Chapter Text
Peter was so done with high school.
His senior year had been his best yet, but it had only proven how ready he was to leave Midtown Tech behind and step into his real life. He could picture the routine clearly: swinging from morning lectures at Columbia to afternoon crime scenes across Queens, ending the night in Tony’s private workshop at Stark Industries. College was calling, and Peter, Ned, and MJ couldn’t wait to answer.
They were eager to leave behind the chaotic European summer trips and the record-high absences that MJ never explicitly commented on, but definitely tracked with sharp, silent precision. Over the final six weeks of the term, the three of them had grown tighter than ever. The world felt theirs entirely. Finals were behind them, college acceptance letters were drip-feeding into their inboxes, and school had devolved into a structured, low-stakes hangout. It was nothing but filler worksheets, classroom movies, and counting down the days. What could go wrong?
“Good morning, Tigers!” Principal Morita’s voice boomed through the PA system as he basked in the bright morning light pouring into the gymnasium. “It’s fantastic to have our entire senior class gathered for one of our final assemblies before you fly the nest.”
Peter and MJ, who had spent the entire morning relentlessly ribbing Ned over his sudden, overwhelming senior-year sentimentality that was complete with custom t-shirts, physical photo albums, and a twelve-minute video montage, turned to him with exaggerated, mocking frowns. Their teasing melted into silent giggles when they caught him discreetly wiping a tear from the corner of his eye.
“As a special end-of-year send-off,” Morita continued, stepping up to the podium with a rare, gleaming smile, “the administration has partnered with our most distinguished benefactor. Midtown High has been selected as the first school in New York to participate in Tony Stark’s newest educational initiative: Generation Iron.”
Peter felt his stomach plummet out of his body.
Unaware of the silent crisis unfolding on the middle bleacher, the principal pressed on over the instant, deafening wave of excited chatter that erupted across the gym floor.
“For the next month, each homeroom will spend one full week as ‘Iron Interns,’ shadowing senior Stark Industries staff, touring restricted research labs, and building professional networks at the Avengers Compound and SI Headquarters. You will be representing Midtown on a citywide stage, so I expect absolute professionalism. Do I make myself clear?”
A ragged chorus of “Yes, sir!” echoed off the gym walls, but Peter remained pinned to his seat, paralysed. His brain felt like it was overheating; he had stood toe-to-toe with Thanos on an alien planet, yet the sheer panic surging through his veins right now felt terrifyingly worse.
Stark Industries was his sanctuary. It was the one place where he didn’t have to hide the suit, watch his strength, or lie about where he’d been until three in the morning. The thought of his entire class, including the faculty, the gossip mill, and the dreaded Flash Thompson, invading his safe space was a nightmare scenario. Worse still, Ned was the only person other than May who knew about his little spider secret. Peter wasn't ready to lose control of that secret.
A stack of permission slips snapped into his field of vision, cutting through the static in his head.
“Peter? Ever heard of 'take one and pass it on'?” MJ’s voice was light and teasing, but her dark eyes were narrowed, tracking every twitch of his face.
Peter fumbled the papers, nearly dropping them to the floor. “Ah- shit, sorry.”
MJ leaned back slightly, scanning him with the terrifying efficiency of someone who could look straight through his skull. “What’s up with you, Parker?”
“Nothing!”
The answer flew out of his mouth way too fast. Over MJ’s shoulder, Ned winced and squeezed his eyes shut.
MJ scoffed, her suspicion mounting by the second. “Right. So what is it about Tony Stark that has you looking like you’re about to throw up?”
Peter froze. She was millimetres away from connecting the dots. He knew with absolute certainty that if he held her gaze for more than three seconds, his pulse would betray him, he’d start babbling, and he’d end up accidentally webbing the bleachers while confessing his entire vigilante double life.
Before he could dig his hole any deeper, a heavy, uninvited hand clapped down hard on his shoulder.
“It’s because the whole school’s finally gonna catch him,” Flash sneered, leaning over the back of their bench. “Three years of lying about a fake Stark Internship, and now he’s sweating because the real world is catching up to him.”
“Fuck off, Eugene,” MJ and Peter chorused without skipping a beat.
Ned immediately jumped into defence mode. “He isn’t lying! And even if he was, which he isn’t, we would still support him unconditionally!”
Ned’s wide, earnest smile was met with three identical stares of absolute confusion and mild disgust.
Flash rolled his eyes, adjusting his designer jacket. “Whatever, Penis. You two enjoy digging up excuses for him. I’m going to go polish up my resume so when Mr Stark realises Parker’s a total fraud, he’ll need a real intern to replace him. Which will be me. And then I’ll obviously become best friends with Spider-Man.”
Flash threw in a dramatic bow, executed a clumsy pivot, and strutted down the bleacher steps toward his friends.
MJ watched him go, her brow furrowing thoughtfully. “That boy’s Spider-Man obsession is genuinely unhealthy. I bet the poor guy regrets pulling him out of that elevator shaft in Washington.”
Ned nodded quickly. “Oh, you can say that again!”
At the same instant, Peter blurted out, “I don’t know, I think Spider-Man is just a really decent guy who’s happy to help anyone, regardless of who they are!”
Peter and Ned’s eyes locked in a brief, agonising moment of shared panic.
Ned scrambled to cover, leaning in with an over-the-top nod. “I mean, yeah! Exactly! We all know Spider-Man’s the greatest. He probably wouldn't hold a petty grudge against a high school kid!”
Peter aggressively backtracked, ducking his head. “Pfft, though honestly? Flash is a massive dick. So Spider-Man probably hates his guts. I mean. I guess. Probably.”
MJ didn't say a word. She looked between Peter’s sweating forehead, Ned’s unnatural posture, and the permission slip still clutched in Peter’s trembling hand. Slowly, a small, dangerous smile touched the corner of her lips.
“Right,” she said quietly, pulling a pen from her pocket and signing her form with a flourish. “Well. Next week at Stark Tower ought to be very educational.”
*
Peter leaned his forehead against the laminate countertop, letting the cool surface soothe his burning skin. The Midtown permission slip sat between his elbows, crisp, white, and threatening to destroy his entire existence.
“May, please.”
“Peter, no!” She laughed, spinning around in their pint-sized kitchen with a wooden spoon in hand as she tended to a simmering pot of pasta sauce. “I’m absolutely not letting you miss this.”
“But I want to miss it,” Peter groaned, his voice muffled by the counter. He lifted his head, pleading with wide, desperate eyes. “I am literally begging you to let me miss it. I will do extra chores. I’ll clean the gutters of the whole building. I won’t patrol for a week!”
May set down her spoon and fold her arms, raising an eyebrow with practised aunt-level scepticism. “Tempting, but no. Cmon, Petey, you love that place! You spend practically every free evening in Tony’s workshop, plus I know you want to prove that Flash kid wrong. Isn't this the exact moment you've been waiting for?”
“Tony is going to embarrass me,” Peter said plainly. “He is going to see me walking through the lobby with thirty of my classmates, and he is going to make it his personal life mission to ruin my social standing forever.”
“Tony Stark? Embarrass you? Never,” she sarcastically beamed, throwing her hands up in mock defence.
“I’m serious!” Peter stood up, grabbed the permission slip and waving it like evidence in a murder trial. “You don't get it. He’s gonna freak out and tell everyone my secrets!”
“First of all, you have one secret, and I highly doubt Mr Stark is up for revealing that one,” May pointed out, stepping over to open the fridge. “Second of all, you’ve spent three years taking the heat for a 'fake' internship. Everyone thinks you’ve been lying. Now you get to walk into the building like you own the place, which, frankly, with the amount of time you spend there, you basically do.”
“I don’t want to own the place, May! I want to blend into the drywall!” Peter tossed the slip onto the table and dragged his hands down his face. “If I walk in there and the AI calls me by name, or if Rhodey walks by and asks why I didn't finish my calculus homework in the lab, MJ is going to figure it out in two seconds. She’s already looking at me like I’m a high-level math problem she’s about to solve.”
May paused, holding a wedge of Parmesan cheese, her tone softening just a fraction. “Peter... she’s your friend. And so is Ned. You can’t hide under a rock forever.”
“I’m not hiding under a rock, I’m hiding behind a mask. There’s a distinction!”
“Let me sign the form, Parker,” May said, smoothing down the edges of the paper on the table and tapping the signature line with a pen she pulled from her hair bun. “Or I call Tony, have him sign it, and I explicitly tell him how excited you are to see him on the tour.”
Peter stared at the pen as if it were a loaded weapon. He looked at May, searching for any sign of mercy, but found only the terrifying, unyielding love of the woman who had raised him.
He let out a long, theatrical sigh that shook his shoulders. “If I die of second-hand embarrassment, I’m haunting this apartment.”
“Fair deal,” May smiled, uncapping the pen and sliding it out of his hand. “Now I’ll sign it, you wash your hands, and set the table. Dinner's almost ready.”
*
The morning air was warm enough to swear, but Peter barely registered the temperature when he pulled on a thick hoodie that morning. He walked toward Midtown High in the absolute worst mood humanly possible, his stomach growling with a violence that made him feel genuinely faint. The night before had been a disaster. What was supposed to be a light perimeter patrol had escalated into a three-block chase with an armed crew, leaving Peter with a nasty set of deep contusions across his ribs and a slice along his forearm that was currently knitting itself together at hyper-speed. His accelerated healing was a lifesaver, but it acted like a furnace, incinerating every calorie in his body to mend muscle and skin. He was running entirely on fumes.
He had considered swinging by a corner bodega for a breakfast sandwich, but nothing sounded remotely appetising. He had a hyper-specific, ravenous craving for pizza - specifically, the ridiculously overpriced, thin-crust grease slice from the cafeteria at Stark Tower. Since today was the long-awaited field trip to Avengers Tower, he decided to suffer through the morning, using the thought of that high-grade pepperoni as a literal carrot on a stick to keep his legs moving.
It was a miracle he hadn't stopped, because the second Midtown High came into view, he realised he was down to the wire.
Standing by the idling yellow tour bus, Mr Harrington was anxiously checking his clipboard and frantically waving the rest of the homeroom aboard.
"Parker, move it! We’re losing our security window!" MMrHarrington yelled across the asphalt, his voice cracking under the stress of managing thirty teenagers on a high-clearance field trip.
Peter winced, digging his sneakers into the pavement and breaking into a light jog. He clambered up the steep folding steps of the coach, the overwhelming scent of exhaust, cheap vinyl, and teenage body spray hitting him like a wall. Up near the front, Ned was practically vibrating in his seat, while MJ was slumped against the window with a worn paperback resting on her knees.
Peter side-stepped down the narrow aisle, dodging stray elbows and overstuffed backpacks, before sliding into the empty aisle seat beside Ned. He immediately dumped his heavy canvas bag at his feet.
"Hey, loser," MJ drawled without looking up from her book. "You're running late this morning. Did you get lost on the way to the bus stop, or did you just decide to dress like a nap?"
"Thank you, Detective Michelle, I hadn't noticed," Peter quipped back, tugging his oversized hoodie over his head. The air inside the packed bus was already stifling, and the extra layer was suffocating his bruised, overheated torso.
Ned leaned over, his eyes wide. "Dude, tell me you brought your pass. Tell me you didn't leave it on your desk. If Mr Harrington leaves us behind because of paperwork, I will never forgive you."
"I have it, Ned, relax," Peter mumbled, rubbing his temples as a low throbbing began behind his eyes.
"Hey! Penis!"
The loud, obnoxious shout echoed from the back row. Flash Thompson pushed himself up from his seat, cupping a hand around his mouth to amplify his voice over the rumble of the engine. "Ready to finally get exposed today? Or are you gonna fake a stomach ache and jump off at the first red light?"
A few muffled snickers broke out down the aisle. Peter closed his eyes, taking a slow breath to keep his heightened senses from snapping.
"Born ready," Peter whispered under his breath, turning slightly toward Ned and MJ with a dry, tired smirk, hoping Ned caught the subtle Spider-Man joke hidden in the sheer exhaustion of his voice.
Ned blinked, his mouth twitching as he registered the double meaning, but before he could respond, Flash leaned over the seat ahead of him, his smirk widening.
"What was that, Parker?" Flash demanded, stepping out into the aisle and starting to swagger down toward the front of the bus. "Didn't quite catch that. You muttering your excuses already?"
The fleeting burst of snark evaporated instantly. Feeling suddenly a lot less confident as his longtime bully closed the distance, Peter fumbled for a safe, non-confrontational answer while trying not to clutch his sore ribs.
"Ahh... nothing, Flash," Peter mumbled, pulling his arms in close and staring fixedly at the back of the seat in front of him. "Just saying it's gonna be a long day."
"Right. That’s what I thought," Flash sneered, leaning over Peter’s seat just far enough to make the claustrophobic space feel even smaller. He tapped the back of Peter's headrest with two deliberate, heavy knuckles. "Try to keep up today, Parker. I’d hate for you to get tackled by Stark Security for trespassing before we even make it past the lobby."
Flash shot a triumphant grin back at his friends before sauntering back down the aisle, pumping his fist once for effect.
Peter slumped further down into the cracked vinyl seat, letting his knees slam into the plastic shell in front of him. A low groan escaped his throat. Between the dull, burning throbbing along his ribcage and the empty, agonising pit in his stomach, every vibration of the idling diesel engine felt like a jackhammer rattling straight through his skull.
"Ignore him," MJ said, her voice completely flat as she flipped a page of her book. "He’s projecting his deep-seated fear of academic inadequacy onto you because his self-worth is tethered to an academic scholarship we’ll beat him out for."
"I am ignoring him," Peter muttered, resting his forehead against the cool glass of the window. "I’m just mostly trying not to pass out from hunger."
Ned leaned in close, lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, and roamed his eyes over Peter’s non-injured side. "Was it aliens again? Robbery?"
"Haha, Ned, you’re so funny!" Peter shot back, trying to subtly tell his friend to shut up around MJ. "No, I- uh, skipped breakfast, burned through all my energy. I feel like my body is literally digesting itself right now."
Ned reached into his front pocket with the gravity of a surgeon handing over a scalpel, pulling out a slightly squished, crumpled silver foil wrapper. He nudged Peter's knee. "Emergency supply. It's half a blueberry cereal bar. I was saving it for lunch, but you look like a Victorian orphan with consumption."
Peter looked at the squished bar as if it were a gift from the gods. "Ned, I could kiss you."
"Please don't, Flash is watching," Ned whispered back smoothly.
Peter tore open the wrapper and inhaled the cereal bar in two bites flat. It barely registered on his lightning-fast metabolism, but it took the raw edge off the burning in his stomach.
As the bus bounced over a pothole on 5th Avenue, Peter wincing as his knit-together ribs protested the jolt, Mr Harrington stood up at the front of the coach. He clutched the overhead handrail with one hand and held a stack of laminated security badges in the other, swaying unsteadily with the motion of the bus.
"Alright, settle down, everyone! Listen up!" Mr Harrington shouted over the chatter. "We are approximately twenty minutes away from Stark Industries. I need to remind everyone that we are guests of Stark. That means standard field trip rules are elevated to Level Five Hundred. Zero funny business."
He pulled a slip of paper from his pocket and squinted at it.
"Golden Rule one: Do not touch any glass panel, door, or device that has a light blinking on it. Golden Rule two: Stay with the group at all times. If you wander off, FRIDAY - that’s their artificial intelligence - will flag you as an intruder, and I really do not want to fill out the security incident paperwork again, Abe. And my own rule three..."
Mr Harrington paused, his eyes scanning the bus until they locked directly onto Peter.
"...No claiming you know Mr Stark, work for Mr Stark, or have ever even made eye contact with Mr Stark, unless you want to be escorted off the premises by armed personnel."
A chorus of snickers rippled through the bus. Flash let out a loud, mocking fake cough from the back row: "Cough-liar-cough!"
Peter just stared straight ahead, picking at the skin around his thumbnail. He could feel Ned tensing beside him, ready to defend his honour, but Peter reached out and gently nudged Ned’s elbow, shaking his head.
"Let it go," Peter whispered, looking out the dirty glass as the soaring, iconic silhouette of Avengers Tower began to pierce the skyline ahead. "I just need to survive until lunchtime."
The bus lurched as it pulled into the huge underground garage beneath Stark Tower, the blinding New York sunlight replaced instantly by the cool light of fluorescent LEDs. Peter’s senses adjusted automatically, the familiar scent of the aggressive air con and distant noises from all 100 floors drifting down into his super senses, his nervous system adjusting accordingly and reminding him he was at his second home.
"Alright, people, single file!" Mr Harrington yelled, practically falling over his own feet as the bus screeched to a halt. "Badges out! Remember, we smile, and we say thank you, and please! Do not lose your badge, or you will be standing in the lobby until three o'clock!"
Peter hung back, letting the swarm of excited high schoolers push past into the aisle. His ribs gave a sharp, throbbing reminder of last night as he hoisted his backpack over one shoulder, wincing internally. His stomach let out a rumble that was thankfully drowned out by the hiss of the bus doors sliding open.
"You look like you're heading to an execution," MJ remarked, swinging her bag over her arm and stepping into the aisle ahead of him.
"More like an absolute public humiliation," Peter muttered, shuffling forward. "If Flash tries to get me thrown out, I might actually let him just so I can sleep in the lobby."
"Not happening," Ned said, flipping round to face his two best friends behind him. "I have a strategy. We stick together, we eat the free food, and we pretend we've never even heard of technology in our lives. Ooh, we could be Amish!"
MJ grimaced, “No, Ned.”
As they stepped off the rubber stairs and onto the polished concrete of the garage, the class gathered in a ragged circle around a sleek, polished set of double doors. Standing beside them was a young woman in a tailored black suit, holding a tablet and looking mildly amused by the crowd of gawking teenagers.
“Hi guys!" she said, her voice easily cutting through the excited chatter. "My name is Claire, and I’ll be your tour guide today. Hop in the elevator, and we’ll get to the lobby, where the tour can really start."
The doors opened perfectly on cue, and a spacious, metallic elevator welcomed the heaving group. It was easy to forget how theatrical Tony liked to be when you saw him every day, but things like this reminded you very quickly.
The students, either in nerves, excitement or respect, weren’t even chattering to each other as they filed in and the doors closed behind them.
Suddenly, a disembodied voice spoke from above. “Good Morning, Claire. Good Morning, Midtown Tech Class 24A.”
“Morning, Friday,” Clair spoke back, looking at the bewildered teens. “Well, don’t be rude, kids, wish Friday a good morning too!”
There was a nervous and slightly giggly chorus of ‘Good Morning, Friday’ that made Claire laugh.
“Thank you, Midtown Tech Class 24A. It’s going to be a wonderful day.”
Claire grinned widely – to his left, MJ whispered a mocking “God, she clearly loves her job” that made Ned and Peter chuckle – and started her script. “It sure is. That’s Friday, the building’s personal AI. She knows everything and anything that goes on in the building; she is security and staff all at the same time. She knows everything about each one of you already.”
“You’ve arrived at the lobby,” FRIDAY spoke again, and the doors flew open.
A few tentative Thank Yous were whispered to the AI as they exited the wide elevator into the largest lobby any of them had seen.
The long and large space had a ceiling that felt like it spanned the normal height of two doors, and the walls were made almost entirely of windows. In front of them, a reception desk and to the right, the security panel that Peter knew so well, flanked by two beefy security guards. Important-looking business people waited for elevators and bounded up stairs, brushing shoulders with headphone-clad engineers in punny science shirts, smiling and wishing each other good morning.
One girl in the front elbowed her friend and whispered, “I feel like I’m at the airport!”
“Welcome to Stark Industries!” Claire beamed at the group again, letting them look around for a few moments before interrupting their amazement. “If you’d like to form a single file line in front of the reception desk, we can get those badges validated and get this show on the road.”
Mr Harrington, clearly trying not to seem unprofessional, was trying to herd his students subtly, but kept losing a few to selfies in front of the Stark sign.
Flash, no doubt with lots of pushing and shoving, was of course at the front of the line. He handed over his plastic ID card to the woman behind the desk, who hovered it over a metallic, silver inbed on the desktop.
FRIDAY’s voice pinged over the speakers again. “Welcome, Eugene, Level 1 Omega Access.”
Flash giggled and pointed his phone camera at himself, letting out an excited “Sweet!” The receptionist instructed him towards the security desk, handing him his card, now slotted safely in a bright yellow lanyard. He puffed out his chest, turning back to cast a sharp glare straight at Peter. "See that, Parker? That's what a real badge looks like. What's yours say? 'Janitor's Assistant'?"
Peter didn't even bother answering. He just waited in line, his body aching, his mind entirely hyper-focused on the distant, beautiful scent of fresh bread and simmering tomato sauce wafting through the building's ventilation. Stupid smell.
The line ticked forward, named called, cardinal yellow lanyards wrapped around their necks, and their backpack’s searched while Peter’s turn moved closer and closer. He couldn’t quite decide whether to present the receptionist with the new, blemish-free thin plastic card that matched his classmates' or the slightly tattered, employee ID card that he usually carried, with its small, grainy picture of him and Tony, where they both look caught off guard that FRIDAY had printed from his first ever security scan.
Okay, maybe not that one if he was trying to lay low.
“Morning,” He smiled as he handed over the card, but his spider sense tingled as soon as the plastic left his hand. The card hovered over the inbed just as the majority of his class had always done, but it send of a melodious chime, the noise that came out was more like a siren.
BEEP-BEEP-BEEP
FRIDAY spoke up again, “BioMetric Overlap Detected.”
The receptionist frowned, “Sorry, kid, I’m not getting a valid-”
Peter cut her off, “I’m an intern of um-” he dropped his voice slightly, “of Mr Stark,”
She looked at him almost pityingly, as if she thought it was sweet. “Okay, sweetheart, whatever you say. Let me make up a new pass for you, it probably just got–”
The receptionist got cut off again.
“Good Morning, Miniboss.” FRIDAY’s voice echoed gently from the ceiling speakers, perfectly crisp and completely unmistakable. "Boss has noted your arrival on the perimeter log. He requested that I inform you that the cafeteria has reserved two extra-large pepperoni pies under your name. Present your ID to the reception.”
Mr Harrington’s jaw dropped so low his clipboard nearly slipped from his fingers. Ned looked like he was about to pass out from sheer, unadulterated triumph. MJ simply turned her head, slowly looking at Flash, whose face had drained of every drop of colour. Claire smiled, “Parker, sorry I didn’t even clock you!”
He awkwardly smiled at her and slid his employee card, with its red and gold striped rim, toward the receptionist. This time, when she hovered it over the scanner, the melodious chime came quickly.
“Peter Parker, Alpha Gold Access.”
Sarcastically, Peter whispered under his breath, “Thank you, Friday.”
But of course, because she’s annoying, the voice responded on full blast, “You are welcome, Petey-Pie.”
Peter stood glued to the spot for three excruciating seconds, praying a rogue wormhole would open in the middle of the Stark Industries lobby and swallow him whole.
"Petey-Pie?" Ned squeaked, his voice cracking into an octave higher than humanly possible. He clapped both hands over his mouth, his shoulders shaking in a violent attempt to suppress a full-blown hysterical laugh.
"Don't," Peter choked out, his cheeks burning a shade of crimson that rivalled his suit. "Ned, I swear to God, don't say a word."
"I am never calling you Peter again," MJ declared, looking up from her sketchbook where her pencil was already flying across the page in frantic, sweeping strokes. "This is the single greatest moment of my life. I'm sketching the exact moment Thompson's soul left his body."
Across the gleaming floor, Flash was frozen mid-stride near the security gates. His phone, still set to selfie mode, was hovering limp in his hand. He looked like he was trying to process a complex quantum physics equation using only a basic calculator. His eyes darted from the gold emblem on Peter’s lanyard to the massive speaker panel in the ceiling, and finally back to Peter, who was shrinking deeper and deeper into his faded hoodie.
"P-Parker?" Flash choked out, his voice entirely devoid of its usual booming swagger. "What... what was that?"
"Nothing," Peter said weakly, holding his hands up. "FRIDAY has a glitch. She gets... confused. Tony was messing with her audio files last week, and-"
"System check: No glitches detected," FRIDAY’s crisp voice interjected brightly from above, entirely ruining his cover. "Audio files are operating at peak efficiency, Peter. Boss also added a reminder to your calendar: 'Feed the kid or he'll faint on the carpet again.' Would you like me to dispatch a catering cart to the Atrium?"
"No! FRIDAY, Flash please-" Peter practically yelled at the ceiling, clutching his lanyard like a shield.
"No! No way! Don't 'Flash, please' me!" Flash shouted, taking three aggressive steps back toward the desk, looking around at the bewildered class for backup. "Did you hack the system? You brought some stupid Bluetooth jammer, didn't you? You set up a soundboard on your phone to say your name!
"Flash, the ceiling literally flashed gold," Ned pointed out, crossing his arms and trying very hard not to look smug.
"Shut up, Ned! He’s a tech nerd! He goes to a science school!" Flash yelled, his voice echoing loudly across the cavernous marble atrium. Security guards shifted their weight slightly, watching the commotion with practised indifference. Flash turned frantically to the receptionist, leaning over her desk. "Ma'am! Tell him! Tell everyone he hacked it! There's no way Peter Parker has 'Alpha Gold' anything! He lives in Queens! He wears clothes from a thrift store!"
Sarah, the receptionist, slowly adjusted her glasses, looking Flash up and down with absolute deadpan exhaustion. "Sir, if he could override Stark Industries' military-grade AI security grid from an iPhone 8, Mr Stark would probably hire him on the spot. Now, please step away from the desk."
"He's fooling you!" Flash insisted, his voice pitching higher. He whirled back on Peter, eyes wild with pure denial. "You paid someone! You paid a rogue staff member to play a recording! What about the pizza line, huh? Why would an AI talk about pizza? It’s a script! It’s an embarrassingly fake script you wrote to look cool in front of everyone!"
"Flash, I promise you, I don't have the energy to write a script," Peter mumbled, tugging the hood of his sweatshirt up over his ears to hide his burning face. His ribs were throbbing, his stomach was screaming for fuel, and the sheer volume of Flash’s shouting was vibrating uncomfortably against his eardrums. "Can we just go on the tour?"
"No! I'm not moving until Mr Harrington reports this!" Flash demanded, turning on their teacher. "Mr Harrington! Are you seriously buying this? Parker is ruining the integrity of this trip! He's committing corporate fraud right in front of us!"
Mr Harrington, who had finally managed to gather his dropped papers, looked up with wide, completely overwhelmed eyes. He looked at Flash, then at the bright gold lanyard around Peter's neck, then up at the ceiling, looking like a man who desperately wanted to be anywhere else on Earth.
"Flash... please calm down," Mr Harrington stammered, clearing his throat weakly. "I... I'm sure there is a perfectly reasonable, highly confusing explanation for... whatever just occurred."
"Reasonable?!" Flash shrieked.
"Sensory levels indicate elevated stress in Subject Eugene Thompson," FRIDAY’s voice chimed in from above, dropping back into her crisp, professional tone. "Would you like me to alert Security to conduct a stress-management removal, Peter?"
"No! FRIDAY, do not remove him! He's fine!" Peter squeaked frantically at the ceiling.
Flash backed away from the nearest speaker panel like it was a live grenade, his jaw working silently as he looked between Peter and the ceiling. The denial was practically radiating off him in heatwaves, but the terror was finally catching up.
"This is insane," Flash muttered, his voice dropping into a tense, rapid whisper as he slowly backed toward the rest of the class. "You're all insane. He's doing something illegal. I'm going to prove it. The second we get to a real lab, I'm going to prove he's full of it."
"Good luck with that, Thompson," MJ drawled smoothly, casually flipping to a fresh page in her sketchbook. "I'm sure Mr Stark's legal team is terrified of your Instagram story."
"Thompson, that is enough!" Mr Harrington finally found his voice, stepping between them with his arms raised, though his eyes kept darting nervously toward Peter's lanyard like it might explode. "We are in a high-security facility. If... if the building's automated network has recognised Peter, then we are going to proceed with the tour as planned and refrain from making allegations of... dark web contraband!"
Mr Harrington turned to Claire, his face pleading. "Please tell me we can move to the next room now."
"Absolutely," Claire said, her professional composure holding up remarkably well, though her eyes glinted with deep amusement. She tapped her iPad, and the heavy security turnstiles clicked open in unison. "Follow me to the express lifts, everyone. Next stop: R&D Level Four."
As the class began to file through, Flash lingered by the barrier, refusing to scan his badge until Peter walked past. He leaned in as Peter shuffled through the gold-lit lane, whispering through gritted teeth, "The second we meet a real scientist up there, Parker, I'm calling you out. You can't fake actual physics."
"Looking forward to it, Flash," MJ said coolly, stepping through right behind them and nudging Peter forward.
The express elevator was massive, lined with brushed chrome and sweeping glass that looked out over the Manhattan skyline as it began its ultra-smooth ascent. The rest of the class crowded toward the glass, snapping photos and whispering in hushed, breathless bursts, but the tension in the cabin was thick enough to cut with a knife. Flash stood on the far side, arms tightly crossed, staring a hole through the side of Peter's head.
Peter leaned his back against the cool metallic wall near the control panel, resting his head back and closing his eyes as the lift accelerated. His stomach gave another deep, hollow churn.
"You okay?" Ned asked softly, angling his body to block Flash's view of them.
"I'm starving," Peter whispered back, keeping his eyes shut. "And my ribs feel like they're in a vice. If I have to explain why the building called me 'Petey-Pie' one more time, I'm jumping out the window."
"For what it's worth," MJ murmured from his other side, her gaze fixed on her sketchbook, "I think 'Petey-Pie' suits you. Very fitting for an Alpha Gold intern."
Peter groaned softly, letting his chin hit his chest as the elevator chimed, announcing their arrival at Level Four.
The elevator doors slid open with a soft, pneumatic hiss, revealing R&D.
If the main lobby had looked like a luxury airport, this floor looked like a sandbox for mad geniuses. The space was massive, framed by towering floor to ceiling glass partitions that overlooked open plan laboratory bays. Robotic arms swung overhead on ceiling tracks, whirring as they welded components together while engineers stood around, all with at least 1 screen, but most with more.
"Alright, Midtown," Claire announced, stepping out first and gesturing toward the main floor. "Level Four is our Applied Robotics and Advanced Mechanics division. The engineers here work directly on next-generation prosthetics, defence tech, and civil infrastructure. Please keep your hands to yourselves; some of the surfaces in these bays are either under active voltage or extremely hot."
The class filed out in a dazed, wide-eyed herd, pressing their faces against the glass walls of the nearest lab bay.
"Look at that casing!" one student gasped, pointing at an exoskeleton chassis suspended from a hydraulic rig.
Flash, however, wasn't looking at the tech. The second his feet hit the floor, his eyes darted around the open floor, searching for a target. His gaze locked onto a tall, sharp-looking man in a lab coat who was furiously typing away on a floating holographic interface near the main demonstration table.
Thanks to the stupid Parker Luck, it of course turned out to be Banner.
"There," Flash muttered under his breath, a cruel, triumphant smirk breaking across his face. He nudged his friend, whispering loud enough for Ned and Peter to hear. "Watch this. Time to end the magic show."
Before Mr Harrington could stop him, Flash stepped out of line and marched straight toward the open demonstration bay, raising his voice with practised projection.
"Excuse me! Dr Banner?"
The scientist didn't even look up from his screen. "I'm in the middle of a calibration run. Tour groups stay behind the yellow line."
"Right, sorry, sir, but we have a quick safety question," Flash said, his tone dripping with fake concern as he pointed back over his shoulder straight at Peter. "Our class has a student here, Peter Parker, who’s claiming he has an 'Alpha Gold' clearance and works directly for Mr Stark. He’s using some kind of hacked badge to mess with the AI, and we just want to make sure he’s not messing around with dangerous equipment."
The entire class held its breath. Mr Harrington looked like he was actively contemplating climbing into an air duct to escape.
Bruce finally paused. He swiped the holographic screen away with a sharp flick of his wrist and slowly turned around. His usually kind, dark eyes scanned the group of teenagers, passing right over Flash, over Mr Harrington, and landing squarely on Peter, who was currently trying to blend in with a steel support pillar.
He blinked once. Then a smile formed from his previous expression of sheer, profound annoyance.
"Parker?" Bruce barked warmly, his voice echoing off the glass panels. "What are you doing back there? Why aren't you in Lab Two?"
Peter winced, taking a tiny, reluctant step out from behind the pillar. "Uh. Hi, Dr Banner. I'm... on a field trip?"
"A field trip," He repeated dryly, as if the words made no logical sense. "You're on a field trip to the building you work in? The building you slept in, like all of last week?"
A sharp, collective gasp rippled through the Midtown Tech students. Flash’s smirk instantly faltered, his finger still hovering awkwardly in the air.
"I was running tests on the pneumatic dampeners late at night!" Peter pleaded, his voice cracking slightly as his face burned. "And I have class! I go to high school!"
"Well, your 'high school' is currently holding up my timeline," Dr Banner smirked, stepping out of the bay and walking right past a frozen, wide eyed Flash without giving him a single glance. He stopped right in front of Peter, pulling an iPad from under his arm and thrusting it into the teenager's hands. "Since you're here, look at these telemetry readouts for the micro-actuators. The torque output keeps spiking by four per cent at peak load, and Dum-E tried to grease the gears with motor oil again."
"I told you, the code needs a dampening loop on the secondary joint," Peter muttered instinctively, his brain automatically slipping into engineering mode as his eyes scanned the complex equations scrolling down the screen. "If you don't cap the current, it's going to keep overheating the servo."
"I tried that. It threw a thermal error."
"Because you forgot to offset the resistance values for the titanium alloy," Peter said, taking the stylus from the tablet frame and rapidly scribbling a revised line of code directly onto the interface. "See? Balance the thermal load here, and it won't spike."
He snatched the tablet back, squinting at the rewritten algorithm for three long, agonising seconds. He grunted, tapping his screen once.
Across the room, the robotic arm on the testing rig hummed to life, executing a complex, lightning-fast rotation with dead silence. No spikes. No thermal warnings.
Bruce stared at the screen, then looked back up at Peter with a heavy sigh. "Fine. You're right. Now go back to your little field trip so I can finish this." He turned on his heel to walk away, paused, and looked back over his shoulder. "And clean up your workbench in Lab Two when you're done. Dum-E stacked six empty pizza boxes on your solder station."
"They're not my boxes, you know they're Stark’s!" Peter called after him, but the scientist had already turned back to his holograms, completely ignoring him.
Claire, experienced in high school social dynamics, butted in before any more conversation happened. “Okay! I’m going to give you 10 minutes to look around in here. Please don’t touch anything or speak to any of our engineers; they are hard at work. We’ll convene here, see a few more floors before lunch and then we’ll be splitting you up for the rest of the week.”
Peter, MJ, and Ned peeled away to the left, stepping toward a reinforced glass observation window where a high-level materials intern was carefully tinkering with blown glass components for advanced fibre optics. Beside him, Ned was practically vibrating with secondhand adrenaline, while MJ casually flipped to a fresh page in her sketchbook, undoubtedly refining her drawing of Flash’s soul leaving his body.
Peter, on the other hand, was just trying to survive. His ribs were still humming with a dull, burning ache, his stomach was throwing a silent, violent tantrum, and it was only 9:30 AM. He was more than ready for the day, the tour, and his entire life to be over.
“Midtown!” Claire’s bright, practised voice projected across the bay. She was standing in nearly the same spot near the main walkway, with a bewildered, thoroughly shaken Mr Harrington hovering at her right shoulder like a nervous shadow.
The class slowly convened around her, casting hesitant, bewildered glances back over their shoulders at Peter as they gathered.
“Now, I’m sure you all know that this facility used to be the primary home base for the Avengers,” Claire continued, her tour speech rolling out smoothly as she gestured toward the sweeping architecture overhead. "Their official headquarters has since moved upstate, but they remain frequent visitors to the Tower. It’s extremely unusual for a public tour group to run into one, so consider yourselves lucky- you’re already one Avenger interaction ahead of any group I’ve guided this month!”
As the class clambered back into the spacious elevator, squeezing together in a tight, quiet pack, Claire didn't miss a beat, barely stopping to catch her breath. “Our next stop is perhaps a little less explosive, but it is absolutely crucial to the day-to-day operations of Stark Industries and the Avengers themselves!”
The lift decelerated with a seamless chime. "Arriving at Level Five: Public Relations and Media Logistics."
The doors slid open, and the class fumbled out into the sprawling PR office. The floor was a sea of sleek, glass-partitioned cubicles, glowing monitors, and busy staff moving briskly between desks with tablet cases tucked under their arms.
It was actually one of Peter and Tony’s favourite spots to clear their heads when a complex engineering problem had them backed into a corner. When they'd been staring at blueprints or code for twelve hours straight, Tony would drag Peter down to the PR overlook. They’d sit on the edge of a vacant desk with a greasy box of takeout, watching the chaotic hum of hundreds of frantic phone calls, making up absurd backstories for whatever corporate crisis the room was solving. By the time they finished their food, every impossible science problem somehow felt a whole lot more manageable.
The Midtown students weren't quite as engaged on this floor as they had been in the main atrium or the robotics lab, rows of people answering phones and typing furiously on dual monitors didn't exactly make for an exhilarating field trip stop, but they shuffled along behind Claire, listening politely.
However, all hope for general focus was instantly pulverised when a tall woman near the floor-to-ceiling windows straightened up from a desk, flipping her strawberry-blonde hair back over her shoulder.
Pepper Potts was moving at a brisk, terrifying speed, a phone pressed to her ear while her thumbs flew across the screen of a second device in her hand. She was so entirely focused on whatever global crisis she was managing that she didn't even seem to notice the cluster of thirty high schoolers completely blocking her exit pathway.
Peter, who had accidentally situated himself near the front of the pack while trying to avoid Flash’s lingering, murderous glare, suddenly realised he was directly in her flight path.
For not the first time that day, or even that hour, he cursed the bizarre technicalities of his spider-sense. The warning flared at the base of his skull, but because Pepper posed zero actual threat to his life, his body simply stood there, frozen, as her shoulder collided squarely with his.
Pepper spun slightly from the impact, her instinctual apology dying on her tongue as her eyes landed on him. A brief, polite smile crossed her face, only to instantly morph into absolute, unadulterated panic.
“Honey!” she gasped, her eyes widening as she checked the sleek watch on her wrist. “You must be late! Oh my god, you are so late!”
“No, it’s- Pepper- I-” Peter stammered, pulling his hands out of his hoodie pockets and waving them frantically.
But Pepper was already bringing the phone back to her ear, her voice dropping into a tone of sharp, executive command. “Happy! Why didn’t you drop the kid off at school this morning? Why is he-”
“Pepper?” Peter tried again, wincing. Sometimes Pepper Potts possessed a level of hyper-competence so staggering that she could make every other functional adult in a three-mile radius feel like a toddler needing a permission slip.
“What do you mean you did?” Pepper demanded into the receiver, her brow furrowing deeply. “He’s standing right in front of me in the PR department!”
She pressed the phone flat against her jacket and stepped straight into his personal space, using the back of her free hand to check his forehead for a fever. “Are you sick, Roo? Are you hurt? Is your rib aching again?”
“No, I’m fine, I-”
“Are you skipping class?” she pressed, her eyes darting over his tired, pale face with laser-focused concern. “Are you having a Spide- Happy, I am talking to Peter right now, do not put me on hold!”
Grabbing Peter firmly by the elbow, Pepper began casually steering him straight through the middle of the crowd, entirely oblivious to the fact that she was physically moving him past his paralysed teacher and dead-silent classmates. Peter could feel thirty pairs of eyes burning holes straight into his soul.
Instinct took over. Reaching out, Peter gently snatched the phone straight out of Pepper’s hand and pressed it to his own ear.
“All good, Happy,” Peter said into the mic. “She just found me.”
Pepper let out a sharp yelp of surprise, her hands dropping to her hips. “Peter!”
“Tour day, Pepper,” Peter said softly, handing the device back to her with a weary, apologetic smile.
It was like a tiny bomb had detonated behind her eyes. The high-strung corporate urgency evaporated instantly, replaced by a sudden wave of realisation.
“That was today?” Pepper breathed out, blinking rapidly.
“Yup.”
She stared at him, her lips parting slightly. “Did we sign the slip? Did Tony sign the slip?”
Peter raised an eyebrow, gesturing vaguely at the group of gaping teenagers behind him. “Well, I’m here, aren’t I?”
Pepper turned her head slowly, finally taking in the sight of the thirty Midtown Tech students standing frozen in her office, Mr Harrington looking like he was on the verge of a full cardiac event, and Flash Thompson staring at her as if his brain had completely short-circuited.
“Oh, jeez,” Pepper said, a warm, bright laugh breaking through her panicked posture. She smoothed down her blazer and offered the class an apologetic smile. “I am so sorry, Midtown! Enjoy the tour, enjoy the rest of your week. I’ve got to run!”
She leaned in, pressed a quick, affectionate kiss directly to the crown of Peter’s head, and turned on her heel, striding briskly back toward the executive elevators while raising her phone back to her ear.
“See you later, Roo!” she called out over her shoulder, her heels clicking rapidly against the floorboards. “Eat something!”
The doors of the executive lift slid open and swallowed her whole, leaving the PR department in a dead, ringing silence.
Peter stood frozen in the centre of the room, his face burning a terrifying shade of bright red, his hoodie sleeves pulled down completely over his hands. He slowly turned around to face his class.
Ned was silently clapping his hands together near his chest in sheer, ecstatic victory. MJ was casually writing what looked like an entire paragraph beneath a detailed sketch of Pepper kissing his hair.
And Flash was standing near the front of the line, his face completely drained of colour, staring at Peter like he was looking at an alien species he couldn't comprehend.
Peter swallowed hard, pulling his collar up around his neck. "So," he mumbled, his voice cracking horribly. "PR. Pretty cool, right, Claire?”
“Wonderful Segue! Shall we leave these people to their important phone calls and file back into that elevator?”