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Peter’s pretty sure the last bad guy didn’t manage to inject him with that foul-smelling liquid, but Karen’s insisting he did, in that decisive, commanding way she has, probably taken from Friday’s programming. Luckily, he’s talked her around to not telling Tony and the others about his last encounter, only letting Karen check his vitals every few minutes until they’re sure the injection did nothing. (Not that Peter was injected with anything, he swears the guy missed.)
He’s only in his third class of the day, but he’s fine, he swears. Karen’s light blinks on in the side compartment of Peter’s watch, the one Tony built for him after the last kidnapping, telling him that he’s not doing as well as he thinks he is, but he’s out of absences and can’t skip any more class.
The room is spinning a little, like he’s on a Merry-Go-Round from Hell, and he can feel his heartbeat in his throat, in his mouth, on his tongue, like he’s throwing it up-- and, oh, there’s the nausea.
“Peter,” Ned’s hand meets his shoulder, a familiar warmth, and Peter feels like sinking into it and sprinting away at the same time, and he can taste his heart beat now.
Ned sounds concerned as he continues talking, his voice does at least, and Peter hates that he’s causing his best friend pain, but his muscles are locking now and his heartbeat is speeding up, and there’s so much noise in his ears, in his head, in his skull.
Then, suddenly, tortuously slowly, rapidly, the pain dulls and the sensations change.
He’s not in his classroom, not anymore. He’s cold, there’s snow on his skin, ice coating his back. It’s dark where he is, and he feels dread rise in his chest.
He knows this place, knows it from security videos in Tony’s Iron Man suit and an ill-advised trip into the cold when Tony wasn’t looking (that didn’t end well, ended with Tony wrapping his arms around Peter as they both cried into the snow, ended with a long talk and anger brewing in Peter’s heart.)
“Tony,” he says, feels it vibrate through his chest and up his throat, but he can’t hear it. “Mr. Stark, Tony”
There are hands on his shoulders. His knees hurt. His face is wet. He thinks he’s babbling, saying Tony’s name over and over again, but he’s so cold that he can’t stop himself.
Danger, Tony’s in danger, help him, save him, keep him safe, he’s in danger.
His Spidey Sense is going wild, the hairs on his neck standing up and practically vibrating. There are flashes of color in the corners of his vision, and he’s starting to get a glimpse of what has him so on edge, but it keeps changing.
It’s Captain America one second, his shield stained with blood, Ultron the next, then a younger Wanda with red on her skin, then a horrible array of all the people Tony’s been scared of in his lifetime, all repeating and circling and making Peter hyperventilate.
Peter feels like his whole body is a taut piece of rope, of metal, so close to snapping, and he knows one thing: he has to save Tony.
Tony, Tony, Tony, he thinks, and the hands leave his shoulders, letting him drift in the cold, this place that frequents his nightmares.
Ned doesn’t know what to do, he’s kind of freaking out.
His best friend is kneeling on the floor of this too-bright history classroom, panting and clawing at his clothes, muttering under his breath about how Tony Stark is in danger, and Ned is freaking out.
Luckily, MJ has always been good at acting under pressure, and she grabs Peter’s phone from his desk as Ned tries to calm Peter down. He hears her talking low into the phone, hopefully calling someone who can help.
“Stark’s on his way,” MJ says, tucking the phone in her pocket. She’s watching Peter with wary eyes, and Ned looks back at him to see what she sees.
Peter’s breathing has leveled out in the moment Ned looked away, and there’s a fog in his eyes covering his too-dilated pupils. He looks feverish, his skin flushed and sweaty. He’s not mumbling anymore, which is good, but he has his head cocked like he’s listening for something far away.
Uh oh. Ned doesn’t like the sound of that.
Peter can hear Tony, far away but close enough that if he focuses really hard, he can just hear the thrusters in his suit. He can save him, he will save him, protect him from all of the people who want to hurt him.
He gets to his feet, the air is cold, it feels like he’s breathing in ice. He can help Tony, protect him from the people who want to hurt him, the people like Captain America with a sickening grin and Obadiah Stane with a terrorist cell behind him.
So many people have hurt Tony Stark, but now Peter is here to help him, to protect him. He won’t let anything happen to his mentor now that he’s around.
His head cocks, Tony’s coming closer. Or is Peter getting farther? No, he can hear the chattering of teenagers even as his skin feels like ice and he scowls at the mirage of threats in front of him, Tony is definitely getting closer to the school.
Tony, Tony, Tony, protect, danger, protect, his mind is blaring an alarm as the thrusters of the Iron Man suit get closer.
Pieces of glass peirce Peter’s skin as he launches himself towards the sound, and the back of his brain notes that he just went through a window, on the third story of the school. But that’s not important, Peter needs to protect Tony. With his senses on full blast like this, even with the barrage of cold and the heartbeat in his ears, Peter can hear four other heartbeats alongside Tony’s.
Anger courses through Peter’s veins, and he tucks into a roll to absorb the impact with the hard ground.
“Peter,” Iron Man’s mechanical voice rumbles with an undertone of Tony’s voice, and Peter blinks through the light from outside to see Tony land the suit a couple feet away, “What’s wrong? Michelle called, said something weird was happening. Are you okay?”
Peter wants to collapse into Tony’s arms, wants to sob into his chest to hear his heartbeat, wants to tell him that everything will be okay, but his Spidey Sense is still going wild, and there are four other heartbeats to worry about that are threats to Tony, so Peter pushes Tony aside and places himself between him and the others.
Through his haze, Peter sees a glint of red, white, and blue, and he charges without thinking, the same way he dove through that window.
Steve goes flying into a tree a few yards away with the force of Peter’s hit, and there are cries of alarm and fear, but Peter’s still moving, still fighting his way through this group of threats to protect Tony.
Captain America almost killed Tony in Siberia, got close enough that the only reason Tony is still alive is Dr. Cho and a modified Extremis dose, and Peter is so scared, so angry, at the thought of the Captain hurting Tony again, killing him, that he jumps into the air and rips the Falcon’s wings off in a single move, dodging the punches that Sam throws in a desperate attempt to stay afloat.
Peter attacks the Black Widow next, activates his web shooters and uses his brute strength and his Spidey Sense until Natasha is stuck to the ground a few feet from where the Falcon landed.
The last heartbeat, too strong, alien, is Thor, and Peter retreats to Tony’s side, eyes locked on the alien who’s too powerful to take on alone, his back to Tony just in case Thor decides to attack Tony. Peter can’t let anyone hurt his mentor, his Tony, not even this all-powerful Asgardian God.
“You will not hurt him,” Peter says, and that back part of his mind that is still conscious, that small part, tells him that something’s wrong, that the fever is starting to make his limbs shake and falter, that his senses are rapidly shutting down and those black spots on the edge of his vision are growing bigger.
The cold grows stronger, the ice in his lungs is making it harder to breathe, but Peter stays standing, staggers backwards to lean against the warmth of Tony’s chest, and oh--
Why is Tony in the cold with him? There’s too much pain in the snow for Tony to be here with Peter. Siberia is too busy with memory and emotion, and Peter cannot let any of it touch Tony, he can’t, he can’t, he can’t.
There are warm hands in his hair, on his frozen face, on his shoulders, and Peter can’t help but melt into the touch. It’s so cold in Siberia, so much snow and ice. The warmth feels so good against his skin, and Peter can hear Tony’s heart, smell the motor oil on his clothes, feel the calluses on his hands.
Then it all goes dark.
Natasha thinks she underestimated the Spider-Kid.
After Tony flew Peter to Stark Towers, Thor ripped the rest of the webbing off of her. She tugs on one of the strands, pulls at it between two fingers. Huh. Smart kid.
She ignores the shouting from the kids in the school and instead glances towards the lump of Captain America. The kid got him good. Steve groans from his place below the broken tree and gives Thor a thumbs up to show he’s alright, and Natasha shakes her head.
Sam pulls himself to his feet and glances mournfully down at what used to be his wings, not mangled messes of metal on the ground. He sighs but nods when Natasha raises an eyebrow. He’s okay.
She clicks on her Comm, “Clint, arrange transport for our bruised Captain and Falcon. And check on the kid, would you?”
Sure, this untrained Spider-Boy just downed three trained fighters with various abilities, but he’s still one of theirs. And by the look of him, he was probably tripping on something powerful.
She likes the kid, even when he asks her too many questions and speaks Russian in a horrible American accent.
He better be okay.
Peter blinks his eyes open to a too-bright room and a horrible annoying beeping noise that’s following closely behind his heartbeat. His mouth is dry, it feels like he’s breathing through cotton.
“Pete, you with me bud?” Tony’s warm voice filters through the beeping.
Tony, Tony, Peter loves Tony.
“Ah, so you’re a little high, Underoos,” Tony says with a smile in his voice. “That’s the good drugs we used to flush the bad ones out of your system. Feel good, buddy?”
Yeah, he feels great, floaty, real good.
“Alright, get back to sleep, Pete.” Tony brushes his fingers through Peter’s hair. “I’ll be here when you wake up, promise.”
Hmm, that sounds good.
Peter closes his eyes as the darkness rushes back in, but Tony’s warmth keeps the cold away. He’s good like that, keeping Peter safe when he’s asleep, fighting off the nightmares.
Wait. Oh--
“Oh fuck, I attacked the Avengers,” he groans.
There’s laughter beside him, sounds like Natasha, and Peter burrows further into the cot he’s laying on. He feels rested, like he got some good drug-induced sleep. He must have been under for hours.
“It’s okay, маленький паук,” Natasha whispers, “though, I think we’ll have to rethink your training if that’s the kind of fighting you can do even when you’re drugged out of your mind. It was impressive, really.”
Peter groans and leans into Natasha’s palm on his cheek. She chuckles again, runs her thumb across his cheekbone.
“We don’t blame you, Spider-Kid, not even Steve, and he got the brunt of it. Sam’s excited about the new wings he’s going to tease you into making for him, and Thor is impressed with your ‘battle prowess,’ his words, not mine.”
Peter just whines, burying his face further into her hold.
“Tony made me promise to tell him when you’re awake,” Natasha says, “but he and Pepper are corralling the media into submission about not hounding you, since you’re a minor and all, so I thought I could not tell him, just this one time.”
Peter smiles, “He’s gonna be pissed.”
“Yes, he will be,” Friday announces from the speakers above, “but Boss and Ms. Potts are doing something important, so for now I will let it pass.”
“Thanks, Friday,” Natasha grins.
“Though it may be too late,” Friday says, her voice amused as an AI can be, “DUM-E has already alerted Boss to Boss Jr.’s awake state. That bot has eyes everywhere, he’s getting more paranoid every day.”
It's gonna be a long day.
Somehow, everything goes well. Peter sheepishly apologizes to Steve and Sam, Steve apologizes to Tony once again for Siberia, and Natasha and Clint leave to hunt down the drug dealers who have been selling their new fear-toxin, probably made by an up and coming super villain with a chemistry degree, again. The news is still going crazy about Peter Parker the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, but Pepper has enough hold on the media to make sure nobody bothers Aunt May, and Peter gets to stay in the Tower for a couple of weeks until the reporters settle down.
Peter's not really sure how he feels about it all, but Ned and MJ have talked to their classmates about not acting weird when Peter gets back to school, and he thinks that's the best he can hope for. After seeing Peter throw Captain America into a tree with superstrength, Flash doesn't seem to want to push Peter around anymore. Strange.
He's sure it'll all be okay when he goes back to school, after all, it's not like Parker Luck is cursed, right?