new developments and nuisances
“Ned, I’m sorry but I’m about to spill tea all over my work can you give me one second?” Peter didn’t wait for a reply as he removed the phone from his ear, careful not to upset the precarious balance he was attempting to maintain.
Peter was late for work and he was carrying far too many things. He was trying to balance his Starbucks tea (Peter didn’t do coffee, it made him jumpy – well, more than usual) and keys in one hand as his phone tried to slip from the grip that his other hand had around papers and files. He might be Spider-Man, but he still only had two hands to work with.
Peter had meant to get into Stark Industries at 8am and yet he was walking through the doors at 10:30, having slept in straight through his alarm. Not exactly normal for Peter, whose alarm sounded closer to a siren each morning. Most times he woke up with his Spidey senses tingling before it could even go off.
Peter stopped at the reception desks in the lobby and set down his precarious stack, so his hands were free to retrieve his key card. He rifled through his pocket and pulled out his old Platinum X card, attached to a worn Midtown High School lanyard. Peter put his files into his satchel and with that hand now free, he proceeded to talk to Ned again.
“I’m sorry, I just got to work, and it’s been a bit of a wild morning,” Peter apologised. “What was I saying?”
“Actually, I was saying,” Ned corrected him with a laugh from the end of the line, “I had an interesting call with MJ last night…”
“Ahh…” Peter said quietly, unable to help the small smile that broke out on his face.
“Dude,” Ned exclaimed, and Peter could picture his exasperated expression, “I can’t believe you told her. Isn’t that like a serious superhero no-no?”
“Well, I told you,” Peter replied stopping outside the SI lifts.
“Yeah, but I’m the guy in the chair, how would that work if I didn’t know?”
“She’d pretty much figured it out on her own anyway.”
“Sure, sure,” Ned said laughing on the other line, “look I need to go work on this paper, but I’ll talk to you later.”
“Yep,” Peter said smiling at the man who got into the lift after him and asked the elevator bot to take them to floor 8.
“And tell me if anything goes down at the reunion tonight,” Ned said sounding almost too eager.
“Do you really think I’d be able to get through this night without texting you the blow by blow of all the bull shit Flash is going to say?” Peter said more quietly, feeling a little self-conscious as they reached the eighth floor. The man stepped out and the silver doors slid closed behind him, leaving Peter to his phone call.
“Alright, I really gotta go, but send me those texts so I can be there virtually or whatever.”
“You got it,” Peter said and hung up.
“Good morning Peter, floor 27?” Friday said over the intercom.
“Hey Friday, 27 thanks,” Peter replied slipping his phone into the pocket of his jeans and withdrawing his Avengers clearance card case. As usual, he held the black box up to his face and tried not to blink as the retina scan was completed. The top of the box slid forward once his ID was accepted revealing the shiny card. He waved it in front of the scanner and felt the lift jolt slightly as it began to rise once more.
“Oh, straight to 27 please!” Peter said hurriedly. That was important, no sense in travelling up and down the building whilst he waited for the morning elevator rush to reside. Or worse yet, try to get to his lab with someone else in the elevator with him. That would be the stupidest way for someone to discover his identity, and Peter had already had a few close encounters of a similar kind.
Friday might have been able to override the in-built programming in the elevator that required Peter to scan his Avengers clearance card each time that he went to his lab, but he figured it was better safe than sorry. If anyone, even people he trusted, got into his lab everything would fall apart, each little part he had put into motion two months ago would crumble and he would be back where he started. He couldn’t let that happen.
Peter ran his thumb up and down the seam of the Starbucks cup, his expression thoughtful as he turned his mind back to yesterday and the lingering memory of Bruce’s words of warning.
Peter knew that Hank Pym had had issues in the past with people attempting to recreate his work, but having an actual contract with the Avengers? That was different. Though Peter was sure that his name wasn’t on the document, as he hadn’t signed anything recently, he couldn’t ignore the fact that what he was working on would come back to kick him in the ass if things went sideways. In fact, it was quite possible that it would come back to kick him in the ass regardless.
He continued to mull his potential ass-kicking as the lift arrived. When the doors opened, the lights in the corridor were flickering. Peter spoke his name to the door when it asked and patiently waited, sipping his tea as it processed the information and slid to the side to reveal his lab.
It was just as he had left it late on Wednesday night. He couldn’t ignore the fact that the lab was quickly becoming even more messy than his room at college, potentially more than his room back at May’s flat. Nevertheless, there was some method to his madness, order where no one else might see it. He set his tea down on the main bench along with the heavy satchel that he had brought with him.
Peter double tapped the ON button of his holo-table and watched as it glowed to life. Opening his tablet, he transferred a folder to the holo-table and began scrolling through the analytics.
“How is everything looking Karen?” Peter asked his AI, anxiously. “Did you run the new changes that I suggested?”
“I did,” Karen said, and the schematics were brought up on the holo-table, a bunch of lines connected and moving in the shape of a particle. Peter’s eyes flickered over it and he used a hand to narrow in on different parts, so much so that he almost missed the most important part of the diagram. The green lettering at the top of the file-like formatting that read ‘PROTOTYPE COMPLETE – SUCCESSFUL’.
“The new formula has proved successful so far, I believe it will hold up in testing.”
“Oh my god!” Peter said fist pumping the air. “Yes!”
They had done it. Peter had, against all odds, managed to recreate something that resembled Pym particles, he could only hope that their structure would hold up in testing.
“Shall I start producing a test serum?” Karen prompted and Peter struggled to answer for a moment or two.
“Um… yeah, definitely please,” Peter said, somewhat lost for words as he stood by the work bench in disbelief, letting the room fall to silence as Karen sent instructions to the small machine in the corner of the lab which burst to life and began to hum quietly as the tiny robots were put to work.
“This, changes everything.” He whispered, absentmindedly rubbing his chin.
Peter lost track of how long he was in the lab. His tea went cold as the sun tracked over the sky, getting closer and closer towards the horizon.
Over the past months Peter had been in close enough positions as he was now, but never had his particles made it past the prototype stage to begin testing. His past attempts had lacked the structure to last any longer than a few seconds when exposed to Earth’s space and time.
There was so much to do. He had not even entertained the fantasy of what might come next if he was successful. So, he started with the simplest question, how to create a suit to not only withstand the adapting of matter that would allow him to shrink, but also the harsh environment that came from going subatomic. Any data he had on going that small was left over predictions from Tony’s last project to go back in time and majority of that was theoretical with the occasional video of Scott, which wasn’t very conclusive either. Hearing Tony’s voice in the background of the recordings was more than difficult. But as much as his mentor’s voice hit close to his heart, he tried his best to hold hope that much closer.
He consulted videos and diagrams of the Ant-Man suit, though he was limited in this capacity to a few crude videos and the scan that his Iron Spider suit had taken at some point during the battle against Thanos’ forces. Trawling back through that data had not been fun. Peter had not enjoyed seeing how his vitals had fluctuated throughout that whole fight, how low his serotonin and dopamine had fallen towards the end before the data dropped off for a month during which he hadn’t touched the suit.
But now, things were different. This could be different. Afterall, Tony had done it for him and if Peter could somehow return the favour, if he could somehow fix the mess that had been left behind.
If these particles succeeded, going back through time and space, following the plans that Tony Stark had left on Peter’s hard drive, travelling far back, to a time where things were different. It would all be possible. Peter struggled to stop his mind jumping in every which way, where he would go, or rather when.
Peter tapped his electronic pen on the corner of his desk as he looked over the new suit he had assembled on his tablet screen. The tech would hopefully ensure his cells survived the shrinking process. Peter had even taken the time to retrieve several of the Cross files that Tony had somehow acquired, to see exactly where he might go wrong.
It wasn’t much, but it was enough. Besides, if Peter had managed to recreate a version of Pym particles the suit ought to be the easy part.
As Peter scanned his eyes over the suit’s design one final time, he caught sight of the digital time in the corner of the screen.
7:13pm
Peter swore. He was late.
Swivelling on his chair he leant over to grab his phone which was at the other end of the bench. It had gradually progressed down there throughout the afternoon as papers were shifted and discarded. Once he got it the screen lit up to display several messages from MJ and a missed call.
He swiped it open to quickly hurry out a response to the capitalised messages that MJ had sent in quick succession. Peter didn’t have time to hit send before MJ’s face appeared on the screen and he was forced to accept the call.
“Hi…” He said hesitantly, trying to use his sweetest voice.
“Where are you!” MJ exclaimed and Peter could hear talking in the background, but he couldn’t recognise any of the voices.
“I’m just on my way,” Peter lied.
MJ saw through it immediately, “you’re still at Stark Industries aren’t you!”
“Yep,” Peter said, “but I’m leaving now, and I’ll be there in like 10 minutes?”
“You’re ridiculous,” MJ grumbled on the other line. Peter smiled despite himself as he scrambled to put his shoes back on. “We’re all at the restaurant but I’ll save you a seat and make sure we don’t order without you.”
“You’re the best,” Peter said in earnest and MJ sighed a relenting ‘I know’ on the other end.
“I better see you soon,” she threatened and Peter, who had found himself in the hands of death on more than one occasion felt something closer to genuine fear. He hung up and resisted the urge to press his head against the cool metal of his bench top. A reunion was the last thing that he wanted to do tonight.
“Karen, I have to go but the suit is ready so can you send that through to get it started,” Peter said as he grabbed his wallet and Midtown lanyard and put them into the pocket of his coat. “I’ll probably be back later to check on everything.”
“Excellent,” Karen replied, “before you leave, I feel I need to tell you that I’ve had contact with Genevieve this afternoon. I would have told you earlier, but I didn’t want to disrupt your work.”
“Really?” Peter said surprised, tucking his coat over his arm. “Have there been any problems with her functioning.” He had been keeping an eye on the AI, if keeping an eye was glancing at her analytics last night before he went to bed and hardly making sense of the squiggly lines but deciding everything had to be fine because nothing was flashing red.
“Nothing like that, but it appears that she has utilised some of the data that George has been collecting, she sent us this.” With that Karen brought up a set of graphs on the holo-table and Peter drew closer, enlarging one with his hand.
“It would seem that she has been drawing information from all sorts of databases, not only has she included George’s media data but she’s collated statistics from the police, the courts and other facets. She’s noted significant discrepancies in recent weapons and munitions companies from several states and the arrival of several unregistered vehicles that have entered the city in recent weeks.” Peter watched, wide eyed, as security camera footage appeared on the holo-table, four separate cameras detailing four, separate grey trucks.
“What does she suspect… or suggest I guess,” Peter said, scratching the back of his neck, he couldn’t deny that the statistics he had been shown were unusual and kind of worrying. It was the sort of thing that would be overlooked by the state police until it was too late.
“In the interest of your wellbeing and safety, she believes it would be beneficial for you to be prepared for potential conflict in the lower Manhattan area, but she is struggling to narrow it down farther than that. After reviewing her data, I too believe it is a good idea.”
“That being said, it is not certain that such an event will occur tonight, but it looks likely to happen over the next week,” Karen said.
“Crap…” Peter muttered, he’d be gone by Monday and wouldn’t be around to help if there was some sort of terrorist attempt. “Has she told the Avengers any of this?”
“Not yet though I suspect her programming will require her to soon.”
“Alright,” Peter said coming to a decision quickly, perhaps too fast but he was feeling the pressure of wanting to make it to dinner on time. “I’ll take a suit out with me tonight, one of the Nano tech ones probably and then follow up with the team tomorrow morning, they’ll be able to send in help or at least keep an eye on things next week.”
“The Nano suits aren’t as strong as your other ones, Peter.”
“It’ll do for now, and if I need backup you can always send the drones,” he said walking to retrieve the suit from the numerous cases that he had lined up against the back wall of the lab. On the far left was a display case that was sat horizontal, rather than vertical.
Peter didn’t have to wait as Karen unlocked the top of the glass compartment, the door slid back with a slight hiss. Set atop polished silver stands were three mechanic spiders, about the size of Peter’s fist. Each one, when activated, used Nano technology to encase his body in a suit. They more or less functioned in the same way that the rest of his Spider-Man suits did, but despite the strength of the Nano tech he had found the suits deteriorated much faster under duress. He hadn’t recalled that being the case with Tony’s suits and Peter couldn’t figure out what he was doing wrong.
“The lab will remain online for the night, so I can keep preparing the test samples and in case you require assistance,” Karen said, and Peter thought he could hear worry in her voice.
“Thanks, Karen,” Peter said turning the spider over in his hands. He momentarily set his coat down on the bench as he reached behind his back to place the spider squarely between his shoulder blades. It clicked a little bit as it tried to find a comfortable space to hook into his clothing. Peter experimentally moved his shoulders up and down and when he was sure that it wouldn’t fall off, he shrugged his coat on over the top.
“I hope you have a nice night, Peter,” Karen said as he walked towards the door and the lights in the lab switched off, though his screens and the machines hard at work in the corner glowed blue as they continued their tasks diligently.
“Me too,” Peter said softly as the door to the lab closed behind him and he waited for the lift. He had begun getting jittery already, the nerves instilled by Genevieve’s data and Karen’s concerns humming in his brain. It would be alright, he told himself. He had to be on alert tonight, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy his night out with his old high school friends. Peter knew he had to have confidence in his own abilities and senses, and with Karen and the suit quite literally having his back, surely there was little to worry about.
Several subway stops and a ten minute walk left Peter standing on the footpath as he craned his head to get a good look past the glass doors of a very fancy restaurant. He glanced down at his phone and triple checked the address that Flash had sent them all. It was definitely the right place. Hesitantly, Peter slipped his phone into the inside pocket of his coat, he suddenly felt very underdressed.
It was the sight of MJ waiting behind the glass that made him feel somehow simultaneously at ease and dreadfully nervous.
“You,” MJ said punching Peter’s shoulder lightly as he walked in and out of the cold. “I can’t believe you’re so late!”
“Only half an hour,” Peter said rubbing his shoulder and letting his mouth droop at MJ’s coldness. “If anything, I’m fashionably late.”
“You’re actually terrible,” MJ said and finally relented, casting Peter a bright smile. “Come on, we’re ordering now.”
She grabbed Peter’s hand and guided him through the candle-lit tables. The lighting in general had a subdued feeling to it that was almost rustic but in a very luxurious way. Peter should have predicted this when Flash said that he’d made a reservation at a restaurant in Manhattan. As usual, Flash was apparently quick to take any opportunity to flaunt his money at them. They were all supposed to be broke university students so what on earth had made him think they could afford to eat at a restaurant that had 4 dollar signs next to its reviews on Yelp.
While everyone else in the restaurant was sat at tables of two, with a few threes and fours mixed in, Flash had gotten them a table that sat fifteen. It wasn’t the entire cohort of ’23 (what should have been the class of ’18 for most of them) but it was most of the people that Peter had spent his high school years at Midtown with.
“Parker, you finally showed up!” Flash said standing up as Peter arrived.
“No need to stand Flash, he’s not the queen,” Betty said snidely, and Peter cringed. It seemed Flash had already managed to put some of his ex-classmates in a bad mood.
Flash scowled at her comment and returned to his seat but continued to talk as MJ took Peter to a seat near her, thankfully as far away from Flash as could be. “Now that everyone is here, I just wanted to let you know that this restaurant comes under my father’s hotel chain, so you don’t have to worry about paying because it’s all on the house.”
From the excited murmurs and thanks, it had been the right thing to say and the mood around the table shifted. A meal for free, at an expensive restaurant like this? Peter was unlikely to get the opportunity twice. Besides he was with his sort-of-probably girlfriend so he might as well seize the opportunity and enjoy it.
Slowly the prospect of the supposed terror threat that had hung dauntingly at the back of his mind and between his shoulders began to seem less important.