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Tony sits there, cuffed to a chair in whatever the hell facility this is, and he stews. He doesn’t enjoy being kidnapped—his ego always takes a hard hit when he allows it to happen, and now that the end of the world has come and gone, he figured this kind of shit would fall off.
But he stews, particularly angry, because this one is personal.
Justin Hammer paces back and forth in front of him. He’s a little weightier than he was when Tony last saw him, sporting a patchy, uneven beard and what looks like a borrowed suit. Still an asshole.
“Haven’t I been through enough?” Tony asks, twisting his hands in the cuffs behind his back. The iron arm is just not strong enough to break whatever the hell these are made of, and he’s angry because Justin thought ahead. When does Hammer think ahead, ever?
“Honestly,” Tony continues. “I’ve got kids now, you’ve gotta stop stalking me. I lost my arm saving the fucking world—apparently whatever the hell repercussions of all that got you out of prison, surely through no lawful avenues, so you’re welcome, by the way.”
“Thank you very much, Mr. Stark,” Hammer says, pointing over at him.
“No, you know what, you’re not welcome. I take it back.”
“You can’t take it back, you said it,” Hammer says, crossing his arms over his chest and holding his head high.
Tony sighs and looks away. There’s what looks like a kind of forcefield around where he’s sitting, and he sighs even harder. The room isn’t too large, with a vaulted ceiling, and Hammer’s situated himself on the platform in front of what looks like a couple empty offices. He prances back and forth above the few stairs that lead down to where Tony is, so he can stay above him.
“You know, I’m really proud of this,” Hammer says, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “This whole thing, right? So I snag you, and then we set off that bomb threat over in Midtown, so all your other super buddies fly over there and just think you’re slacking on the job when you don’t show up. Because you’re still handling the lower level shit like that, I know what you’re doing. I even think that Strange guy is over there, so they’re all there and they’re probably all judging you for not helping.”
“Cute,” Tony says, bitter.
“And this place is state of the fucking art, Anthony, like this could be the Queen’s bunker, and I’ve got all the buddies that left Seagate with me protecting the perimeter—chiseled, rugged guys just—ready to beat the shit out of everybody—”
“Nice, the guys that left Seagate with you, like you’re on vacation—”
“AND we’ve got you in vibranium handcuffs, you’re welcome, your pal in Wakanda’s gonna be real pissed when he realizes how far into the villain layer his shit has gotten—”
Tony looks at him, brows furrowed. “Villain layer? Layer—layer of villains? Is that what you were trying to say? And you’re including yourself there? Or like, lair of villains, like their lair where they keep their stuff—but that doesn’t really work—”
“No, just, shut up,” Hammer says. “Forget it. But that—yeah, vibranium handcuffs, so you’re not getting out any time soon even with your shiny new arm. And that forcefield is brand new Hammer tech, even if your buddies did fly over here once they’re done with their nice little distraction, they’re not smart enough to take down the encryptions, not even Banner, I checked into his degrees and what he studied and covered all my bases.”
Tony’s bitterness is mutating into something else, something more bitter and why the shit can’t this asshole leave him alone?
“Congratulations,” he says. “Today marks the first day in history that you weren’t a complete dumbass.”
“Thank you, thank you very much,” Hammer says, bending over in a deep bow, hands whipping with a flourish. “I thought about every variable, every avenue, now we just need Miss Pepper Wifey to answer my calls and—”
Tony experiences a flash of anger at that, and then a high pitched tone starts going off in his ears, and now he feels like a dumbass.
Peter. Was with Pepper.
Peter.
Like a shining light in the darkness and someone Hammer has clearly not paid attention to despite all his fucking planning, because he would have mentioned it amongst all the other bragging. Spider-Man isn’t an official Avenger yet to the world, just among the group. And Peter would never think Tony is slacking. Because Peter just doesn’t think that way.
Tony’s heart warms, because even though there’s no indication, he knows Peter is coming to get him.
“You know what?” Tony asks, looking up at Hammer again and interrupting whatever dumb shit he was saying. “I was wrong. You’re still a dumbass.”
Hammer stares at him. “What? No I’m not. Why? But I’m not.”
“You are,” Tony says, glancing away. “I’m not telling you why.”
“Oh Jesus, Tony, c’mon,” Hammer says, waltzing down the couple of stairs from the platform he was standing on, like the supreme idiot he is. “You’re such a—”
He stops, abruptly, and pulls out a small tablet from his pocket. His eyes narrow.
Here we go. Let’s go Spider-Man.
It’s faster than Tony could have imagined, and he looks on eagerly. “Oh, what’s that? What’s going on? A little hiccup, maybe?”
“Gotta be some kind of bullshit,” Hammer says. “Super friends are all at the coordinates I set them up at, my guys checked, my guys—oh my God, Raul.”
“Oh my God, is Raul okay?” Tony asks, flexing his fingers a bit behind his back. “Where’s Raul, is Raul here? Is something wrong—is Raul sick?”
Hammer glances up at him but he’s shaking more now, and his pacing gets more panicky and stilted. He holds the tablet with one hand and taps on some kind of ear com with the other, and Tony shifts back in his chair a bit, relaxing.
“Jason, Jason, can you hear me? Are you there? Buddy, the whole reason I gave you this earpiece is so you can report when I need you to report—”
He gasps, dramatically, and looks up at Tony.
“Not good?” Tony asks, raising his eyebrows. “Not good news? Did they go on dinner break early? So hard to find good help these days.”
“Do you know somebody else?” Hammer asks. “I thought the Avengers were very exclusive, I thought you didn’t chat with all the other ragtag Times Square assholes.”
Tony leans forward and stares at him just as all these red, fiery lights start going off on the ceiling, and Hammer looks up and around, dropping the tablet and letting it shatter. Tony catches a glimpse of it now that he can see the screen, and he watches as guard after guard goes from green to red.
He looks back up at Hammer and grins, full of pride. “You don’t know shit about me if you don’t know who my favorite superhero is.”
And with that, the door behind Hammer opens and the lights snap out, only leaving the soft purple glow of the force field around Tony amongst inky darkness. His heart leaps when he hears a gun go off, three times with angry ricochet, and then he hears Hammer shrieking like a little girl, followed by the unmistakable sound of Peter’s webs and a body falling to the floor.
Tony sits there in darkness and silence for a long moment.
“Uh, Spidey?” Tony asks, blinking in the purple glow. “Where are you, bud? You okay?”
The lights click back on and he sees Peter kneeling on the ground, checking Hammer’s pulse.
“Oh thank God. You okay?” Tony asks again. “He didn’t shoot you, right? The asshole.”
“No, he didn’t shoot me,” Peter says. He pulls off his mask and stuffs it in his belt, looking up at Tony with a grimace. “He just, like. Passed out. I didn’t even punch him. I was gonna hit him, like, to knock him out, but he was already passed out and I didn’t even use impact webs, Tony.”
Tony snorts. “It’s fine, that’s just how he is.” He grins at Peter. “Thanks for coming, kid.”
“Duh,” Peter says, approaching him.
“I’m sure he’s got a computer around here or something, so you can disable the forcefield—”
“Yeah, I already did that,” Peter says, walking right through it, and Tony watches, mouth agape. “For some reason he had a stealth mode, and I was able to mirror that and it put it on standby for twenty minutes.”
Tony nods. “Alright, shit, that’s great, okay, plenty of time to figure out the handcuffs, find a key or something—”
Peter walks around behind him and kneels down. “He was stupid enough to alter them and add a code and a second latch.”
Tony feels him do something, and then the handcuffs drop off, like nothing. He laughs, feeling a little lightheaded, and he gets up, turning around to face the kid.
He feels completely and utterly in awe of him. He always knew Peter would surpass him, but he has with such grace and candor and it’s—amazing.
Peter puffs out his chest and points down. “One day, I’m gonna be able to break vibranium with my own strength, and then I’ll tell King T’Challa—”
Tony nearly launches himself at him, wrapping him up in a hug. He ruffles Peter’s hair and pats him on the back, sighing and holding him close. “I’m very proud of you. Very very. Really very.”
“Oh,” Peter says, holding onto him. “Really?”
“Shit, of course,” Tony laughs, wondering if he doesn’t say it enough or if that’s just Peter, always doubting himself. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. Go on.”
“No, I’m—I was done. I’m just—I’m just gonna tell him.”
Tony hugs him for a couple more long moments before letting go, pulling back and gripping his shoulders in continued appreciation of what he’s done here. “You’re the best, you know that? Better than Cap or Bruce. Better than all of them. Number one.”
“Nah,” Peter says, but he’s grinning.
“That idiot,” Tony says, pointing over at Hammer, encased in webbing, “is one of my worst enemies.”
Peter narrows his eyes. “Really?”
Tony lets his arms drop. “Well. Definitely the most irritating.”
Peter laughs. “C’mon, let’s get out of here. Don’t get mad, but I took one of the quinjets to come get you. But Friday flew the whole way so it’s technically like, not that bad.”
Tony scoffs as they head for the way Peter came in, the red lights still flashing and indicating the absolute fucking wreck Spider-Man left Hammer’s facility in. “Kid, that quinjet? It’s yours now, I’m gifting it to you.”
“Don’t say things you’ll take back later,” Peter says, leading him through the corridor, where a bunch of guys are webbed to the walls—some squirming, some still.
“Nope,” Tony says, patting him on the back again. “I will not be taking that back.”
“Okay,” Peter says, eyes wide with excitement as he grabs for his mask. “Then I would also like an Iron Man suit.”
Tony scoffs and turns right when Peter does. “Okay, that—that we can negotiate.”