"That's incredible…" Natasha said, looking at Strange with a mixture of amazement and awe. He was the only one in the workroom with her, just then, since Pepper had gone to take off the Rescue suit, and Tony and Peter had left to take the remaining stone – now safely back inside the polymorph sphere – back to the safe. They were all meeting back in the workroom, so Stephen had simply seated himself on the edge of the bog table and had told Romanoff what she'd missed. After Peter had given her the bag of souvenirs which included an ugly shirt with the inscription 'my friends went to Vormir and all I got was this t-shirt' and a shot glass with a fair representation of the peak on it. "They were really there? Not just ghosts, or something?"
"We all saw them. I hugged May – and Peter touched them all, of course. They were definitely real. From what May said, it's a one time only thing, and only because the universe was paying him back for what he'd done."
"Amazing…" The boy hadn't looked upset when he'd handed her the giftbag. But she knew that he brooded, so she'd keep an eye on him the next few days, for sure. "What were they like?"
"His parents?"
"Yes. Did they look the same as they did in the video?"
"Yes. They were like two people meeting their son for the first time, really." The sorcerer paused, thinking about it. "You know, it might be that the universe was paying them back, as well, for taking them from him so early. Or rewarding them for producing him in the first place. Who knows?"
"You'll tell Wong?"
"Yes. Peter won't mind."
"It'll be interesting to hear his take on it."
"True." He shrugged. "I'm going to wait until I have a chance to look at his hand, though. He wasn't complaining, but…"
"But he wouldn't."
"Precisely."
OOOOOOOO
They weren't the only ones worrying about Peter. Or his hand.
Tony watched as the polymorph slowly transformed itself into a sphere, once more, taking the power stone with it and engulfing it. Shielding the energy until the boy couldn't feel it. Then Peter disengaged his suit, as well, handing the sphere to Stark, and sitting down on the arm of the sofa in their main living area, holding his hand, gingerly.
"Hurts?"
"Yeah. A little."
Tony walked over and took it, frowning at the soft noise that Peter made – even though he was being gentle. He didn't see any blood or redness, so it had to all be on the inside.
"I don't want you doing anything crazy, today, all right? No serving, either."
"It's not too bad."
"Better safe than sorry." He brushed his hand along the top of Peter's head, studying the boy. "How do you feel?"
"My hand? Or in general?"
"In general."
"I'm okay. Really." Peter shrugged. "I feel like maybe I should be sad, seeing them and then knowing I don't get to see them, again. But I'm not. It was amazing. I mean, I know that they love me – I saw the video and you can't fake that – but I don't really remember any of that, you know? And I guess I wondered what they'd think of me. I'm not normal, after all. I just wondered how they would see me."
Tony smiled.
"And now?"
"They're proud of me." And now he did look a little teary-eyed at the memory. "And they know everything about me and they still love me."
"Yeah, they do." Tony hugged him. "We love you, too."
Peter sniffed and put his arms around the man he called dad.
"Thanks for coming with me. It was scary – at least, at first."
"I know. You're welcome."
They were quiet for a long moment, but Peter finally pulled away and looked up at him.
"What did you talk about?" He asked. "You and Pepper, I mean? When mom and dad wanted to talk to you?"
"Your car."
"They know about that?"
"Apparently." Tony smiled. "He asked if it was repairable."
"Oh." There was a little relief, knowing that the damage done to the car that his dad had loved so much wasn't beyond fixing and a great deal of thankfulness that Tony was so willing to help rectify a mistake that Peter had made and Tony hadn't. He looked up at him, cradling the sore hand, again. "Thank you. For everything."
The billionaire just shook his head.
"You're welcome, son." He tapped his shoulder, mindful that it wasn't the right one – to avoid the action jarring that hand. "Why don't we go check in with everyone, get Stephen to check the hand and see if mom needs us for anything, today?"
"And if she doesn't?"
Pepper wasn't going to work, and Peter had already been excused from his schooling – for the day, at least.
"Then we'll eat and work on the car."
"Sounds good."
OOOOOOOO
Pepper was just returning from the other workroom when Peter and Tony entered from their own errand. She brushed her hand along Peter's shoulder, but was clearly more worried about the hand, which was still being held against his stomach, gingerly – obviously aching.
"Has Stephen seen it, yet?"
"We just got here," Tony said, entering the room and walking with his little family over to the table where Natasha was sitting with Strange.
Romanoff smiled at Peter, glancing at his hand.
"Five down and one to go…"
He nodded, sitting down beside her, which put him across from Strange, who held his hand out. Peter offered up his hand, and all of them watched as Stephen asked him questions, watched his reactions to how he manipulated the fingers and the wrist, and made a disapproving noise at the response. A familiar looking brace appeared on the table, and Peter frowned as the surgeon applied it.
"It doesn't hurt that bad…"
"Who's the doctor?"
The frown turned into a chagrined look.
"I'm going to become a doctor so I can say that to people…"
"That's why I did it."
Natasha smiled.
"What are his restrictions, Stephen?" she asked before Tony or Pepper could.
"I want you to eat," Strange told Peter – and looked at Pepper and Tony as well, to make sure they were listening. That was more of a habit, than anything, because they were always listening when it came to Peter. "Then I want to you to get some rest. After that, if the pain isn't worse, you're free to do anything that doesn't require you to use that hand, too much. No serving for the rest of the week."
The boy rolled his eyes, exasperated.
"I'm never going to get two weeks' worth of that done at this rate."
Pepper smiled. Teens weren't supposed to want to do their punishments, but he probably just didn't like it hanging over his head. She could understand that.
"We'll figure it out." She looked at Strange. "How long do we keep the brace on?"
"A couple of days – just to baby it. The wrist, not the boy," he added, winking at Peter. "He can do school, tomorrow, probably – unless he wakes up not feeling well. If he does, call me."
"You're not going to be around?" Tony asked.
"No. I definitely have some things to do at the sanctum – and a long conversation or two to have with Wong."
Which meant that he wanted to let the other sorcerer know what he'd seen, and they definitely had information to add to the knowledge of the library, since now they knew how the soul stone was returned. And where it was returned, to, as well.
"Thanks for coming with us," Peter said. "And making it easier than using the teleporting stone."
"Which you will not use to try to go back there…" Strange added.
"Yeah. No. I won't."
He'd made that promise, already.
"Come on," Tony said, pulling Peter to his feet, cheerfully. "Let's go have breakfast and tell the others what happened. Maybe we can figure out what hole in the ground we can put the power stone in so we get these things out of our hair, hey?"
"Yeah."