Chapter Text
He feels something barrel into him that feels more like football player than speeding train, but he doesn’t have the time to quantify it as he’s lifted off his feet, the wind rushing by him as the train speeds past him, his body held tight into something all too warm to be the embrace of death before he’s set back on his feet. He risks opening his eyes just a touch as he realizes that he’s being [vigorously] rubbed down from shoulder to hips, as if being checked for injuries, finding himself shocked to see long brown hair and wide, worried grey eyes.
“The fuck were you thinking,” the stranger’s muttering, “the fuck were you thinking?” a question Peter’s not too sure how to answer, if he’s being honest, because he wasn’t really thinking much else than can’t let them take my camera from me, and also, this guy’s face is a bit of a distraction. The man’s attractive in a rugged way, with five day’s growth and overlong, tangled brown hair and a chiseled, perfect example of a jawline that he’s ever seen in his life, and he’d snap a picture of it if it weren’t for the fact that the man looks like he’s about two steps away from flipping his shit, hands roughly patting Peter down despite the fact that the teen himself is already informing him that he’s completely fine.
“I mean, I might’ve rolled my ankle a bit, but otherwise I’m okay,” he says, dimly aware of the closing doors behind him as the train prepared to roll out of the platform.
The man drops to his knees almost instantly, demanding to know which ankle before growling in frustration and simply checking both instead, the rough skin of his hand touching gently at Peter’s ankles as he checked him for a broken bone. Once satisfied, he gets back to his feet, leveling Peter with an incredible imitation of the I’m going to fuck you up for almost dying look that he’s seen a multitude of times from the Avengers in regards to Uncle Clint. Instead of tearing into him, however, the man shakes his head, shoving Peter’s phone and wallet back into his hands, much to his confusion before he explains,
“They dropped it and ran when you dived into the fucking tracks.”
Peter winces. “In hindsight,” he says, “It was a bit stupid.”
“A bit?” the man asks dryly, arching an incredulous brow.
“A lot bit?” Peter tries, cringing just a bit.
“Shoulda let you get hit,” the man growls, moving away from Peter to pick up his backpack from where it lay helpless on the ground, “I really shoulda let your dumb ass get hit.”
“But you didn’t,” Peter says, earning himself a scowl from the man.
“And I regret it every passing moment,” he responds, shoving the bag into Peter’s arms, “And now I’ve missed my train, thanks to you.”
Peter blinks owlishly, whipping around to see the empty space in which a train had once been the occupant, cursing lowly to himself. “Dad’s gonna be pissed,” he whispers to himself.
“Fuck your dad, I’m pissed,” the man reminds him, “I wanted to get somewhere, but you had to just jump for the gold there.”
Peter’s brow wrinkles. “I think you’re running out of Olympic jokes to make about this,” he tells him.
The man informs him that the time’s come that he shuts the fuck up now. But, unfortunately for him, Peter’s never been entirely good at this prospect, so after a brief silence, he mutters,
“Thank you,”
To which the man oh-so-politely informs him that he can go fuck himself.
Peter forces a smile. “I could’ve died. You saved me,” he says, “Thank you. You’re a hero.”
The man bristles. “Never that,” he grounds out before turning on his heel, marching away.
“Where’re you going?” Peter calls after him, confused. Doesn’t he need this train?
“Home,” he informs Peter as he passes through the turnstile, “Didn’t really wanna go where I was goin’ anyways. I’ll go another day.”
Peter frowns before asking, more out of curiosity than anything else, “Not even gonna tell me what to call you?”
The man pauses before turning around, leveling Peter with a dark, guarded glare that doesn’t do more than make the boy vaguely uncomfortable; having spent a lot of time in the company of a Black Widow who pretty much holds the world title on dirty looks meant that he’s nearly desensitized to such looks.
“Why would’ya need that?” he barks at Peter.
Peter shrugs. “In case I see you again. In case I need saving again.”
The man rolls his eyes. “You need saving again and I’ll kick your ass, kid,” he informs him, turning back around before saying, “Call me Barnes, you shit. And don’t dive into tracks for fucking cameras; they’re more replaceable than your life is.”
He’s not looking, but Peter’s actually smiling a bit, even though he’s not entirely sure that he’s trying to be funny. “See you around, Barnes!” he calls after the man.
A stiff middle finger is all the response he gets, but for some reason, it doesn’t feel half as offensive as it’s supposed to be. If anything, it fills Peter with a sort of weird elation that he’s not exactly sure how to quantify but, regardless, doesn’t question.
The sight of Natasha in the apartment had, at first, been a source of excitement; a red flag that should’ve gone up refusing to trigger due to his familiarity with the former assassin, but the look she gives him when he comes a hair’s breath away from hugging her gives him the clue he’s apparently missed. Dressed in jeans and a leather jacket, she looks as if she’s just gotten off a cross-country motorbike vacation, which, given her personality, is entirely within the realm of possibility; but the hardness in her eyes speaks to anything but the inherent relaxation her outfit would suggest. Hair tied back, body language tense—she looks like she’s barely holding back her own anger, and it’s both sobering and confusing, because he’s missed his Tetya these past few months she’s been gone, and now that she’s finally back, she doesn’t look like she’s missed him in the least. In fact, she looks damn near ready to just snap his neck at that precise moment, and he can only hope that the only reason she does not is that they are something akin to aunt and nephew, if not for the fact that Peter’s father, the goddamn Iron Man, stands not even a whole ten feet away.
Tony’s body language is another clue to something amiss—his face is smiling, but Peter’s more than familiar with that smile; it’s the one he uses exclusively for the press when he’s hiding things, like disappointment or anger, so Peter doesn’t look at his face for more than a moment. He looks towards his posture—upright and terse—and towards his arms—crossed—and his leg—bouncing up and down. Tony’s not pissed like Tetya seems to be, which Peter finds a small sense of momentary relief in finding, but happy the man is not, and for the life of him, Peter can’t figure out why, but then, as if they’ve both sensed his question, the television begins to play, drawing his attentions, eyes widening when he realizes what show they’ve got planned for him that night.
It’s CCTV, specifically from the subway, specifically from the station he’d only just left about forty-five minutes ago; his own face slightly pixelated from having been adapted to fit the screens. It’s an odd experience, watching himself dive into the tracks, watching himself scramble to retrieve his camera, watching himself curl up in wait for the impact of the train—watching himself as he’s picked up by the dark mass he knows now to be Barnes, watching the man leap into the tracks with a certain and odd amount of grace, picking him up as if he’s weightless, getting a flash of silver before the man literally leaps from the tracks—a feat in and of itself, because the tracks are five feet below the platform and man makes the jump with ease that speaks to superhuman, but that doesn’t matter, he decides, because Peter doesn’t need to see that to figure out who it is. He’s figured it out the moment he saw the glint of silver in the video, he realizes, dropping his bag as he goes closer to the screens, mouth gaping as he watched Barnes turn away from him, the facial recognition apparently embedded into the program of the camera kicking in as it analyzes the contours of the man’s face right before Peter’s eyes, a data sheet with the man’s picture and the identified name of James Buchanan Barnes overtaking the screen.
They make him agree—no, swear—not to tell Steve. Knowing Barnes was in New York would only lead him towards distraction, Natasha reasons, and none of them could afford such a distraction at the current; not when they’ve earned the hatred of the world in the wake of Sokovia.
“Steve has to prove that the Avengers can be trusted,” Natasha tells him as gently as she can manage, staring him down as if she were interrogating him instead, “That’s his main job right now. The last thing we need is him running off to go find Barnes—”
“—his best friend,” Peter says at the same time that Tony adds,
“—a wanted criminal.”
“He saved my life,” Peter reasons, motioning towards the screen.
Tony’s eyes harden just a bit before he says, “And, yeah, we’ll have a discussion about how fucking stupid that was,” his words containing an unexpected little bite that has Peter hanging his head in guilt before he continues, “Regardless of what good he’s done, it doesn’t mean we get to forget what bad he’s done, too. Sure, he might’ve done it as a victim of Hydra, but that doesn’t mean to say that we get to decide he’s absolved of the crimes he’s had to commit; it’s not our right. It’s for a jury to decide, not for us.”
“Besides,” Natasha continues, looking at Peter carefully, “We’re no longer at our own liberty to decide what we can and can’t do. We’ve done that, and look where it’s landed us—public distrust and shame. Every day, the government looks to slap a collar on us and we have to work even harder to prove that we don’t need one. How would it look if we suddenly gave the government what they want to see by harboring a fugitive?”
“But—” Peter begins before Tony interrupts harshly,
“This isn’t a debate.”
“Tony,” Natasha whispers, chastising, before she looks to Peter, who’s so taken aback by the tone Tony’s just taken that all he can do is listen as she says, “If you tell Steve, right now, the first thing he’ll do is drop the recon mission he’s on in Bermuda, leaving Clint there by himself, and come straight here. He’ll then proceed to scour the city for Barnes, who’s actively being hunted by the government as we speak, and best case scenario, he’ll spook Barnes into turning tail and running. In that case, not only will we raise eyebrows and possibly an investigation as to why Captain America is playing manhunt, but we’ll also let a known criminal out of our sights. Right now, Barnes isn’t doing anyone any bit of harm, and from the looks of things, if it weren’t for you trying to get yourself killed, he wouldn’t have even let himself be known.” Natasha looks at him imploringly as she finishes, “Peter, it’ll do no one any bit of good if you tell Steve. Least of all Barnes.”
Peter looks at Natasha for a moment before looking back at Tony, who’s now allowing himself to look as ticked off—not mad, but definitely not happy with his son’s actions—as he so obviously feels, but he’s also aware of the utter shame that’s lingering in the back of his eyes—this is obviously not his ideal situation, Peter knows in that moment, not what he’d prefer, not what he’d like to do—it’s simply a necessary evil, in Tony’s eyes, that they must follow for all of their sakes. This whole thing was about more than just them, Peter knew, more than about what they would prefer or would like, and in that moment, Peter knew what it was that his dads so frequently put themselves through—what they so often force themselves to do—what he now had to do as well. This is what it meant, Peter decides, to be a hero: to give up what you want for the sake of the greater good.
So Peter, ever so quietly, nods in affirmation, complete and utter guilt burning at his heart, giving up his own selfish inclination for the sake of others and the detriment of the few. The decision doesn’t sit easily with Peter, especially when he sees how little Tony himself likes that they have to ask him to do so, but he knows he has little else choice. He can’t help but feel the burden of knowing that he was betraying Steve with his feigned ignorance, can’t help but feel the guilt of knowing that he was hiding something that he knows Steve to find grave importance in, and it hurts, knowing that he doesn’t have any other choice but to do so—for the sake of the Avengers as a whole.
For the good of many rather than the sake of one, Peter Parker finds himself disregarding his own father in order for the whole to be safe.
And never has Peter felt so detached from his own humanism than now, and he now realizes exactly what his parents have been trying so hard to avoid him realizing in the first place. This is the first sacrifice he’s ever made of such a scale, and yet, looking into Dad’s eyes now with a new light, this is hardly the first time Tony’s had to make such a decision to protect people, and he doesn’t even bother with trying to figure out how many times his own Tetya has been in such a spot (because at this point, surely, this must be nothing more than some sort of second-nature for her, given her previous line of work). Tony’s been making this very sacrifice for longer than Peter can truly comprehend, and he can see clearly that it hurts just as much now as it does for Peter now, if not more so, considering what kind of relationship Tony and Steve share, and Peter’s not the kind of fool to believe that Steve hasn’t made this choice, either. All of the Avengers, he’s thinking, must’ve been in this spot, must’ve had to make this call: help this one precious person or protect the many—and he’s no fool to believe that they went with the former decision.
And, you know what he decides?
He decides it’s so fucking unfair that they’ve been making this sacrifice all this time, without anyone to lighten the load, because while they may have each other; they’re only a group of only just over ten individuals, those who hold the title of Avenger. Ten is not enough. It’s not fair to them that they must shoulder the responsibility. So he makes a decision, in the back of his mind, a seed that he’s not even fully aware of developing; an idea that begins to fester within him. He doesn’t fully realize it now, and he won’t for a while yet—but it’s the very idea that has him dreaming of soaring through the skies, of protecting maidens from monsters, of saving the world from destruction.
To become a hero, not for himself, but for the family who has shouldered the burden alone for too long.
Peter Parker decides to become a hero to take on some of the sacrifices so that, one day, his aunts and uncles and fathers will no longer have to; a hero worthy of the weight of the very sacrifices they’ve made over their time.
And, thus is the beginning of his life as he would come to know it, in this small, painful moment, wanting nothing more than to cry but remaining strong for the sake of his precious people, standing on the cusp of realization of the strife his family choose to suffer, taking his first step towards becoming a man worthy of being called a hero, the image of a man who’s been made to suffer for far too long burned into his retinas as he begins to formulate a basic plan on how, exactly, he’s going to go about helping a one James Buchanan Barnes.