Say Hello to Quentin Beck
Peter whipped his head around to gaze at the opposite corner of the room, toothbrush still in his mouth. Through the mirror above the sink, the audience could see Nick Fury in a shaded corner of the room, lounging comfortably on a couch with his tranquilizer gun still aimed at Ned.
“FURY!” Fury’s name was an instinctive half-snarl, half-animalistic-roar that ripped itself from Rhodey’s mouth. The colonel lunged to his feet in a single sharp, jerky movement, before he whirled around to pin Fury with a furious glare. “Are you kidding me!?”
In the face of Rhodey’s blatant outrage, Fury merely pressed his lips into a thin line, offering him and the rest of the audience no words of justification.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Rhodey reiterated, seething. His hands curled into fists at his sides. “He’s a teenager. You shot a teenager.”
“It’s only a tranq gun!” Hill was quick to defend her boss. “It’s perfectly harmless. And besides, it doesn’t seem as though Mr. Leeds was at all adversely affected by this event.” She tossed a nod at Leeds himself, who was currently grinning up at the screen with far more excitement than should be normal. She hadn’t forgotten Leeds’ response to the scene, after all—he’d outright called it “the coolest experience” of his life.
Rhodey glowered at her. “Tranq gun or not, he just shot a teenager.” He turned to Fury, eyes narrowed and unforgiving. “And I have a distinct feeling that you aren’t here for a social call. I swear, if you get Peter involved in any of your shady bullshit—”
He broke off with a shake of his head, leaving the rest of his words unspoken. He didn’t need to finish his sentence—they could all hear the underlying threat.
“If you’re waiting for an apology,” Fury finally broke his silence, seemingly unfazed, “you’re going to be disappointed, because I’m not about to seek forgiveness for something I haven’t done.” True to his words, even his voice was flat, empty of any remorse or guilt.
Rhodey growled. “Whether you’ve done this yet or not, you’re still that man. Your values are exactly the same.”
For the first time since his future self had appeared on the screen, Fury broke his stare-down with himself and turned his face an inch to glance at Rhodey out of the corner of his eye. If one looked closely enough, they might even be able to interpret the look on his face as troubled.
Bulldozing onwards, Rhodey carried on, “I’m sure that even now, all you see when you look at that kid on the screen is Spider-Man. To you, Peter Parker might just be another pawn on the chessboard, but he is so much more to so many others.” Rhodey thought of his best friend, wasting away with a bottle in one hand and a framed picture of himself and Peter Parker in the other. He thought of just yesterday, when his best friend had video-called him in a panic in the dead of night, eyes haunted, and broken down crying at the sight of Rhodey because oh god, I dreamt you were dead too, I – I dreamt I was all alone. He thought of his best friend destroying himself over the thought that he’d lost Peter Parker.
“He is so much more,” Rhodey repeated. In all the years he’d known Tony, he’d never seen him act the way he did with Peter with anyone else. “And he’s a kid, goddamnit. Let him be a kid.” Please.
Fury flinched minutely, unnoticeable to all. Just a kid. He thought back to the last kid he’d ever let himself care about, long before the title of Director of SHIELD had even been a possibility for him.
She’d be horrified to see what he would one day become, he thought. They all would.
He’d made them a promise. He’d made himself a promise, the day he became Director. He’d vowed he would make a difference—the right difference. Today, he looked sidelong at Peter Parker across the room, curled into Hogan’s side, and wondered when all of that would change. Wondered if that had already changed.
He reminds me of her, Fury thought. Her and her pseudo second mom. He could tell Peter was intrinsically good, in the same sort of way Carol was. Peter had a heart of gold to rival hers—and the willingness to do something with that heart of gold.
To make a difference, too.
What would you have thought, Danvers? he wondered. From across the room, Peter rolled his eyes at something Happy said and stuck his tongue out at the gruff bodyguard. Not for the first time, Fury couldn’t help but see Carol in him.
I think you’d like him, he mused.
After a stunned moment of silence, Peter tore the toothbrush out of his mouth. “You’re Nick Fury,” he breathed. Realization hit him, and he whirled around to face his friend again. “And you just shot Ned!”
“It’s just a mild tranquilizer,” Fury reassured. “He’ll be alright.” As if to prove he was here in peace, he turned the gun over and rested it lightly on his knee. “So good to finally meet you. I saw you at the funeral, but I didn’t think that was a good time to exchange numbers.”
Pepper stiffened, the breath stolen from her lungs. The funeral.
Tony’s funeral, he meant. Because her fiancé was dead in some not-so-far-off future.
She’d already known that, of course—had tried (and failed) to process it—but somehow, listening to Fury talk about a funeral made it a thousand times more real.
She didn’t want to have to think about funerals and coffins and losing Tony forever. She didn’t want to have to think about any of that.
They were supposed to get married. They were supposed to spend the rest of their lives together, to build a family and grow old and be happy.
(He made her happy.)
Instead, the love of her life was supposed to die within five years.
Only five.
Pepper didn’t know how to handle that.
“Pep.”
She jerked upright at the feel of Rhodey’s hand landing on her shoulder.
The tension in Rhodey's eyes drained away as he forced himself to set his frustrations with Fury aside. He could make sure that Fury would stay the hell away from Peter Parker later. Right here, right now, he had to be strong for Pepper. With a slight nod, Rhodey smiled at her, warm and comforting—the same way he’d smiled at her the first time they’d all had dinner together after she and Tony became an item, and the same way he’d smiled at her when she’d broken down on the tenth day after the Blip and Tony’s disappearance in space.
Reassuring. Calm. Confident.
“He’s going to be fine, Pep,” Rhodey murmured, and Pepper clung to the certainty in his voice with abject desperation. “We’ll be there to save him.”
Pepper couldn’t do anything but nod and hope.
“No, that would’ve been really inappropriate,” Peter agreed, stammering with lingering shock.
“That’s what I just said.”
Peter swallowed. “Right.”
“The important thing is, you’re here,” Fury cut off Peter’s palpable nerves. “I tried to bring you here. You avoided me, and now you’re here. What a coincidence.”
“Wait,” Peter interjected, his voice hushed. He pointed at the floor as if to encapsulate the hotel in particular, Venice as a whole, and the trip in general. “Was this a coincidence?”
“Why am I getting the feeling that the answer to that is no?” Tony muttered to himself, sarcasm and bitter resentment dripping from his voice in equal measure.
Fury didn’t bother to dignify that with an answer. “I used to know everything. Then, I come back five years later and now, I know nothing. No intel, no team, and a high school kid is dodging my calls.”
Fury swallowed at the confirmation that he had been—or would be, in his perspective—Blipped away. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure what would be worse—coming back to find out that five years had gone by without him, or having to live through those five years with half the world missing.
He shook his head. He couldn’t imagine losing everything—he didn’t want to imagine it. For someone like him, someone who had a finger in practically every pie, being displaced by the Blip and having to reacclimate to an entirely different world sounded like a nightmare.
Information was his bread and butter; it was what made his world turn on its axis.
Without information, without knowledge, what did he have? Without SHIELD, who was he?
“Here’s what I do know,” Fury continued, taking out a pocket-sized triangular projector and placing it on the table in front of him. The device whirred to life as a holographic, interactive image of the globe appeared above it. Red dots were scattered all over the planet. “A week ago, a village in Mexico was wiped out by a cyclone.”
Peter approached the hologram cautiously as the projection of the Earth was replaced by video clips.
“Witnesses say that cyclone had a face.” In one of the video clips, the audience could see civilian crowds fleeing a hurricane in the distance.
Before either of them could say anything more, a loud snore interrupted the discussion. Peter and Fury both whipped their heads around to stare at Ned, who let out another snore.
Much to Fury’s chagrin, Natasha and Clint both broke out into sudden, boisterous laughter at the sound of Ned’s untimely snore.
“Your face—!” Clint wheezed out, tears pricking at the corners of his eyes out of sheer amusement. “Oh, god. You – you look like a wet cat, oh my god.”
He scowled at them in annoyance. “Shut up, Barton,” he grumbled under his breath.
He turned to Hill for support, only to find her shoulders shaking minutely, silent laughter rolling off her in waves.
His scowl deepened. “Not you, too,” he groaned.
Hill cracked, turning away and dissolving in exuberant laughter loud enough to make Fury close his eyes and sigh in defeat. Traitors, he thought irritatedly, all of you.
“Three days later,” Fury’s voice called back Peter’s attention, “a similar event in Morocco. A village was—”
Fury’s explanation was cut off yet again, this time by a knock on the door. Fury silenced himself immediately, raising his gun in the direction of the doorway in an unspoken threat.
“Are you kidding me,” Fury huffed, deadpan, as Clint roared with laughter so hard he rolled off the sofa and fell onto the floor.
Mr. Harrington stood in the threshold, completely oblivious to the tranq gun aimed at him. “Just making the rounds,” he announced his presence. “See if anyone needs any emotional counseling after today’s traumatic events.”
As the clueless chaperone continued to speak, Fury lifted his gun a little higher, aiming directly at the other man. Mr. Harrington couldn’t see it, but Peter certainly could, prompting him to shoo Mr. Harrington away desperately: “No, we’ll be okay. We’re – we’re fine. Thank you.”
“Great, ‘cause I’m not qualified to actually…”
Ned’s snores made themselves known once again.
“Oh, he’s passed out,” Mr. Harrington whispered, finally taking note of the unconscious student. He shot Peter a sheepish grin and reiterated, “Not really qualified to do it anyway, so… good night.” He closed the door as he left.
“That was my teacher,” Peter explained, flustered. “Sorry about that. You were saying?”
Fury looked exasperated, his remaining eye twitching visibly. “A village was destroyed by what may well be another world-threatening—”
Another round of knocks came at the door. “Babe, you still awake?” Betty’s voice slithered through. “You’re not answering any of my texts.”
“Holy hell, this is priceless,” Tony piped up. “The Director of SHIELD getting interrupted by clueless civilians is the best thing I’ve ever seen.”
“Tony,” Steve chided with a roll of his eyes, but even Captain Righteous had to smile.
“Um, he’s asleep, Betty,” Peter called out.
“Oh, already?” Betty sounded surprised.
“Mm-hmm,” Peter confirmed nervously. Unseen by Betty on the other side of the door, Peter’s brows knitted and he pressed his lips together like he’d swallowed a frog. “Yeah.”
“Okay,” Betty replied.
Fury barely waited for her to leave before jumping back in, “That’s why it’s imperative—”
This time, he barely got out half a sentence before he was interrupted for seemingly the umpteenth time. “Hey, boys!”
“I guess even fate doesn’t want you dragging Peter into your mess,” Rhodey said smugly, still visibly frustrated by Fury’s decision to approach Peter during what was supposed to be his vacation. “This is absolutely a sign telling you to back the hell off.”
Fury glowered.
“So, that canal water today was filled with dangerous bacteria…”
Mr. Dell’s voice faded into the background as Fury threatened, eyes flashing with indignation, “Another person touches that door, you and I are going to attend another funeral.” He rose to his feet, impatience clearly lining his every action, and retrieved his projector. “Suit up.”
Rhodey groaned. “Damnit, Fury.”
“…let me know if either of you develops vomiting,” Mr. Dell finished.
EDITH abruptly cut to another scene, framing the familiar canals of Venice. Fury and Peter, dressed in his Spider-Man suit, were making their way along the water on a small boat.
“Stark left these for you,” Fury said, face impassive as if he wasn’t imparting a part of Tony Stark’s legacy to Peter. He barely even spared Peter a glance.
“Really?” Peter swallowed.
Fury didn’t reply, merely lifting his hand and offering Peter a small case. Peter accepted it quietly, words failing him.
Slowly, almost reverently, he opened the case to reveal a pair of glasses. Tucked into the case along with the spectacles was a simple business card emblazoned with the logo of Tony’s company.
Pepper swallowed, recognizing the glasses—and recognizing the moment for what it was. She’d seen those same glasses on Tony so many times as he’d tinkered around in his lab, surrounded by metal suits—both his own, and Peter’s Spider-Man suit.
Even after Peter’s death, Tony hadn’t been able to let go of his memory, constantly improving a suit that—as far as Tony believed—would never again be worn.
Tony had never been able to cope with Peter’s death, with what he perceived as his own failure. Pepper knew her fiancé blamed himself. She knew it in the way Tony sometimes picked up his phone and listened to the familiar tune of hey, you’ve reached Peter Parker, knew it in the way his eyes would glaze over during the day and he’d mouth Peter’s name as if in a trance, knew it in the way nightmares would chase away Tony’s sleep.
(She knew it in the way nightmares would haunt her. Nightmares of twenty-one days waiting and praying for Tony to come home, and nightmares of the overwhelming anguish in Tony’s eyes when he’d collapsed in front of the Compound with a broken whisper of I lost the kid.)
Tony had never forgotten. Had never let go and moved on.
Those glasses only reinforced that idea, that knowledge. Pepper wasn’t even surprised to find that a future version of Tony would one day entrust those glasses to Peter Parker. This Tony seemed stunned speechless by the revelation that he’d left Peter a part of his legacy—Pepper could tell that he was already growing fond of Peter, but there was a difference between fondness and love—but to her Tony… To her Tony, it wouldn’t have even been a question.
Pepper knew, after all, how important Peter had been—and still was—to her fiancé.
(Unlike this Tony, hers knew the difference; hers knew exactly what it meant to love Peter Parker as if he were his own child.)
Peter must have recognized the glasses, too, because he darted a stunned glance at Fury, the white eyes on his mask widening to conform to his shock.
“‘Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown,’” Fury quoted, voice growing somber. He turned to Peter finally, an unreadable expression on his face. “Stark said you wouldn’t get that because it’s not a Star Wars reference.” The gravity of the moment broke as Fury scoffed.
Tony raised his eyebrows. “Star Wars, huh?” he asked with an affected tone of indifference. He fought to keep his composure in the face of his future self leaving Peter an endowment in the event of his death. How did Fury know to give those to Peter? Had his future self prepared—? (Prepared to such an extent that Fury knew that little detail about Peter’s love of Star Wars, no less?)
He shook his head and tried not to think about it. Tried not to think about preparing for his death, about knowing his death was coming and being unable to do anything to stop it.
“Yeah,” Peter nodded, laughing tearfully. “You – the other Mr. Stark, I mean—he, uh, he hated all of my pop culture references. Even though they totally come in handy during battle.”
“Don’t remind me,” Scott grumbled, shuddering as he remembered Spider-Man’s use of Star Wars battle strategies of all things against him in Leipzig.
Peter’s laugh came out less tearful this time, more solid.
Peter said nothing, closing the case with a quiet but final click. He lifted his gaze and faced forward, looking ahead to the future.
Before long, Fury and Peter arrived at their intended destination: one of SHIELD’s headquarters. EDITH carefully left the rest of the route out of her footage to ensure SHIELD’s continued secrecy and security.
“You can lose the mask,” Fury told Peter as he led the young superhero into the underground base, dimly lit by only a few sparse lamps. “Everyone here’s seen you without it. You’d only be feigning anonymity and breathing through spandex for no good reason.”
Peter paused for a moment as Fury entered the base ahead of him. After a reluctant moment, he pulled off his mask, eyes wide and hair unkempt.
“Come on,” Fury called out, offscreen.
“Yeah,” Peter mumbled. He shook his head as if to ground himself in the present, and then wordlessly followed Fury in.
As he headed inside, the camera flipped around and took in the interior of the base, lined with dozens of computers and high-tech equipment.
“Over there, we have Maria Hill,” Fury introduced, gesturing in the general direction of the female agent. “That,”—the camera focused on a bearded man in a leather jacket, holding a rifle in his hands—“is Dmitri. And this…”
Peter slowed to a stop halfway into the base, shock clear on his face. His eyes were wide.
“…is Mr. Beck.”
“At last, we have a name,” Tony said with exaggerated glee. “So it’s ‘Beck’, huh? Does this mean you’ll finally tell us who he is?”
“I…” Peter shook his head, unable to verbalize the answer he knew needed to be said. Of all the people he wanted to admit his failures to, Mr. Stark was the last. He hated disappointing his mentor. He’d done it before, and he’d promised himself it would never happen again.
Except it had, and now he had to face the music. He had to own up to his mistakes and accept Mr. Stark’s disapproval all over again.
Peter sniffed. God, he thought, Mr. Stark never should have picked me. I don’t deserve EDITH, not after what I did. His lips twisted into a frown. Mr. Stark would turn in his grave if he knew what Peter had done with his trust.
(Most days, Peter couldn’t understand why Mr. Stark had chosen him in the first place. Why had Mr. Stark left him, of all people, EDITH? Why had Happy believed that “picking him” was the one thing Mr. Stark hadn’t second-guessed?
Why him?)
“You’ll find out soon enough, Tony,” Happy stepped in when Peter found himself at a loss for words, covering for Peter without hesitation. “Stop hounding the kid, geez.”
Tony rolled his eyes at Happy’s scolding. “Yeah, yeah,” he groaned. “‘Wait and see.’ I get the gist.”
“Good,” Happy huffed sternly. When he turned to face Peter, the unrelenting expression on his face softened, giving way to a much warmer look. “What’s with that look, kid?” he prodded gently. “You look like you’re about to head to your own execution. What’s on your mind, huh?”
Peter swallowed. “Why didn’t you tell him?” he asked in lieu of answering.
Happy just narrowed his eyes at him. “Why didn’t you?” he countered.
Peter looked away, shame-faced. “I let him down,” he muttered sullenly. “You were wrong. He was wrong to pick me.”
“No, I wasn’t,” Happy argued. “What I said in that jet… I meant it, Peter. He never second-guessed his choice when it came to you. And if he were still around…” He faltered, a hint of anguish flashing across his expression for a fraction of a second before he steeled himself and continued, as comfortingly as he could, “If he were here and he knew what happened, he still wouldn’t regret choosing you. He was so proud of you, kid.”
Peter shrunk away, a full-body flinch running through him. He wasn’t, he wanted to deny, but even as the thought ran through his mind, he knew it was wrong; he could still feel the imprint of Mr. Stark’s arms around him, the ghost of a kiss pressing against his cheek, the echo of a whispered kid rattling in his skull. Mr. Stark had been proud of him, beyond all reason.
“He shouldn’t have been,” he said instead of arguing the facts staring him in the face.
Happy scowled at him. “Stop that,” he snapped. “Sowhat if you made mistakes? The important thing is that you didn’t run from your mistakes. You faced them head-on; you fixed them. You confronted Beck instead of hiding from the problem. You made it right.”
Peter swallowed, Happy’s words clinging tightly to him. He wanted so desperately to accept them as truth. He wanted to believe, more than anything, that Happy was right—that it did matter that he’d taken responsibility for his errors and cleaned up his mess.
(Even if it didn’t erase the fact that he’d made that mess in the first place.)
Happy tilted his head. “Look, you asked me why I didn’t tell him,” Happy said. “It’s because the purpose of EDITH compiling this footage isn’t to showcase Quentin Beck. Well, maybe a little bit, but only in that EDITH seeks to show the public that Beck is an asshole who took advantage of an innocent kid. More to the point: I don’t care about Quentin Beck. As far as I’m concerned, this is about you. It’s about you finding your strength, about you overcoming Beck’s illusions, and about you becoming your own hero—though I’m still of the opinion that you were already a hero.”
Happy paused.
Peter stared, his heart suspended in time, and waited with bated breath as Happy seemed to come to a decision.
Happy nodded jerkily. “This is your story, Peter,” he said, his voice stilted yet earnest. It was clear he felt uncomfortable, but he didn’t try to take it back or deny his sincerity. “Let them see Beck through your eyes. That is why EDITH did all of this, after all. Project Freedom, was it?”
Peter nodded wordlessly, his voice lodged in his throat. He couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything but listen and try to breathe through it all. Happy had never been the type to spill his gut or wear his heart on his sleeve—not with him, at least. Before today, the most emotional interaction he’d had with Happy was their conversation on the quinjet, words hushed and almost reverent, a balm to soothe Peter’s broken heart and red-rimmed eyes.
Happy offered a one-shouldered shrug, his smile small but genuine. “Beck already showed the world his side of the story—fabricated though it was. Now it’s your turn to get your truth out.”
His truth. Peter inhaled sharply, exhaled… and breathed.
EDITH followed Peter’s line of sight to the same cape-wearing stranger who fought off the water monster earlier that day. He was standing in the middle of the room, right by a large table.
“Mysterio?” Peter whispered as the man turned around, flashes of blue glowing under his armor.
The man—Mr. Beck—blinked. “What?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Peter shook it off, remembering where he was. He chuckled nervously. “It’s just what my friends have been calling you.”
“Well,”—the man smiled easily, walking forward with a proffered hand—“you can call me Quentin.”
“Oh, shit. Shit shit shit,” Pepper hissed in a panic, her mind racing to put two and two together. “Quentin Beck? I know that name.”
“Really?” Tony asked. “It sounds familiar, sure, but…”
“Of course you don’t remember him,” Pepper said, rolling her eyes. She wasn’t even surprised. “He’s—”
“Pepper,” Peter cut in, stopping her before she could reveal Beck’s unstable history with Stark Industries and the part he played in the B.A.R.F. project. He could tell she knew exactly who Quentin Beck was by now—he knew by the tension in her shoulders, by the terror-struck look in her eyes, by the quiver in her voice. He knew.
Tony clearly didn’t remember, no doubt because back in 2012, Quentin Beck was still just one of the many nameless faces roaming the halls of Stark Industries. As far as Peter knew, after all, the entire B.A.R.F. incident wouldn’t occur until years after 2012, right before the Accords debacle. There was no reason yet for Tony to even know Quentin Beck’s name, but Pepper…
There was no way Pepper had forgotten.
Indeed, Pepper turned to him with knitted brows, curiosity burning her tongue. “Peter, wha—?”
Peter shook his head stiffly. “Don’t,” he implored, Happy’s hand a heavy, comforting weight on his shoulder, “please.”
Pepper frowned, but Peter couldn’t bring himself to explain his reasoning. Pepper wouldn’t understand—not like Happy understood. Unlike Pepper, Happy knew his story. Happy knew “his truth”—he knew how Quentin Beck had blurred the lines between reality and fantasy in Peter’s mind.
Pepper didn’t know any of that. So although it would probably be easier to just let Pepper air the truth about Quentin Beck and get it out there (read: get it over with), Happy had a point: it was time for him to share his truth, and that included believing Quentin Beck was on his side.
(Beyond all that, beyond logic and reason, Peter just wanted to forget all about the way Beck had deluded him. And if that wasn’t possible, he wanted to at least avoid the weight of his mistakes for as long as he could—to pretend that he hadn’t screwed up so spectacularly.
Because no matter what Happy said, he had screwed up. Even if he’d fixed it in the end, it didn’t change the events that led to that ending.
Ignoring the reality of Quentin Beck was impossible in his own world, but here, in EDITH’s manifestation of a self haven, he could pretend all he wanted.)
Pepper fell silent and, all at once, remembered what EDITH had said at the very beginning—that this entire project was designed to “clear Peter’s name.”
Her stomach sank as she tried to make sense of why Peter’s name would need clearing.
(Peter hadn’t said anything about it, but she couldn’t help the gut feeling that Quentin Beck had something to do with the need for such a project.)
“You handled yourself well out there today,” Beck complimented with an acknowledging nod as Peter shook his hand briefly. “I saw what you did with the tower. We could use someone like you on my world.”
Bucky broke out into incredulous spluttering. “Wait. Wait, wait, wait. Rewind. Did he just say—”
“I think he did,” Scott interrupted, dazed.
“What the hell does he mean by that?” Sam choked out. “‘My world’!? I— what?”
“Thanks,” Peter said shyly, looking all at once embarrassed and pleased by Beck’s praise. After a split-second, his eyes narrowed as his mind fully processed Beck’s statement—“I’m sorry. Your world?”
“Exactly,” Sam nodded sharply. Peter’s bamboozled expression seemed to perfectly express his own thoughts on the matter. “Me, too, kid. Me, too.”
“Mr. Beck is from Earth,” Fury cut in. “Just not yours.”
Peter’s eyes widened as he caught on to Fury’s strange wording—the way he’d said just not yours instead of just not ours, so casually it could have simply been a slip of the tongue if not for the fact that this was Nicholas Joseph Fury—for the first time. Back when it had actually happened, he’d been far too distracted by everything else to notice it, but now, watching his past experiences unfold from a different perspective, there was no way he could have missed it.
Not… yours? Why would he say that? What could that mean? Peter wondered, biting his lip in thought. Deep down, it felt like a knife to the gut to discover something else he’d failed to pick up on.
He lowered his gaze and gritted his teeth. How much had he missed? How much had he failed to see—refused to see—because he’d been too busy burying his head in the sand after losing his mentor?
Peter wasn’t the only one who noted Fury’s odd choice of phrasing. Nick Fury himself, sitting all the way across the room, straightened abruptly at the sound of his own statement. His gaze sharpened. ‘Yours’? he echoed to himself, startled by his own diction.
“Fury,” Natasha started, voice low with barely restrained suspicion, “why didn’t you say ours?”
Fury kept quiet, unsure what he could say to answer her question. In truth, he didn’t know the answer himself. The only thing he could think of that might remotely make sense was that it had something to do with Carol and her merry band of Skrulls.
He gave a silent groan. What the hell are you up to? he asked the image of his future self (or was it not-his future self…? Fury needed to get this straight, and pronto) warily. His mind flashed to a memory of Talos and his family, human skin seamlessly crawling up over green features.
His jaw shifted. I’ll figure you out, he vowed, though whether he was addressing his future self, the Skrulls, or the situation in general, he wasn’t sure.
“There are multiple realities, Peter,” Beck carried on where Fury left off. “This is Earth Dimension 616. I’m from Earth 833.”
“I’m sorry, hold on, are we just going to move on?” Sam demanded. “Come on. Time travel is one thing, but dimensional travel is another thing entirely. And we’re just going to accept that’s possible?”
“Apparently,” Bucky shrugged. He’d long since given up on trying to keep up with the world’s scientific progress.
Sam spluttered in disbelief.
“There’s no way that becomes a thing,” he insisted. “Right?”
“Well, Quentin Beck is right there, so…”
Shuri snorted. “You two are going to drive even me crazy one of these days, and that’s saying something,” she remarked.
“Come on, princess,” Sam cajoled. “Tell him that’s not a real thing! You’re a science person, right?”
“A ‘science person’, he says,” Shuri scoffed. “Sure, I’m a science person.”
“So?”
Shuri hesitated. “Well, they’re eight years ahead of us. The possibilities are endless. I mean, Stark will evidently pioneer time travel. They may be different leagues, but is dimensional travel really so farfetched? Already, there are theories. I truly would not be surprised if, in eight years, dimensional travel is simply another common occurrence.”
“Or,” T’Challa cut in, “this has nothing to do with science at all, and Mr. Beck’s situation is far from common.”
Shuri rolled her eyes, unsurprised to hear her brother challenge her opinion. He had always been more unconcerned with the development of technology, simply satisfied with things as they were. She, on the other hand, was a firm believer in the notion that anything, no matter how functional, could always be further improved in one way or another.
“Are you suggesting magic had a hand in this?” Scott demanded, wide-eyed and intrigued.
“Well, we already know magic exists, at the very least,” T’Challa pointed out. “And magic strong enough to wipe out half of all life, apparently. Admittedly, that might not have been magic exactly, but either way, if something like that is possible, then dimensional travel isn’t a stretch at all. The two might even be connected.”
“...Fair enough,” Shuri conceded with a grimace. It still unsettled her to think about the possibility—or rather, the inevitability, it seemed—of trillions across the galaxy simply vanishing.
“What, so you’re suggesting that the ‘Blip’—or whatever they’ll call it—will cause Quentin Beck to travel to an alternate Earth?”
“Well, the Blip must have required a lot of energy—and I mean a lot. Perhaps, in causing the Blip, Thanos inadvertently tore a hole in our dimension and allowed Beck to cross over,” T’Challa theorized.
“...you know what, I’ll take it,” Sam shrugged. “It’s a hell of a lot more believable than the idea that science is responsible for this.”
Shuri snorted. “What has the universe come to when magic is a more likely explanation than science?” she muttered incredulously to herself.
“Hey,” Sam exclaimed, scrunching his nose in her direction, “you may be a science person, but I’m not. I’d rather believe that impossible things like this are outside mankind’s territory, thank you very much. It’s better—for my sanity, at least—if I remain under the impression that the ‘impossible’ is an uncommon occurrence, invited by otherworldly magic than by our own creations. Our lives are crazy enough as it is.”
“I’m sorry, you’re saying there’s a multiverse?” Peter demanded, grip tightening on his mask as he approached Beck with quick, eager steps. An excited grin tugged on his lips. Without even bothering to wait for a response, he launched into rapid-fire rambling, spitting out his thoughts faster than anyone else could comprehend them, “Because I thought that was just theoretical. I mean, that completely changes how we understand the initial singularity. We’re talking about an internal inflation system. How does that even work with all the quantum—?”
He cut himself off, turning to Fury and Hill with a wonderstruck expression. “It’s insane,” he gushed.
“Wow,” Bruce whispered, wide-eyed as he processed Peter’s ramblings, “the kid is more than just smart. He’s...”
“He’s something special,” Happy said with a smile he would never admit was fond.
“He really is,” Shuri agreed, looking just as impressed.
Peter choked back an overwhelmed, undignified squawk of embarrassment. “Wow,” he breathed, locking eyes with Ned—who looked just as dazzled as he did. “Bruce Banner just called me smart. And Princess Shuri agreed with him. Wow.”
Happy snorted. “What am I, chopped liver?” he asked sarcastically.
Peter just stuck his tongue out at him. “Come on, Hap, you know what I mean. They’re Bruce Banner and Princess Shuri. They’re legendary.” Happy rolled his eyes with a minute twitch of his lips that told Peter he was just playing around, and Peter grinned back. He twisted back around to face Ned again, unable to help but repeat—still dazedly awestruck—“And they called me smart!”
“I know!” Ned mouthed back, practically bouncing in his seat with genuine enthusiasm.
Ned had always been Peter’s biggest fan, long before Spider-Man and Tony Stark came along. Even whenever Peter was reluctant to believe in himself, Ned would cheer him on—without fail—and get excited for him.
“Oh, my god, Peter,” Ned whispered, on the verge of a squeal. “Oh, my god.”
Shuri had to suppress an amused laugh at Peter and Ned’s elation. Beyond the amusement, though, it was longing that burned in her eyes.
The fact of the matter was, it was rare that she ever found anyone as smart as her—especially when that someone was also as young as her.
Damn, she thought wishfully to herself, eyes searching for Peter and his friends, I can’t wait to meet him in my timeline. I have a feeling we’re going to get along like a house on fire—or, as the case may be, like a lab on fire. And besides…
She’d never really had any actual friends before. Everyone she knew and interacted with on a regular basis were more her brother’s friends than her own. She didn’t have a meaningful connection with anyone her age, truthfully. Her status as the princess of Wakanda—and a princess who was intelligent beyond her years, with a position as the head of science, no less—had always kept her isolated.
(Lonely, even when she wasn’t alone.)
She swallowed.
Peter and Ned and MJ—they just seemed so in tune with each other. So familiar and comfortable and assured in their friendship. Their every interaction—both on- and off-screen—spoke of such an intrinsic and natural ease that Shuri couldn’t help but ache with longing.
(That, she thought, that is what I’ve been missing.)
Shuri inhaled shakily. She averted her gaze desperately, her jaw shifting with every thought and every pang of yearning.
Stop it, Shuri, she hissed to herself, blinking rapidly. You’ve never needed friends before. (She’d never realized what was absent from her life before.) You’ve always been fine on your own.
(But, she reminded herself, thinking of evenings spent laboring away in her lab, tinkering around with her brother’s suits, just because something works doesn’t mean it can’t be improved.)
(Maybe friends would be good for her. More than good.)
Peter’s grin faltered when he caught the blank, dumbstruck expressions on both agents’ faces. “S-sorry,” he stammered. He schooled his glee slightly. “It’s really cool,” he muttered as if to defend himself.
When he turned back to Beck, the caped hero was smiling at him. “Don’t ever apologize for being the smartest one in the room,” he advised.
The grin returned to Peter’s face.
Peter’s breath hitched at Beck’s effortless compliment and his own obvious reaction. It was just one more way in which Beck had tried to imitate Mr. Stark: in contrast to Fury and Hill’s cold, intimidating demeanors, Quentin Beck had exuded support and goodwill. Beck had stood up for him; he’d defended him to the SHIELD agents who’d only seen him as the embodiment of his powers and his potential—who’d only thought of him as a weapon in their arsenal.
Fury had demanded him to step up to bat, to go along with their plans like a good little soldier. Beck, meanwhile, had been a comforting presence amidst Peter’s uncertainties, reaching out time after time with friendly smiles and patient advice and Peter hadn’t been able to help believing him.
All Peter had wanted was a mentor. (Mr. Stark’s death had left Peter with a gaping hole in his heart and no one to fill it.) And Beck… Beck had played on that. He’d served himself up as another mentor, someone Peter could trust and depend on, and like a child desperate for guidance, Peter had let him.
Peter exhaled shakily. It’s over, he reminded—reassured—himself. He’s gone. He can’t fool you anymore. He can’t hurt you anymore.
You’re safe, he told himself. He thought of his friends’ soothing whispers earlier, rousing him from his panic attack. You’re not alone. He thought of Ned’s earnest support and his lighthearted jokes. He thought of MJ’s smiling eyes and the warmth of her hand in his own. He thought of Happy’s signature squeeze of his shoulder and his murmurs of it’s about you finding your strength.
Happy had told him to let EDITH share his truth. He’d told him to let the world see Beck through his eyes.
Well, Peter thought, this is Beck through my eyes. This is how I saw Beck. A wolf in sheep’s clothing.
For the Avengers to see Beck as he did, they had to first see Beck as the good guy, as Peter’s salvation—when, in truth, Beck had only ever sought to be his damnation.
Fury scoffed again. Hill just turned towards the computer she was standing by with a clear of her throat and a pointed, “Anyway.” With a few keystrokes, Hill brought forth a holographic projection of a black hole. The image hovered above the table beside Beck and Peter.
“They were born in stable orbits within black holes,” Beck began, the projection shifting as he told his story. “Creatures formed from the primary elements: air, water, fire, earth.” Four caricatures appeared in the air, representing each of the different elements as listed by Beck.
Peter watched, entranced by the moving figures in the projection—gaze focused on the clearly blue-tinted caricature of the water monster he’d previously encountered.
“The science division had a… technical name,” Beck said with a shake of his head. He, too, seemed to be fixated on the caricatures—except his gaze was fastened on the fire monster. “We just called them Elementals."
“Ah, the ‘Elementals’,” Bucky noted, remembering Peter’s vague introduction to the concept upon the appearance of the water monster. “So that’s where the name comes from.”
“Yeah,” Peter confirmed, mustering a smile. He felt a little steadier now that he was letting himself believe in Happy’s words of reassurance; now that he’d made up his mind to let the Avengers experience everything as he had. It was the only way his truth could run free, after all. “Yeah, that’s where I got the term Elementals from.”
Bucky hummed, giving Peter a brief nod. “So there are more than just the two Elementals that we’ve seen so far,” he summarized, shooting Scott a triumphant look that lacked any real smugness. The worry in his eyes betrayed his true feelings on the matter. “I’m assuming the creature representing ‘air’ is the ‘cyclone with a face’ that Fury keeps talking about?"
Peter nodded. “That’s the one.”
“So, what, that leaves the Fire Elemental?”
Another nod.
Bucky winced. “Fire, huh,” he whistled. “That does not sound pleasant. Jesus.”
Peter gave a weak laugh. “It definitely wasn’t,” he agreed absentmindedly, his mind traitorously wandering to his first encounter with the ‘Fire Elemental’—or, rather, Beck’s manifestation of such a creature. Even now, knowing what he knew about the illusionary origins of the Elementals, he shuddered at the thought of that battle.
It had certainly felt real.
“Versions of them exist across our mythologies,” Hill said, having approached the duo by now. As if on cue, images from legends and stories replaced the Elementals’ caricatures.
“Turns out,” Beck took over again, “the myths are real.”
“Like Thor,” Peter piped up. “Thor was a myth, and… now I study him in my physics class.”
“Oh?” Thor was grinning smugly, shoulders broadened with pride. “Do you now?”
Peter scratched the back of his neck. “Well, yeah,” he admitted. “My physics teacher is kind of a fan. She’s definitely fascinated by the fact that you, uh, exist.”
Thor’s grin widened. “Is that so?” he hummed.
Tony gave an exaggerated groan. “Great,” he complained, “you just had to say that, didn’t you? His ego is going to be completely insufferable now.”
Rhodey snorted. “Says the most egotistical man in the world,” he jibed.
“Oh, hush, you,” Tony dismissed, pushing Rhodey away with a playful shove. “Speaking of which—you definitely study me in class, too, right? It is a physics class, after all. And I’m Tony Stark, come on.”
Rhodey heaved a long-suffering sigh and shook his head as if to say you see what I have to deal with?
Peter bit back a giggle. It was… nice, seeing Tony and Rhodey interact like this: falling back on their typical banter and taunts, even despite the years that divided them. Sure, it was a little sad, too—it hit him with a stark pang of longing—but it was also nice.
Peter had missed Tony’s particular brand of haughtiness mixed with self-deprecation. It was just so purely Tony.
“Sure,” he said indulgently, trying not to grin too widely (or too tearfully). He pushed aside the thought of Quentin Beck for now and locked it away, resolving to simply savor this moment as it came. “My teacher is a fan of yours, too.”
Tony fist-pumped in celebration. “I knew it,” he said with a smirk.
“Oh, I wouldn’t be too happy about it if I were you,” MJ shot down. “Ms. Warren might be a fan of Stark Industries, but she’s absolutely obsessed with Dr. Banner.”
Bruce choked on air.
“That’s true,” Peter agreed thoughtfully. “She even put your picture up on her wall, Dr. Banner—right beside a number of other famous scientists, including Newton, Bohr, and Einstein. She talks about you and your theories at least twice as much as she talks about Mr. Stark and Thor combined.”
Tony and Thor both gawked in dismay.
Bruce, too gawked—though his expression was filled with shock instead. “I—you— really?” the scientist stuttered. “I’m… on your classroom wall?” His voice was small, breathless, as if he couldn’t quite believe it.
Peter’s bright, amused eyes softened. “You are,” he confirmed. “And Ms. Warren isn’t the only one who admires you. Your research is incredible. I mean, seriously, you’re insane—you’re, like, themost renowned scientist of your generation. Your work on anti-electron collisions is completely unparalleled.” Not to mention your renewed research into gamma radiation that, in my timeline, eventually allowed you to merge your intelligence with Hulk’s strength. “Your brain is amazing, Dr. Banner, Ned and I are both huge fans—”
“Pete, kid,” Happy interrupted his rambling with a snort. He nudged Peter gently and gestured at Bruce. “I think he gets it.”
Peter flushed, finally realizing what he’d done. He peeked at Bruce out of the corner of his eyes and found the scientist gaping dumbly at him, his jaw practically on the floor.
Peter coughed awkwardly. “Uh, yeah,” he tried to save himself, recorking the bottle of his emotions. Truth be told, he'd been waiting to geek out over Bruce Banner since their first meeting, but there had never been an appropriate moment—the first time he’d been introduced to Dr. Banner, after all, had been in the middle of Mr. Stark’s funeral, where Peter had been too upset to even care about meeting one of his idols. “As you can probably tell, I, uh, I’m a really big fan.”
“Oh,” Bruce whispered, voice dumbfounded and a little awed as he struggled to recollect himself in the face of Peter’s unadulterated enthusiasm. He didn’t think he had ever gained so much attention for being, well, him before. The Hulk was used to receiving recognition and acknowledgement; Bruce Banner was not.
He used to think no one cared about Bruce—he was only useful to the Avengers as the Hulk, after all. Bruce was… he was just an ordinary guy.
Hulk was the special one.
But Peter seemed to think that Ordinary Guy Bruce was special, too. Peter seemed to care.
Bruce swallowed. It was… a foreign realization, and one that made his heart swell.
He couldn’t help the tiny, hesitant grin that unfurled across his lips. “I... thank you,” he managed to choke out, though he was sure he sounded a little like a constipated seal.
Peter smiled shyly and looked away, a little embarrassed by his own lack of restraint.
Beside him, Happy chuckled quietly to himself. He could tell Peter found his own actions awkward and mortifying, but Happy knew better. Happy recognized that look on Bruce’s face; he could spot the gratitude and flustered joy in it.
Trust Peter to lighten the mood with one of his trademark rambles, Happy thought, unable to deny the fondness that welled up inside him. That’s just like him.
“These myths are threats,” Fury said darkly, rounding the table and sitting down in front of one of the many computers.
“They first materialized on my Earth many years ago,” Beck explained, the hologram switching to an image of another globe. “We mobilized and fought them, but with each battle, they grew—got stronger. I was part of the last battalion left trying to stop them.” As if to punctuate his words, tendrils of fiery red spread across the Earth in the projection, until nearly everything was devoured. “All we did was delay the inevitable.”
“The Elementals are here now, attacking the same coordinates. Our satellites confirm it,” Hill announced.
“So thank Mr. Beck for destroying the other three,” Fury said. “There's only one left: fire.”
“The strongest of them all,” Beck whispered, staring up at the rendering of his Earth, now completely red. “The one that destroyed my Earth.” The Earth began to crumble in accompaniment to his words.
Beck’s gaze lowered to the ground, heavy and burdened. “It’s the one that took my family.”
“Oh, shit,” Bucky breathed. His earlier assessment of “not pleasant” was a huge, huge understatement. “The Fire Elemental destroyed his Earth? That isn’t hyperbole, is it?”
Peter pressed his lips together into a thin line, the warmth that had washed over him as he’d raved about Dr. Banner’s brilliance fleeing rapidly. God, he thought with a groan, I just can’t get a break, can I?
No matter how hard he tried, he could never seem to escape Beck’s influence. Everything reminded him about the lies Beck had told.
“I’m sorry, but— why isn’t Fury calling us in?” Steve demanded, audibly frustrated.
“Cap’s right,” Sam seconded. “I mean, you’re up against an enemy that has already destroyed one Earth. Shouldn’t the Avengers get involved?”
Peter shook his head stiffly. “I don’t know what to tell you,” he said honestly, and what he meant was: I don’t know where the Avengers were.
What he really meant was: I needed you, and you weren’t there.
Steve sighed, deflating immediately at the sight of Peter’s distress. “I just… Why wouldn’t we show up?” he whispered.
“None of us can speak for your future selves,” Happy stepped in, “but I don’t think I have to remind you that the Avengers only play in the major leagues. And at this point… no one could have expected the magnitude of the Elementals’ impact.” Beck’s impact. “I mean, we’ve gone through the Blip. We’ve already been through hell and back. Half of us have died once before. What could possibly measure up to that, right?”
He snorted, a palpable bitterness audible in the hard edge of his tone. “We all needed to pick up the pieces,” he reminisced, “after Thanos tore us apart.” He paused, glancing sidelong at Peter. “Some of us are still picking up the pieces.”
And what he meant was: Peter didn’t get a chance to breathe. He was thrust right back into the heat of battle, and he didn’t have a team to back him up. None of you showed up.
Peter looked down, too, avoiding the sight of the vanishing Earth. He caught sight of Beck fiddling absentmindedly with the ring on his finger. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, voice hoarse.
“And it will be in Prague in approximately 48 hours,” Hill warned, shattering the moment.
Fury straightened in his seat. “We have one mission: kill it. And you’re coming with us.” There was no remorse, no regret and no reluctance in his voice as he delivered his decree.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize sending teenagers to their deaths was in our mission statement,” Tony sneered, sarcasm dripping from his voice. His eyes burned twin holes into the screen. “What the hell, Fury?”
“And here I thought you hero types were supposed to be honorable,” Loki hissed, backing Tony up. A part of him was appalled to find himself on Stark’s side of any argument, but a bigger part of him could only focus on his growing indignation over SHIELD’s treatment of Peter. His anger flared on behalf of this kid who was but a stranger to him not even one hour ago—a kid who had offered him the chance to start over, free of judgement.
Loki glanced down at Peter and frowned deeply when he saw Peter’s eyes, glazed over in a haze of what seemed to be grief.
He returned his gaze to the duo of Fury and Hill and glared. “Sending a child to do a man’s job is certainly not honorable,” he added.
(Loki was too caught up in his own rage to notice it, but Thor beamed with pride at the sight of his brother sticking up for someone who wasn’t himself.)
Peter’s head snapped up in disbelief. He glanced uncertainly between Fury and Hill. “I’m sorry, did you say Prague?” he spluttered with a nervous chuckle. “Mr. Fury, this all seems like big-time—you know, huge superhero kind of stuff. And, uh,”—he glanced back at the table, still empty now that Beck’s Earth had vanished from the air above it—“I mean, I’m just the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, sir.”
“Bitch, please,” came Fury’s immediate retort, “you’ve been to space.”
Scott choked.
“You’ve been to space!?” Sam echoed incredulously, spluttering in disbelief.
Happy reared back and shot him an incredulous stare. “He’s gone up against the Mad Titan, an intergalactic tyrant,” he reminded Sam. “He was involved in a battle where half of the universe was at stake. Where did you guys think that happened? In our own backyard?”
Sam blinked. “Oh. Right.”
“To be fair,” Pepper mused, “the aliens did come to Earth first. And Thanos later brought the battle to Earth, too. Most of the Avengers only fought Thanos here, on Earth, in the end.”
“Wait, really?” Steve asked. “Why wouldn’t we face Thanos together?”
Pepper gritted her teeth and looked away. Because there was no more ‘we’ at all, she thought, sparing Bucky and the other 2016 travelers an embittered glance. Because you weren’t a united front.
“Let’s call it extenuating circumstances,” she said finally, her voice strained. “Only Peter, Tony and Doctor Strange actually went up to space.” Not counting the Guardians who joined them midway, that is.
Rhodey’s lips tugged downwards into a grim frown. “And only Tony returned.”
Tony inhaled sharply. He remembered, all of a sudden, Pepper blurting out that his future self had watched Peter die. “Shit,” he muttered. He felt like he’d been cursing more than anything else, over the last half hour. “Shit. Peter died… in space?”
That, for some reason, was the image that made him want to hurl more than anything else had so far. The thought of Peter, a teenager, dying somewhere among the unknown galaxies, with an endless ocean of stars above him and an unfamiliar ground beneath him, painted such a tragic scene in his mind.
Tony thought of the clip they’d seen of people vanishing in Midtown High’s gym, a flurry of chaos. He thought of Peter’s ashes, fluttering away into the vast cosmos. He thought of Peter, lost forever in space, away from home, and he had to swallow down the bile rising up his throat.
“I know, but that was an accident,” Peter rushed to explain, close to panicking. He bridged the space between himself and Fury in a few rapid steps. “Sir, come on. There’s gotta be someone else you can use!”
Steve straightened in his seat, eyes narrowing as he waited, on edge, for Fury’s response to that. Would he finally get his answer to why the Avengers weren’t helping?
(Why he wasn’t helping?)
(He knew that Peter and MJ had both insisted that in 2024, he was no longer “in the shape to go out as a hero,” but what could possibly be bad enough to stop him from fulfilling his duty? Especially when an Elemental threatening the destruction of the world was at hand?)
Peter paused, visibly racking his brain, before he shrugged and offered, “What about Thor?”
“Off-world,” Fury answered.
“Okay, um… Doctor Strange,” he suggested.
Hill’s rejection was swift—“Unavailable.”
“Captain Marvel?” he threw out, growing audibly desperate.
“You know Captain Marvel?” Fury demanded immediately. He straightened abruptly, as if yanked by a leash, and shot Peter a startled, interrogatory glare.
“Who’s Captain Marvel?” Clint piped up. Several others murmured their agreement.
Fury effortlessly ignored the question as he waited for Peter’s answer, his narrowed eyes firmly telling Peter that he wouldn’t be able to get out of explaining this one so easily.
Peter chewed his lip, momentarily quiet as he glanced between the Fury in the room and himself on the screen. At the time, even as he’d asked the question, he’d known, of course, that it was a long-shot—Carol’s departure from Earth was still vivid in his memory, after all.
But he’d been desperate and stupid and naive, and he’d hoped against hope that she could make it back in time to lend him a hand. He’d always admired her, after all—he’d thought highly of her ever since he learned that she’d been the one to rescue Tony from a slow and painful death aboard the Benatar.
In truth, he idolized her.
“Yeah,” Peter answered finally. His lips twitched, though his eyes remained distant and far away—lost in thought. He could still picture the friendly warmth in her eyes when she’d arrived on the battlefield in a burst of color, eclipsing every other blast and explosion around them. Despite everything—despite the noise and chaos and danger—she’d looked him in the eye, let him know he could trust her, and made him feel safe.
The certainty and confidence in her voice still lulled him to sleep whenever he had nightmares. Hi, Peter Parker, the memory of her voice would murmur in his ear during moments of panic, enveloping him in a safe haven of her own making. You got something for me?
He smiled and let the memory fade away into nothing more than a feeling, snug and cozy. Even now, she reassured him like nothing else could. She was the embodiment of strength and power, of salvation; she’d saved his mentor, and then she’d saved him, too.
“Yeah,” Peter repeated. “I know Carol.” He paused, his smile broadening into a small smirk. “And I gotta say, I never would have guessed that the Nick Fury wouldn’t be able to eat his toast if it’s been cut diagonally.”
There was a pause, a moment of stunned stillness, and then—
Clint guffawed—naturally. Natasha was much more graceful and discrete about her amusement, but Peter couldn’t help but notice the mirth dancing in her eyes, too.
Fury let his head drop an inch, the only visible sign of weakness he would ever allow himself in public, and groaned out loud. “You had to air my secrets, kid?” he groused.
“Just be glad I’m not telling everyone the real reason you need that eyepatch,” Peter threatened.
Fury stilled. His one eye twitched violently.
“What do you mean by the real reason—!?”
“Why are you saying it like that—”
“Wait, what?” Clint burst out, unable to keep his silence at that news. “The kid knows how you lost your eye!? But for as long as I’ve known you, you’ve always refused to tell anyone what happened! Every time I ask, you just keep going on and on about ‘classified’ and ‘need-to-know’ and it happened in the line of duty, Barton, and that’s all I’ll ever say about it.”
“Damn, kid, how’d you get your hands on that secret?” Hill asked, appearing genuinely impressed.
Beside her, Fury looked like he was wondering the same thing.
“I didn’t think he’d ever tell anyone what happened,” Natasha added, amused. “The most he’s ever said about it to me is that the last time he trusted someone, he lost an eye.”
“Oh, believe me, he said the same thing to me,” Peter snickered, thinking of Goose. Who knew the Director of SHIELD was so dramatic? “Luckily for me, Carol has a soft spot for me. And she loves to gossip.”
Fury’s eyes narrowed. “Carol told you?” he demanded, sounding more than a little disgruntled.
Peter hummed. “Oh, yeah,” he confirmed, far too gleefully to be healthy.
Clint’s expression mirrored his glee. “Oh, my god,” he chortled, “kid, you need to tell us. I’m dying to know.”
“That makes two of us,” Tony seconded immediately. “That sounds like a secret that’s way too interesting to pass up.”
“Parker, don’t you dare—” Fury growled.
“Sorry, Mr. Barton, Mr. Stark,” Peter said sheepishly. “I guess you two will just have to try to wear Fury down.”
Fury paused, eyebrows knitted in thought for a total of two seconds—he’s not going to say anything, not even to Stark?—before he said firmly, “Never gonna happen.”
Clint and Tony let out twin sighs of dismay. Even Natasha looked momentarily disappointed.
Fury, on the other hand, seemed almost… pleased. All he had to show for it, though, was a mildly satisfied grunt and the most minute of smirks. He would never admit it to anyone, but he trusted Carol’s judgement. So if she’d been willing to put her trust in Peter and tell him about Goose, tell him anything about what they went through together in 1995, then Peter must have done something to be worthy of that.
(And from what he’d seen, from what he’d heard, she’d been right.)
Fury looked downright insulted. “Don’t invoke her name.”
“Damn,” Clint whistled, “who is this Captain Marvel, to warrant a reaction like that? Or—Carol, was it?”
Peter smiled a secret smile. “She’s one of us,” he said simply. “The strongest one of us.”
Clint’s eyes blew wide open. “The strongest!?” he demanded. “By whose account?”
“Surely, you’re mistaken,” Thor added, just as shocked. All around the room, everyone eyed Peter in similar stunned surprise. “Maybe she simply hasn’t gone up against me yet,” he boasted with a haughty laugh.
“Or the Hulk,” Tony chimed in. “There’s no way, right?”
Peter merely smiled.
Tony—and everyone else—groaned.
“Come on, kid,” Sam needled. “You gotta give us something, man. Is she stronger than our resident powerhouses?”
“Impossible,” Thor scoffed.
“Oh, it’s possible,” Fury snorted. He’d never forget the way Carol halted an entire wave of missiles all on her own. “Very possible.”
Peter scrubbed a hand over his face. When he met Fury’s gaze again, it was with an earnest, pleading expression. “Sir, look, I really wanna help. I do.” He swallowed. “But if my aunt finds out I left my class trip, she’s gonna kill me. And if I’m seen like this”—he waved a hand at his get-up, red and blue and distinctly Spider-Man—“in Europe after the Washington Monument, my whole class will figure out who I am, and then — and then the whole world will figure out who I am, and then I’m done.”
Peter looked so distressed, so hopeless.
Peter swallowed. His words had come true. The world had figured out who he was. These days, he could no longer roam the streets without some sort of disguise—whether that was a hood over his face or a wig to hide his distinctive brown curls.
He’d become a fugitive. For the sake of his aunt, for the safety of Ned and MJ and everyone else he cared about, Peter Parker had to be dead to the world.
That was his reality now.
“Hey.”
Peter winced at the sound of MJ’s voice cutting through the white noise in his head, but when he turned to face her, there was no recrimination on her face, only fondness. She was still smiling at him as if she hadn’t just found out that he’d wanted to run away from it all—his responsibilities, his duties, Spider-Man.
“Em, I…”
“Shh,” she murmured as soothingly as she could. ‘Soothing’ didn’t exactly come natural to her, but for Peter, she was willing to try. “This doesn’t change anything. You’re still you. You’re still a hero at your core.”
His mouth fell open, stunned by MJ’s easy acceptance. He’d been terrified to imagine how she would react to the realization that he’d been ready to leave the next “Big Bad” to someone else, but here she was, looking at him as if nothing had changed. As if he was still every bit the hero he wanted to be.
“But...” But he wasn’t. He’d been a coward. Worse yet, he’d been a selfish coward. “I – I didn’t want to help,” he said desperately. “I turned Fury down.”
MJ shrugged. Beside her, Ned seemed just as unfazed. “That doesn’t change who you are,” she insisted, and Ned nodded rapidly beside her. “That doesn’t make you a bad person.”
“You’re just a kid, Pete,” Happy chimed in. “More than that, you’re a kid who’s still readjusting to life after five years of being Blipped away. Fury shouldn’t have asked that of you in the first place.”
Peter swallowed. Not for the first time, he looked at his friends, at Ned and MJ and Happy surrounding him with their unconditional support, and wondered what he’d done to deserve them.
There was a long beat of silence. “Okay,” Fury finally said, but there was no compassion or sympathy in his eyes. “I understand,” he lied.
Peter clearly hadn’t expected that. “I’m sorry, what?”
“Why don’t you get back before your teachers miss you and become suspicious?” he said rhetorically, tone condescending. His face contorted into a smile so patronizing it hardly looked like a smile at all.
Fury twisted around with a call of Dmitri’s name—“Dmitri! Take him back to the hotel, please.”
The bearded man stepped forward and nodded.
“Thank you, Mr. Fury,” Peter said sincerely. He backed away, the inner turmoil evident in his conflicted gaze, before he paused long enough to say, “And, uh, good luck.”
Rhodey groaned miserably. “Why do I get the feeling that this isn’t the last we’ll be seeing of you, Fury?”
“Because it probably isn’t,” Fury admitted.
“Knowing you,” Clint snorted, “it definitely isn’t.”
“Well, at least you’re self-aware enough to recognize it,” Rhodey said sarcastically. The steel in his eyes and in his voice never left, telling Fury in no uncertain terms that he was far from forgiving Fury’s overstepping of boundaries—even though logically, it had yet to occur.
“See you, kid,” Beck bid him goodbye as Peter walked past, but his gaze lingered on the vigilante.
“Yeah,” Peter breathed, smiling apologetically, “see you.”
Peter flinched at the sound of the nickname Kid coming from Quentin Beck.
He’d eagerly chased after it back then, desperate for some semblance of the mentorship and comfort Tony had offered him, but… it was so, so wrong, from Beck. It was nothing like Mr. Stark’s utter of ‘kid’—scolding, exasperated, fond, and underneath it all, proud.
Beck’s held none of that fondness, none of that pride. Beck was nothing like Mr. Stark.
(Peter couldn’t believe he’d ever thought anyone, much less Quentin Beck, could possibly be enough after Tony Stark.)
“Bye, ma’am!” he called out, offering Maria Hill a backwards wave.
“Yeah.”
Peter walked out of the secret headquarters, not once looking back. For once, he had his own life, his own desires, in sight and in focus. For once, he wanted to put himself first.
(Dmitri, however, did look back, sharing a meaningful glance with Nick Fury that did not go unnoticed by select members of the audience.)
“Fury,” Natasha groaned, already inordinately fond of the nervous, stammering kid who just wanted to have a childhood. (Who deserved that childhood.) “What the hell do you think you’re planning?”
Peter chewed his lip, a little dismayed at yet another sign he’d missed. Fury had never intended to let him have his peaceful class trip at all.
The disappointed, disgruntled part of him felt a little resentful; that part of him wanted nothing more than to let Natasha tear into Fury and give him a piece of her mind. He knew exactly what Natasha thought of child soldiers, after all—even if he would never truly let them mold him into a soldier.
But another part of him understood why Fury had thought it was necessary to hijack Peter’s trip. Besides, if Fury hadn’t...
—It’s about you finding your strength, about you overcoming Beck’s illusions, and about you becoming your own hero—
Peter shook his head.
“Honestly, it’s fine,” he said finally, making up his mind. He waved off Natasha’s simmering wrath with a nervous chuckle before Fury could try to defend his future self’s actions yet again. He broke off for a moment, long enough to give Happy a firm, grateful nod. He didn’t try to acknowledge Happy’s earlier rare emotional moment verbally, knowing full well that Happy grew uncomfortable at the mere prospect of heart-to-hearts, but the appreciation was there nonetheless, a tangible feeling in the air.
Happy nodded back, patting Peter’s shoulder in a similarly unspoken anytime, kid, I’m here, and Peter’s lips quirked into a grin. In the end, they didn’t need words to communicate that they had each other’s backs.
“It was a harsh wake-up call, yeah,” Peter picked up where he left off, spinning around to redirect his attention to the sofa full of SHIELD agents, “but I needed it—I needed the reminder. To become a better hero, a more responsible one. Someone the people can depend on.”