Chapter Text

“I’m guessing this is how he got out?”

The cop’s flat look is answer enough. Sam turns back to the large iron fence at the entrance of Green-Wood cemetery. The bars are bent apart like spaghetti strands, leaving a wide gap in the middle. Sam pokes at one, but it doesn’t budge; still hard as steel. “And he definitely bent the metal by hand, didn’t carry some sort of device with him?”

“Definitely by hand,” she says. “I’ll have the security footage forwarded to you. Our best guess, the perp is a young, white male, below average height. I’ll have them send you the autopsy report as well, Captain.”

“Thanks.” Sam glances back at Bucky, who stands right next to the spot where the victim was found and stares down at a patch of grass between the grave stones. The victim was young, late thirties. Strangled with a garrote, according to the security footage. “You said the killer left a message?”

“Walk with me.”

They move to the parking lot, Sam waving for Bucky to follow. The cop halts by her car and takes out a see-through plastic bag with a piece of paper inside. Letters, cut out from magazines to spell out:

NYU WOT TRU WOK JZY VOW UPY YOZ VLU NVY UVQ WRY ZUU URK

“What does it mean?”

“It’s Swedish for ‘I’m a young, white male, below average height’,” the cop says. “How should I know what it means? We’re sending a copy over to the FBI to be decoded, but you can have the original. You guys are handling this file, yes? I can scratch it off my to-do list?”

“Scratch away.”

-

A killer who leaves a coded message at the scene, is not a killer who acts on impulse. He must have been planning ahead, which means he likely chose his victim for a specific reason.

Sam and Bucky spend the next three days talking to all of the victim’s contacts. None of them can think of anyone who might have a grudge against her.

“Young white male, below average height,” Sam says as he sits at his kitchen table and thumbs through the file, for probably the one hundredth time. “That’s what were going with. Though I saw the footage and both “young” and “male” is TBD if you ask me. Impossible to really tell. So bottom line is, we don’t really know anything.”

“Intelligent.” Bucky says from the couch. “A killer who leaves a puzzle at the scene is intelligent. And psychopathic.” He is watching TV with the sound off. It supposedly helps him to ‘think outside the box’.

“It could be forensic countermeasures,” Sam judges. “The perp just stuck some random letters on a piece of paper because he knew it would cost us manpower to try and figure out what it says. Whatever supposed cryptology expert they have over at the FBI, they still haven’t cracked it.”

“Cryptology expert.” Bucky says. “Can you get a degree in cryptology?”

Sam shrugs and scratches his chin.

“Idea.” Bucky turns the TV off. “Young white male, below average height,” he says. “Young white male who loves coded messages. We walk into the, ah, the cryptology wing of NYU and we’ll find a lecture hall full of ‘em.”

“Okay,” Sam says slowly. “And then what? Background check on every single one of them?”

“No. We show them the coded message. We ask them for help. We ask really nicely. And if someone gives us the answer, we have either found our killer, or we’re at least a step closer to solving the case.”

“Why would the killer help us decode the message?”

“He left it for a reason.” Bucky says. “He wants to be found. Psychopath. He likes the thrill, the cat and mouse. I bet he’ll start drooling at the thought of helping the police finding himself. I bet he’ll get a real kick out of it. The first word of the code is literally ‘NYU’. That might be a coincidence, but what if it’s not?”

“It’s not bad thinking,” Sam judges. “And we got nothing else. I’ll see if I can contact a professor who teaches there.”

-

Sam’s evening support group for Vietnam War veterans runs late that evening.

Eugene shuffles up to him when he is stacking the chairs. “Hey, guess who just moved into the room next door to mine?” he asks excitably. “Steve Rogers. How old is he now, more than one hundred years?”

“106,” Sam says, straightening. “But I— what?”

“We played checkers together last night. Very amiable man.”

“But don’t you live in a….”

“Well, yes,” Eugene says, and his face suddenly falls. “Shit. Didn’t you know? I shouldn’t have… Sorry.” He makes a hasty retreat.

When Sam gets home, Bucky is sitting on his couch again, staring at the wall, pressing the remote against his chin. The TV is off.

“Did Steve call you tonight?” Sam asks.

“Last night.”

“Is he still living in that same place? Did he move?”

“Not that I know. Why?”

“Just.” Sam says. “Just thinking about it.”

-

Turns out you can’t get a degree in cryptology. But NYU does offer a course in ‘Cryptography and Cryptanalysis’ for students of engineering and computer science. And on the phone, the lecturer had sounded rather enthusiastic about letting Sam have the floor for five minutes to ask her students for help on a real-life cryptology problem.

Sam left out the part where one of her students might be a psychopathic killer.

“You really think one of these skinny nerds is our perp?” Sam asks as he peers through the window in the double door to see into the lecture hall.

“I think I’m gonna keep my eyes open while you explain. Read their reactions.”

“How about I leave the public speaking part to you?”

“How about I serve your lasagna with little pieces of broken glass tonight?”

Sam grins.

The door is pushed open.

“Captain America,” the professor says, a little out of breath.

Sam winces at the title. “Just Sam is fine.”

“Come in, come in. I’ve finished my lecture.”

Bucky lingers near the doorway, his dark eyes scanning every face in the room as Sam steps up to the lectern and explains their case as succinctly as possible: Suspect of a crime left a coded message. FBI hasn’t solved it yet. The Avengers would be much obliged to anyone who can help them crack it. Sam writes the full code out on the black board, and the students diligently copy it down. Some look fascinated, some look bored.

“I opened an email account,” Sam adds, scribbling down [email protected] below the encrypted message. He hears Bucky snort behind him. “I’m hoping to hear from one of you.”

The professor thanks them and the students start filtering out.

A woman with short, blonde hair and combat boots shuffles past. “Good luck. Cryptography courses at NYU are a joke,” she informs Sam with a sniff. “I wanted to go to MIT, didn’t get in.”

She walks on without pause.

Her offhand remark makes Sam think, though. He waits until they got back to their car before sharing. “You think we should go to MIT as well? Cast the net a little wider. We won’t find our perp there, but maybe someone who knows the solution to the code.”

Bucky shrugs his consent.

“You know, MIT is only a short drive away from—”

“I’m not visiting Stark.” Bucky says.

-

“How do you always talk me into shit like this?” Bucky asks as he looks out over the lake. Ahead of them, the trees part and Pepper and Tony’s lake house comes into view.

“Come on, Buck. This is a murder investigation. It’s been three days and the FBI came up with diddly squat. We’d be negligent if we didn’t at least try to set the world’s best AI to work on our little coded message.”

Sam parks the car, turns off the engine.

Bucky’s knees wobble up and down. “How many times have you visited Stark? After he snapped Thanos away?”

“Three of four times.”

“Does he look really sick? Because I don’t like being around people who look really sick.”

“It’s been three years.”

“Yeah, but I heard he still can’t walk.”

Sam sighs and bounces his head back against the headrest. “Do you want to stay in the car? Because honestly, it’s just in and out. It’s not like I need you as back-up.”

“You’re making it sound like I’m scared,” Bucky says, offended, and he promptly gets out.

Sam follows.

-

“I’m insulted,” Tony tells them as he stands on his front porch, leaning on a cane, “to the deepest of my core. That you waited four entire days to present me with such a finger-licking case. Wormholes, flying cities, infinity stones. That’s all very well. But a killer who leaves riddles. There’s a case I’ll actually get out of bed for.” His hand trembles a little as it grips around his cane, but he looks better than the last time Sam saw him. The maniacal grin on his face is simultaneously making it better and worse.

“Hey.” Bucky says. “I see you can walk, now.”

“I’m not walking, just standing,” Tony says, “Pepper wheeled me out here on one of those hand trucks when we saw you pull up. Just kidding, I’m great at walking now. I can do almost half a mile without passing out. Coffee, Mr. and Mrs. Barnes?”

“We’re in and out,” Sam says. “Just to debrief you. Then we’re driving on to MIT to talk to their students. We’ll return here afterwards. Hopefully you’ll have found something by then.”

“Sure,” Tony says. “You’ll join for dinner, then?”

Sam doesn’t remember Tony Stark being so hospitable.

“Okay.” Bucky says, standing a little straighter. “We will join you for dinner.”

-

The MIT professor teaching cryptography had been equally easy to persuade. “Could we just have the final five minutes of you lecture?” Sam had asked him on the phone.

“You can have the first five,” the man said. “You can have the whole lecture. Practical application is vital, Captain America.”

“Just ‘Sam’ is fine.”

So Sam waits by the old-fashioned blackboard, feeling somewhat uncomfortable as students shuffle inside, stare, whisper, and pretend to take selfies while they actually take videos of him. Bucky stands off to the side again, still as a statue.

Sam picks up a piece of chalk and jots down the entire encrypted message. “This,” he explains, turning back towards them, “is a code we found at a crime scene, left by our suspect.”

The door swings open and another student shuffles inside, but freezes near the door.

“Mr. Parker,” the professor says, voice snide. “Late again.”

“Uhhh,” the young man says, tugging at his oversized scarf, eyes huge as he stares at Sam. “I—”

“Sit down.”

Mr. Parker turns and takes a few more steps, then freezes again when he spots Bucky leaning against the wall.

“This is a code we found at a crime scene, left by our suspect.” Sam repeats, as their latecomer squeezes into a seat, a flush high on his cheeks. “FBI experts have been at it for several days, but found nothing - - -“

-

“You had a fanboy.” Bucky says matter-of-factly when they drive back to Tony’s lake house, only forty miles west of Boston. “You should have brought signed pictures.”

“Signed pictures.”

“Signed pictures make people happy, I’ve seen it.”

“I’m never sure if you’re kidding when you say shit like that.”

Bucky gives him a somewhat bewildered look.

-

Tony is on the front porch again when they pull up; sitting in a chair with several blankets piled on top of him, a tablet propped up in his lap. “FRIDAY,” he says. “Please let Pepper know our esteemed guests are back.”

“Done,” her voice sounds from the tablet.

He waves a hand at the cooler standing at his feet. “There’s beer right here. It’s non-alcoholic. Placebooze. Basically lemonade.”

“I’ll have some lemonade,” Sam takes the lid of the cooler and passes one to Bucky. “Found anything?”

Tony hands him a piece of paper torn from a notepad. “Friday ran through a few thousand possibilities. And then came up with this.”

S U N A T M O U N T H O P E

Sam sits on the wooden bench next to him and squints down at the piece of paper. “Sun at Mount Hope? That still sounds like code. What’s Mount Hope?”

FRIDAY kicks in. “Mount Hope is a mountain rising to 3,239 meters, forming the central and highest peak of the—”

“Thank you ma’am.” Bucky says.

“So it doesn’t mean anything to you?” Tony asks. “Doesn’t relate to anything you’ve found so far?”

“No.”

“Keep scanning, FRIDAY,” Tony says, rapping his fingers against his armrest. “There’s probably more than one Mount Hope on this little blue planet. Look for coordinates, definitely look for sunrise times, anything that seems like it might be a next part in the code.”

“Scanning,” FRIDAY confirms.

“What about this?” Sam says, waving the piece of paper. “Not that I don’t have absolute faith in your AI, but how exactly does the original code translate into this?”

“I have her findings here,” Tony swipes through his tablet. “It was a two-step translation. The first step was changing each letter into their equivalent number. N equals 24, etcetera. Each sequence of three letters turns into a sequence of six digits. The first letters ‘NYU’ becomes ’14 25 21’. Step two was matching each digit to the braille alphabet, which uses a combination of six dots. Even numbers stand for raised dots. In ‘14 25 21’ the second, third and fifth numbers are even. In braille, that translates to the letter ‘S’ which has a raised second, third and fifth dot. And tadaa, you got your first letter.”

“Jesus on a pogo stick,” Sam says. “How’s anyone ever supposed to figure that out? Can you forward that to me?”

“Yup,” Tony says, tapping at the screen again. “Good luck figuring out the next step, because it seems even FRIDAY is stuck on the exact meaning. Maybe as you get more clues about this case the message will start making sense.”

Sam takes out his phone to check his inbox and nods when he sees the message from Tony appear. “Have you heard anything about suspicious enhanced activity in New York? Even vague rumors?”

“That sort of information rarely makes its way to me anymore,” Tony says. “My current contacts in New York? Happy, who dedicated himself to some sort of charity work. I don’t know, something with the elderly. And Steve, who now is part of the elderly, with all the accompanying topics of interest: weather and ‘the good old days’.” His eyes flick to Bucky. “You’re still in touch with him, right?”

“Phone calls every night,” Sam says. “Like an old married couple being apart for the first time in their lives.”

“Phone calls maybe twice a week.” Bucky corrects with an eye roll. “And we never talk shop either. He usually talks about his gardening. I like it. It relaxes me.”

“He’s coming over for dinner next week,” Tony says. “You’re welcome to join. Little reunion.”

Sam knows Steve has only visited Tony once before, shortly after the man woke up from his coma. So this visit feels significant. All the more so, because Steve apparently just moved in next door to Eugene… And Eugene lives in a care home for veterans with a terminal illness. Bucky doesn’t even know, but Sam knows, which feels like the sort of thing Bucky might hold against him later.

He fiddles with his phone, idly checks the inbox of his ‘helpsam’ email address and— “Oh. Well. That’s. That’s certainly impressive.”

“What?”

Sam wordlessly turns the screen of his phone so the other two can see.

Hello Mr. Wilson, it reads. You were in my class today. I hope this helps. I translated your code into ‘sunatmounthope.’ Don’t know what that could mean. Probably still code, but not the kind a cryptographer can solve. Kind regards, Peter.

“Who’s that?” Tony asks. “Some college kid, are you kidding me? Who is that?”

Sam shrugs. “Peter.”

“Peter who?”

“I don’t know the name of every kid in that class!”

“You don’t know the name of any kid in that class.” Bucky corrects him.

“FRIDAY,” Tony pushes himself up in his chair with visible effort. “A Peter who is taking MIT’s cryptography courses. Get me a full name.”

“Browsing. Stand by. Peter Parker. Double major in mathematics and chemical engineering. In his third year. He also writes for the Boston Chronicle and works as a tour guide at Backroad Discovery Tours.”

“Oh.” Bucky says. “The latecomer. The fanboy.”

Tony hums. “FRIDAY, tell Pepper she should get him hired for Stark Industries before the competition gets him.”

“Tell her yourself,” FRIDAY says, and Sam almost chokes on his beer.

“Yeah, she does that now,” Tony sags back in his chair. “Pepper has been teaching her a thing or two. She thinks it’s hysterical. Pepper, that is. FRIDAY still hasn’t developed much of a sense of humor.”

“Knock, knock,” FRIDAY says.

“Pepper still works at SI?” Sam asks. “I thought you had both winked out. Cho took over?”

“Yup,” Tony says. “The difference is, I don’t really think about it anymore. But she’s still on the phone with Helen almost every day to talk about whatever. I don’t think she ever really wanted to quit. But she had me lying around the house like a sack of potatoes, so there wasn’t much choice.” Tony was comatose for three weeks after using the gauntlet, and had to relearn almost everything, from walking to speaking. “I don’t know how she did it,” Tony says. “Sometimes she says she doesn’t know how she did it, either. How she managed to help me with my morning exercises and drive Morgan to school every day. I can’t help her retell it; I still have huge gaps in my memory like it’s the Grand Canyon up in there. But she clearly managed somehow. Because I’m walking and Morgan is not yet a college drop-out.”

“Not yet, because she’s nine.”

“Hey. My daughter is a prodigy. She taught herself how to tie her shoe laces when she was six.”

“Yes, Stark. You’ve told me that story.”

-

Sam used to have a cat that he got from the asylum. She had a bit of a history with people, and he was not allowed to come anywhere near her. If he tried to pet her, no matter how slowly or carefully, she would hiss and scratch. But despite that, she always wanted to be in the same room as him. When he went into the kitchen, she went into the kitchen. When he went to sleep, she’d sit on top of the blankets. When he went out, she’d be waiting by the door when he got home.

Bucky is exactly that type of house guest. Everything about him screams lone wolf. But here he is, sitting in Pepper’s armchair with his feet propped up, a plate full of pralines on the table in front of him, looking like he wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.

It reminds Sam of the stories Steve told him about his childhood. When Bucky was the sociable one. The extrovert to Steve’s introvert. How they were entirely different, yet entirely inseparable.

But Steve still hasn’t told Bucky he is dying.

“You have that look again.” Bucky waves his fingers in the general direction of Sam’s face.

“What.”

Bucky has another praline. “Turn that frown upside down.”

-

They have dinner inside, by a roaring fire. Tony eats a normal sized portion, but slowly. Pepper is eating at an equally slow pace; like she doesn’t want Tony to feel awkward.

“We have guestrooms,” Tony says when he catches Sam glancing down at his watch.

It’s weird. They haven’t been much of a group since they defeated Thanos. Tony retired, Steve retired, Nat died, Vision died, Wanda went AWOL. Bruce is around, but became an out-and-out pacifist and refuses to do anything other than advise them. The only person Sam can really call for back-up is Rhodey.

But apparently Tony thinks now is the time to become a team player. Maybe that’s what a near-death experience does to a man.

“Okay.” Bucky says. “We will stay in your guestrooms.”

Morgan claps her hands excitedly. “Yes! We never do sleepovers anymore!”

-

“Sorry about the dust,” Pepper says. “I don’t think anyone has ever used this room. Let me open a window. Bathroom is across the hall. It’s going to be a chilly night but there’s extra blankets here in the— oh.” She has pulled the wardrobe door open and frowns. She reaches inside and takes out a blue hoodie, holding it up in front of her. It has an emblem with the words Midtown Tech written below it. “Don’t know where that came from.” She tucks it under her arm. “There, top shelf. I’m taking one to Bucky’s room, because I don’t think there’s any spare blankets in there.”

-

Sam leans against the doorpost of his guestroom until the bathroom door opens and Bucky emerges, toothbrush in hand. Bucky pauses and stares back at him. “So why ‘helpsam’?” he asks.

Sam shifts on his feet. “Huh?”

“The email address. Why not ‘helpcap’?”

“Does it matter?”

Bucky gives him a look like he thinks it does.

“I was thinking,” Sam says. “It was your theory that our perp might be a cryptology student. That he might be among the very people we’re asking for help. And now this Parker kid solves it, faster than any FBI expert. Does that make him a suspect?”

“No.” Bucky shakes his head. “I mean. Rule nothing out. But I was talking about students doing cryptology at NYU. Some kid at MIT has nothing to do with murders happening in New York. Makes no sense.”

“All right. So we won’t be paying him a visit.”

“Nope.” Bucky says. “Were going back home tomorrow. Massachusetts is too damn cold.”

-

Sam crawls out of bed before sunrise. He can hear Bucky snoring through the wall that separates their rooms.

He throws on a sweater and makes his way downstairs. Tony is already at the kitchen table under a dim light. In front of him is a cup of tea and his laptop. The blue hoodie Pepper found last night is hanging over the back of a chair.

“This Parker kid,” Tony says without even looking up from his screen. “This kid, Sam…”

“Don’t tell me you’ve been up all night googling him, Pepper will blame me,” Sam says. “I’m not really interested in him anymore.”

“I am,” Tony says. “And I don’t google, thank you very much. I have my own search engines. Forget about the coded message, the kid is the real riddle. I can’t figure it out. FRIDAY can’t get a coherent description on him, his records are… I don’t know, it’s like he barely exists. No birth certificate, but the date of birth he gave on his MIT application suggest that he is twenty years old. Twenty-five, actually, but it seems he snapped. And there’s something about how he was emancipated at seventeen because he was orphaned… but I can’t find any data on parents or other past guardians.”

“Odd,” Sam agrees. “Does FRIDAY often have trouble finding people’s information?”

“Absolutely never. I’m beginning to think he’s a North Korean spy or something. Although they usually do a better job at creating a fake background profile. And get this — If he didn’t lie on his MIT application form, he went to high school in New York. Certainly has roots there. Maybe still visits, for the occasional killing spree.”

“Sounds like I should be paying him a visit, after all,” Sam says.

“I’m coming,” Tony says.

“Pepper won’t approve.”

“I don’t need her permission!” He throws a quick glance over his shoulder and adds in a lower voice: “Let’s go right away, though, before she wakes up.”

Chapter Text

Peter hums as he transfers the fresh potting soil into the planter, gently pressing down to remove air pockets. He places his oregano plant on top and adds more potting mix around the edges. “There. Aren’t you all happy now?”

Saturday mornings are for grocery shopping and laundry. Afternoons are for studying. Evenings are for Spider-Man. Head down, stick to the program. Sundays are tour guide-days. He specifically looked for jobs that would help him get to know the city. Sunday evening is for studying.

But right now, right now is just for repotting plants.

There is a firm knock on his door. Peter wipes his hands together to get most of the soil off and moves to the front door, grabbing the package he picked up for his neighbor earlier today. He doesn’t generally socialize. No one ever invites him to parties, but somehow, his fellow students always manage to find him when they have a favor to ask.

Some of them jokingly call him ‘the godfather’. It’s just that he knows the city better than anyone and, well, Spider-Man has a lot of outstanding favors.

He swings his door open and… the past pours across the threshold and into his small apartment, uninvited.

Sam Wilson stands in the hallway, all frowny and menacing, and behind him—

“Mr. Parker,” Sam says. “We would like to discuss your latest email to me.”

“Latest?” Peter repeats, his eyes glued to Tony’s face. Tony looks right back at him, corners of his mouth quirked up. He is used to people staring, of course.

“Can we come in?”

Some question. Can they come in? Can Peter let the past back into his life after closing the door on it so firmly three years ago?

He knew the risks, of course, when he sent Sam the decrypted message. But not helping when there was clearly an important case to be solved had not seemed like an option. His aunt taught him that if you have an ability to help people, you always should. But he hadn’t expected him to show up. And certainly not him. It was just a code… and not even a difficult one.

“Mr. Parker? I’m aware this is not a common occurrence for you. But can we come in? We’ll explain the situation.”

Peter steps aside. “If I had known,” he says, “I would have bought those fresh apricots at the market this morning.”

Sam stalks forward into the room at a brisk pace. So brisk, that he almost rams his shins against Peter’s bed. This apartment is probably a bit smaller than the houses he usually raids.

Tony follows him inside, and Peter only now notices the cane. “Oh my g— Mr. Stark. Wow. You look—”

“Like shit, I know.”

A lot better than the last time Peter saw him. When he had been pale, frighteningly skinny, his mind fuzzy and all over the place. Unable to cut his own food or even go to the bathroom unassisted.

That was three years ago, though. When Tony still knew who Peter was, even if the morphine and the coma-haze sometimes made him forget. Peter never fully realized until now how much that final image of a sickly, frail Tony got stuck in his mind. To see the man now is—

Peter turns away and pushes the door shut, taking a moment to ground himself. They’re just here to ask for advice, probably. Maybe another code. A quick visit to help their case along.

That’s all this is going to be.

“Have a seat, sir,” he tells Tony, pointing at his bed.

Tony lowers himself with a grunt. “Oof. That’s a shitty mattress. Full disclosure. If I sit down there, I might never get up again.” He sets his cane between his legs. His gaze on Peter is intense in a way Peter remembers all too well. That look of fascination, when Tony sees someone or something he doesn’t understand but wants to.

It sends a shiver down his spine and he has to look away.

When Tony first emerged from his coma, he was a shadow of his former self; with a raspy voice and weak muscles. But with an incredible optimism. Peter spent the rest of that school year at the lake house, helping with the groceries, the cooking. Helping Tony with his exercises while Pepper drove Morgan to school. And almost every session ended with the two of them on the floor, wheezing with laughter over whatever dumb joke they had come up with that day.

In those months, Tony taught him how to find happiness in the face of an overwhelming hardship. And Peter is still applying those lessons in his own life today.

Sam does a 360 before his eyes land back on Peter. “Your apartment is very neat for a student. No piles of dishes?”

Peter just smiles as he lets his eyes wander around his small room. He remembers the first few months, when the constant mess was just another source of stress. Just another reason to feel like he was failing in life. Until he decided to turn things around, and he threw everything out apart from the barest essentials. He has one cup, one plate. No chairs. He enjoys the simple life. He likes opening the kitchen cupboards and seeing empty shelves. Space in his room means space in his head. Which reminds him: “I would offer you a drink but—"

“We’re good,” Sam says, and continues his inspection of Peter’s room.

Peter puts the package back on his kitchen counter and quickly washes his hands in the sink to get rid of the soil.

“So,” Tony says. “I hear you have an IQ of 188 and you like riddles.”

“It’s… sort of a hobby? I’m not planning to make a living out of it.”

“Why does a genius like you waste time on something as pointless as cryptology?”

Peter shakes out his wet hands. “So a genius like you can come ask me for help.”

“Is that cannabis?” Sam asks, tugging at the leaf of one of his plants.

“Of course not, wouldn’t dream of it,” Peter says. “Are you going to arrest me?”

“Growing your own marihuana is only legal when you’re over twenty-one. Which, according to our scarce findings, you’re still a few months shy of.”

“Actually, I’m legally a few months shy of 26,” Peter says, and snaps his fingers to illustrate his point.

“Fuck, Sam,” Tony says. “Let’s not start a whole thing about weed when we’re in an apartment building that mostly houses students. Kick down a few doors around here and you’ll find far worse stuff.” 

Sam turns away from the plants. “The code, then. How did you figure it out?”

“It wasn’t too hard,” Peter says, glancing down at the dirt still under his finger nails. “I noticed pretty quickly that the code only contained letters from J to Z. That’s significant, because they all have two digits in their number substitution cypher. I mean, A equals one, B equals two, you know? And J equals ten. It’s the first letter that has two digits. So the first step clearly had to be converting the letters into numbers. Like, ‘NYU’ becomes 14 25 21. You get this whole series of numbers, looks a lot like the D’agapeyeff cipher, which was cool.”

“Very cool,” Tony agrees. And not even with his usual level of sarcasm.

“After that it was a little tougher to figure out. I tried a few different things. Something with binary. A sort of Polybius square. Caesar Cipher. Then realized that the six digits would match with the six dots of each letter in the braille alphabet. The rest is history.”

“So in your opinion,” Sam says, “was this code made by a cryptography expert?”

“An expert? I don’t know. There are far more complicated methods to encrypt messages. Which makes me think it’s more of a cryptography amateur. Then again, this person clearly wanted you to find the message. So perhaps he made it easy on purpose.”

“Easy.”

“We all have our strengths, Mr. Wilson,” Peter says mildly.

“You need to buy a better bed,” Tony comments as he presses one finger into the mattress. “This thing is shit. You’ll give yourself a hernia.”

“I think I got enough student loans already, thanks.”

“We read your guardians all passed away. Didn’t they leave you money?”

Sam shifts his position and frowns. He probably finds the question insensitive, but to Peter, Tony’s bluntness just feels painfully familiar. “I didn’t actually inherit anything. Some sort of complicated admin error after the snap. They didn’t properly reverse my death certificate. By the time they more or less figured it out, my aunt’s assets were already ‘escheated’. Which is a fancy way of saying the government nomnomnom-ed it up.”

“Scholarship?”

“Again, no. Same issue. It’s pretty hard to convince people you’re not dead when the paperwork says you are. You’d think showing up in person would do the trick, but no.” Strange’s spell largely erased him from legal documents, government files. Which, in today’s bureaucracy, poses quite a challenge. He has been using the snap as an excuse for so many years that the lie just rolls off his tongue.

“Sorry about that,” Tony says, looking bothered.

“It’s fine. I’m dealing with it. And it’s good to be alive, either way, Mr. Stark. I’m grateful.”

“Did you grow up around here?” Sam asks.

“No. New York.”

“Oh, I see,” Sam says, with a look in his eyes like he already knew that. “Still go there a lot?”

“Not often. No family left.”

“But sometimes.”

“Yeah,” Peter says, and the back of his neck starts prickling. “Sometimes. To visit my family’s grave.”

“When was the last time you visited? Where exactly did you go?”

Dangerous waters. Because the last time Peter visited May’s grave, Happy had been there again. They cross paths once, maybe twice a year. Happy had asked him his name this time, and Peter had panicked and said ‘Ned’. “I don’t see how that is relevant to your investigation. Either charge me with something or change the subject.”

“Charge you?”

“It’s pretty clear you consider me a suspect. Which makes sense. I check a lot of boxes.”

“You don’t seem too bothered about it,” Sam sharply says.

Peter shrugs. “Well, I didn’t do it. Nothing to be bothered about.”

“But you won’t tell us the last time you went to New York.”

“Considering this is my family’s death we’re discussing, I think I’m well within my rights to keep certain things private.”

“Are you enhanced?” Sam asks point-blank.

“No,” Peter says, while he wonders if maybe they already know. Tony figured it out before, he can do it again. They don’t remember Peter, but do they remember Spider-Man? Do they remember fighting alongside him? “What sort of enhancement did you see in your suspect? Speed, strength, reflexes?”

“I didn’t say our perp was enhanced,” Sam says in a voice like he’s sure he has just tricked Peter into a confession.

“It’s implied pretty heavily. And why else bring the Avengers in? I’m not an idiot, Mr. Wilson. You wouldn’t be standing here if I was. You’d be standing in the apartment of some other poor cryptography student who just wanted to help.”

“Hey,” Tony says. “Assuming you’re innocent. Would you consider working at Stark Industries?”

“Tony.” Sam snaps.

“What? You’re working your angle, I’m working mine.”

“I’ll think about it, sir,” Peter says, because he knows a simple ‘no’ would only fuel Tony’s current fixation on him. “Do you have any other questions?”

Tony leans his chin on his cane and glances towards Sam, who purses his lips. “You write for the Boston Chronicle.”

“Correct.”

“You mostly report crimes, am I right?”

“Correct.”

“Why that particular interest?”

“I know a lot of people around the city,” Peter says. “So. I hear things. Sometimes people will talk to me when they won’t talk to the cops. I guess I have a vibe.”

“Charismatic?”

“You flatter me, Mr. Wilson.”

“No further questions,” Sam says.

“Then I hope you’ll let me get back to my plants. If you get another encrypted message, please do not hesitate to ask me for help.”

Sam helps Tony to his feet and Peter has to clench his hands behind his back to stop himself from jumping in to assist.

“I will be sending job recruiters after you,” Tony announces.

“Have good day, Mr. Stark. Mr. Wilson.”

He clicks the door shut behind them and his knees suddenly buckle. He sinks to the floor, leaning his forehead against the front door. He attunes his hearing and listens to the two men haltingly making their way towards the elevator, Tony’s cane tapping against the tiles.

Even after three years, Tony’s heartbeat still sounds familiar.

Memories emerge, as vivid as if they happened yesterday. How he would constantly monitor Tony’s heartbeat when the man was in a coma. How Tony had smiled at him the first time he opened his eyes. How the first word out of Tony’s mouth was a pun.

He remembers teaching FRIDAY to make knock-knock jokes. Teaching Morgan to tie her shoe laces. It’s one of the last things he did before going back to New York. The new school year was about to start, he was missing MJ and Ned, and looking forward to his final year of high school. Looking forward to graduating, moving to MIT with them, being close to Tony again. May and Happy were considering moving to Massachusetts, too. It had felt like all the pieces were falling into place.

But instead they fell apart completely.

It took him years, but he feels like he is finally at a point where he has accepted the situation and moved on. And now this.

He jumps when there is another knock at the door. He pushes himself to his feet and furiously rubs his face with both his hands before opening it.

“Peter!” his neighbor Hyemin exclaims. “Did you get it? Did you get it?”

“Hang on,” Peter says and moves back to the kitchen to grab the package of the counter. “Straight from Korea,” he says as he hands it to her. “Apparently, they no longer sell this flavor in the US.”

“Thanks,” she says, and winks. “Don Corleone.”

She hops away and Peter shuts the door, slowly shaking his head. Maybe he should be concerned that so many people see him as a potential criminal mastermind.

Something he can worry about later. He has a few more plants that need repotting.

-

“Never heard of something so irresponsible in my life. You know what happens when you strain yourself. And all because there’s a smart student at MIT? There’s hundreds of smart students at MIT! That university poops them out every day like little genius turds!”

Tony winces his way through the lecture. Happy paces up and down the porch, gesturing wildly. He had been waiting by the front door, arms firmly crossed, when Sam pulled up.

Tony had slept through most of their journey back.

“And FRIDAY says you didn’t get enough sleep last night, either. Said you were up at three AM googling that boy. You’re an idiot, Tony Stark.”

“I don’t google,” Tony says.

Happy huffs.

Pepper just sips her tea, tilts her head towards the sun and says nothing. Bucky sits next to her. “Can you lecture Sam later?” he asks Happy. “For leaving without me?”

Happy huffs again. “Well, I hope it was worth it.”

“We certainly have a suspect.” Sam digs through his bag and opens his laptop. “All we have to do is place him at the scene. If we find any evidence that he travelled to New York last Sunday, I think we have enough for an arrest warrant.”

“Oh, good,” Happy says. “Case closed, Tony’s assistance no longer required, he can go back to— What? Who— Is that him?” He has frozen in place next to Sam, staring down at his screen.

Everyone else blinks up at him.

“I… I know that kid,” Happy says.

“What?” Sam angles the laptop further towards him. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, he— I’ve seen him at May’s gravestone a few times. But he said his name was ‘Ned’.”

“Well, that’s not suspicious at all,” Sam says. “What else did he tell you?”

“We never talked much. Um. He said he lived around there. That he knew May through Spider-Man.”

“He told us he always visits his family’s grave.”

“What. Like May is his mother? I mean, Jesus, yeah, same last name. But May didn’t have any family.”

“FRIDAY?” Tony asks.

“No family ties found between May Parker and Peter Parker,” FRIDAY confirms.

“Is he using a fake name? We have no birth certificate from him. He claims it’s because the government messed up his legal files after the snap, but I haven’t heard of that happening anywhere else.”

“What if he is Spider-Man?” Pepper asks. “No, think about it. Spider-Man used to be based in New York, but then started showing up in Boston. Peter Parker moved from New York to Boston. And he could be using an alias. When people use fake names, they tend to use familiar ones. So if he knew May Parker…”

“But the kid is twenty years old. Even counting the snap, that means he was – what – thirteen when we first met him in Germany?”

“Fourteen,” Tony says.

“Not likely.”

“If Peter Parker is Spider-Man, that makes him enhanced,” Bucky says. “And an even better fit as a suspect for our murder case. Facts aren’t exactly stacking in his favor, here.”

“But how does a fourteen-year-old make it to Germany on his own?” Sam turns to Tony. “He was on your side in that clusterfuck, where’d you people find him?”

“Don’t remember,” Tony says. “I’m guessing Nat recruited him.”

“He may have been older than fourteen,” Pepper says. “If his name is fake, his birthdate could be, too.”

“You’re the one who got Spider-Man off the hook when that bridge blew up in London,” Sam reminds her. “Never had a tête-à-tête with him?”

“Not at all. I simply provided the media and police with the facts. That Quentin Beck was not a superhero from another dimension, but an off-the-rails former employee who stole our technology.”

“So, what, the theory is he saves people in one city and kills them in another?” Happy asks.

Sam shrugs. “It’s not an uncommon profile for killers. Charismatic, but zero friends or family. Extremely high IQ. Psychopathic. He could just be in it for the thrill. Playing the hero in one city and the villain in another helps him compartmentalize.”

Bucky tilts his head to the side. “Did the kid seem psychopathic to you?”

“He had a freaky neat apartment, that’s for sure. But with an IQ like that, he’s not gonna seem anything. He could easily give us the run around for his own amusement.” Sam turns to Happy. “When’s the last time you saw him in New York?”

“About three weeks ago.”

Sam lets out a breath. “What do you think?” he asks Bucky.

“Back to New York.” Bucky says. “Visit May Parker’s grave, dig into her history.”

Happy looks perturbed.

“I’ll have FRIDAY monitor Peter Parker as much as she can,” Tony says. “Monitor Spider-Man too, I guess. FRIDAY, did you get that?”

“I always get it,” FRIDAY says. “I’m smarter than you.”

Pepper wheezes.

-

“What do you remember about Spider-Man?” Sam asks as they drive back.

Bucky sniffs as he thinks. “He was in Germany. I guess Nat brought him in.”

“Right.”

“And then he was in New York. When we fought Thanos’ army. I think Strange brought him in that time, we could talk to him. And then he was in London. And then in Boston. I don’t know man, he seems fickle.”

“I never liked him.”

“Yeah, because he whooped our ass in Germany.”

“Hey, he whooped your ass,” Sam pokes the dashboard with one finger. “I whooped his ass. Distinctly remember it. I can hand his ass to him any time I’d like.”

“He was fourteen years old.” Bucky casually reminds him.

“Damn little punks.”

-

He wakes up in his own apartment the next morning, when a metal hand shakes his shoulder. “Get up.” Bucky says. “Police just found a second body. Mount Hope cemetery.”

Chapter Text

“Well,” Tony says. “Peter Parker definitely didn’t travel to New York last night. So you either gotta write him off as a suspect, or assume he’s got an evil secret doppelgänger he is in cahoots with.”

Sam sighs and shift the phone to his other hand. “Damn. Starting from scratch.”

“I definitely like that evil secret doppelgänger theory. I think it's your best theory.”

“It’s your theory.”

He is standing in the middle of the cemetery where the body of Mr. Yates was found a few hours ago.

“So,” Tony says. “Sun at Mount Hope. Sunday at Mount Hope Cemetery. He’s apparently leaving clues where he wants to make his next victim. Seems like we should definitely crack this second code, and fast.”

“Yeah,” Sam glances down at the piece of paper that was found on the body.

427858895760

“I’ve set FRIDAY to work on it. Keep you posted.”

“Thanks.”

He makes his way to the front entrance. The iron gate is bent again, even though the hedges around the cemetery are low enough that you can climb over them quite easily. Perhaps it’s just another part of the message. The perp wants them to know he’s enhanced.

Bucky approaches from the small building nearby.

“Saw the security footage?”

“Yeah.” Bucky says. “They gave me a copy. Used a garotte, again. Dressed the same, too; big boots, black coat and a ski mask. But if you ask me, our ‘young, white male, below average height’ might just be a ‘young, white female, average height’. Something about the way she moved.”

So far for the evil secret doppelgänger theory. “You think there’s any point interviewing the victim’s families? The perp chooses her location before she chooses her victim. That means they are victims of opportunity.”

“Or,” Bucky counters, “she observed her victims for a while and figured out where they would be at a certain moment. And compiled her coded messages based on that.”

“Twice at a cemetery, though?”

“Statistically unlikely.” Bucky agrees. “But. We interview the family anyway.”

-

Peter prints the New York Times article and underlines some key words, frustration bubbling around in his stomach. This death could have been prevented. If he had just searched a little longer, thought on it a little better. There’s a billion locations with the name ‘Mount Hope’, but there aren’t that many in New York itself. And he could have made the connection with the cemetery where the first victim was found.

He exhales. He needs to let it go. There isn’t much he can do now, not without a new code. He somehow doubts the other Avengers will ask him for help again. They shouldn’t. Peter left that life behind, built a new one. One where he can help people without anyone around him getting hurt. He has worked too hard to be dragged back in.

And he has his own problems to solve. Like the car fires near Porter Square; four in a row. He already went down there to talk to the local residents and take pictures from every angle. The next step is compiling a geographic profile, and—

Crap. 8:47.

He’s gonna be late for his cryptography class. Again.

-

Tony calls back after only a few hours. Sam excuses himself to Mr. Yates’ son and steps into the hallway to take the call.

“This one was easier,” Tony says. “It’s Monday at Oakland cemetery. The numbers are atomic numbers, and the corresponding symbols for the chemical elements form a phrase.”

“Monday. That’s tomorrow.”

“Yup,” Tony says. “By the way, you left your hoodie here. The blue one. Needed an excuse to come visit again? You slacker.”

“That’s not mine, Pepper found it in the guest room.”

“Oh, she didn’t say. Okay. Good luck, Captain. I’m gonna get back to reading Mr. Parker’s latest peer-reviewed article on a new mathematical technique for geographic profiling. It’s riveting.”

“He’s still not entirely off my list, Stark,” Sam warns.

“He’s definitely still on mine.”

-

Bucky is watching TV again, with the sound off. Sam takes the armchair next to him. Who knows, maybe he’ll get inspired. “A young, white female, average height.” Bucky says. “Intelligent. But frustrated. Wants to prove she’s smart. Smarter than us. Feels superior. Wants attention. Kills for the attention, not because she wants these specific people dead. Not born enhanced and went off the rails when she got her powers. Or born enhanced and went off the rails after someone kicked her ego in the crotch.”

“Or both.”

“Or both.” Bucky agrees.

After dinner, Bucky gets a call from Steve. A call from Steve involves Bucky mostly listening, with only an occasional “yeah, uhuh”. But not a ‘yeah, uhuh’ that sounds in any way like he is being told his childhood friend is terminally ill.

“Tell that old man to hang up already!” Sam calls out when the two of them have passed the half hour mark. “We have a killer to catch.”

“Sam says he loves you,” Bucky says. “We gotta get ready for tomorrow.”

-

They drive to Oakland cemetery, an hour before it opens. The cemetery is large and has multiple entries.

“Let’s split up.” Bucky says. Immediately followed up by: “Why do you never call Steve?”

“Yes, good,” Sam says. “And, what?”

“You never call Steve, and you don’t like when people call you Captain.”

“That’s… Those things are entirely unrelated.”

“I thought we’d moved past all that.”

“I’m taking the entrance in the back,” Sam snaps, and quickens his pace.

He finds a spot next to a tree and waits. And waits. And waits. And ignores the odd looks he gets from the occasional visitor. And waits. And while he waits, he stews. Because he’s here, isn’t he? He didn’t suit up, but he brought the shield. Just because he has an aversion to hoity-toity titles like ‘captain’ doesn’t mean Bucky needs to go all shrink on his ass.

And how ironic that Bucky accuses him of never calling Steve. Sam can’t even call Steve because he’s always on the damn phone with Bucky.

He pushes himself away from the tree when he hears shouts, and footsteps against gravel. A slender figure, in combat boots, a black coat and a ski mask sprints towards him, meandering around the tombstones. Bucky is in pursuit.

Sam jumps in her way. “Hey, you know what?” he yells. “Steve never calls me either!”

She makes a sharp turn to the left. She’s fast – faster than Bucky, even.

“Can we talk about this later?” Bucky hollers as he turns too; slower, clumsier, like a steamroller changing directions. He won’t catch up to her.

Sam flings his shield, throwing his back into it. It hits their perp square on the back of her shoulders. She stumbles and lands flat on her face while Sam snatches his shield back out of the air.

Bucky catches up to her first, just as she flips herself back onto her feet. “You amateurs,” she snarls, and smashes one elbow into Bucky’s face. Bucky stumbles back a step and she shoots off again.

“Fuck!” Bucky races after her.

Sam has no chance of catching up so he flings his shield a second time. But she is prepared this time and dives out of its way: the shield sails clean over her head; far, far away, before finally crashing into a tombstone somewhere.

Shit. Sam winces.

Bucky is already out of sight.

Sam catches up to him at the entrance, where the man stands on the sidewalk, looking up and down the street. A piece of paper clenched in his metal hand.

Bucky swears. “I lost her. Why didn’t you suit up? You could have caught up with her if you had suited up. You never call Steve, and you don’t like when people call you Captain, and you don’t wear the suit.”

“I would have stood out like a sore thumb if I had suited up! She probably wouldn’t even have shown up. Stop acting like everything I do warrants a psychoanalysis.”

Bucky sighs and spits some blood onto the ground. He holds out the piece of paper. “She dropped that. On purpose, I think. Shit, she loves to make a fool out of us.”

“Why do we always get into a fight right before the important part of missions?”

“Nervous butterflies?” Bucky suggests.

Sam takes the paper and looks down at the letters seemingly randomly cut out of magazines.

stur day ex so u aste q ore do sup gip yor not exra k

“The first words look like ‘Saturday’,” he says. “But she might not go to the next location anymore, now that she knows we’re on her heels.”

“Still worth a try. I’ll send it to Stark.”

“Okay.” Sam sighs, shoulders drooping. “Lemme go check how badly I damaged that tombstone.”

-

Tuesdays mornings are for writing news articles for the Boston Chronicle. Afternoons are for his Matrix Methods classes. Evenings are for Spider-Man. Head down, stick to the program. Water his plants, wash his one cup, maybe smoke a joint out the window.

Right as he lights it, one leg dangling across his window sill, his phone starts buzzing. Unknown number. Peter answers, still hanging out the window. “Hey.”

“Hey, clever cookie.”

“Mr. Stark.”

“Wow,” Tony says. “Recognize my voice over the phone? You really are a fanboy.”

“How can I help you?”

“I got an encrypted message my AI can’t decipher.”

That’s… worrying. “I didn’t hear anything about a third victim.”

“There was a third attempt. No one died. But the killer wasn’t caught. We need to fix that.”

“Send it to me,” Peter says. “If your AI didn’t get it, that’s… Actually that might be a clue in itself. Let me think it over.”

“I’ll send you the code.”

“Okay. Anything else?”

“Are you Spider-Man?”

“No,” Peter says. “What a strange question. Anything else?”

“Who recruited you for Germany? I can’t remember and it’s driving me crazy. Like an itch I can’t scratch.”

Peter takes an extra long drag. “I don’t know what you mean. Anything else?”

“How do you feel about the circle method in spatial distribution strategies for geographic profiling?”

“I think it has potential for crime prevention, but should always be used in combination with other mathematical and non-mathematical methods to achieve the highest accuracy.”

“No further questions.”

-

Early Wednesday morning, Sam is awoken by the buzzing of his phone.

“Got it,” Tony says. “Friday at Cedar Grove cemetery.”

“That took FRIDAY a while.”

“My AI didn’t solve it. My CI did.”

“CI.”

“Confidential informant. Know your jargon, Cap.”

Sam sighs and kicks the blankets away. “Is your confidential informant Peter Parker?”

“That’s confidential. But yes.”

“How did he decipher it?”

“It was a two-step code again. The first step was phone words. You know, telephone keypad used to have letters assigned to each number. 2 equals abc, etcetera. So the first word ‘stur’ becomes ‘7887’. Phone words are a little old fashioned, which might explain why FRIDAY couldn’t crack it. Your killer made a mistake in the first word, which also might explain why FRIDAY couldn’t crack it. I think she was too preoccupied with making the first two words seem like they spelled out ‘Saturday’ as a diversion. The second step was morse code. Even numbers are dashes, odd numbers are dots. So 7887 is dot-dash-dash-dot. But she should have made it dot-dot-dash-dot. For ‘F’. As it is, she just made the phrase ‘Pri at Cedar Grove’.”

“Send me the notes,” Sam says. It’s too early in the morning for him to wrap his brain around all this.

“Sure thing. His notes aren’t as clear as FRIDAY’s, though. You probably won’t understand them, no offense.”

“Send them anyway.”

-

Friday at Cedar Grove cemetery.

Peter knows Cedar Grove cemetery. It’s on the edge of Queens. It’s where May is buried. He had been planning to visit this weekend. Not on Friday. He has classes on Friday. Classes which he absolutely definitely can’t skip. Except he absolutely definitely can, because he knows it won’t really affect his grades. He absolutely definitely shouldn’t, though. Except he absolutely definitely should, because there is a killer on the loose and he knows that cemetery a whole lot better than Sam or Bucky.

Going out to help them would go against every rule he set for himself.

He hasn’t stepped a foot out of line for three years. He kept his head down, stuck to the program. Did everything he could to avoid the people from his past. He even changed one of his majors from mechanical engineering to chemical engineering at the last moment, so his classes wouldn’t be in the same building as MJ’s. He didn’t want to see them, hear about them, think about them.

But it’s all unraveling now. He can stay away from the whole case from now on, but it won’t even matter. Because there’s a message on his phone from Tony Stark. He received it this morning at 10:21 AM, a few hours after he had sent Tony the cracked code.

Mr. Parker. Up for dinner at my place? I can have you picked up.

He knows Tony. He knows what happens when Tony is intrigued. When he obsesses. And his current fixation is an MIT student with an interest in science and a superhero alter ego. All this has happened before, when Peter was fourteen, when Tony barged into his life and declared himself Peter’s mentor, and became a sort of control-freaky, mother-henny, boundlessly enthusiastic bully-slash-fairy-godmother. And now history repeats itself, in some sick twist of fate.

There’s a knock at his front door, and Peter drops his pen to the table with an annoyed hiss.

He opens the door to his neighbor Cas who is hopping up and down on bare feet. “Hey,” he says. “I’m moving a new fridge in on Friday. My boyfriend won’t be here and the elevator is still broken. Could you…?”

“I won’t be around on Friday,” Peter says. “But I’ll make some calls, I know people who’d be happy to help if you buy them a beer after.”

“Cheers, Godfather. Big plans for Friday, then?”

“Going to New York.”

-

“Let’s not fight this time,” Bucky says.

“Don’t say anything stupid, then.”

Bucky rolls his eyes.

It’s early morning, and they made their way onto the grounds of Cedar Grove cemetery to scout the place. It is easily the biggest cemetery they’ve had on their list so far. Sam brought his Wakandian redwing drones, but still… “We should have asked for more back-up.”

“She won’t show if the place is teeming with cops. I suspect she will be even—” Bucky falters, then lightly pushes against Sam’s shoulder, and points.

Sam turns.

Spider-Man is casually approaching down a pathway between two rows of tomb stones; gives a little wave when he sees Sam turn. Once he is close, he pulls his mask up with one thumb to show his face.

“Hey,” Peter says.

“Hey.” Bucky replies.

“You realize we didn’t know about your identity, right?” Sam says.

“Uh. It’s not like you’re surprised.” Peter pulls the mask back down. “Figured you could use some help. What’s the plan?”

“Catch her.”

“That’s not a plan,” Peter informs him. “She’ll know you’ve probably cracked her code.”

“We think she might still show.”

“I agree. She wants to prove she can outsmart you. It’s on profile. I suspect she will be even earlier than usual. And watch you.”

“She might be here already?”

“Maybe. But I think I’d know if she were. I have a thing.” Spider-Man waves his fingers through the air around his head. “So. She’ll be early. Watch us. And then either… try to kill a civilian visitor anyway.”

“Or?”

“If she’s particularly bigheaded. Try to kill one of you.”

Sam nods. “What’s the plan?”

-

And that’s how Peter ends up in a tree, hiding amongst the foliage. He can see both Bucky and Sam from his position, as they patrol the outer edges of the cemetery. Sam gave Peter control over his drones, which is a surprising amount of trust from the man, considering Peter himself was a suspect in the case only a week ago.

Or… maybe this is a test?

He is used to working with drones. He built a few for himself to help him in his geographic profiling. But this Wakandian technology is really something else.

If he could just figure out how they built these drones to be nearly imperceptible to the human ear… That would really come in useful. He prods at the little remote-control screen in his hand a few times, caught up in the technology.

So caught up, that he doesn’t see the movement on the images as quickly as he should have. A figure, dressed in black, prowling amongst the tombstone, slowly but surely moving closer to Sam.

With a single, quick swipe, he sends one of the drones after Bucky to warn him, then leaps down from the tree, right in front of a confused elderly couple.

“I’m sorry – it’s not safe – you need to leave the cemetery,” he rushes. “Leave. Come back later.” And he sprints towards Sam’s location.

He spots her in the distance, crouched behind a rosebush. She is only about twenty feet away from Sam, twirling her weapon in her hand.

“SAM!” Peter hollers.

Sam turns – just in time to see her jump out, brandishing her garotte. Sam immediately brings up his shield and careers towards her, on a collision course.

The blow sends her hurtling back. But she rolls over and immediately leaps to her feet again. Sam repeats the same move, but this time she leaps over him, quick as lightning, lands behind his back and brandishes her garotte.

Peter flings out his arm and neatly webs the wire of her garotte against her own stomach.

Sam whirls around as she stumbles back and furiously yanks at her weapon. He brings up his shield and slams it against the side of her head.

She collapses like a house on fire. Peter has caught up to them and fires a few more webs at her legs to make sure she is staying down.

Bucky approaches too, footsteps heavy and thundering.

“You— You amateurs,” she gasps, wriggling her legs. Her garotte is still plastered to her stomach.

“Yeah,” Sam sets one hand on his hip. “We’re the ones looking silly right now.”

Bucky steps around them and grabs her arms, cuffs her hands behind her back. “Vibranium,” he explains when he catches Peter’s skeptical look.

Sam leans in and pulls the ski mask away to reveal short blonde hair, a nasty head wound and a furious expression.

“Oh. Hey.” Bucky says. “We know you.”

“Do we?” Sam asks.

“Cryptology student. The one who complained she didn’t get into MIT.”

“Fucking MIT,” she snarls. “Amateurs.”

“Two people are dead,” Sam says, “because you felt rejected?”

“I’ve seen people do worse over less,” Bucky mutters.

“Because I didn’t get what was rightfully mine! When people conspire to keep me down, this is what happens. They don’t understand my family’s research so they try to cover it up! My brain works faster than the whole FBI put together. I scare them.”

“You’re in handcuffs.” Bucky reminds her.

“And you made a mistake in you last code,” Peter helpfully adds.

She absolutely freezes, her eyes narrowing. “You take that back.”

“All right, time to get her out of here,” Sam says.

Bucky starts dragging her towards their car. “Take it back!” she yells, kicking her legs. “Take it back! TAKE IT BACK!”

“Damn little punks,” Sam mutters. He turns to Peter, looks him up and down. “Nice job, Mr. Parker.”

Peter nods. “Just kinda had to … had to help. I know this cemetery and all.”

“Right,” Sam says. His gaze on Peter is still calculating, but not necessarily in an antagonistic way. “We’re bringing her in. Joining us?”

“No,” Peter says, and one thumb points across his shoulder, towards May’s grave. “I’m just gonna … visit some family.”

Sam simply nods and thanks him for his assistance.

-

May’s tombstone always looks clean and there are usually fresh flowers. Peter is endlessly grateful to Happy for that. He hadn’t even been dating May for that long, but even three years later he is still a loyal visitor to her grave.

“Could have used your advice on this one, May,” he tells the headstone. “You always taught me to do the right thing, but what if you’re not sure what’s right?”

He could come clean, of course. Tell them everything. He knows Tony wouldn’t be mad. Well, maybe he would be mad. Probably he would be. But he’d be mad in that concerned way, like he always used to be. Mad at Peter for not asking for help, as usual, and trying to fix everything himself, as usual, and having no sense of self-preservation, as usual.

But what would be the point? Would he be doing it for the others, or just for himself? Because he’s tired of being alone?

He shakes his head to clear his mind and rises to his feet.

Head down. Stick to the program. He needs to get back to Boston and catch up on the classes he missed today. That’s his responsibility.

-

He is called by an unknown number as he makes his way to the bus station.

“Hey. It’s Bucky.”

“Oh.”

“Stark gave me your number.”

“Okay.”

“You want a ride?”

“A ride where? You both live in New York.”

“We’re driving to Massachusetts. Stark invited us to dinner. We’ll take you to Boston.”

“Oh,” Peter says. “Okay. Thanks.”

-

“Or do you want to join us?” Bucky asks once Peter is in their back seat. “Steve Rogers will be there. OG Cap.”

“Oh. Uh, no,” Peter says, because bad idea. “No thanks. I have to catch up on studying.” He has a feeling Bucky intentionally waited until he was already in the back of the car before springing that extra invitation on him.

Bucky lets it go pretty easily though. “I bet. Working two jobs. Spider-Man. Double major. How do you get it all done?”

“Luckily I have no social life.”

Sam chuckles.

“Full schedule.” Bucky says. “Not leaving yourself room to think. Are you afraid to give yourself room to think?”

“Don’t listen to him,” Sam says, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel. “He thinks he’s a shrink, now.”

“Yes, don’t listen to me,” Bucky says in a mild voice. “We all know Sam doesn’t.”

Peter thinks couple’s counseling, but doesn’t say it. He takes out his phone to catch up on the day. Someone asking if Peter can fix his glitching laptop. Someone asking if he can help mediate in a conflict with her landlord. Someone asking if he can help her figure out who keeps spray-painting the cars in her neighborhood.

I’ll drop by tomorrow, look into it. He texts back. He knows a few store owners around there; they might let him have a peek at their security footage.

Sheesh, he really is turning into the godfather.

The next message is… shit, it’s from Tony. Gave your number to Barnes. Hope that’s OK. They’ll give you a ride. You’re joining for dinner, right?

And, as Peter is reading, a new message already pops up. Right????

This man is not going to stop. Not until he has grown bored of Peter. So maybe the best thing to do is simply… join for dinner and try to be as uninteresting as possible. Peter knows exactly what Tony finds boring and off-putting. People talking about politics. People talking about healthy lifestyles. And above all else, people talking about their pets.

Peter doesn’t have pets. But he can improvise.

-

It’s a three-hour drive from New York to Tony’s lake house. Every turn in the road feels familiar. Peter has to bite his tongue when Sam continues down Interstate 190 instead of getting off at Worcester like May and Happy used to do. The back roads might take longer but are far more beautiful.

His heart feels full and heavy as the car turns onto the looping dirt road that leads to Pepper and Tony’s lake house.

If he starts bawling on the spot… he’ll tell them his cat died this morning. Great excuse and even greater way to weird Tony out.

Sam parks the car. Peter steps out and it is as if he steps straight into a memory, in vibrant technicolor. Everything is the same. The sound of that one tree creaking suspiciously – damnit it’s been three years and they still haven’t chopped it down. The fresh scent of the pine trees. The sight of the wooden house, cushions and blankets littering the front porch as if the Starks just sleep out there every night. Everything is the same.

Until he sees Morgan.

She is dipping her toes in the lake as Tony watches. She has lifted her skirt with one hand, holding her shoes in the other. Peter needs a moment to even recognize her. Goodness, a little girl can grow up in three years time. She looks like a little lady, so much more like Pepper.

He watches as Morgan points in their direction and Tony turns. Tony waves, then beckons his daughter and they approach. Morgan skips ahead of him. “Hey!” She gives Peter an unguarded, curious look. “I’m Morgan.”

“Nice to meet you, Morgan. I’m Peter.”

“Dad has been talking about you for like a whole week. It’s driving mom up the walls. I think he wants to adopt you.”

Pain grips his heart, and he wonders once again why he let himself get involved in any of this. Is he simply not as strong-willed as he thought he was? Is this all some sort of pathetic, childish yearning for a family?

Sam must mistake his look for one of flustered unease, because he quickly assures Peter: “That’s just Tony, every time something new catches his attention. Don’t worry, he’s generally… pretty normal.”

“That’s an insult, Cap,” Tony says as he catches up to Morgan. “Either call me a genius or a weirdo, but don’t say I’m average.”

Sam crosses his arms. “You keep calling me Cap. What do you call Steve?”

“I call Steve ‘Steve’.”

“So call me Sam. Is he here yet?”

“Yeah, inside, having tea with Pep.”

Bucky turns and starts making his way towards the lake house without a single word.

“Mr. Parker,” Tony says, turning to him. “Happy to have you join us. Should we be preparing a guest room? Staying the whole weekend, I assume?”

“No… No. Nope.”

“I’ll give you a ride home whenever you want,” Sam says.

“Right after dinner, please,” Peter says. “So I’m home in time to feed my cat. She gets jittery when I’m gone for a long time.”

“Yeah, I used to have a cat like that,” Sam says.

“Ugh.” Tony actually shudders.

-

Tony leads them all into the lake house, and Peter has to admit he is curious. He only met ‘old Steve’ once before; the man visited the lake house shortly after Tony woke up from his coma. He wonders how much has changed since then.

He rounds the corner into the kitchen, and Steve Rogers looks up from his cup of tea, a smile lighting up his wrinkled face.

“Ah. Hey Queens,” Steve says. “Long time. I had almost forgotten about you. But good to see you’re still around.”

Peter freezes so abruptly that Sam bumps into him from behind.

“What?” Steve chuckles. “Thought an old man like me wouldn’t remember meeting you all those years ago?”

“You… know each other?” Tony asks as he sags into a chair.

Steve whacks him with the back of his hand. “Tony… You pretty much introduced us. You weren’t even subtle about it. He came in like a wrecking ball, as the kids say.” His smile falls a little as he stares into Tony’s dumbfounded face. Then, he looks at Pepper. At Sam. At Bucky. And finally at Peter.

“Queens,” he says, “a little help here?”

Chapter Text

Peter has imagined a moment like this in his head many times. That someone would just… remember. Out of the blue. Come up to him and say “hey, Pete, long time.” But his imagination never played out beyond that moment, never played out what would happen next. How Peter would simultaneously have to explain himself and figure out how that could be possible.

And now here he is, five adults staring at him like he is a ghost apparition.

“I…” don’t know what you’re talking about? No, they are way past that being a passable excuse.

“You’re…” probably just confused, old man? Nope, he couldn’t possibly disrespect OG Cap like that.

“My cat died this morning,” he finally manages, before remembering that was supposed to be an excuse for something entirely different. “Uh. I mean…” Judging by the blank stares around him, he isn’t making things any better.

He can salvage this. As long as he keeps his cool, downplays it. He takes a slow breath and then sits at the table with Steve. “Sorry,” he says, as calmly as possible. “You’re not supposed to remember me. We performed a spell to make everyone forget. Protect my identity, you know? So that’s, uh. Curious. That you know me.”

A strange look passes over Steve’s face. Something half-way between appalled and concerned. “I’m going to need you to be more precise.”

“I’m going to need you to be more precise. If this spell is somehow – I don’t know – wearing off, I might be in trouble. Do you remember the video that Quentin Beck sent to the Daily Bugle? Where he revealed my identity?”

Steve frowns. “Someone revealed your identity?”

Huh. So Steve remembers parts of him, but not everything, which is… even weirder. It’s definitely even weirder.

“That, ah, sounds like something we would have known about,” Tony says.

Peter exhales slowly. “That’s why we did the spell.”

“Spell.”

“My identity was discovered, and people were getting hurt because of it. Friends. Family. I asked Dr. Strange for help, and he performed a spell to make the world forget me. The whole world. The universe, the— the multiverse. That was three years ago.”

“But I remember you,” Steve says.

“What the hell does that— Did I know you?” Tony demands, staring at him with a bewildered sort of fascination. “Before? As more than just Spider-Man?”

Peter looks away. “We just fought together a few times. You didn’t really know me,” he denies.

“Didn’t really know you? Happy was literally dating your mother, wasn’t he? Holy—”

“May Parker is my aunt. Just my aunt. So – uh – we didn’t see too much of each other.”

“You were living with her,” Steve says. “I remember. Because you were orphaned.”

“Shit,” Peter says. “How do you know so much about me? We met only once or twice, and never outside the battlefield.”

“Tony talked about you a few times, after the first snap. Happy, too. It is decades ago for me, but I do remember. I remember the look on Tony’s face when he returned from space without you. I remember your picture in our files, among the—”

“And what do you mean ‘a spell’?” Tony cuts in. “How is that even— Who did—"

“Is that a thing?” Sam asks. “Can people just—"

“Okay,” Peter raises both his hands. “I can see everyone is getting a little agitated, but it really wasn’t a big deal. You guys barely knew me.”

“What about your family, honey?” Pepper asks, because of course she’s the one who brings it up.

“May was my only family left. And I got her killed, so—”

“What about Happy?”

Peter can feel his own breathing pick up. He shouldn’t have broken the rules. He shouldn’t have come anywhere near them. “I’m sorry,” he says, pushing his chair back. “This was a mistake. Please go back to— to forgetting me.”

There are wide-eyed looks and words of protest as he steps towards the door. Morgan’s bottom lip is quivering, though she clearly has no idea what exactly is going on.

“I’m leaving,” Peter says, his fingers curling around the doorknob. “Can I still get that ride, or am I gonna have to find the nearest bus stop?”

Bucky takes a step forward. “I’ll drive you.”

“Barnes.” Tony snaps.

“This is not the way, Stark.” Bucky tells him. “I’m driving him home. We all sleep on it.”

-

Sam walks the two of them to the car. “Thank you for your help,” he tells Peter. “I guess, uh, we’ll be in touch.”

“No,” Peter says and opens the car door. “I don’t think we will. I’m sorry about all this.”

Sam watches as Bucky turns the car onto the dirt road, and then goes back inside where things have understandably not exactly cooled down.

“…think you should ask Dr. Strange, Tony, not me,” Steve is saying.

Tony sounds agitated, to the point of almost being out of breath. “You said I talked about him. What sort of things— What did I say?” He is leaning forward in his chair. So far that Pepper has stuck one arm out, clearly afraid he might keel over at any moment.

“Stories. You know. Anecdotes. How you took him on the mission to Germany and he insisted on visiting the ‘German Museum of Technology’ during the layover in Berlin. How he one day built a completely functional solar powered robot lawn mower from scratch, but the next day almost set your workshop on fire because he tried to make a hot air balloon out of a paper bag and a cigarette lighter.” He falters, hesitates, and then adds: “You called him ‘your kid’. More than once.”

Pepper is gripping Tony’s arm.

“What about me?” Sam asks.

“I don’t remember you talking about him much. I don’t think you really knew him.”

“Can we call Dr. Strange?” Pepper asks. “Does anyone have the sorcerer on speed dial?”

“I have Happy on speed dial,” Tony says. “I’ll send him ‘round.”

-

Tony’s phone call to Happy isn’t exactly smooth sailing. Imagine being told that the woman you dated for months actually had a kid living with her that was erased from your memory.

Needing some room to breathe and think, Sam has left the house and found a large rock overlooking the lake.

None of this would be happening right now if the Parker kid hadn’t made the first move. He is the one who sent Sam that simple, plain email containing the answer to the first coded message. He is the one who got the ball rolling. Was it just his sense of duty? Or is something pulling him back in, after three years?

“Hello Captain.”

Sam glances up to see Steve step out of the shadows of the tree line. He brought two bottles, holding one out to Sam. “Beer?”

“I believe it’s placebooze, actually.” He takes it and cracks it open against the rock.

“I need to come visit here more often,” Steve says. “I forgot how abnormal life could be. My life is a very comfortable sort of average, right now.”

“I know you’re dying.”

“I know you know I’m dying,” he replies. “Eugene came to me right after he returned from the support group. He felt bad about his slip-up.”

“Why haven’t you told Bucky?”

Steve leans against the rock and takes a swig. “I will. But he knows. I’m 106 years old, Sam. He doesn’t know, but he knows. I will tell him soon. I don’t want to put you in an awkward position. I just wanted to do it face to face.”

“Yeah, I don’t—” Sam swallows. “I was a little out of line. It’s your story to tell whenever you feel you should. How are you feeling?”

“Fine, really. These are unchartered waters. It’s progressing much slower than it usually would. Doctors estimate I have five to ten years left. Five to ten years is a long time. I might still outlive all of you, with the line of work you’re in.” He smiles good-humoredly.

“I thought that was why you came here. To tell Tony.”

“No. Tony simply invited me, so I came. He is different nowadays, isn’t he?”

“He has become a team player,” Sam agrees. “Maybe it’s the coma.”

“Or the family he built.”

“It’s good to have him involved again. I miss being a team sometimes.”

“I’m not worried. I know the world is in good hands,” Steve clinks their beer bottles together. “Captain.”

-

“He’s going to see Dr. Strange,” Tony announces when they get back inside. “Took a while to convince him. He thought Peter was making it up. Accused him of being in cahoots with that serial killer of yours this whole time, in some sort of grand conspiracy.”

“Do you think he’s making it up?”

“I considered it. And then I asked Happy how he met May.”

“And?”

“He couldn’t remember. Said it was fuzzy. And then he started to doubt himself.”

“Yeah,” Sam says. “It’s like when I remember that moment right after defeating Thanos. How you were carried off the battle field, but I can’t remember who carried you. It feels…”

“Like an itch you can’t scratch?”

“This is insane.”

Bucky returns after two hours and says “we didn’t talk about anything, I just dropped him off,” as soon as Tony opens his mouth.

Tony snaps it shut again, scowling heavily.

They have dinner, and do their best to stick to polite small talk, for Morgan’s sake. She doesn’t seem to notice the tense undercurrents in the room, instead spending most of dinner flicking peas at people when they are not looking.

During dessert, Tony gets word from Happy, that he banged on Dr. Strange’s door for about a full hour before giving up. He’s trying again first thing tomorrow.

“Breaking and entering is an option,” Tony says as he plucks a pea out of his hair. “But, ugh. Fine.”

Sam, Bucky and Steve agree to spend the night at the lake house because, frankly, Sam wants to know what the hell is going on, and clearly, Bucky and Steve do too.

He gets a phone call from one of his contacts at the NYPD late in the evening. “She confessed pretty easily.”

“Huh? Who? Which one? Oh right. The killer.”

“Yes,” is her dry response. “The killer who you brought in this morning. That one.”

“Sorry – A lot has happened since this morning.”

“Her father was a biochemist at MIT, specializing in genome editing. We think he may have been experimenting on his own daughter until she snapped. Shortly after the snap, he was found trying to recruit human test subjects. He was fired, then committed suicide. So yeah, that’s what she snapped back to. Went off the rails a little, especially after getting rejected from MIT.”

“Sounds like she needs a really good shrink,” Sam says.

“Also, the FBI is interested to know how you cracked these codes.”

“I … have a CI.”

She obviously knows her jargon. “Understood. Well, if your CI ever needs a job, I can hook them up.”

“I’ll see if I can pass on the message,” Sam says. “Not sure if he’ll be back in touch with me.”

-

Sam gets a good night’s sleep, surprisingly. Some of the others clearly didn’t, based on the bleary eyes that greet him when he gets downstairs the next morning.

“Voicemail again,” Tony shakes his head and chucks his phone on the couch. “If he doesn’t answer me soon, I’m gonna … do nothing because I’m a damn invalid. But Pepper is gonna do something!”

She smiles and squeezes his arm. “I will,” she promises. “I’ll take Rescue and fly down to New York and smash straight through his roof, I promise, Tony. Just give Happy a little time. Maybe he’s not answering because he’s already talking to Dr. Strange?”

Tony opens his mouth to complain some more, but shuts it when the lamp next to him begins to flicker. Sparks appear in mid-air, growing, moving, forming a bright, fiery circle.

Dr. Strange steps through, in full wizard-attire. Sam doesn’t think he has ever seen the man just in jeans and a sweater. Happy stumbles through after him, face pale and tight. Like he has already had his worst suspicions confirmed.

“I’m rather busy, you know,” Dr. Strange says icily. “I don’t really have time to concern myself with a simple forgetting spell. I’m only here because I’ve been given to understand… someone does remember? Mr. Rogers, it was you, was it?”

“I…”

“Back up, Gandalf,” Tony says. “You’re saying this is actually happening?”

“A spell like this was performed,” Dr. Strange says. “The Runes of Kof-Kol. I cast it from the top of the Statue of Liberty. Three years ago.”

“Why?”

“All I remember is that the multiverse was somehow knocked out of balance, and it threatened the existence of our world. I performed ritual to make every creature across every single dimension forget … something.”

“Something.”

“I obviously forgot the something, too. But Mr. Hogan informed me it concerns a person. This, ah, Spider-Man as he’s known in Boston.”

Sam sniffs. “So you just go around erasing people’s memories willy-nilly?”

“My work is neither willy nor nilly,” Strange lectures him. “It’s hard to defend myself, since I have no memories of it. But I trust my own judgement that I performed the spell for a reason. I hope you trust my judgement, too. Clearly, Spider-Man did.”

“Doctor,” Steve says, “I remember him.”

“Yes…” Strange taps a finger against his cheek as he gazes at Steve. “That should be impossible, it was universal, across every dimension.”

“Maybe the spell is wearing off?” Tony suggests.

Strange begins slowly pacing the room. “It doesn’t work like that. The spell doesn’t hide your memories behind some wall that can crumble down. It destroys the memories, simple and clean. No traces left behind. Destruction doesn’t ‘wear off’.”

“What about that weird foggy feeling I get?” Sam asks. “When I try to remember certain moments?”

“Cognitive dissonance,” Strange says with a wave of his hands. “Your brain compensating, filling in the gaps. The memories are gone, Captain, you won’t get them back.”

“But I remember him,” Steve repeats. “Parts of him, at least.”

“Explain how the spell works,” Tony says. “What are the parameters?”

“It was boundless. It stretched across every single universe. There is no—” Strange falters and pauses, leaning his hands against the back of a chair. “Time,” he then mutters.

“No time for what?”

“Time. The spell isn’t boundless in time. It doesn’t stretch forward. If it were boundless in time, you would forget about Mr. Parker every time after you met him in the last few weeks.”

“But how does that—"

“Because Steve Rogers has memories of Spider-Man that, for him, stretch back further than any of us. Further than anyone in the universe, in fact. He travelled back in time and stayed there. In his life, he knew Peter Parker decades ago. If I set my spell's limits to stretch back to Mr. Parker’s birth, that would amount to about eighteen years. But once I performed it, Mr. Rogers only forgot his encounters with Peter from the last eighteen years of his timeline.”

“Okay,” Sam says. “That explains that. Great. Awesome. Now let’s talk about how we fix the rest.”

“The spell was successful, Captain. It has done its work.”

“If you cast the spell, you can fix it. You’re a wizard. Snap your fingers, whatever.”

“Sorcery isn’t omnipotence. You can’t always do, then simply undo. Especially something that was removed, destroyed. If you burn a piece of paper, you can’t put the ashes together and make a new one.”

“So figure something out,” Tony bites out.

Dr. Strange rightens himself. “I trust my own judgement that I performed the spell for a reason,” he repeats. “I hope you trust my judgement, too. I really have more pressing matters that require my attention.”

“Are you kidding m—”

Very clearly not kidding, Dr. Strange opens another portal in the middle of the room with a simple wave of his hand. He is gone a second later, with a flick of his cloak.

Tony is left, gaping into nothingness.

“…That was my ride.” Happy says.

Tony reaches for his cane. “I’m going to see the kid.”

Happy immediately splutters. “Tony, you need rest. Pepper, tell him.”

“I’ll drive you,” Pepper says.

-

Peter sits on his floor as he writes down his groceries. He counts on his fingers, and counts again, and scratches the eggs off his list. That should keep him below fourteen dollars. He glances at the overcast sky framed by his window. It was raining a moment ago, but the sun is poking through now. Perfect time to leave; it won’t be very busy yet.

Head down, stick to the program. No need to think about anything else.

There is a sharp tap against his door. The sound of wood on wood.

“It’s open,” Peter calls.

His door is immediately pushed open by Pepper. Tony is right next to her, cane lifted in one hand, positioned to knock, or possibly to ramrod his door. He looks down at Peter and his eyebrows draw together. “This,” he says. “All of this. Is utterly unacceptable. Taking our memories, are you kidding me? And now Strange says we can’t even get them back. What were you— What were you thinking?”

Peter glances from him to Pepper and back. “I’m going to the farmer’s market,” he says. “Saturday mornings are for groceries. Want to join me? I’ll walk slow.”

-

Tony pauses for a moment as they round the corner, leaning his weight on Pepper.

Peter glances ahead towards the market stalls. “Worried about getting recognized?”

“No. Perks of being in a coma. You come out looking not quite like yourself. Just, ah. That’s bigger than I expected.”

“Give me the list,” Pepper tells Peter. “I’ll get everything. If you watch him.”

That’s… painfully reminiscent of how he and Pepper used to divvy up the tasks back when Peter was living at the lake house.

“Okay,” he says. “Don’t spend more than fourteen dollars, please.”

He supports Tony to the nearby fountain. It is surrounded by a low stone wall; broad enough that you can comfortably sit on it.

Tony exhales as he sits. He sets his cane down against the edge. His body is listing to one side, which means he is tired.

Peter sits next to him. “All right?”

“Yeah. Just gotta. Just gotta catch my breath.”

Peter heart drops into his stomach. He nods, looks away, and thinks about blood on his hands and pooling on the floor.

“You okay, kid?”

“Just, ah. Thinking about my aunt. Not to alarm you, but... Those were pretty much her last words.”

Tony simply nods, and Peter wonders how he remembers May. As Happy’s girlfriend, the innocent bystander who was mortally wounded after a fight between Spider-Man and a bunch of monsters turned ugly?

“I’m sorry we weren’t there for you through any of that,” Tony says. “That you somehow got to a point where it felt like this was the only sensible option.”

“It had nothing to do with you. I caused a rift through several dimensions. I’m talking apocalyptic levels. This was the only way to fix it. That was the choice, which made it an easy one. Even if it meant saying goodbye to a lot of people that mattered. My problems were not your responsibility. You had almost died to protect all of us. You could barely stand up straight back then.”

“Lame excuse,” Tony judges.

“Pepper was taking care of you twenty-four seven. And she still helped me, whenever she could. She… She got me out of trouble after this guy Quentin Beck tried to frame me. Got us a really good lawyer, and a safe place to live and… and… I just didn’t always want to bother her with my stuff. I had May and Happy around, I had it covered. You and I, we weren’t even that close.”

“I know that’s bullshit. You went to Midtown Tech, right? That’s what it says on your applications, even though Midtown Tech itself has no records of you.”

“So?”

“So you left your hoodie in our guestroom. The blue one. And I don’t let just anyone stay in my guestroom.”

Peter frowns and folds his hands together. “That was just from one time I—”

“Don’t lie to me, Peter. Honestly, it’s offensive.”

“Is it? Is it somehow easier for you to know that I spent almost five months living with you after the coma? That I spoon-fed you, helped you learn to walk? Is that what you want to hear? Does that make any of this better? Our world was about to disintegrate, Tony. Even if Dr. Strange could bring your memories back, he shouldn’t. It might just destabilize the multiverse all over again. I made a necessary decision.”

Tony has paled significantly, but his voice remains calm. “But to stay forgotten. That was not a necessary decision. That was a choice. You could have come to me; you could have explained. I’ve seen many strange things in my life, I would have believed your story. Maybe not right away, but eventually.”

Peter looks down at his hands. “I promised my girlfriend MJ I would come find her. After. She said I had better.”

“So you broke your promise.”

“To protect her.”

“You can’t protect people from life, Pete. She didn’t want to be protected. She didn’t want to forget you. That’s not something she agreed to. You cannot take that choice away from her. You don’t have that responsibility. You… You don’t even have that right.”

“Are we still talking about MJ?” Peter asks. “Or are you just pissed off on your own behalf?”

“Why did you choose to stay forgotten?”

Peter straightens his shoulders. “I’m not kidding myself. I know my identity will be discovered again eventually. But at least this time, it will be on my head alone.”

“So you still think it was the right decision?” Tony asks. “Three years older and wiser?”

“I don’t think about it, that’s the whole point. I just— I stick to the program.”

“Going through the motions?”

Peter gives a stiff shrug.

“You need to.” Tony says. “Start thinking about it again. You need to.”

And then he lets the topic go, and starts asking Peter about his classes at MIT. A very poignant example of why Peter loves this man so much.

Pepper returns soon. She shops as efficiently as she does anything else. “Your groceries.”

“Thanks,” Peter sets the paper bag down in his lap. “Uh. Oh, I though I had scratched the eggs of my list.”

“The eggs are on me,” she says.

-

“It’s not just a river in Egypt.” Bucky randomly says as they drive back to New York.

Sam throws a quick glance his way. “Huh?”

“Grief. It’s not just a river in Egypt.”

“That’s not the saying. That doesn’t even work.”

“It’s true, though.”

“It’s not true, because grief is not a river in Egypt at all. It doesn’t work. This is what happens when you try to play shrink.”

“You know,” Bucky says, “normal people have the ability to understand emotions. You don’t need a degree in psychology. Steve is dying, and it reignited your resentment to the idea of taking his title. That’s what happened.”

“ … He told you.”

“Yeah.”

“Oh. And what do you … How do you feel?”

“It’s sad. I’ll miss him.”

“Yeah,” Sam says, a sudden ache in his chest. “Me too.”

“I won’t heckle you about the suit, or the title. Do what feels right.”

“You’re not pissed off at me for not telling you?”

“No.” Bucky says. “That would be stupid.”

“Yeah,” Sam says. “I’m … I’m sorry. You’d make a good shrink.”

“Wow.” Bucky says. “Such compliments.”

-

I won’t call you, Tony had promised him. I won’t call, or text, or drop by. It’s your move, Mr. Parker.

Stick to the program. Stick to the program.

Sundays are tour guide-days. Fourteen people have signed up for his viewpoint tour. All the best spots in the city with a great view: across rivers, parks, boulevards or rooftops. Some technically aren’t publicly accessible, but as always, Peter managed to pull some strings.

The tour ends on the roof terrace of an Italian restaurant. “Feel free to stay and have a drink,” Peter says. “Best coffee in town, if you ask me.”

He leads the group back into the restaurant. Shakes hands. Wishes people a pleasant weekend, a pleasant journey back.

He doesn’t even see them until he does. At a small table in the far corner, MJ and Ned are having coffee. MJ has her laptop out, Ned is gesturing wildly as he speaks, and Peter feels like he is looking at an illusion.

He hasn’t seen either of them in three years.

MJ’s hair is shorter, the tips just touching her shoulders. She is wearing glasses. But her expression is still exactly how Peter remembers it. Ned lost weight, but he covers his mouth as he giggles at something she said, exactly how Peter remembers it.

“I had a lovely afternoon, dear,” an elderly lady tells him, pulling him out of his fixed stare. “You’re such a nice young man. You remind me of my grandson. I’m sure your family is very proud of you.” And she pushes a lollipop into his hand.

He doesn’t believe in divine intervention. But if he did, he would definitely consider this – all of this – a sign.

“Thank you,” he says. “Purple. Wow. That’s my favorite flavor.”

He reaches up to lay one hand against his burning throat and doesn’t look back towards the table in the corner.

When he gets home, he sends Tony a message. Can we talk?

Chapter Text

Pepper picks him up. It’s only a forty mile drive from his apartment to the lake house. She doesn’t ask any difficult questions. Just talks about her week and asks Peter about his. Asks him for recommendations on where to spend a day in Boston with a nine-year-old.

“Have you been to Boston Public gardens?” he suggests. “There’s a big statue of a duck with ducklings and, uh. Morgan used to like ducks.”

“She still likes them,” Pepper confirms. And she doesn’t look freaked out that he knows such a personal detail about her daughter.

God, Tony and Pepper are such good people. He has missed them so much.

-

Tony looks calmer, too. While Pepper takes Morgan out for a not-at-all-subtly-timed stroll, Tony makes them both coffee, and rummages around for that same old tin of biscuit they’ve had for years.

Once he sits down, he gets straight to the point, though. “No more bullshitting. We were close,” he says. “Correct?”

Peter gives a single nod.

“How did we meet?”

“The rundown… I was fourteen. You recruited me for Germany. You gave me a new suit. I turned down joining the Avengers. We worked on some projects together. I set your workshop on fire a few times. We went to space. I snapped. I came back. You fell into a coma. I moved into the lake house for a few months to help out. In September I moved back to New York and you gave me some of your tech with its own AI. Which was mistake number one.”

Tony looks simultaneously amused and perturbed. “Mistake number one wasn’t recruiting you at fourteen? Or taking you into space?”

“My mistake number one, I meant. You named the AI ‘Victoria’,” Peter says, lips quirking up. “Virtually In Coma, Tony Obviously Remains In Action.”

“I remember Victoria,” Tony says. “But that was stolen by…”

“Quentin Beck. Mistake number two. And three, four and five.”

“Ah,” Tony says. He doesn’t push. Even though Peter knows him well enough to see the curiosity sparking through his eyes. Tony always wants answers. But he is also… caring. More than most people give him credit for.

He loves these people; he loves all of them so much. But to them, he’s not much more than an intruder. “Can we just … I don’t want to rehash my whole life story. I know you want to know. Maybe you have a right to. But I just. I don’t know. I don’t know about any of this.”

“Still?”

“It’s hard to explain.”

“It’s painful to know we don’t look at you the same way you look at us.”

Turns out it isn’t hard to explain, because Tony just understands. “I— Yeah, that’s it.”

“More painful than staying alone?”

“Haven’t decided on that yet.”

“If we enjoyed each others company then, we’ll enjoy it again now. Why don’t we give it time to grow? I used to love quick fixes. But I’ve learned to accept that sometimes life is not a button you can press.”

“You don’t even know me.”

“If I knew you well enough to let you spend so much time at the lake house, I’m going to trust my past self’s judgement that.. well… clearly I want you around.”

“I’ve changed a lot since then,” Peter confesses. “I used to be more. I don’t know. Bubbly.” He can’t imagine anything more painful than trying to reconnect to Tony and Pepper only to have them discover that they don’t really like him anymore, the way he is now.

Tony quirks an eyebrow. “And I liked ‘bubbly’?”

“Maybe it wasn’t your favorite thing about me,” Peter admits with a soft smile.

“Peter. When I look at you I just see a great kid that I’d like to get to know better.”

“I’d feel weird,” Peter says. “Hanging out with you when I’m remembering things that you don’t. It feels unfair, like I’m holding something over you.”

“You’ve seen me after my coma. You know my memory had more holes than a Swiss cheese. It still does. I’m well used to Pepper or Rhodey or Happy reminiscing about past moments we supposedly shared. I don’t remember them anymore. But I still enjoy the stories. This is just more of the same for me. You remember things that I don’t and probably never will. It doesn’t matter to me. I’m sure I’ll enjoy the stories.”

Peter does remember. Right after Tony woke up from the coma. He recognized Peter, but couldn’t place him. Even after months of rehabilitation, he still had huge gaps in his memory. But Peter didn’t mind, because Tony was still Tony.

Maybe this is not so different.

“Okay,” he says. “Give it time to grow.”

“So. Tell me something you want to tell me.”

“It’s illegal in France to name your pig after a head of state.”

“I meant something about you, whizz-kid.”

“I like plants.”

“Then you know all about giving things time to grow. Tell me more.”

-

Even though Peter never socialized, he has heard other students talk about it. Going ‘home’ for the weekend. The apartment building he lives in would always be quieter on Saturdays.

And now he’s the one packing his bags on Friday. He is still afraid to call it ‘home’. It feels like home, but he doesn’t want to be presumptuous. He doesn’t want to freak Tony and Pepper out by being too much, all at once. He is still painfully aware that he is practically a stranger in their eyes.

But they’re insanely chill about it, which shouldn’t surprise him, because that’s exactly how he knows them. “I’m not gonna show you around,” Tony says with a smile the first time he spends the night at the lake house. “Because you know where everything is, don’t you?”

Everything is weird. Saturday morning is weird — it has been a while since someone made him breakfast. Saturday afternoon is weird — the workshop in Tony’s shed is almost exactly as he left it, because Tony is still too weak to work on any big projects by himself. Sunday is weird — it has been years since he spent a Sunday doing something other than giving tours around the city.

He goes back to Boston on Sunday evening, feeling absolutely exhausted. But with a feeling of happiness; delicate but brilliantly bright.

And when Friday rolls around, he packs his bags again.

And again.

And again.

The first few times, he gets panicky texts from different people asking him why are you not home you’re always home on Saturday afternoons I need you for whatever.

It takes him a while, and some gentle coaching from Pepper, to learn to respond to some of those messages with a politely worded version of Try and solve your own problem for a change.

There is a lot of ‘first time, again’. The first time he plays a board game with Morgan, again. The first time he spends a day with Tony in his workshop, again. The first time he cooks for them, again. He makes Bouillabaisse; going by an old family recipe Pepper once taught him. The look on her face when she recognizes it is worth a billion dollars.

Happy drops by the lake house now and then when he knows Peter is around. He is more cautious, more reserved, which is a little painful, but it’s okay. It’s how Peter knows him, and he is ‘giving it time to grow’.

One of Happy’s first questions at him is how exactly May died, which Peter doesn’t really want to talk about, but Happy keeps pushing until Tony snaps at him to ‘leave the kid alone’. Peter thinks he senses some tension between the two men a few times after that. But Happy still comes over, so that’s something.

-

After a month or two, when Peter really should be sitting down to start studying for his final exams, he instead sits down to write everything down. The whole story, in as much detail as he can think off. No emotion, no labelling, just the facts. It’s … strangely healing.

He sends one copy to the lake house and one to Happy.

“I didn’t read it,” Pepper says, the next time he visits. “I mean. I will, if you want me to. But I don’t need it. It’s like I don’t know you, but I know you,” she lays a hand on her stomach. “I can feel it, right here. It’s a different sort of memory. One that isn’t in my brain, but in my body. I know Tony feels it. And I know Morgan feels it because she … Usually she hates strangers, you know that. I’ve never seen her warm up to anyone as quickly as she did to you. You’re family, Peter.”

Which makes him ugly cry for about half an hour.

-

He runs into Happy again at May’s grave. They go out for coffee. It’s extremely awkward. Happy hugs him goodbye. Still extremely awkward. But nice.

-

The latest heat wave is slowly crawling to an end. A few rain droplets splatter against the windshield of Sam’s car. He’s hoping for a nice thunderstorm that’ll help cool things down.

“You should get off the interstate at Worcester,” Bucky says. “Take the back roads. That’s what Peter says.”

“Sounds nice,” Steve agrees. “Peter has an eye for stuff like that.”

“Does he?”

“I visited Boston a few weeks back. He took me on a tour around all the community gardens.”

Bucky turns in his seat, looking scandalized. “You didn’t invite us!”

Steve just grins. “I see far too much of you already.”

It has become a bit of a tradition by now. About once a month, the three of them drive up to Massachusetts. Sometimes Rhodey joins them. Sometimes Happy joins them. Sometimes they talk about their latest case. Sometimes they just talk about gardening. Either way, it’s nice to have the ‘old crowd’ together again.

The rain has stopped but the sky is still grey when they arrive at the lake house. There’s no one in sight, but the front door is wide open. They find Tony and Morgan in the kitchen, preparing dinner. Tony is chopping vegetables. Morgan is helpfully stealing tiny pieces of carrot to snack on.

“Sleepover!” she exclaims when she lays eyes on them.

“Not this time, kiddo. Just dinner.”

She sticks out her bottom lip.

“This is a present.” Bucky declares, holding a large paper bag out to her.

Her frown turns upside down. “Thank you!” she chirps. And takes out a neon-green water gun the size of a bazooka. She squeals with joy.

“Wow,” Tony says. “I hate it.”

“Thought you might.” Bucky says. And smiles sweetly.

“Maguna, that’s an outside toy, you hear me?”

“I’M GOING OUTSIDE!” she yells into his face. And races off.

“So happy to have you,” Tony says. “Steve. Traitor. Cap— Sam.”

“You can call me Captain,” Sam says. “It’s whatever.”

“I like Capsam.” Bucky says.

“Capsam,” Steve says. “Capsam Americson.”

“Falcon America,” Tony says. “Or I guess Eagle America would be more patriotic.”

“It really should be Bald Eagle America.” Bucky says. “You’ll need to shave your head, Sam, to really look the part.”

“All of you, eat shit,” Sam says. “I was hoping Peter would be here? I sent him the details of our current case last night.”

“Of course he’s here; he went for a walk with Pepper. Expect him back any moment.”

 “Is he living here now?” Steve asks.

“We’ve talked him into taking a gap year before starting on his Masters.”

“So, yes.”

Tony rolls his eyes, but he is also smiling fondly. “He’s still in Boston a lot. I’d say it’s fifty-fifty, now that summer vacation started.”

“I hope for their sake they’re back soon,” Sam says. “We had rain on the way here.”

Tony frowns. “FRIDAY, is it raining?”

“Why don’t you look out the window?” she suggests.

“Oh, for the love of— Never mind, they’re here.”

Sam looks around the empty kitchen. “How do you know?”

“From the way Morgan is giggling outside.”

Sure enough, a minute later, Peter enters the kitchen. He is wearing his blue hoodie; there is a streak of water down the front. Morgan clearly already made her first water gun victim. And judging by the shrieks coming from outside, the war isn’t over.

Peter politely greets everyone before his eyes zero in on Tony. “Tony. That tree is still creaking, and I told you to call a guy.”

“I will, I will.”

“You say that every time and you never do! One summer storm and that thing will go over and might land on your house and— Agh. FRIDAY. After I leave, can you keep nagging Tony until he calls a guy?”

“With pleasure,” is her response.

“I’m talking day and night.”

“Done.”

“Would people stop turning my own AI against me?” Tony complains.

Peter waves a finger in his face. “Call a guy.” He turns on the kettle and finds the box of tea bags. He looks comfortable, clearly knows his way around. Even though Sam has no active memories of him, it still somehow feels like he has been seeing Peter pottering around the lake house for years.

“You guys wanna sit in here, or in the living room?” Peter asks.

“Here is probably better, around the table.”

“Did you bring more maps of the city?”

“As many as your heart desires.” Sam chucks a whole pile of them on the table.

Peter immediately starts unfolding one, taking up more and more space.

“I’m chopping vegetables here,” Tony says.

“We’re solving a murder!”

“Gimme my space or you’ll be solving your next murder right here! You… You insect.”

“Arachnid,” Peter corrects, mouth quirked up into a smile. But he folds the edges of the map back to leave Tony some space. And then he starts marking the locations and doing his calculations and drawing geometric patterns, and about ten minutes in, Tony has already forgotten he was supposed to be preparing dinner.

“Give me that,” Bucky tells him, and starts aggressively dicing the carrots.

Peter marks off an area. “If the profile is right, somewhere around here is your perp’s anchor point. Either his evil lair or just his… evil home.”

“You know the FBI offered you a job, right?” Sam asks.

“Excuse me,” Tony says. “He’s gonna work for Stark Industries.”

“I think he should just be a tour guide forever,” Steve says. Tony splutters.

Morgan and Pepper enter. Pepper is wet, but Morgan is absolutely soaked, leaving puddles of water wherever she steps.

“What.” Tony says.

“We had a water war,” Morgan says.

“I won,” Pepper says.

“She threw me in the lake!” Morgan complains.

Pepper smiles, showing teeth. “All is fair in love and war.”

-

They have dinner on the back porch, overlooking the lake.

“Peter’s birthday is in a few weeks,” Pepper shares. “Twenty-one.”

“Yeah,” Peter says, and grins. “Which means I can grow all the pot I want.”

“That’s not entirely—” Sam starts.

“You can’t grow a pot.” Morgan says, nose scrunched up. “You get them at the store.”

“Right, silly me,” Peter ducks his head and mouths sorry at Pepper.

“How are you celebrating?” Steve asks.

“Just, I don’t know. Hang around. Bake cookies with Morgan.”

“What about with friends?” Bucky asks. “In Boston?”

“Uh, yeah,” Peter says. “Hey MJ. You have no idea who I am, but I know everything about you, because your memory was wiped by a sorcerer. Wanna come to my birthday party next week?”

“Maybe ease her into it more,” Bucky says. “But. Yes. Essentially.”

Peter huffs. “Very funny.”

“Not a joke.”

Peter stares at him. Bucky grins and sticks another potato into his mouth.

“Hey, you should listen to Bucky,” Sam says. “He gives great advice.”

-

-

-

Peter takes a final look at the crumpled note in his hand. With a light shake of his head, he shoves it into his pocket. He gathers every ounce of courage he possesses, and rings the doorbell.

He waits for seventeen heartbeats, and doesn’t run.

The door is pulled open and MJ looks down at him, with an expression like she is already fed up with him before he has even opened his mouth. Entirely as expected.

“Hi,” he says. “My name is Peter Parker.”