Work Text:
(If you are reading this on any PAY site this is a STOLEN WORK, the author has NOT Given Permission for it to be here. If you're paying to read it, you're being cheated too because you can read it on Archiveofourown for FREE.)
"Hey, cuz, how are you doing?"
Bruce looked up from the data displaying before him and blinked. "Jennifer? What are you doing here!"
"I brought pizza?" Jennifer held up a box. "Half vegetarian for you, half bacon and mushroom for me."
"Pizza. Jenn, it's not that it's not good to see you..." Bruce took off his specially made glasses and sighed. He'd thought that merging with Hulk would have solved all his problems. It just made new ones. He wasn't as strong as Hulk, and, while he hadn't tested it, he was pretty sure he wasn't as intelligent as he'd been as 'Puny Banner'. So he still needed glasses, and figuring out a vaccine, or even a semi-effective medicine, against the coronavirus, was really, really hard. He wasn't that kind of doctor, really.
"But you're busy, and you don't have time to play host," Jennifer said, putting down a couple of paper plates on a nearby desk before opening the pizza box. "I'm not here for entertainment. There's not much use for a lawyer right now. You can't sue a virus for damages. So. I have a couple hands, there must be some work I can do around here that doesn't take a genius."
Bruce sighed again. "Yeah, ok. S.I. gave me this lab, but all I'm working with is theoretical experiments. I guess you could... I don't know... bring me tea?" He smiled at her, faintly.
"And pizza," Jennifer said.
"And pizza," Bruce agreed.
"So, how far along are you?" Jennifer asked once they'd moved away from the equipment and were eating.
"Farther than we were when we started? Hard to say. We're pretty much certain it started with bats, and then went through another animal vector. Pangolin is looking to be the likely species, right now, judging by the physical characteristics of the virus."
"Pangolin... but it started in a meat market... people eat pangolins? Aw, they're so cute."
Bruce nodded. "They're highly endangered and supposedly protected most places. But...some people think it's a delicacy... and that the scales have medicinal uses."
"God. So this disease is the Revenge of the Pangolins?"
"Not funny, Jenn, not funny."
"Lighten up, Bruce! You've always been all gloom and doom!"
Bruce looked down at his green arm. He raised his eyebrows.
"Oh, that." Jenn munched on her pizza. "I never thought Hulk was all that bad."
"Bruce," Jennifer telephoned him a few days later. "I'm... not coming in to work." She coughed. And kept on coughing.
"Jenn... you sound terrible. Have you seen a doctor?"
"No... I called. But you know... I'm young. I don't smoke..." She coughed harder. "Don't have a history... of anything...They said unless it gets really bad, I should just stay home... tough it out."
"You really don't sound good. I don't believe you should be alone." Bruce started shutting down his equipment.
"I'm good. Really."
Bruce stood up. "I'm coming over. If you don't open the door when I get there, I'm going to break it down."
"I'll never get my security deposit back," Jennifer protested weakly.
Bruce picked up a medical kit he kept packed out of old habit. "I'm coming over."
Bruce knocked on the apartment door. "Jenn?" He rattled the door knob, and the door opened partway, stopped by something. He pushed a little further and looked down. "JENN!" Oh god, she was... breathing, but...barely. She wouldn't last long enough to get to a hospital, and even if she did, they were so overwhelmed...
Bruce looked at her, and his jaw tightened. "I'm sorry, Jenn." He picked her up and brought her into the apartment and laid her on the bed. "I wish there were another way."
He set up a direct transfusion, and sat next to her, holding her hand as his blood traveled down the line. "It's a good thing we're a perfect match isn't it?" He whispered, "I hope you can forgive me. I just... you're the last family I have left. I don't want to lose you."
Jennifer woke up an hour later, and looked down at her green, green arm.
"I'm sorry," Bruce said.
Jennifer turned her hand over and over, staring at it, and then she looked up at Bruce and smiled.