Title: My Favorite Weakness (is You)
Summary: Tony needs backup. He hasn't lost it- not yet.
Author's Notes: Welcome back to the now Peter Parker-less world! May I present to you, Worried Tony Stark®.
Chapter 14: Backup
- Tuesday evening, 5 hours since Tony last heard from Peter -
No calls, no texts. The kid's suit is untraceable, and the time Peter said he was going to be at the tower came and passed over three hours ago.
Tony blankly stares at his computer monitor, which is displaying a 3-dimensional map of the streets from Queens to Manhattan. He'd been over the timeline again and again in his head, and looking at the streets stressed him out; there were so many possibilities.
If Tony just picked him up, he wouldn't be here. But he didn't have the time or the mental stability for 'ifs' at the moment, so he tabled those thoughts.
"Hey FRI, you're still scanning for his phone?" He had to come up with a plan.
"Yes, Boss. The last text Peter's phone transmitted was at 1:27 pm. The phone stopped receiving signal at 1:54 pm, and has been untraceable since." Tony had to figure out where to start.
"You said you're able to find the last spot his phone was working?" Why didn't he just offer to pick the kid up? It's not like he had any other plans for the entire afternoon.
"Yes, Boss. Here are the coordinates." The map zoomed out, then focused back in to an alleyway not necessarily on the way to the Tower. So either the kid made a pit stop to visit a friend here, or something didn't go as planned. Either resulting in going off the grid.
"Thanks, Fri. Let me know if anything shows up on the phone or the suit."
"Will do."
Peter had disabled the trackers once before, and although Tony doubted Peter would try that again, he'd check up on that later, if Peter wasn't at home.
Tony decided he would stop by the spot, then visit the Parker's apartment.
Nothing.
That's what Tony had: nothing.
Nothing from the hot spot, nor the apartment.
No hints, markers, or clues.
And No Peter Parker.
He checked the time, which was nothing more than a stopwatch counting the time Tony wasn't on his way to finding Peter; each second was a point amounting to how much of a failure he was as a mentor – no, not that. In this case, he was a failure at being a responsible human being.
Despite the constant jokes on how irresponsible and immature Tony was, he liked to think he was at least responsible for the people he cared about, regardless of what people said. But it was times like this that made him doubt his own self-worth.
"Hello?" The young voice on the phone sounded hesitant, and for good reason. Tony had hidden his own number before calling.
"Is this Ned Leeds?"
Another pause as the voice decided whether or not to convey this information to the unknown number. "Yes, may I ask who's calling?"
"This is Tony Stark. Have you-"
"Mr. Stark!?"
Tony felt the aggravation swell, and he swallowed it down. "Yes. May I ask you a couple of questions, please?"
He heard the kid whisper something. Was Peter there?
"I have a question for you, are you ready?" One step at a time; one breath at a time. Tony knew he had to maintain control over himself if he wanted to gain control of the situation.
He had no power over attacks, save prevention, so he kept the panic down.
"Yes, Mr. Stark, thank you for calling me! May I say what an honor it is to-"
"I'm sorry, it's urgent." Tony felt bad cutting off the teenager, but urgent it was.
Silence met him.
Good.
"Is Peter with you?"
"No, sir, he told me he was going to Stark Tower." This was a dead end, Tony knew it.
"When? Have you heard from him?"
"Uhhhh… sometime after lunch today? But that was a while ago, like a little after lunch. He's normally pretty bad at texting when he's at the tower, so I didn't really-" Tony cut him off.
"Did you or do you know if his suit's tracker was disabled again?"
The boy hesitated; Tony could feel him trying to figure out what was going on. "No, we didn't. Is Peter not at the Tower?"
"Thanks." Tony ignored the question; he had to move on to the next step. What was the next step?
The kid interrupted his thought: "Is Peter okay?" Don't think about it, don't think about it. Stay focused.
He responded instead with, "Can you let me know if you hear anything?"
"Yessi-" Tony hung up.
He hadn't given the kid any contact info, so he sent him Happy's number before calling it himself.
Tony needed backup.
"What did his aunt say?" Happy's vital question was met with silence.
He squinted his eyes; "You told his aunt, right? Tony? Please tell me you've at least asked her if she's heard from him or something."
Tony rubbed a hand down his face. Had it even been long enough to warrant calling the kid's aunt? He looked at the clock, but the numbers meant nothing to him, so he mentally dismissed it.
"Tony," Happy continued, "you should call his aunt; besides the fact that she needs to know, if anything were to happen to the kid, he'd most likely call her first."
"But I'm supposed to be his contact person while she's gone." Tony didn't want to make this call, but he felt the seconds ticking towards the inevitable.
"Yes, you're supposed to be, but he still might've called her first. She's his aunt."
"And I'm his contact. He would have called me first if anything were actually wrong. Therefore, he wouldn't have contacted his aunt." And May would have contacted Tony. And therefore nothing was actually wrong.
If only he could convince himself.
"Yes, you're his contact," Happy admitted, "But you have a history of being difficult for him to contact; a notably short history, at that."
Tony gave Happy a glare, but knew he couldn't argue. He instead turned to look at the map, which now encompassed the entire city, and willed the red, blinking light signifying the search to turn green. It didn't.
"You have to make the call Tony. Honestly, I'd do it for you, but it has to be you." Turn green. Green. Green. The red light refused to give in.
He sighed and picked up the phone. Happy stood up.
"I'll go drive up and down the streets and look," Happy told him. Tony didn't look at him. "I'll stop by his school, his apartment again, and that spot you showed me in the alleyway, before going by the routes he might've taken on his way here." Tony still didn't look up from where he was fiddling with his phone.
Happy stopped at the door. "He's fine, Tony. If he wasn't, we'd know. Call May."
It took another half hour of self-encouragement before Tony could muster up what he needed to call May. He listened to the ringing, hoping she wouldn't pick up so he could push it off for later.
His heart sank as the tone was cut short, and he was met with her professional nursing voice.
"Hi, May Parker speaking." If he hung up now, would he be helping or hurting her?
"Hi, May, this is Tony." He paused, wondering what to say next. Where to start.
"Hi Tony," she said, when he didn't go on.
"How's it going with you two? Anything I can help with?" Her voice was just as chipper, but he could hear the slight change in her tone, wondering why it was Tony who was calling.
Tony swallowed the emotion in his throat, and spoke. "I hope so. I was wondering if you've heard from Peter at all this afternoon? He said he was coming over to the Tower after lunch, but I haven't seen or heard from him since."
He heard what must have been the sound of her checking her phone, and waited until she put the phone back up to her ear. "No, he hasn't texted or called me since this morning."
Tony was once again met with deafening silence.
What was the next step. Was he missing something?
May would know. "Did he had a school thing pop up? Or a group of friends he might have run off with?"
"No," She replied. "No school thing. And Peter wouldn't 'run off' at all without telling anyone. He's not like that."
Tony knew that; he was just hoping.
"Except for, you know…." her voice implied what all roads were leading back to; "….his internship."
Tony nodded, then remembered he was conversing over a phone call. He sighed. "Okay."
"Okay?" She echoed, the panic now evident. "Tony, what should I do? How can I help?"
Tony rubbed a hand down his face. What could she do? What else could be done?
"I can alert the police," she suggested, "send in Peter's photos."
"I already have my best searching every camera an any device capable of… uh, searching," Tony said, "please don't think into that, butdo understand that I'm currently doing more than the police would be able to do at this stage." But it wasn't just that.
If he, Tony Stark, plastered Peter's name and face everywhere, then that would let whoever did know where he was that Tony Stark was looking for him. He doubted that would help reveal whatever was going on, anyways. Peter was strong, Tony knew, and he had deducted that whatever this was, was somehow superhero related. If someone had managed to take him, they were good; and they knew who he was by now.
That, or something worse. Tony didn't want to think of the other reason he'd suddenly get radio silence from Spider-Man. Peter wasn't bulletproof, and New York City was by no means bullet-free.
"Tony?" He'd forgotten she was on the phone. "I can be back tomorrow evening at the earliest. Just let me know how I can help, from my apartment."
"May- Happy is searching the streets now. I have every- wait, from your apartment?"
"Yes, I have to quarantine myself before I go out, it's a mandatory medical staff thing now,"
"May." Why did this have to happen to this family? Tony felt another wave of guilt wash over him as he thought about how he could have prevented this. "May, I'm sorry. I'm doing everything I can, and when I say I have the best resources, I have the best resources. I honestly doubt it will be much longer before we hear something from him, and I promise I will keep you up to as date as I am. You can go ahead and send his photo in, but I'll hear something long before you do if anything pops up."
"Okay, I'm trusting you on this," she said, and for the first time, he heard her strong voice waver. "Thank you Tony. I'll let you know when I get in."
He didn't deserve it. Not her trust, not her thanks. He hung up the phone before he accidentally conveyed any emotion, and resumed staring at the screen while diving into his thoughts again, backtracking, coming up with situations and explanations as to what could have happened.
He was still sitting there when a knock on the door startled him out of his thoughts, and he looked up to see Natasha standing in the somehow open doorway.
It took a split second of recognition for him to regain his composure, and he slid a hand across his desk, causing everything to go blank.
"How long have you been standing there?" He asked, more curious as to how much she could have figured out from what was pulled up on his screens.
"How long has this straight coffee streak been running?" Tony stood up, noticing how it looked like he'd had a lot of coffee.
"Oh, this has been years in the making. I'd need to consult Pepper for the details." On second thought, however, he had actually had a lot of coffee since…. Well, he skipped dinner, and he didn't know what time it was, so since then.
Natasha stared at him, not appreciating his humor, and Tony realized (or more so hoped) that despite her blank expression, she actually hadn't caught onto what was going on.
Of course, now that she was here, he could use her help. She was part of the best that he had promised May. But if she didn't know anything, then Tony was in control. He could use her on a need-to-know bases, as she didn't need to know Peter was Spider-Man, and everything that came with that, for example.
"Work keeping you up late?" She asked, prodding.
"Oh, you know, same as usual. Always on the lookout for threats, bad guys, and people who aren't where they're supposed to be."
"Cut the crap, Tony, what's going on? Is there something we should know about or not? Because at this point, it seems like you'd take any excuse or distraction to avoid facing us."
Right, the rogues. He'd forgotten about that problem; it seemed like forever ago that his biggest stressor was having to face those idiots. But he really could use Natasha's help, and Peter was more important than Tony's personal problems.
"No," he answered, "no we. However, this distraction, or excuse, whichever you prefer, would be out of the way much faster with your help."
Her expression didn't change.
"Your help, which I'd happen to greatly appreciate in this case," he added.
She raised an eyebrow.
"Please." He asked now with less of his businessman's attitude and more of… himself. She could see right through it all anyways, but he wanted her to know he meant it.
She furrowed her brow in consideration, keeping her gaze on him. "Alright, but on one condition: if this has to do with Rogers, Maximoff, Barnes,-"
"- which it doesn't," he cut her off, "it doesn't. So you cannot tell them."
She searched his eyes until she found the honesty she needed, and sighed. "Okay. Fill me in. But first, you need a midnight snack."
Tony almost protested until he saw she was right about the time, and walked with her, willing to eat if it meant getting her on his side for this.
With both the negative and now positive connotations it brought, it was officially a new day.
Author's Note: Tony is trying to hold it together, and more importantly hide the panic from others. What are your thoughts? Ready to catch up with this Tony to where Peter's at?
I hope you liked it!
~ UniverseMarvel
