Trip Back Home

Peter was bored. He was in chemistry-his last class of the day-and was ignoring Mr. Harrington’s boring lecture over elements and how they bond together. He’d already learned about this the week prior with Bruce in the lab and to say he was an expert by now would be an understatement. Currently Peter was texting Tony under his desk about what they should have for dinner, Tony said pizza and Peter said lasagna, when he was pulled back to the reality of his class with a nudge at his side. It was Ned. “Dude?!?,” Peter hissed in a hushed tone, “what was the for?” “Mr. Harrington has and “important” announcement.” Ned replied in an equally hushed tone. “Class!” Mr. Harrington called for the students who had somehow managed to get rowdy in the time it took to him to pick up a stack of papers “I have some exciting news. We’re going on a field trip this Friday!” The teacher said. “Where are we going?” One of Peters classmate asked. “Well,” Mr. Harrington started, barely containing his excitement, “Were going to Stark Industries! Here’s your permission slips. ” He stated handing out the stack of papers he had previously picked up. The class erupted into excited whispers about what they hoped to see there. Peter however was neither happy nor excited about the destination of said trip. Peter galnced over at Ned who was smiling ear to ear about the thought of getting to be in the same building as Tony Stark but when he locked eyes with Peter his smile quickly faded understanding his best friends dilemma. Peter had been living in Stark Tower for a little over 4 months. About 4 1/2 months ago Aunt May had contracted a serious illness due to working in the hospital and died shortly after, leaving Peter with no family and no where to go. Mr. Stark then took Peter to go live with him in the tower and the avengers soon became his new family, so the thought of his class going anywhere near his home terrified Peter. With a headache forming Peter let his head rest on his cool desk. “Hey Parker!” Flash taunted from across the room, “you excited? Your lie is finally going to be exposed.” Just as Peter was about to snap at Flash Ned grabbed his arm and pulled him out of the room given that the period was now over with a reminder to get the slip signed from Mr. Harrington. “Ignore him, he’s just jealous and you can prove him wrong on Friday.” “Thanks Ned.” Peter said grimly but accepted his friends encouragement. “So…what are you going to do? I mean it’s not going to go unnoticed around school if our class finds out you live at the tower with the avengers. I mean it’s awesome and all but that’s a little more than just interning and-“ Ned rambled on but stopped abruptly when he noticed Peters worried expression. “I don’t know Ned. I mean either I die from embarrassment or…” Peter thought for a second, “nope. That’s the only possible outcome of this trip.” Peter sighed as he gathers his belongings from his locker. Ned felt bad for his friend as they walked out of the front of the school and spotted Happy’s car waiting. Once they said their goodbyes and went their separate ways Peter walked to the car and came to the only reasonable he could think of. Friday was going to be the death of him.

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-Friday Morning- Peter walked into school that morning, the signed permission slip weighing heavy in his bag, and prepared to turn it in. In the days leading up to the trip Peter tried in vain to come up with an excuse as to why he couldn’t go on the trip, but when Peter thought of non he asked Pepper to sign his slip and practically begged her not to tell the others. To make matters worse Flash somehow managed to get his number and was constantly sending his messages like “your not even good enough for an internship at a gas station much less SI”, “Your a worthless liar Parker!”, and “your nothing to Tony Stark, he’s just using you to look good in the press”. Of course Peter didn’t tell anyone about Flash’s messages and due to Peter actually being a terrible liar he became very antsy whenever Mr. Stark would ask him about school which only fueled the engineers suspicions about Peter being bullied. So when Peter handed in his slip he accepted his fate and trudged up the steps of the old, musty, yellow bus that would take him back to his house. Since the trip was all day Peter hadn’t bothered with a backpack and only brought the necessary items. His phone and his earbuds. The second Peter slid into the open seat Ned had left for him he was bombarded by a string of questions from his friend but Peter ultimately decided not to answer any knowing his friend wouldn’t stop asking long enough for Peter to even get a word in. Just as Peter was about to put his earbuds in he heard a familiar taunt. “Yo Parker! Think you can get your old friend Tony Stark to get me an internship?” Flash called. At this point the entire bus had stopped what they were previously doing and took notice of the current situation. “What do you know Flash? You probably couldn’t even spell Tony Stark. “ MJ said from the seat across the isle of Peter and Ned. “Can too!” Flash retorted back “T-O-N-Y S-T-“ Just then the bus hit a large bump surprising Flash and causing him to stutter and fall from his seat and into the isle. “See,” MJ smirked, “After all Peter’s on the decalathon team and your only an alternate. A-L-T-E-R-N-A-T-E” MJ finished causing a deep blush to grace Flash’s checks making him duck his head in embarrassment. “Ok you too, that’s enough!” Mr. Harrington called from the front. Peter sighed and finished putting his earbuds in with a grateful nod twords MJ. Today was going to be a long day. _____________________________ As the bus pulled into the parking lot Peter heard his classmates conversations turn into excited whispers about the building in front of them. When they excited the bus his classmates looked and marveled at the 100 story tower that they now stood at the bottom of. Peter of course was the only one, besides MJ, who looked unimpressed given the he lived there. When the class of 20 walked in and saw who their tour guide was Peter instantly felt a little relief. It was one of the newer interns that didn’t know Peter that well named Emily. Peter and Emily had only talked a handful of times so she didn’t realize his position at the tower and how high up he really was and as far as Peter knew she thought he was a real intern. “Good Morning Midtown! My name is Emily and I’ll be your guide for today.” She said once the class was close enough. “Good Morning.” Mr. Harrington said back, “We are so excited to be here.” “Great” Emily smiled. “Let me just hand out these badges and go through security then we can start the tour.” Peter heard her say. ‘Crap’ he thought. See once Peter moved in, Mr. Stark had F.R.I.D.A.Y. start recognizing him by face so he didn’t have to always carry his badge and Peter gave Mr. Stark his badge back. ‘How am I going to explain not needing a badge to get around? I mean that’s going to raise a lot of eyebrows right?’ Peter thought. He didn’t even realize Emily was almost to him in the line until he heard her voice near him. By the time she was only two people away Peter started to nervously fidget with his hands coming to the realization the Emily Probaly hadn’t made him a badge assuming he had his own from his “internship”. As Emily handed a badge to the guy next to him Peter looked away expecting her to skip over him and go to the next person. “Oh Peter! Here’s your badge. Pepper said you left it in the lab yesterday.” She said handing him his old badge not acknowledging that it was noticeably different from the other interns badges. “T-thanks” Peter stutterd out, making a mental note to thank Pepper later for saving him from having to explain himself. When he looked around he was thankful no one noticed his different badge. Yet. “Class if you will follow me through security then we can begin.” Called out Emily _____________________________ Once everyone made it through security with only a few turned heads at F.R.I.D.A.Y recognizing Peter, Emily started to go over the tour and what they would see. “Ok students. We are splitting up the tour into parts. 25% in the morning then 75% after lunch. Since it’s nearly 10:00 thanks to the hour commute you guys experienced we will tour for about 2 hours, eat lunch, then finish the tour afterwards. So let’s begin!” Once they made it to the first stop of the tour, a floor set up a lot like a museum for the avengers and SI, that was he first time Flash saw his badge. “So Parker, how’d you manage to get that badge? I mean your too poor to pay someone to use theirs so what’d you do? Did you steal it?” He sneered. “No, I work here remember?” Peter stated as he tried to walk away but Flash grabbed his arm making him stop. “If you really work here then prove it and get me an internship too” “no” “why not Parker? Is it because it’s not real?” “Because I don’t have to” Just when it looked like Flash was ready to punch Peter he got hit in the face with a crumpled piece of paper. When both boys looked around they saw MJ drawing in her notebook trying to suppress a grin. “MJ, did you ju-“ “Ok class, time to move on!” Emily said, effectively cutting off Flash. When the class started to shuffle to the elevator flash turned back to Peter and pushed him to the ground. “This isn’t over Parker” was all he said as he walked back to the group but not before F.R.I.D.A.Y. caught it on video and sent it to the lab as the elevator door slid closed, taking them to their final destination before lunch. _____________________________ When the doors opened and the class stepped off Emily began to talk. “Class this is one of our many R&D labs. Right now we are just going to observe then after lunch we get to do an activity in one of the labs.” When the clsss stepped up the viewing glass they were in awe. All around the lab tech was being built, experiments were being conducted, and ideas were being formed. To the class it was amazing but to Peter it was boring him to death. ‘This is one of the most basic labs in the tower. If this is amazing to them then the rest of the tour will be jaw dropping.’ Peter thought. After a few minutes one of the scientists stepped outside and explained in depth about what the were doing and began to answer some questions. After about 30 minuets of questions Emily called for the last one. “Is it true that Parker is an intern here?” Flash asked in a smug voice clearly think he had won. Peter could almost hear the smirk in his voice. “Peter? Yeah he’s an intern here. In fact he’s one of the best I’ve ever seen.” The scientist confessed as Peter reddened when he felt eyes land on him. Flash however scoffed with a mumbled with an “whatever” only Peter could hear. “Now class,” Emily called gaining everyone’s attention,”time for lunch.” And with that they were back into the elevator on their way to the cafeteria. _____________________________ -Mr. Stark’s personal lab- F.R.I.D.A.Y. had to wait until Mr. Stark got out of a meeting got show him the footage she had captured. The second he got into the lab F.R.I.D.A.Y. showed him the clip and explained what happend. The second she was done Tony stormed out of the lab and into the common room where the rest of the avengers were. “We have a problem.” Tony said and the Avengers look up at him in alert. “F.R.I.D.A.Y. show them.” Before the video even had a chance to finish the team was already walking in the elevator and Tony told F.R.I.D.A.Y. to take them to the class. They were mad. Scratch the they were pissed and rightfully so and they’d be damned if they let this kid “Flash” as F.R.I.D.A.Y. had called him, lay another hand on Peter. Peter was their family, their kid, and they would do whatever it would take to protect him. They just didn’t realize how bad it had gotten between Peter and Flash.

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— Flashback — It was after school and all the halls had cleared. Peter was standing at his locker and was about to close the door when someone did it for him. “What do you want Flash?” Asked Peter slightly annoyed. He had a long day and the only thing he wanted right now was to go home and sleep. But when does Peter ever get what he wants? “What’s up Puny? I just wanted to have a little chat with ya. Look we all know you’re lying about your internship so just come clean ok?” “I’m not lying Flash. Just accept it.” Peter retorted back At this Flash pushed Peter back into the locker “Shut up! You think your entitled and can lie just because you don’t have a mommy or daddy anymore? Huh? Well you aren’t so just keep your mouth shut.” And with that Flash threw Peter down the stairs and stormed off leaving Peter littered with bruises that he told Tony were from patrol. ———————— “Ok class, let’s pack up our lunches and throw our trash away and head back up” Emily said in her usual cheery voice. “Yes Ma’am” came the monotonous responds from the class. Once they were all pulled into the elevator, and on the way to a higher level lab than before, Emily began to speak. “So I know you guys are all probably bored of hearing rules but it is a mandatory procedure for all tour guides so, while we’re are in the lab you must wear goggles and an apron at all times for safety, there will also be no: filming, touching experiments, rough housing, blah blah blah” Peter just tuned her out knowing half of the rules didn’t even exist, it may be a higher lab than before but it was still a pretty basic one, Emily was just adding these because they were high schoolers. When they arrived at the lab, Emily told the class she would scan her badge first then the others could scan theirs and go in. As Emily was attempting to scan her badge to get in she found it wasn’t working. “Crap,” she muttered “Alright class my badge isn’t working right now so I’m going to call an IT guy to come up and try to get it to work so just hang on a min.” “Can’t you override it?” Ned leaned over and whispered. “Well yeah I can, but to them I’m just an intern so I shouldn’t be able to” “Oh ok” “Say Peter,” Flash piped up, “Can’t you use your badge? Ya know since you work here and all?” He said with devilish glint in his eyes “Yeah Peter, use your badge.” Said a familiar voice. A very familiar voice. When Peter looked up he saw none other than the billionaire whose been raising him for the past few months. Tony Stark. He had his hand clasped over Flash’s shoulder, who was looking very full of himself, “I’m willing to bet money his badge won't work anyways. I doubt he even works here.” Flash said to Tony, his smirk never faltering. “I guess we’ll just have to see.” Tony said with a smirk of his own but Peter could tell it had a different meaning from the one Flash wore. “O-O-Ok sure th- sure thing M-M-Mr. St-t-ark” Peter stuttered out while silently curing both Flash and Tony. He walked up and swiped his card, “Override Protocol?” Said an automated voice that didn’t belong to F.R.I.D.A.Y. “Yes, Override protocol.” Peter responded back a little shaky and very aware of the eyes that lingered on him when the door opened with a ‘woosh’. Flash, who was still next to Mr. Stark, stared wide-eyed as said billionaire let go and walked toward the the door.” Alright then class,” Mr. Stark said waving his hand in a motion letting Emily know she could leave and he would be taking over the tour. “Let’s head in.”< When Emma started to leave she looked back at Peter and they shared a fearful look. Peter gulped, scared about was coming. Once inside Peter chanced a look around the room and to his surprise everything looked normal. Or so he thought “Alright class please find a seat. One of my friends is going to pass out a test. It’s an IQ test to see if there any potential employees in here.” Everyone perked up and started to look around excitedly, everyone except for Peter. “You’ll have 20 minutes to complete the test then after we will start the real fun. “I've got this in the bag. After they see my score there’s no way they could deny me an internship.” Peter heard Flash say smugly to his friends. Apparently Tony heard it too because he responded “‘I wouldn’t be too sure about that Eugene.” Mr. Stark said with a glare but quickly flashed his million dollar smile. Just then none other than Captain America walked in holding a stack of papers. “Thanks Cap, they each get one.” Tony said as Steve passed them out. “Begin.” And with that the only sound in the lab was the sound pencil on paper. When Peter looked down at his paper he had to physically keep himself from face palming. The test was only 5 questions but those 5 questions were all advanced chemistry. A.K.A things these high schoolers couldn’t even hope to understand. Of course Peter understood it, in fact he could do all this in his head but that’s because he’s Peter. Peter who has worked alongside and even challenged the minds of Tony Stark and Bruce Banner. Peter looked back up and glared at Mr. Stark who just gave him a silent “what?” With a as Peter just glared harder and shook his head trying to hide the smile he had at his mentors antics. When he looked around at his classmates he saw worry and panic on all of their faces. He just laughed silently to himself and looked back up at Mr. Stark who was also silently laughing. They locked eyes and Mr. Stark winked at Peter much to his confusion but Peter didn’t have time to question it because just then the timer went off. Peter looked at his paper and quickly jotted down the answers without any work “Ok class” Tony started, “pass your papers to the front. While those are being graded we are gonna work on a little project for two of our avengers. *whistles* Widow, Legolas!” The two master assassins walked in and the whole room quieted. The class looked at them in awe but didn’t dare to look them in the eye, everyone except Peter, once again. He sent a small wave in their direction to which they discreetly returned. “Dang, I was expecting a standing ovation, you guys are lame.” Barton joked which earned him a jab at his side from Natasha. “Zip it bird brain you’re here for looks.” Tony quipped back jokingly and started laughing when Barton stuck his tongue out at the mentor. “So we will divide into 2 groups and one will work on designs for new widow bites and the other will work on designs for Hawkeye’s arrows. Whichever group has the best idea wins!” While the two groups worked the 4 avengers stood off to the side looking pretty proud of themselves, like they just created a million dollar question and were the only ones who knew the answer. ————————————- “Alright stop” Mr. Stark said and both groups presented their design ideas. The group Flash was in was tasked with the arrow design and although they had 45 minutes to come up with one simple design, Flash had shot down every idea the group came up with saying they were useless. Needless to say they had nothing to show for their ideas, and Flash was to blame. Peters group actually had a good idea that impressed both Mr. Stark and Natasha with their design. Mr. Stark deemed them the “winners” and promised to build their design to see if it would’ve worked as Natasha agreed to test it out. “Now that that’s over we have graded your tests and have the results back.” As Mr. Stark read through the results Peter was at the back of the group trying to shrink into the floor, already knowing what was coming. Flash wouldn’t get the IQ level he would want and combined with losing the competition would probably lash out and Peter would be who he turned to to blame. ‘Great’ Peter thought, ‘in front of my family too’ “Eugene Thompson” Mr. Stark’s voice pulled him out of his thoughts, “103” “I knew it! I’m the best! Take that Parker! I’ll come see you after the tour so we can discuss my future here.” Flash called out smugly. “Hold up now son.” Cap said “For starters we don’t accept behavior like that here.” “Nor do we accept egotistical brats.” Natasha chimed in. “Not to mention the fact that we don’t even consider accepting someone with that low of an IQ.” Said Tony “And most we certainly don’t accept bullies here” said Bucky as he walked into the room, metal arm gleaming, with Wanda hot on his heels, hands already glowing red. If looks could kill, Flash would be dead a thousand times over based from the glares he was getting from the avengers, and Pepper wasn’t even in the room...yet. “B-B-But how? Peter works here and there is no way Puny Parker over there is smarter than me.” Flash said, obviously not knowing when to quit. “What did you just call him?” Said Pepper who seemed to have just appeared out of nowhere and looking mad enough for all the avengers combined. “Let me educate you Eugene since you clearly can't do it for yourself. Peter, my son, has an IQ of over 141. He already has a full paid scholarship to MIT, works right beside some of the greatest minds in the world, and he still has time to give back to the community with a charity he created for the homeless. So I’m sorry you’ve been miss lead here but we don’t ever want someone like you working here. Leave.” By the time Pepper finished her jaw was locked and she was seething through gritted teeth. Flash who looked like he was about to wet himself ran to the door but to his horror it was being held closed by Wanda. “Don’t you have something to say to Peter?” She asked. “I’m s-so sor-sorry. I didn’t know. I-I’ll never b-b-bother you again.” Flash said red-faced and looking like he was close to tears. With his apology said Wanda opened the door and Flash ran off. Pepper turned to Mr. Harrington, who had remained quiet throughout the whole ordeal, “The tour is over, so please guide your class out and if I find out you let another kid get bullied in your class ever again, I will personally pay your boss a visit and see to it that your teaching license is suspended.” “Also Peter is staying with us.” Said Barton from beside Natasha. At that the class, who still look shocked at what just went down, scurried out the door and into the elevator. All that were left were Peter, Pepper, Tony, and the other avengers. Pepper took a calming breath and turned to face the group, “How about some ice cream and a movie?” A chorus of “sure” and “sounds good to me” filled the room as they too left the lab. —————————— Monday When school rolled around the next Monday Peter was a little nervous about what would happen. What would people say? What would they think? However he didn’t have time to worry about it as he arrived at his locker and waited for Ned and MJ. After he got his books and closed his locker he locked eyes with Flash from across the hall. Peter instinctively cowered away but it was Flash who broke the eye contact and scurried down the hall and away from Peter as fast as his legs would carry him. Flash’s group of friends looked up and started walking toward where he ran off. As they passed Peter he braced himself for a shove or snarky comment from the group but all he got was a “sup Parker” from some of the guys. Maybe, just maybe, the field trip wasn’t so bad after all.