Fandom: Avengers
Character(s): Spider-Man/Peter P. | Ned | May P. | Iron Man/Tony S.
Pairing(s): slight mentions of Liz/Peter
Warning(s): mild language, discussion of medical treatments, spoilers through Avengers: Infinity War
What was Peter's life, indeed!
Ned never did find out exactly how the "shouting at each other in Italian" episode ended. All he knew was that the very next Wednesday, Peter stepped out of the school and climbed into a black Audi that whisked him away to Avengers Compound. And somehow this arrangement became part of their normal, weekly lives; so much so that Ned barely even thought twice about it. (He did, however, make sure to glare darkly at Happy Hogan whenever he managed to make eye contact with the man. No one hangs up on Spider-Man's Guy-In-The-Chair! No. One.)
Wednesday lab days quickly branched out into Friday night movie marathons, and before Ned quite knew what was what, Peter was spending every weekend at the Compound like a kid with divorced parents moving between households.
Ned would have been jealous, had not Peter been so very free with insider information on the Avengers. Everything from what flavor of ice cream Iron Man preferred to selfies with War Machine and Vision to an honest-to-freaking-god autograph from Pepper Potts!
(Okay, so that last one was solely for MJ's benefit. But Ned may or may not have hyperventilated when he actually got to hold the piece of paper that Tony Stark may have touched.)
Superhero life was more-or-less quiet after the whole Vulture incident. Peter and Ned took down a crack ring together, but aside from that it was mostly stranded cats and lost tourists and grand theft bicycles. And so fall rolled into winter and winter slowly turned to spring. They discovered that Peter couldn't thermoregulate very well, leading Ned to stock his closet with a couple of extra blankets - right underneath the box of protein bars and the first aid kit.
That summer was nirvana. No school. No snow. Lots of time for Spider-Man and his faithful sidekick to go on patrol.
It was glorious.
Ned always had a little thrill every time he logged onto their rigged-up comm system. It was just too cool!
The school bus was noisy and smelly, as usual. They were two months into the new school year and just setting out on their first field trip of the year.
(Ned personally didn't think that the Museum of Modern Art sounded all that exciting...but Darla had made him promise to take lots of pictures for her, so he was ready to pay closer attention than he usually did. Besides, Flash wasn't on this field trip. That in and of itself boosted the enjoy-ability factor.)
Peter seemed to agree, even if he was currently choking on the fumes of the Axe someone was wearing. There were times when Ned really envied his friend the superpowers; and then there were times when he was grateful to be a regular, common, ordinary, baseline human.
He popped in his earbuds and pulled up a video on his phone (a National Geographic special on artificial intelligence). Ned was just getting into the meat of the story when a hand - strong, cold, clammy - slapped him on the side of the face. Peter.
Spider-Man was ready to spring into action. He had gone as alert and stiff as a bloodhound catching a scent, and he was twisting around to stare at something outside the bus. Ned saw his hands tremble slightly, and glanced past him to see a giant donut hovering over the city skyscape. Whoa. Things were about to get cra-zy!
"Ned." Peter hissed. "I need you to cause a distraction."
Oh, right. Secret identity.
Ned blinked. What could he, as an uncool nerd, possibly do to be distracting enough for Peter to get away?
Well - there was one thing he could try. It was going to potentially make him look like the world's biggest wimp, but...sometimes a Guy-In-The-Chair's gotta do what a Guy-In-The-Chair's gotta do.
TBC...
A/N: Okay, folks. This fic is almost over. THANK YOU to everyone who has come along on the ride with me. It's been fun seeing your comments and notifications. Until next time!