sixty-three.
Eight days after Peter's rescue and he's spent the last four in bed mourning for a family that was taken from him before he even had the chance to remember them properly. The memories have been coming back in groups for the last few days, handfuls of his old life here and there. He remembers sitting down at a table in a restaurant sharing pointless banter. He remembers being taught to tie a tie, to tie his shoes, to write in cursive.
He remembers a super-soaker fight in the fifth grade. He remembers being given money for school trips, even when money was tight. He remembers being her number one priority... And it was all taken away. He'll never have those things again... She won't ever have those things. Hydra took all that she was. All she could've been... Gone.
He remembered a church and a casket and people dressed in black and the photo of a man. He remembered May crying over him, whoever he was. He could see the little church from the street and knew that was the place they needed to have May's funeral. It felt right. Having to bury her, though... That was wrong.
He remembered a large apartment building and a door on one of the upper floors and he wanted to go there. The last time he went somewhere alone, he ended up not coming back, so it made sense when he made himself sit up and call for Wanda on his watch.
She'd been staying with him in his room while Tony helped renovate an apartment for her too, but as of right now she was upstairs. As it rang, he could hear May's voice and he could feel that he was zoning out but he couldn't stop it. Distantly he could hear Wanda's voice, but when he blinked he was no longer in his room, but back with Hydra.
He could still feel the barrel of Rumlow's gun on his back as they turned the corner. It's the first time he's been out of his room in days, but this was a different floor, so Peter could only imagine where he was being led. He wasn't going to ask, lest Rumlow just pull the trigger... Not that it wouldn't be a welcome death at this point.
They stopped at a heavy looking set of metal doors. The moment one of them opened, he was literally shoved through. He tripped and fell onto the floor into a small puddle of blood. Slowly, he looked up from the floor and saw a woman chained to a table, and she cried out for him like she knew who he was and maybe she did. But he didn't. He stood and tried to pull her restraints, but nothing happened.
Spinning around, he dared stare Rumlow down. The only experiment brave enough to do so. "What the hell is this?"
The scarred man only laughed. "This is what's left of your blood family, Parker. Reduced to nothing more than an experiment, like you. She's about to make her final effort."
Peter was quick to understand what he meant by 'final'. They were going to kill her. They were going to kill her and he was the only one with a chance to save her. It was confirmed to be the truth when Rumlow spoke again.
"This is the only chance to save her, Parker. If you fail, she dies." With that, he turned and left, leaving Peter alone with the woman he didn't remember. Despite that, he knew that he had to try, or else she would die and it would be on him. Her death would be on his hands and he knew it even now that it would probably end up that way.
The moment the door closed, he rushed to try and free her from her bonds. The bonds, of course, wouldn't budge. He wasn't strong enough to take them apart. He kept telling her that he would get her out, but the whole time she was protesting.
"Peter, no. Peter, stop this. Peter please, don't try and free me. Peter if you free me, they'll kill you!" She cried, but he couldn't stop. She was innocent in all of this, she didn't deserve to die, that much he knew. She never did anything to deserve this, she was a kind person. She didn't deserve to die.
"I don't care if they kill me! You're innocent!" He continued to fight the restraints, but they were solid and refused to budge. He began looking around the room, looking to find something, anything to help. There wasn't much around the room, but in a cabinet, he found some of the same tools that Rumlow kept in the room that he made Peter torture himself.
He took a scalpel and tried to cut away at the cuffs. The leather was thick so it would take a while to get through and he didn't know how long they had. With one cuff broken and one arm freed, Peter thought she would take to fighting against the other restraints but she didn't. She just reached out and touched his face. The softest touch he'd felt in months.
"Peter, leave me. You have to get out of here. You have to save yourself, please! You have to go!" She just kept pleading as he shook his head.
"No, you're innocent, I can't leave you. You don't deserve this..."
When he looked up, Wanda was with him, and she looked worried as all hell. He assured her that he was fine, but now he was just tired and he was sorry for calling her all the way down here for nothing. She doesn't believe him, but doesn't press, instead insisting that he could call whenever he needed, even if it really was nothing, and she would be there.