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She couldn’t stop him. He had started this on his own. She had thought what she had done would be harmless. A silly little correction to teenage sloth.
She should have known better.
May’s ears ring from the rubble, singed hair clinging to her worryingly sticky face. The air above her fills with smoke as the adrenaline in her veins makes her tense.
She should have known better.
She gasps under the new gash in her side, suddenly coming to the realization that she is alone. Fire crackles a few feet away, rubble settles around her. Everything settles, and Peter is nowhere to be seen. She forces the image of Norman’s foot across her nephew's throat out of her mind, wheezing as she manages to lift her head.
“Peter?” May sees nothing through the smog of what used to be a lobby, and as the silence lingers, panic grows. May sits up with far too much difficulty, struggling onto her knees, and then her feet. She half hobbles, stumbling over unsturdy rocks, and barbed metal. “ Peter?! ”
A sharp gasp sent her spiraling in circles, hoping somehow to spot him.
And she does.
And she wishes she didn’t.
“ Peter !” The sight of the boy she raised collapsed amongst rubble sends her rushing forward without caution, absentmindedly tearing apart her smoldering blue-jeans, and scraping her bruised legs against rusted metal. “Baby-hold-stay right there!” She trips, catching herself upon the boulder of concrete Peter’s head is partially suspended on, pushing herself upwards to stumble all the way to him. He doesn’t move.
She feels sick as she faces him. Her little guy, bruised, and bloodied, and god awfully pale. Curls matt to his forehead with blood, and concrete dust, and his eyes glare an awful red color as she tries to ignore the worst of what's punctured his burnt out super-suit. He’s not burnt.
Not that that makes this any better. There are two hard , blood-rusted barbs of twisted, hideous metal forced through his abdomen.
Peter’s face twists up further in pain, and May’s suddenly aware of the terrifying helplessness she’s feeling. She doesn’t think she can do anything. She’s not even sure she can force herself out of the crouch she’d gone into at his side.
“ May -”
“I-I know. It’s-you’re okay.” He’s not. He’s not, and she should have known better. “It’s okay baby.” He hadn’t wanted to help him. “I’m right here.” May brings a hand to his face, hoping to brush the curls out of his eyes, all too aware that she did this. “You’re going to be okay.” He doesn’t believe her. She’s spent years trying to fight off that look, and now in the crackling light of the distant fire it’s returned just to haunt her.
She’s not sure she believes herself either.
Her hand pulls away from his hair, stained with something she refuses to acknowledge. She leans forwards to kiss the unbruised spots on his forehead anyhow. May has to beg herself not to cry into his hair.
A part of her heart feels like it’s detaching, sinking further into her soul than it belongs as her throat tightens. She reaches for her phone to find it gone, and the sinking part of her soul sinks a little further.
“It’s just you and me.” May could laugh at her nephew trying to comfort her now, of all times. Throwing her words back at her had always been a passion of his. It doesn’t comfort her this time. Her mouth forces itself into a wrought line, and she prays to someone that he doesn’t notice her shoulders shake as she cries.
“Yeah..it’s-it’s just us.” She tries not to think of all the better outcomes. How easily this could have been avoided. How she could have let him out of this. She kisses his hair. “I love you so much, Peter-I-I’m so so sorry.” Peter doesn’t so much as twitch under her touch, and a new surge of fear flows through her. She pulls back, and he stares up at her with a wince of pain that she never wanted to see.
“I love you.” She’s having trouble doing so much as swallowing her heart. It’s almost too much trouble to smile for him.
“I love you. I love you so so much baby. I do.” Peter’s breath shakes as he lies there, and May is sure she’s going to lose it.
“You-you have to go.” His voice is shaking now, and she wants to scream. “You can’t.” He doesn’t finish his sentence, leaving the watery glaze forming over his eyes to finish it for him. It’s met with a sharp shake of her head. If she’s too late to save him, she’s sure as fuck not going anywhere.
She’d hurt him enough.
“ May .”
“I’m not going to leave you here.” May finds his hand half-buried, and clings onto it. “I-I’m not.”
“I larb you.” She can’t tell if she’s about to cry, or laugh.
“I larb you too.” Somewhere in the distance a car crunches on broken glass. Her shouts for an ambulance go unanswered. She looks back into Peter’s bloodshot eyes, and wished she could trade places with him. Or that she’d been smarter-put aside her ‘holy moral mission’ to look at the facts. Even if good deeds did go unpunished this one hadn’t , and the brunt of the stick was Peter . “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.” It is. It is in every sense of the word her fault. She leans forward to make some further semblance of contact. Peter’s hands shake as he raises them to cling to the back of her blouse.
The reality of what’s arriving lets her cry again, sure that her child’s blood is smeared somewhere on her face. It seems like Peter has fallen into the same block of silence as her. All they seem to be able to do is hold onto each other. May alternates from stroking his hair, and pressing kisses to his forehead, hoping somehow this made it better.
It didn’t. She knew it wouldn’t.
“I’m scared .” It was barely a whisper-and if she had been sitting as far away as she had she wouldn’t have heard it. Either way, the tremble of weakness, and fear in his voice makes her want to wail as she comes up with no assurances to offer. “ May , I’m scared .” She swallows the lump in her throat, feeling his hands cling a little firmer to the back of her shirt.
She wishes she could hold him. He’s seventeen, far too young for this to be happening, and far too old to willingly clamber into her lap-but she wants to hold him. When he had first come to them-which, in reality was far too close to now-she would hold him, and wipe whatever grief-stricken tears off his face. Sometimes she would stay with him all night.
May didn’t have all night.
She couldn’t pull him into her lap, even if she wanted to. Not without making it worse.
“You’re going to be okay. I promise.” Peter doesn’t believe her. He never does. This time, he doesn’t tell her so. She doesn’t think she can find anything else to say. “I-Your Aunt May isn’t going to let anything happen to you.” She leans back just far enough to wipe silent tears off his face, stiff hands pulling her back in. “I love you so much Peter. It’s going to be okay.” Peter doesn’t answer her this time, and it feels like she’s been impaled too.
She can’t do anything about it. All May can bring herself to do is hold what little of him she can.
And she does. May clings to her baby until his grip falters. She finds herself apologizing over, and over until the words she’s trying to assure him of turn into mush, and the blood matting his hair dries.
The police don’t pull her away until he is almost cold.
She stumbles through the rest of the rumble, numb. Some part of her far away is screaming, and right now she would give anything to find it.
She stands near the remains of the building, unaware of the pain settling into her skin as both police, and medics attempt to ask her questions that don’t really mean anything.
She watches them take him. She knows he will be dead upon arrival.
Happy is trying to argue that he lives here, and is not a member of the media a few hundred feet away. She doesn’t have time for this.
A horrible, vengeful part of her catches wet eyes upon a small staff’s worth of metal, with a concrete-block on the end. Like a hammer. That same part wonders how Norman would look with it forced through his chest.
It’s a horrible thing to think about.
She’s never wanted to do it more. Not a day in her life has she been this unable to stop seeing red-and not because of the literal and metaphorical blood on her hands. She’s been this mad before, and calmed herself down through her own morals. Common sense. Fairness to others-the whole treat others how you would want to be treated scandal.
She’s not afraid to admit she would kill him.
She wanted to kill him more than she’s wanted anything in her entire life, even if the majority of it was her own fault.
There was truly only one way to get rid of the Goblin, and right now that was an eye for an eye.