#this has been sitting in my unfinished art folder so might as well post it anyway

[peachcreekhustler]

"Well excuse my sincerity for thinking I had lost the only two people I have left in this world!"

[bethhxrmon]

Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again Pt. 3

“All that I know is that I don’t know a thing” - “Dust and Ashes” from Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812

Pairing: Peter Parker x Female OC

Word Count: 3.5k

Summary: The time heist is upon us!

Warnings: Endgame spoilers, angst, character death

A/N: Okay, so this is my last update before I go on my big vacation. I won’t be posting anything while I’m gone but I will hopefully keep writing. You can find the masterlist for this fic in my bio!

At some point in the morning, Harper was woken up not by the sun or by an alarm, but by a phone call. The ringing wouldn’t stop even though Harper would have insisted they deserved at least another five minutes of sleep. So they let the ringing go until it stopped. Only for it to start up again another couple minutes later.

“Hello?” Harper grumbled.

There was a chuckle on the other end, “Making time heist suits?”

“Tony? I swear if you’re calling me while I’m sleeping to tell me I’m being stupid I swear I’ll-”

“No, not that. But are you making time heist suits?” he asked again.

Harper rubbed their eyes and groaned, “Yes, I’m making time heist suits. And they’re going great no thanks to you.”

“Hey, if you stop overworking yourself and you wait a few hours, I could help you with your designing. How many suits have you made?”

They sighed, looking to the fabrics and threads and materials strewn around their room, “One… out of… out of enough.”

“Yep, hold tight. And don’t let anyone do anything too stupid, got it?”

“Look, you gotta tell me what’s up otherwise I’m gonna not know what to do,” Harper pointed out.

He sighed, “I figured out how to make it work. But I wanna tell everyone myself, but I also don’t want you working yourself too hard because I know you would.”

“Alright, fine, your secret’s safe with me,” Harper said, “Now can I let you go so I can get some more sleep?”

“Go for it, see you in a bit,” Tony told them, hanging up with a click.

And try as Harper might to get a few minutes of extra sleep, they simply couldn’t. Not when they knew Tony was coming, it was impossible to relax. Was it because of what they said the day before? Or was it something else that convinced him? It didn’t matter, all that mattered was that this could possibly work.

If Tony was there, then they were doing something right. He wouldn’t change his mind like this unless he figured something out. Something way more important than a faster way to make suits.

A few hours later and Scott was getting into the new and improved suit Harper made. Maybe this was the stupid thing Tony wanted them to stop, but they weren’t the type to make up a killer excuse. Besides, how bad could it be really? If Tony were really worried about someone getting hurt, he would have told them to tell everyone that he was coming.

Looking at the new suit that was similar in design, but instead used red and black as the main colors, Harper was satisfied. For only having a whole night to get it done, it was arguably some of their best work. Even better if it successfully shrank and did everything it was meant to.

Within a few moments, Bruce was already starting to send Scott into the quantum realm. Harper didn’t say anything, figuring it would just be that nothing happened. Then they could sit around in defeat for a little while.

Instead, they all found themselves face-to-face with a young Scott. Then an old Scott. Then a baby Scott. Finally, Scott was back to his regular self. Harper laughed despite themself. There was no way this was going to go well, that much was obvious to them. 

Scott sniffed and cringed, “I don’t know if that was baby me, old me, or just… me.”

Hopefully Tony got in there soon, because Harper was starting to doubt any of them had any faith in this plan. If they hadn't known what was to come, they likely would have felt fairly hopeless themself. Instead, they knew exactly what was going to happen, so they just remained calm.

"What's got you so relaxed?" Natasha asked, standing next to them.

They shrugged, "I don't really know... I guess I just feel really good about this."

"So far it's all gone to shit," she pointed out.

Harper nodded, "Perhaps, but maybe it's supposed to be hard at first. Come on, Nat, it's time travel. Not exactly the easiest thing ever. Hell, I think getting Clint to come over here would be easier than that... too soon?"

"No, I tried talking to him. But I'm starting to feel like I was just fooling myself with all of this, you know?" 

"Yeah... I get what you mean, but it's not the end of the world. We tried this thing out once, and we'll have to try it multiple times, but... but I really think we'll get everyone back. Then I'll have my best friend back and things can get better. Not great, but better."

Harper was so unbelievably tempted to tell her just why there was no need to worry about whether or not they would be able to do this. Tony wouldn't have called unless he had a massive breakthrough. Now, what caused it was what Harper wondered, but did it matter? Everyone was one step closer to coming back and that was all that they truly wanted in the end. Just for everything to go back to the way it was before. To get back what they had lost.

Perhaps that was just the thoughts of a grieving person, but they truly couldn't care less in that moment. They wanted their best friend back. Hell, Harper almost wanted their parents back. Just so they could see the look on their faces when they realized that stupid lizard they owned for all those years walked away with all their fortune. It was almost funny to think about in that moment. Not that it made everything better.

They sighed a little bit, "But what do I know? I'm the youngest one here and arguably the most inexperienced and-"

"We both know only one of those things are true. You're the youngest, but you're clever, Harper. Working with you these last five years has taught me a lot. And you've taught me a good amount, your age has absolutely nothing to do with that. Just trust me on this. I can tell you're gonna end up doing some really great things someday. Maybe you won't be an Avenger. So what? You don't need to have a triple black belt in martial arts to make a difference. You've proved that just last night."

That was when Steve ran in, holding his shield,  Tony trailing not too far behind him, "Tony's helping us!"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm here. You guys have been going at all of this time travel stuff the wrong way and I'm gonna show you how to do it the right way. Just watch and learn. Harper, I have a way faster for you to do what you do best, let’s get going," Tony said, leading them back to his car.

Harper gave a skeptical look, "I'm gonna make the rest of the team's suits in the back of your car?"

"Not unless you want to. I just need your help with getting this bad boy inside to where you design. I'm assuming that's your room?" Tony asked.

They nodded, "Yeah, yeah, that's where I do that. What did you make?"

"You see, I was thinking about how annoyingly difficult it can be to get your suits ready. Fiveish summers ago, you took over a month to make a new suit for Annie. If I can just give you some function options and design options to help that as well as full control over colors, you're good to go and make suits by just pressing some buttons," Tony explained as he opened up the backseat of the car.

Inside was a rather large tube-like structure. It took both of them walking it in to make sure that it didn't just fall and break. There was no way Harper was letting this go. If they could get a robot to do all the hard stuff for them in a matter of a few hours, they could save so much time. With a working time travelling device, Harper knew that this was all going to work perfectly. They couldn't wait to tell Annie all of the crazy things they had gone through just to get everything to work like this. She would go crazy. Especially over the new suit maker that could do virtually whatever they wanted.

Once it was installed in their room and Tony was gone, Harper decided to play around with the functions just for a few moments.

"Pull up everything you have on White Swan," they said, wondering just what Tony had been doing the last five years.

Unsurprisingly, there were a few different concepts and designs. They smirked a little bit, knowing that Tony had to have thought of her almost as often as they had.

Then, out of another spark of curiosity, Harper cleared their throat, "Show me everything you have on Spider-Man."

Once again, there were several designs for different suits. There were more for Peter, but Harper knew that they had known each other for longer. And then, there was one more thing that Harper just couldn't help wondering about.

"What do you have for Harper Higgins?"

This time, there was just one, slightly unfinished, suit. It made them genuinely smile. Over all this time Tony had something planned. Realistically, it was for if things got really dangerous, but Harper couldn't help feeling a sense of pride at that. They had their own suit. It didn't do much, they didn't have any powers, but if something got really bad, they weren't going to be useless.

But Harper had a different job to take care of and they knew it.

They sighed a little bit, "Okay... let's get this thing started. Transfer files from Harper's flash drive in the hero folder."

As all the suits were making themselves, they took the chance to go down to the large meeting happening lower in a common area. Suits could take all the time they wanted, but unless they knew exactly where they were going to get those stones, then they couldn't get anything done.

Needless to say, Harper had never experienced anything to do with the infinity stones. They only knew the extent of their power, nothing more and nothing less. No one ever heard about the stones being somewhere in the west coast at any point in time. Not in a time that they were aware of, at least. They didn't know what they were doing here, but Natasha insisted they at least try their hand at researching.

Researching was something Harper had a decent shot in succeeding at. It was something they did with Annie all the time. That was the number one way to make sure she wasn't getting herself into some kind of huge trouble. So they looked around as the different Avengers started to get situated.

Harper sat next to Nebula and couldn't help smiling, "The gold and bronze looks really great!"

"You say that every time I see you," she commented.

The ginger shrugged, "Well, they always look great every time you see me. Not my fault."

"Actually, you were the one who created them, so it is completely your fault... but thank you. I think they look nice too."

Harper wanted to catch up with Nebula for a little while longer, but they couldn't since Thor was starting to go up to explain the Reality Stone to everyone else. A stone which seemed to have a deeply personal attachment with Thor. They noticed that he seemed a little bit different from before. Not in physical appearance, though that was for certain, but through his personality. The way he seemed to react to having to talk about Jane was rough to watch. They sort of hoped someone would just have him wait it out. He clearly wasn't in a good position to be helping out with anything. Either way, Harper listened to them talk about how everything seemed to work together. It was nice to know that they were just so close to getting it all to work.

Once given a chance, Harper went ahead and checked on all of the suits being made. They smiled to themself, loving how they were coming out and how they were coming out so quickly at that. This was more than they could have ever hoped to imagine. Soon enough everyone would be back. They could talk to Annie. A part of them wondered if she would look the same way she did when she disappeared or if she would come back looking older. They weren't sure which they would prefer. Hell, did it even matter? Harper was just elated at the idea of their best friend coming back after so many years of not having her around.

After several years of wanting to call her and tell her about the craziest thing that happened and not being able to. Ned was great, he really was, but they knew that he would rather talk to Peter every day than them. Not that Harper could blame him.

It would all sort itself out soon enough. They could just feel that all of this was going to work out somehow.

It took a few hours. Actually, it took several hours for all thuits to be done, but it was worth the wait. Especially when Harper knew that they would have taken so much longer had they been working all on their own. They couldn't help grinning at their now finished product, seeing that all of them were fresh off the press and ready for everyone to wear them.

Harper bounced down to everyone researching, "The suits are all done! You guys are gonna love them!"

"Great, Harper, that's great because we just finished figuring out how to divide everyone up," Bruce told them.

Harper nodded eagerly, "Yeah? So... what am I doing?"

"I'm gonna actually have you be the failsafe to this whole mission. You're in charge of making sure we actually come back or that nothing insane happens to the machine," he explained.

They nodded slowly, "Okay, how long are you guys gonna be gone for?"

"Just a minute, no longer. You're in charge of making sure it's only a minute. If it's any longer, we could jeopardize everything."

Harper laughed nervously, "Right, because that would be really bad... we'll be fine though, right?"

"Yeah, yeah, of course we will be! It's nothing to worry about. I just felt I should give you a job so you could be occupied."

With that, Harper got to watch their creations in action. All of the heroes looked amazing and Harper couldn't help wishing they were going. Except, they didn't know the first thing about handling an infinity stone. There was no way they were even qualified to monitor the time contraption. Yet, if anything went wrong, they were the one who was going to have to fix it. How that would happen, they had no idea. It seemed like Bruce was riding more on the idea of nothing going wrong. That was a fait assumption given that it would only be a minute. A minute wasn't that long, was it? No, there was no way it would be that long.

Yet, something told Harper they were going to be in for the longest wait of their life.

"You're gonna do great, Harper," Natasha told them with a grin.

Harper hugged her, "Yeah, you're totally right. And you'll all be back and we can bring back everyone else. It's perfect, we'll  fix everything."

Still, that didn't feel too likely when they looked at everyone standing around in the circle. Harper didn't want to mess this up for everyone, but Bruce was the one who put in the commands for the machine. Maybe he really didn't think anything would happen to the machine. That was a relief.

Everyone looked at each other, going over their plan one last time. Who was going with who as well as where and when they would be heading.

"See you in a minute," Natasha said before everyone disappeared.

It was just Harper. Now, they had been alone in the compound before. Not often and not for very long, but it did happen. Maybe it shouldn't have worried them so much, but they couldn't help being worried about what was going to happen. What if something went wrong and they couldn't fix it? What if someone didn't come back? What if they all came back too soon? What if they all came back as babies? What if they were the reason everything went wrong?

That was silly to think, though. They couldn't possibly ruin this one mission. This one not so simple mission that would only be a minute. How long was a minute again? It was one minute. But one minute was sixty seconds. And sixty seconds were more milliseconds than Harper could recall. There was plenty of time to think of all the ways this could go wrong. What if someone didn't get a stone? No, they were all responsible. They would know what to do if anything came up. It was silly to worry about whether or not the Avengers could do this.

But they hadn't stopped Thanos. Half the universe was gone and they couldn't prevent it.

Except, they were all divided at that time. Now everyone was together. They would win this time around.

Finally, after what felt like far longer than a minute, Harper jumped, seeing everyone suddenly appear in front of them. At first, Harper really thought everyone was there.

Until Bruce spoke up for them, "Where's Nat?"

Natasha hadn't come back. Was this supposed to be some kind of joke? No, this wasn't a time to joke around about everything. It was real. Natasha was dead, and it was evidenced by the pained look on Clint's face. Someone she hadn't even had a chance to talk to. The only thing they had in common was that they missed Natasha for more reasons than one.

Everyone knew what happened. Not the specifics, but enough to know Natasha wouldn’t be coming back. Was this really the price to get everyone back? Harper was starting to wonder if it was worth it.

The rest of the team left to go outside, and Harper decided not to follow. Somehow, it just didn’t feel right to be there with everyone else. Not when they knew everyone had known Natasha so much longer than they had.

But that didn’t mean Natasha didn’t mean anything to them. Quite the opposite. Five years and they learned so much from her. Some things were really important and other things weren’t, but Natasha took them in when no one else had been able to do so. Gave them a job and friendship when everyone else decided to go their separate ways, not thinking about what little some people were left with.

Harper walked around the compound, knowing that everyone was outside. No one would have been mad if they showed up too, but they also didn’t feel like they would fit there.

Back in their room, one last suit was being finished up. Since it had been shown with all of Tony’s different ideas, Harper figured he wouldn’t mind them making it into a reality. Figuring out everything they wanted from it was tough, but they managed to work it out on their own. And if Natasha couldn’t be there anymore, they knew they could certainly try to be there.

“The suit looks nice,” Tony commented.

Harper jumped and turned around, “Can’t you knock?”

“Door was open. You coming?”

They raised an eyebrow, “Coming where?”

“We decided to go through with this snap. Natasha would’ve wanted it. I think she would’ve wanted you to be there.”

“Yes. I-I’ll be there, should I change? The blast is gonna be big, isn’t it?”

Tony nodded, “Yeah, I made that for a reason. I didn’t think it would be for this, but you get changed and I’ll work on getting the stones together.”

In less than an hour, Harper stood in a circle with everyone else with a green and white suit. This was finally happening. It was everything they wanted, wasn’t it? Yes, Harper knew that they wanted this. Annie would be back, everyone would be back. Natasha would have wanted them to enjoy life after all this.

Maybe they could go back to college or something.

Everyone was arguing over who should get to snap the gauntlet. Harper didn’t volunteer. No one would have let them, and they knew that.

“I’ll do it,” Bruce said, “It’s all gamma radiation.”

With that, everyone sort of murmured an agreement. Bruce had the gauntlet on and the power was causing him pain. Harper had the mask on for when the snap happened. Their heart started to beat rapidly and then there was the click of a snap.

The force of it gave a bit of an impact, but Harper didn’t care. If it had power, then they could see Annie again. Everyone was back, right?

Once they could get out of the room, Harper rushed out to the window. There were trees and birds that hadn’t been there before. Quickly, they pulled out their phone.

“Ned, Ned they’re coming back!” Harper exclaimed.

Before they could hear a response, their phone was thrown out of their hand and they were forced back by a massive blast.

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