Chapter 1

"Tony, this isn't going to work."

"Calm down, why is it that you only have a pair of balls when you turn into the big guy."

"Tony, I'm not playing around, did you even consider what could go wrong if we did this?" Banner, formerly known as the Hulk, stared at Tony pleadingly as he palmed his hand into his head.

"And did you not even consider what this could mean for us… for humanity?" Tony peered into Banner's eyes as if expecting validation.

"You cannot change where I stand on this. I am not going to go into human modifications just to create some kind of weaponized human, did you not learn anything from what happened with Ultron!?" Banner would not budge on his decision no matter how much Tony urged. He had been a victim of Tony's ideas far too many times. Even though they had made it so far in their experiments, one can only say that luck has protected them thus far.

"Come on buddy. Everything turned out okay. This is not as big as the whole artificial meteor almost ending humanity thing. We aren't creating anything with a consciousness, just modifying something that already exists … a little." He shrugged his shoulders.

"You just don't understand do you? First you save New York, but then you have to cancel it out by creating a rebellious kill bot who tries to destroy the world just to get out of your shadow. Yes, we are scientists; but, even more importantly, we have things we must protect. Creating another weapon is like giving a gun to a passerby in front of the group without knowing whether they are friend or foe. We may have control over who creates the first weapon of its kind, but not who buys it, sells, it and uses it." Banner trusts Tony, but sometimes he just cannot understand him. He stares, hoping at least something in this speech has gotten to him.

"Well. First of all: WE created the kill bot; and second of all, you're right, I don't understand. If we don't do it, someone else will, and we won't be ready for it. How many times do I have to point out that this is not a fair fight? Maybe you are willing to run away from this like you do from women, but I'm not" Tony held his ground. He knew that he could easily beat Banner in a word battle because he was always soft on him. Feeling as if he had an advantage over the silence, he then peered into Banner's eyes once more. "Look man, if we do this maybe we can even find a way to get your body back."

"Look, I'm not doing this with you again. Call me a coward all you want. It's not that I don't fight, it's that I fight different battles than you do," he said as turned away from Tony and looked down at the table. He knew that the glint he always saw in Tony's eyes may once again turn all his efforts to deny into folly.

"Hulk, while you fighting battles on the inside, the battles happening on the outside, the world will not wait for you." He grabbed Banner's shoulder and passionately stared into his eyes. At that moment Banner knew, he fucked up. Why didn't he leave as soon as Tony started this crazy talk? He could have run away like he always does. "If you know that something can go wrong in this, and that I am not going to stop until I get results, why not be here to make sure I don't make another mistake like the last time?"

Banner sighed, "Didn't you say that Ultron was OUR creation?" Banner could no longer contain his curiosity. At times like this he wonders if he is doing this for the good of humanity, or the thrill. Only Tony makes him question himself this way. He suddenly thought, "Does Tony do this knowing full well of the fact that I have a very thin thread of humanity keeping me from starting such dangerous experiments myself? Does he enjoy clawing out these dark inclinations I fight to keep at bay every minute of every day?" At moments like this he only feels defeat. He cannot forgive the Tony that tugs at the parts he hates about himself the most, but most of all, he cannot forgive the self that allows Tony to control him.

As if reading Banner's mind, he began to explain the game plan. "After you finish revising and refining all the fine details of the theories I've come up with thus far, I will get to building the equipment we will need for this. Feel free to come up with new theories yourself, go ahead and use the lab down stairs to run some tests, while I come up with some lame excuse for us to take time off the avengers."

"Do heroes get paid leave? Tell them we've caught the plague." At this point Banner lost his will to fight and could only go with the flow

"Buddy, you're a biochemist, couldn't you come up with a more plausible disease? Whatever, I'll get some make-up artist to make me look so sick I'm almost unrecognizable," Tony shrugged his shoulders as he changed from his suit to his sweat shirt and strode out the room.

"As long as you open your mouth and spew your usual sarcasm, they'll know it's you," Banner muttered just before Tony shut the door. Perhaps he needed to get in at least one snide remark to feel he did not completely lose his word battle with Stark earlier.

As he sat and looked over the notes left behind by Tony, he slowly seemed to recollect the conversation he'd had with him earlier. "Now that I think about it, there was a bit of desperateness behind his usual air of confidence this time around." Physically and verbally everything seemed the same, but as one who has become so close to Tony, it is as if he has developed a sixth sense. "He seemed uneasy, like it was do or die. We have had this conversation several times before, but this time around, the atmosphere was slightly different." As he read further and further into the notes his worries only continued to grow. "This is amazing, how long did it take for him to configure all of this by hand?"

A week passed after Tony's proposition and they diligently continued their work getting only two to four hours of sleep a day. Banner decided to closely analyze Tony's actions to confirm his suspicions of Tony's behavior. As he thought, he is definitely hiding something important from him.

"Hey, Greeny, pass me those notes." Banner scurried to pass the papers to get back to his experimentation log as soon as possible.

"So, I know that we are a week into this and it's kind of late to be asking this but… Why the sudden interest? I mean, why not stick to your robots instead of getting all tangled up in the modification of the human body?"

"Hmm, it was just. You know? Like, WHAM! And a voice in my head said why not use the tool we are born with, the human body. Well don't get me wrong, I still prefer my machines. When human thoughts and emotions get involved things always g o whacky." Tony started to ramble nonsense as if it were a matter of fact.

"I'm sure you're not the first to think of this. We have people on our team that have body modifications but it never seemed to compel you to do anything." He knew he would not get a straight answer from him, but it was worth a try. "You know what, never mind. Come check this out." As their experiments unfolded the direction seemed more like they were researching a biomechanical all-purpose cure, accompanied by enhancement. At first he thought that Tony just wanted some type of precaution in case something went wrong with the test subject (namely himself since they could not bring themselves to harm any living thing as heroes). But Tony only lightly goes over any talk of eventually developing it into an actual modification due to the condensed energy packed into the molecules that could create super human strength on all modified locations of the body whether it be the heart, bones, or skin after the procedure. It is becoming more of an immortality drug. Banner, occasionally chuckled to himself with delight from curiosity, and spite because he felt it to be impossible to give a person immortality.

As the weeks quickly became months, Banner slowly began to realize that the impossible was possible. If this drug and machine were used on a person, they may have the potential to become immortal. The subject would be able to absorb energy from its surroundings and replenish their cells directly by ingesting blood or raw meat almost as if they were absorbing cells to directly replenish its own. The molecules making up its tissues would be too strong and tightly bound to be harmed by something as small as decomposition; if they lose too much energy, they will simply go into suspended animation until enough energy is gathered. Their body would be like that of a vampire, immortal, super human strength, and could even take the excess energy from living creatures without touching them to sustain itself. This is worse than a weapon, "Humans are the true monsters," Banner muttered between gasps. "And I am giving this monster a stronger vessel."

"Hulk, buddy, you want some lunch?"

Shocked out of his realization, he blankly stared at the Bucca bag and uttered, "… Sure." He had no idea how he was going to convince Tony out of this. They had come too far, there was no way he was going to let it go. But there was still time, oddly enough, the Tony that is so obsessed with technology made sure all experimental logs, procedures, and notes were hand written; they could still be disposed of without being detected. Even he, within in all his fear he felt a certain amount of excitement. Once again he felt defeated by Tony's words that always seem to have a deep fragile truth under his usual playful tone. Tony was right, he is a mad scientist.

Tony only seemed to stare at Banner barely laying a hand on his food as if he were analyzing him.

"What's wrong? You're the one who bought the food, why aren't you touching it?" He almost couldn't help but to laugh at the irony of his question, 'what's wrong.' There was so much wrong he didn't even know where to begin. He started to feel dizzy as if his realizations were just too much.

"…" Tony only looked away, completely ignoring the question.

"Hey, why aren't you saying anything?" Banner said with slight unease. Again his vision began to blur, slightly more than before. As he probed Stark for an answer, his vision only began to blur more and more as his legs began to buckle and his sense of touch went numb, only serving to heighten his unease.

"… Tony!..."

Tony finally stood up, but only to walk away.

Upon seeing Tony leave, Banner could no longer find it in himself to hold on and fell to the floor losing consciousness.

Upon twenty minutes after passing out Banner found himself in the machine him and his accomplice had just built. For a few moments, he could only stare in disbelief. Then, before he could yell out to talk reason into Tony he was interrupted by Tony's unusually cold and calm voice.

"I knew I couldn't knock you out for long, but this is just outrageous."

"Tony, why?" His voice almost cracked from the shock.

"Why, you ask? Because I have no choice of course. I have already injected you with the drug, if I don't turn on the machine and infuse it into you, the drug will simply eat away at your energy instead of feeding it to you through your environment. There's no turning back now. Don't worry, I gave you suppressants so you won't turn green right now."

"That's not an answer!" Banner barely managed to raise his voice.

Completely ignoring his outburst, "Come on, you should be happy, if this works like we created it to, your body will only be controlled by emotion as much as the next person, you'll just be faster, stronger, and a little immortal. Don't worry, I won't use this on anyone else, I'll destroy the work after I'm done so chill and listen to some elevator music. It's quite soothing actually."

Once again Banner was overcome with dizziness as he stared at the man he thought to be his best friend look down on him from above.