Dawn of the End ||6||

16. An (Almost) Impossible Solution

"Gracie!" I called after my daughter. The little rascal had taken it upon herself to go barreling through the facility looking for Nat. This place was huge, and I was so afraid of her hurting herself or getting into things she didn't understand.

Despite being much shorter than I, Gracie was fast on her feet. I had to push myself a little harder to catch up to her. She made a sharp turn into a room.

"Oh, hey, kiddo," came Nat's sullen tone.

I caught my breath in the open way of the room. "Sorry, she really wanted to see you. Little stinker outran me before I could help her look for you."

"No, no, it's fine." Nat squirmed as Gracie demanded to be on her lap. Nat's eyes looked a little red-rimmed, as though she'd just finished crying. It was still a sight, to see her blonde locks growing out and her natural red coming back. It was a nice look on her, much better than her chopped platinum locks from before. I knew following our defeat she'd kept it dyed for some time. At some point she had given up.

Gracie was eyeing Natasha's sandwich on the table. Nat nodded for her to take the other half.

"Food monster," Nat said, tickling Gracie. The little blonde squealed between her bites of sandwich. "Another visit? Or am I babysitting?"

"Just a visit. Steve's not far behind. He went to another meeting, he'd dropped me off nearby to take Gracie for a walk."

"I'm not a puppy!" Gracie protested. "Why can't we get one, Mommy?"

I sighed, to which Nat actually chuckled. It sounded sad, though.

"She's fast on her feet," commented Steve as he stood beside me. "Did she want Nat or did she just want the sandwich?"

"Both," I said.

"Really, what brought you guys here?" Nat asked us.

I looked to Steve, nudging him. "You got this."

"We wanted to see a friend," he said.

"Clearly, your friend is fine," said Nat.

"You know, we saw a pod of whales when we were coming up the bridge."

"In the Hudson?"

"There's fewer ships, cleaner water."

"You know, if you're about to tell me to look on the bright side...I'm about to hit you in the head with a peanut butter sandwich."

"You'd have to wrestle it from Grace first," I teased.

"Sorry," Steve told Nat. "Force of habit." He took the seat opposite Natasha. Gracie remained blissfully unaware of the rather heavy air around her. She was just happy she had food and had Natasha close. "You know, I keep telling everybody they should move on and...grow. Some do. But not us."

"You have, in some ways," Nat said quietly. "You guys moved to a nice place, you've got this little one here." She gave Grace a tickle. "If I move on, who does this?"

"Maybe it doesn't need to be done," I said carefully. Even if Nat was able to stop keeping an eye on world threats, I wouldn't want it passed down to Todd. He didn't seem like the type to handle such a task. Nat could, because she had been at this for much longer.

"I used to have nothing. And then I got this. This job...this family. And I was...I was better because of it. And even though...they're gone...I'm still trying to be better."

"Who's that?" asked Gracie, pointing towards something in particular.

Everyone looked where she was pointing. Camera footage appeared before us, showing a vaguely familiar face. It looked as though he was waiting outside of the facility gates, his ride shut off nearby.

"Oh! Hi. Hi! Is anyone home? This is Scott Lang. We met a few years ago, at the airport in Germany? I got really big, and I had my mask on. You wouldn't recognize me."

Steve rose from his seat. "Is this an old message?"

Natasha shifted Grace into her seat, the former assassin now standing herself. "It's the front gate."

"Ant-Man?" Scott continued. "Ant-Man, I know you know that. I need to talk to you guys."

I took Natasha's seat, keeping Grace in my lap while Nat went to go retrieve Scott. When she returned, she not only had Scott in tow but Todd as well. I exchanged a shrug with him when he gave me a baffled look.

For some time, Scott said nothing. He paced fervently, it was making me anxious.

"Scott," I finally broke the silence. Even Grace had eyes on him, more so probably from the fact she didn't know him and was curious. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," he said absently. "I'm fine. Have you ever studied Quantum Physics?"

"Only to make conversation," said Nat casually.

Since when? Todd asked me.

How should I know? You two share the facility!

"Alright," said Scott. "So...five years ago, right before Thanos, I was in a place called the Quantum Realm. The Quantum Realm is like its own microscopic universe. To get in there, you have to be incredibly small. Hope, she's my...She was my..."

Everyone remained silent as Scott struggled. Whoever this "Hope" was, they shared some sort of bond.

"She was supposed to pull me out. And then Thanos happened, and I got stuck in there."

"I'm sorry," said Nat genuinely. "That must've been a very long five years."

"Yeah, but that's just it. It wasn't. For me, it was five hours."

Should Grace be listening to any of this? asked Todd.

She's not going to understand much of it. She'll be okay. He's not scaring her, so she's fine.

"See, the rules of the Quantum Realm aren't like they are up here. Everything is unpredictable." Scott's eyes fell to the empty plate that once held a sandwich. His eyes went sad, as though longing for food to magically appear. He shook his head.

"Scott, what are you talking about?" asked Steve.

"What I'm saying is, time works differently in the Quantum Realm. The only problem is right now, we don't have a way to navigate it. But what if we did? I can't stop thinking about it. What if, we could somehow control the chaos, and we could navigate it? What if there was a way to enter the Quantum Realm at a certain point in time but then exit at another point in time? Like...like before Thanos."

"Wait," said Todd, "are you talking about a time machine?"

"No. No, of course not. No, not a time machine. It's more like a...Yeah, a time machine. I know, it's crazy. But I can't stop thinking about it. There's gotta be some way...There's gotta be...some w...it's crazy."

"Scott, I get emails from a raccoon, so nothing sounds crazy anymore," said Nat.

"So who do we talk to about this?"

The silence was deafening, but the name was in everyone's minds, I knew. While Tony and I had grown apart over the five years, I had an idea as to what life he was currently living.

We would be pulling him back into the very thing that ruined us all from the start.