Upside-Down

Chapter 5

The next thing Tony knows the boy is on the ceiling, staring at him. "Tony Stark?" He asks, looking bewildered. He's in a defensive position.

There was time when, if something like this happened, Tony would've assumed he was drunk and delusional. However, he hadn't had a drink in a week, and actually got a full eight hours of sleep last night. This is real. The boy has the powers of a spider.

He plays it cool. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, kid, get down here your arm is broken."
Peter winces in realization. "It'll be fine... What am I doing here!?" He doesn't move.

"Peter..."

"How do you know my name? Did your robots scan me? Is this about Spider-Man? I'm sorry if I did something illegal- I didn't mean to! The cat was just there and I didn't think he belonged to anyone- was he your cat? Mr. Stark, sir, I'm sorry-"

Tony cuts off the boys rambling. Peter seems to think he knows a lot more than he does. " Peter, Happy told me. Come down. You're not In trouble." Peter looks cautious, starts creeping down, careful of his left arm.

Spider-Man... Tony had seen YouTube videos of the guy. The neighbor protector of Queens. "Sit here kid." Tony motions at a second swivel chair, normally occupied by Bruce.

"Me and Happy were looking for you, I accidentally distracted the driver, and we may have... ran into you. I assume your spider powers include a healing factor, or your nose wouldn't be that shape right now."

Peter winces, "I don't remember that, sir..." he says as he sits in the swivel chair, tentatively turning to face Tony. "I do have a healing factor though." After an awkward moment, the flood gates open again, "I'm sorry sir I thought I would bother Happy, I didn't want to be a problem-"

"Kid, where have you been?" Tony asks. The boy looks unhealthy. Even more so now that he's awake. He looks like he hasn't eaten in days, and that he's been living on the streets.

"I... I set up a camp near the top of the Chrysler Building." Peter looks at the floor, avoiding Tony's eyes.

"Camp... I'm guessing you were evicted. Is that why Happy couldn't find you?"

"No... I disappeared. I got turned off GPS on my phone. I stopped coming to school."

"You did this because you didn't want to bother him?" Tony asks skeptically.

"No... to be honest... don't tell Happy, please sir." Peter looks away from the ground and stares right into Tony's eyes. To his soul.

"I-I won't," Tony says.

"Sir... he reminded me of her. Everything did. I never really felt like he wanted me around... I didn't want him to be reminded by me too..."

"Kid... do you want to know why we crashed?" Tony says quietly. The kid looks down at the floor. Tony keeps going. "Its because he was crying..." he pauses, he doesn't want to make the kid feel worse. He can see him struggling to hold on. "It was like he lost two people that day. He might not be good at showing it, but Peter, Happy loves you."

The boy sniffles.

"Here... you can stay here, at the Tower. You are a hero after all. You save a lot of people, Kid."

"Here?" Peter stiffens, "with the Avengers? With you?" He looks shocked. "No sir, I can't accept that, I'm not good en-"

"Kid I don't think you understand." Tony says, more forcefully, " You need help. You're just a kid. You can't be on your own. Your bright. You have a future." The kid seems like he's going to keep protesting, but Tony barrels on. "Tell you what. You can work for me. You'll be my new intern. But you'll stay here with us. You'll go to school. Understood?"

Peter nods awkwardly. 

Tony hopes he's not making the wrong choice. He hasn't actually seen the kid's grades, but he's lived for two months, he must have at least two braincells. He was a hero as well. Just yesterday, Spiderman saved twelve people from a burning building, and two days before, a lizard creature was rampaging through the streets, and Spiderman stopped him.

"Peter, I'm going to give you a cast, okay?" Tony moves toward the boy, and he doesn't flinch. He just looks... shocked. Processing everything that's happened in the past two minutes.

"Okay intern, here's the first thing your gonna do for me." Tony says, once a navy blue cast is firmly attached to Peter's arm. "Your gonna go to bed. Friday will show you to the guest room." Peter nods and stands up.

"Wait-scratch that" Tony says, "Make me some coffee." He motions to the coffee machine in the corner of the lab.

"Sir... you should get some sleep as well." Peter says, cautiously.

"Nah," Tony swivels toward a holographic screen. "I have some work to do." Tony sends a text to Happy, telling him that Peter was awake and fine, and that he'd accepted a job as an intern, and would be staying in the tower until further notice.

Just before he presses send, A coffee mug arrives on his desk. "Okay, thanks kid, now get to bed," mug in hand, he motions to the door.

"Th-thank you, Mr. Stark, sir."

"No problem kid. Now get to sleep."

As soon as he hears the slide close behind Peter, he turns back to the screen. "Friday, give Peter full access to the building, and bring up info we have on Spiderman."

"On it sir." Dozens of images of the vigilante appear in front of Tony. "Interesting...  what are the goggles made of?"

"Not much we can do about the webs though... I'll ask the kid tomorrow." 

He continues working through the night. If the Avengers where going to introduce a new hero to the world, Spiderman wouldn't be in a hoodie and sweat pants.

________________________________________________________________________________

Thank you for reading this chapter! Feedback is appreciated.

I have decided that in this story Pietro (Quicksliver) will indeed be alive. It doesn't make sense how at the beginning of the move he lines up bullets in seconds, and he's not able to get Hawkeye and the kid out of the way in time. Plus, he's just a cool character.

I'm not sure when the next update will come (hopefully soon)... I have midterms.

Thanks again for reading!!! :D