Saving Spider-Man // A Fanfiction

Chapter Three: The Portal

The elevator slowly moved upward. Peter was sick of the waiting. He had no idea what he was going to say to Mr. Strark. Every floor the elevator passed seemed another moment closer to his doom. Then the machine stopped and the doors opened, and behind those doors stood Tony Stark.

"Hey, kid. Follow me." Peter followed him and thought that at least he had a few more moments to collect himself before they had, 'The talk.' They approached a door a little way down the hall and went in. The room they walked into was extremely bright and Peter had to blink several times before he could see properly. When his eyes adjusted, he found himself standing in a huge lab filled with various pieces of high-tech equipment. He stared, amazed, at all the sciencey things that surrounded him. He had never been in a bonified Stark lab before.

For just a moment, Peter felt like himself again. He felt a rush of excitement that he hadn't felt in weeks. His old love of science and knowledge were coming back...

"Fitz, can you give us a few moments?" Mr. Stark's voice broke through Peter's reverie like a knife. He immediately withdrew back into his new personality and prepared himself for what was to follow.

"Of course, Stark." The engineer snuck a curious glance at Peter before disappearing through the door Tony and Peter had just come through.

"So...how are you doing, kid? I'm sorry I haven't been in contact with you."

"I'm not mad at you. You couldn't have stopped it any more than I could. Change was always inevitable. I couldn't always be an innocent kid. I guess I...I guess I grew up."

"Peter, you're only 15."

"And yet, here we are."

The pair were silent for a moment, then Stark said: "Let me show you around the lab." He knew he was just trying to change the subject. He knew he was evading the real problem. And that was that Peter needed help. Real help. Tony took him around to the various work stations, but nothing seemed to pique the kid's interest, nothing seemed to bring him out of his self-destructive shell

.

At last, they came to a door. "What's in that room?" Peter asked, making Tony jump. It was the first time he had spoken in nearly twenty minutes.

"Actually, I have no idea. Let's find out." Under normal circumstances, Tony would have never gone into that room by himself, let alone with Peter, but he was having a moment of weakness. His mind didn't register the faint purple light emitting through the cracks of the door. He didn't keep Peter close by. He wasn't careful like he should have been. Tony unlocked the door and stepped inside with his surrogate son. Blazing purple light filled the room. Peter inched closer and closer to the orb-like light source without thinking and when Mr. Stark said nothing, (Tony was quite mesmerized by the light himself) he touched the floating ball of what seemed like pure energy.

Just then, in a moment that seemed frozen in time, Tony Stark realized what he had just let happen and was stricken with horror. "PETE GET AWAY FROM--" But he was too late. With a flash and a bang, Peter Parker was gone.

"FITZ!" The engineer came running at the sound of Stark's frantic voice.
"Yes?" He asked tentatively.
"WHAT THE ACTUAL H--- DID YOU THINK YOU WERE DOING WHEN YOU MADE WHATEVER THAT IS??!"
"Oh, that? That's an energy gateway. Very Powerful."
"B-but why?" Tony's anger was subsiding and it was turning into fear.
"Because that's what I do. I develop new stuff all the time. Where's Peter?" Tony's silence gave him all the answer he needed. "Please don't tell me the kid's in the gateway!"
"The kid's in the gateway. Is t-there anything you can do?"
"Uh-uh maybe...I need time though."
"We don't have time, d--- it!"
"Alright, well if you want me to get him out, I need Dr. Banner. Stat."
Tony hoped two genius scientists would be enough to get Peter back safely. He wondered in that moment, was Peter safe? Lonely? Scared? In pain? The same thought played over and over in his mind: This is all my fault.