Work Text:
Valentina likes to just spring interviews on them by letting a whole camera crew into the Avengers tower whenever she pleases—unprompted and without telling any of them in advance. The New Avengers—the Thunderbolts—whatever you wanna call them—are technically Media trained. They took a two hour course on the internet and even got laminated certificates mailed to them but it didn’t quite do any good. John still says slightly controversial things that Bob claims will get him cancelled and Buck just keeps repeating the same neutral script but in different ways. He’s already become a meme. During interviews Ava gets annoyed easily and just disappears when they ask a question she doesn’t like and Alexei will not shut up—ever.
Bob goes pale at even the idea of being interviewed so he’s quickly hidden away in his room when Valentina shows up with cameras.
That leaves Yelena to do the interviews-—“Excuse me?” Yelena’s practiced smile drips from her face—eyes narrowing towards the interviewer. A tall slim woman whose name she’s already forgotten.
“How will the new avengers contribute to apprehending the vigilante known as Spider-Man?” The interview repeats with the same happy expression she’s been carrying the whole interview. It’s a bit unsettling now.
“Why would we do that?”
The woman blinks as if that was a strange response to a completely unrelated question. They had been talking about the Avengers newest member—a dog named Chief that they had adopted from a shelter a few months back and whose skin was green from an unnamed experiment. Bringing up Vigilantes and Mayor Fisk of all people felt completely out of left field. “With Fisk as the Mayor of New York he’s installed a new anti-vigilante task force—and has created a law strictly forbidding vigilantism in New York City. Spider-Man has been a prominent Vigilante in Brooklyn for many years and has yet to be apprehended.”
Yelena has not had nearly enough time to process this information. “If Fisk has a whole task force why would he need us to do it?” She says flippantly.
Yelena instantly knew it was the wrong response when the woman’s eyes practically glowed with excitement—fuck.
“We’re so glad to hear that you have full confidence in Mayor Fisks task force to apprehend the criminal vigilante Spider-Man.”
Criminal? What the hell?
Yelena opened her mouth to clarify or to fix whatever mess she’s just created. “No I don’t think Spider-Man is a criminal.”
“He’s a vigilante.” The women says primly—her eyes are sharp—and Valentina is in the background making a gesture like stop, don’t respond!
But Yelena doesn’t ever listen to her anyway.
“Yeah, but from what I’ve seen he hasn’t actually committed any crimes.”
“From what you’ve seen.” The interviewer nods. “But you can’t possibly know everything and he is a criminal because vigilantism is a crime.”
“That’s stupid.” The words are out of her mouth before she could stop them—double fuck.
The interview smiles—a serpent smile that make Yelenas skin crawl and her fist ball up. “It is very brave of you to speak against Mayor Fisk's anti-vigilante law.”
Is that what she was doing? Yelena looks over at Valentina who’s already stepping up to the camera—plastering on a smile of her own that looks on the edge of panic but closer to professional restraint.
“Yelena clearly has strong opinions on the matter—but that’s the beauty of the new avengers they all have very diverse and distinct voices. Including Chief who loves to use his Bark to demand more treats.” Valentina masterfully moves away from the topic and back to Chief and the promotion they’re doing on BARK a very popular dog company.
The interview is cut short and Valentina has an amicable smile on her face up until the elevator closes on the camera crew and she swirls around to face Yelena with a sharp glare.
“Have you lost your damn mind?”
Yelena shrugs—a headache already materializing onto her cranium. “Maybe you should’ve looked more thoroughly over the interview questions before approving them?”
“This is not my fault. I actually called before we did the interview—you should’ve prepared better.”
“You called me five minutes before—I barely had time to put a shirt on that didn’t have blood.” Yelena pours herself a cup of lukewarm coffee—the first cup of coffee she’s had all morning—it’s three in the afternoon but she’s only just woken up an hour ago so she's still considering it morning.
“That is no excuse. Have you not looked at the news? Mayor Fisk is a man child with a lot of influence and way too much he will not take your words lightly.”
Yelena nods “most of the team were actual criminals—proper assassins. We’ve killed people, Valentina. Spider-Man saves kittens from burning buildings and is an active member in the Make-A-Wish foundation.” If anyone should be behind bars it's them.
“We’re not discussing morality—we’re discussing legality. You are Superheroes, known figures. Spider-Man is a vigilante—an unknown figure. The optics aren’t great.” Valentina is typing furiously on her phone—probably a whole PR team to fix Yelena's mess or bomb the internet with news articles about how great the new avengers are. She had to do that once when Alexei mentioned he used to willingly work for Hydra.
Yelena takes a sip of her coffee and digs her hand into the treat bowl near the counter.
“Those better be BARK treats.” Valentina’s eyes dart over to Yelena's hands accusingly.
“They are.” They aren’t. Chief doesn't actually like those treats.
Valentina leaves—and Yelena doesn’t really think about the whole situation until John texts something about his kid not being able to visit next weekend for Father’s Day because it’s not his weekend. Bob responds with a gif of Yelena's annoyed face and the words “That's Stupid.” beneath it.
Ava sends a voice message in the group chat— Where’s that from? She is a very slow texter and prefers to send voice memos instead.
From Yelena's interview. Tumblr is going crazy over it. Bob responds. Yelena doesn’t know the difference between Tumblr and Twitter but she doesn’t want to risk asking in the group chat.
Ava sends a link to the interview like a traitorous bitch. A few minutes pass and they must’ve gotten to the part in the interview where it suddenly became an interrogation because Bucky thumbs down the video—-a trick Bob showed him a few weeks ago.
Yelena doesn’t think it’s all that bad until a week later. Valentina has them all sit down in the many meeting rooms of the overgrown Avengers tower. The child-assassin is constantly reminded that this building used to belong to Anthony Stark and the Avengers name was an additional conglomerate to the building.
All members sat in their respected chairs—-even Bob was present chief sitting in between his feet forcing him to not tap tap tap his usually jittery feet.
Valentina doesn’t beat around the bush. “You’ve been tasked to bring in Spider-Man.”
Yelena holds back a wave of irritation. “Is this about what I said during the interview?”
Valentina gives her a disapproving look. But most of Valentina’s looks are disapproving. “Well it certainly didn’t help. But Spider-Man has made waves in the news and he might not be the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen but he’s someone Fisk doesn’t want around. And since you publicly admitted to disagreeing with his anti-vigilante stance he’s personally chosen you guys to capture him. As your formal apology.”
“Well consider us not doing that as us formally saying we’re not apologizing.” Yelena leans back on her chair—and John leans forward. “He’s the Mayor of New York I don’t think we’re allowed to refuse.”
“He’s just a man—he can’t force us to do anything.” Ava Starr knows what it means to follow the wrong leader—she is not itching to make that mistake again.
“He can make your life very difficult.” Valentina counters.
“Our life is easy?” Bob strokes the therapy dogs head—his own anxiety and own struggles prominent on everyone’s mind. No. None of their lives have been easy.
Valentina plops a thin file onto the counter “This is not a discussion. If you see Spider-Man, you must apprehend him and turn him into the authorities.”
If we see him.
And the Avengers don’t go out searching for the spider slinging vigilante. In fact they actively avoid going to any of his usual routes. They develop a tunnel vision to the ground the moment they hear a familiar THWIP of his webs. Because if they do not see him then they do not have to turn him in.
It was a technicality. A loophole they all seem to be using to avoid accosting the young vigilante.
Then Bob drops the ball. He’s rifling through the first aid kit frantically. “What’s going on?” Yelena catches the blood on his sleeve and alarm bells ring in her head.
Bob was too busy looking for materials to see the terrified look on Yelenas face.
“Do we have any more gauze? I thought we—“ the blonde woman snatched Bob's wrist pushing his sleeves up his wrist and—she checks—and only when she didn't see any new scars, just the same old jagged long healed ones—did she ask. “Who’s blood is that?”
Bob lets out a breath “um, okay, so don’t be mad.”
“At you? Never. What happened?” Yelena asks gently—wondering if maybe he’s accidentally killed a guy. He has enough blood that if not self induced definitely belongs to someone else.
“Spider-Man is bleeding out on the roof.”
Yelena lied. She is mad. “What the actual fuck, Bob. You couldn’t have just lied? You had to tell me it was Spider-Man?” She’s going to have to report this. Fuck!
Yelena’s immediate frustration isn't that Bob helped Spider-Man—it’s that Bob ruined their plausible deniability.
“What was I supposed to tell you—a hobo wearing a Spider-Man costume is bleeding out on our non-accessible rooftop?” Bob's voice cracks and he looks freaked out. “Would you have believed me?”
Yelena sighs and quickly weights the pros and cons of harboring a fugitive. Yelena looks at Bobs shaking hands and terrified expression and throws that nonsensical cons list away. She grabs the rubbing alcohol from the top shelf above the fridge. “Okay let’s help him.”
Bob immediately leads the way. His ugly as fuck Spider-Man themed crocks, that John got him as a gag gift, squeak against the freshly polished floor. She should’ve never thought he’d do any different. Of course he would help him. It probably wasn’t even a doubt in his mind.
When they get to the rooftop John is already there putting pressure on the gushing wound on the spider's chest. John is the rigid, rule-following soldier who thinks they aren't allowed to refuse the Mayor. Yet, he is the one on the rooftop actively applying pressure to a gushing chest wound. Actually with a quick scan Yelena notes that every single Avengers member is on the rooftop. Well, almost everyone. Bucky isn’t here.
Ava is kneeling beside the boy holding his hand—no checking his pulse. She's the only one capable of phasing out of this situation and yet she stays grounded—perfectly still beside the bleeding vigilante. Alexei is in the middle shouting about how Spiders heal fast—phone on Google and fully lit on his screen— simultaneously useless, deeply sweet, and a massive operational security nightmare. She hopes Valentina doesn’t check his phone again.
“Did you find the—“ John’s eyes land on Yelena and he glares at Bob. “You told Yelena? I gave you two instructions. Get the first aid kit and don’t tell Yelena. Two simple instructions.”
Bob chirps back “don’t be a dick she’s not gonna turn him in.” Then as if he’s just realized she’s not officially said that he turns to Yelrna with big worried eyes.
“Obviously not my top priority right now.” Yelena exasperates and quickly unscrews the cap on the rubbing alcohol.
The kid is conscious which is good—but also makes the part of disinfecting his wound gut wrenching when he screams. “What the hell caused this?”
“A bomb.” The spider themed vigilante cuts out—choppy and in pain.
“What kind of bomb?” Yelena furrows her brows as she peels back the red webbed costume around his wound. Some parts are seared into his flesh—melting his skin an ugly wound.
“A big one.” Cheeky.
John’s military training kicks in—sometimes Yelena forgets that he actually trained for this—once upon a time he was Captain America. John manages to stop the bleeding—wrapping his own sleeping shirt around the boys wound—tight tight tight. Tight enough that the boy screams some more.
“We need to get Bucky.”
“What? no! Why do you need to get him?” Spider-Man gasps through his confusion and pain—Yelena wishes she could take off his mask and hear him better but she knows he wouldn’t want that.
Why doesn’t he want them to get Bucky?
“He’s the only one with access to the med-bay.”
“Can’t you just help me up here? I’ve been told I need to get some more fresh air.”
John shakes his head. “The lighting is horrible up here—“ Alexei instantly turns on the flash on his phone and aims it at the injury. “—and I don’t have all the things I need.”
“I thought you were a war medic. Haven’t you done this before with less?” Ava interjects.
John’s eyes narrow irritably “yes, in an active war zone. We are not in a war and he is not a soldier. We can provide him with better medical assistance than a dark rooftop and minimal first aid. We are taking him to the fucking med-bay.”
“Please, just—not Bucky, okay? I can’t—-not him please.” He’s actively losing blood and begging them not to get Bucky—the only person that can genuinely help him. Why?
Yelena suddenly connects that Bucky not being here is because Spider-Man didn’t want him here and not because the team didn’t want to involve the winter soldier.
“I can pick the lock—“ Bob says suddenly. “I’ve done it before.”
Yelena frowns at that.
“I can phase inside.” Ava suggests with a sigh. Right. Of course.
This is urgent. They haul Spider-Man off the ground—being extra careful not to rustle him too much. He’s lighter than Yelena expected—skinny. Shorter too. She’s never actually seen him in real life so she had nothing to compare his frame to outside of YouTube videos posted years ago and flimsy blurry pictures mid-save.
Spider-Man has been around for a very long time. In his file—the one Valentina insisted they look through it had very little about the boy. His first citing—was with a mugger he apprehended—he was webbed against the precinct brick wall with a note detailing his crimes around 2016. He was missing in 2018–presumably because he was blipped and returned with half the universe in 2023. It’s four years after the blip and the guy doesn’t take any breaks and is constantly doing something yet—somehow—his file is barely three pages long. Virtually no actual information on the guy despite—Yelena could be misremembering—him fighting alongside the Avengers when Thanos came.
Was he not an Avenger? Yelena almost wants to ask Bucky to ask Sam Wilson…to quench her curiosity but now is not the time.
Ava Starr does what she said she was going to and they get Spider-Man into the med-bay without alerting Bucky. Yelena considers this a success. Up until John pours disinfectant onto the vigilantes wound and he’s screaming bloody murder. The scream is so loud that Chief is running down the hall—his large green body rushing to help. He barks loud and a very location revealing bark.
“What are the chances that Bucky is a hard sleeper?” Bob murmurs.
“None. If the child screaming didn’t trigger his fight or flight—Chiefs barking certainly did.” Yelena responds.
Child. Yelena doesn’t know why she called Spider-Man a child—he’s given no indication that he is one—he could be older then her for all she knows. Child slips off her tongue too easily though. She has no sense to back that up—just an instinct. Yelena has heard many screaming children and Spider-Man’s screams sound like an echo of a child.
Yelena's chest pinches. She doesn’t like that he screams like a child.
In record time—a total of forty seconds—-Bucky Barnes is running into the med-bay—hair askew and a gun in his dominant hand. “What the hell is going on?” He hisses—face hard and angry.
“Um…” Yelena and Ava both mindlessly stand in front of the bleeding spider—blocking him from view.
“Spider-boy was wounded. Now we are helping. Mostly John.” Alexei says and Yelena sighs. So much for that.
Bob exasperates “dude!”
“He would have figured it out. He is wearing blue and red spider costume—not very subtle.” Alexei defends—his accent thick.
Bucky’s eyes dart from Alexei to the awkward human wall Yelena and Ava have formed, his gaze dropping to the floor. There’s a smear of blood right by John’s discarded sleeping shirt. He steps forward, the gun lowering but not disappearing.
"Move," Buckys voice leaves no room for debate. Yet Yelena loves to contradict.
She does not move—not even an inch. Ava even stands straighter. “He’s hurt, Barnes. We are doing a medical thing. Go back to sleep. You still have plausible deniability.”
"If we go down—we go down as a team. Move, Yelena.”
Ava looks at Yelena, then shifts slightly to the side. Yelena holds out for two more seconds before realizing the absolute absurdity of trying to physically hide a body from a super-soldier in a brightly lit room. She steps away.
Bucky eyes seem to dim at the sight of a wounded Spider-Man—as if he had been holding out on the possibility that it wouldn’t be him. That maybe this was all some big misunderstanding. The supersoldier lowered his gun—fingers slacking—face a bit pinched.
On the table, Spider-Man lets out a shaky, pathetic wheeze. He’s trying to curl into himself, his gloved hands weakly pulling at the edges of the examination table as if he could slide right off it and vanish into the floorboards.
"Don't," the kid gasps, his voice cracking violently on the syllable. "Please. Just... let me go. I'm fine. I can walk."
He can't walk. He can barely breathe. It would be beyond irresponsible to let him even leave the building. John isn’t even a doctor really. He’s an army medic. He needs real help.
“Don’t move so much, kid.” John reprimands. “You’re gonna need stitches.”
Bucky nods, eyes trained on Spider-Man’s wounds. “Listen to him, Peter. He’s just trying to help.”
Spider-Man seems to freeze. Everyone seems to freeze actually. Did he just call him Peter? Does…Bucky know who Spider-Man is?
He hadn’t told them that he knew Spider-Man. He hadn’t said much of anything actually. He’d been pretty tightlipped during Valentina’s team meeting all those weeks ago and hasn’t made any comments on the very thin file.
Yelena watches this play out, the pinch in her chest tightening. She looks at the kid, who is actively shrinking away from Bucky, then back to Bucky, who seems more perturbed about his injuries than with his identity.
“How do you know that name?” The boy chokes out—and flinches when Bucky puts his gun on the metal tray beside John.
He fought half the universe with the avengers, Yelena thinks, remembering the flimsy three-page file. Bucky must have met him at some point—-surely.
“Cause you told me your name? We’ve met multiple times, Peter. Remember? At the airport in Germany. Just after we beat Thanos. At Tony’s funeral. I didn’t know your name until Tony’s funeral though, you made a speech, he put you in his will. I remember.”
It was so much information all once—Bob looks at Yelena and she genuinely has no answers for him. This is the first he’s hearing of this.
“You…you remember. Me?” Spider-Man’s voice comes out small and hollow—like he’s seconds away from breaking. “But—but you’re not supposed to remember. No one is supposed to remember me.” His voice cracks—Yelena keeps trying to sis out his age. The more he talks the younger he sounds.
“My memories are mine. They will always be mine. The people of Wakanda made sure of it. Nothing can ever take my memories away from me ever again.” Bucky says firmly, like he’s stating a simple known fact—like Spider-Man isn’t shaking under his mask.
“But—
“—John, you did the pressure wrap wrong, it's twisting the lower tissue," Bucky says, his voice snapping back to its usual gravelly authority.
“Ava can you grab the sterile tray from the cabinet behind you. Alexei, turn off that damn phone flashlight, the overheads are on."
"I am providing tactical ambiance," Alexei mutters, but he shuts the light off anyway.
“Yelena—-“ Bucky Floyd his sharp eyes towards The ex assassin. “—hold his hand.”
Yelena does so without any further prompting—Spider-Man’s hands are shaking—from pain or from shock or from fear—she isn’t sure. But when he holds his hands her internal age for him drops even lower. His hands are so cold. Is this costume not heated? It looks cheap and handmade but Yelena assumed it was just meant to look that way.
“You really still remember me, Mr. Barnes?” Peter—Spider-Mans voice is wobbly and he barely reacts when John redresses his wounds.
“I don’t tend to forget kids that beat my ass.” Bucky replies gruffly. “Did you think I would?”
“Yes. Everyone else has.” Everyone else? Ava frowns and Alexei mutters something in German that Yelena doesn’t catch.
“Everyone, Who?" Yelena asks quietly, squeezing the kids' hands.
“It was…part of a memory spell. No one in the whole world is supposed to know who Peter Parker is.” Spider-Man squeezes Yelena's hand back.
“Why?” Bucky sounds almost—-upset. To Bucky Barnes, there is no greater sin in the universe than stealing a man's history. And looking at this bleeding child, he's probably realizing someone didn't just steal the kid's history—they made the entire world complicit in the theft. Yelena knows a thing or two about manipulation—but Bucky Barnes, the Winter Soldier, knows about forgetting.
“It’s complicated. A lot of people were getting hurt. It felt like the only solution at the time.” What a terrible burden. John finishes the rewrapping with uncharacteristical gentleness.
To a room full of people who had been brainwashed, medically experimented on, chemically subservient, or politically discarded, the concept of a kid being completely erased from the world’s ledger didn't sound like magic. It sounded like a Tuesday.
“Okay.” Bucky doesn’t ask any more questions—Yelena has hundreds—she has so many she can’t comprehend how Bucky isn’t dying to ask them. How can he just move on from that.
The Winter Soldier stepped up to the table, his vibranium arm gleaming under the harsh fluorescent lights as he reached down, his metal fingers surprisingly gentle as he hooked them under the edge of Peter’s mask. "Your mask is bleeding. That means you have a cut on your face. We need to treat that too. Can I take off your mask?"
Peter tensed, his whole body locking up for a fraction of a second. He looked around the room—at Ava, who was watching him with a look of profound, quiet understanding; at John, who looked ready to bolt out of the room, at Bob, whose jittery feet had completely stopped moving; and at Yelena, who just gave him a small, encouraging nod.
“They can leave if you want.” Bucky offers—not consulting with them—knowing they’d do as he asks without fussing.
"No, it’s okay." Peter swallowed hard. "You can take it off."
Bucky pulled the mask back and—and he’s young. Terribly young. Not a child—but surely not old enough to have been doing this for years. Bucky doesn’t react—he knew exactly how old this kid was—the others did not.
Yelena thinks of child soldiers and screaming children and the weight of the world on fragile small shoulders and it takes everything in her not step out of the room. Ava turns invisible—phases out of the room without another word. Yelena doesn’t blame her. John is pretending not to be phased but he can see him taking in the kids' wounds with the eyes of a father instead of a soldier's gaze.
Alexei has no filter “Spider-boy is very young. How did this happen? The powers, not the age. I know how human aging works, believe it or not.”
The kid opens his mouth to reply but Bucky beats him to it—swiping his split lip with a cotton swab. “He was bitten by a radioactive spider.”
Of course he knew that.
“I was bitten by Spider once. Not radioactive but very poisonous I puke for days and hallucinated in dessert. Very not fun.” Alexei recalls unhelpfully—well perhaps not unhelpfully—the kid cracks a smile.
The kid is smiling. He wipes at his wet face—wet from blood and then suddenly wet from tears. The moment he starts crying it’s like he’s unable to stop—a broken faucet rushing through water. His shoulders shake and when he starts sobbing Bucky—looks deeply uncomfortable. It must be strange—that the only person that can remember him is someone who didn’t particularly know him all that well to begin with. Virtually strangers. Yelena squeezes Pietros hand again and gives Bucky a snap to look.
Hug him you idiot. She projects telepathically but she isn’t a telepath and Bucky isn’t a mind reader. He just looks at the crying boy with a constipated look—he edges closer—just a bit—like Pietro still has an active bomb in his hand. Bucky places his Vibranium hand on the boys shoulder—a gentle pat.
Peter looks at his hand with glassy eyes—“did you get a new arm?”
“Yeah.” Bucky blinks.
“Vibranium?”
“Yeah…”
Peter sobs harder “that’s so cool.”
Bucky nods, very stoically. “yes. It is.”
Ava comes back—eyes a bit red—but no one mentions that. “I’ve deleted the med-bay logs. Valentina won’t know he was here.”
“That was smart. Thanks Ava.” Yelena praises easily.
“Wouldn’t your boss be upset that I’m here? I heard…Mayor Fisk is making you guys turn me in. I shouldn’t be here—“ Peter tries to get up, nose full of snot but Yelena places a hand on his chest forcing him to lie back down.
“You’re wounded—you’re not going anywhere, kid.” John Walker says gruffly—wiping blood off his own hands with a rag.
“I’m not a kid. I’m 21, I’m legally allowed to drink and everything.” His voice cracks and Yelena doubts he’s ever had a sip of alcohol.
“You legally don’t even exist kid—so you can’t legally do shit.” Bucky doubles down.
“Plus Valentina works for the government," Bob chimed in, stepping closer and giving Peter a reassuring, if slightly shaky, smile. "We don't really like the government. Or the mayor. Honestly, we barely like Valentina."
"We don't like her at all, Bob, don't lie to the boy," Yelena corrected flippantly. She reached over, grabbing a handful of the definitely-not-BARK dog treats from her pocket and tossing one to Chief, who caught it with a wet tongue. She looked down at Peter, her expression softening just enough for him to see it. "You fought Thanos, Peter. You're an Avenger. This is your tower. If some overgrown politician wants to try and take you out of it, he’s going to have to go through a room full of highly trained, deeply unstable ex-assassins first."
“I’m not an ex-assassin.” Bob says suddenly “or a current assassin. I’m just Bob.”
“Hi Bob.” Peter responds amicably.
Peter Parker was easy to get along with. He was polite—smart—and knew his way better around the Avengers tower better than any of them. Chief liked him—which is the deciding factor in their judgement of character. It was easy to mold him into their routine. Peter was closed off at times—and he had horrible nightmares but so does everyone else in the tower, so he really fits in.
He’d swing around Brooklyn a million miles per minute, all chatter and jokes and the second he stepped foot into the tower the mask was off—he got quiet—sad—he was just Peter.
“It’s been two months! How is it even possible that you haven’t even seen Spider-Man?” Valentina rages—Peter pours coffee in her mug—“thank you dear.” She says amicably to the boy—not even sparing him a look.
Peter Parker doesn’t live in the Avengers tower, not that they hadn’t tried to convince him but he does stop by to use the facility at least once a week as Peter not as Spider-Man. The first time Valentina saw him walking around the building unsupervised he panicked and said he was an intern here—an intern for what? For who? It was a dumb lie but Valentina just sprouted her coffee order at him and waved him off like she could care less. She has no idea that the kid currently putting sugar in her black coffee is the vigilante Spider-Man she’s been raging about for the last half-hour.
“Are you guys even trying?”
“He is very slippery.” John responds—far too happy to put one over on Valentina.
“This is not a good look for you guys. People are gonna think that you’re incompetent—you can’t even apprehend one vigilante.” Valentina takes a dip of her hot coffee and makes a pleased expression.
Yelena leaned against the kitchen island, her face an unreadable mask of absolute boredom as she watched Peter step back from the table. He was wearing a slightly oversized sweater Bob had lent him and a pair of sensible slacks. He looked less like a threat to national security and more like a college student who had lost his way to a library.
"We are trying very hard, Valentina," Yelena said, her voice dripping with an expertly crafted layer of exhaustion. She rubbed her temple for added theatrical effect. "But the guy is practically a ghost. We set up perimeters, we scout the rooftops—"
"And then you hear a THWIP and suddenly you all develop severe inner ear disorders that force you to look at your shoes?" Valentina snapped, finally looking up from her screen. She pointed a manicured finger at Alexei. "You. Last week in Queens. There was a report of him stopping a grand theft auto literally three blocks from where you were buying churros. Care to explain?"
Alexei didn't hesitate—biting into his morning donut. “The churro line was criminally long, Val. And the sugar, it gets in the eyes. It creates a temporary blindness. A medical phenomenon, truly."
Valentina let out a long, suffering sigh and pinched the bridge of her nose. "I am surrounded by idiots. Highly lethal, politically volatile idiots."
She picked up her mug, taking another appreciative sip of her coffee. "Seriously, whoever brewed this deserves a raise. It's the only thing keeping me from executing a PR scorched-earth policy on all of you."
Peter, who was currently wiped down the counter a few feet away with a bottle of Windex, gave a polite, humble little nod. "Thank you, ma'am. I put a little cinnamon in the coffee beans. My aunt used to say it cuts the bitterness."
"Fascinating, Ben. Truly," Valentina said, her tone instantly shifting back to the clipped, dismissive drone she reserved for the hired help. Ben was the name Peter decided to go by when Valentina asked for his name.
Chief barks and Valentina lifts a brow at the dog treat that lobs out of his mouth in disgust. It’s the BARK treat that he hates.
“Ben. Take my Lexus down to the secure sub-level. The parking enforcement outside is acting like Fisk personally promised them a bonus for every government vehicle they ticket. Move it before I start firing people." Crime has skyrocketed—despite the newspaper's claims that it’s dropped. Mayor Fisk's first year term has created a violent vacuum on the streets of New York. It’s not hells kitchen bad but it’s a visible difference.
She tosses the keys to him and he refuses to use his lightning fast reflexes and lets them fall to the ground with an awkward smile. “Um, sure, but I don’t actually have a drivers license."
Yelena looks disgusted "you're not a minor are you? Why don’t you have a liscence?”
“No—I’m just…poor.” Peter looks at the keys “I could try but I can’t guarantee I won’t hit the curb.”
Yelena hides a smile behind her blueberry bagel. To anyone else, Peter Parker—or "Ben,”—was just a quiet, slightly awkward young adult in an oversized sweater who occasionally visited the Avengers Tower to do laundry. But to a room full of people who had spent their entire lives being used as weapons, manipulated by handlers, and stripped of their identities, Peter wasn't an asset to be turned over to a corrupt politician.
He was one of them. And they protected their own.
“Jesus Christ who hired you?” Valentina looks annoyed and Yelena grabs her attention away from Peter—Bob takes the keys from his hands.
"We will find him, Valentina," Yelena Belova says, her lips curling into a practiced, entirely superficial smile that didn't reach her eyes. "He cannot hide from us forever. We are closing the net. Very slowly. Very meticulously."
Chief squeezed his spiderman chew toy.
Bob jiggles the car keys “I can practice my parallel parking.”
Valentina grimaces and heads to the elevator to leave.
They all exhale.
“Is this a bad time to say that my license got suspended?” Bob blurts out as soon as Valentina is gone.
“Why?” John frowns.
“Multiple DUIs.” Bob says simply.
“I can park it but I can’t guarantee I won’t take it for a joy ride.” Ava says.
Yelena sighs and takes the keys from Bobs hands. Why must she always be the one stuck doing these things for Valentina?