╔══════════════════╗

MISADVENTURES IN PARADISE
xiii. SEASON OF BEGINNINGS

╚══════════════════╝

   RILEY DIDN'T DECIDE UNTIL recently that spring was her favorite season.

   As a child, she thought it was supposed to be summer, maybe because it was so heavily romanticized in the movies: endless sunny days spent by the pool, ice cream between meals, fireworks on the weekends, no school or homework. But she figured the kids in those movies just enjoyed summer because it was the one time of the year where they had no responsibilities.

   Naturally, she could never relate. She always had something going on growing up, so the turn of every season meant very little to her. Holidays weren't often celebrated, days off were rare, and she never had to worry about buying new clothes to fit each season because she lived in a uniform. The days blurred together in a cycle of colors and routines.

   But lately, she decided she quite liked springtime. She liked how all of the flower petals curl at the same time, how the sunlight stretches over the greening land. Snow melts, clothes get shorter and lighter, the animals awaken. The world takes a deep breath of air as life fills its lungs all over again. The dawn of a new day, a new beginning. And Riley loved fresh starts.

   After all, anything can happen in the season of beginnings.

   Riley could be found at home, sprawled out on the couch in the living room, legs draped over Tony's lap. They just finished spring cleaning the garage and organizing all of their miscellaneous inventions, and now, they were in the middle of a reality TV show binge.

   "How come you never guest-starred on Paris Hilton's cooking show?" Riley pondered. "I feel like that was a missed opportunity."

   "Because I'm a genius, not a rich diva," Tony simply said. There was a pause. He could hear her thoughts loud and clear. "Yeah, I guess I walked right into that one."

   "You practically opened the door yourself."

   "Oh, don't act so innocent," Tony challenged. "You're a Stark for a reason."

   "I'm a Stark because you adopted me against my will," Riley countered. "Besides, I'm still the most humble member of this family."

   "Uh-huh, yeah, no one who's actually humble would say that about themselves."

   Riley rolled her eyes, even though he was right. There simply wasn't a humble gene in the Stark family — including little Morgan and her alien big brother.

   "So... How come we never had a reality show?" Riley went on. She was just a little fixated on the topic. It was always hard to get her to drop things once she got stuck on them. It wasn't a bad habit, but it wasn't a great one either. "Why didn't you have one?"

   "What is this, a job interview?"

   "It just doesn't make sense!" Riley defended. "You built a freakin' skyscraper in the middle of New York with your name on it. You told the Mandarin your home address when he was threatening to kill you. I'm just trying to figure out why you didn't want a reality show!"

   Tony faltered, his eyes shifting. It was subtle, hardly noticeable, but she was too keen to not see it.

   "I KNEW IT!" Riley suddenly shouted. "You tried to make one happen!"

   "Did not!" Tony fired back. He cleared his throat, attempting to gather himself. He was calm, collected. She was his kid, alright. Annoying, perceptive. Yeah, she was his kid. "But if I did... hypothetically, I probably wouldn't have let it air because it didn't have a catchy theme song."

   "...Did you just admit you canceled your reality show over a theme song?"

   "Hey, I said hypothetically."

   "Unbelievable! How dare you rob me from seeing that!" she laughed. "Hey, you don't think Mom would know where those old recordings are, do you—?"

   "I will literally ground you for life," Tony interrupted. As he spoke, the doorbell rang. DING-DONG! "Saved by the bell."

   "Mr. Stark, Ms. Stark, you have guests," FRIDAY announced.

   Tony kept his gaze trained on the television screen as he ordered, "Yeah, let 'em in."

   "My apologies, sir, but I am unable to do that. You changed my protocols."

   His eyebrows furrowed as he peered back at his daughter, puzzled. Riley, then, explained, "You changed them because Morgan kept letting in stray animals every time they wandered to the door."

   "Ah, right. You know, she got away with that for a while until that deer ended up in my shower. Really spooked your mother." He stood, shoving her legs off of his lap. "You expecting anyone?"

   She shook her head mindlessly, leaving him to greet her guests. Though she wasn't expecting anyone, she had a pretty good feeling who it was. Other than Rhodey and Happy, the only people who hung around the Stark Cabin were—

   "Hey, Mr. Stark!"

   "Sup, Mr. Stark!"

   "Hey, Mr. Man!"

   In walked Peter, Ned, and MJ. Well, "walked" wasn't the right word for it. They pushed against each other zealously, squeezing past the door and the suddenly tired man holding it open for them. They must've just gotten out of school for the day. Their vibrant chatter overlapped as they raced into the living room. Once they spotted Riley, they made a beeline toward her, not even bothering to take off their backpacks or calmly greet her. You know, like normal people.

   "RILEY, I NEED YOUR HELP—"

   "NO, I NEED HER HELP—"

   "GET IN LINE!"

   "SHE'S MY GIRLFRIEND!"

   "ACTUALLY, SHE'S MY GIRLFRIEND, MJ!"

   Riley jumped out of her seat, her chest tightening with worry. She couldn't make out what they were saying as they argued over each other. Between MJ's twitchy eyebrow, Peter's panicky shouting, and the look of pure dread on Ned's face, it had to be bad.

   "What's wrong? What happened!? Is someone hurt?!" Riley exclaimed.

   "Someone's going to be hurt if these two don't back off," MJ fiercely threatened, glaring at the boys beside her. They cowered a bit, but they bounced back almost instantly.

   "Hey, I called dibs first," Peter said.

   "You can't call dibs on people, especially girls. It's objectifying. Besides, I called dibs first," Ned argued, which just encouraged the trio to burst into chaotic shouting again.

   "HEY!" Riley asserted. Their bickering fell all at once — as if gravity was born from her voice. All eyes fell on her as they stood in a line, each person stiff with nervousness. "Explain. Now."

   Ned and MJ pushed the arachnid hero forward. Though Peter was much taller and (physically) stronger than Riley was, he was purposely avoiding her gaze.

   "Uh, hey... Hey, Riles," Peter awkwardly greeted. "You look nice today."

   She raised her eyebrows.

   "Right. Okay. Well, we sort of... need your help with something," Peter slowly said. "Nothing bad! Don't worry, it's not the end of the world again, so... you know. You don't need to go all Scary-Valor-Mode on us, heh." He awkwardly punched her shoulder, but she didn't budge. "Okay, I'll just... get on with it. We have a project in our AP Government class on the Sokovia Accords, and we were hoping you could help us out...?"

   Riley deflated. "You guys busted in here because you thought I'd help you with some school project?" she demanded. "Peter, you literally signed the Accords."

   "That's what I said!" MJ exclaimed.

   "Well, yeah, but I didn't know what was going on! I know nothing!" Peter lamely excused. "Mr. Stark basically kidnapped me and took me to Germany against my will!"

   "Gonna pretend you didn't say that!" Tony called from the kitchen, causing him to cringe.

   "It's not our fault you weren't paying attention! That's, like, the only rule to being a superhero," Ned said, which wasn't right, but no one cared enough to correct him. "That's why I was hoping you'd help me, Riley. I'm the minority here!"

   "Not true—" MJ started.

   "Um, yes it is," Ned interrupted. "Peter's got the Spidey advantage, you've got the Roman advantage. I'm all alone here!"

   "Roman advantage?" Riley echoed, eyeing the brunette. "What's he talking about?"

   Ignoring her, MJ declared, "Look, I'm just saying, you and I are best friends. And us girls have to stick together in this patriarchal, male-dominated, testosterone-infected society! Think about the kind of message you'd be sending the children if you helped them instead of me!"

   "Uh-huh, right..." Riley looked to Peter. "Well, what's your argument?"

   "Oh. Uh... I'm your favorite person?" Peter flashed her that stupid boyish smile she adored so much. When she caught herself smiling at him, she quickly turned away.

   "Alright, fine." Riley sighed. "I'll help you all, but you guys owe me."

   And so, she helped them work on their homework for about six minutes before they all got bored and decided to take a break.

   That break lasted a solid hour.

   Hey, they managed to stay on-topic by talking about the government the whole time! Sorta.

   "I don't get why you can't just tell us the truth," MJ complained as she balanced her pencils on top of each other. "Just answer the question: Is Captain America on the moon?"

   "Why does everyone think he's on the moon?" Peter challenged, taking the words right out of Riley's mouth. "It's not like there's anything to do up there."

   "Yeah, at least pick a more interesting planet. Like Jupiter or something," Riley agreed, leaning against him.

   MJ shrugged. "You know, I also read online that Natasha Romanoff's hiding out in Area 51. I think it makes total sense."

   "How does that make sense?" Ned joined in. He sat with crossed legs, busily tapping away at his keyboard (though they all knew he was just playing video games).

   "Dude, the Starks own Area 51—"

   "Area 51 is for aliens!"

   "So!?"

   "...You know what? You make a good point. I think it makes more sense that Captain America's on the moon though," Ned confessed.

   "He's not Cap anymore," Riley corrected, her voice suddenly soft. "He's just Steve."

   There was a beat of silence. Sometimes, they all forgot that the heroes they heard so much about were real people. To ordinary civilians like MJ and Ned, they were untouchable heroes. To Riley, they were her friends. She lived with them, laughed with them, cried with them. It was strange for her to listen to them gossip about the Avengers like that. Like they weren't real people.

   Peter shot her a curious glance, but she didn't meet his gaze. She only squeezed his hand to let him know she was fine.

   Riley cleared her throat, perking up again. "I might not be 100% sure where Steve is right now, but I think I'd know if he was on the moon," she joked.

   "So... wait," Ned realized, choosing his words more carefully this time. "If Steve's retired, then... Who's Captain America now? Is that a thing? Does someone else get to have the shield now?"

   "Well, it's complicated," Riley explained as she glimpsed down at her phone. She narrowed her eyes at whatever was on her screen. "He tried to pass the shield down to someone else. Not me, I don't need it. Anyway, he declined, so the shield's at the Smithsonian now. They've got a really nice memorial up for Cap's legacy actually..."

   Peter watched her curiously. He wasn't sure how he knew, but he could tell something was wrong. "What is it?" She didn't respond. "Riley."

   "Huh? Oh, sorry. Work stuff." She held up her phone, waving it in the air. "It's the weirdest thing. New York has a power outage problem."

   "Oh, don't get me started. It's all my mom talks about," MJ admitted. She was now folding paper airplanes and tossing them aimlessly. "Ever since Christmas Eve, there have been mass power outages across the state. It's always at random, and it always affects the entire state."

   "It's been affecting everyone?" Ned asked. "That makes sense. I thought my parents were forgetting to pay the bills or something."

   Riley nodded. "No one knows why it's happening. I asked the Governor if they could keep me in the loop. I was curious because of some... things that happened on Christmas Eve. But then they took that the wrong way, and now he thinks I'm handling it for him."

   Peter made a face at the reminder of Christmas Eve. He didn't realize she was investigating what happened. It just never came up in conversation.

   "Any luck?" he queried.

   "Nope. At first, I thought it was environmental. Like storms, snow. Stuff like that. But I ruled that out pretty fast. Then, I thought it had something to do with the power grid. But I just got this email saying they haven't found any abnormalities in the Eastern Power Grid. So... it's back to the drawing board," she elaborated.

   "Maybe it's a new supervillain," MJ suggested. "OH! Maybe it's got something to do with the Flag Smashers!"

   "The what?"

   "The Flag Smashers," MJ repeated. "I read about them on this weird forum I found. They're this group of people based in Europe who think the world was better off during the Blip. They're all about uniting the world by dissolving borders and shit."

   "Ah, so those weirdos have a name now," Riley muttered, her mind wandering back to what Carson said all those months ago. "But what would they want with New York? What's the point of killing our power if they're targeting the entire world?"

   No one answered. The Midtown trio sat up, one-by-one. Ned shut his laptop, MJ stopped folding paper airplanes. Riley was left to glance between them, utterly puzzled.

   "Are you guys thinking what I'm thinking?" Peter asked.

   "Dude, yes. We haven't teamed up since Camp Mirkhaven!" Ned concurred.

   "Who said anything about teaming up?" Riley demanded.

   "C'mon, Ri, it's perfect!" Peter exclaimed. "Ned's the Guy in the Chair, MJ's the researcher, and you, me, and Roman can do all the heavy lifting! We can figure out who's doing this together."

   "Nooo, no, no," Riley dismissed. "You guys already have enough going on with school—"

   "Well, it's not like you're making much progress by yourself," MJ pointed out.

   "And it'd be fun!" Ned insisted. "And it'd look really good on our college apps if we helped save New York! Think about it, we all get something out of it!"

   "Besides, we already owe you one. Just let us help you out," Peter urged with a little smile. He gently nudged her. "C'mon, we'll give you 90% of the credit."

   Riley was sort of notorious for wanting to do things on her own, but even she could appreciate the sentiment of working with a team. It was why she pushed and pushed for Fury to let her be part of the Avengers. In her eyes, it was easier to celebrate wins and mourn losses when you have someone to do it with.

   So, she gave in. "Fine. But we're doing this my way, alright?"

   Roars of joy chorused across the group right away. It filled the living room, and in a way, their excitement energized Riley. It was invigorating just listening to them chirp about how they were going to "save New York." First-timers.

   "You know, this is basically how Mystery Inc. got their start," MJ pointed out.

   "Guys, we need a group name!" Ned realized. "And a mascot! We need our own Scooby-Doo!"

   "Yeah, let's not get ahead of ourselves. It's just a one-time gig, alright?" Riley laughed. One of MJ's paper airplanes suddenly hit her forehead. "Hey!"

   The front door suddenly swung open. Morgan Stark's contagious giggles crossed the threshold as she skipped inside.

   "We're hooome!" Morgan sang with her squeaky voice. She squeezed Roman's hand, forcing him to walk with a hunch as she dragged him into the living room. "Hi, Riley! Hi, everyone!"

   "Hey, kiddo," Riley greeted. "What took you guys so long?"

   "Romie got us ice cream!" Morgan chirped. "Because I did really good on my spelling test today!"

   "That's my girl," she praised with a warm smile.

   Meanwhile, MJ repeated with a shit-eating grin, "Romie...?"

   "Don't start," Roman groaned, shrugging off his jacket. He might have sounded annoyed, but there was a twinkle in his eyes that Riley didn't often see in him. "She's the only one allowed to call me that, alright?"

   "Didn't know you were such a softie, Romie," Peter snickered.

   "Yeah, yeah. Hey, Mo, why don't you go tell your old man about your test?" Roman suggested. Morgan simply nodded and trotted upstairs to find them, her purple backpack swaying with every step. Once she was gone, he revealed, "Alright, I have good news and bad news."

   Riley groaned. "Ugh, great. What's the good news?"

   A pause of silence.

   "Why would you ask for the good news first?" Roman interrogated. "Normal people ask for the bad news first."

   "What? That's normal!" Riley defended.

   "Not really. You're weird."

   "You're annoying."

   "So are you."

   Riley shrugged. "Fair point. Just tell us the good news!"

   Roman clicked his tongue, combing his fingers through his raven hair. "Well... Actually... Morgan kinda spoiled the good news," he slowly said.

   "Your good news was about Morgan's spelling test?" Ned questioned.

   "Hey, it's a big deal!" Roman defended, pointing a finger at the boy. "The kid's a genius!"

   "So you don't have good news," Peter corrected. "You just have bad news."

   "Hey, it's not my fault Morgan stole my thunder! Look, just turn on the news. I can tell you haven't heard what's going on because you haven't set anything on fire yet," Roman said.

   "That's really reassuring, thanks," Riley mumbled, grabbing the remote from the coffee table. "I'm sure it's not that bad..."

   World News 21 flashed across the screen. BREAKING NEWS! LIVE! was written in big, bolded letters, which was never a good sign. Anytime something was being reported live, it usually meant something so terrible had happened that they couldn't wait to tell the whole world.

   An older man — some high-ranking U.S. secretary — was standing at a podium. If you listened carefully, you could hear the clicking of cameras from reporters in the background. He spoke slowly yet enthusiastically.

   "Unrest, in the wake of recent events has left us vulnerable. Every day, Americans feel it. While we love heroes who put their lives on the line to defend Earth, we also need a hero to defend this country," he proclaimed.

   A hero?

   Maybe the Avengers were in a bit of disarray, but Valor was still around. What about her? What about Roman? Or Spider-Man? Or literally all of the heroes that were still standing?

   "We need a real person who embodies America's greatest values. We need someone to inspire us again, someone who can be a symbol for all of us," he went on. "So, on behalf of the Department of Defense and our Commander-in-Chief, it is with great honor that we announce here today that the United States of America has a new hero."

   "What the hell is this guy talking about?" Peter muttered under his breath.

   "Join me in welcoming your new Captain America!"

   A man strutted on-screen, smiling eagerly. He waved at the camera and reporters. He seemed so shiny and brand new, so full of life. He was dressed in a red, white, and blue uniform — one that looked far too similar to the original Captain America uniform. It may as well have been an exact replica. He saluted the crowd with one hand, and with the other, he gripped the famous Captain America shield. The same shield that was supposed to be stored away, not being waved around like it was a toy.

   But that wasn't right.

   He wasn't Steve Rogers. He wasn't Sam Wilson either. He was... someone else. The news said he was Captain America, the nation's newest symbol and hero, but Riley had never seen this man before in her life. And you'd think the leader of the Avengers would know something about this in advance.

   A stranger was being introduced to the world as Captain America.

   Riley slowly rose to her feet, her jaw wide open. Already, her heart was racing out of her chest as they all stared at the man on their screen. Not a single person in the room dared to draw a breath or utter a word, perhaps out of disbelief or fear of what Riley would do next. But she didn't do anything. All she could say were three words:

   "What the fuck?"