When Peter had gotten the summons from Stark to come back to the facility he'd been nervous that he'd done something wrong again. He wracked his brain trying to think of what he could have done, but nothing came to mind. As Happy pulled up the front of the building Peter hoped that Rhea would be there.

"Hey, you going to get out anytime soon?" Happy called out breaking Peter from his thoughts.

"Yeah, sure, sorry…" Peter stumbled out of the car making his way up to the front doors. Happy led him down some halls until they came to where Tony was coming out of his lab.

"Peter, glad you could make it." Tony clapped Peter on the back.

"No problem Mr. Stark." Peter nodded. "What's going on, I mean what'd you call me for?"

"I think it's time you started to get some training for your suit and I've set you up with an excellent teacher." Tony guided him into a large state of the art gym.

"You?" Peter guessed.

"Nope." Tony replied and gestured to the center of a training mat. Peter did a double take when he saw.

Rhea wearing a long sleeved grey and pink stripped off the shoulder thin sweater, a pair of grey yoga pants, and pink tennis shoes. She was on the cycle speeding through the course on the screen in front of her with her earbuds blasting her favorite mix of Alexander Rybak and Lindsey Stirling. The exercise bike must have been supped up by Tony or Rhea herself considering how fast and hard she was going on it.

"Rhea." Tony called out, but Rhea didn't hear him. Sighing to himself he walked up behind her grabbing her sides making her startle. With a yelp she fell sideways to the ground with a thud. Peter rushed over to them.

"What's the big idea?!" Rhea pulled the buds from her ears.

"Just thought you'd like to greet Peter." Tony gestured over to where Peter was hovering awkwardly next to Tony.

"Oh, hey Peter." Rhea hopped to her feet holding out her hand to Peter.

"Hey Rhea." Peter stuttered, fumbling to shake her hand. "Are you ok?"

"I'm fine." Rhea waved off his worry.

"Are you getting trained to?" Peter asked.

"Nope." Rhea shook her head. "I'm the one training you."

"What?" Peter said in surprise then realized how it sounded. "Sorry, I just wasn't…"

"You weren't expecting me to be your trainer." Rhea nodded. "Yeah, well don't let my age fool you, I've had extensive training in combat and in technology." Rhea crossed her arms. "That suit you turned down, did you know that I helped make that."

"It was an awesome suit." Peter said quickly as Rhea hummed, eyeing his with a raised brow. "It really was and I would have loved to use it, but I just wasn't ready."

"I guess I can forgive you Peter." Rhea smiled letting Peter know she was kidding.

"I'll leave you two to it." Tony started for the door, pausing for a moment. "And let it be known Friday is watching everything with orders to alert me if you two get up to something…untoward."

"Of course sir, I would never…" Peter stumbled glancing over at Rhea who raised a brow. "I mean not that I think there's anything wrong with you, you're awesome…" Tony cleared his throat. "I respect all women and their armor bearing grandfathers."

"There you go." Tony nodded with one last look before leaving.

"So what kind of fighting training do you have?" Rhea asked crossing her arms.

"Um…" He shifted. "I just kind of go on instinct."

"Well not anymore." Rhea announced then noticed Peter's apprehension. "Come on Pete, think about it. If you're already this good based on instinct and self learning just imagine how awesome you'd be with some training!" Rhea grinned and Peter nodded along, seeing what she was getting at. "Plus the faster you make it through boot camp the faster we can move on to your suits weapon capabilities."

"Wait, boot camp?" Peter asked.

"Think of it like advanced PE." Rhea clapped her hands together. "Drop and give me a hundred push ups."

Peter thought for a fleeting moment about arguing, but he knew that Rhea wouldn't let him win, the look in her eyes alone told him that. He got into position, glancing over at Rhea who was going the same.

"What are you doing?" Peter asked.

"I'm not going to make you do all this stuff alone." Rhea scoffed and started her hundred, Peter still starring at her. "I won't wait up for you though, so you better get to it."

"Oh, right." Peter started up and they went through a whole warm up schedule of Rhea's creation that had him sweating by the end.

Then it was on to what she called the Trial which was a maze/guatlet, a series of ever changing pathways that always had something new to throw at an opponent. They had started using it to train new recruits and had different level setting, very few having been able to beat the whole system.

It was all set up below the Avengers Facility underground consisting of a series of tests that ranged in danger levels. They tested physical attributes, mental capabilities, and stress tests. To make it fair the whole thing was randomly chosen depending on the persons capabilities with a little added to improve their skill and all of it was monitored by FRIDAY as well as AL when Rhea was using it.

"This will give me an idea of where you're at and what you need to improve on." Rhea told him as she showed him the Trial from above on the catwalks. "It's not that the maze as a whole changes it's just that each section is never the same as before. Thanks to my grandpa's holographic projectors we are able to keep it fresh without having to expand it." Rhea pointed to where three recruits were stealthily making their way down what seemed to be an office corridor. They had their guns raised and were checking every room they passed for the enemy. "They're currently dealing with a hostage situation."

"Can they see us?" Peter asked.

"Nah, they look up they just see a ceiling." Rhea said right before the team found the door they were looking for and broke in only for a colorful explosion to go off. "Booby trap, the Trial is non-lethal, but that doesn't mean it's safe, injuries have been known to happen." They watched as the smoke was cleared as the trial was ended and the team hobbled out covered in blue powder. "Most weapon fire is either powder or paintball at this level and for the hardcore like Captain Rogers and Un..." Rhea cleared her throat. "I mean Thor, live ammo can be used."

"Whoah." Peter's eyes widened.

"Don't worry, everyone has to start at the beginner's level to give the machine time to calibrate to your needs, so it's pretty easy at first." Rhea assured him. "Now in you get."

"Ok." Peter walked down the stairs taking a step into the maze. "Hey Rhea, did you ever see that movie about the guy with the wild hair and the girl who wishes her brother away?"

"Yeah, Labyrinth, why?" Rhea asked as she brought up a holographic screen and started to type in some commands.

"Is this like that?" He asked.

"Yes." Rhea typed away, adding a few surprises.

"Really?" Peter sounded surprised.

"No, more like Pan's Labyrinth." Rhea replied the program started up and Peter was put into a situation.

"Wait, what?" Peter looked around at the video game like dungeon setting he was in.

"Good luck!" She watched him as he made his way through the obstacle course easily deflecting and avoiding every attack to what he had dubbed as his 'Spidey-Sense'. "Hey AL, make a note to find a way to disrupt Spidey-sense."

"Got it kid." Al replied. "He's doing pretty good."

"Yeah, he is." Rhea smiled as she watched Peter dodge the basic big boss minions.

"Careful, if your gramps sees that lovey dovey look on your face you may be looking at a squished bug." AL teased causing Rhea to flush.

"Would you stop doing that?" Rhea turned her attention back on her readings. "I'm not looking at him any differently than any other boy."

"Yeah, sure." AL scoffed. Rhea rolled her eyes in retaliation, but couldn't help the small glances she sent towards Peter from time to time.

-0-

Rhea stood on the edge of a building in Queens next to Peter, both of them suited up as Hex and Spiderman respectively. Neither had their masks on, enjoying the night breeze as they talked, waiting to see if they were needed.

"So just do what you usually do and then we'll go from there." Rhea said as she typed into her arm band.

"Right, got it." Peter nodded.

"Loosen up Pete, we've been monitoring you through your suit for a while, this is just for me to get some firsthand information." Rhea grinned.

"That's a little creepy." Peter commented.

"Yeah...by the way, love the Thor impression." Rhea chuckled.

"You saw that?" Peter gaped at her.

"Oh yeah, very funny." Rhea nodded as Peter's face went red.

"Oh man." He groaned.

"Don't worry about it. You're not the only one to go around playing Avenger." Rhea giggled.

"Oh really, who'd you dress up as?" Peter asked.

"What? Me? No, I never did that, I lived with them..." Rhea was cut off as her wrist band lit up and a picture of her dressed as various members of the team starting with her younger years and moving forward. "AL!"

"Oops, sorry." AL commented as she tried to hide the pictures.

"You look so cute." Peter laughed as Rhea finally got the pictures to close.

"Enjoy your update AL." Rhea pressed a few buttons ignoring AL's protest as the update went into effect.

"I really liked you as Captain America." Peter chuckled.

"Yeah, about broke my grandpa's ego that Halloween." Rhea smiled a bit, looking a little sad.

"You must miss them, the other Avengers." Peter said gently.

"They were...are my family." Rhea rubbed her arms. "Being without them hurts."

Rhea's head was bowed and she looked so sad. Peter reached out a few times trying to decide between an arm around her shoulders or if he should just pat her on the back. Before he could there was an alert through Karen of an armed break in at local pawn shop.

"Do I...should I...?" Peter gestured, unsure.

"Yeah Pete, take the lead and I'll follow." Rhea nodded as she pulled up her hood and when she looked to Peter her Venician mask was in place.

Peter pulled on his mask and shot off a line before swinging off the building with Rhea flying after him. The pawn shop was a little out of the way place and inside were a few armed men gathering what they could into their backpacks. Rhea followed Peter as he casually leaned against the door frame the robbers had broken through.

"So is this like American Pickers Thieves addition or what?" Peter asked gaining their attention, their weapons instantly training in on him. Rhea recognized one of Toomes guns that they were still tracking down. It was a sleek silver job that was pulsing different shades of blue on the tip and sides.

"Just back off Spider or you and your girl are finished." The man gestured with the strange gun.

"Oh, then by all means, we'll just leave and let you get on with you felony." Rhea rolled her eyes before all heck broke loose, the thugs putting up a valiant albeit useless fight.

The Rhea saw it out of the corner of her eye, one of the men pointed the strange gun at Peter who was distracted by the other thugs, Rhea stepped in ready to deflect it, but a cold beam was the last thing she expected. Holding up her hand she easily held it back, but the effects were crawling up her arm changing her skin blue and her eyes red. When the man let off on the gun Rhea returned with an ice blast of her own freezing him to a wall as Peter tied up the rest. They quickly made their way out of the store, Karen calling the cops who were in route.

"Wow, I didn't know you could do that." Peter was amazed as they landed on the building opposite the pawn shop.

"Yeah, just one of my tricks." Rhea turned away trying to will her fingers which were the only visible body part she had to worry about Peter seeing, other than her eyes.

"Are you ok?" Peter tried to get around her to face her, but she avoided his gaze and his her hands in her pockets.

"I have to go home." Rhea quickly took off without another word leaving behind a confused Peter. She booked it straight to her room just as AL came back online.

"Hey, what happened to the stakeout? Was I out that long?" AL asked realizing they were back home.

Rhea ignored him as she walked over to her mirror taking off her hood and mask revealing her Jotun face covered in raised lines, her eyes blood red, and her teeth now sharp. It wasn't that she was ashamed of it, in fact she thought it was pretty cool, but it raised a lot of questions about her parentage that she didn't want Peter asking.

"Ok, deep breath, in and out." Rhea said to herself as she focused on reverting to her asier/human form, the blue slowly changing to ivory.

"You know you're going to have to tell him sometime kid." AL commented when Rhea had completely changed back.

"Maybe..." Rhea stared down at her hands. "I just don't want to choose."

"Choose what?" AL asked.

"Between my father and Peter." Rhea sighed.