Avengers One-Shots

(Bruce) Lights Out

Bruce Banner leaned against the wall of the moving elevator, rethinking what just happened and attempting to recall what he simply could not remember.

Bruce and the Team: Nat, Tony, Steve, and Clint, had been sent on an emergency mission to an underground facility.

The small child in Steve's arms he could backtrack to but...

Well, the mission wasn't much. Turns out that there weren't many people, but there was an outrageous amount of lab experiments. Or more like lab rats, because their little "experiments" were living, breathing, people.

The ones who were found, were taken on in combat by the Avengers or found dead.

'Pity.'

The only being alive was a young boy. Bruce guessed he was about seven years old. They found him locked up in a very unlikely room to stumble across, as it was hidden and difficult to find. To put it simply, Steve described it as dark, wet, and unpleasant.

Not a very pleasant room to live in, much less seven years, as Tony could not find any information about the boy. To Bruce, it seemed as if he was born in secret in raised in this wretched place — just his lightly thought out theory.

Suddenly, the elevator lurched to a stop–

They had been going up steadily for a few minutes now. What's happening?

The boy, who claimed his name was E.S. – 63, squeaked out in surprise. Bruce knew it meant something but could not figure it out just yet. The number could be which number experiment he was but what does E.S. stand for? A name?

The lights flickered and the Avengers whispered to each other like silly, scared school children.

"Guys..."

"Whose doing that? Not funny..."

"Hey, hey, hey!" Tony shouted in Clint's ear.

"I'm sure it's nothing."

"Maybe it's–" Bruce was cut off suddenly when the elevator turned dark and it started dropping at an alarming rate. Clint rocketed forward towards the open railing, Tony fell over with an audibly loud clank, as he was wearing his suit. Bruce and Natasha collided with each other, E.S. – 63 hit the ceiling, and Steve with his super human abilities only swayed in spot, looking up at the boy in wonder.

Bruce could tell Tony was preparing himself to fly underneath and attempt to repulsor blast the old, rusty, thing all the way to the top when suddenly the elevator stopped. E.S. – 63 stuck to the ceiling stubbornly, Clint was green in the face and dangerously close to falling off and plummetting to his inevitable death.

Tony was busy lying flat on his back, still trying to get up, Natasha reached for Clint's ankle with great difficulty (because Bruce just so happened to unfortunately be on top of her) and Steve was reaching up to grab the small, brunet child.

Once everyone had composed themselves, Steve stared at the small boy in amazement.

"I want him."

Bruce whipped his head around to face Tony so quickly that his neck cracked.

"What?"

Tony sighed, running a hand through his hair and the scientist finally noticed he'd retracted his helmet.

"If anything, we're the perfect dysfunctional family he needs."

Bruce shook his head, finding it depressing that he knew exactly what Tony was talking about before the man had a chance to explain himself. Bruce understood, "Tony Speak" quite well along with Harold Hogan, Rhodes, and Pepper.

"Tony, are you sure you can handle a child? It's a full blown job. And still, you're an Avenger. Not only that but you've got a company to take care of."

Tony slapped a metal hand on Bruce's shoulder.

"I knew you'd offer to help."

Bruce found himself dumbstruck, taking a step back.

Natasha cradled the boy in her arms.

"He stuck to the ceiling, like a little spider."

And as if on cue, webs shot out of his wrists.

"Whoa!"

Natasha spoke up again, "I think E.S. stands for Experiment Spider. Is that correct?" She stared into the boy's chocolate brown eyes with a certain gentleness that could break anyone's shell. He nodded. "Then 63 is your number?" The adolescent gave a gesture of agreement to her once more.

That's when he spoke, his voice raw as if he didn't do it very often. "But– But I mean– The, um... Other six, sixty-two didn't didn't survive."

Tears threatened to spill from his eyes as he whispered. "Cause, cause momma and pappa. They was there." Clint stared at Natasha, looking just about shocked as Tony was. The female ex-assassin didn't show her surprise because she didn't have any. After all, she was the Black Widow...

"And?" The redhead asked kindly.

Experiment Spider shook his head. "They weren't nice, no. Always with the men in coats..."

Bruce thought this topic was too much for the young boy to talk about so he decided to change it. "What should we call him?"

Tony smacked his lips together. "Let's do a vote. So Aiden..."

Captain Rogers finished his sentence, "or Peter."

Tony and Steve exchanged a smile.

And that's how Tony Stark adopted an innocent boy named Peter.

The End.

6/24/21
M/D/Y

Had this posted on my old account. Just edited it a bit. Hope you like my bull crap.