beginnings, 6
Peter eyed Harley's new piercings as they walk towards the workshop together. His friend went from having no piercings at all to having his lobes pierced with tunnels that had to be about half a centimetre wide. Peter already complimented Harley about it earlier, because they really did look good. Plus, it must have taken guts to go that far straight off the bat.
“I’m just sayin’, key takeaway of our first compsci class, the closet is made of glass with that Flash guy,” Harley insisted, and Peter wasn’t sure how to react to that.
“What.” Peter deadpanned, because Flash Thompson, gay? He was the most homophobic jerk out of all of them back at Midtown. The guy who had latched onto Peter and made his life hell with constant homophobic comments despite Peter being very deeply in the closet back then.
Harley chuckled, and went through the motions of unlocking the workshop. “Seriously! That dude is an attention seeking ass, but his comments? The way he always has to bring it back to gay folks? Yeah, I know the type.”
Peter laughed a hearty laugh at that – both because he could see Harley’s point and because it was ridiculous. “Oh my god, Harley. And here I was thinking I’d just move to another session so I don’t have to deal with him, but you know… this one might just be more entertaining. And he has no clue who I am, so he’s leaving me the fuck alone. You really think he’s just a closeted gay guy taking his internalized homophobia out on others?”
Harley clicked his tongue, and paced his way over to his main workbench to get started. The both of them wanted to deal with some upgrades to their suits before heading out on patrol, so they’d agreed on half an hour to work first. “Seriously, I’ll bring up Grindr next time we’re in class with him and I bet he’ll come up.”
Peter’s brain stalled for a moment. “You use Grindr?”
Harley flushed a little. “I mean, yeah? I’m outta Rose Hill now, ‘n I figured I could, you know, try some stuff out?”
“You do you, I guess,” Peter said, and then hummed to himself as he focused a bit more closely on some of the more delicate wiring in his suit’s mask. He pushed away memories of a few months ago when he’d hit one of his lowest lows, set up a Grindr account and almost made some very bad decisions. He was glad that he backed out, though. Peter wanted his first time to be something special. He also wasn’t entirely sure if he was actually interested in sex, anyway – having never been interested in MJ in that particular way.
He also ignored a small itch somewhere in his brain – like something was off about what Harley had said, even though there wasn’t.
So, back to his wiring. Even with Harley’s much more technologically sophisticated suit, Peter wanted to make sure that his own could do the things he needed. Like pick up clearer audio recordings whenever he overheard something worth going over later while out on patrol without Harley there next to him. There was also the idea of building in some kind of bone conduction earpieces so he could listen to some music on his solo patrols without missing any of the sounds around him, but that was not a priority project. Plus, Harley would want to do the same, and he was in no way experienced enough for that to be safe yet.
While Peter dealt with his audio receiver wiring, Harley was working on mimicking one of the energy blades Mr. Stark’s later suit designs had, and was making slower progress than he wanted. Peter had seen Harley pull off a prototype design, the problem was that it was a complete power sink. Nowhere near efficient enough to use in the field.
Peter finished getting all the wiring for his new audio receivers in place, and exhaled deeply as he moved over to his laptop to do a test run. Three trials later, he decided he was happy enough with the performance. There was only so much he could do with a suit like this; the nanotech suit Mr. Stark had made for him was way better, and there was no denying it.
“How was that writing club meet you went to?” Peter asked, keen to hear about Harley’s day now that he was done with his own work.
Harley sighed, chucked a tiny little resistor at the wall, and pushed his current work project to the side. “Actually not bad at all, honestly. Some of the folks there are darn intense, but it sounds like the club space will be a nice place to kick back and work out some ideas. I have no idea what I’d want to write other than some gay as hell fantasy story, but they all say there’s no shame in not knowin’ yet.”
“Nice,” Peter said softly, glad that his friend found some people who could support him in the new hobby he’d decided to try out. “Photography club was a bit of a bust. I mean, I don’t think I’m at the stage where I can talk about all these niche technical specifics of photographs, and I didn’t really click with anyone there. But I’ve taken a few shots around campus and had a bit of fun with that, so I think I’ll stick to it. Just, doing my own thing rather than with a club.”
“Fair enough,” Harley responded. “Shit, I just can’t get this energy blade workin’.”
Peter hummed. He wondered if maybe Harley was overthinking this or just shooting for the wrong goal right now. “What if you try something different, maybe something opposite to the power sink problem you’re dealing with? Something energy-cheap.”
Harley dropped his tools, and they clanked loudly against the metal workspace. “Peter, you’re- that’s perfect! I know exactly what I need to make next. Because you’re right, I don’t actually need this sword. My batons can already emit short burst pulses and that’s good enough for now. No, it’s time for the Potato Gun Mark 14.”
“The-” Peter started, and then stopped to bark out laughter. Harley was truly just living up to his reputation, now. Peter turned away from his work to face his friend. “If Mr. Stark could see you know, he would be shaking his head furiously. Alright, need a rubber duck?”
Harley turned too, sending Peter a look of confusion. “Rubber duck?”
“You know, someone to talk to who’ll just listen so you can get your ideas out. Sometimes it helps to say it aloud so you can think through your own stuff more clearly and figure out where to go next,” Peter explained. It was Uncle Ben who had first taught Peter the idea, when he was supremely stuck on a piece of homework. And… it was starting to bring Peter a lot of comfort to remember the dead and bring their memories with him, even if he had to let go of the living who had forgotten him.
“Friday, remind me later to tell Abby that she’s an excellent rubber duck, without explainin’ what it means to her,” Harley grinned.
“Certainly,” the AI agreed.
Harley hummed a little, and picked up a piece of scrap metal to fidget with. “So, here’s the idea. I call it a potato gun, but that’s not really what it’ll be. More like, I’m gonna make a projectile launcher for the suit that should need little to no energy, since most of the mechanisms will be non-electrical. All these potato guns I’ve built over the years have gotten me pretty darn good at launchin’ projectiles, so why not make the most of that? Make a launcher that can shoot just about anythin’, with just a little wirin’ to give it a little extra boost. The question is, what else could I do to make it worthwhile?”
Peter smiled, but said nothing. He didn’t need to. He could see the cogs turning in Harley’s brain, and knew that he was about to figure it out himself.
“Well shit, now that’s kinda obvious,” Harley remarked, so Peter just continued to smile encouragingly at him, now standing against his own workspace with folded arms. “Obviously I can hook it up to the aim assist, as well as have Darlene run calculations based on whatever objects are loaded in, all of which can be turned on and off to conserve energy. I could also have the suit help me identify suitable ammunition, and then just… not add anythin’ else, and leave it a simple tool that doesn’t need overcomplicatin’!”
“And there you go,” Peter gestured. “You said you want to honour Mr. Stark your way, and I think you’re doing a pretty great job. He’d be proud.”
Harley groaned. “Don’t you go gettin’ all sappy on me now, we’ve got crime to fight. Time to suit up?”
“Time to suit up,” Peter agreed. Tonight, on top of the usual plan of roaming the streets, they had two agenda items to get on top of. The first, Harley already knew – they were going to start keeping an eye out for the other iron suit wearer in Cambridge, and try to establish contact if possible. The second item was a piece of reconnaissance; Peter had picked up some whispers of a certain danger approaching the city, and he wanted to see if there was any truth to it.
Thanks to a heads up from one Jessica Jones, who he’d worked with a little bit in the months before moving to MIT, he had a location to suss out. It wasn’t anywhere near Jones’ usual wheelhouse – which was mostly casual private investigation work that only happened to sometimes cross over into vigilante work — which is exactly why she had passed it off to him. Well, he could tell Harley later.
Off they went.
Apparently they’d chosen the right night to go out on patrol, because the other iron suit wearer was out and about, and not that hard to spot. It didn’t look like they were patrolling. No, more or less they appeared to just be going out for a ride – or a fly, as it were. It would be on Harley to approach her, since he was the one with the capacity to get up to that altitude.
Peter was also glad Harley would approach the suit wearer for another reason – Harley had taken care of quite a few petty thugs already on that patrol, using his batons rather than any of his suit’s more advanced capabilities. While Peter was taking note of the ways in which Harley really needed to improve his close quarters combat skills, he also noticed how much Harley itched to use his blasters. It wasn’t the more appropriate choice for these encounters, but the way Harley kept holding out his hands and then stopping himself made it a little obvious.
“Wanna go see if they’ll come down to the ground?” Peter asked as the two stood on a rooftop and watched the iron suit fly circles in the air up above.
“Do we even know if they’re a friendly?” Harley questioned, but Peter could see his hands moving into position to lift off from the rooftop.
Peter smirked under his mask. Harley was a quick learner, and despite his inexperience, Peter knew he could handle something like this. “If you really want, I could stick to your suit and come up with you as long as we don’t go too high.”
“Nah, I’ll be fine,” Harley said quickly as he lifted off the ground. At this point, that meant he was well and truly on his own. Peter and Harley didn’t have any kind of comms link yet, so he’d just have to wait. It didn’t take long at all for Harley to reach the other iron suit wearer, and they made no attempts to flee. For a moment, it looked like Harley was trying to gesticulate dramatically, until he seemed to realise that it was very much not a good idea to be waving around the hands he needed to keep himself stable up in the air.
Oh, how Peter wished he could hear what was going on up there. He could only barely see the two of them in the distance, but he could tell that Harley was worked up. The two flyers hovered beside each other for a good half minute, and then Harley turned to look back down at Peter before beginning to descend back to the rooftop. The other flyer followed.
“You two better promise not to go looking me up now that you’ve seen my face,” the other flyer complained with a very familiar voice as they landed on the rooftop. “Damn Shuri for insisting on keeping my newer suit. I’m out here trying to be low-key and that fucking pretty girl just- god damn it.”
Harley just laughed.
Peter got a good look at the face only barely concealed by a set of goggles. “Riri?”
Riri threw her head back and groaned before turning to stare almost accusingly at Harley. “Okay man, what the fuck? New Stark ripoff, why does Spider-Man know who I am? Why do both of you know who I am? I have already done my fair share of attracting the wrong kind of attention, and I am not here for whatever’s going on right now.”
“You could just upgrade your suit to hide your face, you know,” Peter suggested to Riri Williams, who had apparently built her own iron suit from scratch – from the clear difference in design details, it was obvious that she hadn’t gotten her hands on something that Mr. Stark made. And… that was impressive. Her suit even had its own arc reactor, and not many people had the technical skill to reproduce that particular piece of Mr. Stark’s work. Harley hadn’t, but he was supposedly planning to do so when he had the time.
Riri exhaled. “Didn’t seem like much of a priority, given that I only use it to go flying when I’m stressed. I’m not interested in getting involved in your vigilante shit. Can I at least trust you not to blab?”
“Yeah, you can trust us,” Peter insisted. “Honestly, we both just wanted to know what was going on with the ‘Not Iron Man’ sightings that have been going on in Cambridge on and off for the last year.”
“He never said anythin’ about givin’ out suits to anybody else,” Harley added. “But I wouldn’t have put it past the old man to have some other secret adopted kids. You’re not… did you know him?”
Riri shook her head. “Nah. Honestly, I more or less built this as a personal challenge. To see if I could. So you did know him, huh? More to the point, you got a problem with me?”
Harley raised his hands up in protest. It didn’t exactly help that he was pointing his blasters at her, making Riri take a step back. “No! Definitely not! But… you made your own suit from scratch, and you could do so much good with it. But you won’t?”
Riri rolled her eyes. “Oh hell no. I’m pretty sure I’m on an FBI watchlist, and I know a whole nation of absurdly strong merpeople who could turn around any day and decide to drown me if they didn’t like what I’m doing. I’m keeping this to myself, thanks.”
Peter raised an eyebrow – not that either of the others would see that. “Merpeople?”
“They’re blue,” Riri stated seriously. “So, are we gonna address the fact that you both know who I am? I feel like your hidden faces and distorted voice things put me at a hell of a disadvantage here.”
Peter snorted, and pulled off his mask. He was standing pretty much in the middle of a high enough rooftop, and it was secure enough that he wasn’t risking a bystander seeing him. After a moment, Harley followed and lifted up the face of his suit to expose his own identity. It was definitely a daring choice to reveal their identities to her, given that they’d only met her a day ago, but Peter’s gut said it would be okay.
“Oh you have got to be kidding me,” Riri groaned some more. “Well, then. I’m gonna be honest, I’m at a loss for what to do about this. Just… you won’t tell anyone that I’m Ironheart, will you?”
“Course not. And now you know who to come to if you want to join up on some crime fightin’ action. But we don’t talk about it on campus – or, I don’t,” Harley declared. “Ironheart, huh?”
“Shut it, white boy,” Riri retorted, turning her head to the side in a way that gave Peter the impression she was flustered. “…it was Shuri’s idea.”
Harley smirked. Peter could sort of connect the dots, after what Riri had said upon landing on the rooftop – that Riri Williams had a thing going on with the princess of Wakanda. One way or another, she was going to get involved in big messy things, and running away from it would only work for so long. It was better that she came prepared.
“At the very least, you should keep up some training and upgrade your suit some more,” Peter suggested seriously, injecting a whole new kind of tension to the interaction that had somehow been relaxed so far. “Being low-key only works for so long.”
Riri sighed. “I know that. Well, this has been incredibly weird, and I’m gonna head off now. I’ll… see you two around, I guess.”
Once Riri had flown off into the distance, Peter turned to face Harley. His own main takeaway from the discovery of ‘Ironheart’s identity was one of concern for Riri’s safety, and he wanted to overlay that with something else. At least knowing her identity would make it easier to have her back if anything major happened. “So, what do you think?”
Harley shrugged, and closed his suit’s face back up. “I think I need to get to work on studyin’ nanotech. I can’t exactly let her show me up, can I?”
Peter huffed. He knew there was more about that interaction Harley wasn’t admitting, and yet it was exactly the kind of thing he needed to hear. He glanced at the time shown on his suit’s very basic heads up display. It was time. “Definitely not. So, how would you feel about learning some reconnaissance skills?”
Harley turned to face him. “Recon? For what?”
“Weapons deal,” Peter answered plainly. “I got a tip from a… friend. A location to stake out and see if I can overhear anything useful like when the tradeoff is going down, and since we agreed not to stay out too late I want to head over there soon.”
“Cool, alright,” Harley agreed easily. “So, any lessons or advice for your padawan over here?”
Peter chuckled, and finally pulled his own mask down. “Padawan, seriously? But to answer your question, yes. I got involved in tracking down a major weapons deal back in New York when I was barely just starting out, and I made all the wrong decisions. Lesson number one is that you do not dive in and attack the bad guys straight away. Watch and wait silently, learn what you can, and make a plan of attack later.”
Harley rolled his shoulders back. “Why not take them out straight away, stop the deal from goin’ down?”
“Because then the deal just goes down somewhere else and you can’t do anything about it,” Peter answered, and walked over to the edge of the rooftop. Bitter memories of his throwdowns with Liz’s dad resurfaced – that had been different, given that Toomes was the dealer, but he’d done a lot of reflecting on how to deal with similar situations since. “The goal is to find out when and where the deal is going down, and intercept the weapons themselves. If we can find out who the dealer is as well, then we can take the fight to them too.”
“Right,” Harley acknowledged, and the two of them took off. Peter had gotten a little better at navigating the trees and lower buildings and could swing reasonably well, which was a little slower but far more precise than slingshotting himself around the city. Peter led the way towards the warehouse location he’d been given, which wasn’t far from where they already were.
“You should probably go stealth,” Peter suggested as they moved. “And remember not to make a sound or do anything that would give away your position. We don’t want these people to know that we’re onto them.”
“Got it,” Harley agreed, and his suit shimmered out of visible sight. Two minutes later, the two of them crouched atop one of many plain warehouses in Cambridge. Peter was almost tempted to crawl inside, but he didn’t want to take chances. All Jessica had told him was that the weapon was supposedly extremely dangerous, even though she herself had no idea what it was.
“-believe we’re getting a supply of Basilisk Eggs from the Manufacturer,” one of the unknown thugs inside the warehouse said excitedly. Peter crouched even lower, and listened in as carefully as he could. Basilisk Eggs? He didn’t like the sound of that.
“Get a hold of yourself, man,” another voice hissed. “The Manufacturer doesn’t deal to just anyone. Nobody even knows who he is, and I don’t buy the rumours of him being some really old guy like my buddy in Harlem said. But I do know that the Basilisk Eggs are the real deal. Man, if we keep things serious and play our cards right, our organisation will run this city. Bombs that are a guaranteed one hit kill on anybody? We could use it to take out Spider-Man, and people will know to steer clear.”
Peter heard Harley inhale sharply beside him. It wasn’t like he could say anything to quieten his friend, so he just held a hand out and hoped Harley got the message. It wasn’t like people talking about killing him was new, anyway. The greater concern right now was the weapon itself. That second voice had sounded confident about the capabilities of the weapon. If it was true, Peter couldn’t let something like that get out onto the streets. He needed to know when the deal was going down to stop any of it from circulating in Cambridge, and he needed to find out who this ‘Manufacturer’ was.
“Yeah, yeah, you’re right,” the first voice agreed. “I can be chill. But seriously, imagine how the world would respond when we hit Spidey with one of those babies and he just turns to stone. Incredible. Do we know when the shipment is coming? I know it’s on Friday, but boss still hasn’t told us what time. I’ve got a date with my man on Friday night, it’d be good to be able to reschedule, you know?”
“Jesus christ Patrick,” a third voice groaned. “We do not need to hear about your booty calls. The deal’s going at 9:30, which you’d know if you weren’t busy fucking sexting an hour ago. You and Dwayne are taking a separate car to stake out the location an hour before, corner of Pacific and Brookline. Got it?”
“Yeah yeah,” the first voice answered. “That’s early enough. Damn, we are going to be unstoppable!”
Slowly, very slowly, Peter backed away from the edge of the warehouse rooftop, keeping his steps light and silent. He crossed over to the other side of the building and only then did he start swinging away with Harley following behind him.
Those three had sounded pretty confident about what those weapons could do. Peter was going to stop them. The question was – should he bring Harley with? The risk was obviously very high, and Harley was still new to this. He didn’t want to get his friend killed like that. But… Harley wouldn’t like it if Peter tried to leave him out of this. No, he’d just have to be at the top of his game so that nobody got hurt. Especially not anybody he cared about.
The Gays + Harry
Gwensbian: My place, 7pm tonight, we’re watching bridge to terabithia
Gwensbian: 7 lopez st
Harold: are you trying to ruin us all???
Gwensbian: weaakkkk
Harley Gayvidson: no no im with harry that movie ruined me when i saw it as a kid
Beter Barker: i have not seen it
Beter Barker: should i be scared?
Gwensbian: yes
Harold: yes
Harley Gayvidson: yes
Beter Barker: …okay
On his way out, Peter grabbed a couple packets of microwave popcorn to contribute to the movie night snack supply. At first, he had been reluctant to agree to come along. He was still chewing on the thoughts from his conversation with Rabbi Isaacs, and wasn’t sure if he was ready to let Harry back in yet. Even so, he wanted Harry back in his life, and it was only a matter of time. So, Peter relented. He was still angry and upset about having been abandoned all those years ago, but Harry was more than just a decision his ten year old self had no part in.
A shoulder bump from Harley outside his dorm building was all Peter needed to cure his apprehension, wiping it clear from his mind. “This is excitin’, huh?”
Peter bumped Harley’s shoulder back. “It’s just a movie night.”
“You know this is a first for me, right? Having a movie night with actual friends,” Harley retorted, but there was no bite to his words. “Even if it’s just a Wednesday night for you. And hey, what better way to cement friendships than a bit of mutual sobbin’?”
Peter furrowed his eyebrows. Now he just had a new source of apprehension. “Is it really that sad of a movie?”
Harley smirked as the two of them turned a corner and cut across the parking lot. “You’ll see. But it’s also really good, and I definitely respect Gwen’s movie choice. And the fact that she has an apartment off campus that’s big enough for the four of us to hang out at. Like, I’m glad I scored a solo dorm room, but it’s a little cramped.”
“Yeah, mine too,” Peter agreed. He had been kind of worried about having to deal with the awkwardness of sharing a dorm room with someone he didn’t know. Lucking out on a solo room had definitely made things easier. Plus, it helped with the whole Spider-Man thing too.
The walk wasn’t long – barely fifteen minutes. By the time Peter and Harley arrived, Harry was already there, and Gwen was setting up the movie. The TV was in the middle of the living room, with a small coffee table and a couch big enough for three across from it. Well, Peter was more than happy to take the floor. Walking in, Peter gave Harry a smile. It felt a little tense, what with this being the first time he and Harry had interacted in person since Monday, but it was also exciting.
Harry grinned, and waved. “Pete, Harley, you guys made it! I brought chocolate and tissues. And I’m more than happy to use my rich boy privilege to order in some pizza or something later.”
Gwen snorted, and stood up from in front of the TV. Peter was almost amazed that they had a working DVD player in an age where most people just watched their movies online. “We’ll definitely be taking you up on that. Gotta eat the rich, and if you can’t do that, at least eat the food they offer to buy for you.”
Harley nodded his head solemnly. “Speakin’ truth to power.”
“Am I supposed to be ‘power’ in this situation?” Harry questioned, visibly amused.
Peter walked into the living room and plopped himself down on the floor against the couch. “I’m sorry to break it to you, Harry, but you’re actually not the richest guy in the room. That’d be Harley.”
Harley gasped as he followed Peter in and sat down right next to him. “The betrayal! Some secret-keeper you are!”
“All I’m hearing is that Harry and Harley are going to be paying for everything we ever want from now on,” Gwen joked and went to take a spot on the sofa. “How were you guys’ classes today?”
“Peter and I had our first actual engineerin’ class today, and it was…” Harley started.
“Chaotic?” Peter offered to complete the sentence. “Apparently there was some sort of scheduling mixup, and none of the teaching assistants were there. I feel kind of bad for the professor, but it looked like he was… coping.”
Harley snorted, and leaned some of his weight against Peter. Peter relaxed into it. “Barely. But it looks like the class should be interestin’, at least. The practical component of the coursework should be good fun – it’s kinda scaffolded, but it’ll be a start to finish design project, and we’re free to choose our own topics from any engineerin’ discipline.”
“Huh,” said Harry. “That’s way better than what I had today. I’m taking this class called ‘Computer Systems and Society’, and we’ve been given a project to research and report on the cultural impact of AI design progression. Dry as all shit.”
Peter laughed. “You still hate research reports, huh?”
“With a burning passion,” Harry confirmed. “I’d say it’s my own fault, but Greenie was helping me look over my class choices for the semester and insisted I should take this one.”
“Greenie?” Harley questioned.
“Um,” Harry started and then paused. “Yeah, okay. You ever heard of plurality?”
Harley squinted. “I’m guessin’ you don’t just mean multiple of somethin’, so… no?”
Harry nodded, and finally took a spot on the couch. “Basically, my dad – Norman – and Greenie are two different people that share the same body. Greenie’s sort of like a cool uncle who never wanted to be a parent but got roped into helping anyway and secretly loves it.”
“Alright, that makes sense,” Harley responded easily. “What about you, Gwen. Your day go okay?”
“Yuppp,” Gwen said unconvincingly. “First year biology is a bit of a breeze, but it was kind of hard to pay attention to the slow-ass lecturer.”
“They’re pining after a girl they met,” Harry provided, and then got whacked in the face by a pillow. “Oi!”
“I will take revenge photos of you at the end of the movie,” Gwen shot back. “You will rue the day you met me, you absolute snitch.”
“Admit it, you love me and you know I’m too good of a wingman to give up,” Harry teased.
“Ugh, whatever,” Gwen gave in, and then pressed play on the movie. “Sorry if I’m salty that my plan to invite a cute girl over to watch a movie and then comfort her when she gets emotionally ruined by the ending didn’t work out.”
“As someone who’s ex pulled that on me on our first date, I can definitely confirm it’s a pretty good strategy,” Peter said, and then winced. The words had slipped out of his mouth too easily. That had been his first date with MJ, which they had spent inside because the rest of the world was still trying to harass the both of them after Peter’s identity got publicly outed. It had been with MJ, who he was definitely well and truly over. Even so, he missed her on a level of platonic friendship.
Noticing Peter’s discomfort, Harley slipped an arm around him and gave him a comforting squeeze. Peter rested his head on Harley’s shoulder, and tried to focus on the movie that was now playing. At one point, Harley tried to get up to microwave the popcorn Peter had brought. Peter, who immediately started missing the warmth, grabbed Harley’s arm and gently pulled him back down to the ground. Harley allowed himself to be pulled.
Even as the movie drew to an end and Peter found himself sobbing at Leslie’s death, he smiled – because things were good now. He’d come to MIT with the intention of meeting new people and moving forward, and he had already succeeded. After all those lonely months after the memory spell, things were finally good.