Tony Stark, Peter realizes, is the most erratic person he's ever met. He strides inside the hospital with a singular focus and the world seems to disintegrate around him. They take the elevator up to the seventh floor, looking for room 704. "Wait, won't they have cleaned it out by now?" Peter asks, practically tripping over his feet to keep up.

"Private hospital room, private hospital, died yesterday. I doubt it." Tony replies, but he ignores Peter quickly enough when a nurse walks by. "Excuse me, the man who died yesterday, in room 704. Was anyone with him before he coded?"

The nurse raises a brow but shakes her head slowly. "…No. He was alone."

Before she could ask why, Tony's already jetting by, shouting when he sees the janitor walk in through the door, "You! Stop that!"

The janitor whirls around, confused. "What are you-"

Tony bares his teeth, frustrated. Looking inside the empty room, he grabs the jug of water and throws it into the hallway. "Alright that should buy us some time. Wouldn't want anyone to slip right?"

The janitor looks prime to swear before Tony tugs Peter into the room and locks the door. Peter gapes, primed with distress. "What are you doing! He was just trying to do his job!"

"The one thing a detective needs is the scene of the crime. No scene. No facts. No clues. No case." And then turns his back on a still bewildered Peter.

He paces around the room examining every inch. There's the empty bed, still unmade, the monitors still beeping next to it, one of them connected to the IV drip. The bed tray is tossed to the side but there's still George's uneaten breakfast, some pancakes, cut neatly into small square pieces and some fruit. By now, the janitor has called security and a mousy haired man is banging on the door, "Sir! Let us in! Open up right now!"

Peter chews on his lip, "Maybe we should let them in. We can explain!"

"No time to do that. They'll just ruin everything." Tony shoots back.

He turns around, giving Peter a once-over and then beckons him over. "I know you're not a doctor kid. But maybe you can be a sounding board." he gestures to the bed, "The nurse said the patient was alone when he coded, but epinephrine is quick."

Peter nods, he read as much, "So then how did the killer escape before the heart attack?" Peter finishes.

Tony grins. "Exactly."

Peter's expression tightens, he walks around the bed, peers into the IV bag. "Mr. Stark?" he asks hesitantly, "Um, I don't know if this is a thing or not but couldn't he have put the stuff in the IV bag? That way he could just go and the bag would do his job for him?"

Tony's eyes shoot up. "No, no, that's definitely a thing. Though not exactly the way you described it." He gives Peter an appraising look, "Not bad kid."

Tony stands next to him, tapping at the bag. "Yeah…" he murmurs, "He could've dripped the epi in and just lowered the rate of the infusion pump." he straightens, looking excited, "Yes! That would have given him," he hums, teetering his hand, "just around ten minutes to get the hell out of here. The pump is set at 40 CC's…"

Peter's already pulled out his phone, typing furiously and then showing Tony the screen. "Average speed is a hundred." Peter swallows hard, "Someone messed it up."

But Tony looks invigorated. "So we have a method..."

The banging on the door gets louder and Peter feels the sweat on his palms. "Uhh Mr. Stark? I think they're gonna break down the door."

But Tony's upturning the garbage can onto the bed, giving him a little smirk. "Well saves us the trouble from having to open it right?"

Peter doesn't really know how to feel about that and just watches with more nerves inside him than he's ever had before, as Tony sifts through the trash, digging through coffee cups and stopping at a crumpled receipt. The door bursts open and two security guards walk in and Peter squeaks.

Tony just grins.

"Gentlemen." he greets, "One of you mind showing me to the principal's office?"

Peter kinda wants to laugh.

The two of them are waiting on chairs as the captain of the seventh, Nick Fury, talks down the administrator. "Um…does this always happen?" Peter asks, looking up at Tony with fretful eyes.

Tony snorts, sprawled on the chair, arms crossed behind his head. "Danger of the trade. Except usually, I don't get caught."

"Well it's cool that Captain Fury came to bail us out. That was nice."

Tony stares at him from the corner of his eye but doesn't say anything. Minutes pass before Tony's tapping his foot incessantly against the chair before shooting up, teeth clenched. "This is ridiculous. We're wasting way too much time playing kiss ass when we could be finding a murderer."

Peter tries to placate him but it really isn't going well until finally, the two of them are put out of their misery when Fury sticks his head out the door with a flat expression. "Stark." he calls, "Sidekick. Get in here."

Peter wants to retort but thinks better of it when he sees Fury's side-eye. The door closes behind them and the inside of the administrator's office is about as boring as Peter imagined. "This is Mr. Sanchez." Fury introduces and a small man with a growing bald spot and belly stares sternly at them.

Beside him, the man Peter bumped into that morning in the hospital stares. Peter flinches, just the slightest bit, as the memories of where he was running to rush back. If Tony notices, he doesn't say anything. Instead, he dives into his usual pleasantries in his typical drawl.

"I guess you run the joint." Tony says, unimpressed.

"A.K.A the guy who's still not convinced I shouldn't press charges against you?" Sanchez retorts, arms crossed.

Tony ignores him, looking at the other man. "And how about you big guy? You the one who gets things off the high shelves for him?"

Sanchez drops his arms, glaring but the other man hides his smile. His voice is calm and steady, like a rocking boat. "I'm Dr. Baldwin. Head of Surgery."

Tony lights up. "Where you treating the dead guy?"

"No. But he was pre-surgery. So technically, my jurisdiction."

Peter can see Fury's eye twitch like he's exasperated and he steps in front of Tony. "Alright. Here's how things are gonna shake out. After you apologize to Mr. Sanchez-"

Toy gapes, indignant. "I'm sorry, I think I misheard you. Because what I was hearing was apologize when I've just showed him how, when, and where a patient of his was just murdered in his hospital."

Fury glares, voice going deeper. "Once you've apologized to Mr. Sanchez, he'll release the body to our M.E and allow CSU full access to the room."

Tony leans back, slightly mollified. "And that's it?"

Sanchez frowns. "You should count yourself lucky you're getting that much."

Tony's face turns downright derisive and he swivels back to Fury as though appealing to him, "We need a hell of a lot more than that. His files, medical records-"

"Excuse me!" Sanchez interrupts, "That would be a flagrant violation of HIPAA guidelines, not to mention a blatant violation of his privacy."

"Privacy? He's dead! You ever see a dead guy worry about anything?"

"Stark."

The two hold each other's gazes for a moment before Tony scowls. He turns to Sanchez abruptly. "I'm sorry for barricading myself in the room and locking you out."

The man looks grossly pleased with himself and Peter feels the dislike creep up inside him. Tony may have been a firecracker and not exactly a by-the-rules kind of guy. But he was trying to solve a murder. A murder that would lead to his own aunt.

This guy just wanted an ego boost.

After Sanchez' ass had been appropriately kissed, the two were allowed to leave but the Captain takes one look at him and tells Peter to buzz off for a second. Tony raises his brows at Fury as Peter goes, looking too snide considering Fury could just fire him then and there. "Wow. Does your allergy to feelings extend to kids too? Sad."

"Funny. I was about to ask why yours haven't kicked in yet." Tony's blows out a breath, "What? No hives breaking out all over you yet?" Fury shoots back.

Tony looks unamused.

"What do you think you're doing bringing a kid to a crime scene?"

Tony raises his hands in the air, a mockery of an apology, "Hey, hey, hey. The kid's aunt just died and considering I'm trying to you know, what was it again," Tony snaps his fingers, "oh yeah, bring the killer to justice, I thought I could get some info."

"From a twelve year old." Fury deadpans.

"Actually, I'm pretty sure he's fifteen. So hah."

Tony turns to leave, over the conversation and all that it implies when Fury grabs his arm. He looks like he wants to say something. Tony even has half an idea of what it might be. But Fury just looks him in the eye, a hard expression. One that reminds him of his father. Except there's no anger. Just…an expectation.

Tony pulls away.

Eventually, the two make it outside and Tony hails a taxi. "We need to find the woman." he announces and Peter stares, confused.

"The woman?"

"The one who brought him coffee before he was murdered. There were two cups in the trash." Vaguely, Peter thinks he remembers, but he really couldn't be sure, "One of them had lipstick on the lid, so obviously…" Tony trails off and Peter stares.

"Wait…you think this girl…killed him?"

Tony curls his nose. "No. Most definitely not. But she can tell us more about George since evidently some people don't care about murders!" he yells, twisting to glare at the hospital.

Peter smiles at a passerby, hoping to convey that all was well. "But…we don't know anything about her. How are we supposed to find her?"

Tony hails a cab and opens the door to let Peter inside. "We don't. But Dave might."

"Who the heck is Dave?"

Tony pulls out the receipt from the trash and smooths it out, showing Peter the scrawled name and number on the bottom. "Dave, is the barista with the hots for our mystery lady. He works at the Coffee Culture."

"But...couldn't Dave just be customer? How do you know he worked there?"

Tony points at the receipt again. "Look closer kid. Our lady paid for two small coffees."

"But he gave her two large." Peter breathed, excitement on his face.

Tony grinned. "What can I say? Our guy's a flirt."

Peter's still sitting more or less in awe when Tony frowns at him. "That guy. Baldwin. When you saw him you flinched. Did he do something to you?" Tony asks, voice low.

Peter shakes his head slowly. "N-no. I've just seen him around is all." But Tony's still looking at him like he's waiting for something and Peter rubs the back of his neck, "He uhh, he was walking and I bumped into him in the hall when I was trying to get to…" he trails off but Tony looks like he understands.

Tony looks away. Peter stares out the window.

The inside of the Coffee Culture is exactly what Peter imagined it to be. Kinda indie, kinda hipster, very woody and flowery. There's a guy standing at the register and whaddya know, "Bingo." Tony clicks his tongue.

Dave smiles at them. "Hey, how can I help you."

Tony flashes the man's name and number on the receipt, "Was hoping to find the rightful owner of this actually."

Dave pales, gesturing to one of his co-workers to come take over and he meets them at the back. "Hey man listen, if that was your girlfriend or something I'm sorry. I didn't know. I give out my number to a lot of people."

Tony waves his hand dismissively. "No I don't care about that. The receipt says she was here at eight-thirty-five and she was wearing red lipstick."

Dave whistles. "Oh yea, the blonde. Cleavage, tight white skirt, heels."

Peter wrinkles his nose and sees Tony giving him an unimpressed side-eye.

"Oh man, and her perfume. How often do you meet a sexy doctor?"

Peter furrows his brows. "How could you know she was a doctor?"

"I think the white lab coat gave it away."

Tony nods, looking deep in thought before turning around. "Great, thanks. Good luck with the flirting!" and Peter trails on after him.

"Mr. Stark! I don't know why that lady was wearing a lab coat but she wasn't a doctor."

Tony raises a brow. "Oh?"

"My aunt is a- was- was a nurse." Peter shakes his head just the slightest bit, he can't let his feelings get in the way now, "And she was never allowed to wear perfume, it could trigger an allergy."

Tony nods. "Not to mention the fact that no doctor would wear their lab coat outside of the hospital."

Tony's looking at him again like he's appraising him and Peter feels the oddest feeling to stand straighter. He doesn't know why. He doesn't even like the feeing honestly. But a part of him wants Tony's approval. Wants it a lot.

He shakes his head again.

"So Miss. Cleavage isn't a doctor…but what about the lab coat…" Tony purses his lips, staring intently at the concrete before he jerks up in an epiphany. "Hey kid, need a new cleanser?"

Tony leads Peter to one of the swankiest skin care stores Peter's ever seen. The ceilings are high and lined with gold etchings and marble tiling. There are five attendants on the floor, all looking immaculate and all wearing white lab coats. "Mr. Stark there." Peter points to where a blonde woman with bright lipstick is fiddling with a display case.

"Excuse me miss?"

The woman, Jackie, is understandably shocked when they tell her the news. "Oh my god. I was just with him this morning. I can't believe George is dead. Oh my God." she leans against the glass case, just shaking her head.

"And how exactly did you know George?" Tony asks, trying to be gentle.

"Oh! We were uh, we were neighbors." she says softly, "A few months ago, he told me he was having trouble seeing. He just thought he needed new glasses." she tries to smile but then it drops, "And then they found the tumor."

Jackie shrugs, "After he lost his eyesight completely, I started to visit him more, read him the paper and things like that."

Tony's expression doesn't change. "What time did you leave the hospital yesterday?"

She tilts her head. "Oh uhh, a little after nine-thirty. Why?"

Tony's face is grave. "Because we think George died from something undoubtedly unnatural."

Her jaw drops, horror flooding her eyes. "You think he was murdered?" she whispers, falling harder against the case.

"Oh I'm sure of it." Tony replies and she looks like she's going to faint.

"Did anyone see you leave the hospital?" Peter interjects, suddenly feeling impatient.

"I don't know umm. I just- oh God. I can- I can give you my Metro card though. There should be a record of my subway ride."

Tony nods and she scurries behind the counter to grab her purse. In her vacancy, Tony leans into Peter, talking to him, but almost talking mostly to himself. "I put the guy's death at ten-thirty which means if she left at nine-thirty, she couldn't be our killer."

Peter nods. "Too early for the epinephrine."

Jackie comes back, handing over her card to Tony with a smile. "One last thing before we go. Can you think of anyone who would want to hurt him? A family member, a spouse, girlfriend, anyone?"

She looks regretful. "One of the reasons I always visited him was because he was always so alone. No family. Hardly any friends." she looks contemplative before sparking up again, "There was one other person that he talked to though. This doctor that used to come by at night."

Peter looks confused. "His doctor…visited him at night?" he shares a glance with Tony, who looks even more serious than before.

"Not his oncologist, just a doctor. From the hospital. They used to talk about his illness, his medicine, how to manage the pain. It seemed like he was helping George cope with what was coming."

Something sparked behind Tony's eyes. "His cancer was terminal?"

"He only had a few months to live…you didn't know that?"

Tony purses his lips. "His food that morning…did you cut that up for him?"

The woman pulls her lip. "His…? Oh, the pancakes. No, they were cut up when I got there."

Tony nods and pulls Peter away. The woman yells a quick, "Why?" behind them but Tony pays her no mind and Peter turns to shrug apologetically at her.

Tony's walking briskly, something tense in the hardness of his jaw. "This is bad."

"Mr. Stark?"

"Whoever cut up Mr. Miller's breakfast came back after Jackie left and killed him. I'm positive he's killed other patients the same way before and I'm just as sure that your aunt found out."

Peter's eyes go round, his breath coming in short.

"Your aunt was after an angel of death. And if I'm right. He's killed plenty more people before Mr. Miller and if we don't finish what your aunt started; he'll kill way more."

"Why would…why would someone do that?" Peter's voice feels choked.

He feels like he's dying.

"Look at what we know. We know the murderer has some medical expertise, we know that George was visited exclusively by a man claiming to be a doctor, we know that he cut an adult's pancakes into child-size bites for him to eat. Now why would a murderer do something like that?" Tony looks Peter in the eye, "It reflects a specific kind of mindset, a mindset that shows he was meeting George's needs not out of empathy but out of a craving for his dependence. And that mindset reflects a certain kind of killer. One who preys on the weak or the sick. Victims he believes are doomed to die."

Peter sniffs. "May wasn't doomed to die. She was healthy and strong and wanted to live."

Tony pauses. He lifts a hand as though to rest it on Peter's shoulder but lets it fall back to his side, limp. "None of them wanted to die early either. That's why he has to be stopped."

There are tears pricking at Peter's eyes and he rubs at them furiously. Despite every action he's taken revolving around May, he hasn't really had the time to think about her. Truly think about her and her life and her death. And he can't start now. He can't because if he starts he doesn't think he'll ever finish and there's nowhere to go back to that wasn't achingly empty and now that he knows what he knows, he can't go back without bringing the man who ruined their lives to justice. He has to. No matter what it takes.

He takes a breath. Collects himself. And looks Tony in the eye. "So we have to go back to the hospital right? That's his home base."

Tony scrunches his face. "We aren't doing anything. You are going to go home and I'm going to figure out what to do after getting a massive cup of coffee. God my head is killing me."

Peter frowns, hands shaking. "What do you mean go home? I can't go home! May is dead and the person who killed her is still out there! I can't leave that alone!"

Tony's expression darkens and for the first time, Peter feels intimidated by his stature, the way he carries himself like he had never met fear. "This isn't a place for kids. This isn't a murder mystery adventure or the Hardy Boys. This is real life people doing real bad things that have real consequences." he groans, rubbing at his eye, "This is on me. I shouldn't have taken you to the hospital. That was dumb. Anything could have happened-"

"But nothing happened! And I helped you! You know I did!" Tony opens his mouth to retort but Peter cuts him off, startled at his own audaciousness. He's still the same kid that stuttered whenever Flash bullied him right? Same kid who didn't know how not to trip over his own feet to be polite? But this is important. More important than anything.

"I'm the one who thought of the IV and the doctor thing and I know you probably already knew but I helped! I can still help! I know that hospital and the people who work in it and I-" Peter stops, suddenly feeling drained, his whole body sagging. "Mr. Stark." he finally says, looking up with eyes older than his years. "Let me find the person who did this. And then I promise, I'll leave you alone."

Tony hesitates.

"Please."

Tony makes a frustrated noise in the back of his throat, whipping around in a huff. "Fine. Fine! But no doing anything I don't tell you to." he sighs again, turning his head back to see Peter beaming, "If you keep me waiting I'm leaving you." he threatens and Peter bounds towards him.

"Thank you Mr. Stark! You won't regret it!"

They go back to visit the man Peter bumped into in his rush to May's surgery room that day, Chief of Surgery, Dr. Baldwin. The three of them are in his office where's he's trying to score a hole-in-one with his office golf set, sprawled across the carpeted floor. Dr. Baldwin doesn't look particularly convinced. "An angel of death? Here?" he twists his lip, contemplative, "No. We have some top notch brass over here. They would have caught it already."

Tony stuffs his hands in his pockets. "To be fair, it's just a theory." he raises a brow, "But then again, I've been right about oh," he turns to Peter, "would you say just about everything else or only just?"

Peter sighs, not even bothering to reply knowing Tony would just plunder through anyway. "The autopsy proved our original theory that there was more epi in that guy's blood than the doctors gave him after his heart attack." he plants his hands on Dr. Baldwin's desk, the thud jolting him from his put, "That's murder."

His ball misses the hole.

The doctor sighs, stretches out his back and gives Tony his full attention. "I'm very sorry to hear that."

"Yeah well, sorries aren't gonna do much. If I'm going to find who's killing your patients, I'm gonna need some info. Access to your medical records, a list of hospital deaths, and whatever logs you have about epinephrine supply."

Dr. Baldwin sets down his club, sitting down in his desk chair, twisting idly. "And you're talking to me why? Sanchez handles all the papers."

"Yeah. But Mr. Stick-Up-His-Butt'll say no. But you!" Tony smirks, "You tried to hide it, but I saw you smiling when I made fun of Sanchez's height. You don't like him. I don't blame you."

Dr. Baldwin fumbles but Tony doesn't give him the chance to pretend. "Point is, you're kinda a hot shot department head around here and we could use that kind of influent to throw around."

Dr. Baldwin sighs and stops swiveling. "Okay. I'll talk to him." he smirks, "And by talk, I mean threaten to hold a press conference about my grave concerns over the indifference over a potential murderer walking through our halls. That good?"

Tony's grin is borderline impressed. "Dramatic. Showy. I can work with that."

They get the dozens of boxes of records a few hours later and Peter finds himself in the police station conference room with a giant chalkboard lugged inside. "You're ridiculously stronger than you look did you know that?" Tony's staring at him like Peter's the most confounding puzzles as he carries three boxes stacked atop each other into the room.

Flustered, Peter almost drops the boxes all across the table. "I don't know! I grew up! Isn't that what happens to everybody?"

Tony snorts, "Not like that it doesn't. You get bit by a radioactive spider?" he teases.

Peter rolls his eyes. "Hah hah hah. A comic book joke. Really original for a so-called genius."

Miffed, Tony turns to the boxes, "If you can't appreciate my humor- for which I'm renowned for by the way- you can at least help and weed out all the patients who died from a heart attack recently, filtering for if they were seriously ill before."

Peter looks at the piles of papers and feels a swell of trepidation in his gut. But undeterred and more motivated than he'd ever been in his entire life, he dives into the work, sifting through stack after stack. Whenever he finds a name, he sets the file aside and marks it on the blackboard. Hours later, they've compiled a comprehensive, if slightly lopsided list of seventy-three names.

Peter groans, rubbing at his temples. "Oh my God that was a lot."

He feels exhausted. He's hungry, groggy and has the vaguest of headaches clustering behind his eyes, but Tony seems razor focused, perhaps even more so than that morning. There's a craze of obsession in his eyes, a jittery quality in the way he moves that makes him seem caught in his own mind. Peter can just imagine all the theories swirling away between the firing of all his synapses. "It's a lot of work and we're still not done. Seventy-three names and some, all, or none of them can be related to our angel."

Peter stifles back a yawn, narrowing his eyes at the board. "Well, some of these have to be natural causes. Sick people get heart attacks and die all the time."

Tony turns around, sharp and frazzled and Peter knows his temper is shot. "Exactly. Exactly! And without being able to tell who died of what, I don't have a set of victims, which means I can't see his pattern, which means we're no better off than when we started! God I need a d-" Tony stops, the anger vanishes from his face and Peter sees him struggle to contain himself.

And Peter just wants to help. He doesn't want to see that dispirited expression, the layer of shock, disappointment, and defeat. His mind races trying to think of something to get Tony's mind off whatever it is that has him that shaken when Peter jolts, jumping from his seat. "Forget about the victims." he says, nodding along to himself as the rest of the idea forms in his head, "The murder weapon. What about that? You can't just get epinephrine, you have to work for it." Tony's eyes snap to him, "Even if you had a prescription for it, it wouldn't be enough, which means-"

Tony shakes his head, disappointed. "Which means that he stole it? I already checked the pharmacy records. Epinephrine was stolen twice and not even on matching dates."

Peter frowns, shoulders dropping. "Oh…I guess I should've checked- wait." he lights up again, "What about those cart things? I see them all the time at the hospital when I went to see May." And it's the oddest feeling of his aunt's name not feeling like barbs on his tongue as all the pieces come together and he can feel himself getting closer to bringing her the justice she deserved.

Tony looks at Peter like he's the dawn. "Parker you're brilliant." Peter flushes with the compliment, ducking his head to mask how pleased he is, "Quick, grab the file and read me the dates of any missing epi."

Peter almost trips over his feet reaching across the table to snatch the file, skimming the dates as fast as he can. "Epi was stolen…January seven!" Tony turns around, circling the patient name with the corresponding date in a quick circle, "March twenty-seven," Peter continues, "April thirtieth, May fifteen, June second."

On June second, George Miller's name gets circled. Peter's eyes widen.

Tony stares at the board, "Happy finding your first serial killer day kid."

All Peter can say is "Holy shit."

"Hey. Watch your language. Or something. Aren't you twelve?"

"Fifteen. And you know that."

"I know nothing of the sort."

"Wait- Mr. Stark. If- if we're right. This guy's killed five people. That's…"

In a rare burst of compassion, Tony grips Peter's shoulder. "The worst part about this job is that it's needed at all. We can't prevent atrocities, but we can stop them from continuing."

"Yeah…I know. It's just…it's hard." Peter tries to muster up a smile. "But at least we have your pattern right?"

Tony shrugs, "Yeah, but now comes the annoying part. Wait here."

Peter tilts his head in tacit confusion as Tony walks to the door, stopping for a second before sighing again and walking out. "Rogers!" he calls and Peter watches as the blonde detective from before looks up from his desk, expression unenthused.

Tony's expecting Rogers to be standoffish, borderline rude for showing him up earlier that day but Rogers surprises him when he stands up, holding out his hand. Tony stares at it like it's the most foreign thing he's ever seen. Rogers looks at him expectantly and then lets his hand drop, rubbing the back of his head awkwardly. "I wanted to say I'm sorry."

Tony stares.

"I've been reading through some of the cases you consulted with and I get how you work now a bit better and it was wrong that I didn't welcome you properly to the team. The seventh is happy to have you."

Tony looks surprised, mouth slightly parted. "Uhh, yeah. No, it's fine. It's- I come off too strong sometimes, no hard feelings." he sticks out his hand and Rogers doesn't hesitate before he grips it in his own, this time keeping the squeezing to a polite minimum.

"Glad we got that sorted out. Thor's been riding on me all day to talk to you, so I can check this off my list I guess." he laughs and Tony notices the youthfulness of his eyes, the kind of blue that reminded you of summer days in the playground.

"Well since we're all kumbayah now, would you mind doing me a favor?"

After falling asleep sprawled across a bench in the precinct while Tony dug deeper into the data, Peter is awoken to weak coffee and a muffin. "Rise and shine kid, we have a murderer to catch."

Apparently, Tony's favor involved getting the NYPD to launch formal interviews with his twelve suspects. Tony walked Peter through his process, showing him how he cross-referenced all the male staff with their time card stamps to see if they were around at the time of the murder and then eliminated some based on whether they had access to the carts on the floors of the murders. Steve- being friends had first name privileges it seems- had called them up when they were ready to bring the two in to help move the interrogations along.

The two of them step into the elevator and Peter cringes when he sees the janitor from before. Oh if looks could kill. Tony grimaces, standing between him and Peter and clasps his hands in front of him, rocking on the balls of his feet. Peter catches his eye, jerking his head in an obvious hint and Tony pulls his lip harder before silently groaning. He turns to the man, "About before. With the water. I got a bit carried away. Sorry about that."

The man looks at him, unimpressed, but nods. "Oh. No worries. It's all right."

Except, when the elevator opens, he presses each and every button before exiting, looking directly into Tony's eyes.

The door closes and Peter facepalms. "You just had to throw that water didn't you."

Tony just drops his head.

They're supposed to meet Steve in the conference room but Tony pulls Peter aside for a little detour. They poke into Dr. Baldwin's office, it's empty, and Tony urges Peter to make himself comfortable while he helps himself to the doctor's golf clubs and balls. Peter's counting off Tony's third missed shot in a row when Dr. Baldwin walks in, hiding his surprise quickly. "Aren't you supposed to be doing interviews or something?"

Tony straightens, leaning slightly on the club. "I thought we could start with you actually."

This time, Dr. Baldwin doesn't try to hide his surprise. "Me?" he says, disbelief puffing up his words, "I'm the one who got you the files remember?"

Tony shrugs, "Yeah. But that's a great way to deflect suspicion don't you think? Besides, were you aware that all five of our victims were your patients? I suppose that's just a coincidence."

The man looks practically relieved as he settles into his chair. "Actually, no. It's the opposite of a coincidence. Your angel, he picks only the people he thinks are terminally sick right? Well," he flashes a pair of lazy jazz hands, "that's where I come in. I operate on the sickest people we have."

Tony turns up the heat, unconvinced, "Still. Your practice shows what many consider a cavalier attitude towards life and death. Your mortality rate increases every year."

But Dr. Baldwin doesn't back down. "Yeah. Because I operate on people no one else will."

"Last year, the hospital forced you to stop performing an experimental procedure when you racked up a 75% failure rate."

Dr. Baldwin's eyes narrow. "There are risks associated with innovation."

Peter crosses his arms. "Like lawsuits? Your methods caused two deaths that cost the hospital millions of dollars."

Tony raises a brow, like he's surprised Peter spoke up at all, but carries his momentum. "You've been on probation since then right? The kind of deal where one more bad move and you're out of here with a suspended license to boot." Tony glares, his voice taking on a sarcastic, accusing quality. "So here's what I'm thinking. You, big guy with a lot of ambition. You start killing people on purpose, to punish the hospital for losing faith in you. Or, you need an ego boost and wanna feel like God again. Either way- killer."

Dr. Baldwin doesn't flinch, just keeps staring at him with those steady, dark eyes. "Okay. You want to know why I'm not the killer you're looking for?"

Tony waves his hand in a by your leave gesture. "Oh please."

"This angel, if he exists anyway, kills people who are in pain. It's a mission of mercy. Me?" Dr. Baldwin's face darkens, "I'm a surgeon. My favourite kind of patient is unconscious on a table with a tube down his throat. These people, to be honest, I'm not really interested in whether they're suffering or not." he shrugs, "It doesn't really affect me, and that's what makes me exceptional at what I do."

There's a puff of dry laughter and Tony's straightening, shaking his head, almost incredulous. "So basically, you're too indifferent to your patients to be the angel of death." he turns to Peter, something astounded in his eyes. "Incredible. Best alibi I've ever heard."

"I mean, there's that. But there's also the fact that when George Miller was killed, I was all the way on a train from my home in White Plains."

Tony looks at Peter and Peter looks back. Another dead end.

The rest of the interviews are all a bust, each ending in a proclamation of innocence by an increasingly irate Tony. Dr. Cahill is brought to the stand. He's jittery, bags under his eyes, playing with his car keys, and Tony takes all of five minutes to dismiss him as a suspect. Unfortunately, the rest of their interviews turn up no leads either and Tony's so tense Peter's sure he'll freeze into marble forever the entire walk out of the hospital. It's only when they're standing waiting for their taxi that Tony loosens up, that old fire reigniting. "That car." He whispers. "That's that doctor's car. Cahill."

"How could you possibly know that?" Peter asks, incredulous.

"When we interviewed him. He kept fiddling with his keys in the most annoying way. But the car has the same sticker on the key, the basketball team, and it's the same model as the car key suggests. But…" he turns around, squinting at the hospital, then back at the car.

"So it's his car, does it matter?"

But Tony's expression is morphing into one of dawning gravity. "Steve liked him for the murders. I disagreed. But as of five hours ago, Dr. Cahill wrapped up a thirty-hour shift. Legally, he's not allowed to step foot into the hospital for another six hours."

Something hard tightens in Peter's stomach. "When May was done her shift she couldn't get home fast enough."

Tony turns to look at him, face grave. "So then what's our good doctor still doing here?"

The two burst full speed into the hospital, grabbing the attention of the attending security guard. Running to the floor Cahill was least seen on, Tony throws open one of the room doors to see Dr. Cahill sticking a syringe into a tube connected to a sleeping patient. Chills creep all over Peter's body, it freezes him to his core.

Dr. Cahill looks crazed, erratic, the circles under his eyes so much darker than before. The guards surge towards him, ripping him away from the bed as he yells, "Hey! What are you doing! Get off me! I work here! Get off!"

The security guards wrestle keeping Cahill constrained but Tony's paled, dropping his head. "Mr. Stark? We got him. Why aren't you celebrating?"

"It's not the angel." Tony says and Peter feels the disappointment wash over him in waves.

"What?"

"The syringe, it's empty. And that isn't an IV tube, it's for a PCA machine. We didn't catch a killer. We caught an addict." and his eyes are as savage as his tone as though the very state of addiction disgusted him, "He's trying to steal the morphine. Fuck." Tony kicks at the wall, holding in his hiss.

He whirls around, staring daggers into the now trembling doctor. "Bloodshot eyes, bags, general twitchiness. I chalked it up to sleep deprivation but I should've known. I should've known what you are."

The security guards haul Cahill out of the room but Tony's still fuming. They're in the Uber back home when Tony groans, rubbing at his eye with his palms. "Mr. Stark?" Peter asks, voice small.

Tony glances at him. Rubs his eyes harder. "No. Nothing." he says, trying to keep his voice as not angry as possible. "I just forgot about dropping you home."

All at once, the reality of his situation hits him like a tidal wave and Peter is quick to raise his hands, waving them around. "No! Don't worry about it Mr. Stark! I'll come back with you and help you work on the case. I know you're not just gonna leave it."

Tony looks like he's going to protest but Peter's firm. "I won't be sleeping anyway. I might as well be productive. There has to be something we missed."

Tony looks at him but doesn't say anything.

Tony lives in a tall brownstone in an older part of the city. Peter juts out his lip impressed. Whatever he thought consulting detectives made, this isn't what he thought. Tony notices his mild awe and quickly assuages any thoughts of making it big as a detective. "Courtesy of daddy dear." he says, gesturing to the house. "I don't cause a mess and he lets me keep the house. Not a bad deal."

"Does he live here with you?"

Tony curls his nose like he's just smelled something absolutely foul. "God no. No, he's probably in the London house right now. Maybe Paris." Tony pulls his lip, something sardonic, "Anywhere far away is good enough for me."

The inside of the house is dark, definitely in need of repair but not in a way that makes Peter want to turn tail and leave. It just needs a fresh coat of paint, maybe some remoulding. But it's a beautiful base, solid, understated, elegant in a way. The floor opens up to a set of stairs leading up, a hallway down to the kitchen and a giant living room to his right where a giant oak table is sprawled in the middle cluttered with notes. On the wall behind it, a collage of the entire case. Photos of the victims, files, highlighted notes, bits of tissues scrawled with words tacked next to newspaper clippings and other memorabilia.

"Woah." Peter breathes, walking up like he's entranced, tracing the collage.

He skims over the evidence and there's something about everything being clustered all together that makes his brain work faster. Different. Like his neurons just couldn't stop firing. He stops at Allison Carter's file and just freezes. "Mr. Stark? Come look at this."

And Tony's looking skeptical, probably because he's combed over those papers over and over for hours, but comes next to Peter anyway. He points at Allison's file. "All of the angel's victims were terminal. Except for her. She was killed before Mr. Miller."

Tony's mouth pinches, "She'd been sick. Really sick. She was in the ICU for two weeks."

Peter nods, but his energy builds momentum as he points to the notes section of the file. "Yeah but look, they gave her a coronary artery bypass graft. That's a huge surgery. I read about it when I was looking into ischemia. And look at these notes, she was recovering. It was slow, but she was getting better."

"Mr. Stark." Peter's voice is loud and sad, "She wasn't going to die."

Tony snatches the file, staring at it with the intensity of an imploding star. "Then why did the angel make an exception for her." he mutters.

At that moment, Tony's phone rings and his fingers fumble to pull it out of his pocket. He glances at the scree, slides to accept the call and puts it on speaker. "Captain." he greets.

"That druggie doctor you picked up today?" Fury starts, "Guess getting caught gave him a conscience. He's talking. Told us he went into a patient's room to siphon off some of his morphine when he heard someone coming in. He hid in the bathroom and heard a guy he didn't recognize talk to the victim for a whole hour."

"About his condition?" Tony presses.

"Yup. Condition, medicine, how long he had to live. How exactly the disease was destroying his body. And apparently, that wasn't their first conversation. Our guy seems pretty confident he was a doctor. Anyway. The guy left and our guy walked out too and the next day, Sutter died of a heart attack."

"And I supposed he didn't tell us this sooner because he couldn't explain what he was doing in Sutter's room huh?"

"Bingo."

Tony clicks the phone off and turns to Peter, a wild excitement in his eyes. "Alright kid, we're back on track. This proves the angel hypothesis. Someone with the exact description as the man who approached Miller also visited another victim. Which means we have to go through every bit of data again to figure out why Allison was the exception and how your aunt got involved in any of this. But first," he stands up, heading out the door. "Peter, you get started. I need to pharmacy hunt."

Peter is woken up from where he's hunched over the kitchen table, a paper still clutched in his hand by an energetic Tony. "Kid. Wake up. Kid!"

Peter groans, wincing as he stretches out his cramped back "Misser Star'?" he rubs at his eyes and sees Tony dangling a form in front of his face.

"Look at this. It's Dariya Ruseckas' consent form."

Peter swallows, forcing his brain to focus, "Yeah, she's the uhh, the third victim."

Tony nods, impatient, "Yeah. But look closer. Look at the handwriting."

Peter peers at the page before snapping his head up. "It's different. She wrote her own name but someone else filled out the form."

"Exactly. And look at the initials of the nurse. A. J. It stands for Anichka Jones. Jones has to be a married name because Anichka is as Ukrainian as it gets. Which explains why she filled out the form because Miss. Ruseckas, born in the Ukraine, obviously didn't speak enough English to fill it out herself."

Peter's still staring like he doesn't quite get the point.

"The killer liked to talk to his victims. For a long time, multiple times. Getting to know them was a huge part of his process. So? How could he have spoken to a woman who didn't know English unless he knew Ukrainian?"

Peter lights up, rushing out from his seat to find the personnel files. "Don't bother. I already looked through them all."

"And?"

"Not a single doctor knows it." Tony announces.

Petr deflates, something almost like anger sparking inside him. "Then why are you so happy? We're still nowhere then!"

But Tony's lips curl into a smirk. "Because, not all doctors stay doctors."

A quick call to Steve and a Mr. Danai Gura is waiting in the interrogation room like he hasn't a care in the world. Peter's entire body shakes when he sees who it is. The janitor from before. The janitor with the spilled jug of water and the elevator buttons looks at him and smiles. Tony looks grave, taking Peter by the shoulders and leading him to the room behind the window so he can watch and listen to the interrogation without having to go inside. "Stay here. I'll come back to explain everything."

"He- he killed all of those people and May." Peter whirls around, eyes pained and desperate, entire body trembling, "what about May."

And Tony's out of his depth. Never one to get into the nitty gritty of emotions and unable to deal with his own traumas let alone those of others. He doesn't know what to do. Can't even imagine what to do. So he does what he always does, throw a snappy one liner and leaves before anything can get any realer. "If he's the one who hurt your aunt, I'll get him."

Tony strides into the interrogation room, sitting across from Gura on the chair, lips pulled in a tight smile. "Your lack of accent is pretty impressive you know that?"

The man nods. "Thank you. I learned English as a boy."

Tony leans back in his chair, cavalier, nonchalant. "You know, if I had met you in the street, I would never guess you were a native Ukrainian. But at work, well," Tony shrugs, "the tools of your trade gave you away. The blue and yellow rags on our cart, always good to be patriotic, the university on your personnel file. Olesky University." he declares in a grand voice, "Congratulations. Arguably one of the best medical schools int eh country."

"Not arguably." the man replies.

Tony pulls out a file, placing a photo of each victim on the table. "Well since we've established your medical prowess, how about you help us out. Each of these people here were murdered."

Gura raises his brows. "As I recall, all of these patients were very sick. Dying."

"And that makes it okay to kill them?"

The man leans forward, voice low. "When a patient is in pain, dying is not a tragedy. It is a release."

Tony sneers. "You make it sound so noble. Murdering defenseless, sick people."

But Gura doesn't flinch. "You haven't explained to me why I'm here yet."

Steve walks into the room, throwing down a warrant on the table. "We got a warrant to search your place Mr. Gura. We found something weird," he throws a little black book down, "an entire log filled with medical notes, written by you by the way, exclusively about these patients."

Tony glares. "We know you're the man who killed them."

Gura snaps, straining against his cuffed hands. "I freed them. I freed them from the pain-wracked prisons their bodies had become. I studied them, I talked to them. I confirmed they had no chance of recovery. Only the chance of a painful death. I showed them mercy."

But Tony is relentless. "What about Allison Carter? What about her? She was getting better. How can you call that mercy."

The man scoffs. "People do not get better from cardiac cancer."

And for the first time, Tony is at a loss. "What are you- She wasn't dying of cancer. She had bypass surgery. Her blood pressure was improving, her oxygen saturation-"

"NO." Gura roared. "You're wrong. They found a mass in her heart."

"She had her entire life before her."

"No! She was dying! You're no better than Soviet Ukraine." the man says in disgust, "Making up lies to suit your truths. I'm done talking."

Tony slams his hand on the table. "You're done when I say you're done. There's still one murder unaccounted for. May Parker. What did you to do her? She find out what you were doing and you silenced her before she could come forward with the truth?"

"Ms. Parker died in a car accident."

"A car accident someone intended."

"Nobody knew about me. No one. I did nothing to her. Nothing." he glowers, looking straight into Tony's eyes. "I'm done talking."

Peter storms out, not knowing what he's going to do but knowing he can't stand there any longer watching this guy get out of confessing to the murder of the only person he still had left in his life when Tony catches him in his arms, steadying him with an unrelenting grip. "Peter." he commands, "I know it's hard. But he's not lying."

Tears prick at Peter's eyes as he wrestles out of Tony's grip, but Tony's hands are firm. "What do you mean he's not lying! He basically confessed to killing those five people and May knew! She knew!"

"Yes she knew but he didn't know that. And he didn't know Allison's true condition either. Something's wrong. Something is-" Tony freezes, looking like he's caught in a vision Peter can't see.

"Someone else knew." he whirls around, letting Peter go, staring at the interrogation room door. "Someone tricked him."

Gura acted alone but was not nearly as isolated as he thought he was. Tony grit his teeth, trying to think of why the man would think Allison Carter was terminally ill when her record pointed to a path of perfect recovery. His eyes flit to Peter and then back to the floor. May Parker was the key. She had to be. But how she fit into the puzzle was as perplexing as the original question.

He needed more data. But it had been hard for him to get it when Peter was glued to his side at every moment desperate to work his brain past being able to think about his grief. Resolved, Tony shoots up from his seat, giving Peter a quick goodbye before walking briskly out the station. Forty minutes later, he's in a café with Marisa Fajardo. She has a gaunt expression in her eyes and that slow way of walking the mourning so often adopted. As though they don't have the energy to keep up with the rest of the world.

"Thank you for meeting me."

"Anything to help." she smiles weakly.

"The day May died, is there anything you can tell me? Absolutely anything, no matter how small."

Marisa frowned, her fingers curling anxiously around the handles of her handbag. "N-nothing unusual. It was just a- it was just a normal day." she hiccups and then composes herself, "I came into work at seven-fifteen, I was a little late because the line for the coffee was longer than usual and May said she was having a rough day so I wanted to make her tea for her as a little pick me up." she laughs, wiping at her eyes.

"Did you say make her tea for her? Why not buy it when you buy the coffee?"

"Oh no, May was really adventurous when it came to her teas. She liked to try new ones every month and she'd bring a little jar of it to the break room and make herself a cup every morning. I just got a cup of hot water since it was faster than boiling it ourselves."

"Anything else?" Tony presses, gentler this time.

"I made her the tea, we had ten minutes to drink our stuff before we split ways to go on for our shifts. I saw her later that day, she was arguing with um, a pharmacist. I don't know what about. But she sounded furious. But I got a call on my pager and I had to go and then she…she left without saying goodbye and I- I'm sorry. I wish I could be more helpful."

"Don't sell yourself short Mrs. Fajardo. You helped quite a lot actually."

Tony leaves Peter at the station and it's hours before he comes back. There was a jittery quality in the way Tony moved and something odd in his eye like he was keeping a secret. When he left, Peter tried to go after him- "I want to help Mr. Stark!"- but Tony had said he'd do more harm than good where he was going and it was best for him to stay there.

Detective Odinson knocks on the conference room door holding a bag of bagels and a juice box. "Fancy sharing a meal?" he asks and Peter quirks a smile, gesturing for him to come in.

"Stark really just up and left you here huh?"

Peter shrugs, taking the bagel from his outstretched hand.

"I'm Thor by the way."

"Peter."

Thor grins and he strikes Peter as probably the most genuine person he's ever seen.

They eat in silence for a bit before Thor claps him on the shoulder, "I wouldn't worry about it. Stark leaving, I mean. He's a bit of a loner. But he's efficient. Fury said he did some impressive stuff back in London."

Interest piqued, Peter tilts his head, "Did he move here recently?"

"I don't know when he moved here, but he started working here just a couple days ago." Thor snorts, "But it's not like he's getting paid so he's more like a glorified intern." The thought makes him chuckle and it booms like thunder.

Peter's surprised. A guy like Tony, sharp, quick with results, reliable…didn't seem like the kind of guy who couldn't land a job. But then he remembers the brownstone and all the conditions tied to its use. "I guess he must be rich then huh?" he says, feigning disinterest.

"Steve did some digging before he came in, ran a full background check. His father's Howard Stark." Thor's voice drops, shaking his head, "I don't envy that."

Silently, Peter agrees. He knows of Howard Stark. Who doesn't? A Forbes favourite, a Times cover one, two, three times, the subject of articles and news. You don't get to be the world's biggest arms dealer without garnering some notoriety.

"Anyone know why he came to New York?"

"Not a clue. You should ask him."

But Peter has a feeling that would be a pointless task.

Tony arrives an hour and a bit later looking worse for wear. Behind him, escorting an eerily calm Dr. Baldwin, Detective Rogers. Thor glances at Peter, getting up to meet his colleagues, leaving the door open in a silent permission to let Peter follow. But Peter feels floored. He doesn't know what to do with himself. He doesn't even know what he's feeling. He can't really breathe. There's static all in his brain. But Tony catches his eye, his expression tight.

And Peter knows.

Tony's left the observation room door open and Peter knows it's intentional. He stands in front of the one-way mirror, arms wrapped tightly around himself as he watches Dr. Baldwin sit across Tony, stone-faced.

"So if everyone here doesn't mind, I'm just gonna cut to the chase." Tony starts, a hard edge like steel in his voice, "We all know you're a smart guy doc. Brilliant even. You agree with that?"

Dr. Baldwin smirks, "If you're one step ahead long enough, people tend to call you that. You should know right?"

Tony shrugs, deliberately nonchalant, "Oh yeah, sure. But you know," he leans forward, "the real problem with brilliance is that you end up forgetting that other people can be just as fucking brilliant."

Tony opens the file in front of him but doesn't pull anything out yet. "Yesterday, it occurred to me, that I probably wasn't the first one to figure out there was angel of death in General Heart. I wasn't even the second." He pauses and Peter sees him shift his face just the slightest bit to the right as though to look back at him before he stops himself, "But I'll get back to that. Nope!" he stands up swiveling to stare at the bemused doctor, "Someone else got to that conclusion first."

"You mean someone knew and didn't say anything?"

"A brilliant someone. Someone who would have had particular reason to pay close attention to the last two victim deaths."

Dr. Baldwin sighs, "If you're referring to me, I can assure you I had no idea what Gura was up to."

Steve crosses his arms, expression hard. "We have the morgue records. There's a clear paper trail of you going to examine the bodies of the first two victims."

"Yeah. They were my patients. I wanted to know what happened. Since when was that a crime."

"Oh it's not." Tony chirps, "But realizing they were murdered and then keeping quiet probably is." he puts a finger to his lips, turning to Steve, "I'm still new to this whole American law thing, but I'm pretty sure that's a big no-no right?"

"But that's the thing." Tony continues, "You saw the ischemia, connected the dots, and realized, you had a solution to all your problems. Because at the same time, you had made a mistake. A pretty big one. You left a clamp inside Allison Carter's chest after a routine bypass surgery."

Baldwin glares. "I've had enough of this slander." he moves to get up but Steve takes a step forward, "I wouldn't do that if I were you."

Tony continues as though nothing were amiss. "It was inevitable that Miss. Carter would develop complications, "I mean, she had a clamp in her chest. And the worst part is, her problem was easy to fix, just open her up and take out the clamp. But that's the thing." Tony tilts his head, "You were on probation. One more mess-up and it'd be kaput for you. Unless…unless the angel could make it all go away." he finishes softly.

"You realized he targeted patients who were terminally ill and in extreme amounts of pain, so you made her an attractive target." Tony begins listing things off his fingers, his tone cruelly cavalier, "First, you found a biopsy for a patient dying of cardiac cancer, a bit of computer magic later, and bam, it's Samantha's file. Second, you made sure Allison wouldn't get a second of peace, you made sure she was in pain so the angel would end her suffering. That was simple, you just reduced her pain meds, which also helped in making her too delirious to really talk to anyone at all. Third, the angel takes the bait and Allison dies."

"You thought you had gotten away with murder. But you didn't, did you? Someone found you out. The second person to figure out there was an angel in their midst. May Parker found the signs of epinephrine overdose and started her own investigation. She was digging through the files and found George Miller's. That wouldn't be enough to tie it back to you but you couldn't risk her finding about Allison Carter. If someone found the angel, that could lead everyone straight to you. So you killed her."

By now, Baldwin was getting red, his entire body so tense it looked like he might burst. "I don't know who that is." he scoffs and Peter almost sees red.

"You'd like us to believe that, but it's something her nephew said to me. That when he went to see his aunt in surgery, he saw you rushing from the observation window. At first, it struck me as a coincidence. But then I remembered the file she had in her room and started thinking, what if whoever knew about Gura knew about May."

Tony shrugs, "After that, it was easy to work to find through the logs that you had taken over as lead on May Parker's surgery, probably a safety precaution for you, if your original scheme hadn't worked you could just botch the surgery. But you didn't need to do that. You're the head of one of the most important departments in this hospital. It would've been easy for you to go in and take May Parker's medical file and find that she'd been prescribed bupropion. Getting a bottle of it from any nearby pharmacy would have been easy as was slipping it into her purse."

"You can't prove-"

"Actually," Steve interjects, "we can. This," he says, slapping down a grainy security cam photo, "is a picture of you at a Pharmacy on fifth getting a prescription we confirmed was the same kind found in May Parker's purse."

"And what's more interesting," Tony continues, "is that we examined May's tub of tea. Interesting flavor, a pumpkin rooibos tea. Side effects include agitation, insomnia, vomiting, and huh, whaddya know, seizures." Tony slams his hands down on the table, voice picking up in rage, "You crushed high dosage bupropion pills into her tea knowing it would accumulate alongside all the rest she used to take right after the death of her husband. You knew that high doses at her age would trigger a seizure and you also knew it didn't matter where it happened. As long as you could get her into a hospital bed, the angel would do the rest. But you were lucky. Her seizure happened when she was in a car, killing her far away from your crime scene."

Dr. Baldwin's expression doesn't change, but he lets out one slow breath and his whole body seems to shrink and Peter just- his knees buckle, colliding against a filing cabinet, straining his weight against it as though it could hold him and his grief upright. He's sobbing, but it's so intense it's silent, his lungs not being able to take in enough air to even cry. His shoulders shake and his hands are pressed violently against his face like he could push all his sadness away but the weight is too much to bear and he falls to the ground.

May was murdered. She was murdered. She was murdered. Murdered in the most despicable, premeditated way. Murdered because she knew too much. Murdered because she was brave and fearless and wanted justice. Murdered because she bore the burden alone.

Tony continues to rail into the now silent doctor but Peter doesn't want to hear about the evidence or the upcoming trial or his Miranda rights. He turns off the speaker and just ducks his head between his knees and finally lets himself have the breakdown he'd been avoiding all this time.

He's brought justice to May.

He can cry now.

Tony can hear Peter's sobbing even through the thickness of the walls and when Steve takes Baldwin to holding, he asks Fury if he can keep the observation room off limits for a while. Just until he calms down.

"I'll let him cry it out now. He's gonna have a lot to deal with when he comes out." Fury says, lip pulled in a sympathetic line. "Funerals, wills, figuring out where to stay. It's not gonna be easy."

There's a hint in his voice somewhere. A map Tony doesn't have a compass to read. He stares at the captain for a second before Fury just shakes his head and walks away. "You could try talking to him you know. Show the world some proof that you really have a heart in there instead of the tin can you like to pretend you have."

Tony makes a face, somewhere between a glare and half-hearted sneer. He doesn't need to stay here. He really ought to just leave. He's not obligated to do anything and owes nothing to anyone. But he waits outside the door anyway. He waits until the sobbing stops and the sniffling gives way and then there's just the empty silence after a long cry, the hint of defeat and exhaustion. Tony knocks twice before opening the door, standing over a still slouched Peter, eyes puffy and red. "Hey kid."

Peter doesn't say anything. Tony really doesn't expect him to. When his mother died…well…Tony might as well have disappeared off the face of the earth from how he little he wanted to exist in it after Maria left it.

Peter's still staring at him with those brown sad eyes and Tony still doesn't know what he's even doing here. He just knows that something inside him wouldn't forgive him if he left. "I know this is probably the absolute worst timing in the world, but then again, is there ever really a good time for life-changing conversations?"

Tony sighs, rubbing at his hair before sliding down the wall to sit next to Peter where he's hunched against a filing cabinet. "You did really good kid. If it weren't for you, I'd have had a lot harder of a time connecting all the dots. You made your aunt proud."

Peter's lip wobbles and he curls in on himself.

"And I know this is the last thing you want to talk about, but- you have a lot of choices in front of you Peter. And choices tend to be the worst thing in situations like these. But it is what it is. You could walk out that door and we'll get you to any relative you want to live with. Or put you in touch with social services. Or I'll give you every resource you need to get self-emancipated and you could go at it in the world any way you want."

Peter looks miserable. His lip trembling, fingers curling tighter around his sleeves. "Or," Tony says softly, "you could come with me."

Tony doesn't really realize he's serious until the words are fully out of his mouth. He can't believe he said them. He can't even believe he's thought them. But they're out and they're heard and Peter's eyes are wide and he's completely frozen and Tony starts rambling because he doesn't know what else to do in the silence between them. "I think you have the makings of a great detective in you. You're sharp, smart, observant. With some training- a lot of training- you could really be something."

"Of course, you'd come live with me in the brownstone free of charge and I'll give you some money every month. Think of it as an internship stipend. You'd be like…an apprentice."

Peter still isn't saying anything and Tony feels his cheeks warm and it's…unusual…for him to feel flustered. He's never caught unawares. He's always one step ahead.

But he's never been good at things like this.

"You don't have to say yes obviously. It's completely up to you. I just wanted you to know all your options…before you decided anything." he stands up, not really looking anywhere in particular. "I just think it's easier to rebuild your life when you have something to use as the bricks and mortar. You were good at the job. And just as important, I think you enjoyed it." he catches Peter's eye and flashes him a small smile.

"But I'm sure you probably just wanna be alone now. God knows I did when it was my mom. But I'll be out there if-"

"Mr. Stark." Peter interrupts, sniffing and wiping his nose with his sleeve. "I want to go with you please."

Tony's heart pounds. "Are you sure? This won't be easy. The work is hard and my training is worse."

Miraculously, wondrously, Peter cracks the smallest of smiles. "Oh I'm sure." his expression falls and it's almost wistful, almost self-deprecating, "I don't have any family. I only had May. And I don't want to be a foster kid and I don't want to be alone."

He's a smarter kid than Tony was. Isolation had gotten him nowhere. It was branching out like a shy sapling that had shown him true happiness. He sees a flash of sharp and playful eyes. A sultry laugh. A bottle shattering on the floor. But happiness is all too fleeting. He pushes the thoughts away, looks at Peter, real and in front of him. He's so young. Impressionable and malleable and eager to please.

Tony doesn't know what he's doing. He has absolutely no clue. But he sees something in Peter. Something remarkable. Something that needed just a little bit more refining, a little bit more polish. And then it could be great.

And maybe. Maybe. He liked the kid. Just a little.

"This is weird right? It's super weird. I feel like we're in a cheesy Christmas movie."

"No offense Mr. Stark. But you're like, the weirdest person I've ever met. And I just- don't care anymore. About weird or normal or anything. I just wanted to make sure May could rest in peace, knowing whoever hurt her was put away. And now I just-" he stands up, legs shaking, "I really like what you do. You help people. And I want to help people too. I want to make sure everyone else gets justice too."

Tony stands with him, something like respect in his eyes. "Yeah. I think we can pull that off."

There's a moment of silence before Peter starts walking to the door, sending him a little smirk as he goes by. "And if this is a cheesy Christmas movie, I'm still waiting for the really big Santa reveal and my Maserati."

Tony scoffs, walking in step with him, relieved they can banter instead of ruminating in grief. "Can you even drive? Do they teach toddlers that in school?"

"I can drive!...kinda. I mean. I can drive but I've never really…driven."

"That means no, by the way. In case you didn't know that."

"Can you drive? You just uber everywhere!"

"Hey- I'm an adult. I have money. I might as well use it."

They bicker up until the uber comes and keep going as it drives. There's something comforting about it. Something secretly tender. Peter doesn't really know if he made the right choice and if this entire arrangement will implode into disaster or be the best thing that ever happened, but he's open to trying and he's willing to see what happens.

They pull up in front of the brownstone and Tony's phone dings. Tony whoops, getting out of the car quickly. "Pete, you're just in luck. Brucie just finished the autopsy. The Delany case is back on track. Come on, I'll get you up to speed inside."

Peter steps through the doors and knows he's in an entirely different world. But instead of apprehension, he just feels hope.

So at first I was like oh! Why not use Marvel characters as the extras! But then I realized I could never make one of the heroes the murderer and it would be so obvious who it was if I made them a villain so OC extras unfortunately is the only recourse :(

Anyway, Peter deals with missing school and adjusting to his new life next chapter as the mystery of who killed Anabelle Delaney unfolds...