For Verity

[close_to_the_ground]

Man, Peter is gonna get so grounded.

The question is what he's gonna get grounded for. He and Mr. Stark have never really talked about what the rules are when friends come over. It's not an issue yet, since he doesn't actually live at Panoptes. And he's not supposed to tell people about Spider-Man, kind of, but Mr. Stark said he could tell people he trusts and Verity works for Panoptes so Mr. Stark must trust her.

He waits to get a text from Verity and takes the private elevator down to the lobby, hoping Mr. Stark actually works late like he's supposed to.

He really, really likes Verity. He wishes he'd had a sister like her and he feels pretty good about her not being freaked out about the Spider-Man but it's never not a weird thing to have to tell someone.

Okay, deep breath.

Comments

[notaskingpermission]

Verity texts Peter that she's almost there and bikes hard for the next couple blocks. It's one of Panoptes bikes, which are wildly convenient. She's also wearing large sunglasses and a Panoptes baseball hat. She bought one almost immediately after that morning she walked Tony home, just to tease him, but today it's part of her disguise. Her disguise as an ordinary Panoptes employee doing ordinary and not at all shady things.

The ten dollar knife set is in her backpack.

"Hey," she calls in greeting to Peter, parking the bike and walking over, hands on her backpack straps. "Ready for some espionage?"

[close_to_the_ground]

"I feel like this look makes you even more suspicious," he points out, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

"Ready to get grounded by Iron Man, so same thing. Come on, we can use the fancy elevator that goes straight up to the penthouse. And uh, there's some other stuff I want to show you if that's cool."

[notaskingpermission]

"What? I needed a disguise," Verity says, smiling innocently. People always wore disguises during break-ins. Even if her visit is technically allowed as Peter's guest.

"Wait, how can he ground you? I thought you lived in the Disneyworld castle with the wizards," she says, following Peter inside. Though maybe if Tony told the wizards then they would ground him.

[close_to_the_ground]

"Uh, well, he's trying to adopt me," Peter admits, putting his hand up for the thumb scan and grinning as the doors open. Only for him and Mr. Stark. It's kind of a trip every time he gets to do it.

"I mean he was a mentor sort of back home and we've gotten close and the orphanage is great, actually, but the being an orphan part kind of isn't. I've uh, I've kind of lost a lot of parent type people so I don't, I don't like it. I know I'm almost sixteen but I really want it."

[notaskingpermission]

"Oh. Well if it's not official yet what can he really do?" Verity asks, nudging him in the side. She should know better, but it's just a little fun. There's no way the knives are really three thousand dollars.

Verity's smile fades when Peter explains his situation.

"Hey," she says more gently, "I'm sorry. I think that's a perfectly okay thing to want. ...Are you sure we should do this? I don't want to fuck things up for you." She doesn't think Tony is the kind of person to get mad about a prank, especially not enough to go back on an adoption, but she only wants to do this if Peter's sure.

[close_to_the_ground]

"Nah," Peter says with a huff of laughter, elevator doors opening to the always clean and quiet penthouse.

"He likes it when I'm a shit. I think it would bother him if I was always good. Think it makes him respect me more. So you've seen the place, right? Wait, have you seen his bathroom? It's insane. All the products cost a ton and they have to be lined up a certain way and like, always full. He hates almost empty bottles of stuff."

[notaskingpermission]

"Oh my god. Every day I learn about some new facet of his OCD, and I really hope he's just, like...I don't know, OCD Lite. So it bothers him, but we aren't going to give him a full-fledged breakdown, because after we replace the knives you absolutely have to show me his bathroom so we can put all the bottles out of order. Plus," Verity continues, walking backward toward the kitchen while talking to Peter. "I want to see if he uses something for male-pattern baldness. He's, what, mid-fifties? Ish? But his hair looks so good! His shampoo is probably made out of the blood of baby seals or something super exotic and expensive."

Verity stops Peter in the kitchen and grabs his hand, bringing their joined hands up between them.

"Also. We are taking this to our graves. We admit nothing. But if he breaks you down, because I'm sorry, Pete, you're kind of soft. If he gets you to break, you tell him this was a mission for respect. Swear on it."

She brings Peter's hand up to her mouth and smacks a kiss against his knuckles.

"You have to kiss my hand. It's less messier than a blood oath."

[close_to_the_ground]

Peter nods, trying his best to keep a serious face as he kisses her hand.

"I honestly think the hair is just his hair but we can totally check," he says, grabbing her hand and leading the way to Tony's room. He pushes the door open, finding it perfectly clean as always especially compared to his own. "Okay, so he has this hand-soap that he said costs like thirty dollars a bottle or something," he says, opening the bathroom door and turning on the light.

It looks like a spa out of a fancy magazine of May's, Peter thinks. It also has the biggest bathtub he's ever seen. And is definitely not supposed to use.

[notaskingpermission]

Verity drops her backback and looks around the bathroom in awe. It's bigger than every bedroom she's ever lived in. The tub is like a mini pool. Or a hot tub. Is it a hot tub?

"Hey, Peter. Remember how we were going to go swimming after this? Why don't we make a giant bubble bath instead? We can try all the soaps, and drink champagne, and pretend we're on Lifestyles Of The Rich And Famous circa Darrow 2018," she says, going over to the sink counter to start investigating Tony's products.

[close_to_the_ground]

"Oh my God," Peter whispers, because it's never even dawned on him to try something like that.

Verity is kind of a bad influence and it's awesome.

"Okay, okay how about this. You go switch out the knives and I'm gonna start the bath. It takes like, a while to fill up. It's so dumb. Do you need something to swim in? I've got like, extra swim shorts and a shirt? Or...uh. I don't know what girls would wear. Your bra? Whatever. Knives. Bath."

[notaskingpermission]

"I brought my own bathing suit, dork. And gotcha. Mission: Knife Exchange is A-Go!" Verity says, before slipping out of the room with her backpack and booking it for the kitchen. She's not really in any sort of hurry, Peter said Tony is for sure working late, but she at least wants to get a nice soak in before he comes home and potentially ruins all the fun. There's a bath at her apartment, but it's standard bath size and it sucks.

When she finds the alleged three thousand dollar knives she rolls her eyes. She pulls them out of the block and carefully wraps them in a towel, hiding them in a miscellaneous cupboard. Then she takes the cheap knives from her backpack and replaces them. That taken care of, she ducks into Tony's bedroom to change.

She returns to the bathroom in the stupid frilly bikini Elio picked out for her.

"I'm back! If I catch you staring at my tiny tits I'll punch you in the face!" she announces as she comes into the room, hoping she's caught Peter mid-trou so she can make fun of him until the end of time.

[close_to_the_ground]

"What? Oh my God, I'm not!" Peter yelps, hurriedly tying the strings of his swim trunks. He tries not to hunch on himself, always feeling weird being shirtless around anyone as he hands over the crazy expensive bubble bath.

"Dude, I think of you as a sister. As as my big sister, you get to do the honors. Pearl dust."

[notaskingpermission]

"Aw, that's sweet," Verity says, taking the bag of Pearl Dust. She would be more touched but something immediately distracts her.

"Dude. Peter. What the fuck?" She smacks his stomach, eyebrows sky high at the sheer amount of abs he has. She doesn't have a ton of experience with teenage boy's bodies, but she's pretty sure most sixteen year olds aren't this fit. "Do you lift? What's going on here?"

[close_to_the_ground]

Peter freezes when she curses, wondering if like, he's got a hole in his shorts of something horrifying before he realizes what she's talking about.

Oh.

Oh.

"Uh, yeah. I wanted to talk about that. Not the abs. But related. But it's like, it's weird. So you gotta, so gotta promise you'll still be my friend."

[notaskingpermission]

Verity raises an eyebrow.

"Well, you just said I was your sister, so that got you five hundred points in my book, so..." She's feeling really jokey about the whole thing, it's not like being built is bad, but then she realizes something and frowns.

"Wait. Shit. You're not, like...on steroids, are you?"

[close_to_the_ground]

"God, no. No," Peter huffs, walking slowly over to the wall and placing one hand on it then another. Then a foot and then another foot.

He twists around so he's facing her but still easily stuck to the wall.

"Not totally human. Not sure exactly how much not human but not a hundred percent. Mr. Stark knows. It's how we knew each other back home," he says, voice shaking.

[notaskingpermission]

Oh, shit.

Verity is such an idiot. Luckily no one else needs to know how big of an idiot she is. Because she already knew Peter was Spider-Man (come on, Peter Parker, friend of Iron Man? duh), so of course he'd have abs. She just hadn't been thinking about it in that moment, all the muscles surprising her.

But, she's also not supposed to know he's Spider-Man, so her wide-eyed look is probably the right reaction.

She plays it up a little, widening them even more.

"O-kay. Are you an alien?" she pretends to guess. "With...duct tape skin?"

[close_to_the_ground]

"No, no no hell no," he says, dropping from the wall and skidding over on his bare feet.

"Not an alien. Got bit by a genetically fucked up spider. So. I guess I got some spider abilities and some that are just weird. Is it, is it too weird? Do you need to go?"

Shit. It really is so weird.

[notaskingpermission]

Verity really assumed Peter was about to say something like, I am Spider-Man in a dramatic voice like in the movies. (The first ones. Or were those the second ones? She thinks there's been a lot.) But he doesn't, he says spider abilities and she can't help letting out a small, surprised laugh.

"Spider abilities? What does that mean? Can you shoot webs out of your butt?" she teases.

"No, I don't have to go. I mean, if you shoot a web out your butt at me I might, but..."

[close_to_the_ground]

"Yeah, yeah I shoot webs out of my butt," Peter sasses, walking over to the water and sticking his foot in to check the temperature.

"I designed these web shooters so I can swing around, though. Maybe I can take you sometime. I can lift almost anything, though. Like, a lot. And do flips and stuff. And all my senses are crazy."