Chapter Text
Peter awoke with a hand on his shoulder and dust coating his tongue.
“You with me, Underoos?”
Peter opened his gritty eyes and was momentarily confused by the fact that his surroundings remained dark. However, the memories of collapsing metal and concrete returned with unfortunate speed and Peter groaned both in response to the dull aching of his head but also at the dismal situation.
Mr. Stark gave him a consoling pat on the shoulder. “Gotta keep those eyes open, Pete. You should stop hitting your head when you don’t have a helmet like me.”
Peter’s eyes were slowly adjusting to what he was realizing was very dim light rather than total darkness. He could make out the gray shape of Mr. Stark’s figure by his shoulder in the middle of the small cavern of rubble that they were in. Sharp metal jutted out at angles barely a foot above Peter’s head and his right arm was pinned beneath what seemed to be one of the hanging stage speakers. His legs and torso seemed pretty free even though he had to curl up a bit to fit in the tight space but there was a sharp stabbing pain coming from his side.
His breath was hitching like it did whenever he had a broken rib (or two), and he was having a hard time getting enough air through the dust and the panic that was bubbling now that he had identified his surroundings.
“Your suit?” Peter grit out past the amplifying chorus of ‘not again. I need out. Can’t breathe. Not again’ that was riding in circles through his brain.
“Dead.” Mr. Stark knocked on the unlit housing unit on his chest with a metal thump. “Barely got it off before getting trapped in it. Looks like we have some more lab work to do after this.”
“Th– the explosion. D’you think there’s more bombs?”
“I doubt it,” Mr. Stark’s voice was more determinedly hopeful than sincere. “I’m guessing whoever was behind this just wanted to ruin the expo, and, well–” He chuckled darkly– “they succeeded.”
Peter nodded dizzily despite the way it made the ache in his head worse and he screwed his eyes shut as if that would make the claustrophobic, perilously unstable cavern beneath the wreckage of a building disappear. The rubble they were trapped beneath was a cacophony of shifting, grinding movement to Peter’s ears. Nothing was stable. The air pocket they had found themselves in could collapse at any moment. If there was another bomb there was nothing they could do to avoid the blast or protect themselves as the rest of the roof crushed them completely.
Peter couldn’t bear the idea of being fully buried again. He could remember the feeling of two tons of concrete pressed against his shoulder blades and that weight seemed to transfer itself to his chest now whenever he tried to breathe.
His arm being trapped suddenly felt unbearable in the face of the memories of an entire building resting on his back, and Peter tugged at the trapped appendage frantically. The sharp edges of broken debris tore at his skin and there was surely a few hundred pounds resting on his trapped arm, but Peter strained to pull free with reckless abandon.
“Whoa, Peter, you need to stay still. You’re going to make it more unstable.” Mr. Stark sounded as close to frantic as Peter had ever heard him as Peter grunted and whined and the rubble shifted.
Peter ignored the older man and with a final tug that wrenched his arm out of socket and left burning cuts down towards his wrist, he pulled his limb free from the wreckage. The rubble around them shifted, and for a terrible moment it seemed like Peter really had made everything worse and their small cavern was about to crumble on their heads.
Mr. Stark reached out– fumbling only slightly in the still dim light– and frantically clutched Peter tightly against his chest. Peter could feel Mr. Stark’s heartbeat racing in a tempo that nearly matched his own and the pair was silent for a moment while the sound of shifting debris continued.
Dust rained down and it became even harder to breathe, but the shifting finally settled after several long seconds and their air pocket remained tentatively sound.
It was quiet for a moment longer and Peter released a shuddering exhale and sagged against Mr. Stark’s shoulder.
“Hey kid,” Mr. Stark began calmly. “What the hell was that?”
Peter stiffened again but didn’t try to break free of Mr. Stark’s carefully restraining grip. “My… My arm was stuck.”
Mr. Stark’s voice was still even but there was a thread of tension from barely calmed panic underlying it. “And was pulling yourself free worth hurting yourself further and nearly bringing the rest of the building down on us?”
Peter’s arm was stinging painfully, his shoulder ached sharply, and the stabbing in his side had only grown worse with the movement, but his first thought in reply was ‘yes’. He hadn’t thought enough to worry about making their ramshackle shelter more unstable, but he could only be glad to not be directly pinned down. Having Mr. Stark at his back was infinitely better.
“I’m sorry,” Peter said instead of trying to explain that to Mr. Stark. “Are you ok?”
Mr. Stark sighed. “Yeah, kid, I’m fine. That’s what the armor’s for. I’m pretty sure you have the brunt of the damage.”
“I’m alright,” Peter replied automatically. “I have a healing factor, remember?”
As if in reply to Peter’s words he felt his dislocated shoulder snap back into place.
Mr. Stark winced at the audible pop and began to administer a clumsy pat down to Peter’s arms and torso. “I’m pretty sure you consider a stab wound ‘fine’, kid, so pardon my skepticality.”
Peter let out a hiss as Mr. Stark’s hand brushed against the pain in his side that swiftly clarified itself at the touch into a piece of metal shrapnel lodged in his side.
“Case in point,” Mr. Stark said half- apologetically as he moved his hand away. “I can’t do much without a light, but we might have to consider trying to take the metal out before you heal over it.”
Peter’s voice was a little breathless but that was only half due to the sensation of throbbing electricity arcing from the wound. “That sounds like bad field medicine.”
“I’m not excited about it either, but your healing factor makes things complicated and getting surgery on embedded metal shrapnel is worse, kid.”
Peter remembered just who he was talking to and mentally gave Mr. Stark the point of expert in the metal shrapnel department. “I can try to get us out? No need for in the dark surgery.”
“What are you going to do, kid? Push the ceiling off us?” Mr. Stark scoffed.
“Well, yeah, kind of.”
Mr. Stark’s hand held Peter’s wrist loosely like he was prepared to pull Peter back from any sudden attempts at moving. “Even if you’re strong enough for that, Pete, there’s still a large chance the shifting rubble would crush us anyways. Plus, you’ll hurt yourself more by straining like that.”
“I can do it.” Peter insisted. “This shouldn’t even be as heavy as last time.”
There was a beat of silence and Mr. Stark’s grip tightened on Peter’s wrist slightly.
“What do you mean by ‘last time’?”
Peter mentally cursed himself for letting that slip. He shifted slightly as if to move away from Tony’s half-embrace but Mr. Stark tightened his grip again and he aborted the movement. “It’s nothing Mr. Stark. I got out fine.”
“Have you been deactivating Karen’s safety protocols again?” Mr. Stark asked sharply. “She should have alerted me about something like this happening.”
“It was when I didn’t have the suit,” Peter admitted reluctantly. “During… uh, during the Vulture thing.”
Mr. Stark processed that information for a moment. “Well, shit.” He let out a breath that stirred the hair on the top of Peter’s head. “Why didn’t you mention this before?”
Peter shrugged and winced when the movement pulled at his still tender shoulder. “It wasn’t important. You were right. I needed to stop using the suit as a crutch. I needed to figure out how to get myself out on my own, and I did.”
“I wasn’t right,” Mr. Stark replied fiercely. “I was an asshole, and I should have known better than to ignore you and take away your ability to get help when you needed it. I’m glad you were able to rescue yourself, but you shouldn’t have had to.”
“It was fine,” Peter attempted to insist but he was mortified by his voice cracking on the last word. “You had bigger things to worry about than me.”
“Pete, no,” Mr. Stark sighed. “You are way more important than whatever shit I had going on. I was an idiot and I was scared of the responsibility of mentoring you. You’re a great kid, and I didn’t want to fuck you up with all of my–” he waved a hand that Peter heard more than saw in the dark– “eveything.”
“It wasn’t a big deal!” Peter insisted with more conviction this time. “Stuff like that– stuff like this– happens to superheroes all the time and they all get over it fine. I’m a superhero, so, I’m over it!”
Mr. Stark began to reply then stopped himself with a thoughtful hum. “Did you know I’m scared of the dark?”
“What?”
“Yu-p,” Mr. Stark popped the P cheerfully. “Petrified. I’d be shaking in my boots right now if I didn't have company to distract me.”
“But…” Peter couldn’t make the idea fit in his mental image of the genius billionaire. “But you’re Iron Man!”
“Yeah, I am.” Mr. Stark agreed. “I’m also scared of big bugs and male pattern baldness… and absolutely terrified of the people I care about getting hurt.”
“Oh.”
“You don’t have to be fearless to be brave, Peter. If you aren’t scared of anything, it just means you’re either dumb enough or green enough to not have been hurt before.”
“Are we sure?” Peter asked– a hint of humor lacing his strained voice. “Because I feel like it’s been an unspoken rule.”
“Kid.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Peter huffed in an almost-laugh.
He deflated slightly and leaned the back of his head against Mr. Stark’s shoulder as he licked his cracked lips and felt a new type of uncertain fear build with the words in his throat. “Hey, Mr. Stark?”
“Yeah, kid?”
“You know my Spider-sense?”
“Your what?”
Peter’s hand twitched nervously. “Oh, uh, it’s like a danger sense thing? It like helps me dodge things a lot.”
“Ohhh, right. Your Peter Tingle.”
Peter felt his awkwardness momentarily get overwritten but utter mortification at the name. “Ohmygod we are not calling it that. You need to stop talking to May.”
“Can’t. We’re in a Crazy-Spider-Kid support group together.”
Peter huffed but let the matter drop for the moment. “Anyways, I think my Spider-sense is broken right now.”
“What makes you say that?” Mr. Stark asked cautiously like he was afraid of scaring off the moment of vulnerability.
“I had a bad feeling at the beginning of the day when we first got to the expo, but I ignored it because that’s been happening like… kind of all the time recently. I only realized something was actually wrong right before the bomb went off.”
“What do you mean it’s happening all the time?”
Peter wished there was anything around to fidget with. He shook his hand against his leg in a futile effort to release some of the nervous energy in his system. “Like, whenever I’m inside, or there’s a lot of people around, or there’s a loud noise or something. I just can’t tell anymore when it’s like a dumb reason to be nervous or something actually wrong. If I could tell, then maybe we could have found the bomb before anyone got hurt.”
“What happened today wasn’t your fault,” Mr. Stark said firmly. “You shouldn’t feel guilty just because you couldn’t avoid something bad altogether.”
Peter released a frustrated breath. “But still. I don’t know why my senses think everything is scary now.”
“I’m not an expert, but it sounds like you’re describing PTSD, Pete.”
“What? No.” Peter shook his head. “That’s for like, soldiers and trauma victims. I can’t have it. I just….”
“Went through something scary and traumatic alone and haven’t been talking about it,” Mr. Stark finished the sentence for him. “You qualify.”
“It wasn’t that big of a deal,” Peter said weakly. “I should be over it by now.”
“Peter, take it from an expert. If anxiety or PTSD went away just because ‘you should be over it’, my life would be a lot simpler. I have had a lot of panic attacks over things I should be over by now.”
“I’ve been handling it,” Peter insisted with weakening resolve. “It’s just been some nightmares and stuff. I just– I just want to stop worrying that every building is going to cave in on me.”
Mr. Stark let out a wry chuckle. “This whole thing probably won’t help with that. I’m sorry you got stuck here with me.”
“It’s alright. It’s better with company, y’know?”
“I know what you mean,” Mr. Stark said softly.
There was a minute of quiet, and Mr. Stark’s hand shifted to card through Peter’s sweaty and dust-coated hair. “After we get out of here, we should have another talk and include your aunt this time.”
Peter began to protest but Mr. Stark cut him off.
“I know you don’t want her to worry, but I promise you she’ll be more hurt by you hiding things from her, kid. We’re the adults here, and it’s our job to worry about the spiderling a little. I just want to make sure you have the help you need.”
Peter let out a slow exhale and released the protests on his tongue. “Ok. This doesn’t change any Spider-man stuff, does it?”
“I think we’ll figure that out. It doesn’t make me think any less of you, if that’s what you’re worried about. We’ll just have to see if taking a break or cutting down on the fighting would help.”
“Please don’t make me stop again,” Peter pleaded. “I need to help people. I feel way worse when something bad happens and I wasn’t there to help.”
Mr. Stark continued to card his fingers through Peter’s hair soothingly. “You’re a good kid, Peter. Certainly better than me. But you don’t need to take responsibility for every bad thing that happens in this city. You’re still a kid, and you’re still human.”
“With great power comes great responsibility,” Peter quoted stubbornly. “I can help people, so, I need to help.”
“You’re a good kid,” Mr. Stark repeated with a sigh. “We’ll figure this out.”
The pair settled into a comfortable quiet with Peter still leaning on Mr. Stark’s chest. The darkness and rubble still threatened to send Peter spiraling, but the calm breaths in his ear and the hand gently pulling through his hair was enough to keep the flashbacks at bay.
What could have been minutes or an hour later Peter snapped out of what had almost been a light doze to something scraping the edge of his senses.
“Peter? What’s wrong?”
Peter cocked his head to the side and tried to figure out what had changed. There was a distant hum of machinery, and the rubble around them was shifting again slightly.
“I think the rescue team is here.”
Mr. Stark clutched Peter tighter as the rubble began to tremble and dust rained down. For a moment it seemed like their salvation might be the very thing to bury them fully as the sound of machinery grew louder until it was a near-overwhelming force.
Finally, with a terrible screech of metal, the unstable roof of their shelter was pulled away and dim daylight showered down. A cacophony of voices and offers for help immediately overwhelmed Peter’s senses and he was left in bit of a daze as he and Mr. Stark were pulled from the rubble by what seemed to be a mix of SHIELD and city emergency workers.
Mr. Stark kept close at hand even as they were swarmed by medical personnel and Peter focused on Mr. Stark’s presence as a life-line as he was touched and prodded and forced to lie down on a stretcher despite his protests.
“You need to go to the hospital.” A paramedic insisted sternly. “We can’t remove the shrapnel here, and it looks like you have some broken ribs and other things that need to be checked out by an X-ray.”
“Can I ride with him in the ambulance?” Mr. Stark asked– squeezing Peter’s hand comfortingly.
“Family?”
Mr. Stark shook his head slightly. “Emergancy contact at least.”
The paramedic nodded and motioned for Mr. Stark to climb aboard as Peter was hoisted into the back of the ambulance. “Close enough. Let’s go.”
Peter clutched Mr. Stark’s hand tightly as the ambulance took off wailing through the streets. “Don’t let May freak out, ok?”
“I think she’s allowed a minor freak-out after this, kid, but I’ll do my best.”
“Hey, Mr. Stark?”
Mr. Stark tilted his head towards Peter to hear over the noise of the siren. “Yeah, Peter?”
“I’m glad you were with me this time.”
Mr. Stark was quiet for a moment but he smiled softly in reply. “Yeah, me too.”