A/N: Here's Chapter 1! This has been originally published as part of my Webpril 2021 collection, but I have too many plot ideas and this fic seems perfect for it. This one will take some time to update as I'm still taking the time to finish Webpril, but make sure to follow my tumblr (same as my username here) or follow this story to make sure you don't miss the next chapter :) xx Hope you enjoy!
Peter had never thought he'd be afraid of plants. Alright, maybe poison ivy and rhubarb, but not vines of all things. He also never thought he'd see the day when plants came to life...well okay, plants were already alive, but sentient was a whole other can of worms that Peter wished was never opened.
"Remind me to add a herbicide feature to the suits next time," Tony chimed in over the comms. Peter couldn't see his whereabouts, a cloud of smoke barring his view. It seemed like no matter how many explosives or sheer blunt force they sunk into these things, they were getting nowhere.
"New York is struggling with the trees as is, Tony, I don't think we need you nuking the last patch of grass in Central Park," Clint fired back.
"Look, can we talk about saving the forests later? I could use some more hands on deck here." Steve was about a block and a half away from the rest of the team, having appointed himself to 'perimeter' duty but had soon been confronted with a writhing mass of vines that sprouted from the ground like heads sprouted from a Hydra.
Steve's request was met by an enthusiastic "coming!" from Peter, who promptly proceeded to assume the role of a modern George of the Jungle, but instead the jungle was made of concrete, and the vines were...well the vines were vines.
Peter locked on to the small speck of blue weaving in between a forest of green, and proceeded to deploy the four mechanical arms that erupted from the back of the Iron Spider. Each arm seemed to operate on Karen's schedule, but Peter couldn't complain; the AI had faster reactions than Peter ever would, and if he thought about that too much it scared him.
As each metal appendage slashed and carved its way through the thick stems, thick sap oozed out like blood, but as soon as the incisions appeared, they were gone, replaced by cell membranes that were multiplying way too fast.
"Uh, guys? This isn't working…"
"You're telling me," Clint grumbled, feeling more useless than ever. It didn't matter if his arrows were covered in acid, produced flames, or were laced with electricity - the outcome was still the same. As soon as Clint came to that realisation, he had perched himself on the balcony of a nearby highrise, not wanting to risk being caught amongst the chaos. There was many a time he wished he weren't as human. Moreso, he wished he weren't as fragile.
"Hold on, I've got this." Tony rounded the corner of the sidestreet nearest to Peter and moments later as the suit brushed past Steve, a long thin pike that exploded out from a Tylenol sized capsule dug into the ground right next to one of the vines besides Peter.
Within less than a second, Peter felt a shudder beneath the ground, followed by a geyser of dirt. The vine writhed for a moment before falling limp with a heavy thud. It suddenly looked so much smaller, no longer resembling a gigantic green tube man from outside the local car dealership.
"Well that wasn't so bad."
Peter groaned internally, not needing his Spidey Sense to tell him that those would be Tony's famous last words.
The vine began convulsing, and Peter was reminded of the nurses from Silent Hill. For a moment he wished they were; then he wouldn't have to deal with something at least half the size of his apartment building.
Rising once more to its full stature, half a dozen smaller vines broke out from the soil beneath it. Now it really resembled a Hydra.
Tony registered simultaneously the resurrection-including-birth and his position that put him at the epicentre of it all. Firing all repulsors at maximum capacity, he took off aiming vaguely for Hawkeye's vantage point on the balcony.
That would've been the plan.
One of the smaller vines had snaked its way around the suit's foot, up the ankle, and began to relentlessly squeeze. Sparks were beginning to fly out of Tony's right foot repulsor before sputtering and going dark, and in that brief window where full-flight momentum had been compromised, the vine arched back.
Peter watched with mild panic as Tony whipped into the ground with the vine still stubbornly attached. He knew the suit could handle a lot, but what he never knew - and he was fairly sure Tony didn't really know either - was if the suit was going to be able to come back to the workshop in one piece, preferably with Tony in one piece in it. And speaking of the workshop, after the dust cleared Peter's heart sunk as he took in the scuffs and the scattered uneven plates that normally fit together like a puzzle. Of course, with all of their recent calls to action over the last few days and most of the other suits undergoing major upgrades and testing during an almost two month long quiet period - which turns out was a major oversight - the only suitable suit candidate was already semi out of commission.
Tony's communications stuttered back online, jarred momentarily by the impact, and a low groan filtered over the comms.
"Tony, you alright?" Steve was almost 300-feet away, jumping back in after spending an frustratingly inordinate amount of time trying to pull an answer out of S.H.I.E.L.D who had sent a few airborne vehicles to try and scan and triangulate.
"Just. Peachy." Each word was punctuated by a forceful attempt to remove the vine's grip from the suit. Tony didn't want to admit it out loud, but the strength at which it was constricting was starting to hurt. A lot. He really didn't want to think about how much pressure the baby vine had to be exerting for him to feel it beneath the suit. He was suddenly a lot more alarmed about the larger vines.
S.H.I.E.L.D used that moment to broadcast, Nick Fury's voice filtering over the present team's radios. "I see we might have a bit of a weed problem. I would've thought gardening was a bit below the Avengers' paygrade."
"Just tell us how to get rid of these things, they're giving me the creeps." Clint broke his silence, his time surveying the convulsing vines of chaos in Central Park not bringing him any answers.
Fury was all business now. "This thing's set up camp over by the boat house to your north. Scans picked up a large form that looks like a bulb about 32-feet below the surface. Find it, kill it, and we can all go home."
"Roger that," Steve replied, shifting his shield to sit more securely. "Tony, are you rea -"
"I'm gonna need a bit. As kinky as being tied up would be in any other situation…" Tony never quite finished his thought, turning off his radio as the vine constricted once more and he gritted his teeth against the crushing pressure. More of the baby vines had seemed to smell the nearby prey and had turned their attention to his figure lying supine on the ground.
Peter winced, hearing the (almost) disguised strain in Tony's voice. The parent vine didn't seem to care about his mentor anymore, and if it had eyes, Peter was sure they'd be twinkling in a lazy kind of sadistic pleasure. It had minions to do its dirty work now.
"Alright Queens, you and I have got this." Steve looked at Peter and nodded. Clint had one arrow left and that method of attack had so far proven incredibly useless. Except…
Peter swung his way up to the balcony Clint was occupying near the East Green section of Central Park. "Hey, can I have your last boom arrow? Maybe it'll work, but I've got a plan."
Clint raised an eyebrow, loathe to give over his last projectile and cementing how inessential he had begun to feel. Pressing his lips together, he reached behind him and pulled out his last arrow. "Just press this bit in the middle of the arrowhead, okay? After that you've got about five seconds before you need to get the hell out."
"Cool, got it. Arrowhead, five seconds, run. Thanks!" And as soon as Peter had appeared, he had started his commute back towards Steve.
Tony was lying incredibly still. He discovered that if he barely twitched a muscle - which these abominations could somehow tell beneath a layer of armour - the rate at which the squeezing increased slowed down.
"Today would be great." Tony turned his head towards Steve, who had just shifted his attention to Peter who had arrived with an arrow in hand. Steve at once understood the plan.
"Hold tight, Tony." Steve's voice dripped with an authority that Tony found profoundly irritating but Peter found comforting.
"Not going anywhere, Cap."
Steve took off at a sprint next to Peter, who was using the surrounding trees and lamp posts as targets for his webs. The closer they got to the epicentre of it all, the more concentrated the vines were. What started as sporadically placed vegetation now looked more like a dense jungle.
Peter landed softly on the grass as Steve slowed to a jog. Looking up, they were confronted with a writhing mass that looked more like a Kraken than it did a plant.
As they deliberated their next course of action, Peter's blood ran cold as over the radio he heard Tony's agonised scream.