Peter always enjoyed the slight buzz in the back of his head, the worried Karen as she spots some criminals, the traffic sounds of angry cars, and the walking people on the street. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but it somehow soothes him just that little bit.
On a perfectly normal day, peter would get up excitedly, get ready for school, eat breakfast, call Happy while walking to the bus stop, Get to school avoiding flash as much as possible, get to class on time and eagerly wait for school to end so he could call happy again and tell him about school. Then he would go patrolling for a while, calling happy one last time in excitement, practically a blabber mouth about all the excitement he’d enjoy that day.
On a normal day, peter would have enjoyed patrolling. Flying around in the carefree bliss of the winds, sometimes following some birds, really just enjoying the day before stopping some crimes.
But, as luck would have it, something told him today was... different. Peter’s whole body felt almost heavy, and he felt a little out of it. He knew he wasn’t sick, but the feeling still followed him. When he woke up, the feeling practically fell on him like a heavy weight.
Peter ignored it though. He got up, got ready for the day, and attempted to keep calm at the burning in his mind. This of course, meant he forgot to call Happy in the morning and blab about what was going on in school today. He thought happy would be relieved anyway at not getting a call, he basically annoyed the man 24/7.
Throughout the school day, it seemed hella slow. He’d just gotten into lunch when Ned short worried glances and plenty of topics, but peter was too anxious to listen. He’d been almost whispering, knowing that peter could hear him, too; or, at least hoping.
“Peter!” Ned exclaimed as if talking normally, but to peter, he shot right up at the loud noise.
“Yeah?” He whimpered slightly.
“Are you okay, dude?” The worried look in Ned’s eyes made peter seem guilty.
“Yeah. Fine. Just a little anxious to get out of school.” Peter replied, and the rest of lunch was silent.
The rest of the day seemed a bit /too/ fast after peter remembered he wouldn’t have homework with winter break coming up, and that meant more patrolling time. He didn’t really mind that, but he wished that it would just be swinging around a while. He also remembered he forgot to call happy. Crap. He’d have to call him after school.
Peter swirled around his thoughts for a while before the school bell rang. School was out. Peter quickly darted out of the room and grabbed his phone. He took a quick call to happy, as it expectedly went to voicemail. He told him about school and apologized about a million times before hanging up. He cringed at how sick he sounded. Mr. stark would kill him. Or would he? Peter never really thought about Mr. Stark as a parental figure.
Instead of mourning about it, peter just slipped on his suit and took off. The worry flew off him as he swung to the first building, when Karen first spoke. He was relitavely calm, at least he thought so.
“Good afternoon, Peter!” Karen spoke as she silently took a quick scan of his vitals.
“Hey Karen.” Peter spoke lazily.
“My scans are suggesting that you haven’t been feeling well lately. It would be wise if you alerted Mr. Stark and you took the day off patrolling.” Karen worryingly spoke.
“No, no! Karen, I’m fine, please don’t tell Mr. Stark! It’s just a little problem. I can- I can handle it!” Peter spoke semi-fluently.
“... Alright, but if it gets worse I’m alerting Mr. Stark.” The AI was obviously worried.
“Fine.”
Building after building, the worry built on him just a little each time. Peter wondered if mr. stark would take his suit when he saw him like this. Soon, fears he didn’t even know he had crept into him. And he found himself on top the tallest building in Queens. (It wasn’t much tall, maybe about 27 floors.)
As peter chose to swing to the next building not that far off, looking down, and seeing how much space was in between the two buildings was too much. As he lost some web fluid, he started to panic even more. The building was tall, so he didn’t think he’d make the ground that fast, but his worries almost slipped away when he practically /heard/ his heart stop for a solid second. As if that loud, 1 second sound of the heart was the loudest thing he could hear. Then it was black. Darkness. He couldn’t feel, breathe, think, talk, or anything. He’d lost consciousness.
• • •
Tony had been tinkering with some stuff in the compound when he FRIDAY spoke up. It wasn’t unusual at first, until the AI said something different. Something he hadn’t expected.
“Sir, Normally you don’t ask me to invade your work but an AI is trying to reach you. It’s naming itself Karen. It is about Peter.” The AI spoke.
“Patch her through.” Tony spoke, serious but with a hint of doubt.
“Mr. Stark?” The AI spoke before continuing. “My scanners on Peter have been detecting an increase and decrease in heart rate for almost twenty minutes. He also seems to be losing consciousness uncaringly.”
“What?! Send me his location.” Tony spoke, protectively almost, as he called his suit to him.
Tony got the location of peter and practically sky-rocketed out of the door, not bothering to say anything to Pepper or Steve in the kitchen on the floor just below where he’d been. ‘Please be okay, please be okay’ was the one thing that repeated itself to tony in his head as he approached the location. It felt like forever even though it took him 5 minutes.
When tony got a visual on the kid, his heart itself almost dropped when he saw the poor teenager fall suddenly after attempting to swing to the building next. Tony figured he lost consciousness, so he had to get there fast. About his 22nd floor down, tony managed to catch him, right before he fell to the ground. He brought him to a lower building a bit farther away just in case the building he’d fell by scared him or something.
Tony lightly shook peter’s shoulders and almost immediately got a response. Peter jolted awake startled, practically scaring the hell out of tony, too. He was quick to try and calm peter down when he started to kick the ground out of panic. Tony had to be gentle, and careful, since the kid had been hurt.
“FRIDAY, check his injuries.” Tony spoke to the side, as if for peter not to hear him before turning his attention back to the teenager.
When seemed like a small grunt came out of peter as he tried to calm down and figure out where he was, a small “nh” was noticed.
“Peter seems to have had a panic attack with sensory overload and different fears hitting him all at once that put his body in shock for a second to try and calm it down. Other than that, peter has a few small bruises from what seems to be after affects of patrolling.” The AI spoke soft as not to alarm the boy. “Medical attention is reccomended.”
Peter finally managed to open his eyes a little bit more after they felt glued shut. Noticing Mr. Stark, he scurried to get words out of his mouth.
“Ah— M’sr Stark-“ the teen spoke before being cut off by his mentor.
“Kid, relax. Don’t speak so much, you could overwhelm yourself.” Tony spoke back.
“M’sorry” Peter spoke, his words just slightly slurred together incoherently.
Tony smiled a little at the kid’s sincere face of worry but embarrassment. He turned around and attempted to get up to call happy, but was shocked to find a small, seemingly shaking hand pull his shirt softly, as if to say ‘stay’. Tony felt a flow of thought go through his body as he turned around to the childish looking body, to which screamed at him ‘protect him’ loudly.
And with this, tony sat back down next to him, and pulled out his phone, calling happy. Telling him to meet at the compound, which happy had been at, and to have the med bay ready just to make sure peter was really okay. Of course he still needed to help with the panic attack and sensory overload.
As tony got back into his IronMan suit and picked up the tiny child, he seemed to muzzle further into his warmth, even as iron, and closed his eyes, even if he weren’t going to fall asleep. He figured that, since tony had experience with panic attacks.
And then tony made a note to himself: ‘Peter prefers to be near someone or in physical attention when hurt’. Tony smiled a little bit before focusing on the task and flying peter to the compound. He was a little bit surprised at how calm peter managed to be even in his state, though.
When tony arrived at the compound, happy, Steve, and pepper were all waiting for tony. The kid had been quiet, and didn’t seem to show interest in sleep, which was good for now, but may be bad if he doesn’t later.
Steve of course looked worried along with happy, and pepper was more angrily protective that Tony could see in her eyes. As the suit folded back and parked itself, letting the man of steel on the ground, the other three practically ran up to him and the kid. They refrained a little to avoid startling him, and they helped Tony get him into the med bay. It hit him that he had been pouting a little since IronMan had picked him up to bring him here. There would be no arguing about it, anyway, since Tony always won. Especially in a case like this one.
When Tony and Steve got peter on the medical bed, he could barely lift his eyes open anymore. He tried to keep them open while he watched Tony pace around, getting some stuff and asking for scans. He soon came back over and told peter to get some rest, to which peter didn’t hesitate to do, as long as tony stayed on the room. Tony selflessly agreed, smiling joyfully before peter drifted off.
Peter would be fine.
Tony would make sure of it. He would always be fine, and tony would not allow his kid to be hurt. Ever. (Even if they weren’t biologically related.)