Chapter 4
By some miracle, when Natasha, Sam and Maria landed their jet at Stark Tower, it appeared that Hydra hadn’t arrived yet. But that wasn’t cause for celebration, they would likely only have minutes at most. Running into the landing pad foyer, Nat called out, “Jarvis! Where’s Tony?”
“Mr Stark is currently in his lab. He does not wish to be disturbed at this moment.” Jarvis politely replied.
“Sorry Jarvis, but tell Tony we’ve got an Avengers level threat. We need him to get out here right now.” Nat called out as she continued her way to the emergency stairs, sliding down the railing rather than waiting for the lift.
Maria and Sam were waiting in the jet, keeping watch and ready to take off at a moments notice.
“Nat, we have five Shield cars pulling up out the front of the tower. You don’t have long.” Maria said through the comms.
“Copy that.” Natasha replied as she opened the door to the lab level. Just as she started to look around, one of the lab doors burst open, with Tony and a young boy spilling out, looking confused and worried.
“Nat!” Tony called when he spotted her, “What the hell is going on? You said there’s an Avengers level threat?”
“Yeah Tony, we’ve gotta go! There’s no time to grab your stuff, Hydra is here now!”
“Hydra? What the fuck is going on Nat?”
“Mr Stark, what do I do?” The teenager asked.
“I don’t know who you are kid, but you have to come with us or Hydra will take you.” Nat said, turning to the elevator to see that they were all in use, before running back to the emergency stairs.
“We can’t bring him with us if people are after us, he’s a kid!” Tony said, following Nat with Peter right behind him.
“I can handle myself Mr Stark, you know that.”
“The adults are talking right now Pete.”
“Tony, please tell me you have a suit nearby.”
“I’ve got a little something I’ve been working on.”
“Good.” Nat said as they burst through the penthouse doors, making a run for the jet. Tony held out his hands and random pieces of metal started to haphazardly fly through the air towards them from the other side of the room.
“Watch your heads!” Tony called as the pieces started to fly past them, attaching themselves to Tony and unfolding into a suit. Impressive though it was, no one had time to comment before the elevator and stair doors opened behind them, armed Hydra agents quickly spilling out as they neared the jet.
“Hurry!” Nat called out as the jet started to lift off the ground, getting ready to take off. By the time Nat had made it to the jet, bullets started firing at their backs.
“Shit!” Tony called out as he grabbed Peter’s arm and hauled him up onto the jet, while simultaneously trying to fire back with his repulsors. Peter was just pulling his legs in, the back doors quickly closing, when he felt lightning hot pain rip through his leg. He barely had time to yelp in pain before the jet was properly taking off, Maria Hill flying them away as fast as possible to try and avoid the rapid fire of the guns damaging the jet. Tony had his suit off in a second, kneeling down next to Peter, who was clutching his heavily bleeding leg.
“Fuck, Nat do we have medical supplies on board?” Tony said, putting pressure on Peter’s leg.
“Not much.” Nat said, looking grim.
“We can make do, watch out.” Sam said, moving Natasha out of his way, a first aid kit in hand.
“Who the hell are you?” Tony asked.
“Sam Wilson, pararescue. I can help, but we don’t have any pain killers strong or fast acting enough. I’m sorry kid, but this is gonna hurt.”
“I can take it.” Peter said, a determined look on his pale face.
“You don’t have to act tough Pete.” Tony said.
“I’ll be fine Mr Stark, you know I have enhanced healing.” Peter said, grimacing as Sam started stitching the exit wound.
“Enhanced healing? You’re gonna have to tell us who this kid is Stark.” Maria called from the drivers seat of the jet.
“My intern. I’ll explain more later. For now I’d really like to know what’s going on. What kind of threat are we under? Where’s the rest of the team?”
“I’m sorry to tell you Tony, but Steve is dead, Hydra killed him.” Nat said slowly, an almost imperceptible quiver in her voice.
***
After the situation had been explained, the group had sat in silence for a long time. Tony had a sort of blank look on his face, Sam said he was probably in shock. Peter was paler than ever, and was struggling to stay awake, but everyone kept checking up on him, and were all rather surprised that he was doing so well, the bleeding having mostly stopped.
Suddenly, Tony broke the silence. “Where are we even going?”
“A safe house.” Maria said, giving no more information.
“I have to go home.” Peter suddenly said, eyes wide. “May must be looking for me by now, she must be freaking out!”
This seems to break Tony out of his stupor, he sits up and pulls his phone out of his pocket. “Shit. I’ve got 11 missed calls from her.”
“Wait! What if May goes looking for me at the tower? Hydra would at least be watching the place if they aren’t still there.”
“Don’t worry kid, I’ve got good emergency protocols. Jarvis won’t let her anywhere near there while it’s not safe.”
“Well I have to call her. Can I borrow your phone?” Peter said, holding up his own, smashed up phone.
“I’m not sure that’s safe Pete, they could be able to detect and trace the call. And then they would be able to find us and May.” Tony said.
“Here, borrow mine.” Nat said, holding out a small, sleek phone.
“Are you sure it’s safe?” Tony asked. Natasha gave him a look that said ‘Really? I’m on of the worlds best spies and you really think my phone can be traced?’
Peter takes the phone.
***
May had been hysterical when Peter called, and angry and scared when he said he couldn’t come home, couldn’t even tell her where he was. Reports of the attack on Stark Tower had been all over the news, and May knew that’s where Peter had been. But May didn’t know that Peter had super powers (though he highly doubted her knowing would make her feel much better), so he was not in as much danger as she would assume.
He’d assured her that he would be fine, and urged her to stay indoors because it wasn’t safe at the moment, what with Hydra running around.
After what felt like hours, the jet finally touched down, and Peter sat up painfully. He then let himself be hauled to his feet by Tony and Sam, who supported his weight between them. The three of them, plus Nat and Maria, then disembarked onto what seemed to be more of a forest clearing then a landing zone.
Maria looked around, seemingly familiar with the area. “Damnit, we got here first. We’re gonna have to wait.”
“Wait for who? Maria, who are we meeting?” Nat asked.
Tony was shocked that Natasha didn’t already know, but then again, Maria was higher ranking than the red head.
“You’ll see.” Maria said mysteriously, leading them to the cover of a group of trees.
“Tony, while we wait, how about you explain who this kid is? How do we know we can trust him?” Natasha asked, referring to Peter.
“I’m Peter Parker.” Peter piped up. “Sorry, I probably should’ve led with that. I was just a bit distracted by the whole… well, by everything.”
“Peter’s my intern.” Tony said.
“I’m a superhero.” Peter interjected.
“You’re not a superhero. You have enhancements, there’s a difference.”
“I dunno, I think it just means I’m a superhero.” Peter replied with a cheeky grin, before returning his attention to the rest of the group. “I got bit by a really weird spider, and then, voila, I’m a superhero.”
“What kind of powers do you have?” Sam asked curiously.
“Well, I’m really sticky, and really strong, and I used my ultra smart brain to create a really cool formula of spiderwebs.”
“Riiight.” Sam responded.
Just then, a soft rumbling sounded started vibrating through the ground.
“It’s time. Get down low everyone.” Maria whispered.
Then suddenly from above them, an aircraft seemed to materialise out of nowhere. It must be some kind of cloaking technology, Peter thought to himself, in awe. The plane then set down on the ground, and the back door began to lower. Natasha was watching warily, gun drawn, waiting for a sign of hostility.
Maria must have seen some kind of signal or something, because without seeing any people, all of a sudden she was ushering everyone to their feet and onto the aircraft. Natasha was clearly still wary, as she hadn’t put her gun away, but then a small group of five or so people walked out from the shadows.
Most of the people were strangers, but at the front was a familiar face to a few of their group, Agent Phil Coulson.
This was jarring for Tony and Nat, who knew Coulson to be dead, killed in the battle of New York by Loki.
“Agent Hill, I’m glad you made it. Tony, Nat,” Phil acknowledged the two, looking especially sad when he saw Nat, “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you. Is this everyone? Are you waiting on anyone else? I was hoping Clint might be here?”
Natasha couldn’t help herself. With everything that had happened with Fury, Steve and Clint, and now Coulson was alive? And he wanted to know where Clint was, which meant she would have to tell him that Rumlow had him. She simply couldn’t help herself as a loud, ugly, pained sob ripped its way out of her throat.