Chapter Text
Truthfully speaking, Peter shouldn’t have been at the battle with the other Avengers. But when a fight had broken out not that far from his school it caused Midtown to be evacuated for safety purposes. Everyone had been sent home, and happily they all left, not even lingering to watch the fight go down. Everyone except Peter, of course.
There had been multiple reasons Peter had been barred from participating in this fight and several past fights. Though being kept away from the thrill of Spider-Manning had made him hungry for the adrenaline and excitement of it. And Peter didn’t agree with most, if not any, of the reasons.
1. The Avengers had said that Peter spoke too much over the comms in the last battles, which led to Clint nearly being stabbed because of how distracted he was. Which was a little fair, but no one had told Peter not to flood the comms with commentary about where everyone’s targets were. And his warnings had helped several people mid-battle.
2. He often had a bad habit of blocking out peoples commands of where he was supposed to be and when he should be there. This was the least fair in Peter’s opinion, the sounds of the battle and constant pressure from his spider sense made it hard to focus on others. Sure, it led to some property damage and the occasional person being injured, but that was hardly his fault!
3. Tony had confiscated his Iron-Spider suit.
Peter was furious at that. He didn’t think it was fair that Mr Stark took it away again, especially after what had happened the last time his suit had been taken from him. He still couldn’t go near warehouse without remembering what had happened with the Vulture and feeling the phantom weight of tonnes of rubble and rebar on his back. Then again Tony didn’t know about that little scuffle, no one did, Peter hadn’t wanted the other Avengers to think that their youngest member was also incompetent just because he didn’t have his suit. Plenty of them fought without their armour and still easily won, not being tricked like Peter had.
Luckily he still had one of his older suits, something he had designed before Tony gave him an Iron-Spider suit. It was fabric, a little banged up and bloody from a previous fight and not even half as good as his nanotech suit but it still had a working Karen interface, so who was Peter to complain?
Swinging onto a building nearby the battle, Peter surveyed the enemy and the damage. It was some kind of alien with a writhing mass of black, scaled tentacles and three oversized heads with equally oversized purple eyeballs that were shooting some kind of laser beam.
All the Avengers were there, even Bucky and Loki who usually didn’t help the team fight. They were all running around, or flying, trying to kill the thing while destroying as little property as possible. Strange was summoning portals and using them to, rather gorily, cut off the monsters tentacles.
“Well, that’s grim.” Peter remarked as he finished putting on his suit and hiding his backpack. The smooth material shifted easily to fit against his skin as Peter shot out another web and swung into the battle.
He knocked down Loki, protecting the god from a burst of the purple light, before webbing it in one eye and swinging up to another rooftop, looking for where he was needed next. The sounds and smell of the battle was assaulting his senses, thick ash and concrete dust mixing with blood from both human and alien.
Dodging a swing from one of the tentacles Peter leapt again, catching himself mid air and flipping onto the beast’s head where he scanned for weaknesses. There was a small crack in its scales, enough to show the pulsating purple skin beneath. Peter hesitated for a moment as it started to writhe and move again, oblivious to the light spider on its head.
He pulled his mask up a bit and sank his fangs into its exposed flesh, pumping as much of his venom in as possible, before leaping away and swinging to the roof closest to him. The alien must have had toxic blood because Peter immediately threw up from the cloying taste on the back of his throat.
His only consolation was the beast’s sudden roar, scream, of agony. The bite wouldn’t last that long likely. Peter’s venom was only so strong against anything bigger than a cow, but it would weaken it, hopefully enough for the others to kill the damn thing.
Wiping the vomit from his mouth, Peter tugged his mask back down and was immediately assaulted by a jumble of voices as he was patched into the comms by Tony.
“Kid what the fuck are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in school! And didn’t I bench you?” Tony chastised when he worked out Peter could hear them.
“Language.” Steve muttered half-heartedly as he threw his shield, the vibranium digging a trench into the monster’s thick black hide. “Gotta agree with Stark on this one. Stay out of danger Kid.”
Peter grumbled as he swung over to an apartment block, kicking in the door to sweep it for any civilians who hadn’t fled yet. “Schools cancelled because there’s a risk it’s about to be crushed by whatever alien this is! And you may have benched me, but I can still help!”
No one spoke for a few minutes; the comms filled with cursing and grunts as everyone ran around attacking still. The beast, thankfully, was growing weaker by the minute. Peter was unsure if it was just from the length of the battle or because of his venom coursing around its bitter veins.
Clearing another building Peter ran to the next dodging a strike from the creature from its tentacle that was easily twice as thick as a car. “Mr Captain America Sir watch your left!” Peter yelled into comms as his spider sense went off, catching the creeping movement of one of the cut of tentacles.
He paused his building searching for a moment, rolling through a mess that used to be a car park to help Natasha who had become tangled up in one of the hacked and bloodied limb. It didn’t shift when he stabbed it, and he didn’t want to reveal the fact he had venom, so Peter threw a taser web on it and shocked the tentacle till the point it was steaming and smelling weirdly good. “There you go Ms Romanov!”
“Thanks, Маленький паук.” She called back as she leapt into the battle again, fighting beside Clint whose explosive arrows were causing a fair amount of pain to the creature.
It thrashed again and rubble was thrown everywhere from one of the buildings. Peter webbed up as much as he could but just ended up yelling where each piece was going to land.
Tony grunted after a moment, getting confused by Peter’s many warnings and being hit by one of the pieces. “Hey Roo, gonna stop you right there. Remember what I said about filling the comms? Go clear the buildings, we’ve got this. F.R.I.D.A.Y mute the kid.”
There wasn’t even a second for him to protest before F.R.I.D.A.Y muted him from the group comms. Only Natasha, Bucky, Steve and Loki protested to him being muted but all of them quickly forgot it getting lost in the battle again. It was torture, being able to hear and see everyone getting into danger but being unable to say anything when there was danger heading their way.
Hissing low, Peter stormed back into the building he had been attempting to clear, eyes darting around. “Karen check for heat signatures please? And turn off all sound on the Avengers comm line unless someone is trying to get a hold of me.”
‘Of course, Peter. There are two signatures in this building Peter. Third floor. But I will warn you this building is unstable and I would highly recommend leaving as soon as possible.’
At least there was one person, or AI, that hadn’t betrayed him. Peter sprinted through the damaged lobby towards the stairs. Seeing it would have been arduous to climb; Peter shot his webs up to the railing and scaled the silk strands. In no time at all he had reached the third floor and was sweeping each room, calling out.
“Hey? Anyone in here? It’s Spider-Man I want to help you get out of here safe.” No one responded to his comments, so Peter continued to run around confused, the floor shaking ever so slightly underneath him. His feet padded over the dusty carpet, pulling up a cloud of white.
There was one room left that he hadn’t cleared, the door seemed stuck fast. Likely the terrified occupants who had holed up in their home trying not to get killed. An admirable decision but if Peter ever wanted to be on the missions again he had to prove he could listen to Tony.
It took two attempts of throwing his shoulder against the metal door before the hinges buckled and the whole thing collapsed to the ground with an ear shattering shriek of scratching metal on metal. Inside the room it was lit only by red emergency lights and the faint flickering of a drones camera feed thrown up onto one of the flickering monitors.
“Karen can you do anything about the darkness?” Peter tried as he squinted around. His spider sense had been deafening since he leapt onto the battlefield, so he was already struggling to see much with how hard he was squinting.
‘I’m sorry Peter but there is not enough power in this building to turn on any lights. If you would like I can turn on heat vision?’
Peter paused thinking it through before nodding. “Yes please Karen. Heat Vision on.”
The room lit up in varying shades of blue. The floor and walls were deep navy, cold metal with very little heat to absorb. Orange gleamed from the monitor that was flickering more and more, the battle it was showing fading in and out, the drone now laying damaged on the floor in a pile of rubble. Behind one of the doors near the back there was a similar shade of orange and yellow. This one though was shaped into the form of two people instead of the shape of a rectangular monitor.
There they were.
“Hey guys. It’s just Spider-Man, I just want to get you to safety.” He called out walking carefully towards the door and pulling it open easily. The pair seemed to be hiding in a janitors closet if the mops and chemicals were anything to note.
One of them slowly turned to him so that he could see them fully. Even in the dark he could make out and all white lab coat with a chilling emblem embossed over his heart. A skull with tentacles. Hydra.
Well, that definitely explained the monster outside with its large heads and many tentacles. Probably some Hydra experiment gone wrong or gone right. Depends what kind of chaos they had been planning to cause with it.
The two scientists jumped at him brandishing guns. “You do realise that’s quite rude? I’m just trying to help you and now you’re trying to shoot me?” Peter said with his hands on his hips looking down at them. Sure, they were evil but if they didn’t shoot him, Peter might be less inclined to knock them out and just leave them webbed up in the building.
There was a pop and Peter felt heat radiate out from his chest in intense waves that soon grew to become cacophonous agony. While Peter was used to being shot usually it wasn’t point-blank like this, and usually his targets didn’t shoot dangerously close to his heart.
His chest spasmed as he tried to breath through the punctured lung. That certainly didn’t feel very good. “Okay guess you aren’t in the mood for a conversation.”
One hand pressed to his chest; Peter shot a stream of web against the first Hydra scientist’s head and with a tug made him smash his skull into the wall. They both, Peter and the other agent, watched the man fall unconscious into a heap on the floor.
Two more bullets had hit him before Peter could react, the man rushing towards a cupboard where he grabbed something and clicked a button. Without any hesitation the man shoved the item, a small capsule, and swallowed it.
After only a few second he collapsed to the ground, and Peter couldn’t hear his heartbeat. Well, that solved the issue of him but seeing someone swallow a suicide capsule in front of Peter made his heart skip a couple beats. After all Peter was only a teenager.
“Karen…” having to take a pause as his voice cracked Peter leant against a cool metal wall. “Karen please ask Tony to put me back on the comms with everyone. I have intel. Oh, and turn back on comm sound please.”
The sudden wave of noise was disorientating, crashes, yells, heavy breaths of pain. Peter whined pitifully at the noise, having to quickly turn it down a notch as he stumbled towards the monitor, turning off the dead camera feed. As he waited for Tony to allow him to speak again Peter began to hack past secure fire walls, downloading everything onto a flash drive and looking for key information in the creature that was currently terrorising the city outside.
“This better be good Pete.” Tony’s crackling voice cut over the line as Peter hacked into the correct file.
“Uh, I hope it is too? The creature is Hydra materials.” Everyone groaned loudly over the line, the noise making Peter laugh lightly. “Anyways. I’m currently hacking its file to try and work out how to, y’know kill it and stuff.”
A four-digit password came up before him and Peter hesitated before, as a joke, typing in zero-zero-zero-zero. It was much less of a joke when it worked. Hydra security was a joke, that was far too easy. He hummed to himself, some tune Harley had played for him on the guitar over a video call last night, as he worked.
Scrolling through the list of intel and failed experiments Peter came to where he needed to be. “Okay guys. I’ve worked it out. You have to get inside its mouth.”
There was a long pause. “Pray tell Underoos. Why do we have to get in the giant Hydra aliens mouth?” Tony asked with a long-suffering sigh.’
“Um, it says here that the witherstorm, that creature, has some kind of power source in its chest. When it was weaker apparently it was easier to access but now the only way to reach it is going through its mouth and digging it out yourself. I’ve just got to finish downloading these files then I’ll come out to help you all.” And after he packed the three bullet wounds, Peter thought glumly, but he didn’t say that part.
The Avengers went back to ignoring Peter as they argued about who was going to get themselves eaten by the ‘Witherstorm’. He wasn’t really listening, too focused on watching the progress bar slowly edge along the screen. In the end it was Strange who was sent in, given if things went tits up, like they normally did, he could at least portal out.
He grabbed the flash drive and shoved it into his shoe for safe keeping, given that his suit didn’t have any pockets, and stood up from the computer. The building rumbled again and for a moment everything tipped to the side before falling still again.
There was another rumble and Peter’s spider sense flew into a blinding panic. Even when being shot he hadn’t felt this much anxiety from his powers, his whole body was electrified with it. Adrenaline buzzed in his veins, and he felt his hair stand on end as his head swam.
Then the world around him exploded.
Hot flames rushed up to greet him, lapping hungrily at his skin for a moment until dust swallowed them and stifled out their hunger. Peter vaguely felt himself falling, wind whistling past him as he collided with rubble and grit that snapped at his body like a hailstorm, just less cold and bloodier.
When he finally stopped falling his head cracked heavily against something and Peter felt himself on the edge of passing out, barely able to croak out words through the pain and the thick air around him. “Mr Stark Sir? There—something happened, the building exploded. I need… backup… trapped…”
“Did you get all the civilians out kid?” Tony asked, and upon hearing Peter’s grunt of agreement he spoke again. “Okay then just hang out and wait for us to kill this thing then we can help you.”
“But Mr Stark Sir… please I need to—” He was cut off midway through his pitiful sentence.
Steve’s voice was half bored as he spoke, though he couldn’t hide his exhaustion. “Kid just stay put. We all know you want to fight but you won’t be much help right now so just stay out of harm’s way while we deal with it. Stark, mute him, we all know what he will be like otherwise and we don’t need Strange hurt.”
“No! Please—” Peter was muted for the second time that day just because he was trying to help everyone. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t his fault the building had exploded.
Slowly his head got heavier as something hot pooled around him, each breath rattled slightly more than the last, a mix of his punctured lung and the dust in the air. It was all dark, layers upon layers of concrete and metal piled up on his chest like it had been once before.
Peter passed out with a soft whimper of pain.
Minutes, maybe hours, passed before Peter woke in the cave created by the building’s fall. He felt slightly more lucid than he had been originally though his head was still pounding and fiery pain ravaged his body.
The three bullet wounds hadn’t healed yet, the one in his chest was the worse but there was also another in one forearm and the last in his thigh, both of which hurt. One of his arms, the one that had been shot, was pinned beneath a large chunk of timber that was held down by the rubble’s immense weight. And as Peter looked down he felt sick. There was a large length of rusted rebar, that was likely harbouring thousands of diseases, punctured through his hip stretching up and exiting on the other side of his body, through his stomach.
Peter tried to move to see if it had hit anything vital but even trying to move left him in a pain so excruciating that bile pooled in his mouth and his vision turned white with pain so intense it was deteriorating. He tried to spit out the bile but all he ended up with was it seeping down his ripped and burnt fabric suit, the synthetic fabric burnt onto his skin. So, he was forced to swallow down his own puke, lest he choke on it and die before he told Tony how much the man mattered to him.
“K—Karen…” He mumbled, choking down weak breaths. “K you—you there?”
‘I’m here Peter. Would you like me to call Tony for you?’ Her voice was softer than normal, and quieter though Peter didn’t know if that was for his benefit of because her power had been sapped.
“No… d—don’t call Mr Stark… can you call Harley instead?” Tony would just ignore him or get mad at him for failing at his one job. Harley though would be able to calm him down; his boyfriend always did.
The sound of a phone ringing went on for far longer than normal and eventually Peter was put through to Harley’s voicemail. ‘Heya darlins’ I can’t be at the phone righ’ now. Either I’m blowin’ a lab up or I’m hanging out wit’ ma awesome boyfriend! Call back later, or nev’r!’
Upon hearing the voicemail in Harley’s warm Tennessee accent more tears sprung up in Peter’s eyes. he didn’t know that Harley’s voicemail had the part about him in it. whenever they called each other neither of them missed a call. Even if Peter was mid battle with an enemy he would pick up Harley’s calls. And they both knew each other so well that they knew what each other would be doing when, so no calls occurred at school.
“Hey—Fuck—Hey Harls… I—I love you… Don’t forget that. It hurts—so much… Please… I don’t want to die…” Peter whined into the small microphone, he didn’t know if he was going to make it out of this alive, he wanted Harley to know how much he loved him just in case. “Karen, send it.”
His eyes slid shut again as he succumbed to the white-hot pain flashing beneath his heavy eyelids. When sleep, or rather unconsciousness, overtook him at least the pain faded and it was only the weight on his chest remaining.
Peter stirred again after a while, how long he still didn’t know, one eye refused to open, and his mind was slipping through his fingers. Where was he? The Vulture! His mind supplied. Peter tried to move and get up; he had to get to get out of the rubble and stop Toomes before he sold Chitauri tech to someone with bad intentions.
Pain lanced up his whole body as Peter yanked himself trying to sit up. He felt warm rusted metal, jagged as it ripped up through his body. A breathless sob left his mouth and he slumped back over, crying weakly as his body spasmed wildly and felt cold as ice. He didn’t remember getting this injured in the fight against Vulture.
It took a moment to remember he wasn’t fighting Vulture and that instead he was in yet another collapsed building without a suit that could properly protect him and with no one to care enough to come searching.
There was a few weak cheers in one of his ears where the headphone had come loose and fallen away. The Avengers must have won the battle. That was good. As long as they would be okay Peter could be happy. Death could take him and he could finally be with his parents. With Aunt May and Uncle Ben.
“Okay Kid. Mission over, lets pick you up so we can all head home for some food and a good scolding. Send me your coordinates.” Tony spoke into his suit as he helped to drag Strange back towards the Quinjet, the Wizard having fallen unconscious after ripping out of the beast’s chest in a manner that Peter would have related to the movie Alien.
Peter didn’t respond. There was no ping of his notification or even a text from the boy. Shaking it off as Peter being mad at them he focused on helping Strange get comfortable on one of the beds as he let someone else deal with the moody teenager.
Surprisingly it was Loki who tried to get Peter’s coordinates. “Come on Spider-Boy. Speak. F.R.I.D.A.Y unmute the boy!”
There was still no response after he had been unmuted, but the faintest whisps of a breath audible like Peter was sat far away from his comms line. And over that the ringing of a phone, though none of them had called Peter.
“Pete? Kid?” Loki asked again seeming more worried, his brow furrowed in concern for the young Avengers. They all knew Peter and he never let a phone ring, either he would answer it or decline, and message saying to call back later and giving an excuse for why he couldn’t respond at that moment. So, hearing him not picking it up was concerning.
“F.R.I.” Tony started, his voice low with panic. “Where’s Peter?”
She didn’t respond for a while, but when she did the AI’s voice was softer than Tony thought his machines were capable of being. ‘Karen says that Peter is trapped under an apartment building that was taken down by an internal explosion.’
No one in the room was breathing.
No one had to communicate before everyone who was able to, ran out of the jet and started digging through rubble, only half-heartedly following F.R.I.D.A.Y’s advice on where and how to did.
Wanda used her powers to throw large chunks of stone to the side away from all of them, the witch who had come to see Peter as her own child, sobbing in fear for him. Tony had called all of his suits that were able to work over and had gotten them to use repulsors to push away rock and concrete.
It was dark when Loki, who had been slithering through the rubble in the form of a snake, heard Peter’s cell phone and called for everyone to dig, carefully, around the area.
They all found it had not to just throw the stone around and charge through the broken building, but when F.R.I warned that if a rock was moved wrong Peter could get crushed badly.
So, they all moved slowly, passing rocks and rebar away until they came across a horrible scene.
The dust, that seemed to coat absolutely everything in a cloud of white, was thicker here, stuck to the ground and concrete by thick streams of blood. Red gore covered every inch of the small pocket of partial safety.
Peter was splayed out, head crunched against a rock that was thick with dark life blood. One arm was clamped under a large wooden board that would need to be cut to free Peter. And his chest was the worst part; it barely moved as he led there in painful silence. Plastic was melted into his muscle, replacing the raw skin that had been burnt off, and viscous blood covered a jagged tear mark and the length of rebar in his body.
“Kid?” Tony whimpered out as he placed a hand on Peter’s chest.
There was no heartbeat.
Unsure if he was dead or not, Peter refused to open his eyes. His body was heavy, but he was led on something soft, far softer than rubble and his own blood. Breathing felt easier, so surely he was dead? If he wasn’t his punctured lung would be killing him.
Voices appeared around him, fuzzy, and Peter tried to isolate them.
“He’s a Kid! I nearly killed him because he got trapped under a building without his suit and we muted him!” Tony’s voice was tired and shrill, as if he hadn’t drunk anything but coffee for days.
He didn’t want Mr Stark thinking about it that way. Sure, he had taken Peter’s suit and muted him but if he had wanted to Peter could have easily called any Avenger for help. And anyways it wasn’t like he hadn’t been through the experience before, if he hadn’t been weak he could have moved the rock himself. “M’ Ssss’t’r’k…” Huh, words were harder than Peter thought.
Hands were immediately on his face, warm and tender as they cupped his face. They were calloused but too small to be a man’s. Natasha? Maybe.
Peter opened his mouth again, struggling to form the words. “I’s f’ne.. m’s’ser Ss’arc sss’r. I’nt the f’rsst time.” It was far from perfect, but he thought it might let them understand.
No one was speaking so Peter forced his eyes open, squinting at the bright white room around him. He had thought when he heard the Avengers that somehow he might have lived but now he was second guessing that idea.
The hands on his face gently pulled away and were replaced by a cup pressed against his lips. As its cold rim pressed against his face Peter panicked slightly, unsure what was in it. His fangs shot out, and faster than he could stop it venom sprayed from them into the cup. Even when the venom was diluted in the water it still ate through the glass, water splashing onto his lap.
Sitting up sharply pain lanced through his stomach and Peter was forced to grasp at the bed’s handles as not to pass out. Everyone was stood in the medbay around him, a few led in beds themselves. All though, were staring at the melted glass.
His heart monitor jumped up, beeping rapidly as he pressed himself against the headrest trying not to fall over and faceplant into the soft cotton mattress. Which may have been better than sitting there with pain lancing around his hip to his stomach.
“Why staring?” Peter croaked out as he glanced over everyone. Tony was sat at his bedside with Pepper, both of them having heavy bags under their eyes and worried frowns. Steve and Bucky were sat on one of the beds nearby, neither looked injured but they looked bone tired, as if they couldn’t sleep. Thor and Loki were hovering by the door, out of breath from running in when F.R.I.D.A.Y had alerted then Peter was up. Bruce and Steven were standing over a computer with an x-ray on its screen showing a practically obliterated ribcage and fractured spine. Natasha was opposite Tony, still holding the melted glass in her hand, while Clint led in a bed on the far end, leg in a cast. Surprisingly Shuri was there, sat on a bed with Wanda and Vision where she had obviously been fixing something with Vision’s mechanical body.
If he was honest, Peter expected them to have been more injured. Just how long had he been asleep if most of them were fully healed?
“Since when did you have venom?” Bruce asked, his eyes wide as he looked towards the glass as if already thinking of tests to do with the new acidic compound.
Peter didn’t entirely want to do that conversation, so he just sniffled, led back down and promptly passed out once again, much to the dismay of everyone in the room who had been waiting for him to wake up.