Borderline

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"Are you sure this is a good idea? Tony is not really taking this well and with everything that has been going on, I don't think it's time for them to meet again." Bruce sent a glance at Rhodey.

"They saw each other three days ago, Bruce." The man rolled his eyes.

"Yes, and you know what happened three days ago, Tony almost destroyed an entire lab and Peter barely blinked during the whole incident, something disturbing to see, to be honest." He ran his hands nervously down his arms, it had really been scary.

Rhodey nodded slightly. He understood. But they had created the program and there was an emergency. There were so many things happening that he didn't have time to assimilate any of them. A week ago they had recovered everything and had to stay afloat to preserve that.

"You are not sorry?" Bruce asked in a low voice. Dejected. Rhodey understood immediately what he was referring to. It was something that was weighing on everyone but nobody dared to see at the moment. Something that everyone would regret until the day of their deaths. Of this he was sure.

"He lost that, he lost what made him human, I don't understand how-"

"It's not your business to worry about that now, Bruce, focus on what you came to do because-"

"His emotions, Rhodey, he lost his emotions." Bruce stopped to stand in front of the man, "He's 17 and lost his emotions."

Rhodey knew that. He knew it better than anyone. He had seen his best friend lock himself in his lab and go out almost eight hours later drunk and almost unconscious. The violent way in which Tony had assimilated everything and had been trying to assimilate was brutal. Something he thought he would never see. His best friend was losing his mind. And he knew that was going to happen sooner or later but he really wanted him to keep his head for longer.

On the other hand, Rhodey felt terrible. Peter was family. Peter was a kid. Peter had a future in front of him. Peter had everything before and now he lacked much more than just a family. He lacked emotions. They had taken away something essential. Something important, if not the most important part of him.

"I know." He answered tiredly. He was so tired he could feel buzzing in his ears, his body screaming for him to take a break, but he couldn't. There were millions of things to fix because the world was adapting, it was fixing stuff and he was responsible for fixing many of the things inside the world, "Keep your head afloat and maybe in a week we can go to a bar and lose head over this but now is not the time.”

Bruce felt the man squeeze his arm, trying to make him understand. He nodded somewhat defeated. Rhodey was right. They could lose their heads later, it was time to keep it in control.

"Just tell me if I need to call Pepper, okay?"

"I don't think it will be necessary." Bruce sent him a smile to then enter the laboratory and assess the situation.

Jane Foster was sitting in one of the chairs in front of the smart table, showing all kinds of data about the small device found days ago. Helen Cho was writing things on a tablet while the Princess of Wakanda analyzed patterns on one of the monitors. Hank Pym was chatting with a Peter Parker deficient of emotion. Tony Stark sitting on one of the sofas of the place with glasses glued to his eyes, not showing any signs of being listening. The man had his eyes glued to the boy.

Bruce sighed. So these were their lives now...

"Hey, Bruce! Come on, we are analyzing some energy patterns that could be detected a few days ago and we wanted to know your opinion" Jane greeted the man giving him a little nervous smile. Huh, weird.

"Yes, please..." Hank murmured. Bruce frowned. He walked to the monitors and began to analyze the information in front of him.

"Be careful, Peter can take the emotion away from that too." Oh, so that's why the people were tense and nervous. Tony was not going to stop with the comments. He had been doing that for a while. He couldn't blame him. Tony was devastated. There was no other way to describe it. His friend was destroyed inside and out, the man had not only seen his surrogate son die in front of him, but he had been mourning the same boy for five years and when he had finally had him back, it was no longer the same kid from before because of what had happened.

Peter only raised an eyebrow.

"Don't worry Tony, that will not happen." Bruce sent him a small smile.

"What do you think, Dr. Banner?" Shuri questioned from her place, the girl seemed genuinely interested in some holograms for some reason.

"I think I've seen this a few days ago. Not new information about the device?"

"Until now this is the only thing that has been detected, it's as if we all received the same information but from different directions, it's strange but in its entirety, it's really the same data," Helen explained walking towards the man showing him some recognizable information from the tablet.

"Where's Strange, Erik, Hope and Scott?" He questioned by observing the laboratory in search of the other members.

"Strange is dealing with his own magical problems, Erik is out of the country, Hope and Scott are suspiciously "busy" at the same time," Hank replied, grimacing in disgust at the last part.

"I'm sure there's a reason why both have missed such an important meeting, Dr. Henry." Cho smiled watching the man roll his eyes in exasperation.

"I doubt it."

"Ok, then we would be analyzing the same data over and over again or anyone has a plan to proceed?" Bruce questioned as he pulled his glasses out of his lab coat.

"Yes, Stark brought something interesting." Jane directed her gaze towards the man resting in silence.

When the man showed no signs of movement Bruce called, "Tony."

"What?"

"Tony."

"Fine." The man slowly got up from the couch he was on to take his phone out of his pocket and project a hologram presenting a small mark of a pavement of some street in New York.

"What is that?"

"It's the exact place where the device fell," Hank replied.

"It fell?"

Shuri nodded, "Yes, it fell. Apparently, the device was thrown from a greater distance than we're used to seeing."

Bruce understood immediately, "Has anyone called Carol?"

"I already did it, she's going to be able to come in two days, busy repairing alien pavements," Tony replied flippantly. The man was trying to be subtle but the way he couldn't stop looking at Peter from time to time revealed how much it affected him to be in the boy's presence.

"Ok but that doesn't tell me anything, it only confirms the location of the device, something we already knew but didn't have proof."

"Except that's not the only thing, Dr. Banner." Shuri interrupted. The girl pressed a key on one of the keyboards of the monitors and a recording that he recognized very well began to play.

"He is not the only one capable of doing this, he is not the only damn demented person in the galaxy, there are monsters like him, with his size, bigger, smaller but they have the power to do things like this ..." Listening to Nebula speak after a long week of keeping those thoughts away from their consciousness was something they all regretted.

"So this is about the other alien that Nebula told us ... Galactan, Gactus?"

"Galactus." Helen corrected him, "This device may belong to one of the creatures that tried to cure the entropic radiations that wreaked havoc with the alien population that Nebula mentioned."

Bruce felt the pressure on his shoulders begin to squeeze. This could be serious.

"We are not sure, but neither should we leave the possibility aside." Peter, for the first time since Bruce had entered the lab, spoke. He had forgotten the boy's change, before, the kid hadn't stopped talking, chattering about each possibility in the world. Now? The kid barely speaks.

"We need to be sure then," Shuri replied.

"How will we do that?"

"Shuri suggested continuing the research by doing a small separate program to detect the frequencies by which the particles are formed inside the apparatus and how their cure works. If we do this, we may find something to help us locate its origin but really, we should wait for Carol to communicate with us and provide us with better information." Jane shared her opinion. She really didn't want to oppose the Wakandan Princess but she felt it was wiser to wait.

"I think it would be essential to wait." Bruce shared the opinion.

"Why would it be essential, exactly?" Tony watched Bruce.

"Because we could face something we're not ready to see, Tony." The man emphasized the last part.

"I think it would be good to wait," Hank commented as he ran a hand through his hair. Everyone was tired. It was noticeable.

"What do you think, Peter?" Jane glanced at the boy who had been somewhat silent.

Peter lifted his gaze from the smart table and shrugged, "I don't see why we shouldn't continue."

"See? Even the robot shares my opinion." Shuri joked.

"Stop calling him "robot", Shuri," Hank reprimanded slightly as he glanced nervously at Stark.

"Oh, come on, have a sense of humor, you old people, Peter doesn't mind."

"That's because I don't care." The boy commented, "And I really think we should be working instead of wasting time with nonsense like this. Doubting is simply delaying us."

The boy's dry way of speaking surprised everyone. Of course, the boy had introduced his new colorless personality to everyone a week ago but they hadn't really heard him speak so much as to process his new change. They had an incident three days ago that hadn't ended so well but every time the boy introduced new parts of him, with his new life without emotion, they couldn't help but be more surprised about it. The boy even felt fake to them.

"You see, he doesn't care, then we should go on." The girl from Wakanda smiled and started walking towards the monitors to start working.

"Kids, please, I understand that you want to continue but it wouldn't be better if-" Hank started to be abruptly interrupted.

"If you're not interested in going on, you can go and lazy around elsewhere," Peter responded by directly observing Dr. Pym.

Everyone remained silent. It really was difficult to adapt to the new personality of the boy. Bruce risked a look at Tony.

Tony kept looking at him as if he had lost his mind. He couldn't help it. It just didn't fit. He felt his blood boil as the minutes passed, he was sure he was going to choke for all the times he tried to keep the vomit in his mouth. His breathing came out in small gasps and he could feel the discreet glances of the other members of the laboratory. Perfect. A discreet panic attack is exactly what he needed right now.

Forget about him.

Who the hell was this stranger?

His heart was going to shatter. This was different. This wasn't Afghanistan, definitely not a kidnapping by terrorists, not an alien invasion, not Thanos, not seeing him die. This was torture. The greatest torture of his life. This was definitely going to kill him.

Or maybe he was going to kill himself first, who knows these days.

Of all the things that could have happened, this was the biggest and the stupidest. Nothing made sense. His hands were shaking uncontrollably, rage and dejection were taking hold of him slowly, climbing his body and crawling through his veins.

"Eh ... Is he okay?" His voice. God, his voice. So subdued and monotonous. It was like he was stabbing him.

"Y-yes, Peter, I think he just needs a few minutes ..." Bruce nervously alternated his gaze between his friend and the skinny boy standing next to him. The atmosphere of the room began to feel heavier as the minutes passed. He knew it was not a good idea but Rhodey had insisted.

Helen watched discreetly with analytical eyes. She knew that intervening would simply cause more problems so she was going to stay on the sidelines ... but watching didn't hurt anyone.

"I think we should do more tests before we reach a concrete conclusion." Jane interrupted the awkward silence by placing the device on the table in front of them.

"I agree, I think we're rushing too much." Hank shared the idea, he was also anxious to get out of the situation, and he also didn't want to deal with the whole thing at once, God knows all the times his daughter warned him about his little habit of doing stuff impulsively.

"Doing more tests would simply cause the investigation to be more extensive, we can't afford to put doubt on this, not when the world was already in ruins thanks to something of this kind." Shuri refuted. She knew more than anyone that opening the doors to a world where monsters could exist was not a good idea, and if those monsters left their toys on the ground, it was better to return them or get rid of them as soon as possible.

She looked at Peter and tried to get his attention by observing him intensely. She needed her friend to be on her side in this, even if the boy she once knew was different, she was sure part of him still existed inside him.

Peter raised an eyebrow, "I already said that I agree to continue with the next phase, I don't understand what the problem is."

"Kids, you are not thinking methodically, I get it you are scared, we understand, but this really could turn out badly for us if we proceed in an inadequate way." Bruce tried to reason with them while he still kept his eyes on his friend. Tony was really tense and stiff, that was a bad sign.

"I understand your point of view, Dr. Banner but this is not really an experiment, this has happened before and if we neglect ourselves as we did before, this could end up in something much worse. Measures are required immediately." The princess of Wakanda was not ready to give in and this could be noticed in her instance. If she had to call for reinforcements, she was going to do it.

"It doesn't hurt to continue investigating but it is not appropriate to leave aside something that could be solved with time to spare," Cho commented calmly. She trusted that Banner had good judgment when it came to sensitive matters like this but she was sure that the Head of the Science and Information Exchange of the building was right in every way.

"Is this really the time to do this? We're tired, it's only been a week since that purple bastard died, people are still adapting to the changes and under no circumstances-" Hank raised his index finger towards Stark, "Think I will forget that I was fooled in the past so Howard's experiment could steal my particles. Captain of America or not, he had no right to do that."

Jane rolled her eyes, "Those particles helped save the universe, you can't be mad for that, I was assaulted by a raccoon, all right? We all made our little sacrifice."

Oops.

Wrong thing to say.

The atmosphere tensed again.

Shuri and Bruce sent Jane a look, she shrugged a little ashamed.

"A raccoon is nothing, I've been working on those particles for years, and what is it-" Pym stopped as he watched everyone's eyes, "Stark, calm down."

Bruce looked at Tony just to watch him start walking backward while nodding annoyed. Ok, He was upset then.

"It's a comment, nothing else, you can't get mad about that." Peter watched his mentor with raised eyebrows.

Tony huffed indignantly.

"Angry? Why would I be angry, uh? And more importantly, do you actually care?" Helen started to slowly get up from her seat, sensing a fight coming. The others tensed and watched the genius with caution.

Peter shook his head as he let out a small smile, "You're always looking for a fight, aren't you?

"Never with you but now it seems that you need it." Tony refuted immediately. No. This was not right and he was tired of everyone pretending that it was.

"Don't do this right now, we're in the middle of an investigation and-" Peter’s face fell when he noticed that Mr. Stark started to move toward him. The boy decided not to move from his position. He knew Tony was never going to hurt him and the fact that no one else was intervening indicated that they knew that too.

Tony walked up to Peter facing him and only stopping only a few inches from his face, his voice soft but lethal, "I don't give a fuck about the stupid investigation, I don't care that if the idiot alien comes to earth and swallows us with his imbecile mouth or that Thanos himself returns in all his moronic glory, you understand? I'm not going to fake modesty when you're like that."

Peter continued to watch him without reacting. He could not react. He didn't know how or why his brain had simply forgotten how to do it. Something inside him didn't compute.

The other members kept on watching the interaction without intervening. Bruce ran a hand over his face, rubbing his eyes trying to keep the tears at bay. He was not going to admit it soon but the guilt was eating him alive, he knew he wasn't the only one.

"Maybe we should postpone this meeting for later or tomorrow, Hank is right, we're all tense, tired and we really need to get off steam, we'll continue tomorrow," Helen ordered while starting to take her things to retire.

Shuri huffed annoyed, "Don't say I did not warn you."

"You will not come on," Jane commented lightly as she put an arm around her shoulders and forced her to walk towards the exit.

Tony wasn't going to give in and Peter didn't seem to care. While the others hurriedly sought the exit to get out of the uncomfortable situation, Bruce, stopped a few minutes before leaving the laboratory, "Do you want me to stay?

"No"

Bruce nodded and walked towards the others, determined to close the lab doors to give his friends privacy.

Tony was still standing in the same place he had been a few minutes before. He wasn't going to give up. If his protégé wanted a war that was what he was going to give him.

"Don't you think you're exaggerating a bit?" The boy asked after a few seconds. He had tried to make his brain work a few moments ago but it had failed, so he wasn't going to try again.

Tony, frustrated, rolled his eyes. He shook his head a few times without knowing what to say. This was really his worst nightmare. Thanos, that bastard, was right.

"Maybe you can win now but it's in your destiny to lose."

That idiot. That damn idiot. He wanted to bring him back to life only to strangle him to death. He was losing every sense of reason and he knew it, he was delaying a major investigation but he didn't care. It doesn't matter anymore. The world was losing its color, its meaning, its importance.

This should never have happened. Never. He understood the others knew and understood that this was a necessary sacrifice and that everyone had lost a part of them in the process but this wasn't the same. This didn't compare. Nothing compared to this. The robot that was standing in front of him proved it. Vision had more emotions than the boy in front of him.

"Don't you think you're abnormally close to my face?" The kid tried to joke as he took a step back only to watch as Tony didn't give in to his bullshit and walked a step forward. The metaphor was clear. It didn't matter how many times Peter took a step back Tony was going to take one forward and bring him back from whatever reverse development the boy gave.

"Fine." Peter nodded slightly, "But fighting with me is really not going to do anything and you know it."

"Of course I know, that doesn't stop me from trying." Wow, and for every word that came out of Peter's mouth, he had one ready to shut him up.

"You can't do anything to solve this." And that had hurt. A lot. He might as well punched him because sure as hell felt that way.

Peter thought he knew what Tony was feeling, but he didn't understand why he really wasn't capable.

"It's time to leave the armor, Tony, this is not something you can fix or protect." His mentor had to understand.

Tony slapped his hand to his own face, the tears were coming out without permission. He was going to drown if Peter kept talking, he was sure he was going to die. He couldn't keep listening to him but if he didn't, something inside of his being was going to fall and collapse without hesitation.

"Shut up."

Peter shook his head monotonously. Flat movement.

"I can't, and you can't either, what do you want us to do then?"

Tony breathed raggedly as he continued to cover his eyes with his palm. The pain was so deep and sharp that he was sure an invisible being was striking him in an incensing manner. It was impossible to feel pain in such a real and animated way. He felt so alive in the worst possible ways while Peter felt so dead in the best ways to be.

Tony wanted to laugh. God, the universe, Thanos, the Galaxy, life. Nobody was going to give him a break. No one was going to give him a path to happiness no matter how many times he tried.

"Give up, this is stupid, there's no way to fix it, I can live with this, it’s better than being inside a coffin and you know it because you're so-"

"This is not you!This is not Peter Parker, understand this, kid! It's not you!" Tony screamed so loudly that Peter, alarmed, stepped back a little, and Tony took him by the arms and pulled him close, "I don't care if I can't fix it, I'm not interested in knowing why this can't be fixed or why you think it shouldn't be repaired! This is going to be fixed. No! Shut up! Don't say anything! If I have to go to another universe and bring your damn heart back I'll do it and you know it, so shut up!"

Peter looked at Tony somewhat surprised. His stomach, a hollow on his stomach? What was happening? He didn't know exactly where or what but something inside him was beginning to gain a foothold. Something was heating up. His insides were moving, slowly and he could hardly detect it but his enhanced abilities gave him the benefit of distinguishing a part of them. He wasn't liking this.

"You're squeezing me." It was the only thing that came out of his mouth.

"Good, finally you're feeling something." The man resumed his stiff posture and took his hands off him.

"I doubt it." He couldn't help it. It had come out of him, he really didn't want to say that. Tony paused and looked at him.

Peter tried to ignore the little punch his stomach was giving him. Those little jabs becoming more noticeable. Not big waves of them but small proportions.

"What did you say?" Tony couldn't help the small curve that was beginning to form on his lips, nor the great ideas his brain was giving him.

Peter huffed. The truth was that he didn't know how to react, this was new. He had spent five years dead and a week without feeling anything and suddenly the jabs were beginning to appear. Nobody could blame him for not knowing how to react. He didn't like the way Tony was watching him, the man was making up things in his head and Peter didn't want him to keep doing it.

Tony continued to watch the boy with a strange glint in his eyes. He was sure he saw the little slip. More than sure, he was determined to keep seeing more of that. He smirked as he narrowed his damp eyes without taking them off the boy; his boy, "It's lunchtime, come on, we need something in our stomachs if we want to continue with the investigation."

Peter felt, what seemed to be a chill running through his body. So he had noticed. Suddenly, something closed and his stomach stopped feeling the throbbing. Silence.

Tony observed all the reactions without daring to move. The man was analyzing him in great detail. He was going to memorize every reaction, every movement, and every microexpression, to understand. To investigate. To search. To fix. He wasn't going to stop.

"Well, time to eat, spiderling, you look a little pale, I suppose even people without emotions need to eat." Tony ran the sleeve of his jacket through his eyes to remove the wet traces on them. He started to walk towards the exit of the laboratory feeling the eyes of his protégé follow him silently. Great. Excellent. Peter was beginning to understand that trying to stop him was dangerous and it was.

Because the world was going to know how far he was able to go. How far Tony Stark was willing to go to fix things.

.