Chapter Text
January 2029
Morgan double checked her math one last time, though she knew it was perfect. Still, Mom and Uncle Rhodey had drilled it into her head that it was better to check, because even geniuses sometimes transposed something.
Normally, she'd have one of her brothers, or Mom, or her various aunts and uncles check her work, but not for this project. This one was too important, and it had to remain a secret. Morgan had grown up hearing the family story about how, a day before Mom went into labor, Dad locked himself in the lab for three hours and came out afterwards crying, talking about how he made the best kid. Mom always said he had just had a really weird dream, but Morgan knew better, because her Dad had since invented time travel. Well, dimensional travel, which took them to parallel universes, or created branching ones. Not quite the same thing.
Not like Morgan's project.
Because Morgan also knew about the Time Stone, which created actual, pure, time travel. Which meant she could too. Morgan had watched all the movies; she knows all the rules. She'd talked to Uncle Stephen, and Uncle Wong, and Granny Janet, and learned all about the various universes and realms. She'd talked to her brothers about seeing the stones in action, and the snaps. And she'd talked to Uncle Bruce and Uncle Rhodey and dug every detail about the time heists out of them. She knew everything, and according to her calculations, she was ready to go.
It would have been so much easier to make a branching reality, but that would leave her alternate self still stuck without a Dad, and that was simply unacceptable. Thus, Morgan was aiming for pure time travel. She knew that, when traveling in time, one needed to avoid making as many changes as possible. Morgan intended to make one big change, but the fewer smaller ripples she made in the process, the better it would be for the time stream.
Of course, inventing pure time travel was only half of the equation. Morgan had also invented a device that would allow her dad to discharge the energy of the stones, instead of drawing it into himself. All she needed to do now was ensure that he added it to the nanotech of his suit, so it would be activated when he snapped.
One big change.
And Morgan knew exactly when to aim. Because she knew — she knew — that that family story was a clue. Because that moment with her dad in the lab? That would be when she gave him the discharger. Morgan would go back to the day before she was born, convince FRIDAY to summon Dad to the lab, give him the discharger and explain where and when to use it, and then return. One tiny change, which hopefully he could resist tinkering with to create ripples. And then, five years later, one big change on the battlefield. She'll have to assimilate new memories of him surviving that day, and the following five years, but that was a choice Morgan was willing to make.
In the end, the day of the meeting wasn't just a clue, it was the secret to cracking the entire process. Morgan's machine was based on her current age, hence sending her back to the day before she was born. It used a boomerang principle, which is how she'd get back, as it would automatically "snap" her back to the right time like a rubber band. Morgan had set it for a three hour trip, assuming she would need some time to convince FRIDAY to summon Dad, and guessing that he might have remained in the lab for a little while after she left. Plus or minus a 5.4 minute margin of error, of course.
Now, everything was set up, multiple copies of the discharger were tucked into her pockets, she had triple and quadruple checked her numbers, and she was ready to go. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, Morgan pressed the button.
"Calculating trajectory," the machine announced.
"Ooh, do I hear calculations being done?" Peter asked a moment later, pushing open her bedroom door.
"And why are you sneaking around in your room instead of the lab?" Harley asked, following him inside and closing the door behind him.
"Get out!" Morgan snapped, shoving at them.
"Recalculating trajectory," her time machine announced.
"Nooo!" Morgan lunged out for the abort and return button, but she wasn't fast enough; as she slammed her hand down on the panel, she was enveloped in darkness and a rush of wind.
1974
Peter came to with a jolt and looked around frantically. Harley and Morgan were laying beside him, and neither looked to be harmed. They were also waking up.
"What the hell did you do?" Harley muttered, giving Morgan a weak glare as he propped himself up.
"Don't look at me! My calculations were perfect until you blundered in!" she snapped.
"And what were these perfect calculations supposed to do?" Harley shot back.
Peter had started looking around the unfamiliar, but fancy, room. His head snapped back towards the others when Morgan sighed and quietly admitted, "time travel."
"Seriously?!" Peter yelped. "After what happened—"
"I had a plan!" Morgan cut him off. "I was barely going to change anything! Just one little hop a few years back and one single change! I know what I am doing!"
It hit Peter like a super-soldier punch, and a quick glance at Harley showed that he'd made the same connection. Obviously, she was going back to save Tony. Peter scooped her up onto his lap and gave her a firm hug, "I'm so sorry, sis."
She accepted his comfort for a moment, until Harley interrupted. "So, when did we actually go? If this isn't right? And where?"
Morgan fiddled with what appeared to be a chronometer on her wrist. "Oh shit."
"Language!" The boys chorused, just like Tony did when he was mocking Rogers, then they both giggled.
Morgan wasn't laughing. She held up her wrist to show them both the blinking number 1974 on the display. "We overshot by almost 50 years. It was supposed to use my age as a measurement; it looks like it added yours on too."
They let that settle for a moment before Peter decided to take charge. "Okay, first things first; do you have a plan to get back?"
"Yeah, the machine employs a rubber band principle. After three hours of being stretched taut it'll just thwip back into place."
Peter nodded in a way he hoped was reassuring. "Okay, so we just have to avoid screwing up the timeline for three hours, and then we'll bounce back home. Got it."
"Good luck with that," said a new voice.
They turned simultaneously, in horror, and saw a young boy peeking out at them from behind an uncomfortable looking sofa. He had a fading bruise on his cheek and a scabbed over cut on his lip. Peter had once seen a picture of Tony, at four years old, holding his first circuit board. He suddenly had an inkling where they were, and almost hoped he was wrong. "Oh, frick."
o
The other boy rolled his eyes. "Dude, you're 23 years old. Just say 'fuck'." Tony filed away the number to remember later.
"There is a child present!" The first one hissed back, looking pained at the thought.
"Hello!" the girl said brightly.
Tony had been wary at first; not because he was afraid of the dark, like Howard said, but because he'd been kidnapped last week. Jarvis said it was perfectly reasonable to be wary after an experience like that. He was now fairly certain that this trio weren't new kidnappers, though, and had developed a much more exciting hypothesis. "So, do you three time travelers have names?"
"T— time travelers?" The first boy squeaked. "Why would you think we're—" He caved to Tony's unimpressed look. "Fine. You can call me, uh, Ben, and he can be John, and that's Helen."
"Seriously?" 'John' looked at him in disbelief.
"I am trying to preserve the timeline, John." 'Ben' said through gritted teeth. 'Helen' elbowed him.
"You're Tony Stark, aren't you?" she asked cautiously, a strange look on her face.
Tony was still fairly certain that they weren't kidnappers — though he wasn't totally ruling out spies just yet — so he nodded.
"So, uh, what are you doing here?" 'Ben' asked.
Tony rolled his eyes, making 'John' laugh. "I live here."
'Ben' flushed. "Right, yeah, o— of course." He glanced at the others for help, but 'Helen' was still staring at Tony, and 'John' had clearly decided to let him sink on his own. "So, um… what do you like to do for fun?"
o
Morgan tuned out Peter's hopeless babble, choosing instead to focus on her dad. Not that he was that yet, of course. Still, he looked a lot like the photos of herself from this age. Mom had always said so, but there weren't many casual photos of him for a long time. Before Dad was 16, the few photos they had were all staged, publicity shots. After that it was mostly blurry tabloid nonsense: most of which FRIDAY refused to show her because it was "corrupting."
Uncle Rhodey had a few good photos from that time, and he and Mom both had more from the next ten years or so, but it wasn't until Dad and Mom got together that they really started taking candid shots. Of course, Friday could pull up footage from any of a dozen angles and play it, but it wasn't the same as being in the room with him. The nuances like eye contact, the quiet breathing that normally Friday filtered out, the smell of grease and lava soap…
Funny how those two smells were so prevalent both at this age, and in Morgan's memories. Of course there was also coffee and aftershave — sometimes Morgan snuck in and opened the bottle to take a sniff. She suspected her mom did too, which was why the bottle was still there in the drawer on Dad's side of the sink.
This isn't what she wanted, obviously. Morgan had a plan: one big change. But now that she was here, she couldn't bring herself to regret it. Of course, once they got back, she was going to kick out her idiot brothers, lock and barricade her door, and do it again — properly — to get to the right time.
But sitting here, listening to Peter try not to reveal anything about the future, and Dad try not to reveal anything about himself, and Harley try to trip them both up… Morgan could enjoy this while it lasted.
A while later, Morgan's chronometer dinged that their three hours were up, and she grabbed Peter and Harley's hands, just in case. They were still sitting on the ground, so there shouldn't be any kind of disastrous fall and head injury, but it might not hurt to use a helmet when she did this again.
The rushing wind and darkness wasn't as much of a surprise this time, but opening her eyes to the same dark wood paneling definitely was. Morgan held up her wrist, tugging Harley's hand along with it. Both of her brothers leaned over her shoulders to see the reading at the same time as her.
1975.
"Fuck," they chorused.