(MCU) Arcs Collide: Chapter 22 – Project Fishing

Chapter 22 – Project Fishing

Summary: Tony and Hank Pym settle their differences while, with the help of Hope and Scott, they prepare for a daring project.

As Tony, Hope, Scott, and Hank rode the elevator up to the 31st floor, his mind drifted back to the meeting they had just left.

To be honest, the entire thing had gone as well as Tony had expected. But what he noticed was that the Rogues seemed to be waiting for him specifically.

He could guess what Barton wanted. He would demand Tony create his custom-made bow and arrows, and he would demand to see Laura and the kids. And, of course, when Tony refused, Barton would likely threaten him like the assassin he had always been.

Next would be Romanoff. She would try to sweet-talk her way back into Tony’s good graces, selling him the idea that they were family and he shouldn’t push them away. She would likely try to position herself so she could either jump ship again or gather enough dirt to force him to accept her.

Wilson and Barnes were also there, but they looked much less confrontational and more apologetic.

Maximoff? Tony was pretty sure she just wanted to kill him.

As for Rogers, Tony suspected he would demand the world from him. He’d likely ask for his rank back, expect Tony to rebuild their suits, demand to lead the Avengers again, and those were just the first things Tony could think of.

“You don’t have to worry, you know,” Hope commented out of nowhere.

Tony looked at her with a raised eyebrow and asked, “Huh?”

Hope took one of his hands in hers before speaking softly, “I know what you were thinking about. I saw how they looked at you too. That’s why we pulled you away from there. You don’t need to worry about them. Everyone in this tower will make sure that even if they’re stupid enough to break the restriction order, they’ll never get close to you.”

Scott put a hand on Tony’s shoulder and added in his usual upbeat tone, “Yeah, man. We got you. After all, if I let anything happen to you while on my watch, Cassie would kill me, and Paxton would help her hide the body.”

Tony chuckled, both at the terrified look on Scott’s face and from the fact that this threat was legit. Kids these days were way overprotective.

Old Hank scoffed, “I wouldn’t mind punching the lot of them.”

The elevator pinged, and the number 31 glowed above the opening doors.

Tony gave a mock gasp, placing a hand on his chest before saying, “Who knew you cared, Papa Smurf?”

Hank just scoffed again before leaving the elevator, followed closely by the other three.

The 31st floor was one of the two lab floors. When they exited the elevator, they entered the main lobby of the floor, which wasn’t big. It was modest, with a few tables and a couple of seats around each of them. In the corner of the lobby, under the big windows, were a couple of drinking and coffee machines.

Of course, none of them stopped for a drink. As much as Tony would love a cup of coffee, there were more pressing matters at hand. The group took the left hallway and kept walking until they reached the door at the end.

Friday opened the door, and they all went in. On the right side of the room was a row of servers with many beeping lights in different colors. On the wall across from the entrance was a supercomputer with at least five monitors hooked up to it.

But the most impressive part of the room was where the left wall should have been. Instead of a simple flat wall, there was what looked like a high-tech tunnel that led to a dead end. Tony’s mind was thrown back to a conversation a year ago.

Flashback

It had been a couple of weeks since Tony’s meeting with Hope and Scott, where Tony had decided to give the man who sided with Rogers at first a second chance.

Hope had mentioned she had something she wanted to talk with Tony about during that conversation, but Tony had had a schedule to keep, so they scheduled a meeting for today, and Tony found himself in California again.

The elevator pinged, and Tony exited into the familiar penthouse. In the living room sat three people.

Two of them he expected. The third was a surprise—usually an exhausting one.

His childhood friend jumped from her seat with a smile and called happily, “Tony!”

She hugged him while teasing, “When was the last time we met twice in one month? It’s like old times.”

Then a familiar, though much older, voice groaned, “Stark.”

Tony looked at the old man with a flat expression and replied dryly, “Pym.”

He turned his gaze back to Hope and commented in a deadpan manner, “You’re right, Hope—just like old times.”

Hope winced before glaring at her father and hissing, “You said you were going to play nice, Dad! We’re asking him for help.”

Pym narrowed his eyes and growled, “We don’t need his help!”

Hope advanced toward her father with a glare and snapped back in the same tone, “Your company would have been gone by now if it wasn’t for him. You and I would have been on the run now if it wasn’t for him. How the hell do you plan on funding and building your crazy tunnel? And who the hell can you trust better than your own nephew, even if you won’t acknowledge him as such since Mom disappeared?”

Pym frowned but remained silent, not finding a retort to her words. Lang chose to break the tense silence by calling, “Hi there, Dr. Stark. It’s been a minute. Can I ask something?”

Tony turned to the friendly man with his usual shark-like smirk and said, “How are you doing, Little-Man? We’re going to work together now, so call me Tony. What did you want to ask?”

Lang seemed to perk up at Tony’s response and went for the blunt question. “What’s the bad blood between the Starks and Hank?”

Tony shrugged, honestly confused himself, and when he spoke, he couldn’t hide some of the hurt he was holding back. “Beats me. When Hope and I were little kids, our moms were best friends while Hank and Howard settled into a friendly rivalry. Then Aunt Janet died, and something changed. Hank began cursing and shouting at Howard every time they met. Mom tried to calm him down and talk with both of them, but one day, Hank announced that he was taking Hope and moving to California. Since that day, Pym here has kept cursing the Stark name to anyone who will listen.”

Lang looked at Hope, but she seemed just as confused and pained as Tony himself. The energetic guy then turned his gaze toward Pym, but the old man stood up in rage and began to shout, “What do you mean, you don’t know?! Starks! You tried to steal my life’s work after my wife died so you could market the Pym Particle as your own.”

Tony glared at the accusation from the man and retorted calmly, “Old Goat, I recreated the arc reactor by redesigning it in a miniature form while captured using nothing but a box of scraps. I created a new element in a couple of weeks. If I wanted to replicate your particle, I would have been shrinking and growing years ago. Neither I nor Howard gave a damn about your particle beyond its application to protect others.”

Pym scowled. It was clear he was about to start shouting again when Tony’s phone began beeping in his pocket.

Being the asshole he was, Tony ignored the conversation he was in the middle of and pulled out his phone. The moment he did, Friday’s Irish voice spoke through the speakers, “Dr. Pym, I believe you’ve made a mistake, and I can prove it if you’ll allow me.”

Tony raised an eyebrow. He had no idea what his baby girl was talking about. Hank looked reluctant to listen, but Hope cut in immediately, “Please do, Friday.”

Tony set the phone onto the coffee table, and a moment later, a holographic screen appeared from it.

The screen was split into three parts. The first part showed a video of two people in Ant-Man suits landing on a missile and continuing to show the fateful mission. The second screen showed the identification paper of the missile, and the last screen showed the report of the mission to stop it. There was a name highlighted in both forms: “Agent Mitchell Carson.”

The name rang a bell in Tony’s memory. He frowned and asked, “What are we looking at, Fri?”

The response was immediate. “The mission that claimed the life of the previous Wasp was stopping a rogue missile aimed at a populated city. But what none involved knew, not even Howard Stark, was that the missile was registered under SHIELD’s name, and there was an order from within the organization to launch it. Coincidentally, it’s the same agent that was in charge of the mission: Agent Mitchell Carson.”

“SON OF A BITCH! I trusted that bastard!” Pym began to rage.

Hope, who seemed to know the man as well, looked confused and asked, “Why would he do it?”

Friday’s response was to simply change the screen to show another document detailing the attempt to steal the Pym Particle, which was signed once again by the same agent. The Irish voice explained, “Agent Carson expected one of the couple to die in the mission, and he believed he would be able to use the emotional state of the other to steal the formula unnoticed. But Dr. Pym, who was already in the stages of leaving the organization, noticed, so Agent Carson pinned the blame on Howard Stark to break a dangerous alliance to his cause.”

Both Pym and Hope were shocked by what they had learned so far, so it was left for Lang to ask weakly, “What was his cause?”

Friday zoomed in on the corner of the document on the screen. A large octopus symbol filled the screen, and before anyone else could comment, Friday delivered the final blow. “Agent Carson was one of the highest Hydra agents to infiltrate SHIELD.”

Pym’s knees failed him, and he fell onto the sofa behind him. Before anyone could say anything, in a surge of anger, he slammed his fists onto the table and growled, “All this time. The fucking bastard.”

Meanwhile, Tony had something else on his mind. “Fri, when did you find this out, and why didn’t you inform me?”

His baby girl answered straight away, her voice coming from the speakers of the phone. “Once you decided to meet with Ms. Van Dyne, Jocasta focused her search through the files of the info dump around anything concerning her and Dr. Pym, and that was when she found this information. I decided to withhold it so as not to influence your conversation with your childhood friend, Boss.”

Well, when she put it like that, the only thing he could say was, “Thank you, baby girl. You’re the best.”

Tony could hear the smugness in the Irish voice’s response. “I know.”

Lang stared at Tony’s phone while saying in a voice full of wonder, “How? Just how did you create her? She’s so human, it’s kinda creepy.”

Tony smirked at his fellow engineer and said, “Stay on the straight and narrow, and maybe one day I’ll show you her matrix.”

Lang had stars in his eyes, and Tony’s smirk grew. But his face froze when he heard a voice calling, “Stark.”

Tony turned to look at Hank with a raised eyebrow, but the old man had an odd expression on his face. Eventually, he managed to mutter out, “I’m sorry.”

Tony’s eyebrows shot up. He never imagined he would see the day Hank Pym would apologize to anyone, let alone to a Stark. He was so surprised that the only thing that came out of his mouth was, “What was that?”

Pym scowled and started to yell, “Don’t make me… ow.” He was cut off by Hope elbowing her father. The old man cleared his throat before he said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have blamed your father without listening to him first. And even if he did steal it, I shouldn’t have blamed you and hurt you and Hope the way I did.”

Tony calmed down from the surprise and nodded at the old genius. “You’re not the first to assume the worst about Howard or me, so we’re good.”

Pym shook his head. He took off his glasses and began to rub the bridge of his nose while speaking calmly, which was out of the ordinary for the man. “No. Hope was right—you helped me, my daughter, and my company even though I kept behaving this way toward you. If Janet ever finds out about that, she’ll kill me without a second thought. I owe you for all those years I was wrong. I don’t have any right to ask you for more help.”

Tony frowned at the man he once considered his uncle, but instead of opening this can of worms, he chose to comment on something else. “You keep talking about needing help. That’s why I’m here, so let’s at least hear what you’ve got.”

“You better take a seat for that, man. It’s going to sound crazy,” Lang advised him.

As Tony began to sit on the sofa in front of him, he pointed out, “I’ve dealt with my fair share of crazy, Mr. Lang.”

Lang rubbed the back of his head with a small, embarrassed laugh. “I guess you’re right, Tony. Oh, call me Scott, by the way.”

Tony sat with one leg over the other and drummed on his jeans, waiting for someone to begin. Eventually, Hope did. “When Mom and Dad were on that missile, the only way to stop it was to go subatomic. But all the theory showed that doing so would kill the user. But Mom cared more about saving people, so she did it. She went subatomic, and everyone assumed she died.”

Tony’s eyes widened at the implication. “Assumed?”

Scott nodded and then began to speak. “You know that Cross guy I had to steal from you to fight?”

Tony gave him a short nod, mentally reminding himself to add this to Wilson’s crime list for assisting a thief in stealing SI tech without reporting it.

Scott, oblivious to Tony’s thoughts, went on, “Well, he had a suit like mine as well, but he called his ‘Yellowjacket’—stupid name, right? Anyway, when we fought, both of us kept going small and big over and over again. The only way I could defeat him eventually was to go subatomic myself.”

Tony’s eyes narrowed at Scott. “You went subatomic? But you’re still here.”

Scott nodded, and Tony could see where it was going. Surprisingly, it was Hank who kept the story going. “We thought at first that the idiot died too, but then out of nowhere, he grew back. The problem is, he doesn’t remember how he did it, but when I later went through the information the suit gathered while he was subatomic, I found this.”

With that, Hank showed him the screen of his own smartphone (Pym-tech, of course). Tony stared at the screen for a long moment before what he was seeing registered in his mind, and he said in a surprised tone, “Someone tried to communicate with him. But he was in a size that was below any known signal wave. The only wave he could have picked up was one in the same state as him. If Aunt Janet survived and was still alive in that state, it could have been her signal.”

“Is it possible she’s actually still alive?” Hope asked, her voice filled with hope.

Hank seemed like he already had his own opinion on the matter but wanted Tony’s take, so the genius did not disappoint. “It’s possible. A person in subatomic size would enter the Quantum Realm theoretically, and our usual laws of physics wouldn’t apply. So yes, I would say it’s probable.”

Hope seemed to start glowing with hope at hearing it, and Hank seemed to let out a sigh of relief.

Then the old man began frowning at the screen of his phone and asked the room, “But if she survived and her suit still has the power to send out signals, why didn’t she use it to return herself?”

Good question. Tony mused on that for a moment as he leaned back on the sofa, his fingers drumming on his arc reactor when an idea hit him. He sharpened his gaze on Hank and asked, “One of the side effects from your particle is energy release, right?”

The Pym-tech founder stiffened at the question out of pure habit before he shook himself out of it and replied with a nod. “And your earlier models of the suit relied on that fact to function?” Tony asked again, receiving another nod. Tony had one more thing to check before vocalizing his theory. “Your newer model has another power source, correct?”

With the final nod, Tony spoke in a grave tone, “My theory is that when Scott went subatomic, the suit used up most of its energy to achieve it, but then the secondary source kicked in, and he was able to grow back. But Aunt Janet didn’t have another source, and the suit used everything it had to go subatomic, so she might as well be stuck in the Quantum Realm.”

The three people across from him looked at him in wonder, probably finding his theory more than possible.

Tony let out a heavy sigh, uncrossed his legs, and leaned forward, asking, “So that’s what you want my help with?”

Hope nodded a little awkwardly. “Yes. Dad already has the blueprints for an idea to rescue her. But right now, without the company, we’re lacking the funds, lab, and other tools we need for that. But Dad was right—you’ve already done too much to help us recently. It’s too much to…”

Tony raised his hand to silence his old friend before saying in a firm tone, “Aunt Janet always treated me as if I was her own son. I love her as much as you do. If there’s even the smallest chance she’s stuck there, I’ll do whatever it takes to get her out. Come on, old man, show me what you’ve got.”

Hank huffed at the "old man" comment but showed him the blueprints on his phone without any further remark.

Tony’s eyes scanned the plans for what they called the Quantum Tunnel. Tony hummed before speaking. “There are a lot of improvements we’ll need to make, but between the three of us—and I know another couple of people who can really help with this—we can actually do it.”

The spirit in the room had peaked by now, until what Tony said next transformed it into pure tension. “I do have one condition.” All three stared at him with worried looks until Tony smirked and finished, “I want to choose the name of the project.”

The three people across from him could only blink at him for the next minute but eventually nodded their agreement.

Tony swore he could hear Friday mutter, “Oh crap.”

Present

Tony shook his head to come back to the present before clapping his hands with a smirk and calling to the room, “Let’s get Project Fishing running.”

All he got in return were groans from everyone in the room. What’s their problem? Tony’s names are the best.