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i.
“Kid, you’re going to take your miniaturized version invention to the Gala or I’m going to banish you from my will,” Peter perfected his posture, gesturing in Ned’s face for emphasis, “Bring prototype 3B, or you’re not my successor for Stark Industries.”
“Peter, that is a horrible Tony Stark impression. Like, please, spare us,” Ned grimaces, and MJ just rolls her eyes beside them. The two of them are perched on Peter’s bed while they watch their melodramatic friend pace around his room in his new tuxedo.
“Did he mean that?” Peter cries out, ignoring the two of them. “I can’t be in his will or take over his company; It’s obviously a joke, yeah. A joke.”
“Why are you so scared to present your invention, anyways?” MJ asks, raising a skeptical brow. “Your invention is amazing and I know you like talking about it. You got kicked out of chem for
Peter does feel bad for making his best friends spend their random lazy afternoons watching him panic, but his billionaire mentor somehow found out about this Gala by the Queens Medical Association that Midtown has students presenting in. Including himself.
“I’m not scared of presenting it. But Tony, Mr. Stark is going to be there and— I just really have to be at the top of my game. Times a billion. Fine, maybe I am nervous to present it. I need to impress him as Peter Parker and as,” he hushed his voice to a whisper, “you know who.”
MJ snorts, “Everyone here knows who. Including May. Who are you whispering for, doofus.”
“Well, if I were Peter I’d be a pile of nerves on the floor, just completely dissolved from the person I used to be,” Ned chimes unhelpfully, “I mean, doesn’t Tony Stark usually bring the coolest plus ones ever? Or once someone knows Tony Stark is a guest somewhere, it becomes the hottest spot in New York.”
“What if the Avengers show up?” MJ asks, tossing a piece of popcorn into her mouth and missing. Ned’s jaw drops.
“Dude, now you’ll definitely be an Avenger,” Ned says, “Tony Stark is going because he heard about the fancy gala from you.”
“Ned!” Peter hisses, “I’m not an Avenger. I won’t be an Avenger. Being Spider-man on its own is too time consuming. He’s not going for me, I just mentioned how amazing this association is, they’re trying to reform the hospitals in Queens and Brooklyn. Everyone knows he supports local charities.”
Peter huffs, yanking his tie off in little jerks and deposits it onto his nightstand. The tie situation is almost as bad as homecoming before he asked May to help him dress up for his date. Maybe he should have more faith in Mr. Stark, maybe he’ll be his usual stoic self that takes a lot to break down the armor he built around himself. But, he knows Mr. Stark, they’ve been spending more time together. Peter answers Ned by shaking his head, changing back into jeans and a t-shirt and joins his friends back on his bed and balances his laptop on his laptop so they can finish their Clone Wars episode.
He’s unsure of how to act like Peter Parker around Tony Stark when they’re not side by side at the Compound or the Tower. He can finally prove that his internship technically is real to the few kids attending the gala, but he doesn’t see the point in that. He’s mentally preparing himself to see Tony completely train his expressions, each interaction of his will be meaningful and diligent.
Peter turns to his friends, checking on them and offering small smiles before he turns back to the show.
A few weeks ago, Mr. Stark was over to drop Peter off and came upstairs to say hi to May. Peter smiles to himself at the memory of when Mr. Stark visited his room again,sitting on his bed and holding up his nanotech microchip experiment, the fondness apparent.
Tony Stark is totally going to take every chance to embarrass him at the Gala.
—
Peter can’t even see the ceiling once he walks into the venue, suddenly feeling very small and out of place. He’s guessing that he is the youngest one here, judging by the cocktail party attire and glances he’s receiving.
The ambiance of the room comes to life the moment he steps in, it’s a replica of every glamorous event he’s seen Mr. Stark has attended over the years. It’s every TV show and movie he’d watch with May in the nights during their marathons before they’d go to bed, the colossal rooms that stunned them. The room is illuminated from the long chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, the dimly lit candles deliberately placed around the room to light the darker corners of the enormous room.
He’s here an hour early to set up his display for his microchip with his poster he had printed out. The replica of DNA he photographed is printed on the poster, and Peter is proud of himself. Mr. Stark only helped in support, no matter how many questions Peter asked, it was still his project. He glances around, sighing a breath of relief because no other students are here yet. He has a chance to finish getting ready and to discreetly fix his tie on by himself, May was leaving for an overnight shift at the same time Peter was leaving for the gala. If only aunt May could be here tonight, he’s impatient for the celebratory dinner she’s taking him to tomorrow. He is very much hopeless, but it’s fine. Tonight will be fine.
He can feel himself deflating once the room begins filling up and the event starts. There are classical music performers, guests begin feeling the room, and Peter is shoved by his teacher to go outside to experience the red carpet event. Peter is lined up outside with the other students from Midtown, and oh, God, he can’t even remember their names.
Each flashing light of the camera shutters going off feels blinding, and a small headache forms at the base of his skill and makes its way to his forehead. He just needs to blink these stupid lights away and look for Mr. Stark. Maybe it won’t be so sad with Tony here.
He keeps a hand around the camera hanging from his neck, and watches his teacher/sponsor attempt to dazzle the news reporters here for the gala. Peter is stopped by a spokesperson, but his brain feels like it’s circuited short. Why does he feel like this?
Peter turns to all the guests, and tries to stand up straight before answering the woman from the Queens Medical Association. He doesn’t even remember the question she asked.
It’s a nightmare.
“Mr. Parker! We are all very excited to see your project,” Another reporter that Peter hadn’t noticed yells in his ear and smiles to her one-man camera crew.
“Midtown’s own high school students stand here right before us, who do you think will win the scholarship?”
“Peter Parker, is it true you intern for Stark Industries? Is this the reason you were able to complete your project for the association?”
Between the anxiety inducing questions and Peter’s senses going haywire -- and did this man just accuse Peter of cheating?-- He wishes for anybody to save him. But he’s on his own tonight, because he can already see the other part of the crowd forming near a limo pulling up. If these are the type of events that Tony Stark wants Peter to attend once he’s in charge of Stark Industries, because it’s still definitely a joke, but just in case, he never wants to attend anything like this again.
His classmates are doing fine, but their teacher from Midtown pulls them off to the side right after flashing a camera to the interviewer, “I like to see myself as these kids’ biggest mentor. I mean, I’ll try to be humble.”
Peter rolls his eyes and lets himself walk into line back into the gala.
“Mr. Tony Stark!”
“Tony, look to your left!”
“Mr. Stark, are the interns here tonight? We thought you didn’t take interns at Stark Industries.”
Peter’s eyes widen, and his heart thumps in his chest. He wants to say hi to his mentor at least and then go hide in the bathroom possibly for the rest of his life, he doesn’t know, but Tony is giving multiple people his undivided attention for just a moment and then turns to another fan. He doesn't know how Tony does it
Peter reaches the top of the stairs and makes his way back into the venue, sneaking off to the side and letting his classmates go ahead and mingle inside. The chaos is all behind him now. He really hopes he hasn’t sweat through his undershirt, because that was scary and chaotic.
He jumps once he feels hands on his shoulders, and sees Tony flash a smile. He breathes a sigh of relief, but doesn’t miss the look of concern on Tony’s face.
“Kid! It’s your first gala,” Tony smiles in lieu of a greeting, moving his hand from his shoulder to Peter’s tie.”Oh, Pete. Let me fix this. Are you excited?”
Okay, maybe Peter feels more relaxed with Tony’s comforting demeanor and he thinks of how to answer. He wishes it felt just like lab days where they go over web shooter combinations, new suit ideas, because Tony actually values his input. He really hopes the association’s press gets better throughout the night.
“Hey, Mr. Stark,” Peter smiles, “I’m really more nervous than excited, if I’m being honest. But it’s totally fine, I have pictures to take for my school newspaper.”
Peter can’t help but feel warmth spread in his chest, right around his heart while Tony maneuvers his hands around his tie as gently as he can and smiles at Peter’s last remark. He has to admit it’s a more careful side of Tony now that they’re in an isolated corner.
“Make sure you show me all the pictures you take, okay? Now come on, Parker, let’s go mingle,” Tony winks and Peter hides his groan.
Across the room, more Avengers in gala attire spread through the room. Peter is on the side of the stage, ushered by his teacher to take pictures of the first speech that only half the venue is listening to. This is how Peter ends up near the literal Captain America and Black Widow, and Peter’s hands shake around his camera.
It’s not like Peter’s never not worked with them, but it was Spider-Man.
The rest of the night goes smoothly.
He spent the night being conspicuous with his camera, taking pictures from the side stage and watching every pretentious person in the crowd. Who knew medically associated galas could be so pretentious. He tried staying in Tony’s vicinity, but it’s hard to follow a man who’s being followed by half of the room. They’re all CEO-looking business type people, holding their glasses of champagne and all talk too loudly over each other.
He watched in amusement at Tony, his press act isn’t the same as it was before he became Iron Man. But, nonetheless, Tony was amazing at talking to people.
His own stomach drops after each speech is over, because Midtown students including him are the second last to present. He doesn’t understand why they don’t just skip to the money part, who donated the most, who’s receiving a grant, blah, blah, blah.
The same reporter from outside finds him, and at least now he has time to talk about his project and hope she doesn’t ask the same interrogating and invasive question about Stark Industries. And surprisingly, he doesn’t. He has a big smile on his face, because this event solidifies what his device does.
“What do you want to accomplish with your invention?” the reporter asks, her warm smile makes Peter feel welcome. “Imagine there are no limits.”
“I really hope my microchip can be used in the future for collecting data on our DNA. I mean, if we can really understand our cells more with nanotechnology, that’d be unbelievable,” Peter smiles, and MJ was right. He had no reason to be nervous.
He sees Tony Stark from his peripheral, the man is standing with his hands clasped together and an unidentifiable look on his face. Okay, maybe Tony Stark isn’t as nerve wracking at these sort of events than Peter thought. His lip is raised in one corner, and his unwavering faith in Peter is so apparent. It makes Peter feel so seen, which is scary and an unnavigated sentiment.
“Do you want to research more nanotechnology in the future?” the reporter asks, her notepad now down at her side. She stopped writing down information a few minutes ago, and there’s another one of her colleagues gathering around.
“I’d love to do more research, it was a weird concept coming up with a microchip that can scan our cells, and I’m so glad to be here to present it.”
The conversation is opened up to the others gathering around them, and Peter feels a familiar hand on his shoulder again. He looks up at Tony, wishing he could know exactly what was going through his head. This night hasn’t turned out bad, at least not yet.
“Not bad, kid,” Tony says, pulling him a little farther away from the reports so they won’t overhear them. “I can’t wait for you to win that scholarship.”
“Ha-ha, Mr. Stark, good joke,” Peter muses, “I just have a feeling something’s gonna happen tonight.”
This gets Tony’s attention instantly. “A Peter Parker feeling or a certain alter ego’s feeling? Wouldn’t be too surprised if it was the latter, sometimes these events can get out of hand.”
“Oh, no, just a nervous thing, I guess,” Peter says, but is cut off by Mr. Stark.
“I want you to tell the rest of the team, well, who actually made it here tonight, about your invention,” Tony says, nodding towards Natasha and Steve. “Hey, Cap! Nat!”
Peter silently prays to God in his head, because oh, this is technically Peter’s first time meeting the both of them. Sure, Mr. Stark occasionally brings him out on missions, play, no, that was once. He braces himself and sucks in a deep breath.
“I want you to meet Peter Parker, one of the students presenting,” Tony announces proudly, his voice booming. He can’t even pretend to hide his shock, and Tony just breathes a laugh once he notices the indignant shock on Peter’s face, his jaw nearly dropped to the ground. He didn’t actually want to talk to them tonight. Peter plasters on a smile, awkwardly greeting the deadly assassin and the captain of the nation in front of him. Ned was right, he could be a pile of nervousness-turned-to-goo on the floor right now.
“Mr. Parker here is an intern at Stark Industries, but he refused any of my help on his project. I mean, who would ever refuse Tony Stark’s help?” Tony teases, wiggling his eyebrows and Peter just groans.
“Aunt May said I’d be in trouble even if I asked you what a brand of nanotube I was using,” Peter quips, becoming nervous from the scrutinizing gaze from Steve Rogers. He ignores it for now.
“You used nanotubes for your project?” Natasha asks, and Peter hadn’t expected this. An actual conversation with an Avenger instead of an embarrassing stare down and Tony Stark trying to embarrass you in front of his teammates? Yeah, this is a little better.
“Pete here is a genius. He has the best work ethic I’ve ever seen,” Tony takes the chance to brag, and Peter feels like he’s perched up on a podium for the entire world to see, but really it’s just two of the coolest Avengers who also scare him looking down at him. He feels his cheeks warm up and he can’t help but fumble an embarrassed, “Mr. Stark..”
“What? It’s true,” Tony distractedly states, keeping his eyes on somebody across the room. And Peter notices, too, a slight buzz in his senses is warning him. He must not assess this person as a threat, but Peter has a bad feeling about this man and keeps an eye on him. Tony shakes his head and turns back to the conversation, ruffling Peter’s gelled back hair. “Parker’s going to save us all.”
Peter wanders to the side, watching everyone. The other Midtown students are all seniors, and he still feels out of place being here. No, he doesn’t think he’s undeserving, May and Ben’s old words of wisdom helped him cease his self pitying. The other students speak with doctors, CEO’s, representatives, and they do well with their interviews.
He adjusts his camera strap, the announcers begin introducing Midtown and he adjusts his camera strap. The Avengers are spread throughout the room, and he’s actively ignoring the slight buzz of his spider sense. It’s a quiet hum, lurking, but it’s still there after he talked with Tony. He’s hidden next to the stage’s velvet curtain, and sees the man again. He looks college-aged, but prances around nervously.
The teacher from Midtown that no, Peter did not bother learning his name because he’s talked to him like, once, introduces Midtown and talks about their plans for distribution of money they’re receiving in donations.
Nobody’s attention is completely tuned in. that’s when Peter feels hair on the back of his neck prick up, his arms feeling the uncomfortable tingling of danger. He doesn’t think.
He runs onto the stage and grunts once he rams his body into the tall man who really shouldn’t be here.
He feels a sharp pinch and stinging spreading in his side, and gasps once the guy is ripped away by a nearby security guard. But, as he’s pulled away, the knife in Peter’s side is pulled out.
Oh, God. A knife.
Peter was stabbed.
He can immediately hear the crowd dispersing while the Avengers assume crowd control. He is so dizzy, his vision swimming and he doesn’t know what to do, but just clumsily clutches his side. Like his own hands will catch his blood. His erratic senses won’t shut up and what the hell is going to happen to the crowd?
Is the bad guy apprehended?
Why was he onstage?
Peter stumbles and yells out for Mr. Stark. “Mr. S-Stark!”
He tastes the coppery taste of blood in his throat, everybody is being escorted out and he’s just panicking. Where is the security guard? What kind of scream was that? He makes a beeline for the side of the stage. He can hear the sound of Tony yelling, it sounds like it’s coming from his left but he doesn’t know because now he’s collapsed on the ground.
Peter tries to will himself to stop panicking. Weird, spider biogenetics that he knows nothing about make up his blood. He’s Spider-Man. Better him than someone else.
“Kid!” Tony pants, and Peter can feel his camera being crushed under his own trembling hand and tries to move his hand away from the glass. “Pete.”
His lip trembled, and his eyes burned while his tears threatened to spill. The Avengers crowded around them and Steve spewed out a string of demands for his team and everyone around them, to get Peter to safety. If they’re all here, that must mean nobody else is unsafe, he hopes.
He stares, dazed, at the ceiling and the too-bright stage lights and can feel himself growing exhausted. His heart lurches once he feels an arm being hooked under his knees and shoulders, the gentle touch grounding him. They’re careful to avoid touching the wound. Peter turns his head into whoever’s chest this is, hopefully they won’t mind because that would be really embarrassing to have a teenage kid completely buried in their chest if he didn’t at least know them on a first name basis.
But Peter instantly recognizes the cologne.
“Come on, Pete, open your eyes, don’t fall asleep,” Tony softly murmurs, voice carrying under all the disarrayed chaos around them. Peter just presses his face into Tony’s jacket.
He feels like he can feel every nervous jerk and movement around him to get everything in order.
Natasha helps settle Peter down on the ground, Steve’s suit jacket extended on the shiny hardwood floor. Natasha spares a weird look when Tony places Peter’s head in his own lap, sitting on the ground with the kid. She kneels beside them, looking up at Steve and holds her arm out expectantly.
“I know, kid,” Tony’s voice softly rumbled. He raises his voice, “you need to wake up, buddy. Please.”
“ ‘S okay, ‘m awake,” Peter mumbles, “Don’t tell aunt May.”
Tony tries to hide his smile, sniffing and shaking his head at the teenager. He lowers his face closer to Peter’s.
“If I do tell aunt May, then I’ll need you to plan my funeral,” Tony says, closing his eyes and pressing his forehead to Peter’s. He sighs into the teens hair, he’d rather hide here than despair over the fact that he let this happen tonight. He caught a glimpse of Natasha getting ready to treat his wound, her face pinched in worry and focus.
Natasha pretends not to see this tenderhearted moment.
Incoherency and exhaustion embrace Peter with warm arms. If he were coherent enough, his cheeks would burn like lava with how embarrassed he’d be by Mr. Stark’s gestures. It’s not that he doesn’t appreciate them, because his disordered self really does love the coddling. He’s probably dying, so, why not?”
Tony coos encouraging words, and Steve outright frowns at, “Spiderling.”
Natasha announces every move of hers, she slides his shirt up to tend to his wound, she tells him when to expect pain, and she needs to get creative in his treatment. She obviously can’t create a tourniquet to stop the bleeding, analyzing the penetrating trauma. The scar tissue already seems to be healing, and what?
Natasha frowns at Steve who raises a brow once he’s on Peter’s other side, his right side, and she nods his head towards Tony.
He shrugs his shoulders and mouths, “I don’t know,” while Tony keeps the kid calm.
They’ve never seen this kid before tonight, they’ve acquired some background information on the kid tonight, and also, why would Tony know this kid’s aunt?
Steve and Natasha turn to each other and shrug. It’s going to be a really long night.
ii.
Bucky Barnes did not have one single clue or indication of why the fuck he was here, especially again with Sam Wilson, and so he was going to continue sitting in complete silence.
Tony Stark had dragged them out here to this hotel in Long Island, where Steve, Tony, and that Spider menace would meet at this rendezvous point.
Of course Stark sent his least favorite Avengers first, to investigate and scrutinize every little hair out of place. Bucky did not hesitate to give Tony shit over this, but he demanded it to be Sam and Bucky’s turn and payback after accidentally destroying one of the Compound’s training rooms, so, it’s whatever. It’s a big mission, he has to admit; there’s a local warehouse that might be infiltrated with Hydra goons. He’s sure Steve feels the same; the longing ache for Hydra to be completely destroyed already is a mutual agreement. Between everyone.
Natasha’s gathered intel kinda suggested that the Hydra Goons might very well have motives to completely take out the entirety of Long Island, and what kind of Avengers mission would it be if there weren’t explosions and a deadly threat that would send the island into the Atlantic Ocean. He heard vague words about Red Skull being involved, but. Wasn’t he in another dimension or something? Bucky is clueless in his recovery, but things are better. Their team is better.
Bucky had not realized Tony Stark had it in him to be this hospitable, genuinely helpful during his recovery for being in a new century and being used as a weapon, and when the Wakandan princess Shuri was unavailable for tuneups on his metal arm, Tony was his knight in shining armor, always patient and thoughtful when working on his arm.
Bucky and Sam were surprisingly both in good moods, Steve had praised the absence of Bucky’s vindictiveness for anyone and everyone around him. But he could let that all go, and he even managed to stay in his good mood once the insufferable Stark showed up, with Steve Rogers at his side. The little menace Spider-Man is missing, but Sam takes the liberty of greeting both of them on his behalf.
Tony Stark is interrupted mid sentence by incessant buzzing from his phone, and groaning once he reads the caller ID. “Hey, Happy. You’re late. The kid’s with you, right?”
Steve, Sam, and Bucky try to ignore the other end of the line, but two of the three are super soldiers and have super hearing, and the Falcon is just nosy. They hear Happy arguing on the other end of the line about, ‘the kid,’ and Tony just groans. “You’re no fun. Do I need to go pick the kid up myself? I’ll meet you downstairs.”
Tony turns and gives a salute before walking out, the three men turn to each other in skepticism. Sam turns his eyes towards the balcony door overlooking the parking lot, nodding his head. Steve immediately frowns and shakes his head no. Bucky’s lips upturn into a smirk, craning his head to search the parking lot through the balcony door.
Steve perks, intrigued once the balcony door slides open and the conversation between the billionaire and the spider menace echoes through the lot. It’s endearing, really, seeing Stark argue with a tiny vigilante. It’s an all too familiar scene; the kid flinching and feeling scrutinized under Stark’s gaze. And if Steve, Bucky, and Tony had contests to compare their looks, the Look that would make anybody disapprove of their own actions and rethink their life choices within a moment’s notice. Stark always loses. He does have a Look, it’s impressive, but it’s reserved more for the teenager. With them, he just has annoyance written in every crease on his face. Maybe the kid just wiggles under any type of adult that shows any remote emotion and zeroed in on him.
Sam liked picking on the kid, who rarely joined them on missions, but they weren’t complete strangers. Sam filled the Avengers in on the story of his meeting with the Inhumans and Medusa, and the Spider menace completely ruined Sam’s reputation that day. Steve huffs under is breath, reeling everyone in to begin his lecture, probably warming up for Tony, “Come on, guys. Leave Stark and the kid alone.”
“Hey,” Sam warns with no real heat behind it, “You’re the one who started the debate on whether or not Spider-Man is Tony’s long lost son. Or if he’s scooping up kids on the street and adopting them like stray cats.”
“Stray cats?” Steve grimaces, “Anyways, you should have seen him at that gala we went to. The one Pepper forced us to go to, I’ve never seen him like that. He cradled his hurt intern.”
“Look at him now!” Sam hisses, the three of them spying on Tony in the parking lot with the Spider-kid. He’s shoving his mask over his face playfully, fake wrestling with the vigilante. “Did.. he come straight here from school?”
Today is either going to be the best or worst day of Peter Parker’s life.
He’s following suit behind Tony, after he greeted him in their usual banter and the zeroed in attention that lasts an approximate two seconds before his thoughts distract him, he focuses on Happy, and his mind wanders elsewhere. Peter’s always taken aback watching the older man, watching him flee away in the midst of a conversation but never fails to reel himself back in before it’s too late. It’s terrifying, really, trying to gauge just how Tony’s brain works, each decision that shaped him to be who he is today.
Last month’s gala had been ruined by Peter, he just had to take the plunge and get stabbed so nobody else would. The older billionaire had shown an immense amount of affection Peter never thought he’d be on the receiving end of, and to this day it freaked him out. Just six months ago, Tony totally tried to hug him, but he claimed, ‘they weren’t there yet.’ He’d been too stunned to even react in front of Black Widow and Captain America, his mind drifting to unconsciousness while his mentor he accidentally calls, ‘dad,’ in his head whispered reassurances and praises into his ears.
If something like this happens again, not only in front of Captain America again but in front of the horrifying Winter Soldier and the Falcon, who he desperately wants to impress them all, he’s sure he’s going to retreat into a web-shooter spun web cocoon and never escape it. Ever. He’d cut off all outside communication, reassure May he’d be fine, he just needed to resurrect himself. Yeah, that sounds really good.
Peter was scared. Tony, oblivious to his inner turmoil, hastily opened the door and threw the key card into the room and sighed, proceeding over to the hologram to continue their last runthrough of the mission. He’s panicking under Captain America’s welcoming nod, the Falcon’s raised brow, and the Winter Soldier’s glare set on him.
He really didn’t think his next actions through, sputtering under Mr. Stark’s cocked eyebrow and the way his body betrayed him, he was mad. His shoulders hunched up, and cursed the expressive eyes in his suit because under the mask, his eyebrows are raised all the way to his hairline. “H-Hi. I-- I’m Spider-Man,” he fumbles under his own words, setting his backpack down. But he needs to change into his suit, shit. “I’m just-- If you need me I’ll be in the bathroom.”
Peter awkwardly points to the hotel room’s bathroom, bracing himself for whatever he’ll find inside. It’s not very big, at all, and he considers hiding in here. Mr. Stark can totally take his place in the mission, he’ll send his Nano Spider bot out. That would be the perfect substitute, maybe J. Jonah Jameson would approve of that better. Mr. Stark wouldn’t be berated with questions anymore on who the spider-menace is, so he suits up and keeps his identity concealed for now.
“No!” Peter grits out, surprising the rest of the team in the middle of the last mission briefing while they wait for Natasha to manage the mission over the Comms and give them the go-ahead. “You’re not doing that alone, Mr. Stark. Your suit may withstand the shocks of this heat signature that Natasha got a lead on, but what if you can’t.”
Peter’s heart pounds in his chest, and it’s possible even the non-super soldiers can hear the muscle on the verge of falling out of his chest. He won’t back down, he stood up, challenging Tony head on. He won’t let Mr. Stark risk his life on this mundane aspect of the mission, especially when they’re suggesting keeping Peter benched in the room. He hesitates, watching the man mirror the challenge on his face. “Do we need to talk about this elsewhere?”
Fuck the expressive eyes on the mask. He narrows his eyes, and the man made of iron accepts the challenge. “Come on. Let’s talk. Let’s go.” Tony nods towards the front door of the hotel room, placing a hand on his shoulder and making his way out to the hallway. “Pete..” Tony shushes his voice to just above a whisper, hopefully the other super soldiers in the room know better than to listen in on their conversation.
“What’s this all about?” Tony asks, crossing his arms and inhaling a sniff. He really doesn’t need for the man to get defensive now, Peter didn’t mean so dogmatic in the middle, but he burst. It was the wormhole in 2012 over again, seeing his favorite superhero and fearing his demise happened in front of his eyes. Is this how the man felt seeing Peter hurt last month, and every time he sneaks into the Avengers Tower to stitch himself up behind May’s back?
“I— I don’t know, Mr. Stark,” Peter stares down at his shoes, internally reprimanding himself for being a tenacious person and wishing he could jump into the older man’s arm and contemplate everything and unleash all his burdens so he can soothe him. He closes his mouth, and Tony drops his arms to his side with a sigh, speaking before the teen before him does. Maybe he can absolve the kid’s worries with whatever he says next. “Come on, let’s go continue the briefing. If Tasha and I say we need you here, then we need you here. If you can’t follow our directions, then I’m gonna have to send you back home. I’m sorry, kid.”
Peter closes his eyes under the mask, accepting this defeat and turns his back to Tony to continue the briefing inside. If Sam and Bucky stay behind with him, he knows they won’t hesitate to jump to their teammates' aid.
Once Steve and Tony are two miles out surrounding the warehouse at sunset, Sam keeps in communication with Natasha while Bucky watches Tony’s monitor displayed on his laptop. Peter dejectedly waits, not daring to interrupt Natasha on the phone again. Peter knows she doesn’t really mean it, she’s really kind beneath her tough exterior. He’s seen her give one compliment, it was like the clouds parted the way for the sun.
Peter feels utterly useless.
Bucky eyes the teen dubiously when he accidentally breathes on his neck, catching sight of his computer monitor. Peter was a disaster today, on the beaten end of the stick from Bucky, and was lectured to sit on the bed when his attempt to escape the hotel room failed.
At this point, Bucky is used to the kid running away, literally, from any of their interactions. At least the mom of the Avengers Steve Rogers isn’t here to see these interactions, Bucky would never admit out loud that Steve thinks Bucky’s adorable when he’s bullying the kid. He has an image to maintain.
The plan is to have Iron Man and Captain America sneak past the exterior guards, hoping the perimeter isn’t entirely occupied. It’s easy enough, the two of them will seem outnumbered and Sam, Bucky, and Peter will join as backup if they make it that far. For now, they’re being as stealthy as they can to avoid any communication with the inside. It’s collecting data on this heavily guarded headquarters, then possibly break in later.
When Peter Parker hears Iron Man’s blood curdling yell coming from the laptop, he forgets all personal space and leaps off the bed, “NoNoNoNo,” he says, ignoring Winter Soldier’s glare and the elbow strike to his ribs. “Tony!”
“Kid, yelling over this isn’t going to hellp” Bucky snaps, shoving him off and proceeding to take over communications. “I have to help!” Peter snaps, pulling up Karen’s diagnostics in his suit and checking to see if he can reach FRIDAY. There won’t be any luck on this end, with all of his baby monitor protocols, but he needs to do something.
“Put the Spiderling on,” Tony coughs, grunting in the background. They pull up a live feed from the Iron Man suit, the screen going haywire with static and the nanotech flutters. “Kid, I need you to build something. Can I trust you to do that?”
“Yes! YesYesYes, please let me help, Mr. Stark, I told you,” Peter talked a mile a minute, failing to hide every ounce of emotion. “I need you-- build a- to infiltrate this plasma barrier—” Iron Man’s communication through his compromised suit comes through as static, and Peter needs to work with what he has now. Maybe they’re trapped in the headquarters and need a way out, or they’re trapped, he doesn’t know. He can’t help with his super strength.
Peter thinks: Plasma. There is an array of charged particles, but what type of order is it if it was able to scramble Tony Stark’s nanotech? He needs to think in terms of electric and magnetic fields! And shit, he’s talking out loud.
The Falcon and Winter Soldier are stuck on this dilemma, debating whether or not to go down there without this tech or not, they whisper to Natasha as Peter brings up the hologram from his wristwatch.
Peter runs across the room to snatch open his backpack, thankful he had been bored last weekend and forgot to take out his electrostatic physics notes and circuits. Maybe he can engineer something simple to break down the barrier. “Kid! Stark sent some more diagnostics on the material,” Sam shouts, typing furiously on his laptop. Bucky ushers the kid over, and okay, maybe Peter is surprised he was not dragged across the hotel room. They’re making progress. Baby steps.
Sam Wilson has gotten to know Iron Man and the man behind the suit this last year. He knew he was a genius, and often praised Sam and invited him to his lab. Sam doesn’t consider himself smart, or a genius, but he admits he can keep up in the science department. He was a little out of his league here, because the Spider-Kid was a genius.
Stark remarked a string of demands before their communications cut out temporarily, while Natasha worked on getting their channel back up, he devoted his time to help Spider-Man build whatever this circuit was to hopefully overpower and burn out the plasma barrier Tony warned them about.
He is now a vital part to the mission, this is kind of below the Avengers pay grade or SHIELD’s, but the kid did not seem to mind, and he’s digging out tech from his backpack?! And pulls out random shit everybody totally keeps on themselves all the time, the kid rambled when questioned. What sensible person would keep a circuit series on them at all times. College-aged kid, maybe?
Sam’s impressed. He nudges Bucky’s arm once they’re hovered over the newly built circuit after tearing down searching for any strong source to power the circuit. Tony won’t be happy, but the kid stole a powersource from one of his backup suits. If any of them even attempted to look at one of the Mark suits, or any of Tony’s items that he packed for this spontaneous mission, he’d be annihilated on the spot. Sam can respect that his lab is a scientist's own church, as Tony says.
The blue glow of the hologram illuminates the dark hotel room, anticipation is high and Peter’s senses are rendering him anxious. Sam tampers around with the teen. If anyone can keep up with Tony Stark’s erratic and genius brain, he’s always thorough and does his reading and research, then they’ve certainly never met them. Until tonight. Bruce Banner is at his genius level, but they haven’t seen him in a while. Natashs is clever and quick-witted, Steve doesn’t necessarily dislike technology but trains the team to do well without it, they’d assumed he was an old man with no apt for technology, but he’s proved them all wrong, too. But, what the hell, this teeanger is utilizing Stark’s portable lab; He might have his own portable lab embedded into his own suit. This kid must be special.
Dumbfounded, Sam and Bucky frown at each other but the room erupts into cheers and, ‘whoops,’ once the spider kid finalizes the tech Tony requested. It’s unfamiliar, teaming up with this teeanger, but he isn’t half bad when he’s utilized for the team. Other than that, Bucky is right. When the team needed Spider-Man, he spent most of the time trying to prove himself to all of them.
The three of them made their way to the headquarters, hoping Tony and Steve were still being obtained at their last known coordinates, and the idiot Spider-Man thwipped through the woods, unceremoniously launching himself into a trap, it was all too ironic when he was trapped in a net. He yelped loudly and annoyingly and Bucky grabbed his wrist to aim it and cover the arachnid’s mouth with his own webs. What even is his name?
Once that was handled, and that means the stupid fucker was lectured by Bucky like he was some teacher in elementary school, stop fucking around, and the kid dared to talk back to him, wringing his hands together and cracking his bones in anxiousness. “Look, I’m fine! We’re fine, I think I hear Mom and Dad arguing up ahead,” the idiot said, running away on all fours, and what the fuck was Bucky’s night?
The mission went as smoothly as it could.. Stark and Rogers were arguing like a televised heterosexual couple set in the 1960s over dinner, their spider child was frozen like an anchor and whipping his head back and forth between the two parents. Sam had to pull Tony away from the plasma again, he refused to have the kid handle the tech by himself on the first try. The kid had a point responding with, ‘your brain was almost fried, let me try!’ and Steve had to remind him, ‘son, keep your voice down,’ and this is an unconventional family that Bucky wants out of, because these idiots lured a few Hydra agents to them.
Bucky could feel his migraine growing ever so fast, being wonderfully reminded the kid does not shut up and yells the dumbest quips while swinging in the air, like, ‘did somebody order a side of pasta with SPIDERS!’ and Bucky had half a mind to restrain himself from throwing the kid across the dark, grassy field.
Captain America, Iron Man, and Spider-Man weren’t a bad team, at least when the teen wasn’t trying to steal Steve’s shield to launch it on his own. Bucky guesses Iron Man trains with him plenty, the teen stops every blow to the Iron suit before it happens, Tony launches him into the air to spread a steadfire of webs around them.
The last agent throws a punch to Bucky, who catches it and twists his arm back. He nods his head towards Spider-Man, who runs over to web up his hands. “I am the spider. I own the night,” the kid says while webbing up the agent, and Bucky hesitates and decides not to tie the kid up with the glare Tony Stark is shooting him with his faceplate up, “Your worst nightmare has come to life, punk.”
“Underoos!” Tony yells while calling for the Avenjet, “No more Christian Bale impressions.”
The team sinks into the hotel mattresses the moment they push the hotel room door open, safely back at the Rendezvous point after being yelled at by Black Widow for leaving too large of a trail, and she protested their next mission. She claimed she’d do a better job than four frat boys, and honestly, she really would.
The stupid hotel room is too tiny, Bucky and Sam shove each other further away from each other to being able to spread across the bed. Tony took up the next bed, and Steve opted for the loveseat in the corner of the room. Steve eyed Spider-Man while he rambled about each explosion they witnessed. THey have no proof, but speculated one of the explosions was Natasha lighting the headquarters ablaze. None of them would be surprised, she is always two steps ahead of everyone.
“I swear! I’ll clean this up,” the teegers yelps once the Falcon dangles his backpack over the edge of the bed like a newborn child about to be dropped, he lunges for the thing taking up all their space.
Tony whips his head up from the mattress, monitoring the bubbly and bright teen standing between both hotel beds, noticing a slight wheeze and every wince under the kid’s breath. The fight was exhausting, but this is new for Peter; Tony concludes he either doesn’t even realize he’s hurt trying to impress everyone else, or he’s a stubborn little shit and keeps his mouth shut.
Tony can tell how proud Peter is of himself, the kid refuses to move on from tonight’s mission. Everyone humors him, especially Sam, they both seemingly wrecked on the plasma destroyer together. Tony’s prouder of the kid than the kid is of himself. That scares him, the realization, the arbitrary thought sends a pang through his chest.
Tony sits up, shaking his head at whatever that thought was. The kid is going to be bigger than him one day. The kid. His mentee. Somedays, he doesn’t have a clue just what he dragged himself into the moment he stopped outside of the Parker apartment.
Tony schools his own disappointment, masking his frown. He and the kid are still not there yet, but the awareness that this teenager means the entire world to him, right beside Pepper, is terrifying. He’d throw himself over any threat within a moment’s notice to save his kid, the terrifying feeling living in his abdomen that one day he might have to. Or, even worse, the kid might possibly do the same for him despite the mantras he drills into the kid during each training session to protect himself.
He’s really glad and upset, each emotion swirling around in his head. He assisted on this SHIELD level mission tonight, definitely not in range for an official Avengers involvement, but he did. They deal with Gods, aliens, and threats to the universe as they know it, and.. If he can continue to teach the teeanger any vital skills while on the field, he will. As much as he’d like to wrap him in bubble wrap and send him back home.
These arguments he constantly berates himself with every time he worries even slightly about the teeanger always rattle the bucket full of his guilt even further, the guilt threatening to spill over the brim. He doesn’t know what would happen once that point comes, because it will, and he hates it.
He’s pulled from his reverie when the kid stands over him, and Tony cannot wait around any longer. He gently tugs down on his arm and guides him to sit down on the edge of the bed while he dejectedly stares at the quiet TV flashing dancing images across the room with nighttime TV. He can count the amount of times Peter has come to him for help with injuries from his vigilante part-time job, because the amount of times fits only on one hand. Yes, this is a rare moment, and he really doesn’t care if there are other Avengers around to see Tony in this vulnerable state of weakness. He needs to patch the kid up for both their sakes, possibly more for his own.
No, he’s not mother-henning the kid. Yes, he is ushering the kid to move over, no, kid, over here, the pillow will prop you up, this is going to sting, he whispers little praises under his breath whilst simultaneously reprimanding the kid for putting himself in danger. “You cannot put yourself in danger. I know I let it slide today, but if there is a next time, we cannot use dangerous plasma barriers as our beta subjects.”
The both of them hide away in the bathroom eventually, Tony braces himself for how much blood might be under the Spider-Man mask, but the kid’s soft skin is covered in bruises and a couple of cuts above his brow and on his cheekbone. Tony looks at the kid, really looks at him, opting to ignore the warmth blooming in his chest. But the kid definitely makes it hard to. Peter smiles, followed by a snort, “just admit it. I one-hundred percent upstanded you in front of the Avengers. We Wouldn’t have gotten past the super scary Hydra goons if I didn't destroy their weird plasma-powered wall with my tech.”
Tony ruffles the smug little shit’s hair over his mask, his chest filling up with more wistfulness once the kid laughs freely and ducks his head. “Oh, yeah, tough guy? Your tech from the money that came out of my pockets?” Tony smiles, despite himself and admires how lively and energetic the kid is while his joints ache. “How much money do you wanna bet you’ll be back to your stammering self out there because the deadly winter soldier assassin looks in your general direction,” Tony teases, grabbing gauze from the basic first aid kit and soaking it in saline.
“It was so cool, though! The way the tech glowed once it recognized the heat signature of the plasma, and oh, my God, did you see the look on all of their faces? I couldn’t get the parallel circuit to work at first, but, Mr. Stark, it was really a series!” Tony smiles while the kid rambles, grabbing the kid’s face with one hand, medical supplies in the other. “That's like eighth grade science right there but we fixed it.”
Peter allows him to clean his wounds, leaning his head down to rest in the billionaire’s hand, and sometimes Tony is scared of the willing trust the kid thrusts onto him. Tony wipes the cuts on the kids face, resulting in the kid ripping the gauze from Tony’s hands while hissing. “Careful!”
Peter prods at his own face, and turns to Tony expectantly. He’s far too anxious from what just occurred, but Tony cleans the last of the dirt, this time gracefully. Peter whispers into the cold hotel room bathroom, “Do you think aunt—“
He’s interrupted by a thump coming from the living room, and Tony just rolls his eyes. “Alright, party’s over. Let’s see what the golden girls are up to in there before we leave for the compound.”
Before Tony let’s Peter hop down from the sink counter, he gives him a once over and murmurs a request from FRIDAY. Peter groans, but ultimately allows the scan for injuries, and before Tony can stop himself, he gently sweeps hair that’s stuck on the kid’s forehead to the side, his hand hovering and shaking. He moves it before the kid notices.
The dumbass Avengers probably heard everything in the bathroom, their jaws slack now and they look stupid while tryin to be inconspicuous in the hotel room. Tony scoffs, and Peter offers his usual gleam beside him with the mask now down and converses with Steve Rogers. This man may be like, 110 years old, maybe 105, and he sure as hell acts like it when talking to the teenager.
“No! My plan was infinitely better,” Tony hears Peter joke under the mask, messing with him. “During next week’s debrief, you have to tell everyone about my new invention! I got it polarized so fast. Okay, yeah, it did explode, but I built it, not Tony.”
Sam laughs, and wow, this kid is a little shit and the other Avenger agrees with Tony. Tony’s imitated face of betrayal is just sad, placing a hand on his chest, just above his heart where the arc reactor still lies, psueding fake betrayal. “Don’t make me tell all the big Avengers here that you still sleep with a teddy bear,” Tony teases, reaching over the table to pack up the kid’s backpack and throwing his forgotten hoodie at him. He taps a command to order the car over to their side of the hotel. “You just did! How did you even know that!” Peter cries out, and he’s positive the entire room can see the blush on his cheeks. He’s sure the Spider-Man suit somehow displayed out, the rest of the men duck their heads in laughter.
Tony claps a hand on Peter’s shoulder, grabs his own bag, and they both shout goodbyes to the group while continuing their debate on who did the best today. Before the door shuts, Stark pulls the kid close to his side, the kid snaking an arm around his waist and murmurs, “come on, it’s your bedtime. Let’s go get cheeseburgers instead before we tuck you into your bed with your Bucky Bear.”
The door slams shut, the rest of the Avengers left behind resume and turn to each other. They have a lot to think about tonight during their stay here, Sam’s the first to speak up. “Man, are those two weird, or what?”
iii.
Peter Parker can’t sleep.
His head hits the pillow, the calling of sleep slowly inducing him in. It’s been days. It feels like weeks have passed since he felt even remotely this close to sleeping.
His own body betrays him and feels a burst of energy, he shoots up in bed. Instead of doing normal, healthcare professionals recommended activities like meditating or reading a book, he stays up the entire night. He builds his own protocol through Karen. A ‘Get Peter Parker,’ to sleep protocol.
Peter wonders if other vigilantes have stayed up 47 hours to balance school and fight bad guys at night. His work has been piling up this entire week, so he bails on, ‘Get Peter Parker to Sleep,’ protocol, because it’s only 6PM and none of his work for the week is done. It’s two days away until the weekend, and no, teachers don’t accept late work for science projects that will be pitched to a local engineering company who wants to pay for ideas. Peter needs to finish his pitch.
May’s mad after a day of Peter conking out during breakfast, bumping his head on the train on his way to school, how did she even notice that, skipping lunch to stop a nearby kidnapping, and getting snitched on by MJ and Ned during school.
Peter complained to MJ and Ned during their free period this morning about his project he built overnight on Tuesday being snatched by Electro. He accidentally powered the source of her suit that had wires all over her body, a toolbelt, and her bio-electricity powers. Peter hit his head against his desk falling asleep, so they did the one unthinkable thing: called Aunt May.
He felt guilty making his friends worry, but he did snap at them and eventually gave in. His spider powers have been on strike, and he had been careless this entire work. He protested, grasping for the phone while his friends and aunt agreed to send Peter home.
That’s how Peter spent 6 hours trying to get home, web-swinging into a dumpster and frantically begging Karen to stop updating the Baby Monitor Protocol and let him get sleep already. At dark, he slammed the door open and protested against May that he’d rather finish his project than sleep.
“Peter Parker, go to your room now. Look what’s waiting on your bed for you,” May said, opening his bedroom door while the teen dropped his bag to the floor. He gasped, “Ah! My Bucky Bear.”
Peter’s head hit the pillow, deceiving May. Once she closed the door, he reached out for his backpack.
That’s how he got here to this point, May completely disappointed in her nephew still being awake.
And, oh, God, because aunt May totally hates him and desires Tony to embarrass him at any chance he gets as well, their so called tag team parenting, she calls his number. She calls him and decides, hey, let’s yell at Tony, a billionaire who has been idolized by her nephew ever since he could talk and read. May Parker called THE man who her nephew used to dress up as a kid, no, not as Iron Man, but as Tony Stark.
This isn’t a completely strange, out of world occurrence; the pair of strange superhero coparents do call each other on the phone to rant or yell sometimes. The other weekend, Tony called May one Saturday afternoon that Peter stayed over to watch baseball to ask May why, and Peter quotes, “you really did raise a menace. What kind of New Yorker, a teenager, as a matter of fact, does not like the Mets?”
To be completely honest, he had been fucking with Tony. He loves the Mets.
“On the contrary to popular beliefs, I did not keep your son awake this entire week. I’m pretty sure your kid is hacking into the suit again,” Tony announces to May in the living room.
Peter groans, opting to hide his face in his pillow. He’d rather keep his vigilante lifestyle as far away from May as possible, but she knows better than that.
“What did you do to my nephew then!”
“Nothing,” Tony groans, and Peter can hear the pout on his face.
Maybe it’s some sort of exhaustive hallucination, May absolutely did not call Tony Stark. The genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist Tony Stark. For Thor’s sake, it’s a school night. He’s brought back to earth when May squeezes his foot under his duvet and tries to tickle him, he yanks his foot away in time.
“Earth to Peter, come tell Tony why you were sitting in trash today/ I think he’d like to hear it from you.”
“May!” Peter groans, sliding even further inside his comforter. He swears, every time he is around Tony Stark he’d rather be hiding. “Why would you call him? I mean, not that I don’t want to see him!”
And then Tony Stark is in his room again, and oh, fuck, where are his manners. He slides out from under his comforter and smiles at the older man, realizing it probably came out as a grimace. May leaves and gives them privacy, squeezing Tony’s arm before she leaves. They both notice how Tony jumped from the contact, but didn’t say anything.
“Hey, kiddo,” Tony says, and did Peter really miss him this much? He shook his head and properly greeted him.
“Hey, Mr. Stark. As much as I love hanging out with you, don’t get me wrong,” Peter sputters, and dammit he thought he had been done with this phase at least around Mr. Stark. He anxiously twisted his sweatshirt’s strings between his fingers and continued, “What- what are you doing here?”
Peter glances down a little too obviously at the happy first birthday paper bag the billionaire was holding, filled to the top with random items he couldn’t pinpoint. Okay, what? Is he being punked?
“Listen, I really thought we went over the whole, ‘don’t hack into my multimillion dollar suit again,’ but maybe it went over your head? I was a teen before, whatever,” Tony air quotes, “but I really did mean it.”
“What do you mean?” Peter asks, a squeak in his voice that he did NOT mean for it to happen. “I didn’t hack--”
Peter stopped with the set glare, closing his mouth and staring down at the ground again. Man, I really need new shoes. Hey, look at Tony’s shoes. What’s in that bag, anyways? Peter, do you think he’s already forgotten about your conversation that happened 5 seconds ago?
“Anyways, I hacked back into my own suit,” Tony started.
“How! I made sure you wouldn’t be able to!” Peter exclaims and watches the older man take a seat on the edge of his bed. “I mean, if I did, you wouldn't be able to. I disabled it.”
“Yeah, and do you know who you’re talking to? I enabled it,” Tony says, grinning to himself. “Anyways, I brought goodies for good kiddies who promise to never hack into my suit again, because I will take it away again.”
Peter slumps down on the bed beside him, muttering pointedly, “I pinky promise I won’t hack into your suit again.”
“You’re a little shit, you know that,” Tony snorts, pulling the bag from the ground to his lap. “I noticed the little spiderling hasn’t been getting any sleep, so..May practically begged me to buy all this stuff to help you. And Pepper. I had nothing to do with all of this.”
Tony Stark, the Tony fucking Stark, Iron Man, a literal Avenger who saved the world pulls out a fuzzy blanket from the bag. For Peter.
If Peter’s eyes aren’t radiating with pure adoration and literal star shine and whatever element Peter can think of because he secretly loves this man so much, this mentor, this father-figure, and just pure thankfulness, he’s too frozen to speak.
Maybe he’s pretending he doesn’t see the kids face, or he’ll play it off. Tony pulls out even more items. He flashes Peter with bags of chamomile tea, a miniature lavender candle, and he even brought coloring books. The next thing he does that he doesn’t realize he’s doing, but shit, his eyes are burning really bad from the tears forming. He wipes them away.
The older man hesitated, and muttered to himself, shit, I made Parker cry. Don’t cry, Pete.
The rest of their evening consists of Peter shaking his head every few seconds, pinching his own arm, and asking himself periodically if he’s dreaming. Tony told May they’re beginning their adventure of, “Get Peter Parker to sleep.’
May offered to make them both warm soup for dinner, but really resulted in her running to the corner bodega and grabbing three cans of chicken noodle soup while Tony boiled water for them in the kitchen.
After their impromptu dinner, May and Tony try to lock Peter in his room, but not before they both said goodnight. Mr. Stark threw his Bucky Bear at him and pulled his sheets up to his chin for show, but then did the thing again. The thing where he sweeps the hair off of his forehead. Just like their previous Avengers mission, his heart jolted. The gentle touch brought an electrifying feeling, the human touch he craved from the man, once again, his father-figure that he’d never himself admit out loud. Tony really can’t stop embarrassing Peter, can he?
Peter Parker was wrong about intel. The sleep-deprived creature that he is, gave the Avengers wrong coordinates. Sure, this shouldn’t be too big of a deal, but he’s being set ablaze by Electro.
He’s overworked and now he’s definitely annoyed. Crime doesn’t stop, it never will. And he’s frustrated. School will never stop pestering him, either, it just feels too inconvenient right now.
Despite Mr. Stark’s efforts to get him to sleep, and aunt May’s efforts, he didn’t listen. He continued working on his project, because what else will he do? His grades are already slipping, but he can’t admit that just yet. He needs to prove himself.
Maybe some other villain has a hit on him, because for the last week the new villains and muggers haven’t stopped. Maybe it’s his sleep-addled brain’s paranoia, but this all seems too big. He doesn’t get the chance to investigate this possibility.
The Avengers tasked him with one request during his friendly neighborhood Spider-Man patrol, and he’d been too distracted. The mission blew up in his face, literally.
A surge of electricity sends Peter careening into the nearest brick wall in an alleyway, and great, some of the Avengers are here now. But, fuck, Peter feels too hot. He’s burning.
He yells out in pain, Electro standing above him, manually laughing as she sends torturous volts through his entire body.
He stares up, his vision swimming.
He was just wrong, one small little mistake. He’s just wrong— and tony lets him know that because fuck, he really almost died. But, if it means saving others, it’s a fight he’s willing to risk.
Tony Stark stands above him, and he’s never seen the man this furious. He must’ve passed out, and he whimpers as he tries to get out of the man’s hold. It’s his turn to try and deflect.
The older man has never looked this mad. Not since the ferry incident and his plane crash, and not since he last spoke about his betrayer Obadiah Stane. Tony had confided in Peter about this. And he disappointed him. His spirit had been broken from the incident a few years prior, maybe still affecting him even when Peter first met him.
Tony had ghosts in his closet that he trusted Peter to know about. It was like a teenage sleepover, they both couldn’t sleep during his stay one weekend at the Compound and Tony felt safe enough to open up that night, a few weeks ago. After all, they are a part of a team.
Peter had his own responsibilities in his own neighborhood, a home he’d never leave behind. Mr. Stark was truly the first man to ever understand that. It was comforting to know he could trust to have tony in his corner then. Tony humored his pillow fort in the tower’s penthouse. But today, ithe Tony above him is the one he has always been fiercely intimidated by. He idolized him beforehand, and still does. This feels like it’s shattering Peter inside. He messed up, to simply put it.
Tony fucks with the kid who does listen to every single word spewed from his anxiety filled, genius thinking, overcomplicated brain, but he has the hero savior complex either as big as his, or worse. He can’t decide which option is worse. So, he shows up to the apartment unannounced to Peter, to try and get him to sleep?
This is even worse than anything he could ever imagine.
Tony is scared shitless, to say ineloquently.
Peter knows his fierce disappointment, it’s written all over his face. To deflect, he orders the Avengers to keep Spider-Man asleep for the next week. The perfect time for a joke, right? Right.
Peter never could comprehend why someone like Tony Stark would be remotely interested in someone like him, so he had to prove himself. Sometimes he had to go beyond helping the little people, and do bigger things. But Peter knew better.
Disheartened, he swung back all the way to Queens, ignoring how many miles it took and the pain surging through his body. He got away before they could drag him to the Tower’s Med Bay.
It was a night much too familiar. He leans his head against May, who listens. She’s holding back her tears, refusing to notice the second degree burns on his body just yet. He confided in May, because just a few days before Tony had been here helping him. And he refused to listen.
Peter knows the right thing to do. He doesn’t know why he made his way back here to only guilt himself more for worrying May.
May stood him up, encouraging him.
Peter can’t stew in this any longer, and he knows Mr. Stark can’t either. He can’t imagine what’s going through Tony’s mind right now, other than disappointment. He knows Mr. Stark, too, agonizing over this mission.
He won’t lie— he loves spending time with Mr. Stark. And it is scary, but over some time they just.. became a family. Peter adopted this man in his mind. Like, okay, it is a little silly to be working on lab experiments with Tony on the Spidey suit and call him ‘dad’ in his own head, but he can’t help it. He adopted Tony Stark, quite unfairly. But that doesn’t mean the attachment hadn’t formed. He doesn’t know if it’s two-sided, or if it anymore. Probably not.
So, this is why he must fix it. Now.
May Parker is a saint, the best aunt he could ask for, and drops him off at the penthouse. Pepper and Tony’s penthouse in the tower. And he’s so relieved once an awaiting Pepper Potts let’s them both into the tower from the lobby, and guides him upstairs to their penthouse. He pushes down his feelings of intrusions.
If Ben Parker taught him anything, it’s to apologize when due. The mantra rings in his head, with great power comes great responsibility.
He’s much more familiar with the Avengers compound in upstate New York, but this is where he sometimes spends his weekdays with Tony. It’s just one of the houses he’s growing up in during his teen years. Or, maybe that’s a cheesy thing of him to think.
But, all-knowing pepper let’s him in after warmly greeting him and guides him to the living room. Tony, as if on cue, is nervously pacing around on the rug, maneuvering around the coffee table.
Peter furrows his brow, and stares at him before the man notices, the words about to come off his tongue. Tony looks up once Peter speaks, ‘I’m sorry, Tony.”
Tony seems to crumble and tense at the same time as Peter does, and they meet halfway through to hug each other. It was a compelling force pulling them together, the weight of those small but far too meaningful words.
All the anxiety melted away, like Tony personally removed it all. And he feels like the biggest asshole on earth, because he knows this man would do anything for him. An unspoken theory, sure, but the next thing the man does proves it.
“‘Please, let’s never fight again. God,” Tony breathes into his hair, pulling him closer in this bone-crushing hug. Peter holds on, tight, and it’s everything he could imagine in a hug coming from him. The broad muscles of his shoulders wrapped around his head, and Tony Stark has never hugged or loved forcefully in a long time. Or, ever.
“I’m really glad you accepted my apology this easily, or that would’ve been really embarrassing coming down here.”
Tony chuckles, attempting to pull himself together.
Peter pulls Tony even tighter into the hug, and who knows where all this confidence is coming from, he sensed Tony beginning to let go. Maybe it’s his own longing for parent-figure, a father-figure to soften his hurt edges, edges from trauma. He will not cower away like he usually desires to, because no, God dammit, they will settle this like May Parker and Ben Parker taught him to.
Out of the goodness and love seeping from their hearts.
Peter sighs into the man’s chest, and to his horror, May laughs behind them. Tony tenses, he must be thinking the same thing. They’re still in the room?
“This little fight between you two lasted less time than we expected.”
Pepper moves towards them, squeezing Peter’s shoulder.
“Oh, god, we?” Peter asks.
May steps forward and offers her nephew comfort, her lip quirked up in amusement and a look of adoration when she turns to look at this group.
Tony squishes his face into Pepper’s shoulder and loosened his grip on Peter. “Pete, wanna come down to the lab to yell at FRIDAY with me? She didn’t mute our fight in the comms, did she, Pep?”
Pepper laughs in response, shaking her head no. “Oh, I think you’re both going to have fun debriefing this mission next week. Now, go continue your talk. We’ll give you two privacy.”
Peter slept like a baby that night, a tranquility absolved some of his traumas and worries from the mission. The things the two talk about that night, pressed together on the couch with the older man’s arms tucked around him, lulled him. He hopes Ben Parker is watching them, because he misses him.
The love he experiences and desperately works hard for, to fill the void of missing his uncle, is all thanks to the man himself. Peter Parker could never replace him, but he can build his family, brick by brick.
+1
“Mr. Stark?”
Tony doesn’t turn from the spot on the couch next to him, cleaning up extra plates that weren’t thrown away during the party. “Mm?”
“Do you.. Do you think I’ll be a good babysitter to Morgan?”
Tony finally glances up, then turns his gaze to his family mingling in the corner. Peter had thrown the couple a baby shower. His Peter, his own little Peter Parker, who is sitting on the couch worrying about all the wrong things right now. “Of course you will be.”
He doesn’t let the words slip that he’s going to be an amazing big brother .
The jokes had been coming along all night by Pepper, Rhodey, May, and even a little scoff from Happy.
Peter could not escape the quips, no matter how hard he tried, and even the sickening soft looks Tony kept sparing his way. Like the one he’s wearing now. It’s really scary, okay?
Plus, he had appearances to keep up with the entire night, because no, Sam and Bucky did not need to know it's him , the alter-ego he desperately tries to hide.
Peter Parker pretending to be Tony’s lab intern and personal assistant was embarrassing enough when he played along, constantly receiving embarrassing demands and quips from his own boss.
Okay, fine, if they did put two and two together by the end of the night because Peter could not shut up about intermolecular forces at dinner, Peter Parker does not need to justify their all-knowing looks.
“Kid, you do realize I talked about that with Spider-Man , right?” Sam had argued, turning his cheeks pink during their family baby shower dinner.
“Um, I knew that!” Peter diverted, “I told you! We’re really close, it’s like we share everything together. He goes to the same school as me.”
He’ll never forget Tony’s laugh, because it came from deep inside him, the most genuine display. Peter elected to take pictures with his mind tonight, of course, along with his disposable camera, but snapshots his brain would never forget. Tony Stark being happy, these ravishing moments that will be drilled into his brain.
Peter had embarrassed himself that night, he didn’t even need Tony’s help in this effort, but he couldn't find himself to be self-conscious in front of the family he formed over the last year.
After these last few months interacting closely with the Avengers, Peter wasn’t the only one who had formed a family.
Tony Stark had formed new families, new bonds, breaking down his iron exterior. Stark men are made or iron doesn’t qualify true anymore, in the way that Howard taught it.
Tony looks like he’s going to melt from all the deserving love he and Pepper both received tonight.
May Parker wonders how the hell this emotionally repressed, bruised from battle, hidden behind his own curated mask from 40 years of practice has intricately weaved himself into hers and Peter’s life, finding his own place.
She wonders how the hell she got here in her life, and why the hell her nephew is staring back at her with wide eyes, in the middle of losing a wrestling with a robot called Dum-E in Tony Stark’s penthouse after a baby shower.
She jolts at a nearby crash, groaning once she realizes what Tony is doing, or, who he’s trying to lasso in the living room. An Iron Man suit sending tendrils of smoke through the living room, flying solo in the multi million dollar apartment.
She elicits a groan from her teenager once she reprimands him for humoring Tony’s stupidity, yes, it’s actual stupidity, but the older man is smirking .
Who would’ve thought they’d ever make it here? An aunt, her vigilante kid, and a small, yet bigger-than-life man (who is unapologetically a pain in her ass,) and his high methodical and autonomous wife.
May grins.
Tony decided to answer Peter’s question later, with May and Pepper sitting across the penthouse’s room long after the intimate get-together ended. Peter was now drowsy, pressed against Tony’s chest with the man’s chin resting on the top of his head. He’s so full form the latkes he and May brought, because this was a beautiful and deserving occasion for latkes. Peter promised they’d braid the Challah later.
Tony doesn’t remember pulling the teenager this close to him, but maybe it was the bond they created tonight. Peter’s words from dinner persisted in Tony’s head. To make the second law of thermodynamics work, you need to put in work. He knows his conversation with Sam was supposed to be silly, but he knows what he’s heavily implying under his own words.
Just like his uncle Ben had taught him.
They’ve created their own unique system between them, sometimes disordered, sometimes their intermolecular forces banded together in a bond. There are bonds between Peter and Tony that could never be broken. They broke science: An isolated system tends to degenerate and stay into a disordered state. But, Peter brought him, despite his own natural tendencies, to their own vulnerable system. Out of pure love.
“Actually, I take back what I said earlier. You’re going to be an awful babysitter,” Tony murmurs into the kid’s hair, chuckling at his scoff. The warm breath against his own chest is comforting. “I bet you’ll leave the baby in her diaper for days. You’ll give her peas when she asks for pear baby food.”
His laughter was loud, rumbling through Tony’s chest.
“But, no, awful babysitter. Bad Peter.” Tony wills himself to just say what he wants to say.
“You’re going to be a spectacular big brother to Morgan.”
It was like the words stole his breath, sending a shock throughout his body. Tony knows he’s the one he wanted to hear the words from tonight, and it was unfair that he made himself wait.
But if Peter Parker has taught him anything, it’s that his perception of love is completely shattered. He permeated through every awful barrier built by Howard Stark, their own system built from love replaced every bad thing in Tony.
The things whispered by Tony are reserved solely for Peter. They never get to make the Challah until 3AM once the two of them wake up from thunder rumbling through the penthouse. “I love you,” Peter turns in the midst of a braid, the words effortless. Maybe these words weren’t a pretense for anyone around them, maybe they’re a culmination of their bond over the last year and a half. Their own intermolecular bond.
“I love you more,” Tony breathes.
And he means it.