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ziracona · 1 year

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[[On a Superhero short fic kick. I was incorrectly spoiled on events for the PS4 Spider-Man, but the ideas never left my head, so have some non-canon-compliant Harry. This is about a year after the game. Same setup, only instead of Venom experimentation, Norman used a form of the Goblin serum to try and cure Harry. Didn’t go great. Has been trying to improve on and fix ever since. While Norman was out of the country to clear up Devil’s Breath Geneva convention violation allegations, Oscorp kept getting attacked and desperate, and for multiple very bad motivations and without Norman’s knowledge, permission, or approval, woke up and set Harry loose to destroy some evidence and buy time, since doped up on serum he’s essentially a heat seeking missile. Pete as Spider-Man stopped him, but not before Oscorp got what they wanted out of the stunt. Peter is now dealing with the fallout and trying to process what happened to his friend.]]

“Peter?”

“Uh—yeah, sorry. Hang on a second.”

Doing his best to mentally run through the half of the security system he’d memorized at light speed, Peter Parker slid back out of the vent he’d been in and launched himself up two stories in the elevator shaft, landing precariously in a far corner away from the pressure sensors on the lab side.

“Okay. Good now. Hi, MJ.”

“You okay? I mean, that’s what I called to ask about,” came her somewhere-between-worried-and-suspicious voice, “but I mean, right now? You’re not taking a call in the middle of a fight again, right?”

“No, no,” said Peter hurriedly, trying to wedge himself into a more comfortable position as an elevator passed.

“Is that construction?”

“No, it’s an elevator,” he replied, “I’m fine, really. Just trying to stay out of sight and overhearing-range while on the phone.”

“Okay,” said Mary Jane, not entirely convinced but convinced enough to drop it, “Look uh. I guess that doesn’t matter. Not like I could stop you anyway. I just wanted to know how you’re doing?”

…Ah. Right…

“With…Harry…”

Yeah. He swallowed. Okay come on. Now is the time to say something, Peter. This has been like 10 seconds of silence so far and it can get worse.

“Uh.”

“Look. I-I don’t mean to pry, and if you’re not ready to talk about it, that’s fine, of course. I just… I didn’t have anyone to talk to about it, and I know I’m upset, and I just thought. With you…”

Funny. He almost never heard MJ rattled. It was actually reassuring to him. Good to know somebody else felt it too. His shoulders relaxed a bit and he shifted again in the little corner, taking some weight off his back by wedging his knees against a post.

“I uh. I’m not doing great,” he answered truthfully. She was quiet on the other end. “I just…I can’t understand what happened.”

Peter wished he was outside. He wished he could pace and swing around while talking, work some of the energy out, but that would mean re-dodging about eight layers of Oscorp security, and he’d really come too far to go back now, so this was it. Wedged into a tiny corner of an elevator shaft about two feet from a pressure sensor that would put the whole building on lockdown if his foot slipped.

Good thing my feet are sticky, he thought, trying to rouse his spirit, and then with a grimace, Great. Even my quips are suffering…

“I’ve gone through everything I know about eighteen times in my head,” he continued, thinking it over a nineteenth as he did, “And it just…it wasn’t him, MJ. I-I mean, it was—I saw his face. But before? When we were fighting? It wasn’t him. It wasn’t Harry. I don’t…”

For a moment, there was quiet.

“…I’m so sorry. First Otto, now Harry. I can’t even imagine. This has been a terrible couple of years for you.”

“I—“ He hesitated, remembering. Running images of Otto through his head, images of the fight just yesterday, with Harry. “It…that’s not what. I mean…” he tried slowly, worried somehow about her reaction to this. “I mean it really… Wasn’t him. Not like Martin Li, not like Otto. Not like a change. It was like he was…possessed. He didn’t say anything the whole time. And his eyes…”

How to even explain it though?

He thought… if. If it had been like Otto, he would have known. A part of him would have unconsciously recognized Harry’s movements, his voice, something. But no part of him at all had been anything but shocked when the person he was pummeling had finally stopped hitting back and gone still in the wreckage of an automobile plant, and he’d torn the mask off to see…

Honestly, his first thought had been that it was Chameleon somehow. His second Mysterio, and he was hallucinating. He’d wondered if he was crazy before his brain had pitched him the suggestion that it might actually be Harry Osborn in the battered body armor beneath him.

And God, he’d been so terrified he’d killed him for a second he hadn’t been able to feel his own heartbeat. Peter had never once actually tried to kill anyone he fought, and he’d still been terrified this would be the one time he’d messed up and given a hit too hard.

He hadn’t. And Harry was okay. No. Not…okay. Alive. But-

“His eyes?” echoed MJ in confusion.

“Yeah,” said Peter, trying to come back down to reality, “they were…I only saw them for a minute, right at the end, and again, when Oscorp was transporting him away for treatment. But they were glowing. Not brown anymore either. Yellow. He didn’t…look like him.”

His voice had gotten so small.

He hadn’t meant it too.

MJ was quiet.

“…I’m sorry,” she said finally, and he could hear she meant it, “Do you know anything yet? What happened? Where he’s been?”

“Not much,” said Peter, trying to wall feelings back up so he could operate again, “Oscorp said a lab accident of some kind when he was getting treatment, and they’re taking him in to try and fix it.”

Which, thank God not the Raft. He didn’t think he would have been able to bear that. But…

“I…I don’t buy that though. He shows up, sure a kind of motivationless seeming attack, but it ruined the buy-out, and the Oscorp investigation at the same time. Even with their stock taking a hit too, their competition got the worse end of this, and they’re at least stalled from what Yuri expected to be a devastating run-in with internal affairs. Now, they have a perfect excuse for any documents that go ‘missing’. Probably nothing will happen with legal action after that at least until Norman’s back in the country.”

“You think he’d use his own son like this?” asked MJ, aghast.

“No! I would have thought it was about the only thing he wouldn’t do! But after last year…?”

Yeah. After last year, everything about Norman Osborn was more questions than answers.

No. Not about Norman. About…everything.

And that was what he was really afraid of. He wanted to say he knew it hadn’t really been Harry—and he did know it. He believed it. But. Last year had shown him what he knew…what he believed in, it wasn’t always true.

And there could be consequences…

“Right…” said MJ, sounding like she was following the same mental path internally.

“Anyway,” said Peter, hoping to divert her attention back to the present, “I’m going to see if I can’t dig up more. Something like this doesn’t just happen, and I owe it to Harry. To know.”

And to believe it couldn’t have been him. He owed Harry that too. He had to try.

“…Okay,” decided MJ, sounding determined herself, “I’ll do everything I can to dig things up on my end too. Let me know how it goes.”

“Sure thing,” promised Peter, relieved.

“And Peter-“ she called as he went to disconnect, “I’m really sorry.”

“…Yeah.” Said Peter. “Me too.”

There was a click as the line disconnected, and Peter turned his gaze back the way he’d just come. Quick two-story drop, swing into the vent, third from back on the right. Back in business.

It wasn’t like it was the hardest infiltration he’d done in the last year, but uh. Oscorp security was no joke. They’d really beefed it up since everything with Martin Li. Guess that uh. Figures.

Still, he was through the worst of it! Sort of…

Even with an advanced study of the security before going in, a degree in science, and an ability to sense danger and stick to walls, it took Peter another hour somehow to find what he was looking for. Oscorp’s labs spanned many, many floors, with varrying levels of security, and the blueprints did NOT match the interiors! No they did not. Which was extremely frustrating, and against city codes but hey! Not the worst work development for him in recent memory. Backtracking in narrow pipes wasn’t exactly fun or quick, but at least no one was shooting at him.

The place was such a maze in comparison to the blueprints he’s seen that Peter had almost given up on his last trek through yet another story of lab equipment being the right security route to follow and been about to turn around and try another floor, when he’d seen a very impressive amount of oxygen containers being carted down a hall, and followed a sudden hunch. And the cart.

It had payed off. The oxygen had been weaved through halls at what to Peter felt like random, and been left by a huge set of reinforced titanium doors, but he’d had a feeling, and Peter had taken another fifteen minutes to spoof the security system for the four seconds he needed to make it through the motion sensors in the exhaust vent leading in, and it had all been worth it, because he’d found him.

The room was long, with low ceilings and more consoles and lab stations than it seemed like there could possibly be something to do with. About eighteen little centrifuges, incubators, testing sites, printouts, backup power blocks, several types of animals in cages in a corner, data screens, computer banks, a massive microscope, and a lot of things even he couldn’t name at a glance. Near the far end of the room was a large empty tank of green-yellow liquid.

There were people in lab coats all over, some at stations, and a big clump of about eight around a console at the far end of the room.

“-he’s going to literally kill us,” one of the scientists nearest him was saying to another in undertones.

“No, by the time he gets here, we’ll have someone to hang out as responsible for the little incident with his son, and we’ll have gotten some actionable results here he won’t have to know how we got, and that’s going to be the only thing he cares about,” answered the other in a ‘and stop talking about this forever now please’ tone of voice.

“Besides. He’s tied up internationally in court. Even for this, he won’t be home for a month, maybe two, three,” said another.

“You haven’t seen him really determined,” said the first again, “There is nothing the man won’t do.”

“I have, and that’s how I know there are things even he can’t do,” answered the third again, “Now can we please focus on getting those actionable results? Because if we don’t, she definitely has a point.”

Okay. Kind of a huge relief to hear for once it sounds like Norman wasn’t involved in something. At least there’s a line. But, I’m definitely in the right place now, so…where’s Harry? It was the right spot for sure. There was Harry’s name, medical history, and bio readout splashed up on a handful of the screens people were working at right below him. It had to be here, right? Or close anyway. Had to.

Careful, Peter slid along the vent system installed for sucking chemicals in or out of the room in an emergency that ran straight down the center of the lab, for once too intent on searching to be thinking about what would happen if there was a spill while he was in the vent, like he usually would have.

Come on, come on!

He hesitated about halfway down the long rectangular room, noticing a screen near him. It wasn’t at a great angle for his neck, but he could make out the words.

Harry.

‘Experimental serum,’ ‘enhanced physicality,’ ‘heightened aggression,’ ‘triggered adrenal response,’ ‘fractured mental processing.’ He skimmed fast, hitting highlights.

Harry…. God. How? How did this happen! Nothing here about that at all.

It was infuriating.

At least I was right, he thought, not sure if it was okay to be reassured by this or not, since the results looked…pretty grim, according to that, you would have been completely out of your head… when … you…

He saw him.

The eight scientists gathered around a console weren’t just gathered around a console at the far end of the room. They were encircling a tube about seven feet long and three and a half feet wide, filled with the same fluid as the big empty tank, and just big enough to hold a human being in it. Which it did.

It was laid sideways like a battery, plugged into the console, and inside was Harry, laid on his stomach in an oxygen mask and chains.

It was everything he had not to break through the roof the second he saw it.

He couldn’t understand why.

You’ve seen lock-ups before, Pete. You know how hard some of them can be to contain. He destroyed four buildings yesterday. You knew he’d be locked up somewhere.

The calming himself down with logical reasoning thing was not working.

He-he couldn’t even tell if Harry was awake. His eyes were half open and glazed over, floating there—IS HE DEAD??

Panic flooded him.

One of the doctors moved a control on the console and the chains around Harry’s wrists and ankles retracted and pulled taut, immobilizing him, and it was suddenly very clear he was alive and awake, because his eyes snapped open, glowing a bright yellow that’s as unnerving to see, and he started thrashing madly against the chains and trying to slam a knee or elbow into the side of the tank, furious, unintelligible sounds coming from beneath the mask. Almost instantly in response, something shocked him. Peter couldn’t tell where it had originated from, but he’d seen enough people tazed to know what was happening as his friend suddenly jerked and started to convulse, then went limp and still hanging in the liquid like before, eyes shut.

Crap crap crap; Harry. I-

Th-there was nothing to do, but…wait. Watch. He didn’t want to. He wanted to jump down there and start breaking things, but. …He couldn’t. For all he knew, they really…were…helping him. Just because he didn’t like it, didn’t mean…

…

It was hard.

Peter was there for hours. Watching, listening. trying to understand. It was unbelievably miserable.

It didn’t matter this wasn’t the first time someone he’d liked and respected was in cuffs; it didn’t matter this wasn’t the first time he’d seen someone he knew become someone he didn’t. It was different. It was worse. And it was…wrong.

They were experimenting on him. And sure, okay, they had to. They had to figure out what was wrong, to fix it. But not like this!

Nobody talked to him. No breaks, no rest. Not even for meals. Just an IV in an arm and oxygen in a mask keeping Harry alive, trapped submerged in that tiny tube he wouldn’t have even had space to get to his knees in. Sometimes, Harry was out of it, or straight up unconscious. Sometimes, he was awake and struggling, only to get shocked into submission again. Sometimes, he seemed to get shocked down before he’d tried to do anything at all, just to make sure he wouldn’t throw off whatever test they were running. After a while, he quit fighting except to try and pull away from them, while they remote operated robot arms and drew blood and other DNA samples, tried things, tested serums, response times, stimuli. It was exhausting even to watch, and he hated it. Norman never would have allowed this! Whatever his faults, one of them was not using Harry as a lab rat. But. He wasn’t here. The conversation Peter had overheard played again and again in his head as he tried to think. They were right. Norman couldn’t be back for a while. Even if he knew, even if Peter somehow got footage and sent it to him, and it actually made it there, and he believed any of it, all it would probably do is put him through hell.

Which mean he didn’t know what to do.

By the end of his day of listening in, skimming screens for info, and snagging data off drives, Peter was sure of a few things though. One, whatever had happened to Harry, it had happened at Oscorp, and they’d known about it long before yesterday. Two, whatever he’d taken seemed to have had some impact on his neurological condition—at a guess, Peter had to assume that’s why he’d taken it in the first place. They weren’t sure of the full affects though. All they knew for certain was that any time he was awake, the drug kicked in and he was unpredictable: out of it, and dangerous, and unstable, and a lot stronger than a normal human. Three, whatever the drug was, it had not finished altering his DNA yet, and the submersion in the tank was to stay off further changes. And four, whatever they were doing to try to ‘help’ him now, they’d made little progress in the last year with Norman there, and whether or not they actually could do any of what they’d said now without him, their methods without oversight were anything but humane.

And he wasn’t going to stand for that.

He knew that much for sure. Risky or not, Harry needed help. Actual help. Not this. He wasn’t going to sit by, and wait for it to be too late again. He wasn’t going to try to let a problem fix itself and hope. Not with his best friend.

Which meant the only question then was what exactly to do.

He couldn’t just…break him out and take him to a hospital. Oscorp would have him back within the hour. He couldn’t rescue him give him to…anyone, really. There was…no one left anymore he knew to go to for help who’d know how. He couldn’t just break him out and let him go, either, though, because God knew how conscious of himself Harry would be, or what kind of damage he might cause out of his head—let alone what law enforcement might do to him after yesterday if they caught him like this.

Which…meant it was leave him, locked in a tank he could barely move around in to be experimented on by the people who’d sent him out as a weapon 24 hours ago, which wasn’t an option, or…

Oh boy.

It was dark.

Cold.

He couldn’t fall asleep. Harry had tried. But he was so tired his brain wouldn’t. It was running four seconds of memory in an endless, feverish loop and he couldn’t think, couldn’t not think enough to sleep, couldn’t anything.

At least they’re gone, the most conscious part of him thought, wanting to curl up and whimper, but too tired to move.

Who were they? Why? Why why why why why WHY WHY? I don’t—I don’t—I can’t! I-

Movement.

Adrenaline flipped on and Harry opened his eyes wide, irises yellowing and flickering to a glow in the pitch black room as he stared out at the empty lab.

Empty?

No, he thought, fear kicking in like he’d been stabbed with a syringe of it, Something’s there.

The restraints were slack now, with no one there, and he could move just a little, so he pushed himself up as much as he could in the tube and looked.

Nothing. No—

There!

Movement again. Where had it gone?

What’s out there? His anxiety deepened, and he placed his palms against the glass, leaning, trying to see.

It was so quiet.

Why would something be here? What do they want? What do they-

He turned his head left again and in deep shadows about fifteen feet back was Spider-Man like he’d aparated.

Harry jerked back, scream muffled through the mask, instantly hitting the back wall of the tiny glass cage keeping him trapped on his side.

The towering figure raised its hands and called something, but Harry didn’t hear it through the pounding in his ears.

No no no no no no!

Memory after memory from yesterday slammed into his skull and he doubled over and covered his right eye with a palm, digging his fingers into his forehead trying to push back against the pain. He’s going to kill me!

He could see it. He could feel the impact of a foot against his chest, and fists on the side of his face. Remembered the pounding pain again and again, this thing on top of him, until he’d hit his head so many times he’d lost consciousness.

Why?! Help! I—

Movement again. It was coming closer. Panicked, Harry flung his arms and legs against the glass of the tank, trying to break it and get out. Immediately, intense pain shot along his back as the cage tazed him, but he kept trying, too scared to stop—god it was almost on top of him-!

I can’t get out I can’t get out!

Spider-Man was there then, and Harry flung his arms over his head and curled up, recoiling as much as he could and shuddering as electricity ran along his body and fear pumped in his veins.

No no no not again not again.

“It’s okay! Please—I promise I’m not gonna hurt you. I’m trying to help.”

The cage was not snapped in half, and he was not dragged out of it and crushed like he had anticipated. It took a few seconds, but he registered this past the pain in every muscle from the shocks, and thudding of his heart in his ears, the fear in his throat. It took him another few seconds to realize Spider-Man was speaking to him.

“Please! Just—Try to stay calm, okay? That thing shocks you any time it senses a mood spike or adrenaline rush.”

W-What?

Harry lowered his arms enough to see the masked person past them. Spider-Man was inches away, gesturing as he spoke. Harry shuddered involuntarily, mind replaying again and again the way getting his face beat in had felt.

“Okay,” said Spider-Man, “Okay! Good. Uhm. There’s really no easy way to do this. I’m gonna get you out of there, and an alarm is going to sound, and then we’re probably just going to have to wing it, okay?”

Before Harry could think about what any of the words his frantic brain had half-heard had meant, the masked figure wound up a kick, and fractures cascaded along the glass tube in front of him. Harry yelped and tried to drag himself back and away, but there was nowhere to GO in the tube. Spider-Man swung and kicked the glass again, and this time little spurts of liquid shot out from the webbed glass cracks. Harry didn’t see the dent in the glass. He flinched and saw the foot connect with himself. Felt the way his ribs had. The way they still hurt.

Ah ah ah ah!

Electricity sparked along his back, sharp and furious this time, stronger, and he collapsed against the floor of the tube with it in surprise, twitching. Why why why make it stop make it stop!

It hurt; it hurt it hurt it hurt it hurt! Couldn’t—move! Couldn’t…!

The glass shattered, and he was knocked out with the remaining water, catching halfway to the floor as his restraints snapped taut and hung him there painfully.

“I-I got you!”

He could barely see, couldn’t think at all. Muscles still twitching. He felt the restraints snap, and landed against the floor, suddenly struggling to breathe.

“Here.”

The oxygen mask came off, and he could breathe again. There were sirens sounding. Lights flashing. He didn’t understand why. What was going on. Where am I?

O-Oscorp? Why? Everything felt unreal, but that didn’t make him less afraid of it.

When he looked up, Spider-Man was there, kneeling beside him, an arm on his back, and the terror kicked back in full throttle.

With every ounce of strength he had, Harry shoved off the masked figure and stumbled up, running blindly.

He heard, “Wait!” called after him, but didn’t even process the word through the adrenaline, and he tore through the lab with all his might. No plan. No exit. Just adrenaline and fear and desperation.

Something snagged a foot and he slammed forward into the ground and felt himself being dragged back.

No no no!

Twisting frantically onto his back, Harry saw web wrapped around the chain on his ankle, saw that thing reeling him towards it like he was trapped on a hook.

Anger overwhelmed him and he screamed, reaching blindly for the nearest thing—a computer console, and chucked it at him. Spider-Man dodged, but he let go to do it, and Harry scrambled to his feet and tried to run again, only to be hit in the back by something and knocked to the ground.

Spider-Man was on him then, a knee on his back, and Harry screamed and tried to twist around and kick him off.

“I’m sorry about this!” called the thing on top of him.

There were voices, close. Shouts. Louder sirens. Harry was seeing none of it past three days ago. Past being trapped under this thing and the way it had felt when the visor had shattered with a punch and cut the skin by his eyes, and frantic, he twisted onto his back and swung up at Spider-Man only to have a web knock the fist back and pin it to his body. He struggled, trying to get it free, but the thing spun him, winding a web around his arms and legs like a rope, and then dragged him up and flung him over one of its shoulders.

The doors opened at the far end of the lab. Harry was paralyzed for a second, overwhelmed with different memories at the sight of the people in white coats, the men in body armor with guns. The sting of needles, electricity running up his back, chain digging into his wrists, cold, confusion, anger. So much anger.

He lost time to it. Everything seemed frozen in his head, and then time came back and he was at the far end of the room, and Spider-Man was kicking through a wall and running, carrying him with him.

Fury took over and he lost time again to it as he started to fight against the bonds, brain registering only fragments. Labs, gunshots, flashing lights. Some huge drop in a shaft, an office, and then Spider-Man was swinging through a window and he was free-falling, tied up and slung over a kidnapper’s shoulder, and he came back as the anger gave way to fear again.

He screamed, and started to struggle, and felt Spider-Man’s grip slip for a second, and realized to his horror that if he broke free now, he would fall eighteen stories and flatten against the pavement, and went perfectly still, eyes squeezed shut and trying not to shake. There was nothing else he could do. Fight: die. Submit: …and what?

I don’t understand, I don’t understand! he thought desperately, overwhelmed, the sensation of falling coming again and again sickeningly with his eyes squeezed shut, afraid to look as Spider-Man held onto him and swung through the city, Why? What do you want! Why is this happening? What are you going to do?

He didn’t know. He didn’t know anything, except that he was scared and alone. He had been scared and alone for so long, he could barely remember anything else.

Something had happened three days ago. He couldn’t remember. But something really, really bad. And Spider-Man had hurt him, a-and if being locked up hadn’t been enough to satisfy him, then…?

He was scared.

They stopped, finally. He felt Spider-Man land on solid ground, and after a few seconds with no change in that, he let himself open his eyes. Still afraid to move. Harry didn’t recognize the place. An underpass? A tunnel? Something dark. Spider-Man went right to a wall and tugged a piece of cardboard graffiti aside, and there was a door behind it. He keyed in a code, and stepped in quick, Harry still slung over a shoulder, and then they were just in the dark.

There were about two seconds of blackness, and then a light switched on, and Harry felt his stomach drop as the pitch black space lit up and became a lab, with a tank of liquid a very familiar color in a corner.

Despair submerged him like he was already locked inside it again, and he stayed still, too overwhelmed to accept the situation, to think at all.

Nothing but fear.

No no. Please not again. Why. Why?

Spider-Man got to the center of the room and laid him on the floor, and Harry stayed limp, listening, trying frantically to find any way out of this, and coming up blank.

What is he going to do to me?

He wanted to cry. He didn’t want to die yet. Here, alone, without seeing his dad or his friends. He. He wanted to get out. He…

“Okay. Sorry, let me get that.”

Harry barely registered words at all, as Spider-Man knelt and started to pull the webbing off. Just lay there, shaking. Thinking about the tank and the pain in his ribs and his eye. And then his upper torso was free, and with a sudden surge of desperation, Harry lashed out and caught the Spider in the side of the head with a yell.

It had been a lucky shot, and his second swing wasn’t so lucky. Spider-Man caught the fist and dragged it back against the ground, then snagged the other and pinned him down as Harry frantically thrashed and writhed beneath him.

“No!” he shouted, finding his voice for the first time, “Let me go! Stop!”

“Harry! Please!” tried Spider-Man, struggling with him, “Don’t—Just stop! It’s okay!”

Harry could hear the chains still on his wrists dragging against the concrete floor as his kidnapper tried to hold him down.

“Get off me! Help! Please!” shouted Harry, “Help!”

“Harry! Harry it’s okay!”

“Please! Somebody!”

“You’re okay! —Harry it’s me!” Spider-Man let go of one of his arms for an instant and ripped his mask off. “It’s me! I’m not going to hurt you! You’re safe! I promise! I promise.”

Harry stopped and stared.

Above him, Spider-Man cautiously let go of his arms and sat up a little, worried face looking back.

“…Peter?” asked Harry in broken disbelief.

Peter Parker nodded.

…he…

“The…whole time?” he asked.

Peter nodded again. “Yeah.”

Harry shot up and flung his arms around Peter and clung to him.

He felt Peter freeze up, but all he could think was his own relief.

“Peter,” he cried, burying his head against his neck.

There was a second, and then he felt Peter’s arms close around him and hug him back.

He had never felt safer or happier in his life.

“Pete, I don’t know what’s going on,” he pleaded, unable to stop crying in relief, “Something’s really wrong with me.”

“I know,” came his best friend’s voice, steady and reassuring as always.

“I-I’m so sorry; I think I hurt you,” he stuttered, “when—I-I don’t remember why we were fighting, but-”

“-Me too,” cut in Peter worriedly, “I’m really sorry—I had no idea it was you.”

“Thank you. Thank you thank you thank you,” said Harry, digging his face in deeper against Peter’s neck and holding onto him like it was the only thing keeping him alive, “I thought I was gonna die there.”

“Never,” promised Peter worriedly, “I’d never let that happen.”

“How did you find me?” asked Harry, finally opening his eyes.

“As soon as I knew it was you, I just stayed close,” said Peter, “Followed Oscorp. I’m…so sorry I didn’t know. Th-that you were sick, and this whole time you’ve been missing…”

Harry loosened his grip enough to sit back so he could see Peter again, and smiled at him. “How could you have known?”

Peter smiled back, and he looked so sad and so happy and so relieved and so worried all at the same time, that Harry wasn’t sure what it meant.

He felt worry blossom in his chest again. “Pete… What’s going on?” he asked, glancing behind him at the tank, and around at the equipment with some growing unease, then back at Peter. “W-Why am I here? Why do you have that?”

Peter followed his gaze to the tank, and his expression became worried. Which was not reassuring.

He wouldn’t hurt me. This is Peter. He wouldn’t.

“I…nobody told you?” asked Peter, something in his expression breaking, “Did they tell you anything?”

“O-Oscorp?” checked Harry, “No. Or…I-I don’t remember.” Trying to remember hurt.

“Okay,” said Peter slowly, thinking, and looking very upset. There was the faint clink of metal from the snapped chains as he took Harry’s hands gently in his own and looked back at him. “There’s some kind of drug Oscorp had you take. I think because you were sick. It’s altered your DNA, but, not exactly like they thought. It’s why you can’t remember much about fighting me. It kicks in hard with adrenaline and some emotional responses, anger especially. But it hasn’t finished altering you. They haven’t figured out a way to counter it or get it out, but the stuff in the tank, it keeps the serum close to inert. Buys some time to try to find an antidote before it gets worse. I’m…so sorry they didn’t even explain why they were doing things.”

Drug…?

A flash of pain dug into the right side of his skull, and he let go of Peter’s hand to clutch his forehead.

“Har?!” he heard Peter call worriedly, felt a hand in his back.

“I-I’m okay,” he managed, fingers digging into his skin, “I’m okay. Sorry. I…”

“Are you sure?” asked Peter, anxiously helping him straighten back up.

No?

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly.

Words replayed in his head, memories, bad ones, and he took the lab in for a third time.

“So then…” he asked with a sinking feeling, eyeing the oxygen tanks and the monitors, “This is all for me.”

“I’m…sorry,” said Peter, sounding truly miserable, “I didn’t know what else to do. I thought, this way I can help. We can find a cure, and Oscorp won’t find you, and…I know, it still sucks, but.”

There was something about his expression, and Harry felt sick. He turned his head to take in the tank again. A little box. A little glass cage. He felt a shudder run down him. Something worse. “P-Peter,” he tried, looking back at him, “Did I hurt people?”

Peter looked so taken aback by the question.

“When I…when we fought. And…I-I can’t remember. But. I hurt people, didn’t I?”

Peter didn’t answer, but from Peter, that was its own answer, and Harry felt his heart crumble to dust.

He looked away, down at the floor.

“Har…” said Peter hesitantly.

“It’s okay,” said Harry quietly, trying not to think, “I’ll go. I don’t want to hurt anyone else.”

“Har…I won’t—…I wouldn’t make you. You know that, right?”

He looked up at Peter, and smiled. It was good to hear him say that. He hadn’t been sure.

“Thank you,” he said again, still feeling sick at the thought of going back in a tank, “For everything, Pete.”

Peter smiled back at him, and he was overwhelmed.

He put his arms around Peter again and pulled him close, burying his face against Peter and trying to soak in the feeling so he could remember it. He didn’t want to let go. He didn’t want to go back.

“Harry,” said Peter after a second, almost gently.

“I-I know,” said Harry, clinging tighter, “I’ll go. I will. I promise. Just, please. I haven’t been out in a year. Just another minute before I go back in there. Please.”

Peter was quiet. He felt arms close around his back and return the embrace again.

“I was going to say I think it’s okay if we wait a little. I need to get a read on the mutation rate outside the tank as a baseline anyway. Maybe we could get a pizza, some real food, just. Sit for a little bit,” came Peter’s voice.

Harry hugged him tighter, trying not to cry again.

He nodded.

“Okay,” said Peter quietly, and there was a smile in his voice, “Just let me know when you’re ready, and I’ll go grab us one.”

“Thank you,” managed Harry, eyes shut. Afraid opening them would wake him up, “for saving me.”

Peter leaned his head against Harry’s.

“I missed you,” said Harry.

“I missed you too,” answered Pete.

#spider-man Ps4 fic #spider-man fic #Harry Osborn #Spider-Man #Peter Parker #me writing #parksborn #I wanted to write about Peter dealing with betrayal after Otto and loss and his own beliefs and I’ve always loved what he and Harry have #and wanted to write about pain and fear and healing and themes they’ve had together since the OG

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