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It’s a cough paired with occasional sneezing and a slight headache; it’s not bad, more a nuisance than anything, but it’s just enough to have Peter thumbing through his contacts in search of Tony’s number.
The older man answers on the third ring with a gruff, almost distracted, greeting that has Peter dropping against the edge of his bed with a weak cough.
“Mr. Stark, I know we have that mission with Cap later today, but I’m not feeling so hot.”
His voice is brutally honest, from the slight waver to the hint of a rasp coating his tone, but the deep sigh that emits from the other line has his fingers curling tightly around the phone as he swallows back a few coughs.
“The weather’s changing, kid. Everyone is a little sick right now.”
He’s not wrong, Peter thinks. The temperatures have been steadily dropping as the last remnants of fall are shoved away by a biting winter breeze, and it’s got everyone at school sniffling and sneezing. But, Peter fears he may be fighting off more than just a seasonal cold.
A light sigh slips from his pressed lips as his shoulders slump deeply. His grip on his phone weakens, and he clears his throat, wincing slightly at the quick, heated pain that stings across the back of this throat.
“I know, Mr. Stark, but-”
“We all work through colds, Peter. I told you this wouldn’t be easy, didn’t I? Are you really going to tell me you can’t help with this mission because of a small cold?”
Tony’s voice is firm and calm, yet it pierces like a dagger, dangerous and effective. Peter tugs the phone away from his ear for a moment to muffle a cough into his shoulder before he pushes it back against his ear, eyes falling to the floor as defeat burns against his tongue.
“No, Mr. Stark. I’ll go.”
“There’s the Spider-Man I know. I’ll have Happy pick you up in a few hours. In the meantime, take some medicine and rest up to kick this cold while you’re ahead.”
Before Peter can reply, the line goes dead with a soft click. He slowly pulls his phone away from his ear and drops it to the nightstand with little care. The phone call alone has shoved his slight headache into a deep, steady thump across his forehead, and the fatigue from before has intensified, as if the phone call alone sapped what little energy he had away.
He gets to his feet slowly and crosses the room to snag some medicine from the bathroom, already planning on drugging himself up and sneaking in a few more hours of sleep before he has to go out tonight.
His aunt always says sleep is the number one remedy for all things sick, so, Peter thinks, here’s to hoping that she’s right.
*****
It’s not the ringing of his phone that wakes Peter up. No, the repeated sound merely nudges him slowly from sleep, just enough to remind his body that it’s fighting off a virus. He could very easily slip back under despite the ringtone, but his lungs have other plans.
They tremble and burn until he’s shooting up into a sitting position to cough, over and over and over, grating cough after grating cough. His face grows heated, and his eyes brim with unwanted tears as he struggles and shakes against each forceful cough that rips up his burning throat.
It’s, he thinks, at least two minutes until he’s able to catch his breath. By now, his phone is ringing through it’s third call, and he blindly reaches for it as he sucks in deep, sharp breaths to compensate for the lack of air.
He swipes to answer with a trembling finger and pushes the phone to his ear, not even having to say a word for Happy is talking the second the call is answered.
“About time, kid. I’m outside.”
And just with that, the line goes dead. Short and to the point, as Happy always is. Peter takes a brief moment to run shaking fingers through his sleep-matted hair before he swings his legs over the bed and gets to his feet.
For a moment, his vision blurs until his surroundings are but a swaying mass of dull colors, but he’s quick to grab onto the wall and blink rapidly to clear his sight. But, even when his room comes back clearly, he presses the back of his free hand to his cheek, lips curling into a frown at the unsettling heat.
“Shit,” he breathes out as he pushes off the wall and starts out of his room and toward the bathroom. He can hear May starting toward him, but he’s quick to slip into the bathroom and close and lock the door before she can catch a good sight of him.
He makes it to the sink and grips the edges, frown deepening at his pale, sunken reflection as May knocks quietly on the door.
“Peter? Was that you I heard coughing?”
There’s always a chance to be snarky with May’s questions because of course it was him. Who else would it have been with only the two of them in the apartment? But, he knows May means well with her questions and prodding, so he calls back to her, making his voice as normal as he can manage despite feeling as if littered with shards of glass.
“Yeah, I’m okay! I swallowed some water wrong!”
“Okay, well, Happy is outside, so you better hurry!”
Peter calls out an “okay” before he turns the tap on, leaving the water cold as he leans over the sink to splash some across his heated face. The water feels heavenly with each splash, but the few stray drops that trickle down his neck and to his chest burn with an icy cold that leaves him trembling as he quickly grabs a hand towel to dry his face.
The water helps some; at least, he thinks it does. He stares back at his reflection, noting the soft pink coloring his entire face since being hit with cold water. At least he doesn’t look like a blushing ghost at the moment. Small victories, he tells himself as he pulls the mirror back to rifle through the medicine.
He opts for cough syrup and ibuprofen, and he grabs a handful of cough drops before he slips out of the bathroom to finish getting ready.
His changing clothes is sped up by a faint car horn blasting outside. His original plan was to change into his suit sometime at Stark Tower, but he’s suddenly yearning for the built in heater. So, he adjusts his plans slightly. He slips his suit on first then covers it with jeans and a long-sleeved shirt paired with a jacket and sneakers.
He zips his jacket up high and grabs his backpack for show before he pockets his phone and races out of his room.
“More work for Tony?” May asks as Peter moves toward the door.
Peter opens his mouth for a quick reply, but instead of words, he’s suddenly turning his head to sneeze sharply into the crook of his arm, once, twice, three times, before he’s moving his face away with a light sniffle.
“You’re not getting sick, are you?”
May’s voice is significantly closer than before, and Peter whips around from the door to see his aunt standing before him.
“Nope!” He manages out with a wide smile as he runs one hand across the back of his neck. “Just had to sneeze. Nothing major.”
May tilts her head and narrows her eyes. “You’re a little flushed.” She says as she reaches one hand toward Peter’s forehead, but Peter ducks away then forward to plant a kiss to his aunt’s cheek.
“Because I just woke up,” he tells her as he pulls away. “I’m fine!” He adds, turning quickly back to the door. “I’ll see you later!” He pulls the door open and steps out, closing the door on the “have fun!” from his aunt before racing toward the old elevator.
*****
“Now remember,” Tony starts, with Peter and Steve at either side of him. “These guys have guns. Big guns. Guns that could probably kill any of us in a second, so we have to be very careful.” He pauses, sparing a knowing glance toward Peter. “So, there will be no spontaneity, got it?”
Peter meets Tony’s sharp gaze and nods. There’s no chance he would do anything rash tonight. He physically can’t. He managed well enough on the ride from his apartment to Stark Tower, but the second he stepped into the conference room with Tony and Steve, it felt as if his body completely burned through the medicine he previously took.
Every movement was sluggish, and he had to excuse himself to the bathroom four separate times to hack up a lung in hiding, using the excuse that he downed a few cups of water before arriving. On top of that, he was freezing, but he could physically feel the warm drops of sweat rolling down his neck, leaving his suit plastered uncomfortably to his heated skin.
But, he refused to say anything, even now as he’s walking toward battle. He doesn’t want Tony to think he’s weak because heroes can’t be weak. If he wants to keep his suit and remain Spider-Man, he’s got to just work through this the best he can, so he takes the cough drops he has with him like candy and stifles sneezes and coughs as carefully as he can.
The three move quietly forward within the abandoned house, only stopping when a gruff voice calls out from behind them.
“We weren’t expecting guests.”
Peter is quick to whip around, following Tony and Steve’s movements, and he frowns at the six men pointing very large guns toward them.
“Well, shit,” Tony starts, tone more annoyed then worried. “I guess this is go time.”
The second the words leave his lips, bullets start blazing toward them. Peter is quick to jump away despite the cramped hallway, and he begins shooting webs to pull guns away as Steve and Tony rush forward behind the protection of Steve’s shield.
The next ten minutes are a massive blur of webs, kicks, and punches. Peter moves through each motion as if on autopilot, not even worried of taking a hit from a bullet. His mind is cloudy, heavy, distant. He’s struggling to focus on anything for more than a second, so he’s lucky the battle is fast-paced.
He only faintly hears the loud crash of someone breaking through the wall close to him, and after that, everything falls to a muffled quiet, with only a faint ringing hitting Peter’s ears.
Slowly, he drags his gaze to the right. He can make out Steve yelling and running toward him, but he can’t hear words. He doesn’t understand why Steve looks so worried, and for a brief moment, he doesn’t even understand why Steve is there. But, he can’t chase that thought because Steve is on him now. The older man crashes into him like a train, and the two fly back just as a massive beam from the ceiling falls to the floor right where Peter had been standing.
The second Peter’s back hits the floor, his lungs burst, and he pushes against Steve’s shoulder with a shaking hand, urging the older man off of him. Steve obliges quickly, and Peter is quick to sit up and rip his mask off just as the building coughs shoot from his lips.
He leans to the side and coughs over and over into his fist, only just barely able to follow the words coming from close to him.
“Is he okay?”
“Yeah, I think I knocked the wind out of him.”
“Better that then get crushed by that beam.”
Peter’s coughing finally tampers off at this, and he looks toward the two older men, blinking slowly as his vision swims in front of him. He opens his mouth to say something, but sentences are mere jumbled letters in his mind, so he’s only able to manage out a raspy “what?”
“Did he hit his head?”
“No,” Steve answers quickly as he drops into a crouch in front of Peter. “I was careful. I kept my hand behind his head.” He places one hand to Peter’s shoulder, brows pulled together in clear concern. “Peter? Did you get hurt during the fight?”
Peter looks slowly to the hand on his shoulder before dragging his gaze back to the man before him, mind fuzzy, confused. “Cap?”
“Okay, what the hell?” Tony says, moving to hover behind Steve. “Maybe you weren’t careful enough.”
“I was careful,” Steve repeats, voice clipped and urgent. He moves his hand from Peter’s shoulder to the younger boy’s cheek, entire body going tense at the alarming heat that instantly coats his palm.
“What is it?” Tony asks, noting how Steve’s gone rigid.
“He’s burning,” Steve mutters, almost to himself, as he moves his palm to Peter’s forehead. “He’s got a very high fever,” he adds louder.
Tony drops into a crouch beside Steve and tilts his head to study Peter’s poor complexion. “He should have said he was this sick when we talked on the phone earlier.”
“You knew?” Steve asks, voice low, dangerous. He pulls a sharp gaze toward Tony, meeting the man’s eyes. “You knew he was sick?”
“I didn’t think it was this bad. He sounded relatively fine on the phone.”
“Relatively fine,” Steve repeats slowly, voice clouded in disbelief.
“Yes,” Tony says as he gets to his feet. “We needed him tonight, Steve.”
“You could have asked Clint. Thor. Natasha. Literally anyone else. Why him?”
“He needs the experience.”
“He’s sick!”
“People work while sick.”
“He’s just a kid, Tony!”
Steve’s heightened tone pulls Peter back from his daze, and he stares at the two men staring daggers between one another before clearing his throat despite the burning pain the small action brings.
“I’m okay,” he mutters as he locks his gaze to the floor below him.
“You’re not,” Steve fires back, still heated. But, his face softens into concern at the slight wince that his tight tone brings to Peter. “Sorry,” he adds before moving to help Peter to his feet. “I’m just worried. You’re running a high fever.”
Peter’s unsteady on his feet, and he leans into Steve’s side, relishing in the grounded warmth that’s only added when Steve drapes a large arm over his shoulders. “So that’s why I feel so bad,” he mumbles along a weak laugh. The arm around his shoulders tightens as he shoots a quick, panicked gaze toward Tony.
“It wasn’t this bad earlier, Mr. Stark. I swear. I can still handle this, I promise. This is just a bug; I’m not weak. I can still be Spider-Man.”
Tony’s face drops away to guilt, and he can only nod, ignoring the heated look from Steve as the three slowly make their way out of the building.
*****
The drive back to Stark Tower is tense, silent, with only sounds of Peter’s coughing and sneezing fits paired with his chattering teeth filling the silence. The tension is thick and could be easily sliced with a knife, and when they finally pull up to the tower, Peter wants nothing more than to get out of this car before he suffocates against the tension. But, Tony’s got other plans, as it would seem.
“Steve, Happy, can you give us a minute?”
“One minute,” Steve says sternly as he slides out of his seat with Happy following close behind.
The second the two are alone, Peter shoots a wide, panicked glance to Tony. “Mr. Stark, I’m-”
“Don’t,” Tony interrupts with one hand raised. “Don’t apologize. Don’t talk. Just listen, got it?”
Peter nods, not wishing to utter a word.
“Good. Listen, kid. I owe you an apology. I shouldn’t have pushed when you said you weren’t feeling well before. I just really wanted you to get more experience, and I know how much you enjoy working with Steve.”
Peter’s gaze drops to his clasped hands as Tony continues.
“Being sick doesn’t make you weak. It happens to the best of us, okay? I don’t want you to think I’m going to punish you because you’re sick.”
“Avengers don’t get sick,” Peter mutters along a weak cough as he brings his gaze back to Tony.
“Maybe not often, but we are aging. Just last week I threw my back out.”
“Are you okay?” Peter asks, voice concerned, earnest.
“Yes,” Tony says with a sigh. “But that’s not the point. Just- I’m sorry, okay? I’ll listen next time you tell me you aren’t feeling well, so don’t be afraid to tell me. I’m not going to take the suit away because you need some rest.”
Peter nods as his lips pull up into a slight smile. “You’re being really nice. You’re not running a fever too, are you?” He moves a shaking hand to Tony’s face, but Tony swats it away with a huff.
“Get out of the car.”
“Yes, sir,” Peter says, opening the door and allowing Steve to help him out for his knees are buckling.
“Everything okay?” Steve asks as he moves a palm to the small of Peter’s back to steady the younger boy.
Peter glances over his shoulder as Tony slowly slides out of the car.
“Yeah,” he tells Steve, small smile still painted across his lips. “Everything’s fine.”