Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Parker’s Luck™ was, for lack of a better word, whack.

Absolutely out of the entire world whack. Perhaps it made sense on some alien planet, but definitely not on Earth. And that wasn’t a simple opinion that had persevered through time and generations, devolving into its own entity and folklore. No, every instance was all rather well documented and passed from parent to child, as warning tales or as heartwarming stories.

Once, Ben had lost his wallet and realised a bit too late, having already ordered a coffee with no money to pay for it. Lucky was he, though, because an Italian woman named May, whom he had a terrible and debilitating crush on, was behind him in line and offered to cover for it, leaving him her number on a napkin. Then, again, Ben had also managed to fall down a flight of stairs and break his ankle, before a second date with her.

Richard had been the same, finding the love of his life and losing the job opportunity of a lifetime by remaining in New York instead of moving to Pasadena, all on the same day. Which then worked out for the best as he climbed the ranks at Oscorp and created a wonderful family with said woman. But he also had the ability to wear sensible shoes and forego his umbrellas (as in multiples because he had the tendency to wreck them) and then get caught in the downpour despite the clear forecast for the week.

Overall, Parker Luck™ wasn’t known for being aggressive or outrageous, mostly inconvenient, and absurd.

Unless, of course, Peter Parker was involved. It was after his many encounters with said Luck that the family had added the trademark, after all.

He was born during the only thunderstorm of the season, but Mary attributed that to her husband’s fortune. Yet whenever he found a toy in his cereal boxes, they’d discover a new food sensitivity. And his asthma made itself known when he was reciting a poem in school, dressed up as a beautiful little flower.

His parents had even taken him to Coney Island, once, to prove the theory or to put it to rest. His dad was adamant that there was absolutely nothing wrong with their family’s luck and his mom was adamant that there was something in the Parker genes that attracted the absurd and “What better way to prove whether or not I’m right than to let my son run amok in the park! It’d be a win for all.”

“He’s my son too, Mary, and I refuse to let you experiment on him like this,” his dad had replied, itching to know the answer but rather hesitant to admit defeat once his mom had gathered all her evidence.

“Well, then, let’s ask Peter what he wants to do, let him decide if he wants to go to Coney Island! Do you want to, sweetheart?” And how could a five year old say no to such a sweet trip.

At the end of the day, when they left, Peter had won three prizes of different sizes using his innate knowledge and understanding of physics to knock down bottles and duckies, calculating the trajectories of the missiles he would have to launch in order to get the biggest teddy bear ever. He had also eaten an insane amount of greasy pizza and hot dogs, thus proceeding to be very sick on one of the rollercoasters, causing the entire thing to stop for cleaning and highlighting the fact that the small queue of children waiting for the ride was about to be sick, as well. But then, right as he felt slightly better and was asking to return to the rides, there was a small hiccup with the park’s electricity, which warranted the Parkers to take their son and move him away from anything involving heights. He had, in the end, even lost one of his front teeth right as he scored the highest marks in Centipede at the local arcade, winning an even bigger teddy.

Therefore came the absolute conclusion to his mother’s thesis, much to his father’s chagrin: Parker’s Luck™ was completely whack.  They could even call it rigged when it came to their son’s fate, for some inexplicable reason.

It didn’t stop or change throughout his childhood and early adolescence.

Get certified as a genius after taking several IQ scores because no one could believe that the tiny asthmatic twelve year old orphan had an intelligence that could rival Dr Bruce Banner’s and Dr Reed Richards’? Best friend gets shipped away to France and off to boarding school, with no way of contacting each other because his father is the biggest jerk to ever jerk.

Not that it mattered, since they had been able to keep correspondence and sneak around him whenever Harry was back in New York for the summer, but it was still a pretty terrible thing of Norman to do.

Get such high grades that the school is forced to celebrate the achievements even though he is a scholarship student? Flash Thompson starts calling him “Penis” and it catches fairly well with his vast entourage and spreads like quickfire around various schools, thus sticking as a nickname for the years to come, despite the fact that middle school was ending and they’d all move to different highs, earning a fresh slate.

Well, all but him and Flash, who had to join him at Midtown despite his terrible history with science.

Get stuck in detention on his first week because he got locked in the bathroom and missed a period? Become actually really great friends with the other Uber-Nerd™ at school and learn how to navigate the world together growing thick as thieves.

Go on a field trip to your parents’ former workplace and get lost trying to remember where their offices were? Almost die due to a radioactive spider bite that is followed by the scariest fever ever witnessed in Aunt May’s life as a nurse.

Goodbye Uncle Ben? Hello Spider-Man! (With a hyphen, even if the majority of New York followed the Daily Bugle’s lead and forgot it).

It was all over the field, some was terrible, some was awful, some was perfect.

Ergo: absolutely and utterly whack.

On one hand, he had gained super-abilities that he adored, most of the time, when they didn’t wreck his day and cause an overload; he had found friends and allies that cared for him, some of whom were overbearing and impossible to deal with,  “No, Matthew, I will not stop patrolling tonight just because I have a chemistry test tomorrow, I can do that in my sleep” and “I do not need any more updates on the web-shooters, Mr Stark, not all of us have to shoot lasers and bullets in order to be happy”; and he had created an outlet for his emotions and his hyperactivity, although his friends hated to swing with him, but he swore by it.

To be fair, the entire ordeal with the bite would have been fine only outweighed by the whole twhip twhip deal, as MJ called it.

On the other hand, though, he had lost almost his entire family in two tragedies, leaving him as the sole bearer of Parker Luck™ and with Aunt May to care for him; he had acquired a bunch of crazy villains and evildoers who were out for his head, not to mention that he had attracted the ire of various districts of New York’s Finest; and he had accumulated more hours of homework that he had bargained for, not that he had for any at all.

Whoever was dealing his hands was having the time of their lives toying with him, of that he was certain.

He was, quite literally, a single wrong equation away from breaking into Doctor Strange’s place, taking the keys to the Sanctum, using said key to steal the fancy necklace with the time travelling stone inside and get a bunch of books on magic and wizardry, studying every single little thing that those books had to offer just out of spite, because Strange had once commented that only a great mind like his could learn enough to rise in the ranks of the sorcerers in such a short time, all before turning back time and stopping Dr Stark from convincing Aunt May to enrol him in online MIT courses, all because he was “growing too bored with the curriculum at Midtown, he is shrivelling down, May, he is a young genius that needs to be stimulated otherwise he’ll turn into a supervillain that will actually succeed!”

Or maybe he’d stop her from giving her own condition of: “He will remain at Midtown for the other classes, though, because he is still a teenager that needs history and literature, and he has his friends there and the Academic Decathlon, and I will not uproot his life like this.”

Or he’d tackle Tony from agreeing because he too “was sent off to college too young and if wasn’t for Rhodey I’d have died in a ditch by November and Peter should not move to Boston ever, he needs to stay here where we can check up on the stabbing statistics Karen sends each month.”

Unbearable, the two of them. Three if he added Matt to the mix, which he did. He got stabbed on patrol one time too many and it had caused an uproar in the ‘Parenting Trio’, as MJ called them.

Nevertheless, after the whole Uncle Ben debacle back in his freshman year, everything had pretty much settled down. Nothing majorly catastrophic was happening in his life.

He was successfully juggling down vigilantism, high school and college, a side hustle of tech reparations for New York’s vigilantes and heroes and affiliates who were too proud or too broke to afford new models, and a very successful and stressful internship in one of the most prestigious tech and research companies in the world, flanking one of the most intelligent people on the planet!

(He would have asked Reed, but the man was too far up in his head to allow anyone other than Sue and Ben in his space. And Banner had taken his newly found love for space right to Asgard, which would have made a multi-dimensional mentorship hard to maintain. And T’Challa had categorically vetoed him and Shuri to spend more than a week together, especially without supervision, for the apparent sake of humanity. Which was bullshit in their books but they did cause several explosions together, so. He got left with Tony.)

Therefore, it would have been safe to assume that Peter Parker had found his footing and was thriving.

He really should have expected Parker Luck™ to start acting up again, in full force.

Chapter Text

Everything went to shit right as he walked into the gym for their Tuesday AcaDec practise. At least from Peter’s perspective.

Technically, the real damage had already been done weeks in advance, by unassuming and clueless employees who had no regard for his sanity and by an unforgiving school administration who had gone out of its way to ruin his life.

Not that any background mattered, for if Peter had been kept in the dark and untouched by the catastrophe, he would have been fine.

But, of course, he just had to find out somehow. And stand right in the centre of the tsunami, ready to be flushed away by the currents.

It had been a wonderful day, which made sense considering that his demise was moving closer and closer by the second.

The sun was shining and he had experienced the first real warm day of the season, meaning he could forget his fear of hypothermia for the first time in months. He had arrived early (for him, who was chronically at least ten minutes late to everything but vigilante activities) and he and Ned had even been able to chat about the latest episode of Ashoka before the bell rang. He had handed his history essay on World War II with days to spare, filled with juicy gossip and actual real facts right from two extremely reputable sources, after double checking everything he wrote down because, no matter what the press said, the super soldiers he knew were little bitches that enjoyed pulling his legs, both metaphorically and physically. He had avoided detention by appearing engrossed by his teacher’s lesson on the introduction of thermodynamics, (why was the class still stuck on that in AP Chemistry, he didn’t know) despite mentally working out a reaction that had bothered him for two days straight, before writing it all down and beginning to apply it theoretically to one of his projects for SI, to maximise efficiency and cut cost. And he had absolutely smashed his Spanish test, earning a full 100 even though he hadn’t studied for it at all before taking it.

He’d probably have to send Matt an edible arrangement or some edible flowers for sending him off to repair Senora Diaz’s TV instead of hanging out at the firm.

But, then again, he would have to spend money to do so and he was, by all means, unable to do so. The internship did pay well and he and Aunt May were better off than they had ever been, not having to worry about bills or fees of any sort, and he was able to keep up with his metabolism without worrying about the amount of groceries they bought, that was true, but it was all about the mentality.

Once a broke bitch, always a broke bitch.

Therefore the grade would suffice as a ‘thank you’. Which was for the best since Matt would have appreciated it more.

He too was a broke bitch, after all.

Now, he didn’t want to sound presumptuous when he claimed that the day could only get better, but his prospects were quite rosy: MJ would be drilling them on the practice questions he had revised the night before as he swung through the night sky in a call with her and Ned, thus deeming the AcaDec meeting a success in his books; then he had a scheduled call with the Tokyo headquarters of SI to talk directly with the manufacturers about the imminent release of the portable charger he had designed and created, taking in the opportunity to practise his Japanese as well; and then, to top it all off, he would be shadowing Pepper in a board meeting and taking notes for her, after SHE had asked HIM to do so because SHE wanted HIM attend all the meetings he could, because it was important for his future, and SHE always encouraged HIM to ask questions and answer them, if he felt up to it. Something along the lines of “It’s not fair for Tony to keep you to himself, you’re too intelligent to remain stuck in a lab like him” and “You are wonderful, sweetheart, and I want to take every single opportunity I can to show you how to run things”, whatever the heck it meant.

Needless to say, he was on cloud freaking nine!

Nothing could go wrong.

Or, at least, so he thought before he pushed the gym doors open to get to practice with Ned by his side, only to be hit by a wave of Spider Senses going haywire over apparently nothing. Wonderful!

He immediately looked around, searching for danger but all he could register were his teammates, all huddled together, excitedly whispering to each other as if the Nobels had just been announced, and Flash, who was looking at the door as if waiting for him and Ned to show up. Which he probably did since they were his preferred targets.

And, right as he saw them, he began smirking and gleaming as a kid on Christmas morning who had received more gifts than he had anticipated. Which, for Flash, was a constant state given by his popularity and wealth, so Peter didn’t really think much of it, choosing to appear as normal as possible and to sit down, ignoring the way his personal anxiety on steroids was screaming at him to flee the scene and curl up on a dark corner.

And he had almost succeeded in calming the heck down before he saw MJ, basically staring through his soul with her crisis notebook out and a pencil dangling in between her fingers.

“So that’s where the danger comes from,” he thought, his mind playing a weirdly moody version of the 1812 Overture from ‘V for Vendetta’ remixed with the soundtrack from Hitchcock’s ‘Vertigo’.

“Have you drawn anyone interesting today?” Ned asked, innocently and unaware of the danger that permeated the air.

MJ, the vixen, simply kept on glaring Peter down: “Not yet.”

The shudder that left his body was completely uncontrollable and did not go unnoticed by the girl, who looked immensely pleased.

“You know,” he started saying, happy that his voice did not waver and crack under her scrutiny, “I should definitely sue you for emotional damage.”

He was Spider-Man, for crying out loud! He had defeated giant lizards and crashed a plane into the Hudson and had gone toe to toe with the embodiment of Justice, Truth, and the American Way and won. He had even gone against Aunt May’s wishes and become a vigilante. He was not going to be scared of a teenage girl!

Even though he definitely was.

“You’ve been spending too much time around Foggy if you think you have the grounds for a lawsuit and not enough time with Karen if you believe you’d win.”

Thankfully, though, Mr Harrington appeared right out of nowhere with a stack of papers, before he had the chance for a rebuttal. Because he had one, on the tip of his tongue, a golden one even. Absolutely. It was such a shame he could not say it in front of the teacher.

Another shame was that he and Ned still hadn’t been able to ask what the frickety frack was going on with the rest of the group.

And something was absolutely going on.

“Alright, kids, each of you take a bundle and bring them back to me signed in the morning,” the teacher said, beginning to hand out a block of six papers to each of them, acting a bit more erratic than usual. Which was the first sign that something was definitely up. “Oh, hi Ned and Peter, you’re almost late! Here, grab them too.”

They both reluctantly did as they were told, only to be presented with a detailed permission slip, a form to compile with their personal data, a list of rules and, upon closer inspection, three pages of NDAs. All the clues pointed towards a field trip, yet with no indication of their destination. And Peter came to the conclusion that he had been wrong: the danger did not come from MJ.

Not this time, at least.

Field Trips and Parker Luck™ did not mix well. Technically, they did not mix well with Midtown High School of Science and Technology as well, considering that Washington had been listed as one. And a senior the year before had gotten his hand stuck inside a vending machine at the MET. Any sane person would have looked at their school’s track record and decided that even considering taking the children out of their classrooms for more than an assembly was an absolute no-no, let alone applying for and organising an “educational journey inside highly technological and scientific laboratories”.

Hadn’t Oscorp been enough?!

Ned, bless his heart, didn’t really share his personal view and was already excited about the mystery location. Nevertheless, being the great and perfect friend he was, he took one look at Peter’s pained face and finally asked the million-dollar question: “Mr H, what is going on?”

“You would have known if you weren’t late,” MJ said dryly, skimming through the NDAs with expert eye.

Peter knew firsthand how much she enjoyed legal jargon and documents, having demanded a copy of each version of the Accords before they were actively dismantled, just to be able to criticise them pointedly. She then would give him notes for the updates and, if he didn’t make sure they were incorporated, she would then bother him and give him the silent treatment until he passed along for the modifications. He knew better than to even distract her when she was reading anything, especially if it was something official.

So, for her to be so nonchalant about it meant that whatever was happening was more amusing than the papers in her hands, which spelt trouble in his books.

Nevertheless, Mr Harrington simply shook his head: “I should have waited for them, this is all my fault. I was just so excited!” And then he squealed. Properly squealed like a freaking anime magic girl that has found out her crush liked her back and that her nemesis had embarrassed herself in front of the entire school.

Clearly another sign of the Apocalypse coming forth.

“As you know, our team won an excursion after our last match,” both Peter and Ned nodded, since it had been the talk of the ton for the past two weeks. Betty was all over the place with her theories on where they might go and Cindy had created a betting pool. The consensus was that they’d visit the MoMA.

Peter just wished he wouldn’t have to repeat an Oscorp 2.0, but his teammates had clearly not been averse to it, much to his dismay.

“Well, I have just received the date and documentation for our field trip, so on Friday we will meet half an hour before school starts in order to take a bus to Manhattan and enjoy a full day touring one of the most famed laboratories in the country! Oh, and lunch will be provided, but be sure to bring some money if you want to buy something at the gift shop!”

“That’s great, Mr H, but you haven’t told us where to yet,” Peter said, ignoring the dread pooling down in his stomach.

“Please not Oscorp, anywhere but Oscorp.”

But, before the teacher could fill them in, Flash just had to chime in with his unwanted opinions: “He told us, Penis, and trust me, you’re not going to like it,” he claimed with too much bravado and, frankly, Peter had grown pretty tired of the whole ‘derogatory nickname to show his own superiority’ thing.

“Be mindful of your language, especially during our trip. We wouldn’t want to reflect badly on the school, now would we?” Mr Harrington called back, the closest he ever came to a reproach over Flash’s behaviour. The entire school body knew better than to antagonize the son of the PTA president and most influential donor, after all.

“What? It’s true! He doesn’t work there!” he squawked indignantly, as if he had all the reasons in the world to torment Peter over his internship and as if the entire school administration was made of a bunch of idiots for believing him. And, while it was true that they had made fools out of themselves for not believing him in the first place, they soon had to eat their words and hats. He and Pepper had wasted too much time filling out the proper paperwork at the school for them to deny the validity of his extracurriculars. Not to mention the constant reports and the ever-growing pile of published papers he had written or co-written.

The principal had even apologised for his behaviour!

Still, being the private person he truly was, Peter preferred not to brag about his achievements and Flash, being the moron he truly was, didn’t care about the veracity of his words before starting a rumour after having heard half a conversation between him and Ned.

“His lies are going to get busted and then he’d probably ki-” he was about to continue, but MJ simply slapped her hand on the empty chair next to her, causing everyone to turn to her at the sudden noise. She then took to glaring directly at Flash with daggers in her eyes, until he backed down into silence.

Yes, he wasn’t the brightest, but he wasn’t stupid enough to go against MJ.

Mr Harrington took the quiet as his sign that he was allowed to speak again, definitely trying to regain his authority over the bunch of teenagers he was supposed to lead: “This is my last warning, Flash. Be professional or you will not be allowed to come. That goes for all of you.”

“Whatever,” Flash mumbled, complying, crossing his arms over his chest, and pouting like a toddler, “I will simply enjoy when Parker’s exposed for his fake internship!”

“Ned, tell me this is a nightmare,” he whispered to his best friend, who was actively vibrating out of his skin. It didn’t matter that he had spent the previous weekend with Peter camped out in the lab working out how to make functioning lightsabres, a trip to the Tower was still a trip to the Tower. Yet, if the roles were reversed, Peter was sure he’d have a bit of sympathy for his best friend.

Maybe.

Probably.

Definitely.

“No can do, buddy. No can do.”

“To answer you, Mr Parker…” he purposefully tailed off, waiting to finish his sentence, as if to create suspense.

It might have worked, if only Peter hadn’t already understood their destination and wasn’t planning on asking Mr Fantastic to yeet him into space like Monkey D. Luffy would. Or, perhaps, he’d simply follow Bucky’s footsteps and move to Wakanda to tend to sheep. Or taken up on Thor’s invitation and gone to train as an Asgardian Warrior.

For some reason, Thor was really invested in his education, going as far as recommending him books on Norse Mythology and guides on the most absurd topics, like how to rule a kingdom and how to defend one’s territories and how to prepare for betrayal. He had even asked him if he wished to fight with Mjolnir or have a different weapon bestowed on him.

What a weirdo.

Yet, Mr Harrington couldn’t understand his internal turmoil, for he proudly and excitedly said out loud the words that would have stamped Peter Parker’s death certificate: “We are going to Stark Industries!”

Chapter Text

Instead of ringing the Sanctum’s doorbell and seeking refuge at Kamar Taj, (which would have been a great idea, thank you very much) Peter chose to follow his agenda to a t before malfunctioning, as if nothing had happened and as if he hadn’t seen his own life flash before his eyes in a smelly high school gym.

Technically speaking, nothing too drastic had happened.

The school already knew all too well about his internship and the paperwork had been spotless, in a way only the Pepper Potts would have made it. Aunt May had even personally argued with his teachers who doubted his ability to maintain his grades with the newly added work, all the while keeping quiet on the college courses and nightly activity. The AcaDec teens were -Flash excluded- pretty cool, sort to say, and while they might’ve been doubtful about his disappearances and missed practices, mostly because he had never really bothered to clear the air, they would gather all the necessary proofs and finally get off his back.

Unless he miscalculated and then they’d jump even higher on that, trying to munch off his position and success. Yet, they were chill people, so Peter didn’t really think they’d do that. Flash excluded.

Besides, he was extremely confident about his work at SI. So, why would he be nervous?

There was an obvious fear that had been constant since freshman year: give an intelligent person a crumb of a hint and they’d work out his secret identity. Which was, coincidentally how MJ had discovered him.

But he had dropped pounds of accidental clues during the years and none of his friends had realised anything, therefore he was probably in the clear about that whole debacle. If Abe and Charles had not connected the dots about him being Spider-Man after seeing him hanging out with Deadpool at Delmar’s, loudly complaining about the use of guns amongst  New York City's Criminals, covered in bruises that had disappeared overnight and were nowhere to be found the next day at school, then nothing would have made them.

So, shelving that issue aside, there was an itty bitty tiny part of his brain that made him awfully aware that he didn’t really know where he stood.

On paper and for legal purposes, he was listed as a simple intern, since he wasn’t technically allowed to be a full-time employee. The government and CPS would have both been up their asses if they found out the true extent of Peter’s involvement in… anything, really, no matter how many hours he clocked in or how innovative and world-changing his work was. 

He was still a minor, after all.

At Stark Industries, interns had the ability to work around their classes’ timetables, having a minimum of five hours weekly. They aided in the labs and offices and weren’t really able to move around in the Tower, limited to their own departments and tasks. Besides, interns usually remained for up to six months and were typically seniors in college, ready to finish and then move into the workforce. The internship program was used as a launch pad, a trial run of sorts, since 80% of those who finished one had a spot in the company once they graduated.

Peter Parker was an intern in name only.

For starters, he was still a junior in high school and he had been working at Stark Industries for two years straight, officially the longest the company had employed one. He had started out helping Tony in his own lab with gadgets and updates to the Spider suit, before moving on to Avengers and Co.’s gear that needed to be patched up. His mentor had realised by then his talents and had put him to the test, throwing SI projects that were bothering him and his teams for Peter to fix, which he did perfectly. Then he was brought to design his own things and it went all downhill (or uphill) for him. He began actively working on SI releases and projects, becoming involved in each department of R&D in one way or another.

And that was in the scientific field alone.

It all started with the Accords, because of course, it did.

Back when Germany had happened, Tony and Steve had managed to actually work their differences out with words, but the whole process had already been fulfilled by the time they figured out a strategy. So, they were passed by the government and thus implemented after the whole Vulture incident. And then the situation quickly degenerated.

Matt had been livid when he read them and Daredevil quite violently berated Stark for signing them without properly understanding what he had done. Every single vigilante and mutant/super-powered individual all over the world spoke against them, rallying marches and protests as police used force to apprehend them for the simple crime of being born with abilities.

It was, quite frankly, the most stressful period of Peter’s life.

Thankfully, though, the public’s opinion made the UN reconsider them and the commission they had created was dismantled after it was clear that the Accords implemented systemic violation of various Human Rights. Still, there was much work to be done, considering not everything on the Accords was absolute trash.

And, between lab sessions, Peter managed to shine.

He had found Tony rehearsing a speech that he was supposed to present at the UN, detailing modifications that were crucial to the stability of the new version of the Accords, and gave his input in various parts, considering his own experience. Pepper walked right on them hashing it all out and politely told Peter to rewrite the whole thing, asking around directly to those that would be affected the most.

In the end, he had pulled two all-nighters, called every contact in his burner phone, ate too much instant ramen and pizza with Matt, and wrote a monstrosity of a document that was presented the following week during the Revisions. And got actually approved.

The Commission had refused three modifications already and they accepted Peter’s, basically without a fuss. Thus cementing, in the Young Spider's mind, that they were composed of a bunch of idiots.

Afterwards, much to his disbelief, Pepper took him aside and told him, quite bluntly, that he could be their point person when dealing with the Accords, with Tony as a figurehead, if he wanted to. She then asked him if by any chance would he be interested in aiding in the legal department every now and then.

Such a totally normal question for a teenager.

And from then on, she basically took him under her wing, showing him the ropes and having him participate in meetings and discussions whenever his schedule allowed him to.

So, in the years he had worked at SI he had not only moved up the ranks, but also been involved in almost every single aspect of the company. (He avoided the PR side like the plague and he didn't really care much for Marketing, though.)

Therefore, he wasn’t scared of people finding out he worked there. His imposter syndrome was just kicking his ass and being a pain.

But he was Spider-Man, which meant he could endure through any sort of issue, ignoring it until he could properly break it down and freak out.

And so he did.

He was the King of Compartmentalization!

Which meant he was able to do anything he had already planned without an itch. The call had ended with him satisfied about the state of progress that had been made and with the scheduling of another one in two weeks’ time, two days before the launch, mainly because Tony was paranoid that everything that could go wrong would and he had started rubbing off Peter. And he had been able to keep his place during the meeting, even managing to make the board listen to his input and subsequently making grown men squirm in their designer shoes under his gaze, as he made them realise their mistakes in suggesting budget cuts.

SI was a scientific company. Which meant they needed more funds for their research.

Besides, they were a multibillion-dollar empire, they could spare the cents. And Pepper had a kick at his proposal that they’d revise their own salaries, as a starting point for any modifications and subtractions, so it was a win all over the place.

But, after everything was done and his schedule was clear for the evening, before it was time to patrol, he decided that he could pencil in his much-awaited and needed mental breakdown. Therefore, excusing himself as soon as the meeting ended and the pleasantries had been shared, he told Pepper that he had some rounds to make and quickly disappeared inside the elevator.

Where to? He wasn’t entirely certain.

All he knew was that he had to hunt down the person responsible for orchestrating his demise.

Chapter Text

He didn’t have many clues about the identity of the traitor who had betrayed him in such a vicious way, that was unfortunately true, but Peter was very resourceful. Countless foes were always amazed by his abilities and the entire lowlife of New York quacked in their boots over him. He had been trained by Daredevil and by the Black Widow, for Heaven’s sake, and he helped out Jessica Jones whenever she had a tricky lead. He had once managed to track down the Punisher who was injured and laying low, simply to pet Max.

He’d be fine.

He had his intelligence and he wasn’t to be underestimated. The last person who had done so was currently sitting in a cell after having gotten their butt glued to the side of a building. And he had done so using only his webs, which he had created and manufactured all by himself, and his knowledge of geometry and physics. All the while shooting excellent remarks at the perp.

The boy could multitask.

He had his ruthless determination, which had led him to hack into Oscorp for the sole purpose of playing annoying songs over the speakers of the building at random times. Usually when Norman was doing nothing and there was a perfect opportunity to disturb him. He had then used their own security system to watch him lose his shit over it all, unable to stop or even track him.

Harry had laughed so hard, when he shared the footage, that he had spilled water out of his nose and fallen to the ground. Peter had, as any great best friend would, recorded and stored the footage away for a rainy day.

He had a stack of papers, which bore the Stark Industries logo. But nothing on them could link him back to a specific department or individual, so all he could do was stare at the permission slip as if it had personally offended him. Which it did.

He asked FRIDAY as soon as the elevator doors closed behind him. No reason to beat around the bush when you have a shortcut, after all.

And, lo and behold, the AI delivered him right to his prey.

Although, he wasn’t sure he was as safe as he might have imagined. For she had led him right into the ‘Gates of Hell’, as Tony called them.  The nefarious PR department of SI, home of demons and sharks that cared for nothing other than publicity. And, apparently, all the ‘Haralds’ did was run after him and “stifle his creativity and free speech”. The poor billionaire couldn’t even tweet that he wished to punch Elon Musk right on the nose that immediately a bunch of well-tailored suits blocked his account, “for his own good.” Or they vetoed his promotional ideas for releases, which most of the time involved letting the Suits fly around and spell the name of whatever product was about to hit the market, right on the sky, not really bothering to check if it was migration season or if a plane was in their trajectory.

Still, they were mostly under Pepper’s orders, therefore completely allowed to stop Tony from making dumb decisions online.

Encouraged, even.

His own experience with them had been different. Technically speaking, he had encountered employees in the wild, passing them in corridors or sitting in meetings, and they appeared pretty tame and not at all the demon-like creatures Tony painted. They did come up with good publicity and had been a godsend when he was dealing with the Accords, always eager to change their speeches and messages over his word, preferring his point of view as it would have made any situation more appealing to younger audiences.

Besides, the PR department was the reason behind the former Stark Expo, which had been Peter’s introduction to the world of superheroes and villains.

Uncle Ben had done everything to score them three tickets, trying to cheer him up. It had been a few months after the death of his parents and both he and Aunt May had decided that that would have been the perfect opportunity to get him out of the house. Peter had been ecstatic, bouncing off the walls and asking for help to make a mock helmet to wear, just like Iron Man’s. And everything was going well, the stalls were awesome and Peter had managed to talk with a few of the workers, learning the insides of engines and the science behind it all and earning amazed gazes whenever he showed off his intelligence, all the while Aunt May and Uncle Ben proudly flanked him.

But then, there was chaos and he had lost them both. All worked out, in the end, since they managed to find him and bring him back safely home, bundled in blankets as he enthusiastically recounted the experience of standing right in front of one of the suits with his hand stretched out, as if he had his own shooters. Of course, though, Iron Man swooped in to save the day, just at the right time.

When Peter had first told Tony the tale of how they had already unofficially met, the engineer had dropped the wrench he was holding, carefully moved him away from the repulsor he was fixing and point blank told him that he “could trace my first grey hair directly back to you, Jesus, Peter, is it coded in your weird DNA to make me worry about you? I have a heart condition, you heathen!”

Yet Peter couldn’t really share his concerns, though, since that experience had been the highlight of a very shitty year.

Nevertheless, his mentor had successfully ingrained in his brain that PR was to be avoided at all costs, which he tended to do, usually.

Except, he couldn’t let their misdeeds go unpunished. So, he squared up and marched right into Hell.

And soon he found out that he and Tony had a completely different version of Hell in mind when describing the department. PR wasn’t more terrifying than the average office, full of desks and watercoolers and plants and people clicking away on their keyboards.

The only being truly terrifying in there was, in Peter’s opinion, their Head, Mara Habowski, his very own enemy. (Step aside Green Goblin and Norman Osborn, there was someone else to contend for Peter’s most disliked person of the year now! No hard feelings.)

She was a force of nature, according to Pepper, who had managed to reign in most scandals from Tony’s rowdy past and dealt in a no-nonsense way with SI’s publicity. She managed press releases and leaks, and had a picture of Justin Hammer up on a dart board, covered in holes.

And, since Peter had officially been brought in as an intern, was all but pestering him about his own image, demanding information and wanting to know everything she could about him, “for when you go public,” whatever that meant. He had already come out as Bi, after all.

She then had wanted him to make a Twitter account solely for the internship, to promote the company and shed positive light on the otherwise controversial figure of Tony Stark, although his mentor had been very diligent in the past years to keep his image clean. When Peter countered that he already had a social media presence, “Besides, who would want to know anything from or about me? I’m just a nobody intern,” she had pursed her lips in the same way Meryl Streep did in ‘The Devil Wears Prada’ and told him that “shitposting and sharing memes at all odd hours isn’t acceptable in a position like yours. What if what you post now comes back to haunt you once everything is announced?”

Whatever the heck it meant.

And she hadn’t then been impressed by his clarification that he wasn’t only posting silly things, he also went on rants about science on Twitter and posted meaningful pictures of skylines and meals on Instagram, and that, frankly, his Spotify wrapped wasn’t going to haunt him.

“You can go ahead and call me a basic bitch, but at least it’s on brand for me,” he had claimed then, channelling his best Harry Osborn impression and ending the discussion, leaving her with her mouth agape like a fish.

Of course she had signed off the field trip, he realised. She probably had it out for him!

So, reluctantly knocking on her door, he formed a battle plan: he would waltz in, confident and not at all bothered, laying the charm thick and talking in circles around her head, before baulking her into a corner and making her confess on her diabolical plan to terminate him.

She opened the door with a surprised look on her face, inviting him in before asking politely: “What can I do for you, Mr Parker?”

And, instead of being all suave, he just blurted out: “Why do you hate me so!?”

“What?” she asked immediately, sounding shocked, as if she couldn’t compute what he had just said. She then closed her mouth in the weird lip-twist thing she did and kept on blinking owlishly, for some reason. “I beg your pardon?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about,” he told her, trying to regain his composure, “You know pretty much everything in here.”
She shook her head, as if to clear it out, and blinked a few more times, for good measure probably: “True, I know everything,” she conceded, before returning to sit at her desk and motioning for Peter to take the chair opposite to her. “But I definitely don’t hate you. I’m positively certain that it is impossible to hate you. I actually conducted a pool on it and your approval rate amongst the New York divisions is through the roof. I couldn’t get a proper study all aboard the company since you are not that well known overseas just yet, but those you’ve met, they all love you. Even Harold Hogan likes you! And he doesn’t like anybody.”

Peter was Lost, with the capital L. What did the field trip have to do with his approval ratings? Why did he even have one?! Perhaps she and her cronies had found out that he was unpopular at school and were trying to help him in their own misguided ways, unaware that by doing so they were orchestrating his demise. But that wouldn’t have explained such a cruel act on her part. ”I am talking about your personal vendetta against me,” he attempted again, trying to make her understand that her villainous activities had been discovered.

“Have you caused an international scandal I should get ahead of?”

 “No!” he immediately replied. The only scandal he could cause was if his identity was leaked and that wasn’t really a scandal as much as a full-blown crisis.

“Are you secretly working for Hammer Corp?”

“Obviously not, I’d rather become a hermit crab.”

“Then I really don’t have a vendetta against you,” she said, matter-of-factly, leaving no room for argument and staring expectantly at him.

But Peter still hadn’t had his fill: “Explain this, then!” he all but tossed the bundle of papers Mr Harrington had given him right in her face, watching closely as she skimmed through them.

Natasha had taught him how to read body language and Matt had made sure he could understand the slightest changes a human heart could physiologically make under duress. He could tell a lie from a mile away and could spot a liar before they even thought of an excuse.

Yet, when Mara spoke again, she was being completely honest: “We do field trips all the time and these kids earned it fair and square. What can you possibly have against an Academic Decathlon team from Queens?”

“I am in this Academic Decathlon team from Queens!”

From the outside looking in, they might as well entered a staring contest, since they both remained perfectly still after that. He could hear her accelerated heartbeat as realization dawned on her, followed by the dilatation of her pupils and the quickening of her breath.

She had had absolutely no idea that Peter was a member of the Midtown AcaDec.

He should’ve been offended that she didn’t know, considering it was only thanks to him that they had won the last two matches and Nationals, but he had bigger fish to fry. Perhaps he’d revise the topic at a later date.

“No, you’re not,” she said eventually, looking at him as if he had grown two heads or as if she was seeing him truly for the first time. “I would’ve known if you were part of the team that won Nationals last year and are prospected to win again this year. Why didn’t I know of this? Not only you are a certified genius, but you also have medals and trophies to your name?! We should definitely start working this out with the media. I’ve told Pepper, the sooner the better. I can already see the headlines: “Young Prodigy from Queens sets to run the biggest company…””

Peter stopped her immediately, since her eyes had gotten a very dangerous gleam and he didn’t have the time nor the will to deal with anything involving the media: “Miss Habowski, with all due respect, I don’t care.”

To give her credit, she did not look affronted by that. If anything, she was resigned.

It really wasn’t his fault he was a private person! The more cryptic he was online, the funnier he appeared. Besides, no one would ever link him to Spider-Man unless he was under the public scrutiny of the media. She just couldn’t get the full picture!

“Alright, what is your issue then?”

And that was the million-dollar question. Other than the bad vibes and misfortunes that tended to follow him on field trips, he just had his imposter syndrome to thank for raising the red flags. There was also the tiny problem with Flash being an idiot and bothering him, but that was rather relative. “Just…” Peter tried to say, unable to formulate words and widely gesticulating, hoping Mara’s long experience would help her fill his gaps.

And it apparently did, since she was able to understand him even when he couldn’t process his thoughts: “Let me guess: your team has been invited to participate in a tour of the building you work in and you are afraid they’re going to ask questions you legally cannot answer and then bug you about it all once the tour is done. Or that they’d take to the internet and make your work here known before we get on top of the news cycle, correct?”

All he could do was nod, amazed by her speed at pinpointing the problem.

Maybe he’d suggest to Pepper to give her a raise, she definitely deserved it!

“It’s an easy fix,” she told him kindly, taking hold of her mouse and beginning to click away on the keys in front of her, “Let me just send HR and legal an e-mail so they can get more detailed NDAs to your teacher ASAP. This was clearly a communication issue between us, but it shouldn’t be too hard to manage. When do you have to get the papers back?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

“A-Okay. I’m sure HR will get on top of it and deal with whatever comes next,” with a final click, she turned fully to him, a small smile of sympathy on her face. “I’ve threaded you in, so you’ll be in the loop. I really don’t understand how I’ve missed you being from that school, though. Perhaps I should check my records.”

Hold on to the brakes, he most definitely wasn’t expecting that. “You have records of me?”

Somehow, she seemed to find his question funny: “Of course, darling, between us and HR we ought to know everything that goes on in the building,” she claimed, looking every bit the dangerous demon Tony painted her to be. “Besides, we should really start working on your image.”

“You keep saying that, as if I need an image.”

“But you do! You are a published researcher and a respectable name in the scientific world already, plus a terrifically strong asset of SI, but nobody links the two personas together. How could they! Your work is probably going to be taught in university before you even finish high school if you keep up the pace, not that you seem to care about fame. And once everything goes public, well, everyone will want a piece of you. We should start slow, build up your image, then it’s easier to deal with all of that.”

Peter blinked like a deer in the headlights. “I’m not even going to pretend I followed you. Just, to confirm, Midtown coming here was an oversight, not a targeted act?”

“I have not killed or ruined Tony Stark yet and you are a delight to be around and work with,” was her reply, as if that explained anything.

Which it didn’t, at least not to Peter, who tried to twist his lips the same way she did expectantly. He thought he might look like he was having a stroke, but the message still went through.

“No, Mr Parker, it’s not a vendetta,” she said with amusement lacing her words, “I apologise for the inconvenience though.”

“It’s alright, I’m sorry I barged in. This could have been an e-mail.”

“Indeed, but I’m glad you came and visited. Since you’re here, we could perhaps discuss a strategy for your project releases, making you more involved with the public and…”

Thank Thor for Anthony Stark and his miraculous appearances! The man arrived just at the right time, barging in without bothering to knock, and swooped in to save Peter’s sanity. “Absolutely not, dear Mara,” he said, mustering to harness all the flare in the world, “And if you’ll excuse me, I gotta get Pete here upstairs, he promised he’d set the table.”

“Very well,” she admitted defeat flawlessly, Peter noted. Or perhaps she had learnt to recognise anything Tony did as a lost battle. Or she had grown tired of dealing with the man-child and immediately wanted nothing to do with the owner of the company. Either way, Peter took it as his cue to stand up and bolt for the door. And he could have sworn he heard angels sing when she called back, not directed at him: “Stark, since I have you here, would you care to explain why two days ago you tweeted, at four in the morning: “I had a nightmare and the Duolingo Owl was there staring right into my soul.””

“You told me I had to engage online with the younger generation and this was something Peter would have said.”

That was most definitely not something he would have said, thank you very much! He knew better than to pick a fight with that devilish bird and, if by any chance, he had actually found it at the edge of his bed, he wouldn’t have tweeted about it.

He’d already have been dead and buried.

Mara seemed to agree with him: “But you are not Mr Parker,” she said, sounding both condescending and infuriated, “And why did you have to flirt with the Owl once they responded to you!”

Yet another million-dollar question. The poor woman deserved a raise just for having to deal with Tony’s extravaganza on the daily.

“I would have felt rude not to. Anyway, we have to dash. Toodaloo and Sprinkle Sprinkle!”

And with that, he pushed Peter towards the elevators, sprinting out of the department as fast as he physically could.

“Thanks for the save,” he said once the doors had closed and FRIDAY had worked her magic, sending them up without having to push a button, “She is intense.”

“Yeah, could’ve told you that. Why did I have to get down to Hell to rescue you?”

He really, really didn’t want to tell him. But he also knew there was no beating around the bush and that he had to say something, otherwise Tony would have hacked his phone, again, and searched up his history, only to then demand even more explanation. He had googled once how to stitch a wound with floss and Tony brought it up whenever he had the occasion!

Peter didn’t know how he still managed to keep his friendship with Harry a secret from the billionaire, considering he had no understanding of privacy.

“I had this… thing. Problem. That stems from them.”

Tony snorted at that: “They are the ‘Well of all Evils’ for a reason, Underoos. What was the issue?”

“Pfff, nothing!” he exclaimed, a bit too fast and forcefully, “Absolutely nothing.”

And Tony did not fall for his tricks. “Should I just ask FRIDAY?” he persisted, just as the doors opened to the Penthouse.

“No!” he all but yelled, walking towards the couch, and plopping down unceremoniously. “It’s fine. It’s just that…” he trailed off, unsure of how to continue. Then, he picked up a pillow and smooshed it over his face: “MyAcaDecTeamiscominghereonfriday.”

“I got none of that,” Tony’s voice was directly over his head now and a hand took away his solace, exposing him to the harsh lights.

Peter groaned. There was no escape anymore. Not even Doctor Strange’s necklace would have saved him. “I said: “My AcaDec Team is coming here on Friday!” Happy now?”

For a moment, there was only silence. Beautiful, wonderful, incredible silence.

Typical of Tony to break it.

The billionaire erupted into laughter as soon as the words sank in. He was being loud, and obnoxious, and all Peter wanted to do now was hit him with another pillow. Which he did, repeatedly, without using his strength.

“Great, wonderful, perfect!” he punctuated each word with a hit. “Yeah, laugh in the face of my demise, Mr Stark, I’m sure it’ll look nice for your image,” he then added, trying his best to mimic Mara’s tone and attitude.

That made Tony recoil pretty fast: “First, you are not allowed to step foot in PR, ever again.”

“I don’t intend to.”

“Second, this is absolutely the funniest thing that has ever happened! You are so going on that tour!”

“I’m gonna quit if you make me go,” he warned, but they both knew that there was no heat behind his words. Peter threatened to leave SI with the same frequency as Tony did to send Dumm-E and U to the nearest community college. Still, it was the thought that counted.

“I think you mean ‘come’,” he joked insufferably, making Peter question, for the umpteenth time, why he had hero-worshipped the man when he was younger. Bruce had never once mocked him! “Roos, were you not having this reaction, I would have probably sided with you, but this is objectively the best news ever. Now, don’t bother with those papers, I’ll personally call Morita in the morning.”

“Fine,” he conceded through gritted teeth, aware that there would be no reasoning with him. Once he put a thought to the front of his brain, that didn’t leave unless it was seen through. Still, that didn’t stop Peter from trying to prevent a national disaster: “But you have to promise me you won’t go out of your way to embarrass me!”/p>

“Alright,” Tony agreed, weirdly, walking away from Peter and marching right into the kitchen.

Then, once he had reached the open door, his beloved mentor turned back at him and sweetly said: “I’ll stick to the minimum.”

“MR STARK!”

Chapter Text

Peter could have taken two possible paths when dealing with the impending doom.

On one hand, he could hide in his room and disappear until the end of the world. It would bring immediate relief to his otherwise bleak situation, but it would also only succeed in delaying the inevitable.

Besides, knowing his friends and extended family, they would all come barging in at the first missed call, led by the encyclopaedical definition of ‘helicopter-parent’, also known as Dr Tony Stark, and flanked by the world’s worst cook, Aunt May Parker. And, by the time they’d found him, Matt would have already finished lecturing him with a disapproving look on his face.

On the other, he could square up and face the music.

He had taken piano, guitar, and clarinet, after all. He shouldn’t waste all the hours he spent learning and practising.

Still, that didn’t mean he wasn’t allowed to try and avoid the issue altogether. His plan had been rather simple: don’t tell anyone about the field trip.

That way, he would have been able to ignore the problem, pretend nothing had gone terribly and simultaneously make sure no one barged in on their tour simply to say “Hello!” and bother him.

For a building filled with super-duper spies and valiant ancient soldiers and brilliant yet sometimes mad scientists, they all could be thick when they wanted to.

And, when it came to the “annoy Peter Parker” department, they all wanted to.

Starting with Tony Stark himself, who had been sworn to secrecy. But that one was on Peter: he should’ve known better than to trust the man who had given his personal address on National Television while being targeted by terrorists who had impersonated an international crime organization. To this day, no one knew what had happened to the actor who had portrayed the Mandarin. It was as if he had disappeared out of thin air.

Mr “I am not going to reveal to the world that I have become a superhero, Pepper calm down, I’ll just toss these cards out of the window and Improvise, and… oops my bad, ‘I am Iron Man’” just had to run his mouth and inform basically the entire superhero population of New York City, affiliates included, of his troubles.

Matt had immediately called him, laughing, just to confirm the rumour. But he remedied then by asking if Peter wanted to sue Stark Industries and Tony for mistreatment of an employee. Pro bono, obviously.

Wade had gone out of his way to procure a bargaining chip with Tony, all to have access to the feed of the tour afterwards. What could a billionaire want from a mutated anti-hero mercenary, Peter dreaded to find out. Besides, the two had a burning hatred towards each other, so the simple thought of them having a civil conversation made Peter’s blood freeze.

Even Jessica, Frank and Bucky had all, separately, asked if he needed a place to crash and hide until the storm passed. Of course, they were all shut down by the lethal combination of Tony and Aunt May agreeing on something.

All in all, his family was unhelpful, what else was new!

At least he had loyal friends.

Or so he thought, until Ned made sure to stay over the night before the trip, so that Peter had no choice but to follow him along and get to school in time. He hadn’t even allowed him to bring his suit and forced him to wear headphones as they sat on the bus, all to avoid distractions and sudden disappearance. “Listen, buddy, it’s Friday morning, no crime’s being committed in Queens right now. The new bagel place near Cunningham Park just opened.”

“Then what are we doing going to the Tower when we should be in line there!?” he had fruitlessly tried to argue, falling on deaf ears. Ned had visited the canteen at SI one too many times to not know that delicious bagels were waiting for them there.

MJ had just threatened him. Sure, she hadn’t said a word and just looked at him as he complained that he didn’t want to show up, but her eyes were promising enough. He knew better than to go against her and her silent stares.

The last time she had done something like that was when he had tried to hide a stab wound and went to school without stitching it up properly, which resulted in him being grounded for a week. It wasn’t his fault, though: he had a math test that morning!

Which brought him right onto the steps of his high school with ten minutes to spare, snacking on a muffin that MJ had gotten on her way.  He was patiently listening to Ned’s exciting rambles, smiling, and nodding along with his excited words, while she had her nose stuck in a book. Every now and then she would try and reign him in, but he couldn’t help himself! It didn’t matter how many times he had already been at the Tower, each of his visits was always accompanied by eagerness and anticipation.

And Peter always got an earful about wound-up best friend.

Not that he could blame him: the labs were still a pretty sight whenever he passed through and he worked there! And he supervised various projects, adjusted budgets, dealt with equipment deliveries, oversaw the intern’s hiring process, coordinated shared spaces, and sat during all sorts of meetings.

Pretty average stuff, overall.

“What do you reckon we will see?”

Now, Peter had tried his best not to spoil anything from their trip. It was sad enough to visit his place of work, the building where he knew every single secret passageway and nook. Add that to a complete PDF itinerary that only the tour guides were supposed to know, and that would have been downright depressing.

And, of course, James Hawkings, the Head of HR, a lovely man in his thirties who preferred Star Trek to Star Wars, with whom he had had many wonderful conversations and who helped him out when hiring interns, had decided that it would have been a great and excellent idea to forward him their timelines for their tour the next day, thus becoming number one on his hit list.

It was surprisingly easy to scale down Green Goblin as a villain, it seemed, when so many people in his civilian life had it out for him.

Peter should have already arranged a meeting with him and Mara, just to set boundaries, but had decided to wait until after the tour to spare himself from an extra unnecessary headache. Besides, he had yet to determine what actually was in their dossiers (as in multiple and separate, finding that out had been a whirlwind) about him. If he had to bring up complaints about their behaviours and inability to respect his privacy, then he needed to have all the duckies in a row.

All in all, the Universe really did have it out for him!

Nevertheless, he was not about to ruin the surprise and tell Ned how their entire day would pan out, sans interruptions of course.

He still remembered how he felt when Scott told him that he was not part ant. Or when he had told Scott that he could not speak to spiders the way he did ants.

It had been a sad day for everyone.

“I don’t know,” he lied easily, keeping his voice even like Natasha had taught him and steading his heartbeat in a way that would make Matt proud. It didn’t matter that neither Ned nor MJ would be able to detect his lie (at least he thought she wouldn’t), it was still good practice. “Usually trips involve laps around the lower labs and lunch.”

He kept to himself that their tour had been upgraded, courtesy to HR being interested in the team given their many achievements, and that they’d take a test to see if they would be fit to join in the new ‘Summer Internship Program’, targeted right to high school juniors and seniors. There was no reason to stress his best friend further.

Flash, unfortunately, had not gotten the memo that theirs was a private conversation: “Still pretending you work there, Penis?” the other teen sneered, sauntering into the scene as if he was a third-rate villain in some dumb D-Movie.

And even comparing them would’ve been a disservice to every third-rate villains in dumb D-Movies everywhere.

“At this point, I don’t know what to tell you,” Peter lamented. He had hoped to be spared from his stupidity, at least until they got on the bus. He had a pair of headphones stashed in his backpack for the sole purpose of tuning him out, but the idiot had decided to bother him before it was socially acceptable. “It’s like your thick skull is made of Vibranium. Nothing passes through.”
“Nobody understands you, weirdo,” he mocked, probably believing himself to be some sort of genius who looked down on everyone else. But, as a regular moron, Flash didn’t get the memo that he should get lost.

Thankfully MJ was there to remind him: “He called you stupid.”

His face turned red almost instantly, and neither Ned nor Peter managed to keep themselves from bursting out chuckling. Still, he persevered in his personal crusade against the trio: “How dare you! I’ll tell my father and he’ll make sure you’ll be expelled.”
The situation wouldn’t have been as fun if it had been anyone else saying that. Nor if it was a different circumstance. But Flash threatened something like that at least once a week. Just the month before, he had screamed at the lunch lady for not having any more pizza! Needless to say, they did not take him seriously. On the contrary, they laughed even harder.

“You did not just pull a Draco on us,” Ned said in between giggles, wiping at his eyes.

Well, the day had started well, Peter reasoned. His life might end at any moment, that much was true, but at least he had gotten an excellent laugh. And all before they even set foot inside the Tower!

That, apparently, made the other teen realise he had lost the match. “Whatever,” he conceded, snarling at them, “You lot are about to go down. Once Parker’s lies will be unravelled, the Tower’s security will kick you out, just by affiliation.”
“It’ll be fine, we’ll just go to get ice cream then.” Then, he turned back towards his best friends, blocking Flash from his mind. “They opened this new accurate place on the corner and I think it’s fantastic. Tony agrees that it is accurate and Italian food is the only thing he’s really a snob about.”
“His suits alone cost more than a small nation GPD,” MJ claimed, looking unimpressed up from her book.

Peter shrugged at that: “Yeah, but he doesn’t mind getting them dirty or ruining them. You mention cream in carbonara and suddenly you’re the devil. I quite literally ordered Hawaiian pizza once and he refused to talk to me for a week!”

“Nobody believes you, Penis!”

Flash just had to butt himself in every one of their conversations. He was getting really, really tired.
“No one asked you, Thompson!”

Thankfully, Mr H’s impeccable timing made him appear right then and there, stopping Flash’s useless retort right in his mouth. “Children, please, behave!” he all but begged them, clutching the straps of his backpack as if he were an excited kindergartener on his first day. “Now, line up so that I can count you.”
“Mr H, there’s only nine of us.”

“We’re ten!” Flash protested, moving directly inside Cindy’s personal space to make his presence known. As if she had the absolute pleasure of ignoring his existence. But she wasn’t deterred by his action and stood her ground until he backed down.

Good for her, though, because keeping that silence was exhausting, especially with a headstrong Flash first thing in the morning, and Peter would’ve replied something along the lines of “You’re ten!”.

Childish? Maybe. True? Unfortunately not.

Still, Mr H did his little counting and seemed happy at the result: “Alright, you’re all here. Hop on the bus, kids! Let’s go on our little adventure!”

Now, if the Universe hadn’t decided that Torturing Peter Parker was the best past-time possible, the ground would have opened up and swallowed him. However, nothing happened, and hop on the bus he did.

Chapter Text

The bus ride had been uneventful.

Usually, Peter loathed them with the burning passion of a thousand Suns, between the cacophony of noises the engine alone created and the vile smell of unwashed armpits. And there was always chatter, or a baby crying somewhere, and then the driver would yell expletives at the entire city, and he could hear the phone conversation three rows behind him (Linda wasn’t cheating on him, she had just changed jobs and that was why she wasn’t around Joe anymore), and the seat was stickier than he was somehow, and the lady in front of him had to have stopped at the butcher to buy liver and they had to have sold her not the freshest one and he could smell it.

Zero out of ten, he would not recommend it to anyone with heightened senses.

And school buses were much worse!

However, this time hadn’t been as terrible as he had expected. There was a lingering smell of Axe everywhere, that much was true, unfortunately for his nose. And there was the constant ecstatic chatter from his teammates. But other than that, nothing major.

Flash had even been shunned by their peers almost immediately, the rest of them having gotten over his antics, and had listened to his own music for the entire ride, thus unable to spew his usual bullshit and bother Peter, who was blissfully huddled with Ned as they shared earbuds and vibed together. Thankfully theirs was an AcaDec-only event, otherwise Flash would have had his entourage of idiots embolden him, and he would have been a nightmare to deal with.

The only moment where Peter’s ears lamented the sudden spike in noise, was when they were able to see the Tower growing bigger and bigger as they reached it. The simple sight of it caused Abe to squeal so loudly even MJ flinched, followed by various gasps and oohs and aahs. Even from Ned, who had been there countless times!

Peter would’ve thought they’d all grown tired of it, having seen the building whenever they passed through Manhattan or when it was on the TV constantly for one reason or the other. Every news outlet had broadcasted the image of Stark Tower just two weeks prior, when Tony had been caught red-handed at some Gala, spilling his drink on Edwin Cord’s suit. Before getting another one and visibly tossing it on his head, for good measure. And then he jumped on stage to donate money to whatever charity they were raising funds for, adding that his “good friend with the stained jacket and clumped up hair” would match the amount.

Overall, the news chose to stick to the first part and broadcast the video of Tony sipping his non-alcoholic drink before Cord approached, claiming his mentor had instigated whatever had happened.

 A+ Journalism. And one of the reasons Tony avoided PR like the plague. And why the department was very well compensated for dealing with him.

Yet, Peter couldn’t really blame his friends: one thing was seeing the Tower from afar, a distant beacon of light that was unachievable; the other was actually being invited inside. He still remembered the first time he swung there and was told to drop directly at the terrace of the penthouse. He had been so distracted, daydreaming about all the possible things he might see and witness, that he almost got caught by a swarm of angry pigeons.

He was basically flying directly in their path, so their displeasure was a given.

So, he simply remained seated as his friends moved to the windows, nearly pressing their noses to the glass just to get a better glimpse. Even Ned, who had once swung with him (“Peter, please, never make me do this again. If it’s life or death, I choose death. My feet belong to the ground, those webs of yours are genius but for the love of everything sacred in our friendship don’t use them with me, I don’t care if you can lift an elephant.”), was practically vibrating out of his skin at the sight of the Tower approaching.

Even MJ, in her notorious history as a Cool Person who was not bothered by anything, especially if it was linked to old white capitalists, had put down her book and stuffed it into her bag, admiring the architecture from afar.

Technically speaking, they weren’t supposed to bring anything. There was a clause in their extensive NDAs that stated that everything they might carry would be left at the security checkpoint, therefore they should just not bother with notebooks and pens. They would even have to turn their phones into a specific server, controlled by FRIDAY, so that they wouldn’t be able to take pictures or send messages off about classified stuff. Paper trails meant a high risk of exposed corporate secrets and no one wanted that.

Especially not Peter, who would have to read through documents and depositions and a whole bunch of shit he had no time for.

Still, when he had asked her what she was carrying, given the warnings against it all, she had simply sinisterly looked down at him and uttered, with a wicked gleam in her eyes and a smile on her face: “The means necessary to immortalize Flash’s stupidity.” Which terrified him and amused him at the same time.

He did the reasonable thing and fired down a quick message through FRIDAY to let security know that she was allowed to bring her bag in, without nitpicking her stuff. Happy had told him that he was allowed to do so, after all, for whatever reason.

“It’s so big!” Charles exclaimed directly from the window as they pulled up to the curb. They all remained practically still, staring at the front doors from inside the bus, until the driver coughed. Mr Harrington cleared himself out of his stupor, turning bright crimson at being caught red-handed, downright fangirling on par with his teenage students, and called attention to himself, making the team disembark and form a tidy little line, before they all entered inside.

And all would have been fine, if Flash hadn’t decided that now was his time to shine and annoy the heck out of Peter by basically clinging to his side like a very, very aggravating barnacle. And he knew a thing or two about sticky annoying things, being the self-proclaimed #1 Spider-man fanatic.

“Alright, children,” Mr Harrington said, making them move from the constant stream of people walking in and out of the Tower, selecting a clearing adequate enough. He was basically herding them as sheep, too busy being distracted by the shiny lights himself to keep his students in check. “Last warnings: be respectful of the employees, try to maintain your composure, don’t embarrass yourself or the school, be polite and do not harass anyone. And try to have fun! Now, stay right here, I’ll talk to the receptionists. If you move you’ll get detention!”

He pretty much skipped through the floor, all to MJ’s joy, who had regained her brain cells and decided that that scene was worth immortalizing. It wasn’t every day that a grown man walked on air out of sheer excitement, after all.

Yet, however little supervision Mr Harrington provided, it was still enough to keep Flash at bay. And, as soon as the adult got out of (human) earshot, the teenaged doubled down on being infuriating: “I’d back down if I were you, Penis,” he sniggered, practically inside of Peter’s ear, causing him to flinch away.

That greasy boy knew no boundaries! And Peter had lived for the entire summer with Tony Stark, the noisiest man in the Universe.

“Dude, you’re about to enter a building that is controlled by the world’s smartest AI, which can detect language, movement, and intention. Do you really think they’ll let you stay if you start throwing insults around?” Seymour asked, looking around them worriedly. Perhaps the NDAs had scared him more than he’d thought, Peter reasoned, secretly proud of their Legal department’s abilities.

They were no Nelson and Murdock, who handled all of Peter’s personal issues and questions, but if they managed to scare a bunch of teens into shape, then they were definitely on the right track! He’d probably send up (or down, depending on which floor he’d ended up being when he placed the order) a basket with that fancy coffee that Foggy liked.

After all, all the lawyers might share similar tastebuds. With the exception of Matt, who was Peculiar™.

Now, an intelligent person would have backed down from Peter’s shoulders, letting him breathe and enjoy the trip. Flash was, notoriously, not one. “It doesn’t matter,” he cockily said, not backing down an inch from his delusions, “Parker’s lies are much bigger and worse than whatever I could do. I will not leave this place before he does!”

“If you think so,” Ned scoffed at him, winking back at Peter, who couldn’t help but smile. After all, weekends were Tower days. Meaning that he stayed at the Tower until Sunday night after patrol. Aunt May had already sent an email to his principal and Mr Harrington stating he’d remain at the Tower after the trip was over.

If that was Flash’s way of self-inviting for a sleepover, it would have been messed up on so many levels.

Still, he was relentless: “Just admit that you don’t have an internship!” he all but yelled, causing a few heads to turn towards them.

“Flash, first of all, I don’t have to tell you anything. Second of all, I do have an internship,” he calmly said, channelling his best Loki “How Dare You Speak To Me” Laufeyson energy, with a tiny sprinkle of Bucky “I am too tired of your bullshit, stop” Barnes, just to deliver his words devastatingly enough so that the idiot might back off and avoid being killed by an army of robot spiders that he would develop with the sole purpose of haunting Flash Thompson.

But, if moronic board members hadn’t driven Peter to villainy, he doubted a dumb high schooler would.

“Third,” he finally added, leaving Flash with his mouth agape like a fish, “stay away from me, you stink of fake Paco Rabanne.”

Okay, perhaps he had channelled a bit too much Bucky and Loki, but the result had been optimal, so who was he to complain?

Everyone around him was too stunned to respond, except MJ, who appeared impressed by the scene: “Nice job, loser.”

There went the highest compliment he would receive for the day, and he hadn’t shown her his new project to clean air pollution yet! What a waste.

His peers, though, didn’t really see eye to eye with him: “MJ do you really want to get us kicked out?! The rules clearly say to be nice!” Abe squeaked out, followed by murmurs of dissent from the rest of the AcaDec team. Ned could barely contain his laughter at the show.

The girl, for her part, was completely unfazed by the attention: “Not to worry, I’m allowed to call Parker a ‘loser’. I have a permit.”

“If you show me a piece of paper with “I can do what I want”, I swear I’ll scream.”

“Then you’d get us kicked out,” Ned managed to say in between wheezes, having lost it completely and succumbing to the hilarity of the scene.

And Peter would have followed suit, were it not for the scared expressions on his friend’s faces. Maybe the Legal team had been a bit too drastic when drafting their NDAs. “Nobody is getting kicked out,” he said reassuringly, fully aware that he had a say in who stayed and who left, yet not planning to use his power and authority over his friends. And they all seemed to react well to his words, visibly relaxing. Which would have made it easier for them to have a nice, educational, interactive trip and enjoy their stay at the Tower.

Perhaps Ned had been right all along and the day would turn out fun.

“Except you, Penis!”

Perhaps not.

“This is going to be Hell.”

Thankfully, once again, Mr Harrington showed up at the right time. Perhaps it was his superpower of sorts, since he disappeared whenever it was convenient and, lately, had taken on arriving whenever Peter needed to be removed from the spotlight. “Kids, say hello to our tour guide, Miss Barron!” he loudly exclaimed, drawing back the attention to himself and stepping aside to reveal their smiling tour guide.

Now, it would have been impossible for Peter to personally know every single person in the Tower, but he tried to make an effort to at least know faces and departments, to avoid being caught red-handed in sticky situations. Nothing worse than being stuck in an elevator with an IT guy who had on a nerdy shirt on thermodynamics and making a fool out of himself by assuming he worked in physics. Besides, Pepper had told him it would have been a good thing if he got more hands-on with the business and that meant knowing the people that worked for her, which made Peter fall down a rabbit hole for every employee at SI, scouring through their files as if he was on Wikipedia.

He naturally memorized the introduction to everyone’s file, hers included: Stephanie Barron, age 28, graduated from Stanford with a major in Political Science and a minor in Economics, hired on the spot in HR and had been working there for close to three years. But, after James’ email, he had opened her file once more, mainly out of curiosity and self-preservation. And thanks to his readings, and a quick social media stalking, he now knew everything there was to know about her.

Of course, that would have not been weird if he hadn’t already met the woman. Which he did, when he passed through the HR floors four months back and complimented the Mew-Two adhesive on her phone case.

They were totally pals! Right?

“I am so happy to meet you all,” she said cheerfully, with her hands filled with lanyards. She scanned the little crowd and, weirdly enough, her eyes only slightly bulged when she saw him. But she kept her smile intact, to give her credit.

Peter politely waved at her, not really sure what the custom was when meeting a colleague outside of the workplace and having to receive a tour of said workplace from said colleague. Unchartered waters and all.

Perhaps he should have read the employee handbook a bit more thoroughly, but Tony had never bothered to lend him a copy and Pepper had never mentioned it, so he had figured he’d been on the clear by simply skimming though it and focusing on not blowing up anyone with his work.

But he had been so preoccupied with the outcome of the trip, that he hadn’t research proper etiquette or how to behave in situations like those. To be fair, he was pretty the manual didn’t cover what to do in those situations.

Maybe he should’ve just followed Wade’s advice and winged it, but he liked being prepared for things. Not to mention, he liked to leave Wade’s advice for any ‘last hope’ type of things.

“You can call me Steph, there’s no need to be formal,” she laughed then, sounding a bit forced and paranoid, and seemingly throwing him quick and panicked glances. Or maybe that was just Peter’s own mental state bleeding out. What could she possibly have to be afraid of?!

“On behalf of Stark Industries, I formally welcome you and give you our congratulations on your winning streak! I’m going to call your names and each one of you is going to receive a badge. Those are necessary in order to pass those security checkpoints over there, by the elevators, and you have to keep them on for the entire trip. It’s easy, just slip the lanyard over your head, the Tower’s AIs will handle the rest. Now: Avrill Sally.”

MJ and Ned didn’t get one whenever they visited with him, so it made sense for one to be printed out for them for this special occasion. But he knew better than to wish for the same courtesy to be extended to him. And, indeed, Peter’s blood froze in his veins just as she called Seymour O’Reilly up and bypassed him on the list, going straight to Thompson, who turned to him with a wicked smile on his face as he collected his own.

Yet, before he could say anything cruel, Steph spoke up once more, sounding downright terrified for some reason: “It says here that you are… already within the possession of your own badge, Mr Parker. And of course you’d be! And I know you are exempt from wearing it as well. But if you could please do put it on, sir, it would help me out a lot with keeping everyone in check and I know it is presumptuous of me to even ask, but maybe you could do me this favour?”

She was apologetic and the tone of her voice made absolutely no sense to Peter. Of course he would wear his own badge if it helped her! Who did she peg him for, Tony?

Absolutely not!

So he did what he was asked, with a smile on his face, and visibly felt Steph relax. And he also saw Flash’s smile disappear and his mouth remain agape in incredulity, with MJ wasting no time in capturing it all on paper. Another excellent win in his books.

“This is really wonderful, thank you for your cooperation! Now, why don’t we pass through security and then I’ll answer all the questions you guys might have?”

They followed her like ducklings, all in various states of excitement and disbelief. Flash hadn’t even snapped out of his stupor at Peter’s badge, following along mindlessly. Not that anyone minded if he remained dumbstruck for the entire trip, but it was quite freaky to watch his blank expression as he passed through the checks, completely out of it. And Abe had to shake him a bit as they waited for the rest to walk through the machines.

But, other than that, everything seemed to go well, without an itch. The guards did eye MJ suspiciously, with her tote bag still firmly on her shoulder and a pencil tucked behind her ear, but she passed through without stopping and they did not bother her, having read whatever message FRIDAY had sent along. “Let the scary girl through even if she wields a katana” it probably said.

Reasonably so.

Then they were all huddled in front of the elevators, waiting for it to arrive. And Steph thought it was the appropriate time to answer the team, who immediately bombarded her with their questions.

“What are we going to see?” and “Where do you work?” and “Why are our badges white and yours is purple?” and “Do you hire high schoolers?”

Because, of course, now that he was out of his stupor, it meant that Flash would be up and running with his bullshit.

To give her credit, the poor woman didn’t seem fazed by the bunch of teens practically shouting at her. Peter could see why she was chosen to lead tours, as she was very calm and level-headed and knew how to deal with kids.

“I will not spoil our itinerary,” she started, pointing her finger right at Betty and making the girl blush, before continuing patiently, “I am an employee of the HR department, have been for years. And I do not personally hire anyone, but if you mean SI in general, well, it is a bit unorthodox but not unheard of.” That was the most diplomatic way Peter had heard someone shut somebody else up, and he had quite literally spoken with senators and politicians and lawmakers.

She then kept on talking as they hopped onto the elevators: “Now, as for the badges, each colour represents a different department, just so we don’t get confused. We also have a bunch of different access levels: for instance, you guys have a One, meaning temporary passes, while I have a Five, which allows me to bring you guys along. The highest access is usually badge-less, but it would be a Ten.”

The team then continued to ask their questions, Flash being the loudest, trying to “uncover Peter’s lies” and getting angry when he wasn’t able to, since there weren’t any. But, as the doors closed and the elevator began moving up, Peter wasn’t paying attention to anything other than his reflection.

Or, rather, to his Level Ten, Gold Badge.

That was being eyed up viciously by Flash, in a rare moment of silence.

Shit.

Chapter Text

“I do have some ground rules before I’m allowed to let you roam free,” Steph said as soon as they exited the elevator on the third floor, silencing the buzzing crowd.

They didn’t know their full itinerary, after all, and thus were able to imagine countless beauties in their imminent future.

Peter, on the other hand, knew exactly what was behind the gigantic doors they had stopped at and was equally amused and distraught about his prospects. There were, after all, several displays with his name on them and, while he would have appreciated getting the recognition he deserved from his peers, he knew that as soon as one read his initials, they’d bombard him with questions.

He silently prayed to Thor that the adult supervision would be able to remind everyone of their NDAs, although they didn’t really have a clause against interrogations and dispersions of SI knowledge while inside the building.

Meaning: Peter was pretty much screwed, and it wasn’t even 10 am yet.

“Please, do not touch the glass displays and do not try to remove anything from its place. As for what you are about to see, everything is public and thus not covered by your NDAs, but we would appreciate if you did not mention it to the outside world, since it is a nice little secret only those who visit the Tower get to enjoy. Adds up to the mystery of our company, don’t you agree?”

There went Peter’s last shred of sanity, floating through the wind.

“Now, we have allotted half an hour for us to walk through the exposition and I will guide you step by step, but I will allow ten minutes more in case you want to return to your favourite displays. Just, remember not to touch anything, or try to steal anything.”

Then, taking the teens’ (and excitable adult) silence as a sign of agreement, she walked to the door and used her badge to open it, revealing the official “Stark Museum”, an entire floor filled to the brim with inventions and diagrams and projects dating back decades. And, at the end of the ‘room’, were colourful costumes and memorabilia from famed battle sights, and a display for each member of the Avengers Initiative, with affiliates.

There truly was nothing that screamed Anthony Stark more than an entire floor completely dedicated to his life and accomplishments, all inside a building with his name written in bold letters on the side.

Not even Dr Doom was that flamboyant. And he owned a menacing castle up the mountains.

“Here we go!” she exclaimed, leading the way with the teens following her, most of their jaws on the floor as they all took in the sheer number of memorabilia and displays. “Stark Industries was created by Isaac Stark, Sr. towards the end of the 19^th century, but rose to its prestige during the Second World War under Howard Stark, who used the company to fund and help in the defence of the country, before expanding overseas and become the enterprise we all know of…”

As she talked, they all hopped from display to display, skimming fast through the militaristic history that had made Tony’s original legacy the one of “Merchant of Death”. That was understandable, given that he and Pepper had done all they could to rebrand and change his image, but it was good to see that they had chosen not to bury all the dirt and grime from his past.

Peter chose to stick to the back, practically dragging his feet as he followed along in silence, holding his tongue back from quipping every now and then at the various topics he was more than knowledgeable of and were described a bit lacklustre for his taste.

But it wasn’t Steph’s fault for not knowing the little titbits he had hyper-focused on and was thus able to host several Ted Talks on. Perhaps he’d revise their bulletins and fix the, albeit small, mistakes that were bothering him.

He had also noticed that, every now and then, Steph would look back at him, her heart skipping each time and her voice pitching slightly, undetectable to the untrained and unenhanced senses, but something he could pick up effortlessly. And it was really beginning to bother him, given that he couldn’t understand why she would behave that way around him, specifically.

It couldn’t have been a fear of teenagers, since she seemed fine with anyone else. And it couldn’t have been anything he had done in the past, considering he had had limited interactions with her.

Perhaps Mara had spread the rumour that he was unreasonable? But that wouldn’t have made any sense, given that she had sent him a text that very morning to wish him a happy trip around his workplace. And she had shown him her discoveries about his popularity amongst the employees, claiming to have “physical and tangible proof that if someone doesn’t like you, that makes them a nutjob!”

Perhaps it was another one of her experiments?

It didn’t matter, though, he’d find her once the touring was done and they had the free reign around the museum, to check up on her and find out what was bothering her. Maybe it was his t-shirt for the day? She probably wasn’t a chemistry fan and couldn’t understand the joke.

Whatever, at least thinking about it made the tour fly faster and, before he even realised, they had reached the “Hall of Heroes” section, where she graciously stood back and allowed the teens to run amok.

“I won’t have the presumption to know anything about the Avengers’ personal lives and I will not even attempt to guide you guys through their displays,” she joked as the group barely kept it together instead of sprinting towards their favourite heroes. Even MJ was eyeing Black Widow with what he would have assumed was awe in a normal person. “Now more than before, remember to keep your hands and mouths to yourselves and do not fog the glasses.”

“What’s up with the mouth disclaimer?” Charles asked abruptly, stopping in his sprint to turn around and face Steph with a puzzled expression that meant he couldn’t fathom the reason behind it all.

Which he really should have fathomed since he had more two neurons functioning together.

“It is policy for us to remind you, to avoid accidents.”

“Why?”

Before she could reply, Peter intervened, bluntly, trying to stop an endless debate since he knew she wasn’t allowed to divulge pivotal information and would have had to bypass the straightforward answer and truth. And since he knew first-hand where Charles’ ‘why’s would lead. “About a year ago a tour group decided it would be fun to find out what Vibranium tastes like,” he said, hoping it would end the discussion.

It didn’t, unfortunately.

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Seymour butted in, equally as confused as the rest of the team, who hung around instead of making their merry way to the dozen of eye-catching displays that would have been much more interesting than Peter’s explanation.

“Let’s just say,” Steph began calmly, while he was still racking his brain on how to avoid screaming in their faces to just follow the rules (He could have never been a tour guide, he didn’t have the patience. Spider-man had a mask to hide most of his facial expressions after all,) “they did not do as they were told and didn’t keep their hands to themselves, thus making the unofficial rule, official.”

But, seeing the blank and vacant expressions on his teammates, Peter gave up trying to avoid the truth and just blurted it out. He had not signed any NDAs during his entire stay at SI, after all, and no one in Legal would come after his head for what he might say. Or they definitely would have already.

“Some idiots licked the replica of Cap’s shield over there and were disappointed to find out it is just a replica. And they then went around licking quite literally everything to compare the tastes. It was a whole deal, the entire floor had to be disinfected and the guys involved received a lifelong ban from all SI buildings. Happy now?”

The blissful silence that followed his admission was heavenly to Peter’s enhanced ears and the only thing he could hear was MJ’s pencil as it scribbled to capture the various states of distress the AcaDec was in. He even snickered at their dumbfounded expressions, unable to control himself.

Just as he and Tony had completely lost it the year prior, when they had got wind of what had happened. He had laughed so hard he had accidentally jumped on the ceiling, trying to regain his breath.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” Flash uttered, breaking the downright magical silence that came from ten stunned people being unable to process the information given to them. Leave it to him to ruin a good thing, after all.

Steph took pity on him, though, stopping Peter from replying: “Unfortunately, it is true. Hence, the very strict ruling. So, please, don’t do anything to add to this list.”

That seemed to break his friends from their spell and they all dispersed, still in various stages of disbelief. Peter could have sworn he saw Mr Harrington go through the five stages of grief, or seemingly had a PTSD flashback, since probably every single child/teen-related job came with similar consequences.

Yet, in the end, all went well, since they flocked to their favoured hero, leaving Peter and Steph to peacefully lag behind.

It wasn’t as if he didn’t live with said heroes, after all. He was one of the last people who needed a tour. Besides, he had helped design and curate the displays. He knew what they were getting.

He was particularly proud of his own.

Tony had made it a surprise for him, managing to keep him in the dark, even when Peter dealt with the museum for a week straight before its official inauguration. And it had been worth it, to see the grand reveal of his original suit, distressed and beyond repairs without a complete restoring process.

Not even Luke could have salvaged it at that point, and that genius had managed to whip Deadpool’s trousers back into shape after an exploding incident even Wade was hesitant to talk about.

There, alongside the costume and a replica of Spider-man’s current one, was also a detailed list of Peter’s accomplishments, some even from outside of the mask. He had even shed a tear as he read that Spider-man happened to be a favourite amongst the Avengers, ranking number one in Thor and, of course, Tony’s lists.

He was smiling fondly at the memory when he realised that Steph was right beside him.

“Thank you, Mr Parker,” she said, timidly, motioning to the group that had regained their enthusiasm after the weird stalling.

“Oh, it’s nothing. And, please, call me Peter!” he exclaimed, suddenly self-conscious about his role all over again. Too many people called him by his surname, which, at school, would have been fine, to some extent. But it felt rather weird for it to happen in his workplace, especially since he wasn’t anyone special, really! It was weird as heck for famed scientists to refer to him with such respect, after all. “I don’t feel comfortable with the whole “Mr Parker” thing. I’m just an intern. You have seniority over me, I should call you “Miss Barron”!”

And, while he tried to pass it off as a joke, he was rather serious. Which she seemed to guess, based on the puzzled expression that appeared on her face.

She was downright staring at him as if he had grown a second head, not in the good way, but eventually conceded: “I don’t think that’s necessary,” she uttered, “After all, you seem to be under the assumption that we are mere colleagues and I don’t think this is the right environment to unpack all that. Nor am I the right person to do so.”

Clearly, she had to have been to Mara’s school when it came to dealing with him or Tony. She was just so on point that she left Peter speechless!

But, they were colleagues, albeit working in different departments, so everything was alright. Perhaps she meant that.

Right?

Not that it mattered, for Mr Harrington called back to her and she quickly departed from their brief conversation, leaving Peter a bit more puzzled than he had previously been. But she didn’t seem as nervous as she had been during the beginning of their tour anymore, which he counted as a success.

Perhaps she had just gotten some jeepers at having to repeat her spiel to someone who had heard it dozens of times, he reasoned.

Then, out of the blue, he felt a presence next to him and he immediately groaned. Ned had his nose as close to the Falcon’s wings as he possibly could without being reprimanded and MJ was reading attentively from Wanda’s description, which meant that the only people who would have chosen to hang around him instead of watching arguably cool displays were busy watching said arguably cool displays.

Thus restricting the pool of whoever was next to Peter to a very annoying person.

“How did you do it?” Flash jeered, ignoring what a civilized person would consider “personal space” and getting all up in Peter’s business yet again.

Perhaps Matt was right: a restraining order might be overdue.

But that was too much work and he really couldn’t be bothered with filing court documents.

Therefore, the next best thing: stepping away, barely acknowledging him. However, he eventually had to give in and ask, since Flash was relentless and the time wasn’t up yet for them to move to the labs: “Do what exactly?”

“All of it!” the teen basically exploded, tossing his hands up in the air as he began to fire off his little list of discrepancies, “The badge. Security letting you through. The tour guide knowing you and calling you sir. And her treating you like you’re somebody when you’re really nobody.”

“Perhaps she is simply using human decency, which you clearly lack.”

He didn’t like that. “Watch it, Penis,” he sneered right in his face, shoving him. Or, at least, attempting to, if he hadn’t stepped aside at the last moment and avoided a scene that might alert FRIDAY of what was happening. Because then she’d let Tony know and it would become a whole thing and Peter really didn’t have the energy to deal with anything like that.

Most of his spoons had already been used to show up in the first place, after all.

“How’d you get the story right?” he persisted, his neurons clearly not connecting the dots that were right in front of him.
He sighed at that: he truly didn’t want to recall a single detail from the “Terrible Taste Tournament”, as it had been dubbed inside the Tower. Not that Flash deserved to know in the first place.

But he was borderline with his harassment at this point and all Peter wanted to do was put as much distance from his Axe-clad body as he could: “I had to personally order the glasses afterwards, even if it had been a slight from the architect in the first place. It’s a collector’s first rule to make sure all valuables on display have a layer of protection, after all. Not my fault that guy’s an idiot, you know.”

“You’re an idiot if you think I believe you.”

And he was an idiot if he still didn’t believe him, but it was fruitless to argue with him. It would’ve been easier to convince Rocket not to steal someone’s eye.

“Honestly, Flash, I don’t care,” he said, loudly and concisely enough so that it might drive the message home, “Believe me, don’t believe me. It’s the same to me. Just leave me alone.”

But he just wouldn’t stop: he was on his own high horse and was beyond able to see reason. And he was making Peter reevaluate his stance on violence. “I’m going to uncover all your lies, Penis. And when I do, you’ll be blacklisted from every single college in the world and I’ll get an internship here and you’ll be banned for life!”

“Who am I to keep you from your delusions,” he was unable to stop himself from muttering and smirking, as he compiled in his mind the necessary documents he would need to actually ban Eugene “Flash” Thompson from all SI premises and affiliated establishments, be it from visiting to actual employment.

Tony had told him he was allowed to, for whatever reason. It would’ve been a waste to let such a brilliant idea go to waste, after all.

“How dare you…” but he wasn’t able to finish as his words died in his mouth, right as Mr Harrington approached them with the rest of the team.

Too damn bad for him, but a blessing for Peter. He really couldn’t be bothered to file the paperwork.

“Alright! Time’s up, let’s hop back into the elevator for our next stops!” Steph called back, swiping her badge to allow them out and cementing in Peter’s mind that he would make sure she would be getting a raise.

He glanced at the clock inside the elevator as he stepped in.

One hour in.

Several more to go.

It was prospecting to be a long, long day.

Chapter Text

There must’ve been something wrong brewing at the corner, for Peter’s experience had done a complete 180 after the Museum. Which, in his books, was not a good thing, considering the Spider Senses were still going off like crazy. Or perhaps it was just his usual anxiety peeking through.

Regardless, he had actually started having fun in their rounds of the few R&D labs they were allowed to tour.

Granted, it was nothing like his usual visits, when he hopped from project to project and helped out, or when he simply came down to spend time with the friends he had made, chatting about everything, from work issues to personal gossip. But it was still pretty exciting to see the labs from an outsider's point of view, especially since he wasn’t immediately crowded by a dozen scientists and researchers and interns, asking for his attention.

He even had the time to walk around and scope out nooks and crannies while his colleagues gave demonstrations and, on the rare occasion someone linked the tiny version of him who was trying to blend into the shadows and pass by unobserved with the vibrant version that belonged at SI, only a few interns came up to him asking for his input, before quickly realising he was busy and cutting their visits short.

All the while managing to stay under the radar and avoid getting yelled at by Mr Harrington or getting frowned upon by Steph for disrupting their trip. Or at least, he thought she would frown upon him.

He didn’t peg her as a yeller, really.

Their NDAs gave them a certain freedom to roam around a few rooms, mainly around intern spaces where there weren’t as many projects secretly guarded with lives, and he had even managed to spot some gems that would warrant more than a single intern working on them, making mental notes to bump them up accordingly. It didn’t matter that he technically was off the clock, his mind was always working on how to better SI.

Still, it was downright insane for Peter, who had envisioned a day of misery, to find everything not only bearable but enjoyable as well.

After the rocky start and the hiccup at the Museum, Flash had been too engrossed with the labs and the science happening all around them to personally bother him. He had remained at the front of every display and had pushed his way next to Steph at every possible moment, wanting to showcase himself and prove he was the smartest and brightest of them all.

And it was all pretty funny, considering that each time they were asked a question, he always got them wrong with such bravado and confidence that the poor interns giving them demonstrations actually felt bad for correcting him.
Still, his ego never bulged and he managed to recharge himself in between labs by tossing a few jabs at Peter every now and then, either by asking which desk was his or if his job was to bring everyone coffee.

By the way, it really wasn’t since Peter wasn’t allowed to operate a coffee machine unsupervised (and Dumm-E didn’t count as supervision) after the “Great Caffeine Incident”, when he had drank so much coffee, he was awake for three days straight. In the end, he had managed to solve a mathematical problem deemed unsolvable from the 70s and he had created six different types of webbing, but he had also scared the living Hell out of every single trained assassin that worked at the Tower, hence the rules.

FRIDAY had protocols in place any time he was around a cup of coffee and everyone knew that he shouldn’t be left alone with caffeine, if they knew what was good for everyone’s sanity.

Apparently his enhanced metabolism didn’t vibe with mint, citrus, and coffee.

Not that it didn’t matter to him, though, he preferred tea and chocolate anyway. And his sensitivities gave him an excuse to use fun-tasting toothpaste. Besides, caffeine had nothing on his personal anxiety, which was why he needed so much in the first place.

Still, regardless of those tiny superficial shots, the other boy was too distracted to truly cause Peter a headache, which made everything go smoothly.

Yes, he would have still preferred to be anywhere else instead of having to follow a strict routine through his workplace. Yes, he would have rather worked and been hands-on on various projects instead of watching them being explained. Yes, he would have chosen a different itinerary if he could have, showcasing some of the more interesting aspects of the Tower that were off-limits to civilians.

But it wasn’t all that bad and the time actually flew by as they went from floor to floor.

And, before he knew it, the morning had passed quickly and it was now lunchtime. Which he desperately needed as his stomach craved food after the long touring.

Super-metabolisms were a bitch to maintain and he didn’t want to disturb Steph or the interns by snacking, after all.

“What do you think we should get?” Ned asked him after Steph announced their lunch break, telling them to use their badges as credit cards and that their lunch would be provided at whichever stall they chose.

“How are you going to pay with your fake thing, Penis?” Flash had asked maliciously, but Peter hadn’t given him the satisfaction of a reply, choosing to ignore him and walk away with Ned and MJ. He was famished and Flash’s blond streak was starting to resemble a French fry, which was the usual signal that Peter Needed To Eat™.

“Literally anything is good here!” he fake lamented. It was always a struggle for him to decide what to eat at the Tower, given he had all the cuisines of the world at his disposal, without having to worry about the price of dinner. Pepper had given him unlimited funds when it came to food, with the only obligation being that he’d eat something healthy and nutritious, instead of stuffing his face with greasy pizza and hamburgers, just like Tony would. Normally Karen kept a log of what he ate there, in order to establish a rotation, but he didn’t want to bring her into the conversation for fear she’d attract the wrong type of attention.

Besides, Ned and MJ might not want the same thing as their carefully created spreadsheet, which made his next question very easy: “What are you in the mood for?”
Ned was pensive for a whole minute, but still came up emptyhanded: “I don’t know… MJ?”
And, as the two teens turned expectantly to her, she simply started walking and didn’t bother with an answer until they pestered her.

“We’re getting gyros.” Straight to the point, as always.

That was why she was the unofficial leader of their group.

“You’re right, I could go for one,” Peter commented offhandedly, as they got in line.

“One, he says, as if you won’t order three portions of fries and two desserts afterwards.”

“Hey!” he defended himself, aware that Ned wasn’t actively mocking him, “Not my fault my metabolism’s fast.”

“You’ve got Usain Bolt in your stomach,” MJ deadpanned humourlessly.

“You know what…”

They kept on talking as they ordered their food, Peter paying for the three of them, and found a table far away from the crowds, so that they could continue to chat in privacy without the added stress of hearing people chew.

MJ disliked the sounds and, after the bite, since everything got amped up, Peter found he did too. Which usually meant quiet lunches in the library more often than not.

As they ate, it was all fine, with MJ even deeming them worthy enough to witness the brilliance of her sketches and showed them over their shared fries. “You’re not going to starve if we steal some of your food, Parker, you overgrown spider,” Ned had said in a bout of confidence months prior as Peter had jokingly claimed the contrary, unwilling to share his pizza and, from then on, his plate was their plate.

(“You have a Capitalistic Queen funding your snacks, it’s your moral duty to give it to the working class,” MJ had commented on a different occasion, seemingly out of the blue.
“I thought you liked Pepper.”
“I do. I just want your frigging nuggets.”)

So, everything was just peachy in their little nerd bubble.

Until it wasn’t: Peter’s Spider Senses went haywire all of the sudden and he got the immediate urge to run away, for whatever reason. Not just walk or even jog lightly, like he did in gym class. Actual full-speed run, trying to beat Wanda’s brother’s velocity, all to avoid the unknown.

His senses rarely went off inside SI, unless there weren’t flames involved. Or dangerous tools in the wrong hands. Or harsh chemicals in precarious positions. Or superspies approaching menacingly. Overall, they didn’t bother him much at the Tower, give or take a few occasions when they did.

So, for them to burst out and give him the full heeby jeebys in the middle of the canteen was a bit unusual.

Yet everything happened for a reason, Spider Senses induced panic attacks during lunch included.

Once, it had been due to Flash creeping up on him to pour a can of soda on his sweater and he had to brace himself from the imminent cold. Another time, a flying ball was unintentionally aimed at him during a jock skirmish and he needed to duck.

Now, it was because, lo and behold, Captain “Mr Caped Righteousness, the Star-Spangled Man with a Dinner Plate” America appeared from behind him, tailed by a wild hero formerly known as Winter Soldier, now White Wolf, seen holding a plate filled with freshly baked cookies. And they were both marching straight towards Peter, a sly grin on each face. 

As they walked, the room erupted into various sounds of surprise, mainly from the teens on tour. The employees were used, to a certain extent, to seeing the heroes in the wild. They must’ve been, after all it wasn’t an unusual occurrence to spot them simply being in the Tower. Besides, Clint had the nasty habit of choosing the ventilation system as his main mode of transportation, which meant he had fallen out of the ceiling at least once on every floor. And Tony tended to run away from Pepper when he forgot to do his paperwork, hiding in cabinets.

The Heroes and Defenders of the Planet, folks!

After a while, they had just lost their appeal. There was no reason to be starstruck about heroes when said heroes had been seen behaving like children during their annual prank war.

But the AcaDec team had not seen Steve’s pink hair nor the way Peter had magnetised Bucky’s arm to cling to every single thing he touched. Which meant they had a bit of hero-worship still in their systems. Hence, the gasps that filled the giant room, despite coming from a handful of mouths.

“What are you two doing here?” Peter asked as soon as they stopped at their table and sat down unceremoniously, thus making it clear to everyone in the cafeteria that they were there for them and them alone.

Not that any employee had any doubt about that: Peter was often accompanied by a superhero or two. Or being pestered by a superhero or two.

The two Super Soldiers didn’t even acknowledge him, going straight to his best friends: “Hello Ned. MJ. How are you finding the tour? Exciting? Already know all the details?” Steve asked, leaning on Peter by tossing his arm on his head and using him as a stool. As he often did, much to Peter’s chagrin.

“It’s alright,” MJ replied, already sketching the scene in her notebook with an amused expression.

He should really ask her for a model fee, or prepare a contract to have her as his official portrayer, considering she was constantly taking his life and putting it on paper. But that was a thought for another day.

Now he had to deal with the crisis at hand.

“Everything’s great,” Peter butted in, talking fast to avoid getting their conversation back on track, “get back on the part where you answer me and then leave quickly to avoid causing brain damage on our AcaDec team.”

“Please,” he eventually added, not wanting to be unpolite although the two Super Soldiers were rarely polite to him, and shaking Steve off of him before sending daggers his way.

Bucky scoffed at the scene, moving his eyes from Peter’s undoubtedly red face to Steve’s affronted one, and he moved the plate right under Peter’s nose. It was pretty hard to remain cross at them once the heavenly smell reached his nose, but he had gained an excellent poker face during the years.

Between Nat and Matt’s training and the various poker nights Wade had dragged him to, he had had to. Especially when it came to Wade’s: there were candies at stake after all!

But the Super Soldier was relentless: “Relax, kiddo, we brought a peace offering.”

“What have you done?” he asked, without skipping a beat, too used to their antics. They both acted almighty, as if they had never done anything mischievous in their lifetimes, but Peter knew better. Those two were the same pair that had superglued Clint’s arrows to the wall of their training room and passed the blame onto Peter.

They knew how to be sneaky and he knew better than to trust them, especially when they came forward with a “peace offering” unprompted. Because they were unprompted in his eyes only, but in reality, they might have already set something on fire.

“Absolutely nothing,” Steve exclaimed, bringing his hand to rest over his heart, “Scout’s honour.”

“You didn’t fit the criteria to be a scout back then. And you’ve had too much on your plate to become one since.”

“Kid,” Bucky then said bluntly, switching to Russian, causing the teen to turn fully towards him. Other than to gossip around with Nat and Peter, or to avoid saying something he didn’t want Steve to hear, he rarely spoke in Russian. But he had chosen to, to try and calm Peter down, which would have been a sweet thought, if they weren’t the reason behind his anxiety. “We just thought it would be a good thing to get you this freshly baked batch of cookies. Tony told us you might have had a stressful day and that this might cheer you up a bit.”

“God, what does he have planned to ruin me?” he couldn’t help himself from dropping his head on his palms and groaning. All the apocalyptic scenarios from the previous days made themselves known in his mind, reminding him that Tony had said he’d be up to something and he had yet to see what.

He had been pacified by the detailed itinerary he’d been sent from James, forgetting for a moment that his mentor had no regard for anything arranged or planned. If anything, he actively enjoyed ruining people’s plans.

Thankfully, Bucky saw the panic rising in him and went to rest a placating hand on his heaving shoulders: “Pepper made him promise not to pull any stunts. You might see him around, but I’m positive his schedule is packed and he isn’t able to skip. You’re in the clear.”

“Good.”

“Now, can you take these cookies or what? I will get them back upstairs and finish them off if you don’t!” Bucky claimed mockingly after a beat, moving to take the plate back slowly to emphasize his words. Even if he were a regular human with regular speed, he would’ve been able to catch it effortlessly, but Peter moved fast to grab the plate and take it out of the metal hand, sticking to it for good measure.

It wasn’t wise to get in between Spider-Man and food, after all. And the White Wolf had tried once to steal his cookies, which would have meant he had learnt his lesson.

Yet it was best to be safe than sorry when Super Soldiers were involved.

“Like hell you will, give us the plate!” he all but screeched, holding the plate close to his heart, and twisting towards MJ and Ned, ready to pass the bounty between the three of them and making sure Steve got nothing, “Thank you for the delivery, you can now leave before you cause an aneurysm within my teammates.”

Only after he made shooing motions and practically shoved Steve off his chair, did the hero stand up. “Alright, alright, we’ll leave!” Steve exclaimed laughing, ruffling Peter’s hair for good measure, before dragging a reluctant Bucky away with him, “See you later! Ned, MJ, swing by whenever you want.”

And with that, they left as quickly as they had come, leaving the entire cafeteria in silence.

Or, at least, the employees were silent.

The random group of teens wasn’t, all of them staring at the trio as if it was the first time they had seen them, before jumping out and sprinting away from their seats and joining Peter, Ned, and MJ at their table, cramming on the chairs, and piling on top of each other around the trio.

And Peter, being the nice friend he was, simply offered them the cookies that had just been delivered, hoping that would be the end of the discussion.

Of course, though, it wasn’t. it had been futile for him to even wish it’d be.

For immediately he was bombarded by questions.

“How do you know them? How come you speak whatever language the White Wolf spoke? How come they brought you cookies?!” Betty asked rapidly, her voice rising higher than the others and, eventually, the rest of the team quieted down to allow her to interrogate him.

The journalist in her must’ve been dying to know, after all.

“He told you lot he had an internship,” Ned stated and shrugged, as if it truly wasn’t that big of a deal, not really bothering to give any detail and happy to munch on his cookie, while MJ nodded and returned back to her sketches, after murmuring: “Russian’s not that complicated to speak.”

Which kind of scared Peter, but he chose to table it and revisit that thought on a rainy day. He had enough on his plate as it was and uncovering MJ’s secrets wasn’t a priority.

He preferred to live safely and avoid her wrath.

Regardless, his focus moved quickly from her admission, since Flash had to open his dumb mouth and spew his usual business, ruining any moment: “An internship doesn’t explain having dessert hand delivered by literal superheroes, fatso.”

Now, Peter had to agree that merely having an internship didn’t indeed warrant his treatment. He had had many sessions of therapy that rotated around his imposter syndrome, trying to unpack all his emotions with the occasional ice cream, but he also knew that none of his teammates truly deserved to be explained the depth of his friendship with the Avengers, which was why he wasn’t bothering to answer their questions.

And, if Flash had decided to use his brain and leave his sentence at that, it might’ve been fine.

But he just had to insult Ned, which crossed lines in Peter’s brain.

One thing was to be his target at school, which, albeit shitty, was reasonable to some extent. He was, after all, able to endure through the most difficult battles and those were nothing compared to a bit of harassment between the classrooms and halls. It was even fine for Flash to call him names, even during their trip, and imply he was a liar, because Peter knew his worth and he could take it.

But his Guy In The Chair… now that made the Devil Matt was training inside of him come out.

Spider-Man was very protective of his people, all of New York knew.

Yet, he couldn’t be Spider-Man then and there. So he tried to reel in his fury as best as he could, while still making his points land.

Peter immediately took the cookie away from his hands as fast as a regular pissed off human could, splattering crumbs everywhere, and looked at Flash dead in the eye as the other boy sputtered in indignation. It was the same look he gave villains and evildoers from behind the mask and, with or without the layers, it was still effective in making the boy shut up immediately and retreat back into himself.

“Maybe it doesn’t,” he said coolly, not leaving an ounce of space for Flash to reply, “Maybe I’m just a nice person and they know I’m a nice person and like me because I am such a nice fucking person. And how I know them or why is none of your business.”

He watched as Flash scrambled for words, but had absolutely no patience for the other boy. Thankfully MJ understood that and added, without raising her head from her notebook: “I believe that was a dismissal, Eugene.”

They all watched as Flash rushed out of his seat and retreated back to his own table in silence, his metaphorical tail between his legs, and, one by one, each member of the team did the same, thanking Peter for the cookies without any further questions.

He didn’t care whether or not they believed him in the first place, but he cared whether or not they were respectful enough to handle the truth and not bother him about it. Besides, he just wanted to eat his cookies in peace and listen to Ned ramble about the lines of coding they had seen up on 12^th, which he happily did until Steph called them back.

Four more hours to go. Not that Peter was counting.

Chapter Text

“That was incredible!” Ned exclaimed excitedly, clutching to his chest a little binder, full of fliers and diagrams and tips on how to properly reuse-reduce-recycle. They had received them during their last stop at the so-called “Eco-Labs”, where they created and tested green products, and tried to come up with solutions to the ecologic warfare caused by centuries of uncontrolled pollution and unchecked capitalism.

Pepper had been a driving force behind the creation of those, handpicking all the members and making sure they were incredibly well-funded and well-stocked with both materials and brains. A lot of other labs would have been too busy with prototypes to create any bundle of information, unless it was during Review Time and therefore needed to do so to present their projects to the board, but the “Eco-Labs” were known for their preparation.

Not to mention that Pepper liked to hand out fliers about their research and discoveries surrounding green energies at every SI event and actively lobbied against the companies that either greenwashed or denied climate change. It was the only thing PR couldn’t keep her in check about.

That and bashing Tony on social media whenever he did something dumb, obviously.

Even MJ had been impressed with their efforts and had asked two researchers for more details on their projects on a new water clearing system, which was being developed after a few hiccups were resolved during one of Peter’s lab binges. They had both been reluctant to share their work with a high schooler, all too aware that spies came from all shapes and sizes, but one nod from Peter made them spill their guts happily until Steph squared the teens up to leave.

It was pretty hard to reign scientists in when they wanted to talk about their research, leaving Peter no other choice but to promise them he’d pass her number along to the team, in case they needed someone to gush freely about their progress with.

She had even smiled at him!

“Yeah, it really was. I can’t believe we’ve been able to see all this!” Cindy admitted, still with stars in her eyes as they all followed Steph down a corridor on the 27th floor.

They were most definitely not scheduled for any meeting in a conference room, even his teammates knew that, yet, when stumbling in the metaphorical dark, they all knew that they must’ve been in for a treat. After all, nothing in the Tower had diminished their enthusiasm, even when they had been there for eight hours straight.

Since their tour guide was tight-lipped about their next visit, that made their excitement fester and grow exponentially, meaning they were all bouncing off the walls.  

Peter was having the time of his life watching and listening to their theories, one more absurd than the other.

Abe had even claimed they’d witness a live Romanoff interrogation! As if Nat would leave something akin to witnesses as she did her job. Even when he shadowed her, she made certain to keep some tricks up her sleeve, claiming that he was “too soft to know about eyeballs”, whatever that meant.

But Wade and Frank had agreed with her, once he had recounted the accident in which he had almost found out, and thus left Peter terrified to even think about it.

Nevertheless, without the distractions from the fancy equipment and the groundbreaking projects, all their focus was on Peter, who had enjoyed the anonymity of the shadows for as long as he could. He could practically feel all their eyes on him as they walked, even without the Spider Senses.

“I can’t believe you work here, Peter!” Sally told him, jumping up by his side in the blink of an eye. He glanced at her, a bit annoyed about the whole ordeal, but choosing to remain silent. They had never truly bothered to know the truth before, so why should he care about whether they were mind-blown about it now?

But Sally was nothing if not relentless, when she wanted answers: “How are you not constantly overwhelmed by the amazingness of all this?”

He simply shrugged at that, unsure of how to reply.

On one hand, yeah, he was still pretty amazed daily, in all aspects of the business. The labs were a nerd dream and he fed on the science and energy that buzzed throughout the Tower. He had all he could ever need for his projects, personal and non, and he could further along his knowledge on every topic he could think of. He could even practise his speech-making whenever he had to present something, be it to a bunch of other interns (like the time he had introduced the idea of a costume party for Halloween and needed people from each department to help him out in his vision of a mega contest) or to the board of directors. Working there had made him more confident in his abilities and he was shaping his future firsthand, building connections as well as machines.

On the other, though, being Peter Parker, Stark Industries Intern, was nothing compared to being the Amazing Spider-Man, not that he would ever tell anyone that.

In the end, he chose a middle ground, unable to escape her demanding pout: “Trust me, at the third explosion awe wears off.”

And he wasn’t exactly far off from reality.

His first explosion had been due to a miscalculation when handling a bit of his own cartridges for the suit, causing it to explode and coat Tony’s lab in webbing that took two hours to dissolve, but even then he still had high spirits and took the cleaning to stride, unbothered and happy to just be there. He was terrified Tony would have sacked him for that, but his mentor had simply looked at him, standing upright on the ceiling trying to remove all the sticky residue, and had backtracked slowly, asking the teen to “make sure you don’t leave anything yucky behind!”

The second time it was because a substance he was working on overheated and, if it hadn’t been for FRIDAY’s warning, he would have been hit square in the face and probably got a bit of damage, but luck had been by his side and he was fine, if only with a minimal scolding from Aunt May over his carelessness around fire. At least he had kept all his eyebrows and lashes in place!

The third was all Tony’s fault, since he was a nutjob with no concern for safety protocols when tired, and Peter had gotten over his hero-worship by then, causing him to be unsympathetic to his mentor’s ply. He had even left him alone to clean up and snuck downstairs into the cafeteria, feeling a bit peckish.

So, the awe was definitely still there, considering he adored the Tower and would have willingly spent most of the time there, but he also did not rush anymore right after school, trying to squeeze all the time he could before patrol. He had found his balance between working, swinging, and simply living, and he was trying to stick to it as best as he could.

And he was Spider-Man, so stick he did.

But, while he expected to gain mixed reactions from his peers at his admission, all ranging from various levels of shock with a single enraged shout, he had not anticipated Mr Harrington’s yelp and budged eyes. “Explosions?” he asked, gulping soundly, and looking downright concerned for his student’s safety.

Which he shouldn’t be, considering that a lab explosion was by far not the most dangerous thing he had done.

Not that he should’ve or ever would’ve known.

Yet, in his line of work, a concerned teacher wasn’t exactly ideal. It would mean more attention and carefulness from the school staff and, when he needed to sprint out of class because a bunch of drones were attacking the Williamsburg Bridge and wrecking chaos, it would have made sneaking out more difficult.

Which led him to talk more and dig his own grave.

“I said explosions? I meant… not that. Definitely not that. No sir, I have never exploded anything in my life, not even a science fair volcano. In fact, my science fair volcano from when I was eight imploded and erupted, but not exploded! It was a very precise and controlled reaction, after all. And I can assure you, this is a super safe environment! Nothing happens that isn’t meant to happen and I most definitely have not burnt off part of my eyebrows when a chemical reaction flamed up because I accidentally added hydroperoxide while completely sleep-deprived after a three-day lab binge during the last break. Absolutely not!”

He could feel the disappointment roll off MJ as he spoke and, by the end of his sentence, Ned had violently facepalmed, shaking his head for good measure.

Thankfully, though, Mr Harrington didn’t linger on the explosion aspect of their dialogue. Not so thankfully, though, he focused on the binging, because he was a concerned adult and every concerned adult in his life always focused on the binging tendencies.

Except Tony, but who was he to judge, really?

“How would that even have happened? Don’t you have work hours?” he asked, crossing his arms at his chest, and staring Peter down, in a clear intimidation tactic to avoid being lied to.

And it would have worked on anyone else, but Peter had withstood Pepper’s fiery gaze and Nat’s disapproved look and May’s “You will tell me everything or so help me God I will force you to eat my food” one too many times to fall for something as simple as that. If anything, the entire ordeal made his teacher look less scary than the Marshmallow from Ghostbusters.

“Interns are allowed to stay whenever they have time, you know,” Peter easily said, waving his hand around to make the Trusted Adult™ understand that he was blowing the situation out of proportion, that the matter was trivial and that there was no war in Ba Sing Se. “We are busy with school and all that, so it’s not weird to see someone pour acid into a beaker at nine pm, trying to finish a project before finals.”

He probably would’ve gotten away with his distraction, if Steph hadn’t decided to butt in: “There are protocols in place to avoid certain situations, but a few of our members of staff seem to not mind them,” she chirped sweetly, snickering as Peter’s face fell. She seemed to have gotten out of whatever stupor and trance she had had when they had first met and for that Peter was glad, but to mercilessly throw him under the bus in front of his teacher was very rude!

“Why don’t you follow them, then?” Mr Harrington asked, right in Peter’s face in that typical teacher way that seemed to make anyone confess crimes they haven’t even thought about committing yet.

That is, anyone who had not received interrogation training from psychos and superspies. But, since the spy training seemed futile, he went down the psycho route.

“I’m built different,” Peter said, completely straight-faced and mimicking his stance, while Ned and MJ both lost their cool and busted out laughing, immediately joined by the rest of their team, who were enjoying the free spectacle.

He managed to throw Mr Harrington off his loop with that and the poor teacher could do nothing but blink owlishly, as if trying to reboot his own brain for the umpteenth time that day. Too many revelations mustn’t have been good for his health, Peter reasoned, but that man had survived years of public school, therefore must’ve been used to having his expectations and reality shattered on a daily basis by his students. Peter was certain he had done some damage himself throughout the years.

And he did recover fairly quickly, turning expectantly towards MJ with a puzzled look on his face: “Should I be concerned?”

“May knows everything already and has put up rules accordingly,” she replied briefly, taking too much joy out of the entire situation, and undoubtedly filing whatever expression was on their teacher’s face for later use. Peter had to admit that it was pretty comical, and he didn’t particularly like seeing people in distress!

Still, MJ’s answer didn’t seem to calm Mr Harrington down, whose eyes became impossibly wider as he appeared as to be having a coronary.

MJ then rushed to elaborate, in that short way of hers, before their teacher collapsed on the floor: “The answer’s no. He’s got supervision since then. And if it were to happen again, Pepper would take care of it.”

“I don’t feel too reassured,” he murmured, but his heart did slow down a bit, which meant that the crisis had been adverted.

Or postponed.

Now that Peter thought about it, Mr Harrington’s heart had done some weird turns throughout the day, especially when they were in the Museum. Perhaps he should drop into their conversation for him to take a trip to the cardiologist or to monitor his salt intake.

But the thought didn’t have time to sink, for Steph chimed in and called their attention back to herself.

“Alrighty kids!” she said, clapping her hands and opening the door to B14, one of their more modest-sized rooms that were reserved for smaller groups, “We have finally reached our next and final stop.”

“This is just a conference room,” Flash deadpanned, completely missing the point that maybe, just maybe, it had been an intentional choice to lead them there and, if he had just waited a little longer, he would have gotten an answer before having to annoy everyone.

It was a good thing he was never going to become a superhero, otherwise his name would’ve been “Captain Obvious”, and there was no need for someone like him in the streets of New York. There were already enough freakish people as it was.

Thankfully, though, Steph was better at masquerading her distaste and disapproval, for her smile didn’t falter much. Just a few muscles pulled at the corner of her mouth and eye, but unless one had enhanced senses, the movement would’ve been imperceptible. “Indeed it is. But the real deal is inside. Shall we?”

And with that, she motioned for everyone to enter and to take a seat at the equally spaced out chairs, in typical classroom style, signalling to both Mr Harrington and Peter to join her at the other side of the room.

Ned’s eyes immediately widened as he realised Peter wasn’t about to join them for whatever presentation they might be witnessing, while MJ simply smirked, grasping the concept fairly quickly, and twirled her pencil in between her fingers, ready to begin.

“I better end up working in legal,” she whispered, low enough that no one would’ve been able to hear her. Unless, of course, someone were to have super hearing and was able to hear the fight that had broken down four floors up over a stolen egg sandwich.

Why someone would either bring an egg sandwich or steal an egg sandwich, that was a question not even Groot could’ve answered, though.

“I’m certain you lot have about a dozen questions each about what is going on,” Steph exclaimed, immediately followed by the nodding of most heads in the room, Mr Harrington’s included, “I am just so excited to tell you that SI has decided to branch out with our internships! Starting this summer we will launch a new program, targeting specifically your age and grade.”

Various sounds of disbelief came out of the teens, and even Mr Harrington couldn’t keep his happiness contained at the prospect of his pupils being chosen for such a spectacular opportunity. And Peter was proud of his teammates and friends, since they had made it all by themselves.

All except one, who couldn’t read a room to save his life: “Are you actually telling us that you guys didn’t do that before?” Flash exclaimed, pointing an accusatory finger in Steph’s, and thus Peter’s, general direction and waving it around.

“That’s right,” she replied cheerfully, visibly trying to not let his attitude damper the glee around the room, “Usually our interns are college level, for obvious reasons, but we have decided to open our ranks, sort to say, to help you get better acquainted with what you guys might face in the workplace. Obviously, you will not be tasked with anything too drastic or complicated, unlike college-level interns, and you will have fewer hours and responsibilities, both because of your age and blossoming capacities that need to be honed out. But it will be a job opportunity nonetheless! Heck, you might even get called back during the year, if you impress us!”

It didn’t matter if, technically speaking, management was not Peter’s turf and he should’ve gone to James since Steph was one of his employees: that woman was getting a very hefty raise, simply because she had managed to keep face and avoid yelling every time Flash said or did something stupid, and because she had lead them throughout the Tower without a hiccup.

Whereas Peter would have lost it ages ago, if he were in her shoes.

Thankfully he wasn’t into HR and should’ve never have been put on such paths in the first place. Tony had tasked him once to show Hank Pym around a lab and the day had ended up with the two of them studying the tiny hairs that the bite had given him under three different microscopes, completely missing out on the timeline that was originally intended for them to follow.

In the end, everything went for the best since a world-renowned entomologist would have rather analysed a spider-human hybrid instead of sitting in a meeting room with a bunch of suits, yet Pepper wasn’t exactly pleased with their disappearance.

Ergo: no touring duties for one Peter Parker, ever again.

For one brief moment, after her direct statement, everything seemed fine, as if Steph’s words had reached their target, with her being able to answer Cindy’s question about whether or not they would roam departments or stick to a specific one in case they got the internship. (They wouldn’t, it would be a logistic nightmare to have a bunch of teens running around every day looking for their supervisors and no one in the Tower wanted to coordinate that.)

But Flash was nothing if persistent, given that he still campaigned for his own spot on the AcaDec team even when he had nil qualifications: “So, no high schooler has participated before?” he asked when it was his turn again, eliciting various groans from their teammates. Ned even dropped his head on the table at the sound of his voice!

“As I just said,” Steph’s smile was strained and her left eye was slightly beginning to twitch again, but she still remained pleasant and avoided stabbing Flash with a pencil, although her intentions were clearly written on her face, “It is just being implemented, hence has not been applied yet. We are still a couple of months away from summer, after all.”

An intelligent person would have kept their mouth shut since the beginning. A normal person would have owned up to their mistake and avoided embarrassing themselves in a possible place of future employment. A smart person would have apologised and not wasted their precious question time trying to destroy a classmate.

Flash was not an intelligent person, nor a normal one, nor a smart one. “Whatever you get paid to say,” he seethed, practically sending knives right at Peter’s skull, before crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back, clearly unsatisfied with the answer he had received.

At least he kept his mouth shut for a while.

Eventually, after another lightning round of questions, they all quieted down, patiently waiting for something to happen.

Per the e-mail that Peter wished he hadn’t received, they were very much behind schedule. An intern was supposed to be there already and they should’ve already started with the test. Yet no one was there and Steph was glancing worriedly between the clock on the wall and the door.

“You guys just stay put for a moment while I go look for the papers that were already supposed to be here!” she all but shrieked, coughing to cover up the nerves in her voice, before hurriedly fleeing the scene and searching for the wayward intern that was messing up her timeline.

And if his time around the HR department had taught him anything, was to never mess with their timelines.

He really didn’t want to be in that intern’s shoes once she found them.

“So…” a petulant voice broke the peaceful silence, “this is news to you, right, Parker?”

He could have replied in countless ways: he could have ignored Flash’s tone and chosen the high ground, explaining how he knew about it; he could have stayed silent and let him stew in his own doubts and insecurities; he could have moved next to Ned to talk about everything and nothing, pretending their classmates weren’t there.

In the end, though, he chose to stick to his guns and act just as he would’ve if it had been any other employee asking him that, thus dragging them right back into their place.

“Actually, it isn’t,” he deadpanned, levelling Flash with a glacial stare and causing the other boy’s heartbeat to quicken, “I got told days ago that the tour would’ve ended up with this test. And I hate to brag, but I was pretty crucial when defining the Summer Program.”

Amongst the sounds of jaws hitting the floor, a voice rose high in a shriek. It was a sound no one would have expected, given the context, and yet Peter knew it was coming the moment he read the cursed thread.

“AND YOU DIDN’T TELL ME!” Ned yelled, pretty much jumping out of his chair, and staring Peter down, looking betrayed.

“I didn’t want to spoil the surprise, bro,” Peter said softly, channelling his dramatic side and clutching his hands to his heart, for good measure, “I know you love the suspense.”

Ned blinked owlishly at him, before wiping away a fake tear and moving to imitate Peter’s stance. “Thanks, bro. You’re a real one.”

“Bro.”

Usually, by then, MJ would have already shut them down before they enacted an entire Shakespearian tragedy. But she was beaten to it, too engrossed in her shading.

“Shut up you idiots!” Flash all but exploded, standing up and slamming his hands on the table, “All you guys really believe his bullshit?”

“Eugene…” Mr Harrington tried to get the attention back to himself before an altercation happened, but he failed spectacularly. After all, the poor man was not that listened to and respected at school, where he had a somewhat aura of authority, given that he was allowed to threaten detention but never send poor Flash Thompson there, least of all his parents stopped donating.

The other boy was clearly going on a tangent and was not to be stopped by a teacher, especially not outside of his classroom: “No! It’s insane how much he’s got you fooled!”

“I would suggest you sit back down and stop throwing baseless accusations, otherwise I will have to speak with Principal Morita and handle the situation with your parents, once we get back,” Mr Harrington spoke again, sternly, and stared Flash down until he eventually relented, doing as he was told.

But he wasn’t done, as always: “But shouldn’t he take this as well since it’s a great opportunity or whatever?” he asked, this time with a sweet tone that mocked his classmate and mollified their teacher simultaneously.

Said teacher who then had a different target for his disappointed glare.

Since Mr Harrington turned almost immediately towards Peter, he ended up missing Flash’s wicked smile. In his mind, his terrible plan was probably coming together, while in reality, he was simply being a nuisance. Did he really believe that something like that would have messed with Peter or was he simply as bright as a broken lightbulb?

Perhaps he should’ve gotten Legal to check their school entrance exam, given that it made no sense whatsoever for Flash Thompson to survive at Midtown untouched.

“That is an unfortunately well-raised point, Peter. Even with your current internship- which is real and if I hear about you mentioning it again we might need to have a serious discussion, Mr Thompson- it might be helpful for you to take this test. You might get to prolong your work here, after all.”

To be fair, their teacher’s concerns were very valid and, in a different situation, he would have shared them. It made sense for him to suggest a continuation in such a prestigious environment.

But Peter was too tired to try and put himself in the adult’s shoes, especially given that said adult had read numerous reports on his work in the Tower and had also cited his very own work in their classroom at least four different times.

“I’m pretty sure it would be a waste of time on my part,” he said, hoping it’d be the end of their miniature argument.

Yet, given the pregnant silence that followed his words, it became clear that Mr Harrington wanted to comment some more.

In the end, Peter chose to throw him a bone: “It’s not like I’ve got anything else to do right now, so maybe I should take this test instead of waiting around for them to finish it.”

“You shouldn’t take this underfoot, Peter,” Mr Harrington tried again, with a reinforced conviction, “a newly designed internship program sounds just up your alley!”

“It’s up his alley alright, considering he helped us write these questions,” a voice came from outside, belonging to Alex O’Hirn, fellow intern in R&D who was a sophomore at NYU and with whom Peter had personally worked on many occasions, both on official projects and ushered trials that would get them both frowned upon by their supervisors, and considered a friend. The two had dissected some parts of the Rhino’s suit that Peter had gathered up at a scene, so they were pretty chummy with each other.

And, as he came in carrying their test papers, also came Steph, who nodded at his statement: “Peter was actually the one to give them the topics for the test, given that he is technically learning about them in your classrooms. So, Mr Harrington, we have taken a page out of your school’s syllabus, literally.”

"Technically?!” arrived the shrieking disbelief from Flash, but his voice was drowned by a combination of Seymour elbowing him into silence and Mr Harrington trying to remedy his blunder: “OH! Well, it would be a shame then, for him to take it! Silly me. Of course, a student as bright as Mr Parker here would help out whenever he could.”

Peter could do nothing but try to stifle his laugh, making eye contact with both Ned and MJ, who seemed to be in a similar predicament.

“Trust me, Mr H,” he said calmly, not wanting to have too much attention drawn to himself, “nothing beats my internship. Besides, I’m going to be here all summer as well.”

“Yeah, ‘cause fetching coffee and lying are such enriching activities,” came the sarcastic comment from Flash.

MJ looked ready to speak up, probably to tell him to shut up, or to stop lowering the IQ of the entire population of Manhattan, or to start planting trees to replace the oxygen he had wasted.

But Alex beat her to the punch: “Peter’s not allowed around caffeine and if he were to be, then the alarms would be blaring,” he declared as a haunted look appeared on his face. He had been there to witness the Incident, after all, and much to Peter’s chagrin, the punishment and subsequent fear had been warranted.

What he hadn’t expected, though, was the literal War Flashbacks that his coworkers would get every time anyone as much as whispered the word “coffee” around him.

Thankfully Alex managed to compose himself fairly quickly, finishing to pass the tests amongst the teens. “Besides, he is a terrible liar,” he added in the end, before taking his place next to Steph and beginning his introduction.

“Great, then. You guys have ninety minutes to answer our sixty questions and, as stated before, all the material comes from the classes you have already taken. We will not take points away for wrong questions, but if you have to expand some of your answers we might counteract any negative effect. Besides, we are mostly interested in the way your brain works and a bit of logic has been tossed in there, for good measure, just to see what you can do with that. If you are stomped on a question, feel free to ask me or Peter or even your teacher for help. Your time starts… now!”

Peter thought that, hopefully since his classmates were busy and no catastrophe had happened during their tour, that maybe his instincts were wrong and nothing was supposed to go legs up for the day.

Yet, of course, Parker Luck™ was a bitch who just had one last punch in stock for him.

Chapter Text

For ten glorious minutes, the only sound filling the room was the scribbling of pencils on paper, evenly spaced out with some mutterings and puzzled noises that came out of the teenagers engrossed in their tests. Despite the initial awe and, for some, scepticism, they were all preoccupied with the questions in front of them and kept their heads down, trying to work out the answers.

And they should have done fairly well, considering Peter had followed their school curriculum and used topics already covered during class, but he never knew just how much attention his classmates had given to their lectures.

He never paid any to begin with, always too busy with other types of work and using the time to be productive, instead of having to repeat thermodynamic laws for the tenth time.

Mr Harrington had politely asked Alex for a copy of the test, “For the fun of it!” he had claimed and none of the workers had found a reason in themselves to deny him the pleasure of challenging himself. He had even asked Peter which were the questions that he had created and joked that perhaps he’ll have him create future quizzes for the other classes, just to keep him engaged in their coursework.

Apparently he had noticed him slacking off and getting easily distracted at school, even if it never affected his grades and scores.

Peter tried to brush off the attention, but both Steph and Alex seemed hellbent on praising him, causing a proud look to appear on his teacher’s face and a shriek of disbelief to sound from a particular mouth, not focused enough on the questions he probably was not understanding well.

Yet, adulation aside, those ten minutes went smoothly, as a knife through skin whenever someone decided to stab Spider-Man and, subsequently, gift him said knife. Peter used to use the expression “knife through butter”, but he had found out, the hard way, which one was faster and smoother. After all, butter was rarely room temperature, and villains and goons rarely used jagged edges.

Therefore it made sense, for him to believe that the remaining 80 would be similar. Right?

Wrong.

For ten minutes in, FRIDAY came to life in their tiny meeting room, startling the teens and adults alike, and causing a sigh of fear and exasperation to leave Peter’s body.  

“Mini Boss, your presence is required on floor 78,” she blared up from the speakers, drawing the attention of the entire room to the ceiling. Midtown’s first timers at the Tower still hadn’t properly heard FRIDAY speak, although they had heard of her, which caused a little commotion as they jumped up from their chairs at the sound. Even Steph and Alex, who were supposedly accustomed to the AI, did flinch at the sudden noise.

Perhaps they had also never heard her properly speak, since she was coded mainly to interact with a selected few.

But Peter, who was rather used to her, was not bothered in the slightest: “I’ll swing by once I’m done here, FRI,” he replied affectionately, smiling up at the nearest camera to ensure her he wasn’t annoyed with the disturbance. In fact, he would have much preferred to go up and deal with whatever, but he really couldn’t: “I technically am still at school.”

“On a regular occurrence I wouldn’t disturb you,” she fired back immediately, causing him to groan, “but it is quite urgent.”
And those five final words did it for him, with his mind already racing to try and figure out what was wrong to begin with.

78 was typically quiet, being made up of a bunch of fireproof rooms that were used mainly for testing and the necessary equipment to deal with hazardous chemicals and experiments, but it also housed a lab dedicated to Avengers’ tech that was currently trying to disassemble a bunch of unexploded Green Orbs from the Goblin to learn more about them.

Peter shuddered to think about the Possible Worst Scenario, in which said Goblin would swoop in to take what was his and wreck chaos, but that mustn’t have been the case. Otherwise he would have felt it.

Alongside his Spider Senses, he had also developed a “I despise this person viscerally and would very much like to not be in their presence” Sense, which only went off whenever he was approached by Green Goblin or, for some reason, Norman Osbon. And, unlike the Spider Senses, that one never failed. He even had calibrated the radius in which the sense worked and he was proud to say that it covered a whole block, give or take. Which meant he’d be more than able to feel a dooming presence a few floors up.

Therefore the emergency must’ve been manageable and Peter-sized, instead of Spider-sized, which did ease his anxiety a bit.

But he was a simple intern, not a full-time employee, no matter how many hours he clocked in. So, shouldn’t have there been at least four different adults in front of him to contact for an emergency?

“Can’t someone else deal with it?” he lamented petulantly.

FRIDAY sounded almost apologetic: “Boss is stuck in a meeting with a possible investor, but this isn’t her usual area.”

He had figured as much.

But he had had a different person in mind when he had asked: “What about Tin Can?”

“He’s out with the Platypus. Besides, I do believe your approach would be better.”

“Showing favouritism?” he couldn’t help but tease, infinitely happy to be held to such high standards while depressingly sad that his competence was ruining his winning streak against the field trip. He really, really, really needed the day to end without a single hiccup and he was just so close!

The Universe couldn’t have waited for a worse moment to throw a wrench in his plans.

“Always,” came FRIDAY’s reply, which did put him in slighter higher spirits than before.

Perhaps this urgent deal had been a blessing in disguise, he couldn’t help but wonder since he would have had to stay inside the meeting room until his teammates were done and he was already itching to do something else. He would’ve probably passed away from boredom, after all, if she hadn’t popped up with an alternative.

“Fair, I am better than the madman,” he grinned up at the ceiling and rose up to his feet, beginning to walk to the door to deal with whatever the Tower wanted to throw at him. “Alright, guess I have to go up for a bit then,” he then sheepishly added, directed to his teacher.

It wasn’t like he could stop him, right?

Wrong, again.

“Peter, you can’t leave,” Mr Harrington said immediately, standing up and moving closer to the door, blocking Peter’s path.
Because since when did things go smoothly for the tiny arachnid, right?

“With all due respect, sir, you do not have the authority to stop Peter from doing anything in the Tower,” Steph chimed in, coming to the rescue before Peter could say something that would have warranted a month’s worth of detentions.

Which he really couldn’t take because said month was jampacked with prior engagements and deadlines and he had to finish writing a paper for his aero-engineering class at MIT. He simply did not have the time to fit detentions in his calendar!

Mr Harrington’s mouth shot agape and he looked ready to reply, but Steph beat him to it, no longer seeming to care much about composure: “Hell, he could have easily gone whenever he wanted to during our trip and even I wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it. He pretty much has full authority over this entire Tower and business and never even seems to realize it! But, since he is polite and probably didn’t want to cause me an aneurysm, he complied with my itinerary and followed along to my rules without complaining, so not only he has the power to do as he pleases, but he also has my trust. And the same can’t really be said towards all your students. Plus, FRIDAY speaks from the highest positions of power in the Tower, she is quite literally Dr Stark’s brainchild, what she says goes. Ergo: Peter now has to leave to deal with whatever is happening upstairs and there is nothing neither you nor I can do to prevent him from doing so.”

Mr Harrington seemed shocked by her sudden change, and so was Peter for his part. He had grown to fear the HR employees due to their innate ability to keep a straight face in every situation possible and for her to use such fervour and candour it spelt trouble in Peter’s books.

Or, at least, it would, if said vehemence was directed to him.

From his point of view, he simply took a step back and avoided eye contact, enjoying the scene.

“I understand that his internship allots him certain freedoms and respect,” his teacher began saying, raising his arms up as if understanding the danger he could be in, if he took one wrong misstep, “believe me there is no one in our school that deserves it more. But he is still one of my students on a field trip. As he stated before, he is technically at school and under my supervision and shouldn’t leave my sight.”

Steph got a wicked gleam in her eyes at that: “Sight alone, you say?”

Peter didn’t like that an iota.

“Well, ideally he wouldn’t leave, period,” Mr Harrington admitted, wishful thinking and all, “But I suppose, given the circumstances, that sight is enough.”
She clapped her hands and caused a spike in the Spider Senses: “Wonderful! Then we can track him via FRIDAY, who has eyes and ears everywhere in this building. This way you can see him while he deals with whatever.” And she practically dragged the teacher back to their table, without as much as another word.

Peter instinctively huffed out a breath of relief. He would have hated to be the one to suggest that solution, since it did bring even more attention than usual on him, but he figured he would have had to compromise someway.

And that worked for all parties involved.

Or, at least, all of them.

“You can’t be serious right now!” Flash all but exploded, tossing his papers in the air, and pointing an accusatory finger towards the adults in the room, as well as Peter. “Who the hell are Boss and Tin Can and why can’t they deal with this better than Parker?”

And there it was: the final straw.

Peter had wasted so much energy already during their tour to try and placate the insolent child, that he quite frankly did not have any left. He was all out of spoons. And when Peter was out of spoons, he tended to have little to no filter.

Each and every single one of the Avengers, alongside Team Red and the Vigilante Population of New York, had found that out the hard way.

Flash should have been proud to be handled the same treatment, Peter thought, before letting his mouth run loose.

“Flash, I literally can’t take it with you anymore. All day, you’ve just been a pest, always riding up my nerves and competing with good old Johnny for the title of most annoying person in the Universe. Congratulations, you’ve won! At least he brings me donuts as payback. Or is it pay forward? Anyway, doesn’t matter, cause you won and you can take the metaphorical cake and shove it down your throat so you can finally spare me from hearing your voice. If you like it so much, record an audiobook and listen to that on repeat, but for the love of Groot, I do not want to utter another word. At least until Monday, can you do that? Can you grace me with silence and reprieve from your bullshit? Just shut up and fill in your name on the paper, since that’s probably all you’ll be able to do on the test. You’re giving me a bigger headache than any problem ever could.”

The complete and utter silence that followed his little spiel was wonderful.

Yet, alas, he had to break it: “Alright, I’ll try to make it as quickly as I can and you’re going to be seeing me from the projector once I activate the protocol,” he said, directly to Mr Harrington as to ensure that his teacher had understood the procedure and would not cause any trouble. “Do you need anything while I’m away?”

Alex and Ned both did perk up a little at that, clearly wanting something, but MJ shut them down quickly: “You’re not going to run errands, just fix the issue and get back here, I promised May I wouldn’t let you out of my sight either.”

“Betrayed by my own family. Unacceptable!”

Perhaps he was a bit over the top, but he was tired and had taken Dramatic Exits™ from Tony, therefore he was morally obliged to.

“Quit whining.”

“Fine! “Babydoll, show me off on the nearest screen!””

His mentor had originally created the program once Peter had started hanging out in his lab. In the beginning, he never left the teen unsupervised, yet as time progressed he felt more and more at ease. Still, he needed a way to ensure that everything was going smooth sailings and, to do so, he had to “keep an eye on the danger-prone spiderling,” and this way he was able to keep a live stream of Peter running on his tablet whenever he was away, before he could trust the teen to not burst into flames or destroy anything too important.

At the start, Peter was too mystified to actually move without Tony in the room, all too aware of the price of each bolt and screw, but he did relax eventually. Which did led to several of those live streams being taped and used as blackmail material.

It wasn’t until Tony saw Peter’s birthday gift idea for Pepper and stole it, causing chaos in the entire Tower as a tiny angry spider chased down a ‘genius billionaire playboy philanthropist’ for theft of intellectual property, that the program was put to rest.

Needless to say, the repercussions had been insane.

But Pepper did end up loving Peter’s gift, therefore everything was fine.

So, smiling at the nearest camera and noticing how the projector showed the same image with very little delay, he flew away from the scene and went up to deal with things.

Chapter Text

Peter was acutely aware that he had eyes upon him.

Granted, he always had that feeling, even before the bite.

His anxiety had been genetic and had made itself known early on, and his hyperactive tendencies made him buzz out of his skin more often than not, causing heads to turn as he playfully vibrated whenever he was happy or excited. Besides, many called him a prodigy, which did cause a bit of gawking whenever he managed to shatter other’s expectations. It wasn’t a daily occurrence for a kid to outsmart people three times his age and render them speechless, after all.

And, after the bite, everything was amped up. He could hear the heartbeats of people standing twenty feet from him and he could see their most miniscule twitch, which, in turn, made him more conscious about himself. He began carrying himself a little lower, head bowed and focused, trying not to draw attention to anything that was altered and inhuman of sorts. Best to blend in the shadows than to accidentally reveal something that should’ve remained hidden.

The only thing that could have worried him were Geiger counters, given how radioactive his blood was, but he didn’t encounter many on a day-to-day basis and had casually skipped school when they were supposed to use them, thus avoiding accidents altogether.

Besides, by portraying himself as tiny and innocent and harmless, he managed to save several aces up his sleeves. It was all the more entertaining when people underestimated him and subsequently were forced to face the music.

In a strange way, the combination of FRIDAY shadowing him and the knowledge of his teammates watching him was a bit similar to the Spider-Sense, even when he was alone in the elevator, slowly climbing his way up to 78.

Given that the Tower was still standing and that there weren’t signs of an explosion having happened, it reassured him greatly.  He really didn’t have enough spoons to deal with debris, especially after the surreal day he was having.

But there would’ve been very little room for other explanations of FRIDAY’s call, considering that everything and anything could’ve and should’ve been handled by Pepper.

School was doubting the validity of his internship and threatened expulsion due to his skipping classes even when he was justified by his guardian? Pepper Potts met directly with Principal Morita and needled him a new suit, only to bring inside the two surviving members of the Howling Commandos to tell him personally how his grandfather would’ve been disappointed in his prejudice against Peter.

The Avengers were fighting over something useless and unimportant, yet since they were overgrown children behaved like such? Pepper Potts calmly prepared a slideshow detailing how wrong each of them was and forced them all to make peace like civilized adults.

Tony was behaving erratically and maniacally and refused to sleep? Pepper Potts quite literally hosed him down and proceeded to give him so much melatonin he could have become a gummy bear.

Norman was being a bitch? Pepper Potts then proceeded to send him the flowers he was allergic to, while also inquiring about a possible future employee in none other than young Harry Osborn himself.

Icon behaviour, if one asked Peter. Not that he needed to be asked, he always sang her praise unprompted.

Therefore, for her to not be the first person chosen to deal with whatever emergency was happening, albeit otherwise occupied or not, was quite weird. Although, she usually chose to stay as far away as possible from anything Avengers-related related and Peter was technically, if one wanted to be noisy and start assigning labels, an Avenger.

He did use tech that came out of SI, yet he made it all from scratch while also creating for the other heroes who lacked his talent in engineering. He had participated in two or three high-priority, super top-of-the-shelf secret missions, but mostly he was there as an accessory to either Nat or Bucky, who trained him in espionage. And the events that drew on the Avengers and were in New York happened on his turf, so he had to intervene!

But he had said no, multiple times, first in Tony’s face and then directly to Nick Fury, who had not taken the news happily and proceeded to try to both bribe and threaten him into joining.

Needless to say, that was the day Nick Fury realised just how good of a lawyer Matt was.

And so came the conclusion: there was an emergency in the Avengers labs and Peter had to square up.

He took a deep breath as the elevator reached 78 and closed his eyes, trying to ground himself, despite being several dozen feet up in the air. Not that it would’ve mattered since he never felt as grounded as when he swung around the city, but still.

It was a trick that Matt swore by, especially when he didn’t know what he was dealing with, and Peter had zero clues whatsoever.

He had almost expected FRIDAY to send him at least a tiny text, just a heads up, yet his phone was quiet and there were no warning signs nor alarms blaring anywhere.

For some, that might’ve been a good thing, it might have meant that nothing much was amiss and it was all an exaggeration made by the AI, who might have misjudged the situation. But Peter knew better: he had personally added several lines of coding to FRIDAY’s mainframe, he knew firsthand just how accurate she was, and the lack of screeching was unhelpful, since the labs were soundproof, given how many explosions they were used for.

So he cautiously stepped out of the elevator and made his way deeper into the floor, noticing the open and empty labs, and slowly beginning to hear faint and muffled yelling, severely reduced by the soundproof walls.

He came to a halt right outside the main door to the Avengers labs, where he was more than sure the sounds were coming from. He concentrated a moment on them, before even opening the door. They did not belong to a voice he knew or had ever heard and they were being rather loud and obnoxious, which did not bode well for the person who was yelling, probably to a silent audience who was either too afraid or too tired to speak back.

Peter had dealt the entire day with a loud and obnoxious voice screaming in his ear.

And he was not about to pull his punches.

Taking a deep and grounding breath and plastering on his most confident smile, taught directly by Loki during his last visit as the demigod explained that he could use it to win almost all battles of wits, not that he needed it given his sizable brain and intelligence, but that it would be a great weapon in his arsenal nevertheless, he motioned for FRIDAY to open the door and walked in leisurely, drawing the attention of the engineers and scientists that worked there, as well as the curiosity of an older man, dressed in military green and with several medals on his jacket.

He had had a phase, back when he was seven: he had become obsessed with the various branches of the military and had done a thorough and deep dive of research into every single topic he could find in the library. One of these dives was sorely about medals, what each meant and where they stood in the uniforms and who received them. So he knew that the man screeching like a banshee in the middle of the lab was a General, given the stars on his jacket, and had several honorifics bestowed upon him due to his work.

Yet nothing on his clothing explained why he was there. He didn’t even seem to have a badge, which was something essential to step into the elevators, let alone to be led straight into the heart of Avengers operation.

As he had regarded the man in all the tiny details he could find (he has a cat with long white fur and sharp nails, he ate a bagel, with cream cheese and onion and lox and sesame seeds, and has some crumbs stuck in his collar, he is a bit yellowish and his liver isn’t working as well as it should, he gelled his air up to cover a bald spot, he favoured his right side and his shoe was more worn out there), the General kept up his tirade and kept on screaming, unaware of Peter’s presence in the room.

And he couldn’t have that, now, could he?

Peter fake coughed, a double hit to draw attention to himself, causing all the eyes in the room to shift on his frame.

The difference in the air was palpable: all the lab workers took a collective breath of relief, some even going as far as slouching on their chairs and desks, since their saviour had arrived, while the General simply looked at him with a puzzled expression and a raised brow, probably unsure of what could have caused such a drastic reaction from the people in the room.

But he did halt for a moment in his tirade and blinked owlishly at Peter, before paying him no mind whatsoever and returning to his screaming monologue against the Head of the Department.

Rude.

Dr Black, said Head, for his part was stoic and impassible in the face of the General, but Peter could see the cracks in his posture and the way his shoulders sacked down at the sight of him. Which did not bode too well with Peter, considering he had witnessed the man say no to Clint (who had asked if he could make him a joke set of arrows specifically to terrorize the Tower) and scold Sam (who had thought it to be a good idea to put Red Wing in rice after a little swim in the Hudson, instead of taking it up to be repaired).

If he was even minutely shaken, that meant Trouble™.

“FRIDAY sent me up, what seems to be the issue here?” he asked directly, bypassing pleasantries, and earning a curious glance from the General, who seemed to have finally connected the collective relief from the room to the teenager appearing out of thin air, and was thus eyeing him rather carefully.

“Pete, thank God you’re here! This gentleman is trespassing and…” Dr Black started, running a hand through his air, and beginning to motion wildly in that typical way of his, only to be halted in his recounting by an outraged cry.

“I am most certainly not! I had an appointment!”

Rather rude.

“With whom, if I may ask?” Peter inquired, embodying innocence and respect, even if he had neither at the moment.

It didn’t matter how quickly almost every adult covered his ears around swear words, Steve “I have the fucking mouth of a fucking sailor” Rogers had already taught him his entire arsenal. Besides, hanging around Wade had eroded all the wide-eyed naivety out of him.

Not that the General would know.

And he indeed didn’t know and bought the scene as genuine, spilling all the right details: “A member of your Legal team, we were revisioning a bulletin of the next Accords meeting and he told me I could come up here once we were done.”

He would have to check with FRIDAY after the situation got dissolved, but Peter was willing to bet that that Legal member was the same one who was giving him weekly headaches by constantly arguing over the basis of everything and merrily skipping the points, and whose only personality trait was having graduated from Harvard, not even in an Elle Woods Way.

Peter’s smile had morphed into his patented one, specifically designed to lure people into a false sense of safety before he brutally took the rug from under their feet and made them rethink their entire existence and the consequences that had led them there. It was much more effective without the mask, but even Spider-Man used it from time to time. “And thus you thought it proper to waltz up to restricted territory you had no access to, instead of staying where you were supposed, is that correct? How did you even get up here, FRIDAY controls the elevator and I’m certain you do not have the clearance to be anywhere inside the Tower unaccompanied.”

The General was indeed taken aback at the sudden switch from the shy and respectful teenager that had appeared to the confident intern who took no one’s bullshit. “The meeting was two floors below,” he spluttered eventually, straightening his jacket, and raising his head defensively, “and I took the initiative to drop by, as you youngsters might say, since We haven’t received the appropriate responses from this so-called “team”.”

“Wow, I could hear the capitalization from a mile away!” Peter couldn’t help himself from commenting, earning a moderate-at-best eyebrow rise from the General. His intent was clearly one to destabilize Peter and put him on uneven ground, given his grandfatherly appearance, but he did not know that he was used to much more effective eyebrows. The General got nothing on Nick Fury’s single eyebrow or on Steve’s look of disappointment. He kept on unperturbed: “So, let me get this straight, you just showed up unannounced, unwanted, and demanding stuff? Peak U.S. Military behaviour indeed.”

The General looked downright murderous at that point and ignored Peter, jabbing his finger in Dr Black’s chest before yelling once more: “What is the meaning of this, Black? I do not have time to waste on your unprofessional interns. Is he here to fetch your higher-ups so that we can have a discussion about your insubordination?”

“Insubordination means to be rude about one’s higher-up, sort to say,” Peter intervened effortlessly, stopping the doctor from replying, and shifting the attention back to himself, “And I do not think you work here, sir, which would mean you are wrong in your terminology. Perhaps you forgot to swallow a dictionary this morning, choosing to down absurd audacity and entitlement.”

One thing had to be said about Peter, and completely acknowledged by the teen: he could sass and out-sass every single being of the Universe. And the old man did not stand a chance.

“You insolent brat!” the General all but exploded, throwing all his composure to the wind, and beginning to resemble a cartoon villain, only missing the steam rising from his ears, “Do you even know who you’re talking to?”

“Given your attire and the stars on your lapel, I’d say a General. Heavily decorated as well. Afghanistan?”

The General blinked in disbelief at him, looking back and forth (more like down and forward) between Peter’s smiling face and the shiny medals pinned on his uniform. “… Yes,” he conceded evenly, voice devoid of all previous emotion and brows unwrinkled, so at odds with the exploding volcano from a mere breath before, “I’m General Wilkinson, for your information.”

But the calm moment was fleeting, for he shook his head violently, as if to rise from the stupor Peter had caused him, and immediately resumed his previous harsh tone of command: “Now make yourself useful and fetch me someone competent. These idiotic buffoons are useless!”

Peter winced at that, but pretended to be compliant: “Well, if I need to “fetch someone competent” then I might need more than context clues.  What seems to be the issue?”
“I’ll tell you the issue…!” the General began shouting once more, only to be abruptly stopped when Peter interrupted him and raised his hand to shut him up, leaving the old man sputtering and astounded.

“I was asking Dr Black, considering he is the Head of this Department and reports directly to Dr Stark himself. He does not have higher-ups, per se, and I can assure you, he is one of the most competent people in this building. But since you are asking for someone else…”

Dr Black looked more unbothered by the entire ordeal than the rest of his team did, but that could be easily explained by the fact that he was the same man who had once begged and pleaded and downright bothered Thor to study Mjolnir, because “I don’t give a flying fuck if you’re magic or a demigod or an alien, this thing doesn’t abide the laws of physics and I need to know why!”

In the end, he got his way, but was still unable to unearth all the hammer’s secrets.

What the Head scientist did look, was apologetic to a fault. “I’m sorry, I know you were not supposed to be in this morning and I didn’t want to disrupt your plans, but these circumstances were rather unforeseen. Annoying story short: the General here has a particular request that we are not in a position to grant and would not take no for an answer.”

“You bloody well can grant it I say!” the General intervened angrily, but Peter silenced him with one of his patented looks that were very effective on criminals despite the filtering of his mask.

It didn’t matter if criminals couldn’t see his eyes, the threatening aura was still there.

The General was truly helpless and unprepared against him.

“Let me guess…” he trailed off a bit, choosing a more theatrical approach and stalking towards the man, “does this have anything to do with the Suits or with the artillery that is made for the Avengers and is to be used by the Avengers and associates alone?”

It was a rhetorical question if Peter had ever asked one, but the world was his stage and he intended to use it to his best advantage.

“Well… yes!” came the stuttering reply, as if the man was unsure of how everything was panning out. He definitely expected a different outcome, sneaking up to the Labs to create chaos to get what he wanted. “We, as in the U.S. Military, believe that it is Stark’s duty to supply…”

Peter would have willingly let him go on in his rant, but he was on a bit of a time crunch, and therefore decided to cut the inevitable and useless monologue short with a simple hand motion: “S.I. does not produce weapons any longer and would definitely not supply. Besides, Dr Stark’s not duty-bound to anyone other than his work and his wife. He also only loves his bed and his mama, I’m sorry.”

And what if he threw a bit of cheek at the end? Everyone at the Tower was used, to some extent, to his sarcasm and there would be no way he would be sued or complained to HR about it.

Especially given the snickers he could hear from the scientists behind him.

“What? What does that have anything to do with this!” the General spluttered with indignation, clearly out of his element.

It wasn’t every day that one got to meet Sassy Peter, after all. At least he didn’t know him beforehand, otherwise the whiplash would’ve been insane.

And Pepper could attest to that.

“I like quoting stuff, it helps me understand just how out of touch people are with everything that happens around them,” he quipped, moving closer towards the man once more and dusting some imaginary lint off of his shoulder. “It was declared back in 2008 that S.I. would shift their work and products away from death and destruction, barring the projects designed specifically after each Avenger and that are not to be shared with anyone nor mass produced. Not even S.H.I.E.L.D. had the builds for the Suits, and they were more persistent than you could ever dream of being, in their requests. It’s a general rule, General, that S.I. does not and will not make weapons for anyone other than those affiliated with the Avengers Initiative. But you and yours didn’t seem to get that, do you?”

“You insolent…”

If he were Tony, he probably would have stuffed something inside the General’s mind to keep him quiet, or at least put his hand over his mouth. But he wasn’t Tony nor he ever wanted to be him, so he simply channelled his inner Loki and kept on talking unperturbed, as if the man was nothing but an aggravating ant.

“It’s the second time you call me that, it is quite tiresome to be reduced to an adjective and a noun. Not that you’re wrong, per se, but I am so much more than that! I…” a thought came crashing through his brain, zapping him as if made of lightning, and forced him to shut his mouth as his eyes widened.

He wanted to hit himself, how could have he been so tactless! Of course the General wasn’t taking him seriously: he had forgotten to introduce himself!

“Wait! Shoot, I’m sorry, I’m so used to everyone knowing me around the Tower that it completely slipped my mind! I’m so, so, so sorry. I’m Peter Parker, not entirely sure how nice it is to meet you, General. You have a lovely moustache, but the rest of your vibes are just… not it. Anyway, your request is denied, shouldn’t have been made in the first place. Heck, you shouldn’t have been here in the first place!”

The lovely crimson on the General’s face belonged inside a museum. He was just so bewildered and upset it was almost poetic. “This is ridiculous! How dare you!” he kept on screaming, even when Peter remained stone-faced. “Parker, you say? Bring me your father, I am done explaining our reasoning to a preschooler.”

“I’ll have you know that I am a high school junior, thank you very much,” he said, blinking slowly.

Oh, how he was going to savour the next interaction! “Regarding the father issue… Would you like me to dig him up from six feet under or try my hand with an Ouija board? There might be a bit of a difficulty in the reception on the other side, though, so I’m not super sure he’ll pick up the call.”

“Stop being insolent!”

“I am not being insolent, sir. Just impertinent. I am but a poor orphan. Emphasis on both the poor and the orphan part.”

Snickers and giggles surrounded them, someone even going as far as covering their laughter with a few coughs.

“Fine,” the Generals conceded through gritted teeth, unaware of his imminent doom, “Your uncle then.”

“Same predicament,” Peter claimed nonchalantly, as if those were not deeply personal tragedies, “Do you want a shovel to dig deeper yourself or can we move on from my plethora of dead relatives?”

“For Heaven’s sake! Since you’re here, then you must be some sort of relative of P.B. Parker, right? The scientist and Accord writer? Do you understand who I’m talking about?” Peter nodded almost dumbly at that, trying to understand the angle the General was aiming towards. Not that the man could care less about his machinations, he just seemed relieved of having made his point reach: “Bring him to me, at least I will talk with an intelligent adult instead of having to have discussions about matters of national security with a child.”

Peter couldn’t help but scoff at that: “None of this is a matter of national security, trust me. I quite literally found out the nuclear codes by accident, this is nothing compared to that. By the way, did I not introduce myself?” he asked around, to no one in particular.

But the scientists and workers, already used to his antics, caught his meaning, and began nodding like crazy, snickering the whole time.

“I did! Weird, you didn’t pick it up? Maybe you should get a check-up, this could be a symptom of something bigger. Perhaps you’ve grown too senile to remember during our too long already conversation. Possibilities are endless! I am Peter Benjamin Parker, alias the P.B. Parker you’ve just spoken about.”

The gleam in his eyes was wicked, as so was his smile, and the General looked fearful. “That’s impossible!” came the outraged reply, full of distrust and disbelief.
“Just highly improbable.”

“A child cannot have single-handedly shifted the entire way of the Accords and become the most important writer of the new version of the documents,” he contested once more, clinging to whatever sense of stability he had left.

And Peter felt for him, he truly did: it wasn’t every day that earth-shattering revelations were had and taken by heart easily. He would have been much more sympathetic if the General hadn’t been an ass to him and his colleagues. But, alas, he had to drive the point home.

“I wouldn’t say single-handedly,” he said, freeing innocence and naivety, to keep up pretences, “I had a really good lawyer to help me up. But, yeah, I suppose I did, considering that my ideas and words are written on those documents. Now that you know that, will you take me seriously or do I have to destroy you for the lesson to stick?”

The General visibly paled at that: “Destroy me?” he stuttered out, unable to properly form the words.

Peter could have easily been an excellent villain or Dark Lord, he reasoned, if only his moral compass wasn’t as solid as it was. He did love to wreck rude people and criminals alike. The adrenaline rush he got from seeing their faces as they realised his worth after underestimating him was exquisite.

He picked at his nails, nonchalantly, before starting his lecture with as little emotion as he could muster: “I have the President on speed dial and I’m sure he’ll be thrilled to know how you spoke to me. I am the favourite intern of both Tony Stark and Pepper Potts, who are both rather protective of me and not to be messed around. But enough about my connections. More about me, specifically: I’m being trained by the Black Widow herself, in all forms, and I have a few black belts up my sleeves as well as folders in my file cabinet. I am a high school junior who is currently taking MIT classes while publishing official scientific papers on various research topics as well as legal documentation in relation to the Accords and several Human Rights bills that are currently being discussed in the Houses. Deadpool himself owes me more than a few favours. As I said before, I have a really good lawyer, who I shadow from time to time. He’s the one who took Fisk down and he taught me everything I know, which is a lot.”

He paused a moment, wetting his lips before sharing what Tony calls his “feral grin” with the General. “Do you want me to continue or do you get the gist?”

The poor old man had no way to prepare himself for the train that had hit him and was reeling back so fast he might get a headache.

Oh, well. Those were the risks when crossing with one Peter Parker whenever he had no need to pull back his punches.

“I… Well…” the General stammered and stuttered through the words, trying to make sense of everything he had just been told. He eventually settled back, his military training undoubtedly kicking in to make him recognise the threat in Peter’s words and stance as something way above his paygrade, standing stoically impassible with weary eyes, “I see. I get it. I apologise for my earlier outburst. And for sneaking in. I should not have done that, nor demanded to speak with either Tony Stark or Miss Potts.”

“Game recognises game, or something like that,” Peter thought with amusement.

But that didn’t mean he had to stop toying with the man: “It’s Dr Stark and Goddess Pepper Potts, to you,” he exclaimed, enjoying the little yelp that came out of the General’s mouth.

He then softened himself, realising he had probably done enough damage to the man’s psyche. “And no, my word’s final. If Tony was to speak with you he’ll lose his temper and probably blow something up, which is a whole ordeal I don’t have the time to deal with, plus it will involve paperwork for sure and will lead to more breaking stuff and it’s a never ending cycle that serves nobody. Trust me, I’ve had to clean up after him one time too many and I would rather eat glass. At least it’s crunchy, you know? And Pep doesn’t deal with Avengers stuff, so she’ll just send you back to me anyway. Which, again, is a never ending cycle. I’m fond of the ouroboros, but not this much.”

The room dwelled in silence then, no one daring to speak as the General appeared in deep thought, a puzzling look in his eyes as he regarded Peter with newfound admiration and a good dose of respectful fear. The cogs definitely turning in his head were almost hearable, metaphorically speaking, and Peter was patient, prepared for every possible outcome.

Obviously he would have preferred if the General took the opportunity of a strategic retreat, or if he had never graced the door of floor 78, but he was used to things going differently as to what he wanted.

What he had not expected, though, was the General’s next question, straight to a point Peter had no idea existed: “Are you their son?”

Peter’s eyes widened at that, completely taken off guard.

Where the heck could have he even dreamt about that? It made no sense whatsoever! How could he…!?
“What?” It was now his turn to stutter, losing all the charm and charisma and poise he had a moment before, “Why do you ask? Why do all people ask! It makes no sense. It’s absurd!”

He tried to collect himself, he really did, but it was such an illogical question that he couldn’t even begin to try and explain the reasoning behind it. He took a few calming breaths, borrowing from a technique Ned had taught him, and squeezed his eyes shut, already feeling a headache forming behind his eyelids.

“Nat wanted to test my blood and even check my birth video, which was very traumatizing to watch,” he admitted eventually, trying not to think too much about that whole ordeal, “but I can firmly say I am not. As I said before, both my parents are dead and buried and neither Tony nor Pepper ever had a child. What makes you think I’m their secret son!?”

Every single person he had asked had been utterly useless, claiming that he shared some of Tony’s mannerisms, clearly possible due to the fact that they spent so much time together, or that he had Pepper’s kindness yet ruthlessness. But no one had given him a straightforward answer.

“It would be obscene otherwise, to have a child like you even manage this position, if not for nepotism.”
“What position?” Peter asked, a bit dumbly. He felt as if everything was underwater and he couldn’t reach whatever it was that all those adults were implying.

The General blinked slowly, mouth scrunched in and expression sour: “What do you mean “what position?”? You are, what, 17? And deal with issues people three times your age aren’t able to?”

Peter could only nod his affirmative, not understanding what his age had to do with anything. He had been working at S.I. since he was 14, after all, if anything he was already used to dealing with all sorts of issues.

“It’s clear they’re training you so you can inherit their entire empire!”

And with that, Peter’s entire mind frame shattered.

The only saving grace was the arrival of two security guards, right when they were truly needed, who sternly took General Wilkinson’s side and escorted him wordlessly to the elevators, all the while silence swirled around Peter. He could hear all the workers of the lab holding their breaths, as if waiting for a reaction out of him, but he still felt too underwater to even process the man’s words.

“Regardless, it has been very interesting and nice to meet you, Mr Parker,” he could hear faintly as the General was all but dragged away, “I look forward to seeing you at the Accords table!”

“I do not,” was all he could reply, before blinking up a few times to Dr Black and bidding his goodbye, slowly making his retreat as if in a trance.

It was only thanks to FRIDAY’s light guiding him and the soft voice of MJ buzzing in his head, telling him to “just fix the issue and get back here”, that he made his way back to the elevators, too lost in his own mind to process what had happened and to know where he was headed.

Chapter Text

Now, Peter had had his fair share of “outer-body” experiences. 

One did not hang out with Doctor Strange without getting yanked out of one’s own body and tossed into the mirror dimension for any minor inconvenience, after all. And he had lived with his normal anxiety and trauma long before getting the Spider Senses, so he wasn’t new to the whole ordeal of his skin buzzing and his teeth teething and his limbs being jell-o. Now he simply had a tingling sensation that warned him of danger and some heightened senses, which were pretty useful.

Hence why the walk back to the room where the rest of his team was waiting for him wasn’t exactly hard, even with his entire brain fried out of his body and his soul lost somewhere beyond bare consciousness. 

Besides, who needed to be in the right state of mind to navigate the maze of corridors and lifts in Stark Tower when he had FRIDAY aiding him? Not Peter, that was for sure. He had roamed the halls sleep-deprived, in a caffeine-induced frenzy or while bleeding somewhat profusely one time too many to care about direction inside the Tower.

If anything, FRIDAY’s guiding lights on the floor helped him greatly, not only to avoid crashing into imminent walls, but to try and ignore the words he had just heard from the old General’s mouth, still ringing in his mind like church bells at midday. 

It went without mentioning that ignoring was much harder than he had expected, but Peter was nothing if not persistent.

General Wilkinson had to be rambling, borderline of delirium. It must have been senile confusion that led him to that particular conclusion. He made no sense whatsoever, he was delusion personified. He had climbed some stairs and showed up unexpectedly demanding the Iron Legion as if it was some shiny toy army and he was a toddler throwing a tantrum, he was definitely out of his mind! 

And he probably was the same age as Steve as well, which meant that his delirium was probably generationally shared, given that Steve himself had expressed a similar confusion upon meeting him for the first time, outside of the mask.

And Steve had given Tony an earful about him being a vigilante, as if Tony himself had any control over the situation or as if Tony had known Peter before the bite and the birth of Spider-Man.

Unbelievable!

Probably a Silent Generation issue, Peter reasoned as he approached the door. 

The back of his mind was screaming at him, desperately trying to have him remember something vital. Something that he had lost in the sauce before making his journey downstairs. Something that had been out of his sight and mind the moment he had to deal with the old General. Something that seemed to be important enough to warrant a reminder, yet something that clearly wasn't necessary to be remembered, clearly overshadowed by the rest.

So Peter shrugged the thought away, desperately wanting to end the day and crawl back into his bed in his room in the Penthouse.

And after the day he had just had, he was sure Mr Harrington would let him crash there. 

If not, well, he would just spider-web himself to the nearest sturdy object and weep.

Which would warrant him to remain there regardless of approval or adult interference.

But he wasn't particularly willing to cross that bridge, especially considering all the steps involved to make the plan come to fruition, so he simply took a deep breath and pushed the door open, enjoying the silence that came from the inside.

A sweet lack of sound. Borderline melodious in its ironic way. 

It lasted approximately two glorious whole seconds. 

After which was followed by a cacophony of yells and shouts and yelps and general sounds of disbelief that would have hurt a normal pair of ears, let alone an enhanced one, causing Peter to clutch the sides of his head to try and dampen the noise. 

He could hear each decibel crunched and shrieked, altogether in the opposite of a symphony, which made it impossible to make out words. 

Intentions, on the other hand, were quite clear: there was incredulousness, a hint of rage, a lot of confusion and overall an unease that was palpable on Peter’s tongue, tasting like copper, bitter and harsh.

“Everybody shut up!” MJ yelled almost immediately, her voice thundering over the others, before Peter could make heads or tails of what had happened or who was screaming or about what exactly. Now that he didn't have to fight for his life to keep his hearing intact, it was easier to think and ponder such questions.

Too bad he was too confused to properly do anything but stare dumbfoundedly at his teammates.

The noise died down almost immediately at MJ’s command, leaving behind some visible mixed emotions on their faces.

Again, Peter drew a blank at the possible reasons for such drastic and dramatic reactions.

Could the test he had helped write have created such mayhem?

A hand on his shoulder managed to pull him out of his mind and into the present fully, and with Ned’s grounding presence by his side he was finally able to see the room in all its glory: all of his teammates were up on their feet, staring at him as if he was an alien of some sorts, sporting various degrees of incredulity; Alex was pressed against the wall, clutching what must have been the test papers as if his life depended on them, which, considering his other projects and jobs at the Tower, it did not; Steph was trying to reel the teens in, behaving like a lion tamer would and attempting to guide them back to the chairs, fortifying the already strong conviction in Peter’s mind that she deserved the motherload of raises; Mr Harrington was slumped on a chair, looking as if his entire life had flashed right in front of his eyes and he was questioning every single one of his choices, regretting most of them, if the haunted look on his face was anything to go by.

Overall, they made for a pretty unique Renaissance painting.

“Could someone explain what the heck is going on?” Peter asked broadly, leaving room for any of them to fill in the wide gaps in his mind. Yet he did so while staring at Steph expectedly, since she was the Designated and Trusted Adult™ all wrapped into a rather skilled and organized tour guide attire, and therefore must’ve had all the answers he was looking for.

Or, at the very least, most of them, plus the resourcefullness to find the others.

She was quite good at her job, after all.

Hence why he would propose a raise as soon as the tour was over.

But, rather unfortunately, just as she opened her mouth to start her speech, she was beaten at the explanation by an aggravating voice that Peter had grown quite tired of hearing. He craved the sweet relief a piece of adhesive taped to a particular mouth would bring. Or even the muffled sound of words coming out through the sticky mess of Spider-Man's webs. But he wasn't that lucky and his patience was packing its bags. 

And he had been told to have the patience of a saint, both by Loki and Matt. Which did account for something. Although they had probably two different methods to determine and evaluate it.

Regardless, no amount of sanity or sanctity could spare him. And he wasn't sure any court would hold him accountable for the list of actions that popped into his head.

“I’ll tell you, you pathetic and worthless freak!” Flash exploded, so red in the face he might have been easily confused for a tomato-skinned mutant. And Peter might have found it all highly amusing, especially considering the stellar day he had had, if he hadn’t had said stellar day weighing on him. The definition of the cherry on top of a very bad sundae.  

Although, if he was a mutant, then he might have become someone else’s problem instead of Peter’s, which would have been an incredible win in his books.

Perhaps not if Wade picked him up. But a win regardless. 

Especially if the removal was instant and quick and made sure Flash stayed quiet and stopped talking for once in his life.

But Parker Luck™ did not work that way.

Yet it worked overtime that day, apparently.

“First,” he began his tirade, counting things off for no apparent reason instead of giving a simple answer to Peter's question, “all the absurd shits you have pulled since we arrived here, the utter bullshit badge, the fake knowledge of things you literally don’t know and just pretend to, to burst up your nonexhistent social life. The clearly bought respect from scientists who have probably never seen you in their entire lives and recognise you from being a charity case alone. The pitiful show you most definitely paid two fucking Avengers to put on, with which money I don’t know or can’t even begin to think about considering you are poor as dirt and all the other options are fucking disgusting, almost as much as you are. All of that bullshit, I stomached and kept quiet, thinking that if people aren't smart enough to recognise such an absurd ploy to gather sympathy, it’s not my place to tell them. It's not my fault they’re idiots! I'm the only one intelligent enough to see your lies. But I tolerated it all, since it was clearly a pathetic and puny attempt at making yourself important, even if you’ll never be anything more than a poor orphan nobody cares about. But this?! This whole shit show is way out of line!”

Peter stopped functioning somewhere along the avalanche of words, completely dead in his tracks. His entire body froze in time and space. All the tiredness and heaviness of the day came crashing on him, all at once. His mouth couldn't catch up with his thoughts, especially since his mind was swarmed by the echoes of Flash’s words, scrambling the few functioning brain cells he had managed to retain during the hellish day he had lived. He couldn't think, not with the static noise making a comeback and offuscating his thoughts. 

He couldn't breathe. 

Ned’s hands returned on his shoulder with urgency, grounding him as his vision began to swirl once again, shouts bouncing off the walls but not making their way into his ears. He focused on the way the warmth spread to his arm and torso, choosing to ignore everything that was happening around them.

He was tired in a way he never felt even after swinging around all day and night. His breaths became an insurmountable taxing task. His entire head throbbed. His throat closed up. 

He stumbled back into the door, leaning against the frame and closing his eyes.

Peter desperately needed to reel his brain in, as soon as possible, just enough to deal with the mess the stupid field trip had caused. Then, he might crawl upstairs, burrow himself into some covers and pillows, and eat his weight in chocolate.

But, first, he needed to whip his brain into shape to get over the bullshit.

So, he kept his eyes closed and made a mental checklist of everything that needed to happen before he could flee the scene, trying to stop his heart back in from escaping his ribcage.

The first step, and not necessarily the most urgent one, yet the one that would require the most time to be completed: he needed new, updated and much stronger NDAs. He needed them to be impeccable, airtight and so binding breaking them would be equivalent to a generational curse.

A bunch of random high schoolers from Queens had heard a few highly secretive things, since Peter had blacked out while speaking with the General and couldn't really remember if he had divulged private information or not. And his teammates were not supposed to know about his involvement in the Tower and Business to begin with, which made things much more complicated. They especially didn’t need to hear the General's allegations, wrong as they may have been. 

As soon as they stepped out of the Tower, they all had to keep everything they had heard quiet and private.

Hence why he had to sic the Legal team onto them immediately after he dealt with the crisis at hand. Or while he dealt with the crisis at hand. Even before would have been appropriate.

The first sidestep, though, would have been to find a way to actually create a Neuralizer, from Men In Black, but that could wait until after the crisis aversion.

Crisis that would be running much smoother if security was to arrive, he reasoned, once his heartbeat returned at a normal-ish pace. Normal for him, at least.

 And that might just be the second necessary step to take, right after the NDAs were sorted: to summon someone to escort Flash Thompson out of Peter’s sight, definitely after the other teen had put his signature down on a document so binding he might combust into flames if he ever even thought about violating the terms and conditions. 

Or so that the special kind of hellfire known only to lawyers, and those unlucky enough to discover it, would rain upon him if he crossed the line.

Involving Matt would be too much, Peter thought while he managed to open his eyes, taking a look around the room to see the faces of his teammates in various stages of grief at Flash’s incessant rant. Yet, involving the entire Legal team would be just right up his alley for now. Involving Loki was also a possibility, considering how much mischief the trickster god liked to cause, especially to those that caused Peter headaches.

Or so he had claimed. 

But that seemed excessive as well, for completely different reasons than Matt’s.

Regardless, a possible third step, and probably one that was long overdue, was to allow Matt to finally file for that restraining order, which may or may not already have been printed out and was simply needing Peter’s signature and blessing to be processed. 

And, if by any miracle, after the complete disaster that had fallen into his lap in the form of a well-meaning learning opportunity, he still managed to have a bit of sway in the company by the end of their tour, he might find out how to blacklist one Flash Thompson from accessing every single Stark Associated Establishment. 

Perhaps it was too much, a reasonable part of his brain seemed to chime in, warning that he might be leaning a bit on Tony’s dramatic side and might take the wrong page out of his mentor’s book. Especially considering Peter dealt with bigger and badder evils on a weekly basis.

But that reasonable part was easily overshadowed by the complete lack of fucks he had left to give, too tired to properly care.

If Flash was so insistent on trying to ruin his sanity and day by being an asshole, then Peter was allowed to treat him as he would any other impertinent, incompetent, moronic idiot who stumbled into the Tower.

He mentally apologised to Alex, for it seemed he was about to pull a redo on the accident they had had on Floor 26, when an absolute incompetent jerk had managed to mess up three months of experiments with his sheer incompetence and had to be terminated on the spot.

“....You were way out of line, Mr Thompson! How dare you talk to your teammate like that, regardless of the circumstances,” Mr Harrington was saying once Peter returned fully to his body, switching into what Pepper had dubbed his “Boss Bitch” attitude. 

He was not less gentle and caring and kind, by any means. But he was much less tolerant, much colder and much less inclined to deal with others’ stupidity. 

Pepper had worked quite hard to have him understand the importance of a “Boss Bitch” attitude and he was not about to let her down by passing an opportunity to tune in his abilities.

“Thank you, Mr Harrington,” he said, causing all the eyes in the room to turn back on him, uncaring of how cold his face appeared to be or how sickeningly venomous his voice was. That was what the mask covered on the nights were criminals and villains tried too hard to push his buttons, so he didn’t need the review of his peers to tell him how deadly it could be. “But I believe I am more than equipped to deal with the situation now.”

“I do not think…” the teacher tried to chime in, voice high and effectively terrified, but a simple raised hand caused him to stop dead on his tracks as Peter zeroed in on Flash’s red face, full of outrage and self-righteousness.

The other teen visibly gulped at the attention.

“Good,” Peter couldn't help but think, weirdly satisfied by the whole ordeal.

Perhaps he might regret his actions in the morning, but, as the last bits of adrenalin coursed through his body, he truly didn’t care at all about the consequences.

He only remained at Midtown for Ned and MJ, after all, and could have used the extra free time, if push came to shove.

“FRIDAY,” he called out, immediately acknowledged by the AI that ran through each floor and vein of the Tower, and comforted by the thought that he still had her in his corner, “would you mind shooting a message at Legal to let them know we are going to need some new NDAs, please? And to make them Obediah-esque level tight?”

As he talked, he simply kept on staring patiently right into Flash’s eyes, watching as colour slowly drained from his face and as his ego deflated. His heart also spiked up as soon as Peter started talking, even if none of his words were directed at him.

Nor would be, until someone showed up with the updated documentation.

After which, Peter was still unsure of how to proceed.

But, steps were there for a reason!

“Also, FRIDAY, if you could arrange for someone of Happy’s to come up with Legal, that would be grand!”

The whole team gasped at that, probably aware of who Happy was and what he entailed. He had been a rather public figure even before getting poached by Tony to work for him, after all.

Yet, Peter was still not ready to confront them, preferring to let them stew just a bit longer. After all, he was feeling a bit petty, so he might as well explore those feelings while he had an abundance of them.

So, instead of acknowledging his teammates, he just turned towards Steph once more, aware that there would be no interruptions this time around and that she would be able to explain the chaos he had arrived in.

His cold demeanor had been approved by all the scary people he knew, so he was confident in its effectiveness.

And he knew a lot of scary people.

Indeed, he was right: “I believe that seeing you on the screen interact with General Wilkinson was an… experience, for your classmates, Mr Parker, hence why they were behaving as untrained hyenas as soon as you walked through the door.”

“It was not an experience!” Flash tried to shriek once more, but a cutting gaze from Peter finally put him in his place.

“I was not talking to you, nor do I care to listen to your voice,” he simply said, weirdly enjoying the way his teammate shut his mouth immediately. 

Perhaps Matt had been right and he had kept his feral part locked in a bit too tightly, preferring his friendly and unassuming character. 

He kept on ignoring the bothersome teenager, turning back to Steph: “Well, I apologize for my peer’s behaviours. I assure you they are usually not this bothersome. Most of them, anyway. I do believe that this entire ordeal might be somewhat fruitful, if I manage to survive the day.”

The shark smile that appeared on Steph’s face was borderline predatory at that, but she kept quiet and simply nodded once, already having understood everything.

A very well-deserved raise, indeed!

“Well then, Alex!” he exclaimed, motioning for the intern to approach. And approach he did, although shaking like a leaf in the fall wind.

Perhaps he too deserved a raise for dealing with this whole mess, Peter reasoned, and for dealing with Peter himself, but there wasn't much he was able to do at the moment, so he shelved the thought away for later. Besides, interns had a standardized salary and to give him a raise out of the blue would involve too much paperwork. And he didn’t even know if Alex wanted to remain at SI after his internship was completed.

So, yeah. That ordeal could wait until the morning.

What couldn’t really wait, though, was the stack of papers still wedged in between the fellow intern’s arms, rustling against the material of his clothes: “Why don’t you go downstairs so we can get these processed out in the meantime?”

A look of gratitude appeared on Alex’s face, definitely grateful to be removed from the mess the tour had turned into. 

Peter was a smidge bit jealous at the way he practically skipped town, rushing out of the door faster than Quicksilver would have. 

But he had a job to see through. 

“Alright, let’s address the elephant in the room!” he exclaimed, clapping his hands once to gather everyone’s attention. Not that it had strayed from him since the moment he had arrived, but the action was warranted to the dramatic scheme he had cooked. 

“Yes, I am an intern here,” he began, counting off each point with his fingers, a probably slightly unhinged smirk plastered on his face, “Yes, I do have responsibilities that do seem out of the ordinary, but I can assure you they are not, as I simply have earned my place and respect through hard work. Yes, I am a published researcher and yes, Mr Harrington, you have actually used me in class as an example without knowing. And almost accused me of plagiarism, but I can easily understand that and do not hold a grudge for it. No, nothing that has been discovered or divulged here can be repeated outside of this room. Yes, you are going to have to sign newly improved NDAs, so binding they will have no space of motion if you break them. No, most of you being minors is not going to affect the bindingness of the contracts. SI has the second greatest legal team in the world, so I would wage that they know how to deal with this situation efficiently. The first team would never lower themselves to work for such a place, but they are on my retainer, for personal quarrels. Point is: do be careful not to breach our NDAs. Which should be here at any moment!”

It was almost as if the entire Tower was working in his favour, to repay him for the grief he had to go through with the field trip, for as soon as he voiced his impatience, the elevators arrived at their floors and dinged, with the sound of doors sliding open reverberating through the corridors.

“Any last minute questions, before we wrap this up?” he asked, staring down every single member of the AcaDec team, teacher included, daring them to doubt him.

His gaze then settled on an incredibly pale Flash Thompson, miraculously quiet for once.

Peter raised one of his eyebrows at him, taking a page out of his mentor's book and waiting for a minuscule sound to escape the other teen, if only to let loose the cold monster that was beating behind his ribcage. But the other boy seemed to have learnt his lesson, finally.

Some, or most, in this case, of the people that cared about Peter might have said something along the lines of “Too little, too late,” and completely obliterated the teen with absolutely no mercy. Yet Peter truly did not care any longer for the situation.

He had always preferred to avoid the confrontation, when it was possible. And he had rather kept the energy he would have otherwise wasted on his classmate, in case of an emergency. They lived in New York, after all, and who better than Peter to know just how often emergencies happened.

Now, he just wanted for the paperwork to be dealt with and to crawl into his bed and be done with the world for at least a little while.

And, looking at a silent Flash Thompson, scared into silence, he realized that allowing the other teen to prattle on about lies and fake internships and whatnot, had been counterproductive. Instead of a simple conversation, or the involvement of a responsible adult, Peter had chosen to ignore the situation and involuntarily let it fester, into the giant explosion that had happened at their field trip.

“Well, that was a mistake,” he thought, drawing closer to the other boy while maintaining direct eye contact. 

Flash gulped loudly and began to walk back, trying to put some distance between them, but Peter was relentless in his path and didn't stop marching until he had cornered the boy against a desk, torn between fear and rage.

“I have quite a number of things to say to you, Flash,” he said casually, his hands in the back pockets of his jeans and a look that promised not a single care in the world plastered on his face. “I could start talking about all the not-so-nice comments you have made during the years about my family, my social status, my own person. l could mention all the insults you have thrown my way, all the times you actively sabotaged me for your own gain. Heck, I could comment on the events of the day! But I don't think I want to waste my breath.”

Behind him, the door opened and the rest of the room gasped. Peter saw Flash's eyes move to the newcomer, desperation written on his face, but he didn't have the heart to turn around and acknowledge whoever had just arrived. He was laser focused on his train of thought and he had a final blow to deliver.

“You…” Flash tried to speak, but Peter shut him up with a pointed look.

“This isn't your moment to speak. In fact, I think you have said more than enough. You have probably wasted more oxygen with your idiocy and insults than the Amazon rainforest produces in a year. You should consider carrying around a small potted plant, if anything to reduce your carbon impact. You have been rude, cruel, insufferable and self-centered since the moment I met you. But that attitude of yours stops now. Remember how I mentioned the best legal team being on my retainer? I was not kidding. I'm pretty sure you finally realized how little I care for lies, after all. Anyway. Matt Murdock has had the paper drawn for proper legal action against all your abuse for a while now. Yes, the same Matt Mundock who put Fisk away and defended the Punisher. He was merely waiting for my signature to start the official process. He will be ecstatic, now! And, trust me, he is feral when he's ecstatic. It's futile to say that you are to maintain a certain distance from me, have to avoid being in my space and all that jazz. For your own sake, of course. You might have money and you might claim to have talent, but I don't think you would survive going to juvie because you breached a restriction order. And, trust me, you will suffer enough regardless, through the proper legal channels, of course. Oh, and I wouldn't really hold my breath waiting for a position in the Summer Internship Program, or any SI-related opportunity in the future. You may as well have burnt down any possible bridge in the field, with the lack of respect and common sense you show your peers.”

The blood had completely left Flash's face as his words sank in deep, under his skin. The other boy had finally realized just how savage Peter could be when he wished to be. “That's all,” he simply finished, channeling his hidden Devil Wears Prada and grinning up, victorious and vicious.

Peter then turned around, completely dismissing any futile attempts of Flash to save himself and letting him splutter like a fish out of water, and looked straight into Mr Harrington's soul, or he would have if he had Wanda's powers.

The poor teacher did not really deserve his anger, not truly. Besides, the field trip had shed a lot of light on their situation and had done more than enough damage to his psyche to not warrant any revenge on Peter's part.

And, if he was honest, he was way past caring and just wished to disappear upstairs and eat his body weight in chocolate.

"Mr H, I'm going to sort the new NDAs and then dip,” he said to the man, whose heart did skip a beat the moment he switched his attention from Flash towards him. Maybe the MedBay would've had a cardiologist on call to check him up, if they had wrapped the field trip up sooner and smoother. But, as it was, they were all pretty behind schedule.

Mr Harrington blinked owlishly at him, trying to compute his words, but utterly failing: “You cannot leave. You have to come back to school with us!” he exclaimed desperatedly, almost as if his entire life depended on it.

“l cannot even begin to describe how little I want to get on that bus,” Peter said, dispassionately, “and school hours are completed. I do not “have to” anything.”

“But… Your guardian…!” the teacher spluttered a moment, before getting mercifully interrupted by a pretty angelic voice, coming to Peter's rescue.

“I can resolve the ordeal for you,” the majestic Pepper Potts said from the entrance to the room, followed by one of her assistants that was clutching an enormous stack of paper and by Happy himself. “Mr Harrington, is it?” she inquired, causing said man to nod silently, “Wonderful, a pleasure to make your acquaintance. Peter spoke nicely of you, which is why I believe we can find a solution to this issue smoothly.”

“We can?” Mr H asked in complete disbelief, while the rest of the class remained in various stages of shock and chaos.

All besides MJ, who seemed to be enjoying the situation far too much for Peter's liking, and Ned, who was thankfully past his hero-worshipping days, even though Pepper was always awe-inspiring. And Flash, whose heart kept beating but whose brain had completely closed off due to the fear.

Pepper smiled kindly at the teacher, taking pity on him and going straight to the point: “I happen to be one of Peter's emergency contacts and May Parker registered me as an official guardian at the school. I'm positive I can grant him the permission to skip the bus ride back. And if my word isn't enough, I can phone May, if you would be more comfortable with that.”

The room gasped once more and Mr H looked as if he might faint at any moment.

Whether from relief or not, Peter wasn't able to discern.

“Then I think he can,” the teacher said a bit wetly, almost as if every single fiber in his body craved the sweet relief of oblivion.

Which Peter could relate to. A lot.

“Wonderful!” Pepper exclaimed with her patented smile on her lips, the one she always used when she had not-so-nice things to say but chose silence to avoid further problems. “Peter, sweetheart. Why don't you head upstairs then? I will wrap this up for you.”

He would have hugged her tightly if there hadn't been so many eyes trained directly at them. And if the General hadn't thrown around his idiotic theory. And if his classmates and teacher hadn't heard said theory.

Instead, he simply nodded and voiced his gratitude, bidding goodbye to his friends before rushing out of the door as fast as he could.

Pep had it all handled and he would get a recap of everything from MJ anyway. He had no reason to stay, not when FRIDAY had already opened the elevator doors for him.

He just wished Abe had the grace to allow him to properly disappear before asking Pepper if Peter was her son.

And he wished he had been far out of his enhanced hearing range before Pepper answered him that she couldn't “neither confirm nor deny that statement, given personal involvement from all parties involved.” 

Which wouldn't have been a terrible answer, if she hadn't followed it with: “What I can admit is that he is not ours biologically.”

“Oh, shit!” he thought as the elevator doors closed on his shocked face as sounds erupted once more from the conference room. But he knew Pep had it handled.

Besides, that would've been a problem for Future Peter.

Chapter Text

If anyone had told previous-day-Peter that his most chaotic, incomprehensible, out of pocket, and downright absolutely insane day (to date, because nothing was sacred anymore in his timeline apparently, and he didn’t want to jinx it) was going to be his field trip to Stark Industries, he would have probably stared them down until they evaporated out of sheer annoyance and disbelief, because nothing could have replaced his field trip to Oscorp. 

Of that he was more than certain, considering everything that had happened in Norman’s domain was usually doomed.

As it turned out, something could and would. Namely, whatever the heck had happened while his teammates roamed supervised the halls of Stark Tower.

He truly couldn't wait for the hellish day to be over. Or rewritten entirely.

Either way, just out of sight and mind would've been enough.

He wanted to stop blaming all his misfortunes and crazy events on his Parker Luck™, he truly wanted to, but the chaotic entity that seemed to be controlling his life as if he were a D&D character who always rolled a Nat 1, refused to let the craziness end.

Aunt May had told him once, when his mishaps had become unbearable, to just “roll with the flow” and to “see where the current led him” and all other possible combinations instead of just singing Let It Go to him. He had learnt to follow her suggestion and, indeed, let everything go, since he had no control whatsoever over the chaos that happened around him.

Even Loki had been puzzled by it all. And he was the God of Mischief, so that spelt something completely unbelievable in itself.

May would undoubtedly give him the same input on the proper way of living once she arrived at the Tower, ready to comfort him after the horrible day he had lived.

He only had to hold on tight until she came. And then, maybe, he’d be ready to face reality.

For the moment, though, he was glad to be holed up in the penthouse, ready to spend the remaining part of the afternoon, and of his life probably, mopping around, isolating himself from the rest of the world for as long as he could.

He had started by taking the longest shower in his life, trying to scrub his entire brain from the memory of the tour. Not even after dealing with the Sandman had he had to scrub that hard. 

And he had found sand in his hair for three days straight.

He had then begun to eat his bodyweight in Hunka-Hunka Burnin’ Fudge, glad that his enhanced metabolism allowed him to do so.

And then, as a final treat, around the middle of the second tub, he gracelessly plopped down on the couch and burrowed himself in ten different pillows and blankets, wanting to fuse in with the upholstery, and asked FRIDAY to queue in She-Ra and The Princesses of Power, just so he could avoid thinking and replaying his teammates’ shocked faces over and over again.

So much for a tranquil and quiet day in the Tower.

A weird and neurotic energy still coursed in his veins, urging him to be productive and climb walls and swing around, but he was too tired to even consider opening a window, let alone Spider-Manning. 

He had been drained completely. Not even villains were able to reduce him into that much of a mess. 

Even when he was injured, he still tried to shorten his bed rest. But now, he couldn't even think about getting up and doing something.

Hence, the metamorphosis into a couch cushion.

Which would have progressed far into the night, if Pepper hadn’t shown up at the end of the third episode, seemingly as drained as he was.

She, unlike him, sat gracefully on the couch, before morphing into a boneless person and stealing a blanket out of Peter’s fort.

“FRIDAY, be a dear and ask Tony to come here, once he’s done with his tinkering,” she asked after a moment, eyes closed as she massaged her temples, “I cannot be bothered to get up again for the next half hour, at the very least.”

She then tossed her shoes to the side unceremoniously and turned to Peter, a tired expression on her face and a pointed look in her eyes.

He just used his webs to grab a spoon, thankful for the open concept kitchen and living room, and passed her a tub of ice-cream. 

“You are my favourite person in this entire world,” she exclaimed, happily digging in.

They remained in compassionate silence for the entirety of the fourth episode, letting Adora and her friends quest peacefully as they ate and watched. 

Then, before he could let another episode play automatically, Pepper paused the screen. And silence engulfed them in a thick veil.

Peter feared a bit of the worst at the action, ready to be scolded and reprimanded and punished for the weird turn the day had taken. But the blow never came.

Instead, Pepper just sighed, deeply and tiredly: “I have to tell you, Peter, that teacher of yours is a real piece of work. Such a stickler for propriety!”

“Tell me something I don’t know!” he exclaimed, sharing her sentiment, envisioning in his mind the state of chaos that he must’ve left with his swift retreat. Then, feeling a bit guilty about how he had left things, he asked: “What happened?”

The last words he had heard as the elevator doors closed in front of his shocked face still rang in his ears, but he had chosen to ignore them completely. 

Now, though, he had to face the music. Or, rather, he would have to know what had gone down and how, in order to be able to survive come Monday morning.

It was such a pity Aunt May and Tony both wanted him to finish high school. And, while he didn’t want to leave MJ and Ned there alone to the vultures, especially after the whole Tower debacle, he didn't really care whether he returned or not.

Although, he would have felt a bit of sadness at the thought of leaving, if he was honest with himself. And May was right in saying that he needed the structure and familiarity of Midtown, even if it wasn’t the easiest environment.

No, leaving would have been a bad decision all around. Especially now that Flash had been, at the very least, put into his place. 

“Well…” Pepper started, drawing her legs closer to her body and turning around to face him, her expression unreadable, “Nothing I couldn’t handle, if that’s what worrying you.”

Peter pointed his spoon at her accusatorially, aware that he was dipping into his theatrical side, fueled by Tony's, and leaning fully into it: “You would have been able to face the Green Goblin and win, Pep, if you truly wanted to. I’m pretty sure a bunch of kids and a fear-stricken teacher would be nothing indeed.”

“Stop it! I’m not invincible and you know it,” was her reply, although her eyes did sparkle conspiratorially.

Neither of them could remain serious at that, with both dissolving into slightly hysterical laughter.

“I just think you are using 1% of your powers. Just like Shaggy.”

“I will pretend to understand that reference at a later date,” she fired back without missing a beat, wiping a tiny tear from the corner of her eye without smudging her mascara. 

“To answer your question,” she then continued, after having taken another spoonful of ice-cream, before launching into a quick yet thorough explanation of the events: “Your classmates have agreed on the sworn secrecy and on the addendums in the NDAs and I had to do only a tiny bit of Public Relations, answering a few highly covered questions that we wouldn’t mind leaking to the press. This way, they feel important enough to say what we want, and are encouraged to maintain your secrets. Obviously, I hope they will not exploit you, but I’m certain you will be able to deal with them once you’re back in class. They seemed bright enough not to misuse the situation. And, to sweeten the deal, they have been shipped back home with a neatly packaged goodie bag each, Eugene Thompson included. Although his send- off had an official ban from SI and related premises added. I do not think he will bother you any longer, if he knows what is good for his future. But, to ensure it, I then asked your teacher to set up a meeting next week with your principal and Thompson’s family, in order to put an end to the cruelties he has been spewing against you. And I will personally review all security footage from your school cameras, just for my sake of mind. But that will come at a later date, probably with Murdock and Nelson. Oh, and your friends asked me to tell you that they will see you tomorrow, whether you like it or not apparently.”

Peter was, once again, speechless and stunned at Pepper’s efficiency.

“That…” he stammered, unable to catch a single train of thought. In the end, he simply settled for an easy: “Wow,” which did encompass every single one of his emotions.

Pepper smiled kindly upon him: “Wow, indeed.”

They remained in silence a moment, munching on the slowly melting ice-cream, before Pepper mentioned one of the elephants that weighed in the air around them.

“I wondered, as I wrapped things up downstairs, why you never told anyone of us the true extent of the bullying you were facing,” she said, rather sadly as she passed a hand over his forehead and messed up his hair further than it already was, “but I am going to assume it’s because you are as self-sacrificing as all the heroes that have been and are mentoring you. And, since they are all adults who should try to teach you better, I will have a very strong discussion with all of them.”

Peter grimaced at that, remembering another “strong discussion” she had had with the resident heroes of the Tower: “Is there going to be a repeat of the stabbing incident?”

“No,” she reassured him, patting his arm for good measure, before breaking into a Cheshire grin, “It’s going to be something along the lines of the whole “sleeping is mandatory” debacle.”

Peter shuddered at the thought and chose to ignore the shiver that crept down his spine as his brain replayed automatically the scene of Pepper towering over him, Tony, and Bruce, all huddled in front of a 3d printer they had decided to “improve”.

He would not want to be in their shoes with this new round of discussions.

“But,” she added after a moment, seemingly lost in her own thoughts with a sad smile on her lips, “Although I hate the fact that you had to live this situation all alone, I will say that I am glad you stood up for yourself. And that I was very proud of you today, as I always am. And undoubtedly always will be.”

A lump lodged itself in Peter’s throat. He was only able to swallow down the tears that were threatening to spill as emotions took control of him, and croak out a little: “Pep…”, before he was choked by his own thoughts.

Immediately her arms were around him, comforting like they had done so many times before.

He couldn’t really recall when he started seeking her out, airing his issues and complaints to her in more than a mentorial way. It had happened gradually, first with the aspects of work he had been thrust on and then evolving into everything, no matter how little or big. 

Hers was a different comfort than Aunt May’s, even different from the memories he had of his mother’s. Yet, it was no less powerful and meaningful.

“Ask,” she whispered, petting his hair as tears started to slip down his face, “You must have been still within earshot, were you not?”

He nodded, helplessly trying to regain his composure and wiping at his face with his sleeve. He watched her carefully, seeing moisture in her own expression, one of a mixture of happiness and fear and care.

“What did you mean? When you said “not ours biologically”?”

“What would you like me to have meant?”

“Don’t psychoanalize me!” he shrieked, a bit scandalised. 

Though, he reasoned, the turntable was a good way to get the conversation going. Rationally, it was one of the best methods to approach a subject, when unsure of the path ahead. One he would have chosen, if the roles had been reversed.

Yet, just because he understood the thought process behind her own burning question, it didn’t mean he had to like it.

Pepper didn’t seem to mind his reaction: “I’m not trying to, sweetheart,” she said, her own voice full of emotions he didn’t want to decipher at the moment, only choosing to focus on the sincerity in her tone, “But it’s not an easy topic and I don’t know how to approach it. Not without screwing everything up. We’re not talking about a budgeting plan or a report, so we can’t see data and perceive the results in any way or another. Here we’re talking about feelings and your, our, future. Hence, what would you like me to have meant?”

“I…” he started, unable to continue.

He had never dared dreaming this far, not even in his wildest fantasies. 

He was a nobody, a poor orphan with no talent and no prospect.

And yet…

“Let me be perfectly clear,” Pepper said solemnly, looking him dead in the eye and emphasizing each word, “I have grown to appreciate and care for you like a son, not because of what you can do, but due to how kind and amazing you are. And Tony feels absolutely the same. We love you with all our hearts and have tried to incorporate you into almost every aspect of your life, whilst sparing you from the press as best as we could. And, most importantly I believe, we will never try to replace your parents, nor Aunt May and your Uncle Ben. They have raised you into the wonderful young man you are and I am blessed to have been able to have you in my heart and life.”

“Pep…” he tried to speak again, but failed, unable to regain his calm and to stop the tears from escaping his eyes.

She continued talking, her own tears streaking her face and smudging her make-up: “And nothing will change, if you wished to be ours as well as theirs. You will still be your wonderful self, the great inventor and scientist and researcher. You will continue to live your life as you do, with your extracurriculars unbothered. Lord already knows I am already as terrified as I’ll ever be when I see Spider-Man on the news, and that will never change, because I care too much not to. But I care too much about you to try and stop you from doing something you love. And honestly I think that is the most parental feeling I could ever experience. At the end of the day, though, you would still be you whether you chose to be mine or not. You would still shadow me at meetings and you would raise valid points and act as a liaison when I’m not around or when you’re more suited than I to deal with issues and situations. You would still be Peter Benjamin Parker, the kid whom I cherish so much. Nothing would ever change that.”

Somewhere along her words, he had simply tossed his arms around her, allowing himself to be coddled and hugged through the emotions and tears. He could feel her own tears on his shoulder, could hear her heart beat almost out of her chest, as if it was trying to convey her message even stronger.

And, alongside of it all, all his senses pointed to her absolute honesty.

Nothing would change.

But everything had slowly changed, bit by bit as they all grew closer to each other.

Now, he could not think of a world in which he didn’t allow Pepper to stroke his hair comfortingly. He couldn’t think of a world in which Tony didn’t horrify him with dad jokes.

He couldn’t phantom a world in which those two didn't act as his parents, much more than just mentors.

He told her as such, through the wet sounds of tears closing his throat up, earning an equally wet laughter in return.

Peter had lost track of time in her embrace, just basking in her embrace and presence.

Once they had both calmed down, and once Pepper had wiped away his tears tenderly with a piece of her blanket, only then did he dare to ask the question that had rewired his brain and had caused all hell to break loose.

“Was he right, the General, about me being your heir?”

Pepper looked a bit sheepish at that, fixing a loose strand of hair behind her ear: “To be quite honest, I thought you knew already.”

At his immediate gobsmacked expression and undignified yelp, she laughed goodheartedly.

“I thought you were being coy and demure! It’s not like me or Tony were trying to conceal our mentorship. Or how proud we are of you. I bring you with me everywhere I can and I had you interact with all aspects of my job. I have introduced you to several people as “my saviour”!”

“I thought you were joking about spreadsheets,” he fired back, feeling his face begin to heat up but unable to refrain from smiling.

“A lot of people can use Excel. There is no one like Peter Parker, though. Besides, it was everyone’s favourite running gag for a while, I’m sure you’ve noticed it. Natasha was shameless!”

“Is that why she asked for my birth video!?” he yelled, covering himself with one of the blankets, as if the action could erase what he had been forced to watch by the superspy.

He was going to make her pay dearly for that, one day.

Eventually.

Tony, obviously, chose that precise moment to strut in, in all his dramatic glory: “For a genius, you’re pretty dumb, Underoos.”

“Like you’re the one to talk, Tony!” Pepper came to Peter’s aid, defending him whilst hugging him still, as Tony opened the fridge door to retrieve his own container of Stark Raving Hazelnuts. “You believed firmly that Clint’s kids were spies in training.”

“I will, one day, be able to prove that they are, indeed, spies in training,” he replied, as a matter of fact, before plopping down onto the couch next to Peter and stealing a blanket from over him.

Unfortunately for him, Peter had decided to stick to that specific blanket, just to live up to the “menace” moniker the Daily Bugle had bestowed upon him. 

He particularly enjoyed the flabbergasted look on his mentor’s face.

Peter couldn’t tell when he started to assimilate the word “mentor” to “father”, but the emotions behind it were the very same, even if completely different than what he had once used.

“Whatever you say,” Pepper exclaimed, moving her limbs around so that she and Peter now shared several blankets, while Tony remained without. “Peter and I were having a heartfelt moment, if you don’t mind.”

“I do mind!” the inventor said, spoon still in his mouth, “I want to have a heartfelt moment with you two as well!”

“Nobody is stopping you,” Peter piped in, willingly sharing his pillows and blanket with the man, in an act of acceptance.

Tony ruffled his hair, for good measure, and wrapped his arm around them both, even if the angle ended up being a bit odd.

“You’re our little shit, you know that? But Pep is completely right, as always. We love you and we would love nothing more than to call you ours.”

Truly, Peter had only one more question, after everything had passed: “Would I have to change my name or behave differently?”

“You can do whatever you like,” Tony answered, his own voice thick with emotion, “with the exception of everything I wouldn’t do. I don’t think “playboy” would suit your style, but you’ve got the genius part and everything else will come with time. And try not to do anything that would cause me a heart attack. If I could wrap you in bubble wrap, I could. But May said we can't and she's the expert in you, so I'll follow her lead and guilt-trip you into trying to avoid danger. I know that’s a tall ask, but I said try. So, no more getting stabbed and such. But that’s whether or not you wish to make anything official, since we have both, privately, thought of you as our son. And I don’t want you to get hurt, ever. Not because you are a genius, or Spider-Man, or whatever. But because I love you and we want you to be part of our family. You already are.” 

Along his words, Peter had burrowed his face into his shoulder, feeling anchored by his arm. He could hear the steady beat of his arms, smell the faint hint of motor oil that always clung to his hair and skin.

He had been associating him with family for so long, he couldn't deny it any longer.

Pepper then sealed the deal for him, even if said deal had been signed, sealed, and delivered gradually over time. “At this point, the papers would be just a bureaucratic formality.”

And Peter had discovered he had an affinity for bureaucratic formalities!

So, who was he to deny himself the small pleasures in life, like filing proper documentation and gaining a family in the process?

They remained there, on the couch, with beyond melted ice-cream tubs on the coffee table, hugging and crying tears of joy for longer than any of them would care to mention.

None of them had anywhere else to better be, after all.

As it turned out, that had indeed been a much wilder day than whatever had happened with the spider set loose at Oscorp.

Yet Peter wouldn’t really change his Parker Luck™ for anything in the world, no matter how whack it ended up being.

THE END