Chapter 44

The doors of the plane opened and let Salem and Happy out. They slowly approached Peter, suddenly seeing what state he was in.

Salem almost sprinted towards him but he stopped her, taking a step back as he tried to defend himself.

It almost broke her heart to see him scared of her.

Out of everyone, he was scared of her.

She needed to figure out what caused this and get it fucking gone.

"What the fuck happened?" She demanded.

"Stop! Tell me something only you would know," Peter asked.

Salem thought for a second, "I don't— I can't think of anything. What happened?"

"What's the one thing you say you hate but actually love when we're swinging?"

She laughed, "Fuck sake. I hate how you would throw me into the air and then catch me. Better? Can we get this shit sorted now?"

He limped forward, suddenly hugging her tightly as he took a breath of relief. "Thank god it's you."

"What happened?" She asked again.

"I fucked up," Peter said, his voice quivering as he leaned back and looked her in the eyes. "I fucked up bad, Salem."

"Let's get you stitched up first," Happy interrupted. "You're gonna get an infection soon."

)()()(

"If you don't stop squirming," Salem warned him as she stitched Peter up. "I will stab you harder with the needle than needed, Parker!"

He laughed, groaning as she stitched another wound closed, "You should never be a nurse or doctor. You don't have the compassion for it."

"No, I don't have the compassion for idiots that give away billion-dollar technology to a guy they met a week prior," She snapped. "LILITH hasn't been able to disable the drones he already has out. He's rewired them somehow. The only way to disable them is to destroy them or get the glasses back."

His shoulders sank, "I'm sorry. You must be disappointed in me, Sal."

She sighed. "No. I'm disappointed in you because you second-guessed my dad's decision to give you the glasses. He had years to think about it, Peter. Why do you think he gave me full control over Stark Industries? He brought me up to be the head of the company, and he taught you to be a hero. You should have taken his teachings and applied them instead of second-guessing them. I guess it's acceptable though. We're both still teenagers. We're still young and are able to make mistakes."

"Yeah, mistakes that are gonna get our friends and half of Europe killed. Ow!"

She slapped his shoulder, "Stop being a pessimist."

"She's right, you know," Happy said. "The only thing Tony Stark didn't second-guess was picking you, Peter. The only other times are when he found Salem and took her in."

"Everywhere I go I see his face," Peter hissed as Salem finished up the stitching. "And the whole world is asking who's gonna be the next Iron Man and I don't know if that's me, Happy. I'm not Iron Man."

"You're not supposed to be," She said.

"Nobody could live up to Tony. Not even Tony. Tony was my best friend. And he was a mess," Happy laughed. "I don't think Tony would have done what he did if he didn't know that you were gonna be here after he was gone. Now, your friends are in trouble but you're not alone. What are you gonna do without your tech?"

Salem had her hands on Peter's shoulders, feeling the way he relaxed under her touch but sat firm.

"I'm gonna kick his ass,"

She grinned, "Start up the jet, Hap. Our friends are in London. Flash hasn't stopped live-streaming since he got there. I think it's time to get Spider-Man and Darkling back to fighting."

Peter turned to look at her, "You're coming?"

"Of course, I am," She gave him a soft look before letting the famous Stark smirk appear, "Someone has to help you. LILITH set up the console. Bring up everything we have on Spider-man alongside unlimited access to everyone's suits."

Peter watched as the back of the plane changed, morphing to be a fully functional setup to create almost anything.

Salem took a seat on the long cream couches, quickly stretching out like a cat before settling down to watch Peter. She waved a hand dismissively.

"Go on,"

"Aren't you going to help?"

She laughed, "It's your turn to design it. You know what you need. I just go off previous schematics and how you fight."

"You're better at this than me," He admitted before grabbing her arm to pull her up. "Plus your suits always look better."

"Of course," She shoved him a little. "I make them. Happy, start up the music. We've got a new suit to design. You do the schematics, I'll work on the aesthetics if you're so impressed with my work."

"Fair," He put a fist up, signalling her to fistbump him. She did and they instantly began.

Happy watched them.

It was so surreal how they worked together. Both of them had their likeness in Tony but there was something deeper in that. Salem was his daughter, it was expected for her to be like him, but Peter? Peter was almost a better version of Tony, one that could admit defeat. Salem was the same but she refused to let herself be defeated.

It was like watching Pepper and Tony work together on Stark Industries, easily in tune with each other as they went through the throws of work.

They went through the work quickly as the jet flew towards London, to where their friends were.

As they landed, the suit was finished and they both suited up.

Salem still had no sleeves from the fight with Thanos, letting her shadow-coated arms and claws show. The rest was more or less the same, with the addition of a small looping earbud that would let her comm Peter.

Peter's outfit was still between his own Spiderman suit and his Darkling counterpart. Instead of it being bright blue and red, it was a darker burgundy with navy blue and black detailing.

Both of them stood on the top of the jet, waiting as Happy flew it over the whole growing creature made of illusions and lies and technology. Salem could just stand and stay on the jet's wing but Peter clung on a little more than she did, waiting as they neared the centre.

Then, they jumped straight into the illusion.

It was dark, pulsing orange and red and blue as technology followed Beck's commands and the bots flew around and projected the needed image. Peter clung to one of them as he landed and Salem jumped onto one, crouching as she sent a pulse of electricity through it. Alongside Peter's electricity field webs, it sent a whole hurricane of energy through the systems and short-circuited many.

Including the ones they were on, falling through the air as Peter webbed out of there. Salem let herself drop to the ground nearby, landing in a huge crater made by her pulsing kinetic energy.

An array of bots attacked Peter on the roof of some area, making him run away from the flame-throwing bots. As he webbed around, gathering what he needed, Salem brought down more bots. Beck tried to keep them a distance away from her, not letting her take their energy but she just clenched her hands, feeling the Dark Magic come to her easily and crushing the bots in high numbers.

When Peter got the message through to Salem that he knew where Beck was, she went to the area of glass walkways, finding Peter holding Beck up by the collar.

"This certainly isn't ideal, but I have contingencies," Beck said, not realising Salem was there. "EDITH?"

One of the bots shot Peter, sending him flying back into Salem's area.

"Just give me the glasses," Peter grunted as he stood.

"They're not yours, Beck," she said.

"Well, they're mine now,"

Dozens of more bots came through the broken glass, lining up in front of the duo before going invisible and activating an illusion.

She turned to Peter, "I hate illusions."

"Can you get rid of them?"

"Easily," she shrugged. "Easier with a small number. LILITH?"

"On it!"

The dark corridor turned back to normal, disabling the illusion feature but not the combat of the bots. That was something that Salem needed to do when they got the glasses.

They worked through the dozens of bots, destroying each one quickly with piercing hits and cuts into the metal bodies. Beck's arrogance got to him when he demanded that all the drones fire at the duo, resulting in him also getting hit.

Peter shook his head, taking off his mask, "Beck! Beck. You lied to me. I trusted you."

"I know. That's the most disappointing part. You're a good person, Peter," Beck said as he laid down because of his injuries. "Such a weakness. Stark was right. You do deserve them."

Salem lifted a hand, clenching it as she sensed something wrong. The last Illusion of Beck's body disappeared and revealed the real one holding the gun behind her. It misfired and Beck collapsed onto the floor. She held onto the gun as she let her Darkling form disappear, revealing her dark hair instead of white.

"You can't trick us anymore," she told him., snatching the glasses off Beck's body. "Excucate cancellation protocol. Beck is gone. Shut it down."

Peter let down his mask, checking beck's body. "He's dead."

Beck was dead by his own hand. His arrogance was the result of his death.

"Come on," Salem said as their suits disappeared and they were wearing their normal outfits. "Happy is with the others."

Peter nodded, quickly grabbing her and hugging her tightly, "Thank you for believing me."

It took her a moment but she hugged him back, "Of course. We're the youngest Avengers left. We need to stick together."

)()()(

"If—" she huffed out as Spiderman was swinging them across New York City. "Don't stop throwing me—" he tossed her up, watching as she somersaulted in her Darkling form. "I'm gonna hurt you!"

Spiderman laughed, "You'll try."

He caught her and tossed her once more, knowing Darkling secretly enjoyed it.

"And suceeeeee—" he caught her again, quickly swinging them onto the ground.

Then the jumboscreens turned on and Pat Kienan came on with breaking news.

"We come to you now with revelations about last week's attack in London. An anonymous source provided this video. It shows Quentin Beck, aka, Mysterio, moments before his death. A warning: You may find this video disturbing.

Footage of Tower Bridge came on, the exact one from last week's little mission to get the glasses back.

Quentin Beck hurried form came onto the screen, battered and a little bruised as he addressed the drone camera, "I managed to send the Elemental back through the dimensional rift, but I don't think I'm gonna make it off this bridge alive. Darkling attacked me for some reason! She has an army of weaponized drones, Stark technology. She's got Spiderman on her side and she says she'll be the only one to be the next Iron Man. No one else!"

Then it skipped to the next scene, where Salem held the gun and took off her illusion, snatching the glasses off his corpse. "Excucate cancellation protocol. Beck is gone. Shut it down."

Then it went to Peter with his mask down, checking the body before nodding, "He's dead."

"There you have it, folks," J. Jonah Jameson said on the jumbo screen. "Conclusive proof that Darkling, having aide of Spiderman, was responsible for the brutal murder of Mysterio, an inter-dimensional warrior who gave his life to protect our planet, and who will, no doubt, go down in history as the greatest superhero of all time. But that's not all, folks. Here's the real blockbuster. Brace yourselves, you might wanna sit down."

And again back to the altered footage of Tower Bridge.

"Darklins's real name is–" Beck coughed. "Spiderman's name is Peter Parker and Darkling is Salem Stark, Tony Stark's daughter. And she's taking his legacy of Merchant of Death!"

Even where they stood, in New York Square, cameras were pointed in their way. Darkling's cold expression was shown on the jumbo screen for everyone to see. Her true name under it alongside MERCHANT OF DEATH.

"LILITH?" she prompted. "Truth now."

The picture changed to be a video of the true events, showing exactly what happened but it didn't matter. Their identities were out and they were in danger.

Both of them were quickly surrounded by people, either reporters in the area or just people wanting the truth. They crowded around and Salem let down her illusion. She nodded for Peter to do the same. The two teens stood there as Salem took out an earbud.

"Get Happy and the lawyers ready,"

LILITH chimed in with an "Already done. They're waiting for you,"

"The truth is out now," she told Peter who was horrified. "We'll see who they believe."