Narrator's POV
Stephen opened his very tired eyes as the sound of chirping settled in his ears. He was a little alarmed at the sight of the unknown ceiling above him. "Ah!" He gasped, then he recognized the room around him. "Oh yeah..." He said.
He stretched, yawning. He rubbed his eyes.
"Mornin' Sleeping Beauty."
Stephen's head turned to where the voice had come from. It was Tony, still working at his desk.
"You're still working on that?" Stephen asked.
"Yup." Tony answered.
"Did you get any sleep last night?" Stephen asked.
"Nope." Tony answered.
"Tony you need to get some sleep." Stephen said. "So I can get some sleep." Stephen said under his breath.
"You can always withdraw from my room and get a new one." Tony said. "The headmaster has made that an option specifically for students who get me as a roommate. I'm surprised they didn't ask you if you wanted a different roommate after they assigned you here." Tony continued working on.
"I don't know if I'd like to leave you. I sense a lot of stress and negativity here." Stephen said. He looked around. "I think I'd like to help you get rid of that." He stared out the window.
Tony picked his head up and looked over at Stephen. "Hey, what day is it?" He asked.
"It's Wednesday." Stephen said, looking back at Tony.
"Oh yes!" Tony got up and removed the welding mask off his face and set everything down on his desk. He threw himself under his bed.
"I don't think that's how you sleep on a bed after a hard day's work." Stephen said.
"I'm not sleeping." Tony said, digging around under his bed.
"I thought you were finally getting some sleep." Stephen said.
"On Flag Day?" Tony's voice muffled from under bed.
""Flag Day"?" Stephen asked, peeking under the bed now.
"Ha. I got it." Tony finally emerged from under his bed with a silver suitcase. He looked at Stephen who was still puzzled. "Flag Day comes on a Wednesday. Once a year, students are broken down into teams, using the best of their abilities to defeat each other and capture each other's flags. Whoever gets the most flags wins. The victor gets a prize of some sort, but I'm just in it to win it." Tony explained.
"So we're fighting students from other dorms?" Stephen asked.
"Well, basically. Bruce and I carry the whole team. We've won three out of the five rounds we've had. The other two were won by Tim-"
"What do you mean, you and Bruce carry the whole team?" Stephen asked.
"You can take anything that we constructed to our advantage. Like this baby." Tony tapped on the silver suitcase.
"What is it?" Stephen asked.
"It's a secret weapon that is gonna win us today's round." Tony cocked his eyebrows.
"Oh." Stephen looked at it, then he looked up at Tony. "But what if we don't have gadgets to help?"
"Then you use whatever abilities you have." Tony explained. "Timothy always uses that camouflaging ability he's got to sneak past into our base. He's gotten our flag that way twice now, so I made something to sense him." Tony took out a small device from his pocket. "This little guy senses heat signals from any direction within five miles."
"I can see Timothy." Stephen said. "His energy signals are very strong since he's a plant and-"
"He's producing chlorophyll all the time, using large amounts energy! Wow! Yes, Stephen!" Tony took Stephen's face in his hands and pulled him close to his face. "Bruce! We have found our secret weapon!" Tony cheered as Bruce had just entered the room.
"What?" Bruce asked.
"Stephen can see Timothy." Tony said, still holding Stephen's face his in his hands.
"Yes!" Bruce said.
"I-I'm actually not very good at sports." Stephen said.
"It doesn't matter because you can see him. He's our biggest threat. You can just stay at base." Tony said.
A horn went off outside.
"It's time." Tony said, looking into Stephen's eyes. "Come on!" He raced out the door. Bruce followed after him.
"Come on Cloak." Stephen said, the cloak landed on his shoulders; then Stephen followed Bruce and Tony.
///0///0
Once Stephen reached the outside, he saw Gloria and another man standing next to her. They stood on a floating platform, with a microphone.
The students were rattled, jumping up, chanting, screaming and cheering.
"Tony!" Stephen yelled, trying to find him. "Tony!" He called.
Then there was a tap on the microphone. "Students." Gloria spoke. The crowd died down. "Welcome to the Sixth Annual Flag Day competition." She said, everyone cheered. She signaled her hands for everyone to quiet down. "Here we have your headmaster, Dr. Edward." She said. Everyone clapped. He moved his hand down, and everyone quieted down.
"Thank you, thank you." He said. "I can sense that everyone is extremely excited to be here and ready to begin this competition. I will announce the leaders of the teams today." He said. "For the green flag we have Timothy Green." He said. Everyone in Timothy's team cheered and clapped for him. The flag went over to him. "For the yellow flag we Thor." Everyone screamed when the name "Thor" was announced. The flag floated over to a boy with shoulder length blond hair. "For the blue flag we have Victor from the Aquamarines." There were only claps. The flag went over to a boy with shiny skin. "The purple goes to Janine." There was loud cheering from girls. "And least but no least, the red flag goes to Anthony." The flag went over to Tony, everyone cheered loudly.
Stephen followed the flag, and found Tony along with Bruce.
"Oh Wizard, I thought you got lost." Tony smiled at him.
"Alright students, you have five minutes to set up base." Doctor Edward said.
"Ready?" Gloria took over. "Set." All the students turned to the wooded area. "Go!" They all raced toward the trees and bushes.
///0///0
"Come on, this way." Tony said. His group ran quickly to establish a base in a very hidden wooded area. They all huddled around Tony. "Okay guys, here's the plan-"
A large green light went off in the sky. Everyone looked up at it.
"Okay, it's begun. He's what we're going to do-"
"It's the Aquamarines!" A girl shouted.
"Whatever you do, don't get wet!" Tony shouted, they broke. "Wizard keep the flag safe!" Tony said, running away after.
"Everyone back up, its about to be dryer than the Sahara." A girl said throwing a metal ball on the ground.
"Dehydration bomb!" A boy from the Aquamarines yelled.
There was a huge blast of air, blowing everyone back; then sucking everything back in and capturing it in the metal bomb. All the Aquamarines were on the ground.
Tony walked over to Victor. "Alright Vic, hand it over." Victor sighed and handed his flag over. "We have one!" Tony raised it in the air. His team cheered. "Onward for the others!" He said.
Everyone but Stephen followed. He stayed at base with the red flag.
///0///0
It had been hours since Tony and his team left Stephen at base. He had grown bored, no one had tried to steal the flag so far. He was levitating, reading a book. One thing was enforced more than anything in Kamar-Taj, and that was patience.
He was about to flip a page when he felt a mysterious gust of wind blow past him. He looked around, there was nothing suspicious about it.
Then he heard struggling in the bushes. He got on his feet and walked over to them. He saw Everett in the bushes, stuck in some sort of device.
"Oh, hey Stephen." He said. "Could you give me a hand?" He asked.
"Of course." Stephen reached for him.
"ARGH!" Tony came out of nowhere, and tackled Bucky on the ground, trying his best to hold him down. Everett stood up suddenly. Then Clint and Timothy appeared behind him. "Stephen run!" Tony struggled, trying to keep Bucky on the ground.
He saw Clint reaching for an arrow. He ran, taking off as fast as he could, the cloak helping him a bit. He tripped suddenly, he looked at his feet. Vines were wrapped around them.
"Hello Stephen." Timothy appeared from behind a tree. Stephen gasped. "I hope you don't mind if I take this-" He reached for the red flag on Stephen's waist, but the cloak blocked his hand. "Clint." He said. Stephen looked behind Timothy, Clint stood there with an arrow; ready to shoot. He adjusted his sight. In the time it took him to adjust his sight, Stephen managed to make a rip into the mirror dimension and tossed the flag in it. "Stephen, what have you done? Where'd you send the flag?" Timothy asked.
"I'll never tell." Stephen said.
Suddenly a red lightning went off, the cloak dragged Stephen off away from Timothy. He emerged from the bushes, where everyone else was gathered. He had leaves and small twigs in his hair.
Timothy's team appeared out of the bushes too.
"Looks like we had two surviving teams." Doctor Edward said. "Timothy's and Anthony's."
Tony's team jumped up in happiness and cheered.
"That doesn't mean we won. We didn't get enough flags. It's two against two." Tony told his team, they quieted down.
"What about our flag?" Bruce asked.
"It got lost." Tony answered.
"A tie then. Then the victor should be chosen by anonymous vo-"
"Wait!" Stephen shouted. Everyone turned to him. He pulled a flag out of thin air, it was their red flag.
"Mph!" Bucky stomped his foot on the ground. Timothy was shocked more than anything.
"Yeah! Stephen!" Bruce shouted. Tony's team began to cheer. Bruce picked up Stephen, laughing.
"Looks like we have a winner." Doctor Edward announced.
Stephen laughed, holding the flag up in the air.
Tony watched Stephen, enjoying his moment of fame. Stephen caught him staring. He gave him a small smile, and waved at him.
Tony had his arms crossed, smiling at Stephen.