From afar Peter could hear the sounds of the Hulk completely decimating the remnants of the Doom bots and he hoped that the other Avengers had a least finished with Doom before coming over to referee.

Peter knew he'd been too quiet when Steve's voice broke the silence. When he spoke his voice was slow, and it inexplicably reminded Peter of a train coming out of the station, moving slow, working hard, but promising to speed up and then run you over as you lay tied to the train tracks. "Are you telling me," Steve had to pause for a moment, "that you are engaged as well? Are you honestly defending yourself by saying that you not only almost slept with a taken man, but yourself almost cheated?"

Peter winced. "That doesn't matter. None of that matters anymore. What's done is done, and what I never actually did is still following me around, so…"

Steve sighed heavily, "Fine. Ignoring that your own immorality is now on par with Deadpool's—"

"Don't—" Peter interrupted and then groaned. "I'm not saying that Deadpool isn't to blame as much as I am, or maybe because he's super devoted to you guys and a little on the crazy side makes you think that all of the scheming falls entirely on my head, and I'm ok with that. Really, I am. Deadpool doesn't need any more heartache from coworkers. You can blame it all on me, but just, I…"

Peter trailed off, unsure of what to say. On the one hand, yeah, don't blame him, no one was at fault, but on the other hand, if they were going to blame someone, it should be the innocuous Spiderman and not Deadpool. On a third hand, (an alien one growing strangely from his head or his foot), playing the blame game did not usually involve pointy killing tools!

Somewhere along the way when Peter was stuck in his own mind, Captain America had begun apologizing for their behavior, all of theirs, sounding surprisingly genuine, but Peter wasn't really listening. It wasn't until Clint spoke up that Peter really heard any of it.

"Peter." Peter's real name spoken so casually had his insides churning horribly and he suddenly felt the need to vomit. Had he fucked up somewhere in the last five minutes? Was his secret out? "That's his name. Did you know? Deadpool's fiancé is named Peter." Peter blinked furiously behind his mask as he tried to force his stomach to settle. Clint hadn't discovered his secret identity, he'd just been referring to said secret identity as a third party. Peter nodded slowly and Clint's face twisted into something uncontrollable for just a second before he hid it. "Peter is the nicest boy. He's sweet and funny, and we wanted to protect him from Deadpool at all costs. And then we found out they were engaged, but our mission—" he shook his head, "my mission, I should say, stayed the same. I want to protect him. Not just physically, but… his happiness. And then Deadpool had to go and screw it up!" Peter flinched back and clutched the arrow closer to his chest. Clint looked surprised and then regretful at his own vehemence and reached out one unsteady hand to Peter as one might to a kitten one has startled.
Slower, quieter Clint continued to explain, "I wanted to be angry at Deadpool for ruining it. Peter's a sweet kid. He's good. One of the only truly good people I've ever met. Do you understand?" His voice was soft, apologetic, and Peter nodded slowly. "I so wanted to be angry at Deadpool because he ruined that boy's happiness, and then Peter forgave him. He asked us all to be the same to Deadpool, to treat him like we'd always done. And I so wanted to hurt him. And I couldn't. I…" Clint would not now look up. Shame weighed down on his shoulders. "I took it out on the second best thing."

Peter really wanted to tell Clint it was alright, because in the greater scheme of things, if Clint had to punish one of them, he'd rather it be him than Wade. And he knew that after this it would all settle down (or he hoped at least). After a long sleep curled up against Wade he'd be right as rain and could go about this as if it hadn't happened. People had gotten hurt on both sides, but it was clean pain, it would heal, not fester.

And a part of Peter that was already accepting the deep regret and shame in Clint's voice and words, and felt a little sorry for him. He was having to admit his failures in front of not just the guy who he'd hurt, but also his makeshift family, and that had to sting. Peter could understand that pain as well.

But most of Peter, the part of Peter that was doing the reasoning right now in his heightened emotional state (and yeah, he could recognize that this wasn't the best place to be mentally), seeing the arrow sticking out of Bruce's shoulder, poor Bruce who'd never hurt anyone, Peter had to make sure that Clint got it. That he fully understood what he'd done.

And then he could be forgiven.

Peter tightened his grip on the arrow, and then thrust it once more at Clint's throat. It wasn't even touching this time, but Clint fidgeted and raised his hands above his head.

"What would happen" Peter asked conversationally, and he could hear the others shifting behind him, "if I shoved this through your head?"

Clint gulped and behind him Peter could only assume that the others were preparing for a fight. Maybe he'd get that villain status after all.

"I would die," Clint said, and he even had enough of himself after all that regret to sound a little sassy.

"Yeah," Peter agreed casually, "you would. Do you know why?"

"Because stabbing people up into their heads does that!" Tony's voice yelled from behind Peter, and he could hear the repulsors whirring to life, ready to be used at a moment's notice.

Peter jumped back towards the ledge of the building so he could see Clint on one side of him and Steve, Tony, Nat, and Thor on the other. "I know!" Peter yelled. "That's the point! When someone get's stabbed through with one of these little whipper snappers, they pretty much die."

"You are young yet," Thor stated sadly, "You do not need to harm others in order to make your point known. Blood Brother Hawkeye sees the errors of his ways. Is not that enough?"

Peter shook his head. "You don't get it. I'm not trying to hurt Hawkeye. My point is that arrows can kill. They kill humans. I'm human!" He angrily shoved the sleeve up on one of his arms and pulled the tip of the arrow across the pale skin of his inner arm. A trickle of blood sprung up scarlet against his skin and he dropped the arrow. In a calmer voice, channeling his inner 10th grade Physics teacher (a stoner who prattled on about matter and Kepler as zen as Buddha) he said, "I may wear spandex, which has before been called an abomination to all fashion everywhere, but I am not much more than that. Spandex and skin, and below that muscle and bone and organs. Joking is one thing. Punishing me is one thing. But you could have killed me. You almost did."

Clint looked pale, and even the other Avengers didn't know what to say. Peter pulled the sleeve down and jumped off the building, ready to just go home, sleep, bathe, sleep again, mull this over for the next three years, start regretting something (because what's a day in the life of Peter Parker if there's nothing to regret, right?), and then make it all up to them later.

And he would have, too, he would have gone straight home and into the arms of his glorious Wade, and then into a bath, and then into a bed, but instead a pair of over-large green arms folded themselves around Peter's midsection and despite Peter using all of his strength to escape, he was carried off.