#feralego || peter parker

[inhcritance]

@feralego asked: [ REUNION ]:     after spending a considerable length of time apart, the sender reunites with the receiver after saving their life from an immediate and potentially lethal threat. — from peter 👀

It had been almost two years, and the signs weren't easy to miss. Small as some were: some shops had changed, closed or opened. Different names on the newspapers -one of them familiar and dear both-, different faces on TV. New York, however, remained New York, and for the first half an hour of his first day outside, he let the familiarity and the strangeness both comfort him.

He hadn't told anyone he was back, not yet. Not until he fully believed it, until it all felt more real than the last two weeks had, reading over newspapers when his father wasn't home and trying to catch up with a world that had kept going. But he was there to see it now, walking on his own two feet and dressed in comfortable, discreet clothes.

And for the first half an hour, everything was nice. Familiar, in a strange way. Comfortable enough to make him the kindness of letting him pretend he hadn't been gone at all, lie that they all knew it. Then, with that half an hour gone, gone was any mercy the city held for him: he'd been moving with the crowd, trying to get away from the chaos when a blast hit one of the buildings nearby.

In the rooftops, a Spider-Man Harry didn't recognize was fighting yet another new face, and apparently winning easily enough. At street level, however, someone crashed into Harry, the debris from the building atop him crashing on the spot they'd been just a moment before, and Harry only had a moment for relief, to try to stand up and move, before he saw the face of the other and that was enough to halt, for a moment, the very reasonable instincts to get away and keep running.

Instead, Harry's expression lit up in a mix of disbelief and joy, and then -as he realized that his friend probably thought he'd been ignoring him for years- something almost wary and sheepish both.

"Pete." He said, however, resisting the urge to hug him, trying to figure out where they stood, until common sense kicked in. "Let's get out of here?"

[milehighmechanic]

@feralego moved from here

“Devil’s Breath,” he repeats, his voice a whisper, a sigh. There’s relief there, in the knowledge that that horrible plague hadn’t done this. That Otto’s mad power struggle with Norman Osborn hadn’t caused such irreparable harm. But that doesn’t ease his mind entirely. Something had done this. Something, some alien by the name of Thanos, had destroyed the city. Killed people. And even if this isn’t his New York... Even if Stark’s parallel universe theory tracks--and it really does seem to make sense--he still feels it like a gut punch. On their way to Stark Tower, Peter can’t help but gawk at what the city’s become. How it reminds him of the old patchwork quilt he’d had on his bed as a teenager: half tattered and faded, half vibrant and newly patched. Neither half matching up with what it had been in the beginning. He’d agreed to go with Tony. Because where else is he going to go? Who else would have the capacity to understand what’s happened? Who else might be able to help him? ( Dr. Otto Octavius. Norman Osborn. Do either of them exist here? Surely they would, if-- ) “I’m... You expected a different Peter Parker, didn’t you?” He asks a few moments after they touch down on the roof and head inside Stark Tower. Which-- Was known as Avenger’s Tower in his New York. It makes sense. But it’s still difficult to wrap his head around. “And you seemed... disappointed. That I wasn’t him.” An unspoken question stretches out between them, but Peter has his theory about why that is now that he’s not hyperventilating on a fire escape. “I’m sorry, Mr. Stark.”

It’s been a couple months since Tony was last in the penthouse----- Pepper has to visit the city for work more often than he does, and it’s been a long time since Tony felt truly comfortable in the city. Too many reminders. Ghosts around every corner. 

Now he just hopes there’s some food in the fridge. Tony taps his chest, the suit flowing back into the reactor housing, and glances at Peter over his shoulder, expression tight. It’s a long minute before he speaks.

“Fifty percent of the population were killed instantaneously in the Snap. Culled,” he clarifies, voice bitter, “by Thanos. Peter was just one.” 

His fingers rub against each other absently before his fist clenches, trying to ignore the phantom feeling of ash coating his fingers. 

“He was younger than you. Just a kid. My responsibility.” 

He thinks of the determination in Peter’s voice on that spaceship. Excitement, in spite of the DANGER they were all in. The fear in his eyes when Tony had been stabbed. The terror in his voice, when------

Tony shakes his head, too hard. Digs his fingernails into his palms, the sparks of pain grounding him. “I guess when FRIDAY told me there was a Spider-Man sighting, I just… got my hopes up,” he adds, a little softer. “That’s not your fault.” Not for the first time, he’s glad that May was Snapped too. He feels guilty thinking it, he always has done, but at least she was spared the pain. And this.

But this young man is still Peter Parker. Not the one Tony knew, sure, but he’s still PETER. Different, but the same. It’s so obvious, just in that apology. 

“If I can get you home, I will,” he promises. And then, a crooked smile, “not that I’m trying to get rid of you. But I guess you’ve got some people back home?”

[milehighmechanic]

feralego​:

          The stranger’s response reminds her of something Ben–or even Peter–would have said when caught looking just a little too haggard, and automatically, she responds in kind. A little teasing, a little knowing.

         "Tougher than this?“ She asks him with a genial wryness, settling back down into her seat and letting her shoulders dip as she relaxes, assured that he hadn’t been scalded. "You must be quite the force to be reckoned with, then, my friend.”

         She nods when he asks her about her employment.

         "Yes, I’ve worked here for a while now,“ she tells him. Though that leaves a fair bit of the picture out: she doesn’t just work here, she’s second in command, just under Mr. Li in terms of authority and responsibility. "I’m glad you found us, Anthony.”

         She smiles warmly, genuinely, like everything else about her.

         "May Parker.“

     Tony smiles half-heartedly. He thinks he’s more a victim of circumstance than anything particularly tough------ if he hadn't been INJURED, in that first battle with Ultron, he would never have been the one sent to grab the kids, to evacuate the city as his friends fell around him. If he’d been a little TOUGHER, he might have been able to save them.

     And yet, he was the one Kang tried to kill. The one Kang wanted out of the way. 

     May Parker she says, and Tony blinks. Stares. He can’t help it.

     He thinks he might have met Peter’s Aunt, in passing, once or twice, but Peter had always been particular about keeping the different parts of his life separate. Tony doesn’t know how Peter died, in his universe, but he knows it was too young. 

     It could be a coincidence. Surely there must be more than one May Parker in New York. But it’s not. This is just the kind of circumstance Tony ALWAYS finds himself in. 

     And he’s been staring at Mrs Parker for too long. Tony doesn’t know what the date is, he doesn’t know how old Peter might be, if her husband is dead yet, if any of these things are even true because who knows with different universes. He never knew May, and yet he knows her, in the way he knew Peter, knew the young man she’d brought up. 

     “Sorry,” he blurts, a little too roughly, a little too out of practice at this. He needs an excuse. Doesn’t he? “It’s nice to meet you, May Parker.” And his smile might be more jagged, but the words are genuine. 

     Unlikely coincidence it may be, Tony doesn’t think meeting May Parker could be anything but a good thing. No matter what it complicates for him. “It’s been a long time since I was in New York. I keep having real deja vu.”

[milehighmechanic]

feralego​:

          A bump here, a few dozen scratches there; Peter is fine, physically. Nothing his accelerated healing won’t take care of in the next handful of hours. But, as he looks down, patting himself over to double check, he catches sight of the damage Thanos had done to Tony.

          “Mr. Stark…” As far as Peter is aware, Tony doesn’t posses any powers; he doesn’t have an augmented healing ability. And seeing what he does of the wound sets off more alarms in Parker’s head. “We gotta– We gotta patch that up.”

          His eyes swing over toward Nebula, then across the barren landscape, then to the ship. So far from civilization–from doctors–Peter can only hope he and the unfamiliar alien can find something to patch the man up with. And he asks her for help.

————-

          Nebula works wonders on Tony’s wounds, and Peter is so, so very grateful for her calm, steady hands as they travel through space. All he’d really had to offer were quick fixes; using his web fluid as an adhesive to hold a cloth bandage in place really only works for someone like himself, or as a very, very temporary solution.

          But then, when they burn through the fuel–and the reserves; and the food; and they’re getting close with their oxygen supply–it occurs to Peter that even her incredible handiwork might be temporary. And so, finally, after days–or the equivalent–Peter sits himself down across from Tony, grabs the back of his mask, and slowly pulls it off over his head of matted hair. Revealing the whole of his face to Stark for the first time.

          Because, well… If they aren’t going to make it? Peter doesn’t want to go out a stranger; just some random dude in a mask. And he wants Tony to have another friendly face, in case he goes first. Which seems likely, given his already weakened condition.

         “I’m Peter,” he says lamely, pushing a hand through his sweaty mop of brown hair, trying to unstick it from his scalp and forehead. “Peter Parker. I just– thought it was finally time to introduce myself. Properly, I guess.”

          He hopes Tony won’t see through his reasoning, but he’s fairly certain he will.

          “You wanna play?” He asks, lifting the little triangle the trio had been taking turnings flicking at each other. “I think I might finally beat you without the mask on.”

     Tony worries. It’s hardwired into him, these days, perhaps. You’d think, after losing the most important battle in his life, there would be nothing else to worry about. But he watches Spidey, and he watches Nebula, and he watches the oxygen tick lower and lower, and he worries. 

     He likes Nebula. She’s quiet and and angry and uncertain and more than a little bit murderous. She talks of Quill and his two stooges dismissively, but there’s an underlying exasperated fondness there. Tony’s not sure what he does to earn her trust, because historically he is awful at this making-friends thing, but then one day she sits down next to him, and after an hour of companionable silence, she tells him about Gamora, about Thanos. 

     Nebula might ostensibly be in charge; the ship belongs to her, or at least, it does for now. And she’s the only one of them with experience in space travel, so by default, she’s the captain here. He’s not even sure if she’s older than him or not, but somehow, after a few days, when his fever has died down and the situation is slowly getting WORSE, somehow Tony has become the ADULT here. He’s the one they’re looking to, for answers, to keep their spirits up. 

     Tony has no solutions. Not this time. 

     He never expected to survive Thanos. He accepted that, even before Strange traded EVERYTHING for his life. He wants to hate him for that. Hate him because it’s worthless, Tony’s going to die here, in space, and it wasn’t worth it. 

     But Tony can’t hate Strange. Partly because the guy’s dead. It’s really not worth the energy. But also------ Yeah, he can accept his own death. But Spidey? Nebula? No. It’s that thought that keeps Tony fighting, keeps him working in the engines of the ship day after day, as if he can somehow work a miracle. That makes him carefully apportion more food to them. 

     Tony’s already dying. He accepts that. But he refuses to let the others die without a fight.

     He’s tinkering with his helmet when Spidey approaches. Doesn’t really do more than glance up when the kid sits down opposite him, so he only catches the movement out of the corner of his eye. Looks up and he’s staring into the face of a dark haired teenager. A stranger, except he’s not, he’s---- he’s-----

     He’d always known Spidey was young--- you could hear it in his voice, in the references he made. But Tony had assumed he was at the very least an adult, when he’d met him. He hadn’t considered that an actual kid was putting on a suit and fighting crime in the city when he should be in school------

     Tony stares at him, eyes wide. 

     “Are you telling me that thing is limiting your vision?” he demands, after a very, very long beat. He almost makes a grabby hand for the mask, but somehow he’s stuck, frozen. “That’s not----- Did you design it yourself? I could-----” Fix that. His voice trails off, because he could fix that, if he was at home, in his workshop, not adrift in space. His jaw works for a second before he swallows, gaze darting away from Spidey------ Peter.

     Peter Parker. He’s a KID. How old is he? Sixteen, seventeen? He’s not old enough to vote, let alone throw his life away on a SUICIDE mission in SPACE……

     Tony doesn’t have the energy for a panic attack. That doesn’t stop the suffocating feeling that inches up his sternum. “Peter,” he says, carefully, the name feeling strange in his mouth. How old are you, he means to ask, but that question gets superceded, somehow. “Peter, do your parents---- your family. Do they know you’re Spider Man?” Do they know where you are?

[inhcritance]

His name, once again, and then the hug is returned and Harry knows, without a shadow of a doubt, that this is a moment he'll be treasuring. No matter how this goes, how the conversation ends, for a moment he just lives the moment.

For a moment he dwells on how close he's been to disaster, once again, and then he pushes it away. He can't not push it away, because otherwise he might lose his mind in horror and dread and fear, and maybe hide himself in his penthouse, for all he knows he cannot. He simply cannot.

And then he lets Peter's arms ground him back to the moment, and for a few long, beautiful seconds he relaxes into the embrace. Nothing else has to matter.

Then Peter is looking at him far too intently, far too sharply. Looking for something, and it's enough for Harry to wonder if he knows. If he's looking for signs of illness, or for signs of untruth instead. What he knows, what he suspects. And when he's the one to break the silence, Harry is grateful: he doesn't feel like words can fully express the chaos in his heart, even if he wanted to, and when he next speaks it feels like it's not at all enough.

"I'm very, very glad to be back."

And he smiles. It's not a grin, and it's not wild and carefree, but it's genuine. It's also a shade sad, because he's read some of what's happened in the years he's been gone. An eternity and a heartbeat, and then almost three years gone.

"I'm just sorry for the complete radio silence." He then adds, his tone far more serious. "There were some... unforeseen circumstances." Such as being gone for years, instead of weeks, or months, and sometimes it's still a lot and... no. He can't go there. "And I'm still trying to catch up. I've been here for less than a day. But I'm back now. For real."

It's not a promise, he can't go that far, and he almost didn't even get to that point... but for now, things are looking good.

They run. They run, with Peter trailing just behind Harry, mind reeling as he remembers what MJ had told him about Harry's room at his dad's, and about the note. The illness.

The one that had taken Emily Osborn in what should have been the prime of her life. The one that Harry had nearly succumbed to. And the one he's not sure Harry knows that he knows about.

How is any of this possible?

Had everything that had happened with Martin Li and Octavius and Devil's Breath actually led Osborn to a cure?

Peter can't calm his mind. Even just trying to focus on the present, and on Harry looking well just keeps propelling his thoughts back to everything he needs to know. And everything he'd wanted to share with his dear, dear friend.

"Harry--" Peter pants out when they finally come to a stop, and when his friend's arms wrap tight around him. A sensation he'd nearly thought he'd never feel again.

Of course he hugs him back. There is not a thing Harry could have ever done that would have Peter deny him that comfort. And frankly, he just hadn't had the time to do it first.

He throws his arms around his friend, buries his face against his neck, and tries not to think about the fact that he'd very nearly just lost him again. And if he tears up a little, so be it.

Harry's seen worse from him.

When he's finally had his fill, he pulls back, but he keeps his hands cemented onto Harry's shoulders. And he just-- He looks.

Peter Park studies him. He tries to get a reading on his breaths per minute and looks for any pallor or signs of pain or distress; his eyes track his friend's facial expressions and gauge his posture; he watches the way shadows interact with his form just to be sure it all feels real; any and everything he can think of.

"I'm so glad you're back."

He wants to pry and ask a million questions. He wants to dig his phone out and call MJ. He wants to take him out to celebrate. He wants to sprint up the walls of the next building he sees.

"You missed so much," he tells him, his voice cracking. Smile threatening to crumble. "And I missed you more."