Out of Time

by S-Jay494

Seeking revenge on Tony Stark never goes out of style. A foe closer than anyone knows has decided Tony's time is finally up, but an unlikely Avengers unknowingly intervenes. Now the team is split in a race against the clock as half scramble to retrieve a teammate who is lost while the rest battle an intentional contagion that threatens many lives, including Pepper's and Morgan's.

1. Chapter 1

Note: This story only makes sense if you've read my post-Endgame story "The Time Thief." This one picks up following those events. I suggest reading it before you graze your eyes across another word in this story. And, for those who did read "The Time Thief" and asked for more… Well, here is the "more."

The characters you know and love are back. Warning: The team (as you last saw it in "The Time Thief") won't have the same numbers by the end of this one… Please ignore typos as I'm dashing these chapters off as fast as I can to get over the boredom of quarantine.

Enjoy.

oOoOo

San Francisco, CA

Home of Dr. Hank Pym

There was a laboratory deep in the basement of the Victorian home that was out of synch with the historic outside of the dwelling. None of the neighbors even had a clue what rested beyond those ornate walls. An ocean of chemicals was locked away in cabinets constructed of steal and bulletproof glass and secured with intricate locks no locksmith (or better than average criminal) could ever hope to pick.

In the middle of the equivalent of modern-day magic potions, sat a confused scientist. His glasses rested on the edge of his nose and his gray hair was mangled from him running his hands through it so often as he struggled to maintain his focus that August afternoon while his daughter was away. Adding to his confusion on the inside was the occasional utter nonsense that her heard on the outside as his visitor sometimes appeared to be having a conversation with someone who wasn't there.

"I have told him," Wanda Maximoff said testily as she glared at an empty space on the wall. "I will do so again. I don't need you reminding me. I know what I am doing."

"Uh, what are you doing?" Pym asked cautiously as he stared at her. "What is it you want from me again?"

He blinked and shook his head as he decided to just stop fighting the fog that filled his brain. It was an odd sensation, both relaxing and terrifying. He knew everything would be fine if he just did what the woman told him to do, yet he also knew that doing what he was being told was unconscionably wrong. He was torn. He wanted to resist, but he was powerless.

In the end, it was that dual feeling of doing something terribly wrong yet doing it for the greater good that gave him the answer he needed… or so he hoped.

"You are my partner, Dr. Pym," Wanda said more calmly a she addressed him directly. "We need a means to kill a man that cannot be tied to either of us."

This was her third visit to the west coast scientist. She had others who she "interviewed" for assistance, but Pym truly was the one with the greatest breadth of scientific knowledge. He was also the one Pietro insisted was the one who would be most beneficial to his plan, a plan only his surviving sister could execute. Wanda pressed her shaking hands to her throbbing temples and took deep breath as her late brother's voice receded into her memory again, taking with it the pain that flared each time he grew impatient. She suggested to him that they just take aggressive action. She could take what Pietro needed; if she did that she could bring him back and he would help restore Vision for her. He had promised, and her twin never broke a promise to her herself in their lifetime.

But his voice, like a burning energy that wove it's way through her veins, insisted she could not just take what she needed. There were steps he wanted her to follow, that she must follow. That those steps made no sense to her did not matter. What mattered was bringing him back which would also allow her to get Vision back. After that, all the pain she felt would stop.

So she followed his instructions to get the technology they needed banking on the promise that he then would reveal the next step in his plan. She resisted the urge to simply flex her powers and take it for herself. Pietro was insistent that someone needed to pay dearly for his loss and her pain, and who was the source of that pain? The man who ruined their lives so many years ago. When she finally brought the rightful end to that evil man's world, she would also destroy the trust of the organization that protected him, the one that returned him when it refused to do the same for those she loved. They all betrayed her, Pietro reminded her each time she began to doubt the wisdom of her actions, and Wanda needed to make them all pay for that.

The pain, a staggering combination of emotional anguish and physical agony, first flared at Tony Stark's funeral. A little burst of fire in her head then began to smolder. It sparked again months later when it was revealed to her that Stark was not actually dead. The flames truly began burning weeks after that when the people she was supposed to trust with saving the world took on a personal mission to save the most unworthy of their group, the mass murderer who took her family from her, the man who was ultimately responsible for putting her brother in harm's way in Sokovia by creating Ultron. The team bent the laws of nature yet again to save a man who was already supposed to be gone, yet when she pointed out their questionable behavior they would not hear her. They also would not even consider taking the same action to return those who were far more deserving of a second chance. Vision and Pietro died before their time, yet Stark was allowed to live multiple lifetimes.

"It needs to end," she assured Pietro as the pain washed over her again and he warned her that the longer the man was allowed to breathe, the stronger the burning in her head would become.

"You want me to help you intentionally kill someone?" Hank shook his head, still not certain she was talking to only him. "That's murder."

He heard his words and thought it odd he didn't sound surprised or against the idea. He just seemed perplexed by it. The part of him still fighting to gain control pushed him to resist just a bit longer.

"I can't condone that," he continued. "I can't kill someone."

"It's Tony Stark, Doctor," she reminded him flatly then twiddled her fingers, sending pulses into his head that calmed his objections and put the slightest bit of a glazed look in his eyes.

"Then again," Hank shrugged, "some people just ask for it, so who am I to judge? Genetically speaking, every Stark I've ever known was nothing more than a rich crook who left a trail of destruction in his wake."

"That is why you will do this for us," she commanded. "You are the only one who can. I think we need a virus, something that will work slowly but be potent enough that he will feel pain. We will use his pain to persuade him to help us."

"Help us?" Hank asked seeming a bit dazed. "Howard only helps himself."

"We will be using it on Tony Stark," she insisted, having hit this speed bump with the man previous. Pym was hung up on his emotions as they pertained to Tony's father, which made it difficult for Wanda to keep him on task. "If we do this, you will have access to his GPS program. You want to use it, don't you?"

When she first broached the idea with him, Pym flatly refused. His rational and lucid mind did not see a use for Stark's time travel that was not hugely ethically questionable. He was even at odds for whether it was wise for the Avengers to have used the technology to save the man who invented it. It was his questioning of the morality of using it (in addition to his still simmering anger at Tony Stark for sharing half of Pym's Nobel Prize) that got him on Wanda's radar as she formed her plans.

"You can go back save your wife," Wanda reminded Hank. "I will save my family, and you will save yours. We've given so much of ourselves. We deserve this reward, but Stark will not give us the technology willingly so this is how we will get it."

"But can't you just make him give it to you without me?" Hank asked with one last swipe at clear thoughts before losing all strength to question her further.

"No," she said firmly. "He is too well guarded by both men and technology, and he and I are not friends."

"But you brought me the specifications on the bracelets," he replied excitedly as he gestured to the parts on the table in front of him. "I'm nearly done with my own design. I've altered it a bit to get more oomph so I can get to the subatomic level to find my wife faster and bring her back. Surely you can get the program we need for the targeting algorithm. That's the one thing I can't recreate on my own."

"Stark erased it from the Avengers database," she scoffed. "After we saved him, he decided no one should have access to his creation. He did not trust even his so-called friends with the technology. He left them only the bracelets, claiming he destroyed the specifications for them and those are the only ones in existence."

"Not anymore," Hank beamed. "For someone who used to make weapons, he sure didn't understand their power potential."

"But he does," Wanda disagreed. "His bracelets were under the heaviest guard even though they cannot work without his program, which he wiped clean from their records. He left the useless pieces and kept the code that makes them function."

Hank grumbled angrily about sharing that Nobel Prize with Tony and again vented his disdain for the accolades lofted at Tony following his speech to receive the award. It rubbed salt in a very old wound for Hank.

"He's Howard's boy through and through," he snarled as Wanda coaxed his anger with a few subtle movements of her hands. "He's a control freak who trusts no one when in actuality he's the one who can't be trusted. He upstaged me when receiving a Nobel Prize, can you believe that? Then he sabotaged the technology that got him the award to make sure he remains necessary if they ever need to use it again. What galls me is he did it in a way that makes it look like he was a team player. He lets his Avenges pals do the hard part of securing the hardware, but he kept the truly valuable part all to himself. He separated the lock from the key. He's probably deleted the whole code; that's more Tony's style. Howard would hide things in places no one would look, but they were always there. If you knew him well enough, you could find them. Not Tony. He just destroys things when he no longer has any use for them, like he did the weapons division at his company. Made his billions then walked away whistling like he was some pacifist hero."

Wanda nodded, pleased her efforts to stoke old grudges in the man were working so smoothly. For such a smart and stubborn man, she found his mind easy to manipulate when she could keep him on track. That coupled with his scientific knowledge were the catalysts for her plan. Before talking to him after he received his scientific award, Wanda believed her persistent grief over the loss of Vision (and her brother) would finally consume her as her depression deepened. When Hank boasted that given the time, he could have developed a better means of time travel than Tony did the burning in her head told her there was another way to ease her pain.

Hank's boast was outlandish, yet it inspired Wanda and gave her hope wrapped in a cocoon of revenge. What if someone could engineer the means to travel to the past again? What if no one was there to object to her using that ability to save those who were lost to her? The Avengers certainly did not hesitate when deciding to save Tony. Their argument that he was not yet dead was flimsy and convenient in her mind. Pietro and Vision were more worthy of rescuing than Tony Stark.

Hank had now created his own bracelets. All Wanda needed was Tony's computer code to program them. Getting the code, and making the Avengers look like the culprits in heisting it, was a delicate matter. To do that, of course, Pietro told her she needed a biological agent so sophisticated it would appear that only those within the Avenger's Initiative could have created it. She would infect Tony and bring him to his knees and make him believe his former teammates were responsible. She would then offer herself as the solution—the one he could trust. He would give up his precious code to her in return for his life. Wanda would take the code and leave him to suffer, knowing only at the end that he was betrayed.

"You're sure this is the only way?" Hank asked.

"Yes," she assured him then added. "When you do this, you will be recognized as the greatest mind in scientific discovery today. They will laugh in embarrassment that they ever had you share the stage and an award with Stark. You must do this to restore the integrity to your field of study that he has tainted."

"Integrity is the backbone of true scientific advancement," he muttered. "Pure science is the only truth we have left."

Despite his misgivings about helping her (he thought Tony an annoying showboat but not nearly the cutthroat bastard Howard was) and multitude of questions (how would they get away with it once Tony knew they were responsible?), Pym nodded. His reservations were strong, but he allayed them as he thought again of Howard and a project they began back in the 1970s not long after Pym began working with SHIELD.

"You will engineer a virus," Wanda prompted him.

"And a cure," he added as he bobbed his head eagerly.

"No," she said firmly sending a pulse of energy into his brain. "We need just the illness. No cure for now. Do not waste time on that yet. We will do that afterward."

"Afterward?" Hank repeated and scrunched his face as though in pain and started to shake his head but a little movement from Wanda's fingers got him nodding again as Howard's voice echoed in his head about the foundation of Project Hysteria.

"You don't want a virus at all," he said as his realization became clear. "They can be too unpredictable. What you want is a living organism, something that can deliver a toxic chemical and render him ill but not kill him until you have what you want. What you need is a bug."

"A bug?" she questioned. "One of your insects?"

"No, I mean an illness caused by a bacteria," he grinned. "They can do anything. Make him bleed from the ears, go spontaneously blinds, experience intermittent respiratory paralysis. It won't be a normal bacteria; it'll need to be genetically modified to do what we want. I'll make it give off a cytotoxin, a chemical that poisons the cells. It'll give countless symptoms and look like 100 different possible diseases so no doctor can diagnose it. We didn't call it Project Hysteria for nothing."

"I leave it in your capable hands, Doctor," Wanda said, waving her hands again. "Speak of this to no one."

He nodded, instantly forgetting that she was there or that they had ever spoken, just like the last two times she visited. He began jotting notes on a pad for a new spin on an old project. His mind remained divided as he began. He felt a reluctance to do this work, yet he also knew he must. At the same time, he felt the urge to work on a computer program that he knew was somehow necessary to his happiness and the safety of others separate from what his visitor wanted. All the while, his mind kept churning up one face and an urge to talk with the man despite their last interaction being one of confrontation.

"I could use your help with this, Howard," Pym muttered.

oOoOo

-Four months later-

Avenger's Base

Upstate New York

Scott Lang sat in the conference room—alone—for what he felt was really too long considering he was an Avenger… he thought. He fought with them. He time traveled. He knew the secret handshake… Okay, maybe he didn't know that, or even if there was one, but he was part of the club. Making him wait and giving him coffee in a paper cup seemed more like something they would do to a guy interviewing for a position rather than someone who had come up with the idea that led to the team actually saving the universe.

He'd been there for every day for five days. Always the same thing. He'd get up in the morning from the room they loaned him. It looked and smelled like a jail cell, at least the nicer ones he'd been in. It had been a nerve-racking week since he arrived in upstate New York. Actually, it had been a rough couple of weeks since he and Hope determined that her father was not just secluding himself but actually missing. It made sense to turn to the Avengers for help because Hank was an important guy… in some circles. Lang just thought there'd be more immediate action on the case.

Instead, he got up each day, went to the conference room and waited. He'd get lunch and then leave around dinner with no one really talking to him. They weren't ignoring him. Rhodes popped his head in and said hi. Dr. Banner did the same but he was leaving the planet for some reason—no one mentioned what that was. Wanda Maximoff glared at him a few times in the commissary… or it seemed like she did. They never got to know each other and she had been pretty cold to him since he arrived that time with the Pym Particles after she objected to traveling to the past to save Tony Stark.

Lang huffed at that. He wouldn't mind seeing Stark even. At least he talked, which would fill the monotonous silence that surrounded him most of the day.

Without company or distraction, Lang drummed his fingers on the table and tried not to think about how bored he was (or how much his worry for Hank had grown each day since he arrived at the base).

"I bet they never made Captain America wait," he scoffed quietly then jumped out of his seat as the door opened to reveal Agent Phil Coulson.

"Mr. Lang," he said as he entered the conference room accompanied by two armed guards as he carried a black, flat box. "We've determined your theory is correct. Dr. Pym did use his own bracelet and program to attempt time travel. That's why no one can find him. He's not here… or now, I supposed. Our engineers have identified the coordinates he used. Director Fury has green-lighted your mission."

"He did?" Lang asked. "That's great! Wait, what mission?"

"You're going to bring him back," Coulson informed him.

Lang sat up straighter and looking out the door to see who else would be joining the conference. He hadn't been to the base in months. There was a dedication ceremony at the former site where Thanos attacked a year earlier. Lang was among those honored at that presentation where the memorial to intergalactic and world-wide peace dedicated and a center for diplomatic resolution to conflict through understanding different cultures was established. After that, he was only called upon once, when some guy who used to be in prison and was hosing crowds of people with a paralytic slime needed subduing. He'd done that mission with Sam Wilson. The Falcon and The Ant-Man, Lang dubbed. Sam just called it a sticky afternoon in Lisbon.

Still, Lang was glad to be back in the rotation. He waited and continued looking, but Coulson merely slid the box to him then jerked his head to the side for Lang to follow. He opened the box and found a Quantum GPS bracelet. He shoved it on his wrist and followed the agent, who walked at a brisk pace down a long hallway then toward the old airplane hangar that housed the traveling platform salvaged from the previous base. Lang swallowed as he felt his pulse quicken.

"Where's the rest of the team?"

"You're it," Coulson said. "You've time jumped twice successfully. You understand how to do it. You'll be going solo."

"I am?" he gaped. "Right now? Just like that?"

"You came to us a week ago to inform us Dr. Pym had disappeared and your inquiries as well as those of his daughter determined he built his own time travel transmitters and created his own program for targeting," Coulson said. "By time travel rules as we know them, he should have been gone a matter of seconds in our time regardless of how long he spent in the past if his trip was successful. He's been missing for going on two weeks at this point. Obviously, something went wrong."

"Yeah, I got that," Lang scoffed. "How am I supposed to go get him?"

"We'll use his program and our hardware," Coulson explained patiently as he gestured to the device on Lang's wrist.

"But what it if it was the program he used to jump that failed," he questioned anxiously as they approached the platform. "Hank's a brilliant guy, but this piece might have been out of his league. What if the reason he stayed in the past is because his program didn't work to return him? You're going to use the same program to try sending me after him. Doesn't that seem like a bad idea?"

Coulson shook his head then spoke to a tech at the command terminal before returning his attention to Lang.

"We don't think so," he answered. "We think the error is in his hardware rather than his software."

"Okay," Lang nodded. "And if it was? Doesn't that leave me in the past with him and unable to bring him back?"

"There were two bracelets in that box," Coulson said then looked to the guard who held the box.

Lang swallowed, not having noticed the second bracelet due to his nerves any more than he noted the guard picking up the box and bringing it with them on the walk to the platform. The guard opened the case again allowing Lang to retrieve the other cuff.

"Put our bracelet on Dr. Pym and dial both of you home," Coulson said. "Our top programmer reviewed Dr. Pym's program and while it is not as sophisticated as Mr. Stark's, we believe it will be able to work with Mr. Stark's Quantum Bracelets."

"Your top programmer?" Lang nodded. "So Tony took a look at things and gave it a nod? He says it'll work?"

Coulson's smile did not falter as he shook his head.

"Mr. Stark is only a consultant for extraordinary circumstances," he replied. "Our programmers were able to penetrate Dr. Pym's firewall and gain access to his files without Mr. Stark's assistance. That's how they were able to deduce Dr. Pym's coordinates. They were able to get a firm understanding of his program and its functionality. It's passable."

"Passable?" Lang swallowed.

Coulson continued to smile blandly as he gestured to the platform.

"You'll be fine," he said.

Lang looked doubtfully at the platform. If it wasn't Hank who was missing, he would be walking out the door that instant.

"I just think this mission came together really fast," Lang said. "I fewel like there should've been a committee and some meetings. We used to do things by committee."

"Not in my recollection," Coulson replied.

"Well, when we decided to time travel the last two times, I recall there being meetings," Lang reiterated. "There were a lot of people in those rooms. You weren't one of them, but I was. We talked. A lot. There was… debate and… plans… and teams. There were a lot more people involved."

"You're working solo due to your experience, and you have a plan," Coulson reminded him as he escorted him onto the platform. "You're going to retrieve your father-in-law…"

"He's not my father-in-law yet," Lang hedged. "I'm engaged. The wedding is in February."

"You'll be back before then," the agent nodded. "We're still a few weeks from Christmas. You've got plenty of time."

Lang exhaled and felt light headed. They were not supposed to mess with time unless it was a world ending scenario. Something told him the gravity of this situation was more than just a missing scientist. That it involved time travel, particularly time travel gone awry, was concerning. That the Avengers put the accelerator to the floor after looking into Hank's computer sent a shiver up Lang's spine.

"Fine," he nodded, settling his mind on taking the journey to the past again. "Where am I going… and when?"

"You're heading to December 1991," Coulson revealed. "You'll appear on a road in Glenn Cove, New York in the evening. There shouldn't be a lot of traffic, but watch for headlights just in case."

"Wait, I thought Hank went to get his wife," Lang began to worry. "She died in like '86."

"Our programmers determined that Dr. Pym went instead to another time and location from what you and his daughter theorized," Coulson explained.

"Why?" Lang wondered.

"I'm sure Dr. Pym had a reason for why he chose this time and place," Coulson said plainly.

"Do you know what it is?" Lang blurted.

"We believe he's gone to see an old friend," the agent said. "We just don't know why. We're sending you to the same spot he targeted, but we're putting you there five minutes earlier so you'll be there when he arrives. Slap the new bracelet on him and activate the return sequence immediately. You can talk with him after you get back. Make sure you don't linger on that road. Safe travels. Hurry back."

Lang nodded but the creeping feeling under his skin was growing.

The technician engaged the program and with flash Lang disappeared. Coulson waited beside the platform, saying nothing, but merely gazing at the spot where the man vanished. When the designated time arrived, 15 seconds after departure, Coulson's watch beeped in perfect synchronization with the computer's internal timer. The screens flickered to life again. The platform hummed briefly.

Nothing happened.

Coulson looked at the technician, who began typing furiously, then turned bewildered eyes to the agent and shrugged.

"What happened?" Coulson asked.

"I don't know," the technician reported. "He didn't return."

"I see that," the agent said. "Why?"

"I don't know," he replied as he began typing again. "There's nothing here. The power is online, but nothing is incoming."

Coulson sighed, an amazing reaction from the man who never showed any emotion outside of his admiration for Steve Rogers. He ordered the technician to leave the system in its current state then called for security to lockdown the hangar.

"No one comes in and no one touches anything in there," he ordered the guards who arrived. "Leave everything on exactly as it is."

He received a steely nod of agreement then headed to another section of the base. He never liked giving the Director bad news. He liked it even less leaving the man with more questions than answers.

All Coulson knew for certain was that they had a problem. Probably more than one considering where they had just sent their rescuer.

oOoOo

-One week later-

Stark Lake House

Evening

The sun was long dipped on the far side of the lake and the icy crystals of December stars were peeking out of the darkness above when Tony entered his bedroom with his arms raised an a wide grin on his face.

"Our progeny is in bed and sleeping in record time," he said victoriously to his wife as she grabbed clothing from her closet and packed her bag.

"Record time?" Pepper repeated and looked her watch. "You started putting them to bed two hours ago."

"Which is a record," he insisted. "I can't help it if James becomes a musing philosopher as soon as his head hits his pillow."

"Tony," she tried to stifle a grin, "asked 'why that?' is barely a questions and certainly not a prompt for a philosophical discussion. It's a toddler trying to keep you talking so he doesn't have to go to sleep."

Morgan, age 6, and James, age 2, knew that on nights when Daddy was in charge of the bedtime routine, there was a different threshold for timelines. Although, Pepper mused, two hours was technically less time than normal for Tony to put the kids to bed. The real sign of victory would be if both of them remained in bed. If Tony was working on something in his downstairs office, Morgan was apt to sense this and wander down the stairs to spy. James was just as likely to wake up for no reason and go into Morgan's room where he would begin emptying her toy box for no reason other than he enjoyed making messes. For that reason, the toys available to him in his room were limited in number. Otherwise, he would be up at all hours. Pepper suspected that was somehow genetically Tony's fault as his mind seemed to work overtime even when he was sleeping. She was considering asking her husband to program FRIDAY, his AI assistant, to create a warning sensor to inform them anytime James' head left his pillow during the nighttime.

"But he is asleep now," Tony persisted. "Morgan went out like a light. I know they played nice all afternoon, but do you think there's a chance she'll claim tomorrow she can't get along with him because it's too exhausting?"

"If she does, I have faith in your ability to reason her into a different interpretation," Pepper chuckled. "Besides, tomorrow we are in Boston. She will have all new reasons to be tired. Have you packed yet?"

He didn't see that packing needed to be such a production that it took all evening the way Pepper did. Then again, he reminded himself, all he needed to do was take care of his own things. Pepper had to get everything ready for the kids (mostly because she didn't trust Tony's approach of letting their children choose their own clothing). Knowing her children, that could make for a wild array of possibilities. Pepper wanted any public appearance by her children to receive as little notice in the press as possible. While the ceremony where the family would be present was closed to the press at large due to the proprietary information that would be discussed, there would be a pool photographer to document some of it and surely a shot or two of the children so many clamored to see but rarely did would get snapped. For that reason, Pepper was in charge of clothing choices for them.

"I packed after lunch while James was sleeping," Tony answered as he approached her and wrapped his arms around her. "It took like 10 minutes. You're making this too complicated."

"I'm making it organized," she said.

"But you're not having fun," he grinned. "This could be more enjoyable."

"How?" she asked, ignoring the trace of his lips along her neck.

"You could add a striptease, for example," he suggested.

She scoffed and shrugged off his overtures and continued getting her Chanel suit and the right heels in her garment bag.

"I'm packing right now, not disrobing," she informed him.

"Well, James managed both at the same time earlier tonight as I recall," Tony remarked, thinking of how his son (yet again) removed all of his clothing with no reason or provocation as his mother completed his bag for their trip. "He learned that from someone."

"He is more you than me," she asserted confidently. "His body automatically repels clothing, much like yours did in your 20s and 30s."

"Why are you so keyed up about this trip?" Tony asked, fixing her with a worried look. "It's a grant presentation, Pep. It's a grip and grin photo op that's we've done numerous times over the years. The hard work was done by the applicants and the award committee. The only change this year is that the kids will be there either in in the audience or backstage. Whatever you prefer. Happy and Peter will be around to watch them. It'll be fine. You're not the one who's supposed to be anxious. That's my territory."

Pepper sighed. She couldn't explain the knots in her neck and stomach any more than she could find a reason for the anxious thoughts in her mind. They started a week earlier for no reason other than Tony got a call from the Avenges base. It was a short call, less than five minutes. Agent Coulson merely asked if Tony would be available for a conference if they needed him on a technical matter. Tony thought little of the request—it was coming from Coulson so that set his mind at ease. If they sent Sam Wilson to the door or if Fury landed in the yard in a helicopter, then he'd worry he told Pepper.

She wasn't relieved so easily. She had begun to wonder if Tony wasn't the only one in the family who had some repressed trauma issues. He regularly talked with a psychotherapist and it had worked miracles on his ability to deal with stress and process so much of what had happened to him in his life. Pepper's sudden burst of jitters had her wondering if she might benefit from the same. After so many years at Tony's side (and being at ground zero for some of his most damaging moments) left marks on her memories, too.

Before she could express what was bothering her, Tony's phone began to ring. He didn't even glance at it initially as he kept his eyes on his wife. One thing about wielding the power that Tony had (namely the part where no one ever really successfully gave him an order or made him do anything) was that he never had to interrupt what he was doing because he was being summoned. Whether it was a congressional subpoena or even a group of superheroes showing up in the driveway, Tony greeted the world on his terms and his timetable. Always. So the phone rang and he paid it no attention.

Pepper, however, needed a moment to figure out how best to answer her husband's question. To buy the time, she pointed at the trilling instrument and returned to arranging her garment bag. Tony looked at the screen and announced his caller as he answered by putting the phone on speaker.

"Rhodey," he said. "You know, it's almost my bedtime. I could get in trouble being on the phone so late."

"I need you," the former Air Force Colonel said rather than get snared in his friend's playfulness. "I'm like three miles from your driveway."

A corkscrew sensation started down Tony's spine as he froze in place. He felt the color drain from his face then watched the reaction on Pepper's as she saw it happen. She too stopped moving and stared back at him as he cleared his throat and found his words.

"Is this a 'you complete me' confession, or are you looking for a favor, buddy?" he forced he joke, amazing himself once again at how calm he could sound when inside his mind was starting to swirl and howl like a tornado.

"Man, I am sorry to do this to you," Rhodes continued. "I'll be there in a few minutes. We'll talk then."

He disconnected leaving Tony and Pepper in silence. Tony swallowed and looked at his wife's ashen face as she looked back at him tensely.

"So," Tony exhaled as he started moving toward the door, "Rhodey's coming over. FRIDAY, is anything going on anywhere that might be a problem?"

"Checking all news feeds and available security databases, Boss," his AI responded in a hushed voice as the nighttime protocol required.

Tony nodded and made his way out of the room. Before turning toward the stairs, he quickly detoured down the hall. He quietly slipped into James's room and then Morgan's, telling himself it was just to look in on them while trying very hard not to consider that the brief peck each got on the forehead were not kisses goodbye. That was a hard sell for himself as the memory of saying farewell to Morgan the morning after he solve the riddle of time travel was flashing in his mind. As his footsteps sounded on the stairs, Pepper remained in their bedroom looking out the windows for the dreaded arrival headlights as she began to shiver.

On the main floor, Tony slapped on his unique watch—the one that told time and also contained a few extras in the form of defensive technology that he hadn't needed in several years but had also not disabled. He also went to his work where his holotable sat and retrieved a pair of glasses that gave him access to the heads up display for his full server array and clipped them onto the collar of his long sleeve t-shirt for easy access if he needed them but resisting putting them on to see what FRIDAY found for information that might tell him what was coming at him. He noticed a tremor nerves in his hands as he scraped them down his clean shaven face. He then forced himself to take a deep breath as lights spilled across the yard from Rhodes's arriving vehicle.

Tony stepped onto the porch, leaving his coat inside as evidence of his aspiration not to leave his home that evening. As he sat on the railing and waited in the frigid air, Rhodes exited his car. He exhaled a heavy plume of breath, signifying he was preparing for a debate that both weighed on him and that he did not want to have. Tony folded his arms further announcing his lack of interest in the discussion.

"You don't call, you don't write," Tony said as Rhodes climbed the steps. "I never hear from you like that anymore."

"I had dinner with your whole family last weekend, and two weeks before that I went to California with you to check out the new biomedical production facility," Rhodes said.

"But did you call or write?" Tony remarked. "Your call tonight doesn't count. Neither do text messages. I'm just saying a hand calligraphy letter goes a long way when you want to romance someone."

"Are you finished?" Rhodes asked flatly.

"Yeah, I'm out of material," Tony replied. "I'm also too tired to create more. Plus Pepper and I are packing. We're heading to Boston in the morning. September Foundation Grants are awarded tomorrow night. I have a full day planned. Morgan wants to see for herself if the harbor is still brown from the Boston Tea Party, which she learned about in school last month. I told her it's still a disgusting shade, but that has nothing to do with tea. In a rare turn of events, she didn't automatically take my word for it and wants to independently verify it with her own eyes. Obviously, the magic has worn off so I'm not in the best frame of mind."

"You'll recover," Rhodes assured him. "Look, I know the timing is bad. I wouldn't be here right now if we had any other option."

"We," Tony repeated and bowed his head.

His friend's words churned in Tony's head. The team had determined he was their only option. That led to the inference that they'd gone through multiple options already, which meant the problem was sufficiently troubling that it needed a solution that required something extreme—like calling in the consultant they vowed never to go to unless they were out of better choices—at night when Rhodes knew Tony was planning to leave the area with his family for a mini getaway in 12 hours.

"So," Tony began, "something's gone horribly wrong. That's it, right? Must be given the hour and surprise attack you've pulling."

"Attack?" Rhodes scoffed. "Man, I called you to say I was coming. Now, I'm standing on your porch waiting patiently for you to have your say before I explain anything. How is that a surprise or an attack?"

"It feels like an ambush," Tony shrugged petulantly. "You know what those do to me."

Rhodes pinched the bridge of his nose. Agitated and mildly manic Tony was never easy to deal with. Rhodes was skilled at it, but it was like dealing with a toddler hyped up on sugar and caffeine who hadn't napped and was just told he couldn't go to the awesome birthday party he'd been talking about nonstop for days. The only way to get through it was to stay on course and not let him or his comments redirect the discussion.

"We need your help," Rhodes said in a voice that was both rigid with purpose and reluctant with the edges of an apology as he knew the initial response he would receive would be negative.

"No," Tony shook his head as he folded his arms.

"Yes," Rhodes nodded.

"Again, gotta correct you there, buddy," Tony replied. "I don't work for you. I also don't work for your boss… or anyone for that matter. I'm retired."

"First off, you work on your green engines project and your medical thingamajigs all week long," Rhodes pointed out as he folded his arms, signaling he was not backing down. "How is that retired?"

"What, I can't have hobbies?" Tony replied. "And please, if you're going to mock cutting edge technology that saves the lives of children, refer to my advance nano-tech biosensors as a whatchamacallits, not a thingamajigs. It's important stuff and deserves more syllables."

Despite his stress, Rhodes smirked and nodded. His best friend was a lot of things and stubborn with a side of combative when his plans were interrupted were always near the top of that list. Tony was a rare breed in the universe: a living, retired superhero. There was but one other: Captain Steve Rogers. Rhodes had considered dropping by to see his former team leader that evening to seek counsel from him on the sagacity of pulling Tony back into the Avengers operations, but Cap was recovering from a cold. While not a deadly ailment normally, at well over 100 years old any illness made his friends worry. Of course, talking to Cap wasn't technically allowed as the problem facing the Avengers was internal and secret—so secret Rhodes was convinced he only had half of the story himself. In fact, the only reason he was at the lake house to fetch Tony was because Fury had ordered it personally after figuring Rhodes was the only one with any hope of getting Tony to agree.

For that reason, Rhodes decided full disclosure of all he knew was necessary, whether Fury liked it or not.

"There's something going on and they haven't told me the whole story yet," Rhodes revealed. "I know we've lost someone. I don't mean the guy is dead. I mean he's missing, and we don't' know how to find him. We sent him on a mission that we shouldn't have in my opinion. Someone was messing with stuff he shouldn't so we sent in a guy to pull that other guy out. If we could get him back on our own, I wouldn't be here asking you for a favor. If there was anyone else who could help, I'd be there, not here. Tony, a man's life depends on this."

Tony hung his head. The friend knew just the right spots to hit to get a reaction and tear down his defenses.

"Wearing armor again is not an option for me," Tony reminded him. "You do recall all that stuff they did to fix me in Wakanda, right? Well, that's all still working because I don't play with radioactive matches these days."

"Yeah, I know," Rhodes nodded. "I would never ask you to risk that again. We don't need you to suit up. We need your brain."

Tony scoffed in such a way that Rhodes heard echoes of ages ago and expect a confident and cocky response along the lines of: Honestly, who doesn't?

But that wasn't the answer he got.

"Well, the gray matter is a cross between pudding and Jell-O right now," Tony said as he tapped his temple. "FYI, this level of useless and messy in here is never a good thing for the all of you out there. It's some other genius' turn to play savior, buddy. Not to mention that the last time you guys came to me and asked me to think my way through a big problem I ended up dying, so thanks for the flashback. My shrink will love the rerun of my greatest hits in our next session."

He clapped Rhodes on the arm and started toward the door again.

"Tony, I'm sorry," Rhodes genuinely apologized. "I'm not looking to stress you out. I'm your friend. We're brothers. I'm not going to put you in a situation where your life is on the line. You know I'd never do that."

"There's a 'but' at the end of this, isn't there?" Tony interrupted.

Rhodes hung his head and nodded rather than start a debate. Tony, wound up and angry, was a cyclone in a jar. Letting the lid come off was asking for a disaster.

"This is looking like a life or death kind of problem for our guy," Rhodes said then confessed the biggest secret he knew so far. "We used the GPS bracelets."

The remark had the intended effect. It stopped Tony's brewing objections cold. His jaw hung open and he blinked. All fight in him evaporated for a split second.

"The GPS bracelets?" Tony repeated. "Not possible. Not mine anyway. See, you don't have the program to make them work. I scrubbed the targeting devices—four times to be certain. They don't work. So, are you telling me someone else created a Quantum GPS system that does what mine did?"

Rhodes winced, half shrugged, then admitted a hybrid attempt was used with Tony's hardware and another designer's software. He watched his friend's temper go from simmering to boiling.

"Didn't anyone think it would be colossally dangerous to try that?" he ranted as he raked his shaking hands through his hair. "Not to mention that there was nearly universal agreement that time traveling ever again was at best unethical as well as being a cosmically bad idea absent world-ending scenarios being on the line. How the hell did you manage it? Last I knew, Hank Pym won't let anyone have his super-duper red Kool-Ade, which is possibly the only time I've ever thought something Hank Pym did was a good idea."

Rhodes cocked his head to the side and let his friend fume, knowing the anger would be quickly spent as long as he didn't stoke his friend's need to fight by actually arguing with him. Tony simply needed facts to get his head straight and back into the meat of the discussion.

"We had Pym Particles," Rhodes persisted on point. "We used them to send the guy into the quantum realm."

"Plane," Tony corrected.

"What?"

"You said Quantum Realm like it's some fantasy land in a role playing game," he fumed. "It's a plane of existence, not a realm in a fairy tale. It's the Quantum Plane."

"Well, we sent in there," Rhodes plowed onward, "but he didn't come back. We don't know why. We don't know what happened."

"You went spelunking into the past and got bit," Tony nodded. "That's what happened. Maybe your guy died in the past and that's why he didn't come back."

"Maybe, but what if he's just stuck?" Rhodes persisted. "Is there any way for us to reel him back?"

"You want me to be Quantum Ahab and go fishing for your white whale?" he snapped. "That story didn't end well. Why don't you ask the hack who created the new program? If he's smart enough to manage that, let him be your savior."

Rhodes sighed and shook his head because he didn't have that answer despite asking Fury that precise question. The response was that he would be told when he arrived back at the base with Tony Stark. Rather than stew on that, Rhodes prompted Tony by asking simply if it was even possible to remotely retrieve anyone, knowing the base problem was something that might gain traction in the man's brain. After a moment, he saw his friend's eyes narrow as the cogs began turning. He noted Tony nod slightly. At least taking the fate of the universe in the macro off his mind gave him one less thing to be angry and stressed about while giving him a math and science problem to toy with would give him something to play with and somewhere he could channel his stress.

"Obviously, our best people are in over their collective heads," Rhodes admitted. "That means we're fresh out of people who know the Quantum Plane. There is one expert on the planet who we didn't talk to until just now."

He nodded at Tony, seeing a slight hitch in the man's cheek at the subtle stroking of his ego. Tony rolled his eyes slightly.

"So, what scavenger hunt did Nick Fury's mighty men go on this time?" he asked aggressively. "And how badly are we all screwed because of it?"

He cringed as he asked, not fully wanting the answer. His heart began hammering, and his mouth went dry. He felt all the work he'd done sitting with a therapist for the last two years unraveling—or more accurately, retying all the knots in his psyche once again. He also knew, regardless of his participation, he was somehow to blame for whatever was happening. When Scott Lang reappeared after the blip and suggested the crazy idea of using the Quantum Plane as a medium for time travel, Tony Stark created something powerful that (intentionally or not) knocked over a domino. That his creation had somehow, three years later (and without his involvement) kicked a hornet's nest so that everything was going to hell in a handcart yet again was probably inevitable, he murmured to himself.

"No, it's nothing like that," Rhodes assured him. "The universe, the planet, not even any government has a stake in this."

"As far as you know," Tony grumbled.

"There's just our guy missing," Rhodes insisted. "This is just us, the Avengers, fixing a problem that's ours alone."

"Or so you think," Tony added. "You told me you think the one-eyed king of secrets hasn't told you everything."

"That's true, but it doesn't change what I'm asking of you," Rhodes agreed. "We need a favor. We need you to reactivate your program so we can get this guy back."

Tony shook his head and explained it wouldn't work. His program was calibrated to work with his hardware. Not only that, it would (as the bastardize test using the hybrid system demonstrated) not work with a competing technology. Tony further theorized that using the new targeting program had altered the ability of his bracelets to be targeted using the original program. That also didn't take into consideration the mammoth task Rhodes set for him of figuring out if a remote retrieval using any program was possible.

Rhodes felt the tension radiating off his friend and felt his own anxiety kick in as the problem, a colossally large one in his mind when he first arrived, grew exponentially as Tony began easily poking holes in theories and finding speedbumps in the road no one at the base had even considered.

"Our guy's been gone for a week now," he confessed. "We've run out of better ideas, so they sent me to get you because you understand this stuff better than anyone. Please, just take a look and see what you can figure out to help us. This is just equations and computers. You're not going anywhere other than the base. You're not putting on armor. You're not even going to pick up a weapon. We're just asking you to think the way out of this. It's computer work only."

Tony looked back at the house as the door opened. Pepper appeared, wrapped in a coat and holding out a fleece for Tony. She folded her arms and peered at them questioningly.

"This looks intense," she said.

She turned her gaze to Rhodes and looked at him flatly, her eyes were heavy with worry. Tony forced a grin as he slid his arms into his jacket, presenting her with an expression devoid of concern.

"I think you just missed me," he said. "You're rethinking my suggestion based on James' demonstration for a better way to pack."

"It's that bad that you're changing the subject already?" she replied as she looked suspiciously at Rhodes. "What's going on?"

"Rhodey's lonely and wants me to tuck him in then read him a bedtime story at the base," Tony snarked only to receive her continued disbelieving expression which resulted in his shoulders drooping in defeat. "Someone at the base broke something, and they need IT support to fix it. They've got no one competent on the nightshift so he's here begging for a favor. I'm charging my full consulting fee even if I look at the problem and determine they just need to reboot the computer."

She shifted her feet and sighed. Tony offered her an earnest expression. Rhodes bowed his head as an apology that he wasn't sure she accepted.

"We're getting on a plane at 10 a.m. tomorrow," she said. "Do you understand what I mean when I say we?"

"Yes," he smirked. "You, me, and the womb gremlins. I'm clear on the definition."

"Good because that means, you understand we all will get on the helicopter at 9 to get to the airport no later than 9:30," she said firmly.

"Right, but Rhodey just needs my help tonight," he replied.

"Rhodey can wait a few days," Pepper insisted.

"Apparently not," Tony winced. "Look, I don't completely know what's going on, but what I just said is pretty much what he told me. He wouldn't ask if it wasn't important."

A furrow appeared between her eyes as her jaw tightened. She eyed Rhodes coolly to the point that he stepped away, seeing again the betrayal he saw in her eyes identical to when he revealed that Tony was alive and being kept secretly at the Avengers' base several years earlier when the whole world thought he was dead.

"You know that if Rhodey's here at this hour asking for my help that it's not something little," Tony began.

"Yeah," she nodded. "That's what worries me."

"This time is different," he assured her with more confidence that he was feeling, but the need to ease her fears was stronger than his own. "He needs me to take a look at and fix whatever they screwed up. They lost someone on mission, and by lost I mean they just can't pinpoint where the guy is. They don't know how to find him. They're getting desperate and need consultant help to target his location remotely. Enter me, stage left."

"Consulting only?" she asked.

"Well, I'll probably have to do some programming, too," he said.

"Tony."

"I'm only going to the base to sit at a computer and see if I can figure out the glitch," he vowed.

"Why does it have to be right now?" she asked.

"Because that's when he's missing: now," Tony offered.

"Who did they lose?" she asked.

"I don't know," he shook his head as he gestured to his friend. "It's not Rhodey obviously. He didn't give a name. That's probably because whoever it is I don't know or don't like. Let's be honest, those are both pretty big lists."

She smirked before he offered her a hug while assuring her he was only going to review computer data and nothing more. She relented with a frustrated sigh that spoke volumes about her resignation. He gave her a soft peck on the cheek and predicted he might even be home by sunrise if the problem wasn't actually difficult for him to diagnose. He also vowed the only danger he faced was getting carpal tunnel syndrome since their keyboards were not aligned for him specifically the way all of his were nor did they have his level of voice controlled AI.

"See that that's the only trouble you face," she advised him. "If you want to see action and destruction, James and Morgan are bound to be at each other's throats by 8 a.m."

"Don't worry," he murmured, prompting her to blush, as he pulled her closer, "if I wanted something rough, I'd suggest something that doesn't involve the kids."

"Well, you're choosing to spend the night with Rhodey rather than me so good luck with that," Pepper said as she stepped back from him. "Do what you can for whoever is missing, but don't start mainlining coffee to keep yourself going."

"So don't make stupid mistakes faster?" he nodded. "Good advice."

"Tony," she sighed with a warning look.

"Don't worry," he promised as he tapped his watch. "FRIDAY will babysit me. I'll tell Rhodey to throw some kale at me for a midnight snack and then make him drive me home as soon as we're finished. If he tries to pull the old 'car ran out of gas' ploy on the way back just so he can have his way with me, I promise you I'll resist. My maidenly virtue belongs only to you."

She laughed unwillingly and shook her head as she nudged him toward the steps.

"I think after all these years he's given up on you and your virtue," Pepper replied. "He's figured out you're just a tease."

Despite her chiding, he heard the fatigue and worry in her voice. Despite his history of diving headlong into projects and acting independently for his own reasons, Tony had set most of that aside when they married. It had not been a Me world for him in a long time. His life was a We proposition, one that was reinforced with the births of their children.

"Do you want me to say no?" he asked earnestly. "They can upload the data they've got on their problem and I can look at it in the morning after before we head to the airport."

"You'll just stay awake all night trying not to think about it," she surmised as she shook her head. "You're not going to rest until you see what the problem is and start working on it. So get going. The sooner you get there, the sooner you can figure it out and come home. Good luck."

"No such thing—it's all causality essentially based on the roots of Newtonian Physics," he said and kissed her before reluctantly walked toward Rhodes' car. "It's gonna be fine, Pep. I promise. No surprises. I'm not missing the plane."

Rhodes nodded apologetically and waved his thanks to Pepper as she stepped back inside. They headed down the driveway and were at the road before Tony started his inquiry again.

"So who is it?" he asked. "Who's missing?"

"Lang," Rhodes explained.

"What?" he blinked. "Why would Lang even be…? What the hell did you have him go do?"

"I don't know," Rhodes said as they turned down the driveway and gained speed as they headed for the base 15 miles to the east. "I know Lang came to the base. He met with Fury. Then he was chilling in a conference room for a few days. Next thing I know, I get called in and told he went into the past but did come back. That's really all I got."

Tony groaned and hung his head as his thoughts went first to Lang's teenage daughter. Wondering whether she was told her father was missing was irrelevant, but it still bothered him (and made him think of Morgan).

He shook his head to clear those unhelpful thoughts then asked who created the program they used but got a shrug for a response. He asked if Hank Pym had been consulted in case it was just a bad batch of Pym Particles. That was a discussion Tony didn't want to have. There was a reluctant peace between them. They didn't talk. They didn't even look at each other. The man decided to not be pissed at anyone with the surname Stark after he thought Tony was dead. Attending Tony's funeral was his form of burying the hatchet over his anger at Tony's long-dead father. The man then felt betrayed when it was revealed months later that Tony was in fact alive. Things didn't improve in the one-sided Pym-Stark feud when six months after Tony's public resurrection, the two men were co-recipients of the Nobel Prize for Physics. For alphabetic reasons, Pym received his prize first; therefore, he gave his speech first, but he felt he got overshadowed by Tony's acceptance speech moments later. For his part, Tony just thought the guy needed a new tailor, a little more sunlight, and offer a few self-deprecating remarks while letting go of his corrosive rage about the past. Helping pull Pym out of his own mess felt a lot like karma nudging Tony once again.

"Where and when did Lang go?" Tony asked.

"I don't know," Rhodes explained.

"Scott dialed up a place and time but didn't tell anyone?" Tony scoffed. "So he's taking over my job of worst team-player?"

Rhodes let the comment slide. The more frustrated Tony was the more he sank into the old sore spots of the past. No one in the Avengers would consider calling the guy selfish any longer. He'd get called a pain in the ass, annoying, or an arrogant son of a bitch, but when someone laid down his life to save the entire universe it kind of erased any hard feelings from the past about a man's selfishness.

At least, that's what it did for everyone but Tony. He held no ill will toward any of the team. He would never be a fan of Bucky Barnes, but he'd put that painful chapter in the past with the loose and awkward peace accord between them. The only trouble was with Tony and himself. He was still learning how to let himself off the hook for a few of his past acts that caused more than a bit of trouble.

"We know where we tried to send him," Rhodes said. "Our software guys did all the pre-checks and were certain everything was working, but…"

"But you put in the coordinates and Scott went bye-bye," Tony scoffed.

"The system like went into this blue screen of death mode," Rhodes answered. "We ran the emergency protocol to see what happened, but it didn't do anything. Man, it's all a big mystery right now. Just help us sort out what went wrong with the program and I swear I'll have you home to catch your flight to Boston."

"You better," Tony said, "or you're the one calling Pepper."

Twelve hours later, Rhodes wished the worst thing facing him was an uncomfortable call to Pepper.

oOoOo

A/N: More to come. Reviews make chapters get published faster. Posting/tweeting/any social media plugging for my original novels increase that speed by a factor of 10. See author profile for details.