Something Tried and True
Steve looked out the panoramic glass windows of the compound, his hip serving as a casual perch for his hand and a heavy contemplation etched across his face.
The hallway he occupied stayed busy, SHIELD agents and different staff going about their early morning activities. They continued on with their daily business regardless of his presence; their paths never intersecting, and never needing to, as he stood at a standstill.
The moment of pause in an otherwise hectic lifestyle was needed — much needed. For a man who’d been frozen in ice nearly seventy years, it felt as if he’d never stopped moving. But even he knew the brief respite wouldn’t last for long.
It never seemed to these days.
Though the morning sun caught vividly on the glass window walls, it was the bright orange of the spaceship that reflected against Steve’s face, highlighting the lines drawn into his skin like roads on a map. Each created a new path for his never-ending journey — one that, judging from the ship outside and the newcomers now occupying their compound, was a journey that wouldn’t be stopping anytime soon.
Just when he thought life was as crazy as it could possibly get.
“That’s a spaceship.”
Anchoring his right side was Sam, with his dry and blunt statement arriving so suddenly — and with such perfect timing to his thoughts — that a small smile began to tug at Steve’s lips.
“Mmhh-hm,” Bucky sounded from his left, equally as dry — if not more derisive.
That much Steve expected.
But nonetheless, his smile still grew.
Indeed, out the windows and settled on the many acres of land was a spaceship far too large to be housed in the hangar bay. It captivated not just Steve’s attention, but his fellow teammates as well. And it wasn’t just those who stood on each side of him, like Sam and Bucky — both having gravitated to the view no different than Steve before them.
“Yep,” Clint succinctly ‘popped’ his lips, sitting on the bottom step of a staircase not too far away from the other three men. “Hasn’t changed in the last thirty-six hours. Don’t think it’s gunna change anytime soon.”
A steaming mug of coffee reached for his lips, where he took a sip so loud that Steve swore it held every bit of exhaustion he expected from a father who had a toddler back home — and who was abruptly woken up in the middle of night for ‘work’ related business; earning a few choice words from the archer that not even Steve felt comfortable repeating.
He went to chuckle, barely managing a tiny huff as the air trapped in his chest finally escaped in a breath too heavy to be anything other than a sigh. It wasn't as if he wanted to disturb Clint during what little time he seemed to get with his family. And for what it was worth, he held off for as long as he could.
Unfortunately, SHIELD had a tendency to go way over his head; it was simply the nature of the beast. And when they demanded all hands on deck for an alien spacecraft landing at the compound — well, Steve couldn't argue their caution. Especially not after the Battle of New York.
Plus, Thor had requested Pop-Tarts.
It was killing two birds with one stone, needing to getting Clint back east-side while also stocking up on their kitchen supply for the God of Thunder. But without any question of doubt, it was also the weirdest phone call Steve had to make, possibly in his entire accumulated one-hundred years alive.
He was beyond appreciative that he could always count on his team — no matter how far away they were — to be there when he needed them. When Clint had arrived last night, it was with slew of colorful words and a handful of shopping bags that Steve was almost positive Thor had already devoured by now.
“That’s an actual alien spaceship,” Sam repeated himself, disbelief still dripping off his every word as if it were his first time looking at the spacecraft.
“Mmhh-hm,” Bucky’s murmur sounded for a second time, dryer than the first.
Followed by an even louder slurp from Clint — along with a muffled, spoken directly into his coffee, “Yep.”
Steve let his smile stretch a little wider up his face, though the act didn't come easily. It was hard to truly let himself relax after all that happened. If his guard remained up, it wasn’t all entirely his fault.
To say it had been an eventful day and a half would be putting it subtly. And while he personally didn't perceive any threat with the newcomers who arrived, it still gave him one hell of a late night scare that nearly put the entire facility in lock-down.
Luckily for them, the eccentric mismatched bunch only seemed to want nothing more than to tag along for Thor’s visit. One incredibly impromptu visit, that was — of which Steve knew suggesting a ‘heads up’ for next time wouldn’t do anything other than give Thor a hefty laugh and a slap on Steve’s back that would cripple the otherwise average man.
“A ship that came from space.” Sam kept his eyes dead set ahead as he spoke, not trusting himself to look away from the humongous spaceship that took up most their land.
“Mmhh-hm,” Bucky’s murmur sounded no different than the two times that came before.
That finally got Sam to break his gaze, his head rocketing over to Bucky with enough force that it sent a breeze through Steve's hair.
“With aliens on board,” Sam stressed, staring at Bucky as if he’d grown three heads and suddenly gained a second metal arm.
From the staircase, Clint gave a simple, concise nod with a simple, concise, “Yep.”
The SHIELD agents kept their due diligence watching the foreign spacecraft, treating it like the possible weapon it might suddenly become — something that, again, Steve couldn't fault them for. It was just one of the many compromises the strange group had to comply with if they wanted to stay. Along with a full medical clearance that sounded an array of even stranger words from the talking raccoon.
As it turned out, the middle finger proved to be a literal universal gesture.
With a tension in his jaw that caused his teeth to ache, Steve finally let himself sigh as deep as his lungs would let him. Clint was right on the money — it was only two nights ago the spaceship arrived, where the foreigners had been immediately whisked away for SHIELD examination. And while it was taking some folks like Sam time to truly digest how incredibly bizarre the situation was, Steve found himself stuck on something else entirely. Something completely different from spaceships and aliens entering his already crazy life.
It took a lot of contemplation to figure out what that thing was. Looking outside the large glass windows, Steve let the realization draw a new line on his face — adding another road on the map etched in his skin; the diffused glow of orange from outside painting his complexion with the complexity of his journey. Never-ending, it seemed.
Running outside to the fields of the compound with bare feet and nothing but his Captain America shield had been a rude awakening — and not just in the literal sense, having been jolted out of sleep by blaring sirens that sounded from every corner of the facility, tightening his chest until he was sure his rib-cage would shatter underneath the pressure.
There'd been an uneasy feeling in his gut ever since, one that wouldn’t go away — not even thirty-six hours later, long after it turned out there was no danger to be alarmed over.
They'd been safe here for so long that the very concept of a threat to the compound hadn't ever truly passed Steve’s mind. Not long enough to linger on, not long enough to truly contemplate. It wasn't until now — now that it became a real possibility — that he let himself chew on those thoughts. Realizing with a sick feeling that there was far more danger here than he'd let himself prepare for.
Sure, SHIELD’s occupance was an added layer of protection he couldn't deny existed. It was one of the benefits to sharing the property with the top-secret organization; lending them an east-coast head quarters while the team could stay on-site for any abrupt need. Not even Tony seemed to have uprooted himself from the comfort they’d unintentionally established since moving out of the Avengers Tower.
Steve hadn't expected him to stay after the dismantling of the Accords. Now, it was odd when the man wasn't around.
Silently, and without ever truly acknowledging it, they had all created a safe haven of sorts together. They fell into roles without ever realizing it, forging a refuge for themselves, a place where they could lay their heads and know they'd be protected by one another while they slept.
It was where they could have each others backs, even in the most mundane ways — Clint stocking the kitchen supply with a personal touch for everyone, and the entire team knowing better than to touch Natasha's stash of unsalted almonds. Using the excuse of having meetings over dinner, when the subject of work never seemed to be brought up over the course of their meal. They even saw it in their surroundings — the sofa’s in the lounge became worn down, greatly in need of replacement after gatherings became routine and one another’s company became the norm.
Without ever realizing it, they had created a home.
And the false alarms that came with Thor's arrival shook the very blood inside Steve’s veins, bringing him to the unsettling realization that everything that mattered to him, everything he never knew he held dearly — his friends, his family…they could all be taken away in the blink of an eye.
Even with Captain America right down the hall.
Steve could feel the frown pulling on his face, knowing full well that while everything turned out just fine the other night, there was no making that same promise for the next time. A striking fear knotted in his gut at the probability, with the burden of responsibility as a leader suddenly weighing heavy against his shoulders.
Instead of letting it drag him down, he pulled his shoulders back tautly, straightening his posture to stand taller — lifting his chin slightly to catch the bright glare of the sun shinning through the windows.
Family hadn't ever been a word that found a place in his vocabulary. Some time ago that had changed — so naturally, Steve hadn't even realized it occurred. He came to realize that meant he needed to change along with it.
It was his job to protect everyone, to protect the team — he took on that role without ever needing SHIELD to list it under his responsibilities. That was a personal responsibility he accepted, silently and wordlessly, without ever needing another person to know. It was simply ingrained in the fibers of his being.
Sticking up for the little guy, protecting the innocent, avenging those who deserve better — that would always be his way of life, embedded into his very bone marrow. But there was a whole other principle that slowly yet surely started to top them all. A priority that would be first and foremost, no matter the circumstance.
It was whatever he had to do to protect his home, and the family in it. The false alarm was a wake-up call, one he needed. If an attack on the compound became a reality, he’d make sure that he’d be prepared for it.
Even if that meant going down with his shield along the way.
“You guys really telling me I’m the only one bugging over an actual spaceship?” Sam couldn’t have been more blunt if he tried, his arms folded so tightly against his chest it was a wonder he could even breathe.
It plucked Steve right out of his thoughts, and he immediately looked to his right, arching his eyebrow so high it nearly reached his hairline. Despite looking at Sam, the man never returned the gesture, still staring out the window at the spacecraft with a stupefied astonishment taking up every inch of his face.
Bucky pursed his lips as he dryly sounded, “Mmhh-hm.”
Steve didn't even need to look down the hallway to know the slurp of coffee that followed came from Clint — who finished with a large gulp, a loud exhale, and a short, curt, “Yep.”
Steve chuckled, letting the tension in his shoulders melt away with each gentle laugh that left his chest. His hand found Sam’s shoulder and patted firmly before he swiveled his head to the left, catching Bucky’s gaze and holding onto it with a permanent smirk planted on his face.
“You fella’s ready to meet a God?”
If Peter concentrated any harder on rebuilding his web cartridges, he was sure that he’d give himself a juvenile stroke — not that Tony would’ve noticed, too busy across the workshop with welding goggles covering his eyes and sparks of molten metal igniting the room with bright flashes of heat.
The two were so caught up in their individual tasks that for once, the music playing overhead could barely be heard. Tony’s protective gear blocked out the sounds on his end, with earmuffs snugly fit over his head — whereas Peter’s intense focus kept his attention strictly on the machine in front of him; his hands carefully removing a freshly molded web cartridge that he not-so-carefully tossed into the tray on the opposite side of the table.
He was so focused on creating the next cartridge that he almost failed to pay any mind as DUM-E came wheeling by, carefully picking up the tray with an advance grip of his pincher claw and taking it across the workshop.
Peter was just about to push down on the hydraulic press mold — far more advanced than the dinky old model he had back home — when he saw the robot come to a stop near Tony’s work station.
“Wait—! No, no, no, no, no! Not over there, DUM-E — not over there!” Peter rushed out in a panic, his one hand waving frantically in DUM-E’s direction. “If that heat gets too close to the cartridges, they'll explode!”
Despite the commotion that suddenly erupted, Tony never looked up from his own project. The intense sparks of metal continued to reflect against his goggles as DUM-E slowly retreated away from the dangerous heat, taking the tray with him until he found a safe spot to discard it.
It clanked and clattered as he dropped it down onto a cluttered bench.
“Yeah, yeah — right over there, that’s perfect, that’s great.” Peter’s bulky, heavy-duty work gloves kept his thumbs-up from fully forming, but he tried nonetheless. “Thanks, DUM-E, you’re the best.”
Tony never looked up from his welding as he said, “Stop complimenting him, he’ll think he’s doing a good job.”
Peter spun around on his stool until he faced Tony — nearly spinning all the way around had he not scraped his sneakers against the floor to prevent a complete three-sixty turn.
“He is doing a good job!” Peter defended, his smile reaching ear-to-ear while his arm extended straight out like a stick. “He’s only caused like, one fire so far.”
The sizzling heat of Tony’s welding torch came to an abrupt stop, with the sparks that flew off the scorching metal eventually dissipating in the air like embers.
“Him?” Tony asked, the hand not holding his welding torch lifting the safety goggles over his head — exposing his eyes in full. “Or you?”
Peter wished he could blame the heat of Tony’s welding for the embarrassed blush that dotted his cheeks. Unfortunately, it was hard to say whether the look on Mr. Stark’s face, one-hundred percent ‘not buying it’, was the cause of his humiliation — or the fire extinguisher that laid used and now trashed across the workshop, with bits of foam still dripping down the sides.
In his defense, he wasn’t expecting an entire tray of his web cartridges to explode from a few nearby flames of Mr. Stark’s welding torch. And in double his defense, he wasn’t expecting DUM-E to have a full blown panic attack when struggling to find the fire extinguisher that Peter misplaced the last time they were in the workshop together.
From the look on Tony’s face, Peter figured neither defense was going to win his case.
“I just gotta get a stronger casing on these things,” Peter mumbled, more to himself than anyone else. The bulky safety glove that covered his hand massaged half-heartedly at the nape of his neck. “The aluminum shelling of the cartridge is way better than the original design, but the melting point of six hundred degrees is still too low.”
DUM-E’s whine of discontent towards the situation almost sounded like he agreed with Peter — who felt lowkey bad for startling the robot with a very unexpected fire that, much to Peter’s surprise, barely phased Mr. Stark.
“What are you trying to do,” Tony started to ask, yanking off his safety goggles and earmuffs with one quick motion and tossing them onto the table with ease. “Jump into fires?”
Peter gave a dramatic shrug, one that brought both his shoulders all the way up to his ears.
“Maybe,” he murmured, insecurely turning back to the machine in front of him. His fingers fiddled on the handle of the press mold without any real intention of continuing his work. “Wouldn’t be the first time I wound up in a burning building.”
The sigh that escaped his chest was unintentional, and halted mid-exhale. Peter clamped his mouth shut and clenched his jaw with frustration, shaking away the lingering thoughts of self-doubt that had so rudely managed to creep into his head lately.
Seriously — who would’ve thought the pressures of being brought back from the dead would top the stresses of maintaining his GPA in high-school. He sure didn’t.
Though music still played overhead and throughout the workshop, and was far louder now that Tony’s welding had taken a pause, Peter had a gut feeling that his sigh still managed to be heard — even with his best attempts to stifle it.
A dead giveaway was the lingering stare that burned a hole in his back. It felt hotter than if Tony’s eyes were actual welding torches blowing fire right against his t-shirt, with the large print text of ‘Think like a proton and stay positive’ catching the overhead ceiling lights.
Right along with ‘that’ look Peter was all too familiar with.
“Just…gotta make sure I’m prepared. For the next time,” Peter muttered, not daring to give ‘that’ look any acknowledgment as he ripped off both his gloves with the desperate need to fidget his hands. The heat that spread across his cheeks — this time for a reason other than one impromptu use of a fire extinguisher — kept him from turning to face that stare head-on.
That was, until, Mr. Stark finally spoke up.
“You’re distracted.”
Peter spun in his stool so rapidly, he didn’t stop until the entire three-sixty ride gradually circled him back in Tony’s direction.
“Of course I’m distracted!” Peter practically shouted, tossing both his arms wildly in the air. “There’s a spaceship outside!”
Tony gave a sharp, short nod before turning right back to his work. “And there it is.”
Peter either elected not to hear his exasperation, or was way too excited to pay it any attention.
“You gotta let me meet them, Mr. Stark — c’mon!” Peter all but exclaimed, to the point where his voice cracked in pitch and he couldn’t even bother to care about it.
Tony didn’t even look at Peter as he wagged the welding torch his way.
“That homework finished yet?” he asked, deadpanned and serious — so deadpanned and serious that at first, Peter swore on his young life the man was joking.
It took a solid five seconds to realize he wasn’t.
“What!?” Peter, once again, was too worked up too notice the crack in his voice. His arms flew down from the ceiling until a rigid hand pointed right at Tony. “You said if I spent two hours working on my paper you would compromise and let me spend two hours working on my web cartridges—”
Tony nodded. “Yes, I know, I never said that I didn’t say that—”
“You just said that!” Peter hastily interrupted.
Tony made a face, one that words failed to describe. “I just said that I never said that, I didn’t say—”
Peter kept his hand pointed at Tony. “You totally said that, Mr. Stark—!”
It was Tony’s turn to spin around on his stool, the look that followed so hot it put his welding torch to shame.
Peter elected to keep his mouth shut after that.
Reluctantly.
And with much struggle.
Almost as if he had it down to a science, Tony didn’t speak again until Peter swallowed his lips whole — as if the man knew it would be a waste of oxygen to even try speaking before that. The kid’s sheepishness kicked in like second nature, and Tony waited until those lips — too loose for their own good — sealed away before wagging his welding torch in Peter’s direction for a second time.
“You’re only here right now, kid, because your aunt gave up her weekend with you to make up for a disruption in rotation with the wedding,” Tony casually reminded him, using his free hand to carefully arrange the dismantled pieces of metal on the table below — in no organizational pile that Peter could make sense of.
Peter made a face that nearly rivaled Tony’s from before, a long pause morphing that expression into a tight grimace.
“May let me come here because she’s on a weekend trip with Happy to Vermont.” Peter shook his head with a muttered, “Still weird to say.”
Tony rolled his eyes, noticeable even with the distance that separated them. The chunks of metal on the table below, however, remained far enough away that Peter couldn’t quite make out each piece with perfect precision.
It wasn’t as if he needed too, though. The decade old arc reactor had enough of a signature design that any ol’ fool could’ve picked it out in a field full of junk. Even disassembled and now torn apart by his own hands, Tony’s once life-saving device glimmered brightly underneath the overhead lights.
Tony picked up a small hammer and began striking down with heavy force on a single, dismembered piece of that iconic device.
“The distance doesn’t negate her wrath,” Tony said, finding a rhythm with each hit and sticking to it. “You don’t finish that homework, and I get blasted in the private repulsor parts by one surprisingly lenient aunt, all circumstances considered, who was promised you’d be properly chaperoned to ensure academic success. So pick up that pencil—”
Peter furrowed his brows. “It’s all done on my laptop—”
“—and hit the books,” Tony finished, with one more swing of his hammer, and a final, “Hard. Capiche?”
Peter tried not to sigh.
He tried, and he gave himself credit for that, but it was impossible not to be disappointed after finding out about all the activity that happened at the compound just a few days ago — and now being told he still had to do homework in-spite of it all.
Sitting inside the same building as actual aliens from outer space — talk about things that were never not gunna be weird — Peter knew the ongoing issue of temperature limits to his web cartridges would only keep him preoccupied for so long. Even if May had chewed his ear off the other day when his once-missing cartridges, unbeknownst to him, created a sticky mess in her office.
Peter still couldn’t figure out what had gotten them so hot that it caused a web explosion all over the contents of her desk. Including the paperwork that she insisted couldn’t be salvaged.
But it was also impossible to focus on anything other than space aliens occupying the same building as him.
As if noticing that inability to focus, Tony snapped his fingers in a way that his heavy work gloves prevented anyone from hearing.
“Get a move on, shake a leg — sooner you start, sooner you finish.” Tony didn’t even spare Peter’s puppy dog eyes the time of day, already back to his project before he’d finished speaking; sorting through the scrap metal that laid in front of him with ease.
Peter gave a quick glance to the cracked screen of his cell phone and noticeably frowned when he caught the time. It was still late morning approaching early afternoon, yet it felt like he’d been waiting an entire lifetime for a greet-and-meet that Mr. Stark kinda-sorta-not-really promised him.
Peter couldn’t remember for sure — he had been really excited when Happy picked him up from school last night and was told some ‘unusual guests’ tagged along with Thor on his return to Earth.
The latter alone had Peter bouncing in his seat the entire way to the compound. Once he discovered that the infamous missing boy from Missouri was a part of the ‘alien guests’ who had landed, there was simply no containing his excitement.
And now, instead of meeting them all, he was stuck doing an English essay for Ms. Warren’s class.
Because apparently Parker Luck was as infinite as the space the actual aliens had arrived from.
It was both equally awesome as it was weird.
Tony had just returned to welding and Peter had dug for his laptop out of his backpack when he turned back around, hopeful optimism etching across every inch of his face.
“When I finish my homework, can I meet them then?” Peter couldn’t help but scooch forward, using the heels of his sneakers to push the stool across the workshop until he was halfway to Tony’s station. “And Thor? Can I meet Thor?”
Tony dropped the welding torch and went to rub at the bridge of his nose, stopping when the heavy duty gloves kept him from giving his muscles the massage they desperately needed.
One by one, he took off the protective gear and then scrubbed at his face, letting out a sigh that Peter had a feeling he’d been holding in for a while now.
Just like ‘that’ look, Peter knew full well what ‘that’ sigh meant.
“Thor — maybe, I dunno — kid, keeping track of Thor is like keeping track of a six-month old puppy without a leash.” Without even looking at Peter, Tony wagged a hand flippantly in his direction. “He comes and goes faster than we can keep up with — if you see him, just don’t let him near any of the glassware. Man has no respect for the dishes around here.”
It was a good while before Tony looked up again. When he finally did, and only after what appeared to be a silent pep talk to get there, Peter had managed to inch closer towards his side of the workshop while barely making any noise along the way.
Tony arched an eyebrow, looking him up and down — and then again.
And finally, again.
“You’re not gunna focus on that paper until you get an answer, are you?”
“A spaceship, Mr. Stark!” Peter exclaimed, the only thing wider than his grin being both his arms, spread out further than even what the Staten Island Ferry had once stretched him to be.
Tony spun his stool to face him head-on, keeping a tight pinch on the bridge of his nose as he silently willed away the complications Peter was sure had to exist in a situation like this.
The sigh had given it away. It always did.
“Kid…” Tony started to say, with another sigh at that — the frustration in his breath expressing those complications Peter knew existed somewhere.
FRIDAY lowered the volume of music playing overheard without ever being asked, and Tony didn’t fail to throw an annoyed look at the ceiling along the way — as if perturbed at his own AI’s behavior.
He rolled his eyes before looking back down at Peter.
“The last I heard, Mr. Missouri and the The Marvelous Martins passed SHIELD’s medical clearance — but whether or not they get to stay is completely up to the guys upstairs.” A beat took the room as Tony pointed a thumb casually behind his back. “Not so literally, the big dogs at SHIELD. Ones too important to hang around here.”
Peter tried not to let himself get bummed out — he did, get bummed out that was, but he tried. Yet there was simply no denying the disappointment that hit his gut once hearing the words ‘SHIELD’ leave Tony’s mouth.
He figured there’d be complications with actual aliens coming to the compound — so awesome — seeing as the Battle of New York was only five years behind them. It went without saying that SHIELD still had sensitivity issues to aliens arriving on Earth. Peter couldn’t even blame them for being extra cautious, not after all that happened that day and ever since.
“Are they gunna let them? Stay?” Peter timidly, and almost too quietly asked. “Is SHIELD gunna let them stay?”
Tony worked his jaw and clucked his tongue, finally easing up on the bridge of his nose only to wrap both arms tightly around his chest with each hand digging deep into his armpits.
“Thor’s good graces with SHIELD is the only reason they weren’t shot down at first sight,” Tony explained, almost as he were speaking his thoughts out loud with Peter’s benefit of hearing it all be said. His eyes found a wall and latched on there without any real focus. “We’ll have to see how much sway the God of Thunder still has with Fury’s lackeys. If any of good ‘ol Coulson’s stories hold up…”
A stretch of silence made every whir and whine from DUM-E all the louder. For a moment, Tony stared off at nothing, unfolding his arms only so he could absentmindedly move a few pieces of metal on the table off to the side with a single digit.
He stopped almost as quickly as he started, redirecting that finger straight at Peter.
“Work on that,” Tony sternly told him, gesturing to the laptop. “You’re not going anywhere until you get that done. Regardless of if we have visitors or not.”
Though Peter rolled his eyes at Mr. Stark, his smile stayed in place. It took him a few scooches to get back over to his work table, and with the laptop out of his backpack, he threw open the top and quickly booted up his systems.
“Aliens, man,” Peter excitedly muttered to himself, typing in his password with his grin only growing larger by the second. “So cool.”
It was hard to focus on his paper — half-written and only on its first draft — while the thoughts of Mr. Stark’s wedding and Thor’s attendance floated through his already over-worked and over-excited brain.
Even if he didn’t get to see the other aliens who came along with him — which, Peter wouldn’t deny would be a huge bummer, seeing as the missing boy from Missouri had captivated his attention ever since his cross-country summer road trip with Mr. Stark — there was still no doubt that the God of Thunder joining the wedding party was going to be awesome on its own merits.
Peter really couldn’t deny it anymore. There was something incredibly invigorating about the upcoming wedding; almost as if he felt brought back to life for a second time, renewing his spirit in all the ways he didn’t know he needed.
For once, it really felt like everything was coming together to be okay. Like not even Parker Luck was strong enough to intervene.
After all, friends and family of all kind were going to celebrate two really awesome people, in Peter’s unbiased opinion, marry for the reason of love.
How cool was that?
Suddenly, Peter found himself staring at his fingers, each digit spread across the keyboard but never once striking down on the letters below him.
It was a long moment before he looked up — where he found Tony working diligently with a pair of pillars, carefully shaping the piece of metal that once sat inside his chest into a circular band no bigger than Peter’s finger.
“Hey, Mr. Stark?” Peter called out on a whim.
Tony kept his eyes strictly on his task as he sounded out, “Hm?”
Peter watched for a beat that went on a little too long — earning a curious look from Tony along the way — as the man bent and folded the amber glowing metal with a pair of pillars in one hand and blacksmith tongs in the other.
Even though Mr. Stark hadn’t actually told him what he was working on, Peter was smart enough to put the two and two together. And while his visiting weekends were always ‘Internship’ days — which meant sometimes they’d work on their suits together, other times they’d brainstorm crazy new ideas that either took off or failed — Mr. Stark was right, today wasn’t technically an ‘Internship’ day. Not on his off-weekend that May had traded to make up for next week’s wedding.
And so, without any real plans for the weekend, Mr. Stark had simply told him he had a project he needed to wrap up. For Peter, that was the extent of that.
Taking a moment to truly watch and examine Tony’s movements, Peter didn’t need verbal confirmation on what he saw. It was obvious to the passing eye; a ring of sorts being crafted by hand, and the material used to forge it laid all across the table Mr. Stark had stationed himself at.
Peter could tell himself all he wanted that he didn’t know what provoked his next question. But even he knew the focus of the wedding had taken his thoughts hostage for a while now — sometimes even more than the lingering weight of being brought back to life.
“When you asked Ms. Potts to marry you…” Peter trailed off, swallowing hard to wet his parched throat. “When did you…I mean, how’d you…”
Tony slowly set his tongs down, careful on where he put the glowing hot ring along the way. An arch eyebrow vocalized his puzzlement more than words could’ve.
“How’d you know?” Peter forced himself to finish, the best that he could.
Tony let the tongs lay down next to his welding torch, being sure to keep the still-glowing metal in a safe place where it couldn’t be disturbed.
“That she’d say yes?” he tried to clarify, proving Peter’s attempt ineffective after all.
Looking down at his work table, Peter tapped his finger on the surface without ever stopping — never once finding the courage to look at Tony when he spoke.
“That you…loved her,” Peter managed to fight against every atom in his body that screamed for him to stop talking. “How do…how do you know when you love somebody?”
When Peter finally looked back up at Tony, he wished nothing more than if he could go back in time and shut up after all. The look of confusion on the man’s face was enough for Peter to crawl into a ditch and die from dirt inhalation.
“Like, obviously I know what love is,” he tried — oh boy did he try to make himself look better. “It’s not that I don’t know what love is — I love May, I love…you know, other family. And friends.”
He was making it worse. With every growing inch of Tony’s smirk, Peter knew he was making it worse.
“But what’s it like?” Peter finally found the words to ask, and with a heavy sigh parting the break that came in-between. “With you and Ms. Potts? What’s…what’s that like?”
Peter wasn't lying — not even in his nervous stammered fit that failed to string together a coherent sense of words. He knew what love was. He knew he loved Uncle Ben, he knew he still loved Aunt May. He knew he loved his parents at one point — what kid didn’t?
But yet, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t stop thinking about almost two nights ago. Not because of the aliens that landed at the compound while he was in Queens — no, something else finally disrupted his excitement for that.
It was remembering MJ’s smile on the bridge, and the way she smelt like powdered doughnuts and vanilla lavender, mixed with the draft of sea water that rose from down below.
The way the bridge’s lights made her skin look like polished chestnuts, and her hair a perfect frizzled mess of tangled vines and curls.
How her laugh was as soft as the wind, and her smile was bright as the setting sun.
It was remembering the way she made him feel — a way he’d never felt before. A feeling he couldn’t quite explain, but also couldn’t forget.
Peter couldn’t help but wonder what that was.
And as Tony looked at him head-on, with a small smile turning his lip up towards his ear, it was easy to say the older man had it figured out a long time ago.
“Well, Mr. Parker…” Tony went on to clear his throat, “when a man loves a woman—”
“Alright, alright — stop, stop, stop!” Peter waved both hands frantically in front of him, his eyes clenched tightly shut along the way. “Forget it, just forget it. Forget I said anything.”
Because of course Mr. Stark wouldn’t pass up that opportunity.
The belly-laugh that followed from him only proved as much.
Annoyed, Peter returned to his laptop as Mr. Stark’s laugh began to slowly fade away — not that the words on his screen did him much good either. It was all gibberish at this point, and the stare against his back returned, this time with a vengeance.
Tony could’ve actually blown his welding torch against Peter and he wouldn’t have known a difference.
“So how are things going with MJ?” Tony finally broke the silence with a smirk so proud, it etched new lines on his face.
Peter spun in his chair so fast, he nearly tipped right off.
“That’s not what I asked—”
“It’s called reading between the lines—” Tony blithely argued.
“Then-then learn to read!” Peter’s defense was weaker than a newborn child. “Because you clearly can’t read—”
“Oh, yeah?” Tony cocked his head to the side.
Peter rapidly nodded his. “Yeah, because there-there are no lines…to be read. So…you’re just…reading…nothing.”
Once again, Tony folded both arms over his chest and leaned back, resting against the edge of his work table with an expression so cocky, Peter suddenly had a full understanding on how the man got to be where he was in life.
He relented, with as sigh so dramatic it put an emphasis on each of his sixteen years alive.
“Things are going good,” Peter finally answered, a bob of his head getting stronger by the second. “Really good.”
The pause that followed was on purpose. Tony kept quiet, just long enough that Peter could whisper a hushed, but carefree, “…scarey good.”
When Tony didn’t respond a second time around — again on purpose — DUM-E strolled by with a few “Whee- whoops” to break the silence.
They both threw him a look of annoyance, both at the same time, before he rolled away.
“I just don’t know how I feel about her and if, like…” Peter trailed off, waving his hand in every which direction as if that would clarify his nonsensical ramblings. “I dunno, if this is, like…if what I’m feeling is…”
Tony straightened his head, looking Peter straight on.
“Love?” he asked, the crinkle in his eyes matching the crinkle of his lips.
Peter tried to hide the blush that heated his cheeks, but even turning away briefly wasn’t enough to disguise what was so openly worn on his face.
“What’s it like?” Peter asked with little preamble, diving head first into what he figured would be awkward no matter what either of them did or said. He knew if he didn’t jump now, he never would. “When you…you know, love somebody? How do you…how do you even know? What’s it even like?”
There was a long hesitation on Tony’s behalf, but not one Peter worried would be an abrupt end to a conversation that had yet to start. His eyes once again gravitated towards nothing, looking away to give his head the freedom it needed to formulate his words.
Finally, he pointed a finger up ahead, lackadaisically gesturing to the fire extinguisher in the corner of the room — where he’d been staring all along.
“It’s like a fire,” Tony nodded ahead, silently pointing to the tray of still smoldering web cartridges that saw their fate at the hands of a few welding sparks. “One that requires kindling — they all do. You have to tend to it, nurture it, feed it — or else it'll just burn out.”
Peter looked to the tray of smokey web cartridges, and then to the used fire extinguisher on the floor, before finally swinging his gaze back at Tony.
The man had redirected his own eyes down to the surface of his table; where pieces of metal laid scattered about, and random letters that had been laser imprinted as text laid scrambled in a mess.
“At first you don't know how to tend to it,” Tony said, slowly working those pieces in a disorganized pile. They had been disassembled entirely, with only some of the arc reactor core remaining in tact. “So like the moron you are, you throw a bunch of gasoline on it — and it sort of works. You get big flames. Lots of fire, lots of passion.”
Peter watched, without daring to utter a single sound, as Tony slowly but steadily arranged the pieces of metal into a circular pattern. Gradually, letters like PROOF and STARK started to form into words. All encasing the arc reactor that Peter still couldn’t believe once sat inside Mr. Stark’s chest.
“But the fire dwindles out,” Tony continued on even as Peter got lost looking at the contexts scattered on the table. “And once it does, you realize it's going to take more than just dumping gasoline to keep it going. It’s not some one and done, mess-up-and-it’s-over. It’s maintenance. Careful, precise maintenance. So you figure out what those things are — what keeps the fire going.” Tony paused to work his jaw. “Leaves, twigs, little pieces of wood — euphemisms, of course. Big teddy bears — not usually one of those things, learned that the hard way. But you find something to throw in the fire, stick to it, and you keep tending to it to keep it alive. You realize the work never stops, the project’s never completed. It’s always going, always a constant. But you’re better for it. They, uh…they make you want to be better.”
The next sigh Tony let out was far less heavy than any that came before it. The smile was even lighter than that, spreading his lips so naturally it looked smooth as butter.
“It’s a chore, every day. Takes a lot of energy. Lot of time, lot of commitment,” he explained, absentmindedly working the final pieces back into their original design. “But you know you’re in love because…absolutely none of that bothers you.”
Leaning back from his work and the rearranged pieces of metal in front of him, Tony nodded silently to himself. There were many chunks missing from what it once was, all now molten down into the glowing metal that sat off to the side. But for what remained, the text across the circular device could still be discerned.
“You know because…you just know.”
Peter flickered his eyes to the arc reactor and the now empty glass display case off to the side. It was at the same time he realized he was smiling that he also realized the conversation was a lot less awkward than he originally thought it was going to be.
He rolled with it, managing to gather the courage for what he asked next.
“Did you always know it was Ms. Potts?” Peter’s hand waved in all sorts of floppy motions that correlated with his nerves. “You know, that’d she’d-she’d be your wife. One day. Did you always know?”
Tony nodded, and nodded, and nodded — but all the while, he looked away, making every single nod that bobbed his head a contradiction to his unspoken answer.
“I had my moments of doubt,” Tony finally spoke that contradiction out loud. Though his head nodded yes, his words spoke differently, even scoffing with a bit of self disdain. “Hell, I’ve doubted a lot of things in life, kid. I’ve doubted myself. My friends. The Avengers. I’ve doubted…yeah, I, uh…I’ve doubted a lot.”
Tony cleared his throat, not just once but twice. It wasn’t until he swallowed a few times and chuckled away a few private thoughts that he finally looked back at Peter, his smile returning with the same lightness as before.
“But Pep, she’s…she’s always been there for me,” Tony admitted, honestly. “Always. Once I knew, I…I just knew.”
It was Peter’s turn to nod, and he did it twice as much as Tony before him — a feat, all things considered. So rapid and shaky that it was a surprise his head didn’t roll right off his shoulders.
Despite his eagerness, Tony’s eyebrows furrowed somewhat warily — the skepticism in his own explanation evident in his tight expression.
“Get it?” he asked, doubtfully.
Still, Peter kept nodding. And he meant it, each bounce becoming more genuine than the last.
“Yeah, I-I think I get it.”
There was little Peter had to lie about these days — and boy did it feel great having that burden off his shoulders. There was no reason to keep his secret identity of Spider-Man from his friends or family; not to mention having an entire superhero team watching his back meant he’d be safe from others finding out.
Hell, the most sneaking around he had to do lately was only when he wanted to pull some childish prank on Sam and Bucky — who never failed to start the trouble that Peter insisted he had no choice but end, like the responsible do-gooder he was.
And ever since everything that happened in Wakanda, Peter felt like he could be one-hundred percent honest with Mr. Stark, no matter the subject at hand. It was a openness he hadn’t felt with anyone since…
Well, ever.
It seemed the kinship he and Mr. Stark had developed was one nothing could compare to.
So there was no reason to lie. And he didn’t. Bit by bit, Peter was really starting to feel like he was understanding things.
Maybe that’s what growing up felt like.
“Good,” Tony concisely said, with a wagging finger quick to get Peter’s attention. “Wrap it up with the ladies if you have any plans.”
Just like that, Peter threw his head back and shouted, “Oh my god, Mr. Stark!”
So much for not being awkward.
“No spider-babies, you hear me?” Like all awkward times that came before, Tony relished in Peter’s humiliation — wagging his finger in the most waggish way he possibly could. “Is that clear? For all we know, you lay eggs—”
“I don’t lay eggs!” Peter’s voice squeaked at its highest possible pitch, earning a very confused “Whee-whoop?” from DUM-E.
Like always, Tony kept on — basking in Peter’s embarrassment. “Is that a hypothesis, or have you done extensive research—”
Peter frantically shook his head. “This conversation is not happening—”
Tony waved a dismissive hand. “Of course you’ve done extensive research, you’re a teenage boy — you probably do your research every night—”
“Dude!” Without wasting a nanosecond, Peter threw his arm out straight as a stick — two fingers pressing firmly down on the webshooters that were attached to his wrist.
At that same time, Tony spun in his stool and clawed his fingers deep into his wrist watch — dragging his nails down his palm until the nanites of his repulsor brought his Iron Man gauntlet to life.
“Hey — hey, hey,” Tony warned with a smirk, aiming the deactivated repulsor right at Peter with all five fingers spread wide apart. “Watch it. You wanna show off your toys, I’ll show off mine.”
The playful stand-off was met with Peter’s belly laugh of his own, and the sudden interruption of an Irish accent flooding through the ceiling.
“Incoming call from Colonel James Rhodes,” FRIDAY announced, having shut off the music at the same time her systems brought to life a large holographic screen, right at the very end of Tony’s work table.
It blinked with an afterglow of blue as FRIDAY awaited his signal to answer the call.
Tony briefly glanced to that screen before using a gauntlet covered finger to point right at Peter.
“This isn’t a white flag, it’s a ceasefire,” he strictly announced, all the while letting the nanites of his gauntlet seal back into the watch on his wrist. The way they dispersed and disappeared could’ve very well been magic in Peter’s eyes. “Homework. Now. And stop making me say it — it leaves a bad taste in my mouth, gets worst every time, pretty sure it’s going to cause acid reflux.”
At the same time Peter rolled his eyes, this time with much less of a smile, Tony rolled his stool towards the end of the table and tapped the ‘answer’ button on the holographic screen.
The grin that spread over his face was a sharp contrast to the hard-pressed expression Rhodey greeted him with.
“Good morning, Pooh-Bear,” Tony began with enough syrupy goodness in his tone to drown a bee.
Rhodey took in that fake sweetness with a deadpan expression and stress lines that easily aged him by decades.
“Good morning? You think this is a good morning?” he blurted out, not daring to hold back a single ounce of his tone-biting frustration.
Tony’s lips parted to speak at the same exact time a resounding CRASH came through the video call, sounding louder by the passing second — until it abruptly stopped, prompting one very confused look from Tony and an absolutely fed up look from Rhodey.
“Don’t stop! Believing!” The obnoxiously loud singing came from a distance, very clearly not belonging to Rhodey despite his face being the only thing taking up the video call. “Hold on to that feeLLINGG!”
“Where are you?” Tony’s eyebrows knitted tightly together until they became one, and he rolled his stool closer to the holographic screen as if he could figure out the answer for himself.
The only clues he could pick out were the sounds of pots and pans banging relentlessly together, combined with the annoying singing that could’ve very well come straight from a karaoke bar at ten o'clock on a Tuesday night.
“Streetlights! PeopPLLE—”
“Where are you?” Rhodey bit back, looking even more annoyed than before — Tony was honestly impressed. “Are you soldering — is that jewelry you’re making?”
Tony quickly glanced back at the table behind him, where the welding torch laid next to a pair of blacksmith tongs and a still-glowing warped piece of metal.
“It's a hobby,” Tony breezily answered as he turned back to the screen. “Now answer my question, I asked it first — don’t skip turns like that, it’s rude.”
“Do I look like I’m in the mood for games right now?” Rhodey’s lips pursed into a tight circle, accentuating the stress lines already dug deep into his face.
And yet Tony shrugged it off like it was lost spare change. “We’ve already established you aren’t having a good morning, but what’s new there.”
At the same time another worrisome CRASH sounded through the speakers, a handful of pillows came flying from the left side of Tony’s screen, soaring behind Rhodey and eventually far out of sight.
Not a second later, Tony snapped his fingers.
“Those are from the lounge sofa,” he concluded. “You’re upstairs.”
If Rhodey’s face fell another flatter, it might as well have reached the center of the earth.
“Wow, Tony, it’s almost like you’re a genius or something,” Rhodey drawled out, more than ready to say something else when a raccoon suddenly popped up from the bottom corner of the screen, startling even Tony for a hot second.
“Lemme have this, I need this—” Rocket reached for the phone with two gloved paws that managed to quickly grab it from where it'd been placed.
Rhodey yanked the phone back just as quickly, and fast enough that Tony briefly got dizzy as he watched the lens shake and swing about, all while the two fought over the device.
“Touch my stuff one more time, rodent—”
“Don’t call me a rodent!”
“Seriously bro, don’t call him a rodent!” A voice sounded from the distance, only having a face when Rhodey’s phone briefly caught Quill in the kitchen — holding a broom in one hand, and a spatula in another. “He’s sorta got a thing about that, could get real nasty — pop open a beer and I’ll tell you about the time on Birj, it’s hilarious—”
“Oh my god, are they there?” Peter’s sudden presence behind Tony nearly gave him a heart attack — visible in the way he spun around fast enough to give himself whiplash, and with eyes wider than the old arc reactor on the table nearby.
“Jesus, kid—”
“Mr. Quill and the aliens, are they there with you?” Peter failed to notice Tony’s startlement, going on to excitedly ask Rhodey, “Right now? Here? I mean — in the lounge?”
Tony made a face that Peter was pretty sure he’d never seen before, while Tony was almost positive he’d never made it before.
“Homework. Yesterday.” Tony waved his hand hard enough to create a breeze — teenagers. A whole different breed in his book. “Go, shoo, get busy.”
The disappointment from Peter was palpable, and Tony was a millisecond away from telling the kid to stop dragging his feet on the floor — he was almost convinced that Bambi looked less sad when his mother died.
“What’s Peter doing here, I thought this was his weekend in Queens.” Rhodey’s face settled back into frame as he got his camera in a safe place again, though he noticeably kept one eye on the raccoon that passed by, who was muttering under his breath the entire time.
“What are you doing here, I thought you were in Washington State kissing D.O.D ass,” Tony matter-of-factly assumed, spinning back around on his stool only once content having seen Peter actually start typing on his laptop.
“I was,” Rhodey curtly tossed back. “Up until SHIELD called me with news that space aliens made a landing at the compound — which by the way, Tony, that’s something you need to tell me! Preferably when it happens, not over a day later!”
Tony tossed both his hands in the air. “I thought you were in Washington State kissing D.O.D ass!”
“I was!”
The only thing louder than Rhodey’s frustrated shout was the room-echoing BANG that followed, and a gasp so startled it could’ve taken up every ounce of oxygen from the compound.
“You have broken it!”
“No, no, it’s not broken! It’s not — it’s just—”
“Peter, if you don't stop touching things—”
“I’m allowed to touch things, Gamora!”
“You’re breaking everything you touch!”
“It’s not broken!”
Tony slowly worked his jaw and before choosing his next words. “Just gunna go out on a limb here and make some wild assumptions—”
“Yeah, yeah,” Rhodey rapidly nodded his head, “that’s a real smart thing to do right now—”
Tony kept on, “Judging from the way Flash Gordon over there is tearing through the lounge—”
“Mh-hm, mh-hm, yep, yep,” Rhodey hurriedly agreed, in the most sarcastic tone he was physically capable of conjuring up.
“This mean SHIELD doesn’t have a problem with Space Invaders dropping by for cocktails?” Tony concluded, earning a hard-pressed look from Rhodey — and a long stretch of silence that never meant anything good from his friend.
“Why do you think I’m stuck on babysitting duty?” Rhodey finally answered with a question of his own, and with an aggravation Tony wasn’t sure he had heard in quite some time. If at all. It seemed they were both managing new things today — Tony showcasing expressions previously unseen on his face, and Rhodey with a new level of annoyance that very well could break world records.
Before Tony could even try and make a defense to the situation, a young woman with pale skin and pitch black eyes jumped into the frame, taking up half the lens with a smile that reached all the way to her ears.
“The metal-man has agreed to be our chaperon while we visit Terra!” Mantis squealed, the antennta’s on her forehead moving right alongside her visible enthusiasm.
Rhodey didn’t waste a second in grabbing her arm, gently but firmly, and forcing a gap between them.
“I didn’t agree to jack, Ladybug — three feet back, please, and keep those antennta’s away from me,” he said, every bit ‘no-nonsense’ as all the times that came before.
For eyes as dark as the night, Mantis’s pupils manage to grow even larger; with her antennta’s shining brightly and casting off the windows nearby.
“Ohhhh…you are more than angry,” Mantis slowly revealed, her brows knitting closely together as she looked Rhodey straight-on. “You are, as Quill says, pissed off.”
“Tony—!” Rhodey let go of the alien girl so quickly, it was as if she’d caught fire — or was an actual bug, his hand wiping at his bicep with quick, forcible swipes up and down. “I didn’t sign up for this!”
Tony made a face, and stuck to it. “How was I supposed to know they’d drag you into this?”
Rhodey immediately stopped rubbing at his arm, his head skyrocketing up to the lens of his phone.
“They’re considered weapons, Tony! They’re aliens. Of course they’re gunna drag me into this!” Rhodey was officially as pissed as Tony figured he could get. “You have a Colonel of the United States Air Force with direct ties to the Avengers and the contracting Weapons Procurement Liaison division of the US government. They don’t want anyone else but me touching this!”
“Take a compliment!” Tony tried to reason, gesturing one hand out to the screen with a smile that was entirely there for pacification. “They trust you enough to watch what are technically intergalactic space weapons—”
“I did not put in my vacation time to babysit aliens, Tony!” Rhodey shouted, so loud it reached over the banging of pots and pans from across the room. “I put in my vacation time for your impromptu wedding—”
“This is part of the wedding!” Tony argued, his smile doing absolutely nothing to placate Rhodey. Still, his grin grew larger. “Think of it as an…extended bachelor party.”
“Did someone say party?” Quill’s voice was only heard as he shouted from out of frame, and the abundance of excitement in his tone came through clear as day. “I am down to party! Oh man, let’s do this, I need a good shindig—”
“Are you joking!?” The only other female in the room raised her voice — no antenna’s on her head, but just as alien as they could come. “Peter, you and Thor just spent two weeks on Spartax—”
“We were working—”
“We didn’t get paid!”
“Because we couldn’t find the Celestial Mirror!”
“Because you both were too busy wasting time at the Star Dust Disco—!”
“There was a lead there! I told you, the owner’s sister—”
“Yes, Peter, please tell me even more about the owner’s sister—”
Rhodey didn’t give their argument the time of day, too busy pointing a stern finger at the lens of his phone as he had his own argument with Tony.
“None of this would be happening if you hadn’t invited Thor—”
“Hey, I was as much in the dark about this as you,” Tony countered. “If you’re gunna point fingers, point them at Strange. You ask the man a favor and the smug bastard can’t resist the opportunity to show off — how was I supposed to know that Thor would arrive in a damn spaceship, unannounced, with the Astral Anarchists Galaxy Goofs in tow?”
“Hey!” Quill shouted, simultaneously mixing with Rocket’s indignant, “Watch it, you flarknuff! That’s the Guardians of the Galaxy, to you!”
If Tony hadn’t rolled his eyes as hard as he did, he would’ve never seen Peter staring from across the workshop — fingers still on the keys of his laptop, but his attention long since diverted back to the phone call taking place.
“Homework, kid.” Tony didn’t even look Peter’s way, deciding that multiple finger snaps was plenty enough to get his point across. “Focus up, pen to the paper, chop chop.”
Rhodey silently watched the encounter with an eyebrow arched high, and his silence making the disorderly racket sounding from the lounge all the louder.
“Let me guess,” Rhodey eventually started to say, “May finally put her foot down on extra-curricular activities?”
It was Tony’s turn to throw Rhodey a deadpanned expression, and Rhodey’s turn to return it with a grin of his own.
“Kid has some kind of paper due and I’m playing the part of the responsible adult while she’s outta town,” Tony reluctantly explained, followed by a harsh grimace that crinkled his nose up tight. “I’m going to need mouthwash if I keep saying that.”
Rhodey couldn’t have shook his head any harder if he tried. “Uh-uh, what you need is to get your ass up here. Now. ”
Tony furrowed his brows. “I’m a little tied up with this wedding planning, Platypus—”
“Bullshit,” Rhodey spit out. “We both know Pepper handles every detail down to the nth degree — including keeping you away from the planning.” Rhodey didn’t give Tony a pause of air to make his case. “You aren’t doing anything down in that workshops besides goofing off with Peter—”
“I’m babysitting too!” Tony still found a way to defend himself.
“The tree talks, Tony!” Rhodey was bordering the line of hysteria at this point, Tony could tell. The aggravated anger that once reached maximum heights had now become something else entirely new, and it showed in the crack to his voice. “It only says three words. But it talks.”
“I heard that!” Rockey yelled from out of view, only to pop into frame just as quickly — with the aforementioned tiny tree perched innocently on his shoulder. “I'll have you know that Groot has a far larger vocabulary than any of you Terran scut rugs!”
“I am Groot!” The high-pitched voice eagerly joined in, before jumping off Rocket’s shoulder and running into the kitchen with a waddle that nearly took him to down to his knees.
Tony watched — unblinking — as the little creature ran off. The tiny tree managed to climb up a barstool all on his own before finaly accepting help from a much larger man, who took him across the kithcen and out of sight. Around that time, Tony finally managed to shake away his trance, though he definitely looked like a wet dog trying to get there.
“Tell you what,” Tony finally suggested, “If you need backup, I’ll send the kid to you — he’s dying to meet the Quill guy, anyhow.”
The sound of a resounding CRASH came from inside the workshop this time, and Tony spun on his stool just in time to watch Peter jump up from his, so fast it toppled right onto the ground.
“Holy cow, seriously?” Peter excitedly asked, his hands fumbling as he struggled to pick up the stool and place it back on its two legs. It fell two more times before he got it upright.
Tony rolled his eyes with a response sitting in his throat, but Rhodey beat him to it.
“Uh-uh!” Rhodey snapped, pointing his finger directly at the camera lens — tapping enough times to get Tony’s attention again. “Don’t you go pawning this off to Peter. Don’t you even think about it. Come deal with this chaos yourself.”
Tony spun back around on his stool. “I’m in the middle of—!”
“I mean it, Tony.” With decades of experience under his belt, Rhodey knew better than to keep talking. The phone call ended with a single tap of his finger, and no sooner after did the video connection cut to black.
FRIDAY dismissed the holographic screen long before Tony could even think to ask her.
A few ‘tsks’ worked his tongue, only accompanied by the passing “Whee-whoops” on DUM-E’s end.
And Peter stood silently—anticipatively—with enthusiasm so blatantly tangible that Tony could practically feel himself drowning in it, even all the way across the room.
“Come on," he begrudgingly relented, "we better get going before that vein on his forehead gets any bigger,” Tony didn’t hide the sigh that spoke his words. He pushed his stool to the side and waved Peter on to the exit doors. “Besides, I wanna make sure the rodent hasn’t spread rabies, anyway.”
Despite Tony being closest to the doors, Peter managed to get there first — so quick, the automatic feature failed to function in time for him to run out.
“This is gunna be so cool!” Peter excitedly bounced on the heels of his feet as he waited for Tony to catch up, only to run ahead of the man the moment the doors parted, already far down the hallway before Tony could holler for him to slow down.
Their departure left both projects discarded on the workshop tables, and it wasn’t long after they left that FRIDAY shut off the overhead ceiling lights — the surrounding technology the only remaining thing that brought a little bit of light to the room.
The soft glow from monitors and computers shined a gleam of blue over the decade old arc reactor, one that had been constructed into a memento of love; now dismantled and reassembled into something else entirely.