The Spider and The Flame (Peter Parker)

Part 7- Training

One week later

It's been one week since I arrived here. Everything has been relatively calm, other than Tony Stark giving me suspicious glares at every chance he gets. I think he's mostly just concerned that I'm spending too much time with his precious Peter. Honestly Tony, who else am I supposed to hang out with? Rhodey? No thank you. I like hanging out with fun people, not authoritative assholes.

I haven't heard anything from Steve, or about Steve, for that matter. It's not that I thought he'd go on a full scale rescue mission for me, I just thought I'd have heard something by now. It makes me depressed that I'm not a very sought after member of the team.

The depressed feeling I get about Steve all goes away when I'm with Peter. He's like a rock, holding me to my sanity here. After all, I am technically a prisoner. He's fun and always brings a smile to my face, he always seems to know what I'm thinking.

Every morning I wake up in the bedroom Tony Stark made up for me. He made sure to eliminate any chance of my escape, so I have no windows and a door that is sealed shut from the outside at night. I can take off the suit as I please at night time, fly around the room, throw fireballs at things, but what's the use? Every morning I wake up in the bedroom knowing that Peter will be the one to open that door. I couldn't hurt Peter just for a chance to escape.

The funny thing is, every morning I wake up in that bedroom; but I never fall asleep there. Every night Peter and I chat for hours and fall asleep wrapped up in each other. He's my favourite pillow. He's very warm for a spider I guess, and I seem to fit in with his body like two puzzle pieces. I guess he carries me to my bed every night. The thought of him carrying me in his arms gives me a giddy feeling.

I don't know how to feel about my situation with Peter, but I know I'm confused as hell. He hasn't tried anything which I think is good, but at the same time I wish he would. I know that Steve and Tony wouldn't approve.

"Ash?" I hear Peter's voice shake me from my trance. I lose my train of thought moments later, blinking rapidly to bring myself back to reality. My eyes meet Peter's.

"W-what? Oh, yeah?" I stutter, blinking still. I must've zoned out for a while... My eyes are as dry as a desert.

"Are you ready?" He asks, looking confused and concerned.

"Uh" I mutter, "right yeah, of course" I smile, following behind him out into the indoor sparring arena.

The arena is enormous, with weapons of all kinds scattered on shelves around the room. Each shelf is marked with a name, mostly with 'Natasha' or 'Clint'. Reading Clint's name I smile, thinking back to our time training together before Berlin. He's an amazing coach.

Peter leads me to the centre of the room and turns around, holding his arms in the air.

"Here it is! Pretty cool, huh?" His smile is shining brightly, and I can't help but join in. "This is your first real training session with me so it's going to be super fun."

"What can you teach me that I don't already know?" I ask, beginning to walk aimlessly around the room, lightly gliding my hand against cabinets as I walk around. I make my way slightly towards the centre of the room, not making eye contact with Peter.

Without notice, Peter grabs my left forearm and goes to reach for my hips, but I evade his attack by jumping into a front flip, over his grip and onto the floor behind him. I land in a low body position, and take the opportunity to spin my leg swiftly around and hit his ankles, knocking him to the floor. He falls and let's out a groan.

On his side, I rush towards him and pin him to the ground, holding both of his shoulders down firmly with the balls of my hands. I climb on top of him and straddle his waist, pinning him to the floor. To finish off I grab his hands and hold them together over his head, bringing him to a pretty pathetic defeat.

"You want to try that again, Spiderboy?" I smile and bite my lip.

"I was going easy," he smiles, sliding his tongue quickly across his bottom lip. I stare down at his lips and back to his eyes, my lips spreading apart. Lost in the moment, Peter takes advantage of my unpreparedness and flips me off of him with sheer ab strength. He quickly pins me to the ground the same way I did him, and stares into my eyes. "It's Spider-Man." He firmly states, emphasizing the word man, and clenching his jaw slightly.

His deep brown eyes meet mine again and he begins to bring his head down to mine. Anticipation overtakes my judgement and I begin to lean upwards to meet his lips.

Just a second before we connect, the blast doors begin to open and Peter pulls back, looking up at whoever is entering the room. He quickly falls off to my side and laughs, trying to act casual.

"Oh good, you guys are here," Natasha Romanoff saunters into the room, wearing her full black suit. "And you're already stretching! Ash you must be a good influence on Petee. He never stretches. I don't think he can even touch his toes."

-

After training for the first time with The Black Widow, I've really learned a lot. She's a very good teacher, similar to Clint, but admittedly fights much dirtier than he does. She specializes in cheap tricks and what she calls 'money shots' (basically just waiting for her opponent to be perfectly distracted and then taking the opportunity to attack), which I find very intriguing. I'm capitalizing on the skills she teaches and I'm doing very well, the same can't be said for Peter.

Peter is terrible at being subtle! He's like a walking dinner bell. He can't 'sneak' or do anything without being completely obvious about it. I guess, with the red suit and everything, he's used to being spotted from a distance, but come on. The least he could do is try to pin me without coming face to face with me. He seems to want to turn everything into a frontal assault.

"How did you get your powers, Ash?" Natasha turns to me while we all walk towards the blast doors, done training for the day. My jaw clenches immediately.

"Born with it" I lie, flashing a smile.

"I thought you said-" Peter begins to speak, but I turn towards him and glare. Thankfully, Natasha doesn't hear Peter try to butt in. Peter's mouth closes slowly.

"Oh, okay." She smiles. We reach a fork in the hallway and she turns away from Peter and I, waving and saying, "see you guys later!" Then proceeding to walk off down the hall.

"Why did you lie?" Peter asks as we continue walking towards the kitchen.

"It's personal, I don't like talking about it." I mutter and bite my lip nervously.

"You can trust me, Ash... You know that, don't you?" Peter's eyes shine with a sincere glow.

"Pete..." I sigh, "I've known you for like, a week. We were literally at war a week ago." Pain creeps through Peter's expression, "It's not that I don't like you." I choke on the word 'like' for some reason, but clear my throat and continue, "You're great! I've just grown up in a totally different world from you. I don't really trust anyone, it'll take me a while to figure out how to do that."

"I get it." Peter coughs, looking ahead and breaking eye contact, "I still think you're just being difficult, though."

I scoff at his words and smile, "Me? Difficult? Never, Spider-boy." I laugh, and Peter joins in. The word 'Spider-BOY' has become my favourite way to annoy him.

"Oh, come on!" He whines at the nickname and throws his arms up in defence.