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As Peter sat beside his new mentor in the passenger’s seat of a very expensive car, he began to feel a little queasy. Nothing, in particular, had triggered it. He just tended to get car sick from time to time. He closed his eyes and swallowed a few times to help ease the nausea, but it wasn’t really helping. Tony liked to take the corners at an unreasonable speed and every time he did, his stomach flipped.
Under normal circumstances, he would ask whoever was driving to stop the car and give him a few minutes to collect himself or perhaps buy a soothing drink to sip at. However, the current circumstances were anything but normal. He wasn’t in the car with May or Ned’s mom or even Happy. He was in the car with Mr. Stark.
That hadn’t been the plan of course. Happy was supposed to have been the one to pick him up from school but apparently something had come up. Because when he’d opened the back door, he’d been surprised to see his mentor behind the wheel. Tony had smiled and waved him to the front saying that ‘he refused to be a chauffeur,' and he’d happily obliged. From there the man had started talking and hadn’t stopped for much more than a quick ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer since.
“Hey, you with me, Kid?” Tony asked, causing Peter’s eyes to snap open.
“Yeah. Definitely, Mr. Stark,” Peter replied with a nod of his head that he regretted instantly. The movement of his head had mixed poorly with the movement of the scenery outside of the windows, causing him to go from mildly uncomfortable to downright nauseous.
Tony had started talking again, something about steel alloy versus carbon steel, and Peter took a deep breath in through his nose. Then slowly dropped his gaze from the horizon to the clock. They were only twenty-five minutes into the hour-long drive. He was going to have to say something.
Just as he was about to open his mouth to say he wasn’t feeling well, Tony hit the gas, weaved between two small cars and sped past a large pick up truck to get past a cluster of building traffic. As he did so, Peter lost what little control he had over his stomach and gagged unexpectedly. He tried swallowing past it but a splash of sour liquid hit the back of his tongue causing his body to double in half all on its own as he vomited into his own lap.
“What the hell, Kid!” Tony shouted, his eyes darting back and forth between the road and the mess that was accumulating beside him. “Christ! You couldn’t have at least tried to give me some warning so that I could pull over?”
“I’m sorry,” he gasped, the moment he could get the words out and could feel the heat of mortification creeping up his neck, all the way to his ears. “I’m so, so sorry. I didn’t mean to- to do that,” he attempted to apologize, knowing he’d absolutely ruined the man’s car. Then he laid his head on the cool window and simply closed his eyes.
Feeling marginally annoyed and extremely unsure about how to handle the situation, Tony gritted his teeth and sighed.The kid’s cheeks were pink with embarrassment, maybe fever, but probably both and he suddenly felt bad for shouting. “Look, I didn’t mean it like that- I’m just- not really good at this kind of thing,” he attempted to backtrack.“-but we should probably- what? Take you home, right? You want to go home? Of course, you do. I’m sure your aunt knows what to do with all of, well, this,” he said, waving his hand haphazardly towards the passenger side of the car.
“Yeah,” Peter tiredly crocked, only then realizing that perhaps he was more than a little car sick. His body had begun to ache and he couldn’t stop shivering. “Home sounds good.”
Tony turned the car around, taking the speed down a notch when the kid whined at the motion. He took it easy for the short time it took to get back to Queens. And was relieved when they pulled up to the Parker’s apartment without further incident. Not that it mattered too much. He’d already decided he was going to burn the entire car to ashes and buy a new one to drive back to the compound after he’d dropped the boy off.
“What about the lab time, Mr. Stark?” Peter asked as he sluggishly opened the door.
Resisting the urge to get out and walk around the car to rush the kid out, Tony forced a tight smile. “We’ll reschedule. When you’re less-” The word ‘gross’ came to mind first, but he managed to catch himself before he actually said it. “-sick.”
Peter licked his lips and nodded his head. “Okay and I’m still really sorry.”
“I get it, Kid,” Tony flippantly remarked because he knew the situation was horrible for both of them and that it wasn’t actually the kid’s fault. So he made an effort to reflect that knowledge as he spoke. “Now go ahead and skedaddle. Stay hydrated and whatnot,” he said, shouting, “I'll be in touch!” through the window before driving off.