MIND GAMES|PETER PARKER

epilogue

"First you leave the country and miss school and now the grant requires housing a foreign exchange student? Are you serious? Where are they gonna sleep? Are they going to need clothes?" Aunt May paced in front of Peter who was sitting on the couch in their living room.

Tony had filled her in on only a small part of the plan which was that Peter was going to have to take on some really big responsibilities. She had no idea he meant actually looking after another teenager. Who was foreign!

"I mean, do you understand how crazy this sounds? He's making you take care of a person that you know nothing about while he goes off and parties and builds big robotic things or whatever," She waved her hand after thinking too long about the billionaire's actual job.

"Aunt May, please. She's really important to me-I-I mean," She stared at him blankly as he continued. "This grant is really important to me. Look, it's just for a little while to see how it goes and if it doesn't work out, we'll talk to Mr. Stark and figure something else out," He reasoned and she sighed before sitting down on the couch and interlacing her fingers together.

She seemed to be lost in thought and Peter carefully placed his hand on her shoulder. She turned to him and smiled softly.

"Please, Aunt May. I can do this," He reassured her. She smiled a little more and nodded.

"Alright," He quietly fist-pumped and she grabbed his arm after he did it. "But Mr. Stark better be paying you to take care of this foreign kid because I can't pick up another shift at work," She shook her head with a sigh and Peter placed his hand on her shoulder reassuringly.

"I'll make sure it all works out," He assured and she smiled softly before standing up to kiss his head and then walking out of the living room.

-

"Okay, here we are," Tony said from beside Jessie as they stood in front of Peter's front door. Jessie hardly spoke to anyone after losing her powers. At first, she hadn't realized how much different her life would be. She spent her whole life being cased in an empty room and being trained by S.H.I.E.L.D. because of her powers and now they were gone. She would no longer go on missions or fight with the Avengers. She didn't know who she was anymore.

She never had the chance to have her own life and now she did, but she wasn't sure how to do it. She was okay, at first, with the idea of staying at Peter's, until she figured out why she was staying there. Tony was making Peter babysit her. She hated the idea of him being coerced into looking after her.

She didn't want to be alone, but she didn't want to be around people who would only remind her of the thing she'd lost. She remembered always hating her powers, but now she wanted them back more than anything. She felt like fighting wouldn't be enough to protect her from enemies.

After losing her powers, she stayed at Tony's for a few weeks so that doctors could do more tests on her brain. When she wasn't being tested, arguing with Tony, or shutting herself in her room, she did one thing quite frequently. She trained and sparred in Tony's gym like her life depended on it. In her eyes, it did.

The tests the doctor's had done showed that whatever debris had hit her head, shut something off in her visual cortex. They explained how that was where the most activity of her power had been. They also told her that they could probably turn it back on, but it was unlikely that they could do it without possibly damaging her visual cortex. So, it was either risk going blind in which her power would be useless and leave her more vulnerable, or continue her new life as a regular girl without any extraordinary abilities.

It was that terrible news that put Jessie and Tony in front of Peter Parker's front door. It was that terrible news that made Jessie give up on the hope that her powers would return. It was that terrible news that would begin her new life as an ordinary girl.