Black Blood Spider

The voices. They’ve become worse.
First it was the usual. Mr. Starks voice echoing through his thoughts. Words he had said just before Peter had turned to dust. Then Thanos voice like the moderator of his doom, an endless commentary of philosophical statements about balance or genocide.
But this time there was another voice lingering in the depths of Peters voice, hungry for something else. For something that Peter didn’t even know lurked within him.
He woke up, drenched in his own sweat and shaking. It wasn’t even 4am yet but Peter was full awake, staring out at the darkness of Queens. Now that he was awake he could just get his suit on and go on patrol for an hour or two.

The city was loud, even at this time of day. With every swing over the rooftops Peter felt more and more alive, the cold wind blowing fresh air through the fiber of his red and blue suit. Some lights were already on in bureaus and apartments. He never liked to peek inside the windows, at least not for too long - there were lifes happening behind shut curtains that Peter wasn’t a part of. As he flew carelessly over the roofs of New York he came closer to Manhattan and the really high buildings with glowing lights signalling their end between rough clouds. Since their fight it had become some sort of habit to try and jump from the highest buildings, to destroy the voices in his head for a short moment. But today he wasn’t in the mood.
There was something in the air that almost choked him mid-swing. A thought that crowded his mind and crept in every tiny corner of his brain. A thought that was everywhere in an instant.
Find me.
Peter knew that thought even though he had never heard it before. Something clear as a voice that talked to him from no where and everywhere at the same time. He jumped at the facade of an old house and held on to the brick stone wall. He tried to see who has talking to him, who was numbing his senses and replaced them with another kind of fear.
You know where I am, child.
Peter turned around, guessing he had heard the voice from that direction. And he froze instantly. Right behind him, without him having noticed it in the darkness, stood the big modern building he knew was the new city residence of Tony. The new Stark tower if you wanted it to be, just a few blocks away from the actual thing.
„Mr. Stark?“, Peter asked as if the voice had been Tony in his suit all along. „Karen?“
Karen activated not a moment to late. „Yes, Peter?“
„U-Um, you didn’t talk just there, did you?“
„No, Peter. You were talking to me first.“
Peter hesitated. Maybe he was getting crazy after all. Maybe Aunt May had been right. He had some kind of trauma and this was his way of coping with it. Voices. He was imagining things, wasn’t he? He tried to breath but the thought in his mind still choked him. Still made him tense without knowing why. There was something here, something he had to find.
Find me, the voice had said. But what and where?
In Tony’s apartment? He wouldn’t just break in, he wasn’t a criminal after all. But he felt the selfish feeling of going after the voice anyway even if he was breaking in the home of the one person who trusted him relentless. Would Tony even know?
Of course he would. Tonys tech would defeat Peter in a second.
He couldn’t just go there and find whatever the voice was coming from.
„Later“, he sighed, trying to shake the creepy feeling of being watched off. He had to go home before Aunt May woke up and then - school. And maybe, if he survived the day without feeling this sickening tenseness again, he would go visit Tony again. He would find what bothered him and put an end to it.

„Peter!“; Tony said with a surprise in his voice. He was in a typical gray shirt and sports leggins, a fancy watch around his wrist. „What are you doing here?“
„Um“, Peter sighed, „I ... I don’t feel so good and...“
Tony’s face moved to the likeliness of a stone. „Don’t you pull that sentence on me, Peter. I have a weak heart already.“
It took a moment for Peter to realise what he had just said. He couldn’t even remember his last moment before the disintegration but Tony remembered it for both of them. Appearently he had cradled Peter in his arms, trying to calm him, trying to keep him from fading away like the others. Peter knew he had been afraid, but that was all left from the moment.
„Uh, right. Sorry, Mr. Stark“, said Peter and turned away his eyes. He felt guilty for not really caring because the voice in his head was far more important. Or it disguised itself as such, Peter corrected himself mentally. „I just ... thought I could hang out a bit?“
He could see that Tony was hesitating. Maybe he thought „This isn’t my son, this is a kid I am legally not responsible for“ followed by the thought „But this is the kid I let die, that I couldn’t save and that maybe hates me secretly for it. I can’t say no to him“. And for once Peter was happy for the guilt in the people around him. He didn’t even have to say it out loud.
„Sure, come in“, Tony said.
A short time later Peter and Tony said on the couch, eating pizza and talking about school and the avengers. Tony told him that he had seen Mr. Barnes again, somewhere around the headquaters. For a few month after the final fight everyone had thought Mr. Barnes and Mr. Wilson were as good as dead. Even Natasha had been seen fewer than normal.
Peter knew why.
They missed their friend. They missed Captain America. Now, Peter didn’t have that many happy memories with Steve Rogers to begin with - after all he had almost been crashed by him in Berlin. But he hadn’t wanted for him to die. He hadn’t wanted for anyone to die and it made him much more grateful to have Tony still by his side.
„He was looking good, like in a healthy not „I’d take revenge but the guy who’s at fault for this is already dead“ kind of way. Hasn’t really moved on but ... has anyone so far really?“
„Have you?“, asked Peter bluntly and only realised way too late how straight forward his question had been. Immediately he shrunk to half of his size on the sofa.
„I ... no, Peter. I haven’t. And I don’t think I ever will.“
„That’s ok, I guess, Mr. Stark“, said Peter and felled uncomfortable. He didn’t want to think about the finale fight they had, about how he hadn’t even been a part of it. He wanted to think that it didn’t even happen, that he had never been in space and...
Tony nodded with a sigh. „If you ever need to talk...“
„I’ll come to you, Mr. Stark.“
Tony smiled at the comment. Soft and yet broken. Everything about Tony was broken. It was in his eyes, how space and death still glimmered in them. Unerasable.
„I need to go to the bathroom“, Peter announced after a short while. He knew where it was but he knew he wasn’t going there. In the moment of Tony’s trust (and his filled up belly) it was his only chance to follow the voice in his mind. He knew it was wrong, that he shouldn’t do this behind Mr. Starks back but ... Tony wouldn’t understand.
Peter didn’t even understand what was happening.
To his luck the lab was locked. It just felt like the perfect place to find whatever Peter was looking for. The voice was silent in his mind but he knew it was there, guiding him to the right place. Peter took a deep breath and opened the doors as quietly as possible.
And in the moment he had closed the door he felt it again.
His spider senses went wild in the matter of a second, making his skin burn and his muscles tense. He knew that he was right the moment he looked at the suitcase on one of the desks. And he realised what he had tried to ignore the whole week.
Whatever was in the suitcase was the answer to his questions.
As quietly as possible he stepped forward and fiddled with the opening clasps. He had thought, or maybe hoped, that Tony kept this a secret and closed but it didn’t take much power for Peter to open it. It was way too easy.
Peters eyes widened as he looked at the plain insides of the suitcase. Embedded in a soft, red cushion lay one vial with a strange black liquid in it. For a moment Peter thought about opening it, felt the voice growing louder, stronger, inside his mind. Every inch of his body wanted to know what Mr. Stark and Norman had talked about last week ...
But before he could succumb to these dangerous thoughts his normal spider senses came into action and Peter took a big step away from the suitcase, the vial. This wasn’t right and way too dangerous for him. Did Miss Potts know? Would she approve if she knew that whatever Norman Osborn had brought in with him had actually stayed?
Peter felt obliged to ask Tony out but that would only blow his cover. He had to keep a low profile and never look at this horrible black stuff again that tried to lure him back with every second. Whatever it was, it seemed to like Peters powers a bit too much.
Help me.
The voice was the loudest it had ever been but Peter felt his own strength coming back to him. The realisation that he had to withdraw as long as he was still able to. This was nothing he should meddle with. This was a Only-Tonys-biz thing and he didn’t want to get pulled into another adventure by being foolish enough about his own boundaries.
This was something for another superhero.
Spiderman out.

„You took your time“, Tony commented while checking something on his phone. If he had noticed Peters detour to the labs he didn’t show it. Maybe Tony had wanted him to see it? No, Tony was the last person to want him next to danger. He could imagine Mr. Starks anxiety rise only by the thought of Peter endangering him again.
„Yeah ... we had mexican yesterday“, Peter lied. Would Tony notice once he went to the bathroom himself?
Tony looked up at Peter. „You ok, Pete?“, he asked and there it was again - that broken voice mingled next to his normal one. The one that saw right through him. Peter nodded without looking at Tony. He felt guilty for trespassing but he had learned his lesson. He was so sure that he wouldn’t ever succumb to the voice again, no matter how sweet it sounded, how strong it ripped at his senses.
„Maybe I should go home“, Peter suggested but in that kind of tone that made absolutely clear that he wasn’t open for other suggestions. Tony hesitated for a moment, than he sat up and clapped in his hands.
„Right, sure. You want me to call Happy or-“
„I think I’ll do it my way, Mr. Stark“, Peter joked and grinned. He wouldn’t even be this far as Spider-Man if it wasn’t for Tony. „But thank you. Thank you so much.“
„You’re welcome, kid“, Tony said with a kind of question in it. He watched how Peter ran down the steps of the stair case. Only when Peter heard the door shut closed he took a breather again. He would never cross Mr. Stark again. He would never be so stupid to ignore his better senses.
But even as he swore himself to keep himself away from whatever black liquid was in that mysterious vial - something in him kept a certain curiosity alive. And it was growing. Minute to minute. Hour to hour.