"Tony Stark? And the Avengers?" Ryan practically shouted as he pushed his way to the front of the crowd. Peter simply shrugged.
"Would you believe me if I said it was a glitch?" he asked, shoving his level ten badge haphazardly into his jeans pocket. Ryan glared at him.
"I think you owe us an explanation, Peter, don't you think." Peter swallowed nervously.
"Midtown can I have your attention once again, please." Jamie's voice carried somewhat coldly over the heads of the class. Peter sighed quietly in relief as Jamie led the class down a short hallway toward one of the lower down RD labs. He slipped to the back of the class once they got to the lab and pulled out his phone. He'd watched the demonstration they were doing a million times anyways so it didn't really matter that he wasn't listening. He stood staring down at his lock screen for a solid thirty seconds. No notifications. Complete silence from the Avengers. Which was definitely weird. Usually at least one of them would text him as soon as he entered the building. Usually Clint asking what he wanted for dinner, even if Peter wasn't staying for dinner. His ears shot up at a small sound from above. A small clank, maybe from the vents? Shit. Clint was in the vents. Of course he was. Peter racked his mind, hoping to think of something to stop Clint from jumping down into the room, but it was too late. Clint had already jumped down in front of him, making the rest of the class jump. Peter sighed.
"Hi, Mr. Barton," he said defeatedly. Clint took a step forward and ruffled Peter's hair fondly.
"Hey, squirt. Stark wants to know what you want for dinner."
"Chinese," Peter said quickly, his face a bright red. Clint grinned.
"Good choice, see you later."
"Bye," Peter said. Clint waved to the rest of the class before practically skipping out of the lab. Mentally bracing himself for a burrade of questions, he turned to face the rest of the open-mouthed class.
"Was that the real Hawkeye?" Cindy, being the first one to snap out of shock, asked. Peter sighed.
"Ye-." Ryan cut him off.
"Of course not. It's probably some street cosplayer that Peter paid to pretend to know him," he said snarkily. Jamie stepped to the front of the class and said, "Actually, Mr-," she glanced down at the nametag everyone was made to wear in the building, "Johnson. That was Mr. Barton- also known as Hawkeye," she said calmly. Ryan kept his firm glare on Peter.
"How many people did you pay to lie for you, Parker?"
"Knock it off, Ryan. It's not worth it," Flash muttered from behind Ryan, coming to Peter's rescue yet again. Ryan took his gaze of Peter to whirl around on Flash, but upon noticing Ms. Warren's cold glare on him, he made a different decision.
"Fine, but this isn't over, 'Squirt'" Ryan said, making a mockery of the nickname Clint had called Peter earlier. Peter simply chose to turn his back and ignore him, making Ryan scoff angrily. Jamie cleared her throat awkwardly, breaking up the tension in the room slightly.
"Well, let's continue with our tour shall we?" she asked, gently. A couple students nodded in agreement, as she began to lead the class out of the room.
"And that's everything from that room," Tony said sourly as the video stopped playing, lapsing the room into uncomfortable silence. Steve glanced up from the laptop Tony had been playing the footage from.
"How did we not know about this?" he asked. Tony shook his head.
"I knew he was hiding something, but everytime I asked about it he just clammed up and wouldn't talk to me. So I never pressed it."
"Peter's been bullied for a while," Bruce said sadly. Tony whipped around to glare at him.
"You knew about this?" Bruce quickly raised his hands.
"No, you can just tell from how he reacts to this kid, Ryan or whatever, that he's used to the torment." Natasha and Clint shot a glance at each other before standing up simultaneously.
"I hate to say it, but no you guys can't go kill the kid. That's illegal," Tony said, standing up to block their path.
"We need to do something about it though, Tony," Natasha said angrily. Steve smiled knowingly despite the situation.
"I think we will. You've already got something planned don't you, Tony?" Tony nodded.
"We've got a meet and greet in half an hour with Peter's class."
Jamie stopped in the middle of a long hallway and turned to face the class.
"We've got a small addition to the class trip," she said with a sly smile. Peter cursed quietly. An extra addition. Awesome. What embarrassment was coming from the Avengers next. He'd let himself have a small amount of hope when none of the Avengers had popped up for a solid forty-five minutes. But now, all that hope was gone. This extra addition practically screamed Tony Stark. Jamie shot him a gentle smile as he was herded into a small conference room along with the rest of the class. He had barely managed to take a seat at the back of the room when the door slammed open with a loud bang. The rest of the class gasped in excitement as Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, Thor, Bruce Banner, Natasha Romanoff and Clint Barton stormed into the room. Peter swallowed nervously upon noting the expressions on each Avengers face. Pure and unbridled rage. Mr. Stark stepped up to the front of the room, where a pedestal was set up and cleared his throat.
"I've been alerted of something quite alarming by my AI FRIDAY," he started. "FRIDAY runs all the security in this building as notified me upon seeing something on the security cameras." Peter froze. There was no way there was any footage of his sneaking out of the tower in his suit, and even if there was, Mr. Stark wouldn't tell the entire class that Peter was Spider-Man, would he?
"Where is Ryan Johnson?" Natasha asked impatiently. Ryan smiled airily and held his hand high in the air. Peter let out a small sigh of relief. This wasn't about Spider-Man.
"Right here, baby. Why? You want my number?" Ryan said. Natasha always had her emotions on lock down so that only people that knew what to look for could see right through her emotionless expression. But, at the moment her mask slipped and her anger slipped through. Peter watched as Steve stealthily held out his hand in front of Natasha. To the average on looker it looked like he was simply stretching his arm, but Peter knew he was holding her back.
"We saw you bullying, Peter Parker," Bruce said, taking over the lecture. "We don't like bullying, Mr. Johnson." Ryan's overconfident grin slowly started to slip off his face as he dropped his arm. Peter hid his face in his hands. This was so much worse than he ever could have imagined. Tony glared at Ryan.
"Stay away from the kid, or you might find out just how influential I am, to college administrators. You'll never get into a good college. You want a job? Not if you keep bullying my kid." Peter looked up sharply at that. My kid? Had he heard Mr. Stark correctly? Ms. Warren stood up.
"Excuse me, Mr. Stark. Do not threaten students in my class," she said, dangerously. Tony whirled on her.
"You did nothing when Peter was being bullied. I could have you fired for that." Ms. Warren opened her mouth to retort when the window behind her shattered into a million little shards, and something big rolled into the room. Peter's eyes widened as the thing- no the man, stood up and shook a few shards of glass off his long wing-like devices on his back. The Vulture made his way to the front of the class and took in the Avengers all in fight ready positions.
"It's not you I'm here for," he said, turning his back on the superheroes like they were simply citizens. He faced the class, his eyes wandering for a bit before landing on Peter.
"It's Spider-Man I want to have a little chat with."