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The air was sterile, smelling of medical-grade cleaner and disinfectant. The room was a decent size, anything smaller and the machines surrounding the bed wouldn't fit. The breath was caught in Peter's throat as he stood in the doorframe of the hospital room. In the bed lies his mentor, father figure, Tony Stark. He had been cleaned up the last time Peter had seen him lying up against the shrapnel pile on that ugly battlefield that had once been the Compound. All except for the dark skin taking over his arm and up to his shoulder.
"Peter," The voice sounded weak, almost hollow with grief. His eyes followed the sound actually to see Pepper Potts Stark beside Tony. She was disheveled, traces of tears on her face from the previous crying that Peter had not been a witness to. "Come in darling." She waved him over. It almost felt like an intrusion. The sixteen-year-old swallowed as his sock-covered feet carried him into the room. It had only been a day; Tony had been rushed to the tower that he bought back after the Blip. Peter was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that five years had passed and that he had been dead during that time. When they got to the tower, his dad mentor had been rushed into the Med Bay. Peter had been shuffled up to the penthouse. It was all a haze, he had been in and out, numb to everything. But then Cap had handed him a set of clothes, after almost twenty-four hours, and pushed him to the bathroom to take a shower and wash away all of the blood, dirt, and grim that had clung to his skin. Now here Peter stood, wet hair with a towel around his neck, a pair of loose sweatpants, and a shirt that he knew without a doubt was Tony’s from the oil stains to the smell of cedar, something burnt, and a touch of his Dior Sauvage Eau de parfum. (That’s how he swore Tony had always smelt).
Pepper was quick to gently catch the boy’s wrist, pulling him ever closer to her. “It’s so good to have you back.” She whispered into his curly hair as she hugged him tight like he might turn into dust once more.
“I-it’s good to be back.” He choked out as his arms wrapped around her. He didn’t feel like he had been gone. Of course, the memory of the pain from his atoms burning into ash one by one was still there, but no time had passed for him, just like he had blinked and was five years in the future.
“He would be happy that you’re here.” Peter sucked in a shallow breath and his eyes trailed over to the bed.
“Can I be here for a while?”
“As long as you want, Peter. Please, I know he would enjoy you being here with him, even if he isn’t awake.” She pulled back and gently cupped his cheeks, running her thumb along his jawline for a moment before pulling away and moving to the side, letting Peter sit in the chair that she had been in minutes before. “I have to go real quick, but I’ll be back.” She pressed a kiss to his forehead and then moved to leave the room. Leaving Peter and Tony by themselves.
Peter looked back over at Tony and let out a watery sigh. Reaching over his fingers curled around his mentor’s good hand, grasping it like a lifeline. “You have to wake up, Mr. Stark.” He commanded, forceful with his words. “I need-… We need you to wake up!” Sniffling, he turned to the side as he tried to stop the tears that had just started falling.
“I love you, dad. Because that’s what you are, my dad. So please wake up for me.”
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Three months had passed, and Peter was still growing used to everything that had changed. To start, Morgan Stark. She was a whirlwind of chaos but was so sweet and innocent. Peter would die for her or kill for her or both, if need be, no doubt about it. The four-year-old had become glued to his hip from the first time they had met.
Peter had been sitting next to Tony’s hospital bed when the door flung open, slamming against the wall. In ran a small figure, bolting right up to him, screaming “PETEY!” The girl clambered onto his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck. He was frozen to the spot. He didn’t know this child. Why did she know his name?
“Daddy told me all about you! He said you were gone, but now you’re back and we can play together! Oh oh! And we can dress up and- “
“Morgan Stark, young lady, how many times have I told you not to run off? " Pepper stood in the doorway in all her glory. Peter looked between the young girl and Pepper for a moment before it clicked, his eyes widening as he glanced at Tony’s prone form. No way, no way, no way! His mentor had a child. Why did his heartache like that?
“But Mommy, you said Petey was here, so I needed to see my big brother!” She stressed the word ‘needed’ as if she might just drop dead otherwise. But that wasn’t what caught Peter so off guard, it was the fact that she had called him her brother. Him? A big brother? He raised his eyebrow as he looked at Pepper, hoping for an explanation of what was going on. The woman just gave a soft smile and nodded.
“I see, well maybe you should tell Petey who you are. After all, you just ran up to him without saying anything about yourself. “The young girl let out a huff, grumbling a bit. But then she was glancing back at him with large doe brown eyes.
“I’m Morgan. Daddy said that you wouldn’t know me because you were gone for so long, but I forgive you. Now you’re back so you get to be the best big brother because I’m your little sister.” She said it with so much confidence and so blatantly as if he should already know all this. And that is how he ended up caring for his baby sister.
How she always looked at him like he hung the moon never failed to stop him in his tracks. The two had become thicker than thieves, Pepper and May watching as they grew ever closer in their sibling bond. He would try to tune out the two when they would start to talk, having overheard plenty of conversations that ended with the two women in tears.
“Tony would love to see them together.” He had once heard and had to block out the rest before he, himself, gave into tears and grief. Tony was still in a coma. They had removed his arm within the first few days of his being in the Med Bay. It was killing him, and the doctors said that he would never be able to use it again, even if it wasn’t killing him. Now when Peter visited it felt like guilt was swallowing him whole. If only he had been quicker on those battlegrounds, maybe then Tony wouldn’t be in that bed, wouldn’t have lost his arm, or wouldn’t be in a coma. It should have been him that snapped, not Tony.
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Second was Pepper Potts Stark. He needed to get used to her new last name, after all, she and Tony were married now. Besides the point, before the Blip, he never really interacted with her. She was the CEO of Stark's tech company after all, so why would he? Tony also kept the two of them cramped in the lab all day, most of the time. And sure, every now and then she would join them for the occasional lab, turned movie, night but they just didn't hang out like that. So, he was surprised when not only did she open the tower to him, but also to May, allowing them to move into an unused floor due to the lack of housing in New York after the non-existent part of the population was snapped back to reality. Not only that, but she revealed that he had his own room in the penthouse and that she would rather that he stay close "For Morgan's sake", she had said, but the way that she had said it seemed like she also wanted him close.
She included him in everything that she and Morgan did, not leaving him out any. They went to the zoo together and watched movies on the huge couch in the living room of the penthouse. He would tag along with her, down to the office, when Morgan was at preschool. And at some point, in his head, he had begun to call her mom because she had taken up that role. Part of him felt guilt for putting Pepper in the role, because after all May had raised him, but even then, she didn't make him feel the same way that Pepper did. Sure, she loved him, and he knew that she would do anything for him, but he knew that she was just his aunt, there was a slight difference between Aunt May and a mom. And sometimes at night, after Pepper and Morgan fell asleep watching a movie, he would sit up on the couch and let his heart feel full of the fact that he had a family now. But then the ach would return when he remembered that his dad was a few floors down in a coma.
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That’s where he found himself once more. This time he had carried in a vase full of carnations and sunflowers, setting it on the table beside the hospital bed. They had moved Tony to a bigger room just a week after the battle. Some sort of attempt at comfort had been made due to the fact that they had changed the sheets on the bed to ones matching Tony and Pepper’s bed, and Tony’s pillows had been brought down and propped behind his head. The color was slowly coming back to Tony’s pale skin. It was a bit of a relief to see that, but it never changed the guilt that Peter felt.
He reached down to grab Tony’s hand, intertwining their fingers as his other hand came down to grasp at him a bit firmer. “Hey, Dad.” He would never admit to calling him that, but the word slipped out more and more, even more so when Morgan insisted that the teen call ‘their daddy’ by dad and not his given name. “He’s our dad silly, Petey-pie.” That was all she would say.
“You’ve been asleep for a really long time. I know that you’re a drama queen, but I think you’re taking this to an extreme, don’t you?” He breathed out a sigh through his nose, sniffling a bit as he stared at his mentor’s comatose form. “We really miss you. Won’t you please wake up? You know, you missed Christmas… and New Years.” His fingers curled a bit tighter as he still received no reaction. “I love you, Dad. You need to wake up soon, people are expecting you.” He left, still feeling as empty and numb as when he came.
Two weeks later he was back in that room, reading over a textbook, face twisted as he tried to concentrate on the material. He groaned as he tossed the book into the chair next to him. They had told him that day that they weren’t sure if Tony was going to wake up, and that hurt. He wanted to scream and tear the world apart. Heck invent time travel (how ironic) just to get Tony to wake up. Glancing up at the still figure he puffed.
“Tony, please, if you don’t do it for me, do it for Morgan. Wake up!” Warm tears trailed down his cheeks as he was now glaring. The pain, the grief, it was transforming into something ugly, anger. He was angry that Tony wouldn’t wake up. It wasn’t fair that Peter had to sit here and watch over him while not being able to do anything. “I’m mad at you. I’m mad that you were so nice to me. I hate that you just took me under your wing without any thought to how I felt, or how it would affect me. I’m mad that every time I look up to you, all I see is a hero, someone who taught me to be a man. And not just any man, but a good and kind man. I hate that I must hear Pepper and Morgan cry because you’re being so selfish and won’t wake up!” His chest was heaving as he sobbed. He didn’t hate Tony; Peter never could hate him. And he wasn’t really mad, he was just saying that, trying to express everything but the anger was taking over. His glare had found the floor as he twisted his hands together. “Sorry, didn’t mean that. I’m not angry, just worried.” Was all he could say into the stale air as if Tony could hear him.
“One.. hell of.. of a confession… there, kid.”
Peter’s head snapped up, and there in all his awake glory was Tony Stark. A sob rippled through Peter’s throat as he stood up so abruptly that his chair fell backward and he was in Tony’s bed, grasping at him, wrapping his arms around the billionaire.
“Woah! Kid.” Tony shifted a bit as he too wrapped his single arm around the teen.
“I love you, Dad! I missed you so much, and all you did was sleep!” The teen was sobbing into the man’s good shoulder. Tony swore his heart had stopped, dad, that’s what he was, a dad. To both of his kids, but to hear Peter say it after not seeing him but briefly after five years of moruning him, that was like his heart was being squeezed with joy.
“Please don’t ever leave me again!”
“Don’t worry Pete, I won’t be going anywhere for a long time.”
And Tony meant that, now that he had his first child, his son, back on this Earth, breathing and alive, he was going to fight like hell to stay with his family. He would have to lose his own life before he ever left any of them again.