This was not supposed to take so long to update, but here we are!

9 o'clock on a Friday evening, a very rare dinner reservation and a table for two.

Tony tugged on the cufflink to his sleeve, admiring his reflection as he took one last glance in the oversized mirror of his bedroom.

Pepper was just in time to enter the room and see the man's antics, she joined him, both smiled lovingly towards the other.

"Shall we go?"

The drive was short, Definitley short enough for Tony to had done it himself. But then, what was the fun in having a driver/security guard/friend?

Happy Hogan was equally as perplexed as he had gotten the call only an hour in advance. "It's fifteen minutes down the road."

Tony was quick to fire back, "It's fifteen minutes that I can be sipping on champagne with my lovely lady."

Happy rolled his eyes as he hung up and made his way to the tower. He didn't complain too much, knowing this little escapade would result in a bonus check later.

So he went and drove the two.

The multifaceted man now sat patiently in the luxurious car that had its own private reserved parking space at the restaurant.

Tony had even gone so far as to request a server be sent to Happy to take his order as well.

Happy felt pretty good about it all- right up until his phone buzzed. He picked it up and felt his stomach drop at Peter Parker's name.

"Hello?" He couldn't help but be paranoid, the kid was calling within patrol times. But then again, if it were an emergency he wouldn't be the one being alerted. Right?

"Happy! Hey! How are you!?"

Happy flinched and pulled the offending phone speaker away from his ear, he soon recovered and didn't waste any time.

"Kid? What's going on?"

Everything about the situation felt wrong, from the timing of the call, the way Peter sounded, and all the tension from how peculiar this night was in general.

"I might need some help."

Peter's voice was wavering, and Happy knew the differnce of sound quality between a suit and phone call. This was definitely a suit call.

"I'm going to need a little more information than-"

"Call ended"

Happy immediately tucked his phone in his pocket and turned to get out of the car when suddenly Tony knocked on the glass of the passenger side window. Pepper stood close to him as Tony opened the door and was about to speak- this was when Happy cut him off.

"Something is up with the kid. He just called, sounded like he was in his suit."

All expression fell, a slight paleness took over and without any other words being needed, Tony's suit retracted around him. He had Karen contacted the second his mask was online.

"Karen, initiate baby-sitter protocol, section 3-"

"Apologies, the Baby-sitter protocol has been revised and prohibited from communications via Stark." The robotic voice responded without delay.

Tony's stomach dropped- had the kid really hacked the suit? "I'm going to kill this him- ok give me coordinates on Spider-Man's suit location."

"Certainly, displaying coordinates now."

Tony pushed back his fear as he realized how close the coordinates were to Peter's home. He couldn't get any stats on the kids health since the protocol had been hacked.

It only took three minutes to arrive to the coordinates given. Tony would have been hard pressed to find Peter if he didn't have his state of the art suit to relay heat signatures.

To anyone else's eyes, the ally was void of anyone, just a shitty street light illuminating the large green trash bins in the back of the dead end.

Thanks to the Iron Man suit, the trash and illuminated a tiny red Spider-Man shaped figure behind them.

Tony made quick work of shoving the heavy bins away, the front of his suit automatically opening as Peter's crumpled body was revealed.

Tony's entire world fell as he took in the scene, his breathing hitched but he took control. He needed to be strong right now.

"Jesus Christ kid.." Tony set off to work on laying Peter on his side. Careful to not remove the two knives that were currently protruding out of his body.

Stark had already sent the same coordinates to Bruce, he knew something was seriously wrong from the moment that Happy informed him of Peter's call.

Tony kneeled next to the lifeless form of the usually entergetic and high spirited teen. "Peter? Hey kid, can you hear me?" The slight buzz Tony had from dinner only moments ago was completely gone by now.

There was so much blood. It circled around the kids body, there was too much of it. Even as Tony tried to stop some of the bleeding- it would pool around his hands and seep through whatever material he used. Hysteria creeped in more and more as each failed attempt occured.

"You can't die. You hear me? I have to…I have to lecture you about hacking the suit. Sneaking around, being reckless- you can't just get out of trouble! Please…" Tonys voice cracked as he desperately tried to help stop the bleeding.

Peter was too pale, too quiet. In fact…Peter looked dead.

That's when the terrifying thought occurred. Tony shuffled around, carefully taking the Spider-man mask off to take Peters pulse- nothing.

There were no thoughts, words, emotion- pure instinct kicked in as Tony set off into doing chest compressions. His body shook as he felt Peter's ribs cracking underneath his hands.

"You can't leave! You hear me?! You can't fucking leave! Please! Please…" Tony cried out- suddenly a strong set of hands tried to pull him away.

He fought against their grip, "get the hell off of me!"

"Tony. You've got to let us help him. He doesn't have a lot of time here." The sense of urgency in the voice made Tony give in. He knew that calming yet stern voice-

Bruce. Thank god.

Tony stood back in an instant, watching the paramedic team do their job the best they could with the circumstances. Soon, Tony couldn't even see the kid with the swarm of medical personnel around him.

He only heard commands, "starting the defibrillator, CLEAR!"

Tony's entire being shook uncontrollably, he fell to his knees as he heard Bruce shout once more.

"CLEAR!"

Time stopped, Tony waited. His vision had black dots invading from every angle but he had to know if the kid was ok.

Then, finally, Bruce spoke.

"Alright, get me the….stat…let's get him to med bay…heart rate is improving but…"

The kid was alive. Peter was alive.

Tony allowed unconscious to take over, falling to a heap and hitting his head on the disgusting green bins on his way down.

Soon after Peter was loaded into the ambulance and rushed away- Tony was also lifted by a team of paramedics as his suit auto piloted itself back to the base.

Tony woke long before Peter did. In fact, he beat Peter by two weeks. The kid had fallen into a coma, the stress on his body from the blood loss and overall amount of time it took for him to get appropriate care were all factors.

Bruce said it was a slow process, he made sure that Tony and May knew of how this all might play out once Peter did come out of his coma.

Sure enough, within another week Peter had not only woke up, but also passed all of his brain function tests. He had managed to evade any lasting damage, his body was healed by this point as well.

Rest was the only thing Peter needed by the time the worst had passed.

He was quiet though, ever since he had woke up. PTSD was a powerful thing, and this was another one of those times where flashbacks and dissociative episodes plagued Peters waking life.

How could it not? It was a discussion that all the adult around the teen had frequently, Peter heard every word as they whispered outside of his med bay room.

It wasn't just that though, it was the guilt. As soon as he regained full consciousness and made sense of the world around him again- Peter felt a dull ache. Guilt. He thought he had everything under control though, he told himself once he got cleared from medical care then he would stay out of trouble and stay out of everyone's lives for a while. He had done enough damage.

Fortunately, a certain self sacrificing billionaire had caught Peter in his defeating thoughts.

"Can we talk, kid?"

Peter nodded from his place in the plush hospital bed, Tony had splurged on all the medical equipment around the medbay- it was a good investment considering how much the entire team depended on it at times.

Peter straightened himself amongst the pillows, trying to seem a little put together. Truth was, with all the wires and machines still hooked to him- he still looked so small.

Tony took a seat next to the bed, looking up at the vitals monitor and then back at Peter whom was nervously staring down at his hands. Tony sighed, "I'll cut to the chase, no one has really said much up until now- but you scared the shit out of us. Out of me."

"I know…I'm so sorr-"

Tony held a single hand up, "Just listen. You lost enough blood to kill a regular person, if it wasn't for your healing factor you would have died in that alley. You were in a coma for two and a half weeks. You had a collapsed lung in that time, a ventilator, feeding tube, two blood transfusions."

Peter sunk down in his covers, trying to make himself small, trying to disappear. He knew it was bad, but no one had truly told him how bad.

"You almost died Peter." Tony's voice cracked. He allowed a moment of silence to drive that point home, and then, "but you are not in trouble. No one is mad, no one is resentful."

That finally got Peter to look up.

"Mr Stark…I promise I won't mess up again. I-"

"Don't promise things you can't keep,kid . This line of work will get you hurt more often then not. That is why I put such strict rules into your suit. That's why I kept it here, and that's why-"

Peter squeezed his eyes shut. He knew what was about to happen, no more suit…

"That's why we are going to meet in the middle when we work on your suit again."

What?

"What?"

Tony couldn't help but smile at the shock, "I'm not making the mistake of taking your suit away again. I think we both know you would just customize another onsie to run around in."

Peter blushed, that was true but still…

"I'm not going to let you get yourself killed. I should have listened when you voiced your opinion the first time but to be fair-I didn't think you would, or could, hack into KARENS controls. Which, by the way, has a whole other, more aggressive, lecture in due time. For you and your little friend. But for now, you have to let people know what's going on in that head of yours. Like it or not, you're young, and this kind of stuff would affect anyone."

Peter couldn't believe what he was hearing. He had expected to get scolded, thrown out, no suit, no support ever again. But this…this wasn't even in his thought process for scenarios that could happen. So of course, he couldn't help the embarrassing onslaught of tears.

"I'm sorry Mr. Stark…I know I messed up- thank you…for letting me stay."

Tony put his hand on the kids head as he stood up, "jeez, just hold on, let me go get some ice cream and we can talk upgrades- and therapy."

Peter nodded happily as he wiped at his face, Tony took one last glance as he turned to retrieve some snacks. He smiled as he left the room, determined to prove himself a worthy mentor.