Fire erupts from the oven when Peter opens it to check on the casserole and he yelps in surprise. White foam covers him, the oven, and most of the kitchen as DUM-E puts out the fire with the fire extinguisher, and Peter wipes his face off.
He's so glad he had the sense to bring the robot up for this exact reason.
"Oh my god...Dad is going to kill me." He looks around the kitchen, taking in the mess he and DUM-E made and whines. "FRIDAY, do I have time to clean this up before Mom and Dad get home?"
"Your parents just finished their objective for their mission. They should be home any minute now." Tony's AI answers.
Peter sighs and elects to just lay on the floor and wait for his impending doom. "Good bye cruel world. DUM-E, be a bro and cover me." The robot obliges by spraying him with more foam from the fire extinguisher until it's empty. "Thanks buddy."
DUM-E beeps happily in response as Peter prays for the floor to open up and swallow him. When he had gotten home from school just a couple of hours ago, FRIDAY informed him that Tony and Stephen were out on a mission but would return by dinner, and the teen thought he would surprise them with a homemade meal. He thought he had enough practice from successful attempts when helping Aunt May, and he had helped Bucky on a few occasions, and he even followed the recipe to a T. He had no clue why the casserole caught fire.
Now Tony was going to gut him for destroying the kitchen...and possibly scrap DUM-E for parts.
Peter gulps when the familiar sound of a portal opening echoes through the floor. He hears shuffling very briefly before the footsteps stop abruptly when the owners stop by the kitchen.
"What the fuck?!" Tony yells.
Yup. He was gonna die. Tony was probably going to display his head on a stake outside the tower to warn other people what happens when you burn dinner.
"Peter!" Leave it to Mom to worry first. The man was his only chance of surviving his mistake. "FRIDAY, where is he?"
"On the kitchen floor, doctor."
Thanks FRIDAY, Peter thought as his parents scramble into the kitchen. Leave it to artificial intelligence to rat him out. The teen wondered what the weapon of choice would be. A knife? Fork? Corkscrew? That sounded dramatic enough for Tony to use.
Strong hands grab him and pull Peter into a sitting position, and the teen grimaces when a kitchen towel wipes foam off of his face. Peter braves looking up and finds both of his parents looking worried and he frowns.
"Why didn't you answer me?!" Stephen demands.
"I was hoping to spontaneously combust or have the floor open up and swallow me whole." Peter mumbles.
"Are you hurt?" Tony asks as Stephen continues to wipe off the foam.
"Just my pride."
"What happened in here?"
"I wanted to make you guys dinner...but it somehow caught fire and DUM-E doused it and me."
Stephen stops and looks at Tony, who looks at him in return, and they stare at each other before bursting into laughter. Okay, now Peter was starting to wonder if he maybe ingested some of the foam and died because he was not expecting this. His dread soon turned into irritation when the adults show no signs of ending their laughter, especially when tears start to trickle out of the corners of their eyes.
"I'd rather you stab me with a corkscrew now."
That only got Tony laughing even harder, but it at least helped Stephen sober up. The doctor wipes his eyes with a chuckle and helps Peter to his feet while he stands, leaving the engineer to laugh his ass off on the floor. He would calm down eventually.
"What's the real reason you didn't answer me?" Stephen asks with a soft smile.
Peter sighs and looks down. "I knew you guys would be mad at me."
The sorcerer tilts his chin back up with his hand. "Peter, you tried to do something nice for us. Accidents happen. You're really making a bigger deal out of this than it is. We can clean this up. The stove might need to be replaced though." Peter cringes but Stephen snorts. "That's not a big deal either. Your father sneezes out that kind of money in five minutes. It's chump change to him and you know it."
"I'm sorry."
"Nothing to be sorry for."
Tony heaves through his laughter. "I can't breathe!"
Stephen rolls his eyes and kicks his husband in the side, earning a startled 'oof' from the man, but ending his laughter.
"Ow! My spleen!"
"Actually that was your kidney." Stephen drawls.
"FRIDAY, call the cops and report domestic abuse!"
"Disregard that and order pizza for us and the team. Then have them come up." Stephen says .
"Yes doctor." FRIDAY responds humorously.
"Even my personal AI is against me." Tony says with a groan as he finally moves to his feet and ruffles Peter's foam covered hair. "Anyway, Mama Bear is right. It was an accident. We appreciate the thought though."
"You're not mad?" Peter asks timidly.
"Nah. We kind of needed a laugh. Just don't cook anything without some help for a while alright?"
The teen nods and Stephen brushes him off a little more. "Go take a shower cub. The others will be up soon."
"What about the kitchen?"
"Bird-boy still needs to make up for breaking a window. He can clean it up." Tony consoles him and Peter nods again before carefully making his way to his room.
Stephen and Tony wipe themselves off of any fire extinguisher residue and then trek into the living room to sit on the couch as the Avengers arrive little by little. Sam was actually the last to arrive, and Peter had already rejoined his family at that point, fresh out of the shower, when Tony points toward the kitchen.
"Wilson. Finally have something for you to do for breaking my window."
Sam follows his finger a gapes at the disaster. "What the hell?! What exploded?!"
"DUM-E got trigger happy. Chop chop birdie. You can take a break when pizza gets here."
Sam turns to Stephen. "But Mommmm-" He whines jokingly.
The sorcerer only smirks. "You're wasting precious daylight."
"Ugh. I bet Peter caused this mess. Playing favorites Strange?"
"Of course. He's the only one I signed up to raise. The rest of you are an unfortunate addition."
"Ouch." Sam says before braving the kitchen.
Natasha sits on Stephen's other side on the couch and proceeds to lounge back after throwing her legs over his and Tony's laps while Peter sits on the ground in front of Tony and leans back against his legs. Nat was one of the very few that could get away with getting comfortable like that, but she was also one of the very few that didn't cause trouble. Of course she didn't stop it either, but that was mostly because she knew it was a lost cause. For the most part, she tried to help keep Peter out of trouble and that was enough for them.
Everyone else spread out around the room, and when FRIDAY alerted them of the pizza's arrival, Scott was sent down to retrieve it. Stephen retrieved drinks through portals, chucking a Capri Sun at Lang when he came back with the pizza and set the boxes on the coffee table, and Peter browses through movies on the tv. To everyone's relief, he chose something other than Star Wars.
"Aww, Strange...is this a proposal?"
"Hey! Thumbelina! Quit flirting with my wife!"
"You're no fun." Scott grumps and sits on the couch next to Clint.
"Can I web him to the ceiling again?" Peter asks excitedly.
Tony grins. "Ye-"
"No." Stephen interjects.
"Too bad." Nat says with a grin.
Peter plays the movie as Sam joins them from the kitchen, and occasional chatter fills the room throughout dinner. When Sam found out what happened to cause the mess in the kitchen, he actually laughed and declared cleaning the mess was totally worth the story. His favorite part, everyone's really, was that Peter had asked DUM-E to cover him with more foam in an attempt to hide. Vision later said he felt better knowing he wasn't the only one who burned food, and Wanda offered her help if there was ever a next time. Peter grumbled there never would be but his parents knew him. He would try again eventually. It would probably be dessert though and either Wanda or Bucky were viable options as help.
Speaking of dessert...
Bucky holds up a bag of M&M's. "I brought pitching practice."
Tony groans. "Barnes, you are the worst." The engineer then grins and snags the bag. "Me first! Go long Underoos!"
Peter jumps to his feet and his father tosses a candy across the room, and the teen jumps up, sticking to the wall, and catching the chocolate in his mouth. Tony fist bumps Scott and continues throwing candy for the teen to crawl around and catch, and soon starts a candy war with the rest of the Avengers. Stephen at first rolled his eyes and stayed out of it, but when Clint nailed him on the forehead with a piece, he turns to the archer, and the man curses when the sorcerer conjures multiple arms.
"You've signed your death sentence Barton."
Tony loads him up with chocolate ammo, and Stephen hurls M&M's at Clint in rapid succession, and thwarts his attempts to escape through the air vents. The candy war lasts for a good couple of hours, the movie completely forgotten, and when they were finished, there were surprisingly few chocolates laying around.
"Sam. You gotta clean those up too." Tony declares.
"Oh, hell no!"