the siren |peter parker x siren!oc|

Tranquility: Part 9

trigger warning: this chapter includes a depiction of an almost-attempted suicide and discusses themes of depression and suicidal thoughts.

They arrived at the top of the hotel in time before any first responders had shown, the precise scenario Lena wanted. It could be overwhelming to have loud sirens and flashing lights and people yelling, and the last thing she wanted was for the individual to throw themselves off the top of the building for that very reason.

Suicide was quite a concept that that innately human. Lena had felt a particular draw to the idea, doing small amounts of research on the phenomena in nature. There had been studies, and while animals killed themselves, it was never suicide. The act of suicide, a living organism craving oblivion in a dangerous way, was only enacted by human beings.

Her curiosity stemmed from a deep, dark feeling that had dominated her daily interaction with her abusers. Abusers were the word that Tony and Peter used. It described the beings that tore her apart piece by piece, leaving her a shell that her peirasmos had figured out how to fill.

She stared at the figure whose hands were shaking and took a moment to enter inside their head to get a sense of what they were feeling. Without warning, a wave of emotion came over her, and it was strong yet empty at the same time. A sob broke through her chest, two or three tears falling out of her eyes and piling up in the socket of her goggles. PET released some of the pressure, allowing them to slide down her face. She felt Peter's hand on her shoulder, knowing that these tears were caused by her empathic abilities, and she was taking on this man's unimaginable sadness.

The man was in deep sorrow. A pit of darkness that seemed to never end. She wanted to step into his life and fill that hole, but she knew that this illness that he has was going to be an uphill battle and a fight he needed to solve on his own. She inhaled and hummed, audible enough to creep into his senses and ease him backward. He wanted to resist, but her soothing melody was pulling him in.

Austin... she fished around for his name and sang to him when she found it.

"I-I..."

She stepped closer, Peter's hand falling off of her back. With each step she took forward, she beckoned Austin back, hoping and needing the space between them to get smaller. When she was just a foot away, she could feel him resist, craving to fight back and fling himself off the side of the very tall building. She felt her throat clog with tears again but swallowed and shoved them away, knowing she needed her strength to save him from himself.

"Are you..."

I'm The Siren, Austin. She sang it in her alto voice, I know you are distressed and looking for peace. She dug through his mind, searching for someone to emulate, to help him feel more at ease. The image of a young girl appeared, she was significantly younger than him, potentially his teenage daughter.

Look at me, Austin.

He only turned his head until he was able to grasp what he was looking at. A perplexed look flashed on his face as his body followed what his head wanted from him. He clenched his teeth and his face scrunched; he was holding back tears. Lena stepped forward, wrapping her hand around the back of his head and letting it fall onto her shoulder until they were both kneeling, him grasping at her desperately.

"It was a drunk driver. Two years ago a drunk driver killed her," his voice was muffled through the material of her suit, but she understood him, "It's so hard to live in a world without her. She was our only kid..she was everything."

Lena would not have understood this when she first started transitioning into a human being. Her relationship with her parents had been a hateful and strenuous one, as well as nonexistent. The relationship she had built with Tony, though, had replaced it. They would never admit it to each other outright, but she saw Tony as her father, and let him fill a space in her heart that she had not realized was there.