1. Guilt
Peter guessed that the color of the remaining charcoal that was barely holding up the apartment building was approximately the same color as the inside of his lungs. The smoke billowed around the corner of the stair railing as he braced himself to heave himself into the building once more. He aimed his web shooters at the top of the stairs and pulled himself up story by story.
“There are civilians in the corridor to your left. I advise you approach with caution,” Karen relayed. Peter tried to save his breath and didn’t reply back to the AI.
As if she could read his mind, a display brought up the quickest way to the last two people left in the apartment building. Peter turned the corner and jumped over a fallen beam to reveal a young woman outside of the threshold of an apartment. A young girl, about Morgan’s age wailed from inside of the apartment, desperately clutching onto the wall opposite the threshold. They were obviously debating about either getting help from the apartment window or attempting the broken stairs. They had become trapped in the time it took them to decide and a hole in the floor between them had broken down into the apartment below.
Peter’s heart pounded thinking about what he would do if Morgan were trapped like this. Her cries and screams were what jolted him out of his phased look at the young girl. He approached the young woman who was looking into the apartment, across the hole at the young girl.
“Spider-Man!” The woman coughed and wrapped her scarf tighter around her mouth and nose. She crouched down onto her knees, desperately trying to catch her breath. “Please get her out!”
Peter nodded. “I’ll be right back, stay here!” He webbed across the hole and attached himself to wall behind the girl. She reached her arms up to him, tears still streaming down her face. He tossed the little girl out of the window and webbed a net below her using some nearby street lamps. Her screams stopped as Peter heard the webs stretch and break her free fall.
When he turned back to the woman, she was already on her knees, clutching her throat and hacking on the dark smoke. Her hand was placed on the apartment stair railing.
“Miss, can you-“ His words were cut short by a sharp sting crawling up his neck. His Spidey sense was a second late as the woman leaned on the nearby railing to heave herself up. He watched helplessly from the window when she put her weight onto her hand to brace herself, and the railing gave out in a burst of broken embers.
His heart dropped as her form tumbled out of view and into free fall where he knew the 5 stories of stairs had already collapsed.
“NO!” Peter aimed his shooters to launch himself over the broken stairwell, ignoring Karen’s warnings. When he started his descent towards the screaming woman, so did the 6th floor.
Morgan tossed her Barbie off the side of the kitchen counter, attached to a string. Barbie dangled from the imaginary web and knocked the side of the granite several times before Morgan decided to swing her above her head.
“What did I say about spider-Barbie in the kitchen?” Pepper raised her eyebrows and looked at her daughter with a pointed grin. Morgan shrugged threw spider-Barbie off the counter again and let her swing, imaging her big brother doing the same thing.
“Oh, let her have her fun.” Tony grinned and tossed the veggies in the skillet. “Just don’t let go of the web, Barbie might fly into my omelette.”
“Boss, Peter Parker has arrived and he is in need of assistance.” FRIDAY piped in the conversation and the worried expression on Tony’s face set in as he gripped the pan tensely.
Spider-man rounded the corner into the kitchen.
“Peter!” Morgan exclaimed and dropped spider-Barbie on the kitchen stool. She jumped over to Peter’s side and he slipped off his mask to reveal his dark sooted face as he doubled over, violently coughed trying to catch his breath.
Tony dropped the omelette pan and rushed over. “FRI, scan him.” He braced Peters shoulders and coaxed him to breathe. Morgan took a step back from the two men as Peter struggled to inhale. The AI started rambling a list of symptoms that Morgan failed to understand. A mild con-cush-on? Elevated Heartrate? Something about lots of heat?
“Call Helen.” Tony barked at Pepper. She was quickly at Peter’s side with the number already dialed and a damp towel. “Kid, what happened?”
“C-couldn’t go-“ Peter gulped in air as the tears started slipping down his face. “-G-go to May...”
“Just breathe. Tell me what happened?” Tony asked, leading him to the couch. He collapsed into the cushions with a defeated huff. Peter balled his fists and pressed them over his eyes, trying to stop the tears from coming. Pepper started to wipe the soot away from his cheeks as Tony pressed the spider emblem on his chest, deflating the suit. “Peter, you need to cool down, take your arms out of the suit.”
Morgan watched as her father helped Peter navigate his arms out of the slick material. Her brother’s chest continued to heave, now turning from gasping breaths into hesitant sobs. Her mother returned to the kitchen, saying she was going to go fetch more water.
“Pete, I need to know what hap-“ Tony started again before being cut off quickly by a harsh response.
“I wasn’t fast enough!” Peter snapped. He quickly bit his lip, trying to keep it from trembling. “I-I let her fall a-and I couldn’t...”
“Did you push her?” Tony asked. Morgan was still confused about who ‘her’ was exactly, but her father seemed to know. Peter shook his head and more tears fell, leaving tracks through the remaining soot. “Then it is not your fault.” Peter fell into Tony’s embrace, sniffling and wiping away tears. Pepper laid a cold towel around Peter’s shoulders and held it against his neck. He seemed to quickly relax to the relief in temperature.
Morgan was surprised that her parents were reacting so calmly during this encounter, because the moment Peter took off his mask and burst into sobs, she had been paralyzed behind the couch. “Peter, are you ok now?” Morgan asked from behind the couch.
“I think so.” Peter gathered himself and reached a hand out to the young girl. She took it and joined the family on the couch, listening to Peter’s breathing even out.
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2. Sensory Overload
“Morgan, will you go get Peter? His popcorn is ready.” Pepper leaned down with a personal bowl with popcorn
Morgan put her hand in the bowl, stealing some popcorn. She knew he had some sort of sixth sense, but she didn’t think that would extend to noticing a few stolen kernels.
When she reached Peter’s room, she swung the door open and waltzed in.
“Petey?” She teased when she didn’t see him hunched over his desk as usual. Peter’s leg would usually bounce as he worked on finding “anti-derivatives” and “Inner-sha” formulas. Morgan was still working on solving two step equations, but Peter would usually just smirk assured her that she would pass him quickly. “Peter?” She called again, looking under the desk. Under the bed. Up at the ceiling. Her brother was nowhere in sight.
“Peter?” On the third call of his name, she heard a groan from behind. Morgan rolled open the closet door and Peter recoiled. The teenager was tucked under the few hanging garments that he kept at the Stark’s apartment and he was visibly shaking. His hands were clamped over his ears and eyes pinched shut due to the light Morgan had just let in with the closet door.
“Are you ok?” Morgan started to reach out to her trembling brother before he gasped and webbed the closet door closed. It rolled in its tracks before heavily bouncing off of Morgan’s outstretched arm, knocking her down along with the popcorn. She yelped and scrambled back, clutching her bruised forearm.
“Morgan, I’m so-“ Peter tried to reach out to the young girl, but collapsed again, clutching his head and groaning.
“FRIDAY? Dad?” She called from her crouched position at the end of the bed frame. Her voice ringing down the hallway only made Peter curl in on himself further, hissing slightly. “It’s ok.” She tried to console the teenager who was in obvious pain.
Tony poked his head around the threshold of Peter’s guest room and looked at the scene of the crying kids and spilt popcorn.
“FRI, lights-out protocol.” The windows tinted, the lights dimmed, and the hallway lights shut off as well. “Morgan, can you wait outside please?” She nodded and quietly picked up the overturned popcorn bowl, and waited in the threshold of the door.
“I’m sorry Mister Stark, I hurt her“ Peter continued to clutch his head, but now very grateful for the dark environment.
“She’s ok, but it’s definitely your bedtime.” Tony whispered. He reached down and helped Peter stand on two wobbly knees. Morgan watched as her father led him to the bed and started to slowly help the whimpering boy take off his shoes and jacket.
As Peter visibly started to relax, Morgan remembered a time like this earlier this year. She walked quietly back into the room and started to search through Peter’s backpack which was discarded along with the Spider-man suit, lying on the floor. She finally rolled the bottom desk drawer open and found the pair of dark wireless headphones. She walked up to Peter’s bedside and handed the headphones to her father, who gratefully took them and slid the over the boy’s head.
Eventually, the pair slowly backed away from the bed and flicked the lights completely off. Tony kneeled down to Morgan as soon as they were out of earshot and down the hallway.
“Thanks for your help, Mo. If Peter gets like that again, you ask FRIDAY for the “lights-out” protocol and then come get me, ok? It really helps him relax after a long day.” Morgan shook her head and gave the popcorn bowl back to her father.
After the movie was over, Pepper and Morgan went to go check up on Peter. She tiptoed down the dark hallway behind her mother, who silently pushed the door open. There was not a single sound coming from the lump of covers, but Morgan knew that’s how Peter liked it.
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3. Injury
Morgan was used to Peter stumbling into the avengers tower after patrol, looking for a quick stitch up or some pain relievers after a more difficult battle, but tonight was different.
Morgan and Tony were tinkering with something in the lab when FRIDAY alerted him that Peter had activated his emergency call button. Tony had ushered Morgan into the elevator. As the elevator door was closing, she saw her father’s nanotech suit wrap around his body as he flew out the nearest landing and into the city.
Morgan went up to the floor of the Stark apartment. Her mother was sitting at the kitchen counter, scrolling on a tablet and typing furiously on a laptop. So instead, she stepped back into the elevator and went down to the medbay to wait for Iron Man and Spider-Man to come back.
Morgan not knowing what to expect walked out into the pristine and clean environment and started walking down the hallways looking for anyone. She passed Peter’s usual room which had a few posters up from the last time he was stuck in bed for a week. There was no one in sight. Until she heard some shouting from the front of the medbay. She walked down the hallway, ignoring her clammy palms and feeling of dread at the bottom of her stomach as she made her way forward to the front doors.
There was a small team of doctors pacing in the waiting room. Morgan backed herself into a corner, out of the way as she watched the head doctor bark orders to the nurse staff. The woman scrolled through a tablet and read through the report that was still loading.
“Where’s that gurney? Someone tell me you prepped the OR?” The doctor lifted her head briefly before continuing to scroll. “Jesus, Stark...”. Morgan recognized her as Helen Cho, the woman who helped Peter last month with a gun shot wound.
“Ok, 30 seconds everyone.” Cho announced and handed the tablet to another nurse. The gurney finally wheeled in and the familiar sound of thrusters became closer.
Her father landed with Peter in his arms. Morgan wanted to go greet her brother like she usually does when he needs a pick-me-up but on closer inspection, the boy was asleep. His head lolled in Tony’s arms and as they moved forward towards the team of doctors, bloody iron man footprints marked the hallway.
The Iron Man suit retracted revealing her father’s worried face.
“H-he just s-stopped breathing, Cho!” He almost screamed. His arms were trembling and Peter’s limp arm fell from its cradled place in Tony’s arms.
“Stark, what happened?” She countered as he started lowering Spider-Man onto the cot. The nurses had already started to work on the hero, shrugging him out of the suit which hid a bubbling green wound. Someone tarted to peel away the bloody mask to reveal Peter’s ashen face, blood trickling down his forehead and cheeks. Morgan yelped to herself as her brother was being carted away by the nurses.
“He was fighting something a-and I-it- Scorpion! It was Scorpion, the venom, I-I couldn’t-“ Tony rambled but Cho cut him off and started following the gurney down the hallway.
“Stay here Stark, let us work.” She pushed him out of the hallway and pointed to one of the chairs. He clumsily stumbled into a corner arm chair and held his head in his hands, cursing out loud to no one in particular.
Morgan finally mustered the courage to make herself known. “Daddy, is Peter going to be ok?” Her father glanced up from wringing his hands and reached out for his daughter, his fingers still bloodied but he didn’t seem to notice.
“Hey, pumpkin,” Tony forced a smile and bit his lip through the creeping panic attack. “You know that Pete is strong. He’ll be...”. Tony never finished the sentence as Morgan crawled up into his embrace and wrapped her arms around his neck. They sat like that for a few more minutes, rocking back and forth with worry before Pepper stepped out fo the elevator.
“Tony, what happened?” Her mother approached the two. Morgan felt her father gulp before responding.
“Scorpion. Peter got caught in his spike, and the venom...”. Tony trailed off gripping Morgan a bit tighter. “He fell off a building and Scorpion got away. When I got there... I mean, Jesus Christ, Pepper... I think they took him in surgery.”
Pepper nodded and Morgan pretended not to notice her mother wipe the tears from her eyes. She lifted Morgan from her father’s embrace.
“Well, you need to get cleaned up before May gets here, I’ve left a message at her work. Sitting here for hours isn’t going to help him.” Tony nodded and they parted ways to find a change of clothes.
Pepper was washing the dried blood off of Morgan’s face from when she hugged Tony. She got the young girl a new change of clothes and Morgan asked again.
“Is Peter going to be ok?”
“I think he promised to watch Frozen with you since he skipped out on movie night last week, right?” Pepper asked, pulling the new shirt over Morgan’s head. Morgan nodded. “And does Peter break promises?”
“No, we pinky swore.”
Morgan looked up from her place in her mother’s lap as Aunt May burst through the medbay doors, looking frantically for the Stark family who sat in the plastic chairs in the empty waiting room. She started walking slowly towards them before looking down at the bloodied footprints that had yet to be cleaned from earlier. The color drained from her face before she continued her stride.
The families greeted each other and shared what little information they knew about Peter’s state. They waited silently in the medbay for another 3 hours before the doctor came out of the double doored hallway.
“He’s stable now if you want to see him.” Helen Cho announced to the waiting room. Tony and May jumped up with a gasp and Pepper and Morgan followed behind them, hand in hand.
May immediately crumpled in the seat near Peter’s bedside, running her hands through his hair. Tony tried to put on a brave face, but Morgan could see her father’s stern exterior start to melt when he looked at the boy lying in bed, attached to machines and monitors, beeping annoyingly. A thick bandage was wrapped around his chest and the cuts on his forehead were starting to heal without any stitches. The hiss of the oxygen tube under his nose made Morgan’s stomach squirm, but she knew he was on the mend.
Morgan approached the bed and pulled Peter’s hand closer, careful to avoid the IV taped to the back of his skin. She looped her pinky with his and could have sworn she felt a twitch back.
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4. Flashback
Morgan liked the fancy banquets they went to. The Stark family always invited Peter to join and if he was free, he would act as Morgan’s date throughout the night. Of course, he always brought either Ned or MJ as a plus one. Morgan always liked getting dressed up and twirling around with Peter or sneaking desserts off the tables with MJ. Ned was fun to hang out with too, but he was mostly in shock being in the same vicinity as The Tony Stark.
Tonight, they were at a gala for something, Morgan never paid attention to the purpose, but she was excited to play with MJ, was playing with the hem of her dress sleeve.
“MJ, can we go get some food?” Morgan whined, twisting on the balls of her feet, pleadingly. MJ looked down at her and smirked, knowing their favorite past time.
“Hey loser, we’re going to get some food, you want anything?” MJ shoved Peter who stumbled out of his funk. “Hey, you ok?”
“Yeah, I just...” Peter suddenly straightened his back and frantically glanced around the room.
“Petey?” Morgan gave his jacket a tug before her brother locked eyes with someone across the room. He grabbed Morgan’s hand and pushed her and MJ behind his body roughly.
“TONY!” Was all he could say before a loud noise rang through the hall. Peter took off running toward the sound and MJ grabbed onto Morgan and lifted her in her arms. The gala attendees ducked and started to run frantically through the cocktail tables. MJ started to follow the Peter but got lost in the crowd. Morgan knew her brother wouldn’t leave them if there was trouble, so she trusted that they were safe now.
Throughout the screams of the people and the jostling of bodies, there was a scuffle towards the front of the Gala room where the sound had rang out. The people had started to filter out and MJ managed to make it to where she saw Pepper and Peter looking at the floor, before dropping to the ground.
Morgan twisted in MJ’s arms and stared at the scene unfolding in front of her. Her father laid on his back, with blood pouring out of a hole in his shoulder. Her mother knelt next to his head as Peter applied pressure to the wound with his bare hands, red leaking through his fingertips and onto his suit jacket.
“What this? ‘Tis only a flesh wound!” Tony joked before the pain hissed through his clenched teeth.
“Tony, you were shot! Get over yourself!” Pepper exclaimed as she backed away for the EMTs to do their work. Tony glanced down Peter who was still applying pressure to the wound in his shoulder. His eyes were misty and his breathing was strained.
“Underoos, what’s wrong?” Tony coughed painfully, wishing he had not spoken.
“Mr. S-Stark, I-I -“ Peter muttered and shook away a tear rolling down his cheek.
“It’s nothing major kiddo, you wish.” Tony joked again. Morgan watched as Peter pulled his hands away and looked at the blood on his fingertips. Tony looked worriedly at the boy who was starting to scramble away. “Pete-“
“I’m so sorry, I’m sorry-“ Peter quietly chanted to himself. “I’m sorry, Ben, I’m...” Tony quickly grabbed his hand in an effort to ground the boy.
“Peter, look at me.” He pulled harder on his hand again. “Look at me, it’s Tony. Not Ben. You’re ok.” Peter nodded but continued to pull out of his mentor’s grasp.
MJ transferred Morgan into Pepper’s arms and the young girl watched as MJ wrapped her arms around a trembling Peter, slowly rubbing circles into his back. The boy stared over her shoulder at the EMTs bringing their equipment and gurney over.
“Mo, you look after Peter ok?” Her father squeezed her small hand and glanced once more at the teenager with blood coating his hands. Tony was loaded onto the gurney. “Watch it will you?” Tony hissed and clutched his shoulder again. Pepper rolled her eyes.
“Try not to die on the way to the medbay.”
“No promises.” Tony relaxed into the pillow as the cart slowly rolled a path out of the gala hall.
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5. Delusion
Morgan couldn’t sleep in this lightning storm. The rain had been pelting against the window since She quietly jumped out of bed to find her father tinkering with something downstairs.
“Dad,” Her father jumped and quickly spun on his stool. “I can’t sleep.”
“Is it the storm?” He asked. Morgan nodded and settled on the bottom stair. “Damnit Thor...” Tony shook his head and scoffed.
“Damnit Thor.” She repeated.
“Did I say that or is it a mommy word?” Her father cocked his head and pressed his lips into a thin line. Morgan considered her response carefully.
“It’s a mommy word.”
“Damnit you’re good.”
Tony trailed off before powering down his work station and reaching out his arms for Morgan. “FRIDAY, let’s make sure that there is only one person who is awake at this hour.”
“Boss, that isn’t entirely true. Peter Parker has been awake three times in the last hour.”
Her father raised an eyebrow and hoisted her further up his hip.
“We should get him a juice pop.” She winked from her father’s arms.
“Take some more time during negotiations, that’s going to be a no. Let’s go see what’s keeping him up, whatcha say? I’m the only one in this cabin who shouldn’t be able to sleep. For more reasons than one...” Tony trailed off before starting to take to the stairs.
Tony set her down outside of Peter’s room and slowly opened the door to the dark room.
“Pete, are you awake?” Tony whispered from the threshold of the door. Morgan heard her brother’s blankets rustle and a slight moan come from the dark. His breathing was coming in spurts and Tony stepped further into the room. “Peter? FRI, lights on.”
The lights turned on and Morgan had to blink a few times. FRI keeps the light in Peters room completely dark during the night and it was always hard to adjust. She usually came to his room in the night when she had a nightmare, but now it seemed as if he was having one of his own.
Peter was clenching his fists into the blanket and his arms were strained away from his shoulders. His head was thrown back deeper into the pillows as sweat beaded across his forehead. The expression on his face was one Morgan had only seen a few other select times.
The blanketed boy tossed and turned, groaned and mumbled. “Stop... No, he woul- no!”
Tony approached his bedside, asking FRI to scan Peter.
“He is not injured, Boss, however he seems to be experiencing emotional distress.”
“Is he having a nightmare?” Morgan asked, but her father didn’t seem to hear her. He laid an arm on his shoulder and on his tightened arm muscle. He gently shook but Peter ripped out of his grasp easily. Tony shook a little harder and Peter bolted upright. A panicked gasp escaped his lips.
Peter’s eyes locked with Tony’s and widened. “Oh good, I was didn’t know if you were going to snap out of it.” Tony smiled and reached out for his shoulder but Peter violently jerked away.
“No, you’re not - you’re not real - I can’t - “. Her brother turned to the opposite side of the bed and hastily threw back the sheets before taking off down the hall. The pair exited after him as Peter descended the stairs.
“Go to your room, Morgan.” Tony pushed her further down the hallway before barelleling after the boy who was already halfway down the stairs. She would have liked to go to her room and hopefully this was just a bad dream, like Peter was having. However, her stomach filled with worry for her older brother, so she followed her father after him. The older men were much faster then her. By the time she got downstairs and through the open door, the two were already outside in the storm.
Morgan hiked up her pajama bottoms and stepped into her mother’s shoes. The muddy water soaked into the brim of the sandals but she couldn’t stop now. There was something wrong with her brother and father, and she needed to help.
“Kiddo, you need to breathe, I know what you’re going through.” Tony held his hands up carefully and slowly advanced toward the trembling teenager. Peter seemed to screwed his eyes shut tighter and slapped his palms against his ears.
“It’s just a dream, it’s just a dream... Mr. Stark wouldn’t say that...” Peter repeated and leaned his shoulder against the nearest tree. Tony’s expression weakened.
“It was just a dream, right? So open your eyes.”
“I-I-I don’t know anymore, you’re in my head, you’re not Mr. Stark...” Peter whined and doubled over into a crouch against the tree bark.
It was then that Morgan realized that neither of them had shoes on. She ran back inside and grabbed the nearest pairs of shoes she could find and a blanket from the back of the couch. Sad people needed a blanket too, right? She took the items back into the slowing rain storm and focused back at the scene that was unfolding.
Peter shook off another hand from his shoulder and Morgan flinched when he screamed in surprise and pushed her father away, hard enough for him to topple over his heels.
“Pete, I’m real! Mysterio is gone, it’s over.” Tony jumped up from the mud and grabbed her brother around the middle, pressing his arms to his sides. His struggling started to diminish even though Morgan knew he could get out of her father’s grasp easily.
“Mister... Stark?” Peter seemed to finally blink the sleep out of his eyes. The delirium quickly wore off as he collapsed into Tony’s grasp. Tony stumbled under the boys weight and got a better grip around his middle. Tony gently guided them down into the wet grass and Peter leaned back into his arms, desperately grasping Tony’s wrists.
Tony murmured quiet words of reassurance as Peter’s trembling turned into quiet tears. As Morgan approached the two, she noticed that the things he was saying were the same mantras that her mother would repeat to her father on bad days.
“Morgan is coming.” Her father locked eyes with her and motioned with his head for her to continue forward. Peter hung his head further and bit his lip. Morgan hoped that wasn’t shame or embarrassment. She handed her father the blanket which he pulled up around Peter’s shoulders. His disorientated look washed away as the minutes passed and his breathing evened out.
“I brought you some shoes.” She lifted the pairs of shoes away from her body, offering them to her father.
“Thank you, baby.” Her father smiled and grabbed them from her. “Can you go get Mom and ask FRIDAY to start the ‘Spider-needs-a-hug-protocol’?”
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+1 Reverse
Morgan was a bit sad knowing that this was the last day at the cabin before having to go back to the city. Peter sometimes liked to come out in the woods and test out new Spiderman projects and today Morgan had the opportunity to help him with his project.
“Petey, what does this one do?” Morgan asked, holding up a small disk. Her brother slowly descended upside down from the tree.
“New defense mechanism.” He gracefully took it out of her hands and set it back in the box. “It releases a small shock wave to stun people. Nothing that would hurt anyone, but might buy me a few seconds when I’m working with the bad guys.”
She held up a vial and shook it’s contents, the white lines swirled in the beaker. “And this one?”
“Mark 7. New web fluid. If I calculated correctly, it is supposed to be more elastic and flexible.” Peter said and flipped right side up. “Should we try it out?”
Morgan enthusiastically nodded. Peter smiled and lead her into the clearing where he always tested out new web shooters.
“Be right back, and I’ll give you a swing!” He hollered before launching himself into the air with a single bound.
It was always a treat watching her brother act like Spiderman without his suit. To Peter the suit was a sense of purpose, maybe even an escape sometimes. To Morgan the suit was another side of her brother that she liked as well, but she really enjoyed his true self. The Peter who came to play Legos and watched Frozen with her on the weekends. That was the Peter who was swinging through the trees whooping and smiling.
“Hey, I think I got a handle on the physics of these things, you ready for mark 7 swing?” Peter raised both hand in the air and aimed his wrists at two sturdy tree limbs. He joined the two strands of webs together into a seat and lifted Morgan between the strings.
The strands bounced under her weight, but ultimately they stretched with her.
“Petey, can you push me?” Morgan asked. Her brother took his place behind her and started to push. Gently at first and then his super strength kicked in and she started flying faster and higher. “Higher! Higher Peter!”
Peter webbed himself up to a nice place in the tree and shot another strand toward the base of the seat. He started to reel her higher for more momentum and her feet started to dangle as she was raised backward.
“Higher, higher!”
“This is high enough, ok hold on!” Peter let go of the web that was holding her in the air and Morgan was now in a free fall. The seat stretched as the gravity held onto her stomach at the bottom of the curve. At the end of the swing, she felt the swing stretch further than she thought she would go and the webs in her hand grew thin before hearing a snap.
Morgan started to fall.
“Morgan!” She heard her older brother cry and reach out for her, but he was too late. A sharp pain jolted up her right wrist and into her shoulder as her side connected with the base of the tree. The snap made her gag and she lost her breath. This was the worst pain she ever felt. Morgan couldn’t decide if her wrist was on fire or becoming numb. Finally she thought it felt as if it was electricity combined with... Fire. It was just the worst.
“Morgan, hey, hey, you’re okay, you’re going to be okay...” Peter crouched into her vision. “What hurst the most?” She tried to point to her right arm but the movement jostled it and she screamed again.
“You’re going to be ok, we’ll get dad to help patch you up. Maybe even Uncle Bruce. Do you want me to carry you or can we walk back slowly?” Her brother reached out to her side but she stepped out of his grasp.
“Please don’t pick me up!” She begged. Peter nodded and started to steer her towards the cabin. They walked slowly but eventually Peter swung open the door and started yelling.
“Mr. Stark! Mr. Stark! FRIDAY, get Mr. Stark, and... Call... Call...” Peter stuttered frantically, the grip on her shoulders tightened.
“Calling Dr. Helen Cho.” The AI finished his sentence. Morgan didn’t realize how hard she had cried before the sight of her father approaching seemed blurrier than she’s used to.
“What happened?” Her father questioned and kneeled in front of her.
“Mr. Stark, she fell and I couldn’t catch her, a-a-and she fell!”
“Morgan, where does it hurt?” Her father asked, his hands hovering over the arm clutched to her chest.
“My arm, my wrist, m-my... Daddy, it hurts!” She squealed. Even breathing moved her arm at the wrong angle
“Mr. Stark, I’m sorry, I-I didn’t see her in time!” Peter frantically said. She turned to look at Peter but her wrist jolted and she screamed in sudden pain.
“Kid, it’s ok, accidents happen. We need to get her to Helen.” Her father said to Peter. “Pete, go get something that would work as a sling, and an ice pack.” Her brother left quickly and she heard a voice come from the ceiling.
“Tony, it is my day off, someone better be bleeding out.” She recognized the cold voice of Dr. Cho.
“Cho, you’re getting a pay raise. Meet me in the medbay in an hour.” Tony said as he guided Morgan to the couch. It sounded like Dr. Cho was going to say something back, but Morgan whimpered as she settled back into the cushion gently.
“Morgan?”
“Broke her arm.” Her father continued to explain the situation and Morgan was grateful that she didn’t have to talk and could focus on not moving too much. While Helen recited basic first aid, Peter came back with an ice pack wrapped up in a towel.
After 10 minutes of careful movements and several tears, Morgan’s arm was securely attached and webbed around her neck and the trio were on their way to the medbay.
She felt so stupid and weak crying about a broken wrist. She’s seen Peter come visit after patrol with injuries far worse and she remembers seeing her father in the hospital after the titan war.
“You know, I haven’t ever broken a wrist.” Pete leaned in with a reassuring smile. “If you can live through this, that means you’re stronger than Spiderman!”
“You think so?” She sniffled. That is exactly what she needed to hear.
“I know so.” He ruffled her hair gently. “You might even be stronger than... Than Iron Man or Thor.” Peter shot a glance toward Tony, who raised an eyebrow.
“What about Hawkeye?” Morgan grinned, thinking of her uncle.
“Oh, she’s definitely stronger than Legolas.” Tony chimed in.