The Hulk and the Beast: Chapter Twenty
Night, Purple Planet
"I don't know how comfortable I am going any further at night," Lily said.
"It'll be perfectly fine," Meriam assured her. "I'm nocturnal, right? If I see anything, I'll scream really loud!"
"That sounds weird, even if you do mean that fox scream thing," Black grumbled.
"We're almost at the top," Potter said. "We're maybe two hours away and I don't know about you, but I can't stand being that close to the next step and just laying around."
"We should be well rested when we go from one world to the next!" Lily insisted. "Eighteen hours on the move isn't healthy and this planet has messed with our sleep rhythm enough as it is!"
"Let's just go to the top, we don't have to go through," Potter insisted.
"It is a bit annoying, stopping now when we're so close to the top," Black agreed.
"Oh, you're only saying that because you'd do anything Potter says," Lily scoffed.
"Would not!"
"Would too!"
"We can't afford to bicker!" Meriam snapped. "We should put it to a vote."
"A votes' not fair," Lily pointed out. "Black and Potter are best friends, they'll always vote the same, and you and Potter are twins, so you're skewed in his favor, too! And even if you didn't the best we'd get is a tie."
"If you're that uncomfortable, we can make camp here," Meriam said. "It is secluded."
"It's only two hours and it was your idea, Meriam," Black said. "Come on, just because Evans decided to be a stick in the mud, again…"
"Meriam's right, if Evans really isn't comfortable with it…"
"Guys," Meriam pleaded, "we really can't afford to bicker, we're barely two days in and…"
"Fine! Fine, have it your way!" Lily shouted. "We'll walk the rest of the way to the top tonight, in the dark, with no lights…"
"We're wizards," Black reminded her, half way to scathing. "Lumos."
"Oh, right," Lily turned beat red. "Lumos."
Unknown, Purple Planet
The Mission, the mission, the mission. It was all the Winter Soldier could afford to think about. Complete the mission, retrieve the book, track the children. They were easy enough to track, their first leg of the journey through the alien planet they left behind a trail of dead alien creatures and unusual arrows that hummed in the Soldier's Adamantium hand.
"Careless," he grumbled to no one in particular.
"Better for us," Greyback snarled.
The Soldier wasn't talking to him.
"So what if the cubs carelessly left behind a trail of breadcrumbs for us to follow. We hardly need it, I can smell them. They smell delicious."
Everything about Greyback rubbed the Soldier the wrong way. Even the thoughts he wasn't supposed to have rallied against him like they rallied against Skull, even though it was wrong not to follow orders. That didn't mean he had to like them, or anything around them.
"We're wasting time," the Soldier grunted.
Not looking back, he took off in the direction of the next arrow. They were headed towards the base of a nearby mountain. It looked vaguely like the canines of the alien creatures that had been downed by the children's arrows.
"You don't slow down, do you?" Greyback panted. He was breathing hard, but keeping pace, despite the Soldiers efforts to 'accidently' leave the foul creature behind. "You wouldn't happen to have a name, would you?"
The Soldier didn't deem that worthy of a response. It didn't pertain to the Mission, so it wasn't important.
"Good thing Skull gave me that serum, ay?" Greyback attempted once more at small talk.
The word serum triggered a memory for the Soldier. It was wrong that it was his memory. He wasn't supposed to think about… Steve… Serum… Captain America. The Soldier hated Captain America. It was his fault. It was all his fault, if he hadn't… done something… then something bad wouldn't have happened. That didn't matter.
"That's not a part of the Mission," the Soldier snarled.
"Seems like Skull did a number on your noggin," Greyback snorted.
That didn't deserve a response either.
Not long after the sun set, four lights flickered on at the peak of the mountain, making it laughably easy to find the children. Not that Soldier ever laughed. Greyback did, low and guttural, like a feral, starving animal. It made the Soldier want to wrap his metal arm around the other man's neck and hold on until the damn thing shut up.
Midnight, Purple Planet
They made it to the top of the mountain. There wasn't a visible portal, like there were in the Crossroads dimension, but if Meriam held the book just so, a section of sky shimmered in the light of the five moons. The Neptune planet set about an hour ago. Or, technically the horizon came to meet it. Meriam would be a bit sad to leave the moon behind. Sure, she didn't like the alien creatures that wanted to eat them, but the rest of the planet was beautiful. She couldn't wait to see the twin suns rise over the vast expanse of valleys and mountains around them.
"Remus!" James shot up from where he was tending to the spelled fire he set. "We forgot to call Remus!"
James started rustling through their rucksacks, until he came across the silver mirror, "Oh, I bet he's worried himself into a proper stomach ache."
"He's always got a stomach ache," Sirius snorted. "It's no wonder he's so small. He can't eat when he's stressed and he's stressed all the time."
"I'd be too, if I had friends like you two clowns," Lily scoffed.
"Can we not fight," Meriam pleaded. "Everything's alright. We're well on our way. Only two more weeks and we'll be in New York! How many people can say they walked to New York City from Stinchcombe, anyway?"
"Just us, suppose," James said. "Once we manage it."
"What was it you said, Evans?"
"One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," Lily sighed. "This moon is more interesting than our moon, anyway. It's got funny trees and moon aliens."
"Who's to say there aren't aliens on our moon?" Sirius said.
"Or Martians on Mars!" James jumped up. "I wonder what Martians look like, do you think the Book knows?"
"We really ought to call Remus," Lily scolded. "He's probably very worried."
"Right, of course," James said, pulling the mirror out. "Do you think Mr. Stark knows what Martians look like?"
Meriam was about to scold James for being scatterbrained, when she saw a flash of silver light in the darkness. Instinct immediately took over, and she let out a very loud alarm bark. It was quite foxlike, considering her human vocal cords, but it had the desired effect. Lily immediately lunged for her bow and Sirius and James drew their wands.
Meriam had very few moments to process what exactly was happening when a metal hand lunged from the darkness and grabbed onto the Book in her arms.
Earth, July 16, 2014
It was a nice summer day. Remus knew most of New York was suffering in the summer heat, but Avengers Tower was so well climate controlled, it was actually sort of chilly all the way up there. It was a bit of a relief to go on a walk with Gwyllgi, even if he'd rather be in the lab with Mr. Stark, waiting for his friends to contact them.
Captain Rogers kicked Remus out of the lab. His rational was that it was a beautiful day out and Remus had been inside for nearly forty-eight hours. He tried to kick Mr. Stark out as well, but that was like trying to give a cat a bath, and he gave up.
Remus figured he caved so easily because it meant he and Mr. Stark would have the tower to themselves for an hour while Remus was out. The rest of the Avengers, with the exception of Thor, were on SHIELD missions. Thor was on leave, something about a girlfriend who had a job in England, but she wasn't British. Remus liked Mr. Stark and Captain Rogers a lot. He wanted them to be happy.
Remus had his panic button and his phone and Gwyllgi was chipped. Remus wondered for a moment if he was chipped. He wouldn't put it past Mr. Stark, he could be insanely over protective and was prone to bouts of paranoia. Yeah, he wasn't nearly as bad as Director Fury, but he didn't like that Remus wasn't doing any self-defense training.
Remus tried them with Captain Rogers, Natasha, and Clint, but he had a panic attack every time, thinking that the Winter Soldier was coming at him in the HYDRA base again. He didn't word that out loud, particularly, he just said it reminded him of HYDRA. Natasha was the most disappointed in him, Captain Rogers the least. Clint was someone in the middle, no doubt trying his best not to start ragging on Remus for being a wimp, because Captain Rogers would yell at him if he did.
The important thing was Mr. Stark and Captain Rogers knew where Remus was and had several redundancies. They'd planned the route for his walk and Mr. Stark was tracking his location. Plus, every five or so minutes, he texted them a picture of the trees, Gwyllgi running around with a stick, or the chocolate pretzel he bought at the best pretzel stand in the park. Captain Rogers replied to that with a thumbs up emoji, the only emoji both he and Remus were comfortable using, much to Mr. Stark's dismay and amusement.
Remus was sitting at a bench and about to dig in to his chocolatey good pretzel, when a jarringly familiar voice shouted at him.
"Remus! There you are!"
"Dad?" Remus froze. His head snapped up and he was met face to face with the last man he ever thought he'd see again. "Dad!"
"What are you doing, get up!" Lyall grabbed him roughly by the arm. "We have to get out of here."
"What are… how did… but I thought…" Remus sputtered, dropping his pretzel to the ground. "But… but… you're dead!" Remus cried. "Dad, Dad, I thought… there were gun shots and everything smelled like blood and death and…"
"No time to explain," Lyall hissed. "Shut up and move."
Lyall's grip tightened uncomfortably around Remus' arm and he yanked him down the path. It would bruise for sure, but Remus didn't care. The relief that his father was alive was beginning to overpower his confusion.
"Wait, Gwyllgi!" Remus cried. "She's still tied to the bench!"
With strength that surprised Lyall, Remus wrenched himself free and ran back to the bench, fumbling with Gwyllgi's lead while she happily licked his face.
"What are you doing?" Lyall hissed, grabbing Remus once more. "I said there's no time!"
"But my dog!" Remus pulled away and finished untying Gwyllgi's lead. "Okay… but… where are we going? I've got to call Mr. Stark, he needs to…"
"You can't trust him," Lyall said manically. "You can't trust anyone here."
"But… Dad, you're not making any sense?"
He had to be Lyall. He looked like him, he sounded like him, he even smelled like him, which was usually what gave shapeshifters and androids away, according to the minimal and also mandatory SHIELD classes taught by Principal Coulson after school.
"Who do you trust, Remus, me or strangers?"
"But you died," Remus insisted, holding Gwyllgi as close as he could. She wasn't panicking about Lyall. For a moment, Remus thought maybe he was hallucinating his father, he probably looked like an idiot, talking to himself. But then Gwyllgi jammed her nose against Lyall's leg and licked his hands, looking for pets.
"I'll explain once we're safe. We have to go where it's safe, Remus."
"But… Mr. Stark…" Remus pulled his phone out. "We can trust him, he saved…"
"Do as I say!" Lyall grabbed the phone and chucked it.
"Dad!"
He grabbed Remus as roughly as he could and started dragging him down the path again, Gwyllgi trotting behind them. She was starting to whimper now, sensing Remus' rising anxiety.
"Dad, you're hurting me," Remus struggled. "Stop, stop, I'm following you, please."
Lyall swung around and slapped Remus clean across the face, "Shut up, Remus!"
"I'm sorry," Remus whimpered, shrinking in on himself.
Gwyllgi immediately panicked. She latched onto Lyall's pantleg and started snarling, swinging her head back and forth.
"Gwyll, no, bad dog! Ci drwg, Gwyllgi!"
Lyall kicked her off. Gwyllgi yelped in surprise and fear.
"Train you mutt better, boy!" Lyall shook Remus.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Remus sniffled, pulling Gwyllgi closer to himself.
The ruckus was starting to get the attention of other people in the park. Before Lyall started getting really violent, most walkers and joggers just looked away uncomfortably, but now they were looking over in shock before turning away and speeding up. It was only a matter of time before someone whipped out a phone and called the police or started filming.
"What are you looking at?" Lyall snarled at a jogger who slowed down instead of speeding up.
"Dad, please," Remus pleaded.
Lyall grunted, yanked Gwyllgi's leash from Remus, and continued dragging Remus away from the park. In a panic, Remus realized he was looking for a place to Apparate away from prying eyes.
"Wait, wait," Remus struggled. "Dad, I don't know what's…"
"I told you to be quiet, Remus," Lyall snarled.
"But…"
Lyall raised his hand again threateningly. Since he was holding Gwyllgi's lead in his fist, it wouldn't be a slap next time.
"No, Dad, I'm sorry," Remus whimpered. "Don't hit me again, please."
"Huh, that's weird," Tony said, tapping the screen.
"What?" Steve asked, looking up briefly.
"Remus and Goose are in different places, right now."
"Maybe it's a glitch?"
"Maybe…" Tony said. "He hasn't texted us in a while."
"He's eating his pretzel, you know how he gets when he's got chocolate," Steve said fondly.
"Wait, his emergency fob is with Goose, I think she got away and he left his phone behind."
"Where are they?" Steve rolled over and looked over Tony's shoulder.
Remus' phone was still near the Western Shore Boat Landing, where he liked to sit and watch the boats. Gwyllgi and Remus' fob were behind The Dakota, on John Lennon Dr. Then, all of a sudden, they were both gone.
Well, character number 2 (other than Bucky) that I would have loved to tag but I had to boil it down to the top four characters. Lyall Lupin! Yay! He is so annoying to write because he's kind of an asshole but also kind of not, but definitely he is and writing a character this gray is difficult and finicky.
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