#onlyfins

"It's, uh, nice to meet you, Bruce. Sorry—I normally look, um. Better than this."

"Sure," Bruce agrees easily. There's a thread of laughter in his voice, which Peter can't blame him for.

"Wade got back yesterday, right?" Kate asks, too-innocent. Peter narrows his eyes at her, because she knows good and well he got back last night, they were on the same mission.

"Yeah," Peter replies, suspicious.

Kate grins lasciviously at him. "Late night?"

Aw, jeez, come on, Kate. Way to call him out in front of what is supposed to be a complete stranger. Peter feels his face get hotter and just makes a strangled non-committed sound. It does nothing to dull the bright look of mischief in her eyes. She reminds him suddenly of MJ, and Peter makes a quick vow to never, ever introduce them.

"Anyway, Peter's a scientist, too, Bruce," Kate says, probably as a means to take pity on him by not saying that he does OnlyFans. Unfortunately, it's in fact now a new level of horrifying to Peter. His academic nightmares have never included toe crocs either.

"Something about protein rope? There was a while Wade couldn't stop talking about it but I couldn't be entirely sure it wasn't an innuendo."

Goddamnit, Wade. Peter's torn between annoyed frustration at his inconvenient blabbing and helpless affection that he cared enough to include Peter's research in his idle chatter.

"Not an innuendo, though, given Wade, I see where you might have gotten that. No, it's high tensile silk protein fiber."

Peter wants to shove the words back into his mouth the moment he says them. Kate won't think about it, but Banner's not an idiot. The less he knows about Peter and his research the better, lest he starts putting one and two together and gets webs.

It's too late, though. Bruce brightens. "Oh? That's interesting. Looking into plastic replacements?"

"Among other uses," Peter agrees. "A non-toxic, biodegradable, strong and flexible fiber could have a lot of uses. Bandages, rope, fire-suppressant—"

Bruce's head tilts curiously. Jeez, Peter, think of literally any other use that Banner doesn't associate with Spider-Man, come on—

"—and, uh, fabric, obviously," he adds quickly. "Wade wants me to make him dresses in it, but I don't have that kind of money."

Kate snorts. "Well, make him pay for it, he's got the cash."

"Fair enough," Peter laughs. "But even if I had the money for the material, it's more about the lab space."

"The lab space?" Bruce asks thoughtfully. "I take it your school won't provide it?"

"Ah, no, not unless I do my Ph.D there. Graduated last fall with my Masters."

Kate and Bruce congratulate him—which Peter politely accepts while wondering how fast he can extricate himself from this situation without looking even crazier than he does already.

Then Banner drops a bomb on him.

"Well, if it's lab space you need, you're welcome at the Tower. Stark's got tons of space, he won't miss one lab."

Peter is, for a brief second, stuck entirely in twain. Peter Parker, the scientist, is over the moon at the idea of getting his grubby mitts on Stark's tech for his webs. Spider-Man, the anonymous vigilante is screaming blue murder at the idea of stepping foot in the lobby of Stark's giant AI spy machine of a Tower unmasked, let alone having his webs processed there.

As such, instead of any intelligent answer he might have summoned, Peter makes a garbled sound like a dying goose.

Luckily, Bruce takes it as being overwhelmed instead of the debilitating existential alter-ego crisis that it actually is. He waves off Peter's goose malfunction.

"Seriously, Peter, it's no problem. I would say any friend of Wade's, but that's not true. You're special, according to Kate. Just come by the Tower and tell them your name. I'll make sure they set some space up for you."

"Um," Peter manages finally. How does he fix this. How does he get out of this?

"Oh!" Kate interrupts. "That reminds me! Can you guys watch Jeffrey for a couple of weeks? I was going to text Wade about it today, but might as well ask you now that you're here."

Despite the absolute riot of emotions happening in Peter, he can't help but brighten immediately.

"Of course, you never need to ask. We're always down to watch Jeff."

"Great!" Kate claps cheerfully. "Ooh, can you come in on Friday and bring him home with you? I'm trapped in a meeting right before I fly out, it'd be a huge help."

Well. That was a trap. A trap that Peter walked directly into. An adorable, land shark shaped trap, but a trap nonetheless.

Doomed, Peter says, "Uh. Sure?"

Kate beams at him. "Thanks, Peter!"

Peter feels a little like he's been stream-rolled. The similarity to MJ is once again uncanny and deeply, deeply cursed.

"You're welcome?" He offers weakly.

"Kate," Bruce says, "Sorry, Peter, but speaking of meetings—"

"Oh my god." Kate slaps her hand against her forehead. "I totally forgot. We're on a snack mission—"

"For a meeting that we are late for," Bruce adds dryly. He waves his phone which is lighting up with an unflattering picture of Stark. "Nice to meet you, Peter. I'm looking forward to seeing your fiber in action."

Oh, don't worry about that. He's already seen it in action, Peter thinks hysterically. Peter can't help but flash back to the last time he had deploy his webs to the keep the Hulk from smashing a too much. He had not been a happy camper.

"Right," Peter manages after what is probably an awkward beat, "Um. Nice to meet you, Bruce. Nice to see you again, Kate."

Lies, terrible lies. Peter went out to get coffee and his life became about twelve million times more complicated in the span of like ten minutes.

Kate and Bruce whisk away, leaving Peter holding his stupid gourmet coffee pods, wondering what the hell just happened.

A pimply teen walks by and snorts. "Nice kicks, dude."

"Fuck my life," Peter says seriously and then has to apologize when he gets a scandalized look from an elderly woman.