Starting Life From Zero: Far From Home

Chapter Forty-Nine

With his mask and most of the electronics in his suit damaged and the injury to his leg fresh despite being partially healed by Ferris, Peter needed to make sure he engaged Emilia as quickly as he could. Despite her kind nature, she might have been as dangerous an opponent as he ever faced, especially alone.

And with the last stunt that he pulled and Sam still reeling from his bout with Petelgeuse, it was likely that no one was coming to his aid. Then there's the fact that I basically openly attacked two Kingdom of Lugunica Knights—hope that doesn't bite me in the ass later.

Peter soared through the air, carried upward as far as Ram's air current would take him using the web-shooters to steer himself through the dissipating mist in a bid to reach Emilia. So far, there was no plan and at these current speeds he had very little time to make one. Still, he had to do something. He had to try anything that he could.

"Peter!" Puck zipped toward him, flying at speeds that he didn't know the cat-spirit could manage. "Peter, I'm going to need your help." As Puck reached him, the small spirit circled around him in the air and came up alongside him, matching his glide speed.

"Good to see you're okay," Peter said. "Julius implied that Emilia had been possessed and that if you were still contracted to her it shouldn't be possible."

Puck sighed. "It shouldn't be, but I think I can force Petelgeuse out of her body—the only thing is you have to promise me, no matter what, that you'll look after Lia, okay?"

Peter fired a pair of webs for the ground, using both of his web-shooters and jerked himself forward as he pulled his body into a crouch position. "What are you planning to do?" he asked.

"Promise me, that's as much as I can say," Puck shouted as he zoomed off toward Emilia.

"I'm never going to stop looking after her, but Puck—wait! What are you going to—" Peter's Spider-Sense sent a shockwave of warning through his head to join the general throbbing pain that was there. It came on so suddenly that his hands almost grabbed for the sides of his skull, just as one of the unseen hands stabbed into the shoulder of the suit, piercing into the material to stab him with a sharpened tendril of darkened mist. It would knock him out of the air. It tried to push through him more and force him down.

He had to remember that there was no way to tell how much control Emilia had over herself. Peter worried that before Puck did whatever it was he was going to do, before he could get to her, whatever was left of Emilia would be gone.

Peter tumbled through the air with the unseen hand still jutting out of his body. He grabbed it, clutched in both hands at the furthest point along it that he could reach and crushed it screaming as his strength surged to snap the unseen hand. It bent, went crooked and then dissipated. Though the damage had been done, he had fallen far enough that the kind of approach that he wanted to make would be impossible.

Then someone caught him under his arms, hoisting him into the air at a steep angle with the wind whipping through his hair.

"Sergeant Wilson?" Peter said looking up to see Falcon carrying him.

"Whoa, now that's little formal," Sam Wilson replied.

"You're still pretty hurt, should you be—"

Sam cut him off. "Look kid, that whole White Whale thing—all of this, you did it for that girl. If she's in trouble we need to take any chance we've got. I may not be in top shape, but I can ferry you up there."

"Thanks."

"Besides, what, you've got to weigh all of 110 pounds soaking wet," Sam added.

"Not exactly instilling much confidence—look out!" Peter pointed to where one of the unseen hands was breaking through the mist. Sam rolled to the side to dodge it before climbing higher into the sky.