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“Mister Stark!”
Peter coughs when the smoke hits his mask.
“Karen, activate additional air filtering system,” he commands and shoots another web in the general direction of the closest building on the off chance of hitting something solid when he’s barely able to see his own web shooter.
“Ha,” he calls out victoriously when the string tightens and he feels the familiar pull on his shoulder joint. “On a swing and a prayer,” he grins to himself in satisfaction as he lands, crouching on a window, that some poor guy would have to clean again, and squints against the wall of smoke.
The smoke seems to originate right about where he has last seen Tony and Karen’s radar still shows the tiny Ironman figure in the same exact location but there’s no reaction from the man in question. Or at the very least movement or blasting.
“Mister Stark,” he calls out again and trusts Karen’s old footage to calculate his next web shot. He sticks the landing rather roughly but when he does, starts running up the building, again more in a random guess and at the very obvious lack of any other compelling option.
“That’s weird,” he frowns when he reaches the end of the smoke wall that was precisely cut off about 100 m off the ground. “Karen, have you ever seen cut off smoke?”
“I have not, Peter,” his A.I. replies, “I only see what you see.”
“That’s a good point.” He crawls along the side of the building, trying to peer into the seemingly impenetrable grey block of smoke. Without such luck. “Have you been able to establish communication with F.R.I.D.A.Y.? Or Mister Stark?”
“No,” Karen sounds contrite, “I am not able to contact either of them but as long as they are still on the radar I would conclude that F.R.I.D.A.Y.s system is still operable.”
“Figures,” he sighs, “How mad do you think Mister Stark would be about me jumping into a smoke wall without sight?”
Karen sounds amused, “I am certain he would try to discourage you from jumping into a smoke wall without sight, Peter.”
“Yeah,” he agrees contemplational, “I think so, too.” He straightens up at the top of the building and gently starts bouncing in his knees. “But he has been without communication for the last three minutes and it’s starting to annoy me. Karen, show me your best pictures of whatever awaits us down there.”
And, with one last look at the city behind him, he jumps into the unknown with only an inkling of where he is going.
“Mister Stark!” he yells, unsuccessfully squinting against the darkness. Slowly he starts his descent to the ground, positively surprised when nothing seems to be destroyed in his path.
With Karen’s help he maneuvers through the streets by jumping from one street lamp to the next until he gets to the place where the radar symbol is still steadily blinking in red and gold. He jumps down from the last street lamp and carefully puts one foot in front of the other on the off chance that someone’s in his way. Even though, from what he can gather it is eerily quiet and almost creepily empty.
“Mister Stark?” he calls out again.
Just as his own creepy echo in a pitch-black world is starting to freak him out, his foot his something with a loud (and painful) but familiar clonk. He crouches down immediately and, sure enough, it’s the Iron-Man suit.
“Mister Stark?” he worries when the man doesn’t move or answer, “Karen run diagnostics.” Before his A.I. can reply, however, three things happen in the span of about as many seconds.
First, the impenetrable smoke wall falls to the ground and completely vanishes.
Then, the sound of the city comes back. Their general area is cleared out but there’s honking and chatting and engine sounds in the distance. Even the smell reappears and Peter’s not sure if they couldn’t have gone without some of the nastier ones for another couple of days. His attention, however, is held by the third occurrence.
Mister Stark moves! And then his faceplate swings open.
“Mister Stark! I was worried about you! Why didn’t you have F.R.I.D.A.Y. call me? What even happened? You should’ve waited for me.” He breaks off when his relieved rambling doesn’t get interrupted as it usually is. He frowns because Mister Stark is talking. Or trying to at least.
He’s moving his mouth and then stops when he realizes, at the same moment as Peter, that no sound is coming out.
And then F.R.I.D.A.Y.s voice is in his head.
“Hello Peter. I have run all diagnostics and injury checks. Both the suit and boss are completely undamaged. But he seems to have lost his ability to talk.”
Mister Stark seems to be hearing his A.I.s assessment of the situation as well and looks ready to argue her but, again, when he opens his mouth, everything is silent.
“Uh oh.”
Mister Stark glares at him. He’s sitting up and, with a defeated sigh, starts moving his hands. He’s flailing them through the air with his index finger pointed and ends the movement with a decisive downward swish. The whole thing is a lot more entertaining for the sole reason that he’s doing all that still clad in his Iron-Man suit.
“Uh,” Peter frowns, “Are you trying to mime a wizard?”
Mister Stark nods enthusiastically.
“Oh! Nice! I mean,” he looks up sheepishly, “Not nice that you got bewitched but I think I did a good job at figuring that out.” He studies him intently for a moment even though F.R.I.D.A.Y. already gave him her assessment because there’s a hint of worry rising up. “Are you okay?”
At first, Mister Stark levels him with a what-do-you-think look but then his gaze softens and he simply nods. And, as if to emphasize his point, holds up a thumbs up.
Peter giggles. “Okay, okay, that’s good. How do we un-bewitch you? Do you know what happened or, like, what spell they used? Do you see their face?” He stops when Mister Stark is shooting daggers at him with his eyes, again. “Ah, right, sorry. Forgot you can’t answer.”
He’s still trying to think of a solution when Mister Stark pushes himself up from the ground and – it feels like an important addition to emphasize that he is still in his very high-tech, very deadly suit – starts moving around.
“Oh, I’ve always loved Charades!”
Mister Stark glares again but continues his motion of putting something around his neck.
“Uh, a scarf. You’re cold?” Head shake.
Now he takes whatever he put around his neck and puts it in his ear, then holds out his other hand and listens intently.
“You want to break into a safe?” Eye roll.
He holds up one finger and points to the not-scarf-thing. Then holds up his index and middle finger to indicate the start of the second word. Which he decides to start by circling his index finger at the side of his head and then waving his entire hand in front of his forehead.
Peter frowns. “I’m sorry, Mister Stark, but what the heck? Are you trying to insult me? I’m sorry to tell you but you’re no match to my middle school class mates.”
Mister Stark glares again which now seems to be his default look. But at least Peter knows what that one means.
He crosses his arms in front of his chest.
“You’re starting over?”
He nods and holds a thumbs up and they share a grin.
“See, I’m not so bad at this. Though, I’m starting to believe May and Ben only ever let me win.”
Mister Stark shrugs as if to agree but doesn’t let Peter reply before beginning to mime again. This time he holds out his left hand with his index and middle finger raised and then starts moving his other hand in front of it in a circling motion.
“Oh!” Peter exclaims, “You want to call Dr. Strange. That makes sense.” He stops. “Wait. How on earth where you trying to say Dr. Strange before that? Never mind. How do we contact him?”
He points to his head, then suit and then at Peter’s mask.
“Can F.R.I.D.A.Y. contact him?” Nodding.
“Nice! I think we’re getting the hang of this,” he grins, “F.R.I.D.A.Y. would you please call Dr. Strange and tell him where we are and that we need his help?”
“It’s my pleasure, Peter,” the A.I. replies kindly.
He has just turned back to Mister Stark to ask what their next move would be when F.R.I.D.A.Y. interrupts him again and moves her interface to replace Karen’s.
“Uh oh.” He stares at Mister Stark with wide eyes who seems to be clueless and worried. “Miss Potts is calling.”
They stare at each other for a moment.
“Do you want me to tell her?” Violent head shaking.
“Okay, okay, uh, I’ll just tell her, uh, something,” he says more to himself than anything else. “F.R.I.D.A.Y. accept call.”
“Tony?” Miss Potts worried voice is in his ear, “What the hell happened? I just turned on the news and they say you fly into black smoke and I couldn’t reach you. Is everything –“
“Uh, Miss Potts?”
“Peter?! Where is Tony?”
Mister Stark has his arms crossed over his chest and is eyeing him distrustfully. “He’s here?” he tries at first, then nods his head, “Yes, he’s here with me. And, in his defense, he didn’t fly into the smoke. The smoke came to him, basically. But he’s fine, I promise.”
“Okay, that’s great,” Miss Potts sighs in relief, “Can you please give him to me? I want to have a word with him.”
Again, Mister Stark furiously shakes his head.
“Uh, he can’t come to the phone right now. But I can deliver a message of whatever you want to say to him?”
“Peter, tell him to stop messing around and get to the phone.”
Mister Stark covers his face with both hands which Peter finds slightly insulting but even he realizes that this is not going to work out the way they had planned. Or not planned.
“There’s kind of a problem with that, uh, he can’t really… talk right now.”
“What?!”
“He’s fine, I swear,” he reiterates, “Just some wizard or witch got to him and now he can’t talk. And he’s horrible at Charades.”
Miss Potts laughs and relief swings in her voice. “You’re telling me I’m missing the only moment in time when Tony actually shuts up?”
“So, you’re not mad?”
“No, I’m not.” Mister Stark slumps back in relief. “But tell him we’re having words about fighting witches on a Wednesday later. Preferably as long as he can’t talk back yet.”
Before Mister Stark can fully get into his silent protest, A big orange circle opens up and a hand pulls them both through it without saying hello.
They step through on the other side and into the Santum Sanctorum of New York City.
“Woah,” Peter gasps, “This is so cool.”
Mister Stark, however, barely glimpses at the awesome interior and just meets the eyes of their host above Peter’s head.
“So, what have you two gotten yourself into this time?”