an: I imagine this to be set sometime after Civil War, and before Infinity War. My villain sucks, but there's a reason I don't write the movies. Also, PLEASE REQUEST what you want to see. I need ideas for new stories. And if any of y'all are interested, I just posted a new story about May's reaction to the end of Infinity War.

"How much do you think you're worth, kid?" The woman circled him, looking him up and down as if assessing an item for sale, not a fifteen-year-old child.

"Huh? A few hundred thousand dollars? Maybe a million or two?"

"He won't come," Peter spat, blood in his saliva, arms straining against the chains that held him down.

The woman laughed, and it was a horrifically menacing sound.

"Right, kid. Tony Stark will risk his life over and over again for random people, people who persecute him, who protest outside his door and smear his name across the evening news. But, you're right, I doubt he'd save his own kid."

"I'm not his kid," he whispered for the thousandth time, "just an intern."

She just laughed that awful laugh again.

"Give it a rest. I've tailed the two of you for months now. You don't buy your intern a car, or take him out for pizza on a Thursday night, or show up in the front row of his decathlon meet. You don't make an intern a million-dollar suit. Even Tony Stark isn't that charitable."

"You're wrong," was all he managed.

She seemed to entertain the thought for a second, scrunching her face and biting one of her black fingernails in contemplation.

"M-hm. Humor me then, kid. What's a billionaire superhero doing with a pathetic thing like you?"

A pathetic thing like you.

He'd be lying if he said he'd never had the same thought.

Peter sometimes thought it was because he was a walking charity case; an unsuspecting teen who had stumbled upon some powers and was in desperate need of a coach. He even had the tragic backstory to boot.

Tony had some demons to atone for, and maybe Peter was his idea of penance.

He'd wondered when it would end, when Tony would finish his due diligence, make his peace with the world, and then Peter would be on his own. Again.

"I don't know," he whispered to the scrutinizing woman.

The room was a bright, sterile white, and interrogation-style lights burned into his eyes.

She had speakers set up in each corner of the cell with a different radio program blaring from each of them.

The lights and sounds were overwhelming, leaving his brain in a dizzying spiral. He didn't know exactly how long he'd been there, but he guessed it was over a few hours.

Peter could hardly concentrate enough to speak, let alone form a plan to escape, and he was using all of the resolve he could muster just to keep his eyes dry. He couldn't afford to let the woman know just how well her setup was working.

He felt like Superman in the presence of Kryptonite, drained and utterly powerless. That sinking feeling crept up on him quickly, coursing through his head, his veins, his heart, making them heavy, like his blood had turned to lead.

"What do you want from me?" He asked, the act of speaking making him want to vomit on the floor. With every passing minute, the lights burned brighter and the sounds rang louder.

"Oh, I don't want a thing from you, love. You're just the bait."

"It won't work," he paused, taking a few breaths to steady himself, "he's not that dumb."

She laughed once more, the sound like needles pressing into his eardrums.

"Dumb? No. But Stark's weakness has always been his humanity and that's why I know this will work."

He wanted her to be wrong; but in his heart, he also knew that Tony would come. Peter just hoped he'd be prepared for the trap.

A thud reverberated through the reinforced walls, and a sick smile crossed the woman's face.

"Daddy's here."

The sight of Peter's face, devoid of any color save for the smears of blood and dirt, threatened to send Tony to his knees.

He hadn't needed to break down any walls, and the signal sent by Peter's suit had been easy enough to trace. In fact, it had all been too easy. But he didn't let that thought cross his mind because, as terrible as he looked, Peter was right in front of him. And he was alive.

"Mr. Stark," he wheezed, eyes squeezed so tightly together that the blood vessels on the side of his head were visible, "you have to go."

Tony wasn't looking at Peter anymore, though. His eyes were trained on the other room's other occupant. In an instant, his hands were up and firing. The speakers were blown to pieces and shards of glass rained down from the ceiling before his palms trained on her.

The effect was instantaneous. Blood rushed back to Peter's face and he opened his eyes again.

"Mr. Stark—," Peter started, and Tony turned to the sound for a split second, giving the woman time to reach behind her back.

He expected a gun, maybe even a knife, or literally anything beside the item she actually pulled. It looked like a phone, and her finger hovered precariously over a button.

"Really? That was your big plan? Trap us in here and blow us all to smithereens? Lady, if you have a death wish, you don't need to take it out on the rest of us."

The woman didn't falter; a menacing smirk slid across her face.

"It's not a bomb. Well, not the kind you're thinking of anyway. But it will blow up the kid's life if you don't put the weapons away, Stark."

Tony looked confounded, and his eyes were vicious, but he slowly lowered his hands. He wasn't going to play games with Peter's safety.

"Good. Try that again," she wiggled her finger, "and I press this button, and every major news network gets a video proving that your 'intern' right here is in fact Spider-Man. No one that he loves will never be safe again."

Tony thought about ending her right there—maybe he could beat her to the punch. Hell, would it be so bad if the world knew who Peter was?

One look at Peter abolished that idea. His face was about as pale as it had been when Tony first walked in, and he knew what was running through his head.

May. If they knew who Spider-Man was, they would go after May. And after experiencing Pepper's kidnapping, and seeing Happy nearly on his deathbed, Tony knew he couldn't risk that for the kid.

"What do you want?" He asked, teeth gritted.

"The suit."

Tony faked a laugh. "Look, lady, I'd love to hand it over, but I'm kind of going commando under here, and I don't know that we're there yet," he gestured his hands back and forth between the two of them, quickly stopping when her finger twitched over the button.

"Give me the suit, or I send this and then every villain out there learns that the world's newest superhero is some puny twelve-year-old dork from Queens. It's up to you."

He ponders for a second, as if weighing the options, and she laughs.

"Damn, maybe the kid was telling the truth. You really don't care about him, do you? What is he, some long lost accident from a one-off with a sorority slut from college? A little side project for you to fix when you're bored?"

The look on Peter's face as she was talking made his heart sink, but he had to keep stalling. They'd have a chat later—when this lunatic was behind bars and Peter didn't look like a character off The Walking Dead.

"First off, whoever you are, I'm pretty sure slut-shaming isn't okay anymore—or was ever okay—but I'm going to let that little comment slide for now. He's not my kid—not technically, at least," he looked at Peter before he continued, "and we haven't really had a chance to dive into the daddy issues and the whole define-the-relationship talk, and not that it's really any of your damn business, but, here's the kicker, I do give a shit about him and I'd really prefer it if you didn't ruin his life."

She opened her mouth, but he quickly shushed her. A look of relief washed over him as he spoke into the suit's comms unit.

"Nat, I know we're not on super great terms, but did you take your sweet time just to spite me?"

Confusion crossed the woman's face, and her finger instinctively pressed into the button on her device.

Peter blanched, but Tony didn't flinch.

"You just signed his death certificate," she hissed, dropping the phone on the floor.

"Actually, you just signed yours," he said, as Natasha Romanoff entered the room and had the woman on the floor, unconscious, in under two seconds.

"God, that sounded cheesy. I blame her; this whole thing reminds me of the plotline from a terrible DC movie," Tony said, emerging from his suit (under which he was, thank God, not going commando).

"How long does it take to remotely delete a video off of a damn iPhone? Jesus, haven't you ever had to erase some racy photos from an ex's phone before?"

"It's not my fault you didn't mention anything about having to hack into a phone when you told me your plan. But if you think you can do better, I'll remember that next time you call me in a panic because I happened to be in town," she said, giving Tony a glare before she smiled at him.

"It's good to see you, Nat."

"It's good to see you, too, even if you are still a huge pain in my ass. Can we maybe not mention this to Clint, though? You're still at the top of his shit list and I'm trying to be the namesake of his next child."

Tony offered his hand, "I won't tell if you won't tell."

"Deal," she said, shaking his hand before eyeing the kid who was still restrained in his chair.

In a minute, the two had the chains off and were helping the kid to his feet.

Peter blushed a little when she put an arm around his shoulder to steady him.

"Y-you're," he stuttered.

"She's back-up," Tony finished. "You know, that thing you're supposed to call when you're in trouble?"

They were outside the building now, Happy looking entirely out of place in the driver's seat of the silver Audi, surrounded by deserted, crumbling buildings.

Peter looked away from Tony guiltily, and Natasha elbowed the older man in the ribs.

"I'm Nat; I saw you in Germany. Your combat skills aren't too bad, for Stark's kid," she winked.

"He's not—," they both started, and Nat couldn't tell which was better: the wide-eyed embarrassed look on Peter's face, or the pursed-lipped, slightly disappointed one on Tony's.

"It was nice to meet you, Pete. And Tony? Maybe keep a better eye on him next time?"

Before either one of them could protest, she was gone.

"How did she," Peter stammered.

"Rule one with Agent Romanoff: don't ask questions. My personal theory is that she's some kind of alien, or maybe a witch, but Bruce hasn't been around to help me test that hypothesis."

Tony opened the door for Peter before climbing in beside him, and the jokes faded as he saw how tired and small Peter looked.

"Nat deleted that video off of everything kid—no one is ever going to see it. May and Ned and MJ are all still safe, and we're going to keep it that way, okay?"

Peter nodded, but something was clearly still eating at him.

"Pete, talk to me. What is it?"

He thought about lying and saying it was nothing, but he couldn't deal with not knowing anymore.

"What am I, to you?"

Tony raised his eyebrow, troubled that the kid had to even ask the question.

"I didn't even hesitate to call Natasha, even though it meant burying my pride and rebuilding some bridges, when I knew you were missing. And you know that's hard for me."

Peter let out a small laugh.

"But I would do it again, in a heartbeat, because I need you to know that you are important to me, and if you ever need me, I will always be there. No matter what. Understood?"

Peter just nodded, words stuck in the back of his throat.

"Okay, good. Glad we had our moment. Now let's get you home before your aunt has my head on a silver platter."