The next day, Peter eagerly took the subway to Grand Central-42nd stop, and had to stop himself from walking much faster than a teenager normally would. It had been hard to sit through his classes, especially when most of them didn't hold any challenge for him. He was so interested to see what they'd do today at the internship. He was anxious too, though. What if yesterday was a fluke? What if Mr. Stark wasn't really planning to have him come to his lab again? What if he'd misunderstood? His steps slowed, anxiety creeping in. Should he go in through the lobby? Where had the receptionist said the intern entrance was? Ugh.
He found himself standing outside the front entrance for a full minute, frozen, as he tried to decide what to do. Finally he took a deep breath and pushed the door open, walking gingerly towards the reception desk. Thankfully, it was the same employee as yesterday, and he only looked confused for a moment before smiling brightly at Peter and directing him to the same elevator as before. Peter sagged with relief as he turned and approached the lift.
This time he approached Mr. Stark's lab door a little more confidently, but still paused in the doorway.
"Hello? Mr. Stark?" he called, not seeing the engineer anywhere.
"Oh, hey, Peter," he heard a voice from the far right. "Come on in."
Peter carefully set his backpack on the same couch, and moved toward the voice. He tipped his head in confusion as he found Mr. Stark lying on his back under one of the holo tables. It was off, and he appeared to be working on it, like he would a car. Peter wasn't sure what to do or say, so he just stood there for a moment.
"Um, hi. What would you like me to do today, sir?" he said, deciding that ignoring the strange positioning was his best bet.
"Uh, you can hand me that hex key set from over there. The blue one? I think I'm ready to close this panel up, but I grabbed the wrong sizes."
"What were you doing in there?" Peter couldn't help but ask, hoping he wasn't being annoying. He'd watched Mr. Stark work on a different holo table the day before, and it had looked amazing.
"This one keeps shorting out a little, and the flicker's giving me a headache. So I finally got in there and double checked some of the wiring. Something was a little jiggly, probably from DUM-E and U bumping around in here," he raised his voice accusingly for that last part, "but I think I fixed it."
"You repair your own tables?" Peter asked curiously. For some reason he thought someone as smart and rich as Mr. Stark would have people for stuff like that.
Mr. Stark grunted a little and scooted out from under the table, looking up at Peter in confusion. "I built 'em, kid. Who else is gonna fix them when they're not working?"
"Oh! Of course! Sorry." Peter said. Why couldn't he keep his mouth shut? Of course these were things Mr. Stark built personally. I mean, he knew the man was brilliant, and was responsible for a huge percentage of Stark Industries products, and the Iron Man suits and… He'd just never imagined the genius actually getting his hands dirty and manufacturing his own inventions.
Mr. Stark stood up, groaning a little as he did. He gave Peter a speculative look. "I should have waited for you to get here though, and just told you how to do it. Your back would probably have no problem crawling under there."
He'd let Peter work on his tech? "I… Of course, sir, I'd be completely happy to help with stuff like that. Just save all the floor-crawling stuff to me! Because I'm great at reaching stuff that's…low." Peter bit his lip at the last word. Stupid. Why couldn't he just smile and nod, instead of babbling like that? His parents hated when he chattered at them.
The disheveled genius tilted his head, but his mouth quirked up, and he looked amused, not annoyed. "I'll keep that in mind. Now come here," he said, walking towards the back of the room and crooking a finger at Peter to follow him.
Peter heard Mr. Stark's watch buzz, and the man checked it absently.
"Oh. Are you hungry? FRIDAY said it's snack time. I had them send up a bunch of snack-type stuff."
Peter was just about to open his mouth and assure Mr. Stark that he'd already had a snack on the way over, but then he smartened up and said, "That sounds amazing, sir. Thanks!"
A few minutes later Peter was munching on some cheetos and had a granola bar in his back pocket while Mr. Stark showed him what else he wanted him to do. "Just a bunch of tests to see where you're at in different disciplines. FRIDAY's got them queued up at that workstation back there."
Peter's eyes widened a little, and he nodded. He hadn't expected this, but it made sense.
"I mean, some of this I'd know if I could have just pulled up your transcripts and aptitude tests and whatever else I'm sure your little nerd school does, but FRIDAY reminded me that it's unethical to hack minors' records."
Peter stared at Mr. Stark, a cheeto frozen in the air halfway to his mouth. "Um… but it's not unethical to hack adults' records?" he asked finally, feeling brave.
"Eh. It's worse when it's kids," Mr. Stark said. "I mean, I guess I could have just asked you. And your parents," he mused, as if the idea had just barely occurred to him. "They could've sent me stuff."
"Pretty sure they don't know how to access it, either," Peter muttered.
Mr. Stark heard anyway. "Oh? Isn't that stuff parents are supposed to have access to? 'You'd better get this C- up to a solid B, or no partying for you this weekend,' and whatnot?"
Peter stifled a laugh. "'No partying this weekend?' You think the parents who care about grades are going to let their kids go out to parties?" he said, trying to make sure he'd understood what he'd just heard. He tried to imagine Ned's mom or dad saying that and just couldn't picture it.
"How should I know?" Mr. Stark blustered. "I never did the whole high school thing! When I was your age—wait, are you 15?"
"Fourteen, sir."
"Well, when I was almost your age, I was at MIT, and they didn't know if I even went back to my dorm at night. They did pay attention to my grades, though," he mused.
"Well, I don't think mine have ever signed into the grade portal," Peter said, feeling pretty confident about that. May had ragged him about missing assignments in the past, but he didn't think his parents even got e-mails from the school, much less jumped through the hoops of creating accounts and passwords to check on things. "But if you want, I can tell you which classes I've taken, and if I understood the material, or what grade I got, or whatever?"
"Tell FRIDAY. But that's a good starting place. Then she'll run you through whatever's left. It's impossible for me to know what kind of projects to assign you or let you help on if I don't know what you don't know. You know?"
"Right," Peter said, trying to make sure he was processing that sentence correctly.
"No crumbs in the keyboard!" Mr. Stark said, wiggling his fingers distastefully at Peter.
"Of course not," Peter said, appalled. He wasn't six.
Just then, DUM-E came rolling over. He approached gingerly and stopped a few feet shy, unlike his enthusiastic greeting the day before.
"Hey DUM-E!"
"Oh, DUM-E's charging right now. He spent all night cleaning up the bag of epoxy dust he accidentally ripped open when he was running around with a screwdriver yesterday. It basically exploded all over my main fabricator," Mr. Stark said grumpily, glaring at a different corner of the lab, where Peter could now see the inert robot.
"Oh. Then who's this?"
"That's U. DUM-E's little brother. A little smarter, a little more obedient, but also less entertaining," he said with a wink.
"Like the letter? Or the word 'you'?"
"The letter."
"Hi, U," Peter said, reaching out slowly to pat the robot on its camera. DUM-E had seemed to like that. U also beeped softly, and he sounded happy.
"Hey, FRIDAY's gonna give me some tests, so I have to go over here and work, okay?" Peter said, heading in the direction of the workstation. U followed happily, and seemed to watch over Peter's shoulder as he input his base information for FRIDAY and then started taking the tests she brought up.
Two hours later, yawning and feeling a little sluggish from sitting and testing so long, after a full day of sitting in school, Peter was re-thinking his enthusiasm for the internship, even if it was with Tony Stark. He stood up and stretched, and his stomach rumbled a little. Ugh, that meant actual hunger pangs weren't far behind.
FRIDAY had released him, so he walked over to where Mr. Stark was working at a terminal. U had long-since lost interest, and seemed to be (only somewhat effectively) cleaning up the sink over on the far back wall.
He hovered in the engineer's visual field for a moment before he finally spoke to get the man's attention. "Mr. Stark? I'm done, I think?"
Mr. Stark turned and looked up at him, then his eyes flew to his watch. "Oh! It's about that time, huh?" He turned all the way around and leaned back against his desk. "Hey, you hungry?"
"You can assume the answer to that is always 'yes,'" Peter said with a small smile.
Mr. Stark's eyebrow jumped in amusement, and he turned back to his console. "Let's do Chinese. You have my order, FRI. What do you want, Parker?"
"Um, orange chicken and lo mein?"
"That all?"
Peter tipped his chin down, but he really, really liked Chinese food. "Could I have some egg rolls, too?"
"Yep. Always order what you want here."
"Awesome," Peter mouthed silently.
"She'll order from next door, so it should be here in like fifteen minutes. They're fantastic."
"Pull up a chair while we wait. You care if I look at your results right now with you here, or you want me to wait?" Mr. Stark asked.
"Uh… I don't mind. You can look."
"Good answer, nothing to be embarrassed about. These are just a few measuring sticks, and let me know where we might wanna work. I'm not grading you or judging you based on what you know or don't know yet."
What? That didn't even make sense. Of course it mattered how he did on the tests. It always mattered. Peter tried not to feel awkward or shift around too much while Mr. Stark looked over his scores and results.
Finally, he whistled, and looked up at Peter. "Still, though, impressive, kid. You're skyhigh in a few of these categories." He indicated the areas on the screen. "Really good teacher, or special interests?"
"Um, a little of both? But I read a lot, mostly? So more special interest, I guess."
"Like arc reactor tech?" Mr. Stark asked with a smile.
"Definitely."
"But seriously, kid. I think there's a lot here you can actually help me work on, seeing what you already understand or have exposure to. It's hard to fit some of it into the short time we have every day for internships though." Tony turned in his chair again and stared at Peter like he was an interesting kind of puzzle. That wasn't weird at all. Peter tried not to shift too much under his gaze.
He was rescued by the food arriving, delivered by a security guard from downstairs. They dug right in, and Peter was in heaven. His parents didn't care for Chinese food, but he needed to remember to get some for his "afternoon" snack sometimes.
Tony was eating, too, but with less attention than Peter, and he stopped to turn and ask a question. "What time do you get out of school?"
Peter swallowed the chicken in his mouth quickly. "Um, 2:55?"
"Would you get here faster if I had someone pick you up?"
Peter thought about it. "Not necessarily, sir. I think it takes just as long by car to go that far as it does to take the train. I'm not sure it would be worth it," Peter managed to get out, sounding halfway intelligent, hopefully. Mr. Stark was offering to send a car for him? This was crazy…
"You can stop it with all the 'sir' stuff, Parker. You're making me feel older than I am," Tony said, waving a hand. "What about Friday nights? You usually busy? Out with friends and stuff?"
Where was this going? "No, not usually. Sometimes? We're more likely to get together on Saturday afternoons, I guess."
"How would your parents feel about you staying later on Fridays? Maybe 9 or 10? Negotiable, of course, if you have other plans. I just think some of the projects I have in mind are better with a longer time frame. I hate working on stuff in bits and pieces."
Peter didn't like that either. It was annoying to get interrupted and pulled out of a project all the time. " I'm not sure? I can ask. Is that the best plan? I just… things get extra weird on public transit on Friday nights," he said sheepishly, fully prepared for his concern to be dismissed.
"Oh, that's not a problem. My driver could drop you off. Ask about it, okay? We can reduce your after-school hours, if it's a problem. But if not, of course you'd get paid more for the extra hours," Mr. Stark said, turning back to the screen, his food forgotten behind him. "FRI, look up the laws with stuff like an internship. How many hours can he be here?"
"Paid?" Peter asked Mr. Stark's back. "The internship is paid?"
The engineer swiveled back around, his eyebrows drawn together. "Well, yeah, of course... I mean, I'm pretty sure it's just minimum wage for this high school program, but SI doesn't short its interns, even if you are underage. Didn't you read that in the materials they sent out? Pepper said they sent out materials." The last statement was muttered more to himself.
"Uh, I guess I missed it." Because his parents never gave him the packet of information…
"Paperwork is boring, but you need to pay attention to it, kid. Or pay a lawyer to pay attention to it, like I do," Tony said with a smirk.
"I will, sir. Sorry, sir," Peter said humbly, burying his annoyance so it didn't show on his face.
Mr. Stark glanced at him sharply, tilting his head slightly as if he was trying to figure something out. He sighed.
Oh, crap. He'd asked him not to say 'sir,' hadn't he. "Sorry, uh, Mr. Stark."
"Boss?" FRIDAY interrupted. Tony made a "go on" motion towards what must be one of her sensors.
"Because the internship is set up as a Cooperative Education Program, interns are allowed to work up to six hours on school days, as long as they don't go over 40 hours a week."
Peter ate quickly while the man looked back and forth from his phone to his screens, looking like he was trying to figure something out in his calendar. Finally he stopped and turned back to smile at Peter.
"Easy there, killer. It's not going anywhere," Tony said, amused.
Peter looked up in consternation. He had been eating a little quickly. Whoops. Even with the snack, he'd been so hungry! Stupid spider bite.
"I've got it worked out on my schedule, so talk to your parents about later Friday nights, yeah?" Tony continued. "Starting next week, if that works. I think our time is up for today, but I'll get some things set up that I want to work on anyway, that you can help with, or even maybe do for me." Tony looked pleased at this idea.
Peter's phone vibrated in his pocket, then his ringtone sounded. Peter frowned, his hands scrambling to pulli t out. He was sure he'd turned it on silent. "Sorry, I don't know why—" It was Mary. "Um, it's my mom? I—"
"You're fine," Mr. Stark said, waving his hand in permission and turning back to his screens.
Peter walked away as he swiped to answer.
"Hello?"
"Peter, I texted you, and this is the second time I've tried calling," she said, sounding very annoyed. Oh, that explained why the call had finally come through. He had set it up that way for emergencies.
"I—"
"I need you to put dinner in the oven. The vegetarian lasagna. We're coming home in an hour, but will only be there for about 20 minutes before we have to leave."
"Uh, I'm at my internship, Mary. I was just leaving, but it'll take me a little while to get home."
His mom made a noise of exasperation. "That's today?" She was silent while she thought for a moment. "Do the individual enchiladas then, I guess. They'll cook faster. Don't forget, and hurry home."
"I… Yeah, okay," he said quietly.
She hung up.
"Sorry, I've gotta go," he said, picking up his backpack and facing Mr. Stark. "I'll see you next week?"
"Yeah, kid, sounds good," Mr. Stark said, giving Peter a little wave. "Don't forget your eggrolls," he said, pointing to the unopened box next to Peter's chicken, which he'd almost finished. Peter quickly snagged the last piece of chicken and picked up his containers to throw them away on his way out the door.
Peter paused in the doorway and looked back briefly at the technical wonderland behind him before heading down the hall. This was good. The first really good thing that had happened in his life since he lost May and Ben. And the fact that his internship was even paid gave him another idea. He'd been looking at possibilities for some kind of suit to hide his identity while he helped people, but he didn't have any way to get materials. But if his parents would let him have some of the money from the internship, maybe he could actually put something together. Feeling nervous but excited about that possibility, he stepped into the elevator. The one without buttons. He'd been so confused last time until the AI had spoken up, asking where he wanted to go.
"FRIDAY? Lobby, please?"
"Of course, Mr. Parker."
Once the teenager had left the lab, Tony swiveled back around in his chair, considering the doorway he'd just paused in. Usually he wouldn't have noticed something like that, but all of his hyperfocus-skills had been trained on the boy, even though he acted like he was working on something else. Something seemed… off.
The test results were… well, Tony didn't say he was impressed unless he was. He turned back to his computer screen.
"FRI, compare Peter's results on these different tests with available results from typical high school students his same age, as well as students at schools similar to Midtown Tech. Then I want comparisons from first-year Engineering students at a handful of the better colleges, as well as senior-level students. Do we have access to data for all of those?
"One moment," FRIDAY said. Tony contemplated the conundrum that was Peter Parker while he waited. The kid was probably as smart as him at that age, but instead of owning it, he seemed rather self-deprecating about his knowledge. Tony had been constantly celebrated (well, by people other than his dad) for his genius, and he hadn't been humble about it. Was this just a difference in personalities?
"Yes, Boss, I can access those. Data on your screen in ten seconds."
Tony sifted through the results for a few minutes. Yep, as he thought, the kid had some knowledge gaps, but for the most part, was outperforming the first-year Engineering students, and many of the seniors, as well. Why wasn't he in college? Surely scientists at the Parkers' level knew it was a possibility.
Hmm, the Parkers. He sat back in his chair again, thinking. That conversation with his mom had been short, and weird, from the little bit he heard. And had he called her 'Mary?'
"FRI, get me whatever you can find on the kid. Anything publicly available, of course," he said, thinking of Peter's nervous face when he mentioned hacking into records.
"You already have a lot of that information from the check you did on him before you decided to have him work here in your lab, Boss," FRIDAY reminded him. "You never read most of that, though."
"Sassy. Bring up that stuff, and get me more. What makes this kid tick? Anything on his relationship with his parents? He seems well-adjusted, and much nicer than them, but something seems weird. But what do I know? He's the only teenager I know, right?"
"Is that a rhetorical question?"
Tony rolled his eyes and ignored his AI. As articles and information slowly appeared on his screen, he looked through them carefully. After a few moments, he spoke again.
"FRI, bring up stuff on May and Ben Parker."
"Mr. Parker's aunt and uncle?"
"Yes. It looks like they were killed in an accident recently." He rubbed at his chin. "I wonder if they were close. Do you think some of this could be explained as grieving?"
"I'm sure I don't know, Boss. You could try asking Mr. Parker about it."
"True," Tony said uneasily. That sounded like a lot of feelings, and he barely knew the kid. "But that doesn't explain why his parents wouldn't be paying any attention to his grades, or why he acts so squirrely. And he always seems hungry. But that can be a normal teenage thing, right?"
FRIDAY didn't bother replying.
"And he was so different with me than he was with them at the Gala." Tony was just musing to himself at this point. "All of it can be explained away, piece by piece, but I still feel like something is off."
"It may be so, Boss, but what can you do about it as his intern supervisor? That's what you are, by the way, officially; I've updated his records. Which means you will need to fill out paperwork every week."
Tony glared at her sensor. "Low blow, FRI. There's no way around that?"
"Not if you want to have him working with you instead of with the other interns," the AI said firmly.
"As for what I can do about it… Nothing, I guess. Just watch for any actual red flags, and give him some good experience here?"
"Your plan seems sound."
Tony leaned back in his chair and rubbed at his eyes. "I have no idea what I'm doing here, FRI. No one briefed me on this kid thing."
"You've done pretty well at flying by the seat of your pants before, Boss. Maybe you'll surprise yourself."
"You think so? Hmm. Hey, bring up all of the projects I've considered in the last twelve months that you think are up to the kid's knowledge level."
Slowly, Tony's screen started populating as FRIDAY picked out projects.
"Uh, on the holo table, please, dear." The projects reappeared behind him as Tony spun his chair around. He created several different organizational folders and started throwing projects in different ones as he read through them. Working with someone else was going to be different. He was kinda looking forward to it, though.
