Mama Nat

Career Day ✓

A/N: we don't have Career Days in Britain, it just isn't a thing, I vaguely remember when I was like five us having to find out about our parent's jobs and tell the class but uh, yeah and a couple parents did come in at some point but that was only one police officer and firefighter and it wasn't to tell about their jobs it was to do safety talks. That's the closest and that was just my school I think. Anyway, all of this is uh, made up I guess but this chapter is bull. However, I hope you enjoy it.

Career days were possibly the days at school that Peter dreaded most. It's not that he wasn't proud of his parents, nor that he didn't want to show them off, but rather that they never came. No-one did. They were all superheroes or secret agents, so of course they didn't. He didn't expect them to. He just hated the teasing that came after the parents left. But he couldn't exactly fake being ill like he had as a kid, his parents knew he didn't get ill anymore. He could try making up an illness that affects spiders and got passed on to him but they're both super spies and there's noway they'd fall for it.

As he left, Natasha called out that there was a surprise for him later that day. Knowing he'd get no information no matter how he asked, he said he was looking forward to it, kissed her cheek, and left.

The first couple of hours were fine; usual, boring class stuff. Usual, annoying Flash stuff. Usual, happy friends stuff. Then third period rolled around and adults flooded the room. MJ's mother, a nurse, gave him a sympathetic squeeze on the shoulder and Ned's dad, an engineer, gave him a nod. It didn't make him feel any better. When his name was called out, he prepared himself to explain that his parents hadn't been able to make it when the door burst open.

"Did you have to be so aggressive?" Maria muttered, earning a laugh from the redhead beside her.
"Apologies for being late, we could only get a couple hours off and then couldn't find the right room and it was mayhem. Schools are way more complicated than they need to be," Natasha started. The teacher spluttered at the sight of her, in her new and improved suit designed by Peter. Peter felt much the same.
"Miss Romanoff," the teacher spluttered.
"Hello." Natasha smirked at the awestruck face filled room. It appeared neither teen nor adult were unaffected.
"Nice to meet you, Mr Harrington," Maria spoke up when it became evident Natasha was just going to smirk, "I am Maria Hill, this, as I'm sure you all know, is Natasha Romanoff. We're not too late are we?"
"Wh-what for?"
"It is career day, is it not?" Maria asked. There were some blank looks but they were sure it was today. She turned to Natasha. "I swear, if you got the wrong day-"
"Me? Mia, you're the one who planned this, if anything-"
"Mum, Mama, it is today. You're just in time actually," Peter piped up from where he was half stood, half sitting at the back. "My name just got called." They smirked like they planned it, he wouldn't be surprised if they had and this was all some joke they were pulling to make it more fun for them and more embarrasing for him.
"You can't call the black widow mum!" Someone shouted, one of Flash's friends most likely.
"I didn't, I called her Mama."
"That's weird."
"Calling random women your mother is freaky, Parker."
"He's not calling random women mother, he's calling two famous women mother, it's so much worse."
"Actually, Peter is my son," Natasha piped up, interrupting the cacophany of teenagers. "I adopted him when he was three. Not that it is any of your business, but we don't have long and need to get this show on the road."
"Pete, you good?" Peter nodded at Maria's question and tilted his head. Maria clapped and got started. "It is probably obvious that we cannoy discuss a large part of our professions with you. However, we thought we'd come in and share what little we can. Natasha will be discussing what it means to work as an agent of SHIELD, while I figured I could talk about my previous job. Before SHIELD or working liason with the Avengers, I was in the marines. I signed up at sixteen and the training was more than just tough. Half my troop dropped out. I went out on two tours, worked my way up from private to commander before being scooped up by SHIELD. I doubt any of you are looking at going into military jobs, at least not in the typical sense, so I suppose we should move on to more likely job discussions for you." Peter had never seen her look so awkward, and they'd been kidnapped and tortured together. Fuck, he'd tortured her with glitter for years and made her speak to the World Security Council with pink sparkles in her hair.
"Are any of you thinking of joining the intelligence industry? Whether that be FBI, CIA, Homeland Security or somewhere better like SHIELD or SWORD?" Natasha asked, her distain for the FBI and CIA obviously coming through in her grumbles. Three hands raised. "This doesn't apply to you Pete," he put his hand down, "but any questions about that process?"
"You've never done this before, have you?" Cindy asked. Her hand hadn't been up, but she seemed the only one brave enough to question the two powerful women - arguablly two of the most powerful women in the world.
"No." They answered in sync. "Never been the student either."
"It's weird that you said that at the same time."
"Maria and I have been close since I was rescued by SHIELD. We worked together amongst other things and got used to silent communication, reading each other's body language in place of verbal communication. Our teammates joke that we can read either others mind."
"I'm not convinvinced thet can't," Peter piped up, MJ, Ned and their parents chuckled at him leading to a few others to join in.
"How do you become a SHIELD agent?"
"There's a few ways. My path to SHIELD was unique in that I was trained from birth to be an assassin and a SHIELD agent was assigned to kill me but realised I was barely older than you lot and he took pity on me and brought me in. After I was deprogrammed, a procedure where they access your neurological pathways and rewire them, I was offered immunity if I worked for SHIELD. Maria, as she mentioned, was a Marine and SHIELD talent spotted her - that's a pretty common way they recruit. Usually we take on agents from other agencies and make them better at their job. We watch, and we choose quite often. The other option is to sign up to the academy.
"There's three branches," she continued. "First is Logistics - that's where the data anaysts, tactitians, hackers etc train. If any of you end up signing on, I imagine it'll be there or the science branch. Frankly, those lot are too smart for their own good. College aged kids that already have PhDs - I know a woman who got spotted at 18 who already had two PhDs in fields I can't pronounce. I take it a few of you would fit in there. Then there's the field branch, the biggest. They train you to fight, to handle pretty much any form of weaponry, resistance to interrogation, all the typical stuff really," Natasha answered, Maria looked at her oddly for half a second, unaware she knew so much about the academies. Natasha turned to look at her and subtly gestured to Peter. Only Maria and Peter picked it up. "Or, you be as good as me, I didn't do any of that."
"You were brought on as an independant assassin, we were testing you," Maria chuckled. Natasha just rolled her eyes. "Similarly, you can be picked up by high ranking specialists who train you up, send you off to graduate and then train you up more to be a specialist yourself. To seek that out, you have to have already either graduated from there or prove to the board you can do the same things the academy students can. You're their responsibility until you can prove yourself to be level three," Maria continued. "That's actually how Peter has done his training."
"Mum!" He shrieked. "I'm not actually an agent," he clarified to the class. "But you can't live the life I live and not go to the academy. Nearly all the kids of agents spend their time at their summer camps."
"He is. He has the badge and has done the missions. He's listed in our database."
"Can I have my adoption certificate back? I want to go back to the state."