After they'd corralled the boy—Monkey, wasn't it? What a weird name—into the living room, Natasha wasted no time in trying to question him, everything that she'd known from interrogating previous suspects at the boy, who would either completely ignore the question or would answer as vaguely as possible. It was frustrating to all of them, but Steve could some what understand the situation that the boy was in. After all, he'd woken up in a random place—well, it was more of a cage mind you—and then random people came, telling him that he needed to calm down and answer everything that they needed to know or he wouldn't be able to see that only one that he cared about. Steve probably wouldn't trust anyone if he was in the boy's place, either.

But sadly, that was not the currently situation.

The kid was dangerous; that much they're gathered. He was strong and fast, even if he was injured. He somehow managed to break the cage open without a weapon of any sort (they were still looking into that) and then manage to get a pretty far ways away from said cage without getting caught.

"Look, kid." Steve eventually spoke up, gaining the boy's attention. "You need to cooperate. We said that if you did, you could see your brother, right? Just answer a few questions for us, okay?"

The boy glared at him warily before shaking his head with a sigh and leaning back against the couch that he was sitting on. Natasha took this as an opportunity to intervene with more questions. "Name?"

"I already told you that." The boy mumbled, looking rather dejected and definitely cautious.

"Name?" Natasha repeated, eyes narrowed. Her tone left no room for argument.

The boy gave the woman a sideways glance and let out another sigh, resting his hand over the injury on his chest. "Luffy."

"Wait—" Tony interrupted, holding up his hands. "I thought you said your name was Monkey?"

"What?" The boy—Luffy—looked confused for a second before something clicked and he shook his head, a small, amused smile on his lips. "No, that's my family name. Monkey D. Luffy. Luffy's my actual name."

Clint snapped his finger a few times, looking like he was wracking his brain for a stray piece of information. "Isn't that a Japanese tradition?"

"Japanese?" The confused look was back and this time it didn't go away. It was like the kid had never heard of Japan before. Steve watched curiously, thinking that the 'other-world' theory might not be so ridiculous as everyone thought.

"Y'know," Tony said. "Japan? The island nation off of the coast of East Asia? Full of robots and super-smart geeks? I mean, not as smart as me, but still pretty damn smart."

The boy frowned at the billionaire and let out a huff. "I don't know of a place called Gupen. There a lot of islands, I don't memorize their names. Nami might know, though." He trailed off at the end and the Avengers could only assume that this 'Nami' was someone that he knew.

"It's called Japan." Natasha corrected, ignoring the mutter of 'isn't that what I said?' and continuing on with the questions. "But it doesn't matter. What's your age?"

"Seventeen." Luffy replied, closing his eyes as if he were going to take a nap, putting the straw hat over his face and leaning back.

Steve was about to comment that he looked rather relaxed for being in the position he was, but then noticed all the tense muscles that lined his skin. From the shoulder down, Steve could tell that the boy was anything but relaxed. He couldn't blame the youth, though; after all, this was stressful to all of them.

"Do you know what the Tesseract is?" Natasha said, leaning forward with an unusual amount of seriousness in her voice.

"Tesseract?" The boy repeated, taking his hat off of his eyes and glancing at Natasha with a confused expression. "What's a Tesseract?"

"A giant blue cube of pure energy, to put it mildly." Steve answered before Natasha could. Something about this kid was . . . different. Everything he'd said so far didn't seem like a lie (And Steve had a pretty good sense when someone was lying) but at the same time, Steve wanted to believe that the kid had heard of something as big a Japan. Had known about stuff that normal kids his age knew about. "Have you see any blue flashing lights lately?"

"Umm," The boy hesitated, thinking for a second. "Not blue, but I saw a white light just before I blacked out." He frowned from under his hat, shaking his head. "But that's about it. The next thing I know, I wake up in a glass box."

"Could you tell us where you were before you woke up here?" Natasha took over the interrogation again, leaning back in her chair, waiting for the boy to answer.

Luffy took his hat off from his head and started fiddling with the rim (He seemed very found of the tattered thing, Steve noticed.). The raven-haired male didn't meet their eyes when he said, rather bluntly, "No."

"I thought you said you were going to cooperate." Steve narrowed his eyes, making sure that the boy knew that he was in no position to argue. Even though he said that he understood the situation the boy was in, it wasn't the time to pity him. "What about your brother? Surely you want to see him?"

"Ace can take care of himself," Luffy said flatly, eyes narrowing, but they could all see the worry in his features. "I'm not telling."

"Kid, look. You're currently under our custody right now and it's our job to find out what the hell happened." Clint said, raising from his seat and standing straight in front of the said male. "You either tell us, or the government is going to come and take you and your brother away from each other and hound your asses in ways that you won't like. So just—"

"So you are with the marines." Luffy snarled, his eyes taking on a dangerous edge. Even someone like Steve knew that this was not good and a fight was going to break out if nothing is done. And this time, Steve wasn't sure that he could stop it, so he knew he had to intervene before anything could happen.

"We're not marines!" The super-hero snapped, taking a step forward and pushing the boy back into the couch. "But, kid, Clint is right! If we don't do what they want, then it'll be bad for the both of us. So, just answer the question; where were you before you woke up here?"

The boy looked surprised for a second before he shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. "I won't tell."

"Luffy, come on. We really need you to answer this." Bruce tried to coax the kid into answering; placing a hand on the boy shoulder, ignoring the way the boy flinched and curled into him. It was easy to tell that he was stressed and uncomfortable, possibly even more than all of the Avengers combined. Steve distantly wondered how much longer until he snapped, but soon pushed the thought out of his mind.

"I won't tell." Luffy repeated, shaking his raven hair and closing his eyes. It seemed like he was trying to convince himself more than the Avengers. "I won't tell."

Bruce frowned at the boy, removing his hand. "We don't want it to come to this, but if you won't tell us, then you'll never be able to see your brother again."

Steve had to ignore the flinch from the boy when they mentioned his brother. He knew this was cruel, but it was completely necessary. The kid might not look like a threat at the moment, but very well could be. They needed to figure out where they came from and why they were here. If he did happen to just be an unlucky contestant caught up in a situation that didn't have anything to do with him, then they'd let him go. They might watch him for the rest of his life just as a precaution, but he'd be free and would never see any of them again.

However, Steve knew that wasn't the case here.

I—we—Ace," Luffy stuttered for a bit, shaking his head. "A war." It seems like he was finally cooperating. "We were in a war."

"A war?" Steve muttered, looking at the boy. He wanted to say that it didn't surprise him, but couldn't. A war was not meant for kids, especially those who didn't look any older than sixteen. "Where?"

"Marineford." The answer was barely above a whisper.

Tony frowned, confused. "Marineford? Where the hell is Marineford?"

"I don't know." Luffy looked up at them with a sigh. Emotions were swirling in those dark orbs of his and Steve had to hold in a wince when he saw just how badly the kid was hurt. "By Impel Down? I thought Nami said it was somewhere near Mariejois." Once again this 'Nami' was mentioned.

"I've never heard of those places." Tony announced, completely disregarding the confused look on Luffy face as if the boy were saying, 'how could you not know?' and turned to Bruce, seeking answers. "What about you guys? Ever heard of them?"

"No," Steve muttered. "I haven't."

The rest shook their heads except for Thor who simply looked perplexed. "The names sound familiar." He said, but then shook his head. "But I do not remember where."

"What about—"

"Sir," The voice of J.A.R.V.I.S cut through the air like a knife, quickly silencing everyone. "The other occupant seems to be stirring. Do you want—"

A loud explosion shook the building and for the second time that day, alarms blared to life, causing everyone, even the boy, to wince at the noise.

"Damn it! This is my house! Stop breaking it!" Tony shouted to nothing before turning his glare to Luffy. "What's with you damn kids and making things explode?!"

"Sorry?" The boy hesitantly offered, looking rather perplexed with the whole situation. One moment it was a serious interrogation and the next, it was complete chaos.

"It seems your brother has awakened." Steve stated, quickly gaining the attention of the boy. He offered a tired grin, placing a hand on Luffy's shoulder just to make sure the boy wouldn't run.. "How about we go meet him?"


So, um, yeah. That happened.

I know! I know! Luffy's being a little OOC here because I know our normal Luffy wouldn't give a shit about them and would complain about food and not answer any of the questions, completely disregarding all the questions but you guys have to remember that 1) The Avengers, no matter how rude, are using Ace's situation to their full advantage. Luffy wants to see Ace badly because the last time they saw each other, Ace was about to die. 2) Luffy is not quite in the right mind. As I said before, he's not as bad as after Marineford was over because he didn't see Ace die, but he's still really confused and just wants to see his big brother who the Avengers are threatening to separate. How rude.

Okay! Another a lot of you guys asked about the injury on his chest; Yes! I know that the blow was delivered after Ace died, but that mark also symbolizes a lot of things and will be important later on. This is why this story is a bit of an AU because Luffy did, in fact, get his wound before Ace died. It a bit confusing, so don't stress about it too much, okay? Just know that he has a wound and don't wonder about where it came from.

And then there were questions about why Luffy woke up first. Well, the answer to that is because I say so. If Ace woke up first, being the untrusting ass that he can be, he'd probably end up burning down the whole building, quite possibly destroy the city and become labeled as an actual threat, where as if Luffy woke up first (As seen here) might be able to convince Ace before he did something too rash.

Next chapter will be about how the boys got out of their cages! And Fury's call and Ace and Luffy fluff while starting to break the Avenger's sense of logic.

Until next time! ~ c: