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Everyone thinks that Hulk is stupid, that she is a mindless animal driven by the rage woven tightly into her being. This is not the case. True, Hulk cannot compete with Banner intellectually, but that doesn’t mean she’s incapable of understanding or learning. After all, Hulk can see, hear, feel, and remember everything that Banner does. So who is to say that Hulk is stupid?
Yes, she is Bryce Banner’s anger and pain personified and yes she hates weak puny Banner who keeps her trapped and hidden away, but she knows why. Hulk knows emotions, knows that Banner is afraid, and always has been. Afraid of Dad, afraid of Ross, afraid of dying, afraid of watching friends die like Mom did. So even though Banner and Hulk loathe each other, Hulk will forever stand between Banner and the dangerous outside world.
And if she is labeled a monster because she puts Banner ahead of innocent lives, then so be it.
Hulk doesn’t trust the red haired woman. Her eyes are cold and she smells of falsehood with a hint of fear. Hulk watches her warily through Banner’s eyes as she talks. Since Banner is the one that handles complicated things like conversation, Hulk doesn’t pay attention to what is being spoken, preferring to simply remain alert.
So when Banner slams her hands down on the table in front of her and lowers the mental barrier that keeps Hulk from coming out, Hulk is ready and growls softly (or at least softly for her) knowing that Red Hair can partially see her.
In less than a second a gun is pointed at them and Hulk can feel Banner’s smugness at her guess being proven. Hulk doesn’t quite understand what exactly happened, but since there is no outright threat, she settles back down again.
Whatever it was that Red-Haired woman wanted Banner to do, Banner agrees and some time later, they are in some kind of crowded place that floats on water. Banner is uncomfortable, and slightly twitchy so Hulk keeps one eye open at all times.
Then Red Hair is there with a man at her side. This one doesn’t smell like fear. Hulk can immediately sense that he is a leader, though his respect and regard for them is clear. Banner has an image of her mind of the man wearing a blue uniform so Hulk calls him Blue. Hulk doesn’t like Blue, but she doesn’t dislike him either. As she doesn’t really like anyone, this is a compliment to Blue.
The ground that they are all standing on lifts up from the water and Banner laughs it off but she’s secretly concerned about being in such close proximity to other people. Hulk doesn’t care.
Perhaps Banner merely suspects it, but Hulk can almost taste the secrets that linger in the air around everyone’s smiles and permeate the folds of clothing until they reek of it. It’s the thickest around the man in the suit and the man with the eye-patch. Like Red-Haired woman, they cannot be trusted. But then again, when everyone is out to get you, whom are you supposed to trust? Hulk doesn’t ponder the question, and even if she did, she wouldn’t be concerned with coming up with an answer.
Besides, it hasn’t escaped either Banner or Hulk’s notice that a cage has been built especially for them.
As Banner and Hulk watch the man in green and gold pass by her room, he turns to look at them and Hulk suddenly feels so cold that it burns. Hulk wants to take control, to dull the pain, but while Banner is shaken, she is firm and the mental barrier between them doesn’t budge an inch. Hulk snarls at this, but reluctantly quiets down and waits patiently for her turn. It will come soon enough.
Unlike Blue, the big man with long hair doesn’t treat them like someone to be respected due to her power. For the most part he seems to see himself as above everyone in the room, including her. Hulk snorts at that.
Hulk feels blisteringly cold again and she is more than irritated. Hulk want out! She yells at Banner but the other ignores her again.
Both are then distracted when another man enters the room. He has a pretty blue light in his chest. Banner’s reaction to him is different from the others, Hulk notes. The emotions churning in her are similar to the ones she had when they were with Betty, though nowhere near as strong. Hulk doesn’t know him, so he’s not a friend. Hulk begins to pay attention.
The man (Tony, according to Banner) doesn’t smell afraid or disgusted. What he does smell like is fascination and bittersweet cynicism (though Hulk doesn’t know what that is or what it means). She can also smell metal and grease and coffee and coconut of all things.
Tony begins talking to them, and compliments both Banner and Hulk. Hulk can’t remember the last time anyone said they liked her. It’s… nice.
Hulk hasn’t thought anyone was worth liking after Betty, but she can make an exception for Tony. Even with the periods of the strange cold that she keeps feeling, she keeps analyzing him.
Tony more or less treats Banner and Hulk as equals. He offers them a place to stay in his home. He pokes them too, but Hulk oddly doesn’t mind, because it confirms that he’s not afraid of her. He defends them with words when Blue mentions how dangerous Hulk is, and a few minutes later, he gives them berries.
Tony doesn’t realize it, but to Hulk, the behavior he displays seems to her like a courting ritual. After all, what else could offers of food, clothing, and shared shelter be for?
Blue leaves and Tony and Banner talk about Hulk. Tony thinks that Hulk saved Banner. Banner doesn’t know what to believe. Hulk smirks.
It hurts. The cold hurts and it’s more intense than ever. There are too many people in the room and they’re so loud, and it’s beginning to feel like Hulk and Banner are surrounded. Red Hair is there as well as Eye-patch, which doesn’t help at all. Banner seems to feel the same.
The cage is brought up and Hulk growls at the word. She’s locked up enough already, and she will NOT go into a physical cage. And as Banner says, they couldn’t die even if they were somehow put in there.
The memories of the men that tried to kill them are even more inflaming and they entwine with the ice in Hulk’s vision. She strains against Banner’s skin, but before she can emerge, Blue says something and the ice melts and Banner pushes her away.
Moments later the room explodes.
The barrier cracks.
More lies. Red Hair won’t stop telling lies and it makes Banner mad because she knows they won’t be all right. They are never all right.
Banner snaps and Hulk surges forward, and for a moment their body is caught in a state in between both forms. After momentary resistance from Banner, Hulk rips the control away and rises from Banner’s ashes when she falls into the back of Hulk’s mind.
As the transformation finishes Hulk shakes herself and roars, reveling in the sound of her powerful voice resounding in the now smaller space.
There’s a small gasp of pain behind her and Hulk whips around to see Red Hair staring at her in horror, having just wrenched her foot out from under some wreckage.
Red Hair bolts and Hulk chases her. She betrayed them, and lied to them and Hulk will make her pay.
Red Hair is fast and quiet but it’s all too easy to find her from her quick breath. Red Hair full out runs when she’s found, and Hulk chases her, not caring about the obstacles in her way, which are either thrown to the side or demolished when she rams into them.
She catches up to Red Hair and with one swipe sends her flying into a wall. Hulk advances but before she can attack again, someone slams into her side, crashing her through a wall.
After taking a moment to reorient, Hulk pushes herself up to see that her attacker is the long-haired man from earlier. He is also pushing himself back up and staring at her with apprehension. They both slowly stand up and begin circling each other.
Hulk doesn’t wait for Long Hair to make the first move, and she swings her fists toward him. He ducks both times, and punches her face. It stings, which is unusual, but which also makes her angrier. She uses the momentum of his hit to spin all the way around and punch him back. This time it connects and Long Hair stumbles back.
She raises her fist up and brings it down, only for him to block and push back with his arm against a hand that is several times larger than his own.
Long Hair shifts so that he’s wrapping both arms around her wrist, which is nearly the width of his waist. He shouts, “We are not your enemies, Banner! You must try to think!” but Hulk isn’t puny Banner, so she snarls and punches him away from her.
Hulk stamps toward Long Hair as he gets up again and holds out his hand to the side. As she gets closer she begins to charge, but just before she reaches him a hammer flies into his hand and he slams the hammer upward into Hulk’s jaw. This time it’s her turn to go flying as she crashes into one of the planes stored in the room.
The pain is worse than the punch and Hulk’s vision clouds with pure fury. She rips off part of the plane and flings it at Long Hair who avoids just in time.
Long Hair hurls the hammer at Hulk and instead of bouncing off of her, the weight and force throw her backwards.
Instead of Long Hair, Hulk’s blind rage is now directed at the hammer, which she tries to lift so that she can smash the stupid thing to pieces. The hammer doesn’t move. No matter how much strength Hulk puts into it, she can’t even make it budge. She screams in frustration and rage but Long Hair kicks her and picks up the hammer and she focuses on smashing him again.
Long Hair clings to her neck, using the hammer to try to choke her. Hulk can’t reach him to pull him. She struggles more and more attempt to shake him off but he doesn’t let go until she jumps up through the ceiling onto the above floor. When Long Hair releases her she grabs his neck and begins squeezing.
A spray of bullets on her back makes Hulk drop Long Hair and turn around. A plane is shooting at her and even though the bullets feel no more painful than heavy raindrops on her skin, that doesn’t stop her from bellowing at it.
The bullets don’t stop coming and Hulk leaps onto the plane. She sees a frightened face before she begins ripping the plane apart. The pilot springs out of the plane in his seat, but Hulk catches him and waves him around angrily before tossing him and looking for more things to rip out of the plane.
A few seconds later the plane explodes under Hulk. She falls and the earth slowly ascends toward her. Hulk focuses on one lone building and angles her body accordingly toward it. Now that there is nothing for her to take out her anger on, she does her best to avoid people and avoid the nasty guilt that Banner feels when Hulk lets her come back.
The building can’t hold up the force of Hulk’s heavy body as it impacts. She falls right through the ceiling and catches glimpses of scared birds taking flight before her vision is filled with rubble.
Her anger spent, Hulk decides that she is done for now. She calls back Banner and curls up in the back of her mind.
It isn’t long, though, before Hulk realizes something big is going on. Through Banner, she can see the strange beings flying out of a hole in the sky and destroying buildings. She hears the panicked screams, and tastes smoke.
They meet Blue, Long Hair, Red Hair, and a new man with a bow and arrows, but Long Hair doesn’t attack, and Red Hair doesn’t run.
Friends now? She asks Banner. Sort of, is the answer she gets in return. We fight beside them, not with them. They need Hulk now.
A big fish flies toward them, chasing a small red and gold metal man. Metal Man is Tony, Banner explains.
Hulk doesn’t care about whys or hows, but she accepts the control willingly handed over from Banner and gleefully punches in the head of the big fish.
The fish flops over and Metal Man/Tony shoots at it and the fish screeches in pain as parts of it explode.
Metal Man flies over to Hulk and the others and they all face outward toward the aliens who make loud noises at them. Hulk sneers at their weak attempt to intimidate and lets out a roar that shakes the ground, and make several aliens shrink back in fear.
Blue is talking to the others who all seem to listen to him. When he’s done he turns to Hulk.
“And Hulk?” She grunts in response.
“Smash.” Good. Being allowed to smash is good. Hulk grins. She leaps into the air and onto the nearest building where she immediately begins doing what she loves best. The aliens and their puny weapons are no match for her fists.
She leaps up again, smacking aliens right out the air. In the distance she sees another big fish. She takes a shortcut right through a building and ignores the reactions of the humans inside toward an enormous green woman barging through an office, breaking a window as she jumps through it, and landing on the face of another big fish that she drags down and away from the building.
Hulk climbs up the fish’s face and onto its back where Long Hair is fighting more aliens. Hulk rips apart some aliens before taking a chuck of armor and slamming it down into the fish’s spine. Long Hair points his hammer upward and lightning strikes it as he brings it right down and the fish immediately dies and immediately ruins another building by crashing into it as it falls.
Both Hulk and Long Hair survey their work for a moment before Hulk remembers the pain from their fight and punches him, smirking as he goes flying. If he is as strong as he says he is, he will be fine.
Hulk crushes a few more enemies then looks up to see Red Hair on one of the flying things the aliens are using and being chased by the bad man in green and gold that made Hulk’s head hurt. He is the one that Hulk most wants to beat up. She’s about to jump up to get him, but before she can, the vehicle under him explodes and he lands on a balcony jutting out of the tower in the center of the city.
Hulk doesn’t let him rest for a single moment as she jumps onto the balcony and throws him through the glass of the building and stomps toward him. Bad Man stands up at yells “ENOUGH!” at her, which is enough to make her stop out of surprise that he isn’t cowering.
“You, all of you are beneath me. I am a god, you dull creature.” Hulk gets tired of him talking.
“I will not be bullied by-“ Hulk grabs Bad Man by the legs and smashes his body several times into the floor and then once more for good measure until dropping him into the dent she’s made.
“Puny god.” She sniffs. As she walks away, Bad Man whimpers.
Quickly rejoining the battle, Hulk finds that the aliens seem to consider her to be one of the biggest threats. Hundreds of them swarm in the air above her and blast at her so much that she can’t see through the smoke. It doesn’t hurt at all, though it tingles a bit. Hulk shields her face with her arm until the smoke clears and she continues fighting.
Suddenly something streaks by her and Hulk looks to see Metal Man carrying a rocket and slowly flying it up toward the hole in the sky. She watches as he disappears from sight the moment he enters it.
He doesn’t come out. Around Hulk, aliens are dropping dead but she keeps her eyes on the hole.
The hole begins to shrink and Metal Man still isn’t coming out.
Just before the hole closes, a small red and gold figure comes out. At first Hulk growls happily, but then realizes that Metal Man isn’t flying. He’s falling. And fast.
Humans aren’t like Hulk. They break when they fall.
Without another thought, Hulk hurtles herself into the air, catches Metal Man in midair and grabs onto the side of a building to slow them down as they fall together, cradling Metal Man gently in the curve of her arm to protect him. At just the right moment. Hulk lets go of the building, and lands on her back with Metal Man on top so that he doesn’t get hurt.
Careful not to jostle him because humans are so easy to hurt, Hulk lays Metal Man down on the ground as Long Hair and Blue join her. Metal Man isn’t moving. Hulk leans over him as Long Hair tears off the metal face to show Tony’s. His eyes are closed and he isn’t breathing.
Frantically, Hulk nudges at the back of her mind where Banner is and feels her surprise at being acknowledged and panic at Tony’s lack of movement.
What Hulk do? Hulk asks. Hulk remember story about kissing awake. No! Banner says quickly. Shock. Tony needs a shock.
Blue and Long Hair seem to have given up and they step away from Tony.
A shock. Hulk takes in a breath and lets out a deep bellowing roar that isn’t born of rage for once.
The sound barely leaves her lips before Tony jerks and his eyes open as he inhales deeply. Hulk throws back her head and roars again, feeling something akin to triumph and joy.
Tony is talking but Hulk isn’t listening. She’s watching as Red Hair and Bow Man approach and talk to the others.
There’s nothing else to smash and Hulk is bored. She sits down on a pile of rubble as the others talk and doesn’t move until she follows them back to the tower.
The Bad Man is taken care of by Long Hair and everyone sits down on the couches in the room.
“You did a good job, Hulk.” Blue tells her. The others all start agreeing and Hulk smiles, baring her teeth.
“Um, I don’t suppose you could turn back into Dr. Banner, could you? We don’t have anything else for you to smash, sorry.” Blue adds cautiously.
Hulk huffs, but Blue is right. She sits down with a loud thud and begins changing as she goes to sleep.
Later, Banner climbs into Tony’s car and they start talking as Tony drives them somewhere.
Banner wants to leave. Tony wants her to stay. Hulk rolls her eyes.
Stupid Banner go with Tony, she tells Banner, but the other can’t seem to hear her. Eventually though, Banner agrees and Hulk approves. Banner needs a mate anyway since she left Betty. Besides, Tony likes both of them.
Yes, Hulk thinks. Tony will make a fine mate for Banner.
The problem is how to get both of them to see that too.