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“Alright, FRIDAY, what test are we on?”
It’s late afternoon on a Saturday and Pepper is away on a business trip, which means Tony is in the lab at their penthouse doing things he shouldn’t be doing—namely, getting very drunk on vodka sours and performing volatile munitions testing with questionably serviceable nanotechnology.
“342, boss. Ready when you are.”
“That’s my girl,” Tony praises. He’d be lying if he said he didn’t still miss JARVIS, but he has to admit that he appreciates his current A.I. iteration’s shared enthusiasm for ‘do-what-thou-wilt-and-damn-the-consequences’ behavior. He wonders what that says about his state of mind while he wrote its code, or the state of his mind for the past couple of years for that matter—all the little tics and behaviors the A.I. absorbed and learned and twisted into its own makeup.
“I’ve got a good feeling about this one. Let’s blow the shit out of that target down there,” he says, holding up an open-palmed hand towards said target. The nanites respond immediately, forming a gauntlet around his hand and forearm—still a little too slow, but they’re holding together well this time. The repulsor in his palm flickers a few times, then glows.
“Look at that,” he crows giddily. “I told you I had a good—”
The repulsor glows blindingly bright, then pops like the overheated filament in a lightbulb. The gauntlet shatters like glass, hundreds of tiny fragments falling to the floor and then instantly congealing together into a silvery amorphous blob that briefly shivers before stilling.
“Well, fuck,” Tony says, deflated. “Add that to the failure pile, FRI. Or is it a failure mountain now?”
He retreats to the couch at the rear of the lab, grabbing the bottle of vodka on his way and taking a straight swig of it. He plops down on the couch, and the room continues to move in a way that definitely portends that he’s going to have a hell of a hangover tomorrow.
“Shall we try again?” FRIDAY suggests.
“Maybe in a little bit,” Tony says, stretching out on the couch and laying an arm across his face. “I gotta metabolize some of this booze first. Safety first and all that.”
He must fall asleep, because the next thing he knows he’s being awoken by someone shaking his arm. He cracks an eyelid open and discovers a face hovering mere inches away from his own.
“Gah!” Tony says, recoiling. “Jesus. Are you trying to give me a heart attack?”
“Sorry,” Peter replies, sitting back on his heels. “I need your help, and you wouldn’t wake up. Are you drunk or something?”
“No, I am not drunk. Not anymore, at least,” Tony says as he sits up, his heart rate slowly returning to normal. He must have been out for a while—it’s dark outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, or as dark as it ever gets in Midtown, and the lab is dimly illuminated a cool blue by the computer monitors and holographic schematics hovering above the workbench. “How did you even get in here?”
“FRIDAY let me in. We’re BFFs.”
“Of course you are.” Tony scrubs a hand over his face and stretches out the painful tightness in his lower back, trying to blink his way out from under the grogginess of booze and sleep and the deep throbbing ache behind his eyes.
“Can you maybe hurry?” Peter asks.
“Can you maybe hold your horses? Some of us aren’t teenagers. Some of us have bad backs and hangovers,” Tony grumbles. “FRI, give us some light. Low light, please, sweetheart, have mercy.”
The overhead lights slowly brighten, bathing everything in a soft, warm glow. Tony looks down at Peter still kneeling next to the couch, and the reason for Peter’s urgency becomes horribly apparent.
There’s a large dark stain wetting the front of the kid’s t-shirt. Tony can do nothing for a long, terrible moment except stare at it, until the initial shock wears off enough to unlock his frozen muscles. He slides down onto his knees next to Peter, his hands hovering uselessly between them.
“Fuck. What the—Jesus. You could have maybe lead with this, you know,” Tony says. His heart is racing again. He can feel his own pulse in his throat. It tastes like fear.
Peter makes a little impatient noise. “I said I need your help. It was like the first thing I said.”
“Okay. Okay. Okay. But you didn’t say ‘I need help because I’ve been disemboweled,’” Tony says, getting a little angry in his panic. “That was an extremely important detail you left off.”
“You’re exaggerating,” the kid says, but he looks down at himself a little doubtfully. “The knife wasn’t even that big.”
“Alright, shut up. You’re distracting me,” Tony tells him, his hands still hanging awkwardly in the space between himself and the kid. He’s seen Peter hurt before, of course, but there is a monumental difference between a black eye or a broken wrist and this total catastrophe in front of him. He needs to think. Think, think. His brain is like a car stuck in the mud, the tires spinning wildly and going nowhere. He doesn’t know what to do.
“I think you’re supposed to put pressure on it,” Peter says.
Tony blinks at him. “What?”
“You just said you didn’t know what to do,” Peter clarifies. “I think you’re supposed to put pressure on it to try and stop the bleeding.”
“Okay. Okay. Right. That is definitely right. That is exactly what I’m supposed to do.” Tony clamps a hand against the kid’s stomach. Warm blood seeps between his fingers. The edges of his vision immediately start to get fuzzy and stretched.
“Mr. Stark, are you gonna pass out?” Peter asks, alarmed. “You just got like, super insanely pale.”
“No,” Tony says shortly, taking deep gulps of air.
“Are you gonna throw up? ‘Cause I’m a sympathetic puker, and if you puke then I’m gonna puke, and I already threw up twice on the way over here and it hurt so bad. I don’t want to go through it again.”
“I’m not gonna puke,” Tony assures him a little shakily. “I’m fine. You’re fine.”
The kid is not fine. The kid is bleeding out right in front of him, like a nightmare come to life. Tony needs to do something, but he still can’t think straight. The only thing his brain seems capable of focusing on at this time is a series of horrifying outcomes that will directly result from his current floundering inaction.
“Fuck, I need help,” he admits to no one in particular. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Can you maybe stop saying that?” Peter asks. “It’s kinda stressing me out.”
“I don’t actually mean it,” Tony lies. “I’m just thinking out loud. I’ve got this, Pete. It’s fine. You’re fine.”
“Sir?” FRIDAY pipes up, startling Tony. “Would you like me to notify the medical team at HQ and prepare air transit for you?”
“Yes, yes, I do want you to do that,” Tony replies, feeling very much like the ineffectual captain of a ship that had been careening towards the rocks, only to have the first mate leap in at the last second and correct course. “God, you’re a miracle. Have them pick us up at the Tower.”
He doesn’t technically own the building anymore, but he still has all the security override codes, and it’s the closest place he can think of with a helipad. He can handle the extra paperwork and any lawsuits he gets hit with if it means the kid makes it to his next birthday.
“Call Happy, too,” he adds. “Tell him to have his ass here in under ten minutes or I’m firing him. Really impress upon him that this is an absolute fucking emergency. Put the fear of god into him.”
“With pleasure, boss,” the A.I. chirps with bloodthirsty enthusiasm.
Feeling a little steadier now that help seems imminent, Tony turns his attention back to Peter. He can feel him taking shallow, stilted breaths against his palm through the thin material of the kid’s t-shirt. It’s one of those t-shirts with a goofy science joke printed on it that seem to compose ninety-percent of Peter’s wardrobe, the punchline hidden under the spreading stain and Tony’s hand. It hits Tony like a hammer to the head that this is a child he’s holding together with his bare hands. The room starts spinning again, and this time it has nothing to do with the vodka sours he drank earlier.
“Where’s your suit?” he asks. “Tell me you didn’t waste time changing your clothes after being knifed.”
“I wasn’t wearing the suit,” Peter replies. “I was walking home from a movie.”
“You were walking home from a movie?” Tony repeats, not understanding. “And what—someone just stabbed you?”
Which really feels completely unfair. Tony expends a great deal of time and mental energy constructing suits designed to keep the kid safe from every dangerous scenario Tony’s anxiety-ridden, sleep-deprived imagination can cook up, but none of that matters if Peter is going to get himself stabbed walking home from the movie theater. It’s like an arms race that Tony is never going to win—no matter how many safety protocols Tony implements, he’s always going to underestimate the kid’s enormous talent for getting himself into trouble.
“Well, no, not exactly,” Peter says. “I was walking home and I see this guy harassing this girl, right? She’s really scared and this guy is being super aggressive and stuff. And I don’t know what to do because I’m not Spider-Man. I’m just…me. So first I try yelling at him to scare him off, but it doesn’t work.”
“Of course not. You’re about as intimidating as a clubbed baby seal,” Tony tells him. “No offense.”
Peter gives him a sour look. “Do you want me to tell you what happened or not?”
“Sorry. It’s a nervous thing—makes me run my mouth. I didn’t mean it. Please, continue.”
“Okay, so this guy just ignores me and keeps hassling this girl, and then he pulls out a knife on her. And she’s screaming like he’s really gonna murder her, so I just...jumped in.”
“You jumped in?”
“Yeah, between the girl and this guy. And then this dude just—just stabs me. Like he doesn’t even hesitate,” Peter continues. “So I punched him—not hard, Mr. Stark, I promise I was really trying to be careful, but I was like, kinda in shock or something so maybe I hit him a little harder than I meant to, ‘cause I knocked him clean out. Sorry. I know I’m not supposed to do that.”
“You know what? I’m not even upset,” Tony says. “That guy deserved it. Stabbing a kid—what a dick.”
“I know, seriously rude,” Peter agrees. “So anyway, the girl ran off the second the guy went down—which okay, you’re welcome, but whatever. And then I realized I was bleeding really bad so I walked over here.”
“You walked here?” Tony says incredulously. This story somehow keeps getting worse.
Peter shrugs. “Yeah. I mean, I rode the subway part of the way, but mostly I walked.”
“Why didn’t you call me? Or Happy? We would have picked you up.”
Peter shrugs again. “My phone’s dead. And anyway, you’re drunk. You shouldn’t drive—that’s dangerous.”
“I’m not drunk, Jesus. And how many times have me and Happy and May got on you about keeping your phone charged?” Tony asks, exasperated.
“Yeah, I'm aware that I was dumb, alright?" Peter says defensively. "I’m being punished for it now, obviously."
“You know,” Tony says. “You could have just nabbed someone’s phone and called for help instead of hoofing it all the way over here.”
Peter is aghast by the suggestion. “Spider-Man doesn’t steal,” he replies, all righteous indignation. It would be cute, if he wasn’t actively bleeding to death all over Tony’s floor.
“You just said you weren’t suited up as Spider-Man when you got stabbed,” Tony points out.
“Peter Parker doesn’t steal, either,” the kid says firmly.
“Borrowed, then.”
“Well, yeah, I guess I could have. But I didn’t want to freak anyone out walking up to them covered in blood, you know? Plus I can never remember your number anyway.”
Tony closes his eyes for a long, long moment. The problem, he thinks, is that the kid is too good. Tony can very clearly imagine this sweet, dumb child walking alone through the streets of New York City with a stab wound and being too polite to bother anyone for help. Peter would break his own arms before he would do anything to inconvenience someone.
“Tell me again how you got into that smart kid school,” Tony says.
“Ha ha,” Peter replies drily before wincing. “Ow. Oh, god. Can I lie down? I think I need to lie down. I’m feeling really bad now.”
The massive dose of adrenaline he had to have been operating on must have finally and abruptly run its course, because he goes several shades paler all at once, and his eyes get that glassy, unfocused look of someone suffering from shock.
“Yeah, lie down. Good idea,” Tony says, alarmed by how quickly the kid's going south.
“Oh man. Oh man. This really sucks,” Peter mumbles, closing his eyes. “I really fucked up...that was stupid, huh? Jumping in like that.”
“Really fucking stupid,” Tony agrees. “And really brave. You did good, kid.”
Peter takes a shaky breath. “Really?”
“Absolutely. This is going to be a badass story to tell your friends later. Here—” Tony grabs Peter’s hand and slides it under the one he has pressed against the knife wound. The kid’s skin feels cold and clammy, and Tony tries not to think about what that might mean. “Put pressure on that. I know it hurts but you really gotta press hard, alright? Just like that. Don’t let up. I’ll be right back.”
He jogs over to the bathroom, where he gives himself exactly ten seconds to silently panic in private and then another ten seconds to attempt to pull his shit together, and then he grabs a clean towel off the rack by the shower. When he comes back out, the kid is lying completely limp and still on the floor, his arms flopped out at his sides.
“Hey, what the fuck?” Tony says, rushing over and dropping back down to his knees next to Peter. He shakes the kid roughly, trying not to choke on the panic squeezing its way up his throat.
Peter stirs and blinks slowly up at him. “Oh shit. Sorry.”
“You gotta stay awake, alright?” Tony tells him, pressing the towel against the gash in the kid’s stomach. “You’ll miss the helicopter ride if you fall asleep. You ever been in a helicopter before?”
“No,” Peter mumbles, still blinking owlishly.
“You’re gonna love it, I promise,” Tony says. “But you have to stay awake. If you stay awake, I’ll let you pick out any car you want from my garage. Just pick one and it’s yours.”
Peter shakes his head slowly. “I don’t…I don’t have a driver’s license.”
“You can get one. Right? We can—we’ll practice driving together. We’ll take the Bugatti. How many kids get to learn to drive in a fucking Bugatti? Okay? Just—fuck. I’ll take you to Disney World. Rent the whole goddamn place out so we don’t have to wait in any lines. How does that sound?”
“Good, but—Mr. Stark, are you gonna be okay?” Peter asks.
“Am I going to be okay?” Tony replies. “Kid, you’re the one bleeding all over the place.”
“I know, but I think you’re kind of freaking out right now.”
“Who—me? I’m not freaking out,” Tony insists.
“Yeah, you are. Your hands are shaking, and I can hear your heart beating really fast.”
“You can hear my heart beating?” Tony asks. “Damn, kid, you never fail to impress me. We really oughta run some more tests, you know—we only have very basic information about your biometrics. That’s totally my fault. I’ll admit that this is delving a little into shaky territory for me—weird biology is more Dr. Banner’s bag—god, he would love you—and Brucie is…gone, so—”
“Mr. Stark,” Peter says, cutting into Tony’s babbling.
Tony looks down at him. The kid is white as a ghost, just completely washed out. It takes Tony’s breath away a little. “Yeah?”
“It’s okay,” Peter tells him gently. “It’s really going to be okay.”
“I think I’m supposed to tell you that,” Tony replies weakly.
“Okay, so—tell me that,” Peter says, his eyes pleading.
Tony nods, swallowing hard.
“It’s okay,” he tells him, trying to keep his voice steady. “It’s going to be okay. You’re going to be okay.”
“Yeah, that’s good,” Peter sighs.
Tony can’t tell if the kid actually believes him or if he’s still trying be reassuring. It makes Tony feel like shit either way, as does the fact that he can’t think of anything else comforting to say. He presses a hand against the top of Peter’s head instead, like he can physically hold him here even as the kid looks like he’s starting to drift farther away again.
The elevator doors open across the room behind Tony, but he doesn’t dare turn around or move at all, even when he hears Happy barreling towards them. Everything feels too fragile, like if he even breathes too hard it will all shatter and fall apart like the nanotech gauntlet had.
“What the fuck happened?” Happy asks, dropping down next to the pair of them. “Don’t answer that, we don’t have time,” he adds before Tony can even open his mouth, and Tony sends up a little silent prayer of gratitude to whatever higher power that may or may not exist that Happy at least has his head screwed on right.
“Come on, let’s move—car’s waiting, everyone’s ready to go at HQ. The chopper just landed at the Tower. You keep pressure on that, I’ll carry him,” Happy orders, so solid and purposeful. “You look like total shit, by the way,” he adds, glowering.
The comment shakes Tony out of the vice-like grip of dread he'd been in. He lets out a little bark of laughter.
“God, I’m glad you’re here, Hap,” he says. “You’re like a guardian angel. A real dickish, uptight one—which is exactly what I need and deserve.”
“Yeah, that’s cute, right after you threatened to fire me,” Happy grunts as he scoops Peter up and they start awkwardly shuffling towards the elevator. He looks at Tony over the top of the kid’s head. “And for the record, I got here in eight-and-a-half minutes.”
“I would have given you a sixty-percent salary increase if you’d done it in seven,” Tony tells him.
“Good thing I don’t do this shit for the money, then,” Happy says gruffly, adjusting his hold on Peter as the elevator begins its descent to the garage.
**************************
Tony sits in one of the small waiting rooms down the hall from the OR at the compound's medical facility, rhythmically clenching and unclenching his left hand into a fist, trying to work feeling back into his numb, trembling fingers. He had changed his clothes and washed away all the blood that had coated his hands and arms once the kid had been handed off to the facility's medical team, but he notices that there are still dried flakes of blood under his fingernails. He closes his hand into a fist again and shoves it away in his pocket, turning his attention to the phone he's holding in his other hand. He makes a call and presses the phone to his ear, biting the inside of his cheek as he listens to it ring.
“Tony?” Pepper’s voice answers finally, sounding a little sleep-muddled. “Is everything alright?”
“Hey, honey. Yeah, everything’s fine. Sort of. I’m calling from upstate. The kid got hurt. He’s fine—or he’s going to be. That’s what the doctors keep telling me, anyway. He’s in surgery right now. So. That’s what’s going on here. Thought I’d let you know.”
There’s a beat of silence. “Are you alright?” Pepper asks gently.
Tony takes a deep breath. “Yeah, I’m great, really, really great. I just thought—maybe—you could come home a little early. I mean, this stuff with the client can wait, right? It’s just…I need you home. You know, if that’s alright. I could use you here right now.”
“Of course,” Pepper says immediately. “I’ll make arrangements to fly home right now.”
“Thanks, Pep,” Tony says, swallowing down the sudden tightness in his throat. “You know I really appreciate you, right?”
“I love you, too, honey,” Pepper replies, and Tony can hear the smile in her voice, tender and understanding.
Happy comes into the waiting room right as Tony is ending the call, a styrofoam cup full of coffee in each hand.
“Did you call May? Do I need to go get her?” Happy asks as he hands one of the cups to Tony.
Tony grimaces. “Not yet, no.”
Happy gives him a look of frustrated disbelief. “What the hell are you waiting for? She’s gonna want to know what happened. This is her child, Tony—you have to tell her.”
“I know that,” Tony snaps. “I’m just trying to think of the right thing to tell her so I don’t freak her out too bad. That’s all. Jesus. Give me a break here.”
Happy rolls his eyes. “Listen, I’m going to go ahead and start driving. You better call her before I make it to her apartment.”
“Yeah, alright,” Tony says, waving him away. He spends another half hour staring at his phone trying to think of the right message to present to May, his leg jiggling nervously. It’s almost as panic-inducing as trying to keep the kid from dying was.
Hey, May, it’s your best pal, Tony. Just letting you know someone artfully rearranged your nephew’s guts with a folding knife while he was on his way home from the movie. I waited too long to tell you because I’m a big fucking coward and you terrify me. But don’t worry, I handled everything like a champ. Definitely did not panic and practically let your kid bleed to death on my floor. XOXO.
He chickens out in the end and has Happy call her. That’s why Tony pays him the big bucks, after all.
***************************
Several hours later, the kid is out of surgery and resting in a recovery room, and Tony has paced back and forth up and and down the hallway outside the room so many times that it’s a wonder he hasn’t worn a groove into the floor.
He’s finishing another circuit when May finally comes out of her nephew’s room. Tony stops pacing and grits his teeth as he watches her stride down the hall towards him, a thunderous look on her face.
She marches up and smacks him across the mouth.
Tony stumbles back at step, cupping a hand over his stinging jaw. “Yeah. I deserved that.”
“Yes, you did. You should have called me as soon as you brought him here,” May says, fuming. Then she hugs him, holding him tightly for a long time. “Thank you for taking care of him.”
“Well, you know, it’s all part of the job,” Tony says, sucking at his swelling lip. “Just another day in the life.”
May releases him, reaching up to rub at the red spot she’s left on his cheek. “Sure. Like I can’t see right through you. ”
“God, you’re terrifying,” Tony says. “I’m a little bit in love with you."
May rolls her eyes. “I’m gonna ignore your nonsense just this one time, since I’m feeling so grateful to you. I gotta go into work now. I couldn’t find anyone to cover my shift since someone called me so last minute.”
Tony grimaces. “Sorry. Really. I’ll do better next time.”
“I would say let’s hope there isn’t a next time, but I know how Peter is,” May says with a wry smile.
Tony blows out a breath, feeling bone-deep weariness. “Tell me it gets easier, please.”
“Sorry, pal,” May says, squeezing his arm. “But he’s worth the heartache, I promise.”
“Yeah, I know,” Tony sighs. “That’s the problem. It’s too damn easy to get attached.”
May pats his cheek, gently this time. “Keep an eye on him for me, alright?”
“You know I will.”
*********************
The last time Tony laid eyes on Peter, the kid had looked like death barely warmed over, so it’s a pleasant surprise to come into his room and find him peacefully sleeping and already looking more rosy-cheeked and alive. It’s remarkable and a little scary, what that spider bite did.
Still, Tony carefully inspects the various beeping machines displaying the kid’s vitals before he’s satisfied enough to settle in the chair next to the bed, and then—just to be absolutely sure—he lays a hand on Peter’s chest so he can feel the kid breathing and the steady beat of his heart.
Pepper arrives about an hour later, looking slightly rumpled from her early morning flight, but to Tony she might as well be the most beautiful creature he’s ever laid eyes on after the harrowing night he’s had. The world always seems a little more focused and orderly when she’s nearby.
“You should go to bed,” she tells him in a soft voice. “You look tired. I can stay with him.”
“I know this is just my under-treated anxiety talking,” Tony says, “but if I leave this chair or close my eyes even for a second, the kid is going to die. So I have to stay here.”
Pepper’s smile is fond and knowing. “Well. At least you recognize the absurdity of that idea. That’s progress. You can call your therapist later in the morning to celebrate.”
“Ha,” Tony says, running his hand through his hair and so that the strands stand on end.
Pepper smooths them back down, and then she leans down and kisses the top of his head. “You know, we tried to warn you.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know.”
“But,” Pepper adds, cocking her head. “I think it looks good on you.”
Tony huffs out a little humorless laugh. “What—the all-consuming panic and flailing incompetence?”
“Something like that,” Pepper murmurs, her mouth curving into a small smile again.
She kisses the top of his head once more, and then she bends over the bed and kisses Peter’s head, soft and featherlight so she doesn’t disturb him.
Tony watches her, feeling pierced through with a love so intense it almost hurts, and a longing for something that he doesn’t yet dare to name. It looks good on her, too, he thinks. Whatever it is.
**************************
“Mr. Stark?”
Tony cracks an eyelid open. A face peers into his from about two inches away.
“Gah!” he says, flinching back. “Christ almighty. You have got to stop doing that. I’m an old man with a bad heart.”
“Sorry,” Peter says, sitting back on the bed. “Do you know you snore? Like really loud?”
“I do not snore. You were dreaming or something,” Tony replies, straightening up in the chair and rubbing the painful kink out of his neck. He squints at Peter. “You should be lying down. You just had major abdominal surgery. I don’t think you’re supposed to be up yet.”
“I feel super great, though,” Peter says slowly, examining his hands like he’s never seen them before. “I feel...whoa.”
Tony snorts. “I was going to ask if your pain meds were working, but I’ll take that as a yes.”
Peter turns his head to look at Tony, a hopeful expression on his face. “Do I still get to go to Disney?”
“You remember that?”
“Yes. And the car.”
“Car?” Tony says with exaggerated confusion. “I think your pain meds are working too well. I never said anything about a car. Your aunt would kill me.”
“Mm,” Peter hums doubtfully. “Well. Can I ask for something else anyway?”
“You can ask, sure.”
“Will you get me a grilled cheese sandwich?” Peter requests. “Like, just a regular boring one, not like the fancy ones you make sometimes with weird cheese that smells like feet.”
“I can get you a regular, boring grilled cheese,” Tony says. “Boring sounds very good right now. That’s all?”
“That’s all.”
“You have exactly two settings, you know,” Tony tells Peter as he gets up. “You’re either the easiest-going kid on the planet, or you’re making me shit my pants.”
“I dunno what to tell you,” Peter says, back to intently examining his hands. “Hey, are my arms actually floating, or am I just really messed up?”
“You are definitely really messed up.” Tony leans over and grabs Peter under the chin. “Hey, look at me for a second, I want to tell you something important. You’re a really good kid, you know that? Maybe too good sometimes. Dial it back a few notches, okay? For my sake."
"Mr. Stark, I can't make any promises right now," Peter tells him, his face comically solemn. "I'm under the influence of drugs."
Tony lets him go, shaking his head. "You're hopeless," he says with exasperated affection. "This is hopeless. God help me."