Midtown School of Science and Technology
Monday, 9:12 a.m.
One week after Eli came home
Eli had insisted on going back to school.
Not because he loved trigonometry (though he did), but because routine was oxygen and the Choir had already stolen twelve days of it. So Monday morning found him in his usual seat by the window in AP Physics, headphones on, rocking gently, chewing on the sleeve of Carol's NASA hoodie that he had absolutely not been allowed to return.
He was happy.
He was safe.
He was catastrophically unaware that the universe had decided to test the tensile strength of She-Hulk's patience today.
Jennifer Walters (human form, blazer, pencil skirt, glasses, looking every inch the terrifyingly competent lawyer) was technically "volunteering" as a guest speaker for Career Day. In reality she had parked herself in the hallway outside Eli's classroom the second the bell rang, arms folded, green threatening to creep up her neck every time the fluorescent lights buzzed wrong.
Inside the classroom, Mr. Warren was droning about inclined planes when Flash Thompson decided today was the day he reclaimed his title of Biggest Asshole in Queens.
He leaned back in his chair, loud enough for the whole row to hear.
"Hey, Rowan! Heard you got kidnapped by aliens. What'd they do, probe you for why you're such a freak?"
The room went very, very quiet.
Eli didn't hear the words. He was deep in a stim-happy trance, tracing the grain of the desk with one finger, headphones blasting 432 Hz pure tone. But he felt the shift in air pressure when every phone in the room started buzzing at once.
Because every single one of Eli's protectors had the same livestream open: Gwen's body-cam (she was on the roof), MJ's phone propped in the auditorium, Jean "lightly" piggybacking the school security system from Xavier's, and Carol in low orbit running facial recognition on anyone who looked at Eli wrong.
Flash never stood a chance.
Eli finally registered that people were staring. He lifted his head, confused, and saw Flash smirking.
Flash, emboldened by the lack of immediate explosion, opened his mouth again.
"I'm just saying, maybe if you talked like a normal—"
The classroom door exploded off its hinges.
Not metaphorically. Literally detonated inward in a cloud of metal shavings and gamma-green fury.
Jennifer Walters was no longer human-sized.
She was nine feet of pissed-off jade muscle in a shredded blazer, eyes glowing like toxic waste.
The temperature in the room went up fifteen degrees.
Jen's voice came out as a growl that rattled the windows.
"Finish that sentence, Eugene. I dare you."
Flash's face drained of color so fast he achieved new personal bests in pallor.
Every kid in the room except Eli (who was frozen, hands over his ears, rocking hard) scrambled backward. Desks screeched.
Jen took one step inside. The floor cracked.
Her gaze flicked to Eli. Saw the distress. Saw the tears starting.
And something in the Hulk part of her brain snapped its leash.
Flash tried for bravado. "It's a free country, lady, I can—"
Jen moved.
One second Flash was in his chair.
The next he was dangling by the back of his letterman jacket twenty feet in the air, Jen holding him one-handed like a misbehaving kitten.
Outside, the sky darkened as a binary star dropped out of orbit and punched a sonic boom over Queens.
Carol Danvers landed on the football field hard enough to crater it, eyes pure white energy.
Jean Grey teleported in with a phoenix-winged BAMF that set off every car alarm on the block.
Gwen dropped from the ceiling on a web-line, already masked.
MJ walked calmly through the front doors filming on her phone because evidence.
Jen didn't even look at them. She was busy staring into Flash Thompson's soul.
"You put my kid in distress," she said, conversational. "Do you know what happens when you scare my kid?"
Flash whimpered.
Jen smiled. All teeth.
"I promised him I'd never Hulk out at his school. I lied."
She turned, still holding Flash, and strode into the hallway.
Eli's classmates watched through the doorway as She-Hulk sat down cross-legged in the middle of the corridor, placed Eli gently between her thighs like he was made of spun sugar, and wrapped her arms around him from behind. One massive green hand covered his headphones, the other stroked his back in slow, steady circles.
Eli went limp almost instantly, face pressed to the warm hollow where Jen's thigh met her hip, breathing slowing to match the steady thump of a gamma heart.
Jen's voice dropped to the softest murmur, the kind she used when reading him Discworld at 3 a.m.
"I've got you, baby. You're safe. No bad sounds. Just me."
Eli made a tiny happy noise and nuzzled closer.
Then Jen looked up.
Flash was still dangling, now at eye-level with a very pissed-off Captain Marvel.
Carol floated closer, voice deceptively calm. "Jean, how much force would it take to put him in a solar orbit?"
Jean, arms folded, Phoenix flaming behind her like a very judgmental cape, didn't even blink. "Approximately 11.2 km/s from this latitude. I can give him a running start."
Gwen cracked her knuckles. "I've got web fluid rated for re-entry."
MJ kept filming. "This is going on TikTok with the caption 'Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.'"
Principal Morita came running down the hall and took one look at the situation (She-Hulk cuddling a student while three other Avengers debated launching another student into space) and decided today was a mental health day for everyone.
Jen ignored all of them. She was rocking Eli gently, humming something low and steady.
After three minutes Eli's rocking slowed. After five he was asleep, thumb in mouth, completely hidden between the safest thighs in the galaxy.
Jen kissed the top of his curls and finally addressed Flash.
"You are going to apologize," she informed him pleasantly. "And then you are going to transfer schools. Possibly planets. And if I ever hear that you made another kid feel small again, they will never find all the pieces."
She opened her hand.
Flash dropped six inches and landed on his ass.
He scrambled backward until he hit the lockers, sobbing out apologies in no particular order.
Carol crouched in front of him, binary sparks dancing across her knuckles.
"Say it to Eli," she said.
Flash looked at the sleeping boy completely encased in green muscle and warmth.
"I'm sorry, Eli," he whispered. "I'm so sorry."
Eli didn't hear it. He was dreaming about radio waves and soft places to land.
Jen tightened her hold, protective and proud.
"Good," she said. "Now get out of my sight before I decide the sun needs a new moon."
Flash ran.
The Avengers (plus Gwen and MJ) stood in a loose honor guard around Jen and Eli for the rest of the day. Classes were cancelled. The football field had a new crater shaped like a star.
By lunchtime the footage was viral.
The caption, courtesy of MJ, read:
Local bully learns that when She-Hulk says "my kid," she means it with her entire gamma-irradiated soul.
Don't touch the service dog. Don't touch the autistic kid.
Some rules are written in orbit.
Eli slept between Jen's thighs for four straight hours, waking only once to mumble "love you" into her skin.
Jen teared up so hard she had to go full green just to hide it.
Carol took a hundred photos.
Jean sent the school a formal letter from the X-Men legal team that basically said sue us, we dare you.
Gwen and MJ started a GoFundMe for new classroom doors titled "Worth It."
And Flash Thompson transferred to a school in Canada before the final bell.
Peter Parker showed up at 3 p.m. with a churro and the expression of a man whose life had become a sitcom he wasn't paid enough for.
He took one look at Eli using She-Hulk's thigh cleavage as the world's most secure weighted blanket, sighed, and handed Jen the churro.
"I quit," he said.
Jen accepted the churro with the hand that wasn't currently cradling the most precious thing in her universe.
"No you don't," she told him cheerfully. "You're on babysitting rotation tomorrow."
Peter looked at Eli's peaceful sleeping face and decided yeah, okay.
He could live with that.
End of Chapter 4
(Chapter 5: "The One Where the Entire Harem Meets Eli's Mom and Everyone Discovers Elena Rowan Is Scarier Than the Phoenix" — ready when you are.)