Chapter Text
The night Peter Parker died, the world didn’t just lose a boy, it lost its very soul. His final, shuddering breath echoed through the universe like a cruel whisper of fate, and in that instant, something fundamental unraveled. The light in his eyes once so full of warmth, of hope, winked out, and with it, went the fragile balance that held the world together.
The streets, once alive with the hum of city life, were swallowed by an eerie stillness. Shadows stretched long and heavy, curling around buildings like grief itself had taken form. The stars above, once distant beacons of possibility, seemed to dim, mourning the loss of the boy who had burned brighter than any of them.
Peter’s death wasn’t just a tragedy; it was a wound carved into the timeline, a scar history would never let fade. He wasn’t just another fallen hero, another name on a memorial. He was theirs, the heart of the Avengers, the son of the world's most powerful rulers, the beacon that stabilized their ruthlessness. And without him, mercy died alongside with him.
Peter wasn’t their son by blood. No strands of DNA bound him to them, no genetic ties linked their fates. But none of that mattered, they didn’t need blood to prove that Peter was theirs, and no one dare to question them.
They found him on a night as merciless as the world that had abandoned him, a small, trembling shadow curled up against the biting cold. His clothes were little more than scraps, thin fabric barely clinging to his frail frame, his skin marred with dirt and bruises that told a story no child should ever have to live. A deep purple bloom spread beneath one eye, stark against his tear-streaked face. He didn’t cry out when they approached, didn’t flinch, just stared up at them with hollow, haunted eyes that had already seen too much.
They had fought wars, seen entire civilizations crumble, stood against gods and monsters. But this, this tiny, broken thing shivering in the dark, so innocent, was the most devastating sight of all. They couldn’t walk away. They wouldn’t.
So they took him in. They wrapped him in warmth, bathed away the dirt and the past, dressed him in clothes that actually fit, clothes that were as soft as the child skin. They fed him, coaxing him to eat, to trust, to believe that maybe he was safe now. And when night fell, when they tucked him into a warm bed for the first time in who knew how long, his small frame curled beneath the covers, something inside them shifted, something inside them broke .
It wasn’t just a child they had rescued. He was theirs now. In every way that mattered, and that changed, so much that it was hard to believe.
From the moment they took him in, Peter became the center of their universe, their unspoken agreement, their shared purpose, the one thing they all protected with an almost terrifying devotion, the one thing that they all agreed on. Peter had them all wrapped around their finger and he didn’t even knew it.
The world could crumble, cities could fall, and they wouldn’t bat an eye, so long as Peter was safe. He was untouchable, not just because of who his family was, but because he had become something greater than all of them.
He was their innocence, the sliver of light in their bloodstained lives, the proof that they could be more than warriors, more than killers. He was their redemption, a reason to believe that there was still something good in a world that had only ever taken from them. No one would dare harm him, not out of fear, but because the very thought was unfathomable. To hurt Peter was to defile the only pure thing they had left.
They loved him in a way they had never truly understood before. The Avengers, hardened, battle-worn legends, men and women who had seen the worst the universe had to offer, became something else entirely when it came to him. They were softer, gentler. They doted on him, protected him, taught him to be kind, even as the world had long since stripped kindness from them.
Peter was their boy. Their greatest weakness. Their only salvation.
They wanted Peter to be everything they weren’t, to be good, to be better. And he was. He exceeded every hope, every impossible dream they dared to have for him. His heart was too big for his small frame, his kindness boundless, spilling over into everything he did. He was living proof that despite their sins, despite the blood on their hands, something pure could still exist in their world.
But it was that very goodness, that relentless need to help, to heal, that would one day lead him to his tragic end.
Peter couldn’t ignore suffering, couldn’t turn away from someone in need. It was as natural to him as breathing. He’d stop in the middle of a downpour to help a lost child find their way home, carry heavy bags for strangers as if it were second nature, hand over his lunch money to a homeless man with a bright, easy smile and not a single hesitation. He saw the world not as it was, but as it could be, as it should be.
And that was why they had failed him.
Because in the end, the world did what it always did to people like Peter. It took and took until there was nothing left.
His parents worried, they hated seeing him go without, watching him give away his lunch or his jacket simply because he couldn’t stand to see someone else suffer. It broke something in them, this endless selflessness of his. He would have given away the whole world if he could, piece by piece, just to make someone else’s life a little easier.
But Peter’s heart was too large, his empathy too deep, and no amount of pleading could change that. And when fate gifted him powers, when he realized he could do more, that boundless kindness became something else entirely.
What had once been a boyish impulse, a simple need to help, turned into a calling. A mission.
The bruises started appearing first. small, barely noticeable. A split lip here, a dark smudge along his ribs there. He brushed off their concern with a sheepish grin, quick words, and faster reflexes. But they weren’t fools.
Then came the sleepless nights, the moments they’d find his bed empty, his room chillingly silent. He thought he was careful, but they knew. Of course, they knew.
Peter had taken the weight of the world onto his too-small shoulders, and no matter how much they tried, no matter how fiercely they wanted to protect him, there was no stopping him now.
They had their suspicions. The bruises, the exhaustion, the way Peter sometimes winced when he thought no one was looking. But he was quick with his excuses, quicker with his smile, and despite their fears, they let themselves believe him.
Until the night he staggered through the front door, pale and trembling, his breaths coming in short, uneven gasps.
For a split second, they thought he was just exhausted, maybe overworked himself again. And then they saw it.
The knife.
Embedded deep in his stomach, its handle slick with his blood.
He swayed on his feet, his lips parting as if to say something, maybe an apology, maybe an explanation, but no words came. Instead, his knees buckled, and he collapsed right there in the middle of the living room, his body hitting the floor with a sickening finality.
Blood spilled out in waves, dark and endless, staining the floor beneath him. It took less than a second for the Avengers to react, but in that single, horrifying heartbeat, time seemed to shatter around them.
Because no matter how many battles they had fought, no matter how much death they had faced, nothing had ever prepared them for this.
For Peter, for their precious boy to be spilling out blood, to be hurt.
Peter survived. But the fear of losing him almost killed them.
They had faced death before, had stared it in the eye and defied it time and time again, but nothing, nothing, had ever compared to the sheer terror of watching Peter bleed out in their arms. The memory haunted them, seared into their minds like an open wound that refused to heal. It wasn’t just fear that gripped them, it was desperation. A bone-deep, soul-crushing need to keep him safe, no matter the cost.
They wanted to lock him away, shield him from the cruel, unforgiving world. He was too good, too precious, and they had already lost too much. They couldn’t lose him too.
But Peter, damn him and that stubborn, reckless heart of his, looked at them with those wide, earnest eyes, full of fire and conviction, and begged them to let him keep fighting. He swore he’d be careful, that he’d never make them go through that again. He even agreed to let one of them accompany him, a compromise they weren’t sure would be enough, but somehow, they relented. How dumb they had been.
But, how could they not?
He was their boy, and they couldn’t stand to see him hurt.
But they also couldn’t stand to see him unhappy.
For a while, it worked.
For a while, they had peace.
Peter still fought, still threw himself into danger with that same unshakable determination, but at least he wasn’t alone. At least they were there to watch his back, to make sure he came home at the end of the night. And for a while, it was enough. They let themselves believe it was enough.
But peace, they learned, was fleeting.
Someone found out. Someone uncovered the secret they had fought so hard to protect. They learned who Spider-Man was beneath the mask, who the boy was that the Avengers guarded so fiercely. And they waited.
Peter never saw it coming.
They caught him after school, dragging him into the shadows before he could even react. Maybe he fought. Maybe he screamed. Maybe he was terrified in those last moments, reaching for help that would never come.
By the time the Avengers arrived, it was too late.
He lay there, crumpled and still, his body already cold beneath their trembling hands. The blood had stopped pooling. His bright, shining eyes, full of so much warmth, so much life, were dull, empty… lifeless.
Peter was gone, Their Peter was gone.
The years that followed were a slow, spiraling descent into madness.
Without Peter, the Avengers became something else, something darker, something ruthless. They had lost wars before, lost friends, lost pieces of themselves in battle, but nothing had ever broken them like this. Nothing had ever stolen their very souls.
They were no longer heroes.
They were monsters, wielding their grief like a weapon, their fury like a storm. The world, once shielded by their strength, now trembled beneath it. Cities whispered their names in fear. Governments no longer saw them as allies, but as gods with bloodstained hands, unchallenged and unstoppable.
Mercy became a foreign concept.
There were no second chances, no warnings, only judgment, swift and merciless. Justice, once tempered by Peter’s compassion, turned into vengeance, cold and unrelenting.
Because Peter had been their tether, the fragile thread that kept them human. He had saved them from themselves.
And when he died, that last shred of humanity died with him.
The family they had once been shattered alongside their hearts.
The tower, once a home, became a mausoleum. The echoes of laughter that had once filled its halls were silenced, replaced by a suffocating emptiness. What had once been his space, his room, his favorite spot on the couch, the chair he always claimed at the dinner table, became untouched relics, frozen in time, too painful to face yet impossible to erase.
There were no more family dinners, no more movie nights where Peter would argue over popcorn flavors or fall asleep curled up against one of them. The lab, once filled with Tony’s exasperated groans and Peter’s excited rambling, sat eerily quiet, covered in dust.
One by one, they retreated into themselves, drowning in work, in missions, in anything that could make them forget, if only for a moment. But it never worked.
Because Peter was everywhere. In the half-finished projects he’d left behind, in the old sweaters still tucked away in his room, in the silence that screamed louder than any battle ever could.
They had lost teammates before. They had lost friends. But this?
This was different, this was everything.
This was losing the one thing that had held them together.
And without him, they weren’t a family anymore.
They were just... fragments.
No one suffered more than Tony.
Peter had been his shadow, his partner in science, his heir.
They had shared something deeper than blood, something beyond father and son, beyond mentor and protégé. Peter had been his, in every way that mattered. A kindred spirit, someone who looked at the world with the same wide-eyed curiosity, the same insatiable hunger for knowledge. Together, they had built, discovered, created, dreamed.
But now, the lab, once their playground, their sanctuary, was nothing more than a graveyard of memories. Half-finished projects sat untouched, collecting dust. The whiteboards, once cluttered with equations and doodles, remained frozen in time, Peter’s messy handwriting still lingering like a ghost.
And the silence... God, the silence was unbearable.
Tony tried. Tried to step inside, tried to pick up a wrench, tried to drown himself in work the way he always had. But without Peter’s endless chatter, without the hum of excitement in his voice, it all felt meaningless.
So he stopped.
Stopped going to the lab. Stopped working. Stopped caring.
For the first time in his life, Tony Stark, the man who never knew how to sit still, did nothing. Because what was the point? The one thing that had ever truly mattered to him was gone.
Until one day, an idea struck him. Wild. Unthinkable. Impossible.
But it didn’t matter.
Because if there was even the smallest chance, no matter how insane, he would take it.
Because Peter was gone.
And Tony was going to bring him back.
Tony had toyed with the concept of the Multiverse before, back when it had been nothing more than a distant theory, a puzzle to unravel for the sake of curiosity. It had fascinated him, sure, but it had never been real.
Now, it was all he had.
It became his obsession, a singular, all-consuming purpose that burned through his grief like wildfire. He knew he couldn’t bring their Peter back, no amount of genius, no miracle of science, could undo what had been done. But maybe, just maybe, there was another Peter out there. One who still had a chance. One who needed them just as much as they needed him.
It wasn’t about replacing their son.
It was about saving him.
A desperate hope, a reckless dream, but it was the only thing keeping Tony from collapsing under the weight of his own grief.
For the first time in what felt like forever, he called the Avengers together. Forced himself to care again. To shower, to eat, to scrape together the shattered remnants of the man they had once known.
When he stepped into the meeting room, the air was thick with something heavy, suffocating. He saw it in their faces, the same brokenness, the same exhaustion. They had all been drowning, each in their own way.
But now?
Now, for the first time since Peter died...
They had a reason to fight again.
"Tony, what is this about?"
Steve’s voice was tired, exhausted, but there was something else buried beneath the weariness. A sliver of hope. A fragile, flickering spark that hadn’t been there before.
Tony took a breath, steadying himself. He had spent so long drowning in grief, in silence, in nothingness. But now, he had something. A chance. A purpose. And if there was even the smallest possibility that it could work, then he had to try.
"I think I’ve found a way to bring Peter back."
The words cut through the air like a shockwave, a whispered impossibility that sent the room into stunned silence.
No one moved. No one spoke.
Disbelief clung to them like a second skin.
"Tony," Bucky said slowly, his voice careful, like he was trying not to spook a man on the edge of a breakdown. "Have you been sleeping?"
Tony clenched his jaw. He knew what they thought ‘he’s lost it, he’s grasping at ghosts’ but they didn’t understand. Not yet.
"I’m serious," he said, firmer this time.
Barton exhaled sharply, arms crossing over his chest. "And how exactly do you plan to do that?" His voice was sharp, slicing through the fragile hope in the room.
Tony didn’t flinch.
"I’ve found a way to travel through the Multiverse."
Silence. Thick. Suffocating.
For a long moment, the only sound was the faint hum of the tower, the distant pulse of a world still turning, a world that should have stopped when Peter died.
So Tony laid it all out.
The theory. The science. The possibilities stretching infinitely before them.
Somewhere out there, in another world, another timeline, another Peter existed.
A boy who needed them.
A boy who could fill the gaping void that was tearing them apart.
A boy who could bring them back.
"You want to replace our son?"
Bucky’s voice cracked, thick with anguish, the accusation heavy enough to make the air in the room turn suffocating. His hands curled into fists at his sides, his entire body coiled tight, like he was barely holding himself together.
Tony felt the words like a punch to the gut.
"No," he said immediately, his voice softer now, almost pleading. "No."
His gaze swept across the room, meeting the eyes of the only people in the world who could understand the gaping, unfillable hole inside him.
"But we can’t live without him," Tony admitted, his voice breaking on the words. "And somewhere out there, there’s a Peter who needs a family. Who needs us."
The room blurred for a second as tears welled in his eyes, again. The same damn tears that always came when he let himself think too much, feel too much.
This wasn’t about replacing Peter. It never could be.
But it was a chance, maybe their only chance, to claw their way out of the darkness, to find some small, fractured piece of what they had lost.
Silence stretched between them, heavy and unbearable.
The Avengers exchanged glances, unspoken conversations passing between them, grief tangled with doubt, longing with fear.
They had all lost the same person.
But they had each lost something different.
Something uniquely, irreversibly theirs.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Steve nodded.
"Alright, Tony." His voice was steady, but there was something deeper beneath it, something raw. "We’re in. What’s the plan?"
Tony exhaled a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.
For the first time in years, something inside him shifted. His heart. buried for so long under layers of grief, suffocated by loss, fluttered. Fragile. Tentative. But alive.
Hope.
He swallowed hard, forcing himself to focus.
"This isn’t going to be easy," Tony started, his voice firm, but there was a spark there now. "We need a machine strong enough to breach dimensions, a way to track his unique signature across universes, and a plan for what happens when we find him."
Because they would find him. They had to.
One by one, the Avengers straightened, the weight of despair shifting just enough for something else to take its place.
For months, Tony and Banner worked tirelessly, pouring every ounce of their genius, every fragment of their grief, into the project. The lab, once a tomb of silence and regret, became something else entirely.
A beacon. A place where dreams, impossible dreams, might just come true.
And slowly, so slowly, the Avengers began to feel like a family again. Not the same as before, never the same, but closer. Bound by a singular purpose, a desperate, unwavering mission.
Find Peter. Bring him home.
But the search for a compatible universe proved more difficult than they had anticipated. The Multiverse was vast, endless, and sifting through it felt like trying to catch stardust in their fingers.
Tony had known this wouldn’t be easy. He had prepared for obstacles. But he hadn’t expected it to take this long.
Hadn’t expected the endless hours of dead ends, the false hope of universes where Peter didn’t exist, or worse, where he had already been lost.
Doubt crept in, insidious and cruel, whispering in the back of his mind.
What if they never find him?
What if this was all for nothing?
What if Peter is truly gone?
And for the first time since this all began, Tony was afraid.
Afraid that the one thing keeping them all together, the fragile thread of hope, was beginning to fray.
Just as the weight of doubt threatened to suffocate him, the lab doors slammed open.
A scientist burst in, breathless, wide-eyed, his face flushed with urgency.
"We’ve found a compatible universe!" he gasped, voice trembling with excitement and exhaustion.
For a single, heart-stopping moment, Tony froze.
Then his pulse exploded, hammering in his chest as he shoved away from his desk and followed the scientist at a near run, his mind racing, hope clawing its way back to the surface.
They found one.
They actually found one.
The lab was alive with energy, screens flashing with data, holograms flickering across the air like ghosts of possibilities. And there, glowing in brilliant blue, was a projection of a world that could be their salvation.
"It’s different from ours," the scientist explained, still trying to catch his breath. "But it has everything you were looking for. And, the Avengers in that universe are either dead or retired."
Tony barely processed the words. His focus was locked onto one singular thought.
"And Peter?" His voice was raw, almost desperate.
The scientist hesitated, glancing at the data. "Peter and the Avengers never met. He lives with his aunt."
Tony’s breath hitched.
His aunt.
His stomach twisted, because in his world, Peter’s life before them had been a nightmare. A brutal, suffocating darkness. The reason they had taken him in.
"The same aunt?" Tony forced out, his voice barely above a whisper, dread and hope warring in his chest.
Because if she was the same, if she was anything like the woman Peter had suffered under, then this boy…
This Peter needed them.
Just as much as they needed him.
The scientist hesitated, clearly sensing the weight behind Tony’s question.
"Yes," he admitted carefully. "But we don’t know if she’s the same as the one in our universe."
Tony’s jaw clenched, his fingers twitching at his sides. That answer wasn’t good enough. But right now, it was all he had.
"Okay, go on." His voice was tight, controlled, but barely.
The scientist shifted nervously before continuing. "He doesn’t have his powers."
Tony’s breath stilled.
"What?"
"We checked every possible trace. There’s no indication of enhanced abilities. No Spider-Man. No vigilante activity connected to him. He’s just… a normal kid."
Tony swallowed hard, the words hitting him harder than he expected. Peter without his powers.
Just a boy.
A boy who had no idea what was coming.
"We couldn’t pinpoint his exact location," the scientist added, shifting uneasily. "We only know he’s somewhere in New York."
Tony exhaled sharply, dragging a hand down his face.
"Leave everything you have on the table," he said, already reaching for the files. His mind was spinning, calculating, planning. "You’re dismissed for the day."
The scientist didn’t need to be told twice, hurrying out as Tony flipped through the pages, scanning the data with laser focus. His fingers curled around the edges of the reports, gripping them like a lifeline.
Then, without hesitation, he pulled out his phone and called the one thing that still mattered.
"Get to the briefing room. Now."
Minutes later, they arrived, one by one, their heavy footsteps echoing through the room. Shadows of their former selves, but standing. Present.
And as they took their seats, as the weight of what was happening settled over them, Tony met their gazes and said the words that changed everything.
"We found him."
"We found a compatible universe." Tony’s voice remained steady, but the weight of the information threatened to crush him. He knew what he was about to say would change everything.
"It’s different," he continued, scanning their faces as a cautious hope flickered in their eyes. "But it has a Peter."
Silence filled the room as they absorbed the words, an almost tangible shift in the atmosphere. He took a breath before laying out everything, the retired Avengers, the unfamiliar setting, and the fragile possibility that they could find their boy again. He watched as hope began to bloom, but he knew it would be short-lived.
"There’s one problem." His voice was quieter now, the words heavier. "In this universe, Peter never met us. He still lives with his aunt."
The reaction was immediate.
Bucky shot out of his seat so fast that his chair scraped violently against the floor, the sharp noise echoing through the tense silence. His entire body was rigid, his hands clenched into fists at his sides as fury darkened his expression.
"What?" His voice was low, but it carried an undeniable edge of rage.
Around the room, the others reacted similarly, their faces hardening, their hands tightening into fists as they processed what Tony had just told them. They all knew exactly what that meant.
The woman who had hurt Peter. The woman responsible for sending him into the cold that night, battered and trembling, abandoned like he was nothing. The woman whose cruelty had carved wounds so deep into his soul that even after years of love, care, and reassurance, they had never fully faded. They had spent so much time healing Peter, breaking down the walls of fear and neglect that she had built around him, proving to him that he was safe, that he was wanted, that he was loved. Now, the thought of another version of Peter still trapped in that house, still enduring whatever pain she inflicted, made something dark and violent settle in their chests.
"Calm down," Tony said, raising his hands, trying to contain the tension before it spiraled out of control. "We don’t know if she’s the same person as the one we knew. This is a different universe, and we need to gather more information before making any assumptions or decisions."
The anger in the room didn’t dissipate, but the Avengers forced themselves to remain still, barely containing the storm of emotions threatening to consume them. The possibility that this version of Peter was suffering the same fate as their Peter had once endured was something none of them could ignore. If they discovered that he was in danger, if they found out that his life was anything like the one their Peter had been forced to escape from, they would not hesitate to intervene. They had lost Peter once, and they refused to stand by and let another version of him suffer the same fate.
The room simmered with barely contained emotion, the tension so thick it was nearly suffocating. No one spoke, but the weight of their unspoken fears, their unyielding desperation, crackled like electricity in the air.
Tony exhaled slowly, steadying himself before he spoke. "Now, we need to form a plan to get him back. And I think I’ve got just the one."
The Avengers leaned in, their eyes locked onto him, searching for something to hold onto. For too long, they had been drowning in grief, suffocating under the crushing weight of their loss. Now, for the first time in years, something flickered in the darkness that had consumed them. It wasn’t just hope. It was something more.
It was the chance for redemption. It was the possibility of restoring what had been shattered, of finding the missing piece that had left them hollow and broken. It was the whisper of fate, the universe telling them that perhaps, after everything, they weren’t beyond saving.
The road ahead would be long and uncertain, filled with obstacles they had yet to face. But none of that mattered. Somewhere out there, across the vastness of the Multiverse, their Peter existed. And no matter how many worlds they had to cross, how many battles they had to fight, they would find him.
Because he was their son.
And they were bringing him home.