Chapter Text
The first week of December, Clint manages to break the toaster by shoving a massive slice of extra-thick french toast into one of the slots, which subsequently jams it. Any other time, Tony would have just thrown out the damn thing and replaced it with a brand new one. But Tony’s been jittery recently (as he usually is during the month of his parents’ death) and he’s decided to fix the toaster himself to keep his hands busy.
Tony is hunched over the kitchen counter, and elbow deep in wires and metal. Clint is standing by, hovering near the outlet on the wall, munching on handfuls of salted peanuts, and glaring at the side of Tony’s head. The mechanic won’t let him near the appliance or even allow him to pass tools over, but Tony insisted that Clint “help fix it” since he was the one that broke it. So far, all he’s done is unplug the damn thing and stare while Tony mutters to himself. Nat is sitting on one of the stools at the counter and filling out a mission report on her StarkPad. She’s been occupying Clint by keeping up a running debate with him about the pros and cons of Ikea furniture.
It’s the end of a very quiet week at the tower. There was one recon mission a few days ago that only took a few hours to complete, and yet, there was still a mountain of paperwork that amounted to twice the effort of the actual mission. Earlier in the week, Sam and Nat had taken a short trip to Wakanda to pick up a case or two of vibranium (to be used in the making of the team’s tech). And there’d been a press conference yesterday (which everyone was present for) to officially announce Bucky as no longer on government watch, and now a fully integrated Avenger.
So, in this rare moment of inactivity, the whole team is loafing around on the common floor and wholly embracing their domesticity.
Steve is at the window, sketching the snow-covered Manhattan skyline. Bucky is next to him, settled in a chair in the corner and reading a book on the history of segregation and the sixties. (He’s been trying to catch up on all the pieces of history he missed while he was busy being tortured.) Wanda is sitting cross-legged on the floor in the common room and folding her laundry while an episode of Say Yes to the Dress plays quietly on the TV in front of her. Sam is perched on the arm of the couch and watching the show over Wanda’s head. He’s mostly making snarky comments about the “froufrou fluffy cupcake things” and laughing at the absurd things the brides' entourages say, but everyone knows he’s more than a little invested. Clint catches glimpses of the episode from his spot in the kitchen and when one of the dresses reminds him of Laura’s wedding dress, he says so out loud. Tony grunts affirmatively to let Clint know that he's listening.
It’s just as Tony finally gets that pesky wire to do what he wants it to, that his cell phone rings. The chorus of Get Ugly by Jason Derulo signifies that it’s Peter who’s calling. Evidently, the boy himself hacked into Tony’s phone a few months ago and set that as his own ringtone. Tony hasn’t bothered to change it. He mutters a curse and looks between the soldering iron he has in one hand and the wires he’s pinching together in the perfect position with the other hand. After determining that he can’t put down his work, he tells FRIDAY to answer the call so he can talk hands-free.
“Kid, I swear to God I’m gonna lose my shit if you’re skipping class to call me,” he warns before the kid can get a word out.
Peter’s snort is broadcast to the whole team via the speakers in the kitchen. “It’s lunchtime, dad.”
“Really?” Tony looks up, his brows scrunched. “Already?”
Nat holds up her StarkPad for Tony to see and, sure enough, the time displayed in the corner of the screen says 11:34AM.
“Yeah. I have a question though,” Peter says over the background chatter of students filing into the cafeteria.
Tony rolls his eyes and brings the soldering iron down towards the dissected toaster. “I probably have an answer,” is his sarcastic response.
“Can Ned spend the night tonight? He just got this new upgrade package for Beast Slayers and I thought it would be better if we could play it on the TV in my room since it’s so much better than his computer screen, ya know? His mom already said yes.” His voice is rushed and insistent, like he was trying to get all the words out before Tony could say no.
It didn’t matter. The kid was wrapped around Tony’s finger. He couldn’t say no even if he tried.
Tony just chuckles at his kid’s antics. “Sure, kiddo. Your nerd friend can stay the night. I’ll tell Happy to drive by Freddy's place so he can grab his things after he picks you both up from school.”
“Thank you so much!” Peter exclaims. There’s a breathless shout of, ‘I’m going to go to Iron Man’s house!’ somewhere in the background, and Steve would bet his right arm that that was Ned’s voice. “Love you, dad!” Peter says.
Tony’s lips curl up into a satisfied smile. “Love you too, Pete. See you soon.”
The call ends automatically, no doubt FRIDAY's doing. Clint stuffs another handful of peanuts into his mouth and crunches.
“You know, I hope you don’t take this the wrong way,” the Archer starts, mouth still half-full of chewed peanuts, “but you’re much better at the dad thing than I thought you’d be.”
Tony solders a piece of metal on the toaster. “You think so? Most of the time I’m scared shitless,” he admits.
This kind of honesty is abnormal for Tony. Or, at least, it used to be. The Tony that Steve remembers hid his emotions behind snappy quips and tinted sunglasses. (Sometimes, he still does, especially where anything concerning Siberia or the Civil War is concerned.) But for the most part, Tony says how he feels, even if it makes him seem vulnerable. Which is something Steve hasn’t quite gotten used to yet. Sometimes these moments still take him by surprise.
Not that Steve thinks that’s a bad thing. He’d much rather share space with a Tony who doesn’t think that being the smartest, most unflappable person in the room is his greatest personality trait. But still, it takes some getting used to.
“Yep.” Clint drums his hands on the countertop. “That’s how you know you’re doing it right!”
Tony snorts and scrunches up his face in a haughty sort of disbelief. “Since when do you know about doing things right, Katniss?” he cracks. “Last time I checked, you liked pineapple on your pizza, and that fits squarely into the 'doing things wrong' category.”
And, there’s the Tony Steve knows.
_______________
Steve is in Indonesia on a relief mission. Mainly, he’s just helping lift heavy things after an earthquake destroyed a large suburban town. It’s not usually something that’s in an Avenger's pay grade, but this particular Avenger is trying to stay in the Nations' good graces. And he’s got super strength, so that’s a plus.
They put him up in a hotel in Malang, just outside of the disaster zone. It’s actually quite nice, Steve thinks. They probably put him in one of their best rooms. It’s a one bedroom suite with an outdoor patio. There’s a mini bar in the room, and the bed is dressed with soft, down linens. He’s more comfortable than he expected to be as a man who lived during the Great Depression. A soft bed was hard to come by when he was a teenager, let alone a soaking tub and room service. But, he supposes, he’s gotten used to living in Stark Tower where luxury is abundant and almost overwhelming. He never thought he’d see the day where living like a wealthy person wouldn’t make him squirm out of his skin. But here he is.
A commotion on the television screen grabs his attention. An American news program is filming Tony (or rather, Iron Man) swooping down over the Manhattan Bridge and firing a repulsor at what looks like a human-rhinoceros hybrid. The mutant hurls a car off the bridge like a child might toss away an unwanted toy, and Steve winces when he thinks about the person (or people) who must be inside of it. But before the vehicle and it’s terrified occupants can become acquainted with the trash and rubble at the bottom of the East River, Spider-Man swings into view. He shoots a web at the falling car and flings it over to the shore. It’s not the smoothest landing, but it does the job. The spiderkid helps a young lady and her infant son out of the car before webbing himself back up to the bridge.
The camera pans back to the newscaster who, to her credit, manages to look completely unphased as she reports updates on the escalating situation. Well, that’s a New Yorker for you. An evacuation notice for Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Hoboken scrolls across the bottom of the screen.
Steve wonders briefly if the rest of the team will be called in to help. He knows Sam and Wanda are in the tower and Bucky’s at a therapy appointment. Nat’s supposed to be checking out a possible human experimentation network in Serbia with Clint, but he hasn’t heard from either of them in almost thirty hours, so who knows if they’re still on the mission.
Steve’s musings are cut short as the news cameras pick up a flash of Sam’s vibranium wings. He watches as Wanda drops from his arms and lands in a crouch in front of the rhinoceros-man mutant. According to the newswoman, the beast goes by The Rhino. How original.
Wanda’s magic has it at least partially contained when Spider-Man spooks the thing by swinging around in his peripheral vision. Steve can tell the goal to incapacitating the Rhino is generally the same as when Scott got really big at the airport and the kid bound his legs before the team’s flyers knocked him over. But, instead of looking down in confusion like Scott did, The Rhino decides to use his horns to try and knock Spider-Man out of the way. The kid ends up effectively impaled and is thrown like a limp ragdoll onto the city streets. Iron Man immediately abandons his assault on The Rhino and flies after Spider-Man. The camera follows Tony as he lands hard next to the crumpled figure of the spiderkid.
He doesn’t look good. There’s a rapidly growing pool of blood underneath the boy and Steve can see a hole in his abdomen even with the shitty view the news crew has managed to get.
Tony cups the boy’s head in one of his metal-covered hands and says something to Spider-Man. The microphones don’t pick up what he says, but if Steve knows his reassurance speeches for dying soldiers as well as he proclaims, it’s probably something along the lines of, “hold on, kid. We’ll get you help. I’ve got you.” Etcetera.
Steve feels bad for the kid. He doesn’t know much about Spider-Man, but based purely on his voice and general enthusiasm for everything, he’s most likely not older than twenty one. A college student, Steve thinks is the most likely conclusion. What a shame. A young boy who hasn’t seen much of the world yet – too busy drowning in hard liquor, pulling all-nighters, and studying for finals. Steve never went to college, but he’s seen enough movies by now to know that college is really only there to suck exorbitant amounts of money out of unsuspecting, hopeful students, and give a large group of young adults just enough alcohol and rope to hang themselves with. Steve’s come to realize that most kids desperately want that “College Experience” so he’s learned not to judge too harshly. But still, there’s a whole damn life after college. And, from the looks of it, Spider-Man will never get to experience it.
He watches as Tony rockets off, carrying a limp young man in his arms. He sends a prayer to God for the kid’s health, because somehow, even after everything, Steve still believes in the Big Man Upstairs. He gets shit on for it constantly (usually by Sam, who is a self-proclaimed agnostic) but it doesn’t stop him from going to Sunday Mass each week.
When Steve returns to the Tower a little less than a week later, he finds Tony and Peter in the kitchen amongst an array of bowls and partially cooked ingredients. Peter is sitting on a stool and kneading at a mound of flour and eggs on the counter with his bare hands. Tony is chopping tomatoes with a steak knife. An appealing aroma of Italian spices hangs in the air, which is impressive considering Tony’s lack of cooking skills.
“Are you sure this is gonna be safe to eat?” Peter asks, staring at his dough-covered hands. “I don’t think this is very sanitary.”
Tony scoffs. “You washed your hands first, right.”
“Duh.”
“Then it’s fine. This is how my mom always used to do it and it always came out great.”
“But what makes you think she passed her cooking skills onto you though? Yesterday morning you literally burned the scrambled eggs so bad you had to throw out the pan.”
“Hey,” Tony squawks indignantly and throws a chunk of tomato at Peter’s head. It hits him on the cheek and slides down slowly until it falls off and lands on his lap. Peter giggles and sticks his tongue out at Tony. “I don’t need cooking skills to follow a recipe.” Peter unceremoniously plucks the tomato piece off his lap and pops it into his mouth with a sly grin.
“All I’m saying is,” he pauses for a second to swallow the tomato, “if I spend the rest of the night puking my guts out, it’ll be your fault.”
Tony scoffs. “Kid, the last time you puked was when you were, what, thirteen?”
“Fourteen,” Peter corrects as he reaches for a hand towel that’s hanging from the oven handle. It’s just a little too far away though, so he's not exactly successful at procuring it. “But that’s beside the point. I just – ” He's had enough of trying and failing to grab the towel, so he moves to stand up, but Tony interrupts him before he can even get his butt off the chair.
“Ah-ah, sit down,” he says, placing his hands on Peter’s shoulders to keep him in the stool.
Peter whines in only the way a teenage boy can. “Dad.”
Tony raises his eyebrows and points a finger at Peter. “Stay.” He reaches for the hand towel himself and passes it to Peter who accepts it with a pout.
When Tony turns back to the tomatoes, he notices Steve in the mouth of the kitchen and nods in his direction. “Hey Cap!” he beckons. Steve feels a small fire light in his chest because he notices that there isn’t a smidgeon of anger or disgust in Tony’s greeting. It’s all just friendliness. This is what Steve has been hoping for ever since he’d been pardoned.
“Tony. Peter.” He nods at the two of them respectively. Peter waves with his now-clean hand. “What’s on the menu tonight?”
“My mom’s tagliatelle primavera.” Tony looks a little sheepish at the admission, but doesn’t shrink under Steve’s inquisitive glance.
“Smells delicious,” Steve says, breaking their eye contact to look over at Peter, who is gripping a zucchini in one hand and trying to stealthily slide a knife out of the knife block with the other hand.
Tony follow Steve's gaze and makes a strangled sort of sound at what he sees.
“Nope,” Tony says with a tone of finality as he nabs the knife out of Peter’s hand. “No pointy things for you for a while.” Peter lets out a loud groan in response.
“Oh, come on. I’m sixteen! I’m not gonna stab myself while I’m chopping vegetables.”
It’s then that Steve notices a hint of protectiveness and maybe a little fear in Tony’s eyes. It’s not a look that Steve is meant to see, but he does all the same.
Steve is pretty sure this is just the lingering after-affect of Spider-Man’s fight with The Rhino. Steve found it very difficult to watch and he’s not the parent of a teenager. From what he knows about parenting (which is very little, to be honest) apparently it’s pretty much all down to instinct. There’s an inherent need to care for your child at all times. And when a parent sees someone else’s child in need, the urge to protect your own young gets even stronger. Okay, so maybe a good majority of this theory came from a documentary about gorillas, but still. A primate is a primate, right?
So, Steve supposes, this over-protective, helicopter-dad schtick that Tony’s got going on right now is actually pretty warranted.
“It’s probably best if you listen to your dad, Peter,” he advises, sending a sympathetic look in Tony’s direction. “He just cares about you and wants you to be safe.”
“I – uh, yeah,” Tony stutters, a wide-eyed expression of surprise pasted clearly on his face. “Thanks Steve.”
Tony and Peter exchange a look that Steve can’t decipher.
“I’m sorry about Spider-Man, by the way,” he says, sympathy dripping from his voice like warm molasses.
Tony’s eyebrows furrow even further. “Huh?” he asks dumbly.
And now Steve is confused too.
“I saw the fight with the Rhino guy on the news,” he explains, but it sounds more like a question when it comes out of his mouth. “It didn’t look great.”
Tony winces visibly, gulps, then nods. “It wasn’t. The spiderling needed heavy-duty surgery. He uh, almost didn’t make it.” He clears his throat to rid his voice of the thick emotions that had been building up. Steve can see the shine of unshed tears in his eyes, but doesn’t mention it, out of respect. His voice is smoother and more confident when he says, “But he did. The wall-crawler lives to be annoying another day.”
“Oh, he – he lived?” Tony nods. “Wow, that’s great!”
“He’s got super healing,” Peter announces. The boy’s hands are occupied with a grater and a large block of parmesan. He looks up, blushes, and then adds, “or, so I’ve heard.”
“You’ve never met him?” Steve asks. It seems a reasonable question. Tony’s son meeting Tony’s mentee would have been bound to happen eventually, Steve thinks.
Peter shrugs. “Nah. Dad says he’s kind of a nuisance. But from everything I’ve seen on YouTube, he sounds like a solid dude.”
Tony laughs. “Yeah, definitely a nuisance.”
The conversation dies down naturally after that. They don’t invite him to eat dinner with them – nor does Steve expect them to – so he quickly excuses himself to his quarters where he plans to have a pizza delivered. Which he will eat while watching The Price is Right (something Clint suggested he watch a few months ago and has now become somewhat of an addiction for him.)
Maybe Spider-Man’s miraculous recovery had more to do with his enhanced healing – as Peter put it – than Steve’s prayer to God, but Steve will still thank Him for the young man’s safety before he goes to bed tonight. After he watches a bunch of strangers guess the prices for random retail items. You know, as one does.
_______________
In late January, Washington DC sees its worst winter storm in half a decade. The former “Rogues” (as they’ve been dubbed by the media) were scheduled to appear at a two-day PR event at the Renwick Gallery, which naturally ended up getting cancelled at the last minute. In fact, the team had just landed on the White House helipad when the event coordinator – a tiny woman bundled up in what looked like every winter coat she owned – scurries up to them and profusely apologizes for not being able to get the message out sooner. ‘The storm took out our power last night and, of course, you see, that meant we lost the use of our radios.' Her teeth chatter as she hands each of them a signed note that excuses them from the event (another byproduct of their two-year probationary period; they’re not allowed to skip out on PR events unless they’ve gotten prior approval or have been officially excused by the event coordinator.) Clint grumbles about having to get out of bed and pack a bag for fuckin' nothing, until a massive gust of wind and hail that sounds like genuine nuclear warfare hits the Quinjet as Nat’s getting it off the ground.
They’re all gathered in the common room and “shooting the shit” (as Sam calls it) over cups of hot coffee when the elevator dings and the sounds of Peter’s excited squabbling flows from its open doors.
“ – doesn’t even see me, right? So I just kind of – oh shit.”
He cuts himself off when he notices that not only is there a group of superheroes lounging on the common room couches when they’re supposed to be in DC, but also that they’re all looking at him.
Tony, who’s also emerged from the elevator and has taken a protective stance next to Peter, echoes his son’s statement. “Yeah. ‘Oh shit' is right.”
They both look like they’ve been caught red-handed. Though Tony is better at concealing it with a tight grimace, Peter's guilt and panic is easily read in his pinked cheeks, hunched shoulders, and wide-eyed stare. Upon closer inspection, Steve notices a small cut on Peter’s cheekbone that’s obviously been cleaned and tended to. There’s a single butterfly bandage strip adhered to it. It’s no longer bleeding, but Steve can already tell he’ll have a massive bruise in a few hours. He knows that an injury like that, in that spot, usually is caused by someone else’s fist. And he’s confused for a moment, because Peter walked in with a huge smile on his face and he’d been babbling animatedly, which is not behavior Steve usually expects from people who’ve just been punched in the face. But then, he looks away from the kid’s face. Peter’s hair is slightly disheveled and there’s a few curls clinging to the sweat on his forehead. He’s favoring his right leg. His worn-in Converse sneakers are left untied, like he’d slipped them on in a hurry. There’s a smattering of scabs and scrapes on his elbows.
And bunched in his hands is a familiar red and blue suit.
“They were not supposed to be here today, right?” Peter whispers. His eyes are still glued to the unexpected company but his head is tilted towards Tony. “I didn’t mess that up?”
Tony’s arm has snaked its way around Peter’s shoulders and Steve can almost see the ripples of tension coming off of it. He can tell Tony is trying his damnedest to not clench his fists, scoop the kid up in his arms, and run. Instead, Tony attempts to put on his signature cocky-but-nonchalant expression, which is invalidated by the way he hisses his next words through his teeth. “Nope. They were definitely supposed to be kissing major ass in DC right about now. This one's not on you, kid.” There’s a resigned sort of anger there, like he knows what’s coming and – though he’d definitely be anywhere else but here, if given the choice – he’s accepted it. He’s glaring at Steve – whose eyes are flashing from Tony’s face, to Peter’s, to the suit in Peter’s hands, and back to Tony’s – and trying to non-verbally communicate how much he does not want to do this right now, and could Steve please wait like five minutes before tearing into him about a kid not being fit for war.
Nat, who's also warily eying the red and blue fabric that Peter is clutching in his white-knuckled grip, says, “The event was cancelled.” Her voice is smooth, and anyone who didn’t know her well enough would have assumed that she hadn’t been surprised, but the way she’s narrowing her eyes at Tony says differently. Though, she doesn’t seem to be angry at Tony or the kid. She looks more intrigued than anything, and maybe a little frustrated that Tony had managed to keep a secret like this from her in the first place.
Steve however... he is feeling a mix of anger about being lied to, confusion, bewilderment, and exasperation because of course this is something Tony would do. He takes a cautious step towards the father and son. “Tony, you didn’t.”
Despite having known the kid for less than a year and only having spoken to him a handful of times, Steve feels a strange protectiveness for him. Rhodey, who’d apparently known Peter a long time now, had laughed when Steve grumbled to him about how difficult it’s been to feel so conflicted about a child he barely knew. ‘The kid has a way of making everyone melt. He’s like a rescue puppy in that way. One look in those eyes, and you’re a goner. Doomed to love him for the rest of your life,’ he'd said to Steve over a cup of coffee and a stack of military contracts. But Steve had been convinced his feelings were more about the fact that Peter had turned Tony into an entirely different person than the one he’d known. Tony was softer now, more authentic. He didn’t have as hard of a time expressing his emotions. He told people he loved them more freely. He slept more now. Steve hadn’t seen him take a single drink the entire time the team’s been back together. Not that any of those were bad things. Tony's the happiest Steve’s ever seen him. That’s the complete opposite of a bad thing. But Steve wishes he didn’t feel like such an outsider in his friend's happiness. He’d have preferred to have been a part of it – to have been there with him for it – rather than feeling like he’d walked in late and only ended up catching the tail-end of a really good, heart-warming family movie.
Bucky says he’s jealous. Steve says it’s ridiculous to be jealous of a teenager, but he doesn’t disagree.
All these emotions have been bubbling underneath the surface for a while now. And once Steve sees Peter with the suit, and he makes the connection to the kid from Queens who he’d nearly crushed with a jet bridge at a German airport two years ago, everything bursts.
“Tell me you didn’t bring this kid to Germany.” It’s a warning as much as it is a plea.
For a moment, he thinks Tony might deny everything, tell Steve he’s mistaken and that he’s not actually seeing what he thinks he’s seeing.
But Tony winces and then gives a half-hearted shrug.
“Not my best decision, I’ll admit,” he throws up his hands in surrender. “But in all fairness, I wasn’t expecting to have to fight anyone.”
This earns him a litany of groans, gasps, and protests from the former Rogues who, by now, have also caught on to the current predicament.
Clint’s looking at the kid like he’s just sprouted a second head. “No way. No fucking way.”
“He’s a kid, Tony!” Steve shouts.
“You think I'm not painfully aware of that, Steve?” The volume of Tony’s voice matches Steve’s. Tony has taken his arm off of Peter’s shoulder and is using it to gesture angrily at Steve.
“Excuse me. Hey!” Peter interjects, waving his hand. “I’m the kid you’re talking about. Literally, I’m right here. Hi.”
“Peter, you have no idea what you’re getting yourself into, here,” Sam insists. “This is dangerous stuff.”
Peter clenches his jaw and simply says, “I’m aware.”
“No, I really don’t think you are,” Steve cuts in. “And I think that’s Tony’s fault. I think he dragged you into this without properly explaining the risks and responsibilities of carrying an entire planet of innocent people on your shoulders.”
“He didn’t need to explain it to me. I know all about my responsibility. That’s why I do this. Not because he made me, not because I’ve got some sort of misplaced God-complex, and certainly not because I’m just a stupid kid looking for my fifteen minutes of fame. People have died because I didn’t get involved. Because I chose not to use my powers or step in when I could have, someone I love is dead. I will not let that happen again, regardless of what you, or Tony, or anyone else says. Do you understand?”
By the time Peter is finished speaking, he is nearly out of breath and the whole room has gone uncomfortably quite. Tony is rubbing a soothing hand up and down Peter’s back and Peter sends a look of gratitude back at his father.
“What kind of powers?” Wanda eventually asks. She is curious and cautious, not accusatory. There’s a fizzle of red sparks dancing at the tips of her fingers; it’s a display that’s common for her when her emotions are running high. Usually a few deep breaths and some mindless distraction helps to calm her down. But this time no one moves to stop her or present her with a distraction, mainly because everyone else wants to know the answer to the question.
Simply because it was Wanda that asked, Peter’s face smoothes into a calm expression and when he speaks, his voice is even and almost confident. “The suit just protects me,” he explains, “gives me an open line of communication to Tony, it’s more durable, got tons of different fail-safes for when I get into trouble. Everything else, that’s all me. The sticking to walls, the strength, speed, agility. And I’ve got this weird sixth sense type thing. It warns me when something’s about to happen.”
Tony replaces his arm back around Peter’s shoulders and tugs him closer into his side. “Kid can dodge a bullet before it even fires. He can bench-press a building and walk on the ceiling unassisted. You’d’ve given me those powers at his age and I would have burned down the whole fuckin' universe. But he chooses to help old ladies cross the street, intercept hijacked planes, and run into apartment fires to save family pets. Tell me again how he doesn’t deserve to be out there with the rest of us?”
Throughout Peter's explanation and Tony’s rant, Clint’s eyes kept squinting narrower and narrower as they darted back and forth between the father and son. When Tony finishes, Clint sucks a sharp inhale through his nose and flares his nostrils.
“Stark, you better tell me right now that you didn’t experiment on your son.”
Peter’s face scrunches up like he’s smelled something foul. Tony just stands there, an expression of utter bewilderment plain on his face. “What?!” they both screech at the same time.
“The fuck, Clint?” Sam questions. “What kind of accusation is that?”
“Well, how did he get like that?” He points at Peter.
“Okay, first of all, don’t talk about me like I’m a thing. That’s rude.” Peter says, holding up one finger. He adds a second finger before he continues, “Second, Tony has nothing to do with my powers. I'd had them for six months before he ever even met me, and I’d already gotten someone killed by then. So would you please stop blaming him for literally everything that’s ever happened to me?”
Steve has to physically take a step back because for some reason his brain isn’t making sense of what’s actually happening here. “Wait, what? Before he met you? He's not – you’re not Stark’s son?” He’s flapping a pointer finger back and forth between Tony and Peter, who are both now looking slightly embarrassed?
“Well, um, not biologically,” Peter admits, scratching at the back of his neck.
“I’m adopting him,” Tony announces. He looks down at Peter and the two share a small, gentle smile before Tony acknowledges the group again. “I started out as the guy who made sure the kid didn’t get himself killed, and then he grew on me, not unlike a fungus or a barnacle.”
“Thanks, dad. I feel the love.”
Steve just stares at them. “I am very confused.”
Tony lets out a long sigh and ambles over to lean on the kitchen counter, like he’s settling in for a long conversation. Peter hops up to sit the counter next to him and lazily swings his dangling feet. Steve notices that the cut on Peter's cheekbone has nearly fully healed in a matter of minutes. At first he is dumbfounded, but then he remembers Peter mentioning once that Spider-Man had enhanced healing.
Before Steve can start to spiral into a mental inventory of how many times he’d been in the general vicinity of Peter and not known that he was healing from one of Spider-Man’s wounds, Tony takes a breath in and then starts to explain. “A new vigilante pops up in Queens and starts making waves when videos of him catching a bus with his bare hands gets uploaded onto the internet, of course I’m gonna keep an eye on it. I had FRIDAY do a trace to see who the spiderling behind the onesie was – ”
“Not a onesie,” Peter interrupts, which Tony adeptly ignores.
“I figured there was no harm in letting the kid continue rescuing cats out of trees stopping petty crime. It’s not like he was fighting Chitauri on his own. But still, that onesie was an eyesore, so I started making the kid an actual suit. One with safety protocols, training wheels, and an AI that connects to mine. I was really just planning on giving it to him and asking him to come in for training a few times a month. But then the mess with the Accords happened and Ross was threatening to take you guys in dead or alive if we couldn’t talk you down. So I recruited Peter, only because I hoped you’d see we had the numbers and would be willing to talk things out. Not once was I expecting the kid to have to engage in combat with anyone. In fact, I explicitly told him to keep his distance and only restrain with his webs if necessary.”
“Yeah, I don’t know why you thought I would listen to you,” Peter sasses.
The way the kid says it throws Steve for a loop, even though it really shouldn’t. He knows that Peter is a teenager, and that teenagers sass their parents all the time. But that teenager is also supposed to be Spider-Man, who is notorious for his sass (God, Steve is really kicking himself for not connecting those dots earlier) but also, Spider-Man (or rather, Peter) is not in any way related to Tony, but is still somehow his son? Steve hasn’t decided yet whether or not the lack of biological parenthood makes this situation better or worse.
Despite Steve feeling like his brain had been left in the 40’s, Tony keeps talking. “I left him alone for a while after that, thinking he might go back to the would-be muggings and the cats in trees, but I still had him update Happy after each of his patrols to make sure he was staying low to the ground. And he was for a while, until he found out that his girlfriend’s dad was stealing leftover alien tech from Damage Control and the crew who cleans up the messes we leave behind. Long story short, Pete ended up clinging to the outside of one of my planes as it crashed into Coney Island, wearing only his pajamas, all to prevent my tech from being stolen. Kid saved the world single-handedly and I realized I’d severely underestimated him.”
Right, well. Now Steve is confused and he kind of feels like shit. Clearly he judged Tony and Peter a little too quickly. Actually, now that he’s thinking about it, he’s pretty sure that’s one of his biggest character flaws. He thinks with his heart, not his head. He felt betrayed, to a certain extent, because he was essentially lied to regarding Spider-Man’s identity. He felt stupid and slightly embarrassed for assuming Tony and Peter were father and son. He felt a strange sort of protectiveness towards the boy, because he’s only a boy. And, well, now he feels like a hypocrite too. Steve wasn’t even that much older than Peter is now when he joined the army (illegally, too, might he add) and allowed a random scientist to experiment on him. Steve peers over at Bucky who is already smirking at him like he knows the exact dilemma that’s happening in Steve’s head. He felt, and so he judged.
Now that he’s got the full picture, he sees a lot of himself in Peter. He sees an eager soldier and a powerful young man. But only an hour ago, he’d look at Peter and see a soft, awkward boy whose idea of a wild night was probably ingesting laundry detergent and building Lego sets. Maybe it’s possible that Peter is both? Maybe Steve looks at people like they’re two-dimensional? Maybe Steve has just lost all perspective at this point.
He’s not really sure what to do with his feelings, so he kind of just lets his eyes wander from person to person.
Wanda looks teary-eyed and sympathetic, like she’s seconds away from scooping Peter up into a hug. The red sparks have gone away though, so that’s good. Sam looks constipated, like he can’t quite understand that the kid he made fun of for liking Capri-suns is the same kid who webbed him to he floor of an airport tarmac. But there’s also a bit of satisfaction in his expression, most likely because he’s proud of himself for being right about Tony and Peter’s relationship. Clint is still doing that over-protective-dad thing where he’s glaring at Tony like he’s the worst kind of dad for allowing his son to put himself in danger, but at least he doesn’t look like he’s ready to attack. Bucky is still smirking at Steve (Yeah, okay. Whatever.) And Natasha seems more thoughtful than anything else.
“So, naturally, I decided to adopt him,” Tony is saying, completely oblivious to Steve’s internal conflict. “We’re working it out with his unusually hot aunt. She’s on board. Actually she’s the one who suggested it in the first place, but still.”
So now there’s an aunt and Peter’s mom? Which one is May? Or are they the same person, and May is supposed to be Peter’s aunt? Is there no Mom to speak of? Is that why Peter needs adopting?
“I am not any less confused,” Steve admits.
Tony just blinks at Steve for a moment. “I really don’t know how to explain it any clearer, Cap,” he says. “Kid?” he looks at Peter, who just shrugs before effortlessly hopping down off the counter he’s been sitting on. “Right. Okay, look, it’s been a long day for all of us. Maybe more so for Captain Spangles over there. Can we just agree to call it a night on this discussion for now? We can re-adjourn when Steve has the rest of his brain back.”
“No, you know what, I don’t think – ” Clint starts to argue before Sam cuts him off.
“Barton, stand down.” He nods at Tony and Peter. “We’ll see you two for breakfast in the morning? I’m makin' my ma's grillades and grits.”
“That sounds great, Mr. Wilson!” Peter says with a smile.
“I’ll put juice in a sippy cup just for you,” Sam jokes and Peter’s face splits into a massive smile as he lets out a giggle.
“I’d cry if you didn’t,” the kid responds.
Sam scoffs, but he’s sporting his own smile that matches Peter’s. “Get outta here, problem child.”
Tony ruffles Peter’s hair lightly and the latter leans in to the loving touch. Wanda coos at the interaction and Peter teasingly sticks his tongue out at her.
“Good night,” Tony says, acknowledging the room full of superheroes who are still in various stages of disbelief and contemplation. With an arm wrapped around his son’s shoulders, Tony leads Peter towards their living quarters, leaving Steve to stare perplexedly at their backs.
When the two are out of sight, Steve blinks hard a few times, pinches the bridge of his nose, and sighs. “I need a drink."