CHAPTER TWO: Hurt

Peter Parker

Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud.

Something's...throbbing.

My head? My heartbeat? If...if it's my heartbeat...then it's on the wrong side of my chest.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

I feel my brows knit together, my lips curving into a frown. My head feels thick and heavy, like it's filled to near overflowing...with what, I'm not sure. Cotton, maybe? Except cotton's supposed to be light. And my head feels the opposite of that.

Ugh, I can't think straight.

Thud. Thud.

Swallowing thickly, my mouth so dry my tongue is sticking to the roof of my mouth, I attempt to pry open my heavy eyes.

Inches away from me is black stone, a wall of it that is both jagged and smooth, covered in a glassy, polished sheen. Thin cuts and crevices wind up the obsidian wall, red light glowing dimly through them, pulsing faintly like it has its own heartbeat, like someone cut into the rock to find its veins emitting a crimson glow.

It's pretty, hypnotic.

And definitely not from Earth.

It's that thought that has my eyes widening, my breathing hitching as the memories from the past several hours, or what I hope are the past several hours, crash into me.

"His heart rate is accelerating, as is his breathing pattern. I believe he's waking."

I don't know that voice. Or, do I? It sounds...vaguely familiar.

Shit. Shit.

"Kid? Peter? Can you hear me?"

That voice I know.

I'm curled up on my side, facing the wall of hammered ebony stone, interspersed with strange columns. Breathing comes harder, so I wrench off my mask and start to roll over to face the voices-

Pain.

White hot pain lances through my right shoulder, shooting down the raw nerves of my arm, my chest, my back. It makes me inhale sharply through my nose, a pained grunt escaping my closed mouth before I can try to stifle it.

"Easy," Steve soothes, his voice utterly calm. "Try not to move."

Screw that, I think. I need to see what the hell is going on. Trying not to look at the barbed hook I now very clearly remember is embedded into my shoulder, I slowly, tentatively place my hands on the ground in front of me, putting most of my weight on my left as I begin shoving myself upright.

"Hey, don't-"

Too late.

Breathing raggedly, a cold sweat erupting all over my skin, I ease myself up into a sitting position, the pain making me clench my teeth together so tight, my jaw begins to ache.

"Ow," I pant, head hanging low.

"I told you not to move," Steve reprimands quietly.

"Sorry, Cap. Not...not used to following orders," I admit, turning so that the left side of my back is leaning against the stone wall. My shoulder is throbbing, the pain of it making me dizzy. But hey, I can finally see what's going on.

And it's not good. Not good at all.

I'm in a cell.

The words send a thrill of icy panic down my spine that has my insides clenching and my mind bleating no, no, not again, not this, trapped, no, no, nonononononono-

"Anchor," Bucky's steady voice reminds me.

Anchor. Right. I can-

-but I'm locked up, I'm in a cell and they got me and everything is red-red-red and black-

I press against my chest, just over my heart, pain lancing up my right arm at the movement, but I press harder until the grey spots speckling the edge of my vision begin to die down, and my lungs feel less tight and my heart isn't pounding so loudly and-

"Sorry," I mutter, my face flushing.

"Nothing to be sorry for," Steve's eyes are sympathetic, understanding, and it makes me feel more embarrassed than I already am.

To distract from my growing mortification and still simmering panic, I take in everything around me.

My cell seems to be made of thick glass on three sides, cornered by those tall, jagged pillars of red lit black stone. The ceilings are much higher than I expect them to be, tall enough to imprison the aliens themselves, if they felt like doing so. There are more cells on either side of me, and a narrow walkway at the front separating the line of compartments from another row across from it.

Steve's in the cell just across from me, Vision to his left, Dr. Bruce Banner to his right. In the cell to my right is Bucky, who is sitting with one leg outstretched, the other pulled up for his metal arm to rest on, his body facing mine. And Scarlet Witch, looking pale and on the edge of panic herself, is in the cell to my left.

"Crap," I say.

Bucky snorts. "That about sums it up."

"What happened?" I ask, frowning. The last thing I remember is pain exploding in my shoulder and being dragged up into the air.

"We were taken," Scarlet Witch answers tightly, her fingers clenching and unclenching into fists.

"By the aliens?"

She raises a brow, like 'what do you think?'

Then I notice something as I gaze at each of my fellow prisoners in turn. "Hey, where are all your hooks? Why are you guys all hook free?"

"We were all on the ground when we got taken," Dr. Banner replies, speaking for the first time, his hands rubbing nervously together. "I think you were the only one up on the roof."

"Lucky me," I mutter, leaning my head back against the warm stone.

"We were all taken separately," Vision informs me, gazing at me with those unnerving eyes of his. "They strapped something to my chest that prevented me from phasing and released an electronic pulse that short circuited my sensors."

"Best I can tell, I got hit over the head," Dr. Banner winces, rubbing the back of his skull. "Hard."

"What about-where are the others?" I ask Steve, my eyes widening. "Where are they? Mr. Stark-"

"Not here," Cap cuts me off. "We were the only ones taken."

Which meant Mr. Stark, Natasha, Sam, Colonel Rhodes, they are all still in New York, left behind. That, or they are-

"Don't," Steve orders firmly. "I know that look. They're fine. The aliens weren't interested in them."

Not interested in them. Not them. Us. Because we are the ones that were taken, that are locked up in cells instead of killed.

Oh god.

Oh shit.

I'm trapped in a cell on an alien ship, probably hurtling into deep space at this very moment. An alien ship. In space.

Oh god oh god oh god.

The thought is so claustrophobic, so completely terrifying that I begin pressing against that spot above my heart again to keep the panic at bay. There's so much...the dark cell, the oppressive, dim lights casting everything in a red sheen...the knowledge that I am in space, captive aboard an alien craft and it isn't a sci fi movie or a comic, it's real and I'm trapped and there's a freaking hook in my shoulder.

Breathe. In and out. In and out.

At least...at least I'm not alone this time. I'm taken, I'm locked in a cell, but I'm not alone. I have five other Avengers with me. Five super strong Avengers.

And I know Mr. Stark. I know the lengths he will go to to save his team, to save me.

He had gone to the ends of the earth to rescue me from Hydra. He'd done anything and everything within his power and beyond it to remove Venom, to keep me safe. Somehow, I don't think something like outer space is going to stop him or the others from coming to help us.

I trust him.

It's just that simple.

Even if...even if I had been the only one taken, even if I was the only one in this corridor of cells, I would trust Mr. Stark to come for me. He always has. Whatever this is, wherever we are going, we are going to get out of it.

Bolstered by these thoughts, I let my hand drop to my lap, grit my teeth, and sit up further, ignoring the pain in my right shoulder. "Okay," I breathe. "So...we have a plan, right? What's the plan?"

They exchange looks.

"There is a plan, isn't there?" I ask hopefully.

"Hard to come up with a plan when these cells are impenetrable," Bucky says dryly.

"Indeed," Vision agrees, looking way too calm for this situation as he stands perfectly still in the center of his cell. "I cannot phase through any of the walls."

"It isn't affected by my power, either," Scarlet Witch adds, her voice bitter as crimson light weaves between her fingers. She splays them in a jerking motion, and the light shoots forward to be absorbed into the glass wall in between us.

"Bucky and I can't exactly punch our way out," says Steve at my questioning look.

"What about the Hulk?" I ask Dr. Banner. "Can't you-he-can't you guys bust out of here?"

Dr. Banner winces. "Yeah, not a good idea. He might be able to smash apart these cells, but he'd likely take half the ship out with them. And I don't know about you, kid, but I don't fancy taking a swim amongst the stars."

Fair point.

I sigh heavily, then realize how rude I'm being. "Oh. Hey, I'm uh-I'm Peter. Nice to meet you, Dr. Banner. I'm...actually a huge fan."

He raises his eyebrows. "A fan, huh? The big guy will be happy to hear that."

"Oh. Not him. I mean, yeah him, he's freaking awesome, but I meant you," I stammer awkwardly. This is not exactly how I had imagined meeting one of my idols. "Your research. I've based a few science projects off of your work. Even wrote a paper once on your work on anti-electron collisions. Got an A."

Stop talking, Parker, you sound like an idiot.

Dr. Banner looks a little baffled, but pleased. "Call me Bruce."

"Wanda," says a slightly accented voice to my left. I turn towards her and give her a smile, which she returns with a small one of her own. I remember then, that while I was locked up in a cell in a Hydra facility, she was in one not too different on the Raft, and that being trapped like this is probably just as horrible for her as it is for me.

Maybe even worse. She was imprisoned for a long time.

"I am Vision," the android introduces himself, and I give a little wave with my good hand.

We lapse into silence for a few minutes, each of us lost in our own thoughts.

I think of May, her pale face and worried eyes as she'd refused to let me go, as she told me to come home. My gut wrenches with guilt. God, she must be freaking out by now. Sorry, May. I won't be home for awhile.

And Ned...I'd never texted him back.

Or MJ.

Be careful.

I guess I hadn't been careful. Clearly not careful enough, since I've been kidnapped by aliens and thrown into a cell heading god knows where.

Be careful.

I frown. If I didn't know any better, I would think that MJ knew that I was Spiderman, that she was warning me to watch out for myself. But that is impossible. There's no way she could know. She probably saw the news and was wanting me to stay inside, to stay safe.

I should have texted her back the same thing.

You too. That's what I should have texted. It would have only taken a second.

I hope Mr. Stark is okay. Him and the others. I hope he called May and that he didn't lie to her like last time. Thinking of how well it went over when he'd fed her a story after I'd been kidnapped by Hydra, I highly doubt he'd make the same mistake twice.

"Hey, Pete?"

I jerk, my eyes shooting open, then hiss at the burning pain lancing through my shoulder. Had I fallen asleep?

"Yeah?" I croak, blinking blearily.

"How's that arm?" Dr. Banner-Bruce- asks, his brown eyes worried.

"Uh...it's been better."

I'm trying not to think about it actually. Trying not to look at the black, craggy edge jutting out of my shoulder, the barbed end of it poking out of my back. Trying not to dwell on the throbbing, burning pain emanating from it, or the warm blood I feel drying on my chest and back.

Key word is trying.

I shift uncomfortably at all the eyes on me. "It's fine."

"You're impaled on a hook," Bucky deadpans from my right.

I shoot him a dirty look. "No shit. Can we talk about something else, please?"

My good hand is clenching into a fist. The more we talk about it, the more I focus on the pain, on the oppressive, violating feeling of something inside me.

"Why us?" I bite out suddenly.

Steve's eyes move from my shoulder to my face. "Why take us?" he clarifies, and I nod. "If I had to guess, it's because of our abilities."

"Our...abilities?"

"Think about it," he prompts. "Who did they take? Who did they leave behind? None of the others were super soldiers, or were enhanced with any kind of special powers."

I frown. He's right. Mr. Stark, Natasha, Sam, Colonel Rhodes, they were all insanely good fighters, way better than me, with more experience and the tech to match. Better heroes who'd done more to protect the world than I had. But they'd been left behind. Why?

"That's encouraging," Dr. Banner rubs a hand over his face, leaning against one of the glass walls of his cell.

"But what do they want us for?" asks Wanda. "Why take us instead of kill us?"

Vision opens his mouth to answer her when a distant hiss and boom echoes across the corridor. We all go still and tense, silencing our conversation to listen.

I glance at Bucky, then Steve, their faces grim and focused.

Shit. What's happening?

Metal begins clanking on stone, the sound ringing eerily, heavily, rhythmically. Footsteps, multiple, if I had to guess. I meet Dr. Banner's worried eyes, and I try to steady the rapidly increasing beat of my heart.

I see it through the outer wall of Bucky's cell first, an alien like the ones we fought in New York, looming tall and terrible, its grey skin covered with black armor, with hella creepy eyes, and tattoos running down its bald head. I glance up at the spikes running down its neck and spine, spearing through the armor.

There are two of them.

They stalk down the walkway, spears strapped to their backs.

My skin prickles all over, my wound giving an extra throb as I watch them move. There's almost a gracefulness to how they walk, the same kind of effortlessness I've seen in the Black Widow when she's fighting, something feline and deadly.

Steve and Vision are already standing, and the others get to their feet as the aliens approach, readying themselves for what's about to happen, preparing to fight back. To my left, red light begins to emanate from Wanda's cell, her scarlet eyes glowing bright enough to rival theirs.

I try to push myself up with my left arm, but the pain makes my knees buckle, makes me slide uselessly back onto the ground.

The aliens' steps begin to slow, their terrible eyes scanning their prisoners, their expressions hidden by the black, metal plated masks adorning the bottom halves of their faces.

They stop in unison in between Steve's cell and mine.

And as one, they look at me.

My stomach bottoms out, the breath dying in my lungs as every single muscle goes completely rigid.

Strange clicking, reptilian noises murmur beneath those masks, and then one of them presses its clawed hand against the wall of my cell. It shoots up towards the ceiling at its touch, and there is now nothing between me and them.

"Hey," Bucky slams his metal fist against the wall between us, his face dark and furious. "Hey!"

They stalk towards me, and hook in my shoulder be damned, I am not going to let them take me without defending myself.

Heart hammering in my chest, adrenaline surging through my veins, I let one of them get close before hooking my foot around its ankle and pulling sharply. It stumbles, falling to its side, and I kick out hard into its chest, using the momentum to stagger to my feet, pain blaring in my shoulder at the movement. The other alien advances, but doesn't reach for its weapons.

Bucky is punching the wall separating us with his metal fist, over and over and over again as the alien lunges for me. I dodge to the left, but then I feel a hand at my ankle, holding me in place as the second alien, dark eyes blazing, shoots out to grip my by my throat.

The two converse in their low, hissing language as I struggle against its hold to no avail. Its grip is like steel, but it doesn't attempt to squeeze my airway shut, it just holds me in place.

"Let him go!" Steve demands in a deadlier voice than I have ever heard from him, and behind me, Bucky is still beating furiously against the glass barrier, but the aliens simply ignore them, the one holding me turning and dragging me out of the cell.

I buck against its grip, trying to pry of its hand with my good arm, my shoulder now burning fiercely with dizzying pain, but it's no use.

I get one last look at Bucky's murderous expression, his metal fist raised before I am dragged over the threshold of the holding cell corridor's exit.

And the door slams shut.

Tony Stark

Nothing.

No indication of who these guys were, what they wanted, why they took our people, where they'd come from or gone to. No alien bodies. No splashes of blood or scraps of DNA to study. No residue from their weapons, no traces of any energy signatures.

Not a single fucking clue.

Even Natasha, with her arsenal of disturbing skills and resources, is baffled by it. The government wants answers, the media wants the story, and May Parker wants to know why the hell her nephew hasn't come home yet. But there's nothing but a battleworn street and a handful of survivors that are just as clueless as the rest of the world.

"Where is he?" are May Parker's first words when she answers the phone.

I wanted to avoid this phone call, but I know how that story plays out. I don't have a plan for what I am about to tell her.

"I don't know," is my honest reply. I don't know where he is, this kid that has somehow become the bane of my existence and a crucial addition to my life.

"Is he alive?"

"I don't know."

Her breathing hitches. "What the hell do you know?"

I tell her.

"You go. You find him," May says with a ferocity that doesn't surprise me. "You bring our boy back home."

I don't even bat an eye at the word 'our'.

"I will," I vow.

I don't know how many promises I will make to the Parker family. Don't know how many I will be able to keep, how many I will be forced to break.

There's nothing to go off of. No leads. No clues.

But terrible odds have never stopped me before, have never stopped the Avengers. When I tell Rhodey this, he gives me a baffled look and replies, "Terrible odds? Tony, there are zero odds. We have nothing. What are we supposed to do, scour the entire universe?"

If it comes to that, yes.

I call in reinforcements as soon as we regroup back at the Avengers facility upstate, not knowing what they can possibly offer, but knowing we can't do this on our own. God, what has it come to that Scott Lang and Clint Barton qualify as backup? Natasha had been the one to bring in Lang, and a short phone call from me had had Barton leaving his pitchfork and tractor behind to pick up his bow and quiver.

Sam has adopted a permanent expression of worry that I know will leave deep, permanent imprints into the space between his eyebrows and the corners of his mouth. I offer him top of the line anti-aging cream from Pepper's bathroom, but he scowls at me and waves it away.

Natasha keeps up the calm, all business air as she throws herself into research, into tracking down any information of our alien kidnappers, her frown deepening every time her search turns up no results.

Rhodey is at a loss, wanting to do something just as badly as the rest of us, but also has a tendency to keep pointing out that all we've uncovered is a steaming pile of nothing in that super helpful way of his.

So here we stand, a group of powerless, clueless Avengers, all that is left of Earth's Mightiest Heroes, without a single idea of how to hunt down and rescue the rest of our team.

That is when F.R.I.D.A.Y. notifies me that we have more visitors.

Exchanging frowns and baffled looks, none of us having made any more calls or sent out any more invitations, we are more than a little stunned when King T-Challa himself enters our disarrayed conference room, followed by a shorter young woman sipping a large frappuccino from Starbucks and a trio of fierce looking Wakandan guards.

Well, I'll be damned.

"Not that I don't appreciate the surprise visit," I say, standing and reaching forward to clasp his hand. "But we are in the middle of a crisis here. I hope you have something more to offer than some spectacular fashion advice."

The young woman beside him snorts, then gives me a very unimpressed look. "Though you could use the fashion advice, Mr. Stark," she says in a heavily accented voice like the king's as her eyes wander down my designer suit. "We have brought something infinitely more valuable."

"Shuri," scolds T'Challa with a disapproving eye.

"And what's that?" I ask, eyebrow raised.

Shuri smirks over her frappuccino. "Our aid."

A/N: Ahhhhh you guys! The overwhelming response to the first chapter of this fic totally made my day! I am so excited to see familiar reviewers and brand new ones! I am beyond thrilled that you are all as excited for this fic as I am, and I hope it doesn't disappoint! Seriously, you guys make my day. You have no idea how inspiring it is to read your thoughts and excitement, or to know how invested you all are in this verse I am playing with.

PippinStrange deserves a huge round of applause for her beta skills, her constant source of support and inspiration for me, and her above and beyond mad skills. She's working on a birthday fic for me that heals all the holes in my chest that Infinity War gave me, so if you are feeling the same, go check it out! Her other stories are just as amazing too, and the reason I am writing Avengers fics at all.

I don't have a plan for the length of this fic, just kind of taking it where it leads me, but be prepared for lots of action, suspense, humor, and lots of different POVs. Should be super fun!

Review Replies:

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gandalf537: BRO YOUR REVIEW MADE MY DAY. XD Like WOW. Seriously left me grinning like an idiot. Thank you so so so so so much. I was hoping my old readers would be psyched to see a new one! Hope you all enjoy this one as much as the others! You're amazing. Seriously.

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Guys, seriously. Reviews are the kindling to the fires of inspiration. Thank you all so so much. Please continue to leave your thoughts and support below, and I will do my best to update as frequently as I am able to!

Coming Up:

Chapter Three: The Man Comes Around

In which I get to write from a POV I have NEVER written from before (GUYS I LOVE IT SO MUCH), you guys get to find out what happened to Peter Parker, and meanwhile, back on Earth, the others plan their rescue, and Tony meets his match in a certain Wakandan Princess