Author's Note: Alright here we go with worried Dad Tony and Motherly Natasha. I promised this so here we are. I own nothing.

19. Home

Piper crept in through her private entrance to Avengers Tower, hoping against hope that the Avengers had been called out on a mission. She was not so lucky as the elevator stopped on the family level instead of her private level. She might have convinced, or in reality slightly reprogramed, JARVIS to ignore her frequent comings and goings and to keep quiet about all things Spider-girl that went on in the tower but he did help Tony parent most of the time. It wasn't that Tony was a bad parent but he didn't really know what he was doing. Though that meant the Piper had plenty of leeway to slip off and be Spider-girl it also meant that whenever anything happened that was even semi dangerous Tony got a bit overprotective. This was evidenced by him immediately wrapping her in a hug when she stepped off the elevator. She hugged him back and spotted Natasha's eyes narrowing at the bandages on her hands.

"Are you alright Pipes? I knew that Osborn kid was bad news!" Piper laughed lightly.

"Dad, this was not Harry's fault. Nobody knows where that thing came from or why it showed up at his house." Tony huffed clearly annoyed. Clint laughed and held out a large mug of hot chocolate to Piper. She grinned and took it, Clint gave her bandages a cursory glance before making his excuses and heading up to his level. Piper knew a full med kit would be waiting for her in her bathroom when she reached her level.

"The point remains that he threw a giant house party and it devolved into people getting hurt! And seriously it sounds like it was the most last minute party ever!" Piper laughed lightly.

"That's probably because it was." She proceeded to explain using a slightly altered version of events. Tony knew she had been to 'detention' last week, he'd bought her ice cream afterwards insisting that a teen's first detention was a milestone. He had been in and out of detention quite a bit during his short high school career. Tony pouted slightly.

"None of us are partiers dad. I don't expect it to happen again." Tony rolled his eyes slightly.

"Alright, but if it does, it happens here! Seriously I could throw a party ten times cooler than anything Osborn could." Piper laughed. Her adoptive father and Norman Osborn were constantly in competition. She and Harry laughed about it a lot.

"I'm pretty sure if half the people at my school found out I'm your kid they would die on the spot. Just of sheer shock." Tony laughed. Piper sat down at the large kitchen table and sipped her hot chocolate.

"So aside from Osborn's disaster of a party how was today?" Piper grinned.

"It was actually pretty awesome. Remember I told you about my friend Eddie Brock?" Tony nodded taking a seat across from his adoptive daughter.

"Well he's back! He goes to midtown high now! He's a year ahead of me but still. It's really cool to get to see him again." Natasha had to hold back a laugh at the look on Tony's face. He was very protective of his daughter, especially when it came to boys. If Piper wasn't such an oblivious idiot he would have had quite a bit more work on his hands trying to keep the boys away from her. Though the whole Iron Man thing might work with most of them.

"That's great!" Piper grinned wider.

"Yeah, I'm thinking about inviting him MJ and Harry over for a movie night. If that's ok?" Natasha could practically see the twitch in Tony's eyebrow but he couldn't say no to Piper's puppy dog eyes. No one could, if Natasha didn't know better she'd say it was another superpower but she'd been able to do it long before she became Spider-girl.

"That sounds like fun. But there will be supervision." Piper grinned and hugged her father before downing the last of her hot chocolate. Then she yawned.

"I'm beat. I'm gonna go to bed." Tony ruffled her hair.

"Sleep tight Pipes." Piper grabbed her bag and walked back to the elevator.

"Night Dad!" Tony grinned and turned to talk to Natasha but she was gone. He sighed, he'd never get used to living with the assassin.

Piper made it up to her room and hissed lightly. Her hands hurt like hell, she knew that her healing factor could fix the damage once she got all the glass out. She walked into her room and found Natasha waiting for her, several towels were laid out and there was the first aid kit she had no doubt Clint had put out for them. Natasha held out her hands for Pipers. Natasha carefully unwrapped the bandages and began to remove the glass that remained in her hands before rewrapping them. Then she pulled Piper into a hug. Piper sniffled.

"Pauchok, tell me what happened." Piper began to explain everything while Natasha listened. She spoke about how she had been taken over by the symbiote and how she couldn't even really comprehend what she was seeing or feeling anymore. Like she wasn't even a person anymore. Natasha ran a hand through the teens hair as she spoke looking down at the bandages on her hands. Natasha pulled Piper in for another hug and rubbed her back soothingly. Piper was in tears when she finished her story. Natasha told her to change into her pajamas and that she would be right back. The Black Widow snuck off to the kitchen grabbing a small stack of cookies and some chocolate from her stash before making it back to Piper's room. Piper was still in her bathroom so Natasha cleaned up the first aid kit and set down the snacks on Piper's bedside table. Piper came out of her bathroom in a set of Captain America pjs. Natasha smiled. Piper grabbed a bar of chocolate and sat down on the bed next to Natasha. Natasha pulled her into a hg again.

"Your darkness does not define you Pauchok. The fact that you were able to beat it, looked it in the face and took it down, that defines you." Piper buried herself into Natasha's side. Natasha smiled at the teen. She smiled as Piper fell asleep. She began to hum a lullaby, she remembered few things from her days before the Red Room but that lullaby was one of them. She knew she couldn't have children, the Red Room's graduation ceremony was too effective but if she had ever had kids she hoped they would be like Piper. Sweet smart and kind. She ran her hand through the teens hair again. She hoped that Piper would be ok, an experience like that could seriously mess with your head. Natasha had had her identity stripped away in the Red Room and her grip tightened on Piper's shoulders at the thought of her going through something similar. The door creaked slightly as it opened and Natasha slipped a hand into her pocket where she always kept a knife, just in case. Clint peeked around the door and Natasha relaxed.

"How's she doing?" Natasha smiled at the sleeping teen then up at her partner.

"She had some glass healed into her hands but other than that she's physically ok." Clint sat down next to Natasha at the head of the bed.

"And mentally?" Natasha frowned slightly.

"Time will tell. Being ripped out of your own head and forced to face every dark thought you've ever had is hard. Harder when you have to face it alone." Clint laid a hand on Natasha's shoulder.

"Good thing she's not alone then isn't it." Natasha smiled.

Meanwhile back at the Osborn's currently empty penthouse a dark shadow creeped in through the still broken window. He wore almost all black, only the white collar of his costume and his shocking white hair visible in the darkness. He laughed lightly. This was child's play. With both Osborn's staying at a ritzy hotel until their window could be fixed there was nothing to get in his way. He expertly circumvented the security system and made it to the safe he was looking for. He cracked it easily. Smiling he raided the jewelry that was left there. He grinned and grabbed a small box out of the safe. Popping it open he found a small note sitting on top of a beautiful set of sapphire earrings.

"To Piper, Happy Birthday. Love Harry. Aww that's so cute. Might as well leave him that, guy sounds like he likes her a lot, those are real sapphires after all. He's trying." Slipping out of the window the cat burglar crept back across the city into a small apartment. He set down his bag of loot and pulled off the short wig and mask. Felix Hardy sat down at his kitchen table and laughed as he checked out his haul.

Pauchouk: Little Spider in Russian, borrowed it from Tumblr.