close_to_the_ground | For Tony

For Tony - Post Kidnapping

He's okay. That's what Strange kept trying to tell Peter as he'd tugged his mask over his head and immediately started webbing through the city, trying to get home. He didn't care if he was wearing his civilian clothes, didn't really give two shits who saw him.

Tony got hurt. And okay wasn't gonna cut it until Peter saw it with his own two eyes. He still didn't understand what had happened. He got beat up? That doesn't make sense and even without the suit Tony Stark can handle random muggers or whatever so there's gotta be more to it than that.

God, it's Peter's fault he doesn't even have a suit, anymore.

He swings to one off the windows of the penthouse because taking the stairs from the roof is too slow and pops the window open, stumbling into the living room.

"Mr. Stark!" he yells, pulling the mask off, hair hopelessly messed up. "Mr. Stark?"

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"Oh, Jesus!"

Tony sat up on the sofa with a start. He'd been lying on it beneath a comforter, half-drowsing after the pointed application of a few PM pain pills. Peter's voice cut through suddenly, startling him upright. The ice pack over his eye slid off of his face and onto his lap.

"Class is out? What time is it? God, what day is it?"

"Who did this?" he mutters, hurrying over to the couch, hands hovering over Tony's face.

"Doctor Strange called me. He said someone beat you up. What the hell happened? God, I should have been here. They could have just, they could have done something really bad and how would I have even known?"

"Woah, hey, calm down."

With his one good arm, the other in a sling, Tony grabbed one of Peter's wrists, pressing down on his pulse point. It was a good trick, one Strange had showed him a month ago. It worked on Tony, so he had to consider it might help Peter calm down as well.

"You were at school. There was nothing you could've or should've done, and I'm not about to say anything to encourage you to go out there looking for a fight. Don't superhero angry, that's my job."

"I don't give a shit about school when you're in danger," Peter argues, wrapping a hand around the wrist touching him as he settles on the couch, scooting as close as possible.

"What happened? All he said was you were okay but got beat up. Like, were you mugged or something? There's gotta be some tech we can come up with until the suit is done."

"Maybe reconsider that?"

Tony wished he had another hand free, because the kid deserved a flick on the forehead for that. He shifted enough to let Peter take his seat. The couch was fortunately deep.

"I'll work on it. I'm not sure what or who they were, but they were working for some group of vampires, the one we had a run-in with before. I think our lovely mayor is making them a little too ballsy."

Tony leaned back against the wing of the sofa's arm.

"They had abilities. I was a little outclassed."

"Oh my God," Peter whispers, shaking hands tightening unconsciously around Tony's wrist. That's his fault, too. The vampire thing was totally Peter's fault on top of the suit.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," he babbles. "You need a panic button. You need something to alert me so I can come help. I could have handled it. I'm your family and so we protect each other. That's how it's supposed to be."

"Do not apologize to me," Tony said, brows darting up in warning. "This isn't your fault. There is no fault to assign here. And you need to stop apologizing every time the world turns."

His mouth tilted to the side.

"Like I said, I'm working on it. But you can't cut class every time trouble comes sniffing around, or you'll be cutting all of the classes. I put myself out there. I invite this. I have my reasons, but I can't take ... you blaming yourself, on top of ten years of being Peppered. And you've got too much going for you upstairs to end up the GED kid because you were never in class."

"The classes are slow and boring; it doesn't matter," he huffs, reaching out to carefully pat the skin around Tony's black eye.

"What did they do to you? All the Doctor said was that you were okay. You don't look okay. You kind of look like crap. I'm patrolling tonight so I need to know what they did," he insists, because screw it. Peter knows he can find them. He knows he can take them, this time.

"Hey."

Tony moved his head so that he could meet Peter's eyes, holding the too-bright hazel gaze. There was too much emotion showing there, and in the set of Peter's jaw. He'd seen that look before. Worse, he knew he would be the same way if the position was reversed. But Tony was a whole flurry of bad decisions, and Peter needed to ... not be.

To be better than that.

"Don't do this angry. You need to not do this angry. They cast some kind of hypnosis on me, they used eye contact. I couldn't move to go for any of my stuff. We'll figure out a way to counter it, and when I have the suit finished ... we'll pay them a visit."

Tony sighed.

"Please just listen to me."

"They could have killed you if Strange hadn't found you," he argues, letting go of Tony's arm before he can do damage.

"They still could. They could show up tomorrow or, or tonight. They aren't gonna stop at just this. They're gonna kill you. They're just gonna take you away if I don't stop them," he gasps, chest getting tighter and tighter.

He has to stop them. He has to stop them right now because Tony is just human without the suit and if he loses him then that's it. That's game over. Peter can't do it, again.

"Yeah. They could have. But they didn't."

Tony reached around Peter's shoulders to pull him over, resting his head on the center of his bare chest, over the scars that spread out from over his heart. He covered Peter's eyes with his palm.

"And they could show up, maybe. But as long as I'm in the building, this is the safest place in this city I could be. PEGGI likes me too much to let me get kidnapped. We'll stop them when we have a plan. And with help."

"She didn't do a damn thing this time, did she," Peter spits out, letting himself be pulled in but still stiff with tension.

"I know you're not gonna just stay in this building until the suit is built, I know you won't. I can do this. I can take them. I gotta protect you, the suit is gone because you sacrificed it to save me. Mr. Stark, please. Please. I can't lose you, too."

"Okay, don't swear at the AI please, you'll hurt her feelings. I was out on lunch break when they grabbed me. Knew I shouldn't have given in to the siren call of the taco truck."

The jokes were flat. Tony was busy thinking. He moved his hand up to Peter's forehead. It was clammy but warm.

"I can't stop you from going out there, kid. And I'm smart enough not to try, because it'll just piss you off more in the end, and it won't work, and I'll end up remodeling another building."

He dropped his head to rest his chin on the crown of Peter's head.

"But at least promise me you won't do it alone. You don't have the experience yet. Take someone. Okay? Promise me."

Peter squeezes his eyes shut, sliding an arm behind Tony's back as he slowly allows himself to hug him back. God, this is worse. He wants to be mad, he wants Tony to lock him in his room so he can destroy it and scream at something.

"Only if you promise the same thing," he mutters. "And the panic button so next time I know and I can come. I lifted a building off me without your suit. You need me to back you up until you're protected. I need to know I can be there for you."

"I promise. A panic button. I won't even be mad if you leave during class, because I'll make sure only to push it if it's a serious emergency. Okay?"

Tony sat them both up again, groaning from the way the bruises pulled near his ribs.

"Because you're right. This isn't like ... any of the crap I've dealt with before. That's a little scary. It's a little scary that they might have political connections, too."

"Really?" Peter breathes, because he expected a fight on that. Something about focusing on school or who knows what.

"Yeah, yeah okay. I promise," he says, keeping a steadying hand on Tony's back and using his strength to prop him up. He feels light as air, as pumped up on adrenaline as Peter is.

"No going alone for either of us and a panic button for you. I, maybe make one that goes straight for you for me to wear, too. In case I can't get the mask on. I swear, I can watch out for you. I'll keep you safe."

"You're not a normal kid. And while any parent would want their kid to have as normal a life as possible, not just any parent is dealing with raising a very small Avenger."

Tony smiled, an expression that was wry and a little helpless. It was an odd position he'd put himself in, filling in for a father, a mother, a trainer, a leader. There was an instinct to protect Peter, because there was a terror of what might happen if he didn't, but ...

In two short years he'd be his own person. He had to be ready for it, and not just as Peter Parker.

"You know I'm supposed to be the adult here. It's not your responsibility to keep me safe. Also, Iron Man?"

Edited 2018-09-09 00:33 (UTC)

"I am not very small. I'm only like three inches shorter than you," Peter scoffs, frowning as he draws his legs up and leans back, taking in Tony's injuries with a more assessing glare.

"Family takes care of each other. We're family. And your kid can benchpress a car so yeah, not normal so not a normal situation. Protecting you is the actual very least I can do considering what you gave me."

Tony politely didn't mention that it was probably less than three inches, and that he wore shoes with lifts. Instead, he let Peter take his weight and reached for the television remote, turning it to the evening news.

"Okay, first or all, I'm no slouch at a dead lift either." And it was a joke, because next to Steve's seven or eight hundred pounds, next to Peter's three tons, and whatever else, Tony really was a bit of a joke. Out of armor.

"I shouldn't need to be protected, is the issue. When I do, it means I made a wrong decision somewhere. I need to do better."

"No you didn't," Peter protests, because he doesn't even have to think about it. Tony is never gonna convince Peter he's anything less than awesome.

"You're just not a reckless kid who got himself bit by a magic spider. You're a genius who sacrificed his two million dollar suit to save his reckless kid's life. So like, now I watch out for you."

That got a sigh out of Tony. It wasn't as if he didn't appreciate that Peter, for once in Tony's life, wasn't critical of everything he did. But sometimes he wished Peter would be, sell ... just a little more critical, for his own sake.

He was just going to have a hard life ahead of him, after sixteen.

"You're reckless because you care, is all. I think it's going to be delivery for dinner. You want to pick something out?"

All the pain medication was keeping Tony from being very hungry. Also the ache in his jaw. But Peter needed to eat regularly, more than most.

"Yeah, yeah of course. I can take care of everything, stay right there," Peter says, scrambling up and over the back of the couch, skidding around a corner to Tony's room. The insane, blinding anger has at least been temporarily replaced with the desire to take care of Tony as long as he'll let him.

He grabs all the softest, fluffiest pillows and the stupidly soft robe Tony likes to wear.

"Here, you need more back support. I'm gonna order Ramen. Easier to eat, I think. The good stuff with the kakuni. You want one of your fancy bubbly waters?"

Red, who usually waited for Peter on the roof after class was out, finally realized there was activity in the apartment again and came jingling in through the dog door to watch Peter get things together. Her ears were back, her expression curious and worried. She was a sensitive animal.

"Uh, no. Do you know how to make tea? The honeybush, it's in the red canister."

The ache in his chest demanded a hot drink, but also a lack of caffeine. He leaned back against the new pillows and let himself sink back with a sigh, perfectly comfortable for the time being.

"God, your aunt did such a good job on you. If my dad asked for a drink I would have given him the finger."

"Yeah well your dad was a dick to you and you're super nice to me so take some of the credit," Peter scoffs, scooping up Red with one arm as he trots over to the stove.

"May used to make me make her this weird matcha tea stuff. It was gross. I can handle whatever honeybush is," he says as he turns on the kettle and fetches the tea. "Gotta give Ben credit, too. He only died a few months before I met you. He did all the cooking and that kind of stuff, actually."

"That explains a lot," Tony said from his nest on the sofa. He'd been invited to dinner a few times, usually as cover for an eventual lecture about how hard he was working Peter. Dinner was always predictable, at least, in that it was predictably either burnt and a lost cause, or ... wanting something.

Tony could cook, of course, but it wasn't the same kind of cooking. It wasn't home cooking from a grandmother's recipies. It was dishes that could be picked up at a Le Cordon Bleu boot camp. Good, but a little too fiddly.

"I'm ... it's sad I never got a chance to meet him. Make a whole pot, alright? And get me the tonkotsu? Get yourself some takoyaki, too, like, two orders of takoyaki."

Peter liked them, and they were good cold from the fridge the next day. Tony probably wasn't making any bagged lunches for the next few days.

Edited 2018-09-09 02:30 (UTC)

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For Tony - Post Kidnapping

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