November 12th, 1987 — Cambridge, MA
12:19 PM, EST

"I wish you hadn't done that." Tony said as he was seated next to Shelby in the Student Conduct office. He felt like they were back in elementary school, waiting to talk to the principal. "Don't get me wrong, I'm proud of you, Shelbster. That was one mean right hook. I just don't want you to get in trouble."

Shelby sighed and looked over at Tony. "I was being harassed, Stark. Because of my gender. Did you expect me to stand by and take that?"

"No." Tony answered. "He should be the one getting in trouble, not you."

"Yeah, well." Shelby frowned as she stared blankly at the wall across the hallway from them. "No one ever believes the woman." As she spoke the words, it hurt how real they really were. No one ever seemed to take the woman's side of any story as true.

Tony frowned. "I'll tell them the truth, too. Get that kid what's coming for him. Not that your fist wasn't good enough."

Shelby looked down at her hand, noticing that her knuckles were somewhat bruised from the punch. "I can't believe I actually said knuckle sandwich. That is so middle school boy of me." She said with a laugh.

"He did say you should make someone a sandwich." Tony replied. "He didn't specify."

Shelby smiled. "That is true."

"Kind of inconvenient that the campus security officer was walking out of the building right as you did that and saw everything." Tony said, a slight smirk on his face.

Shelby laughed. "Yeah. I hope I don't lose my scholarship. I can't afford to stay here if they do."

"You won't." Tony said. "If they take away your scholarship, they'll lose me. They don't want that publicity."

"You're going to threaten your education for me?" Shelby raised an eyebrow. "That's not sweet, Stark. That's idiotic."

Tony scoffed. "They aren't going to touch your scholarship, Girl Genius. I admit, I have some privilege around MIT because of my name, but using it for helping you wouldn't bring me any guilt. Worst you'll get is a mandatory anger management class, which you maybe could use anyway."

Shelby groaned. "I am not going to that alone."

"Yeah, you know who should go with you? Lisa. She's mean." Tony stated.

"Lisa is not mean, Tony, just because she said you look like a douchebag. You kind of do." Shelby laughed.

Tony scoffed and rolled his eyes. "A handsome douchebag, at least."

The Dean of Student Conduct walked out, an older woman with curly gray hair and thin reading glasses. "Miss Colewell, please step into my office."

"Yes ma'am." Shelby responded, standing up. Tony went to stand up alongside her, but the dean wasn't having that.

"Not you, Mr. Stark." She snapped, narrowing her eyes at the boy.

Shelby suppressed a laugh as she followed the dean into her office. She noticed the name plate on the door. Eleanor Bell. Shelby hadn't been certain of her name before that.

"Now, Miss Colewell." Eleanor said as she took a seat at her desk. "We have a problem here. One of our campus security officers witnessed you punch a man in the face. On campus. Said man has also filed a complaint with my office."

Shelby nodded. "I did, but it was not unprovoked. I promise you that."

Eleanor grimaced. "That is what I had suspected. Please, tell me the story."

Shelby nodded and began to retell the tale, not leaving out one piece of the story. "So, that's why." She smiled slightly as she noticed the dean was suppressing a laugh of her own.

"He told you to make a sandwich, so you gave him a ... a knuckle sandwich?" The older woman hooted. Shelby had to say, she was surprised to see the woman that had seemed stern and uptight only moments before laughing over Shelby's actions.

"Yes." Shelby admitted.

"Listen, Miss Colewell, believe me, I have experienced many forms of such harassment from my peers throughout my decades here at MIT. Do you think I got up to Dean of Student Conduct without pushing my way up? No one wanted to see a woman succeed in a STEM field of any kind in my days. Things are changing, but slowly." Eleanor stated. "I won't place any mark on your transcript or anything, but the university regulations state that I have to place students involved in physical altercations in an anger management course, which you will complete during the spring semester."

Shelby nodded. She supposed it wasn't too bad of a deal. She thought maybe if the Dean of Student Conduct had been a male, she wouldn't have gotten off so easily. "Thank you. I can do that."

Eleanor nodded. "My office will set that up. You can talk with my secretary out front to fill out the paperwork." She smiled slightly at the younger girl. "Miss Colewell, may I suggest .... perhaps less physical altercations? You can prove men like that ignoramus wrong by succeeding and doing better than them in everything. That's what I did."

"Thank you." The redhead said with a smile. "I will do that. I am doing that."

November 12th, 1987 — Cambridge, MA
5:23 PM, EST

Tony was eating dinner with Rob and their other housemates when the kitchen telephone began to ring. He stood up to answer it, hoping that it would be the cute brunette he'd given his number to earlier that day.

"Hello?" He answered, leaning against the wall as he played with the telephone cord.

"Anthony?" A stern voice rang out, causing Tony to frown.

"Dad." Tony frowned, knowing his father didn't call unless something was wrong or if he found out that Tony did something bad. Typically, it was the latter.

"I got a call from my good pal Wilson today." The elder Stark began, causing Tony to sigh. Arthur Wilson was the president of MIT, and he was good friends with Tony's father. So, anything screw up that Wilson heard about got directly reported to Howard Stark.

Tony wasn't exactly sure if that was legal or not. Not that it always mattered when you were a powerful man like Howard Stark.

"Did you?" Tony sighed, taking a seat on a stool near the phone. He wrapped his finger around the cord, wanting nothing more than to not be on the phone with his father.

"Yes. He said his assistant saw you walking into the Dean of Student Conduct's office today. What did you do, Anthony? What did you do this time? Do you want to get kicked out of school? A man as smart as you deserves to be at MIT, but your actions sure as hell make me think that you don't want to be there!" By the time Howard finished his range of questions, he was yelling, and Tony had to hold the phone away from his ear. He was convinced half of Massachusetts would be able to hear his father, not to mention his housemates.

"Well, Dad, to answer your questions, I didn't do anything. Today." Tony began, his voice dripping with sarcasm and attitude. He shouldn't have been so short with his dad, considering he was his father, but he was. He always was. It wasn't like they had ever really gotten along well. Maybe it was because they were the same. Or maybe it was because they were too different. "So, what did I do? Nothing. Do I want to get kicked out of school? Of course not."

"Then why the hell were you in that office?" Howard demanded.

Tony sighed. "Defending a friend, that's all."

There was a brief pause on the other line before his father spoke again. "Defending a friend? That's awfully noble of you. You expect me to believe that someone as selfish as you would do that?"

Tony snorted slightly. "I'm selfish?"

This time, it was the elder Stark that laughed. "You think you aren't?"

Tony rolled his eyes and took a deep breath. "One of my friends got in an altercation with an asshole. I went along to make sure she didn't get screwed over by the dean."

"She? A girlfriend? Well, your mother will be pleased. She's convinced you'll never settle down and that you'll get a girl --"

"Not a girlfriend, Dad. A friend. Lab partner. I wouldn't ... she wouldn't either. And Jesus, I'm 18 years old. Tell Mom I'm not settling down for a while." Tony said with a chuckle.

"Oh." Howard sighed. "I'm sorry for the outburst." He apologized. "You can't blame me for being concerned, son. Especially with some of your past actions ..."

"Yeah, Dad. I know." Tony said. It was true, the Stark boy was a genius, but he was lacking severely in the category of being a well-behaved son.

"Alright, well... that's all I needed." Howard said, clearing his throat. "I'll be hanging up now."

"Okay." Tony said, nodding his head. "Wait, Dad." Tony's eyes went wide, and a smirk filled his face. "Do you think you could hook me up with some vibranium?"