Author's Note: Hello! Welcome to this story! I'm taking a break from Stygian at the moment (another Avengers Fanfic, for those of you unaware) because it has literally driven me to tears and this idea occurred to me a few months ago and I finally sat down and started it. Thank you so much for giving it a try! :)

So, in Thor 1 Odin arrives at the precise time to keep both Thor and Loki from falling into the Void and I looked at that, tilted my head and the cynical part of my brain went: well, what if that didn't happen? What if Odin just missed them and both Loki and Thor fell into the Void and were captured by Thanos? Whalla! The story was born! :)

IMPORTANT THINGS TO BE AWARE OF:

This is an Alternate Universe, pals, and since Loki and Thor have been stuck with Thanos since they fell, the Battle of New York never happened, just want to make that clear. The Avengers have still assembled, but it was to fight off Malekith when he roared in with the Aether instead. Age of Ultron didn't happen because New York didn't, so no Wanda or Pietro, sorry. :( Peter references stuff that happened in Spider-Man: Homecoming, but without the Chitauri warships, it occurred slightly differently, also, CIVIL WAR has also not occurred. And, though I'm a hard core Clint/Laura shipper, I sort of want to try my hand at Clint/Natasha so Laura/Barton children wont be in this story, either, and (this note is turning out much longer than I intended) after Captain America: the Winter Solider, Bucky went back with Steve after the Helicarrier exploded-I think this is everything you need to know for right now. ;)

Things will be explained deeper as the story progresses, but I'm just trying to prevent as much confusion as possible. :) Again, thank you for your interest.

Pairings: Tony/Pepper, Jane/Thor, and Clint/Natasha

Summary: ""...Sir?" Peter repeats, cautiously. The man licks his dry, split lips and then parts them, ragged breath escaping followed by a pleading whisper: "Help him."" Odin arrives to late to save Thor and Loki from the plummet into the Void at the end of Thor 1, and both are captured and claimed by the hand of Thanos. Four years later, Peter Parker comes across two half-dead men wandering the streets of New York.

Rated for minor violence, implied/referenced torture, paranoia on my part and an over all darker feeling. No slash, no smut, nor anything inappropriate. Language is all K.

Sorry for any grammar/spelling errors.

Disclaimer: I own nothing!

For your information, this story is cross-posted on Archive for Our Own under the pen name of "GalaxyThreads".

Oh, this is all we know; oh, tragic and miserable,

We're not cynics, we just don't believe a word you say; we're not critics, we just hate it all anyway.

-Icon For Hire "Cynics and Critics".

Chapter One:

Peter ought to accept the fact that he (despite his strong resentment towards the idea) is a bit of an idiot. "A bit" is actually a pretty flattering statement, because he is a vast one, actually; how he managed to make it into High School with his head firmly attached to his shoulders is starting to become a bit of a mystery. One that even the great detective Sherlock Holmes would be puzzled at. Honestly, it's just buckets upon buckets filled with stupid, stupid, stupid.

He really shouldn't be surprised anymore, but he does have his moments where he has to pause and wonder with great amazement how it is exactly that he's not dead by now. Because, despite how his actions speak otherwise to this point, it is, in fact, not a goal of his to be stabbed, impaled or even nicked by the sharp object in the abdomen that's currently looking to be headed in that direction.

Idiot. His mind insists, in a voice that sounds drastically like Aunt May's. Idiot, idiot, idiot.

Indeed.

Honestly, his only goal after leaving school was to do a quick patrol around the city, make sure there was no one who he needed to help across the street then head home because he has a Spanish exam on Friday that he needs to study for and if he doesn't pass it then May's going to ground him from the suit for a week.

Again.

He's been slipping with homework recently as he's been attempting to work off the stress that the Vulture-incident shoved onto him through Spider-Man and Aunt May is not happy. Granted, she hasn't exactly been pleased to an amount of boundless joy since learning about his alter-ego three months ago. She yelled, then she cried, and then called Mr. Stark and repeated the process.

Peter felt horrible, he didn't mean to keep it from her, it just sort of happened; he'd just wanted to track down Uncle Ben's killer and be done with it, but the outcome didn't turn out like that. Instead, he'd kept going and enjoyed it.

After she'd gotten through with crying and a fair bit of yelling (honestly Peter had half expected her to toss him into the streets and burn the suit in anger), she'd set out a few guidelines that he was to follow and one of those was: "School has to come first, your education isn't going to suffer". Peter has been trying, he really has, but sometimes the sleepless nights really eat at him and he escapes into his suit to burn off steam. Without the proper amount of rest he needed, he fell asleep during multiple classes, Ned's prodding with pens the only thing keeping him from utterly failing, but the few C's that he achieved he can't say he's utterly proud of.

Aunt May caught word of this and was quite furious and didn't let him go out for a week.

So yes, he has to pass the quiz with a B+ or better because he doesn't want a repeat of May's wrath. He was only going to do a quick hour long run around the city and then be done with it. An hour. That was it.

Reality, as it turns out, does not bend quite so easily to time schedules.

Out of place.

It's the first phrase that pops into his head that really fits the two men. It's really the first wording that flits across his brain in the first place, but it fits more than the following: "strange and possibly dangerous" does, although it's not wrong. Not exactly. Peter wouldn't exactly label the two of them as bank-robbers, or really criminal looking, but they do seem to give of this sort of "vibe". New York is not exactly home to innocent angels on a good day and most people have come to accept that if you wander the streets, you're going to come across some shady fellows. It's just common knowledge that everyone who grows up there is taught in childhood.

No crowd normally parts like this for any random guy like they are for these two blokes.

Honestly, after he got over the "strange"-thing he thought it was almost amusing. There is nothing really threatening about them for the people to be actively avoiding/walking around them for at a first look. Both are tall, but that's about all they have in common. Dark hair spills over the shoulders of the man on the left and golden hair is tied into a firm ponytail on the man on the right. The dark-haired man is thin and the other is broad making it an odd contrast. The blond man's arm is swung over the thinner's shoulder and he appears by all intents to simply be dragging the former along in a tired stagger that looks exhausting.

It was once he realized this, that it had gone from amusing to concerning.

Neither was heading in the direction of a hospital that they both appeared to greatly need, just aimlessly moving forward. The black-haired man appears to be trying to talk to the general population who avoid them because his head turns in their direction and people give him panicked looks. It was in this moment that Peter had finally realized why they were avoiding the two like a wrinkly, old, walking band aid that smells fetid.

Clutched in the right hand of the dark-haired man is a staff-spear thing about two and a half feet long with a glowing blue object at the end. They're wandering around with the weapon might as well have been the Black Plague for all that New York appears to care and if someone doesn't do something soon, they'll more than likely be arrested.

Which for some reason, doesn't quite sit well with him.

Peter tilts his head curiously and gives the two another hard stare as when the dark-haired man attempts to speak to someone else, a young adult makes a rather rude gesture in his direction. Peter frowns.

They need assistance—or at least directions to a hospital and, Peter isn't certain, but he's pretty sure neither is native to New York. They likely won't be able to find one easily the way they're going.

"Mr. Parker," Karen's voice sounds inside his ear, causing him to jump slightly. Sometimes he forgets that she's there because she can be so quiet. It's nice to have a companion as he patrols and someone who can direct him to those in need, but sometimes she can be like an unhappy nanny with everything that he does. He is aware that Mr. Stark designed her to assist and look out for him, which he finds oddly warming, but sometimes he misses the days where he was solo. Why? She's a fully functioning AI who has, alas, had the pleasure of working with him for several months now and she can pretty well guess his actions. Then voices her disagreement. Loudly. This is reassured to him a moment later as (with a disapproving tone) she states: "I find this unadvisable."

Unfortunately for her, this doesn't really deter him.

Peter moves from his perch on the side of a building, beginning to shift towards the two men as he crawls along the glass and states, snarkily: ""This"?"

"Your current choice of action: moving to assist those two men." Karen says without missing a beat.

Peter lifts his wrist aiming a web; yeah, well, pretty much everything he does as Spider-Man is inadvisable to her. Jumping into a gun fight: inadvisable, staying fifteen minutes past the eleven PM curfew: inadvisable, helping an elderly across the street: inadvisable because they might have a gun and shoot him. She is unbelievably smart, but sometimes a paranoia monster.

Peter shoots the web and gives it a tug to make sure it stuck and steady enough to hold his weight (he has had the pleasure of slamming his face into the ground when he hasn't done this before hand and a person should only test gravity as little as possible in their lives) before swinging across a distance and landing in a crouch on the wall.

He's getting closer, he just needs to crawl along this and then he can jump in front of them. "They need help." Peter argues, only half heartedly into this dispute. His focus is elsewhere and he isn't really going to listen to Karen's protests anyway.

"Yes," Karen agrees, "shall I call the police?"

The police? They would probably arrest them for wandering around with weapons and they don't look like they can deal with that right now. Peter's frown deepens then he shakes his head, "No, I'm going to talk to them."

If Karen could sigh, Peter is quite positive that she would have at this moment, a slight noise of annoyance does pop up, however. "Of course you are." Yep, that's him, the idiot who wants to help people and will probably not make it to his twenty-first birthday because of it.

Peter resists a roll of his eyes (barely) and flips from off the building he was perched on landing with slight grunt in a crouch about fifteen feet ahead of the two stumbling men. A few people give slight yelps of surprise at his sudden drop in from seemingly nowhere hands going to their chests in a defensive position, but Peter ignores them, shifting through the New Yorker's towards the wide-berthed men. He's attempting to have more confidence than he really feels as he moves forward, because the weapon clutched in the hand of the dark-haired one looks a bit more frightening up close and his spider-sense firmly says no in the direction of it.

Where did that spear even come from? Peter hasn't seen anything like it before and it doesn't appear to be from a dedicated comic-conner attempting to reenact something. And these two don't even strike him as that type of person. The weapon isn't from any TV series that he knows of and he doesn't recognize it period.

And it's glowing. It is, in all actuality glowing. Not like flashlight does with the single light sparkling through a bulb, but the entire thing is giving off a blue light. The end is also sharp and pointed more than likely painful to get stabbed with.

He has no desire for that outcome.

Peter takes several steps forward and halfway jumps in front of the men to get their attention. His eyes widen at the sight of them up close. The blond man really isn't walking on his bare feet, just being pulled along by his raven-haired companion. His clothing is tattered, torn and worn through heavily and there is a thick homemade bandage wrapped around his right eye that contrasts to his deathly pale face. The other man, clutching the spear, appears washed out and exhausted. He too, is wearing similarly diaphanous clothing, barefoot and is equally pale. His eyes hold deep shadows, but his grip on the other's arm is so tight it looks painful. His eyes hold a glassy, haunted note to them.

Peter nearly reers back from this information as it processes quickly, but forces himself to remain standing where he is. "Sir?" Peter asks, tentivily towards the dark haired one, because the blond doesn't look near answering anything, pale and obviously near unconsciousness or actually unconscious. Cats, they look terrible. They need a doctor and badly.

The man doesn't look at Peter, eyes stubborn and unyieldingly locked to the ground.

Peter's lips thin.

"Mr. Sir, can—do you need assistance?" He asks, half considering snapping his fingers in front of the raven-haired's face to gain a reaction, but the added length of the sentence appears to be enough for him. His glassy-eyed stare drags from the concrete to Peter's face, coming to a halt and piercing green eyes stare at him sharply.

They look at his face for a long moment, squinting in confusion.

"...Sir?" Peter repeats, cautiously.

The man licks his dry, split lips and then parts them, ragged breath escaping followed by a pleading whisper: "Help him."

His voice is a mixture of an off-center-not-quite-British that Peter can't place. It's croaky and breathless. The raven-haired man tilts his companion towards Peter slightly, the blond letting out a slight groan at the movement. His spider sense pulses and Peter's eyes widen considerably at it and he takes a slight step forward to catch the blond man as he wavers in the other's grip.

"Mister, I don't—" Peter starts to say, his voice rising a pitch because he honestly has no idea what to do. He just wanted to point them in the direction of a hospital, not much else. He can't help the blond because he isn't a doctor or really certified for anything beyond putting a bandaid over bruises (and you don't put bandaids on bruises). Granted, yes, he has removed bullets from himself and wrapped the injury, but the only reason he's survived is because he has super healing.

He doesn't know how to provide assistance.

Raven-hair clutches at the spear tighter, his fingers flexing around the weapon before a half strangled sort of sob-noise escapes him and he stares at Peter, a look of wild desperation in his eye, "Help him."

Peter stares, but his spider sense is thrumming in the back of his mind.

"Please," Raven-hair pleads, his voice softer, he's starting to sway slightly, the grip on the other wavering and Peter reacts more on instinct than thought as he reaches forward to catch the blond as he slips from Raven-hair. Peter's doesn't strain with the surprisingly light weight, but lifts his gaze as the man murmurs (that without his enhanced hearing he honestly doubts he would have caught): "please help my brother" before his eyes slip shut and he promptly collapses.

Peter lets out a rather unmaly yelp of surprise and reaches his other arm out to grab the man as he falls face forward and lands on his knees, both of them lowered to the ground, but no head injuries. That's great, the rather not hysteric part of his brain supplies, no concussions are a good thing. Aunt May would be glad, she, as a nurse, doesn't like dealing with concussions and is always drilling into him to prevent head injuries as much as he's able.

The other part of his brain, not cheering for preventing two concussions screams in building hysteria: WHAT THE HECK DO I DO NOW!?

911. He's supposed to call that number for emergencies.

This counts as that, right?

And what? He's Spider-Man at the moment and he can't exactly leave his number for them to call when they need him to come in for a statement. And what about the glowy-staff-thing? Wasn't he against calling the police for that in the first place?

Peter lets out a slight groan between his teeth and wants to give his hair a tight pull, but can't because of the mask. He can't just remove the suit anyway, his backpack is in an ally blocks from here and these two need assistance now.

Peter's fingers scramble for his phone in a pocket somewhere on this blasted suit as the people around him continue to give a wide berth. Good, he doesn't really want them to overhear this. His fingers grasp his phone and he tugs at it and presses the passcode in before unending to "call" and flips through his contacts rapidly before pushing "Happy".

He presses it to his ear as he leans forward to tilt the head of Raven-haired so he can breathe easier and listens to the line ring.

And ring.

And ring.

Seriously? Now!? Peter hasn't called or texted Happy as aggressively as he did before the Vulture-incident a few months ago, (frankly he's quite embarrassed at how much he was pushing for the man's attention), but Happy has made a point to pick up his calls after the Vulture thing.

Until now.

He must be busy.

"This is Happy Hugon, leave a message."

Peter bites his tongue to withhold the curse of frustration that wants to escape, "Um, yeah, this is Peter, I...found some almost-dead guys that have a weird glowy thing and I don't know what to do. Call me when you get this, please!" Peter says and hangs up. This is just bloody great. He holds the phone to his ear for a moment, hopeful Happy will return the call, but it doesn't happen.

"I have attempted to get ahold of Jarvis, Mr. Parker," Karen says into his ear, producing another jump from him, "but Mr. Stark appears to be busy at the moment with an undercover mission with Black Widow and won't return for several days."

Perfect.

Peter flips through the contacts again and presses his hands against his eyes for a long moment in frustration, oh, he has no idea what to do. He has the other Avenger's private numbers, Mr. Stark gave them to him about two months ago in case he was "ever busy and you get shot again", but he doesn't exactly feel comfortable calling them. He's only met them in person a few times and he's barely exchanged a few words with some of them. Honestly, he's a little frightened of the team.

"Help my brother please."

Siblings, the realization suddenly hits him. The two are siblings. What the heck were they doing to get this dead-like and grab the weird staff thing? They could be from Asgard, but there's been a lack of communication between them and the other planet over the last five (maybe, honestly, Peter doesn't know, he only remembers Mr. Stark and Captain America mentioning it when he was in the room) months.

Oh, this is wonderful, he can't figure out how to help two people and now he's determined they are aliens. Only reasonable explanation, of course.

He frowns, deeply, before flipping through his contact list again. His aunt is a nurse, she can help him figure out what's wrong and if they really need to see a hospital, she can help him get them there. The glowy-thing keeps halting his attempts to call 911. He just has to get them to his apartment several blocks from here. He can't take both of them at the same time without causing some sort of bodily damage (and he doesn't know if they have broken bones) so he needs a partner in crime. Or a guy in the chair.

Peter types in "Ne" to his phone and presses Ned's contact number before holding the phone to his ear.

Please pick up, please pick up, please pick- "Hey Peter, this better be about a time for that English assignment that we have, because my mom isn't leaving me alone about that at all. I'm starting to agree with her. Dude, if we don't get started, we are literally going to have to stay up all night working on an assignment again and as fun as that was, I don't want to do it ever again. Period. So—"

"Um, actually, this isn't about school, Ned." Peter corrects, before Ned can get to much into his rant about the assignment he forgot about. Whoops. It's due on Friday, they should get started on that. "I need your help."

"Is this for Spider-Man?" Ned demands, his voice way to cheerful for the situation, "Please tell me it's for Spider-Man."

Peter pauses, glances at the two men then says: "Um, sort of."

000o000

"I feel like a kidnapper." Ned moans in distress as they step into Peter's apartments' elevator after having carried the two men through New York for the last hour or so. It is, unfortunately, not Ned's first declaration of this statement. More like his twenty-sixth or hundreth. Honestly, Peter lost count some time ago and started tuning them out at about the same time. They've received plenty of stares from many, many New Yorkers from their current position.

They aren't kidnapping, they're just...moving the two adults so that way they can receive medical assistance when May returns. Without their consent. Yep, it's pretty much kidnapping—with a good intentions, not that that exactly makes it better. Peter resists the urge to lean towards the elevator wall and give it a good whack with his forehead. The most it will do is hurt and then bring a headache, furthering his current one, but it might help his ever rising levels of anxiety.

Peter readjusts his grip on the blond, grabbing a little firmer to his arm and waits for the elevator to reach the floor his and May's apartment is located on. Both Ned and Peter started with Blond-guy and Raven-haired in fireman's carry, but the stares they'd received for the action had made them both change to an arm over the shoulder and a slight drag.

It doesn't help their (the adults) bare feet any, but it has helped with the whole "we aren't kidnappers" look they were going for. Neither Ned nor Peter has any strong desire to go to prison. Or any desire at all, actually. He is honestly surprised that they made it back to Peter's apartment without being pulled to the side by a concerned police officer.

The elevator, finally, blessedly dings and Peter shuffles forward, his shoulders giving a slight whine in protest as he moves and he presses his lips together. They are tired of dragging a person around and would like to stop. Almost there, Peter reminds himself.

Ned had grabbed Peter's backpack on the way to assist Peter with moving the two men and Peter had changed back into normal clothing before they began their trek back to the apartment. They reach the door and Ned releases a breath of relief as Peter stuffs his left hand into the depth of his pocket, searching for his key.

His fingers wrap around the cool metal and Peter sighs with solace that he didn't lose it again. It's happened more times than he can admit aloud without damaging his pride. He's always losing things, it's kind of a curse. He puts something down and it's pretty much never where he left it after that. It's ridiculous, because he can name the first twenty monarchs of Norway after looking at it once, but lose a bowl of cereal he just poured. Peter stuffs the key into the lock and shoves the door open, dragging Blond-guy into the small apartment.

It's smaller than the one that he and May used to have towards the beginning of this year (about two months ago) but they moved when the money issue started getting worse. Ben paid for a lot of the expenses with his job that May couldn't and with her suddenly forced to pay for everything, money has gotten tight. It's not uncomfortable (the apartment) and May does what she can to keep costs down low, so he doesn't complain about how much he misses their old apartment. Yes, it's not the same one that they had when Uncle Ben was alive, but that's a good thing. Sort of.

There's less memories here than there was at the other apartment, but it kind feels like they've betrayed Ben slightly by moving. May needed it though, and that pretty much settled and complaints Peter had on the issue to a quiet murmur in the back of his mind. It's not like they switched complexes, they just moved down the hall and Peter is grateful for that.

Peter pulls Blond-guy into the living room and distributes him on one end of the sofa that he slumps against, his body lax and unresponsive. His breath escapes him in a hissed groan. It's concerning. The man's eye-patch band aid thing is dirty and looks like it needs to be replaced soon. Peter doesn't want to attempt removal. He's half afraid he'd make it worse than it already is. (Honestly, Peter doesn't know) for all he's aware, the entire eyeball could be missing. Which would be disgusting.

The door to the apartment closes before Ned walks into the room several moments later, releasing Raven-hair onto the other side of the sofa and his head rolls back, eyes squeezing shut for a moment a slight grimace appearing on his face. Peter's breath catches in his throat, but Raven-haired doesn't awaken.

Peter runs a hand through his hair and releases a slight hysterical laugh. "Okay, great, they're in here." He says.

What now?

He can have a really bad, stupid impulsive streak sometimes, and this is definitely on the list of one of the more ludicrous things he's done. Why the heck did he think this was a good idea? It is a little late to return them though, or just distribute them in a hospital. He should have thought just a little harder about this.

Idiot. Idiot. Idiot.

"Yeah." Ned says, his expression perfectly stating Peter's uncertainty to this situation.

A sudden surge of gratitude sinks into Peter's stomach for Ned agreeing to help him with this rather than just proclaiming him crazy and never speaking to him again. Peter wouldn't have blamed him if that had happened.

Peter swings his backpack over his shoulder forcing his eyes away from the two unconscious men and he stares at the staff-thing that he stuffed into his backpack earlier. He hadn't known what to do with it when Ned arrived, but it seemed fairly important to the two brothers so he took it. He shoved it into his backpack, the sharp part first so the stick was pointing up because it didn't look so threatening.

He grabs the golden handle and his spider sense tingles unhappily in the back of his mind. What is up with this thing? His spider sense has been blaring in the back of his skull ever since he came three feet of it.

Peter unzips the top of his backpack and pulls the rest of staff-spear-thing from within the confines of it. The blue part isn't glowing as heavily as it was when Raven-haired was holding it earlier, but it's still glowing softly.

His spider sense hisses in the blue-glowy-stone-thing's direction.

There is nothing dangerous about it! Nothing that Peter can see, anyway. He rests it on the coffee table in front of the sofa (giving a mental sigh of relief as his spider sense calms almost instantly to a low thrum rather than a high pitched scream) and tosses his backpack towards the foot of the couch and shares a look with Ned.

What has he gotten himself into?

May is going to kill him.

With a blunt spoon.

Peter groans and presses his hands against his eyes, "I am an idiot." He moans aloud.

He doesn't see it, but can almost hear Ned's shrug, "Pretty much."

Peter lifts his head from the confines of his palms and glares, "Thanks."

Ned lifts his hands in defense, "Peter, we literally just kidnapped two homeless guys with a glowy-staff thing that should probably be at a hospital."

"We didn't kidnap them." Peter protests weakly, though common sense in the back of his mind argues otherwise. Raven-hair asked Peter to help though, the desperation in his green eyes isn't something Peter thinks he can forget anytime soon. It's probably why he wanted a first hand in this in the first place. Alright, note to self: Never make eye contact with the people he helps again.

He releases another distressed moan and Ned smacks his upper arm in a friendly way to quiet him, "You did the right thing." Ned assures and Peter looks up at him, doubtful. Right. Ned's lips thin and he sighs, "Alright, probably."

More accurate.

Hopefully this doesn't blow up in their faces.

May will be home soon, she can fix this. Why couldn't Happy have picked up the phone and talked him out of doing this? Or Karen? She seemed to just accept that this was going to happen and remained quiet. Granted, she was really there for when they pulled the two guys around New York, stuffed in the back of Peter's backpack and all. Peter pulls his hands down his face in his anxiety before sighing heavily, "Okay."

Okay. This is fine.

Ned and Peter stare at their kidnappee's for a second before Ned turns to him, "What do we do now?"

How should he know? He's been asking himself the same bloody question for the last three minutes since they got here!

"I don't know," Peter admits, "we can't really do anything until May gets home." Ned frowns before releasing a sigh and shifts across the room, exiting the living room and plopping down onto one of the chairs pushed against the table in the kitchen. Peter's lips curve down, but he follows the suit and sits stiffly in the chair, the further he gets from the staff-thing the lower his spider sense thrums. Weird. He leans against his elbow, resting his other hand on the wood. He still has a view of the couch from here and can see the heads of blond and black hair popping over the edge. In the sudden silence, he can hear the ragged breath of one of them. He can't tell which.

He releases a breath into the air and glances at the clock. May won't be off her shift for about thirty minutes and there's still the twenty minute wait as she gets transportation back to the apartment. They have plenty of time to fill during this likely hour long wait ahead of them.

Peter's lips thin and he releases a sigh before lifting his gaze to Ned, "You said we had a group English assignment?"

Author's Note: Yay! :) I'm going to attempt to update this as quickly as I can, but I do sort of need to plan it completely first, it could be a little bit of a waiting period. Thank you so much for your interest! :)