Stranded

“B-cky,” he slurred, struggling to push himself up onto his elbows despite the pounding in his head.

The man made a threatening noise in the back of his throat  - something vaguely reminiscent to a snarl -  in response and stepped closer, looming once more with his hands clenched into tight fists at his sides.

Peter swallowed, subtly flickering his gaze to the side. He was lying nearly flat out on the ground right next to the cot, which was on his left. It was on raised legs, with about a two foot gap underneath the bed frame. 

Bucky’s form tensed, and Peter’s mind was made. 

This was gonna hurt like a bitch, he thought, cringing internally, and then he sprang himself into a sideways roll under the mattress just as Bucky aimed a harsh kick at where he’d been laying prone only a moment before.

His mouth opened in a soundless, pained gasp; his entire torso was on fire, and his ankle felt like it’d been physically ripped out of his skin only to be roughly reinserted with all the bones in the wrong places. 

He was on his stomach now, which didn’t help with matters in terms of breathing, and he didn’t have a moment to spare. His head felt like it was some kind of fizzy drink, shaken up to the point that it was ready to explode from the static coating his vision. His arms were shaky and uncoordinated as he grasped onto the edge of the bedframe and flung himself upright from underneath it on the side opposite to Bucky, standing shakily and lurching towards the door, heavy steps resounding behind him.

And then he set his left foot down only for it to give away under him, sending him collapsing back onto the ground with an agonized gasp, forearms smacking onto the tile floor. 

A boot to his mangled ankle had him screaming, fingers uselessly scrabbling at the ground as he tried to crawl forwards.

The next kick collided with his ribs, making his vision momentarily white out as he fruitlessly curled in on himself as if to ward off the pain that was already inflicted.

Even still, his eyes, though squinted in pain, were open, so he saw the next incoming impact, aimed right for his face. His arms snapped up nearly without his say, it was such an instinctive reaction, and he caught the shoe between his hands, feeling Bucky momentarily adjust himself to regain his balance.

What - 

It felt as if time had slowed to a standstill as his brain struggled to comprehend what had happened.

His head tilted to the side and back to let his eyes drift up, up, and up to meet Bucky’s gaze. Bucky - no. It... Peter’s skull throbbed. This… wasn’t Bucky. The cold features, guiltless violence, simmering hatred… 

No. Yes. 

It - it was Bucky; it just wasn’t - it wasn’t him steering. In control.

Filtering through the black dots still dancing in his vision, Bucky’s face reminded him of something.

Of someone.

Of the man himself. But. Before.

It was like there were magnets behind Peter’s eye sockets, forcing his gaze to remain set on the other’s face despite how it made his head pound and his eyes strain with every microsecond that passed. 

Yes. 

Peter had seen the files. Had read them. Had seen the pictures. Not all of them. But enough. Of HYDRA. Of Bucky there with them. When he was himself but wasn’t. When he wasn’t… when he wasn’t in… wasn’t in control. Yes. Asset. Soldier.

In the sluggish scant few seconds that felt like a veritable lifetime longer, Peter reached an epiphany. 

Bucky now…he was everything he ever feared - was absolutely terrified - of being. Of doing. Hurting - Peter barely withheld a coughing fit through his aching sternum - and almost… soon… killing… people he cared for…

Peter’s hands tightened minutely around the boot still in his grasp, and he swallowed thickly, expression sinking even as he withheld the drained grimace that threatened to overtake his features. 

More pressure weighed down against his palms, and his lips thinned.

He raised his eyes back up from where they’d momentarily lowered, and he met Bucky’s gaze. 

It was the rush of pure, unadulterated resolve piercing through his fogginess that sent him faintly reeling in the back of his mind. He hadn’t realized the extent to which he’d begun to let himself just… give in - to the tiredness, the exhaustion, the placation that he never stood a chance for much longer anyways - until he now once more felt a reason to rebel against the sensation, pulling back into his resistant mindset that had apparently slipped away from him without his notice. He nearly shivered at the thought.

Instead, he let his lips pull back into an inaudible snarl that bared his likely blood stained teeth as he narrowed his eyes in defiance.

He took a couple quick breaths, galvanizing himself, and then he heaved, throwing Bucky backwards into the cot with a resounding crash and simultaneously scrambling to his feet, putting nearly all his weight onto his good ankle.

He slouched sideways into the wall and used it as an impromptu balancer, more or less jumping on one foot as he raced towards the door, heart pounding again and skull throbbing insistently. 

He wasn’t going to let Bucky kill him. He wouldn’t. Couldn’t. He didn’t want to have any of the Avengers kill him, not only because he didn’t want to die but because he didn’t even want to imagine what they’d go through once they came back to themselves. Of course he didn’t want any of the Avengers to go through that. But right now, at least in this very moment, he could admit that he wanted it to happen to Bucky the least. Maybe he was avoiding thoughts about Tony and how the man he looked up to as a mentor and… more - would react, but, at least for Bucky, it was straightforward. He’d seen the primal fear in Bucky’s eyes when he’d told the others how he couldn’t ever be in the same position again. How he didn’t know (though it was clear he meant he knew and it wasn’t positive) if he’d ever be alright in his own body if he somehow managed to hurt those he cared about again while under someone or something else’s control. 

And even if Peter knew it wasn’t his own fault that the place got gassed, the thought that Bucky would revert inwards on himself, blame himself, hurt himself because of something that was entirely out of his control that ended up causing Peter’s-

Yeah. No. Peter wasn’t going to be the one to put that on him, and if it gave Peter one more reason to push himself forward - to push himself harder - well. So be it.

There was another cot between him and the door, and, hearing Bucky lurch back to his feet behind him, Peter staggered around it and thrust it with all the strength he could muster directly into Bucky’s hulking form.

The metal frame of the cot collided into the man with an audible screech of metal hinges bending and snapping and sending Bucky flying backwards into the far wall.

Peter forced himself to tear his gaze away, hobbling towards the exit. 

Gleaming metal caught his eyes, and he unconsciously reached to the side and grabbed onto the - IV pole. Well, Peter shrugged inwardly, teeth on edge as he forced himself forwards faster upon hearing the crumbling of drywall breaking away, impromptu crutch it was. 

Nearly all his weight on the pole, his head snapped frantically to the left and right as he burst through the entrance, looking for some miracle way to suitably let himself escape. 

Both halls projected the same useless sight of completely empty expanses, sparse doors few and far between and completely worthless in stopping an enraged super soldier.

But straight ahead, there was something.

Not something that Peter really wanted to use, but he didn’t have much choice - or time.

He forced himself forward and dropped to his knees in what he could tell himself was purely necessity and not at all from underlying exhaustion, wrenching the cover of the vent in the lower part of the wall free and flinging it to the side with a clatter, caring little for any noise or commotion he made. 

The vent was much smaller than the one that’d been connected to his room - the one Clint had found him in - and that was what Peter was banking on now, diving forwards and scrambling inside the space that was hardly larger than three quarters of a foot tall and what felt like barely over a foot wide. It was likely slightly larger than his haphazardly labeled proportions, but as the sides squeezed down on him and compressed his already restricted breathing and searing ribs, he couldn’t bring himself to revise them. 

He used his amply sticky fingers to drag himself further into the vent just as he heard the door to what could only be the nursing station be completely ripped off its hinges - something that was rather unnecessary, Peter thought somewhat hysterically to himself, considering the fact that the door had been left wide open behind him. 

His breaths came out in short, aborted inhales through his lips, nose nearly useless with how clogged it was with blood and the bent-further-than-usual angle of it. 

He heard the crash of the wooden door being flung into a wall, metal knob clanging loudly and the rest of the frame splintering with sickening cracks that had his mind flashing back to his useless ankle that was sending pulses of agony searing through his system with every knock of it against the walls of the vent.

His senses felt like they’d been dialed up to an eleven, his nearly completely dimmed vision in the darkened vent serving to intensify his focus on the others, causing him to pick out every pulse of blood through his veins, every uptick of his heartbeat, every rasp in the back of his throat, every unnatural shift of his bones- 

And the sound of Bucky’s footsteps storming over to the vent he was dragging himself away from the entrance of.

He - he had to be far enough in.

His arms trembled as he stretched them out, attaching each of his palms to the sides of the vents and dragging himself forwards by them until his hands were level with his shoulders, elbows completely bent. 

Behind him, there was an abhorrent screeching of metal being ripped with inhuman strength that had Peter’s pulse skyrocketing and his arms scrambling to pull himself deeper into the vent he hoped he was safely ensconced in even as he simultaneously struggled not to clutch his ears in agony at the sound that seemed to pierce directly into his eardrums.

His teeth were bared as if he could ward off the sound with that alone, and he barely resisted the urge to shake his head like a dog, knowing that would only send another pounding throb through his cranium which already felt cracked wide open.

And then a hand clasped an unforgiving band around his ruined ankle, and he let out a blood-curdling scream as his bones shifted and crunched wetly, blood spurting out from the already pierced skin, and his fingers dug into the metal of the vent with a screeching grind as he ripped himself forward and out of the grip. His knee collided with the side of the vent with a jarring bang from how hard he’d jerked it forward out of the searing grip, and he frantically clawed himself forward and away, mind a blaring signal of pain-fear-no-stop-STOP-STOP-STOP-STOP-

He didn’t really know how long it was until he came back to himself.

It was just a mind numbing series of stretch, stick, pull, stretch, stick, pull, stretch, stick, pull, stretch, stick, pull - over and over and over as he let the pain take over his higher level thinking and let his body move without his direct say.

The hand - Bucky’s hand - wrapping around his ankle as it had? Peter didn’t know how, but, at least in the moment, it felt like the most excruciating thing he’d felt thus far. More minor things like some glass or splinters in his skin, a concussion or two, some bruises? Well, that kind of stuff could happen on patrol. Dislocating his shoulder? Definitely hurt more than usual, but manageable. Being stabbed or otherwise impaled? Pretty horrible, but at least still somewhat par for the course. Being strangled? 0/10 - harrowing and panic inducing, would not recommend. Being burned the first time until his skin was bubbling and the second for it to be charred black? Pure and utter agony. Having half his ribs nearly caved in? Legit torture. 

But, for some reason, having a hand form a crushing grip around his swollen and unnaturally bent ankle and shoving the bone completely sticking out through his skin back under until blood gushed free through the now unstoppered wound? 

That had sent him into another dimension of pain. 

Maybe it was because he’d never had a bone actually peak through his skin like that before. Maybe it was because he hadn’t ever felt someone directly touch said bone. Or any, for that matter. Maybe it was because he’d thought-prayed-hoped that Bucky wouldn’t be able to reach him -  which meant he’d rather brainlessly hung onto the belief that he wouldn’t be subjected to any more outside sourced pain - was what made it hurt all the more. 

Not that it mattered, really. Not in any way that mattered, at least. 

Peter almost managed a laugh at the thought, the sound coming out as a hoarse wheeze. It didn’t matter in any way that mattered. Ha. 

He lowered his aching arms down onto the cool metal of the vent, leaning his head forward to rest his forehead onto the ground as well. 

His entire frame was shaking from exertion and tension at this point, and he honestly had no idea where he was situated in the tower. He was probably still on the 23rd floor, seeing as he hadn’t noticed any inclines or declines and hadn’t dropped any levels either, but that was about all he knew.

He sighed quietly, letting his eyes waver shut. 

He couldn’t say exactly how long he’d slept back in the cot before Bucky had found him, but even if he let himself believe his previously generous assessment of having been under for a few hours, that still meant that, overall, not much time at all had passed. 

He’d knocked out a bit in the room after fighting the Ironman suit as well, but that couldn’t have been more than a couple hours, really. 

So that meant he’d spent a maximum - a very nice maximum that he doubted was accurate - of nine hours resting since the start of the whole thing.

And, even though it felt like days had passed since the others had been put under whatever gas they were under, he had a creeping, horrifying suspicion that not even a full twenty-four hours had passed.

Sure, he’d gotten to ‘greet’ each of the Avengers that were currently present in the Tower, but most of his interactions with them had been pretty short, and the times in between those interactions weren't often much better. 

All of this to say… well. Not much, really.

In terms of the gas, he didn’t know how long it’d take for it to work itself out of their systems naturally, but of course more time was better because more time meant greater likelihood of the effects fading. So that was one con for only a shorter time having passed. 

As for other stuff, there were two things Peter could think of: 

One: getting help. And Two: making it out.

More optimistically was clearly number one: the longer time went by, the more likely it was that someone was coming to help. Peter doubted that nobody had figured it out at this point - if they hadn’t known from nearly the beginning. Tony definitely had protocols about this kind of stuff, so SHIELD or at least Bruce probably knew. Maybe they were even working on a cure or something. Or maybe they were coming to get him out.

Peter blinked.

He hadn’t thought about that before, and he almost regretted thinking of it in the first place. Sure, SHIELD might know the Tower’s down, and, sure, they might even know about the gas and even its composition, but the likelihood they knew about Peter not having been affected by it? Slim to none. The more he thought about it, the less likely it seemed that anyone would be coming for Peter and Peter alone.

Which brought him to his second point: making it out.

If it’d been only a day - which Peter had extreme suspicions supporting as much - then that meant that Peter had almost died… at least half a dozen times in twenty-four hours. Roughly one near death encounter every four hours, if he was being nice about it. Honestly, just being in the same Tower as the Avengers gone (unwillingly) rogue was basically a near death experience in and of itself. 

Peter resisted the urge to gently bang his head against the bottom of the vent; he had enough injuries without inflicting any more upon himself. It would almost be comical - if not for the fact that it was the complete opposite of anything even faintly resembling humor - the amount of wounds he’d amassed. 

And now he was stuck in a vent in who knows what part of the Tower with a set of cracked ribs, a bruised sternum, a set of somewhat healed burns, a patched up shoulder and stitched up abdomen, at least one concussion (maybe they stacked), a broken nose, and a mangled ankle - the latter two of which would undoubtedly heal wrong if he didn’t get them set - sooner rather than later. 

Or, well, maybe later.

Despite feeling a mild sense of claustrophobia from how close the walls of the vent were hugging him, he could readily admit that his current position was probably the safest he’d been thus far. He couldn’t hear anyone around, and it was nigh impossible for anyone else on the team to fit through this set of vents without getting stuck, even the slightly stiffer but still somewhat rubber-boned Clint. 

So.

Safe. 

Ish. 

Peter closed his eyes again. 

He’d take what he could get, and any and all rest was appreciated by his bruised and battered body.