sixty-two.
Four days after Peter's rescue and he's upstairs with Natasha and Steve and they're just having a casual conversation. Bucky is out at the store with Wanda, he thinks, and Wade had to go home for a while.
For a moment he could pretend that he was a regular teenager with a mom and dad and not some freak that didn't even have any birth parents. They hadn't told him, and he didn't remember, but it wasn't hard to figure it out. He didn't look anything like these people and they were way too old to really be his parents anyways. Everybody knew who Steve Rogers was... Well, they knew who Captain America was.
He'd only come out of the ice a few years ago, so there was no way Peter could be his son at all. He'd had James with him, so there was no way that Bucky was his father either, based on what he remembered about him. Despite how close he was to Natasha, somewhere deep down he knew that she didn't have any kids, and he knew why.
He thinks he remembers a brief instance where she might've been pregnant, but the memory is so blurred he can't make out what's really happening.
When he tunes back into the conversation, Nat's talking to him about some girl named MJ that he used to hang out with and how she'd love to come and see him, and how Ned would too, and she even asked him if he'd be excited to go back to school in a couple of months. He didn't answer. He didn't remember the people she was talking about, despite knowing they were probably once really important to him.
She keeps talking about these kids for another couple of minutes before he asks her to please stop talking about them. She furrows her brows and Steve turns around because he'd said it kind of suddenly and a little bit loud. It was easy to see the conflict on the boy's face and Nat, not quite understanding the state of Peter's memory issues, doesn't quite register what the problem is.
"I don't know who that is! I have no idea who the hell you're talking about!" He's getting really worked up about it now, he can't help it. It's so goddamn frustrating not remembering the simplest of things. As of this point in time, he doesn't even know when his own birthday is. All he knows is what happen at Hydra and a few very vague and unimportant things from long before that.
"Hey, Pete... We're sorry, alright? We didn't mean to frustrate you." Steve says gently and Peter shakes his head, long strands of hair falling into his eyes.
"It's not you guys, it's me, I... I don't even know who I am anymore, and I appreciate you guys including me, but I just don't remember. I don't, I'm sorry." There were tears of anger and frustration in his eyes and no matter how much he blinked they refused to go away and it was just frustrating him more.
He felt weak, useless and stupid that he couldn't remember the easiest things. It wasn't even remotely his fault though, it was theirs, Hydra's. They're the ones who tortured him so badly that he lost every sense of who he was. He didn't have a grip on himself anymore, and sense of his own being. He knew what Hydra wanted him to know, even if it was all fake. He knew that not everything he remembered from there was real.
He could see the guilt on Steve's face, the remorse on Nat's. He just wanted to curl in on himself and stop existing for a while. He wasn't even a whole person anymore. He felt that he was much, much less than that. An object, a weight to be carried, a burden. He just wanted to be normal and he couldn't.
He was just a kid, he didn't understand why there was such a tax on happiness, a price to pay for being a part of humanity. He didn't understand how the world could be so cruel. Steve tried to say something else but Peter just insisted that he was tired and would like to lay down, politely asking if he could please be wheeled downstairs.
And Steve obliged. He wheeled the boy down to his room without qualms and left the boy there just the same. Peter was glad. He felt he could finally have a moment to breathe, despite not really doing much breathing at the moment. He felt trapped, not in this space, but in his head, in his body. He didn't know who he was or who he could be. There was a gentle flash of memory behind his eyes and he could see a healthier version of himself walking across his room.
The old him pulled aside a picture frame on the wall and opened a small hatch, then the memory was gone. Peter, more curious than ever, carefully stood from his chair and made his way to the picture. In it he saw the woman, May, then in memory, he saw her again, ripped apart and bleeding and Peter can't stand the sight and doubles over, puking all over the floor.
His light bar flashes gently to alert him that someone is coming in because of course, though she may not be speaking to Peter directly, Friday had still alerted the others to Peter's predicament. The door opens and in steps Wanda, back from shopping with Bucky who must still be upstairs.
"Oh, Peter... What happened to you? Come, sit back down." She says, and her accent is coming through and it's nice because he remembers it and it's pure. It's a sound he knew and it was embedded in his brain and it was one of the few things Hydra didn't manage to take away from him and he held onto her voice and her arms while they just sat together and waited for Bucky to finish stomping down the stairs.
As soon as he came into view in the doorway, it was like something in the room shifted and suddenly his guardian angel was watching over him, his leader, his protector. He gently asked Wanda what happened, she said she didn't know.
Peter, halfway to hysterics, pointed a shaking finger towards photo on the wall. "I saw her. She was, she was dead... Was it real?" Then, again, more desperately, "Was it real?!"
And Bucky doesn't even answer all the way and Peter knows the answer just from that and his voice is hoarse as he forces himself to keep speaking. "Oh my God. She's dead? She... I'm an orphan? Just like that? My... My whole family is gone?"
He swears that he can see tears in Bucky's eyes and he knows there are tears in Wanda's just by the way she refuses to look up from the floor. Bucky sighs and moves to stand. "I think I should go get Steve."
Peter begins pleading, voice so hoarse it hurts him to breathe but he doesn't want this to be deflected or put off any longer. She was dead and they knew and they probably weren't going to tell him for a long time, but he wanted to hear it. He wanted the truth. For once he just wanted someone to tell him the truth. So Bucky sent Wanda for Steve in his place and knelt back down in front of Peter.
"I'm sorry, маленький паук, but it's true... She's gone... And I truly think that she has been for a long time." And Bucky sounds so upset at having to tell Peter this, but it seems there was nobody else that would come clean yet, and if he was asking then it was time.
"So when I saw her there, it was real? She... Was she really there?" He rose from his chair and so did his voice, "Did they really make me see her?! Did they kill her just to make me look?!"
Peter's yelling quickly turned into heavy breathing and near sobs before Bucky could even tell him if that was the truth or not. Peter almost didn't want to hear it.
Bucky touches his knee and Peter instinctively takes a breath, allowing Bucky his chance to talk just as Wanda reappears in the door with Steve and Nat behind her.
"We found her in a room on the second basement floor... Cut open, ripped apart, whatever you will... The room she was in was cold, it slowed the decaying process, so she... Stayed... She stayed together longer, you could say... And I can't tell you why they did it, not really. I can't think of any reason more than that they wanted to get to you, and they thought she was the quickest way to make you break... And I'm so sorry that they did that to you, Peter... I can't even begin to imagine how you feel right now, and I know it hurts, but you're not alone, okay? We're all still right here for you, Peter, and we wanna do whatever we can to help you adjust to this new life, okay?"
Bucky did a glance to Steve, who just looked soft, and Nat, who looked somewhat fond. He looked back to Peter, who looked a little bit calmer now.
It would take him a long time to get over this, but at this moment, he had people with him and he would take that.