{*Another chapter my beautiful readers. I nearly abandoned this story but all your comments and support kept it alive! I thank you all and urge you to keep up the comments, I don't reply often but let me assure you I have read every one.
For all those asking: Jaffa and Jarvis are most definitely going to meet. It may not be for a couple chapter yet but let me tell you when it does it is going to be glorious. Jarffa... what an interesting idea.*}
Peter was woken by an alarm clock. As cliché and expected as it was, it was the absolute truth and no fancy description or dramatization was going to change that. The reverberating echo of the quivering sounds waves the emanated from with the luminous cube-ious boxiness. Alarm clock, awareness, we get it. Really it was entirely unfair, he was a superhero (super powered vigilante same difference). he could create an AI out of pure grief and brain power, create world first equations for web fluid on the back of paper napkins, life cars with a single hand and he made a mean lemon meringue. Yet from the darkness of his slumber he must arise… due to an alarm clock. How mundane.
"Peter stop monologueing about alarm clocks, you still have to get up. You have an exam today remember?"
"Jaffaaaaaaaaaaa! Why can't you let me make up excuses to extend the time in my warm bed." Peter whined as he tucked the blankets further around him and buried his face into the mass of pillows so only the occasional tuft of fluffy brown hair could be seen.
"Maybe instead of monologuing about alarm clocks you could try eating them instead. I hear they are very time consuming" Jaffa snickered proudly to herself. A high pitched whine of pain emanated from the lump in the bed before it ultimately rolled off the bed onto a heap on the floor.
"Jaffa. You're an absolute embarrassment." came the muffled complaint from the earthbound lump.
"I thought you said there is always time for puns Mr. Don't-try-and-kill-me-for-one-second-I-just-gotta-make-this-terrible-pun. Speaking of which I've decided I am going to make a new rule: After that robber nearly stabbed you because you were too busy laughing at your own joke puns should only be said in situations that does not result in potential death"
"One more time pun and consider that rule broken." Peter muttered darkly.
Jaffa let out a electronic hum that reverberated around the room and started flicking random lights on and off. Peter huffed and hide his head under a pillow.
"I'm just killing time till you get up. Guess that makes this a time scene. Crime scene? No?"
"OMG JAFFA NO" The mound of blankets of the floor seemed to curl even further within itself as if pained with the outside world.
"Ooo! I once knew a man was caught red-handed murdering an alarm clock. Guess he had too much time on his hands"
"MY SANITY. SOMEONE SAVE ME! PLEASE!" a hand was seen stretching desperately from the blankets on the floor, clutching desperately at the air. There was blissful moment of quiet that allowed the hand to begin snuffling its way back under the covers before a Jaffa's smug voice once again filled the room.
"Hey, Hey Peter."
"NO! I swear to God Jaffa…"
"What do you call a dog that can tell the time?"
"NO NO NO PLEASE I'M GETTING UP I PROMISE." The mound of the floor trembles before a human shaped blur launches out of it. Peter stumbles awkwardly like a new-born fawn adjusting to its legs as his eyes blink slowly and unfocused.
"It's called a watch dog"
Peter screams in frustration and leaps towards his computer to no doubt attempt to shut Jaffa up. Fate has other ideas however as his leg gets tangled in the blankets sending him crashing to ground in a yelp of pain.
Jaffa laughs hysterically for a few seconds only to abruptly cut herself off when Peter doesn't get up instead continuing to groan in pain. He pulls up the leg of his PJ's to reveal the bandage Jaffa had insisted on the previous night, a fresh patch of blood already forming.
"I, I mean…" Jaffa stutters weakly before pausing for several moments.
Before she can continue talking Peter staggers to his feet and laughs awkwardly.
"Guess I should listen next time you tell me to clean my room."
Jaffa's voice was stronger this time and filled with an angry undercurrent.
"That wound was deeper than you told me. Your healing abilities should have closed it by now if you were to be believed. Those slimy, mud eating miscreants who DARE call themselves heroes. Why I should…" Peter paled at Jaffa's angry tone, not yet emotionally recovered enough to repeat the lecture last night. He was having flashbacks already. OH THE HORROR.
"What! No! Of course, I didn't lie to you, why in the world would I do that! I would NEVER-" Jaffa scoffed, "usually, occasionally, sometimes, lie. I must have… impaled it. On something. Re-opened it because it was just a scratch and totally healed. Not even hurt by the Avengers."
"And pray, do tell, on what exactly did you… imaple it with." Jaffa drawled entirely unimpressed. Peter frantically looked around his feet shouting the first object he saw
"Ah… pillow!"
"A pillow." Jaffa said slowly.
"A pillow! It jabbed me out of pure spite and reopened it. More reasons not to get up in the morning, you may incur the wrath of pillows." Peter glared suspiciously at the pillow sitting oh so innocently on the floor. He knew what was up.
"A… pillow… managed to cause the great and powerful Spider-man harm when the Avengers could not."
"It was a very aggressive jab." Peter muttered defensively as he crossed his arms and stared petulantly at the floor. "The Avengers WISH they could jab as hard as pillows can."
"Peter! This is a serious situation, I don't think you realize how much of a threat the Avengers are."
Peter simply laughed, waving the conversation with a manipulative smirk on his lips. "Don't worry Jaffa! The only thing that's a threat: is this conversation to my education. You wouldn't want to be the reason I missed yet another test now would you Jaffa."
Jaffa let out a low growl of displeasure, fully aware of what he was doing but ultimately not being able to argue against it. Getting Peter to school was a chore in itself, let alone getting him to go for a history exam. Better to take the opportunity to pressure him while it was there.
"Alright Gilgamesh you win this time."
Peter halted mid step on his way to his desk to turn and give an incredulous look into one of her cameras.
"I'm sorry who?"
"Gilgamesh, from Gilgamesh in the Outback? He's in hell and he gets shot by an arrow. He then bites the shaft in half before pulling it out. I was making reference to the fact you, you know broke the arrow in your leg in half. What arrow in your leg you may ask? Well Peter, the arrow you got hit with when you were ATTACKED BY THE AVENGERS! After I EXPLICITLY TOLD YOU that you were NOT TO-"
"No one would get that reference Jaffa" Peter hurriedly turned back to shoving random books into his bag in an over exaggerated manner that screamed 'look Jaffa! School! Not lectures please'.
"Well I understood that reference," she sniffed
"Well YOU are an AI."
"Now Peter I know you're uncultured but do not blame me for it. Though you did create an actually cultured AI so I'm sure you won't be needing your year 1 handwriting book in a history exam." Peter blinked in surprise as he noticed what book he was putting in his bag, guiltily withdrawing it.
"Perhaps it would be best to remove the Senior Advanced Polish book as well" Peter blinked in surprise.
"But I don't even know Polish" he said dumbly staring at the book. How did he even own this? It was probably on the booklist for History. Never needed any of the things on the History booklist; why not add a book on Polish to make poor students on scholarships pay more. It was an evil plot to overthrow the Government. Ah HA! Peter always knew that there couldn't possibly be a way History teachers were all old and smelling of turnips.
"Jaffa! Quick! What bugs eat turnips!"
"No Peter you cannot uncover the corrupt History anarchists. You are not getting out of the exam. Now hurry up and get ready!"
"How did you… never mind." Peter carefully reshuffles the books, swapping out his geography textbook for a maths book he needed for 4th period, fishing around the bottom of his bag to confirm his calculator was in there. He closed it triumphantly reasonably sure that he had all the things he could possibly need for a fun day of learning. Note the sarcasm. Downstairs his Aunt's laugh could be heard as she chatted to Jaffa while cooking breakfast. The company was good for her. Smiling softly Peter shuffled round his room scanning the floor for some clothes that would pass as being clean. He could sense Jaffa's disprovable as he picked up a pair of jeans and a red shirt. Giving them a quick whiff he determined that the smell was not yet bad enough to cause people to suddenly and unexplainably faint. Also known as totally wearable.
Peter pulled them on triumphantly. Running a hand through his hair he determined himself sufficiently presentable and grabbed his backpack ready to leave. His hand had only just grasped the strap when he stopped and frantically began to pat himself down as he mumbled under his breath.
"Pen… pen… where the hell is it?"
The neatly packed bag was once again turned on its head as books, scraps of paper, a calculator, old spider web canisters and a small but very outranged colony of cookie crumbs spilled onto the desk. He frantically slid through the chaos on his desk before diving under it and rummaging among the objects down there. "Jaffaaaaaa" He whined "Where did you put my pen! I know you took it!"
"Peter in case you have forgotten I am an intangible AI lacking opposable thumbs or any actual physical or molecular structure." Peter crawled on his knees scanning the ground and once again regretting not listening to Jaffa when she repeatedly told him to tidy his room.
"Yeah? So?" he said popping his head out from where he had rolled under his bed in his quest for a pen.
Jaffa huffed. "As in, NO, I did not steal your damn pen. Don't blame me that you keep losing them." Peter gave her camera a suspicious look as he jumped and stuck to the ceiling. He crawled menacingly over to the various cameras in the room looking behind each one.
"Peter get down from there. What have I told you about crawling on the ceiling." Peter stuck out his tongue and pointedly moved a couple steps down, so he was on the wall instead.
"Peter. Vill you stop wasting time. You're already late and you know fully well that you are not going to find a pen there" Jaffa stated sternly trying not to let any of her amusement at the care-free atmosphere leak into her voice.
"Hey you never know! Maybe my pen got bitten by a radioactive glue-stick giving it the uncanny ability to stick to everything!" Peter finished with the last of the cameras and crawled across to begin checking in-between the folds of the curtains.
"Yes well a pen at least has the intelli-" Jaffa cut herself off abruptly causing Peter to cock his head in worry from where he dangled upside down off the curtain rod. After a moment, he shrugged he continued his search, albeit at a slightly more subdued pace and a slight crease of worry on his brow.
Peter at this point had his foot wrapped around the curtain rod as he dangled diagonally across the room, with one hand anchoring him to the desk and the other fishing around the mess accumulated on his desk chair.
"You should stay home today"
Peter promptly chocked, lost balance, and was sent crashing in an undignified heap to the floor. He sat for several moments in stunned (and painful) silence before raising an eyebrow and attempting to untangle his gangly and rather un-cooperating limbs.
"I'm sorry did you just say you DIDN'T want me to go to school? You, JAFFA, the high and mighty believer in the school system and who's constant and infuriating attempts to get me to school are probably the only reason I haven't dropped out yet"
"I... just don't want you to get hurt." Her voice was soft and pleading so only the faintest traces of her Russian accent could be heard.
Peter however was stern. All the cute playfulness vanished leaving only to hardened vision of a man who was on first name basis with death. "Cute. I almost believed you."
"What!" Jaffa snarled "Your protection is all I care about-" Peter cut her off with a wave of his hand.
"Jaffa. What's happened." There was a long pause during which Peter stared stonily into one of the camera's and tapped a finger impatiently.
"I… the daily bugle just released todays newspaper. Its… not particularly nice towards Spiderman"
Peter raised an eyebrow incredulously. Was that all. "Nice and Spiderman don't work together when regarding the bugle. I know this Jaffa, its rubbish. You should know this too." Jaffa didn't say anything simple turned on Peter's computer and opened it up to an image of the papers front picture.
"Oh."
Peter gripped the back of the desk chair hard enough that the plastic started to mould beneath his hands as a quiver overtook his body. Today's headliner; 'Avengers take Action: Spider-man confirmed villain.' For once however, the Bugle looked to be somewhat onto something. All thanks to the lovely photo provided by the lovely Eddy Brock.
"Dickhead" Peter muttered under his breath.
I mean he had to give him credit it was an exceptional shot. It was taken just after he had tied Hawkeye and Widow up helpless on the bridge. The angle was just right so the moon shone light directly onto them, making their faces look heroic and defiant. Meanwhile in the shadow, Spider-man advanced menacingly towards with something gripped tightly in his hand as he extended it towards them. I mean HE knew it was a marker but certain, ah, more sinister conclusions could easily be drawn. His conclusion being he was positively stuffed.
"If you can just stay home while the story is still hot, hold off on patrols till this cools down-"
Peter straightened and lifted his head, shaking off all the fear the had briefly consumed him.
"I can't just hide when the world is against you. Sometimes you must simply hold firm and let the wind storm past. I'm not weak nor broken Jaffa. I will not hide" Peter held his head up high and packed his books back in his bag before shrugging the strap onto his shoulder.
"I worry."
"I know Jaf." Peter then smirked and turned to give a camera a wink, "Besides It's the Bugle. There isn't a New Yorker out there who doesn't know their news is rubbish, no matter how convincing some dumb picture may be."
Jaffa gave a soft laugh giving in, though perhaps not agreeing. "Well if you are so determined to do your History exam I won't stop you. Though perhaps you should get a move on. School starts in 10 minutes." Peter's face drained of colour as horror filled his face. He scrambled to open the door before slamming it behind him and leaping down the stair on two bounds startling the life out of his Aunt where she stood making brownies for the latest charity bake sale at the hospital.
"Peter! What are you-"
"Can't talk Aunt May. Running late!" Peter skidded around the corner in front of the bench grabbing a bagel as he slid past. Shoving it in his mouth he began hopping frantically to the door as he attempted to put on his shoes and crashing into several walls. He eventually made it the door and yanked it open and yelled out a warbled goodbye around the bagel still in his mouth.
"WAIT! PETER YOU NEED TO SEE THIS-" Jaffa's frantic cries were left behind though as he ran out the door in a flurry of superhuman movement. In his rush, he missed an announcement of an interview with the Avengers that was playing on the TV. As well as the pen sitting innocently on top of it.
"The sun rose this morning to a new day, a new era. In the light of her rays a glorious man was formed with a great, yet heavy burden on his shoulders. Not just a hero. A SUPERhero, and an incredibly handsome one at that. A man so filled with purpose his sheer hero-ness left even red headed ninja woman swooning-
-Shit! Natasha what was that for! I know lots of red-headed ninja's. OW DAMMIT! That hurt you know!-
Ok. His hero-ness left woman of EVERY hair colour who worked normal jobs like training seals, swooning and falling over themselves-
-OW! Will you stop hitting me woman I'm giving a dramatic monologue and you're breaking the vibe here.-
FINE! His hero-ness left PEOPLE, both MAN and women, who have lots of hair colours cause I love rainbows yay, and work boring jobs that have nothing to do being ninjas, because woman empowerment….?
-HOLY CR- okay now you're just doing it for the fun of it. Ow Stop THAT
OKAY. With each step the super hot super hero took, light and goodness travelled in his wake chasing away the shadows that dared to cross his path. For he had been brought down to the mortals for a reason. A new shadow had dared to leave the confides of night and step into the hero's realm of sun. A shadow far darker and more sinister than normal, not a villain, a super-villain. It was at this new dawn that the extremely intelligent, attractive, benevolent, some even say omniscient, hero rose to turn the full glare of his wrath against the puny shadow in what was sure to be a swift but none the less glorious battle!"
A tired and grumpy voice interrupted,
"A battle in which he then promptly got his shiny ass handed to him in. Guess his 'righteous light' got re-bounded off his huge ass forehead blinding himself instead."
"Fuck you too Barton." Tony groaned as he turned away from where he had been staring dramatically out a window into the sunrise, instead facing where the rest of the team was gathered on the few couches outside the elevator leading down stairs to Shield's conference room. Clint lay sprawled on his back on the top of the couch where Natasha sat throwing grapes in the air for him to catch above.
"Do you even know how early it is?" Clint grumbled around the mouthful of grapes "Why do conferences always have to be so damn early."
"They want it recorded now so it'll be aired during the prime breakfast news slot. Give the city a day to gossip and create anger towards Spider-man, so by the repeat that will no doubt be playing tonight, you'll have to whole city in agreement."
"Classic technique, used it myself a few times." Tony piped in
"…Yeah but Cap promised to cook bacon this morning. Where is my bacon?" Barton whispered mournfully as he stared in betrayal towards where Steve stood leaning against a wall with a raised brow.
At the mention of bacon Thor leapt up with enough force that Mjölnir was sent flying, narrowly avoiding crashing into Natasha's head. She snarled and diverted the path of the grapes she had been throwing so that it splattered against the side of Thor's head. It only went downhill from there.
When Coulson entered to inform them that the press was ready, he very nearly walked back out again. The couch had been flipped over to cover where Bruce was crouching, who seemed to me muttering the script of Beauty and the Beast under his breath. Natasha leapt between hiding spots pelleting an endless supply of grapes towards Thor, who was deflecting with a whole coffee table he had picked up to use as a shield. Tony had somehow managed to turn the water sentient and attach a pair of claws beneath, allowing it to gallop round the room as Tony sat cross-legged on top urging 'Bucephalus' to splash water on Steve. Steve himself had somehow lost his shirt and a sock, (the shoe however still remained on his foot) and was chasing Tony around the room and seemed to be loudly proclaiming that it must have been stolen by the Hogwarts since the Vulcans needed the clothes of mortals to find Nemo and that Tony had to help him find him reclaim it since he was so knowledgeable on the subject.
Clint was spinning slowly as he dangled from a sluggishly moving ceiling fan yelling, "THE FLOOR IS LAVA GODDAMIT! LAVAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA."
"I had to leave for 10 minutes. 10. Minutes." Coulson muttered blankly before sighing.
"Clint, get down from there, Natasha and Thor, put the furniture down and stop playing with food I thought you were adults, Tony, stop turning everything into a minion and return Steve's clothes, Steve, stop listening to Tony's 'history lessons' and Bruce… just keep doing whatever you're doing."
The Avengers all guiltily shuffle to do as he says trying to make the room look like it hadn't just been ripped apart by a tornado. Coulson massaged him temples and muttered under his breath and took a slow sip of his coffee. Clint instantly was at his side grabbing greedily at the cup, only to have it plucked out if Coulson's hands by Tony first.
"Ah ah ah. Not for you Birdy. Man has to have his third morning coffee before talking to the hungry sharks." He smiled at Coulson and pulled a collection of cards from his pocket.
"A perfect speech as requested. I'm so glad SHIELD has finally accepted that they employ dreadful speech writers. Like amazingly bad. To the point where I'm pretty sure its Hydra sabotaging you." Tony squatted Clint away where he continued to hover and attempt to steal Tony's, or well Coulson's technically, coffee. When he managed to brush a finger against it Tony snatched it away and hissed at him sending Clint scrambling away terrified to Nat.
"Nat! He hissed at me!" he whispered in horror.
Tony simply took an obvious slurp of the stolen coffee before turning back to Coulson.
"Don't know why you insisted I wrote it down. I would improvise the whole thing and it still would be better than the drivel you lot come up with."
"Steve's reading." Coulson stated matter of fact as he plucked the speech cards out of Tony's hand.
"I'm sorry what!" Tony snatched the cards back.
"You do realise who here literally grew up manipulating press conferences right? Leave me with a room of reporters and I can make them leave proclaiming that goats eat birds and that the world is flat because God accidently drove his car over it."
"That is why we had you write the speech. Steve however, is still reading it," Coulson smiled as he plucked the cards back and handed them to Steve.
"We need Captain America right now, not playboy extraordinaire Tony Stark. The Public will listen and trust what he says as gospel. People grew up listening to Captain America the fair and just hero."
"Fair and just my ass, they haven't seen him play Mario Kart," Tony grumbled but reluctantly consented.
On his way past Clint found himself sniffing the air before whipping his head around are zeroing on a plump middle-aged man in a fedora on the end of one of the middle rows, a bacon breakfast sandwich halfway to his mouth. Clint strode casually forward and in one seamless movement stole the sandwich just before the man took a bite, instead placing it in his own. For a few seconds, the man could only look in shock to where he hands still sat clamped mid-air, yet by the time he looked up the procession of Avengers had already moved past; and his breakfast along with it.
Steve was nervous as he walked up to the podium despite the fearless gaze and confident walk. The Avengers though could see the slightly curled hand at his side and the invisible shield held within it. So, they stood behind him as a united front, Thor and Natasha at his shoulder, Tony leaning casually against a pillar, Clint standing steely eyed and protective at his back munching aggressively on a sandwich and Bruce, Bruce stood at the very back on the stage with a uneasy and disturbed look about him
"Thank you all for coming this morning. As many of you are aware we are here to discuss the rumours that the Avengers have uncovered a cunning villain currently based in New York. We are here to confirm that they are correct."
There was a roar from the reporters as they jumped up and began firing questions.
"Why has the public not been informed before-!"
"-do you have to say about the-"
"-vgers plan to defeat this villain."
"Mr. Stark is it true you ate lobster last Saturday!"
"ENOUGH!" Thor roared slamming his fist on the lectern and successfully stunning the reporters and earning a thankful smile from Steve.
"I ask that your questions remain until the end. The villain has been confirmed to be masquerading under the name of Spider-man-"
There was an uproar of noise and shock until a stern look quieted them.
"We have video proof of Spider-man acting as enforcement between rival gangs, drug cartels and robbers. We believe he has ties to powerful secret organisations that aim to create powerful super-villain weapons. From what we can tell Spider-man has been acting on their behalf and has most likely committed horrific crimes, no doubt conducting many of the crimes he 'stopped'. We are urging all civilians to flee as soon as Spider-man is seen and not contact the number that will be displayed on this recording immediately. He must not be approached. The Avengers promise that we will not let this villain or the organisation he works for unpunished. We will fight, as a team, to bring him down.
Do not doubt that Spider-man is a threat. Though the Avenger pledge to give our best resources to bringing down this villain we cannot do this alone! A battle doesn't make a war and New York proves to be our powerful army. We are urging everyone with any connection to Spider-man, who may have interacted with him in the past, has learnt information from him, may know anything about the people he works for to come forward. We want to know everything, every secret, and New York can find them for us. Show these villains they cannot break New York, that we are strong, and we are united against our foes. We are better off without Spider-man and together we can show him just that.
Any Questions?"
Silence. They were stunned, though their eyes gleamed in patriotism and their chests puffed with pride. None moved until one voice piqued up in anger.
"Yeah I have one." A man leapt up furious, causing the reporters the lean away from him. He tilted his head up and steeled his eyes as one hand fixed the fedora on his head.
"New York stands with you but… can I have my sandwich back?"
{*So... how was it? What is your guess to where the story might be headed? I would be interested to hear! As always comments, suggestions and all the like are appreciated.*}