Hi!

I recovering from wisdom teeth surgery, so thanks for being patient with me! It's a slow journey, and I don't always feel like doing anything other than sleeping.
Thank you all so much for the comments and PMs!

SIDE NOTE:
I just finished watching Spider-Man: Far From Home and had this idea, so be warned that this potentially contains Endgame spoilers, Infinity War spoilers, Iron Man spoilers, and pretty much every other spoiler for any other movie before and including Far From Home!
If you don't care, I don't care! Just warning you!
Also, no rude comments. Please? If you don't like it, it's called the back button. It sends you back to the previous page. There's also the close button, that shuts down the entire window. Please feel free to use either or both of these.

DISCLAIMER: If I owned Marvel, or Spider-Man, or Iron Man, or any of the characters, you'd know. And I definitely wouldn't be posting fanfictions on a little website. I'd simply put it in the movie.

The wind was freezing cold as he left the city, the buildings becoming fewer and farther in-between and the people turning from the self-respecting Queens residents to more shady people who avoided crowded areas most of the time. It wasn't a good place for a sixteen-almost-seventeen-year-old, not matter how sticky said teenager had the ability to become or how high his PSAT results had come back.

Unfortunately, Peter didn't have a choice. Hated by the general population, his only way of survival was to go where everyone else was hated by the general population and try his best to fit in. But he wouldn't stay here forever. There were plenty of places he could go where no one would look. It was what Banner had done, wasn't it?

He exhaled and adjusted the shoulder straps of his backpack, running a hand through his curly hair. The wind chilled him to the bone and he wrapped his arms around himself the way Tony had. He'd felt safe, then. He'd felt like everything would be okay. He relished in the memory for a moment, imagining his mentor's embrace: stronger than May's, and more paternal to her motherly.

"If you were good enough, maybe Tony would still be alive."

His eyes shot open and he released himself, gasping for air as Beck's words echoed around his head.

Nothing was okay, and nothing would ever be okay again.

He found a place under a bridge and pulled on the MIT hoodie over his layers, practically curling up inside it. It was summer. It was supposed to be warmer than this.

And so it was with a prayer for warmer weather that he dropped off.

"Jay, track him," the man said aloud. He stood on the sidewalk, looking around the bustling city. Peter Parker's face showed from every television screen in every direction, but the teenager himself was nowhere to be seen. JADYN D. confirmed it, flashing labels over everyone she could, and Peter was not one of them.

Jadyn D. had been created using the same system Edith had been developed from, and like its predecessor, it had control of every existing global weapon created by Stark Industries and it's own copy of all programs. The one thing the developer regretted was not trying harder to link the two. He hadn't wanted Jadyn to be trackable, but now he couldn't track Edith, either.

That left limits as to how he could track a sixteen-year-old vigilante who could hide pretty much anywhere, but he knew where to start. Because if Peter were to tell someone where he was, there was just one person, and that was his aunt.

She still lived in the same apartment she'd lived in since her husband had died, he knew. That had been the event that had left her a widow, living off a nurse's income to raise a young boy. And she'd done it alone for four years until someone had stepped in to help. But that had been temporary. For two years, a man had stepped into the child's life; provided a father figure and helped with things. And then Peter had been dusted, and the man had continued keeping an eye on May, making sure she was okay.

He'd still felt responsible for the kid's death, but more than the guilt on his back, he'd felt it in his heart. He'd loved that kid.

And he'd given his life to prove it.

The man raised his hand and knocked lightly on the flimsy door. He felt it give slightly beneath his hand and wondered if it was a miracle it hadn't crumbled yet. And then the door opened.

May Parker stood in the doorway, her mouth slightly open as the stared at her visitor. She hesitated, the door wavering slightly in her hand, and he put his hand on the knob to push it open more, stepping in and closing the door behind him.

"May! Focus up!"

"You-" she stuttered. "You were-"

"Yep!" He confirmed, and then, "nope! Well... kind of. I need you to focus. Where's your nephew?"

"He's gone," she choked out. "A couple hours ago, he took some of his things, packed a bag and left."

"Did you report it?"

The expression on her face was heartbreaking.

"You know Peter," she whispered. "I trust him, and though it kills me... I'm letting him go. I couldn't stop him anyway."