So I know it's been a while since I last wrote anything. Remember that new fancy house I just bought? Yeah, it caught fire. I've been dealing with being technically homeless for the last 5 months while arguing with insurance companies and learning first hand that being a grown up fucking sucks. Responsibility can go suck a dick. Also Life has a sense of humor since I once wrote a story about Peter's home burning down.

And for the record, I have had family and friends step in to help me out, my house is almost completely reconstructed, and hopefully within the next month I'll be back home. So it's not complete doom and gloom.

I tell you all of that so you can understand why this story is a rollercoaster of styles and feelings. I started it before the fire, tried to pick it up again after the fire, was too depressed so I ignored it, and then got excited now that my home has walls again.

Also, I figured I needed to finish this before Marvel decides to fuck me over with what ever is happening on the 26th (Endgame...).

Please my emotional ramblings in the form of a story.

Also, being a grown up with responsibilities is better than being dead, but still...I'm allowed to be dramatic.

Chapter Text

"But then, in his lifetime, [he] had often ignored what was technically legal. Technicalities didn't appeal to him. All too often, they simply got in the way of doing the right thing."

-John Flanagan (2011), "The Lost Stories (Ranger's Apprentice Book 11)

Tony Stark was throwing a temper tantrum and disguising it as a banking frenzy.

It was confusing, somewhat alarming, and admittedly a little funny to watch.

"What am I looking at?"

"It's called a blondie."

"It looks like a giant cookie."

"No, it's a…it's like a giant cookie, but it's not."

Peter licked juice off his thumb and looked between the two men arguing over a piece of cake. He was sitting on the counter, legs crossed, feet tucked under his knees as he slowly ate chunks of pineapple out of a plastic container.

The kitchen was a mess, there was no other way to describe it, despite Tony's "efforts" to clean up as he went along. The sink was overloaded with mixing bowls and whisks, globs of watered-down batter still coated the sides despite half-assed efforts to rinse them off.

There was a measuring cup tipped over on its side near the stand mixer leaking a thin line of vegetable oil onto the counter. Cracked egg shells, chocolate wrappers, and something that looked suspiciously like crumbled peanut butter cups littered the floor around the trash bin.

The countertop and surrounding cabinets had arcs of drying chocolate batter streaked in long, trailing lines; a product of turning the mixer on high and letting physics reign.

There was also a fine coating of flour and powdered sugar that seemed to coat every once reflective surface.

Tony said it was an accident, but Peter had seen the man work before. Had watched him dismantle everything from multi-billion dollar jets to a busted up coffee pot May had bought at Costco. Tony wasn't messy. He was disorganized at times, a little erratic with his methods, but he wasn't messy.

Which was the only reason Peter was willing to bet the fourteen dollars he had in his pocket that the hazard area that had once been the penthouse's kitchen was completely intentional.

Pepper had asked Peter to distract him, to take Tony's mind off the fact that he was, for lack of a better term, under house arrest, grounded, quarantined to the Tower until the threat to his life could be nullified.

Apparently, Tony didn't have the best track record with being told "to sit it out" and he was prone to taking drastic measures. Pepper had known this already, but Peter was quickly learning.

"Just watch him. Don't let him do anything stupid."

"Like what?"

"At this point, I wouldn't be surprised. Just…just call me if he looks like he's about to build anything that looks like a death-bot."

Peter had a pretty good feeling chocolate cupcakes with peanut butter ganache weren't going to end the world, but he had an even better feeling that Pepper still wasn't gonna be happy when she got home.

Because from where Peter was sitting, it wasn't so much about trying to get the recipe right as it was about how big of a mess Tony could make.

Rhodey looked at the blondie Tony was transferring to a cooling tray and sighed. "Tony?"

Tony eased the pastry from the pan, wiped his flour smeared fingers on his already stained t-shirt, and reached for a bowl full of buttercream. "Yeah?"

"Why are you doing this?" Rhodey asked, sounding both resigned and tired.

"Ask the kid," Tony said, head tilting in Peter's direction as he stirred the icing. "It's his fault."

Peter frowned and tried to talk around the large chunk of pineapple he'd just bitten into. "Um. No, it isn't."

Tony stopped stirring. He looked at Peter and gestured at the mess around them. "This was your idea."

"How was this my idea?"

"You told me to watch YouTube."

"Yeah, but I meant look up old vines or watch videos of cats being weird," Peter defended, "not latch on to May's playlist and binge on baking tutorials."

"You turned it on and left." Tony lifted the spatula and licked at the icing, his eyebrows rose in quiet surprise at the taste before he returned to stirring. "The videos just started playing and I went with it. What did you expect?"

"Excuse me for thinking you capable of navigating the internet unsupervised," Peter mumbled just before popping another piece of pineapple into his mouth.

Tony stopped stirring and frowned. "Is that sass? Are you sassing me right now?"

Rhodey smirked, looked down, and tiredly rubbed his forehead as he muttered, "You're turning the kid into a little smartass."

"Better than being a dumbass," Peter pointed out, only to freeze in horror when he realized what he'd just said, and who he'd said it to…"I mean, no, I wasn't calling—," he tried to apologize, but Tony quickly cut him off.

"No, do not apologize for that. That was funny." Tony pointed the spatula at Peter threateningly. A glob of icing fell onto the counter. Tony had a gift for amplifying awkward situations.

Peter stared back and forth between the genius acting like an overgrown five-year-old and the colonel glaring at him disapprovingly. "Uh…"

Thankfully, Rhodey wasn't one to let an awkward silence linger. He shook his head in amused disbelief and said, "You are terrible."

Tony rolled his eyes and let the spatula drop back into the bowl of icing with a thick plop. "I'm adorable."

"He's adorable," Rhodey countered, pointing a finger at Peter. "You're a pain in the ass."

Tony frowned and stole a piece of Peter's pineapple. "He can be a pain in the ass. Ask Happy."

"I'd rather we didn't ask Happy," Peter added quickly, tone somewhat timid. They ignored him.

"What do you think Pepper's going to say when she sees this mess?"

"Hopefully, she'll be so impressed with the food that she won't notice the mess."

She wasn't impressed.

And she definitely noticed.

There was a small discussion that sounded a lot like an argument. It started with an exasperated "What the hell, Tony?" and ended with Pepper angrily stomping away, cupcake in hand and heels click click clicking down the hall.

Somehow Peter got roped into helping clean up the mess, which he personally thought was unfair. But it wasn't like he could exactly tell Pepper Potts that, not when she was glaring daggers at Tony.

Pepper was intimidating in a way that Peter had only experienced with May.

He decided he wanted to stay on her good side, and apparently Tony did too, because when Pepper decided that both Tony and Peter were banned from the kitchen, they didn't argue.

It was a sign of how much Tony truly cared for Pepper that he actually respected the ban (seeing how it was his kitchen, but whatever.)

It had taken nearly an entire hour to clean up the mess from Tony's baking venture, and Peter had hated every minute of it.

Not because it was hard (it wasn't) or boring (it was), but because Tony had officially lost his distraction and was now visibly pouting.

It was unnerving and Peter didn't know how to handle it. He had hoped things would get better once they made their way to the lab, but nope.

Tony was still pouting.

But now with purpose, or that's what Peter told himself. Tony's irritated frown had morphed, looking a little less annoyed and a lot more angry, determined.

Peter claimed his spot at the small work table Tony had given him and watched as Tony began to pace up and down the length of the work room, hands occasionally reaching out to grab a screw driver or bundle of wires, fingers twitching around them before he tossed them aside, dismissive. His eyes were constantly roaming, like he was looking for something.

Peter folded his arms on the table and rested his chin on top, eyes following Tony.

Eventually, Tony sat down in front of a computer and began lazily typing. Images began to appear on the screens around the workroom, articles highlighting the attack on Stark Industries, photos of the damage caused by unknown explosives, lab reports, chemical analyses, witness statements—

"Are you hacking the S.H.I.E.L.D database?" Peter asked, recognizing Nick Fury's frown in one of the photos and knowing good and well that the media wouldn't have been able to get a shot like that.

"Not the whole database," Tony muttered, fingers steadily typing at a pace way too calm for someone committing what Peter was pretty sure to be a crime. "S.H.I.E.L.D keeps hiring idiots that use agency computers to play online games or update their Facebook status. They're asking to be hacked."

Tony zoomed in on a photo of the device that had blown a crater in the street the size of a swimming pool. "Besides, it's technically my case, the guy was trying to kill me. If anyone has a right to look at it…" Tony trailed off with a shrug before he sent the pictures of the mangled device to a different screen with an order for FRIDAY to scan.

"I thought Director Fury said you weren't allowed to work on the case?" Peter asked. He blinked as blue and white holograms of twisted metal and burnt wires materialized before him. "That it was too dangerous?"

"Aliens, psychotic gods, pissed off aunts, and confused super soldiers are dangerous," Tony said, fingers flicking through the holographic images, sorting them into groups that Peter couldn't understand, "A deranged bomber is tame by comparison."

Peter begged to differ, but kept it to himself. He sighed, propped his chin on his folded arms once more, and continued to watch as Tony sorted through projected images, listened as FRIDAY was ordered to run diagnostics, to analyze shapes and textures, to compare densities.

In no time at all, the room looked like something out of every nerd's dream. Tony worked non-stop, talking to FRIDAY as though she were an actual person only for her to talk back, completing the illusion. More images filled the air, morphing and shifting under Tony's command.

Peter sat in stunned silence, because holy shit, this is exactly how he'd always imagined Tony Stark to be and, yeah, actually getting to watch Tony Stark be Tony Stark was kinda cool. At least it was until Tony spun on his heel and began sorting through a plastic bin filled with scrap metal.

When he returned to the center of the room and held up the misshapen piece of metal next to an image of the busted bomb, brow arching in judgment as he compared the two, Peter frowned.

When Tony began pulling out used circuit boards and spools of unused wires, Peter's enthusiasm for the science flat lined.

"Mr. Stark?"

"Yeah?"

"What are you doing?"

"Reconstruction." Tony grabbed a pair of welding gloves and began to pull them on.

Peter looked between the images of the twisted, blackened metal in the photos and the nice smooth pieces lying on the work table. "You're gonna rebuild the bomb?"

"Yep."

"Uh…"

Tony spun around, frown in place as he searched for a welding helmet. "Spit it out, kid. "

"Miss Potts said I was supposed to call her if you start to do anything…dangerous," Peter hesitantly admitted.

"Is that why you're here?" Tony snapped. He looked angry, sounded angry. "You're my babysitter now?"

"What? No!" Peter quickly assured him. He licked his lips and gave half a shrug. "She just, she just asked me, since I was, you know, already here…I'm not a babysitter."

Tony gave him one more hard look before softening the angry, betrayed glare into something closer to an annoyed scowl. He sighed, shoulders falling as he picked up the spool of wire, examined it.

Peter licked his lips and said very quietly. "Please don't build a bomb."

Tony looked up and glared. "I'm not planning on using it, I just…," he turned and threw the wire across the room. It landed on the back work bench, sending a scattering of tools clanging to the floor. Tony stared at a screwdriver as it rolled behind a cabinet. He took a deep breath, let it out through his nose and turned to Peter, eyes hard, pleading, like he was begging Peter to understand. "Someone tried to kill me."

"I know," Peter said.

"People were hurt."

"I know."

"And you think I should just sit back and let it happen? That I should let other people fight my battles and get hurt trying to fix whatever fuck up this is?"

"Mr. Fury said—,"

"I know what Fury said," Tony's voice was sharp, words short and crisp. "I'm asking what you think."

Peter felt himself shrink into his chair, more disappointed than scared. "You know what I think."

Tony glared. "Pretend I don't."

Peter forced himself to take a deep, calming breath and then focused his eyes on the smear of baking flour on Tony's shirt as he tried to put his thoughts into words. "If it were me…I'd want to be out there helping, stopping the guy before someone else got hurt."

Peter looked up to find Tony still staring at him, eyes still hard, but his mouth was pressed in a tight line, like he was fighting a smile, a justified 'I was right' kind of smile. He nodded, gave another somewhat defeated sounding sigh, and sat across from Peter, arms folding on the table, welding gloves still on.

Peter licked his lips and hesitantly leaned forward, mimicking Tony's pose. "So…what are you gonna do?"

"I don't know," Tony admitted. He sounded tired. "Despite popular opinion, I do not actually enjoy breaking the rules, but benching me is-,"

"Stupid?" Peter suggested.

Tony smiled, a real one. "Yeah, it's stupid. Let's go with that. Keep it PG."

Peter smiled back.

"Alright, loopholes. Find them." Tony pulled off his gloves, tossed them aside and looked at Peter expectantly.

Peter frowned. "What?"

Tony rolled his eyes. "Kid, you are a fucking savant when it comes to breaking the rules-,"

"Bending the rules," Peter corrected. Tony ignored him.

"—so let's have it. I was told I couldn't leave the tower, that I was to sit this out and not interfere with the investigation. How do I get around that without being a dismissive, selfish asshole with no consideration for others?"

And oh shit. Okay, that was happening.

Or it would be if Peter could make his brain work.

"Uh…," he hummed, and he just knew he looked like an idiot all slack jawed and wide-eyed. But Tony was used to it, because he sat patiently, finger steadily tapping on the tabletop, waiting for Peter's brain to finish short-circuiting so it could reboot and actually think.

"Well…," Peter began, one shoulder rising in a hey, what about this kind of shrug, "they didn't say anything about me not going."

Tony's finger stopped tapping. His eyes widened for just a moment, before they crinkled in what Peter took to be amusement. "You are one sneaky son of a bitch. But the answer's no. Try again."

And yeah, that was not what Peter had been expecting. "What? Why?"

Tony stood and shook his head, scoffing like it should be obvious. "I'm not about to send a kid in to do my dirty work."

Peter jumped to his feet. "I'm not a kid," Peter pointed out. It would have worked better if he didn't have to actually look up to meet Tony's eyes.

Tony's voice softened, so much so that he almost sounded sad when he said, "You really are. "

"I was freaking fourteen when you asked me to go up against Captain America." And yeah, Peter was starting to get angry. Maybe a bit more indignant than pissed off, but yeah, there were emotions. More than one of them.

Tony rounded the table slowly, tilting his head to the side, eyes squinted as he moved to stand directly in front of Peter. "And now you're a full two years older. Wiser, smarter, better. More mature. Right?"

"Exactly." Peter stood his ground, forced himself to maintain eye contact.

The corner of Tony's mouth quirked to the side and Peter knew that was the answer Tony had been hoping for because his head straightened up and his hands came up to the side, the perfect embodiment of there you have it if Peter had ever seen one.

"Well, so am I," Tony said. "Call it personal growth, kid. More than one person reamed me a new one when they found out I recruited a freshman too young to shave. And, yeah, you might have proven yourself more than capable-,"

"Multiple times."

"—But that doesn't mean I'm about to willingly put you in the line of fire. Not again."

Tony turned to walk away, and Peter felt his jaw drop again. "Are you serious right now?"

"Deadly. Now, unless you have a plan B, this conversation is over." Tony turned and waited, one eyebrow arched expectantly. "Well?"

"I got nothin'," Peter admitted, somewhat angrily and nothing at all like a whine.

The other eyebrow perked up to join the first as Tony's face morphed from one of annoyed expectation to one of surprise before both folded into a distrusting V as his eyes narrowed. "You're lying."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are."

"Am not!"

"Are to!"

"I thought we were supposed to be more mature now?"

"Rhodey was right. You are a little smartass." Tony pointed a finger at Peter and got way up in his personal space. "Stay away from S.H.I.E.L.D. Got it?"

"Got it."

"No hacking. No sneaking around the bomb site. No following their agents. No nothing. Am I clear?"

"So, no doing any of the things you've been doing?"

"Lose the attitude and answer my question. Am I clear?"

"Crystal."

But Tony was right. Peter was a fucking savant when it came to loopholes.

Peter was told to stay away from S.H.I.E.L.D, and he would. Totally.

Didn't mean he couldn't look elsewhere.

He'd been forbidden from hacking, tracking, or thinking about anything S.H.I.E.L.D related. But Peter didn't need S.H.I.E.L.D. He'd been born and raised in the city and the last two and a half years had taught him how to navigate it.

Sure, Happy and the others laughed and made fun of the way Peter helped little old ladies cross the street. They made dramatic "awwww" sounds when he rescued a cat from a tree, or in Happy's case, muttered a deadpan "that's cute".

And yeah, sometimes being the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man meant being rewarded with churros and pinched cheeks rather than cheers and praises. But it also meant that Peter got to know the neighborhood.

And while Iron Man was on a first name basis with the Governor, Spider-Man knew the nickname of the homeless guy that liked to camp out behind the bank on 32nd.

"Hey, Glitch. What's up?"

Glitch was hunched over in a kneeled position as he tried to fix the wheel on his shopping cart. He jumped at the sound of his name, knees popping as he tried to stand. As soon as he saw Peter hanging upside down from a broken fire escape, his wrinkled race fell into a frown as he rolled his eyes. "What the hell you want this time, kid?" he asked, moving to bend back down and resume his work.

Peter smiled beneath his mask and gave a small shrug. "Just to talk."

"You talk too much. Anyone ever tell ya that?" Glitch asked.

"You do," Peter informed him. "Every time we meet."

Glitch tossed another scowl over his shoulder and resumed his work. "And yet you can't take the hint."

"So, does that mean I should take these hotdogs somewhere else?" Peter asked innocently, slowly revealing the white, grease stained bag he'd been hiding behind his back.

Glitch looked up and eyed the bag suspiciously, like he was weighing the cost, trying to determine if a conversation with Spider-Man was worth it. "You get sauerkraut?"

"The extra smelly kind," Peter confirmed, shaking the bag enticingly.

"Extra smelly just means extra tasty kid." Glitch climbed up to his feet and gestured for Peter to climb down. "They don't teach you that in Queens?"

"Pretty sure they don't teach that anywhere, man." Peter took a hotdog out of the bag before handing the rest to Glitch. He pushed the bottom of his mask up to his nose, plopped down on the ground next to Glitch's cart, and bit off half the hotdog in one bite.

Glitch shook his head, but sat down beside him. They ate quietly for a minute, Peter finishing the rest of his hotdog in a second bite, Glitch deciding to take the time to savor his, mindful of getting sauerkraut in his beard.

When Glitch finished his first and was reaching for his second, he sighed and cast Peter a sideways look. "Alright, get to it. I know you're a nosey little fuck, so what're you wanting to know?"

Peter dove right in. "You hear about the bomb that went off Wednesday in Manhattan? The one near Stark Tower?"

Glitch chuckled. "Iron Man sending you to do his dirty work now?"

"Nope, just thought I'd help out. Ask around."

Glitch licked a glob of mustard off his lip and looked at Peter like he was judging him. Gauging him. "I heard about it. But then so did everyone else."

"You hear anything about who might have done it?"

"Nope. News people got a lot of opinions though. You ever hear of Google, Spidey? You can look this shit up yourself."

"I'd be happy to bring up any news articles related to the bombing, Peter," Karen chimed in happily. Peter ignored her.

"I think you and I both know I'm looking for something more," Peter said, reaching into the bag and grabbing another hotdog. "Specifically something that the News wouldn't know. Or wouldn't release."

Glitch balled up the foil from the finished hotdog and threw it on the ground. He wiped his fingers on his coat before reaching inside for another. "I already said I don't know who did it, kid."

Peter felt his shoulders slump. He took a large bite while he tried to think.

"But I did hear something about a raid down near the docks," Glitch added, "Something about explosives and shit."

Peter nearly choked. "When?" he asked, or tried to. It was muffled by the half-chewed food in his mouth.

Glitch gave him a 'you know better' glare worthy of Aunt May and said. "A few days before the bomb went off."

And okay, that was interesting.

An hour later, Peter was having to remind Karen, yet again, that he wasn't technically breaking the rules.

"Mr. Stark forbade you from interfering in S.H.I.E.L.D's investigation."

"I'm not interfering in S.H.I.E.L.D's investigation," Peter pointed out. "I'm following a completely un-S.H.I.E.L.D related tip from a friend."

"He did not seem like a friend."

"It's a love-hate relationship," Peter explained. "He keeps the love part hidden deep down."

"Like Happy?" Karen asked.

Peter frowned. "Yeah, like Happy. Now, can you just please scan the building?"

Karen didn't answer, but a moment later the seemingly abandoned building appeared to glow before his eyes as Karen's sensors did their thing. "All clear," she said. Peter smiled.

Here's the plan, the one Peter sort of half-way thought out as he swung through the city and tried not to puke questionable sauerkraut down on half of Manhattan: find a clue or two, bring it back with a casual "So, while I was on patrol I might have found…"

If he was lucky, S.H.I.E.L.D would use the information to save the day, Tony would proudly pat him on the back, and Nick Fury would…do whatever Nick Fury did when he was happy.

The only problem was Peter was a few days too late. The police had already combed the warehouse, removing anything that might have been relevant.

Peter sat on an empty, dust covered crate and sighed. He fell back, his legs still dangling off the side and looked up at the rafters. "Karen?"

"Yes, Peter?"

"Hypothetical question here, but would you consider hacking into NYPD database as breaking Mr. Stark's rules?"

She said yes. Peter rolled his eyes and climbed off the crate.

The warehouse was mostly empty. There were strips of abandoned police tape trailing the ground near the doors, about a dozen dilapidated crates that were probably older than Peter strewn about, and a slew of tire tracks and footprints spanning the entire floor. Nothing else.

"Back to square one," Peter mumbled as he made his way to the door. He had just raised his arm, fingers bent back and wrist cocked to release a web, when something beeped.

"What was that?" Peter asked, just as the outline for a warning sign popped up in his field of vision.

"My sensors are detecting a hazardous material," Karen answered.

Peter looked around the barren room. "Where?"

It wasn't so much a hazardous material as it was trace amounts of one, almost like a bomb had sprung a leak and left a trail. A trail that Peter followed as Karen tracked it like an animated blood hound.

Peter noticed as he followed Karen's directions that the trail seemed to overlap with a rather narrow set of tire tracks. "It looks like a cart or something," Peter offered. Which would make sense, because who in their right mind would want to carry a leaking combustible material around.

Then again, who in their right mind would try to build a bomb?

The tracks led to another building, one nearly a block away from the abandoned and completely useless warehouse.

"Karen?"

"Scanning."

"Thanks."

It was empty, but not like the previous building. Because while this one didn't have anyone inside, and there were no traces of bombs or trip wires…

"Are you sure, Karen?"

"I'm sure, Peter."

There was still a lot of other stuff.

Stuff the police most definitely missed.

"Holy shit." Peter stared gob smacked at the scene before him. It looked like something out of every pyscho's handbook. Chapter One: How to be creepy as hell.

There were boxes of electrical components, spools of wires, and a soldering machine much like the one in Tony's lab. And while that was worrying, it wasn't what had grabbed Peter's attention.

There was a rickety plastic table pushed up against the back wall of what used to be a supervisor's office. Above it was a collage of images that screamed stalker and set off Peter's Spidey sense. It was pictures of the Avengers, of Miss Potts and Happy. Of Peter.

There were images of Nick Fury and others Peter had never seen before but was willing to bet his PlayStation on being S.H.I.E.L.D agents.

There were blueprints spread out on one end of the table. One he recognized as Stark Tower, the others he didn't know.

There were computer print outs of articles, some relating to the Avengers, some to various government departments that had been set up to deal with various Alien and Avenger related disasters.

"Karen, I think we should call Mr. Stark."

"Calling," Karen answered, and a moment later Peter listened as it rang and rang and rang and eventually went to voicemail.

"Hang up, Karen. Try again," Peter ordered, pushing aside the articles to look at the book beneath. It was one of those cheap calendar books you could get at the store, the kind May used to keep track of what bills were due when.

The call went to voicemail again. "Would you like me to hang up again?" Karen asked, but Peter wasn't listening.

He was flipping through the book and trying not to freak out.

It was a schedule. Schedules, plural.

Someone, somehow had gotten ahold of Tony's itinerary, or what it used to be before he'd been ordered not to leave the tower. Each time and place was written out in red ink.

There were other appointments listed, some in blue ink, some in black. A few dates were highlighted, others crossed out with little notes like "too crowded", "no line of site", and "no exit" scribbled beside them.

Peter looked for last Wednesday's entry, saw where Tony was scheduled to arrive back in New York, back at Stark Tower. The date was circled.

Peter looked to the end of the week and felt his stomach drop. "Karen, is today Saturday?"

"Yes, Peter."

"Oh, shit." Saturday was circled in black ink. There wasn't anything helpful written in, not like with Wednesday's date that had read "S. Tower 11PM". No, this one had a hastily written "SHB" with no time.

"What the hell is SHB?" Peter asked, feeling himself starting to panic. He tossed the book back on the table and began to hurriedly sort through the articles.

"SHB is a shorthand acronym used by many S.H.I.E.L.D agents to refer to the S.H.I.E.L.D base of operations in a city outside that of agency headquarters," Karen supplied helpfully.

Peter froze. "What?"

"SHB is short for S.H.I.E.L.D Home Base," she explained. "It is often used during field reports when-,"

"Okay," Peter said cutting her off. "Where is S.H.I.E.L.D's home base in New York?"

"I believe that would constitute breaking Mr. Stark's rules."

And they so did not have time for this. Peter was about to tell her as much when his eyes landed back on the tower's blueprints. He moved it to the side and scanned the ones below, the ones he hadn't recognized.

In the bottom left hand corner of the second blueprint was a blurred legend, like the printer had been about to run out of ink, but Peter could still make out the blocky lettered "SHB".

"Karen, I think the bad guy's gonna try to blow up S.H.I.E.L.D's offices," he said slowly. His hands were starting to shake. "So I really need you to give me that address and then to get Mr. Stark on the phone."

Karen waited long enough for her program to analyze exactly what Peter had said before she declared, "It's in Manhattan."

Peter can travel pretty fast, a hell of a lot faster than any train or cabbie trying to deal with traffic, but even so the creepy warehouse was just far enough from S.H.I.E.L.D's offices that Peter began to panic.

And apparently it was showing because the second Happy answered the phone he was immediately on high alert. "What's happening? Why are you freaking out?"

"There's a bomb!" Peter screamed between heavy breaths. He was flying high enough above the city that he didn't have to worry about causing a panic, or at least he hoped so. The last thing he needed was the Daily Bugle finding out he had caused a bomb scare in the middle of rush hour. "The bomber's gonna attack S.H.I.E.L.D!"

"What?" Happy said, and Peter could hear him moving into action, , and for a second, Peter thought he could hear Ned yelling in the background. "Why are you calling me? Where's Tony?"

"I don't know, he's not answering his phone," Peter explained. He could see the outline of the building housing S.H.I.E.L.D's offices, it was just a few blocks away.

"What about your panic button?" Happy asked.

Oh. Yeah. That was a thing. "Uh…"

"Damn it, Parker. Press the damn thing, and stay away from that building!"

"Happy, it's gonna happen today, and today's almost over," Peter explained just before ordering Karen to hang up. He activated the panic button and dropped down right in front of the building.

Now what?

It wasn't necessarily a flash back, but Peter suddenly couldn't get the Ferry Incident out of his head. This was a completely different situation, different scenario, but still…

What if he ran in there, pulled the fire alarm, and he was wrong? What if there wasn't a bomb? What if he somehow just…made everything worse.

"Parker, what are you doing?" Tony's voice sounded in his head so loud and clear that for a moment, Peter thought he was there with him. He turned on the spot, but didn't see anything other than passing pedestrians watching him with varying degrees of curiosity before he realized the voice was coming through the speaker in his mask.

He could have started off with "I can explain," but decided time was an issue and it might be best to just jump right in and do the actual explaining.

"I'm at S.H.I.E.L.D's-," Peter began.

But Tony cut him off. "Yeah, I can see that, kid. But what I want to know is why you are at the one place I specifically told you not to go? There's no loophole here, kid. I distinctly remember tell-,"

"Mr. Stark just shut up and listen! Please!" Peter yelled and yeah, now people were stopping to stare. Peter fired a web and started to climb. He didn't care if he was climbing up the side of a building, looking like a maniac. He couldn't think, couldn't breathe with everyone staring at him like that.

Tony got quiet. Peter talked.

"I think the bomber is going to attack S.H.I.E.L.D. I think there's a bomb somewhere in the building, and I…I don't know."

There were a few moments silence and then Tony asked, "How sure are you?"

"Uh…," not very, if Peter was being honest, "Seventy percent, maybe?"

The groan Tony gave made it clear he wasn't happy with that. "Look, Fury and I will handle this. You get away from that building. Am I clear?"

"Mr. Stark-."

"I'm on my way. You get out of there. Now." The call ended before Peter could point out just how stupid of an idea that was.

He stopped climbing. He was probably about twenty stories up, give or take. A quick look down proved people had lost interest and moved on, each too busy with their own lives to worry about Spider-Man having a meltdown.

"Karen, can you scan the building?"

"I cannot, Peter. S.H.I.E.L.D's security prevents outside scans."

Peter rolled his eyes and rested his forehead against the window he was currently hanging onto. Think, Peter, think.

But he couldn't think. The noise in the city was picking up. The work day was ending and everyone was eager to be anywhere but where they were. He could hear people talking, phones ringing, horns honking…

And honking.

"Hey, this is a no parking zone, asshole!"

Peter looked down at the yell to see that a mover's van, the bright orange kind you could rent by the hour, was parked right in front of the building. People were honking and trying to move around it, impatient New Yorkers flipping off the driver as they drove by.

"Karen, can you scan that van?"

And she did, because Karen was awesome and also smart enough to know the seriousness of the situation. Peter didn't know if he was relieved that he was right when she reported something suspicious in the back, or freaked out because holy shit there might be a bomb in that van.

"Mr. Stark is on his way, Peter," Karen reminded him. And yes, that was true, but Peter was already here, so…

He jumped down, landing on the roof of the van just in time to scare the hell out of the driver who had been trying to casually walk away. "Hey buddy, where ya going?"

The man looked like he might have been a little older than Happy, but he was definitely in a lot better shape, because the second he saw Spider-Man standing above him he took off running. And boy was he fast.

But Peter was faster. A few flicks of his wrist and the man was webbed up tight, cheek pressed into the façade of the building, eyes wide as he frantically tried to mumble around the webbing over his mouth.

Peter jumped down and opened the back of the van. "Holy shit."

"Is that a bomb?" someone asked. And yes, yes it was.

A big one.

"Peter, there appears to be a timer," Karen pointed out.

Peter looked at the numbers slowly counting down. "Where's Mr. Stark?"

"He is two minutes out."

Well that wouldn't work. The timer was just under the two minute mark. If they were lucky, Iron Man would arrive just in time to see the bomb explode.

Peter looked around. Men and women were starting to pour out of the building, some were ushering people away from the truck, others were staring at Peter, waiting to see what he was going to do.

But Peter didn't really know. He couldn't exactly drive the truck out of the way. Not in two minutes and definitely not in rush hour.

Peter felt himself begin to panic again and his mind went back to that damn ferry.

"The ferry…" Peter turned. If he looked straight down 73rd Street he could see the East River. "Karen, how unstable is this thing?"

"I do not understand your question," she said as Peter jumped up and hovered over the bomb.

"Is it gonna go off if I move it?"

Karen waited two seconds and said, "I do not think so."

And okay, he would have preferred a definite answer, but that was better than nothing. "Okay, new plan."

And it was a bad one, but it was better than waiting around to blow up.

Wrapping the bomb up in webbing and slinging it on his back like a deformed and deadly imitation of St. Nick's bag of goodies wasn't exactly Peter's first choice for dealing with the bomb, but he'd run out of options.

Ignoring the yells and orders of the agents behind him, Peter hefted the bomb onto his back and took off, shoulders pulling at the joints as he swung towards the East River.

It was just two blocks, two lousy city blocks. He could make it. "Karen, what's the blast radius?"

"There are too many unknown variables, Peter," she informed him calmly. Her tone was soothing, like she could tell he was freaking the hell out. "But you still have 47 seconds."

Peter tried to count. His brain was alternating between Oh shit oh shit oh shit to one-one thousand, two-one thousand, three-, to thinking of Aunt May and how he had promised her a safe and stress free weekend with Tony.

"It's nothing to worry about, May. I promise."

Fifteen-one thousand, six—

Roosevelt Island was in the distance, partway between Queens and Manhattan. Peter wished he was further down river, further from the shore.

He wished someone else was there to handle this, because as much as he loved being Spider-Man, there were moments, just a few, where he wished he could just let someone else take on all the responsibility.

"Peter, I suggest you hurry."

Not helping, Karen.

Peter was almost there. He could smell the river, hear the birds squawking, taste the salt in the air. The only plan Peter had was to get the bomb in the water, get it away from the people.

Only problem with that was he couldn't exactly walk up and just drop it in. He was going on pure instinct by now, heart pounding, Spidey-sense blaring, shoulders straining.

He kept imagining that scene from that really old movie Die Hard where Bruce Willis jumped from a building as a bomb went off, swinging through the air on a repurposed fire hose.

Peter had a really bad feeling he was about to be Bruce Willis, whether he wanted to be or not.

He flicked his wrist, pulling hard on his webbing to get enough momentum to carry him across the street and within distance of the next building….and then he got an idea.

Another terribly bad idea.

Maybe he did want to be Bruce Willis. He could swing from the last building, propel himself far enough over the river and toss the bomb before swinging back. It could work.

If he ignored Karen's warnings and everything he knew about physics.

It would work.

Maybe.

Didn't matter either way. He was down to just seconds now. Either it worked and it hurt or it didn't and it wouldn't be his problem anymore.

Peter muttered a desperate "please work," shot a web to the highest point, and pulled as hard as he could before letting go.

Peter was used to that weightless feeling that came with free falling. It was a rush, a little added bit of excitement that came with being Spider-Man and swinging through the city. But this time was different.

He'd reached the end of the road and swung out over the river like a pendulum. As soon as he released the web, Peter's stomach dropped. The air rushed in his ears, his heart pounded, and he felt gravity wrapping around him, pulling him down.

He released the bomb and desperately flung out both wrists, webs flying towards the closest building as the bomb fell towards the water.

He expected to hear a splash.

What he heard was a boom and the sound his body made when it collided with something hard.

When Peter opened his eyes, it was to find a frowning Nick Fury and Iron Man leaning over him.

"You better not be dead."

It was said in annoyance, with noticeably more anger than concern, or so Peter thought, but then again he'd just been thrown head first into a concrete wall.

In all honesty, Peter wasn't even sure which man had said it.

"Come on, kid. Use your words."

That was Tony, and there was definite concern there.

"Did I do it?" Peter asked.

"You definitely did something," Fury answered. "But no casualties, if that's what you're asking."

Okay, that was good. Cool. That had been the goal. Peter turned his head, felt the world tilt for a moment and frowned.

He was lying on the ground, back pressed up against the building. Glass was everywhere. It crunched beneath people's feet and made a little tinkling sound when he shifted, the pieces falling off of him.

There were emergency lights shining everywhere. Fire trucks and police cars lined the street. Some people were stomping about, looking official, others were standing about, looking useless.

Peter pushed himself up into a sitting position and leaned back against the wall. "No one got hurt?" he asked again.

"No one but you," Tony confirmed. He was still wearing his mask, his head tilted to the side, like he was studying Peter.

"I'm okay," Peter said.

Tony wasn't convinced. "Karen says otherwise."

"Karen's wrong."

And yeah, apparently AIs could sound indignant because just as Fury asked, "Who the hell's Karen?" Karen decided to tell Peter that she was most definitely not wrong.

"You have a mild concussion and several lacerations and a possibly dislocated shoulder."

"I'm moderately fine," Peter amended. Tony took off his helmet in time for Peter to see him roll his eyes. His hair was wet, the usual careful styling completely absent. One side was flat while the other stuck up in spiky tufts. The whole image was completely unexpected and so not what Peter was used to seeing outside of combat.

Tony, for once, didn't seem to care. He was glowering. It was somewhat intimidating, but Peter was used to it.

Tony bent down. "Which shoulder?"

Peter pointed to the one that hurt worse, and then without any warning, Tony reached forward and grabbed it, metal covered fingers pressing where Peter really wished they wouldn't.

"Mr. Stark, that kinda hurts," Peter informed him.

"Not as much as this will," Tony said. Peter realized he should have seen it as a warning, but he was still coming down from an adrenaline high. That and he'd just had his bell rung when a blast wave forced him to kiss a high-rise.

Tony pushed and pulled, the movement quick, practiced, and exact- a good sign that the man knew what he was doing.

Didn't mean it didn't hurt though.

Peter screamed, pushed Tony away, and fell back with a strangled cough. He gave his shoulder an experimental shrug. And hey, look at that. It didn't hurt as much anymore.

Tony was sprawled out beside him, legs akimbo as he rubbed at the armor over his chest. Apparently, he'd pushed a little too hard.

Tony sat up, propped his arms on bent knees and said, "Damn, kid. Give a little warning next time."

"Ditto," Peter mumbled. He reached up and scratched at a tickle in his ear. He frowned when the annoying tickle turned into an annoying wetness. It was sticky, causing his mask to cling to his skin.

He didn't need to look to know his head was bleeding.

"Someone want to tell me what the hell is going on?" Fury snapped. And man did he looked pissed. Way more intimidating than Mr. Stark's scowl.

It was probably the eye-patch.

"I found the bomber," Peter explained, rising once more to a sitting position. He gestured towards the river and the debris bobbing in the water. "Then I got rid of the bomb. Sort of."

"Yeah, we're gonna need a little more than that," Tony said, so Peter gave it to them. He scratched his head again, felt the wetness smear, and explained about schedule books and blue prints. He was just getting to the part about the weird photo collage on the wall when Fury spoke up.

"How'd you find all this?"

"…I asked around."

Tony looked up to the sky and made a face. One that clearly showed his was trying to keep his temper under control. "Kid, we talked about loopholes."

"Not a loophole," Peter quickly pointed out. "This had nothing to do with S.H.I.E.L.D. NYPD ran the raid."

Fury didn't seem impressed. "And how did you know about the raid?"

"…I asked around," Peter repeated, somewhat reluctantly. When both men's frowns deepened, Peter reminded them that "It had nothing to do with S.H.I.E.L.D.!"

Tony shook his head and rubbed at his forehead, looking very much like Colonel Rhodes had early that morning. "You're killing me, Webs."

And okay, was Peter just supposed to let the bad guy blow up a city block? "What was I supposed to do?" Peter yelled.

"Sit it out, like you were fucking told!" And now they were sitting in the middle of a crime scene, literally sitting, asses to pavement, feet tucked under knees, yelling at one another like pissed off preschoolers.

"You were building a bomb!"

Tony quickly held up both hands, one urging Peter to shut the fuck up, the other begging Fury to just wait a damn minute. "No. No I was reconstructing a bomb…," but of course Fury didn't look convinced. "I wasn't going to use it! You've seen Law and Order, CSI, things like that! I was looking for a signature. Jesus, kid."

It turns out, if you say just the right thing, Nick Fury's scowl can get even scarier.

Peter watched as the man took a calming breath, placed both hands on his hips, and then looked down to Tony, who was still sitting on the ground, and asked, "Is this what I'm going to have to worry about now? A mini-version of you?"

To Peter's horror, Tony just tilted his head back so he could meet Fury's eye, smirked, and said, "You're just mad because the kid found the psycho before you did."

"Please don't make him angrier," Peter whispered. They ignored him. Peter was actually okay with this.

"Did you set him up to this?"

"Believe it or not, I specifically told him not to do this."

"Technically, you said-," Peter started to explain. But Tony wasn't having it.

"Kid. You really want to do this right here?"

Peter saw Fury's eye travel to him. "Never mind."

"Get him out of here. Both of you, gone."

"Gladly," Tony snapped, and then without warning, he grabbed Peter beneath his arms and lifted him into the air. "What the hell were you thinking?"

"I didn't go after the bad guy," Peter quickly explained. "Not technically."

"Then tell me technically what you did do?"

So Peter did. Or he tried to. He reminded Tony that he did not look into anything S.H.I.E.L.D. related. That he hadn't planned to confront the bad guy, not even once. He even reminded Tony that Parkers have shitty luck, just in case Tony had forgotten.

But most importantly, he pointed out that "I tried to call you!"

"I was in the shower!"

"I know FRIDAY can patch through emergencies."

"She does, and she did. What the hell do you think the panic button was for?"

And yeah, Peter'd forgotten about that again.

The yelling pretty much went back and forth until they landed. Not because Peter was sick of being yelled at, but because he knew he was right.

He stalked into the penthouse, pulled off his mask, and whirled around to face Tony.

"If I hadn't done what I did, they'd all be dead now!"

"Are you…is that blood?" Tony asked. The suit disengaged, Tony stepped out and immediately reached for Peter's head, tilting it so he could see where the blood was coming from.

"It's fine." Peter scowled. Tony didn't take him at his word. Instead, he pushed his fingers through Peter's sweaty hair, his frown deepening when he saw the small cut above his ear. It was already healing, Peter could tell. He could also tell, thanks to Tony's still probing fingers, that it was probably bruised to hell and back. "You're ignoring me again," Peter grumbled.

"I am very much not ignoring you," Tony grumbled back. He squeezed his hand under Peter's jaw. "Feel that? That's me not ignoring you."

Peter pushed Tony's hands away and took a step back. "You know what I mean."

"Do I?" Tony asked, and boy did Peter hate it when Tony did that. "Why don't you explain it to me, just to be sure?"

"You're not listening to anything I say," Peter told him. He was trying to be calm, to keep his voice even and low. But the more he said, the angrier he got. "You keep telling me I'm a kid, that I need to stay out of everything unless it somehow benefits you, and you refuse to listen to me, to admit that I'm right when we both know that that bomb would have killed a lot of people if I hadn't stopped it."

"What do you want me to do, huh?" Tony asked, sounding just as angry. "Am I just supposed to send you out there every time something dangerous pops up? No backup. No experience. No idea what the hell you're doing? Huh? Tell me, Parker. What the hell do you want me to do?" He'd slowly stepped closer with each question, each point he thought he was making until he was standing right in front of Peter.

But Peter wasn't having it. He pushed Tony away, causing him to stumble back as he yelled, "Stop treating me like a damn kid and treat me like a freaking team mate. Is that so hard?!"

It echoed off the glass walls and tiled floors. Tony stared at him, eyes wide. Peter just stood there, panting.

"Tony?"

They both turned at the sound of the soft voice. Pepper Potts was looking at them with a worried frown. Behind her MJ, Ned, and Happy were all looking out of the elevator, each with varying degrees of confusion and nerves.

Peter felt the fight leave him in a rush. His head hurt, his shoulder hurt, his…everything hurt. He could still feel the fear he'd first registered when he realized he was looking at a very real, very big bomb. He felt awkward and embarrassed, though he couldn't really pinpoint exactly where those feelings were coming from, but he was willing to bet it had something to do with Nick Fury.

He gave one more tired look at Tony and walked out.

He thought about going home, realized that unless he took a shower first he'd have to explain to May why he was covered in blood and dust, and detoured down the hall to the spare bedroom that had somehow become his.

Except the second Peter slammed the door shut, he decided he was too tired to move. He made it as far as the bed, knees hitting the mattress before he face planted, nose landing hard on the soft, soft pillows.

He closed his eyes and tried to focus on his breathing, on the little tricks he'd been taught to calm his nerves. He tried harder when he heard his door open and close.

"Are you trying to suffocate yourself?" MJ asked.

Peter sighed and said "No," or he tried to, but thanks to his face being buried deep in a pillow all that came out was a very dejected sounding moan that hinted at negation.

MJ was smart. She figured it out.

Peter felt the bed dip, heard her sigh as she leaned back against the headboard, her knee coming to rest on his shoulder as she pulled her feet up onto the bed. "Is Stark gonna be mad you're getting blood all over his fancy pillows?"

Peter thought about pointing out that they were his fancy pillows, that Tony had outfitted the room for everything he'd thought Peter would need, fancy hypo-allergenic pillows included, but he didn't really feel like getting into it. Not that it mattered anyway.

"What do you want, MJ?" Peter asked.

"To make sure you're okay, but if you're gonna be an ass about it, I can go let Stark do it instead."

There was another negative sounding moan. MJ understood that too.

Peter turned his head so he could see her. "I just wish he wouldn't…" treat him like a kid? Make him feel insignificant? Be so mean?

MJ didn't really need Peter to clarify. She got the gist. "D'you ever think that maybe he's doing it out of concern? Like maybe he doesn't like the idea of you being dead?"

May had said the same thing. Ned had too. And yes, the thought might have crossed Peter's own mind once or twice, if for no other reason than Tony had said it multiple times, but that was beside the point.

And when the hell did MJ start siding with Tony Stark?

"Since he took a noticeable interest in making sure you don't die from your own stupidity."

"I'm not stupid."

"No, you're not. But you do stupid things."

Peter glared at her.

MJ was unimpressed. "It's not like it's a secret. Ask Happy."

"Let's not ask Happy."

MJ smirked. She reached over and pushed aside Peter's hair, smirk falling when she saw the cut. "Does this need looked at?"

"It'll heal," he promised her, then closed his eyes as she started to run her fingers through is hair, blunt nails scraping gently along his scalp.

"Did you go after the bomber?" she asked.

"No." Peter winced as MJ formed a fist, pulling at his hair. "Not at first," he corrected. MJ resumed gently scratching his scalp.

"At first I just went to see if I could get more info, you know? Find out if there were any leads, look for clues—,"

"Even after you were told to stay out of it." It wasn't a question, just an unnecessary observation.

"Mr. Stark was told to stay out of it. No one told me anything."

"Stark didn't tell you to stay out of it?"

"….not exactly." He was told to stay away from S.H.I.E.L.D. Technically.

MJ sighed, gave his hair another aggravated tug and slid down until she was lying beside him. "Look at me," she ordered.

Peter looked at her. She had one eyebrow arched in judgment.

"You're not stupid-," she began.

"But I do stupid things," Peter finished for her. "Yeah, I know."

"So…is it over?"

And that was a good question.

Technically it was. Bad guy was captured, citizens were saved, and Tony Stark was no longer sequestered away by order of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Peter, however, was the one now grounded because apparently Pepper Potts had a big mouth and May Parker was number three on her speed-dial.

There was more yelling, some crying, and an angrily determined confiscation of phones, PlayStation controllers, and laptops before Peter was ignored as May tried to cool off in her room.

"You know, there's supposed to be a system to things," May said later that night, out of the blue. She was standing at the stove, one hand propped on the counter as the other stirred a pot of store bought marinara.

Peter was sitting in the living room, TV muted, head leaned back against the couch as he stared at the ceiling. He let his head roll to the side, watching as May studied their half-cooked dinner. "What?" he asked.

"A system," she repeated, and Peter frowned at the waver in her voice. "To life. People are born. People grow up, they have kids, they bury their parents. Wash, rinse, repeat." She set the sauce covered spoon to the side and turned, arms crossing over her chest as she leveled red-rimmed eyes on Peter. "Parents aren't supposed to bury their kids," she said. "That's not how the system is supposed to work."

Peter lifted his head and turned towards his aunt. "May, I'm fi-,"

"I bought you funeral insurance. Did you know that?" She snapped, cutting him off.

Peter just stared at her. "Funeral insurance," he whispered.

"It's where you buy an insurance policy that will pay for a funeral when someone dies," she clarified, voice still wavering, still somewhat snappish. "I bought it six months ago, right after-," she trailed off, leaving Peter to think back on what could have happened six months ago to prompt her to begin planning his funeral.

He couldn't think of anything.

She continued to glare at Peter, arms still crossed as she breathed in heavily through her nose.

Peter couldn't tell whether or not she was fighting back tears or trying to resist the urge to yell at him some more.

She shook her head, ran her hand through her hair, and gave a heavy, sob-tinged sigh before sitting down at the kitchen table. "I bought me some, too," she added. Letting her eyes wander back to the living room and Peter. "In case I—in case…well, you know."

Dinner wasn't really awkward. May didn't give it a chance to be. As soon as the noodles were done and the sauce mixed in, she fixed herself a bowl and disappeared into her room.

Peter ate, cleaned up the kitchen, and went to bed without brushing his teeth.

He slept, kind of. Or he thought he did. He tossed and turned, even dreamed a little. The kind of dreams that sounded like hate and anger and smelled like burning skin before he opened his eyes and saw the welded slats of the bunk above him.

Sometime just after dawn he heard May puttering around the apartment, smelled coffee brewing, heard her groan when she realized the milk had expired.

She knocked gently on his door, peaked her head inside, and gave a sheepish sort of smile, something like a truce, when she saw his eyes were open.

She walked to Peter's desk, plugged his phone in using the frayed cord that only still worked because Peter had wrapped the entire thing in electrical tape, and made her way to the bed, nudging Peter, urging him to scoot over as she laid down beside him.

She reached forward and carded her fingers through Peter's hair. Her nails were longer than MJ's, her touch more loving, too. More calming.

"We good?" she asked.

"We're good," he answered.

"You're still grounded though." She let her hand drop.

"I know."

"No leaving the apartment."

"I know."

"I don't care if Godzilla himself is rampaging through Queens. You are to stay here."

Peter rolled his eyes. "Got it, May."

"Also, you can have your phone back," she said, nodding towards his desk and the phone she'd put on to charge. "Not as a reward or anything," she added, pointing a finger at him accusingly, like he had done something—something else—wrong, "but only because if Godzilla does show his ass, I need to be able to get in touch with you."

Peter smiled. "You're gonna be late," he said, rolling onto his front and tucking his arms beneath his pillow.

May nodded, ran her hand through Peter's hair one more time, and smiled softly, almost sadly. "I love you."

"I love you, too," Peter said.

She kissed him on the temple and left. Peter closed his eyes and slept until noon.

Uncle Ben had set up a system of sorts for when Peter got in trouble, a way to "work off" his punishment. May had a tendency to overdo it when it came to grounding. Or at least Peter had always thought.

Ben had seemed to agree, because he had suggested (and somehow managed to convince May) that it'd be a good idea for Peter to do a few extra chores to shave off time from his sentence.

So when May grounded him until he was thirty for accidently flooding the bathroom when he started to fill the tub and then got distracted by cartoons, Peter was able to trim it down to two weeks when he did the dishes and took out the trash every day (a week and a half after he helped dry out the bathroom).

When Peter accidently knocked Mrs. McClurksy down the stairs, fracturing her femur in his haste to get to school on time, Peter was able to whittle "forever" down to just a week when he helped carry all of Mrs. McClurksy's groceries up and helped with her laundry.

Ben might be gone, but as far as Peter knew their system was still in place.

Of course, back then he was usually grounded for things like back talking, forgetting his homework, or breaking the TV.

He tossed a nearly empty take out container of General Tso's chicken into the trash and wondered how long it'd take to work off 'suicidal stupidity', 'terroristic acts of idiocy', or as Nick Fury had put it, 'being a fucking dumbass'.

Peter wanted to call it heroically getting results, but he'd been overruled.

He pulled an old Tupperware container out from the back of the fridge, opened it, and quickly closed it again. He didn't even bother to try to identify what it had once been. He simply stuffed it into the heavily drooping trash bag and fought to regain control of his gag reflex.

He was just about to reach for the butter container to see if it was actually butter inside or some fuzzy forgotten concoction May had intended to have as leftovers when there was a rhythmic knock at the door.

Familiarly rhythmic. Because Tony Stark couldn't just tap, tap, tap.

"What are you doing here?" Peter asked, and yeah, it might have sounded a bit rude. It wasn't supposed to. Honest. But Peter's surprised voice had always sounded a lot like his being a little ass voice, and he sure as hell wasn't expecting to see Tony Stark standing outside his front door wearing grease stained jeans and holding a container of homemade chocolate cupcakes.

"Apology cupcakes," Tony declared, pointing at the clear container before pushing said container into Peter's chest as he made his way, uninvited, into the apartment.

"Apology cupcakes?"

Tony gently nudged his foot against the half-full bag of trash still sitting on the floor before reaching for the refrigerator door and pulling it open. "I might owe you an apology. Maybe, a small one, because you were still wrong. Wrongish? But I probably could have handled that better, you know, with Fury," he clarified before straightening up and frowning. "You're out of milk."

"Yeah, it's uh, it's in the bag," Peter said, nodding towards the trash bag at Tony's feet. He was still standing in the doorway, cupcakes in one hand, the other resting on the still open door. "We need…more," he finished lamely.

Tony just shrugged and started rummaging through the cabinets, acting right at home as he filled two glasses full of water. "Eat your cupcake," he ordered.

Peter frowned, remembered the angry glare Tony had given him the day before, and did as he was told. Sort of.

He shut the door and sat at the table, at least. There were three cupcakes, all with day-old ganache and white paper cups that had turned somewhat clear thanks to butter and oil. Peter picked up the one in the middle.

"Is Nick Fury still mad?" Peter asked.

Tony handed him a glass of water, took a sip of his own, frowned at the taste of Queens' tap water, and said, "Honestly, I think being mad is just a perpetual state when it comes to Fury. Pretty sure his base, factory default is 'pissed off'."

"Are you still mad?"

Tony tapped his finger against the glass, thinking. "A little," he answered. "But it's not entirely focused on you, if that makes you feel better." It did. "But for the record, I am sorry."

"Uh, me too," Peter said. He looked down at the cupcake, scratched his thumbnail along the ridges of the wrapper, and tried to think of something to say to fill the awkward silence.

Tony beat him to it though. "New rule. No loop holes with me. "

Peter looked up, felt the corner of his mouth quirk into a smirk. "But it's fine for everyone else?"

"Sure," Tony said, waving a hand dismissively, before frowning. "Maybe not Happy, 'cause you know, you're liable to give the big guy a stroke. And let's add your aunt to that list, yeah? Pretty sure she deserves a freaking medal having to put up with both of us. Speaking of, how much trouble are you in?"

"Grounded until I graduate. She didn't clarify whether that was high school or college."

The corners of Tony's mouth turned down in a sympathetic wince. "Maybe save one of those cupcakes for her. Might soften her up enough to let you off the hook before you finish puberty. If you've even started it yet…"

Peter rolled his eyes and looked to the bag of trash on the floor. He wanted to tell Tony he was already working on convincing May to let his sentence end early for good behavior, that he planned on not only vacuuming after he finished with the fridge, but scrubbing the bathroom and googling how to dust with that fancy dusting spray May used that made the apartment smell like lemons.

But Peter's brain got stuck on May and the image of her sad smile and his mouth took a detour because what he said next definitely wasn't about toilet cleaners or dust bunnies.

"D'you know you can get funeral insurance for people?" Peter asked. He focused on the cupcake's icing, watched as little cracks formed when he pressed his finger into a stale swirl of ganache. There were a few moments of heavy silence, and when Peter looked over, Tony was frowning, studying him much like he had the images of burnt bomb fragments the day before.

Peter licked the dried icing off his finger and began to explain, "It's like life insurance, except-,"

"I know what funeral insurance is," Tony cut in, still frowning, still studying.

Peter nodded, and started peeling away the little paper cup from the cupcake. "May bought some for me. Apparently."

Tony stared at Peter, mouth pressed in a firm line, eyes wide, almost angry. "Jesus," he hissed and leaned back in his chair. He raised his hand, wiped at his mouth, and looked away, focusing on the chipped backsplash behind the kitchen sink.

"I can't stop doing this," Peter blurted out. It was one of those you say it as you're thinking it kind of things, it had to be, because if Peter had had time to think it through, he never would have said it.

But too late. The words were out.

History had a tendency to repeat itself.

Tony had a catalogue of quirks, facial expressions, mannerisms, favorite sayings…

Anyone who knew the man could close their eyes and guess how he'd react, what he'd say. Peter used to be shit at that game. He knew what he wanted Tony to say, but more times than not he couldn't guess what Tony would actually say.

But this time, Peter was pretty confident he knew what was coming. After all, they'd already had this conversation. Multiple times. More than Peter wanted to admit.

It happened anytime things got too dangerous; someone would ask Peter to quit, to forget about Spider-Man and just focus on being a kid, and Peter would have to explain why that wasn't going to happen. Why it couldn't happen.

Tony continued to stare at the kitchen wall, and for a small, hopeful moment, Peter thought maybe Tony hadn't heard him. But then Tony turned back to Peter and leaned forward. He propped his elbows on the table-top and rubbed his hands tiredly over his face, stopping with the palms of his hands pushed hard against his eyes.

"I know," he said, eyes still covered, voice heavy.

Peter felt his eyes widen in surprise. So he was still shit at guessing. Sometimes that wasn't a bad thing.

"You're not gonna try to convince me to stop?"

Tony moved one of his hands to the side and looked at Peter, the one exposed eyebrow arched in disbelief. "Would you actually listen this time?"

Peter looked back to his cupcake.

"That's what I thought."

There were a few more moments of heavy silence before Tony leaned back in the chair and said, "You know I can't get a life insurance policy?"

He sighed, twisted his mouth to the side like he was thinking of something and didn't like the taste.

"Between Iron-Man and the-," Tony tapped the center of his chest, where the arc reactor used to be, "—my heart isn't exactly in tip top shape."

Peter must have looked concerned, because Tony waved another dismissive hand and said, "Don't worry. I've got a few years left, few decades if we're lucky, but…," Tony trailed off and gave his eyes another tired rub. "I'm not getting any younger. None of us are. And one day….what I'm trying to say, is one day we're not gonna be able to keep doing this. If we're lucky, we'll turn old and grey and all have to retire."

Tony shrugged and made a face that was half contemplation, half sneer and added, "Cap might not, but who knows." He sighed, reached forward and broke off a piece of Peter's cupcake, stuffed it in his mouth and slowly chewed as he stared at Peter, eyes narrowed in quiet thought.

"You're young," he finally said, wiping bits of chocolate crumbs onto the floor, eyes suddenly focusing anywhere but on Peter, like eye contact was suddenly too uncomfortable. "Too young at the moment, but whatever." He looked up and offered a small smile. "But you'll grow up one day, earn the name Spider-Man and," he made a vague gesture, hinting at the future, at whatever vision he had of an adult Peter Parker.

Peter wanted to say something profound, to point out that that was quite possibly the nicest compliment Tony'd ever given him (in a round-about way), but he was pretty sure his voice wouldn't be steady, so instead, he stuffed a chunk of chocolate cake in his mouth and muttered an incredibly awkward and quiet "thank you."

Tony did a good job holding back a laugh, which Peter was more than thankful for.

"Alright, kid," he said clapping his hands together and distracting Peter from his own self-inflicted mortification. "Wanna get out of here?"

Peter quickly swallowed the cupcake, coughed at the dryness. "Grounded, remember?"

"Oh, yeah." Tony inhaled and let it out in a heavy huff of air, cheeks puffing out, eyebrows raising as he looked around, searching for a Plan B.

Peter saw his eyes land on the trash bag.

"Want help with your chores?" Tony asked.

Peter stared at him. "You wanna clean out my fridge?"

Tony shrugged. "Hey, you helped me clean up my mess when I was grounded."

"Yeah, because Miss Potts made me."

Tony tilted his head to the side, mouth twisting into a knowing smirk. "You trying to tell me you wouldn't have helped if she hadn't yelled?"

Okay, yeah. Peter would have totally helped, but that was beside the point. "Have you ever actually cleaned out a fridge before?"

Tony looked insulted. "Parker, you literally saw me scrubbing my kitchen floor yesterday."

"Yeah, but," Peter turned and looked towards the trash bag and the outline of the discarded Tupperware bowl, "There's a difference between sweeping up spilled sugar and venturing into a Parker fridge."

Tony smiled. "I'll make you a deal," he said, leaning forward once more, posture challenging, "if I find anything in there that's half as bad as what Bruce has been known to leave in my fridge in the name of science, I'll rescind my no-Neds-in-the-lab rule."

"Seriously?"

"Try not to sound too eager. We're talking about the man who created the Hulk. He's literally been known to bring questionable things to life."

Peter wasn't about to argue, not if it meant he could cut his intended To-Do list in half, or at least however much Tony was willing to do.

"Just think of it as an extension of my apology," Tony said, finding nothing but butter in the yellow container. "You help me, I help you. That's how life works right?"

And yeah, it was. Sometimes. If you're lucky. But Parkers and luck have never gotten along. It was a thing. But Peter had learned a long time ago that not everything had to do with luck, because life was chaotic. Sometimes people died, sometimes they got super powers. And sometimes they managed to unintentionally guilt-trip billionaires into sorting through their aunt's questionable leftovers.

And maybe May was right, there was a system to life, a way things were supposed to go and it didn't include parents burying their kids.

But Peter had already buried three parents.

He knew May was worried, that she'd already buried the majority of her family, but so had Peter.

As much as he didn't want to die, he didn't want to lose anyone else even more. And he meant anyone.

So if that meant Peter had to bend the rules, had to incur the wrath of Nick Fury and his aunt to ensure that he wouldn't be attending any more funerals anytime soon, then he'd do it.

"Jesus! Alright, kid. Ned can come to the lab."

So yeah, life was supposed to have a system, but the system fucking sucked.