"fury was right. tony did a lot for me so i owe it to him, to everybody." peter was telling beck, drinking yet another lemonade from the bar.
"do you?" he countered.
he nodded, incredulous. "yeah. i mean, mr. stark gave me the chance to be more. he wanted me to be better than him. and fury wants me to live up to that.
"what do you want?" beck asked.
"what do you mean?"
"what do you want?" he repeated.
peter shook his head with sa slight scoff. "i don't know-"
"what do you want? peter parker. now. i know you're thinking about it."
he threw his hands into the air in exasperation. "i wanna go back on my trip with my friends! and i want to go to the top of the eiffel tower with the girl i love, and i wanna tell her how i feel and... and give her a kiss! and make up for all the times i didn't say i loved her."
beck gave him a tight lipped smile. "you're not gonna do that, are you?"
peter shook his head again. "no, i can't."
"why not?"
"because i have too much of a responsibility." he explained. a waitress then tapped him on the shoulder, handing him the edith glasses, which had fallen onto the floor. "oh my god. thank you so much." peter said, taking them from her gratefully.
"what are those?" beck asked. "are those the--?"
"edith glasses, yeah." peter nodded.
beck shook his head. "they were just on the floor? try them on. let's see how they look on you."
peter put on the glasses, blinking for a moment before looking at him. "i actually really like them."
"can i be completely honest with you?" beck said.
peter nodded. "please."
"they look really stupid." beck said, making peter's face fall. "but maybe they have a contact-lens version."
"you try them on." peter said, holding them out to him.
beck took the glasses from him, putting them on. "what do you think, kid?"
peter frowned, his brows furrowed in concentration. "next tony stark, i trust you." he mumbled.
"what?"
"mr. stark left me a message with those glasses: for the next tony stark, i trust you." peter explained.
beck shook his head. "i''m still not following. how many lemonades have you had?"
"he knew every mistake i ever made, okay?" peter continued. "he must've known i wasn't ready for something like this. maybe he didn't trust me to have edith, he just trusted me to pick who should. it makes much more sense. he always knew i'd do what's right. and he's not gonna give them to fury because fury would give himself edith."
"you're probably right about that." beck nodded.
"right, so the world needs the next iron man. and it's not gonna be me. i mean, i'm a sixteen-year-old kid from queens." he said. "and kodie's, she's.. she's already sapphiron, right, and she would've taken the glasses herself if she really wanted them. it needs to be an adult with some experience and that's good... like tony stark, like you."
beck then shook his head. "no. peter, come on. no."
peter looked up, speaking to the glasses. "edith? hi. um. i'd like to transfer your control over to quentin beck."
"peter, what are you doing?" beck asked.
"doing the right thing." he said, laughing slightly.
"any transfer will require confirmation." edith reminded him.
"stark gave you the glasses."
peter shook his head. "mr. stark gave me a choice. it's my choice to make, okay? and i'm gonna make it. you're a soldier, a leader. you stopped the elementals. you saved my life. you saved the world, okay? he'd want you to have them."
"waiting for confirmation." edith said.
"confirm." peter said quickly, handing the glasses back to him. "welcome to the avengers. they look good on you. mr. stark would've really liked you." he said, getting up from his seat.
"where you headed?"
"i'm gonna... i'm gonna go talk to kodie." he said.
"good luck, kid. i give you a fifty-fifty chance.. you're pretty awkward." beck replied.
peter chuckled. "yeah."
⎊⎊⎊
dakota was walking along the street outside of the monster attack, doing her best to clean up anything she could. once she'd done what she thought she could, she walked through the alleyway, too lazy to fly around. as she walked, she heard a web sound, which made her look up, wondering if it was peter.
sure enough, he dropped down so he was dangling in front of her, upside down. "hey." he said, slightly out of breath.
"hey." she replied, chuckling. "you gonna get down from there, or..." she said after he'd been hanging for a moment.
"can i kiss you?" he asked, in complete awe of the way her hair was blowing in the slight wind.
she shook her head. "peter, you're literally upside down right now, no."
"come on, please?" he asked, swinging back and forth now.
"fine." she mumbled, pulling his mask down from his chin and to his nose, pressing her lips to his. he smiled into the kiss, her hands cupping his cheeks. "no, no, that's so weird, your nose was like.. on my chin." she complained as they pulled away, and he dropped back to the ground to stand, laughing.
"okay, okay, can i get a normal one then?" he asked, webbing her to pull her closer by her waist. she laughed slightly as he put his fingers on her chin, pressing a gentle kiss to her lips.
"i'm sorry your entire trip was ruined." she frowned.
he shrugged his shoulders. "ehh, not the entire trip. i mean, you're here, right?"
dakota smiled, shaking her head. "well, but we didn't get to do paris."
"yeah, well, sometimes things don't go the way you planned." he reasoned, putting his hands on her hips. "but, i actually.. i did have something planned, and i wanted to tell you something."
she looked up at him, her brows slightly furrowed. "yeah? what's up?"
"um, it's something i... i've been meaning to say for a while."
"what?"
"i just... you are..."
"beautiful, a genius, immensely talented..."
"yeah, yeah, all that. and i don't know how to put anything into words, but you mean so much to me. and i'm so glad you're here and that you're here for me even after everything you've been through. and i guess..."
kodie put a hand on his cheek, making him stop talking. "hey, calm down, okay? breathe." she reminded him.
he smiled, nodding. "you're beautiful." he said, watching as she smiled up at him. he reached into his pocket, taking the necklace he bought from his pocket. "i just.. i lo-"
before he could finish his sentence, a light erupted from next to them. from it came a projection of lightning and clouds, and they recognized one of the elementals in the image. "what the hell was that?" kodie and peter mumbled in unison, looking up at it.
dakota looked at where the light had come from, picking up a piece of metal that was covered in peter's webs. "what is it, some kind of projector or something?" peter asked and she nodded, holding it out to him.
"yeah, but it's really advanced."
"it looked so real." he mumbled, looking down at it. "wait, does that mean that.. the elementals are fake?"
kodie shook her head. "i mean, i guess, but that doesn't make any sense because we were there, right? right, we fought it."
peter nodded, trying to wrap his head around all of it. "there was fire and destruction, and.. who would do something like that?"
she frowned, knowing he wouldn't like the answer. "mysterio."
⎊⎊⎊
"we have to call mr. fury and tell him that beck's a fraud but i think he tapped my phone. so, i.. i need my black suit, and i have to go to berlin and talk to mr. fury in person." peter said, leading the way to his hotel room.
suddenly, mj stopped him. "are you spider-man." she asked, but it was more of a statement than a question.
"what? what, no. no, i'm not spider-man." he claimed.
she gave him a look. "then why weren't you at the opera. or washington? and you keep disappearing all the time. brad was talking about some photo of you half naked with some girl-"
"what?" dakota immediately asked.
"what! no no no no that wasn't- no, brad's lying."
"so you're either a male escort or you're spider-man."
"no! i'm not a male escort!"
"then you're spider-man."
"no, i.. i am not spider-man, no!"
"you're literally standing next to an avenger, you're spider-man." mj said defiantly.
peter, who had become friends with the girl throughout his trip, shook his head. "no, no."
"then why are you calling nick fury?"
"give it up, she knows." kodie finally said, smiling at mj. "hey, dakota stark."
"i.. i know who you are." mj said, smiling at her. "nice to meet you, though, we didn't get to talk at homecoming but i saw you there, it was crazy."
kodie smiled. "yeah! yeah, i remember you, you were really cool! and you were at the party at liz's house, right?"
"yeah!"
while the two talked, peter led the way into his hotel room. the two girls were slightly chatting in a corner as peter changed back into his stealth suit. "oh, ned, perfect." he said as his best friend walked in.
ned's eyes widened as he saw that mj was in the room. "the costume looks great. for the.. costume party... at the... prince's castle."
"she knows." peter said, pointing to mj. "i told her."
"he didn't tell me. i figured it out."
"she figured it out." dakota confirmed.
peter turned back to ned. "look, mysterio is a fraud."
"but he saved me and betty's lives."
"he's been faking the whole thing with illusion tech." kodie said, holding up the projector.
peter nodded. "yeah, he's using these, like, hologram projectors."
"that's crazy."
"ned, i need you to call may, get her to call mr. harrington, say she wanted me to stay with family in berlin, okay?"
ned nodded. "got it. easy."
"wow, you guys lie with such ease." mj said, getting caught up on the whole situation.
dakota tossed the projector to peter, who smiled. "don't tell anyone about this, okay?" he then said, turning to mj. "anyone who knows is in danger."
"i've known first, and i've known longer, but it's not a competition." ned said.
"technically i knew first, but it isn't a competition." kodie corrected.
"are you coming with?" peter asked her, surprised when she didn't follow him.
she shook her head, looking at something on her phone. "i just got a message from pepper, something's going on at stark industries right now.. something about stolen tech..." she trailed off, reading the message. "i think this might be.." her eyes widened as she looked at the device in peter's hands. "these drones might be stark tech." she announced.
"what?" peter asked.
"yeah! yeah, i remember my dad.. a few years ago, he made a device... binary augmented retro-framing... it was huge, it was crazy, we had this whole thing at mit to promote it and everything."
"okay, okay, so what is it?"
dakota shook her head. "it was supposed to heal traumatic memories, or something, but it's just a bunch of holograms that make it look like you're back with your loved one, or back at the moment where it all went wrong." she said. "if i'm right, this could be the devices that just got stolen from stark industries."
peter's eyes widened as he listened to her. "okay, okay. i'll go talk to fury, okay? you go to stark industries, get what you need to, okay? i got this with fury." he assured her.
"you sure?"
"yeah, yeah, but let me know if you find out anything else, okay?"
"yeah of course."
peter pressed a kiss to her forehead before they both ran out the door and out of the hotel, going their separate ways.