A/N: I realized it might not have been very clear in the last chapter, but Peter's strength was shown through two ways. Obviously there was the physical, e.g. him throwing all the buses and holding up the building. The second was ... emotional? I guess? I don't have a word for it, but it was when Peter saved Flash and Chad(holding the building away from him technically counts as saving). How many of us would save our bullies if given the choice? I view that as a kind of strength and I can definitely see Peter having it.

Midtown High School was closed down for an unknown amount of time for repairs, making Peter feel slightly bad. That meant that him and the other students would get bucket loads of homework to make up for all the missed days... As if he didn't have enough problems already.

Like figuring out who knew his secret.

"Could it be Mr. Toomes?" Peter asked, looking down at a list in his hands of all the people that could know his secret.

Tony raised an eyebrow, everyone looking over at the boy. "Who?"

"That scary vulture dude that tried hijacking your invisible jet. He's the only one I know that saw my face and knew who I was."

"Peter, did you really show yourself off to the enemy?" Nat asked with a frown, "That's Tony's thing to challenge a bad guy by releasing personal info about himself, I know he's your mentor but-"

"No, no," Peter shook his head as his hands fiddled with the paper, "I didn't tell him... He kinda found out..."

"Peter..."

The boy sighed, knowing that he wouldn't be able to get out of this now. He really didn't want to give them all the embarrassing story behind his first date... "His daughter was my homecoming date... She was telling him about Spider-Man saving her at the capital and mention that I wasn't there... I guess with the way I was acting around him and the fact that Liz kept saying I disappeared for the decathlon meet and didn't show up until after Spider-Man save them at the Washington Monument, he put the pieces together."

The room was quiet for a while, Sam leaning over to pat Peter on the shoulder. "That's rough, man..."

The group went back to silently looking for possible baddies, everyone trying to ignore the now awkwardness that filled the room.

Hours later, Peter finally gave in to the call for sleep. He stood up, bid the Avengers farewell, and headed to his room. Tony had offered both Parkers a place to stay while they searched for this new foe, but May had turned him down. She couldn't afford to take off of work for however long that would be, nor did she enjoy the idea of a two hour drive to work one way. But she did order Peter to stay there, to stay as safe as possible. Now the boy was under the rules that he had to have someone with him whenever he left the compound, whether it was patrolling or getting a pizza.

It wasn't so bad there, he loved hanging out with his heroes... But he felt like he was constricted. Everyone was searching for whoever this person was, everyone was always asking if he was alright, everyone was always making random checks on him in the middle of the night... He felt like a child that had just been brought home from a traumatic experience. It was suffocating.

These thoughts circled around his head, keeping him from sleep. His fingers tapped softly against the bed, the need to be free filling every fiber of his being. He needed to swing freely through the city, he needed to shoot webs at the last minute and barely miss slamming into the ground, he needed to be free from watchful eyes.

"Hey, Friday?" He quietly started, staring up at the ceiling.

"Yes, Peter?"

"You're under orders to tell Mr. Stark everything that I do while I'm here, right?"

"That's correct."

"Could you delay a piece of information to him for... an hour?"

It was silent for a while, Peter almost afraid that the AI was ratting him out before she spoke again. "Yes, but I will tell him if he asks."

Peter grinned as he shot out of bed, quickly putting his suit on. "Thanks, Friday!"

He snuck out of his room, jumping to the ceiling and crawling towards the nearest window. He was just going to swing around the nearest town for a little while before coming back. No harm, no foul. No one -aside from Friday- would even know that he was gone.

"If you say one more thing about camping," Wanda growled, probably at Scott, "I will make your life a living hell."

Peter bit his lip to hide a laugh. Scott had been going on about an Avengers camping trip since Tony brought it up during the fight with Chad, and it was enough to drive everyone mad. Peter liked the idea though, and was the only reason the idea hadn't been completely eradicated yet. So far it was Peter, Scott, Tony, Steve and Clint that were for the idea; Wanda, Bruce, Sam, Natasha, Vision, and Rhodey strongly against. Though Nat and Rhodey were starting to waver.

"Come on, guys! It'll be fun!"

Peter smiled as he crawled away from the family room, the balcony that was always open coming up. He dropped to the floor softly and ran to the open door, taking in the cool breeze against his face before putting his mask on and jumping over the railing. He shot a web at the nearest tree and pulled himself forward. The nearest town was just five minutes away, so he'd have plenty of time to himself.

It felt so good... Because of the long trip back to Queens, Peter wasn't allowed to patrol every night now. Just twice a week. Something about it also cutting back on chances of him getting attacked by another minion of this 'boss'. Peter knew that it was really because no one wanted to travel four hours every night just to watch over a kid.

But he wasn't a kid! He was turning sixteen in a week and was almost basically an adult! He fought bad guys before, so it's not like he was completely helpless. He had super powers too! He was more than capable of protecting himself.

He swung around the town for a while, doing his best to keep his head clear. Stressful thoughts were for when you were trying to go to sleep, not swinging around buildings.

It happened so fast, Peter didn't even have time to react.

The brightest spotlight ever was suddenly shining in Peter's eyes, a high pitch squealing sound assaulting his ears. He let go of the web he was holding and curled himself into a ball in midair, his body soon hitting the ground with a loud thump. He couldn't do anything but cry out in pain as his heart hammered in his chest, hands grabbing him and dragging him somewhere.

Maybe he should have listened to the adults a bit more...

~*~*~

"Boss," Friday called, interrupting Tony, Rhodey, Clint, and Sam's card game as the TV flickered on, "I think you should see this."

The four men looked at the TV, a local news station that was talking with a young girl holding some red fabric in her hands.

"I just found it over there," She pointed to a water fountain in the middle of a lighted park. "I don't know why everyone seems worried, he probably just wanted to go swimming or something."

"What are we watching, Fri?"

The AI stayed quiet as the camera turned back to the news woman, "This is a first I've ever heard of anything like this happening in all my years. Why would a super hero, especially one so concerned about his secret identity as Spider-Man, suddenly take off his suit in public? There's no word yet on whether or not the hero is in danger, but we have all noticed a significant lack of heroing from the hero lately. Could this be an omen of ill will for our favorite crime stopper?"

The TV was muted as the screen changed to a news room about sports, the men all watching with wide eyes.

"Friday, please tell me that Peter is sleeping in his room."

"Peter left the tower forty-five minutes ago."

Tony closed his eyes, taking in a deep breath as he pinched the bridge of his nose. "And I wasn't alerted because...?"

"He asked me to delay the alert for one hour." She almost sounded mournful as she answered.

"Damn it, Peter!" Tony stood up, calling his suit to him. "Alert the others! Get everyone suited up and in that town as soon as possible!"

And just like that, Iron Man was gone. The others in the room shared a worried glance before quickly rushing to suit up.

Minutes later, the whole team was in town and talking with as many people as they could to find information on Spider-Man or whoever took him. But since it was so late at night, most of the town was sleeping and not very many respectable people were still walking the streets.

Sam flew over the local river, scanning the water for any signs of Peter like the little girl on the news said. Rhodey flew over the forests and surrounding areas, trying to find any kind of shady places someone may keep the boy. Nat and Wanda teamed up, searching the area the suit was found for any clues. Clint climbed every building he could, analyzing every possible scenario. Steve spoke with whoever would give him time, though it wasn't much. Tony covered everything he could while holding Peter's suit in a fist, cursing himself for not doing anything for Peter's growing impatience.

Of course he noticed Peter growing antsy from being stuck at the compound all the time, constantly being watched by the others. He should have taken Peter to Queens again, stayed back at a safe distance to let the boy have his freedom for a couple hours without feeling like he was being controlled. But he was so preoccupied with finding this new threat that it never occurred to him that Peter might sneak out! If he had just paid a little more attention, all of this could have been avoided.

They searched the rest of the night, but still ended up with nothing useful. Each member of the team blamed themselves for one thing or another, whether not noticing Peter's growing need for the outside world or not teaching him enough about self-defense. Each one believed that if they had done one little thing differently, Peter would still be there.

The End

A/N: Wow, I'm so evil. This story has ended on such a horrible cliffhanger... I almost feel bad. 

I needed to get a new chapter out soon before a lot of craziness happened in my life, and the original version of this was nearly 6000 words and no where near finished.  Therefore... there's going to be a sequel! Yay! No idea what it's going to be called yet, but just keep an eye out. I'll post a preview of it here when I do post it, so make sure you're following this story!

Thank you to everyone that reviewed, favorited, and followed this story. I love getting those notifications, and it really pumps me up to keep writing. You're all awesome.