Chapter 2
Harley woke up from a nap he didn’t remember taking. He stared at the ceiling of his workshop and tried to remember. He passed out from exhaustion? It wouldn’t be the first time it happened. At least once a week since graduating high school and no longer having a consistent schedule he’d be in the workshop and forget that sleep was something normal humans needed to function. Those days he would make his way to the closest flat surface, which more often than not was the floor, and sleep until the ache in his back reminded him why he had shoved a couch into the corner in the first place.
Above him the light flickered. Tony had told him to rewire it last time he stopped by but that was weeks ago and Harley hadn’t gotten around to it yet. He was working on bigger things than a flickering light. Outside the workshop the world was dead. Harley couldn’t remember the last time it had been this quiet. It must have been after the Mandarin excursion and the town finally began to mourn Chad Davis. Harley hated the quiet. He ignored the throbbing in his side and closed his eyes.
Screams. All around him. Harley pushed through the crowds of people looking for Adaline and his mama. Had it been hours or minutes? Days or years? Time flowed strangely in the orange-lit world. A hand grabbed onto his wrist and pulled him from the mass of people.
Harley lurched forward, a layer of dust shooting into the air as he moved. Harley coughed and brought one arm up to cover his mouth and nose while the other pressed against the ground to hold himself up.
Wait, dust?
He kept one arm pressed firmly against his face and used to the other to help push himself up. The entire workshop was covered in a layer of dirt and dust as though it hadn’t been touched in years. Harley knew he was a mess and that his workshop was by no means clean but this was something different. The thick layer of dust shouldn’t have been there, not when he and Adaline spent two hours last Saturday cleaning everything in anticipation of Tony stopping by any day now for his monthly visit.
“The hell,” he said looking at the rusted tools littering the table. Harley lifted a wrench and inspected the stained handle. This was a joke. It had to be a joke. Any minute now Adaline was going to jump out from the corner and yell “gotcha” while his mama laughed and filmed his reaction to send to Tony and Pepper. Harley would yell at them and not really mean any of the words he said and they’d all get a laugh at his expense.
The gotcha never came. He dropped the wrench and sent another wave of dust into the air. The coughing fit only subsided when he pulled the collar of his shirt up and over his face so that only his eyes were uncovered.
“Adaline,” Harley called out through the fabric. “This is funny and all but you need to stop.” The workshop was silent save for his careful breathing and rattling of the windows. “Addy?” Harley tried again.
This was wrong. Something was wrong. He needed to find Adaline, needed to know she was okay. Harley tried to turn but tripped over a mess of tools and wires and was sent sprawling on the floor. The TV on his desk switched on.
Earth loses it’s best defender, the broadcaster said accompanied by an image of the destroyed Avengers Compound. After five years the Avengers succeeded in bringing back the dusted at the loss of Natasha Romanoff and Tony Stark. We are live on the scene at…
He stared at the screen. Earth loses it’s best defender, that’s what they said when Tony went into space again. Harley got the text, the one he always gets before Tony does something stupid like fight a robot or join a Civil War among the Avengers. But what about the dusted? Five years? Loss of Natasha Romanoff and Tony Stark? Were they...no. No, they were Avengers. The Avengers didn’t lose.
Except they did. Five years. Dusted.
The doors slammed open. “Harley.” He kept his eyes trained on the TV. The images switched to thousands in the streets. People were running through the crowd and throwing themselves at the confused ones who hadn’t aged a day. “Harley,” she repeated. He finally turned, tears streaming down his face, to meet the confused eyes of the girl who busted in. “They said...they said everyone was coming back so I ran home. Oh god, I didn’t even call mama.” She started to cry and recognition crossed his face.
“Addy,” he said, because of course it was Addy. Who else would cry over him? Maybe his mama, but she wasn’t here. Addy was. Addy who was taller but still had the same face of his baby sister, just with the added bonus dark circles under her eyes as though she hadn’t slept in days. Maybe she hadn’t.
Adaline lurched forward and grabbed onto Harley. He jerked backwards with the force but wrapped his arms around her. Adaline was shaking. Crying. “I...I’m sorry, Harley. I tried to get mama but then you were falling apart in my hands. Oh god, oh my god you’re back. Harley.”
“Hey, it’s okay. Don’t cry,” he whispered. Harley was never good at calming her down. When she was a baby and their mama would step out of the room she’d start screaming her head and Harley never knew the right thing to say. Some things never changed.
“You can’t tell me to stop when you’re crying.” Adaline pulled back but kept her hands squeezing down onto Harley’s shoulders. They were nearly eye-to-eye. Years of being taller than her and she catches up in an instant.
Five years, the broadcaster had said. The dusted were missing for five years, he was missing for five years.
“I’m only cryin’ cause you’re cryin’.” She knew he was lying but smiled at him anyways. Harley brought his hands up and cupped her face. He wiped away the tears with his thumbs. More gathered under her eyes. “Addy, what happened?”
“You been gone five years, Harley.”
“Five years,” Dr. Strange said. Harley wasn’t sure why he was here with half of the Avengers. Dr. Strange had found him wandering through the crowd looking for his family and pulled him into the collection of superheroes while mumbling something about “Tony Stark’s other kid”.
“We’re stuck here for five years?” Quill asked. Harley liked Quill. He made outdated references and thought he was cooler than he actually was. Reminded him of Tony. Tony wasn’t here and Harley didn’t know if that was a good thing or not. If anyone was going to save them, it was Tony, but it was awfully lonely without the Mechanic texting him every few days about what was happening in New York. Did New York still exist? Did Rose Hill?
“If everything goes according to plan, yes. Most of us won’t remember once we’re out, it’ll feel like it’s been minutes.”
“But while we’re in here it’ll be years.” Bucky Barnes was here. Harley couldn’t decide how he felt about that. On one hand Barnes, Sam Wilson, and Wanda Maximoff were criminals who fought against Iron Man, on the other they were superheroes. Sure, they weren’t an Iron Man but they were alright.
“I’m afraid so.”
“This sucks.” Harley had to agree with Peter. Peter who Tony talked about every moment he was talking about Harley’s new suits designs, who Tony said Harley would love but never actually introducing him to, who was a year younger than him and running around New York in a Stark Industries Spider-Man suit (which Harley had helped design) despite the fact Harley had spent years trying to convince Tony to let him build and use a replica Iron Man suit to help people in Tennessee. Peter who, despite being everything Harley wanted, Harley didn’t hate.
“Harley?” Adaline was staring at him. It took Harley a minute to register that he had zoned out and been looking over her shoulder at the wall. “Are you feeling okay?” Harley couldn’t even begin to imagine what she had gone through seeing his disappear like that. It was no wonder she was clinging to him so hard.
“I’m fine, just a little out of it. Is mama?”
“She’s alright,” Adaline said. “She’s gonna kill me for coming home but I wanted to see you before him.”
“Before who?”
“You gotta understand, we were lost without you. Mama and I didn’t know what to do.”
Harley could already tell he wasn’t gonna like the answer she gave. “Addy?”
“Dad’s home.”
Oh. Oh hell no.
—
Cassie used to fall asleep to her mother telling her stories about Ant-Man and the Wasp. They were her heroes long before the decimation and long after. Even when she grew too old to hear her mother’s stories before bed she’d always think about them and where they were. No one knew what happened to those who were dusted, not even the Avengers. Cassie made her up theories about where they had gone and how they were going to find them. She read every book and every paper Hank Pym had published. She read all of Bruce Banner’s work and all about Stark Industries from Howard to Tony. She could probably replicate the super soldier serum used on Steve Rogers in her sleep but she didn’t. Cassie might have studied and prayed for her dad’s return but she wasn’t a hero. She could have been, Kate told her so, but Cassie didn’t want to be a hero. They've already lost her dad and her stepdad, she didn’t think her mom could take another heartbreak. So she helped Kate as much as a sixteen-year-old could from the comfort of her own house.
Cassie liked Kate. The older girl found her while looking for a way to bring the dusted back because the Avengers couldn’t. Apparently being the daughter of a superhero meant Cassie should know something. She didn’t, but wanted to help. She became Kate’s “girl in a chair” of sorts. Kate went out and was a badass on the weekends and Cassie stayed home monitoring her with the technology Tony Stark had sent when dad didn’t come home. The two formed a close relationship over the past five years so it made sense that Kate would be who Cassie goes to when her dad reappears after five years of being missing. She just wished Kate would be a little more open to the fact that he was back.
“Why would I be lying?”
“I don’t know,” Kate’s voice cracked over the coms. “It just doesn’t make sense. Why would your dad magically appear after five years?”
“Maybe the Avengers finally did something?” The monitor flashed. “Shots reported on twenty-second street.”
“And only bring back one person? I doubt it. Where on twenty-second?”
“Near Newkirk,” Cassie replied. She knew Kate meant the best but Kate also wasn’t that fond of the Avengers. She gave up on them when they couldn’t stop Thanos but Cassie never did. Maybe her dad’s return had nothing to do with the Avengers but he’d be able to help them. He said so himself before running off to the Avengers compound with a promise to come home. He left without telling Cassie how exactly he got back but she was hopeful. Mom wasn’t the same since Jim’s disappearance and Cassie hated to see her so lonely.
“I just don’t want you to get your hopes up and then be disappointed.”
“I won’t be disappointed. I believe in them.”
“Everyone did and look where that got us.”
“My dad’s back so something must be going right.”
“Yeah, but it’s been five years. Why’d it take them this long to bring back one person?”
“Well, maybe they didn’t bring him back.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve spent the past five years reading everything I could about the Pym Particles and Quantum Realm,” Cassie said. She pulled up one of the files she had typed up and sent it to Kate’s phone. “Before everyone was dusted my dad was working with Hank, Hope, and Janet to gather quantum energy to be used as a means of healing. That’s what I’ve just sent you.”
The connection dipped as Kate began using her phone. Cassie would love to figure out how to keep that from happening but they couldn’t exactly ask for help. Kate made it clear that she wanted nothing to do with the Avengers and Cassie respected her wishes even going as far as lying to Steve Rogers about Kate’s identity when pressed. Cassie knew Steve knew she knew more than she was letting on but he didn’t push her with mom looking over her shoulder and the loss of dad and Jim so recent.
“Cassie,” Kate said. “I love you but I have no idea what this means.”
“The Quantum Realm is outside of our own world, it’s like a whole other thing. Hank Pym thought that time might work differently in the Quantum Realm but he never had any proof until now. My dad hasn’t changed in the five years he’s been missing so if he wasn’t dusted where was he?”
“You think your dad was in the Quantum Realm.”
“I don’t know for sure, but it’s a possibility.”
“Well fuck.”
“I know. There’s nothing in Hank’s notes about the variability of time in the Quantum Realm so I might be wrong but it makes sense.”
“I’m sorry, are you telling me you have Hank Pym’s notes?”
“Well, yeah. They were with my dad’s things when they vanished. My mom put everything in a storage locker but I kind of just took them. No one noticed they were gone and my mom was too upset to see what I was reading.”
“Just got to twenty-second, we’ll finish this discussion later.” The line clicked as Kate muted her mic. Cassie sighed and pushed away from her desk. She kept Hank’s work and the notes she had taken in a box under her bed. Cassie hadn’t looked over it recently, trying to move on instead of obsessing over the past, but now seemed like a good time to pull out the files. If nothing else, she might be able to find out what he dad was taking to the Avengers.
Cassie fell to the floor and reached under her bed. She felt around for the storage box holding everything. When her fingers touched the edge she pressed her arm further and grabbed hold of the handle to pull.
It wasn’t just notes, papers, and books inside the box. Two years ago she also hid away the things that reminded her of her dad. Pictures, letters, and the hideous rabbit she loved so much. Those sat at the top. Cassie stared down at them. For five years these were the only things that remained of her dad and now he was back. He was going to do something stupid again except this time maybe it wouldn’t be illegal like the Germany thing. Cassie didn’t want him to do anything stupid or dangerous, she just wanted him back. For years she prayed for him to come back and now he was but he was a hero and heroes risked their lives to save everyone.
She put the memories aside and pulled out Hank’s file on the Quantum Realm. Cassie had a mystery to solve.
—
It was all over the news. Everyone who was snapped were reappearing in the streets, spaceships were above the Avengers compound, and then Tony Stark was dead. Kate was running through the streets of New York before the broadcast even finished. People walked around lost of confused, many of whom weren’t even on the streets when they disappeared but in destroyed buildings, crashed cars, or airplanes. Whatever the Avengers did, they made sure the world was safe unlike the snap which didn’t care who was injured in the process.
The past five years of running around the city had granted Kate plenty of time to become better acquainted with the streets. She memorized the different paths from their house to the alleyway where Susan vanished and practiced the run as a part of her training. The thirty minute run was cut to twenty with the addition of scaling walls and buildings.
The alley was empty.
Kate cautiously stepped forward. This was the spot Susan turned to dust. This was where she was supposed to be. They said the vanished were appearing in safe locations near their spots of disappearance so where the hell was her sister?
“Susan?” Kate called out. She hadn’t been into the alley, not fully, since that day. She was afraid of what she might see, of the nothing that came with her sister’s ashes blowing away in the wind. “Susan?”
All around New York people were tearing through the streets in search of their missing loved ones but what about those who were nowhere to be found?
She fell to her knees. Five years of preparation. Five years of gathering intel on those who might be able to help her bring her sister back. Five years of nothing because the Avengers got there first but couldn’t even bring her sister back. Kate couldn’t even hold air long enough to scream. She clamped down onto the retractable bow at her side, not enough to trigger it but enough to keep her grounded. She took a deep breath. This was fine. It had been half an hour since the vanished started reappearing all over the world, Susan wasn’t the kind of person to sit still. She probably wandered off the second she realized Kate was no longer by her side.
Kate pushed herself up and stared out the alley. The crowd had grown as people flooded the streets to search for their missing loved ones. She was never going to be able to push herself through that mess. Across the alley was a fire escape, the ladder started above her head but she hadn’t spent five years training for nothing.
She backed up against the wall opposite of the fire escape. Once her back was pressed against the brick she ran forward, using the momentum to leap up and grab onto the bottom rung of the ladder. Kate pulled herself up until she could reach the second rung and grab hold. She repeated the motion until her feet were planted on the bottom rung. From there it was easy to climb the fire escape like she had so many times before.
She tried calling Cassie. Her friend didn’t answer. Kate remembered Cassie saying something about her stepdad being one of the dusted which meant she was probably on her mission to find someone. Kate hoped it went well for Cassie, she was just a kid when she lost both of her fathers. Fuck, her dad was Ant-Man. He was at the Avenger’s compound. Was he alright? Was he even still alive?
Kate shoved her phone back into pocket. She hadn’t thought to put on her sabre gear before taking to the streets, she barely had the brains to grab her bow. What good as a bow without arrows? What good was Kate without them? She hung the bow on her back.
“Kate?!” She froze. She was going crazy, she had to be going crazy. It’s been five years, Susan’s not back. But everyone else is. “Kate?!” Susan called again, her voice frantic. She was nearby. Kate ran to the edge of the building and peered down. She couldn’t see her sister among the mass of people but Susan was down there. She perched on the edge of the building and gazed down into the crowd. The wind whipped around her. In these moments Kate felt every bit the hero she was trying to be. Jessica Jones called it crazy, Kate called it thriving.
She scanned the crowd taking in each and every face. What had Susan been wearing? A blue sundress. Was her sisters hair dyed? No, she let the dye fade until only her natural color remained.
Standing in the middle of the mob was Susan, calling for Kate and spinning every time someone shoved her to the side. She looked just as Kate remembered. Kate grabbed hold of the building’s edge and used it to aid in her descent. She dropped down from window to window until she was on the ground and running towards her sister. Kate pushed people out of her way in the rush to find Susan. She grabbed onto Susan’s hand. “Come on,” she said and began pulling her sister from the crowd back to the alley she had disappeared from so long ago. Susan didn’t fight it and let herself be pulled away. Kate didn’t stop until they were safely hidden in the alley.
“Kate?” Susan asked when Kate finally let go and stepped away.
“Hi.”
“Oh my god, Kate, look at you. What happened?”
“I grew up,” she said. Susan grabbed her and pulled her into a hug. Kate kept her arms hanging limply by her side.
“You’re an adult. I missed you becoming an adult.”
“Didn’t miss much.”
“I don’t care. You’re my little sister and I’m supposed to see you grow up. Oh god, I can’t believe this. I woke up and everyone was yelling. People were screaming about the Avengers and an alien. I thought they got you too.”
“Nah,” Kate pulled back and smiled. “Takes a lot more than an ugly looking grape to kill me.”
“I can’t believe you. I can’t believe this. They’re saying Tony Stark’s died. Oh god, and the Avengers.”
“I don’t want to talk about the Avengers, not right now.”
“Okay. Home?”
Kate nodded. “Home.”
—
Once again Harley was surrounded by superheroes but this time he wasn’t the one out of place. Half of these people Tony had complained about for one reason or another but they came to his funeral like they deserve to be here. Maybe they did, they were on the same team and had a connection Harley could only dream about, but Tony was his Mechanic. Pepper didn’t greet everyone at the door but she met him and pulled him to the close family the second Harley walked in. He meant something to Tony but standing here with everyone he felt like nothing.
Harley recognized most of the faces. There were a few he didn’t, people who weren’t trapped in the orange-lit world, but he saw everyone else. Quill and Drax found the rest of their friends in the later half of their time in the soul stone. The entirety of the Guardians stood together including a talking raccoon and blue girl he identified as Rocket and Nebula. Dr. Strange was by himself and Peter was with a woman who Harley guessed was the Aunt he couldn’t shut up about. The original Avengers, all who were, stood apart. Steve with Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes, Clint Barton with his family, and Bruce and Thor together at the side.
Pepper and Morgan walked to the lake. In her hands Pepper carried the original arc reactor. “Proof that Tony Stark has a heart?” Harley asked. Pepper smiled. “People used to say he was heartless, only cared about fame and money. They never thought he could have friends and family. Imagine if they could see his kids now.” It had taken Harley a few hours to realize he was one of Tony’s kids. When it finally hit him he had to go find a dark corner to sit and cry in.
This was the fifth funeral Harley attended and only the second he’s cried at, the first being the funeral for Chad Davis after Rose Hill realized he hadn’t gone crazy but was in fact killed trying to fix himself. Harley didn’t even know Chad but felt connected to him after the excursion with Tony around Rose Hill and finding out about extremis. It was hard not to cry knowing how close he had been to the drug that killed him. It was hard not to cry here because Tony was a mentor, the father figure Harley created and then lost without even knowing he was fighting. He stood in the back to avoid the eyes of those who didn’t know him which, because no one remembered the soul stone, was everyone except Pepper, Happy, and Rhodey.
Pepper set the arc reactor in the water and pushed it off. Everyone stood there, silent together, until it drifted out of sight. Then Clint stepped forward and did the same with a pair of Widow Bites. The pair of memorabilia was a reminder of what they lost to gain back the ones who had been lost. It sucked. It wasn’t fair and Harley was pissed at the universe.
The group of heroes broke apart. Bruce, Steve, Sam, and Bucky left together, talking about returning the stones. Harley had seen them before the funeral. They were forgotten on the table as everyone mingled and mourned. They weren’t forgotten anymore. The Guardians left next. Their ship had been parked in the woods nearby. When Harley was exploring before the funeral he saw it. Quill and Nebula were arguing but stopped when Harley walked by. They stared at him until he hurried off and out of sight. Thor went with the Guardians. Peter and his aunt followed Happy and Rhodey back inside the house. Harley caught Rhodey’s eye, the man waving him forward. Harley shook his head, not ready to face everyone yet. Clint’s left his family, chasing after Wanda who vanished as soon as the funeral was over. Clint’s family followed the Parker’s into the house. Dr. Strange stayed in place, staring out into the lake. Harley walked forward.
“Dr. Strange?” Strange turned to look down at Harley. From the outside he looked intimidating but Harley knew to a certain extent it was front.
“Who are you?” Oh. Dr. Strange didn’t remember him. He said most of them, if not all, wouldn’t remember life in the stone. It was just Harley’s luck that he’d be the only one to remember the friendships created in the lost five years.
“I’m, uh, Harley Keener, sir.”
“Right, the other Stark kid. How can I help you?”
“What decides who remembers the stone?”
Dr. Strange’s dismissive attitude quickly shifted. “Excuse me?”
“You said most of us wouldn’t remember life inside the soul stone. So what decides who remembers?”
“You remember the missing five years?”
“Sort of. I don’t remember everything but I remember some,” Harley explained. Strange stared down at him with an inquisitive look. Harley shifted back. “I just wanted to know if anyone else did.”
“No, not that I know of. Interesting that you would remember. Are we sure there’s nothing special going on in that mind of yours? Have you come in contact with an infinity stone? Gamma radiation? Secret Asgardian relative?”
“No, no, and no. No infinity stones were in Rose Hill, no gamma radiation, and my mom works in a diner and dad’s a deadbeat. Neither are Asgardian.”
“Interesting. I don’t know why you might remember while the rest of us do not. The answer might take weeks of study and testing.”
“Yeah, I’m fine with never knowing.”
“Are you sure? You’ve graduated, yes? It wouldn’t be too hard to move you to New York for a few months while we try and find the answer.”
“It wouldn’t, but I’ve got a family back home waiting for me to get back.”
“Of course, if you change your mind call me, yes?” Strange pulled a business card from thin air. He showcased his tricks in the soul stone but somehow seeing them in the real world made them that more impressive. Harley expected weird magic inside the stone but here it was different. Then again half the population had been killed by an alien so really magic wasn’t that far off.
“What am I supposed to do? Remembering this and everything.”
“Write a book, build an Iron Man suit, move to Canada. I can’t tell you what to do, just look for a silver lining, kid.”
A silver lining? In being one of, if not the only person who remembers what it was like being dusted? “Not to be rude, Dr. Strange, but fuck a silver lining.”