#adopted peter | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

imwatermeloness · 2 years

Text

Alive and Healing

Pepper has been doing paperwork all morning. It never ends. Being the CEO of one the biggest tech conglomerates in the world is great, unreal and so, so gratifying, but damn if it doesn’t suck sometimes. Her work takes time away from being with her family, and she’s not able to spend as much time with them as she would like to. And the paperwork. God, the paperwork.

She stares at the papers on her desk with a dark glare until it feels like her eyes will burn a hole in the contracts if she does it any longer. Her phone vibrates with a text message on the table and she reads the time. 1pm. Glancing back at the papers she decides she needs a break from the whole issue. It’s past noon already, she could get lunch. Pushing out a heavy sigh, she raises herself from the chair, her eyes incidentally catching the news report that’s playing on the TV she likes to have on to fill the silence in her office.

She slowly lowers herself back down, a shaky hand reaching for the remote to up the volume.

“...bank robbery gone wrong in Queens. We’re receiving live footage from the crime site, where a 15 year-old teenager has been severely injured. Witnesses report a young boy getting shot after trying to stop the perpetrators. The last we’ve heard, his state is critical and he’s being rushed to…”

Pepper’s ears are ringing and her stomach is but a hollow pit with the way her body is taken over by all encompassing dread. Statistically there are a lot of 15 year-old teenagers in Queens. The city is filled with 15 year-old teenagers that are all brave in their own ways. This doesn’t have to be their teenager.

A vivid memory from this morning springs up in Pepper’s mind, of Peter telling her not to wait for him home after school. That he would go to Ned’s straight after Decathlon practice.

The weight on her chest lifts off, just a little bit.

So it’s probably not Peter.

She picks up the phone though, and calls the boy anyway, just to get a peace of mind.

It goes to voicemail.

The weight returns tenfold.

Next she finds Ned’s number and waits with a hammering heart for the familiar stuttering. But he doesn’t pick up either.

A numbing kind of urgency takes over her and she scrambles up from her place at the desk, the contracts falling on the floor in her haste to get out of the office.

The clicking of her heels echoes in the hallway she runs through to get to the stupid lab her fiance spends so much of his time in.

Like a hurricane, she busts into the shop, “Tony.”

The man spins around in his chair, pointing a screwdriver at her.

“I know what you’re gonna say, I will sign the- Pepper? What’s wrong?”

“Tony-” she tries to catch her breath. “It’s Peter, he’s…”

“Peter?” Tony stands up from his chair and strides to his fiance. “What about Peter?”

“He’s- there was a bank robbery in Queens. They said a teenager tried to stop it and got shot and that he’s critical and he’s 15-”

“Alright, slow down-”

“-and now I can’t get a hold of him-”

“Hey, hey, slow down-”

“-and Ned’s not picking up-”

“Pepper!”

Tony’s loud volume startles her and it’s only now that she realizes she’s nearly hyperventilating.

The man gently grabs her by the shoulders and draws in a deep breath, which she copies, although much more shakily.

“Now, from the beginning, and slowly, tell me what’s wrong. A bank robbery in Queens?”

After a few more calming breaths, Pepper starts with a croaky voice and tells Tony everything. He listens to her, eyes narrowed in concentration, and by the end of her monologue, Tony looks concerned too.

“Okay.” he muses, almost to himself. “It’s most likely not Peter, though. Like you said, he told you he was going to go to Ned’s and he doesn’t live anywhere near that bank.”

Pepper grips her phone to stop her hands from shaking, and nods. Now that she’s had time to think about it, she knows it’s unlikely that it’s their kid. But her heart won’t stop racing and her mouth is dry from the rush of adrenaline. But she knows that Peter will not walk away when he sees something’s not right. She knows he will always try to be the hero he’s desperate to prove he is, despite the fact that everyone already thinks that of him.

Tony reaches for his phone, dials Peter’s number and puts it on speaker. The call goes straight to voicemail. Pepper can see from the tightening of Tony’s lips that the fear she’s feeling is taking over her fiance too.

“Hey, Pete, call me back when you get this, okay? Everything’s fine, but there was a news report about a robbery in Queens and we just wanted to make sure you’re okay. Alright. Just call me back, bud. And say hi to Ned.”

The line beeps, signaling the end of the call. Pepper hears Tony let out an anxious sigh and watches him tap his phone on the palm of his hand.

“Okay.” he speaks up again. “I’ll- uh… where did the newsagent say they were taking the kid?”

“Uh…” Pepper wipes an escaped tear off her cheek. “I don’t know.” she admits. “I didn’t listen to the whole report.”

Tony’s lips quirk in a sympathetic smile, and he pulls Pepper in a quick hug, pressing a soft kiss on her forehead.

“That’s okay. I’ll figure that out. Can you call Ned’s parents, check if the boys are still there?”

And she feels stupid. In her panic she hadn’t even thought of Ned’s mom, who’s a stay at home mom. Pepper would never admit it outloud but sometimes she feels jealous of the woman. Jealous that she will never be able to quite reach the level of parenting that the woman seems to excel at.

“Yeah… Okay, yeah, I’ll do that,”

“Okay,” Tony kisses her again, this time it’s a quick peck on the lips. “It’ll be fine. He’s gonna be home in no time and this is gonna be just us freaking out over nothing.” Then he pulls away, a sharp command to F.R.I.D.A.Y. filling the large room.

Pepper pulls herself together enough to search for Mrs. Leed’s number on her phone.

The line rings for a moment before a familiar voice filters through the phone.

“Hello?”

Pepper clears her throat. “Mrs. Leeds! Hi, it’s Pepper, did I catch you at a bad time?”

There are sounds of shuffling on the other woman’s end before she replies excitedly.

“Oh, Ms. Potts! No, not at all! How are you?”

It’s a struggle to hide the trembling in her voice when she responds.

“I’m just fine. Listen, is Peter still there? He's not answering his phone.”

Mrs. Leeds lets out a fond chuckle. “Oh, no actually, they went out a while ago. Something about a mission. You know how those two are, always up to something.”

All the air is robbed from Pepper’s lungs. The earlier panic makes a comeback, and it returns ten times stronger. The ground seems to disappear from beneath her feet, and she has to sit down on one of the cluttered tables.

“Oh.” she breathes. Swallows. There’s a bad taste in her mouth. “Well. When they get back, could you tell him to call me, or Tony?”

She barely hears the answer from the rushing in her ears, and once she hears the end call sound, her eyes begin to burn.

Meanwhile

“Dude, what was that?”

Peter groans and picks at the scratch on his temple. “It came out of nowhere.”

Ned breaks out in a laugh. Again.

“It just-” he cackles, “Your face, and then you threw your phone in the lake.”

Peter glares at him. Again. “Ha-ha, laugh it up. Let’s see you get attacked by a crazy pigeon.” He grumbles indignantly, still rubbing at the angry scratch left by the bird. “I’m gonna need like, ten tetanus shots, and a shot for rabies.”

All he had wanted was to get a few pictures of the adorable duck family in the lake when, out of nowhere, a screeching grey blur had flown straight into his face, scratching him and then flown off. In the commotion Peter had accidentally thrown his phone in the lake, and scared the duck family off.

So yeah, not one of his most graceful moments.

They’re walking back home, no longer interested in their mission to find the special colored duck they’ve heard rumours about. Peter is not really a fan of birds right now.

And they’re not really walking, more like dawdling, because Pepper and Tony have done so much for him, taking him in, dealing with all his bullshit, giving him everything he has ever needed, and now he’s going to have to tell them that he’s already lost his really expensive phone. It’s disrespectful, ungrateful, negligent, and he doesn’t want to cause them any more trouble than he already has.

No. He can’t go home yet. (What if this is the thing that makes them realize they’ve had enough.)

“We could go back to your house?” he offers hopefully. “We could finish the lego?”

Ned beams at him. It releases something in Peter’s chest and he’s never been more grateful to have him as his best friend.

TONY

Tony rushes through to hospital doors and sprints straight to the reception.

“Hey!” He hollers at the lady behind the counter, the remnants that are still left of his manners disappearing into thin air.

After Pepper’s teary statement that Peter was not, in fact, at Ned’s, Tony had raised hellfire on all the news channels that reported on the bank robbery until one of the agents had told him which hospital the teenager, maybe Tony’s teenager, had been taken to.

The young woman gives Tony an unimpressed look, seemingly non-caring about his celebrity status. She’s most likely very used to these kinds of outbursts, but still meets him at the counter.

“Sir?”

“There was a robbery at a bank in Queens and a teenager was shot. I need to know his name.”

The woman raises a well maintained eyebrow at him, finally showing a sign of surprise. “Sir, we are not allowed to disclose that information.

“No, listen to me!” He nearly bangs a fist against the glossy countertop. “I need to know it, because my kid is not picking up his phone and I don’t know where he is!” He’s shocked when he feels his eyes fill with involuntary tears. The receptionist blanches at him, clearly bemused. Peter is not public knowledge, and the adoption process was very hush hush.

The woman recovers quickly, though, and gives him a sympathetic frown, like now she’s taking him seriously.

She sighs compassionately, but remains professional. “I’m really sorry, Mr. Stark, but we really can’t give out that information”

“Please. I need to know. Just- just tell me if- what kind of- did he have brown hair? It’s curly. He’s about this tall,” Tony shows this with his hand, and continues to ramble, “And he- he has brown eyes. And he’s pale, he doesn’t eat the vitamins we tell him to eat and his iron levels are lower than they should be and-”

The woman reaches over the counter and places a comforting hand on Tony’s upper arm to calm him down. It doesn’t help, because the receptionist's expression turns sorrowful after she hears Tony’s rant.

“I shouldn’t tell you this, but the boy matches your description-”

Tony’s fingers tingle with adrenaline and he forgets to breathe.

“-but, it also matches hundreds of other teenagers in this city. He’s in surgery right now and we have a very competent team of doctors working on him.”

“How- can you- can you tell me how he’s doing? The reports said that he was critical…”

“Why don’t you sit down in the waiting room, and I’ll get someone to come to you with updates when we have them? I’ll ask them if they can ask around and see if they have the boy’s name or something, alright?”

So Tony sits down on one of the chairs in the waiting room. He calls Pepper, she calls Rhodey and Happy, and somehow Steve, Sam, Natasha and Bucky find out about it, and suddenly the small room is full of earth’s mightiest heroes. Together they wait for any kind of news for two hours before a nurse approaches them.

Tony can tell the verdict from her expression alone. It’s confirmed by the quiet “I’m sorry.” the nurse offers. She tells them that they have still yet to identify the boy.

The room is cold suddenly. Tony is numb. Distantly he can hear Rhodey offer to identify the body but Tony can’t focus on anything. The world feels distorted somehow. It’s strange. There’s a good chance the kid is not Peter. But if it is, it’s going to wreck their whole world, and it’s going to destroy Tony and Pepper to a point they can not come back from. They just got him, and he’s been healing, getting happier, finally eating enough and laughing and now… Tony loves being a dad. It’s his most important job and he loves it. He would die without that job, he knows it. God, he feels sick.

They are all holding their breaths, waiting for the nurses to make the body representable enough for Rhodey to go and identify whether the kid in question is the center of their universe or not.

Finally, the same nurse comes over, asks for Rhodey, and just when the colonel is about to leave with her, Pepper’s phone rings.

She shares a fearful gaze with Tony, looks at the contact name, and instantly her eyes start glistening, and a breath escapes in a sob. Mrs. Leeds. She lifts the phone to her ear.

“Mrs. Leeds?.”

Tony can’t hear what the woman is telling his fiance, but it makes Pepper collapse in her chair and break out in relieved sobs.

“Oh, thank God, thank God.”

For the first time after hearing of this fiasco Tony feels like he can take a full breath.

”No, no, everything’s fine. Just, could you put him on?”

A fresh wave of tears rolls down Pepper’s cheeks as she squeezes her eyes shut when Peter’s voice comes through the receiver.

“Hey baby. Yeah, I’m alright. We couldn’t reach you… Oh, honey, that’s alright, it was an accident. We’ll show it to Helen. No, no, we’re in the city, we’ll pick you up. Okay, sweetie. I love you, Peter, so much. No, I’m okay, it’s just been a long day. Stay put until we get there.”

Tony reaches his trembling hand for the phone, and Pepper hands it to him.

”Pete?”

”Hey, Tony.” He sounds bashful. ”Is Pepper okay? She was crying…”

Tony has to look up and squeeze his eyes shut to keep the tears at bay. This domestic life is turning him soft, making him cry even when he doesn’t want to.

”Yeah, bud, she’s okay.”

”Okay.” He mumbles, unsure. ”You guys are acting weird.”

A breathy laugh escapes Tony’s mouth at how put off Peter sounds. ”I know, we’ll explain when we come get you.”

”Mh.”

”But everything’s fine, kid. We’ll be there in thirty minutes, okay?”

Another absent minded hum from the teen.

”And I love you, Pete.” He needs to say it. He needs the kid to hear it.

”Yeah… and, um, yeah.” Peter stammers, but Tony understands. Tony knows Peter loves them without hearing the words. Saying it is hard for the kid, but they’ll get there in time with some more healing.

They say their goodbyes, and hang up. Then Pepper, Happy and him get into the car. The drive is a blur, and Tony feels like he teleported when they roll onto the driveway.

Peter is already sitting on the small porch with Ned, and at the sight of the car, he stands up, picking at the hem of his sweater nervously.

He has a cut above his brow. The pigeon Pepper briefed him on when they left the hospital.

Peter walks to the car but before he can get there, Pepper and Tony get out of the car, seemingly riding the same train of thought.

”Hey-” is the only sound Peter can get out when Pepper pulls him in for a fierce hug. The kid’s eyes flash in alarm and he gazes at Tony over the woman’s shoulder. The man sends him a reassuring smile, which doesn’t do a lot for the kid’s nervous demeanor, but he reciprocates the hug anyway.

”You’re okay, baby.” Pepper’s voice is nearly a whisper. She pulls back enough to place her hands on the sides of Peter’s head, and kisses his forehead gently. The boy’s confused eyes fill with moisture at the oddly blatant show of affection that he’s still getting used to. ”What’s wrong?” He murmurs desperately.

Tony takes a step forward and pulls the kid against his chest as soon as Pepper lets go of him. ”Nothing. Nothing, bud.” He kisses the top of the teens head, burying his nose in the wild ringlets of hair. ”We just had a bit of a scare, that’s all. We’ll tell you about it in the car.”

Peter’s face is hidden in the fabric of Tony’s shirt, and Tony gently brushes his hair off of his forehead, thumb grazing at the red line on his temple. ”You okay? Does it hurt?”

The kid shakes his head. ”Only my ego.”

Tony lets out a fond chuckle. ”It’ll bounce back.” He pats the teen on the back. ”C’mon, let’s go home. Say bye to Ned.”

On the ride home the couple tell a censored version of the day they’d had. Like they expected, Peter feels guilty about the phone and not picking up. At dinner he picks at his food again, only eating half of it, but later he watches a movie with them, even laughing at some parts. The road to recovery is long, but at least the kid will be here to experience it.

#irondad #tony stark acting as peter parkers parental figure #ao3 #fanfic #my fic #adopted peter

13 notes · View notes