O Brother, Where Art Thou?

It wasn’t until 30 minutes into his forbidden search for Morgan that Peter realized his feet were bleeding. It wasn’t a shocking revelation by any means—the painkillers he took before he leapt out the window helped calm him considerably. The quick swig of whiskey to wash the taste of medicine away helped ground him, too. He had both of those to thank for his cool, calm, and collected approach to realizing he left without socks and shoes. Though his healing factor had slowed considerably since the gunshot wound and the weird dreamworld place-thing, the cuts on his feets were closing and reopening beautifully. He stopped for a few minutes to admire the tiny drops of blood he was leaving behind him. He always appreciated anatomy. Or was it art? Feet? Anyway, it wasn’t important. What was important? 

Morgan. 

Peter knew he wasn’t her first choice of rescuer by any means, but it was his fault she was out here and it was his responsibility to fix. A small part of him knew that people would be angry with him and that he was disappointing Happy and Rhodey and Tony especially with his actions, but that small part was dwarfed by his duty to stop fucking up the Starks more than he already had. He shook his head—scoffing out loud, to nature and whatever birds could hear him—as he thought about all the ways he failed them. 

Tony said he loved him. Called him his son. Traversed some weird magical landscape for a jackass, unknown college student just because it was the right thing to do. Did nothing but say kind things once he got him back. Their history was peppered with these kinds of things—inventing time travel to get him back, adopting him just because it gave him stability in the face of unspoken fears of ending up alone, inviting him into his family, into his workshop, into his life. Coming after him every time after they fought. Forgiving him every time after he said rude and cruel things. If their relationship was a series of transactions, Peter would be in crippling debt. 

And for all of Peter’s genius and intelligence, he couldn’t understand it. 

A mocking voice that sounded like his four-year-old self told him he couldn’t understand it because it doesn't make sense to love something so broken. 

He stubbed his toe on a rock and swore loudly.

He really hated himself. 

Here’s the deal. It’s not like they show in the movies: this descent to self-hatred, to depression, to addiction or whatever the hell Aunt May tried to name in their safehouse the night before she died. It didn’t come in with a bang or hormones or some traumatic and triggering event—though he had those in spades, thank you very much. 

Instead, it came in slow and friendly. Disguised in labels such as mature, responsible, genius, kind, angel, good. It came in pats on the back and “hang in there, Peter, good job, Peter, keep it up, Peter, my good boy, my good son, my good nephew, my good kid.” It was insidious and sincere and cloying, smirking at every praise and supportive comment, twisting and perverting them into something unspeakable. Good becoming not good enough. Responsible becoming and I wanted you to be better. Kind becoming I’m sorry, Uncle Ben, I’m sorry, Aunt May, I’m so, so sorry, Pepper. 

And, maybe, before the Snap, before he spent five years in stasis, trapped unknowingly in a mad titan’s evil plan, he could deal with the feelings of inadequacy and grief and heaviness. Before Titan, he could swing on webs and go to class and build robots and eat sandwiches and forget the voice inside his head that told him he was wasting his time and effort on a project that would never be successful. But something happened after he returned. His atoms knitted themselves back together and the voice that typically spoke in soft whispers in the middle of the sleepless nights decided it wanted to be front and center in the middle of his mornings and noons. It was loud and obsessive and only stopped for two things: alcohol and Morgan. (And, to be honest, the story of how he figured out the first was exactly like they show in the movies—a high school party, a bully, a dare, and the need to prove himself coupled with an ill-timed text from a concerned mentor/father-figure.) 

Peter stopped walking and pushed out his senses a little bit further. The calm numbness he felt at the beginning of his journey was quickly dissolving into a frantic energy. Morgan had always been resourceful, but the further he journeyed from the mansion, the more likely it was they were walking away from each other. The sun was already setting, which did absolutely nothing to calm him down. The thought of an eight-year-old walking around in the dark was terrifying enough without thinking about all the wild things California hills promised. 

With the evening came the wind, and the temperature dropped about ten degrees. Thanks to the spider bite, Peter could see fairly well in the dark, but kicked himself for not bringing a flashlight, a first aid kit, or even a bottle of water. He kept moving forward, his brain playing tricks on him as he saw the moonlight dance with the shadows of the rocks and trees around him. 

There. 

Two heartbeats. One fast and steady. The other, quick and nervous. And nervous. And nervous. And skyrocketing. 

Peter got there just in time—jumping in front of Morgan right as the mountain lion lunged. 

(There are sounds that haunt Peter late at night. A gunshot ringing. A ferry cracking. A warehouse falling. An alien fighting. An aunt dying. The silky voice of a revenge-seeking psycho speaking uncomfortable truths in the middle of a Saw-like torture session. But he never thought he’d have to add “neck snapping” to that list.) 

A scream ripped through his throat before he could stop it. His senses made the bite 100x worse—he could feel the flesh tear off of him, hear the ripping, and smell the blood as it flowed out of his side. The lion was dead and had he been any slower, he would have been too. Climbing up the rock was difficult, but he worked to keep calm. Morgan’s face was more frightened than he had ever seen it, and it wouldn’t help for both of them to lose their shit. 

After a small conversation and some quick field medicine performed by his brilliant, elementary-aged sister, Peter’s eyes fluttered closed. He wanted to tell her how brave she was, how she did such a good job, how he was so proud of her, but instead, he let out a sigh, and fell into unconsciousness, the sound of her quiet crying filling his ears. 

A sharp stinging at his side woke Peter up. The sun had warmed the rocks considerably, and Peter hissed as Morgan sprayed more antiseptic on his wound. She winced apologetically and ripped some fabric from the bottom of her shirt to wrap around him. He sat up slowly, noticing that, in addition to her ministrations to his side, the cuts on his feet were covered in Spider-Man bandaids. 

He raised an eyebrow at her as she rolled her eyes and stuck out her tongue. “They were cheap, Petey. So sue me.” (Morgan’s “so sue me” phase lasted for five months when she was six, to the point that Tony had offered to buy her a pony to get her to stop. Pepper vetoed that hard, but in the end, Tony built her a mini robot horse that she and Peter promptly fixed to shoot glitter out of its eyes. Six was a fun age.) 

They stared at each other until Morgan dissolved into giggles. Peter huffed a laugh and pulled her into a quick hug.

“Okay, Miss Bliss, let’s talk, yeah?”

Morgan’s face fell as she looked away and picked at her nails.

“Number one,” Peter wiggled his finger at her dramatically, “I am…so sorry, Morgs.” She looked up, wary, as he continued. “I shouldn’t have—I didn’t—it was an accident. I didn’t mean to tear it. I wasn’t really paying attention, I was thinking about something else, and it just…happened.” Peter ended lamely. He didn’t know how to explain flashbacks or dissociation or his general fuckupedness to an eight-year-old, but he hoped she could read his sincerity. 

She nodded slowly and he could tell she was thinking about it. Quickly, he said, “Just because I apologized, Mo, doesn’t mean you have to forgive me. You know that right? It’s okay to still be mad about it and mad at me.” 

Morgan looked at him sharply, looked away, and then huffed. “That’s. That’s not it. Just it.” She looked up at the sky, and Peter could tell she was avoiding his eyes. “I am mad at you. Not because of Mom’s quilt. You. You left me. I needed you.” Her voice broke at the last word, but she looked as if she was forcing herself not to cry. “You just left. You never came back. I don’t understand. Why?”

“Morgan, I couldn’t. It. The whole universe was going to break. I didn’t have another choice.”

“Bullshit.”

“Morgan!”

“Bullshit. You could have come back. You could have told me. You just didn’t want to.” 

Peter felt her words twist uncomfortably in his gut. And maybe part of the reason was because he wasn’t being totally truthful (and he was pretty sure she knew it). Because, yeah, he didn’t have another choice at first, but the past eleven months had been filled with choices, choices that he knew were very much not approved of by his friends and family. Choices he couldn’t even begin to verbalize his reasoning for. Not to her. Barely to himself. 

They sat in a heavy silence—Peter knowing that he didn’t have a good enough excuse to give her. 

After a few minutes, Morgan spoke again. “What’s number two?” 

“What?” Peter looked at her questioningly. 

“You said number one was you were sorry. What’s number two?”

He smiled and ruffled her hair. She squeaked indignantly. “Number two, dear sister, is to never run away from home without your big brother. Where are we off to, bug?”

She looked at him incredulously. “You mean, you won’t make me go home? You’re going to come with me?”

“Of course I’m coming with you.” 

She laughed then, bright and joyous and so incredibly Morgan and whispered an “awesome” to herself. 

“So, what’s the plan?”

She rubbed the back of her neck and shrugged. “Um. I don’t know. I was going to try to find a job, maybe near…Disneyland?” She seemed a bit chagrined and quickly went on. “I mean, I know that’s stupid because I’m a kid and all but I couldn’t get all the way back to New York and I know it’s, like, super expensive to buy a house but maybe I could find a roommate or something, but now you’re here, and…” She broke off at his fond smile. “Anyway. Yeah.”

“Can I ask you something, Morg? Our rules?” Peter took her hand. 

She recited for him, “The Kids Stick Together protocol: no lying, no secrets, no eating Dad’s spinach casserole.” 

He smiled again. “Exactly.” He waited for her to nod before he went on, “Did you really run away because you were mad at me or was it for another reason?” He waited her out as she was visibly struggling to respond. Peter saw flashes of guilt and despair in her eyes—something that looked so familiar to him but very out of place when she was the one wearing it. 

“Not really.” She took a shuddering breath and Peter realized that she was trying not to cry again, “I didn’t want…” She stopped, gulped, and tried again, this time whispering so softly that even Peter’s enhanced hearing had to strain to hear, “It’s my fault Mom died. I…I don’t deserve to be around. I can’t…Dad can’t…I just. I can’t do that to him.” 

It felt like a gut punch. Like ice cold water dropped on his head. Or knives being stuck in his side. Time stopped and Peter could hardly comprehend what she was saying—this star-girl, this wonder, this miracle who made the world better with every breath she took, feeling guilt and shame for a terrible wrong that was done to her. And how (how?) could he make her understand that it wasn’t her fault and never would be her fault? That her dad would die a thousand deaths and fight a million villains and traverse a billion universes everyday before even thinking about blaming her. What words were there to explain all that to an eight-year-old? There weren’t. 

So Peter said this, “Morgan. Hope. Stark. Listen to me.” He took her chin and lifted it so she could see his eyes. “You are not the reason your mom died. You did nothing wrong that night. That was one hundred percent the bad guy’s fault. One hundred percent. Your dad would never blame you for that. Ever. Do you understand how happy he is to have you in his life? How happy we both are? Morgan, please, don’t ever think that. You are so smart and brave and special.” Peter was rubbing circles on her back as she cried. “I will come with you anywhere you want to go, bug, but if you’re not going home because you think Dad doesn’t want you there, you are incredibly wrong.”

“And that’s a problem, because Starks don’t like to be wrong.” Tony’s voice was strong, confident, and Peter only detected a tiny waver. Morgan looked up, hiccuping, while clutching Peter’s shirt. In the clearing, Natasha, Rhodey, and Tony were walking towards them. The three barely spared a glance at the dead lion laying at the side of the rock, though Tony clenched his jaw tightly when he spotted it and Rhodey sucked in a breath. Nat’s face was neutral, but Peter noticed her hand near her belt where he was sure some sort of weapon was hidden. 

Tony got to them first, emotions Peter couldn’t name swirling in his eyes. He held out his arms towards Morgan who faltered for a moment, and then jumped into them, crying harder as he sank to the ground and rocked her back and forth. 

Peter watched as Rhodey unzipped the backpack he was carrying and handed Peter a pair of socks and sneakers. His cheeks burned as he took them. “How did you know?”

“You’d be surprised by what I know, Pete.” Rhodey was sardonic and disapproving. “Let’s go. There’s a road close if we follow this trail. Happy will meet us there.” He shared a look with Natasha and then said, “Why don’t you and I get started and they can follow us when they’re ready?”

Peter nodded and climbed down the rock. He hissed as his side twisted, and Rhodey’s whispered “Jesus Christ, Peter” brought Tony’s sharp gaze to the bloody shirt wrapped around him. Rhodey waved him away. “We’ll be fine, Tones. Take your time. We’ll meet you at the car.” 

With a steady hand on his back, Rhodey led him down the trail towards Happy and towards a conversation he was very uneager to have.