Chapter 4
ONE WEEK BEFORE BEN DIES
Ben had been working non-stop for the past few days. First it looked like Tony Stark had built a new suit. Then it looked like it was just a new color palette for his “Iron Legion.” Then it looked like the suits were trying to kill everyone and Ben started reaching out to Stark Industries for comment. So far no one high up had answered.
Now Ultron had officially fallen and Sokovia was as safe as they could be on the ground. Stark Industries had suffered several pieces written by Ben, Ben's colleagues, and journalists from other papers suggesting that the new robots were part of a world domination scheme. Then Sokovia had been lifted from the ground and no opinion pieces knew how to talk about the destruction until the next day.
Peter hadn’t been happy when Ben had written one of the nicer articles suggesting world domination. He had idolized Stark since they’d been to the Stark Expo many years ago. He didn’t like the idea of Iron Man being a bad guy. Since the first press conferences following Stark’s return from Afghanistan and the infamous Iron Man announcement Ben had written critical pieces about Stark. Peter had been writing Tony Stark and Captain America letters in crayon since he could. Peter’s letters normally failed to mention economic responsibility like Ben’s, but Peters were the ones that ended up on the fridge.
Right now the press community surrounding Tony Stark was waiting to hear back from Pepper Potts about a potential conference where they would answer questions and make announcements. Ben always prefered a one-on-one phone call, however, so did everyone else so this was probably best.
“We know anything yet?” May asked when he made it home at seven on a Wednesday.
“Not yet,” He put his bag down and pulled her into his arms. “Press conference here soon so I’m probably going to have to go to the tower tomorrow.”
May smiled, “You love saying that don’t you.”
“That I get to go to Stark Tower for work?” He kissed her forehead, “Absolutely I love saying that. Maybe they’ll have changed their badge system and I can bring a fake one home for Peter.”
“I think people who tinker as much as Peter does are the reason they don’t let you bring home your Stark badge.”
Ben laughed, “Yeah, I give him a good hour before he’d figured out the magnetic pattern or something and was able to get in on his own.”
May smiled and pulled him in closer. “He sounded like he had something he wanted to talk to us about.”
“Tonight?” Ben asked.
“Well he wanted to make sure you weren’t to busy, and I don’t think he wants us to know that he has something to tell us, but probably as soon as we can all sit down for dinner or something.” May kept her voice quiet so that Peter didn’t hear.
“Did it sound bad?” Ben matched her volume.
May shook her head, “I don’t think so, he seemed nervous but not quite ‘killed a person’ nervous.”
“Not quite?”
May laughed in a way that always made Ben smile. “You know what I mean. I think it was a normal teenager nervousness.”
Ben nodded, “You guys already eat dinner tonight?”
“Yeah, I made pasta. There’s enough leftovers for you to either have dinner tonight or lunch tomorrow.”
Ben smiled and kissed May again and whispered seductively in her ear. “I love your pasta.”
May rolled her eyes but let out a laugh anyways. “I believe there’s an old saying about the fastest way to a man’s heart?”
Ben smiled and let go to start putting putting his coat away. “While that may be true, and your pasta is delicious, I mainly love it because it makes everyone else in the break room jealous.”
“They don’t get home-cooked pasta?”
“They don’t have an amazing wife.”
May rolled her eyes when Ben gave her another kiss on the cheek. “Did you already eat then?”
“Yeah, someone on the team brought in pizza for the late night. Good news is that the article is going through editing first thing in the morning but otherwise it’s done.”
“What’s it about?”
“Stark,” Ben shrugged, “It’s about the murder robots and the emergence of the new cape guy. We still don’t have answers on whether those events are related or if the new cape guy has a name so that the news doesn’t have to keep calling him ‘the new possible hero-the one who can fly but doesn’t have wings-he doesn’t have the red aura-yeah that one.’”
May rolled her eyes, “A room of journalists couldn’t think of a more defining characteristic than flight?”
Ben looked mock offended, “It’s all we’ve seen him do! He might be strong but we don’t have that on footage. He kind of appears to be naked but we don’t have any proof of that either. He’s got a cape. He doesn’t seem to be a suit. It’s not that guy with the wings from the Triskelion. It’s not the new girl who was involved in whatever that traffic mess in Seoul was. To many of them can fly May and this guy has been caught on public camera about four times.”
By this point May had lead him over to the couch where they sat down and he pulled out Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. “You’re cute when you get all mad about this stuff. You know that right?”
Ben rolled his eyes. “Did Peter need anything before we start reading?”
Man shook her head. “He’s been coming out every half hour for a snack, said he’s got a new system to work on homework and he’s taking a bunch of short breaks. I’ve read about it, I know a couple of students who can do it but we’ll see if he can get it.”
“I think he works better when he just kind of obsessed until he’s done.” Ben opened the book.
“He says he can’t do that for essays.”
“Oh, I could see that.” Ben almost started reading before he looked back up. “Did he want to talk tonight?”
May thought for a moment, “I think his paper is due tomorrow, so probably not.”
Ben nodded and started reading until they were both so tired that they had to go to bed.
The press conference happened late the next day. Pepper Potts and Tony Stark spoke of the events involving Ultron. Captain America discussed Sam Wilson, Vision, and Wanda and Pietro Maximoff. Natasha Romanoff discussed the unfortunate disappearance of Bruce Banner and the current efforts to find him. Unfortunately for most of the reporters, only Pepper and Captain America stayed for questioning and both were wonderful at spinning an answer without actually giving much away.
The press conference didn’t end until six meaning Ben didn’t get home until a little before eight.
“I’m home,” He called when he didn’t see May standing in the kitchen. “Kyle from editorial was very jealous of my pasta today.”
“Did you get to talk to Iron Man?” Peter asked. Ben turned to see him and May sitting together on the couch working on homework.
“I didn’t, I asked Captain America about the Falcon though which was fun.”
“What did he say?” May asked.
“Well I asked him if us not seeing him in the fight with Ultron meant he was a one time deal or if he was busy, and he sounded like it was mostly a busy thing. It seems The Falcon has a day job.”
“Really?” May asked.
“Either that or he’s running some secretive avengers stuff but that’s speculation so we’ll see what we print. We’re doing enough wild speculation at this point.”
“Anything big happen?” Peter asked. “Did you see the suit?”
“Not the suit,” Ben answered, “But Stark was wearing a kind of bulky watch that looked like it could be weaponized if needed.”
“That’s so cool,” Peter had a thoughtful look for a few moments. “But that means it’s not powered directly by the arc reactor right? So it would need some sort of alternate power if it could do anything. I wonder if it relies on more old-school weaponry then or if it still has his blaster.”
“I’d bet he doesn’t go back to guns,” Ben answered, “He hasn’t been seen by any press with a gun since Afghanistan. Curious about the power thing though, I wonder if it hooks back up to his chest if he needs it to get power or if it’s a small enough amount of energy that it doesn’t matter.”
Peter nodded lost in thought. Ben and May shared a smile and Ben joined them on the couch.
“How’s the homework situation tonight?” Ben asked May and Peter.
Peter shrugged, “I turned in my essay earlier so I have some calculus to do but it’s an easy unit.”
“May?” Ben asked.
“I’m still grading the presidency papers but it’s going faster than I thought.”
“Uhm-” Peter spoke before Ben could -“If you’re not busy then can I ask you guys something?”
Ben tried to hide how shocked he was at Peter’s bluntness. The kid normally rambled for half an hour before getting to any given point. “You don’t have to wait until we’re not busy Pete, what’s up?”
“Uhm-” Peter looked back at his calculus notebook -“So I was uhm- well I was thinking about stuff and I just wanted to know if you guys knew what mom and dad thought about gay people.”
Ben’s head reeled for a moment at the multiple layers to this question. “Uhm I believe the first thing to say is that no matter where this question is coming from, your aunt and I love you no matter what.”
“Absolutely,” May answered.
Peter nodded and smiled enough to let Ben know he could continue.
“Let me think if I ever heard them talk-” A distinct memory showed up and Ben forced himself not to physically react to the possible reprecutions. Richard had complained about ‘disgusting faggots,’ mutliple times while drunk. Mary had always shut him up or called him out, but the thoughts were there.
“Do you know the answer?” Peter asked looking starry eyed. This was going to crush him.
Ben looked at May but she shook her head. She didn’t remember, or wasn’t there for, his drunken rants.
“I do,” Ben answered, “Uhm, yeah.”
“Why are you saying it like that?” Peter asked.
“Your dad- well as you know they both worked in politics, so-”
“He hated gay people didn’t he?” Peter’s face had fallen. He looked torn.
“Of course not,” May said before Ben could answer.
“May, he-” Ben took a deep breath and started before Peter could spiral any farther. “Politics around this were not the same as they are now. Your dad didn’t try to understand it, he didn’t think about it very critically, he just saw something that he’d grown up hearing about and he made some bad judgements about it. I would say that in 2001, when I heard him talk about it, he did not like the idea of gay mairrage being legalized but that doesn’t mean that he wouldn’t if he was alive today and had watched the discourse change.”
Peter didn’t say anything so Ben continued.
“He also picked up a lot of bad opinions from our dad. Some of them were things that Mary or I talked him out of, some of them he still hadn’t shaken. I don’t think anything you could have done or said would have stopped him from looking at you like you were the best thing in the world.”
“But he didn’t like gay people?” Peter whispered.
Ben sighed, “I don’t know for sure. I watched him grow out of a lot of bad habits though Peter and I honestly think that by now he would have been ashamed of those opinions.”
“That doesn’t change them.” Peter said.
“It doesn’t.” Ben agreed.
“Peter they both loved you more than the world,” May said, “They- I don’t know I must not have been there when your dad talked about it but I can’t see that baseless of an opinion getting in the way of his love.”
Peter shrugged, not looking at either of them anymore.
Ben pulled him into his arms and May joined. They sat there for a few moments, taking in the conversation.
“I think I’m bisexual,” Peter whispered, still wrapped in their arms. “I- I don’t know but I really like this guy at school but I don’t think I’m gay because I still really liked Kate before she moved away and I don’t think that was fake because it kind of feels the same, and I talked to MJ about it because she passively attends a lot of clubs in order to see how the world works or something and I know one of them is the LGBT club and I told her, and she said that I probably was bisexual and I googled it the other day and I don’t know it feels right, but I don’t know and I don’t want Dad to hate me.”
Ben squeezed Peter tighter in his arms. “You could not do anything to get him to hate you. Nothing. He cleaned up your poop all the time. I watched you vomit chicken nuggets down one of his nicer suits right before a big meeting and he made sure you were okay before he finished getting cleaned up. He loved you so much Peter. He would have come around to it I promise.”
“And you’re not doing anything wrong,” May added, “You’re not doing anything wrong hon’.”
Peter nodded into their arms and started crying. “I- MJ said she was sure you guys would be cool with it, and-” He took a deep breath, -“And I knew you would be cool with it, because we went to that parade a few months ago, and you guys were really upset you couldn’t make it to that teachers wedding and it was two girls, but I- I don’t know, you read so many stories online when you look up this kind of stuff and some people end up homeless and-”
“Your parents would not have kicked you out.” Ben answered the question Peter didn’t want to ask. “I promise you. No matter what your dad’s opinion of you became. Even if May and I are totally wrong and he never changed his mind, your Mom would have kicked your dad out before you.”
Peter smiled a bit at this.
“Your mother,” May continued, “Was the biggest ‘no-bullshit’ woman I have ever met. If she didn’t like how something was being handled she told someone and she changed something. That’s how she got into political spheres so well. She was a woman who didn’t take no for an answer. If anyone suggested you were less because sometimes you had crushes on boys she would have made sure you knew she cared more about you than she cared about their opinion. I promise.”
“Really?”
“To a fault,” Ben laughed, “She got in trouble once because she hung up on someone from the white house because they suggested that Wakanda would be better off with severe Democratic US intervention.”
Peter smiled brighter and Ben ruffled his hair. “We love you kiddo okay, nothing’s gonna change that.”
“I love you too,” Peter said.
“Did May make dinner again tonight?” Ben asked him.
“Ben there are take out containers on the coffee table in front of you.” Peter answered. Ben looked up and there were in fact several empty take out containers amidst the piles of graded essays.
“Yeah I don’t have anything to defend that.”
“Aren’t you an investigative journalist?” Peter asked.
“Hey!” Ben laughed, “I’ll have you know I questioned Captain America himself today.”
“And the answer you got was super boring,” Peter was laughing a bit now too.
“Low blow Peter,” Ben smiled, “The truth isn’t always flashy.”
Peter rolled his eyes, “Ben you write about superheroes and the answer you got was that Captain America’s friend also has a day job.”
Ben laughed again and pulled Peter in tight, “Sorry, next time I’ll make sure to figure out exactly what type of breakfast sandwich they all like and get it super boring.”
“Next time you need to ask Tony Stark about his watch.”
“Yeah and get laughed at by all the other reporters in the room who are asking about world events.”
“Tony Stark doesn’t have a permit to carry that watch and if it is a weapon then it can do just as much harm as a gun. These are the real questions Ben. It’s concealed carry and he’s the only one who has it.”
“You’re your parents kid for figuring out that angle but unfortunately the trials that we watched when you were ten ruled that he doesn't need to hand any of that information over to the government yet. Maybe now after the whole Sokovia affair, but right now I have no legal ground to accuse him over anything. My producer also wouldn’t like it if I suggested we write a piece on Iron Man’s watch in the middle of all this.”
Peter rolled his eyes. “Fine. After all this is over. Ask Iron Man where he buys his watch. I bet he says he made it himself.”
“I bet he does Peter.” Ben smiled.