Disclaimer: I do not own any of these properties.

Contact warning: Discussion of child abuse.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Lily was. Was what, she wasn't sure. JARVIS had told her that she was alive. Maybe she was alive. Maybe it was that simple.

Lily wasn't quite convinced. She was a quick learner, and she quickly realized that the state of being alive was deeply interconnected with the state of being dead. They were natural dichotomies. To be alive, one must have the ability to die. One could not be both dead and alive.

Lily wasn't so sure if she had the ability to die.

Then, what did that make her? She was sure she was; is.

Lily is. Harry is.

That natural dichotomy scared her. For as confused as she was about her state of being, Lily knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Harry was alive.

That dichotomy, that thin line, was etched very clear.

….

Dreams are not logical and linear progressions where one plays out an entire story in their mind. For Harry, his dreams were flashes and impressions that seemed so real in the moment, but fleet away making him feel empty.

Sometimes that was a blessing and sometimes that was a curse.

When daybreak streamed in through the window, Harry opened his eyes to a strange hotel in a strange city, somehow feeling the most alone he had in a long time and the most connected. He laid in bed for a moment, closing his eyes as if wanting to drift back into the dream to continue the torture.

He had seen his parents – not his actual parents, more like vague blobs that his subconscious instinctually knew where supposed to represent Lily and James – begging him to work on Doom's project. Then, he had seen Tony dying and his heart giving out.

Harry rolled over into the pillow and took deep breaths.

Then something buzzzeed on the bed, lightly vibrating the sheets. Harry jumped up automatically reaching for his wand. He addressed the room with narrowed eyes.

Bbbbuuzzz.

Harry followed the sound with his eyes to see a little black box vibrating on his bed.

Oh. Phone. Right.

"Hello," Harry answered.

"Kid. Hey. I'm back in town. Pepper is coming up to get you," Tony said on the other line.

"Dad…" Harry trailed off.

"Yep," Tony popped, "That's my name."

Harry rolled his eyes and sighed. He asked, "How did the mission go?"

"Eh, we will talk about it later," Tony said dismissively.

Harry knew that tone of voice. He had heard it many times from people close to him. "Who got hurt?"

There was a pause. Tony finally answered, "Rhodey." Tony left the name hanging if he wasn't telling everything.

"And…."

"Bruce is MIA," his father finally admitted after a beat of silence. Harry frowned.

Missing.

Visions of a dead Lily, James, and Tony flashed through his mind. Harry liked Bruce a lot. He seemed like someone who had been broken a long time ago and he lived his life like everything could disappear in a moment. If anything, this was proving why.

Missing, but not dead.

Maybe Harry could help if he could get to Bruce quickly enough.

There was a knowing part of him whispering in the back of his mind that this was why he needed to help Doom. If Bruce died and Harry sat on the knowledge of how to hypothetically save him and didn't… Harry couldn't live with himself.

"I can help," Harry announced to Tony.

Tony sighed on the other end of the line and started to protest.

Harry was too busy shoving Doom's notes into his bag to listen. He could decide on that later, for now he had something to focus on.

…..

If Bruce's life had been set to music, it would scored to early 2000s grunge music. It was comical how much it should have been set to a moody guitar with a raspy semi-screaming man raging about "how bad" everything had been.

He grew up in a household that knew broken bottles and where physical abuse teetered between physical and the fear of physical at every moment.

Despite that, some of his strongest memories involved the cold. When he was seven, his mother moved them into an apartment where there was a gap underneath the door that they were too poor to fix. They would shove towels in the gap to try to stop the heat in the apartment from escaping since they didn't have money to pay the electric bill.

The cold that winter in Idaho was harsh. Bruce was surprised he had all his toes.

Now, sometimes he dreams of being back in that bedroom, cold and alone. The cold of the house kept his father at the bar longer and his mother cooking more huddled in front of the warmth of the stove.

Anyone who has been cold in their life knows that sometimes the only cure to the cold is the heat of rage. Bruce hadn't been cold in a long time. The monster was always warm underneath his skin.

The Hulk stood in front of him radiating body heat. Bruce wondered idly what Hulk running a higher body temperature meant in terms of the thermodynamics of the change.

"Bruce need protecting," the monster repeated.

"But why me?" Bruce asked the question he had always wondered. Why him? It couldn't have just been the radiation exposure. Bruce knew deep down, beyond the scientific recesses of his mind, that there was no feasible way it had just been the radiation that had caused this change. Bruce highly suspected that it had instead unlocked something that had already been inside of him.

This creature looked at him and blinked. It didn't know. Bruce was asking God a question, and he didn't even believe in God. Gods, maybe. Clearly Thor existed.

"Why me?" Bruce repeated to itself.

"Me ask to many questions," the Hulk said, then decided to just plop down into a sitting position, legs sprawled out in front of it. Bruce figured he probably did ask too many questions, but his mind was full of them.

He paced back in forth in the darkness, the creature watching him.

"What are you?" Bruce asked, "Where you created? You are clearly capable of thought; how much do you process?"

The creature moved its head back and forth at Bruce as if amused by the pacing.

"Sit down," it commanded, pausing Bruce's derailing train of thought

Bruce turned to the creature. It stared down Bruce as if it would not take no for an answer. He felt his entire body stumble forward from the hitch in his step to the shaking of his hands until he stood in front of the green monster. It nodded its head forward.

Sit. The Hulk wanted Bruce to sit. He twisted his body until his legs collapsed in on themselves and Bruce found himself sitting crisscross on the ground close enough that he could hear the Hulk's breathing.

The creature reached out his hand, large green fingers stretching forward. For the first time Bruce truly looked at the color of the monster. It wasn't a flat green, but rather a blend of darks and lights with purplish and red hues swelling underneath. Bruce could see the blue of the veins.

Bruce instinctively reached out to touch the hand. His usually average sized hands calloused from years on the run seemed dwarfed next to the massive palm. Nonetheless he pressed his palm to the outstretched hand, then he yanked his head up to look at the creature's eyes.

Bruce expected to rage and anger; he expected to see the red burning behind the white. Instead all he saw was cold pain, and Bruce knew in that moment more about the monster than ever had.

"You're hurt," Bruce said, palms still connected. He then muttered, "We're hurt."

….

Peter Parker felt like his molecules had been placed in a food processor. Every inch of skin burned distinctively, as if his body was attempting to tear itself apart and put itself back together. Something in the deep recesses of his brain, the rational calm part of his, knew that he should raise all alarms and go to the hospital.

Something was going deeply wrong with his body. This was the sort of indescribable pain that must only precede death.

And yet. Yet.

There was a stronger urge than the pain that pulsed inside of him. The urge to hide what was occurring was so strong that at times his brain could only focus on that thought and the pain would subside into clarity. It was like his body knew something that he didn't.

Whatever the consequence of telling someone about this would be worse than this pain. So, Peter wrapped himself tighter in the blanket surrounding him, and closed his eyes to emulate the act of sleeping. Maybe if he pretended hard enough that his body could relax into sleep, the dark nothingness would take him, and he would have momentary retrieve.

Maybe.

….

Harry found himself sitting at a very official looking conference table with the rest of the Avengers. Natasha looked calm as always. Clint had an air of boredom about him which was given away with the tightness of his neck muscles – Harry really thought he should work on that. Tony was clearly distraught and angry. Steve looked guilty and tired. Dr. Strange leaned forward over the table on his hands they were shaking but only slightly.

Fury addressed the room from behind a TV screen.

"You're telling me that you defeated an entire alien army, but couldn't beat a giant talking head," Fury voice sounded both exasperated and astounded. Harry agreed with him. He should have been there.

"To be fair sir –"

"No, just regale me with excuses please."

"Cut the shit Captain Jack Sparrow," Harry heard his father growl, "we don't have to debrief you on what happened. My best friend is lying in a hospital bed in a coma, and one of our own is missing. We are wasting our goddamn time here and listening to tell us how we fucked up isn't going to help the situation. I didn't see any SHIELD agents running around helping yesterday."

Fury looked like he was going to bite back a retort, but Steve soft voice interrupted. "While I disagree with the way that Tony phrased that, he is correct. We have a missing soldier to find and everyone here feels guilty enough."

Natasha asked, "Are there any signs of Bruce or the Hulk or who might have possibly taken him."

"JARVIS is doing a deep scan trying to find any sign of him and there has been nothing," Tony said at the same time that Fury answered with a simple, "No."

"I can find him," Harry said confidently. The magic might be slightly illegal in Britain, but well, they weren't in Britain anymore.

Every eye in the room turned to him.

Steve asked, "Are you sure? This isn't going to result in you hurt again."

Harry rolled his eyes, "Yes I'm sure. And no, it won't hurt me. It's quite common magic."

JARVIS interrupted their conversation, "Sir, the EPC is insisting that they speak to everyone."

"Well they are going to have to fucking wait," Tony said.

Harry grimaced. Unlike Dumbledore, the EPC was a magical body that Harry didn't want to get on the bad side. However, Bruce took priority, and the EPC would have to wait.

….

Bruce looked into the eye the demon and saw only other's sins. "What happened to you," he whispered, but he already knew the answer. Deep down, he always knew the answer.

"Hulk smash," the creature said without prompt. Bruce felt his muscles contract in fear of being smashed, but he didn't flinch, and he didn't move.

"We can't deal with everything with smashing."

"Bruce deal with nothing with smashing. Bruce weak. Hulk strong."

"Hulk is very strong," Bruce agreed. "He went through a lot."

"Bruce coward." The statement hit Bruce like a punch in the gut. He almost wished that the beast had swung at him instead.

"I am not a coward."

"He left Mommy," the creature's bore into him with cold righteous anger. Bruce's breathing quickened. He had told no one about that.

"I had no choice; he would have killed me if I stayed in that house," Bruce protested.

"And Mommy died."

That was the statement Bruce had feared. His entire body felt like it had been dumped in a cold lake. His mother had died when Bruce was sixteen, only a couple of months after he had run away. If he had stayed, he knew deep down that his father's anger would have stayed focused on him, and his mother would still be alive.

Instead, Bruce had ran and never looked back. He was a coward.

"That's not fair," Bruce argued weakly with the beast.

"Bruce should have let Hulk smash."

Bruce closed his eyes and felt like he was fifteen again, breathing heavily as he stood up to his father for the first time. The man had allowed the alcohol abuse to degrade his body; he was ailing. Bruce stood tall as his father was crumpled on the ground.

He remembered the words – You gonna do it boy? You gonna kill me. I always through you were a Momma's boy, but maybe you're more like me. I see that fire in your eyes. You want to be the man of the house now? I see the way you look at –

Bruce shut the words out of his mind. His father had then proceeded to accuse him of some vile horrific thoughts that Bruce feared had been part of that man's fantasy. Bruce had stood there stunned at the time. He had been barely a man, but older than a child. His awkward gangly body had preferred the dark rooms of science classrooms and libraries to track fields and gyms.

Those words that his father had said that day filled him with such fire and anger that he had grabbed the nearest hard object, in this case a heavy glass vase his mother had purchased from a thrift store, and used it to strike his father.

Do it again, the man had said, be like me.

Those words had hit Bruce like a train. He dropped the vase which shattered into a thousand glass pieces on the floor.

Coward, the old man had called him. You're not a son to me.

His father had thrown him in Juvie for that incident. The judge had dropped the case, but more due to clerical error that anything. Bruce had smashed, killed, so many people in his life at this point. Faceless people he didn't remember when he was taken over by the beast had been left dead in the street. A deep dark part of Bruce wishes that his father would have been his first.

If there had been any justice in this world, that man deserved to die. His mother did not. Yet, Bruce had been so determined to not be like his father that he had ended up enabling the man.

"Bruce no let Hulk smash."

"No more smashing buddy," Bruce said, "No more killing."

"Hulk let no one get hurt. Hulk hurt."

"We're going to be like him," Bruce said, "We are already like him."

The beast shook its head violently. "We protect. We smash."

Bruce stared into the creature's eyes and knew what needed to be said, "But sometimes we can allow ourselves to be protected." The creature's eyes grew wide. "We have friends. They care about us. We're not hurting anymore."

"Hulk hurt."

"I know buddy, but there are no more fresh wounds."

"Hulk hurt. Hulk hurt. Hulk hurt," the beast repeated and again and started to shake. Bruce leapt up off the ground away from the creature. The Hulk put its hands in its head and chanted, "Hurt, hurt, hurt."

Bruce didn't know what to do, but his mind spun. How could he fix this? Where was he? That was only one answer to that. Bruce was in his own mind.

"Show me," Bruce commanded, and the Hulk and him locked eyes. Suddenly like a title wave, emotions washed over his entire being. He felt sadness, anger, hurt, pain, grief, and so many other negative emotions overwhelm him. Bruce was sure he had begun to cry.

Before him the beast started to shrink. It was like all the emotions Bruce had kept bottled up since he was sixteen rushed back through him. He felt the grief of his mother dying as strongly as the first day he had learnt of her death.

The beast shrunk and became more like him, but he didn't stop when he became Bruce's size. He continued to grow smaller until he was staring at his five-year-old self. Bruce heaved under the weight of emotion. Yet, he felt something else in there. The power, the green monster, the creature was becoming part of Bruce. It was absorbing into his skin.

Bruce breathed heavy as he stared at the small child in front of him.

Little him made fists and said, "Smash, smash," and there was anger in his eyes. The type of anger and rage that only a child could feel.

"What happened to me," Bruce whispered. Did something happen when he was five to give him these – what? – powers? Many children had been abused, but only he turned into a giant green rage monster.

Then, younger Bruce started to cry. Bruce got down on his knees in front of the child and pulled him into his arms. Bruce cried with him.

"Daddy hurt me," little Bruce said.

"I know," Bruce responded.

"He took me somewhere. He said that if I was a good boy that he would help me to grow up to be big and strong like him. They strapped me down and stuck needles in me…" Bruce's breathing caught in his throat. What is this? He didn't remember this incident at all.

"What happened next?" Bruce asked the boy.

The child shook his head, "I don't know." Then, younger Bruce disappeared in his arms.

Bruce stood up, tears staining his face still. Inside him was the rage and fury of the beast. Yet, there was also a calmness, an acceptance. He stood in the darkness of his own mind, feeling alone for once. Bruce sat down, and allowed himself to cry – for his mother, for himself, for the child that had something done to him.

….

Bruce wasn't in America, of that much Harry was sure.

For one, a basic point-me spell was causing his wand to spin aimlessly. That usually suggested that the subject of the spell was outside of around a three-thousand-kilometer ranger. After a certain distance, the curvature of the earth started to mess with the possible paths to find what you were seeking.

Option two to find Bruce included blood magic. This was by far the most accurate but required the blood of the person they were intending to find.

When Harry had asked Tony if he happened to have Bruce's blood on hand, his father hadn't blinked. He told Harry he would have to go check the labs. Harry thought that was fair, after all Bruce renowned for his work on biochemistry. Maybe he did keep his blood lying around.

While his father went seeking the required blood, Harry started to chalk out the ritual.

Steve lurked in the background watching Harry work.

"Gods and now witches," the man said, "My pious mother must be rolling in her grave."

Harry paused what he was doing. Despite the Dursley being vehemently against the wizarding world, he wouldn't say it was because of religious reasons. They beat him for being unnatural, sure, but not because they thought he was a devil worshiper.

Harry had to ask the question that was now burning inside of him. "Does me being a wizard offend you?" He felt his hand slightly shake. Harry had come to really like Steve.

Steve snorted and shook his head. "Son, anyone who hates another person and cites the reason as religion doesn't deserve the peace that their belief system provides them. Plus, I was injected with a serum that turned me into a super solder. The way that you and Tony have explained it, your magic is just advanced science. I'm many things, but I try not to be a hypocrite."

Harry tabled that little bit of info for later. Injected with super solder serum? That sounded like there were some stories there.

"Thank you."

"No one needs to thank another human for treating them with basic decency," Steve said wisely.

Harry locked eyes with him. "And yet most people fail at that."

"Well you've been hanging out with the wrong people kid, but that's already started to change," Steve nodded in a general direction towards the door where Harry knew that Clint, Natasha, and Dr. Strange were brainstorming ideas on where Bruce could be.

A calmness washed over Harry. Also, a determination. Steve was right. Everyone in this tower had treated him with kindness and respect. They were going to find Bruce and bring him back.

"However, I have to admit. Shapes drawn in chalk on a floor and blood being required, you're not convincing me that the stereotypes about wizards aren't true," Steve winked at him.

"To be fair, I've never sacrificed a living creature in a spell before," well, that was true only technically, since he had never killed an animal intentionally in a spell. However, at one-point Harry had tried to transfigure a spider into a small object and then back again. He had failed at the backwards transfiguration and killed the poor thing. "However, flying broomsticks and pointy hats are fairly accurate."

Tony then burst into the room with multiple vials of blood in his hands. "Found some. Bruce had it hidden inside of a safe in his office in the lab. I had to blast it open, which I feel bad about, but he can't forgive me about the invasion of privacy unless he is still alive."

Tony handed Harry one of the vials. The second it touched Harry's hands he knew there was something odd about the blood.

Harry verbalized it. "Are you sure this is Bruce's. The magical signature coming off this is spiking with some sort of radiation. I've never felt anything like it."

Tony nodded, "Well that makes sense considering Bruce's tendency to turn into a raging gamma monster."

Harry blinked, "Excuse me?"

"Are you telling me you weren't aware of that?" His father looks amused.

"I'm not even sure what I'm not aware of," Harry said. Raging Gamma Monster? Harry imagined that would make sense considering that his father was part of a superhero group. He once again reminded himself that he should have done more research before moving into the tower.

Steve explained rather calmly, "Years ago Bruce was in a lab accident involving Gamma radiation that caused some sort of," Steve paused thoughtfully, "mutation that when he gets angry, he grows in size, turns green, and loses mental facilities."

Harry blinked. That was surprising, but then again there had to be a reason for Bruce being involved in the Avengers. He seemed rather docile, but then again so did Remus. Harry made a mental note to introduce the two of them once they recovered Bruce.

"You really didn't know that?" His father asked again, sounding stunned.

Harry shrugged, "I guess I should have done some research."

Tony gave him a look like ya-fucking-think-so. Harry rolled his eyes at him.

"As enlightening as this conversation is, I think we all want to figure out where Bruce is, so I am going to get back to this."

Harry placed the blood in the desired spot in the middle of the runes and flipped to the right page of the book in front of him.

He began to chant.

….

When Bruce finally stopped crying, he felt embarrassed. Then he felt embarrassed for feeling embarrassed. He was a grown man, crying alone in a – what? – dream. He felt far to awake for this to be a dream, and yet there was no other explanation.

There was the lack of the complete burning suppressed rage he usually felt simmer under his skin. In fact, he felt more at peace than he had in years, despite his efforts to meditate and, only sometimes, medicate.

At the same time, he had so many questions his mind was spinning. Where was he? Was this some kind of magic that had trapped him in this dark abyss? Was that actually the hulk he had spoken to? Was the Hulk some sort of representation of the trauma he had experienced as a child? If so, was the creature telling the truth? Was his father somehow responsible for the creature he had become, not just in spirit, but through an actual experiment?

If it was some sort of experiment, had the gamma radiation triggered it? Was it reversible?

So many questions spun through his mind, and yet, Bruce also felt numb.

As many questions as he needed to answer for himself, he was either trapped in some altered mental state or some of magical pocket world.

The was now, how was he to get out of this?

….

Peter Parker woke up attached to the ceiling.

Literally.

Attached to the ceiling.

It was as if someone had super glued his fingers and toes to the outdated popcorn stucco that adorned the apartment's dry wall.

For a moment he thought he had fallen out of his bed onto the floor, but then his sense of balance came back and he realized where he was positioned.

Peter let out a curdling yell and then his body went crashing to the floor with a loud thud.

About three seconds later, his uncle came running into the room.

"Peter? Peter? Are you okay?" He asked, presumably anxious upon seeing Peter lying on his back on the ground.

Peter blinked, almost thinking the last thirty seconds were a dream. "Uhh… yeah. I'm fine Uncle Ben."

"You don't look fine kiddo," Ben argued.

Peter climbed to his feet. "Nightmare," he mumbled. At least, that seemed like the only logical explanation for everything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours. Had Peter actually been stuck to the ceiling? If so, how the ever-living frick had Peter gotten up there? Peter internally apologized to his Uncle for his internal use of language.

Ben looked at him like he was doubting that excuse.

He made his way over to the bed. "Hey, come sit with me buddy," he said, and tapped the space next to him.

Peter followed him over.

"Now, I know a lot if going on right now, with Harry and the incident today at Oscorp –"

" – not that much is going on – "

"With you at Columbia during the summer. You know, I debated it with your Aunt. I know you're a smart kid, but I want you to have your summers still and I wasn't sure if adding the stress of summer classes was a good thing for you."

"Uncle Ben, I love my class," Peter protested.

"I know kiddo, and that's why we decided you should take it."

"But?" Peter prompted; he knew there was a but in there.

"But I want you to know that we are here for you. You're still a kid, our kid, and you can come to us with anything."

"I know, but there isn't anything to come to you with," Peter lied. He didn't know what was going on, but he had a gut feeling that he needed to figure it out himself first.

"What about Harry?" Ben asked.

Peter blushed. What about Harry? Was he not allowed to make new friends? "I don't understand Uncle Ben –"

"Do you have a crush on him?" Ben asked.

What, what? Feelings, as in his Uncle thought he was gay? Not that there was anything wrong with that, but Peter had always assumed he was straight. What about Liz? Peter paused and thought about Harry and a warm feeling bubbled up in his stomach.

Maybe he did have a crush? The revelation didn't feel as mind blowing as it should have.

"I – uh, I don't know. Maybe," Peter answered honestly.

Ben nodded. "Alright, I'll accept that. But Peter, just know that your Aunt and I will love and support you no matter what.

Peter felt an odd sense of relief wash over him. He wasn't sure if it was related to the odd experiences he had over the last day or the fact that he was still processing that he might be gay? Or bisexual? Or pansexual? Or demisexual?

Peter needed time to think that one over.

"Thank you," Peter whispered.

After his parents had left him, Peter had struggled with abandonment issues and separation anxiety. At least, that's what the child Psychologist had said when he was eight. His Aunt and Uncle had taken it in stride and Peter had slowly learned to depend on the fact that they would always be there to pick him up after school. His biological parents might have abandoned him, but Aunt May and Uncle Ben would not.

Gay or not gay. Whatever was going on or not.

Uncle Ben laughed, "Don't thank me kiddo." He ruffled Peter's hair despite Peter's attempts to duck out of the way.

"Stop, now I'll have to re-gel it," Peter complained.

"Pete, your hair was already helpless," Ben stated.

Peter stuck his tongue out at his uncle. That bastard.

"Alright, your Aunt ran to the store to grab some stuff for dinner. It'll be done in a little bit. Why don't you grab a shower?"

Peter frowned, "I don't smell that bad."

"You sure about that kid?" his Uncle asked with one eyebrow raised. Peter had no idea how Ben did that, but he was defiantly jealous.

Peter pouted.

"Get going," Ben said, and Peter got up to walk to the bathroom. His brain was spinning. Waking up attached to the celling. Possible feelings for his new friend.

Was he dreaming earlier? Even if he was gay – or bi, or pan, or demi – would Harry even like him back?

So many thoughts were swirling around in his brain that Peter was on autopilot walking into the bathroom. However, when he went to shut the door, his hand stuck to the doorknob. Peter tried to wrench his hand away, but that only caused the door to loudly shutter.

Peter's eyes widened as he stared down at the brass knob.

"Peter," his Uncle called out.

"I'm okay," Peter said, strangled.

His hand was attached like glue. His mind raced. What had happened to him?

He yanked his arm backwards, falling to the ground as his sticky fingers released. He stared down at his hand.

Peter's breathing quickened.

He wasn't dreaming.

This was real.

Jesus Christ.

….

Ummmm... Hello?

It's been so long I don't even know if an apology is enough. Since I posted the last chapter, I have gone through some insane life changes, some amazing, some devastating. I graduated college. I got engaged. Anyways, I never forgot about this baby. I want to thank every single person who commented on this fic and asked me when I was returning. It was those comments and the sweet words that motivated me to eventually finish this chapter.

I can't promise you when the next one will come, but I can promise that this fic is never far from my mind.

I love you all! Hope you enjoyed the chapter.

~ Emm