Chapter Text
When Tony awoke this time, he noted that he was not tied to the bedpost – a fact his arms took great delight in. Unfortunately, though, he awoke alone, and to the sight of Peter Parker’s turned back.
“Kid? What are you doing?”
Peter whirled around, as though not having anticipated Tony’s early rising.
“Packing,” he said flatly. “Give me half an hour, and I’ll be out of your hair.”
What?
Tony vocalised the sentiment. “What are you talking about?” He rose from the bed, striding over to where Peter was – maintaining a respectable distance from him, but just close enough so that Peter could reach out for him if he so wished. “Why are you leaving?”
“Can’t stay in one place too long,” Peter responded, eyes never leaving his organised mess. “Can’t risk being caught.”
Tony nodded. Made sense. “Okay. Let me take over. I just need to leave a few messages, and then I’ll be right there with you–”
Brown eyes rose to challenge Tony’s. “No!” A shirt was thrown, rumpled, into the overflowing, unfolded chaos of the kid’s suitcase. “You’re staying here. You can – make up some story, tell the press whatever the hell you like, I don’t care. But I’m leaving, and you’re staying.”
Tony’s head felt like he’d hurled it through a blender. “So, last night was just, what, goodbye? I thought that you–” he managed to cut himself off from revealing too much. “Why did you let me stay last night? Why did you act like we were gonna be in this together if you were always planning to leave me?”
“Because!” Frustration laced Peter's words. “It was just. One night,” he explained. “One night, where I could be me again, and you could be you, and we didn't have to be anybody else. Where we could just be together, and not have to worry about anything else.” Peter wiped his nose with the back of his sleeve as discreetly as he could manage. “That's all it was supposed to be, Mr. Stark. Just one night. A once-in-a-lifetime occurrence. Nothing more.”
It made sense. Peter was tired and haggard and weary of this life; of a life Tony had all but carved out in a gravestone for him. To an extent, Tony could empathise. All he wanted was to go back ten years. Back when Tony was not really/alright, maybe a little bit/completely and utterly 100% in love with Peter.
Back when Tony had Peter.
“Kid, we can be together,” Tony added, stressed. “You and me, right here and now. I’m a mechanic. What do you think I do for a living?” Quietly, “Let me help you.”
Peter barked a harsh laugh, the discordant sound grating on Tony's throbbing migraine. It went against the laws of fairness – to have Peter so disillusioned, so beaten, so torn down. It was all wrong. Peter should never be like that; that was a Tony Stark façade. That expression had no business displaying itself on a Peter Parker face.
“What?” Peter snapped. “You think I can just wave the white flag, apologise for everything I haven't done, and I'll suddenly be accepted back into society? And, then what, live with you? Right, yeah, Morgan will love that. It's not as if I haven't traumatised her after I tried to kill her.”
Tony couldn't breathe. “No, no. You didn't–”
“Of course I didn't! But Beck loves to wear my face for the personal attacks. Loves the show of intimacy as he slices those I try and protect.”
Peter's eyes glistened with tears, but they weren't shed for Morgan. No, Tony realised with sickening clarity, those tears were for his best friends.
Ned. MJ.
Bile rose in his mouth, and Tony tried not to choke on it. Peter didn't need Tony's belated apologies, ones that would inevitably provide no justification for their murders – no, Peter needed Tony to be strong, for the both of them.
A hard task, admittedly, but when had Tony ever not risen to challenges?
And if there was one thing Tony Stark did when he was trying to read a situation, it was talk. “Y'know, I hated Steve, for what he did to me,” he started, probably a little too casually, judging by the pinched look on Peter's face. “For breaking up the team, for lying to me, betraying me.”
Tony had to pause, gather his bearings. Even now, just over a decade later, the nauseating ache threatened to tear its stitches and bleed into his tone. He honestly hadn't expected the raw vulnerability when he chose this as a conversation starter – or maybe it was Peter's situation that was bleeding over into this recounting of Siberia. Either way, Tony had to take stock before proceeding. Peter was uncharacteristically silent during this process (or maybe this was now the new characteristic; the new normal for Peter Parker? No. Stop it.) so Tony reluctantly pressed on. Peter deserved true honesty, regardless, and this serum was only too willing to comply.
“I never understood it. How he could just betray everyone, all to save one person.” Tony swallowed. Fuck. This was the hard part. “I didn't get it, before, but I do now. Kid, I'd throw it all away for you. Every fucking thing I have. I'd tear my own goddamn heart out for you.”
Okay. Too far now. Dial it back a bit – or several bits.
Peter's brow scrunched up adorably. “Mr. Stark, what are you saying?”
“Pete, I'm saying I'm all in. I've been all in, even when you handcuffed me up to your bed – which, by the way, I'm a massive fan of, and feel free to do again.”
Hope flared on Peter’s face for one glorious fraction of a second, before shuttering away into the night. “No, no. I can't – can't ask you to give up everything just for me.”
“Well, that's good, because you're not asking. I'm telling you: I am never going to leave you. That's the one thing I can't do.” Tony sniffed. “Besides, you'll be doing me a favour actually. Keeping me from fucking up Morgan's life because, let's face it, that was always a guarantee.”
“No!” Peter countered. “Stop saying stuff like that to me. You're supposed to go. Get outta here. Tell the world how you faced Spider-Man and lived to tell the tale.” Peter flailed about with his arms. “You're still everyone's favourite superhero, Mr. Stark. Don't screw it up on my account.”
“Yeah? Well, Spider-Man is my favourite superhero. So, I guess we're at a bit of an impasse, aren't we?” To put it mildly.
Peter groaned. Gesticulating wildly, he countered, “No, we're not. This is not an impasse – this is an impasse-free zone. We are impasse-less. We are nothing. You retired being a superhero, gave up on Iron Man. I have been on my own for years now. I don't need you.”
That last sentence damn near broke him, the painful honesty burying a dagger in his heart, but Tony pressed on. Just because Peter didn't need him didn't mean that Tony wasn't just gonna stop trying.
“The whole reason I gave up Iron Man was because of you. You were my reason, and when you died,” the familiar ache inside of Tony threatened to consume him, choking the life right out of him, but he had to say this, Peter deserved the truth – “Iron Man died with you.”
“You should go,” Peter repeated monotonously, eyes trained on a spot just above Tony's shoulder. “You have a wife and a daughter – don't give that up.”
“Kid, if you think I could ever leave you, then you've got another thing coming,” Tony confessed. “I'm yours. I've always been yours; I always will be yours.”
Irritation coloured the sharp contours of the kid’s face, bleeding into his tone as he countered: “No. I’m not some – some – some fall-back option just because you're scared the world you left isn't the same one you came back to. I'm not some convenient excuse for you to use just so you have an out; a reason to become Iron Man again.”
Tony’s temper flickered. “A convenient excuse? That’s what you think you are?”
Peter scoffed, but his eyes shot straight to Tony’s – point-blank. And Tony... couldn’t get a read on him.
“Kid, don't you trust me?”
Peter didn't respond. Eyes never leaving Tony's face.
And there it was: the crux of the matter. The blinding crescendo of deceit and betrayal, held up with a fragile bow of love.
There was only one thing left to say. The one thing – the only thing – he swore he would never reveal, keeping it locked in the dark recesses of his mind, vowing never to let it see the light of day.
Tony took a deep breath, and confessed his greatest crime:
“Peter, I love you.”
The only sound was the nervous stutter of Tony’s damaged heart.
“What?” Peter croaked.
For a moment, deep-rooted preservation instincts urged him to recoil, to refute. Emotional vulnerability was not exactly Iron Man’s thing. Iron would sooner break than bend, for anything.
Anything, that was, except for Peter Parker – the exception to the rule.
“I love you,” Tony repeated, and witnessed as the vibranium walls Peter enshrouded himself with came tumbling down with three beautifully tiny little words.
“You...love me?” Doubt clouded his tone. “Not loved me? You still love me?”
“Yes,” Tony stressed, lips curving into a smile despite himself, despite their current situation. “I have never stopped loving you, kid, and I’m not about to start anytime soon.”
Looking into Peter Parker’s face was like watching the morning sun break through the holes of the clouds, vanquishing the darkness. It stole the breath from Tony’s lungs, and rerouted his brain to his heart. Tony could look at Peter all day – all day, every day. That was all Tony wanted to do. Just be by his side, having his back.
With no prior notification, no warning, Peter practically launched himself into Tony’s arms, causing them both to stumble back as they caught their balance beneath their shared weight.
“Does this mean I’m coming with you?” Tony asked, breathless with exhilaration.
Peter laughed, cried. “Yes. Yes, yes, yes.” He pressed a quick kiss to the corner of Tony’s mouth. “I love you, too,” he smothered tenderly against Tony’s lips.
Tony tightened his hold, and did not let go.