"Ant Man?"

"What?"

"Was it too late to change the name?" you smirked, nudging Sam gently when he began to laugh along. It was a conversation that was all too familiar for your friend.

"Iron Man was already taken," Scott quipped with an equally smug look. "Besides, what's wrong with Ant Man?"

"It doesn't sound very intimidating."

Scott glanced at Sam, who was standing just a step behind you and trying to hold in his laughter to avoid another poke to the ribs. He knew that introducing the two of you was a good idea, even if Steve didn't agree, and he was enjoying how much he was going to torture him with this win later. "She's right, Tic Tac."

"Okay, so what's yours then?" Scott challenged, pulling off his helmet to see you clearly as he waited. It was a false air of patience that he carried; inside he was a bundle of nervous energy, first from the rapid shift in size that he had just endured, but also from the prospect of having someone on the team who he could actually relate to.

"I don't need an alias," you scoffed, "I have nothing to hide. What you see is what you get."

"That's a liiiiie. You're a shifter. Who's to say that what I'm looking at is really your true form? Wait! I've got it! I think we should call you Shifty. You actually seem a little shifty if you ask me."

"I didn't."

"Pfft, okay," Scott snorted, giving Sam a sideways look before putting his helmet back over his head. He held his hand out to guide you forward, letting you take the lead to get into the jet first. "Down to business then. Nothing like a mission to kick off your first day of Avenging, right? Let's go. Time to see what you can do, Shifty."

You stopped cold, so quickly that Scott nearly tripped and pushed you over, but his quick reflexes grabbed around your waist to hold you both up. When you tore his hands away and gave him a firm push back, even he wouldn't be able to deny that maybe he had gone just a little too far. With each word, your finger pushed a little further into his chest, until he swore that you had left an indent in his skin beneath it. "Do not call me that. Unless you want to find yourself on the underside of my boot, I suggest you drop it, Tiny." Without another word from either of you, you turned on your heel and continued on, leaving him next to Sam with a paleness spreading over his features.

"See?" Sam said jovially, with a firm slap on his friend's shoulder, "I told ya she'd like you!"

"Are you serious?" he swallowed hard, his eyes still fixed on you. "Then what the hell does hate look like?"

~~~

A few missions after that first day was all it took for you to realize that you didn't exactly hate Scott; he was okay, and it was getting easier to tolerate him. His jokes got a little bit funnier the longer you knew him, but they were still pretty bad. He never took himself too seriously, which you could appreciate, but sometimes you wondered if he ever took anything seriously at all. One of your fears, on any team that you had ever been on, was that too much humor or lightheartedness would get someone hurt or worse, and even though you knew that there had to be some fun in a life like this, you couldn't encourage him.

Scott was just toying with you. He was well aware that his jokes and antics were wearing on you, and he was having the time of his life torturing you with it. It was clear to him that he was figuring out what hate really did look like, each time that you rolled your eyes at him, or when you gave Sam that simple glance in frustration that you thought he didn't see. But he did see it, and you were simply feeding into his drive to make your life intolerable. It wasn't that he didn't like you; he did. He only picked on people that he liked. Scott had always found kindergarten rules to be ageless and universal, so why change his ways just for you?

Maybe because he had started to like you anyway. Like, really like you.

It took a moment of clarity for him to realize how he was feeling, and when he did there was no turning back. Once the idea was in his head, it played over and over in his mind as a constant reminder that as hard as he had tried to fight it, he was a complete failure. A giant failure, at that. It was never more apparent then right now, as he towered above the building that Tony was certain that you were being held in after you had gone missing on the previous mission. He had no true responsibility to you, but Scott felt an unwavering need to get you out of there, even if he had to break the building apart to do it.

"Hey," Tony broke into his concentration, "maybe not smash quite so hard? You're not Banner, and if you're not careful you might drop a ceiling on her or something. Kinda counterproductive to what we're trying to accomplish here."

"I'm not gonna drop a ceiling on her. That's ridiculous...oh, whoops!" Scott yelped, fulfilling Tony's prophecy by letting a large section of the roof slip within his massive hands. "Okay, just stop talking to me! I need to concentrate!" Tossing the large slab away carelessly, making Steve dodge it at the last second, Scott felt his heart begin to race at the sight of you, holed up in a dark room at the back of the building, as if forgotten when your captors decided to make a run for it as the team arrived. "(Y/N), I've got you," he said quietly, finding that his hands were now too large to pick you up, "sort of.."

"Oh, god," you groaned, pushing yourself into his hand to help, "what do I call you like this? Are you compensating for something? Why are you so big?"

"Is now really the time?"

"It's always the time when you do things like this and expect me to not say anything, Scott."

"Tell ya what, how about you let me at least get your rescue done before you start knocking me down again, okay? Maybe what I'm compensating for is the inferiority complex you give me every time we argue like this." Once you were finally secure in his hand, he turned and made his way back towards the jet, but he didn't change back to his normal size. In fact, his other hand had come up to cover you as well, as if you could slip from it at any time. Even with the promise from Tony that he could get you safely into the jet himself, Scott didn't care; he believed that the only way to have you safe and sound was to do it himself.

~~~

You couldn't stand the feeling of owing things to others, and Scott had been relentless in reminding you that he had saved you after you had been so verbal about being able to take care of yourself so many times. Sure, there was an essence of joviality behind his tone when he gave you crap about it, but the point was being made just the same. That's why when you had the chance to return the favor, you had first taken the mood a little too lightly until you realized just how difficult that this particular rescue would be.

"He's in the suit," Tony groaned, feeling pain in every inch of his body after taking a direct hit. The suit around him had malfunctioned after an impact that had dislodged the arc reactor, and Scott had gone within the mechanism to re-wire it to allow Tony power to get away from the fight. He had barely pulled the faceplate away from his helmet before he could feel the oxygen around him growing thin.

"How long since you've heard him say anything?" you called out over the comms, your new sense of urgency drowning out Steve's voice in the process. "Maybe he just lost communications?"

"I think he got stuck in a power surge. The reactor lit up, then went crazy and died out again and I haven't heard a word from him since. (Y/N), can you get in there to check on him?"

"Me?" you gasped, taken aback at what he was asking. You were a shape shifter, but what he needed you to do was something that you had never done before. You would have to shrink yourself down remarkably, and you had no idea how much energy it would take to do it. You were just about to tell Tony that you didn't think you could do it when Scott's face flashed across your mind, laughing, of course, and the guilt was quick to wash over you at the sight. "I don't know, Tony...I guess I can try."

Tony could sense the hint of fear in your voice, and he thought that maybe a little joke would help lighten the mood, but he sure didn't pick a very good one. "Come on, (Y/N), you've got this. What's the worst that could happen?"

"You could have two tiny dead people stuck in your suit forever?"

"Well, that's morbid."

"Hey, you asked."

"Point taken," Tony relented, "I'll just work on a plan to get you out in case that should happen, and you just focus on making sure that it doesn't."

Once you had crossed the battlefield under Steve's cover, you focused on how you would best take on this smaller size, and where you would even start to look for Scott in the suit that would be massive once you had changed. He was an engineer and would at least know his way around the suit, again leaving you at a disadvantage. "Tony, do you know where he went in?"

"Under the right shoulder plate, I think."

"Ugh, okay...here goes..." You closed your eyes and put all of your focus into what you needed to do, shifting the energy that was already hard to contain within you; being in the midst of a fight left your adrenaline surging, and to bring it all in and under control so quickly took energy in itself. When you felt your heart begin to slow and the shaking in your body began to calm, you opened your eyes with a start, looking up to see a giant version of Steve staring back. "Okay, so that worked," you said awkwardly, "uh, Cap, a hand?"

Steve knelt down and let you climb up into his hand, all the while continuing to stare at you as he gently moved to set you onto Tony's suit. "Good luck."

All that you offered was a nod in thanks, but as it would turn out, you wouldn't even need it; you could see Scott from where you stood, lying motionless on a tangled mess of wires that he had been working on when the surge took him out. "Tony, this suit's dead, right?"

"From what I can tell."

"Okay, great," you sighed, pushing forward. Even with his reassurance that you shouldn't be jolted by the exposed wires that had hit Scott, you crept up to him and reached out slowly, finally bringing yourself to touch his hand as you waited for the same to happen to you. When nothing happened, you began to hurry, grabbing his arm and dragging him clear of the danger and towards the opening where you had gone in. Moving as fast as you could now, you hurried back towards the reactor and plugged in the final wire that he had held in his hand, nodding in approval and hurrying out when the suit came to life around you. You were just about to the outside again when you stopped, remembering to take his helmet off to be sure that he was even still alive. "Cap, I'm bringing him out!"

"Is he okay?"

"He's out cold, but he's breathing." You could feel your body struggle to hold this smaller form, pushing you to return to normal, thankfully waiting until you were clear of the suit before taking over your control and avoiding a terrible option. Instead, it left you lying over Tony, staring at his shocked face at your sudden appearance.

"Sweetheart," Tony chuckled cautiously, "not that I'm against the idea, but I'm usually on top."

"Oh my god, Stark, really?" you hissed, pushing yourself off of him with a little extra hit against his chest to make your point. "Not gonna happen." You turned and knelt back down at his side though so that you could see where you had left Scott, reaching down to take him so that you could bring him back to the jet. "Cap, I could use a little cover again."

"And I could use your help out here, (Y/N)," he argued back, "get him settled and get back in the fight."

"I'm staying with him."

"(Y/N)-"

"Final answer."

"What the hell am I, useless? I'm back, so let's go," Tony huffed, slapping the front of his helmet back on as he stood. When you heard the repulsors power up and push him into flight, you knew that Steve wouldn't hold the grudge for long, and that now you owed Tony for giving you time to make a run for the jet.

"Great, I can't wait to hear how I'm gonna have to repay that," you grumbled under your breath, gently setting the tiny version of Scott onto one of the benches in the quinjet. Your hands were too large in comparison to try to adjust his regulator to bring him back to normal size, and you were just far too tired to shrink down to that size again. Fortunately, now that he was getting fresh air again it didn't take too long for him to wake and do it himself, though still uncertain and fumbling at the action.

"What the hell happened?"

"The suit tried to kill you," you answered flatly, watching him carefully. "But I won."

"So, we're even?"

"Really? No 'thank you'? Do you realize what I had to do to get you out of there? Not all of us are used to being so tiny. Maybe you've just become accustomed to things being...smaller."

"Giant Man, (Y/N)," he snapped, but there was still pain in his voice when he moved to sit up, "I'm Giant Man too, so don't even go there."

"Hey, just lay down, alright? Cap and Tony have it, we can stay here till it's over. You're not getting out of here unless it's through me."

"Giant Man," he repeated.

Your mind went to a conversation that you had gone through when you first met Scott, and the parallel wasn't lost on you. You began with a quiet snicker under your breath, but when you broke out into a full laugh at his expense, he pushed himself up with an inquisitive and annoyed look, despite your failed attempt to hold him steady.

"So," you chided, "was it too late to change that name too? I think we really need to work on your vocabulary, Scott."