#spideysforce

Notes: Title from Alannis Morrissette's That I Would be Good. Not mine, no profit garnered. Thanks A!!!!

        "Peter, Peter, Peter," Tony said, walking through campus. "Wherefore art thou?"

No one answered. Not that Tony had said it that loudly. He knew exactly where Peter was, because Peter had a watch that Tony had made. Peter had a number of things that he wore nearly daily that Tony had manufactured. Lots of people Tony loved had things Tony had made, he enjoyed the art of creation.

Peter's watch was blinking away that Peter was in fine health though it said nothing about his mind. Peter hadn't called in almost two weeks, didn't answer Tony's calls and wasn't being his usual arachnid self. Something was off.

Tony arrived at Peter's dorm room and knocked on the door. A rhythmic knock, knockity knock knockers. Peter opened his door and stared blankly. Then, "Whoa. You're Tony Stark."

"You already know that," Tony said, squinting."You've known me for years."

"No," Peter said, laughing. "What? No."

"That's not funny," Tony said. "Give me your phone."

Peter blinked and then handed it over. It was still a top of the line StarkPhone that Tony had enhanced. Tony went straight to the pictures and scrolled back until he found pictures of himself with Peter. He held it up. "You have these on your phone. You have this phone which no one can buy because I made it for you. None of this ringing a bell?"

"No," Peter said, looking troubled. He actually winced. "I don't remember these. I don't." He rubbed at his forehead. "My head hurts." He took back his phone.

Tony had Friday do a scan and nothing was physically wrong with Peter. Nothing that was showing on the kind of scans Friday could easily accomplish. Slightly better than an x-ray, not a real hospital thing. Tony went into Peter's room and started searching until he found the suit, folded and stashed under towels and sheets May had unpacked the day they'd all moved Peter in. Tony held up the suit. "Does this cause a headache?"

Peter shook his head. "No, no, that's, pretty nice Halloween costume, huh?"

Multi-million dollar halloween costume, Tony thought. He took the mask and placed it on Peter's head. The kid was unusually malleable and willing to put up with being manhandled. The suit AI started talking to Peter and Peter said, "What? What is happening?"

Peter took off the mask and handed it over. He looked seriously upset for about one split second. Then his face was smooth and placid. "You're showing me a lot of weird stuff, sir. But I don't know you. I don't know what's going on here."

Tony grabbed a tiny screwdriver from inside his jacket and threw it at Peter's shoulder, as hard as possible, with absolute malicious intent. Thankfully, Peter was still Peter underneath the hateful forgetting - Peter caught it easily and automatically. "Whoa," Peter said. "Why did you do that?"

"How did you do that?" Tony bundled up the suit and took Peter's phone back from Peter's hand, the one that didn't hold one of Tony's favorite screwdrivers.

"I don't know," Peter said. "I don't know." His voice got angrier. Then he sat down and rubbed his forehead again.

Tony started calling Peter's friends. First he got Ned who was elated to hear from Peter. After Tony broke his heart, Ned said, "Yeah, it's weird. It's so weird. It's like he barely remembers me. Suddenly I'm the one calling him and half the time I mention things, important things, he just goes blank. I was gonna call May. Next week. I thought maybe he was dating someone? Not because he mentioned he was dating someone, but since he was silent about, you know, thwipy thwipy."

Peter frowned at him and then put on noise cancelling headphones plugged into his laptop. Also made by Stark Industries. Also not for sale anywhere because Tony had made it specifically for Peter.  

Tony was tempted to call MJ, but a quick glance at Peter's texts gave him that information. He had effectively stopped talking to nearly everyone starting two weeks ago. May had found Peter mostly normal, but slightly weird, Ned still got some calls, but everyone Peter met while Spider-man or because of Spider-man, he had dropped.

Tony took a moment to be relieved that it wasn't personal. A long moment. It wasn't an irrational fear, Tony had alienated a lot of people. That's why Tony had come up from New York City. He needed the kid to give a shit about him. But this wasn't personal.  

Peter took off his headphones and closed his laptop. "Are you done?"

"Why don't you see what's wrong with you?"

"Of course I do," Peter said, low and fierce. "I'm not a fucking idiot. I know there are, there are these blank spots in my memory. I try to make sense of them and it just hurts." He looked away. "My head hurts and people I don't know are upset with me."

Tony said, "When did it start?"

Peter clenched his jaw and Tony worried about his teeth. Surely his teeth were as spider strong as the rest of him, because otherwise something was going to crack. Peter said, "Two weeks ago. I woke up, I was on top of the covers and that, that costume was on the floor. And obviously, I could tell it wasn't just a costume, but I don't know why I have it if it's not just a Halloween costume." Peter was staring a hole in the floor. "So I folded it up and put it away and got ready for class. And when you called, or other people I don't know, I just ignored it. Okay?"

"Well, no, it's not okay, but that sounds like a course of action you took."

Peter relaxed just a micro amount at that. He said, "What are you going to make me do now?"

"It sounds like you had a very selective memory wipe, like, Eternal Sunshine movie style wipe. But that wasn't actually science. Fantastic movie, though," Tony said, getting up. He pocketed Peter's phone. He waved at Peter.  "We can't solve it here."

Peter frowned but followed. He even got in Tony's car without protest. He didn't relax like he usually did in the passenger seat, he was tense and acting like a nervous nelly. Tony cursed the situation that made him talk that way, even in his head.

Tony drove them to the Boston SI building. It wasn't adequate at all, but Tony could work with that.  Between FRIDAY, Peter's own suit, and the tech Tony could cobble together he could absolutely state definitively it wasn't some kind of technology or physical attack. "Magic," Tony said. "That sucks. I hate calling this guy."

Luckily Strange showed up pretty quickly. Peter looked scared and lost because, of course, he didn't remember the fifteen times he'd met Uptown David Blaine and his magic blanket. Strange did his rhythmic gymnastics finger motions and things glowed and finally said, "Someone who doesn't know how to do magic cast a very bad spell."

"Can you reverse it?" Tony tried to keep his annoyance out of his voice, he was pretty sure he failed. "And find out who did it so we can stop them?"

Strange was still gesturing. "I'll take care of stopping her, it's my obligation."

Peter's eyes rolled up as he fell back on his butt. Then he blinked a few times and held his head. "My head still hurts so much, Dr. Strange. Can't you fix that?"

"Yay, thanks for fixing him," Tony said, rushing over. "Any lasting effects?"

"No," Strange said. "But it will be painful, it was a particularly badly done spell and I couldn't reverse it easily. You'll be fine in the morning."

"Awesome," Peter said.

Strange left without saying goodbye, as per usual. Peter said, "I saw that girl. She's just another college student. She was really angry. I just wanted to calm her down."

"Well, that didn't work," Tony said. "I think we can move on now. I can call back, maybe get some of your painkillers here."

Peter rubbed his head for the millionth time. "Don't worry, I'm fine."

"Sure you are," Tony said. "What's wrong?"

"I forgot you, I forgot everything," Peter said. "All of it." His eyes were red. "I wasn't even me."

"And we fixed it," Tony said. "We fixed it."

"I forgot everything. I didn't know who I even was," Peter said. He hadn't gotten up yet. Tony was squatting next to him, and his knees were killing him. He ignored it.

"And we fixed it," Tony said. "You have people."

"Who I didn't even remember," Peter said. "Having people doesn't always last. I know that. You know that. My headache is making me feel sick."

"Maybe for me people don't last," Tony said. "But you're a much better person than I am. You make friends everywhere."

"Mr. Charming," Peter said. "You can make me feel better without running yourself down."

"See, look at you, back to yourself already," Tony said. He patted Peter's shoulder and stood up. "Come on, we can get food or see a movie or whatever, I don't know."

Peter sighed and stood up easily. Youth was wasted on the young, except for Peter who was never a waste. Tony pulled him close and silently hated that now he and Peter were the same height. At least the kid was unlikely to end up taller than Tony. Tony said, "I know it sucks."

"You don't actually know," Peter said. "But thank you for trying. You heard the man, I'll be fine in the morning."

Tony took Peter back to his dorm. He also had an entire meal delivered from his favorite restaurant in Boston. Peter ate everything in silence. He took his phone back from Tony and texted furiously between taking enormous bites. Tony said, "Made up with everyone?"

"Basically," Peter said. He forced a smile. "You're going to stay until I'm in a good mood, right?"

Tony shrugged. "I'm here for you, if you want to talk."

Peter laughed. "Okay, you forcing that line out put me in a genuinely good mood. Go home."

"If you don't call me tomorrow, I'm coming back."