(Brain Damage) - Pieces Hit the Ground
Tony watches Peter like a hawk, worry shaking through his entire body. He just needed to be able cto get them out! He was going absolutely crazy not being able to do anything. Peter was a wreck. The kid had been drug in, completely limp, giving Tony a heart attack.
There had been a disconnect in the kid’s eyes, something lost. He had been asleep since last night, and as Tony felt the kid’s forehead his worry just continued to grow. The boy’s fever had become exceptionally worse. The kid was hot and weak, shivers raking through his body every breath he took. Tony had searched the boy’s body, and had known when he saw Peter’s knee, finding the infection there. It looked as if the world’s most unqualified person had ripped into the kid’s knee and just dug around before throwing a few stitches over the top and calling it a day.
Looking at Peter’s chest had Tony wanting to throw up. The left side was still covered with a litany of bruises from the car crash, and Tony wondered for the millionth time how everyone else had come out of it with a few scrapes. It had almost killed Peter.
Peter began to whimper in his sleep, tossing his head from side to side as tears began to fall from under his closed lids. Tony leaned up off the ground, ignoring the ache in his tired joints as his hands ran over the kid’s forehead.
“You’re okay, Pete. Hey, buddy can you look at me?” He began fussing with the boy’s hair, pushing it back and speaking soft nothing’s into his kid’s ears. Peter began to cry harder, his whole body seeming to twitch and jerk as though he were fighting off invisible monsters surrounding him.
Then he began to thrash, a broken and harsh scream coming from his throat as his arms waved through the air. Tony grabbed them, and pushed them to the bed before shaking the kid firmly.
“Alright, that’s enough. Come on, buddy! Open up!” Tony cried out, and then he saw dreary, hazed eyes staring back at him, no recognition held as the boy cried more and more.
“You’re okay, you’re okay.” Tony felt useless. Saying those same words over and over again, like a broken record, knowing he couldn't do anything to actually help the kid.
“Ben?” The small voice cracked, and Tony’s heart shattered on the spot. “What are you doing here?”
He knew Peter wouldn’t remember this. The fever taking all of his knowledge and shoving it in a box somewhere at the back of his mind. So, Tony did what he thought best in the moment.
“Oh, bud-” His voice cracked before he cleared his throat. “I’m just here to say hi.” Peter grinned then, tears continuing to fall as his whole body shook from the chills. Tony didn’t know how long he had. He was sick and getting worse by the moment, his lungs had begun to hiss and wheeze every breath he took. Peter’s body couldn’t handle getting sick right now.
“Hi.” And this ripped a sob straight from Tony’s throat.
“Hey, Pete. Listen, bud, I need - I need you to promise me something.” Peter blinked, as thought trying so hard to process exactly what this man was asking of him.
“Yeah?”
“I need you to hang on, okay? Because, here’s the thing, I can’t do this without you? Alright? I just, I just can’t get through this without you. I’ve had to do it before, and I can’t do it again, you know that.” Peter nodded, almost imperceptable if Tony hadn’t been watching him so closly. He thought about it then, the kid fading away in his arms, so terrified of what was happening as Tony watched - powerless. It was that all over again.
“Of course. Gotta - gotta do -” The kid’s voice broke off as his eyes closed once more, and the tension left his body. Tony let out a deep sigh, as he leaned forward despite the heat of the kid’s brow and kissed him on the forehead - listenting to ragged, wheezing breaths.
“Just hang on.”