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“Spider-Man, check that building.” Steve commands as the team runs through the street toward the latest threat.
“Aye-aye captain!” Peter says with a mock salute, laughing as he ignores the eye rolls and groans from his teammates, shooting a web toward the top of the building.
That’s how fights like this tend to go. Peter only teams up with the Avengers when the threat is located near Queens, which happens far too often for comfort. While the actual Avengers fight the bad guy, Peter is tasked with clearing out the surrounding buildings. He doesn’t mind it too much since he’s ‘looking out for the little guy’, but he sometimes wishes the team would see that he’s useful for more than just civilian duty.
He really can’t complain, though. At least the Avengers are letting him help now. There was a time when the heroes would shoo him away, saying that they didn’t need him. And Peter doesn’t blame them, seeing how all they know about him is that he’s an enhanced person claiming to be a hero who makes jokes in the middle of fights.
The only person who knows Peter’s identity is Mr. Stark. The billionaire wasn’t going to hand over a million dollar suit to just any random person. He did his research - aka, followed Peter home after a night of patrolling. To say Tony was shocked after finding out a 15 year old kid is the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man would be an understatement. He had tried to talk the kid out of the superhero life, knowing the strain that it has on a person, but the kid was too stubborn.
After the whole Vulture incident, Peter decided to stick closer to the ground, and it was working well for him. He was able to find a balance between being Spider-Man and Peter Parker. Things were good.
In moments like these, when he is assisting the Avengers, Peter likes to pretend that these people are like his family. He lets himself think that they care about him more than just as an extra pair of hands. It’s silly and probably a little childish to think that way, but he can’t help it.
Peter loves his aunt, and he is happy with the life they live together, just the two of them. It’s just, you can never have too many people in your life, right? With all the loss Peter’s been through, he can’t help but want to fill that void.
Shaking away that thought, Peter focuses back on the task at hand. “Karen, will you look for heat signatures?” He asks, smiling when his heads up display shows a handful of figures scattered in the building below him. “Thanks Karen!”
“My pleasure, Peter.”
“You should play some good action music, Karen.” ‘Peter jokingly suggests, already making his way to the closest heat signature. “I’m thinking mission impossible.”
“No.” Tony’s voice says through the comms. “No music. Focus, kid.”
“Don’t be such a party-pooper, Mr. Stark.” Peter groans with mock annoyance.
“Spider-Man.” Steve scolds, causing a small blush spreads across Peter’s cheeks as he remembers the other Avengers can hear him too.
“Sorry.” He mumbles, stopping himself from saying anything else. Reality catches up with him again, like it always does, reminding him that he doesn’t mean anything to these people. It’s easy to forget that the only reason they let him help is so the real heroes can focus on the main threat. He’s basically just damage control for civilians.
Clearing out the surrounding buildings is an easy task. Most people had already gone somewhere far away from the threat, so the buildings tend to only have a few people in them. Peter has just finished doing a final sweep over the last building on the block when a loud explosion shakes the structure around him. His spider sense is screaming at him to move, but before he can act, the building starts to fall.
The second time around doesn’t make it any easier. If anything, it’s harder. Because this time, Peter can’t get out on his own. Chunks of broken concrete keep his legs pinned to the ground, his arms are folded at awkward angles, and he’s pretty sure his left shoulder is dislocated.
He can feel where a metal rod has pierced through his suit and into his side. The warm spread of blood sends a shiver down his spine as it contrasts against his skin with the cold ground beneath him.
Dust fills his mouth with each labored breath, making it even more difficult to get the air he so desperately needs. Peter tries to keep his panic at bay, tries to push back the fear that wants to consume him.
This is it , he thinks. This is how I die.
He hears shouting on the other side of the comms, his head spinning as he tries to make sense of it all. “...der-Man. Can you hear me? Did you get all the civilians out of that building?”
Civilians..out of… Oh right. The building. The one he’s currently trapped under. The one that’s squashing him like a bug. If only spiders were considered bugs and not arachnids, the irony would be quite funny.
“Spider-Man!”
The voice snaps him back into focus. “What?” He wheezes, still struggling to catch his breath.
“Did you get the civilians out?” The voice that he recognizes as Steve asks again.
“Yeah..civilians..out.” He grunts through clenched teeth, squeezing his eyes closed, fighting the urge to cry out as pain shoots through his side. “But-”
“Good.” Tony interrupts. “Keep them away, kid. These bastards don’t seem to be letting up any time soon. We’ve got our hands tied and don’t have time to worry about other people.
Peter doesn’t say anything in return, fear rising in him as Tony’s words sink in. We’ve got our hands tied. He’s stuck. Not only can he not get himself out, but none of the Avenger’s can get him out either.
Don’t have time to worry about other people. He’s other people.
Biting his lip, Peter decides to keep quiet. He is not the priority. Not to the Avengers, not to the world around them, not to anyone. Peter isn’t an Avenger, he’s just some kid in a gloried onesie, trying to make a difference in his small corner of the world. New York needs the Avengers more than Peter. Once the fight is over, then Peter can ask for help. Right now, he just silently pleads that he doesn’t bleed out under the pile of rubble.
Peter’s not sure how long he’s been stuck. He passed out after another explosion caused the debris around him to shift, and the jagged edge of a rock cut into his back. When he woke back up, Peter couldn’t feel the lower half of his body anymore, making the weight on his legs seemed like it had both increased and lessened at the same time.
It took a few minutes for Peter to notice that the commotion from the fight had died down. Relief flooded through him, and he fought back the tears that came with it. He still had to be rescued, celebrating would have to come after he was out from under the fallen building.
His breathing was still labored as he strained to talk. “M-mr. Stark.” He panted, a few tears slipping down his cheeks against his will.
“Hey, kid. Good job keeping the civilians away.” Tony said, sounding distracted. Of course the man is distracted, he just fought off a shit ton of alien hybrid things and now has to work with damage control to clean things up. Peter should have waited. “Go wait in the jet and let medical check to make sure you aren’t injured. I am almost done here, and then we can go.”
“Mr. Stark.”
“No, you aren’t getting out of the medical check. FRIDAY says your suit took some big hits, and I am not sending you home without an all-clear.”
“Mr. Stark.”
“Actually, I don’t trust you to go on your own. Where are you? I’ll come get you myself.”
“Y-you know the building that fell.” Peter whispers, not daring to talk any louder to prevent himself from whimpering.
“You’ll have to be more specific, kid.” Tony answered, and Peter imagined the man rolling his eyes. “There are at least 5 buildings that fell.”
The rubble around Peter shifted again, and he screams as the pipe lodged in his side, presses deeper inside him. “The...the first one.” He barely manages to say before his eyes slipped closed again, the pain becoming too much.
Peter bites his bottom lip, squirming under the gaze of the Avengers, who are all surrounding the hospital bed he’s in. He wishes the ground would open up and swallow him whole. May’s reaction had been bad when he first woke up - the guilt of making his aunt cry still eating away at him - but the intense stares of the heroes’ came in a close second.
The expressions on each of their faces vary from shocked to disappointed to angry. And Peter doesn’t blame them. If he thought he was surprised when he woke up to find that his identity had been revealed to the group, he can only imagine how they must have felt when they learned that a 15 year old kid is Spider-Man.
“You should have told us.” Steve finally said. “We would never have let you fight if we knew how old you are.”
“That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you.” Peter mumbles, stopping himself from rolling his eyes as he avoids Steve’s gaze.
“So all those times you called him ‘kid’, you meant a literal child.” Natasha scowled at Tony, turning everyone’s attention away from Peter. “You knew that he is a minor and you still gave him a suit?”
Scoffing, Tony leaned against the wall, crossing his arms. “I think you all should be thanking me instead of blaming me. The kid was wearing pajamas before I came along and I knew there was nothing I could say or do that would stop him. So, I figured a high-tech suit with hundreds of safety protocols was better than letting him fend for himself. Wouldn’t you agree?”
The room went silent as the team took in what Tony told them, several of them looking back and forth between Peter and Tony. “Is he yours?” Clint asked randomly.
“What?” Peter and Tony said at the same time.
“Biologically.” Clint clarified. “Are you his dad?”
“No.” Tony answered quickly, shaking his head. Not that he’d mind being Peter’s dad. The kid wormed his way into Tony’s heart and he liked to think of their relationship as more a father/son relationship than that of a mentor/mentee.
“Can we get back to the real problem here?” Steve asked exasperated, motioning to Peter. “He’s too young. He shouldn’t be out there fighting people or being crushed under buildings.”
Peter glared at Steve, feeling annoyed that the man was talking about him as if he wasn’t five feet away from him. Steve may be the ‘American Hero’, but doesn’t have any right to dictate what Peter can and can’t do. “I think I can handle myself just fine, Mr. Rogers. I may be young, but that hasn’t gotten in the way of anything. My age didn’t stop me from lifting the other building off of me or from stopping the plane full of Avenger tech from being stolen.”
The second he was finished talking, Peter knew he had messed up. He had been so careful to keep the first building a secret from Tony, knowing that the man would freak out more than what was necessary. And judging from the look on not only Tony’s face, but the other Avenger’s too, he had been right to keep that story to himself. Oops.
“The..the other building?” Tony squeaked, his voice cracking at the end.
“M-maybe you should sit, Mr. Stark.” Peter whispered, looking at the pale man who looked seconds away from passing out.
Nodding his head, Tony sat in the closest chair, then focused back on Peter. “What other building?” He growled through gritted teeth.
“Tony.” Natasha sighed tiredly. “You can question him later. We first need to know why Peter didn’t tell us he was trapped and hurt.”
Damn, Peter was really hoping they would skip over that question. He doesn’t know how to explain that he didn’t view himself as a priority at the time. That answer would only cause people to freak out more than they already were. It also doesn’t help that if given the chance to redo the situation, he wouldn’t do anything different - he would still wait until the fight was over, letting the group of heroes finish taking down the threat before he asked for help.
“Would you like to explain, kid?” Tony leaned back in the chair, quirking his head to the side, waiting for Peter to answer.
“Um, not really.” Peter sheepishly glanced at the man for a second, then went back to fiddling with his fingers.
“I wasn’t giving you an option.”
“It was worth a try.” Peter mumbled, slowly blowing out a long breath. He might as well get it over with. “You were all busy stopping the bad guys and that was more important.” He said with a shrug, hoping that acting nonchalant about it would lessen their reaction.
Tony gaped at him, opening and closing his mouth, unable to say anything as he processed what Peter told them. “Are you serious?” He finally exclaimed, looking at Peter like he had grown two heads. “Fuck the bad guys; there are enough of us to help you and take them down. Kid, nothing - and I mean nothing - will ever be more important than making sure every member of the team is safe.”
“But…”
“Don’t you dare say that you aren’t part of this team.” Tony cut him off, knowing exactly what Peter was about to say. “You might not be an Avenger, but when you are out there helping us, you are part of the team. Got it?”
Failing to suppress a grin, Peter ducked his head as he nodded. “Yes, Mr. Stark.”
“I don’t believe it.” Clint suddenly said, his eyebrows furrowed, looking at the two of them. “I don’t believe that he’s not your kid.”