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Scott Lang blinked hard.
The stale air of the abandoned storage hitting him like a wall as he pushed open the creaky van door. “Okay… where the hell am I?” he muttered, rubbing his eyes, trying to shake off the fog clouded his mind after he notice that the rooftop he’s stand before gone replace with this dusted and maybe haunting storage in his opinion.
The silence around him wasn’t just quiet—it was heavy, like the world had paused and forgotten he existed. No signal. No beep from Hope’s comm, no word from Hank or Janet. Just nothing.
He shuffled around, checking the van, then the cage that somehow locking him in it. He try to open it but yep, it’s locked tight. Great.
Scott took a deep breath, trying to recall the yoga breathing that Daniel—one of guy he known during his prison time with a calm vibe, had taught him. “Inhale… exhale… don’t freak out, you got this.”
A few moments later, at least enough calming down for him to think, Scott spotted a CCTV cameras glaring down at him like accusatory eyes. Scrambling through the scraps by his feet, he found a broken marker and frantically scrawled “HELP” on a dusty box nearby (Fingers crossed, he thought).
Not twenty minutes later, a security guy showed up. He popped the lock open with a satisfying click.“Thank God! I was starting to think I was going to end up as some mad scientist’s science project in here,” Scott said, half-panicked, half-relieved like he’d just escaped a weird episode of Black Mirror.
“Where did even you come from, exactly?” the security guy asked, eyebrows raised as he suddenly appeared in this van that been abonded for years.
Scott flashed a sheepish grin, rubbing the back of his neck. “Oh, you know, just your usual quantum realm detour, a little time warp, sprinkled with epic bad luck. Basically, a typical Thursday for me.” The officer blinked, clearly debating whether to call for backup or just pretend he didn’t hear that.
Scott threw up his hands. “Trust me, you don’t wanna know.”
Once he was finally free (with a lot of convince and half lie to, enough to make him look suspicious guy), Scott wrestled the quantum machine out of the van—after what felt like a solid hour of disassembling parts that definitely weren’t meant to come apart so easily. He dragged it onto the street with a cart he found on that storage and blinked, trying to take everything in. But something was... off. The air hung just feels diferrents, it was thick with a kind of quiet sadness. People passed by with their heads down, shoulders hunched like they were carrying invisible bag stuffed with the world’s problems and full of grief.
He walked and walked, trying to find some normal—again, but the city felt like a ghost town haunted by the weight of missing time. Then a kid on a bike rolled past him, and Scott blurted out, “Hey, what the hell happened here?”
The kid just shrugged, eyes cold and distant. That silence hit harder than any answer could.
Scott’s chest tightened. Something big had shifted (maybe everything)—and he was stuck somewhere far behind it all.
He kept moving after that, restless, until his eyes caught a worn poster peeling off a cracked wall. It announced some memorial event for a place called the “Wall of the Vanished” — a name Scott didn’t recognize, but that sounded like a punch to the gut.
He blinked twice at the date. 2023. That was five years ahead of the “now” he thought he was in.
His throat went dry, panic pressing at his ribs—almost choke him. He swallowed hard, tried to steady himself. He told himself to breathe. One step at a time.
With a mix of dread and a stubborn flicker of hope, he followed his feet to this “Wall of the Vanished.” When he finally got there, rows and rows of names carved into cold stone stared back at him, each one a story he wasn’t sure he was ready to face.
There was Hope’s name, Hank’s, Janet’s (all the Pym family, basically)—etched into the cold stone under the “Vanished”. His own name was there too, staring back at him like a ghost from a past life. Then came the hardest part: searching for Cassie. His peanut, his wild hearted, stubborn full spark of a daughter.
Her name wasn’t there. Neither was Maggie’s. Or Jim’s.
Relief tangled with confusion, knotting in his chest like an old friend he wasn’t sure he recognized anymore. If they were still here—somewhere…maybe, just maybe, there was a chance to fix this mess.
Scott wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand, feeling the weight of hope flicker like a fragile flame inside him. So, he headed straight for Maggie’s house, the one place that might fill in the blanks and help him find his footing again.
He knocked, and the door swung open. Maggie stood there—his ex-wife, looking older but still with that fierce warmth in her eyes that never quite went out. She blinked, then whispered, “Scott? You’re… alive.”
Scott forced a nervous chuckle. “Yeah, barely. Surprise?”
They fell into a hug, awkward but real. “Yeah, funny story,” he mumbled, scratching his neck. “I think I’m kinda… got stuck. Five years in the quantum realm. You know, typical Tuesday.”
Before Maggie could say anything, Jim Paxton—her husband now and the calm anchor in this storm, appeared behind her, equally shocked. “We thought you were gone for good.”
Scott broke free of the hug and gave a half wave, half sorry nod. “Hey, Jim. Sorry about crashing the place. But, uh, what happened? The world just lost its mind or something?”
They let him in, but didn’t jump into answers right away. Settling in the kitchen, Maggie poured tea while Jim kept stealing sideways glances, still half in shock that Scott was actually standing there.
Scott felt the awkward buzz between them. Here he was, crashing at his ex’s place like the star of some weird sitcom, trying to figure out how to be normal again in a world that clearly wasn’t.
After a pause too long even for him, Scott broke the silence. “Okay, seriously…can one of you explain what the hell happened while I was... you know, stuck?”
Maggie took a deep breath, as if gathering strength to unpack years of chaos for the guy she once loved—who, it turned out, wasn’t dead after all. Sitting down beside Jim with a cup of tea in her hand, she nodded slowly. “They call it ‘The Blip,’ Scott. That’s what the government and the Avengers say.”
Scott noticed the crease deepening on her forehead and the stubborn strands of white threading through her hair. He swallowed, feeling the weight of all the time he’d missed with them (fuck....again, he thought). But he kept quiet, listening. Really trying to understand.
“Well, half the world just... disappeared. Including Hope, Hank, Janet, and well…you—which I guess it’s not now,” Maggie said softly.
“Wait disappeared? Like... poof?” Scott asked, raising an eyebrow.
Maggie swallowed hard, her voice trembling just a little. “Yeah. Like just… vanished into thin air. One minute my mom was right there, and the next—poof. Gone. To be honest, It’s impossible to really explain it, Scott.” Her eyes flickered with the weight of that memory.
Jim reached over, squeezing her hand gently, offering quiet strength without saying a word. “We’re still trying to make sense of it all ourselves.”
Scott swallowed hard, the reality settling like a stone in his chest. “Okay…”. He ran a hand through his hair, like trying to shake loose the confusion. “So while I was stuck in my own little quantum jail, the world flipped upside down. Half the people just vanished in this... Blip thing. And now everyone’s scrambling to pick up the shattered pieces.”
Jim nodded, the short version that barely scratched the surface.
Scott’s chest tightened, the five years he’d lost pressing down harder than ever. Five years he stuck in some quantum limbo while everything he cared about was tangled in grief and waiting.
Leaning back, Scott tried to catch his breath through the swirl of panic and guilt. “And you guys? You holding up okay?”
Maggie gave a sad, tired smile. “Honestly? It was rough. The economy tanked, government’s a mess. We barely scraped by, but we managed. Jim being a cop helped keep us afloat a little faster than most. And Cassie… she missed you. More than you probably know.”
That name hit him harder than he expected. Cassie—his peanut, The kid whose birthdays, recitals, and milestones he’d promised never to miss. And yet here he was, having missed it all again. He just nodded at Maggie, the silence between them full of the weight of all the moments lost.
He looked at the two people who had somehow kept things together, even with half the world missing. “Thanks for keeping the door open for me,” Scott said, voice quieter than he wanted.
Jim’s reply was calm, with a warmth that surprised Scott. “Well… you’re still family.”
The tea in front of Scott was still warm, but it tasted like cold ash. Just as he was about to say something, the front door burst open. There she was—Cassie. Not the little eleven year old he remembered or hoped to see, but a teenage girl, tall and fierce, with a backpack slung low and stomping like she owned the place. She froze when she spotted him, like a ghost stepping out of nowhere. Then the dam broke. Tears spilled over, and without a word, she threw herself into his arms.
“Dad,” she whispered, voice cracking, “I thought I lost you forever.”
Scott held her tight, whispering back, “Hey, peanut... I’m here now. I’m not going anywhere.”
For the next three days, Scott really tried...like, with all the awkwardness and clumsy effort he could muster to at least pretend he was living a “normal” life while crashing at Maggie and Jim’s place. He was attempting to slip back into a world that had moved on without him, as if five years lost in the quantum realm was just a weird vacation he took alone.
But “normal” was a cruel joke , especially when those five years meant missing out on so much with Cassie—five years full of questions she never got to ask, emotions too heavy for both of them to carry all at once. It even didn’t take long for Scott to realize what Cassie had been up to during his absence. She’d uncovered Hank’s old journals—pages stacked with memories, puzzles, and scientific scribbles that felt like a map to the missing pieces of their family.
He couldn’t blame her. After all, the last thing he’d promised Cassie was a trip to that new dessert place she’d been begging to try, before telling her he had to take a “short trip” into the quantum realm to gather some energy for Ava. But that short trip turned into an endless wait…for her, it was a goodbye that never came.
That broken promise haunted her (—and honestly, haunted him too. Adding more on his endless guilt over them). It pushed her obsession to crack the secrets of the quantum realm, convinced that the answers, the way to bring them all back, were hidden in its strange, shifting depths. Maybe, just maybe, the quantum realm was holding onto more than just time…it held her hope. And for the first time in a long while, Scott wanted to believe it with everything he had.
On the fourth day, Scott found himself sitting in Maggie’s workshop, a quiet space that the couple give for Cassie to lose herself in something other than grief. It was a small sanctuary for her, where the weight of reality could be put on pause, where broken pieces might somehow start to fit again.
He flipped through Cassie’s notebooks, pages bursting with frantic scribbles, half drawn diagrams, and wild ideas she’d sketched between classes and homework. The kind of notes that shouted, “I’m trying,” even when the world felt like it was trying to break her.
Because Maggie and Jim figured this was better—better than Cassie curled up in her room on her tenth birthday, tears streaking down her face as she clung to that scuffed little trophy labeled “World’s Greatest Grandma.” The trophy that had been a joke between Scott and Cassie once, a silly award she gave him to make him smile. Now it was a reminder of what was lost (—for everything she were fighting to get back).
Scott flipped through Cassie’s notes—each idea wilder than the last, but all packed with fierce determination. It took him back to those days when Hank actually enjoyed having Cassie around during his turn to watch her. The old man found a rare kind of peace watching this stubborn, curious kid grow. Cassie wasn’t some genius prodigy, but she soaked up every word Hank said. Every strange quantum fact, every complicated formula she buried herself in like it was a secret treasure map.
Her mission was clear: to be Scott’s hero partner. That drive pushed her to keep learning, always preparing, always trying to be better. Because what she really wanted was simple— to stand by his side, to help, to be someone he could count on. Someone he wouldn’t have to leave behind.
And Scott let her, let the Pym’s couple teach her all their quantum secrets and mysteries, as long as he could keep seeing that spark in her eyes—that fierce, bright smile that showed just how much she loved learning all of it.
He was lost in that thought until he noticed Jim leaning casually against the doorway, calm and curious. “So…,” Jim said, voice casual like it wasn’t a conversation they both secretly needed, “how’s it feel, living in your ex-wife’s house? Bit weird?”
Scott snorted and looked him over. “You have no idea. I’m like the world’s most inconvenient guest. But hey, Maggie and Cassie have been amazing—It’s nice to see that, better than I deserve obviously.”
His eyes flicked over to the whiteboard packed with Cassie’s scribbles and diagrams. “Jim… thanks for being there for them.”
Jim, raised an eyebrow mid sip his coffee.
“No, seriously, I mean it. Thanks for everything you’ve done so far…for being a better partner to Maggie than I was and for being Cassie’s anchor while I was gone.”
Jim dropped onto the brown sofa in front of the desk, noticing the scraps of paper Cassie had ripped up and tossed aside, the half empty, coffee stained glass nearby. It was clear she still carried her own battles, locked in those sleepless nights, trying to crack the code of this whole disaster, like maybe she held the answer to all the chaos.
“Well… I try,” Jim said with a sad smile, fully aware of how weird this conversation was and how strange their dynamic had become.
Jim didn’t really hate Scott, but he wasn’t exactly his biggest fan either. Ex-husband and dad to his daughter, Scott’s criminal past was complicated, but Maggie had loved him once, deeply—and for Jim, that made Scott more annoying than hateful.
“I love both of them, and I want to be the best I can for them,” Jim said, a hint of dry humor creeping in. “Honestly, I’m still trying to convince Maggie to file a restraining order on you just so I can win this weird competition between us,”
Scott chuckled, the tension easing a little. Maybe Jim was onto something. He didn’t always feel worthy of the love they gave him, but hearing it said out loud, with a little humor, made it easier to face.
“I’ll try to convince her over dinner tonight,” Scott said with a smirk. “You know, lay on the charm and all that.”
Jim raised an eyebrow. “So… what do you actually think about all this?”
Scott blinked, caught off guard. “About what?”
“You know...this whole quantum realm obsession, the scribbles, the notes. Honestly, I’m no genius. I have no clue if what Cassie’s doing is right or if we’re basicaly just letting her spiral into full blown madness.”
Scott went quiet for a moment, turning over everything he’d read in those journals, the wild theories and desperate hope tangled together on every page. Against all odds, something about it felt real—like this might actually be the answer. Or at least a start worth sharing with his old crew, the Avengers.
“To be honest… yeah. Some of it makes sense. The basics at least. It’s solid enough for me, or any of the Avengers, to take a crack at,” Scott said finally, surprising even himself.
Jim smiled, a little suprised, amused but accepting. After all, Cassie was Scott’s daughter, and Scott was still Ant Man who somehow found his way into the Avengers’ chaos and occasionally save the world. So maybe, just maybe, there was hope in those scribbles after all.
Before Scott could say anything else, the screech of tires pulled their attention outside. Jim shot Scott a knowing glance, ‘Brace yourself, here comes the chaos’.
The front door creaked open, and in walked Maggie and Cassie. Cassie’s backpack bounced with every step. Scott watched them, that familiar knot of hope and guilt tightening in his chest. Maggie caught his eye and offered a small, tired smile. Cassie, on the other hand, barely spared him a glance before flopping dramatically onto the couch, kicking off her shoes and tossing her backpack near the door.
“Dad!” Cassie burst out, a grin breaking through all the stress like sunshine cutting through clouds. “You wouldn’t believe the chaos at school today. And guess what? Also, I maybe figured out some part of that quantum formula thingy!”
Scott raised an eyebrow, trying to keep his cool but failing miserably as pride bloomed in his chest. “Oh yeah? You sure you’re not just trying to distract me so you can skip homework?”
Cassie rolled her eyes but couldn’t wipe the smile off her face.
Later that night, after dinner had faded into comfortable silence, Scott stood on the balcony, staring down at the glowing screen of his phone while sipping cold water. His thumb hovered over the messages he’d exchanged with Jim earlier that morning—the one piece of proof that he was really, truly back. Jim had been shocked, of course. Thought Scott was just another name on the endless list of “missing.” or a ghost that finally decide to haunt him back after being strict with him during his house arrest time back then.
But here he was, texting like nothing had happened, except everything had. They texted back and forth, Scott filling Jimmy in on everything he’d been through, and Jimmy—well, he shared all the updates only someone with his clearance could get. Stuff the public had no clue about, the kind of intel you’d expect from an agent who’s part FBI and ex SHIELD agent.
Scott Lang & Jimmy Woo
Thursday 9:00 am
Antsy Man: Is this number still active?
Agent Woof: Who is this?
[Antsy Man is typing…]
Antsy Man: It’s Scott.
Jimmy stared at the screen, latte in hand, weighing his options. Because even if the world was falling apart, he figured he deserved a good latte. For a whole minute, he just sat there, debating between blocking the number like any sane man would or leaning into the absurd and accepting the impossible. And in a world where sorcerers, aliens, and literal gods rented apartments a few blocks over, maybe “Scott coming back from the dead” wasn’t the craziest thing for his morning.
Scott Lang & Jimmy Woo
Thursday 9:33 am
[Agent Woof is typing…]
Agent Woof: No, you’re not.
Agent Woof: Look, I don’t know what prank you’re trying to pull, but I’m very busy.
Thursday 9:35 am
Antsy Man: Wait, Jimmy, seriously. It’s me.
Jimmy sighed, rolled his eyes, and decided enough was enough. No more back-and-forth. He hit call.
The phone rang once, twice. Just as Jimmy was about to hang up, a familiar voice cut through the silence…a voice he thought he’d never hear again in five years. Scott. The guy who could resize his body as much he like, pop back up with a card trick, and somehow still look like the kind of dad who’d argue about coupon expiration dates. The same guy who’d stood next to Captain America like it was no big deal… and then wouldn’t shut up about it for a week.
For a moment, Jimmy just sat there, listening to that voice that was both impossibly familiar and utterly surreal. And for once, the impossible felt like a welcome thing.
“Hi…” Scott’s voice came through, a little rough but unmistakably his.
Jimmy blinked, the latte halfway to his mouth suddenly forgotten. “Scott? Is that really you? Because if this is some elaborate prank, you’re in deep trouble.”
There was a pause, then Scott laughed. “No prank, man. It’s me. I’m back.”
Jimmy ran a hand through his hair, still not quite believing it. “Man, you’ve got some explaining to do. Five years gone, no word, and now suddenly you pop up like a bad penny.” He shook his head with a smirk. “I’m this close to blocked your number. ”
“Well, thank God you didn’t. That would’ve been awkward,” Scott said, laughing.
Jimmy cleared his throat, trying to sound casual but failing miserably “Alright, spill it. Last I heard your name was when the government read out the list of people who vanished. Which, spoiler alert wasn’t exactly cheerful.”
Here’s the thing about Jimmy and Scott, it wasn’t exactly the kind of friendship you planned. Jimmy found him irritating and strangely entertaining. Sure, Scott was knee deep in Avengers chaos (which Jimmy totally got, because honestly, who says no to Captain America?). But, in between Scott testing the limits of his ankle monitor, spamming him with reels, and questions like ‘If the thor is a teddy bear, what kind would it be?’ in the middle of his workday—something shifted. And, somehow he just stopped seeing him as “that guy I have to keep an eye on” and started seeing him as a friend.
A weird, chaotic, occasionally exasperating friend… but still a friend.
Scott let out a long breath on the other end, the kind that sounded like he’d been holding it since… well, since his comeback. “Okay, so…look, I already got the basics. Five years gone, half the universe poofed, then came back like nothing happened, yada yada. But I need details, Jimmy. The in between stuff. How the heck did the world go from ‘normal but with superheroes’ to… whatever this is now? And who’s even still out there? I need to know who’s active, where they are—like, is there even still an Avengers team, or is it just some sad group chat now?”
He leaned back in his chair, Taking a sip of what was now definitely-lukewarm latte. “Wow. Straight to the point, huh?”
“Hey, you’re my guy for this,” Scott said, grinning through the phone. “You’ve got the connections, the clearance. Lay it on me.”
“Fine. But you didn’t hear this from me. Officially.” He grabbed a pen and started write down names on a napkin, because apparently SHIELD and FBI training did not prepare you for Scott Lang’s sudden pop quizzes.
Jimmy started listing the names off like a grocery list only slightly more depressing. “Natasha Romanoff, she was basically the one that holding whole circus together during the Blip. The rest? Scattered. Thor was in New Asgard, probably still doing… whatever Thor does when he’s not saving the universe. Hulk was around, only now he’s ‘Professor Hulk,’ which is just Banner’s brain in a green body that still wears cardigans. Cap was running support groups, trying to help people move on. Rhodes kept things running on the military side. Stark?… married, living in some cabin in Georgia with Pepper and their kid. And honestly? Happier than I’d ever seen him, at least from the paparazzi shots I’d stumbled across.”
He twirled the pen between his fingers. “Then there were the new players. Carol Danvers…pretty sure that’s her name?—basically human turned alien or something, popped in and out, mostly out because, you know, other planets. We’ve got a talking raccoon, and no, I’m not kidding and his teammate, a blue alien who looks like she’s perpetually unimpressed. I heard they still check in with Romanoff now and then. Wakanda lost both the royal siblings in the Blip, so their royal Guard took the wheel on representing them. And there were a few sorcerers drifting in and out, doing… you know sorcerer things.”
Scott whistled low. “Wow. That’s… smaller than I thought.”
“Yeah, well…” Jimmy shrugged, even though Scott couldn’t see it. “Half the team was dust, the other half was running on caffeine, grief, and ‘let’s just hope this works.’ Honestly, it was like if your PTA had to run the planet. But with fewer bake sales and more alien invasions.”
Scott shook his head. “Man, I leave for five minutes—”
“Five years,” Jimmy corrected.
“—and the whole lineup changes. What’s next? Luis gets an invite to join?”
Jimmy smirked. “Honestly? Wouldn’t be the weirdest thing that’s happened.” He leaned back, lowering his voice. “Look, this is as much as I can give you. And yeah, maybe my clearance technically gets me more than this, but let’s just say some of it came from a friend still with SHIELD. Either way, I don’t have the full playbook. You’ll need to go to them directly for that.”
Scott’s end went quiet.
“What’s with the long sigh? You’re not coming back?” Jimmy asked.
“No… I mean, not like that. It’s just—” Scott hesitated, and for a second, his voice dropped the usual jokey tone. “I’m still processing. I went in thinking I was gone for five hours, and I came out to find my daughter’s a teenager. I just… want a little more time with her. At least until I’m ready.”
Jimmy nodded to himself. “Later as in tomorrow, or later as in ‘when the moon is actually made of cheese’ later?”
Scott chuckled. “Somewhere in between. I just… need a little more time with Cassie before I throw myself back into the deep end.”
“I get it. Well… Romanoff, Rogers, and Banner are the only ones still at the compound last I checked. The rest are scattered. But yeah… that’s pretty much the lineup.”
Scott was quiet for a beat, like he was filing all of that away in some mental cabinet labeled Stuff I Really Didn’t Want to Know Today. “Alright… that helps. Thanks, Jimmy.”
Jimmy shrugged again. “Don’t get all sentimental on me, Lang. I’m not crying, you’re crying.”
Scott laughed, but it came with that softer edge. The kind where you know the joke’s just keeping the heavier stuff from spilling out. “Still… appreciate it. I’ll owe you one. Dinner. Drinks. Whatever your undercover FBI diet allows these days.”
“Make it tacos from that place you like,” Jimmy said. “But not the Tuesday rush. I’m not elbowing a soccer mom for the last carnitas again.”
“You’re the one who dove for it last time!” Scott shot back, grinning.
“And I’d do it again.” Jimmy’s tone was flat, but the grin was there. “Alright, man. You go be Dad first, hero later. Just… if the world starts ending again, don’t wait for me to text you. Those SHIELD guys are terrible at group chats.”
Scott chuckled, shaking his head. “Got it. And Jimmy?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks… for keeping me in the loop. And for not making me feel like I’m already late to the party.”
Jimmy smirked into the phone. “Well it’s better late, than you gone again Lang.”
“Okay….bye Jimmy.”
“Later, Ant Man.”
The line went dead, and for a second, Scott just sat there, phone still in hand, staring into the kind of quiet that felt heavier than it should. Smaller Avengers group. Bigger Cassie. And somehow, the universe had kept on spinning without him—like he was just… optional. He let out a breath, stood, stretched, and decided maybe, just for today, he’d focus on the one world he could save—the one that still called him “Dad.”
Or so he thought.
But the conversation with Jimmy wouldn’t shut up in his head. It kept looping, and now Cassie’s scribbles in her old notebooks didn’t help either—half baked science ideas and formula’s, doodles of ants in capes, notes about “Dad’s return.” It made him feel… selfish. Like he was choosing to be Scott Lang the guy instead of Ant-Man the hero, when maybe he should’ve been both.
Two nights later, that guilt came back swinging. He jolted awake in the middle of a nightmare—Hope and the Pyms gone, him left behind again, just like before. The room felt colder than it should. He shuffled to the kitchen for some water, trying to shake it off, but as he passed Maggie’s home office, he caught a thin strip of light spilling out from under the door.
‘Cassie? Still awake?’ he thought, squinting at the clock on the wall. 2:45 am. A sacred hour for teenagers… to be unconscious (well… supposed to).
He knocked once before pushing the door open.
Cassie was standing over the big whiteboard, writing equations that looked way too intense for any sane hour. She was in pajamas, hair shoved into a messy bun, headphones on, totally in the zone. The kind of focus that made you forget the rest of the world existed—something Scott knew all too well. She only noticed him when the shift in the air made her turn.
“Oh…Dad. You’re up?” she asked, slipping off her headphones.
Scott raised his eyebrows, taking a sip from his glass. “Pretty sure I’m supposed to be asking you that.”
Cassie smirked, the kind that said she knew exactly what he was getting at but had zero plans to explain herself right away. “Couldn’t sleep,” she said, tapping the marker against her palm. “Brain wouldn’t shut up.”
Scott stepped inside, glancing at the board like it might suddenly make sense if he stared long enough. It didn’t. “Right. Totally normal insomnia stuff… quantum mechanics at three in the morning.”
“It’s not quantum mechanics,” she corrected, eyes still locked on the board. “It’s—” She hesitated, biting her lip. “It’s just… an idea.”
And that was the tone. The Hope Van Dyne ‘I’m onto something so good it might blow up in my face’ tone (that come’s naturally after too much hang out with her every ime they go together). He hated how much he recognized it.
He took another sip of water, mostly to buy time. “An idea that needs… you know… sleep? Ever heard of it? It’s this amazing thing where you close your eyes and—”
“Dad,” she cut in, spinning the marker like a drumstick. “You ever feel like… if you don’t do something right now, you’ll miss your chance forever?”
Scott opened his mouth, then shut it. “…Yeah. I’ve felt that.” He set the glass down, voice softening. “But if you run yourself into the ground, you won’t be around to finish the thing you’re killing yourself over.”
Cassie gave him a small smile. “Says the guy who got stuck for five years in the Quantum Realm.”
“Hey, I came back, didn’t I?” He tried to sound offended, but it came out more like a laugh. “Eventually.”
She chuckled, then glanced at him. “I’ll go to bed soon. Promise.”
He narrowed his eyes. “So… what’s the big idea that’s keeping you running on nothing but caffeine at 2 am., when you’ve still got to go with Jim in the morning?”
“Well…” She drew the word out, almost sheepish. “It’s probably insane.”
“Peanut, nothing’s insane when your dad was in the same group chat as Captain America and got literally punched by some of the Avengers.”
She snorted. “I keep forgetting you know him.”
“Trust me, I’m still trying to figure it out myself. So… spill.”
She tapped the board. “Okay… I was thinking. After you came back, I kept going over what you said about being in the Quantum Realm. You said it felt like five hours, right? But here, five years had passed. So… what if there’s a way to navigate it? Control the time? Not just jump in and hope for the best, but… I don’t know… make it predictable. Contain the chaos.”
Scott blinked at her. “Time travel?”
“Sort of. Maybe. Honestly, I came up with half of this idea while choking on a sandwich at lunch today, so it’s still a mess.”
He stayed quiet, because as ridiculous as it sounded… it wasn’t that ridiculous. Janet had told him once the Quantum Realm existed outside of time and space—so maybe Cassie’s “insane” idea wasn’t that insane after all. In fact, it was terrifyingly possible.
“And to be honest…Ive feel like this idea actually the most closest one that have potential”
“Yeah… I can see that,” he said, forehead wrinkling.
“You think it’s not insane?”
“Well…idk time travel crazy. but it’s not that insane as I’ve once have a talk with Janet her experience stuck in that realm. So…it’s not that far”
Cassie’s eyes lit up. She hadn’t expected him to take it seriously. “Then you should tell them. Or at least… talk to someone about it.”
“Talk to who?”
“Dad…” She gave him the look. “You know who I mean. Your old coworkers.”
“Luis? Kurt? Dave?”
“Dad.”
He grinned. “Okay, okay. You mean the Avengers…?.”
“Yes.”
He scratched his chin. “Hmm… let me think about it, okay?”
“Dad.”
She tilted her head. “Are you avoiding them… because of me?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean… last time you saw me, I was barely up to your waist. Now I’m almost as tall as you and Mom.”
Scott just stared. He wasn’t ready for this conversation—definitely not almost at 3 am.
“I heard your call with Mr. Woo,” she said softly.
“Uh…”
“Sorry. I eavesdropped.”
“No, no, Peanut…it’s okay.” He waved it off. “But… well, yes I do just want more time with you.”
Casies smiled faintly. “Well… we’ll have more time after you save the world.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think I’m great enough to save the world.”
“Dad, you’re the world’s greatest grandma. You’ve got this.”
They both laughed quietly.
“I trust you,” Cassie said, her voice steady but softer now. “And if you go to them… you won’t have to do it alone. I’ve seen you fight for the good cause and with them. That counts for something. Just… as long as you never give up.”
“Since when are you this wise?”
“I’ve always been this wise.”
Scott gave her a look—the one that said “sure, kid’”, but didn’t push it. When he finally convinced her to get some sleep, Scott stayed behind, just standing there. Glanced back at the board one last time before flicking off the light. The whiteboard was still full of numbers, arrows, chaos—and maybe something brilliant.
For the first time in a long time, he wasn’t sure if she needed him to protect her… or if maybe he needed her.
He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. So yeah… Monday. Monday he’d make the trip upstate, walk into the compound, and try not to look like a guy who once got launched into a fence by Falcon. But for now, he had a daughter to tuck in—well, remind to tuck in, because she was sixteen and technically didn’t need tucking. Still, dad duties.
“Night, Peanut,” he whispered.
Somewhere in the back of his head, a little voice said, you’re gonna have to meet them, Scott. The Avengers…or whatever was left of them, anyway. Because if Cassie’s idea was even half right, it could change everything. Or completely blow up the fabric of reality. And knowing his luck, probably both and in the worst possible order.
Also, at the same time Scott had that weird mix of feelings he hated—proud, worried, and just the tiniest bit terrified. Proud because her daughter was smart enough to think up something like this alone. Worried because she might actually be right. And terrified because… well, time travel was already complicated enough.
He sighed, grabbed a snack from the kitchen (because life changing conversations at 3 am required leftover pizza), and told himself he’d figure it out in the morning.
Yeah...let's do that.