In Which The Temperature Rises

At 7:15 a.m., Catherine gave Peter's phone a call and it went straight to voicemail.

At 7:30 a.m., she realized that Peter's phone was either dead or off.

At 8:15 a.m., she jumped at her phone reminding her to take her vitamins.

At 8:30 a.m., she had almost called Tony's number three times.

At 8:35 a.m., she got the call from Happy.

By 9:30 a.m., Peter was on her examining table, shivering and sweating.

To say that the kid looked awful was an understatement. He looked worse than when he had been hit by that taxi last week. The suit was gone. He had peeled off immediately once he was in the privacy of her lab. Now he was in sweats and a t-shirt. They were already plastered with sweat.

Peter had a brave smile but every episode of shivers shattered it. He didn't even try to sit on the examining table, instead crawling onto it and laying down like he had finished three marathons in one day.

If it wasn't for her years of medical training, the guilt would have been staggering.

He was burning. There was a fever. She listened to his lungs quickly. No blockage. There was a strain on the little body. He was stiff. Worse of all, the chatterbox was barely talking.

"What happened to 'easy peasy' Peter?" The question was almost rhetorical.

She put her stethoscope around her neck and placed her gloved hand against his forehead. The heat was bad. Already the heart monitor was showing an organ frantically keeping up with the apparent fever.

His teeth chattered. "Still easy peasy."

Her smile was hidden but tight against her face. Her medical mask was starting to make sweat prick her cheeks. She watched his chest and the clock. His respiratory rate was high and the breaths were shallow and quick. It wasn't quite at the point of hyperventilation but he was certainly getting there.

"Let's make that a little easier, okay? I'm going to slip this on." She eased the oxygen mask around his head and started the flow. He barely seemed to notice it. His eyes were sluggishly tracking her movements. She was trying to rush through getting the vitals but her mind was spinning trying to find an answer to this illness.

"What happened?" She slipped on the blood pressure cuff. The sweat made it easy.

"You look funny in the mask and glasses. Why are you wearing one?" He asked in a sideways fashion.

Not a good sign. She needed to hurry.

"Because, Peter, I can't catch what's wrong with you. If it is getting you, then it'll crush me. Relax for a moment." She had taken out her contacts for her glasses. She had forgotten about doing it. Her body had gone on automatic pilot as she prepped for this situation.

The cuff filled and deflated. Peter's blood sounded in her ears. It was weak. The tension was in her chest now. She pulled off the stethoscope, ripped the cuff loose and placed it to the side.

Her physical examination was enlightening. It made her more concerned. Besides the few typical superhero scrapes and bangs, two large black bruises were on his side. They were about the size of baseballs and blacker than they should be. Peter twitched as she touched them. He had no idea how he had gotten them.

"Now, concentrate, what happened?"

He did try, she could see him trying to put the fragments together. "I tried to break out. I broke some suspicious lab stuff open to cause a distraction. One of them was filled with a funny tasting gas. I guess I blacked out 'cause I woke up on the floor and then I started feeling really hot. I escaped. It…it didn't go away."

Something that looked like fear came into his eyes. "Do you know what it is?"

She continued. "Have you been sick since you turned into Spider-Man?"

"No. Not even," he paused, "the whole school went down with Janice's mystery cookies."

Poor school nurse and janitors. Catherine nodded but there was nothing in her mind. Even with broken bones, she'd set them and know Peter would be healed by the end of the week. She'd never tell the kid this but he was, to a degree, invincible.

Except for now.

"Tell Aunt May that I'm still on the mission." He shivered again. "I can't-she won't." His face went white.

She barely got the trash can to him in time.

"You need to rest." She rubbed his back as she helped him lay back down. Part of her shook now. "I'm going to set you up on I.V. and give you something for that fever. We'll run some blood work too. I'm writing Peter Parker a doctor's note for school as well."

He nodded. There was barely any color in his face.

"We will beat this." Her voice sounded so calm compared to the swirl in her mind. What the hell was stronger than his healing?

"Thank you ma'am." It was a small and wavering sound.

She stayed frozen in place for a moment.

"Let me go get some supplies, shout if you need something." She got up in a jerk and grasped the trash can. She moved the recycling can to his side. The room seemed so small then, everything focused on the teen. Her jaw ached from clenching it. A normal fever she could handle. This did not seem normal. Everything was too heightened too quickly.

He tried to smile at her one more time as she stripped off the mask, lab coat and the gloves and dumped them in the biohazard can near the door.

"Don't worry Peter," she said and closed the door on him.

It was her fault. Anger pounded in her head. All she could do now was fix what she saw in front of her. Everything pointed it to being a bad fever. Maybe it was the flu. In any other kid, she might just proceed as if it was. She shook her head at that. Beyond her medical knowledge, she felt like it had to be more. He had opened numerous containers. One of them could have been containing a new virus.

It could be anything. Her imagination wanted to go crazy with the possibilities.

"Don't stand there looking shocked. It's disturbing. Give me an update."

That blasted her out of her own thoughts. Tony stood a foot away. The muscles in his arms stretched tight against his skin as he crossed them. She had forgotten that he was waiting outside for her. She'd had fought him tooth and nail to stay out of the room.

Seeing someone healthy hurt her. The difference was astounding. Peter was almost see-through compared to the Tony. The energy level alone made her stare. To be able to see another human being stand seemed like a miracle.

"Come on. I'm not giving you the big bucks to look like a deer in the headlights." He snapped his fingers in her face.

Something clicked into place, locking away all the extra emotions and crazed imagination. They would do nothing to help her. Only the calm and collected nurse could really help Peter. Time and time again in the ER, she had discovered the best thing that she could do for her patient was treat what she saw in front of her.

Tony snapped again impatiently.

She brushed Tony's hand away. "No, you pay me the 'big bucks' to take care of Peter. Now let me do that."

She turned down the hall not waiting for a response. In this moment, she didn't owe him anything.

"What's wrong with him?" He nagged her.

"I'm getting him some medicine to knock down the fever, liquid acetaminophen. I think we have that," She shouted over her shoulder and then muttered to herself, "I hope we have enough of it." She was mentally shifting. There was a list that needed to be put together of everything that she needed. She couldn't waste time.

He didn't go away. "I've got a very concerned hot aunt downstairs. What's got him?"

"I'm going to run some blood work." Her keycard opened the lab door. It hissed open and the lights flickered on. She tried to slam it in his face. A quiet lab would be good. Disappointingly, he made it through. It was something about owning the building that meant he could open any lock.

She had to get back to Peter. Already it had been too long. She pulled open the fridge, going for one of the neatly packed IV bags. Then she grasped another one just to be safe. The rest of the intravenous kit was in a nearby drawer. Turning around, Tony was standing in between her and a cart.

"Move. Please."

He took two steps to left but that looked like all the ground that he was willing to give.

"Thank you."

She dropped the bags and the equipment on the top. The rest of the materials would be easy. Most of them were already on the table. She had prepped before Peter had arrived. Happy had said simple things like he was "out of sorts" and "sorta sweaty". She had thought a dislocated limb. Cute. Her prep wasn't even close to sufficient.

Now for the acetaminophen.

"Doctor Crow, I need answers now." Tony grabbed her arm, yanking her to a stop. Her shoes slid against the tile.

"Stark, you need to calm down and let me go." The words came out icier than she wanted them to be.

The fingers on her wrist loosened.

"You want to know that I'm thinking? Here is what I know," She said as she moved to unlock a cabinet, "The kid has a fever that would kill a normal person. BPM won't mean much to you so let's just say his heart is beating faster than Usain Bolt's. He just vomited his breakfast, no actually, last night's dinner."

She held up the bottle to the light. It was half full. It was enough to get started. "The worst part is he's scared, really scared, and there is nothing that I can do about it that."

She paused to check on the billionare. Something had softened in him as if he was processing the words. He hadn't moved but his posture was falling apart, the strong man routine breaking down by an inch.

"I don't have those answers." Her voice stumbled on that sentence so she pushed on. "I can treat the symptoms but it could take much longer to understand the why."

The statement made it real. A truth in her mind. His face changed again and he nodded. This was a serious situation. Catherine put the medication on a cart. She double checked the items. The cold tools felt good in her hands. These could be used for something.

Now he was silent.

And it was grating against her nerves.

"He went into a shady lab dealing with biological experiments. I'm a nurse practitioner here, not a scientist. Then he comes in like this," She said and syringes clattered on her cart, "Give me an hour. I'll get him stable. That I can do."

"Handle May. You're smart. You've talked hundreds of people into weapons they don't need. Do it with her. Get her to wait. I need Peter alone." Catherine arranged herself behind the cart. He still hadn't moved.

She threw up her hands.

"If you feel like it later we can have all the tea and crumpets and cookies you want and we can talk." Catherine stared Stark directly in the eyes and raised her chin. Then strands of hair had fallen in her face so she pulled it impatiently back again in a ponytail.

Muscles were pulling in Tony's jaw as she put her hands on the handle of the cart. Her words weren't a lie. Her ears strained to hear Peter. It had been too long.

The wheels squeaked against the tile. The cart brushed past him as she opened the door. Tony stayed behind in her lab. Fine with her. He could play with all the needles and thread he wanted.

She had real work to do.

Fun fact: Since I finished Nanowrimo, I've had time to do a reread and tweak things. I rewrote almost the entirety of the back half of this chapter and I love it now. Catherine can be a powerhouse. It's about time that she showed it.

Only in a writer way do I find it funny that Peter pretends to be sick and then two chapters later this happens.

What do you think?

Thank you for reading as always. -Quin