Chapter 7

Ali could hear beeping to her right and opened her eyes.

The sight that met her reminded her a lot of two years ago when she had overextended her powers and knocked herself out. Obviously she knew that this was way more serious but she wasn't too concerned. For one the Avengers were her family so she knew they would never let anything happen to her and two, because her family also included the worlds best doctors.

The bed she was lying on was clearly the one in the med bay of the tower but somebody had draped her fluffy light blue blanket over her. The beeping noise was coming from a heart monitor that was connected to her chest with various wires. As well as the heart monitor there was also a tube full of a light brown liquid that was connected to her stomach and an IV tube in her hand that Ali tried not to look at or think about.

All in all she felt way better though her stomach hurt a lot when ever she tried to sit up so she gave up on that decision very quickly.

Only after about 5 minutes of being awake Natsha rushed into Ali's room and carefully gave her a hug.

"Don't you dare do that to us again."

She whispered it into her hair as she hugged her and Ali felt a few tears fall onto her head as she returned the hug.

"What happened?"

Natsha broke out of the hug and wiped her face to get rid of any traces of her tears.

"You don't remember?"

"I remember... my head hurt and I kept throwing up whenever I ate anything and I remember being too hot..."

The memories were rushing back to Ali but she kept the fact that Peter had looked after her too herself though she knew that her mum knew that she hadn't told her the entire truth she was glad that she didn't press.

"You had a stomach bug which caused your fever. This bug however paralysed half of your stomach and due to the massive amounts of scar tissue on the other side your stomach basically couldn't digest anything. You have a faster metabolism than normal because of your powers which was why you felt so tired and dizzy."

"But Jemma fixed me?"

At that Natsha smiled. She had pulled a chair right up to where Ali was lying and was holding onto one of her hands.

"She did but to fix you she had to create a hole from your stomach to your skin so that she could get you enough nutrients for her to try and fix the half of your stomach was paralysed. She fixed it though and she has found a way to get rid of some of the scar tissue."

Ali could still sense a lot of unease from her mum and so was still a little confused.

"That's a good thing though, isn't it?"

Natsha nodded,

"It is... it is but the only way that the medicine to get rid of some of the scar can be administered is straight to the stomach..."

Ali quickly filled it the gaps.

"So the hole that was created that connects my stomach to my skin has to stay?"

Natasha nodded her head.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"It could have been way worse and I can still eat, I just have to have some medicine now. This isn't going to stop me from doing the things I want to do."

Natsha smiled at that,

"Well, it will for a week because you are in bed rest."

Her smile widened when Ali groaned. She was just glad to have her daughter back and healthy.

Over the next week she was almost always in the company of an Avenger not that she minded. Only when they had to have meetings or go on missions did they leave her alone or when Maya came over.

As much as Ali loved her family she was glad when they had to spend the afternoon in Italy for an emergency mission that they couldn't get out of no matter how hard Natsha tried.

The only reason that none of them stayed behind was because they were all needed and because Maya was supposed to be coming over after school that afternoon to give Ali her school work.

Since the start of the week of her week of bed rest, Ali had been receiving most of her work through emails from her teachers but Maya still came over every so often to give her the worksheets that weren't attached to the power points.

That afternoon Maya was supposed to come over in order to give her the worksheets but really Ali was just excited to see her best friend and catch up on all of the gossip going round.

4pm came and there was still no Maya so Ali texted her.

Your best friend is still waiting for the gossip

It didn't take long for Maya to respond which surprised Ali a little.

Well your friend has something so much better than gossip for you. In fact it is going to be the one to deliver the worksheets to you

???

Maya didn't respond to the question marks which made Ali even more confused. She had no idea what she was talking about.

What she was talking about knocked on her door about 5 minutes later.

The knock confused Ali since almost everybody just barged in or knocked and then opened the door.

This person knocked and waited for her to say come in before they opened the door.

The heart monitor that had been attached to her chest was gone and so was the IV in her hand and there was no longer any light brown liquid being fed into her stomach through a tube since she could now eat normally.

Even then she still thought that she looked horrendous and especially did not want to be seen by this one boy. Of course that one boy was the one to open the door.

His blush made her smile slightly and she could see the worksheets in his hand.

"Hey Peter. Umm..."

She looked around herself before just using her hands to try and pull herself up into a sitting position. Usually the bed had a remote to it that lifted the back of the bed up slowly and it was almost always on the table beside her bed but of course when she needed it most it was not there.

She winced. They had taken her off pain medication yesterday much to Ali's relief since she hated having to have foreign substances pumped into her body and it meant that the IV could be taken out. It also, however meant that she could feel the shooting pain whenever she used her core muscles to do anything.

Peter saw her try and sit up and her wince and automatically ran over to her and helped her to sit up. The worksheets were still in his hand.

Once he realised what he had done he blushed but before he could say sorry Ali spoke,

"Thank you. Usually there is a remote that lifts the top of the bed up but I have no idea where it has gone."

"I can look for it if you want?"

"No no it's okay. I don't really need it. Thank you for bringing the worksheets."

"That's okay."

There was silence for a few seconds while Peter looked closely at Ali as if he were expecting her.

"Are you sure that you are alright?"

"Yeah. I can eat and I can drink and I will finally be off this stupid bed tomorrow and back to school by Wednesday next week. Why?"

Peter blushed at that.

"I was just worried that's all. Can't I be worried too? I know that Mr Stark definitely has been since he keeps rushing around the lab and checking his tablet every few minutes."

Ali groaned at that and Peter looked at her helplessly as he didn't know what was wrong though her words soothed his worry.

"I knew he had been! He kept denying it but I knew he was lying, I just couldn't prove it. He must have set up some closed circuit cameras that have not been attached to FRIDAY."

"He did..."

They lapsed into silence for a while before Peter handed her the worksheets and Ali placed them on the table beside her before saying,

"Thank you. So do you want to play Uno with me? If your busy then that's okay or if you want to get back down to the lab since I know it is one of your intern days today and..."

"I would like to play Uno."

At that Ali smiled and reached for the pack of Uno cards that were on the desk but Peter was quicker and had already grabbed them.

Ali smiled while he dealt out the cards and let her go first.

"I am so going to beat you!"

"No way! Science and Maths predict this game to be in my favour."

Ali laughed at that and they continued to play. They played game after game until an alarm rang.

It was Ali's phone and Ali sighed before setting down her cards onto the bed where both her and Peter were sitting.

Dummy had already wheeled towards her another table but this one had her small syringe of medicine on it.

Ali smiled when she saw Dum-E and pulled up her top so that it allowed her to open the tab that blocked off the tube that connected to her stomach. The T-shirt had only been pulled up a little but Peter still saw a few of the scars that littered her stomach and was shocked though said nothing.

She picked up the syringe from the table which Dum-E then wheeled away and connected it the the end of the tube before pushing the medicine through the tube. Once the medicine was in her stomach Ali took out the syringe and put it in the bag that was on her other table. She then pulled the tab back over the tube and dropped the T-shirt so that it once again covered her stomach.

Although Peter was trying to hide his shock, Ali saw right through him and internally cursed. She was really not in the mood to delv into her past.

"Ali..."

"Look Peter, I am alright. That is all in the past and has been for a while. I would explain it but I can't. Not right now. I will at some point tell you but just not right now. Okay?"

Peter nodded.

"Does Maya know?"

"She knows part of it but not all and I don't want her too. It wouldn't be fair on her."

"What about fair on you?"

Ali shrugged but knew he had a point.

"I have the Avengers and the rest of my family. They know."

Peter nodded and let it go.

They played Uno together for the rest of the afternoon until FRIDAY informed them that the Avengers would be arriving back in 5 minutes. Since the Avengers still did not know about Tony having an intern, Peter decided to leave.

After saying there goodbyes he left and the Avengers were surprised to find a very happy Ali sitting up tidying away some Uno cards.

Tony was the only one to have known what had happened since he had been watching Ali through the cameras he had placed in the room almost the entire time and had been giving everyone else regular updates. He still wanted to keep Peter to himself though so didn't tell the others about him or confront Ali.