Peter woke slowly, but was aware of several things almost immediately as he did. He was a little warmer than he had been the morning before when he woke, there was a familiar lullaby being hummed in the back of his mind and something tiny that felt like it weighed a hundred pounds was curled in a ball purring in the middle of his chest.

He opened his eyes, a little confused, and saw that the sun was well up to judge by the brightness of his bedroom. The Cloak of Levitation was draped across his other blankets and was caressing his cheek, suddenly, now that he was awake, and his kitten was the source of the purring – not surprisingly. The lullaby stopped – although the caresses didn't.

"Is Stephen here, then?" he asked it.

There was a confirmation and a feeling of amusement, which was shared by Alec, Peter realized.

"What's so funny?" he asked, sleepily, wondering how he was going to get up to go to the bathroom with Nutmeg looking so comfortable on him.

"Your folks never cease to amaze – or amuse – me," Alec replied. He didn't tell Peter why, though, and the boy had a feeling that he probably didn't want to know. "Good afternoon."

"It's afternoon?" He looked at the TV display, since his left hand was under the blankets – and the cloak – and his right was still in the bandages and sling and didn't have the watch on, anyway. The display assured him that it was after one o'clock. "Wow… I slept late."

"You needed the rest, then," Alec assured him.

"No one woke me to make me eat?"

He tried to think back and remember, but he didn't remember anything. He had to assume, though, that everything was alright. Otherwise someone would be hovering in the bed with him – watching for any indication that something was wrong with him. He supposed that most kids his age would hate that suggestion that the adults around him were so smothering, but (to himself, anyway) Peter wallowed in the love that it represented.

"I'm to let Friday know when you wake," Karen told him. "Are you awake? Or going back to sleep?"

"I'm awake. Thanks."

He stretched as well as he could without rolling Nutmeg off his perch, but the kitten opened an eye at the motion and stretched as well, claws all coming out and a mighty yawn showing an impressive array of tiny, sharp, teeth. Peter reached out with his left hand and slid a finger along the kitten's face, looking for any sign of tentacles with a snort of amusement.

"Don't be so quick to shrug it off," Alec told him, also amused – although his was aimed at Peter. "They aren't crazy."

"Yeah? Nutmeg's a kitten octopus? A kittopuss?"

"The correct word is Flerkin," Alec corrected with a silent chuckle. Even as he said it, the Mind stone supplied an image in his head of a yellow cat – much older than Nutmeg. It was normal enough looking, and then – just like Tony had described – huge tentacles emerged from its mouth, complete with all kinds of razor sharp teeth. Before Peter had a chance to do more than stare, Nutmeg flopped back down on his chest, batting playfully at a corner of the cloak and Alec spoke up, again. "He's probably one of the rarest creatures in the universe, and one of the deadliest."

Peter felt a surge of worry. Not for himself, the ancient sorcerer noticed, immediately.

"Do they know?"

What if Tony made him get rid of Nutmeg? He wouldn't be allowed to keep something so dangerous. What would he do? Nutmeg was only a baby. He couldn't take care of himself. He'd be all alone. And-

"Stop." Alec didn't have any control over Peter, but he was as intimately close to him as he could be, and a mental powerhouse. "They know, and they're fine. They're not going to make you get rid of him. He's sitting on you, isn't he? None of them are hovering to make sure he doesn't eat you. Relax."

"But-"

"He's deadly, Peter, but no threat to you or your world. Ask Carol. She knew one. And Nick. Although he might not really be the one to reassure. Just don't freak out on this. He's not going anywhere; Tony and Pepper already have decided that he's good for you."

There was another brief feeling of amusement, from Alec and from the cloak – which was playing keep away from the kitten that was now stalking it.

"I thought he was just a lost stray…"

"He was a lost stray," Alec agreed.

"Where did he come from? Did you know what he was all along?"

"Not until he gave himself away in front of Tony and the others – then I saw what they saw. I can't get into his mind like I can others – no more than I can see what Jack's thinking, or Ironpig."

"Wow…" Peter's panic had already faded, and now he was beginning to study the kitten, closer – but he didn't look any different, even knowing what he could do. "He really ate the teleportation stone?"

"Yes."

"So it's gone forever? Or will he poop it out? Like Jack did with Pepper's thumb drive?"

More amusement.

"No. Neither. His kind are a lot bigger on the inside than they look. I imagine the thing will just sit in the interdimensional pocket until the next time you need it and summon it."

Peter frowned.

"Won't that hurt him?"

"When you summon it, the teleportation stone doesn't come flying all the distance from wherever it was to land in your hand, right?"

"Right. It just appears."

"So it isn't going to fly out of him – or tear through his little body to get where it wants to be. It'll just pop over to you. Try it."

He hesitated, though, looking at his kitten and wiggling his finger until Nutmeg switched his assault from the cloak to the digit, little teeth gnawing on Peter's knuckle.

"I don't need it, right now," Peter finally said, shrugging and using his hand to flip Nutmeg onto his back so he could rub the furry belly. "It can stay where it is, for now."

Before Alec could reply, there was a knock on his outer door and then the sound of it opening. Peter looked at his bedroom door in time to see Tony poke his head into the room.

"Awake?"

Peter nodded, and Nutmeg flipped himself back over, watching as Stark walked into the room and sat on the edge of the bed.

"Yeah. Everything okay?"

"Yup." Tony picked Nutmeg up, rubbing the top of his head with the free hand. "We're just hanging out, today… Lazy Saturday. How do you feel?"

"Pretty good."

"Tired?"

"No. I slept really good. No dreams – at least none that I remember."

"Hungry?"

"Yeah."

"Well, why don't you get dressed and meet us in the lounge? We'll have lunch, you can have breakfast and we'll spend the rest of the lazy Saturday together."

"Sounds good. Shuri's still here?"

He didn't think that she'd leave without saying goodbye, but things happened, sometimes, and she might have needed to go home for something.

"She is. Stephen's here, too. Gradymatson and the military liaisons all left this morning, but they said they told you goodbye last night, so we didn't wake you."

"Yeah. No, we did. He said to come visit, sometime."

Tony nodded.

"He told me that, too. Maybe we will. It might be fun to hang out with him when he's not pulling our chestnuts out of the fire, right?"

Peter smiled.

"Probably. He told me it's his job to save superheroes, though, so he'd probably come up with a crisis or something."

The billionaire rolled his eyes and stood up.

"Get dressed. I'll be in the lounge with your kitten. Fifteen minutes or I'm throwing him in the soup pot."

"He's pretty scrawny… Ironpig might be a better choice…"

"I'm going to pretend you didn't say that."

Tony winked at him and left, still carrying the kitten, and Peter smiled at his retreating back.

"You were right; he doesn't seem too worried about him."

"I'm always right, Peter," Alec told him. "I thought you knew that by now."

Now it was the boy's turn to roll his eyes, and he waited for the cloak to move so he could push his blankets aside and get up to get dressed and start his day – abbreviated though it was going to be since he'd slept so late.

It was still promising to be a good one.