A/N: This is an AU where the Avengers are teenagers and almost out of high school and I don't own Marvel or basic plot. And please read my Romanogers fanfic, You Snuck Your Way Right Into My Heart, now on my profile!

Despite library rules, the students inside were buzzing with activity. The glass doors swung open with a dramatic flourish and a young adult man strutted into the room, wearing a black baseball cap, a reddish orange trimmed blazer and designer jeans. He flashed a mischievous grin at the librarian, who immediately scowled at the all too familiar man.

"Mr. Stark!" she snapped. "What are you doing here?"

"Wouldn't you love to know, Lorraine," Tony Stark replied and flashed his old school ID. He then made his way over to a certain table, where a close knit study group of teenagers were sitting among scattered, thick textbooks and typing away on the way out of date computers.

"Come on, team," urged one of the boys at the table. He had sandy brown hair that actually looked cool today and a long sleeved red T shirt. Steve Rogers, captain of the sports team. He was now reprimanding the others quietly while looking cautiously around the library. He hadn't noticed Tony yet. "Quit messing around. We have to study."

"I am studying!" argued the red haired girl at him.

"Studying what?" He smiled flirtatiously at her and she managed a quick, weak smile for the same emotion back, but then glanced at one of the other boys uncomfortably and Tony rolled his eyes.

"'Team'?" Tony snorted as he plopped down onto the empty seat next to Steve. The other boy looked at him in surprise.

"Stark? What are you doing here?"

Ignoring the question, the dark haired man shrugged. "Who cares about this crap?" He flipped absentmindedly through a textbook and the boring sentences that dragged along the pages made his brain and eyes hurt. "No worries, team. I'll just buy off the exam board for you." He was the heir of beyond wealthy businessman, Howard Stark, so yeah, it was definitely possible. He could have done it ages ago.

"Uh, Tony," chided another man at the table, a timid and shy science geek named Bruce Banner. "I think we should just study. I don't want to get in trouble." He was glancing nervously at the others and Tony knew that they were still the rebels of the school, at least the library, considering the murderous glare Librarian Lorraine was shooting them. He had taught them so well.

"Yeah, don't buy anyone off, Stark," agreed Clint Barton with a carefree shrug, his gray blue orbs dark with fatigue. "I'll just copy off Freckles here." He nudged the other one with his shoulder, who gave a brief smile before digging his nose back into his book.

"Wait, why are you even here, Stark?" the only girl there demanded. It was the beautiful Natasha Romanoff, Clint's ex girlfriend, but they claimed to be friends now- uh huh, yeah right, Tony thought- and her straight fiery red mane of hair was swishing from side to side as her verdigris eyes inspected Tony's features, searching for any deception. Maybe they knew him a little too well. "Didn't you graduate, like, three years ago already?" she continued with a smirk.

He returned it with a wider smirk. "Just wanted to visit my favorite crew again. It's like Black Widow all over again." The other men at the table gave him brief, imperceptible nods. "But still, what's up with the studies? Anything juicy going on at school that I need to know about?" He wiggled his eyebrows and leaned in and Steve and Natasha rolled their eyes at his immature behavior.

Suddenly, a tall and blond man walked up and sank down into another chair at their table. Gesturing dramatically with his hand, he announced in a loud and clear voice, "What is this study you speak of? I shall vanquish this threat, my friends!"

"Oh, God," Tony groaned and bored his eyes into the ceiling. "Why do you still have that crazy foreign exchange student?"

"He's cool, Stark," Banner mumbled in defense of Thor Odinson, still looking at the textbook. Tony looked back down and his eyes widened.

"Uh, you vanquish your shirt too, Point Break?" the dark haired one asked, his dark brown eyes avoiding Thor's tanned and bare chest uncomfortably.

"Shut up, Stark," snapped Natasha distractedly. "Let him talk."

As if on cue, Librarian Lorraine rushed over to their table and pushed her horn rimmed glasses up her pointy nose.

"Mr. Odinson!" she exclaimed in a fierce but quiet tone. "Keep your voice down. And find your shirt! What is wrong with you? Attempt to be decent for once!"

While the others sniggered under their breaths, Thor sighed out an exasperated gust of air. "But I was just at the swimming pool-" But after another sharp look, he relented. "Yes, Lady Lorraine." He rose from the table and exited from the library, ignorant of the appreciative glances of the other girls at other tables.

"So, where your girlfriends?" Tony laced his fingers together, cradled his chin in them and stared directly at Natasha, who was staring down at a book painfully and biting her lip.

"Huh, what? Oh, they're all at Hill's place."

"Cool. Funky Town." He remembered that very spacious loft and was eager to go there again. Alas, the owner loathed him and only let him in because of his connections to his incredible girlfriend, Pepper Potts. "What's up with you?"

"Nothing." The redheaded woman slammed the book down in frustration and put her head in her hands.

Steve glanced at her, his navy blue eyes swelling with concern and reaching a hand out. "Hey, is it-"

"Shut up, Rogers! Not in front of them!" exclaimed she and she pushed her chair away from the table and stalked off towards the book shelves. Steve groaned at himself and followed after her.

Tony's eyebrows raised. "Oooh. What's up with them?"

Banner shrugged, also staring after them. "Dunno. They've been acting weird a lot lately."

"Oooh," crooned Tony again. "Juicy."

"I think they are- what do you call it?- sneaking around," claimed Thor, who had acquired a black T shirt and sat back down in his chair.

"Even more juicy."

Clint shook his head. "It's not happening. Trust me." It was obvious he still had feelings for Natasha, and she probably had lingering ones too, but not as strongly as Clint's.

Everyone else just shook their heads. "Yeah, right."

Meanwhile, at a modern and very stylish loft, which only Tony Starks' digs could beat, in the middle of the city, a girl with long raven black locks slid down the railing of the curved stairs and tried not to wobble on the way down. The wind whistled past her ears and her dark high heels made impact with the floor with a thud.

"This place is too cool!" Darcy Lewis exclaimed as she walked over to the plush dark red couch and removed her glasses. "Maria's dad has to let us use this place for the party. We can't use Stark's because that'll be too obvious, right?"

Pepper Potts swung her reddish blonde hair over her shoulder. "Exactly. You would not believe how miserable Tony was when he found out we weren't using his tower for it. As for Maria's dad, well . . ." She gestured across from her with one hand. "Jane's sort of, uh, working on it."

Jane Foster was sitting cross legged, or rather a lotus position with her smooth eyelids drooped over her eyes. Darcy stared bizarrely at her best friend. "She is?" she asked in a quiet and incredulous voice.

"Shh!" hushed Jane, opening one chocolate brown eye. "I'm concentrating on sending the positive energy to Maria's father's head, so that he will say-"

"Yes!" a triumphant cry rose up from the doorway of the kitchen and finished Jane's sentence as Maria Hill entered the room. She extended her arms widely with a proud grin on her face. "My dad agrees that we can have the birthday party here in the loft."

The three other girls cheered out exclaims of joy and happiness. Pepper rose from her chair, pink cell phone already in hand. "I'll call Tony and have him spread the word to the guys," announced she and she quickly exited the room.

"Ugh, I better not hear any sappy comments," grumbled the black haired girl on the couch.

"You don't think Natasha's going to guess, do you?" Jane asked unsurely and raised a dark eyebrow.

"What?" Maria waved off the question with a flip of her hand. "That we are throwing her a surprise birthday party a month before her actual birthday? No way! Not unless someone spills." Her voice had taken a dark and accusing tone as she planted her hands on her hips and trained her dark eyes onto one of the other girls. Jane also crossed her arms over her chest with a smug and expectant lift of her eyebrows.

Darcy awkwardly scratched at the material of the couch, her dark blue orbs fixed on the floor, feeling everyone else's eyes on her, even Pepper's from the doorway. "Yeah, speaking of that . . ."

"Darcy!" they all cried.

"I wouldn't do it on purpose," she explained, waving her hands around to assure she hadn't spilled the element of surprise. "It's just that I say the first thing that comes into my head, which makes me the worst at keeping secrets. It's sort of tragic." She ended glumly.

The blonde walked back into the room with an ending click of her cell phone. "Tony knows. The guys are in."

"You did tell them it's a masquerade party, right?" asked the brunette, unfolding her legs.

"Yeah, I said to wear the outfits for the fashion and animal show fundraiser, since we're having the party right after," Pepper confirmed with a nod.

Maria sighed. "Yes, having to train with those pets. Joyous day."

"Hill, you do know they don't have any home and we're giving them a chance to?" Jane said, being the ever so compassionate one.

"I know. It's just that they keep following me and it's creepy."

"Okay, guys, we better head to the Dish before Natasha gets there," Darcy warned, also rising from her sitting position.

All the others agreed and headed for the door.

"Come on, Nat," Steve sighed, leaning against the bookshelf. The aisle was empty, except for him and the redheaded girl in front of him. Or rather, her back in front of him. "We can't keep hiding, you know." But he couldn't help but throw a glance over his shoulder to see if anyone was overhearing. Natasha let out a sarcastic snort.

"You're one to talk," she commented, turning to face him.

"You know some people won't approve of this."

"Then why are you doing it? Come on, Rogers. Take risks for once. And people are not going to go ballistic. Trust me and chill out."

The sandy haired boy never understood how she could be so calm and cool about things, especially since it was her own problems. But hell, he trusted her. More than he should have to. He nodded. "Fine. But when are we going to tell them?"

"Hopefully when we are old, when we have white hair and wrinkles and perhaps, and that's a big perhaps, if there are any kids to tell it to."

Steve rolled his navy orbs around in their sockets at her sarcasm. "Seriously, Natasha. We have to do it sooner or later."

"How about later? Like, a very long later?"

"Nat-"

"Stark will make the most cheeky, disrespectful and offensive 'jokes' ever since he's Tony Stark and Clint will hate us forever because he'll be too offended that I didn't ask him in the first place. As for the girls, they'll start ask those annoying questions all friends ask and you know no one normal can bear that."

"But you're not normal, Romanoff."

Those lovely blue green eyes met his. "Excuse me?"

"You're not a very good person," he started when she had finally turned to face him, "but you could be."

All she could do was smile slightly. But then it faded. She knew he didn't mean it about what they were talking about, but about something else. And that just made her smile again. "And would you still like to help me with that?"

He flashed that unparalleled, sweet yet dazzling grin of his. "I will always want to."