ice creams and AIs
Peter didn’t want to go back inside. He didn’t even want to be at the compound anymore.
It was becoming more and more clear how the team saw him. He wasn’t a part of it at all – heck, he hadn’t even been an Avenger until a few months ago after his hurried initiation pre-battle. Not to mention, the fact that he was still in collegewhile the others had years of experience and training under their belts.
It was evident that they simply saw him as something Tony had left behind, yet another creation to help in their battle against evil. It just so happened, that Peter was quite adept at the tech side of things, which was in hot demand now that Tony wasn’t around.
In some ways, Peter felt like he had become just another piece of AI that Tony had gifted the Avengers. How was he any better than the tech that he was intending to upload later that afternoon?
Peter’s eyes were closed, and he started when he heard the hiss of the glass door opening down the path – indicating that someone was about to join him in the garden. Peter was expecting May, dreading Pepper and hopeful that it might be Happy, but he sat a little straighter when he saw that it was Carol Danvers.
Peter said nothing as he watched Carol walk over to him. It was strange seeing her like this. Peter wasn’t sure he had seen her in casual clothes before – the sleek black pants and the smart woollen sweater she wore seemed almost alien right now. Which was ironic, Peter supposed, considering Carol technically wasa little bit alien.
“May I sit?” Carol asked once she reached Peter.
He said nothing, but shifted to the other end of the bench to allow some space for her. Carol sat slowly, her eyes on the stream and the surrounding garden.
“I’ve been reading the news,” Carol said quietly, turning slightly to face Peter more. He kept his eyes on the bark of a tree about two meters from them, watching a colony of ants crawl up it. His mind flit briefly to Scott, thinking of how he was spending his Thanksgiving with his family. “A lot of things are being said about you.”
“I know.” Peter replied. He leaned down to pick up a handful of pebbles from the gravel path and began turning them over in his hands. He started to flick them into the stream, savouring the satisfying plop as they broke the water’s surface tension.
“The press is under the impression that you’re the next Tony Stark. There are even rumours that you’re going to take over Stark Industries.”
“Those are lies,” Peter spat, scowling as he threw another pebble into the stream. He was surprised at the venom with which he said it.
“I know.” Carol said softly – assuringly. “Everyone else in there knows, too. They don’t mean to be insensitive.”
“I know.” Peter conceded. “I’m not angry at them for wanting me to do my job.” He truly wasn’t.
“Then why areyou angry?”
“I’m not,” Peter insisted stubbornly. It was a lie.
When they look at me, they don’t see me. They see him.
Everywhere I go, everything I see, is all him. So why isn't he here anymore?
“Peter—” Carol was cut off by the sound of the door opening once more.
Morgan’s head peeked out the door and her face broke into an impish grin when she caught sight of Peter. Morgan’s eyes shifted to Carol and Peter got the weird feeling that she was reading the situation, as though she understood that perhaps their conversation was too serious to interrupt. She was incredibly socially aware for someone so young. To ease her mind, Peter flashed her a small smile – it was all he could really manage in the moment.
“Petey,” Morgan called, skipping down the path and up to the two of them, “Mommy said to come save you.”
“From what?” Peter asked, smiling as Morgan perched herself between himself and Carol.
Morgan glanced mischievously at Carol and then smiled at Peter, as though they were sharing a secret. Carol laughed warmly.
“What have you got there?” she asked, giving Morgan a look that made the young girl clap a hand over her mouth – as though she were afraid the secret was going to spill out if she didn’t.
“Nothing,” Morgan said, clearly hiding something behind her back with one hand.
“Hmm…I think you’re fibbing.” Carol said looking at Morgan with a quizzical brow. Morgan just shut her mouth firmly and tilted her head as if to say ‘really?’.If Peter had to guess, he’d say she had acquired that particular mannerism from her mother.
“Then what’s this?” Peter said, managing to pull the crinkly ice cream from Morgan’s tiny hand.
“Heyyyy!” She complained, looking up at Peter. “That’s for me!”
“Oh really.” Peter mocked, opening it for her.
“Thank you.” Morgan said politely, taking the red ice cream from him. It was one of those ones for two people, with two sticks that you could split down the middle. She pulled it apart with a little difficultly and offered one half to Peter. He wasn’t really in the mood for ice cream, but he took it anyway with an over the top gasp of welcome surprise.
“No ice cream for me?” Carol asked sorrowfully.
“Sorry.” Morgan said shyly, swinging her legs contently beneath her.
Carol gave an exaggerated sigh.
“Here, you can have some.” Morgan said and promptly thrust the ice cream in Carol’s face.
Carol spluttered as the ice cream bumped off her nose, leaving her with a red smear across her cheek. Morgan clapped a hand over her mouth as she laughed. Peter couldn’t help feeling a little astounded at the fact that the almost six-year-old had just smeared ice cream over the face of the most powerful being on earth.
“Sorry…” she said in-between her laughter.
“Oh, I am so going to get you back for that, little missy,” Carol said smiling and going in to take a bite from Morgan’s ice cream – she did it slow enough that the little girl could see what was happening and had time to launch herself from the bench to scurry off into the garden.
“You can’t have my ice cream!” Morgan called back.
“Oh, we’ll see about that!” Carol cried. She jumped up from the bench and followed Morgan around the garden in a game of tag.
Peter grinned at the interaction and briefly wondered when Carol had gotten so good at interacting with children.
Once he had finished his ice cream Peter stood up and stretched, reaching his hands above his head and sighing. Distraction was wonderful, if he could just stay distracted for long enough then he could reallyconvince himself that everything was entirely, completely and utterly fine.
The sun was beginning to set, casting Peter’s bedroom in a soft amber glow.
He swivelled the comfortable desk chair back and forth as he typed commands into the Compound’s security system, updating software and preparing it for the arrival of its new artificial intelligence programme.
His eyes were flicking between the two desktop computer screens sat before him and his fingers flew across the keys as quickly as he could without making a mistake – Ned was much better at touch typing than Peter was.
Peter paused momentarily to snag a Dorito from the bowl sitting beside him, and he brushed his cheesy fingers off on his jeans before continuing with the code. He was in his element; this was where Peter liked to be.
“Alright, Karen,” Peter said. “Is everything ready to go?”
“Everything appears stable,” Karen replied from his phone – which was sat propped against one of the screens. Peter had considered just adding her to the compound system for as long as he needed, but given that they were uploading new intelligence, he didn’t want to risk anything going wrong.
“Awesome,” Peter said swivelling in his chair as he backed away from his desk and turning to another table across from it, on top of which sat his duffle bag. Peter rifled around in it until he finally found what he was looking for.
“Here we go," Peter said holding up the blue data base drive, "Genevieve, welcome to the Avengers Compound.”
It was the motion of holding the drive before his eyes that made him catch sight of the room before him and actually trulysee it. He saw the light and the beauty of the sun’s rays from the view out the wall of windows to his right. How had he not noticed the sun setting? The windows should have made it almost impossible not to notice the burning light cast as dusk descended. After all, they were one of Peter’s favourite features of his room at the Compound and, perhaps, the only thing he actually liked about the room regardless of its comfortable bed and impressive lab space.
Back when Bruce had been getting everyone to choose their rooms, Peter had been indifferent. He wasn’t a permanent resident at the compound and, while he liked the rooms with the large windows and open space, it wasn’t really a big concern. At the time, he had been far more preoccupied with trying to develop the team’s security system to a standard that could be approved by the critical eye of Nick Fury.
In the end – though there had been a few arguments and a couple of vicious rounds of rock, paper, scissors – everything had worked out well. Sam, Bucky, Bruce and Rhodey were all on the ground floor while Wanda, Vision and Carol had taken rooms on the fourth floor. There were several other bedrooms on the top and middle floors for the rest of the team if they needed a place to stay, but people like Scott and Clint preferred to stay permanently with their respective families unless they were on duty. Nick Fury had insisted on having a separatebuilding altogether, and he had taken up residence in a small annex near the hangar. He claimed that he could barely stand being in the same room with any of them for more than 10 minutes, and that living with them would probably result in someone’s untimely death.
Peter had been left with the last room, which he had been shown to the first time he had stayed at the new compound the week after it had been completed. The rest of the team were out on missions and it was Bruce who directed Peter to his new quarters. The room that Peter was currently standing in was, geographically, in the exact same spot that Tony had stayed in at the compound when he worked and lived there. In fact, the set up was almost identical from what Peter remembered of the old compound. Big lab space, double bed, large desk. One of the first things Peter had done was push the bed to the window so that he could see the sky outside at night after the sun had gone down.
Firstly, before accepting the room, Peter had called Pepper and explained to her that there must have been some sort of mix up. He couldn’t have Tony’s old quarters. If anyone should have it, Pepper should. But she had insisted that she had no use for the room, and given it was a decent sized room with a generous lab space it made perfect sense for Peter to be the one to take it.
Apparently, no one else in the team had been willing to take over a space which had once been Tony’s.
‘We figured you’d be more at home here than any of us’, Bruce had said as he showed Peter around.
Peter had no idea what exactly about the last six months had given anyonethat idea, but he had shut his mouth, clenched his jaw and stuck it out. It was just a room – four walls and a roof. All Peter needed to do was just keep his eyes down and work or shut them as he went to sleep, and the memories would stay away.
“Peter?” Karen prompted from his phone back on the desk. Peter realised he had completely zoned out.
“Yep, sorry,” Peter apologised, tapping the memory drive against his palm and heading back over to the desk to sit down.
“Here we go,” he said sliding the drive into its place, smiling as the screen in front of him shifted to show a loading bar.
“Approximately two minutes remaining,” Karen informed him.
“I can’t believe things still need the time to load,” Peter said in exasperation, launching himself to his feet once more to pace about the room. “Karen, can you play Plansby Birds of Tokyo?”
“Of course.”
The chorus melody for the song had been stuck in his head all day and he figured the only way to get it out of the loop running ‘round his brain was to listen to the song out loud.
Peter tapped his foot as it began, not surprised when sound burst from the Bluetooth speakers embedded in the ceiling above his head. The compound was practical, but that wasn't to say it didn’t maintain a certain level of luxury that Tony would’ve been proud of. Peter mimed the beat of the drum as he paced back and forth before the window, looking out to the sky outside. Above the compound, it had faded to a darker blue as the sun crested the horizon and sent the world into twilight. Peter tried not to remember the last time he’d watched the sun set from the compound before the Snap, but the memory was eating at the back of his mind, at the wall he propped up between him now, and everything that had happened before.
He could feel he memory tugging at those bricks, sending them down one by one until the whole structure trembled in his mind.
Instead, he concentrated on the music playing over the speakers, trying to focus on picking apart the layers of song – listening to the lyrics, then the guitar, then the electronic synths in the background. Perhaps it wasn’t the most musically advanced song (though he wasn’t exactly an expert), but it was enough to ground him in the moment and ward his memories off.
“Ten seconds,” Karen updated, and Peter strode back over to the desk as the green loading bar reached completion.
“Ok,” Peter said, cracking his fingers in anticipation and watching as Genevieve’s programme was brought up on the screen.
“Everything is looking good; she’s assimilating smoothly into the system,” Peter said, nodding. He scrolled through the data as the AI absorbed all the information and adapted her systems to spread throughout the compound. “Hello, Genevieve?”
Peter waited a few beats for the new AI’s answer. “Hello. I am Gen,” the distinctly female, English, voice paused. “May I ask why I have been uploaded to… The Avengers Compound.”
“Hello Gen, this is Peter Parker.” Peter said into the receiver of his computer as he watched the data shifting while Genevieve’s artificial brain processed the new information.
“Peter Parker, Spider-Man, currently enrolled at MIT. Tony Stark told me of you,” Gen said and Peter frowned. It was natural for her to be able to access his data via the ethernet, but adding that he was Spider-Man and ‘Tony had talked of him?’ – perhaps not entirely impossible, but he could barely understand the full extent of her capabilities himself.
“What do you mean Tony told you about me?” Peter asked.
“Mr Stark informed me of a lot before he passed,” Genevieve said. “I am built on the models of FRIDAY and JARVIS. I can do everything they could, but Mr Stark said my closest model resemblance was to the artificial intelligence in charge of Spider-Man’s wellbeing and safety.”
“Karen?” Peter said growing slightly nervous. Perhaps it would have been a good idea to see how Genevieve interacted on a smaller scale before giving her access to the Compound. His eyes flicked to the blue data disc, aware that pulling it out would shut everything down if he needed to.
“I am more than just a bot, Peter,” she said calmly. “Karen and I are far more in tune to human nature than you might think.”
“She is right,” Karen said. “She is far more advanced than we imagined.”
“My sole purpose is to aid the Avengers,” Gen said, pulling up strings and strings of code which Peter struggled to comprehend but recognised as the base work for the computers mind. “I have access to the memories of Tony Stark and can make informed decision based off of those, but I answer only to the Avengers and Peter Parker.”
“Wow,” Peter breathed, leaning back in his seat.
“Your surprise flatters me but if you would excuse me, I will go and introduce myself to the rest of the residents,” Gen said and fell silent.
“Well…” Peter said blinking rapidly. “That was really strange.”
“She is beyond what we anticipated,” Karen said quietly, and Peter sensed that his companion was concerned.
“Is there anything else that we know about her? Anything we should be concerned about?” Peter asked. All that he had found about Genevieve was a perfected programme for a new bot called Gen (which Peter had elongated into the full name). According to the notes Tony had left in her file, she was ‘everything the Avenger’s will need’.
“Nothing that she hasn’t already told us,” Karen replied automatically sifting through the information in Genevieve’s file from the Stark drive that Tony had left Peter, “She is equipped not only to handle all the security and organisational needs of the Compound but it seems she is also quite advanced in managing the team members safety… mentally.” Karen said the last word after a beat.
“Crazy…” Peter muttered. “But it seems like everything is settling in well, and if she can do that good of a job at keeping everyone under control then it will probably take some of the weight off Carol and Fury.”
“That is true,” Karen said somewhat absentmindedly, and Peter figured that she was still analysing Gen’s code.
“Peter?” A voice came from the hallway outside the bedroom and Peter’s eyes darted up.
“In here,” he called back and began shutting down the programmes that were open on the computer. His tablet was connected to the same network as the compound so if anything did go wrong, he would hopefully be able to fix things remotely.
“How’s everything going? I just had a kind of weird conversation with the new AI. She calls herself Gen?” Bruce Banner said as he ambled casually in through the door and over to where Peter was sitting.
“Yeah she’s a little different – a lot more advanced in terms of EQ than you’d usually see, so it will be interesting to see how this goes.” Peter said, switching the display screens off and zipping up his duffle bag. “But you know where the kill switch is for the power so if anything goes wrong…” he trailed off and mimed pressing a button.
“Yeah, I’d like to hope that this isn’t going to be like Ultron, and I trust Tony’s work but something about her seems so different from Friday…”
“She’s actually kind of like Karen,” Peter said, shouldering the duffle bag.
“Huh...” Bruce murmured, scratching his right arm absentmindedly, as though twinges of the pain inflicted all those months ago still remained despite the surface having mostly healed.
“Anything that I can do before I go?” Peter asked, trying to keep the apprehension from his voice. He really wanted to just leave now. He’d done what he had meant to by showing his face at the lunch, uploading the new AI, and fixing up the malfunctions to the doors and Sam’s new suit. To be honest, he was just ready for a good night’s sleep.
“Actually, there was something that I wanted to talk to you about. You remember the conversation we had a few weeks ago at Stark Industries?” Bruce asked, standing a little straighter. It was a bit of an unnecessary shift, Peter thought, considering Bruce already towered over him.
“Which one…” Peter wondered, wracking his brains. He’d talked a lot with Bruce while they were working on the new compound and after as the security systems were put in place. Peter began walking slowly to the door and Bruce followed.
“It’s about the conversation we had about Pym particles,” Bruce reminded, his voice lowering.
Every bone in Peter’s body seized up, but he made his best attempt to make his pause natural as he stopped before the door to the room and took a quiet, but shaky breath.
“What about it?” Peter asked. “I was pretty certain that that conversation was firmly finished.”
“I just wanted to check in. Happy’s told me that you’ve been ordering some pretty top-class parts recently.”
Peter groaned internally and cursed himself for purchasing things through Stark Industries. He’d prayed that Happy would just turn a blind eye to the sheer costof the pieces that Peter was ordering, but it seemed he was far too smart for that. Honestly, what had Peter expected from the head of Stark Industry's security?
“It’s just stuff for the Stark Expo project and other small things that I’m doing for SI,” Peter said, forcing the lie out.
“Ok, because you know what I said last time,” Bruce reminded, “Time travel is risky business, and I made a—”
“A promise to one of Doctor Strange’s friends in 2012, yeah, yeah I know,” Peter said, finishing Bruce’s sentence and flashing him a confident smile. “Don’t worry, I moved on pretty quickly from that idea, and I’ve just had to accept that some things can’t change.”
A bitter lie, but nothing that would be too damaging.
“Ok, but I want you to know that the Avengers recently signed a contract with Hank Pym forbidding any of us from even trying to replicate his formula – let alone using the particles for time travel purposes.” Bruce said sternly. Peter looked at the floor hating that he had to keep lying.
One word flashed around his head,
Chronos
“Don’t worry, really.” Peter smiled, eyes rising to meet Bruce’s. “I’ve totally moved on, and I want to work towards using my ideas to help other people move forward too and not stay stuck in the past.”
Liar.He hated how easily it came out of him.
“Ok,” Bruce said returning Peter’s smile and clapping him on the shoulder as they left the room, Peter shutting the door behind them. “That’s good, I just wanted to check in, but you know I trust you.”
“Thanks,” Peter replied, the word tasted like sawdust on his tongue.
“You looking after yourself? College can be a pretty big change,” Bruce said as they followed the corridor down to the staircase.
“Sure am,” Peter said, grinning and straightening the duffle bag on his shoulder. He was glad for a change of topic. “It’s pretty awesome and I feel like the stuff I’m learning might actually be able to do good at some point.”
“I’m sure it will!” Bruce said enthusiastically. “It’s always good when you actually enjoy what you’re studying, plus you can apply it to your work which is pretty great.”
As they reached the staircase they were joined by Wanda.
“Are you leaving so soon?” She said catching sight of Peter’s bag and the tablet in his hands.
“Yeah, there’s quite a few things that I need to take care of back in the city,” Peter replied, feeling a twinge of genuine disappointment. Out here at the compound he could almost forget the other 70% of his commitments, but he knew that hiding from the world wouldn’t make them go away. He’d tried that back in May and it hadn’t gotten him anywhere.
“Of course,” Wanda said, smiling. “I hope everything goes well with the Stark Expo, but don’t stretch yourself too thin, there’s only so much one person can do – even if that person is a seventeen-year-old with crazy insect genes.”
Peter laughed; Wanda enjoyed mistaking his age it seemed. She liked to pretend she was a lot older and more mature, even though Peter was sure the gap couldn’t be more than five years. “Eighteen actually but thank you, I’ll try my best.”
At the foyer Peter found majority of the rest of the team waiting to see him off. Happy and May were waiting by the door to go out to the car, bags of Tupperware containers, no doubt holding leftovers, sitting on the floor beside them.
“Everything done then?” Happy asked, and Peter nodded the affirmative.
“It was good to see you again Peter. Stay in touch and make sure you come visit next time you’re in the city,” Carol said from where she stood at the top of the stairs that lead left into the kitchen.
Peter smiled. “I will.” He could sense the undertones of what she meant in her phrasing and was reminded of their conversation from earlier. He had a feeling that it wasn’t quite finished yet.
A lot of things are being said about you.
Whyare you angry?
It appeared that Pepper and Morgan had already gone home during the hours he had spent tinkering around the compound, though Peter was sure he would see them some other time over the weekend. He was sad to have not been able to see Morgan off, but, on the other hand, it was probably good that they had left early because it meant that Peter could avoid any further questions from Pepper about the Expo.
Peter smiled at the people around him, but something about it felt forced. This wasn’t right, there were too many people missing. It must have looked a little like that too because as Peter was about to follow Happy and May out the door, Bruce caught his shoulder in a tight grip. Peter turned around, all his instincts telling him to step back when he saw the intense look in Bruce’s eyes. He looked like he was about to say something stern but then he sighed and his gaze softened.
“Just remember to keep living in the present kid. College should be one of the best experiences of your life, and it doesn’t do well to think about things that can’t be changed…”
Peter smiled nonchalantly, pretending he didn’t understand exactly what exactly Bruce was implying. So instead he just nodded, giving one last wave to the people waiting in the foyer before darting out the door to the buzzing engine of the waiting sedan.
Some things can’t be changed…. Peter mulled the thought over in his head as he opened the car door and jumped into the back seat.
Peter had a never-ending amount of respect for Bruce Banner, but he just couldn’t bring himself to agree with that statement, not when he was getting so close…
Not when time travel was possible.