Invasion Of The Smart Kids

"Hey, Tony?" Kitty stuck her head into the garage, where Tony was fixing up one of his cars. "I think we're being invaded."

He slid out from under the car and looked at her with confusion. "What?"

She nodded to the elevator and they both went down to the public level of the Tower. In the lobby were about seven or eight kids, ages ranging from ten to seventeen, all on laptops and with stacks of papers in front of them.

"Can I help you?" Tony asked loudly.

Every single one of the kids looked up at him with shock and fear. They stayed silent as Tony walked up to one of the paralayzed children, who had a book in his lap and a pencil in his hand. "Is that homework?" He asked. "Physics?"

The kid nodded.

"Number ten is wrong." Tony pointed to it. "Your free space permittivity should be 8.85 pF/m, not 8.58. Switch them around."

The kid's mouth formed an 'o' and he nodded as he started erasing furiously.

"1. How old are you, twelve?" Kitty asked, holding up a finger, then two. "2. Why are you doing it here?"

"The wifi is really good here." One of the teenagers whispered.

Tony's eyebrows drew together. "Don't you have wifi wherever you came from?"

"No." The teenager answered for everyone as they rest just shook their heads. Kitty noticed that most of them had very old, obviously secondhand laptops and their backpacks were torn and frayed. "And Starbucks said we each had to buy something to use their wifi."

Tony walked around to the teenager's computer and saw that it was on the Avengers wifi system, the one that was only supposed to be accessible to the Avengers living in the Tower. "How'd you get past my firewall?" Tony asked.

The youngest person in the room, a small girl with braids in her hair, raised her hand. "I broke your password using an algorithm I wrote."

Another said, "And I boosted the strength so it didn't look like we were using it."

"That's why the internet was so slow for a few hours, then back to normal." Kitty marveled.

Tony stared at the students for a minute, taking in the faces of each and every one of them. "How long have you been doing this?"

"A while." Someone admitted.

Tony shook his head and he and Kitty left the lobby in silence.

The next day, all of the kids in the group were hesitant to go back to the Tower. Someone had looked it up and technically, Tony Stark could have them arrested for trespassing and stealing and something else that nobody caught the name of but the charge wasn't good. Still, they needed the internet so they all marched in together with the mindset of 'if they arrest one, they arrest us all'. The protest-like vibe was stunted, however, when they saw the blonde girl from yesterday standing there, waiting. She was in her Avengers suit and had multiple shopping bags at her feet, but the kids only noticed the gun on her hip.

The little girl who broke the firewall widened her eyes and her lip quivered. She burst into tears, shocking Kitty.

"Hey, hey," Kitty held her hands out in what she hoped was a comforting way. "Don't worry, you aren't in trouble."

"It's the gun." One of the other kids explained as she held the little girl in a hug. "Ebony's brother's just died because of a drive by."

Kitty immediately took the gun holster off and handed it to Pepper, who put it under her desk, out of sight. "Look, look," Kitty crouched down to the girl's level and opened her hands. "No gun. It's okay, you aren't in trouble and there's no gun." She tried, but the girl was still crying inconsolably. Kitty got on her knees and started rustling through one of the many bags. Finally, she pulled out a brand new, tags-attached pink backpack. "Do you like this? Would you like this?"

The little girl shook her head.

"Okay," Kitty said distractively as she began searching through another bag. "Uh…"

"She likes yellow." The older girl mouthed to Kitty.

Kitty smiled and located a bright yellow backpack. "How about this?"

Ebony peeked at Kitty and the bag. Still sniffling, she grabbed for the backpack and snatched it from Kitty's hands. She held it to her chest and seemed to brighten a little.

"Better?" Kitty asked.

Ebony shrugged.

"Well, there's some school supplies in there, I didn't know what y'all would need-"

"Us?" The seventeen year old asked. He looked around at the rest of the group. "All of us?"

"Yeah, everything in the bags." Kitty pointed to the piles of shopping bags.

He looked apprehensive, like he was waiting for the ball to drop. "And we don't have to pay for it or-"

"No." Kitty shook her head. "It's 100% free and yours to keep, no strings. Everyone gets one-"

The kids descended on the bags, nearly ripping one in half. Meanwhile, Bucky came from downstairs, also geared up for a fight. He paused when he saw the kids, but Kitty smiled encouragingly and waved him forward.

Bucky cautiously approached. "Stark says we need to go-"

"He'll be fine." Kitty waved her hand dismissively.

"He seemed really urgent-"

"In a minute." She whispered, still watching the kids as they marveled over their new stuff. "Look how happy they look!"

Bucky was too busy watching Kitty's smile to notice the children.

"No way!" One of the teenagers said. "This is a MSI laptop!"

"Yeah," Kitty glanced at Bucky, who quickly looked away so she didn't catch him staring. "I, uh, didn't know what you needed or what was best and that's what everyone suggested-"

The kid promptly turned around and hugged Kitty. "Thank you!"

"Oh," Kitty immediately stiffened and looked uncomfortable. "No, no that's not necessary-"

Every single kid in the group started hugging Kitty, forming a barrier of children. Bucky laughed and snapped a picture of Kitty, who still looked very uncomfortable. They all let go of her and started to sit in the chairs to play with their new stuff.

"Uh, you guys can't be out here though." Kitty said. "It's for business meetings and a lot of adult stuff."

The kids deflated instantly.

"So, Tony and I built you guys your own study nook." She led the parade of kids to what looked like a sitting room with clear walls and a clear door. "It's soundproof for studying, there's snacks, drinks in the fridge," Kitty nodded to the refrigerator. "Comfy chairs for everyone and you guys have your own wifi and passcode is on the wall over there. If you guys need anything, tell Pepper over there," She pointed to the redhead in the lobby. "And Pepper will tell me or Tony and we'll get it all taken care of."

Chorus' of 'thank you's rang through the room and everyone dispersed to explore the new environment. Kitty and Bucky walked out of the study nook and headed for the elevator.

"The glass is bulletproof, so the kids should be pretty safe in there-" Kitty stopped when she felt something tugging at her leg and she looked down to see one of the kids.

"Can I keep this here?" The kid held up the laptop.

Kitty's eyebrows drew together. "You don't want to take it home?"

"If I take it home," The kid looked down at their beat up sneakers. "My mom will sell it."

"Why would she sell it?"

The kid shrugged.

Kitty looked at Bucky, then over at Pepper, then back to the kid. "How about, when you're ready to go home, you give the laptop to Pepper," She pointed to the redhead, who waved. "And she'll keep it safe for you."

"Okay." The kid said hesitantly.

"I gotta go but Pepper will take care of anything you kids need."