How Far We've Come

Chapter Eight

When Peter woke up, Jarvis was talking. Going on and on about something or other in his gratingly monotonous tone. But Peter couldn't understand anything over the ringing noise in his ears.

He was laid out on the ground, cheek against something cold. His head was pounding and his fingers splayed over something hard and smooth. Hardwood.

With a groan, he pushed himself up to his elbows and tried to piece together what happened. But Peter's arms were slick with sweat and sent him back down to the ground, landing on his jaw.

Grimacing in pain, he carefully lifted himself up again.

He was laying on the floor in the Tower's gym.

How did he...?

Oh.

Right.

He was running before, up on the treadmill, and now he was tentatively fingering a bruise along the ridge of his left cheekbone.

Had he fallen and passed out? Or passed out and then fallen?

Peter wanted to stand up and shake it off but his whole body ached from the impact. Just touching his cheek took enough energy to reignite the black dots in his vision. Instead, he rolled onto his back and finally tuned in to Jarvis's ramblings.

"-fathers are on their way right now, Master Peter, just try to relax."

That was all it took to launch Peter to his feet.

But he stood up too fast and simply tipped back to the floor in the opposite direction.

"Try not to stand up, sir. You took quite the fall-"

"Jarvis," Peter croaked before launching into a coughing fit. His lungs felt like they were stuffed with sandpaper. He needed water. "Tell them I'm fine. Don't-"

"Peter!"

Steve was at his side, hands on his son's face, before Peter could try and pull himself up again.

The overly bright florescent lights of the gym weren't helping him to focus in on his Pops' face. Peter blinked until Steve's worried eyes and locked jaw came into view. "What happened? Jarvis said you passed out on the treadmill and flew across the room."

Crashing footsteps announced Tony's entrance before his aggressive swearing started up. "Kid, I would say something about you flying across the room like Spider-Man, but, well-"

"Tony-" Steve started.

Tony knelt beside Steve and waved him off. "What the hell happened?"

"Well, sir, as I told you earlier-"

"He wasn't asking you, Jarvis," Steve snapped.

A hand came to rest on Peter's chest and since both of his dads could hover with the best of them, he didn't even know whose hand it was.

"Peter, you're soaked," Steve said, "How long were you down here?"

They were concerned. They loved him. They actually, honestly cared. But all Peter wanted to push his dads away.

He didn't want them to ask questions or put together the pieces as to how or why exactly he was currently laying in a puddle of his own sweat and unable to get up off the floor.

The dieting website, the one he found on social media, said all of this was normal.

That his body would need time to readjust to his new caloric intake and the lack of fats and carbs. It was natural.