Chapter Text
Two weeks later, the sky split open again.
This time, there were three portals.
They tore across the clouds above lower Manhattan, glowing violently against the skyline as dozens of alien soldiers poured through them, dropping toward the concrete below. The first explosions sent civilians scattering, cars swerving into one another as the Avengers scrambled to establish a defensive line between the invasion and the evacuation routes.
"Incoming left!" Sam shouted.
"I see 'em!" Clint answered, drawing back an arrow.
Steve threw his shield hard enough to knock two creatures off the side of a building before turning to meet the next wave. Bucky moved through the crowd of panicked civilians, covering them as they sprinted toward safety, while Bruce transformed before the first explosion had even finished echoing between the skyscrapers.
Tony rocketed straight through the center of the airborne formation.
Then, a flash of red and blue.
Spider-Girl swung through the canyon of buildings.
She didn't announce herself.
She didn't crack a joke.
She didn't yell, "Miss me?"
She simply arrived and went straight to work.
Tony noticed. Of course he noticed.
After weeks of listening to silence, he'd become painfully aware of every word Penny didn't say.
When a parking garage began to collapse, she was there before the first section of concrete hit the pavement, webbing one support beam to another and holding the structure long enough for a family trapped beneath it to escape.
When an alien charged Clint from behind, her web line snapped around its weapon and ripped it from its hands before Clint had even realized he was in danger.
When a building facade gave way, she caught four people. Then six. Then twelve.
She moved faster than anyone else on the battlefield, crossing impossible distances in seconds and somehow always appearing exactly where she was needed. She never wasted a movement, never hesitated, never stopped long enough for anyone to ask if she was okay.
Steve watched her swing from one side of the street to the other. "She's incredible."
Sam followed her path with his eyes. "She's terrifying."
Not because she was being reckless. Not because she was taking unnecessary risks. Because she was so precise. Every movement was economical. Efficient, controlled, and sharp.
There was nothing improvisational about her style anymore, no little mid-air corrections, no playful extra swings, no moment where she seemed to simply enjoy being Spider-Girl. She identified a problem, solved it, and moved on to the next one.
It was impressive.
It was unsettling.
There was something almost mechanical about the way she navigated the chaos, as though she'd stripped away everything unnecessary and left only the part of herself that knew how to survive.
Forty-three minutes later, the last portal snapped shut.
The remaining creatures collapsed or vanished, and the deafening noise of battle slowly gave way to sirens, emergency crews, and the distant cries of people searching for missing loved ones in the wreckage.
The Avengers slowly stood down.
Clint pulled out his hearing aid long enough to rub at his ear. "I vote shawarma."
"I vote bed," Sam groaned.
Bruce was already back from Hulk form and was kneeling beside an injured civilian, checking for internal trauma.
Spider-Girl landed near a crushed police cruiser. She bent forward slightly, one hand pressed tight against her side as she fought to catch her breath.
Tony noticed. He walked over to her, his suit stepping down into standby mode.
"Hey."
She looked up. "...Hey."
Her voice was bright. Automatic. Like she'd been waiting for the exact moment someone asked.
"You hurt?"
"I'm fine."
Tony almost laughed at the sheer predictability of the answer. Almost.
Instead he ignored her answer completely. "We're heading back to the Tower."
She nodded once. "I know."
"Come with us."
She hesitated.
"Bruce likes doing post-mission medical checks on everyone," Tony pushed.
"I'm okay, really."
"We'll order pizza."
"I have homework."
"Penny."
She looked away, her posture stiffening. "I really think-"
Movement registered behind her half a second too late.
One of the creatures they'd assumed was dead lurched upright from beneath a pile of rubble, a jagged spear of black metal clenched in its grip.
"PENNY!"
She turned, and the spear drove straight through her side.
There wasn't even time for her to scream. Her eyes went wide behind her lenses.
Steve's shield slammed into the alien a heartbeat later, striking it hard enough to send it crashing backward into the debris.
It didn't get up again.
Penny stood there.
For one impossible second, she simply remained upright, staring down at the weapon protruding from her side as if her brain couldn't process what had just happened. Then, with a quick, instinctive jerk, she pulled the spear out of herself.
Blood poured onto the pavement.
"Penny!"
Her knees buckled.
Tony caught her before her body hit the ground. "Oh, God."
Dark blood soaked through his gauntlets almost immediately.
"Bruce!" his voice echoed down the street. "BRUCE!"
Bruce was already sprinting over. He dropped to his knees beside them. "Move your hand."
Tony obeyed, and the moment he lifted his gauntlet, blood surged faster.
Bruce's face drained of color. "We have to move her." He locked eyes with Tony. "The Tower. Now."
Tony didn't argue. He slid one arm beneath Penny's knees and the other around her back, lifting her against his chest. She was frighteningly light, her head rolling against his shoulder, her face pale beneath the torn fabric of her mask.
"...Sorry," she rasped.
Tony looked down at her. "For what?"
Her eyes fluttered weak and heavy. "...Pizza."
For one bewildered second, Tony just stared at her.
"No," Tony said, his voice tight. "No, kid. Don't-"
Her eyes rolled shut, her head limping against his collarbone.
"Penny!"
There was no response as Tony fired his thrusters and launched into the sky.
The flight back felt endless. FRIDAY cleared the medical bay long before they arrived, and the second Tony touched down on the pad, a team of trauma nurses rushed forward with a stretcher.
"On three. One... two... three."
They transferred Penny onto the surgical table.
Tony instinctively moved to follow, but a nurse blocked the doorway.
"We need room," she said.
"I'm staying."
"No." The nurse's tone was low and steady, leaving zero room for argument. "You'll be in the way."
Tony stared past him into the room.
Penny looked impossibly small beneath the harsh medical lights. Nurses moved around her in a blur, cutting away the suit while someone hung a bag of blood and hooked up monitors. The quick, frantic beeping of the cardiac monitor filled the room as the team worked.
The nurse placed a heavy hand on Tony's shoulder. "Someone will come get you as soon as she's stable."
Tony didn't move.
"Mr. Stark. You have to go."
He finally took a step back, and the heavy doors slid shut between them.
The waiting room was dead silent, and Tony couldn't bring himself to sit down. He paced a line across the floor, turned, and paced back. Again and again.
A few minutes later, Sam walked in fresh off the quinjet.
Good, that meant Bruce was there and working on Penny.
"What happened?" Sam asked.
Tony couldn't get the words out, so Happy answered for him. "An alien got up from the wreckage."
Clint came next, followed by Steve and Bucky. Natasha slipped into the corner so quietly that Tony didn't realize she was there until she sat down.
At some point, someone asked how old Spider-Girl actually was. Then someone else asked for her name. The team had fought beside her often enough to know her by her suit, her voice, her quips, and her impossible acrobatics.
Now, in the fluorescent quiet of the ICU waiting room, she was just fifteen-year-old Penelope Parker. A kid.
Every time the operating room doors hissed open, Tony bolted up.
Finally, Bruce stepped out, his surgical scrubs streaked with blood. Tony moved instantly. "Bruce?"
Bruce looked at him. "She's going to be okay."
A collective exhale passed through the room.
"The spear missed her major arteries. We stabilized the internal bleeding, and once we closed the wound, her enhanced healing took over."
Tony closed his eyes, leaning back against the wall. "Thank God."
"She'll need to stay here for a few days to recover. She's not out of danger yet, but she's stable"
"How long until she wakes up?"
"Hard to say. Her body's exhausted, and we have her sedated right now."
Tony nodded. He should have felt relief, and he did, but something about Bruce's posture hadn't relaxed. Beneath the calm medical update was a heavy, suffocating weight.
Bruce glanced around at the rest of the team. "Tony, I need to speak with you privately."
The relief in Tony's chest dissolved, replaced instantly by a cold drop in his stomach.
Bruce led him into a nearby consultation room and pulled the door shut behind them. Neither of them spoke for several seconds.
Finally, Bruce let out a slow sigh. "How old is she, Tony?"
"She's... God, she's fifteen."
"Do you know her full name?"
"Penelope Parker. Penny."
Bruce looked down, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "There's something you need to see."
Tony's brow furrowed. "What is it?"
"When we cut away the rest of her suit..." Bruce stopped. Tony had worked with him long enough to know that a pause like that from Bruce never meant anything good.
"What, Bruce?"
Bruce crossed his arms. "Her arms."
Tony stared at him.
"They're covered in self-inflicted wounds."
For a moment, the words floated between them without making sense. "...What?"
"They're in various stages of healing."
Tony shook his head once, taking a step back. "No."
"Some of them are older," Bruce said gently.
"No... you're making a mistake, she-"
"And some of them are very fresh."
Tony's breathing rattled in his chest. "No."
"Tony-"
"No!" His voice cracked, the word scraping out of his throat.
“I know this is a lot to take in,” Bruce said gently.
Tony just stared at him, his brain completely refusing to connect the medical reality with the girl he had just watched on the battlefield. Spider-Girl. Penny. The kid who left voicemails about chemistry tests and web-shooters. The kid who always smiled.
Bruce gave him a moment before continuing. He didn't rush to fill the silence.
When Bruce spoke again his tone was quiet and careful. "Some of the cuts are deep enough that, without her healing factor, they would have been fatal."
Tony reached out blindly for the back of the nearest chair, missed, and caught his weight against the wall instead. "...Jesus."
Bruce nodded softly. "I know."
Tony stared at the floor tiles.
The voicemail echoed in his head, not just the words, but the exact tremor in her voice. The erratic breathing. The long, desperate silence.
"Mr. Stark..."
“I…”
His stomach turned over violently.
"I don't know who else to call."
Tony closed his eyes. "I ignored her."
Bruce didn't answer.
"I ignored her," Tony repeated, his voice dropping into a hollow whisper. "She called me, and I ignored her."
"Tony-"
"Can I see her?"
Bruce hesitated. "Yeah. You can see her. But remember, she's heavily sedated. She won't be awake for a while."
Tony nodded numbly, and they walked back down the corridor toward her room.
The room was dim when Tony entered. Monitors beeped softly beside the bed, steady and rhythmic in a way Tony couldn't bring himself to trust.
Penny looked impossibly small. Her Spider-Girl mask had been replaced with an oxygen mask.
She was dressed in a hospital gown, thick bandages wrapped around her midsection, an IV running into the back of her left hand. Her dark, chaotic hair was spread across the white pillow. Nothing about her looked like the girl who had been swinging through Manhattan a few hours earlier.
She looked peaceful. Bruised. Fragile.
Tony took a slow step toward the bed.
Then his eyes fell on her arms. Bandages covered parts of her forearms, but not all of them.
The exposed skin was a patchwork of trauma. Thin white scars. Raised pink healing lines. Fresh red cuts. Older silver ones. They crossed over each other in layers until Tony couldn't tell where one injury ended and the next began.
"...Kid."
His voice was barely a breath. He reached out a trembling hand toward her, but stopped before making contact, suddenly terrified that if he touched her, she would wake up and pull away.
Bruce stood quietly in the doorway behind him. "I can document the side injury as a field wound."
Tony didn't respond.
"But I can't hide the rest of this, Tony." Bruce looked toward the bed. "She's a minor."
Tony closed his eyes tight.
Bruce continued softly. "Her parents need to be brought in."
"Her parents are dead," Tony swallowed hard, his throat tight. "She lives with her aunt. May."
Bruce paused, letting out a quiet breath. "Then May needs to know."
Tony's stomach dropped again.
May.
He was going to have to tell May. May, who had no idea her niece was Spider-Girl.
Tony nodded, forcing himself to keep his eyes on Penny, on her arms, on the visible proof of pain that had been hidden beneath long sleeves, beneath a red and blue suit, beneath every cheerful greeting and practiced smile.
Every "Hey, Iron Man."
Every "I'm fine."
Tony pulled a chair up to the side of her bed and sank into it. For a long time, he just sat there in the quiet, watching her chest rise and fall. Then, so softly that Bruce barely caught it from the doorway, Tony whispered, "I'm so sorry, kid."