They took the transit van to within two blocks of Pym Technologies. Coulson ran the briefing from memory, no notes.
"The expo gave Darren Cross a public profile he didn't have before," Coulson said. "Which means standard infiltration options are narrowed. He knows who the Capsule Corporation is. He's going to know S.H.I.E.L.D.'s enhanced roster shortly, if he doesn't already."
He looked at Skye, then Donnie Gill. "Both of you competed in the World Martial Arts Tournament. You are recognized superhumans with a public reputation. Neither of you gets near the building in an official capacity. As long as Darren isn't stupid, he won't give you the chance to get in."
Skye and Donnie both nodded, accepting this without argument.
Coulson's gaze moved past Melinda May and Jemma Simmons, settling on Fitz. "Mechanical engineering, electrical engineering," Coulson said. "With your knowledge and abilities, you can easily be hired by Pym Technologies. The infiltration mission is yours."
Fitz nodded. "I apply for a job through the normal process, get in, and monitor the movements of the company and Darren Cross."
Skye raised her hand. "Is there actually a problem we know about? The documents I've reviewed don't show anything unusual."
"That's the point," Coulson said. "We are only there to monitor and gather intelligence, rather than directly going to their door to make arrests. The Yellowjacket suit is impressive, but it's not anything inherently special to S.H.I.E.L.D. We will not resort to trickery or coercion."
He looked around the van. "If everything goes well, S.H.I.E.L.D. may become a legitimate client. But we need to prevent some bad things from happening and avoid such products from being sold on the black market. As for Darren himself, we need to make sure he doesn't become arrogant and go down the path of crime because of the power the Yellowjacket suit offers."
Skye nodded thoughtfully. "I understand. An investigation and assessment are needed."
"Assessment is part of what we do," Coulson said. "Tony Stark faced the same treatment back then."
Darren Cross and Hope van Dyne were having dinner at a high-end restaurant. Darren ordered champagne before they'd even looked at the menu, which was a tell.
"I've been thinking a lot about gratitude lately," Darren said, which was how he'd been starting conversations lately—with something that sounded philosophical but was actually personal. "And this morning, while meditating, an interesting idea suddenly popped into my head. I think it might apply to you as well."
Hope smiled faintly. "Go on."
"Gratitude is also a form of forgiveness," he said. "I've been angry with Hank Pym for so many years. I dedicated my talent to him. I could have worked anywhere, but I chose a terrible mentor. And you... you didn't even have the right to choose."
Seeing Hope's thoughtful expression, Darren continued. "He never trusts you. Kicking him out of the company he founded may not be honorable, but he forced us to do it, didn't he? We shouldn't be angry; instead, we should be grateful. It is precisely because of his failures as a teacher and as a father that we were prompted to grow stronger."
Hope nodded, looking at him over the rim of her glass. "You are Darren, a success, and you have won everything."
Darren picked up his champagne, took a sip, and leaned in. "But I need your help with something."
"What's the matter?"
"I heard there's a company that supplies S.H.I.E.L.D. with a super soldier serum that has no side effects," Darren said. "The company is controlled by S.H.I.E.L.D. I think you could communicate with them on behalf of Pym Technologies. See if you can persuade them to allow us to purchase—or exchange the Yellowjacket suit for—the serum."
Hope raised an eyebrow. "You actually knew about this? There hasn't been any public information revealed about a flawless serum."
"The information was leaked by a client who wanted to cooperate with us," Darren said, his voice dropping lower. "We all know the effects. The fact that Captain America is still active in the Avengers shows how powerful this serum is. It gives superhuman strength, slows down aging... Can you imagine the power a super soldier would unleash after being equipped with the Yellowjacket suit?"
He tapped the table. "This will be an absolutely more powerful combination than Ant-Man, and even more powerful than your father. I believe the two will have a synergistic effect. One plus one is greater than two."
Hope nodded slowly, seeing the undeniable logic in the math. "But has your research on shrinking particles been successful?"
Darren clenched his fist. "Hank really doesn't want to help us at all. We are still stuck on the problem of not being able to shrink living matter. The technology isn't mature enough yet. We need time, but I believe we will succeed."
He unclenched his hand and smoothed his expression. "Although there is no finished product yet, communicating with a vision for the future is an innate ability of us entrepreneurs. I need you to navigate the situation on their side. Find out S.H.I.E.L.D.'s attitude toward our product, and assess their director, Smith Doyle. Find out how many shrinking particles and Yellowjacket suits it would take to exchange for a dose."
Hope looked at him for a long moment. Darren's request aligned perfectly with her own need to speak with Smith Doyle.
"I will go," Hope said. "And I hope Director Smith won't turn me away. The anti-aging properties of the super soldier serum are quite appealing to me."
As she spoke, she reached up and lightly touched the faint wrinkles at the corner of her eye.
Scott Lang's preparation for the job was meticulous. He and his crew had decided to return to their old ways, and he was leaving nothing to chance.
"Communication lines have been cut off," Scott reported from the passenger seat of the van. "Signal collection is jammed. No one will be able to make an emergency call tonight. Inspection completed."
Luis sat behind the wheel, drumming his fingers. "If anything goes wrong, I'll protect you, understand?"
Scott pulled his hood up. "Don't worry. That kind of thing can't happen."
He knew perfectly well that if things went sideways, Luis wouldn't be able to help much, let alone raise bail, but the confidence was part of the process. He got out of the car.
Watching him leave, Luis grinned at the others in the back. "I like his cocky attitude."
Scott approached the villa's courtyard wall, broke into a sprint, and leaped over it in a fluid, practiced motion. Over the comms, he heard someone in the van whistle. "That's awesome!"
Landing softly in the yard, Scott surveyed the house. He located the electrical network connected to the room alarm behind the garden shed. Within minutes, he had it isolated and disabled.
"The alarm network is broken," he whispered into the radio.
Amidst his companions' static-laced cheers, he pried open the ground-floor window and slipped inside. The house was quiet. He found a key on the dining table and used it to unlock the basement door, but stopped short at the heavy steel frame beyond it.
"There is a fingerprint lock on the door," Scott said.
"What did you say?" Luis squawked over the radio. "Ernesto didn't tell me that! Oh my god, are we doomed?"
Scott thought for a second. "Not necessarily."
He crept upstairs to the master bedroom. Rummaging through the drawers, he found exactly what he needed: super glue, a metal ring, and a roll of transparent packing tape. He returned to the basement door, used the tape to extract a clean fingerprint from the knob, transferred it to the ring, applied a thin layer of glue, and heated it over a gas stove in the kitchen.
The mold set perfectly. He pressed it to the scanner. The light flashed green.
"He didn't trigger an alarm," the lookout murmured over the comms. "He's amazing."
Scott opened the basement door and descended the stairs. When he saw the safe, he let out a heavy sigh. "Is there any mistake?"
"What's wrong?" Luis asked.
"They're not kidding, the safes here are tricky. It's a Carbondale. Made in 1910. The Titanic was built with this type of steel."
"Wow, can you handle this?"
"Its effectiveness is greatly reduced when it gets cold," Scott explained, pulling his gear from his backpack. "Do you remember that iceberg?"
"Of course," Luis said. "It killed Leonardo DiCaprio."
"It killed everyone," another voice chimed in.
"But it didn't kill the old lady," the lookout argued. "She later threw the Heart of the Ocean into the sea."
Scott ignored them. He filled the lock cylinder with water from the basement sink, then blasted it with liquid nitrogen from his kit. Water expands when it freezes into ice, but metal does not. The thermal shock shattered the internal mechanism. The heavy door groaned and swung open.
Inside the safe was a single garment bag.
"What's inside?" Luis asked. "Banknotes or jewelry?"
Scott unzipped the bag, his shoulders slumping. "There was nothing there. Just a rider's uniform. An old motorcycle suit."
"No money, no jewelry, nothing at all?"
"All that work for nothing," Scott said helplessly.
"I'm sorry, Scott," Luis said softly. "I couldn't let you get even a little bit."
A thief should never leave empty-handed. Figuring it might be a limited edition or signed piece, Scott grabbed the strange, textured suit and stuffed it into his backpack.
What he didn't know was that he wasn't alone. Clinging to the basement wall, a small ant equipped with a camera the size of a grain of rice was watching his every move, broadcasting the feed directly to Hank Pym.
After dinner, Darren Cross brought Hope to the main laboratory floor of Pym Technologies.
Fitz, three days into his cover as a newly hired engineer, stood near the testing area. He casually led a lamb into the center of the reinforced glass chamber, keeping his head down and his expression carefully blank.
Hope frowned slightly at the animal. "I thought our experiment would start with mice."
"Is there a difference?" Darren asked, moving toward the console.
"Darren, maybe you should consider rats. There are specially bred experimental mice for this." To Hope, using a lamb felt entirely too cruel.
"Shrunk organic tissue is the core of this technology," Darren said dismissively, punching in a code. "I can't present a semi-finished product to the client. Actually, I would prefer to use chimpanzees and monkeys as test subjects."
He initiated the sequence. "Start experimenting with 34-C to reduce the size of organic atoms."
The golden, shrinking particles injected into the instrument and sprayed over the lamb. In an instant, the animal collapsed inward, destroyed at the sub-cellular level. It didn't shrink; it violently compressed into a small, unrecognizable pile of minced organic matter.
Hope gasped, her hand flying to cover her mouth.
Standing a few feet away, Fitz simply memorized the experiment without reacting. For him, there wasn't much difference between using rats and sheep—S.H.I.E.L.D. had seen worse. But he had just confirmed the most critical piece of intelligence: the Yellowjacket suit was still just a concept, and the shrinking tech was a lethal failure.
Darren lowered his head, his jaw tight. "Experiment 34-C failed. Clean the workbench and bring in the 35-C test specimen."
He turned to Hope. "Our research wasn't entirely successful, so I'm leaving the S.H.I.E.L.D. negotiation in your hands now. We need more time."
Looking at the gory failure in the chamber, Hope didn't know whether to be relieved or terrified. She nodded. "I will visit Director Smith Doyle tomorrow."
The next day, the weather broke. Heavy rain lashed against the windshield of Hope's red Ferrari as she drove toward the S.H.I.E.L.D. Triskelion in Washington, D.C.
The appointment had been submitted days ago. This visit wasn't just at Darren's request; it was also a mandate from her father to verify the matter of resurrecting her mother.
As she navigated the slick roads, her mood felt as turbulent as the storm outside. Darren wanted to combine the super soldier serum and the suit to create a Yellowjacket warrior that would far surpass the original Ant-Man. He had already informed her father of his plan.
Hank disagreed, believing that if Darren succeeded and partnered with global institutions, it would end in a catastrophe they couldn't control. Furthermore, Hank had incisively pointed out that S.H.I.E.L.D.'s flawless serum was likely created by the resurrected Howard Stark.
But Hope had her own reservations—specifically about her father's stubborn refusal to let her inherit the suit.
In her view, Darren's idea was structurally sound. It just had the wrong pilot. The concept could be applied to herself: she could inject the super soldier serum, wear the Ant-Man suit, and enter the World Martial Arts Tournament. With that kind of power, she could win the championship and finally make the wish to bring her mother back.
Thinking about the weight of it all, Hope slowed the Ferrari, turning into the imposing security gates of the S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters.