Having
forced his way into the operating room at Cross Technological Enterprises to
rescue Dr. Erica Sondheim, the new Ant-Man (Scott Lang) faces the CEO,
Darren Cross, revealed to be a physical giant. He hits the hero, who shrinks and sends
a horde of flying ants into his foe’s eyes, following up with a lunge at his
face. But Cross’ senses are exceptionally sharp and he can see Ant-Man well
enough to swat him out of the air, using tweezers and a surgical probe to
trigger his growth back to human size. Cross removes Scott’s size control belt
and breaks the antennae from his cybernetic helmet, rendering the hero helpless
(or so he thinks)….
Later,
Cross visits Ant-Man who is chained up in the basement. He relates how, as a
powerful industrial leader, he was felled by a heart attack. Unable to find
help from doctors, his company developed a nucleorganic pacemaker which was
hooked up to Cross and began immediately to improve his heart. In fact, it
improved his heart and circulation system so well that he grew into a giant.
And then he was told that the pacemaker was slowly eroding his heart; he
underwent a transplant but that heart soon started to fail. He then heard of
Dr. Erica Sondheim and had her brought there. His rapid healing factor makes it
impossible to complete a heart transplant before the tissue heals over and he
hopes Dr. Sondheim’s surgical skills can compensate for that problem. He also
shows Scott his room full of unwilling heart donors, homeless men kidnapped from
the streets—but now he can have the heart of a healthy young superhero….
That night,
Scott repairs the cybernetic helmet with spare antennae he carried for just
this emergency and summons his ants to fetch his canisters of shrinking and
growth gases. With his equipment restored, Scott overpowers the guards and
flies his ant fleet to the operating room. There, he finds Dr. Sondheim
refusing to perform a heart transplant without assurance that the donor was a
volunteer. Cross refuses and Ant-Man clouts him. By constantly shifting his
size he forces Cross to chase after him until the villain suffers a heart
attack and dies. Dr. Sondheim confesses that during the last transplant, she
put back Cross’ old heart instead of a new one and now she feels guilty for
having deliberately killed a patient. Scott assures her she did the right thing….
Epilogue:
Dr. Sondheim operates on Cassie Lang and it’s a success; Scott thanks the
doctor but she says he should thank Ant-Man. Then Yellowjacket (Hank Pym)
approaches him; Scott thinks he’s about to be arrested but Pym congratulates
him for his heroism. Hank, miniaturized, saw Scott break into his home and take
the Ant-Man costume. Curious, he followed Scott to CTE and was zapped by a
security device. Groggy, he was able to observe Hank but not contribute; Scott
made out all right so he suggests Scott keep the costume. Scott likes the idea
and decides he would like being the new Ant-Man….