Dev trudged up the cement stairs of Midtown School of Science and Technology, trying not to make eye contact with anyone and blasting 80's rock in her earbuds. School is the worst. After a summer full of summer assignments, video calls with Parker in Europe, and movie marathons with Ned, she was definitely not ready to go back to the hell that was the American high school.

"Dev, Dev!" she heard someone say, muffled. Dev pulled out an earbud and looked behind her shoulder to see Michelle waving. Dev smiled and pulled out the other earbud. Michelle walked up to her, and they fistbumpbed. "How was your summer?"

"Bloody boring," Dev shrugged. They started walking up the steps together. "Parker was in Europe all July, so I was stuck watching Star Wars with my brothers. But I'd be shitting myself if I said I'm happy school is back."

"School is just a synonym the government uses as capitalistic torture," Michelle stated. Dev laughed.

"I missed comments like your's, Michelle" she said.

"I got by MJ now," said the other girl.

"Oh really? Bloody hell, Michelle's gotten all fancy, eh?."

"And Dev's accent got stronger."

"Sorry. I blame my brothers." They both laughed.

"Are they still in town?" asked Michelle. Dev nodded, shifting her backpack more onto her shoulders. They had entered into the hallway, surrounded by other classmates and various antics that they were up to. Some were looking for their lockers, some were hugging their best friends, and even some were already spray-painting the metal doors of the lockers. Dev raised an eyebrow at them.

"Yeah, they're staying for a bit. Brendan's school doesn't start until later in the fall, and Matt's floatin' around for right now with his best friend, who's also staying unfortunately," Dev replied.

"Sounds fun," Michelle laughed. Dev shrugged with a smile. She had to admit - it was nice to have her brothers back in the same house, even if it was a little cramped. "Alright, I'm gonna go find my locker - see you later in class!" Dev waved as the girl walked away.

"Dev!" she heard someone else call. Dev looked up and grinned at the sight of Ned.

"Ned!" She jogged over to him, and they met with a big hug. "It's so good to see you! What did you do over the summer?"

"So much! But also not that much," he said, excited. "I have to catch you up! Where's your locker?" Dev pulled her schedule out from her pocket and glanced at the locker number.

"It's down the hall."

"Oh maybe it's by Peter's! I haven't seen him yet, but did you see Liz?! She's gonna be a senior this year, wow so crazy. Oh did you get a new backpack, Dev? I HAVE to tell you about all of the stuff I bought this summer while you were out with your brothers-"

"Jesus, slow down, Ned," Dev laughed, putting her hand up. "We can catch up on the way to my locker, yeah?" He nodded, and the two proceeded to push through waves of students to her locker. Her stomach dropped as she saw who was near it, talking to a certain Gwen Stacy: Harry Osborn.

"Dev and Ned!" Peter's voice brought her out of her thoughts, and she turned to be engulfed in a hug from a very excited Peter Parker. "Oh my gosh, I missed you guys SO much in Europe! Dev, I can't believe you lived there for so long! America is so different!"

"Good to see you too, Parker."

"Peter Parker!" Ned hugged his best friend after Dev. Dev laughed. "Do you have jetlag?" Peter shook his head.

"Not really - I got back like half a month ago, so I'm good," Peter said, adjusting his backpack on his shoulder.

"That's nice," Ned said. "How was Europe? I was catching Dev up on my Lego summer adventures..." Their voices drowned into the back of Dev's head as she glanced over at Harry.

Goddamn, why do breakups suck? she thought, focusing on her breathing. She looked down at her black Converse and felt her shoulders twitching. She heard the twitter of Gwen's laugh ring through the air, and Dev frowned to herself. Why're they talking? Did they make up? Is that why he broke up with me?! Bloody... Peter snapped his fingers in front of Dev, and she looked up.

"You ok, Dev?" he asked, worried. She nodded.

"Yeah. Fine."

"Your accent got stronger," he said with a small smile. Dev laughed.

"MJ said that too. I think it's my brothers' fault," she said.

"Oh yeah, are they staying?" Ned said. She nodded again. Thankfully, before they could go to her locker, the first bell rang and students began to scatter. "Oh! What's your guys' first class?" Dev looked at her schedule again, and Peter did the same.

"Honors English," they both said at the same time. Dev grinned.

"Fantastic," she said.

"Aw, darn I have Physics," said Ned. "Ok well I'll catch up with you guys later!" He waved and then went towards his own class. Peter glanced behind Dev and then guestered for her to walk in another direction.

"Are you sure you're ok?" he asked again, once they were in a quieter hallway.

"Kind of," Dev admitted. "Not really. I saw-"

"Harry and Gwen," Peter finished her sentence. "I saw 'em too. Sorry."

"Don't be. I'll be fine," she sighed. "Just gotta be stronger."

"Let me know if you need anything," he said, patting her shoulder awkwardly. She laughed.

"Thanks, Parker. It means a lot."

//

 "Hey. Saw you on the headlines of the news with the Avengers."

"Oh...you did?"

"Yup. Looked pretty badass, Spidey."

"Well, thanks, Wings."

"You're welcome. Invite me next time, alright?"

"Sure."

//

TWO MONTHS LATER...

Dev made her usual walk up the steps of Midtown Tech with her headphones in her ears, playing soft 80's rock. She had her hands in her sweatshirt pocket, and she looked down as she walked into the school. She usually didn't see her friends until she was inside anyways, so she had no need to look up.

The first two months of school had been a bit rough, with Harry and all, but her friends made up for it. During the first week, everyone in the school realised that Harry and Dev had broken up due to the news spreading like wildfire from a random student (Dev guessed it was probably one of Gwen's friends). Gwen and Harry weren't dating, yet, but they seemed to have rekindled their close friendship. Harry and Dev unfortunately had two classes together, but thankfully, they sat far away from each other. They had exchanged some small conversations, but resorted to just avoiding each other in the halls. Of course, it was easier for Harry as he was automatically accepted into the school's hierarchy, but Dev was fine just sticking with Ned, Peter, MJ, and the occasional aca deca teammates. 

Home life was usual. Her da convinced Brenden to stay for a few more months because as a young law student, Brenden could help out at the law firm that their da worked at and get college credits for being an intern. Matt and Marc were staying longer because they didn't want to go back to Ireland after being in a bustling city in America. They sometimes went on the streets in Time Square to earn meager amounts of money, playing their guitars and singing. Matt loved the spontaneity of it and Dev convinced their da to let them keep doing it, even though he hated it.

Dev walked to her locker, avoiding glances with Gwen Stacy's friends who were at nearby lockers chatting about nails. She unlocked it, took the books she needed, and closed it again with a small sigh. The students' noises around her were muffled by her music playing, but she knew she should probably take off the headphones before Principal Morita saw her and got upset. She unplugged her earbuds and rolled them up into her pocket as she walked over to Peter's locker, only a few lockers down. The sounds of the school's video announcements reached her ears: something about homecoming being soon. Dev saw Ned sneaking up on Peter as he grabbed his textbooks, and she laughed a bit. As she got closer, she heard some cheerleaders calling them lame.

"-we'll build my new Lego Death Star!" Ned declared, holding up a Lego version of Emperor Palpatine. Peter turned around and looked surprised but delighted.

"No way!" he exclaimed "That's awesome! How many pieces?"

"Three thousand, eight hundred three," Dev interrupted. The two boys looked up. "What? Ned was bloody rambling last night about it on the groupchat."

"Which one?" Peter tilted his head.

"The one you never check," Ned huffed. Dev laughed.

"Well, that's an insane amount of pieces," Peter said. He closed his locker, and the three started to walk in the halls.

"I know!" Ned said, excited again. "Do you wanna build it tonight?"

"Uh no sorry, I got the Stark Int-"

"Internship," Ned finished, looking a little downcast. "Always got that internship."

"Yeah, well hopefully it'll lead to a real job with them," Peter shrugged.

"They would hire a kid?" Dev asked. Peter nodded.

"I mean, I think so."

"That would be so sweet!" said Ned. "He'd be all, 'Good job on those spreadsheets, Peter. Here's a gold coin.'" Dev raised an eyebrow, and Peter gave Ned a look. The teenager put his hands up in defense, the Lego minifigure still in his hand. "What? I don't know how jobs work."

"That is exactly how jobs work, bud," Dev said, making Peter laugh.

"Ok," Ned laughed too. "Well, I'll knock out the basic bones of the Death Star at my place. And, and then I'll come by afterwards..." Ned continued about his Legos, but Dev noticed Peter's gaze had shifted to focus on Liz Toomes from down the hall. She rolled her eyes. Weirdo. "....because for the most part, the difficult thing is the base of it. The top half we can knock out in two hours, tops," Ned continued. He was interrupted by the loud bell. "Oh shoot, I should get to my first period. Bye guys!" Peter was brought out of his trance, and him and Dev waved at Ned as he walked away.

"Mate, you really need to stop staring at her," Dev said to Peter. He blushed slightly.

"I'm not uh staring at anyone!"

"Sure...creep."

"Hey!"

After Dev and Peter finished their first period, they headed over to Physics, where they unfortunately shared the class with the one and only Flash Thompson. The day was going by slowly, and Dev was fading in and out of class, trying to also not stare at the back of Harry's head. Oh yeah, he was in the class too. She was doodling birds on her paper when she heard Mrs. Warren start asking the questions to the class.

"Okay, so how do we calculate linear acceleration between points A and B?" she asked. Immediately, Flash's hand went up. There were some snickers throughout the desks. Mrs. Warren sighed and pointed at him. "Flash?"

"It's the product of sine of the angle and gravity divided by the mass!" he said confidently. She shook her head.

"Nope." The snickers intensified, and Flash lowered his hand, embarrassed. Dev found herself laughing a bit too. Harry put up his hand to answer, but Mrs. Warren looked towards another student who was watching videos on his laptop. The rest of the class glanced over as well. "Peter? You still with us?" He looked up, startled, and nodded.

"Uh, yeah, yeah, I am." He closed his laptop and shuffled around some of his papers to reveal messy notes. "Um...mass cancels out so it's just gravity times sine."

"Right," Mrs. Warren nodded. "See Flash? Being the fastest isn't always the best if you're wrong." The class burst out into laughter, and Dev reached over to give Peter a fistbump.

"What were you watching on Youtube?" she whispered.

"Nothing," he murmured. She leaned back in her seat.

"Uh huh." Dev sighed and looked at the clock, which read 11:38. It was only 11, and she was already tired.

Dev's third period usually went fast even though it was boring. AP World History wasn't the most intriguing subject in the school. The only exciting part of the class was that lunch came right after. After the bell rang, the students jumped up to get to the cafeteria and be with their friends. Dev got into the line for lunch, putting in one headphone to drown out the other kids around her. After thanking the lunch lady, she found Peter and Ned sitting at their usual table, discussing more Star Wars.

"Hey guys," she said, sitting across from them.

"Hey Dev, how was World?" Peter asked.

"Boring as hell, but today we learned about Henry VIII."

"Oh the dude with lots of wives?"

"Yup."

"Hey, look it's Liz," Ned nodded towards the back of the cafeteria. Dev turned to see what they were looking at. Liz was standing on a small step-ladder, hanging up a Homecoming poster and waving to her friends.

"Did she get a new top?" Peter wondered aloud.

"No, we've seen that before but never with that skirt," Ned answered.

"You guys should probably stop staring before it gets creepy," Dev rolled her eyes.

"Too late," Michelle said. They all looked next to them to see her sitting at the table over.

"Michelle!" Dev grinned.

"Hi," waved Michelle. "You two are losers."

"Then why do you sit with us?" Ned asked, offended.

"Because I don't have any friends," Michelle shrugged, moving to sit closer. Dev laughed.

Academic decathlon was all of their fifth periods. The four usually met up after their separate fourth periods to go to the class together. Dev wasn't in aca deca; she still told them that she wasn't smart enough. But she had a free fifth period, so she joined the gang and helped the team practice by being a judge or questioner. Today, they were anticipating and practicing for nationals in Washington DC while Dev sat in the back of the room, working on some English paper.

"What is the heaviest naturally occurring element?" Liz asked from the stage. Charles dinged a bell.

"Oxygen is the lightest! Wait...that's not the question..." He bit his lip, and Dev laughed to herself. Cindy, one of the smartest girls in school, groaned and started flipping through books up in her seat on the stage. Abraham, another teammate, dinged his bell.

"Uranium."

"That is correct," Liz nodded. "Thank you, Abraham."

"Peter, it's nationals! Is there no way you can take one weekend off?" Mr. Harrington asked Peter desperately. Dev looked over at them as Peter shook his head.

" I can't go to Washington because if Mr. Stark needs me, then I have to make sure that I'm here," Peter said. Dev raised an eyebrow in surprise.

"You've never even been in the same room as Tony Stark!" Flash rolled his eyes from his seat on the floor, his feet propped up on a chair.

"Wait, what's happening?!" Cindy said, looking down at Mr. Harrington.

"Peter's not going to Washington," Sally, another one of the smart girls on campus, said. She was on her stomach, biting a pen while reading a thick study book.

"No no no no!" Cindy groaned more. Abe dinged a bell to shut her up.

"Why not?" he asked Peter, who looked very shy.

"Really?" Liz turned to Peter, disappointment in her face. "Right before nationals?" Dev knew that that look would kill Peter later.

"He already quit marching band and robotics club," Michelle chimed in from the side of the room. They all turned to look at her. She looked up from her book. "I'm not obsessed with him, calm down. I'm just observant."

"Fine," Liz sighed. "Flash, you're in for Peter." Flash grinned and took his feet off the chair.

"Ooh, I don't know," he said, cheekily. "I gotta check my calendar first. I got a hot date with Black Widow coming up." Dev rolled her eyes and went back to writing her essay. She heard Abe ding the bell.

"That is false!" The students laughed.

"What did I tell you about using the bell for comedic purposes?" Mr. Harrington said, exasperated

a/n

( i hope this formatting is correct ahhh im using my computer so lemme know if the gif is too small or something ahhhhh )

DEVON JACKSON AND THE GANG ARE BACKKKK WOOOOO

i am SO sorry for leaving all yall hanging for like a year LOL oops but i got SUPER hella busy this year and aHHHH

but now that quarantine is happening, i have been getting back into fanfic writing so YAY! i hope to finish this story soon ( it should go faster cuz we're now in movie territory ) and then we can finallyyyyy go onto world war 3!! 

well i hope you guys enjoyed!! sorry this chapter was a bit long hahah 

and excuse my bad writing skills, i'm getting back into it so i think imma lil rusty right now LOL

love yall!!

tell me how you guys are doing!!