HOPELESS ☾Peter Parker - 1

THIRTY FOUR

Aspen didn't want to believe that one of her own parents--or possibly--both had been the one experimenting on her in her time at Hydra, but with the information given, it was and not to. 

Dr. Hoffman was dead long before Aspen was even born, and the file about herself stated that a "Dr. Blue" had been the one to inject her with serums; it was pretty clear that the file was correct.

But Aspen just couldn't fathom it. She had clear memories of Dr. Hoffman doing the procedures, and she couldn't understand how her brain could possibly be wrong. That is, until Tony Stark did more digging and found something very interesting.

"Now, I don't know what the serums did to you exactly, but I did find this," he pulled up an image from the Hemlock file and put his finger under the part he was about to read. 

"Serum thirteen was a success, Hemlock's temporal lobe was finally accessed." He read the information before turning back to the two teen's.

"Now, the temporal lobe is the part of the brain that has to do with-" He began to explain but Peter cut him off.

"Storing long term memories." He was nodding, "So if Hydra found a way to access that part of her brain-"

"They could potentially change my memories." Aspen finished, nodding along with the boy.

"And that would be how they convinced you that Dr. Hoffman was your doctor instead of one of your parents, how they made you forget you have trigger words, and even how they made you forget exactly what they did to you. Potentially, Hydra could have changed practically every memory in your brain." Tony explained, bearing the bad news. 

"But I don't think they did." Aspen shook her head. "I still have memories from my childhood that involved both of my parents--happy ones at that! I don't think they changed everything in my head, just the things they didn't want me to know."

No one really knew what to say next. They were all thinking their own thoughts and coming up with new ideas, but this was all so strange to them--especially to Aspen and Peter. Aspen rubbed her forehead with her eyes closed. 

What if was all fake? Every memory and image that she had from her past could've been created by doctors in a lab, but Aspen chose not to think like that. 

Instead, she would think that it was all real. That her childhood was as happy as she remembered and that her parents loved her unconditionally. 

"So what now?" She finally let out, opening her eyes and staring directly in front of her.

"We can read through your entire file if you want, but I can't promise that we'll find anything that can help us." Tony suggested with a shrug.

Aspen nodded reluctantly. Of course she wanted to learn as much as she could, but she was afraid of what she might find. But, she decided to ignore her hesitance and read through it all  despite the horrors she may be faced with. 

So, the three of them read all day, taking a few breaks when necessary. They skipped through the reports of her punishments, and didn't read anything too violent. 

At some points Aspen would grow uncomfortable and have to take a second to collect herself, but when that happened Peter would grab her hand and calm her down.

Peter's gaze would not stop moving back to the beautiful girl next to him. He was worried that reliving all of this would be too hard on her and that she would have another break down, so he kept an eye on her.

"Hey Mr. Stark, how about we stop for today?" Peter spoke up, noticing how Aspen's behavior had changed and how her body was more rigid.

The man took in a deep breath and turned to face the two teens. "You know what, no."