"Kid, what are we listening to?"
"I'm not sure, but I think FRIDAY's in the 1960's now."
"It's Wang Dang Taffy Apple Tango, Pat Boone, 1959." FRIDAY supplied helpfully.
Peter frowned. "Okay, yeah, maybe we can move through the decades at a slightly faster pace, FRI."
Tony scoffed. "Or, maybe you should let me take over from here."
"I don't know, Mr. Stark," Peter said, grinning. "You don't exactly have a wide variety in what you listen to. I've only been here a few weeks, and I think I already have your playlists memorized."
Tony gave him an incredulous look. "Because it's a highly curated list, developed and refined over many years."
"That's a funny way of saying 'limited."
"That's it. FRI, put on my playlist."
FRIDAY obeyed instantly, and Shoot to Thrill blasted through the workshop speakers.
"Mr. Stark! That's not fair. I don't even remember enough to have my own playlist."
"Are you seriously pulling the amnesia card in my workshop?" Tony asked, arching a brow.
Peter grinned and shrugged. "Maybe? But come on, it's true. I have no idea what I like."
Stark rolled his eyes, "I guarantee you're not going to find out by listening to Wang Dang Apple, whatever."
"It's all part of the experience. How can I truly appreciate what I do like if I don't also know what I don't like?"
Tony stared at him, unimpressed. "FRI, turn the volume up."
Peter groaned dramatically and pulled out his phone. He shot off a text to Harley:
Peter: How do you even deal with him?
Harley: A careful mixture of flattery, sarcasm, and disregard.
He appreciated that Harley knew exactly who he was talking about without needing context. Not that Stark was all that bad.
Actually, Peter was having a lot of fun in the workshop.
Every morning, Stark had a new project waiting for him, something designed to challenge his thinking and force him to problem-solve in creative ways. And every evening, Peter wrapped up the day with Stark looking over his work, either critiquing or—more often than not—praising him for his "ingenuity and resourcefulness."
Peter wouldn't admit it to anyone, but he lived for those moments. He wanted to impress Stark. Something in Peter relished the praise.
"You did a good job, kid. And look how you got around the lack of insulation. Just brilliant." Tony smirked, shaking his head. "I'm gonna have to think of something more difficult tomorrow."
Every day Stark said that.
"I'm going to have to think of something more difficult tomorrow."
And every day Peter's chest filled with something warm and fuzzy. He didn't quite know what it was. But he liked every aspect of that sentence, especially the bit about "tomorrow."
Today, it was Harley's old haptic glove—the one that zapped.
Peter slipped the contraption on and attached it to a power source. It was a little stiff, lined with thin metal plates, but it looked functional enough. Really, it was quite impressive, especially when he found out Harley had built it years ago when he was a kid. The trouble it had was probably more a matter of fit, than anything else. There shouldn't be any gap between the electrodes and skin.
Peter sent a quick test charge into the electrodes of the index finger and felt a sharp snap of electricity.
"Ow—damn it," Peter muttered, shaking his hand.
So maybe it was a flawed design, but it just needed some adjustments. He toyed with it a bit and was satisfied enough with his fine-tunings that he tested it again, this time sending a charge to the entire palm of the hand and each finger. Peter yelped as another painful discharge snapped through the glove. It made the hairs on his arms stand on end and gave him a weird buzzing sensation across his skin.
There was a lingering tingle and his fingers felt fuzzy. Peter tried to pull his hand out but the glove stuck to him. He shook his hand and wriggled it but the glove stayed firmly on. What the hell?
Peter looked around but Stark hadn't noticed anything amiss over the loud music. The man was engrossed in developing a new set of trick arrows for Clint Barton.
This made no sense. It defied physics. He glared at his hand in confusion. Peter put a little superstrength into it and yanked hard. The connection suddenly broke and his hand was freed, but it pulled a few electrode panels out with it. That's not supposed to happen.
He set his hand down on the table, thinking, and when he tried to lift it, it was as though his hand was suction-cupped to the table.
Peter growled in frustration. "No way!" It took some wriggling and a bit of an awkward fight with the table before he was free. He was suddenly glad Mr. Stark had the music blaring and was ignoring him, because he knew he looked like an idiot.
Peter stared at the palm of his hand, scrutinizing the ridges of his skin. It looked perfectly ordinary, but there was a lingering staticky feeling on his hand. Weird.
He absently ran his hand through his hair as he considered the chemical and physical possibilities, and, in a panicked moment, froze. Idiot! Why would I do that?
But his hand didn't stick. In fact, the fuzzy feeling dissipated to almost nothing after running through his curly locks.
"You okay kid?"
Pete looked up to see Tony watching him under raised brows.
"Uh, Yeah. Do you know if Dr. Banner is in the lab?"
"He is." FRIDAY chirped from above.
"I'm just gonna go ask him a question real quick."
Before Tony could respond, Peter darted out the doors and ran all the way to the lab.
When he arrived, Dr. Banner was hunched over a spectrometer.
"Hi, Dr. Banner! Can I use your stereo microscope real fast?" Peter's words ran together as he spoke but Banner just waved him on, barely looking up from the mass spec print-outs.
Peter pulled the articulated arm of Banner's nicest stereo microscope, snapped on the lights, and shoved his hand under the lens. He focused, upped the magnification to 90x, refocused, and … stared.
Peter was not an anatomist, but he knew what the human epidermis was supposed to look like. Are those…? What are those?
He pulled out his phone and took a pic of his hand. He snapped off the light, shoved the microscope arm back into place and bounded out of the lab, calling over his shoulder, "All done! Thanks, Dr. Banner! See ya later!"
Peter registered a muttered "No problem." But Dr. Banner never looked up from his data.
The teen practically flew back to his bedroom. Once he was behind closed doors he opened the photo and took a long look.
The ridges of his hand were covered in tiny, microscopic projections. Setae. The word came unbidden to his mind, much the same way any of his science knowledge did. He had learned it at some point. Geckos have setae. Insects. Spiders. It's how they walk on the ceiling and don't fall. Peter stared at the picture.
He had setae on his hands. That explained the micro-velcro feeling he had in the workshop.
A wave of nausea rolled around in his gut. Why did he have hairs on his hands? What was he? Was he even human?
Wait, can I climb like a spider?
Peter's gaze traveled up his wall and settled on the ceiling. He shook his head. No way. Peter looked back at the wall. Well…
He placed his hand on the smooth wall and pressed. It slid down and fell lamely at his side. Hmmm. But no, his hand didn't have that staticky feeling anymore.
"Electricity!"
Peter ran to his closet and dumped out his junk box. He'd started accumulating interesting refuse from around the compound since Stark had gotten on his case about filching from the spare parts bins in the workshop. Sam had made fun of Peter the other day for becoming a pack rat, but then he'd given the teen a disposable camera he'd received at a wedding. Peter rifled through the pile and found it.
Peter pressed the button to charge the flash and a little red light turned on. From there it was a simple matter of ripping the plastic case open just enough to expose the capacitor.
Peter took a fortifying breath. Okay. On the count of three. "One, two, …. Three." Peter grabbed the capacitor. There was a pop and Peter yelped in pain.
"Fuck. Ouch. Damn. Ow, oh ow ow."
"I'd advise against doing that again." FRIDAY warned from above, reminding him of her ever-present watchfulness.
Peter looked at his hand. It had a vaguely fuzzy feeling again. "No problem, FRI. I don't intend to do that again." His gaze traveled up to his bathroom doorframe and he narrowed his eyes at the molding. He could pretend to hang from that with muscle instead of weird microscopic spider hairs. FRIDAY wouldn't know the difference.
He stood in the doorframe and reached up, curling his fingers onto the molding. He could feel his sticky hand bond to the surface. He pretended to attempt a dead hang, lifting his feet and…. he hung from the sticky hand. With his full body weight.
Peter let out a whooping laugh as he clung to the frame on stickiness alone. From FRIDAY's perspective he was just being a stupid kid, hanging from his doorframe. But Peter wasn't exerting an ounce of grip. He wondered how long it would last. He whipped out his phone with his free hand and started a timer.
At around the 12 minute mark Peter dropped onto the floor, the stickiness of his had had dissipated to a barely noticeable tingling. Could he induce a longer window of time to be sticky? Did he need more electricity? That seemed to do the trick. He would just need a bigger capacitor.
"FRI? Where is Mr. Stark?"
"Mr. Stark has stepped into his office for a video call."
Perfect. Peter hopped up and ran the whole way to Stark's workshop, where he pilfered around the spare parts bins until he found what he needed: a bigger capacitor. He hooked it up so it would take on a charge, and then promptly disconnected it from the power source.
All he had to do was brush up against the leads 'accidentally.' There was no way FRIDAY would know what he was about to do. It would look like a total accident. Peter steeled himself for the shock. This was going to hurt like hell. He closed his eyes and …
Unfortunately, that was the moment Mr. Stark entered the workshop.
"Kid, why is FRIDAY sending me alerts about—Peter wait!
But it was too late. He'd had already bridged the gap between the leads with his hand, causing an instantaneous crack of discharged electricity. He was thrown back and hit the floor with a sharp yelp of pain.
Peter had known this capacitor would pack a bigger punch than the tiny one in the camera, but he hadn't expected quite that much pain, or the ringing in his ears.
Tony was instantly at his side, lifting him into an upright position. "For Christ's sake! What the hell was that?"
"Ow."
"Yeah, I'll bet." Stark glared down at him and Peter shrank away from the man.
Mr. Stark looked angry. Very angry.
"I-it was an accident." Peter almost stuttered.
Stark glared more ferociously. "Oh, and was it an accident when you turned a camera into a taser a few minutes ago?" He grabbed Peter by his shoulders none too gently and hoisted him to his feet.
"Why are you shocking yourself?" Stark practically shook him, still looking thunderous.
Peter felt himself cower under the man's glare. Superstrength and deadly training be damned, his legs were rubber under the man's scrutiny. Peter had taken down a Hydra agent twice his size, but somehow, this—standing here under Tony Stark's scrutiny, feeling like a stupid, reckless, irresponsible kid—felt worse than any hit he could take.
His throat clenched. There was just something about the disappointment in his eyes and voice that cut Peter deeply.
Stark released him and turned away, scrubbing a hand down his face, inhaling deeply like he was forcing himself to cool off. His shoulders rose and fell once—twice—before he finally turned back.
Peter fought the urge to flinch.
"Okay," Stark said, his voice tightly controlled. "It's okay."
He didn't look like he believed what he said, but at least he wasn't trying to shake Peter anymore.
"Let's take a breath," he continued, quieter this time, his voice dipping into concern instead of frustration. "Are you hurt?"
Peter swallowed hard, forcing words past the knot in his throat. "I'm f-fine."
The slight stutter betrayed him.
Tony's expression didn't shift. Just studied him, assessing, like he could see straight through to whatever tangled mess Peter was trying to hide.
"Let me see your hand."
Peter hesitated, but Stark had already gently taken his wrist, turning it over to examine the injured palm.
There was an obvious burn. Peter knew it would heal by tomorrow. But it would still hurt.
Tony sighed. It was a tired sound, the kind that said, I don't know what to do with you.
He turned and walked to the supply cabinet, retrieving the first aid kit. He came back with antiseptic, burn gel, a cold pack, and gauze and pointed to a chair.
Wordlessly, Peter sat.
For a long moment, Tony said nothing. Just took Peter's hand and began working—spreading the gel so gently that Peter barely felt the sting. The contrast between his anger before and his gentleness now was so jarring that Peter's throat felt tight for a completely different reason.
It was such whiplash that Peter could barely hold onto his own emotions. He felt his eyes water at the unexpected gentleness. Especially when the man spoke.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to yell. I panicked."
Peter nodded shakily.
He was too afraid to reassert his lie that it had all been an accident, but he couldn't very well tell the truth, either. He stayed silent and watched as Stark finished wrapping his hand. It was then that he realized that he had lost all of his stickiness. There was no tingly feeling at all. It was completely gone. The stronger shock hadn't worked. Quite the opposite.
He didn't know whether to be disappointed or grateful that he wasn't currently stuck to Mr. Stark. He simply noted it as a data point and moved on.
"It's fine, Mr. Stark."
"No, it's not. I shouldn't have let my fear get the better of me. You didn't deserve that."
His fear? What had he been afraid of?
"Look," he said, voice more careful now, like he was choosing his words with surgical precision. "I'm not good at this stuff. But you can talk to me if you need to, okay?"
Peter's eyes narrowed in confusion.
"I need to know you weren't hurting yourself," Tony continued.
"Mr. Stark, it's not like that at all!" Peter felt himself blanch. "I wasn't hurting myself on purpose, it was just … science." He finished lamely.
Tony didn't react at first. Just studied him again, like he was genuinely trying to understand.
"What were you trying to accomplish?"
Peter opened his mouth.
Closed it.
Lied.
"Harley's old glove still zaps you when you use it," he said, forcing a weak, half-hearted grin. "It got me thinking about simulating pain in a video game. I was just messing around. I wanted to see how much pain I could safely cause without actually causing damage. Because, you know, I can heal really fast if I mess up, so I make a really good guinea pig."
The lie left a bad taste in Peter's mouth for at least a couple different reasons. And he must not have looked very convincing as he said it.
Tony just stared.
Not mad.
Not angry.
Just… disappointed.
The silence stretched too long, suffocating, and Peter squirmed.
Finally, Tony sighed, voice quieter this time.
"Let's not insult my intelligence," he said flatly. "Or yours, for that matter."
Peter's stomach plummeted.
Tony leaned against the workbench, crossing his arms. "What was this really about?"
Peter clamped his mouth shut. How was he supposed to explain this?
"Have you been remembering things? Is this about your memory?"
And Peter froze. Because what the hell did that mean?
His heart pounded. Did Stark… know about the dreams?
Tony rubbed his temple, muttering something under his breath. Something about how he was bound to mess this all up.
Who? Peter?
He wanted to protest that he wasn't going to mess up anymore, but then Stark spoke.
"How about we take a break from the workshop."
Peter's breath hitched.
No.
Stark was supposed to give him another project tomorrow.
Peter had messed up. He should probably have apologized or said something, anything else to explain himself. But instead, he shrugged like he didn't care. "Fine. Whatever." He got up and left.