Fighting And Helplessness

Peter was sharply tugged out of the recesses of his haunting nightmares by a wave of freezing water. He wasn’t surprised when he felt the sickening brush of ice cubes against his skin, the water was so cold he felt like he was burning for a second. He tore his eyes open, momentarily forgetting where he was and why he wasn’t staring at his bedroom ceiling. He blinked wearily and looked up, terrified to find Ryan’s chilling face mere inches from his own. The man’s eyes were calculating, and Peter flinched as his hand lifted slowly, fingers reaching up to cup the now dripping teens face between his palms. Peter bit his lip to quickly stifle the whimper he felt tugging at the back of his throat. Ryan, however, seemed to notice this as his lips broke into a nauseating smirk as he tilted Peter’s face from side to side.

“Hm. Bruises and split lip on the face have healed nicely, neck is almost fully healed. Electrical burns from the taser have subsided on the neck.” Peter allowed his eyes to dart behind Ryan’s head as he heard the scribbling of pen on paper from close to the door of the room. Four of the armed guards stood, waiting, and beside them were two people dressed in lab coats, much like doctors or surgeons. Peter felt his stomach turn as the image of him being cut open like an experiment, held at the mercy of Ryan, armed men and psychotic doctors.

He was pulled from his mind as he yelped at the feeling of Ryan’s cold hands slowly, almost carefully, lifting his shirt up. Peter yanked at his restrains, tensing up as he realised there wasn’t enough give on the chains for him to prevent Ryan’s wandering fingers. He felt his face burn as the man’s hand ghosted over the skin where his bruising and taser marks had been.

“Same deal with his chest and stomach, everything’s pretty much healed.” He removed his hand and carelessly tugged Peter’s shirt back down before returning his fingers to his cheek again. He ran his thumb over the teen’s cheekbone, in a mock gesture of comfort. Peter swallowed bile as the memory of his Dad doing the same thing when wiping away his tears filled his head. He refused to compare his Dad with Ryan, because Ryan was sick, and clearly he had no qualms for hurting and kidnapping a sixteen-year-old.

“Your healing factor is damn impressive, isn’t it Peter?” He gritted his teeth together and locked his jaw, avoiding eye contact with the man who was still rubbing his thumb over his cheek. The hand pulled away from his face and Peter barely had time to shove away his relief and acknowledge his senses blare in warning before the hand slammed down on the side of his face. His head snapped back and collided painfully with the tile behind him. He groaned and rolled his jaw to ease the throbbing discomfort that radiated through the entire right side of his face.

“Look at me and respond when I address you, other than that you can keep your mouth shut. You’ll come to learn soon enough that complying will just be easier for you.” Ryan’s voice held steady with his frustration, but Peter didn’t want to back down. He felt the sudden urge to think like his Dad, to think like a Stark.

“Are you back on about this whole ‘comply or suffer the consequences’ charade? You’re stupid, your whole operation is messed up, not to mention, highly illegal, and my Dad will find me.” He spat his words with the familiar sarcastic and harsh spite he often heard his Dad use when he intimidated or hid his emotions from people. Ryan stood, flicking his fingers and the three men moved forward.

“I don’t care about whoever your Dad is, he isn’t going to find you, and I really don’t give a shit about the law. If you don’t believe me, ask the collection of other mutants that came here in similar circumstances to you, but never made it out… alive at least.” Peter opened his mouth to comment on the ‘mutant’ remark, but he stopped when his throat seized in fear.

“There… there are others here?” He asked nervously, his voice wavering slightly.

“There were others here,” Ryan corrected, “but not anymore, because, if you hadn’t worked it out, they’re long dead by now.” His words were cold and uncaring, like he couldn’t, or wouldn’t, grasp the fact that he had stolen the life of other, innocent people.

“I – I… you killed people? Like… like you murdered them in cold-blood?” Peter’s voice wasn’t wavering now, it was shaking as he choked out the words in absolute horror. Ryan sneered as he answered, the satisfied smirk painting his features in a twisted, evil grimace.

“Of course. I torture people like you, experiment and gather data until they outlive their use, then dispose of them. I would expect by now at least one of them would have families that cared, but either nobody’s intelligent enough to track me down, or my theory is true.” He paused, waiting for Peter to ask about his theory, but the quaking teen was busy looking down at his lap, lips trembling. “My theory, Peter, is that no one is stupid enough to care about mutants, animals and freaks like you aren’t worth our time. Unless the time is spent figuring out how your… abilities could improve the world, you don’t matter to us, to anyone.” Peter let his vision be covered by his thick lashes, as he closed his eyes, trying to block out Ryan’s abhorrent speech.

“You know Peter, I’m willing to bet nobody is even looking for you right now. Who would care about you, huh? You reckon your Dad is gonna find you? I reckon he’s glad he doesn’t have to care for an abomination like you anymore.”

Peter shook his head, feeling his eyes burn with unshed tears. He felt weak again, like how he felt before he had powers, being bullied by Flash again. He knew it was all words, he knew his Dad was looking for him, he had to be. Knowing didn’t stop his voice from wobbling, or the tears from falling as he looked up with wet eyes at Ryan.

“Stop it. I’m not a – a freak. My Dad is coming for me and he’s not g – gonna let you kill me.” He thought that’s all he wanted to say, but he tacked on more with a barely audible whisper, “and y – you aren’t going to break me.” He winced, waiting for the blow to come, but it didn’t.

“Mark time, 8:12 am, majority of wounds healed. We can check out the bullet in his back at the lab.” Ryan looked down at Peter, the smirk back on his face, “you’re gonna spend the day with me and the doctors so we can make a few… adjustments to your cell. I’d love to personalise it and tailor it to you.” His smile only grew as he spoke, which indicated to Peter that what he meant didn’t have anything to do with a coat of paint and some posters, but rather something more sinister and cunning, judging by how pleased he looked.

The three men took Ryan’s explanation of Peter’s upcoming day as an invitation to cover his head with a burlap sack. Peter hated how it itched and irritated his ears and ruffled his damp curls, but he was preoccupied with struggling in his bonds as the men detached him from the wall and hoisted him up to his feet.

“The drugs are still in your system, that may be why it’s proving hard for you to take down three of my men. Don’t worry, if I see you continue to struggle I’ll just hit you with another dosage of the stuff, I have an excess of it just for you, Spider.” Peter stilled his movements, he would rather fake compliance and wait till he had an opportunity to run, then get another wave of drugs that would sedate him into a state of forced compliance.

“Good boy Pete,” Ryan praised. Peter felt bile rise in his throat, he hated being praised by the man, it made him feel like he was doing what he wanted.

“Fuck you,” he spat fiercely, his words slightly muffled from under the burlap sack as the men tugged at his arms and shoved his back forwards to begin walking.

“You’re a bit too young for that kid, but thanks for the offer.” One of the guards whispered in Peter’s ear and he felt a chill run over his skin, goose bumps rising at the notion of the man’s words. He heard Ryan laugh darkly from somewhere ahead of him, but Peter was too focused on trying to memorise the turns they were taking, to care too much.

Straight from the cell, left, right, left, left, straight, right, left, right… left? Straight, right… right? Peter lost count as his focus weakened, he tried and failed to track anymore turns as his body was jerked in different directions. Walking with no eyesight threw off his balance and his Spidey-sense wasn’t much help, it was just a steady, continuous buzz at the base of his skull. He knew why, wherever he was, he wasn’t safe, and his senses were on edge. He thought about becoming dead weight and just dropping to the floor and refusing to walk, but he had no doubt the men would just continue dragging him across the floor.

One of the men holding his elbows tugged suddenly and harshly at the joint and Peter was jolted forcefully, stumbling over his feet for a moment before righting himself quickly. His sense flared up from a buzz to a warning call and he tensed just before a heavy blow landed on his stomach, the air being effectively knocked out of him. He wheezed slightly as he caught his breath, ignoring Ryan’s command to hurry up. He let himself be tugged along for another few turns before the men holding him stilled, and he heard the tapping of Ryan and the doctors’ footsteps come to a stop.

He stayed, slightly swaying in his place as the fingers gripping his arms tightened minutely. He heard the noise of metal wheels rolling across the tiles and the rumbling of something shaking on the surface. He heard Ryan telling the doctors softly about his gunshot wound and he swallowed, his throat bobbing with the movement.

“It’s still lodged, the skin’s healed overtop so we’ll have to dig it out.” Ryan paused, and we he continued speaking, Peter could hear the smile in his voice, “don’t bother using anaesthetics.” The now terrified teen shivered and tensed his body, trying to see anything through the sack still draped over his head. He pulled in a shaky breath as Ryan’s footsteps moved toward him, the noise of his shoes on tile echoing slightly. Peter jumped slightly, flinching away from the hand that came to rest on the small of his back.

“W-what are you doing?” He asked softly as Ryan’s hand pushed slightly, making him move forward blindly. He kept walking straight until the hand pulled back and gripped both his shoulders, spinning him in a one hundred and eighty turn. The hands pressed down on his shoulders and lead him to sit down on something cool and smooth.

“I’m taking you to where you’ll be the majority of today, don’t fight it – just comply.” Ryan’s voice was almost patient with the teen, but it had a malicious undertone that Peter caught. His senses hummed, and he began to fidget slightly under the man’s arms.

“Stay still” Ryan said sharply, digging his fingertips into Peter’s upper arms with bruising force. “Come and hold him still while I get the restraints on him.” Now he was fully struggling, he managed to stand back up and begin reaching to rip away the sack, but pairs of strong arms wrapped around his flailing limbs and soon he was being shoved roughly back down onto what he assumed was a bench or table. His chest was pushed down on and he pressed back against it with all the strength he had, but one of his wrists had successfully been attached to the edge of the table and another pair of hands joined the first.

With the combined factors of two buff men pushing down on his chest, one of his arms being held down by reinforced cuffs and the small amount of drugs still in his system, not to mention the bullet still lodged in him, Peter was overpowered. His back met the surface of the table with force and his head knocked against it painfully, increasing the intensity of his headache, the sack doing nothing to soften the blow. He moaned and feebly tried to yank his free limbs away from the bite of the cold cuffs, but the amount of people gripping at him made it, so he was secured to the bench without too much of a hassle.

“You don’t make this easy on yourself, do you kid?” Peter felt anger surge through him at the nickname, and he pulled at the restraints, arching his back and slamming it back down in hopes of breaking the whole table. He growled and tried to pull away from the finger that began to travel up his leg slowly.

“Get off me!” He yelled, blowing as much anger and force into his words as he could, his voice echoed off the walls and yet, the finger didn’t slow. It dragged up, over his jutting hip bone, along over his stomach and ribs, before finally it stilled over his pulse. Peter tried to move away from his fingers, but they followed his movements. After, what Peter guessed was half a minute Ryan rattled off what he assumed was his heart rate to the doctors, who he heard scribbling it down.

“I’m not sure if you just have an extremely elevated heart rate, or if you’re just that terrified right now, Spider?” Ryan phrased it like a question, but Peter was too busy tugging at his restraints to answer. He yelped as a heavy fist came down on his ribs, and he tried to curl in on himself, but he couldn’t move his wrists or ankles any closer to his torso. He was spread eagled on the metal surface, his breaths hitched as he sucked in and back out.

“Answer me.” Ryan warned dangerously.

“I – I just have a faster heart rate” Peter answered quickly, wanting to avoid another attack while his sense was dulled by the sack. He heard Ryan hum in approval and he realised that he had never truly disliked someone so much in his life, not even Flash was as big of an asshole as Ryan. He squirmed on the table, feeling like a child as he whined “just let me out of these” he suggested, shaking the chains slightly “I won’t try anything if you just get them off.” He heard Ryan bark out a laugh, he knew he was a terrible liar, but there wasn’t much else he could do.

“Pull up a second bench next to his, undo the restraints on his left side and flip him over so we can get to his back.” Peter felt his heartrate increase, he didn’t want them poking around in his back to get the bullet out, especially not without anaesthetic. He heard the shuffle of footsteps and heard what he believed to be two men at his head and two more at his feet, one of them must have been Ryan. He could feel hands on his wrists and ankles, pinning them down, but he still struggled, yanking and twisting his limbs in all directions. He arched his back and tried to pull away from the guards and Ryan, but they used his own momentum against him. They rolled him over onto his stomach and he only managed to raise his head just before his chin would have slammed down against the metal.

Ryan peeled the sack off of his head and threw it to the side, watching intently as Peter blinked wearily as his squinted eyes slowly adjusted to the brightness of the room he was in. He scanned the room, his chin raised just enough so that his cheek wasn’t pressed against the cold metal. He was in a lab, with high ceilings and no windows, just like his cell. He figured they must have been somewhere underground, considering the lack of access to outside and the bite of the cold that seemed to leak into his bones. His wide eyes roamed over the equipment in the room, everything was surgically white and clinically clean, it made his eyes throb and his stomach feel sick. The two doctors were inspecting him, jotting things down on their clipboards every few minutes, regarding him like a mere experiment, a piece of data to be broken down and analysed. He turned his head to face the other side of the room, in which there was a large metal door, more surgical instruments and equipment and a row of sinks and chemical wash stations with padlocked draws lining the wall.

Peter tore his attention back to the bench he was on as the metal cuffs began to squeeze and bite his skin. He shook his arm and leg as they tightened the bonds to the second table, but he stopped when he felt an aggressive hand running through his hair and gripping the curls tightly. His head was forced upwards and his neck was exposed and tilted at an angle where he couldn’t swallow or suck in a proper breath. He coughed weakly as he was forced to look into Ryan’s cold, grey eyes. He could hear the whistle of his breath coming through his awkwardly angled windpipe over Ryan’s words.

“You like it? I restock and cater all the tools to whatever subject we have, and you have the privilege of being the latest. The little spider kid who thinks his daddy’s gonna save him. It’s almost sweet how much hope all of you have when we first meet.” Peter gulped, squeezing his eyes shut as the lump in his throat worsened on account of the angle it was being held at. “I suggest you hold onto that hope for now Peter,” he leaned in, his fingers tightening in the teens curls, “because it never lasts much longer than this.”

Peter was about to respond, to respond with a bite back at the man, and he opened his mouth to do so, but not before the man acted. He used his grip on Peter’s curls to slam his head down onto the metal surface, hard enough to make a resounding crack echo throughout the lab. His head collided with enough force for him to see white spots flutter in his vision, and he let his temple and cheekbone take most of the hit. He knew what a broken nose felt like and he would rather deal with some heavy bruising than having to reset his own nose.

Peter winced as he attempted to roll his jaw, checking everything was still in place, which thankfully it was. Having a bruised face was the least of his problems now, because his mind was laser focused on Ryan’s hand in his hair, which wasn’t tight anymore. The touch was soft, and his fingers carded through his wild curls, which were now fully dried from the water he had woken up too. The touch made his hair raise and his teeth grind together, his spine shuddered, and it took all of his effort to keep his thoughts off his Dad, because he didn’t feel like crying in front of Ryan. It was sickening to think that the pseudo safe hand in his hair was the same one that just brutally whipped his face into the table. He would rather a rough hit here and there then the careful, lingering and soft touches that Ryan dealt.

Peter groaned and shook the hand out of his hair, holding in a sigh of relief when he heard Ryan step back from the table. He turned his head and laid his good cheek onto the table, giving his neck muscles a break.

“Get rid of his shirt while I grab the tools.” Peter stiffened as he listened to Ryan directing the doctors, he heard the scrape of something being picked up from a bench from the other direction and flinched as he heard the snipping of scissors beginning to cut away his shirt. A set of hands carefully removed the fabric and discarded it, leaving Peter to shiver as his bare torso pressed against the freezing metal. He saw Ryan wheel a smaller metal bench over next to him, the surface containing a kidney dish, cotton swabs, antiseptic wipes, bullet forceps, tweezers and a single scalpel. Peter was very familiar with medical instruments, he had a test in health and biology where he had to memorise and list off the tools needed for different surgeries, and bullet extraction was one of them.

“If you’re still, I can promise it’ll hurt a lot less that if you’re stupid and decide to struggle.” Ryan was blunt, and he sauntered closer to Peter, moving further behind him to the point where his eyes couldn’t track the man anymore. Peter gulped, flexing his wrists again to subtly test the strength of them again. If he moved his left arm the right way he could still feel the bullet graze his shoulder blade slightly, it hurt far less that what it originally did, but it was till far less than comfortable. Peter tensed as the cool feeling of the antiseptic wipe cleaned away his dried blood from before the wound had healed. Ryan laughed from behind him as he discarded the wipe and ran a hand over the healed skin of Peters shoulder.

“Mmm, just relax Pete, it won’t hurt too bad, the bullet isn’t too deep, and you heal quick.” Peter couldn’t relax around Ryan and he sure as hell didn’t want to either, the idea of letting his guard down around the guards, doctors and especially Ryan, made Peter want to curl up into a ball and hide his face. He closed his eyes as he heard Ryan pick up the scalpel, waiting for the feeling of the blade pressing into his flesh.

He almost expected it to just feel like a bad paper cut but it really didn’t. It was a sharp, piercing pain, and it only got worse the deeper the knife cut. By the time Ryan had dug through enough layers of Peter’s skin to draw blood and locate the bullet, Peter was biting his lip heavily to restrain the pained noises he wanted to make. Ryan was silent as he worked, the only sounds Peter could hear were his own laboured breaths and the scribbled of the doctor’s pens on paper.

He breathed out through his nose as the scalpel was lifted away from his now bloodied skin and placed back on the bench. He knew what was next, and he almost wished he didn’t, because no matter how prepared he thought he was, he just really wasn’t in any way. He poorly concealed a gasp of agony when the bullet forceps wiggled their way into the wound, opening around the bullet and slowly, pulling it back out again. The clink of the bullet falling into the kidney dish both relieved and sickened Peter, the worst of it was over, but that bullet had been lodged inside of him for what, a day now? That wasn’t ideal. Nothing about the situation he was in was ideal in any sense of the word.

He felt Ryan run the cotton swabs over the blood that pooled under his shoulder, shivering under his cold, pressing fingers. He wrinkled his face when the scent of his own metallic blood reached his enhanced nose and he clenched his fists as he felt Ryan dragging a swab directly over the already healing cut. He groaned and lifted his head up as the cut began to burn slightly with the prolonged exposure to the cotton swabs.

“See spider, that wasn’t too bad. At least not compared to the other tests we have to run today.” Peter pressed his cheek back down to the table, a sudden wave of exhaustion crashed over him. Ryan rolled the smaller table away with his foot, telling the guards to dispose of things and clean away the blood, making sure to keep the bullet for ‘the files.’ He walked back into the teens line of sight and Peter calmed slightly at being able to keep an eye on what he was doing. Ryan crouched in front of him, so they were face to face. His fingers, which still lingered with the smell of Peters blood, tilted his chin up from the table.

“What heals faster, bruises or cuts?” He asked, running a gentle finger over the darkening skin on Peter’s cheekbone, lightly prodding at the discolouration. When he took too long to respond, the fingers over his skin squeezed threateningly and Peter winced as his bruise was pressed on.

“Uh – it depends, on… on which is more serious I think.” Ryan frowned, ether unsatisfied with the answer or in thought. The pressure on Peter’s cheek released and he blew a quick breath out in relief.

“So, the cut will heal before the bruises will then?”

“Um, I think my body will use more energy on healing the cut, but the bruise will probably fade before the cut completely heals. B – because it’s not that serious.” Ryan let go of his cheek and stood, walking over to the doctors again. Peter let his head drop one more, his hearing trained on the hushed whispers behind him.

“I want to run the preliminary healing test now, no use in waiting for that cut to close up.” He heard mumbled replies, a few ‘yes sir’s’ and a quiet ‘I’ll get the tools sorted’ before he heard the smaller bench being filled with tools once again.

“What’s that? What do you mean ‘preliminary healing test?’” Peter’s voice was higher than he meant, and it gave away his fear, presenting his anxiety rather than his curiosity. Ryan strolled back over to him and Peter clenched his gut in worry.

“Anyone ever teach you not to eavesdrop Pete?” Ryan flicked his forehead and smirked as Peter flinches slightly at the crude touch. He opened his eyes again and frowned deeply, annoyed at how weak he felt, kicking himself for letting his fear show.

“It’s a bit hard not to when you have super hearing,” he said bluntly. Ryan thumped his hand down over Peter’s bullet wound, light enough not to cause more bleeding, but hard enough to hurt a fair amount.

“Don’t talk back,” he warned before walking behind Peter once again. He lifted his head and twisted his neck around to try and follow the man, but it aggravated his wounds and he gave up quickly. He let his head drop again and he focused on the sounds of tools being placed onto the table and the scribbling of pens on paper.

He forced his eyes back open, which he hadn’t realised he had closed, when he felt Ryan’s presence directly behind him again. He heard the snap of latex gloves and the familiar swipe of an antiseptic wipe run all the way over his back, starting over his shoulder blades and running down to his hips. That was a large area, almost his entire back.

“I’m starting off shallow and getting down to the deepest ones closer to the hips, where there’s less movement. Don’t fight and feel free to scream as much as you want it doesn’t matter, I soundproofed this lab a long time ago, for that reason.”

Peter felt a wave of nausea as his senses cried out in his skull, urging him to run, to fight while he still could. Despite every part of him screaming at him to get away, he couldn’t, the cuffs were too tight, and the table wouldn’t give underneath him, Peter was utterly and completely helpless. He was trapped, at Ryan’s mercy. The thought of giving the man the satisfaction of knowing he could, and would, eventually make Peter scream, made him feel sick. He felt his heart racing, heard his pulse thrumming wildly as the antiseptic wipe was discarded and a blade was dragged teasingly across his shoulders. It was light enough to not draw blood, but to make terror bubble deep within his core.

Peter refused to scream, he made a promise to himself that he would hold back any noises of pain for as long as he could. If not for himself then for his Dad, because he knew giving his captor the satisfaction of making him scream was also giving him more power over him. Ryan didn’t need anymore power over him right now. He was strapped to a damned metal bench, helpless. He felt like crying, he felt like fighting tooth and nail, he felt like calling for his Dad, begging to feel safe again. But he held all that back, because he wasn’t giving Ryan the satisfaction, not now, not ever.

He grit his teeth together as he felt the press of the blade on his shoulder. He focused on the feeling of his cheek pressed against the frigid metal bench beneath him. He estimated the cut was about and inch and a half, very shallow, bearable for the moment. Each new cut evoked the frantic noises of pens gliding over paper and it began to nag at Peter’s sanity. He counted ten cuts in total, each slightly deeper than the last that ran down his back, each of them just over an inch long. They spanned across his shoulders and Peter started to realise that despite how shallow the cuts were, the sheer amount of them chipped away at how much he could bear the pain.

He bit the inside of his cheek as Ryan began on the second row, getting deeper and deeper with every slice of the blade. It must have been sharpened, Peter thought, because it was gliding across his skin and splitting it open without the need for much pressure. Ryan hummed from somewhere behind him, wiping the blade off on some cotton pads as blood began to soak the metal. Peter felt a second antiseptic wipe drag across his back, swiping up the slowly dripping blood that began to slide down his back in a stark contrast to his pale, quaking skin.

Ryan pressed on, carving into Peter’s flesh and making him press his teeth into his cheek to hold back the pained noises he wanted to make. As Ryan began a particularly harsh cut he choked back a yell, choosing instead to swear loudly.

“Fuck!” He immediately bit his tongue and pressed his forehead into the table, hiding his flushed face. To his surprise, Ryan stilled for a minute, running a gloved hand over his back slowly as if admiring the damage he had caused.

“That’s it Pete, it’s easier if you don’t hold back. We’re getting into the rough stuff now, so I’d suggest you just let go.” Peter sucked in a shaky breath and grinded his teeth together, pressing his nails into his palms as Ryan began the fourth row. The cuts were teetering on the edge of unbearable and Peter felt a lump in his throat forming again. As Ryan pushed on to the fifth row Peter couldn’t hold back his tears anymore, they cut trails down his cheeks, feeling hot against his chilled skin and dripping onto the table supporting him.

“Ah! Jesus… Fucking hell!” Peter yelped as the blade signalled the beginning of the sixth row. The gloved hands dug into his skin and he tried to focus on that, sniffling and trying to stop his tears.

“Shh, it’s okay – we’re almost done now, you can cry.” Peter hated how Ryan tried to console him, how he knew he was crying. Peter felt his resolve crumbling slightly, but he kept as quiet as he could, biting into his cheek so hard he could taste blood in his mouth. His breathing was unsteady and rapid as Ryan continued row six.

He stopped to clean Peter’s back again between the sixth and seventh row. The amount of blood was staggering, and it began to pool on the table, staining Peter’s torso as it dripped down. At some point during the seventh row Ryan asked for a longer scalpel, so he could carve deeper. Peter quickly began feeling lightheaded, from the blood loss or the pain he didn’t know. It made no difference to him, he thought weakly, passing out was probably the most ideal option for him right now. He tried to concentrate on the splashing noise his tears and blood made on the table, and as Ryan began the eighth row, he was teetering on the edge of consciousness.

He was barely aware of when Ryan finished the final row, all he knew was the agony, the white-hot pain that flared over his entire back. The bullet extraction wound felt insignificant, compared to how he felt now. As his tears fell, and Ryan placed a cold, damp sheet over his marred back to soak up the blood, he finally let himself fall into the black abyss that was sweet unconsciousness.

----

Tony knocked back his fourth coffee of the night, or morning if you were pedantic about it. He winced at the bitterness and told himself he would cut back on the caffeine once Peter was back home safe. He swung around in his desk chair, his eyes circling around the room full of either sleeping or dutifully working Avengers.

Rhodey, Clint and Sam were taking their break on the couches, deep in their slumber. While Natasha and Steve tapped away at all camera footage in New York, only an hour away from their next shift change. Tony worked too, but he had refused to sleep or even take a break, the only times he stopped working or left his desk was when he was getting coffee or locking himself in the bathroom and fighting off a panic attack.

He couldn’t exactly help it, anytime he watched the alley footage and saw the bruised skin or looked into his sons wide and terrified eyes, all he could do was blame himself. How could he let his kid get cornered in an alley, hurt, kidnapped, not even a mile away from home? He was Iron Man, a Dad and he had promised to protect Peter, how could he fail him like this? Tony felt useless, he had done everything in his power and couldn’t think of any other way to get any closer to finding him. He had checked Peter’s phone and suit, which were both either destroyed or offline. He had combed through all the footage and recordings taken around the time and place Peter walked to school, even gone as far as hacking into some house cameras that were on the kid’s route. There was nothing, the only new thing he found was some footage of the two vans driving to get to the backstreets, but even they didn’t help at all, just provided a new angle.

He rubbed his hand through his hair and sighed loudly, biting his nail, deep in thought. He glanced at his watch, it was well past nine in the morning and he should at least sort everyone helping with food, but he couldn’t tear himself away from working. The more he worked, the quicker he could find his kid. He still hadn’t been able to shake the image of the broken and bloodied Peter from his nightmare, and the image haunted him. Tony thought, deep down, that if – when he found Peter, he could very well look like that, which is precisely what terrified him the most. He knew torture, kidnapping and ransom better than he’d like to, and he knew PTSD, nightmares and sleepless nights even more than that. He detested the idea that Peter might ever have to go through any of that like he had to.

The older Stark blew out a wobbly breath, moved his empty coffee mug to the side and began working feverishly again. The brightness of the screen illuminated Tony’s face, highlighting his dark under eyes and making his dark and mussed hair stand out against his pale skin. The light reflected his still slightly damp cheeks and shining eyes, his shaky, caffeinated hands shaking as he tapped away at the computer.

----

Steve looked up from across the room, smiling slightly as he took note of the normally stoic Rhodey leaning against his hand, half-asleep. His eyes flashed over where Sam was doing the same, squished into the corner of the three-seater couch that Clint was sprawled out across, face shoved into the crook of his elbow. He turned to his left and watched Natasha type away at her computer, brow furrowed in concentration.

His half smile dropped into a look of concern and pity as he looked over at Tony. The Stark had just downed what must have been his fourth or fifth cup of coffee. His hair was tousled from the amount of times he had run a swift hand through it or tugged at it in annoyance. The soldier watched silently as Tony checked everyone with his eyes, either out of caution or concern – Steve didn’t know. He felt for the man, although he couldn’t exactly relate to losing a kid, he could understand the aspect of loss in general. He still remembered how he felt seeing Bucky fall from the train and how guilty he felt after that. He had the best hearing of the Avengers, aside from Peter he guessed, and Natasha was observant enough to pick up on the clues and figure out what Steve already knew was going on.

Every so often, excluding the times where he was getting coffee, Tony would excuse himself from the lab and head down the hall. Natasha caught on after the third time, but Steve could hear it from the start. Tony was locking himself in the bathroom and having panic attacks, or severe anxiety attacks, either way he was not coping at all. Cap didn’t know what to do, he gently suggested the mechanic take a break, maybe catch up on some sleep for an hour or two, but he had refused. Even when Rhodey had more than ‘lightly suggested’ the stubborn man shook him off and said he was fine, just worried. The man was splitting apart at his seams and just couldn’t deal without the kid, and his intense guilt complex was only making things worse.

Steve felt like all he could do was sit and watch his old friend break down. If he were a shitty person, maybe he would have let that happen, but no matter the two men’s past disagreement, he wasn’t going to allow Tony to crumble.

“Can you continue working, keep an eye on him while I sort some food out for everybody?” Natasha nodded curtly, glancing over at the captain before quickly assessing Tony, before darting her eyes back to her work. Steve stopped a few steps away from the man operating solely off caffeine and worry, leaving him plenty of space considering how uneasy he still was around them. He waited till he had the man’s attention before speaking calmly, keeping the worry out of his voice, knowing how much the Stark hated to be patronised.

“Hey, I’m heading to make breakfast for everyone, is it alright if I use the kitchen?” Tony opened his mouth in protest, but Steve knew exactly what he was going to say before he did. “Yes, you can keep working down here, but you still have to eat. You can type and chew quite easily. I’ll make you another cup while I’m at it.” He picked up the man’s cup and twirled it in his fingers, still waiting for permission to raid his cupboards.

“Hm? Yeah, okay that’s cool. Just don’t use any of the cereals, they’re… Uh – they’re for Peter.” Steve watched Tony’s face fall as he retreated into what must have been memories of the kid. He spoke softly, trying to make his words as comforting as possible.

“Of course, I’ll make some pancakes or something,” he took a slow step forward giving Tony plenty of time to move away if he was uncomfortable. “You know, we’re all here to help. We aren’t going to stop looking until we find him Tony, I can promise you that.” The mechanic turned around in his chair until they were facing each other, and Steve really noticed how tired the man before him looked. He had heavy bags under his eyes and his fingernails had been chewed away, he looked far less like the ‘genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist’ he had once claimed to be. Honestly, if Steve had to compare him to something, he would say he looked like the fathers who were terrified of their kids not coming back from war. That comparison made something inside him stir, an urge to protect and comfort his friend. He resisted the urge to place a reassuring hand on the man’s shoulder, realising it was a bit too soon for physical contact. The last time they had touched was Siberia, but Steve quickly pushed that from his mind when Tony spoke again.

“Thanks Cap, I’m not planning on taking much of a break till he’s home anyway.” It was strange, to hear a man he thought he knew so well talk about the Tower as his and his child’s home. The fact Tony even had a kid surprised him enough, but hearing him talk about it so… normally, that was another thing. Regardless, he nodded and wandered out of the lab and to the kitchen.

----

When Peter woke, he was no longer chained to the metal table, instead, he was sprawled on the tiled floor. He guessed he had only been out for a few minutes at most, because he saw one of the doctors cleaning the still bloody scalpel. That’s when he remembered what made him pass out in the first place, and that’s also when he realised why his back felt like it was more bloody wound than actual skin. He mumbled a few quiet swear words as he tried to roll further onto his front, to take the weight off his still sluggishly bleeding cuts.

He looked down at himself, noting how the skin around his wrists and ankles was raw and bruised. He still wasn’t wearing anything on his torso, and his jeans had obviously caught a few drops of blood on them. His cheekbone and temple throbbed and his head pounded in time to the rapid beat of his heart.

“Well, how long did that take huh? One experiment, just over an hour, before you passed out? Pathetic.” Peter snapped his head up at Ryan’s voice from across the lab. He was standing with the doctor who wasn’t cleaning, and holding a stopwatch in his hand, flashing the small display up to Peter before letting it drop back around the doctor’s neck. He staked towards the shivering teen, laughing darkly as he scuffled weakly away from him. Peter stopped when the buzz of his senses told him he was about to back into the wall and upset his injuries.

“Get a – away from me,” Peter demanded shakily, his voice quivering almost as much as his chilled body. Ryan only smirked wickedly as he moved closer to the boy.

“You aren’t exactly in the position to be making demands, are you spider?” He quirked an eyebrow and the cowering form below him, almost daring him to try not respond to the question. Peter only managed to open and close his mouth a few times, searching for words, before the man brought his foot down on his chest. The teen fell back, his arms slipping on the tile now slick with his blood. His back pressed into the floor painfully and he was unable to contain the small yelp of fright as his cuts were aggravated again.

If anything, the pained cry only egged Ryan on, he pushed his weight down on the foot that was crushing down on Peter’s chest until the teen wheezed and frantically gripped his ankle. He clawed at the foot, trying to take as much weight off his chest as possible, feeling the cuts underneath him burn in agony again.

“S – stop, get off! I – I’m sorry, I’m not in the position to make demands.” Peter wasn’t begging, but he was beginning to comply, answering Ryan’s question without need for a second prompt. The man lifted his boot from the kid’s now heaving chest, and he immediately scrambled up into a sitting position, taking the force off his wounds. Ryan nodded at him, before turning on his heel and walking back over to the doctors, motioning for the guards to follow him. The men huddled in a tight cluster as Peter caught his breath and calmed his heart rate to a semi-calm state. He looked around the lab again, looking for something to defend himself with, or to find an easier exit point. There was nothing, all the tools were on the other side of the room, behind everyone, and the only exit was the same metal door they had entered in, which was now shut securely.

Peter let his eyes scan the room, roaming around the floor before coming to a stop on a large tub at the groups feet. He honed in his hearing and tried to catch what Ryan was saying, luckily the man didn’t try to conceal his voice too much.

“No, we can’t sedate him, it’ll skew the results for the experiment. You’re just gonna have to trust me when I say he’s too weak to fight off three of you right now.”

“Besides,” one of the guards spoke up, “if he gets too much to handle we can always just taser the little shit again.” Peter gulped when he heard that, his heart picking back up again.

“That won’t be necessary, but if he does fight too much you can do it. Just don’t let him pass out before the test again, I want him fully conscious for this or it’ll muck up the results.” Ryan ordered back, making Peter fidget in worry. “He’ll just get more compliant the more we test on him. I think he’s beginning to get it through his head that fighting just makes things tougher on him.” He didn’t know what the next experiment was, but he knew he didn’t want to become compliant for Ryan.

The circle turned toward him, regarding him carefully, like a piece of meat. He looked back with wide eyes, his mind racing as the guards trudged toward him and the doctors flipped through their notes as Ryan watched silently. Peter stilled as the men got closer, figuring he could try and run later, when they weren’t expecting it so much. He was gripped under the arms by two of them and the third jabbed at his neck to get him moving over to where the tub sat.

Peter let himself be guided over in front of Ryan, wincing as a swift blow to the back of his legs had him falling to his knees beside the tub. He looked down, expecting something sinister or cruel to be waiting, but it was just water. Somehow, that scared him more, because as his mind connected the dots and he remembered what his Dad had endured in Afghanistan, he realised water was just as terrifying as what he could have pictured. They were going to drown him.

“This won’t kill you, because we’ll pull you out once you lose consciousness.” Ryan spoke in a way as if his words were going to make Peter feel any safer, as if he could ease his nerves in any way. He felt his heart racing, his stomach leaped up into his throat, squeezing the lump that remained there in fear as his eyes stung. He looked up through his lashes at Ryan, silently begging for something to get him out of this situation as he felt two sets of hands clamping down on his shoulders securely.

“Wait! Wait, you don’t have to do this. I – I’m just a kid I’m not…” Ryan cut him off with a bark of laughter, he waved his hand dismissively as he replied.

“You aren’t seriously entertaining the idea that just because you’re a kid I don’t need data from you?” Peter stuttered at the question, trying to formulate a response quickly.

“I – uh, I don’t – I don’t know. Just, don’t do this.” Ryan rolled his eyes dramatically, flicking a look over his shoulder to confirm the doctors were ready, before nodding at the guards holding Peter’s weakly struggling body in place.

“Do yourself a favour and save your oxygen kid.” The hands pressed harshly on his shoulder, leaning him forward over the tub, only having slight trouble overpowering the teen. A third set of hands gripped his head, finding an easy handhold in his hair, before shoving Peter’s head under the surface of the water as the click of the stopwatch rang through his mind.

He jerked and struggled as much as he could, but all he managed was to increase the amount of blood still leaking from his back, and the water soon became a coppery red tinge. He felt it up his nose and the bubbles tickled his face as he frantically thrashed in the tub. He tried to cry out for them to stop, but all he succeeded in was getting a mouthful of metallic water.

After a minute and a half of fighting, his lungs started to burn, the urge to just breathe in became harder and harder to ignore. He was all out writhing against the hands now, shaking his head to try and dislodge the fingers holding his neck underwater. Another minute later and the need for air was becoming too overwhelming. When Peter hit the three-minute mark his struggled became weaker, his head span under the water as he scrunched his face up, trying desperately to focus on not breathing, rather than the burning in his chest. After four minutes he recognised the familiar grainy texture to his sight as the edges of his vision began to fade into a greyish black. Spots danced over his eyes and he pressed his eyelids shut, trying to overcome the sheer panic that was eating at his insides almost as painfully as the need to breathe.

At about six minutes, Peter decided that the only thing worse than running out of air, was breathing in water. He was about to pass out anyway, and some far away part of his mind remembering studying the medical reason for the body willingly sucking in while underwater. When someone is about to lose consciousness, there’s so much carbon dioxide in their blood and so little oxygen that the chemical sensors in the brain prompt the body to take in a completely involuntary breath, regardless if it’s submerged underwater or not. The last thing Peter thought of as he slipped away once more was that this must have been how his Dad felt in Afghanistan.

The teens body slumped and after a few seconds, Ryan called time. The guards pulled his slack body out of the tub and dropped the limp form onto the tiles, tilting his head and body to the side to allow the water to drain from his mouth and nose. The doctors clicked the stopwatch, noting down the time at 6:47. They raised their eyebrows, impressed at the spider’s lung capacity. Ryan kicked the form and, when he got no response, reached out and pulled the taser from one of the guards’ belts, jabbing it roughly into Peter’s ribs. He smiled sadistically as the kid came to, coughing and hacking out mouthfuls of water, gagging on it as it came back up from his throat. He sucked in massive breaths and rolled further to his side, expelling the liquid from his lungs painfully, relishing briefly in the feeling of air in his lungs.

“Holy shit” he heaved, steadying his shaking frame with weal arms, pressing his palms against the wet tiles. He shuddered, shivering violently as water dripped down from his wild and soaked curls. Ryan kicked the tub across the room, making Peter wince as the noise grated his sensitive hearing. He leaned down, tilting Peter’s chin up slowly, a smirk creeping over his lips.

“How was that Petey?”

“Not… exactly th – the most ideal” he replied quickly, coughing some more as Ryan released his chin, letting it drop to his chest. He hummed softly to himself as he scanned over the doctor’s notes, shooting quick glances down at Peter every few minutes.

He could feel himself trembling, his fingers shaking as he lifted them up to wipe away the excess water trailing down his face and neck. He whimpered quietly, tucking his face into his knees as he starved off an anxiety attack forcefully. Peter didn’t bother looking up as he heard Ryan whisper to the guard.

“Give him a small dose of the stuff so he’s out while we set up for the next few experiments.” Peter let the guard yank his head up from where it was buried in his knees, his hair being tugged painfully as the needle was jabbed into his flesh and everything melted away into pitch black.

----

Steve finished off the last of the batter in the pan, placing the last pancake onto the large stack. He smacked at Clint’s hand with the spatula before dropping it into the dishwasher.

“Go wake up Rhodey and Sam, get Nat up here too and then you can eat,” he said, putting on a harder tone that he knew the archer saw through. Clint smirked and rolled his eyes, putting down the coffee jug. “What did I tell you about drinking from the machine, get a cup if you want coffee” Steve said, a small smile gracing his lips as he slid some spreads onto the table.

“The coffee jug is a mug if you don’t give a fuck!” He heard Clint call over his shoulder as he headed back to the lab.

Once everyone was settled at the table and Steve had loaded up his own plate, he carried that, a cup of coffee and Tony’s plate back to where the man was still tapping away at his computer. The man was either so engrossed, or didn’t care when Steve walked in, because he didn’t even glance up from the screen.

“Here, eat this,” Steve said firmly, sliding the plate across to the man, knowing how he hated to be handed things. He also slid across the coffee, and Tony reached out for it and took a large swig before turning around in his chair. Their eyes met, and Steve was about to press on and urge the man to eat now, but Tony spoke first.

“Thanks Cap, for uh – for helping out and stuff.” He looked down at the plate, breaking eye contact and fiddling with the fork compulsively. Steve walked around him and sat in the chair not too far from him, setting his own plate down carefully before replying.

“You don’t have to thank me, I left you the phone in case of stuff like this. I’m just…” he swiped at eye before continuing hesitantly. “I’m just, really sorry you’re having to go through this. I know it must be horri…” Tony cut him off with a wave of his hand and spoke through a small mouthful.

“Yeah, it sucks and it’s a real shitty situation, but I’m just going to stay focused on finding him, rather than uh – talking it out over breakfast” he gestured at the two plates, “which thank you for, by the way.” Steve smiled sadly and nodded, taking a forkful of his own food before turning back to his computer and beginning to type and eat. “You’re going to stay and eat here in the lab?” Tony raised a curious eyebrow at him from over the rim of his coffee mug. He nodded when Steve signed that yes, he would be. The two men ate and worked in silence until everyone else came back down, wiping their mouths and expressing their thanks to Steve for the meal.

“I reckon it’s time for another switch, Tony you gonna take a break this time?” Rhodey sighed and rubbed his eyes tiredly when he shook his head stubbornly. “Fine, but you have to at some point soon” he said bluntly, sitting down on the chair next to him while Natasha and Steve laid down on the couches.

Sam, Clint, Rhodey and the determined Stark all worked diligently for another two hours before Tony began to feel the beginning of another attack gripping at his lungs painfully. An overwhelming sense of dread was rising in his chest as he excused himself from the lab, heading further down the hall into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. His heart palpitated as he saw images of a pale, lifeless Peter flashing behind his shut eyes. Tony couldn’t tell if he wasn’t able to breathe or if he was just hyperventilating, all he knew was he felt like anytime he sucked in he wasn’t getting any oxygen. His mouth felt dry and his throat burned as it felt like his windpipe was closing inside him. His chest hurt, his head pounded, and he felt like he was being choked. He felt tears run down his cheeks as he sunk to the floor, fighting the hot flushes and chills that rolled over his shaky body like a wave.

“Peter, oh god Peter.” He sniffled and gagged on his words as nausea hit him like a truck. He felt dizzy even as he pressed his back against the cabinet, the handles digging into his side keeping him somewhat grounded as he pushed through the panic attack. His stomach churned, and he shivered feverishly, looking out at the bathroom through a fish-eyed lens. He sobbed and sucked in huge lungful’s of air as he rode out the attack, alone on the bathroom floor. He gripped at his hair and muttered quiet apologies into the air as he imagined his son, alone in a cell, crying for his Dad. “I’m sorry baby, I’m so, so sorry. I’m coming, I’ll find you I swear.” His hands trembled as he balled his fists up and pressed them against his eyes harshly.

He eventually calmed his breathing and stood on wobbling legs, splashing cold water on his face before patting it dry again. He gave himself a weary once-over in the mirror, ignoring how his bags were so pronounced it looked like he had two black eyes, before heading back to the lab, downing the rest of his coffee hurriedly and resuming his typing on the computer. He payed no attention to how Steve and Natasha were awake now, propped up on the couch and fixing him with worried and pitying eyes.

----

Peter was leaping off the roof, he was so close to the van if he just shot a web out he would land perfectly. His feet left the solid roof and he was in the air for a few seconds, so close.

“Surprise!” He yelled through his large smile, the feeling of the wind on his suit was one he would never get used to. His blissful optimism was cut very short as he felt something large and sharp rip him out of the air, slipping over his torso before tightening on his ankles. He let out a surprised shriek, he was too out of breath from sprinting and swinging across lawns to notice how his Spidey-sense had thrummed in his skull.

He was upside-down, his arms flailing uselessly below him as the world seemed to spin around him. Blood rushed to his head and he could see the solid ground of the streets getting further and further below him. He was so high, he had never been this high in his suit before. Sure, New York buildings were tall, there were skyscrapers he stuck to on the regular, but this felt so different. He was in suburban streets in Queens, there was nothing to stick to or swing from if he fell from this height.

“What the hell?” He cried, his words were whipped away with the winds blowing past him, a roar in his sensitive ears. He craned his neck and looked up, his body was being shaken around so much he couldn’t make out much of anything, but he thought he saw the flap of mechanical wings, and the fluorescent glow of green eyes staring down at him.

He didn’t know much, everything was happening so fast, but the only thought his mind could form was that he wanted out of these sharp metal talons before he got any higher. He kicked out at the metal that was wrapped around his ankle, hearing something snap with a loud, metallic crack. Before he could struggle anymore he heard something ringing in his ears and he barely recognised it as a beeping. He felt something in his back move, and then a weight was lifted from his suit, had it broken? Then, he was being yanked out of the claws and was free falling through the air, the lights of the world below him spinning and melting into a yellow black blur.

Peter’s body collided with the deployed parachute and he began to tumble towards the ground at break neck speed, the material wrapped around him and couldn’t catch any air. The parachute didn’t slow his descent. He caught a glimpse of the vulture-like creature silhouetted against the pale moon before the grey fabric of the parachute clouded his vision and he was trapped, wrapped tightly in a blanket of sure demise.

Every few second he saw light from the city, and each time he clocked them as closer then before. He began to fully panic, he was going to hit the ground, his bones were strong but even Spider-Man couldn’t survive a fall from this height. Peter remembered when his Dad fell from a similar height, encased in his Iron Man suit, thankfully he had lived, sustained a bit of damage but nothing serious. But the Spider suit wasn’t made out of the nickel-titanium alloy that his Dad’s suit was, and it couldn’t prevent his sure death.

When Peter felt his body hit the concrete, it seemed to swallow him whole. He felt cold and he couldn’t breathe at all, he saw the parachute flow around him, it looked like silk underwater. Underwater? Had he fell in water? He began to struggle, he was in water, he was alive. He felt like he had hit the pavement and his back burnt like hell from the impact, but he was okay. For now, all he had to do was find and break the surface of the water. Easier said than done. He was drowning, the parachute was still wrapped around him and from the force of the hit, Peter wasn’t exactly sure which way was up, which way to swim. He kicked out and punched at the fabric, hating the way he could feel his suit mask absorbing the water. As his strength weakened and his lungs screamed for air, he thought briefly this must be what water-boarding feels like.

It was so, so dark, and he still felt like he was falling, just a lot slower and in a direction, he didn’t know. The material was stuck to his suit and he couldn’t stretch his arms of legs enough to swim. His eyes fell shut and he let the darkness swallow him.

----

Peter wished when his memory ended he would wake up the same way he had in the dream, in his Dad’s comforting hold. But the metal around him wasn’t the Iron Man suit carrying him across the surface of the lake, it was the chilling bite of the cuffs, locking him to the same metal bench. The same emotionless eyes of the doctors watched him, the same ready stance of the three guards surrounded him, and the same sickening hand running over his face was back, attached to Ryan, the practical bane of his existence.

Peter shook his head, regretting the movement as the room swung around him and the fingers curled in his hair tightened till his eyes watered. He let his eyes fall shut, too exhausted to fight, or even struggle with his restraints. All he could do was let the cold touch of the metal on his wounded back and the glaring lights above him lull him into submission as Ryan cooed gently above him, saying something about how compliance benefits them both.

He exhaled through his nose, his eyes rolling back into his skull as he listened half-heartedly to the scratch of the doctor’s notes and the clanging of metal tools on metal benches. As he felt the recognizable sensation of antiseptic wipes on his torso, and the agonising burn of the scalpel cutting into his flesh, he willed himself to fall back into his dark sleep. His lips quivered, and he felt hot tears drip down his cheeks and fall past his temples, into his curls as the blood rolled down his sides in time to the skilful digging of metal in his cuts.

Ryan dragged the blade across the teens hip bone, running the clinical tool over and over the same skin until he met bone. His eyes flickered up to the boy’s face and he smiled to himself when he saw it was scrunched in pain, tears rolling down the poor spider’s face and mixing with the blood on the metal bench he was strapped to, like a twisted watercolour artwork. He loved the way the boy was trying so hard to hold back his screams, the more he did that, the sweeter and more rewarding it would be when he finally managed to break him.

Ryan craved and longed for two major moments with any new subject he had the opportunity to experiment on. The moment when they finally broke down and screamed and begged for him to stop, and the moment where they finally realised that they weren’t going to make it, they weren’t going to survive this chapter of their lives. When they looked up at him with tear stained eyes and begged for their life, pleading and bargaining with him.

Something about Peter was different, and it had nothing to do with the fact that he was a trained hero who went out and saved people on a regular basis as opposed to the messed up mutant freaks he would find on the streets. It had something to do with his mentality, how much hope he had, how much positivity he saw in the world, how he refused to kill. It was naïve, stupid and probably related to how young he was. The rest of his subjects had all been older than the sixteen-year old, but none of them had the same fire that he seemed to. In fact, almost all of them just cowered in fear and did as they were told for fear of causing themselves more pain, but not Peter. The teen hadn’t cowered, he had looked Ryan directly in the eye and told him to go fuck himself, he was relentlessly fighting and snarking back, it was refreshing, and Ryan knew it would just make breaking him that much sweeter.

Ryan wiped away the blood that was trickling down the wound from Peter’s hip with another antiseptic wipe before pulling on a pair of gloves. Peter opened his eyes as he felt Ryan leaving his side for a second, he sniffled quietly and watched with glassy eyes as the man picked up a small surgical instrument with jagged teeth that lined the blade. He pressed his eyes shut and spoke over the growing lump in his throat, his voice cracking and breaking as he pushed the words out.

“W – what are you doing to me… what is th – that?” Ryan smiled, glad the boy could voice his curiosity.

“This is a type of bone saw, it’s made specifically for this type of surgery. I’m performing an open bone biopsy and a bone marrow biopsy on your hip bone Pete. I’m removing and collecting a sample of your bone marrow and the outer layers of your bone, to look for abnormalities in your structure.” Ryan grinned and ran a hand over the trembling teens collar bone slowly, trying to calm him. “Hey, shh… it’s alright, I promise it won’t take as long as the preliminary healing test.” Peter let his head drop back to the table, squeezing his eyes back shut as more silent tears slid down his face.

He whimpered as he felt Ryan hacking away at his bone with the serrated tool. The sound was almost worse than the pain, it grated in his ears and bounced around the lab along with Peter’s soft whimpers and hitched breaths. He bit into his lip to stop from crying out, but he was so tired and so consumed by the sensation of Ryan cutting through cartilage and extracting layers upon layers of his bone and its marrow. He thumped head against the table and sobbed loudly, biting back his cries. Tears ran steadily down his cheeks and he heard the slight squelchy noise his blood made as it clung to the hole in his hip and the rough saw.

“Hold his head still till he stops hitting it, we don’t want brain damage do we Petey?” Peter sobbed as large hands held his head still, a palm coming to rest over his forehead and under his neck. Ryan seemed to take his time, and Peter’s body refused to let him fall into unconsciousness, no matter how badly he wanted to escape the pain. The surgery took three quarters of an hour and when Ryan finally tugged out the last fragment of Peter’s hip bone, he wiped the bloodied area surrounding the wound and patted Peter’s cheek softly, running a finger over his still bruised cheekbone.

“Hey spider, you did good during that, cried nicely. Just let the doctors clean up a bit then all that’s left for today is another two surgeries on your shoulder and knee then I’ll show you back to your updated cell. Does that sound good Pete?” His voice was mockingly sweet and praising, like he was proud of how Peter let his tears fall. It made the sick feeling in his stomach grow. There was a beat while the teen remembered to reply to direct questions, before he took a shuddering breath and managed a meek nod.

“Can – can I have anaesthetic for the n… next two?” Ryan almost gave in, almost crumpled and let the boy have the drugs, just because the sound of his wreaked, decrepit voice was like music to his ears. But he held steady and shook his head slowly, running a hand through the teens soft curls, rubbing at his scalp as he replied.

“Remember this morning, when you called me and my operation stupid, then said fuck you?” Peter swallowed nervously as the fingers in his hair became minutely rougher, “this is your punishment.” Ryan smirked darkly, removing his hand from Peter’s curls and sliding it down the table to rest at the boy’s right knee. Somehow, the biopsy hurt more on his knee and shoulder than his hip had. His body finally gave up on dealing with the agony some time into the last surgery, after he had run out of tears and he just trembled and shook with racking sobs.

----

He dreamed of his Dad, of his warm embrace and calloused hands brushing through his hair, his throat humming careful murmurs of safety and promises and home. In his dream he wasn’t bloodied or bruised or holding himself together for fear of breaking, he didn’t have to hold back screams or try and cover his tears as he felt his Dads strong, steady arms wrapping around him and pulling him closer.

Peter floated in the delusion that he was safe again, that he was with his Dad, and the unspoken promise of protection wasn’t false.