Takes place after Peter plays golf with Tony the first time and before Natasha comes back.
"So what did you think?" Peter looked at MJ apprehensively. It had taken weeks to convince her to go to this particular movie. He had sacrificed multiple chances to pick what they would do on what had become their standard date night. He thought maybe the body count alone would be enough for her not to hate it.
MJ pursed her lips. "I didn't hate it." She saw the look of relief on Peter's face and realized she needed to back him down or extensive movie marathons, including the extended versions and possibly some tv series, were in her future. "But I didn't love it either."
Peter turned and faced her, walking backwards to keep up. "Come on. What's not to love? It's a archetypal story...set in space. There's action, adventure, intrigue, bad choices, heroic sacrifices..."
MJ sighed. "It's Star Wars."
"It was Rogue One...which was a prequel to Star Wars."
MJ rolled her eyes and grabbed his hand. "It wasn't bad. That's all you're getting."
Peter grinned and spun around to walk next to her. "I'll take it." He fought back the urge to ask if she'd watch Star Wars with him now that she had seen Rogue One. He thought that was probably pushing his luck. He felt the familiar tingle and his fingers tightened around hers as his eyes darted around looking for the source of what was setting him off. His eyes landed on two men erupting through a door. He recognized both of them. Spider-Man had tangled with them last week. They were low level gang members, really just thugs that loosely associated with one of the local gangs. The problem was they thrived on hurting people for no reason. Which is what they were apparently intent on doing now.
Pushing MJ back he waded forward. He wasn't sure what his plan was but he knew he couldn't confront them like he had before. He looked at everyone surrounding them. A couple other kids their age, probably leaving the same movie they had. Some tourists, you could always spot tourists. A young boy with his mom. If Peter had to guess, the boy was about ten. There were a couple of guys in their 20's, another group of men probably in their 40's, and then a group of girls. None of them needed to be involved in the chaos that he felt certain was about to erupt.
MJ watched Peter work his way towards the two thugs. It had been easy to figure out what had made him tense up. She still wasn't entire sure what he planned on doing. She lost sight of him as the various groups of people started trying to move out of the way as the two thugs pushed a couple of the guys that had been walking between them. She pressed herself against a building to try to avoid being trampled by the people fleeing the fight.
Sirens could be heard in the distance and one of the gang members signaled to his friend that they needed to leave. MJ watched the men disappear around the corner before glancing over at Peter. She noticed three things simultaneously. One was that the look on Peter's face wasn't one she was familiar with. She had seen his frustrated face, his embarrassed face, his determined face, his playful face. This one was different. It's predominant feature was one of pain. The second was that his eyes were darting, looking for something but she wasn't sure what. The third was his hand pressed to his side. It was partially hidden by the flannel shirt that he had on over the Star Wars t-shirt. It was the plain black one with the original Star Wars logo. It had taken her a moment to realize that red was seeping through his fingers. All of the pieces clicked. Peter was hurt. Badly.
People were starting to circulate around in the aftermath of the chaos. She took the opportunity to push him towards the alley. Once they were back far enough and hidden from prying eyes, she pulled his hand back and pulled up his shirt. She blew out the breath she had held when she saw the wound. "Web-shooter. Now."
On autopilot the web shooters formed around Peter's wrists. He looked at MJ and started to tell her there was no way he was swinging anywhere right now.
"Webs. Lots of them." MJ shook her head when he just looked at her in confusion. She grabbed his wrist and triggered the device herself, aiming it at his side. Sufficiently covered, she gently patted the surface to make sure it was sealed around the wound. "Spider webs are used around the world as makeshift bandages. It'll hold." She glanced at his wrist, knowing Karen was also listening. "Karen, I need Stark...now...route it to my phone." She slipped it out of her pocket and connected the call that was already ringing through. "Stark...Peter's hurt. Peter...not his alter ego." She glanced around the alley to make sure they were still alone as she heard a string of expletives from the other end.
"How bad?" Tony was already cycling through his options. Helen was in Korea. He was on the other side of the freaking county. May usually worked on Thursday nights. He had already triggered the suit and was headed that direction but it would take him more than an hour to get there.
MJ looked up at Peter who had gotten significantly paler. "Uh, stab wound. He lost a decent amount of blood but I think I've got it stopped right now. What do I need to do?" She knew she couldn't just take him to a hospital.
Tony flipped through the data on his HUD. FRIDAY had talked to Karen and he saw they were only a couple blocks away from the safe house. FRIDAY had also sent a message to Rhodey who happened to be in New York. "Can you get him to the safe house? It's only a couple blocks away. Karen can guide you there. Rhodey is in Manhattan and I'll get him to meet you there." He had thought about sending the suit to Peter but that would have left MJ alone, which Peter would never agreed to.
MJ slipped an arm around Peter, careful to avoid the wound on his side. "I know where the safe house is. I think I can get him there. I'll call you when we're there." She disconnected the call and slid her phone back into her pocket.
"I can't believe you just hung up on him." Peter smirked. He was over the initial onset of pain. Or maybe he was just attempting to be over it because as he put one foot in front of the other he realized the pain was still there.
"He'll get over it." She urged him forward. "I can't carry you. We can't take a cab to the safe house. I'm not sure if you even have the nanotech suit with you but even if you did you couldn't just walk down the street in it and you certainly can't swing anywhere. It'll take Rhodey 45 minutes to get over the bridge from Manhattan at this time of night and even at the snails pace you're walking we'll still beat him there. I'm still not watching all of the movies but if you refrain from bleeding everywhere I may watch a second one just as a thank you for not dying." They had merged into the flow of people walking on the sidewalk at this point. MJ concentrated on Peter just moving in a somewhat fluid movement.
"MJ, you're rambling." Every step pulled at his side. Broken bones hurt, but he could deal with them. Cuts would bleed, but not like this. He had gotten a look at how much blood was on his hand and he was guessing he probably had never bled this much before. Getting stabbed sucked. And apparently MJ rambled in emergencies. Good to know on both counts. "And it's not loaded yet."
MJ frowned. "I'm not rambling. I'm stating facts. What's not loaded?"
"The Iron Spider. We're still working on the interface that will let me choose from deploying just web shooters or the full suit." Peter tried to suck in a breath. Moving in general hurt. He glanced up at the street sign. Two blocks down, one to go. "In case you were wondering getting stabbed is way worse than getting cut or breaking something. I mean the broken bones are nothing. I just need to make sure the bones line up correctly..."
"Ok, now you're rambling." MJ could see the safe house ahead. They just had to make it there without getting stopped. Two teenagers walking around one off the lesser populated areas at this time of night was suspicious at best. Relief spread through her as they entered the safety of the building. She let go of him long enough to pull up the elevator door. She glanced over at him as the elevator carried them up to the floor with the medical equipment. Even if he passed out at this point she felt fairly confident she could at least drag him to where he needed to be.
She felt her phone buzz in her pocket and slid it out as she pulled the elevator door open and maneuvered Peter out. She knew who it was before he said anything. "What do I need to do first."
"IV. Is he still conscious?"
"Yes I'm still conscious." MJ had answered the phone on speaker. She smirked at the amount of snark in Peter's tone and was a little surprised by the relief in Tony's voice.
"IV bags are in the cabinet. Just insert it into the auto IV and it'll do the rest."
Peter took the bag from her and slid it into the device himself and slid his arm into the sleeve, cringing slightly as the needle inserted. He tried pulling up the edge of his shirt with his free hand.
MJ pushed his hand back and pulled up the shirt. "You're going to need a new Star Wars shirt." She had put her phone on the table next to the inclined bed in the pared down medical suite at the safe house. "Ok, Stark, now what?"
"Hang on, I'm patching Helen into the feed." Tony had installed the cameras on the off chance that something like this would happen. "Helen, do you have video yet?"
"I do. MJ, what did you use to stop the bleeding?"
MJ looked up at the ceiling and frowned. "Webbing. I know it's synthetic but I took the chance that it would hold like regular spider webs." She looked back at Peter and hissed. "There are cameras here?" She frowned at the shrug she got in response.
"MJ, that's genius. The webbing was a great choice. We need to remove it, clear the blood, and stitch him up. I wish we could wait for Rhodey but FRIDAY has his ETA too far away. Do you think you can handle stitching him?" She had already texted Claire Temple to see if she was anywhere close by. Peter's blood pressure was way lower than she wanted it to be. Waiting wasn't an ideal option.
"I can do this." MJ met Peter's eyes and nodded, squeezing his hand.