Chapter Text
“Tony?”
The superhero sighed, glancing over at his driver as the two of them sat in the car on the curb. He didn’t have a lot of time, but he had to do this right. “Yeah?”
“People are staring.”
Tony nodded, glancing back at the group of older teenagers sitting on the stoop of the apartment building where Penelope Parker lived. A couple of them were on their phones, and one was smoking, but the rest were all watching them, sharp eyes no doubt taking in the very expensive car and wondering what it was doing in their neighborhood. “Yeah...I got that.”
“You gonna go in?”
“Of course.” It wasn’t that he was worried...he could handle a couple of teenage boys. Well...not all teenage boys. The oldest looked to be in his early twenties, and although there were seven of them, Tony didn't think they were looking to cause trouble. Hell, he was in their neighborhood and, climbing out of the car, approaching what was probably their building. He just didn’t want to deal with the inevitable attention that came with being Tony Stark out in public, especially not when he didn’t have a lot of time. “Hap, wait here?” he called over his shoulder.
“Sure thing, boss,” Happy told him, flashing a thumbs up and pulling out a novel, and Tony rolled his eyes. Normally he’d tease him for that...but Cap had gone off the rails and he needed to bring him in before Ross did. So he approached the front steps, pausing when none of the boys sitting there moved. The oldest shifted away from the railing where he’d been leaning though, arms crossed.
“Never thought I’d see the day that Tony Stark came around here.” The man was grinning, seeming truly amused, and Tony sighed a little. So he’d been recognized already. Fantastic.
“I’m looking for Steven Westcott’s apartment,” he told him, hoping that by being friendly, he could save himself some time. He was pretty sure the man lived on the seventh floor, but it wouldn’t hurt to double check. When he’d first looked into tracking down Spider-Girl, the last thing he’d been expecting was a high school sophomore in foster care. But, he’d figured, he could work around that.
No, he wasn’t legally allowed to take a foster child out of the state...or the country. And the first plan, the one he’d made before Cap had decided to go after Barnes, hadn’t involved anything of the sort. He’d planned on making her a suit, which he had, then eventually introducing himself and offering it to her. Things had just changed a little. But no one had to know. Right? Did that make him sound like a terrible person? Happy had given him a strange look when he’d asked, seeming torn between telling the truth and placating him. But Tony needed someone to help him subdue the others, and Spider-Girl seemed like his best bet.
“That creepy fuck owe you money?” one of the boys asked with a smirk, and Tony lifted an eyebrow.
“I’m actually looking for his foster daughter,” Tony told him, speaking slowly as he tried to process that. Creepy fuck? That was...concerning. He hadn’t looked into Steven Westcott, apart from seeing that he was Penelope’s foster daughter and that he had a clean record.
“Which one?” the older man asked, shooting the younger boy a look which shut him up.
“Penelope.” He knew that Steven had two foster daughters, and that another foster child, a young boy, had just been adopted by a local family.
“What do you want with Penny?”
“I’m here to offer her an internship.” Tony saw no reason in making up a second lie...besides, he could probably give the kid an internship. And it wouldn’t hurt for these random guys to know that. For a moment, the man just stared at him, something in his eyes that Tony couldn’t quite place. Sadness? Worry? Whatever it was, it wasn’t good. “Their apartment is on the seventh floor, right?”
The guy nodded. “Yeah, but Skip’s at work until six...and Penny doesn’t come around much.”
That...didn’t make a lot of sense. According to her records, Penny Parker was fourteen. “She...she doesn’t come around much?” Tony repeated, eyes narrow as he filed away the nickname.
“Yeah.”
Tony glanced back at Happy who hadn’t even looked up from his novel, then back at the man. “So...she isn’t going to be here?” It was a quarter ‘til three in the afternoon, so he’d been expecting to speak to her guardian, whose job was listed as ‘registered nurse’ before the girl arrived home from school. He hadn’t been able to find out much about the man’s schedule, but since the younger foster daughter was eleven, he’d figured the man would try to be home when the kids got home.
Apparently not.
“Probably won’t be around for a few days.”
Red flags were rising in Tony’s mind, one after the other, and something made him think that he could trust this guy. He seemed to know Penny Parker, and knew that she didn’t stay here much, despite officially living here. Besides, Tony prided himself on being able to read people fairly well...minus Obidiah. But he gave himself a pass on that one. “Do you have any idea where I can find her?”
Before the man could answer, a young girl with her hair in long braids approached, big headphones over her ears, a bounce in her step as she listened to whatever was playing in her headphones. When she caught sight of them, however, she hesitated, eyes narrowing before turning to the guy Tony had been talking to. And that’s when he recognized her from the photos he’d looked up. Letitia. Penny’s foster sister.
“Hey, Tish. You gonna meet Penny today?” the man Tony had been talking to called.
She nodded, glancing at Tony again. “Yeah...but why’s Iron Man here?”
The guy snorted. “Ask him yourself. God knows he can talk.”
Tony grinned. “I’m looking for Penny Parker. I wanted to talk to her about an internship with my company.”
“Oh.” Tish nodded as though that made perfect sense. “Yeah, she’s really smart. I’m supposed to grab food from the apartment and meet her, but if you buy us some good snacks I’ll take you to her.” The offer was delivered in such a matter of fact tone that Tony had to chuckle as he glanced at the man he’d been talking with.
“She drives a hard bargain,” the guy said with a shrug and a smile.
“That she does.” The little girl just looked between them, waiting impatiently as the toe of her sneaker dug into the concrete. Tony was wearing a baseball hat, so that would keep him from being recognized...hopefully. That would have to be good enough.
“Alright,” Tony agreed, nodding. “You have a deal.”
At that, the little girl gave a big grin that made her look her age, shifting her backpack on her shoulder. “Cool. I like pretzels the best, but Penny likes trail mix.”
“I think we can manage that,” Tony told her agreeably, waving to Happy who had put the novel down and was watching in confusion as Tony followed the eleven-year-old girl back onto the sidewalk.
“Bye, Dave!”
The man that Tony had been talking to nodded and gave a short wave. “See you around, Tish.”
Tish pulled a device out of her pocket, disconnecting it from her headphones as they walked, and Tony looked down at it, trying to get a better look. It looked like an MP3 player...but not one he’d seen before. “What kind is that?” he asked. He hadn't spent a ton of time with kids, but he could talk about electronics anytime.
“It used to be a Zune, I think. I found it in the trash, and Penny found a bunch of other parts from other stuff and built this.” The little girl held it up for Tony to get a good look at the device while looked like the Frankenstein’s monster of MP3 players.
“And it works?”
“‘Course it does. Penny can build anything. But I put all the music on it, because Penny doesn’t know the difference between ACDC and Led Zeppelin,” Tish told him, leaning in and grimacing as though telling him a secret. Tony had to bite back a laugh.
“That's a tragedy!”
She nodded. “I know! My daddy listened to all the good music! He liked rock and roll the best. Momma said I listened to music too much, but Daddy got me CDs all the time at the Goodwill. Penny finds me some too.”
Tony wanted to ask what had happened to this little girl’s parents, but figured he’d just look into it later. No need to bring up painful memories. In the end, though, he didn’t have to. Apparently eleven-year-olds were happy to share their life stories with strangers. At least, this one was as the two passed apartment building after apartment building. “Daddy’s in jail now…” She shrugged, eyes downcast as she tried to play it off. He knew that tone, though. The one he’d used plenty of times after the death of his parents. The shrug. The faked nonchalance. “The police said he had drugs, but Daddy never did drugs. He said that if he ever caught me doing them, he’d send me off to boarding school. You know what that is?”
Tony snorted, thinking of his own experiences. “Yeah, I do.”
Tish nodded. “Yeah. It sounds bad. Drugs are dumb anyway,” she told him bitterly.
“That they are.”
After another block, Tish led him into what she told him was her favorite convenience store, grabbed a bag of trail mix and a bag of pretzels, and strode up to the counter before turning to him with an expectant grin. The cashier didn’t seem to notice them, barely glancing up from his phone to ring up the snacks, and Tony wanted to ask if she wanted something else. Candy or something. But he didn’t want to be insulting...didn’t want to step over a line when he didn’t even know where the line was. He was following an eleven-year-old girl through the streets of Queens to find a fourteen-year-old girl to take with him to Germany to try and stop half of the Avengers from going full civil war on him. Boundaries seemed kind of blurry at the moment.
Once they were back on the street, Tish opening the bag of pretzels and offering it to him first before devouring them by the handful, Tony finally asked where they were going.
“Penny always does her homework at the library after school, and I meet her there. She doesn’t like to go to the apartment though, so I get snacks.”
“Why doesn’t she like the apartment?”
Tish shrugged. “She doesn’t want to run into Skip.”
“Why not?”
Tish shrugged again, this time looking uncomfortable. “They just fight.”
He let it go, not wanting to press her. “So, Penny likes science, right?” Tish nodded. “What about you?”
“Oh, I like math! Daddy was always really good at math and he taught me! Penny says I’m good too, even though she does really hard math and I’m just learning Algebra. And I’m good at science too, but not as good as her. I’m better at writing papers, though. I like to read the books in English class. The only class I hate is PE. We have to run around the gym and no one ever picks me for teams. I’m really good at everything else though. I’m getting all A’s this year!”
Tony had to smile, nodding and lifting his eyebrows and trying not to think about how long this was taking. He had a little time. It was fine. “That’s pretty impressive. Maybe you’ll be getting an internship with Stark Industries in a few years.”
She shrugged. “I don’t know what I want to do. Penny went on a field trip to Oscorp a few months ago, around Christmas, and when she came back she got the flu really bad. She said Oscorp was okay, but she said she bet Stark Industries was cooler. Ooh, can you let us come to your labs and see them? I’m going to high school in two years, so I’ll get to go on the field trip then! Or, or, you could let eighth graders go? Or could I come to the lab?”
He glanced down at her where she was walking sideways beside him, hopping up on her toes as she spoke, the beads in her braids clicking together, voice full of hope. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll talk to Pepper. She’s the CEO of my company. We’ll see about having eighth graders come on a field trip to the labs next year.”
The girl’s face lit up. “Really! That’s so cool! Wait until I tell Penny! She’ll be so jealous, but I’ll tell her all about it! Will she be working with you in the labs? For her internship?”
“Probably.” At this point, he didn’t know if it was a lie or not.
Just then, they turned the corner, and Tony spotted the library. “Here it is!” Tish cried, speeding up and turning to him seriously. “This is the library, and you’ve got to be quiet inside or the librarian might ask you to leave for the day. Then Penny would get upset because she works here until they close. She only leaves to walk me home before dinner because she doesn’t want me to walk home alone in the dark, then she comes back here until nine when they close.”
“What does she do then?” Tony asked, resisting the urge to tell her that he’d been in a library before. They climbed the stairs together, stepping into a room full of bookshelves that felt dark after the bright sunlight outside. In the middle of the room was a staircase, and Tish headed straight for it, waving quickly at the librarian at the desk who smiled briefly at them before going back to her work.
Tish didn’t answer his question, instead climbing the interior steps that led to an even quieter second floor, then leading him through a maze of bookshelves until they were approaching a table in the very back corner.
And that’s when he spotted her for the first time.
Penny was small for fourteen, curled up in a chair with her backpack beside her, a bottle of water on the floor at her feet, and a textbook in front of her. Her laptop was on the table as well, along with some notebooks and loose paper. All in all, it looked like she’d made herself at home. When she glanced up, eyes narrow, her whole body went stiff, her gaze lingering on him before shooting to the younger girl that bounded right up to her.
“Iron Man was at the apartment looking for you, so I told him I’d bring him to you if he got us snacks. Look! The kind you like!” Tish whispered before holding out the bag of trail mix and the girl smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes.
“You extorted Iron Man for snacks?”
Tony stepped forward then, trying for a friendly smile. “Sorry to interrupt your studying. I just wanted to talk to you about an internship.” Then, glancing at the little girl, he went on. “I’m actually doing some pretty interesting research on spiders.”
At the word, Penny’s whole face went hard, but he kept going.
“And I was wondering if you’d be interested in a position with Stark Industries.”
Penny stared at him, then glanced over at Tish, seeming to make a decision. “Hey, Tish, go get us some cups of water from McDonalds, would you?”
The younger girl’s mouth dropped open, and then she glared. When she spoke, she obviously struggled to keep her voice down. “No! I want to know about the internship. I brought him here so I should get to hear about it too!”
Penny sighed, and for a moment Tony expected this to be an all out sibling war. Instead, the girl softened for the first time, then grabbed her wallet from her backpack, pulling out three single dollar bills. The only three bills inside. “If you get us water, you can go get a burger and an ice cream too.” Penny held up the money, and something in Tony’s chest clenched when he saw the naked longing in the younger girl’s eyes. How long had it been since she’d had ice cream?
Finally the girl took the money, then turned and left, only sulking a little. “Will you tell me about it?” she asked, turning with a resigned sigh.
“Yeah, I’ll tell you later. Promise.”
And then Tish was gone, leaving Tony with Penny Parker. After a moment’s hesitation, he sat down across from her, hands clasped on top of the table as she watched him, all of the softness gone from her face.
She didn’t trust him. She was afraid of him.
“How did you know?” Penny demanded first thing, her voice quieter than necessary. He noticed that she didn’t even try to deny it.
“Lots of research. Don’t worry, no one else knows.” Tony wanted to ask her so many things. He wanted so many questions answered. Where did she sleep? Why didn’t she stay at her apartment? Was she okay? Was she in trouble? And part of him almost did. But another part of him kept reminding him of another pressing issue at the forefront of his mind. “I have a proposition for you, actually. The Avengers are going through a bit of a rough patch. We’re having issues with Captain America. I need someone to help me subdue him, along with a couple of others. Not hurt, just...contain. So I can talk to them.”
Penny stared at him, eyes inscrutable. She looked older than fourteen, he thought with a pang. Older and more tired. “Does this have to do with the Accords? And Sokovia?”
So she followed the news. He nodded. “It does. Secretary Ross wants to arrest them. Put them in prison. And I don’t like the Accords either but unless we all sit down and agree to something, the Avengers are screwed.” She was staring at her textbook, silent and thoughtful, so he went on. “We have to talk through this. I...I have to try to make him understand.”
“So you need my help?” It was a strange question asked in a strange tone. Almost tentative. But still, he nodded.
“I do. That’s why I’m here. I’m asking for your help. As Spider-Girl. Help me bring them in...get them back to the tower so that we can try to talk again.”
For a moment, Penny just stared at him. But when she finally spoke, she didn’t bring up the fact that she legally wasn’t allowed to go. She didn’t ask if it would be dangerous, or what they would tell Skip. Instead, she nodded, and spoke in a whisper. “I’ll come with you...on one condition.”
Tony had to smile, although it felt tense. He hadn’t been expecting this to be a negotiation. Then again, he’d probably give her whatever it was she wanted. Maybe she really did want an internship. “I think you girls really are related. What do you want? More trail mix?”
Penny gave him a half smile, but it looked sad. Tired. Old. “Get Tish put into a different home.”
That...that hadn’t been what he was expecting. “A different home?” he repeated, wanting to make sure he got it right.
“Before we leave. Get her put somewhere else. And make sure Skip can never get another foster kid.”
Tony leaned forward, clasping his hands as his stomach seemed to drop. He did his best to keep his face calm, but he didn’t know if he managed it. “And what about you?”
She shrugged. “What about me?”
“You’ll still be with him?”
Penny shook her head. “I don’t go there much. And he doesn’t mess with me anymore. Doesn’t mess with Tish yet either but...if I’m gone for more than a day or two…” She shrugged again and Tony’s whole body felt cold. A lump was in his throat, and he thought for a moment that he might be sick.
“He doesn’t mess with you...anymore?”
She waved him off, not meeting his eyes. “It doesn’t matter. Just move her to another home before we go and I’ll do whatever you want.”
The look in her eyes broke his heart...broke down whatever barriers he’d built up before meeting this girl. Whatever he wanted. She’d do whatever he wanted if he moved a little girl out of a home where she apparently wasn’t safe. What did she think he would make her do? What had Steven Westcott made her do?
The hardness left Penny’s face then and she pressed her lips together, eyes wide and pleading as if losing hope, looking once more like a child…like she was grasping for straws. “Please...please, sir. Please get her out of that house. She’s going to be thirteen in two years and…just...put her somewhere else. You can do that, right? You’re Iron Man! And you’re a billionaire. Can you...can you just put her with someone nice? Someone...like...just a normal, good family. She’s only eleven, and...someone might still want her.”
Penny had been in foster care with Steven Westcott for a year. She’d only had her powers for six months, as far as he could tell. Maybe less. The girl across from him stared down at the table, her hands resting on her closed physics textbook, and Tony felt absolutely sick. His whole body was cold, and he desperately wanted a drink of water. He even thought about asking for a drink of hers. Or maybe, when Tish got back, she’d give him one of those cups.
“Please,” Penny whispered. “Please. If you can put her with another family, I’ll do anything. I’ll...Spider-Girl will do whatever you want her to.” The girl closed her eyes, seeming to resign herself to an unknown fate, and Tony knew, right then, that things had changed. He’d come here with the hopes of recruiting a vigilante to help him out. But he would have to do more than that.
“Okay,” he murmured, nodding. He meant it, although he had no idea how he was going to manage it. Could he pull some strings with Shield? Maybe Pepper could help him find another foster family for the kid. Or...or maybe he’d just have to take her in for a little while until he could find someone better. Either way, the little girl that had told Tony that she was good at every subject except for PE was not going back to that apartment…not for long, at least. “Okay. I’ll get her out...but you have to trust me.”
She nodded, something resigned in her eyes that he hated...that shook him to his core. He knew then, in that moment, that he wasn’t just getting Tish away from Steven Westcott. He was going to get Penny out too. Whatever it took.