Chapter 2
Peter bites off the shriek that is about to escape his mouth and bats the spider off his hand, squashing it on the ground. Flash does not need any more ammunition against him, and a terrified yell over something as trivial as a spider bite would definitely be social suicide at this point. Of course, it didn’t just feel like a trivial spider bite. It burns like crazy, and Peter swears he can feel it radiating up to his shoulder.
By the time students are milling onto the bus, Peter can feel the sweat beading on his face, and there is a ringing in his ears. Ned sits next to him and says something, but Peter doesn’t hear it, resting his head against the cool glass of the window and closing his eyes.
“Dude, wake up.” Ned shakes him. “You don’t look too good.” There’s a teacher waiting impatiently for them to exit, and Ned has to help Peter out of his seat.
Having stood up quickly, Peter has to tamp down the urge to throw up as a wave of vertigo hits him, and he stumbles toward the exit. The teacher takes one look at him and excuses him from the follow up assignment. “You should go home, Parker,” she says, hading him a pass for the nurse.
Peter doesn't take it, only nods, the motion sending pain rattling through his brain. “I’ll call…” He trails off, swallowing hard against a forceful gag and pulling out his phone. He presses the contact labeled ‘babbo’, and breathes a sigh of relief at Tony’s voice.
“Luce della mia vita,” Tony sighs over the phone, “I’m in a meeting right now.”
“I’m—“ Peter leans heavily against a tree. “I’m sick.” Ever concerned about other people, though, he adds, “I’ll just—“ He’s cut off by another gag— “call Dad.”
“Don’t call Steve, I’ll come get you,” Tony insists. “I heard that. Are you throwing up? Please say no.”
“No,” Peter says weakly before doubling over, his lunch and breakfast making their way onto the grass. “I’ll call Dad.”
Tony starts to protest, but Peter hangs up, pressing the contact just below Tony’s. Steve picks up on the first ring. “What’s up?” Peter could practically hear him checking his watch. “Hang on, aren’t you in school? You are.”
“I’m sick,” Peter says, struggling to keep it together. “Just- uh- you know.”
“I’m not a mind reader, but I will come get you,” Steve tells him.
“I threw up, dad, Jesus. Make me say it.”
“Language,” Steve reminds him. “You don’t sound so sick after all. Maybe I won’t come get you.” Steve jokes. Peter can hear him starting the car, the change in audio as the call transfers to Bluetooth. “When did it come on?”
“On the bus,” Peter mutters, trying to focus on one blade of grass and stop the world from spinning. “I-I’m really dizzy. Body aches.” His eyes close for a long moment and he sways.
“Not to mention the…” Steve seems to search for a delicate word. “Hurling.”
“Not to mention,” Peter affirms, startling back awake. “I’ll go out front. Already… got excused from the assignment.”
There is definite alarm in Steve’s voice as he says, “Keep talking. Convince me you aren’t just getting out of an essay. I’m like five minutes away.”
Peter’s blinks felt like they were getting longer and longer. “-‘s not an essay,” He mumbles, slurring a little and tripping over nothing.
Steve pulls up by the time Peter makes it to the curb. He struggles with the door. Peter’s depth perception seems to be way off, and now a headache is building. It takes three tries, but he gets his fingers hooked in the handle and pulls with all his might. It doesn’t budge and his fingers slip, leaving him falling backwards. He stumbles and ends up on the ground, wondering why he isn’t falling asleep right there.
He hears Steve mutter, “this is bad,” as he hoists Peter unceremoniously into the car. Then it’s too comfortable, and Peter’s eyes close.
He wakes up in his bed, violently shivering and about to throw up again. Luckily he only dry heaves, having nothing left to throw up, because the blankets are too heavy to lift and go towards the bathroom.
The next two days are spent in and out of delirious sleep, with faces floating in and out of his field of vision. His babbo is there the most, almost constantly, usually accompanied by their family doctor, Helen Cho. His dad is there, in and out, sometimes wearing his shield uniform. Some vague part of Peter’s brain wondered if there will be a cool mission story when he finally manages to wake up.
Peter’s eyes shoot open. He immediately turns to the clock next to his bed. Just after four in the morning. Every trace of the sickness is gone, leaving him feeling better than he has in his entire life. He throws the blankets off and stands up, about to tell Tony that he is feeling much better, but when he walks towards the door, the blanket comes with him. He brings his hand to his face. The blanket is sticking to his open palm. He shakes his hand and the blanket stays stuck. It is only when Peter sits down on his bed and takes a deep breath that the blanket drops free. Peter’s mind is already racing through possibilities, but none of them are at all plausible. Finally, he rests his hand on the blanket and lifts it.
Nothing happens. Why had he expected something to happen? He had just woken up from what was probably a massive fever that had left him delirious. Still, there is a nagging in his mind and he tries again, this time urging the blanket to stick. Lifting his open hand, the blanket sticks. In his shock, the concentration lapses, and the blanket falls. He does the blanket trick a few more times, trying to figure out if it’s some kind of crazy lucid dream.
Then, an idea occurs to him, an idea that he immediately brushes off. It stays with him, even as he walks towards the door. Babbo would have an answer for all of this. A few steps away from the door, he catches sight of himself. Clad in nothing but a pair of shorts, his mouth falls open.
Peter had received self defense training for the past seven years, but he was never incredibly fit, both asthmatic and short.The body he is seeing in the mirror now, though, is not one he recognizes. He’s genuinely chiseled. The sleep shorts, which reached almost past his knees the last time he wore them, are riding up on his thighs, which are almost bulging with newfound muscle. He’s grown a few inches at least. Peter drops to a plank position, holding it effortlessly. He watches the clock. An entire minute passes and he doesn’t even feel winded. The plank test at school had exhausted him just a few weeks ago. He presses down into a pushup. It’s easy, incredibly so. He does five more and stands up. If this is a dream, he marvels, I don’t want to wake up.
Confidence bolstered by the strangely strong body he has found himself in, he walks to the wall. Testing his abilities once again, he presses his hand flat to it, focuses, and pulls gently. He sticks. Disengaging the stick, he lifts one foot, staring at the ceiling for a moment and rethinking. “No harm, no foul,” he mutters to himself. “It’s an experiment. Trial and error, like Babbo says.”
He focuses, and his foot sticks. Fully expecting to find himself flat on his back, he lifts his other foot, standing up horizontally. Again, he sticks. He places down his other foot and stands there, completely defying gravity. Holding in a whoop of excitement, he reminds himself of the late, or rather, early, hour. “One small step for man,” he jokes to himself, lifting a foot, “one big step for mankind.” He takes a step. Then another until he’s literally walking up the wall. He reaches the top, looks down, and feels his feet slip for a moment. Then he eyes the ceiling. “This is a bad idea,” he affirms to himself, twisting and placing a foot on the ceiling. “This is a—“ he stands on the ceiling and feels a grin spread across his face. “The most fun I’ve ever had,” he finishes. Ever a scientist, Peter makes his way back down to the ground and pulls out a notebook.
- stick to walls
- Strong?
- Literally abs
He stares at the list. Then, he realizes that he is reading in the dark. Not just the dark, the pitch black. Tony had bought state of the art blackout curtains for every bedroom when Steve went on a health kick and had lectured them about the importance of quality of sleep. The only light in the room is from his analog clock and he is reading a piece of paper just fine. ‘Night vision,’ gets added to the list.
“How am I going to tell them?” Peter whispers, staring down at his hands. “What am I supposed to tell them?” He pushes his chair away from the desk and stares at himself in the mirror, imagining. “Hey, Babbo, Dad. Um… woke up with superpowers.” He stares for a moment, seeing the shock on his biological father’s face and the blue eyes of his dad’s widening. He decides to wait, to come up with a plan and really figure things out for himself before trying to tell someone else about them. Around five, the hour finally sets in and he climbs back in bed, pulling the covers up to his chin, convinced that he won’t be able to fall asleep.
An itch in the back of his brain sends him from a dead sleep to bolt upright two hours later. He turns and sees Steve, his Dad, standing in the doorway, startled by the sudden awareness. “Hey, peter. Feeling alright? I’m going to get Tony.”
Peter opens his mouth to tell him. The truth is on his lips begging to get out, but he stays silent. Steve returns quickly with Tony.
“Luce della mia vita,” Tony whispers, rushing to Peter’s side. “That was serious.”
Steve follows him. “Helen wanted you in the hospital.” Peter is completely distracted by the way he can hear both of their heartbeats. It’s quiet, like a slight tapping in the background, but he can hear it. Not to mention, the light that’s leaking into his room from the hallway is blinding. Tony’s cologne is almost giving Peter a headache, but he can also tell it isn’t that strong.
“He’s been kidnapped in the hospital,” Tony says flatly, in a way that suggests they’ve had this conversation before. Their voices are hitting Peter’s eardrums at the same volume as normal, but at the same time incredibly loudly.
“How long was that?” Peter asks. “I only remember, like, blurry segments.”
Tony seems hesitant, but Steve answers, “it’s Saturday morning.”
Peter raises his eyebrows in shock. “That means I was out for, like, a whole day.” The blood drains from his face. “I missed a day of school. Oh my God, they’re going to kick me out.”
Steve bursts out laughing. “Glad to see you’re okay. Nothing like your Babbo.”
“Hey,” Tony calls.
“Honestly, did you even go to two consecutive days of school in your life, Tones?”
“You always liked the bad boys,” Tony says seductively. He leans towards Steve. Peter hears their heartbeats speed up.
“Gross,” Peter says. “Disgusting. Stop right now. Put your tongues away.” He fakes a cough. “Look, I’m sick again.”
Tony and Steve both laugh this time.
Steve leaves for an absurdly long run, as he does almost every morning, and Peter eats breakfast with Tony. Dr. Cho comes by for a checkup and gives Peter the all clear.
Peter starts to get antsy, wanting to test out his newfound strength and get out of the house. He manages to convince Tony to let him go, promising to drive for a full two hours with Steve that night to make up for it. Once he’s out of the house, he searches for a construction site he passes every day on the way to school. It was supposed to be the location of the new library, but they ran into zoning and budget issues, and the work ground to a halt. In any case, there’s plenty of hidden places to run some tests.
Peter first ‘warms up’ something he’s vaguely aware of but completely ignorant of the specifics. He’s never played sports, so warming up consists of walking up and down a few walls and doing a handstand, which is so cool he forgets why he’s there for a second.
Finally, he looks for the heaviest thing he can find. It turns out to be an abandoned CAT machine. “This is not going to work,” Peter whispers. “No way.” Then he walks up to it and grabs it near the tire. Engaging the stickiness has become somewhat of a second nature at this point, and he more has to think about not doing it than doing it. “This is insane.” Then, he lifts the bulldozer. It feels like nothing. Well, not nothing, but it’s easy. It feels like lifting a gallon of milk or a box of parts from Tony’s workshop. “What’s a gallon of milk going to weigh now?” Peter asks himself, setting the bulldozer down as gently and in as similar a spot as he can. His heart is going crazy, not from exertion, but from excitement, hammering in his chest. He can hear it in his eardrums.
Peter makes sure he’s obscured from view and makes his way to a piece of scaffolding. His heart is beating out of his chest, but he jumps, doing a flip in the air and landing. It should have sent a shock through his legs strong enough to break hem, but instead he lands lightly, easily.
He spends the rest of the afternoon goofing off with his newfound powers, before checking his swatch and realizing he really needs to get back to the house before Tony comes looking for him. Somewhere around the third kidnapping attempt, Tony had developed SHHAL, the subcutaneous heart, health, and location tracker. He would question why Peter had been in an abandoned construction site for hours if he checked, and he wouldn’t check it if Peter was home in time. He still takes the longer way home, marveling at his sudden cardiovascular fitness. The air quality and a walk of this length would have sent him into an asthma attack two days ago. Instead, he isn’t even winded and feels the temptation to jog. It’s easy to ignore though, and just as the sun is setting, Peter approaches the last crosswalk for their penthouse. Deep in the alleyway on his left, a man is handing his wallet to another man. The robber is holding a knife.
Peter has no idea why he does it, except that he’s been in that situation, handing over your wallet and praying that it’s all they want to take, and it sucks. So he stops and approaches the man, pulling his leg out from under him and pulling the wallet out of his hands. The would-be robber is wheezing on the ground, the wind knocked out of him. The other man takes his wallet, gives peter a shaky thanks, and runs. Peter dodges as the robber manages to stand up and take a swing with the knife. He feels the man’s punch coming and blocks it, landing one in the man’s gut. Wary of his strength, Peter punches as lightly as possible. The man still crumples, clutching his stomach. Peter just runs away, dancing on his feet as he waits for the light to turn and the walk sign to come up. Then he’s across the street and into the lobby as fast as he can, pressing the close elevator doors over and over as if the man was suddenly going to follow him home.
Only once he’s safe in the elevator does the adrenaline of the situation wear off. He feels a slight sting on his arm and realizes that the mugger must have grazed him somehow. It isn’t very deep, though. It almost looks like a tree branch scraped him.
The doors open and peter makes a beeline for his room, nodding when Tony says dinner is ready. He’s always been accident prone, so he already has first aid supplies in his room. After taping some gauze over the small cut, he pulls on a sweatshirt and curses the few inches he seems to have gained in the night. His pants are high waters now, and he’ll probably be needing a new wardrobe, but there’s nothing to be done about it now.
Tony and Steve are already sitting at the dinner table, plates dished out with spaghetti and salad, but untouched. They’re looking at Peter in a way that he knows means something’s up. He wonders if Tony pulled his tracking data during the day anyways, wonders if there were security cameras he missed at the construction site. Trying not to dwell on any of it, he sits down, ducks his head to keep from making eye contact with the two men that can read him like a book, and dishes out a massive plate of spaghetti. Now that he thinks about it, he’s ravenous.
“How was your day?”
Peter’s fork freezes halfway to his mouth. Tony never asks it like that. He always asks something along the lines of, “how much bail money do you need, squirt?” Or, “Any bodies to bury?”
Peter looks up and sees the looks on both of his parent’s faces. He takes the bite, chews quickly, and swallows. Finally, he responds, “Good.” Then he starts to inhale his pasta, attempting to make himself unavailable to answer questions.
“Pete,” Steve starts, playing with the noodles on his plate. Peter gulps. It’s really bad. Steve never calls him by his name.
Tony gives him an overly meaningful look and states, “I called Dr. Rutledge.”
“Dr. Rutledge?” Peter furrows his brow. “Why?”
“Peter,” Tony sighs.
He knows. Peter says, “I know it was dangerous but I swear I don’t even think I can get hurt anymore—“
At the same time that Tony says “we all have bad days, it’s nothing to be ashamed of and nothing to hide—“
And then they blink at each other. Peter gathers himself first. “Oh what do you mean?” His Babbo obviously did not know. Peter is going to try and keep it that way.
“I heard dangerous,” Steve says, a firm expression making its way onto his face. Tony mirrors it and they face him, a united front in parenthood.
“Don’t gang up on me like this, dad?” Peter appeals to Steve, but years in the military have perfected his interrogation face. “Babbo?” Tony’s face melts, but only for a moment.
“What were you doing that was dangerous?” Steve asks.
“Why did you think I was having a bad day?” Peter counters.
“I’ll tell you and then you tell us, right?” Tony leans forward, resting his elbows on the table.
“Okay.”
“We saw your heart rate and emotional levels were elevated and noticed the date.”
“Oh.” It had almost been eleven years to the day since his parents had died and he had been crazy excited all day. “I was excited, actually.” Tony raises an eyebrow as if to ask “why?”
Peter stands up. “Maybe it’s better if I show you.” He walks to the wall and places a hand on it. “I was excited because I woke up and I could do this.” He lifts himself into a horizontal handstand with one arm and then brings his feet down, standing up parallel to the ground.
“Oh my God,” Tony whispers.
“Ok get down.” Steve is already rushing over, trying to help Peter down.
Peter pushes off the wall and does a flip, landing lightly on the carpet. Having his parents know is a big relief, a weight lifted from his chest that he didn’t know was crushing him. “It’s cool right?”
Steve wraps him in a tight hug. “We’ll figure this out, Peter.”
Peter appreciates the hug, as always, but pulls away. “Figure it out? I’m pretty much a superhero. It’s amazing.”
“I think we’re going to have to postpone that drive,” Tony says, pulling out his tablet. “We’ve got to figure this out.”
“No,” Peter pleads, “I only have five hours left and dad has that shield training coming up. I want to get my license on my birthday, not after.”
Tony and Steve exchange one of those incredibly meaningful and indecipherable glances. “Okay,” Steve says. “Let’s go for a drive.”
He takes Peter to an abandoned parking lot. Tony is already reading up on Peter and JARVIS is analyzing a blood sample.
After the second time Peter slams on the brake thinking it was the clutch, Steve stops him, laughing. “I keep telling Tony you have to learn one and then the other, not both at the same time.”
“Sorry.” Peter rests his head against the headrest. “I guess I’m not that focused.”
“Who would be?” Steve asks, shifting the car into park. “You woke up and can stick to walls. And apparently you didn’t tell us.”
“Hey. I came around.” Peter sighs. “It’s like— I literally lifted a bulldozer above my head today. How am I supposed to go back to school?”
“A bulldozer?” Steve is not impressed. Concern and anger are battling for control of his face. “Over your head?”
“It literally felt light,” Peter says, unaware that his adoptive father is not nearly as calm about it as he is.
“Peter, never do that again.”
“What?” Peter pouts. “How am I supposed to test my strength? Wait.” He turns, excited. “Do you think I could beat Bucky in an arm wrestling competition? Please say yes.”
“Depends on the arm,” Steve says dryly.
“How soon can he come over?”
There’s a moment of sadness on Steve’s face. “He’s on a mission right now. We haven’t heard back from him in a few days.”
“Oh.” Peter’s gaze falls to his lap. “Is he with Auntie Nat at least?”
“Nat and Sam are with him,” Steve confirms.
“So it’s just aunt Pep at Sunday dinner?” Peter asks. “We haven’t had one all together in a long time.”
“It has been a long time.” Steve stares out the window for a moment longer and then says, “out of the chair, squirt, I’ll drive home.”
“I could do it,” Peter starts, but then he sees Steve’s expression. It’s a little pained. He needs the distraction. Peter climbs out of the drivers side and hands the keys to Steve. Then he backs up a few steps and jumps, landing momentarily in a handstand on the car and then twisting and landing on the other side.
“That will never stop creeping me out, I’m calling it now,” steve chuckles when Peter climbs in beside him. “I think Babbo will be more scared, though.”
He starts driving and Peter chatters, filling the air with words, and keeping his dad from falling into scared thoughts. “I wonder if we should tell Aunt Pep. Of course, Aunt Pep works with SHIELD all the time so she would be okay with it. I definitely don’t want to tell Nick, though. He’s super creepy. I never understood the whole eyepatch deal because it’s literally the 21st century. We don’t have pirates anymore. He would literally enlist me into SHIELD like he does with everybody with superpowers. It’s kind of weird to call them superpowers because I was always- like- the opposite of superpowers. Oh yeah, I think my asthma is literally gone and that was the coolest thing hats probably ever happened to me. Except when I lifted the bulldozer except maybe you don’t tell Babbo about that because—“ Peter abruptly stops, staring out the window. There’s a catastrophic car accident on the road, bringing traffic to a stop. Peter watches for a moment and then fumbles with his seatbelt.
“Where are you going?” Steve asks. Then he sees Peter’s focus and reaches to stop him. “Wait, no.”
Peter’s already out the door, sprinting to the pile of cars. He has go idea how it could have happened but he can see the car on the bottom, and the firefighters struggling to get people out of it. There’s thick smoke around in every direction, so the firefighters and EMT’s don’t notice him. He grabs the car on top and shifts it, easing it gently towards the ground. It rests on its side, opening up the side so that the people inside can get out. Peter springs away before anyone can see that he helped, running into Steve, who was being held back by a police officer. Steve drags him towards the car. “What the hell were you thinking? You can’t run into danger like that.”
“Language,” Peter mumbles. “They wouldn’t have gotten out without me.”
“It doesn't matter,” Steve says desperately. “It doesn’t matter. They could have seen you, you could have crushed them. You could have crushed yourself, Peter.”
“I-” Peter stares at Steve. “Sorry,” he says sullenly, landing a savage kick against the curb, leaving it cracked and crumbling. He storms back to the car, climbing in the back seat and slamming the door. Steve stares at the wreckage of the accident, at the people that wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for his adoptive son, and sighs. This is the opposite of what he needed this week, between Bucky, Nat, and Sam’s radio silence, pressure from Shield to push his husband back into the weapons manufacturing business, and his own difficult cases to handle. He stares down at the busted curb and marvels. There must have been some serious changes to let Peter kick cement hard enough to crack it without destroying his own foot. Then again, the kid had been snapping wood boards and cinder blocks since he was eight years old. He knows about the form for kicking and punching.
With one final sigh and glance toward the sky for answers, Steve turns back to the car. It’ll be a change, but they’ll deal with it. The drive back to Stark Tower is stony at best and downright hostile at worst. Peter is out of the car almost before Steve has it in park, slamming the door behind him and rushing inside. By the time Steve pulls the keys from the ignition and paces in after him, the living room is empty but for a bewildered looking Tony. “Did the drive not go well?” he asks, setting a mug of what Steve hopes is decaf, given the hour, on the counter.
“We encountered an accident on our way back,” Steve says, a muscle in his jaw twitching with frustration. He isn’t angry at Peter, but he is angry at the situation. “Peter ran into the fire and used his newfound strength to lift a burning car. People escaped, but he was right there in the middle of it, Tony, it was terrifying.”
“Oh my God,” Tony says, turning toward Peter’s room. “Is he okay?”
“He was fine until I got after him for doing something so unsafe,” Steve says.
Tony pulls his husband into a hug. “I’ll talk to him. He’s fifteen, remember being fifteen?”
Steve only groans at that, picking up Tony’s mug and sniffing it. He takes a sip. “I don’t think anyone saw him. I’m assuming we don’t want the news getting out that the Stark heir has osborne tech in his blood.”
“We do not,” Tony confirms. “Listen, I’ll go talk to him. Just get to bed. It was a stressful night, and you’ve had a difficult week.
Steve opens his mouth to protest and then sighs. “Thanks. Good night Tony.”
Tony watches his husband leave and then downs the rest of his coffee. “C’mon,” he reminds himself, “you’ve created AI. You can talk to a sullen teenager.”
After Peter refuses to open the door ro respond to any of Tony’s attempts at conversation, he presses the heel of one hand to his eye. “This is what you get, Stark. This is what you get for unprotected sex. God, I should have stayed abstinent.”
“I heard that,” Peter calls sullenly.
“Never have sex, Peter,” Tony says jovially. “Never ever. For one, you’ll never be old enough, and for two, you could end up with a teenager one day.”
The door finally opens, and Peter chuckles, “I’m an easy teenager. You couldn’t handle a difficult teenager.”
Tony grabs Peter into a hug. “It already takes three, well five, six actually. Huh.” Tony is distracted for a moment, counting on his fingers, “me, Steve, Pepper, Rhodey, May, and Ben.” He’s lost in thought for a moment before snapping back to it. “Six adults to parent you. You know that means six people that would be crushed if you were hurt.” Tony steps back and sizes up his son. “Hang on, are you taller?”
“I think the spider did it,” Peter says, seeming at least somewhat mollified. “I wasn’t trying to get myself killed.”
“I know. But until we’ve got this entire thing figured out, let’s just hold off on any heroics, okay?”
Peter meets his eyes after a moment, and Tony is terrified when he replies, “Okay,” and it’s the first time Tony is unsure whether his son is telling the truth.
Steve is wide awake when Tony returns to their bedroom, and both of them are equally troubled. Steve pats the bed. “You go first.”
Tony changes quickly and then joins Steve under the sheets. “It was bound to happen eventually, but I think our son learned how to lie.”
Steve gives him a blank expression. “He’s been lying since I met him, what are you talking about?”
“He’s been lying poorly since you met him. Peter’s always been honest, he’s never had anything to hide,” Tony tries to explain. “But today, he told me he’d stay safe until we had this all figured out, and–” Tony’s hands flail through the air, searching for words– “and I had no idea if he was telling the truth or if he was going to do what he said he was going to do, it’s like this is the first time I’ve been terrified to trust him.”
Steve sighs, putting his head in his hands. “I know. It’s like he’s becoming his own person, I mean I imagine him behind the wheel on his own and I just–”
“It’s terrifying.”
Pepper answers the video call almost immediately and gives them a flat look after they manage to explain their woes. “It’s parenting. But, I’m sorry, did you say Peter has superpowers?”
“Worse, superpowers gifted by Oscorp,” Tony says. “I’ve been running every test in the book, and JARVIS’ll have the results organized by tomorrow.”
“That’s a lot to take in,” Pepper sighs. “As for your parenting dilemma, that’s life. It’s terrifying. One day you just realize that your kid isn’t a kid anymore.”
“I hate it,” Tony pouts.
“How are you feeling, Steve?” Pepper asks.
Steve frowns. “I want to take Peter out of school.”
“What?” Tony and Pepper ask at the same time.
“Hear me out. I’ve been thinking–”
Tony interrupts, “Don’t hurt yourself,” but it’s more automatic than anything.
Steve snorts and continues, “today, when Peter was frustrated, he kicked a curb, a cement curb, and it started crumbling. I’m not saying we make that decision tonight, but in order to keep a lid on the whole thing, we might have to limit points of contact.”
“I’m worried because he’s a genius,” Tony says bluntly. “He’s the age I was when I was going to college, and he’s smarter than me. Not only that, he genuinely wants to learn, which I never did. I don’t want to isolate him or make him feel different.”
“Keep an eye on things,” Pepper says. “Controlling his strength might come more naturally to him than you would think. And Tony, you know Peter doesn’t make many friends at school. He has Edward and Michelle, but his relationships with the rest of his classmates are more antagonistic. If I may weigh in on the matter?” she asks.
“Like you have to ask,” Steve says. “Please.”
Tony nods and Pepper continues, “Well, school is a security threat for Peter. We knew that going in, but now it’s becoming more evident. You’ve never paid a ransom on your son, but more importantly you’ve never not paid a ransom on your son. Until it’s proven impossible, people are going to try it. And even after, people are going to try it. Like I said, there are a lot of factors to consider, but that is something that’s been on my mind for a while.”
“Thanks,” Tony says. “We’d better let you go. See you at Sunday dinner.”
Pepper waves and ends the call. Tony lays down, and JARVIS shuts off the lights. His sleep that night is fitful, and every time he wakes, he can’t help but pull up the SHHAL data on Peter, who apparently isn’t sleeping much better.