked as a pizza delivery guy, occasionally sold staged photos of himself in the Spider-Suit to the newspaper, and sometimes couldn't even pay rent... Peter considered him the most miserable superhero.
Peter reached out and patted his shoulder: "Don't worry, I don't have money either."
"Uh..." Tobey-Spidey was highly skeptical. Peter's clothes looked expensive, and he had such a magical suit. He didn't look poor at all.
However, Peter was telling the truth about his lack of personal wealth. The clothes he wore were provided by the base as a perk, so the cost was low. Since he came from a later era, the general technology was more advanced than Tobey-Spidey's 2004 world, making his clothes look higher-quality. In reality, the entire outfit was only worth about a hundred dollars. And his entire Spider-Suit was entirely free (acquired from a villain)! But Peter knew no explanation would convince Tobey-Spidey.
"Alright, Peter, why don't you go change your clothes first?" Peter (Earth-616) suggested, pointing at Tobey-Spidey's tattered suit.
"So, you're really Spider-Man? Why haven't I seen you before? Are you from another city?" Tobey-Spidey walked along the rooftop with Peter, still asking questions curiously.
"Another city? You could say that" Peter nodded slightly.
"Wow, cool!" Tobey-Spidey exclaimed.
Then, a look of sudden realization crossed his face: "I know! You're from that mysterious Eastern country across the ocean, right? Bruce Lee! Hoo-hoo-hoo!" Tobey-Spidey struck a few Jeets Kune Do poses.
"...Does Aunt May know you're this much of a goofball?" Peter retorted. He pointed upward: "Actually, I'm from another world."
"Another... world?" Tobey-Spidey stopped dead, turning to look at Peter, his eyes wide. "What do you mean by another world?"
"Mhm," Peter nodded, confirming his meaning.
"You're a ghost!" Tobey-Spidey stumbled backward.
Peter: ???
"Ahem, just kidding," Tobey-Spidey flashed a wide, toothy grin, then rushed excitedly toward Peter. "So, Democritus's 'innumerable worlds' really exist? The atoms move arbitrarily, rapidly, and chaotically in the void, colliding, breaking, and combining into various shapes, and hooking up to form worlds and the things within them. Each collision, break, and combination holds infinite possibilities, forming countless worlds... Wow! Wow, wow! That's so cool, that is so cool!"
"Yes," Peter said, slightly surprised. He had assumed Tobey-Spidey, only a high school student working odd jobs, wouldn't be familiar with such complex philosophical concepts. It seemed his knowledge was unexpectedly broad. Tobey-Spidey mentioned things Peter hadn't even heard of. A genius is a genius. Even attending public school and juggling work for rent, he had acquired vast knowledge through his spare-time reading.
"The Multiverse, the Multiverse! Wow! What must that be like? Is your world the same as ours?" Tobey-Spidey was bubbling with curiosity.
Peter shook his head: "Although some dimensions act as parallel universes to each other, every universe has subtle differences. For instance, I recently visited another universe and met seven different Spider-People."