One
Peter backs up against the brick, panting like he’s never tasted air. The bar behind him is playing Adele.
Focus, kid, he reminds himself. It’s probably what Tony would say.
“Approaching,” Karen warns, but Peter’s already rolling on his shoulder, planting his left foot and throwing an uppercut to the stomach before a quick 2-3 to the head. The blood sprays from the attacker’s nose as he falls back, and Peter doesn’t even flinch.
Adrenaline pumping, he bounces for a moment on the balls of his feet. “Two to go,” he marks. “Fuck. Where’s the girl?”
Peter slips backwards under another man’s sloppy attempt at a stab to his carotid artery. He recognizes this guy’s blood-matted blond hair and, flipping him over his shoulder, grunts, “I told you to stay down.” He stomps on the hand holding the dagger, kicks it away, and catches his breath for only a moment before throwing another series of well-timed punches to a third man’s groin and face.
Peter turns, panicking, searching for the fourth and final man, and then his breath catches in his throat. The hairs on the back of his neck tell him he’s in trouble before he even hears the click of the gun’s hammer.
“Turn and I’ll shoot,” the man spits.
Peter forcibly slows his panting. “Karen, call Stark,” he rasps.
He starts to raise his hands up and out, trying to appease his aggressor, but halts when the barrel pushes roughly into the back of his head. Just beyond the dumpster, the others are pushing back to their feet.
“Not so tough now, huh, Spidey?” the blond man taunts, attempting to conceal a slight limp as he approaches. He decks Peter right in the face without warning and laughs as the boy stumbles backwards into his accomplice before his feet finally slip.
With his gun trained on Peter’s face, the other man barks to his friends, “grab her and get to the van. Now.” He and Peter stare each other down as the rest of them scramble away. Peter isn’t deaf to the cries ripped from the girl he’d meant to save, but he can’t move. Not yet.
There’s no characteristic mark to this man. No scar, no bright blue eyes, no tattoos—he’s as plain-looking as they come. In another context, Peter might even admit he’s a trustworthy sort of handsome.
“Stand down, kid,” he hears distantly, but Peter’s all tensed up, ready to jump as soon as this gun trails. “Peter, I swear, do not let him shoot you. I swear to God.”
Peter smiles. It’s just him and the gunman now, who at some point must turn and get to his van—the very vehicle rumbling down their alley now. The man steals a glance, but that’s all Peter needs.
“Okay, I won’t let him then,” Peter replies to Tony, swiping his leg in an attempt to trip the assailant.
He’s been tricked, he realizes too late. Someone shouts in his ear.
It burns hot.
His eyes flicker down to his thigh slowly and he reaches to push at the little red hole with his thumb, hissing immediately.
Fuck, where’s the girl? he remembers, looking up.
The man is backing up, shrugging, waving his gun carelessly now. “Should've stayed down.”
Peter pushes to his feet, using the loose boxes surrounding him for some purchase. “Don’t—don’t take her,” he orders, but then the attackers are helping their accomplice into the van and closing the doors and accelerating forward and he’s—he’s lost. He lost this fight.
“Stop!” he shouts once more, desperate. His webs miss the van entirely.
His knee buckles just as he notices the blood he’s standing in.
“I don’t need to hear it, Tony,” Peter grunts, struggling to push himself into a sitting position. Mr. Stark doesn’t move from the chair at the foot of his bed.
Tony’s jaw is firm, and his eyes shoot daggers. “I told you to stand down. What did you think would happen, huh?” he demands, jumping to his feet and throwing his chair back. “There were still three men in that van. You have no idea what kinds of weapons—civilian, military, alien—they were hoarding in there. If you had been listening, you would’ve known I was on my way. We could’ve tracked them together.” He turns and kicks the chair over to the other side of the room. Peter barely flinches.
“Instead,” he scoffs, “I found you in a lake of your own blood with an exit wound the size of my palm—”
“It was not that—”
“Ah-ah,” Tony bites. “No. Not your turn. When you can walk without a limp, then we’ll talk. But until then, you’re going to sit your ass down in that damn bed.”
Peter slides down the pillow again. “It could have been a lot worse, Mr. Stark. I’ll be fine in a few days.”
Tony sighs, dragging his hand down his face before moving over to the bed. He pushes Peter’s legs over and sits, eyes scanning over the kid’s facial bruises. “I know you were going to do everything in your power to save that girl,” he admits quietly. “I know. You’ve already proven to me, more times than I wish, that we share that goddamn self-sacrificial complex.”
He pauses to look at his hands.
“But, Peter, imagine if he’d had sharper aim. There are…there are some things that don’t grow back.”
They stare at each other for a while, but Peter is the first to avert his eyes.
“It’s my fault they have her. She might be dead now. I could’ve—I should’ve been better,” Peter whispers.
“No,” Mr. Stark counters, “you did everything you could have. Anything more and you would be dead right now.
“You can’t haunt yourself with this. Please, Peter,” he pleads, “don’t. But let it fuel you—let it help you be more receptive to outside help (i.e. me), emphasize with victims, move faster, rely on your senses more. Let it make you a better hero in the future.”
He gives Peter a few moments to think it over, but then he’s squeezing his calf and standing up. “I’ve got a detective waiting on me downstairs. There’s a notepad on the stand there, and I need you to write down everything that happened—any details you remember about the girl, the men, the car, anything. They’re going to look into it, okay?” Peter nods.
“And, Peter, I—I can’t let you go out as Spider-Man for a while.” Peter sits up straight, eyes wild. “I just, I need you to take a break for a little bit. You’ve had two major injuries in just a few weeks.”
“Excuse me?” Peter snaps. He’s shaking; he can feel it. “I am not a kid anymore. You don’t get to have that kind of say over what I can and cannot do.”
“You made that suit with Stark tech, right?” Tony says, albeit weakly. It’s not a card he wants to play, but he doesn’t see another option at the moment.
“You’re really gonna go there, aren’t you.” Peter’s throat is tightening up. He feels tears prick in the corners of his eyes and blood rushing in his head, but he forces himself to keep his jaw set and his nostrils flared.
“I think it gives me some sort of say,” he responds quietly. “At least until you’ve passed a physical exam.”
Mr. Stark offers a slight, mostly upset smile before he turns to leave. As he stands in the doorway, his hand still on the doorknob, he says, “I’ll send May in,” and then he’s gone.
The tears tickle as they run past his ears.