You're not Steve

Academic Decathlon

Chapter 65

Peter's Pov:

My phone vibrates and I pull it out.

Tony's face shows up and Ned asks who's calling.

"My dad." I smile and answer the call.

"Which one?" Ned asks leaning in to the phone as well.

"Tony. Hi!"

Ned makes a questionable sound.

"Parker. Peter. Hi." Tony says.

"Hi mR StArK!" Ned grins into the phone.

Tony chuckles, "Hi Ned. How was the academic decathlon? Did you boys win?"

I laugh, "It was just a practice.. Ned what day did Mr Harrington say the competition was?"

"Oh, uh, it's not for another month."

"Hm, well how was the practice?"

"ItwassogoodandMrHarringtonwasfunnyandthecaptainisreallycoolandflash-" Ned gushes and I smile.

"I'll stop you there, Ned - it sounds like it went good. What are you two doing now?"

"Uh, walking out of the school yard?"

"Ned, do you want to come for dinner? Then you two can tell us about practice."

"Really!?" Ned bounces on the soles of his converse high tops.

"Yeah, to make up for last week. And some of the others are out of town for a few days so we have room."

"Wait, Tony? Who's out of town?" I ask confused. I don't remember anyone mentioning this.

"Uh, Stephen, Steve, Bucky, Sam, Rhodey, Nat, and Wanda. Thor and Loki are in Asgard, Scott's with Cassie."

"And they went where?"

"Wakanda, oops, uh Ned pretend you didn't hear that."

"Okay Mr Stark!" Ned's eyes go wide in excitement.

"So does that work? We're on for dinner?"

Ned and I look to each other and both nod.

"Yup, it works!"

"Greeeeaaaat" there's shouting in the background.

"Peterman! And Ned! We're picking you up, okay? Hang tight for a minute or two." Clint cackles through the phone.

"That was Hawkeye!" Ned whispers to me and I nod.

"Clint stop!"

"You stop!"

"Come on Clint!"

There's a loud crash.

"Sorry about that, apparently Clint and Pietro are picking you up."

"Okay."

"Incoming call from Fart Face." I hear FRIDAY say through the phone.

"Oh shi-..ip, uh I got to go kid! See -" the call ends.

"Well, um."

We decide to get some practice in for decathlon using the quecards we got, so that's what we do for 15 minutes sitting on the curb.

"Okay, what is the heaviest naturally-occurring element?" Ned asks.

"Uh, that would be uranium?" I answer.

"Yeah!" Ned puts his hand up but I'm looking at the road ahead.

"Dude, don't leave me hanging." Ned sighs still holding his hand up.

"Wa, what?" I turn to him and see the hand. I slap it and he smiles.

"Wait DUDE!" Ned points to the tractor fast approaching us.

"There's a tractor on the road!"

"Yeah.." wait till he realizes that's our ride.

"That is sick bro, I want to drive a tractor on the road - Wait OH MY GOD PETER IT'S COMING TOWARDS US!"

The tractor stops in front of us and Pietro hops out.

"Sup Ned, Peter."

"Hi Mr Quick!" Ned waves and Clint snorts.

"Ned, you can call me Pietro."

"A car honks from behind the tractor.

"Come on, we gotta go!" Clint beckons us on.

We grab our backpacks and climb up.

"Unfortunately this isn't a four seated tractor so you two will have to sit up top."

Ned's eyes widen for the eightieth time in the last half hour and Pietro smiles.

"Cinnamon Roll make sure neither of you fall off or get hurt." Pietro gives us a thumbs up.

Clint turns on the music player Tony added when he was fixing it after the crash, and starts blasting AJR - one of Clint's new music obsessions, courtesy of Wanda.

Clint smashes the gas and the tractor lurches forward. I have to grab Ned's backpack to stop him from flying off.

°°°

"So, tell us about about the academic decathlon. You said the captain's cool?" Tony asks.

We're sitting down at the table, everyone's served themselves and we're about to eat dinner.

"We're going to get jackets!" I exclaim at the same time Ned says "Yeah!"

Bruce gives me a confused look.

"They're yellow and have the little logo! Oh, but we have to bring in $50 for it because it's ours to keep. So I can get a job if I need to to pay it off, they don't need the payment for a few weeks."

"Peter, hold up. Did you say you'll get a job so you can pay for a school jacket? Did you forget that I'm a billionaire. Of course we'll pay for it, we'll pay for Ned's too! And you're too busy and young to get a job."

"Also you'd only have to work like 4 hours to pay for the jacket." Pietro points out.

"Oh, um, okay. Thank you Tony." I smile, slightly embarrassed.

"We're your parents."

"That is true."

"So, tell us about the captain. Why are they cool."

"Okay Mr Banner!

"It's okay, you can call me Bruce, kid."

Ned has a moment of confusion then shrugs with a smile, "Okay Mr Bruce Kid!"

Tony chokes on a potato as Bruce sighs.

I hold back a smile, "So her name is Michelle, but she goes by Mj."

"And we were practising, and Peter kept getting questions right. And Flash, I don't know if you know him but-"

"Oh we know Flash." Clint creepily smirks and Ned coughs on his water.

"Um, okay, so Flash was like 'You're such a nerd Parker' and the captain, Mj was like 'Our school is for nerds. And you're literally doing homework.' And she rolled her eyes and Flash shut up."

"Yeah, she seems pretty cool."

"Interesting. I'm glad the captain is good and not someone like Flash."

"Speaking of Flash, does he still have pink hair?"

Ned nods, "How did you know?"

Clint smiles.

"Incoming call from Fart Face." FRIDAY says and Tony uses some language Steve wouldn't approve of.