CHAPTER SEVEN ;
"  reflection in the mirror "

"   i'm all caught up in the rush
    get excited every time i see ya
    i don't wanna call it love
    whatever it is, it's unfamiliar   "
✧   LOSE MY COOL
                dnce!

Laurie sits at the dining table with a sour expression crumpling her features as her fluffy hair stands up on wild ends. She keeps her freckled cheek shoved against her bunched up fist, making her face stretch and scrunch weirdly. To say she's in a bad mood is an insanely huge understatement. Now, let's be honest, Laurie is the kind of person to have mood swings, but she's usually all like, 'sue me! I'm fifteen, what do you expect?!" about it. But today really takes the cake. To be fair, she does have a pretty good reason to be a bit P.O.ed at the moment.

Let's take events into account, shall we?

1. Laurie finally started to... bond with Scott and then bam! They got arrested, which leads to #2.

2. She had to spend a night in a prison cell that smelt like ham and cheese sandwiches and stinky feet.

3. Scott literally shrunk down to the size of a little tiny insect and that led to another round of interrogation in which she had to lie through her pearly whites the whole time.

4. She totally just lost all of whatever trust her mom had in her, she let her own stupid self down, and worse yet, Cassie had to find out.

5. Scott is now a jailbird, on the run, on the lam, at large, or whatever.

6. And, finally, which is perhaps the worst thing yet, Paxton and Maggie just cancelled her Spotify subscription so bye-bye TWENTY ØNE PILØTS, it's been nice suffering with you.

"Mom?" Cassie breaks the silence and shifts in her too big of a chair, calling out to the woman who sits at the other side of table, "Is Laurie in really big trouble?"

Maggie's light brows crease in at her youngest, "Why don't you ask your sister?"

"I tried." The seven year old nods quickly and her numerous pigtails bounce as she does, "But then I got an autmatted response."

"A what?" Paxton, who sits at the head of the table, frowns in confusion.

"Autmatted." Cassie chirps nonchalantly before stuffing in a spoonful of Fruity Pebbles.

"Do you mean 'automated'?" Paxton supplies as Laurie rolls her eyes and shakes her head down at her own bowl of cereal.

"Yeah! Watch!" Cassie turns in her chair and then uses the center of her sister's forehead as a button.

Laurie straightens and speaks in a robotic voice that she somehow is able to make insanely snarky, "I'm sorry. Laurie LaRue Lang is currently out of service because apparently she is now the worst person alive!" She fakes a gasp, holding a hand over her heart, "End of message."

Laurie gives a bitter and sardonic smirk to her mother that lingers for about a full minute before she drops her gaze back down to her cereal. Paxton just shakes his head and Maggie rolls her eyes. Laurie's over-all covered shoulders slouch and her lips pucker out again. Her nose ring bumps against her nose and she sniffs at it irritatedly, tossing her brown hair off of her neck. Cassie lovingly pats Laurie's shoulder and then turns back to their mom for an answer.

"So, yeah, Baby, your sister's in some trouble." Maggie sighs and rubs her forehead before she turns to her fiancé, "Are you gonna be home for dinner tonight?"

Paxton's phone suddenly beeps and the detective pulls it out of his pocket, frowning down at whatever message is displaying on his screen. Laurie slowly raises her eyes and squints at the man from across her forehead, theorizing just what exactly could be coming through on his work phone. Either some guy egged the precinct again (which Laurie promises wasn't her) or it's news about her dad. And by the look on Paxton's tan face, she's about eighty-eight percent sure it's definitely not about Mr. and / or Miss Egg (still definitely not Laurie).

"Uh, yeah." Paxton responds distractedly, standing up from his chair and grabbing his jacket, "I'll pick something up. Text me."

The girl's hands go limp on her spoon and she drops it into her milk before she slowly looks away from the detective. Everything is absolutely horrible, perfectly wretched. Laurie sadly looks over at the Cap'n Crunch box that sits across from her face, frowning at the little happy moustached man.

Cap'n Crunch would understand.

"Okay." Maggie lifts her eyebrows at the man, "Good news?"

"Uh... I don't know." He gives her mom a flat forced smile, "It's news."

Laurie's hands drop into her lap and she quickly begins scratching at her kneecaps, feeling pretty antsy at what this "news" could be. Cassie suddenly leans back in her seat, folding her arm over the back of her chair and resting her hand casually on the back of Laurie's.

"Are you trying to find my daddy?" The little girl puckers her lips and narrows her eyes.

Laurie slowly looks at her sister with a sad smile. She really does feel responsible that Scott is gone from Cassie's life again. I mean, sure, Scott was a total dipwad in that he immediately turned to "burglary" once things went down the drain, but still. She encouraged it, and also she took part in the burglarizing too. Can't really ignore that fact either. Even though there are sirens and alarm bells bouncing off the insides of her skull, Laurie's face grows blank when she looks up at Paxton.

"Yeah, I am, Sweetheart." The detective / fiancé / soon-to-be stepfather gives an awkward smile, going utterly still halfway to the front door, "I just want your daddy to be safe."

Laurie scoffs loudly, making a face down at her Cap'n Crunch and angily stabbing at the little cinnamon sugar covered squares. Maggie gives her oldest a deep frown, shaking her head in disapproval.

Cassie picks up on Laurie's attitude, simply replying with, "'Hope you don't catch him."

She then carelessly looks away and goes back to eating her cereal in silence.

This girl is a sass-master in training; it's fabulous.

Paxton half-nods in understanding and nothing more is said.

When she trudges up the staircase, Laurie takes her sweet time, flailing her hands back and forth and stomping her feet. What does she have to hurry up for anyway? Life has gone down the drain; it's gone back to the old time normal which consists of sleeping, eating, going to gymnastics, and oh, who could forget summer school? Ah, the joys of being a teenager.

Plus, now she has lost computer privileges 'til for-ev-er.

Laurie jumps and promptly nosedives into her unmade bed, groaning into the mattress. She lies there for a long moment before she hears this, like, super weird sound. It's the sound of wind fluttering against paper, only she doesn't have the fan on and she certainly didn't open the window because she doesn't like things like fresh air and sunlight apparently. Laurie tries to ignore the fluttering sound until it grows annoying and she just can't take it anymore. She lets out a groan and she rolls her eyes up at her window sill, but the sight of a lined sheet of paper with a few ants cluttered around it makes her go completely still.

She didn't put that there.

She certainly did not put that there.

So, now, if she's going to be perfectly and intellectually logical about the matter, she would conjure up a scientific question that smartly states: how the flying flip did that get there?!

"Okay, okay." Laurie pants quietly to herself, reaching out to it and stretching just a little too far before she tumbles off the bed.

She hits the ground, but quickly pops back up and stares at the paper with her wide icy blue eyes.

"Move it or lose it." She mumbles to the little ants that she shoos away before carefully picking up the paper.

Laurie slowly stands as she stares at the paper that has an address written with unfamiliar chicken scratch handwriting. She frowns and turns the paper over to find two letters written there: HP. Her stomach begins to feel a bit topsy-turvy and her faces feel a bit green as she realizes just who exactly must have sent the note... from ants, which is cooky in of itself, but whatevs. HP or Hank Pym, that old dude whose house they jacked but who also helped her dad escape in the magical suit of madness. And now he wants her to go right back to the literal scene of the crime.

Laurie's not a moron.

That's gotta be where Scott is camping out.

Or the old dude wants to kill her for robbing him.

Either way could be seen as every teen's desire: finding their long lost dad or dying away from all of the responsibilities of life.

Not bad options, really.

"Laurie?"

The fifteen year old quickly whirls around, stuffing the note in her overall's back pocket, and putting on a ridiculously cheesy innocent face, "Eh, what? I wasn't doing anything! So, um, like, I don't know, what?"

There's a long pause when Cassie purses her lips, shakes her head, and sighs, and then she says, "You're a very bad liar, Laurie."

The fifteen year old stares at her sister for another long moment before she concedes with a quiet sigh of her own. She motions her sister closer and Cassie steps over for Laurie to pick her up and drop her onto the bed beside her.

"Don't tell Mom." Laurie smirks and rolls her eyes, "If she finds out how bad of a liar I am, the game is up."

Cassie smiles a bit before she drops her head and begins kicking her polka-dot socked feet against the side of the bed, "Is it Daddy?"

"Yuppers." Laurie puffs her cheeks and lips with a breath of air, drooping her shoulders, "Guess that's something else you can't tell Mom. Sorry, Little Mama."

"It's okay." Cassie's little button nose scrunches as she gives a confident nod and smile, "I'm good at keeping secrets."

"Love you, Cas." Laurie presses her lips to her head, hugging her close, "I'll help him find his way back to you, okay?"

♢ ♢ ♢

Sneaking out the window is not as easy at daytime as it is a night, it turns out. But Laurie's pretty sure she manages it successfully when she makes it down the street without any sign of her mom screaming on their front lawn. This time, Laurie's a little smarter about getting to Old Man Pym's house, choosing instead of walking or wasting money on a taxi to instead ride her bicycle all the way there.

Laurie awkwardly parks her blue bike by the mailbox and casually kicks at the cracks in the sidewalk as she meanders up to the front door. She swears the house is like one from Scooby Doo or some murder mystery movie. The last time she was here she came with Scott so it was chill, but now she can only imagine all of the scenarios of this going wrong. It does not give her the warm fuzzies; seriously it's F-R-E-A-K-Y.

Laurie squints an eye at the front door as she reaches the front step. She briefly considers texting Gordo to let him know if she dies, he can have her computer, but she decides against it.

No need to worry him just yet.

Laurie awkwardly kicks at the wooden wall that lines the door, still debating on whether or not to ring the doorbell. She doesn't really want to die. She has so much to live for! Well, not really, but she's sure she could scrounge up something worth not dying for.

And then the bushes behind her rustle.

Laurie's eyes slowly widen and she turns even slower, carefully raising her fists like she knows how to punch. I mean, she doesn't, but she'll give it her best. The green bush continues rustling and wiggling around, making her tense even more. That is until she sees the edge of a familiar jean jacket and a yellow backpack over the top of the leafy plant. Her icy eyes narrow and she scowls, wrenching off one of her dirty white converse and then hurling it at the bushes. What follows is a surprised yelped and then the stumbling emergence of a familiar boy with fluffy brown hair.

"Leapin' lizards, Gordo!" Laurie throws up her hands at him, "What the heck-o is your problem-o?!"

Gordo scowls at her, snatches up her shoe, and then hurls it right back at her. Laurie shouts as she barely manages to dodges the flying thing. The dirty shoe crashes directly into the door, making a loud thud before it falls limply onto the front step.

"Hey!" Laurie yells irritatedly, scowling at the boy once again.

"Gosh dang it, Laurie!" Her best friend groans and rubs the now sore spot on his head, "You hit me right in the face!"

"That was kinda the point." The fifteen year old snaps as she hops around to pull on her shoe and retie her shoelace, "What are you doing here?! Did you follow me?"

"When you say it like that, it makes it sound creepy." Gordo argues back, straightening his crumpled jean jacket, dusting off his new pristine white converses of his own, and then stalking over to her.

"It is creepy, you loser."

"What kind of best friend would I be if I didn't follow you after I saw you sneaking out after I came to check on you after your father joined the list of America's Most Wanted after you've just been arrested because of stealing from some rich dude's house after you lied to my face about everything?"

Laurie doesn't speak for a moment, simply staring at him before she nods in quiet agreement, "Well, when you put it like that..."

"Mmhm." Gordo purses his lips at her before shaking his head and saying, "Is this where He Who Must Not Be Named is ducking out?"

"Yessir. It's some old dude's house, name's Hank Pym." Laurie runs her hand through her hair, "He helped 'me' father ESCAPAY from the bastille."

"Hank Pym... Like from Pym Tech!" Gordo's eyes light up in near excitement, "Dude! That's awesome! Did he give your dad any cool gadgets or gizmos or stuff to escape the stockade?!"

"Ha-ha-ha, 'cool gadgets, gizmos, or stuff'?" Laurie gives an long drawn out and rather awkward laugh, rocking back on her heels and scrunching up her nose, "Whaaat? I don't know what you're talking about, my dear Gordon." She glances around quickly, always watching out for those Illuminati.

Gordo is not at all impressed with her stupidness, merely furrowing his dark brows and frowning at her, "Why are you the way that you are?"

"Oh, go eat slugs." She sighs, "Anyway, I was supposed to come alone, but since you're here, you mine-as-well join in on my criminal activity." Laurie then rolls her eyes and shoves her index finger into the doorbell. "And he's not on America's Most Wanted. Don't be dramatic."

"That's rich coming from you."

"Hueh." Laurie makes a low sarcastic laugh back at him.

And then they wait.

And wait.

And wait.

"Dude, seriously?" Gordo makes a face and pushes his face against the door's glass window, "You sure this is the right address?"

"That's what the note from the ants said." Laurie grumbles back, yanking the paper out of her pocket and double checking.

Gordo's head snaps towards her, looking at her like she's wacko.

Boy's got no clue about all of what's about to be dumped on him.

When she sees that she was definitely right about the address, Laurie irritatedly begins shoving her finger into the doorbell repeatedly and yelling up to the security camera, "Hey, Mr. Creepy Dude! What's hoppin'?" They two are met with silence and the fifteen year old girl grows louder, "Yo! Sup! Mr. Hank!"

Gordo leans over, whispering as he also stares up at the security camera, "Maybe he doesn't go for the common vernacular."

"Fair point." Laurie nods and points at him before she starts yelling again, "That's cool, Mr. Hank! I can roll with that!" She tosses her hair back and clears her throat, "Good morning! Hello! Howdy! How do you do?"

"Still nada." Gordo still commentates after another sec of silence, pressing his lips into a fine lip as he grabs at the yellow straps of his backpack.

Laurie huffs and shakes her fist dramatically up at the security camera as she still jams on the doorbell, "No offense, my good sir, but you stinkin' invited me to your freaky mansion of doom so I think it's super rude that you aren't,"

The door suddenly flies open.

Laurie's mouth immediately clamps shut and Gordo's face scrunches into a cringe when a tall woman with short dark hair, pursed red lips, and angrily narrowed eyes stands in the doorway. She has one hand on her hip and it's locked tightly into a fist. Talk about intimidating.

"Ah!" Laurie nods and awkwardly points at her, "Well, I see your doorbell's working! Good for you!"

The woman just blinks with a hard expression, her eyes darting between the girl and the boy, "What are your names?"

Gordo goes to answer, but Laurie snatches onto his sleeve and pulls back from the lady in offense, "What's your name?!"

The woman makes an irritated face at her, "You're in my house."

"Ha! False! I know my grammar! This is a difference in preposition, lady! We are not 'in' your house, we are 'in front of' your house which means that we don't gotta do nothin'!"

"Laurie?" A familiar voice calls out, completely ruining absolutely everything.

The woman gives Laurie a practically smug expression and Laurie sticks her tongue out at her. The other brunette just rolls her eyes and motions the fifteen year old inside, but pushes a hand out at Gordo when he tries to follow.

Laurie puts her own hands on her hips, "Listen, feminista, you let Gordo in or, mark my words, I'm walking!"

The woman lets out an irritated scoff before she steps back and gives the fifteen year old boy barely enough room to squeeze in. Gordo stumbles to the tall girl's side so that they both can now see that none other than Scott Lang stands on the stairwell. He's dressed in pajama pants and a plain tee, looking like he's just gotten up. The woman closes the door loudly and stiffly leaves the main entryway for the room next to it.

"Hey!" Laurie calls, stretching her hands out as she looks over at her father, "You're the size of a normal human being!" Gordo makes a confused face at her and his floppy hair falls in his eyes, "How refreshing."

"Yeah." Scott nods quickly and jogs down the last few steps to get to her, "Hey, are you okay? How'd you get out of jail?"

"Paxton pulled some strings." Laurie rolls her eyes and shrugs, "Dunno, don't care."

"Right, okay, that's good. Good." Scott nods and his brown eyes flash over to the other teen standing beside her, making him perk up to seem friendly, "Hi! I'm Scott."

Gordo suddenly flashes a cheesy grin, "It's great to finally meet you in person! Well, not that we could meet any other way, I mean who goes around meeting in spirit, right?" He puts out his hand for Scott to shake who just stares at him oddly, "Anyway, hey-o, I'm Gordo."

"Hah, that rhymed." Laurie snorts.

"I guess I'm a poet and didn't even know it." Gordo chuckles back.

Laurie gasps, pointing at him, "Man, you rhyme every time!"

Gordo gasps back, pointing at her too.

"Well..." Scott blinks between the two of them, "That was fun." As the two look back at him, Scott shakes the fifteen year old's hand, "I guess that would make you the famous best friend."

The boy glances at the girl with wide eyes, "You told your criminal dad about me?"

Scott's brown eyebrows dip before Laurie just shakes her head and ignores her best friend to ask her dad, "So, you're officially a fugitive, how's that feel?"

Scott scrunches up his lips, tilts his head to the side, and, after a thinking pause, shakes his head, "Not good, gotta tell ya."

"I respect that." Laurie actually laughs a little, "So, what exactly's going on?"

"I don't really know..."

Scott leads the two teens into the dining room where that old guy from the precinct is sitting at the head of the table and that scary woman from the front door is hissing at him, "I could take down the servers and Cross wouldn't even know it. We don't need these guys."

The old guy suddenly turns his attention away from her, speaking to the three who stand rather awkwardly in the doorway, "I assume that you've already met my daughter, Hope."

"I did." Scott nods awkwardly, "She's great."

"Eh." Laurie wavers her hand back and forth in debate, making Scott look at her.

"Miss Lang." The old guy directs his attention to her, "And you brought a friend."

"Yeah, sorry." Laurie shrugs with a cringe, glancing from Scott to Hank, "But don't worry, you can trust him."

Gordo awkwardly nods, swallowing and trying to sound professional for... whatever this is, "I'm Gordon Makina. People call me 'Gordo'."

Old Man Pym nods, "Nice to meet you, Gerald." Gordo makes a face and Laurie snorts before the man moves on, looking at Scott and Laurie, "Hope doesn't think that we need you two."

"We don't." Scary Lady bites back as the three take seats at Hank's left, "We can do this ourselves."

"I go to all this effort to let you steal my suit, and then Hope has you both arrested."

Laurie sharply looks at the woman.

Hope lets out a sigh and motions out her hand, "Okay, we can try this and when he fails, I'll do it myself."

Laurie slightly stiffens at all of the insults flying towards her dad while Scott just watches everything in an understandable amount of confusion and Gordo... well, Gordo is just kinda there.

Hank lets out a bit of sigh and tries to explain off his daughter to the others, "She's a little bit anxious. It has to do with this job, which, judging by the fact that you two are sitting opposite me, I take it that you're interested in."

Gordo leans over to Laurie, "Are we about to become part of a super secret criminal organization? Because it can't take a while, my mom wants me home for dinner."

Laurie doesn't get to respond before Scott voices all of their thoughts, saying in confusion, "What job?"

Hank pauses business, taking time for the niceties, "Would you like some tea?" When both of the Langs answer in the affirmative, the older man keeps going, "I was very impressed with how you managed to get past my security system. Freezing that metal was particularly clever."

Scott's eyes scrunch and his eyebrows bend, "Were you watching us?"

"Scott, I've been watching you for a while." Laurie's eyes widen, feeling slightly creeped out before the man goes on, "Ever since you robbed Vista Corp." Hank remembers Scott's necessity to avoid saying 'stealing' and quickly corrects himself in a surprisingly snarky tone, "Oh! Excuse me. 'Burgled' Vista Corp."

Gordo smiles and Laurie snickers before Scott rolls his eyes over at her.

"Vista's security system was one of the most advanced in the business. It was supposed to be unbeatable. But you beat it..." Hank tilts his chin down, asking, "Would you like some sugar?"

"Yeah, thanks."

Three pairs of eyes drop down to the table where small black ants begin gathering up the different sugar cubes and pushing them towards Scott's teacup. Laurie's eyes nearly pop out of her head and Gordo's jaw drops.

Scott scrunches up his lips and makes a face, giving a slight head shake, "You know what? I'm okay."

Hope just barely smirks at him.

"That's just gross." Gordo cringes in agreement with the man.

Laurie, however, leans down and rests her chin to the tabletop to study the ants better, whispering, "Whoa."

Her icy eyes narrow slightly as she watches the ants suddenly turn around, moving around the corners of the sugarcube and then begin pushing them back towards the small cup. It's probably gotta be one of the coolest things she's seen.

"How do you make them do that?"

"Ants can lift objects fifty times their weight..." Hank begins explaining.

"It's so true!" Laurie starts off in a voice so bubbly and excited that it sounds to Scott super uncharacteristic of her, "Ants are insane, man. They can build cool stuff, and they tunnel things out."

Hank gives her a bit of an odd look but nods all the same, "And they cooperate with one another, yes."

"Right." Scott nods a little between the two of them before pointing at the crazy ants, "But how do you make them do that?"

Hank taps at the space behind his ear, "I use electromagnetic waves to stimulate their olfactory nerve center. I speak to them. I can go anywhere, hear anything, and see everything."

"And still know absolutely nothing."

Hope cuts the words back with an uncomfortably familiar bitterness to her tone that both Scott and Laurie recognize. Hank looks over at Hope with a weakening frown, even watching her with a sadness that Scott finds familiar. Laurie straightens and awkwardly swallows back the lump that grows in her throat. She's not sure why but she suddenly can't look at Scott now. Her cheeks burn a weird hot pink and she irritatedly scratches at her knee caps.

"I'm late to meet Cross." Hope finishes and her eyes barely look at them before she turns and leaves.

Hank watches after his daughter for a long moment before the whole gravity of the situation weighs down upon the Langs and Gordo.

Scott awkwardly raises his hand, "Uh... Dr. Pym?"

Hank just blinks at him, "You don't need to raise your hand, Scott."

"Sorry, I just have one question: Who are you? Who is she? What the heck's going on? Why is my daughter involved in all of this? And can I go back to jail now?"

"All fair questions." Gordo comments quietly, making his best friend 'mmhm'.

Hank offers no quick answer, merely standing and saying, "Come with me." As Hank leads them down into the basement, he begins to explain just what the heck is going on, "Twenty years ago, I created a formula that altered atomic relative distance."

The three still stare at Hank with blank expressions and Laurie raises an eyebrow, "You what now?"

"I learned how to change the distance between atoms. That's what powers the suit. That's why it works."

"Suit? What suit?"

Everyone ignores Gordo as they finally enter a dark lab that is full of crazy cool equipment that kids like Laurie and Gordo only fantasize about having at their disposal because they're secretly nerds.

"Whoa," Scott comments in an impressed tone.

But his tone is nowhere near as impressed as Laurie's when she oozes, "What the what?! This is stinkin' awesome! Dang! Wow!" Everyone looks over at her and her eyes widen and she quickly straightens, "Not that I'm impressed or anything because, psh, yeah."

Gordo shakes his floppy head at her, "Nice save."

Scott purses his lips and rolls his eyes away from his daughter.

Hank lets out a sigh at the great mistake he's made in including her before he goes on with his necessary backstory, "But it was dangerous. It was too dangerous." Gordo glances at Laurie in that lingering confusion and Laurie slides her hands in her pockets in interest, "So I hid it from the world. And that's when I switched gears and I started my own company."

"Pym Tech." Scott supplies with a nod.

"Yes. I took on a young protégé called Darren Cross."

"Darren Cross." Scott's eyes widen and he nods, "He's a big deal."

"Also seems like a major jerk." Gordo comments with his arms crossed over his chest.

"Right?" Laurie mumbles back with a small snort.

Hank gives a half-nod at the teenagers, "But before he was a big deal, and a 'major jerk', he was my assistant. I thought I saw something in him. The son I never had, perhaps... He was brilliant, but as we became close, he began to suspect that I wasn't telling him everything. He heard rumors about what was called the Pym Particle, and he became obsessed with recreating my formula. But I wouldn't help him. So he conspired against me and he voted me out of my own company."

Scott shakes his head, "How could he do that?"

"The board's chairman is my daughter, Hope." Hank answers, forcing back all of the emotion in his tone, "She was the deciding vote."

"Y'ouch," Laurie whispers, pressing her lips together.

Gordo glances over at his best friend with slightly pursed lips of his own, knowing perhaps more than anybody that this could be Laurie... it could be Laurie if she and Scott don't change... if they don't fix themselves.

Hank goes on with another breath, "But she came back to me when she saw how close Cross was to cracking my formula. The process is highly volatile."

Man, this sounds an awful like a supervillain origin story and Laurie is not liking it.

"If one isn't protected by a specialized helmet, it can affect the brain's chemistry."

The fifteen year old girl frowns at this information, thinking about all of the possibilities of what this could mean...

"I don't think Darren realizes this, and, you know, he's not the most stable guy to begin with."

Scott furrows his brown eyebrows, shaking his head as he still doesn't really see the full picture here, "So, what do you want from us?" he tilts his messy head of hair towards his fifteen year old that stands at his hip, "What does Laurie have to do with it?"

Hank looks between the father and daughter that stands across from him, seeing what was a younger version of himself and his own daughter. The unforgiveness. The bitterness. The coldness. The broken trust. They're nearly like a reflection in the mirror, just set back in time. Losing his daughter to all of that destroyed him. He lost his wife. He lost his child. Scott already lost his wife. The fact is, Hank Pym doesn't want that to happen to this man and his daughter. He has to give them a second chance.

"If Laurie applied herself in school, your daughter could graduate from high school next year. She's much smarter than she gives herself credit for."

Scott's brown eyes trail over to his daughter with a soft expression as the girl stands rigidly, uncomfortable at the attention.

"Your daughter was not part of the original plan, Scott, but I have my ways of knowing that she has a fascination with the kind of work I'll be putting her to." Hank nods towards the fifteen year old boy at Laurie's side, "If he keeps this to himself, George can tag along."

Gordo scoffs and throws up a hand as Laurie smirks over at him.

The older man grows serious and purses his lips, giving the man a long look, "Scott, I believe that everyone deserves a shot at redemption. Do you?"

Scott grows just a serious, "I do."

Hank stands across from him, speaking in a voice that promises nothing but the truth, "If you can help me, I promise I can help you be with your daughters again."

Scott looks over at Laurie who stares back at him.

They hold a strange and silent conversation. They both think about Cassie. They both know that she needs her dad back. They both think about the two of them. They both know that they need to fix themselves. They both want the same thing and, if this is the way to get it, then there's no other choice.

Kind of reluctantly breaking her gaze from her dad, Laurie glances at Gordo who smiles a little and shrugs.

He's in.

Of course he's in. If Laurie's in, so is he.

"Now..." Hank dips his bearded face, "Are you ready to redeem yourself?"

"Absolutely." Scott speaks in a new sense of morality and confidence, nodding, "My days of breaking into places and stealing stuff are done... What do you want me to do?"

"I want you to break into a place and steal some stuff." Hank responds flatly through his pressed together lips.

Scott and Laurie nod and simultaneously say, "Makes sense."

Well, there you go! A thousand years later and I finally updated. Sorry, you guys, I am horrible. But I did it! How did you like it? This one was both fun and hard to write, especially when it came to fitting Laurie, much less Gordo, into the mix. How did I do? We got to see more of Hank and introduce Hope! Ahhh, I love what becomes of their dynamic later one. Hope and Laurie are so fun and Hank and Gordo, it's so fun. And how about Laurie and Scott? We're going to be seeing them working together in a more fun way as we progress so I hope you're excited! Give me your thoughts!

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