Archive of Our Own

It's been a weird day for Peter– not in a 'he'd fought a giant lizard in the subway on the way to school and was late to Spanish class' kind of weird, although that definitely happened.  In fact, even including the lab coat lizard in the subway, most of his day has been pretty normal.  It's what happens after school that Peter thinks is weird.

He gets out of seventh period shop class and pulls his phone out of his bag to unmute it.  He would prefer to keep it turned on at all times, but his last two classes of the day are robotics and shop class, both of which involve using sharp tools, and both of which have a strict no phones for safety reasons policy.  If he'd had it turned on earlier, he might have received the cryptic message he's staring at now.  He eyes the time.  It came in an hour and a half ago.

'Hey kid, it's Tony.  There's an emergency.  Call me back at this number.'

The sender claims to be Tony, but it's from an unknown number that Peter doesn't have saved in his phone.  It doesn't make any sense that Mr. Stark would be texting him from a random number.  It feels like a trap more than anything.

Peter reads the message two more times and then dials the number.  He thinks that whoever it is is going to let it ring out, but just before he's certain he'll be sent to voicemail, someone answers and says, "Go for Stark."

"Mr. Stark?"  It definitely sounds like him.

"Pete?"

"Yeah, yeah it's me Mr. Stark.  You said there's an emergency?"  Peter looks around him to see if anyone's listening.  The halls are already mostly clear, most students eager to leave once the final bell had rung for the day.

"Lab emergency.  I need you here."  Peter can hear the strain in his voice.  He doesn't mention how it's not a lab day, he just says that he needs Peter there, and Peter isn't going to turn him down.

"Sure, I'll be there."

"Great, thanks."  He hangs up without a goodbye, and Peter pulls the phone away from his ear to stare at it, just to be sure that the call has ended.  Lizards in lab coats in the subway, and now this?  He and Mr. Stark aren't close, but Peter has been to the lab enough times now and spent enough time with the man that he knows something is up.  He plays over the conversation in his head again… the way Mr. Stark's words had been short and strained.  There doesn't seem to be any hidden meaning behind his words… no: 'I'm being held hostage at the tower by aliens from outer space.'  Still, something is wrong.

Peter hurries down the main hall and out the front doors.  He expects to see Happy there waiting to take him to the tower, because if Mr. Stark needs him for something, Spidey related or otherwise, he always sends Happy.  Happy isn't there though.  There's no black SUV waiting to take Peter into Manhattan.

Peter would like to just swing across the city, but his suit is kind of trashed from that morning's encounter with the non-native lizards of the New York City subway system.

Instead Peter jogs to the nearest subway and takes a train, and then a bus.  The bus drops him off a block from the tower, and then he jogs the rest of the way.

If getting a weird call from Mr. Stark from an unknown number had been weird, the disarray and chaos that Peter finds as soon as he walks through the front doors of Stark Industries is downright bizarre.

Inside the lobby, all of the computer systems seem to be down.  Lights are flickering on and off in an irregular pattern, there's a crew trying to pry one of the elevator doors open, and security is manually checking people off on printed lists in big thick white binders.  Whatever is going on, Peter thinks that this is probably why Happy hadn't been there to pick him up.  Nothing in the lobby seems to be physically broken, so Peter doesn't think the building came under a physical attack.  He wonders if it had come under a cyber attack.

Peter approaches the front desk.  There's a small line of people waiting to be let in, and a long line of people waiting to be checked off on their way out.  The five security officers at the desk appear to be frazzled, especially as more people come into the lobby from the stairwells.

After five minutes, the two people in front of him are allowed entrance to the building, and then it's Peter's turn.  He would have just gone to the stairwell, but he feels like he's walking into this situation blind.  He has no idea what's going on, or what exactly Mr. Stark needs his help with.

"Name?" the frazzled security guard asks.

"Peter.  Parker.  Peter Parker," he rambles.

"If you have a lanyard this will go faster."

"I don't."  He's never needed a security lanyard before.  Usually he goes in through the parking garage and up the private elevator that goes to the upper levels where Mr. Stark's lab and penthouse are located, but this is the fastest way in from where the bus had dropped him off.

The guy glances up at Peter, eyes sweeping his face, his hair, and his ratty hoodie.  Then without comment, he starts flipping through the pages of the massive white binder.  From what Peter can see, it's an alphabetical list of names.  He gets to P, scans down it with his finger, double checks, and then says, "You're not here, kid.  What's your business?  We're kind of busy as you can see."

"Mr. Stark called me.  I'm his intern."

The guard pauses, finger going still where it's still trying to find Peter's name on the list of allowed employees.  He looks up at him again.  "Mr. Stark doesn't have an intern, and if he did, that intern would have a lanyard with a clearance card."

Peter shifts from one foot to the other, hand gripping the ratty shoulder strap of his backpack.  He's not sure what to do here.  Whatever is going on, he doesn't want to call Mr. Stark to get him in.  The man must be busy trying to take care of whatever has caused all of this.

Peter steps aside, because there's a new person in line behind him, and pulls out his phone to call Happy.  Unlike Mr. Stark, Happy picks up on the second ring, voice terse.  He's half shouting into the phone.  "What?"

"Uh, hey, it's me.  Peter.  Parker.  Mr. Stark wanted me here, but I can't get in at the front desk.  I'm not on the list, and I don't have a lanyard?"  He says it more like a question.  He's never been through this process at the front desk before.

"Stay put."  That's all Happy says before he too hangs up on Peter without so much as a goodbye.

It's less than a minute later that the security guard's phone is ringing.  It's a different guard than the one Peter had dealt with.  He picks up, listens intently to whoever is on the other line, and then he looks up and scans the area, eyes landing on Peter.  "I understand sir," he says, and then hangs up.  He motions Peter over to him.  "Parker?"

"Yeah?"

"What's going on?" the man that couldn't find Peter on the list before asks.

"Mr. Hogan said to let the kid in.  He said his name is on the gold list."

"Really?"

The guy flips to the very back of one of the white binders, past at least 500 pages of paper.  On the very last page there's a short list.  Peter leans forward to see if he can read what's printed there.  Five names: Tony Stark, Pepper Potts, James Rhodes, Happy Hogan, Peter Parker.

Both of the guards look up at him again, like they're not sure what to make of him.  "Got any ID?" the first guard asks.

Peter shakes his head, but the one that had spoken to Happy on the phone says, "He doesn't need it.  Mr. Hogan said to let him in."  The guy gives Peter an uncertain look, then leans forward and motions towards the elevators.  "Good luck, kid.  Wherever Mr. Stark is, you're going to have to hike up to him.  The elevators are down and it's 93 stories to the top."

Peter nods, thinks about asking what's going on, changes his mind, and then decides to ask anyway.  "Why are the elevators down?"

"Everything is down.  Mr. Stark's AI went down about four hours ago.  The AI controls just about everything in the tower."

Peter's eyes widen.  "FRIDAY?  Wait, she's down?"  He looks around again, and tries to take it all in, lights still flickering above him.  He doesn't give the guards a chance to answer and takes off towards the nearest stairwell, almost running into several people making their way out and looking tired, like they just came all the way down through the tower on foot.

As soon as he's in the stairwell, he stares up above him at the never ending flights of stairs.  He'd like to put his web slingers on, but he can hear people still coming down through the stairwell.  Instead, he starts up the stairs and makes it up five flights before he pauses to listen again.  It sounds empty for at least twenty floors above him for the moment, so he drops to the ground to rifle through his backpack, pulls his web slingers out and straps them on before pulling his hoodie back on to hide them.  He pauses to listen again, and when he's certain that no one is in the stairwell above him, he aims up the open column of the stairwell and begins to web himself upward, ears alert for people coming down.

Twelve flights of stairs up he has to pull himself back onto the stairs and start walking again because he hears a door open and several people come out.  He passes them two flights up, and then begins to web himself upwards again.  Peter is positive that if FRIDAY is down that Mr. Stark will be in his lab or FRIDAY's server room, which are both across the hall from each other on the 90th floor.

All in all, it takes him about ten minutes of webbing himself up, pausing to wait for people to pass as he walks, and then webbing upward through the tower again.  He makes it to the 90th floor and has to stop because everything above 90 is restricted.  The stairwell simply ends at a door that Peter can't currently access because it has an electronic lock which FRIDAY controls.

He stares at the lock for long moments, trying to decide what to do.  He's sure he can break it, but isn't sure if it's the right move.  He thinks again about calling Mr. Stark to ask, but is afraid that he'll interrupt him at a critical moment soldering wires or something.

Peter reaches forward to the handle and wrenches on it.  It doesn't break.  He should have known better than to think it would be easy to get in.  He presses down on the little piece that should open the door and then reaches forward with his other hand and starts to twist the entire handle.  At first, nothing happens.  He braces his feet and twists harder, and finally hears the metal of the door start to groan.  He applies more pressure, and finally the handle shifts slightly, but not enough to break the mechanism holding it in place.

He steps back and stares at it, and then decides to twist it the other way.  It shifts back into place and then the metal starts to groan again.  He ends up having to twist it back and forth, applying all of his strength before it finally gives way and he rips the entire handle free.  The door still isn't open, but that's ok.  He reaches into the hole in the metal door he's just created and feels around for the latch inside, and then presses it down.  The door pops open only to reveal another, smaller stairwell, and another door.  He tries this second door and finds that it too is locked, but is not as difficult to break into now that he knows how.

Once he has it open, he finds himself in the hallway with Mr. Stark's lab and FRIDAY's server room.  The door to both are open, and some light is spilling out of the server room.  He can hear the tapping of keyboard keys coming from within as he heads down the hallway.  He peeks into the server room and finds a mess of wires on the floor, criss crossing from cabinet to cabinet full of electronic equipment and servers.

"Mr. Stark?"

"In here."

Peter goes inside and walks along several rows of tall server cabinets before he finds Mr. Stark sitting on a plastic crate that looks like it was brought across the hall from the lab.  He has a laptop on his knees that's hooked up to a thick wire leading into a server.  The room is warm… not hot, but warmer than a server room should be.  Normally rooms like this are kept cold because servers put off so much heat that cold air has to be pumped in.  With FRIDAY being offline, then temperature control must be offline too.

"Hey," Tony greets him, not looking up from his computer screen.  He's tapping in lines of code, fingers flying across the keyboard.  "FRIDAY is down and everything is a mess."

"Did we get attacked?"

"I don't know yet.  I need your help getting FRIDAY back online, but first I need you to go find Pepper and make sure she has access to the upper levels and the penthouse."

"The doors are locked.  I had to break two of them to get in."

At this, Tony does look up at him.  "You broke in by yourself?"

Peter nods.

"Did you hack in?"

Peter lifts his hands up and wiggles his fingers, and Tony gives a nod.  He looks a little impressed.

"For future reference, if you're inside trying to get out, you can just push the door open, even if the power is out or FRIDAY is down.  You'll have to break into a few more doors so Pep can get up to the penthouse though since you're working your way up through the tower.  First go find her and make sure she's ok.  She was probably on level 72 when FRIDAY went down.  That's where her office is.  Her phone is controlled by FRIDAY too so it's completely down and I haven't been able to contact her."

"Happy's phone is up."

Tony pauses typing again and looks at Peter.  "It is?"

Peter nods.  "I had to call him to get him to let me in."

"Mmm.  He was out of the tower when FRIDAY went down.  He had to take care of a few things."  Tony looks around the server room.  "That changes things.  It might have been a focused, localized EMP that sent us into a tailspin and might also explain why I've been having trouble rebooting the servers."

He looks up at Peter, nods his head sideways towards the door, and says, "Come back after you find Pep and get her access to the penthouse."

"Yes sir."

Tony sighs.  "Cut it out with the sir, kid."

Peter doesn't know what to say to that, and Tony is typing away on the keyboard again, so he turns and leaves.  He heads back out into the private stairwell, and then the main stairwell, and starts heading down through the tower.  He has eighteen floors to get down, but luckily going down is a lot easier than going up.

He doesn't encounter anyone else in the stairwell as he descends, but there are a few people in offices once he makes it out of the stairwell and onto the 72nd floor.  He stops a harried looking man who is speedwalking towards the stairwell and says, "Is Miss Potts still here?"

He points behind him.  "Her office is at the end of the hall."

"Thanks."

He passes a few people working, marking things down on paper since the computers are down, but the floor is otherwise empty.  That is until he reaches the end of the hall and finds the door to Miss Pepper's office standing open.  There are twelve people inside, all writing things down as she lists off things that need to be done.  He doesn't want to interrupt, but Mr. Stark had told him to get Pepper and take her upstairs to the penthouse.

He stands in the doorway awkwardly for several moments until one of the people inside notices him and says, "Miss Potts, you have a visitor."

She looks up from her own notepad, full of handwritten notes, and says, "Peter, you're here.  Is everything ok?"

"Mr. Stark wanted me to come get you."

She stands up, tells the employees gathered around her large office that she'll be right back, and follows him out into the hallway, shutting the door behind her.

"Is Tony ok?"

"Yes maam.  He wanted me to help him get FRIDAY back up, but told me to come check on you first and then break the doors open to get you through to the penthouse.  They're all locked down because FRIDAY is offline."

"He called you to come help him?"

Peter nods and says, "Yeah, but it was from a different number.  He said his phone is down and he thought yours was too.  Happy's phone is still working."

"Can I have Tony's number please?"

Peter pulls his phone out and opens his call history, and then follows Pepper back into her office so she can get a pen and a piece of paper.  "Happy's number too please," she says after she writes down the number Tony is using.  Peter gives her that number too and then she looks up at him with a smile and says, "Thank you Peter.  I'll call Tony.  For now I have things to deal with here, so I won't be done for some time.  Go ahead and do the rest of what he told you to do."

Peter nods and backs out of the office.  He closes the door behind him, but before it shuts, he hears someone ask who Peter is, and Miss Pepper say, "That's Tony's personal intern.  He works with him in the lab."

"Mr. Stark has an inter-" the door clicks shut and he doesn't strain to hear through it, even though he could if he wanted to.

When Peter is faced with hiking eighteen floors back up again, he decides to web himself all the way up.  There's no one in the stairwell this high up at the moment, and he really doesn't feel like hiking up and down through the tower any more than he has to.  He feels bad for all the employees this high up that had to hike all the way down to leave work for the day.  If they don't get FRIDAY back up, he wonders if work will be canceled the next day for them, or if they'll have to climb all the way back up through the building again.

When he makes it to the 90th floor, he doesn't stop.  He breaks open the stairwell door to the 91st, 92nd, and 93rd floor, and then the door to the penthouse.  He feels bad doing it.  Mr. Stark will have to replace all of the locking mechanisms once FRIDAY is back up again.  At least now Miss Pepper will have access to the penthouse when she's done with work for the day.  Peter has only been into the penthouse once, and that was after a late night patrol gone wrong.  He'd come to the tower looking for Mr. Stark and hoping that he had enough first aid supplies to stitch up a gash on Peter's forehead.

He heads back down three floors to the hallway with the lab and server room, but as he enters the hallway, the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.  He turns and stares at the broken door leading to the stairwell.  Anyone can get in here now.  Anyone that makes it past security and up through the tower can march right into this hallway and into the lab, or up into the penthouse where Miss Pepper will be.  All of Mr. Stark's security systems have been rendered null and it will be Peter's fault if someone dangerous gets in.

He passes the open door to the server room where he can still hear Tony typing away, and goes into his lab.  He's been coming for lab days twice a week for the last six months, and knows his way around the large private lab.  Usually they work on Peter's suit or the Iron Man suits, but sometimes Tony lets Peter work on personal projects, or Peter helps Tony with things that are being developed by R and D.

Peter heads to the workbench that has been loosely designated as his and starts pulling drawers open, looking for the things he needs.  He'll be in the server room with Mr. Stark and won't be able to hear or see people going up the private stairwell to the penthouse or other levels.  He needs a device to monitor the stairwell and notify him when someone comes up.  It doesn't need to be fancy, it just needs to work.

He gets out a soldering iron and then goes to one of Mr. Stark's workbenches and starts rummaging around in drawers until he finds an old prototype for a Stark Phone model that is now outdated by two generations.  He pulls the phone apart and sets to work creating a little watching and listening device.  He doesn't move back to his own workbench, and instead uses a laptop at Mr. Stark's to do some quick coding.  It takes him twenty five minutes to get it working, and another five to test it.  It's ugly, but it will have to do.

He scrounges around and finds a roll of duct tape, and then heads back out of the lab and to the private stairwell.  He climbs up the wall above the door leading into the main stairwell, and then tapes the device to the wall.  People coming in from the main stairwell won't see it, but the camera in the old phone will see them coming in and send a notification to Peter's phone with a picture of who entered the stairwell.

As he climbs down, his phone starts going off, sending him notifications of movement.  He moves out of the stairwell before he checks it, and finds several up close shots of himself.  Task accomplished, he goes into the server room and finds Mr. Stark lying on the floor.  He has several server centers pulled out of a cabinet near the floor, and is inside the cabinet on his back working on something.

"That you, kid?"

"Yeah."

"Hand me the T5 bit."  Peter looks around and doesn't see it.  Tony's hand appears from under the server cabinet, waiting.  When Peter doesn't hand it to him, Tony says, "Check the crash cart down at the far end.  It should have one if you can't find the one I was using."

Peter goes down several rows of cabinets and finds the crash cart.  Tony is right, there are all kinds of tools here and two sets of bits.  He finds a T5 and brings it to him.

"Great," Tony says.  He finishes what he's doing, wiggles his way out from under the cabinet and says, "How much do you know about servers?"

Peter shifts nervously.  "Almost nothing."

"Time for a crash course then.  Half of the internals are fried and we're going to have to replace it all.  I have the parts in my lab, but I can't do it all myself."

Peter nods.  Tony taught him to solder, and how to use the proprietary language he codes in.  He taught him how to use almost every tool in his lab, and dozens of other things.  He's a good teacher, and Peter is a fast learner.

"Servers 101," Tony says, and Peter looks up to meet his eyes, intent on learning everything he needs to as fast as possible.

* * *

Peter has made three dozen trips to the lab across the hall for parts, has pulled apart two full cabinets of servers (out of fifty), and has fixed exactly nothing after two hours.  It's not for lack of trying, it's just that these things take time, and he's not as fast at fixing things as Mr. Stark is.  Mr. Stark is in another row of cabinets working silently and diligently to get things up and running again.  Peter has pulled things apart meticulously, setting all the bits and pieces in their own piles, and is intending on tackling two cabinets at a time assembly line style.  Once they're completely apart, he thinks he can move quickly through each server replacing parts, and then assemble the servers back into the cabinets again.

His phone buzzes, and he pulls it out, worried that it might be a notification from the device he'd created.  He's right.  There's a photo of Happy entering the private stairwell.  "Happy is coming," he says.

"You can hear that?" comes Mr. Stark's voice.  Peter can't see him, but he's just in the next row over.

"He's in the private stairwell."

Tony's head pops around the end of the row.  "I didn't know you could hear that far.  Or over the sound of the servers."  FRIDAY is down, and the servers are all screwed up, but several of them are still on and are humming noisily.

Peter flips his phone around.  "I built a trail cam to notify me since I had to break the doors all the way up to the penthouse."

Tony looks at him for a moment, and then says with a slight frown, "Good thinking."

"Security is important."

"Did you set up boobie traps too?"

"Goonies never say die, Mr. Stark."

Tony huffs a laugh and then goes back into his own row of cabinets.  "Wasn't sure kids your age still watch that movie."

"Uncle Ben and I used to watch really old movies together."

Tony sighs.  "It's not a really old movie."

"Sure it is," Peter says, unscrewing a piece to one of the servers he's disassembling.

"Kid-" Tony is cut off by Happy appearing from the hall.

Happy gives Peter a wary look, eyes moving around the two hundred parts and pieces of servers littering the floor in a circle around him where he sits, and then he passes by to Tony's row and says, "How close are we to fixing this?"

"We?" Tony asks.  "Who is this we?  Pete and I are moving as fast as we can."

Happy sighs.  "All right.  Just so you know, all but thirty two employees are out of the tower.  Twelve of the people remaining are security.  We've got all the entrances and exits covered.  Pepper is still in her office with two aids and her personal assistant, and there's a big group of IT guys asking if you need help."

"No, not with FRIDAY.  They should be busy tackling some of the SI servers on the 41st floor."

"They are.  That server room looks like this one."  Happy's eyes travel around the mess of wires and components littering the floor.  Tony's workspace looks much less organized than Peter's, and Happy had thought that Peter's workspace was a mess.

"Is it all hands on deck down there?  How many guys stayed to fix it?" Tony asks.

"Seven, and they called in back up.  Five more people are on their way in."

"Good.  They'll have the SI servers back up and running before we have FRIDAY up."

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

"Just keep doing what you're doing."

"Right."

Happy comes back into view at the end of Peter's row of cabinets, and asks gruffly, "Did you call your aunt?"

"I texted her."

"Good."

Then he leaves, and Peter gets a notification a minute later from his phone, and looks just to see a still frame of Happy entering the stairwell again.

Peter wishes they had backup coming to help them.  He wonders how big the SI server room is if seven guys isn't enough to tackle the problem.  He'd give anything to have seven guys helping them.

"You doing ok over there, Pete?" Mr. Stark calls.

"Yeah, I'm good."

"If you have any questions, let me know.  It's better to ask then to do something wrong and have to go back and fix it."

"I'll ask," Peter promises.  He'd spent over an hour already disassembling several servers with Tony and learning how to replace the fried components and then how to reassemble them.  He'd asked a lot of questions, some several times over.  He thinks he has it all down now.  There's more to learn and more to do to fix FRIDAY, but for now they're just tackling fixing the physical components.  There will be coding and troubleshooting to do later.

* * *

"C'mon," Tony grumbles, irritated.

Peter hears a tool clatter to the floor, and Tony grumbles again.

"Do you need help?"

"No.  FRIDAY isn't going to come back up if I can't fix the C17 server though.  More of this server is fried than the other ones."

Peter gets up from the mess of components he's sitting in and goes down the aisle and then around the corner so he can see Mr. Stark.  He looks up at Peter and then waves him over.  He points out several blackened circuits and melted wires.  "The server room is FRIDAY's soul, but this server is where her personality subroutines are stored."

Peter grimaces.  He likes FRIDAY, and hearing Mr. Stark say that her soul has been fried and might not be fixable makes him sad.

"We'll fix her Mr. Stark."  Peter finds an empty space to sit down next to him and decides to hand him some tools.  His stomach grumbles uncomfortably.  He's not sure what time it is, but he hasn't had anything to eat since lunch.

Tony watches him as he settles into place, and when Peter looks up at him, finds the man looking uncertain, or confused, he's not sure.  Usually if Peter catches a glimpse of something like that on Mr. Stark's face, it's gone in an instant, wiped away and replaced with a smirk or a neutral expression.  Not this time though.

"You gonna help me with this?" Tony asks, leaning back a little, like he's trying to get a better look at Peter, or size him up.

"Yeah, tell me what tools you need and I'll hand them to you."

Tony frowns, looks down at the server he's working on, and says, "Ok, let's start by swapping out the CPU's.  Give me a fresh one out of the box and grab the thermal paste."

Peter reaches into the box of CPU's and pulls the plastic container it's in apart.  They fall into a comfortable silence, like they often do in the lab when they're working on something interesting.  This isn't the relaxed atmosphere of the lab… Mr. Stark is tense in a way Peter has never seen him be before, but Peter is happy to sit here and help him, especially if it means saving FRIDAY's soul.  He wonders if a part of FRIDAY is still active, passing through the servers that are still up and running, humming with energy and pumping heat out into the overwarm room.  He thinks about her watching them in the way that only FRIDAY can, pulling apart the servers where she's stored and piecing her back together bit by bit.

* * *

After they get C17 fixed and back in place, Tony says they don't need to wait to try to get FRIDAY up and running again.  He sends Peter back to continue fixing the servers in another row and then sits down on his upturned crate with his laptop to try to reboot FRIDAY.  Peter can hear that it's not going well, but there's nothing he can do to help Mr. Stark because he doesn't yet know how to tackle the issue from the software side of things.

"Doesn't make any sense," Tony says to himself.  "She should be up by now."

"Maybe she has the blues."  It's not a helpful comment.  Peter knows it's not, but he feels like he should say something.

Tony reaches over and pats a server cabinet on the side, the one with server C17, and says, "It's ok sweetheart, we'll get you fixed up."

In his own row, Peter reaches over and pats a cabinet in solidarity with Mr. Stark and FRIDAY both.

* * *

From the time Tony called him and told him that FRIDAY was down, it took Rhodey three hours to talk his way out of the Accords Committee meeting he was in, another hour to get home, and then four hours to drive to New York.  Then, because life hates him sometimes, he was faced with an insane climb up through Stark Tower.  The climb would have been hard for anyone, but for a man with mechanical leg braces, it was torture.  He'd stopped off on his way to the tower for food, because he knows Tony, and knows that when he's in the midst of a crisis or a big project, he forgets to eat.  By the time he finally makes it up to the 93rd floor (about an hour), the food is cold.

He stares at the empty hallway leading to Tony's lab and the server room.  The lab is dark, but there's light spilling into the too warm hallway from the server room, so he thinks that's where he'll find his best friend.

"Hey Tones, you in here?"  Before Tony can answer, he spots a teenager, arms deep in wires.  He's going to ask who the boy is but Tony answers him first.

"Back here, Platypus."

Rhodey walks down the rows of server cabinets and finds Tony sitting at the crash cart at the far end of the room.  There are parts and wires strewn around the floor in this row too.  "I came as soon as I could.  Here, dinner."

"Dinner?"  Tony blinks up at him.  "What time is it?"

"Nine thirty."

He blinks several more times, like his brain is trying to catch up with the fact that the day has come and gone, but then he reaches out for the paper McDonald's bag and says, "Thanks."  He rifles through it, comes out with a burger, and says, "Is one of these yours?"

Rhodey shakes his head.  "It's all yours.  What can I do to help?"

Tony hands him the bag back.  "Take this down to the kid.  He's probably starving."

"Who is he?"

"Peter."

Rhodey pauses for a moment, but then heads back down to the other end of the room.  Peter has untangled himself from the mass of wires and looks up at the bag of food rather than at Rhodey.  "Here, this is for you."

"Thanks, Mr. Colonel Rhodes sir."  Peter pulls several fries out of the bag and starts eating them, ravenous, like he hasn't eaten in a week.  For all Rhodey knows, he hasn't.  He doesn't know much about the kid, only that he's Spider Man and that he's been helping Tony out in the lab for a few months.  Rhodey has asked Tony about him, but Tony never has much to say other than that he's smart, and that he's a good kid.  He's been curious about Peter for a while.  He'd asked Pepper once too, but all that Pepper had said was that Tony was trying hard to keep Peter at arms length.  She hadn't said why, but Rhodey thinks he knows.  His best friend has a hard time letting people get close to him.  Tony was like that in college, but even more so after finding out that his godfather had tried to kill him (and had then attempted it a second time) so that he could take over the company.

Rhodey has a dozen questions he wants to ask Peter, but that will have to wait.  FRIDAY is Tony's baby, and it's clear to Rhodey that he's upset and stressed out.  He's pretty sure that Tony has been in here all day trying to get her up and running again since she crashed at eleven that morning.

He goes back to the end of the room and sees that Tony's burger is sitting half eaten on the edge of the crash cart.  "Eat your dinner man.  Tell me what you need and I can get to work."

"Coffee," Tony says.  "Lots of coffee."

"I meant with the servers."

"Caffeine," Tony reiterates, almost demanding, picking up his cold cheeseburger to take a bite and then setting it back down again.  "Go find a barista from Starbucks and bring him up here to make coffee on the spot.  Get a guy with a mohawk and tattoos.  They make the best coffee.  And find more food for the kid.  He has a fast metabolism.  I can't believe it's after nine already."  He says the last bit to himself, like he's upset that it got so late without him noticing.

"I'll make a pot of coffee," Rhodey says.  "I'm not hiring a barista."  He goes to Tony's lab, finds an empty coffee canister and an almost empty coffee pot.  He sighs at the prospect of having to hike up another three levels to the penthouse, but that's exactly what he does.  He expects to find Pepper up there, but when he gets there, the penthouse is empty and dark.  She must still be at work, trying to put out the fires that FRIDAY being down all day has created.

He grabs two bags of expensive coffee, three clean mugs, and then heads back down to the lab and sets to brewing a fresh pot.  He's grateful that the lab is cooler than the stifling server room.  If they weren't in a skyscraper they could have some windows that open to let some cool air in.  He's tempted to break out the window at the end of the hall just to get some air flow.  He's only been on this floor for twenty minutes total and he's already sweating.

When the coffee is brewed, he brings the three mugs and the entire pot to the server room.  Peter doesn't even ask, he just makes grabby hands towards the coffee and Rhodey lets him take an empty mug and then fills it up for him.  Peter takes a long sip and then disappears back down the row of servers he's working on.  Tony does nearly the exact same thing a minute later.

"Gimme."

"How about thank you?" Rhodey asks.

"Thank you.  Gimme."  Tony makes grabby hands towards the pot of coffee, and Rhodey snorts.  He wonders just how much time Peter and Tony have been spending together lately.

"What next?  What can I do?"

"We were attacked.  I wasn't sure before, but I am now.  Half the hardware in every server is fried.  We've been replacing it but there's still more than a hundred servers to fix.  There's also DNS poisoning.  They must have hacked in right before the targeted EMP went off.  I still don't know how they did that by the way… how they affected only the tower from the thirtieth floor and up.  Happy checked, none of the surrounding buildings were affected.  Everything is overheating since FRIDAY controls the environmental systems and she's down, and there's three separate viruses competing for my attention right now that were sent into her servers.  The IT guys down on 41 are dealing with all of the same issues on the SI servers, though they're having to eradicate a completely different virus that is bent on stealing data from the legal department, specifically patents stored on several servers."

Rhodey lets his mouth hang open for long moments.  "That's- a lot."

Tony huffs.  "Yeah."

"Have you called anyone else to help?"

"Bruce.  I left a message."

"Mm."  As far as Rhodey knows, Bruce has been MIA for the last two months.  He'd shown up to help Tony and Rhodey in Germany six months back, but had dropped off the map after that.  Tony had mentioned seeing Bruce two months ago, but Rhodey doesn't know where.  He doubts Bruce will turn up to help.  He's kind of surprised that Tony would call Bruce for help with FRIDAY at all.  Rhodey thinks that FRIDAY is even more important to Tony than any of his Iron Man suits.  Then again, Rhodey hadn't realized that Tony was close enough to Peter, or trusted him enough to muck about in FRIDAY's servers.  Maybe he's wrong about Bruce too, or maybe he's just desperate.

Rhodey rolls up his sleeves, trying to cool off, and then heads to the only row of server cabinets that doesn't look like a bomb went off in there.  "This row hasn't been touched yet, right?"

"Right," Tony calls.  "Cabinets that have been repaired have a pink sticky note on them.  Anything without that still needs to be looked at."

"It's been a long time since I've done work like this man," Rhodey says.

"It's like riding a bike.  Ask Peter if you need help," Tony says from the next row, still tapping away at the keyboard on the crash cart.

Rhodey doesn't want to, but ten minutes later, he does end up asking Peter for help.  He'd rather ask Peter other questions, like how much time he's been spending with Tony, and how he ended up with powers, but for now, helping Tony figure out how to fix FRIDAY's servers is his priority.

* * *

"Oh my God," squeaks Peter's voice.  He's two rows of cabinets down from Rhodey and Tony.  Tony is on his back under a server cabinet trying to re-wire something and Rhodey is in a chair next to him that he'd dragged in from the lab, trying to fix a reboot loop of C27.

Tony pauses, slides out from inside the cabinet, and says with a frown, "What did you do, Roo?"  Peter doesn't answer, and Rhodey looks down at Tony and the anxiety written all over his face.  "Talk to me kid, what's going on over there?"

"The Dr. Banner just came up the stairwell," comes Peter's excited voice.

"Psh."  Tony sighs and then wipes his face with a sweaty hand.  "I thought something was wrong."  He goes to slide back under the cabinet again where there's barely enough space for him with several server trays removed.  From underneath he mutters, "You never talk about me like that anymore."

Peter comes around the corner a minute later and says with a smirk and a voice of admiration, "Oh my gosh Mr. Colonel Rhodes sir, we're in the Tony Stark's tower!  Can you believe it?"

Rhodey smirks and Tony drops the tool he's using on his face.  "Kid-" he groans.

Peter goes back to what he's doing, though he keeps his eyes up on the door, waiting for Doctor Banner to appear.  He does a minute later.

"Tony?"  He spots Peter first, just like Rhodey did, and Peter gives him a starstruck look before pointing towards the other side of the room.  Bruce frowns lightly, but then moves forward to find Tony.

"Hey, I got your message, what can I do to help?"

Tony doesn't even come out from inside the server cabinet.  He just says, "Coffee.  Lots of coffee."

And that's how they spend their night.  Rhodey gets up to make coffee, Tony explains the situation to Bruce, along with everything they've fixed so far and what they're still working on, and then Bruce sets to work and is soon elbow deep in wires and server components.  It's after eleven PM when he arrives, and after two thirty when Tony finally gets rid of the last virus, fixes the DNS issue, and is able to reboot FRIDAY's systems.

When he's certain that FRIDAY is actually up and running, and that her subroutines haven't been tampered with and that her personality is intact, Tony leans back in the chair at the crash cart and sighs in relief.  "I'm glad you're ok sweetheart, you had me worried," he says up to the ceiling.

"My apologies, Boss," comes her reply, and Tony sighs again in relief.

Peter comes around the corner to where Tony, Rhodey and Bruce are sitting, working on laptops, and grins.  "We did it, Mr. Stark!"

Tony gives him a smile.  "Sure did, kid.  Things all squared away with B2?"

"There's still some pieces to replace in the B cabinets, but it's looking good."

"We can tackle that tomorrow.  Why don't you go clean up that row for now?  Throw all the damaged components away."

"Sure, Mr. Stark."

Peter disappears, and when he's out of sight, Bruce says in a low tone, "Seems kind of young to be an employee."  It's more of a question than a statement.

Tony frowns, and says, "Oh my gosh, you're right."

"Here we go," Rhodey mumbles.

"Who the heck are you kid?  You're not an employee!  How'd you get in here!"

Peter doesn't come back.  Instead he calls from several rows away, "I'm a Goonie.  I thought you knew that!  Hey, is there any more coffee?"

Tony looks at Rhodey and asks, "How many cups did he have?"

"Ten!" Peter calls.

Bruce gives Tony a questioning look, but he ignores it for a moment and says, "No more coffee for you.  Any more and your blood will be straight caffeine."

Peter doesn't answer, and Bruce asks again, "So- who is he?"

"My understudy."

Bruce just stares at him.

"He's my intern."

Before Bruce can ask, because Tony still hasn't given him any real information, Rhodey pipes in with, "His name is Peter Parker, he's 16, he works with Tony in the lab, and he's Spider Man."

Bruce raises his brows, and throws a thumb over his shoulder towards Peter.  "He's Spider Man?" he half whispers.

Tony nods, leaning back in his chair and closing his eyes.  He's tired, and now that his task is complete, exhaustion is hitting him full force.  It's the first time all day that he's had a chance to relax.

"Tones, why don't we call it a night?  I'm sure the kid has to get home."

Tony's eyes fly open, and he looks panicked for a moment.  "Shit.  The kid.  I didn't even think about him being here this late."  He lifts his head up and sits up straight.  "What time is it?"

"Almost three," Bruce supplies.

Tony gets up and heads down to the other end of the room where Peter is picking up the mess of wires and components scattered on the floor all the way down the aisle of server cabinets.  "Hey, it's almost three in the morning kid.  What's your aunt going to think?  I have to get you home."

"I told her it was an emergency and she said I could stay as long as I needed."

Tony blinks at him a couple times, and then frowns.  "She's ok with you staying this late?  Isn't it a school night?"

"She caught me coming in after two last week from patrol.  She said she'd rather know I was here than out there."  He shrugs.  "She said since this was a legitimate internship thing that I could miss school tomorrow as long as it doesn't happen too often.  I have straight A's anyway and haven't missed any days yet this term."

"You went to school the day after you got that gash on your forehead?"

"Yup!  It healed overnight!"

"Mm hm," Tony murmurs, not quite sure that he believes him.

"I can finish up here Mr. Stark.  It's ok, really.  I told May that the servers were down and she checked in a couple times tonight.  She's working a night shift anyway and won't know when I get home.  I can just swing home after I'm done."

Tony knows that May often works nights, but he's suddenly uncomfortable with the thought of Peter going home this late to an empty apartment, or staying by himself in an empty apartment at all.

Tony steps out of the server room for the first time in hours and walks across the hall to the lab. He shuts the door and asks FRIDAY to put up a privacy barrier, grateful when he hears the low hum of the barrier go up because it means that FRIDAY is back and is all right.  He pulls out his phone and finds May's number.  He has it in case Peter is ever seriously injured and has to stay the night in the Med Bay, but has never had to call it before.  He feels nervous calling the number now.  Peter's aunt must think poorly of him for keeping Peter so late that he won't be able to go to school tomorrow.

The phone rings for so long that he thinks it will ring out to the voicemail, but May finally picks up.  "Hello?"  She sounds cautious, and Tony can't blame her.

"Uh… hi, this is Tony.  Stark.  Peter is ok, I just wanted to call and let you know that we're done.  I'm sorry for keeping him so late.  We were working and I didn't realize how late it was until a few minutes ago."

She's quiet on the other end for long moments, and Tony wonders if she hung up or they lost connection.  He's just about to check when she says, "From what Peter said it sounded like the tower was about to come crashing down around you if he didn't help."

"That's- yeah, that's pretty close.  Lights, elevators, security systems… it was all down due to a targeted cyber attack.  Pete helped me re-build an entire server room and get it all back up and running."

"Well…" she trails off for a moment.  "I'm glad he was able to help you then.  You know, this internship means a lot to him.  He would do just about anything you asked of him."

Like lie to his aunt and fly off to Germany, hangs there unsaid between them.  Yeah.  He still doesn't feel great about that one.

He clears his throat, uncomfortable talking to this woman he doesn't know about a kid that he really doesn't deserve to spend time with.  "I won't send him home alone.  I can drive him.  But if it's ok with you, I was going to ask if he can stay the night in a guest room.  We ate dinner but I wanted to feed him again and make sure he got enough to eat.  I'd drive him back in the morning after he wakes up."

She's quicker to respond this time.  "I'd appreciate that.  I'll call him out of school in the morning so he can sleep in.  Just make sure he gets home before two in the afternoon tomorrow when I have to leave for work."

"Will do, thanks."  He waits for her to respond, but she doesn't, so he hangs up.  She's probably busy since he called in the middle of her shift.  He stares at the phone like it's a creature that bit him… a snake or something.  He's surprised that Peter's aunt hadn't yelled at him for being selfish and irresponsible.

"This internship means a lot to him.  He would do just about anything you asked of him."  Maybe that's the part of the conversation that's bothering him.  He's barely done anything for the kid.  He doesn't know why the internship would mean anything to him at all.

He goes across the hall to the server room again, and finds Rhodey rubbing a knot out of the muscle in his left leg, and Peter and Bruce still cleaning up.  "Leave it," he says.  Let's order takeout and go to bed."

"I could go for food," Bruce says, sounding tired.

Rhodey gives Tony a raised brow.  "Three AM is early for you to go to sleep."

"I promised the kid's aunt," Tony mumbles.  He's just as exhausted as the rest of them.  Even Peter is looking a little worse for wear.

"You ok with Bruce staying in your apartment tonight?" Tony asks Rhodey.  "I promised the kid the guest room in the penthouse."

Peter pops around the corner at this, looking interested.  "I can just go home Mr. Stark, you don't have to find me a place to sleep."

"I cleared it with your aunt.  Plan is set, kid.  Food, then bed, then Happy or I will drive you home in the morning."

Peter looks surprised, but gives a single nod, bundle of cut up wires in one hand and a trash bag in the other.

"Put those down.  We'll finish cleaning up tomorrow."

The four of them head up to the penthouse.  FRIDAY has food arriving just ten minutes later, and again, Tony is beyond grateful that she's back up and running.  He hadn't even asked her to order food, but she must have heard them talking about it and ordered takeout from the closest restaurant that's still open.

They eat in near silence, too tired to talk, and then twenty minutes later, Bruce and Rhodey disappear into the elevator to go down to the 81st floor where Rhodey has an apartment next to Happy's.

Pepper is asleep in the master bedroom, Tony had checked when they'd come in earlier.  All that's left to do is show the kid to the guest room and then go to sleep himself.

"Guest room," Tony says, leading Peter to a room just off of the kitchen.  "There's a private bathroom, and locks on all the doors."

"Thanks, Mr. Stark.  I'll be really quiet, I promise.  I won't cause any trouble."

Tony takes a step back to look at the tired teenager.  Trouble?  Yeah, Peter can be troublesome when he's out as Spider Man, but just as Peter his intern, he's anything but trouble.  "You're fine, Roo.  Get some sleep."

Tony turns to leave so Peter can shut the door, but Peter stops him with, "It was cool getting to spend the night hanging out with you and Doctor Banner and Colonel Rhodes."

Tony snorts, turns, and says, "Hang out?  That wasn't hanging out kid, it was just work."

Peter doesn't seem to have heard him because he's already kicking his sneakers off to climb into the large bed in the guest room.

Tony pulls the door shut and leaves him to sleep.

Pepper doesn't stir when Tony enters the dark master bedroom a minute later.  She must have had an equally exhausting day.  He wonders how many points the SI stocks dropped just from the tower being shut down for the day.  She'll probably be dealing with the fallout from this for weeks.

He doesn't bother getting changed.  Like Peter, he toes his shoes off and flops down into the bed in the dark room.

He wants to go to sleep, but the events of the day keep circling his mind.  He'd expected Rhodey to come when he could, because Rhodey always comes when he needs help.  And he'd been hopeful that Bruce would come, though not entirely certain that he would.  He's known for a few months that Bruce is staying up in Buffalo because Tony has been paying for his apartment up there, but hadn't known if Bruce would come when he'd left a message on his phone asking for help.

Peter though… he thinks back to leaving a message for the kid in the middle of the day, and then thinks about what May had told him an hour before.  "He would do just about anything you asked of him."  Yeah, he'd been certain that Peter would come too.  He's not sure when he moved Peter from the, 'kid I barely know and don't want to know,' into the 'few people I trust' category, but he's there now.  He'd never considered showing Peter FRIDAY's coding or her server room, but when FRIDAY had gone down and he'd needed help, it hadn't been a question about whether he trusted Peter enough to let him see FRIDAY or not, he'd just called and then waited for Peter to get out of school and come help.

Peter had been there with him in the server room for hours upon hours, late into the night to the point that he'd skipped patrolling, skipped going home, and was up too late to go to school the next day.  He counts back in his head and thinks that the kid was there working with him for eleven hours straight.  Tony had needed him, and Peter had answered his call for help.  No questions asked, he was just there and had somehow cleared it with his aunt to be there late into the night.

Tony doesn't have many people in his life that he believes will drop everything and just be there for him.  Pepper, Rhodey, and Happy.  That's it.  He has a few other friends, like Bruce, but he's never believed that if he really, truly needed them that they would be there.

And until today… until this very moment, he hadn't realized that Peter was on that very short list of people he could count on.

Tony has been trying his hardest to be one of the people that Peter can count on, even though he hadn't been there for the kid before… had taken his suit and let him be crushed by a warehouse… had let him deal with the Vulture all by himself and be involved in a plane crash.  Peter who has nobody else but his aunt and his friend Ned.  Peter who had needed Tony to be there then, so Tony is doing his best to be there for him now.

But then Peter had gone and flipped the tables on him and had come when Tony had needed help.  The kid hadn't complained about being tired, or hungry or bored, he'd just been present and willing to help.

"He would do just about anything you asked of him."  Tony has done barely anything for this kid.  He has no idea why Peter would be willing to do so much for him.  He's Tony's intern, but he doesn't get paid.  But he still shows up when needed the most.

"He would do just about anything you asked of him." "He would do just about anything you asked of him." "He would do just about anything you asked of him."  May Parker's words play through his mind as he finally falls asleep.  Peter is willing to do anything Tony asks, but Tony has no idea why.

* * *

It's after eleven the next morning when Tony wakes up.  Pepper is gone, already down in her office working, according to FRIDAY.  Peter on the other hand is still asleep.

Tony crosses the penthouse and knocks on the guest room door.  "Pete?  You awake in there?"

There's a shuffling sound from the other side of the door, and then it opens to reveal Peter, looking tired, hair sleep mussed.  "Yeah Mr. Stark, I'm awake."

Tony huffs a laugh.  He's pretty sure his hair looks just as bad as Peter's does right now.  "C'mon.  I promised your aunt I'd get you back before this afternoon.  We'll grab food on the way."

Peter perks up instantly at that.  "McDonalds?  Can it be McDonalds, Mr. Stark?"

He motions back into the room for Peter to get his shoes.  "Whatever you want.  Grab your shoes."

Thirty minutes later, they're most of the way to Peter's apartment, and Peter is nearly done with a large paper sack of food from McDonalds.  He's made his way through two large fries, three cheeseburgers and a small pie.  Tony hopes it's enough to fill the bottomless pit of a stomach that Spider Man has.

When they turn onto Peter's street, Tony says, "Thanks for coming to help last night.  It was a lot.  Long hours."

Peter shrugs and turns with a grin.  "No problem, Mr. Stark.  I'm your intern right?  That's what interns do!"

Tony frowns, fingers gripping the wheel hard for a moment and then relaxing again.  No.  Normal interns wouldn't work that hard, or that late, not without pay.  Not at the drop of a hat.

As he pulls up in front of Peter's building and stops the car, his mind is still racing.  He still can't come up with an answer to his question of why Peter would do just about anything he asked… or why the kid's aunt is so sure of that.  The only people willing to help him like that are his friends.  Rhodey.  Happy.  Pepper.  Maybe even Bruce.

"No kid," he says as Peter reaches for the door handle.  "I think you might actually be my friend."

Peter freezes, still mid reach for the handle.  When he turns back around, he's giving Tony the same star struck look he'd given to Bruce the night before when he'd come in.  The kid hasn't given Tony that look in quite a while… not since a couple months after starting to work in the lab with him.

Tony shifts in his seat, uncomfortable with the attention suddenly.  He's about to suggest that Peter hurry inside so he doesn't worry his aunt, when a smile spreads slowly across Peter's face and turns into a grin.

"See you later, Mr. Stark."

"Later, kid."

If Peter bounds up the steps into his building thinking loudly to himself, "I'm friends with Iron Man!!!!" Tony will never know, though he has a feeling.  He smiles to himself a little as he pulls away from the curb to head back into Manhattan.

* * *

Peter greets him as soon as the elevator doors open and Tony steps inside.  "Hey, Mr. Stark!"

"When are you going to drop the Mr. Stark bit and call me Tony?" he asks, looking down and tapping a message into his cell phone as the elevator starts to rise.  It's later than they normally meet for lab time, almost five thirty, but Peter hadn't seemed to have a problem with being asked to come later than normal.  Tony had had a late meeting to attend, and he's pretty sure that Peter spent the extra time after school out patrolling.

"When are you going to stop calling me Roo?"  Peter returns easily.

"Never."  He taps out one last message into his phone and then looks up and makes sure that FRIDAY isn't carrying them up to the lab, since that's not their destination.  He catches Peter grinning out of the corner of his eye.

"So what are we doing in the lab today?"

The kid hasn't yet noticed that the elevator has passed the floor with the lab.  It's been three days since he's seen Peter.  They haven't had any lab days since the all nighter they pulled trying to fix FRIDAY and piece her back together.

"Nothing.  We're not going to the lab."

"We're not?"  Peter frowns as the elevator doors open to reveal the penthouse.

"You're late!" Rhodey calls from around the corner in the kitchen.

"Yeah yeah," Tony murmurs.  "We're doing dinner," he says, turning to Peter to answer his question.

Peter raises his brows, confused.  "Dinner and then the lab?"

"Just dinner, kid.  A movie maybe.  No work, no lab time, just hanging out.  Real hanging out, not sitting on a server room floor for eleven hours straight."  (Or sixteen in Tony's case).

They round the corner and find Rhodey, and Bruce standing at the kitchen island pulling open almost a dozen containers of Chinese takeout.  Tony is watching Peter's face instead of eying the counter full of food.  Peter's eyes light up when he realizes he's been invited to just hang out and spend time with them, no work required.  He thinks again about May's comment about Peter being willing to do just about anything Tony asks.  Tony thinks, now that he's seen Peter's face light up at this and at being called his friend, that he'd do just about anything to see the kid's face light up like this again.  And maybe, in a day or two, he'll be able to admit to himself that he organized this whole thing just to see the kid grin like this and give him that look again like he'd hung the moon and the stars.

"Fried rice or chow mein?" Rhodey asks, pointing to the boxes of food.

"Both?" Peter asks more than says, testing the waters.

Rhodey pushes both white boxes of food towards Peter along with a plate, and Peter goes up to the kitchen island, still grinning to himself.  He's quiet, too shy to talk to Bruce and Rhodey.  He'd been like that with Tony at first in the lab too.

After the initial shyness had worn off in those early days in the lab, Peter had tried to laugh and joke around with him, but Tony hadn't responded in kind.  He'd told Peter to focus on the things they were working on, or had asked him questions until he was certain Peter knew the rules, and how to code, and where the fire extinguishers were in case the lab was burning down.

He hadn't wanted to see Peter's relaxed side… the side of him that jokes and laughs, and talks about his personal life.  In fact, Tony had tried hard to shut all of that out, not wanting to get any closer to the kid than he had to in order to watch out for him as Spider Man and work with him in the lab.

But Peter had shown up when he'd needed him most.  He'd been there even though he didn't have to be… was getting nothing out of the transaction in return.  And May had given him a little glimpse into Peter's personal life despite him not wanting to see.  "This internship means a lot to him.  He would do just about anything you asked of him."

And despite not wanting to laugh and joke around with him, Peter had continued to do that anyway over the last few months, and earlier in the week up in the server room.

Tony had felt nervous and uncertain about inviting Peter up here to spend time with them.  Doing this would put a definite end to holding the kid at arm's length.  It's not often that he has occasion to just be himself with those that aren't Pepper, Rhodey or Happy, and more recently Bruce.  It's not often that he lets himself care about anyone else's personal life outside of his close friends.

"So what are we watching?" Bruce asks, his own plate already piled high with food.

"Die Hard," Rhodey suggests.

"Nuh uh," Tony says.  "The kid and I vote for Goonies."

Peter looks up from where he's putting food on his own plate, eyes alight.

"Seriously Tones?  Goonies?" Rhodey asks.

"Goonies never say die, Mr. Colonel Rhodes sir," Peter pipes in.  "Mr. Stark and I are both Goonies."

Rhodey points at Peter.  "Is he for real?  Is he gonna be like this all night?"

"Kid's not wrong," Tony says.  "Two against one."

Bruce clears his throat.  "I haven't seen it.  What is it?"

Tony points at Bruce and says triumphantly, "Three against one.  We win.  FRI, cue up Goonies.  Pete, you wanna fill Bruce in?"

Tony carries his plate of food to the living room, and as Peter follows, he explains the basic plot to Bruce.

"It's this really old movie about pirates and boobie traps, and there are these bad guys chasing the Goonies and-"

Tony settles in on the couch, Rhodey grumbling in a chair across from him. Bruce and Peter follow, Bruce listening attentively, trying to keep up with the teenager's rapid words.  Tony remembers suddenly that he has something for Peter, and pats his pockets until he finds it.  "Here," he says, pulling out a lanyard with an ID badge on it.  He hands it to Peter, who has taken a seat next to him.  "Put this on."

Peter stops talking about the movie and looks down at what Tony is trying to give him.  "This has your name on it, Mr. Stark."

"Happy is still making yours.  You can use mine in the meantime."

Peter looks up at him, confusion written across his face. "You don't mind?"

He motions impatiently for Peter to put it on.  "Don't lose it.  This way the next time you come in the front you'll have a badge and can just come right in.  Security knows not to mess with you."

The lanyard is black with a gold clasp.  The ID card is black and has Tony's name in simple gold lettering at the bottom.

Peter puts it on, still looking uncertain.  Bruce and Rhodey are both watching with curiosity.

"Uh… Mr. Stark?"

"Yeah?  Movie's about to roll kid, make it quick."

Whatever Peter is about to say, he decides to keep it to himself for now.  He smiles to himself instead.  Peter's smile is all that Tony wanted in return for that lanyard and ID badge, which now has Peter's ID attached to it as well as his own in FRIDAY's system.

"Got nothing?" Tony asks.

Peter shakes his head and stuffs a spoonful of fried rice into his mouth, still smiling.

"Roll it FRI."

"Yes, Boss."

FRIDAY is up.  Three of his five good friends are sitting with him, ready to enjoy dinner and a movie.  And the kid is still smiling.

Life had been terrible three days ago, but today, Tony thinks, life is good.