Spider-Man: Close To Home

Chapter 16: Recruitment

"Huh… That's a really nice car." Peter said to himself.

The year had just started back up, and he was beginning to get back into his normal routine. As he approached his apartment, he saw a really nice Porsche parked in the parking lot. It definitely didn't belong to anyone he knew that lived in this complex.

"What is such a nice looking car doing in a place like this?" Peter wondered to himself as he entered his apartment, adjusting his earbuds.

With a DVD player fresh from the dumpster in his hand, he made his way up the elevator and down to the apartment. He reached into his back right pocket and pulled out his key, and unlocked the door. He walked inside.

"Hey, May." He greeted as he entered, setting his backpack down and heading towards the kitchen.

"Mmm, hey," Aunt May greeted with a hum. "How was school today?"

"It was okay. This crazy car parked outside…" Peter's sentence trailed off as he looked into the kitchen to see none other than Tony Stark sitting next to his aunt on the couch! His blood ran cold with shock as Aunt May looked at him with an excited expression.

"Oh, Mr. Parker." Mr. Stark said, looking up at him.

"Um…" Peter paused for a moment, removing his earbuds and stammering in surprise. "What? What are you- What are you doing… Hey! Uh, I'm-I'm-I'm Peter." He finally got his introduction out.

"Tony." He replied simply.

"What are you- What are you- What are you doing here?" Peter asked.

"It's about time we met. You've been getting my emails, right?" Tony asked, winking at him. Immediately, Peter started to catch on.

"Yeah. Yeah." He said.

"Right?"

"Regarding the…"

"You didn't even tell me about the grant." Aunt May spoke up suddenly.

"About the grant." Peter finished his sentence, almost as if agreeing with what she was saying.

"The September Foundation." Mr. Stark specified.

"Right." Peter said, folding his arms in front of him.

"Yeah. Remember when you applied?" Mr. Stark asked.

"Yeah…?"

"I approved! So now we're in business." Mr. Stark said, giving him a firm, hinting expression before beginning to sip from his mug.

"But you didn't tell me anything. What's up with that?" Aunt May asked, "You keeping secrets from me now?"

"Well, I just- I just know how much you love surprises, so I thought I would let you know… Anyway, what did I apply for?" Peter changed subjects and directed his question to Mr. Stark.

"That's what I'm here to hash out."

"Okay. Hash it out, okay."

Peter and Mr. Stark made their way into Peter's room. Mr. Stark closed the door behind him, immediately turning and walking to his trash can. He spit out the food that Aunt May had offered him.

"As walnut date loaves go, that wasn't bad," He commented before making his way over to Peter's desk. "Oh whoa, what do we have here? Retro tech, huh? Thrift store? Salvation Army?" He asked as he pointed at the tech on Peter's desk.

"Uh, the garbage actually." Peter answered.

"You're a dumpster diver."

"Yeah, I was… An-Anyway, look, um, I definitely did not apply for your grant…"

"Ah-ah," Mr. Stark interrupted him. "Me first."

"Okay."

"Quick question of the rhetorical variety," Mr. Stark said before pulling up a holographic video from his phone that displayed Spider-Man swinging past a car thief and webbing his foot out from under him. "That's you, right?" He asked Peter.

"Um, no. What do you- What do you mean?" Peter immediately folded his arms and got defensive. Mr. Stark kept going.

"Yeah," Mr. Stark pulled up another video of when he stopped a speeding car from crashing into a public transit bus with his bare hands. "Wow! Nice catch; 3,000 pounds, 40 miles an hour? That's not easy. You got mad skills."

"That's, uh, that's all on YouTube, though, right? I mean, that's where you found that? Because you know that's all fake. It's all done on the computer?"

"Mm-hmm." Mr. Stark hummed, beginning to look around his room a little more.

"It's like that video. What is it…?"

"Yeah yeah. Oh, you mean like those UFOs over Phoenix?"

"Exactly." Peter answered.

Before he could realize it, Mr. Stark had already taken a stick and used it to open up the attic door in his room, revealing where Peter kept his costume.

"Oh, what have we here?" Mr. Stark asked. Immediately, Peter grabbed the costume and threw it back into his closet area, leaning against the wall to hide it.

"Uh…"

"So… You're the Spider…ling. Crime-fighting spider. You're Spider-Boy?" Mr. Stark asked. Peter folded his arms again and sighed, seeing that he'd been found out.

"S-Spider-Man." He corrected him.

"Not in that onesie, you're not." Tony commented.

"It's not a onesie," Peter said, stepping away so that Mr. Stark could see the costume. "I don't believe this. I was actually having a really good day today, you know, Mr. Stark. Didn't miss my train, this perfectly good DVD player was just sitting there, and Algebra test… Nailed it." Peter said, smacking his screwdriver against his desk.

"Who else knows? Anybody?" Mr. Stark asked, holding Peter's costume in his hands. Peter shook his head.

"Nobody."

"Not even your unusually attractive aunt?"

"No. No. No no! If she knew, she would freak out. And when she freaks out, I freak out…"

"You know what I think is really cool? This webbing," Mr. Stark tossed the webbing container to Peter, and he caught it. "That tensile strength is off the charts. Who manufactured that?"

"I did."

"Climbing walls; how you doing that? Adhesive gloves?"

"It was a long story, I was…"

"Lordy! Can you even see in these? Eh, I'm blind!" Mr. Stark asked, holding up Peter's goggles to his eyes and making funny noises.

"Yes, I can!" Peter snatched his costume away and put it back, "I can see in those. Okay? It's just that when whatever happened happened, it's like my senses have been dialed to 11. There's-There's way too much input, so they just kinda help me focus." Peter explained.

"You're in dire need of an upgrade. Systemic, top to bottom, hundred-point restoration," Mr. Stark commented. "That's why I'm here," He said as Peter sat down on his bed. Mr. Stark changed gears and asked Peter a very pointed question.

"Why are you doing this?" He asked. Peter shifted a bit, and his eyes widened a bit. "I gotta know. What's your MO? What gets you outta that twin bed in the morning?" He asked. Peter looked down at his hand and rubbed it a bit.

"Because… Uh… Because I've been me my whole life, and I've had these powers for six months…"

"Mm-hmm." Mr. Stark hummed to indicate that he was listening.

"I read books, I build computers… And yeah, I would love to play football, but I couldn't then so I shouldn't now."

"Sure, because you're different." Mr. Stark said, following along with his reasoning.

"Exactly, but I can't tell anybody that, so I'm not… When you can do the things that I can, but you don't…and then the bad things happen, they happen because of you." Peter finally got his motif for the past 6 months out. Mr. Stark nodded a bit.

"So you wanna look out for the little guy, you wanna do your part. Make the world a better place, all that, right?"

"Yeah yeah yeah, just looking out for the little guy… That's what it is." Peter replied. Mr. Stark stood up a bit and made his way over.

"I'm gonna sit here, so you move the leg," Mr. Stark said. Peter did so, and he sat next to him. He patted a hand on his shoulder. "You got a passport?"

"No, I don't even have a driver's license."

"You ever been to Germany?"

"No."

"Oh, you'll love it." Mr. Stark said.

"I can't go to Germany." Peter defended.

"Why?" Mr. Stark asked. Peter paused a bit awkwardly, not finding a definitive reason to give him off the top of his head.

"I-I got…homework." He answered finally. Mr. Stark rolled his eyes at him.

"I'm gonna pretend you didn't say that." He said, beginning to get up.

"No, I-I'm being serious. I can't just drop out of school!"

"Might be a little dangerous. Better tell Aunt Hottie I'm taking you on a field trip." Mr. Stark teased him. Immediately, Peter stood up and webbed Mr. Stark's hand to the doorknob, not allowing him to open the door.

"Don't tell Aunt May." Peter stipulated, holding up a finger.

"Alright, Spider-Man," Mr. Stark said. Peter's eyes widened a bit; he felt a bit star-struck at hearing Iron Man address him by his superhero name.

"…get me out of this." Mr. Stark said suddenly, gesturing to his webbed-up hand. Peter flinched and quickly went back towards his desk.

"Sorry, I'll get the, uh… So, uh uh, what's the… What's the big mission?" Peter asked, grabbing his screwdriver and starting to cut through the webbing.

"You'll get the scoop when we get there." Mr. Stark said to him.

"Got it, got it. Okay…" Peter nodded, taking a deep breath.

It really began to sink in then and there that this was to be a new chapter in his life as Spider-Man, a crime-fighting superhero…

The End