AN: Have some fluff before the final climax commences!


Bruce, by all appearances, has been the quietest so far about Peter's prognosis. He finds that focusing on the science of Peter's needs and not the emotional tsunami of this situation is far easier.

Only at night, in the safety of his normal bedroom when the lights are off, do nightmares visit him, insecurities about what he could have done better. He can't seem to cry like the others, not now that Peter is awake, but his heart does.

Even Hulk moans inside his head.

Bruce is almost relieved when Steve says it. It's something to fixate on.

"You've tried setting him on his feet?" he clarifies.

Steve nods, a hurried one-two that's dizzying to watch. "Peter's knees wouldn't even stay straight, when I held him up. He's…boneless."

Everyone glances at Peter out of habit, checking if he'll complain about this 'being talked about as if I'm not in the room' thing like he normally does.

Peter only stares at Steve's mouth, since he's the one talking.

Bucky swings his own legs to the side of his bed, frowning at Peter. The soldier is still pale, too slim for his build. But his cheeks go rosy from some emotion Bruce can't identify.

"When the mercenaries attacked my apartment, one of the bullets swiped Peter's spine," says Bucky. "By the time we got to Siberia, his legs went numb sometimes. Well, he used the word 'offline,' but he couldn't feel them, is my point."

A faint smile trails across Tony's face.

"We checked his spine multiple times." Bruce walks up next Steve and eyes Peter's heart rate monitor, the only one still attached. "We caught the infection-induced fever before it could spread and it was just a deep graze, essentially. Straight across. No muscle damage."

The four men go quiet. Bruce grits his teeth, angry at himself for missing something. Is this related somehow to Peter's sensory input? Can he feel his legs but not make them obey commands?

With a patient that can't understand a thing going on around him, Bruce feels helpless. This is worse than treating a baby—at least they cry and react to facial expressions.

Peter just…exists. If he's in pain, he's got no ability to display it.

Bruce doesn't realize he's clenching his jaw hard enough to be audible until a hand lands on his shoulder.

"Hey." Steve's voice is a caramel murmur. "It's not your fault."

"Yes it is," Bruce snaps. "I missed something. What use am I if I can't even help Peter with the most basic things?"

Tony chuckles, a halfhearted but sincere sound. "What is it with doctors who can't take their own advice?"

Own advice? What is he…?

Bruce flushes when he figures it out and Steve smiles a bit. "You said it me then so this is me returning the favour: it's not your fault, Bruce. Take your time and we'll figure this out. Together."

Tony fiddles with something in the corner. "For now, I have a better solution than carrying Peter around like a chia pet."

"A wheelchair, of course." Bruce unclips the heart rate monitor from Peter's index and checks that he has enough warm clothing on. Someone—probably Steve—has already dressed him in a wool pullover and sweatpants. "Steve, just make sure to watch for if his lips start to turn blue or he swallows a lot. That one means he's thirsty…Steve?"

Bruce is confused but he doesn't fight it when Steve takes his hands and places them on the chair handles.

Tony's eyes, as he picks Peter up, are soft. Both on his son and when they come to rest on Bruce.

"Your turn, Bruce." he says. He sets Peter in the chair, adjusting his feet so they're at a natural angle, and tucks a blanket around his legs. "I know this is rich coming from me, but don't keep avoiding what you need."

Bruce, eyes wide, pushes up his glasses for an excuse to fidget. "What do you mean, what I need? I've seen Peter more than anyone, every day for hours with testing and—"

"We're not talking about testing." Steve only gets away with the interruption because he's Steve and he never does it, ever. "Just…turn off your science brain for a while. Be Bruce, not his doctor."

"Very funny," Bruce mutters.

As if that's even possible. Still, he's uneasy.

Tony mirrors Steve when he gently takes Bruce's hands—when did I take them off?—and wraps them back around the handles.

"Get out of here, Bruce. Go show our kid the freaky bonsai garden Rhodey planted. It's ridiculous."

So Bruce does.

He pushes the wheelchair down the hall, riding the elevator to the main lobby. It's a Friday and there aren't even any groundskeepers around this morning. The sun is at full peak now, warm for ten o'clock on a September day.

Peter's got slippers on his feet, where they rest on the foot stops. They're Hello Kitty, with rainbow sparkles and cupcakes.

Bruce leans over the chair a bit so he can catch Peter's eye. "Tony's silly, isn't he?"

Peter says nothing, of course, but like always he watches Bruce's lips and eyes while he talks. Bruce brushes the too-long curls out of Peter's face. Peter's lashes flutter at the touch, and his muscles relax the longer Bruce does it.

"You're alright, Peter," he whispers, close to Peter's ear. "We're not leaving you."

Finally, Bruce wheels him out the glass doors and through the pair of cherry blossom trees to the garden.

Bruce stops dead.

"This…is a bit ridiculous, actually."

It's like he and Peter have become giants in an ant-run world. Tiny trees circle a baseball diamond and a bowl shaped building. It takes Bruce an embarrassingly long time to realize he's looking at a scale, plant-shaped replica of Central Park.

Bruce is so astounded by the miniature everything that he laughs.

And is so startled by that laugh that he does it again.

Bruce doesn't do loud guffaws or giggles like Clint indulges in sometimes. Bruce does the slow, rolling wave of laughter that builds for a breathless moment before smoothly going back to a husky series of barks that make Bruce's glasses fog.

He takes them off, tucking them in his pocket, and rolls Peter over to a stone bench beside the Central Park 'fountains.' When he sits down and looks over at Peter, the boy's eyes are a hair wider than normal.

He seems hypnotized by Bruce's mirth.

"I'm okay, Peter," Bruce says, just in case the noises can be misconstrued as crying. "Sometimes stress just builds, you know? Gotta let it out."

The garden is fenced in by thorny bushes, which Bruce finds odd. Oak tress overhang those and drop acorns into Rhodey's masterpiece.

When a stray pine cone tumbles across Shakespeare garden, Bruce picks it up and turns it over in his hands.

"Look, Peter. The scale pattern on this is a Fibonacci sequence. You were struggling with some math principles one time and we talked about this." Bruce musses the teen's hair. He smiles, broad and easy. "You picked it up so fast. You're smarter than I ever was at your age."

Peter's eyes stray to a chickadee pecking at the bonsai flowers.

Bruce isn't normally a tactile person, hasn't trusted himself to be in a long time, but here alone with Peter he feels no need to keep up the pretense.

He takes Peter's lax fingers in his hand and squeezes.

"I know how it feels to be trapped inside your own body, Peter." Bruce wrestles back the demons rearing in his mind's eye. "Screaming, flailing to be in control. If you're in there, doing that…I hear you, Peter. I'll always hear you."

Peter looks down at their hands, then back to the bird.

Bruce leans his head on Peter's, their curls tangling together in miasmic whorls. "Even if you're not, even if there's none of you left in there and you'll be like this for the rest of your life—I still love you, Peter. We'll be well protected goldfish together."

Bruce closes his eyes, fixated now on the sound of Peter's elfin breaths. "You're still the brightest light I've ever met."

And then there is the gauzy blanket of silence.

But that's okay. Bruce loves silence more than anyone else on the team, can read all the hidden messages that come only with the lack of words and the profundity of body language.

Bruce and Peter are still.

The chickadee throws pink petals with his beak.

More pine cones and Fibonacci sequences drop around their feet.