Work Text:
Chapter 1
"Parker."
..
"Parker."
..
"Parker!"
Peter slowly turned his head to face the man sitting across from him. The man looked old and utterly disinterested — just as bored with the situation as Peter was, if not more. The signs of exhaustion were etched into his face: deep wrinkles, sagging skin, and heavy bags under his eyes. With a tired motion, he set the few sheets of paper from Peters own report back down on the table. Then, sitting opposite Peter, he removed his glasses and rubbed his forehead, clearly trying to chase away the headache Peter had given him. .
"Son, please. I can't help you if you don't let me in."
The man waits a moment, searching for any signs of progress in Peters eyes. He receives nothing but the orbs of a blank canvas; like last time.
"Same time next week then, son."
"I'm not your son." Peter snarled as he shot to his feet, snatching his bag from where it sat beside a small decorative plant in the corner. Skipping any pretence of politeness, he shoved the door open and stormed out, brushing past Tony, who was waiting just outside the reception area.
Tony sighed, opening the therapists door back open to speak with the man.
"We're six weeks in, Michael. This isn't helping him." He stood by the door, not daring to enter the room that brings Peter so much distance in his head. "If it were, we'd see signs. Any. The boy hasn't even bothered to start a school examination, he's falling behind. Now, you know I care desperately about his health more than his grades, but I don't want him to have to repeat a year and this is what it looks like is going to happen. I mean, what are you even telling him in here? To open up, to.. to talk. I'm not paying you to have him storming out of the room as soon as you finish!"
Tony drops his head, nothing is spoken in reply from Michael opposite him.
"...I just want my boy back." Is what Tony came up with.
"I'll see you both next week, Stark. Have a good weekend."
"Yeah, I doubt it." Tony rolled his eyes and shut the door behind him. With a sharp exhale, he forced himself to head down the corridor, making his way to the car where Peter was waiting.
He loved that kid - more than anything - but Peter's pain was starting to bleed into everything, weighing down everyone around him. And Tony knew it wasn't fair to think that way. He knew grief wasn't something you could just snap out of. It lingers. It throbs. It changed shape but never really disappears.
Still, he wished Peter could understand that it does get easier. That the ache never fully goes away, but somehow, you learn to live with it. Tony had lost more people than he cared to count. He knew what it felt like to drown in it.
And god, he was trying -really trying- to keep Peter afloat. But the kid was deep under, and for the first time in a long time, Tony wasn't sure how to pull him back up.
The car beeps open as he makes his way outside, meeting Peter who was stood by the passenger seat. Tony got in the other side, sitting with his hands on the wheel, millions of thoughts running through his head, all of them stopping Tony from starting the engine. They just sat in silence as his fingers tightened over the wheel. Peter made no move to start a conversation, he just silently prayed that Tony wouldn't pry.
But he always does.
"Son-"
"Why does everyone keep calling me that?" Peter snapped, turning to face Tony with a look that could curdle blood— sharp, bitter, and burning with something uglier than anger. His expression twisted, all sneer and contempt, like he couldn't stand the sight of him.
"Stop," He spat. "I'm not your fucking kid, Tony."
The words came out like venom, but beneath the bite, buried under the rage, was a rawness he couldn't hide. Something broken. Something that didn't know how to be held without hurting.
Tony turned back to the wheel and started the engine. The ride back to the tower was in silence.
———
"I'm not the man for this, Pep," Tony said, his voice low and fraying at the edges. "He doesn't want me here. He doesn't want anything to do with me. He thinks that I can just bring them both back—like I did with him. But I can't."
He collapsed into the couch beside her, elbows on his knees, hands hanging uselessly between them. The words sat between them like something alive, sharp and unforgiving.
"He's such a bright kid," Tony murmured. "Why doesn't he understand that I can't do it, no matter how badly I wished I could?"
Pepper stood frozen for a beat, watching him fall apart piece by piece. Guilt twisted in her chest, not because she didn't care—she did— but because she didn't have a fix either. She wasn't used to seeing Tony like this: not angry, not deflecting, just... undone.
She stepped forward and gently pushed her fingers through his hair, a reflex more than anything. The motion was tender, but hesitant, as if she were afraid he might break beneath her touch. She wanted to say something, anything to make it better, to remind him that Peter's pain wasn't his fault, that grief never followed logic. But the words stuck to her throat.
All she could do was stay close. Sometimes that's all you can do. But it didn't feel like enough, not for Tony. Not for Peter. Not to the broken mess this had all become.
"It's late Tony.."
"You head to bed, I'll join you a bit later. Should clear my head.. "
"Don't do this. Please." She almost begged. Pepper pulled her hands from his hair and gripped his instead, holding them so tightly it might have hurt him— if he'd been feeling anything clearly at all. Her voice wavered, not with fear but with something far more fragile: hope, teetering on the edge of collapse.
"Don't shut yourself out," she said, eyes searching his. "Don't become one of your machines again. I can't go through that version of you, not again." She took a breath, trying to steady herself. "This boy—your boy Tony— he needs you. He's hurting. And if you disappear on us now? That's the last thing he needs. That's the last thing we need."
Tony let out a scoff, but there was no humour in it— only bitterness. His gaze dropped to their hands— hers tight, desperate; his, limp and unresponsive.
"Need me?" he muttered. "The kid despises me, Pep. I'm just a walking reminder of everything he's lost. And worse? I won't give him what he wants— I won't bring them back. Because I can't. So no, I'm not what he needs. I'm exactly what he resents."
He tried to pull away, but she didn't let go.
And in the quiet that followed, all that remained was the weight of it— the ache, the helplessness, and the truth that neither of them wanted to say out loud.
... Tony stood, Pepper sobbed in his disappearance.
———
It had been hours since the session, but the words still echoed in Peter's head—dull and heavy, like they were stuck there, refusing to settle or make sense. He lay on top of the blankets in the guest room—his room now, apparently—staring up at the ceiling like it might eventually give him an answer. The shadows stretched long across the walls, the sun bleeding out beneath the horizon. The silence around him wasn't comforting. It was loud.
Except it wasn't completely silent.
Through the floorboards, muffled but unmistakable, Peter could hear them—Tony and Pepper. They were arguing.
He didn't need to hear every word to know what it was about. His name kept surfacing in fragments, distorted by the walls: "he's just a kid," "you have to talk to him," "you're all he has left," and then Tony's voice, lower but sharper, "He doesn't want me."
Peter shut his eyes. He hated how his chest twisted at that.
He rolled onto his side, pulling the blanket halfway over himself even though he wasn't cold. It didn't help. Nothing helped. Not the bed, not the house, not even knowing someone was downstairs fighting for him.
He still felt alone.
He wished they'd stop talking. Or yelling. Or caring. He didn't know which hurt worse—the thought that Tony might give up on him, or the fact that he hadn't yet, and Peter still couldn't bring himself to let him in.
He pressed his palms hard against his ears, like he could shut it all out—the voices, the grief, the unbearable weight of being what was left. But even then, in the quiet of his own making, it followed him.
The ache. The guilt. The loss.
And the sinking fear that maybe this was just how life was going to be now.
The argument downstairs had quieted, replaced by the creak of footsteps on the stairs—measured, reluctant, and unmistakably Tony's. Peter didn't move. He kept his back to the door, eyes open, fixed on the wall, breathing shallow and quiet like he could somehow disappear into the silence.
A silence that didn't last. A soft knock sounded at the door behind him.
"Pete?" Tony's voice was tentative, almost careful. That wasn't like him. "Can I—" he paused, like even the words were fragile. "Can I come in?"
Peter didn't answer. Didn't even blink.
After a few moments, the door creaked open anyway. Tony stepped inside, hesitating in the doorway like he expected to be shoved back out.
Peter still didn't turn around. "Heard you downstairs," he said flatly. His voice was dry and sharp, like glass in his throat. "You two fight about me often, or am I just lucky today?"
Tony sighed, stepping further into the room. "We weren't fighting. We were—"
"—talking about how fragile I am?" Peter cut in, finally sitting up on the bed, his eyes dark with something closer to fury than sadness. "How I'm some charity case you have to deal with because my whole life fell apart?"
"That's not—"
"No? Then what is it, Tony?" Peter snapped. "You show up, save the world, bring everyone else back from the dead, and now you get to play Dad of the Year while I sit here rotting in someone else's guest room?"
Tony's jaw clenched. He didn't move from where he stood. "You know it's not like that. What I did with the Stones—what we did—it was a one-shot. A miracle. It's not... it's not a reset button, Pete."
Peter laughed. Cold. Hollow. "Yeah, well, maybe you should've saved it for people who actually mattered."
The words hung in the air like a punch.
Tony flinched, barely, but didn't leave. He just looked at Peter—really looked at him. Saw the anger, the grief, the complete unraveling of a kid who had nothing left but his rage.
"I know you're hurting," Tony said quietly.
Peter looked away. "You don't know anything."
Tony didn't argue. He just stood there, in the doorway of a room that had never felt like home, watching a boy who no longer knew how to let anyone help him.
Peter's hands curled into tight fists in his lap, his whole body trembling with the weight of everything he wanted to scream but couldn't. He stared at the floor, voice low but sharp, cutting through the silence like a knife.
"Stop pretending that you're going to help me. Everything that you can do, you won't. Maybe I don't care that I hurt, I just want them back and we have a way of getting them back and you're telling me you won't even try?"
"Peter.. it's not pos-", but Peter cut him off, suddenly pushing himself to his feet, eyes wild with desperation and anger.
"You have the tech. You have the power. You had the Stones. You brought back half the universe—brought me back." He spat the words out like they burned. "But now, when I ask you to bring back the only family I have left... you say it's impossible. You say it can't be done."
Tony's face tightened, pain flickering behind his eyes. "It's not about what I want or what I'm willing to do, Pete. It's about what's safe—what's real. The Stones—time—they don't work like a magic fix. You saw what happened last time. I can't risk breaking everything trying to undo this!"
Peter's voice cracked, fury mixing with heartbreak. "So you just won't help. Even when I'm falling apart?"
Tony took a step closer, his voice softer now, trying to reach past the anger. "I am trying, Peter. I'm here. I'm not walking away."
But Peter shook his head, tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. "That's not enough. You're not enough."
Tony swallowed hard, then reached out hesitantly, placing a tentative hand on Peter's shoulder. "I know it feels like I'm turning my back on you. But I'm trying to keep you safe—from breaking the world, and from breaking yourself."
Peter flinched but didn't pull away. The anger was still there, thick and bitter, but underneath it was something raw and aching—a desperate need for someone to hold him, to tell him it would be okay, even when everything was falling apart.
Tony squeezed his shoulder gently. "I can't fix this for you, Pete. But I won't leave you alone in it."
Peter let out a broken, bitter laugh, then buried his face in his hands.
Because he didn't know how to be okay without them. And maybe Tony couldn't fix that.
But at least he wasn't gone.
For a moment, Peter let the weight of Tony's hand on his shoulder settle—felt the sting behind his eyes soften as the tears threatened to spill over. But then, with a sudden sharp breath, he pulled himself upright and swatted Tony's hand away like it burned him.
"Don't," Peter snapped, voice rough and brittle. "Just... don't."
His eyes flashed with anger now, hard and unyielding. "I don't want your pity. I don't want you pretending like you're here for me when you're not willing to do what I need you to."
Tony's face fell, hurt flickering behind his steady gaze, but Peter didn't care. Not anymore.
"Stop acting like you can fix this with a pat on the shoulder," Peter said, voice rising. "Because you can't. No matter how much you want to convince yourself otherwise."
He turned away sharply, facing the window now, trying to choke back the ache still simmering inside.
"I'm not a kid you can just 'keep safe,' Tony. I'm the kid you left behind."
The silence that followed was heavier than any argument—filled with all the things neither of them dared to say.
Peter stood stiff by the window, his chest rising and falling in shallow, furious breaths. Behind him, Tony stayed silent for a moment too long, still standing in the middle of the room like he wasn't sure whether to stay or walk out.
"I get it," Tony said finally, his voice lower now, but firm. "You think I don't care. You think I'm making excuses. But I'm not choosing to leave them behind, Peter. I'm choosing to not lose you too."
Peter didn't turn around. "That's not your choice to make."
"You're right," Tony said. "It's not. But if I let you chase ghosts through time, you're not coming back the same—if you even come back at all. And I won't risk you for something we can't change. I won't."
Peter let out a bitter, hollow laugh. "Right. So I just live with it, huh? That's your solution?"
"No," Tony said quietly. "But you live. And I'll be here. Whether you want me to be or not."
Peter didn't reply. The anger was still there—hot, unforgiving—but it had dulled at the edges, replaced by something heavier. Something tired.
Tony lingered a second longer, then finally backed toward the door. "If you ever want to talk—yell, throw something—I can take it. Just... don't shut down, alright?"
The door clicked closed behind him.
Peter stayed where he was, jaw clenched, eyes burning. He hated him. He hated him for saying no. For being right. For staying.
He pressed his forehead to the cool glass of the window, eyes closed. Outside, the city didn't care about grief. Lights blinked on. Cars moved. The world turned, unbothered.
And Peter felt smaller than ever.