CHAPTER 14

The next morning, Scott was shivering in the Ant-Man suit, plastered into the back of a crevice in the fuselage of a jet plane on its way from San Francisco to Boston. “It’s freezing!” he shouted into the mic. “You couldn’t make a simple flannel lining?”

“You’re over the target area,” Pym said, ignoring Scott’s complaints. “Disengage now, Scott.”

Scott had his carpenter ants in three groups. “Squadron A, go,” he said. The first rank tumbled out into the slipstream. “B, go. C, go.” When they were all in the air, Scott guided Ant-thony toward the edge. “All right, Ant-thony, please don’t drop me this time.”

Then Ant-thony leaped out into the air, twenty thousand feet above the ground. “Aaaaahhh, it feels like a big leap from sugar cubes to this!” Scott yelled.

“Stay calm,” Pym said.

A minute later, when the ants came down through the lowest layer of clouds, Scott said, “Uh, guys, we might have a problem. Hank, didn’t you say this was some old warehouse? It’s not!”

The old Stark Technologies warehouse in Hank’s photographs was now a gleaming new complex with the unmistakable Avengers logo a hundred feet wide on the roof.

“Scott, get out of there,” Hope said.

Pym chimed in. “Abort! Abort now.”

“No, it’s okay,” Scott said. He was closer now, and didn’t see any lights on or any sign of human—especially Avenger—presence. “It doesn’t look like anyone’s home. Ant-thony, get me to the roof.”

“He’s going to lose the suit,” Pym said, worried.

Hope looked at him like she couldn’t believe that was his biggest problem. “He’s going to lose his life,” she said.

Ant-thony dropped Scott a foot or so from the gravel rooftop and he tumbled over, hopping to his feet. “All right, I’m on the roof of the target building.”

Back in Pym’s house, he and Hope saw a shadow flash across one of the monitors feeding them the ant’s-eye view. “Somebody’s home, Scott.”

Almost as soon as he’d spoken, certified Avenger Falcon swooped down and landed on the rooftop not twenty feet from where Scott stood in the gravel. He heard someone talking to Falcon over a microphone in his suit. “What’s going on down there, Sam?”

Man, Scott couldn’t believe it. He was right there with the Avengers! “It’s the Falcon!” he reported to Hope and Pym.

“I had a sensor trip, but I’m not seeing anything,” Falcon said, scanning the area to make sure. Looking right at Scott, he said, “Wait a second.”

“Abort, Scott,” Pym said. “Abort now.”

Scott held still, and anyway he was barely the size of the tiny pebbles he stood among. “It’s okay. He can’t see me.”

“I can see you,” the Falcon said.

“He can see me.” There was only one thing to do. Scott hit the thumb button and returned to normal size. He popped up the visor on the helmet and said, “Hi. I’m Scott.”

Hope turned to her father. “Did he just say, ‘Hi, I’m Scott?’” Pym couldn’t look her in the eye.

“What are you doing here?” the Falcon asked, all business.

“First off, I’m a big fan,” Scott said.

“Appreciate it. So who are you?”

“I’m Ant-Man.”

The Falcon tried not to laugh. “Ant-Man?”

“What, you haven’t heard of me?” Scott was trying to be cool, but then he reconsidered. “Nah, you wouldn’t have heard of me.”

“You want to tell me what you want?”

Might as well tell the truth, Scott thought. “I was hoping I could grab a piece of technology just for a few days and return it,” he said. “I need it to save the world. You know how that is.”

“I know exactly how that is,” Falcon said. He started walking toward Scott and talking into his wrist comm. “Located the breach. Bringing him in.”

Oh, I don’t like this, Scott thought. “Sorry about this,” he said, and shrank. Then he launched himself up and punched the Falcon square on the point of his chin. The Falcon reeled backward and took off, the wash from his wings knocking Scott over the edge of the building. Scott hit the grass and took off running.

“What are you doing?” Pym was shouting in his ear.

“Breach is an adult male who has some sort of shrinking tech,” Falcon reported as he glided over the lawn where Scott was trying to evade him. He spotted Scott and landed, trying to stomp him. Scott jumped out of the way and buzzed around Falcon’s head, throwing punches that he hoped weren’t too hard. Or not hard enough. “Sorry about that,” he kept saying. Falcon tried to shoot him, but for one thing Scott was too small, and for another he hung on to the gun’s barrel sight until Falcon gave up. Then Scott tried to hit him again. This time Falcon saw him coming and threw a punch in time to knock Scott sprawling. Also, he accidentally returned to full-size.

“That’s enough!” Falcon said, hauling Scott to his feet—but Scott went after him, putting Hope’s moves to good use. He was standing toe-to-toe with one of the Avengers! All of a sudden having the suit was great.

Then Falcon’s wings smacked together on either side of Scott’s head, and Scott saw stars. He shrank again and shouted, “Ant-thony! A little help?”

Ant-thony appeared, Scott jumped on his back, and they buzzed away toward the warehouse. Falcon followed, but Scott got there first. That meant that when Falcon came in, Scott could again use his size to his advantage. He waited until Falcon stalked through the warehouse door, then he snuck inside Falcon’s suit and started tearing at the electronics.

Falcon launched himself backward through the door, spiraling crazily in the air as his wings shorted out. He hit the ground hard, plowing up a furrow for several yards, then leaped to his feet and looked around. But Scott was on hisback, and all he had to do was wait for Ant-thony to catch up.

As he rode Ant-thony away, he heard Falcon saying into his wrist comm, “It’s really important to me that Cap never finds out about this.”