Peter and Harley sat on Peter's bed in the tower, listening to Christmas music and talking about what Peter's going to do while Harley's with his family in Rose Hill for Christmas. They wore matching pajamas, of course, because Tony's eternally over the top, and munched on the cookies that they'd helped Steve make earlier.

"I can't believe you're going to be gone for a while week!" Peter pouted. "That's, like, forever."

Harley laughed, reaching up to smooth Peter's hair. "That's nowhere near forever, darlin'. It's only seven days. I'm sure Tony's going to put you to work so hard that you won't even notice I'm gone."

Peter flopped down onto Harley's lap, rolling so they could make eye contact. He pouted harder. "He's not going to be able to put me to work. I'm going to look out the window for you for the whole week like dogs do when their owners are gone."

"You'll be fine."

"No I won't."

Harley bent over to peck Peter on the lips. "You will. If you're not, MJ promised me she'd come over here and do a Hallmark movie marathon with you."

Peter gasped. "She wouldn't!"

"We both know she would," Harley smirked, looking at his watch. "Oh, won't you look at the time? I've gotta go." He gently shoved Peter off his lap and hopped off the bed.

Peter groaned as he followed. "I know you're going to have a great time with your family and all, but I'm still going to miss you."

Harley picked up his bag. "I know. I'll miss you too, but my ma wants me home for the holiday."

Peter sighed. "Yeah, I get that. Everyone wants you for Christmas."

Harley laughed and kissed Peter again before leaving the room and heading towards the elevator, calling behind him, "care to walk me down?"

"Of course." Peter jogged behind him until he caught up and took his hand. "Let me take your bag."

Harley raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

"Because my parents raised me to be a gentleman."

"And not because you're going to make a rash decision involving it?"

Peter looked at him incredulously. "Of course not!"

Harley eyed him suspiciously. "You sure?"

"Yes."

Harley gave him the bag and they entered the elevator, where Peter eyed him with his big doe eyes. "What if I come with you?"

"Then you'll get all dependent on me and won't be able to do anything without me ever again, sugar."

"Is that so bad?"

"Yes."

Peter huffed. "I pulled out the eyes and everything! What's a hormonal teenager to do?"

"You're to celebrate Christmas. With the fucking Avengers. Maybe you've been numbed to them, but that's really, truly, extremely cool."

"I guess."

:/ (hey look, it's Rick!)

Harley was right. It was really, truly, extremely cool.

Peter woke up on Christmas morning to the smell of Bucky's special eggs and bacon and the sound of Christmas music gently coming from FRIDAY's speakers. Tony opened the bedroom door and let himself in, coming to stand by the bed and ruffle Peter's hair. "Morning, underoos. It's half past nine and everyone's up except for you and Clint." He held up a Nerf gun. "Want to come wake him up with me?"

Peter stretched like a cat and sat up. "Sure!"

"Great." He dropped a soft package covered in Iron Man-themed wrapping paper on Peter's lap. "Put these on first and meet me in front of his room in five."

Peter rolled his eyes at the paper but smiled. "What's in it?"

Tony smiled back at him with a wink. "You'll see."

He opened the package as Tony left the room. It contained a festive pajama set with a pattern made up of Christmas trees and snowflakes. He quickly threw them on and brushed his teeth before running to the door to Clint's quarters, where his dad followed soon after in pajamas that were identical to Peter's.

Peter snorted and rolled his eyes. "Really?"

Tony kissed his son on the head. "Yes, really. Your mom has a matching set too. She thought it was a great idea. We're taking a photo and it's going in the SI newsletter." He held a Nerf gun out to Peter and grabbed the door handle. "Now, are we going to stand around talking about matching pajamas, or are we going to traumatize an Avenger with Nerf darts?"

Peter took the Nerf gun. "I choose traumatizing the Avenger."

Tony nodded. "I've never been so proud."

He threw the door open and the father and son sneaked in, remaining completely silent until they'd reached opposite sides of the bed. Peter gently took the blanket that covered the sleeping Clint and mouthed three, two, one.

He threw the blanket off, yelling "open fire!"

It was a massacre. Clint, in his bright purple pajama pants, was defenseless as the two pummeled him with darts at painfully close range. He was jolted awake by two figures in matching Christmas-themed pajamas, and Peter would bet that for a moment he'd thought he was under attack by actual foes in even weirder costumes than usual, but no, it was just his man-child of a coworker/landlord and the actual child of that man-child, possibly here for some revenge for something or other, more likely here for completely unsolicited torturing. He screamed at a pitch that could quite possibly only be heard by dogs and Peter.

Eventually, though, they ran out of darts, and Clint wanted an actual reason as to why he'd been woken up.

"Everyone else is awake and we want breakfast," Tony answered simply. "Bucky won't let us eat until everyone's ready, so of course it became our mission to wake you up." He threw a Christmasy t-shirt at Clint. "Merry Christmas, now put that shirt on and get to the kitchen."

Clint grumbled something about the hour, but obliged as Tony led Peter out.

Tony smiled, the corners of his eyes crinkling. "Ready for Christmas chaos, kid?"

Peter smiled back. "Yeah!" He paused for a moment, though. "Wait, can I call Harley before breakfast? I told him I'd call him on Christmas."

"He's not going to be awake. Tennessee time is an hour before New York, remember?"

Peter's face fell into a pout. "Oh, yeah."

Tony snorted at the dejected expression. "Wow, my genes really won, didn't they?"

Peter paused the pouting to look up at his father, surprised. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," Tony gestured vaguely at Peter's face.

"Can you elaborate?"

"At your age I was the master of the doe eyes. I trademarked that kicked-puppy face."

Peter rolled his eyes good-naturedly. Before he could quip, FRIDAY told them that breakfast was ready and even Pepper was getting impatient, so both of them high-tailed it to the kitchen.

Breakfast was delicious. Bucky had upped himself with the main dish, and Thor had enjoyed it so much that he smashed a glass in the process of asking for more. Everything was gone in under twenty minutes.

Tony turned to Pepper as soon as the last bite had been taken. "Can we do presents now?"

Pepper huffed a laugh. "What are you, five? We can open them after clean-up."

"Or," Tony countered, "we could clean up after we open them."

"Or we could just clean up," Natasha suggested. Steve was already picking up the trash while Bruce was doing dishes.

Tony rolled his eyes. "Okay, okay." He picked up his and Pepper's plates and took them to the sink.

:/

The cleaning up was made quick work of, and once they were done Tony immediately ushered everyone over to the tree and dropped a gift in Steve's lap. It was an Iron Man-themed mug. Absolutely ridiculous. Steve loved it.

Tony got his photo. Tony got lots of photos. Photos of him with the presents Peter got him, photos of Peter and Pepper together, photos of various Avengers in various states of emotion (Thor got ridiculously confused when Peter gave him a particularly complicated piece of tech and Natasha got rightfully upset with Clint for a particularly insensitive gift).

By the end, everyone was hopped up on sugar from various Christmas treats and Thor decided that was the perfect time to play the hammer game. "We have not done it in so long," he boomed. "Perhaps one of you is worthy now, although I do not think so." He exploded into boistorous laughter at the mere thought.

Everyone got sat down around the coffee table, with Mjolnir in the middle. Well, everyone except for Natasha and Pepper, who'd decided to go find some of the good wine for later that night instead of partaking. Sam called them cowards for it, and is now probably on a list somewhere courtesy of Natasha.

Tony, with his ego, went first. He walked up to the table, situated his hands in a grasp he deemed proper, and lifted with his legs. There was a tad bit of movement, but ultimately it firmly stayed put on the table.

It went about the same way for most of the table as they went around. Steve got the most movement by far, but wasn't able to fully lift it.

It went the same, that is, for everyone but Peter.

After Bucky had tried and failed, Thor laughed with great enthusiasm. "See? We have been most of the way through and yet, no one has managed to lift it!" He clapped Peter on the back. "Now you, young Tonyson. Do not be discouraged by the failures of your predecessors. Of all of them, you are the least unlikely to fail." He smirked. "Of course you are not very likely to succeed, either."

Peter stumbled up to the edge of the table and stared at the hammer for a very long moment.

"What are you doing, trying to pick it up telekinetically?" Sam asked. "Put your hands on it!"

Peter rolled his eyes at him, but took the handle.

After much grunting, the unexpected happened. He managed to lift the hammer about a foot off the table. The room fell into silence until Tony gasped. "I KNEW IT!" he shouted. "MY SON IS BETTER THAN EVERYBODY!"

Clint sat there with his mouth wide open. Sam might've passed out. Bruce and Thor beamed at the kid like proud parents. Finally, Peter got startled by Mjolnir's lightning and sheer power and dropped it, breaking the coffee table. He sheepishly looked at his dad, who would surely be paying for it. "Sorry."

Meanwhile, Tony was beaming. "Sorry? You just held fucking Thor's hammer! You could've broken the floor for all I care, I get to rub this in Thor's face for the rest of my life."

Peter smiled a bit. "That was pretty cool. Hey FRI, did you get that on video?"

"Of course, boss," FRIDAY answered in her Irish lilt. "I'll download it to your phone."

"Thanks!" Peter beamed at the ceiling and snuggled into his dad's side while Steve turned on a Christmas movie.

And so concluded Christmas. Peter was totally fine without Harley, Tony got to be proud of his son for yet another reason, and Thor was deeply humbled.

Fin