The conversation with Aunt May over the phone had gone a lot better than Peter'd honestly expected it to. Of course she lost her shit, but only mildly, as he assured her he was entirely okay and that it wasn't Spiderman related stuff, but that Katya had gotten into an accident and he was going to stay over at the compound with her for a bit. May had of course asked what kind of accident could have happened at a school dance that required surgery- which the scans had concluded she needed- but let it go when Peter told her he was really just too tired to explain it to her now.

"Do you want me to come up there and stay with you?" She'd asked, and he took a moment to consider.

"That'd actually be nice." It'd be morning soon, anyway, but he didn't know how long it'd be until he could see Katya. "Love you, Aunt May."

"Love you too Pete."

About an hour later- the sun had just started to creep through the windows, the palest of pinks-

Aunt May came down the hallway, armed with a bag of bagels and arms open for a hug, which Peter immediately stood up to sink into.

"I'm so sorry about Katya," she told him, letting him bury his face in her shoulder. "Any news on how she is?"

Peter pulled away and nodded, exhaustion tugging at his eyes. "She's out of the OR and she's stable, for now, they said, but she's still under." Peter felt like he was in one of those medical soap operas, with how surreal this all felt. "They're going to bring her in here in a second-" he gestured towards the empty hospital bed in the room closest to them, "and then we can go in."

Aunt May went in for a second hug, catching him off guard this time. "Oh, Pete," her voice was soft. Peter could feel the bagels poking through the bag into his chest. He'd already cried so much. "I'm just so glad you're okay."

"You can thank her for that," he said, hollowly, tugging the bag of bagels from between them. Aunt May released him. "She took the hit that was meant for me."

Aunt May didn't do very well to hide the relief that flooded her face, but then, as if on second thought, added, "Doesn't she know that one of your-" she wiggled her fingers at him "Spider-powers is that you heal quickly?". Peter just stared at the bagels and nodded.

"Oh," Aunt May said softly. As if she didn't know what else to do with herself, she tugged Peter by the hand back over to the bench he'd been waiting on so they could both sit down. "I, erm, just got a dozen because I didn't know who would be here and what everyone liked, so-they're assorted, and there's cream cheese-"

Peter's smile was wan, but still there. "Thanks Aunt May. Mr. Stark came by for a while and no doubt-" Peter looked up for a moment, as if he was trying to find one of the cameras, though he never could- "Is watching all of this from somewhere, and Happy came by a few times. Now that it's morning I expect we might have some help with these." He gave a hollow laugh, lifting the bagel bag up slightly. He hadn't eaten in over twelve hours, so he grabbed one, though he wouldn't have been able to identify a hunger cue at the moment if he tried.

Peter was well on his way into his second bagel, just dipping it whole into one of the cream cheese tubs, staring at nothing, really, when medical assistants wheeled Katya into the glass room before them. They adjusted her oxygen tube and reattached a bunch of wires they'd brought with them, already stuck to her by heart monitor stickers and such, to the machine above her bed. Peter stood up so quickly he knocked over the rest of the bagels. One of the assistants remained behind, plugging some information into a laptop on a wheeled stand, as Peter let himself into the room.

"We can come in now, right?" He asked her, still holding half a garlic bagel in his hand. The assistant looked at him quizzically but nodded.

"All her vitals are on that screen, and we're monitoring them, but as you can see she's stable. The anesthetic should wear off soon, and she'll wake up." The assistant's tone was upbeat, which did help lift Peter's spirits

Despite the front being made of glass, which made Peter feel very much like they were in a fishbowl, the rest of the room was furnished sparingly, as any civilian hospital room seemed it would be- Peter didn't spend a lot of time in hospitals- though there were hinged cabinets with coded locks on the back wall labeled for things such as 'Radioactive Substances' 'Biochemical Waste' and 'Misc/ Unidentified. Tech.". But there was a couch, and a recliner, and one of those rolling tables meant to wheel up to the bed so the person in it could use the tabletop.

Peter couldn't help the ache in his chest when he looked at her. Her hair had been washed- or, upon second glance, shaven from the nape to where the crack in her skull had been, halfway up the back of her head, but you couldn't tell that from the front unless you were really looking (which of cours, Peter was.) He had a feeling Katya'd like that, when she'd notice it. Kind of like a badass undercut, which fit her perfectly.

She was in a hospital gown with the blankets pulled up to her shoulders, though, so he couldn't see much more than that. She just looked so small, drowning between the web of wires attached to her and the empty bed, all alone, and unconscious. He'd seen Katya sleep before- when she'd 'lose' their nightly game and fall asleep on Facetime first- and this was nothing like that. Her brows were knit, her forehead wrinkled- something, probably her hand, jerked underneath the sheets- she was clearly troubled. Maybe she was having a nightmare.

Aunt May had collected the bagels back into their bag and slowly made her way in as Peter shot towards the chair nearest Katya's bedside. He dug through the blankets a bit until he could find her hand and froze- it was restrained with a heavy, leather belt to the bedframe underneath the mattress. Peter looked to Aunt May helplessly, as if she would know the answer, before looking back down at Katya's hand. Was this normal?

Regardless, there was enough room around it that he could hold her hand, which he did, taking another quick bite of the bagel, and finishing it with three more. The assistant had said 'any minute now', but it'd already been ten, so she technically hadn't been wrong, but Peter was growing frustrated.

Katya's hand twitched in his again, a bit more violently this time. She was clearly having a nightmare, but maybe she was that much closer to waking up? "Hey," he leant forward to whisper in her ear softly. "I"m here, myshka, It's pauchok, I've got you-"

Mr. Stark came flying in, an assistant wheeling the laptop as best she could alongside her as she jogged behind him. He addressed Peter. "Kid, help me get those restraints off before she wakes up."

Peter wanted to ask what, wanted to ask why, he had so many questions and working with such little information all night had begun to wear on him, but he sprung into action and began to unbuckle the one around the wrist he was holding as Mr. Stark started hurriedly working on the ones around her feet.

"Mr. Stark, what's going on?"

He'd gotten one off, and was working on the other foot. The assistant was hurriedly unbuckling the one around Katya's other hand, and told the room, "There's one across her chest and abdomen as well."

Peter flung back the blankets until he could find the belt around her chest and made to undo those, too- these were heavy buckles, they realized Katya wasn't the Hulk, right? Had there been some sort of confusion?

"Let's just say I just learned some very pertinent information that would make these very dangerous." Mr. Stark answered, finally, before helping Peter work on the one on her abdomen. They had to be careful with that one, as it was flush with the new bandages that covered what were no doubt a flurry of stitches.

"Dangerous? How could these be dangerous?"

But Mr. Stark didn't answer him, peeling the rest of the blankets all the way back so that Katya's full body was exposed. There were two around her thighs, as well- Peter set to work on those.

"Forgot about those." the assistant said, sheepishly. "Sorry, Mr. Stark."

Mr. Stark didn't acknowledge her, just started unbuckling the restraints from the bed themselves. "Get these out of here before she wakes up." He told the assistant, shoving them to her chest. Peter did the same to the few nearest to him, and handed them to Mr. Stark, who added it to the growing pile in the medical assistant's arms. She nodded, and scurried out of the room.

Mr. Stark visibly relaxed, then, with a sigh, before seemingly spotting Aunt May for the first time. 'Oh, good morning Mrs. Parker. Are those bagels?" He didn't wait for an answer before rooting around the bag for one, which he also ate raw like Peter had, studying Katya's unconscious form in front of them.

Peter leaned over to pull the blankets back over her- she had to be cold- before addressing Mr. Stark directly. "What's going on?"

"Is there any, like, schmear for this-?" Mr. Stark asked, looking back into the bag and grabbing the half-eaten tub Peter had been using before, prying it open with his free hand and scooping some out as if his bagel were a spoon. Aunt May was still taken aback by everything that'd just happened.

"Apparently in the OR they had some trouble getting her to go under-" Peter didn't know if Mr. Stark was being intentionally vague for Aunt May's benefit or if that's just all the information he was willing to give at the moment. "So I took a look into her old files- you know the ones-" he sent Peter A Look. So this was for Aunt May's benefit, "And it just suggested that she'd be kept out of restraints. It's not the doctor's fault, they didn't know." But they were lucky, Peter could've sworn he heard Mr. Stark mumble through his next bite of bagel.

He must've meant the files Katya'd been talking about the other day, Dreykov's old information. But why would there be information about restraining her? Peter still had no clue what went on in the Red Room, not for sure, and he didn't know if he'd ever know, but the way Mr. Stark was phrasing it made it sound like it was for their safety, not hers. A part of him that he didn't want to acknowledge was itching to get a hold of those files for himself. Just to see what everyone was talking about.

It took another few, long, minutes , but Katya finally began to stir, her eyebrows still knitted. She blinked, blearily and Peter scooted closer. "Myshka!" he said brightly, the exhausted stress he'd been harboring all night- and morning- seemingly melting away with his surprisingly-even to him- upbeat tone. "Good morning!"

"Pauchok?" She asked blearily, taking a few heavy blinks to re-orient herself. She looked down at herself, tugging the blanket off her chest to reveal the hospital gown and all the heart monitor stickers underneath, and glanced to her right, where she still had an IV in. She sat up so suddenly that her head hit Peter's and he flinched, hissing in pain. Before he could say anything, she'd ripped the heart monitor stickers from her chest and was tugging at her IV before Mr. Stark ran to her other side.

"Katya!" He said, his voice stern and raised, but not angry. "You're in New York, you're at the Avenger's compound-" he clamped a hand around where her IV was but she'd already tugged it free, slipping it underneath the tape meant to hold it in place so that she could do so with his hand still around her arm. She batted at the oxygen tube, ripping it from her face, the monitor behind them going haywire as everything got disconnected. "Dammit- Katya!" Mr. Stark leaned forward and slapped her on the forehead. "Look around!"

She'd scrambled as far into the crux of the incline of the bed as she could go and did so, and Peter recognized that gaze- the empty, vacant gaze he'd seen from her a couple of times, like back at Liz's party, or when he'd walked in on her training herself. Peter reached forward and squeezed her free hand. "Myshka, it's me. You're at the Avenger's compound. You're safe." He stood up so he could wrap his arms around her in a hug, rubbing small circles in her back. "It's okay, it's me, you're okay. I've got you." He didn't care that Mr. Stark was watching them warily, or that Aunt May was recovering from the squeal she'd let out when Katya had jumped into action- he just focused on taking long, deep breaths, and keeping constant pressure around her shoulders and chest- careful not to mess with anything that was bandaged up. "You're free. You're safe."

It took long moments, but soon Katya's haggard breathing was beginning to mirror his own, intentionally slowed, deep breaths. He pulled away. "You see?"

Most of that vacant stare was gone, replaced by the mischievous gaze he knew so well. Peter's chest swelled with relief. She nodded, then smiled. "Hi, pauchok."

He kissed her lightly on the nose.

From her other side, his hand still clamped to her arm, Mr. Stark made an exaggerated gagging noise. "Okay, well now that that' settled-" the machine was still going haywire behind them, which must have paged the medical assistants as three of them flew into the room. "Katya, you're in the hospital wing of the Avenger's compound, and these people are going to hook you back up to that thing there-" he pointed to the monitor in active conniptions, "So that we make sure you stay okay. You just had a big operation, where they had to stitch you up- there are no trackers, I promise, I'll come show you in a second- but first we need to get this IV back into you before you ruin my shirtsleeve."

Peter glanced at the hand in question and realized that, despite the tape, without a tourniquet her arm was bleeding freely, and it was beginning to seep through Mr. Stark's fingertips.

"Okay?"

Katya narrowed her eyes in suspicion but nodded.

"And I'm going to be here the entire time." Peter added, squeezing her free hand again. He could see her shoulders relax a bit at that.

"...Okay." She sounded skeptical, but nonetheless allowed the assistance to swarm her momentarily to replace everything she'd ripped off.

Peter spotted Happy outside the glass , talking with Mr. Stark, who was wiping his hands off into a towel he'd somehow procured. "Hey, Aunt May, Happy's over there, maybe he wants a bagel?"

Aunt May nodded, still visibly shaken, and left the room, bagels in tow.

It took a moment after the medical assistants left for Katya to be able to fully relax - or, as much as she could. She was still clearly uncomfortable with all the wires attached to her.

"You're still in the same clothes from the Snowball," She told Peter after she'd scanned him with her eyes, "How long has it been?"

Peter shook his head blearily, a laugh escaping. Of all the things to focus on. "Just overnight, and whatever time it is now in the morning."

"You didn't want to go home and change?"

"And leave you here?!" All the stress of the night seemed to eke out in that sentence, and Katya shot up. The beeping on the heart rate monitor increased in both volume and frequency. Peter winced. "I"m sorry, I didn't mean to sound so snappish. But I wasn't going to leave you here by yourself, Katya. Do you remember what happened?"

Katya heaved a heavy sigh and nodded. "Yeah. I fucked up big time."

"No, I fucked up big time. I should've never asked you to leave that tracker. I'm sorry that I did- we would've seen her coming, and at least have been able to avoid…some of this." he gestured to the room around her. Her eyes widened.

"Wait, where is it now?"

"Where did you leave it yesterday?"

"It should be at my bedside table-" She made to sit up, and groaned in frustration when she realized she couldn't get out of bed with everything attached to her.

"It's okay, I can get it. Seventh floor, three doors down, right?" He asked with a smile, even though he already knew the answer. She nodded.

"I'll be right back."

—- —-

He'd never actually been in her room before, but it was about what he expected. The same posh motif as the rest of the compound, but he noted the german ivy above her bed and the oxalis at her windowsill.

I'll buy you all the plants you want. We can make your whole room a garden.

All her school stuff was dumped by or on her desk, and her bedside table-

There were a couple books stacked up and an empty glass, but the tracker sat in the middle of it all. He grabbed it, glanced at it- the tracker said Aneszka wasback at her apartment building- and brought it back down to the med floor.

When he got back, Mr. Stark was there, showing her a holograph of what seemed to be scan of her own body, projected by his watch face.

"You had organ damage here, and here, so they fixed that up-" he pointed to a couple spots on the scan, which Peter couldn't identify off of the top of his head, "and this-" Mr. Stark ran his finger down the transposed perforated line on the scan, "is where they stitched you up. You've got a bunch of stitches underneath those bandages, but look-" he enlarged the image, and pressed something on it that made it the interface red, though nothing changed in the scan itself. "No trackers or anything of any kind. Okay? You gotta trust me on this."

Katya nodded warily. "Okay. Thanks, Tony." She picked at a thread at the blankets covering her legs, "Sorry I freaked out."

Mr. Stark tapped his watchface and the hologram disappeared. He ruffled her hair affectionately. "No worries kid, I know it was confusing."

Katya grumbled something at her feet for a moment before glancing back up, making eye contact with Peter, who held up the tracker. "Pauchok!" She grinned.

Peter made his way over to the edge of the bed and sat down, tossing the tracker onto her lap. "She's in the same place as always."

Katya glared at the interface of the tracker as if it had done her a personal wrong, but kept it in her lap.

Peter scooted closer to her, until he could delicately move the wires enough to lay down next to her. He glanced up at the monitor momentarily, not that he knew what most of it meant, but some of it was labeled pretty plainly. Her heart rate was still elevated,which was he guess to be expected, even when she turned to snuggle in his arms as best she could. He could feel her wince beside him as she moved- the pain meds must be wearing off, and he hoped she would get more soon, because it hurt him to know she was hurting.

They laid like that for a while, the only interruption being a nurse coming to bring her some sort of meal replacement drink, since the surgery had been mostly abdominal and she wasn't allowed to eat solids yet, ("I wanted a bagel, dammit," she'd grumbled) and to remove the oxygen tube from her face and replace it instead with a clamp around her finger. Now that she knew that she was safe, and okay, and- for the most part- healthy and recovering well, Peter could feel the rest of his adrenaline slipping away and the exhaustion from the night overtake him.

He only knew he'd fallen asleep because the next thing he knew he was being gently shaken awake by Aunt May. "Lets head home for a bit and get you some clothes and a shower," she said, he voice low, as Peter realized Katya was sleeping next to him, "We can come right back afterwards."

He glanced towards Katya, who's sleep still looked troubled, and reluctantly untangled himself from the wires. Aunt May looked better, but still somewhat shaken. He squeezed her hand. "Thanks, Aunt May." And they left to go do just that.