Timshel

ii - In Memorium

warnings: Endgame spoilers, graphic depictions of violence, murder, and brainwashing

***

2023, Pepper Pott's cabin, upstate New York

"You know, I was going to digitize all of these, I don't know why Tony never did," Pepper sighs as she sits down on the edge of Tony's desk, staring at a box of files from the late 1990s to the early 2000s.

"Why were these files never digitized to begin with?" Peter asks, opening the dust-covered box to stare at the yellowing paper inside.

His hands were shaking and he had tears in his eyes as he sifted through the box.

"I think these were small projects, nothing huge like the ones he immediately digitally filed. He just never got around to it. You know him, always busy, constantly looking for the next thing to fix or work on."

"Right," Peter sighs as he thinks about his mentor. Mr. Stark was always jumping from project to project, sometimes juggling half a dozen things at once.

"So I figured I'd let you look through them, if you wanted to, you can hold onto them. Nothing important, but I thought his notes might make you smile. I haven't really gotten around to reading them but I'm sure they mean a little more to you."

"Thank you, Ms. Potts," Peter smiles, his lips quivering, tears welling in his eyes as he looks at Mr. Stark's handwriting.

"Petey! Petey! Come on! Happy says you can play hide and seek!" Morgan shouts, the spitting image of her father, looking more and more like him every single day. Especially when he wasn't here, Peter saw Mr. Stark's quirks in her. His head tilt, the way his nose would scrunch up, her eyebrows.

"Hey Morgan!" Peter quickly wipes his tears away and sets the file down, crouching to pick up Morgan who came running into her dad's office.

"Petey, you know when I would go into dad's office or catch him working he'd get me an ice pop. Do you want a juice pop?" Morgan asks, small hands tucking one of Peter's curls behind his ear as he started walking out of the office, Pepper smiling fondly at the pair.

"I'd love a juice pop," Peter laughs as he brings Morgan out to the garage freezer where they found the stash of juice pops.

Peter set Morgan down and she sifted through the different pops, "there's cherry, and green apple, and blue raspberry. And even though cherry is my favorite, and I don't let mommy eat those, you can have cherry."

"I can?" Peter asks, eyes wide as Morgan nods, handing him and cherry pop and getting one of her own.

She giggles before running away, back into the house.

"Come find me Petey!" She shouts before slamming the garage door.

Peter laughs, nibbling on the juice pop and letting it stain his tongue and lips a dark red as he walks into the cabin, crouching on the ground as he moves, searching for the small light up sneakers or the bright pink and purple shirt.

He finds the light up sneakers hiding behind the curtains, bright red and blue flashing as Morgan giggles.

It reminds Peter of the times he would play hide and seek with his parents as a kid, almost always hiding behind the curtains, eventually he learned they found him by his sneakers, so he would hide elsewhere.

"Morgan, where are you?" He asked playfully, passing right by her hiding spot.

Her heard her telltale giggles of Morgan behind the curtain but he played along, walking past her slightly.

"Psst, pssst," he heard her and he backed up, finishing the juice pop and holding the wooden stick between his lips.

"Morgan? Is that you? Oh my gosh," Peter pushes the curtain open and Morgan jumps out, her arms wrapping around his neck as he picks her up, spinning her around as she giggles.