Chapter 1
It was only meant to be a normal Wednesday, Peter thought as he fought against the magical restraints that pinned him to the ground.
Well, he never got what he wanted, anyway.
So, of course, he was in a dark alleyway, and it was almost midnight. Tony would kill him if he were out past curfew, so he decided he wanted to finish this up before he was going to get into trouble. Sadly, all was in vain.
As the man in the hood hovered over him, quite literally (“woah, dude, you gotta teach me how to do that!”) Peter began to see dark spots in his vision. He only half registered the knife plunged into his side from earlier, and when it was removed he started gushing blood even more so. He didn’t care, though. How could he? He was currently fighting a . . .wizard? Sorcerer? He didn’t know.
He got more and more exhausted as he fought against the restraints, feeling metal pin against his chest. The hooded figure dug his knife into his chest, dragging it across his midriff agonizingly slow. Peter held back the scream that threatened to crawl its way from the back of his throat, the tears that stung his eyes seemingly having a will of their own as they soaked into his mask.
The man didn’t seem too concerned, however, with his writhing as he drug the knife to dig into his chest. Peter noticed that he wasn’t aiming to stab him in the heart or lungs. He was instead almost. . .drawing on his chest, with the knife and his blood. The knife wasn’t normal, either. It emitted a faint glow as he did his work, the boy biting his tongue as he resisted the urge to scream.
The knife traced a symbol into his chest, and as it was dragged along it felt like white hot metal being pressed against his skin. It was shallow enough that it wouldn’t leave lasting damage or scars, but it still hurt like hell. And shredded his suit to pieces. Don’t forget that.
“There you go, Spidey. A nice pretty picture.” The man stood back as if to admire his work, letting the knife fall to the ground. He formed himself a portal, and with that, was gone.
With his disappearance, the restraints fell away. Peter tried to get up, but let out a cry at his movement.
“Peter, would you like me to call boss?” Karen sounded concerned.
“No, thanks Karen. I got this under control.” He attempted to get up again, only to fall right back down when he couldn’t see straight. He groped at his side with a hiss.
“Contacting Tony Stark.”
“Dammit.” Peter fell back against the wall, attempting to staunch the bleeding as he fell in and out of consciousness.
Finally, he heard the familiar sound of the Iron Man repulsors, and could only fall back into darkness after feeling strong arms around him.
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He woke up, slowly, finding nothing but darkness around him. He wasn’t in the medbay, that he knew for sure. He could only assume he was in his room at the compound. That’s where Tony brought him if his injuries were minor enough to be monitored by FRIDAY alone.
The ache in his side told him that his wound had since somewhat healed, but still burned when he shifted. His chest also stung, but not as bad. He was wearing a sweatshirt and hoodie rather than his suit. All in all, he felt normal for someone who had just taken a beating. He ached all over, but there was something else he couldn’t quite place. His brain felt fuzzy and his brain was stuffed full of cotton as he tried to sit up, shaking.
There was a mass at the end of his bed.
He audibly gasped when he saw it, falling back down to the pillow. A large, dark body stood at the end of his bed and just watched. As far as he could tell, it was far from human.
“Peter, your heart rate has increased considerably. Contacting boss.”
Peter opened his mouth as if to reply, but no words came out as he kept his eyes trained on the creature that stood and watched. He heard the door slide open, and thought that maybe with the light flowing into the room it would dissipate. But it didn’t. He gasped in horror as he could see the outline of ten-inch claws. The thing didn’t have a face-- instead favoring what looked like the outline of human features, outlined by sunken holes in its face in place of eyes, nose and a mouth. It had the shape of a human, but was covered in tendrils of black, as if it had veins filled with dark blood. Its ragged breathing made its chest rise and fall heavily, staring at him with eyes that it didn’t have, but burned right through Peter all the same.
“Peter? Are you okay?” Tony asked from behind the creature. He made his way around to his bedside.
“D-don’t you see it?” Peter stuttered, pointing at that. . .thing at the foot of his bed. He thought maybe it was a result of sleep paralysis or hallucinations, but the way it held fast and never once wavered in its appearance told him otherwise. Imaginary demons don’t heave enormous, audible breaths.
Tony furrowed his brow “See what?”
Peter swallowed. Hopefully Tony didn’t think he was crazy. “There’s this. . .thing at the bottom of my bed. I don’t know what it is.” He flinched and sat straight up as it began to become mobile, slowly moving towards him.
Tony was startled by his erratic movement and sat down on the bed. Peter moved closer to him, as if his mentor could protect him from whatever mind game was being projected into the room.
“I. . .I don’t know what is.” He clung to Tony’s side, not caring how childish he was being. Whatever was currently heading towards him was enough to send him back to his days of being afraid of the dark. When Ben had to stay with him until he fell asleep because he was too scared of what might come out of the closet.
Monsters under the bed had always been a figment of his imagination-- but this one was too real. Too real, he reasoned, to let himself feel shame for being scared out of his wits.
It scared him, too, that only he could see it.
As it came closer, he could smell it. He’s never smelled anything off of a hallucination. He thought that maybe he was imagining it, but then a clawed hand came down to his chest. He tried to get away, but it was too fast.
“Peter, what’s wrong?” Tony sounded concerned as he felt the boy’s grip tighten on his arm. Suddenly, all of the air left him as the monster plunged a clawed hand into his chest-- not into, he thought-- through his chest.
He watched helplessly as he saw dark spots return to his vision.
“Peter!” Tony yelled, panicked. Peter slumped into his side, not breathing. He vaguely heard Tony tell FRIDAY to get Bruce, and felt strong hands lift him off of the bed. This tore him away from the claws grip, and he gasped for air, sputtering.
“Hey, it’s okay, I’m right here, okay?” Peter took comfort in Tony’s voice as he let him carry him to the medbay, vertigo still making the room spin. He dared to look back at his room, and could see that it was empty.
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As Peter laid on the hospital bed in the medbay, falling in and out of consciousness now and again, he started to feel the ache of his injuries return. He had previously ignored them, his system filled with adrenaline as he tried to crawl away from that. . .thing, but now the pain was returning with full force. It felt even worse than before, and he gripped a hand to his side as Tony ran his fingers through his hair.
When he took his hand away to reveal the stab wound had bled through the bandage, Tony asked Bruce for medical supplies to redress his wounds. This concerned all three of them. Due to Peter’s enhanced metabolism, he healed quickly and a stab wound almost never took this long to close.
“You must’ve skipped dinner,” commented Bruce as he helped Peter up.
Tony replied for him, “He didn’t. Ate four bowls of spaghetti last night. God knows how. Lack of nutrients can’t be the cause.”
“FRIDAY, scan Peter for any foreign substances in his system.” Bruce said, speaking to the ceiling.
“Got it. Results should be prepared within two minutes.”
“You think I was poisoned?” questioned Peter, wincing as Tony peeled away the bandage on his side.
“In a way, yes.” They both gave Bruce a confused look, to which he replied “Look, I’m not an expert in magic or anything, but according to your description of the guy and the symbol that’s scratched out across your chest, I’m willing to bet this could be a spell. What did you say happened again, Tony?”
“He froze up like he was having a panic attack and tried to get away from something, saying that there was something coming after him. And then he stopped breathing, and now we’re here.” Peter wined when he felt the disinfectant make contact with his skin, “Sorry, kiddo.”
Suddenly, FRIDAY chirped up. “I’ve got the results. There is no trace of any physical foreign substance in Peter’s body, though I’ve cross-referenced it with some of Doctor Strange’s database and found a match.”
“Strange. Of course.” Tony said flatly as he patched up the wound with gauze and tape. “What is it, Fri?”
She paused, which was unusual for an AI. “The name of the curse is unknown.”
“Wait, curse?” Said Peter, alarmed.
“According to this database, the symbol on your chest can be traced back to the dark ages. The spell is unknown, because it was often passed off as hysteria. It hasn’t resurfaced in quite some time-- about six hundred years, to be exact. The information is stored deep in the archives under the mystery classification.”
“Great. Just great,” Tony ran a hand over his face. “So we have no idea what this is, except that it’s old and that it’s a spell?”
“That is essentially all we know, boss, yes.”
“I think we should contact him,” interjected Bruce, “We could really use his opinion right now. Do you have his number?”
“I do.” Tony said as he opened his phone.
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“Alright Tony, I haven’t got all day. What’s so urgent?” Stephen Strange crossed his arms as he stepped out of a portal and into the living quarters common area.
“Come see for yourself,” Tony replied, leading him to the medbay.
As soon as they crossed the threshold, Strange stopped dead in his tracks. “Wait-- you said this was a curse, correct?”
“Well I can only assume,” said Tony, “Peter had a strange encounter with one of your types last night-- came back with a symbol on his chest and claiming he’s seeing things that aren’t there.”
“Well it’s one hell of a spell, I can tell you that,” said Stephen, uneasy, “Its aura hit me like a truck as soon as I walked in.”
“I can hear you, you know.” Peter said from behind the privacy divider of his bed, “This curtain doesn’t make me deaf.”
“Nice to see you too, Mr. Parker,” smiled Strange as he walked to stand at the foot of the boy’s bed. “You’re looking healthy as ever.”
“Ha-ha-ha,” he said, then winced at the pain in his chest. Tony walked to the side of the bed, concerned.
“It’s hurting you? More than it was before, I mean,” He questioned, staring down at the boy’s bandaged chest.
Peter winced, “It’s not getting any better. It might be getting worse.” He said the last part quickly, as if expecting Tony to be upset with him. Tony just stared at him for a minute, studying his face.
“Strange, any ideas?” He said without looking away from Peter.
Stephen walked forward to examine the boy, peeling back the thin hospital gown that was covering his torso. He went to touch it, but instantly flinched back as if he had burned his hand.
“What? What is it?” Said Peter, alarmed.
Strange looked pale, his hand hovering over Peter’s chest. “I need to go.”
He began to walk out of the room swiftly, his cloak billowing behind him.
“What? What do you mean you have to go?” Tony questioned, irritated as he followed behind.
The sound proof door of the medbay slid shut and Stephen turned to Tony, his voice low and urgent. “I’m sorry, Tony, but this magic is beyond me. It’s dark. I could imagine it’s from a small clan, but it’s too powerful. It’s like a virus-- it will spread.”
“Which is why you’ll be the one helping to contain it,” Tony said, his eyes wide with the realization that there might be nothing they can do. “Stephen, you’re my point guy on this. I don’t know any other wizards.”
The man paused, contemplating the other’s words. “I don’t-- this is beyond me. I don’t know how to help him. I’m sorry, Tony.”
He turned to leave, but Tony stopped him. “Wait!” His voice was edging on desperation now. “What’ll it take for me to get you to help him?”
Strange looked Tony up and down. He opened his mouth to reply, but nothing came out as he chose his words carefully. “I’ll need research. And scouts. And any other resources you can provide me with that will help us figure it out. Maybe some of your contacts.”
“Consider it all done.” He raised his hand in an offer.
Stephen eyes Tony’s hand, wary, then took it.
“Tony-- I have to warn you, before we get into this.”
“Yeah?”
“Those monsters under the bed aren’t so imaginary.”