Scott Lang didn't understand half of what had transpired that day. Not that that was an oddity. He was usually out of the loop on any given day that operated outside of his norm. Figuring things out was never his strong suit. He'd simply gone through life following the path of least resistance that was the most stimulating. Unfortunately, that path led him to dark places while letting everyone around him down in the process. His greatest victims being – Maggie and Cassie.

The broken promises he made to his wife (of the time) were inexcusable. The biggest one being that he'd stop burgling, and because of his breach of commitment, he abandoned her and their young child when he'd inevitably gotten caught. Which he always did. And every time that happened he'd justified it by saying that they needed the money. But that was a lie. He was an engineer. He could have easily taken a high paying job and earned an honest wage. He just didn't want to. It wasn't exciting. And he didn't want to put in the effort to find a better, legal option. He wasn't willing to compromise – not even for his family whom he loved.

Then, eventually when the opportunity of becoming Ant-Man was presented to him – another proposal that simply fell into his lap – he took it along with the high stakes lifestyle that came with it; the thing that he missed the most. But it didn't take long until that ended with him back behind bars too – repeating the destructive cycle. And that time, he not only abandoned his family – per his usual – but he also abandoned Hope.

Now, however, he was trying his best to turn over a new leaf and finally take power over his life and the responsibility for his past cruel actions. And he'd be damned if he let his partner down again. Especially after the promise he'd made to her that he would be there for her no matter what.

At current, Scott was walking down the Rainbow Bridge with Janet and Hank flanking him on either side, all in their respective Pym Particle suits, helmets open/deactivated. The Pym's had traveled the (now accessible) Bifrost to Asgard where Scott greeted them on arrival. Despite the beautiful view, trekking over the majestic walkway that led right into the heart of the city, they looked as if they were heading to their demise.

The battle didn't last much longer after Enchantress was neutralised. She wasn't dead though. Apparently, she was able to cocoon herself in magic as the partially collapsed cave fell atop of her, protecting herself. The falling rock merely knocked her out. Luckily, it was for a time long enough for Thor to dig her out and put some sort of anti-magic-lady handcuffs on her (Scott didn't actually know what they were) and haul her off to a special containment inside of the palace.

Meeting them at the mid way point of the bridge, Valkyrie stood with Pegasus. "You need a ride?" Her demeanour was softer than he'd noted of her before the battle.

"We're okay," Janet said, "but a guide would be appreciated." She looked to Scott, silently asking if he agreed.

Scott nodded. "Yeah, she knows this place better than I do."

"Well, alright." Valkyrie mounted her ride. There were no introductions. No pleasantries. Just straight down to business.

Hank pulled a mint tin out of his pocket and placed it onto the ground before opening it. Out from the container crawled a couple ants. After putting the item back into his pocket he shrunk himself down. Scott and Janet followed suit while they too miniaturised themselves.

Scott and Hank mounted their ants and were soon in the air beside Janet who was already in flight, with all three of them now having their helmets on.

Valkyrie then launched herself into the air as the three were pushed back in the wind from pegasus's powerful wings. They quickly recovered, stabilising themselves before following after. The foursome now off towards the mountains.

When Scott had heard the initial transmission from Steve which was, "Hope disappeared with Maria." Scott, along with the others, speculated that Hope had shrunk down with her to seek medical assistance as she flew off with her. But as soon as Steve mentioned that Hope was fiddling with her belt, Scott knew instantly and undoubtedly where they were.

Valkyrie brought them to the flat ground just outside of the Southern entrance of the mountain where the trio grew to size. There were still Svartálfarian bodies being dragged away by Asgardian soldiers around them. The battle had ended a few hours ago but the efforts were still going strong as they cleaned up their home. They especially wanted to disappear all the death from the eyes of the innocent. Many who were still awaiting inside the mountain until they were cleared to leave and return to their homes.

There to meet them were Steve and Natasha who were standing near the entranceway. Both of them looked like they'd seen better days. Bloodshot eyes with gaunt, pale faces. Scott knew their appearances weren't from the battle. Both of the agents were close with Maria. They were her family. Those dead eyes were ones of those who were mourning the loss of a loved one.

Shortly after their feet touched ground, Tony swooped in from the air, landing next to them. They all opened up their helmets.

Everyone stiffly nodded at one another in awkward greetings. Though, Scott noticed one particularly heartfelt gaze shared between Janet and Tony. Not that Scott fully comprehended it. He always assumed Tony didn't care much for Maria. Every time he saw the two together they seemed annoyed by the other.

"So," Hank asked, eyes cast downwards, "is this the site?" He gestured at the rocky ground in front of them.

Natasha shook her head. "Ah, no, they were through this tunnel here." She pointed to the entrance.

"But the van won't fit inside," Scott explained.

"Hmm," Hank grunted, "okay."

He reached into his pocket, pulling out the miniaturised vehicle and placed it on the ground. He then shot a device at it that grew it to size.

Scott moved towards the van to help Hank open the back trunk doors to reveal the travel quantum bridge within it.

"Where's the medical team?" Tony asked as Hank checked the calibration points on the bridge.

Steve answered him in an exhausted tone. "They're all attending to the injured."

"Well, call them over."

Steve huffed in pure exhaustion. "Tony." He pinched the bridge of his nose like he didn't have the energy to say anything beyond the other man's name.

"Maria's first priority." Tony continued, now a little heated as he stepped closer to Steve.

Steve dropped his hand away from his face, looking up at him. "She doesn't need a medical team," he said with visible tears in his eyes.

"Of course she does!" Tony snapped before locking his jaw as he demanded with a pointed finger, "Call – them – over."

"No!" Steve barked, clear that he was getting to the end of his rope.

"No?" Tony laughed out. "Tell me then, who's gonna attend to her injury?" His voice grew louder. "Who's gonna stitch her up and—"

"I was there!" Steve cut him off with a shout. "I saw it." He aggressively pointed at himself as tears escaped his eyes, running down his cheeks. "The arrow went through her body. She doesn't have a puncture wound that needs to be stitched up. Her heart was obliterated on impact. There's just a hole in the middle of her chest now."

"We can still fix her!" Tony aggressively pointed at Valkyrie when Scott could have sworn he saw tears in Tony's eyes too. "They can fix her." He then turned to the Asgardian. "Tell him!" he ordered without authority.

Brunhilde awkwardly yet gently said, "Asgard may have advanced medicine but we do not possess magical hearts that bring back the dead."

Everyone fell silent. A sense of discomfort mixed with despair was palpable in the air as Tony walked away (not too far) and started pacing.

"But," the Asgardian sympathetically offered to the silent Midgardians, "I can act as a medical transport if one is deemed necessary. It's a short flight to our hospital from here."

Suddenly, the sound from a spring loaded collapsible table cut through the air. The gang all looked over to Hank as he planted the travel furniture on the ground. He then wordlessly headed to the driver's side of the van and pulled out a laptop and briefcase. Walking back to the table, he placed the items on top of it and began setting up the equipment that was going to both turn on the bridge and track Hope's suit.

In the time Scott had known Hank he learned that the older man avoided emotional scenes like the plague. So to see him keeping his head down while doing his work as the people around him were crumbling, was very on brand.

To their relief, Hank was quick to set up, because everyone else was too distraught to speak and it was clear they all wanted the silence to end.

"Okay," Hank said, looking at his laptop. "I've got a ping off the Wasp suit and we're calibrated to its general location." He then waved over his wife (of how much longer? Scott didn't know). "Janet, you'll guide me and Scott when we're in there."

Janet didn't walk over to him though, instead she planted her feet steady as she said, "I'm going with Scott, you're staying here."

"Like hell you are." He sounded appalled by her audacity.

"Yeah." She remained firm. "Like hell I am, is right."

"My equipment. My rules. I'm going."

She then locked eyes with him as she strongly spoke. "Our daughter – right now – is probably clinging onto Maria's lifeless body, completely devastated." Her voice started to waver. "And you think you're who she wants to see? The person who's made it abundantly clear that you've never liked her girlfriend, and have wanted her out of her life since day one!"

"Fiancée." Scott practically whispered in correction.

"What?" Janet turned to him, her face aghast.

"Not girlfriend – fiancée." He nodded, remembering how happy Hope was when he found out about their forthcoming nuptials. The smile she had on her face would be no more. "They got engaged earlier today." He was actively holding back tears now. "They were planning to have the wedding right after this mission."

Tears instantly flowed down Janet's cheeks. Her gut-wrenching reaction had Scott's undivided attention so he didn't see how the others took the news. Janet closed her eyes, taking a deep breath before exhaling and looking back to Scott.

"Let's move." She wiped her tears away and went to Hank's table. Pressing a button on the computer, she turned on the bridge. She then grabbed the tracking monitor out from the briefcase that laid open next to the laptop.

Scott complied as he made his way to the front of the bridge next to an already awaiting Janet. She took his hand in her own and turned to look at him, asking, "You ready?"

He nodded before they both looked ahead. Then, with a running start, they jumped into the bridge and went subatomic.

Once they reached the quantum realm and Janet started flying them towards Hope's signal (while towing Scott behind with hands still together) his mind started wandering.

He was thinking back to when he found out that Hope wasn't in love with him. In hindsight, he should've realised it sooner. Specifically, when Hope was so quick to forgive him after he betrayed her for Germany and left her for the Raft. And it's not like she wasn't still pissed at him during their time apart. But – then again – she also didn't care enough to covertly fly in through his window and yell at him during his house arrest either.

She probably would've been fine if she never saw him again. This was evident when he came back into her life. It was like he didn't matter enough for her to hold a grudge against him. Or – more accurately – not one that lasted very long. The cut that he made, if done by someone else, would've been deeper. For the fact was – Hope didn't simply forgive and/or forget when it came to the ones she loved. She was still on shaky ground with Hank, to this day, for his past indiscretions. If she cared deeply for a person she didn't shrug them off. She clung on. For better or for worse. She either festered in anger like she did with her father, or she fought to get them back like she did with her mother, and then later with Maria.

He still remembered Berlin. Scott didn't so much as entertain the thought of calling Hope over to join them. He felt special that Captain America had wanted him specifically for his team and knew if Hope was there she'd outshine him; and he wanted to be the golden child, not her.

But Scott's abandonment of Hope didn't get the Hank-treatment, it got the Janet-treatment. Right there he should have known better. It didn't add up. Because Janet, like Maria, left her due to selflessness where Scott left her due to selfishness. They were saving the world when he was trying to be the centre of it.

Hope clung onto Maria because she mattered. She had always mattered. And now he would have to find them and get Hope to release her. To uncling from the woman who had only ever abandoned her out of love and never in betrayal; and he wasn't sure if he had the strength to get her to let go.

Scott didn't know how long they'd been flying around for. The quantum realm was like that. Time anyways felt odd. Hank called in a few times to check in on them, but the distance between his transmissions were an incoherent concept to fathom just like the distance they traveled.

Whenever Hope asked him about the quantum realm he'd only ever described it as confusing. He wished that she would just go herself, but she always gave excuses. From as far as he could tell, they were probably legitimate reasons. Like she didn't have the time. Or had to monitor something from the outside that he didn't understand. He blindly trusted Hope. Which was something that he was trying not to do with people. But at least with her he knew how capable she was, making it a low likelihood of him getting into trouble while doing it.

"There!" Janet pointed with her free hand to a location up ahead.

In the distance there was an outline of two people squished together on one of those big floaty globular thingys that Hope told him the name of but he forgot. He always just referred to them as King Kai Planets because they remind him of the one tiny celestial body from Dragon Ball that you could walk around in a number of seconds.

As they approached the figures, Scott couldn't help but contort his face at the image before him. He then focused onto Janet as the two shared a look of confusion. She increased her speed as she brought them down, landing on the large mass that Maria and Hope were resting on.

In front of them was the most peculiar sight. Hope was sat hunched over with her legs spread to incorporate Maria who was sitting in front of her. Well, she was somewhat in front of her because – that's where the confusion lay – Maria's torso wasn't leaning up against Hope's sternum, it was inside of it. Like their upper bodies were phasing through one another.

"What the—" Scott gawked, not understanding how that could be.

Janet instantly moved to the women, crouching down next to them as she took a closer examination of the situation.

"Jellybean, can you hear me?" she asked her daughter in a much calmer voice than Scott would have expected to hear in a time such as that.

When Hope didn't reply she quickly took her arm that was flopped over Maria's lap, and whipped off Hope's glove and Stinger so she could shove her two fingers up her sleeve to check her pulse.

After a moment she took up Maria's wrist in her other hand, checking her pulse too.

"She's got a heart beat," Janet whispered with her back to him.

"Hope?"

"Ah– yes." She shook her head. "Hope too." She practically laughed.

"Too?" Scott asked in shock, "Maria has a heartbeat?" He dropped to his knees beside her.

"Their pulses are thumping as one." She looked over to him with glistening eyes and a hopefully smile. She then turned back to them as she said in a heavier tone. "Both are very weak though."

"Are you saying Hope's using her heart to—"

"Yeah."

"How? How did she get Maria like… well like that?" He gestured at their combined bodies. "Our hands didn't Power Ranger's Morphin' Time together like that on our way over here." He knew that she probably wouldn't understand his reference but would still get the gist of his question.

Janet smiled in awe as she said, "Because you and I aren't on the same frequency."

"Huh?" He had no idea what she was talking about.

"They can't stay like this." She ignored his question as she gently put their arms down, letting go of them. "A single heart is not meant to keep two alive."

"But what about Maria?"

"I don't know." She dropped her head, shaking it. "But what I do know is – if we don't separate them we'll lose them both."

Losing Hope was not an option that Scott was willing to risk. He may have really liked Maria, but he loved Hope. Ultimately, he could live with the moral consequences of saving Hope if Maria perished due to his actions.

Guess he wouldn't have to convince Hope to let go of Maria after all. He was about to physically do it himself.

"Hank." Janet addressed the man through their quantum communications device. "Would you please put Tony on the line."

"What? Why?" Scott heard the man grunt through Janet's yellow Wasp suit.

"I would like to speak with him, that's why."

They heard him grumble before he turned over the comms.

"Yes, Auntie Janet?" Tony answered like somehow he believed that he could save the day now that he had the comms.

"Tony, dear, I'm going to come out with Maria so I'm gonna need you to catch us. Okay?"

"I thought Scott was bringing her out?"

"He's going to bring Hope."

"Hope? I don't understand—"

She calmly continued while cutting him off. "Then you and Valkyrie are going to have to fly them both to the hospital."

He eagerly asked, "What's happening in there?"

"I can't get into it right now. Just be prepared. We'll be out shortly."

"Yeah, okay. I got you," he assured her.

"I know. Now can you please put Hank back on?"

Hank then burst on the line like he grabbed the communicator from Tony. "What's going on? Did you find Hope?"

"Yes. But we still need a moment," she said while wiping her brow. "Standby for extraction request."

Janet then moved to the front of her girls, reaching out to take Maria's hands into her own. "Okay, Scott." She gestured to the spot right behind Hope and Maria. "Why don't you grab Hope and pull." She phrased it as a question but said it like an order.

Scott stiffly nodded as he went behind them and took a hold of Hope's waist (which was a part of her body that Maria wasn't phased through).

"What's gonna happen once they're separated?" A horrifying thought then crossed his mind. "If they can be separated. What if they can't be sep—"

"Scott." She gave him a pleading look.

"No. Right. I'm sorry."

"Okay, pull," Janet instructed.

They both forcefully tugged. To Scott's relief, their body's moved apart. There was a fair amount of resistance and they displaced at the speed of molasses, but at least they could be pulled apart.

Once separated, Hope flopped into his arms with her head flinging back onto his shoulder. Maria, on the other hand, was hunched forwards against Janet's body. In her current position, Scott noticed Maria's suit had a two inch tear in the centre of her upper back. He assumed that it was cut by the arrow head after it passed through her body. The information made him subconsciously squeeze Hope's body in his arms, the sympathy he had for his partner now growing.

Janet tightly wrapped her arms around Maria's body after she grabbed Hope's glove and Stinger that were on the ground. Scott then scooped Hope up into a bridal carry as he got to his feet. No one was catching them so he needed to be ready to land appropriately. He then briefly looked down at his partner and dear friend; his stomach churning at the sight of her passed out in his arms.

"You ready?" Janet looked up at him.

Scott wanted them to receive medical attention as soon as possible. "Yeah," he said, not hesitating to answer as he caught her gaze.

She nodded at him.

"Okay, Hank." Janet spoke through her comms. "Pull us out."