Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Ever since May died, it felt like a month had been logged entirely off of the calendar for Peter. Everything was so new, a taste his tongue fails to recognise. Tony planting the compound closer to Midtown High for some reason, having to walk to school instead of May driving him, waking up to an empty house and no May to cook breakfast for him in the morning, and even with so much given to him, it still left like a piece of him was missing. A lost case, empty, destined to be forsaken. The other part of him was glad, glad that everyone in his entire life has died? No, of course not. But every now and them, he knows. He knows that he's guilty for being happy, he's guilty of not being able to save her. He's saved so many worthless people before, why couldn't he save her?

His throat felt so dry, so closed as he swallowed gulps of breath while walking in through the doors of the high school. He wasn't ready for condolences to be thrown at him every now and then, even worse for MJ to sketch his face. But he has to, no, this isn't Spiderman. He isn't Spiderman, no, this is Peter Parker. The Peter parker who flinches at every loud noise in the middle of class, the Parker that shows up late at decathlon practice, the Parker with good grades and overwhelming anxiety that interrupts the spaces between his words. That Parker.

With the full part of him, (the part that wasn't filled with Spider-Man and bravery) his legs guided themselves through the doors of the school. Surprisingly, there wasn't anyone in the hallways, not even the single trace of someone's backpack forsaken near an empty locker, nobody. Peter must have thought that he was too late, or too early since he held up his wrist. He had a watch that Mr. Stark gave him a specially customised watch with more webs than he could ever want stored in and an emergency button.

Peter pulled his gaze back onto the empty hallways of Midtown High and this time his head had guided him through, he walked through and turned his head left and right; Nothing.

Maybe I'm too early, Peter thought to himself as he knocked on the classroom door and without waiting for an answer, walked in.

Big mistake.

A few heads had turned to look at him, by a few, he meant everyone. Even Mr. Harrington had paused to look at him for a second before going back onto his computer to find out why the projector wasn't working. Peter hadn't realised that his losses were this important, as he paled, and as his heart had slowed down to 1 beat a second, he glued his eyes into the floor and walked to his seat. The least of his problems were that he forgot to apologise for being late.

“Dude, you okay?” Ned leaned in and whispered as Mr. Harrington had begun the lecture. Despite Peter feeling a little less okay with the attention being all on him he replied with an “I'm fine” and tore his eyes away from Neds.

He could hear MJ’s pencil scratching the paper and her gazes every once in a while due to his enhanced senses, it was all new. He listened to Mr. Harrington's lecture, emphasis on the ‘listened,’ he couldn't understand what he said. Words transparently ran through his head, completely incoherent. At least nobody was looking at him now, but he could see Abe hiding his phone under the desk and texting Charles across from him, but the letters were too small for him to understand what was written.

Betty–Who was sitting on Charles’ left–Leaned over to whisper something in his ear, accidentally throwing a glance to Peter; he was staring up at the board as Mr. Harrington wrote up some physics formulas to explain but he could see her expression lingering for shorter than a second.

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When the bell rung; indicating that the third class had ended, Peter felt like all the breath that had gathered at the bottom of both of his lungs flew crawling out of his throat and into the perfume of Michelles. He wasted no time packing up his stuff and running into the washroom.

What he wasn't surprised by was Ned following him into the stall, he locked the stall door and rested his back on the now locked door. Peter was sitting hunched over his knees on the covered toilet, he wasted no glance at the clean and marble bathroom flooring.

“Dude, I'm so sorry about May..” Ned had a different kind of expression on his face, one that the Star-Wars-fanboy-Ned wouldn't have, one that Peter didn't like looking at. He doesn't like staring at a concerned and apologetic Ned's expression.

“It's not your fault, you know that Ned.”

“I know, I know! But I still feel so bad, everyone's staring at you like you're the new Lady gaga–or–Man gaga!”

That one cracked a smile onto Peter's face and his once drooping eyelids widened atleast slightly more so the light in his eyes weren't blanketed anymore. He lifted his head up and saw that Ned was holding two trays, full of food. “Ned.. you didn't have to bring me food, I'm not hungry.”

Ned gave a slightly annoyed eyebrow raise at that. “Look man, I'm not trying to make you sadder but I know you know you haven't had any breakfast since.. y’know.. May.. so it's either this or I'm spoonfeeding it to you.”

Peter decided to shut up and take the tray, reluctantly taking a bite of his apple. The food pools to the bottom of his stomach, though he tried not to pay it any mind. Ned smiles as he takes a bite and decided to lead him out of the stall, the thing that surprised them both was MJ standing right Infront of them with crossed arms and a raised eyebrow.

Ned was first to gather his breath. “What–what are you doing in the men's bathroom?!”

“Listening into your conversation. It doesn't take a shield spy to know that you were both in the stall together, neither a physicist to see your shadows. So, let's just leave the washroom before Mr. Harrington sees that we're late to class.”

“The bell hasn't rung, if it did then my ears would've already been bleeding.”

“You know what I meant, get on with it Spiderman.”

Ned seemed upset that MJ didn't give him a hero name, and when she called him ‘Gottfried’ it didn't soothe his upset and he just further played upset.

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“So, uh.. who's gonna get you home?” Ned asked once the bell had rang and the 3 were packing up their stuff.

“My legs,” Peter replied “it doesn't take a doctor to figure that out.”

As Peter mocked MJ, they all walked out to their usual pick up waiting place; the front of Midtown. With MJ’s glares at the people staring at Peter, It spared him the anxiousness of facing their questions. Once MJ’s dad picked her up, Peter and Ned stayed together for a bit. It saved Peter from returning to an empty house, he guessed. Carrying his depressing thoughts away was a black SUV Infront of him and Ned, he stared at the expensive car for a second before going back to chattering with Ned, he guessed it was for another student. But when the windows lowered and the driver laid on the horn, it jumped Peter back to the gaze at the black car.

“Happy?” He said, his shocked expression and Happy’s annoyed one made up one hell of a story for Flash to make of. Next to Ned’s amused expression was Peter's surprised one.

“I thought you said you were gonna walk home?!”

“Get in, kid. Boss’ not waiting for nothing.” He hesitated while stepping away from Ned and murmuring–’I guess not..?’ as he jumped into the back on the car. Happy raised the tinted windows and drove off and away from a jaw dropped Ned. Once they were far away enough from Midtown, he asked;

“Where are we going? Mr. Stark didn't tell me that I was going to the compound, why are we going there? I have homework!” He sputtered out before Happy could even respond; annoyed.

“You're going to the Avengers compound, and don't ask me why. Boss likes you kid, he wants to be with you.” He responded with his usual annoyed tone, but it held some sort of concern as it reached Peter. At that, he decided not to push anymore questions as they parked into the Avengers Tower. Before he knew it, he was on the Starks private elevator to Tony’s personal floor.

As the elevator stopped, he reluctantly walked into the living floor of Tony’s. He felt as if each step he took he was breaking an expensive vase each, he glanced around, and he was surprised at how.. messy, and living the whole floor was. For the richest guy in the world, he had expected it to be a little cleaner and formal. But, he wasn't complaining. Actually, he liked how messy it was. It made it feel more alive, unlike the dead white and gray usual that rich people had.

The first thing he saw as he walked in were the remnants of the avengers living space, the TV was large and plain black, it was off. The sofa was as large as the TV, comfortable, with neutral red and gold rimmings. The glass table divided the TV and the sofa with empty plates of leftover spaghetti, he shifted his gaze onto the kitchen.

The kitchen was just as living as the open living room, a large pillar was the only thing dividing the two as they didn't have any doors or walls enclosing on them. A long and sleek dark gray acted as the table with 10 stools on both sides, two fridges were put next to each other with sticky pads on both with the one on the left written on ‘CAPTAIN AMERICA’S FRIDGE’ the other was ‘FAMILY FRIDGE’. He wondered why they would need two separate fridges, but he guessed it was just rich people stuff.

Before he could take in the rest of the floor, a knowing figure and a familiar motor oil smell interrupted his train of thoughts. He looked up at the engineer as he walked up to him. “Hey kid, why are you standing like there like that? Come on.”

Dr. Stark started, placing a hand on Peter's back and guiding him into the unfamiliar lab. Well, it wasn't as unfamiliar as it could have been. Usually he worked in the Stark towers lab, or the lower labs with the other interns and Tony chaperoning. But this one was different, it was larger, and it held cases with Tony’s Iron-Man suits and a singular Iron-Spider. He murmured a low ‘Woah’ as he walked in. Tony was about to rhetorically ask ‘Like what you see?’ but realised how disgusting it would sound so he refrained and pretended like he didn't hear him.

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A while after shaky hands and a couple minor shocks from the stress toy Dr. Stark was using)(–Wires) he sat across from Peter, he decided to speak up about May and laid down the wire that was exposed in the completely damaged Iron Man suit arm. “Peter, alright, tell me. What is actually going on? I'm not gonna push you if you don't wanna talk about it, but May is a death you'll have to speak up and accept soon enough. And If I know you, I know you don't come to acceptance THAT easily. So, go on.”

When Peter let his heart drop down to the bottom of his stomach, he let that meanwhile linger as the silence between their dialogue. He only spared Dr. Stark something of a glance before focusing more on the wires he was observing and connecting, he murmured breaths as he tried to organise the wires in his brain: weren't as easy to work through as the two in his hands. “I.. I don't really.. I don't have anything to say. I guess.. She's just dead, but.. I do have one question," he lifts his head to look up at Dr. Stark, "why did you call me to come to the Avengers compound?" he honestly wanted to ask more, that if it was because he wanted to simply talk about Mays death, and why they were at the Avengers Compound instead of Stark Industries, but his mouth stayed frozen at the end of his sentence so he let it melt and close as Dr. Stark spoke.

"Exactly what I just asked kid, I can't possibly understand why and how you're not freaking out and sobbing when Aunt May just died, but then again I can't understand teenagers like ever so it wouldn't make any sense for me to ask that to a teenager. I don't know if teenagers at like me and think and like think like me but that would mean I have a kids mind, and I'm sure I'm not a kid but you are like–you're mind is not teenage at all like you're a smart kid so and I don't im not trying to make you feel insulted I'm not I am not trying to make you feel insulted but–"

"I.. I think i get it Dr. Stark, uh.. Yeah, I think.." Peter thought that Dr. Stark might have Adhd with how much he stuttered. one thing he had noticed, is that whenever Dr. Stark was nervous or couldn't get his thoughts straight, he would stutter. Alot. And it just seemed to have happened much more since talking about May with Peter, and he couldn't understand why. May wasn't and didn't seem too important to Tony so.. Peter couldn't figure why he was so nervous, why Dr. Stark was stuttering so much and why he couldn't look him in the eye.

He supposed he would get that answer later, because Peter Parker didn't want to leave Tony Stark. Atleast, not yet. Not soon.

Chapter Text

"What the hell am I doing.." Tony murmured under his breath, checking with a black pen his signature. Well, that was a lie. Tony knew exactly what he was doing, he knew he had to do this and he knew he desperately wanted to. Of course, he wasn't put on as Peter's emergency contact for no reason! the right and dominant part of his brain was screaming a positive reaction to him signing, while his left cried blood.

"You're signing a contract which indicates that you are now Peter Parkers legal Guardian." With a fully practiced tone of authority; spoke Pepper Potts. She pulled the paper away and slipped it into a file under her desk.

"Rhetorical. That was.. A rhetorical question. Y'know, emphasis on the periods instead of question marks–"

"I know what a rhetorical question is Tony."

Dr. Stark mentally punched the annoying little silver.. Moving.. Stick thingys in frustration and a pinch of annoyance. Atleast, the greatest pinch of annoyance. He would've asked her if he could stop it but he already did and we know how that would turn out.

He sighed, "Alright.. I'll be in my office if you need me–" He stood up and walked over to the door, pausing when his hand perched itself on the handle to speak.

"I probably will, and you most definitely will act asleep so you wouldn't have to do your own work."

"I DO do my own work, what do you think I'm doing all day in my lab?"

"Then why am I the one signing paperwork?"

"Because you never backed down from the job of being a CEO." He stated, and decided that was enough to say and left her office.

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So that was what Dr. Stark was hiding, well, not HIDING.. More like holding back, he definitely planned on telling Peter but.. Not yet, obviously. When the time came, but he just didn't expect the time to come this soon.

It was when a comfortable silence fell over the both of them; when He and Him were sitting opposite to eachother on a table and a hologram divided them with their own blueprints. Peter was working on his 'webshooter fluid', Tony knew because he asked. And he always got his answers. Dr. Stark was fixing up his broken suit arm, it was a good suit and he wouldn't leave it in the rubbish because of a little dislocation. The silence was toned with a pinch of awkwardness when Peter had glanced at Tony a few times in anticipation, atleast he suspected it to be anticipation. But he wasn't sure, so he didn't know if he should've said something or let the silence go on.

"So uh.. I've been meaning to ask.. Why did you bring me to the Avengers Compound instead of Stark Industries?"

Shit.

Shit? Was everything going to go to shit when Peter asked that question? When the time came? He wasn't so sure. But it didn't make a difference anyway, Tony stark was never sure about anything, but he still took that second-guess anytime he had the chance to, so what was so difficult about this one?

He lifted his head to look at him for a bit, then turned it back down. "Well, since you asked.. Uh.. Just a minute!"

Tony paused to think, then slid his phone off the table and walked into the washroom. He left a dazed looking Peter there and decided to listen to the line ring a couple of times until he heard a pick up. He was pleased to hear a familiar voice reply. "What is it Tony? I'm in the middle of a meeting–"

"You truly are my saviour! Okay, remember the guardianship contract I signed?? Yeah, I need that. Like, right now!"

Silence..

"Why do you need it?" "Peter asked a question I couldn't answer just– give me the contract paper thing."

Tony knew there was no way to get to the contract he signed, so he didn't know how or why he was asking. "The contract paper is at Stark industries." he realised.

About time he had realised.

There was a moment of silence before Pepper - an angel - spoke, "is Clint in the building?" she asked, expectation built up in each syllable she allowed to leave through her mouth. "Yes, he's pretty INSIDE the building. He's in the fucking vents and he's probably listening into our conversation!"

It wasn't long until a slightly muffled voice came from the vents, causing Tony to sigh and shut his eyes. He never believed in the quote 'Out of sight, out of mind,' but right now it was looking pretty Strong. "HELLO."

His familiar voice echoed throughout the vents, reaching Dr. Stark's eardrums. He seemed to hold a face that screamed, the message entails: 'You are a curse I wish I had never summoned.'

"Why do you need Clint I know Clint would love to do whatever you want him to do but why and what is it?" Tony murmured into the phone, opening his eyes only to glare at the vents. Pepper seemed to follow the murmur and decided to mimic it, understanding why his voice was so low. "I have a plan, you tell Clint to grab the contract from the file under my desk, and bring it to Avengers compound through the vents."

Tony listened reluctantly, raising an eyebrow and decided to put the phone call on speaker for Clint to hear. When he got a yell of confirmation, Dr. Stark supposed it to be enough of a message and shut the call.