Hi Guys. Thanks you all for your support. FYI there will be some hints dropped about Peter's father, who will be very important to the sequel that I will eventually write. So if you figure it out, be good fans and don't spoil it for the others.

Manhattan - The Trisculon Building, Medical Wing

When Peter Parker woke up, he was wrapped in soft warmth and blinded by the light.

"Oh, boy. It's finally happened." Peter thought. "My dangerous, reckless, incredibly stupid hobby has finally killed me. This is the prefect beginning to the week."

Peter managed to sit up with a groan. His ribs were killing him. Blinking away the light spots on his eyes, he took in where he would be spending the rest of eternity.

"Oh, crap. I've gone to Hell."

Staring back at him were six very shocked superheroes and a couple of guys that Peter just couldn't figure out right now. This was so bad. He was so beyond dead, he couldn't even begin to process this. He ran the hand not hooked up the IV drip through his short hair.

His hair.

He jumped and pulled the covers over his head.

"You took my mask off!" he yelled at the top of his lungs. "You took my mask off! Why did you take my mask off?!"

He peaked out from the sheets when one of them cleared their throat. He was a stocky guy with black hair and glasses. He looked like some college biology professor. Not very Super Spyee.

"We, ah, had to make sure you were still alive." He said hesitantly. "But we didn't know you such a…"

He trailed off ineffectively.

"Squirt?" Asked the bow man.

The professor looked under his glasses, "That works."

"I don't need this." Peter said exhausted. "I am a Straight A-Student. I work for a raving lunatic to help my Aunt keep the house. I have a girlfriend. I do super-heroics on the side." He ticked off every point on his fingers. "I DO NOT NEED a bunch of shadowy government operated Supers knowing that I'm Peter Parker." He finished at the top of his lungs.

Captain America considered at him with a faint smirk. "We didn't know your name, Son."

Peter felt his face glow bright red with humiliation. Only one thing to do,

"So, this is where you do the brainwashing?" he babbled. "I always thought it would be more Late Frankenstein than this. Slimy, stone walls, Rusty metal tables with leather straps, you know the works. Or I'm I being stereotypical. I mean clichés like that just don't go in today's competitive mad-scientist market."

Now one of the men Peter had previously ignored moved to center stage. Looking at him, Peter couldn't see how he had missed him. Although, if there was one place where an armed six foot something black man dressed in head to toe black leather with an eye patch could be overlooked, it was in a room with a Norse god, a world famous Supergenius-Superhero-billionaire-playboy-philanthropist and the most decorated soldier who ever lived.

"Kid, I think you got some bad information." He said seriously. "Why don't you tell me where got the idea that we brainwash people?"

He somehow felt it would be a bad idea not to answer.

"It was about two, three weeks ago." Peter frowned, "I was chasing some spy trying to steal missile plans. I caught up to him, and ugh... kinda ripped his face off. He said SHIELD had experimented on him and if they caught me I would be in just as much trouble."

Tony Stark let out a haughty scoff "And I thought you had more sense than to believe what comes out of a Supervillian's mouth."

"Who do you think I am?" Peter scowled at him, offended, "It just got me thinking. So I started doing a little creative surfing. There about a hundred sites of ex-SHIELD employees saying everything from super-soldier experiments to engineering the Great Recession. The only one I could prove was the real deal was some guy named Sandhurst. He said that SHIELD gave him funding to create a mind control devises to create an army of obedient super-humans."

Everyone in the room looked at the one-eyed man, who sighed, shoulders slumped.

"Basil Sandhurst did work for SHIELD." He conceded. "He was also a mole for a terrorist organization called A.I.M. He used the funding we provided to brainwash half our staff. He's in the Vault. And not supposed to have access to technology of any kind, especially computers."

Another guy stepped forward. He looked like an Accountant In Black. "I'll look into that Director Fury. Don't worry."

Eye-Patch, Director Fury, nodded and turned back to Peter. The teenager for one was still a little wary of the whole thing. He was pretty sure that Fury could see it too.

"Believe me kid, if I could brainwash anyone, it would be the walking, talking migraine." He jerked his head in Tony's general direction.

"You're only saying that because you care." Stark grinned wickedly then turned to the young hero, nodding, "You're safe, kid."

An armored Avenger that could only be Thor nodded, "The Man of Iron speaks the truth. I did not trust SHIELD when I first meet them, but they are worthy allies."

Cap and Bowman nodded in agreement.

Peter started to relax a bit "Then why did you send these guys after me?" he nodded to the assembled Avengers.

"You were kinda making a mess, kid." The bowman piped up. "Someone has to teach to how to play the game."

"What Agent Barton is trying to say," The AIB stated, "is that SHIELD was going to make you one of the Avengers."

He stopped and gave Peter a once over, corners of his lips turning down in a concerned frown.

"But we may have to rethink this, Mr. Parker."

"Either way, you had better get some rest." Fury said "We'll figure something out when Medical clears you."

He clapped a heavy hand on Peter's shoulder. He looks up into Fury's one brown eye.

"I know this is confusing but we really are the good guys here." He pulled a tattered photograph from his pocket and hands it to Peter. "I hope this prove that."

Peter draws the sheet up to his chin and leans back into the hospital bed, eyes glued to the photo. His Parents, much younger, standing ankle deep in golden sand before a jeep, smiling broadly in desert camos; their arms were hooked around what looked like an equally young, two-eyed Fury. Peter looked back and forth between the photo and Fury. His head was spinning. He wasn't sure if it was the movement or the photo. Fury smiled at him; years of unspoken sadness were etched into his face.

"We'll talk later." He said, kindly.

Like that had flipped a switch, the electric buzz of adrenaline started to fade from Peter's blood. His mind still spun with a hundred questions but his eyes felt like someone had attached lead weights to them. He gently slipped the photo under his pillow before his head hit it. The last thing he saw before he was out like a light was the Black Widow gently closing the door. She was the only one hadn't spoken the entire time.

The Avengers Towers - Penthouse

It had become their habit. Every mission, every press conference, every time they were called together, they always had one last meeting before heading out. After New York, it was Shawrama. It had tasted like over-spiced mush to Natasha. Today, the whole team was winding down with drinks at the newly renamed Avengers Tower. And Tony wanted to know what they all thought of their newest associate. Tony and Natasha were at the bar with the rest of the Avengers were draped over various pieces of furniture around the living room.

Clint spoke up first, raising his head from the chair he collapsed in, "He's an annoying, whiny, juvenile little prankster." He let his head drop back over the armrest. He had only had three shots and he was already seriously buzzed. The bump their new associate gave him didn't help.

"You just don't like him because he broke your shiny toys and your head." Tony stated. "I like him."

Clint pointed at the ceiling, "He broke your toys, too."

Tony shrugged, "I know but he broke your toys first. And he has a great sense of humor."

Steve nodded. "He is a little rough around the edges, but he has a lot of potential. He beat three of us, with no training at all. And he has helped a lot of people."

"I agree with Steve," Bruce added, "Have you looked at his journals?"

He held up one of the journals that SHIELD had appropriated from the Parker residence.

"He has an incredible mind. He might even be smarter than his father and that's saying something."

Thor just shrugged, "I don't know what to think of the young warrior. I did not have the chance to test his mettle. I shall simply have to see."

The rest of them looked at Natasha, waiting for her opinion on the young superhero. She glared at her gin and tonic and would not look at any of them. She was lost in her own mind; her face was a featureless mask. She downed the drink in one gulp and picked up her car keys.

"We'll wait and see." She said as she walked to the elevator.

The rest of the Avengers watched her go. Clint was too out of it to notice her behavior. The rest didn't understand her enough to know something was troubling her.

Across Town – The Trisculon Building, Medical Wing

The SHIELD medical center was practically deserted at this time of night, which meant that Natasha only had to sneak past three nurses, two doctors and six sentries. Fury didn't want to lose his newest recruit to one of the numerous mob bosses and super-criminals he had somehow managed to piss off during his very brief tenure as a superhero, so he had stashed Peter deep in the base. Even so, it was almost childishly simple to disable the cameras in the hallway. She slipped into the room she wanted and saw her son lying still and quiet on the bed.

She hadn't seen him since he was a just a few minutes old. Now sixteen years later, he had landed right back into her life. It had taken her all of three seconds to recognize him. She had practically had a stroke when Bruce had removed his mask. Awkward, she smoothed a few strands of his dark hair. Her hand rested on his cool forehead; his steady pulse beating in her sensitive fingertips.

"Athlete's heart." she thought idly.

She wondered if he always had that kind of heart or if his powers had strengthened it. She wondered how Peter got his powers in the first place. Something told her that her time spent as the Red Room's lab rat had a hand in it. Had Peter have these powers from the moment she gave him up? It was almost too convenient that the son of the Black Widow had all the strengths of one. Or had he spent more than fifteen years as an utterly normal child? What could have triggered them if he did?

"Why had he decided to become a superhero anyway?" She thought angrily. "What could be so important that he would risk his life for?"

She didn't know why. She didn't know anything about him. Did he play football or run track? Or was more the academic type? She had repeatedly tried to forget about him; in her line of work, sentiment of any kind was enough to get you killed. If she had hesitation every time a child was involved, she'd have been dead a dozen times over already.

And yet late at night, defenses beaten down by her missions, she would look up the Parkers, scrounging for the barest details of his life. There was little enough to find: A school, a home address, a short article about time he accidentally blow up his elementary school gym during a science fair gone wrong, and two pieces about his parent's disappearance and his uncle's murder. She knew what happened to the Parkers on their final mission. It was no great secret around SHIELD, though she doubted Peter himself knew.

Nat sat down on the edge of the bed and carefully examined his face, gently stroking one cool cheek. He didn't look much like either of the Parkers; he didn't look much like her either. He was much darker and had a stronger chin and cheekbones. His mahogany hair was thick and wavy, not board straight, like Richard, or red and curly, like her or Mary. His eyes were hers, round and huge, but colored a smooth, depth-less brown. The full, pouty lips that graced his face were completely different from Richard's thin mouth or Mary's wide smile. Peter was very much his father's son.

Her heart caught on the memories of him. Yasha was probably the one person she never stopped loving. She wondered how he would feel about his son fighting crime. She wondered how he would feel about having a son at all. It wasn't something they chatted about between missions.

She felt something wet drip onto her cheeks; she touched it and realized they was tears. For the first time in years, since before she was a child, the Black Widow, the Ice Queen of the Red Room, was crying. And she couldn't make it stop. She curled around herself like a protective shell and wept silent bitter tears. Her heart felt heavy, sore and swollen. A muscle that has been used in years. It was stupid to feel this way. He wasn't her son. Mary was his real mother; his Aunt was more his mother than her. Even Fury, who had not seen Richard, Mary, or Peter since Somalia, had more of a right to be a parent than her. Natasha was just a stranger, and no amount of blood could change that.

That didn't stop her from seeing pieces of herself in the arch of his brow and the set of his mouth. It didn't stop the memories of her swollen belly that played back in her mind's eye. She had spent hours with hands resting on it, feeling him kick at the walls that had trapped him. It happen not stopped the feeling she had always gotten alone in a crowd or near sleep in her apartment. That maybe if she turned the next corner or opened her door, he would be there, waiting for her, for his mother.

She roughly wiped away her tears and got up from the bed. What had happened to him during his life was a gaping hole. The reasons for his behavior were a mystery to her. There was one thing she did know. He was her son, her only child, and she would do everything in her power to protect him. She was at the door when something made her stop. Almost without thought, she went over and pressed a kissed onto his forehead.

"Good night." She murmured as she left the room as quietly as she had come.