A Familiar Face
Where was he?
Memory.
Consciousness.
Vision.
All cloudy.
Torrents of sound like ultrasonic waves roar from a speaker in the center of Peter's brain.
His head hurts.
Or should he say... the pain is coming from behind his eyes?
It's as if hundreds of long needles continually stab through his brain.
Can brains even feel pain?
"Aagh, waahhh!"
It's not just pain.
Pain, shivering, and itchiness.
Like his whole body is on fire.
Peter wants to take off his skull and tear out the brain.
His head's going crazy, driven by various impulses...
Who am I?
He struggles to breathe.
Almost suffocating.
Needs oxygen.
Pain, shivering, itchiness.
He then notices an abhorrent groan. Only seconds later, he discovers the sound is seeping from his very own throat.
Trying to stop, Peter instead dives into a fit of hellacious coughing and wheezing.
The insides of his throat feel as if they're completely set ablaze. He desperately attempts to inhale air through the coughing and spluttering.
It hurts.
He's drenched in sweat.
The drops hanging off his forehead are irritating. Peter wants to wipe them all away.
He tries with the back of his right hand. The appendage moves, slowly, and fulfills his wish.
Peter's bodily senses are far from normal. Right now, his body feels one beat off from his will, as if it's not his own body.
As if his nerves aren't communicating properly with his extremities.
He tries blinking slowly. It might just be his imagination.
Am I just tired?
The words flutter through his brain.
I have been working long nights, to be fair.
Timidly, Peter attempts to move his hand again.
It doesn't feel out of place this time.
This is his body.
"Peter? You listening?"
A familiar voice.
Peter takes the earphones slowly from his head, placing them back into their original spot.
He turns to face the voice.
Tony.
He gives Peter a perplexed look.
"What happened, kid? You suddenly yelled."
What's he talking about? Peter questions silently.
"You feeling bad?" Tony prods.
Peter tries answering, though his voice doesn't cooperate. Bewildered, Peter clears his throat several times and attempts to speak again.
"I - I'm fine. I think."
Tony eyes him cautiously. "What were you doing with the Time Leap Machine?"
Peter blanks.
What?
"N-nothing?"
Tony shakes his head, defeated. "Alrighty then. Anyway," he turns, grabbing a wrench from a nearby work bench, "you still okay with the plan?"
Peter's heart wilts.
"Plan?"
"Yeah," Tony's perplexed eyes look over Peter once more. "The plan. I'm gonna head over to Horizon to grab the compressor. Remember?'
Peter almost chokes.
He digs into his brain for memories.
Like a chain reaction, several scenes, several words, several smells...
... flash back into his mind at one singular instant.
"JARVIS and I - we - we're locked out of my Tower. I can't contact Bruce."
"SHIELD's been compromised. I need to save Bruce. Peter - Peter, you need to stay alive."
"The new director - Pearce - is Hydra."
"PETER! THE MACHINE!"
Tony's death.
Peter remembers.
He remembers it all.
He time leaped.
"Where is this?" he speaks quietly.
"Huh?" is Tony's confused response.
Peter grabs the older man's shoulders and draws near.
"What time is it now?! What month? What day? What time?!"
"H-hey, ouch! Calm down, kiddo!"
Bruce runs into the lab.
"What's happened? Tony, you- Peter?!"
Relinquishing his grip on Tony, Peter turns to Bruce.
"What time is it today?! What's the date?!"
Bruce hurriedly checks his watch.
I-It's the eighteenth, a little past five in the afternoon."
... the eighteenth?
Avengers Tower... is attacked tonight.
Bruce is captured.
Tony is killed.
What is this?!
Was the Time Leap Machine... successful?
Peter remembers his webshooters can also provide the time and date.
Frantically activating the function, he stares hard at the numbers.
Dec 18th. 5:14pm.
Around four hours until Tony is killed.
"Y-you guys. You-"
The words don't come out.
Beneath his feet the concrete floor felt soft, not as much as even a firm carpet, but not right for cement.
Peter staggered to the edge of the room, his jeans brushing against the hard wall. It was suddenly difficult to make out the details of the laboratory.
He attempted to walk towards the older figures, though he didn't make the first step. Staggering backward, his mind swirling, his breathing shallow until Peter finally hit the floor.
xxx
He wakes with a start.
Bruce hurries over.
"How's your temperature, Pete? Lemme have a look-"
Peter stands without giving Bruce the chance, his feet wobbly.
"N-no. Bruce, you gotta leave."
"What? What's wrong?"
Before he can answer, Peter notices the darkness of the room.
The sun has fallen. Night has invaded.
"Where's Tony?"
"Left a few minutes ago to get the compressor."
"Sh-shit," Peter can hardly breathe.
It seems the Time Leap Machine packs a rather unsavory punch.
"Peter, if you just tell me what the problem is, I will do everything in my admittedly large range of power to fix it."
Their eyes lock, and Peter's trepidation almost fades completely in favor of steely determination.
"The Tower's gonna be attacked! Soon! Y-you'll be captured and Tony will - s-shit-"
Bruce prods further, his brows burrowed into a deathly frown.
"Tony will what, Peter?"
The younger boy shakes his head. "It doesn't matter. We need to lock the Tower do-"
His sentence is cut in half - a reflection of the sudden power cut to Avenger's Tower.
"No, no, no, no-"
The room is enveloped in darkness.
Both Peter and Bruce shoot their eyes to the doorway leading into the outside hall.
Several red beams flash in and out of existence. Laser sights.
Guns.
"Looks like the cavalry is here," Bruce mutters, slowly pulling his glasses from his eyes.
"Bruce - Bruce, it's too late. There's too many out there. You were captured last time, and they'll find some way to do it again.
Bruce visibly wilts.
"What do we do?" he whispers.
Peter can sense the tension in his voice, however hard he attempts to hide it.
What was there to do?
Fight until death?
Or...
"The Time Machine. You gotta send me back! Tony activated it last time, but - but I blacked out. I couldn't save you."
Bruce nods, thinking. "We won't be the only Avengers targeted. It's safe to assume every other member is currently in one situation or another. They've found a perfect opportunity to break us." He turns back to Peter. "The compressor isn't inside yet, but we have no other choice. I'll calibrate the Machine to send you back as far as it'll allow without the compressor. You should have a day or two, at best. If it works, that is."
Peter nods.
He hears footsteps growing closer in the hallway.
"Do it. I'm ready."
Bruce hurries to the contraption, his head low.
Faintly tapping several keys, he audibly curses and turns back to Peter.
"It's unstable. Too dangerous. I can't let you-"
His eyes widen.
Tranquilisers.
Several dozen.
All slam into his chest, piercing the skin.
He mouths something to Peter.
Peter doesn't understand any of it.
Instead, he rushes to the machine.
He slams the earphones over his ears.
He feels bullets enter his body.
He screams.
Once again, a black void consumes him.
Peter time leaps...
... now with a plan.
To save his friends.
To stop Hydra from securing the world.
All he needs to do...
...is find every member of the Avengers...
...and save them.
xxx
