Albus returned only seconds after they'd taken a few steps up the stairs and when he did, Steve looked at him curiously.
"I thought you were going to contact somebody?"
"Scorpius and I agreed that somebody should watch you guys." He glared at Loki. "You know. Just in case."
"Scorpius is a most interesting name," Thor remarked without preamble. "One mayhap I should expect to heard more in the realm of Asgard than in Midgard."
"His family likes to name people after constellations. Some of them anyway." He looked them over. "So while you're all still in a truth-telling mood, what's up with this tesseract thing anyway? What is it, even? Some kind of weapon?"
Steve looked at Tony who looked back at him. Loki glared at the ground. Only Thor straightened up and spoke as if reciting from memory.
"The tesseract is an ancient artifact which holds within it cosmic power, a jewel of my realm which was stolen away ages ago. I did not suspect that I should find it here." His head turned toward Loki. "Nor that it should be my brother to so zealously pursue it or attempt to use it in a course of destruction."
"So you guys are brothers." Albus smiled, but the expression did not reach his eyes. "I'm sensing some tension. Makes me think of my brother."
"Loki is merely misguided, misunderstood." The man in question tossed his head, still unable to speak but nevertheless able to convey his disdain. "You must come home. We will fix this and all will be well again! You must believe me, brother."
"We can't allow you to do that, not when he's threatening earth with that tessaract," Steve said severely.
"He will give it up!" Thor protested, his expression strained yet hopeful. "Give it up and return to Asgard!"
The look on Loki's face plainly revealed that he wouldn't be taking this course of action if he could help it and Albus turned to Thor in sympathy.
"I don't know that he's going to go along with that plan." Thor opened his mouth to protest but before he could, Albus changed the subject. "So if you're not wizards like I was assuming, what are you?"
"Your people called us gods in ancient times," Thor said.
"Yeah, I know, although forgive me if I'm a little skeptical." He looked at Steve. "What about you?"
"I'm a super soldier in the employ of the United States government."
"Super?" Albus' voice grew thoughtful. "Like a hero? Like a super hero?"
"You could all us that." Steve's cheeks reddened. "Although I honestly feel as though I am merely doing my duty."
"So how'd you get paired up with a guy like him?" He nodded at Tony. "Because he seems like a real…"
"Back!" Scorpius came running down the stairs.
"Did you find your uncle?" Albus asked.
He shook his head. "He wasn't in the study or the potions chamber or the library. I shouted but no answer. Left a note on his door, hopefully he'll find it soon."
There was a sound upstairs and they grinned.
"Well that was fast," Albus laughed.
"We're downstairs!" Scorpius leaned into the stairwell and screamed. "In the dungeons!"
"The dungeons?" A voice drifted down but it didn't sound like an uncle; it didn't even sound male. "What the heck are you doing down in the dungeons?"
Scorpius drew back and swore under his breath. "It's Frankie."
"But she wasn't supposed to come over until seven!" Albus gasped.
"Yeah, and how long do you think we were out there looking for that bludger and then escorting these four back here. Damn it! We must have lost track of… Frankie!" He forced a smile to his face. "How good to see you!"
A girl walked in clutching a six pack of bottles in one hand and a bulky purse slung about the other arm. She was a brunette, taller than Albus but not yet Scorpius' height, with wavy brown hair that she bound in pigtails hanging down either side of her face. She took a look at the four prisoners but only raised an eyebrow.
"Al. Scor. What did you two do?" Her voice was laden half with suspicion and half with bemused concern.
"We can explain," Scorpius said quickly.
"You can explain why you have four men chained up in your basement. This is an explanation I would love to hear." She set the bottles down on the floor with a thunk. "Here, Al, I brought you a copy of the Quidditch mag with your cousin Rosie in it." She tossed him a glossy after fishing it out of the purse.
"Thanks."
""So what is this about?" She looked the four over. "You pick them up from some club?" Her tone was frosty and Scorpius flinched. "You know, for once in my life," she sighed, "I would like to get into some kind of shenanigans that didn't revolve around men who aren't even going to give me the time of day."
"This isn't anything to do with that!" Scorpius said. "We found them in the forest earlier today when we went out looking for a bludger that escaped."
She frowned. "I did think they looked a little old. So if they're not refugees from some really weird club scene, who are they?"
Albus leaned in. "I think they're super heroes!" He whispered.
"Al, this dungeon echoes like a canyon, they can still hear you," Frankie remarked.
"I think they're super heroes!" A grin was starting to form. "Well, except for the one in green. We've only just started talking to them but we're pretty sure he's the villain."
"He is not!" Thor protested. "He is my brother!"
"Thor, you have to admit, in the circumstances of the case…" Steven started.
"Thor?" She laughed. "And it would be the one in green," she smirked. "You know, to be the bad guy."
"Frankie, you're a Hufflepuff, do not start that house stereotype bullshit with us," Scorpius shot back, "because you will lose."
With a roll of her eyes, she bent down and grabbed one of the beers she'd brought. "Think I'm going to need this." Fishing around in her purse, she withdrew her own wand and popped off the bottle cap. "Are you really super heroes?"
"Some would say we are," Steve admitted.
"Why aren't the other two talking?"
"I silencio'd them. They were getting lippy."
She sighed and waved her wand.
"Finally! You little punk, you have no idea what kind of trouble you're in!"
"Tony," Steve cut in, "they're just kids."
"We are not just kids!" Albus said, cheeks coloring. "We're seventeen! We're of majority!"
"Yeah? We'll he's probably over a hundred." Tony jerked his head towards Steve.
"I'm not that old," Steve protested. "I've been frozen in ice," he explained.
"If they're heroes, why'd you tie them up?"
"We didn't know that when we tied them up!" Scorpius protested. "And I'm not so sure that I buy that they're heroes."
"You gave them Veritaserum, it's got to be true," Albus spoke up.
"You gave them Veritaserum? Scorpius!"
"What! We could have been in danger. We needed to get the truth out of them quickly. Veritaserum was the perfect solution. Try not to let your Gryffindork father's genes make you lose all your common sense for once Frankie!"
She scowled and took another swig of beer.
"And we're not going to be the ones in trouble," Scorpius said, finding the thread of the original conversation. "I from what I've heard, that's going to be you. Since you apparently let this tosser get his hands on whatever that power source was."
"The tesseract," Steve supplied.
"Right, the tesseract. Just what I was about to say."
"Can I have a beer?" Al interrupted. "Sorry. Don't mean to bother."
"Sure, who else do you think I brought them over for? You think I'm going to drink this all myself?"
"Where'd you get them anyway?" Scorpius asked.
"Nicked 'em from mum's pub."
"And you give me grief about using dad's potions," he laughed as she took the caps off.
"I left a few sickles for them!" She grinned.
Albus transfigured several of the stones into cushy chairs and they sat down facing the four.
"What's the story on these guys, then, if they're supposedly super heros?"
"Guy in green, calls himself Loki, apparently took a tesseract from the other guys. That one," Albus pointed at Thor, "wants to take him back home wherever that may be. The other two want the object back, but he's not exactly being willing."
"Well if you gave him Veritaserum, couldn't you ask?"
"We thought of that!" Scorpius said snidely. "It's in motion. He knows who has it – some guy called Barkley?"
"Barton," Steve corrected.
"Barton. And it's in some kind of mobile ship."
"What's he planning to do with it?"
"How should I know?" Scorpius bristled.
"We just said! You ask! Half the time guys like these spill their guts bragging and that's without a shot of truth juice!" She stood up. "Greenie. Loki. Whatever your name is. What are you going to do with the tesseract?"
His brow furrowed and his mouth trembled in his attempts to resist. "I will use it as a portal to bring an army to earth to conquer you stupid, weak mortals like you are merely so much cattle."
"Now that wasn't so hard, was it?" She turned to Scorpius. "Well if you don't know where it is, how are you going to do that?"
"I was intending to rendezvous with those holding it at a certain point." The words came slowly and laboriously.
"A certain point. Think you could get a little more specific?"
There were a few beats of silence.
"Stark Tower."
"WHAT!" Tony screamed at the end of the lineup. "You're going to use my tower, open your damn portal, invade of all New York!"
"Yes, that was the general idea." He smirked. "And there's no reason it still shouldn't happen."
Albus set his beer down. "What? What do you mean by that?' He asked sharply.
"You idiots," Loki laughed. "The plan can still proceed. I am not necessary. Only the tesseract."
"So why were you fighting them?"
For a moment, he still resisted, but the words nevertheless spilled out. "As a distraction."
Albus looked over at Scorpius nervously. "We need to let them go. Three of them anyway."
"When?" Scorpius demanded. "When is this going to happen?"
Loki shrugged. "Soon."
"More specific than that!"
"Days?" He shrugged. "It depends."
"He needs to stabilize it first," Stark suddenly interjected. "Something that powerful, it needs to be controlled. If it's just pure energy, it wouldn't be very useful. That's why SHIELD couldn't use it."
"SHIELD?" Albus asked.
"The governmental organization we are working for," Steve said.
"That you're working for!" Tony protested. "I'm a temp. At best. It's more like community service. Super community service. Bestowing my intelligence graciously upon those lesser…"
Scorpius held out his wand.
"Cut it out or I will silence you again. Or worse." He let the threat hang for a moment.
"Oh come on!" Tony protested. "You're already endangering the entire planet keeping me chained up here, you're not even going to let me snark?"
"We can't keep them like this," Albus repeated.
"Thank you," said Tony. "Finally, one of you talking sense."
"Or…" Albus began.
"Or? What 'or?'" Tony pulled against the cuffs. "I don't like 'or.' We need to get out of here and get that tesseract back before his royal ponciness over there uses it to unleash… unleash whatever extra-dimensional freaks he's going to unleash!"
"Or we could do it!" Al said brightly.
Five voices chorused a "What."
"Oh damn." Frances frowned. "He's got that look."
"Look, what look?" Albus asked in an innocent tone.
"The same look you used to get when you would tell us you were going to be a Jedi-Power Ranger-Wonderbolt-Pokemon Trainer-Starfleet Captain when you grew up. And also Batman at night. The look that explains why the hat thought about Gryffindor for a long moment. The look that means you're about to suggest something incredibly dumb."
"It isn't dumb!" He pointed at Loki. "It might not be our kind of magic, but he has some kind of power and we can use magic to fight him! We've already gotten a whole bunch of his plan out of him! They could use us!" He grabbed the front of Scorpius' robes in his enthusiasm. "We're wizards, they could totally use a wizard! Or two! Or even three!" He looked at Steve. "You don't have a wizard yet do you?"
"I didn't even realize wizards existed," Steve admitted.
"See! We can help!"
"I don't know Al…"
"We don't need to be baby sitting in addition to everything else," Tony interrupted. "No way. Not a chance. Not even a small one. We leave, you stay here, end of story."
Scorpius glared at him and his jaw set. "I think it's a fantastic idea Al. Best one you've had yet, even better than making the Chamber our makeout spot." He smirked. "And if you're all tied up here, who is going to stop us stopping him?"
"I will!" Frankie smacked them both on the back of the head. "You're supposed to be Slytherins! Use some sense! Rushing off into something like this is reckless and foolish and too many synonyms for stupid to list!" She crossed her arms. "Scorpius, what would your uncle say?"
"Actually, I happen to think it a good idea." A voice echoed from the corner.
In the corner a shimmering cloak slid to the floor, revealing the man who moments before had been invisible beneath it.
"Uncle Nott!" Scorpius laughed and ran over to embrace him.
Behind him, Loki's wan face grew a shade paler.
Ten points to whatever Pottermore house you're in if you can figure out which canon couple are Frankie's parents. The clues are brief but in there. ;)