It's Understandable: A Tronnor AU

25. The Mission (Part One)

Friday was the day.

"You can do this, fighter." Troye had his hands firmly on Connor's shoulders, his voice like a hopeful wrestling coach. "You're worth it, you don't deserve the way he's treated you, you're so much better than him." He whispered in his boyfriend's ear, he himself caught up in the commotion of what they were about to execute.

Connor looked down the hall, where his first opponent, Oli stood. He and his friends clumped like fat buildup in the artery of the hallway, pinching the stream of students, nobody telling them off because they were them. A robust-looking pack of brazen jocks and meninists. Brainless, but cruel.

Watching them and their varying, idiotic expressions from over Connor's head, Troye's face stiffened in supportive rage. "Are you ready, baby?" He asked, his lips grazing Connor's frizzy hair. He'd been too jittery to tame it this morning.

Connor's lungs shook a tad, but he couldn't help but clench his fists in fed up desperation. "I'm ready." No matter how freaked out he was of this conflict, this was step one of the plan: defeating Oli, the first level boss. He wished he had some extra lives.

Troye sensed the tension in Connor's shoulders, and squeezed them encouragingly. "I'm standing right back here if you need me. If anything goes wrong, I'll intervene, okay?"

"You'll..." Connor looked back at Troye, his eyes similar to a baby owl's with him groping for faith. "You'll keep me safe?" He asked softly, both of them realizing how genuinely scared he was. Oli wasn't the worst of his attackers, but he was definitely a brute, and he was afraid of all the different kinds of abuse Oli could easily subject him to.

Troye recognized this fear. He'd seen it before, many times, a rabid wolf in the forests of Connor's eyes. So, with a soft, pacifying smile, he just rubbed his frightened boy's shoulders. "I swear. I won't let anybody hurt you." He promised, his comely voice killing a few of his boyfriend's stomach roaches.

So, with a tender, gentle push from Troye, Connor trotted unassumingly towards the mass of boys. His legs felt like planks of wood, his stomach a sack of mossy pebbles, his whole body a woodland rotting in his own anxiety; but he made himself keep walking. Troye watched from just behind the corner, in case he had to step in for any reason, as Connor stalked up to Oli.

"Um, Oli?" Connor eased up to the large boy, struggling to keep his body strong, like Troye had suggested over and over again. He weathered his voice to demand, surprising himself by only stuttering a little. "I really h-have to talk to you."

It took Oli a second, but he eventually agreed to notice Connor's presence. Turning away from his friends, who usually refused to talk to Connor and called him crazy for doing so, he gave him a stinging smirk. "I'm kind of busy, faggot." He chuckled to himself at this apparently funny joke of a joke. He was even more of a jackass trying to impress his dicks of friends.

Connor's stomach tightened around his breakfast. Oli's friends laughed, mostly at the mean tone their leader used, and Oli's ego visibly inflated with the volume of his own laughter. It hurt, but Connor only needed to think of them all burning in their own fires to get angrier. That anger forced him to stand his ground. "Faggot?" He pushed. "Do you even know what that means?"

The spite in the small man's voice caught Oli by surprise. Trying to save his composure after accidentally dropping his jaw, he chuckled rudely. "Um, it means faggot, faggot." He replied facetiously, harshly. "Like, fucking tiny pixie-boy anal-loving loser, faggot."

"Now, that's where you're wrong." Connor retorted, his voice so robust that his vocal cords felt peculiar manufacturing it. It was like they'd abruptly switched all their mechanisms from the production of fluffy, bunny plushies to poision-tipped arrows and matching steel bows. His factory throat producing quiet and lethal comeback. "If you had a brain that was even remotely less dull and narrow, which I highly doubt could ever be possible, you would know that the legitimate definition of faggot is a pile of sticks. You just called me a pile of sticks, and are average-minded enough to think it makes enough sense to offend me."