Revamped!
Chapter 45: Pym Particles Part Four
Twenty-Seven Years Ago - Pym's Penthouse - 16:43 PM
"Janet," Hank says.
Looking up from her computer, Janet sees Hank enter her home office. In his hands is a simple white envelope with his name written across the centre in black cursive. The envelope itself also has a simple border that was half-pink and half-blue. Janet sees Hank's confused expression and can't help but smirk because she's excited.
"Open it," she tells him.
"What is it?" He asks her.
"I got you a gift."
"It's not my birthday."
"I know." Her smile grows. "It's for Father's Day."
"Janet, it's not Father's Day and we don't have kids."
Janet just gives him an eyebrow raise. Hank slowly opens the envelope and pulls out a card. He ignores what's on the cover of the card but what's on the inside. The card didn't have any standard hallmark text in it but Janet's writing. It wasn't fancy like the envelope but just had Janet's rushed yet still-eligible writing in it, half-cursive and about ten font sizes too big. There was also a happy face at the bottom. Hank has to read the simple two-word message two thousand times before understanding what it says. Janet laughs excitedly as she goes up to hug him.
"We're pregnant!" Hank exclaims, reading the card.
"We're pregnant!" Janet cheers, jumping up to kiss her husband.
-o-
Present Day - El Yunque National Forest, Puerto Rico - 11:22 AM
Angela takes one end of the lower level as Xavier handles the other.
Xavier kicks over one entire table which hits and knocks over some soldiers and scientists. Equipment flies all around and although they're still highly outnumbered, Xavier still has a good knowledge of who's pointing what weapon at him and from where. Bullets bounce off his shield from every angle as he turns. He quickly pulls out his gun and fires back. Xavier quickly turns his shield horizontally and whips it like a frisbee to knock them all over in the circular formation they're all in.
Angela takes random documents that she thinks look important as she kicks over the scientists who mangle them. She shoves them in her utility belt as she uses both of her guns to fire. Once out of ammunition, Angela discards her guns momentarily and starts using some stray test tubes as her weapons. She sees a soldier coming in her direction so she roundhouse kicks him to the ground, taking his weapon as her own.
Merida runs along her side of the upper level. She sees a hoard of soldiers in front of her and she holds one arrow in her quiver. She fires it and the arrow zips by right above their heads. As the soldiers look and wonder why the hell she missed by so much, Merida is already taking them down with her bare hands. She knocks some of them over the ledge, sending them crashing down to the lower level and not caring whether or not they landed on Angela or Xavier since not only will it be their problem but it will be a problem they can handle.
Janet grows back to her normal size again once she lands on her half of the upper level. She takes out her particle storage gun and starts to shrink the place. The walls and ceilings start to crumble down due to the gun and everyone starts to notice. Many soldiers try to take her down to prevent this but she fires back at them with her free hand.
One of the soldiers shoots the gun in her hands and it flies over the balcony and hits the ground below. Janet is about to shrink and fly to get it herself but gets yanked back by her short hair. She screams since she values her hair before kicking her leg back and knocking over the soldier.
Angela dives forwards for the storage gun. As Merida and Xavier cover her, she lies on her back and fires the gun at the ceiling until the place shrinks another couple of feet until the entire place itself is only a few feet above their heads.
"Are we supposed to be in here when the place shrinks into nothing?" Merida asks.
"Unless you want to go to whatever the subatomic world is," Xavier replies. "I know I don't!"
Merida loads her bow and fires it at the last soldier harassing Janet. Once Janet's on her feet again, Angela throws the storage gun back up at her.
"I got this!" Janet exclaims as she catches the gun. "Go!"
They all nod and listen without objection. On a normal mission, they would argue to stay but this place will compress them into a subatomic world and Janet is the only one who could shrink the most without entering it. Once alone, Janet turns the gun into an implosion device by shifting one of the gears. She plants it on the wall and sets it to a ten-second countdown. As it ticks down, Janet knows she has to get out as fast as she can.
Janet climbs onto the ledge and is about to shrink and fly out but gets shot. She gasps as she feels her body go limp and fall unconscious, her eyes closing as she watches the numbers get smaller and smaller.
-o-
The lab itself disappears and all that remains is the storage device. Xavier, Angela, and Merida all run over, calling Janet who is nowhere to be seen. Then they're all forced to believe the truth they didn't want to accept: Janet ran out of time and is now in the subatomic world.
They all look at each other, unsure of what will happen now.
-o-
Present Day - Stark Towers - 11:59 AM
Everything with the Pym Particles on this end is being cleaned up. The whole day was a success despite the accident in the beginning. James looks down at his ringing phone and a small smile approaches his face when he sees that it's Angela. He steps to the side as he picks it up.
"Hey, babe, how's Puerto Rico?" James asks her. "Are you getting a tan?"
Angela: James, are you with your dad?
James looks over his and sees his dad nearby, talking to Emily and Daniel about her drywall problem. A part of him doesn't want to answer that question because the serious and frightened tone that Angela had in her voice makes him not want to know what she would say next. James takes a quick breath, deciding on going with the benefit of the doubt to hope for the best in this phone call.
"Yeah, he's here," James replies casually. "We're still at Stark Towers, just finishing up. Why? What happened?"
Hearing the ongoing phone call, Hank turns around to look at James. They can't hear the rest of his phone call but they notice and can feel the tension coming from it. James faces them and his face is pale with pure shock and his eyes fill up with tears. Hank immediately runs over as James drops the phone on the ground.
"James, who was that?" Hank asks frantically, holding his son.
"Mom's gone, Dad!" James yells. "She's in the subatomic world!"
[Halfway through typing this chapter, I thought of a way they could've shrunken the lab down without Janet getting shot and going into the particle world]. [2020: *has no memory of that*]
