Harley made it home and collapsed, shivering, trying not to let the hot tears escape as his breaths came fast and jagged. His worst fear had come true. The Spider, the monstrous supervillain that haunted his nightmares, knew who he was. Knew everything about him. He wasn't even safe here, at home. His family weren't safe. The Spider would go after them all. His family, his teachers, his team, his classmates, probably even his tutor and the guy who delivered his takeaway. And it was Harley's fault. How had he found out? How long had he known? How long had he been toying with Harley, laughing at his futile attempts to fight? He'd demonstrated just how powerful he was - all the villains of New York feared him enough to obey him, but he'd never actually made an attempt on Harley's life - yet.
Harley had to tell Tony. He'd told him not to worry, that it was just a hunch, that there was no way the Spider could know his identity. Tony would be so mad. He would probably take away Harley's suit - not that it would do any good now. Harley would never be safe.
No.
He couldn't think like this. The people of Queens were counting on him. The Spider was a villain, and villains always lost eventually. Harley needed to push back, needed to find his identity, needed to thwart his evil plans and put him behind bars. Harley was Iron Lad. Iron Lad was a hero. And heroes always found a way to save the day.
As if on cue, Harley's superhero phone buzzed with a message. It was the tech store owner he'd spoken to a few weeks ago, texting him a list of the stolen items. Harley scanned through them eagerly, searching for something that stood out. Several items were dismissed immediately as useless or irrelevant to the Spider, and soon Harley had a rough idea of the pieces the Spider had actually needed to take.
The next day, Harley went to Stark Tower with renewed hope as soon as his tutoring session with Peter ended.
"You okay, kid?" Tony asked when he walked into the lab.
"Kind of. Is there any way my family could stay here for a bit? It's just, the Spider is upping his attacks and I don't want to put them in danger."
"Of course, I'll get that arranged right away." Tony went to leave, then hesitated. "Is the Spider going to be an issue? You know I can make time to help if you need it."
Harley shook his head. "I've got it under control now."
"If you're sure." The older man left, and Harley went to his bench, pulling out the list of items he'd compiled. The next hour was spent finding each object in the equipment store and working out what it did in the hope that it would give him a broader view of the Spider's plan.
By the end of the third hour, there was just one component Harley hadn't been able to work out the function of. He would ask Mr Stark, but he had no idea where his mentor had gone off to, and he'd already asked so much of him.
"FRIDAY, what can you tell me about this?"
"I'm afraid my databases are currently being backed up so I am unable to access that information. However, there is an intern currently on the R&D floor that took one from the general store a month ago. If you would like, I can direct you there?"
"Yes please." Harley followed the lights to the right floor, then looked up in shock when he realised that the intern FRIDAY mentioned was actually Peter, his young tutor. He'd almost forgotten that the boy interned here.
"Harley! Hi," Peter looked up expectantly. "Can I help you with something? Is this about the tutoring, because I'm actually a bit busy right-"
"No, it's related to your internship. FRIDAY told me you took an advanced component from a store last month."
Peter's eyes widened in alarm. "I'm sorry, I didn't know I wasn't allowed to! I know I'm just meant to be doing research, but I'd finished my report and wanted to build something! I can put all the parts back where I found them by tomorrow, please don't fire me!"
"Relax, I'm not going to fire you! Don't worry, you haven't done anything wrong. I just wanted to ask a couple of questions about it, I'm trying to figure out how it works and what sort of thing it could be used for."
"Oh! In which case, I don't think I can help you much. It's quite a complicated piece of tech, but it basically acts as a glorified programmable motor. Unfortunately there was only one of them in the intern's general store, and they've got very limited applications unless you have two or more, in which case the functions are almost infinite."
"Anything else?"
Peter shook his head. "Sorry, Harley."
It was only when Harley was back in Tony's lab that he realised there was another question he should have asked - if the motor was useless by itself, why hadn't Peter put it back in the store? What was the project he'd mentioned, and where was he keeping it?
He woke up the next morning with an outlandish theory, and a plan.
~
Peter sighed heavily as Harley left. Ever since the Spider had revealed he knew Iron Lad's identity, Harley had been far more alert, and Peter was constantly worried he was going to give something away or not be able to uphold his nonchalant persona. He knew it would be risky taking from the Stark stores but he'd already stolen everything he could from nearby shops.
He pulled out the blueprints he'd been working on - he'd been able to hide them when his senses warned him someone was coming - and looked over the plans. He was behind schedule, so he'd have to find somewhere private to work on them in school tomorrow if he was going to get his latest gadget built on time. He had a spectacle planned, and the entire world was about to be shaken to its core by the Spider.
But first, school.
"Have you got anything planned for the weekend?" Ned was chattering away as usual. It took Peter a moment to realise the question was for him.
"Not sure yet, there's a project I'm working on for my internship that might take up some time. Why?"
"Just wondering, dude. Hey, you're tutoring Harley, aren't you?"
"Yeah?"
"What's he like?"
"Alright, I guess. A bit high-and-mighty for my liking."
"Look, he's heading this way now!"
Peter resisted the urge to twist around in his lunch seat.
"Hey," a voice said. "Mind if I join you guys?"
"Please do," Ned said, slack-jawed at the prospect of the older basketball player sitting at their table.
"Hi Harley," Peter forced a smile. "Do you need help with something?"
"No, actually. I just thought, seeing as we spend so much time together, it would be nice to get to know you better."
Peter felt his smile becomes strained and worked to control his facial muscles to seem happy. "That would be really cool. You play basketball, right?" Harley couldn't know about the Spider, he was just being obnoxiously friendly. Even so, Peter would do his best to keep the conversation about Harley.
"Yeah, I love it. Do you do much sport?"
Peter and Ned exchanged a glance, and both stifled a laugh. "We're nerds," Ned said simply. "We don't really do sport."
"I did try to take up running once but then I almost got run over so I quit," Peter said, truthfully. "Definitely nothing to do with the fact that I hate running."
Ned laughed again. "How long have you been playing basketball?" He asked Harley.
"Only a few years, actually. When I was younger I was convinced I was going to play ice hockey."
"What changed your mind? Are you bad at skating?"
Harley shrugged. "Not really. It's just expensive, and very time consuming. I just got too busy to practise. So if you guys aren't into sport, what do you do?"
"Tutor you," Peter laughed, deflecting easily.
"Peter," Ned scolded lightly. "We're nerds, like I said. We watch Star Wars, build Lego, write computer programs, sometimes Peter designs machines and stuff..."
"What kind of machines?"
Peter shrugged. "Whatever I feel like. The parts I can afford are quite limited, though."
"Is that why you accepted the internship? I happened to see some records, it looks like you declined it for ages before accepting. What made you change your mind?"
Peter took a few moments to gather his thoughts before replying carefully. Harley was definitely probing. His senses began a low warning hum - he needed to get out of there. "I was really busy, but I suddenly realised what a great opportunity I would be passing up, not just for extra credit but for potential future careers, so I accepted." He cursed internally; he should have taken the defensive.
"So using Stark technology to build your own inventions is just a side benefit?" Harley pushed. Peter began to sweat. He was used to having the upper hand around Harley, but here, with so many people around, he was powerless.
"Yes," he replied shortly. "I actually have some homework I need to finish before chem, so I'm going to go now. I guess I've had less time in the evenings recently." It was a cheap shot, but it served as a good enough distraction for Peter to slip away before he could protest.
Peter locked himself in a cubicle in the bathroom and leaned against the door, heaving a deep sigh. From now on, he was going to have to tread very, very carefully.
~
Harley said a polite goodbye to Ned shortly after Peter left, and went to the library to think. He hadn't gained much information from the conversation. Peter hadn't said anything to prove he was the Spider, but he also hadn't disproved Harley's wild theory. And he'd certainly displayed a level of snark that Harley had never experienced from Peter before.
He wanted to think he was just jumping to conclusions. The Spider had never been seen during school hours or during the window when Peter was tutoring Harley - but that could mean nothing. Peter and the Spider had both taken a rare piece of tech that was useless by itself - but that could also be a coincidence. There was no solid evidence that Peter was anything but innocent - but there was also no proof on the contrary.
Harley ran a hand through his hair, staring unseeingly at the textbook in front of him. He was going in circles, but there was little he could do about it. He was in dangerous territory trying to discover the Spider's identity. Any slip-ups could prove fatal, but letting the elusive villain continue to terrorise the city was not an option. Not when he knew Harley's name and where his family lived.
That evening, Harley headed back to Stark Tower. He spent most of the night locked in a lab, creating. Then he gave his creation instructions, let it loose, and went to bed.
"You seem tired," Peter commented during their after-school tutoring. It was true, Harley felt awful, but Peter had seemed a little on edge too. And there was no sign of the tiny drone he'd set to follow Peter. But there also hadn't been any Spider sightings.
"Didn't sleep well," Harley said, blinking blearily at the work booklet. But he didn't miss the smug look of satisfaction that vanished from Peter's face before Harley could be sure if he'd imagined it or not.
"Fair. Well, we're nearly done. Let's just go over the four chambers of the heart again, and if you can name the blood vessels that connect to each one we can finish early."
It was ridiculous, Harley thought. Ridiculous, that he'd thought for an instant that this helpful, understanding child could be a murderous, obnoxious villain.
But later, he watched through the footage the drone had been recording all day. In slow motion and paused on a big screen, that fleeting expression he'd noticed didn't just look smug, or even sinister. It looked evil.
~
Peter was sick and tired of this charade. He couldn't keep acting nice about Harley without at least some of the freedom being the Spider brought - but there was a nagging sensation that was always present. It felt like back when Cindy had been following him, except he couldn't shake this pursuer. But it had been three days. He needed to get out and do something; terrorise Iron Lad, or anybody really. So he ignored the warnings that he was being watched and changed into his costume.
The moment Peter slipped the mask over his head he realised he'd made a terrible mistake. His computer sensors scanned the surroundings and latched onto a tiny piece of technology that was hidden behind a bin. Now that he was listening, he could hear the whirring of its minuscule camera.
The Spider swore and stalked towards the small drone. It tried to fly to safety, but Peter shot a web and yanked it back, crushing it underfoot. It beeped as it died, but Peter knew it had already told its master everything.
So Harley had finally caught up. It was time to raise the stakes.
~
It was a miracle - a horrifying, unbelievable miracle.
Harley knew the identity of his arch-nemesis.
His tutor.
A killer and criminal of the worst kind.
A child.
The game was on.
Harley knew it would be useless, but he went to Peter's apartment anyway. He'd come up with an excuse to do with tutoring, but it was unnecessary. A man with greying hair answered the door, slurring a little. When Harley tried to explain his purpose and ask if Peter was in, the man had flown into an abrupt rage and yelled something incomprehensible before slamming the door.
Harley was just about to text Tony to let him know what was going on when he got a text from Peter. There was no message, just an image. A photo of the machine Peter must have been building.
Peter knew he knew, then. And he was done hiding, but apparently not quite finished with his games.
Harley sent the photo to his laptop and got to work.
~
Peter sat in his new (temporary) lair, tapping his foot against the ceiling. He'd moved the machine before sending the message - it had only been here long enough for him to take a photo with just enough clues for Harley to find the location. Now he sat watching the perimeter camera feeds on his phone, waiting.
Harley would fall right into his trap.
As if summoned by Peter's thoughts, a glimpse of red and gold flashed on one of the cameras, so brief that anybody else might have missed it. Harley had noticed the cameras, then. Even the ones that were meant to be extra hidden. Sneaky.
Peter made sure to kick over a chair by the table as he crawled through the window, affixing a web to the sill before he launched himself away to watch his plan unfold from afar.
~
Harley was close. So close. And the Spider, in all his terrifying unpredictability, was becoming predictable. Harley had seen the badly hidden cameras easily, and his scanners had picked up a couple more. He was about to dismiss it as sloppy when he forced himself to think again. Peter had been ten steps ahead all the way through this. No way he'd make such an obvious mistake now.
Instead, Harley took a minute to manually create a program to scan the area for cameras. Lo and behold, there were more. These were tiny and had been hidden with some kind of electromagnetic shield. Harley shoved down the satisfaction at uncovering one of the Spider's traps, knowing the smugness would make him rash, and he couldn't afford to miss anything else. Carefully, watching all of the cameras to make sure he wouldn't be detected, Harley made his way into the apartment building which had been set for demolition.
He was almost at the door of an apartment - the one he'd identified using some clues hidden in the background of the image he'd been sent (no doubt intentional) - when a loud, startled noise came from inside. Abandoning all thoughts of stealth, Harley blasted through the flimsy door. He was too late - the Spider was gone. But a web was still drifting down from where it had been used to fling him out the window, and a steaming mug was on a desk next to a knocked-over chair. Harley had taken the Spider off guard - he had the upper hand now.
Closing the window and pulling the blinds so the Spider couldn't see what he was doing, Harley began his search of the apartment. Unfortunately, it looked like Peter had only moved in here very recently. There was no sign of the machine, but there were blueprints for it left on the table in the Spider's haste to leave, which Harley took multiple photos of then shoved into a bag for him to take with him. A last scan of the room showed there was nothing else worth taking, so Harley quickly left before the Spider came back to hide the blueprints.
Back in the workshop, Harley examined the diagram. Despite all of his technological genius and FRIDAY's assistance, he couldn't work out what it was designed to do. But the plans were clear enough on how to disable it, so all Harley had to do now was find it before Peter decided to use it.
"FRIDAY, keep running diagnostics on the plans and those images, see if you can figure out what the machine does?"
"Of course," FRIDAY replied. Harley stepped back into his suit and made a beeline back to Peter's apartment. He was sure the boy wouldn't be there, but it was as good a place to start as any.
Letting the nanotech retreat back to his watch but alert for any signs of attack, Harley knocked on the door again. There was some mumbling and then the door swung open to reveal a salt-and-pepper-haired man with bloodshot eyes and the distinct sour breath of an alcoholic. Harley tried not to wince as the man squinted at him and swayed a little, but at least he wasn't yelling this time. "What do you want?"
"Peter tutors me, I need to get back a textbook. Is he home?"
"No," the man replied shortly, glaring, and made to shut the door, but Harley caught it.
"Can I come in and grab it from his room? I'll be quick, I promise."
The man groaned, but let him in. "Teenagers and their coming and going and not being where they're supposed to be," he muttered to himself. "Blasted kids, Peter, where even is he, I'm going to kill the boy when he comes back. If he.... oh, I don't know."
Wincing, Harley edged past the obviously drunk man. From the smell and state of the apartment, this wasn't a once-off. No wonder Peter didn't like staying at home.
Peter's bedroom was small but surprisingly homey. His homework and some lego was spread on the desk. Any signs of the Spider were carefully hidden, but the window was unlocked. On the walls were photos. Most were either of Peter with his friends and some with the man who must be his uncle, but a few were with a different woman. In those photos, the man looked whole and Peter looked young but happy. Really, truly happy. He wondered what had happened to the woman, and whether it was the reason Peter had gone down the path of evil.
Then Harley noticed Peter's laptop. It was locked, obviously, but the screensaver was one that flashed up recent photos. One of them was a screenshot of a map with directions to an area right on the coast. Harley wasn't sure whether this was a trap or another move in the game or a genuine mistake on Peter's part, but he knew he needed to get to that location and disable the machine before the Spider could use it for something terrible.
Harley grabbed a random book from Peter's shelf, and sped back into the hall, waving at Peter's uncle. "Got it! Thank you sir, bye!"
Harley didn't heart the man's response. He was too busy running out of the door, suit forming around him, and blasting into the sky.
4th and final part coming soon!