"I know it's a motherfucking Saturday, but I will be damned if I let any of you out of this room today," Fury said, looking around the room at all the students that had earned detention from the school he unfortunately was stuck being the principal of. "You all have reasons to be here, and you will be here all day to contemplate what shit you did to get me stuck watching all of you on a motherfucking Saturday. This job is just bullshit." Fury walked out of the room with a final warning for nobody to move from their seats.

Tony Stark was the outcast in school. He didn't consider himself bad, but others tended to. He wasn't stable with relationships. The only thing he needed to be stable with was his grades, otherwise he knew there would be another beating waiting for him from his father – his sole guardian after his mother had passed, as no one else would take him – when he got back home.

Bruce Banner was quiet, considered a bit of a freak. Everyone suspected he had anger issues, but inside the worst part was that he was just plain lonely. He was privy to the same expectations and punishments as Stark, and while they weren't necessarily friends yet, there was a looming similarity that might have that fact change by the end of this day.

Natasha Romanov was popular. She would practically slaughter anyone who tried to tell her otherwise or spread rumors about her. Everyone regarded her as innocent, even the dorky Clint Barton that had been crushing on her since freshman year. Sure he was a senior, and sure he was head athlete in school, but Natasha still wasn't sure. Clint had literally saved her life before and she still never made up her mind.

Thor Odinson was always causing trouble. He was the only athlete in the school superior to Clint, and he was the most popular boy. Everyone loved him at their school – and did he ever know it. It gained him a lot of people that hated him, including a boy that used to be like his family.

Loki Laufeyson was a scrawny young boy that used to live with the Odinson's as a foster child. Eventually he got to leave, which made him happy because he never really fit in properly there. He was taken in by another family, which while they didn't treat him much better…at least they didn't lie to him. All that the boy really wanted in the world was to be heard, to be seen. He wanted to be able to have opinions and be strong. But, with his small form, he never really was able to. He didn't mean to gain help, but he needed his friend – well, actually to be correct now, adoptive brother – to be there for him. He couldn't win all the battles on his own.

Steve Rogers was generally a quiet teenager. He didn't like people picking on the smaller boys, especially not Loki. He used to hate watching Loki get torn down by his old family, and now that they lived under the same roof, they got along quite well. Even though Steve wasn't as intelligent perhaps as young Loki, he liked to hear Loki talk about anything and everything. They weren't just brothers now, they were best friends.

Each had their reasons for being there, and none of them spoke for a while. Not until Stark spoke up. "Hey, well, shit. Why is everybody so quiet around here?"

"We're not supposed to be loud, it's detention you imbecile," Natasha replied.

Stark laughed. "Oh, come off it Red. Don't be such a buzzkill. Fury is probably busy swearing at some poor soul over the phone, why don't we just have some fun?"

"Because fun with you is average at best," Natasha said as she started fumbling to put her hair back properly.

"How would you know? You are a whore alright, but not one that's come near me," Stark sneered before walking over to the next desk, sitting on top of it and ready to bother Bruce. "Hey there muffin, I know it's been a while."

"Stark, what do you want?" Bruce asked, clearly annoyed.

"I am bored," Tony said simply as he lay down on the desk, laughing. "Can't we do something fun? And the name is Tony. Really, I don't mean to ruin the whole thing. But you can call me Tony."

"Okay, T-o-n-y, will you get your ass off my books and then we can talk?" Bruce asked, irritated as he tried to yank his textbooks out from under Tony's ass.

Tony frowned, getting up. "Studying is no fun, and studying isn't even allowed in detention."

"Try telling that to my dad," Bruce mumbled. Tony heard it anyway. He slipped down and into the seat beside Bruce, and he pulled at the boy's sleeves until he saw the bruises. Bruce looked up at Tony, daggers and sadness in his eyes at the same time. "I…I can explain those."

"No need," Tony whispers, looking around the room to make sure no one else is watching before pulling up his shirt, revealing lots of purple bruising. Bruce looks astonished, and Tony nods and pulls it back down. "I get detention a lot, and well, that along with the lack of time to study…yeah, my dad's the same way as yours. I always did wonder if you wore long sleeves for the same reason."

"You won't say anything, right?" Bruce asked softly.

Tony leans over and gives Bruce a kiss on the cheek. "Our little secret, I promise."

"I promise," two small voices say from behind them.

Tony whips his head around to see Loki and Steve, who had been quietly watching their conversation. "And why would you, Steve Rogers, keep such a big secret for us two?"

Steve looks over at Loki, and Loki simply nods and gets out of his seat, indicating for Tony to switch spots. Tony does, and he stares up at Steve expectantly. Steve lifts up his pant-leg first, then his sleeve, then his shirt over his torso for glimpses of his scars, before pulling each back down in kind. "I…nobody ever wonders why I built myself up in muscle, I need to defend myself. My father is a bit heavy on the drinking, and the boys in my neighborhood hated me too as I grew up. I had to grow up to be stronger, and still to defend those who are in a situation like I was. Like him-"

Steve gestured up to Loki, who was dressed up in layers as well, and then he looked back at Tony. "So, no, I won't tell. You have my word."

"I'm sorry," Tony mumbled quietly. "Sometimes I forget other people have drunkard assholes for fathers too. I mean, I didn't even know. I wouldn't have even guessed – you just, now you are just so strong about everything."

"It's a practiced gift," Steve said through his teeth.

Tony didn't know why he did it, because past the hook-ups he wasn't a really intimate person, but he leaned over and yanked Steve into his arms for a hug. "I'm sorry."

Steve just leaned into Tony, and rested his head on Tony's shoulder for a while. It wasn't perfect, it wasn't amazing, it just was.

When they pulled away, Clint was standing in front of them, frowning. "What the actual fuck? How do you do it Tony?"

"Do what? I am not doing anything bird breath," Tony said through his teeth.

Thor walked up after Clint. "You don't deserve friends, Stark. You are just a lazy bastard who blows up things in shop and goes home to rich old daddy to buy him whatever gadgets he wants."

"You are one to talk, norse-named bitch? Seriously, you fucking want to go there?" Tony asks angrily, getting out of his seat and walking over in front of the statue. "Here's my fucking impression of what Thor's home life is like."

Tony took a minute to get himself into character and then smiled. "Hi son, guess what? We can go hunting this weekend!" He turns around, turning into Thor, puffing out his chest for extra effect. "But father, I have to go to the tournament this weekend." Once more he turned around to become Odin. "That's okay son, we can do both!" Once again he turned into Thor, and he said. "Gee, thanks Dad."

Thor smiled, not getting what was wrong with that. "What's wrong with that? Is there anything wrong with that?"

"For you, there's nothing wrong with that. But, you know what Thor? I-" Tony was interrupted.

"Tony, if I may. Thor, there's something wrong with that because your father owns the biggest company in the world and he used to have two sons. But while you were in glory land and are still, here's the experience I had with Odin," Loki said, walking up to Tony and whispering in his ear. Tony asked if Loki was sure he wanted to do this, but Loki just nodded.

"Dad, can I come too? I have finished all my homework and I have finished cleaning, and I have-" Loki began, cut off by Tony who was playing Odin again.

"No! You need to continue, it's not good enough," Tony as Odin said, before trying to storm away.

Loki ran in front of him, begging anew. "I also was wondering if I worked hard enough this year at school I really wanted to try working for the company this summer, even as an intern, no money needed just for the experience to get into school and-"

Tony hesitated for a moment. Loki nodded before Tony slapped (fake-slapped) Loki and watched him fall to the floor. "I said no. You will listen to me, I am your father."

"Am I not your son too?" Loki asked as Tony was still (acting, of course, not actually hurting the boy because Loki had enough bruises) kicking him again as he was down.

Tony stopped, knowing they had made their point, and turned back to Thor. "Thor, you sick bastard, realize that while you are lucky enough to be spoiled without consequence others are not so lucky."

Thor moved up to Loki and offered his hand, and hesitantly Loki took it, standing up in front of Thor now. Thor sounded choked up as he spoke. "What you showed me, is that the truth?"

"I…yes," Loki answered slowly. "It's okay because I don't live there anymore, and things at Steve's are mostly better and I…I am protected now. It's alright. You didn't know."

Thor watched in horror as the truth was spoken, and he took the boy he still considered a brother into his arms in a hug, and then as they pulled away Thor kept the boy's hand in his, walking off to talk more about what's been going on with Loki all those years.

The others started to walk towards an open area and they sat in a circle, starting off talking more casually. Then, the question was asked about how each of them got into detention that day. Tony started. "Well, as you might know, I am a bit daring with my experiments in shop. As Clint kind of mentioned, I blew up half the shop class. What they didn't realize is that I was trying to build a robot, and after that fifth prototype I made a sixth that worked perfectly. Since it took so long to build, I called it DUM-E."

"That's kinda sweet," Clint said. "It's Steve's turn then. How about you, how'd you end up in detention?"

"I, well, I don't like seeing other kids that can't defend themselves get hurt by bullies. Somebody was stupid enough to beat on Loki in my line of sight, and well, they ended up looking worse than he did. That's why I'm in detention. Loki's here because he told off a teacher who was kind of making fun of him. I am really just starting to hate this school," Steve finished honestly, and then he turned to Natasha. "I know you haven't talked much because you think you are too good for this, but how about you?"

"I actually don't think that," Natasha replied slowly. "I just…I screwed up a lot of people to get where I am. This school is an absolute battlefield. It's almost like the people's lives I have ruined have created a shade of red across my ledger, and I'd like nothing more than to clear it. I will do so, starting with this confession: I didn't skip school and get detention to go shopping. I skipped class so I could go on a date with Clint without my friends finding out about it. I hate having to get those bitches approval on everything I do. I wish I could just break free of this stupid place sometimes. One day, I want to be recruited as a spy and never have to conform other than by the ruses of disguises."

"That doesn't sound half bad," Bruce said quietly. "Thor, how did you get to detention today?" Bruce asked as Thor entered the circle and sat down beside Loki.

"I got into detention, well," Thor began sadly. "My father, when he was young, he used to play pranks on the weakest of the team. And, I, I felt horrible about it after. What I did is humiliate another teammate and make him feel like he was less of a man – we taped him up, naked, in the school locker room and waited for another class to find him. After we did what we did, which I won't mention again, I couldn't help but think about even though my dad was very proud of what I did – what would his dad think?"

"Well, in case you didn't get it, he's talking about me," Clint said quietly. "My dad isn't a kind man, and he was really pissed off that I couldn't defend myself enough not to get humiliated that way. Let's just say, um, well…" Clint pulled up his sleeves on the sweater he was wearing, and then he put his hand up to his face to smear away the makeup he had been wearing to cover the bruises. "I was thankful that Nat had agreed to help me cover it up, because well, when I told her what happened to me at home she understood."

"I think all our fucking parents should go bowling," Tony said sadly. "Alright, one left, Bruce…why were you in detention?"

"Well, I, I don't want to talk about it," Bruce said slowly, curling up into himself a bit.

"You are the only one left sweetie, come on, I've got you," Tony said sincerely.

Bruce took a deep breath. "You know, my dad, he's not okay when I get any bad marks. So, you know, I needed to keep up a good average. I need to be prepared to get into Harvard. I needed an extra class to try and keep up my grades, so I took shop. I thought it'd be easy."

"I take shop," Tony responded, raising up an eyebrow. "What are you trying to say?"

"I'm trying to say it was harder than I thought it would be. I had to make this stupid clock. The clock had to work, and it had to have something special about it. Mine was supposed to light up, and a little bird was supposed to come out on each hour. I tried for weeks and weeks, and when it came out, it didn't work. I got an F," Bruce whispered. "An F is never acceptable, and I figured if it wasn't acceptable for me…he was going to kill me. And it was going to hurt. I was lucky I didn't get expelled, because, there was a gun in my locker…"

Loki crawled over before anyone else could and onto Bruce's lap, just wrapping his arms around the other boy, hugging him tightly. Tony and Steve both stared at him for a long moment of sadness, before looking at each other. Tony started crying. Steve yanked the small billionaire into his arms, and Tony sobbed into his shoulder, soaking the fabric of his shirt. Neither boy cared.

Thor looked around the circle and asked the question that he had been thinking. "How many of you have felt that desperately hopeless?"

As they each looked up, every person in the circle nodded to agree they've felt that way. There wasn't one of them that hadn't contemplated suicide at some point in their life.

Loki pulled away a bit from Bruce. "I'm sorry for hug-jumping you, but I just…"

"You understood," Bruce whispered.

Loki nodded again, and Bruce held the boy a little more comfortable onto his lap so they could both look into the circle, which had turned into a bit of a mess of tears. Thor and Clint were tending to a crying Natasha, mumbling about her mother being gone for so long and her father was literally a murderer so, in her words, 'why would he care about abuse if he didn't care about murder'? She knew it was his job to murder, as a government agent, but the red on his ledger…and the abuse…it was hard for her to hide.

Steve and Tony were curled around each other, talking to each other about what happens in each of their homes, and were contemplating moving out. Steve had a decent job, Tony had a trust fund and a legal right to a spot at Stark industries in the lower divisions where he didn't have to see his father – they were just discussing, but everything seemed to be folding together through the words and tears.

Bruce then spoke up again. "You want to know how I got caught."

"I thought, well, regular locker-check?" Tony asked, now curious again and curving around to look, Steve's arms still securing around him.

"Well, no," Bruce admitted, smiling a bit now. "It was a flare gun. It went off in my locker."

Finally the mood was lightened as they all started to just laugh about the flare gun debacle. And, as the laughing finally died down, the day came to an end.

Tony argued with Fury and earned himself about four more detentions, and Steve punched Fury in the face as he defended Tony…which earned them four weeks together to hang out in detention.

Clint and Natasha walked out of detention together, and for the first time in a while Natasha didn't care what anyone was going to think – it wasn't about them, it was about her. And about who she wanted to be, and who she wanted to be with. They were already planning to leave for a few years to go find a special ops placement that might take them.

Thor apologized for what seemed like the thousandth time to Loki, offering a position at the corporation Asgard Inc. when he was to take over as boss. He knew that Loki wanted to be a writer, and as the company had a division of publishing, he thought he'd do what he could to help. They left on good terms, and Thor was head of the company within the year after his father's untimely demise – for which, of course, Loki rushed to his side to help him mourn.

Bruce wasn't completely better, but now that they all had met he realized he wasn't alone in his struggles. Tony helped him with shop, Clint taught him how to dress, Steve taught him some self-defense mechanisms – and, in the end, Natasha ended up finally pushing him into getting set up with the person he was too shy to ask out until prom. Which, of course Loki said a big yes. They've been together ever since.

As for Steve and Tony, as one would wonder how they ended up, they figured things out at the end of the day, as Steve came to visit Tony in the closet he was protesting having earned so many extra detentions for. "Stark, you gotta get up, it's time to go."

"I thought we got past the whole Stark thing?" Tony asked slowly, groaning in frustration. "I don't have to leave. I will be here forever according to those detentions, right?"

Steve laughed a bit, shrugging as he took a seat beside Tony. "I'll be right there beside you, I guess."

"I, yeah, you didn't need to do that," Tony replied wistfully.

Steve sighed. "Yes, I did, because it was a kind of preemptive move to this," Steve said, before leaning in and capturing Tony's lips with his.

"Is that – Steve Rogers, oh innocent one, was that a move?" Tony asked when they pulled apart for air.

Steve smiled. "I guess it was. Can we call it a day though? We still have tomorrow, right?"

"We still have tomorrow, and a lovely closet to fuck in now, what do you say?" Steve shot Tony a look as he said the words. "Fine, I'm kidding, my lovely little prude. Let's never forget about me, okay?"

FIN.