Work Text:
“Peter, are you sure you’re okay?”
Peter shrugged, dismissing May with a wave as he made his way back to his room.
“I’m fine, promise.” The lie feels terrible in his mouth and if he was turned towards May, he knows the look she would have on her face - like she doesn’t believe him just as much as he doesn’t believe himself.
He couldn’t get himself out of this... mood, closing the door of his bedroom as he dropped his backpack and walked forward - letting himself down gently in his bed.
It hurt, he didn’t know why it hurt so much - like a deep, relentless ache in his chest - something he hasn’t been able to shake since the last mission with the Avengers.
He knows he should tell Tony or at the very least Bruce - the only one on the team who knew the truth of who Spider-Man was under the mask.
But he doesn’t want to bother either of them - not when this mission was the first that he’d ever been allowed to lead point on, the team finally trusting him in a way that Peter wasn’t sure they ever would before.
Peter winces as he turns around in his bed, a hollow ache in his chest - trying to remember what could’ve caused this to hurt so bad.
He remembers swinging through the sky, yelling out directions for Hawkeye to follow only to get slammed in the chest with something that knocked the wind out of him - blacking out for a moment until he finally came to, ignoring the sharp pain in his chest as they continued on.
Tony had hovered - trying to see if he was okay but Peter had waved him off, refusing a trip to the medbay since Clint had also gotten injured - not wanting to risk his identity on his first real mission.
Peter figured that his healing would take care of it as it always did, but now - three days later, nothing solved it, Peter feeling like there was a weight on his chest anytime he tried to breathe.
Peter can hear May softly knock on the door, hear her voice calling out to him before she walks in but Peter can’t respond - feeling like he drowning on dry land for how much it hurt to breathe.
But as soon as she opens the door, Peter sits up - ignoring the sharp pain in his chest and forming an awkward smile, May walking forward with a frown.
“Pete, you okay?”
“Yeah, yeah I’m okay.” He finally says, May’s hand rifling through his hair as he looks up to her, seeing the concern on her face.
“You sure?” She asks, Peter briefly nods - gritting his teeth to avoid the pain, “Just tired, think I got a headache.”
May looks like she doesn’t believe him but Peter’s insistent, shaking his head as he says, “I’m okay, really. I think I’m gonna take a nap, sleep it off.”
Before May can argue further someone knocks at the door, Peter guessing it was the takeout she ordered for him after he came back from school.
May wrestles with herself for a moment before looking to Peter, ruffling her hand through his hair again as she says, “I’ll heat up the food so it’ll be ready for you when you wake up, okay?”
Peter nods gratefully as May goes to answers the door - sighing in relief when she leaves only to wince.
The pain ebbed and flowed all day - Peter wasn’t sure what had caused it.
But if it had been three days since he was supposed to have healed, recognizing that May could see something was wrong - he knew he had to figure out what it was.
“What brings you here, Pete?” Bruce asks, Peter fidgeting with his backpack strap a little before he walks forward.
“I wanted you to uh, check something. If you can,” Peter says, glancing around the empty lab, “if you’re not too busy.”
Bruce smiles, a kind and gentle look on his face as he says, “Never too busy for you, Pete. What can I help you with?”
He gestures for him to sit down across from him, Peter letting his backpack down as he winces - seeing the look on Bruce’s face.
“It’s— something’s wrong in my chest. It hurts,” Peter says, the idea of thinking of it causing the pain to feel like it flared up again, “I don’t know what it is.”
Bruce frowns, glancing at him over his glasses, “Is this from what happened on—“
“I think so, I was looking it up online and I think maybe something healed… wrong,” Peter says, seeing the contemplative look on Bruce’s face.
“I know you’re not a medical doctor and I know looking online is terrible, but I can’t explain it. It’s like something’s—“
“You’ve broken more bones in the past year than most people do in a lifetime,” Bruce says, a sad smile on his face, “I trust you know your body better than anyone does at this point. I can contact Cho and see if she can get some testing done.”
Peter sighed in relief, wincing again as he says, “Thanks, I didn’t know how to ask her myself without…”
Peter trails off, realizing he had given himself away as Bruce frowns.
“Have you not told Tony?”
“No,” Peter says, “And I’m not going to.”
“Peter—“
“He didn’t even want me to be on that mission, Dr. Banner. If he finds out how seriously I got hurt then—“
“Tony cares about you, Peter. He just wants you to be safe,” Bruce interjects, Peter shaking his head furiously.
He knew Tony cared, that wasn’t the problem. It was that Tony cared too much — too worried and guilt ridden anytime he got hurt, Peter not wanting to wrestle with the burden of what would happen when he inevitably did.
But before either of them get to argue further, an alarm flashes out over the Tower’s intercom - Peter looking at Bruce in alarm, the two of them recognizing it for what it is.
“We have to go.”
“Peter, if you’re as injured as you say—“
“I’ll figure it out later, we gotta go.” Peter says, holding back a grimace as he reaches for his suit in his backpack - facing Bruce head on.
“We have to help.”
“Peter, keep your eyes open.”
Peter blinks, feeling like there’s tremendous pressure on his chest. It hurts to breathe, hurts to blink - he can barely focus, much less do what Tony’s asked.
“Come on, kid. Look at me, look at me.” Peter barely feels the rough fingers against his face, his vision blurring as he tried to do what Tony asked.
Peter can see the way Tony’s eyes widen, sees the sweat dripping down his face, the terror radiating off of him, even as Peter’s mind starts to slow.
Peter opens his mouth to say something, only to feel a hot, sticky liquid in the back of his throat. He starts to cough, only causing the panic in Tony’s voice to become clearer.
“Fuck. Don’t talk, Pete, just- just keep—“ Peter doesn’t hear the rest of it, the sharp pain and pressure on his chest causing him to look away from Tony.
He sees it now, the reason behind Tony’s panic. It’s long, wiry, a thin line of metal that Peter’s mind can’t wrap around why it’s jutting out from under him. Peter blinks again, tries to remember when Tony’s voice brings his attention back to him.
“Don’t look at it, Pete, look at me.” Peter does, wheezing - suddenly feeling light-headed. The sharp pain has gone away, even as the pressure hasn’t - causing Peter’s breaths to shorten.
He can’t really breathe, but Tony looks so frazzled - he doesn’t want to worry him anymore.
He sees Tony’s hands scrambling over him, trying and failing to stop the bleeding. It occurs to Peter that there’s no team to come save them, the jerk they were fighting having cut off their comms - short-circuiting both their suits.
There’s another moment of clarity, Peter simultaneously feeling clear-headed and disoriented. There had been an attack in the city, the team all rushing out to see what was wrong.
Peter could remember fighting off some people with alien tech, swinging through a construction site as Tony flew beside him until they got blasted by some kind of ray.
He remembers both of them falling out of the air, Tony’s scream as Peter - sensing danger - pushed him out of the way.
They’d landed hard, but it seemed Peter got the worst end of the deal.
Peter gasps, the dull ache in his chest giving way to numbness.
No one was coming. Tony’s suit wasn’t working and Peter had a sense that the man was barely staving down a panic attack.
“Ms’r St’rk” Peter wheezes, half-heartedly reaching for Tony’s hand. Tony immediately grasps it, eyes brimming with tears.
“Don’t do this kid, come on, I got-I’ll figure out—“
Peter doesn’t hear the rest.
Before he slips into consciousness, the darkness closing in, all Peter can really think of is how glad he was that at least he wasn’t alone.
When Peter finally wakes, it’s quiet - save for the steady beeping of what he can only assume is a heart monitor, groaning slightly as he shifts.
“Hey, hey kid, don’t move.” He hears a familiar voice saying, opening his eyes to see Tony staring at him - eyes blood shot and hair a mess, glancing around the room.
The windows to the medbay are dark, May asleep on the couch beside his bed. He frowns looking back to Tony who looks like he’s been awake for days - if not longer.
“You gave me a hell of a scare, Pete. Whole team’s been waiting for you to wake up.
Peter’s eyes widen at that, croaking out, “Do they know?”
Tony sighs, running a hand over his face before he nods, “Yeah, kid. They know.”
Peter glances back up to the ceiling, “Shit.”
“Yeah, that’s one word for it.” Peter looks back to Tony, seeing the haunted expression on his face.
“Mr. Stark—“
“Why’d you do it, Pete? You would’ve been okay, you would’ve— you would’ve been fine.” Tony says, his voice cracking slightly before he swallows something down.
“It’s not on you to save me.”
Peter shakes his head, “It’s my responsibility to save everyone.”
Tony sighs again, looking as if he’s aged years in however long he’d been asleep, “Yeah well, I’ll wait till you’re a little less drugged before we argue about your massively overblown guilt complex.”
He frowns, staring at Peter more meaningfully, “Which speaking of, includes you not telling me about your last injury.”
Peter sighs, regretting the action as soon as he does it, closing his eyes as he says, “Ugh, that hurts.”
“I’ll bet,” Tony says, nodding towards his chest, “Aside from all the other shit that happened, Cho said you had pseudarthrosis of the sternum.”
Peter blinks for a moment, the memory of something he looked up online coming back to him as he asks, “My bones healed wrong?”
Tony nods, a grim look on his face. “So bad that your lung was punctured but because of your super healing, grafted around the opening. According to Cho, it was a miracle you were breathing at all.”
Tony closes his eyes, sighing again before saying, “Swinging out to fight some jackasses with tech didn’t help any.”
Peter doesn’t apologize - not when he knows there’s nothing that would’ve stopped him from helping anyway, sensing from the look on Tony’s face that he seemed to recognize that as well as the ghost of a smile forms on his face.
“Though I gotta say, kid. Whole team thinks you’re a badass now.”
“Really?” Peter asks, Tony rolling his eyes.
“A dumbass mostly, for swinging out with a punctured lung ,” Tony says with emphasis before shrugging his shoulders, “but the kind of guts it takes to face trouble like you do...”
Tony trails off, shaking his head before saying, “You really are the best among us, kid.”
Peter smiles, grateful that Tony’s not too pissed off only to see a look he recognizes on Tony’s face as he says, “But you swing out there again without telling me what’s going on and you’ll have more than me to deal with.”
Peter raises an eyebrow only for his eyes to widen as Tony says, “I’ll tell May.”
“Mr. Stark, you wouldn’t.”
Tony grins, Pete regretting everything as he leans in.
“Try me.”