Chapter Text
Part 6
“I don’t like it.”
“Of course you don’t, Tony.”
“I mean, why does he have to close the door, right? Why can’t he just… keep it open when his friend is here? Or, better yet, just spend their time in the living room, where I can keep an eye on them.”
“I might be wrong, but this might be the reason as to why they’re doing it.”
“Your sarcasm is not appreciated at the moment, Pep. Can’t you make them open the door?”
“Tony, if anything happens to Peter, Jarvis would let us know and Ned would probably come out to tell us,” said Pepper tiredly from her place near her desk.
They were in her office with her sitting and working to keep the company running, and with Tony pacing from one side of the room to the other, feeling agitated. He glanced at her for a moment at the words, but then shook his head and kept on marching back and forth.
“You’re worried about nothing,” she insisted. “It’s not like they’re six. These kids are thirteen. They can handle themselves for a little while without supervision, and without the awkward dad constantly watching them.”
The man whirled around the face her. “I’m not awkward. I’m the opposite of awkward. I’m the coolest dad ever—ask Ted, he’ll tell you how much he wants me to be around,” he said and then ignored her eyeroll in favor of pacing some more.
Thing was, Tony knew the situation wasn’t anything bad—he was just worried. He’s gotten so used to being there for Peter, that the moment the kid invited his little friend over and chose to close the door so that Tony would be left out… well, it was weird, okay? He wasn’t used to the kid shutting him out like this, unless it was a bad day. And this was definitely a good day. Or maybe an okay day.
Rational thoughts kept on supplying Tony with the claim that Peter was growing up and that he was now a teenager—a small and young teenager, but still a teenager, nonetheless. And teenagers were shitty little things that Tony never liked. Rationally, he knew that the kid would, eventually, become one, too. Tony just didn’t want to accept that he was already living through this hell of the kid no longer being a kid but an adolescent.
He wanted to believe it was just his fear of being left out of his kid’s life, because he knew Peter becoming a teenager meant less admiration toward Tony and more snidey comments and bratty attitude. Because what was there to fear other than that, right? Tony remembered his years as a teenager—truth be told, he hasn’t changed that much, but it was enough to see just how much worse he used to be when hormones actually took over his life.
But that wasn’t it. There was more. It was just that Tony didn’t want to think about it too much because it always made him feel helpless, with nothing he could possibly do to make things better. After all, Peter was dying—they all knew his time was running out with every passing day—and according to the test results, Helen wasn’t too enthusiastic about him making it past the next two years at best.
Peter seemed to partially accept that, and everyone else chose not to dwell on it and instead try and live their lives…
Only Tony found himself obsessing over the fact that his kid was about to die and his last years would be with him distancing himself from Tony because he was an annoying adolescent. True, it was still only beginning—the kid still hung out with Tony—but now he was inviting his friend over and closing the door of his room? That was the sign for bad news! That was like a red flag for Tony to notice.
“Okay, Tony, you’re going to drive me crazy if you don’t stop moving like that—”
“Oh, I’m sorry—am I bothering you? I didn’t know. I can just leave—”
“—so either sit or—yeah, you can get out. Take a walk, breathe some fresh air. It might help you feel better.”
“—I’ll just get out the door and…” He went toward the door of the office and then snapped back around to face Pepper. She didn’t seem to be surprised by his decision to not go along with this, but she still looked at him wearily. “No, you know what? No, I’m entitled to feel a little shaken when my son decides to push me away and he has less than two years to live. I think—I think that’s pretty justified, wouldn’t you agree?”
The woman smiled softly at him, as if finally listening to his distress instead of ignoring it. “I know you must feel terrible. This is the nightmare of every parent.” She locked her blue eyes on his and Tony could feel the sympathy and sadness washing out of her in waves. “I feel terrible about it too, but Peter’s still alive and he’s living his life and having as much fun as he can right now. Don’t you want that? For him to be happy? Even if it’s not always with you, he’s still living the life he wants.”
He let her words swirl around his head for a moment. Peter wasn’t with him right now, but he was with his little friend; and despite the fact that Tony couldn’t watch them (unless he used the cameras over the tower, but that was going a step too far), he knew Peter was spending his remaining time the way he felt was right.
Plus, Ned has been his only friend these last few years, and for a child that grew up with plenty of kids, Peter probably missed having people his age around.
Pursing his lips, Tony sat down on the chair on the other side of Pepper’s desk before he crossed his arms over his chest defiantly. “You might be right, but I still don’t have to like it,” he concluded. His girlfriend just shook her head in exasperation before turning back to her computer monitor. “I just don’t want to think about what’s going to happen the day after.”
“We’ll handle it together.” She offered him a warm smile.
A moment later the door opened and the two adults turned around to see Peter walking into the office, Ted sheepishly remaining out of the office but gawking at everything in his line of sight, all the same. Tony barely had time to turn around before Peter was next to him, weakly tugging on his arm to make him get up.
“Dad, Dad, we’re building Ned’s new Lego set of the Millennium Falcon, but we’re going to add an actual motor to it so it can fly around. Cool, right? Do you wanna help us? I mean, you can help with the Lego structure but you can’t touch the motor ‘cause we wanted to do it ourselves and using you is like cheating.”
Tony looked at Pepper. “Sorry, gotta go. Hate to leave you hanging like that but I’m sure you’ll do just fine without me, honey.”
The dry look he got from her as he got up and let Peter try and drag him out (which was, apparently, close to impossible for the kid who became paler and weaker with every passing day) didn’t even affect Tony, who was just glad he could do something with Peter for a little while. Peter and his friend Ted, that is.
For the record, this was not entirely Tony’s fault, okay? It was a combination of a lot of things that, sadly, ended in a disaster that presented itself as a creepy robot that attacked the Avengers while they were lounging around after a party. Peter was supposed to be asleep already in his room, and Pepper was out of the country on business, so Tony was just glad they weren’t around to witness the madness.
The ones present, though, were Cap, Romanoff, Hill, Banner, Helen, Thor, Rhodey and Barton. They all turned around to look at the mess of a robot that came out to greet them, looking disoriented. There were disconnected wires stringing from his metallic body. He looked like he was one of Tony’s drones that just decided to get out of repairs before he was done. Which was strange ‘cause it wasn’t supposed to happen, and yet…
“How could you be worthy?” the robot mused as he turned to face all of them. With each step he took, Tony noticed oil dripping to the floor, leaving stains on the marble. Personally, he didn’t care much, but he was pretty sure that whole situation was bad. The others looked in confusion at the robot. “You’re all killers.”
“Stark,” said Rogers curtly.
The man lifted his phone a little closer to his mouth. “Jarvis,” he called.
There was no answer from his AI, though. Which was… strange. He couldn’t comprehend a scenario where Jarvis would ignore him. Unless he was shut down, but that wasn’t possible because only Tony could do that. So what was going on?
Maybe the robot couldn’t hear them, or perhaps he just chose to ignore their tense looks. Whatever it was, he kept on talking, almost like he wasn’t exactly with them. A little drunk, perhaps; or sleepy.
“I’m sorry, I was asleep.” He kept on twisting his head from side to side, looking around. “Or I was… a-dream.”
“Reboot Legionnaire OS,” Tony kept on trying to talk to Jarvis, but the AI really was unresponsive. He tried doing it manually, then. “We got a buggy suit.” Nothing seemed to happen, though. It was like the suit wasn’t connected to anything Tony controlled. Which was… strange. Because it was obviously one of his suits. The ones he used to protect citizens during the missions of the Avengers.
“There was this terrible noise,” the rogue robot drawled on. “And I was tangled in… in”—he stumbled backward, just a little, as he observed the wires dangling off him—“strings. I had to kill the other guy. He was a good guy.”
Tony’s breath hitched. His hand clenched as he tried to prevent his mind from supplying him with the image of Peter lying on the ground, unresponsive. Because who else was in the building?
Cap frowned a little more. “You killed someone?”
“Wouldn’t have been my first call. But, down in the real world, we’re faced with ugly choices,” said the robot and then, to Tony’s horror, when Thor asked the robot who sent him, a recording started playing, of Tony’s own voice from earlier that very day, when he tried to convince Banner about experimenting with Loki’s staff. “I see a suit of armor around the world.”
A few heads in the room swiveled to look at Tony with frowns on their faces. He couldn’t be bothered by it—at least now he knew who this guy was. But more importantly, if he hurt Peter… if he hurt that kid in any way… Tony would never forgive himself. But Peter was asleep. The kid was asleep upstairs—there was no reason for Ultron to go after him. But then… who was the dead one? Unless Jarvis… No…
“Ultron.” Banner’s eyes widened a little as he turned to look at Tony.
“In the flesh.” The robot spread his arms a little. “Or, no, not yet. Not this… chrysalis. But I’m ready. I’m on a mission,” he said. Romanoff was the one to ask him what mission he was talking about. “Peace in our time,” he stated.
That was when the other robots attacked.
Tony was barely aware of the others as he was thrown from the shock of a blast. It took him a moment to get a grip, and then he quickly grabbed a fork of some kind from a table nearby and ran up the stairs of the floor before jumping onto the back of the nearest drone. He struggled to both hang on to the robot and try and stick the fork in the metallic neck to essentially kill it.
It took, perhaps, too long. But he couldn’t do much else. This was never supposed to happen. Jarvis was supposed to keep an eye on everything. Tony should have been able to turn off the robots with no problem.
So he took down the robot and then fell to the floor only to turn around, onto his back, to watch as the others took down the other robots—all except for Ultron’s falling-apart body. The people in the room, heaving and panting, turned to glare at the robot who seemed very undeterred by the action.
He sounded almost human, it was concerning. Well, no, his voice was very metallic and modulated, but the way he moved and the way he said things… was a little too human.
“That was dramatic,” said Ultron, unbothered. Tony moved over to sit on broken stairs that must have been blasted by the robots. He was aware of his bloody lip but didn’t bother to wipe it.
“I’m sorry, I know you mean well. You just didn’t think it through,” Ultron went on. “You want to protect the world but you don’t want it to change.” Tony looked at Banner in alarm to see the scientist already staring back at him. “How is humanity saved if it’s not allowed to… evolve?” Ultron picked up a dead drone and presented it to the room. “With these? These puppets.” He crushed the head until it sparked, then tossed it away. “There’s only one path to peace. The Avengers’ extinction.”
And then Thor, the God of patience and relaxation, threw his hammer at the creepy robot that fell apart but still managed to quote Pinocchio.
The room fell silent as they all seemed to take in everything that’s happened. And to think that only an hour earlier they were all happily messing around. Tony could feel the eyes boring onto him, but his mind was basically stuck in place as he tried to figure out what the next step was. He heard Steve asking Banner and him what was going on and to explain everything but the words didn’t seem to compute and register in his brain as his mind went haywire.
“Stark?”
“Tony, what the hell was that thing? Ultron?”
“Bruce, do you know anything about it?”
“Stark, snap out of it!”
He blinked his eyes and then shot to his feet, his eyes searching the room for one particular person. He noticed Thor jumping out to follow a distancing robot that must have escaped the building, but didn’t pay it any mind.
When he spotted her, he clicked his fingers and pointed at her. “Cho, you hurt?”
The woman opened and closed her mouth a few times, seemingly caught off guard, but then she shook her head. “N-no, I’m okay.” She gasped a little. “I’m okay. He didn’t… hurt me. That… that thing.”
“Tony, what—”
Ignoring whoever it was that tried to gain his attention, he kept on looking at Helen. “Good. Peter’s room, now,” he said and walked past the others without sparing them a glance.
He was aware of the demands to know who the hell Peter was and why it was important right now, but ignored it all in favor of making his way to the elevator. Helen’s heels clicked on the marble floor behind him, and as Tony pushed the button to the elevator, Steve stopped next to him.
Tony turned to him warily. “Look, I know what you’re gonna say, and you can get upset as much as you’d like later, but right now—I need to check the kid is okay.”
The crease between the supers soldier’s brows smoothed a little as he shook his head. “God, Tony, I know. I’m coming with you. He mentioned… killing someone. You don’t think he meant—”
“No, I don’t. They’re on different floors. He had no reason to kill the kid,” Tony cut him off before he could finish that sentence.
The door of the elevator opened and Tony, Cho and Steve stepped in. Surprisingly, the others followed, seemingly not willing to miss out on whatever this was. They were all looking at Tony intensely, not knowing what was going on, except for Rhodey, who anxiously looked from Tony to the floor numbers as they went up.
“I have a theory—not sure if it’s correct yet, though,” Tony told Cap. “Let’s handle this one problem at a time, Popsicle, what d’you say?”
Before Rogers could answer, Tony stepped out the elevator only to be tackled by a familiar teenager. His breath caught in his throat for a moment before he took Peter in and realized that aside from being a little freaked out, the kid was okay. Physically, he wasn’t hurt. He did sway a little on his feet as he clung to Tony though, and the man realized he was trying to stabilize himself by relying on him.
That was fine by him, as long as the kid was also inhaling and exhaling.
“Hey, hey, you’re all right. You’re okay,” muttered Tony. “Why are you up? Did something happen?”
The kid shook his head before pulling back to look at him. He was so fixated on Tony that he didn’t even seem to realize there were more people in the hall. “I couldn’t sleep because I wasn’t tired so I started watching a movie, and then it just started getting all fuzzy so I asked Jarvis what was going on but he wouldn’t answer me. So I checked and it was like Jarvis was gone, and then I heard loud crashes from the floor below and I figured something was wrong because usually parties don’t sound like that, as far as I can tell.”
He closed his eyes for a few long moments, like he was concentrating on something. When they opened again, the kid looked like he was somehow beyond exhausted. “What the hell happened?”
Tony scrunched up his nose and sniffed. “Ultron went rogue.” He wasn’t even sure the kid knew about Ultron, but with how many times Peter hacked into Tony’s files, he was willing to bet his kid knew about the idea. And by the dropped jaw of the kid, Tony guessed he was right to assume so. “You okay? Not dizzy? Not hurt?”
“I’m fine,” Peter nodded and then his eyes finally moved over Tony’s shoulder. He froze at the sight of the others. Tony glanced at the adults and found all of them—except for Rhodey, Cho and Steve—gawking at Peter or just staring at him with confused expressions. “O-oh… h-h-hey!” His grip on Tony’s arm tightened a little as he leaned toward the man a little. “They’re the Avengers,” he whispered in awe.
“If you start fawning over them, I’m gonna disown you.”
“Do you think Bruce Banner will take me in then?”
Tony huffed.
“I’m sorry, what’s going on?” said Romanoff, moving her eyes from Peter to Tony. Next to her, Barton’s eyes were wide open in shock. “Who’s the kid?”
Waving his hand awkwardly, Peter smiled at them all weakly. “I’m Peter. Peter Parker,” he replied. “Hey, Steve and Uncle Rhodey!” His hand fell down when Cho stepped forward and put her hand on his forehead with a calculating look. Peter sagged a little. “Oh, hi, Dr. Cho. I’m fine, really. I feel great, awesome, amazing. You don’t need to check or anything—it’s all exactly the same as it was before.”
The skeptical look on her face made the boy cringe until he admitted to having a mild headache. Tony looked away from the two as the woman started checking the boy’s state and turned to the others who, in turn, sent him curious and confused frowns.
“Right… Meet Peter Parker, my son. Pete, meet the Avengers. All right, moving on.”
“Not moving on.” Hill raised a hand. “I’m sorry, you have a child? How did SHIELD not know that?” she asked and her eyes went over to Romanoff, who shrugged, looking a little perplexed as to this new development. “Who’s—who’s the mother? When did this happen?”
“I’m thirteen. But I will be fourteen in a couple months,” Peter chimed in, then turned back to Cho’s examination.
Banner shook his head and his brows pinched together. “Wait, Tony Stark managed to keep a secret from everyone for thirteen years? That doesn’t sound right…”
“Well, technically, I only hid him for about nine years, give or take,” corrected Tony. They kept on staring at him. “Is this really what you want to focus on right now? We’ve got a raging robot on our hands that decided to kill all of us and you want to stand here and talk about the kid?” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Yes, Peter’s my kid. Yes, I kept him under the radar.” He turned to look at Cho. “Helen, how is he?”
“As far as I can tell, he’s all right. His body is just fatigued,” she said.
Peter smiled and clung to Tony’s arm again, probably to keep himself standing. “So Ultron attacked you? That’s so cool!” He rolled his eyes when Tony glared at him. “I mean, it’s so terrible. Whatever shall you do? Hey, where is he now? I mean, you’re here and there’s no possessed robot around so I’m guessing you destroyed him… but you’re still worried, so he’s still loose? Wait, did he escape? Dad, can I help track him? Pleeeeease?”
“For a kid with asthma, you have plenty of air, don’t you?” Tony commented dryly and then turned to the others. “Let’s get back down to the lab—we need to check everything we can. Kid, you’re coming with us. I don’t care what happens, you stay right beside me, got it?”
Peter snorted. “Every teenager’s dream—to be stuck by their parent’s side,” he said but didn’t seem to disagree with Tony. That would have to be good enough. “All right, let’s go find the evil robot!”
They all went over to Tony’s lab to try and understand what was happening with Ultron and how to deal with the situation, although Tony could see the curious looks the adults all sent toward Peter as the boy heavily sat down in a rolling chair, his head leaning back as he stared up at the ceiling.
The kid looked beyond exhausted at his point, but Tony couldn’t force him to fall asleep with everything that was going on—he was busy trying to work on the Ultron problem, too.
While the others were all talking about how Ultron could now get nuclear codes and about the robot’s mission to get rid of the Avengers, Tony checked in on Jarvis only to feel like someone was trying to impale him with a sharp shard of ice.
When he presented to the room the ruins of Jarvis—what was left of his beloved, old AI—Tony felt like he was staring at a body of someone he cared about; a beloved. Not only because the AI was based on someone Tony really liked growing up, but also because the AI has always been there for him, assisting him with everything he could ever need. To think that the AI was gone now because of something Tony had created, thinking it would save people… well, it made him feel terrible.
They all gathered around the orange, holographic ruins of Jarvis and stared with disturbed expressions.
From his place on the chair, Peter perked up and widened his eyes. “Wait, that’s Jarvis?” he asked. “What happened to him?”
“This is insane,” commented Banner.
Tony just stood next to Peter and put a hand on his shoulder to try and comfort him. The kid grew up with Jarvis, too, after all. They were both attached to the AI more than anyone else—other than Pepper, maybe—so it made sense the kid would feel bad about losing the constant presence.
Bowing his head a little, Steve kept his arms crossed over his chest. “Jarvis was the first line of defense,” he said, understanding the implications of what was going on. It was rather amazing how much the man has managed to learn about the technology of these days after growing up in a different time period. “He would have shut Ultron down. It makes sense.”
Well, that wasn’t completely accurate.
“No,” said Banner slowly, and Tony looked at him, expecting him to say what he himself was thinking. “Ultron could have assimilated Jarvis. This… isn’t strategy,” he went on, still staring down at the remains of the AI. “This is… rage.”
Peter shook his head a little and curled into himself on the chair, his knees coming up and his hands wrapping themselves around his legs.
Tony turned around at the sight of the others turning around at the sound of heavy footsteps approaching him. He had just enough time to understand it was Thor that was making his way toward him, before the god picked him off the ground and glared daggers at him. The other people in the room tensed at once and Peter hopped off his chair sharply only to sway unsteadily, his eyed drooping a little.
“Come on, use your words, buddy,” Tony urged the man, though it was hard to speak when he was being held by his throat. Basically, Thor was choking him.
“I have more than enough words to describe you, Stark,” said Thor.
Behind his back, Rhodey stepped closer to Peter, who put one hand on the man to steady himself before letting his eyes focus on Thor. “Hey, what are you… let him go!” said the kid, though his voice was probably weaker than he would have liked.
The god’s eyes shot sideways at the young voice before locking once again with Tony’s. And then Steve raised his voice to draw his attention, demanding information. With a dissatisfied look, Thor let Tony go and the man stumbled back a little, his hand coming up to rub at his sore throat.
After answering about where the direction the robot Thor had followed went to, the god turned to Peter with a perplexed expression. “I’m sorry, who is this?” he asked the room.
“Oh, right—you missed the MEMO, earlier,” said Romanoff.
Peter didn’t seem inclined to answer because he just crossed the room to stand worriedly next to Tony, his eyes narrowed as he seemed to wait and see everything was really okay. Which it was—Tony probably deserved that little outburst. Maybe.
He was trying to help, but that didn’t matter—he did still release a killer robot that could get access to practically everything in the world. It wasn’t the best situation they could have ended up in, to be fair.
Trying to reassure Peter that he was fine proved to be pretty hard because Tony missed most of the conversation between the others as he tried to calm his kid down enough to make him sit back down. It was already making Tony feel anxious to think that there was a killer robot out there that wanted all of them gone—he didn’t need to see Peter barely managing to stay upright, at the moment. Eventually, the kid realized that and relented, but he did still send Thor an irritated glare that the god didn’t seem to even notice.
“I don’t understand,” Helen cut through the thick atmosphere in the room and they all turned to her. She’s been staring at the smashed, previous body of Ultron until that moment, but now she turned around to face Tony. “You built this program. Why is it trying to kill us?”
Tony turned around to stare at the stack of papers on one of the tables, his eyes not really seeing as his mind kept on racing. Peter’s shoulders tensed but he didn’t say anything.
He wasn’t actually certain what made him chuckle—maybe the realization of just how terrible everything was shaping up to be. Maybe just nerves. Maybe he was finally having a meltdown. Whatever it was, he could see Banner shaking his head subtly in his direction and Peter burying his face in his knees again.
A part of him wondered how crazy Peter was going to think he actually was after all of this, but honestly… the kid’s been there during some pretty bad moments in Tony’s life—if he was still willing to hang around, the man figured there wasn’t much that could push him away at this point.
Behind him, Thor chimed in again, sounding annoyed. “You think this is funny?”
His laughter cut abruptly and Tony turned to look at the caped man. “No.” He glanced around the room. “It’s probably not, right? This is really terrible. Is it so… is it so…” He started chuckling again. “It is… it’s so terrible.”
“This could have been avoided if you hadn’t played with things—”
“No!”
“—you don’t understand.” Thor finished, ignoring Tony’s interjection.
“—understand,” said Tony at the same time as the god. He walked toward him, feeling like his thoughts were stirring restlessly, making his anxiety rise. “No. I’m sorry, I’m sorry. It is funny.” He stopped right in front of the man and despite having to look up to maintain eye contact, Tony didn’t care. He felt attacked—so he lashed out. “It’s a hoot that you don’t get why we need this.”
From his place close to Peter, Banner raised his voice a little. “Tony, maybe this might not be the time…”
The mechanic turned to look at the scientist. “Really?” he demanded. “That’s it? You just roll over, show your belly every time somebody snarls?” Tony accused.
Banner’s reply was that he only did it when they created a murderous robot, which didn’t sit right with Tony because that wasn’t… that wasn’t it. His eyes briefly locked with Peter, who seemed to try and follow the conversation the best he could, a frown slowly forming on his face. “We didn’t. We weren’t even close. Were we close to an interface?”
Banner nodded his head with a grimace, but the one to speak up was Steve. “Well, you did something right,” he said, drawing the attention to him. “And you did it right here. The Avengers were supposed to be different than SHIELD.”
“Anybody remembers when I carried a nuke through a wormhole?” said Tony and Peter raised his hand. “Put your hand down, Pete,” he said offhandedly just as Rhodey shook his head and denied everything, sarcasm basically dripping from his every word. “Saved New York? Recall that? A hostile alien army came charging through a hole in space.”
He said it despite the averted eyes of everyone in the room as they all seemed to go back to that day in their memories. It wasn’t the fondest day they had, no.
“We’re standing three-hundred feet below it.” The kid blanched a little at that and his head lifted up, like he was trying to see the wormhole even now. “We’re the Avengers. We can bust arms dealers all the livelong day, but that up there, that’s… that’s the endgame. How are you guys planning on beating that?”
“Together,” answered Steve.
Tony tried not to roll his eyes. “We’ll lose.”
“Dad…” protested Peter, his voice weaker than it was before.
“Then we’ll do that together, too.”
He kept on talking to the others but Tony tuned him partially out as he leaned on Peter’s chair, staring down at the kid that returned his gaze with wide, scared eyes. God, he was just thirteen—he didn’t need to deal with any of this.
That was exactly why Tony didn’t want Peter to be a part of his life. Or at least, not a permanent one. Because it was too dangerous, and now Tony had to deal with a psycho robot and keep the kid alive and well. As well as he could be, that is.
“This is so cool.”
“This isn’t cool, kid. Quit moving so much when we’re in the air.”
“But we’re in a jet headed toward Africa on an Avengers mission! That’s so much cooler than building Legos with Ned. But, um, don’t tell him that. I don’t think that would be too nice, right, Dad?”
“I still can’t believe you have a son,” noted Banner, looking at Peter and Tony curiously. “This feels… odd. It’s—it’s not something I would have guessed.”
Tony was flying the jet and Peter was supposed to sit with the others so that nothing would happen to him—just in case—but of course the kid had to approach Tony and start rambling about how cool his life seemed to be.
Peter bounced up and down on his toes, smirking. “Yeah, he’s not the best example of a human being, in general,” he stage-whispered. Tony retaliated by jabbing his side with a finger, making the kid chuckle and squirm. “Sorry! I’m sorry!” he laughed, wheezing slightly. “Can you blame me, though? I barely knew you for a couple of years and you were already dying without telling anyone. I kept all those videos from back then, you know. They’re not going away any time soon.”
The man kept his eyes on the sky ahead as he fought to keep his composure. “That’s it, you’re grounded. Once this whole mess is behind us, I mean. Once Ultron is gone, you’re grounded—no Ned or that little girlfriend of yours for the foreseeable future.”
“My life is the foreseeable future,” Peter protested. “And she’s not my girlfriend!” he added as an afterthought. Someone snorted behind them, though Tony couldn’t dictate who it was. He suspected Barton. “If you wanted to bring me along just to bully me, you should know that’s really mean and I’m gonna tell Pepper the moment I can call her.” His hand came up to his head and he closed his eyes for a moment or two. “I—I think I’m gonna… sit down for a little while…”
They were on their way to try and find Ultron according to the clues they could find using the paperwork that was at the tower rather than anything they had online. Which sucked for Tony as the man who was mostly comfortable around technology, but considering their enemy this time around was technology, he figured it made sense, as much as he hated it.
When they decided to leave, Tony should have probably left Peter behind because the kid had nothing to do with any of this, but he couldn’t. Not when Pepper wasn’t there and when Ultron was still loose. What if the robot came back to attack Peter? No, Tony needed to keep him safe, and that meant bringing the kid along. Of course, he first asked Helen about it, wanting to know if it was even safe for the kid to travel so much. She didn’t like it too much, but she said it shouldn’t put too much of a strain on the kid’s condition.
Still, he was more than wary as he glanced back to see Peter lying down on a bench in the jet, his palm covering his eyes as he seemed to finally rest. Romanoff looked like she wasn’t sure about what she was supposed to do with the kid—stay away or entertain him a little, somehow—and frankly, Tony wasn’t sure what to expect from her, either.
Honestly, out of all of them—not counting Steve, who already knew Peter—Barton was the only one who seemed to accept Peter’s presence the easiest. So when the kid started resting, Barton sat down next to him and chatted with him lightly, like it was second nature to talk to a teenager and not something people usually felt completely overwhelmed by. Tony decided not to think about it too hard—he didn’t feel like completely melting down his brain.
“So…” Banner sat down next to Tony, pursing his lips a little, like he was trying to buy time, somehow. The mechanic sent him a wry look. “Peter—how did you find out about him?”
Tony kept his face blank. “He came looking for me in a hospital.”
There was a beat of silence and then Banner sighed. “I don’t even know what I expected,” he admitted, and from the corner of his eye, Tony noted the way he peered back to look at Peter for a moment. “So… wait, he’s sick? Unfortunate timing, huh?”
“It’s terminal. He’s been sick since before the moment I found out he existed,” replied Tony. Banner spluttered and then looked back again, like he wanted to remember what the kid looked like right now, seeing as he was going to die. “Yeah, it’s not the best situation, and he doesn’t have a lot of time left at this point. We’re just… trying not to dwell on that too much. It’s not like I haven’t tried everything, already.”
“God, Tony. I’m so sorry.”
The man shrugged and then glanced sideways at the scientist. “Hey, I need you to keep an eye on him when we all go out if you stay behind—sometimes he faints or has asthma attacks in the worst possible time and I don’t want him to be alone in case that happens.”
Nodding, Banner didn’t even hesitate before he agreed to it. Well, at least that problem was solved.
Okay, maybe that wasn’t the best idea—to leave his kid with someone with anger issues. But how was Tony supposed to know about that little witch and her mind games? How was he supposed to know Banner would be forced to turn into the Hulk? Well, with his streak of bad luck, it should have been obvious.
Tony was frantic as he asked to see any news about the Hulk after destroying Ultron’s latest body, knowing well enough that the AI was likely still active someplace else. He didn’t care right now—not when Ultron’s last words were about the Hulk. Not when Tony knew that the Hulk’s last known location was in the jet with a sick and vulnerable Peter.
Somehow, there was nothing to indicate that the Hulk has ever been awakened. No news, no nothing. Tony informed the team about Ultron’s words and the lack of information on the subject as he landed out of the jet, his hand held in front of him as he prepared for a fight—just in case the Hulk was still in the jet. God, he didn’t even want to imagine what was probably going on with Peter. If Banner turned into the Hulk with Peter nearby… this wouldn’t be good, okay?
Everything seemed to be okay, surprisingly. Tony marched forward and his faceplate lifted the moment he noticed Banner sitting in the vehicle next to a fainted teenager. Blood freezing, Tony let his suit retract as he ran toward the two of them, sliding to his knees in front of the still kid. There didn’t seem to be any injury on his body so he probably only passed out from his sickness rather than anything external. Or from shock, maybe.
Banner explained to him what went down—apparently, that witch and her brother showed up and messed with Banner’s mind, which, indeed, turned him into the Hulk. At Tony’s alarmed expression, the man hurried to explain that, despite it all being fuzzy from that moment on, he could still vaguely recall Peter talking to him calmly until the Hulk finally relaxed and the green guy switched back to the confused scientist. But this all must have taken quite a toll on Peter because he collapsed a few moments later.
That was… that was a lot to process. The kid nearly died—earlier than he should have—because of Ultron and because of the Hulk and because of that witch and her fast buddy. But instead of being killed, Peter talked to the freaking Hulk until that rage monster reverted back. It was… it was hard to imagine.
The only one the team always sent to calm the Hulk down after missions was Romanoff because she was probably the only one who could handle it—the only one the Hulk listened to.
Well, apparently Peter had that gift, too. Not that Tony was going to send his son out to calm the green, scary rage monster that his friend sometimes turned into.
“Dad?” the kid’s weak voice reached his ears and Tony looked down at him as Peter blinked his eyes open, looking dazed. His eyes flitted over the ceiling before he noticed Tony and his lips stretched into a faint smile. “The Hulk called me his friend. It was awesome,” he said and then whimpered in pain as his hands shot up to touch his forehead.
“Sounds exciting. Never risk your life like that again, you hear me?” he berated.
Peter scrunched up his nose. “It’s not like I had much of a choice—he was blocking the exit. And I’m pretty sure I’m not fast enough to run away from him, either, so it didn’t really matter.”
Pinching his brows, Tony closed his eyes tiredly and groaned. “My son has a death wish,” he mumbled under his breath. Peter huffed in indignation while Banner’s lips quirked up a little. Tony turned to him. “Tell the others everything is okay and that they can come back here—Barton mentioned the others not being in the best shape, either. We need to head out quickly.” He faced Peter again. “And you, mister, are grounded ‘til you’re thirty.”
“That’s not fair! I stopped the Hulk without any backup!”
“Life ain’t fair, buddy,” he said and straightened up to ready the jet for takeoff. Then, as an afterthought, he turned to look at Peter over his shoulder. “But you did good, kid.”
The smile he received in return made the words worth it, for sure.
When Bartron said he had someplace they could rest in mind—a place under Ultron’s radar—Tony didn’t expect to find himself in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by the secret family of the archer.
Sure, he had his own secret family—just a kid, but whatever—but it still caught Tony by surprise that there was another person in their midst that hid members of his family from the team; except for Romanoff who seemed to know about the place and the people residing in it already.
Suddenly Barton’s strange looks toward Tony from the moment Peter got revealed to all of them made sense. He was eyeing Tony because he found out that he wasn’t the only one to secretly be a father. God, that was a strange thought.
During their short stay there, Tony got to know Laura—Barton’s wife—and their kids. Granted, they were younger than Peter was, but the teenager still seemed to get along with them rather well. Tony was almost jealous of the kid—how come his own son could be this friendly and gain friends so easily when Tony at his age was to socially inept that he couldn’t make a single friend? The closest person to him in his life was Jarvis, and he wasn’t exactly Tony’s age.
Still, it was good to see Peter being so welcome and content during such a grave time. It also enabled Tony to focus on talking to Steve to try and figure out their next move. And it gave Tony time to freak out over finding Nick Fury right there, observing them all quietly. For a moment there, Tony wanted to hide Peter from Fury, but then he sighed and gave up—the others knew. Tony would just have to get with the new program.
And maybe threaten Fury’s life later on.
Well, one thing led to another and eventually Tony found himself getting ready to leave again. They needed to get Ultron, whether he liked their plan and their chances or not. They had to try; and despite denying it being completely his fault earlier on, Tony knew that this mess was the cause of his own actions.
He was just… he was the one who insisted on trying to mess around with the stick of destiny. It was on him. It was one-hundred percent on him. Or… well, Banner did agree to help him, didn’t he?
Looking at the others getting ready to leave, Tony sniffed and then pulled Peter aside, eyeing the boy critically the entire time, as if expecting to see his body collapsing to the ground just like that. But Peter was pretty much okay. He was pale and thin and swayed a little bit, but it wasn’t as bad as it could be, so Tony took that small miracle and tried to focus on the fact that Peter wasn’t currently dying. Or… visibly dying, at least.
“Kid, listen to me—I need you to stay here,” said Tony.
Peter blinked twice and then frowned. “What? But you told me to stay close to you,” he said. “Dad, there’s a crazy robot out there—I don’t wanna stay here. I… I don’t wanna be out of the loop again.” His voice turned a little desperate.
“This is nonnegotiable.”
“So you expect me to just sit here and wait to hear whether or not you’re dead?” exclaimed Peter, drawing the attention of Romanoff and Steve who looked a little worried as they regarded both Tony and Peter from a distance. Peter didn’t seem to mind. “Why can’t I come? I’ve been stuck in that hospital room the last time you risked your life at this scale, and you nearly died without me even knowing about it—I can’t live through this again!”
Tony’s heart ached at the thought of that. He tried not to think too hard about how horrible it must have been for Peter to watch from afar as Tony threw himself into danger time and time again, unable to do anything or even know what was going on.
And that was when the kid already mentioned a few times that he was supposed to die before Tony—as wrong as that was. It seemed to strike a chord with Peter whenever he thought about Tony dying before him. Like he just couldn’t fathom such a world because he was destined to die early, but other people like Tony… they weren’t.
And now he was going to leave him in the same situation again.
“It’s too dangerous,” insisted Tony.
The kid scowled. “Why? Because I might die?” he spat out.
The rest of the Avengers finally turned to look at them curiously, looking a little concerned or like they didn’t know how to react to what was happening.
Peter threw his arms in the air, nearly knocking himself off his feet at the loss of his balance. “I could die tomorrow for all we know—why does it matter what’s the thing that kills me? Why can you throw your life away but I can’t?”
Thick silence spread around them after that and Tony couldn’t bring himself to look away from his kid’s eyes. He could tell by the way they shone that Peter was trying to hold back tears of frustration.
He wanted to promise him that everything would be fine, to tell the kid that he wasn’t going to die—he was going to stop Ultron and come back perfectly unscathed. But they both knew that would be a lie. Or at least, Peter and Tony both knew that it might not come true.
For a moment Tony wished Pepper was there to stay with the kid because then he would at least be with someone he knew. But instead Pepper was away on business and Tony was here with the kid who looked at him like he couldn’t believe Tony was abandoning him, like he felt betrayed; which was stupid—Tony was trying to keep him alive a little while longer. Because he had to. He just couldn’t imagine this boy—teenager, already—dying. He didn’t want to see this. He didn’t want to imagine it. He didn’t want the kid to disappear.
So for now… for now, all he could do was keep him safe.
Sighing, Tony squeezed the kid’s shoulder a little. “It’s not up for debate, Pete,” he stated firmly. Peter exhaled shakily, the anger that overtook him for a brief moment now gone, replaced by something akin to despair. “Let’s just both try to stay alive—what do you say, bud?”
“I can’t promise anything,” muttered Peter dejectedly, looking at his shoes instead of Tony. At least he was talking to him, though.
“Me neither.” And that was a horrible thing to say, but it had to be put out there. Peter didn’t react. “I’ll do my best, though,” he added encouragingly.
Peter still didn’t do anything so Tony let go of his shoulder, suppressing the desire to just remain in this safe place with his kid.
“Okay, let’s go,” he told the team, raising an eyebrow at them as they immediately turned around, pretending not to have been listening to the conversation the entire time.
Before he could exit the house, though, a hand tugged at his shirt and Tony turned around a moment before Peter hugged him tightly—or as tightly as he could muster with his pathetic amount of strength—and sniffed a little.
“I’ll do my best, too,” he whispered. Tony ruffled his hair a little, a sad smile tugging at his lips. Peter pulled away, looking slightly sheepish and uncomfortable. “Besides, I promised Ned we would meet once everything settles again, so I can’t… I can’t die just yet, y’know?”
Tony snorted. “Sure, kid.”