Author's Note: I don't own any of these marvelous characters. Also, I hate myself, I hate myself, and I hate myself. I told myself that this wasn't going to be a serious fic. Damn it, I swore to myself that I would not get involved….and yet here I am, rewriting this damn story because my brain is not satisfied with it.
Chapter One: No Matter Where You Are
Elizabeth "Betty" Ross was having, what she deemed, the worst day of her life. It was worse than that one time in the ninth grade when she kissing her then crush and their braces intertwined. It was worse than the time when she had forgotten to save her dissertation and accidently deleted it the day it was due. It was even worse than the day when she had accidently gotten hit by a car.
This day, May 11th, was arguably worse than the day her boyfriend, Bruce Banner, turned into a giant green rage monster and disappeared from her life.
Upon further reflection, she took that back. That day had been bad, unfortunate even for everyone involved especially for Bruce, but this day was a day that would live infamy. She toyed with the diamond ring on her finger. The damn thing felt like it was cutting off her circulation.
It wasn't too late to back out yet, was it?
Then the music started to play. Why her? Why now? What she wouldn't give to have the church spontaneously combust. The wedding march, it sounded more like the funeral march to her, was playing an on old pipe organ. She did not get up; she was too numb to move her legs. The disapproving cough of her father, General Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross, alerted her that it was now time to move. Reluctantly, Betty got up.
"You look beautiful." He said gruffly.
If she actually had a healthy relationship with her father, that might have meant something to her.
"Thanks." Was her mindlessly reply. She had been like this for a while, mindless. The once brilliant cell biologist had been reduced to a puppet. At this point in her life, Betty was going through the motions of basic human interaction. She got up, got ready for work, said "hello" to everyone who she knew, and she lived-no. No, no, no that wasn't right. She didn't live anymore. Living implied that she enjoyed life and she didn't.
And now she was getting fucking married.
God damn it. They were closer to the alter now.
How the hell did this happen? When did her life take such a nosedive that jumping into a rushed marriage counted as an escape? Betty shook her head ruefully, slightly messing up her veil. Oh yeah, when her father's annoying little soldiers wouldn't stop stalking her. Why? Because of some stupid nonsense about Bruce being a "dangerous biological weapon" and he might come back and do God knows what to her. He wasn't dangerous, she knew that. When she was being tackled to the ground by soldiers, when daddy dearest nearly got her killed, Bruce had protected her. He loved her. It's at that thought she tears up a little. He loved her and she had no idea where he was.
They were at the alter now.
Was Bruce dead?
She was the bride.
Was Bruce hurt?
Glenn Talbot was the groom.
Was Bruce dying somewhere in some god forsaken third world country?
Glenn had proposed to her only after a month of meeting her.
God, she hoped Bruce was okay.
It looked good for Glen to be marrying the daughter of a respected general.
Did Bruce think about her at all? Wherever he was?
The ceremony goes by in the blink of an eye and the words "I do" mechanically tumble out of her mouth.
Why couldn't it have been Bruce that she was now kissing?
Kissing Glenn was like kissing a brick wall. It was rough, hard, and devoid of all passion.
The reception isn't much better than the wedding. The father-daughter dance is hell. Her father twirls her around on the dance floor as some gushy sappy over the top song plays in the background. Her father is dressed in his military best and she's wearing her mother's wedding dress. He's trying to smile at her, he tells her that she looks beautiful and that her mother-how dare he bring mom up-would be so proud to see her marrying the right guy. It all goes in one ear and out the other. She can't stop thinking about Bruce.
"It's your wedding day." Ross snaps at her. "Would it kill you to smile?"
A range of snappy and sarcastic replies come to her mind and all of them are followed up by verbally tearing down her father for ruining Bruce's life and making her a prisoner but all she can say is, "Would it kill you to stop stepping on my shoes?" He looks down and sees that he is in fact standing on her shoes. General Ross was a man of many things but a dancer was not one of them.
"You shouldn't have worn open toed shoes." Is his way of saying sorry.
"Hmm…" She checks out as the dance goes on. Her mind wanders back to Bruce and just wondering if he was okay. It's the not knowing that gets her. Her heart manages to drop into her stomach just thinking about what Bruce could be going through. He's a scientist, not a fighter. He doesn't like violence, he sure as hell doesn't want to hurt people, and most importantly he doesn't want his curse to be used to create more of him.
And yet, her father, the military, and the pentagon go the most extreme lengths to weaponized the Hulk. Never mind that they have seen what happens when the serum works, aka Captain America, and what happens when it goes bad, Blonsky, but what happens when the serum works in a half assed way, Bruce. You don't have to be a scientist to know that the risks outweigh the rewards. It goes beyond logic for her to see why anyone would want to replicate the serum. She settles on thinking that the military, pentagon, and whoever the hell is in charge has spent too much money to say that the super soldier serum is a failure.
Her blood boils and, suddenly, she realizes that she's not dancing with her father anymore. She's dancing with Talbot. He's an okay guy, he's nowhere near as nice as Leonard or Bruce, but on the bright side, he knows that the marriage is a sham. It's out of convenience for both of them. She gets daddy's trained stalkers off her back and Talbot gets some nice military contracts.
"Our song is playing." He whispers in her ear, trying to emulate how a newlywed husband might say to his bride.
It might be "their song" but she has no idea what it is. She didn't plan the wedding, it was all her dad and his people. She just showed up wearing the dress. It's a bouncing little song, pretty catchy too. Betty is sure that she's heard it somewhere before. It's not half bad and she has the oddest feeling that the song will be stuck in her head for days on end afterwards.
Talbot leans in for a kiss as the dance finally ends and she begrudgingly complies. For a second, she's able to imagine that it's Bruce kissing her and everything is perfect…but only for that second. She's then hit with the cruel reality that Bruce is a million miles away and here she is married to some guy out of convenience and that he's among the hundreds of people who would like nothing more to have Bruce strapped to an operating table and cut out whatever makes him green.
Between wanting Bruce to stay safe, to wanting him to be next to her, and to hold him again, she feels like she's being pulled in a million different directions and about to reach her breaking point. She tears up again and buries her face into Talbot's chest, all the while managing to fake perfectly the image of the happy content bride with her husband. What she wouldn't give to be with Bruce right now. Her sorrow is placated with the idea that wherever Bruce is, whether it's some third world country or down the street, that he is safe. Her father still fumes that tracking Bruce has all led to dead ends and that no one seems to be able to pin him down. That thought alone is enough to get her through the reception and through the rest of the night.
She might be a married woman but she and Talbot don't live together. Now that she thinks about it, she doesn't even know where he lives. They've always met up by chance or at her father's office.
"Whatever..." Betty sweeps her apartment for any of her father's nasty listening devices. It's part of her nightly routine. After she gets home, she looks for bugs and then she destroys them. Last night it was with the blender on high, the night before that she tossed them down the garbage disposal, and the night after that she had ran over the bugs with her car.
Betty checks the normal places, under her bed, behind her television, in her plants and finds nothing. That's not too strange. The tech guys who install the bugs have been getting better at hiding them as of late. It's almost like a game between them and her. Betty won't ever admit it but it is sort of fun even if they do invade her privacy on a daily basis.
The windows are clean, there are no devices on her ceiling fan or in the vents either. She's getting slightly frustrated. The tech guys have never been this good before. The longest it's ever taken her find all the damn bugs is half an hour. It's been an hour. It's not until after she double checks her phone and the horribly fake ivy plant in her living room does she give up.
She kicks off her shoes and shimmies out of her dress, letting it drop to the floor before she collapses onto her bed. That's when she sees it. The tech guys hid it in her lights. She'll give them points for this one. Grabbing her ladder, she makes the climb and successfully gets the listening device. There's something else in the lights besides the bug. It's a card.
"Congrats on your nuptials…" Betty reads out loud, "…but you married an idiot."
On the inside of the card, there's a pretty good doodle of Talbot being smashed by a certain green monster and her heart flutters. The Hulk has the most unlikely of fans. She revels in the idea of her father having a stroke with the idea that his soldiers are fond of Bruce's alter ego.
"With much love, your personal stalkers."
She ignores that tiny twinge in her heart that the only real relationship that she has is with her stalkers. Oh, she needed help, she needed lots of help. How much does therapy cost again?
"Thanks guys." She says even though she knows that they aren't allowed respond back.
Betty pulls the covers over her head. She feels a little bit better now that the day is gone.
"Goodnight Bruce. I love you…"
Author's Note: Guess who's going to try to incorporate the comics, the movies, and other aspects of the Hulk franchise into one? That's right me…hooray…anyway let me know what you think. Criticism is always deeply appreciated. Updates will occur every Sunday morning.