Another super early post because it's 1am where I am, but I just finished a chapter you won't see for months and I am having feelings. Let it be known, I can get my own heart pounding (or, in this case, get myself to actually cry) by my own writing. I'm not sure what that says about me, actually. But, anyway. Point is that I'm awake and you benefit from it via early chapter.

So, I just want to be clear that the robotics competition in this chapter was originally based on similar competitions middle schools and high schools host, but up a level. There's no problem-solving AI in those real-world competitions – the bots are all controlled with remotes. But this is the MCU and even if a JARVIS-level AI isn't anywhere else on the planet, you gotta believe other tech companies and scientists have gotten farther than the MCU version of Alexa. So just…go with the idea that middle schoolers have starter packs for basic reasoning in their coding.

Next week is the last chapter of part 1, and if you're not already subscribed to me on this site, you might want to get on that. Part 2 is going up right after, and it's a DOOZY. Part 1 has been, as one commenter astutely noted, kind of "low stakes." Personal, but low. Not so much the world-ending mayhem in this one. Now's where I tell you that part 2 and beyond are going to ramp it up. So jump on board – this thing is going to accelerate from here on out.

The song for this chapter is "Underdog" by Alicia Keys. One of my current favorite jams, and very appropriate for Peter.

Enjoy!


Chapter 17: Built to Break the Mold


The science exhibition on Friday began when the school was opened to parents and guests at lunchtime. There were lunches available to buy to help raise money for the school and lots of non-science projects put together by students more interested in the arts lining the hallways. The choir and band combined forces to play the school song after lunch on the soccer field since the gym was being set up for the science competition.

Peter had kept very close to his friends all week in spite of knowing Doctor Kreese-Silver should be watching the club members, and he was as relieved as they were when adults started showing up. Aunt May and Mister Carbonell were there right on time to eat lunch with him, and Peter supposed he wasn't too surprised that Miss Rushman appeared as well, although she didn't stay with them — she said hi and then immediately walked off.

Just as Peter finished eating his better-than-normal-cafeteria-food lunch (which Mister Carbonell complained about like it was the worst food ever), E-Bit, Estrella, and Nkosi all wandered over to introduce their parents to Peter and his adults. The four of them instantly regretted it when the cabal of adults decided to pass the time waiting for the lunch period to end by playing a game of "Who can tell the worst story about their kid in front of the others?"

Mister Carbonell almost added a story of one of Peter's chem reactions gone bad until Peter subtly reminded him that "for every one you've got about me, I've got two about you," and that was enough to end his participation in the game. Nothing stopped May, though, and Peter eventually just accepted the fact that his friends were going to know a lot more about him than he would have liked.

At least the other parents were as bad as May. Nobody left the lunch hour unscathed.

Robotics was the last event of the day, so Peter wandered around with Aunt May and Mister Carbonell to see the other projects as the judges passed from one to the next. His friends' volcano went off perfectly and Peter actually laughed to find out that the model of him as a sacrifice was what triggered the explosion by piercing a thin film suspending the baking soda over the solution. The carnage after the explosion was as epic as Nkosi had dreamed and earned the three of them quite the cheer.

Peter felt his nerves growing with every passing minute, though.

"He's okay, right?" he found himself asking about half an hour before the robotics portion.

Mister Carbonell nodded. "Miss Rushman is watching over him herself. Nobody's going to mess with him, I promise."

Still, Peter worried.

Finally, the person with the mic and speaker set up on the low stage at the far end of the gymnasium asked for everyone's attention.

"The time has come for the live event of our exhibition. Will all students and guests please clear the area inside the red box marked on the floor? Robotics competitors, please report to the stage with your bots."

There was a lot of frenzied shoving and moving around as people cleared the marked area on the floor. Peter, with Mister Carbonell at his side, retreated to Mister Thompson's room where his bot was waiting. He didn't see Miss Rushman until he almost ran into her outside the door.

"Hello, Peter," she said. He noticed that her hair was long and straight now, but as red as before. "I'm sorry those boys didn't follow my rules as well as I hoped they would."

"It's okay," Peter rushed to assure her. "They got in trouble for it."

"Yes, about that." And she looked up at Mister Carbonell.

"It's handled," he said.

She nodded. "Good." Turning her attention back to Peter, "I'll go find a good place to watch. You make sure you take them apart."

Peter smiled. "I will!"

In Mister Thompson's room, Peter retrieved his bot; his homeroom teacher had allowed him to hide it in a cupboard behind his desk, just in case, and Peter breathed a sigh of relief to see it still wrapped just as it had been this morning.

"Hey, Peter." Mister Carbonell looked a little uncomfortable.

"Yes?" He hefted his bot into his arms. "Is something wrong?"

"No. Just...after you win. I've got something to tell you. Okay?"

That sounded ominous. "O-kay?"

"It's good. Don't sweat it. Actually, ignore me." Mister Carbonell shook his head like he was getting water out of his ear. "Okay, let's go show those bullies what real genius looks like. I am going to get a picture of that Doctor Creep-Face when he watches you beat the pants off his precious little club team."

Peter grinned.

Back in the gym, there was a lot of activity happening while teachers set up the course in the marked out area. Peter made his way to the stage, trying to pretend nobody was looking at him.

But they were, because up until this moment, nobody else had really thought the club had any competition. And yet here he was, making his way up to the stage and hoping his knees wouldn't shake.

"Hi Peter," said Miss Roberts, the computer teacher who met him on the stage. "I just need to take a look at your code and make sure that you wrote it yourself. Is that okay?"

Peter nodded. He held the bot out for her to plug it into her laptop. He knew this was part of the test, and he felt a little embarrassed to have her see all his notes and commented-out bits and places the code was clumsy. But he had written every bit of it himself, even if he had gotten a ton of help from Mister Carbonell. The rules said he was allowed to ask for advice or consult written materials, and he had done no more than that.

Miss Roberts was smiling when she looked back at Peter. "I can see you put a lot of work into this. It's very advanced. Did you learn a lot?"

"I learned so much," he said, relieved. "And it was more fun than I thought it would be. I always liked chemistry better, but coding is kind of the same. Except your reactions aren't substances — they're what you make the robot do."

"I'm glad to hear it." She closed the program on her laptop and unplugged the bot. "Everything is in order here. Next year when you're back in my class, I might ask you to show this to the others and tell them what you learned. But let's see how your bot does on the course first. You can go wait your turn over there." She pointed to where there was one chair by itself on the far end of the stage.

Peter nodded, half hugging the bot to his chest. He made his way to the chair, noticing that there were four chairs on the other end of the stage.

At least they kept us apart, he thought to himself.

He could see Doctor Kreese-Silver with the club talking to Miss Roberts out of the corner of his eye, and she examined their bot the same way she had Peter's. He tried to get a look at their bot, but everyone was standing in the way.

"All right!" The person doing the announcing now was Missus Kim, the assistant principal. "Welcome to the final set of entries for today's exhibition. Before we get started, how about a round of applause for all the previous exhibits?"

The crowd cheered as requested. Peter noticed Doctor Kreese-Silver leave his club at their place on the stage and make his way into the crowd. He also thought he saw a flash of long red hair approaching him.

"For those of you who are new to our annual tradition, the robotics portion of this competition requires the highest level of scientific acumen and advanced preparation. Each year, the science department selects a challenge which any and all entries related to robotics must be able to complete for consideration. This year's challenge is a maze."

Peter looked down at the cleared area of the gymnasium floor. The long rectangle that had been drawn in tape was now filled with items and hazards, including low walls made from wooden planks, a portion that looked like it had been covered in sand, and a spill of soapy water. He mentally checked off each obstacle, weighing it against his own bot's capabilities.

The robotics club still looked confident.

Peter looked at his feet.

"The competitors will have to start their bots at the starting line. Then, with no outside help at all, each bot must traverse the maze successfully, never leaving its boundaries which are GPS-marked and those coordinates provided to the students in advance. At the end of the maze, there is an item which the bot will have to retrieve. Then the bot must return back across the maze and successfully hand the item to the students."

Peter took a slow breath.

"If no bots complete the challenge, the judges will award the robotics prize based upon how well each performed prior to its failure. If all bots complete the challenge, then either or both may be considered against the other top competitors of other disciplines."

So we could both win our individual grades, Peter thought. Or the overall school prize.

Good.

"This year, we have two competing teams in the robotics event. Before their turn, I will invite each to come forward and say a little about their bot while we have them scan the item for retrieval. If either bot cannot scan the item successfully, they will not run the maze at all."

The assistant principal turned and Peter thought for sure she winked at him. But she gestured to the robotics club first.

"Please welcome these four eighth grade members of the robotics club — Johnny Lawrence, Dutch O'Dell, Fred Fernandez, and Bobby Brown." She handed the microphone to Johnny while Miss Roberts appeared with the item to be scanned.

It was a little figurine in the shape of the school mascot, a kestrel with wings fully spread. Peter smiled. That might be hard for a claw to hold onto, depending on how it was built and coded.

"Hi," Johnny Lawrence said into the mic. "We're really excited to introduce you to our bot. We built him together over the last few months and we think he's really going to impress you with what he can do."

"His name is Crusher!" Dutch yelled from behind Johnny. "Because he's gonna crush this course!"

And of course Dutch looked over at Peter with a sneer, but Peter chose to ignore him.

"All right," Missus Kim said. "Let's see what Crusher can do! Johnny, if you would set him at the starting line, as soon as he moves, we'll begin the clock."

Finally Peter could get a good look at Crusher the bot, and when he did, he had to duck his head again so nobody saw him laugh. But he couldn't help it!

Crusher looked like a Roomba that had lived its worst life. It was rounded with wheels on the bottom, but the casing was a little messily soldered together, and it had a bunch of extra spikes and bits attached that were probably supposed to look functional or at least intimidating but definitely didn't do anything useful. Honestly, it looked to Peter like someone wanted to build a bot for fighting and took over design. It also had a claw hand sticking up off the top — that, at least, looked right. But Peter could see some wires were tangled around each other running up and down the arm, which meant someone was in a hurry when they did that part, or didn't care. And that told him about how well it might be wired internally, too.

Sure he wasn't going to make the wrong face from the stage and get punched before he even got to compete, he finally looked up and sought out Mister Carbonell in the crowd.

Mister Carbonell was not guarding his expression at all and Peter could see the man actually laughing. Then he noticed Peter watching him and gave Peter a thumbs-up. Peter returned it.

Johnny set Crusher down on the course and the bot immediately moved forward. The crowd started cheering it on as the ugliest little Roomba-knockoff began navigating the course. It bumped into walls but knew enough to turn and move sideways until it found a gap. It avoided the sand trap and the soapy water probably more by sheer luck than good programming, and soon enough it had reached the other side. The claw hand extended, grasped the kestrel figurine, and then the bot rotated to return.

On its way back, it did run into the sand trap. There, the bot struggled. The wheels spun on the sand, and one wheel in particular looked like it maybe got jammed. The crowd urged Crusher on, the robotics club more than anyone shouting and stamping their feet from the beginning of the course.

After three minutes of trying again and again to go the way it wanted to go, the bot's wheels must have cleared enough sand on one side that it was able to pull itself forward and out of the trap. Finally it made its way back to the starting line, dropping the item into Johnny's waiting hands.

"Yeah!" Johnny yelled, holding the figurine aloft like a trophy. Then he turned and pointed directly at Peter with it. "Beat that!"

"The official time," Missus Kim announced, "is eight minutes, forty-five seconds. Now, while we reset the course, we will have the other student scan the item and tell us a bit about his entry."

And then Peter felt nerves twist in his stomach and it took everything he had to walk towards the assistant principal with the robotics club glaring at him and every eye in the room watching him.

"Let's go Iron Man 2.0!" came a yell from the crowd.

Peter blinked, and suddenly other students were yelling, remembering his costume from Halloween. And he thought about Mister Stark being so brave, and the fact that he was happy somewhere, and that gave him enough courage and calm to hold his head up.

He let the bot scan the figure first before he turned to Missus Kim, who was smiling at him. "Go get them, kid," she said.

Peter had his hands full with the bot, so he let her hold the microphone for him.

"Um, hi. I'm Peter Parker. And this is my bot. I named him Crawl-E."

The laughter in the crowd encouraged him further.

"I built him with some help from a really good friend, and I learned a lot about coding to do it. I think...building Crawl-E helped me see that there's always a way through or around a problem if you look at it long enough. So I hope Crawl-E can show you the same thing when he tries the course!"

Peter didn't really listen to the crowd's reaction to his speech as he stepped down from the stage and approached the start line. "Okay, buddy," he said. "Let's show them."

Crawl-E was not shaped like a Roomba. It was shaped a bit like Wall-E, thus the name, but without a head. Honestly, Peter thought it looked like a fusion of Wall-E and the little black repair bots that ran around on the Death Star in A New Hope. It was low to the ground with a pair of treads that ran underneath in the place of wheels. It had optical sensors on both ends because it didn't really have a designated 'front,' and Peter had painted it Iron Man red with a little gold nameplate on one side.

"Whenever you're ready," the teacher with the stopwatch said.

Peter took a deep breath and set Crawl-E on the floor.

At once, the little bot zipped off into the maze. Unlike Crusher, Crawl-E didn't bump into the obstacles. However, it also didn't move in much of a straight line. Crawl-E moved back and forth within the GPS-defined space, examining the obstacles as it went. As soon as it had covered an area, it advanced and examined that as well. At the end of six minutes, Crawl-E finally reached the end. It's little claws emerged from where they were tucked low on its sides and it gripped the kestrel.

"Looks like you lose, princess," Johnny said from beside him. "It'll never be back in time."

Peter looked away.

And then the crowd began to cheer.

Crawl-E was returning at full speed, rushing about with the precision of a dancer following choreography. Peter grinned fully as the little bot picked the most efficient path back, having made a map of the area on the way to the figurine — it didn't have to solve the maze twice because it had been programmed to remember it.

Crawl-E also ran right over the sand trap, not viewing sand as a problem, and it wasn't.

It might have taken six minutes for Crawl-E to reach the figure, but it took it less than a minute to return. And it did so to the sounds of deafening shouting from every side.

Peter took the figure from Crawl-E's claws and scooped it up, his chest feeling so full he was sure he would burst.

I did it! He managed to look up and spot Mister Carbonell, whose grin was huge. We did it!

"Official time — six minutes, fifty-four seconds. Folks, we have a winner! Congratulations, Peter Parker! With that done, the school judges will consult and we will announce the exhibition winners shortly."

Peter enjoyed the cheering but saw the absolutely murderous expression on Johnny and Dutch's faces — and a sort of bored one on Fred's and an impressed one from Bobby — and decided to go be elsewhere while the judges made their final decisions. So he scooped up his bot and ducked into the crowd.

For one heart-stopping moment, Peter was sure his only path through the press of people was to head back into the dark hallways that had meant trouble at Halloween. But suddenly he felt a hand on his shoulder. He knew who it was without looking.

"Mister Carbonell! We did it!"

"We sure did, mini me." Mister Carbonell was grinning big enough to crack his face. "Now, how about you come hang out with your aunt and I. Someplace other than back there."

"Definitely."

Aunt May gave Peter a huge hug, and Peter had to show Crawl-E off to everybody who managed to find him in the crowd, including Nkosi, Estrella, and E-Bit who were fiercely proud of their friend.

"Sorry you sacrificed me to your volcano now?" he teased them.

"No." E-Bit tossed their head. "Clearly that was the final good luck charm you needed."

"It wasn't luck," Mister Carbonell corrected them. "It was skill and hard work. Nothing less from Mister Parker."

Peter flushed and swallowed a lump in his throat.

"Good afternoon!"

They looked up to see Principal Freeman take the stage. With her were four other teachers, each holding a medal. Principal Freeman waited for the chatter to die down a bit.

"My name is Principal Naomi Freeman, and it is my great pleasure to announce the winners for each grade of those who participated in today's exhibition. For everyone not receiving an award today, please remember that every effort is worthy even when it is not rewarded, because the reward is in what you learned, not what you earned."

Some enthusiastic parents clapped at that, but most students just rolled their eyes.

"For the sixth grade, the judges would like to award the prize for best entry to...Mariella Credi for her excellent work in detecting and cleansing impurities in our drinking water!"

A cry went up from one corner of the room and a girl rushed forward to the stage while a whole big family cheered for her. Peter would have clapped, but his hands were full of Crawl-E so he yelled instead. Mariella was so happy she was nearly crying as one of the teachers hung the medal around her neck.

"For seventh grade, the judges would like to award the prize for best entry to...Peter Parker and his amazing bot Crawl-E!"

Peter's ears filled with the sound of rushing. He felt Crawl-E lifted from his hands — by May, he realized belatedly — and Nkosi gave him a shove towards the stage while the crowd parted for him. On the stage, he had no idea who gave him the medal or what they said to him. He just tried to smile and stand still next to Mariella and breathe.

"For eighth grade, the judges would like to award the prize for best entry to...Kerry Barber for her analysis of sound waves necessary to break a glass!"

Peter almost had his breathing under control by the time the other girl stood next to him.

"And now for the final prize." Principal Freeman paused. "In years past, this award has often gone to someone who also won their year, but it is not required. The judges decide this award based on the difficulty of the exhibit chosen, the quality of execution, and the hard work and drive to succeed as shown by the student. It is our hope to see many more great things from this student."

Peter could see Johnny's face, expectant and smug. Honestly, he didn't have the energy even to care.

"The winner of the overall school prize is...Peter Parker!"

Peter blinked, and he knew he looked shocked rather than happy and he couldn't help it. He'd known he would beat the club...but to win overall...to break the robotics club's winning streak…

And then he could hear Nkosi and Estrella and E-Bit chanting because they were yelling his name. "Pe-ter! Pe-ter! Pe-ter!" And the crowd joined in.

Peter managed the stumbling step forward to receive a second medal.

"I am very proud of you, Peter," Principal Freeman said softly. "Enjoy this victory. You deserve it."

Peter never heard the short speech that was the end of the exhibition as the cheering died down and people started to scatter. He would never remember congratulating the other two winners and accepting their congratulations in return. And he was so caught up, he wouldn't even wonder what Doctor Kreese-Silver or Johnny and the others thought about his win because they were nowhere on his radar and they were gone by the time he thought to look for them.

Finally when he was standing with just Mister Carbonell and Aunt May in a suddenly quieter gym, he felt like he could think clearly again. "I...really won?"

"Oh, honey." Aunt May was crying, because of course she was. "You did." She hugged him tight. "I'm so proud of you. I can't even tell you."

"Me too, Peter." Mister Carbonell was still smiling, but there was something strange in it. Something almost fragile. "So proud."

Aunt May looked at the two of them and lifted Crawl-E from Mister Carbonell's hands. Then she nudged him with an elbow.

Mister Carbonell glanced around. The gym was mostly empty now, and they had drifted into a corner on their own. And Peter remembered that Mister Carbonell had wanted to tell him something.

He looked up. "Is...is now when you want to tell me whatever it is?"

Mister Carbonell's face reflected a lot of emotions, and Peter couldn't place them all. But he saw pride, and affection, and nervousness.

"It's okay if you don't want to," he said quickly. "Really."

"No, Peter. I…" Mister Carbonell gulped, then pulled Peter into his arms.

Peter leaned his head on Mister Carbonell's chest, reassured by the steady, if rapid, heart-beat.

"Ti voglio bene come tu se fossi mio figlio."

Peter's heart stuttered in his own chest. "What...what does it mean? You've called me that last word before."

And he wondered if he imagined the point of wetness on his head.

"It means...figlio means son, Peter. It means I love you as if you were my own."

And Peter squeezed back as hard as he could. "I love you, too, Mister Carbonell."

-==OOO==-

"Oh, my god, I'm so stupid!" Tony buried his face in his hands. "I was supposed to tell him I was Tony Stark!"

Pepper laughed. "Honestly, I think that was better. Certainly more important."

"Aargh. I didn't even mean to! It just burst out!"

Pepper knew perfectly well that this kind of outburst was one only she or maybe Rhodey ever saw. Tony had been rightly called a drama queen many times, but that was by people who hadn't seen him holed up in the penthouse lying on a couch yelling into a pillow. She wasn't even surprised anymore when he showed up, flounced to his favorite spot in the living room, and proceeded to have a mini meltdown.

Honestly, it was healthy. The fact that he could have these feelings and express them, rather than hiding them behind a biting or veiled comment and then refusing to engage, was a huge step forward. Tony felt things keenly, fiercely. Pepper was always happier when he felt them with all their passion even if it was a little silly looking, because it meant he was being honest with himself.

She ran her hands through his hair from her spot on the arm of the couch. "And what did Peter say?"

The answer was muttered and muffled, but Pepper caught "loves me" and that was enough. She grinned. "Oh, Tony. Do you have any idea how happy I am right now?"

"No?" He peeked out from behind his hands.

"Very." She brushed hair out of his eyes. "That boy deserves all the love in the world, and you deserve it, too. There is nothing wrong with finding out that a kid who has become as much a part of your life as Peter has sees you exactly the same way."

"Ugh, feelings." But there was a smile on his face anyway.

"Now, tell me about these bullies and what's happening with them." Pepper shook her head. "I don't like the idea that they have the rest of this year to make Peter's life miserable. Especially if the abuse started before they were even in school together."

Tony nodded and sat up, obviously relieved to talk about problems to fix. "Well, first, Romanoff dug up a little old dirt on that Doctor Jerk from the robotics club. She'll give it to the school tomorrow before she heads off on whatever SHIELD mission is happening this time and that will probably be the end of his career."

"It's a start, anyway. Imagine him caring more about some made-up corporate event than a kid being hurt." Pepper made a mental note to add his name to her list of people Stark Industries would never employ, consult, work with, or permit to participate in any partnerships. Just in case.

"Of the kids, it's really two of them that are the problem. One of them is basically a follower and hasn't really done that much, and JARVIS found a clip of the other kid talking to that principal after the exhibition to tell her how sorry he was and that he was done with that group of friends."

Tony shook his head.

"Those main two, though, are not going to stop."

"Then what can we do?" Pepper wanted to know.

"Well. Since apparently I'm not allowed to repulsor them in the face…"

"Yeah, no."

"I know; May said that, too."

Pepper grinned. She loved having May Parker on the other side of Tony's life to help out at times like this.

Tony waggled a finger at her. "I knew I should never have introduced you two."

"The kids, Tony," Pepper reminded him.

"Right. They're a little young for juvie, and that seems like overkill. Even for hurting Peter, I don't want them in jail. I just want them out of his life forever. I know we could get their parents jobs elsewhere and force them to move, but that feels like rewarding the family for their kids' bad behavior."

"Does either family work for SI?" Pepper asked.

"No, but that's not really an obstacle."

Pepper sighed. That tone of voice usually meant Tony either spontaneously buying out a company — which meant work for her and damage control — or Tony calling in favors at high levels — which also meant work and damage control.

"I also considered buying wherever they live and kicking them out just for the visceral enjoyment," Tony said, "but I really don't want to run any more apartment blocks."

"Well," Pepper said, "I'm glad to hear that this time at least you're not talking about framing the kids for various weird crimes and forcing the families to move out of state or face public ridicule."

Tony frowned. "When did I ever do that?"

"I think it was March of 2007. You were also really drunk, and some guy at an event tried to grab me someplace I did not welcome it."

"Oh, yeah." Tony's eyes went dark and feral for a moment. "That was warranted. I'm good with that one."

"So, what are you going to do about these kids?"

He sighed. "I don't know yet. I'll think of something. There has to be a way to get them out of the neighborhood without going too far or rewarding their parents for raising bullies."

"I like this new version of you that cares about whether or not you go too far," Pepper said.

"Yeah, this moderation stuff from May is insidious. You know, I had been...there's a file on my server where I was trying to figure out how to do something pretty aggressive. Build a suit of armor around the world for the next time aliens show up."

Pepper swallowed, her light mood suddenly dashed. "Is that really a good idea?"

"I thought so at the time." But he looked at his hands. "Now, I don't really know. May talks about how you can't stop bad things from happening. You can't prevent stuff. It's about how you deal with it. And...I mean, it makes sense. How easy would it be to go from 'protect the whole world' to 'squash anything that looks like a threat' to 'destroy anything that doesn't agree with me?' And the slope gets slipperier from there."

Pepper carded her hands through the hair on the side of his face, touching his jaw. "Your impulses are so good, Tony. But, I think this time, I'm glad you're backing off. Besides, any tool that strong could turn into a weapon, too, and I don't think I want anything like that aimed at us."

"That's why you turned down Extremis and Killian the first time."

"It is." Pepper nodded. "Also he gave me the creeps. But...a sword cuts two ways. And Captain America has proven that the metaphor works for shields, too. When it comes down to it, anything in the wrong hands can cause harm. I think we have a responsibility to be very careful about what we bring into the world, and into whose hands it can fall."

"You," Tony leaned forward, "are very wise, Miss Potts."

She smiled. "Thank you, Mister Stark. But you got there yourself this time without any help from me."

"I guess maybe I'm growing." He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively. "Is it sexy? It's sexy, right?"

"Actually, yes." Pepper leaned in to kiss him. "Very."