Save Dad
"A breach just opened up in the middle of Wall Street. Civilians are in danger." FRIDAY informs the Avengers.
"Man, we just started the movie!" Clint complains.
Natasha rolls her eyes. "What is it? Aliens?" she asks, getting up.
"Probably. I don't think anyone on Earth can open a space breach." Tony remarks.
"Awesome! I want to get my hands on the tech that can do that!" Peter says excitedly, lifting his head off of Tony's shoulder. Tony starts to say something but is cut off.
"You're such a nerd squirt." Clint smirks.
"Heyyy!" Peter complains. Clint snorts and ruffles Peter's hair.
"Ok, that's enough. Suit up people!" Natasha calls.
Before Peter can run off, Tony grabs his arm.
"Pete, I don't think you're ready for aliens yet." Tony tells the teen after everyone leaves.
"What do you mean I'm not ready." Peter jokes. Peter's smile falters when he sees the serious look on Tony's face.
"I mean, you need a little more training. I can't just let you fight aliens when you're not ready for it." Tony explains.
"Mr. Stark, I'm fine! I beat Vulture while on the outside of a plane at 20,000 ft off the ground! I can handle aliens." Peter insists. Tony's heart hammers at Peter's words as guilt fills him up. This kid was really not helping his case.
"Kid. I'm just trying to keep you safe. You can't be reckless fighting this kind of thing. Ok, end of discussion. You're not going." Tony says with finality.
Anger burns in Peter's eyes. "You can't stop me. I'll just follow you." Peter threatens, his voice low. Tony whirls around.
"What did you just say?" Tony dares. Peter doesn't falter.
"I said, I will follow you. You can't just keep me locked up here." Peter says glaring at Tony. Tony takes a deep breath, trying not to lose his temper.
"Oh yeah? FRIDAY, Peter is not allowed out of this Tower under any circumstance you understand?" Tony asks his AI.
"Of course boss."
"I can keep you locked up here and I will. This is for your own safety kid. And we will have a talk when I get back." Tony says, turning away from his kid.
Peter goes red. "You can't do that!" Peter says, raising his voice.
"Just did kiddo." Peter runs in front of Tony and stands in front of him. Anger consumes him as Tony looks at him and sighs.
"You are not my dad. You can't tell me what I can and can't do." Peter growls. Tony stops at that. He tries to hide the pain in his eyes. The one thing he never learned to hide was emotion through his eyes. It's why he wore sunglasses everywhere.
"You are not going." Tony says, his voice cracking. With that, Tony walks toward the Quinjet ignoring the tears pricking the back of his eyes.
"I HATE YOU!" Peter screams.
All the anger drains out of Peter the moment they leave. Peter sinks to the ground and puts his head on his knees. What did he do? He hurt Tony. How could he do that? The man was just trying to keep him safe, and that's exactly what a father does. Oh no. What did he do? Peter plays the memory over and over in his mind. His eyes fill with tears when he remembers the crack in his mentor's voice. Peter had always wished that Tony thought of him as a son as much as he thought of Tony as a dad. And now, he probably just lost Tony forever.
"What did I do?" Peter whispers in tears.
Steve is babbling on about a plan that Tony doesn't even pretend to listen to. Their plans usually go to hell in the first few minutes anyway. Tony knew he would make a horrible father. It's why he pushed Peter away after he refused the spot on the team. It's why he spent the nights he had with Peter in the lab worrying that he would mess the kid up. And now, he got what he deserved. He was the worst mentor and father-figure if the kid ever thought of him that way, which apparently he didn't. It hurt like hell. Peter hated him. Of course, Tony doesn't regret keeping Peter in the Tower. If anything happened to the kid, Tony wouldn't be able to live with himself. But Peter's words were honest. He had lost his kid anyway.
"Stark? Tony…Tony!" Steve says softly.
"W-What?" Tony asks looking at the Captain.
"Are you ok? What's wrong?" Natasha asks worriedly.
"I'm fine. Why are you guys looking at me like that?" Tony asks, with an empty look.
"You're crying Tony." Steve says. Everyone looks at him worriedly as he wipes his face quickly.
" Shit. S-sorry. I'm fine." Tony mutters.
"Tony. Tell us what's wrong." Clint says.
"I'm f-" Tony tries.
"Cut the BS Tony. We're a team. You can tell us anything." Natasha says, putting a hand on Tony's shoulder.
Tony runs a hand across his face. "Well, my kid and I got into a spectacular argument in which he proceeded to tell me that I'm not his dad and that he hates me." Tony says defeatedly, tears already pooling in his eyes again.
"Tony. He was just angry. Kids say things they don't mean when they are angry. That kid idolizes you. He couldn't hate you if he tried." Clint says softly.
"Whether you like it or not, you are that kid's dad. He knows it. We know it. And you should know it too." Sam tells him.
"I bet the squirt is going to be apologizing your ear off by the time we get home." Steve chuckles. Tony smiles slightly.
"Are you sure you want to get into this Tony? You can go home and find your kid." Rhodey offers. Tony composes himself.
"No. You guys would be screwed without me. I'll be fine. Let's just get this over with so I can talk to my kid." Tony sighs.
They nod and take-off.
"Where the hell did these guys come from?" Tony asks, blasting one of the aliens out of the sky.
"Language." Steve says.
"Really Steve?" Everyone asks into the com.
"What?" Steve asks.
"Ok. Guys, they're bringing a huge ass missile out of the portal. Someone get on that please." Clint says, firing arrow after arrow at the never-ending horde.
"Ok, that missile is a problem. We gotta get it from them somehow. Like right now!' Steve yells.
"I got it." Tony says, flying straight toward the aliens with the missile at full speed.
"Ok. I got it. Should I just throw it back in the portal?" Tony asks, grunting with effort as he stabs the creature in the chest.
"Yeah. Get it away from you as soon as possible. We don't know how or when it will detonate." Natasha says.
"Copy that. I wish I could take it back to the lab though. This thing probably has some serious fire-po-"
BOOM.
The world explodes.
"Tony!"
Peter is woken up by a blaring alarm. He lifts himself up and rubs the tear tracks off his face.
"FRIDAY? What's going on?"
"Boss is critically injured. They need all hands on deck. I am authorized to call for backup." FRIDAY says.
"Oh my God." Peter chokes. He grabs his suit and tries to open the window.
"FRIDAY! Let me out!" Peter yells.
"I have direct orders from boss to not let you out under any circumstance." FRIDAY says calmly.
"There's no one else but me! HE'S PROBABLY DYING, PLEASE!" Peter screams.
"I'm sorry. I'm not authorized to go against direct orders." FRIDAY says.
Peter wipes at his eyes. Wait.
"FRIDAY! Take me to the lab!" Peter yells, sprinting into the elevator. Peter sprints into the lab and slams his mentor's StarkTop open.
"Ok...ok..ok." Peter mutters accessing Tony's protocols.
"That should do it! FRIDAY initiate Peter's emergency protocol." Peter says, waiting anxiously.
"Protocol initiated. Access granted." the AI says from above.
"Thank goddess." Peter sighs. Peter strips off his clothes and pulls on his suit.
"Karen, I need you to get me to Mr. Stark as fast as possible." Peter tells his AI.
"Hello, Peter. The fastest way to Mr. Stark will take approximately 19 minutes." Karen says.
"What?! That's too long! How did they get there so fast?" Peter asks.
"Wait, stupid they took the Jet." Peter mutters. Peter runs a hand through his hair and looks around the lab. His eyes settle on his mentor's backup IronMan suit.
"Ok. Umm Karen? I need you to get me access to FRIDAY'S logs through Peter's emergency protocol. And get me access to that IronMan suit." Peter says, running to the IronMan suit.
"Access granted." Karen tells him. Peter double taps the arc reactor in the middle of the suit and it opens up for him.
"If it were in better circumstances, I would think this is awesome." Peter murmurs, looking at the holograms in the suit's helmet.
"Karen? Are you there?" Peter asks.
"Yes. I'm right here Peter." Karen's pleasant voice says.
"Great. FRIDAY, take me to Mr. Stark. Full thrusters. And put me on autopilot." Peter says.
"Of course Peter. Flight duration T minus 6 minutes." FRIDAY informs him. Peter shoots out the window and into the sky.
"Great. Now pull up Mr. Stark's suit logs. I want to know what happened." Peter requests. Peter watches in shock as his mentor is blasted backward caught in the epicenter of a missile blast.
"Show me live footage in his suit right now." Peter chokes out, ignoring the bile in his throat.
"The suit is too damaged. I cannot get a signal from the suit." FRIDAY says.
"Ok. Just tell Bruce and Dr. Cho to be ready in the MedBay. I'm most likely going to be flying him in. Let's hope I'm wrong." Peter tells the AI.
"Done. We will be arriving in about a minute." FRIDAY says.
"Great. Get me into the Avenger's comms as soon as we're in range." Peter says.
Peter exhales slowly. He hopes he won't be too late.
"Tony!" everyone yells.
"Someone get to his position!" Steve yells.
Natasha grunts. "I'm on it."
Natasha runs over to the IronMan suit. She tries to pry open the mask but fails.
"I can't get it open! We can't just leave him here." Natasha says into the comm.
"Sam! Can you fly him somewhere away from the fight? We can't have him more injured!" Clint yells.
"On it!" Sam picks Tony up and gently deposits him on a roof.
"Guys! We don't know how bad he's hurt! We gotta get him to a hospital!" Sam yells.
"A hospital won't do shit if we can't get that goddamn suit off of him." Natasha says, kicking an alien away from her.
"Guys? This is Peter! I'm on my way!" Peter worried voice filling up their ears.
"Kid? How did you...ok it doesn't matter. We need you to get him out of the suit and out of here!" Steve says.
"I know! I took an IronMan suit. I'll be there in a minute!"
"Get him home kid."
Peter stumbles out of the suit and races to Tony's side. Someone must have put him up here to get him away from the fight.
"Mr. Stark!" Peter yells, kneeling at his side.
"Karen. Get FRIDAY to disengage survival mode in his suit." Peter gets out. He was glad he spent so much time working on the IronMan suit with his mentor. He was lucky he knew what to do.
After a moment, FRIDAY speaks through his mask. "Survival mode disengaged." the AI informs him.
Peter double taps the device on Tony's chest and the suit melts off him. Peter takes off his mask and hurriedly puts his ears to Tony's chest. To his relief, he finds a weak, but steady heartbeat.
His mentor's eyes are closed and there are cuts all over his face. He is taking scarily raspy breaths that are shallow and inconstant. Blood is dripping from his mouth. From where Peter can see, Tony has shrapnel from the IronMan suit embedded into his chest and back. Thankfully, Peter doesn't hear any gurgling noises in his chest which at least means there is no blood in his lungs.
Peter pulls his mentor onto his lap and chokes back a sob at his wince.
"Mr. Stark? Can you hear me? It-It's Peter. You h-have to wake up now. Please wake up." Peter says, gently shaking Tony's shoulder.
He doesn't get a response.
"I'm sorry. I'm s-so sorry. You have to wake up so you c-can y-yell at me and ground me r-remember? You said we were going to talk when y-you got back. Wake up Tony. You have to open your eyes so I know you're ok." Peter sobs.
Tony stirs slightly.
"That's it! Can you hear me? I'm going to get you out of here I promise dad. You have to open your eyes and say something. Anything please." Peter begs, tears glistening in his eyes.
Tony's eyes flicker open slowly and Peter lets out a choked sob.
"Pe'er." Tony asks weakly.
"I'm here." Peter whispers, wiping the blood off Tony's face and carding a bloody hand through his hair.
Tony gazes up at him, struggling to keep his eyes open. But he knew it would freak his kid out more, so he would try.
"I-I'm sorry. For everything. You're the closest thing I-I have for a dad. I'm going to get you out ok?" Peter says, tears running down his cheeks.
Tony tries to reach up to his kid's face but grunts in pain and his hand flops down.
"I'm going to get into the IronMan suit. I'm right here." Peter says, slowly easing his mentor off his lap.
Peter sprints over to the IronMan suit and steps inside. Then, he hurries back to Tony's side.
"FRIDAY, can I pick him up?" Peter asks.
"Picking him up could lead to further blood loss but leaving him here will result fatally." FRIDAY tells him. Peter swallows the lump in his throat. Peter retracts the mask so Tony can see his face. He tries to ignore the muffled scream of pain when he picks his mentor up.
"I need you to focus on me, ok? You'll be up a-and making fun of me for calling you dad in n-no time." Peter tells him softly, his voice cracking. All Peter wants to do is clutch his dad to his chest and break down, but he can't do that. He has to pull it together.
They launch into the air with Peter carrying Tony bridal style. Peter tries to shield Tony from the winds as much as possible but he is as aware of Tony's blood loss as Tony is.
"FRIDAY? H-How much time d-does he have?" Peter asks, trying not to cry.
"He has approximately 11 minutes until the blood loss is fatal." FRIDAY says regretfully.
Peter sucks air in through his nose and exhales through his mouth. He cannot afford to have a panic attack now. Not when his dad needs him.
"Get us home. As fast as the thrusters can go." Peter orders.
"Pete." Tony murmurs.
"What is it Tony?" Peter asks.
"I-I love you son. Just remember that 'k?" Tony asks weakly, looking into his kid's baby-brown eyes.
"No. You're not going to talk like that. Y-You're going to be ok. You can't say that like that." Peter pleads, tears flowing steadily out of his eyes at Tony's words.
Tony hums. "I love you k-kiddo." Tony whispers, closing his eyes.
"No...no...No! Tony! Open your eyes! We're almost there!" Peter yells. As they fly, Peter prays to every God he knows for everything to be ok. For the universe to be fair. It already took two father's from him. It can't take away another.
Peter kisses his mentor's forehead. "You're going to be ok." Peter says, his voice breaking with every word.
His mentor doesn't answer.
"We have arrived." FRIDAY informs him.
Peter flies backward crashing through the windows and into the MedBay. He places Tony on the waiting bed as Tony's med team swarms him. Peter steps out of the suit and clutches Bruce's arm.
"Save dad." Peter says before blacking out.