Marvel's Kryptonian Scientist Chapter 368 368

At a restaurant sowhere in New York, a man in his early thirties squatted outside the entrance, staring blankly into space.

Though technically still young, the heavy stubble on his face and the exhaustion in his eyes made him look much older. Dressed in a waiter's uniform, he radiated the defeated air of soone life had beaten down one too many tis.

His na was Scott Lang.

Only a few months earlier, he had been released from prison after serving ti for theft. He had managed to find a low-paying job, but after his divorce, even the possibility of regaining custody of his young daughter seed increasingly out of reach.

Scott needed money.

A lot of money.

The kind of money he would never earn waiting tables, even if he worked for the next fifty years.

Perhaps because they knew exactly how desperate his situation had beco, a few old friends had suddenly reappeared in his life.

And they ca bearing an offer.

After hearing them out, Scott rejected it imdiately.

"Another burglary? Co on. I'm done with that life. I am not going back to prison."

"Keep your voice down, buddy."

A heavyset man with a thick beard draped an arm over Scott's shoulder and lowered his voice.

"We really need you for this one. I swear, this'll be your last job."

He leaned closer.

"The payout is huge. Enough to set you up for life. Enough to get your daughter back."

Scott fell silent.

For his daughter, there was very little he wouldn't do.

After a long pause, he sighed.

"Tell about the target."

A grin spread across the bearded man's face.

"I knew you'd co around."

He quickly explained.

"The guy's a scientist and businessman. Owns properties all over New York. One of his old villas has been sitting empty for years."

"We've got intel there's a high-security vault inside."

"Oh, and his na is Hank Pym."

Late that night, a window-covered van sat parked beside a road near an upscale residential district.

"I'm heading in."

Dressed in black tactical clothing, Scott adjusted his mask and earpiece before slipping out through the rear doors.

Inside the van, his accomplices monitored an array of equipnt.

They jamd nearby surveillance systems, disrupted local signals, and kept watch on every street surrounding the target area.

Their operation looked less like a group of petty thieves and more like a professional heist crew.

Scott moved quickly toward the villa.

Reaching the outer wall, he climbed over with practiced ease.

A few specialized tools later, the security bars on a window were open.

He slipped inside.

"No alarms."

Inside the modified van, one of Luis's hacker friends couldn't help sounding impressed.

"This guy's unbelievable."

Luis smirked proudly.

"That's why I insisted we bring him."

"He's the best."

The crew resud monitoring the operation.

No mistakes.

No surprises.

That was the goal.

Following instructions fed through his earpiece, Scott navigated the mansion.

"Cross the main hall. Stairs on your right. Second floor. Third storage room from the end."

Scott flicked on a small flashlight.

Monts later, he arrived at the designated room.

A fingerprint-secured door blocked his path.

A smile tugged at his lips.

Too easy.

Using adhesive tape, he lifted a residual fingerprint from the handle.

After reconstructing the print pattern, he replicated it well enough to fool the scanner.

Five minutes later, the door unlocked.

No alarms.

No alerts.

Nothing.

Inside, Scott found himself facing an enormous reinforced vault door nearly seven feet tall and over three feet wide.

"Now we're getting sowhere."

"What was that?" soone asked through the earpiece.

Scott ignored the question and examined the door.

His eyebrows rose.

"No wonder you needed ."

"What is it?"

One of his partners sounded nervous.

Scott ran a hand across the steel.

"Carbondale."

"Built in 1910."

His familiar thief's grin returned.

"Made using the sa steel used on the Titanic."

The van went silent.

Scott chuckled.

"Rember the iceberg?"

"The cold resistance wasn't exactly impressive."

Before prison, Scott had been a top engineer.

As it turned out, engineering and burglary shared more similarities than most people realized.

He drilled several precise holes into critical structural points of the vault.

Then he injected large amounts of water.

Next ca liquid nitrogen.

The water froze almost instantly.

Ice expanded throughout the internal frawork.

Pressure mounted.

A few monts later—

BOOM!

The massive vault door exploded outward and crashed onto the floor.

The sound echoed throughout the mansion.

"Open it!"

The excitent in his teammates' voices was impossible to miss.

"What'd you find?"

Scott stepped over the fallen steel door and entered the vault.

Then he froze.

The room was empty.

Completely empty.

There was no cash.

No jewelry.

No gold.

Nothing.

Only a dusty table standing alone in the center of the room.

Resting atop it was a dark red motorcycle suit and a strange-looking helt.

Scott stared.

"...What the hell is this?"

For several seconds, he couldn't find words.

Then frustration took over.

"There's nothing here!"

"What?"

Luis nearly shouted through the earpiece.

"Nothing?"

"No money?"

"No jewels?"

"Nothing!"

Scott glared at the bizarre suit sitting on the table.

After all this effort...

After risking prison again...

This was what they found?

Luis sounded genuinely apologetic.

"Sorry, Scott. I know how badly you needed this."

The information had co from one of his contacts.

Apparently, that information had been wrong.

"Forget it," Luis continued.

"Co back. We'll figure sothing else out."

"Yeah."

Scott took one last look around the vault.

Still nothing.

Then he shrugged.

A thief should never leave empty-handed.

At the very least, the strange suit had been locked behind two layers of security and a century-old vault.

That had to an sothing.

He packed up the suit and helt.

Then he slipped out of the mansion and returned to the waiting van.

The atmosphere inside the vehicle was grim.

Three accomplices stared at Scott.

None of them looked happy.

"So let get this straight."

The bearded man rubbed his face.

"We spent an entire night planning and executing this operation..."

"...for an old motorcycle outfit?"

Another accomplice snorted.

"Let's be accurate."

"It's a really ugly motorcycle outfit."

"I wouldn't pay five bucks for it online."

"What now?" soone asked.

Luis sighed heavily.

"We leave."

"This job was a bust."

The others reluctantly agreed.

Scott remained silent.

The strange suit rested on his lap.

His instincts as an engineer told him sothing wasn't right.

A motorcycle suit?

Really?

Soone had hidden it behind a Carbondale vault door.

A vault that required extraordinary effort to breach.

And the layer of dust covering it suggested it had been deliberately stored there for years.

People didn't protect worthless junk like that.

Which ant one thing.

Whatever this suit was...

It was far more valuable than it appeared.