*glances at calendar* Huh, interesting.

*stares at last update date* Oh... it's been ten days. Whoops.

2 AM came all too quickly, as far as Peter was concerned. But, nevertheless, he stood at attention in the gear room as soon as he heard the elevator approaching. He'd only had just over two hours to prepare, though that was more than enough for Weaver to prepare for the hit. His dark red, dark blue, and black suit was filled to the brim with contraptions in hidden pockets and in a belt around his waist. His web-shooters were fully stocked and replacements were tucked away in a band around the wrist. An assortment of knives, daggers, and throwing stars adorned his pockets and were strapped to his skin underneath. A nanite housing unit was attached to the small of his back, ready for action in case he needed it as a last-minute weapon. The reinforced spandex and body armor underneath helped conceal the fact that he was armed to the teeth in weaponry. While he'd had the time, he also went and upgraded some of the technology he had implemented into the suit to help with his hacking endeavors. From what intel Peter could gather, the Compound had an AI that monitored the premises at all times. It would be much more difficult to get past than the simple mainframes he was used to.

He was a bit alarmed to note that there were more than just his handlers coming down to greet him. A small group of eleven emerged from the elevators; his three handlers and eight goons, from what he could tell. Scrappy had a smug grin on his ratty face, Hornet (the handler who handled his torture sessions and also held the brunt of Peter's fear and anger) held the god awful whistle in his hands, and Ace had a small frown on his face. Peter felt his heart sink. This didn't bode well for him. He couldn't help the pang of anxiety that bubbled from his chest at this assortment. His senses were on edge; there was danger, but he couldn't place where it was. Then again, he had learned to repress that sensation years ago. He was always in danger here and only really heeded it when it was stronger.

Hornet lifted the whistle to his lips and blew into it for ten long seconds. The noise grated on Peter's ears and burrowed into his skull, effectively clearing his mind and giving him a clean slate. A part of Peter had been prepared for the inevitable when he had noticed the specialized whistle. They had learned it was the most portable torture device in their arsenal that worked so well that it made him susceptible to whatever they said after they blew into it for long enough. As his mind short-circuited, a fleeting realization hit him. Whatever they were about to ask of him required his complete and total compliance. Otherwise, they wouldn't have used the whistle.

Noting the blank look on both Peter's face and eyes, Hornet dropped the device from his lips, grinning. Ace adjusted the tie he was wearing before clearing his throat. "Weaver, there has been a change of plans." His lead handler murmured, before giving the floor to Scrappy.

The man was all too eager, arms moving to emphasize his words. "Well, y'see, we had a little meetin' with the others who knew 'bout ya after receivin' the hit on the Avengers. However, a few hours after the meetin' with everyone, we discovered most of the files on ya were either copied or taken. The only people who could've had access was one 'a the eight who was aware of ya existin'," he wrung his hands together, a malicious grin on his face, eyes narrowed. "So we need ya to sniff out our dirty lil' rat for us."

Hornet gave a wry grin that crinkled the corner of the lip that had a scar dashing across it. "These mooks here are the direct underlings of each of the suspects. They'll take you to them and ask all the questions."

Ace fixed a cold gaze on Weaver. "Protocol Masquerade is in effect due to this. After you're finished, you will return here for further instructions. The original hit will be held off until this is performed," after that, he gave a nod. "Hornet, you may confirm the order." And with that, he spun on his heel and left the room, Scrappy following closely behind.

Hornet lifted the whistle to his lips and blew two quick bursts on it, and suddenly, Peter felt like he could breathe again. Awareness slowly trickled back into his eyes at that. He felt like stumbling from the sudden whiplash, but had long since learned to hold himself carefully. The last of his handlers approached him with a grin. "You know what to do, Weaver. Get it done."

Peter's body moved automatically to leave after Hornet had disappeared, the other goons moving ahead to lead him. Really, he was just along for the ride. He had learned a few years before that every time they did these special orders, his body and subconscious would carry them out regardless of what he wanted. It was like he was no longer in control of his own body, as if his sight was trapped in someone else's shoes. It was a form of dissociation the mutant really hated, but had no control over. There was no point trying to fight the order, either. He didn't know how to break past it, never had, and it didn't seem likely he would discover how to do so now; especially where doing so would be suicidal.

The first visit was to one of the last HYDRA heads that knew of his existence, who went by the name Alpha. Peter hadn't actually seen him before, but definitely had heard of him. He was well-versed on everyone's code names that knew of his existence. He had to be. One of the lackeys, Dante, stepped forward, ushering the asset to follow. The others were waiting at the exits, knowing full well they were only to leave with Weaver. The assassin followed the interrogator into the room, the door closing softly behind them.

Alpha was in his mid-fifties, with salt and pepper, balding hair. He was a bit heavy set, with a stern look in his gray eyes that would make most uneasy. He held himself with importance as he sat rigid in the office chair at his desk, clacking away at his keyboard. When he heard them enter, Alpha's spine stiffened, and he gave them a tentative glance. Peter's trained eyes saw that Alpha was clearly disturbed by his presence there. He held himself defensively, guarded, as if he expected an attack at any second. Which, the mutant supposed was fair. He hadn't seen the infamous assassin in person before, only knew of his existence and some of the hits he'd done. To be standing in the same room as such a deadly killer would put anyone on edge.

"Hello, gentlemen," Alpha said, voice calm, though the assassin noted a bit of panic breaking through the facade. He was definitely on-edge. "To what do I owe this visit?"

Dante flashed his boss an award-winning smile, taking one of the guest chairs and placing it in front of the desk, spinning it to where he could lean his elbows on the back of the chair. "Oh, nothin' much, boss. Just doin' a teeny tiny little investigation."

At that, Alpha stiffened further, an incredulous look spreading across his face. "I haven't a clue what you mean by that, Dante. I have done nothing to warrant any form of check-up on my duties, especially in regards to the asset," he said, giving a nod in Weaver's direction. Snagging a stack of papers he was working on, he straightened them on his desk, before placing them in a tote. "Now, if you will excuse me, I'm doing some very important work."

At that, a malevolent grin flashed across Dante's face, his brown eyes narrowing. His dark skin came off almost sickly under the pale office lights as he adjusted, raising a hand to rest against the side of his face, palm against his cheek. Raising his other hand, he waved his pointer finger aimlessly. "A little birdie told us that one of yous messed up and leaked some important info. To my knowledge, you're going to be replaced either way," an eager grin crossed his face. "Frankly, it's a real nice promotion on my end," snapping his fingers, he pointed his finger at Weaver, before directing it at Alpha. "Tell me, asset, does he seem dirty to you?"

Peter hadn't detected a lie in his words, and while his heartbeat was erratic, there was only trepidation at such a deadly killer being in the room. But against his own will, his body moved, snaking a knife out of his belt. Before he could really even process it, the knife was buried in Alpha's chest, hitting the heart, before quickly being ripped out, spun around, and sunk into Dante's head. Both let out surprised grunts, before slumping in their seats, eyes glazing over as their life bled out in steady crimson drips. The assassin ran the knife against the dark red sleeves of his outfit, before pocketing the knife. It was then that Peter's brain registered what had happened, and he felt a quiet nausea rise inside his stomach at the sight. The scent of blood was one he would never get used to, and he closed his eyes, using the privacy of the office to clench his fists and let his mask slide for just a second. But, he quickly collected himself, turning to automatically look through all of Alpha's files and folders. None were the missing ones, as Peter suspected.

It saddened Peter that they didn't really need to die. Any of them, for that matter. But he couldn't disobey a direct order even if he wanted to; it was programmed into his subconscious to follow it. And one of those orders had been Protocol Masquerade; the protocol he despised the most. It was their code word to let Peter know who his targets were without another uneducated person learning who it was. The protocol was simple. Leave no survivors. Ace's intent was never to let these right hand people take over; it was to kill anyone who had the potential to be corrupted, besides his direct handlers, who had absolutely no reasons to turn dirty. It made his chest fill with black tar at the thought. Because one of the informants went against the given rules, all of them had to be killed. How many of them had families, and lives outside of this hell? Sure, they were HYDRA, and his captors. But their loved ones weren't likely to know of the dirty deeds they were committing behind their backs. They deserved justice, not release for their crimes by murder.

As he walked out of the room, the mutant couldn't help but feel helpless yet again when facing his situation. No one should've ever been subjected to something as despicable as this, especially a young child carefully crafted and molded into a mindless killing machine. Well... almost mindless. They didn't know he still retained some of his old self, and as far as Peter was concerned, they never would learn. As long as he played the part well (and, well, sometimes he didn't even have to play; his body did it for him), they would be none the wiser. He couldn't risk another tweaking. He would lose everything he's fought hard to keep as the smallest semblance of himself. He had nothing else to hold onto but the smallest victory that they hadn't yet killed off Peter Parker.

He hesitated for the smallest second as Carmen worked to open the door to Omen's space, a bit dizzy from the overwhelming stench of blood clinging to his outfit, hidden by the dark colors. This was the second to last of them, before Coin; the one Peter was dreading the most to encounter due to his kindness. He had already visited the other five. After Alpha and Dante had been Fox and Beaver, who went down even easier than he had honestly thought. Quincy and Paprika had known it was coming and had actually made his job easier by disposing of themselves (though it rattled him how willing they were to kill themselves. Were they looking forward to the day they could be freed from their positions in HYDRA? He didn't know). Leaf had to help him corner Yarrow, and Chartreuse had actually taken out Mahogany in arrogance, thinking she would take the position herself and not realizing no one would be left in the end. Peter wasn't too sure how much Carmen knew, though he had gathered she was intelligent enough to know what was unspoken about him returning with no one and the copper scent that clung to his clothing.

With a jostle, the room opened to Omen's, and both stepped in. The lights were off, the blinds closed, the room draped in shadows. But Peter's night vision was in full effect as his eyes took in the scene. It seemed someone had already beat them to the punch. Omen was a Polynesian woman of great intimidation and power, yet she had made her fair share of enemies, which was evident by the three corpses in the room already. Two attackers and the businesswoman herself, covered in blood that had broken their confines through the bullet wounds that adorned their bodies. Picking up one of the guns, he noted with interest they were his design, with a silencer he had implemented to catch bullet casings so they wouldn't fall on the ground after firing. It was a bit curious that they had clearly been intending to take out the confidant then escape. They clearly doubted the woman's skills. It was almost a shame she had to be taken out so gracelessly, though Peter was secretly thankful it was one less person's blood on his hands.

Moving into the room without a sound, he moved past the bodies without so much as a glance, rifling through the documents. He was interested to note that one of the files containing information on him were indeed in the room; though it was clearly a copy, since the words were still legible and hadn't been eroded by direct exposure to oxygen like most of them should've been. She only had the one, though, which wasn't nearly what she should've had. That told Peter that she had clearly had someone else who she had pawned the files off onto... or, more accurately, an accomplice she had gotten one of the files from. She shouldn't have had access to the files, after all. No, the only one who did was... Coin. The realization clicked in Peter's head, accompanied by a feeling on unease. What had Coin been doing with his files, and why had he given a piece of it to Omen? Were the two of them working together? What were they working on that involved his information? He couldn't help but feel both a sense of panic and relief. Panic at what they could've been doing with it, but relief that it seemed someone clearly wanted the information for something that was definitely outside of HYDRA's desires. They would never authorize the taking of his information, as evidenced by the purge he was being ordered to do. Did that mean that Coin was someone not truly loyal to the ancient organization? Peter was curious to find out more.

Carmen snapped him out of his thoughts by picking up the folder of information, giving it a rather wry smile. She placed it in his hands, tapping it. Then, she brushed a stray bang out of her face, tired eyes fixing on his lenses. "I suppose we now know where it went, huh?" she said, voice calm. Peter felt a pang dart through his chest at her tone. She was scared, but the determination in her voice spoke wonders of her thoughts. She knew she was going to die and was unafraid. It made him jealous of her conviction. She walked over to the door, flashing him a small smile. "You get that to your handlers. I'll take care of Utaka," she paused on the doorframe, a small frown on her face. A decided look of "fuck it" crossed her face before she turned to face him. "Look... I'll be honest. I don't have a lot of time left. I knew getting into this business would kill me, and I was perfectly fine with it. I had nothing left to lose," letting out a sigh, she stared at Omen's body with a sad glance. "Omen and Coin... they were SHIELD agents that pretended to be HYDRA when they were exposed to keep an eye on things here. And I... I was one of their reformed confidants. They taught me I could use my skills for something... better."

She walked over to him, a small frown on her face as she once again touched the folder, before gently flipping it open. Peter felt his breath catch in his throat as he realized it had redacted information on his identity. She traced her fingers on all of the blacked out lines. "We... couldn't discern much on who you actually are. They're careful, your handlers. But we've been here long enough to note some key things," Carmen's expression turned bitter as she gave him a once-over. "For example... you can't be older than sixteen. We haven't heard your voice or seen your face, and the information on your age is missing, but... we were able to fill in the pieces. You were brought in ten and a half years ago, right? Yet your build, height, and weight indicate someone who hasn't fully developed yet," her tone was sad and clipped as she muttered, "And from some of the logs of your... tweaking... that we were able to find, you were clearly inexperienced. I can't imagine what they put you through..."

Peter said nothing, not trusting the moment enough to break the vow of silence that he'd kept strong for eight long years, ever since they deemed Peter Parker gone from his body. But he couldn't help but feel breathless at this revelation, shocked into rigidity. He hadn't known what was going on in the background, of course. The mutant couldn't believe his luck. Some of the people who knew about him were SHIELD? That meant that they had been reporting information on him to the good guys, right? Who knew about him now, then? Were they working to rescue him? How long had they been doing this?

As if reading his thought process, Carmen let out a choked laugh. "We weren't able to do anything for years. It was... frustrating. We hadn't even been able to see you, let alone get much information regarding you. It took Coin years to gain their trust enough to become their file keeper. And Omen... she had to pull a lot of strings to get the attention off of him so he could retrieve the files," she let out a relieved breath at that. "We knew the time had come when they ordered the hit on the Avengers. It was lucky it coincided so well with us being able to sneak away enough information to make it worth it." Carmen let out a shaky breath at that, her voice and conviction wavering. "I don't know who you really are, and I wasn't sure of it before. But, seeing you now, how you're inaction is reaction enough, I can tell... you're actually aware of what I'm saying," she let out a relieved laugh at that. "Which means they didn't win, because some part of you must exist in order to even want to listen to what I'm giving you instead of killing me. That's... that's a relief, to be honest. We were worried for the longest time that there was nothing left to salvage... that they had succeeded in turning you into a mindless killing machine."

Peter set the folder down, his hands suddenly slack. Was he... was he that easy to read? With a small frown, he let his hand hover over the table, before coming to a decision. He tapped his fingers quietly against the desk, taking a pause every now and again. As part of his training, he had learned morse code. He hadn't ever had to use it to communicate before, though. His gaze never left Carmen's stormy blue eyes as he punched in his remark. I-M S-T-I-L-L H-E-R-E, he tapped. He was tempted to add barely, but refrained.

At that, the woman visibly brightened, a choked sob leaving her lips. "I wonder how wonderful a person you could've been had none of this happened. You were willing to find a loophole in your vow just to assure me that what we were doing was right," she sniffed, reaching a hand back to pull her hair out of the loose ponytail it was in. Her dark brown hair cascaded to her shoulders. "You won't find Coin here. I imagine you won't tell Hornet, Scrappy, or Ace about any of this. They expect you won't break your vow of communications, after all," she grabbed one of the pistols off of the ground, checking the silencer and readjusting it. "Thank god. Look... whoever you are... Coin, Omen, and I have worked hard for this opportunity. I know it might freak you out to try and accept the help, but please, don't fight this. You deserve it."

Peter frowned under the mask, and tapped out, W-H-A-T O-P-P-O-R-T-U-N-I-T-Y?

Carmen walked back to the door, one hand resting on the doorknob, the other on the trigger of the gun. She gave him a final, sad smile. "Freedom and rescue."

With a quick twist, the hidden agent burst out of the door. A thud echoed down the hallway as Utaka went down. She then lifted a hand to give him a wave goodbye, before moving out of the room and grabbing Utaka's body. She moved them over to a window, opening it and propping his body on the edge. She then aimed the gun at her temple and pulled the trigger. Both bodies went over the edge. Peter's heart twisted as he glanced away, trying to not let it rub him the wrong way.

The entire conversation was eye-opening for the assassin. After years of bad luck and cursing his misfortune, it seemed fate was finally smiling on him. The very organization that had infiltrated SHIELD had had the same treatment done right back to them with three agents. Not only had they taken as much information on him as they could, but they had gone to provide him something he had thought intangible. Freedom. Rescue. After nearly ten and a half years of this hell, Peter almost didn't want to believe it. Could they actually pull it off? Who were they going to in order to give him that chance? If he had to guess, it was likely the Avengers. After all, they had waited to act until the hit was made. Chances were they were going to give that information to the famous group of superheroes. For what reason? Did they put their faith in them to amend his situation? Did they think that if they made them aware of his existence, they would be able to miraculously undo ten and a half years of damage?

Could he even trust it? He couldn't rely on anyone but himself. No one was trustworthy. Anyone could turn on him and doom him. Trust was a weakness. Hope was a weakness. Trusting hope was something he couldn't even entertain for the years of hell he'd endured. Besides, what if they weren't as good as appearances gave? They had all done their fair share of questionable things, if the information he'd been given for the hit were any indicator. Beyond that, Ace, Scrappy, and Hornet had pulled out all of the stops to keep him under their thumb. They would be willing to move all of heaven and earth if it meant keeping him as their own personal asset. They had already proven it.

But they had gone through with their infiltration so thoroughly. They truly believed he deserved to be rescued, and thought there was no one better to do it than superheroes. It almost made him want to laugh. No one had come to rescue him before. Why now, after he was already broken beyond repair? Was it because the supposed superheroes weren't even around at the time he'd gone missing to even help, or did they not even know of what was going on under their noses? The killer was more willing to bet on the latter than the former. He wouldn't be surprised if they hadn't assumed a cold missing person's case from nearly ten and a half years before would have the victim still alive. Besides, he was just a young kid from Queens. Sure, his parents had been notable scientists, but his birth hadn't exactly been the largest public knowledge. He knew the chances of rescue were slim, if not nonexistent. That's why he'd given up hope nearly five years ago.

He didn't know what to think, so he wasn't going to. He could worry about it later. He wasn't going to trust anyone but himself. He couldn't afford to. Collecting himself, he moved past the opened window and the sound of murmurs from the ground below as he moved over to the elevator. Running his hand down the sleek metal, he found the hidden button and pressed it. The elevator did a quick scan, before it beeped in confirmation and began moving down to his secret floor. He would deal with this information later. But maybe, he could let a little spark of hope burn inside of his chest. Maybe he could convince the heroes to kill him before HYDRA could get their hands on him again if his hit failed (as he thought it was likely to, since Carmen had implied Coin had gone to let them know). Maybe that would be better than them trying to rescue and redeem him. Peter didn't think he deserved it, after all.

He would have to wait and see.

Sorry for the gap in updates! It's been a bit busy. My parents are moving to another state tomorrow morning, so I've been helping them prepare for the move. I also work Monday-Friday for 8 hours a day, so that takes a good amount of time, and there's a county fair that's gonna be happening in my area soon that I'm planning on entering some art pieces into to see if I can win anything! That and trying to keep up with updates on fanfictions I've been reading have been sucking a lot of my time. Definitely not happy I haven't really been able to have the time to update earlier, but I hope this will do!

(Spider on the Run shouldn't be updating until tomorrow, though; it's currently midnight and I kinda have work in the morning, oops.)

I will... fully admit this chapter didn't turn out how I thought it would. I came to the decision while I was thinking of how I wanted to go forward with this story and SOTR and decided that I wanted these to be slow-burn. I'm not in any rush to end either of them, so I hope you guys will stay patient with him as I slowly develop their stories! But I also realized that in order to achieve everything I wanted to with these ideas that they would need to be slow-burn anyways. So... expect a lot of chapters.

merendinoemiliano- Haha, thanks! I'm... pretty much planning on this AU turning into a rewrite of the MCU beginning in part with Civil War and working forwards through the other stories. Which... likely means this story might actually either have a lot of chapters of a few sequel stories (depending on where I want to make a divide, considering I would have to be covering Doctor Strange (most likely just a passing mention of him), Spider-Man: Homecoming (oh, now THAT should be fun to rewrite), Black Panther (more than likely a passing mention as well but we'll see), Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame at the very least (Spider-Man: Far From Home will honestly depend on how this AU ends up turning out to be honest), so... that's at least three full films to re-write at the smallest. :D

YuukiAsuna41- Well, have no fear. There's... actually gonna be more of this aspect that I had originally planned, mostly because I actually got really interested in showing more of this aspect before moving on to the later touches of this story that relate more to the categories.

Krakengirl- Oh, the direction will only get more interesting as I go further. Honestly, I kind of want to avoid a lot of the superhero movie tropes where the villains are supposed to be super smart but make really dumb or careless decisions. I'm taking a lot of inspiration from the way they wrote Mysterio in Far From Home with how I'm developing his specific handlers in HYDRA. It makes things a lot more interesting and actually gives them some stakes and consequences. Well, that might be a good ways off, but I'll definitely say they're gonna have to work hard to earn it. I will admit though that the categories I chose and the way I'm planning for the story to eventually go, though, will definitely lead to some rather hilarious ways for them to try and gain his trust. Also, yeah, I couldn't resist. Would've been better if Strange were part of the MCU before Civil War, though, since both Robert Downey Junior and Benedict Cumberbatch played the famous detective in their careers. That might be something I'll reserve for the Doctor Strange and/or Infinity War rewrite portion.

Winged Lady Colette- Thanks for your interest! Here's the update (a few days later than I would've liked, oops).

Thebookworm33- Ah, thanks! I was honestly so excited to tackle this idea, and honestly, each update I do just makes me fall more and more in love with the concept of this AU. I can't wait to get to some of the later stuff I have planned in this AU rewrite. It's gonna be fun since this Peter is such a socially awkward stick in the mud with trust issues for days, haha. Like, I imagine this version of Peter would probably be really confused by Flash's insults if it ever came to that. It's gonna be a blast. Thanks! I debated on whether I wanted to try and upkeep two slow-burn stories at the same time, but I decided to just screw it and go for it, and I'm honestly glad I did. SOTR provides me a nice little canon-compliant fic that I can mold as I like, while this gives me a completely different AU to rewrite and sculpt. And I can actually write Tony, Steve, Vision, and Natasha in this one! :D Honestly, I love Peter HYDRA fics too, but most of them I've seen usually just involve Peter having a connection to the Avengers before being taken and then spending a small time with them before returning to their grasp. I have seen (and love) quite a few that have him a willing (or most likely unwilling) experiment and agent of theirs (some that come to mind are Wolf Spider (by PeterNeedsAHugParker), The Itsy Bitsy Spider (by Chibisakura30), The Wandering Spider (by sparks1120), Undercover (by Patufet), and Night of Ashes + Lost Emotion (by Tiana Lanster), and I recommend all of them since they're all interesting reads). It's always fun to see them and I decided I wanted to do my own take on the concept. Thanks, though! I kinda wanted to test the waters with this whole AU rewrite thing and wanted to brush past some of the really dumb tropes I occasionally see (like really large ignorance to things that should be quite a bit obvious, like missing files) while also trying to be realistic with it (honestly, I do think HYDRA would do their best to keep Peter as an asset secret. I mean, look what happened with Bucky. He was too out there and he was taken from their grasp. Why wouldn't they be more careful with him, especially since he's more naturally powerful than a super soldier thanks to his mutations? I've gotten kinda frustrated with some media portrayals of bad guy groups in recent times where they're said to be evil and powerful and all of that jazz but they make really careless choices and decisions that take all of the consequence out of it).

By the way, a little announcement! I opened up a tumblr! I'll likely be posting art and shiz over there, and will always take asks/suggestions there as well! Go check it out if you wish! The link is on my profile page, or you can simply look for PhantasmicNovember on tumblr!

Next time on OWOW: A little information gathering goes south.