Ghost, Ultron-99, and Ant-Man.
Ghost was also not prepared for the sudden blow to the back of his head from an arrogant sounding individual. Ghost rolled into his fall, tumbling back onto his feet to meet his assailant mask-to-mask. His get up was...different, though he didn't have the right to judge fashion. Red and black microfibers and what he could only guess was maybe leather formed to a dark matte helmet that made him think of an insect. He definitely wasn't Private Eye at least. Ghost wasn't sure if this made things better or worse.
"I didn't know Scott Lang left insect gimps lying around to guard his horribly built tech," Ghost insulted back. "Let me do my work friend. Whatever he's paying you, it's not worth what I can use from this program. I mean, I pretty much have everything I need actually. All of this is really just, antiquated."
With that, Ghost leveled his rifle and fired off a round, aiming center mass. The rifle was almost completely silent, equivalent to the sound of someone shifting around as they sat. The round sparked in the air as it traveled, a rather new age piece of tech Ghost was proud to boast about. The round fazed just like his suit when fired, only reforming when in approximate contact with organic compounds so that it could unleash a vicious shock to knock his opponents unconscious for a short time.
Henry just shrugged. “We recently redecorated.” As the gun was pointed at him he flicked his thumb down on his right hand shrinking down, pushing himself straight off the ground as the… shot. Though he couldn’t see it, the trigger was pulled wasn’t it? He pushed himself up on the ground, hitting his left thumb button and growing to his regular size his fist aiming for his opponent's face.
“Sorry, but I can’t let you leave with what you have. Secret identity and all.” By this time an alarm was flashing on his hud, the small dosage of Pym particles he had used upon Janet would be wearing off and she would be growing to her regular size. Which would hopefully prove a suitable enough distraction. If not, then he guess he’d need to see how good she’d be in a real fight without any testing.
Janet had several new facts to work with. One, the guy, or rather his suit, didn’t really like electricity. Two, her scanners were detecting a growing lack of whatever it was that made her shrink, and estimated she only had few seconds to react before returning to her usual size. And three, the change in size did little to her actual abilities, which was rather strange. She would have to inquire Henry and persuade him to let her have a peek at his research.
Positioning herself behind the armored man, she watched the brawl with worry. Her processor skipped a tick when the intruder fired his rifle, but fortunately Henry was able to evade it.
Then the shrinkage ran it’s course, and Janet prepared to act, raising her arms. Without her combat protocols she would have to improvise, and those weren’t odds she liked. So instead once she grown back to full size, she went to grab Ghost’s head, her telepathic interface spooled up and ready to trap his mind in an illusion - in which he would have overpowered Henry, escaped and hopefully led them straight to his lair, or at least give them some idea of where to look if they failed to stop him here.
Ghost wasn't sure why he was being constantly thrown off his game today, but when his attacker shrunk and reappeared just before punching him again, he knew that this wasn't some half-assed idiot in a dumb costume. As Ghost took the hit and back on his ass again, some old information decide to emerge from the cobwebs of his mind. Pym Particles
Before he could get up and possibly stop the guy to ask how he's gotten his grubby hands on Pym Particles, a pair of feminine hands grabbed his head. Without any working, he was in the thralls of a mental attack, something he's again never expected to go down in a simple heist like this. As he slipped into whatever dream world the woman was trying to put him into, he fought back. There was too much at stake, too many people who needed someone like this and letting himself go down this easily was not an option. Nueva York need Ghost. The people deserved a hero, goddamnit!
In what seconds of conscious though he had left, Ghost heard the godsend ring of his suit restoring functionality. With a single thought, Ghost was intangible again and immediately fell from the woman's hands and through the floor.
“Janet-” Henry shouted before he could stop himself as Janet reappeared right behind the figure and put her hands to his temple. There was a couple of seconds before he went intangible and fell through the floor. “You know, that’s a neat trick. Keep a look out he could be back.” He focused on the neural link with the ants in the room, some of them moved outside waiting to see if he re-appeared there. Others crawled around his and Janets feet, trying to pick up any kind of a trail.
“I want you to access the net Janet and pick up any details you can about a guy that can walk through walls and go invisible and looks creepy as anything.” He tapped his helmet, trying to perform his own scans. The problem was his scanners were as good as Janet’s but he couldn’t process the information the same way. “Also while you’re at it check SAM is okay, yes she may annoy you but she holds a lot of important information, see what this guy managed to take.”
Janet growled in frustration as the intruder slipped away into nothingness again. She could only detect his EM signature getting away, without gathering any more information. She was happy to be praised, but she wasn’t as good as she wanted to be. Still, it has been her first time around in a fight, and she wasn’t even ready or fully activated and equipped for that matter.
Nodding at the instructions, she went on to search. A few queries on Alchemex later, she had an answer. “I suspect the man might have been the most recent iteration of Ghost. The abilities fit. I am unsure about his motives though. The first ghost was often branded as a terrorist. this one...” she thought for a while and checked on the acquired data, “I’m not certain. The hack was brutal and raw. SAM is missing pieces of code, more are corrupted and some bits were copied. Notably those containing access codes and information on Alchemax. You may wish to notify your employer to change them immediately - My own hack was interrupted and his servers are still operational.” she delivered the report.
“It would seem none of our data was stolen past what he observed here. I do not believe he got a glimpse of me. What I do know is the geographic location of his server farm. I believe if we were to set fire to it, we would draw him out?” she suggested with an innocent looking face, but did the knuckle popping motion.
Sighing, she unplugged the drive containing SAM’s remains from the contraption and morphed into an easily blending shape, with actual clothes on instead of connections for the thus far non existent armor. Shoving the drive into her pocket, she looked Henry in the eyes: “Well, that was a memorable first day of life. Can we go home now?”
Just below them, Ghost was still there. Waiting and listening. The woman's name was Janet. That meant something, but he couldn't piece it together. Lang Securities warehouse, insectoid man with Pym Particles, a woman named Janet. Janet van Dyne? Were these people related to Hank Pym? Ghost shook off whatever thoughts raged through his mind and shot back up, returning to tangibility just underneath the first stranger and sucker punched him with an uppercut.
After finally getting in a successful punch, Ghost floated up above the two and looked around. Ants were crawling around everywhere, most likely from the ant-farm sitting on the other side of the warehouse. Yep, that mostly confirmed his suspicions.
"I finally get it now," Ghost muttered in his usual chilling tone, "you two are either part of the Pym Family or have a weird fascination with them."
Ghost turned to the woman behind him, Janet, and could tell immediately that something was off. Her body language was stiff, maybe a little too much. She seemed normal enough, but Ghost knew a machine when he saw one. Nothing this advanced or this close to being human, but with just enough signs to point towards robotics. Ghost kept it to himself of course.
"So what are a pair of Pyms doing in Nueva York with a highly advanced programmed intelligence?," he asked as he floated just above the reach of the ants. "I'd rather not have an army of Ultrons messing up this town worse than it already is."
Henry was a little bent over from the punch, however stood up straight again as the fine gentleman hovered a bit lower, piecing it all together apparently. He hit the button on the side of his helmet, lifting the faceplate. “Well she’s just sightseeing right now, I’m working. Making a living, making sure nobody screws around with Pym particles and all that.”
He smirked at the family or weird fascination. Both of those were true in a way, less so for Janet but she had only been alive for a day. Through the neural link he told the ants to move away, though still had them looking for something useful. If they could track this guy that would work better than knowing where some of his information occasionally went through.
“The real question, is what is a former terrorist long dead doing in Nueva York with new tech and with a changed perspective on life? I mean we’re not causing any harm… Well she won’t and none of mine has hit the news so lets just ask that question. After all, you have me at a disadvantage Mr….?”
Ghost didn't reply, floating past Janet to drop right next to the program container. "I was here for this," he told them as he lightly knocked on the machines housing. "What I took were some omega-level access keys to some of Alchemax's biggest server farms."
He turned to them, looking at them dead in the eyes as he spoke. "Banking information, prototype schematics, private business dealings and audio recordings. Names. Numbers. The literal keys to this cities salvation. With what I have here, I can have every executive in Nueva York's head on a pike." He floated up to Pym, never breaking eye contact.
"And if you dare to try and stop me, I'll put you and the girl both in the ground," he threatened. "This is bigger than all of us. This is the revolution this country needs."
Henry just clapped. “Inspiration speech. Truly, it was. Though did you not think I thought off that?” He paced around Ghost. “I’m a smart guy-” He pointed to Janet as if using her as an example. “-I’ve got a cover inside Alchemex, I have my little spies here-” He indicated to the ants “-I can also go small enough to sneak around as I wish, go where I wish and all that fun stuff.”
He laid back against one of the few tables left standing in the room. “It’s not as simple as exposing all this information, what are you going to do? Just go and literally take them all out? That won’t solve squat. They’ll bring in new guys and it will be just the same, and you’ll be a wanted criminal. That won’t help anyone. Janet, how many assassination attempts have there been against the executives of Alchemex? Include both failed and successful attempts.”
Janet giggled at the mention of putting her in the ground. The man was certainly welcome to try, bu given the fact that all she needed to do to render him inert was to charge her skin with some voltage, she was reasonably confident a battle of minds would have been a better field even for him. That of course required him to try and hack her system which he had negative chance to accomplish, or for him to hold still while she had him in a hold, at which point she could simply restrain him.
“Too many, not enough.” Janet summed up the inquiry about the assassinations. “Furthermore, I have no interest in overthrowing the corporation. I wish to protect people, nothing more, nothing less.” she summed up her programming into organic terms and accessed ehr historical database again. “Furthermore, not many revolutionaries succeeded in bringing the utopia they presented, whether willingly or not. Take the Soviet Union, Al-Quaeda or the countless revolution movements in Africa. The only result of those is a shift in the distribution of wealth, but in any given system, there were rulers and masses.”
She extended her palm, activating the projector built originally for SAM. “Observe, the average standard of life in year 2000 on the world.” she explained the graphic she was projecting, a globe with rainbow colored continents. Problematic regions like Africa displayed in the red, large agglomerations in green. “and now the average standard of the corporate owned cities on the northern american continent now.” she said and displayed a chart, with the percentages being more or less the same. “Your intent may be noble Mr. Ghost, but all you will change is that the people will move around. It is the iron law of oligarchy: those with money control the rest, whether they earned it with their own company or through governmental means.” Janet ended her lesson.
Ghost chuckled to himself. It's like they weren't even listening. "These keys are the answer to that age old constant then," he replied as he floated over to the woman. Her emerald eyes threw him off for some reason, and her brown hair looked almost too real as he grew closer. "With the data-keys, I'll rip Alchemax of their almighty dollars and burn it in their faces. This will be an extinction-level event for the corporate world Miss Pym."
Ghost turned to leave, tired of being lectured by what he knew was a machine in human form. He stopped for a moment, thinking. Without even turning to speak Ghost quickly muttered, "01010000 01101111 01101111." This statement is a lie. Something dumb one of his only friends told him to try if he ever had the chance. Ghost made his way towards the exit, saying nothing else.
“Try a 2 Mr. Ghost. They work great.” Janet snickered, but in her system filed Ghost on her watch list. He knew something about her - how much she couldn’t say, not without hacking into his database without being detected - something to do with a free evening perhaps. It shouldn’t take longer.
Henry just sighed. “I am listening, what makes you think the people who take over for Alchemex or even replace them will be any better? You can’t just rip down the old without the foundation for something new. Doing something like that would just cause more problems than it’s worth.” He sighed. “I want to see Alchemex gone as much as you do, replaced by something better with an actual democratic process rather than extreme capitalism.”
He paused for a second as if in deep thought. “If we could find a way, to replace the existing structure-” He paced moving his finger back and forth as he spoke. “-If we could replace the existing structure with those who aren’t going to abuse the power, and people in the government with enough spine to handle themselves we may be in with a chance of breaking the hold the rich haver over the city.”
He looked from Janet, to Ghost. “This is probably the best course of action there is too take, and it’s the one I’m going to take.” He sighed, couldn’t believe he was saying this. “Why don’t you work with us, you know what they say after all. Three genius’ and it’s a party.”
Ghost groaned in though, stopping in mid-flight as he listened. Working with others wasn't his usual preference, but maybe having others to rip him out of his comfort zone would be an interesting test. He'd probably keep his home-base separate from these dealings, but maybe he could work this out.
"Ok Pym, you have my interest," Ghost replied as he turned back to the two. "Maybe it's time for me to put away the solo act for now for the betterment of Nueva York. I'll let you in on my tech if you can let me observe and study some Pym Particles."
The deal seemed fair to Ghost. Much of his tech was top of the line and practically irreplaceable unless Ghost made it himself. Letting him test and play with some of the Pym Family secrets wouldn't hurt…
Henry just laughed to himself, pointing at Ghost as he looked at Janet. “This guy has balls, I’ll give him that.” He turned his attention back to Ghost. “I’m all for the teaming up, though I’m afraid the chance to study Pym Particles isn’t on the table. They’ve gotten out of my families hands at least once and when that happened so did bad stuff. How about, we do secrets on a case by case basis. I mean you’ve still got me at a disadvantage knowing my surname when I don’t know yours. Won’t be that hard to find me in any census in the city or my daughter.”
He had to get that out sooner or later, someone with a relationship in tech and the statement earlier had him a bit concerned about how much Ghost actually knew or at minimum guessed. “Besides, you’ve got that whole invisible, walk through walls thing going on. It’s probably better if we stick to what we’re both good at, I mean you didn’t see Iron Man using Pym Particles back in the Heroic ages.”
"Stark was a fool," Ghost replied coolly. "But no matter, I'll find out at some point. I have no interest in shrinking myself, honestly. It's what I want or who to shrink that has my attention."
“I highly doubt just by seeing me use them you’ll find out, you’re little scanner thingies won’t do much good either otherwise other people would have found out by now. If you do try, I’ve seen some pretty messy things happen. Alchemex gave up before they got to human trials, thankfully.” He pulled a disk from his right hand leg, and twirled it in his hands. “This disk, can shrink whatever it hits… for a period of time. When you need one, if for whatever reason I’m not there and by the point we are trusting each other you can use one. Don’t try and open it. They’re sealed shut with mechanisms in place to prevent tampering. Though how about, we call it a day, go home and rest. Meet here tomorrow, do some introductions maybe… Plan our first move. How does that sound?”
Ghost snickered. "I never rest," he replied bluntly. "I'll be back tomorrow then. Same time. Hopefully with less punching. No promises."
With that, Ghost when fully invisible and intangible and flew up out of the warehouse and up to the sky. Once again he could smell the vile nature of Nueva York. The rich giggled in their high-rises and the poor suffered in squaller. To his surprise, a blazing trail from one of the poorer districts seemed to lead towards Central Park. Ghost sighed. Enough bullshit for one day. For now, he would return to him base of operations and go over the data-keys in peace. Maybe listen to a little Paul McCartney...
