Chapter Text
Everywhere he went, Peter felt eyes burning into him, whispers ghosting his ears, saw shadows stumbling towards him, then shrinking back. He was left to suffocate, everyday, knowing the world was watching him and anticipating his slip up, to jump at parading his failures as entertainment. Anxiety boiled at a constant inside his chest when he realized he was a sacrifice they were fattening up with gossip and hysteria; once his secret was confirmed, they’d hang Spider-Man out to dry.
Each gossip column theory was a knife in his back. Was Spider-Man colluding with Thanos all along? Did he murder Tony Stark for causing the blip that brought everyone back? Then slaughter the heroic Mysterio for finding the truth out? Spider-Man has to have something to do with Captain America vanishing, right? Spider-Man, Spider-Man, Spider-Man…. How do we know this Peter Parker kid isn’t some mutant schizo freak?! Where is he, huh?! If Peter Parker doesn’t have something to hide?!
He stumbled from the bed to the hallway, dragging himself along the wall before collapsing in the bathroom and gasping for breath, he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think straight with this pounding in his head. Stripping and crawling into the shower, he sat fetal while the hot water pounded on his back.
It had only been a month since the broadcast. Pepper called him within seconds, urgently hissing “Wherever you are, Peter, get out of there. Don’t let anyone see where you’re going, don’t talk to anyone, don’t stop for anyone, don’t have contact with ANYONE until I get this sorted out.”
“Mrs. Stark-” Peter cried back in confusion, but she was already off the line, and within minutes the Stark Industries CEO had a vicious legal team and living arrangements lined up for what was to come in the next months. When questioned on her involvement, she described it as her ‘moral responsibility to aid a Stark Industries scholarship beneficiary’ and nothing more.
Happy assured him that Aunt May had been whisked off somewhere safe, secure, and most importantly, unknown. Just like he was. Untracked. And Alone.
Changes took place in Peter that he couldn’t explain; the stress, the fear, the grief tore away at his mental health and twisted up what remained of his insides. He couldn’t sleep without seeing Beck’s illusions, the darkness and shadows and corpses haunting him. EDITH tried her best to walk Peter through his daily panic attacks but he was growing more erratic each day, his brain chemistry being wrecked havoc on by the unbridled depression and anxiety. He felt very far away from the person who came back from his fight against Mysterio victorious, and couldn’t remember what it felt like to be deserving of Mr. Stark’s faith.
The shower turning cold brought Peter back to himself, enough to catch some shaky breaths. Sluggishly pulling himself out, Peter dressed again and made his way back to bed. The lights were still dim, very very dim, because he couldn’t stand waking up from one of his Mysterio induced nightmares in complete darkness. Crawling in and staring at the ceiling, Peter let himself become numb with exhaustion. At this point, numb was the closest thing he had to happy, and he sank into it without resistance.
Just when he was on the cusp of falling asleep, a tiny voice whispered in the very back of his mind, “Mr. Stark told the world himself he was Iron Man, because he wasn’t a coward.” And Peter started his whole night all over again.
-
Peter jolted awake, not from a nightmare or panic reaction to a sound from outside, but to frenzied static and beeping from his bedside table. EDITH’s lenses were flashing on and off, scrambled like a virus bulldozing through a computer. “EDITH, what’s wrong?” Peter almost shouted as he threw the sunglasses on, and EDITH replied in a broken electronic tone “Accessed from- unknown…. location... protocols being overriden, Peter, may I suggest-”
The whole building jolted as if hit by a landslide and Peter jumped up, panic coursing through his body as he scrambled to a dresser on the other side of the bedroom. Tearing the bottom compartment out as the building continued to tank, Peter reached all the way back and ripped out his spider suit. 'In case of an emergency' Pepper had insisted. Without warning, the floor vanished from Peter’s feet and he was left plummeting, gripping tightly onto EDITH and his suit and too paralyzed with fear to make a sound. The buzz inside him that usually alerted him of danger became a shill scream, shaking his bones and causing white splotches to spot his vision.
He fell and fell and fell and fell, lights zipping past him, his body being pulled in different directions, the pressure starting to cause physical pain until he was teetering on the edge of passing out-
Peter’s body hit the floor like a wet rag with a silent scream, his senses failing. He was too disoriented to tell if he had actually blacked out or not, a white noise filling his ears as he willed his body to move or eyes to open but they weren’t yet in sync with his body. The white noise morphed into distant voices speaking rapidly but he couldn’t make them out. Slowly forcing himself to roll onto his stomach, Peter took a few labored breaths before pushing himself onto his hands and knees and finally opened his eyes, squinting at the sterile white light.
“A lab?” Peter said under his breath as his blurry vision cleared and he took in the room of advanced equipment and people in white coats, all frozen in shock.
Spider-Man was just dropped neatly into the lap of HYDRA.