Spider-Son & Iron Dad two shots

Gone, Gone, Gone

Spooktober 16: The Undead

⚠️emetophobia, panic attacks, ptsd-induced nightmares⚠️

"...Peter?"

The teenager stood in a vast cloud of orange sky, his head tilted down, looking at his hands. They were trembling.

"Peter," Tony said again, stumbling forward. His arms outstretched to catch him, his heart fluttering in his chest. Not again. Not again. Not again.

He could hear a high-pitched drone in the back of his mind, something not unlike the flatline of a heart monitor. He exhaled sharply, panic seizing his every move. "Peter, come on, kid, just— just walk over to me."

Peter wasn't close enough for Tony to catch him if he fell, and if he fell he would break, dash into dust across the floor. He was a thousand miles gone, five years too far.

Something was swirling around them, now. Tony blinked, let his eyes take focus around him. An ashy grey snow, otherworldly, brownish-decayed matter that took the form of crumbling soot. He'd been here before. He knew.

"No!"  Tony yelled in agonizing outrage. He threw his fist onto his thigh, hoping it wouldn't bruise, but rather fall apart under his punch and join the rest of the flying ash. "Take me instead, please. Don't let me watch this again. Don't let it happen— God, fuck, please—"

Here he was, reduced to a begging man. The most human he could be, the most humble he'd ever been; he fell to his knees, hitting his thigh again, and again. He yelled as his voice went hoarse.

"Please," Tony pleaded. "Please. He's my kid, he's just a kid. Please, he didn't deserve it, none of them deserved it. Peter, look at me. Just let me fix it!"

Peter didn't look up to him. A shaky breath escaped his lips, followed by a pained whimper.

Tony flinched. He didn't want to watch, not the first time and now not the hundredth, but he was stuck to his spot, he couldn't blink if he wanted to because as horrific as it was, he missed seeing the silhouette.

(Love and grief worked like this:

Tony loved Peter— he didn't want to see him cry. He didn't want to see him in pain, he didn't want to see him afraid. Tony grieved Peter— and after everything, the absence was by far more heartbreaking than all of it. Peter was not there to cry, and Tony could no longer wipe away his tears. He could no longer tell him it was going to be okay, because it wasn't. Peter was gone.)

"Kiddo," Tony said quietly, his voice breaking at the edges and splintering through the consonants. He clenched his jaw painfully.

Peter gasped, shuddered, breathed out shakily. Slowly, he tilted his head up. His eyes were colourless, sunken in, unfocused. His skin was flaking apart in grey specks like a cracked porcelain doll, just over his blanched boney cheeks, tears dripping down his chin, and he looked... he looked...

"You killed me," Peter croaked out, keening and betrayed. He was devastated. The crook of his eyebrows was stressed in grief. "I trusted you, and you— you killed me. You said you would always be there, you..."

For once, Tony could say nothing. He didn't even breathe, just stood, wavering, flinching with every word thrown his way.

Peter whimpered again, stumbling in his steps. The cracking of his skin stretched over his nose, and continued down the length of his neck.

"You said you'd fix it." Peter's hands shook, his voice still full of terror, but not even his fear could hide the crestfallen way he was looking at Tony. "You said I was alright."

Tony's bottom lip shook. He dipped his head down, unable to take any more of it. The tears welling in his eyes began to cascade down, landing in his hands, laid palm-up on his lap. He knew this truth already. He knew how this story ended. He had lied. He had failed.

"I want to go home," Peter said, his voice catching on a sob. "Take me home. Please, take me home, Mr. Stark. I'll forgive you. I'll do anything, please—"

Tony's face crumbled, his tears falling harder now. He gasped a choked breath, his lungs squeezing as he tried not to cry. He didn't deserve these tears— they weren't for him.

"Please, take me home, I'm so sorry," Peter said, his voice growing more panicked, more desperate. He cried so loudly, so innocently, heartbroken. "You can have the suit. Please, I'm so scared. Please—"

A scream tore from Peter's throat, loud enough for Tony's whole body to seize up in a flinch. He yanked his head up, the tears making his vision blurry.

In his view, there was no Peter;

But rather a new snowfall of dust.

Tony woke up then, yanking himself from the bed and barreling to the bathroom. He hadn't spent more than a second moving, surely, before he was emptying the contents of his stomach into the toilet bowl, shivering and pouring with cold sweat.

He didn't realize he was crying, actually sobbing with his clenched fingers making prints on the porcelain, until a few minutes later, where he realized that Pepper was now behind him and gently rubbing circles into his back.

He would be lying if he said this was the first time a night ended up like this.

"Oh god," Tony began to shudder, "Pep— Shit. Pep, it— I was—"

"Shh," Pepper soothed, her face pulled tight with worry. She kissed him on the forehead, despite the lingering salt and sweat, and continued to rub his back. "It's alright, Tony. Just take a breath."

"He's gone," he gasped. A teary whine lodged its way in his throat, parental and grieving and painful. "He's gone, Pep. He's gone."

"I know," Pepper whispered, tears in her own eyes as she frowned deeply at him in the dark. "I know, baby."

They stayed like that the whole night— Tony rocking back and forth, fighting waves of his panic attack next to the toilet with Pepper at his side. All the while, Tony's voice ran itself into a rasping husk, repeating; he's gone, he's gone, he's gone.

He's never coming back.