20Literally just entire pages of Tony and Bruce feeling guilty… I figured these scenes were a bit too much, so they got pulled out.
From Chapter 25…
Tony glanced for the umpteenth time that morning at the skinny kid in spandex perched uncomfortably in a chair on the other side of the coffee table. He really didn't look like much. He'd put on a sweatshirt at some point, probably something Bruce had found for him. He could have been just any other teenager, if you took away the bright red mask.
"But what's the big deal about the kid?"
Tony wasn't putting up with this bullshit any longer.
He stood up, ignoring Pepper's disapproving frown and the sudden dizziness that followed.
"We are telling you that everyone on planet Earth was enslaved, and you want to know what the big deal is? JARV, pull up footage from our first confrontation with Spider-Man. All of the cams."
Holographic screens emerged in the center of the room. Everyone became unnaturally still as Spider-Man came into sight.
"Dammit Tony, we've lost him. Why'd you take so long getting over here?"
Nat's voice. Tony's cam showed an empty rooftop, a black New York night. Tony clenched his hand.
The memory of it was painfully clear.
"Hey, style takes time. And don't blame it on me. Spider-Man's the one who booked it out of here."
The sound of his own voice saying those words was grating. Tony shut his eyes.
"Jarvis, scan for nearby life forms with unusual heat signatures."
"Don't bother Tin Man, I'm right here."
He pitied them. It was almost painful to have to watch the other rediscover what he'd known all along. Their faces grew blank, emotionless, like the good little agents they were. Tony knew behind their emotionless masks, the same guilt he felt grew.
'There's a kid behind that mask' he wanted to say. 'We beat up a high schooler.'
That's what got to Tony the worst.
A teenager.
Here they all were, the Earth's Mightiest Heroes, assembled together in all their glory in their big-ass fancy tower, and it was a skinny kid in spandex who had to step in and save the day.
The planet.
All nine realms.
Because dumb-ass Tony, who had seen everything that was out there in the wormhole, who had watched Loki use mind control to get what he wanted, couldn't do the very obvious thing and have a few mind controlling alien contigency plans ready for such an event.
He'd fought it. It hadn't been enough.
When they'd had Fury give the order to track down Spider-Man, he'd known their end goal. He couldn't prevent his body from climbing into the suit, bantering with the rest of the Avengers like nothing was wrong. He couldn't prevent his arm from firing repulsor blasts at the poor kid, slamming his metal fists into the kid, but he'd been crystal aware of the kid's muffled cries.
Like the Battle of New York hadn't given him enough nightmares. Now he had this guilt on top of it to eat away at what was left of him.
Tony knew what the kid had gone through. Kvilla was a hive mind, and that hive mind came with limitless access on others thoughts, memories. Especially those relating to P- the kid. Spider-Man. He was their big threat. He had potential, capability, power, that kvilla needed to neutralize.
So kvilla had pieced together the parts of this kid's life by taking the memories of everyone they had possessed, everyone who knew anything about Spider-Man.
Tony knew he was parentless, knew why he was parentless too, knew his uncle had died, knew who had killed him. Tony knew where he went to school, what other kids thought about him, what other people thought about his secret identity, and uncomfortably knew how his aunt felt about him, worried about him. What she suspected about his nighttime activities.
He hated being privy to all this emotional shit. It made him disgustingly sympathetic.
It made the guilt all more potent. He hated the fact that this teenager, this kid, was the one cleaning up after an Asgardian-sized mess because the Avengers, SHIELD, hadn't had the foresight to prepare for something like this.
Tony knew Loki wasn't the last alien to come to Earth and meddle with people's brains. He'd seen what lay beyond the wormhole. He hadn't done a damn thing about it, and his lapse in responsibility meant a high schooler had to feel the stress of saving the entire planet.
Casualties, too. The kid's aunt was hospitalized. Tony knew what the damage looked like, because he'd had full access to Daredevil's memories when kvilla had used him.
It didn't look good.
Kvilla didn't think she would last long, even if the kid had given it the information it had wanted. Who was Tony to argue? Kvilla had access to the best doctors on the planet.
Tony hoped it would get better. Naively, kid didn't deserve to lose the last living member of his family.
The fighting had begun.
This is what they'd done.
This is why what the kid had done mattered.
The footage concluded.
Kvilla had wanted him to give up Pet- the kid's identity, and since that was what Kvilla had wanted, that's what Tony didn't want.
From Chapter 10…
The first thing Bruce had done after leaving Peter's room and returning to his own was throw up.
Call him soft. Call him over-emotional. But he'd seen close up the wounds inflicted on Spider-Man. The third degree burns that had melted the suit into the skin, the bruises he was sure to have. An arrow wound.
For what? What would make a teenager go through such great lengths? Who was Peter protecting when he went through unmeasurable pain to keep his identity a secret?
The next thing Bruce Banner had done was some research.
Trembling fingers had slid across his Stark tablet. He'd hesitated before opening up the file that Peter's mother had submitted. It included personal information such as address,but it would also include health concerns.
Bruce Banner began to read through it.
Peter's mother hadn't submitted the paperwork required for Young Minds. Peter's mother was deceased, along with his father and his uncle.
The only living relative Peter had left was his aunt, a May Parker. She was a full time nurse at one of the many hospitals dotting the city.
The next part of his file was standard. He was attending Midtown High. His address was for an apartment in Queens, and his grades were high above average. He was the best in the school.
Everything else seemed perfectly average, until Bruce reached the last part.
Do you have anything in particular you would like us to know about your child?
In uncharacteristically neat (she was a nurse after all) handwriting, Peter's Aunt had given a few sentences of precious insight into Peter's past.
His parents had left six year old Peter with his aunt and uncle for a short while, only for their plane to go down and them never return. At age fifteen, Peter Parker's uncle Ben Parker had died after witnessing a robbery and attempting to stop it.
If 's memory served him, that's when Spider-Man had first started making appearances.
A year later, Peter's girlfriend Gwen Stacy had died.
The aunt didn't say how, nor did she say why. But Dr. Banner was a scientist and a doctor. He could make an educated guess.
Words from three months ago, when this whole thing had started, came back to him.
"Unlike you monsters, I've got people I care enough about to keep out of the bloodshed and danger."
There was the fact that he considered the Avengers monsters for not keeping the people they cared about out of harm's way.
He'd had experience. Peter knew what it felt like to lose someone because of what he did.
Bruce may have only had minimal experience with psychology, but he knew enough to know that Peter probably blamed himself for his girlfriend's death, his uncle's death, and possibly his parents death as well.
Peter walked like he held the weight of the world on his shoulders.
He very well may have.
Bruce knew what it was like to bear the blame of people's deaths. He'd killed people before. It made you ask questions like 'why did I get to live when the other person didn't?'
The Avengers were wrong about Spider-Man. SHIELD was wrong about Spider-Man.
But Bruce had known that.
Why hadn't he stopped them? Standing to the side and watching an injustice happen was the same as doing it yourself. He should've talked sense into the Avengers.
He wouldn't make the same mistake again.
While he was still deep in his thoughts, JARVIS smoothly spoke up.
"Sir, your presence is requested in the Avenger's control room. It is urgent."
Bruce had sighed.
It probably had to do with Spider-Man.
He had gone upstairs.
At the sight on the screen, Bruce almost let out control right there.
Spider-Man stood on top of the One World Trade Center…
