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When Tony Stark’s phone went ringing at half past three in the morning, the billionaire knew immediately it was not a good sign.
Peter Parker never called.
Peter Parker was the type of a guy to write a text message even in the most inappropriate situations in that weird teenage way.
Peter was the type of a person who called him “old” for using caption letters, and who used a bambillion emojis in every paragraph.
So yeah. It was pretty weird that Peter was calling him.
In the middle of the night. In the middle of a school night, more importantly.
Not that Tony was sleeping. He was in the lab – tinkering with some quantum computing advances for Stark Industries (which he had postponed for four months already and Pepper had been scowling him about, but whatever). Whatever. Peter was calling.
So yeah.
He quickly stood up and took the damn call.
“Yeah?” he addressed instantly. There was laughter on the other side. A boy's and a girl’s one. He could tell only that.
There was a silence for a good second, then the girl said something incomprehensible.
“Peter? You there, buddy?” the man said once again.
“What?” Peter said with a strange tone of voice. Tony closed his eyes and breathed out heavily. He knew exactly the tone. “Yeaaah, I’m fine,.. more than.. fine, ac’lly, you know…”
The girl in the background laughed again, clearly yelling at him to pass the joint back to her. Tony wanted to roll his eyes, and immediately come and ground Peter. God, what was the boy doing?
“Then why are you calling me, buddy?” Tony continued, acting as if he was not on the edge of calling Peter’s aunt and informing her about the situation.
The laugh continued, and he could only hear mumblings from Peter. Then he could hear that Peter’s phone was passed, as it was being moved.
Then he could hear the girl’s voice clearly.
“Hey, -’don’t know if Parker here was bluffin’ or not, but if you’re Tony Stark, I’ve got a question” was Tony’s hearing fine? Has he fallen asleep and this was his nightmare? No more atomic bomb attacks, but heart attacks because his nerdy intern was suddenly smoking and was high?
“What the hell did you smoke? Are you high, both?” Tony said before he could pull himself together.
He promised himself that Peter would be better than him. What the fuck was going on, how the hell did that sweet boy start with something like that? How long was this going on?
So many questions, and not one answer was close.
“Ooh, he had a good amount. Said something about a need to think clearly. Helps me a lot,” the girl answered immediately. Her voice sounded high, but she was clearly a pro.
He was the same when he was high, Tony realised.
“Aanyway, I was wondering if you could answer that question of mine..” she continued.
“Yeah, shoot,” he shrugged his shoulders. “But then I’ll have some questions, and don’t you dare end the call before I have the answers, alright? Or else I’ll track down Peter’s address and I’ll come by myself.”
“Sure,” the girl answered. “I read your paper on the chemical bonding of Baddasium. Terrible name, by the way. Missed an opportunity for Starkium or shit. You’re saying it works similarly to the hydrogen stuff, but that doesn’t make fucking sense, mate. I looked into it. Never saw it in real life, but you can’t tell me that an element with proton number 113 is as reactive as Hydrogen and Lithium, as you’re saying there. Doesn’t make shit sense, only if there was a different type of bonding than..” the girl stopped for a minute, clearly thinking.
“Hope your thoughts are clear thanks to the weed,” Tony commented. Then Peter exclaimed something in the background. Tony could clearly hear the words “boring” and “doesn’t make sense, Tony”
“Fuck, it does,” the girl spoke up again. “Only if there was a different type of bonding than you have written there. It’s a fucking lie, right? And the reactions, too. You wrote it wrong so that others couldn’t make their own. If it reacted like Hydrogen, it would be the next hydrogen bomb. Russians could be making one in the labs for a decade. Fuuck,” the voice continued. “’Am right, right?”
Tony wanted to laugh. That article was posted almost three years ago, yet nobody had commented on it. “And how did you find out?”
There was silence on the other side. “You know, just basic stuff. Was bored.”
“Sure,” Tony nodded. At least Peter wasn’t hanging out with dumb people.
“Weren’t you nominated for the Nobel prize for this? Like, in three different categories? How the hell did you win that?” the girl continued.
“Don’t ask me, I don’t have more answers than you do,” he shrugged. “So, now that you have your answer, can I have mine?”
“Go for… Parker, don’t stand up! ’Told you! You had too much! Now just sit and laugh! What? Yeah, go for it, Mister Stark,” the unknown girl replied, obviously trying to act somewhat normal. Tony knew what was and what wasn’t normal. She was probably on cloud nine, trying to answer his (very) serious questions.
God, maybe he really was old.
A few years back, he would invite himself the moment that smoking was mentioned. Now, he was getting worried over a joint.
But Peter was Spider-Man. He could have some reaction to it.
“Tony, pleaaaase, I think I want to live with you. Do you have any more pizza?”
Tony was confused. He did not understand whether Peter was asking him, or the strange girl.
“What’s your name?” was the first question that left his lips. Meanwhile, he gestured in the lab so that FRIDAY would be able to look at the girl’s info.
Legally, of course.
Tony Stark was not one to do illegal stuff now, was he?
“Tony,” the girl answered immediately. The real Tony only pinched his eyebrows. What was he expecting from a high teenager, once again?
“Yes?”
“No, my name is Tony. Like you. But with an “i” on the end. Toni,” the girl replied without missing a beat.
“Cool. You got a last name, too, mystery Toni with an “i”?”
“Uh,” there was a pause on the other line before Peter’s voice interrupted the conversation.
“Yeah, but she’s a runaway, Mister Stark, so she won’t tell you,” he started laughing. “But I swear, she’s nice. I look af’er her, you ’now? Protecting her, and ’tuff,,” he mumbled to the phone. Then the girl (Toni, Tony reminded himself) took the phone back.
She was going to say something, but Tony interrupted whatever she was going to say.
“Why the hell do you have a joint at ho-,…” he stopped for a millisecond, “at whether you are?”
There was quiet on the other line for a second or two. Tony started to get worried, and when he was finally going to say something once again, the girl answered.
“Shit keeping me up at night. Doesn’t help to keep it away but still. Parker said I should call him when I feel like relapsing and here we are. Three in the morning, studying chemistry papers and on the line with the Tony Stark. Life is strange, innit?” she continued as if she was having a normal conversation. “I’ll keep an eye on Peter, don’t worry. It’s not like I sell it, I’m not that type of a gal, trust me.”
“Yeah,” Tony nodded after a while. “Yeah, why not. But please, don’t overkill it. Really, it’s not gonna be comfortable in the morning. And don’t let him do anything stupid. Does his aunt know he’s with you? I don’t think it would be safe for him to go through the dark NYC alone at night, laughing his ass off.”
There was silence on the other line.
“I’ll text his aunt I needed him in the lab very quickly for a scientific discovery, and that he will sleep over at the Tower, that alright with you? That way, you won’t have to worry about a pissed-off Italian aunt, and I will,” he went on. The girl immediately accepted his offer.
“Thanks, Mister Stark. Peter wants to order pizza, so I’ll go but he’ll live, don’t worry.”
“Good night to you too, Tori,” Tony said, and ended the call before he could hear any upset remarks about her name being said wrongly. Slowly, he scratches his ear while he walks to the computer in the centre of the room.
God, he’s too old for stalking young teenagers.
On the other note, however..
Yeah, he wants to know who the mystery person was.
And honestly, it doesn’t even take that long. All he needs to do is to go to Peter’s Instagram account and look through the people he follows.
When he doesn’t find the girl there, he raises his eyebrows but goes onto Spider-Man’s account. It’s not very hard from now on.
The dumb girl may be not following Peter on his personal account but he, however, follows her there, on this very public and, supposedly, very neighbourhood-friendly, one - which is far more suspicious than the other way around.
Name toni_jarvis shines on him in the dark lab. When he clicks on her profile, he finds out she has a private profile, but her description says her name is “Eden T. Jarvis” and her profile picture is a selfie with Spider-Man.
Fucking Spider-Man, not Peter.
What the fuck did his Kid get himself into now??
The name Jarvis rings a bell, nevertheless.
“If I may say, Boss, I think the girl is a descendant of Edwin Jarvis,” is soon to be heard from the speakers installed in the lab.
“Wow, Friday, such a great discovery, I wouldn’t have known that it was a possibility,” Tony exclaimed immediately with rolling eyes. He may be a genius but it takes him a moment to calculate the possibility of the girl being somehow related to his old butler.
There was silence sulking for a hot minute, until the AI answered: “Sorry, Boss, my apologies.”
“That’s fine. Edwin had a daughter, right? What was her name again, Fri?” he asked instead.
“Erica Jarvis, born in 1975, Boss. There are photos of you two from your childhood, sir. Would you like to see them?” Friday answered promptly. Tony only shook his head.
“No need. I remember her now that you said that,” while the ’we had a failed friends with benefits thing between us’ went silent. No need for opening his youthful relationships.
He definitely needn’t go into that. It was too late for that kind of shit (or was it too early? He had no idea, and he was quite scared to look at the clock on the wall- oh, it was five o’clock already, shit, Pepper was going to kill him-). “Eh-uh, where’s she now, Fri? Edwin was with the British the last I remember, right?”
The AI was silent for a minute, again.
“Yes, Edwin Jarvis is currently working under her Majesty, the Queen. According to my latest information, he is her personal assistant, and-”
“How ’bout my first question, Fri, hm? I know those flaws of yours, do you want me to look into your coding again?” he raised his eyebrow, knowing that it meant nothing good.
“I’m afraid the location of Erica Jarvis is unknown. Her last telephone call was held with the ex-director of SHIELD, Nick Fury while the SHIELD organisation was still active. The telephone call was held six months ago on February 26th. That is the last information I was able to find in my database.”
Well, that never meant anything good. “Can you get me a transcript of that call?”
“I am afraid not, Boss. But I can tell you the call had 26 seconds in total, and before that, Erica Jarvis, along with her daughter, were residents of the Royal family estates for roughly half a year.”
“She has a daughter?” Tony almost choked. He needed a shot of espresso.
“Yes. When you look at the display in front of you, there is a photo of Princess Eloise and her. The girl was admitted to Benenden all-girl school last September with a full-ride scholarship, however, she no longer studies there. The school…..., --….., …. .”
Tony’s attention, though, went elsewhere. On the screen, two girls were clearly paparazzied – while the Royal was laughing at something, the other girl was exclaiming gestures with her hands in the air, clearly upset. Her eyes were looking straight to the camera. In the next picture, the Royal looked in the same direction as her. However, that was not the thing that took his attention.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Fuck. Double fuck.
“What’s the girl’s info, Friday?” he asked instead. Was he supposed to wake Pepper up? Or was this the moment he was going to lose his mind and go all nuts?
“Edward Antonia Jarvis, born 1998. She is, currently, reported as a runaway.”
“Unblock me the account of Peter’s little friend,” he could see she had posted three photos.
Soon enough, he was looking at the girl’s photo.
Not in a creepy way. Way more in a “oh god what have I found” way.
Was this really the time he should wake his PR manager up? No, was this the time he was supposed to wake up from this very random dream?
Friday was, once again, silent.
Until she wasn’t. It probably would have been better if she hadn’t spoken at all.
“If I may, your parents’ death was approximately eight to fifteen months before her birth, therefore during your biggest alcoholic relapse. I cannot confirm nor deny whether Edward is your daughter, but the face recognition fits the profile that one of your children could possibly have. Maybe you would like to call Colonel Honeybear to confirm the timeline?”
“No need,” Tony sighed, while slowly sat down. “Fuuck, what the hell have I done?”
“Is there anything that Obbie has written into the databases? Anything at all? Some block of any sort, instant name disapprobation or anything? Look through it, Fri.”
“I am afraid not, Boss. There is absolutely nothing, although I advise you to go through the information yourself when you feel like yourself. I may have some information banned, not knowing about them. Even though this possibility is not likely, it may be.”
“Yeah, yeah..”
Once again, he looked at the photos before him. Short dark curly hair, olive skin, sharp face lines. Sharp jawline, high cheekbones, narrow nose. And piercing eyes. Very piercing eyes, fuck.
No way the girl went under the radar. No fucking way – he could not believe it. She looked like the perfect Stark prodigy. She definitely could be seen from afar, something about her made people look in her direction. Just like Erica, he realised grumpily.
If there was one person the girl looked like more than him, it was somebody he wanted to leave deep in the past. Well, this was a problem that could have a solution. Maybe it didn’t even need to be solved. But.. a runaway. His possible child that was reported as missing, was currently getting high in New York City with Spider-Man, solving science problems after one another.
Yes, he was definitely too tired for this. He could solve this tomorrow.
But the eyes of Howard Stark that were looking at him through the photographs of the young girl probably wouldn’t leave his mind for the next few months. He was sure of that. Because that was the Stark curse – the Starks would live forever and ever.
Stark men were made of steel, as his late father liked to say. And those steel eyes were piercing through his soul after all these years again and again.
All that he could hope was that the young Stark escaped all the shit that they had in the genetics. God, he really wasn’t ready to be a father.
No, scratch that.
He was not ready to be a father to somebody who was getting high, clearly going the same path as himself a few years back.