Chapter Text
3 AM, the night was cold at this hour, he could watch his breath turn into white fog as soon as it left his body, condensing right before his eyes.. it reminded him of when he was younger, Peter would sometimes spend hours outside with friends, pretending to be dragons. The memory made him smile weakly. Ahh.. sweet childhood innocence.
His gaze fell upon the lively town of New York, bustling, even at this late hour. Truly, the city didn’t sleep, no day of the year. Even when it was getting more frosty with fall approaching. He could see masses of people down in the streets, going on about their life, not having a clue that a few stories up, Spider-Man was watching out for them, diligently. By himself.
When Peter was younger, right after Uncle Ben’s death.. he hadn’t been Spider-Man for long then, just kind of fumbling from one adventure to the next, barely able to save the day and coming out of some encounters in one piece, just by an inch.
Remembering young Peter, he wished one of the older Heroes who had been at it longer had taken the time to warn him about the dangers of the job, about the 100% guaranteed heartbreak, betrayal and suffering. The inevitable, mental struggle that one had to go through everyday.
Really, he didn’t even have to be warned about the mistakes he made in the past, Peter was a firm believer of ‘you’ll learn from your mistakes.’ He wouldn’t have been able to avoid making those anyway. Mistakes came with any occupation.. not all of those occupations included beating the snot out of a super powered bastard, but he was sure some were just as dangerous.
Not that it changed anything now. Peter didn’t know what his life would have been like if he’d have had someone in his corner from the very start. Would it have made him a better person? Doubtful. If there was anything he was convinced of, it was his moral code.
A better hero? Maybe. Not like Peter could know, with that lifetime of where he had support in that department never having taken place. But it sure would have been nice to have a veteran help him deal with his first failure, where he didn’t manage to save the day.
He remembered it, so very clearly.. people died. He couldn’t save them. He saved some. Some weren't good enough to little, ol’ him though back then. It was either save them all or be a total failure of a hero. The guilt ate him alive for weeks, he almost quit over it. It was rough, long story short.
Now? He knew it was bound to happen. Spider-Man was a very good hero, some would say. Personally he could confidently say that he had some skills to back up his massive chatterbox of a mouth. But he would still have to deal with the fact that even Spider-Man couldn’t always bring everyone back home, safe and sound.
It messed with him, still, up to this day… and while it did mess with him, he no longer let it affect his work. For every day where Spider-Man was incapacitated, there was someone who had to suffer for it. So, the moral of the story? Spider-Man can’t afford a sick day.
Not that he took any. If he didn’t let his work be affected, he could keep going forever. The man could just live, day in, day out, saving people. As he got older, until eventually age would catch up with him and cap one in his ass. But that was fine with Peter, he could live with that.
There were worse plans than going out like that.
So, the spider-themed hero did his best to follow his plan. Mostly solo. Used to be involuntarily but these days he was quite willingly a loner. He tried working with teams in the past, with other heroes, he really gave in an effort. Tried, hard.. to be a teamplayer.
Did it work out? What’d you think? Would he be sitting up here, on this rooftop, by his lonesome if it had? Any chance he gave those people to let him down, they’d take it in a heartbeat, just screwing him over, again and again. His help? Oh, sure. No problem accepting his help when they needed it but actually helping him when he needed it? Too much effort.
Playing on his morals and gaining his sympathy, just to throw him under the bus later without so much as an explanation as to why they would do something like that to him.
So, while he continued to be willing to help anyone in need, letting them get any closer than an arm's length was a big no no. He worked better alone anyway, no need to risk another bout that could ruin his entire progress of not appearing like a total menace to the public. For once? Maybe? Let him just do his thing?
Regardless, despite his reservations about other heroes and being basically no contact with every single one of them, when the information about Wolverine’s disappearance reached his ears he couldn’t help but let it pull on his heart strings. Automatically he felt obligated to keep an eye out for the feral mutant, lest he’d be lost forever or whatever.
Not because Wolverine needed his help, in any sense, god knew, high and low, that Wolverine could stand on his own. The man could handle himself better in a lot of situations than Peter would be able to do himself, mostly thanks to his healing factor and the fact that he was not shy of putting his claws through people.
So again, not because he thought the older male needed his assistance, but because he felt obligated.
The X-Men were very close, basically a huge family, so watching their borderline frantic attempts to locate their missing friend and member, it definitely gave him some form of emotions.
He wasn’t exactly on good footing with these people, but he felt bad for them, especially the children that wanted their teacher back. Wolverine was a lot, good with kids was one of those things. They loved the man. He wanted to help ease that suffering.
That and Wolverine had a habit of getting picked on by organizations like Hydra and whoever else had a massive hard-on for the man’s adamantium skeleton and massive healing factor. Which didn’t even include the danger that he could be if he ended up being brainwashed. Which he, unfortunately, was weak against. It happened before, to his knowledge.
Which was bad. Spider-Man fought the guy in the past, going toe to toe with the older mutant and saying it’d been tough would have been an understatement. He did not have unbreakable bones but he was stronger, faster and his spidey-sense should put him on equal footing with the mutant, maybe even a bit above, but it didn’t.
Wolverine.. in short.. was extremely difficult to beat. Last time they had a violent altercation with one another Spider-Man almost took a severe beating, the only thing keeping him from a stay in the hospital being that he had the blessing of sticking to the ceiling and keeping himself out of range.
But the man had tons of experience. When Wolverine couldn’t reach someone with his claws because they were too far away? He’d come all the way up there. Don’t test him. Guy could jump, guy could climb. In under five minutes Peter had been put into a position where either he used his entire strength, or he’d get seriously mauled.
Don’t get him started on what the dude could do if he actually planned on killing him. Spider-Man was good.. but Wolverine was the best at what he did and stabbing people up the ass was something he did a lot. Plus, it wasn’t much of an admission to say: I lost against Wolverine. The Hulk once caught a stabbing from the guy. The Hulk! When he heard of it he thought for sure he was going deaf or something.
Who stabbed the Hulk and lived to tell the tale after all?
Wolverine.
Last time he saw the man had been during a misunderstanding, thanks to the Bugle, like usual, where he ended up on the run from the public, a common event. The older mutant ended up being one of the heroes trying to hunt him down. Attempted to gut him like a proper fish. Just like that. His own, boring, normal bones were no match for that adamantium set.
Broke his hand decking the guy in the face like he deserved.
Sure, he sent the man flying off the roof they had been on at the time, giving him plenty of time to zip away, it made his evening a whole lot harder though, having to fight with a damn, single hand.
They never really talked about that. He saw the man once more when the initial culprit was caught but didn’t stick around to hope for an apology. Wolverine was a piece of shit of a man. The guy didn’t apologize.
Still, despite Peter absolutely not enjoying this guy’s company, again, he was going to do his remote best to find the other. He was good to his own people and they missed him.. Where to start though? Wolverine had been seen all over New York, last at a bar down in China Town. Probably to get drunk.
He seemed to always try and get drunk. There were little instances where he spotted the guy without beer. Saw him once, at 5 AM, knocked off his rocker, drowning in beer cans. Who drank that much at 5 AM?! Wolverine! Dude knocked beer back like water, for crying out loud.
Regardless of whether the older man was wasted or not though, Peter was not itching for a rematch. He was so over that.. So not interes…ted..? What did he spy there, with his little eye..?
His eyebrows went as high as they could, watching a familiar woman walk down the street, just below him, at angle from where he could see her easily, but she couldn’t see him. Someone pinch him and call him Trudy.. Peter leaned a bit back to remain in the shadows, not wanting to risk his catch to notice him after all..
Viper, in the flesh.. or scales, whatever she felt like sporting right now. Woman sure had a lot of shedding to do with how snakey she was. If there was someone who deserved a nipple twister, definitely her. She was a hoot. Not the good kind. Last time they met she put her heels through his back, almost breaking his spine.
Fun times.. 0/10.. would definitely never repeat that and recommending it wouldn’t occur to him in his wildest dreams. Guy just kind of.. didn’t like getting stabbed with sharp heels, or something..
What were his options..? Look for crime, Wolverine, or follow Viper? Chances were, if he followed Viper, he’d not just find crime but by the off-chance, perhaps, maybe even the hairy man that plagued his nightmares. Someone please, maybe god, give him a sign on what to do!
Looking down below he watched her uncharacteristically stumble over a piece of loose fabric on the sidewalk. Hilarious. Guess that was his sign. The webslinger crouched a bit closer to the roof he was on, letting her walk further and further.. before really beginning to trail her.
So, game-plan. Big chance she was not acting solo, because where Viper was, there was usually Hydra. Hydra? Sucked. Didn’t like them. Kind of mean? Bad fashion sense. A little bit on the posh side but with just.. a horrible color combination. Green and yellow? Please. Someone wake them up from their delusions.
Green in general was a horrid color.. try red on for size. Then again, guess yellow wasn’t too bad? But with green? Someone must have taken a dump in their brain or something or horribly abused the guy who designed their uniforms because, by the lord above, it was just an awful sight to behold.
May be getting a little distracted here.
Peter jumped off the roof he was currently on to the next one, landing on his toes, rolling and sprinting over the concrete to follow Viper’s direction. The woman was basically strolling down the street, which in itself, was already weird.. alright? Not just that, but she tripped.. over trash.
Very unlike her.. but somehow she looked exactly like Viper. Mhh.. Maybe this was the perfect example that even villains sometimes felt like just strolling down the street. Couldn’t be assholes 24/7, right? Oh? She turned into an alley. Alright, not in his sight no more, did she notice him? Better not.
Peter shot a web to the other side of the street against a building, jumping over and swinging the rest before landing on the opposing roof, immediately crouching down again as he crawled closer to the edge of the building to look over.. nh..? Mh!? What?!
She was gone. Glance to the left, nothing, glance to the right, nothing. Did he lose her already? No. Refused to believe that.. where could she have gone..? There were no doors inside the alley, there was a wall blocking it off, making it a deadend.. He was sure Viper could climb that but if she had, she’d have seen him first.
So, what was left? His gaze fell onto the manhole that was.. kind of really jumping into his eye from where he was hanging. Couldn’t be that obvious, right? Well, he meant, Hydra wasn’t always sharp with their hideouts but in the middle of fucking Queens? Like hell! Ah man.. He sighed..
Did he have to climb into the sewers..? He checked the area once more, glancing around, then dropped down to land next to the manhole and checked over his shoulder, scanning the walls closely, one last time… ah shit. Looks like he got to wade through some shit soon.. He grabbed the round metal slab and tried to lift it.
Stuck.. Or locked? Was it an actual manhole, was the question? Peter glanced around to ensure no one saw him, then he stemmed his heels into the ground below him, straightened his back, dug his fingers into the palms of his hands as he closed his fists around the handles of the manhole.. and then he pulled.
Slowly his muscles tensed more and more, bulging with the effort of wrenching this out of the ground. It was creaking dangerously, the metal almost bending slightly, which made Peter worry that the guy was going to break the handles off first, before he managed to open this shitty, fucking manhole.
His spidey-sense went off.
Immediately he let go of the handles and instead jumped up, webbing the wall to disappear in a nearby shadow. High on alert, but not seeing anything yet- no- wait.. a civilian? Heading into a dead end..? Peter tilted his head to the side as he watched a middle aged man enter the alley.
Dark grey hair, unassuming features, pants and a sweater. Bit cold, no? But it seemed like this guy had a good grip on things, especially when Peter watched the man pull out a tiny square-like remote and began to head right to the manhole. Was he gonna stand on it..? He didn’t wanna chance it. There was a visible Hydra Symbol on it.
A quick web and the guy was pulled right off the ground and to the ceiling where Spider-Man webbed the other to the cold stone before he could even comprehend what was going on, he got knocked out. Yep- no chance. This took priority.
Webbing the man up some more after taking the remote to ensure he would neither yell nor run away while Peter was in there, Peter was pondering whether or not this was the smartest action to be committing himself to. He did have this.. singular button now.. It was a rectangle shaped remote with a singular, small button in the middle of the front, the back having the familiar Hydra Symbol sitting there.
Why would they even bother putting their symbol anywhere? It rang any heroes alarm bells as soon as they saw it, if they were anything worth their salt. Or experienced, longer in the field than one year.. It was tough to not run into Hydra if you were playing with the big leagues.
Spider-Man would know, he didn’t even look for those guys and kept running into them. No matter now, case in point. He jumped back down to the manhole to land next to it on quiet soles, inspecting the remote one more time before aiming it at the manhole and.. clicking it.
It opened inwards.
Inwards.
Like a trap door- No freaking way he’d be able to tear it out the wrong way then, obviously. Damn it- That was embarrassing. Peter groaned weakly and rubbed over his face.. Fine. You know what, fine. He was gonna take it. Whatever.. Here he goes! With a hop he dropped down the hole, into the darkness, hearing the door slam back shut behind him.
Not five minutes in and he almost got caught right away.. now sticking to the ceiling only and asking himself how he missed Hydra building a huge, underground base, right in his home block. He’s been living in Queens since forever. He patrolled day and night basically-
How the fucking hell did he not spot a crumb of this action? Peter was besides himself with anger at the goddamn guts those idiots had, building an evil lair right in his home turf. All of New York was his turf but Queens? It wasn’t a secret that Spider-Man hung around in Queens more than he did in the other parts of town.
They had some serious guts to be trying this garbage with him. He’s taking this personally. Going to find Viper and shave her bald. Damn the woman, he’s sure she had something to do with this, she always had something to do with the trash that Hydra was coming up with.
Vile, evil woman. He’s going to punch her. Right in the face, like a true gentleman. Take a tooth out. So very annoyed.. For now.. he just crawled along the ceiling, thankful that he wasn’t running into anyone yet, the hallway was narrow, it was dark.. it felt like the calm before the storm.
He slipped onto the wall and from the wall to the ground, staying low as he snuck through the halls, glancing around every corners before moving on.. there was just one direction to go, going deeper and deeper.. staircase after staircase.. Peter felt like this was a very bad idea.
Sadly, he had no other options but check this out. Couldn’t just leave it alone! So, deeper down the rabbit hole Spider-Man went.. until finally, he began to hear noises.. people speaking.. somewhere. The path split in three directions. There were signs, showing which path led to where:
‘ Laboratory’
‘Brig’
‘Control Room’
Just.. what?.. All this way for three rooms..? Surely there were more, right..? Unless this facility was built with the intention of only needing these three rooms.. which wasn’t comforting. Brig already told him there would likely be some people down here who would rather be somewhere else..
Like, for example.. an older, feral mutant..
Could it be though? Spider-Man narrowed his eyes, glancing between all three options and in the end choosing to head to the Control Room. That’s where all the action would be. Plus.. he could see the laboratory and the brig from there as well, he was sure they had security cameras hanging there that overlooked the entire base..
He.. ahhh they probably knew he was here if he went by that logic. But he hadn’t seen any, so he hadn’t destroyed any either. Mh. Well, he’d see.. Peter began to walk the path to the right, to the control room. His hackles were up.. Viper was down here for sure and she probably had some tricks up her sleeves. Snakey woman. She lived up to her name.
The voices were getting louder. He cracked his knuckles, rolled his shoulders, ready to just waltz right in there and announce himself to the world. Maybe he should skimmy down and just do this hedonist style to disorient them. The thought made him grin a little.. Ahahh.. That’d be the day.. But in all seriousness..
He hoped Logan was down here. Not because he wanted the mutant to be a victim of Hydra again, but if he wasn’t down here, where was he? Spider-Man didn’t know where else he could look.. but then again, if he was not here, he was sure he could figure out easy enough if Wolverine was a victim of Hydra again by asking them.
Very nicely.
For now.. he spotted a door at the far end of the hallway, a lightbulb flickering above it and giving it that nice, creepy, horror movie vibe. But the voices clearly came from there, it not being closed completely, a crack of light shining into the hallway from the room. There were people in there, likely, with guns.
That was fine. He could handle them. He could deal with guns.. He did all the time. No, he didn’t. But he would make the time. So, when he reached the door, instead of kicking it open or trying to sneak inside, he just shoved it open the old school way, completely uncaring of the many heads snapping in his direction and oh! There was Viper!
Knew she was there! Didn’t know why she thought walking down the street like a normal person would be a smart idea but guess everyone had an off day every now and then. He grinned a bit wider under his mask, for himself. “Hey there! I forgot the onion rings but I hope the slumber party is still happening regardless, yeah?”
Click, several guns, aimed right at him. How predictable. “Aw come on! It was just a single bag of onion rings, you can’t seriously be that miffed about them. I’ll get two bags next time, let’s call it even, yes?” There was a heavy pause, with apparently none of them being sure what they should be doing.
It was Viper who finally broke the camel's back. “Just what are you people waiting for?! OPEN FIRE!” She bellowed, pulling a gun of her own but a web shot already across the entire room to catch her by her wrist and with a tug, flung her right to the man in spandex. If beating her was that easy he’d have celebrated.
Unfortunately as soon as she was close enough she abandoned the gun in favor of a knife she had hidden somewhere on her body, probably under her scales, he’d believe it. He blocked the incoming stab, grabbed both by her wrists and spun to chuck her back at her people to the left to use her like a bowling ball.
She ended up slamming into the first man there with her heels first, toppling him over and causing a domino reaction of toppling the others in that area, catapulting herself right back at him. “How did you find this place?!” She hissed when Peter blocked another stab, trying to punch her in the rib but she slipped away, leaving them in a bit of a standoff.
Her goons weren’t firing because they knew their aim was shit and Viper was right in front of him.
“You walked down the street?” He quipped. “Like you were shopping. Saw you almost fall flat on your face over that random piece of garbage on the stre-“ “Stop talking!” She hissed, but oh, was that a red face? Peter just smiled and cooed at her. “Aw, did the crazed villain forget she’s got a warrant out for her?”
The woman jumped at him again, with a scream that embodied her rage very nicely but, thankfully, rage he could work with. He dropped backwards, just fell flat on his back and angled his knees up to his chest. Only to jerk ‘em up and ram both his heels right under her jaw when she missed him, sending her flying through the room and crashing uncomfortably onto the huge console to the left.
Red light. Peter narrowed his eyes when red lights began to flash, unbeknownst to Viper, who was unconscious on the floor, likely with a broken jaw. But the men down here were clearly noticing it because they began to scramble, looking extremely worried now if they hadn’t before with Peter’s entrance.
Please don’t be a self destruct kind of thing. Right under Queens? If that was the case he’d have to stay and try to shut it down before it blew-
“ALL ENERGY BEING RESET IN 100… 99…98..”
Energy being reset? That didn’t sound so bad- he barely dodged a shot, making him jump away from the door and ready to throw down with the rest of the people in here, instead.. he watched them all shove and push to get through the door as fast as they could. One was dragging Viper. He was going to go ahead and follow them but- but finding prisoners was his priority.
What.. was going on? Should he be worried..? This was worrying- he looked around hectically. Console. He made a beeline for it and began trying to see if there were any security cameras. The screen was huge, a ton of data was on it but what it was related to was unknown to him. Seemed to be the make-up of a biometric structure-
Wolverine.
In the left corner, there it was. A rectangle picture that showed him the man, on the ground, a heavy collar around his neck that was connected to the ground with a massive chain, anchoring the poor dude in place. Holy hell, he actually found him. Or.. Or what was left of him.
Clearly not in a good condition over there. The man wasn’t wearing anything but with how filthy he was, he might as well be wearing a full body suit. Something told him that wasn’t just dirt.. looked a lot like.. like dried blood. God preserved him. He scanned the panel in front of him closely.
“40… 39… 38…”
Holy Moly. He couldn’t give into the stress. There! He grabbed a lever right under the picture and tugged it. Red Light flooded the cell in the picture and he could see Wolverine’s body flinch and curl away from the light, his massive body just rolling up into a tight ball there before his head lifted, clearly disoriented.
Brig. Now. Peter jumped away from the console, letting his eye-lights snap on for when the power shut off in under a minute. They were like flashlights, built into his mask to provide perfect vision, even in the dark. Night-vision wouldn’t work down here since it’d be pitch black.
The red flashing was unnerving him, but it must be worse for Wolverine, who knew what they shot him up with. What kind of torture he had to endure. But it ended today. He was getting the man out of here. Out the control room, down the hall, to the brig. His legs were pushing max speed, he was going as fast as he could.
Click.
No more red lights.
No more lights at all.
He could hear a deep, disoriented, confused howl at the end of the hall that he was following. The lights of his mask gave him the creepy horror game vibe that you got from playing a first person adventure. Urrgh, hated it. He didn’t bother yelling out, but when another half yell, half growl echoed through the hall, now a lot closer- wait- too close-
Spidey sense kicked off. The hallway was too narrow to really escape anywhere to but backwards.
A body was suddenly in his field of vision, making Peter yell out in surprise, digging his heels into the ground to stop but being so close to the other person he got absolutely barreled over. He didn’t even need to see them properly to know who this was, because he felt it.
Now he knew what those guys had been running from.
Three points, ramming right through his left shoulder and skewering him cleanly as he landed on his back, being pinned like a bug and having a familiar, feral, angry face right in front of his own face.
“Augh! Hnf- No! Wolverine- Logan!” Peter scrambled. The claws digging in his shoulder stuck in the ground and not moving but that other hand was trying to do the same to his other shoulder. He grit his teeth and tried to get his legs under the guy to throw him off but his weight of over 300 adamantium filled kgs was making it very difficult to get a proper angle.
And then the older man’s head snapped down and headbutted him with so much force he was sure he passed out for a second there, everything going black for a bit and his grip slipping. It’s over, he’s going to-
“Hffrrrrgggrrrrr….” The growling was as close as ever, even with his vision swimming like he was drowning in happy sauce, he could tell the man was so angry he was basically foaming at the mouth, drool dripping down the edges of his mouth. Fucking gross. Really? Slobber onto someone else… Those claws were right in front of his face.
He could feel the middle one poking his forehead. Would go right through his brain, he’d be dead instantly. Not an option, he reeled, ready to use his now free hand to deck the guy enough to send him flying again-
“..Spider-Man..?” The gruff, husky voice was carrying a heavy undertone of confusion and pain, as if he struggled to think a straight line. Oh god- ok. Peter grit his teeth when the claws suddenly jerked out of his shoulder, he could feel them scraping against his fucking bones. Wolverine was up again and stumbling away a few feet, wiping over his face with his arm as if that’d clean him.
Holy shit.. “Logan, no, wrong direction-“ The older man crumbled on his legs, sinking back to the ground, his massive body folding in on itself as if it was made out of cardboard. Which was almost cute, if not for the fact they were in an enemy base, he’d take the moment to take a picture.. No- the man was naked. He wouldn’t.
Peter fought to get to his legs, having to gather himself for a bit to shut out the pain before moving over and crouching down next to the other, wincing as the arm that had been stabbed wouldn’t move the proper way it wanted.. Not good. Not at all.. But he had to work fast for now.
So, he slipped an arm around the other’s waist, the healthy arm. “Come on, it’s gonna be alright, dude. I’m getting you out of here.” Peter tried to comfort the older man, but all he got was a weak, pained groan. Thankfully he seemed to be able to understand what Peter was planning, because he let himself be dragged to his legs and offered as much support as his beaten body could give.
Dude felt wet-… wet? Peter looked down and had to do everything in his power to not drop the mutant when he realized why. He thought he was dirty earlier, because he looked dirty on the screen, like dried blood and all.. but that wasn’t it only.
His skin was missing. There were huge chunks of it, just gone. It was clearly healing back, his legs mostly covered in it but bald spots showed him that just recently, those disgusting freaks had skinned Wolverine. Or parts of him anyway. Oh holy shit. He wasn’t holding onto the guy.
He was holding onto his raw muscles. Grabbing his fucking tissue- Peter almost vomited. But he couldn’t. He just switched his hold until he had the man by his skin, not his.. his bowels. Uurgghh.. no surprise that man was in pain. Logan, next to him, groaned again in misery. “No, shhh.. it’s ok..” He hushed him softly, beginning to draw him back down the hall to the exit.
He was gonna let Captain America handle this base.. Wolverine was going to be his first priority.. Where.. where could he hide the guy? Hydra would try and get a hold of him as long as he was weak, after all.. He narrowed his eyes.. there was a place he could imagine bringing him to.. didn’t like it though.
He could hear the other hero leaking blood in massive amounts onto the ground.. not leaving him any choice.
Out of all the places in the world, his apartment was not the best place to hide a hurt hero. But it had been the closest place for this. He couldn’t think of anything better except for maybe calling the X-Men. Why wasn’t he doing that, by the way..? Easy. Because now he brought the dude into his apartment and he didn’t want them to know he lived here.
There would be no way to avoid his identity being blown then. He panicked, maybe, a little.. he had been too focused trying to smuggle a heavily bleeding, naked dude into his apartment after all, without leaving a golly darn trace. Managed, but now he looked like he had killed the man himself.
Was covered in his blood and all.. he had to go back out to clean the blood that Wolverine did leave behind.
But back to his apartment, He put a tarp over his bed and then put Wolverine onto it to ensure he could clean up the evidence later, for one. And for two: He needed to clean the guy. He was completely filthy after this adventure.. But before he did that, he had to give a minute of silence for his water bill.
Peter didn’t have the money for this, damn it.. At least he didn’t have to worry about anyone coming over, currently not on talking terms with a lot of people. He may or may not could be doing better in the social department. Whatever. He grabbed a bucket, a sponge, and then began the process with luke-warm water.
He was thankful, by the heavens, that Logan wasn’t conscious right now. As soon as his back hit the bed, he was out. And again, it was a blessing. His skin was definitely healing but so slow it was barely noticeable. Had to get some food into the dude. Or at the very least any form of nutrition.
But.. cleaning first..
Takes him three full hours caring for the guy until Peter was done making life hell for himself. Everything was clean.. Wolverine was no longer bleeding everywhere so he got to lay on the mattress.. he was bandaged up, wore the biggest shorts that Peter owned and the only reason they were big enough to fit him was because he once bought the wrong size and just never go around throwing that pair out..
Everything was fine..
He was fine.. Peter was fine..
Which was why he had the extreme urge to drink himself into a coma. Sitting in his chair and watching the shorter male breathe calmly, just snoozing away in his bed.. at some point he switched from being unconscious to just being asleep, the hint being that Wolverine snored like a goddamn buzz-saw.
He was tired.. His apartment was made out of a kitchen, a bathroom and the rest. It wasn’t built for two people. It wasn’t even built for a man his own size, this was too small for anyone to happily exist in it and the mess? It was overfilled. Trash on trash. He lived like a pig, alright?
Between journalism and Spider-Manning, there wasn’t a lot of time for cleaning, alright? He was too busy! Fuck.. he rubbed over his eyes and stared out the window.. he pulled his curtains close, so he had to peek from between them and see if he could spot anyone.. didn’t look like they had been followed..
Last time he checked, Captain America took this very seriously. Dude brought the entire club down upon those clowns. Viper was contained. So were her goons. Good succeeded once again. The laboratory was under close eye from both Bruce Banner and Tony Stark. They’d figure out what was going on in there. And Peter?
He would make sure that Wolverine lived to see his kids and friends again. That did force him to wear a mask, even at home, lounging here in normal fabrics, a shirt, shorts, socks.. and a Spider-Man mask. He couldn’t risk it.
He had to take care of his own wounds and while his costume was breathable, he’d rather have the three stab wounds for example in free air.
Once this was over.. he would likely have to move. But it’d be easier hiding from one man than the entirety of New York.. oh who was he kidding. When Wolverine woke up in his apartment he’d have his scent and would be able to recognize him anywhere. No matter what he wore.
He sighed and leaned back, away from his window and back into the chair.. just.. letting it go for now. This sucked.. He should have just called the damn X-Men. Now he felt obligated to help the man get better first before handing him over.
Why though? He’d be safer with them.
Ok, know what? He grabbed his work phone and dialed the number burned into his memory.
Rang once, twice.. click. “Yes, hello?” Who was this? “Eyo, who am I speaking to?” He looked at the ceiling. “Depends who’s asking.” Sounded like a young woman. Maybe between 17 and late twenties? “Uncle Joe, looking to chat to the professor.” A moment of silence. “Erhm.” Hesitant over there.
“Spider-Man. It’s Spider-Man.” Peter added, maybe having her be a bit more at ease with that information. “And y-“ “Oh, shit. Really? Like, the Spider-Man?” Oh, cute. He had a mutant fan. “Yeppers. Listen, I’d love to chat, but I really gotta talk to the professor. Kinda important, Spider-Man bussiness.”
Another heavy pause. Peter glanced at Wolverine, the man was still sleeping. His face, earlier a grimace of pain, now relaxed and almost peaceful.
“He’s not here.” Hn- “What?” “Most of the adults aren’t.. There was an emergency back in Germany and they went there to help. You know, X-Men business.” While their friend was missing? Maybe they thought he was in Germany? Whatever.. “When are they going to be back?” Couldn’t leave Wolverine there if there weren’t enough adults to defend him there.
He didn’t want to lure Hydra to the school, out of all places. “I think.. somewhere next week.. maybe two weeks.” Ohhhhhhh.. Ouuuf.. No way. This was a nightmare. “Aye.. Alright. Thanks for the info, misses..?” “Smith! Tabitha Smith! I’m one of the adults staying over here right now.” Alright.
“Ok, well, I’ll call again soon. Thanks for the info.” He tried to be friendly even though his nerves were shooting through the roof, so once he said his goodbyes, instead of sitting through the woman offering him help instead he just hung up and leaned further back, hanging to the side and groaning in annoyance.
One to two weeks.. Wolverine would probably be good to go by then but damn it he didn’t feel like having an eye on the guy that long. But he would, because if Wolverine got caught again before his friends saw him again.. man, he’d be feeling that forever. So..
A soft huff from the bed had him almost wince. But looking at the man’s face… he was still asleep. Lucky bastard.. Peter sighed.. drew his knees up to his chest and waited.. took him a bit.. but eventually he managed to just fall into that mindset where he just watched, listened and waited.
Couldn’t sleep because what if they came for Logan? So, Peter was taking first watch.. fuck the fact that he hadn’t slept in over 34 hours. Damn it. Today was supposed to be an easy day..