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Harley's hand had slipped around Peter's waist and the younger boy was very conscious of the injuries he had sustained there earlier on.

Harley pretended not to notice Peter's form tensing at the contact. At first, he was hurt that Peter didn't seem to want to be held by him, however, when the doe-eyed boy snuggled further into his arms after a moment, that thought was eradicated.

Harley was slightly suspicious of the movement and by the looks of things, the snake perched in the curly hair was giving him, he noticed it too.

Harley pretended to yawn and tensed his arm around Peter as gently as possible, but still enough to tighten slightly, and watched in anger as Peter flinched at the strain to his abdomen.

After having the green snake shoot a dagger-like glare at him, Harley dragged Pater off to the side quickly.

"What the hell happened to you" Harley questioned the young Stark with wide eyes.

"W-what are you talking about?" Peter feigned innocence.

Harley's eyes narrowed and he dragged Peter behind a wall and lifted his shirt slightly, knowing that despite his reflexes, Peter wouldn't stop him for fear of harming him.

Harley knew that was unfair but right now all he cared about was the safety of his boyfriend.

Harley yanked up the shirt and gasped in horror at the discoloured patches of skin scattered along the smaller boy's chest and stomach.

He became angry with himself, for not noticing sooner, Peter, for not standing up for himself and whatever idiot decided it was a good plan to mess with the angel child of the Avengers.

He dropped the shirt to look into his boyfriend's eyes, only to find them trained on the door in shame and embarrassment.

His anger seemed to drain away at the sight of the boy looking so helpless and broken in front of him. Of course, the ever-constant fury towards whoever did this remained strong.

Pushing a strand of hair from the brunette's face he questioned softly "What happened love" pools of worry causing his eyes to glisten as his boyfriend heaved a quiet sob and shoved a fist in his mouth to keep himself silent.

As carefully as he could, Harley pulled the other boy into his arms, oblivious to the snake that slithered away during the interaction after having seen the damage inflicted upon the spiderling.

"It's ok, love, let it out I'm here," Harley soothed, continuing to whisper soft affirmations and calming words into his ear as he sobbed.

After a few minutes, Peter seemed to gather himself and pushed himself out of his boyfriend's arms. Or he tried to. Harley refused to let him go too far and kept a hold of his upper arms when he pulled away.

"Are you ready to tell me what happened yet my love?" Harley asked the still trembling boy gently.

Peter seemed to gather himself and shakily nodded back.

"I-i well I um, sometimes or, uhm, some people don't really, totally believe the whole 'internship' thing, I guess? It's really not a big deal at all, nothing to worry about honestly.

Harley simply stared unblinkingly at Peter until he heaved a heavy sigh.

"Peter that didn't even make a slight bit of sense."

Peter flushed and started babbling again until Harley hushed him gently. "OK, we're doing this nice and slowly, my way"

"Let's start at the beginning, hmm? Who doesn't believe the internship?" "Uh well, a few people in the class and the teacher-" "Wait what!? The teacher didn't believe you? The hell?"

"No, but like I said, its fine I really don't care what others think, but a few of the students really didn't like when I started proving that the internship was real and I made the stupid mistake of elbowing one of them to get him to agree with me on something so then he told me to meet him in the bathroom so I did-"

"Wait you actually WENT to the bathroom? Why?" Harley asked confusedly.

"Because if I didn't he'd just do it back at school like a hundred times worse and I figured I could hide it."

"And you didn't fight back?"

"I didn't want to hurt him, plus most of the stuff he said was accurate." The last part was mumbled.

Harley sighed exasperatedly and pulled his self-sacrificial boyfriend into his arms once again, knowing they were missing part of the tour but not really caring all that much about that either.

When the mumbled words registered themselves in Harley's brain he pulled out of the hug again and glared angrily into the slightly nervous eyes of Peter.

"What. Did. They. Say. To. You." Harley demanded.

Peter's eyes widened comically when he realised that Harley had heard his mumbling and he attempted to dodge the question. Of course, his protective boyfriend wasn't going to let that happen.

"Peter shut up for a second okay?" Harley told his boyfriend. Peter looked up at him wide-eyed as his cheeks were grabbed in Harley's hands.

"Okay, I love you, Peter. Do you hear that? I love you. Your name is Peter, you are a wonderfully handsome boy who I love and plan to spend the rest of my life with despite being a massive nerd and pissing me off regularly with your dad's help. No matter what anyone outside the family, Ned and MJ say to you, it only truly matters if they know who you are as a person. So tell me what this person said to you"

Peter stood shell-shocked for a moment, staring into his boyfriend's eyes, only brought back to reality by said boy lightly tapping his cheeks.

"I -I ok, um, he just um, deadnamed me and called me a couple slurs. He called me fag too and I was stupid and talked back, saying I was with you and couldn't be a fag if I was a girl" Peter dutifully ignored Harley's smirk at this piece of information "But that just made him hit me even harder.."

As Peter trailed off Harley's smirk fell and he drew the broken boy back into his arms as he began to sob again, rubbing his back in a soothing manner.

After a couple of minutes when Peter calmed himself down, the two headed back towards their tour group who had since moved on. As they were walking the both simultaneously noticed the absence of a certain reptile and turned to each other wide-eyed.

"You don't think-"

"He wouldn't have-"

Both boys turned panicked just as they reached their tour group, terrified of what the trickster god could be up to, and sure that their family was already aware.

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Ok I know its been a while but ill try and be better at updating, just school has just started back and I'm trying to focus on that, even though that's not the best excuse its the only one I have.

Someone remind me next Friday (25th) That I need to have a chapter out on Saturday!

Love you all,

1219 words

Lila out 💜