"Where the hell is he?" A voice asked calmly, anger fueling the tone.
"What? Who? Who is this?" Tony returned the confused look Pepper gave him from the interruption to their argument.
"Don't you "who is this" me. I have called every police station I know, every friend he has and every parent of those friends. I even asked his damn teachers! Now you tell me what stupid "retreat" you've got my boy on now"
"Wait is this May?"
"Yes!" Her calm state fell apart.
Tony's eyes went wide and his hand instantly jerked the phone away from his ear "Wow" He mouthed to his unimpressed fiancé. Then suddenly the reality hit him "Are you saying that Peter is missing?" He became uncomfortably rigid and serious as he asked, his eyes darting around the room as he thought.
"So he's not with you?" May countered, anger dissipating to worry.
"No. No we haven't been in contact for a while now. How-how long has he been missing?"
"He hasn't been answering my texts since 7:46 last night"
Fifteen hours and fourteen minutes "Uh.. Was he out as Spiderman then?"
"I can't be sure. He doesn't really stop to tell me these things"
"Uh okay. Well, look, I'll-I'll find him, alright? He'll be back home before you know it"
"Okay" May answered unsurely.
"Okay, goodbye May" Tony finished in a rush before ending the call.
"What's going on?" Pepper's voice had an edge to it.
"The kid's missing" Tony didn't wait for Pepper to say anything back, but she was probably halfway through something anyway when he started walking, or jogging really, out of the room.
The left-behind red-head stared off in annoyance and surprise for a moment, then quickly followed the trail her fiancé just took.
Tony started up Friday, eagerly giving orders on finding the boy he'd encouraged to become a hero.
The computer worked quickly and the A.I explained at an equal speed. The map zoomed until a deserty looking area popped up. There were cliffs lining the background and a darkness that must've been a caved in point. As the image continued to become more apparent, the darkness could definitely be identified as an entrance to inside the cliff. And that was where the tracker signal was coming from.
So if the tracker was working, why hadn't Tony received a signal when the kid got taken so far from his home city? The billionaire couldnt figure that puzzle out, but he was insanely thankful of the tracker still being in place. Well why wouldn't it be if Peter didn't even know it had been put there after he removed the last one? All guilty conscience of that move was immediately released now that Tony had proof of the tracker being useful. He didn't know what predicament Spiderman was in, but after over fifteen hours with barely any recorded movement, the kid definitely needed help.
Tony thanked Friday out of habit, rushing back out to collect his suit. Pepper was standing behind him now, looking worried, but Tony wasn't concerned with her at that point. Because if anything had happened to that boy...
"Tony!"
The billionaire stopped with a sigh and turned around, eyes near pleading "What?"
"You're just running in blind?"
"Whoever took Spiderman has had a fifteen year old boy at their mercy for over fifteen hours. You know how much can happen in fifteen hours? A lot! A lot can happen. And if he's dead-" Tony's voice broke on him.
Pepper gave an understanding nod and Tony took that moment to leave. When had he become so attatched to that kid? They both wondered.
"Stop. Please, just stop" Peter kept his eyes closed and didn't bother lifting his head. In all honesty, he didn't think he had the strength to anymore "I can't... I can't" He whispered brokenly.
All snarky comments and sarcastic comebacks had been taken out of him at this point. He just wanted the pain to stop. He just wanted to go home.
Cold fingers pressed underneath his chin, gently forcing his head up. He wanted to keep his eyes closed but he couldn't hold back the instinct to open them.
The eyes his met were full of concern, and he felt sick immediately. He knew he shouldn't have pleaded like that. What was going on in that man's mind, Peter was scared to know.
"Of course, of course" Even the voice he put on sounded concerned.
Peter closed his eyes again, fear clenching his heart. He couldn't escape, he knew that. The pain was inevitable at this point. Breathing hurt, thinking hurt, there was nothing that eased it, sleep barely seemed to help.
The footsteps of his personal prison guard (and torturer on the side) stopped behind him "I'll just cut you down, alright?" The sincere way he said it almost made Peter feel hopeful until he realized again that it was all a play to make him feel exactly that way.
A burning sensation impacted each shoulderblade, rippling through the rest of his body and hurting worse along the areas of his skin covered by water, which at this point was a fair amount with all the water the damp cave had falling from the roof above him. His scream still managed to sound strong when the rest of him couldn't be. He was sure that pleased the bastard doing this to him.
When the feeling died down, Peter let his weight fall further, now almost fully relying on the chains hoisting his arms up to keep the rest of him up too. His legs had gone weak long ago, but he'd been managing to stay standing for a while, despite the shallow puddle of water beneath his feet. Or the shallow puddle of water that had been beneath his feet, but was now more accurately beneath his knees.
The chains tugged on his arms, pulling the muscles and causing extra, unnecessary pain. But he was too tired to care anymore. Besides, it was a lot easier to bear than anything else he was experiencing.
The bad guy started laughing as he paced back to the front view of his captive. Peter stared up defiantly, but it wasn't nearly as powerful as it had been at the beginning of this.
When was the beginning of this? Had anyone noticed he was missing yet? How worried would Aunt May be? Or Ned? Would anyone else care?
"You're actually pathetic, you know? When I was put after the Spiderman I was really expecting a lot more of a challenge. But you, you're just some stupid kid who's too righteous to know better"
"Are you ever going to let me go?" Peter asked wearily.
"Oh eventually, I'm sure. But I do enjoy this a little too much to let it go so soon"
Peter looked up hopelessly, his eyes dull but still full of plea "I'm fifteen"
"I'm aware" Bad Guy's voice matched to the same tone his little spider had used, though with some sarcasm easily laced through.
Peter hung his head in reply.
He didn't know what to do anymore. He'd already tried to escape, but the chains were too heavy and tight, his webshooters (and all other tech pieces for that matter) were gone and, well, he really didn't have much else to try out. Not now anyway, before he could've managed a few extra tricks. He'd have done them too, if Bad Guy hadn't always either been watching him or hurting him.
Now he didn't even need to be supervised because he was too damn weak to help himself. He knew his body was doing its best, but it just wasn't enough when his brain was screaming for results.
"So what haven't we done yet? Electrocution, waterboarding, boxing lessons, kickboxing lessons, little bit of construction work..." Peter winced at the way his sufferings were described, the pain enhancing upon each recollection of when it first started "Exotic and diverse materials used for the purposes of a piñata stick. Hmm... What else can we try? Any suggestions? If not I suppose we can just go back to some other things. You didn't seem fond of the bamboo stick afterall"
The bruises on his torso and face seemed to pulse more excessively with pain at the reminder.
"How do you feel about a knife? Or a whip maybe? I don't really wanna damage that neat suit of yours, but I'm beginning to forgot what it sounds like to hear you scream, and we simply can't have that, not when it's such a beautiful scream"
Peter cringed in frightened anticipation of what was going to happen next. What terrible torture was there for him now? And what did he ever do to earn himself such a fate? ...Was this going to kill him?
A blinding light shook Peter out of his little world, the heat and sound that followed scaring the hell out of him, and again he tried to find a way out knowing full well he couldn't.
When the effects died down, Bad Guy was slumped against the other wall, his head against his rising chest. Still alive then, which Peter was honestly considering to be unfortunate. The guy happily took to torturing a fifteen year old, did he really deserve to live?
The weight of the chains suddenly fell and Peter's body followed the example. He never hit the ground though, but being caught by metal arms wasn't much less painful. He grimaced at the nausea starting in his stomach as the metal arms that caught him pushed him back up into a kneeling/sitting position. He still rocked a little and Iron Man never let go of his shoulder as to keep him in place.
"Mr Stark" Peter greeted quietly. Was the room getting darker? And what were all those spots clogging up his vision? "How...?" He trailed off when his mind slipped away from his grasp and sent him into the realm of unconsciousness.
Tony quickly grabbed the teen's other shoulder and pulled him into the suits chestplate. The older man stared out of his suit sorrowfully, his grip tightening around the boy. Looking around the room and having seen the state of Peter, Tony felt like his heart had just been torn out. There was some definite blood spatters and pools throughout the room, but it was clearest on the weapons held by one of the room's corners. And there were a lot of weapons there. Mostly blunt force trauma causing weapons, like bats and hammers, though a bamboo stick was what looked like it had the most blood on it.
Cautiously, hyperly-aware of Peter's conditions, Tony maneuvered the boy into a position that he could safely carry him in, with the least risk of extra injury or pain if he needed to run and for when he started flying.
Peter was a pretty fair distance from anywhere too, so flying was unavoidable. Tony wished he had found the kid sooner, but then he'd never even known that Peter had disappeared.
" 'M sorry" Peter's soft and tired voice broke the silence and stole Tony's attention for a moment. But the kid quickly passed back out.
Fixing his grip again, Iron Man boosted off the gritty ground surrounding the cave like lair, and shot off into the night sky desperate to fly faster than his suit could manage.
"It's okay" Tony whispered repeatedly in his mind to try and keep himself calm.
So I watched Spiderman Homecoming recently. I'll save the fangirling and simply stick to the basic "It was fucking fantastic and my life is now complete and I'd watch it again in a heartbeat and if you haven't seen it go right now" Yeah, that's the incredibly short version of what I have to say so anyway, for some reason, this idea popped up after watching it and so I just had to write it down. ...I don't need to explain how my sick mind works to you...
But hope you like this chapter anyway. It'll probably be a short two-three shot but then again I can be very quick to change my mind and find a new idea to add in. Stay tuned peeps!
This is IFandomTooMuch, signing off
