“I’m sorry, Peter, but if you’re going to continue to lie you won’t be allowed to go on the trip,” Mr. Harrington said awkwardly as Peter looked at him in shock.
“But I’m not lying,” he responded desperately. He wasn’t sure why he was protesting so much to this; he didn’t even want to go on the field trip in the first place. Maybe it was because it hurt that even his teacher didn’t believe him. “The internship is real!”
The usually chill teacher sighed, folding his arms. “There are no high school interns at Stark Industries, especially ones that work with Tony Stark personally. Instead of going on the field trip, just attend your usual classes,” he said stubbornly and left the room before Peter could continue arguing. Mr. Harrington was his favorite teacher, he never expected him to be like that with him.
When Peter got home, his face was still red and he sort of wanted to cry, and unfortunately Bucky saw him before he could try to look normal. He was instantly led over to the couch and leant into Bucky’s embrace. It was weird how close they had gotten in such a short amount of time, especially since the ex-assassin was still very guarded around most people. Now he was like Peter’s older brother as well as one of his best friends.
“What’s wrong?” Bucky asked quietly, silently vowing to kill whoever made the kid sad.
“I can’t go on the decathlon field trip here on Thursday because no one believes me about the internship. Mr. Harrington wouldn’t even let me show him the paperwork or anything.” It was quiet for a moment, something Peter was used to when Bucky was trying to fix a problem. He would usually think something through thoroughly before proposing his solution, as opposed to Tony who would always talk through something out loud.
“FRIDAY, tell everyone that we’re playing paintball on Thursday. And tell Tony to let Peter work on the Iron Man armor today or I’ll make sure his lab plays Despacito on repeat for the rest of the month.”
Peter grinned and perked up instantly. “Paintball?”
“Yeah, pal. Your class will have no choice but to believe you, and I know Clint’s been pushin’ for a rematch since we destroyed him last time,” Bucky said with a matching smile. Yeah, it would probably be a little awkward running into his class at his house, but it would be kind of great to be able to prove them wrong without having to go on a ridiculous tour. “That work or would that be too embarrassing or something?”
“I think you might be a genius, Bucky,” Peter responded after thinking it through. “It probably won’t help my cover though. Everyone at school thinks I’m this wimpy kid with asthma.” before Bucky could respond, he was cut off by someone else.
“Don’t worry about that, kid,” Tony said as he and Natasha walked into the room, both looking a little concerned. “I’ll make them sign some NDAs before the tour so nothing can get out if anyone finds out about Spider-Man.”
“And if people ask about your sudden skill at gymnastics, tell them that you’ve been training with me and that should explain things,” Nat cut in with a shrug. “It’s not really a lie either so you’ll have an easier time talking about it.” Peter blushed a little, pretty embarrassed at being such a bad liar while living with spies. He was mostly just proud of himself for keeping his identity a secret despite that fact. Soon they got distracted with whatever Clint managed to get into this time, putting the field trip in the back of their minds.
The day of the trip Peter’s a little more nervous, kinda hoping he won’t run into his classmates, but also kinda hoping he gets to prove them all wrong. After a pep talk from Bucky, he feels more confident and focuses on winning the game, knowing that he has someone backing him up no matter what happens. He lets himself relax into the game, getting into the right headspace to kick Team Romanov’s ass.
XXXXXXXXXX
When he thought about it for a second, it made sense that his classmates were so shocked. Rounding a corner to see Peter dressed in all black, holding a pistol with a rifle strapped to his back, would probably freak out most people. His spidey sense alerted him to the group of people right before there are many a “PETER????” and “HOLY SHIT HE HAS A GUN” and other panicked exclamations. He spun around with wide eyes and shushed them, hurrying up to the group (half of them took a step back because yeah he’s got a realistic looking gun but the other ones are too frozen) and looks over the group quickly.
“Everyone shut the fuck up for twenty seconds!” he whispered harshly, tilting his head to the side to listen for Steve trying to sneak up on him. Cap was just not as sneaky as he thought he was. Actually, most of the avengers weren’t that sneaky when you had super hearing. Mr. Harrington seemed to finally get out of his own shock and began probably saying ‘Peter what are you doing here? Why do you have a gun??’ and other fun questions and accusations, but before he got out the first question, Peter’s sense made him stiffen and grab Flash (MJ had actually taken to filming the whole ordeal and he made a mental note to ask her to send him a pic of Flash’s terrified face), putting the bully in front of himself. Flash squeaked and let out a high pitched yell when he got shot by green paint. The whole class jumped and took another step back, all of them still in varying degrees of shock.
From down the hall Steve yelled loud enough for the group of teens and a very baffled teacher: “Peter! We all agreed no human shields!!” and yeah everyone recognized his voice. Oh well, it’s not like he wasn’t expecting this to happen.
“It’s Flash from school, though!” he shouted back with a grin.
“Oh nevermind then!” Flash made an offended noise but still looked Spooked enough to let it go.
“Hey tell your team to take twenty! Get over here!” then to his own comm he said “hey guys ran into the acadec team take twenty, I’m sure they’d all like a quick meet and greet. Second floor by lab twenty-seven.” after he received affermatives from his team, he turned to his class who were so incredibly confused. “Uh, hey guys.”
“Peter, what the hell?” Charles asked and Peter met Ned’s eyes that were wide with awe. Before he could even attempt to answer that, Steve arrived, one shoulder hit with yellow.
“Avengers paintball. Peter is scarily good at it.” Steve looked at all the excited faces, then saw Flash and his ruined shirt. “I’d say sorry about your shirt, but I’m not.” Peter tried to stifle his laughter, and saw MJ do the same behind her camera.
Ned gasped. “Peter you didn’t tell me you played paintball with the avengers!!”
Just then, Tony, Natasha, Bucky, Clint, Sam, and Rhodey showed up, Bucky and Natasha with no paint on them like Peter, and Sam the most colorful.
“Is that the asshole who was rude to you about knowing Stark?” Bucky asked without preamble, pointing at Mr. Harrington with his gun who looked terrified.
“Yeah, a little ridiculous that he couldn’t go on the trip because he was underselling his relationship with Stark,” Natasha added with a raised eyebrow, and smirked when his teacher gulped audibly.
“Oh my god, we have had this talk before. can you all please try not to terrorize, threaten, maim, or mentally scar my teacher and classmates?”
They mostly ignored him and all glared at the teacher for a beat longer than necessary, but moved on. “Hello, Peter’s friends. We’re the Avengers, any questions?” Tony asked with a smirk. They were all kinda shook, especially after Peter’s comment, but he could see the moment they all were like aye, whatever it’s the Avengers.
Every hand went up and of course the first one was “so you really do know Peter??” and they’re all like yeah no shit sweety.
“Who are the teams?” Cindy asked excitedly.
Tony replied, “Today team Parker is Peter, Bucky, Rhodey, and myself and Team Romanoff is Natasha, Steve, Clint, and Sam. The only rules while picking teams is that only two of the nightmare quartet can be on the same team.”
“Whats the nightmare quartet??”
“Oh yeah. Thats Peter, Natasha, Bucky, and Clint. We tried that one time and between the four of them we had only landed five. That was a terrifying day and no one wants a repeat.” the ‘nightmare quartet’ shared proud smirks while the team looked absolutely gobsmacked because how was Peter fucking Parker on the same level as the other three?
Eventually the twenty minutes was almost up, and Peter dragged Natasha (did Peter just physically drag the Black Widow and not get killed???) over to MJ who put her camera down to blink in admiration. “Nat, this is MJ. She wrote that huge thing on her blog about you I showed you last week.” MJ looked at him with something weird and intense before looking back at Natasha.
“Oh yeah, that was really thoughtful and well-written. You should come by tonight for dinner for a proper interview if you're interested,” she offered and MJ tried not to show how much her heart was exploding.
“That would be really cool, thank you,” she answered calmly, but Peter could hear how fast her heart was beating.
“I’ll tell you the details later, MJ,” Peter said with a grin, then all the Avengers turned to each other with similar evil glints in their eyes.
“Bucky and Peter, I swear to god if you don't stop mercilessly attacking me I will make your life hell,” Sam said tiredly. Bucky and Peter grinned at each other and fistbumped while the class was mostly forgotten.
“Okay, a minute left. Same rules, no cheating. That means you Clint, no staying in the vents forever. We good?” Rhodey asked and they all gave their affirmative. “Alright, break!!” he announced and they all scattered, leaving the stunned kids behind them.
XXXXXXXXXX
It was quiet for a moment before the tour guide awkwardly moved things along, but the class was a little dazed for the rest of the tour.
Occasionally they would see various Avengers sneaking around or paint flying from one end of the hall to the other, but they couldn't see what they would be shooting at. Or in Bucky’s case, they wouldn't even be able to see where it was coming from before one hit Sam on his chest, looking even more exasperated.
While they were at lunch, they actually saw Peter dodge shots by doing a series of back handsprings and shot the person attempting to get him mid fucking flip without looking tired. And it actually worked, immediately followed by a “ow! come on, kid!” shout from Sam. They all sat stunned as Peter cackled and disappeared around the corner.
“Ummm, holy shit,” Abe commented weakly. They all very much agreed because Peter was supposed to be terrible in all things physical activity. They were pretty sure he even had asthma and were all around pretty positive he Wasn’t Able To Do Shit Like That. Ned and MJ seemed to be having an especially good time.
Towards the very end of their tour, a fairly loud alarm went off and they had about three seconds of panic before it turned off again and the tour guide winced and explained, “yeah, I’m pretty sure that's just the game over alarm so there is no reason to panic.”
In the lobby, the Avengers were there after their game, Bucky still paint-less, Natasha with one shot, Peter with two, Sam completely covered head to toe, and the rest of them pretty decently hit. They watched as Peter and Bucky did a long secret handshake that rivaled his and Ned’s while the rest of Team Parker celebrated. Peter saw his class about to leave and excused himself from the other Avengers, half jogging over to the group.
“Dude that was so awesome!!” Ned exclaimed with a huge grin that Peter returned. “You have to text me a full recap later!!”
After Peter promised Ned, he turned to MJ. “Come around tonight at six. It’s just a casual thing so don’t worry too much about it,” he said with a smile, unfortunately blushing a little.
She smiled back and nodded. “Thanks, Parker. I owe you one.” Yeah, Peter definitely had a crush.
Mr. Harrington awkwardly approached the teen, boy making eye contact. “I’m really sorry I didn’t believe you. No one will question the fact that you have an internship anymore.” It really did mean a lot to Peter that his teacher would apologize.
The rest of the class looked in awe and jealous, and Flash definitely looked angry. Whatever, Peter thought. He had a really good day, and even Flash’s death glares weren’t enough to ruin it. Mr. Harrington was definitely right. He didn’t have to worry about anyone doubting him anymore.