Don't Pull Your Fists
With a moan, Hope opened her eyes. A small part of her mind thought this must be how it feels like to be in a car crash as she slowly moved her limbs. There wasn’t anything broken in her body, thankfully. She felt fine other than being shaken a little bit.
Hope knew she would most likely crash somewhere when she exited from the quantum realm, but she didn’t think the impact would feel so intense or so sudden. She and the quantum pod turning back to their normal size happened far quicker than she calculated. She wasn’t sure if she should think it was a mistake of her own, a miscalculation or a failed part, and something she needed to worry about.
She looked around her. The pod was on soil, she realized. When she looked up, she saw gray sky between the trees leaves, the trunks long as mountains from her point of view. There wasn’t any sound she could hear.
Seeing there was no active threat, she checked the console and the empty seat beside her if anything was broken. There was no smoke inside or outside of the vehicle, all the instruments running properly. There was no beeping other than the radar, so the pod was fine. With a sigh of relief, she let her head drop back to the seat, and almost at the same time, she started to giggle.
“I’m… in another universe,” she shook her head, half delirious and half awed. She looked outside of the pod. “This is ridiculous…”
Biting her lip to stop herself from smiling, Hope held her face between her hands to pull herself together. With a last smile, she reached and tapped on the newly installed tablet to locate exact coordinates of the signal. Ten seconds later the signal was located and Hope didn’t bother to stop herself from heaving a sigh. As she and her mom had predicted, she needed to fly to a long way to the source.
Her dad’s paranoia could be really annoying sometimes.
She quickly rechecked the pod's systems before getting out. After she stepped on the–soft? sunken?–but dry ground. It was weird, considering she was in her shrunken size and she wasn’t on the sand. She filed the little detail on the back of her head before focusing on completing her less complicated quests.
She pointed her right blaster to the pod and pushed the little button on it with her left hand. The already ant-sized vehicle shrank even smaller with the newer remote that she has installed to her blaster. She took the pod from the ground then put it in a tiny bag on her belt for safety. With a last look around her, she took off and followed the signal with the little screen on her left blaster guiding her between the dead-looking trees.
Hope huffed in frustration and kicked a piece of junk in anger.
She thought that the moment she’d find the signal, Scott would be there too. Then they’d jump into the pod and go back home.
She should've guessed it wouldn't be that easy.
She closed her eyes and started to take deep, calming breaths. She leaned on the old wooden table behind her for support as she thought. The scrappy, almost amateur looking radio’s low buzz was the only noise in the old, one-room cabin other than her breathing.
The abandoned cabin was on the side of a muddy lake. The trees in the forest that surrounded it looked dead. No animals or anything alive was anywhere to be seen, and the inside of the cabin was just as lively as outside; trash and junk was scattered all over the place. The only furniture was a stripped bed, an old table, and two chairs.
The old radio with a collection of other used tech and cables were on the bed. It was the signal’s source. Hope was sure it was Scott who built it and, judging by the new looking big batteries, he had been here not long ago.
There wasn’t any note, letter ,or anything that had letters on it other than the empty boxes and packages of pistachio ice cream, mustard, and tacos. When she looked more carefully, Hope saw there were even some dried orange peels on the floor. Definitely Scott.
There wasn’t any other food rubbish other than that and the amount was almost ridiculous. Scott surely spent some time here or left all this trash behind him deliberately for her to see, if she ever came here. For an ordinary person, they were just garbage, but Hope knew they were his favorites. They had many fights over the best ice-cream flavor or if it was legal to eat hot dogs without mustard on top.
Hope didn’t know why he wasn’t here waiting for her or when he was here last time. For what she could see from the dirty windows, there was only one, narrow and rocky road that lead to the little cabin in the woods. It was barely wide enough for a car and there were no new tire traces.
Hope didn’t know if she should wait for his return, but she had no idea when or if he was going to return, or whether it was safe for her to go to him. She didn’t have the answer for any of the questions that were swirling in her head. Is he safe? Is he far from here? Is he hiding and that’s why he didn’t leave anything that could guide me to him?
The number of questions in here mind was threatening to drive her crazy with a new wave of fear and desperateness, but Hope was better than giving in to panic. So instead, being the scientist she is, she came up with a plan. She examined the inside of the cabin once more to be sure she hadn’t missed anything, then she shrank, leaving the cabin from the broken window and looked at the dark, from the dirty lake to the tree cemetery around it.
Scott wasn’t at the other end of the road.
Hope knew this was most likely happen, but it didn’t upset her any less. Though, it couldn’t be compared to what she was feeling at what she found.
San Francisco… but make it cyberpunk.
She couldn’t think of any other phrase to define the scene in front of her. The whole city, the streets she’d spent her childhood and adulthood looked old and dirty, some buildings looked like they’d crumble down any minute. She still could recognize some buildings and streets, enough for her to be able to know where was she, but there were also so many other buildings and roads. They didn’t look new or old exactly, but they were damaged and neglected.
The people were another matter entirely. Everybody was wearing some sort of suit. Most of them were the same with tiny differences. All had the same mask on their faces, but she saw some of them take them off when they get in cars or houses. She flew to a window of an apartment to see the inside. She stepped on the frame and saw a black stripe all along the frame, keeping what’s outside from coming inside.
Whatever caused all this must be on the air, Hope thought, but I breathed back at the forest and I didn’t feel anything.
Starting to feel a bit anxious, Hope examined the apartment to distract herself. It looked like an ordinary kitchen. A woman was cutting vegetables with a cat walking between her legs. Hope smiled faintly and fled two windows left. This time it looked like a living room, still normal, except the big, metal... box covering the apartment door.
Hope frowned, but she couldn’t get inside to examine it up close. She saw another one of the suits people on the streets were wearing, hanging on the wall beside the box. When she looked at the box again, she saw it had a handle on it. Like door in front of another door.
What happened here?
Hope flew away from the window and looked down at the busy street. Street lights were starting to light up, and it made Hope realize the sky was darkening too. She needed to find a place to spend the night, but she wanted to look around a bit more. Thinking it wouldn’t be too hard to find a hole in a wall when she was this small, she decided to go deeper in the city in hopes to find a clue what really happened.
With her small size, her wings were able to carry her to the city’s downtown area in a matter of minutes. Seeing something clearly wrong with this world, Hope thought it would be best to stay out of locals eyes.
Recognizing another street, she dove between the tall and modern buildings. The scene here wasn’t so different from what she already saw. People in masks and suits, walking in straight lines and ignoring the giant flying screen in the middle of the street. What?
AT ORDERS FROM THE RED QUEEN, ALL CITIZENS MUST CONTINUE TO WEAR THEIR PROTECTIVE SUITS WHILE THEY ARE IN UNSTERILE ENVIRONMENTS.
“I’m a what now?” Hope froze in mid-air at the shock of seeing her face in a giant screen. Big red letters were continuing to sliding below, as Hope saw herself start to speak with a tone so authoritative that she almost couldn’t believe it was indeed her voice.
“With the latest developments coming from our Quantum Controlling Team, the air and soil outside of sterilized buildings and vehicles are still carrying dangerous amounts of Quantum energy particles. For your own safety, follow the protocols.”
Hope was still stunned and couldn’t turn her eyes away from the screen. A storm of thoughts was making her head ache. “Red Queen? What the fuck?”
Hope’s panic was rising with every second that passed as she continued to watch herself talk. Her eyes started to catch details of a red-black suit she was wearing when the recording started over, and she saw herself- no, she wasn’t her! Whoever she was, she wasn’t Hope van Dyne!
A drop of water on her head shook Hope out of her trance and almost made her lose her balance. Realizing a downpour had started and the only source of light were street lamps, Hope took a calming breath and forced her thoughts and fears go away. Right now she needed to find a roof over her head. She’d have to wait for a while to freak out about her other self and Scott’s whereabouts. So, she turned and flew away from the screen to a narrow street, hiding in the darkness.
The gap between the buildings turned out to be an alleyway. Even in the dark and up high, Hope still could see a lot of trash was scattered on the ground. Pieces of glass and metal were glittering on the wet asphalt as she flew over them.
"No, please. No! No, let me go- HELP!"
Hope's head snapped at the distressed voice of a woman. She was at the end of the shortcut, two other -much bigger- figures were standing beside her. One of them was holding her arm.
"Hey!" Hope yelled and flew faster. She got higher above them, then dove down while growing back and landing on one of them with a kick to the chest.
Hope and the attacker fall down with a loud chunk. The sound and the pain under her feet confused Hope for a moment. Whatever she just jumped on wasn't flesh and blood, but Hope didn't have time to think about it because the other one had thrown the woman to the ground and was coming for her now.
Hope quickly shrank down and punched the thing on the face before it could get to her. The force of her punch made him fall and made its mask fly over his head, revealing what was behind it.
An iron face with two menacing red eyes looked at her. A face she knew very well from a couple of years back. Ultron.
Sure, why not? Hope instinctively raised her arms to blast a hole in its chest, but something held her arm back and hurled her forcely to the wall behind her. A second later, an iron fist made contact with her chest, making her gasp in pain.
Then something slammed into the robots head, distracting it momentarily and allowing Hope to raise her hand to the robot’s chin and blow through its head, causing a tiny explosion that would've roast her face if it wasn't for her helmet.
The robot that held her captive fell back and she quickly shot the other one before it could make a move. She leaned back to the wall and put her hand on her aching muscles. If the punch landed inch higher, it would’ve broken her collarbone.
"Thank you, whoever you are," the woman said, tentatively approaching the still breathless Hope. She didn't wear a mask on, Hope noticed. Maybe the robots attacked her because of it.
Hope nodded and said a muffled yeah under the helmet. Without thinking it through, she opened it up to talk easier. "I should thank you too if it wasn't for your rock-"
But the woman wasn't listening to Hope. Instead, she was backing up hastily while holding her hand like she wanted to protect herself. "Oh, no. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry! My mask got damaged I-"
Continuing to stutter, she took her bag and mask from the ground quickly ran off. Leaving Hope standing in front of the wall while still clenching her right.
"What have I done in this world?!" Hope asked herself in pain, looking after the woman.