5
Peter spent the rest of the week perfecting his plan when he wasn’t at school. He felt like he was starting to settle in there and he was enjoying having a normal life. That was why at eight pm on Friday night, he wanted to crawl into a hole and live there for the rest of his life.
He was starting to accept the fact that he was free and that he was no longer in the Red Room and the fact that it could all be taken away the second he opened his mouth in front of the Avengers made him so stressed he could rip all of his hair out. But he knew that he would never truly be free until the Red Room was taken care of.
Dressed in all-black clothing and his weapons hidden, Peter left his apartment, grabbed one last thing from his bag before he did and locked the door behind him. He double-checked he had everything he needed and took off. He wasn’t planning on taking the subway, if it all went wrong and he had to flee the scene then they would be able to track him back to his place using the security cameras. So the back alleys were his only choice to avoid being tracked.
Thankfully, he didn’t run into any trouble, he had heard enough horror stories about the crime in New York and he just knew the alleys would be the spot where it happened. He didn’t have time to fight off petty criminals right now.
Soon enough, Peter found himself staring up at the tower, nerves taking over his body. He wanted to throw up. He had broken into a lot of buildings in his time but this one was different.
Not giving himself another second to consider what he was doing, knowing he would convince himself he could just do it tomorrow instead, Peter stuck his palms to the side of the building and began climbing, praying to god that nobody was working late. That would give both of them the fright of their lives.
Once he had climbed up to the Medbay, he crawled in through the vent hatch where one of Friday’s secret ports was located. It took him a while to find that information but he’s nothing if not resilient. He plugged in the USB with the virus and checked his surroundings before continuing forward. Since he knew the team would be watching a movie, he had made sure to program that the movie would continue to play to give him some time to get to the common room but he knew he had to be quick, sooner or later they would realise something was wrong.
It didn’t take him long to locate the common area, the layout printed in his mind and the distant sound of laughter working as a guide. Once he was above the TV and looking through the vents, trying to decide when the perfect time to reveal himself would be, he could tell that Romanoff had caught onto him, leaving him with no choice but to come out.
With one last breather, he dropped out of the vents and raised his arms, hoping it would pose him as less of a threat.
The team didn’t seem to agree with his sentiment, all jumping up and grabbing their respective weapons and pointing them straight at Peter. He had the urge to fight, it was in his blood, a fuck ton of deadly items pointed right at him and all he wanted to do was start punching. That feeling increased when he caught sight of the man who had kick-started his childhood, but he fought off his instincts and spoke.
“Can we not kill me, please?” probably not the best way to start this off, “I really should’ve planned this part out too,” Peter mumbled to himself.
“Yeah, that would’ve been a good idea,” Stark rolled his eyes, bringing Peter back to the room.
“I’m just gonna wing it, what could go wrong?” he shrugged, “I’m from the Red Room, or I was, I escaped,”
“No, you’re not,” Romanoff denied. Now that was what could go wrong, “Barton and I shut that place down years ago,”
“You thought you did, they had enough resources to rebuild, I wish I was lying,”
No one seemed to believe him and he was starting to panic, especially when Bucky stepped forward.
“What’s your name?” the soldier frowned, disbelief in his eyes.
“Pietro Parker-Melenov,” the man’s face dropped. Peter knew he remembered.
“He’s telling the truth,”
“How do you know?” Rogers stepped forward, a stern look spread across his face.
“Because I kidnapped him and spent two years in a cell with him until he was shipped off,” Bucky answered shortly, a guilty look spread across his face no matter how hard he tried to hide it.
“What if he’s still with them and lying about escaping?” Barton whispered, unaware of Peter’s enhancements.
Peter groaned, gaining the attention of the entire room. He was already getting sick of this.
“Okay, whatever. Believe me, don’t believe me. It’s not my life that you’re putting at risk, it’s the girls that are still there that you are. Whether you want to help me or not, I’m taking them down. You’re choice,” Peter frowned. He hoped they would help him, he couldn’t actually take the Red Room down without them.
“Okay,” Romanoff sighed, “Take his weapons, let’s go to the meeting room,”
Steve walked over to Peter, looking a little uncomfortable at the prospect of having to pat him down so Peter took pity on him, removing every weapon from his body and handing them over to the Captain, well, almost every weapon.
“And the rest,” Romanoff rolled her eyes.
Peter grumbled as he took the knives out of his underwear, almost laughing at the look on Starks face and the disgust on Rogers’ as he took hold of said weapon.
“Is that all of them?” Steve asked, putting the weapons into a bag.
“I pinky promise,” Peter snarked, these guys were way too serious.
Deciding to take his word for it, the team led him into a room with a large table and chairs and all took their places around said table, leaving Peter to sit between the two super soldiers, probably in case he switched up on them.
For the next hour, they drilled Peter with question after question, wanting to get every detail out of him and if they didn’t believe him before, they did now. Clint kept his eye on Nat the entire time, he could tell she was shaken up by the whole thing, she had been sure that they had taken the organization down and to hear this news had really thrown her off.
Bucky was no better. Peter was telling the truth, which meant he was the reason he had to live the life he did. He could remember the day he kidnapped the only male black widow and judging by how Peter’s gaze seemed to linger on him a little longer, Peter remembered too.
“Okay, bring up the location Fri,” Tony requested and was met with silence. That was when Peter remembered the USB. He was honestly a little proud of himself, he didn’t expect it to still be working.
“Oh right, I put a virus into the Medbay port, I forgot about that,” Peter smiled, sheepishly.
“Seriously?” Stark sighed, exasperated.
“Well, I had to get in somehow,” Peter raised his arms.
“I’ll go,” Sam grumbled, leaving the room to unplug the USB.
———
“It’s getting late, we’ll continue the plan tomorrow,” Steve said, ending the meeting and leading the way out of the room.
Peter was happy to say that his plan had gone the best it could’ve. They did point their weapons at him like they were going to shoot his brains out if he made the slightest move but in the end, they heard him out and the Red Room was finally getting what it deserved.
Once they returned to the living room, everyone had gone off on their separate ways. Peter made his way over to the open window to climb down the side of the building, but Tony and Nat stopped him.
“You should probably stay here until the Red Room is taken care of, or at least the night, just in case anything happens,” Nat offered, a look of hope in her eyes. Peter didn’t need to stay at the Avengers tower to keep himself safe, he would do just fine by himself but he could tell there was something deeper in Romanoff’s request so he reluctantly agreed.
“I don’t have any of my stuff though,” Peter pursed his lips, standing awkwardly by the window.
“There are brand new clothes in the guest room, we can get your stuff in the morning,” Tony said, he and Nat walking Peter to said guest room.
The room was pretty nice, with a big bed in the middle with two nightstands, floor-to-ceiling windows spanning an entire wall and a few nick-nacks spread across the room. It wasn’t anything special but it was still one of the nicest rooms Peter had ever seen.
“Here are your weapons, we trust you enough to have them back. I know what it is like to be in an unfamiliar place without anything to protect yourself, just don’t take advantage of our trust,” Nat handed over the bag and Peter sighed in relief. With that, Tony and Natasha left the room, leaving Peter to settle in for the night.
———
It was two hours later and Peter still couldn’t fall asleep. He couldn’t convince himself that he was safe in the tower and that was completely stopping him from relaxing. He had his weapons attached to his body and a gun under his pillow so he couldn’t understand why he felt so on edge.
After trying for another hour to fall asleep, Peter gives up and heads to the kitchen, hoping a glass of water would be enough to cool his mind and let him finally fall asleep.
What he wasn’t expecting, was to find Bucky Barnes standing at the island, glaring at a glass of water.
Peter was a little nervous to be alone in a room with the man who had kidnapped him but as soon as Barnes looked up and Peter could see the guilt on the man’s face, he forgot all about it and carried on with his task.
He had the intention to ignore the man and go back to his room with his water, but as he was filling his glass, Bucky spoke up.
“I’m sorry,” he almost whispered, his voice croaky.
“I don’t blame you, if it wasn’t you then it would’ve been someone else,” Peter replied, avoiding eye contact as he took his water and left the room, not sparing the man another glance.
As soon as Peter arrives back in the guest room, he downs the water in one go, places the glass on the nightstand and collapses back into bed. Something must have cleared his mind, whether that was the water or the short conversation with Barnes, Peter didn’t know, but what he did know is that he fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.