Encourage His Interests
Peter was nine when Wade decided it was time to start teaching Peter how to defend himself, and it was brutal. It was bad enough that Peter had accidentally gotten wrapped up with one of his enemies, but to have gotten so badly hurt? That was unacceptable. Even if it meant hurting his son in the moment, he had to learn to defend himself against people who wouldn’t give him the kindness and mercy his own father would.
Unfortunately, that goal was slowed down significantly. To prove they were serious (though Wade didn’t doubt a threat, and he certainly didn’t doubt one from these guys), they had taken one of his son’s hands. It was by a pure miracle that Peter’s quick thinking saved his dominant hand.
‘Let’s see how much your son likes not being able to write, Wilson.’ A shuffle on the other end of the phone. ‘Which one, kid?’
‘Left! It’s my left!’
A clunk and a scream. A ‘don’t listen to ‘em, Dad!’. And the line went dead.
That was unacceptable. Wade hadn’t been careful, had let himself slack, and this was what happened. His kid got caught in the crossfire.
Buck had started shadowing him on his way home from school on his off days. Some of the other mercs had joined in, something that warmed Wade’s heart, if only a bit. They cared about his kid – and what was he thinking back then, taking in a kid when he led this kind of life? – and were willing to go out on a limb to protect him.
Peter’s bed had been moved down to the main floor, since the ladder was harder to climb with one hand. He had been poring over books and a sketchbook since it happened.
“Hey, Kid. Time for your lesson.”
Peter groaned. “Those hurt, Dad.”
“Yeah, but it means if someone tries to hurt you again you won’t just be able to take it, but you’ll be able to dish some of that pain, too. Now get up and come on. Weasel set up a place in the back for us to practice.”
Peter’s balance was decent, since he still had the arm, but the lack of a hand clearly bugged him. “Do you think I could make a hand? Like a working robo-hand?”
“You mean like the ones in Star Wars?”
Peter’s eyes lit up. “Yeah! Like those!”
Wade looked at the kid a minute. If anyone that wasn’t Tony Stark could, it would be Peter. Even if it took him years. “Yeah, kid. You can do anything you put your mind to.”
Peter took the encouragement and used it to fuel him through his lesson. Wade praised him when he got maneuvers right – which was more often now – and helped him when they were wrong. He did some knife drills, some gun drills.
He was getting better at self-defense. Even if he did only have one hand.
Haley didn’t ask when Peter showed up to school missing a hand. His teachers got concerned, asked if his dad did it to him. Peter couldn’t believe the accusation, and defended his dad as ardently as he could. The only time his dad had hurt him was in training, and as far as Peter was concerned, that didn’t count. He was landing more and more hits every day, learning how to use the end of his amputated limb as an attack against Wade.
Instead, she started changing their signals. Whatever gestures they had used before had started developing into something more concrete. A language, almost. They could communicate fluently in their signals, even if Haley had never learned actual sign language.
“I guess we need to use one hand now, huh?”
Peter laughed. “I mean, I do. You don’t.”
“It’ll be more interesting that way. Then I can rant about people on one hand and talk about homework with the other. Confuse my mom.”
Her mom had thought teaching Haley to talk before teaching her sign was the better of the two options, and hadn’t liked it that she and Peter used signs to communicate. She couldn’t stop them from seeing each other at school, though, and Haley still didn’t know American Sign Language, so their language kept developing with time.
“You need any help?”
“I’ll get used to it.”
Haley started laughing. Her hands started flitting, fast as always. “You’ve got something planned. Something ridiculous and sciency.”
“Yeah. Yeah I do.”
Their teacher looked back at them, a playful wink as he caught them signing instead of paying attention. “Mr. Parker, would you like to answer the question?”
It was a math question, basic multiplication. He had started studying that last year, when he found a multiplication table series online at the library. The numbers had stuck in his brain ever since, spurring an interest in fields with math and science.
“27. Nine times three is 27, sir.”
“Very good.”
It was kind of understood at this point – as long as their grades were decent, he didn’t care if they goofed off in the back.
Wade would always feel guilty for what happened to his kid, but watching him gather bits of metal, shaping it and trying to start a prosthetic – something Wade was trying to save up for, but didn’t want to get his kid’s hopes up – was kind of fun. He had sloppy sketches of his plans that Wade was sure were more accurate and precise in his head.
“I think I’ll start by just building one.” Peter rambled as he cut the soda cans he had gathered from the dumpster and began layering them. “If only I had a way to melt the edges of these together…”
“I’ll pick up a cheap soldering iron for you tomorrow, alright, kid?”
“Alright. I’ll keep cutting these then.”
“Be careful, yeah? Metal can be really sharp, especially if you’re cutting it.”
“Yeah, Dad. I’ll be careful.”
Wade ruffled Peter’s hair, pulling him close for a minute. “You know I love you, right?”
Peter looked at him like he had gone mad. “Yeah. Of course, I do.”
“Alright kid.” Wade pulled a chair up, grabbing a spring off the table, sparking indignation in Peter. “Now, what are we using this for?”
Peter rolled his eyes, smiling as he launched into an explanation. If this was going to become part of the new normal, Wade kind of liked it. He hated how it happened. He hated that his kid was in this situation. For so long, Peter had been hesitant, hadn’t smiled.
Now he was smiling, passionate and excited as he held open a book from the library, pulling together bits of information about engineering and anatomy.
“I was thinking, if I can get the metal joints to fit together right, I can set up a series of pullies, locks, and supports that can keep the hand in certain positions!”
Wade nodded. “So is that what this is for?” It was a small rod, from what Wade couldn’t tell.
“Yeah!” Peter pulled it from Wade, grabbing another piece of scrap metal. “I was going to attach it to this, and then find a way to attach it to the bottom of the spring. If I attach a ring right here,” Peter motioned to a point on the drawing underneath the fingers a bit, “Then I can secure the fingers in a more upright position.”
Wade nodded. “Tell you what. We can’t use a soldering iron or anything to work with this until tomorrow, so how about we lay the parts out tonight and we can make our first try tomorrow?”
Peter got excited at that. As they went, Wade asked questions, pulled his attention to different parts of the machine he had designed. Peter had always been creative, but the stack of books he had gotten from the library and the pictures he had printed from different movies and shows where characters had metal hands had helped him design something impressive.
Wade wasn’t delusional. This was probably going to flop the first time around. But if it got the kid to stop thinking about it, then there was no reason to stop him from trying.