Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Daddy! Petey’s here!”

Tony didn’t even glance up from the slice of bread that he was carefully buttering for a grilled cheese. It wasn’t that he made a habit of ignoring his daughter, exactly, it was just that they’d reached the phase of her imagination spilling over into reality, and he’d learned to entertain her fantasies without putting his life on hold to indulge them.

It was an art, really.

“No, baby,” he said patiently, “Petey’s not coming until Friday. He has classes.”

“I know that.” Her sass was palpable. God, she was going to end up just like her mother. What a frightening thought. “But Petey’s right there. Look.”

He set his cooking aside with a sigh, turning to follow Morgan’s point without expecting any real result. Still, he was doing his best to be a good father, whatever the hell that meant, so he humored her.

He didn’t actually expect her to be right.

Peter, and, sure enough, that was Peter, was out on the balcony, leaning heavily against the railing. He was in the Spider-Man suit, which Tony would’ve expected at this time of night, but his face was uncovered, mask clutched in one of his still-gloved hands.

None of these details were particularly alarming. Hell, even Peter’s unplanned presence wasn’t the thing that made his heart leap. The suit might’ve been damaged, or he could’ve just had a slow patrol and decided to swing over for a little company.

The fear came from the fact that the kid was clutching desperately at his chest, legs shaking as he stumbled drunkenly away from the railing. It was the fact that, even from this distance, Tony could see how pale and sweaty Peter’s skin was. It was the fact that every single one of his parental instincts screamed out in one long, horrifying, piercing warning.

Child in trouble. Child in trouble. CHILDINTROUBLE.

“Fuck, fuck.” The kid was obviously injured, and Tony knew that he would’ve never come to the balcony like this unless it was bad, unless he physically couldn’t make it anywhere else, because he would never risk Morgan seeing. With that in mind, he shot a glance back at the girl as he made a beeline for the door. “Stay here, Morgan.”

“Is Petey okay?”

“Of course, baby. Just stay where you are and let Daddy handle it.”

She did, of course, not stay where she was.

In the end, he couldn’t even blame her. As much as she often reminded him of Pepper, he was the one who provided the other half of her DNA. Stark children weren’t engineered for sitting back, letting others take the lead.

He didn’t have time to tell her off, to send her back inside where the world couldn’t touch her innocence, because just as he was pushing through the glass door and sucking in a breath of the cool night air, Peter was collapsing.

There’s a concentrated single-mindedness that is unique to parents seeing their children in pain. It blots out everything else, eclipses rationality. And in that moment, Tony felt it. Nothing else mattered except getting to Peter, holding Peter, saving Peter.

He’d never moved so fast in his life.

“Hey, hey.” Somehow, he managed to hook his arms underneath Peter’s armpits as his knees gave out, softening the fall as they both sank to the ground in a tangled heap. He laid him down gently, cushioning his head as he settled it onto the hard cement. “Peter, buddy. Hey, talk to me, yeah? You gotta tell me what’s wrong.”

The kid gasped weakly, face ashen and pupils blown. He flailed a shaky hand up to his chest.

“Hurts,” he groaned.

“Your chest hurts? How?” He roved his hands up Peter’s sternum. No blood, no outward sign of trauma. “Did you get hit?”

A nod, followed promptly by a dangerous fluttering of eyelids.

“No, nope.” He tapped the kid’s cheek, fear spiking. “Stay awake, Peter. No sleeping until Cho’s got you drugged off your ass, you hear me?”

Peter’s eyes went comically wide as he tried to orient himself. Tony could see him clawing his way back to consciousness through sheer force of will, and, damn it, he couldn’t believe that he lived in a world where that sight made him proud, but it did.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y.,” he left his palm pressed gently against Peter’s chest, their eyes locked, “call a med team.”

It’s alright. It’s alright. He tried to pour the thoughts into his gaze, to transfer them to Peter without words. I’m here. I’m here. Dad’s right here.

“Already done, Boss. Helen Cho is also en route from the Compound. She should be on location within the hour.”

“Good, good. Tell her that we’ll need-”

A small voice cut him off. “Daddy?”

Oh, god. Morgan. In the mind-numbing blur of terror for Peter’s safety, he’d completely forgotten that she’d followed him onto the balcony.

From the look on Peter’s face, it looked like he’d just realized it, too.

The kid swept every bit of pain out of his expression all at once, tilting his head to give her a wavering smile. “Hey, M. You,” he paused to gasp, a lung-deep grating noise that made Tony’s skin crawl, “you okay?”

She bit her lip, looking between Tony and Peter slowly, as if gauging exactly what her reaction ought to be. He could imagine her confusion: Peter looked totally calm, while Tony knew that his face was the picture of fear.

“Daddy was making me a grilled cheese.”

He almost laughed at the absurdity of the anecdote, at the absurdity of the whole situation. Five minutes ago, his primary concern had been spreading butter evenly on a piece of whole-wheat bread. What the fuck had happened?

Peter blinked, taking far too long to process Morgan’s statement for anyone, let alone someone with his IQ. “Sorry.”

That one word took enough air to vault him into a coughing fit. Tony propped him up until it passed, then eased him back down. Peter’s eyes re-found his easily, and he could see the kid’s veneer cracking. He was trying so desperately to play the big brother role, but Tony could tell that he wanted nothing more than to break down and cry.

“What hurts?” He whispered, trying not to alarm his daughter any more than he already had. “Still your chest?”

“Mm,” Peter clung to his composure, eyes flickering to Morgan, as he swallowed and choked out a little, “can’t… breathe.”

Shit. Shit.

“Okay, you’re okay.” He brushed a thumb across Peter’s cheek, other hand still splayed across his chest. “F.R.I.D.A.Y., what’s wrong with him?”

“My scanners are limited outside of the building-”

“But you can scan him, right?”

“I can.”

He felt like screaming. They didn’t have time for this. “Then do it.”

The silence that followed was broken only by the wheezing of Peter’s breaths and the small whimpers Morgan made as she cried. It was like a symphony composed of Tony’s worst nightmares.

“My scans indicate that Peter is experiencing symptoms of hemothorax, which appears to have to have brought about a pneumothorax.”

On a better day, Tony could’ve processed the medical jargon. He knew, distantly, that both of the terms existed somewhere in his vocabulary. But Peter’s breaths were getting more and more desperate, and Morgan was crying harder and harder, and nothing made sense, nothing made sense, god, nothing made sense.

“English, FRI,” was all he could choke out. He felt like he was the one who couldn’t breathe.

“Peter’s chest cavity is filling with blood, which has led to the collapse of one of his lungs. He also appears to be suffering from the initial stages of hypovolemic shock. Without immediate medical treatment, he is at a high risk of cardiac arrest.”

“Okay. Alright. Shit.” He knew, distantly, that he shouldn’t be cursing around Morgan, that that was one of the family no-no’s. On the other hand, Peter was suffocating underneath his hands, so he had more important things to worry about then the expletives Morgan might parrot back at daycare.

He cupped Peter’s face, ran his hand over his forehead. “Eyes up, Spider-Man. Just keep taking deep breaths. I know it hurts, but you’ve gotta try.”

Just look at me, kid. Just look right at me.

The kid let out a small gurgle, fingers curling weakly against the cool cement, like he was reaching for something. “Mister Stark.”

He could see the plea in Peter’s eyes, heard it loud and clear: comfort me. Lie to me. Tell me I’m going to be okay, promise me that I’m not dying. If you say it, I can believe it. Please.

“Everything’s fine. Nothing’s gonna happen to you, alright? I won’t let it.”

He wanted the words to comfort the kid, to pull some of the fear from his eyes, but they didn’t, because Peter’s next breath was barely even a breath, more of a painful convulsion of his chest, and suddenly there were fresh tears to join the sweat soaking the kid’s face.

“T’ny.” Peter’s fingers bumped against his knee. “T’ny… help.”

“Shh, shh. I’m here, I’m going to help you.” Don’t be scared. Please don’t be scared. I can’t stand it when you’re scared. “F.R.I.D.A.Y., where’s my med team?”

“On their way. However, as only a handful of staff were on duty at this time of night, there is a slight delay in their response-”

He tensed his jaw until pain surged through his skull. “I don’t give a shit what their excuses are. Tell them to hurry.”

A pause. “Will do, Boss.”

“Daddy?” Morgan crawled closer until she was kneeling by Peter’s shoulder, face streaked with tears and still hiccupping on sobs. “Why’s Petey so sick?”

Oh, god. He couldn’t do this. She was too young, too young to stare the reality of the world in the face like this. How could she ever understand? Peter was dying just inches away. That’s not the kind of thing a four-year-old could possibly understand.

Tony could barely understand it, and he’d had half a century more experience with life’s shittiness than she did.

“M’rg’n,” This time, Peter’s attempt at a smile was more of a pained grimace, hand twitching weakly as he tried to reach for her, “‘s okay.”

Morgan’s face wobbled dangerously. “Petey…”

“‘S okay,” the kid repeated, managing to barely brush his fingers against Morgan’s leg. A second later, she was gripping it tightly. Some of the tension in Peter’s body released, and his voice grew fainter, like the contact had given him some sort of permission. “‘S okay, M. ‘S okay.”

“Hey,” Tony tapped the kid’s cheek, fear racing across his skin like a current, “stay awake, Pete, y’hear me? Remember that F.R.I.D.A.Y. said? You’re going into shock. I know your body’s telling you to sleep, but you have to stay awake.”

None of his words seemed to register. If anything, Peter’s gaze unfocused more, eyes trailing away from Morgan and up to the sky. His blinks were slow, and he wasn’t gasping for air anymore, although each breath still rasped painfully in his chest. There was an eerie peacefulness falling over the kid, and it made Tony thread a shaky hand through his hair on impulse. He wasn’t sure if it was a final comfort, another half-hearted attempt to keep him awake, or some sort of non-verbal plea, a tether to keep the kid here, at his side, to stop him from drifting somewhere he couldn’t reach.

Please don’t leave me. Please, Peter. Please.

He positioned himself in Peter’s eyeline, using both hands to cup the sides of his face. “Peter, buddy, look at me.” A blink, and the kid’s eyes slid over to his. Tony’s breath hitched at the sight. He could see everything that made Peter Peter leeching out of his gaze. A bit of him disappeared with every blink.

Tony had a terrible feeling that there was an invisible timer running out, that these were the very last moments he’d get to spend staring into his child’s eyes.

“Peter, please.” He tried to soak up every inch of Peter’s face, of the way that, even now, his eyes gentled when he was staring at him. The trust, the adoration, the love. “Stay with me.”

Suddenly, Morgan was pushing herself against his shoulder, little hands reaching out to fist in the front of Peter’s suit, cheeks glistening with tears. There was horror on her face, a heaviness that didn’t belong on features so smooth. Without understanding, she seemed to have understood.

“Petey,” her voice was pleading. Tony couldn’t tell if she was just mimicking him, or if it was coming from her own tenuous grasp of the situation, “Petey, please.”

“M’rg’n.” The corner of Peter’s mouth twitched as he looked at her, lips parting in an attempt to say something else, maybe another slurred interpretation of her name, maybe another comfort, another try for reassurance.

Nothing but a gag came out.

The kid’s eyes jerked back to Tony’s, wild and scared. Something passed between them in that second, something deep and clear. If Tony believed in clichés, he would’ve described it as being a spectator to someone else’s life flashing before their eyes. There were a million emotions warring for dominance on Peter’s face all at once, a million thoughts conveyed in a single breath.

And then it just… stopped. His eyes settled, stilled. His face relaxed. Out of the corner of his eye, Tony could see his weak grip on Morgan’s hand relax.

And then he didn’t move, didn’t blink, didn’t breathe.

His eyes were still fixed on Tony’s face, but they didn’t see him. They didn’t even look like Peter anymore. They were just… dark. Empty.

Dead.

“No. No.” For a second, all he could do was freeze, locked up in his horror. “Peter, buddy…”

“Sir,” F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s voice was rushed. “The med team is about three minutes out. My scanners indicate that Mister Parker is in cardiac arrest. You need to perform chest compressions.”

“Daddy?” Morgan’s voice had never been so full of fear before. He felt sick. “Daddy, Petey isn’t breathing.”

Right. Yes. Fuck. Peter wasn’t breathing. His heart wasn’t beating. His eyes were even seeing, brown irises so familiar but suddenly so foreign, so lifeless and cold.

He folded his hands over Peter’s chest, somehow numb and explosive all at once. He pressed down once, twice, let his body fall in the rhythm that he’d drilled into himself over the course of countless first-aid seminars.

(“Wait, you do the compressions to the beat of Another One Bites the Dust?” Peter was laughing, hands poised over the practice dummy’s chest. “That’s a little morbid, don’t you think, Mister Stark?”)

“It’s okay, baby.” He didn’t spare Morgan a glance, gaze still locked on the vacancy in Peter’s eyes. It felt wrong to break the contact, like he was violating one of the kid’s final wishes. “Daddy’s gonna breathe for him.”

“Can you do that?”

“Yeah.” He wanted to scream, to sob. Unbidden, a few tears dripping down his cheeks, but his expression stayed impassive. “C’mon, Pete. Don’t do this to me. It’s time to come back.”

“Where did he go?” Morgan questioned, hand reaching for Peter’s pale face.

“Don’t touch him,” he snapped, too caught up in his spiraling thoughts to rein in his temper. He’d feel bad about it later, he knew, but now he felt nothing. “Stay back, Morgan.”

“Daddy, what’s-”

“Be quiet.” He was a terrible father. God, he was a terrible father. One kid sobbing beside him, rejected and afraid, the other growing cool and stuff underneath his hands. He choked on a gag, vision blurring with a fresh wave of tears. “Fuck, Peter, just fucking breathe.”

He didn’t. Tony stopped the chest compressions just long enough to do it for him, his warm lips against Peter’s cool ones, then back to the rhythm. Beat, beat, beat. One of the kid’s ribs finally snapped on this round, and Morgan whimpered.

“Daddy, what was that?”

“Nothing, baby. Don’t worry about it.” Peter’s face was getting paler, lips blue. Whatever oxygen he was getting secondhand from Tony wasn’t enough.

He was dying. He was dying. He was dead.

Oh, god. There was no denying it, not when he looked into the kid’s face: slack and gray with glassy eyes.

“Damn it, Peter.” His arms burned from the force of the compressions, but he didn’t let up. “If you die in front of your sister, I’ll bring you back and kill you again myself. You understand me?”

He got no response, just the same blank gaze and the sound of the balcony doors tearing open. A moment later, a medic was kneeling at his side.

“Well done, Mister Stark, but we can take it from here.”

He pulled away and let the other man take over, falling backwards into the cool cement. Another medic shoved an oxygen mask over the kid’s face, pumping air into his stagnant lungs. She gently shut his eyes with her other hand.

Tony felt the action like a physical blow. For some reason, he knew that he’d never see them open again.

“Please,” he breathed, distantly aware of Morgan crawling into his lap, tucking herself underneath his aching arms, “please. He’s my… He’s my kid. You have to save him. You-You have to bring him back.”

My kid. My child. My baby.

“Petey.” Morgan was shivering against his chest. Was it cold? Maybe. He couldn’t remember, couldn’t bring himself to feel the air against his skin, not when he could still feel Peter’s still chest under his palms. “Daddy, I want Petey.”

“I know.” Me too, baby. Me too. “I know you do.”

When they transferred Peter onto a stretcher and started pushing him away, Tony distantly wanted to follow. His muscles twitched weakly, but he couldn’t muster the strength to rise. For once, Morgan seemed content to stay still, unnaturally silent. She just snuggled into his lax arms, chest catching as she cried.

Some time later, Pepper joined them, heels clicking as she jogged across the balcony. F.R.I.D.A.Y. must’ve called her back from her late-night meetings. She set one hand on Morgan’s back, and the other cupped his face, a parallel to the way he’d touched Peter.

He swallowed back bile.

“Hey, honey.” Pepper tilted his chin until their eyes met. “Why aren’t you with Peter?”

“He’s… He’s…”

She shook her head, expression pitying. “No, he’s not. They got his heart started again. Last I heard, they’d just located the bleed that caused the hemothorax. He’s still critical, but he’s alive, and Helen’s with him. He’s got every resource in the world.”

“He’s alive?”

“Yes, honey, he’s alive. Now, c’mon.” She looked down at Morgan. “Hey, baby. It’s past your bedtime. You must be tired.”

She shook her head violently, nose digging into his ribs. “No, no.”

“Okay, okay.” Pepper soothed. “That’s alright. We can go down to the MedBay with Daddy. How does that sound?”

Apparently, that wasn’t a good enough appeasement, because Morgan instantly started to wail, squirming out of Tony’s loose grip and making a bolt for… somewhere. Tony doubted she even knew where she was going. Luckily, Pepper snagged her before she could take off.

“I want Petey!” She screamed, slamming her little fists against Pepper’s collarbone as she hugged her close. “I want Petey!”

“I know, baby, shh.” Pepper scooped her up and stared pointedly at Tony until he clambered to his feet as well, swaying. The motion felt robotic. He felt robotic. “It’s alright. We’re gonna go wait for him now, okay? We’ll get him to you as soon as we can.”

Just as quickly as the fit began, it ended. Morgan went limp all at once, voice a whimper. “Petey was bad.”

Pepper herded her broken family towards the elevator. “Why’s that, sweetheart?”

“He didn’t listen to Daddy. He told him not to go to sleep and he didn’t listen.”

Pepper’s breath caught in her throat, the only outward sign of distress she let slip past her walls. She paused for half a second in the threshold of the elevator before shoving it away, pushing through, and joining Tony in the corner. “Oh, darling. Petey was really hurt. It’s really hard to stay awake when you’re that hurt. I’m sure he did his best.”

“Daddy cursed.”

“Sometimes adults do that when scary things happen.”

Morgan buried her face into Pepper’s neck. “Petey was really scared, Mommy. I don’t want Petey to be scared.”

“Well, he’s safe now, baby, and he isn’t scared, so you don’t have to worry about that anymore.”

“Are you sure?”

“Mhm. He’s just sleeping, and Miss Cho is with him, so he’s not alone.”

Slowly, Morgan unstuck her face from Pepper’s shirt and looked over to Tony. “Are you still scared, Daddy?”

I’ve never been more scared in my life, and I’ve flown a nuke into a wormhole, had my best friend slam his shield into my chest.

“No, baby. Daddy’s fine.”

Sometimes, you lie to your children. Tony had done it twice in one night. Once, of course, was right then, staring his daughter in the face with an artificial smile and offering her an empty reassurance.

The other was when he’d held Peter’s face and told him that everything would be okay.

--

Morgan fell asleep on hour two of waiting for Peter’s surgery to end, drool sticking her cheek to Pepper’s expensive business dress. Tony watched her for a while, watched her back rise and fall with every breath, watched her eyelashes flutter as she dreamed.

He didn’t know how much time passed before Pepper pulled out her phone and started typing out a text one-handed, careful not to jostle Morgan out of her sleep. It was a normalized dance for them now: living life on their tip-toes, desperate not to disturb the precious few hours that their child was actually quiet and calm. It made his heart ache. That was a move he’d perfected long before Morgan was born, during movie nights with a patrol-weary Spider-kid dozing off on his shoulder, the buzz of lightsabers and whines of blasters filling up the negative space.

He would’ve given anything to transport back to those moments: back to high school Peter, foolish and youth-bright. Back before everything got complicated. Before he’d gotten a second child to protect. Before Peter had gotten his full ride to Columbia. Before the kid’s heart had stopped underneath his hands.

Minutes blurred. Then, Happy materialized in front of them.

“Hey, Boss.” He directed the words at Pepper, flicking worried glances in Tony’s direction. “What do you need?”

“Could you take Morgan to bed, please?” Pepper sounded apologetic. “I’m really sorry to ask, I now it’s not your job, but I… I don’t want to leave right now.”

Both looked pointedly at him, and he nearly laughed. They really weren’t being subtle, were they? Come on. He was in shock, not stupid.

“Of course, not an issue.” Happy slid the sleeping child into his arms with a gentleness that warred against his gruff exterior. “I’ll stick near her room, too. In case she wakes up.”

“You don’t have to do that, Happy, F.R.I.D.AY. can let us know if anything-”

“I want to.” Tony caught the man’s bitter grin out of the corner of his eye, felt a kinship with it. “Not like I’ll be sleeping until we get word on the kid, anyway. Might as well do something useful.”

“Thank you, Happy,” Pepper murmured.

He grunted in response, never one to linger in a compliment. “Just let me know once you hear anything. Even if… well, even if it’s not good news, I have to know.”

“Of course.” As Happy turned to leave, Pepper stopped him again. “Oh, could you call Rhodey? Tell him what happened.”

Happy nodded. “I’ll send him down when he gets here. Kid’s aunt, too.”

“That’d be wonderful, thank you.”

The muted slap of Happy’s dress shoes on the linoleum echoed down the hallway, only stopping once the elevator closed around him.

And then they were alone.

Pepper’s hand wrapped around his wrist.

“Tony, honey, look at me.”

Just look at me, kid. Just look right at me.

He did, eyes slowly coming to rest on hers, brown against green, life against life. He wondered if he would ever forget watching the life leave Peter’s, if he could ever erase the sensation of the kid slipping through his fingers.

“You’re in shock.” She murmured. “Do you understand that?”

“Yes.”

She sighed, free hand coming up to trace along his jaw. “Everything is going to be okay, alright? We’re going to get through this, all of us.”

He didn’t believe her, but he nodded anyway.

She smiled.

It was almost worth it.

--

Five hours passed.

The stagnancy came to an end when Helen Cho strolled into the waiting room. She was back in normal clothes, must have ditched the surgical kit right before coming out. May had arrived by then, still wearing scrubs from her rounds. She’d sat on Tony’s other side without a word, just quietly rubbed her hand up and down his arm.

He hated to admit it, but the monotony of the rhythm was one of the few things that had kept him sane as the hours wore by.

May’s gaze jerked up the moment Helen approached, voice strained yet hopeful. “Helen. Thank god. Is he…?”

“He’s alive and relatively stable.” She reassured, kneeling in front of Tony and scrutinizing his face. “How are you feeling, Tony?”

He blinked, genuinely confused. “What does that have to do with any of this?”

“Peter isn’t my only patient. The medics said you were already in shock when they got there.”

He cleared his throat. “I’m fine, Cho. Tell us about the kid.”

She watched him silently for another few beats, then stood with a heavy sigh. “We assume that Peter must’ve experienced some form of blunt force trauma to his chest. That trauma caused major damage to the blood vessels lining his chest cavity. By the time the medics arrived, one of his lungs had already collapsed, and the hypovolemic shock, paired with the fluid filling his chest cavity, caused a cardiac arrest. We were able to intubate and restart his heart, as well as locate and cauterize the damaged blood vessels. We also performed a thoracostomy, which let us drain the blood from his chest. We’re still waiting for his lung to fully re-expand, so we’ve left the tube in place. Like I said, he seems to be stabilizing, although he’s still reliant on the respirator.”

“And?” May whispered, voice steady but hands shaking. “I’ve done this before too, Helen. Told families things they didn’t want to hear. I can tell you’re setting us up for something.”

Helen glanced away, visibly steeling herself, before offering May a tiny nod and continuing. “We think that his lung had collapsed by the time he got to the Tower, which means that he was already getting a decreased flow of oxygen before the cardiac arrest brought on a total respiratory failure. Even with the rescue breaths, Peter was without a sustained oxygen supply for a prolonged period of time. We need to run more tests, obviously, but… there appears to be some of the preliminary signs of brain damage.”

Tony’s entire being froze. He centered in on that one, damning phrase.

Brain damage.

Was there anything worse for a kid like Peter? God, Tony had spent so many lab days just marveling at Peter’s brain, how beautiful and brilliant and abstract it was. Peter was his brain. Sure, the spider bite had made him athletic beyond belief, but at the end of the day, Peter Parker was defined by his intelligence. He was quick, and witty, and he constantly floored Tony with how even his simple ideas could end up changing the world.

He couldn’t have brain damage. He just… couldn’t. It wasn’t right.

“Do… Do you have any idea how severe it may be?” Pepper asked, voice thick.

“Not yet.” Helen glanced at each one of them, eyebrows knitted together in regret. “Once he’s had a little more time to settle, I’ll send him for some brain scans. Those’ll give us a much better idea of what we’re working with. We’re weaning him off the anesthetics now, so… we’ll be able to do some neurological tests at the same time.”

Tony swallowed. “You mean when he wakes up?”

“I…” It was strange, really, to see a woman as confident as Helen Cho dancing around her words. “I… I’m not sure that he’s going to, Tony. At this point, a coma would be our best-case scenario.”

“Helen.” May looked resigned. “Please be honest with us. His brain must’ve been without oxygen for, what, at least ten minutes? Longer?” She set a hand on Tony’s shoulder. “You don’t… you don’t think he’s ever going to wake up, do you?”

If Tony didn’t know better, he’d say that Helen was about to cry.

“He was without oxygen for longer than any normal human could survive. It’s a miracle that we were even able to restart his heart. You… You have to understand-”

“Helen,” May choked out.

Her shoulders slumped, defeated. “No, May. I don’t think he’s going to wake up.”

Something in Tony broke, all at once. His next breath was a sob, hand shaking and chest screaming, imploding, and god, is this how Peter had felt?

Peter. His kid. His child.

He couldn’t be gone. He couldn’t be gone. He couldn’t be gone. He just couldn’t.

“No,” he gasped, shaking his head hard enough to make the world spin, “no. He-He was awake. He was talking. He said my name.”

The last thing he said was Morgan.

May’s arms wrapped around him, an awkward embrace over the uncomfortable plastic of the MedBay chairs. He let his face fall onto her shoulder, crying even harder when he realized that she was, too.

“There’s still some hope.” Helen’s voice felt like an intruder in their misery. “Peter’s healing factor works in ways that we still don’t fully understand, and we haven’t run the tests to confirm anything yet. It’s just… we need to be realistic about his future.”

He heard May respond, heard Pepper ask about visiting the kid, heard Helen give timeframes for scans and tests and a million other things.

All he could think about was the irony of the fact that Peter had been Morgan’s first word, and that Morgan would be Peter’s last.

--

Tony let May go to the kid first.

He wasn’t sure if he even wanted to see him. What would he look like? Would he look like Peter, like his kid, or would he look… different? Empty? Vacant? Would he be able to sense his absence?

He didn’t know what would be worse: staring at Peter and not recognizing him, or being able to trick himself into thinking that he was just sleeping, that all of this was some hyperrealistic nightmare.

Even with his best efforts, he only managed to avoid Peter’s room for about an hour, because May eventually emerged and all but dragged him through the hallways, past ORs and supply closets and to the wing set aside for severe casualties, only pausing her crusade when he balked violently at the kid’s doorway.

She turned to watch him with deep, understanding eyes. “What’s wrong?”

Everything was fragmented. The world was splintering, and so was he. “I… does he… what does he…?”

“He looks normal, Tony.” She gave him a miserable smile. “He just looks like Peter.”

His voice came out a broken rasp. “That’s almost worse.”

“Oh, Tony.” May rubbed his arm with her palm, like she could revitalize him with the gesture. “Go and talk to him. He might still be in there, he could still hear you. He’d want you to be with him, don’t you think?”

“What if he’s not? What if he’s really gone?”

“Then you don’t have anything else to lose.”

And, well, that was true. If he’d lost one of his children, was there anything else the world could rip away from him?

There just wasn’t a grief worse than that.

--

When Morgan was just a few months old, she’d had to go into the hospital for tongue-tie surgery.

It was a simple procedure, but it had still made his whole being seize up with terror.

The anesthesia was the worst part. He’d always hated it with Peter, although he thought he hid it well. Despite the way it turned his stomach, he never left. Always stayed right at the kid’s side, holding his hand, murmuring comfort and praise long after his eyes had rolled back.

It went against every instinct inside him, to let someone stick needles in his child, shove masks over their face, pump what felt like vials and vials drugs into them. It was even worse after they’d gone under, because then he had to leave. Had to hand his child, his precious, fragile child, over to near strangers (even if they were the best surgeons money could buy), and walk away.

And then he had to sit, helpless, waiting for news.

They’d let Pepper hold Morgan while they put her under. Tony had stood behind her, hand braced on her shoulder. She’d never had to do this before, not like he had, so he was determined to hold it together for her sake.

As soon as they’d pulled Morgan’s limp body out of Pepper’s arms and taken her back for the operation, Pepper had buried her face in his chest and cried.

The surgery had gone perfectly, of course. The nurses had fetched them to sit with her while she recovered from the anesthesia, and he still remembered how small she looked. Vulnerable, delicate. So desperately in need of protection.

That was the exact sensation that he felt when he stepped into Peter’s hospital room.

There were so many machines, so many wires, that the kid looked more robot than human. He had two IVs, one for fluids and the other for pain meds (do you even need pain meds if you’re too far inside yourself to feel pain?). He had sticky pads all over his bare chest, heartrate strumming across a monitor just a foot away. Tony forced himself not to think about the catheter, or the nasogastric line, or the tube crawling between the kid’s fractured ribs, sucking blood and pus and god-knows-what out of his lungs and into a clear plastic collection bag.

But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t ignore the ventilator.

Every one of the kid’s mechanical breaths sent chills up and down his spine. God, he couldn’t even breathe for himself. If this machine broke, faltered, then he could just… stop. Cease. Die. Slip further and further away until Tony didn’t even have the illusion of life to cling to.

He cleared his throat, sat in the chair May had pulled up to the kid’s bedside, gently took his hand. The other one had an IV stuck in the back and a pulse oximeter on his index finger, but this one was free. If he just stared at this hand, he could pretend that everything was alright. That Peter was bound to wake up soon, drunk on the good stuff, grinning up at him and slurring out some half-assed apology for getting hurt.

“Hey there, buddy.” He didn’t dare look at Peter’s face. He knew it would break him. “Anytime you wanna wake up and prove Cho wrong is fine by me. It’d save us on the brain scans and lab time. Honestly, now that I’m really thinking about it, it’d be a little rude for you to keep napping. All the nurses could go home early.”

Nothing. Just the mechanical rise and fall of the kid’s chest and the buzz of machines.

He dropped his forehead to the back of Peter’s hand, breaths shaky. Desperation rose in his throat.

“Peter, please. I’m sorry I couldn’t save you. I’m sorry I didn’t do enough. I’m sorry I lied. I’m so, so sorry. But you-you have to wake up.” Every breath hurt. It felt like he was being punished. Why should he breathe when Peter couldn’t? “What am I going to tell your sister, huh? She needs you. May needs you. I need you. So please, buddy. Come back to me. To us. I know you can. I know you’re brave enough. If anyone can overturn the odds, it’s you.”

He stood, then, leaning over Peter’s face and pressing a soft kiss to his forehead.

He still didn’t open his eyes, still couldn’t bring himself to stare down at the kid’s face.

“Please come back,” he whispered, like he was passing on a secret. “I need you.”

Please, Peter. Please.

I need you. I need you.

I love you.

--

He couldn’t have been sitting at Peter’s bedside for more than a quarter of an hour before Rhodey stepped through the doorway, exchanging a handful of hushed words with May as he shut the door behind him.

“Hey, Tones.”

He cleared his throat. “Did they tell you?”

“Yeah, they did.”

“Did they tell you everything?”

“They told me everything.”

The statement dawned on him slowly. He realized, all at once, that even he didn’t know everything.

“I-I don’t understand.” He didn’t let go of Peter’s hand, kept clinging to it like he’d never held anything more precious in his life. “How could this happen? I have… I have protocols. They’re built into the suit. The second his vitals started fluctuating, it should’ve notified me.”

Rhodey set a hand over his shoulder. “I talked to F.R.I.D.A.Y., and she said that Karen got knocked out by the blow. Most of her wiring’s in the insignia on his chest, right? It was just… unlucky.”

An intense urge to understand reared up in inside him. If he could piece together all the data, he could turn it into something codifiable, something he could organize and repair. “Who was he fighting? Did the footage survive? What does-”

“Tony, don’t do this to yourself.” Rhodey knelt by his chair, eyes sweeping over the hospital bed, the machines, Peter. “You’re not gonna change what happened.”

“So you’ve seen the footage.”

It was a statement, not a question.

“I have,” Rhodey conceded. “And I’ve got no idea who he was fighting. It’s glitchy, pieces are missing. Seems like some new supervillain, but I couldn’t get any ID on him. It’s hopeless, Tones. You’ll just torture yourself if you go down that route.”

“He’s not supposed to take on the heavy stuff without me,” he whispered, swiping his thumb up and down the back of Peter’s hand, the same soothing motion he used when the kid was worked up from a nightmare. How much of his time had he dedicated to lulling Peter to sleep? Now, he’d do just about anything to make him open his eyes. “He’s not ready, he’s still a baby.”

“Tony, he is twenty-one years old. I know you call him kid. I know he’ll always be your kid, but he’s an adult, and in case you haven’t noticed, he’s been one for quite some time. You can’t protect him forever.”

“It seems like I can’t protect him at all.”

Rhodey sighed. “You couldn’t have prevented this. You know that, deep down, even if your guilt complex isn’t letting you accept it right now.”

He bit his lip, bowed his head. “Listen, I… I want to be alone with the kid right now.”

“Alright.” Rhodey pushed off his chair to stand, leg braces humming. Another reminder of Tony’s failure, a reminder that he would never be able to protect the people he loved. “I’ll be with Pepper if you need anything.”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t let his kill you, Tony. Please. It’s not worth it.”

“You’re not a parent, Rhodey,” he murmured back, “and I don’t blame you for saying that, because you’re not and therefore you can’t possibly understand, but if this goes the way Helen seems to think, then there isn’t life for me after this. You have to understand that.”

“No, I don’t.” The door opened. “And if this goes badly, then I guess I’ll just have to convince you otherwise.”

--

He waited in Peter’s room, side by side with May, while they took the kid back for a dozen different brain scans.

When they rolled his gurney in a few hours later, his hair was disheveled and clumped up from the EEG’s adhesive paste. Without really thinking, Tony walked over and started gently working the hardened goop out of the kid’s hair, drawing himself into the task to avoid the terror gnawing in his stomach.

Helen walked in a few moments later, StarkPad in her hands and sympathy in her eyes.

“I have good news and bad news,” she started.

“Tell us the good news, please,” May said. “I think we both need some of that right about now.”

“Peter has retained some electrical activity in his brainstem. That is, I can’t diagnose brain death.”

May’s voice cracked up with relief. “Oh, thank god. Thank god.”

Helen winced at the reaction, words careful. “However, the damage from the respiratory failure is… extensive. While his EEG showed some activity, it was minimal.”

He dragged his fingertips over Peter’s forehead, voice gruff. “What does that mean?”

“Obviously, the prognoses for coma patients can vary widely. The brain is a delicate thing, and we’re constantly discovering new neuroscience. But… I’ve never heard of a patient with Peter’s level of damage reaching a total recovery.”

May materialized at his side and gripped his elbow. He couldn’t tell if she was seeking support or giving it. “What’s our best-case scenario?”

“With a little time, he may shift from a coma to a vegetative state. With a miracle, he might even regain minimal levels of consciousness. But, and I’m sorry if this seems harsh, but… he’ll certainly never walk again. He won’t be able to speak or communicate. He won’t be the person you knew before. He won’t be Peter.”

May audibly choked. Tony looked down at the kid’s face for the first time since the balcony. Studied the curve of his jaw, the slightness of his nose. No wrinkles, no frown lines. Just the face of a 21-year-old kid.

May had been right: he looked like Peter. He looked like his child. This was the face he’d memorized, the face that was plastered all over the Tower’s walls, grinning behind certificates and awards or covered in marker after Morgan decided to make him her personal canvas.

He didn’t look dead.

“That can’t be all of it,” he murmured, resolve hardening. “You have to take his healing factor into account. It may still kick in. Like you said, it’s not like we understand how normal brains work, let alone his. We’re… We’re not dealing with a normal case here. We have to make exceptions.”

He’s not just a statistic, a newspaper tragedy. He’s my kid.

Parents aren’t supposed to outlive their children.

“I don’t think you’re letting yourself process what I’m saying, Tony.” Helen’s hand came to rest on his free shoulder. “People don’t just… bounce back from damage this severe. I can keep his body alive. We can insert a permanent feeding tube, regulate his temperature, force his organs to function, but it won’t bring him back to you. He’ll never get up from this bed. He’ll never recognize you. He’ll never say your name.”

He was already shaking his head, raging against the implications of her words. “No. You aren’t listening to me. He’s not a normal kid. He… He might turn this around. He’s done shit like that before.” He gestured wildly at Helen. “You’ve said it yourself: his healing factor is a miracle. It can… it can do miracles.”

May was silently crying, grip on Tony’s arm tightening with every second, other hand clasped over her mouth to muffle her sobs. Helen seemed torn between comforting her and shocking Tony back to reality.

She met his gaze. “Do you want him to live like this, Tony? Do you want him to suffer in a hospital bed for the rest of his life, hooked up to all these machines, not even able to breathe for himself? Is that what you want for your child?”

Is that what you want for your child?

It was strange, hearing someone else acknowledge it. To hear someone else talk about Peter as his.

He wanted to scream. “But… he’s breathing.”

Helen’s voice softened. She could tell she was making headway. “With a ventilator, Tony.”

No, no. He has to come back. He has to. “Just… Just give him a chance. Please.” He looked over at May. “He… He just needs a few more days to get his strength back. Then he’ll heal. He’ll wake up. Please.”

Helen’s gaze bled with pity. “It’s May’s decision what happens next. She’s his power of attorney.”

He swung towards her, drunk on hope, desperate for an ally. “May, please.”

She observed him through puffy eyes, then looked to Helen. She sounded tired, like she was humoring a child, but he didn’t even care. They could humor him all day long if it meant that Peter might live.

“Is there any chance?”

Helen let out a disbelieving sigh. “I can’t say there’s no chance, not when Peter’s enhancements are such an anomaly, but May,” she stared at her, imploring, “it’s so unlikely that I struggle to even call it a chance.”

May bit her lip, gaze wandering to Peter, lying small and tiny amidst a sea of machines.

“Let’s… Let’s give him some time.” She whispered, eyes falling to the floor. “I don’t think I could live with myself if I didn’t at least give him that.”

--

Tony had always assumed that parents were lying when they said that they didn’t have favorite children. After all, you had to have at least one you preferred, right? That was just human nature. You picked people, made lists, built hierarchies in the most mundane places.

But now he was a parent, and he knew that they’d been telling the truth. Or, at least, they’d been telling his truth.

If someone made him choose between Morgan and Peter, he wouldn’t be able to do it. It’d kill him.

He still remembered one interview, a year or so ago, right after he’d started posting photos of Peter and Morgan on his social media. The reporter had insinuated that he would, naturally, pick Morgan over Peter, because she was his flesh and blood and Peter wasn’t.

He’d stood up and left, and the clip had gone viral as soon as it leaked. The next time he’d seen Peter, the kid had hugged him just a little tighter than usual.

For him, Peter was more than a just trial at parenthood. Peter was the thing that had made him a parent. He was as good as his firstborn. He loved him. He loved him so, so much. And he loved his daughter, too. He loved them both. Equally and fiercely.

But just because he knew that he could never pick a favorite didn’t mean he could ignore the fact that, sometimes, he had to prioritize.

When Morgan was a baby, Peter had gotten less attention. Their movie nights were cut short, and his Tower visits consisted more of diaper changing and tummy time than tinkering in the lab. Peter was sweet and genuine about the whole thing, because of course he was. The world hadn’t done a thing to deserve him.

When Peter got hurt on patrols, Tony and Pepper had a silent agreement that she would handle Morgan, and he would handle Peter. Once again: prioritization. He didn’t like it. It always left a bad taste in his mouth, always felt like choosing, but it was necessary. It was life.

At least, that’s what he kept telling himself now, three days since Helen gave them Peter’s initial diagnosis. It was the belief that was carrying him through each hour of his bedside vigil, each hour that he left his wife to deal with their daughter on her own.

It was the primary focus of his thoughts when F.R.I.D.A.Y. informed him that Pepper had brought Morgan for a visit.

Morgan didn’t say a word when Pepper walked her in, just wandered over to the bed and peered up at Peter curiously. There was something solemn in her expression, like she was struggling underneath an invisible weight, a weight that hadn’t been there before.

“Hey, baby.” He hoped his voice didn’t sound as rough as he imagined it did. At the very least, he hoped she didn’t notice. “Do you wanna come sit with Daddy and Peter?”

“Mhm.”

He pulled her into his lap, grunting as her elbow jabbed into his side. “Oof. Alright. There you go. Do you… do you want to say hi to your brother?”

Morgan’s gaze roved up and down Peter’s body slowly, taking it all in. “Hi, Petey.”

“You can hold his hand, if you’d like.” He held up his and the kid’s hands, their fingers intertwined. “Just like Daddy is. Do you see?”

“Mhm.”

“Do you want to try?”

“Mhm.”

He untangled his hand from Peter’s and helped settle hers in its place. “There. That’s it.” He ran his palm over the top of her head, encouraging. “Just like that. Give it a good squeeze, and maybe he’ll feel you.”

Morgan’s voice was small. If he listened closely, he swore he could pick up an undercurrent of fear. “If he feels me, will he wake up and say hi?”

“I… I don’t know.” I wish I could give you promises, baby. I know that’s what you want. What you need. “I hope so.”

Morgan’s free hand started stretching out the sleeve of his t-shirt. Her eyes stayed fixed on the floor. “Does Miss Cho know?”

He paused. “No, baby. Nobody knows.”

“But… but he’s getting medicine, right?” She stared up at him, the same pleading he felt within himself reflected in her eyes. “They’re giving him medicine so he feels better. So he can wake up a play with me. It’s… It’s Friday. He promised me that we could play Star Wars today.”

“Oh, baby.” He gestured helplessly at the IV. “That’s not medicine. It’s just something special to keep him from getting thirsty.”

“I can give him my juice.”

Every moment was a battle for composure. He couldn’t bear her innocence, couldn’t bear the weight of trying to preserve it. “I’m sure Peter would like that, but he… he can’t drink anything while he’s sleeping.”

“Oh.” Morgan sat silently for a few seconds, mouth downturned in a little frown. “What can Peter do, Daddy?”

Not breathe. Not move. If Helen’s right and I’m wrong, he can’t even think. “Well, if you talk to him, then he might be able to hear you. He just can’t answer.”

“But he’ll answer eventually, right? If I talk to him enough, he’ll have to wake up.”

If he’s going to claw his way back for any of us, it would be you.

“Why don’t you try, and we’ll see?”

“Okay.” Morgan gnawed at her lip for a second, contemplating. Then, she squeezed Peter’s hand and rambled like her life depended on it. “Petey! Mommy says you’re sleeping really really deep, and that’s why you don’t wake up, even if I talk super loud or touch you. Mommy talked to Miss Cho before I came to say hi, and she says it’s because you hurt your brain. I asked her if we could put a Band-aid on it but she said it wouldn’t help, which is stupid.” She wrinkled her nose. “I can’t wait until you’re all better and you wake up! Miss May says that Daddy thinks it’ll be really soon, and Daddy’s never wrong. Then we can play Star Wars!”

Pepper moved to his side and set a hand on Morgan’s shoulder. “Hey, darling. It’s about time for dinner. We can come visit Petey again later.”

“Will he be awake then?”

“I don’t know, sweetheart.”

Her face fell. “Oh. Okay.” She twisted to look up at him, face beseeching. “Daddy, are you coming to dinner? Mommy’s making alfredo.”

He helped her wiggle of his lap and let his hands linger on her shoulders, reluctant to let her go. “No, baby. Daddy’s gotta stay with Petey.”

“Oh.” More disappointment. “Okay. Bye, Daddy.”

He swallowed back a sob. “Bye, sweetheart. Sleep tight, okay?”

“Okay.”

He wondered if he’d just managed to lose both his children in one night.

--

“Tony.”

He glanced up from Peter’s face, giving his wife a weak smile. “Hey, Pep. Who’s got Morgan?”

“May’s watching her.” She crossed the room slowly, arms crossed. “You know that today was her first therapy session.”

Right. Yes. The therapy. The therapy that Helen had suggested and Tony had reeled against until Pepper overrode him.

“Mm. How’d it go?”

“Alright.” She pulled up May’s chair, which had been pushed off to the side, and dragged it up against his. “Doctor Rutledge had Morgan act out what happened with dolls.”

He winced. “Well that’s horrifying.”

“It… It was. But she seems to think it was a positive step.”

“Yeah, I guess.” He still hadn’t fully processed the idea that Morgan had been there when Peter had… well, during the chaos. It was too big a concept to grasp, that his precious child had seen something that even Tony couldn’t begin to analyze, to accept. “All that play therapy shit.”

“Exactly. Doctor Rutledge also thinks that we should stop telling her that Peter’s asleep. Apparently, that might be why Morgan keeps throwing tantrums when we put her to bed. She thinks that Peter went to sleep and didn’t wake up, so she’s scared that she might go to sleep and not wake up now, too.”

“Why would she think that?” The anger surprised him, but it didn’t seem to shock Pepper. She just watched him impassively, like she’d been expecting it. “She saw what happened. She knows he didn’t just go to sleep. That’s one of the reasons this is all so fucked up. She saw his heart stop, Pep. His eyes were fucking open. Doesn’t she understand that people don’t just fall asleep with their eyes open?”

His eyes were open. He was looking at me.

“She’s four, Tony.” Pepper paused, visibly collecting herself. When she spoke again, her voice was softer, more understanding. “She can’t connect events like that yet. It’s too much. Besides, she remembers you telling him to stay awake. I think some part of her subconscious thinks that it means that she has to stay awake, too.”

Well, that was a horrific thought.

He deflated, rubbing an exhausted hand down the front of his face. “So what do we tell her?”

Pepper started massaging his shoulder, slow, loving, everything he definitely didn’t deserve. “Doctor Rutledge said it would help if we tried to explain what’s happening to her. The injury, the coma, what… what might happen next.”

“You want me to tell her that he’s dying?” The words caught in his throat, his next breath a shuddering gasp. “That there’s not even enough activity in his brain for him to breathe on his own? That… that nothing even happened to his brain? His brain… his brain’s perfect. I’ve seen the scans.” He stared up at Peter’s face, peaceful and unmarred. “It’s… it just looks so fucking perfect.”

Pepper’s soft hand wiped a few tears from his face. She didn’t try to comfort him, didn’t offer any empty promises. She knew that nothing she said would transfer this weight. At the end of the day, Pepper loved Peter, but Morgan was her child. She knew that for Tony, things were different. She’d always known that, always accepted it. Now, she had to accept his grief as what it was: a parent watching their child slip right out of their grasp.

“He was without oxygen for too long, Tony.” Her fingers threaded through his hair, gentle and kind. “No matter how perfect it looks,” her eyes followed his gaze to Peter’s face, “no matter how perfect he looks, he’s g-”

“Don’t.” He couldn’t. For some reason, Pepper saying it made it more real, and he just couldn’t. “Please… just don’t. His healing factor still might kick in. There’s still a chance.”

“I… I want you to be right, honey. I really, really do. But the point is that we’ve got a frightened, confused child on our hands. She doesn’t understand what’s happening. To me, to you, to Peter. We have to help her. We have to… we have to prepare her. Just in case.”

His heart stuttered. What was it like to be Morgan? Too young for anyone to give her the straight truth, just old enough that she was starting to perceive the pain around her. She’d seen Peter die. She was holding his hand while it happened. And now her whole life had been uprooted. Her father was MIA, her mother trying desperately to hold the pieces together, her brother hooked up to a dozen different machines, not helping her build Lego villages or put all her toy ponies in their stable, just laying there, still and quiet.

“Yeah… Yeah.” He shook his head. “Fuck, we have to, don’t we?”

Pepper nodded.

“I should do it, shouldn’t I? Tell her, I mean. I should… I should be the one to tell her.”

“Unless you don’t think you can.”

“I don’t,” I can’t think of anything else that I’m less qualified to do, “but I still know that it should be me.”

There was a spark of pride in Pepper’s eyes. It warmed him. “Doctor Rutledge gave me a list of books, for us and for her. I’ve ordered them all. We can go through them when they arrive and pick which ones we like. I’ll start reading them to her at bedtime, and then you can talk to her, when you’re ready.”

When I’ve decided that this whole thing is hopeless. When I’ve decided that it’s time to pull all these machines away and hold my kid’s hand while I stand by and let his heart stop.

He swallowed the thought down. “Books?”

“Mostly for Morgan. Storybooks that help children comprehend grief and death, but I got some for PTSD as well.”

Afghanistan, New York, nights of waking up in cold sweats, clawing at his chest, the perpetual sting of not safe on his tongue. “Does she have…?”

“It’s very mild. Doctor Rutledge thinks she’ll get through it with some more play therapy.” She paused. “And… she’s young. I’m hoping she’ll forget.”

The words hit him like a blow. “What a thought.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s going to forget him.” Oh, yeah, and now he was crying again. Strange how that was becoming his new normal. “She’ll… she’ll forget him holding her. Playing with her. Sneaking into her room when he’s staying over just to keep her company. By the time she’s his age, she won’t even remember his face.”

“Sweetheart.” Pepper cupped his face, forced him to look at her. “Yes, she will.”

“How?”

“We won’t let her forget. We have photos, videos. She’ll always remember him, because he’ll always be a part of her life. We can… we can celebrate his birthdays. Make it a thing. Tell her stories. She won’t forget him, Tony. She won’t.”

“Pep… I… I don’t know if I can do this,” he half gasped, half whispered, “I don’t know if this is something I can survive.”

“Oh, Tony. You know I’ll always support you, and I want to be here for you-”

He winced. “Why do I feel like there’s about to a but that I’m not gonna like-”

“Because there is a but,” her tone was as forceful as it had been since the balcony, and it made him flinch, “and it’s that I know that this is hard, and I can’t even begin to imagine the pain you’re going through, but you don’t have a choice but to survive it.”

“Pep…”

“Don’t. Tony, please don’t take this as cruel, because I don’t mean it to be, but you have a child. Your flesh and blood daughter, the one you and I brought into this world together. You have a daughter who is frightened, alone, and feeling incredibly abandoned right now. You don’t have the luxury of just… giving up.” She sighed, hand falling from his face. “And you have to stop holing yourself up in this room.”

“He’s my child too.” He knew Pepper didn’t mean it like that, he knew, but he couldn’t help the urge to defend the kid. He’d never been able to help that urge. “One of… One of the first things I promised myself, when you handed me that test, was that I would never let him feel forgotten. I mean it when I say that he’s my kid.”

“I know that you do, Tony, and I’m not saying that he won’t always be your baby, but-”

“Do you want me to sacrifice him for Morgan?” He felt a little bad for cutting her off, but the stress was just building and building, and he couldn’t keep anything straight in his head. Couldn’t even control himself. “Is that what you want?”

“No,” she snapped, “I want you to use your common sense.”

“I am, and he needs me.”

“No, he doesn’t.” Pepper grabbed his arm, tight and unyielding. “He’s gone. I am so, so sorry, Tony, but he’s gone. Everything that made him Peter is gone. Sweetheart,” her voice broke, “he doesn’t even know that you’re here.”

It was the thing Tony had known, deep down, since the beginning. Peter was lively, unbashful in his care for other people. When Tony cupped his cheek, he leaned into the touch. When Tony brushed his hair out of his face, he let out a contented sigh. In the tender moments when Tony pressed a kiss to his forehead, he blushed, eyes shining.

The Peter on the bed wasn’t Peter. Despite what everyone thought, he knew that.

He just couldn’t accept that it would be that way forever. He couldn’t accept that his Peter wouldn’t come back.

“But… God, Pep, but he looks so perfect.”

“I know,” she murmured.

“I can’t let him go.” That was the truth of the matter. The one thing that kept him going. Tony Stark could not let Peter Parker go. It was an impossibility, a paradox. “I can’t just… stand back and watch him die.”

“You wouldn’t have to watch.”

I think I already did.

“That’s not the point.”

“I know, but you’re going to have to come to terms with it eventually. The sooner you do, the sooner all of us can start to grieve, and the sooner Morgan can get her father back.” Pepper rubbed his shoulder one last time and stepped back. She’d said her piece. She knew that there was nothing else to do but let Tony process the words on his own time. “I should go back to her. May’ll want to get down here soon, anyway.”

“Yeah, yeah.” The world was too much. There were too many expectations, too many decisions that were impossible to make. “Tell her I love her.”

“Why don’t you come up with me and tell her yourself?” She challenged.

“No. I… I can’t leave him. Not now.” He swallowed. “Even if he doesn’t know that I’m here, I just… I can’t leave.”

Pepper sighed, like she’d already known that that would be his answer. “Alright. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

The door opened, shut. Outside, he imagined that the world kept on turning. People went to work, raised their kids, fell in love. And he stayed locked in this room, spending every second praying that the kid would open his eyes, so that his world could restart.

--

Pepper always kept Morgan’s visits short and sweet. Tony didn’t know who that was more for: him, Morgan, or Pepper herself.

It certainly wasn’t for Peter. As far as he could tell, the kid didn’t have a clue that she was even there.

Today, Morgan was wearing a summer dress, embroidered sunflowers scattered across the hem. It must be nice outside. Of course, Tony wouldn’t know.

She crawled up into his lap without an invitation: their usual ritual. Then, she asked her usual question.

“Is Petey still sleeping, Daddy?”

He gave the usual response.

“Yeah, baby.”

They’d played through this interaction dozens of times over the past two weeks, but the sadness of Morgan’s face never got easier to bear. “Do you still think that he’s listening?”

“We hope that he is.” Please be listening, Peter. “Do you want to talk to him?”

“Yeah!” Morgan tucked her knees to her chest and gave Peter’s corpse-like form a little wave. “Hi, Petey. I colored you a picture today. I used red and yellow crayons because red is for you and gold is for Daddy. I brought it! Miss May promised that she’ll hang it up tonight, but you can’t see it with your eyes closed so I’m sad.” She frowned a little, then wiped it away. “Mommy and Daddy say you still need to sleep so your brain can feel better but I miss you. Wake up! You’ve been sleeping for forever.”

“Tony,” Pepper’s voice was thick, “I think it’s time for Morgan to come back upstairs.”

“Right, yeah.” Once she was here, he never wanted to let her go. He wasn’t very good at that: letting things go. That’s how they ended up in this mess in the first place. “Hey, baby. Do you want to go play with Mommy?”

She twisted to look up at him, pouting. “I wanna play with you.”

He swallowed back the guilt. “Daddy needs to stay with Petey.”

“No!” The outburst was so unexpected that both he and Pepper flinched. “You’re always with Petey! You’re never with me!”

It hurt because it was true, because it played on the exact insecurities he’d been grappling with for weeks. “I-I’m sorry, baby. But Petey’s really sick, okay?” Is this sick? Or is it just death? “I don’t… I don’t want to leave him alone while he’s sick.”

“But I’m bored.”

“I…”

Pepper swooped in, firm and forever to his rescue. “Morgan, darling, let’s leave Daddy and Petey be for a bit, alright? We can go make some cookies with Miss May. Does that sound like fun?”

Morgan wavered, torn between the lure of cookies and her dedication to her tantrum. “But I want Daddy.”

Pepper took her hand and helped her hop to the floor. “Daddy will come later.”

She swung around, eyes wide and expectant. “Do you promise, Daddy?”

“I… yeah, baby.” Sometimes, you lie to your children. “I’ll be up later.”

There were a few seconds of silence while Morgan chewed through the answer. Then, to the relief of everyone, she nodded, contented. “Okay, then.”

Pepper met his eyes. He knew that she knew he’d just lied through his teeth, could see her disappointment. He was fulfilling all the fears she’d had ever since that positive pregnancy test. He couldn’t blame her for hating him, even if it was just a little.

She cleared her throat. “Can you say goodbye, Morgan?”

“Bye, Daddy. Bye, Petey.”

--

He hadn’t meant to eavesdrop.

It was immature, really. A major invasion of May’s privacy. But… he’d realized that he’d forgotten his phone as soon as he turned on the shower and thought he’d just slip back in to grab it.

The second he cracked the door, however, May’s voice trickled through, and he froze.

“Hey, baby. I kicked Tony out to go take a shower, but I’m sure he’ll be back soon, so don’t worry if you’ve gotten as attached as he has.” She sighed, weary. “I talked to Helen earlier, while Pepper had Morgan with her therapist. She said that there’s nothing else anyone can do. Tony’s had experts out, and they all agree with her. I’ve checked the scans myself, just to… to try to understand, I guess. I can see what they can, even if I wish I couldn’t. I’m… I’m actually taking it a whole lot better than Tony is, all things considered. I don’t get the impression that he ever really learned how to handle grief. But you and I had to, didn’t we? We wouldn’t’ve survived, otherwise. Not after your parents. Not after… not after Ben.”

It hit Tony all at once.

Peter was all May had left. He was her only child. Her only family.

Why hadn’t he thought of that before?

“Tony’s supposed to explain everything to Morgan tonight.” His stomach rolled at the mention of that evening. He’d never dreaded anything more in his life. “Pepper’s been reading her lots of picture books to help, but I still don’t envy him. How are you supposed to explain that to a child? I still remember explaining your parents to you. I think it might’ve been the worst thing I’ve ever had to do. And Morgan… she loves you so, so much. God, Peter, baby, she loves you so much. We all do. And nobody… nobody loves you more than me. Maybe that’s selfish of me to say, but it’s true. You’re my child. My only child. I… I just wish it was me, not you. I wish it was anyone else but you.”

I have Morgan. May has nothing. No one. Not even her husband.

“As soon as Tony has some time to process everything, I’ve given Cho permission to let you go.” The words weren’t a shock, but they choked him up all the same. “You’d never want to be hooked up to all these machines for the rest of your life. You’d… You’d want us to move on. So I’m gonna do that, baby. I’m gonna sit right here and hold your hand until you’re gone. You’re never gonna be alone, not even for a second. And I know that Tony’ll be right here with me, right here with you. From the beginning to the end. I… I promise.” She was sobbing, now. Tony could hear it in her voice. “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. God, Peter. My baby. My bright-eyed baby. I love you so much. I’m never gonna stop loving you, okay? I’m never gonna stop.”

He shrunk back. Closed the door as lightly as he could. Sat down on the cool tile, and realized, in a swoop of all-consuming darkness, that Peter wasn’t coming back.

He pressed his back against the door and let himself cry, May’s words echoing in his head.

I’m never gonna stop loving you.

--

After his shower, he joined May at Peter’s bedside. For a while, they sat in silence, the rush of the ventilator and the beeps of the heart monitor filling the air.

“May,” he whispered, “he’s… he’s not here anymore, is he?”

She looked over at him. Neither of them had tried to conceal that fact that they’d been crying. “You heard?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry.”

She waved him off. “Don’t apologize. There’s nothing you heard that I’m ashamed of.” A pause. “But yes, Tony. He’s gone. His healing factor… it just isn’t enough.” She cupped his cheek, palm soft against his stubble. “I know they call it life support, but in situations like these, we usually start calling it organ support. Taking him off the ventilator is just… letting his body finish what it’s already started.”

He clenched his jaw, let out a shuddering breath. “How do I even tell her? It’s… I don’t even know how to handle this myself. How am I supposed to help her handle it?”

May smiled at him, teary-eyed but steady. “You’ve been a parent for quite a while now, Tony. Do we always know what we’re doing?”

“No.”

“Exactly.” She pulled her hand away from his face and stood, leaning over to brush her fingers through Peter’s limp curls. “You don’t have to be sure of yourself to help her. You just have to be there.” She glanced back at him. “Just like you’ve been there for him. Like you’ll be there for him, until it’s over.”

His breath caught. “I was the last thing he saw.”

He doesn’t know why he said it.

“I’m glad,” May murmured, gaze back on Peter’s still face. “He would’ve chosen that, I think, if he could’ve. Don’t you think?”

“He would’ve preferred you.”

“Maybe, but I wasn’t there, and you were. The last thing he saw was someone who loved him. And that… that gives me some peace, at least. It should give you some peace, too. At the end, he knew that he was loved, that he was safe. That’s all any of us can ask for.”

--

By the time Morgan came down for him to break the news, he was numb. They’d talked with Helen, made the quiet decision to spend tomorrow saying goodbye, and pull the ventilator the next morning. After that, he’d given May some time alone with Peter, just wandered blankly through the MedBay halls until she came to fetch him.

Morgan wandered into the room cautiously. Her eyes darted from Tony, to May, to Helen, and back to Pepper, who was walking in behind her. Right from the start, she could tell something was wrong.

“Hey, baby,” he murmured, reaching out and letting her curl up in his arms, “how was your day?”

She ignored the question, balling her fists up in the front of his shirt, eyes wide. “Mommy said we’re gonna have a talk.”

“Yeah.” He’d been afraid of crying, of breaking down and frightening her, but he knew, suddenly, that he wouldn’t. He was too swallowed by grief to even express it anymore. The imminent loss just too massive to process. “It’s a really serious talk. It might make you sad.”

Her brow furrowed. “Is it about Petey?”

“Yeah, it is.” He paused, collecting himself, pulling his thoughts together. He had to get this right the first time. There were no do-overs. “You know how Mommy and I have been saying that Petey’s really sick?”

“Mhm. And he’s been sleeping to get better.”

He forced himself not to wince. “See, baby, he hasn’t exactly been sleeping. Have you ever heard of a coma?”

“It was on the TV once, on a show Mommy was watching.”

He nodded, encouraging. “See, our brains need oxygen to work. That’s why we breathe in air. But Petey didn’t get enough air, so his brain got hurt. When our brains get hurt, they shut off to protect themselves. That’s called a coma.”

“How do we fix it?”

Here we go. The rush to the finish. “Sometimes, we can’t fix it.” He took a second to apologize, silently, for Morgan’s childhood ignorance. “Sometimes, people are so hurt that their bodies can’t work anymore.”

“What happens then?”

“Well, we can help them with machines, like the ones that are helped Petey breathe.” He gestured to the ventilator. “But if they aren’t going to get better, sometimes we decide to turn the machines off.”

“And then what happens?”

“And then they die, baby. That’s… that’s just how life works, sometimes. Everybody has a lifetime, and sometimes those lifetimes end early.”

“Petey and I found a dead butterfly in the park once,” she said abruptly. No tears. No reeling against his implications. Just a random statement.

Okay. Uh, he could roll with that.

“Yeah? Did you feel sad?”

“I guess.” She shrugged. “Petey made me feel better, though.”

“I… I bet he did.” Even through the numbness, that one hurt. He checked himself, refusing to let his composure slip even as the thoughts of he’ll never be around to make you feel better again danced in his head. “See, Petey’s too sick to heal. Miss Cho did everything she could, but sometimes even doctors can’t make people better again. So we’re all gonna spend tomorrow with him, and then Daddy and Miss May are gonna let Miss Cho turn all the machines off.”

Morgan’s eyes were wide, voice small. “And then he’ll die?”

“Yeah, baby. And then he’ll die.”

The realization dawned on her face, horrible and crushing. “So he’s… he’s not gonna play Star Wars with me anymore?”

“No, baby. He’s not gonna be able to play anything with you anymore.” He’d thought he was good, thought he wasn’t going to cry, but now he was close. “But he’ll still be your big brother. He’ll never stop being that, okay? And we won’t forget him. You can remember him and love him even though he isn’t here anymore.”

Her face twisted up, the first few tears rolling down her cheeks. “I don’t want Petey to die, Daddy.”

He pulled her into his chest, every ounce of his body aching. “I know, baby. I don’t want him to die, either.”

“Then don’t let him.”

“Daddy can’t make him stay if he wants to go, sweetheart.” I already tried. “If I could make him stay, I would.”

“Is it gonna hurt?”

“No, baby, no. It won’t hurt.”

“Do you promise?”

Yes. Yes. That’s the only promise I can give you. “Yes, sweetheart. I promise he won’t hurt even a little bit.”

“Are you and Mommy gonna die too?”

His eyes flickered up to Pepper’s. “We… We all die eventually, Morgan. But Mommy and I are gonna stick around for a long, long time, okay?”

“Okay,” she murmured. “Do you promise?”

I have to live, he realized, stomach dropping, or, at the very least, I have to survive.

“I promise.”

--

They let Morgan into Peter’s room as soon as she woke up.

She was being about as brave as a four-year-old could be, hiccupping and red-faced but otherwise calm. She didn’t scream or throw a tantrum, just climbed into Tony’s lap and took Peter’s hand, the ritual they’d perfected over the past few weeks.

“Petey,” she whispered the name in a tone that made Tony feel almost like an intruder, like this was a secret he wasn’t meant to hear, “Petey, please wake up. Please. Daddy says you’re gonna die but I don’t want you to. Wake up. Wake up.”

He dropped her forehead onto her shoulder, hiding his anguish where she couldn’t possibly see.

Oh, baby, he thought, of all the things he’d do for you, you just asked for the one thing he can’t.