The Little Match Spider

A Little Care

Peter soon quickly found out what T'Challa meant by "getting him looked at".

He had followed T'Challa out of the bathroom (while leaning on him for some support) and when out he saw the most large and luxurious bedroom he'd ever seen. A large canopy bed, a flat screen tv two couches and huge windows on the side instead of walling.

The room was bigger than his and May's apartment.

His eyes peeked with interest and amazement as T'Challa had led him down the large halls that were covered in old paintings or artifacts and with huge windows currently being covered by drapes with the old candle chandeliers light the halls.

Now he was really starting to wonder where he was.

The room they had stopped at and went in looked similar to a doctor office with white walls and lights, a medical bed, sink, x-ray, and plenty of equipment from bandages to cotton balls to needles.In a corner stood another African looking man, who was sitting in his chair with his back facing towards them.

"Kwame" T'Challa said "I need some help".

The man (or Kwame) turned around immediately fixated his attention to Peter "oh! He's awake your highness".

"Yes" T'Challa now had his hands on Peter's shoulders upon catching the teen eyeing the exit "but, he has a lot of bruises on his body and I was wondering if you could look over them.

"Oh course your highness".

T'Challa led Peter over to the medical bed and helped him up on it before gently removing the robe to revealing Peter's bruised back. The bruises were now free of dirt and now didn't look infected but they still needed attention.

Peter knew his beating bruises were bad already but when he heard Kwame gasp and drop the clipboard he was holding he had to wonder if they were that bad. 

That's was how Peter spent nearly an hour getting medical treatment.

He ended up having to get stitches on his cheek with the cut being deeper than he thought after having it disinfected of course. His bruises on back and body all had had bandages placed on them also after being cleaned and having medicine on them. He wasn't to surprised on hearing he had indeed gotten frostbite, more surprised on hearing that he was extremely underweight and dehydrated, he even had a few rashes on his skin. He even had to get a few shots.

Come to think about it, he didn't remember the last time he had actually eaten a full meal or had drunken clean water before, due to May often giving him nothing but water from a hose outside. And perhaps the rashes had something to do with the old mattress he slept on was because it hadn't ever been cleaned and had several unknown stains on it.

Kwame looked at Peter's back with shock as he applied rash cream to Peter's rashes, eyeing his bruises with concern and frowning sympathetically when Peter flinched and made a small squeak every time he even slightly touched the teen.

Now he was concerned.

He was pretty sure all of this wasn't just from homelessness.

He had to know.

"So do you have a family young one?" he did once have children himself so he knew how to get them to open up. Peter didn't say anything but just mentioning the word "family" made him give a heartbroken face as the memories of his parents dying in the accident and his uncle Ben being killed came back. Death just had to take away the only people who cared about him.

Life was so unfair.

Kwame sat down on his chair and sat it near Peter "well, we will have to call them of course. Inform them where you are and that your safe here, they must be pretty worried about you". In reality, he was pretty sure the boy wasn't aware they weren't in his home town but rather in a new whole different country.

Peter's face froze up at the thought of going back to his Aunt May knowing she wouldn't be concerned that he nearly froze to death or was starving, more upset about the fact that making it seem like she was beating her nephew and starving him wouldn't make her look good to the public's image.

"N...n...no! P...please don't take me back" Peter teared up "y...you don't k...k...know what she'll do to me!" he began to hyperventilating breathing heavily from fear and horror.

"Who's 'she?' " .

Peter seemed to realize what he said and immediately tried covering up his fear and teared eyes as well as getting his breathing under control but, Kwame was determined to find out more. He couldn't just leave it there without getting the full story.  

"You don't have to be scared Peter, we won't send you back to your guardian if you aren't being treated rightly by her, but you need to tell us if you don't truly feel safe with your parental figure  otherwise we can't if you don't say anything". He tried to clam Peter down by holding his hands and rubbing them comfortingly to keep Peter from hurting himself if he broke into a panic attack.

"A...alright..."

Peter began telling Kwame the whole story from how he had lost his parents to the point where Aunt May began beating him. He described his living arrangements in detail carefully illustrating his "bedroom" of an old dirty mattress as a bed and being locked in and not allowed to go to the bathroom during the night. Then he told about the beatings, about how Aunt face would whip him with a belt and even cut him with glass once.

By the time Peter was done talking he looked at Kwame's face and saw the horror written on it.

"Did I do something wrong?" he asked nervously.

"Not at all" Kwame reassured "and I promise you won't have to live with your aunt again or go through that torture." He'd definitely be informing T'Challa about this, who in turn would no doubt inform child services back in New York he wouldn't be allowing Peter to go back to that monster of a women.   

At that moment T'Challa walked back in (having walked out a while ago to check on something) in his arms were a two piece pajamas and a certain toy on top.

Peter also noticed and happily saw Carrots on top of the clothing.

"Here's your toy Peter" T'Challa said before giving Carrots to the excited teen. Peter looked at Carrots, his fur had been washed of all the dirt and now was back to it's soft white, the buttons had polished, and the pink ribbon around his neck had been cleaned and placed back in it's bow.

Peter stared at Carrots closely with no expression. He looked so...clean, just like him.

T'Challa stood next to him watching Peter's blank face. It made him worried, thinking that Peter would be upset over not having his toy look sentimental anymore by the one who made it.

But then a small smile grew onto Peter's face as he hugged Carrots.

"Thank you"  .

"Your welcome" T'Challa said as he showed the Pj set to Peter that he had gotten made for him "now lets get you into some clothes tonight before bed".

"Bed". Peter hadn't heard that word before in a long time. His nights consisted of lying on that old mattress without a blanket and sometimes with cold air in the room, he had already gotten several fevers from it.

He had been dressed in a red and blue pajamas and a pair of socks that hugged his fragile and small (in his opinion) body, despite the clothes covering him up you could still easily tell that the teen was wearing a diaper under his pants. But Peter didn't care, he was too tired to worry about it.

Soon he had T'Challa wrapping his arms around him.

And he was then lifted off the ground.

"What are you doing?" he asked as T'Challa began carrying him out of that doctors office.

"Taking you back to my room" T'Challa didn't seem to think that  carrying a fourteen year old boy was weird "I intend to feed you and get you in bed for the night".