Inspired by some Irondad art I did a few months ago: "Hitching a Ride." I just needed a good reason for them to travel that way. :-)

"Call incoming from Peter, Boss." Tony glanced at his watch. 6:55 PM on a Saturday. Peter would usually be on patrol at this point. Was he calling to chat, or was something wrong?

"Put it through, FRI."

"Mr. Stark?"

"What's up, Spider-bite?"

Instead of protesting the nickname, Peter only sighed, which made Tony sit up a little taller in his chair.

"I, uh… I might need some help."

Tony was on his feet. "Are you hurt? Anything broken? I swear, kid, if you can't go a single week without-" Tony had already grabbed a nano-housing unit, and his bleeding edge suit was quickly covering his body.

"Not exactly."

"What do you mean, 'not exactly?'"

"So I was maybe-possibly doing what you told me not to do," (Tony only rolled his eyes here. Big surprise.) "and trying to get some surveillance on the Manfredi family again-"

"What have you got against them, kid?" Tony allowed himself a tiny rant. "They're really not something for teenage vigilantes to handle, especially my teenage vigilante, but you can't seem to leave them well enough alone, no matter how many times I tell you to keep your distance."

"Sorry! Sorry. Just… reasons, Tony," Peter said, a hint of vulnerability creeping into his voice. Huh. They'd be talking about that later.

"Keep going. You were trying to stick your sixteen-year-old nose where it doesn't belong."

Peter sighed again, gustily. Well, he wasn't the only one who was frustrated.

"So I was trying to listen in, but wasn't having much luck. I really feel like I need to do some electronic surveillance, because-"

"Pete. Focus."

"I thought I saw a cat under the bushes. And I was worried about it, because this isn't exactly the best part of town." Tony glanced at FRIDAY's sensor and gestured at his screen.

A single line of text appeared on the screen: What can I do for you, Boss?

With a sigh of his own, Tony typed "track Peter's location" into the keyboard. JARVIS would have known what he meant. A few years in, FRIDAY constantly impressed him with her growth, but he still missed his AI assistant who had learned his thought processes so well that stuff like that was almost seamless. Actually, J had often had things up for him before he even knew he needed them.

A blinking dot showed up almost fifteen miles away, and Tony's eyes narrowed.

"Peter. What do you think you're doing down in Brownsville?" Easily one of the most dangerous areas of Brooklyn, Tony thought the boy would have more sense than to be poking around there, without even checking in first. Apparently not.

"This is where my source sent me, Mr. Stark! I was gonna tell you, but I knew you had that meeting this afternoon, and you know Pepper hates when you leave those early, and-"

"And what made you think I might leave early?" he prompted the teenager. His suit fully formed, he was already on his way to Peter's location. He was sticking to a fairly sedate speed, for him. The neighbors tended to complain if Iron Man broke the sound barrier outside of actual emergencies. And Peter didn't sound like he was currently in too much danger. And he'd best not be injured, if they'd been talking this long and he hadn't mentioned it.

"Well, because Brownsville, isn't exactly the best part of town?'

"Bingo. And?"

"And you'd probably take exception to me being here by myself, even as Spiderman, because you've been kinda overprotective since Chicago?" Peter said, a touch of accusation in his voice.

There was a lot of sighing in this conversation. "If you knew I'd be worried about it, why couldn't you just ask me to go with you, Pete?" Then, more quietly. "I'm sorry if I've been a little more nervous since Chicago. Give me a break, kid. It's only been a week since you were kidnapped for the second time."

"I know." Peter was quiet for a minute. "I would've asked you, but you don't like me messing with them anyway, and Mr. Stark, you're not exactly subtle."

"I can be subtle! Subtle is my middle name!"

"Thought it was Edward," snarked Peter, a smile in his voice. "And you most definitely cannot."

"So what's the problem, kid? What am I rushing in to save you from? You said something about a cat. It had better not be a cat you need help saving, in Brownsville of all places."

"Uh, no. It's not a cat." There was an odd quality to Peter's voice.

On Tony's HUD, he could see he was within a mile of the spidersuit tracker. "FRI, engage noise dampening." Then, "I can be subtle," Tony groused to himself.

"I've been able to hear you coming for like two minutes, so…"

"Eavesdropping? And you have super-senses. Doesn't count."

A moment later, Iron Man dropped (somewhat silently to the ground) in front of the superpowered teen, who was curled into a miserable ball in a sketchy-looking alley. Peter put his hand up frantically as Tony started to speak, but his mentor didn't catch on soon enough.

"Kid, what's wrong?" Tony asked, willing his helmet to melt away.

"Oh. My. G- ugh! What is that smell?" Tony immediately re-engaged his helmet, but he kinda felt like he'd just trapped the smell inside with him. "FRI, air scrubbing, pronto!" he said frantically. The smell eased a little, and then finally (mostly) dissipated.

"What in the world, kid?"

Peter hadn't taken his mask off. Hopefully the filtering function in there was helping him out a little, but this suit wasn't nearly as airtight as Tony's could be. His white lenses drooped in misery. "Told you it wasn't a cat."

"Peter, did you get sprayed by a skunk?"

"Apparently," the younger hero said caustically. "I saw him disappear into those bushes over there, and tried to go in after him. He didn't appreciate it."

Tony tried for just a minute to choke back his laughter for his dejected-looking kid's sake, but he was only human.

"You wanna quiet down, Mr. I'm-So-Subtle?" Peter asked flatly after a minute. "I'd rather not draw what-would-certainly-be 'Manfredi' attention, if possible.

"Sorry! I just… sorry," Tony said, clearing his throat, and getting it under control. "What's the plan, kid?"

"Well, unfortunately, I overestimated my web fluid again, and I'm kinda low for swinging home. Usually that's not a problem, because I can just jump on the train when I get close to a good line. But tonight, not so much…"

"So you're saying you need a ride."

"Yeah."

"Pete, you stink. That stuff is going to imbed itself in my nanoparticles if I carry you."

"I know," he said morosely. "I was thinking maybe I could just web to your chest plate and you could kinda act like a moving building?"

"Huh. Well, I guess so. But where am I taking you? I mean, how are we going to get rid of the smell?"

"Karen's been working on it, and she has some ideas. If you don't mind, I already had her order some stuff to be delivered to the Tower. I'm hoping my clothes and skin don't actually smell too much, with the way the suit is designed. I haven't taken my mask off, but it's still a little overwhelming."

"I can imagine, kiddo," Tony said, the softness in his voice not quite coming through the suit's vocals. "So… the roof of the Tower? Pepper will literally kill me if I let you in the penthouse smelling like that."

"I know. Yeah, the roof. I'll see about soaking the suit in something that will neutralize the smell, but not fry any of the electronics."

"Sounds like a party," Tony huffed. "A party for one, by the way."

"I know, I know ," Peter said again. "This is the worst."

"Peter," Tony's Iron Man voice said firmly, "you being hurt, you being missing. Those are 'the worst,' not this. This is… a big inconvenience, but we'll work it out. And I'm glad you called me for help."

Peter's chin tilted up towards Tony, and his mask's eyes narrowed slightly. What was his face doing? Conversations through masks were dumb. Finally, he nodded.

"You ready?"

"Yes, sir."

Tony (somewhat quietly) blasted back into the air, about twelve feet above his protégé. "Latch on then!"

Peter stood, and did, and Tony carefully took off, one smelly Spider-kid dangling from his suit. Once he built up a little speed, Peter looked more comfortable holding on, and he thought he even heard a few 'whoops' of excitement. He smiled under his helmet, a little surprised they'd never done this before.

Hours later, after so much scrubbing, and two showers, Peter hungrily devoured the Thai food Tony had ordered for him.

"What's the prognosis on the suit?" Tony asked warily, sitting down on the other end of the couch. Peter was right, and the suit had mostly protected him from the smell, but all the scrubbing had transferred a bit of it afterwards. When he got right up close to the kid (which he did, after the second shower) there was only a slight whiff of his unfortunate encounter.

"The scrubbing, and that mixture Karen recommended helped. It's spending the night in the decon-chamber, which FRIDAY thinks should be fine. I'll need to run a bunch of diagnostics on it tomorrow to make sure nothing is damaged, I guess. I mean, if that's okay."

"I wasn't planning on you being here this weekend, since we had you all last weekend, but you know you're always welcome, Pete. May's okay with it?"

"She's annoyed, because she's off tomorrow, but she also doesn't want any of that smell in our tiny apartment," Peter said, his mouth quirking in amusement.

Tony's eyes narrowed. He really needed to find a way to talk them into moving somewhere bigger, safer, and hopefully closer. So far, he hadn't had any luck, though.

"I told her I'll be home in time for dinner, and we'll spend the evening together."

"Good. That sounds good," Tony mused, taking a bite of his coconut curry. Then "Hey, what did we learn today?"

"Don't run out of web fluid?"

"Mmm, you haven't learned that yet, so I don't have my hopes too terribly high."

Peter made a face at him. "Don't follow stray cats into bushes?"

"Also pretty sure that's gonna happen again, too, but double checking their species first is an absolute must."

"I'll take it under advisement."

"Hmm."

Peter sighed and set his empty container down on the coffee table, leaning back into the couch. He smiled tentatively at Tony. "I learned you'll always come rescue me when I mess up? Even if I'm in trouble partly because I didn't listen to you."

"That's a given, but I'm glad you know that. But kid, I won't always be able to, won't always be here. You've got to make good decisions on your own, too."

"I know. I'm working on it. Thanks for bailing me out, though."

"Anytime, Spider-bite."

"Ugh, that makes it sound like I'm six, Tony."

Tony just smiled smugly. "If the shoe fits, bud. You did chase a 'kitty-cat' under some bushes today."

"You're the worst. I hate you."

"Love you, too."

If you want to see the picture, you'll probably have to look at the AO3 version of this story, by copying and pasting this on archiveofourown under works/ 46199557

OR you can search DeviantArt and my username there: ctrsara40.