Tuesday

February 9, 2016

Queens, New York

5:30 PM

Peter Parker's Apartment

It wasn't perfect but it should do for tonight. She handed one of the three small earpieces to both Peter and Ned. There was a small speaker in placed at the base of the earpiece to allow the wearers voice to be picked up. It wouldn't be much of a communication device if you couldn't talk too and hear through it.

Morgan managed to rig it up in just under an hour and a half. Not bad on her first attempt. She programed word codes in order to prevent the saying of their individual names. She was M, Ned was N, and Peter's code was either S, Spidey, or Spiderman. That was so Ned and Morgan could contact him more readily. They weren't superheroes so there were no alternate identities for them. Not that Ned hadn't insisted on trying.

She told him they could pick official code names later. This was essentially a demo run to see how the earpieces worked in the field. Figure out the kinks and perfect them for the future. Plus it'd help to have more time to work on them rather than scraping them together with scraps of material.

"This is so cool, what would we do without you Morgs?" Ned said, examining the gray earpiece.

She didn't reply. "Got everything you need Peter?" she asks, grabbing her backpack off the floor. Ned and Morgan were going to head to their own homes and attempt to use the communication device. They needed to go always, it was getting late and Peter still needed to go out on patrol before May got back.

"Yep, thanks for this Morgan."

...

6:00 PM

Pepper Potts's Apartment

As soon as the clock hit six she presses the small button to turn on the earpiece. It take a minute by then the loud whooshing of wind fills her ears. Car horns blare but they sound like they're quite a ways away.

"Testing, can anyone hear me?" Morgan asks.

"I can, M," Peter says, the sound of cars getting louder.

"Ditto," Ned's voice crackles over the comms. "I can't believe we're actually doing this. You really are a genius Morgan."

She was flattered by the complement but now wasn't the time to be big-headed. "I know, but this is about Spidey have access to resources he might need. So we know they work. We all sound a big crackly so I need to work more on the speakers, both ways, but the distance doesn't seem to be affecting us. No one's cutting out right?"

"Neither of you are, I don't know about me though," Peter replies.

"You're good." Ned confirms.

"Any crimes in progress down there Spidey?"

"Nothing so far M. Some nights are busier than others though."

Ned gasps. "I turned on the police scanner. There's a carjacking in progress, I'll get you an exact location in just a second." He tells Peter the current street the carjacker has turned on. "See Spiderman, this is why you need a guy in the chair."

"You're not going to let this go, are you?" Peter asks, as the sound of a car engine fills the speakers. "Hang on a minute guys. I found him."

Morgan and Ned oblige as they listen to the sound of the streets through the speakers. There's the sound of webshooters and creaking metal.

"I'm not an expert, but I don't think that belongs to you," Peter says, presumable to the carjacker. "Hey all yours, officers!" The sound of wind passing returns.

"This is still unbelievable," Ned sighs wistfully.

"I think I'm going to sign out. If there's an emergency, y'know the right code?" Morgan asks Peter. Looking down at the new blueprint for an upgraded comms unit. It would take her a bit longer, but the sounds quality will be fifty times better than it was currently.

"Yeah, thanks again Morgs," Peter say. "Goodnight."

"Night Morgan," Ned chirps. "But I'm totally not going anywhere. This is to awesome to not spectate."

Morgan snorts. "I'd save eavesdropping would be the more accurate term. Maybe voyeurisms but that's a bit kinkier than what we're doing."

"Ew, thanks for the mental image Morgan," Ned replies, she can practically hear the shudder in his voice. She laughs.

"Real question is if Spidey is in or out of the suit?"

"Morgan!" Peter shouts in humiliation. She can practically picture the flush of his face and the curl of his mouth. She shakes her head.

"See ya later boys." She disconnects her comm.

...

9:15 PM

The phone on her bed buzzed and Morgan reached over to feel around for it. She was currently taking apart a few old computers that she'd kept for parts and was trying to at least start on the new comms. Sitting here while Peter was out there saving people she needed to feel like she was doing something useful.

"Hello?" she said, not even looking at the caller ID.

...

Avengers Tower

New York City, New York

Tony's Workshop

9:15 PM

As it turns out, tracking down a random child born in 2001 with only bare minimum information was actually a pretty time consuming process. Between the thousands upon thousands of people by that name and who have a mother with the same name, Virginia, it was like looking for a needle in a hay stack.

F.R.I.D.A.Y. had managed to comb through an astronomical amount of people, ruling out so many that he Tony wouldn't even bother to search through the numbers. As long as it was taking he was at least closer than when he'd started out. They eliminated a nice portion of people.

Yet he couldn't help the growing dread. What if he couldn't find them? Could he live with the knowledge of having a daughter and never being able to meet her? It grated on him that Obadiah Stane knew and kept it all from him. The bastard was still holding thing over him.

What else was he hiding before his death?

He did know that there were no other secret funds of money stashed away so at least he didn't have anymore secret children he was unaware of.

It took a few days but eventually F.R.I.D.A.Y. was positive that they could rule out that Virginia Potts was no longer living in California. There were no records found other than a birth certificate, which made sense. He did manage to find an apartment leased to one Virginia Potts and he was sure that it was hers.

He almost wished Morgan was older then. If she was there might have been more information to track them down. School records, but she was barely born and wouldn't have even been able to talk let alone go to school.

So looking for traces of a Morgan H. Potts from the year of 2001 was pointless. If he could find more current documentation that should be helpful. She would've had shot records by doctors to attend school. That would at least provide him a location to look.

One thing he was sure of, Pepper and Morgan no longer lived in California, which means they were somewhere else. Which left 49 more states to search. He doubted Pepper would move to the Midwest, far too mundane for her. That left the East coast.

Tony had given F.R.I.D.A.Y. explicit orders to interrupt whatever he was working on if she found anything relating to Pepper or Morgan. No matter what time of day or night.

Yet even with the most advanced technology and the state of the art surveillance capabilities, so far they'd come up with a whole lot of nothing. He was practically ready to start pacing if they kept hitting dead ends.

"I think I've found something of importance, Boss" F.R.I.D.A.Y.'s voice chimes overhead. Tony pauses on the project in front of him. "An application was sent from the apartment which was leased to Ms. Potts to Oscorp. It was for a position as the secretary for the main office of the building. Stark Industries was listed as a place of former employment. It appears as though she was offered the job as her lease was terminated two months afterwards."

Now that was interesting. "Fri, get me live footage from Oscorp."

All he needed to do was see her face. If he could get a glimpse of her he'd know in a heartbeat. The holographic image appears before him.

A woman is seated at a large oval desk, her fiery red hair pulled back in a pristine bun that he recognized immediately. It was the same look Pepper always wore when she came into work everyday. Not a single hair out of place. The phone to her left rings and she reaches for it. Her face tilts slightly up towards the camera and it feels like his heart's stopped

Did his heart stop? No, he put a hand to his burning chest, there it was. Thump, thump, thump. Steady as can be.

He recalls the soft curve of her face, the shape of her eyes, those perfect lips that had pressed against his skin that one drunken night. And, of course, that beautiful red hair that always made his heart catch in his throat. It was Pepper.

He's not trying to think about it, but his mind has other ideas.

That night flashes before his eyes.

"This is such a bad idea Tony..." she says, voice slurring slightly as Tony sucks her neck. She's breathless, her hands bunching up the fabric of his shirt into her fists.

"I've always been a fan of bad ideas. They're the most fun. C'mon let's live a little Pep." He presses his lips against her as she moans into his mouth. His hands creeping up her back, unfastening her bra.

"You are such a charmer Mr. Stark," she says seductively, a laugh escaping her. Her eyes are lidded and heavy making her look even more beautiful. "No wonder all the women want you."

Then it happened, they ended up in his bed. The tangled sheets, the moans and laughs, the kisses and the pleasure. Then he woke up and she was gone. Just like she'd always taken care of his women of the night, she just left. No note, not even a text. Like he wouldn't want to see her in the morning.

Is that what she had thought? That he saw their night as just another hook-up in his never ending line of bed partners. He was a mess back then but he'd had feelings for her. He was too afraid to admit them to her. He wouldn't even admit them to himself.

How could he be a reliable partner when he always drank to much, was too reckless. Only cared about what he wanted whenever he wanted it.

That was the main reason he'd never wanted to be a father. He didn't want to be anything like his own father. Howard Stark was so distant and cold. Never telling Tony he loved him, hell, that he even liked him. Tony was always shipped off to some boarding school far from home. Nothing he ever did was good enough to please the man and now, now he was a father himself.

What if he screwed her up? Plus what did he know about having a daughter anyways? With boys there were sports and cars. What did girls like?

She was too old for dolls right?

And what if he made her feel like his father made him feel? He didn't want that for his daughter. He wanted to be better for her than his dad was to him. It didn't matter that he was terrified. He would find Pepper and Morgan and make this right.

Even if he and Pepper wouldn't be what they may have ended up being, he'd still be there for their daughter. He'd make it up to Morgan if it was the last thing he did.

"That's her. F.R.I.D.A.Y. keep track of Ms. Potts and see if you can get me a phone number or an address," Tony tells the AI, watching as Pepper vanishes from the range on the camera.

Finally progress.

A/N:

There it is, I rewrote some of the Tony sections because I wasn't happy with the original version. I didn't change much but I really didn't want to do a whole scene rewrite. I think it works fine for what I wanted with the few tweaks I made. Next chapter will be about the reveal. Morgan's not gonna take it well...